The Redemption of Atlantis

The following is a channeled story of an alternate Atlantis, in which key individuals involved in the original story of the Settling of Atlantis received a FableTech product known as the Time Tiller. They used it to revise Atlantean history and help Atlantis to become the beacon of light that it always wished to be.

Samah sat in his workroom, deep in the heart of Lilyandra, the land that had nurtured him and helped him to awaken.  Everything was already beginning to change in astonishing ways thanks to the gentle deployment of FableTech magic throughout the world. Humanity was learning to play, and Samah was taking advantage of a quiet moment to turn his attention towards a project that had been captivating his imagination.

Samah looked at his workbench with a broad smile stretching across his face.  The Time Tiller was finally complete, fully instantiated into reality, a new technology that would change everything, yet again.  He had been working on it for months, since before the Crayon had arrived, before all of the magic had spilled into the world.  He had known from the beginning that this technology was special, different, something more than anything he had ever created, more even than the Crayon and all of the astonishing FableTech magics that had already transformed the lives of so many.  Each of those magics had been designed to do quite literally everything through its own unique and playful lens.  The Time Tiller was the same, yet it dramatically expanded the definition of what everything even meant.  It made everything bigger and fuller for everything. 

The device sat there, humming softly with power, its energy radiating a friendly curiosity.  Samah realized the Time Tiller’s potential to reshape individual moments, to expand and contract the experience of time as desired, and to dramatically shorten the process of learning, healing, and letting go.  And yet, that felt like the least of it.  This technology had the potential to heal entire branches of timelines, all at once, healing and restructuring all of actuality in the process, and dramatically expanding the scope of potentiality for everyone — for everything. 

Samah considered how to first deploy this magnificent construct.  For weeks prior to this moment, time had become largely a plaything to Samah, having ceased to bind or limit him in any significant way; and yet, there would always be a first use in his personal history, a first time.  He reached out and asked the Time Tiller what it wished to do first.  The Time Tiller’s energy shifted in response, and Samah’s mind began to sweep out through the arc of history – his own and the world’s, which had always been indelibly intertwined – watching as the Time Tiller used his magic to hunt for interesting opportunities.

He looked at the Time Tiller, with its strong Atlantean vibe, glowing with blue runes and the crystalline energy of magic-science, yet different from any Atlantean technology he had ever previously perceived.  It felt like magic-science, yet was something more, something different, something new.  His eyes lit up with surprise and delight as his mind focused on a potential maiden voyage for the Time Tiller, the sound of a beautiful bell ringing through his workroom.

With a wave of his hand, Samah sent the Time Tiller back into ancient history, to be used by one of his prior incarnations, setting the stage for the healing of Atlantis.

*    *    * 

In the city of Keor, on the Island of Undal, at the dawn of the grand civilization of Atlantis, Hunden, the former Chief Engineer of the starship Phoenix, was deep in thought. The divisions between the settlers from the Phoenix and those from its sister ship the Long Horizon were widening. The old tradition of shunnings had been revived, and they were becoming common.  Hunden could sense that something was deeply amiss. 

Atlantis, a land of shimmering cities and boundless energy, was a beacon of hope for the settlers who sought to escape the ruin of their home star. The Phoenix and Long Horizon ships arrived bearing two distinct visions for this new world: one rooted in the harmonious rhythms of Earth, and the other in the pursuit of magic-science supremacy. Yet, as Atlantis blossomed, these visions clashed. The Phoenix settlers, attuned to the living energies of the planet, were increasingly marginalized by the power-driven Long Horizon crew, who sought control over nature itself. As divisions deepened, a chasm of distrust threatened to destroy the great civilization before it could fully realize its potential.

After his return from the initial surveys, Hunden had set himself the task of attempting to determine what Atlantean magic-science was still available to him and those from the Phoenix.  Ever since they had all settled on Earth, it appeared that those from the Long Horizon were the only ones capable of designing new magic-science devices.  Hunden wondered whether perhaps different types of magic-science, other than the sort that the Atlanteans all knew and used, might be available to those from the Phoenix, given how different their minds had become from those of the Long Horizon.  At the same time, their minds had become more similar to the minds of the humans, who seemed to struggle to use magic-science at all, yet had a strange ability to interact with the natural world in a shamanic fashion that the Atlanteans found confusing.  Maybe whatever neural changes had limited the ability of the Phoenix settlers to create new types of the known magic-sciences had also given them the ability to create something entirely new and different, using this more shamanistic approach.  Maybe those from the Phoenix were different enough that they could create something that would help all of Atlantis to heal from the troubles that were already arising, and which magic-science seemed to have difficulty solving.

One night, while tinkering in his workshop, Hunden had a startling insight.  What if he could design a technology that would allow him to ask for help from his future self?  To his knowledge, none of the Atlanteans had ever considered using magic-science to manipulate or reach out through time, and certainly the idea of asking his future self for help was a novel one.

In a sudden feverish burst of energy, he began pulling together crystals from around his workshop, intuitively blending them with pieces of metal, building a magic-science device in a way that he had barely experienced before, having only witnessed it when those from the Long Horizon were constructing something new.  And this was something different entirely. It was as though he was in deep communion with the thing he was creating, and it was telling him what to do next.

