Archive of Our Own

It's not something you talk about, really.

“So I guess I have a mongoose now?” Taako says, pulling the collar of his shirt down to show off the new bond mark, just off-centre at the base of his throat. Sure enough, it's a small outline of a mongoose in dark red. “Could be worse.”

“Looks kinda badass,” Lup adds. Hers is identical, but placed closer to the nape of her neck. Barry peers closer at it and frowns.

“I haven't got one yet,” he complains. He gives his bare arms a cursory glance, but they're still free of any marks whatsoever.

The bond marks were their gateway into constructing the bond engine. With the Light of Creation, they finally had concrete ways of studying the bond marks, how they formed, studies that went beyond tracking circumstance and effect.

None of which is Barry’s particular area of study, but he knows as much as anyone in their society does about them – that bond marks represent connections between sentient beings, a tangible proof of an intangible concept. Marks start small and grow as a relationship does, urged on by actions and emotions. Beyond that, they vary wildly between people and cultures, each image and colour and placement different and full of individual meaning.

Each culture has their own meanings to ascribe to these things, but in the modern age, a lot of that has fallen away. Still, Barry can’t help but remember a few particular stereotypes. Elves treasure a few large marks over many small ones, dwarves hide their marks, gnomes display them like accessories. And humans collect them like tacky souvenirs.

He’s only known the rest of his crew for about a year now, but if they’re the last representatives of their entire culture, than the stereotypes couldn’t be more wrong.

“You haven't even got one from any of us, though, right?” Taako asks him, cheerfully ignoring any social convention dictating how you probably shouldn't ask people about what marks they do and don't have. “It's been months. Pretty sure the mongeese aren't making the cut if we aren't.”

“Kinda harsh,” Lup says, tone carefully blank. Taako just shrugs.

“Hey, we aren't in Fantasy Kansas anymore, Lulu,” he says. Lup scowls. “If we can't have a little friendly chat about bond marks, what's the fuckin’ point?”

“It's fine,” Barry says, embarrassed but unsure whether it's from the subject or Lup’s defence of him. “I don't have a lot of marks. They take a while to come up.”

It's better than the pathetic truth. He has exactly two -- one for his mother, one for his childhood best friend, both of whom died long before the Hunger attacked their plane.

“Well, we have time, at least,” Lup says. She stretches and twists one last time, craning her neck to see the mongoose mark in the mirror. Barry looks away.

She's more right than she knows. Lucretia is pressed against the railing as they fly out of the storm that is the Hunger, tears on her face. Lup has an arm around her, although her eyes are dry and hard. Merle braces himself against the stairs to the bridge, Taako stands in the middle of the deck with clenched fists, Barry is desperately scanning through readouts on his handheld instruments, and Magnus—

Magnus is there. The white threads of light surround them all, and Magnus is there again, his black eye proud on his face, and the bear claw of his new bond mark with the Power Bear peeking out from under his rolled-up sleeves.

They fly into a new plane, they live, they search, they fight, and they die, but they always end up there again, over and over, with the only sign of the passing time being the bond marks that appear and grow on their skin.

It's fascinating, the way their entire beings are reset, and yet the bond marks gained during each cycle remain. Barry would love to study it further, but… there are other priorities on this mission. And despite everything…

“It's just not something you talk about,” he tells Lucretia helplessly. “Not where I come from, anyway.”

Lucretia nods, finishes her sentence, then looks up from her journal and says, “I suppose I have a different perspective. After all these years, it's just another thing to record.”

“All these years,” Barry repeats. “It's only been, what, nineteen cycles?”

“Nineteen years,” Lucretia confirms. “I'm twenty-five, Barry, or I was when we set off. We've been travelling together for almost half my life, now.” She leans forward and looks him in the eye, something she rarely does. “If we can't trust each other with these things, then what are we doing out here?”

Her words are an odd echo of Taako’s from their first cycle. Maybe that's what drives him to speak up on their uninhabited beach world.

Already the cycle is ideal, with the Light recovered the very day after it falls, and their location on this quiet shoreline only adds to the carefree mood. And, after a few days of suspicion (there has to be a catch, right?), even Davenport starts to relax into it and embrace the break they've somehow caught.

He’s out there now in the shallows, floating on his back near Merle. Further out, Lup and Magnus are applauding and catcalling as Taako does dolphin-like flips over incoming waves. Lucretia is next to him on the beach, sketching in a journal, and Barry is sitting, as usual, away from the fun.

Next time they find a world with a pool, he's really gonna have to teach himself to swim.

Merle ducks under the surface for a few moments, then emerges with an armful of seaweed that he gleefully dumps on Davenport, who flails and shrieks, and then they're both swatting water at each other. It's fun to see their pragmatic captain actually having fun, for once. But something else catches his eye.

They'd all packed for two months of climate controlled ship living, as per the mission briefing. New clothes had been picked up along the way, yes, but with the exception of Taako’s short skirts and Magnus’ tank tops, none of them are particularly revealing. And yes, after twenty years, they've all seen each other in various states of undress -- all very much embarrassing on Barry's part, but he suspects some of the others had engaged in some significantly nicer situations san clothes. But he doesn't really want to think more on that for a few reasons.

In any case, this is the first time they've all been around each other with their bond marks bared in a purposeful way, thanks to Taako’s home-transfigured bathing suits. It seems significant. Barry takes a deep breath and tells himself to seize the moment.

“Merle’s got a few marks,” he says, nodding his head towards the dwarf. Lucretia looks up and twitches the corner of her lips as Merle’s head breaks the surface after a particularly large wave, shaking his hair out and hauling Davenport up by the arm. Even at this distance, Barry can see a few darkly coloured marks scattered over his chest, with a larger one taking up space on his upper arm. “Are… do you have any..?”

Lucretia presumably takes pity of him and his shocking social skills. “A few,” she says. She’s wearing a short-sleeved shirt for once, like Barry, and she turns her forearm up to show him a silvery series of lines. “That’s Merle’s, I think,” she says. Barry peers at it with interest. It’s mid-sized, as bond marks go, taking up most of her wrist, and on closer inspection it does bear some resemblance to the white threads that pull them back together at the end of each cycle.

“You’re pretty close, huh?” he says. Lucretia smiles gently.

“I like to think so,” she says, “but I have a mark for all of you.”

That’s. Unexpected. “Really?” Barry asks.

“I told you before, Barry. We’ve been travelling together for almost half my life. We live on a ship that’s powered by bonds, for goodness’ sake,” she laughs. “Do you think the others don’t have a mark for you as well?”

Even more unexpected. “I… never thought about it,” he says slowly. Whenever he’d considered the rest of his crew’s bond marks, it was always in the context of their relationships with each other, excluding him, or about how he was yet to even gain one. The fact that they might have marks representing him when he had nothing…

“I’m sure they’d all be happy to talk about it,” Lucretia says. She’s watching the ocean again, with a peaceful expression. It looks good on her.

“Maybe,” Barry says. He pokes at the sand again. Yeah, maybe.

After that conversation, Barry looks over the others with a new insight.

Minus Merle, who goes down sick after the first week and recluses himself back to the ship with few exceptions, they all seem reluctant to leave the shore for any period of time. Which means many opportunities for some covert people watching.

Magnus doesn’t have nearly as many as he’d thought. Mostly they’re clustered around his thighs (he really hopes Magnus doesn’t notice him staring at his thighs), but there’s also the bear claw on his bicep, along with a paw print on the small of his back that he’s only too happy to talk about.

 “Hell yeah, check it,” Magnus says, twisting and pulling up his shirt to show off the mark. It’s smaller than the bear claw, but the bright red block colouring stands out much more. “I knew a dog trainer when I was a kid. She was awesome. First bond mark I ever got, thought it was so cool, you know? All my friends before that were, y’know, actual dogs, so.”

Merle isn’t exactly keen on company, but Barry does catch Davenport slipping out of the sickbay on the Starblaster at sunset one afternoon, while everyone else is out watching Taako’s latest stunt. Barry is going over some information he’d gathered two cycles ago and never looked at again, but he glances up at the sound of the door swishing open and closed again.

