Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

You spot the hatchling slowly climbing up the ramp from the bottom of the crater. They are already geared up in their EVA suit, minus the helmet clipped to their side. They are taking their time, seemingly absorbing the sights of their home one last time before they take the final step to becoming a real astronaut. You don't rush them, focusing on cleaning the dust of out the mining helmet in your hands. You know what it's like to leave for the first time. The mix of nerves and excitement often come paired with feelings of sentimentality.

“Hey, I thought I might see you before the big launch,” you call out as they approach you. “Nerves getting the better of you?”

They don't reply, just... look at you for a while. They slowly scan over your clothes, your hands, your face, lingering at your scarred eye.

You arch a brow at them. “Need something, hatchling?”

They watch you talk, but don't listen. After a moment, they say, “Hi, Gossan.”

“Hey, Sed,” you reply. They take a steadying breath, open their mouth to say something, then stop and look away, eyes downcast.

“If you're nervous, don't worry about it. Your nerves are between you, me, and the vast endlessness of space.” You grin at them, trying to cheer them up, but they don't see it.

Eventually, they settle within themself, square their shoulders, and look at you. “Think you can give me a hand with something for a minute?”

You set the helmet on the ground and brush off your hands on your trousers. “Sure, what can I do for you?”

“I've been working on an art project, of sorts. Trying to get a photo of everyone in the village.” They gesture towards the scout launcher on their back.

“Yeah? And when did you find time for that?”

They shrug. “Everyone needs a hobby, right?”

“Fair enough. Let me guess, it's my turn?”

They nod with a small smile. “You're the last one, actually.”

“Alright, what do you want me to do?”

The two of you step out of the cave entrance. They point over at the cliffs behind the fenced-off ghost matter. “I think I want you up there. I'll get a shot from by the firewatch tower so I can get you in frame with the trees and the geyser behind you. We'll have to wait a few minutes for the sun to rise, though.”

They shoo away Arkose so as not to block the shot as you climb up and settle down on the edge of one of the shorter cliffs. They look between you and the trees and cliffsides behind you, shifting left and right and back to get a good angle. Their focused, intense squint makes you chuckle.

“Any reason in particular you saved me for last?” you call out to them.

They don't answer for a moment, and you're not sure they're going to. Eventually, they sigh, looking down at the scout launcher in their hands, and say, “I was... being shy, I guess? I don't know. I was always trying to impress you — I wanted you to see me as a proper, y'know, capable astronaut, not some artsy type like Gabbro.” They laugh a little, and you smile.

“Gabbro is a proper astronaut, a little creativity never hurt anyone,” you say.

Because for all their quirks, Gabbro was as fine and reliable an astronaut as you could ask for. They had just been finishing up the space program when Feldspar disappeared. They were graduated early, in fact — their inaugural solo flight was as part of the search party. They were devastated in that Gabbro way that can be very hard to see: perfectly easygoing and relaxed when asked to report in, but they rarely spoke otherwise and rarely came home. When you finally called off the search, Gabbro pretended they didn't get the message, that their radio was on the fritz, until Chert went out and got them themself. You know they had felt like they'd failed. You all did, yourself most of all. But Gabbro had proven themself a valuable member of Outer Wilds Ventures during that time.

Sed's lip quirks a bit ruefully. “Sure, that's true.” They look up then, and meet your eyes. “You were... this project is important to me. And you're important to me. It took me a while to believe that I was good enough to complete this project and... and good enough for you. Or something like that.” They shrug and look away, embarrassed. At the same time, the sun begins rising overhead, and they immediately focus again and start taking pictures.

You hum in response. All that tracks with what you know about the hatchling, although you are surprised at their sudden self-awareness. When Feldspar disappeared, and while Gabbro was graduating, Sed was just getting ready to join the space program. Before, Feldspar had taken the lead with new recruits. Besides being OWV's greatest pilot, Feldspar was excellent with the hatchlings, knowing just when to push them and when to be kind. The young ones adored them, and the older ones hung on every word of their instruction and guidance.

But with Sed, the role of flight coach fell on your shoulders, and you weren't sure you were up to the task. You sent them away the first few times they requested to join the space program. You had your hands full already. You had decided to not only completely redesign the safety systems going into each ship, much to Slate's displeasure, but also reconfigure the communications system with Hornfels as well as add several new modules to the training program for any new recruits. At the same time, Rutile had decided to take you on as an apprentice and train you to be the next mayor. They weren't getting any younger, they had told you, and it seemed more and more likely that OWV was going to have a significant impact on your species' future, so the new mayor should be familiar with the goings-on not just on Timber Hearth, but the rest of the solar system as well.

You dove into the work and let it consume you. You needed the distraction. Feldspar's absence left you feeling cold and numb and directionless, and you latched onto any task you could find, anything that would prevent you from floating away in the vast and freezing empty space they left in your heart. Porphy, bless them, appeared at your side during that time. They never let you miss a meal, quietly sitting beside you while you ate the food they brought you, and eventually you started to open up to them in a way you could not with anyone else. They kept you warm. They tethered you, and slowly you started to heal.

All that is to say, at that time you weren't sure that you were ready for Sed. The responsibilities you heaped upon your own shoulders were growing larger and heavier by the day. But the hatchling was persistent. They followed you like a shadow, and even when you sent them away, you still saw signs of their presence. They would try to “help” you at times; you'd come back from lunch with your documents rearranged or some wiring resoldered, usually poorly. You'd tell them off, and they'd look up at you innocently and say, “Well, teach me the right way, then.”

In the end, you took them on, if only to protect your work. Thing is, they took to space like a tadpole takes to water, like they had been born in it and for it and knew nothing else. They were loud and confident, aggressive when it came to getting information but eagerly listening when it was given. It was hard, sometimes. They reminded you so much of Feldspar. What's more, they trusted you implicitly, and believed in you more than you believed in yourself at times.

They step closer and ask you to face the lens of the camera. “Well, I'm glad you figured it out,” you say. “You usually do. I'm proud of you, no need to try and impress me.”

They look at you, young and big-eyed, then quickly back down at the scout launcher's screen, blinking.

You chuckle. “Now, don't get all weepy on me. Come up here and show me what you've got.” You pat the ground at your side, and they hop up and show you the screen.

They flip through a couple of pictures they had taken. The first few were taken from a distance, and you are dark and featureless, your silhouette outlined against the cliffs and rising sun behind you. In the last, you are much closer to the lens and in focus, your mouth in a slightly open grin as you talk.

“Huh, interesting,” you say, “I like how you captured the shadows and all that. The contrast.”

They laugh and lay back on the ground beside you, stretching out as their legs dangle over the edge. “Thanks.”

You both are quiet for a few moments, enjoying the gentle breeze and the warmth of the sun as it begins to make its descent.

“So, got any plans for your first flight? I got a 'satellite' that needs repairing in the zero-g cave if want to get in some last-minute practice before you head off.”

They don't respond for a moment. Then, “Can I ask a weird question?”

“Shoot,” you reply.

“You remember Loess?”

That... well, it's certainly a weird question, not remotely what you expected.

“Sure, probably better than you do; you were little when they died.”

“They had been on life support for a while, right?”

“For several months, if I remember correctly.” Loess had looked after you when you were young, much like how you mentored Sed now. They were studious and quiet, but always had a kind word for you. They supported you even when your interests turned away from the earthworks and geology they were trying to teach you and pointed towards the stars instead. When they got sick, several new devices were developed to aid their breathing and to monitor their well-being. Much of this new technology was eventually repurposed into the life support systems that the spaceships use today. As the disease progressed, however, Loess became more and more reliant on the machines, until they slipped into a coma and these became the only things keeping them alive.

“How was it decided to disconnect them, in the end?” they ask. “Did you all take a vote, or...”

“We all discussed it, but in the end it was decided that since I was closest to them, I would make the call.”

They frown and mumble, “That doesn't seem fair.”

You say nothing and rub the back of your neck. You are never one to discourage their questions, but something about this conversation is making you feel strangely uncomfortable. You have no idea where this is going.

Again, it takes a while for them to continue. Then, they ask quietly, “Did you feel like you were killing them?”

You look at Sed. You aren't offended, but you're very surprised and confused. They don't talk like this, not with you at least. Not this bold and direct. Not this quiet.

“Are you asking for yourself?”

Sed tilts their head at you, confused.

“That is, are you worried about getting hurt or dying in space? Or are you concerned about the life support systems themselves? If that's the case, we can do some checks with Slate-”

“You're jumping to a lot of conclusions there, Gossan.”

You quiet down and watch them, feeling lost. As Sed was growing up, they had clung to you. They spoke differently to you than they did with others. Still loud, but always wanting to please and impress, trying to say what they thought you wanted them to say, even when you could see around it. Rutile had laughed, called it hero worship, told you to leave it alone when you tried to push them towards others. You had been just the same way with Loess, Rutile told you. You didn't feel up to the task, at first, but eventually you accepted the role and did your best to lead Sed down the right path.

Now, you feel told off; corrected, but not unkindly. You feel like a hatchling.

Why does Sed sound so much older than they did just yesterday?

You realize they're still watching you, waiting patiently for your answer. It takes a moment to remember the question.

“Well, I... sure, I could've felt like that at first. But not afterwards.”

They raise their brow at you, and wait for you to continue.

“Loess... by the end, they were alive, but not living, if that makes any sense. I wasn't ending their life, that had already ended on its own. There was nothing anyone could do about that, and that's okay. Once I realized that, keeping them on the machines felt less like I was helping them and more like I was keeping them alive for my own sake. It got easier to make the decision to let them go.” You sigh. “Easier, but not easy.”

Sed quietly takes in your words. They seem to want to say more, or to ask more, they open their mouth and close it again. A geyser spouts noisily near you; the wind takes it and sprays you both with a fine mist. Sed smiles at it and looks up at the sky. You follow their gaze and watch the Attlerock trek its orbit past you. By now, it's gotten dark, and you can hear the chirpbugs chirping away.

“It all really is beautiful, isn't it.” Sed says with gentle reverence.

“Alright.” You stand up in front of them, hands on your hips. “What's going on with you? When you walked up here all quiet I chalked it up to nerves, but now I'm not so sure that's the case.”

Sed laughs, throws their arms in the air and gestures at the sky. “Look at it! The universe!”

“Sure, it's pretty, but what about you?”

“I'm just... I'm so happy I get to be part of it. That I get to be on this planet and in this solar system that's rocketing through space at hundreds of thousands of miles an hour, and I get do it with all of you.”

They stand up and take your hands, bent over to get closer to your face, grinning. You pull away a little at the intensity of it.

“I got to be an astronaut. It's all I wanted all my life. Even if I never took off in my ship, even if I never left the atmosphere, I was an astronaut. I didn't understand that for a long time. I got to be an astronaut, Gossan.”

“Sed, you're... I want you to sit down. Let's try to calm down a bit.”

Sed doesn't sit down, but they pull back and take a deep, steadying lungful of air. They chuckle under their breath. “Sorry, Gossan. I just love it all so much. I don't want it to end.”

“Sed, sit down,” you say. Your hands are shaking and you don't know why.

“But it already did, didn't it? Like you said. I don't want it to have ended. But it already has. It's not my fault.”

“Sed, stop!”

They stop. They take another deep breath and give you a gentle smile, full of compassion. It makes you feel small. This isn't... this isn't how things are supposed to be. Something is wrong, but you don't know what.

They touch your shoulder, and you startle at it. “Sorry, Gossan,” they say. “It's going to be okay.”

You don't know why this is agitating you so much. They're being honest, you think, they're not lying to you. And they seem completely unbothered themself. But something about this conversation is making you feel like your ship is in a flat spin, out of control and careening towards the ground.

No, that's not right. It's not you who's in a flat spin. It's Sed, and you're watching helplessly.

You clench your fists, breathe in your nose, out your mouth. You have to get control of this situation.

“Alright hatchling, here's the plan.” You put your hands on their shoulders. “I appreciate you speaking honestly with me. But you're not making much sense, and all this talk about 'death' and 'the end' is... frankly, I'm not sure you're in a good mindset to fly right now. So we're going to take a break. We'll head down and let Gneiss take a look at you, have a chat, and decide where to go from there.”

Sed doesn't appear to be listening. They're watching the horizon. “I really appreciate you, Gossan. If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have gotten to see ten percent of the things I've seen.” They look at you with a grin that makes your heart sink. “Without you, I wouldn't have learned how to do this.”

Before you could catch hold of them, they step back out of your grip and kick themself into the air with a short burst from their jetpack. They drop into the empty geyser behind them and disappear.

You scream their name. You rush to the hole in the ground, but are thrown back and to the floor by the sudden force of water.

They come tearing up through the geyser, riding the wave with their jetpack at full blast, whooping and laughing all the way. You track them as they fly high enough to catch low orbit, before they fall and hit their jetpack again just in time to land hard on the launch pad.

“Sed, come back!” you shout. It is drowned out by the roar of their ship's engines as it takes off, screaming low over the crater and past the horizon.

It is very quiet after that.

You roll to your knees and stare at the point on the horizon where they had disappeared.

“Is everything okay?” You hear Moraine trotting up behind you. “What was that all about?”

“I... I have no idea,” you reply, panting to catch your breath. You start to stand up, then fall to your knees again with an intense and growing pain at your back. You hear a roaring in your ears. Did you fall in the ghost matter pit? No, you're nowhere near it. You can't see, everything looks blue and you fall to your belly on the ground-

You gasp and blink away tears as the pain disappears all at once, as if there had been none to begin with. You get your knees under you and sit up, feeling your arms and neck and back. Your skin and clothes are all perfectly untouched, no more scarred or holey than normal.

What in the all-encompassing void is going on?

Chapter Text

You look up and around you. The chirpbugs continue their song in the dark. All the trees and grass on the hillside are undamaged, as are the firewatch platform and the structure around the tree. You see Moraine there, kneeling and clutching the railing.

You jog over to them. “You okay, Moraine?”

“I think so,” they reply, panting.

“What was that? An explosion?”

“No idea. I was listening to Chert's drum through my signal scope, but it got staticky and I lost connection. Darn it, I think I dropped it.” They pull themself up and look over the railing at the ground below.

You look down as well, and see Porphy and Rutile next to each other in the town.

“Y'all good down there?” you shout. Porphy says something, but the sound is eaten by the geyser blasting near them.

Porphy tries again. “We're good, you?”

“We're fine,” you yell back.

Moraine comes over to your side, leaning forward and squinting towards the launch pad. “Do you think a fuel tank exploded? I don't see any fires, but it's too dark to tell anything else.”

“No,” you reply. “It was way too big for that.”

“Gossan!” Rutile calls. You look down again and see that Porphy has found a flashlight, and seems to be looking for more. “Can you see if everyone up there is okay? We're going to check down here.”

“Got it,” you call back. You turn to Moraine. “Could you see if you can find where Arkose ran off too? Sed chased them away, but I didn't see where.”

Moraine doesn't reply, still looking off into the distance. You shake their arm. “Hey, focus, Moraine.”

“Does the sky look... wrong, to you?”

You follow their sight line, then look around, and then directly up. Something does seem strange. It's dark, but something about it reminds you of daytime. The sky is a cloudless soft black, solid and...

Where are all the stars?

Moraine blinks rapidly, rubs their face. “I think that explosion may have damaged my eyes somehow.”

You continue looking up, cold dread slowly seeping into your bones. “I'm not so sure,” you say. You tear your eyes away, shake your head, and grab Moraine's arm again. “Go find Arkose and see if Rutile needs any help.” With that, you turn and march towards the museum.

You see Hal sitting on the front steps, looking dazed. “Where's Hornfels?” you ask, startling them.

“Oh, uh, somewhere inside I think. Did you feel-?”

“That explosion? Yes, it was down in town too. Come with me.”

They aren't in the museum, so the two of you climb up the stairs to the observatory. You find Hornfels looking through the telescope into an empty sky.

“Got any news, Hornfels?” You ask.

“Maybe it was a solar flare?” Hal follows up. You nod, although that seems like a possibility that is more hopeful than reasonable at the moment.

Hornfels looks at you. Normally, they would constantly talk to themself while they work, reading aloud or quietly speaking their thoughts and measurements and theories. Now, they are silent. Their eyes are wide and haunted.

Suddenly from the radio console echos Chert's tinny voice: “Please don't leave me, Hornfels.”

Hornfels rushes over to the console, presses the button next to the microphone and leans in to it. “I'm- I'm here Chert. I don't... what- uh... tell, tell us what you've observed. Gossan and Hal are here too.”

“I was... I was out here observing the- updating the star charts, and I saw, I kept seeing...” Chert seems to run out of breath, and it takes a second for them to start up again.

“There were... for the past, maybe, half hour? At first I saw a supernova, and I thought, look at that! How exciting! How rare!”

They laugh, and it sounds painful. “And then I saw another. And another. And... I tried, I kept trying to call you at first, Hornfels, but it didn't work. So I stopped trying. I figured, maybe that was for the best? Maybe it was better that you didn't know, that nobody knows. That I, I had to...”

They go quiet. You bump Hornfels out of the way and take their place at the microphone. “You're alright, Chert,” you say with what soothing voice you can muster, “You're alright. What did you find?”

“The universe was dying,” Chert continues, voice emptier than can be attributed to a bad radio signal. “The universe was dy- is. Is dead. All the stars are gone. Including the sun.”

You stare down at the console. The information doesn't really make you feel much of anything at the moment. It settles in your stomach like some six-stem mushrooms that haven't had the toxins cooked out and will probably make their presence known in an hour or two.

“So... alright.” You're not sure what to say in this situation. You feel inclined to give condolences, to say, “Sorry for our loss.” The idea almost makes you laugh. “So, if you're saying the sun, along with all the other stars, has gone supernova,” you start again slowly, “wouldn't the entire solar system have been destroyed along with it? Wouldn't the shockwave have... burned through everything?”

“It burned through me,” Chert replies, desperate, pleading. You shudder.

“No, I understand, Chert. We felt it too. You're not hurt, right?”

“No,” they say.

You run your hand down your face. Hal, who has been looking through the telescope, suddenly cries out. “Hornfels!”

“Give us just a second, Chert. We're not going anywhere,” you say into the microphone. You walk over to Hal, while Hornfels asks, “What is it?”

“I thought I saw a light, so I looked closer with the telescope, and I realized it's that blue beam of light near the white Nomai structure on Brittle Hollow! But it looks... it's too small. It's too far away.”

Hornfels takes Hal's place at the telescope and starts tracking the planet.

“Do you think... did it lose orbit? Are the planets losing orbit?” Hal squeaks out. You attempt to look through the slats in the observatory's roof, but whatever they see is too distant and too faint for your naked eyes.

Hornfels does not reply, but you can hear them faintly mumbling seconds and angular degrees under their breath. You let them work for a few moments, before saying, “Let's hear a theory, Hornfels.”

They clear their throat, blinking and pulling away from the eyepieces. “It appears that Brittle Hollow is keeping its usual orbit,” they say.

“Then why is it so far away?” asks Hal.

“It is at an appropriate distance,” Hornfels continues, voice low and gaze a bit unfocused, “It is at the far side of its orbit, not quite opposite that of Timber Hearth. Normally, it would not be visible from here at that position. The sun would be between us and it.”

The three of you are silent for a while. Eventually, Hal says, “Not sure Outer Wilds Ventures has a protocol for this one, I'm guessing?”

You are struck by a sudden, sickening thought. You return to the radio.

“Chert, hold tight for a second. I'm going to radio the other travelers. You haven't seen Sed, have you? They took off for the first time just a few minutes ago.”

It takes them a moment to reply. “I... I haven't. No, I haven't.”

“Alright, we'll call you back shortly.” You find the radio switches, each labeled with a white sticker. You flick the lowest one, with the much newer and cleaner sticker labeled “SED! ::)” in Hal's blocky handwriting.

“Sed, it's Gossan,” you say down the mic, “Everything good on your end? How's the sky looking?”

You get no response.

Hal comes to stand at your shoulder, wringing their hands. “They should be okay, right? They took off just before this happened. Maybe the radio isn't working?”

You try again. “Sed, status report?”

Still nothing. You grit your teeth, and switch to Riebeck's channel.

“Riebeck, status report?”

Riebeck replies, startled. “Uh, stable and secure. I think...”

“Await instructions,” you reply, and switch the radio again. “Gabbro, status report?”

“Stable and secure.”

“Await instructions.” Switch again. “Esker, status report?”

“Stable and secure. Gossan, what in Hearth's hollow core is going on?”

“Await instructions.” Switch again.

“Sed, status report?”

Nothing.

“Sed, say something.”

Nothing.

“Sed, if you're mad at me, if you want to give me the silent treatment, that's fine. Just say something, anything, Sed, please.”

There is only the faint buzz of static.

You go to push the button again when Hornfels touches your hand. You flinch back, but they wrap their fingers around your wrist gently. You hadn't realized how badly you are shaking.

“We'll keep trying, Gossan,” Hornfels says to you, voice low, “Let's try again in a few minutes.”

You pull away from them, glaring, and whisper harshly through gritted teeth, “This isn't going to be another Feldspar.”

“I know, I know,” Hornfels says with their hands up in a placating gesture, “We're not giving up on them, but we need to look at the big picture right now.”

“No, we need to start a search party, we can't wait-”

You are cut off when you hear Slate call from downstairs. “Gossan, you in here?”

Hornfels responds, “We're up in the observatory, Slate!”

You ignore them and turn to the youngest in the room. “Hal-” you say, then stop. They're crying, but they're looking at and listening to you, so you continue. “Call Gabbro. Tell them to pick up Esker and start searching for Sed.” They nod stiffly and go to the radio.

As soon as Slate's head appears in the stairwell, you say, “Slate, I need you back out at the launch pad. Go ping Sed's ship on your tracker, they aren't responding to their radio.”

Slate stares at you, frustrated and dumbfounded. “Gossan, we already- I did. The signal was lost.”

You straighten up. “What do you mean 'the signal was lost'?”

Slate sighs, and there's more anxiety behind it than you're used to hearing from them. “Gossan, you were just there. The computer is showing a “signal lost” error, with their last location somewhere way too close to the sun. Did you hit your head on the way up here?”

You bite down on your tongue and just stare at them, silent and cold and still.

“And now I can't find Mica, either,” they continue through clenched teeth, “I thought they were following you up here, but Porphy said they can't find any of the hatchlings.”

“All our hatchlings are missing?” Hornfels asks, voice high and worried, “How?”

You realize you've bitten your tongue hard enough to bleed. You realize you have to move. You can't just stand here. If you let yourself mourn now, you've killed them.

You clench your eyes shut, wipe your face with a hand, and decide that when you open your eyes, you're not allowed to feel anything until you've fixed everything. You take a deep breath. You open your eyes. You spit blood into the corner of the room.

You turn to Hornfels. “I want you to work with Chert and Hal to figure out what the immediate effects of this supernova will be. I want to know what to expect for the next hour, the next six hours, the next day, and the next week. Got it?”

“Yes, yes,” they say as they turn to the computer system.

“Slate, you're going to-” You're cut off by the rapid buzz of someone repeatedly trying to patch through to the radio. You look up at the panel with the barest hope in your chest, but it's Chert's signal light that is flashing.

Hal steps aside to let Hornfels take their place at the radio, and Hornfels opens the channel and says, “Chert, it's Hornfels.”

As soon as they release the microphone button, Chert's voice screams through. “-ACK HOLE. THERE'S A BLACK HOLE. A BLACK HOLE HAS FORMED AT THE CENTER OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM!”

You and Hornfels exchange a look, and they rush over to the telescope as you push past Slate, who follows you as run outside while Chert continues yelling. You and Slate slide to a stop on the bridge overlooking the town and stare up at the sky. You... can't really see anything. Everything is as black as it has been. A strong breeze is rolling through, and it is markedly colder out here than it was before you went into the museum.

Slate seems to realize that looking for a black hole in black void is futile at the same time you do. They shove their hands into their pockets and look down at the town instead of the sky. By the light of lanterns and flashlights, you two can see Spinel and Gneiss doing something in the generator building next to the water wheel. The lights in the windows of some of the cabins flick off.

“How long you think we've got?” Slate says, not looking over at you.

“How long for what?” you mutter.

“I don't know, until we freeze? A day? A week?”

You massage your forehead. “I don't know. The atmosphere will retain some heat. Hornfels can figure out how long.”

“And then? We don't have solar power to run the heaters, we've only got so much wood to burn, and we can't grow more trees without a sun.”

“I know, Slate. I know all this.”

“Die today, die tomorrow,” Slate mumbles under their breath, “freeze, starve?” You don't acknowledge it. They exhale, rocking from one foot to the other. After a pause, they say, “Sed was talking about the sun before they took off. Then they flew right at it.”

You turn at them, teeth bared. “They didn't kill themself.”

Slate, taken aback, pulls away from you. “That's not what I said.”

You grab the front of their shirt. “They aren't dead. They are not dead. Don't you dare speak that into existence.”

“That's not what I said. Don't touch me.” They shove your hand away from them. “I'm saying that maybe they knew something, they-” They stop mid-sentence, eyes going wide as they look up over your head. “What is that?”

You turn around. Coming to a slow, wobbling landing on the ridge behind the ghost matter, you see a very large, cylindrical gray object with three legs and bluish glass dome on top.

From the bottom of it appears the soft purple circles of a gravity lift. Then, following it down, comes, something – someone? – wearing a heavy three-eyed mask and carrying a limp and lifeless Sed.

Chapter Text

You sit and char the end of your marshmallow stick, feeling impatient and bored. Sed was never known to be an early riser in the first place, and they had stayed up late making sure the supplies in their ship were organized how they wanted and chattering away about their plans for the data logging feature they had set up on the ship computer with Hornfels. You had finally convinced them to lie down and get some rest before their big day.

You are excited yourself – near giddy, in fact, in the way you only get just before the launch of a new ship. And you don't think you're overexaggerating when you say this one is a masterpiece, filled to the brim with every bell and whistle and technical marvel that you could cram in. Sure, it has its quirks, and the autopilot is still barely out of its alpha stages, but-

“OH COME ON!”

You nearly fall right off the log you're sitting on when Sed jolts awake with a shout. You manage to drop your stick into the fire as well. Darn it, that was a good one.

You right yourself on your seat. “Sed, what in the world-”

Your voice is drowned out by the hatchling's wordless yelling as they kick their way out of their sleeping bag and continue to kick at it once they get up.

“Hey, settle down!” you shout at them. “You're going to trip and fall into the fire if you keep that up.”

“I was this close, Slate,” they say, and suddenly they're in your face. “This close. I was dead on, I finally had it, and the light-forsaken third landing leg clipped the platform.”

You shove them away from you, and they stumble back. “Get off of me, I have no idea what you're talking about. You just woke up.”

They pace back and forth in front of the elevator, gesturing wildly as they speak. “I have tried everything, Slate. I've tried following behind it. I've tried flying opposite and meeting it in the middle. I've tried perpendicular. I've tried straight down. I've tried jumping with my jetpack from Ember Twin, for Peat's sake, and I burned up before I could even get to the right altitude! I don't know what else to do!”

They're certainly agitated, but you haven't the foggiest idea what they're alluding to. “Did Porphy let you get a taste of their new batch before you went to bed? You're not making any sense.”

They ignore you, continuing their march around the camp. “And trust me, I've finally figured out how the Nomai ships work. That's not the solution either. I tried. There is no way those self-righteous furballs could have landed on the Sun Station using that useless computer-controlled descent and landing system. If I can't land using misaligned retro rockets with a faulty pressure venting system, how are they supposed to land without any rockets at all? It's impossible!”

“Hey, I fixed the pressure venting system.”

“And then I have to sit there and watch my failure replayed moment-by-moment all over again. Like, I know, universe! I know I screwed up! I was just there!”

They pick up an empty can and pitch it across the camp before crumpling into a pile on the ground and tugging at their ears.

You have no idea what to say in this kind of situation. You just sit there and stare at them, the camp growing silent as even the chirpbugs shut up with the break of dawn.

Eventually, you clear your throat. “So... crazy dream then, huh?”

Sed flops onto their back and screams into the air.

They stand up in a hurry before you can say anything else. “I give up. I give up! No, no I don't.” You see them take an exaggerated breath with their hands on their chest, eyes closed. “I'm not giving up. I am- I'm taking a break. That's what I'm supposed to do when I'm frustrated. 'Take a break, do something fun, make some art,' Gabbro says. That's what I'm doing. I'm taking a break.”

They march into the elevator. Too late, you call out, “Wait, the launch codes-”

“I'M TAKING A BREAK!” they shout back as the elevator shoots up to the launch pad.

You pause there, half stood as if to follow them, before you settle back down on your seat. What was that? You recount what you could make of what they were saying. It had been almost impossible to follow. Were they mad at you about something? Something about a 'Sun Station,' something about a Nomai ship? Not being able to land?

You go to poke at the fire before you remember with a sigh that your marshmallow stick is now completely immolated. Sed hasn't taken off yet. Maybe you should stop them? They might be liable to crash their ship into something out of anger at this rate. Or maybe you should go find Gossan. You're no good with worked-up hatchlings.

You resign yourself to getting up and fetching Gossan. You're about to stand when you hear a shutter rapidly clicking above you. The sound approaches, and you blink as a Little Scout lands on the ground right in front of you.

You look up just in time to see Sed lose their balance from where they perch on the outside of the elevator scaffolding. They fall and only slightly catch themselves with their jetpack before crashing to the ground with a sickening crunch.

They shout with what almost sounds more like deep annoyance than pain. You jump up off your seat, but you're too shocked to move toward them. “Sed! What is wrong with you?!”

They point at you as they struggle to stand. “Shut up, Slate. Don't even talk. I don't want to hear it.”

They manage to get themself upright and yelp in pain as they try to put weight on their left leg. “Yeah, okay, that's it,” they say through gritted teeth. “I'm resetting. I don't even care anymore. This loop is bust.”

You watch, paralyzed, as they hop on one foot to the elevator, enter the launch codes, and disappear as it rises. Only after you hear the rockets fire do you think to shout after them, “Wait, Sed...”

Then you watch as their ship soars low and out of sight.

You're not sure how this is your fault, but you know for a fact that you're going to end up getting the blame for this.

What should you do? Should you call someone? Maybe Esker can watch for them, or Chert could go out and intercept them?

You somewhat numbly hobble over to your mobile computer setup and fire it up. It takes a few minutes for the hunk of junk to finish its startup process, but once it does, you open the ship status and tracking program. Each ship log loads in slowly, one at a time. Chert at Ember Twin, Riebeck at Brittle Hollow. Feldspar's ship, which you still haven't been able to talk yourself into deleting, displays an “ERROR: Unable to locate signal” alert as it has for many years. Gabbro at Giant's Deep.

Sed's listing loads in, and the status with it.

[ERROR: Signal lost.]

You squint at the alert, then switch over to map view, which again loads in without any of the urgency you're starting to feel. The sun, planets, orbital routes for the planets, artificial satellites and their orbital routes, and finally the ship locations all pop into view. You zoom in to the marker for last known location of Sed's ship. Did they land on one of the Twins?

Turning on the trip tracker, you hit the playback button, and all of the planets' orbits reverse and start up again. You see the little icon for Sed's ship leave the launch pad, make a sharp turn west, skim then escape Timber Hearth's atmosphere. The Twins are nowhere nearby as the ship tracker displays a straight, unfaltering line to...

[ERROR: Signal lost.]

You rotate the map, repeat the playback. There's nothing there. Nothing they could have landed on. The tracker is beyond the orbit of the Twins, beyond even the Interloper's closest pass-by. The dotted line terminates at the surface of the sun.

You stare at the error message. Not “bad connection,” not “unable to locate signal.”

[ERROR: Signal lost.]

You step back a few feet from the screen, still staring at it. You take another step away, then stop. Then you tear your eyes away and jump up the ledges towards town.

You see Mica fiddling with the controls of their model ship. “Hey!” they say, then turn to face you. “Oh, I thought you were Sed. Are they getting up soon? I want to show them-”

“Go get Gossan and tell them to come here,” you say.

They look up at you with a small, petulant pout. “No, I don't want to miss-”

“NOW, Mica!” you shout.

Their eyes widen behind their goggles. You're not one to raise your voice at them, not like that. They hesitate, then take off down the hill.

Gossan arrives a few minutes later with Mica following. You've stripped away all unnecessary data on the computer model, increased the tracker precision. It's unusually hot out right now, and your computer's fans are screaming in protest at the request for more processing power. Still, once the program loads in, you are met with the same results.

“What's the problem, Slate?” Gossan asks as they approach. You step to the side, and they come up and look at the monitor. They look at the error, look at the map, zoom out and rotate. “What am I looking at?”

“I don't know. Sed's ship.”

The lean forward, squinting at the screen, lean back again. “But... they just took off?” They say, their voice gaining a slightly higher pitch. They look over at you.

“They woke up from- upset, with a... some kind of nightmare, just a little while ago,” you stammer, talking over yourself. “They were saying, I didn't understand, they were mad about landing? They kept trying to say... then they fell down and hurt their leg. They got into the elevator before I could stop them-”

Gossan shakes their head, raises a hand at you. “Stop, you're saying they got hurt? You let them leave when they were hurt?”

You put your hands in the air. “I don't know! I didn't understand what was happening! They were talking about landing on the sun or something, and then they fell off the elevator scaffolding-”

Gossan throws their arms down, bending in half as if you'd punched them in the gut. “And you let them leave?!” They look simultaneously enraged and ill.

You don't know what to say. You stare at them, wide-eyed.

They shove you aside with a disgusted grunt, and you stumble back a step, bumping into Mica. “Radio Esker,” they order, “I'm going to get Hornfels to start calling the other travelers on the long range. Mica, you-”

The rest of their directions are drowned out by a sourceless roar. You fall to your hands and knees, suddenly wracked with pain. It hits you all at once, deeper than your skin, past your muscle and bone, and the person of you itself is dying.

It is only a second, and disappears all at once without a trace. You raise your head with a gasp and look around frantically. No fires other than your campfire gently crackling, no signs of explosion.

You get to your feet. Mica and Gossan are gone. Did you... pass out? How long were you out?

Assuming Gossan and Mica had made their way to the observatory like they said, you go over to your radio and sit down heavily on the ground beside it. You tune it as quickly as you can to Esker's channel.

“Esker, you there?” you call.

It takes a minute to hear a reply. “Yep, sorry Slate, got the wind knocked out of me for a second there. How've you been?”

“Did you see Sed take off just a minute ago?”

“Well, no, they're...” Their voice fades out before returning. “Well, they were just here, where did they go off to?”

“They're with you?!” you exclaim. You feel like your heart jumps and your guts untwist all at once. “Stars, Esker, my tracker is saying they flew into the surface of the sun!”

“I think it's probably more accurate to say that the surface of the sun flew into us,” Esker replies, almost amused.

You... think you must have heard those word in the wrong order. You lean an ear closer to the radio's speaker. “What? Say that again, Esker?”

“The supernova, Slate.” Esker says, their voice coming loud and clear through the mid-range radio. “Did you feel it too? Hurt like nothing else, I'll tell you what. Seems like everything's fine now, though.”

You shake your head, letting out a frustrated growl. “Stop kidding around, now is not the time for- ugh. Is Sed with you or not?”

“Hm... Doesn't look like it. They were just here, how did they...”

“Call Hornfels if you spot them.” You turn off the radio, stand up and step over to the computer again. You refresh the model, but now it's not loading correctly at all anymore, the thing not even managing to load data for the sun. Stupid, useless computer.

You slap the lid of it closed and stomp your way back into town. Halfway over the hill, you run into Porphy. “Hey, is Mica with you?” they ask, breathless.

“No, they went with Gossan up to the observatory.”

Porphy shakes their head. “No, they're not with Gossan. We can't find Tephra or Galena either.”

You frown with an incredulous look. “They would have passed right through town, unless they took the back path. Are you sure?”

Porphy rolls their eyes. “Yes. We checked, and I was just talking to Gossan. They're not with them. They're not in any of the cabins either. We're worried that they got scared by that blast, but we have no idea where they would have run off to.”

Huh, so that wasn't in your imagination, you guess. “Did Gossan still go up to talk to Hornfels?”

“I think so.”

“I'm headed up there, I'll keep an eye out. We think Sed might be hurt.”

Porphy leans back, surprised. “Hurt? They just took off a few minutes ago.”

You shake your head. “I know. I don't know. We're trying to figure it out.” You push past them and jog through the town. Everyone seems to be thrown into commotion, looking around and calling out to each other. And with every step up towards the observatory, you start to feel that this whole situation might be bigger than you realized.

Chapter Text

[ERROR: Unable to align celestial diagram with current optics. Adjust positioning or select a different diagram.]

You cannot select a different diagram, this is the last one you have on file. You don't bother changing position either. You had, earlier – you had twisted and turned in your seat, aligning the star chart displayed on your helmet's HUD with the sky around you as the universe slowly, then quickly, grew dim. You know now that there are no more stars behind you than there are in front of you, or above you, or to the left or right or below your feet. There's nothing for the charts to align with at all.

You let the diagram blink away from your screen and look through the glass unimpeded. You had tried to call Hornfels several times, but the signal was blocked by interference from the violent solar activity. Someone had landed on Ash Twin at some point, you couldn't tell who, maybe it was Riebeck's ship, maybe not, but they left just as quick. You will face death alone. You don't know how to feel about that; maybe it's how it should be, but that doesn't make up for the wrongness of all of this.

You don't stop drumming. You haven't, you can't. If feel like if you stop your heartbeat if not time itself with stop along with it.

The red sun circles your north-pole camp, always present, never hidden from you. There will be no twilight nor a sunset here. Night will fall upon you in the brightest way imaginable, all at once and never again.

Why is it when science fails to answer you, you find yourself searching for peace in poetry?

(Science did not fail to answer you.)
(You failed to listen.)
(Yeah, it's more prose than poetry, but I still like it. It's art, art is always good! Maybe we can work together to make it rhyme, if you want?)

“What are you looking at?” Sed asks, stepping around from behind you, looking into the distance as if trying to follow your sight line. They aren't wearing an EVA suit, but you guess it doesn't really matter now.

“From what I can tell, I think it's the death of the universe.”

Sed turns back to you, an eyebrow raised. “How's that?”

“Most of the stars in the observable universe have either burned out or gone supernova. Ours is next.”

“What is a supernova?” Arkose asks. They're digging around through your gear. “Also, where are your marshmallows? Can I have some?”

“You can have one. Or... you know what, have as many as you would like. There's no dinner for you to spoil anyway.” You turn to Tephra, who is following Galena as the two of them pick up little rocks from the ground and place them in a pile. “Tephra, do you remember what a supernova is?”

“It's a... it's an explosion, right?” Tephra replies. “Like the model in the museum. It's when a star explodes after it gets too old.” Sed walks over with a larger, heavier rock to add to their pile.

“You all shouldn't be here,” you say.

Mica looks up from peering through your telescope. “I think it's time for a lesson!” they say. They stare squarely at you, and you can't read the expression behind their goggles. “You owe us that much at least, right?”

“Ugh, a lesson,” says Arkose. They start loading a stick up with too many marshmallows.

You stand up and position yourself at the front of the camp. The hatchlings barely acknowledge you.

You gesture towards the blistering, bubbling surface of the sun held in place unmoving behind you. “So, for most of our lives and recorded history, our sun has been in the main sequence stage. But now that it is nearing the end of its life cycle, can anyone say what stage it is in now?”

“Red giant stage, right?” Tephra says, not looking up. They have their back towards you as they stack rocks with Galena and Sed.

“That's right!” you reply. “The process of fusion at the core of a star creates a lot of heat, which produces an outward force that pushes against it's own gravity. However, a star in the red giant phase will completely consume all the fuel at its core, leaving just the heavy element iron right at the center. Like when a fire has burned up all it's wood, it starts to cool down.”

“Can't we just add more wood?” Arkose asks, mouth full of sugar.

“Not enough wood in the universe for that, I'm afraid,” Sed replies.

Tephra tilts their head but does not look back at you. “But if it's getting cooler, why does it feel like it's getting so hot here?”

Mica rolls their eyes. “Because the diameter of the sun is increasing, so all the planets are literally closer to its surface. Obviously.”

You continue: “So now that the core is cooling, it can't push against gravity anymore. Watch what happens next.”

Above you, the star, your sun, begins to very slowly fold in on itself, growing hotter and whiter as it does. “The heavy weight of the star crushes the core into small, compact, dense ball. This process is very fast, it only takes a few seconds!” But you stand and watch it change in slow motion. It takes several minutes. You can still hear the beat of your drum all the way over here. The hatchlings pay no attention to you or the sun.

“Once the core reaches a critical density, it collapses into, most likely for our sun, a neutron star. The outer layers of the sun stop falling in suddenly. This creates a shockwave of neutrinos and gravitational force that blasts out across the solar system, passing through all matter, including us and the planets.”

You watch as, at its smallest size, the sun does just that, throwing out nearly imperceivable wave at you and through you.

“You all should stop playing and pay attention,” you plead.

Sed, Tephra, and Galena work together to build a small tower from the rocks they have collected. Mica stares through your telescope at empty space. “Why?” they ask.

“We are about to die,” you say.

Galena comes over to you, wraps their little arms around your shoulders best they can. “Don't cry,” they whisper, “this is your fault.”

Mica sighs, bored. “If we're all gonna die anyway, who cares if we spend our life studying the stars or playing with rocks? It all ends the same.”

“Yeah!” Tephra pipes up, “Why are you complaining? I didn't even get to be old enough to be an astronaut, you got to come all the way out here!”

The light washing over the camp turns to a bright, unstoppable blue.

“The shockwave of energy carries out through the outer layers of the star, causing them to expand and spread out over the solar system and eventually into the wider universe.” Your voice keeps up its tenor of cheerful fascination despite the tears running down your face.

Sed lays back on the ground, stretching their arms and finally looking up at the ocean of light slowly approaching them. “At least it's pretty,” they say.

“And look,” Mica adds, pointing at Timber Hearth in the distance, “The village crater is pointing away from the supernova, so we won't even know what hit us.”

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” Arkose asks. Their marshmallow is on fire. They put it in their mouth anyway.

Tephra looks at you. Their skin is starting to burn and blister. “I don't know. Why'd you try learning so hard if you didn't want to know the answer, Chert? Would you have told all of us if you could have so that we could suffer with you?”

“The force and heat and radiation from the supernova destroys everything in its immediate vicinity!” You cannot hear your own voice over the sound of the drum.

“What will happen when it hits you?” Sed asks.

“I will die,” you reply.

Sed, now in an EVA suit, is right in front of you. Your bare face reflects in their visor. “What happens after that?”

You shout, “Now, let's see the supernova demonstrated in real time!”

You are alone in your camp. You beat your drum.

The sun goes supernova.

You scream, close your eyes.

You die.

You find your experience immediately after death to be more bodily than you expected.

You feel your heart's staccato beat reverberate through your throat and face and ears. You hear the wheeze of your breath, so fast and weak that you are sure to face some kind of second death through suffocation shortly. Your limbs begin to shake at every muscle being held drumskin taught for too long.

Your leg twitches involuntarily, and feel you the press of your drum still balanced between your knees. Slowly, disbelievingly, you reach out a hand, and your knuckles brush against its top. You tap a finger, and gentle thump from the barrel replies. You tap again, and again, faster and more firmly, an accelerating beat, until all at once you open your eyes wide.

You see... your campfire. Your camp. And nothing else besides.

If anything exists beyond the little island, you cannot see it. The dry lakebed and the world around you are completely consumed by void.

A small laugh squeaks out of you, startling you. If this is what an afterlife is supposed to look like, it is... it could be worse, you imagine, but it is terrible. You are aware and alone. You had hoped to sleep.

That isn't true, really. You had hoped to live, and then you had stopped hoping anything at all. But now, looking back, you wish to sleep. Not... not whatever this is.

Because outside of the direct vicinity of your campfire, there is nothing. No sun, no stars, no planets, no...

You look closer at the emptiness. There's something – you get up, stand as close to the edge of your camp as you dare – yes, a light. A small orange glow in the distance, moving quickly right to left from your perspective. It accelerates slightly, then disappears. You wither, but perk up again as reappears a few dozen seconds later, past your left shoulder. From the light, an even tinier speck of light appears from it and flies away. As your eyes adjust to the dark, you can just make out the speck approach something, lighting its blue surface, before striking it and disappearing from view.

Hollow's Lantern. You're looking at Hollow's Lantern and Brittle Hollow.

Maybe you're not so alone after all.

You scramble for your radio switch, flipping it on with a sharp burst of static.

“Is anyone there?” You say, your voice frail and strained. “Hornfels?”

You get no response.

“You're not gonna get a response,” a young voice whispers behind you. You whip around, but see nothing but your crackling campfire. You whimper and cannot even find the strength to feel embarrassed by it.

You cry out as the radio crackles to life. “Ah, Chert, give me just a moment. There seems to have been some kind of explosion nearby.” The voice fades at the end as the speaker steps away from the microphone.

“HORNFELS!” you screech, pushing your hands up against the rim of your helmet and twisting your head to try to get an ear closer to the speaker. “Please, Hornfels, are you there? Please don't leave! Hornfels?!”

The voice volume increases as it approaches the mic again. “I'm here, Chert, what do you need?”

“Are you- is everything okay? Is Timber Hearth okay?”

“I think so...” Hornfels replies, distracted. “It sounded like the new traveler's ship either violently exploded or crashed directly into the observatory. Everything seems fine, however, I don't see any signs of damage...”

“Hornfels,” you sob, collapsing to the ground, “Hornfels!”

“Chert?” You have their full attention now. “Chert, what's the matter? Are you injured?”

“Hornfels, the sun...” You can't finish the sentence, it is hard for you to breathe.

“The sun? I can't understand you, Chert. Try to calm yourself if you can, tell me how I can help you.”

“The sun,” you gasp out, “It's- its gone. It's gone! It went supernova!”

There is a pause, and you hear Hornfels shifting something around. “I'm sorry, I still can't quite hear you. Did you say a star went supernova? While that's certainly exciting, I'm not sure what all the distress is about.”

“No, Hornfels! Our star! The sun! The sun is gone!”

“...Our sun is gone? You're not making much sense Chert.”

“Listen, listen to me, Hornfels,” you say, your voice low and harsh. You find yourself becoming angry. “Look outside right now. Look through your telescope. The stars are gone. All the stars are gone, including ours.”

You are met with silence. One minutes stretches to two, with nothing but faint static playing through your speakers.

“Please don't leave me, Hornfels,” you whisper weakly into the mic.

You hear their voice again, and close your eyes in relief. “I'm- I'm here Chert. I don't... what- uh... tell, tell us what you've observed. Gossan and Hal are here too.”

You describe what you witnessed. What you think you saw, what it seemed like... no. What you saw. You can't start doubting yourself, not about this. You saw it. You felt it through your flesh and bone. You tell them what you have witnessed.

They ask you if you have seen the new astronaut.

You glance behind you at Sed sitting in the camp. They are actively burning, like a marshmallow dipped into the fire. The shrug at you, palms up, with a mischievous grin.

“I... I haven't. No, I haven't.”

You do not tell them about the hatchlings.

They close the channel with promises that they will call you back shortly. Again static hums through the speakers.

“Sure, sure, 'we'll call you back.' That's definitely going to happen.”

You increase the volume as loud as you can until the hum becomes a buzz that fills your helmet and ears and head.

You want to sit down. You want to cry. You want to play your drum.

You go to your telescope.

Over the next several minutes, you find other signs of existence, faint lights that have managed to hold out against the darkness. Hollow's lantern is the biggest and brightest. Near to it, on the surface of Brittle Hollow, you manage to catch sight of and track a faint blue beam similar to the one on Ember Twin. Far off in the distance, a glowing pinpoint of light that you can't quite determine the source of. It disappears, and a flash of lightning tells you that Giant's Deep has blocked your view. You hope Gabbro is okay. You're too afraid to try calling them.

Even the village on Timber Hearth becomes visible to you once the planet has rotated enough. You can make out the glow of population, ambient orange light from campfires and artificial sources. You track it with your telescope and allow the tiniest ember of hope to find purchase in your heart.

As you watch, the light... warps, briefly, doubles and twists, and the planet is obscured.

“Oh, it's gone forever,” Mica laughs. They are sitting in the dirt beside you, and their voice cuts right through the radio static still filling your helmet.

How could it be obscured? The only two bodies that pass between Ember Twin and Timber Hearth are Ash Twin and the Attlerock. Ash Twin has already passed, you can hear it just starting to draw in sand again, and the Attlerock is too small to obscure your home planet completely.

“And also the sun,” Sed adds. They sit on the edge of the island, their legs swinging in the nothingness. “Or, well, I guess not anymore.”

“Do you know what's going on?” you ask them.

“Of course I do!” they reply, hands on their hips and chest puffed confidently. “I'm not going to just tell you though. That's cheating. I already gave you a hint.”

You continue to watch. The empty void looks back unchanging. But, maybe not empty? Can you still see the faint light of the village, but stretched into a ring?

“Focus, focus,” Tephra and Arkose chant behind you, even Galena's tiny voice joining in.

Then, a bit to the left of where it disappeared, the light of the village folds, melds, doubles again, and bends back into shape.

You fumble to press the radio's call button on your helmet as quickly as you can. You press it again and again and again and again and again and-

As soon as you hear Hornfels' voice blare through at max volume, you start screaming.

“THERE'S A BLACK HOLE. THERE'S A BLACK HOLE. A BLACK HOLE HAS FORMED AT THE CENTER OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM!”

Chapter Text

You did not expect that on your arrival to the Quantum Moon's sixth location, you would find it so familiar. Like you have seen it, known it, every day. Like you were born here.

You wonder if everyone, every visitor who comes here, feels this way and sees this place how you do now. This might be presumptuous thinking, but you theorize that this is not the case. At each location prior to this one, the Moon reflected that which it was beside, whether dry sand or water or trees or brittle stone or twisting brambles. But here, under the unblinking gaze of the Eye of the universe itself, it feels almost as if the Moon is reflecting your own soul.

Do you recognize yourself in the smooth and even ground, rolling with a multitude of muted colors? In the sharp and jagged outcroppings that tower high above you, whether protecting like thorns or pointing the way? In the billowing clouds drawn ever towards then parting for the Eye? Should you?

You are not sure what type of self there should be to recognize. By your arrival here, you are marked as having grown from a child to an adult. Should you feel changed? Do you?

You do. You know that in some way, this place has changed some fundamental, innate aspect of yourself, if not your whole self entirely. You know this, though you cannot perceive it. You are changed by having been here, but you are not so sure that this change can rightly be called growth.

Could it be that, in the wake of your observance, this place is not reflecting you, but you are reflecting it?

Your thoughts are interrupted by a short and mechanical click.

You look towards it, and you see... something, standing some distance away to the north. A person, perhaps? A creature obscured by rugged clothing and a heavy, round helmet made of unfamiliar materials. They hold in their hands a relatively large and complicated device pointed towards you. You cannot see much of whoever is inside the suit, but the size, body proportions, and strange shape of the legs tell you that it cannot be a Nomai.

This is... you knew that visiting the sixth location could invite uncertainty and unpredictability, but you never could have imagined this! A member of an apparently intelligent alien species, here before you!

You go to step forward, but stop yourself. You are bigger than it, and you have no immediate way to communicate that you mean no threat or harm. However, it approaches you, walking forward without any hint of trepidation, so maybe your concerns are unfounded.

Once it is close enough that you can see through its visor, your hypothesis is confirmed; this is no Nomai. An extra eye, blue skin, no fur to speak of. It pulls back its lips, showing you its teeth and squinting its eyes. You hesitate to infer too strongly of its expression, but its posture seems relaxed, calm, even comfortable, so you feel it safe to assume that its grin is a happy one.

It says something to you, part of which you, unexpectedly, understand. "Hi, Solanum!"

You blink at them, angling your head to look more closely with your third eye. They know of you? Do they speak your language? "Adımı nereden biliyorsun?" you ask. How do you know my name?

They look blankly at you, then move their shoulders up and down and say something in their language. They seem not to understand.

"Solanum?" you say, hoping they understand the lilt in your voice as a question.

Their smile drops, and they speak quickly, but they still seem relatively relaxed, so you don't think you've upset them. They continue talking, looking away towards nothing in particular, and you wonder if they might be talking to themself more than to you at this moment. It is fascinating to hear it, though. Their tongue sounds somehow heavier than your own, the words often dragging slightly through the middle and lifting higher at the beginnings and ends, creating an almost melodic rhythm.

They seem struck by inspiration and look intensely at the back of their device, pushing the buttons until they find what they are looking for. They turn it around and hold it up to face you. You step closer cautiously; they let you, and even lean towards you as you both look at the device together.

You realize now that this device must be their image capturing tool. The panel displays a monochromatic photo. In the photo, you see what appears to be the surface of the Quantum Moon at its Giant's Deep location. In the middle of the image stands the shuttle you had arrived in.

"Solanum," they say, tapping on the display panel. So they had seen the shuttle, but it isn't your personal shuttle, it doesn't have your name or any identifying marks-

That is right, the verbal data recorder! You don't believe you introduced yourself on the recording, but the transcriber would have labeled it as having been your dialogue. If that is where this person learned your name, perhaps that means they can read your language even if they cannot speak it?

To test your theory, you trace words onto your actualization staff and press it to a stone shard behind you. If I have inferred correctly from what you are showing me, it seems that you learned my name from my voice recorder on the shuttle?

The alien pulls a second, smaller device from off their back and aims it at the text. The tool rapidly scans over your text as they glance at its display, then they turn to you and grin, bobbing their head.

You hum happily, and trace again. Wonderful! I am impressed by your ability to not only translate my language but also use your image capturing device to communicate. — I only regret that I cannot understand your language. There are many questions I would like to ask you! Where do you come from, I wonder?

They put away their translator and quickly take out their image capturing device again, almost dropping it in their haste. They seem to be fluttering with excited energy, which you find contagious. Their eyes scan the display panel until they find what they are looking for. They turn the device around again and press their shoulder up against your side to show you. The sudden closeness startles you a bit. You lean forward to look more closely at the image.

You see an unfamiliar settlement made up of several discreet, disconnected buildings, apparently built of wood in an architectural style you have never seen nor heard of before.

You trace out: Is this your home planet? The flora and geography are reminiscent of Timber Hearth, but there is no such settlement there as far as I am aware.

The alien seems to draw back a little at this, their grin gone and their energy reduced. Have you disappointed them? Upset them, somehow? Perhaps they do not wish to discuss their home, but they were the one to show you the image...

They have turned their device away from you, and are looking much more carefully and slowly at the images on the display. After a moment, their smile returns, and they lean against you again and show you the photo. This time, they show you a surprising and rather humorous image of a person in similar attire to them floating in low atmosphere several inches above some kind of mat tied between two trees. They hold a small wooden tool to their mask, and their posture suggests utter unconcern at their current predicament.

From there, the alien spends several minutes going through their image catalog and showing you selected, presumably unrelated photos. The White Hole Station silhouetted against the sun. An extreme closeup of the face of someone from their species, the angle of which makes you laugh aloud. Pieces of the suit they are currently wearing hung up in a small wooden space. Several pictures of the Quantum Moon.

They show you a picture of yourself standing near where you are now, taken from a distance. That explains the sound that had caught your attention earlier. The image, you think, is framed quite artfully. It is low to the ground, pointed up enough to show the vortex high above you, and the shards of rock at your sides towering over you make you look very small in comparison. However, you find your own posture in the image, alone and looking off at nothing in particular, a little embarrassing compared to the grandeur of the location.

You huff a laugh. Playfully, you thrust out one hand to cover the display and turn away to hide your face with the other hand.

For the first time, the alien (you really should ask their name) steps back, dropping their shoulders and pulling the device to their chest. You take a chance and pat them on the arm, then quickly trace out a message. I apologize, I did not mean to make you think I am upset. I am only being silly. — This sixth location is so beautiful, but I look like some little insect hiding in the stones.

They look up from their translator and squint hard, leaning towards you. Then they grin, take your shoulder and jostle you a bit. Once again, you are surprised at the physical and familiar way they are behaving with you, but the interaction still feels friendly.

They take a step back, holding up the image capturing device and aiming the front of it towards you. You tilt your head at them, then realize what they are doing. You strike a thoughtful pose, looking off the the side with a hand on the bottom of your mask. They grin and crouch down low, their device almost at your feet and pointed up at your face.

You hear the click sound again, and they stand up and show you the image. This time, your body takes up most of the display, and the angle makes you look much taller than you are.

You bark out a laugh, and the corner of their eyes crinkle behind their visor. You set down your staff and hold out your hands. Understanding, they hand you the device, carefully positioning your thumb over a button to activate it. They take a few steps back and strike what you would call an "adventurous" pose, jutting out one leg and leaning forward, a hand over the top of their visor as if to block out the sun while they look off into the distance.

You hold up the device and press the button. A second later, the image appears on the display. You were a little too close; the top of their helmet is cut off. You take a couple steps back, hold up the device, and press a button again.

The device explodes in your hands.

Part of it shoots out and slams directly into the other person's torso, sending them flying several feet in the low gravity before they smash against the stone. At the same time, the recoil knocks you back and you stumble to the ground.

You stand up quickly. All that is left in your hands is the frame of the device. You drop it and rush over to the alien's side. They lay flat on their back, the majority of the device clinging to the front of their suit. They seem to be struggling to breathe, their breaths coming in short, loud gasps.

"I am so sorry!" you exclaim, forgetting the language barrier for the moment. You try to pull the device off of them, but the feet of it are stuck firmly to their suit. "I must have done something wrong. Are you injured? Please, how can I help you?"

You lean forward, looking through their visor. You see their lower eyes squinting almost shut and their lips pulled back and up into a wide grin. They reach over and pat your arm. You realize, then, that they aren't gasping with pain. They are, you believe, laughing.

You huff out a nervous chuckle of your own. You take them by the arm and carefully pull them up to a sitting position. The device stays stubbornly stuck to the front of their suit. That makes you laugh more, and all at once you realize just how absurd this all is. Reaching the sixth location of the Quantum Moon, meeting a member of an unknown species, communicating with said person, then nearly killing them with their own technology. You certainly did not expect the day to go this way when you launched from Brittle Hollow this morning.

Once both of you have calmed your breathing, the alien gestures towards the device's frame. You stand up and bring it over to them. They press a third button on the handle, and with a flash of void, the imaging device returns to its cradle. You blink with surprise. You notice now what you hadn't before. Tiny warp cores, clearly Nomai in design, are integrated both into the device and its frame. Your clan is not shy about sharing technology with others when the opportunity presents itself, but when could this have occurred?

As they get to their feet, you begin to trace out a question about the nature of the warp cores, and how they were acquired. Before you can finish, they step forward and put a hand on your shoulder. You look up.

"Solanum," they say, a gentle smile on their face. They put a hand on their own chest. "Sed."

"Sed?" you confirm. They bob their head up and down. You put a hand on their shoulder, and say, a little hesitantly, "Sed."

They grin, wide and warm. "Sed. Solanum, Sed."

"Sed," you say again. You blink, and everything seems to... shift, slightly. Not in a quantum way, necessarily, it was subtle, but...

The alien, Sed, is standing in front of you, but their posture is completely different. They sag, slump forward, and fall to their knees. Before you can process what is happening, they raise their helmet and vomit onto the ground.

Chapter Text

You rush to the alien's side as they cough and sputter. They don't seem to have any difficulty breathing without their helmet thanks to the mysterious atmosphere of the Quantum Moon, but they are panting as if they had just sprinted the circumference of its equator. Their whole body is shaking, and as you reach out to steady them, you suddenly draw back in shock. Their face and what is visible of their neck are covered in angry purple burns that you did not see before. They look exhausted and delirious, and all the joyful, friendly energy they displayed just seconds ago is gone.

"Sed?"

They look up in your vague direction, and you have no theory as to the emotions behind their wide, listlessly wandering eyes. They look past you, around at the space, maybe at nothing specific, before their gaze lands on you again. They reach toward you, and you go to support them, but they simply trace the edge of your mask with delicate fingertips.

Then all four of their eyes roll back in their head, and you get a grip on their sleeves as they collapse. They are much heavier than you expected, but you mange to lower them down and onto their back as gently as you can.

You stare at them as they slowly blink back to consciousness, you still clutching at their suit. You don't understand what is happening, what could have caused this. Your only weak hypotheses are that perhaps exposure to this place had been slowly causing them harm, or that they were sick all along and are only now expressing symptoms, but neither explains the spontaneous damage to their skin. Your life support systems would have loudly alerted you to sudden temperature fluctuations or high levels of radiation or other environmental concerns, but there was nothing.

They attempt to sit up, and you help them, only for them to lean to the side and start heaving again. Nothing comes up this time, and you believe you can safely assume that their clenched-teeth gasps and nasally whines are expressions of pain.

Whatever this is, it is beyond you, you know that much. This person needs help that you cannot give them. This is a matter for a doctor, or a biologist of some kind.

You don't know if anyone in your clan has ever returned from their Quantum pilgrimage with anything more than a renewed sense of purpose, but today it looks like you'll be returning with a sickly member of an uncontacted alien species. Progress blooms from the unexpected, you suppose.

You pick up your actualization staff and trace out a message before pressing it into the ground at their hip. I am sorry, I am afraid that I have no pertinent medical experience that can help you. — Unless you object, I will bring you to someone who may be of more aid.

They stare unblinking at the words on the ground. You gently tug at the translator on their back. Once you remind them of its existence, they pull it forward and slowly read over your message. They don't seem to react one way or the other, which is all the permission you need to carefully press their helmet back down over their head and start lifting them to their feet.

They are dizzy and unbalanced, leaning heavily against you, but they can walk. It is a good thing; you are not certain you could carry them. With their arm pulled across your shoulders and you hunched over awkwardly to bear their weight, you begin the trek back to the north pole.

The journey is slow and arduous, and even more so whenever you encounter uneven or rocky terrain. The little Moon is feeling more the size of Giant's Deep, and you begin to wonder if you will ever reach the other side, but then you are stopped by a wall of obsidian. There is no shrine in sight.

“You're going to have to close your eyes, my friend,” you mumble. It is more difficult than it is worth to utilize your staff just now, so you simply cover their visor with a hand and hope they get the hint. You blink a few times, and soon enough, you are greeted by the sandstone tower.

You haul them inside and set them down to lean against the wall and rest while you plan your route. You have a few different options involving a few different Moon locations. You want to avoid wading through knee-deep water with them, and ice seems particularly hazardous to navigate, so Giant's Deep and Dark Bramble are off the table. You ultimately need to get to the shuttle at the south pole of Brittle Hollow, but that will involve ice as well. That leaves Timber Hearth and the Twins. Timber Hearth has flat terrain but several small rivers that will be difficult to cross. Therefore, you estimate that the best route would be to travel to the Moon's location at the Twins, make your way down to the canyon wall at the 40th parallel north, take the shrine there to Brittle Hollow, then do your best to trek down to the shuttle. You won't be able to avoid the ice completely, but you'll cross that gravitational transport beam when you get to it.

Decided, you close the door, dark and quiet covering over you. You switch on you mask's light, causing it glow a bright purple around the edges of the eye ports.

The moment you do, the moment you see the indicator on the wall start shifting, a peace you did not realize you had inside you is taken away. You are filled with the most horrible sense of dread, and you think, Ah, that's right, I'm not alive.

You are blind and deaf to the world. Your throat is filled with sand and water and emptiness, you do not breathe. Your heart has stopped, and it will not start again, as it has long since rotted out of your body. All of this was fine before. Because this is how things are, then they are how they should be. Now, though, something about these facts strikes you as... illogical, wrong, and you think, How could I not be alive?

And with that, you watch the shrine's location indicator grind to a halt beside the symbol for the Twins.

You are alive and whole, but you know for certain that it is not without cost. The death that was you was peace as well, but two of these are gone, leaving only you. The 83.33333% of you that was at rest is now at restlessness. It is a debt owed to the universe, and only with its mercy may this debt not be as forever as the death was.

Is the universe capable of extending mercy? Can a debt to the universe ever be repaid or forgiven? You want to gasp for breath, but it comes easily. You want to collapse, but the muscles in your legs and back are steady and strong. You are, and you are alive and whole.

So you swallow and blink your eyes and stand up straight and roll your shoulders just because you can, and because there's nothing else that can be done, you carry on.

You kneel beside Sed to help them up again. They stare up at you, eyes wide, and with a slurred voice mumble something you don't understand. You smile at them even though they cannot see it behind your mask, squeeze their hands in a way you hope comes across as comforting, and lift them to their feet. “We have to keep moving, Sed.” At hearing their name, they lean on your arm and walk with you out of the shrine.

Traversing the uneven and shifting sand together proves even more laborious than crossing the stone surface at the Eye location, but thankfully you have less than half the distance to cover. Once you near the red canyon walls, you begin glancing around for the shrine. But then you spot something unexpected. You startle and blink, and it disappears. Frowning, you blink several times at the same place. The shrine appears, but you let it pass and continue blinking.

Sure enough, what you imagined you saw is proven true — the Brittle Hollow shuttle, standing tall and waiting to depart.

A shocked and delighted laugh escapes you. The shuttle is reflecting the Moon's quantum properties! What a miraculous and convenient discovery! It is known that objects in the vicinity of quantum materials will eventually adopt quantum properties themselves, such as with the shrine your people built here many years ago, but typically that process occurs after quite some time.

Your delight fades, and you feel it fold into something dense that lies heavy in your stomach. There is something wrong about this. Instead of dwelling on it, you steel yourself and focus on getting Sed into the shuttle.

The gravity elevator lifts both of you easily and deposits you into the clean and familiar space. Your voice recorder lies untouched from where you left it, but one of the oxygen-supplying dwarf trees near the control console has spontaneously died. It feels decidedly like an ill omen, but you choose to be grateful that the other has survived.

You flick on the artificial gravity of one of transport beds and do your best to lay your friend on it comfortably. It really is not designed for someone of their height and body shape, and you have to help them remove their heavy backpack and lay it on the floor, but it seems worth the effort. They are barely aware of their surroundings at this point, their eyes rolling and unfocused as they look around at nothing, and you don't trust them not to fall out of the shuttle's open hatch. They are obedient, at least, willing to acquiesce to your maneuvering without resistance. You do your best to lower the transport bed's harness over them and hope it will not do more harm than good.

Once they are reasonably secure, you make your way over to the console. Looking out through the window at the billowing clouds above you, then back over your shoulder at the sandy ground, you bid a silent goodbye to the Quantum Moon. You thank it for its part in carrying you forward into this new phase of your life, whatever it may become. Then you level your gaze at the controls, and the marble follows your eyeline into the the center track.

Space folds around you, and feel yourself fold with it and simultaneously expand to fill the vacuum, and then you are looking up at the walls of the gravity cannon and empty space above it.

You step back to Sed's side, but they appear to have lost consciousness again. You can see their chest rise and fall (Do they respire through lungs, like you? You should make no assumptions), so they're still alive, for now. You leave them strapped to the transport bed and hurry out of the shuttle.

Gravity flips as you pass through the shuttle's hatch, and you land heavily on your feet. When you look up, you are surprised to see the walkway around the gravity cannon... empty. Cold and eerily quiet.

You look around, but it is extremely dark, it seems as though some of the artificial lights in the area have gone out. It is too dark to even see the hollow undersurface of the planet in some places. You step over to the edge of the platform. Nobody is stationed at the cannon controls, either. The light of your mask reflects off the latticework cannon structure, and you notice that it is worn and chipped. In the distance behind the controls, you can see the gravity lift from the black hole to the Crossroads, and you can barely make out lights of the Hanging City. The bridges between the two, however, are partially collapsed.

“Bells?” you call out, and can immediately feel the wrongness to it. Brittle Hollow has a peculiar, signature echo as sounds reverberate off the ceiling and cliffsides and are eventually consumed by the black hole below. But instead of returning to you, your voice weakly peters out into nothing, like trying and failing to scream in a nightmare.

Still, you continue. “Bells! Caigua! Is anyone available?” you shout. You jog up the path to the cannon observation building, noticing deep cracks in the road. You stop short at the doorway, looking in.