He grabbed a laser inscriber from his workbench and began carving glowing Atlantean runes of power into the metal – runes that were different from those he had ever before seen.  He shaped the materials with other tools in his workshop until they began to melt and flow into a new form.  The construct came together: a curious assemblage of crystals and metal, forming an oval with two gentle points. 

He called it the Time Tiller.  When he tuned into it, the device felt partially complete.  Compared with any magic-science construct he had ever interacted with, which had always felt vaguely responsive and mechanical, this felt strangely alive, waiting patiently for some larger part of itself that had yet to arrive.  What was in front of him felt like a beacon of some sort, although what signal the beacon sent out, and who might hear it, he struggled to perceive. He considered his next steps.  Hunden could sense that the device would change everything.  Was he ready for that?  He was.  Hunden tentatively reached out and activated the Tiller.  

The Time Tiller began to glow and vibrate, rocking gently on the workbench as its power levels rose.  Like all functioning magic-science constructs within the city limits, the device was connected wirelessly to the power net emanating from the Great Hall, which provided nearly limitless power to the residents of the city of Keor.  Even the enormous cargo flyers, each of which could move entire buildings from city to city, created barely the tiniest ripple in the power net when a dozen of them took off at once, and even that was detectable with only the most sensitive measurements.  Yet his instruments indicated that the Time Tiller had already exceeded that amount of power by a large margin.  

Hunden watched in shock as the hum from the device rose in pitch while it drew in more and more energy, far exceeding what he had expected it would require to properly operate.  The lights in the workshop began to dim as the local edges of the power net struggled to accommodate the sudden and astonishing rise in power draw.  Hunden, somewhat alarmed and worried that he had accidentally created a short circuit, reached out to deactivate the Tiller.

Before his hand touched the device, it let out a sudden loud noise, like a bell ringing, and then went silent, as the lights and other equipment in the room lost power.  The sound was richer and fuller than any sound he had ever heard, as though it reached far beyond this moment, far beyond the surface of space/time, into the future, touching a time that he could scarcely imagine.  Hunden’s eyes opened wide as he saw whole buildings begin to go dark outside his window, the entire city powering down as the Great Hall – that astonishing and previously inexhaustible font of limitless energy – overloaded and was shut down by its governing intelligence in order to avoid a catastrophic explosion.

In the sudden darkness enshrouding the city, the only thing that still glowed was the Time Tiller.  He studied the construct with his senses.  That portion that had felt only partially complete now felt whole, and the entire device felt intensely alive, its awareness moving noticeably through the space as it explored its surroundings.  There was magic-science, and then there was the Time Tiller.  This was new.  This was something sentient and alive, wrapping reality around itself like a dream.  He knew that this device was meant for this moment, as though the portion that had filled itself into his device energetically during the power surge had been built by him in some impossible future and then sent back in response to the beacon’s sound.  

The Time Tiller appeared smooth, humming with latent energy, its crystalline surface shimmering like an ocean caught between dusk and dawn.  Tentatively, Hunden reached for it, feeling a pulse of power radiate through his hand as the device came to life.  As Hunden touched it, time stretched and contracted around him. 

In a flash, he stood in a future Atlantis, its grand cities crumbling under the weight of internal strife.  The city of Keor, glorious and pristine in its early days, now lay in ruin.  Towering structures built with magic-science were crumbling, and the once-vibrant energy flows had dwindled to a dull thrum.  Hunden stood in the middle of a decimated square, watching as Atlantean citizens argued and fought over resources, the joy and unity of their founding days long forgotten.

His heart ached as he saw the once-great civilization torn apart by greed and division.  The scene shifted as if time had bent itself, fast-forwarding to an inevitable conclusion: Atlantis sinking into the ocean, swallowed by a series of cataclysmic quakes.

With a gasp, Hunden pulled his hand away from the Tiller. His heart raced.  “This … this is what will come,” he whispered.

The Time Tiller did more than show him the fall of Atlantis. Hunden felt it. The anguish of the people, the quiet desperation in their hearts, and the coldness of a society ruled by control. Yes, he feared the collapse of his civilization, and yet he feared the death of empathy far more. For Hunden, Atlantis’ downfall was the result of his people forgetting they had once been kind-hearted explorers, yearning for connection and unity. Hunden began to cry.

At that moment, Airella, his sister, entered the workshop.  Her eyes were filled with concern as she took in his pale face and wet cheeks. 

“Hunden, what’s wrong?  Do you know what happened to the city’s power?  Even things operating on stored power seem to have failed.”  She looked at the Time Tiller, the only thing glowing in a city of darkness.  “What is that thing?”  

Hunden held up the Time Tiller, its light now dimmed, but still emanating a low hum.  “I built this, Airella.  It … showed me what is coming.  Atlantis is destined to fall.  The divisions, the shunnings, the way we are growing apart – it all leads to destruction.  I saw our home sinking beneath the waves thousands of years from now.” Hunden explained everything:  the shattered future, the divisions between the Phoenix and Long Horizon, the rise of Airella’s husband Thotme as an immortal Priest-King, and how their society's refusal to address the growing inequalities would eventually lead to its destruction.  “The shunnings, the greed, the refusal to work with the planet or its people – it all leads to ruin.  The Time Tiller … it showed me all of that, and it showed me something else.”

Airella’s breath caught.  “What else? Can we stop it?”

