A wave of wind rolled toward them from the point of rumble, visibly to the naked eye. It flew toward Ria and her furry companion like the blade of an ethereal sword, striking to remove her head off her torso. It started Ria, who unconsciously dropped the fruit and crouched to lay completely flat on the ground. The angry wave brushed past her a second later. It came whooshing. The impact made her hair dance frivolously in the air. They whipped and whirled behind her head, threatening to rip away from her scalp. The force exerted by the wind pushed her down and backward; it tried to pry her off and take her along.

Thankfully, there were no stones or broken branches and logs lying around; otherwise, one of those blind missiles could have ended up hurting her in more than a few ways. She would have been lucky to survive with nothing impaling her body or any broken bones. The wave, however, passed away quickly.

Ria stood up and dusted herself. Dirt and grass fell from her naked torso as she brushed her eyes open. The whole area had been damaged beyond easy repair. The wave had ravaged the ground and uprooted the grass from many places, leaving behind naked patches of brown soil. The vines had been displaced and deflowered, bringing the bricked walls behind them into the open. And most of the herbs growing along the wall had been similarly uprooted. The evidence of their presence remained easily distinguishable. The wind had picked up everything and taken them along.

Exhaling, Ria put her back to the stump and faced the direction of the explosion –to find the reason behind the thundering crackle. Whatever had caused the disturbance had left behind ten feet large square hole in the ground a short distance away. She squinted in surprise at how precisely geometrical the hole was; and as if that wasn’t a mystery to itself, a braid of interwoven branches grew from the roof and extending directly into the hole. It whole length glowed similarly to the others braids hanging near the tree stump housing a fruit at their end.

This sudden movement by the supposed dead tree confused her. She had only taken a bite from the fruit and hadn’t even filled her stomach yet. Couldn’t the disturbance have happened after she was finished with her business? Wondering whether the changes had anything to do with the guardian and his fruit of life, Ria looked around for their presence and easily found the furry being gawking at her. As for the fruit, the guardian was sitting on it, but the thing had –for some reason- lost its glow.

“What happened?”
“Your wounds have healed.” It replied almost instantly as if it was waiting for a chance to hold a conversation. Ria, however, ignored its worthless babble. She didn’t have time for its puzzles. Something had changed. Her instincts which had honed alongside her troubles were blaring at her to get ready. Tide was coming. The garden wasn’t safe anymore.

A similar thing had happened in the first tunnel she had woken in; it was the sound of carnival music which had broken the loop and given her a path to tread. In the second tunnel, the water had deepened; a needed change for the crocodile to travel. In this stage, the change was that hole which had just opened up.

“What,” she said pointing at the dark hole. “Is that?”

The Furry beast looked at her with wet eyes, as if scared for her well being. Receiving a hateful glare, however, made it flinch. Its eyes dropped –expressing feelings Ria couldn’t argue with- and started sobbing.  Ria, however, didn’t let it gloat. Leaning toward it, she picked it up and started shaking it vigorously. It was the only method she could think up at the moment to make it talk without hurting it… too much.

“What happened?” She firmly asked, keeping an eye on her surroundings. Thrown was her docile nature and vigilance returned with the death of calmness.

“Your… task… grave… inside.” She heard it say, but his words were too fragmented for her to connect. She was shaking the guardian with the intention of interrogating it, but with the trust between them shattered and blown to bits by the crackle, her intentions changed. Her bottled anger exploded on it.

Blinded by the rage she almost threw the poor fellow on the ground but ended up putting it down when she heard his pitiful cry. She cursed under her breath while the guardian cried its throat out. She had to rub its head and pat its back warmly to make it stop crying.

“I thought I was going to die.” It said, sniffing and wiping the tears clogging its sight. It blew its nose on the hem of its robe and plopped tiredly to the ground. “Thank god we can’t get hurt on the first floor.”

Ria didn’t understand the meaning of its words, but they certainly made her remember about her own wounds. Miraculously, the pain which had been irritating her since ever was gone. Not only that, but she also noticed herself using her bandaged hand to calm the tiny guardian. Not only did no discomfort surge up her arm from her once hurt hand, but she could also actually flex her fingers without being stunned and deafened by her own screams.

It wasn’t long ago when the smallest of movements associated with her left hand had felt like she had put her whole hand in fire.