The building is crumbling. The door itself its missing, and huge chunks of the walls and floor have fallen away. The platform for the the gravity elevator is gone completely, leaving the rings to terminate unreachably high in the empty air. Cautiously stepping halfway down the precarious staircase, you can see through the hole in the wall that the path to the Crossroads no longer exists, that its jagged edge empties off into nowhere.

Normally, this building would have been just starting to fill with eager people preparing to celebrate the homecoming of the latest Quantum pilgrim. Now, it is dark and silent and still and cold, devoid of life. Anyone who may have once been waiting up for you has not been here for a very long time.

You want to call out further, but your voice sticks in your throat. None of this is right. None of this is right, and you don't understand what you're observing.

You stumble back out of the room. You don't understand what you're observing. There's a procedure for that. You tug uselessly at your mask and try to calm your breathing. Scientific method. You don't understand, so employ the scientific method. Observation, question, hypothesis, experiment, analysis, conclusion. You count your breaths to the words, and slowly begin walking back to the shuttle.

Observation: There are no people within the vicinity of the gravity cannon. The structures around the cannon are exhibiting profound levels of damage. Many of the roads, paths, and other means of traversal to and from the gravity cannon are no longer usable.

A piece of the walkway crumbles beneath your feet. You look through the resulting gap, and watch the tiles fall and fall until they are consumed by the black hole swirling beneath you. You swallow.

Question: Are there currently any Nomai within Brittle Hollow?

You kneel down and peer through the gap with your third eye. It can pick up fainter light and more subtle movement than your lower eyes. Even so, turning your head this way and that to see the Hanging City and other platforms far off in the distance, you can see no signs of habitancy, only destruction. Holes are torn into the floors of buildings, exposing them to the emptiness beneath them, and smoke trails from some distant fire. Entire swaths of the planet's undersurface are invisible to you entirely, as if the rock was patched together with many meters of the blackest fabric.

Hypothesis: There are currently no Nomai within Brittle Hollow.

You stand up, and before you are quite aware of it, you are in the shuttle and standing at its interface. You are holding your actualization staff in your hand, and it takes you a moment to remember why.

Experiment: Make contact with all active and receptive Nomai devices, and see if you get a reply.

During your preparations to travel to the Quantum Moon, it was explained to you how use the emergency broadcast network. A message sent on this network would be delivered to every device currently in use: every scroll wall, every holographic tablet display, every personal communication device, in all the solar system, simultaneously. It was warned that this network was to only be used in the most dire of emergencies on your journey.

A few nights ago, you and your friends tossed around various increasingly ridiculous scenarios where you might have to use this system to call for help, ranging from “your suit spontaneously catches fire” to “the periodic table of elements suddenly inverts” to “you experience mild gastrointestinal discomfort.” It was all playful teasing, and you had laughed late into the night over it together.

As you dock your actualization staff into the console and swipe to open the network, the giddy laughter echos in your ears like tinnitus.

A recording symbol appears on the glass before you, and you hesitate, willing your mind to produce words. “I am- this is Solanum, speaking from within the shuttle currently stationed at Brittle Hollow's gravity cannon.” You hate how your voice shakes, you try to sound calm and professional but your voice is pitched high like a child's. “To anyone receiving this message, I request an immediate response, please. The area around the gravity cannon has sustained major damage, and I am not sure the cause. There is no one else nearby. Please respond.”

You stop the recording, and the transcript swirls out before you. You turn around to face the data column as it rises from the floor in the middle of the shuttle. Once it has reached its full height, a ring of text appears around the base. Sending emergency message to all active devices...

It should only take a few seconds for the message to be delivered to devices on Brittle Hollow, and no more than a minute for it to reach even the farthest devices in the solar system. Still, it may take a few minutes to receive a response. You breathe deeply and try to calm your hammering heart as you watch the data column.

Much more quickly than anticipated, data appears.
No devices active within the last ten minutes found on Brittle Hollow. Emergency message not sent.

Then, immediately, one by one:

No devices active within the last ten minutes found on Timber Hearth. Emergency message not sent.

No devices active within the last ten minutes found on Ember Twin. Emergency message not sent.

No devices active within the last ten minutes found on Ash Twin. Emergency message not sent.

No devices active within the last ten minutes found on the Sun Station. Emergency message not sent.

No devices active within the last ten minutes found on Giant's Deep. Emergency message not sent.

No devices active within the last ten minutes found on the Orbital Probe Cannon. Emergency message not sent.

Analysis: Unable to establish contact with any Nomai on Brittle Hollow. Further, unable to establish contact with any Nomai within the entire solar system.

You read the messages over and over. You look over your shoulder behind you. Beyond the data column, beyond the glass of the shuttle and past the gravity cannon, movement catches your eye. You watch quietly as the Quantum Moon wanders by above you, dimly lit by the glow of Hollow's Lantern.

Conclusion: Hypothesis confirmed.

You startle badly when Sed, still strapped to a transport bed beside you, begins coughing and gagging. You turn around to see them struggling to remove their helmet. You rush to help them, and they turn and vomit, the bile tinged with red. They continue coughing and start wrestling against the bed's harness, trying to get up. You press their arms down, and say, “Sed, Sed, Sed,” attempting to soothe them.

They still and turn to face you, all four eyes squinting to focus on your mask. “Solanum?” they whisper.

“Yes, I'm here,” you reply.

They look at you blankly. Their eyes droop closed, and they slump back against the bed.

You continue to hold their arms, despite them no longer trying to move. “I don't know what to do, Sed,” you whisper. “Everyone is gone. I don't know what to do.”

They have no reply for you. Even in their unconscious state, their brow wrinkles, their eyes twisted shut with pain. You wonder if you are the last two people in this solar system.

But no, you remember the photos they showed you. Other people, people who look like them (but no people who look like you). Buildings and structures surrounded by pine trees and geysers that they had pointed to as being their home.

If this person is to survive, they will need medical attention that you cannot provide. You now no that there are no other Nomai present who can help. But maybe there is someone out there who can.

“I will get you help, Sed,” you say quietly to the unhearing alien. “I will get you home.”

Chapter Text

As soon as you spot Sed being lowered from the vehicle now perched on the crater's edge, you begin running towards them. They are without their helmet, and their head dangles lifeless and unsupported as whoever-it-is struggles to carry them.

You let out a strangled scream and nearly stumble as the one carrying the hatchling jumps with them off the cliff. No jetpack activates, but their boots glow a dark purple, and the two of them float gently towards the ground before they are obscured from your sight by the roaring spray of the geyser.

"SED!" you attempt to shout around the sound of the water. You run and leap up onto the ledge, uncaring of the cold water that soaks you. Once the geyser dies down, you can see Sed, now also soaked, held near the edge of the ghost matter pit. Water drips off the mask of the very tall person holding them, and they stand there completely frozen as they stare down at the green crystals.

"No, not that way!" you say as you grab hold of the their sides and start dragging them back. They startle out of their staring and let you guide them backward and away from the ghost matter.

Slate appears and takes Sed from the other person's arms and lowers them onto the ground. "They're alive, they're breathing," Slate says as you jump down and kneel next to the hatchling. You press a hand to the front of their suit, and you can feel the shallow rise and fall of their chest. You let out a shaky breath.

They're alive, but they're in terrible shape. Their face and neck are covered in deep purple burns, their breaths come in short wheezes, and you can see blood and vomit on their cheek and chin.

"What happened? Where's their helmet? Did it break?" Slate asks. They turn to the other person, who has knelt down by Sed's feet. They look up at Slate, but don't respond. "Their helmet. What happened?" they ask again, louder, and gesture around their own head, but the person says nothing.

"I don't know if they understand. This, where's this?" you say, and reach out and pinch the side of the person's mask, shaking it.

They pull back out of your grasp, and after a moment's hesitation, pull the mask forward and off of their head and shoulders entirely.

You are met with three wide eyes set in a dark, almost black, face, surrounded thick blue-gray... fur?

You and Slate stare in shock.

Sed coughs weakly, and you turn your attention back to them. Their eyes are clenched shut and their mouth is twisted in a pained grimace.

“Hey, hatchling, wake up,” you say. You put your hands on either side of their face, careful to avoid the worst of the burns. Their skin is damp from the geyser and ice cold. “You're back on Timber Hearth now, you're safe. Can you hear me?” They do not react to your words or your touch.

“That's- that's the same as the new statue in the museum, right? The Nomai statue?” Slate asks, leaning forward as their eyes search over the other person's face. The Nomai stares back, their shoulders hunching slightly as they draw away from Slate's inspection.

“Doesn't matter right now. We need to get Sed inside, they're freezing,” you respond. You start to lift the hatchling to a sitting position. They are still unresponsive. “Help me, Slate; grab their legs. Hornfels has electric heaters in the museum, right?”

With you at their shoulders and Slate at their knees, you work together to carry Sed past Chert's cabin, over the bridge, and into the museum. You lay them down as gently as you can in front of the gravity ball display.

"Hal!" you call, kneeling over Sed again.

Hal appears at the top of the stairs. "Yeah? What- oh, Sed. Oh no." The color drains from their face, and they stumble down the stairs towards you.

"They're alive, they're alive, Hal," you assure. "Bring me a medkit, please, and something to dry them off with."

"We don't- I don't think we have a medkit here," they say, rushing to your side and looking down at their friend's face. "Are they... are those burns?"

"Do you have a Geiger counter?" Slate asks suddenly. Your stomach drops down to your knees.

"Um, I think so, hold on..." They rush back up the stairs again. You and Slate share a glance, but neither of you voice your fears. Something in the back of your mind grumbles about them having a Geiger counter in the observatory but not a medkit. You push it aside.

Hal returns with towels draped over their shoulder and carrying a device partially escaping it's casing. You make a noise to stop them halfway down the stairs. "Stay there, Hal. Slate, go get it."

"What? Why?" Hal says, hurt, as Slate takes the bundle.

"If they've been exposed to radiation, they could still be contaminated," you explain. You begin gently patting Sed dry with the towels while Slate turns on the device. It clicks softly as Slate runs the probe over the hatchling's torso, their gloved hands, the soles of their boots, their face, down the neck of their suit.

"Well, they're not contaminated," Slate says. "This is reading around 80 clicks per minute, same as the background radiation here."

This surprises you. "Has it been tested recently? Why is it's casing open?"

"We were working on adding it to the Little Scout," Hal answers in a breathless rush. "It works, we were just using it yesterday."

You sigh. "That's some good news at least, we don't have to worry about irradiating the whole village." As you speak, you find your voice cracking and strained with tense anxiety. You take a deep breath. Focus on focusing, you tell yourself. Focus on fixing this.

You set your jaw and look up at Slate. "Run down to the village, tell Porphy and Gneiss to set up a sick room. We'll bring Sed to you."

Slate looks like they want to say something. You level a silent glare at them, and they leave.

Hal moves to take Slate's place at Sed's feet. You try to wave them off, but they stand their ground. "You can't carry Sed all they way into town by yourself," they say.

You shake your head. "I need you to stay here and help Hornfels. I'll get them to help me." You nod toward the person in question.

With a confused frown, Hal turns around, then screams.

The new person, the Nomai, has quietly kept their distance since you all had entered the museum. Now, they are peering into the glass of one of the exhibits, their three eyes tracing over the bones of the Nomai skeleton lying in an undignified and crumpled heap.

Hal glances back and forth between the Nomai and the stone statue through the doorway. “How- what-" they stammer.

The Nomai looks up and past Hal, meeting your gaze. You can't read their expression.

Without breaking eye contact, you tell Hal, "Go upstairs and help Hornfels.” You scratch at your chin. “Also, tell Riebeck to come home. We're going to need their expertise."

Hal retreats backwards up the stairs, mouth hanging open. They pause when they reach the top before disappearing into the observatory.

You sigh, put a hand on Sed's head, then jolt when you realize their eyes are open.

"Oh, hatchling, there you are," you say. "You're alright, I've got you."

They groan, clenching their eyes shut again. They mumble soothing words, you're not sure to you or to themself. "It's okay. It's okay. It'll be over soon."

You grip the front of their suit and try to temper the panic in your voice. "Uh uh, don't say that. Stay awake, Sed." You tap the top of their head to rouse them; the skin is not so burned there as their face.

Their eyes do not open again. "Don't be afraid," they whisper, then go limp.

For a dark, dizzying moment, you think they've died in your arms. But you press your fingers to their neck and your ear to their chest, and you feel and hear their heartbeat, the air moving through them. They're alive. They're breathing.

You want to keep it that way. Screw the supernova, this matters more than anything to you right now. You might all freeze to death tomorrow, but this hatchling is not going to die today.

You move behind their shoulders, ready to pick them up. "Hey, uh, Nomai. Come help, get their legs."

Although they were already looking at you, the Nomai startles at your address. They stare at you blankly, holding their staff in both hands.

You sigh, rubbing your face with your palm. "Watch, listen," you say, probably a bit more sharply than you should. You use sign language at the same time, gesturing near your face, like you would when helping a tadpole learn to communicate. "Help me carry Sed." You step forward to lift Sed's legs in demonstration. As you do, the Nomai steps back, holding their staff horizontally in front of them as if to bar your approach.

Thankfully, at that moment Slate stumbles into the museum carrying a stretcher under their arm. "What are y'all still doing here? Gneiss is waiting on us."

With some effort, you and Slate manage to get Sed loaded on and strapped down to the stretcher. Together, you lift and carry them outside. Even more so than the cold, you are struck by the deep darkness barely held back by the faint glow of the lights along the path. Without the stars twinkling above you, or the light reflected off the Attlerock and the other planets, it is so much darker than night. Even the depths of the mines, speckled through as they are with luminous stone, do not feel as dark as this.

Carefully, you bring Sed down the ramp into the village proper. In your peripheral, you notice the Nomai following you. Near the bottom, Porphy meets you, eyes wide with worry. They put a hand on yours as you carry the stretcher and they guide you toward the first cabin near the hatchling house. "This way, Gneiss is setting up," they say. "What happened? Slate said they're burned, and their leg is injured?"

"They're burned, it looks like radiation burns with how even they are and how they stop at the edge of their faceplate, but they're not contaminated." You turn and look at Slate over your shoulder. "Their leg?"

"It should be broken, the way they fell," Slate confirms.

Your brow furrows. "Fell? When?"

Porphy nudges you aside and takes the stretcher from you. "We'll check inside. Rutile needs to talk to you."

On cue, Rutile steps up behind you and takes your arm. You tell them, "In a minute, Rutile, I need to help Sed."

"Porphy and Gneiss have Sed for now. I need information, Gossan," they respond.

You watch as Porphy and Slate carry the stretcher and disappear into the small cabin. You consider arguing, but reluctantly you turn and follow Rutile.

Rutile drags over another chair so that there are two under the great hollow tree. This is a personal rule that they say keeps their head on straight when operating as mayor; if there's something important to discuss, it's discussed sitting down. They drop down into their rocking chair, and you sit on the edge of your seat, ready to leave as soon as you're excused.

"Alright, what do I need to know? Highlights only, please."

You take a deep breath and focus on speaking succinctly. "You felt pain a little while ago? Like a burning?" Rutile nods. "The sun went supernova, apparently. Chert saw it first hand. All the other stars are gone too. We don't know why we lived. We shouldn't have."

Rutile looks away and chews their lip. "The sun didn't rise..." they say quietly, then trail off.

You look over the village, the glow in the windows of the cabin by the waterfall, the oil lamp illuminating the porch of the kitchen cabin. You remember what it looked like in the daylight, commit the image to memory, and hate yourself a little bit for doing so.

"Is it stupid to ask if there's any way we can survive without a sun?" Rutile says with a flat voice.

"It's stupid to ask if we can survive a supernova, but here we are," you say in turn. "Stupid is as stupid does. Call it a fourth law of motion."

Rutile lets out a huff of air that could pass as a chuckle. "Is that supposed to sound hopeful?"

"Sed's alive," you reply.

"Ain't that something?"

"I sure hope so."

Rutile sighs. "That's the best we've got then. Next question: what's that?" They point up at the silver and glowing purple object partially obscured by the big tree.

"As far as I can tell, a Nomai ship."

Rutile points at the cabin Sed is in. "And who's that?" You can see the person who brought Sed home leaning in the doorway, but not entering the room completely.

"A Nomai," you say.

Rutile chews their lip again. "They got anything to do with this?"

"Don't know. Doubt it. I don't know how one person, even a Nomai, could kill all the stars in the universe or save all the planets in the solar system, but..."

"Fourth law?" Rutile finishes, and you hum in acknowledgment.

Rutile stands, and you stand as well, but stay put. They look over the village again, hands in their pockets, and it takes them a moment to speak. "We turned off the power to everything but the observatory, the cabin Gneiss is using for Sed, and the path lights. Once the solar batteries are used up, we'll need to find a different solution. I sent Marl to check on Tektite and start chopping more firewood, we'll need it if it's going to start getting cold. Moraine and Spinel are still looking for the hatchlings."

You nod.

"Alright, go," Rutile says, and you take your leave.

The cabin currently being used as a sick room is the one most recently shared by Sed, Hal, and Marl, if you remember correctly. Some of the adults like to keep a permanent place they call their own, like Chert and Riebeck and Slate, but most of you will float around to whatever bed is convenient. Sed and Hal typically stick together in the same cabin, but sometimes Marl is replaced by Tuff, or Mica trying out the adult cabins, or Hornfels when they can be convinced to go to bed.

Converting it to a sick room means pulling unnecessary furniture out of a bedroom, bringing in basins of clean water and extra lights and medical supplies, and making sure the room is kept warm and humid. By the time you make your way over and push past the Nomai to enter the room, all this has been prepared. Sed is laying on the bed as Gneiss hovers over them and Porphy carefully removes the hatchling's boots. The rest of their EVA suit and gear has already been dumped on the floor.

You move to stand next to Gneiss as they inspect the skin on Sed's face, jaw, and neck. Under the artificial lighting, you can more clearly make out the extent of the damage. Starting abruptly at the top of their forehead, their skin changes from the clear, youthful blue it should be to a mottled purple. Farther down past their nose, the purple becomes shiny and raised, stretching across their chin and throat in unnatural ways.

Gneiss is moving slower than they would normally; they tend work efficiently when patching people up before either sending them out or relegating them to bedrest. This time, though, they look closely at every centimeter of skin, running their thumb over the raised bumps over and over again. They seem distracted as they do so, lost in thought.

"What do you think, Gneiss," you say, "Radiation burns, or something else?"

Gneiss looks up, noticing you for the first time. "Oh, yes, Porphy told me. I agree with you, these look more like radiation than thermal or chemical or electrical burns.” They hover a finger over Sed's face, tracing the line where the worst of the scarring stars. “My guess is they put their arms up over their eyes, and that's why it's not as bad here. But..." Their face grows pinched and worried. "When did this happen, Gossan?"

"Less than an hour ago, they must have only left the atmosphere a minute or two before the supernova."

Neither they nor Porphy startle at the mention of a supernova, so Slate must have already told them. Still, Gneiss looks troubled, and shakes their head. "These aren't fresh burns, Gossan. These are scars. All these raised spots are keloids. These have to be months old at the very least."

You stare at the hatchling's face. Damaged, but whole, with no open wounds or missing skin. When you don't respond, Gneiss asks, "Have they been hiding injuries? Covering their face?"

You shake your head, a bit dazed. "No. No, they couldn't have. I talked to them minutes before they took off, face to face. They weren't wearing their helmet or anything."

The room goes quiet. You vaguely make out the sound of the back door to the cabin opening and shutting. Porphy meets your eyes briefly as they prepare an IV. "I don't know what to make of this, then," Gneiss mumbles. They bump you aside as they begin untying the front of Sed's collared shirt. You take the hint and step back to give the hatchling some privacy.

At the back of the room, Slate speaks up from where they lean against the wall. "So, I agree that Sed's face looked fine just before they launched," they say. They shift in your direction. "But they didn't leave camp between waking up and taking off. So I don't know when you saw them, Gossan, but it wasn't minutes before they launched."

You are dumbfounded, and rage bubbles up like acid in your stomach. “What are you talking about? They came up the ramp from the village already suited up, talked to me, then took off with their jetpack to the launch pad and left.' You snarl at them. "Are you calling me a liar? Why are you even still here?"

Slate doesn't back down, but doesn't meet your eyes either. Firmly, but without heat, they say: "Well, between you forgetting our conversation at the camp, forgetting about seeing for yourself the computer tracker showing Sed flying into the sun, forgetting that Mica was with you right before they disappeared... I don't know that your recollection of events is all that reliable right now, Gossan."

None of that is true. None of that is possible. Even if your memory failed you, you woke up by the ghost matter pit after the supernova. You could not have gone to the camp. You saw Sed.

You know that you and Slate don't get along even on good days, but this, trying to gaslight you, trying to make the others doubt you... "What is your game, Slate?" you hiss through your teeth. "I talked to the hatchling. Do you think I hallucinated that?"

Slate looks past you at Gneiss and Porphy. "Did either of you see Sed come through the village or talk to them at any point before they launched?"

It is quiet behind you. You look over your shoulder stiffly. Gneiss is focused on the hatchling. Porphy stares at you with a furrowed brow.

"No," Gneiss says.

"No," Porphy agrees, somewhat hesitantly.

Your ears and shoulders drop. Slate folds their arms and says nothing.

In the silence, you hear a small voice say, "Did Sed get hurt?"

You flinch in surprise. From under the bed crawls Tephra, shortly followed by Galena. Porphy exclaims, "Where did you two come from?! We've been looking everywhere for you!"

Galena, who is now standing by Sed's head and looking down at them with wide eyes, signs something you don't catch to Gneiss. "Yes, dear. They're burned," Gneiss replies.

Galena turns to Tephra, their shaking visible in their eartips. They whisper something to their sibling. Tephra whines and says "No, oh no. We're sorry. We didn't mean to."

You take them each by a shoulder and pull them away from the bed. "They're alright," you say, and you pause to clear your throat and to strengthen your suddenly uneven voice. "They'll be alright. They got hurt while they were out traveling, you didn't do anything."

Tephra is crying in earnest now. "I think we did! We went into the mines-"

"You were in the mines?" Porphy interrupts.

"Tephra, you know you're not supposed to go in there," you say.

"I know!" Tephra sobs. "I'm s-sorry! We went in with Sed, but then they disappeared. I think w-we burned them, but it was an accident, I promise!"

You look up towards the other adults in the room, who seem just as lost as you are, before turning back to Tephra. "Sed was with you in the mines? When? And why were any of you down there?"

Galena signs, guilty and wavering: Sed taught us how to be stars.

Chapter Text

You watch as Tephra tries to straighten out the antenna on their radio. The music coming from its speaker hums and buzzes like an angry boiler beetle as they do so.

“I don't know why this thing is being weird,” Tephra complains. “Chert sounds normal, but Riebeck's banjo is really quiet, and Gabbro's flute sounds different, like... whistly. I can't hear Esker at all, it keeps picking up some other sound instead.”

“Probably because you left it outside and it got wet,” you say matter-of-factly.

“No, Arkose left it outside,” they respond, continuing to twist the long piece of wire. “I told them to bring it in and they didn't.” Tephra huffs and sits down on the edge of the porch, giving up for now. “Gneiss said these radios don't work very good anyway, that's why we're allowed to play with them.”

“Yeah, but I still don't think they'll be happy if we break them.”

Tephra shrugs. “Well, when Sed comes by, we can get them to test it. Gneiss gave them a fancy new signalscope that can get different frequencies, and it has a handle that doesn't break off!”

Soon enough, you see Sed coming up the bridge over the river, wearing all the stuff they need to go into space. They're kind of annoyed, though, stomping quickly in your direction, and Mica is following them for some reason.

“I just don't understand why I have to go with you!” Mica says. “I had the perfect spot to watch the big launch!”

Sed turns and bends down to Mica, pointing at themself. “Mica, I'm the one who's launching. You're not going to miss the launch if I'm not in the ship.”

“And that's why you should be up there and not down here taking pictures or whatever,” Mica responds.

Sed ignores them, rolling their eyes and walking up to you and Tephra. “The two of you, come with me, we don't got all day,” they say.

You squint at them, frowning. They sound... not normal. They're normally bossy, it's not that, but it's usually a fun bossy. Now they sound wrong-bossy. Wrong for them, anyway.

Tephra doesn't seem to notice. “Hullo, astronaut!” they say. “Where are we going? We were waiting to play hide and seek with you. You got your new signalscope, right? Moraine won't let us-”

“No, not right now,” Sed interrupts. “We don't have time.”

You catch Mica's eye and quickly sign something to them. They grin.

“I need the three of you to come with me, then we're going to go up and get Arkrose- whoa, hey!”

As Sed is speaking, Mica jumps on their back and covers their eyes with their arms. “Go, hide!” Mica yells. “One, two, three...”

You grab your radio, and before Tephra can run off, you grab them too. “Hey, come with me,” you whisper.

Tephra follows as you run behind the electricity building. Marl says “Hey, be careful of the water wheel!” as you pass, but they don't try to stop you. You climb up and across to the roof of the big cabin. As soon as Tephra catches up, you tug them down with a finger over your lips to tell them to be quiet.

“Why are we hiding together?” Tephra says in a loud whisper. “Neither of us can win if we're found together!”

“Do you think Sed is acting weird?” you ask. “Like, are they stressed out?” That's what people usually say when they're upset. They're tired, or if it's worse, they're stressed, or if it's worser, they're “stressed out.”

“I don't know. Kinda.” Tephra shrugs. “Maybe they're scared, since it's their launch day and Feldspar got lost the last time they launched.”

“Hmm, maybe.” That sounds... kind of right? But not all the way. You peek over the edge of the roof, but you can't see Sed or Mica.

Tephra continues, “Or maybe it's because they're growing up? Porphy says that growing up can make you act different sometimes.”

Both of you jump in surprise when Sed suddenly appears, their steps clunking loudly as they clomp across the roof towards you. Mica is following behind them.

“Hey, how did you find us? You don't even have your signalscope out!” Tephra whines.

“Listen to me,” Sed says, crouching down in front of you. They look really mad, their face is as hard as a rock and their teeth bite together like they're trying to crunch through bone. “I ran out of time last time I tried this, and it was awful. I am not doing that again. Get off this roof. Now.”

You don't know what that means, and neither does Tephra, but you both hurry to get down anyway.

The three of you trail in a row behind Sed as they head toward to top part of the village. Gneiss gives all of you The Look, but Sed says, “I'm showing them something in the museum, we'll be back soon,” and you keep going. They don't sound mad, but you think they're just pretending.

As you walk under the waterfall and up the ramps, Tephra glances at you, but you shrug at them. You don't know what's going on. You step forward to ask Sed, but freeze and realize your mouth won't open. Oh. Oh well. You can talk with your hands.

You come up beside them, and you have to run to keep up with their fast walking. Are you scared or just stressed out? you ask them using sign language.

Sed stops at the top of the ramp, hard enough that Mica and Tephra bump into each other behind them. They look at you, their eyes and nose wrinkly from being confused. “Why are you signing to me?”

“Because you're acting like a grownup,” Mica states, “And Galena doesn't talk to grownups.” You nod a little. Mica can be rude, but they usually know what's up.

For you, people go into two different piles: open-mouth people, and closed-mouth people. Some people you can talk to with your mouth, but for other people, your mouth stays closed and you have to talk to them with your hands. Hornfels and Gneiss told you that you have something called “selective mutism,” but you don't really like that name. You don't get to “select” who is in what pile, no more so than you get to select what foods taste good or gross.

Most of the adults are in the closed-mouth pile, except Spinel and Esker and sometimes Chert (Chert is in both piles, like how Y is both a vowel and a consonant). You talk to them with your hands, with sign language. Sometimes you can force yourself to open your mouth, like when Slate is up on the launch pad and you need to yell to tell them that the elevator motor is on fire. But it's really, really hard, and it makes you feel nervous, so you usually just talk with your hands.

All of the hatchlings are in the open-mouth pile. It's easy to talk to them, although you might have to whisper if an adult is nearby and can hear you. Sed is still a hatchling, even though they are older. They have been starting to go into a sometimes-pile like Chert, but usually you can still talk to them with your mouth, even if you have to talk quietly. You've never had your mouth glue shut near them like it is now.

Sed looks at you, then looks away. “I haven't even drunk sap wine yet,” they say. They sound hurt, like someone hit them. You kinda feel bad, but not really, because you didn't do anything wrong. It's their own brain hitting them if anything, not you. They take a deep breath and look at you again and say, “Sorry. You can sign if you need to.” But then they go to Arkose and don't answer your question.

Arkose is throwing stuff at the ghost matter, even though they've been told not to. “Hey, cut it out, I need your help,” Sed says. They stand between Arkose and the ghost matter, hands on their hips. Arkose doesn't reply. They pick up another rock and throw it. It bounces off Sed's chest.

“Arkose, what's wrong with you?” Mica asks with a flat voice. They ask almost every day. Sometimes you wonder the same thing.

Behind you, Tephra says, “Does the sun look... sick to anyone else?” You look over, and they have their head up staring at the sky. You follow their eyes. The sun rising over is a little darker yellow, maybe, and heavier-looking. The edges of it bubble and spit, reminding you a pot of soup that's about to boil over. Coronal mass... eruptions, you think Chert taught you? “Sun burps” according to Gabbro, which is a gross name but easier to remember.

Whatever it's called, it looks like bad news.

Sed seems to think the same thing. They look up at the sky, and you can just hear them whisper, “Not again.” They stand with their ears low and back hunched like they're worried they'll bump their head on the sun if they stand up straight. But then they clear their throat and pretend to be happy like they did with Gneiss. “Looks like a bad storm coming in.”

Mica side-eyes them. “There are exactly zero clouds in the sky right now.”

Sed looks around, opening and closing their hands. They stop when they see the entrance of the mine. “Okay, change of plan,” they say. They kneel down in front of you and talk quietly, which you know means something sneaky is going to happen.

“I've got just the spot to keep us- keep us dry from the storm. But y'all gotta follow my lead. Got it?” The four of you nod. Sed's sneaky plans are fun, and since they're the oldest, usually they let themself get in trouble with the adults so the rest of you don't have to. “Okay,” they say, “stay with me, act casual, and keep quiet.”

With that, they stand up and jog over to Gossan in the entrance of the cave. Gossan looks up from the helmet they are cleaning and tilts their head, suspicious. “Hey, uh, everyone. You've got some hatchlings following you if you haven't noticed, Sed.”

“Yeah, they said that they wanted to see your reaction?” Sed replies, sounding confused and a little worried.

“My reaction to what?” says Gossan, even more suspicious.

“So, Mica was telling me that Slate made some last-minute, uh, 'modifications' to the ship? Something that Slate said would increase takeoff acceleration by fifty percent?”

“Fifty percent?!” Gossan exclaims, turning to Mica. “How? What did they do?”

Mica's eyes widen and they lean back, away from Gossan, putting their hands up. “I, um-”

Sed cuts them off. “They were afraid to tell you, they were worried about getting in trouble, but I said it was okay. Anyway, would you mind talking to Slate? I'm all for more speed, but I'm kind of concerned-”

Gossan shakes their head and breathes out through their nose. “Hold tight, I'll take care of it.” They march away, mumbling under their breath.

Sed watches them until they disappear down the ramp. Then they turn to you with a grin. “Y'all want to see the mines?”

Arkose gasps and yells, “Yes!” and Sed shushes them. You look at Tephra. They seem more unsure.

“We're- we're not allowed? Won't we get in trouble?”

“Nah,” Sed says, walking past them and climbing into the elevator. “I'll take the blame if I need to. Besides, I'm a grownup now, remember?”

They say the last part like they're not happy about it. Tephra looks at you. You shrug.

“Come on, it's pretty cool in here,” Sed says. “Everyone squeeze in, we should all fit.”

All of you join them in the elevator. You end up squashed between Arkose and Tephra. Sed pulls a lever and the elevator shutters and drops, faster and louder and way longer than you expected.

When you get to the bottom, you don't want to move. Your eyes open as wide as they can to try to see in the dark. Tephra clings to the back of your dress and whispers, “Are we in space?”

There are no lights here except the dim lantern glowing like a moon on the elevator shaft high above you. All around you, over your head and on all sides, you are surrounded by tiny lit-up specks, most white but some blue or yellow. Your whole body feels different, loose and floaty, like your boots are coming unstuck from the floor.

“No, but it's the next best thing. There's a reason why new astronauts practice in here.” Sed flicks on their flashlight. The glowing lights don't disappear, but now you can make out the edges of the rocks.

Arkose steps out, and their second step makes them bounce up in the air. They yelp and fall to hands and knees, then laugh, “Whoa, awesome.” Mica clutches the elevator's railing and says, “Eugh, I don't think I like this.”

You step forward as well. Your bones are like jelly, but every move makes you feel powerful, strong, too strong for this planet to hold you down. You look up the elevator shaft, back when you came from. You bend your knees and jump as hard as you can.

You fly into the air, and Tephra screams. You fly up and up, high enough to hit the lantern meters over the elevator door. You hover, hang there, weightless. Then you gently float back down to the ground.

You agree with Mica. You don't think you like this. You think you love it. You think you might love it more than anything else.

“Cool, right?” Sed asks you. You just stare at them with a grin so big it could break your face. “And we're still at point four times gravity. Just wait until we get to zero.”

Sed leads you all down the dark cavern. You jump with every step, hitting your head on the roof of the tunnel, until Tephra grabs your hand to make you stop. Along the way, Sed picks up a long rope and ties several loops in it. When you get to a wall with a sign that reads “Zero-G Cave,” they hand each of you a loop. “Here,” they say, “put these on so we don't get separated.”

Each of you pulls a loop over your head so that it sits loosely around your waist. “Can I use this jetpack?” Arkose asks, looking at the suit hanging on the wall.

Sed frowns at it. “Nah, let's just use the ladder. It's easy in low gravity.” They pick up a long hook laying on the floor to reach and pull down a rope ladder. You each climb it, one after the other. The ropes around your waist get in the way, but Sed's right, it takes almost no effort to get to the top.

Above the wall, the space widens out to a huge cavern, full of platforms and barrels and tools and so much more of that star-covered rock. Tuff is on one side, wearing a metal helmet and using a pickaxe to chip at the rocks. They notice your group right away.

“Sed, what- Why are you all down here? I thought you were leaving today.” Tuff asks, confused.

“Emergency evacuation drills.” Sed says quickly. “Gossan is working on setting up the mines as somewhere to go in case of an emergency. They told me I have to practice with the hatchlings before I go.”

Tuff looks between them and your group. “Really? All of a sudden? I haven't heard anything about this.”

Sed shrugs. “Neither had I, until today. I don't know, go ask Gossan about it. Unless you want to join us down in the cave?” They grin, taking a step towards them with their hands out.

“No, no no no, no way.” Tuff says. They step backwards to the entrance of the mine.

“Come on, you sure? We can all just float around a little, it'll be fun!” Sed says.

Tuff gags. “No. Absolutely not. I'll go talk to Gossan.” They almost run back the way you came.

When they're gone, Tephra turns to Sed. “Why do you keep lying?” they ask.

Sed looks a little sour at that, a little sick. “I gotta. Explaining the truth sucks,” they mumble. Tephra doesn't seem convinced at their answer, but they don't know what else to say, either.

You make your way down a short ramp to the lip of a huge hole in the cavern.

“Okay, two more hops down,” Sed says, “who wants to-”

You jump without looking, as far as you can. Sed yells, “Wait, we're tied together! Go! Go Tephra!”

Like a necklace of polished stones, each of the hatchlings spill over the side of the cavern. You silently, Mica with a huff of effort as they jump off, Arkose whooping, Tephra with a yelp as they are pushed forward then followed by Sed. You swing your arms and legs as you fall, like you're treading water. Your stomach shifts like its detached from the rest of your guts. You feel kind of sick, and you hiccup and laugh and you really don't care.

As soon as one boot hits the ground, you're using it to lunge forward before the other one can even join it. You lurch toward the next pit, but a sharp tug at your waist flings you backward. You fly past a surprised Arkose before crashing into Sed's chest.

“Oh, sorry, didn't mean to pull you that hard,” Sed says. You look up at them and you can't say anything, not even with your hands, just hiccup and laugh and cough and hiccup again. Sed smiles at you, and you don't think they're pretending this time. “Watch out, we have to look before we leap here.”

Tephra and Arkose are already kneeling at the edge of the next hole. When you join them, the only thing you can see is a huge machine slowly spinning in darkness.

“I can't see the bottom,” Tephra says.

“There isn't a bottom, not really,” Sed replies, excitedly waving their fists. They're starting to sound like themself again, less old and stressed out, not completely but they're getting there. “This is the center of the planet. Once we go down there, gravity can't push us down, because there is no more down. There's no up, or down, or anything. Watch.”

They take out their Little Scout, aim down, and shoot it into the hole. Instead of going straight for a bit and curving and falling to the ground, it just keeps going straight, never slowing down until it hits one of the arms of the machine and sticks to it, lighting it up.

“When we go down there, we'll be in zero gravity, which means you won't slow down if you start going too fast. I've got my jetpack, so as long as you stay tied to me and stay away from the mining equipment, you should be good.”

Mica crosses their arms, standing away from the edge. “I really doubt we're supposed to be down there. Are we allowed to do this?”

“Nope!” Sed says, then falls backward into the pit.

The slack on the rope goes tight, and Tephra is pulled in with them, yelling, “Oh, okay, okay, here we- whoa!”

Arkose follows them, diving in head first. Mica tries to back up and away from the hole, saying “Wait, wait-” so you jump in and the rope pulling on both their sides drags them in too.

You fall for a second, slowly, but then at a certain point it doesn't feel like falling, it just feels like... going. Sed was right, the whole “down” part of it goes away.

Sed grabs your loop as you pass, and with couple loud pops from their jetpack, everyone in the group is floating together in one spot in the giant mine. You're so excited you think your heart and your head and your whole body might explode. At the same time, you're really careful with your movements. Even when you lightly tug on the rope or bump against Mica or Sed, you start moving and you just don't stop, not until something makes you stop.

You move your arms and legs like you're swimming through the warm air of the cavern, but nothing really happens. You want to try doing a backflip. You reach out a foot and use Tephra's thigh as a kicking-off point, leaning back. You don't kick them hard enough to hurt, but instead of just you turning upside down, Tephra starts spinning too.

They squeak out, “Don't do that, stop!” and grab at whatever is nearby, which happens to be Mica's leg. Mica tries to shake them off, but they hold on tight.

Sed laughs. “Equal and opposite reaction, remember! Don't kick each other if you don't want them and you to both go flying.” Then they take off their loop and drop it over you, so that they're free floating and the rest of you are tied in a circle.

Mica, still trying to pry off Tephra, says, “Sed, if you leave us down here without a jetpack, I'll kick your butt worse than Gossan will.”

Sed doesn't seem worried about the threat. “I'm not going anywhere, just giving a demonstration. I don't even need my jetpack.” They hold up their scout launcher and shoot it. The bright light of the scout rips past like a shooting star, and Sed themself starts moving the opposite direction. “See? It's not just the scout that goes, I go flying too. The more I do it, the faster I go!”

They call back the scout and fire it several more times, each shot making them move faster or change direction. Then for some stupid, dummy reason, Arkose reaches out and tries to catch the scout flying by.

They grab one of its feet and they are caught in a twirling dance with it, which means all of you are caught in a twirling dance with it. Arkose yells, “Grab it, grab it!” You reach out to hold on to the scout too, and with the other hand hold Mica's arm.

You're laughing hard and loud enough it's hurting your stomach, and Arkose is just screaming you think in a happy way, and Mica is saying, “Okay, okay, okay,” but they look like they're having fun too.

Tephra seems the most nervous, but they look at you and you give them a huge grin and say, “Be loud, it helps!” So they yell into the air until their yells turn into laughs too.

The Little Scout held between Arkose and you and clicks and twitches. Thankfully, since the four of you are so much bigger than the scout, you are moving and spinning fast, but not too fast. Less thankfully, Sed still decides to grab the tied-up bundle you all have become and fire their jetpack until you're floating still again.

You whine, but Sed holds out the back of the scout launcher and says, “Look, I took a picture of y'all.”

It's a very goofy picture. The four of you are squished together, laughing and yelling and all looking different directions. You can see the mining equipment in the background. Hopefully Sed doesn't show this to any of the adults.

Sed helps untangle all of you, straightening out the rope until you're in a chain again.

Mica frees the rope from where it had gotten caught around the tools on their toolbelt and dusts themself off as if they had gotten dirty. “Cool, great. Now that that's done, can we possibly go play somewhere that isn't so freaking hot? I thought the mines were supposed to be cold.”

Sed doesn't answer right away. They're looking back at the entrance of the mine with the same face they had on when you first saw them today. You still don't know what that face means. You ask them the same question as before, the one you didn't get an answer to, and you find you can open your mouth this time, not open wide or loud but open enough. “Are you scared or stressed out?”

They look at you, and whatever emotion is in their eyeballs is so big and heavy and bright you have to look away like you've stared too long at the sun.

“It's the spinning,” Sed whispers.

“What?” Arkose asks.

“You feel hot because of the spinning,” they say again, louder and more confident. “It's an astronaut trick, one of the most fun ones I've learned so far. You can stay warm in space by spinning.”

You think they're playing pretend again, but something makes you want to play along with them. Mica isn't convinced. “Since when?” they ask.

Sed ignores them and turns to Tephra instead. “Remember when Gabbro told you about how all of us are made of stardust?”

Tephra nods, their wide eyes reflecting the sparkling rocks around you. You don't remember the details of that lesson, but could never forget that point. Gabbro still calls you and Tephra stardust instead of using your names sometimes.

Sed is talking fast now, and loud. They point at Arkose. “How is a new star formed?”

“When a whole planet gets set on fire!” Arkose yells.

“What? No-” Sed says, tilting their head and squinting.

Before they can explain, you say, breathless, “Gasses. Stardust. They fall together and start spinning really fast and hot.”

“Yes! Yes!” Sed shouts. “If you spin fast, as fast as you can, in zero gravity, your body will remember when you used to be a star and heat you up and keep you warm.”

Mica doesn't seem to believe it still, but less sure about it than before. “So, you're saying because we were spinning...”

You're already trying it. You push off Sed's arm, twisting in place. You do it again, faster, and Sed fires their jetpack to stay still. They grab Tephra's shoulders to set them spinning too, then Arkose, both of them laughing. “Yes, try it! Whoever spins the fastest will feel the warmest!”

Mica, not one to be left out, also pushes off Sed. “Go, go!” Sed shouts. “Keep going! If you go fast enough, you'll feel like a fire, like you're the sun itself!”

“Won't – that – hurt – us?” Tephra asks, their voice getting louder and quieter as they quickly face or turn away from you.

“No, I promise, I promise it won't hurt you. You'll be okay, you'll all be okay, I promise!” Sed is yelling as loud as they can over the roaring sound that is starting to fill your ears, and they are laughing and sniffling and out of breath. “Go! Go faster! Galena's got it!”

You do got it. You got this more than you've ever gotten anything in your life, like you tore yourself out of your egg for this very moment. You spin faster and faster, the rope loose around your waist keeping you in place but not slowing you down. Nothing could slow you down now. You spin, the dust inside you crashing into itself and melting together into something it's always meant to be. The space around you roars, and you glow so bright you can see the light of it behind your closed eyelids. Your skin, your body, your bones get hotter and hotter until they are the hottest things there ever was.

Today and forever, you become a star.

Chapter Text

The sound of a jetpack firing fills the cavern, covering over even the sharp impacts from your pickaxe. Sed, probably. You knew they couldn't resist popping their head in here one last time before taking off.

Sure enough, they land delicately on your work table, then plop down to sit on its edge, making the wood creak in complaint.

"Hey, hey. Nice of you to drop down."

“Having fun?” they ask.

You take out your earplugs, quirking an eyebrow at them. “Yeah, sure. I'm having to do double duty to pick up your slack, you know, since you decided you were too good for mining.”

They throw out their hands, swinging their legs. “Hey, my ship's done, we don't need to pull extra ore for the hull anymore!”

“You'd think so, but Slate asked for another six barrels of the stuff. I think they're anticipating some upcoming repairs.”

Sed lets out an offended squawk. “They have no faith in me! That turd sniffer, six barrels? What, do they think I'm going to tear off the entire roof?”

You chuckle. “Right, they should see you down here, it's not like you have a record of bending the blades or burning out the motor on the zero-g harvester or anything.”

“Listen,” they say. They pause, then conclude, “Shut up.”

You turn back to the chunks of ore you've managed to chip off the main mass. “Gossan left the electrical work on the new motor for you to take care of, last I heard.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Sed says dispassionately, scratching the back of their neck and looking off into the cave. You can see out of the corner of your eye a thought pop into their head.

“Hey, I have an idea,” they start, inspiration pillowing their voice in a way that tells you immediately that it's a bad idea. “You come down to the harvester and help me with the repairs.”

You cough and choke on your spit. “Eugh, what- ugh, what makes you think would do that? Are you nuts?!”

They stand up and take hold of your arm, tugging at it. “Come on, you've never been all the way in the zero-g part, right? You've only been as far as the entrance.”

“Yes, and I promise, that is plenty for me, thanks.”

They pull harder, trying to lead you down into the planet's core as if that were a perfectly reasonable place to be. “Please, Tuff, you've never even tried it.”

You dig your heels in and stand firm. “I don't need to.”

“You do, you have to try it. You can't say you'll be happy living your entire life until you die without trying it at least once.” They sound almost urgent.

You shake them off. “What are you talking about?”

They pull their hands back to their own chest, looking away and struggling to find words. “Uh. Like... a bucket list, you know?”

It's weird. Them teasing you about the idea of floating in zero-g or seeking you out specifically to tell exaggerated stories about their spacewalk training is practically a daily occurrence. Which, ugh, gross, but it's not like you don't get them back. You pick on them about being permanently called “hatchling,” since they were youngest for so long before Mica came along, talking to them in a cutesy tadpole voice to rile them up. Or you poke at them about whatever is going on between them at Hal, making their ears blush purple while they insist that there is nothing going on. Sure there isn't. Either way, you and Sed have an arrangement. Mutually acceptable harassment.

So this isn't a new conversation. But there's none of the teasing giddiness you're used to. Just an odd sincerity, and, if you look close enough, maybe even some hidden desperation.

You shake your head of the idea. This isn't that deep. They're probably just nervous about leaving soon.

Crossing your arms, you say, “Going to space, floating around in zero-g for who knows what reason, all that can be on your bucket list, but it sure as dirt ain't on mine.”

“But you never got to try it,” they whine, dropping their arms in defeat.

“Yeah, and I've never tried drinking fish emulsion either, that doesn't mean it's on my bucket list. I don't have to do every possible thing I could ever do to be satisfied with life. I'm perfectly happy not going into that cave.”

Sed shifts in place from foot to foot, looking this time back at the corridor to the elevator shaft. “What if you could, though? What if you could do whatever you wanted, and you did all the good things, and you only had the scary or bad stuff left. Would you do it?”

You roll your eyes and pick up your pickaxe. “No, I'd just do the good stuff again.”

“But you already did it.”

“And I can't do it again?”

“You already did it again. You did it, like, a million times.”

You throw your arms out to the side. “I don't know, then I guess I'd do it a million and one times! What are we even talking about?”

“Its- ugh. I don't know.” They lean against the wall and slump down until they're sitting on the ground.

You roll your eyes again and pull a few chunks of loose ore away from the wall with your pickaxe while Sed works on forming their own personal gloomy raincloud above their head.

“Listen, I don't know why I'd willingly choose to do something that would make my life inarguably worse,” you say. “But if it was the absolute very last option, everything else exhausted, maybe, maybe I would dip a toe in that cave with you.”

Sed looks up at you with big, hopeful eyes. You drag the tip of your pickaxe down the wall of rock above them, making glitter rain down and dust their head and shoulders and lap. “But today is not that day, my tiny, precious little tadpole.”

They fly to their feet with a disgusted screech, trying to brush the clinging glitter off themself. It doesn't work. It never works. “Aw, what's wrong, itty bitty bug?” You say, bending forward with your hands on your knees. “Did the widdle tadpole get all dirty? Do they need to get dunked by the ankles into a geyser to clean off? Poor thing, let me help.”

You lunge at them, and they jump away with a giggling yelp. “If you touch me, I'll tie you to the roof of my ship and barrel roll us both into the sun.”

You burst out laughing at the unexpected violence of the threat, then have to lean against the wall and try not to puke when you think about it a second too long. Your gagging just eggs Sed on. “Just you and me, Tuff, death spiraling into oblivion!” they shout, marching around you, “Nobody can hear you scream in space!”

“Okay, okay, I get it!” you say, clamping your hands over your ears. “I won't dunk you, leave me alone.”

They settle down at that, crossing their arms with a victorious smirk. “You'd better not.”

You pant to catch your breath, annoyed but also somewhat glad you managed to distract them from whatever sullen mood they were talking themself into back there. Straightening up with a groan, you say, “Shouldn't you be leaving in that ship, anyway?”

“Yeah, you're probably right,” they reply. Then their eyes go wide. “Wait, I completely forgot why I came down here!”

“What? To fix the ore harvester, right?”

“Nope,” they say, holding up their scout launcher with a wicked grin. “To send you to space.”

Several minutes of setup, direction, posing, argument, and reposing later, the frankly ridiculous photo session is finished. The end result is, admittedly, kind of great.

In the monochromatic image, you stand in silhouette, back the the camera, flat-footed and sturdy, hands raised out to the sides. Your headlamp is on and pointed at the wall in front of you, casting on the stone a circle of light not unlike the sun, and all around that circle are the reflective specks in the ore, indistinguishable from stars. At a quick glance, or from a distance, you could look very much like an astronaut yourself.

“You know, it's really not fair that the camera can pick up the light from the ore just fine, but you point it at real stars, there's nothing.” Sed bemoans. “You try to get a cool picture of the cosmos and it ends up empty, like the planets are dangling from strings in front of a hanging black sheet in some museum model.”

You pat them on the shoulder with a cheeky smile. “See, I told you. Who needs the cosmos, our little caves here at home are just as good.” You stretch your neck and arms. “Now let's get out of here, I need a break. Is it just me, or is it super hot in here all of a sudden?”

You head back to your stuff, but Sed makes no move to follow, looking at the walls as if they were far in the distance. “I don't know. Remember how when we were young, we weren't allowed to go in the caves, 'cause they were dangerous? And that made us really, really curious every day when we passed the entrance, and we'd tell stories about what monsters or secrets could be in there?”

“Yeah? I mean, I think Feldspar snuck in a few times, but I sure didn't.”

They don't seem to hear you. “And then you get old enough to go in and it's not huge or scary or anything you imagined. It's just part of your home like everything else, like the rivers, or the geysers, or the town.”

Sed turns around slowly as they talk, like they're trying to memorize every barrel in the cave, every platform. “That was space, for me, growing up. A cave full of mysteries I'd see from a distance every day that I couldn't wait to get old enough to explore. And then you get old enough and you solve those mysteries and you learn all those secrets you get a little less scared of the monsters. And by the end, you figure out that all the universe really is just like that little cave. Just part of your home.”

You don't really know what to say to all that. You guess it makes sense. “What's got you talking so big all a sudden?” you ask.

They shrug. “Couldn't tell ya. See you around, Tuff.” They turn around and drop down the ledge toward the cave entrance.

“I mean, we gotta go out the same way-” you call after them, but they're already gone. That nose-picker better hold the elevator.

You bend down to pick up your pack, and as soon as you touch it, a long, slow pain tears through you, and you pass out.

You sit up what feels like only seconds later, shaking the memory of the pain out of your system. You stare at the offending backpack. That- it- it electrocuted you! Or something, that's your only guess as to what happened. You look at your hands and clothes, nothing hurts now, nothing seems burnt, but you're too dirty from mining to know for sure.

You had an extra bundle of cable attached to your pack, but it wasn't connected to anything. The only things powered in there are the radio and your electric lantern, and neither of those carry much of a charge. You look around at the light grid installed in the cave. No loose wires or errant sparks as far as you can tell.

You get to your feet and dust yourself off the best you can. You consider going over to kick or poke at the backpack, but that sounds like you're just asking to get shocked again. Maybe Gossan or Sed can take a look at it, or Rutile could come down. Leave the electrical business to someone who knows what they're doing.

You sit on the edge of the drop to the elevator and lower yourself as much as you can before you let go and fall the rest of the distance, cringing all the way. Even the slightly reduced gravity here sets your stomach churning.

Once you reach the elevator shaft, you see that Sed has not waited up for you. Typical. Oh well, maybe you'll have time to watch their launch once you get outside.

You are about to pull the lever to activate the elevator when a faint, distant sound echos from somewhere deep within the cave. You pause, listening closely. There's nothing for a while. You think you've imagined it, but then you hear it again. Something like an unfamiliar cry, a wail distorted by reverberations as it makes its way from its source to your ears.

You are immediately set on edge, your skin prickles and your heartbeat picks up speed. Your mind helpfully supplies you with the monsters Sed had mentioned just minutes ago. You remember sitting around a campfire with the other hatchlings as a young Feldspar tells you stories about their forays into the cave. They would lean in, and in a low voice, describe groaning, guttural howls coming from any and all directions, the massive tentacles of some unknown beast emerging from the walls to reach slowly towards them.

At the time, you and Hornfels had clung to each other in fear. (Gossan and Slate were enraptured. Porphy was indifferent.) Experience has since taught you that the “guttural howls” were just the oxygen supply system acting up, and the “tentacles” were the roots of some long-dead tree breaking through the ceiling.

You are a long way from being young enough to believe such campfire stories. But when you hear the cry a third time, you can't help but gulp.

Still, some instinct, or maybe some death wish, compels you to investigate. You creep back to the main cavern. Instead of pulling down the rope ladder to reach the top, you strap on the jetpack. You hate using the thing, but idea of having a big and loud and fiery tool at your disposal calms your nerves a little.

You pop the thrusters the minimum amount required to get you over the ledge. Here, the sound is slightly clearer. It sounds like a voice, a young one, but one that's unfamiliar to you. A shudder runs through you. Creepy, that's so creepy.

You slowly tiptoe your way forward until the toes of your boots are just at the edge of the dropoff into the lower part of the cavern. You heart hammering in your chest, you peer over the lip.

The moment you do, you hear a voice shout “SED!” A short scream escapes you. The source of the shout at the bottom of the cavern cuts themself off with a flinch. Galena. It's Galena, standing down at the lowest platform before the zero-g area. That's why you didn't recognize the voice. You've never heard them yell since they were old enough to talk.

The poor thing gapes at you, then immediately bursts into tears. Not only are they trapped in that horrid place, but you're not one of the people that's allowed to hear their voice, and you caught them yelling for Sed. “Darling, oh darling, you're okay,” you call down to them, heart breaking. “You just hold tight there, I'm- I'll.... I'm coming down, just hold tight.”

Gosh. Golly. You really are coming down, aren't you? You haven't been down that far but once, probably a decade ago, and you swore off the whole concept then and there. But you can't just... you can't just leave them down there, crying like that. You can't call for help, either — your radio is still in your electrified backpack.

So with trembling hands, you clip the carabiner attached to the winch at the top of the ledge to the fall harness you wear but never use. You hate this, you hate every bit of this.

You don't let yourself drop, oh no, with excruciating slowness you clamber down the rocks to the first wooden platform, cling to the side of it, shimmy down a support post the the next platform, and repeat. Finally, finally you reach the ground. The gravity here is probably half that of the upper area. All your limbs feel like goo, and you shuffle over to Galena, not daring lift your feet from the floor.

When you reach them, you kneel down and put your hands on their sides, stabilizing yourself as much as you are them. “H-hey, we're okay now, we're all g-good,” you say, your voice shaking. “Are you hurt? What- how long have you been down here? How did you get down here?”

They sniffle and wipe their face with their arms, looking down at the ground. “It's okay, t-take your time,” you tell them. Although you'd much rather them not take their time if at all possible, you want to get out of this light-forsaken place as fast as you can.

Eventually, with trembling hands, they sign, We got stuck. We turned into stars and then Sed disappeared and we were tied together and we didn't know how to get out since we were tied together and I untied myself even though Mica and Tephra told me not to and I jumped off the mining machine to get up here but I couldn't go up any more because I don't have a jetpack and the others are still tied together and they're too scared to untie themselves and jump out like me.

They are signing so quickly you can barely understand them. What you do get, though, sends your stomach to your feet. “We? The other hatchlings are here too?”

Galena nods and signs, Yes, me and Tephra and Mica and Arkose. Here, I'll show you.

Before you have time to react, they slip from your hands, crouch down, and launch themself into the growling belly of the planet. You clamp your hands over your mouth to keep yourself from screaming as you watch them drift into the darkness. Okay, so they're not at all afraid of zero gravity. That's great. That's cool and normal. This little one is flinging themself through space as if they were splashing in a puddle. This is so dangerous, this is so, so bad.

You poke your head over the edge, squinting as if that would help you see less of the horror in front of you, and you can just make out the bundle of hatchlings that Galena joins. Mica spots you at the same time. “Tuff!” they shout, “Is that you? Do you have a jetpack? We're stuck, we can't get out of here.”

“No!” you yell back. “I-I mean yes, it's me, but I don't- I'm not- I... are you okay?”

“No, I just said we're stuck!” Mica calls, loud and angry. “Get down here and help us!”

You look around, panicked and frantic. You can't do this. You can't do this.

You spot the crane high above you and nearly choke with relief. The crane. Your savior. It's used to haul out ore, it can handle fishing some hatchlings out of – ew, ugh.

You swallow down bile and call out, “I'm going to- I'm going to lower the bucket crane down to you! Wait just a minute, you can climb in and I'll pull you out.”

Mica shouts something in response, but you ignore it in favor of taking a few deep breaths. You flex your shaking hand on the jetpack's controller, and whisper, “Three, two, one,” before pressing the button.

You overshoot in the reduced gravity. You smash into the ceiling and, screaming, just manage to catch the edge of the platform with the tips of your fingers on the way back down. You clamber up to your hands and knees and cling to the wooden slats, heaving.

You press your forehead to the wood, not caring about possible splinters. Why, why is this happening to you? Literally anybody else on the planet could be doing this, and it had to be you.

You drag yourself to your feet and over to the controls for the crane. It thrums to life as you power it on, and it creaks and complains but ultimately obeys when turn the knob to get it to lower and dump its current load.

The crane's bucket just touches the ground when you hear a distant, heavy, devastating CLUNK. You look behind you. The exit to the elevator is dark.

CLUNK. The lights go out in the main part of the cavern. You whisper, “No...”

CLUNK. The final section of the power grid shuts down. The crane's engine goes silent. The lights go out. The hatchlings far below you yelp and scream. You are pitched into a desolate, star-filled darkness.

You laugh. You don't know why you laugh, but you can't stop. You laugh hysterically and choke, tears running down your face. You're just so... you're just so angry all of a sudden. This isn't fair. You don't deserve this. You're so mad and you cling to your anger as if it could pull you up like the now-useless winch attached to your fall harness. Why you? You punch the equally-useless crane control panel, and it scrapes your knuckles.

“WHY ME?” you shout.

“Tuff!” you hear Tephra scream, voice straining painfully. “Help! Where are you?”

You're pissed off. You're enraged. Those hatchlings don't deserve this either! You're hotter than the sun, you could burn this whole place down if you wanted to.

You take a strangle hold of the jetpack controller and leap into the void.

Your anger evaporates about three seconds later, but you're still dropping. Fear pours into you like water filling your nose and mouth and throat and lungs, and you're drowning. You can't scream. You can't even breathe. You're falling in darkness and you're going to fall forever.

It occurs to you, unprompted, that you're still wearing your headlamp. But you have to reach up to turn it on. And you have to move to do that. Your right hand still grips the jetpack controls, you dare not touch the buttons. You hold your left hand tight against you slowly creep it up, up, up, until you can flick the switch. A circle of light appears before you, illuminating the wall of the entrance of the innermost cavern sailing unreachably past.

You feel the last touches of downward gravitational pull seep out of you, and you're sure it's taken your blood with it. You dare not move again, not even to lower you hand from your helmet, every muscle clenched. You are weightless. Every part of the planet's crust and mantle and outer core, every inch of its enormous mass in all directions, draws you towards itself in perfect equilibrium. They take and take and take from you until you are left with nothing.

Then something crashes into you, sending you careening with it, and you scream every molecule of air out of your lungs.

You are flying to what could be called your right, but the monster of the pit sinks its claws into you and your flight is suddenly halted and changes to drift slowly left instead.

Then you feel something patting both sides of your face. You force your eyes open. Galena, not a monster. It's Galena, patting your cheeks and squinting at the bright light from your headlamp pointed at their face.

All you can do is throw your arms around them and crush them to your chest. “Oh,” you say, and you can't get out anything more around as you gasp for air. They wiggle their arms free and put them around your neck, hugging you back.

Over their shoulder, you see that they are chained to Arkose, Tephra, and Mica with a long rope. You are slowly drifting towards each other, and soon you bump together into a chaotic pile.

Mica immediately starts unbuckling the jetpack, shoving your arms out of the way to remove the straps from your shoulders, grinding and bearing their teeth. “Give me that, what is wrong with you?” they snap, “Get a hold of yourself.”

Tephra, at your side, throws their arms around your waist in what is becoming a group hug. “No, you can't be mean to them!” they say, their voice shrill with tears, “They're just scared, it's not their fault!”

Mica manages to remove the jetpack, and you feel even more untethered without it. Thankfully, Arkose takes it place, climbing on your back and clinging to you with their arms and legs. Pinned between the death grip of the three hatchlings, you feel a tiny bit more grounded.

You look up again and see that Mica is strapping on the jetpack themself. “Wait,” you say, and have to clear your hoarse and torn-up throat. “Wait, can- are you able to use that?”

“Of course I am, I built this one,” they state, stealing your helmet and headlamp putting it on as well. It's too big for them and drops down over one of their eyes. “Hold on.”

“You... you built-?” You're cut off when, with a kick and a stutter of flame, Mica fires off the way you had entered. The rope around their waist goes taught, and you squeeze hold of Tephra and Galena tight enough to make them squeak in pain.

The four of you are pulled along behind Mica at a terrifying speed. You clench your eyes shut, and your teeth chatter. Arkose is whooping and hollering, and you feel them let go of your shoulders and throw an arm into the air behind you. Galena is giggling too; Tephra seems to be the only one with their head on straight with how they hold just as tight to you as you do them.

Mica lands on the next level just long enough to recharge their jetpack. Before the rest of you even touch the ground, you're dragged upwards again through the darkness. You peek an eye open just enough to see a thousand shooting stars in the rocks flying past you.

Then you're all thrown to the ground, bouncing and rolling through the dust. Galena crawls out from under you as you press your face against the dirt and scream into it. You're done, you're done, you're done. You never have to do that again. You're free. You're out. The planet presses back against you like it's returning the hug.

Mica dumps the jetpack on the ground and drags you by the arm until you're sitting up again. “Come on, can we just go?” they say. Their anger from before has drained into a cranky weariness, but their voice shakes, too.

You wipe your face on the inside of your shirt. “Yes. Yeah, yes, let's get out of here and never come back.”

You stand up, discovering that Tephra still hasn't detached themself from your side. That's fine, you're still trembling violently yourself. You reach out to take back your helmet, but Mica says, “No, I'm keeping this,” and walks away toward the elevator, following Arkose who has already dashed off. That's fine too. They can keep it forever for all you care.

You get ready to drop down with Tephra, but realize that Galena is still behind you. They're looking back the way you came, staring longingly towards the depths of the planet. “Hurry up, Galena!” Tephra complains. They startle, then follow the rest of you with one last look back.

As you approach the elevator, you hear Arkose cry out, “We're going to be trapped here forever!” They don't actually sound distressed at all. You enter the shaft and, right, it's just as dark as everywhere else. The power is still out.

Mica is showing more nervousness than they had before, now that their adrenaline has worn off. “It's fine, we can run it manually, we'll just need to work together,” you tell them.

You unlock the manual weights and show the hatchlings which ropes to pull. It doesn't take a lot of strength, but it's slow going up to the top of the shaft. Your adrenaline is crashing, too, and it feels like you're on the edge of drowning and slowly, an inch at a time, making your way to the surface of the water.

Finally, though, finally you breach the top. Even before the elevator has locked in place, Mica is climbing out, panting. You tie back the ropes, and by the time you turn around, all four of the hatchlings have already scattered.

You sit on the ground. You lay your head in your hands. You feel empty and weak, and you have a feeling you'll be up sick all night after this.

But you did it. You did it. Against all odds, against even yourself, you got to the hatchlings, you got them out. They're safe because of you. Why or how they got down there can be someone else's problem to figure out.

Arkose comes back into the cave and to your side, walking stiffly, more disconcerted than they were at any point earlier. You reach out a hand. “Hi, dear, what's wrong?”

They take your hand and hold it tight. “It's bad out there,” they whisper.

You frown and, standing up, walk hand in hand with them to the entrance of the mine, out into the open air. You're met with an empty, starless, hanging black sheet of a sky.

Chapter Text

When Sed starts coughing again, Gneiss tells everyone who isn't Sed or Porphy to get out of the cabin. You scoop up the young traveler's suit and gear and carry it under an arm as you leave.

Outside, Mica bounds over to Slate, calling their name repeatedly.

"You okay?" Slate asks them.

"Yeah?" replies Mica, as if it was obvious. "Rutile wants to talk to you about reactors."

Before they walk off, you catch the engineer by the sleeve. "Slate," you growl. "Watch yourself."

Slate doesn't look at you, and doesn't respond. They tug their arm out of your grip, shove their hands in their pockets, and follow after Mica.

You watch them leave, gritting your teeth. You don't know what their problem is, why they're trying to get inside your head when there's so much at stake. But you'll have to deal with them later; you've got bigger fish to fry.

You huff a breath out your nose and turn back to Tephra and Galena. Perhaps thankfully, they seem to have forgotten their worries in favor of investigating the new visitor. The one whom Arkose currently has backed against the wall of the hatchling house.

Arkose is fiddling with the box-shaped head of the Nomai's staff, which lights up as they poke at it, and Galena has joined them. The way the staff is positioned, it looks as if the Nomai is trying to use it to put some distance between themself and the hatchlings. You catch Arkose and Tephra taking turns asking in rapid-fire succession, "Since you have three eyes, can you only see three things at a time?" and "How many teeth do you have?" and "Did you used to be a skeleton like the other Nomai?" and "Can I have this?"

You snap your fingers in the air to get their attention. "Hey, twelve eyes on me, please." All three hatchlings turn and face you, and the Nomai looks up as well.

You put down Sed's gear, step closer to the hatchlings and bend down to eye level. "Arkose, where have you been?"

They scuff their boots on the ground. "Uh, nowhere..."

Tephra starts to speak up, and you raise a hand to hush them. "Where have you been?" you say again firmly.

Arkose frowns. "The mine. But only because Sed told us to! They're kind of an adult, so we thought it was okay!"

"When?"

"Just a little while ago. We got stuck and Tuff had to help us."

"Why couldn't Sed help you? Were they hurt?"

Arkose gets annoyed at that, petulantly crossing their arms. "No, they were gone. They must have left when we were playing stars. I think they wanted us to get stuck."

"Sed wouldn't do that, not on purpose! They just disappeared!" Tephra contradicts loudly.

You run a hand down your face. "I was in the mine all day. How would you have gotten in without me seeing?"

Tephra says, "When Sed told you that Slate needed your help or something, and you went to the launch pad, we snuck- uh, we went in."

You bite your tongue and quickly even out your breath again in front of the hatchlings. You did not go to the launch pad.

Working your jaw, you turn to Galena. "Is all of this true?"

Yes, they sign, waving a fist. Then, looking up with hesitant concern, Did you forget? That's what Slate said.

You look over the little one's face. Clearing your throat, you straighten up and say, "Alright, here's the plan. We are in a dangerous situation right now, which means we need all hands helping. Spinel and Moraine are probably still looking for you. I want you three to go find them. Stick together, and do not leave the village. If you cannot find them in half an hour, go to Rutile and do what they tell you. Again, do not separate from each other. Understood?"

Three voices mumble or state or sign, "Yes, Gossan." Arkose pipes up, "Can I be in charge?"

"No. Get moving."