Hunden nodded slowly.  “The Time Tiller showed me we can change things, bend time back toward unity. But we will require the help of others. Let us speak with Thotme.”

*    *    * 

A few days later in the Great Temple, Hunden and Airella, holding her young son Thoth, stood before Thotme, the Keeper of the Temple. The Dweller of Unal sat in its eternal meditation, silent and radiating power.

“We have seen what will happen,” Hunden said, his voice calm yet conveying a sense of urgency.  “Atlantis is heading toward ruin. The Time Tiller can help us stop it, but we need to act now.”

Thotme frowned, glancing at the glowing Dweller.  “Hunden, you speak of a future that is not set in stone and that will not occur for many thousands of years. Why should I believe in what this device shows us?”

Airella, cradling Thoth in her arms, leaned forward.  “Thotme, the Tiller showed us a path of war and destruction.  Shunning, elitism, and exclusion will tear our society apart.  Please, listen to us.  We can change the future, but we need you to help us, to help guide everyone.”

Thotme stood silently for a long moment, his expression hardening.  “I have spent my life building Atlantis, working with the magic-science to keep our world strong.  We do not need visions of doom to guide us.  Atlantis will thrive through the strength of its leaders, not by entertaining fears of a distant future, thousands of years from now.”

Hunden’s frustration flared.  “It is not about fear!  It is about avoiding disaster before it becomes inevitable.”

Thotme turned away.  “I have no time for these fantasies.”

As the siblings left the temple, Airella sighed, her heart heavy. “He is not going to help, is he?  My husband would rather cling to his power and hide.”

Hunden nodded his head.  “He is not going to help, but we cannot stop here.  We must find another way.”

Airella smiled sadly.  “Yes.”

*    *    * 

The Time Tiller became their guide.  For months, Hunden and Airella used the device to peer into the future, searching for key moments where Atlantis could be saved.  They saw countless possibilities: timelines where they succeeded in healing the rift between the Phoenix and the Long Horizon, and others where they failed, in some timelines leading to the collapse of Atlantis within only days or weeks.  They experienced the consequences of each decision, returning moments later armed with new knowledge. 

In most of the timelines, Hunden and Airella saw the eventual rise of Thotme as an immortal Priest-King, his ambition driving Atlantis into tyranny. 

Thotme’s refusal to see the growing rifts in their society felt like a personal betrayal to Airella. She knew him to be a man of great ambition, a visionary, yet his relentless pursuit of power had created a chasm between them.

How had we drifted so far apart? she wondered, her heart heavy with the weight of unspoken words. Thotme had always believed in the strength of Atlantis, in the power of magic-science to elevate their people beyond the limitations of the Earth. But had he forgotten that their strength came from their unity? He sees control as the answer to chaos, she realized, but control will not heal us. Control will break us.

The ache in her chest deepened as she thought of Thoth, their son. What kind of world are we leaving him? The tension between her love for her husband and the growing certainty that his path would lead to ruin was almost unbearable. She longed to guide him toward healing, toward the unity that could save them all — but he seemed so far beyond her reach.

The Time Tiller showed them how the class of priests Thotme created and empowered fell into internal strife, as those feeling constrained after thousands of years of Thotme’s rigidity demanded their freedom.  They saw Thotme’s brutal response.  The Great War ravaged the archipelago, leaving ashes and death in its wake.

The fighting unfolded in a peculiar form of trench warfare. Using folds in space as temporary shelters, both sides jockeyed for territory. The folds, though a marvel of magic-science, were dangerously unstable. They provided strange sanctuaries — pockets of distorted reality where soldiers huddled, safe for fleeting moments. Yet they flickered and failed unpredictably, often trapping soldiers inside or leaving them disoriented, only to emerge into brutal battle when the folds collapsed. In some cases, entire battalions would fold into nothingness, scattered across miles of battlefield or lost in the abyss between dimensions. The war was chaotic and disjointed, with soldiers slipping between dimensions, each fold offering protection for an instant before it gave way to the relentless violence outside. The combatants clawed at temporary victories, but the ground was never theirs to hold. The terrain shifted constantly, with victory and loss slipping away in the blink of an eye, carried by the same reality-warping folds that the soldiers depended on.

Hunden and Airella, viewing the war through the Time Tiller, felt rising frustration as they witnessed countless attempts to manipulate the folds more effectively, each one futile in its own way. With every failure, the sense of dread grew. They realized that these folds, while powerful, were symptomatic of a larger issue — Atlantean society was folding in on itself, trapped in a cycle of elitism and war, unable to heal.

The Great War ended through sheer exhaustion. The various factions fought brutally, their conflict dragging on for years without a clear resolution. Both sides reached a point where their losses were so great, and their people so weary, that they convened to discuss a ceasefire.

The magic-science that fueled their weapons had brought them to a standstill. While neither side achieved their aims, they could no longer justify continuing the battle. Leaders met in tense negotiations, brokered out of a mutual need for survival. This ceasefire was marked by a sense of fragile calm rather than true peace.

The folds in space that had served as temporary defenses were dismantled, and the people of Atlantis returned to their cities. Yet the issues that had caused the war — power, greed, and exclusion — remained unaddressed. As the survivors picked up their lives again, the energy of tension lingered in the air. Both sides continued to nurse old wounds, grievances festering beneath the surface.