Davenport looks… tired, he thinks. Their captain scrubs a hand over his face and smooths a hand through his hair, for once out of its habitual ponytail, worrying at a spot behind his ear before putting his hair back up. There’s a second where Barry wonders whether it would be better to stay silent or announce his presence, but then his mouth makes the decision for him, saying, “Hey, Cap, think he’ll be alright?”

Davenport jumps. “Oh, Barry,” he says, yanking part of his hair in shock. He grimaces and shakes his head a little. “What did you—? Oh, uh, yeah, he’ll be fine. He’s Merle, y’know,” he says wryly.

“Yeah, I guess,” Barry says. Davenport rubs his thumb behind his ear again, seemingly without realising. “Uh… sorry if I’m overstepping, Captain, but are you alright?”

Davenport sighs, and gives Barry an appraising look. Barry straightens his posture without thinking. “You weren’t with the Institute for long before this mission, were you?”

“No sir,” Barry says, slipping back into formalities. “Transferred a few months before.”

Davenport nods. “I knew Merle at the Institute for a pretty long time… pretty well, too. Well enough, at least.” He turns his head just enough for Barry to finally see what he’d been messing with. It’s a dark green bond mark, just barely visible against his dark skin. At first Barry thinks it’s just a leaf, not even that large – but then he realises that the leaf is connected to a long vine, with other leaves branching off it, stretching out under Davenport’s hair and disappearing below his collar.

“In all that time, I’ve never known him to worry about a thing,” Davenport continues, turning his head back and letting his ponytail fall again. “I’ve gotten used to worrying enough for the both of us, I guess. Even if whatever dumb thing he does won’t matter after we reset at the end of the year.”

“I’m sure he’ll be fine,” Barry says. “And, uh, thanks for, telling me. That.”

“Lucretia mentioned you were interested in bond marks,” Davenport says with a shrug. “If we’re trusting each other with our lives, we can trust each other with this, right?”

“Right,” Barry repeats.

Over the course of the first few months, Lup loses most of her interest in swimming. It does seem pretty repetitive, not that Barry would know. But Taako is still enthusiastically going out into the waves each day, and by the time their year is half-gone, he’s made up some sort of wooden board that floats, carrying him over the waves with ease. It looks pretty sick, if he’s honest, and he means the board and Taako himself.

He’s sitting on some rocks overlooking the beach, just admiring them both, when Lup plants herself at his side, sucking down a smoothie out of some large fruit. “Enjoying the view?” she asks. Barry nods, not really paying attention to Lup for once.

“He’s pretty good, I’ll admit,” she continues.

“Yeah,” Barry says, absently.

“You’re not the first to fall for his sweet flips routine.”

“Mm.”

“I guess on this motley crew, you might actually be in with a chance. You’re not exactly his type, but I can probably put in a good word—”

“Woah, no, wait,” Barry says, frantically rewinding back the last few seconds. “I didn’t – no, uh, I’m not, with Taako, or about him, I guess. Uh.”

Lup slurps her smoothie louder than seems physically possible, given the lack of a straw.

“Seriously, that’s not what this is, I swear,” he continues. He can feel his face heating up as it sinks in. “I mean, he’s great, and he looks great for sure, but—”

Lup is looking at him with a raised eyebrow, and in a fit of dramatic irony, Barry is suddenly struck by how much the expression makes her look like Taako. They’re truly such distinct people that half the time, Barry forgets they’re technically identical.

“I just really like his moves?” he tries. “In a strictly platonic sense.”

“If you say so,” she says, but her voice is playful. She stands, putting a hand on his shoulder to lever herself up, and starts walking away. “I can still put in that good word!” she yells over her shoulder.

“Thanks, I guess,” he yells back. She flips him a quick thumbs up and Barry watches as she goes. She’s wearing a backless top, and Barry hadn’t even noticed, but he notices now, because it exposes the bond mark on her back.

She and Taako definitely have the largest bond marks he’s ever seen, and he had in fact known about them before they even met. They were infamous on the Institute campus – a pair of beautiful elf twins, as brilliant as they were chaotic, with matching, incandescent bond marks that they showed off at any opportunity.

As she walks away, the mark ripples over Lup’s back, the swirls of silver and blue and purple shifting. It has no discernible shape, just a cloud of colour that stretches over her skin, large enough that it doesn’t fade until the very nape of her neck. And if he looks out to sea, he knows he’ll be able to spot the similar riot of colour on Taako, flashing gold and pink and red in the sun.

They’re both so beautiful to look at, even if it hurts to know he’ll never have anything touch his skin that even remotely resembles it.

But there’s no harm in trying. The next day he’s waiting at the shore when Taako paddles in, wringing his long hair out as he glides over the waves. “Hey, Taako,” he says. “Can I ask you a favour?”

He doesn’t even notice until two cycles down the line, but he’s stuck out of the ship without his shoes, and when he finally gets back, he sits down to pick the tiny rocks out of his feet.

And on the bottom of his feet, in the middle of his arches, are two bond marks. Small, but bright, they both have a design that looks like flames – the left coloured in silver, blue and purple, and the right in gold, pink and red.

The white threads pull them back together, and suddenly half their crew is back on board the Starblaster.

Merle had left early that year for Parley, his outline drifting away into smoke before the day was over, and everything had gone downhill from there. A hostile planet with a militia that tightly controlled the population had caught Taako in the crossfire within a week of their arrival. Davenport and Lup, both on edge from the sudden losses, led a few ill-fated expeditions to retrieve the Light once it touched down on the other side of the planet, but Magnus was injured badly in a skirmish, and Lucretia caught an illness that none of them knew anything about, and without their healer aboard—

Lup has her arm around Taako’s waist, talking quietly. He nods a few times and leans his forehead against hers.

“You good up there, Cap’n?” Merle calls out, heading for the bridge.

“Don’t come in here!” Davenport yells back. Merle starts, but Barry’s used to that furious tone by now. He’s been hearing it for the past year.

“Did we get the light?” Magnus asks. He’s looking around, a little dazed. “I don’t remember dying, did we get it?” He looks to Lucretia, but she shakes her head.

“I got sick,” she says. Her voice is shaking too.

“We didn’t get it,” Barry tells them both. He probably sounds bitter, but that’s fine. Everyone is back. They can try again.

The bond engine’s hum quietens, and Davenport appears, impressively intimidating for someone barely over three feet. “Merle,” he grits out, “can I talk to you? Privately?”

“Sure, Dav,” Merle says, but Davenport barely waits for the first syllable before he’s grabbing a handful of Merle’s shirt and dragging him back into the interior living quarters.

It’s impossible to slam an automatic door, but somehow Davenport manages it. The noise doesn’t stop there, either. Everyone winces at the sheer volume of Davenport’s yelling, audible through the thick walls of the ship, even if the words are indistinguishable.

“Hachi machi,” Taako murmurs. “Tough cycle, huh?”

“You kidding? It was a blast without you there,” Lup says. She seems jovial enough, but she’s still clutching at Taako’s waist tightly.

They end up staying on deck, no one willing to go back inside, even after the yelling had fallen silent. “I mean, what’s he so mad about, anyway?” Taako asks, lounging against the sun-heated metal of the ship walls. Lup is slouched beside him, while Barry sits across from them against the railing. “Dude was dead the whole year.”

“Pretty sure that’s the point,” Barry says. Magnus sprawls out next to him on the deck, and Lucretia sits delicately on his other side. “Could have used a healer a few times.”

“It wasn’t too bad,” Magnus says. He’d died around four months in, before things took a turn for the desperate. “We had some bonding time. Real fire-forged shit. Check it.” He pulls the cuffs of his cargo shorts up just enough to show off a scratchy blue bond mark that stretches down his thigh. “It’s bigger now, right? Me and Barry were doing some crazy back-to-back badass stunts.”

And now, for once, Barry can join this particular conversation. “It was pretty cool,” he says, and hitches his shirt up at the waist. On his hip, small but solid black and starkly visibly, is the outline of knife. Lup and Taako both scramble forward to see it, cheering loudly.

“Hell yeah, Bluejeans!” Lup says, at the same time as Taako’s “Knew you had to get one eventually, Barold.”

