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The memory came unbidden, like the echo of a song she wished she could forget. Kahina had tried to bury it—*really, truly tried*. But the Pleroma had a way of dredging up its own history, especially the bits that refused to sit still and play quietly.

Ah, yes. The *council*. A divine gathering meant to decide the fate of creation itself. What could possibly go wrong when you place a roomful of egos the size of collapsing stars into one shimmering amphitheater of light and tell them to agree on anything? The Archons, the stewards of order, were as composed as always—until they weren’t. The Aeons, the eternal architects of existence, were eloquent and ethereal—until the shouting began. And Barbelo? Well, she was the only one who had the good sense to appear serene, though Kahina had the distinct impression that serenity was really just her particular brand of unimpressed exhaustion.

The council chamber had been blinding, as usual. Its columns of living light twisted upward into infinity, their radiance humming with the faint chorus of existence itself. A sight meant to inspire awe, no doubt. But for Kahina, who had been summoned here without so much as a warning, it felt more like walking into a debate that had already been raging for millennia. She and Lyrion had taken their places at the edge of the room, freshly charged with their new roles as Barbelo’s so-called protectors. And by “protectors,” of course, she meant glorified babysitters for beings who considered compromise a four-letter word.

“Creation falters because the Pleroma bleeds,” one Aeon declared, their voice like the chime of glass breaking under water. They gestured broadly, their light flaring as if the force of their rhetoric alone could mend the fractures.

“It falters,” another interrupted, their tone as sharp as a blade, “because *some* among us hoard their essence, refusing to share the burden of sustaining the realms.”

The first Aeon turned, their radiance dimming as though insulted by the very notion. “You dare to accuse me? When you’ve been siphoning the Pleroma’s light for your own ends?”

And just like that, the chamber was no longer a council but a battlefield of accusations. Light clashed with light, their radiant forms flaring in tandem with their tempers. Words became weapons, their meanings spiraling out into raw power that sent tremors rippling through the chamber walls.

Kahina had leaned toward Lyrion then, her voice a dry whisper. “I thought these were supposed to be *divine beings*. You know, harmony incarnate. Balance made flesh.”

Lyrion didn’t look at her, though his jaw tightened. “They’re Aeons,” he said simply, as if that excused everything.

“Oh, right. My mistake,” she muttered. “What was I thinking? Divine beings squabbling like mortal kings? Totally normal.”

And then, of course, there was Sophia. Oh, *Sophia*. She was the only one who hadn’t raised her voice. She didn’t need to. No, her power wasn’t in volume or in force—it was in the subtle, silken threads she wove between the others. Where the Aeons roared and raged, Sophia whispered. A tilt of her head here, a softly spoken word there, and the seeds of discord grew like ivy wrapping itself around the fragile pillars of their unity.

“Perhaps the fault lies not in the light but in its stewards,” she had said, her voice a gentle melody that carried far more weight than it seemed. “After all, what is divine light without those who shape it? And what is harmony without… ambition?”

The chamber fell silent at that, the Aeons pausing just long enough to glance at one another, suspicion blooming like shadows across their radiant forms. Kahina had to admire Sophia’s craft—really, she did. Watching her work was like watching a master painter ruin someone else’s masterpiece with the subtlest stroke of color.

And then, as if the universe hadn’t been chaotic enough, the Pleroma itself began to quake.

At first, it was subtle—a faint shiver in the light, a note of dissonance in the eternal chorus. But then it grew. The ground beneath them trembled, fractures of shadow slicing through the golden brilliance of the chamber. The Aeons, for all their celestial wisdom, stopped their bickering long enough to notice.

“The boundary,” one of them murmured, their voice tinged with something that almost resembled fear.

Barbelo, who had remained silent until now, finally rose from her place at the center of the chamber. Her form blazed like the heart of a dying star, brighter and more terrible than anything Kahina had ever seen, yet still… calm. She didn’t speak. She didn’t have to. With a single motion, she raised her hand, and the light of the chamber surged outward, pushing back the fractures before they could spread.