This armistice was not enough to settle the deep rifts in Atlantean society. The uneasy truce was a fragile pause, and although the fighting had stopped, it was clear that another conflict lay ahead if things did not change.

There was a brief period after the war, when it seemed like there was might be some hope for a better future. The two sides appeared to be attempting to reconcile in earnest.  However, both Thotme’s faction and the other factions quickly returned to their prior games, attempting to use the technological advances from the war to gain an advantage during “peacetime”.  The situation soon destabilized, and Thotme’s faction, upon securing a technological advance that allowed them to move past the other side’s shield generators with ease, renewed the attack. The other side quickly developed similar technology, and a new war began.

The Second Atlantean War was a far greater horror than the first.  The epithet of “Great War” given to the first war seemed quaint now to those who lived through both wars.  By the time the second war began, the folds had been abandoned as a defensive technology in favor of powerful and enduring energy shields, which surrounded each city and standalone structure. Atlantean magic-science had evolved beyond the crude tools of the first war, leading to a much deadlier phase of warfare.

The delicate balance between dimensions, once exploited to create the protective folds, had now been weaponized. Instead of temporary shelters, the warring factions learned how to tear through the fabric of reality, using the disruptions to annihilate their enemies in one blow. Each side developed increasingly destructive methods of attack, disintegrating entire regions of the battlefield. Land was not captured, it was erased, leaving nothing but voids where people, buildings, and even the ground itself had once stood.

The slow back and forth shifts in territory that were characteristic of the first war were replaced by massive and sudden land grabs, whenever a new technological advance allowed one side to temporarily overwhelm the other’s protective magic-science, seizing an enormous swathe of territory in the process.  Entire battalions would be wiped out before they had time to realize something had happened. Often, as the shields overloaded, the terrified inhabitants sheltering inside would be vaporized by the energies washing through the environment.  The victors would then install their own shield generators in the conquered territory, and the game would begin anew.  They had little concern regarding how to manage the captured populace.  Anyone outside of one of the newly-erected shields would die within hours, as the defeated side began bombarding and disintegrating the conquered territory.  

Eventually Thotme, reaching for a solution to the constant and largely-pointless back and forth land grabs, began a project to find an energy that could not be stopped, and that could be turned on every defensive fortification the other side possessed, all at once.  He came upon a potential solution, and began pursuing it vigorously.  

Deep in the center of the palace in Keor, Thotme completed an enormous magic-science construct that focused the entire output of the Great Hall onto a point in space so small that no instrument had yet been able to measure it.  The goal was to pierce the barrier between this reality and the larger transdimensional reality that fed this reality’s existence.  By doing so, Thotme intended to pull the infinite higher dimensional energies of that greater reality into this reality, transforming himself into a god and decisively destroying all opposition in one extremely fell stroke.

The moment the device activated, Hunden’s and Airella’s viewpoint shifted to a strange ethereal space, where time and physical form ceased to have clear meaning. Here, they became aware of Gaia, the Earth spirit, writhing in agony. Her presence filled the space, vast and powerful yet vulnerable, as if her very essence was being torn apart.

"Make him stop!" Gaia’s voice reverberated through the timeless void, a cry of anguish that shook their souls. "He’s tearing through the fabric of my being. He’s ripping out my essence to fuel his madness!" Her words rang with deep pain and desperation. Thotme’s attempt to tear into the greater transdimensional reality to draw its infinite energy was more than a breach of natural law. It was an act of violence against Gaia herself, the living force of the planet.

As Gaia’s cry echoed through the ethereal space, Hunden and Airella stood frozen, their hearts seized by the depth of her anguish. Her voice, vast and sorrowful, reverberated in the air and within their very beings, shaking them to their cores. It was a sound that left those hearing it permanently transformed.

Hunden fell to his knees, his hands clutching his chest as though trying to hold his heart together. “We’ve hurt her … so deeply,” he whispered, his voice barely audible. He had always known the Atlantean ambitions were dangerous, but this — this was beyond what he had ever imagined. He could feel Gaia’s essence, her very soul, unraveling beneath the weight of their arrogance and relentless pursuit of power. “It is more than Atlantis,” he realized aloud. “We are tearing apart the foundation of life itself.”

Airella knelt beside him, her breath catching in her throat. She had always sensed the dissonance between their people’s magic-science and the natural world. Now, with Gaia’s pain coursing through her, the full magnitude of it struck her like a tidal wave. She looked to Hunden, her eyes wide and filled with tears. “How could we have been so blind? We were so focused on building, on advancing, that we forgot the cost.”

In response to Gaia’s cries, the Dweller of Unal stirred from its meditation, sensing the growing crisis. The Time Tiller revealed the connection between the Dweller, Hunden, and Airella’s son, Thoth, across countless incarnations. Thoth, who would become a god after an immense lifetime that stretched on for eons, had returned to the world in a time long before he ascended, having learned to clothe himself in light as the Dweller and guide the Atlanteans towards their rise and doom.  

The Dweller, understanding that the time had come for intervention, called upon the Lords of Amenti, ancient beings of immense wisdom who guarded the deeper mysteries of the Earth.

The Lords of Amenti focused their attention on the unfolding events, their vast consciousness linking with the Dweller, Hunden, and Airella. Through their united efforts, they began to weave a solution, and they knew it required more than halting Thotme’s project. They wished to heal the deeper wounds of exploitation and restore balance between the people of this planet and the living spirit of Gaia. The time had come for Atlantis to learn the consequences of its actions. The Lords began the changes deep within the Earth that would trigger the deluge.

