/---/ absolute WHITE /---/

"... did it work?" whispered a figure with a noteworthy hat.

the figure, she found herself surrounded by absolute darkness. her robe and scarf flowing to a non-existent breeze.

"hello? is anyone there?"

there was no answer.

she begins pacing forwards, one foot at a time. it seems wherever this place is atleast had a floor.

"... ah!"

she had tapped her foot onto something, sending it clattering forward.

upon closer inspection, it was a wand. charged with magic, wands served as one of the many options to apply and guide magic with.

almost as if it was out of instinct, the figure held their hand to the wand's tip, which had the shape of a cross.

"it's still sparking with energy. so... i did fire the spell."

"but..."

"why am i not dead, then?"

that's a fair point. why was she not dead? she recalled what they told her.

... is this what obliteration is like? for a spell with enough power to warrant such a description from their master, she still seems very... here.

very alive. very not dead, like she had hoped for.

WHITE WITCH paced around the void. what were the odds that she was simply teleported to another place?

she thought if that was true, then it was fair for her to be lied to. that it was fair that she wouldn't actually be trusted with such a terrible power.

once she gets out of here, maybe then she'll find something to finally finish the job.

so she began walking. along the way, she had taken the care to summon small motes of light to mark her path.

maybe she'll bump into a wall, eventually.

how long was she walking for? WHITE WITCH turned around, only to see a line of light motes that plotted all the way back to the horizon.

she treks back. clearly, looking for a wall was not the correct call here.

eventually, she steps on the first mote of light. WHITE WITCH sighed, as their legs gave way.

she collapses onto the ground. was this some sort of sick joke? maybe it was a cruel prank at her expense. they knew, didn't they? about how she was so pathetic.

maybe that's-

"Come on, where is it?"

huh? what?

WHITE WITCH looked up at the direction of the voice. she doesn't see anything, but she can very clearly hear the frantic and desperate tone of this man.

"She must have left something behind. Did I already look in here, or..."

she hears the rattling and scrambling of what appears to be common, everyday household objects. had she stumbled into the home of someone?

and then, she heard it. the clinking of glass.

the way it sounded... didn't she have a glass bottle of ink? and then, a softer clink. the sound of a feather's tip tapping against glass.

... that's her quill. what is it doing... 'there'? in fact, the commotion this mystery man is making is beginning to sound quite familiar to her.

it's her home. someone is going through her home. but why?

she hasn't even taken the time to process what this stranger was talking about. even their voice is beginning to sound familiar.

"... come on, White. I know you had that spell! Please, please, please..."

she hears the sound of papers scattering through the air. this panic is begining to get onto her nerves.

WHITE WITCH reaches in to slap the source of the voice, but her hand passes through nothing.

she stumbles down onto the floor. the voice still continues searching through her home.

she can't take any more of this. maybe if she went somewhere else, she'd feel better.

eventually, she started hearing another voice.

"... and there it is. Whew! It's almost pristine..." spoke a female voice.

"what are you talking about?" confusedly asked the WHITE WITCH.

But she doesn't get an answer.

"hello? can you hear me-"

"Heck, making the glass myself was tough, but it sure makes the sculpture shine brighter. Atleast I think so!"

"..."

fine, she's being ignored. at least they could let her see what the whole glass thing is about.

WHITE WITCH seats herself down on the floor, beginning to formulate a plan. wand in hand, she flicks and twirls to cast a sight spell.

nothing. that rules a very weird case of blindness out, and by how her slap phased through the male voice sifting through her home, it was unlikely to be that anyways.

judging by the lack of the walls in this place, it is unlikely that she has just moved to another location either. she walked for what, years? and yet she never hit an end.

so... did she really die? is this what being a ghost feels like? just wandering for all eternity in a dark void, hearing voices and sounds as she walks through what she assumes to be the living world...

... if she died, she would have just gotten up with all of her wounds fixed a day after at most. but she hasn't resurrected.

this really only leaves her being put into an alternate dimension. or atleast put on a plane of reality that isn't her's.

she tries paying attention to the voice again, but she hears only the chirping of birds. it will suffice.

WHITE WITCH draws and twirls her wand to cast a sight spell once again.

if the world she hears can be put on a piece of paper, then she must be above or under it, within another sheet of paper.

so all she needs to do is to direct this spell to let her look at the "world" paper. she flicks, and...

a bubble appears. contained within the bubble is a little window to the "living" world. WHITE WITCH circles around the bubble, eagerly looking at every nook and cranny she can spot from this tiny bubble.