Her focus shifted from the furry being to her bandaged hand. She could see her fingers moving underneath the t-shirt. She hesitatingly removed the t-shirt and saw her hand no longer pale and blue or, bruised and battered, like before. Even though the fingers, which she had herself removed, hadn’t grown back, the wounds themselves had closed and healed. The hand, however, looked odd missing its last two fingers and the mass of muscles, skin, and bones connecting them to her wrist.

She raised her claw-shaped hand in front of her face and curled the remaining fingers into a small fist. They worked surprisingly well. She was sad at her loss, but she didn’t cry. She hadn’t overcome the loss, but she had grown strong in the time being to enjoy what she still retained.

She didn’t forget to check her ear on the sides of her head and found the scabbed wounds there similarly healed and closed. She pictured her image without ears and blushed thinking how freakish she must look without her ears. But she didn’t regret her decision. She had survived and that’s what means the most.

To her wonder, her feet and legs had also healed. Her legs even pulsated with vigor. There was a far greater strength flowing through her veins than she remembered possessing. The fruit had rejuvenated her. Her hunger was gone she was healed and most of all, for the first time in a long-long while, she was feeling sorry, for a stranger.

Her emotions which she had bottled and buried deep inside her heart were now growing back out and showing compassion. It is important to be able to feel because humans are emotional beings. Her bubbling compassion was just another tick in the long list of things which kept her sane and different from the sewer beasts. Its presence told her that even though she had become a part of the sewer, it hadn’t become a part of her. She was still Ria. She was still human. That hadn’t changed.

Ria sat down on the ground. Although the hole which had opened looked eerie, it didn’t really vomit out monster for her to defeat. After the first crackle, the garden had returned to its previous calm. The birds had also started chirping again.

Cupping her hands together, she placed them in front of the sobbing furry being. “Come.” She said. It hesitated at first -afraid of being whipped around like a ball, shaken like a wet cloth, and thrown away like a fruit's seed- but decided to follow anyways; Wiping its big green eyes, it held her thumb with both hands and climbed onto her hand.

It sat at the center of her palms, waiting for her to speak. Ria thanked it for giving her the fruit and determined to get answers, she started asking it questions. “Do you have a name?” She asked and it nodded its small furry head.

 “I am Ria.”
“Em,” it whispered.

“Em… can you tell me anything about this place?”

Em heard her but didn’t speak. He had gone back to stare at its furry feet. Ria didn’t feel any urgency, so she let it take his time, and finally after ten minutes of grumbling under his breath, he spoke, “This… is the garden of Eden”

“Huh?”
“Not the real one. But it is this planets Garden of Eden.”

“You mean there are other planets?”
“That I don’t know. But I know that there are other realms.”

“Is this related to me?”
“Yes,” Em said, so softly she almost didn’t hear him.
“Can you tell me why I am here?”
“Yes.” He said. He was like a child who only answered as much was asked of it. And like a child, he was in a bad mood right now. Ria didn’t know how to make it tell her everything. The best she could do was to talk to it politely and have patience.

“Why am I here, Em?” He hesitated at first, as if afraid of being punished for speaking about things he shouldn’t. Ria thought he wouldn’t help her anymore, but he proved her wrong.

“T-To prepare mankind. To birth a leader,” he said stuttering, his body trembled as if he was having a seizure. With this, the ground also started shaking. The birds started crying and leaves started falling from the branches above.

“Prepare us for what, Em; tell me?” Ria asked eagerly felling a pang of urgency in her heart. The change was happening. She didn’t know what would happen this time, but she knew she had just uncovered something even she wasn’t supposed to know- Something which mattered more in the grand scheme of things; Something which concerned not only her but everyone living on Earth.

As she tried to get answers out of Em, she saw his eyes rolling to the back of his head. His fur, which was white and clear, started turning grey. “I can’t say; I can’t say; I can’t say…” He mumbled again and again until it body suddenly stopped trembling; that’s when he pried himself out of her grip and jumped away to the ground.

His body touched the ground, and before Ria could do anything about him, the ground swallowed him whole. Ria watched him disappear. The ground stopped quaking for a moment after, then rumbled with an intensity much-much greater than before.

The lights which had been constantly shinning dimmed until complete darkness enveloped the garden in its sheet. The tree and its various branches instead, started glowing in a mix of purple and blue. A bright pillar of white light erupted from the square hole, tapering to the side before touching the roof. The pillar of light pulsed and throbbed like a heart and its rhythm –somehow- exactly matched her heartbeats.

“It’s time.” She head. The voice wasn’t Em’s; and neither did it have any source. It seemed to be coming from everywhere and just a manifestation of her mind at the same time.  

“The grave has opened. It is time.”