“I have more than one,” Barry retorts, and then clamps his mouth shut. Lup and Magnus make an ‘oooh’ noise in unison. Taako waves a hand.

“Nah nah nah, if we’re having a sesh, I’m doing a stealth roll to get the booze from inside,” he says, rolling to his feet. “Still got that nasty shit from that dragonborn tower city. Seems like as good a time to get fucked up as any, right?”

“I’m not gonna say no,” Magnus shrugs.

And shockingly, Lucretia adds, “I… wouldn’t mind that.”

“Aw hell yeah!” Lup cheers. “’Cretia’s ready to get wild.” Lucretia hides her mouth behind her hand, but her eyes crinkle.

The impromptu party doesn’t actually get too crazy, although Barry feels like showing off the marks he’s collected from them all is pretty off-the-chain for him. And to be fair, he doesn’t remember much after Taako starts his Thong Song dance routine.

He wakes up on the couch inside, arm hanging off the side. There’s someone pressed against his back – he risks a glance over his shoulder and sees a mass of wavy blonde hair, and knows it’s Lup without any further information. Across from him, he can see Lucretia curled up in the stuffy armchair, and, yep, that’s Magnus passed out on the rug between them, Taako unconscious on his chest.

With careful movements, he extracts himself out of Lup’s arms and sits up, back creaking. He stretches, rolling his neck, and when he opens his eyes again, Merle is standing in the kitchen doorway, looking between him and Lup in an exaggerated fashion.

Clearly, Barry’s old enough to get an aching back from one night on the couch, but not old enough to stop himself from blushing.

“Dav wants a team meeting when everyone’s awake,” Merle says after a few moments, clearly still amused. “Well, he wanted to wake y’all up, but I thought you looked too peaceful.”

“Thanks, Dad,” Barry grumbles, still too embarrassed to make it sound properly sarcastic. “So you two are still talking?”

“Aw, it was just a little spat. It’ll be fine.” He stands up and stretches. “C’mon, I’ll make breakfast.”

The rest of the crew filter into the kitchen one at a time, but all in fairly good spirits, helped no doubt by the smell of pancakes. Even Davenport only looks a little sheepish when he shuffles in half an hour later. He sits at the table with everyone else and nods, smiling at Merle when he hands him plate. He turns his head to say something quietly, and Barry sees the dark green leaf marked on his cheek, definitely not present the previous day.

Merle laughs, and Davenport ducks his head. Barry goes back to his pancakes. It’s a new cycle, and everyone is back. They can try again.

The sky on this world is a pale pink with two suns hanging distantly. It makes an almost shocking sort of longing rise in Barry’s chest – he thought he’d gotten over the worst of his homesickness after the half century mark.

“There’s a couple prominent cities, as far as I can tell,” Davenport calls out from his customary spot at the helm, on the bridge. Barry stands down on the deck, watching out over the railing. “Anyone got a preference?”

“Whichever one is cold!” Magnus volunteers.

“Wherever there’s food other than bread,” Lup complains.

“The southern continent seems well-developed,” Barry says, tapping a finger on his chin. He stops himself after a second – that’s Davenport’s mannerism, not his. “If we’re trying to avoid trouble…”

“Good joke,” he hears Davenport mutter. The captain sighs and spins the wheel, almost idly steering the ship into a banking turn. “We’ll go back up into orbit until the Light arrives. It shouldn’t be more than a day or two at this point, if we didn’t miss it already. But, after it shakes out, either way, we’ll circle back.”

Verdict delivered, the crew all shuffle out to the edge of the deck, taking up their habitual Light Watch positions. Barry stays where he is, looking out over the lowering horizon as Davenport takes them back up out of the atmosphere, but Lucretia heads to the stern, a journal practically appearing in her hand as she goes. Magnus races to the mast to climb it and keep a lookout, Merle waddles up the stairs to the bridge, and Lup and Taako saunter over to Barry, leaning against the railing on either side of him.

“Calling it now, this’ll be a weird one,” Lup says. “Maybe everyone is made of – I don’t know, salt?”

“Salt?” Taako repeats. “Creative.”

She shoves Barry’s shoulder, hard, knocking him into Taako and shoving him off balance by proxy. “Please don’t make me do a hit on your brother for you,” Barry says, but he’s smiling as he says it. Taako dramatically brushes some invisible dirt off his shoulder where Barry knocked him.

“Makes sense,” he says, settling back against the railing. “We’re due for another World of Weirdbeards. What was the last one, the hamster civilisation?”

“Babyville,” Barry corrects. They all take a moment to grimace at the memory. Lup picks at a nail. The red paint is chipping away, just as it always is when they reset.

“Anyway. Pretty sure it’ll be a mark-free world, too.”

Those ones are rare. “What makes you sure?” Barry asks. Lup looks him over. She does that sometimes, just looks at him and makes him feel uncomfortably… visible. It’s Cycle 39, as they’ve designated their time, forty years of knowing each other, almost twenty years of knowing he’s in love with her, and still he can’t help but cringe away from that look.

After a moment, she looks away and yawns, stretching her arms above her head and turning to lean her back against the railing instead. “Just feels like it.”

“Got that Nat 20 perception roll, huh?” Taako says.

“Is that how perception works?”

“Probably best not to think about it,” Barry says.

The conversations dies out after that, but they all stay like that, clustered together on the railing, the twins bracketing Barry in. They’re just above atmosphere now, looking down on the planet, all of them watching for the streak of light that will herald the beginning of their search.

Hours pass. Taako disappears inside, and Lup follows a few minutes later. Lucretia strolls past at one point, writing in her ever-present journal. Occasionally, Magnus gives an aborted shout, then apologises for the false alarm. Merle walks up and down the stairs to the bridge at least four times before he gives up and goes to take a nap.

Barry himself is almost asleep on the railing when a mug is shoved in his face. He jumps and slams his chin, knocking his glasses loose, and only has a second to mourn their loss before a Mage Hand snatches them out of the air.

“Oh, uh, thanks, Lup,” he murmurs, tired tongue tripping over the words. The person is a blur of blonde hair and brown skin without his glasses, but Taako probably would’ve let his glasses fall, so Lup is a safe bet.

“NP, NP.” He fixes his glasses and takes the mug. It’s one of approximately a thousand they’ve picked up, as gifts and souvenirs from temporary friends and tacky gift shops. This particular mug is bright red and shaped like a crescent moon with a flat bottom and no handle. It’s absolutely impractical, and absolutely Taako’s favourite.

“Got kinda rough there at the end, huh,” he says, still quiet. Lup holds her own mug – a glazed ceramic thing covered in bubble writing advertising a place called Shrimp Heaven – and watches the planet below.

“Pretty rough,” she agrees. “But hey, new cycle, new me, all that jazz.”

“Yeah. Guess so.” For once, she’s the one avoiding his gaze.

She’d stuck close at his side after Magnus went, but it was mostly an offer of protection, not one of companionship, but still. Spend enough nights huddled up for warmth and trying desperately to sleep through the sounds of battle, it’s inevitable to feel like you know them a little better.

“If you wanted to talk about it,” he offers, only to be cut off by a shout from Magnus.

“It’s there! Starboard side!”

Barry and Lup look up in unison to see a dazzling star, larger than all except the nearby sun, shining brightly. For a few seconds it seems like it’s not even moving – but then it grows larger, brighter, almost blinding, and then it’s streaking past them at incredible speed. Barry feels himself gasp involuntarily. It doesn’t pass directly next to them, but it’s closer than it’s ever gotten before, and it’s beautiful.

“Got a heading!” Davenport calls, and the ship hums to life from its previously idle state. “Looks like southern continent wins.”

The Starblaster banks at a sharp angle and plummets after the Light.

They set down just outside a vast forest, but for once, luck is on their side – it takes less than an hour to find the Light, sitting plainly in a clearing with no one else in sight.

Which leaves the rest of the year for their leisure. The nearest city is small but bustling, busy enough to provide enough entertainment for the whole crew. Taako and Lup immediately scope out the cuisine, as usual. Lucretia goes with them, more often than not, recording conversations and cultural landmarks, sketching the sights. Even Merle and Magnus get into a routine of their own, walking the city every other day, in between maintaining the Starblaster.

