The Underworld
by Daphne Garrido
She was dreaming.
Dia would wake up to the fact she was within one often. Exploring consciously. Flying away if she so chose, if things got too scary.
Though, it always took until the third lunge to take-off, for whatever reason.
This was different.
She wasn’t alone. There were two along-side her.
One she knew well.
The other had only been felt through energy. A strangest happening.
They didn’t look how these people did in the world.
But somehow, in this place, Dia knew who they were.
Morganna was a friend she’d loved dearly, and not seen for a great deal of time.
Heather, she did not know.
Still, finding herself here with these two, in a void of darkness. Something in her knew who they were. There was no question to the matter.
Her friend had the same energy as always, distinctive, yet older. Her complexion far, far darker.
The spirit within was showing.
Some life she’d lived which had meant the most to her.
Heather was a Sage. Some Priestess. Her face unclear to Dia. But known, all the same.
It was here Dia felt herself transformed, something joining her. Embodying itself within her.
The Goddess, Omelas.
Carrying Omelas’ torches, Dia knew things.
She would be channeling this Goddess. She’d be leading into the dark.
This was the underworld they were entering. A most twisted place of fear and the unseen.
She’d felt Omelas’ knowledge flowing.
This passage she’d found herself about to traverse was not to be trifled with. Whatever was happening. She’d need not be foolhardy in the face of such dangers.
Yet she felt the strength of Omelas pouring through her. It was intoxicating.
Dia felt so brave. She knew the power to face this darkness was now within her.
So she led them forward.
The Tower of Eels
Slithering, snaking tentacles of purest darkness.
A rising cylinder of them.
Fear incarnate; this test to enter the underworld. Its vision searing itself into her mind as she led the way into pitch-darkness.
Evil.
Dia felt it creeping inside them all. In the back of their skulls. An infectious terror.
Omelas spoke through her then.
“Be not afraid. Fear is all it can use against you.”
So she’d held her torches high.
Dia feeling the strength of the Goddess clearing her mind. Quelling her worries. Finding presence in breath as she walked.
These women beside her were unfazed, standing in such strength of their own.
The flame of her torch burned brighter.
The Mountaintop
They’d be heading to a mountain. Dia just knew this somehow.
Or at least, Omelas did.
Once past fear, the journey was of time. It’s passage, of caution.
Mind would wander, and the torches would dim.
Dia had to stay present. She had to let Omelas work through her.
Their party would not be lost in the darkness.
A highest mountaintop was reached.
Such strange sights the underworld’s horizons held. A darkest beauty. Yet, still so felt, an ever-pressing sense of danger. An atmosphere of foreboding — inescapable, encompassing.
Dia had not experienced anything like this. There was nothing close to it she’d ever dreamt before, or seen in vision. Continuing to know in her heart and gut, that this needed her every effort of focus and determination.
This was not a dream she could fly away from.
This wasn’t a dream at all.
A plateau they’d come upon was carved down flat into a great circle, with a stone tablet at its center.
Omelas spoke.
Morganna was to lay upon the tablet.
Heather came to Dia’s side. She’d shown her where to place the torches on the outside of the circle.
Taking the lead here, this was Heather’s part.
She’d taken seat upon a glowing symbol — many like it etched into the great border of this stonework.
Heather had begun to sway and chant, Omelas walking Dia to rest beside her.
The sky above this great altar on the mountaintop swirled in violets and blues, in ever darkening clouds.
Something was happening.
Dia lost herself in the chant. Before long, finding it was Heather on the platform, and Morganna now resting beside her in this movement and song.
Again, Dia chanted this hymn so taught by forces beyond.
Knowing it would come, able to feel it in her gut, she’d opened her eyes to find Heather offering a hand, leading her to the tablet herself.
Dia was scared. But she knew there was no turning back.
And so she’d laid.
The feelings in her body were inexplicably powerful.
Often, had Dia experienced somatic release. Feeling herself purged of holdings within. Tensions and tightness of the body, wrought from trauma throughout her life, releasing.
Never had she felt anything like this.
The energy pulled from within her on that slab would change her.
She knew it.
This journey was not over.
Omelas would take the lead again, from within Dia.
This great goddess of the underworld. One who walks beyond boundaries. Leading people into the darkness to face what must be seen. Guiding those out who’ve found themselves lost so to its depths.
These three women would make their way along the highest ridges of the mountain-range.
Omelas’ torches would dim along the way, as Dia’s mind swayed, calling her to steel herself, and allow the light to burn brighter inside.
The Valley of Titans
They were upon this place. It known somehow to Dia.
Great lumbering shadows moved through an epic spaciousness below them. A sprawling canyon.
Dia sat, as did the women to either side of her.
They’d watched a titan birthed by pain.
These monsters were the unseen demons of humanity. Manifestations of terror, horror, and hurt.
Dia could feel her own part in the birthing of this great creature before her. Some darkness, still within, seeping into its creation.
They were tall as buildings, these titans, seeming to be made of stone, their movements glacial.
Morganna and Heather would each take one of Omelas’ torches in their own, outermost hands. Holding onto Dia’s upward-facing palms with the other.