WHITE WITCH spies what seems to be a little home. it had a cozy feeling to it, from the woodwork that composed the flooring and the frames of the windows, the finely carved furniture and the fireplace putting it all together.

then she notices a shelf. she backs off from the bubble and tries to feel where the shelf is... then, once again with a twirl and a flick, a shelf composed of delicately crafted glass sculptures appear before her eyes.

all of them depict... birds. some she recognizes. others completely elude her. could a bird really look like that...?

she reaches out to closely inspect one of the sculptures, but then the bubble popped. all that remained was darkness.

WHITE WITCH walked back to her home, following the trail of light motes.

upon arriving, WHITE WITCH created another bubble. upon peeking, she paced herself to what she thinks was one of the walls of her home.

and then, she paced to the opposite wall. a massive bubble emerged from the tip of her wand, consuming the smaller one, with it's width reaching from one end of her home to the other.

she could see everything. her quill, her books, and...

where she was, before she ended up here. in fact, isn't that... where she was standing? before all of...

she clutches her head, but she can't find the memory she's looking for. she prepares to sit down, when...

"... okay. Okay. Maybe she left a pattern on the ceiling or something. Like... Like... She's a healer, right? And..."

the voice is back, but this time she could get a proper look. his clothes were red and he looked quite young, and his hat...

... his hat...

WHITE WITCH takes off her hat. the brim, the crumpled tip, it's all clicking.

"RED WITCH? RED WITCH, is that you?" spoke the WHITE WITCH, as her words fell into deaf ears.

she puts her hat back on, waving at the RED WITCH to try to get his attention. but it was as if he wasn't even seeing her...

once RED WITCH made way to another room, WHITE WITCH followed suit and summoned another bubble. it was then that WHITE WITCH noticed RED WITCH's notebook.

the bubble's frail nature meant that she couldn't get too close, but even a faraway glance is enough to tell that the notebook has seen lots of use.

even in such a state, the RED WITCH still fervently scribbled onto it's pages, murmuring and likely noting down about her home. why is he doing that?

she sits down and watches as the RED WITCH walked around her home for hours. the light shining through the windows shifted from one point to another, until the sky became dark.

"... dammit. Dammit, please..." suddenly, the RED WITCH tore a piece of page out of his notebook, crumpling it and then tossing it onto the floor. WHITE WTICH could see tears form in his eyes.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, WHITE WITCH." spoke the RED WITCH amidst sobbing. "If I only..."

"I've looked for thousands of miles in every direction from your home, and you're nowhere to be see-"

WHITE WITCH had instinctively covered her ears. she closed her eyes with all of her might, running towards the bubble.

pop.

she had run off to who knows where, when she halted in her tracks.

a barely audible, but constant screaming to her left. she turns towards the screaming, waiting to see if it would stop.

it never stopped. WHITE WITCH, in a moment of empathy and morbid curiosity, found herself walking towards it.

as she got closer, the screams got louder. eventually, she caves in.

she conjures a bubble.

peeking into it, she saw the impossible. dimensions that she couldn't even have a speck of hope at comprehending unfolded between her very eyes.

shapes that imploded upon themselves and then expanding perpetually, violent flashes of color, and... is that skin?

it is. from the looks of it, it seems to have been stretching for eons, and yet wherever she looked, there seems to be no tearing anywhere.

before long, she found herself popping the bubble. she swore that she could feel the impossible space staring right at her somehow.

then, the screaming stopped. all was quiet.

instead of finding relief, WHITE WITCH immediately absconded from the scene.

how long has she been running for again? WHITE WITCH stopped to feel her heart, only to feel nothing.

come to speak of it, she hasn't felt anything resembling a need either for the entire time she's been here. she didn't feel hungry, nor did she thirst for any water.

she walked for what felt like, or could have been centuries back and forth and ran for who knows how long, yet she didn't feel the slightest hint of fatigue.

she stopped to try and comprehend what was going on with her, but something interrupts her.

this time, it was a deranged cackle. she made her way to the source of the cackling and decided to see what could incite such laughter.

she arrives at the scene, conjuring a bubble to see. this time, she spies an eldritch space, with the slightest peek of it filling WHITE WITCH with an aura of malevolence and terror.

once again, the voice belonged to someone with a hat and robe. they were purple, but stains of red were scattered all over it.