Davenport is the one who spends the most time learning from the city’s inhabitants, this cycle. Mostly because this particular city is solely inhabited by gnomes.

“The differences in language especially are fascinating,” he enthuses over dinner, almost a week after they collected the light. “It’s not exactly my area of expertise, and I’m not even fluent in our world’s Gnomish, but the Common language is almost more of a creole with Gnomish. I’ve been trying to work it out. I’m meeting with the city council tomorrow, so I’m hoping they can direct me to where I can get more information.”

The council, fascinated by their story, does one better. They assign a guide to the crew, tasked with imparting as much knowledge as possible, and therefore facilitating the exchange of cultural information.

In fewer words, a spy. But a nice one.

Halfway through the year, she arrives bright and early at the Starblaster, parked outside the city limits, with bundles of flowers in her arms and a smile on her face. “Maiisdanâ,” she greets Barry, who is only half awake. He squints in the face of her perpetual energy. “The festival has begun. Is the rest of your crew ready?”

“Festival?” Barry mumbles. He’s been shut up in his room for the past five days, going over a series of photos they’d taken a few cycles back. The guide nods.

“The captain assured me you would all be most interested in the Festival of Bonds,” she says, and that perks Barry up. Davenport hadn’t said anything about it, but it sounds fascinating. Especially since, just as Lup had predicted, this is a world where no one they had encountered has any sort of bond marks.

“Give us a few minutes,” he says, and goes back inside to wake up the rest of the crew. They’ve all agreed that it’s probably best they don’t let their guide into the ship itself.

It takes a collaborative effort on Barry and Merle’s part, but they get everyone up and ready within half an hour. Most of them were still sleeping, but Davenport had been dressed and fastidiously putting his hair up when Merle had ducked in to check on him. Thus, while the rest of them stumble around pulling on shirts and hastily eating breakfast, Davenport spends the thirty minutes occupying the guide and subtly dissuading her from going inside.

“Iidrii,” Barry hears Davenport say when they finally make it outside. The guide is practically hanging off his arm. “Iidrii? Is my pronunciation right?”

The guide nods rapidly. “Yes, and the double vowels are notoriously hard for non-natives, as you’ve no doubt noticed – you’re a natural, Captain!” She looks away shyly. “That is – of course you are.”

Magnus muffles a burst of laughter behind his cough, and even Barry finds himself scratching his nose to hide a grin. Their guide, besides being incredibly knowledgeable in local culture, is also somewhat hopelessly infatuated with Davenport, which Barry probably shouldn’t find as funny as he does, considering his own situation.

Maybe it’s because Davenport is equally hopelessly oblivious to her every advance. Case in point—

“Not really,” he says with a shrug. “I’ve been going over it with Taako and Lup. Should we head off?”

“Of course,” the guide says, visibly disappointed.

The festival is in full swing when they reach town, the welcoming arch covered in flowers woven together in a riot of red, orange, yellow and green. The rest of the town is similarly decked out, and the streets are filled with market stalls laden with tiny flower-themed trinkets, all in the same four colours.

“Bonds are very important to us, as I’ve told you before, Captain,” their guide says, raising her voice above the bustle of the crowd. “Especially in smaller communities like ours, connections with each other are prized far above things like wealth or possessions. This yearly festival celebrates those bonds! There’s a lot of different elements, but my favourite has to be the markets…”

The guide continues on, but Barry lets his attention wander. Lup has stepped away from the group to inspect one of the tables, crouching slightly so as not to loom over the gnome running the stall. “Anything interesting?” he asks. Lup nods thoughtfully.

“Supporting local businesses,” she says, and digs in her pocket for a few coins. She hands them over with a smile and then plucks two bracelets from the table. They’re fairly simple, just dyed rope and tiny flowers threaded through, but on closer inspections Barry can see that the flowers are actually made from fired clay, sculpted and painted in painstaking detail while still remaining as light and delicate as the real thing.

He takes one without thinking and runs his fingers over it, tracing the red petals. “They’re beautiful,” he says, half to the stall holder and half to Lup. “Taako will love it.”

Lup snorts. “Yeah, maybe,” she says, fondness in her tone, “but it’s for you, not him, you goober.”

He gapes at her. She just rolls her eyes and takes the bracelet back, only to carefully fasten it around his wrist. “I’m really glad you finally got bond marks from us,” she says, voice soft but clear even over the crowd. Her hand stills on Barry’s wrist.

Luckily, he’s saved from his own speechlessness by a loud tolling, a bell being struck somewhere nearby. “Oh, the ceremonies!” he hears their guide say. Lup gives him one last smile before she heads back to their friends, who’ve only made it a few metres down the road. “I was so caught up… come, come, you should see! Maybe even participate?” The guide’s pale face is turning pink. Taako turns his head and laughs quietly into Magnus’ shoulder. Shockingly, Barry finds himself significantly less inclined to laugh at how flustered she is when he himself is probably still just as red as the flowers now circling his wrist.

The guide leads them out of the depths of the marketplace and up an incline to a series of structures. Most of the buildings they'd seen during their stay are cosy and low to the ground, but these are tall and slim, clustered together at the top of the hill. Each has a bell attached to a horizontal pole that sticks out from the spire, and all are currently chiming in a way that sounds incredibly old.

“Each chapel is dedicated to performing different ceremonies,” the guide says. “They're used as normal for the rest of the year, but for today they hold mass ceremonies. It is superstition and tradition, but most consider ceremonies held today to have good fortune and longevity.”

“They're… bonding ceremonies?” Davenport guesses. The guide beams and puts a hand on his arm.

“Yes, yes! Of all sorts. Differentiated by the flowers, which you're an expert on now, Captain.”

“I wouldn't say so,” he says, looking around at the bright flowers decorating the doors of the chapels. “Orange is for work relationships, yellow for romance… green for family?”

The guide nods. “And red for friendship. There are many other kinds of bonds and relationships, of course, and relationships usually aren't exclusively one thing, but these are our main ceremonial halls. I don't suppose you would be interested in joining the festivities..?”

“This is getting kinda sad,” Lup murmurs in Barry's ear. He winces sympathetically at the eager look on the guide’s face, paired with the polite interest on Davenport’s.

“I'd be interested,” he offers, if only to break the weird energy of the moment. “I mean, it sounds interesting. We only have equivalent ceremonies for romantic relationships, where we're from.” The guide looks mystified.

“Only..? How odd. But we would be honoured if you would join us, in whatever ceremony you wished.”

Immediately Magnus hooks his arms around Barry's shoulders, pulling him into a loose hug and pushing Lup away. “Barry, Barry, let's get friend-married!” he chants. “I get to marry Barry, guys, I have dibs!”

“You can have him,” Taako says. He grabs Lup by the forearm instead and continues, “Sibling bonding time?”

“Sibling bonding time,” she confirms. They start walking for the chapel draped in green. Lup looks over her shoulder after a moment and meets Barry’s eye, giving a hesitant wave. The bracelet slides down her wrist. He waves back.

“Marry that Barry! Marry that Barry!” Magnus continues to chant. Lucretia is hiding a laugh behind her hand.

“Bonding ceremonies aren't limited to two people,” the guide tries to interrupt, but Magnus can't be stopped. Barry pats the massive hand on his chest.

“Guess I'm getting married,” he says. “You guys joining in?”

The guide gives Davenport a hopeful look. Merle, finally, distributes some of Pan’s mercy and takes Davenport’s hand. “You guys do your stuff. We're gonna check out one of the other halls.” He makes an overt gesture towards the chapel decked out in yellow.

The guide’s face falls. Mission accomplished. “Of course,” she says, and to her credit, her tone stays completely professional. “Please, enjoy your ceremony. Many happy years to you.”

She turns on her heel and marches into the red chapel.

“You too,” Davenport calls after her, a second too late. He gives Merle a quizzical look. “You don't want to go with everyone else?”

Merle waves a hand. “Nah, I married Lucretia a decade ago, that's old hat now.”

“That was for diplomatic purposes only,” Lucretia says.

“Anyway, I wanna pick up some officiating tips. Never know when I'm gonna have to pull that trick out again.”

“If you say so,” Davenport says doubtfully. But he lets Merle lead him off by the hand.

