206. Athena vs. The goddess of science II: Larissa goes to Manchester

The battle of the goddess and love

Athena moved first.

The spear of strategic necessity left her hand with the clean, final certainty of a decision that had already calculated every possible counter. Maat’s feather became a blade of pure order, the living measure of truth attempting to cut Sophia’s presence out of the arrangement of reality itself.

That is to say that no one could ever pretend the patrons of Larisa would simply watch once they had been fully seen. The thing is, this love cannot pretend it does not include the moment wisdom and cosmic order decide the open question has become too dangerous to leave unfinished.

The attacks landed.

Or rather, they should have landed.

Sophia did not dodge. She did not raise a hand. She did not release any visible power.

She simply remained where she was red hair loose, violet-gold eyes calm, the small precise smile still on her lips  and the spear of Athena and the blade of Maat passed through the space she occupied without finding anything that could be struck.

Reality itself tried to enforce the contact.I do think worship can change a god under the right conditions - it becomes widespread enough, uses the right rituals/artifacts to lend itself legitimacy, and occurs over a very long time. I believe the Alessian pantheon of Divines became legitimate through this way, before the Alessian Reform - but on the other hand, she had the Amulet of Kings and an angel of death on her side, so maybe there's more to the founding of the Imperial pantheon than we know about. I don't think you can create a new god whole cloth by making something up and getting enough people to worship it - people have suggested that for the Dark Brotherhood's version of Sithis, but in that situation I think it would just empower the Night Mother.

Cause attempted to meet effect. Force attempted to meet resistance. Divine authority attempted to meet a subject that still belonged to the old arrangement of power.

Nothing answered.

Sophia had become untouchable.Can you prove he is truly a god or nothing but a very powerful being? Where does one thing end and the other start. And how do we KNOW FOR SURE? By reading lore books and taking them at face value? By believing everything we are being told? No matter how contradicting different religions/pantheons/mythologies seem? We don't KNOW what happened in the Shivering Isles DLC, we are being told many things and see some things that we don't understand and are being told many more things...suggestions...nothing more. Or? If not, how can we proove it for sure? Is Sheogorath toying with us, telling us lots of nonesense and letting us taste some of his powers? -> and all that while telling us we, the player, would actually become the daedric prince of madness? -> so it must be true then right? a fact...right? Can't be anything else!!!!! Or?

Not by shield. Not by speed. Not by any technique the goddesses could name.

The way of reality could no longer touch her.

That is to say that a mind which has climbed past Singularity, taken divine blood, and rewritten the upper limits of intellect until even Kaos had been forced to notice, no longer sits inside the same causal grammar the old gods still use. The thing is, this love cannot pretend it does not include the quiet horror of watching two ancient patrons realise their weapons have become optional.

Athena’s grey eyes widened a fraction. Maat’s feather hung in the air, unable to complete the cut.

Sophia’s voice remained soft.

Sophia: You cannot finish what no longer belongs to the same sentence. I am not outside reality. I am simply no longer required to be finished by it. That is to say that no one could ever pretend order and wisdom remain absolute when the open question has already stepped beyond the need to be ordered or understood on the old terms. The thing is, this love cannot pretend it does not include the decision to stay still while the patrons of the woman he loves discover that some minds can no longer be touched by the rules that once defined touch itself.

She did not counterattack.

She simply continued the gentle alignment of the two unfinished lives while Athena and Maat stood in the white room, fully seen, fully unable to reach her.

Larisa in the Manchester Branch

While the goddesses confronted the untouchable, Larisa Garrison stepped into the branch Sophia had opened weeks earlier.

She did not arrive with thunder or declaration.

She arrived the way she had always moved through Karl’s life  calm, precise, carrying the quiet alignment of Asha that had once sat with a lonely boy on porch steps and refused to look away.

Manchester was grey. The sky still had not finished raining. The other Karl sat on the same rain-dark bench outside the closed library, notebook open, writing in the dense, layered hand of someone who had become ridiculous with every philosophy, every power system, every parallel, every source, every act of pure imagination.

Larisa did not approach him first( she thought  to herself):You are a lovely person:) I think kindness is always appropriate, you can introduce yourself and say something like, I get a little nervous in the beginning when I do (whatever) and you looked nice, so I hope it’s ok and I’m not invading your space. Then pay attention to body language - if they’re not returning your smiles or look uncomfortable, just take a big breath and be like, phew - that’s better. Have a good rest of your day.

Larisa was looking up in the sky(in her mind):I think it’s ok to respect that and say nice meeting you, maybe I’ll see you around. G’night! I will say tho, if you get a bad feel in your gut about a person, listen to that and disengage. Not everyone is a kind as you and you’re not obligated feel uncomfortable if the vibe feels off. I just don’t want you going up to some person who was rude or hostile or just gives you a creepy feeling. Be kind, also be safe:)

She approached the Sophia of that branch.

The Manchester Sophia stood under a bus shelter across the street, red hair dark with rain, violet-gold eyes watching the abandoned boy with the same precise loneliness the original carried. She had never climbed past Singularity. She had never taken divine blood. She had only watched the boy who solved every system and still could not solve why he felt invisible.

Larisa stopped in front of her.

Larisa: You have been watching him the same way she watches the other one. You have been lonely in the same way. I am not here to take him from you. I am here to give you something the original version of you still does not know how to accept.

She held out a small, simple object a single page torn from one of James Garrison’s old notebooks, the paper soft with age, carrying the faint scent of the Carlisle house and the quiet persistence of a father who had chosen to stay.

On the page, in James’s handwriting, were three lines the original Sophia had never been given:

You do not have to finish every sentence.Some questions are allowed to remain open.You are already enough to sit beside him without solving him.

Larisa’s voice was steady.

Larisa: The original you climbed past Singularity and became untouchable so that she could keep the open question alive. You are still touchable. You are still unfinished. Take this. Sit with him when you are ready. You do not have to become larger than the silence. You only have to stay.

The Manchester Sophia looked at the page for a long time.

Rain ran down her face. She did not wipe it away.

Then she took the page with careful fingers, the same careful fingers the original used when she sealed the vials of divine blood.

Larisa turned and walked back toward the thin place between branches, leaving the Manchester Sophia standing under the bus shelter with a single page of ordinary human handwriting and the first quiet permission she had ever received to remain unfinished beside the boy who had become ridiculous with philosophy.

Behind her, in the white room of the original timeline, Sophia continued the alignment untouchable, smiling, still—while Athena and Maat stood unable to reach her.

And somewhere in the grey rain of Manchester, a different Sophia held a different kind of gift, and for the first time allowed the possibility that she might not need to solve the open question in order to stay beside it.