WHITE WITCH understood why the clothes were stained, for she has stumbled upon an unspeakable atrocity being committed by the PURPLE WITCH.

PURPLE WITCH brandishes a blade, flaying bits and chunks off their latest victim. said victim was irrecognizably deformed, forcefully stripped down to the very bone.

she has seen enough. she bursts the bubbles and marks the vicinity with light motes, establishing a ground she will never tread on again.

"why had PURPLE WITCH committed such horrible things?" thought WHITE WITCH as she walked back, following an increasingly complex pathways of light motes she had made.

perhaps they had also lost it over the years, like she did. like she did...

WHITE WITCH tries their best to recall the moment they decided to try to use the witch-killing spell on herself.

she couldn't think straight, and she had fallen out of her chair. lying down on the floor, it felt like her head was gonna collapse into itself.

she lifts herself from the ground, and shambled over to a wall.

WHITE WITCH bashed her head against the wall, hoping for something to come. she rams her head, denting the surface of the wall.

it wont stop. no matter how hard she bled, it doesn't feel like it's going away.

her guilt. her regret, her helplessness to do anything that fateful day.

that day... the world changed.

a great cataclysm happened. death and sufering covered the world.

the war that she decided to participate in as a medic has ended. not through victory nor stalemate, but through the complete annihilation of both sides.

she could hear it. even if she was just imagining it, it all felt real to her. imaginary arguments, spiels, debates and speeches, all centering around a single topic.

on how she doesn't deserve to live. to breathe. that if she took one more step, she'd be violating the will of a thousand lost souls.

the walls had eyes and each eye was a single person she failed to save. she has the power to save them, after all. she was entrusted with the ability to heal, so shouldn't it be her responsibilty to cure and heal?

shouldn't every life that she failed to save, every bit of agony that she could have prevented weigh on her mind? as a constant incentive to do better.

or atleast, it started out as an incentive. but then...

WHITE WITCH slammed the ground with her fist as hard as she could. the floor doesn't yield, but her hand does.

it's bleeding.

she couldn't help but snicker. she felt the temptation to smash her fist again. and again. to punish herself for her sin. to repent.

laughter turned into screaming. she wishes she had something to bash other than the now bloodied floor.

it doesn't even hurt, like how she wanted. she's just bleeding out.

why must it be like this? WHITE WITCH scrapes her hand across the floor, smearing it with blood all over.

a long time after, she had completely stopped bleeding. but she's still alive. nothing leaks out of her self-created wound.

her breath is shaking.

with nothing else hurting or bleeding, she's alone with her thoughts once again. dammit, dammit, dammit.

please, someone. just maim her. kill her. kill her, please.

WHITE WITCH gets up and decides to wander somewhere. she doesn't leave a trail of motes behind this time. she just wants to get lost for a while.

eventually, she is lost. nothing in sight.

WHITE WITCH thought to herself, alone. she's here because she felt sick, she felt disgusted at herself for not being able to save the people around her.

she aimed the wand at herself to end her misery, but does that end anyone else's?

no. in fact, even if she was alone, she could have been helping.

maybe she could have helped the PURPLE WITCH. maybe she could have helped whoever that was screaming.

but now that she's... wherever this is, she can't do anything anymore. she can only watch and observe, as the world goes on without her.

it all culminates. WHITE WITCH stomps the ground, before crumpling up and bashing her hand onto the floor, only for nothing to come out.

"FUCK."

suddenly, she hears the whriring of machinery. WHITE WITCH, desperate to distract herself, follows the sound without hesitation.

she eventually arrives to the sound of someone tinkering. making a bubble, she sees someone in cyan clothes.

"... the stabilizer's working, good, good. This should keep it from doing anything too crazy."

"I'm not too sure about the battery life, though. But maybe if I can rig something with the stabilizer, then..."

the CYAN WITCH spoke in nothing but technological jargon. she seemed isolated from the world around her, but she definitely seemed happier than the WHITE WITCH.

if memory served her correctly, CYAN WITCH was the technomancer of the other witches.

she always saw technomancy as just science in magician clothes, but then again, CYAN WITCH is doing her job, right?

unlike her. very so unlike her. and even if she tried to do so and heal people, she'd be failing to do her job in another part of this world.

she is one person, after all. she couldn't. she couldn't...

she couldn't have saved them all. she literally couldn't save them all.

has she... truly killed herself over...

no. she just wasn't trying hard enough.

and now, she will never have the chance to try again.

she can't handle it. she runs even faster, trying to get as far away as she can.

eventually, she is stopped by the sound of a running river. bird calls of a dozen varieties filled the air.