The three of them take off, and you sit down on the edge of the cabin porch and rub your forehead, passing your fingers over the scar of your missing eye. In the days following the accident, Gneiss had run various tests on you to check for a concussion or any signs of brain damage. They had examined your short term and long term memory, and everything confirmed that you were in good shape in those areas. But are you? Could latent memory problems have been building up so slowly you didn't notice until now? Or did the stress of the situation, or even the effects of the supernova affect your mind?

But no. While Arkose's story matched Tephra's and Galena's, it didn't match Slate's. Sed could not have been with the hatchlings and talked to you and stayed in Slate's camp all just before launch. And none of that explains their somehow fully healed burns or the Nomai that brought them home. You can't start doubting yourself now.

You sigh and drag the pieces of Sed's suit and gear into your lap. Along with their helmet, their backpack seems to be missing, as well as its jetpack and oxygen apparatus. You check around their suit, looking for any signs of damage. You flip it over, looking at the insulated fabric and its seams, but nothing is charred or frayed. Everything is exactly how it was yesterday when you inspected it with them, even down to the crooked Outer Wilds Ventures patch hidden under their shawl. The one that, not all that long ago, they had very rightly earned.

You float high above the atmosphere of Timber Hearth, just past the orbit of the Attlerock, in Slate's latest ship. Over your shoulder leans Outer Wilds Ventures newest trainee, peering out the front window at the Hourglass Twins in the distance.

“Chert should be down in the-” You say, and stop yourself. You do not normally sound like that.

Sed yelps with laughter, usually loud but unusually high-pitched. “Wait, why- what's wrong with our voices?” they squeak.

You sigh. “Helium leak.” You twist a knob on the end of your oxygen supply tube. “Close your external air intake and take a couple deep breaths. This is why we always wear our suit inside the ship.”

They also switch from external air to oxygen tank only and take a few measured inhales and exhales. You get up from the pilot's chair and go over to the pipes used to deliver the helium gas that pressurizes the fuel and oxidizer tanks for the engines. They appear from the ceiling, cross next to the reactor, and disappear into the floor. You check each of the pressure gauges and, sure enough, the rightmost gauge is displaying a number that is higher than the rest and slowly rising.

“Come look at this, Sed,” you say. They walk over and you step aside to let them see the gauges.

“Huh. I think I can hear the leak, actually. A faint whistling sound.”

You shrug. “Maybe, you've got younger ears than me. Know how we fix it?”

They look around as if they'll find the answer hidden amongst the gear. “Uh, duct tape?”

You snort and say, “It may come to that. Let's call Slate and see if they have an idea.”

You sit back down and flick the radio over to Slate's channel with a flare of static. “Hey Slate, look something up for me.”

“I'm eating,” is their reply.

“Find the schematics for the new helium pipes you installed. Which rocket does the pipe on the far right go to?”

“The one closest to the reactor?”

“Correct.”

You hear papers shuffling down the open mic. After a moment, you hear, “Starboard aft rocket.”

Out of the corner of your eye, you are amused to see Sed orient themself toward the front of the ship, hold out their right hand while mumbling “starboard,” then pointing their right thumb behind them while saying “aft.”

“Figure out which thruster it is?” you ask them.

“Yep!” they chirp in response.

Through the radio, Slate says, “What are you asking for?”

“We've sprung a helium leak,” you reply, “The pressure gauge is still in the safe range, but it's climbing.”

“Might have something to do with the pipes being closer to the reactor now,” Slate mumbles.

You put the heel of your palm to your forehead. “Slate, you know helium expands with heat. Why would you move them closer to the reactor without heat shielding?”

“I had to make room for your redundant oxygen supply and CO2 scrubber systems somehow.”

“And the heat shielding?”

They ignore you. “The system is designed to vent helium into space in case of excess pressure. It should be fine.”

“It sure should be, Slate, but it's not.”

Slate sighs. “Well, vent it manually, then. The controls are above the ship log computer. The ten switches to right of center of the monitor.”

You get up and walk to the back of the ship, pushing past an amused Sed. “Y'all are funny. You're always so annoyed with each other,” they say.

“They're annoying,” you reply simply, searching for the correct switch.

“I think they're in love with you.”

You look flatly over at Sed, who glances away innocently, rocking on their heels with their hands behind their back. You roll your eyes. “Mind your own business, hatchling. Go watch the gauge and tell me if the pressure goes down.”

You wait until they're in front of the gauge, then flick the rightmost switch. Suddenly, you hear a whistling sound, rapidly increasing in volume and pitch. “The pressure's increasing quick,” Sed says, alarmed.

You flick the switch again, but the whistling still grows louder. “Get back, Sed.” You step forward and pull them back by their poncho.

You hear an explosion, you hear the glass of your visor shatter, and you hear yourself hit the ground.

You think you lose consciousness for a second. When you blink your eyes open, you can see the blurry image of Sed above you, and after your ears stop ringing you can hear them calling your name.

You blink again, and then you notice the deep, screaming pain in your temple, ear, and top left eye. You feel blood pouring out of your face.

Sed is trying to remove your helmet, and you help them to do so. A chunk of sharp metal falls from the neck of your suit and clinks to the floor.

Through gritted teeth, you ask, “Are you hurt?” Your voice is high-pitched again, but it doesn't make Sed laugh this time.

“No, but you are. You're bleeding,” Sed replies, voice shaking.

The cabin didn't depressurize, you would hear it if it had, so that's one good thing. “Any hull or reactor damage warnings?”

Sed looks over towards the monitor. “No, no warnings.”

“Alright, get me the backup oxygen mask and the first aid kit.”

They help you sit up and put the mask over your nose and mouth, its tube stretching across to the oxygen tank in the starboard hull. They kneel beside you and open the med kit. “Gossan, you're bleeding a lot. I can't even see left half of your face, it's just blood,” they say.

This doesn't surprise you; you're dizzy with pain, though the oxygen is helping. “Yeah, a bandage isn't going to cut it. There should be a sterile cloth in a package there.”

They pull it out and hand it over to you, and you press it with both hands to your wound, trying your best to suppress a groan.

“Your ear, too, your ear is really bad,” Sed says, and helps you put pressure on that as well.

You focus on taking a few deep breaths. After a moment, you say, “Go sit down and check the statuses of the rockets.”

They seem reluctant to part from your side, but they do as you say, sitting in the pilot's chair and inspecting the monitors.

“It's saying the starboard aft rocket is not operational,” they tell you, voice still shaking.

“But the others are good?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah- yes, they're operational.”

You shift in place, sitting up straighter. “Alright, refill your oxygen tank, then sit back down and call Slate.”

Sed turns in their seat to face you. “Why? My oxygen is still at 60%.”

“Because you're nervous, and you're breathing too fast. You should be at 90%. Refill and sit down.”

They pause, looking down at the ground, before getting up and hooking their personal tank to the onboard tank's nozzle. They quickly fill up, and say quietly, “Sorry, Gossan. I'm trying.”

You smile gently at them, though it's hidden behind the oxygen mask. “You're doing good, hatchling. Sit down and call Slate.”

They sit down and push the microphone button. You call out loud enough to be heard across the cabin: “Slate, we're coming back in. Get Gneiss and Porphy and have them come over to the launch camp, please.”

Slate replies: “Please? You only use manners with me when something's wrong, Gossan. What happened? What do you need Gneiss and Porphy for?”

“There's been an incident with pressure-feed system, Slate. We're going to need medical assistance.”

Slate is quiet for a moment. When they speak again, it's sober and serious. “Who for?”

“For me. Hatchling's fine.”

“Any fires?”

“No fires, no fuel leaks, reactor's fine.”

“Okay,” Slate sighs, “I'll be back in a minute. Be careful, Gossan.”

The radio goes silent as the line closes. You lean your head back against the wall and wince. You're starting to feel wetness seeping through the cloth pressed against your face.

You slowly drag yourself to your feet. Sed starts to get up out of the pilot's seat to help, but you say, “Nah, stay there, hatchling.” Keeping the pressure on your wound, you hobble over and lean against the back of the chair.

“Alright, here's the plan,” you tell them. “This injury is more than we can take care of with the supplies we've got up here, so we're headed back to town. I've got to keep pressure on to slow the bleeding, so you're going to take us in. Got it?”

“What?!” Sed exclaims, and the volume makes you wince again, a headache starting to form. “Take us in? Me? But I- I haven't trained for this yet, Gossan!” They try to twist around in their seat to look at you.

“Yes you have,” you reply, “Stay still, you're going to knock me over.”

“I mean, you've explained it all to me, but that was on land! And I practiced with a tiny model rocket, not with an entire ship in outer space in an emergency situation!”

“The same concepts all still apply. Hey, look up here, at me.” They turn and look, more carefully this time, and you can see their youth and worry shining in their eyes. “You've got all the knowledge you need, you just need to apply it. We were going to practice landing later today anyway. You're ready, Sed, you can do this. Yeah?”

They nod a little, and you raise your eyebrows at them and repeat, “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” they reply.

“Yeah what?”

“Yeah, I can do it.”

You grin at them. “Darn right you can. Eyes forward. I'll talk you through it.”

“Okay,” they say. They take a deep breath and grab on to the sidestick controller. “Okay.”

“Go ahead and lock on to Timber Hearth, and let me know our distance from it.”

It takes them a moment, but they find the lock-on button without help. “It says 4,800 meters.”

You nod. “So, what I want you to do is take us in to about 650 meters. We're going to take it slow, keep your speed between 20 and 40 meters a second. Watch out for the Attlerock.”

Sed lines themself up and pushes forward to begin accelerating toward Timber Hearth. That is, they try to. Instead of moving forward, the ship spins in place to the right. Startled, Sed lines up with Timber Hearth and tries again. Again, the ship turns in place.

“I can't, the thruster,” Sed says in a rush, “The starboard aft thruster is out, I can't accelerate forwards.”

“Stop thinking about what you don't have, and start thinking about what you do have. What have you got, and how can you use it?”

Sed looks around the control systems for a moment, before focusing on the sidestick again. Their nervousness reflects in the ship's movements as it turns right slightly, strafes left, right, pitches forward a bit.

“Can I... Can I use the landing camera?” They ask eventually. “Use the dorsal thrusters to move forward?”

You smile, but keep your pride to yourself for now. “Can you?”

They don't reply, but pitch backward carefully and turn on the landing camera. They take minute to reorient themself, activating the dorsal and ventral thrusters to move forward and back, practicing using their roll to take the place of their yaw. They aren't rushing themself, and watching them take the time to acclimate also stokes the pride that is warming your heart.

“I think- I... I am ready.”

“Go ahead, then.”

They begin to slowly accelerate toward Timber Hearth. “Don't forget to look out your windows,” you remind them, “your field of view is reduced in the camera.”

You let them fly silently for a few minutes. You try to press the cloth harder against your eye without letting out a yelp of pain that might make Sed even more nervous. Your headache is worsening, and your hands and feet are starting to tingle, none of which you figure are good signs.

You notice that Sed is gripping the sidestick controller very tightly. Every few seconds, they glance out the front and two side windows with sharp, stiff movements, before leaning in close to the landing camera monitor again.

“How you feeling, hatchling?” you ask.

“Fine. Good,” they answer, and you know that this time their high-pitched voice isn't due to the helium leak.

You huff a small breath out your nose and ask again, lower, “How you feeling, Sed?”

“...Scared,” they reply after a moment, “A little scared.”

You smile, and put a hand on their shoulder. “That's alright. You can be a little scared, but don't let it control you. We can be all the scared and mad and sad we need to be later. For now, we need to be focused.”

“It'd be a lot easier to be focused if you'd stop trying to talk to me about feelings,” they grumble under their breath.

You laugh. “Fair enough.” You pull your hand away and grimace at the smear of blood it leaves behind on their suit. You hope they don't notice.

Soon, they say, “We're at 650 meters.” They reorient their ship so that your home planet is visible through the front window.

“Good work. Now, what are we looking at?”

“Uh, that weird glowy swirly orange Nomai thing?”

“Sure the... yeah, whatever it is. So, where is the town crater from here?”

“I- I don't know,” they say, panic rising slightly in their voice.

You shrug, and lean your head against the back of the pilot's chair. “Fly around and find it, then.”

“Oh, right. Okay. I can do that.”

They start to drift. You keep your head down, but you can hear them struggling to maintain altitude, repeatedly pausing their search to fire the thrusters away from the planet.

“You feel gravity pulling us in?”

“Yeah, it's hard to stay at 650 meters.”

“Feather the thrusters, short bursts. That will help you maintain altitude. You want to work with gravity, not against it. Let it help you.”

You hear them start to do just that. You close your eyes and exhale.

“Found it! I see the observatory, and the landing pad.”

You lift your head and blink. You can't quite focus your vision enough to see more than green and white blurs out the window. You feel nauseous.

“That was... quick.”

“I mean, it took me like five minutes, it wasn't that quick.”

Ah. That's not a good sign either. Looks like you're running out of time.

You clear your throat and say: “Here's what I want you to do. Don't worry about landing on the landing pad. Just land on the, the cliff, it's a bigger target. You can- we'll figure out how to get down later. Keep your- keep your speed under 20 meters a second, then under. Um. Under 10 meters a second when you get to... 300 meters. You're... don't forget the... spool down.”

“Gossan?”

“Sorry... you-” You trip on something, despite standing still. Or maybe the gravity crystal acts up. Or maybe you just faint. Your knees buckle, and you spill down to the ground around the pilot's chair, and then you go to sleep.

You wake up what feels like just a few seconds later, but you're lying flat on your back, looking up at the stars and the bottom of the ship. Porphy is kneeling over you and pressing a towel against your face.

You lift your hand weakly toward them and slur out, “Hi, darlin'.”

Porphy snorts and shakes their head. “Don't you 'darling' me. You're probably gonna lose that eye.”

Gneiss kneels at your other side, pulling your arm down and looking for a vein. Only then do you realize that you are lying on the wood of the landing pad, not the grass of the cliffside. “Where's Sed?” you ask.

“Right here.” They appear standing at Porphy's side. Their helmet is off, and you can see their eyes are red with tears.

“All good?”

They smile, and it's only a little wobbly. “All good.”

“I thought I told you to land on the cliff.”

“Well, you gave up decision-making privileges when you decided to pass out on me.”

You laugh loud, causing both Gneiss and Porphy to reprimand you and hold you still. Gneiss injects you with something, and Slate and Porphy lift you onto a stretcher. You only get a brief glance at Slate's face; they look stricken and refuse to make eye contact with you.

Before you are taken to the elevator, you grab the triangular Outer Wilds Ventures patch sewn to your sleeve and tear it off.

Startled, Sed asks, “What are you doing?”

You thrust the patch into their chest. They stumble, and take it from you. “Hold on to this for me,” you reply.

In the end, you did lose that eye, just as Porphy had predicted. Turns out that on the ship, the diaphragm that was meant to burst open when pressure was directed outside had simply failed to do so. You didn't even bother calling out Slate for the mechanical failures; they completely reformatted the not only the pressure venting system, but the entire engine clusters. They never really look you in the eye when they talk to you anymore.

As soon as you were allowed to sit upright, you had sewed that OWV patch onto Sed's suit. You were still bandaged up and pretty heavily drugged at the time, and you somehow managed to sew it on sideways, with the wrong corner facing up. Sed laughed and didn't let you fix it, said it looked “cooler” that way.

You shake your head of the memory and take a deep breath. Getting lost in nostalgia isn't going to fix anything, and there is still so much to fix.

Setting the suit aside, you are left with a pile of tools. Sed's Little Scout, their signalscope, and...

Right, their translator. You pick it up in your hands. Assuming the electrical tape and the unsecured wires are part of the design, it's just as intact as the suit. You pull the trigger and it whirs to life, complaining about the lack of text to decipher.

You are struck with a sudden thought, and you look up towards the Nomai. They haven't moved from where they hatchlings had cornered them. Their hands wring the handle of their staff, and they stare up vaguely in the direction of their ship.

You jump up from your seat, startling them into attention. "Alright, Nomai," you say. "Let's see if you can write."

You kneel in front of them, and in the dirt you write, "What happened to Sed?" Then you raise the translator and point it at the words.

Nothing happens. Maybe it only works the other direction. Then you mentally kick yourself. Why would it translate Hearthian? There's no reason Sed and Hal would have prepared to communicate with a living Nomai.

"Uh, Sed," you say. You point at the suit laying on the edge of the porch, then at the door of the cabin where the hatchling is being treated. "What happened?" you say as well as sign, although it did no good last time.

Once again, the Nomai just stares wide-eyed at you. You try to swallow your frustration. It's not their fault.

"Alright, maybe it's too early for questions. Can you write? Whatever you want to say." You reach out and pull on their staff a little. They flinch, so you back off and mark the dirt with your finger again. "Just use that, you don't even need to kneel down and get your hands dirty."

Something seems to click, but they don't write in the dirt. They hastily touch the box at the top of their staff, tracing various patterns. Looking at it, it doesn't seem to have buttons or a screen, or any visible power source. You can't guess what it does.

After a moment, they press it into the ground. At your feet, glowing blue swirls of complex lines and geometric shapes bloom from the tip. You have to step back to give it space.

You clap your hands. "Ha! Now we're getting somewhere." You raise the translator again. This time, one letter at a time, text filters through to the display.

My name is Solanum. I mean no harm. — I assure you, I did not harm Sed. I found them injured, and I brought them here immediately so that they could receive proper medical attention. I was not involved with their injury. — I have only just finished my Quantum Pilgrimage. I come bearing no weapons, I am completely unarmed. I will acquiesce to any demands.

You blink. That is... a lot.

You look up at their face again, and they stare back at you. You still find them hard to read, but something about their expression and the wordy formality of their message strikes you as... young.

This Nomai, Solanum, is very young, and very, very scared.

Again, you want to kick yourself. Of course they would be terrified. This is their solar system too, and the sun just blew up. They're on a planet full of aliens they can't communicate with. And as far as you know (although what do you know anymore), they are somehow the only Nomai still alive.

You take a deep, calming breath, and try to speak softly and slowly. "Okay, Sol- uh... Solanum. Thank you for telling me all that. I know you didn't hurt Sed. You did a very good job helping them. I know things are scary right now, but we're going to get through this together, alright?"

Even though they can't understand the words, you hope they get something of the meaning, the tone. If they do, they don't show it, just continuing to stare at you with an expression you can only describe as "stressed."

You cut off another sigh. "Come on, follow me. You probably could use some peace and quiet."

You take a few steps away, looking up and holding out a hand expectantly. Thankfully, they get the hint and hesitantly step after you. You're glad you don't have to guide them physically; you're starting to get the impression that they don't want to be touched.

You lead them to the small, single-room cabin attached to the storage building by the river and hold open the door for them. "Here you go, nobody will bother you in here," you say.

Solanum looks between you and the open doorway, and you gesture inside with an open hand. Slowly, they creep into the room.

You don't enter yourself, trying to give them space, but speak from the doorway and point at the bed. "You can lay down and get some rest if you want. I'll come in and start a fire in a little while so you'll be nice and warm."

At your gesture, they sit down on the edge of the bed, and after a moment, they touch the top of their staff and press another message into the floor. You pull out Sed's translator and read:

I will not cause any problems. My clan will come for me soon. They will give you anything you want for my safe return.

You rub the side of your face. Maybe that's true. Maybe somewhere out there Solanum has people looking for them, someone they can they can reunite with. The hope feels hollow in your chest.

"Alright, Solanum, alright," you say with the most soothing voice you can. "You're safe. We'll take care of you. You're okay, Solanum."

But they just look at you, as still as the statue in the museum.

You shake your head. "Get some rest, hatchling," you say. You step away, and shut the door behind you.

Chapter Text

One of the nice things about meditation is how it sort of... waters down time.

Once, when you were a hatchling, Feldspar snuck you down into the mines while they and Esker were helping Chert with their zero-g training. You spent most of the day playing with a water tank you had found down there. The tank had a long hose with a valve at the end to let you control the flow of water. You turned the valve to let out a small puddle's worth of liquid, and it congealed into a bounding and flexing orb that wobbled and clung to your fingers when you poked at it.

When you meditate, every loop, every minute in that loop, feels like one drop that floats out then joins that water orb, losing its shape to meld with the whole. Each moment folds around the next until you can't really tell one from the other.

After a while, you've managed to incorporate every part of your routine into your meditative process, everything from dumping water on your campfire, walking down the hill, tying up first one side then the other of your hammock, laying back and blowing notes into your flute while rocking in the breeze, being flung by a cyclone and greeting space, returning to gravity and to your song. Even dying. Every step is now as fundamental to keeping that floating puddle intact as the deep-breathing techniques you started out with.

The only time that isn't diluted is when Sed comes to visit. Just like when you hear the roar of an approaching cyclone, the crunch of boots racing across sand equally tells you to brace for impact.

Sure enough, Sed barrels into the side of your hammock without further warning. It tips dangerously, but you manage to keep it from flipping entirely. "Gabbro!" they call, loud and ignorant of your literal near downfall.

"Heyo, time buddy!" you answer. "How's the universe been treating you?"

"I've made a discovery!" they declare. "That is, I made what I thought was going to be a discovery, which turned out to be an absolutely useless non-discovery for all that I had worked it up to be, but which then ended up leading to an accidental, partial, kind-of discovery that might be important but I haven't been able to interpret and doesn't really answer any of my questions? At all?"

They're practically vibrating with exited energy. They climb around and play on your hammock as they speak, kneeling on one side of you and bouncing the mat, trying to stand up on it without using their hands, then climbing over you completely. The ropes creak in complaint, but you've learned to double knot them every time in case of a surprise visit from Sed.

"Sounds like my kind of discovery," you say, immune to their antics as they rock the hammock wildly. "Give me the run-down, what'd you find?"

"Okay, so, after I went inside the Orbital Probe Cannon and figured all that stuff out, I was like, 'Wait, what about the probe itself?' Because I see it every loop, first thing when I open my eyes. I figured that there was probably something important to learn there, right? So I start trying to follow it. It took me like, twelve tries, it's really fast and actually kind of small, so I kept losing it by the time I left the atmosphere of Timber Hearth. But I finally managed to catch up with it one loop, way out on the edge of the solar system, and guess what! It's completely nondescript and boring! There's no text on it to translate, no electrical panels or anything I can mess with. I think it must have some sort of onboard Nomai gravity tech, because I couldn't even nudge it off course with my ship. All that effort for nothing, and I was so far away at that point I didn't even have time to get back to the solar system and do something useful."

With a frustrated groan, they flop down belly-first perpendicular to you on the hammock, crushing you under them. You grunt and struggle to free your arms. "You know, you weigh two times more here than you do on Timber Hearth," you inform them.

“You know, you can cry about it two times harder here than you can on Timber Hearth," they reply, copying your tone and not moving an inch. "But you know what the crazy thing is?" they continue. They roll onto their side to face you, propping themself up on an elbow. You grunt again in pain as they switch from squishing your abdomen to pinning your legs. "When the supernova happened, I watched it happen, and it was taking a really long time to reach me, because I was so far away. Then it started slowing down, and I was still traveling away from it next to the probe, and then I realized it wasn't going toreach me."

"Wait, what?" you say, sitting up as much as you can.

"Yeah," they reply, "I got really, really scared. I thought I had taken myself out of the time loop. But then my, like, my vision kind of... corrupted, I guess? All my senses, actually. And then I saw my memories play back and I woke under the launch pad, like usual."

"Whoa. That is crazy." You lean forward, your forearms supporting you as they rest on Sed's side, and your buddy twists to look up at you. "So, if the supernova didn't reach you, maybe you didn't die at all? From what you told me about what you learned at Statue Island, it seems like the statues record our memories and send them back in time, but not our bodies or anything like that. So there could be a version of you out there in some other version of time where you don't get killed by the supernova, and you don't wake up at home after it."

After a moment, Sed says, "I don't think I like that." Their voice is smaller than usual.

They roll off your legs and go to sit up across from you in the hammock. You shrug as you let them up. "Who knows, that's just my first guess. But now that you've got my brain thinking about it-"

You are interrupted as Sed grabs the sides of the hammock and, in one swift motion, manages to flip you out of it entirely. They nearly fall out of it themself, but instead sway violently until they get their balance. You hear them cackling as you roll onto your back in the sand. "You gotta stay on your toes, Gabbro!" they laugh. "You gotta be prepared for anything!"

Once you recover from having your breath knocked out of you, you say, "Now that you've uncovered that mystery, where you off to next?"

"I don't know," they say, leaning over the edge of the fabric to look at you. "I still have a few islands to explore on this planet, but I've literally barely scratched the surface of Brittle Hollow, so I might start there. And I haven't even landed on the Twins or seen Chert yet. There's a lot to pick from."

They dangle an arm off the hammock, and the fingertips of their glove graze against your helmet as they slowly rock in the breeze. They ask, "Hey, by the way, where's your ship?"

You reply, "That's a good question. It's definitely on this planet somewhere. I mean, unless a cyclone came by and tossed it into space, I guess. Heh, that would be pretty nuts. I hope it's not lonely."

When Tektite first taught you how to meditate, they called it something like “reaching a gentle place of peace and rest.” You're not sure you agree with that description nowadays. Nowaday, haha. Since you and meditation have gotten to know each other pretty well over the past several... the past whatever-amount-of-time, you think it might not be “gentle” so much as it is “indifferent.” It takes everything, all thoughts, all emotions, good or bad (as much as a thought or emotion could be good or bad) and covers them up, like fish under the ice of a frozen pond.

Your time buddy, like just about everyone else, isn't quite on the same wavelength as you. Instead of letting their feelings swim around deep under the surface, they'd rather hoist them flopping and flailing by the tail. They would come to you frustrated or annoyed or angry or sad, kicking sand or pacing around or ranting loudly. They learn all kinds of things and come back to tell you about them. They describe some new Nomai technology or new astrophysical concept or even the discovery of another alien species that had lived in this solar system. But whatever excitement and momentum these discoveries gives them stops dead as soon as they can't find a so-called solution to something they think is a puzzle.

They sit in the sand under one of your trees after having thrown most of your cans and bottles into the ocean in a fit. You had continued to play your flute as you watched the strong gravity of the planet give each item a much larger splash than it was due.

“Gabbro,” they sigh, “are you even capable of feeling negative emotions? I don't think I've seen you any worse than maybe, like, mildly confused.”

You shrug. “Eh, why would I? I'm a busy person, why take up time wallowing when I'm in the middle of my important research project of whether it's more relaxing to lie in a hammock that is swinging to the left or to the right?”

You spot the top of their helmet and visor as they peek at you over the edge of the hammock. “Your hypothesis?”

You shake your head. “Inconclusive. More research is needed.”

They roll their eyes and disappear as they drop heavily back into the sand.

“You can't just not feel bad ever. Can you? If you're choosing not to be sad, could you choose to be sad?”

You hum and think about it for a moment. You answer genuinely: “I'm not sure. I'll add it to my list of things to ponder over, somewhere between figuring out if life is devalued when death is off the table and whether a marshmallow tastes better when it has been on fire for more or less than eight seconds.”

“Okay cool. Actually, no, shut up, I don't care, and I never have.” They attempt to throw sand at you, but they undershoot and most of it lands back on them. They groan with deep frustration, then sigh. “Sorry, I'm being mean for no reason. I'm just mad. I can't just... turn off my emotions like you can, but I need to do something.”

“Have you tried... taking a break?” you offer in a sing-song cadence.

“Nooooooooo!” they cry loudly until they run out of breath.

“Have you tried... getting a hobby?”

“Like what?”

“Learning an instrument?”

“I don't have one, and that sounds repetitive and boring and worse than taking a break, actually, don't suggest it again.”

“Have you tried... something else creative? Like writing, or drawing, or building, or something like that?”

They sit up again with some effort. “I write in my ship log sometimes, but just basic stuff I don't want to forget.” They pick up handfuls of sand and start pouring them onto your bed. You can hear them thinking now, so you don't respond. They say, a little softly, “I like taking pictures.”

They say, “I found your ship!”

You reply, “Oh, cool. So it's floating in the ocean, huh? Did it look like it was having a good time?”

You wonder if Giant's Deep likes to meditate. It's been doing this a lot longer than you, it's got it's routine down pat, you bet. Maybe its meditation is its thick, cloudy atmosphere, concealing the surface behind a pretty green swirl. Maybe it is its cyclones, flinging out and showing the solar system whatever catches its fancy. Maybe it is its current, the impenetrable constant that keeps locked away whatever secrets it might have at its core. Maybe each of these is a step in its meditation. Or maybe its meditation is the orbit itself, holding it fast in its place, unable to change direction or move any slower or faster, not that it would ask to.

Sometimes when your time buddy swings by, they don't say anything at all. They stand at the side of your hammock, one hand just barely touching the edge of the fabric. You scoot up a little higher, and they climb in and sit between your legs and lay back against your chest. You rest your elbows lightly on their shoulders and resume your flute-playing where you left off, a little quieter than before.

Although they never said so to you, you could tell that they were always afraid of the cyclones here. They don't like the noise, you think, and would stare way up at the funnel and cling to a tree or your ropes despite having a jetpack they could use to catch themself. When they are quiet like this, though, and a cyclone comes by and picks you both up, you don't think they are any less afraid, but they just close their eyes to it and lean heavier against you.

The entire time they sit with you, they are very stiff, and very still. In the brief moment just before the supernova hits you, when everything is dark, you hear them whisper, to themself or to you or perhaps to the universe at large: “I don't know how to sleep anymore.”

They say, “I saw your ship again.”

You reply, you tell them that you hope its having fun.

Again, maybe its not quite right to ponder over whether Giant's Deep "likes" to meditate. You don't think that meditation is something that can be liked, exactly. You personally can't say you “like” breathing, or having your heart pump blood. These are just things that happen.

There is one point in time that is extra watered-down for you. You open your eyes, or maybe they were already open, and you're sitting on the beach, your hammock not yet hung. You are sitting halfway in the cold water, and you're not wearing your helmet. You feel... mildly confused. But Sed is sitting in front of you. They are touching gently your head and face and neck, swiping away water from under your eyes with their thumbs. They're telling you some story about when Hal lost a boot to a mud puddle and tried to fish it out with a fishing pole.

You look at them, then let your eyes close. You press your face into their hands and they tell you their story until the sun comes and gobbles you all up.

Next loop, they visit right away, and you're rocking in your hammock and greet them with a “Heyo, time buddy!”

But what do you know? Just because you don't know if you can rightly say you “like” meditation doesn't mean Giant's Deep can't.

They stand beside your hammock, a few feet away. They don't touch it, and they don't touch you.

They say, “I found the source of the time loops.”

You reply. You say a lot of words. You say you'll take a nap if you feel like it.

They look at you quietly. They turn around and walk back to their ship, and they take off.

Still, what would be a better way to word this, so as not to say “like”? Hm...

You hope that... You hope that Giant's Deep's meditation is as real to it as it needs it to be. Sure, let's go with that.

Sed stops visiting.

After that, it's like you pressed that hose up to the zero-g orb of water and opened the valve. No more single drops to count as they are drawn into the mass. Just an amorphous lake floating in the void, growing larger and larger until it envelops you, and you're no more distinct within the sea of it than any single drop. You can meditate through pretty much anything, now. You're not even really sure you're interrupted when you die anymore.

But when the sky goes dark, and it stays dark, and it stays dark, and it stays dark, and you're still here?

You sit up and swing your legs over the side of the hammock, set your flute in your lap, and look over the ocean. You can hear the breaking of the waves and the distant roar of the cyclones, but you cannot see much. Every few seconds, purple lightning races across the sky, revealing the hiding places of the surrounding islands and storms. With every flash, they have drifted to a slightly different location, but their speed and direction are hard to predict with how briefly you see them before they are gone again. Ooh, spooky. You wait, swinging your legs to rock the hammock, but sun's outer layers never catastrophically expand into your space.

Huh, Sed really did it! Well, they did something, you guess. Not sure what, but definitely something. Guess that means meditating is over for now.

You go very, very still. The hammock's rocking stills with you.

You don't know how long you sit there before the radio in your helmet buzzes to life. Through it, for the first time in... some time, you hear Gossan's voice. "Gabbro, status report," they say, curt and no-nonsense.

You realize you haven't been breathing. You gasp, and quickly respond, "Stable and secure," as you've been trained.

"Await instructions," they reply, and the line goes dead.

You should probably pack up camp, or something. Now that time has been freed from its casing, born out of it like a tadpole from an egg, you're probably going to be asked to do things again. Back to work, back to very carefully managing expectations.

It's surprising, you'd think the death of the sun would have more impact on your surroundings. You remember distantly that, in one version of time, one version of Sed did not die to the supernova either. It was probably very dark for them, too, and very quiet.

Without your sense of sight to give you much information, you try to focus on the rhythm of the ocean waves, Giant's Deep's heartbeat.

Was? Is? Sed told you that story a while back, but within the context of the time loops, their sun probably just died too.

You can't count the waves, they sound like background noise, like static. Like you aren't a couple feet above them, but deep underneath.

It could be that that version of them is out there, right now all that time ago, trying to decide what to do too. Sed had said that they were afraid.

You remember that the first time you woke up not-dead, you called Hornfels. They told you you were dreaming. You talked a lot about dreams, it was nice.

Or, it could be that, as soon as your not-dead time buddy's memories got funneled back to the next loop, they just lost consciousness, and they didn't have to try to figure anything out or make decisions.

Your teeth and jaw ache, and your skin prickles like the salt spray could reach it.

You have a few options here. There's not much you need to bring with you, packing would be quick. You could go back to Timber Hearth. Hornfels will be calling soon. You lift your flute to your mask, play a few long notes. It's the same note, four times.

You could also stay here. You could also just choose to do nothing.

Giant's Deep didn't die this time, either. You wonder if it can keep it's meditation up if there's no sun for it to orbit around. You wonder if it has to decide what to do next too. You close your eyes suddenly and beg, beg for a cyclone. You just need to see space, right now, that's all. To see that the sun is truly gone. You need it more than anything.

Giant's Deep, your friend, sends one by. It lifts you up, and just past the horizon, you see the full expanse of the nothing that the universe has become. It is shockingly, grotesquely, morbidly, the most beautiful thing you've ever seen.

You could stay here. You could choose to do nothing.

Hovering in zero gravity above your mat, you press your thumb against the off switch for your radio, on the left side of your helmet under where your ear would be. Nothing has to change. You don't have to leave. You don't have to do anything.

Just before it clicks in, you hear Hal's voice through the speakers. "Gabbro, do you read?" You can hear that they are crying.

You fall, and crash back down into the water.

You wait a moment for the island to slow its bobbing up and down before you answer. "What's up, Hal! I think I do more writing than reading these days, but I can hear you loud and clear, if that's what you're asking.”

They don't react to your lighthearted joking. "I can't talk long, we need to call Chert back. Did you feel some kind of explosion out there? Apparently the sun went supernova, but all the planets survived."

"Wow! Crazy."

Hal's voice is shaky, but focused and professional. "Sed took off for the first time just a little while ago. They... they're missing."

In slow motion, you stand up, holster your flute. You head up the hill, you left your jetpack and its fuel up there. Your feet drag through the sand with every step. "Huh, that's odd. Where were they seen last? Did Chert or Esker spot them?"

"No, last anyone's seen them was at their launch. Gossan is making plans with Hornfels and Slate. They asked for you to go get Esker and start looking for Sed."

We know how much you care about them. If you want to join the search party, we can graduate you early. It's not without risk, but if you feel like you're ready, we'll trust you. If you do not feel ready, there's no shame in staying here. It's your choice.

You want to scream.

"No problem, I'll start heading out. Anywhere specific they wanted us to look first?"

It's hard to hear Hal's quiet voice. "Somewhere around the sun," they say.

You flick on your helmet's HUD, and the marker for your ship blinks into place. Only 280 meters away.

When you reach it, the engines fire without hesitation.

You leave Giant's Deep.

"Hey Esker, you copy?"

They reply, but it sounds like they're under water. Oops, guess the ship's speakers got flooded. Everything in your ship is kind of damp and musty smelling, and something near the back is throwing sparks every few minutes, but other than that, it's shipshape. Heh.

You switch back to your helmet's speakers. "Say it again, Esker?"

"I said 'loud and clear,' Gabbro! Good to hear from you."

"You too, old friend. Anybody tell you what's going on?"

"No, everyone's line is busy, and nobody tells me anything these days. We don't have a sun anymore, that's all I know. Hey, Gabbro, where are you by chance?"

"Just outside your orbit, I'm coming in to land. Sed is missing, Gossan wants you and I out looking for them."

"Oh, good!" Even over your speakers, you can hear them let out a shaky, relieved breath. They add quickly, "Not good about Sed, of course, good about you, uh, you coming here. Soon, right? You're landing soon?"

"Landing now, grab your suit."

Not long after, they are climbing into your ship, hunching a little to prevent their vaguely-triangular-sort-of-conical helmet from knocking the ceiling, their signature hat tied snugly to the top. "Now look there, it's Gabbro!" they say happily once they've settled in. You lift off and start orienting yourself with your map. Thankfully, Ol' Spacey's batteries haven't died yet. "You're looking well, how've you been?"

"Same old, same old," you reply. You're going to have to fly by map for this one, you can barely make out anything through your windows in the dark. On a hunch, you mark Ash Twin and ask your ship nicely to begin making it's way over.

"You've been eating more than just marshmallows, I hope."

"Uh huh."

You can hear Esker shifting around in the cabin, trying to get comfortable. You squint and lean forward, trying to spot any source of light or movement. "Wild business this whole supernova situation, huh?" Esker says.

"Sure is."

They are quiet for a moment, idly tapping on various gauges behind you. You ignore them. They clear their throat.

After a while, they say, "So, what's all this about a time loop, then?"

You gun the retro rockets to stop your ship in place.

Chapter Text

Up on the far side of your camp, you catch sight of someone running in your direction.

Why, that looks like Sed! So Gossan must have finally let them set off on their own. Have they always been so tall? It's been only a few months since you've seen them, but they must have had a growth spurt in that time — they aren't all that much shorter than you now.

"Esker!" they call to you as they scramble down the side of the crater in some kind of hurry.

"Oh, hey, it's you! Ground control didn't tell me you were launching. Long time no see! Actually, I guess-"

"Great to see you, Esker," they interrupt as they run up to your side. They stop so suddenly they nearly tumble over, and they bend down, hands on knees, as they pant and try to catch their breath. "Need your help."

You sit up straighter at that, leaning forward. "Something wrong? You didn't crash, did you? Reactor troubles?"

Sed straightens up again, shaking their head and waving their hands at you. "No no no, I'm in a time loop."

You blink at them. "A time-"

They interrupt again. "Yes, a time loop. Time keeps resetting and I've been repeating the same 22 minutes over and over again." They tap on their knuckles as they speak, counting out each sentence. "Yes, you heard that right. No, it's not a game I'm playing. No, it's not a practical joke from Slate or Gabbro. I didn't hit my head. I'm not experiencing hypoxemia. I think the Nomai have something to do with it but I'm still trying to figure that out. Me and Gabbro are the only ones who remember each loop because a Nomai statue looked at us. I'm sure I didn't hit my head. At the end of each loop the sun goes supernova."

By the end of their list their voice fizzles out as they run out of breath. They pause to gasp in some oxygen. Then they look at you again and ask, "Did I miss anything?"

You feel a little dizzy as you try to process everything that was just said. "So you... 22 minutes... hmm." You scratch at your ear. "Are you... did you practice all that?"

"Yeah," they say, nodding. "I've been here nine loops in a row."

"And the, a supernova, you said? What happens-"

"We all die," they say, a little quieter. "I'm trying to stop it."

"...Huh."

"Yeah."

You take a deep breath and push it back out your nose. Then you stand up, wincing as your bad hip complains. "Right, then. What can I do to help?"

"Yes!" Sed shouts, pumping their fists and bouncing in place. You startle a little at the volume. "Record time. You're the best, Esker! Okay, here's what I've got."

They pull their scout launcher over their shoulder and hand it to you. You take it and grab a blanket from your stuff, spreading it out on the ground so you'll have a somewhat clean surface to work on.

The hatchling crouches beside you as you separate the scout from the launcher. “So, what I'm trying to do is get this to save pictures between loops,” they begin. “That piece of the Nomai statue you and Hornfels hooked up to the ship computer for extra data storage is causing the computer's memory to be preserved between loops. When I explained it to you before, you said that the statue probably recognizes the hard drive as a type of 'brain' for the ship and so it's recording and uploading and returning the memory the same way it does with my brain.”

You look up and off to the side with a contemplative nod. “Hm. Seems as sound a theory as anything.”

Sed laughs. “It's your theory, I'd be worried if you weren't agreeable to it.”

“Alright, well, did you try hooking the scout up to the ship's computer and uploading the pictures?”

“I did, and it worked, it saved the pictures, but it took too long. I don't have the time to do that every loop.” They plop down into a more comfortable sitting position with a huff. “So next loop you helped me open a wireless port between the scout and the ship. And that worked! It took forever to reformat the scout's hard drive to be compatible, we barely managed it in time, but I was able to see pictures I had taken that loop on the ship's computer when I woke up again later. Interesting thing is, I didn't have to reformat the drive again or change any of the software that loop, the changes seemed to stick.”

“That is interesting!” you say, digging around in your equipment until you find a small keyboard that was only missing a few keys and a tiny display monitor. “I suppose that whatever that Nomai tech is doing, it's now including the scout's hard drive as part of the ship's brain.”

“That's what you said last time.”

After plugging the keyboard and monitor into the Little Scout, you enter the command prompt to open the wireless network. Sure enough, the display lists two connections, with SED-AFTCOMP showing “active” and SED-EVA and SED-LAUNCH as “inactive.”

“So, I'm guessing this is your current issue,” you say, tapping the screen. “Looks like the scout doesn't want to communicate with your on-ship computer and anything else at the same time.”

Sed nods and sighs. “Right. It's sending all the image data directly to the ship. I can't see the pictures on my helmet display or even on the scout launcher's display anymore.”

“I see.” You lean back a little where you kneel, adjusting your hat as you think. “It should be an easy enough fix. We'll just tell the ship computer to send the data to your suit or launcher whenever either runs an image pull request. So all images will be automatically sent from the scout to the ship and stored there until an image is requested by a display device. You'll need to head back to your ship and run a couple commands, though.”

“Ugh, figures.” Sed stands up with a groan and trudges off in the direction they had appeared from. “I'm walking, I'm not running anymore this loop.”

You chuckle as they meander away, and you squint at the sun rising over the horizon. Now that you're looking at it, it does seem quite a bit darker in color than usual, deep and irritated.

The sun passes behind Timber Hearth. As you watch your home, watch the glow of the village lights as the planet rotates, you feel a squeeze of apprehension, of fear, in your gut.

You look around at your empty, quiet camp, at the edge of the crater over which Sed disappeared and is no longer visible. You'd be ashamed to admit how quickly you get up and grab your radio, how you scramble to tune it to Sed's channel before your thoughts catch up to you.

“Can you hear me, hatchling?” you say down the mic.

“Loud and clear,” comes the tinny reply.

You hold back a sigh of relief, and clear your throat instead.

“That's good. Let me know when you get to your ship and I'll give you some instructions.”

“Will do!”

A piece of wood shifts in your campfire, and you watch as a few embers fly up and fizzle out. Everything is very still, and the silence seems heavy and dense, like its pressing down on you.

You push the microphone button again. “So... what made you ask me, instead of getting Slate to help you, or Hornfels?”

“Slate honestly sucks at working with software, their autopilot system is barely operable as is,” they say. “And Hornfels asks too many questions.”

“That so?”

“Yeah, as soon as you mention a time loop, that's all they want to talk about, and you can't get a word in edgewise.”

“Heh, I can see that.”

The line goes quiet for a moment. You clear your throat again.

“So, you, uh... what's the reason for wanting to save scout photos? Something you're working on?”

“Two reasons, mainly,” they reply, and you can faintly hear the crunch of their boots as they walk. “Firstly, to keep track of what I'm discovering in the time loops. I've been all over the place, Esker. I've been keeping notes in my ship log, but being able to save images will make things a lot easier. I keep finding these slide reels — ancient image archives — and they have some super important information on them. But by the time I find a reel, find a projector, find a light for a projector, and set everything up, I don't have time to really look closely at the images like I want to.”

“Ancient image archives, huh? Nomai, I'm guessing? Hornfels and Riebeck would die to get a glimpse of that, I bet.”

“Not Nomai. It's... ugh, it's crazy, Esker. I'm finding some wild stuff out here that's been under our noses the whole time.”

“Not Nomai? Is that so?”

“It's a long story, longer than we have. I'll come by and tell you sometime.”

“You do that, hatchling. And what about your second reason?”

From the radio's speaker, you hear a sound of creaking metal and a brief hum before the crunch of rocky soil changes to the thump of boots on wood. “Well, the second reason is that Gabbro says I need a hobby. They said I should take it easy every few loops, but I can't just, like, lay around and nap. And I find such beautiful things out here, Esker.” Their voice softens a little, and it makes you smile. “It's gorgeous, and it's gone in just a few minutes, and I just want to catch it and keep it and hold on to it if I can, you know?”

You chuckle. “You did always like pretty things, even when you were barely old enough to walk on land legs. I gave you a chunk of amethyst I found once, you were delighted.”

“I still have it!” they exclaim, “It's here on my ship, right here!” You hear them dig around, then the sound of stone gently tapping twice on metal.

“Well I'll be, look at that.” You find yourself grinning.

“Anyway, I've got the command terminal pulled up here, what should I do next?”

You guide them through a series of commands to input as you enter your own codes into the Little Scout's terminal. You instruct them to do the same for their ship's onboard scout as well. Soon, the device in your hands has added SED-SRVPRB1 and SED-SRVPRB2 to the network list. Along with the suit display and now also the ship's cockpit monitor, everything is showing as active and connected through the ship computer.

“Why don't you come back here and see if everything is working to your standards,” you tell them, closing down the command terminal.

“Can do!” they reply, and you hear them swing shut the ship's hatch.

“You said that Gabbro was wrapped up in all this business with you. I haven't seen them in a while. How've they been?”

“I have no idea.” It sounds like they're jogging this time, but it doesn't drown out the mild frustration you can hear in their voice. “They don't talk to me about how they are. They talk to me about everything else they can think of, but any time I try to ask them about what they're feeling, they find some way to talk themself right out of the conversation.”

You huff out a laugh, shaking your head. “That sounds like Gabbro.” You fiddle with the harness straps crossing your chest as you watch Timber Hearth's village rotate past again.

You sigh. “Listen, you're old enough not to be told what to do, but I'll make a request. Keep trying with Gabbro, if you can. Try not to give up on them. What you're going through sounds like it'd be a lot worse going through it alone. I imagine they don't want to go through it alone either.”

Sed doesn't say anything, but you see them appear over the edge of the crater and half run, half slide down the side of it.

You turn off your radio as they approach and take off their helmet, panting. “I thought you said no more running?” you say.

“Yeah, well,” they respond with a shrug.

You hand over the scout launcher from your seat on the ground in front of the Little Scout itself. “Come on, let's see if my programming knowledge still holds any water.”

They take it from you, and you hear the click of a shutter as they accidentally press a button. “Oops,” they say. “Well, that will work. Look, it's you!”

They turn the device around and show you its display. You see yourself from a low angle, kneeling in front of the scout on the blanket with your radio and keyboard beside you. You're looking up and to the side at Sed, reaching out as you pass them the launcher.

You shake your head. “You said you wanted to capture pretty things, not my ugly mug.”

Sed laughs loud. “Nah, you're plenty pretty!” They push another button on the launcher, and the scout warps back into its cradle. “We'll see next loop if it worked, I guess.”

They give you a hand as you pull yourself to your feet. “If it gives you any more trouble, you know where to ask for help.”

Sed grins. “You're the best, Esker. I owe you.”

You settle yourself back down in your rocking chair, and the hatchling settles down on the ground next to you. “If you find time between gallivanting around and trying to save the solar system, come by and tell me a story about those slide reels, and we'll call it even.”

“Sounds good,” they say, looking at the photo on their scout launcher. “Maybe I should try to get pictures of people as well, not just stuff I find.”

“You could make a good project of it,” you reply. “Try to capture their personalities like you're out here trying to capture the sky.”

Sed gives a thoughtful hum in response. Again, the sun rises over the horizon. This time, it looks red and bloated, white hot in the center like a painful boil. Again, you feel the slow clench of fear inside you.

“So, a supernova, huh?” you ask, staring up at it.

Your attention is pulled down as you feel Sed take your hand, and you squeeze it back. "It only hurts for a second, then it's over, I promise,” they say. “You won't even remember it. Time will reset, and it will be like it never happened."

"But if I understand all this right, you'll remember, won't you?"

"Yeah."

You take your hand from theirs and touch their head, smoothing a thumb over their brow. They look up at your touch. "That really isn't fair to you, is it, hatchling."

And oh, it ain't right to see a little one look so sad. But you don't see it for long.

Chapter Text

You and Hornfels stand in mirrored contemplative poses as you stare up at the gleaming copper eyes of the Nomai statue.

“And you say that you didn't do anything to deactivate the locking mechanism on the eyes?” Hornfels asks. “You're sure you didn't bump it or, I don't know, accidentally utter some Nomai code word?”

“No, I didn't even look at it!” you reply, exasperated. “I just walked over to the entrance to see if Sed was coming up yet, and when I came back, the eyes were open! Where do you think I would have learned a code word?”

Hornfels sighs. “Maybe it was simply on a timer. You would think we would be able to hear some sort of internal timekeeping mechanism clicking away if that were the case, however.” They sigh again and mutter, “I was hoping it would be a code word.”

Your musings are interrupted by a distant but familiar shout.

“Hal!”

“Sed!” you respond, grinning. Hornfels winces at the volume but doesn't react otherwise.

“Halite!” you hear again, closer.

“Sediment!”

They appear in the doorway, geared and equipped for space travel like a real and proper astronaut. They stand sideways with their chest high and point at you. “HALIMENT!” they yell.

You copy the dramatic pose. “SEDILITE!”

They laugh, bounding over and crushing you in a hug. You hug them back and say, “Hey, I was just about to come find you!” You free an arm to point at you and Hornfels' discovery. “Look look look, you’ve gotta see this—the Nomai statue’s eyes are open!”

Sed pulls away, hands gripping your arms, but they don't look at the statue. They look at you, searching your face like they lost something in it, still grinning but it's... strange. Wistful, maybe? They look like they could cry if they let themself. Instead, they laugh again and hug you tight.

“Uh, you good?” you ask, scratching at their sides through the heavy fabric of their suit.

Before they can answer, Hornfels clears their throat. “Hatchling, Gossan said you'd be coming up to get the launch codes before you leave. Why do you already have all your gear?” They stand with their hands on their hips, wearing a disapproving squint.

Sed steps back and turns to show off their jetpack. “Slate said I've been packing on the pounds and wanted me to test to thrust-to-weight ratio before taking off. Want to see?” They flick the igniter switch on the controller with their thumb a few times, flinging small sparks near the jet canister.

Hornfels holds out their hands and exclaims, “No, not in the museum!”

Sed laughs and tugs at your arm. “Hey, come outside.”

You pout. “But the statue...”

“Outside. We're going outside,” they say, punctuating the words with wide swings of their arm toward the doorway. They flick their igniter again as if for emphasis, prompting an indignant yelp from Hornfels.

“Yes, outside, both of you, before you burn down my observatory.”

Hornfels shoos the two of you out the entrance of the museum. Once there, Sed drags you by the arm and deposits you under the awning covering the back path to the launch pad. “Okay, stand there,” they say, “I'm gonna take your picture.”

They take off their backpack/jetpack/oxygen apparatus and drop it on the ground before pulling forward their Little Scout launcher. You raise a brow. “Why?”

“Why not?” they offer noncommittally.

“What, you need something to remember me by?” Your voice wobbles as you pretend to wipe away a tear. “Something to remember the good old days before you leave your little home planet for bigger and better things?”

They don't reply. They smile, but it's tighter now and shows no teeth.

Your playful tone drains away, and in a quieter voice you ask, “How are you feeling? Are you... nervous? Upset?”

Their face is obscured as they hold up the scout launcher and aim it at you. “Of course not,” they say with their usual jovial aggressiveness, “but I'm going to be upset if you don't hold still and let me take your picture.”

You frown, but decide to drop it for now. “Fine, but make me look cool at least. What do you even want me to do, some fancy pose?”

They shoo you back with a wave of their hand. “No, just stand under the arches and act casual. I want it to look like a candid shot.”

“A fake candid shot, got it.” You step back a few feet. “Here?”

“Yeah, and don't look at the camera!”

You glare directly at the lens of the device for a rebellious moment, earning a disapproving sound from Sed, then let your eyes wander to the horizon and lean against the cliffside. The sun is starting to set, and the warmth of it feels good on your skin. As you shift, your marshmallow stick strapped to your back pokes you. You pull it forward, take a small knife from your pocket, and start whittling.

It's quiet for a minute or two, the only sounds other than the waterfall up the path are the occasional clicks from the camera on Sed's scout. Eventually, even those die out. You glance towards them with just your eyes, trying to be discreet about it.

Again, they're looking at you with that wistful expression. It's distant, gentle—it reminds you of how Tektite sometimes gets when you find them sitting out by the graveyard humming a slow but happy tune. But it's present too, warm, like you're the sun they're basking in.

Not for the first time, you feel affection pool in your stomach at seeing them. At watching them see you. It rattles your core and hitches your breath and feels as if you swallowed a tiny model rocket that's trying to navigate your guts. The first time you noticed it, you thought you were getting sick. You told Gneiss about it, and they laughed and held your hands and explained that you were sick but not in a bad way. They taught you old, old songs that were so sweet and sad. Songs that made you cry, but that also showed you that you were not alone, that these feelings you felt were a music much older than language.

So, reassured you needed no medicine, you settled down and learned to love the buzzing that filled your chest every time you looked Sed in the eye. Still, though, you kept it to yourself. Not a secret, but... it just never came up in conversation. That's what you tell yourself, anyway.

You catch each other staring, and Sed looks back down at their Little Scout. “Alright, want to see?”

You pull up beside them. On the screen you see the grayscale image of arches reaching overhead, the golden ratio spiraling around your leaning form, across your held out knife and marshmallow stick, and back to your eyes glancing sidelong towards the viewer. They did, in fact, make you look cool.

“You're gorgeous, you know that, right?” Sed mumbles into the space between you.

“Aw, shucks,” you deadpan.

They return the scout launcher to their back with a tired sigh. “Well, that takes care of that, I guess.”

You stretch your arms as you stand beside them and don't start a conversation. You want to ask about their upcoming launch, but they're tense and thoughtful in the way they can be when they've got something to say and are worried about saying it. This mood isn't common for them, and it's making you nervous.

You wander a few feet away, kick a bundle of dry pine needles into the creek. Sed watches your shoes, watches the needles float away and disappear over the waterfall. You wander back, stand in front of them with your hands in your pockets, waiting. You notice that, for once, they've actually got their boots on, instead of just the dirty socks they usually insist on wearing. They're ready to leave. All that's left to-

“Are we supposed to fall in love?”

The question seems to bounce out of their mouth all at once, like a hiccup they didn't expect. They blink at it and clear their throat, but don't make any attempt to pull it back.

You, for your part, feel like you've been struck by a geyser to the face, and you cough to clear your airways. “That... that's kind of a big question all of a sudden. Like, as a species?”

“No, smaller. You and I.”

It doesn't seem like any smaller a question to you, with how your heart tries to slow down and speed up and stop all at the same time. You can only stare at them for a moment, wide-eyed.

Sed takes your silence and rambles into it, gazing off at the horizon. “I mean, the expectation is there, right? You've heard the comments as well as I have. 'Oh, those two, it's only a matter of time.' We've heard it since we were tiny. We've never not heard it. But, like, are they right?” They turn to you, and it's clear that this isn't just some thought experiment for them. There's some amount of desperation in their voice. “Are we- is there... are we supposed to fall in love?”

It's not a secret, it just never came up before. You swallow, your fists clenched tight in your pockets, but you don't look away. It's not a secret, just... just say it.

“I... for what it's worth, I, uh, already am. In love with you.”

It's Sed's turn to stare. You watch their expression change in front of you. Their ears drop, and they get a faraway look in their eyes that you think looks very much sad and rather a bit lonely and maybe even a little afraid. You don't really think they're looking at you, specifically, in that moment. It confuses you, so much so that it overwhelms most of the nervousness you are feeling.

They say, quietly, “I'm sorry.”

Startled, you laugh aloud. The sound of it seems to plummet Sed out of orbit and right back into their body rump-first, and the resulting shocked and somewhat offended look on their face makes you laugh even more.

“What? What's so funny?”

“Sorry, but 'I'm sorry' wasn't really in my head as a potential response I would get from you.”

Sed stomps away a few steps, throwing their hands out to their sides, raising their voice. “I am! It's not funny! I can't- it's not... You don't understand, there isn't enough time. I'm sorry, Hal, I don't-”

You follow and catch up with them, put your hands on their shoulders. “Hey, it's okay. I know you've gotta launch today...”

Their voice goes quiet again, and their hands drop to their sides. They look weakly at you with a deep, forlorn frown. “I don't know if... I don't think I'm in love with you, Hal.”

Oh.

Hm.

You take a breath.

How do you feel about this? It made you flinch, emotionally, but did it actually hurt you?

It's not like this scenario hasn't crossed your mind before. You were honestly 50/50 on whether or not Sed was romantically attracted to you. And you're not gonna lie, finding out... it smarts a little. Enough to make you wince, but not so much as to knock the wind out of you. You take stock of yourself. Yeah. Yeah, that's okay. It's achy, but you aren't wounded. You can walk it off.

Should you feel more sad, or something? You kinda just feel relieved, like you've just fallen out of a tree and realized you're bruised but nothing's broken.

You find that you're more worried about Sed than anything. They look like they're trying not to cry. You rub your hands up and down their arms, soothing. “It's okay, Sed, take it easy. It's okay.”

Sed takes a deep breath, lets out a shaky exhale and a quiet, sullen, “Sorry.”

“Listen, it's...” You hum and look around, rubbing your cheek with the heel of your palm. “Come on, let's sit down. It's gonna take a minute for me to figure out what I want to say.”

You take a seat on the edge of the cliff, far enough down the path from the waterfall that you will still be able to hear each other talk. After a moment, Sed sits down close to you, no farther away than they normally would, and that settles some anxious thing deep inside you.

You swing your legs over the side and rub your hands on your trousers. It's dark again, making the pretty orange glow from the various fires and lanterns in the village stand out.

You take a deep breath before you begin. “Listen. It's okay that you don't love me back. I didn't really expect-”

“Wait, Hal.” You look up at them, surprised, and they look back at you with worried urgency.

“I don't want to interrupt, but I do love you. Please understand, I do love you. I'm just not...”

You smile at them, full and real. “I get it, I understand,” you say. And you do, you really do, even if you can't explain how. It brings you comfort like a soft scarf around your neck, you trust it like the sturdy belt around your waist. You rest your hand on theirs, and they let you.

You continue. “What I mean to say is that... my, I guess, my happiness and my feelings for you don't hinge on you being in love with me. Right? I'm in love with you. With who you are now, not with some, like, imagined idea of what our relationship would look like if the feeling was reciprocal. I don't know, does that make sense?”

Sed watches the town, looking somewhat chastised, but also not so tense as before. “I think so.”

“I'm not asking for anything different from what we've always been for each other. I know you love me, and I like that feeling. I love spending time with you, and I love the way you are. You don't have to meet some sort of expectation to feel any different about me than you already do. I'm happy. I love you. You don't need to change for me.”

Sed listens to you, slowly breathing in the warm night air. Suddenly, their expression changes, and they level a suspicious squint at you.

“Wait,” they say, “how long have you felt like this?”

Your ears draw back and your eyes widen. “Oh, uh. I don't know.”

They squint harder and jab you in the chest with a finger. “Yes you do. You've got this all figured out.” They get in your face, nose to nose. “Spill it, Halcyon Days. How long?”

You rub the back of your neck. “Uh... I guess around when we started working on the translator?”

Sed presses their hands into their face, muffling a frustrated scream. “Hal, that was, like, two years ago! Why didn't you say anything?”

“It- it never came up!”

“And so you bring it up now? Now, of all times?”

“I mean, you kinda asked, Sed-It-Best.”

They tug their ears like they want to rip them off, and you flick them in the wrist to get them to quit it. They put their hands on the ground and drop their head with a loud exhale. “Fine. Whatever. It's fine.”

But something about the tightness around their eyes and mouth tells you it isn't fine. And something about the sad droop of their shoulders tells you it's something more than just you not telling.

Quietly, looking out at the village, you say, “If it's not fine, you can say it.”

“It's not that,” they tell you. It takes them a minute to continue, rubbing their mouth with their knuckles. “I'm worried I'm going to hurt you. That I have been hurting you.”

You frown, run your eyes briefly over your own arms and torso as if looking for a mark, then tilt your head at them. “I don't feel hurt.”

They don't say anything, just look off towards the rising sun. You turn your body to face them more directly. “Here, can I explain some things?”

You hold out your hands, palms up, and they turn toward you and drop their hands into yours, heavy and familiar. “Okay,” they respond.

You take a deep breath before telling them, “You can... you're allowed to be in love with someone else, if that's what you're worried about.”

Sed gets agitated immediately, starts to say something. “Listen, just let me finish,” you interrupt, and they reluctantly close their mouth.

“This isn't me trying to give you permission,” you continue. “You don't need my permission to do anything, that's not how this works. I'm just letting you know. You're not going to hurt me if you fall in love with someone else, whether you decide to tell me or decide to keep it to yourself. I don't expect my feelings for you will change, but I can give you any kind of space you need, and there won't be any jealousy, I promise.”

You look down at their hands in yours, bouncing them for a moment, before looking back in their eyes, feeling that well-known, pleasant buzzing in your chest. “Just don't... just don't take advantage of me. And don't take me for granted. You avoid those two things, and we're set, got it?”

Sed looks away, lifts their knuckles to their mouth again as if to hide some of their face. “What if I already have, though?” they say. “What if I already am?”

You watch them, you can tell they're pained, and it hurts your heart to see it. But you just shrug. “I don't know, cut it out, I guess? I don't think you are, though.”

Sed is quiet for a while. The sun bears down on you overhead, uncomfortably hot today, and the waterfall roars in the distance.

“Okay,” they finally say, taking a deep breath. “Okay.”

They still look troubled, though. They say, “I feel like... I think maybe if I had enough time, things could be different.”

That... alarms you, deep inside. “What do you mean by that?”

Their face hardens a bit, and they look very tired. “Don't worry about it.”

You frown. “I'm gonna worry, Sed.”

They don't say anything else. You stare hard at their face, as if looking close enough could let you read their mind. “Are you okay? Beyond... all this?” You wave your hand in the general direction of your conversation.

They turn away and rub their cheek to hide their face from you again. After a moment, they laugh a bit, forcing some lightheartedness into their voice. “I don't think so. Not really. I've been... I've been... struggling, lately. I guess.”

You nod, swinging your feet. “It seemed like it. You've been lying.”

Sed's shoulders shoot up to their ears. “What? No I haven't.”

“You lied about being not being upset earlier, and you lied to Hornfels about the whole 'testing your jetpack' thing. You were smooth about it, weirdly smooth, but I could still tell.”

They stand up, voice raising in pitch. “I'm not. I'm just nervous about my launch day, you know?”

You stand as well, brushing dirt off your hands. “That's a lie too, and not nearly as smooth.” You reach out, taking their hands again. “It's alright. I'm not mad, take it easy.”

They look around, seeking an escape, but don't let go of your hands. Eventually, they deflate. “I don't... I'm sorry.”

You give them a small smile. “It's okay. Hey, listen, you don't need to launch today. Your ship's not going anywhere. If you're not feeling good, if you're struggling, you don't need to go.”

“I do need to go, I think.” They look down at the ground. “I'm sorry. I'm not doing well, but... I don't think I can find the answers I need unless I go.”

“Okay. Okay.” You lean forward, close to their face and in their line of sight, grinning. “You're going to be amazing out there, Sed. Even starlight isn't fast enough to catch you.”

Sed laughs at the hatchlinghood idiom, the one that Esker used to tease them with. They press themself into your chest. “I love you. I do love you, Hal.”

Wrapping your arms around them, you say, “I know. And I'm so... I'm so happy for it, Sed.”

They relax against you, and you giggle and say, “You know what, I have a theory.”

“Varsayım? Hypothesis?” they respond, translating what you had both discovered to be an exceptionally common Nomai word.

“Yes. Hypothesis: you're in love with space.”

They hum, thinking, then say in a mysterious drawl, “Maaaaybe.”

With a frown and a in tough voice, you say, “I'm gonna fight space. I'm gonna kick it's butt.”

They laugh into your shoulder. “You're gonna fight space. All of space. I don't think space has a butt.”

“You go out there and find the space butt for me. Then come back and tell me so I can kick it.”

They chuckle. Then they throw themself out of your arms, suddenly panicked. “Wait, I have to go! It's getting dark, I have to go now. Sorry, I'm so sorry, I have to, I can't stay.”

“Oh, right now? Why do you-”

They buckle on their jetpack faster than you thought possible and interrupt, pointing at you. “But listen, I heard what you said. I'll cut it out. I'm not going to take advantage of you, and I'm not going to take you for granted. I can't stay, but I'll say goodbye, no matter what. I promise!”

Taken aback, you stutter, “You, I... uh, okay, good luck! Take care of yourself out there, you hear?”

“I will!” they shout back. “I love you. Bye!”

Before you can respond, they rocket away, their jetpack carrying them directly to the top of the launch pad. You walk backward up the hill, waving, and don't stop waving until their ship crosses the horizon.

(Heat. Pain. Death.)
(You wake up whole.)

Chapter Text

You sit with your elbows propped against the edge of the keyboard, face in your hands, rubbing your forehead. You have a deep headache throbbing behind your eyes all the way to the back of your skull.

The past four hours have been an unpredictable cycle of either nerve-wracking chaos or painfully slow tedium. The search for Sed had been called off, but it was a nightmare getting Gabbro and Esker home. Gabbro's ship has not yet been fitted with the new map lock-on and autopilot features, and they struggled to get a visual of Timber Hearth.

It wasn't just the lack of light. Through the collective observations of you, Gabbro, Esker, Hornfels, and Chert, you came to understand that the darkness itself has gained some sort of... viscous quality. It encroaches on even the brightest sources of distant light like a black fog. The farther the object, the less light can escape it. At the far end of it's orbit, even Hollow's Lantern looks no brighter than the Attlerock once did on a sunny day. The substance of this fog and the reason for its sudden presence has yet to be explained. As you tracked Gabbro's ship through the telescope, trying not to lose sight of what should be the very bright emergency beacon they lit up on its belly, the darkness made you shiver from its creepy oppressiveness and blink your eyes as if doing so could clear your vision.

If you wanted to be kind to yourself like Hornfels said you should, you could blame this darkness for preventing you from seeing the Interloper in time. Before you could warn them, it clipped Gabbro's ship, knocking out their electrical system and sending them spiraling out of control.

Gabbro was able to get the ship stabilized after several minutes, but it resulted in them stalling out well above the plane of the solar system and left Esker with a dislocated shoulder. Eventually, after a trepidatious spacewalk to make repairs and some tense orbital calculations, they were able to land safely back on Timber Hearth.

Now you're stuck bug-fixing a cobbled-together computer program tracking and predicting the planets' orbits. The idea had been to use it to build a flight plan to make Riebeck's return home a bit smoother. For some reason, though, the program has been proving unreliable. Hornfels' code is sound, but whenever you look through the telescope, the planets are a few degrees off from where they were predicted. Brittle Hollow, specifically, is proving immensely difficult to pin down.

Your stress is compounded whenever you think about Sed, which is near constantly now that the Gabbro and Esker emergency is over. Moraine had come up a little while earlier, working as a runner of information, messages, and goods. They had brought up two bowls of boiled axeroot with mushroom gravy―comfort food―for you and Hornfels. You jumped on the opportunity to ask about your best friend. Apparently they'd had their stomach pumped of nearly a liter blood and hadn't yet woken up, but they are stable, according to Gneiss. Moraine left, letting you know to play music if you had something that needed running, they would hear it through their signalscope and stop by. You weren't able to eat much after that.