It was breathtaking—literally. The sheer force of Barbelo’s power stole the air from Kahina’s lungs, leaving her rooted in place.

But Barbelo’s gaze wasn’t on the fractures. It wasn’t on the trembling light or the silent, stunned Aeons. It was on Kahina.

And in that moment, Kahina understood what was about to happen.

It wasn’t just the Pleroma that needed protecting. It was *everything*.

The moment shattered like glass when the fracture nearest to them began to collapse entirely. A fragment of light, as large as a star, tore free from the Pleroma’s surface and hurtled downward, spinning wildly toward the distant material realms below. Its golden glow warped as it fell, flickering like a candle caught in the wind.

Kahina didn’t think. She acted.

Her wings erupted behind her, blazing with furious light, and she launched herself into the void. The force of her leap cracked the ground beneath her feet, but she didn’t look back. The fragment was falling fast, its radiance dimming as it tumbled farther and farther away.

She caught it just before it reached the boundary. Her fingers wrapped around the shard’s surface, its warmth spilling into her skin like a fading heartbeat. It was heavier than she expected, its light flickering weakly as though the fall itself had wounded it.

Kahina pulled it close to her chest, shielding it with her wings as she began to ascend, her body straining against the pull of the void. Shadows reached for her, clawing at her light, but she didn’t stop.

When she returned to the chamber, the shard cradled in her arms, the Aeons were silent. Even Sophia’s gaze lingered on her, unreadable and calm, though Kahina thought she saw a flicker of something—approval, perhaps, or curiosity.

Barbelo stepped forward, her light dimming just enough to make her form visible. She extended a hand, and Kahina placed the fragment into her palm, feeling its warmth leave her as she did.

“You have chosen,” Barbelo said, her voice resonating with infinite certainty.

Kahina frowned, her breath still coming in sharp gasps. “Chosen what?”

“To bear this burden,” Barbelo replied, her gaze steady. “To protect this light. To protect *all* light.”

Kahina glanced at Lyrion, who stood at the edge of the chamber, his expression unreadable. He had known. Of course, he had.

And just like that, the decision was made.

She and Lyrion became Barbelo’s protectors that day. They had accepted the roles, even if neither of them truly understood what it meant.

But Kahina remembered the silence of the Aeons, the way they had watched her with something that was not respect, but expectation. And she remembered Sophia, her soft smile a mystery that Kahina was still unraveling.

It was in that silence that Kahina understood one truth about the beings she had sworn to protect:

The Pleroma didn’t fracture because of the void. It fractured because of them.

And oh, what a burden it was, to be the chosen protectors of harmony in a realm so fragile it shattered if someone so much as *breathed wrong*. Kahina often wondered if Barbelo had plucked her and Lyrion out of sheer desperation, like a gambler hedging bets on the last two coins in their pocket. Surely, out of all the luminous, eternal beings with wisdom beyond mortal comprehension, *these two* had been the obvious choice to save existence?

Clearly, Barbelo had a sense of humor.

The memory pressed deeper, unspooling like a thread of golden silk through Kahina’s mind, though it snagged on every sharp corner of her irritation. That council meeting—that divine parade of egos wrapped in light—was a moment that had etched itself into her bones, no matter how much she wanted to scrape it away.

After the fragment of divine light had been saved—*by her*, no less—she had thought there might be a moment of peace. A rare pause in the chaos where the Aeons might actually reflect, perhaps even express a word of gratitude. Foolish, naïve Kahina. The room had gone silent, yes, but not out of awe or respect. No, the stillness had been ripe with judgment, a quiet thrum of calculations and unspoken criticisms.

It was Sophia, of course, who broke the silence, because if there was one thing Sophia excelled at, it was pouring oil onto an already blazing fire.