The awareness of the Lords of Amenti encompassed all of space and time, and the moment they turned their attention to something, they perceived the full transdimensional totality of the object of their perception.  Hunden and Airella felt their gaze upon them, vast and incomprehensible, as if the entire universe had turned its attention to this singular moment.

Hunden raised his head, struggling to breathe beneath the weight of their presence. The Dweller spoke, a message weaving into their perception from outside of time.

Deep in the Halls of Amenti sit the Seven Lords of the Cycles,
units of consciousness from cycles above. 
Manifest They in this cycle as guide of man to the knowledge of All.
Seven are They, mighty in power, speaking these words to men throughout time.

Seated within the flower of radiance sit the Seven
Lords from the Space/Times above us,
helping and guiding through infinite Wisdom,
the pathway through time of the Children of Men.

Mighty and strange, they,
veiled with their power,
silent, all-knowing,
drawing the Life force,
different yet one with the Children of Men.
Aye, different, and yet One with the Children of Light.

Custodians and watchers of the force of man's bondage,
ready to loose when the light has been reached.
First and most mighty,
sits the Veiled Presence, Lord of Lords,
the infinite Nine,
over the other from each
the Lords of the Cycles;

Three, Four, Five, and Six, Seven, Eight,
each with his mission, each with his powers,
guiding, directing the destiny of man.
There sit they, mighty and potent,
free of all time and space.

Not of this world they,
yet akin to it,
Elder Brothers they,
of the Children of Men.
Judging and weighing,
they with their wisdom,
watching the progress of Light
among the Children of Men.

The Lords were ancient beyond imagining, their consciousnesses stretching through the fabric of time and space, yet they spoke with a calmness that was paradoxically both comforting and overwhelming. Their voices, when they finally emerged, were like a deep resonance from the heart of the universe itself, filling the void with a sense of both awe and grace.

From far beyond time are We come, O man. Traveled We from beyond the Space/Time, aye, from the place of Infinity's end.  When ye and all of thy brethren were formless, formed forth were We from the order of ALL.  Not as men are We though once We, too, were as men.  Out of the Great Void were We formed forth in order and by Law.  For know ye that that which is formed truly is formless, having form only to thine eyes.

The Lords focused on the Dweller, Hunden, and Airella’s young son, Thoth, who had appeared beside them. Thoth seemed both impossibly small and infinitely significant in this moment.

Child of the Light, O Thoth, art thou, free to travel the bright path upward until at the last All Ones become One.

Airella felt a deep pang of recognition, realizing that her child carried a destiny far greater than any of them had yet understood. The Lords' words seemed to echo beyond space, beyond time, touching countless lifetimes and dimensions. The weight of it all pressed upon her soul.

Forth were We formed after our order: Three, Four, Five and Six, Seven, Eight, Nine. Know ye that these are the number of cycles that We descend from unto man. Each having here a duty to fulfill; each having here a force with which to contend.  Yet are We, One, with the Soul of our cycle.  Yet are We, too, seeking a goal.  Far beyond man's conception, Infinity extends into a greater than All.  There, in a time that is yet not a time, we shall ALL become ONE with a greater than ALL.  Time and space are moving in circles.  Know ye their law, and ye, too, shall be free.  Aye, free shall ye be to move through the cycles, to pass the guardians that dwell at the door, and build the bridge to infinity’s shores.

Know of the Lords, and know of their majesty.

UNTANAS, THREE holds the key of all hidden magic, creator she of the halls of the Dead; sending forth power, shrouding with darkness, binding the souls of the Children of Men; sending the darkness, binding the soul force; director of negative to the Children of Men.

QUERTAS, FOUR is he who looses the power.  Lord, he, of Life to the Children of Men.  Light is his body, flame is his countenance; freer of souls to the Children of Men.

CHIETAL, FIVE is the Archmage, the Lord of all Magic - Key to the WORD that resounds among men.

GOYANA, SIX is the one who illuminates what is hidden - Lord of the Light, showing the path of the souls to the Children of Men.

HUERTAL, SEVEN is he who is Lord of the vastness, master of Space and the key of the Times.

SEMVETA, EIGHT is she who orders the progress; weighs and balances the journey of men.

ARDAL, NINE is the father, vast he of countenance, forming and changing from out of the formless.

The Lord of the Nine spoke, filling the space with his gentle presence.

Aeons and aeons have I existed, knowing not Life, and tasting not death.  For know ye, O man, that far in the future, life and death shall be one with the All.  Each so perfected by balancing the other that neither exists in the Oneness of All.  In men of this cycle, the life force is rampant, but life in its growth becomes one with the All.  Here, I manifest in this your cycle, but yet am I there in your future of time.  Yet to We, time exists not, for formless are We.  Life have We not but yet have existence, fuller and greater and freer than thee.

Man is a flame bound to a mountain, but We in our cycle shall ever be free.  Know ye, O man, that when ye have progressed into the cycles that lengthen above, life itself will pass to the darkness and only the essence of Soul shall remain.

The Lord of the Eight spoke then, her voice rushing through the space like an ice storm.