You shout and nearly fall off your stool when Hornfels pats you on the back. You turn to them, a hand over your rapidly-beating heart. “Hornfels, you startled me.”

Hornfels puts up their hands with a small, apologetic smile. “Sorry about that. Made any progress?”

You lean back so they can see the monitor. “No, the opposite. I can't get the algorithm to keep up. The difference between these numbers and where Brittle Hollow actually is keeps getting bigger, and I don't know why.”

They look over the details on the computer, then over at your red-rimmed eyes and dark eyebags. “Goodness, Hal, you look terrible.”

“Thanks,” you snort, turning back to the screen.

Hornfels shakes their head. “No, I mean, how long have you been up? When was the last time you got some sleep?”

You glance over at the digital time counter on the screen. It takes an inordinately great effort to do the math in your head. “Twenty-two hours, looks like.”

“Hal!” Hornfels exclaims, hands on their hips. “You should have been in bed before any of this even started!”

You twist your mouth to the side, but you can't really muster the energy to pretend to be contrite. “I was staying up to watch Sed's launch.”

Hornfels sighs. “It's my fault. I should have sent you away earlier.”

“You needed my help. You still need my help.”

They point to a string of digits on the monitor. “Read this.”

You squint, trying to get your eyes to focus on the tiny symbols, the backlight burning your retinas and worsening your headache. “1, 4... 8-”

“That's a zero,” Hornfels says. “Go to bed. I don't want to see you up here until you've had a full eight hours of sleep.”

You cross your arms. “What about you?”

“I had only been awake a couple hours before the supernova. Go on, don't make me get Rutile up here.”

Hornfels is typically pretty easy to convince to let things slide, or to distract from their attempts to show authority. They seem adamant this time, though, and you're worried that maybe you have been causing more bugs than you've been fixing. So you slide off of your stool and make your way to the staircase. “If anything happens, you have to send Moraine or someone to wake me up. Okay?”

They wave you away. “Yes, yes. Shoo!”

You leave the observatory and the museum, taking a flashlight with you. The moment you step outside and catch sight of the sky, you have to duck your head. The open expanse of flat, uninterrupted black above you is dizzying. You feel like you're going to fall into it. You quickly turn on your flashlight and keep you eyes toward the ground as you start to make your way into town.

It's miserably cold outside, but not nearly as cold as it should be given four full hours, 35 solar days, without a heat source. It's cold, but not yet dangerously so. That is something that has also so far been unexplainable. Hornfels asked Chert to use their Little Scout to measure the ambient temperatures on and in the vicinity of the Twins. They had started to, but they've been... distracted. Every time Hornfels checks in on them, they report something different. Their unfinished attempts to determine the stability of the black hole, or the various sources of light they have been able to spot but not quite document, or a possible reduction of lightning on Giant's Deep they observed. It seems like they can't stick to one thing for very long. They occasionally ask questions that neither you nor Hornfels can make sense of: How many people are on Timber Hearth right now? Is it still safe to make music? Why can't you just leave me alone?

Hornfels had switched to giving them simple, rote tasks, and that seemed to calm them down a bit. Hornfels wants to bring them home, but Chert is opposed to the prospect, saying that they're more useful on Ember Twin then they would be on Timber Hearth, that we need the data they can collect. Unfortunately, this is true. You hope that, like you, Chert's just sleep-deprived, but Hornfels is concerned that this isn't the case.

The cold prickles against your skin, and you can already feel it making you sluggish and stiff, so you hurry to get to the cabin. The village is unusually still. You figure most are staying inside to preserve heat, you can smell the smoke coming from the chimneys, but it doesn't make the place feel any less eerie and abandoned.

You step into the cabin, shutting the door behind you and kicking off your boots at the entrance. You immediately notice that the boiler is working at full force, making the interior of the building almost uncomfortably hot and humid. You poke your head through the first open door. Inside, you see Sed curled into a tight ball on the bed, a lightless ceramic heat lamp hanging over them. From their inner elbow curls two rubber tubes leading up to two bottles. Saline and some strong pain medication. Beside them in a chair sits Esker, leaned back against the wall with their feet propped up on the bed. Their arm is in a sling, and their hat is pulled down over their face, presumably asleep.

You swallow and step over to the side of the bed. Sed had been changed out of their flightsuit and into a loose sleep dress. Careful not to touch them, you shield their eyes with a hand and turn on your flashlight, pointing it at their face.

More clearly than before, you can see the burns that mark their face and neck. The worst of it begins most notably under their eyes, twisting and coloring the flesh down to an abrupt stop across the bottom of their throat. Beyond that, their skin is relatively undamaged, minus a few shiny spots scattered over what you can see of their collarbones. Their forearms, too, are burned, though not as badly as their face.

You find it strange and rather upsetting that these burns have not been wrapped and, leaning closer, you can see no sign of ointment or medication having been applied. Why didn't Gneiss treat the wounds? Are they letting Sed's skin air out or something like that?

“Those aren't new burns―they're old scars,” Esker, apparently not sleeping, states as if reading your mind. “That's what Gneiss says at least.”

You look up to see Esker watching you inspect Sed. You frown at them. “They didn't have those burns before they took off.”

Esker shakes their head. “That's what I thought, too. I trust Gneiss's opinions over my own when it comes to healing, though.”

“Have they been awake at all?” you ask.

“Not really. They've not really been asleep either, though. They keep mumbling nonsense, trying to roll themself right out of the bed or pull out their IVs. I only got them to settle down a little while ago.”

You turn off the flashlight and sit on the edge of the bed, staring at Sed's face. Their brow is pulled down into an almost frustrated grimace. “What have they been saying?”

“Dark stuff,” Esker says, rubbing at their jaw. “Stuff about something ending, about being afraid or not being afraid. Apologizing a lot.” They sigh, watching Sed on the bed. “Gossan's worried about their mental health. Says that, before the launch, they were talking about death. Slate says they were all worked up and that the ship tracker showed them flying right at the sun, but the two of them are having a hard time reconciling their stories with each other.”

'I've been struggling, I'm not doing well.'

'I can't stay.'

'I'll say goodbye, no matter what.'

'I love you, bye!'

The words from earlier today echo in your head like the sharp ringing of hammered metal. You knew that they were in a bad spot mentally. You saw it as soon as they hugged you in the museum. They told you directly that they weren't doing well. And you still let them go.

Why would this have started all at once? They were doing great yesterday, weren't they? You and Sed spent hours together putting the finishing touches on the Nomai translator. They were nervous, but so excited, so overjoyed at the same time. They couldn't stop talking, a huge grin on their face all day long. They danced with you in the museum. You loved them more than you ever have.

Was that what blinded you? The thought stabs you in the gut like a shard of broken glass. Were they in pain this whole time, and you could not see it behind that confident smile? And when you did not see it, they spelled it out for you in the plainest language they could, and you still did nothing? You still let them go?

“I shouldn't have let them leave,” you whisper, breath shaking. “I should have made them stay.”

“Now, none of that.” Esker puts their feet on the floor and leans forward toward you. “You know as well as I do that when they've got their mind set on something, nothing stops them.” They reach out and touch Sed's open palm. Sed does not wake, but their fingers wrap around one of Esker's instinctively, clinging to them like a tadpole.

“They've been through a lot,” Esker continues, looking down at them with a soft, sad smile, “But they survived it. We've just got to be here to help them through the aftermath.”

You watch Sed's hand, their face. Then you look up at Esker sharply. “They've been through a lot of what?”

Esker doesn't say anything, keeping their eyes on the bed.

You stand up, voice raising slightly. “What do you know, Esker? What have they been through?”

Esker clears their throat, adjusts their sling, and after a moment says, “I've been asked not to say.”

“By whom? Sed? You said they haven't woken up.”

“By Gabbro.”

You are almost baffled out of your growing anger entirely. Out of a list of names you expected Esker to say, that was probably at the bottom of your list. But the anger returns quickly. “Gabbro? What do they have to do with any of this?”

Esker frowns. “More than you'd think. I've already said as much as I can about this. Just trust that-”

“No, hold on a second. Gabbro doesn't get to decide-”

“Gabbro?” Sed mumbles, followed by a long whine. Their eyes are still closed, but they begin moving as if trying to crawl out of the bed.

Esker takes both Sed's hands in one of their own and presses them gently back against the bed. “They're alright hatchling. Everyone's good. Just relax.”

They struggle against Esker for a moment, weakly trying to pull their hands free, until they lay back down again and go still.

Esker runs their thumb over the back of your friend's hand. “Sed will tell us what they need to tell us when they're ready,” Esker says eventually.

You stand frozen at the back of the room. All of this is wrong. You're the one who helps Sed, supports them no matter what. Now they've been through something that's left them delirious and scared and with old burn scars on their face, and you can't even know what it is.

You move slowly to sit down again. Esker says, “You should head to bed, hatchling.”

“I want to sit with them,” you reply. The anger from before has washed away into exhaustion.

“Hornfels sent Moraine down here an hour ago to tell me specifically not to let you do that. Go on, I'll get you if they wake up.”

It takes you a while to move. You do eventually. You get up, shuffle to the nearest unoccupied room. You change into whatever sleep clothes you find there, fold down a bed, and fall asleep before you even remember laying down.

You're not sure how long it's been when you wake up. You're not even sure what it is that wakes you. But when you open your eyes, you see, backlit from a small light in the hallway, someone standing silently over you. You startle and gasp, and it takes you a second to realize it is Sed. Their scars shadow and pull at their skin in unfamiliar ways, and you burn with shame for taking so long to recognize them.

You prop yourself up on an elbow and squint at them. “Sed? Are you okay?” you say quietly. You're not entirely sure if they're awake or sleepwalking. “You're not supposed to be up.”

“Hal?” they ask, their voice a hoarse and painful-sounding scratch.

“Yeah, I'm here,” you say, sitting up more.

They stand there, swaying, clutching at the sleeves of their sleep dress. They look like they did when the two of you were little. When things in the dark still scared you both.

They whisper, “I can't remember how to sleep.”

You scoot back in the bed. “Come here, lay down.” As they climb in beside you, you ask, “What do you mean, you can't remember?”

“It's been so long since I've slept. I forgot a long time ago. I can't remember what to do.”

They lay on their side, facing you. You run your fingertips up and down their arm. “You just... you just sleep. You close your eyes and relax, and you'll fall asleep.” Your voice is weak and shaky. “I'll stay with you. I'll help you sleep, okay?”

Their eyes trace your face, and you can tell now that they're not sleepwalking; they're awake, and they really, really shouldn't be. They're far more exhausted than you are.

And you know this isn't the right time for this. You know. But still, you ask: “What happened, Sed?”

“I'm sorry,” they say. “I thought I was making the right choice. I thought I had figured it out. But I must have done something wrong. It didn't work.”

This isn't the right time. This isn't the right way to ask. The words fall out of your mouth anyway.

“Did you try to kill yourself?”

Sed closes their eyes. Clenches them shut tight. “I was already dead. I just had to disconnect the life support.”

You keep smoothing your fingertips up and down their arm. Up and down, up and down. Eventually, their face and body relaxes, and their breathing evens out.

Slowly, careful not to wake them, you hug them against yourself. You cry as quietly as you can.

Chapter Text

With a couple more turns of your socket wrench, the final bolt pulls free. You shimmy your fingernails under one edge of the panel, and it pops loose in your hands.

You manage to dodge the resulting gush of seawater from the now-exposed compartment, which is a pretty impressive feat given you're lying on your back in tight quarters under your ship.

The water soaks the wood of the launch pad and slips between the slats down to the Outer Wilds Ventures museum below. You try to peek and see if anything important got wet, but it's too dark to tell.

You roll onto your back again and face the guts of your ship. This panel hid access to some of the port-side air filters, which you can now see are thoroughly soggy. Even after that initial wave, water still drips steadily next to your head.

You reach your hand up to catch a droplet. It lands on your knuckle and hangs out there for a moment before deciding to wander around to your palm. It smells so strongly of Giant's Deep, of salt and ozone. It's also frigidly cold.

Wait, why is it still liquid, anyway? You try to remember the freezing temperature of salt water. It doesn't spring to mind, but you imagine it's lower than fresh water. Another drop lands on the other finger, but instead of curving around the left side, it runs down the back of your hand. If you were in space for just a minute or two, it wouldn't be surprising that the water didn't have time to freeze. But you were-

Actually, how long did it take you to get to Timber Hearth? You remember the events. You picked up Esker. You flew around. The Interloper bonked into your ship. You went to fix your ship's bruised landing gear. You talked to Esker. Or maybe you talked to Esker earlier?

Talking to Esker was strange. It was strange hearing their voice and seeing their face, and the topic of conversation was strange, too. So you let them do most of the talking until you couldn't stand it anymore. Then you did all the talking and talked about trees and marshmallows and music and nothing until there was nothing left to talk about. Another drip. How many is that, four? This one drips down to the cuff of your sleeve.

What were you thinking about? Space.... how long you were in space. You talked to Esker and you flew to Timber Hearth and you landed, you saw Slate and Slate says, "Do you still have the socket wrench?" So you remember all of the events that happened in space, but for whatever reason, you have no idea what time scale to put on any of them. Did you talk to Esker for more or less time than it took you to get your ship under control after getting shoved by the comet? Were you in space for less than an hour, or more than twelve hours?

Another drip of water. The damp cuff of your sleeve clings to your wrist. The sensation of wet clothes is pretty strange, too. It's been a while since you've worn something that wasn't waterproof. The droplets are very cold, like ice, but not quite. How is it that it isn't frozen? Fresh water freezes at zero degrees, but what temperature does salt water freeze at? Minus ten degrees, maybe? The air filter compartment is not particularly well-shielded from the cold, it doesn't need to be, and the reactor is on the opposite side of the ship. It should get cold enough to freeze even salt water in this compartment while you're in space. Although, you guess that depends on how long you were in space. Did Esker say something about temperature behaving unpredictably? Or, not Esker, that was-

You hear the echoing thunk of metal being slapped somewhere above you. "Gabbro, do you have the socket wrench or not?"

You jerk in surprise, banging your knee against your ship and sending a dull pain down your leg. You turn your head and can see Slate's boots. "Either get to using it or hand it over, we still need to open up the roof," they say.

You wiggle your way out from under your ship's belly and pull yourself to a sitting position. "What’s the rush?" you ask.

Slate is currently wrestling one of the larger pried-up floorboards out of the small entrance hatch. Half of the other floorboards are scattered over the launch pad to dry out in the... in the void, you guess. “Your ship's interior already stinks of mildew,” Slate says. “We need to preserve power, so we can't use heaters, which means getting more airflow through here is our only option. If we don't dry this thing out, there's going to be mold growing on every inch of it before a week's passed.”

You scoot over on your butt to the next panel on the list, this one closer to the front window. "I don't mind if a few spore pals want to accompany me. Maybe they can be my co-pilots!"

Finally tugging the long plank free of the hatch, Slate levels an skeptical glare at you. You don't know why, but they look... younger than you expected. The wrinkles that mark their forehead and between their eyes are not as deep as those of the image you had in your head, their jowls and the bags under their eyes don't sag so far. They're more than a decade your senior, right? Are you remembering correctly? You feel like you could be the same age.

"SLATE!" Mica yells from somewhere far below the launch pad. For someone so small, they can make their voice reach incredibly far.

"What?" Slate shouts back, punctuating it with the sound of wood being tossed into a free space on the launch pad.

"Sed wants to come up the elevator, but their codes aren't working!" Ah, your time buddy's finally up! That's, ah... hmm.

Slate tries to share a glance with you, but you catch it too late. "Why are they out here?" they mutter, and you shrug. Slate yells back down, "Tell them to go back to bed!"

"I tried," Mica replies, a little more frantic, "They won't listen! They're freaking out!"

With a concerned frown, Slate leans forward to look down the elevator shaft. You stand up and join them. "Get them out of the way, then, and send the elevator back up, I'll come down."

It takes some... a couple... Wow, you really have no idea how much time is passing. Eventually, that's a good word, eventually the elevator appears. "I'll go down and talk to them, you can keep working," you say.

Slate looks at you like you said you're going to start speaking Nomai. Which, hey, it might not be a bad idea to learn it. You wonder if learning to read or speak would be easier. Since you now have a native user of the language available, it shouldn't be too- "You? You're going to talk to them?" Slate interrupts.

Maybe you should feel offended at that, that could probably be considered offensive. You don't bother, and smile instead. "Yeah, I got this." Before they can object, you climb into the elevator and pull the lever on the controls.

At the bottom, you see Mica holding out a marshmallow, waving it around like they're trying to keep the attention of a tadpole. "Here, Sed, follow the yummy mallow, just keep coming this way," they entice.

Sed, for their part, stays where they stand in front of the elevator, facing Mica but not lured by the sweet treat. "How are you here? You're supposed to be with the model rocket," they say, their voice hoarse. They are still wearing a sleep dress, hunched forward and barefoot.

The elevator gates creak open, and at the sound of it, Sed turns around and steps toward it.

They look up and meet your eyes and freeze in place.

Like Slate, Sed also looks different from what you remember. When Hal called you and Esker back to Timber Hearth, they said that Sed had shown up burned. It later got to you that they were actually burned a long time ago, somehow. Now, in the light of the lantern on the worktable Mica was using, you can see it for yourself. All along their neck and the lower half of their face are discolored, textured bumps, with everything higher than that to the top of their forehead a shiny purple. It makes them look old, kinda.

Their clothes are different too. You only saw them twice without their suit, you think. Once when they forgot to put it on before dropping out of their ship in a rush and had to go back and get geared up before running back to your hammock. The other time… actually, it was the last time you saw them, you’re pretty sure. They walked out to you without their gear. They were only there briefly before leaving, so you guess they didn’t bother getting suited up. Either way, their day clothes were nothing like the pajamas they wear now. It’s kind of funny—while their face looks older, their clothes make them look younger. It doesn't make their age meet in the middle, though. It just seems mismatched and unnatural.

More so than their clothes or their skin, the thing that stands out as most different about them is their eyes. They’ve got this distance in them, this fear that isn’t like the fear that you’ve seen in them before. Before, they tried to hide it, usually. You’d catch glimpses of it floating to the top of the opaque soup of bravado and enthusiasm and frustration and anger and hope that was constantly stirring in their head. Now all that other stuff is gone, filtered out and strained through a fine sieve. Only the fear remains, naked and empty in their eyes.

You’re not too confused by the passage of time to understand that you have not seen Sed in a long, long while.

“How are you here?” they whisper, stepping backward.

Mica shouts, “Hey, careful!” Sed stumbles over the stones around the empty fire pit. You catch their wrist, then have to catch their shoulder with your other hand when they continue stumbling.

“Watch it, watch it,” you say quietly, redirecting them to sit on the log in the camp since they seem pretty determined not to continue being upright.

“I don’t understand,” they whine, not putting up much resistance to you moving them but not helping either. “I don’t understand what’s happening.”

You get them settled and stand up straight. “Hey, Mica,” you say, “mind if we have a private conversation?”

The hatchling shrugs. “I don’t care.” They return to their worktable.

You squint. Something went wrong here. You try again. “Can you... leave?”

Mica rolls their eyes, scoops up some tools from the table, and takes the elevator up to the launch pad.

You pick idly at your fingernails as you watch the elevator elevate. You look down at them. They’re square shaped, and a bit long. You should probably cut them. Fingernails grow back, right? Yeah. Yeah, of course they do.

“Why aren’t my launch codes working?”

You look back at your time buddy. They’re sitting on the log, rubbing their lower eyes with the palms of their hands hard enough that the skin wrinkles. “Does it hurt?” you ask.

“Does what hurt?”

“Your face.”

“No. Should it?”

“Probably.”

“Oh.” They keep rubbing their eyes.

There’s dry skin around your cuticles. Probably because the air is a lot dryer here than on Giant’s Deep. Colder, too. Or, probably not colder, but it feels colder without your suit on.

You shift your weight back and forth between your feet. “Do you want to go inside? You probably aren’t supposed to be out in the cold.”

“No.”

“Okay.”

You walk over to the wood pile and grab a couple logs, tossing them into the empty fire pit. You’re supposed to be conserving firewood too, but you’re not going to let your time buddy freeze out here.

“Why aren’t my launch codes working?” Sed asks. Oh, right, they asked that before.

You dig around for small twigs and branches you can use as tinder. “I told Slate to change them.”

Sed drops their hands from their face and looks over to you. They seem a little more stable now, thankfully, more like themself. Hmm, well, not really. They look a little more like a person, at least, less like something empty. There’s something like betrayal and exasperation floating next to the fear.

They swirl some words around in their mouth for a while before spitting them out. “Can you honestly tell me whether you’re really here this time?” they ask, flat but for some painful drag to it, like they’re caught between dreading the answer and feeling indifferent toward it.

You pause from snapping the twigs in your hands, look at your shadow on the cliff wall cast by the lantern behind you. “I think so,” you say. But nah, you know for sure that you are really here. Your brain keeps getting stuck in the mud of it. The light on Giant’s Deep was too diffused by cloud cover to make such harsh shadows as the one that towers above you. You tilt your head to the side, and the light marks out the lines of your ears. You know without a doubt you are here, but you don’t have any objective proof of that, so you feel like stating it too strongly might sound overconfident.

“How?” Sed asks.

You throw your hands up and out to the sides, the sticks you hold extending your arm span. Your shadow looks like a creature, an alien from somewhere far away. “You fixed it!” you say. Your voice sounds strange, like it belongs to someone else, not to you, but to someone you've never met. “The time loops are done!”

Then Sed’s four eyes are filled with panic, panic, panic, panic, empty and wild and large. They jump up, trip over your legs to their hands and knees, scramble to stand, lurching toward the elevator shaft.

You’re not sure how you get to be this way, but you find that you have them in a headlock, one arm around their neck and the other around their chest, and you’ve fallen backward together before the returning elevator could crush them.

They fight you with more strength than a person supposedly suffering from radiation poisoning should have any right to. They kick the ground and their flailing elbows catch your ribs and they fling their head back, just missing your teeth.

“Stop! Stop!” their broken voice cries out. “I have to leave! I have to go now!”

They almost manage to roll you both over, but you keep your grip tight. “Hold on, hold on, take it easy,” you say. “You’re done with all that, the time loops are done.”

“I can’t wait, Gabbro, the sun!”

“The sun is gone. It’s already gone. Look up, the stars are gone too.”

They go still in your arms. You feel them look around as they lay on top of you, shifting slightly to take in what little they can see of the blank sky above this canyon.

“It should be morning by now,” they whisper.

“Yeah,” you reply quietly.

“Can you let me up?”

“Yeah.”

You let go of them, and they roll off of you and sit on their knees beside you, still looking up at the sky. You sit up cross legged next to them.

It’s quiet in the camp. Even though it’s dark, the chirpbugs don’t sing, like they’re confused about what’s going on too. You feel a vibration, a quick thrum of a generator kicking on somewhere in town.

“I did something wrong,” Sed tells the sky. “I must have done something wrong.”

You kind of want to lay back down in the dirt again. It was nice, it was cold and a lot harder than your hammock, but it made your back feel good. You don’t lay down, though. You’re not entirely sure you have enough energy to move that much at the moment.

Fingers press into your open palm. The contact startles you. Huh, you’re trembling, you hadn’t noticed.

You look up, and Sed is looking at you now rather than the sky. The panic in their eyes has subsided, but the fear has not. “Did I hurt you?” they ask. They’re hurting you now, you think. No, no they’re not, they’re touching you gently. Why does it hurt?

You stand up and brush your hands off on your pants, then go pick up the tinder you had dropped. “Nah, I’m good,” you say. “What about you?”

“I'm okay.

“You were supposed to be in bad shape, according to Gneiss.”

“Really?” they say. “I feel okay, I guess. Tired, but not, like, injured.”

“Your face is all messed up, buddy.”

They frown, touch their forehead, their nose, and recoil when they touch their chin. “Ew, what is that?” they say, running their hands over their bumpy cheeks and jawline.

“Old burns, if the rumors are to be believed, older than should be possible.” You pile up the tinder with the logs. You wonder if there are any matches around you could use. “They don’t hurt?”

Sed inspects their neck with their fingertips, picking at scabs that aren’t there. “No, not at all. It’s not super sensitive and it feels kind of tight, but not painful.” They cough and grimace. “My throat hurts real bad, though.”

“I think they ran a tube down to your stomach, said it was full of blood.”

“What? That’s…” They tighten their hands around their neck as if they could stop the procedure that’s already happened. Their voice is starting to get sharp and panicked again. “Why? Why?”

“Is there a blowtorch on the table over there?” you ask.

“What?” they startle, looking up at you.

“A blowtorch, to start the fire.”

“Oh. Uh.” They stand up, looking over the messy contents of the table. “Yeah, here.”

They toss it to you, and it seems to levitate toward you so slowly that you miss it completely. Whoa, that is extremely trippy. The gravity here is so much lower than on Giant’s Deep.

You pick the blowtorch up out of the dirt and flick it on, sparking out a short triangle of blue flame. You hold it to some of the twigs as Sed stands up and slowly paces around on the other side of the fire pit, hugging their sides.

“Are you… is there…” they start, then stop themself with a short wheeze of incredulous laughter. They put their hands up on their head, brow furrowed. “I don’t even know what question to ask. Do you, I don’t know, do you know anything?”

You chuckle, and the sound of it sticks to the back of your teeth. “I try not to know things, buddy, it’s bad for my reputation.”

Sed doesn’t seem to like your joke. They groan and rub their eyes again. “I’m- please, Gabbro, I need something. Give me something to work with, I, I can’t- I don’t understand…” They trail off, clutching their head and staring down into the fire.

Oh, the fire is going. The wood caught a lot faster than the wet stuff you used to work with. You set the blowtorch aside and look up at the launch pad, scratching your chin. “Where to start…” you say slowly. “Well, I can tell you my perspective, at least. I was going about my routine, leaning back in my hammock and enjoying the ocean breeze. The sun spun its last and came by to say farewell, as usual. But when it was gone, I was still in my hammock, and it was still dark. Then Gossan called to check in, and I figured, well, that was that!”

Sed watches you, listening closely. The first familiar bubbles of puzzle-solving motivation are starting to float up through to the surface of their face. “What did Gossan say?”

“Not much. But then Hal called and said that you were missing, and that maybe you had flown into the sun. Turns out they had things backward, though, because you showed up on Timber Hearth with your Nomai friend.”

Sed’s mouth drops open and they lean towards you, probably closer to the fire than is reasonably safe. “Solanum? Solanum is here? How? Is she okay?”

You shrug. “Good as anyone else, I guess. She’s been holed up in a cabin since I got here.”

“Oh, Solanum,” Sed whispers. They step around and sit down heavily on the other end of your log. You know what, now would be a great time for a marshmallow, you bet. You get up. Slate must have some around here somewhere.

Sed watches the fire quietly while you dig around in a pile of canned goods under the worktable. “Does anyone know about the time loops?” Sed asks.

You bump your head getting out from under the table, but you found what you were looking for. A brand new, unopened can of marshmallows, not a speck of rust on it. “Not as far as I can tell. Everyone seems to remember the supernova, but they keep referring to it in the singular, so I guess they just remember one instance of them.” You sit back down on the log. Wait. You need a can opener. You stand up again. “Well, except Esker. They also only remember one supernova, but they know about the time loops somehow.”

Sed leans back with a confused frown. “Esker? Why just Esker?”

“They said you told them.”

“I told them…” Sed mumbles. “When? I probably told everyone about the time loops at some point in the beginning. Why is Esker different?”

Ah, there’s a can opener. It’s in with a bunch of drill bits, for some reason. You sit down again and settle in, hoping you won’t have to get up again. “Your guess is as good as mine. They started asking me questions about it when I met up with them like it was no big thing. I told them to keep it to themself when we got here, though.”

Sed rubs their scalp, elbows on their knees. “Whatever. That doesn’t make sense, but whatever.” They exhale a long, slow breath, and clear their scratchy throat. Then they say, looking at you with sudden seriousness, “Do not tell anyone about Feldspar. I need to get them myself. Anyone else will get killed trying.”

You look back at them, but you can’t hold the eye contact for long. “I’m not telling anybody about any of it, buddy. It’s not my story to tell.”

They watch you for a moment before turning back to the fire with a small nod.

You shuffle your boots in the dirt. “Are you going to tell-?”

“No.”

You raise your brows at them. “Nothing?”

They rest their head in their hands, hunched over, elbows on knees again. “No. None of it really happened.”

Before you can explore that thought, they look at you from between their arms and ask, “How did you get here?”

Somewhere in the distance, another generator kicks on, the shake of it rumbling even over here. You dig the metal blade of the can opener into the marshmallow lid. “Me and Esker flew over when Hal finally told us that you were home safe and we didn’t need to be out looking for you anymore.”

“No, not when, how. Esker picked you up?”

You twist the handle. The can opener’s blade is dull, and you have to squeeze tight to get it to actually break through the metal. It bites its way through, a little at the time. “No, I picked them up.”

“How?”

Bite, bite, bite, goes the little metal disk. Finally, the marshmallows pop free. “With my ship.”

Sed stills. They turn away from you, looking off at something you can’t see in the middle distance. You dig a marshmallow out of the can. You kind of hate raw marshmallows. Even just touching them grosses you out a bit, they have a weird dusty texture and their bouncy squish is downright unnatural.

You hand one out to Sed. They don’t even glance at it. “I- I thought your ship wasn’t…” They don’t finish the sentence. The marshmallow just sits and wobbles in your palm. A third generator-

Okay, no, this is getting ridiculous. That isn’t a generator. You never actually heard it, anyway, but the vibrations you felt reminded you of one. At the same time you feel it, though, the marshmallow doesn’t vibrate, not really. It more like… flexes. Stretches a tiny bit, then squashes a tiny bit, then bounces back to normal.

Sed clears their throat and talks like they’re out of breath. “So. Um. So, is your- is your ship in good shape? Slate- Slate is up there working on it, right?”

“Yeah. It’s soggier than Slate likes, and it got a bit banged up by the Interloper on the way here, but it’s doing good otherwise.” You feel it again, and pay attention this time. It’s not an earthquake, you don’t think. It’s got some of the rhythm of one, but it’s not coming from below you. It’s like the air itself is wobbling, like everything is wobbling, even you. You feel it again.

“The Interloper?” Sed exclaims. “How in the universe is the Interloper still around?”

You feel the wobble again, and you hold out your arms to it. It reminds you of the pull and push of the tides, but somehow on a much smaller and much larger scale at the same time. “Hey, Sed, do you feel-?”

You’re interrupted by a droning sound that changes to a roaring high above you. A ship blasts through the atmosphere, overshooting the launch pad, so fast that you can’t recognize-

“Riebeck?!” Sed shouts, jumping to their feet and looking in the direction of town, where the ship disappeared. “That was Riebeck’s ship!”

You hear the terrible crunch and scrape of impact far off in the distance.

Then the wobble, perhaps jealous of the attention even briefly being diverted from it, becomes violent. You feel it again, and again, and again. You can see it now, even, everything around you warping back and forth like you’re drunk and looking from under water at the same time.

You think you’re going to be torn into little bits, and then you hear probably the strangest sound that has ever existed. A plop, for lack of a better word, like a droplet of water the size of a planet dropping into a bucket the size of the sun.

The wobbles still, then stop completely. Too late, though, it seems.

High above you, the metal crane and elevator, the tallest thing the Hearthians have ever built, creaks, pop pop pops, creaks, screams. Your ship’s rockets fire, and the launch pad is swept out from under it, dragged away as the top of the elevator shaft bends towards you and then away and then towards again closer and closer-

You’re tackled up and off your feet and back and down hard against the canyon wall as metal and wood fills the camp like a tidal wave.

Chapter Text

It’s these in-between times that are hard on you.

You and Gneiss had spent the last half-day trying to consolidate electrical power. The waterwheel hooked up to the hydroelectric generator is enough to keep the heat lamps on for Sed, as well as power a few lights and the battery charging station for flashlights and other portable devices, but not much else. And if the river freezes over, hydroelectric power may no longer be an option.

The solar batteries are all being used to keep Hornfels' computers running in the observatory, but those are probably only going to last a few more hours before they’ll have to be switched over to an oil generator for power. And that’s a more finite resource now, too—without power to run the pumps down in the generator building’s basement, it's going to be a long and slow process to draw up any more oil from the ground. Preserving the oil and the electricity also means having to resort to burning wood for heat.

You’d gone up to the observatory to get some numbers. Hornfels really wasn’t willing to give you anything substantial. According to their math, the planet should be colder than the coldest day at the poles within a week, and colder than this planet has ever experienced since its atmosphere was formed another few weeks after that. But, according to Hal, “the math isn’t mathing properly.” It’s currently colder than usual, colder than comfortable and still dropping, but it’s downright balmy compared to what it should be. Hornfels seemed to be losing faith in their ability to give you any kind of estimates whatsoever, but Hal wasn’t. As you left, Hal whispered to you that Hornfels’ current numbers were saying the average global temperature wouldn’t drop below freezing for as many as two or three months from now. Nobody knew how that was possible, it shouldn’t be possible, but Hal believed it with as much “fourth law” spirit as anyone, so you decided to believe it too, for now.

So you radioed Tektite next. Marl and Spinel had caught up to them at that point, and the three of them were making not much progress trying to see if the fast-growing but extremely hard wood of some alien plant in a crater out there could be of any use. You gave them the notes from Hornfels, then asked how long they thought the firewood would last. Tektite must have already been thinking about it given they were able to provide an answer quickly, not only for that, but for food as well. Spinel figured that the fish wouldn’t last long without the sun growing algae for them to eat, and the insects wouldn’t fare well with the changing temperature. They suggested digging up as many tubers as possible before the ground could freeze over. The mushrooms and fungus don’t need sunlight to grow, but they won’t last forever either. Ultimately, Tektite figured that in the best-case scenario, given you all somehow didn’t freeze to death in the meantime, given absolute best practices and the strictest rationing, the trees and plants and fungus and fish and insects would all be used up in under two years.

Two years. It’s hard to wrap your head around. It’s both longer and shorter than you had imagined. Two years until the planet has been stripped bare to the roots. Two years left until… nothing.

Your noisy thoughts must have been loud enough to carry across the static silence. Tektite whispered to you across the radio, “Hush, Rutile. There’s nothing to be done about it. Things just happen sometimes, and there’s nothing for it.”

If anyone knows this, it’s Tektite. They are the oldest of you, and the only one that remembers clearly the deadly outbreak of disease that nearly wiped out your species so many years ago. They had only been a hatchling themself, and the little crew of them, Gneiss, Spinel, you, and little Esker had, by the end of it, made up more than half the population. Tektite had taken it upon themself to care for the lot of you, to keep you safe and soothe your worries while the adults were busy trying to put out this fire. Tektite knows what the end of the world looks like. They know what helplessness feels like.

Even now that you’re both old, they are the one you go to when the rare bouts of sleeplessness and nightmares and worries overtake you. They are the one whose arms you fall into, the one who holds you tight and like they did when you were hatchlings. “Hush, Rutile.” The words were always the same. “Quiet those noisy thoughts of yours. Hush now, Rutile, hush.”

It’s these noisy thoughts that keep you up now, sitting in your rocking chair when you should have gone to bed hours ago. It wasn’t so bad when you were busy working with the power and getting information and making plans with Gneiss and Gossan. But now it’s an in-between time for you—everyone else is either up working in the observatory, or working at the launch pad, or working outside the village, or sleeping like you should be.

It’s these noisy thoughts that are leading you to make foolish, dangerous mistakes. Tuff, showing more respect than you probably deserved, had pulled you into a private room away from listening ears before screaming at you for turning off the power in the mines. That’s something you’re going to have a hard time forgiving yourself for. You were in a rush to preserve the solar batteries, but you could have sent someone to ask Gossan if anyone was down there. You had acted without thinking, and your actions could have seriously hurt not only Tuff, but the hatchlings, too. Tuff had made it out uninjured but not unharmed. They fully broke down at your feet, crying all the tears you couldn’t shed yourself for having escaped the darkness of the mines only to be met with the darkness of the universe.

It’s these noisy thoughts that leave you rocking slowly in your chair with your hand-crank flashlight, tracing the rooflines of the buildings of the village, counting every log, listening to creak of wood as the houses talk to the wind that caresses them. You look over at the now-dim projector screen and are reminded of the show Feldspar had put on after their return from Brittle Hollow. Everyone had crowded around the projector as Feldspar showed photos taken with their Little Scout, each one paired with an elaborate story of adventure and discovery. Photos of the crumbling shells of once grand buildings made of smooth, tan stone, inlaid with delicate tilework. Of the remnants of life, furniture and tools and dishes and utensils left where they lie. Of the corpses. The bones of the people who must have loved their villages to have built and cared for them so beautifully.

Two years. You wonder how much longer after that the buildings of your village will remain standing. They won’t crumble like the Nomai’s villages. With no one to air them out, to keep them warm with fires in the hearths, to tar the wood before the flood that occurs every year or two, to carefully wash away mold before it can grow… no, your village will not crumble. It will rot.

You wonder how long it will take for your bodies to be like the bones that are the Nomai. How long it will take for you to rot like your village. Will someone like Feldspar tell stories about your bones someday? Or will the rot disgust them so much that they will leave and never speak of what they found here? Two years. So little can change in that amount of time, really. The hatchlings’ bones will still be so much smaller than your own.

Hush, Rutile. Hush, hush, hush. You tell yourself this as you stand and roll up the projector screen, putting it away. You wish Tektite was here to tell you in person.

You just finish slipping the cover on the projector screen when you notice a tremor. Immediately you look above you and step out from under the launch pad, but no tools or bolts fall through the cracks. You look around the village. No damage that you can see. You sigh. Even if they are small enough that they don’t rouse the sleeping villagers, earthquakes are not something you want to add to the list of difficulties you all face.

As you scan the town, your eyes land on the little room cantilevered off of the storage building, the addition that you and Riebeck built when you were teaching them carpentry. Since your mind is already on the topic of Nomai, it wanders to the topic of the Nomai now hiding in that room. Gossan had gone in to start a fire for them and offered them food, but they didn’t take it. You advised Gossan to give them some space. Especially if they are as young as Gossan believes they are, hovering over them isn’t going to help them feel more comfortable. They can come out on their own, when they’re ready.

You’re really not quite sure what to make of them, to be honest. They may be a hatchling, but if they were capable of flying that strange white pillar of a ship and saving Sed, then they can’t be too young. That’s where the conflict in your mind lies, however. How do you interact with someone you’ve never met who isn’t a tadpole? When a tadpole finally grows its legs and manages to trek its way from the spawning pools to the village, an introduction party is typically thrown. But these little ones aren’t even knee-high to you at that point; they can’t talk, can barely walk, and are completely feral in the beginning. You get to watch them grow up, and you learn about them step by step as they develop each part of their identity.

But this Solanum seems to be only a few steps shy of adulthood, capable of communicating and caring for themself. They’re no tadpole, and probably shouldn’t be treated as such. But how do you interact with a grown person you don't know? How do you get to know someone if not while they get to know themself?

Another tremor, an aftershock. You squint at the unlit oil lamp swaying minutely where it hangs above the big cabin’s porch. It hadn’t moved with the last one. Was this aftershock somehow stronger than the original tremor?

The door to the cabin swings open as Moraine steps out, yawning and rubbing their eyes, their own flashlight in hand. They sweep the beam of it across the village, and you put a hand up to stop the light as it crosses your face.

“Oh, sorry,” Moraine says, lowering the beam to the ground. “I thought you had gone to bed.”

You shake your head. “I did, but it didn’t last long. What about you, able to get any sleep?”

“Some, but not much.” They drag over a chair beside yours and sit down with a huff. “I kept waking up to listen with my signalscope. I told everyone to play music if they need anything. I was afraid of not noticing someone who was looking for help.”

“You could have handed it over to me, I can keep an ear out while you get some rest.”

They shrug. “That’s alright. I feel kind of nervous without it, honestly. Like I might miss something important.”

Another tremor, this one big enough to rattle the glass in the windows. Moraine looks up toward the launch pad. “Did someone just land?” they ask.

You stand up and shine your light around at the buildings. Most hanging objects started to sway with that one. “I think it was an earthquake.”

Moraine frowns. “It didn’t feel like it was below us, it felt like-”

Another tremor. You hear the glass of a window shatter somewhere. At the same time, Moraine turns their flashlight on Gneiss stepping out of the big cabin, and Porphy pokes their head out of the hatchling cabin with a lantern. “What was that?” Gneiss asks.

“Porphy, are the little ones with you?” you shout across the village.

“Mica’s with Slate, I have the rest!” Another tremor. More shattering glass.

“Get them under the beds!” You and Moraine climb between the three geysers and duck down. It’s not safe there, but it’s safer than under the launch pad. “Gneiss, where are you?”

You can’t see them in the dark, but you hear them yell, “I’m getting Sed and Esker!”

Another tremor. Metal screeches, wood creaks in pain. “Moraine, was there anyone else in the big cabin?”

They are kneeling in the shallow water, trying not to be thrown to the ground. “No, I don’t think so.”

Spinel and Marl are out with Tektite. You saw someone, probably Hal, leave the sick cabin earlier and head to the launch pad. Everyone else is either there or at the observatory.

Solanum. They’re still indoors, and there’s storage in the rafters of that building.

You squeeze past the geysers and run towards the storage building. Another tremor. You fall to your knees and cut your hands on broken glass. Moraine yells after you, but it is drowned out by a violent roaring in the sky. You stand and throw open the door to the storage building then the one to the side room and shine your light in.

Solanum sits curled up on the bed in the corner of the room, arms braced against either wall. The floor is already littered with objects—a ladder, a crate of fishing gear, scrap wood.

Solanum looks from where they stare at the ceiling to you. The windows above them have deep cracks in the glass.

You grab the front of their suit and drag them off the bed. They resist, clutching at your wrists and yelling, “Yapma, yapma!” They’re lighter than they look. You push them under the table against the wall then climb under yourself, holding them still and blocking them with your body from the rest of the room.

The tremors rip through you, boom… boom… boom… boom… like the planet is being beat like a drum. The windows shatter and scatter glass across the bed and table and floor. You hear nails popping free. More wood and other objects crash against the table.

Then with a plop it dissipates then stops, like a tantruming tadpole running out of energy and falling asleep.

You are about to move when you hear a catastrophic crashing, loud as the loudest explosion, but so much slower. You duck and pin Solanum harder to the wall, and they don’t resist you this time.

The whole cabin rattles with the crashing, but then that stops too.

You lean back. There’s something heavy and flat laying against the table and blocking you in. You can’t see what, your flashlight didn’t make it under the table with you. The object doesn’t fall away immediately when you push against it, so you give up for now and pull your pen light out of your pocket.

“You hurt, Solanum?” you say as you click on the light. A small, dim circle is illuminated in front of you. You scan it over them, and your breath catches when you see blood on their clothes until you realize that it’s probably yours from your injured palms. You check over their hands, their arms, their legs. Their suit looks intact, and they’ve still got heavy metal boots on, so they’re probably not bleeding at least.

You turn the light up to their face, and it startles you. This is the first time seeing them closer than a dozen meters away. They’ve got dust on… in their fur, you guess, and a small spool of fishing line caught up in their antlers. You hope that didn’t conk them on the head too hard.

You realize that they’re not looking back at you, but at your hand. They point at it with a thin, red-gloved finger. You hold out the pen light to them. “Here, you can hold it while I get us out of here.

They take the light, but hold your wrist in place before you can move. They turn your hand over and point again, more urgently, at your palm.

You shake your head. “I know, I’m cut up. We can take care of it when we’re not under a table.”

You awkwardly manage to turn around to face what you can now see is a large cork board that had been hanging on the wall over the table. There’s something behind it keeping you from pushing it down, but with Solanum’s help once they realize what you’re doing, you manage to push it up and over the blockage.

Nearly everything that had been in the rafters is now covering every surface in the room. You are immensely grateful that the fire in the fireplace had burned out a while ago, or else the many papers scattered across the room would have served as fine tinder to light up the scrap wood mingling with it. Solanum climbs out first, and you go to follow before you stop with a yelp. In your rush, you managed to pull a muscle in your thigh, and it’s not going to let you straighten out your leg without a great deal of pain.

You’re about to try using the lip of the table to pull yourself up when Solanum crouches down in front of you, tilting their head.

“Go on outside,” you say, pointing at the door, then at your leg, “Don’t wait up on me, this is going to take me a minute.”

Instead, they point at your leg as well, as if confirming the side. “Yeah, the right one, I’ll be alright, just gotta walk it- oh!”

Before you can finish the sentence, they’re at your right side, lifting you with some effort to avoid putting weight on that leg. “Oh, alright, that will work. Thank you, Solanum.”

No longer crouching, you can grit your teeth and straighten your leg enough to put it on the floor. Solanum kicks through the debris to clear a path to the door, then scoops up your abandoned crank flashlight and hands it over to you.

Once you step outdoors, you’re immediately hit with the stench of jet fuel. You shine your light out and up. All you can see is a crumpled mess of wood and metal draped over the cliff wall. You raise the light and see the massive disk of the launch pad is wedged between the ancient hollow tree and the bottom third of the elevator shaft.

There were at least four people on or under that launch pad.

“SOUND OFF!” you bellow from deep in your chest. Solanum flinches at the volume.

You hear “Moraine!” from the direction of the geysers. Then, from the other side of the village, “Gneiss and Esker!” and Porphy’s voice, “Porphy, Arkose, Galena, Tephra.”

“Porphy?” you call out.

“No loose fires,” they respond, “nobody’s hurt, but the hatchlings don’t have shoes on and there’s a lot of broken glass.”

“Stay put. Gneiss?”

“No loose fires. There’s debris in front of the door, we can’t get out. We don’t know where Sed is, they’re not here.”

“Sed’s not…? Wait, do you have Hal?”

“Hal went up to the observatory a couple hours ago.”

You suck in air through your teeth. That was Sed you saw earlier going to the launch pad, not Hal.

“Can you hear me?” Moraine says. They’ve got their signalscope pointed up to the sky while they speak into its handheld microphone.

A series of colorful swears bursts through the device’s speaker. You look up and see two jets of flame high above you and approaching. Thank the stars, they were able to take off. “Tell them to stay away, they’ll light the jet fuel,” you say.

“Rutile says stay back, it smells like jet fuel is leaking.”

The franticness in Slate’s voice is not diminished by the tiny speaker. “Mica’s with me, but Gabbro and Sed were down in the camp! Riebeck crashed somewhere, I can’t see them. I don’t…”

You don’t think you’ve ever heard Slate this torn before. You can see it in the ship’s movements as it shifts north and south indecisively.

You take the microphone from Moraine. “Slate, you can’t land here. Go help Riebeck and keep in contact with Moraine, we’ll try to get to Gabbro and Sed.”

The ship hesitates and shifts before leaving north.

You hand back the microphone and start limping toward the camp. “Let’s go, it’s just going to be us three for now. Moraine, run ahead with Solanum.”

Moraine sprints up the hill. Solanum perks at hearing their name and looks at you.

You take their penlight and swap it for your bigger flashlight, then swing your arm and point up the hill. “Moraine. Go with Moraine. Help Sed and Gabbro.”

They look at their flashlight in their hands, then up at you. They take a few steps backward up the hill.  You smile at them the best you can. “Yes, go.”

They turn around and take off up the hill. You follow slowly after them.

When you eventually turn the corner into the canyon, the stench of jet fuel is nearly unbearable. Your penlight just barely provides enough light to let you see through the kicked-up dust. A large metal girder lays at an angle across the first step down. You recognize the broken pulley attached to it as part of the crane that had been at the top of the elevator.

Crouching underneath, you find Moraine and Solanum slowly picking their way through the mass of debris, the beams of their flashlights urgently sweeping across it. The huge stripped tree trunks that served as support posts criss-cross the camp, and steel beams and twisted rebar weave together into a dire and dangerous field of briars.

Moraine is calling out the names of the missing, trying to climb over one of the largest timbers. “Quiet, listen for a reply,” you say. They shut their mouth and stand still.

“Solanum, wait,” Moraine says. Solanum lifts their head, looks between them and you. You hold out a hand to them, and then cup your ear, angling it towards the debris. Solanum stills and listens.

The camp is quiet but for the wind pulling through the broken limbs of the trees damaged by the collapse. Then Solanum spins in place and drops to their knees, shining their light under one of the larger wooden posts now leaned against the canyon wall. “Mor-Morin,” they say, stumbling over the name. “Sed! Sed!”

Moraine rushes over as you try to as well, struggling to lift your leg over some of the more treacherous areas. Moraine starts pulling away some of the looser pieces of metal near where Solanum is looking, but stops with a cringe when they hear metal scrape against metal. “Do we need to worry about sparks?”

“No, jet fuel takes more than that to ignite, just be careful not to drop anything on them.”

By the time you make your way over, Solanum and Moraine are pulling away the last piece of scrap blocking them. There, you see Gabbro sitting against the wall, slowly blinking awake. “Oh, hiya Solanum, nice to finally meet you,” they say slowly, coughing. Their skin is scraped in several places and they are covered with dust. Sed lies face-down beside them, partially pinned under several planks.

Solanum carefully lifts the wood away. The bent rebar attached to it shines with wetness when the light passes over it. Blood.

As soon as the planks are removed, Sed gasps and coughs, shifting their arms. You release the breath you were holding. Thankfully, it seems the rebar just missed impaling them, but it left a deep cut on their back, starting near their tailbone and tearing a jagged, bloody line all the way to the top of their right shoulder.

“What- what happened?” they say, trying to get their knees under them.

You put a hand on their uninjured shoulder. “Don’t get up, hatchling. There was an earthquake, the elevator and crane fell down on top of you.”

“Wasn’t an earthquake. It was an airquake,” Gabbro states as if it is obvious, slowly pushing themself against the wall to climb to their feet.

“Gabbro, be careful, you might be hurt,” you say. But as you’re speaking, Sed gets up to their knees as well, and you try to steady them as they lean forward and clutch at their side. “Sed, slow down.”

“It’s just some broken ribs,” they say. “Good pelvis, good skull, good spine, all’s fine.”

Gabbro chuckles as the rhyme. You gape in horror. “All’s not fine, hatchling. Your back is shredded.”

They reach around, their fingernails snagging on the loose thread of their torn clothes. “I’m bleeding? Is the blood dripping?” they ask.

“What?”

“Is the blood dripping down my back? I can’t tell.”

Gabbro steps around Sed and peers down at them, then back around again to help them up. “Nah, you have twenty minutes at least.”

Sed nods in agreement. Moraine tries to step past you. “You both need to stop moving so much-”

You put a hand out and stop them with a sigh. “No, we should help them get out of here. The jet fuel shouldn’t ignite unless maybe if Slate brings the ship over here again, but I don’t want to risk it.”

“But Sed doesn’t even have shoes on!” Moraine exclaims, waving their hands at them. They and Gabbro are already climbing through the debris back to the canyon entrance.

You shake your head. “Sed usually doesn’t have shoes on, and there’s no stopping them now.”

The five of you eventually make it out of the rubble and back to the center of town. “Gneiss, we got Sed and Gabbro, but Sed’s bleeding and they probably both have concussions,” you call out.

“Porphy is going to have to help them, they went to the big cabin with the hatchlings” Gneiss yells back, “The door is still blocked for me and Esker, and I’m not going to try climbing out the window unless I have to!”

“Rutile,” Moraine says, voice worried. They’ve got their signalscope out again, this time pointed toward the observatory. “Hornfels is playing music. They need help.”

Sed is already moving in the direction of the ramps up to the higher level of the village. You grab their arm to stop them, and they immediately pull away from you. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“I need to see what’s going on,” they reply.

“You need to stay here and get that cut stitched. Gabbro?” They startle at their name, as if just now realizing there are other people around them. “Get Sed to Porphy, watch for broken glass. Me and Moraine will go up to check on Hornfels.”

You turn to Solanum. “Do you want to stay with them or go with me?”

They stare back at you with no understanding, shrinking into themself a bit.

Sed clicks their tongue in thought, then says haltingly: “Kaçmama yardım etmek? Yoksa Rutile… uh, kalacaksın?”

Solanum straightens at hearing their language, but still tilts their head. “Ne? Kaçmak? Neden kaçmaya ihtiyacın var?”

Sed struggles for a moment to think of a reply. “Ağaç asansörüyle kaçmak. Arkadaşlara yardım.”

Solanum looks between them and you, then back to them. “Sanırım seninle kalacağım.”

Sed nods. “Solanum wants to stay with me.”

You squint at them, suspicious. You’re not the Nomai language expert, but that was a lot of talking for a simple answer. “You go directly to Porphy, nowhere else. Understood?”

They level an unusually direct glare at you. “I’m bleeding, Rutile, where do you think I’m going to go?”

You sigh. “Gabbro, keep an eye on them. Come on, Moraine.”

You and Moraine leave the others and trek around the geysers to the back of the village. As you go, more and more damage becomes visible to you. Many of the windows are broken, and you can see several instances of roofs lifting away from walls and at least one water tank that has come unfastened and toppled down, crushing a porch. Most of the wood seems unharmed, it’s the older glass windows and metal nails and fasteners and other inflexible materials that seem most affected.

Once you make it up to the building Esker and Gneiss are trapped in, the reason why becomes apparent. As Moraine sweeps their flashlight over it and up high above it, you can see that the entire ramp system has collapsed onto and around the cabin. There is no way to reach the higher level of the village from here. And the back path by the launch pad is currently covered with debris. You’re trapped.

A faint light passes over the buildings, like moonlight from the Attlerock. Beside you, Moraine gasps. “Rutile, look.”

You follow their eyeline and loop up. Above you, from the north horizon to horizon to the south, tracking slowly from east to west, a thin, bright line of white tears the sky in half.

Chapter Text

You really need to radio Gneiss at some point and thank them for the transmitter currently attached to the neck of your banjo. They had originally installed it when they were testing something with their new signalscope design, and it just never got removed. Now, though, you are making good use of it. You have your in-suit radio tuned directly to the banjo's signal and turned up to a probably unsafe volume level, and it's doing an excellent job of drowning out the sounds of volcanic activity from this planet's moon.

Gabbro had tried several times over the years to teach you various relaxation and meditation techniques, to little success. Emptying your head of thoughts never quite worked; whenever you got rid of one anxiety-inducing idea, your brain would decide to fill the vacuum with something even more terrifying.

This, though—carefully facing the wall so you can see nothing of anything around or... or below you, completely covering over any explosions with the same extremely loud 23 notes strummed over and over again—this works. Can't worry about your surroundings when you are blocking out any sign of their existence, right?

That's probably why you fail to notice the roar of a jetpack and the screaming coming from someone careening at great speed in your direction. That is, you fail to notice until they crash into the tree above you and then come crashing down on top of you, and you find yourself buried in broken tree limbs and hopefully-not-broken Hearthian limbs.

Once you've managed to stop your own screaming and partially disentangle yourself from the pile, you realize who had landed on you.

"Sed!" you exclaim at Outer Wilds Ventures' latest trainee, who is currently groaning from where they lay upside-down half in your lap and half over the rock you are sitting on. "What- how are- are you okay?! How did you get here?"

"Ow," they reply, opening their eyes and blinking up at you. "Oh, sick, I lived. Hi Riebeck!”

"Where did you come from?!" you ask frantically as they do a clumsy backwards somersault onto their knees, only to clutch at their shoulder in immediate regret. "A-are you hurt?"

They grit their teeth and make a face while slowly sitting upright. "Ugh, yeah, I'll be fine in like... seventeen minutes. How are you?"

"I, uh, I'm okay, I think." You brush through the scattered leaves and chunks of bark until you find your banjo thankfully undamaged. "What happened? Did you fall from up above somewhere?"

"No, I didn't fall, I..." Sed tilts their head contemplatively. "Well, I mean, I guess it was technically falling. I was trying to slingshot myself around to the top of the Tower of Quantum Knowledge over there." They point somewhere past the lip of the ledge your camp is perched on.

You don't look to follow where they are pointing. "You... what? You slingshot around what? Not around the- the..."

"The black hole, yeah." They look over the side like they're thinking about doing it again.

"Sed, no!" They're scooting closer to the edge on their knees, peering over it. You stand and place yourself between them and empty space, way too close to the edge yourself to feel comfortable, and put your arms out to block them. "That's so dangerous, Sed, you can't do that! You could die! Don't do it again. P-Please, I mean..."

"Okay," they say, and sit back down on the ground as you let out a shaky, relieved breath. "Actually, while I'm here, can I take your picture?"

You shake your head in surprise at the sudden change of topic. "Take my picture? Like, with your Little Scout? Why?"

"For fun. I'm trying to get pictures of everyone."

"Oh, uh, yeah, I guess." Sed gets up from the ground, hissing in pain as they slowly lift their scout launcher. You reach out to help them. "Are you sure you're okay?"

They wave you off. "I'm good, stay there, don't move. I think if I back up I can frame you with the trees and the walkway to the city behind you. It should look cool."

As they talk, they point their scout launcher at you and look at its display while trying to get a good angle.

You feel a bit self-conscious, not sure what to do with your arms. "Do you want me to, like, pose, or..." You try to stand up straighter, before remembering how close to the edge you are and leaning forward again with bent knees. "Also, please be very careful not to hit the wrong button and, uh, shoot that thing at me."

They laugh, and you hear the shutter click a few times. "Pssh, please, I'm a professional. I haven't done that since-"

They're interrupted by a violent crash as a ball of magma slams into the planet's surface above you, causing both of you to startle. You giggle nervously. "That, uh, that sure is some storm out there, right?"

Sed rolls their eyes and goes back to taking pictures. "Riebeck, we work together how often, and you're still going to resort to talking about the weather?"

"I mean, it's more than just weather, I think. Hollow's Lantern has been really unstable today."

Now that you don't have your banjo music blaring in your ears anymore, you can hear just how violent the volcanic activity on Brittle Hollow's moon has become. Every few seconds the space echos with the sound of hot magma colliding with the surface somewhere in the distance. Not only that, but every once in a while you hear a deep rumbling followed by some strange whoosh that you don't dare to wonder about the source of.

You twist at your gloved fingers, carefully keeping all four of your eyes on Sed and nothing else. "Actually, I think it's getting w-worse. Do you think we should leave? Or call Hornfels maybe, or..."

Sed looks up from their device at you with... concern? "Hey, no, don't be scared, you'll be fine," they scramble to say, reaching out towards you. "You'll be okay, we can, uh... oh, wait, want to see something crazy?"

"Uh... I don't know..." you say, leaning away from them a bit.

"No, like, you-level crazy, not me-level crazy," they assure you, patting you on the chest and going to sit down on the ground. You're not really sure what that means, but you sit up on your rock beside them.

They turn on the display on their scout launcher and start flipping through photos. "So I've been exploring the caves on Ember Twin. Look at what I found."

They hand you the device, and you peer down at the screen.

You see a black and white photo of the inside of a large cave. In the foreground, four intricate metal cylinders of varying heights stand together on a tiled platform, each with a short scrawl of Nomai text below them. In the distance, alcoves carved into the sides of the cave and enclosed with crumbling walls are lit by artificial lighting.

Your eyes grow wide as you take in the details of the image. "Oh, Sed, is this... did you find a Nomai structure under the surface?!"

Sed grins and reaches up to change the picture. "Not just a structure."

The next photo is taken from the same location, but closer to the edge of the platform and pointed down. You see a long, zig-zagging staircase all the way to the bottom of a cavern that must be deep enough to nearly reach the center of the planet. Several more alcoves covered by walls and dotted with windows and doorways line the cave, and a partially-destroyed tower climbs up one side. Sed hits the button again, and you see another picture of a lit path leading to a massive building emblazoned with some sort of metal icon.

"Oh my, Sed, this is-"

"A city!" Sed exclaims, grabbing the side of your suit and jostling you. "A whole city inside Ember Twin! They called it the Sunless City, apparently."

You laugh high-pitched, trying to cover your mouth but just pressing your hands to the front of your helmet. "This is incredible! A whole city, and I had no idea it existed! This is great!"

"I know, look, look, this was, I think, some sort of open living space here. Then all these over here were sleeping quarters, I guess, look at the beds. And these shelves, aren't they cool?"

The two of you crowd together over the small screen, enthusiasm building off each other as you flip through various photos, some close-up and focused on specific pieces of furniture, others showing a more distant, wide-angle view of whole rooms. "Gosh, that table is gorgeous," you state. "There are so many rooms! How many people lived here? Wait, that means there were two groups of Nomai—one that lived on Ember Twin, and one that lived here on Brittle Hollow."

"I know, that's what I've been thinking about. Their population must have been massive, at least 50 people if I had to guess."

You flip to another picture, a side profile of some kind of angled, raised surface. "And these, you said they are beds? What makes you think that?"

"Because some of them were, uh, occupied," Sed says, clearing their throat.

"What, you mean with a skeleton?"

"Right." They point at the picture. "Their head would be up here, and their legs down here in these divots. There was only ever one person in a bed, but sometimes there would be two beds next to each other, or there would be a small bed for a hatchling underneath the big one."

"Wow, Sed, that's amazing! The hatchlings shared their sleeping quarters with the adults? That's so interesting. I wonder what else we can decipher about their culture from this. Do you have any pictures of beds with the skeletons?"

"No, I don't, I, uh..." they put a hand up to rub the back of their neck, but are blocked by their helmet and chuckle awkwardly. "I don't like taking pictures of the skeletons. Sorry."

You tilt your head at them. "Oh, really? Why? They've been dead for a long time."

Sed shakes their head, looks out towards the Hanging City. "It doesn't feel like it. They've got writings there, all over the walls and floor. Important things, personal things, even stuff written by hatchlings. When you get to reading enough of their little signs... a lot of them are like diaries. You get to know them, the Nomai."

Sed clears their throat again mumbles, as if embarrassed, "I don't know, it's stupid, but they're kinda like my friends. It feels wrong to take pictures of them lying there dead like that."

You understand, partly. When you see them sat on benches slumped over their work, bits and pieces of a project scattered around them, or halfway through a meal of some sort... To you, it's not very different from passing by Rutile and Spinel washing dishes together or Hornfels asleep on a pile of papers at their desk as you stalk around out of sight. There's life there, still, frozen in time but still real. Even as a hatchling you had no discomfort from being around it, leaning in close to a skull Feldspar brought home and imagining what had caused the person's antler to crack or tooth to chip.

But that was just one more odd thing about you, apparently. Hornfels and Feldspar and Gossan had commented on your curiosity the same way they talked about your weird extra fingers, with low voices echoing their concern or interest or cautious optimism. They left you to your interests, ultimately, but you kind of liked that the Nomai at least wouldn't talk like you weren’t there, like you were invisible. Maybe you related to them, in a way. They were no more able to speak up for themselves than you were. Maybe that’s why you were so adamant about making sure they were… seen.

Still, if Sed doesn't want to take pictures of dead bodies, you can respect that. You guess.

You reach the last picture from inside Ember Twin, the next few showing the planet from a distance. You go back to the wide view looking down over the city.

"What's in that large doorway, there at the bottom of the cave?" you ask.

Sed leans over again to look. "That goes to something called the High Energy Lab. Those four tubes up at the top turn the lights on and off, and the light for that area is called 'High Energy Lab Trail' or something like that."

"A lab! Somewhere they did research, maybe, or, oh, maybe they built devices for producing energy, or for storing it? That's so fascinating." You pass the Little Scout back to Sed, and they put it away. "When you go back, you have to show me the pictures you take! That is, I mean, if it's not an inconvenience-"

"I'm not going back," Sed says abruptly. "I can't go back. The sand..." They trail off without explaining.

"Sure, I mean after the sand has drained off to Ash Twin again."

"I can't!" Sed says, voice cracking at the end. "I can't, the sand always gets in and when it gets too high it blocks the entrances and I can't... move. I can't move." They cut themself off from saying more, and they stand up and pace around your camp.

"Oh. Okay," you say, as if you understand them when you really don't at all. You pick up your banjo and frown down at it as you pluck a few notes and Sed walks around. Then, suddenly, it clicks and you look up and say, "Oh! You're- you're scared!"

Sed stops and crosses their arms, body turned away from you. "No, that's stupid. There's nothing to be afraid of."

You put your hands up. “Hey, I'm not blaming you, I'm basically the Feldspar of being scared of stuff! I mean, that is, if Feldspar was famous for being scared of stuff and not... not being scared of stuff.”

Sed groans, the glass of their visor squeaking as they run a hand down it. "It's so frustrating! I want to go back, there's so much I want to explore there still. It's probably my favorite planet I've been on so far." They cross their arms again, hugging themself as they sigh and mumble, "It's embarrassing. It's not like it's going to kill me."

You shake your head. "It's not embarrassing, space is full of dangerous things!" You gesture as you talk, counting on your fingers. "You're flinging yourself around empty space in a ship with a barely operable means of slowing down. You're baking yourself just under the surface of the sun and exploring uncharted caves that no one in the universe has seen since the Nomai died. I mean, think about where we are now, standing on a crumbling cliff that is dangling over a gaping, all consuming... in-inescapable..." You pant breathlessly. "Let's stop thinking about that actually."

Sed turns to face you now, tilting their head. "Yeah, why did you come out here anyway? Tuff is terrified of space and zero gravity too, so they stayed at home and took up mining. You could have done the same if you wanted."

You shrug. "I did just stay at home for a long time. I kept putting stuff off. I studied with Hornfels to get out of training with Feldspar. I practiced carpentry with Rutile and music with Gneiss to get out of even looking at the ship that Slate was building for me. I was actively trying to do everything I could to avoid becoming an astronaut." You laugh a little, looking up at the ceiling as you reminisce. "But every time Feldspar would come back with some artifact or Gossan would bring home a bag full of potsherds, I dropped everything else. I wanted to see it all for myself. I had to, even when I was terrified. Which I was. Which I still am, um, all the time. Including right now. I am doing a great job ignoring this volcanic storm until it passes, thank you very much."

"OK, but how do I stop being afraid?" Sed says. "I want to see the rest of the Sunless City, I really want to, but I... how do I stop being afraid?"

You shrug again and go back to plucking your banjo. "I don't know, tell me when you find out, if- if you don't mind."

"But you're here."

"Yeah?"

Sed throws their arms in the air and shouts, "You're here! How did you get here if you're afraid?!"

You match them, throwing your arms out as well. "You don't have to yell, I don't know! I just did! I... I trained, and I was scared. I took off in my ship for the first time, and I was terrified. I landed on the Attlerock and Esker had to help me power down my ship because I was having a panic attack. I flew to Brittle Hollow screaming the whole way." You point up and behind you. "And when I cross that bridge into the Hanging City I'm probably going to be struggling not to throw up with every step! I barely made it out here as it is, I have no idea how to be an astronaut and not be scared at the same time!"

Sed stares at you for a while, then with a long sigh flops down on the ground beside you. "Alright, fine. Whatever." They lean up against your leg, resting the side of their helmet on your knee.

You go back to playing your banjo as they relax. "Sorry I can't be more helpful," you say.

"You're really cool," Sed replies, and they sound so grumpy it startles a laugh out of you.

"Oh, I, uh, I don't think-"

Suddenly, they shoot to their feet, yelping as they do so. "Ow! Okay, we're going to make a deal. I'll go to the Sunless City again, and you have to go to the Hanging City. Got it?"

You're starting to regret your impassioned speech. “W-what? I mean, uh ,what's the rush? We can... we can stay here, make a plan first, uh, check our equipment-”

They put their hands on your knees and shove their helmet into yours, making you throw an arm back to not get knocked over completely. “Riebeck,” they say, teeth sharp, eyes sparkling, “life is so much shorter than you could ever imagine, and every one of us only gets one chance to do the things we want to do.”

Just as quick, they stand up again and thrust out a hand toward you. “Do we have a deal?”

You look back and forth between their face and the extended hand. You take it hesitantly. “I, uh, oh. I guess?”

They shake your hand with enough vigor to make your suit rattle. "We have a deal. You have to do it now, you promised, and so do I." They take a deep breath and puff out their chest, declaring: "I'm going to go right now! Or, not right now, next... in the- in a few minutes! That is, I'm going now! See you soon, Riebeck!"

With that, they turn and march off toward the Crossroads and out of sight.

You gulp. You're-... not quite sure what you just agreed to.