WHITE WITCH wishes that she could wrap herself in a bubble. or atleast, have a bubble stick close to her face. maybe then she can pretend she was alive all along.

and then she can forget all about this. all about the darkness, the floor, the time she spent in there, which is quickly dissipating into an irrecognizable mess.

seconds became minutes, which became hours.

hours became days, and days became months.

months became years, and years... how many years was it? did she spend all of her time in this void in a single second, or an infinity of decades?

WHITE WITCH thought that it was maybe it's better to focus on the whole bubble idea. hold it close to her face... her face...

maybe she can make... lens. and then she would just keep them near her face...

glasses. she was thinking about glasses.

she creates a mote of light. it is bright, but most importantly, it was solid.

WHITE WITCH imagined a pair of glasses, and soon enough, glasses made out of lights appeared in her hand. all that remained were the lens.

with two motions of the bubble conjuring spell, the frames were filled in. she puts them on, and bears witness to the river she heard, the birds flying over her and the grass gently rustling along the wind.

she gives in to the temptation to just lie down, but once she met her back with the ground, it was clear that she was still in the void.

but she's doing this to pretend all of this away. can't she just pretend the cold away, or...

upon flipping over, the WHITE WITCH saw a figure on the other side of the river. she scurries over.

the figure's green clothes were enough to tell her that she was the GREEN WITCH, shaman of the witches.

GREEN WITCH unhesitatingly lifted her foot towards the river. WHITE WITCH gasped. if she's going to drown herself, she's going to be disappointed.

... suddenly, GREEN WITCH found herself stepping on something that wasn't water. it was the snout of a ferocious looking reptile, similar to a crocodile or an alligator.

despite it's scars telling that it had quite a few battles out in this river, it escorted GREEN WITCH across the river with the utmost gentleness.

once the two had reached the other end of the river, GREEN WITCH walked into the forest clearing she was lying down on earlier.

GREEN WITCH had phased right through WHITE WITCH as if she was some sort of ghost, shocking the latter enough into tumbling down, knocking off their glasses.

as WHITE WITCH recovered her glasses, she couldn't help but foster a sense of envy towards the trust GREEN WITCH had towards this creature, and how the creature responded to that trust in kind.

she felt so alone. so, so alone. the envy turns into sadness, and she doesn't want to be sad anymore.

WHITE WITCH found herself reaching out for her wand, and drawing it like a firearm. she puts the glasses back on, and took aim at the river.

she fires a bolt at the river, furiously desiring to destroy it. but ultimately, it struck nothing other than the floor WHITE WTICH is too familiar with.

WHITE WITCH felt the temptation to snap her wand here and then, but she relents. like she always did.

WHITE WITCH had begun placing motes along her way again. she's far away from her home now. she doubts that she'll ever make it back, or that she'll ever want to.

this time, the sound of something... metallic interrupts her.

she puts the glasses on. this time, she found herself in an apartment room. a window looked out into a massive cityscape, a view she hadn't seen ever since the war begun and ended.

in the darkness was a man with black robes and a hat, tinkering with bullets and firearms.

WHITE WITCH couldn't see much of BLACK WITCH's features. even his hands were covered by finely woven gloves. but she could see that BLACK WITCH was doing a routine cleanup of his weaponry.

BLACK WITCH's hands moved with absolute stillness and precision as he disassembled a pistol. WHITE WITCH could feel a speck of marvel within her as the innards of the firearm were revealed to her.

"There we go." and before WHITE WITCH knew it, the gun was put back together. she doesn't know what exactly changed about it, but BLACK WITCH seemed content with it's state.

"Now, for the gear..."

BLACK WITCH then opened a drawer beneath the table the firearm was disassembled on. she could see bullets of all types, neatly organized and still within their packaging.

the organization certainly pays off, as BLACK WITCH didn't even look before grabbing pieces of ammunition, placing them besides the pistol. asides from the expected pistol ammo, WHITE WITCH also took notice of the shotgun shells.