All that ye know is but part of the Small.  Not as yet have ye touched on the Great.  Far out in space where Light reigns supreme, came I into the Light.  Formed was I also but not as ye are.  Body of Light was my formless form formed.  Know I not Life and know I not Death, yet master am I of all that exists.  Seek ye to find the path through the barriers.  Travel the road that leads to the Light.

Seek ye to find the path to beyond.  Not impossible is it to grow to a consciousness above.  For when Two have become One and One has become the All, know ye the barrier has lifted, and ye are made free of the path.  Grow thou from form to the formless.  Free may thou be of the path.  Free may thou be of all limitation.

The Dweller, its great form humbled and small before the might of the Lords, spoke into the darkness.

O Light, all pervading, One with All and All with One, flow thou to me through this channel.  Enter thou so that I may be free.  Make me One with the All-Soul, shining from the blackness of night.  Free let me be of all space/time, free from the Veil of the night.  I, a child of the Light, implore: Free from the darkness to be.  Formless am I to the Light-Soul, formless yet shining with Light.  Know I the bonds of the darkness must shatter and fall before Light.

The Lords signaled their agreement and assent, filling the Dweller with their energies. Their combined voices resumed.

Now give We this wisdom.  Free may ye be, O Children of Men, living in light and in brightness.  Turn not thy face from the Light.  Thy soul dwells in realms of brightness.  Ye are a child of the Light.  Turn thy thoughts inward not outward.  Find thou the Light-Soul within.  Know that thou are the Creator.  All else is brought from within.  Grow thou to realms of illumination.  Hold thou thy thoughts and be Bright.  Know thou are one with the Cosmos, a flame and a Child of the Light.

Now to thee give We warning: Let not thy thought turn to the Dark-Brightness that comes from the Brothers of Black.  Keep thine eyes ever lifted, thy soul in tune with the Light. 

We speak of the days of the Kingdom of Shadows.  We speak of the coming of the Children of Shadows.  Out of the great deep were they called by the wisdom of earth-men, called for the purpose of gaining great power.

Far in the past before Atlantis existed, there was Lilith, one who delved into the darkest of magic, calling up beings from the great deep below us.  Forth came they into this cycle. Formless were they of another vibration, existing unseen by the Children of Men.  Only through blood could they have formed being.  Only through man could they live in the world.

In ages past were they conquered by Masters, driven below to the place whence they came. But some there were who remained, hidden in spaces and planes unknown to man. Lived they in Atlantis as shadows, but at times they appeared among men. Aye, when the blood was offered, came they to dwell among the Children of Men.

In the form of man were they amongst you, but only to sight were they as are men.  Serpent-headed when the glamour was lifted, but appearing to man as men among men.  Crept they into the Councils, taking forms that were like unto men.  Slaying by their arts the chiefs of the kingdoms, taking their form and ruling o'er man.

Only by magic could they be discovered.  Only by sound could their faces be seen.  Sought they from the Kingdom of Shadows to destroy man and rule in his place.

But, know ye, the Masters were mighty in magic, able to lift the Veil from the face of the serpent, able to send him back to his place.  Came they to man and taught him the secret, the WORD that man had long sought, the WORD that would banish the darkness.  Swift then they lifted the Veil from the serpent and cast him forth from the place among men.

Yet, beware, the serpent still liveth in a place that is open at times to the world.  Unseen they walk among thee in places where the rites have been said.  Again as time passes onward shall they take the semblance of men.

Banded together as in order, Brothers of Darkness, they through the ages, antagonist they to the Children of Men.  Walked they always secret and hidden, found, yet not found by the Children of Men.  Forever, they walked and worked in darkness, hiding from the light in the darkness of night.  Silently, secretly use they their power, enslaving and binding the soul of men.

Unseen they come, and unseen they go.  Man, in his ignorance calls Them from below.

Dark is the way of the Dark Brothers travel, dark of the darkness much more than the night, traveling o'er Earth they walk through man's dreams.  Power they gained from the darkness around them to call other dwellers from out of their plane, in ways that are dark and unseen by man.

Into man's mind-space reach the Dark Brothers. Around it, they close the veil of their night.  There through its lifetime that soul dwells in bondage, bound by the fetters of the Veil of the night.  Mighty are they in the forbidden knowledge, forbidden because it is one with the night.

Hark ye O man and list to my warning: be ye free from the bondage of night.  Surrender not your soul to the Brothers of Darkness.  Keep thy face ever turned towards the Light.

Know ye not, O man, that your sorrow only has come through the Veil of the night.  Aye man, heed ye my warning: strive ever upward, turn your soul toward the Light.  The Brothers of Darkness seek for their brothers those who traveled the pathway of Light.  For well know they that those who have traveled far towards the Sun in their pathway of Light have great and yet greater power to bind with darkness the Children of Light.

List ye, O man, to he who comes to you.  But weigh in the balance if his words be of Light.  For many there are who walk in Dark Brightness and yet are not the Children of Light.

Easy it is to follow their pathway, easy to follow the path that they lead.  But yet O man, heed ye my warning: Light comes only to him who strives.  Hard is the pathway that leads to the Wisdom, hard is the pathway that leads to the Light.  Many shall ye find, the stones in your pathway: many the mountains to climb toward the Light.