Before you can contemplate it further, your thoughts are interrupted by a slowly growing roar, like the volcanic fire coming from the moon but much, much more massive. You shut your eyes and brace for impact, then scream at the immense heat.

The pain passes just as quickly as it came. Goodness, that was unpleasant. You really don’t want to look around, but you open one eye just a sliver, just enough to make out the text at the top of your HUD.

SURFACE INTEGRITY: 93%

Okay. Ninety-three percent is good! Not perfect, not ideal, but good.

You open your other three eyes and slowly sit up from where you had fallen to the ground. Nothing seems to be amiss in your camp. Your fire still crackles innocently, and not even your jetpack tank got knocked over from where it leans against a tree. You stand and dust yourself off, feeling a little embarrassed. Maybe you’re just being dramatic.

Still, if that was a meteor, it was either really close, or really really big. Or both.

You pick up your scout launcher and recall the Little Scout from where it stands guard over your camp. You fire it at the wall, at the bottom of the road directly above you, at the floor just outside your campsite. The surface integrity stays at a steady 93%.

You slowly step out to the main walkway, very careful to stick to the right and avoid the large hole in the floor. Still 93%. Nothing to worry about!

Something catches your eye in the far distance, past the much-too-short railing, to the right of the beautiful latticework structure of the gravity cannon embedded in the crust.

Ever since you made the harrowing journey under the surface of this planet, you haven’t been able to understand the whole lighting situation. In developed areas, the Nomai had made strategic use of wireless, mysteriously-powered lamps that you would love to bring home with you at some point. But even outside the path and structures, the underside of Brittle Hollow’s surface is always lit by a dim, ambient glow, reflecting in the shiny rock in shades of blue and purple and red.

You haven’t been able to determine the source of this glow. You suppose it might have something to do with the bl- ahem, the, er, astronomical anomaly that forms the core of this planet. Its terrible moniker stems from its tendency to capture light and prevent it from escaping. But perhaps the light that manages to escape its grasp ends up scattered and tossed up to reflect off the ceiling, somehow?

Either way, something seems to have changed in this respect. Two large patches of the ceiling have stopped reflecting light. It reminds you of a damaged computer monitor with large swaths of dead pixels, or when one of your magnifying lenses fails and leaves you with a blind spot in your helmet. It isn’t a gradual thing, either. The edges are sharp and distinct. The rocks are visible, then invisible, then visible again.

You angle your head to look at the patches through the telescope on the right side of your helmet. You notice something orange and zoom in on it. Not a full-sized meteor, but a small ball of magma probably the size of your head, slowly drifting past. It disappears behind the rocky crust of the planet.

Oh.

Oh.

The light isn’t reflecting off the rocks there because there aren’t any rocks to reflect. These patches aren’t dark sections of the crust, they’re missing sections, holes to outer space.

So why can’t you see any stars?

You retreat back to your camp, sitting on your cushion and pulling your banjo into your lap. You don’t know what to think of this. You’d really rather not think about it at all, if you’re honest. Maybe you should call someone who’s better at thinking than you are.

You make sure the antenna on top of your helmet is straight, then set your in-suit radio to the observatory’s channel, trying to reach Hornfels. You get a busy signal, someone is already using that line. You try Chert next. Also busy. They’re probably talking to each other. That shouldn’t be surprising, they report to each other regularly, but imagining the conversation they might be having right now puts your nerves on edge.

You fidget with your banjo, tuning it. One good thing is that it seems like the volcanic storm from Hollow’s Lantern has slowed, if not stopped completely. Still, it takes quite a bit of effort to keep yourself from turning on the banjo’s transmitter again and trying to drown out the worries that are starting to build in you.

You nearly jump out of your seat when Gossan’s voice comes through the radio. “Riebeck, status report?”

“Uh, stable and secure, I think…” you manage to say.

“Await instructions,” is their clipped reply. The radio then plays only static at you.

Ooh, that isn’t good. If Gossan is sending protocol call-and-response messages, that means something bad is happening.

You wait another several minutes, but no further instructions are sent your way. You try calling Chert again, but the line is still busy. So you try Esker instead. Thankfully, it patches through right away. “Hi, Esker, do you- it’s Riebeck, do you copy?”

They respond quickly. “Riebeck! Good, maybe someone who won’t rudely cut the call mid-sentence. Are you well?”

“Um, I think so? I just got a ‘status report’ call from Gossan. Is there… is there something going on?”

“Is there something going on? Well, I should say so, Riebeck, the sun’s just exploded!”

You blink, increasing the volume on your speakers. “Is that a- a euphemism for something?”

Esker guffaws through the radio, and you wince and turn the volume down again. “You looked outside anytime recently?”

“No, I’ve been trying to avoid it, honestly.” You’ve been keeping your eyes locked on the ground since you got back to your camp.

“Well, it’s not a euphemism. The sun went supernova a few minutes ago now.”

“...Our sun?”

“The one and only!”

“Our sun w-went supernova?” you ask again, louder and somewhat more hysterical.

“Well, I guess not the one and only, since all the stars went out too.”

“OUR SUN WENT SUPERNOVA?!” you shout. If you hadn’t seen the lack of stars yourself, you’d think it was some mean, stupid prank. But this, and the painful burning sensation earlier, and… oh, oh no. “What do we do, Esker? Are we going to die?! I don’t- what- should I go somewhere? What do we do?!”

“Now, don’t blow a gasket, Riebeck, the danger’s already passed. Everything seems to be intact, as far as I can tell.”

“What… how can that be? Our sun going supernova should have destroyed everything! Are we… how are we alive? Am I dreaming?” You feel like you’re going to pass out. You lay on your back and put your legs up on the rock ledge to get more blood to your head.

“It’d have to be a collective dream, if that was the case. Who knows, maybe it’s possible!”

“You sound awfully chipper about this, Esker!” you shout. You’re too dizzy to feel bad about shouting.

Esker sounds a little embarrassed when they reply. “Oh, well… it’s about time we had a little excitement around here, you know? Besides, we got hit by a supernova and didn’t die, what’s there not to be chipper about?”

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe the fact that we can’t survive without a sun, Esker!”

“Okay, that’s… hm.” You can picture them rubbing the back of their neck and squinting off into the distance. “Maybe I hadn’t thought of it like that.”

The faint buzz of someone else trying to patch through to Esker hums through the speaker. “Oh, looks like Gabbro is trying to get a hold of me. Let me call you back later. Take care of yourself, Riebeck!”

The line switches to static. You wave your hands in the air in frustration, then let them flop back on the ground again.

This is horrible. This is horrific. There’s no protocol for this. How could there be? What are you supposed to do in this situation?

You slowly sit up, waiting for the dizziness to pass. Your campfire crackles, growing dim with the lack of fuel. You suppose you should put it out. That seems like an appropriate thing to do in an emergency—ensure there are no active fires nearby.

You shovel dirt onto the fire and stamp it down, getting rid of any lingering embers. Then you slowly start packing up your camp. You figure that this will probably end up being an “all hands” kind of emergency, and you’ll be asked to come back to Timber Hearth before too long. Better have all your gear in order so you’re not rushing to collect it later. Plus, you really can’t think of anything else to do.

Something like an hour later, you’ve just finished cleaning and drying the last of your dishes when a voice comes through your radio again.

“Riebeck, do you copy?” It’s Hal.

“Yes! Hi!”

“How are things looking out there?”

You look up automatically. You really wish you hadn’t, you were doing so well keeping your eyes to the ground.

Huge swathes of the planet are just… missing. Gone. Massive geometric chunks exposed to nothing but the, well, nothing. There’s not even starlight to fill the gaps.

Even the twin bridges that arc over your head did not come out unscathed. The middle section of the bridge on the right has disappeared, the remaining edges jagged and crumbling.

You step forward hesitantly. What’s left of the bridges continue their arc around the inside of the planet until they terminate at the Hanging City. Thankfully, the city itself seems just as intact as it was before the volcanic storm, at least as far as you can make out. You’ve spent a lot of time staring at it from a distance through your helmet’s various telescoping lenses, and it seems there is no more structural damage than when you first arrived.

It’s remarkable. Even after Hollow’s Lantern threw everything it had at this planet, launching dozens of meteors bigger than your ship at every meter of its surface, the city still stands. Even when the planet crumbles around it, this place the Nomai built stretches into the depths without faltering. Even a supernova could not make it wobble.

“Riebeck? You still there?”

You can’t tear your eyes away. “Hal, right. Sorry. Everything’s looking… perfect.”

“Oh, uh, alright, great.”

Hal goes on to repeat what Esker said about the supernova, and you don’t mean to, but you tune it out. Despite all the universe falling apart in unimaginable ways, this monument to the Nomai’s ingenuity and courage and desire to shape the world around them in such beautiful ways remains. You still have your one chance.

“...Also, there’s a- the- there’s been a… listen, just, Gossan wants you back here. We’ve been having a hard time getting Gabbro home, so we’re going to build a flight plan out for you. You okay holding out there for a while?”

“Give me eighteen hours.”

“Give… what?”

You’re shocked and confused yourself. “Eighteen hours?” you repeat, as if confirming with your own brain what you said.

“Uh, let me check…” you hear them say something away from the microphone. Then they turn back and say, “Hornfels says fine. They’ll set up some computer models for the planets’ orbits and have a flight plan ready for you in eighteen hours.”

Your voice squeaks when you speak. What are you saying? What are you doing? “Gr- uh, great! Ha ha. See you in… in… in eighteen hours!”

Hal signs off. You gulp for air. What is wrong with you?! Why did you have to open your big mouth? You could have just said, “Okay Hal, thanks for working on those flight plans, I’m just going to sit here and enjoy a couple nice, safe, toasty marshmallows in my nice, safe, toasty camp!”

It occurs to you that you could still do that. You asked Hal to wait eighteen hours, you didn’t promise to get anything done in that time.

You did, however, promise Sed. Somehow. You’re still not sure how that happened.

And to be fair, you promised yourself, too. Just like when you joined Outer Wilds Ventures, and when you flew to the Attlerock, and when you landed here on Brittle Hollow, you promised yourself you would keep moving forward. You weren’t just going to make do with what bits and pieces the other travelers brought home. You were going to see it for yourself.

But now that you’re standing at the foot of the bridge, jetpack and camp gear on your back, Little Scout launcher in your shaking hands, all those promises are starting to sound really stupid.

You launch the scout at the ground a meter ahead of you. The surface integrity is the same here as it was in the camp. So you launch it at the beginning of the bridge. Still 93%.

You creep forward. You are immensely grateful that the bridge is wide enough that when you stay in the middle, you can’t see over the sides. The problem is, it’s also too long for you to see the end. You picked the left bridge, you know it’s all in one piece, but it curves away from you like you could never reach the end of it. You launch the scout forward another meter. Still 93%.

You keep up this pace. Launch the scout. Check the surface integrity. Walk forward two steps. Recall the scout. Repeat. You don’t let yourself look farther than three meters in any direction.

You reach a new section of the bridge, and the surface integrity changes to a horrific 34%. And you know the scout is rounding up, you know the real number is probably 33.652% or something like that.

You launch the scout again at this section, and a third time. The number doesn’t change. So you inch out a foot, tapping the ground a few times like you’re checking an icy pond. The surface integrity holds steady at 34%.

So you hold your breath and slowly, so slowly, continue your routine. Launch the scout. Surface integrity: 34%. Take two steps. Recall the scout. Launch the scout. Surface integrity: 34%. Take two steps. Recall the scout. Launch the scout. Surface integrity: 34%. Take two steps.

You hear a crack.

Surface integrity: 29%.

You break into a dead sprint.

The surface integrity displayed across the top of your HUD updates with every footfall as you run as fast as you can. 27%. 24%. 19%. Tiles split apart and crumble ahead of you, exposing the emptiness in the gaps.

The entire section starts to rattle and shake. You stumble with your right foot, so you kick off with your left foot and blast your jetpack at full strength.

The floor disappears beneath you and is eaten up by Brittle Hollow’s horrendous mouth.

Your screams are cut off when you slam into a massive stone tower and flop down onto a sturdy walkway.

You lay there for a while, dazed but alive, uninjured but sore. You laugh with what you would consider an appropriate amount of hysteria. You cry a little bit. You recall your Little Scout, which remarkably survived as well. You gag a couple times, but manage not to throw up.

Mostly, you just stare. The Hanging City rises high above you.

Chapter Text

It’s hard to describe your experience of the next several hours.

You feel like you… lose yourself a little bit? Not completely. There are a lot of rickety stairs in this city, a lot of sketchy platforms with large holes in them. One room you found had a glass floor and you just turned right around and moved on. Every time you have to navigate these dangerous places, you become deeply aware of your own presence, of your pounding heart and shaky hands and too-heavy footsteps. But then you’d reach the next room or building or platform, and you’d be gone again, some part of you separating from yourself. You'd become a mote of dust floating from room to room. A Little Scout going where it is sent, observing and recording. You’re not sure how, but it’s like you’re watching yourself from a distance, drifting farther and farther away from anything so bodily as fear or anxiety.

It is easy for you to imagine this place as whole, as it once might have been. The latticework over the windows without missing pieces, the plaster without chipped away patches, the walls no longer crooked and leaning. You sit at a table with two skeletons and rest your chin at your hands as you watch them. What were they talking about? What food were the bowls in front of them once piled high with? What did it taste like, smell like? Would you have liked it, or would it taste strange to you, making your face twist in mild disgust as these Nomai laugh good-naturedly and give you something else to try?

You photograph, copy, and carefully hand-translate all the writing you can find, and there is so, so much to find. You read all these names. Poke, Avens, Idaea. Phlox, Ramie, Conoy. They talk and debate and argue through written messages about Vessels and Ash Twin Projects and advanced warped cores, things that were apparently important to them but for which you have no context. But then you find other writings, ones that are personal and genuine, moments of vulnerability willingly inscribed onto the walls of public places. You imagine doing that yourself. Writing out your feelings in a place where anyone passing by for years and years could read them. The concept is scary and thrilling at the same time.

You find the school. It’s the first thing you find that makes you cry. The skeletons here are so small, a skull could fit into each of your hands. You read their assignments and sit among them and have to blink hard to clear your eyes of tears so that you can see. You take a break for a while to realize that you’re not sad, you think. This doesn’t feel like loss. This feels like gaining, somehow. The universe had people in it that built buildings with the sole apparent purpose of serving as a place for hatch- for children to learn. Their love of knowledge and their dedication toward acquiring it and sharing it with others is represented in physical space, in the change in the world made by this small room. Their values are so great and immovable that this tiny corner of the fabric of the universe is made to bend around them like the roots of a tree growing around a rock. The passage of time is irrelevant to it. Even if the rock were removed, the bend in the tree would remain. The Nomai are dead now, but they aren’t gone. The universe had them, which means it has them still. They existed, so they exist forever.

The thoughts in your head don’t make sense to you even as you think them, but neither do some of the things you are reading, so you take note of them both and set them aside to analyze later. This is what the “losing yourself” is, you think. You are surrounded by death and decay, but all you can see in it is life, lives that lived just as much as yours is now, if not more so. You’re a phantom in it, both alive and not, whispering through the walls. A conduit for discovery, not a person. Maybe this is some version of the meditation that Gabbro tried to teach you?

You find a place that is particularly treacherous to navigate, but so worth the risk. You find the beds that Sed had shown you, and their inhabitants. It makes you laugh and hiccup. They seem so uncomfortable! But even the bones of the Nomai resting in them look relaxed and unbothered, so what do you know?

This area is so worn-down that you have to use your jetpack to jump across gaps. What a wildly dangerous thing you’re doing, you think distantly to yourself. But at this point you’re so out of body that you only hesitate and shuffle around for a moment before taking each leap. The momentum is carrying you as much as your jetpack, and you’ve haunted this place with impunity so far, and the next room is right there! You can picture so clearly the walkway that once led to it. The structure, despite its frailty, does its best to welcome you in, like it’s recognizing your efforts and the risks you are taking and rewarding you at every turn.

You squeeze yourself through a hole in the floor, drop down, and climb over some shelves. The city rewards your agility with a device you have not yet encountered, displaying text like the scrolls but it seems like more than that. You touch it, lift it carefully, and it makes noise. A deep and somber voice, sounding tired and thoughtful, but happy. A voice! A voice! How can the Nomai be called dead when they still speak to you? You sit with the device for a full hour, translating it, playing the sound over and over. “Hi, Cassava,” you say, choked up. “My name is Riebeck. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

So you bounce and fly from room to room, laughing all the way. “Who is Riebeck?” you ask loud and crazed to a skeleton leaned against the wall. “I can't die! I am the Ghost of Brittle Hollow!” You wait for the skeleton to respond. It doesn’t. You feel a little embarrassed. This all might also just be adrenaline and a delayed panic response. Oh well, another thing to put away and analyze later.

You sober up a bit as you reach the end of this building. The place demands it. Grand trees on either side frame a large metal symbol embedded in glass. You recognize the symbol as the same one you saw in Sed’s pictures, and only now do you remember it had also been on the wall of the Nomai structure you explored on the Attlerock.

You sit for a while to decipher the text on the panel underneath the window. It uses some of the same vocabulary you struggled with on the Attlerock. The… face? The face of everything, or of stars. Star-have-everything. Universe. The face- no, the Eye. The Eye of the universe.

You look up at the symbol again. You guess you can see an eye in it, although it looks more like a star to you. It made a sound, or a call, which brought the Nomai to this solar system, which means they were from somewhere else before! The thought is dizzying. Where was home to these people? And how did they manage to make such a clearly loved home in a place that was foreign to them?

But then you start doubting your translation when the panel reads that this Eye is older than the universe. That doesn’t… that doesn’t seem right. You must be translating this poorly.

“Open your head—no, mind—to the… could-be things. Possibilities,” you mutter aloud. Open your mind to the possibilities. You tilt your head to the side as you repeat the phrase. Hm.

The three panels being watched over by this Eye remind you at first of the ones you found before, the debate in the snowy area. But, on translating, you realize these are very different. For one, none of them are signed. For another, none of them are refuted, or even very thoroughly expounded on. Each line carries an independent thought, a… a possibility, you suppose. Each one treated as equal in such a way that they could all be simultaneously true or simultaneously false at once. There are no scratch marks or circled lines of dialogue to indicate, hey, those ones are wrong, this is the right theory, this one is real. There’s no conclusion. Just a collection of concurrent possibilities.

It leaves you with an odd, uneasy, weightless feeling. Like you’re being forced to face the fact that the destination you need to be flying toward isn’t on your map. You wonder if that is the intent. Did the Nomai leave this place feeling lost? Or did they leave these panels with a burning desire to find?

You don’t know. You don’t think you could ever be big or smart or good enough to take on the Nomai’s search. At the same time, though, you don’t think you’re being asked to.

You’re the observer of the Nomai, not of the Eye—you’re the thing not alive here, the ghost. Someone else is meant to answer the Eye’s call, not you. That you are sure of.

Your thoughts are reflected by more writing you find etched on the wall while leaving. It is still about the eye, but different this time, somehow both more straightfoward and logical but also more personal.

I suspect imagining we are special to the Eye in some way is wishful thinking, you translate slowly, carefully. The Eye might have called out to any sentient species. — Or it might not have been calling out at all, and that my ancestors heard the Eye’s signal holds no great, deep meaning. — This wouldn’t be so bad, I think.

“I agree, Solanum,” you reply. “We’re not special, and that’s… that’s okay! We don’t have to be!”

Your in-suit radio crackles to life. “-in. Come in, Riebeck! Do you copy?” Hornfels’ signal is scratchy at first, then comes in clearly. Oh, has it been 18 hours already? No, it’s been just over 13 hours. Why are they calling so soon?

“I copy, Hornfels! I can’t wait to show you what I’ve recorded, it’s just… wow, Hornfels, it’s spectacular!”

“Oh, thank the stars. Where are you right now?”

“I’m in the Hanging City! Can you believe it? The real Hanging City, specifically in some sort of shrine built by the Nomai for something called ‘the Eye of the universe.’”

“Riebeck, you are in grave danger. You need to return to your ship as fast-” the signal crackles, then fades out.

You shouldn’t be surprised by how quickly your facade falls away.

You’re flung back into yourself with all the violent velocity of one of the Lantern’s meteors. You’re not the agile and weightless Ghost of Brittle Hollow, untethered by both gravity and consequence. You’re Riebeck. You’re dizzy and dehydrated and starting to hyperventilate.

“Hornfels? Hornfels, are you still there?” There’s no response.

You hurry upstairs towards the exit of the shrine and are met with a gap. It’s a much shorter gap than some of the others you encountered, the flooring on either side seems stable, and there’s nothing in your way. You could jump this without your jetpack. But there’s nothing, nothing beneath it, nothing to catch a fall except that great crushing orb of everything far below.

You can do this. You can. You did it a bunch of times just a little while ago. Could you build a bridge out of furniture or something? No, idiot! Just go!

You can hear your breath wheezing. Calm down, your oxygen is getting low! Should you go back to the two trees to fill up? No, that’s a terrible idea. Go forward, you can get to the trees in the snowy area.

You toe up to the edge of the platform. Are you near- whoa, okay, do not look down. Do not look at your feet, or the floor, or anything. Just go. Just go!

You leap across, pushing your jetpack at full boost. It’s way too much. You hit the angled ceiling of ice above you, skid off of it to the left, boost to the right as hard as you can, and still barely land where you wanted to, getting thrown to your belly in the process.

You lay there on the ground, heaving. Why did you come here? What made you think you were good enough an astronaut to make it all the way out here and also survive the trip back?

You’re still on the ground when you hear Chert’s voice through the radio this time. “-beck, are you there?”

“I’m-” you have to stop and cough a few times. “I’m here.”

Chert sounds immensely relieved. “Goodness, Riebeck, we keep losing you. Are you okay?”

Not really. “Y-yeah, I think so.”

“Okay, the black holes are interfering with the radio signals, so Hornfels and I are going to have to tag team here. Are you headed toward your ship?”

Shakily, you pull yourself to your feet. “Yeah, I’m- I’m working on it,” you say. Then you pause. “B-black holes? Plural?”

“Yes. Yes.” Chert’s voice sounds distant, even with the speaker right next to your ear. “I’m so sorry, Riebeck. I should have seen it. The orbital calculations weren’t lining up, and I should have- I should have known. It’s so obvious, and it’s been staring down at me this whole time, but I didn’t-” The signal sputters out again.

You kind of wish you had stayed lying on the floor. Why is there more than one black hole? Did the supernova produce one? But, from what you understand, the sun was only big enough to produce a neutron star. Oh, what do you know, you’re an archaeologist, not an astrophysicist.

A series of beeps warn you that your oxygen tank has only three minutes worth of air remaining. So you carefully drop down to the first floor of this building and hurry back out to the walkway. Here, you pause for a moment and look out over the bridge that leads back to the Crossroads, gripping the railing tightly. Now that both the right and left sides of the bridge are out, you won’t be able to get back to your ship the way you came.

Thankfully, as you were exploring the Meltwater District you discovered a small gap that led to the surface of the planet. At the time, you had cringed away from it. Even the little sliver of sky you could see looked so unnatural without any stars. Still, you are glad to have an exit that won’t force you to navigate the broken bridge. Your jetpack fuel is dangerously low as it is.

You’ve refilled your oxygen at the trees beside those debate boards and are making your way up the multitudes of stairs to the surface when Hornfels connects with you again. “Riebeck, can you hear me now?”

You clutch at the radio transmitter on your suit as if doing so will hold Hornfels in place. “Yes, I can! What’s going on? Chert said that, that, that there are more black holes?”

Hornfels' voice is jittery with what sounds like a mix of anxiety, exhaustion, and caffeine. “We can only stay in contact as long as the black holes are not between us and you. Yes, there are two black holes. Brittle Hollow’s, and the one that formed after the supernova of our star. Brittle Hollow’s orbit has been altered in a way that we now recognize as it spiraling into an inevitable merger of the black holes.”

Your steps stutter to a stop as your brain tries to catch up one word at a time with what it just heard. Orbit? Spiraling? “Merger?” your voice squeaks, “W-what, uh, what does that… what?”

“It means the black holes are going to collide with each other, Riebeck!” Hornfels shouts. “It means you have to get to your ship as fast as you can!”

The urgency in their voice spurs you into motion. You climb out of the icy hole to what your HUD minimap tells you is the surface of the north pole. It feels like you’ve gone blind. The only things visible to you are those that are lit by the flashlight on your helmet. Everything else is pure darkness. You have no way of knowing where the horizon is, where the ground ends and the sky begins. It all looks the same.

“If you can get to your ship, we have a plan to help you escape the immense combined gravity of the two black holes. What you’re going to do is-” The radio signal fizzles out again.

You slap the transmitter a couple times. “No, come on! I don’t- I, I don’t know what to do!”

You spin around helplessly. South, you just have to go south, your ship is at the south pole. You can pick any direction you want, just move.

You spot some light not far in the distance, so that’s the direction you start running. It’s hard not to trip over the icy rocks in your way, all your attention is directed at your feet.

The lights, you soon discover, are more of those wonderful Nomai light fixtures attached to a crumbling building. One of them that had fallen to the ground draws your eyes to a jetpack tank lying abandoned under a series of written notes.

You don’t even bother to refuel, just snatching up the tank and with shaking hands replacing it with your nearly empty one. “Thank you, thank you Feldspar.”

“Riebeck?”

“Feldspar?!”

“Feldspar? No, it’s Chert.”

“O-oh, Chert. Hornfels keeps cutting out, they said that there is going to be a, a merger? Of the, of the…” You can’t finish the sentence.

“Of the black holes, yes, Riebeck. The orbit of Brittle Hollow had been pulling closer and closer to the solar black hole.”

As you continue running south, you see another small blessing on the horizon. What at first looks like the sun itself you realize is Hollow’s Lantern, no longer spitting balls of magma, burning so brightly relative to the darkness that it almost hurts your eyes to look at. It provides just enough light to the ground in front of you that you can safely speed up, using your jetpack to boost you forward.

“How- how is that possible?” you pant.

“It shouldn’t be, that’s the problem!” Chert exclaims. “They said- they kept telling me I was missing something. I should have believed them. The orbital calculations were all off, but it wasn’t Hornfels fault, it was mine.”

They? They who, Hornfels? Before you can ask for clarity, Chert continues, “The calculations we were using ran off the assumed mass of the black hole. But the- I know, you don’t have to remind me! The radius of the event horizon indicates that its mass is nearly four times that of our original star.”

“What? That doesn’t make any sense!”

“I know it doesn’t, I’m sorry! I tried to rely on my own understanding of the logic of this situation, and failed to-”

They cut out again.

Your oxygen refills as you reach your old camp at the equator. You boost up over the canyon, then have to boost down hard. You almost think it’s not going to be enough, you can feel the tug of gravity trying to pull you away from the planet, but you manage to get your feet on solid ground.

Thanks to the light of Hollow’s Lantern and the odd glow bending up from around the black hole, you can see that there is very little in front of you. In fact, you can make out the entirety of the south pole glacier, all the way from the dome at the top to the spires of ice far down past the surface. You can make it out because between you and that, only a small outcropping of the surface of Brittle Hollow remains. Everything else is just… empty.

“Riebeck, can you hear me now?” Hornfels again.

“I’m here! I can’t, there’s a gap…”

“You do not have much time. Brittle Hollow is now orbiting the black hole at a distance closer than even the Twins. Listen to me very carefully. You will not be able to escape the gravity of the black hole by flying straight toward Timber Hearth. You will need to perform a gravity assist maneuver with Ember and Ash Twin and combine their angular momentum with your ship’s thrust to-” They cut out.

“A gravity assist?!” you cry. “You mean a… a…”

“A slingshot maneuver?” Chert, now, finishes your sentence. You realize, suddenly, that there’s a light you can make out in the distance. You thought at first that it was another glowing ball of magma sailing past. But there’s a specific trail of smoke leading from it, and it… that…

That’s a campfire. That’s Chert’s campfire. That’s Ember Twin. You are passing so close to Ember Twin that you can make out Chert’s camp.

It disappears below the horizon as Chert continues. “No, Riebeck, that won’t work, you’re not going to have the velocity to even reach the Twins. What you have to do is attempt to maintain a stable orbit with the, I can’t believe this, with what is currently a binary black hole system. Then you will gradually and methodically use your ship’s thrust to expand that orbit until you are able to escape the-” Static.

“Maintain a stable orbit? How? How am I supposed to do that?”

You can make out, now, a splotch of light farther in the distance that might be Timber Hearth’s village. But it’s… it’s moving so fast! Or maybe, no, no it isn’t. You’re moving that fast, Brittle Hollow’s current orbit must be moving at incredible speeds, and accelerating if the shorter and shorter connection intervals with Hornfels and Chert indicate anything.

“No no no, Riebeck, do not attempt to enter the orbit of these black holes!” Hornfels exclaims, loud enough over your speakers to make you wince. “You will surely run out of jet fuel before you manage to escape if you attempt that. Stick to the plan, go-” Static.

“I’m- I’m not even at my ship yet!”

“You’re not at your ship yet?!” yells Chert. “What are you waiting for? Go! Go!”

You go. You- oh, oh no, you’re going!

You launch yourself across the gap. Then you go higher, and higher, that’s too high, that’s way too high, the gravity-

You thrust downward, and you see the full expanse of Brittle Hollow’s black hole beneath you. You clench your eyes shut, screaming.

You crash into snow, tumble, bounce up, roll a couple times, then are brought to a standstill by the metal and glass dome at the south pole.

“Riebeck, are you okay?! I heard screaming!”

You’re not sure which way is up. You don’t think you’re injured, but you’re crying anyway. You’re terrified. You don’t want to be here.

“Riebeck, are you listening? Are you at your ship yet?”

Why is this so hard for you now? You were doing great earlier! Before, in the Hanging City, you weren’t like this. You didn’t care about danger, or risk.

“Riebeck, you need to keep moving, I know it’s-”

You wish you were back there again. You wish you weren’t so afraid.

“Riebeck, you have-”

How do you get that feeling back?

“Riebeck?”

How do you stop being so afraid of dying?

“RIEBECK!”

Oh, maybe that’s it.

You flip a switch on the transmitter on your suit. Your radio goes silent, not even static playing at you.

Slowly, you roll to your feet. Oof, okay, your knee and ankle don’t feel good, maybe you’re a little hurt. They’re not broken, you think, just sprained. Hopefully.

You limp to your ship, having to tug at the hatch a few times to break the ice that formed around the edges.

You climb into the pilot’s chair and sit down, pressing all the buttons and flipping all the switches needed to fire it up. “I… I can’t die,” you tell yourself weakly as your ship’s engines hum then sing then roar to life.

You try to open the map display, but it just displays an error message of “CANNOT CONNECT TO SATELLITE. TRY REBOOTING.” Right, no sun means no power for the satellite. That’s fine. “That’s fine,” you say. “No it’s not. It’s not fine, um, not at all. I’m... I'm going to deal with it anyway.”

Your stomach feels like it’s spinning in circles. Then you notice the bauble beside your console, a polished glass sphere hanging from a chain, swinging slowly around in those same circles. “These balls move on their own!” the museum placard in your memory helpfully reminds you. Well, at least you have some indicator of where the other black hole is.

You feel your ship starting to shift before you even put your hand on the control stick. With just a single light burst from the engines, you’re levitating in the air.

“I can’t die,” you remind yourself. You can see Brittle Hollow’s black hole below you in the core. It looks back at you.

“I can’t die. I can’t be killed.” You pitch forward, down, at the mouth of the universe that would so happily chew up all your bones. Gravity assist maneuver. Slingshot. You can’t believe you’re about to-

“I can’t die!” you shout at your thoughts. “I can’t be seen! I’m a dead thing walking!”

With both hands, you push the stick as far as it will go. Your engines rumble and roar like thunder, and you careen toward the black hole.

You urge your thrusters forward, forward, then forward and up up up. The light of you warps around the void’s thin skin.

“I CAN’T DIE!” you scream. “I AM THE GHOST OF BRITTLE HOLLOW!”

The belly of your ship skims along the black hole. You see four, then six, then ten or twelve connected chunks of the planet’s crust break away. But instead of falling down, they fall up, away from the planet, then disappear in a blast of purple sparks. You follow them, sailing at great speed through the gap they create.

Suddenly, you can’t see anything. No crust, no black hole, just darkness. But your little bauble indicates that the solar black hole is somewhere in front of and above you.

You gun your dorsal and aft boosters hard. The bauble beside you turns clockwise towards the ceiling slowly, so slowly. Seventy degrees. Ninety degrees. One hundred ten. One hundred thirty. One hundred fifty.

You and your ship shutter and flex violently. It feels like all your bones spread out then condense, like the worst g-force training of your life. It happens again, and you cry out, sure you’re being torn in half.

Your bauble points directly at the back of your ship, then slowly falls down to a resting position, pointing down at the ground created by the artificial gravity of the Nomai crystal behind you.

Did-did you make it? Are you-

Oh that’s Timber Hearth right in front of you isn’t it.

You yelp and pull back and up as hard as you can. You’re too late to overshoot, your ship rattles as it breaches the atmosphere. Your headlights illuminate the launch pad and the trees around it before one of your landing legs clips the edge of the crater and sends you tumbling through the air.

Thankfully, the cliffside also slowed you enough that when you hit the ground, your ship only rolls three or four times before skidding to a stop. Multiple alerts ring and flash and beep at you from your console. It would be neat if your body had alerts like that. You can’t really tell what might be broken right now. The reactor isn’t one of the alerts, at least, and you can’t really bring yourself to care about the rest of them. You're really, really tired all of a sudden. You kind of want to take a nap...

You jostle and blink awake as you hear someone call, “Riebeck! Are you hurt?”

“Who?” you mumble dazedly, turning to look in the direction of the voice.

“You, dummy!” Marl’s face appears in the circle where your ship’s hatch should be. Huh, it must have gotten ripped off at some point. You’ll have to get Slate to buff that out. “Did you hit your head? Don’t move around too much.”

You ignore them, clambering out of the ship to their protests. “I- I feel fine actually. My knee and ankle don’t even hurt anymore!”

Slate is at your side now too, somehow. “What were you thinking, Riebeck, you came in way too hot!”

Something compels you to point at them, wink, and say “No, you’re too hot.” Then you giggle, which turns into doubled-over, hysterical laughs while Slate and Marl look at you like you’re crazy. “That doesn’t even mean anything!” you choke out.

“Go back! They’re okay, go back to the observatory!” Slate yells at what you see is Gossan and Hal running towards you. Then Slate climbs into your ship, presumably to turn it off. Oops, forgot that part.

You follow after Gossan and Hal, stumbling a bit. “Riebeck?” Marl calls after you.

“I’m fine! I want to tell Hornfels about what I found!” You march confidently back to the village, only having to catch your balance a few times on the flat ground. You feel great! Your leg feels kind of weird, but you feel amazing otherwise!

You manage to climb back down into the crater, Marl close behind you, and your hands are shaking really badly but you’re doing awesome! Even if it’s kind of hard to breathe and it feels like your vision can’t keep up with your head when you turn it!

You take a couple steps toward the observatory, and there’s Gabbro and Sed and…

And a, uh…

Um.

Oh, actually, maybe you don’t feel-

Everything goes black.

Chapter Text

“Hornfels, do you read? I lost contact with Riebeck, I can’t hear them at all anymore!”

Timber Hearth and the Twins are, at the moment, on the same side of the binary black hole system currently tearing apart any radio signals that try to cross it. “I read you, Chert, I lost them too,” replies Hornfels’ tense voice. “Do you have a visual on them?”

You don’t. You’re looking frantically, but you can’t see them. You might be able to with your telescope, but everything is moving too fast to track. You cannot see Brittle Hollow directly, but its Lantern is still with it, whipping around the solar black hole together with its planet closer and faster than even that one Nomai satellite had once orbited around the sun.

You are buffeted by another gravitational wave as Brittle Hollow swings past, and this one drags you to your knees. But there, among purple splashes of glowing material as pieces of Brittle Hollow fall past the event horizon, you see it. Two tiny stars of flame, their light bent but not stolen by the black hole.

“I see them, I see them!” you shout. “Go, Riebeck, go, go!”

“They’re not gonna make it,” Arkose states with a pitying shake of their head.

“They have to,” you say quietly. “Please, Riebeck, go.”

You can’t hear Hornfels’ response, by now the black holes are between you and Timber Hearth. The twin stars of Riebeck’s thrusters are dimmed and stretched beyond visibility.

Another gravitational wave stretches then compresses every atom of you, and you fall to the ground and curl up like you could hold yourself together. It hurts, but not like the burning of the supernova. It hurts from the inside out.

Sed comes and crouches over to you, unfazed by the violent waves. They click their tongue at you and say, “I’m not gonna lie, you look kinda pathetic like this.”

“Am I going to die?” you ask.

They raise a brow at you. “What, you think you’ve earned that yet?”

Another wave washes through you, and the last thing you hear is a laughing “Bedtime!” as your lights go out.

You’re not sure how long it takes you to wake up, but you do wake up, against all odds. Your head is throbbing, and you are pretty sure you could count your bones by the ache you feel in each one, but you’re alive. You sit up slowly and immediately have to squint.

Far in the distance, brighter than your campfire, bright enough even to overcome the dark fog that envelops the solar system, is a beam of light.

It emanates from the top and bottom of a small, defined point. You recognize it as that distant and unmoving white spot that, despite your best efforts, you haven’t been able to identify beyond recognizing that it is most likely not a star. It had dimmed over the hours after the supernova, and from certain angles was eclipsed or obscured by equally unidentifiable geometric chunks of material.

Now, though, this little pinhole in the dark fabric of the universe shines as if a laser points through it. Two lines of luminous material violently erupt from its poles. Nearest to the source, they have all the strength and definition of a blowtorch’s flame. Then for a great distance they remain defined, but increasingly mottled, like the beam of a flashlight shining through smoke. Then, at their eventual terminus, they dissipate and wisp away in a manner that suggests to you that these are not simply beams of light, but pressurized jets of superheated gas. In unison they sputter out briefly, flickering and worsening your headache, before erupting steadily again. If they were not perpendicular to the orbital plane of the solar system, one of them would probably be long enough to reach the black hole itself.

The black hole.

You twist and look over your shoulders. You can’t immediately make out where the black hole is currently. Has the merger completed? You aren’t experiencing any more of those gravitational waves, so it must have.

High-pitched feedback screeches through your radio, and you wince and hurry to lower the volume. Staticky, jumbled sounds burble at you, before slowly clarifying into Hornfels’ familiar voice. “Testing, testing, testing,” you hear them say, voice strung out and weak. “Come on, radio, work.”

“Hornfels, I hear you!”

You hear a shuttering gasp. “Chert! Stars, Chert, you’re okay?”

You are alive. Somehow, you are alive. “I am. What happened? Where is Riebeck?”

It sounds like Hornfels is having trouble catching their breath, like they’re trying not to cry. “Chert, I didn’t… I thought I had lost you.” They swallow loudly before continuing. “Riebeck’s okay. They crashed near the village, but they’re okay.”

“YES!” you cheer, letting yourself fall back again and kicking at the ground. “Yes, Riebeck! You brilliant astronaut, you did it!”

“Are you safe, Chert? Are you injured?” Hornfels asks.

You slowly sit up again, still giddy. “I got knocked out during some of those last few gravitational waves, but I think I’m okay.”

“Is your helmet intact? Your ship? Much of the non-tempered glass here shattered, including the primary mirror of the telescope here in the observatory, and it seems that some larger structures in the village collapsed.”

“My helmet is polycarbonate, not glass, it’s fine.” Glancing out at the distance, you are surprised to notice that you can just make out your ship. The light cast on the ground here from the distant jet is not quite that of the Attlerock on a dark night back on Timber Hearth, but it might as well be full daylight compared to what you’ve gotten used to. “My ship seems to be intact, too, as far as I can tell from here.” Then you startle. “Wait, the village? Is everyone okay?”

You hear Hornfels take a shaky breath. “I- I don’t know that yet. I will tell you when I have more information. But we need to focus on you right now, Chert. We need to get you back to Timber Hearth.”

You stand up, wobbly on your feet like a tadpole. Tephra mocks you, swaying dramatically and throwing themself to the ground, making Galena laugh.

You turn away with embarrassment and mute your radio microphone. “Please, just stop. You’re not real,” you remind them. Yourself. You remind yourself.

Mica rolls their eyes hard enough that their head is pulled along with it. “You really want to go over this again? First, you got the age of the universe entirely wrong. Then you got hit by a supernova and didn’t die, but you’re cool with that being real I guess. And you didn’t even notice that the black hole is over four times bigger than it should be and nearly got Riebeck killed because of it. Do you really think your perspective of reality is worth anything?”

This isn’t the first time in the past several hours you’ve had this argument. There’s a logic to it, and you hate it. If there wasn’t, you could blame your head not being screwed on right. You could blink them away, leave them on the peripheral of your vision and ignore them. But you ignored what the stars were telling you, too, and look where that got you.

“Chert?” Hornfels calls.

You turn your microphone back on. “Give me a minute to get my bearings again.”

You determine what tools you immediately have access to. Your telescope’s mirror was small enough to avoid shattering, it seems, but the image it reflects is blurry. It will need to be taken apart and realigned. Your Little Scout seems to be unaffected, thankfully. It’s one of the most useful tools you have, and the one you’ll need for your current observation goals.

The first order of business is to figure out the new radius of the merged black hole, and from that determine its mass and gravitational acceleration. But to do that, you need to know where the black hole is.

You look around for light source options. Your usual go-tos are Dark Bramble, although its mysterious glowing core can be very hard to detect in the fog without a telescope, and Hollow’s Lantern, which doesn’t exist anymore.

The thought hits you hard and all at once. Hollow’s Lantern and Brittle Hollow have been destroyed. The solar system now has only five planets. You swallow down the bile rising in your throat. It seems so incredibly, confoundingly wrong.

Mica groans. “Ugh, can you get over yourself? There’s math to do.”

Tephra points with a foot from where they lie in the dirt. “Yeah, there’s a super bright light you can use right there!”

Right. Right, the jets. You look up and see the line of them slicing through the sky. You take a deep breath and focus your attention on them.

“Are you seeing this, Hornfels? The light?” you ask.

“I can’t see much of anything without my telescope,” Hornfels snaps. They only speak sharply like this when they’re very stressed.

“You don’t need it, just look outside, you should see it if Timber Hearth is facing away from the black hole.”

You hear Hornfels shuffling and the clatter and ruffle of one of the observatory’s fabric awnings being retracted. Distantly, you make out, “There isn’t any- oh. Oh!”

At the same time, the light of the jets begins to bend. Perfect, just what you were looking for. You turn on your HUD’s angle display, raise your scout launcher to a careful 70 degrees from the ground, and fire.

You monitor your scout to ensure that it escapes the gravity of the Twins and begins to make an orbit around the black hole without falling in. You’ve practiced this maneuver quite a bit. Get the Little Scout on the opposite side of the astral body you’re measuring, subtract the distance of the body from the scout and the body from your position on Ember Twin, and you’ve got a rough idea of that body’s diameter. It’s messy and awkward, but it works. It was by this method you determined the diameter of the sun when you first landed on Ember Twin as a fresh, green astronaut. It was also by this method that you had finally realized that the black hole was much larger than you had originally assumed.

But before your scout can reach the other side of the black hole, you already know something is off. Just by watching the light of the jets bend and loop around its event horizon, you can tell it isn’t significantly larger than it was before the merger.

“I mean, are you surprised?” Sed says, shrugging. “You know what it would mean for you if the black hole was the size you thought it was going to be. You got a lucky break!”

The jets sputter again, like when the gas line gets kinked in a rocket fire test. They go out once, twice, then burn steadily. But with each sputter, the ring of light stretched around the black hole is visibly thinner and wider.

You understand immediately what it is you’re seeing. The heaviness of this understanding creeps over you, weighing down your feet, then legs, then torso and hands and arms, all the way up to your neck as if you’re being buried alive. It’s familiar, conclusive, and morbidly comforting, like the diagnosis of a terminal illness. You don’t have the empirical proof of your discovery yet, but you will soon. Your lucky break will be very short lived.

You make note of the distance recorded by your Little Scout, recall it, and send it out again at a slightly different angle. As you wait for it to make its orbit again, you sit down at your drum. “Y’all want to dance?”

“Yeah!” shout Arkose and Tephra in unison. Galena waves their hands excitedly, and Sed picks them up and throws them over their shoulder, making the little one giggle. “Really? Now?” Mica deadpans.

“Hornfels, mind playing something on the radio I can drum along to?”

“I’m sorry, I was talking to Gossan and Hal. Say it again?”

You tap a rapid drumroll. “Music, please, play us some music!”

“...Chert, you need to get to your ship.”

“I’ve got the scout out now, I’ll get you some data shortly.”

Their voice is quieter, shakier. “There’s still time. There has to be. Please don’t give up. You have to come home.”

Your eyes flutter shut for a moment. “You and I both know that isn’t going to happen. Please, Hornfels. Play something.”

They are silent for a moment, and you hold your breath. You exhale with relief when they take the noise gate off the radio and you can hear the sounds of the observatory, the hum of their computers and the tap their footsteps on the wooden floor.

You all have never really managed to find a better or more elegant way to play music and talk over the radio at the same time. You probably could have, but you never bothered. Turns out, between the bursts of discovery and realization, science has a lot of slow and boring parts. It wasn’t uncommon for Hornfels or Hal to turn on some music to entertain the three of you while you wait for a computer simulation to render or data to roll in. You’d hear Hornfels tapping their desk or monitors with pencils as they try to copy your drumming, and Hal is particularly good at making up lyrics on the spot to whatever you are listening to.

Despite the lack of the typical giddy, bored, stayed-up-too-late energy, the procedure remains the same. Open up the noise gate so that you can hear everything in the observatory through the microphone, put something in the cassette player, and turn it the right volume so that you can hear it over the radio without drowning out each others’ voices.

An old song starts playing, one that was recorded before anyone in your village was born. It starts slow, but becomes increasingly loud and brash and playful as it goes on. It’s one of your favorites.

You begin to drum along, tapping the rim of your instrument in a sharp repeating pattern along with the opening notes of the music. The hatchlings cheer and begin swinging each other around and stomping to the beat. At the same time, Gossan speaks over the radio. “Chert, Riebeck is home safe now. You can no longer help them by remaining at your camp. You need to go to your ship immediately while we make a plan to get you to safety.”

Hal speaks up loudly in the background. “The fact that we’re even talking to you means the merged black hole hasn’t drawn in the Twins like you thought it would. You can leave! You still have a chance to come back.”

You put down your drumstick for a moment and recall your Little Scout at the apex of its orbit, again recording the distance. “Okay, Hornfels, do you have the gravitational acceleration calculator and orbit predictor up? I have two new data points for you.”

“The data points don’t matter, I can’t do anything with them!” Hornfels shouts. “My algorithms have proven unreliable at every juncture. We nearly lost Riebeck because of it!”

“No, no, Hornfels, your math is perfect,” you urge gently. “The only times they have failed was when the data was bad. I keep making assumptions about what is true, and that’s what gets us in trouble. As soon as I actually measured the diameter of the black hole instead of using the size we logically assumed, the results of your algorithm matched exactly with what we observed. Plug in these two data points: 479 meters and 488 meters.”

You continue drumming as you wait for a result. You hear through the open mic Hal ask, “Why are they acting like this?” Nobody gives them the answer.

Hornfels speaks quietly, but you can still make them out. “The first data point indicates that the black hole has increased in mass and is at eight percent of what we predicted its mass to be after the merger. The second data point gives us 14%.”

You nod, although they can’t see it. That’s about what you expected. You stand and fire off your scout again. “I’ll be able to confirm this with a couple more passes of my scout, but it appears that the black hole is expanding in intermittent bursts that seem to coincide with the flickering of the astrophysical jets that have appeared at the far end of the solar system. I have no idea why the merger expansion would be delayed, maybe it’s some kind of time dilation effect from the black hole that we just don’t understand, but I believe that within the next several minutes the black hole will achieve the size and mass we had predicted.”

Nobody says anything, and the only sound you hear is the music from the cassette. “Great, now you’ve gone and scared them off!” Tephra exclaims, tossing their hands into the air. You did throw a lot of information at them at once. Should you have kept this to yourself? Are they better off not knowing, like with the impending death of the universe?

You are considering turning off your radio and cutting off communication completely when Hornfels speaks again. “There still could be something we’re not accounting for. You-”

The rest of their sentence is drowned out when Hal exclaims, “Sed! What are you doing here?”

“What’s going on?” Sed replies.

You look up to see the… the fake Sed in your camp laughing. “It’s me! Oh, this is super funny,” they say, then clap their hands together. “Wait, I have an idea. Galena, you be Hal. Tephra can be Gossan, Arkose can be Hornfels.”

Mica rolls their eyes and sits down at your telescope. “And I’ll just eat dirt, I guess.”

“But I want to be Gossan!” Arkose whines.

Sed puts a finger to their lips, “Shh, stick to the plan. Ready?”

The four participating hatchlings line up shoulder to shoulder and take a bow, as if putting on a campfire performance. The stage is lit by the flickering astrophysical jets, and their acting is backed by the increasing intensity of your drumming and the music playing over the radio.

Tephra, now wearing Gossan’s helmet, steps forward first, putting a disapproving hand on their hip and pointing a finger at Sed. “You shouldn’t be up here, you should be resting in bed still. It’s not safe for you to be moving around this much.”

Sed crosses their arms. “I’m fine, the village is a mess anyway, it’s no safer there than here.”

Arkose, sporting a turtleneck, jumps forward and asks, “Is anyone hurt?”

“No,” Sed replies, “Riebeck is passed out outside, but everyone else is fine. I left Solanum outside with them and Marl. What is happening?”

Tephra shakes their head hard enough that the helmet falls over their eyes. “Hatchling, this doesn’t concern you. Go sit in the museum. Hal, Gabbro, you should go too. Hornfels and I will stay with Chert.”

Oh, is Gabbro in this scene too? You’re not sure how to feel about that. You’d really rather them not have to see you like this. Or, that is, hear you.

“Someone just give me the bullet points of what you know,” Sed insists.

Galena steps forward this time, already sporting Hal’s bandanna. “There was a supernova, Sed.”

“I know that, next point, we don’t have all day,” says Sed.

Galena flaps their mouth and gestures enthusiastically, not quite in time with the words. “Instead of creating a neutron star like we would expect from a star the size of our sun, it created a black hole four times more massive than the sun. We don’t know why or how. That black hole just now merged with Brittle Hollow’s black hole, and Riebeck barely managed to escape back to Timber Hearth. The combined black hole is not as big as we would think from the merger, but Chert says it is getting bigger. If it reaches the expected merged mass, its gravity will be great enough to drag the Twins into itself and destroy them, but Chert is refusing to take this opportunity to leave!”

Arkose ducks their head, hiding it dramatically in the crook of their arm. “They can’t.”

Galena turns to Hornfels- or, to Arkose… Galena turns with a confused frown. “What? Why?”

You record the distance of your scout, recall it, and fire it again. You could take this moment to explain, but you have no desire to interrupt the performance. You duck your head and play your drums.

Tephra says with a serious frown, “Their ship doesn’t have enough fuel or power. Riebeck refueled at the Attlerock before going to Brittle Hollow. Chert’s ship is at half a tank, and it is the old single-engine style ship. It won’t be able to achieve to force necessary to escape a black hole of this magnitude.”

Hal looks between Gossan and Arkose… no, wait, that’s- “Did… did you know this the whole time? Why didn’t you say anything?”

Hornfels has their face in their hands and is sniffling around their words. “Chert asked us not to. We didn’t want to upset you or Riebeck.”

Galena’s ears droop. “So, so… so Chert’s just going to…”

Sed interrupts the sad moment. “Wait, the sun’s black hole merged with Brittle Hollow’s black hole?”

“Yes,” Arkose answers, “We predicted it too late, we didn’t realize how massive the-”

Sed again cuts them off. “Did they put their scout through the combined black hole?”

Hornfels tilts their head, confused. “No, they measured the diameter by sending their scout in orbit to its opposite side. It can’t go straight through, it would be destroyed by the pressure once it breaches the event horizon.”

Sed commands, “Have them send their scout directly through the black hole.”

Arkose shakes their head, raising their hands in a placating gesture. “Sed, I don’t think you understand. A black hole’s gravity produces-”

“Ugh, get out of the way.” Sed pushes through the performers and hops off the wooden stage they all have been standing on. They approach you, and you lean away from them a little. “Chert? You need to send your scout through the black hole. Shoot it directly at the black hole.”

Everyone looks at you expectantly, as if waiting for your line. You look between them. You can’t remember the script. “Oh, but you’re doing such a great job,” you say quietly. “You don’t need me.”

You are met with silence. The hatchlings’ faces slowly fall. You said the wrong thing. The stage was built too close to the campfire, it is starting to burn. Everyone starts to talk at once.

Hal says, “Sed, are you okay?”

Gossan says, “Hatchling, you’re bleeding.”

Sed shouts in your face, “Don’t touch me!”

“I… I didn’t touch you,” you whimper. You couldn’t have, you’re playing your drum.

The stage is on fire. The actors are burning. Sed jumps into the flames rather than interact with you a second more. “I can’t. I can’t talk to them.”

The music and other voices go quiet as the noise gate on the radio is replaced. The performers take a bow as the stage collapses into ash. Through your helmet’s speakers, you hear Gabbro’s voice. “Hiya, Chert.”

Chapter Text

It takes you a long moment to reorient yourself toward having a conversation. Gabbro said hi. You can say hi back. You can say it, and they’ll hear you over the radio the same way you heard them over the radio.

“Hi, Gabbro,” you reply quietly.

You are suddenly torn between asking them to leave and begging them to stay. This wasn’t part of the plan. You are soon going to fall into a black hole, and Hornfels and Gossan agreed to stay with you as long as you would let them, only the two of them. You would get them whatever last data you could, and then you would cut the radio just before the end. That was the plan.

But now Gabbro is here, and Sed, and Hal didn’t leave. You don’t want them to see you like this. You don’t want them to hear you die. You don’t want to hurt them. But now that you’ve heard Gabbro’s voice, you can’t bear the thought of facing the end of yourself alone a second time. You don’t know what to say, you can’t say anything at all. A small sob bubbles out of you before you can cut it off, and you dispel it with a shaky exhale and try not to lose control completely.

Gabbro, thankfully, doesn’t acknowledge your crying, though you’re sure they heard it through the radio. “Nice breath there!” they say with gentle cheerfulness. “Can I get another one? Another slow breath?”

You do as they ask, a small amount of shame burning in your ears. Despite this, though, you start to lose any desire to have them leave. You inhale again, then exhale. “Diameter readings of 515 and 533 meters,” you say, then clarify, “Sorry, those are for Hornfels.”

“Alright, one second.” You distantly hear them repeating to Hornfels. “Hornfels says 32% and 44%.”

Not long, then. Not long at all. Why are you having to go through this twice? Why, both times, was your doom set to such a specific timer? First with the visible expansion of the sun, now with the measurable expansion of the black hole. You could extrapolate the number of minutes until your death. How cruel though, and how fitting, if you got that wrong too?

“Ten, nine, eight,” chants Arkose, “six, fi-” they interrupt themself, collapsing to the ground dramatically with a pained cry as Tephra laughs and joins them and Sed counts on their fingers, confused.

“Or you could get down to zero and then find out you were two minutes early,” Mica suggests. “Wouldn’t that be embarrassing?”

You’re caught between laughing and gagging at the miserable absurdity of it.

“Chert, you still with me?”

You try to focus on Gabbro’s voice instead of the hatchlings. “I am. I’m here.”

“Cool, cool. How about a brain check? What's your head at today, out of ten?”

You really don’t want to think about what your head is at currently. You feel like acknowledging it makes it real. “I’m fine,” you say.

“Fine? Huh, never heard that number before, is it a new one? Combo of ‘five’ and ‘nine,’ maybe?”

Gabbro isn’t going to give up on this. You grit your teeth.

“Don’t think about it too much, just the first number that pops into your head,” Gabbro says in the pause.

“Two,” you manage to spit out. “You?” Neither of you ever gets away with calling for a brain check without it being reflected back on them.

“Oh, a solid three. That’s alright. I’m just gonna do the talking, Sed’s going to do all the thinking for the both of us. What are you at, buddy, a four?”

In the background, you hear Sed shouting, “All three of you need to back off and let me and Gabbro do what we need to do!”

“Oh yeah, at least a four over there,” Gabbro continues. “We’re going to give you some instructions, Chert, think you can follow along?”

You exhale another shaky breath. “I would really rather sit here and play my drum.”

You hear Gabbro move closer to the microphone. “I get that. You know if anybody gets that, it’s me. I promise though, Chert, I’m going to talk you through every step, and it’s going to suck, but it’s going to be worth it. Okay?”

Their voice is low and soothing, urging but calm. They’re not commanding, and they’re not begging, and you know that they will tell you things straight if you ask them to. Still, you don’t know how much fight you have left in you.

Eventually, you reply, “I’ll try.”

You hear Gabbro tap rapidly on something, releasing some excited energy, and you tap along with your drum as if you could take that energy for yourself. “That’s perfect, that’s all I need,” they say. “Alright, Sed needs you to shoot your scout at the black hole. It needs to go into the black hole.”

That will destroy it, but it’s going to be destroyed either now or later, so what do you have to lose? You stand up with your scout launcher and walk to the edge of the island you’re camping on. “You say that like it’s easy to do.”

“Maybe not for anybody else, but for you? You’re a pro at this, you’re a scout master, no shot’s a long shot for you.”

Normally, it would probably be impossible, not that you’ve tried. The scout launcher just does not have the capability of sending the scout with enough power to overcome the angular momentum of the Twins’ orbit and reach the center of the solar system. As it stands, though, the expansion of the black hole works in your favor.

There’s no light source behind the black hole at the moment, but you still know where it is. You can feel it pulling at you, urging your suit, your skin, your blood and bones toward it. You raise your scout launcher and fire. It only has to get close. The black hole will meet it halfway. You just have to wait.

In the ensuing silence, you ask, “Why are you at a three?”

You can hear Gabbro’s mind tune back into the conversation from wherever it had gone off to as clearly as if it was accompanied by a burst of radio static. “What? Say it again?”

“Brain check. Why are you at a three?”

“...Well, there was a supernova.”

Hm. That’s an excuse at best. There was a measured thoughtful pause before the reply, one that was too long to be a premeditated answer but too short to be a genuine one. The truth can often take several minutes at least for Gabbro to put into words. A convincing lie can be made up on the spot. “Diameter of 575.”

“What?”

“For Hornfels.”

“Oh. Right.” A pause. “72%.”

You realize you can’t see the scout’s marker on your HUD anymore. It’s gone. You’re not entirely surprised that it failed to perform an emergency recall, but you are surprised that there is no message reporting a lost signal.

But on the HUD, right on the edge of your peripheral, a tiny white arrow points left. You follow it slowly. It slides upwards slightly as you turn, then floats to the middle of your vision, and you have to squint.

“SCOUT,” it reads, “19.7 km.”

If the tracker is to be believed, the scout is currently located at and quickly moving away from the center point of the astrophysical jets in the far reaches of the solar system.

You press the button on the launcher to take a photo, but you are shown just a square of matte black on the screen. You flip the switch to the rear camera, take another. This time, a square of white but for the curved dark triangles in the corners. You take another photo, and there is more mottled dark in the corners. A third photo, and you realize the white shape in the center is spherical and now partially obscured by geometric shadows. Around the boundary of the white shape, unidentifiable objects smear and stretch across its edges.

“My scout is… it moved,” you report, too stunned to muster any professionalism. “It’s far away. It’s by the jets.”

You hear Gabbro repeating this away from the microphone. Then they tell you, “Sed says they don’t know what that means. It should be near the white hole.”

“The white hole?”

Another pause. “They say it looks like a big circle of light with warped edges.”

“That’s… yes, that roughly describes what I’m looking at.”

You hear Sed shouting in the background. Another long pause, and Gabbro says, “You’re going to have to slow down if you want me to relay all that, buddy.”

There is feedback as the microphone is violently jostled, followed by Sed’s taut voice shaking with adrenaline. “Stuff that fell into the black hole inside Brittle Hollow would come out the white hole unharmed, so when the two black holes merged, they got connected to the white hole too.” They pause, panting heavily and struggling to catch their breath. “So if the Twins fall in the black hole, they should come out of the white hole.”

A white hole. It’s a term that’s not entirely unfamiliar to you. It mainly existed as a silly thought experiment that you and Hornfels had constructed and quickly discarded on a brainstorming day that involved a bottle of sap wine shared between you.

“So if a black hole is like a space mouth that eats everything,” Arkose posits with a hand on their chin, “a white hole is like-”

Tephra quickly clamps their hands down over Arkose’s mouth. “Ew, don’t be gross!” they laugh.

Their analogy is not much less complex than what you and Hornfels had tossed around. But neither of you could come up with any observable evidence of such a possibility, nor math that could logically support it.

Mica claps as if impressed. “Wow, keeping up the track record of failing to see stuff right in front of you! Good sciencing, smarty pants!”

You sit back down at your drum and tap out a buh-dah, buh-dah, buh-dah, like a heartbeat. It really, really, really shouldn’t be possible. But then you catch something red in the corner of your eye.

Swinging wide past you, in an arc more like that of the Interloper than any of the planets, Hollow’s Lantern slowly meanders by.

“Huh,” you say. It’s the most insightful thing you’ve said all day.

“You still with us, Chert?” Gabbro asks.

“I guess,” you reply.

A bit farther from the microphone, they ask, “You want to take over?”

“No,” Sed answers, whispering but still close enough to the microphone to make out, “I’m going to pass out. There’s probably stuff from Brittle Hollow around the white hole still, they need to get out of the way.”

The mic creaks as it is adjusted again. “Okay, Chert, ready to move?” Gabbro says.

You sob again suddenly, for no apparent reason. You’re so confused, and you’re so exhausted. You feel like you’ve been kicked around like a ball. Are you going to die or not? How many times are you going to painfully drag yourself on broken legs so close to the peak of this mountain of realization, the conclusion, the understanding of inevitability and a peaceful acceptance of it, only to be thrown all the way down to the bottom to start all over again? You don’t want to move. You want to shut down. You wish you could separate from your body and drift away from it blind and deaf and so blessedly empty of thoughts.

Your breath shudders again, and Galena whispers in your ear, “Crybaby.”

“Stop it!” you cry, standing up. You want to clasp your hands over your ears, but you’re blocked by your helmet. “Stop, just stop.”

Gabbro hums a quiet note and says, “Chert, would you mind telling me what 17 times 19 is?”

It’s a grounding technique. You almost say that out loud, since it's kind of funny, but you can only catch your breath enough to say, “I’m okay.”

“That’s good to hear, but darn it if I still don’t know what 17 times 19 is.”

You clench your eyes shut and break the numbers down into pieces.

“Seven times two is 14. Ten times two is 20. Fourteen plus twenty is 34. Thirty-four times ten is 340. Three hundred forty minus ten is 330. Three hundred thirty minus seven is 323. So 17 times 19 is 323.”

“That’s awesome, thank you so much. Can you also give me 63% of 22?”

“Fifty percent of 22 is 11, half again is five point five, so the answer will be between 11 and 15. Sixty three times two is 126. One hundred twenty six times ten is 1,260. So if 1,260 plus 126 is… 1,386, then 63% of 22 is 13.86.”

You can hear Gabbro beaming. “You’re a genius, Chert, that’s perfect! Want another one?”

You open your eyes and blink them to focus and shake out your arms and hands. “No, let’s move.”

“Yes, you’ve got this!” They turn away from the mic and say, “Where are they going?”

The reply is slow. “The caves. Under… underground, or-”

There is a clattering, and you hear Hal shout, “Sed!” and Gossan, “Go get Gneiss or Porphy!”

“What’s going on?” you ask.

Sed walks up and towers over you. “I’m dying,” they snarl at you. “I’m trying to help you, but you are taking too long. I’m dying because of you.”

“I’m trying, I’m sorry.” You stand up. You have to hurry. You’re ruining this.

Gabbro continues, unfazed by the commotion in the room. “You’re doing great, Chert. Sed fainted, but they’ll be back to normal soon. When you go through the white hole, there’s going to be a lot of debris. Is there somewhere under cover you can go?”

You strap on your jetpack and your drum beside it and look around. The sand is only halfway drained to Ash Twin, so it limits your options. There’s a large artificial archway to the left of the land bridge to the island, you can just make it out under the light of the white hole and its jets as they flash bright and dark and bright again. You have to leave quickly, there’s no time to pack up camp. You have to leave everything behind.

You take one step towards the edge of the platform, and Galena says quietly, “Are you going to leave us behind too?”

You stop.

All five of the hatchlings stand together, unmoving, staring at you. “We’ll die here,” says Mica.

“Aren’t you going to save us?” says Arkose.

“I don’t want to die again,” says Tephra.

Sed says nothing. They stand there slack jawed, skin ashen, eyes dull and gray.

Your breath sticks in your throat. “I- I can’t leave them,” you choke out. “I can’t leave the hatchlings.”

You don’t hear anything but the flow of sand for a moment, and you wonder if everyone died after all.

Then, not quite succeeding in hiding their worry anymore, Gabbro says, “Chert, you know I’d never make fun of you, right?”

“R-right.”

“When’s the last time you took your medicine?”

You’re frustrated and ashamed and terrified all at once. It can’t be that simple. It’s all too big to be that simple. It’s never been this bad even before you and Gneiss and Porphy worked together to make something that helped.

…Well, there was a supernova.

You defer the logical conclusion with excuses. “It’s- I’m not- I’m fine. I was doing good, and I miss things when I’m on it, so when it ran out, I thought…”

You hear Hornfels for the first time in a while. “Chert! Why didn’t you- you should have said something-”

“Hornfels, shut up,” Gabbro snaps more harshly than you think you’ve ever heard them.

You really are an idiot.

“That’s what we’ve been saying!” Mica exclaims.

“Sorry. Sorry, sorry, I’m sorry.” It’s all you can mutter. Sorry to Gabbro, sorry to Hornfels, sorry to the hatchlings, sorry to the universe for not being well enough to see that it was dying.

“You’re okay, Chert, I’m not mad at you,” Gabbro says, voice low but shaking slightly. Are they lying? No, they’re better at lying than this. They’re upset, but they’re not mad at you. “So, it sounds like you are seeing the hatchlings?”

You don’t want to say it, but Gabbro deserves the truth more than you deserve any scrap of dignity left you could cling to. “Yes.”

“Okay. That’s okay, let’s see what we can learn about this situation. Do you still have your scout with you?”

“No. Is it safe to recall it? We don’t need it out by the white hole anymore?”

“Right. I think so? Go ahead and recall it.”

You do. The space in your scout launcher warps, and the small probe returns to its place. “I have it.”

“Excellent. Now, can you use it to take a picture of where you see the hatchlings, and tell me what you see?”

You shoot it on the ground in the middle of the camp, at Mica’s feet. They glare at you silently.

You take a photo. You turn the scout, and take several more photos. Where you see Galena, there’s only dirt. Where Tephra should be is nothing. Just your telescope stands behind the spot where Arkose and Mica are standing. And where Sed should be, there is nothing but campfire and smoke.

“I… I just see my camp. My empty camp.”

“Good job. Great job. What does that mean, when what you see isn’t in photos?”

You’re stupid. You’re so, so stupid. You know this, you knew this the whole time. “I’m hallucinating. They’re not real.”

“Chert, you are brilliant and incredible. That is exactly right. All the hatchlings are safe here on Timber Hearth.”

You know this. It’s the only thing that makes sense, it’s the only thing that is logical. You can leave them, because there’s nothing here to leave.

“But then you’ll have to do this alone,” Galena whispers.

And that’s just the crux of the issue, isn’t it?

“I don’t want to be alone,” you whisper, watching the last of your dignity float away and fall into the black hole.

“I know Chert,” Gabbro says, voice strained with an emotion you cannot place. “I know. I’m sorry you were alone before. I won’t let you be alone now. I’m right here. Can you get somewhere safe?”