BLACK WITCH then took out a piece of paper and laid it on the table. It had the drawing of a Venomous Gambit, a...

a...

she remembers. she once seeked out this exact creature in hopes of dying, and she found it. it couldn't kill her, so she killed it, but not before dying repeatedly, over and over, until she learned how to fight it off.

thus, she knew that BLACK WITCH was preparing the wrong gear for this type of confrontation.

a Venomous Gambit is at it's most vulnerable before it starts fighting. a strong enough surprise attack is pivotal, but the way BLACK WITCH is preparing himself, he seems more focused on the ensuing fight than the opener.

that's good for him and all that, but he's heading to fight something that thrives through attrition. it's trademark venom is core to it's strategy, but so were it's scales.

upon a combat situation, the Venomous Gambit's scales would adjust and adapt to the opponent's attacks, shifting them in such a way that minimized the damage it received.

and that assumes the attacker is able to hit the Venomous Gambit in the first place, for it was also deceptively fast. a shotgun is a decent option, but something more automatic would perform much better against it.

"no, wait. wait, wait, WAIT."

"BLACK WITCH, listen to me! the shotgun wont work!"

what if he got poisoned? he's carrying antidotes, but the Venomous Gambit had a myriad ways of getting poison back in that anything that isn't naturally immune will eventually fall to it.

he needs a healer. he needs help. BLACK WITCH gets off the table and does a last minute check up of his gear.

"BLACK WITCH! BLACK WITCH, please, you'll die like that! the Gambit, it's... it's venom is... you're going to..."

but there's nobody to save him. he approaches the door to his room.

"you're going to..."

after all, she was the healer, and she was in no way able to help her.

"die..."

BLACK WITCH exits the room.

"..."

WHITE WITCH took off her glasses and held it in her hands. she applies all of her force to it, causing it to shatter and crumble into pieces.

she ran from where she came. she had to find her home. she had to fix this. she's still breathing, right?

people were still dying, and the world is going on without her. there's nobody for her to confide in and trust. and the people she cares about...

she wants to be a part of the world again. she'd do anything to feel the walls of her home again. she'd clean it up, she'd put herself together. she'd fix herself. she'd improve.

there has to be a way out.

right?

it's been so long.

WHITE WITCH had turned to using the motes as rudimentary note-taking, and her notes stretched all the way into the horizon through every direction imaginable.

she's not even sure if her fellow witches are alive anymore, despite their immortality. they all seem to have... disappeared.

BROWN WITCH's humble home and glasswork has been overtaken by nature, RED WITCH had stopped barging into her home (a welcome change, admittedly), YELLOW WITCH's screaming was gone, someone else lives in BLACK WITCH's room now, CYAN WITCH's workshop is unable to be found, no matter where WHITE WITCH looked and even PURPLE WITCH was nowhere to be seen, only leaving her carnage behind.

... wherever they went, WHITE WITCH prayed that they didn't end up like her.

there is no way out. but... maybe, maybe she can end her misery here and then.

she had noted down an intriguing theory in case escape was impossible around 1120 miles away, southwest. she might as well try the theory out.

first, she has to sit down. so she does so, and crosses her legs.

second, she conjures a bubble, peeking into no particular place in her ruined home. daylight seeped in through the window frame.

lastly, she then closed her eyes, and emptied her head.

WHITE WITCH opens her eyes. it was now nighttime.

time has flown by. so what happens if she...

she closes her eyes again.

when opening her eyes again, she could barely see a skyline through the window. in fact, that might not be a bird she's seeing- it might be a plane.

close. open. her home is gone, and in it's stead was a vibrant, green park. she could see benches and the cute little lake she remembers wandering off to every once in a while.

how much time has passed again?

WHITE WITCH closed her eyes.

"how much time has passed now?" she thought.

WHITE WITCH couldn't help but think about the weight that was within her heart.

the world went on without her, didn't it? so... she can go on, too.

she can go on without being weighed down.

she wishes her final apologies to the witches, who she didn't realize was willing to help her before she committed this most terrible deed.

to her mentor, who trusted her enough with the spell. at least she didn't hurt anyone else with it.

to the people she... couldn't...

help. and heal.

and to...

herself.

i'm

sorry

WHITE

WITCH

/---/ the end /---/