Here's a thought that's killing me.
It's the alternate timeline. Post-Path of the Heroes, Abeke wanders through Erdas with Uraza to try and find closure and healing from Shane's death. One night, she has a dream that feels so real.
In it, Shane appears to her, looking just as he had when she lost him. He invites her to come with him and see something. They walk together through the inky darkness of the night, and the words they exchange Abeke will never repeat to a single soul. In the distance up ahead, something blazes softly into existence. It looks like a portal.
Through it, Shane shows her things. Abeke sees another life ripple and flow before her eyes, a life that could have been hers -- had Shane survived. She sees the good and bad in their future. The happy moments they shared. The fights they had. She sees herself finally open her heart to him, and everything that followed thereafter. She sees them live. She sees them die.
The last thing Shane shows her will stay with her for as long as she lives. They look upon a scene of two teenage girls, sitting on a hillside and gazing at the stars. They have just reconciled after a time of pain and distance. Abeke intrinsically recognizes their voices and everything about them, even though she has never seen them before. But somehow, inexplicably, she knows them. They are Adaeze and Monife, the daughters she would have had with Shane.
And as she watches them, she is overwhelmed with a love stronger than any she has felt before. She loves these girls, and she says so to Shane. They don't truly exist for her, but somewhere, in some way, they do -- a different Abeke is there too, another version of herself who would die for them in a heartbeat.
Shane holds out a hand to her. "Come with me, and they will be real," he says. Against the backdrop of the shimmering portal, his eyes glow with a longing so deep it breaks Abeke's heart.
Abeke knows in that moment that she could take his hand, step into the portal with him, and wake up in that other life. She would wake up in the moment when he lunged in front of her to protect her from her possessed spirit animal, with a little more time to shoot the arrows that would save him. But that is not her destiny. Not this time.
She looks behind her and sees the sun peeking over the horizon, spilling its golden rays across the fields they crossed. For the first time, she sees the beauty of the land around her. The night is fading; she is about to wake. Shane's face is sorrowful when she turns back to face him, still standing in darkness. She clasps his hand and holds it tight. "I cannot," she finally says, her voice thick with rising tears. "I am sorry." And then she breaks.
Shane holds her in his strong arms for what feels like an eternity, and yet all too short. Presses a kiss to her brow. Rests his chin atop her head. Abeke will always remember the love and warmth of their last moments together. She knows he carries no hurt with him anymore, no anger, no shame. And after that, neither does she.
She wakes in the sun's golden light, thankful for a new day.