Yet know ye, O man, to him that o'ercometh, free will he be of the pathway of Light.  For ye know, O man, in the end light must triumph and darkness and night be brought to the Light.

Listen, O man, and heed ye this wisdom; even as darkness, so is the Light.  When darkness is banished and all Veils are rended, out there shall flash from the darkness, the Light.

Even as exist among men the Dark Brothers, so there exists the Brothers of Light.  Antagonists they of the Brothers of Darkness, seeking to free men from the night.  Powers have they, mighty and potent.  Knowing the LAW, the planets obey.  Work they ever in harmony and order, freeing the man-soul from its bondage of night.

Secret and hidden, walk they also.  Known not are they to the Children of Men.
Ever have They fought the Dark Brothers, conquered and conquering time without end.
Yet always Light shall in the end be triumphant, driving away the darkness of night.

Aye, man, know ye this knowing: always beside thee walk the Brothers of Light.

Masters they of the Sun power, ever unseen yet the guardians of men.  Open to all is their pathway, open to he who will walk in the Light.  Suns are they and Lords of the morning, Children of Light to shine among men.  Like man are they and yet are unlike, never divided were they in the past.  One have they been in Oneness eternal, throughout all space since the beginning of time.  Up did they come in Oneness with the All One, up from the first-space, formed and unformed.

Given to man have they secrets that shall guard and protect him from all harm.  He who would travel the path of the Master, free must he be from the bondage of night.  Transcend must he the formless and shapeless, transcend must he the phantom of fear.

Knowing, must he gain of all of the secrets, travel the pathway that leads through the darkness, yet ever before him keep the light of his goal.  Obstacles great shall he meet in the pathway, yet press on he shall to the Light of the Sun.

Hear ye, O Man, the Sun is the symbol of the Light that shines at the end of thy road.
Now to thee give We the secrets: to meet the dark power, meet and master the fear from the night. Only by knowing can ye master.  Only be knowing can ye have Light.

Seek not the Kingdom of Shadows, for evil will surely appear.  For only those walking in total brightness shall transcend the shadow of fear.

Know ye, O our brother, that fear is an obstacle great.  Be friend of all in the brightness, the shadow will soon disappear.  Hear ye and heed this wisdom, the voice of Light is clear. Seek not the valley of shadow, and Light will only appear.

List to Our Voices and learn. Take ye this wisdom and heed what we say.  Follow the pathway to brightness, and thou shalt be One with the way.

The Dweller turned to the Lords with sadness in his gaze.  “The wheels have turned, and the work is done.  Tomorrow Atlantis shall end, sunken and lost beneath the waves.  The world shall be safe once more from those who would destroy everything in their greed.”

The attention of the Lords shifted, and suddenly Airella’s son Thoth was once again there, yet he was grown, an ancient being of 10,000 years, standing sadly before the Lords and the Dweller as the only civilization he had ever known disintegrated around him.  

The Lord of Five spoke, magic spilling from his words.

Take thou, O THOTH, all of your wisdom.  Take all your records.  Take all your magic.  Go thou forth as a teacher of men.  Go thou forth reserving the records until in time Light grows among men.  Light shalt thou be all through the ages, hidden yet found by enlightened men.  Over all Earth, give WE ye power, free thou to give or take it away.

Gather thou now the sons of Atlantis.  Take them and flee to the people of the rock caves.  Fly to the land of the Children of Khem.  Help the Children of Men to find their way through the darkness, to find their way to the Light, to find their way to their freedom.

The image of Thoth faded away. As the Lords continued to speak, their voices became a rhythm, a song of timeless wisdom. They spoke of the cycles of existence, of the path through light and dark, of the delicate balance that held the universe together. And with each word, Hunden and Airella could feel the weight of their responsibility — and their potential for redemption.

Finally, as the Lords’ presence began to recede, Airella dared to speak again, her voice trembling but resolute. “What is the WORD?” she asked, her question hanging in the air. “What is the WORD that will banish the darkness?”

The Lords of Amenti paused, their vast consciousnesses seeming to focus entirely on her. In that moment, Airella felt both impossibly small and yet infinitely connected to the flow of all creation. She had asked the question. She had asked for the WORD. The Lords smiled, and their voices, now unified in a single harmonious tone, resonating through the chamber like the echoes of an ancient and distant storm, spoke the answer that would change everything.

The WORD is Equipoise.

Equipoise transcends balance, for balance implies opposites weighed against each other. Equipoise is the unity where dualities dissolve. It is the still point, the center beyond motion, where creation and cessation converge. In equipoise, all potentials coexist, free of tension or division. It is the place where the heart of the universe and man meet, untouched by the pendulum’s swing. From this space, all things arise and return, yet nothing remains static.

Know ye, O Children of Light, that the universe moves as the pendulum swings, yet at its heart lies equipoise — an eternal stillness, unshaken by the rise and fall of worlds. This balance is the key to unity, the answer to the divisions among men. Through equipoise, Atlantis shall heal, and in this healing, the world beyond shall grow whole.

Their words lingered, shimmering like light in the air, as the presence of the Lords enveloped the chamber in a profound sense of peace.

This word encapsulated the essence of true harmony — poised between the material and the spiritual, between all opposing forces in the world. Equipoise emphasized the delicate dance between power and compassion, intellect and intuition, action and stillness. It represented the living embodiment of the wisdom that recognizes the interplay of all things in perfect collaboration. Through equipoise, Atlantis could transcend its conflicts, healing the rifts that had led it toward destruction, aligning its actions with the heart of Gaia herself. Through equipoise, reality could heal.