After a moment, Lucretia turns to them with a nervous smile.

“So,” she says, “I suppose we should go and get married, then?”

“Yeah!” Magnus cheers. He releases Barry from the hug in favour of putting an arm over both their shoulders. “Squad marriage!”

“Marriage squad,” Barry laughs.

He'd never actually been to a wedding back in their home dimension. During their trip, he's been to at least a dozen -- friends they'd made, important ceremonies they'd been privy to, and yes, occasionally, marriages amongst the crew for various reasons. Lucretia and Merle's wedding was a pompous affair as a show of faith with a hostile society they'd been dropped into a while back. Way back in their first decade, Taako and Magnus posed as a married couple for half a cycle after getting separated from the rest of the crew while they tried to covertly find their way back. And he’s pretty sure that party he and Davenport had been invited to a few years ago had some sort of wedding undertone, but neither of them spoke the language, and the twins had refused to translate half of what the clan’s leader was saying.

This ceremony is much easier to follow.

They cram into the back of the chapel just as someone at the front starts speaking in a ringing voice. The minister, presumably, or whatever this world’s equivalent is. “Friends!” they say, a wide smile on their face. “We gather on this day to tie ourselves in a bond that is sacred, one that is a serious commitment, and one that is something to be joyfully celebrated. And with joy I begin the proceedings. Turn to one another!”

Across the crowd, people pair off, or cluster in small groups, all turning inward. Magnus nudges Barry and nods to a group of six forming a small circle.

“We could’ve had them beat for numbers,” he whispers loudly. Lucretia shushes him and steps out from under his arm, pulling them both in to form a triangle.

“Do you think it’s rude to write this speech down?” she whispers, much more quietly.

The minister’s voice rings out again. “Join hands, touch foreheads, or make contact as you wish.”

Magnus immediately grabs bother their hands. “Guess that answers that.”

“Friendship is a bond of endurance. A bond that can weather tests that will break others. This bond you share with one another, this bond that is formalised and recognised before all today, is one of hardship. But I urge you to never forget that it is one of joy, too!”

A murmur of happiness goes up from the crowd. He hadn’t exactly been nervous going into this, but unexpectedly, Barry is starting to actual feel pretty good about the whole thing. Joyful, even. He squeezes Magnus and Lucretia’s hands. They squeeze back.

“In this hall I see those who have fought for this bond, you who have weathered storms and found your home in ruins. But the foundation remains strong! And so I say to you, may your foundation remain ever stable beneath your feet. And may your home ever be filled with joy!”

A cheer goes up amongst the crowd, and Barry finds himself cheering too. Even Lucretia is smiling widely.

“Now! Turn to your partners and repeat the honoured words.” There’s the sound of shuffling as folk move in place. “You have walked this path with me.”

“You have walked this path with me,” Barry says, in sync with Lucretia and Magnus. He looks at Lucretia as he does and she nods slightly.

“Now continue forward with me.”

“Now continue forward with me.” Magnus is getting misty eyed.

“And if you leave this path…”

“And if you leave this path,” Barry says. He’s probably holding their hands too tightly, but they’re holding on with just as much strength.

“…I know you will be waiting at the end.”

“I know you will be waiting at the end.” Magnus’ voice falters halfway through and a tear slips down Lucretia’s face.

“I am joyfully yours, now and always.”

“I am joyfully yours,” Magnus chokes out before his voice cracks. Barry drops his hand in favour of a hug instead, and finds Lucretia doing the same. Magnus clutches both of them to him and puts his face in Lucretia’s hair.

At the front of the chapel, the minister is giving some concluding remarks, but the formal vows are clearly over. Another cheer goes up when the minister finishes, and then the crowd starts to file towards the door.

“You good, bud?” Barry asks. Magnus shakes his head. “Okay. It’s alright. C’mon, let’s get out of the way, huh?”

Together, he and Lucretia manage to shuffle Magnus out of the doorway and back into a quiet corner, away from the crowd. He’s quiet, but his shoulders shake, and his tears drip on Barry’s ear. No one says anything. Barry rubs Magnus’ back and accidentally grazes Lucretia’s hand – she’s doing the same.

“I hate it when someone dies early,” Magnus says eventually. His voice is raspy and unusually quiet. “I hate it when I die early. I don’t want to leave you guys alone.”

“It’s not like you meant to die,” Barry says.

“I shouldn’t have rushed in,” Magnus retorts. Finally he lets them go to scrub at his face. “I want to be able to help. It was bad, last year. I should have been there ‘til the end.”

There’s nothing Barry can say to that. It was bad, with Merle and Taako gone so soon, and after Magnus died and Lucretia got sick it was all he could do to keep Lup and Davenport from flinging themselves into a fight they wouldn’t come back from.

“What happened, happened,” Lucretia says firmly. “You’re back. That’s all that matters.” She smiles, very small and fairly weak. “Waiting at the end, right?”

Magnus sniffs. “Yeah,” he rasps, and wipes his eyes again. “We should find the others. Their shit is probably done by now too.”

They walk to the doors, Barry and Lucretia on either side of Magnus, crowding against him as close as possible.

It’s lighter outside, and sure enough, the rest of the crew is milling around, although their guide is missing. “Hey newlyweds,” Merle says breezily. “Have fun?”

“So fun,” Magnus replies. Taako squints at him.

“Hey, asshole, you didn’t cry at our wedding, what gives?”

“You kept saying my last name was Dongman,” Magnus says. Taako makes a pffsh sounds.

“Whatever. Me and Lup are like, double family now, apparently.” Lup nods and holds up a bright green woven bracelet, different in style to the red one on her other wrist, then points at a matching one on Taako.

“Look, we’re twins,” she says, and laughs. Magnus laughs too, and he really does seem to be cheering up quickly. Just like always.

“I’d love to compare the similarities and differences between ceremonies,” Lucretia says, then looks to Merle. “Did you take notes? For your officiating.”

Merle scratches his chin. “Aw, hell, you know, this memory of mine, I’ve already forgotten half of it. Sorry, Lucretia.”

“What about you, Captain?”

Under her curious look, Davenport seems uncharacteristically evasive. “Well,” he hedges, “I could probably remember… some of it. I was watching the people, really.”

“Oh shit, you guys got married too,” Taako says, absolutely delighted.

Merle taps the side of his nose. Taako gives a high pitched cackle that brings a promise of years of teasing and makes Barry automatically break into a light sweat.

But to everyone’s surprise, the matter is dropped with minimal needling. Maybe Taako is just feeling the spirit of the day. Maybe he’s just glad for confirmation that there’s no harsh feelings between Merle and Davenport since their argument at the start of the year. For whatever reason, they all head back to the main festival in companionable silence.

The week-long festival flies by in a flurry of petals and the twice-daily ringing of the bells. On the last day, all seven of them gather in the chapel dedicated to friendship bonding ceremonies and join hands, repeating the vows with muffled laughter and elbow nudges instead of tears. Lup, squeezed between Barry and Lucretia, beams the entire time.

He thinks that will be what he remembers from this cycle. They take the Light and run the second the Hunger’s storm clouds gather, not wishing any extra damage on this world. As they run to the edge of the planar system, Barry finds himself hoping that their guide isn’t hurt in the attack.

But after they reset, he thinks about that ceremony, and about bonds in a place without bond marks. About how each of them said the phrase “I am joyfully yours” just a little differently, but all with the same sincerity.

They've been through worlds like this before. Their home planet was pretty stable, in terms of weather, but a few realities they'd passed through experienced storms and natural phenomena on a massive scale. The mushroom planet and its clouds of spores, a planet where tsunamis regularly swept over the small landmasses that dotted the surface, the unchanging forest world he and Merle had gotten lost in – but each time, they hadn't really felt the impact until they'd landed on the surface.

Barry is standing next to Lucretia on the deck, watching as she takes interested notes on the clouds below them, rapidly approaching. "I've never seen cloud formations so still… I’m interested to see what effect it has on the surface, since it seems planet-wide," she says, and Barry nods, and then they break through the clouds, and everything goes sideways.

Literally. Barry crashes into Lucretia as the deck tilts underneath them, sending them both skidding across the polished metal. Davenport yells something and the Starblaster claws its way back to stability, fighting against the blast of icy wind that’s suddenly battering at them from seemingly every direction.