If you could make out its edges, the event horizon of the black hole's event horizon would probably take up two thirds of the visible sky with how close the Twins have swung toward it. Each step you take is like trying to walk against a strong gale during a storm on Timber Hearth’s plains. The light cast by the jets far in the distance reveal clouds of dust flowing from the Twins, which you realize is sand being drawn away from the transfer stream and into the black hole.

You toe up to the edge of your island, take a deep breath, and hop into the dry lake. You briefly panic as you drift to the side due to the black hole’s pull instead of falling straight down, but you correct with your jetpack, actually having to downthrust to land in the sand slowly draining from the lakebed.

“We’re moving?” Gabbro asks.

“We’re moving,” you confirm.

You drag yourself under the arches. They are obviously Nomai construction, wide and elegant, but you wish they were a bit more confined. You tend to get claustrophobic easily, but this feels too open even for you given the current situation. You pin yourself into the corner the best you can, hoping that the stone roof high above you holds fast.

“I think I found a spot. It’s not great, but it’s the best I’ve got.”

“Sounds like it’s perfect then,” says Gabbro. “All good?”

“Not really. You?”

You hear two sad notes from a flute.

It’s so unexpected a laugh bubbles out of you as unbidden as the cries did earlier. In response, Gabbro plays the same notes again, but longer and with a more dramatic trill.

Because you’re too emotionally worn out to do anything else right now, you unhook your drum and prop it up in front of you. You beat the top of it heavily with your drumstick once, then follow with a rapid roll mirroring Gabbro’s trill. The roll kicks into a familiar beat, which you speed up and transform into something improvised. Gabbro follows your rhythm. It’s a strange concord. The breathy bass of Gabbro’s flute pairs with heavy bumps, hollow pops, and woody taps of your drum. Neither of you carry a melody, nothing that someone with an untuned ear could easily hum along with. And maybe it sounds weird and lonely and a little sad, but it's yours, it’s the two of yours.

“Hey, Gabbro?” you ask while hitting your drum.

“Yeah?” they reply, pausing their flute playing.

You turn inside out.

For a brief moment of infinite time, your bones and blood and guts make up a gory exoskeleton, your suit stands in for skin, and your drum takes the place where your heart once was.

Then you go back to the way you were before.

You gasp for breath just to ensure your lungs can still fill with it. You look up and have to quickly turn away from the brilliant light enveloping your island in the distance. Your skin warms with heat you haven’t felt since this planet was still perched next to a sun. Then the ground shakes with the drumming of a violent impact, then another, then another.

You crouch down low. You want to peek out of your bunker and see what’s going on, but a massive crash above you causing a rain of stone and dust just outside your cover keeps you in place.

Then you remember your scout still sitting on the island. You press the photo button on the launcher strapped to your side.

In the photo, past the edge of your camp, you see the towers of Ash Twin over the horizon. You take another photo. You capture one of the towers mid-impact as it slams into some massive structure, a crescent ice and architecture, shrapnel flung out far to the side. A third picture a moment later, and the tower is simply gone, its base buried in rubble and plumes of dust.

“I’m through! I’m through! I’m through!” you shout, then yelp as you are knocked to the ground by an impact somewhere behind you.

“Chert? I’m here. Are you okay?” You can barely make out Gabbro’s voice over the rumbling and crashing around you.

Impossibly, impossibly you are. “I’m okay!” you declare. “Gabbro? I’m here!”

“I’m here,” Gabbro echos.

Then, more quickly than you expected, everything calms.

You put your drum on your back again and cautiously step out. The light is not as blinding as before—as you look around, you can see that you are moving away from it, its jets stretching across the sky. They are steady, now, no longer flickering.

“I think it’s safe now,” you say, voice weak with waning adrenaline. You start walking up the hill toward the island. “I’m going to see what happened.”

“You’re okay?” Gabbro asks after a moment. “You’re safe?”

“I’m safe,” you repeat.

“Okay.” Their voice is slow and quiet. Dissociated. “I’m going to go. Can I… are you okay if I go?”

You pause where you are. Worried, you say, “Yes, Gabbro. Can you go to Tektite? Or Spinel, or someone else?”

Instead of a reply, you hear the microphone being moved again. “Chert? It’s Hornfels.”

Hearing their voice makes the reality of the situation smash into you like the Twins smashing through the debris field. You—not just you, this entire binary planet system—just fell past the event horizon of a black hole and escaped through a white hole, something that just an hour ago you considered a concept too far-fetched to even seriously theorize about. You’re alive. Once again you failed to recognize and accept the cosmic shifts around you until it was too late, and once again you cheated death despite this.

“Hi. Hi, Hornfels,” you whisper, unable to find enough breath to speak more loudly.

“I don’t-” a cough, a sniffle. Hornfels clears their throat and tries again, words watery. “Sorry, I- I don’t know where you are, exactly, the village is facing away from your direction.”

You struggle as well to keep your voice under control. “Let me- let me get my bearings.”

You start climbing up to the island again, but stop and drop down into the lake when you spot something. Your telescope, half buried in the sand. You carefully dig and pull it free. It will take a while to fix this and clean it out, but you have spare parts in your ship.

Your ship has also toppled into the lake. There isn’t too much damage, thankfully, and when you climb aboard and fire it up, your computer doesn’t warn you of any major damage. Two of the viewports are badly scuffed and scratched, but not cracked, and your tanks and engine cluster are all still spaceworthy. You theorize that your ship had been pulled away from the planet by the black hole’s gravity and deposited in the half-empty dry lake, shielding it from impacts from the debris field.

You slowly lift off, bringing your ship out of the lake. From here, you have a better view of the surroundings.

The white hole and its jets are still slowly receding as the Twins move away from it. You realize with a sinking feeling that, while there does appear to be an arc to the planets' movement, it may not be enough to form an orbit. You are being pushed away from the white hole, and toward the black hole. “It’s going to be a cycle, I think, Hornfels,” you say. “The Twins are going to continue to fall into the black hole, be ejected from the white hole, and repeat.”

“So we’re at risk of planet collision.” The exhaustion in their voice overwhelms any shock or dismay at the news.

You shake your head, your ship turning in place as you observe the locations of the other planets. “I don’t think so, not immediately anyway. I think this is all going to be more complicated than that.”

As if to prove your point, your eye catches the glow of Dark Bramble as the Twins pass by. It rotates quickly, much more quickly than it used to, making a full rotation in probably under two minutes. At the same time, it seems to eddy in place, pinned between the black hole and the white hole, no longer keeping its orbit around the center of the solar system, but not falling towards it either. You catch sight of a small object flung from the planet’s vines, like a magma ball from Hollow’s Deep but in reverse. Then you see another, sent off into the far reaches of space.

“There’s something wrong with Dark Bramble,” you say quietly.

“Of course there is,” Hornfels groans, voice muffled. “Of course there is. Add it to the list.”

You set down your ship where it had been before, begin the spool down procedure, and drop out of the hatch. You will have to retrieve some rope to stake it down so it doesn’t fall into the lake next time you approach the black hole.

“Did I hear your engine turn off?” Hornfels asks. “Where did you land? I didn’t see you.”

You start walking back towards your camp. “Near the island at Ember Twin’s north pole.”

“Chert, no,” Hornfels says in a desperate whine. “Just come back. You don’t have to contend with the black hole’s gravity anymore. Please, just come back to Timber Hearth.”

Your island is covered by a small dune of sand, presumably deposited here from the plume that was being dragged toward the black hole. It will take a while to clear it all. You sigh. “Without the deep space satellite and the observatory telescope, you’re blind. I’m the only one in position to observe what is happening in the solar system. We still need to figure out how the other planets’ orbits are reacting to the merged black hole and learn about this… this white hole and its jets, and I want to do some deep space probing with my scout. I have a theory about the temperature issue, but it needs testing. I’m staying here.”

“At least come back to refill your medicine.”

There are five lumps in the sand, positioned in a circle where your campfire had been. The toe of a boot sticks out of one of them. Out of another, a small blue hand. You turn away from them. They’re not real. They’re not, they’re not, they’re not.

“I’ll be fine.”

Chapter Text

You sit on the porch of the big cabin, using a flashlight to scan over the papers in your lap. You read each line over and over again, not getting a good sense of the words despite having written them yourself. You got a few hours of sleep before you were woken to help Hornfels with the black hole merger emergency, but your vision still blurs with exhaustion.

Rutile is waiting for you inside, but you’re putting off joining the meeting you called with them for as long as possible. Even after trying to organize your thoughts with this pile of notes, you feel lost amongst the mismatched stories and accounts and information you have accrued.

You pull out the meeting agenda and return it to the top of the pile. You still feel somewhat silly for having it. Feldspar used to tease you for your organizational habits, saying you would rearrange the solar system to put the planets in alphabetical order if you could. Still, Rutile approved of the agenda concept when you introduced it, and even Slate couldn’t argue when they saw how much faster and more concise it made these sometimes arduous meetings.

Your heavy eyes stare at the three goals listed at the top of the page:

1. Determine Sed’s perspective of events and reconcile it with those of the other villagers.
2. Determine source of Sed’s information about the white hole.
3. Discuss Sed’s physical and mental health and establish a plan of action regarding both.

Sed, Sed, Sed. They seem to be the common denominator in all of this, somehow. With every new situation that appears, Sed ends up in the middle of it.

You had tried earlier to question them one-on-one as Gneiss was stitching up their back, apparently for the second time. They had torn the first set of stitches immediately upon waking up by jumping out of bed and trying to rush out the door.

When you spoke to them, however, it seemed the words went in one ear and out the other, and they barely responded at all, staring emptily at the wall and refusing to meet your eyes.

“If you don’t want to talk to me, there are plenty of others who are waiting to have this conversation with you,” you had half offered, half threatened.

After a heavy pause, they surprised you with the longest sentence they had said since waking. “May as well get it all over with at once.”

So a meeting was called. And now, as Hornfels steps up onto the porch beside you, you don’t have a reason to delay it any longer.

You look up at your tall friend standing there wearily. “Ready?” you ask them.

They heave a long sigh, shoulders slumping. “Not really, no.” Despite this, they open the door and enter the cabin, and you scoop up your papers and follow them.

The broken windows had been boarded up in the three-or-so hours since they were blown out by the gravitational waves, making the room seem dark and closed-in. An oil lamp and a few candles spread about the common area provide dim lighting over the tired and stressed occupants of the sofa and other seating in the room. Rutile, Hal, and Esker all look up as you enter.

“Hornfels, you sure you don’t want to sit this one out?” Esker asks from where they lean in a doorway. “You look like a stiff breeze could knock you over.”

“I nearly lost every single one of my off-planet astronauts today, including you, one after the other,” Hornfels bites back. “I really don’t know how you expect me to look.” They plop down heavily on the opposite side of the sofa from Hal and bury their face in their hands. “If there are any answers to be had, I want to hear them. I will go to bed afterwards.”

You perch on the armrest beside them, not for a lack of seating, but for some closeness with Hornfels. This day has been hard on both of you. You look over to Rutile. “Are we waiting on anyone else besides Sed and Gneiss?”

Rutile shakes their head, rubbing absently at the bandages wrapped around their hands. “Marl said Tektite is headed back to town and might join us later, but we’re not waiting up for them. Everyone else is either sleeping or trying to clean up the village, including dealing with the spilled jet fuel. I think Marl and Tuff were going to work on Hal’s suggestion of reinstalling the gravity crystal in the museum to act as a temporary replacement for the ramps to the higher level of the village. In the meantime, we’ll have to keep using the log lift as an elevator.”

As soon as Rutile stops talking, Hal asks, “How is Sed?”

“And Riebeck, for that matter,” Esker adds.

“Riebeck is asleep, Gneiss said that they pretty badly sprained their knee and ankle and were somewhat delirious, so they put them on some heavy painkillers to get them to rest,” you say. “Sed… hasn’t been very cooperative. They refused painkillers, haven’t been staying still, and they aren’t talking much.”

You sigh. “I’m not sure how this is going to go. Speaking of,” you turn to Hal, “are you sure you want to be here for this?”

“I’m not leaving,” Hal replies, straight faced.

“I’m not asking you to. But, you saw the agenda? This probably isn’t going to be a pleasant conversation. If you can’t keep your emotions in check, there’s no shame in stepping out.”

Hal nods once. “I understand. I’m not leaving.”

Rutile looks over their copy of the agenda, holding it closer to the candle light and squinting at the paper. “Can you give me a brief explanation of point two again? I have the barest understanding that the line of light sometimes in the sky is coming from a ‘white hole’ somehow attached to the black hole. I don’t think I need more details than that right now, but what does Sed have to do with it?”

Hornfels leans back, hands clasped in their lap. “Sed knew about it. Chert and I had only briefly theorized on the concept in the past, and as far as I understand neither of us thought it worthy of discussing with or even mentioning to anyone else. But Sed not only knew what it was, they knew where it was and how it worked, even so far as recognizing that objects passing through it would be unharmed, and that there would be debris accumulated around it. We would like to know by what means they acquired this knowledge.”

Rutile hums thoughtfully, watching the flame in the oil lamp flickering. “I wonder if Solanum knows anything about this white hole. Maybe Sed learned about it from them.”

You frown, shaking your head. “Solanum wasn’t in the observatory during that situation.”

Rutile looks over to you. “Is it possible they discussed it before then? Sed and Solanum did come back to Timber Hearth together, after all.”

You shake your head again. “I don’t think Sed was gone long enough for…” Your sentence peters out unfinished. From your perspective, Sed was only off-planet for a minute or two before the supernova. But according to some of the others, that time may have been as long as nearly half an hour.

Rutile seems to understand your hesitation, but doesn’t comment on it. “I mean even before that. I’m curious if Sed had secretly been in contact with Solanum before the supernova.”

Hal speaks up quickly. “Sed would have told me, there’s no way they would have kept that a secret from me. Besides, the translator only works one way.”

Rutile shrugs. “Sed didn’t seem to have any trouble holding a conversation with Solanum without it.”

Hal pauses, startled, searching the elder’s face for any sign of falsehood. “How? We can’t speak Nomai. We’ve guessed the pronunciation of a couple words, but that’s it.”

Rutile responds with a confused frown. “Sed certainly can, unless they were speaking some other third language with each other. I didn’t question it, I thought that was what you two had been working on.”

“No, we don’t…” Hal struggles to find the words, becoming upset but trying to restrain themself. “It took us two years just to get their writing figured out, we can’t… Sed can’t speak-”

Hal’s words run out as the front door creaks open. Sed steps in, followed shortly by Gneiss, who is positioned in such a way behind them that it is clear to you that they consider the hatchling a flight risk. Sed pauses in the doorway, their eyes passing over each of you in turn, leaning away and taking in the setting as if they are disquieted by it.

Rutile pats the armrest of the plush chair beside them. “Come on in, sit down,” they say. You pay close attention to their tone of voice. You weren’t sure what kind of tone you were going to put on yourself, whether you should be tough and no-nonsense or cheerful and disarming or sentimental and concerned or something else entirely. But Rutile just sounds… normal, really. Patient and gentle to a limited, specific measure, but one that is poured out with the natural ease of something not put on at all.

Sed stays where they stand until ushered forward by Gneiss. They walk across the room with a stiffness you can at least partially attribute to pain before sitting on the edge of the chair, ready to get up again at any moment.

“How are you feeling?” Rutile asks, leaning back and getting comfortable themself.

“Any chance we can skip the small talk?” they respond quickly, tapping their fingers on their thigh.

Gneiss grabs a pillow that had been pushed off the sofa and hands it over to Sed. “Sit back and hug this to your chest,” they instruct, “it will make it easier for you to breathe.” Then they sit down between Hal and Hornfels.

Sed does as told, the task having the secondary benefit of forcing them to settle more deeply into the chair.

“We can do that,” Rutile says. They hand over their copy of the agenda to Sed. “This is what we’re looking to talk about today. Since you’re going to be the star of this show, why don’t you pick what you want to talk about first?”

Sed takes the paper from them and looks over the enumerated points slowly. They don’t answer for a while. You want to suggest a point of discussion, but you take a cue from Rutile, who seems to be in no hurry as they rock back and forth in their rocking chair.

Eventually, and without warning, they say, “Why did my stomach have to be pumped?”

“So, you want to start with point three, then?” Rutile asks.

Sed reads over the line again, their nose wrinkling with distaste. “I guess.”

“Alright, then. Gneiss?”

You feel sorry for Gneiss, sometimes. From what you understand, they were forced by necessity to take on the role of a healer at a young age. When the previous healer died, along with a large portion of the population, Gneiss was the only one available with the right mixture of compassion, fortitude, and raw intelligence to handle the job. If it were up to them, Rutile had told you privately, they would bury themself in music and instrument building the same way Slate does with engineering. If there had been someone else to take up the mantle of healer, they would likely have never gone near it. But their greatest strengths are also what eats at them. Their compassion is such that they could never see someone sick or in pain without giving over every ounce of their skill and energy and ingenuity to help that person. And they would never complain about it, but it is obvious how any instance of their help being unable to fix or cure is taken by them as a personal failure.

You can see this now, with how they sink into the cushions and lower their head with an edge of weariness that seems more than physical.

“When Slate and Gossan brought you in, your condition seemed… dire, hatchling. Very dire. You were in and out of consciousness, vomiting blood. When I saw the state of you, your burns…” Gneiss pauses, sighing deeply. “I was mentally preparing myself to begin performing end-of-life care on you. We put you on heavy pain medication immediately. Acute radiation poisoning isn’t like injury from ghost matter. It’s deceptively slow. It destroys your body and your body’s means of healing itself.”

Sed leans forward over their pillow, listening closely, but beyond that you cannot interpret their expression. “That’s what you thought it was? Radiation?” They ask with, maybe, some amount of quiet awe.

“That’s what I still think it was,” Gneiss says, meeting and holding eye contact with Sed. “The burns match what we would expect with a high dose of radiation exposure, although they are fully healed. Once we got your digestive track cleared of blood, there were no signs of continued bleeding or damage. Your white blood cell count was initially extremely low, but it rebounded to normal levels within a couple hours.”

“How long is that kind of healing supposed to take?” Sed asks.

“Typically after initial exposure, there will be a latency period where you feel good for several days before your health deteriorates. But everything we have seen in you suggests that you have passed even that deterioration phase and have made a full recovery. That should have taken months, if not years,” Gneiss says.

Sed frowns, tilting their head. “How long was I out?”

“About half a day,” you respond.

Sed lowers their eyes to the ground, brows knitted together. “So… I healed really fast? The supernova happened not long before I got here, right? Or, wait, am I confused about that?”

You purse your lips. It seems Sed is just as clueless about this situation as the rest of you. “No, you have that right. The supernova happened maybe 17 or 18 hours ago now.”

“So I’m okay then. I just have scars.”

“If the scars bother you, we can talk about finding ways to minimize them later, but they will most likely never be gone completely,” Gneiss explains. They close their eyes, looking every bit their age. “But, yes. You’re alive. You’re okay. For now, I believe you are okay.”

Sed watches the elder, their ears hanging low with guilt you haven’t seen in them since… well, since The Eye Thing. “I’m sorry, Gneiss. Sorry I scared you. You don’t deserve that.”

Gneiss opens their eyes again, startled and a little embarrassed. With a small, forced smile they say, “Oh, don’t worry about me, just get to feeling better and I’ll be happy.” Their smile fades. “My bigger concern is… Radiation poisoning, you know, if survived… it can come with long-term health risks.”

Sed’s face sours at that. They look nauseated, and they turn away and press their cheek into their pillow. “I don’t want to talk about that.”

“It may not…” Hornfels starts, then hesitates, clearing their throat. “It may not be entirely relevant.” Gneiss wilts further into their seat.

You know what they’re saying, or what they’re trying to say. The lack of a sun precludes just about anything that could be long term. You shoot them a gentle but firm glance to drop the subject, then look back over to Sed, who has clenched their eyes shut tight.

Rutile seems to weigh the options mentally, then says, “We can leave that for a later time. Now, point three has us discussing your mental health as well, Sed.”

The hatchling, eyes still shut, says, “Can we skip that part too? It isn’t relevant either.”

“No, this is something we need to talk about,” you say. You move to stand, but settle back down onto the armrest. Calm. Be like Rutile, you need to be calm about this.

“So, it seems like you haven’t been doing so great lately,” you start. “Ever since you woke up, you’ve been distant and agitated. Not acting like yourself. Hal told me you said some concerning things as you were coming off the pain medication.” Hal doesn’t say anything, watching Sed with a strictly neutral expression. Sed does not lift their head from the pillow. You continue. “Even before your launch, the conversation you and I had combined with your blatant disregard for safety with that geyser maneuver told me that your head wasn’t in a good place.”

That catches Sed’s attention. They look up at you sharply, eyes narrowed. “What conversation?”

You clench your teeth. Not this again. You thought if anyone could back up your point of view, it would be Sed. You can’t quite keep the heat out of your voice when you say, “The one where you asked a few too many questions about Loess’ death, hatchling.”

“Loess?” Sed’s eyes wander as if looking for an answer somewhere on the floor. “What specifically did I say?”

Rutile sighs. “We can move on to point one for now, but we will need to come back to this topic later. Gossan? This one’s yours.”

You shut your eyes for a moment and take a deep breath, exhaling out your nose. “Apparently, everyone remembers the moments before the supernova differently. Many people, though not everyone, say they talked to you, Sed.”

You pull out a paper from your pile and reach to hand it over to Sed. Rutile glances at it disapprovingly. “Let’s not overwhelm them, Gossan.”

Sed leans forward and snatches the paper from your hand, pillow discarded. “No, I want to see it,” they say, immediately poring over its contents.

You look to Rutile, who sighs and shrugs. So you take your copy of the document and begin reading aloud.

• Arkose, Galena, Mica, Tephra: All four hatchlings report going with Sed into Zero-G Cave. Say that Sed seemed “stressed” or “scared,” played together before Sed “disappeared.” Later rescued by Tuff.
• Chert: Witnessed decay and supernova of sun. Did not see Sed launch.
• Esker: Did not see Sed launch.
• Hal: Spoke to Sed, participated in Sed’s photography project, Details of conversation not provided, but expressed concern about Sed’s mental well-being. Saw Sed launch approx. one minute before supernova.
• Hornfels: Spoke to Sed, participated in Sed’s photography project, and handed over launch codes. Did not express concern about Sed. Saw Sed launch approx. five minutes before supernova.
• Gabbro: N/A
• Gneiss: Did not speak to or see Sed before launch. Saw Sed launch approx. 20 minutes before supernova. Saw Sed fly low over village for approx. two minutes shortly after launch.
• Gossan: Spoke to Sed, participated in Sed’s photography project. Discussed Loess’ death, discussed an “end” in a concerning manner. Sed jumped into a geyser to get to launch pad. Launched approx. one minute before supernova.
• Marl: ______
• Moraine: Did not speak to or see Sed before launch. Saw Sed launch approx. 20 minutes before supernova. Saw Sed fly low over village for approx. two minutes shortly after launch.
• Porphy: Did not speak to or see Sed before launch. Saw Sed launch approx. 20 minutes before supernova. Saw Sed fly low over village for approx. two minutes shortly after launch.
• Riebeck: N/A
• Rutile: Did not speak to or see Sed before launch. Saw Sed launch approx. 20 minutes before supernova. Saw Sed fly low over village for approx. two minutes shortly after launch.
• Sed: ______
• Slate: Spoke to Sed. Says that Sed woke up agitated and nonsensical, talking about the sun. Sed then went to the launch pad and fell into the camp, injuring their legs before immediately returning to launch pad. Saw Sed launch approx. 15 minutes before supernova. Spoke to Mica and Gossan, lost tracking signal on Sed’s ship.
• Spinel: ______
• Tektite: ______
• Tuff: Spoke to Sed, participated in Sed’s photography project. Discussed Zero-G Cave, expressed mild concern about Sed’s mental well-being. Did not see launch after Sed left cave. Later rescued hatchlings.

As you finish narrating the material, Sed continues scouring over it, their eyes flipping up and down the paper with a speed that suggests they’re afraid it will be taken away from them. Their brows knit together as they do so.

“Why are some of them blank?” they ask eventually. “And what does ‘N/A’ mean?”

“The blank ones are people I haven’t gotten a chance to interview yet,” you reply. “Spinel, Tektite, and Marl have been out on the plains all day. Riebeck and Gabbro are not applicable because they wouldn’t have been able to see you launch from their campsites, so I didn’t interview them. Esker and Chert potentially could have seen you from their positions, but neither of them did.”

Sed glances as Esker, and you think out of the corner of your eye you catch Esker wink. You squint at the older astronaut. “Got something to add, Esker?”

Esker shrugs. “Not me. Maybe if someone had bothered to warn me that Sed was set to launch yesterday, I would have something to contribute.”

At that moment, the front door opens again and Tektite enters, shedding their backpack, helmet, and tools without acknowledging the room. “Oh, convenient timing, we wanted to talk to you,” you say.

Rutile seems to pick up on something about their manner that you don’t catch. Frowning, they ask, “Is there a problem, Tektite?”

“We’ll see,” is all they reply, dropping their kit in an unceremonious pile in the corner. They sit down on a stool that had been dragged into the room and stretch out their metal leg, squarely joining the conversation. Although Rutile is mayor, Tektite gets special respect as the oldest of the Hearthians currently. They are also infrequently seen in the village, typically only returning for special or important occasions. Both of these things, combined with their inarguable wisdom and the fact that they don’t speak up much unless they have something important to say all lead to them holding a significant amount of authority and influence over any village proceedings they choose to involve themself in.

You turn in your seat to face them. “We wanted to get your perspective on the minutes prior to the supernova. Has anyone explained the supernova situation to you since you’ve gotten back?”

They lean down and adjust their prosthetic, loosening a buckle. “I witnessed it.”

“You… oh,” Hornfels says. “Oh. None of us were able to see it here in the village, this side of the planet was turned away from the sun when it occurred.”

Rutile stills their rocking and leans forward, searching Tektite’s face without getting in their space. “Are you alright?” the ask.

Tektite straightens and looks Hornfels dead in the eyes, ignoring Rutile’s question. “What I want to know is whether you,” they point at Hornfels, “and you,” they point at yourself, “were planning on telling the rest of the village what was about to happen, or if you were just going to let the weight of that responsibility fall on the shoulders of your hatchling astronauts.” They finish by pointing towards the hatchling astronaut in the room, who flinches at the gesture.

You blink at the unexpected hostility, and Hornfels stammers, “I- we- we didn’t know. We weren’t aware of the sun’s coming collapse until after the supernova had already occurred.”

You nod. “Chert witnessed it as well, but they weren’t able to get in contact with Hornfels or anyone else. Everyone was unaware until afterwards.”

They give you and Hornfels each a hard look in turn. “You expect me to believe that both of you managed to be completely clueless about your astronauts’ involvement in this situation?”

Dumbfounded, you fail to respond. You don’t know where this is coming from. Before you can say anything, Esker pushes themself off the wall that had been supporting them and walks over to hold out a hand to Tektite, grinning at them. “Come on, it looks like there are some details I can catch you up on.”

Tektite looks at Esker for a moment, then accepts the hand, being pulled to their feet before following them out the front door. Sed watches them as they leave.

Hornfels looks around the room, clearly distressed by the conversation. “What was that about?” they ask, turning to the hatchling more specifically. “Sed, do you know what they were talking about?”

Sed stares at them, then at you, with wide eyes. They shake their head no minutely.

Rutile, still looking towards the door with a concerned twist to their mouth, eventually sighs and says, “Let’s continue. Gossan?”

You clear your throat, still somewhat disoriented, and reshuffle your papers to settle yourself again. “Really, it’s Sed’s turn at this point,” you say, turning to the hatchling. “Any thoughts on this situation so far?”

They look back down at the paper, brows furrowing again. Then they shrug. “I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense.”

“Any insights at all. Let’s hear them,” you push.

They look you in the eye, speaking flatly. “How about you ask a more specific question.”

You feel your jaw harden. Calm. Don’t let them get a rise out of you. “Are you noticing a certain through-line to all the reports, hatchling?”

With no shortage of sass, Sed holds up your paper as if to inspect it more closely and says, “Well, your reporting style suggests an inclination, if not bias, towards supporting your idea that I was important in all this.”

Hornfels raises a hand to their mouth either to stifle a surprised laugh or a small gasp, you’re not sure which. You yourself are once again taken aback by the unexpected shift in Sed’s behavior. You don’t think they’ve ever challenged you so directly. Two days ago, they would have followed your lead with perhaps some playful quips or, at most, pointed questions if they really disagreed with you. But the way they meet your level stare suggests to you that they are ready for a battle and have no intention of backing down.

Trying to keep some amount of authority and control over this situation, you hold yourself back from glaring at them. “And why do you think the experiences of the others would have led me to that conclusion?”

Sed argues with a strangely practiced ease. “You sure did write my name down a bunch of times, but that seems to be the only consistent thing here. Half of the people didn’t seem to see me in town, but you’re saying I talked to you. Where? At the launch pad?”

“No. You and I spoke outside the mines.”

“So why didn’t anyone else see me go over there? Did you see me take the back path past the museum?”

“You came up the ramps.”

“Were the hatchlings with me? That’s what they say.”

You grit your teeth. “The hatchlings’ story isn’t consistent with the other accounts.”

“It seems to line up pretty well with what Tuff said from what I can see. But you’re right, there is a discrepancy here. According to Slate, apparently I ‘injured my legs,’” Sed kicks their feet for emphasis, “and they also said that Mica was there. So who is right here? Tuff and all four of the hatchlings, or Slate, or you?”

“Sed,” Rutile warns, “watch your tone.”

Sed ignores them, continuing to charge ahead. “And who else does Slate say they saw there, besides me and Mica?”

“Sed,” Rutile says again, more firmly. You say nothing, your mouth a flat line.

Standing out of their chair, they lean in your direction, gesturing with the paper and raising their voice. “What do you think, Gossan? Are you noticing a certain through-line in all of this?”

Rutile moves to say something again, but you back them down with a wave of your hand. Then you lean back in your seat, clasp your hands in your lap, and take in the hatchling silently. They seem to be in some amount of physical pain. As soon as they stopped speaking, their hand went to their ribs. At the same time, though, they don’t seem to be entirely conscious of this pain. They bear through it as if it is the least of their worries. Despite all their heat, you get the impression that they speak with preemptive defensiveness rather than actual anger, like they are attacking before they can be attacked themself.

Beyond that, though, you cannot really read them. Sed used to be… you don’t want to say “simple,” but they were. They were clever and cheeky and smart, but predictable, at least to you. Reliable. Now, though, it’s like you don’t know them at all. Like they’re some other person than the person you knew just days ago.

Slowly, they wilt under your inspection, gradually losing steam. Their defenses aren’t dropped, but it seems like the effort of holding them up is exhausting them. Eventually, they lower themself back into their chair and look away.

Only then do you speak up, voice low and cool. “Are you suggesting that I had something to do with all this?”

Sed finally relents a bit, staring at the floor. “No. I’m not. I’m just saying it doesn’t seem like you have all the information.”

“Why don’t you help us with that, Sed,” Rutile says, calm and patient as ever. “What do you remember?”

Sed glares at the knots in the wooden floorboards. After a moment, they mutter, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

You shake your head firmly. “We’re not skipping this one. We’ve told you everything there is to know, now it’s your turn.”

Sed keeps their head low, their ears pulling back slightly, and you can’t tell if it’s with guilt or shame or defensiveness. “I crashed,” they say, just above a whisper.

You share a look with the other adults, Hal still focused solely on Sed. “Elaborate,” you say.

Sed groans, then throws out their arms, immediately wincing in pain. “I- ow- I crashed! That’s it! There’s nothing to elaborate on.” They drop their head again. “I went through the town and said goodbye to everyone, got the launch codes, then launched. I was going to the Attlerock first. But then I blinked and all I saw was the qu- the phantom moon right in front of me. I couldn’t turn away fast enough. Next thing I know I’m waking up on Timber Hearth getting IVs pulled out of my arm.”

“Why doesn’t your story match with anyone else’s?” you ask.

“I don’t know!” they rebut. “Why doesn’t yours?”

You’re not letting that start up again. “Look at me, hatchling,” you demand. They raise their eyes and meet yours. “You are saying you didn’t talk to anyone?”

Sed bares their teeth. “I talked to everyone, Gossan. I said goodbye to everyone. I’m not a monster.”

You frown slightly, tilting your head. “I didn’t say you were.”

“I played hide and seek with the hatchlings. I said goodbye to you. I even stopped to practice in the Zero-G Cave one last time. But I didn’t talk about or do any of the things the rest of you remember.” They cross their arms petulantly, sitting back in the chair. “So if all of you are having memory problems, it’s not something I can fix.”

For the first time in a while, Hornfels speaks up. “None of that explains how you knew about the white hole, or how you can apparently now speak Nomai.”

Sed’s ears drop, and they look away again. “I…” They stop, clearing their throat. “I don’t know.”

Hornfels shoots them an incredulous look. “You don’t know? It seems like you know much more than anyone else.”

You notice that Sed’s eyes are becoming unfocused, their hands trembling slightly. “I don’t know. I don’t know what I was saying. I just- I had to help them. Chert was scared, and I didn’t- I knew- I don’t know. I didn’t want them to be scared. They were going to die. I didn’t- they knew about it, and they’re always scared, so I just said things to try to help them, but it doesn’t work because they still get scared, and it doesn’t matter if I say anything or not because they just get scared again-”

Rutile cuts off their increasingly incoherent rambling, reaching out a hand toward them. “Hush, Sed. Take a breath, keep your head where your feet are at.” When Rutile touches their hand, they flinch back, pulling away from them and closing their mouth with a click of their teeth.

Hornfels’ exhaustion has worn their patience paper-thin, and their face is turning purple, you’re not sure whether from holding back shouting or tears. “And speaking Nomai? Being able to verbally communicate in a language that you shouldn’t have had resources to know how to pronounce? Conveniently timed with you being brought home by a living Nomai who seems to know you by name?”

“I DON’T KNOW!” Sed screams, gesturing wildly in panic and frustration. Then they drop their face into their hands. “I don’t know. I don’t have any answers for you. Just… just stop asking.”

Hornfels, the adult who Sed has possibly spent the most time with, who taught Sed how to love to learn, who showed Sed how to chase knowledge as something that could be caught, who shaped Sed’s natural curiosity into the thing that carried them to the stars, stares at the hatchling like they no longer know who they are.

For the first time since Sed entered the room, Hal moves and makes a sound, heaving a deep sigh. They stand up, wipe their hands on their pants, and walk over to casually crouch in front of their friend’s chair. “Sed,” they say flatly.

Sed drops their hands into their lap, staring at Hal with a great amount of exhaustion themself. “What?”

“I’m in love with you.”

The room becomes deathly quiet, all at once, like everyone stopped breathing. You swear you can hear the flicker of the flame in the candle on the other side of the room. Gneiss, quietly but so loud in the silence, says, “Hal? Now isn’t the time...”

Sed, for their part, just looks as if they’re waiting for the rest of the sentence. Their brows raise a tiny bit, seemingly more thrown off by the silence than the sentiment.

Hal’s own brows lower. “What?” they ask Sed, no emotion seeping into their voice except that of the dull confirmation of a presumed understanding. “Heard that one before?”

Sed’s face morphs into something akin to horror.

Hal stands up, crossing the room without making eye contact with anybody. Sed stands as well, taking a step towards them. “Hal, wait-”

The front door opens, then slams shut hard enough to blow out the nearest candle.

Hornfels leans back far against the sofa, angling their head toward the ceiling and shutting their eyes. Gneiss trades worried glances between Sed, you, and Rutile. Rutile shakes their head and looks at you. Sed stands in the middle of the room, clenching and unclenching their fists and staring at the door.

You’re just… tired. It seems that along with theoretical astrophysics and an alien language, this hatchling has also mysteriously learned how to craft a lie that can hold water almost long enough to get them out of trouble.

Sed moves toward the door, and you catch them by their collar. They whip around, braced to fight and not looking at your face. “I’m done. I want to leave.”

You stand up, walking to the far end of the room. “One last question,” you say. You open the cabinet behind Sed’s chair, heft out the large object stored inside it, lay it on top of the cabinet, and step aside. Sed’s eyes grow wide as soon as they see it. Their Little Scout.

You put your hand on the device, claiming it, and look up at Sed. “Is what I find on this scout’s hard drive going to line up with anything you’ve told us today?” you ask.

They stare at the scout, and eventually look up at you with a shocking, unnatural emptiness. “If you care about me at all,” they say, voice dull and lifeless, “do not go through that hard drive.”

They turn on their heel and leave the cabin, not bothering to close the door behind them.

Several hours later, you are sitting awake on the edge of a bed. Specifically, the bed currently occupied by Porphy. It wasn’t often that you shared, both of you wanting to take your relationship slow. But after dealing with the aftermath of the black hole merger and the effects it had on the village, Porphy was stressed and anxious, and your favorite tends to deal with these emotions by distracting themself with other people’s problems, especially yours. So when they learned how long it had been since you slept, they dragged you into a bed in the big cabin and held you until they fell asleep themself.

You tried to sleep, void knows you need it. But despite your exhaustion, you couldn’t get your swirling thoughts to slow down enough to rest.

Rubbing your face, you give up for now, wandering down to the common room to make yourself some tea. Instead of finding a kettle, though, you find yourself standing in front of the Little Scout still sitting on top of the cabinet.

Rutile had weighed the costs and benefits of looking through the scout’s hard drive without coming to a specific conclusion. Gneiss had voiced doubts about invading Sed’s privacy when they seem so distrusting already, but they didn’t show much confidence in their own suggestion. Hornfels went to bed without giving an opinion, looking for all the world like they were halfway between falling asleep and falling apart.

You had decided to leave it alone for the time being, to get some rest and come at the issue again later when you had a clear head. But for the life of you, you could not get your head clear. Every time you reach the edge of sleep, an image of Sed’s face lighting up then being devoured by the supernova startled you awake. When in these half-dreams Sed’s face started getting replaced with Feldspar's, you got out of bed.

So now you stand before Sed’s Little Scout. You know that it’s hard drive must have, if not answers, at least information. Almost every villager report involving Sed also involved this camera. If any one of these reports is true, there should be photo proof of it.

The question is, do you really want to know which memory might be the real one? Do you want to prove that your perspective is right, as is Sed’s accusation of you being the through-line? Do you want to confirm that this memory of you clutching your apprentice by the shoulders and fearing for their life while they rambled about love and death was some kind of fabrication? Which is better? Which is worse?

You feel like you’re sleepwalking as you take the scout launcher into your hands. It’s heavy, and the metal has absorbed all of the cold in the air.

With the flip of a switch, the device’s computer hums to life. Its small screen blinks awake, greeting you with a bare-bones menu.

You’re not sure what emotion is causing your heart to hammer. You press the down arrow button twice, causing the cursor to hover over the words IMAGE ARCHIVE. Slowly, very slowly, you push in the select button. It clicks.

The screen changes. A dialogue box appears.

ERROR: Unable to locate file.

Chapter Text

You inspect the thing in front of you with a hand above your eyes, shielding them from the hazy but persistent light that emits from its core.

By all accounts, it looks like the massive seed of an unknown plant. It reminds you of the round, spiky seed pods of a berrygum briar, the kind that you’ve had to pry from the feet of several unfortunate hatchlings that weren’t watching where they walked.

But something about it… you don’t know. You don’t have any convincing words or any evidence, but you don’t think it can rightly be called a plant.

As a treekeeper, you carry in your head and your little field guide all the knowledge the Hearthians have ever recorded about the flora on your planet and then some. The facts and figures are important to have, you won’t deny that. You know what grows in what kind of soil and sunlight or shade, what bits are good for eating or healing and what needs to be avoided.

But there are some things that just can’t quite be put down in words, numbers, and statistics. You can’t write down how to look at what seems to be a perfectly healthy tree and understand it’s full of rot and ready to fall in the next windstorm. You can’t measure the amount of cragworm castings you need to see before you know to start digging up the flat-tooth bulbs early, before those little munchers can get to them. Maybe someone can, but you can’t. You just know how to feel it out.

This small moon of a seed feels alive in a way that is different from a plant. You don’t know why. All living things have things they need to keep them alive, but this feels like it’s capable of wanting beyond needing. It feels like it’s capable of having an opinion, somehow. Like it’s capable of hate. You’ve thrown rocks into its hollow, foggy pits half expecting it to spit them right back at you.

You look over your shoulder to see Slate’s new ship breaking through the atmosphere and coming to land somewhere outside the crater. Right, Sed’s launch day is today. You guess they wanted to explore close to home for their first trip, although you pictured them as being more adventurous than that. Maybe they saw the note you left at the firewatch tower and wanted to check things out themself.

You’ve been out here for several days now, trying to get to know the seed. It’s not yet been a week, Rutile would have sent out Marl or Hal to check on you if it had been, but it’s getting close to it. In that time, the chunks of ice that this thing had probably once been encased in have started to melt, sending little rivulets of water down to soak into the dirt. You thought that was clever—the thing brought its own source of water to drink. But then it started growing at a shocking, impossible rate. You thought your eyes were playing tricks on you. So you sat in front of it for a couple hours and just watched. You sat unmoving a meter and a half away from the tip of a root, and your stomach wasn’t even growling for your next meal before it was trying to make its way into your lap.

Something about it makes you uneasy. You can deal with plants being somewhere you don’t want them to be. You’re a tree keeper, it’s your job. But if this thing is not a plant, then dealing with it might be beyond your simple skill set. Spending your days out in the land doesn’t teach you how to navigate an alien invasion.

What it does teach you, however, is how to be observant. How to be watchful. How to see change, and when to fight it, and when to let it be. And from what you’ve observed in the perpetual dusk of this crater near the north pole, the sky’s been changing faster than the seed has.

You’ve been hearing Sed climb around on the hill behind you for the last several minutes now, doing something with their Little Scout. If they want to come out here and play with the new toys Slate made them, maybe you can convince them to launch it into this seed and see if anything is inside. They might not want to risk losing or damaging it, but it’d save you the trouble of dragging the stationary one from the firewatch tower all the way out here.

But when you look over your shoulder, you see them making their way out of the crater, back towards their ship. You call out, “What, going to leave without saying hello?”

Not that you mind if they do, people can come and go as they please, and you know Sed had a whole list of things they wanted to see. Sed’s good at making themself sparse if they think they’re going to be given a chore that doesn’t align with their plans. But instead of waving and running off like you expect them to do, they freeze in place, curling in on themself.

You spend a lot of time alone in the grasslands and wooded craters. You’re rarely in town more than a few days in a row. In your old age, you can’t tolerate the busyness of it as well as you once could. When you were younger, when that terrible disease had burned its way through the population, it had just been the nine of you for the longest time. Four adults and, including you, five hatchlings. That had been a dark and difficult time. You hadn’t even had a dozen years of life under your belt yet, but you gave everything you had back then to just keep the other little ones alive. You never could have imagined the beautiful village that they would go on to create with those who were born after them.

For all the pride you have in that village, it’s loud, and bright, and chaotic. More often than not, you find yourself retreating to the company of the trees and stars.

Still, you were always happy to greet and spend time with anyone who sought you out. It was usually for one of four reasons. One, you accidentally bump into someone out exploring or looking for some quiet of their own. You’d give them a wave and be on your way. Two, it was someone out to check on you or bring you home for a meeting or some event going on. Three, someone was missing you, wanting your company. That was most often Rutile, but it could be Gneiss or Spinel or Marl or once upon a time, Feldspar.

The fourth reason is what usually elicits the kind of reaction you’re seeing now in Sed. Someone so in need of a modicum of peace, an ounce of comfort, that they come looking to borrow it from you.

That someone’s been lots of different folks over the years. Even when you were little and things were bad, it was Rutile wanting to carry the weight of the world on their shoulders and finding they weren’t big enough yet, or Spinel spitting mad at that same world. It was Feldspar, quietly whispering to you their fears under the cover of a thick copse of trees. It was Slate after Feldspar disappeared, wandering the grassland drunk and lost. It was Chert, before you and they worked out together that it would take the expertise of Gneiss to start quieting the monsters in their head. It was Gabbro, again and again and again it was Gabbro.

They don’t always realize that’s what they’re doing, and they’re not always willing to own up to it. But if there’s one thing you’ve learned in your many years of life, it’s what a hurting heart looks like. You should know. You’ve got one yourself. So you’d talk with them or listen, be quiet with them, breathe with them, or take them into your arms. Whatever you could do to give them some of the peace they’re looking for.

It has never been Sed before. But that flinch, and the hunch that makes it looks like the weight of their kit and helmet could crush them, and the swimming and sunken eyes when they turn around to face you tell you for certain what Sed is here for now.

“I was just… taking a picture,” they say. Their voice sounds weak even through the amplification of their helmet’s speaker.

Watching their face carefully, you say, “Well, if you want to take some more pictures, why don’t you come down here and see if you can get a shot of what the inside of this seed looks like.”

They hesitate, glancing back up the hill in the direction of their ship, swaying in the wind. Then they start slowly making their way down to you.

“Looks like something that might’ve come off of Dark Bramble,” you say as they find their place beside you. “It’s not anything I’ve seen on Timber Hearth before, that’s for sure. What do you think?”

They don’t reply, staring into the pit of the plant in front of you while breathing high in their chest. They raise their scout launcher towards it. It rattles in their unsteady grasp.

They fire the scout, but miss, causing it to stick to the thorns of the seed. They swear under their breath, something rare for them. They recall the scout, fire again, and this time it knocks against the thorns and falls to the ground. They quickly recall and fire again, overshooting completely. “Stop it, just go in,” they hiss.

They hold the scout launcher tightly, closer to their body, but that just makes it rattle more. “What’s got your hands shaking so bad?” you ask quietly.

“Sorry, I’m-I’m trying to calm down,” they reply, breathless. “That’s why- I needed to take a break, that’s why I’m taking pictures. I shouldn’t… I thought…” They launch their scout and miss again. With a frustrated, strangled grunt, they march deeper into the crater.

“How about you stay up here with me?” you say. They ignore you, getting close enough to aim their scout launcher into the middle of the seed point-blank. As soon as they raise it, however, their elbow catches a long, sharp thorn.

It immediately punctures the suit, leaving a small, whistling gash in the fabric while their oxygen pump simultaneously tries to replace the leaking air with what it can draw in from around it. Sed gasps and steps back, scrambling for their duct tape.

You step up next to them, putting a hand on their shoulder to guide them away from the thorns. “No need to rush, you’re not going to run out of air here.”

“It’s fine,” they say, voice shaking as they struggle to tear off a length of tape and apply it to their elbow. “It’s fine, it doesn’t matter.”

You let them patch up their suit and put away their duct tape, keeping your hand on their shoulder. The hole still whistles faintly with escaping air. “What doesn’t matter?” you ask.

“The thorns, the seed. It’s fine, it doesn’t matter what’s in there. None of it matters.” They shift in place, but don’t pull away from you. They cough, clear their throat, force out a painful laugh. “Hey, Tektite, could you, uh…” They falter, attempting and failing to sound casual. “Could you… could you not be afraid of this? Please?”

You tilt your head at them, but don’t say anything. “I mean, could you- the seed’s nothing to worry about,” they continue. “You don’t need to worry about it or be scared, okay?” Their breath hitches, and they put a hand up to their visor as if to cover their mouth. “I just- just don’t… I don’t want you to spend your last…”

They choke on a sob, pulling on the bottom of their helmet and gasping for breath.

You take hold of their other shoulder, stabilizing them and leading them down to the ground. “Let’s sit down here for a minute.”

They nearly collapse to their knees, but you bring them down slowly. “I can’t breathe,” they choke out, hands scrabbling at their neck.

“Can I help you take this off?” you ask, and they nod. It’s not the helmet affecting their breathing, but if they want it off, you can do that for them. Can you? Yes, this helmet is similar to the mining helmets, the locking latch is in the back.

You lift it off their head too slowly for their liking, and they throw it away from themself, knocking it to the ground and sending it rolling back toward the seed. They rub at their face and mouth, panting. “I still can’t- I can’t-” they stutter.

You put a hand on the back of their neck, holding them still and secure. “You can’t breathe because you need to cry, Sed, and you’re fighting it,” you say, voice low and calm. “You can cry. You don’t need to fight it, not here.”

They do still try to fight, gritting their teeth and bowing their head, clutching at the ground with gloved hands. It’s a losing battle, however. They stop breathing completely, but you’re patient with them, rubbing the back of their neck and ear with your thumb. They gasp, which tumbles into a sob, which rolls into a stuttering wail.

You stay there together like that for a while. Them sitting in the dirt with their face buried in their shaking arms, trying to muffle their loud cries. You kneeling beside them, holding them steady, removing the rest of their kit from their back and setting it aside, keeping your own breaths slow and calm. You try not to read too much into their tears before you’ve had a chance to talk to them, but you get the feeling that they haven’t let themself cry in a long time.

Once their breathing evens out a bit and they start wiping at their eyes with their sleeves, you ask, “What is it that’s making you cry?”

“I can’t say,” they hiccup, struggling to get the words out as tears continue to flow down their face. “It’s- it’s too big.”

“Too big, hm…” you say thoughtfully, shifting to sit more comfortably next to them. “If you can’t say, then let me guess. Is it bigger than me?”

It’s a silly question, and you don’t expect them to play along, but you can see it starting to unstick their mind and let it begin turning again. “Tektite. It’s so, so much bigger than all of us.”

“Wow, that is big. Is it bigger than the sky?”

They frown, turning away from you. “Yes, Tektite.”

You look up at the sky in question. You can see the edge of the sun peeking over the top of the crater’s walls. It’s not something you should be able to see from this angle.

“Is it bigger than a supernova?” you ask quietly.

Sed gasps, clasps their hands over their mouth, and stares at you.

You close your eyes. There is a warm breeze pulling through the young knocked-over trees in this crater, whistling past the climbing roots of the alien seed, washing you in the scent of pines and sourgrass and early earbalm blossoms. You inhale, let the breeze join you. Then you exhale, let your breath join the breeze.

You pull the hatchling closer to you. It catches them off guard, but it knocks them out of their shock and they comply, starting to breathe again as you pull them sideways into your lap.

“H-how… how do you know? You’re not supposed to know,” they stutter. You cradle them in your arms like they’re much smaller than they really are, supporting their head in the crook of your elbow.

“The constellations have been good company to me, I notice when they change,” you say, wiping at their tears. “Marble is missing an eye, and the Leaning Tree has fewer limbs left than I do.”

They stare hard at you. “Did you only notice because you started talking to me, or did you already realize it before I came here?” They look at you with dread, like the sky itself hangs on your answer, but the only answer you have is the truth.

“I noticed before you arrived.”

“No.” Their face crumbles, and their tears renew. They hide themself in your chest. “No, you aren’t supposed to know! I thought it was just Chert, and I tried… I tried to stop them, to distract them, but it never works and even if it does they just forget and then they’re afraid again!”

You can’t quite follow their rambling, but you listen anyway, rocking them back and forth slowly. “I’ve observed, hatchling, but I can’t say I know what is going on. Could you explain it to me?”

They hiccup again, and speak so quietly it’s hard for you to hear them. “The universe is dying,” they mumble into your shirt. “I thought it was the- the Nomai tech, the Sun Station. I thought I could stop it. I thought I was supposed to fix everything. But the Sun Station didn’t work. The universe is just dying on its own.”

You wonder how long this has been known. If Chert knows about it, then Hornfels probably knows too. Did they conspire to keep it secret, to hide it from the village? Was Sed looped in on this plan, did it tie into their efforts to translate the Nomai language? Or did they find out on their own somehow? You suppose none of it really matters now.

“Can you look at me, Sed?” They slowly pry themself away from your chest and look up at you, bathed in the grey glow emanating from the seed behind you. It reminds you of when you held Rutile like this when you were both hatchlings, when the dead had just been buried, when two-thirds of the village beds were empty. Sed’s face wears the despair, hopelessness, and fear that Rutile’s had all those years ago.

You rest a hand on their cheek and do not look away from them. Your voice is calm and firm. “This is not your fault.”

They close their eyes and sob. They try to hide their face again, but you hold them still. “No, I was going to fix it. I don’t know what to do,” they cry.

“Look at me again?” you request, and with effort they blink their eyes open, still crying. “This is not your responsibility. You can’t save the universe any more than you can save a person whose time has come. Nobody can ask this of you. Not me, not Chert, not the Nomai, not the universe itself. It is too big for you. This is not your fault, Sed. This is not your fault.”

They don’t say anything else. They can’t, and neither can you. This time when they try to hide their face, you let them, hugging them tight against your chest, rocking them, trying to give them all the peace and comfort you can.

You see the sun crest over the edge of the crater. It is a warm, beautiful, violent crimson red.

Sed whispers against you, “We only have a few minutes left, Tektite. I’m sorry. I have to leave.”

You squeeze them tighter, concern for them ghosting into your voice. “You don’t have to be alone for this.”

“I do. I have to. I can’t watch people die. I know how to die alone, but I can’t watch you die. It hurts too much. I’m sorry, Tektite, I’m weak and I’m a coward. Please let me leave.”

“You are none of these things, Sed,” you say. You let them pull away from your arms.

They stand, but they turn back to you, taking your face in their hands and pressing their forehead against yours, pushing your helmet askew.

“Please don’t be afraid,” they whisper. Then they turn and scramble up the tree leaning against the edge of the crater, not looking back, leaving their kit and helmet behind.

You take your time leaving the crater yourself. Once you make it to the top, Sed and their ship are gone.

You turn back the way you came. From this distance, the alien seed you had spent the last week watching over looks smaller, more like a plant, more like just another thing that found a place to live here on Timber Hearth. The sun looms behind it, red and roiling. Lighting flashes on Giant’s Deep not far to your left. The Hourglass Twins spiral past and disappear under the horizon.

You sit at the edge of the crater. Sunlight warms your skin just as it warms the ground. A couple tears drip down your cheeks to wet the grass beneath you. You inhale, letting the breeze join you.

As everything goes dark and the sun collapses down into a tiny point, you can only think of how wonderful it all has been. Life, and the living of it. You hum softly as blue waves of light approach, an old song that had been hummed to you by someone who died long ago.

The sun’s final breath washes over you. Your breath joins it.

You are not afraid.

Chapter Text

"Arkose said they saw 'em come back here."

You and Esker approach the launch camp until your path is blocked by heavy debris. In the distance behind the pile of wood and metal, you can make out the disk of the launch pad leaned against the giant burned-out stump that had once formed its base. The dark sky above the tree looks hollow without the crane that once accompanied it.

Esker pauses, eyes tracing the lines of crisscrossed timber with their hands on their hips. “What a mess,” they say quietly.

The crane and its accompanying elevator had been a collaborative project between Esker and Slate years ago, back when Slate was a teenager. Slate had been what you would consider a troubled and troubling youth. So had Esker, if you’re being honest. Each had similar, if reversed, difficulties growing up—Esker was the youngest of their generation, and Slate was the oldest. Both of their situations tended to leave them feeling isolated and misunderstood by their peers. They also had reversed skill sets—while Esker could manage just about anything with decent but unremarkable talent, Slate was an unparalleled genius in an extremely narrow field.

So, naturally, their connection was apparent if often at odds. Their relationship grew to become one where Slate would seek out Esker specifically to lash out against when their frustrations became too much to bottle up, and Esker took the blows and patched up Slate’s knuckles when they were spent.

When Slate’s interests became markedly more explosive and their rocketry project had started its third or fourth fire, Rutile called for an intervention. Slate was barred from continuing to experiment in or near the village.

Slate had hollered incomprehensibly about the unfairness of the situation before stomping off with a righteous fury. Esker had stepped in then, arguing on Slate’s behalf what the young engineer had been unable to put into words: Slate was dedicated to this project, so forcing them to leave the village to continue it was tantamount to exile.

So with Esker’s advocacy, a compromise was reached. Slate could continue to work on the project, but it would be relegated to the unused canyon behind the village. It was a cramped, uninviting space, but it would belong to Slate to use it how they wished.

Slate, from what you understand of the stories Esker told you years later, showed their appreciation in a uniquely teenaged Slate way. Without explicit thanks and nestled between eye rolls and insults, Slate had asked Esker to become the second member of what would become Outer Wilds Ventures. Not even Feldspar had yet been given such a privilege, and Esker recognized and accepted the offer for the valuable show of trust that it was.

It was Esker and Slate together who designed, constructed, and raised the crane tower and its elevator. As it grew taller, so did Slate. As Esker helped make it more stable and sure, so too did Esker help Slate become more calm and confident. In time, this tower became the most massive structure the village had ever seen. It was the thing that made the rest of you realize what Esker had seen all along, that Slate and their Outer Wilds Ventures were not just blowing things up for fun, they were doing nothing less than shaping your species’ future.

And now it lies as a useless heap on the floor.

You won’t pretend you can read Esker’s mind, but can only imagine that Esker looks at this swath of destruction and sees what amounts to a broken promise.

“It was the six-inch bolts that failed,” Esker says without prompting. They’re crouched in front of a jagged post, the accused metal hardware poking out of it sheared in half. “That’s what Slate figured. Most of the cabins use nails or smaller bolts that were able to give and flex with the gravitational waves. The observatory columns use wider ten-inch bolts that withstood the waves without breaking, thank the stars.” Esker stands with a sigh. “But the tower and the ramps on the other side of the village used six-inch bolts. They were just in that sweet spot. If we had used smaller or larger bolts, the tower would probably still be standing.”

Esker speaks with an unbothered, airy voice that is so obviously put on that you want to hug them. But you know they wouldn’t accept that right now, not from you. So you squeeze their shoulder without saying anything, and they tap you on the back in appreciation as they walk on.

Slowly on account of Esker’s sling-bound arm, you climb, duck, and carefully avoid scratching yourself on sharp metal until the two of you find what you are looking for. In the middle of a nest of debris that had once been the launch camp, Sed sits in a partially cleared space on the ground, a document from the meeting earlier abandoned in their lap as they stare up at the empty sky. They are lit by what some around town are calling the “white hole,” the light from which is dimmer, sharper, and colder than moonlight, casting eerie shadows at odd angles. The air still stinks of jet fuel.

The hatchling’s back is to you, and they look over their shoulder at you with empty, listless eyes that seem to widen with sluggish realization as they glance between you and Esker.

You let Esker lead the way, and they clamber over to Sed’s hidey hole with some effort. “What are you doing out here all by your lonesome?” Esker asks with some chipperness.

“Didn’t know where else to go,” Sed replies, dull and quiet. Their body language has changed slightly, stiff and discretely alert. They’re immediately on the defensive.

“Well, mind if we join ya?” Esker asks, looking around for a suitable spot to sit.

“Kind of.”

Esker hesitates, but you say, “Sorry, then,” and sit on a relatively horizontal beam within an arm’s length of Sed. Esker takes a tactically less confrontational seat in the dirt beside the hatchling.

You cut right to the point. “So, Esker and I got to chatting, and between you telling them about your whole ‘time loop’ situation, and you telling me about the sun and the stars dying off, we figured we might have a somewhat bigger picture than average about what you’ve been dealing with.”

Sed doesn’t react much to the news, looking back toward the sky but with closed eyes this time. “Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out then,” they mumble.

Esker laughs a bit. “Not hardly. We've got a collective 40 or so minutes of what I’m guessing was for you a lot more than that.”

Sed continues to sit silently with their eyes closed, face to the sky like they’re imagining sunlight warming it. Eventually, they lower their chin and level a hard look at Esker. “What specifically do you want from me?”

Esker’s brows furrow with concern, and you speak up when they don’t. “Information, mainly.”

“You won’t get it from me,” Sed says, turning their gaze on you.

“Why’s that?” you ask. “Because you don’t have it, or because you’re not willing to share it?”

“Yes.”

Esker looks at you, and you realize you’re going to have to take over for them, that their sympathy isn’t what’s going to keep the conversation moving. So you sit back a bit and say, “If you want specificity, how about we ask you some questions, and you let us know if you have an answer you want to give?”

“And if I refuse?”

“You have every right to, and we’ll leave you to your business and decide what to do with our assumptions without your input.”

You don’t have to say more than that. If you can tell anything by the way Sed grits their teeth like they’d rather be pulling out each one with rusty pliers than be having this conversation, they know you have leverage over them. You don’t like it much better than they do, but it is what it is.

Sed spends a long time mentally wobbling between options before closing their eyes again and saying, “Fine. Hit me.”

Esker shifts where they sit in the dirt, propping up one knee to angle themself more toward Sed. “Let’s start with just clarifying something. Everyone seems to remember the time just before the supernova differently. We’ve been guessing at a lot of this, but we gathered that maybe everyone has got a memory of a different one of your time loops. Does that make any sense to you?”

It’s a complicated concept that you haven’t been able to wrap your head around as readily as Esker, but Sed’s shoulders drop minutely with some relief, like it’s one of the easier topics that Esker could have started with, somehow. “Seems like it,” the hatchling replies quietly.

Esker nods, humming. “Good, maybe me and Tektite haven’t lost all our marbles yet.” Esker graciously does not wait too long for a laugh that isn’t going to come before continuing. “Got any ideas about why we each only remember one of your loops, and why it’s different for everybody?”

Sed rocks from side to side a little bit, their eyes wandering around objects in the background, away from the two of you. “That’s- it’s not… I don’t know. It’s not the right question. Nobody is supposed to remember any of it.”

“So what’s the right question?” you ask.

Sed shrugs. “Why do you remember anything, I guess? Why are any of us even alive to remember anything? I don’t know. I’m trying to figure it out.”

“Is this info helping any?” Esker asks. They lean over to tap on Gossan’s document sitting in Sed’s lap. Then they make the mistake of resting their hand on Sed’s knee. What would normally be taken as a simple gesture of comfort and camaraderie makes Sed flinch like they had been slapped across the face. They reel away, hissing, “Don’t.”

Esker withdraws as if stung, returning their hand to their own lap instead. “Alright.”

Sed usually likes touch, both on good days and on their rare bad days. Esker knows this, or they wouldn’t have tried. You held them not a day ago. At least, you remind yourself, from your perspective.

Sed seems just as aghast at their own reaction as Esker does. You catch a tremble in their chin before they duck their face toward the ground. “S-sorry,” they mumble. “Uh, what… what was the question?”

Esker clears their throat and goes to repeat themself, but you interrupt. “When was the last time you got a hug, hatchling?”

Sed’s face blanks, crumples, then hardens with rage all over the course of a second or two. They stand up. “Shut up!” they shout, “I’m not- if you’re going to ask- don’t you-”

You cut off their rambling with a placating gesture, waving them back toward their seat. “Sit down. If you don’t want to answer something, then don’t.”

“You don’t get to ask that,” they say harshly, although their rage is quickly faltering.

“Hush, Sed,” you say. “I do get to ask that. You get to either answer or not answer. Sit down.”

Sed stays standing, head low and fists clenching and unclenching. Then they practically throw themself to the ground again, sitting out of reach of you and Esker.

“When’s the last time you got a hug?” you try again.

“I am not answering that,” Sed barks at you. They try to sit with their knees to their chest, but wince and shift with frustrated discomfort.

You wait for them to settle. Esker, seemingly mourning the distance between them by the way they bend forward to lean even a few inches closer to the hatchling, says, “How are your ribs and back feeling? Are your bandages still good?”

Sed rubs at their face and eyes harshly with their palms. “Ask a real question.”

Esker frowns. “That is a real question. I’m concerned about you.”

Sed’s hands still but don’t lower from their face. “Stop. I’m not answering that. Just… just ask me what you were trying to ask about the paper or whatever.”

Esker glances at you, but you don’t have any help you can give them. So they say, “I was asking… what was it? We were talking about memory. Right, did Gossan’s list help you figure anything out?”

Sed finally drops their hands. You’re surprised to see that there are no tears in their eyes or on their cheeks. They lean over and pluck up the paper that had been dropped in the dust when they stood. “No. Well, kinda. I- I have a hypothesis but… there are some gaps.”

You nod. “That’s understandable, it’s only been a few hours, not much time to come to any strong conclusions.” You prop an elbow on your knee so that you can rest your chin in your hand as you watch the hatchling. “From what Rutile told me, it sounds like you were trying to tell them in that meeting that you didn’t remember anything, but by the end it started becoming obvious that that wasn’t the case.”

They don’t respond, brushing dirt from their paper and fiddling with a crumpled corner. You guess you didn’t ask them a question, to be fair.

“Why lie?” Esker asks in a gentle, non-judgemental tone.

Sed shrugs, still keeping their eyes on their paper. “I don’t want to tell the truth. It’s not that deep.”

Esker is looking at you again, obviously becoming increasingly worried about saying or doing the wrong thing and upsetting Sed again. You meet their eyes, taking a breath to consider your words. Then you say, “Okay, a word of advice to you, hatchling: Life is probably going to be easier for you if you just tell people you don’t want to talk about something instead of lying about it. Everybody knows you too well for lying to work out in the long run.”

Sed scoffs loudly, rolling their eyes hard enough to pull their head along with it. They open their mouth to say something, but give up and turn away with a sneer, shaking their head. Then they turn to face the two of you directly. “Okay, fine, you want some honesty? Listen up, because I’m not giving you any more than this.”

Esker sits up with attention. You keep your relaxed pose, but watch Sed carefully as they speak.

“In different time loops, I have tried to explain what happened to me to almost everyone,” Sed starts. “Here’s how it typically goes.”

“I can kind of get Hornfels to believe me, at least in theory. Riebeck too.” They count on their knuckles as they list people off. “Hal supports me, but they can’t get over their worry to consider what I’m saying with logic instead of emotion, so they believe something has happened to me but they don’t believe the details. Esker is the only one who will believe me most of the time without hesitation, but you and I both know that nobody listens to you.”

They point at Esker as they finish the statement. If Esker feels hurt at it, they don’t show it behind their pinched and concerned expression, and they don’t make any move to deny Sed’s words.

Sed grits their teeth for a moment before continuing, pulling out their next words like thorns buried deep in their foot. “But as soon… as soon as Gossan gets involved, and they always get involved, everything falls apart. They think I’m having some kind of mental break no matter what I say or do. I have never once gotten them to believe me.”

They stand up, pacing what short distance they can in the destroyed camp.

“If I go to Rutile, they don’t understand the technical details so they look to Gossan to make an opinion. If I talk to Slate, they either sit with me with no helpful input or send Mica to get Gossan. If I talk to anyone else, they go to Gneiss, who goes to Rutile, who goes to Gossan. There may be some minor variations of this situation depending on who I talk to first and how upset I get when talking about it, but these basic details are always the same, and the end is always the same.”

The hatchling pauses to face you again, gesturing wildly. “I get cornered by a bunch of people who think they know me. They think they know what I need and act like they know how to take care of me better than I do. They get to watch their brand new astronaut, their little hatchling, lose their mind. And then I get to watch all of them die.”

They sit down heavily again, a small cloud of dust rising around them at the action. “It sucks, and it’s always the same. So I stopped telling people about the time loops and the supernova and everything a long time ago, because it’s a waste of time and it just hurts people.”

“You know which of your loops I remember, right?” you say, tilting your head. “The one where you told me that the universe was dying, about how you were trying to fix things. I held you while you cried. I believed you.”

You’re not sure what your goal in saying this is. To move them, to make them feel less alone? Neither thing hits. Sed looks at you with a flat gaze and a flat voice and says, “No, you didn’t. You saw the sky was changing before I got there. You believed yourself.”

And then it occurs to you, with no small amount of shame, that your goal had been to defend yourself. To deny what Sed was saying, because what they’re saying sounds so hopeless you don’t want to accept it. Before you can stop them, Esker makes the same mistake.

“It may be worth a try,” Esker starts. “Circumstances are different than they were then, and-”

With patience you might not be due right now, Sed says, “Esker, Tektite, you don’t even believe me now. You think you know better. You think it will be different this time. Do you know how many times I’ve heard every single person in the village say something like that? I can’t even convince you to believe what I am saying about this tiny aspect of my experience. You, both of you, when you saw the sun die with your own eyes. What makes you think I can convince everyone on the planet that I’ve been stuck in a time loop?”

The hatchling looks tired and old as they run a hand over the burns on their jaw. “I don't want to go through that again. I don't want to try again, especially now that everyone will remember when it goes wrong.”