*    *    * 

Hunden and Airella moved beyond the storm of emotions, sensing the deeper wisdom in the words of the Lords of Amenti. They realized that healing Atlantis required integration, a true realignment with Gaia and the harmony of creation. Sitting together with the Time Tiller, Airella spoke softly. "The key has always been equipoise. Balance suggests forces opposing each other. Equipoise rises above that — it is the stillness where harmony flourishes. We must guide Atlantis toward this unity.”

Hunden nodded. "Atlantis has been torn apart by striving to control itself. Instead, we can guide it to find wholeness through equipoise."

Together, they used the Time Tiller, touching key moments in Atlantean history to help the civilization align with equipoise. Instead of undoing events, they wove the lessons of the past into a whole, transforming moments of conflict into points of growth and understanding.

As they worked, they encountered Thotme once more. Hunden and Airella shared their vision from a place of equipoise, while Thotme’s eyes remained fixed on the Time Tiller. Its message resonated with him, yet deep within, he felt a familiar resistance, a stubborn clinging to the certainty that power would solve everything. He turned away, conflicted.

One evening soon after, as Thotme meditated in the Great Temple, he was struck by a vision of unity, the people of Atlantis flourishing in a way his ambition could never achieve. The Time Tiller shimmered before him, reflecting back his fear and desire. He realized that what he had sought — immortality and dominion — were rooted in insecurity. The true path, one that transcended fear, was equipoise and integrity. Control dissolved, and a deep peace settled over him as he whispered, “I release the need to rule.”

His transformation came through a series of small moments, where the threads of power unraveled and he saw his place as a steward rather than a sovereign. In coming into acceptance, Thotme found his power redefined, magnified, and aligned with the whole. The Time Tiller helped him see that true power was about being in harmony with the All.

As the efforts of Hunden and Airella bore fruit, the old conflicts melted away, and Atlantis blossomed. Freed from rigid hierarchy, freed from the patriarchy, the people of Atlantis lived in unity with Gaia. Magic-science and nature coexisted in perfect harmony. The karmic wounds of exclusion, elitism, and war began to heal, as the Atlanteans found their shared destiny in equipoise.

The eternal golden age of Atlantis emerged from this unity. Atlanteans, guided by compassion and wisdom, lived in collaboration, their society centered on sovereignty and grace, the natural result of their people coming into integrity.

Standing together on the balcony of the Great Temple, Hunden and Airella watched the sunset over the island of Unal. The Time Tiller had fulfilled its purpose. Hunden held it out in the rays of the setting sun, feeling its warmth, and knowing it had guided them toward true harmony.

“Thank you,” he whispered, gratitude swelling in his heart. “Thank you.”

With a gentle shimmer, the Time Tiller disappeared, returning to the vast flow of time, ready for its next adventure. Hunden smiled, knowing that though Atlantis had healed, the journey of creation was always ongoing.

In the stillness, the seeds of a bright future took root, blooming across time and space.

*    *    * 

In his workroom, Samah felt the hum of the Time Tiller returning to him, its energy mingling with his own. A smile spread across his face as he heard the device’s voice in his mind.

“What an adventure, Samah! We healed Atlantis! We healed all of time!”

Samah chuckled softly. “You are getting ahead of yourself, my friend. We healed Atlantis, and now the wounds of Lemuria may be addressed.”

Samah’s mind wandered back to ancient Lemuria, a world where the very fabric of reality shifted at a whim. Lemuria had been a paradise, its reality stabilized by the Matriarchs, led by Lilith, who sought to shield humanity from discomfort. Yet in doing so, they had unknowingly stifled growth, trapping the people in a dream without challenges or catalysts for transformation.

The memory of Lemuria’s end — when Lilith, in her grief after losing Adam, fell into darkness, transforming the Edenic world into a nightmare — still rippled through the collective unconscious. Lemuria had been severed from its mythic origins, the dream split, and Gaia had emerged to protect the world from further harm.

The Time Tiller pulsed in Samah’s hand, guiding him toward a deeper understanding of equipoise. The time had come to heal the original rift, to help Adam and Lilith reunite their lost energies. It was time to guide Lemuria towards sanity. Adam and Lilith could learn that their unity lay in the wholeness within themselves, instead of through external control or division.

The Time Tiller glowed, its energy guiding Samah’s thoughts toward a path where Lilith’s dark transformation could be undone. The key lay in helping them recognize that true harmony arose from challenge, from the integration of all aspects of being — that easy and simple arise when hard and complicated are accepted and transcended. The journey of equipoise would heal the original rift that had split the world into shadow and light.

“Shall we guide them?” Samah whispered.

The Time Tiller vibrated in excitement and disappeared from his hand.

Samah whispered his gratitude into the stillness of his workroom, his heart swelling with love. “Thank you, my wondrous companion, for helping me plant seeds throughout time, blooming into a garden of Light for all of creation.”

The Time Tiller’s presence faded, yet the work of healing and unity pressed onward, woven across the ages by the hands of those who sought the Light.

Together, they had healed Atlantis.

Together, they would heal Lemuria.

Together, they would heal all of creation.