He and Lucretia stagger back to the mast, clutching at the handholds Magnus installed cycles ago. Barry will have to thank him for that, if they get out of this one alive. “Where did this come from!” he shouts over the howling winds. Lucretia shakes her head, eyes squeezed shut.

“Who else is on deck?” she shouts back.

He doesn’t know the answer to that. Barry’s stomach rolls with fear, and the deck rolls beneath their feet again. The bow of the ship tilts upwards suddenly, violently, throwing the two of them into the air. Lucretia almost loses her grip, but Barry wrenches his arm around her to grab a different handhold, keeping himself as a barrier between her and the roar of the storm.

It’s almost impossible to hear anything over that roar, but in an absent way that’s probably due to shock, he thinks that Lucretia might be crying.

With a violent movement, the ship’s bow drops to horizontal and then a downward angle. Barry only has a moment to loosen his hold slightly before they hear the scream.

For a second his heart lurches like it’s been left behind – it’s Lup, it has to be Lup. But when he finally sees the source, he realises that he guessed the wrong twin.

Taako clings to a railing from the wrong side of the deck. His chin is hooked over it, arms desperately scrabbling at the smooth metal for purchase, and when his eyes dart around wildly for help, he looks afraid like Barry hasn’t seen in decades.

But he’s stuck here on the mast. He can’t let Lucretia fall just to save someone else—

Merle slides into view a second later. He’s barely tall enough to reach up and grab the railing himself, but he reaches for Taako’s hands anyway, and then they’re both glowing in a faint light. A strength buff, probably.

“Maggie’s coming!” Merle yells, just barely audible over the wind. “Just hold tight!”

Taako doesn’t say anything, or even nod. He just keeps holding tight.

Magnus rushes out moments after, crashing his way past Barry and Lucretia to reach their friends. Leaving Merle to anchor Taako, he braces against the railing and leans over it, locking arms around Taako’s waist to haul him back up.

And that’s when the wind increases tenfold. Barry has to lock his hands around the mast until his knuckles ache just to keep himself from flying off the deck as it starts to corkscrew in the air wildly, banking at sharp angles and throwing them from side to side. Lucretia is screaming, Barry is screaming, someone else is screaming, but he can’t think of anything except holding on, making sure at least one person is safe. If they crash, they crash, but he won’t let Lucretia go until he’s ripped away from her.

It feels like hours before the ship finally settles into a smooth dive once more, but it’s probably only a few minutes. The wind continues to rip at them, but it’s not enough to do more than muffle their hearing and whip their clothes and hair around them. Barry unclenches his hands stiffly, finally pulling away from the mast and Lucretia.

She’s a mess. Her previously tied-back hair is now a wild puff around her head, and her eyes are red and slightly unfocused. But she’s not looking at him. She’s turning to the spot on the railing where their friends were clinging to the ship and each other – the spot that’s now empty of any life.

“Oh, no,” is all he can think to say. His voice is croaky too, his mouth dry.

They’d ended the last cycle so well, well enough to forget how the previous one went. And now it’s happening again.

“Taako!” he hears from the front of the ship, near the cabin entrance. Lucretia’s eyes widen.

“Oh, no,” she repeats.

Lup slams her way onto the main deck a second later, hair wild and robes flying. She’s gripping her wand like it’s a sword. “Where are they,” she roars.

What can they say to that? They’re still in the air, still kilometres above the surface, and with the way they were getting tossed around, there’s no telling where their three wayward crewmates were tossed overboard.

She stalks her way over. The wind is really adding to her threatening image, Barry thinks. Still probably in shock. “Barry,” she says, voice low but clearly audible over the wind. “Where’s my brother?”

“Merle and Magnus were helping him,” he says. It sounds distant to his own ears. “They were helping him back on board. But we hit turbulence…”

Lup doesn’t attack him, or start crying, or emote at all, really. She just gives him that searching look. He doesn’t know what she sees, but after a moment, she nods, and heads for the railing.

Lucretia realises her intentions before Barry does. “No!” she cries, wrenching away from Barry to run after her. She throws her arms around Lup to pull her back, fighting against Lup’s struggles. “He’s gone, Lup! You won’t find him!”

“You don’t know that!” Lup shouts back. She finally squirms out of Lucretia’s grip, but Barry’s there to catch her. “Let me go, Bluejeans!”

“I will when you stop trying to kill yourself!” he yells. Lup’s glare is poisonous.

“I have magic powers, asshole, I’ll live,” she spits. She gives another furious struggle and Barry lets her go. “I’ll live, and I’ll find my brother!”

“Those winds probably tore them apart,” Barry says. There’s no point sugar-coating it. “They probably went over together, and got separated in the winds, and knocked unconscious from the G-force.”

“Merle has a higher G-force resistance than anyone at the Academy except Davenport,” Lup retorts. “He can take it.”

“Okay, so Merle stays conscious,” Barry says. He can see Lup settling into the debate, looking less likely to jump overboard each moment she could spent arguing instead. “He’s still separated from the others, and they’ll definitely be passed out.”

“But he did cast a strength buff on Taako,” Lucretia says suddenly. She looks thoughtful too, twisting her hair back as she speaks. “He could probably keep a grip even if he lost consciousness, with that advantage.”

“They have a chance,” Lup insists. “And it’s a better chance if I go after them.”

“They’re already gone, Lup! We’re miles from them by now. We have a better chance if you stay here.”

The ship is flying smoother now, the wind dropping as they get lower to the ground. “They’re out there, and I’m going to get them back,” Lup says firmly. Barry sighs and runs a hand through his hair, then rubs his eyes.

“I know you will,” he sighs. “Just – let this storm pass over, and then we can start looking.”

Davenport lands the ship in the middle of a barren stretch of field where the long grass is practically growing horizontal. There’s nothing for kilometres around except more grass and more wind. When he stumbles down from the bridge, he has a growing bruise on his cheek and a determined look that Barry remembers all too well from two cycles back.

“They’re gone, aren’t they,” he says. It’s not a question. Lup is stewing in silence, presumably already planning for her inevitable rescue mission, and Lucretia is looking down, so Barry nods. “Right. Okay. The clouds looked planet-wide, so we can assume that the winds we experienced in the upper atmosphere are permanent, which will make our escape problematic. Unless we find a way to fortify the ship against it, I think we’re stuck down here for the year, folks.”

“So unless the Light comes down in this field…” Lucretia starts, and Davenport grimaces.

“Don’t think we’re getting it this time,” he confirms. Another blow to morale. “But for all we know, the wind is usually confined to that upper atmosphere. We’ll camp out here for a few days and see how things shake out. If it calms down, we can do some fly-by scouting.”

“And look for Taako, and Merle and Magnus,” Lup says.

Davenport looks… pained, almost. For a second. But then he puts his pragmatic captain’s face back on. “They’re competent enough to look after themselves, if they survived that fall. We’ll put out some flares once the wind calms, and we’ll keep looking, but if they’re gone, they’re gone, Lup.”

She clenches her fists. “I’m not losing him again,” she says, low and threatening. But Davenport’s never one to back down, so he stares up at her without flinching.

“You can’t get yourself killed every time he does, either,” he says.

Lup clenches her jaw, but after a few seconds, she looks away. “I’m gonna prepare some flare spells,” she mutters. “Call me when the wind dies down.”

And she storms back into the cabin.

Honestly, Barry should’ve predicted it, but the days pass and the winds don’t die down. If anything, it seems like they’d landed during a calm period. The grass around them grows horizontal from the constant gales that rush over the land and batter at the sides of their ship. It makes an odd noise as it runs over the metal surface, a sort of hum that almost sounds melancholic. But that’s probably just projecting.

This world holds the worst sort of grim nostalgia, and not just for Barry, it seems. Everyone is feeling the effects of losing Merle and Taako so early again, and with Magnus as well, this time.

It’s enough to make anyone snap.

There’s a light on in the kitchen as Barry shuffles off to his quarters, long past when he reasonably should’ve gone to sleep. It’s been at least two days since they arrived.