Esker, bless them but they don’t know when to stop. “You wouldn’t have to do it alone this time, though. Me and Tektite have your back, we can speak in your behalf-”
Sed stands again, groaning with a mixture of anger and frustration and grief. “You're not understanding me. You're focusing on how you think this affects me. Think about everyone else.”

Desperately, the hatchling says, “I know you want to talk about what you experienced. I know, I get that, I went through that feeling myself and I don’t… I don’t really have any right to stop you.”

They step closer to the two of you, and they want to reach out, but they can’t make themself bridge the gap. “I'm sorry for telling you. Esker, I'm sorry I told you about the time loops, and Tektite, I'm sorry I told you about the stars. I wouldn't have told you if I had known you would keep remembering. I shouldn't have told you even to make you remember for those 22 minutes.”

Esker reaches a hand into the space between them, palm up. Sed doesn’t take it, and steps back again. “Because it hurts to know, doesn't it? It hurt to learn it back then. It's hurting you now.”

When Rutile and Gossan’s meeting was over and you were done talking to Esker, Rutile found you sitting in their rocking chair. They brought you inside and tried to ask you how you were, or what happened, or something like that. You kissed their lips. You kissed their bandaged palms and the inside of their wrists. You didn’t tell them that, for a few minutes, you had believed you would never see them again. You didn't say anything, and that worried them so bad it was as if you had told them the sun was going to die a second time.

There’s an ache in your chest that you think Sed might understand better than you do.

“None of this was supposed to happen.” Sed continues. You’re not sure they can see you anymore. “Nobody should even be alive right now. I did something wrong, and now we’re dying slowly. I cut the tail off the fish and it jumped back in the water before I could cut off the head. I turned off the life support and Loess didn't stop breathing. I screwed this up, and now everyone is dying slowly and painfully. Do you understand? How I feel isn't relevant. What happened to me isn't relevant. Minimizing suffering is the only thing that matters anymore.”

As they speak, their voice weakens, and their gaze becomes increasingly unfocused. By the end of it, their knees shake and nearly buckle, and they grab a broken wooden beam to stop themself from falling. Esker is at their side in an instant.

“You alright?” Esker asks, standing close. Sed shakes their head and straightens, brushing off their palms on their pants.

“Yeah, I just got dizzy for a second. I haven’t talked this much since… well. Yesterday, I guess.”

“Can I see your hands?” Esker says.

Sed pulls their arms toward themself protectively. “Don’t touch me, please.”

“I won’t, I’ll just look.”

In the small space between them, Sed hesitantly opens their palms up, and Esker hovers their own free hand underneath them but doesn’t touch.

“Ah, just some scrapes, nothing to worry about,” Esker says lowly, soothingly. “I was worried you might have gotten a splinter, but you don’t even need a bandage. You’ll heal up right as rain in no time.” They look up, face soft. “Now, I don’t want you fainting on us. When’s the last time you ate? Marshmallows don’t count.”

Sed’s face wrinkles. “Yesterday?”

“Hmm. How about you find something to eat after we’re done here, yeah?”

Sed stays where they are a moment longer than necessary, then steps back, looking away. “Maybe.”

“Sed?” you call out to them.

“What?” They look at you, then startle. “Wh-what’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong?” you echo.

“You’re crying.”

Oh. You touch your cheek. “So I am.”

“Why?” Sed asks.

“I’m sad, hatchling.” you say. You don’t try to hide or wipe your tears. “I’m sad for you, and I’m sad for everyone else too.”

Sed doesn’t know what to say, but you don’t need them to say anything. “What do you want to do now? Do you have a plan?” you ask.

Sed puffs out a half sigh. “I don’t know. I’m still trying to understand what’s going on. I’m trying… I’m going to fix things. But I need time to figure out how, and I need to be left alone. I can’t get anything done with y’all breathing down my neck and calling me into meetings all the time.”

That’s what you were afraid the answer would be. You push yourself to standing with a grunt. You could really use some rest yourself. “Alright. Come here.”

Sed looks at you wearily. “I don’t want a hug.”

“I know, come here.”

Sed steps towards you. At the same time, you step toward them, into their space, and grab them roughly by the back of their neck.

Sed is startled out of even making a noise, their eyes wide and round. You bring your face close to theirs. “Listen to me,” you say, voice low and steady despite the tears still running down your cheeks. “I don’t know what ‘fixing things’ looks like in your eyes, but I can see several bad paths it could lead you down. You are not to do anything that will harm anyone or prematurely bring an end to this village. Do you understand?”

The hatchling’s eyes grow wider somehow, but then their expression slowly hardens. “I understand, Tektite,” they growl. They do not try to defend themself, to deny what you are saying. You’re both on the same page with this.

“What I told you yesterday is still true today,” you continue. “This is not your fault. None of this is your fault. Do not act unwisely and make things start being your fault. Do you understand?”

They don’t reply, staring cold fire at you. You don’t let them go, and you don’t repeat yourself.

“I understand,” they finally say.

“Go back to the village.” You straighten up and release them. They step back quickly, and with a final sharp but not entirely unsettled look at you, they disappear through the wreckage.

Esker quickly takes their place in front of you, grabbing at your wrist. “What is wrong with you?” they say angrily. “Why are you treating them like they’re some kind of monster?”

It takes you a moment to be able to speak. Your tears have redoubled, and you have to cough and clear your voice to convince words to come out instead of a sob that Esker wouldn’t tolerate right now.
After a couple deep breaths, you say, “They’re not a monster, but they believe that they are, and they might try to do something monstrous to prove it to themself.”

Esker doesn’t accept that. “They need help, Tektite, they don’t need someone to reaffirm what they’re wrongly thinking.”

They are gripping your wrist painfully tight, but they’re shaking, so you gently squeeze their bicep. “Sed won't accept comfort right now,” you say, looking them in the eye. “They can't. It would be like trying to give a hug and say ‘there there, it's alright’ to someone who's actively on fire. It's not going to work out for anyone. What they want is to be taken seriously, to be believed. So that’s what I did.”

“I believe them too! But some of what they were saying was just… blatantly untrue. Like how they think they’re alone in all this. I’m not going to let them think I agree with them on that.”

The problem is, Sed being alone is probably true. As long as they keep locking folks out, as long as they believe that they’re alone, it’s true. And believing something that no one else believes in is one of the loneliest experiences you could think of.

But you don’t say any of that. The core of what Esker is saying is right, Sed wasn’t correct on every point. Plus, you don’t want to argue with Esker. So you just say, “I know.”

Esker drops your arm with a huff. “I’m not going to treat them like you did.”

You exhale a quiet, somewhat shaky sigh. “I know, bugbite, I’m not asking you to,” you say. They glance sidelong at you for the pet name they never were quite able to grow out of. “I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know exactly what they need, I’m just trying to do my best by them, same as you. You were kind to them, and they seemed to take to that, so keep taking care of them however you can, alright?”

Esker sighs and looks down at the ground, a hand on top of their hat. Eventually, they say, “So we’re keeping this to ourselves, I reckon?”

You rub at your wrist absently and say, “I won’t oblige you to anything, but that’s my plan. I can’t see how telling people could do anything but more harm than good for that hatchling right now. I don’t like it, but I don’t see a good way around it until Sed opens up.”

Esker doesn’t seem to have much more to offer than a slow nod, and you’re tired, so you start moving to leave the camp the same way you came in. You’re stopped by a hand on your arm and a quiet, “Nope, hold on a second.”

You turn to see Esker’s firm and caring expression aimed at you this time, and they pull you into a hug.

Surprised and extremely grateful, you wrap your arms around them, mindful of their sling. They keep a hand on the back of your head and let you cry the last of your tears into your shoulder.

You pull away after a minute or two, and they swipe at your cheeks with their thumb, a small, gentle smile on their face. “Don’t fall apart on us, you big lug. We rely on you.”

You chuckle breathily, shaking your head. “I appreciate you, Esker.”

As the two of you slowly make your way out of the destroyed camp, Esker asks, “Do we need to go find Gabbro next?”

“If Gabbro doesn’t want to be found, we’re not going to find them,” you reply. “Send them out to me in the field when they turn up. I’ll probably need to talk to them alone—they’re going to be even more flighty than Sed, if experience tells me anything.”

Esker raises their brows at you in disbelief. “You’re leaving again? Now?”

You pause when you reach the clearing, dropping a hand on their uninjured shoulder. “I’m sorry, I know I could be of use here, but I have to leave tomorrow. I’m going to check on Gneiss before I go, but then I have to go back out and deal with the seeds.”

“Seeds? What seeds?”

“Big ones, worrisome ones, that seem to be coming from Dark Bramble,” you say. The line of light from the white hole cuts overhead, and you can make out the silhouette of the vine-infected planet in front of it. “Two more of its seeds have crashed on Timber Hearth.”

Chapter Text

You are incredibly sore when you wake up.

You really don’t want to be awake, if you’re honest. Your eyes are crusty and bleary when you blink them open, and your mouth is dry with an unpleasant sour taste. As soon as you shift, you feel a deep ache in your shoulders, and even accidentally bumping your chest with your arm almost makes you squeak with pain. Looking down the front of the night shirt you don’t remember putting on, you see two long, vertical, suspiciously seatbelt-shaped lines of dark bruises extending from top of your shoulders and meeting below your ribcage. Your knee is the worst thing, you can’t even move or bend it and it burns like the bone was replaced with a chunk of Hollow’s Lantern.

So you just close your eyes and lay there, annoyed and irritated at whatever could have caused you to become too uncomfortable to fall asleep again. You should probably be trying to remember how you got hurt. That’s probably important. You don’t want to think about it, though. You try not to think about it. You try not to remember crashing on Timber Hearth after escaping Brittle Hollow’s destruction via black hole merger after you explored the Hanging City after the sun went supernova-

Oh, dang it.

Your eyes shoot open and you sit up so fast you nearly fall back again with the head rush. Brittle Hollow! The black holes! The sun!

You go to swing your legs out of bed and realize why you can’t move your knee. A bulky brace of wood and fabric surrounds it, holding it firmly in a slightly bent position. Further down your leg, a lighter, fabric-only brace wraps around your ankle and bare foot.

You don’t want to put weight on that leg, you figure you’ll be yelled at by both your body and whoever wrapped up your limb like this. But thankfully, a pair of crutches has been left leaning against the wall by your bed.

Once you kind of figure out how to use them, your shoulders complaining about the unusual strain, you hobble-hop out to the common room. There you find Tektite and Gneiss cuddled together on the couch. Tektite rests their cheek on the top of Gneiss’ head, listening quietly as Gneiss talks in low tones.

You notice that Gneiss' eyes are red and wet, and your thoughts immediately spiral. Are they crying? Why are they crying? Is it because of you? Are you in worse shape than you thought? Are your injuries permanent, unrecoverable? Are you dying?

“Am I dying?” you blurt out. The two on the couch startle and look at you.

Tektite lets Gneiss up and the healer walks over to you. “Riebeck! I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you get up. Of course you’re not dying, what makes you think that?”

You stumble over your words as Gneiss reaches up to cup your face and touch your arms, their eyes checking over your posture. “You’re- I thought- are you upset? About, um, something?”

Gneiss utters a small laugh and wipes at their eyes. “Oh, don’t mind me, dear. I’m just a bit tired is all. Go sit down on the couch so I can adjust your crutches.”

You obey, purple-faced with embarrassment. Of course they weren’t talking about you. Why would you assume that, dummy? As Gneiss takes your crutches and makes them longer, more suitable for your height, Tektite kisses them on their forehead and says quietly, “I’ll be back as soon as I can,” to which Gneiss smiles but doesn’t reply. Then they nod at you and say, “Take it easy, Riebeck. Listen to Gneiss,” and leave the cabin, shutting the door behind them.

Gneiss leans the adjusted crutches against the wall and turns to you with their hands on their hips. “Now, I imagine you’re feeling rather beat up. Let’s take a look at you.”

They take the time to look at your eyes and test your memory. You find that what you can remember of the time between now and just before you crashed is foggy at best, which disturbs you but Gneiss reassures that it’s not unexpected. They look over your bruises and poke at your knee and ankle, asking what hurts and what doesn’t. Then they hand over a tiny bottle with maybe two dozen pills in it. “You can take two of these every six hours for the pain. As for your leg, you need to stay off of it as much as you can and keep it raised. Stay here and try to get some rest. I’ll bring you some food and ice for your knee in a little while.” Then they leave.

To your credit, you manage to follow their instructions for at least half an hour.

The crutches are a bit easier to use now that they’re at a proper height, but it still takes some effort to navigate yourself off the front porch with them. It doesn’t help that the village is as dark as a nighttime thunderstorm and messier than the aftermath of one.

There’s mainly a bunch of wood, just, all over the place. There are piles of planks in front of each cabin that you see Tuff using to board up broken windows. A much larger pile of wood leans against the two waterfall cabins and sticks up out of the lake itself, and your insides twist when you realize that the wood had once been the now-collapsed ramp.

As you limp up to inspect further, you come across Tephra and Galena, who are currently using claw hammers to pry up nails from a section of the ramp laid flat on the ground. Galena waves at you but quickly refocuses on their work. Tephra, who seemed to be playing with a pile of nails, runs up to you.

“Riebeck!” they exclaim. “You’re awake! You missed it, Slate had to use Gabbro’s ship to tow your ship since you broke your ship and it can’t fly by itself anymore!”

“Slate had to-? Oh, oh gosh!” You swing around, looking for your ship up on… wait, where is…

“Also, the launch pad got knocked down, so Slate took it outside the crater over there somewhere,” Tephra adds, pointing past where the launch pad should be.

You feel sick to your stomach. “No, did- did I…?”

“Nah, the black holes knocked it down.”

“Oh, okay, that’s good-” You cut yourself off with a scream as you realize why you are able to see all the way to the other side of the crater without sunlight. A sharp, piercing beam of light rising from the horizon cuts across the sky. “What is that?!”

Tephra, clearly losing their patience with you, rolls their eyes. “It’s the white hole. Come on, Riebeck, you’re an astronaut, aren’t you supposed to know this stuff?”

You’re not a very good one apparently, between crashing your ship and not knowing about remarkable astronomical anomalies that have become so commonplace that even the hatchlings can identify them.

“Everything alright down there?” you hear from somewhere up above you. Looking past the waterfall, you see a faint purple glow coming from something sitting next to a winch on the edge of the cliff. Below it, Marl rappels against the cliff face, a series of tools dangling from ropes around their waist.

Tephra gets back to helping Galena, and in the time it takes for you to limp up the path, Marl rappels down and shimmies across to where the dirt path ends and the wooden ramps are supposed to start.

“Hey, good to see you up and moving around!” Marl says as they pull themself up to stand next to you.

“What are you doing?” you ask, looking at the complicated tangle of ropes they’re attached to.

“Getting ready to install the gravity crystal thing from the museum to at least temporarily replace these ramps,” they reply. “How are you feeling?”

“Confused, I guess?” you say with a small, awkward laugh. Dazed is more like it. “I’m, uh, struggling to catch up with all I’ve missed.”

“Oh, I bet, buddy!” They clap you on the shoulder. You wince but manage not to yelp. “There’s a lot to catch up on! The sun being gone, this whole black hole disaster, the Nomai walking around the village, Sed’s issues…”

The Nomai?

Oh, right, the Nomai. It’s coming back to you now. As you came back to the village crater after you crashed, you saw a Nomai walking around. You know, kind of like the statue Gabbro found, but real? Or like the skeletons you found, but alive? Interesting, very interesting.

You nod along slowly as Marl continues to list out the village’s problems.

Then your eyes bulge and your mouth drops open.

Your crutches clatter to the ground as you grab Marl’s shoulders and scream, “THERE’S A LIVING NOMAI IN THE VILLAGE?!”

Marl grabs your arms, and you realize that’s the only thing keeping you from tipping over from lack of support and sudden dizziness. “Yeah, pal, did you forget?” they laugh. “Wow, you really have been out of it, haven’t you?”

“What happened? Where are they now? Or, she? He?” Marl holds you back from your instinct to pace up and down the path. You feel like you’re on a mission, not that you know what that mission is. There’s a living Nomai! Here, of all places! You can’t just stand around and chat all day!

Marl laughs again. “Alright, calm down, if Gneiss finds out I’ve let you twist your knee again I’ll be on mold-scrubbing duty for a year. They came in with Sed, apparently. They helped me carry you down to a sick room, then they were following Rutile around for a while. Rutile’s gone to bed, and I don’t know where the Nomai went off to after that.”

You freeze in place. “They helped you carry me?” Then you smack yourself on the head a couple times. “Ugh, why can’t I remember? Did they say anything?”

Marl holds your hands still, voice growing more serious. “Okay, I’m not telling you anything until you actually chill out.”

“Okay, okay,” you say and take a couple exaggerated breaths even though you want to yell at Marl for interrupting. “What did they say?”

“Nothing, really. Nothing I could understand at least.” Marl smirks. “You sure had a lot to say though.”

“What?” you reply, blanching. “Oh no.”

“Yeah, you just immediately started asking questions, like ‘Are you a Nomai?’ and ‘Are you from Ember Hollow or Brittle Twin?’ and ‘Are the beds comfortable?’ Then you kept repeating something that sounded like ‘yah veh soo’ over and over again.”

Yah veh soo? What? What could that-

Oh. Yağ ve su. Oil and water. That phrase from the voice recorder you found, the phrase you repeated over and over until it got stuck in your head before you finally managed to translate it. It must have been the only bit of verbal Nomai language that you could remember at the time.

Wow, you hope that this Nomai doesn’t read too much into that.

“No…” you moan, dropping your face into your hands. “Why do I have to be so awkward?”

Marl pats you on the back. “Aw, cheer up, it wasn’t so bad. It was pretty cute if anything.”

“Huh?”

“Oh, nothing, nothing,” Marl says, clearing their throat.

You straighten up, looking around for your crutches which Marl helps you retrieve. “I have to find them. I have to apologize for being an idiot, at least. Do you know where they could be?”

Marl shrugs. “Dunno. They commandeered your room, so maybe in there? Also, your stuff got knocked all over the place during the black hole merger. We put everything into boxes, but we didn’t know how you wanted it to be organized, so… yeah.”

So that’s how you find yourself pacing back and forth in front of the storage building.

It was kind of an accident that you ended up with your own room. Most people don’t really have a room that “belongs” to them. They might have a preference or habit as to which cabin they tend to sleep in and drop their stuff when they’re not using it, but that could change from week to week, if not day to day.

So when you requested Rutile to help teach you how to build the addition to the storage building, most assumed that it was because you wanted the room for yourself. The rule was, if you want your own space, you have to build it and maintain it yourself, as much as you are able. For slightly differing reasons, Chert and Slate have taken advantage of this, each having their own little place to live and work that others aren’t allowed to enter without their permission. Everyone tried to afford you your own privacy as well until they caught on that this project of yours had just been a hastily decided upon excuse to procrastinate from the daunting and nerve-wracking task of building your ship and facing your future of traversing outer space. Now the room is used more freely by the village, although it never quite lost the classification of being “Riebeck’s room.”

Which makes it all the more embarrassing that you can’t bring yourself to even approach “Riebeck’s room.”

You had managed to peek inside the storage building just long enough to see that the door to your room was closed before you quickly retreated. If the door is closed, does that mean the Nomai is not in there? You usually leave the door closed when you’re not inside, and most others who go in and out manage to do so too, except sometimes the hatchlings. When you are inside, you only close the door if you don’t want to be disturbed. So does that mean that the Nomai is in there and doesn't want to be disturbed themself?

You could knock. Maybe that’s what you should do. But wait, knocking is a form of nonverbal communication that acts as a request for permission to enter a closed or private space. Is it safe to assume that Nomai would recognize this form of communication? Oh no, you definitely should not assume that. That’s a disaster waiting to happen.

So maybe you should just go up and start talking through the closed door? Introduce yourself, maybe? No, that's a horrible idea too. What would you even say? Presumably, they can’t understand Hearthian. And you can’t speak Nomai, unless you just want to chant “yağ ve su” at them again. Ugh, what is wrong with you?

You deliberate long enough that eventually Rutile, bleary-eyed after just getting out of bed, catches you pacing outside the storage building and tells you to stop walking around on that leg so much and to either go lay down or make yourself useful by helping Porphy in the kitchen cabin. You’re almost glad to temporarily give up on your venture. You were starting to panic about the possibility that the Nomai would come out of the room to find you stalking around outside it.

So after some more slow and careful porch navigation, you make your way inside the kitchen cabin, calling out, “Porphy? Rutile asked me to come help you cook?”

Inside, you do find Porphy, but they’re not attending to the half-prepared meal like you had expected. Instead, they are sitting behind a dangerously fed-up looking Sed, an open medical kit beside them.

“Give me a minute, Riebeck, I’m changing Sed’s bandages,” Porphy says.

“Did you get hurt?” you ask Sed.

“No, Riebeck, I’m wearing bandages for fun,” they reply.

Then you realize that what you thought must be smeared dirt or a shadow across Sed face is actually some serious-looking burns. “Oh, goodness, what happened to your face?”

There is probably a more sensitive way you could have worded that. You probably should have just ignored it altogether. Even so, Sed doesn’t look any more irritated than they did before you spoke up, not that you’re sure that would be possible with how Sed is snarling at their current predicament. “Got burned,” they say flatly.

That much is obvious, although between now and when you saw them in Brittle Hollow, you’re not sure what could have caused such gnarly burns except…

You gasp. “Did you get caught in the supernova?”

“Who knows?” Sed says, frustrated, and shrugs, then immediately flinches and whirls around on Porphy. “Okay, you need to stop-”

“That was you!” Porphy exclaims, equally exasperated. “The more you move, the more it’s going to hurt!” They stand up with a huff, collecting the tools and bandages around them. “Come on, if you can’t sit still, you need to take your shirt off so I don’t have to work around it. Riebeck, could you finish peeling those mudstalks, please?”

Sed stomps after Porphy into a side room as you try to find a comfortable way to sit on the stool next to the crate of the long, fibrous stems and the bucket of papery skins that had already been shucked away.

While you slowly work, occasionally snapping off a piece of stalk to chew on, you can occasionally hear complaints coming from both parties in the other room.

“You should let Porphy fix you up,” you call out with a full mouth, trying to peel flakes of plant skin from your fingers. “You need to get healthy so you can, um, fulfill your side of our deal!”

“Ow! What deal?” Sed calls back.

“The one where you would, uh, you would go back to the Sunless City? After I go to the Hanging City?”

Sed’s head pokes through the open doorway, looking at you with a confused and distrustful squint. “You haven’t been to the Hanging City.”

“Oh ho!” you say haughtily, pointing a stalk at them. “That’s where- that’s where you’re wrong, friend. I just got back from there, in fact!”

Something in Sed’s expression changes. Their fiery annoyance seems to cool a bit, damped down and replaced with something softer, possibly even a little vulnerable. It’s a weird display from anyone, especially Sed, who yesterday would have probably been screaming in your ears with excitement by now.

“What?” they say quietly. “When? How?”

Since you’re pretty much done with the mudstalks, you pull your stool closer, close enough that you don’t have to talk from the other side of the room but far enough not to invade their space while Porphy works on them. “Oh, it was a whole ordeal,” you start. “Right after you left, Hal called me and said there had been a supernova.”

They are unmoving and silent as you relate your adventure, looking at you with what you can only guess is awe. It makes you a little self-conscious, really—you’ve never been the best storyteller, you stutter and stumble over your words and tend to ramble and go off on tangents. But you don’t stop. Sed looks like they… need this, maybe? Their ears lift at the mention of every new location you saw or name you read about, and they seem close to tears when you start describing the Eye Shrine District. You’re not sure what’s making them react like this. It’s probably not your storytelling, but just in case it is, you try to evoke in your words and gestures all the passion and amazement and joy you experienced, leaving out no tiny detail. It’s keeping Sed still, in any case, so hopefully Porphy will be able to more easily patch them up.

Porphy walks back out of the room and goes to wash their hands as your story concludes. “And then I passed out, I guess, after I crashed? I don’t really remember that part. I could almost believe it was all a dream, if it weren’t for my leg actually being messed up. Dreams don’t usually result in real injuries, I think.”

Sed is silent for a while, disappearing into the room and then reappearing fully clothed. They stand in front of you and fidget their hands almost like Galena does when they want to give you a hug but are feeling too shy to ask. You’re kind of surprised that Sed hasn’t tackled you by now —that’s what they did back when you told them you had practiced with your jetpack for the first time, and this seems like a way bigger deal in your opinion.

Instead, they open and close their mouth a few times before eventually saying, “Thank you.”

“Thank you…?” you repeat slowly, looking around like you missed something.

“For… for making it,” they add. “For making it to the Hanging City.” They walk away and sit down on the bench near the door, apparently deciding that this is enough clarification.

“Oh, uh, okay,” you say. “You’re welcome, I guess.”

The only noticeable sound for a while is the rhythmic thumping of a knife against a cutting board as Porphy chops the mudstalks you had peeled. You take another bite of the one in your hand and chew thoughtfully.

Eventually, Sed mumbles, “Where’s my ship?”

You cough to avoid choking. “You- you lost your…?”

Your voice dies in your throat as the exterior door opens and a tall, dark shape fills the doorway. Lanternlight reflects off the shiny metal of a large, unfamiliar, three-eyed mask.

You squeak and pull back toward the wall as the figure sweeps into the room and quickly fills the relatively small space. Delicate gold patterns cross the dark green suit, and the clomping of metal boots is interspersed by the tapping of the end of the staff against the wooden floor.

The figure stops in front of Sed, who shows none of the utter shock you’re sure is all over your face right now. With the quick tap of the staff, purple writing grows and blooms across the floor at their feet. Then, just as suddenly as they arrived, the figure leaves again.

You release the breath you didn’t know you were holding as Sed stares down at the message on the floor. Their hand opens and closes at their hip before they startle and look down at the air they’re grabbing at. “Where’s my translator?” they ask, panicked.

“It’s upstairs,” Porphy says. “Riebeck can you-” They cut themself off, eyeing your leg brace. “Nevermind, I’ll get it.”

As Porphy hurries up the staircase, you find at least some of your voice. “Was-” you say, then swallow and try again. “Was that the Nomai?”

“Yeah,” Sed replies, still looking anxiously between the message and their hip.

“What’s their name?” you ask. You’re not sure why you’re whispering.

“Solanum. Her name is Solanum.”

Porphy returns from upstairs, passing the translator to Sed, who snatches it away and turns it toward the message on the floor. You can see text crawl across the translator’s screen, but despite leaning closer you can’t read it.

“What does it say?” you beg.

Sed is quiet for a moment. Then, “She says she’s leaving.”

“Leaving?” you echo, ears drooping.

“Already?” Porphy says. “Does she need some supplies, or to refuel her ship? Although I don’t know how easily she can refuel with the state the launch pad is in…”

“It doesn’t… her shuttle doesn’t work like that,” Sed says, staring at the message like they’re still trying to translate it. “It teleports. Like the Little Scouts.”

Your stomach sinks. “Where does it teleport to?”

“Brittle Hollow’s gravity cannon.”

“Sed,” you say, and they look up at you. “Brittle Hollow doesn’t exist anymore.”

You stare at each other. And then, at varying speeds and resulting in varying levels of pain, you both leap to your feet.

Porphy cuts in front of both of you before either of you can even take a step toward the front door. “No, you two don't need to be running around, I’ll get them,” they say, jogging out the door. “Tuff, stop them!”

Porphy closes the door behind them, and you try to share another meaningful look with Sed, but they’re a step ahead of you and are already rushing to leave, pulling the translator’s strap over their shoulder with a grimace. “Wait for me!” you say. Then you shake your head. “Wait, how do you know her name? And which pronouns to use?”

Sed ignores you, but at least they leave the cabin door open for you.

Outside, you see Solanum on the log lift, struggling to figure out how to operate it while Tuff approaches her, walking backward and talking to Porphy. “Why, what’s going on?” they say.

“They’re trying to get to their ship, but it’s not safe!”

“Why isn’t it safe?” Tuff replies, reaching Solanum and gesturing to guide her off the log lift. “Hey, come here, Solanum.”

Solanum looks at Tuff, no expression readable behind her mask, then raises her head slightly and seems to look past them. She steps down off the log lift but keeps her distance as Porphy catches up to Tuff.

“Sed says it only goes to Brittle Hollow,” Porphy says, hands on their hips. “I don’t know a good way to communicate that, though.”

“Maybe we can draw something?” Tuff replies. “They don’t know sign language, right?”

You realize that Sed has left your side, and then you realize it’s because they’re the only one that noticed Solanum pass Tuff and Porphy and start walking toward the waterfall while they were distracted. “Uh, guys?” you call out.

The two of them jump and hurry to follow after Solanum, but she’s tall and walking with purpose and outpaces them. You struggle to keep up with your crutches, but Sed is not moving quite as fast as normal either, so they end up lagging behind with you.

You and Sed make it as far as behind the waterfall, where you find Tuff and Porphy staring at Solanum walking sideways up the wall. A second later, Marl appears over the cliff and also starts walking down it, parallel to the ground. Solanum brushes past them, and they watch her pass with confusion.

“Oh, that’s going to be bad for me,” Tuff says quietly.

“Y’all can come up too, if you want,” Marl says, “the gravity crystal should be secure now.”

With some clumsiness, Porphy starts making their way up, ending up on their hands and knees before figuring out how to stand. Sed quickly follows, and you struggle to make the transition with your bad knee but manage after a moment, looking sideways at a green-tinged Tuff. “Take your time!” you say to them as you pass.

You reach the top in time to see Porphy, now on flat ground, reach out toward Solanum. They grab hold of her arm, saying, “Alright, slow your roll, we need to- whoa!”

Before they can finish the sentence, Solanum tries to rip herself out of Porphy’s grip. Caught off guard, Porphy stumbles forward but manages to keep their hold. Solanum struggles and tries to pull away.

Porphy is laughing a bit, like they’re trying to wrestle a squirming Arkose who’s trying to avoid a bath. Which is… this isn’t right. Solanum isn’t a tadpole fresh from the spawning pools. She’s something different, something that none of you have interacted with before: a stranger. And Porphy’s a stranger to her.

“Hey, hey!” you shout. “Porphy, knock it off! Let go of her!”

Porphy pauses their attempts to corral Solanum to respond, “I’m not going to hurt them, I’m just-”

You hobble closer. “She doesn’t know that! You can’t just treat her like a new hatchling. You’re an alien to her, she doesn’t know you, and you’re restraining her. Why would she trust you right now?”

Porphy looks at you for a moment, then slowly lets go and puts their hands up, taking a step back. “Okay, alright.”

Solanum snatches her arm back and turns to face you and Porphy, her shuttle rising high in the distance behind her. She stands with her head low and her feet apart, staff held in both hands.

“Solanum,” Sed says quietly.

Solanum looks over to Sed, who nods up toward the horizon to your left, where the launch pad had once been. “Tanımlamak,” Sed says, “gezen ay.”

Solanum follows their gaze, and so do you. The Quantum Moon slowly orbits past.

As you and they watch it, Sed eventually steps in front of Solanum, taking a slow, calming breath. Then they say, “Evren var ve biz varız.”

Is… is Sed speaking Nomai?

Sed turns to Porphy. “Up in her shuttle is a voice recorder. It’s like a half-circle shape plus a triangle shape, and there’s Nomai text on it. Can you grab it? The shuttle uses one of those gravity beams like on my ship. Do not look at the front console, whatever you do.”

“There’s a recorder?” you ask Sed in a whisper as Porphy jogs away, although again you are not sure why you are whispering. “Is that how you know that phrase? And… and Solanum’s name?”

“Yes, yeah, sure,” Sed replies, focusing again on Solanum, who has mostly stopped moving.

Solanum repeats the phrase Sed used, then says something more. Sed shakes their head. “Sorry, I don’t have enough words.”

Eventually, Porphy returns, carrying more than just the recorder. “Your helmet and backpack were up there too,” they say.

Sed ignores the gear and puts the recorder on the floor. It looks nearly identical to the one you found in the Hanging City. Not bothering with their translator, they flip through the dialogue and play something near the end. Again, it is the same phrase.

“Is that Solanum’s voice?” you whisper.

“Shh,” they reply.

“Sorry.”

They play something longer from somewhere in the middle of the recording. Her voice sounds so different from Cassava’s. Younger, higher pitched, less tired. Peaceful. Confident.

Solanum doesn’t react to the recorder for a long time, although you’re not sure how Sed is expecting her to react.

“What does that mean? What you played?” you ask after a minute.

Sed still does not look away from Solanum. “I’m just trying to remind her that she doesn’t have to be afraid of things she doesn’t know.”

Still, nothing happens. Sed does not say anything else, and Solanum doesn’t move. You glance at Porphy, and they shrug at you.

You nearly jump out of your skin when Solanum says something, although it is too quiet for you to make out.

In response, Sed leans back and nods over their shoulder at the museum. “Bilgi yeri. Tanımlamak ve açıklamak yeri. Biz gideceğiz.”

Your ears perk up. Wow, Sed is really good at that!

Sed walks to the museum, and Solanum follows, and you and Porphy follow them both. Along the way, you find Marl helping Tuff transition from the gravity crystal to the ground. Tuff is shaking like a leaf and breathing heavily, but they give you a thumbs up before Porphy hooks their elbow and pulls them into the group as well.

Tuff and Porphy elect to stay near the entrance of the museum while the rest of you head inside. Low, bassy music fills the building as Sed immediately begins marching up the stairs to the observatory. You hesitate with your crutches at the bottom. Those are going to be slow and painful to deal with, but you sure as dirt aren’t going to stay down here.

You manage the first three steps, and you’re proud to not audibly groan with pain on each one. But then you feel a pull on your arm, and when you look up you yelp loud enough to hurt your throat. A massive mask obfuscates most of your vision, because Solanum is the one holding your arm, supporting your weight. You freeze. What is happening? Why is she so close and also looking at you?

She takes another step up, then waits. Shakily, you do the same. Then she takes another step, then you. She’s… she’s actually helping you.

This is simultaneously the most amazing and most pathetic thing to ever happen to you.

You only manage to glance up briefly, because you don’t want to trip, gosh, wouldn’t that be embarrassing? But you see Sed step over something on the staircase. After a few more steps, you see what it is—the source of the music, Gabbro laying upside down on the stairs and playing their flute.

“Gabbro? Uh, what are you doing?” you ask.

They pull their flute away from their mouth long enough to say, “Helping Hornfels,” before blowing another note.

Thankfully, they sit up and pull themself into the observatory so you don’t have to try climbing around them. Inside, you hear Sed saying, “We need to see any of the pieces of Brittle Hollow we can find.”

Hornfels is in a… box? A small wooden structure has been built around the computer bank, with sides covered in tarps and blankets and a curtain covering a roughly-hewn doorway. You hear the whirring of a small portable heater, and you realize that this box must have been built to stay comfortable long-term inside the poorly insulated museum.

Hornfels does not draw open the curtain when they curtly say, “The telescope’s mirror is still broken, rendering the telescope useless until Tuff and Gossan and Rutile can make a new one,” and… oh. You’ve seen Hornfels annoyed before, it’s not rare that they’re salty at you or Hal, or more often at Sed, or most often at Gabbro, but they are mad mad right now for some reason. As in, speaking to Sed with all the flatness one would read off the chemical compounds of a deadly plant kind of mad.

This does seem to make Sed hesitate, but not for long. “Solanum doesn’t know what happened to Brittle Hollow. She is trying to go back there, and she will keep trying until we show her there’s nowhere to go back to.”

There is another long, uncomfortable pause before Hornfels throws aside the curtain. “Fine. Where are she?”

“Is she,” Sed corrects automatically. Hornfels squints at them with a cold glare, and they back away with their hands up. “Solanum,” they say. “Isim Hornfels. Açıklamak kişi.”

Solanum approaches Hornfels hesitantly while they turn their attention back to the computer. Hornfels says, “Chert has managed to send pictures of some of the remains of Brittle Hollow they spotted. What is she needing to see?”

Sed sits down heavily on a bench near the telescope, and Gabbro sits beside them. Dropping their head into hands, Sed says, “The gravity cannon first, if you have it.” They sound out of breath.

“Not feeling too hot, t- uh, buddy?” Gabbro asks.

“Dizzy,” Sed replies. “Can’t take deep breaths with my ribs messed up, and I’ve got a headache.”

“Have you had any water recently?” you offer. “You could be dehydrated, maybe?”

Sed seems to chew on this concept for a moment, then mutters, “Crap.”

You go give them a consoling pat on the shoulder, but retrieve your hand when Gabbro shakes their head at you insistently.

“Okay, look here, Solanum,” Hornfels says in the meantime.

Hearing her name, Solanum steps closer. She considers the narrow door of the box for a moment, then reaches under her mask. After a series of clicks and hisses, she pulls the entire apparatus forward and off of her head.

“Oh, wow,” you whisper.

For a reason you can’t quite pinpoint, your eyes well up a little bit when you see her face.

The fur on her face is short and black, and a fluffy silver mane wraps from the top of her head to her chin and down to her shoulders, pressed flat from her helmet. Twisting antlers curve over her head and protrude from the sides of her jaw. Her two lower eyes flick around her surroundings, while the third in the center focuses on the monitor that Hornfels is gesturing towards.

She’s… you really don’t have words to describe her beyond the superficial aspects. Terrifying? Maybe that should be correct. You have never seen something so foreign, so alien as this. Some part of yourself says that you should be scared of her.

But you aren’t. More than anything, you think you feel validated. All those years you spent studying bones, you never felt like you were studying something dead. You felt like you were trying to understand something more important and alive than you could ever imagine yourself being.

When you see Solanum here, looking at you and then looking away, walking, breathing, leaning closer to Hornfels to see the monitor but trying not to get in their space, nothing about her makes you feel afraid. You feel like you’re looking at home.

“Sed…” you say.

When you look over to them, you are surprised that they aren’t looking at Solanum themself. They are watching you from behind their hands that still support their head and partially cover their face, and despite their apparent pain and discomfort, there is a tiny bit of a smile in their eyes. “I know, right?”

Solanum backs away from the computer, her antlers getting caught on the doorway before she yanks them free. You wince with sympathy. You hope that didn’t hurt.

She backs into and nearly stumbles over the orrery in the middle of the room, and you automatically step forward as if you could help her, not that you could do much with you leaning on one leg and two crutches.

She is glancing between Hornfels’ computer and the orrery. Behind you, Sed says, “Copy her movements to show that you agree or understand.”

Both Gabbro and Hornfels are looking at you, and now Solanum is too, and you realize in a stomach-dropping moment that, oh yeah, you’re supposed to be the Nomai expert here.

Oh goodness, you have spent your life daydreaming about a moment like this but you are not remotely prepared to actually do it!.

“Do… does… um, is she…” you stutter. “D-does she understand, um, nodding and shaking the head? Or other nonverbal m-means of communication? Smiling and frowning?”

“Not naturally, but she’ll pick it up quick with the copying,” Sed replies.

“Pointing?”

“She’ll get it, but she’ll point more with her eyes and head than with her hands.”

“Okay, okay,” you say mostly to yourself. “I can do this.”

Solanum looks at the monitor, then you. Then she looks at the orrery, then at you again.

You swallow hard. You point at the monitor, then at the orrery.

She watches your hands, then reaches out and touches the little wooden ball that represents Brittle Hollow, her finger following it as it rotates on its track.

You nod, then immediately cringe and point at the monitor instead.

Solanum watches closely. She touches the tiny paired model on the orrery.

“She… I think she wants to see the Twins, Hornfels,” you say.

After a moment, they reply, “I have them up.”

You make eye contact with Solanum again. It’s dizzying. Her eyes are a greenish-gray, with rectangular pupils. You point at the monitor.

The three of you go back and forth between the planets—Solanum indicating what she wants to see, you speaking for her, and Hornfels calling up the pictures.

She points at the middle of the orrery, and you swallow hard and say, “Uh oh. Um, she’s- she’s asking for the sun.”

Hornfels sighs. “It isn’t going to look like much of anything.”

Solanum stares at the screen, then looks at you again and points at the same place on the orrery.

“Oh I don’t… she doesn’t get it, I don’t think,” you say.

Hornfels leans close to the monitor, rubbing their chin as they flip through the images they have access to. “I can try this one, it shows the light of the white hole bending around the event horizon.”

You point at the screen again. Solanum goes to it. After a long moment, she looks up again, pointing at the middle of the orrery, speaking to you in her language. Your head sinks down into your shoulders. “Sorry, sorry, I don’t know what else-”

“Let’s try this,” Gabbro says, standing up and going over to the stairwell. They point down at something on the lower floor. “Solanum.”

She follows Gabbro, crouching to see what they see, and you ask, “What are you-?”

“The supernova exhibit,” Gabbro replies.

“Oh!” you exclaim. “Good idea!”

Then you pause for a moment and put yourself in her large metal shoes. Finding out that your sun exploded from a bunch of aliens you can’t speak with via a series of museum dioramas… it would probably suck, at best. It would probably be utterly horrifying, at worst.

The way she reels back, eyes wide and distant, suggests she is leaning towards the “worst” option.

She speaks frantically back and forth with Sed, and you really wish you had been around whenever Sed and Hal must have learned the verbal components of the language. Eventually, she quiets, then points at the model for Ember and Ash.

“She’s asking for the Twins again, Hornfels,” you say. “Sed, did she-?”

“She figured it out,” Sed replies, dropping their face into their hands again.

“Oh,” you say, your ears drooping. “Sorry, Solanum.”

She watches the monitor for a long time, not asking for the image to change. Hornfels leans back in their chair with their arms crossed over their chest, sighing again. Gabbro sits on the bench next to Sed and plays some quiet notes on their flute.

You shuffle side to side. Your knee is feeling sore and swollen, but you don’t want to sit down and possibly give Solanum the idea that you’ve tapped out of the conversation.

Eventually, she steps away from the computer, Hornfels turning in their chair to follow her. But instead of going to the orrery, she walks up to Sed and kneels in front of them. Sed drops their hands, and they look at each other for a while.

Then, raising the staff she carries with her, she touches the box at the top of it. You watch as thin trails of glowing purple light follow where her finger traces over the box. Then she presses the other end of the staff into the floorboards, and text curls out from it like the reaching tendrils of a fern.

Sed pulls forward their translator, aims it at the text, then stares at the display for several moments.

“What does it say?” you ask, trying not to sound overly impatient.

It takes Sed another moment to answer as they chew on the inside of their cheek. Then they say, “She’s asking what happened to the Nomai.”

You hear Hornfels gasp quietly, and you stop breathing entirely. “How… what…” you say, not even sure what you’re trying to ask. Now you kind of wish you had sat down. “Does… does she not know?” you squeak out.

“No,” Sed says, still holding eye contact with Solanum. “In her perspective, all the Nomai were alive and with her, like, a couple days ago at most, probably.”

“What?” You cover your mouth. “Oh. Oh no.” Again, you start to imagine yourself in her position, but squeeze your eyes hard and make yourself stop before you start crying or have an anxiety attack or something. You try to take a deep breath to steady yourself. You don’t want to make yourself useless here. This isn’t about you, you need to calm down and help. But what can you even do?

“Do we…” you start, clearing your throat. “What can we tell her? We don’t even know exactly when the Nomai died, much less what happened to them.”

“281,042 years ago,” Sed replies.

You blink. “Uh. What?”

“The Nomai died 281,042 years ago,” Sed repeats. “They were killed by ghost matter. It was super pressurized inside the Interloper. It exploded and covered the solar system almost instantaneously.”

You step back with surprise and nearly lose your footing. “How- how do you know that?” you ask. “How can you know exactly what year it was?”

Sed doesn’t reply, standing up with a wince as they clutch their ribs. Gabbro stands up too, but doesn’t help them.

Sed turns and says, “Hornfels-” then stops. Hornfels is staring at Sed with some inexplicable combination of disbelief, disgust, and despair. It hurts you to see, and it’s not even aimed at you.

“How can you know any of that?” Hornfels demands.

Sed shrinks in on themself, looking down at the ground. “Please, Hornfels,” they say quietly.

“I- I can’t believe…” Hornfels stops, gritting their teeth and swinging their head away. “You used to trust me, didn’t you? Or was that a lie too? Was I stupid to think that?”

“Please,” Sed says again, voice low enough that it is hard to hear. “You can be mad at me. But please help Solanum. I need you to show her a picture of the Interloper.”

Hornfels looks hard at Sed again, then runs their palms harshly down their own face and turns to the computer.

Sed takes a deep breath and steps close to the orrery as Solanum walks up behind them. You are dreading whatever is about to happen. “Should… are you sure we should do this? We can wait until we can communicate better with her, we can get more information-”

“No,” Sed says. “We’re doing this now.”

Sed touches the only orrery model that is on an elliptical path, tapping it with a finger. Solanum watches them, then follows their gaze as they look over at the monitor of Hornfels’ computer. She looks at the picture of the comet, its two tails cut off by the edge of the photo. Then she looks back at Sed with no visible reaction.

Sed then grips the comet model, pulls, and snaps it off along with its post. Then they go to Dark Bramble and do the same thing.

“Sed!” Hornfels snaps.

“It’ll come back in a few minutes,” Sed says, breaking off the larger green ball of Giant’s Deep.

“What do you mean ‘it will come back’?” Hornfels replies, exasperated.

Sed freezes. They stare at the tiny planet figures in their hand, then look up at Gabbro.

“No worries,” Gabbro says, “we can fix it later. Keep going.”

Sed blinks a couple times, then proceeds to snap off every other planet on the orrery, leaving the sun. Bundling them in their hand, they nod at Solanum and start making their way down the stairs.

Gabbro follows, but Hornfels stays at their computer, their elbows propped up on the desk with their head in their arms. You ask, “Where are we going?”

“The ghost matter pit,” Sed replies, not looking back.

“Oh? Uh, why?” you say, then yelp as Solanum puts herself under your arm to help you down the stairs again.

Sed stops at the bottom of the stairs and waits for the two of you, but doesn’t look up, staring at the ground and biting their cheek.

Eventually, they say, “Because the only thing I’ve found that can surpass any language barrier is pain.”

Chapter Text

For whatever reason, as you methodically ensure that your mask and each part of your life support system is properly attached and secured to the rest of your suit, your mind keeps wandering back to Lami’s pet millipede.

You had been sick both times your class was assigned to go on a field trip to Timber Hearth, to your great disappointment. The second time you even tried to hide your illness, but your mom noticed your nose was pink with fever before you ever left your home. You were sullen and sniffling and miserable and bored the entire day, but when Laevi and Lami returned from the trip, they snuck into your room and told you everything they had seen and done.

Most of their descriptions of the planet—told in an excited hush as they talked over each other, whispering to avoid being caught by your parents—could be summarized with two words: “wet” and “alive.”

Being here now, you’re inclined to agree with them. You could count on your proximal phalanges the number of times you have been on the surface of any planet. The best comparison you have is possibly Giant’s Deep. When Bells flew you there to descend the Tower of Quantum Trials, you were sealed tightly in your suit and too nervous and focused on your task to properly take in the surroundings. But later, when your mom took you via Ash Twin warp tower to show you her work on the Construction Yard, you had been allowed to go with minimal protective gear.

Immediately after you warped to the vast ocean planet, every one of your senses was aware of the water. Your nose and tongue could detect the salt as your lungs filled with humidity. Your fur frizzed with it, and your bones were dragged down from the immense gravity. You had to strain your ears to hear your mom over the wind and waves. But somehow, as you looked out over the shifting and endless surface of the water, more than anything it reminded you of waiting for Ash Twin’s towers to become accessible and looking over the shifting and endless sea of dry sand. Each planet equally desolate, equally unwelcoming and hostile to the small patches of life that by virtue of their resilience held tight to their own existence.

Perhaps that is why, despite it being your best comparison, Giant’s Deep is at best a poor comparison to Timber Hearth. The planet you are on now, like Lami and Laevi said, is certainly wet, but in a way that is discrete, hidden, and so filled with life that you are sure that even the air you breathe is crawling with it.

As you turn the round handle and push open the door that you had carefully observed others using until you learned how to operate it yourself, your mask filters the outdoors air into something that only smells sterile. But even still, your brain fills in the scents of wood, moss, pine needles, mildew, wet grass, smoke, and soil that had been overwhelming you until you had returned to the safety of your gear. In the distance, instead of the roar of Giant’s Deep’s storms and the heartbeat of its waves, you can hear the quiet wash of the river, the far-away hum of the waterfall, and then the explosive shout of a nearby geyser. As you take your actualization staff and step off the wooden deck of the building and onto dirt, your boots stick minutely to the soft, damp ground, and mud clings to your soles and joins you as you walk down the path. The nearly impenetrable darkness of this planet requires you to rely on the senses beyond your sight, but each sense harmonizes with this point, that the two words that Lami and Leavi kept returning to were accurate ones. You do wish they had mentioned how hard it was to see here.

Lami’s pet millipede had been revealed to you in secret as the three of you huddled under your bed. A “sample,” Lami had called it as they released it from their water bottle and let it crawl over their hands, a creature they had collected from a hollowed stump on Timber Hearth “purely for scientific research purposes.” This “sample” had also apparently been given the name “Stick.”

Stick was something you later discovered was known as a two-toned spiral millipede. Rather than having legs on just its underside, the legs wrapped around the body like the twist of a DNA strand, allowing it to easily climb through the tunnels it bored through tree branches. As Laevi helped Lami pull branches and leaves and clumps of moss from their bag, you emptied a large glass jar of beads, and together you built a small terrarium for the arthropod. It was only when your dad questioned why you kept sneaking raw vegetables into your room that the three of you got caught. You learned that day that smuggling both plant and animal life between planets was strictly prohibited, and that Lami’s actions could have potentially led to ecological disaster.

Lami was required to turn in the jar and its contents to Coleus. As it turned out, Coleus was merciful on Lami, recognizing and appreciating their interest in biology. He kept the jar in his own office and told Lami to visit and care for the little creature as often as they wished. But he also did not intervene when, despite Lami’s careful attention, Stick slowly lost energy, stopped eating the food it was offered, and one day was found curled up and unmoving at the bottom of the jar.

Laevi later told you that Coleus comforted a tearful Lami and explained that many forms of life are very sensitive to their environment and, even when treated with the utmost care, may not survive when placed in unfamiliar settings. It was a difficult, sad lesson to learn about not interfering with alien life, but none of you ever forgot it.

For not the first time today, you wonder what the last days of Stick’s life were like. It was not for a lack of love and care that it died. But were the twigs and sandy floor and little spoons of water too poor a facsimile of its home environment to support it?

Could it understand the intentions of the creatures outside its jar as they offered it all sorts of fruits and vegetables and begged it to eat?

Did the glass of the jar warp Stick’s view of everything outside, the way Timber Hearth’s strange atmosphere hides the stars and sun from you?

But you stop yourself from wondering if the millipede missed its family. Even you can recognize that doing so would be a futile exercise of projection on the poor arthropod.

You will not let yourself be like that millipede. You have warp technology. You will not die here. You are not closed in a jar at the whims of the curious and ill-advised.

It took you a while to realize that was the case. When you first arrived on Timber Hearth with a very unwell alien, it did not occur to you how unsavory the optics of this particular circumstance were and how dangerous a situation you were putting yourself into.

But then, under the hectic and upset direction of the aliens around you, you were led into a building and were immediately face-to-face with a piece of the most important technology your people had ever created. Your parents work in orbital construction, including the Orbital Probe Cannon and the Sun Station, so you are at least somewhat familiar with the Ash Twin Project. You are familiar enough to know that this memory statue is not meant to be on Timber Hearth.

Further past that, you found other bits and pieces of your culture. There was a plant vase and a bench sat up on a pedestal. There was what you would consider to be a random section of wall with some information about the Attlerock inscribed on it.

There was a Nomai skeleton. Not posed, not displayed proudly like a donated scientific model would be. But lying in a crumpled, undignified heap, curled up at the bottom of a jar.

The hypotheses your mind formed roared threats at you louder than an approaching cyclone.

These seemingly unrelated objects ranging in importance from completely mundane to absolutely vital and would not typically be given away. Are they stolen trophies?

The gravity cannon and surrounding buildings on Brittle Hollow are crumbling and broken. Were they damaged in war?

Your people are gone from this system. Were they chased out?

Then you were isolated and enclosed in a small, dark room, with no obvious means of egress except for a door you did not know how to open. You did not bother with the scientific method this time. You skipped to the conclusion. You were being held hostage by a hostile alien race.

You began to doubt this theory when you met the person who you now follow as they enter one of the many small buildings in this crater. You’re not entirely sure of their name. Root? Rootle? Something along these lines. The aliens vary greatly in size and height, and you can’t begin to guess what genders they might wear and how to differentiate between them. You can’t reliably tell how old they are with no antlers to twist upward with onset of adulthood and no fur to whiten with advanced age. But this individual’s skin takes on a weathered quality, and they speak to others with a certain authority, both of which incline you to believe they are relatively older than some of the others.

In any case, during that strange earthquake earlier, they helped you and protected you, even injuring themself in the process. They let you leave their side to look for Sed and the other alien with them. When you returned to town, they let you leave with Sed, and did not put you back in that room or try to restrict your movement in any way.

And Sed themself. They actually spoke to you! You still are not sure how to react to this. They must have lied to you when they let you believe that they did not understand Nomai when you met them on the Quantum Moon. But to actually be able to speak to someone, even in what broken language they are capable of and for what short a time before they ran off again, gave you some modicum of hope that you may have the opportunity to explain yourself, to talk your way out of the situation you find yourself in.

But they did run off, and your circumstances adjusted in a way that was very strange and hard to comprehend: you were put to work. Everyone was busily engaged in tasks together or individually as they undertook damage control in the aftermath of the earthquake, and you were folded in with them with relatively little fanfare. For example, shortly after Sed separated from you, you were asked to help carry an injured alien down to a building in the center of the village. You are not entirely sure why you keep ending up with this responsibility, first with Sed, then with Rootle, now with this person. Maybe they equate your greater height with greater upper body strength? It certainly isn’t the case, but you don’t mind helping with these matters to the extent that you are able.

Truthfully, you did not mind any of the tasks that you were assigned. Once the injured person was laid flat on a horizontal surface indoors, the other person who carried them worked with you to move debris from another building to free two people trapped inside. After that, you stayed with one of those two previously trapped people, possibly the resident doctor, and passed them things they gestured to as they worked to splint the leg of the hurt individual and bandaged Rootle’s hands. Then you went outside with Rootle, and they had you work with some people you eventually realized are probably children. The children showed you how to use a long-handled brush to push broken glass into piles to be safely removed.

You were not entirely sure if you were being asked or commanded or forced to engage in these tasks, but you were beginning to feel safer than you had previously, so you decided to perform an admittedly risky experiment.

The next time you were given a task, you said no. You gently pushed away the tool that was handed out to you, and you stepped back. The person, Mal? Marl? Marl, you think. Marl looked at you with the ridge above their eyes wrinkled, speaking their unfamiliar language. You folded your hands together and stepped back again and sat on the ground, not far enough away to be unreachable, but far enough to potentially be considered a flight risk.

They did not approach you, but instead walked away, out of sight. You suddenly became very nervous and began to regret your actions. You waited, mind swirling with what punitive action might come your way but unwilling to compromise your experiment.

When Rootle approached you, you tensed as they crouched at your side. They held out a bowl to you, one filled with watery broth and what looked like some kind of cooked vegetables. You took it from them, looking up at their face. Their mouth curled up at the corners, and they reached out and touched your arm, and then they stood and walked away.

The broth was thin and smelled of a foreign sour tanginess, but the steam warmed your face in the frigid air. You sipped at it, chewed a soft vegetable cautiously. It was strange. You are not sure if you liked it or not. But you were hungry and it was warm and you weren’t being punished and these things nearly made you cry as you ate. You ate until a small, oblong silver object floated to the top of the broth, and when you saw that this object had eyes, you lost your appetite completely.

You went back to the room you had stayed in before, seeing that someone had in the meantime come in and cleaned up the mess of objects from the earthquake. You sat down on the wide, cushioned bench and made a plan. It is still possible that your previous hypothesis of these people is correct, that these are some warmongering race that came to this system that settled on Timber Hearth and drove out the Nomai in the meantime. (The meantime being how long, though? They have established a permanent village here. You thought you had only been on the Quantum Moon for hours.) But their behavior toward you personally seemed contrary to this. Without more evidence either way, you will not be able to form a solid theory. And you feel that the evidence you need will not be here, but it may be on Brittle Hollow. You just have to go and find it.

It is that decision, that determination, that leads you now to touch Rootle’s shoulder before they can disappear inside a building.

They turn and look at you, their eye-ridge raised. “Sed,” you say. You turn your masked head side to side as if searching.

They speak with someone inside the building briefly, then lift a finger toward a building across the way.

You part from them without speaking. You consider writing a message, but you are relatively sure this person does not understand your language.

As you walk toward the indicated structure, avoiding puddles from the geyser with both your mask’s lights and the handheld lumination tool you had been given earlier, you recall the one other person you met that perhaps does know your language. Sort of. Partially.

As you were carrying the alien with the injured leg, the one who was wearing a suit that was different from but reminiscent of Sed’s, their confused mumblings on occasion struck a note of familiarity with you. It was not until later that you recognized what they were saying.

Yağ ve su. Oil and water.

You don’t know what inspired them to repeat that particular phrase over and over to you, but it rang in your mind like a malfunctioning alarm bell on and off through the rest of your day. Oil and water. Are you the oil here, and these people around you the water, or the other way around? Would you float if you stayed in this place, or would you sink?

Either way, you will not mix easily. You need your family, your friends, your home. You need to leave. You will not be found curled up at the bottom of the jar.

When you find Sed, you tell them as much, though for the sake of simplicity you leave out the metaphors. Sed, I am here to inform you that I will be leaving for Brittle Hollow immediately, you write on the floor at their feet, your message carefully predecided. I must uncover what happened to my people, and my unfortunate inability to understand your language necessitates that I return home to learn what I can on my own. — I am glad that you are safe and well with your family. Now I must find mine. — I hope that I can meet you again once I have more answers. Please thank Rootle and the others for their care and attention towards me on my behalf.

Before, you theorized that you were held hostage here. Now, you hypothesize you are free to go. But once again, you learn the consequences of jumping to a conclusion without engaging the scientific method.

You are stopped.

One tries to block you, then two. You get past them. Then one physically restrains you and you whirl around on them and you are suddenly certain that you are going to have to resort to violence in order to escape.

Your heart pounds and your life support system warns of increased oxygen use as you bend your knees and take your actualization staff in both hands. You know how to fight. You can, if you have to, but you don’t want to. You have never inflicted more than bruises in schoolyard tussles, and these people are so much stronger than you, and there are now at least three against one. You have to fight like your life depends on it. You have to be ready to hurt them. You don’t want to.

“Solanum,” Sed says, and you have to force yourself not to clench your eyes shut. You wanted to be their friend! That is all you wanted! Please, you don’t want to hurt them, they will hurt you before you can even-

They nod at something behind you, pointing with their head and eyes like a Nomai would, rather than with their hands like these people do typically. They speak your language, their accent counting out each syllable like they are verbalizing an algebraic formula. “Identify. Wandering moon.”

You keep your two primary eyes on Sed, but your third flicks to follow Sed’s indication. There, with all the subdued boldness with which it has always asserted its presence, the Quantum Moon glides over the horizon.

You had occasionally noticed it as you worked here on Timber Hearth. But only now does that seem illogical to you. You can see the Quantum Moon, and now even the Attlerock as it passes overhead. They are barely lit, but you can see them.

On both the Quantum Moon and Giant’s Deep, the atmosphere occluded every part of the sky from view. What kind of atmospheric effects could hide the stars, and the sun, but not the planets?

You are not a meteorologist. You have never been to Timber Hearth. But you can see the Quantum Moon and little else, and something tells you that something is very, very wrong.

“Evren var ve biz varız,” Sed tells you.

All three of your eyes now blink into focus on Sed, and you know the wandering moon has left you because of it. “Ne dedin? Evren...” you ask. They finish the sentence together with you.

“Evren var ve biz varız.” The universe is, and we are.

You swallow hard and turn your head to the side. This statement is a fundamental principle that you live by and aspire to, one of your own making with Bell’s guidance, one that you would sometimes repeat in a whisper to yourself in times of doubt as if it were a mantra. But how could this person know it?

Sed looks up at the shuttle. They speak to the person who restrained you and gesture a shape with their hands, a half circle with a triangle coming off of it. That's it, the verbal data recorder. You left a sort of mission statement, your last passing thoughts before you entered this new phase of your life, on the recorder in the shuttle. Sed must have listened to it before they found you on the Moon.

“Evren var ve biz varız,” you repeat again quietly. Sed looks at you, nods. “Bana Nomai dilinde iletişim kuramaz mısınız?” you ask them, but they look at you blankly, mutter something in their own language. The answer is no, then. They know some of your language, but not nearly enough.

Evren var ve biz varız. Why did Sed say this phrase? They are trying to tell you something through this limited vocabulary, but you have no idea what.

The person who went up to the shuttle comes back down with your recorder in hand. Sed shuffles through the recorded lines and hits the playback button. You hear your own voice, a bit tinny and sounding somehow both so much younger and older than you feel now: “Evren var ve biz varız.” The universe is, and we are.

They shuffle back a couple lines, and again hit play. “As a child, I considered such unknowns sinister. Now, though, I understand they bear no ill will.” At the end of the statement, Sed looks at you.

As a child, your feelings about the Eye of the universe were… complicated, at best. At worst, you blamed it for anything and everything wrong in your life. Any time your parents had to leave you in the care of a neighbor as they undertook a dangerous construction mission in space, you felt it was the Eye stealing their love away from you. Whenever disillusion or discontent about the means by which the search for the Eye was decided to be undertaken was whispered in your city’s caverns, and those whispers filtered down to you children as a source of ridicule and derision, you blamed the Eye for the divisions and fights it caused among your friends. When Ilex suggested your parents were foolish for choosing to work on the Ash Twin Project instead of helping the clan build a new Vessel, you gave him a black eye and wished you were strong enough to punch the Eye of the universe just as hard.

As you began your teenage years, you took on a more academic approach toward the Eye. You wanted to learn it and study it, to know it as if to know an enemy, to find its weaknesses, to justify your hatred. This was not so straightforward a process as you had expected. You could not hear its signal, its voice—you could only learn about it from the way it had spoken to others. The way your ancestors spoke of it in their writings and recordings.

They all spoke of it differently, as it touched each of them differently. They all heard the same call, a few brief tones through the dark, and over the years they spoke of it with interest, or confusion, or love, or loneliness at its absence. They all listened, and not one of them decided that it was something to be turned away from. They chased it, they followed its call.

Through your studies, you learned there was very little to learn about the Eye itself. But you learned about your people. You learned that whatever victory or success they had, the Eye could not be credited. Whatever misadventure or tragedy, the Eye could not be blamed.

Your people identified and explained, the planets orbited and spun, the sun burned, the stars glowed, the Eye sang, and you observed. There was no maliciousness in any of it. Only being, always real but made true by your observing.

It hurt to learn this lesson. To see that all the anger and sadness and fear that you had aimed at the Eye had skimmed its gravitational field and orbited around to make its way directly back to you. But it was a comfort, too, similar to the comfort Coleus gave to Lami. He did not blame Lami or Laevi or you. And, he promised, Stick the millipede did not blame you either.

Maybe this is why Sed has said these words to you. To ask for your patience, to ask to be understood. To ask to be forgiven, when their only mistake has been to exist.

The universe is, and we are, and I am. Evren var ve biz varız ve ben varım.

“...Ve sen de varsın,” you finish quietly, looking on to the person, your friend, who is watching you so urgently. ...and you are too.

Sed watches you “Information place,” they say haltingly in your language. “Identify and explain place, we go to.”

You need information. If you are to understand how the universe has changed, you need to understand their part in it, and yours also. So you follow them.

A parade of people are with you, but none of them try to restrain you again. As you enter the large, white-roofed building and meet again the Ash Twin Project statue, you hope you are not making a mistake.

Part of the group separates from you. As you go to ascend the stairs, you realize one person has been left behind. Ah, yes, the oil and water person. You think at first you have overstepped some invisible boundary when they freeze as you offer them help, but eventually they let you support them to the top of the stairs.

There, you meet someone—Hornfels, the “explain person,” making use of a large machine inside a small, wooden space. You cautiously remove your mask and the attached apparatus, keeping it close by, and squeeze yourself into the space the best you can at their beckoning.

The front-most cube of the machine is brought to your attention. It is a screen, like the one on Sed’s image capturing device but larger and more complex. Hornfels leans aside to give you room, and you step closer.

On the screen, you see a monochromatic image in a similar style to those Sed had shown you, but in higher resolution. You see the outside of the familiar stone latticework of Brittle Hollow’s gravity cannon, but something is missing. You lean forward even further, crowding into the little room.

Everything is missing. Everything that should be around the gravity cannon is nothing but black void.

The image changes, and it is the gravity cannon again, but further away and from a different angle. This perspective only shows you even more emptiness around the cannon.

A third image is presented to you, a nondescript piece of purple land with no architecture. It floats alone in space like a lost tooth.

A fourth, a fifth, a sixth image. More of Brittle Hollow’s crust, a piece of the crust with one wall of a structure still attached, and Hollow’s Lantern.

A seventh image. The Black Hole Forge drifting uselessly in space, one of its lifting arms broken and dangling.

You step backwards away from the machine, your antlers snagging briefly on the doorframe. You were just there. How can this be? You left from Brittle Hollow hours ago with Sed. You left from there for the Quantum Moon hours before that.

You remember standing at the gravity cannon’s base, calling out to no one. You remember how fragile everything looked, and how your voice did not echo off the walls like it used to.

You step back again and bump into something. Looking back, it is a small, circular table, and tiny spheres on posts travel along notches carved in radiating circles from the center sphere.

Is this… a model of the solar system?

The person with the crutches approaches. You point at the screen behind you, then at the model. After a moment, the person gestures with a hand toward the screen, then at the model. Right, they point with their hands, not their eyes. You aim a finger at the small purple sphere near the middle of the model. They point at the screen.

You point at the pair of spheres, one red, one gray. The person says something. Then they point at the screen.

The walk back to the machine feels longer than the circumference of the planet you stand on. But you hold your breath and make yourself look.

You see Ember Twin, with Ash Twin mostly obscured behind it. You scour the image, but you can find nothing obviously amiss. You are shown a different angle, and again it looks refreshingly unremarkable.

You then are shown Ash Twin, and something seems off, but it takes you a while to see what. Then you count the towers. The tower to Giant’s Deep is missing entirely.

You point at other astronomical bodies on the model, not sure what you are looking for, afraid of what you might find.

The storms on Giant’s Deep swirl their patterns as always, but the next image makes you swallow down a gasp. The Orbital Probe Cannon is a scattered, floating ruin.

Timber Hearth does not seem harmed, but its largest crater is like a tiny starfield itself with the glow of artificial light sources that had never previously been there.

Dark Bramble looms as always, but behind it, what should have been the White Hole shines brighter than it ever has, and two beams of light fire out from its poles, sharp at first and then widening and dissipating and bending towards the shattered planet. The White Hole Station is nowhere to be seen.

You point at the center of the model, and the person with the crutches speaks, and Hornfels breathes a loud sigh before adjusting the image again. The image, however, fails to appear, the screen completely dark.

You look at the person again, pointing a finger again at the yellow sphere. Their mouth is pulled to one side. They look around at the others in the room, then back to you. They point at the screen again.

You turn and look, and the screen is still mostly back, but this time showing a faint white ring of light, like the gravitational lensing around Brittle Hollow’s black hole, but not reflecting any of the planet.

You look up again. “I want to see this. The sun,” you say, pointing again at the model.

There had been a person earlier playing a musical instrument on the stairs. They stand up now, moving near the stairs and pointing at something on the lower story. “Solanum,” they say.

You step around beside them, crouching to see what they are pointing at. It is another model. These people could have been students of Spire.

This one depicts a much larger yellow sphere. Beside it, the spheres grow progressively redder, larger, until the final one, which is painted a bright blue.

Yellow sun, increasing in diameter, becoming red, then…

Is this the answer you have been looking for?

“Sed?” you say. “Was this… is the Ash Twin Project responsible for all of this destruction? Did a supernova destroy Brittle Hollow?”