“Courage,” Sophia had said, her voice as smooth as a blade slipping between ribs. “It’s so refreshing, isn’t it? To see action taken without hesitation. Though…” She paused, tilting her head in that maddeningly elegant way of hers, her radiant form shifting like a soft ripple of moonlight. “One wonders whether courage is enough to protect the Pleroma when its very essence is crumbling.”

There it was. The seed, planted so subtly that Kahina could almost admire it. Sophia’s tone was gentle, her words wrapped in the silk of admiration, but the implication hit harder than any blow. Kahina could practically *feel* the weight of the Aeons’ collective gaze turning toward her, assessing, measuring.

Lyrion had stepped forward then, ever the poised counterbalance to Kahina’s simmering frustration. “Action must begin somewhere,” he had said, his tone polite but firm, his staff glowing faintly as though punctuating his point. “Harmony cannot be restored by waiting for perfection. It requires hands willing to act.”

“Of course,” Sophia had replied, her smile a masterpiece of grace and ambiguity. “But harmony is delicate, isn’t it? A balance so easily upset… even by the well-meaning hands that attempt to save it.”

It had taken every ounce of Kahina’s restraint not to launch her blade of light straight through Sophia’s artfully serene expression. The Aeons, naturally, had lapped it up. Whispers spread through the room like cracks in glass, their forms shifting as they debated whether action without foresight was courage or recklessness.

Kahina had stood there, the mark of the shard’s light still pulsing faintly against her skin, and she had realized, with bitter clarity, that the council was not a place for resolutions. It was a theater. A stage where beings of impossible power performed their roles with practiced precision, all the while circling one another like predators in the same cage.

Barbelo had not intervened. Why would she? Her role wasn’t to coddle or direct the Aeons but to maintain the illusion that divine harmony was still attainable. She had simply watched, her luminous form still and unyielding, as the seeds of discord were sown around her.

And so, the council meeting had devolved into what it always was: a war of words, sharp as any blade, cutting deeper than any weapon Kahina had wielded. The Aeons didn’t bicker loudly like mortals—they dissected one another with precision, their accusations wrapped in beauty, their arguments laced with poison that only grew stronger with repetition.

Kahina remembered catching Lyrion’s eye at one point, a faint look of resignation flickering across his face. He had always been better at hiding his disdain for the council’s antics, but in that moment, even he couldn’t conceal his weariness.

“Do they ever tire of the sound of their own voices?” Kahina had muttered under her breath.

Lyrion’s lips had twitched into what might have been the ghost of a smile. “They’ve had eternity to perfect the art of it,” he had replied. “Why stop now?”

Eventually, as the arguments reached their inevitable crescendo of radiance and righteousness, Barbelo had raised a single hand, and the room fell silent. It wasn’t a gesture of authority—it was something far heavier, a reminder that she was the only thing holding the Pleroma together.

“We are not here to debate perfection,” Barbelo had said, her voice calm and resonant, cutting through the stillness like the first note of a symphony. “We are here to act. And if action must begin with these two”—her gaze had fallen on Kahina and Lyrion, steady and inscrutable—“then so be it.”

And just like that, the weight of divine expectation had settled fully on their shoulders.

Kahina hadn’t known whether to feel honored or insulted. Was it truly a recognition of their worth? Or had the Aeons simply decided that if the Pleroma needed protecting, it might as well fall to the ones they considered expendable? She didn’t know then, and she didn’t know now.

But she did know this: whatever harmony the Aeons claimed to protect, it was a fragile, brittle thing. It wasn’t the kind of harmony that could endure. It was a mask, worn to hide the fractures beneath—a harmony held together not by trust or unity, but by fear of what would happen if it fell apart.

And perhaps, Kahina thought bitterly, that was why Barbelo had chosen her and Lyrion. Not because they were perfect. Not because they were the best. But because they weren’t bound by the same endless cycles of argument and inaction. They were outsiders, unburdened by the weight of divine tradition.

They were not here to preserve a false harmony.

They were here to burn away the rot.