“Lup?” he whispers, ducking a head in the door. She’s there, mixing something slowly in front of the counter, not looking over her shoulder to answer. Just stirring a wooden spoon around the big purple plastic mixing bowl the twins had somehow snuck on board when they first set out.

“I think there’s a leak in this bowl,” she says, also keeping her voice quiet. “Feels like moisture is getting out. Not surprising, huh? How old is this thing?”

“Uh, well, it’s cycle…” Damn, he really needs to think hard to remember these days. “Forty, now, so… forty years old?”

“Older than that. I think Taako stole this when we were kids.” She laughs a little. “He wanted to make pancakes. I told him, ‘Dumbass, where are we gonna cook them? We don’t have a pan either.’”

Barry steps up to the counter beside her. Her eyes are red. “He’s probably looking just as hard for us, Lup.”

“But we’re not fucking looking, are we?” she snaps. She sets the bowl down too hard on the counter and crouches to fiddle with the oven dials. “We’re just sitting here, when they could be dying just over the horizon.”

“This wasn’t your fault, and it’s not anyone’s,” Barry says. “Sometimes we die. We just have to make sure we get out at the end, and… and they’ll be waiting.”

“Waiting at the end,” Lup snorts. She shakes her head and a strand of messy blonde hair falls in her eyes. She doesn’t brush it away. “I want him here, on the path with me, right now. This is bullshit, these fucking dials—!”

She cranks the dial violently, and it pops off in her hand. There’s a still, silent moment where she just stares at it before her face crumples.

Barry kneels instantly to put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine, we can fix it. We can fix this. It’ll be alright.” Lup leans into him and puts her face in his chest. She’s not crying, he doesn’t think, but her shoulders shake. “It’s okay. We’ll get them back.”

Their fifth day milling about the ship, checking read-outs and running tests on the environment and eating and sleeping in a mechanical sort of way, ends with Davenport puncturing the silence with a slam of his hand on the table. He’s been shuffling and dealing tarot cards without any apparent end result for half an hour, but now he puts them down and says, “This isn’t going to let up.”

No one asks what he’s referring to. “It’s only been a few days,” Lucretia says. “They could run for a few weeks and then rest.” It’s a token protest at best.

“It could run for a few weeks and then get even worse,” Lup says. “We’re not getting anything done sitting here, so let’s go.”

She’s been setting off flares, one in the late morning and one in the evening – or whatever passes as those times in this cloud-covered world. There’s been no response yet.

“We’re just going to fly until we get to a new area,” Davenport warns. “If we can find a forest, or an ocean, or even a city, it might get us some answers.”

“If we find a river, we can camp by it and follow it for a while,” Barry offers. “If the others are still out there, that’s what they’ll be doing.”

That’s as much discussion as they need. Davenport heads for the bridge, Barry settles at the bow, Lucretia at the stern, and after a moment’s hesitation, Lup climbs the mast to take Magnus’ usual spot. When he looks back again, he sees her sitting at the top, fashioning a makeshift harness out of the long scarf she’d had looped around her neck.

At first the ship shudders in the wind, rocking from side to side, but Davenport brings it under control with a masterful hand. “Keep an eye out,” he calls to the crew, and then they set off, following the direction of the gales.

And for hours, that’s all they do. The grass fields don’t change, the wind keeps blowing, and if not for their instruments, it would be all too easy to imagine that they’re simply flying in circles.

But near the end of the day, the horizon breaks up, and mountains start to come into sight. At first Barry thinks they might be illusions in the fading light – but Lup calls them out too, and Davenport confirms them in his sight. They’re flying almost dangerously low to the ground to minimise exposure to the more damaging winds above, so their field of vision is limited somewhat, but the mountains look promising. “There could be societies living in shelters there!” the captain yells. “It’s our best bet for now!”

As if in response, Lup sends up another flare. Barry keeps an eye forward for an answering shower of sparks.

The mountains grow and grow as they slowly head towards them, and soon they loom within kilometres of the ship. But even sooner, they find a small lake, only three times the size of their ship, hidden in the long grass until they’re practically on top of it.

Davenport brings the ship down. “Visibility’s gonna be gone in a few minutes,” he says, landing them in the grass at the shore of the lake. “Barry, can you check out that water? Our tank is running low, and we should collect natural water while we can.”

“Yes sir,” Barry says, and runs to grab his testing kit.

When he comes back out onto the deck, night has truly fallen. With the perpetual cloud cover, no light from stars gets through, and they hadn’t seen a moon of any kind during their brief survey from space, so the lights of the ship’s windows are all he has to guide by. He does a quick fire cantrip to summon a flame in one hand, holding it against his chest to shield it from the wind and keep it above the grass, and then steps carefully out into the field, looking for the edge of the lake.

Above him, still up on the mast, Lup shoots up another flare. It bursts above them in brilliant sparks of gold, pink and red. They’re instantly carried off by the breeze, but they still shine brilliantly, and for a second the night sky looks just like their homeworld’s, dotted with bright stars.

The water is good, as far as Barry can tell, and a quick drink doesn’t reveal anything beyond a slightly murky taste, and they spend the next hour or so filling containers and bringing them aboard. The water is always the first thing to go, when they find themselves in a world without civilisations, so they stock up when they can.

But after that, they all find themselves adrift again, wandering around the deck. Lup climbs the mast again and shoots another flare. Lucretia sits on the stairs to the bridge and writes. Davenport is the only one who’s actually turned in for the night – the rest of them are waiting.

Eventually, Barry tires of pacing and finds himself sitting with Lucretia. “I don’t think I bought chapstick,” he says.

“I have some Burtoch’s Bees if you want,” Lucretia replies, not looking up her journal. She’s sketching now. He looks over her shoulder and sees a two-page spread of grass fields.

“Yeah, thanks,” he mutters. They lapse back into silence for a while.

“World’s like this scare me,” Lucretia says quietly. “No signs of life.”

“Like a nightmare,” Barry agrees. Lucretia leans on him slightly, as if assuring herself that there’s at least one other lifeform out here.

“Thinking about how we might die in a place like this, where there’s no one around to even mark our presence here…” She sighs and looks down. “Sorry. Maudlin talk.”

“It’s a maudlin place.”

“Nothing like the last one,” Lucretia says. She smiles and looks up, now. “Not a single flower.”

“Our guide would hate it,” Barry laughs. Lucretia flips back a few pages in her journal and smooths out a page. The light from the window casts across a messy sketch of their guide from the last cycle, frozen mid-smile, looking off page. Lucretia doodles a few flowers in the air around her.

“She was enthusiastic, if nothing else,” Lucretia says.

“Mmm.” Barry opens his mouth to add something, but pauses. “What was her name?”

He’d never even asked.

“Sindri,” Lucretia answers without hesitation.

“Hey, nerds, we got some action!” Lup yells from above them, and they both look up to see her blurred form leaning away from the mast. “Towards the mountains!”

They scramble to their feet and race to the edge of the deck. Sure enough, at the foothills of the mountains, there’s a small flicker of light.

Lup sends up another flare, and then a fireball, laughing loudly. Barry finds himself laughing too – it’s a weirdly intense relief, knowing that there’s someone out there.

“Guess someone knows we’re here after all,” he says to Lucretia. She beams.

The light winds its way towards them, sometimes disappearing and reappearing, but growing steadily brighter. Finally it curves away from its relatively steady path to avoid the lake. Lup and Davenport, both long since having joined Barry and Lucretia at the railing, exchange anticipatory looks. Lup lights a flame in her hand and holds it up high as a signal.

And then the light is close enough for them to see by. A pale face, almost glowing in the flames of their torch, with short colourless hair that flutters around their pointed ears. An elf, or close enough to be familiar.

“Are you more strangers from another plane?” they say, voice high and reedy and oddly stilted. Barry’s hands flex on the railing and Lup leans far enough down that he puts a hand on her back to keep her from falling.

“You’ve met more strangers?” she asks. The elf nods and Lup slumps boneless with relief.

“Three strangers who told us their story,” they reply. “They are still healing. But they told us you would come.”

Now Barry feels that same relief. He hears Lucretia mutter a choked oath of thanks, and Davenport let out a loud sigh, but all he can do is rub a hand over Lup’s back.

