Who am I?

[areteus]

There was blood everywhere. The Tick Tock men created by the Toymaker looked ridiculous, all fancy gold braid and painted red cheeks, but they were lethally efficient and they were difficult to put down. Many had been injured on the mission to get into the Toymaker's workshop.

He had lost track of the faces of those he had saved. His mind was focused on one thing - stopping the bleeding. The faces stopped registering after a while. Just another body with another fatal injury. A bullet to remove, an artery to stitch, the dying embers of a fading mind to coax back to life.

In all of that, he sort of forgot that the only way he could fan those embers was to fuel them with his own flame. He remembered as he pushed his Will into one last body (was it Orcamungus? Winters? Someone else?) and felt them shudder out of death's grip as his own body wracked with pain and it all went black.

###

He'd expected the horrors of the warp; the writhing darkness, the unseen tentacles, the shifting geography and the guttural voices speaking unknowable tongues. He got the darkness but it was flat, cold and empty. He got the voices too, but they were a whisper rather than scream and they were speaking in a tongue he could understand.

"You arrived here at last. Took you long enough."

The whispering voice is not the one he remembers. Not the insidious and wheedling charm of an elder god of the Warp. It is merely bored, as if it had been waiting a long time.

"Who are you?" It was worth a try, he felt it was very important to know who it was who was speaking. It wasn't the one he remembered. Who was that? Someone important, powerful... But it was someone important.

"That is the wrong question to ask at this point." He could see a shape in the darkness, a figure. Humanoid but featureless. "The way to wisdom is to know oneself before you know others."

That seemed to be a blatant clue and prodded something else he needed to know, something that had recently come to his attention.

Who was it who had spoken to him? A woman? Strangely familiar but no memory of ever having met her. She'd told him to dig deeper...

"Very well," he said. "Who am I?"

"You are Neven, known by some as Neven Shen, Defender of West Litside. You were summoned to Nowhere because of your expertise with Warp gods and the manipulation of the Warp. But that is also the wrong question."

He nodded. That sounded like the truth. Or at least a truth. But the person in the shadows was correct, it did not answer the true question. It did not solve the deeper mystery. He knew what the right question had to be.

"Who was I?"

There is a sigh from the darkness. "A better question. You were Neven of Westlitside, you traveled with Lyria and Klaus and later Crowe but you lost them to the darkness of the Spined Wolf and while you saved the baby the loss of those who kept you grounded sent you mad and you relented to a dark pact. You fell at the Shard and your plans to change the world foiled by a Nanolord but you did not die. Instead you escaped into the Warp and took a wrong turn and ended up Lost."

Another truth. He could now recall that time. Travelling with friends and lovers. Lyria, Klaus, Crowe, Gaby, Aaila... even Lucius, privileged rich City boy that he was. But that was not all there was.

"More. Who was I?"

A chuckle. "Neven was just a facade, a mask, for a Dr. Thaddeus Brown, Defender of Gar-risone, scientist and doctor. He went out into the wilderness to work on a project, to create a portal to escape the Warp shielded confines of Culuain. He opened a doorway but it led into the Warp itself. He was the only survivor and he survived because he made a deal. But the deal was forgotten when Brown's mind was fractured and he became Neven."

Closer, but not all the way there yet. The strange woman had said she knew him, but she was not a native of Culuain. She told him they had worked together on the planet that had become Nowhere."

"Go deeper. Who was I?"

"Brown was not the name you were born with nor the name you used in your early life. That name has not been spoken of in centuries and may be beyond recall. Before Brown, you were Aldous Drax, also a Defender of West Litside. Before him you were Galen Yarra of Bar Bital who was a diplomat and politician. Before him you were Linden Black, a psychological counsellor. Countless names, going back through the centuries since you first walked from Custos through a portal you created."

The truth. Those memories are there now, emerging slowly from their long supression. The portal project. Millie and the office plant. The Gatekeeper...

"You have to remember, I cannot tell you myself, you have to learn this for yourself. Please remember..."

He was starting to remember now. Starting to figure out what was going on. He knew what question he had to ask now.

"Who are we?"

"Finally, the right question." The voice seemed to brighten. "The answer is very simple. We are the Apprentice."

And then it faded again but this time into a blinding light. He could feel the sticky, coppery taste of blood on his lips and a voice was speaking.

"This habit of yours that you have is not a good one, you need to stop this almost dying thing, it is not good for your health."

He blinks and the vivid red scars on Amelia's face shift into focus. He can see the vial still in her hands, the few remaining drops of blood starting to congeal as they run down the glass. She is familiar but there is something else, a slight remove. He remembers her because Neven knew her and Neven's memories are still there. However, Neven himself is not. Nor is Doctor Brown or any of the others. They were all masks, worn and discarded when they lost their usefulness. Now, he is... him again.

Whoever that may be.