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"You can&039;t be real," I gasp, backing away froure "You&039;re not my brother You never really existed I made you up"

"Yes," the boy nods "You transforh he should have perished on your world, by subconsciously utilizing the power of the Kah-Gash We were surprised it cooperated with you But the Kah-Gash never ceases to surprise us"

"You&039;re not Art!" I shout "Art didn&039;t speak like this He never spoke at all"

"True," the boy says "Artery could communicate with his own kind, but only telepathically Art would never have been able to speak, even if he&039;d grown up

"I&039;m not the demon you stole or the child you turned it into," the boy continues "I a the difficulty you had accepting my natural form, I adopted the body of someone you would feel more comfortable with If you prefer, I can switch to the shape of your mother or father, but I think you will find"Are you a shape-shifter?" I ask, getting tohile

"No," he says "I have no physical body I asse its flesh and bones It was a creature like the one that attacked you They are pitiful beasts Hard to believe they are descended fros once as industrious as yourself"

"What do you mean?" I frown

"It&039;s a descendant of the Atlanteans," Art says "They were bipeds, like you, and their society was sily influenced by the beings of Atlantis"

"Atlantis?" I croak "What are you talking about? Atlantis was a mythical city"

"No," Art correctscities, the closest inhabitable planet to Earth The Atlanteans explored this world to its fullest, then the lifeless planets nearby, finally extending to their neighboring galaxies They visited your world Your ancestors worshipped them, built s down as they did"

"Are you pulling rowl

"I do not understand," Art responds

"Are you trying to fool me?"

"No Atlantis was an advanced planet The Atlanteans ise and kind But they harnessed the raw energy of this universe, and that is dangerous They knew the risks and accepted them It was the price they paid to explore further afield, beyond the confines of their own sector of the universe

"They fell within the space of an hour," Art goes on, and although he has a child&039;s face, he looks like an adult as he gazes upon the wrecks of the buildings "An explosion set off a chain reaction and their society crumbled The ships they&039;d sent off into space were linked to the home world, so they were destroyed too The sky filled with pollutants and ash Death claimed nineteen billion souls A few Atlanteans survived and mutated, but I doubt they would have wished for their offspring to end up like this It would have been better if they&039;d all perished"

Art falls silent I stare at the boy who is the iht of as a brother Now that I&039;ht-it&039;s a lot easier talking to soht

I study the graveyard of the world around , but I don&039;t think so I&039; on the reends was never a city at all, but a different world The infor the truth, the Atlanteans visited ht us to read and write, to build Maybe they even bred with us and-

"No," Art interrupts "The Atlanteans did not breed with lesser beings"