Dia knew it here. Hands embraced with these women.
Omelas was not to lead. This was her part. Why she had come.
There was a light she’d always found herself connected to. Felt so high above when reached for. A place of wisdom, stillness, and peace.
She wielded it always.
Now here, having been led so far into the dark, it became clear.
She was to channel this energy she wielded into her heart, and blast this valley of titans with divine light.
So she went inward. She reached upward. Out of the underworld. Above the reaches of the material plane. And she’d pulled grace down into her.
Even at these depths. It was hers to channel at will.
Heart glowed so brightly. She’d never known it could hold this much. The power of Omelas had opened her. The support of these two powerful priestesses beside her, enflaming her love.
This energy within her reached such peaks, Dia’s inner vision completely washed-out in golden light.
She’d let it all go, beaming it from her heart, a wave of energy more powerful than she’d ever known. Even beyond that of the mountaintop.
She blew the titans to pieces.
Having never felt such sensations before. It was a release for all-time.
Something had been changed in this moment. Like all moments throughout this journey.
Yet Dia could feel it here stronger than ever.
Her world would change.
The Chasm
At the farthest ends of the valley, a great chasm was found, glowing with crimson aura.
Their approach had taken a great deal of time.
These three women had walked so far together. Dia, feeling more powerful than she’d ever before.
This would be Morganna’s turn to lead.
The time for her gift to sow its seeds into the underworld.
She’d handed her companions weapons of war.
Dia had taken a short sword and shield. Heather a staff, holding some power in her hands which would be enough alongside it.
Morganna had a longsword as she led them into this reddened fissure within the side of a towering cliff-face, both gloved hands grasping its hilt.
She’d looked here like Dia had known her in life, but armored, even more fierce.
Dia’s heart was surging.
She knew what was to come as they walked the length of the crevasse.
And they did — a hoard.
They’d torn those demons to shreds. Each and every one of them.
Dia herself feeling viscerally affected by the violence she afflicted upon these monsters of the dark, catching glimpses of Morganna in action, stunned by her ferocity.
Heather had been staying back, holding them in some form of protection.
The last living demon’s skull was stuck to the granite wall of this canyon by Dia’s own sword.
She’d felt her hands shaking, her blood boiling.
She screamed then. In glory.
They all did.
The Beast
Beyond the chasm was a chamber. Within it, a beast like no other.
A towering inferno of hatred and lies.
This beast was of man. All the horror and bloodshed compiled into form. Each one of those titan’s darkness, inside a lone, dark warrior.
A giant. Within a chamber of size unmet.
They had fought.
Victory, was known at this point to Dia.
Having come this far. Having done so much beside these women, with Omelas. Dia knew they were to destroy this evil.
It was Dia herself who’d landed the final blow. Morganna clearing the path. Heather holding them both so, as it was her place to do.
Dia climbed onto the monster, having fallen at the evisceration of his heels by Morganna’s blade. His skull was of bone. Yet there would be a spot for Dia’s blade, and she’d lodge it deep inside.
That monster’s screams were music to the soul. Something inside Dia herself releasing in the moment.
They’d done something very important here.
She’d no idea what, but that much was clear.
Dia had woken in the cold. Her covers tossed aside.
‘That was weird.’ She’d thought.
Feeling into herself, she’d noticed something changed. Those releases so felt. They’d really happened. She was different somehow.
She’d dream again that night.
It would be of celebration. A party.
Heather and Morganna were there, in the ways she would have more expected to see them both.
Yet so many others. A whole family. Some kind of order.
They had done great things this night Dia was to feel proud, she’d known it. Morganna had approached her at the end of this dream, with an oddest revealing.
The power Dia had so wielded on this journey — of Omelas — had been lent. It was not hers to channel. This journey had been a test for Dia. A chance to feel that power.
To be that bitch.
It was Morganna that was so connected to Omelas. Who bore those torches with her soul.
The next day was a strange one for Dia.
Having gone to work, still lost in what the hell had happened. She found herself writing a letter. It came out of her. This was the first time she’d ever felt that happening. Words flowing from so deep within.
This letter was for Morganna. It was from Omelas.
The way Dia had felt so driven in the underworld. So knowing of her purpose. So free of fear. She’d carried that with her to deliver the letter.
Dia walked right into her own underworld. To face her own greatest demons. It was the bravest thing she’d ever done, even if she’d panicked and ran back to her car on the first try.
Years passed.
Dia never figured out why all that had happened. She’d still never heard back from her friend. The confusion of it all had sent her spiraling initially. Her life’s demons all rising to the surface at once. Needing to be faced and fought.
She’d navigated every step of this time in trust, in faith, still feeling Omelas inside her — their strength.
Her life had changed. Everything changed. She was more than she’d ever been before. But it still didn’t make any sense to her.
It was these many years later. Still under the cloud of this darkness and confusion so wrought into her life. Where she’d asked herself the questions which would plague the rest of her time on this earth.
Did I ever make it out of that underworld?
Have I been living in one my whole life?