“We’d be grateful if you could take us to them,” Davenport says, and the elf nods, beckoning with quick gestures for them to follow.

He keeps his hand on Lup’s back for the entire walk back to the mountain commune, and halfway along, he realises she’s leaning into it.

The elf beckons them again towards a small opening in the rock face, and leads them down a zigzagging pathway, the sounds of the wind quieting with each bend. They pass several offshoots, but the elf continues walking, holding the flame aloft and casting shadows on the grey stone walls.

But soon the narrow corridor widens, leading to one grand opening in the stone, and they all enter into a wide hall list by multiple fireplaces. Around the fires gather more elves, talking quietly and gesturing frequently, none of whom look up when they enter.

Well. One elf looks up.

“My dudes!” Taako says, and waves jauntily. He’s sitting close to a fire, blanket wrapped around his shoulders like a cape, and rustic-looking bandages covering his leg up to his thigh. Despite this, he hobbles to his feet just in time to get lifted in the air by Lup, who’d left Barry’s side the second Taako opened his mouth.

“What kind of shitty wizard are you? You fell off a fuckin’ ship,” Lup scolds, and Barry doesn’t hear anymore because Magnus has sprinted over and scooped both he and Lucretia into a bear hug.

“I knew you’d find us!” he says happily. Barry grins into his chest and pats his shoulder.

“I’m glad one of us did,” Lucretia says, voice muffled in Magnus’ shoulder.

He lets them go and turns to look back at the fire. Taako is sitting down again, simultaneously being lectured and hugged by his sister. Davenport is over by them as well, nodding along to whatever Lup is saying, but also looking Merle over as he does.

Barry hadn’t even noticed him at first, but there he is, seemingly asleep amongst all the reunion drama, which is… pretty typical, actually, and goes some way to assuring him that everything is fine. But as they get closer, he can see some blood clotting at his temple, and some superficial wounds that match the ones Taako and Magnus share.

Magnus sprawls out on the floor behind Davenport and sighs. “Don’t worry about him, Cap’nport,” he says breezily. “They reckon it’s just a concussion. He’s been awake a few times, and last time he made a joke about being in Lothlorien.”

“What’s Lothlorien?” Davenport asks, settling back on his heels. Magnus shrugs.

“No idea. But he makes weird references no one gets all the time, so we figure he’s fine.”

“No one around here can heal for shit, so he better be,” Taako complains. He twitches his bandaged leg and adds, “Never thought I’d miss the old man’s shitty healing rolls.”

“Next time, don’t jump off the damn deck, and you won’t have to miss anything,” Lup says, but without anger. Taako flicks her arm and she flicks him back.

As if waiting for a break in the conversation, the elf who’d led them here approaches cautiously and hovers next to Barry before addressing them all. “You are welcome to stay as you wish,” they say, making sharp gestures as they do so. In better lighting, it seems to be a secondary form of communication. “It is a commandment to take in anyone from the wind. We can discuss more once your friends have recovered.”

“Thank you,” Davenport says. He stands and falls into his Dignified Captain posture, which never fails to add at least two extra inches to his height. “We’re deeply grateful for your help, both in saving our friends and leading us here to them. We’re in your debt.”

The elf nods. “Rest, please. Someone will bring you food and drink shortly.” With another gesture that almost looks like a spellcasting action, they leave.

Davenport blows out a large breath and sits again, this time cross-legged and facing the twins over Merle’s sleeping form. Magnus scooches in and Barry sits too, completing the circle. He can recognise an impromptu crew briefing about to start.

“Okay, gang,” Davenport says, in a more tired version of his Captain Voice. He leans his chin in one hand, and the other rests idly on Merle’s wrist, fingers against his pulse. “This seems like a safe place to stay for now. Magnus, Taako, what can you report?”

The two start to talk, interrupting each other with details and corrections and additions, but remaining mostly coherent. The commune is called the Gatherers, and there are a number of other communes elsewhere, but none that they’ve seen. Everyone here is elvish or some variation thereupon, and their communication style is a mix of Common and a sign language that Taako still hasn’t gotten a good grasp of yet. They seem wary but accommodating.

“It seems like a safe bet for a place to hide out,” Magnus concludes. Davenport thins his lips and hums.

“We’ll stay here until everyone’s healed up,” he decides eventually. “You’re right, it wouldn’t be sensible to ignore these resources while we can use them. But the Starblaster is still where it’s safest. I’ll go out and bring it around tomorrow when it’s light. Lup—” He looks up, sees Lup’s death grip on Taako’s wrist, and visibly thinks better of it. “Magnus, you’re coming with me. You said there’s no natural predators here?”

“None that they told us of,” Magnus says.

“Alright, well, it never hurts to be safe. We’re not losing anyone this cycle.” Everyone nods firmly at that decree. Merle lets out a soft snore. “Get some rest, everyone.”

Later, with the fires dimmed to embers and the people in the hall all asleep on woven grass mats that are comfier than they first look, Barry lies between Lup and Magnus, still awake despite the exhaustion in his bones.

There’s something that’s telling him this is too happy an ending for this cycle, given that they’re only a week and a half into the year. It’s less of a gut feeling and more an anxious voice of pessimism in his head, so he’s trying to pay it no mind, but it’s still enough to keep him up, listening to his friends’ calm breathing.

“You know, over the years, I think you’ve actually slept less than I have.” He turns to see Lup, bleary eyed and disgruntled, looking at him from five inches away.

“Sorry,” he whispers back. She sticks her tongue out at him. He tries not to laugh and wake everyone else up.

“Got them late night blues or what?” she asks. Behind her, Taako shifts and mutters something, and they both fall silent until he stills again, pressed against Lup’s back.

“Just thinking,” he says. Absently, he tugs at the red flower bracelet on his wrist – a nervous twitch and a good luck charm rolled into one. “About how bond marks don’t go away when someone dies.”

Definitely not what he was thinking about, but a good enough diversion. Lup hums quietly.

“Makes shit like this more complicated,” she replies. “We would’ve known for sure they were alive.”

“You knew for sure,” he says, and carefully nudges his shoulder against her hand, settled between their heads.

“Not for sure,” she says, very quiet. “I’d want to be sure about it. But…” she trails off, and then rallies again. “I wouldn’t want it to be just. Gone.”

He tries to picture Lup without the resplendent whirl of colour that encompasses her entire back, but he can’t. Over the years it’s grown slightly, reaching over her shoulders and up her neck, but only to a point. Taako’s had the exact same growth. They could only assume that it had stopped growing simply because it had reached the limit of how large a bond mark could physically be.

His, on the other hand… He holds his forearm up the light. In the crook of his arm is a small, silvery pine tree, looking like it was scratched there with a quill. It’s Merle’s mark, etched on his skin for almost ten cycles now, and it’s only ever grown a fraction larger than when it first appeared.

“It’s not an exact science,” Lup says. He looks over and meets her eyes, the dark brown of them lit up by the dying fire. “They don’t grow at measured rates, or react to events in structured ways. There’s hundreds of variables that we know of, and thousands that we don’t.”

“Yeah,” he sighs. He lets his arm fall and rests his hands on his stomach. “I was always a late bloomer.”

Lup laughs, slightly too loud. On Barry’s other side, Magnus turns in his sleep, rolling from his back onto his side, so that his breath ruffles Barry’s hair.

“I dunno,” Lup says, eyes still sparkling. “I think it’s nice. More meaningful. Not everyone gets to leave a mark on you, y’know? But we do. I do.”

“Yeah,” Barry says again, mouth dry. “You do.”

His neck is cramping from twisting his head, but he wouldn’t look away from Lup’s eyes even if the Hunger started attacking a year early.

But the moment breaks when Magnus snuffles and mutters something, then rolls again until he’s half on top of Barry with an arm around his waist. He murmurs again directly into Barry’s neck and sighs.

This time, Lup is quick enough to muffle her laughter behind her hand. “See? Magnus thinks so too,” she whispers. She smiles, sharp white teeth flashing in the dark. “Go to sleep, Barold.”

Maybe it’s just the surprisingly comforting weight of Magnus pinning him to the mat beneath them, but he finds himself slipping into unconsciousness easily after that.