Sed squints up at you, trying and failing to understand you. “Identify again. Again.”

“The Ash Twin Project,” you say more harshly than you intend to. “The sun. Is this our fault?”

A spark of understanding lights Sed’s four eyes. They speak with deadly conviction. “No, Solanum. No.”

You want to pull your fur out in frustration. You have avoided a most horrifying answer, but now you are still with no answer at all.

You point at the paired model spheres again, at a loss for what else to do. The person with the crutches speaks. Hornfels operates the machine. You see the outside of your home planet again, the image static and lifeless.

This solar system is irreversibly changed from how you understood it to be. Brittle Hollow doesn’t exist anymore. Neither does the sun. Although you cannot see it, the chances that your home within Ember Twin is unchanged seems statistically improbable.

Although you should, you do not want to employ the scientific method here. You feel that even without it, you are careening toward a conclusion that will change you in all the same ways it changed the planets—violently and thoroughly.

You do not want to figure out the answer for yourself, but you do need to know it. So you cheat.

With your actualization staff supporting you, you kneel in front of Sed, who is sitting on a bench with their head in their hands. They sit up, and the two of you look at each other for several moments in silence.

You trace a question on your staff, then press it into the floor. What happened to my people?

They use their translation tool to read your message, then continue looking at you. They speak, but in their own language, and a conversation starts over your head and quickly grows heated. You can neither understand it, nor participate in it. Sed does not look away from you.

“Explain, Sed.” you whisper. You know they know these words.

They stand abruptly, and you follow them.

Sed goes to the model and touches a figure you had not been able to identify, a small silver one on an elliptical orbit. They look at you, then look over to the screen.

You don’t need to approach the machine to see displayed an unfamiliar comet. You tilt your head a bit. You had forgotten, there was a comet that was supposed to be entering the solar system right about now.

Then you watch as Sed breaks off each of the model's figures in turn. Then they point you back down the stairs.

You do your best to help the person with the crutches again. They helped you how they could with communicating, it feels like the least you can do.

Sed carries the planets in their hand like a bouquet of cut flowers as they lead you outside, the two individuals who had been downstairs rejoining the group. You follow as they walk with determination down the path in the direction of your shuttle.

They pause in front of the fence that seems to be protecting a display of beautiful green crystals that grow directly out of the dirt and stone in this area.

When you catch up with them, they find a crystal that rises from the ground on this side of the fence line. First by kicking at it with their foot, then digging around it with their free hand, they eventually pry it from the ground.

Sticking the other models precariously under their arm, they hold the model for the comet in one hand, and the crystal in another. Then they look at you, tapping the model and crystal together. “Same,” they say in your language. “This, from this.” They raise the crystal, then the model.

You look between their hands with all three eyes. “I think I understand,” you say. “These crystals came from the comet?”

Sed grimaces. “No good words. Understand?”

“I understand,” you reply.

You watch as Sed turns and approaches the fence, prompting what sounds like warnings from some in the group. They take the comet model and the crystal in one hand, and look at you.

Together, they toss the crystal and the comet model past the fence. Neither go very far, but a trail of green fire suddenly appears, blazing through the air behind them and making you flinch.

Sed looks at you again. They raise the rest of the planet models in their other hand. You look down at colored spheres, and when you make eye contact with Sed again, they throw these models past the fence as well. Again, a trail of green flame appears, then quickly dissipates.

You look at the little models in the dirt, not fully comprehending. “Are you saying that the planets have these crystals too?” you say, unsure. “That they are… submerged in the crystals? Or in the radiation from the crystals?”

Sed breathes deeply. “Sorry, Solanum,” they say. They raise their hand up to the fence line. They press it forward through the air very slowly, stopping at some invisible mark and wincing as their hand faintly glows with a green tinge. Then they look at you again.

They watch you as you step alongside them and raise your own gloved hand. Slowly, you copy them, your arm reaching over the fence-

Suddenly and without warning, fire bites at your palm, but a fire that feels like acid. It feels as alien as the dust flung from a far away galaxy. It feels as familiar as the blankets on your childhood bed. It feels like the end of all things.

You stare at the model planets on the ground, the little blue circle of Brittle Hollow, the red and gray specks of the Hourglass Twins. Everything you called “home” is lying in the dirt, consumed by flame. You step up on the first rung of the fence, lean far over it, reach a hand out to the models, and burn.

You stand there, among the trees and geysers, and burn until you are nothing.

You stand there, among the sand and cacti, and burn until you are nothing.

You stand there, among the crumbling stone outcrops, and burn until you are nothing.

You stand there, among the still water and cyclones, and burn until you are nothing.

You stand there, among the twisting vines, and burn until you are nothing.

You stand there, among the Eye and a friend, and burn until-

You are dragged back and down to the ground.

You stare up at the blackened sky as Sed rolls off of you. You blink, and see the Quantum Moon hovering above you. You blink again, and it disappears. You keep blinking, but your eyes keep blurring your vision no matter how much you try to clear them.

Eventually, someone at your back helps you sit up. You try to set your hand on the ground to support yourself and yelp back in pain, but you are prevented from falling backward.

You look up and see Sed in front of you on their hands and knees. The person who had been playing music kneels at their side, speaking softly to them. Sed is clutching one side of their chest in pain, sobbing, tears dripping off their nose and chin, and only then do you realize that your eyes are blurring because you are crying yourself. “Sorry,” Sed says in broken Nomai. “Sorry, sorry, sorry.”

Your arm sears like it has been dipped in liquefied nettles. You reach for the shoulder of your suit and with a shaking hand untie the sleeve until you can pull it and your glove off in one go.

From your hand to past your elbow, the fur is singed, and your skin is mottled with blisters.

Someone kneels in front of you. It is the one who restrained you. You have to fight against yourself not to reel away from them. They open a box of what you would guess are medical supplies, and you close your eyes. You brace yourself, but whatever touch you are expecting never comes.

You crack open your third eye. They speak softly to you, saying your name, reaching out but not all the way, waiting for you to give them permission. You hold out your shaking, damaged arm, and this person supports and cradles it with one hand. With the other, they slowly, gently, press a cloth to your wounds.

You are reminded all of the sudden of a time when you were a child. A fight you had not started but had won, your knuckles bruised and bloody. Your dad consoles you, gently cleans and wraps your battered hands, wipes away your tears.

He was going to meet up with you, you remember. He was waiting at home to join you on Brittle Hollow, waiting to celebrate with you when you returned from your pilgrimage. He would have been waiting for you when...

You bite your tongue to stop yourself from wailing. Your tears fall down in earnest now and you curl in on yourself, shaking with barely restrained sobs. Beside you, the person treating your injuries is being as careful as they can, but your skin prickles wherever they dab at it with some kind of foul-smelling antiseptic.

As they wrap your arm in bandages, you focus on getting your breathing under control. You know now that they bear no ill will. You feel foolish for ever having believed so. But still, you do not feel safe enough to grieve here. You have to compose yourself.

They seem willing to be patient with you, sitting at your side, another still supporting you at your back until your breath slows and you open your eyes.

You realize that, at some point, Sed had been taken away. Their translator was left behind on the ground near your feet.

You look around and find your staff abandoned in the dirt. You reach for it, and it is handed to you.

You trace out a sentence and press it onto the ground, then two words below it, one to the left, and one to the right. With some discussion over your head, the two people near you switch places. The person who treated you moves behind you, supporting you so that you cannot fall back again. The person who had been supporting you, the person with the crutches, shuffles awkwardly until they sit at your feet. They pick up the translator and use it to read, Would you be willing to answer some questions? and Yes and No below it.

They lean forward and touch the ground where you had written Yes. You force yourself to breathe slowly and deeply. Then you begin tracing on your staff again.

Do I understand correctly that the substance behind the fence came from a comet in the solar system, and that it was responsible for killing the Nomai?

Again, they tap the word Yes.

And am I correct in understanding that no Nomai from my clan survived, other than me?

Yes.

Do you know when this happened?

Yes.

Please help me to understand when this occurred. Did this happen more than 10 years ago?

Yes.

More than 100 years ago?

Yes.

You continue to guess numbers. 200. 500. 1,000. 2,000. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Frustrated, you ask: Are you simply going to choose “Yes” for every question I ask?

It is hard to read these people’s expressions, but if you had to guess, you would say that this one looks apologetic. They touch No.

So you trace out an absurd number.

Did this happen more than 100,000 years ago?

Yes.

You stare at the words on the ground. They glow up innocently at you.

Did this happen more than 200,000 years ago?

Yes.

Did this happen more than 300,000 years ago?

No.

You bark out a short, bitter laugh. You had wondered if you would have to ask if it was more than infinity.

You continue to narrow down the number. More than 250,000? Yes. 290,000? No. Back and forth you reply, until finally:

Were my people killed 281,042 years ago?

Yes, they tap.

281,042 years. You have been completely, utterly alone for 281,042 years.

You stand up abruptly, nearly knocking over the person behind you in the process. You stare at the one in front of you, the knuckles of your uninjured hand turning white as it grips tightly the handle of your staff. You grit your teeth, and force yourself to trace out: Thank you.

Then you turn and storm off down the path.

Chapter Text

“Riebeck!” Rutile calls from somewhere outside the room. “Are you in here?”

Through gritted teeth, you respond, “Yeah, over here!”

Rutile enters the bedroom to find the precarious position you’ve been subjected to. You lay on your back on the bed, an ice bag taped to your injured knee as Porphy holds the limb at a near 90 degree angle in the air, massaging around the swollen joint.

You bite your sleeve to muffle a hiss of pain. “They’re trying to pop me, Rutile,” you complain. “They’re going to make my leg explode like a… like a rotten pondslider egg!”

“Gross,” Rutile replies with little to no sympathy for your predicament, though they do sit by your head and take off your hat to start massaging around your ears, which helps distract from the pain at least. “Think they’ll survive, Porphy?”

Porphy rolls their eyes, squeezing behind your knee in a way that makes your eyes water. “Despite their best efforts, yes. Even though they don’t want to stay off their feet like they’re supposed to, Gneiss wrapped their knee up tight enough that they haven’t done any more damage.”

Finally, Porphy takes mercy on you, reapplying your knee brace and letting you sit up. For all that hardship they put you through, you guess your knee does feel a little better, though you’re not going to admit it. You turn to Rutile. “Did you need me for something?”

“I do,” Rutile replies, moving from the head of the bed and pulling over a chair to sit in instead. Uh oh, if Rutile is grabbing a chair, that must mean whatever they want to talk about is pretty serious.

Porphy glances between Rutile and the door. “Should I-”

“No, no, you can stay if you want to,” Rutile says, waving them into the conversation. As you scoot over to give Porphy room on the bed, Rutile starts, “Hornfels and Tuff gave me the run-down of what happened with Solanum yesterday.”

Your shoulders immediately slump, and you drop your head, twisting your fingers. You feel awful about what happened with Solanum yesterday. “I- I wanted to help,” you stammer, “but I… I didn’t know what to do. Or say. And even if I could, I couldn’t- I didn’t know how to say, or write-”

Porphy squeezes your shoulder, thankfully more gently than they did with your knee, and cuts off your rambling. “Hey, you did a great job helping, you did everything you could. It was just…” They pause, sighing before finishing their sentence, “...a bad situation.”

Rutile nods. “I agree, based on what the others told me. You made yourself very useful during all that, and you should be commended for it.”

You look away, trying not to cringe at their praise. You don’t feel like you were helpful or useful. You tried your best, sure, but you’re not convinced that it was good enough. “I feel like there’s a ‘but’ coming,” you mumble, waiting for whatever reprimand is surely next.

“Not at all,” Rutile says, leaning back a bit in their chair. “The opposite, really.”

They pause for a moment, picking out their words carefully before continuing. “I think it would be wise to put together a support team for Solanum. Not only does… she?” You nod your head to indicate that they’re using the word correctly. “Not only does she have to contend with this traumatic information she just found out, but she’s also going to have to start transitioning to life here on Timber Hearth.”

They pause again, taking a deep breath and scratching their cheek as they look at the blank wall, and you wonder if they’re trying not to get emotional. “She shouldn’t have to be alone through that. And she shouldn’t have to feel alone, either.”

Rutile looks at you again with a serious expression. “So if you’re willing, Riebeck, I’d like you to be part of this team. You are not obligated to help, but I think that with your expertise, you are more qualified than any of us to find out Solanum’s needs and communicate them to the rest of us.”

You continue to twist your fingers, wishing you had your banjo nearby so you could fiddle with the tuning pegs instead. You agree that this support team sounds like a relatively decent idea, but you’re not sure how you could have led Rutile to believe that you are at all qualified for any of this.

You swallow hard and try to deflect. “Um… what about Sed? They seem to know Solanum better, and they’re much better with the Nomai language, too. Or Hal?”

A frown deepens the wrinkles on Rutile’s face. “Sed’s got their own support team getting formed, and Hal’s on it, along with Gossan and Esker. I’d rather Sed focus on themself right now, rather than on someone else.”

You tilt your head, momentarily distracted. “Why? What’s wrong with Sed?”

Rutile shrugs. “We don’t know, exactly. Ever since they showed up with Solanum after the supernova, they’ve been acting like a different person. They’re hurting, that much is clear, but they don’t want to say why.”

“Oh,” you respond, mentally scanning through your conversation with them on Brittle Hollow for any missed signs of distress. “I thought they seemed okay when I talked to them. A little anxious, I guess, but they seemed excited to go back to Ember Twin.”

Porphy and Rutile stare at you like you told them Sed had flown into the sun. “When did you speak with them?” Porphy asks.

You lean away under the sudden scrutiny. “Um. Uh. Like, just before the supernova? They accidentally fell into my camp under Brittle Hollow’s surface, and we talked for a while and looked at pictures they had taken of the ruins of a Nomai city on Ember Twin. Then they… they left?”

Porphy and Rutile now stare at each other. “Does Gossan know-?” Rutile starts.

“Nope,” Porphy answers with a slow shake of their head. “They sure don’t.”

“Is this- is this something I should know, too? Maybe?” you say. “Or, uh, unless it’s private or something…”

Rutile looks at Porphy a moment longer before shaking their head and turning back to you. “It seems that, for some reason, just about everyone has some sort of false memory about what Sed was up to just before the supernova. Whatever it is, it’s not possible they talked to you and also went to Ember Twin. They launched for the first time at most 30 minutes before the supernova.”

That doesn’t make any sense. The memory doesn’t really seem false to you, but you guess you don’t know what a false memory looks like. “Oh, that’s… bad?” you offer. “Sorry, uh, maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.”

Rutile sighs, “No, I’m glad you did, it’s better that we have as much information as possible. We’ll let Gossan know, they’re taking the lead with Sed’s situation.” Porphy nods. You rub the back of your neck. You hope you didn’t get Sed in trouble somehow.

“Anyway, back to Solanum’s team,” Rutile continues. “Like I said, you are not obligated to get involved, I won’t ask you to do something you’re not comfortable with. I’m also not asking you to do this alone; I intend to be the other part of this team, we would work together to come up with ways to help Solanum.”

“I’d like to join the team too, if I may,” Porphy speaks up. “Me and Solanum didn’t get off on the best foot, but I’d like to remedy that if at all possible.”

Rutile nods. “Great, I think you could be a big help. Thank you, Porphy.” Then they address you again. “You don’t have to make a decision right now, but I want to get started soon, so if-”

“I’ll help,” you say suddenly, surprising everyone, including yourself. “I… I’ll join the team. I don’t think there’s much I can do, but… I’ll do my best.”

Rutile grins at you, putting a hand on your good knee. “Thank you, Riebeck. That’s all anybody can ask for.”

You once again find yourself standing outside your room trying to build up the courage to do anything other than stand there. At least you made it farther than the exterior door this time. You also aren’t pacing anxiously, unlike previously, but that’s mainly because juggling both your crutches and the heavy pitcher of water in your arms is hard enough as it is.

You briefly but seriously consider putting the pitcher on the floor, knocking on the door, and running away. But again, your crutches would impede the final step of that plan.

So you hold your breath, count down from three, and… wait no don’t knock she might not know what that is and you will drop your crutches and the water and everything will be ruined do not do that.

Okay. Okay, let’s try again. Count down from three, and… “S-sol-”

The door swings open, and you scream.

Somehow, you manage not to lose grip on everything you are carrying. And thankfully, Solanum manages not to flinch too badly, although she winces and her ears twitch at the volume.

“Oh, Solanum! Uh, hi, sorry,” you say.

She looks… you don’t know. Not really sad or happy or anything. She’s just looking down at you, eyes half lidded. She isn’t wearing her suit anymore, you notice, but instead some sort of lightly padded insulated garments that you assume had been underneath the shell of her outer suit. One sleeve has been removed at the shoulder, revealing the bandages wrapped from her hand to past her elbow.

You thrust out the pitcher toward her, its contents sloshing dangerously. “S- um, su!” you exclaim, hoping you are remembering the pronunciation of “water” correctly.

Solanum blinks and takes it from you, lifting the lid and peering at the contents. As she replaces the lid, she murmurs, “Teşekkür ederim.”

She goes to put the pitcher on the table in the room, but you don’t follow her. Rutile stressed to you the importance of letting her have her space and not intruding unless you are invited.

She returns to the door and stares at you. It takes you what must be an uncomfortable amount of time to realize that she’s probably waiting for you to say something or do, well, anything other than stare back at her.

You suddenly remember the existence of the note in your pocket. You wanted to be more prepared this time, so you spent a couple hours meticulously drafting, writing, editing, tossing out, redrafting, scratching out, rewriting, crumpling into a ball, writing, editing, and spellchecking a message in the Nomai language. It was tough to decide how you wanted to both introduce yourself and express your thoughts even in Hearthian, and then properly translating it was a whole different adventure, but you think the end result managed to capture everything you wanted it to. So you hand over the crumpled page, and your hands only tremble slightly as Solanum takes it from you and reads it.

Hello! My name is Riebeck. — It is sad that the Nomai are dead. — How do you say yes and no?

Solanum looks at the paper for a long time. Without lowering it, her eyes flick up to look at you dully. You offer a nervous grin.

“Reebek,” she says.

“Ree- oh! Uh, Riebeck,” you reply.

“Riebeck,” she says again.

You nod your head vigorously. “Yes! Riebeck.”

“Yes?” she says, tilting her head slightly.

“Oh.” You reach over and tap the corresponding word on your note. “Yes. Yes.”

“Yes,” she repeats. She touches the next word and looks at you.

“No,” you say. You’re communicating! You’re making progress!

“Yes. No.” She repeats the words a few more times under her breath, before her voice peters out. She again looks silently at the paper, then looks up and watches you, just as silently. You try not to fidget.

“Sen yağ mısın, yoksa su musun, Riebeck?” she says eventually with a quiet voice, and that’s a lot more words than you are prepared for.

But you remember yağ, “oil,” and you remember su, “water,” and you think you can recognize the pattern of the rest of the sentence and it feels like a hypothetical and it also kinda feels like a test so you take a chance and offer, “Riebeck… no yağ.”

Solanum watches you again, and you really wish you could at least ask her what she is thinking. But then she touches a word on the note and says, “Hayir.”

You blink and say dumbly, “What?”

“No,” Solanum says. She touches the word again, and you pay more attention this time to where she is touching. “Hayir.”

“Oh! No, hayir. Hayir is no.”

She touches the next word. “Yes. Evet.”

“Evet. Evet is yes,” you repeat verbally, then repeat over and over silently and beg your brain to remember. “Thank you, Solanum!”

Again, she just looks at you. She opens her mouth as if to say something, but stops. Then she says, “Teşekkür ederim.”

She takes a step back into the room, and you take that as a cue to leave. You wave, grinning, then hobble out of the building as quickly as you can.

All things considered, that went better than you expected! You made your deliveries, you know that she’s able to read your handwriting, and you learned a couple of words in Nomai!

You freeze as soon as you step off the porch.

Wait, you forgot to bring cups!

When you come to visit later that same day, Porphy is behind you skillfully balancing two covered trays, a medical box, and a lantern in their arms.

You clear your throat and call, “Solanum!” Definitely better than before, you only sound kind of hoarse and awkward.

Solanum opens the door, looking at you just briefly before catching sight of Porphy, who is laying the trays on the floor in the storage room behind you. She leans around you to watch them, shooting you a severe glance. “Porphy,” you say, pointing. Then you hand Solanum another piece of paper, tapping on the first word.

Porphy has food that you like or do not like. — After, Porphy will do injury for you.

Solanum seems to have a harder time understanding this note, based on the way she holds it close to her face and looks quickly between it and you. To be fair, you had less time to write it, as Porphy wanted to come over before the food they made went cold.

She taps quickly on a word near the end of the note, and you lean forward to see. “Injury?” you say.

“No,” Solanum says forcefully. She taps again on the same word, backing slightly away. “No Porphy, no… eejury.”

Porphy looks up at their name. “What? What is she saying?”

You take the note back, squinting at it. “I… I think I must have written something wrong. I couldn’t figure how to write a verb like fix, or heal, or something.”

“So what did you write?” Porphy asks.

“Do injury,” you reply. Then your face goes blank with realization. “Oh, wait.”

Porphy rolls their eyes. “Come on, Riebeck,” they groan. They sit down on the ground and open their medical box. “Solanum!”

Solanum startles, looking around you with her hand tight on the door, ready to close it.

Porphy holds up a roll of bandages from the box. “Look, see?” They unravel it and wrap some of it around their own wrist. “Treat injury, not do injury. No injury, Solanum.”

Solanum visibly relaxes as she watches Porphy, loosening her grip on the door. She looks at you with her lower eyes. “Riebeck…” she says, her tone not unlike Porphy’s, which makes Porphy laugh.

You throw up your hands. “Sorry, my bad! Also, kinda Porphy’s bad since they were rushing me, I guess, but mostly my bad.”

Solanum retrieves her staff from where it leans against a wall somewhere in the room. After tracing shape into the top, she presses it to the outside of the door, words spilling out from the staff’s tip.

You gasp with excitement as she steps around you and closes the door. “Wow! Okay, let’s see.” You sit down on the floor to inspect the Nomai lettering. “Okay, so that’s ‘I,’ or ‘me.’ There’s also a ‘you’ in there. Two verbs… no, three. So, ‘I believe you… want… to write…’ Then we have my sentence. Oh, okay, not ‘do,’ she gave me a different verb I’ll have to figure out later.”

As you continue mumbling to yourself, you can hear gentle clattering as Porphy removes the lids from their trays, and the room is quickly filled with the mingling scents of cooked foods.

“She also copied my first sentence here,” you say as you turn around. “I think she is saying she doesn’t understand it? I wrote that you brought food that she might or might not like. That’s, uh, what I tried to write, anyway.”

Porphy sits cross-legged on the floor in front of the now-open trays. Each tray contains nearly a dozen tiny bowls, each with a different small amount of fruit or vegetables or fish or simple, cooked foods. “Alright, let’s see if we can act it out, then.”

You scoot around on your bottom and shuffle closer, your splinted leg stretched out awkwardly. After watching the two of you, Solanum slowly and cautiously also sits on the floor, the entire process and end result looking far more complicated with her digitigrade legs.

“Does she know the word ‘food’?” Porphy asks, “Or ‘good’ and ‘bad’?”

“Uh, she knows ‘yes’ and ‘no’,” you reply. You pull out the note again and tap a word. “Food,” you say, then you wave your hands over the bowls. “Food. This is food.”

Solanum looks over the display with some restrained curiosity. “Yes. Food,” she says quietly.

Porphy claps their hands, which makes Solanum’s ears flick. “Okay, great! Let’s start with…”

They hover their hands over the bowls before picking one with some cracked bottlenuts. They pop one into their mouth, chewing it happily. “Yes. Good. Good,” they say, showing Solanum the contents of the bowl.

“Yes. Good,” she replies, inspecting the dish but not reaching out for it.

Porphy repeats this process, picking a different bowl, eating a bit of the food inside, and saying again, “Yes, good.”

Solanum hesitates, looking between the two bowls, her ears pulling back. “Good, good?”

You purse your lips. “She might think that ‘good’ is what the food is called.”

“Hmm,” Porphy says, rubbing their chin. “Maybe if we give her an alternative?”

They reach out again, and this time to your surprise they pick out a pickled laddershoot, which Porphy hates. They take a bite, pull an exaggerated face of disgust, and spit it back into their hand. “No, bad, baaaad,” they say, dragging out the word.

Solanum watches closely, but doesn’t say anything. You take Porphy’s bowl and eat a laddershoot, yourself. You don’t love them, but you don’t mind them either. “Good,” you say. Then you take the bowl of thunder-and-lightning seeds, which most of the village enjoy but you think taste the way a sunburn feels. You pretend to eat one, which Porphy notices and snorts at, and you copy Porphy’s disgusted face. “Bad.”

Solanum’s eyes widen, and she makes an unfamiliar gesture with her hand, waving it from side to side almost like she’s mimicking the movement of a fish. “Yes. Good, bad.”

“Okay,” Porphy says. “We got it, you think?”

You shrug. “Maybe?”

“Let’s try.” Porphy picks up the first bowl on the tray and offers it to Solanum. “Good, bad?”

Solanum takes it in both hands, sniffing at the fried rust lichen before hesitantly picking up a piece, looking between the two of you. “Yes, go ahead!” Porphy says.

Solanum looks at it a bit longer, then takes a small bite. She seems very focused as she chews. Then she says, “Yes, good,” as she finishes the piece in her hand.

“Excellent, good!” Porphy cheers. They hold out their hand for the bowl, and offer another dish when Solanum passes it to them.

This process continues, some bowls earning a more enthusiastic “good,” some more subdued. But when Solanum tries a blackgrass cake, her face puckers, the space above her nose wrinkling, and she covers her mouth with a hand and coughs slightly. But she doesn’t put down the bowl, and she says quietly, “Yes. Good.”

Porphy takes the bowl from her, laughing. “No, Solanum. Bad food.” They stand up suddenly, making Solanum duck their head and watch with tensed muscles, ready to stand or move away.

Porphy stomps to the exterior door, saying, “Bad, bad, bad,” with every footfall. They swing the door open, look at Solanum, pause for effect, then with a final “bad,” they dramatically toss the contents of the bowl out into the dark outside.

“Uh, Porphy?” you say as they close the door again and sit back in their place.

“You do not have to eat food you don’t like,” Porphy says, leaning toward Solanum. “No bad food. No bad food, Solanum.”

Solanum stares back at Porphy. “No bad food,” she whispers.

Porphy grins, handing over the next bowl. “Yes, Solanum.”

Solanum doesn’t take the bowl. She looks away, head lowered, her breathing somewhat more erratic. She wraps her arms around herself, and she takes a couple deep breaths.

Porphy lowers their arm. “Sorry, that was a bit exciting, wasn’t it?” they say softly.

They put down the bowl, and instead pick up another Solanum had tried earlier, one that had gotten one of the biggest “good” reactions from her. They hold it out, saying, “Here, Solanum. Good food.”

Solanum looks at the offered bowl, eventually unfolding herself to take it with a quiet, “Teşekkür ederim.” She says that a lot, you realize; you wonder what it means.

She finishes the contents of the bowl. Setting it down and looking more relaxed and composed than before, she moves on to the next new dish. As she continues down the line, she occasionally says, “Bad food,” quietly and looking at Porphy, and later more confidently.

When Solanum is handed a bowl of hot zigzag guppies, she gently pushes it away without trying it. She instead traces something into her staff, leaving a message on the floor in front of you.

It’s short, but no easier for you to translate. “‘I cannot… eat…’ Oh gosh, I don’t know what that last word is supposed to be.” You touch the final word of the sentence, looking up at Solanum.

Solanum says the word, then huffs, scratching the base of an antler. She points at the side of the fish’s face. Then she points at her own face, at each of her three eyes. “Gözler,” she says. “Gözler, bad food.”

“Eyes?” you offer. You point at each of your own eyes, then at the face of the fish. “Eyes bad?”

“Eyes bad,” Solanum says.

“She can't eat things with eyes?” Porphy asks.

“I guess?” you say. “The Nomai did have a whole thing about something called ‘the Eye of the universe,’ they had a shrine dedicated to it in Brittle Hollow. Maybe it has something to do with that?”

“Hmm,” Porphy says. They pick out a little fish from the bowl and twist off the head with their fingers. They hold out the now-headless body to Solanum. “No eyes?”

Solanum’s nose wrinkles at the offering. “Bad food,” they reiterate.

“Okay, got it!” Porphy says cheerfully, dropping the two pieces of fish back into the bowl and putting it aside. They collect the rest of the bowls that have fish, crawdads, insects, and other creatures. “Bad food?”

“Yes, bad food,” Solanum says, voice airy and relieved.

In the end, other than all the fish-and-but-based bowls that had been excluded, about another third of the remaining bowls are relegated to the “bad” pile.

Porphy seems satisfied as they look over the remaining options and take some notes in a notepad they had brought with them. “Not too shabby! Somewhat of a picky eater, but not nearly as much as Slate or Hal. We can work with this.”

They look over at Solanum again, who is eating the last of the feebleblossom buds. “Do you want more?” Porphy asks, tapping their finger and thumb tips together, then cringing and chuckling awkwardly. “Oops, she’s not a tadpole, maybe I shouldn’t do that.”

You shrug. “I don’t know, she might want to learn sign language, too. Actually, I think I know this one.” You take Porphy’s notepad, slowly writing down what you hope says, “More food?”

You hand it to Solanum, saying the phrase verbally in Hearthian at the same time. “No more food,” she says after looking at the page. “Teşekkür ederim.”

“Alrighty! Riebeck, would you mind gathering these up?” Porphy says, gesturing at the stacks of bowls. “Take what you want of the leftovers, I’ll have whatever you leave.” Then they turn to Solanum, pulling out the medkit. “Okay, Solanum. Injury time. Treat injury time.”

Solanum’s ears fold back, but she holds out her bandaged arm and lets Porphy unwrap it as you start piling up the empty bowls and eating some of the leftover food. When you look over, you can see that Solanum’s arm has several blisters, and you wince with sympathy.

“Bad injury?” Solanum asks, her jaw clenched.

“Mmm, good-bad injury,” Porphy replies as they wet a cloth with antiseptic. “Sorry, Solanum, this is going to sting.”

Solanum yelps as the cloth touches the first blister, pulling away automatically. Porphy waits, and eventually Solanum reaches out again. Porphy takes Solanum’s hand and puts it on their own shin, encouraging her to squeeze onto the fabric of their pants. “Hold on to this, it will help you hold still.”

Solanum is quiet while Porphy works, and you finish cleaning up. After a couple minutes, Solanum says, “Riebeck?”

You turn around, and Solanum reaches for her staff with her good arm. “Oh, here,” you say, picking up the staff and holding out the box-end toward her. She traces onto it, then taps the ground with her hand. You touch the other end of the staff to the floor, and are delighted when letters spiral out from it.

You kneel down, taking your time to translate. Looking over as they pull out a cloth bandage, Porphy asks, “Is that part near the end Sed’s name?”

“Yeah,” you say, blinking and looking up at them. “How do you know that?”

Porphy smirks. “As soon as they figured out how to write their own name in Nomai, we started finding it carved in table legs and doorframes and baseboards all over the village. Hal’s name, too, although I think it was still Sed doing the carving most of the time.”

Yeah, that makes sense. To be fair, you have a couple notebook pages somewhere with your own name in Nomai scrawled over and over again.

Eventually, you come up with a translation. You think, anyway, you’ve had to fill in a few words with context clues.

I do not wish to further burden you with my inability to speak your language. Is Sed’s translation device available to ease communication?

Hmm. There might be a slight problem there. Sed’s translator is currently out of commission, but you have no idea how to explain that.

Also, burden? You would have been thrilled to exercise your language skills on some old inventory list you found scratched into a wall on the Attlerock. You never could have imagined getting to converse with a native speaker!

Finally looking up from the text, you see that Porphy is packing up the medical kit. Solanum is somewhat curled into herself, not as relaxed as before, alternately picking at the edge of her bandages and rubbing at her eyes.

When she looks over to you, you tap her message on the floor. “Translator,” you say.

Solanum sniffles. “Trans…?”

“Trans-lay-tor,” you sound out, and she copies you.

Then you stand up, pointing at the exterior door. “Sed’s translator.”

Porphy frowns as Solanum stands as well. “Riebeck, she’s pretty sore. She might need a break.”

“Oh, uh.” Yeah, Porphy is probably right. She does seem to be less relaxed than she did before being treated, more impatient. Impatient enough to have already left out the door you pointed to. You startle, grabbing your crutches and hurrying after her. “Wait, Solanum!”

Outside, Solanum stands on the stairs, looking around in the dark. The white hole must be on the far side of the planet right now. Interestingly, her head tilts forward a bit, as if she is using her middle eye more so than the lower ones.

She points forward at a cabin across the way, correctly inferring that the glow under the door means someone is inside. “Sed?”

“Uh, yes, I think so,” you reply.

Solanum walks forward and promptly falls off the short staircase.

“Solanum!” you gasp. She quickly stands, brushing dirt off her clothes with a loud huff. “No-” She waves her arms vaguely toward the expanse of the sky. “No… no eyes!”

“Are you okay?!” you ask. She climbs up the stairs again, brushing past you as she goes back inside. You’re about to follow her when she reappears, this time holding a hand-crank flashlight. She says nothing as she steps off down and toward the other cabin, keeping the light pointed at the ground in front of her.

Ah, no eyes, she couldn’t see. But even in the dark, you can make out the stairs at least. Maybe her dark vision is worse than yours?

Solanum doesn’t wait up for you, but she struggles a bit with the door, pulling first before pushing it open as you hobble up behind her.

In stark contrast to the cold dark outside, the main room of this cabin is far more pleasant. A fire burns in the woodstove in the corner of the room, warming some sweet-smelling tea in a kettle, and an oil lamp hangs over a work table scattered with wires, small tools, and electrical components.

Although the physical atmosphere of the room is pretty warm and cozy, the emotional atmosphere is decidedly frigid. Sed sits propped up in a bed, glaring as they try to balance something in their lap and solder it at the same time, and Hal sits on the other side of the table, working on a different part of the same device. While seeing them work on a project like this together is not at all a rare occurrence, them working so silently is almost unheard of.

“Oh, hi, Solanum and Riebeck,” Hal says. “Please don’t touch anything!”

Solanum, who had been moving with single-minded determination until now, pauses when Sed looks up and they make eye contact. “Sed… bad injury?” she asks quietly.

Sed blinks rapidly with surprise. “Hayir,” they say, transferring the tools and components from their lap to the work table and standing up.

“Good injury?” Solanum asks.

Sed looks off to the side for a moment, then answers, “Hayir.” Standing close to Solanum, they hold out their hand, showing their bandaged palm. Solanum does the same, and although the size and shapes of their hands and arms are very different, their tan-colored wrappings match. Sed looks up again at Solanum, then stands up on their toes, angling their head upward. Solanum hesitates briefly, then completes the gesture, leaning forward to touch the tip of her nose to Sed’s.

“Özür dilerim, Solanum.” Sed whispers as they pull away. Solanum does not reply, but takes a slow breath.

Hal watches as Sed climbs back into the bed. “Did you… kiss her?” they ask, curious but subdued.

Sed clears their throat, looking at the tools on the work table and nothing else. “No, it’s, uh, more like a hug. For Nomai, I mean. Like… friendly.”

Hal watches Sed a moment longer, then returns to their own work with nothing more than a, “Hmm.”

Wow, yikes. Something super weird is going on between the two of them. You wonder if it has anything to do with Sed’s own support-team situation.

Thankfully, Solanum is the first to break the uncomfortable tension in the room. “Bad translator?” she says, her eyes darting around at the bits and pieces of the device scattered across the table.

“No, not bad,” Hal says, quickly putting on an at least partially fake smile. “Er, not really good yet either, but… here, look.”

Hal holds up the piece they had been working on, a display screen, one larger and more of a square shape than what had previously been used for the translator. When they do so, Sed takes the scanner of the device, holding it above a page with several random words, phrases, and sentences written out in Hearthian.

You gasp when Nomai text appears on the screen, stretched very wide but recognizable, before it stretches farther, freezes, and the whole system crashes and goes blank. Hal leans back in their chair with a long sigh. “Yeah, not good yet. We’re working on it.”

“Bunu Nomai kelimeleri ve bu gezegen kişi kelimeleri için yapacağız,” Sed says.

Solanum looks over at the electrical guts of the translator spread over the table. “Ne zaman hazır olacak?” they say.

“Bilmiyorum.” Sed responds. This must be what Solanum feels like all the time, not being able to understand the conversations around her. It doesn’t feel great.

If you had to guess, you would say that Solanum isn’t happy with the outcome of this conversation. She shifts from foot to foot, pinching at the bandages on her arm, and when she says “Teşekkür ederim,” it’s through gritted teeth.

She turns around suddenly to leave. You go to follow her, and she stops abruptly and turns to you, stopping you in your tracks. She says, “Beni takip etmene gerek yok, Riebeck. Teşekkür ederim.” You freeze in place, and she steps out the door and closes it behind her.

You stare at the door with confusion. “Sed? Do you know what-?”

“‘You don’t need to, something, me.’” Sed replies, not looking up from the soldering work they have returned to. “I’m going to guess by the context that the middle word is ‘follow.’”

You wilt, your shoulders dropping. “Oh. That makes sense, I guess.”

“She did throw in a ‘thank you’ at the end, if that helps,” Sed adds.

You don’t really think it does. There’s not much to thank you for. “How did you learn to speak so much Nomai anyway, Sed?” you ask as you turn back to the room.

“Yeah, Sed, how’d you spontaneously learn all this stuff in 30 minutes?” Hal mutters under their breath in a high-pitched voice.

If Sed’s loud sigh is anything to go by, this is apparently an old and stale conversation topic. They put down their tools and bury their face in their hands, trying to massage away a headache. Then they let their arms drop across the table. “Okay, listen. Both of you.”

Hal looks up from their work and gives Sed their full attention, which makes you feel like you should, too.

Sed pushes themself back in the bed, leaning against the wall. They speak slowly, one word at a time. “I don’t want to talk about it. Alright? But, I don’t… I don’t want to keep lying either. So I’m just going to tell you now. Yes, I remember how I learned Nomai and all this other stuff. No, I’m not going to talk about any of it. Okay? Sorry I lied before. This is the best I’ve got right now.”

Sed clenches their teeth at the end of the last sentence, as if stopping themself from saying any more. Hal watches them closely, their face softer than before. “Okay,” they say quietly. “Sorry for being sarcastic.”

Sed glances up briefly at Hal, but doesn’t say anything else.

“Okay…” you say, dragging out the word because you’re not entirely sure what you’re agreeing to but it seems like the right thing to say.

Both Hal and Sed quietly return to their work. You lean your crutches against the wall and look over the table, picking up a tool and putting it down again.

“Did you need something else, Riebeck?” Sed asks flatly. “Solanum doesn’t want you following her, but you can go anywhere else.”

“Yeah, I mean, while I’m here!” You flop across the foot of the bed, turning on your side to face Sed, who pulls their feet up out of the way and gives you the stink eye. “Why do your vibes suck so much lately?” you ask.

Hal barks out a short laugh, one that sounds more based in surprise than humor. “You can’t just ask that.”

At the same time, Sed groans. “Riebeck, what did I just say, like, 15 seconds ago?”

“Oh, sorry,” you reply. You roll over to your back, watching the light from the oil lamp flicker on the ceiling. After a moment, you roll onto your side again. “No, but for real though.”

“Riebeck,” Sed growls, looking like they’re ready to physically kick you off the bed.

“It’s not about you, necessarily!” you defend. “But everyone is either pissed at you or acting like you’re dying. Maybe that’s a them problem, I don’t know.”

Hal is laughing again. Sed throws a pillow at them, but given that they have plenty of sharp and heavy things available to throw, they can’t be that mad.

“Of course my vibes suck, Riebeck,” Sed says. They reach for another pillow, but they hold their ribs and flinch, so you hand it over to them. But then they throw it at you, which is unfair. “Have you looked around? Everything sucks right now.”

You push the pillow away, and you’re surprised at how irritated you suddenly are. At the sentiment, not at the pillow. Sed’s the first one to say it so bluntly, but it’s been an undercurrent in just about everybody’s conversations and actions and general mood and it’s just… wrong, to you. It’s wrong, and you don’t understand why you seem to be the only one who gets that.

Even so, you surprise even yourself when you state, “Everything is great, actually.”

The others both stare at you, Hal with open disbelief, Sed with continued sourness but also some mild curiosity. “Riebeck,” Hal says almost cautiously, “we don’t have a sun anymore.”

“Yeah, that’s what I mean!” You sit up on the bed, leaning towards Hal. “The sun is gone. The sun went supernova. Crazy, right? Worst thing that could happen?”

You lean forward even farther. “And guess what?” you say in a stage whisper, as if revealing some dramatic truth. “We survived. We’re not dead. We survived the worst possible thing for no apparent reason.”

The front door opens, then, and Gabbro peeks through. “Hey, Sed-” they say.

“One second, Gabbro,” you cut them off and continue. “And then everyone is like, ‘We can’t survive without a sun.’” Your voice takes on a mocking tone as you quote nobody in particular. “But, like, we are? We literally are? I don’t know what you’re doing but I’m certainly surviving, thank you very much. It’s not even all that cold outside, despite what basic thermodynamics requires.”

You stand up, getting loud, and it feels good. It feels like when you could hop gaps in the Hanging City without a fear of falling. Hal, Sed, and Gabbro all watch you as you limp around the room. “What else? Brittle Hollow got destroyed. Got eradicated by a black hole, right? Except it didn’t, really, it’s all over the solar system now but all the parts are still there somehow. I survived the black hole merger even though I shouldn’t have. Chert survived falling into a black hole even though they definitely shouldn’t have. Solanum survived her entire species getting wiped out even though she apparently should have been dead 280,000 years ago!”

You sit down on the bed with a huff, crossing your arms over your chest. “I’m not saying nobody should be, like, upset or scared or whatever. But we haven’t just had the best possible outcome to every scenario. We’ve had the best impossible outcome to every scenario, better than even makes sense. On a scale of “normal” to “everything sucks,” we’re at, like, a negative eight if you consider how bad things should be.”

Your math probably doesn’t make sense but you’re guesstimating with your heart, okay?

The other three just stare at you. Hal eventually says, “This is, uh, a lot for you, Riebeck.”

You lay back across the bed again. “Yeah, well, I didn’t perform a last-minute slingshot maneuver around an impending binary black hole merger just to sit around and mind my own business, I guess.”

Gabbro, who has been shuffling around by the door waiting for their turn to speak, finally says, “Sed?”

“Yeah?” Sed replies.

“I’m heading out.”

“...Alright.”

You notice that Sed hasn’t looked up from their work. But after Gabbro waits around a moment longer and then turns to leave, Sed raises their head. “Gabbro?”

Gabbro turns, brows raised, but doesn’t reply. Sed’s eyes lower to the floor. It takes a moment for them to say in a nearly inaudible whisper, “Don’t stop playing your flute.”

Gabbro doesn’t respond. They turn and leave, closing the door behind them. You watch them go, and take in the silence they leave behind. You wave a hand in the air. “See? These are the vibes I’m talking about.”

It’s late the next day before you have a chance to go see Solanum again. You think Porphy was with her earlier, but Rutile kept you busy and covered in sawdust for the past several hours.

As you enter the storage building, though, someone walks in right behind you. You turn around to see who it is and nearly gasp. It’s just Sed, but they look even worse than usual, like they haven’t slept since you saw them yesterday.

“You’re taking up the whole doorway,” they grumble. Yeah, they have the grumpiness of someone who hasn’t slept, too.

You step aside to let them pass you, and you follow as they go and knock on Solanum’s door. “Solanum? It’s Sed. And Riebeck.” You notice that all of the glowing writing that was on the floor and door yesterday is now gone. It’s unexpected, given the text you found in the Hanging City had been there for hundreds of thousands of years. Maybe she can choose whether the text she writes is permanent or temporary?

Solanum opens the door, and she looks pretty tired, too. Or, droopy, anyway—you assume that heavy eyelids and low-slung ears and shoulders are indicative of tiredness for Nomai the way they are for Hearthians.

It is only when Sed pulls the carrying strap off their shoulder that you realize they have their translator with them. They push the device into Solanum’s hands, who nearly fumbles it. Sed then holds out a spiral-bound notebook open to the first page and, at the same time, reaches over to press a button on the translator. Blue lines of light project from the translator and track over the page, and then the screen in front of Solanum lights up. You lean over Sed’s shoulder to read from the notebook.

|The translator should be working in both directions now. Hold down the button on the left to translate text from Hearthian to Nomai, or the button on the right to translate from Nomai to Hearthian.|

|You have to hold down the button, not just push it. Also, give it a second when switching languages, if you push both buttons at the same time it will bug out, but Hal or I can fix it if that happens.|

|Be careful with it, it’s the only one we have, but it’s yours now.|

It takes Solanum a couple tries to keep the button held down long enough, but her eyes grow wide when spirals appear on the screen. As she experimentally moves the device up and down to scan the different lines on the paper, you say, “Wow, Sed, you’re giving it to her? That’s really nice of you!”

Sed doesn’t reply. They next remove a cork-leather bag from off their shoulder, handing it over to Solanum as well. They turn the page in the notebook as they do so, and Solanum eagerly scans it.

|Hal thought you should have this as well. You can put this notebook in here, and there is also a writing slate, some pencils for the notebook, and a box of chalk sticks for the writing slate.|

|If whoever you’re talking to doesn’t have something to write on, they can use these. Or you can use them yourself for whatever you want.|

Solanum takes the offered bag, but doesn’t look through it, still focused on the translator. Funnily enough, instead of putting the bag on her shoulder like Sed had, she reaches behind her and hangs it from her antlers. How convenient!

She looks around at the various components of the translator, then reaches behind the door and retrieves her staff. Carefully tucking the translator in the crook of her elbow, she traces out a message onto the door, then scans it with the translator and shows the two of you the display.

|Sed, this technology is astounding, and your efforts to make it capable of two-way translation are so much more than I could have asked for. I am eternally grateful for your generosity.|

|I believe I may be able to integrate this device with my actualization staff, but I will only do so with your permission.|

Sed pulls out the pencil tucked into the spirals of the notebook and quickly scrawls a response.

|It’s yours, you don’t need my permission.|

Solanum reads the translated message. She hesitates a moment before tracing something onto the head of her staff again. This time, though, she doesn’t press it to the floor or wall. She lets it go, and her staff begins floating in the air on its own.

You and Sed both take an instinctive step back. Solanum seems to offer the translator to the staff, holding it out and repositioning it a few times until the staff latches on. The length of the staff coils around the translator several times, while the box aligns itself with the translator’s display.

Once everything stops moving, Solanum takes hold of the device again. This time, though, when she traces a message onto the box, she presses a button on the translator at the same time. When she touches the combined device to the wall, purple swirls of text appear as usual. But, looking closer, the characters are all Hearthian.

|If our technologies have integrated properly, you should be able to read this.|

You laugh loudly and jostle Sed, who side-steps away from you. “Oh my gosh, Solanum, that is amazing!”

Solanum, though, frowns at the text, adding an addition to it. |I am afraid I do not know how to cause the staff to write in parallel lines as is typical for your language. Will this cause difficulty of communication?|

“No, no, it’s good!” you say as Sed hands you the notebook and pencil. You point to words in Solanum’s messages and then point to the same words written in the notebook, reading them aloud. Solanum watches you and sounds out a couple of the words as you say them.

After a moment, Solanum looks up, asking, “Sed?”

You look up as well. Sed must have left while the two of you were distracted. “I hope they went to bed, they looked really tired,” you mumble. “Oh, wait, I can write that now!”

You copy the message into the notebook and struggle to stand still enough for Solanum to scan it. You’re absolutely giddy at this new communication development. Solanum, though, stares at the doorway Sed left through.

You add another message to the page. |Speaking of bed, there’s something that Rutile and I have been working on that we want to show you. Also, can I borrow your slate? I don’t want to waste all your paper.|

After you switch out the notebook for the writing slate, you and Solanum head over to the big cabin. It isn’t a long journey at all, but every few steps one of you pauses to write a message to the other. You pronounce Rutile's name and explain how the word “slate” also happens to be the name of someone in the village. Solanum asks you to read aloud both your own messages and hers to help her become familiar with spoken Hearthian, and she also asks how to pronounce “How do you say this?” and “What does this mean?” and other basic phrases.

Both of you are energized by this development, but in different ways. While you are almost delirious with excitement over the new world of communication opportunities this technology provides, Solanum is serious and focused. She reminds you to clearly enunciate the messages you read aloud whenever you forget or get distracted, and she repeats and memorizes the phrases with the same meticulous intensity that you would check the seals on your own space suit, as if both actions are equally responsible for preserving life.

Just before you reach the big cabin, you freeze as a thought occurs to you. You rub out the previous message on the slate with your sleeve that is quickly growing white with chalk powder, and you write, |Can your staff still write in Nomai too?|

It takes Solanum a moment to reply. When she does, she presses it into the ground and steps over the message, walking past it without looking up at you.

|I do not think there is any longer a reason for me to write in the Nomai language.|

You frown down at the words. “Wait, yes there is,” you say, realizing too late that you say it to no one since Solanum has walked off toward the big cabin. “Solanum!”

She stands by the door until you catch up, then continues to wait as you write on the slate.

|Yes there is!|

|What reason could there be?| Solanum responds. |Nobody remains who can read it.|

|I can read it!| you write.

Solanum exhales through her nose before writing, |I do appreciate that, Riebeck, but is it not easier for you just to read your own language?|

It’s true, it’s definitely easier and faster to read Hearthian. It takes you a moment to think of a response.

Eventually, you write, |Yeah, but, I like reading Nomai. I like learning how to, and learning about the differences in our cultures based on the differences in our languages. It’s fun to use, too, and it’s beautiful to look at. You don’t have to stop using it just because it’s a little less convenient for the rest of us!|

As Solanum takes the time to translate, read, and contemplate the words, you start to feel a little embarrassed. This is kind of selfish of you, isn’t it? You don’t want to make Solanum write in Nomai if she doesn’t want to.

When Solanum looks up at you, you hastily begin to write as much. But before you can finish, the tip of her staff taps against the side of your boot. You look down and step aside as a spiral of Nomai text blooms under your foot. You gasp with both delight and relief, and Solanum gives you a curious look. She waits as you lean over the text, mentally translating it word-by-word.

I can continue to write in the Nomai language occasionally. But I need to learn your language as well.

“Yes, good!” you cheer. Solanum watches you, her expression unreadable as you lead the way into the big cabin.

Rutile has temporarily taken over Gneiss’ workshop in the back of the cabin for the sake of this current project. Normally, larger-scale carpentry is done outside, but being in the cold for long periods of time was proving hard on Rutile’s joints.

Once you enter the room, you swing around to face Solanum and hold your arms out to the nearly finished project. “Ta-da!”

In the middle of the room, Rutile is attaching the headboard piece of a re-creation of a Nomai bed. It is made of wood rather than stone, and it is based on approximate measurements that you and Rutile gathered from your photos from the Hanging City, but otherwise you two copied the design as closely as you could. Gneiss sits at the back of the room, taking a break with a bowl of food and supervising Arkose. The hatchling is sanding the edges of the foot of the bed with aggressive strokes, wearing goggles, a dust mask, gloves, and an apron, all oversized.

“Ah, Solanum, there you are!” Rutile says as Solanum creeps into the room. “Riebeck, can you ask her to-”

“Nope!” you interrupt, holding out the slate and chalk to them with a grin. “You can, though! Hal and Sed finished upgrading their translator.”

“Oh, wonderful!” Rutile brushes some of the sawdust off their hands and arms before taking the slate. They write on it as they walk around to the side of the bed, opposite Solanum who is running her hand over the carved divots. Rutile holds the slate over the bed toward her, and as she scans it with the translator, she requests softly, “Say this?” while glancing at you.

“She wants us to say what we write out loud so she can practice speaking,” you explain. “And to say what she writes, too.”

“Oh, wise idea,” Rutile says. They point at the slate. |Hello, Solanum. Would you mind hopping up on this and letting us know what you think? We had to guess the angles and lengths, and they can still be adjusted.|

Solanum sets down her staff-translator combo tool and lifts herself onto the bed. You giggle as she immediately relaxes and stretches out, seemingly almost against her own will based on the way she then catches herself mid-sigh and sits up again. Tracing onto her device again, she presses the words into the headboard.

“Look at that!” Rutile says, whistling at the Hearthian text glowing in front of them. They read, |This is beautiful. I have never seen a bed like this carved from wood before. Why did you make it?|

As Rutile writes a response, Arkose loudly exclaims, “Excuse me!” They try to sand around Solanum, who quickly pulls her legs out of the way.

“Hey, take it easy, Arkose,” Gneiss warns. “Come over here and take a break for a few minutes.”

“But I don’t want to take a break yet!”

As Arkose continues to complain, Rutile gets Solanum’s attention again with the slate. |We wanted to try making things a bit more homey for you, if possible. Riebeck noticed that Nomai beds are very different from Hearthian beds and figured that you might be uncomfortable on a flat bed like we use. Is there anything you would like adjusted?|

It takes Solanum a few moments to reply. She shrinks in on herself a bit, pulling her limbs close and picking at the bandages on her arm. Eventually, she writes, |No, this will be fine. Thank you.|

Rutile looks at her, then leans sideways against the bed, edging slightly closer to her. “Solanum,” they say. When she looks up, Rutile says quietly, “No bad food.”

Solanum blinks and looks down again at her bandages. You don’t think you can be of much help here, given you have no idea what Rutile is talking about or what food has to do with furniture. So instead, you take the slate from their hands and dig around through the pile of blueprints and sketches on the work table, pulling out a few photos that had been printed from your Little Scout.

You write on the slate again, then read it as you pass it over to Solanum. |You can probably help us figure out the bedding situation. These are photos of the beds we used as an example, but we have no idea if they had any bedding on them, because any cloth or other materials that might have been there are long gone.|

Solanum reads over your message, but before you can pass her the photos, Rutile snatches them out of your hands. “Riebeck!” they snap with all the angry urgency they usually reserve for housefires.

You put your hands up. “What? What’s wrong?”

They hold the photos out toward you, blocking Solanum with their body. “Look at these and tell me what’s wrong with showing them to Solanum. Tell me how you would feel if it was our village.”

You look at the picture, the skillfully carved bed, the skeleton lying serenely in the divot. You imagine it was a Hearthian cabin instead, a flat bed instead of a raised one, the skeleton of Moraine or Spinel or Tephra lying in it. You think hard, but… you don’t really think you would feel any different. If anything, you just wish you knew who this person is the way you would know if they were a Hearthian, know their name and personality and history. You don’t think that’s the answer Rutile wants, though. So you hesitantly try, “Bad?”

Rutile sighs, running a hand down their face. “Riebeck, you need to think about-”

They cut themself off when Solanum touches Rutile’s elbow. Rutile looks at her, a deep frown on their face as they hold the photos away. “No, Solanum.”

Solanum keeps her hand on Rutile’s arm, and keeps eye contact with them as well. “Rutile,” she says softly.

Gneiss speaks up from the back of the room. “It’s hers, Rutile,” they say. It sounds like a conversation they’ve had already. “All of it is hers. You can’t keep it from her.”

Rutile is clearly not happy with the situation. They exhale loudly, looking at the floor, at Solanum, at the ceiling, and at Solanum again. Then they pass her the photos, leaning heavily with their forearms against the bed.

Solanum holds the photos with both hands, head angled down as slowly scans over them with her third eye. All three photos show the same bed from three different angles. Riebeck watches her closely as she looks over them, but she doesn’t react, not moving or making a sound.

After a while, she takes her translator and writes, |These images were taken in the Hanging City?|

|Yeah, near the Eye Shrine District,| you respond.

|On which side of the shrine?|

|The left side, I think? If you are looking from the shrine itself.|

|On the higher level, near the tree?|

“Evet,” you reply out loud.

Solanum takes a slow breath, then passes you the photos again. You put them on the work table as she writes, |There would typically be a few layers of blankets draped over the bed that the user could either lay on top of or underneath, depending on their preferred sleeping temperature and level of cushioning.| Then she is quick to add, |That will not be necessary, of course. I will not impose on you any further.|

Rutile stands up straight again, taking the slate and shaking their head as they write, |We will get you blankets, Solanum.|

Gneiss stands up, brushing off their hands and holding them out for the slate. “My turn?”

Rutile hands it to them, and Gneiss waves Solanum over. Solanum watches them from where they sit on the bed.

“Gestures aren’t universal, Gneiss,” you laugh.

“Oh, hm… I never thought of that,” Gneiss says. They walk over to Solanum instead, writing on the slate in small, neat lettering. |I want to take your body measurements so Spinel can get you some new clothes made and you won’t be stuck wearing just what you brought with you. If you’re alright with that, come stand over here.|

Solanum looks at the slate for a bit, twisting at some of the longer fur around her chin. You’re still not great at reading her expressions, but she seems a bit more… distant, maybe?

Instead of writing a response, she slides off the bed and goes to stand where Gneiss had been. Gneiss pulls out a long tape measure from their pocket and says, “Come here, Arkose, you can be my model.”

Gneiss begins measuring first on Arkose, demonstrating what part of the body they want to measure and how. Then, when Solanum shows she understands with a Hearthian “yes,” Gneiss measures her and notes down the findings.

“How… is your name?” Solanum says, which earns her big grins from all in the room except Arkose.

“WHAT is your name,” Arkose corrects loudly.

“What is your name?” she tries again, this time directing her question toward the hatchling, who beams.

“My name is Arkose, and that one is Gneiss, and that’s Riebeck and Rutile but I think you should probably know that already,” they explain.

Solanum looks to you for help. “Arkose,” you say, pointing. “Gneiss.”

“Yes,” Solanum replies. “Arkose. Gneiss.”

Rutile has you help them drill holes in the headboard of the bed to add securing dowels, so you start paying less attention to the conversation between Solanum, Gneiss, and Arkose. When you do tune in occasionally, you notice that Solanum’s replies are getting shorter and shorter, and that even with the translator she sometimes struggles with Gneiss’ questions about what type of material and fit she prefers.

You perk up when you hear Rutile use your name as they read out the question they had written. |We’ll probably be able to finish up and move your bed by tomorrow. Do you want to stay in Riebeck’s old room by yourself, or do you want to be in a different cabin with others?|

“Ben eve gitmek istiyorum,” she mutters, then writes out, |Where I have been is fine.|

She is picking at the bandages on her arm again, enough to have made tiny holes in the cloth.

You blink, tilting your head. “Solanum,” you say, and she looks up at you, eyes wide. “Are you good?”

She looks away from you quickly. Before she can reply, she startles when Gneiss touches her hand, then her arm.

“Rutile?” Gneiss says. “Is the bed heater in her room turned up too high? She’s very warm.”

“That room doesn’t have a bed heater, just the fireplace,” Rutile says. They reach over Gneiss to touch Solanum’s shoulder, then hover their hand near her head. “Oh, goodness, you can feel the heat coming off her without even touching her. And she was outside for a while with Riebeck too, she should be much colder than this. Is this a problem?”

“I don’t know,” Gneiss says, clearly concerned.

Solanum is standing very still, her eyes darting between Gneiss and Rutile. You clear your throat. “Uh, guys-”

Arkose takes Solanum’s hand between both of theirs. “Ew, it’s like holding a cabin shrew,” they laugh.

Gneiss blinks, then looks at Rutile. “Wait… do you think she could be warm-blooded?”

“No,” Solanum says, almost too faint to hear.

“No?” Gneiss says, “Hm, then I wonder what could be-”

“Hey, alright, that’s enough,” you say, taking a step closer. “Sorry, Gneiss, but you need to pay more attention. She’s not answering your question, she’s saying ‘no’ to what you’re doing.”

“Oh,” Gneiss says, then pulls her hands away quickly when she looks up and sees Solanum’s expression. “Oh, I’m sorry, dear.”

Rutile takes a step back as well, and Solanum does the same, pulling her arms close to her chest. “Solanum,” Rutile starts, looking stricken. “Gneiss, give me the slate.”

“You need to say ‘stop,’ like this!” Arkose says loudly. They take your hand and put it on top of their head. Then they shove it away, saying “Stop, Riebeck!” They do it again. “Stop, Riebeck!”

“Stop…” Solanum says, voice quiet and shaky.

Rutile finishes their message and holds it out to her, but she rubs at her face and doesn’t look at the slate. Instead, she writes her own message. As she does so, her eyes are filled with tears, and her breath shutters. |May I leave, please?|

“Yes, Solanum,” Rutile says quietly. Before they can say anything else, Solanum rushes out the door, head low.

It is late the next day before you see her again. You catch her outside the storage cabin as two people attempt to wrestle her new bed into the building. It’s Hornfels and Gossan, for some reason, and their height difference doesn’t seem to be making things any easier for them. You’re not about to step in, though—Porphy said you can start using a cane instead of crutches soon if you take it easy.

Solanum is standing nearby, watching the others work. She’s wearing the clothes Spinel had made—baggy pants that cinch in at the ankles and waist to accommodate her different leg shape, a large shirt, a scarf, and a heavy shawl knitted with multicolor yarn which she wraps tightly around herself with her arms.

You hobble up to her. “Hi, Solanum!” you say. You hold out the slate and chalk she had left behind in Gneiss’ workshop.

She takes them from you, then quickly starts writing a message on her translator-staff. You step back to give her room to press it into the ground.

|I apologize for my behavior yesterday. You were all very kind to me, and none of you did anything wrong. I simply became overwhelmed and lost my composure. Could you please tell me where Rutile and Gneiss and Arkose are currently located so I may apologize to them as well?|

You huff, and you can’t help the aggravation that seeps into your voice when you say, “Hayir.”

Solanum stares at you as take the slate back from her and write on it. |You don’t need to do that. They are going to come by and apologize to you. They messed up here, not you. They all feel really guilty about not realizing they were making you uncomfortable until it was too late.| You pause for a moment, then add, |Well, maybe not Arkose. We’re working on them.|

Solanum reads the message, her face lit by the green glow of the translator’s display. She looks up and watches Gossan and Hornfels for a while. They’ve managed to get the bed halfway through the storage building’s door, but now they’re having to move shelving to get it around the corner to Solanum’s room. You think it would probably be easier if they just removed the headboard temporarily, but they’ll figure it out.

Solanum taps your boot with her staff to get your attention. Another message is written on the ground, this time in Nomai script.

I think I need to learn how to express myself more clearly.

In reply, you write, |I can help you with that! In the meantime, you can smack anybody who isn’t paying attention to you, I imagine that works in any language.|

Solanum laughs quietly, a short, high-pitched bleat. You don’t think you’ve heard her laugh before.

Chapter Text

Things in the village slowly start to calm over the next several days. There is hardly an unprecedented astronomical disaster to speak of, and most everyone spends their time with busywork that exists in some uneasy place between urgent and mundane. The fallen walkways to the higher level of the crater have been dismantled, their wood stored for some possible future use, and the other damaged areas around town have been at least temporarily patched up. The launch pad and crane are a wash for now, and potentially forever. Rutile has sent just about every able-bodied person in and out of the launch camp organizing the destruction. A good way to deal with the jetfuel-soaked materials and soil hasn’t been decided on yet. The most viable suggestion so far is the possibility of setting up a furnace to boiler to steam generator to re-rigged solar batteries system so that the materials could be burned for energy and at least something productive could come of all the mess.

Slate is making progress on fixing up your ship, from what you hear. You haven’t seen it yourself, there’s no easy way of getting out of the village crater with a bad knee, and Slate hasn’t called you to help anyway. You’re pretty sure if they could work even farther away from the village and all the chaos that has been happening in it, they would.

You’ve been relegated to indoor work, occasionally operating the radios in the observatory and communicating with Chert when someone forces Hornfels to go to bed, or sometimes helping Porphy can the foraged food that the tree keepers bring in.

You spot Solanum out and about every once in a while. Moraine and Esker gave her a tour around the village, and she’s spent some time in the kitchen cabin with Porphy and Spinel. You even saw her join the group working at the launch camp at one point. However, she’s never out for more than an hour or two at a time before she retreats back to her home base in the storage building.

Today, though, you haven’t seen her at all. After asking around, it seems like nobody else has either. Porphy says she didn’t stop by the kitchen cabin, so they brought her some food, but she didn’t answer her door.

When you go outside to ask Rutile if they’d seen her, they are in the process of telling everyone to hole up inside the cabins for a few hours. Tektite had radioed in saying a storm was building up over the mountains in the south, and it was due to blow toward the village crater soon.

So now you’re laying on your back on a bed in the big cabin, listening as the rain starts to fall against the metal roof. (Rain, not snow. You bet everybody who cares more about physics than you do is having a field day about that.)

Storms are a relatively rare thing on Timber Hearth. You try to guess how many you remember experiencing yourself. You assume somewhere between 20 and 30? You missed the last big one—Hornfels had radioed you a couple days after you landed on Brittle Hollow to let you know that communications would probably be down until the storm passed.

Brittle Hollow, of course, never had real weather of any kind while you were there, unless you want to call the Hollow’s Lantern situation “weather.” The Hanging City and the other settlements under the crust had the advantage of not only avoiding meteor storms, but also any other kinds of storms.

A troubling thought occurs to you, and you slowly sit up. The Hanging City didn’t have storms. You would guess it never rains on Ember Twin either.

As thunder rumbles overhead and the rain clatters against the roof, you wonder, is this the first time Solanum has experienced any of this?

You put your leg brace on and limp over to the window. This room is one of the few fortunate ones that didn’t have the glass blown out in the supernova merger. Even so, it may as well be boarded up with how little you can see through the dark and rain outside.

Okay, the distance between this cabin and the storage building isn’t that far, but the geysers are between you and it, and with your bad leg you’re going to have to be careful. You’ll have to be quick, too; if the wrong person catches you sneaking outside right now, you’ll be in big trouble.

As you dig around through the dresser in the room, it occurs to you that a week or two ago, you would have been anxiously tapping your feet over the idea of doing something dangerous and stupid like this. But you skimmed the event horizons of two black holes all of about three days ago. You should be able to survive some rain.

You luck out when you find an old poncho someone has left behind at the bottom of a cabinet. You grab your flashlight and sneak out the door. Thankfully, the rain masks the sounds of your crutch and clumsy footsteps.

Thunder crashes overhead as soon as you step out, and the lightning illuminates the village for just a brief second as if it had daylight again.

You make your way slowly down what you hope is the path, using your crutch to feel around as much as use it to support yourself. Even with your flashlight, the rain is falling hard enough that you can’t even see a meter in front of you. That’s probably why you scream as soon as you see four circles of light suddenly reflected back at you.

A hand appears in front of the circles, and you realize that they are simply the reflection of your flashlight in a set of eyes. Sed’s eyes, specifically.

“Sed!” you say, trying to catch your breath. You have to shout to be able to be heard over the storm. “What are you doing out here?”

Part of the reason you didn’t see Sed until you were nearly on top of them is that they don’t have a flashlight themself. They also don’t have any type of poncho or raincoat, and their clothes are completely soaked through.

“Where is Hal?” they shout back at you.

“Uh, the graveyard cabin, I think? Spinel said they were sharpening tools there a couple of…”

Sed is already gone, sloshing through the mud in their socks. They disappear into the rain and dark, presumably toward the gravity crystal. You can only hope that’s where they’re headed, anyway.

You continue on your way. By the time you push through the storage room door and shut it behind you, you feel exhausted from the cold, and it’s a wonder that the rivulets of water pouring off your poncho aren’t forming icicles.

You shed the garment and dump it on the floor. The room is dark, but you can make out the glow of lantern light underneath the bottom of the door to Solanum’s room.

“Solanum, it’s Riebeck!” you call as you tug off your muddy boots. You don’t hear a reply, but you do hear something.

Now in just your socks, you pad toward the door, tilting your head toward it and avoiding the temptation to press your ear against the wood. The sound, is it… crying?

“Solanum?” you call again.

“No, Riebeck!” you hear from the other side of the door. Solanum’s voice is hoarse and watery. “I do not talk now!”

It’s remarkable how quickly she has been picking up new vocabulary. When you’re with her, she asks about the meaning and usage of a word in almost every sentence you write. You have been doing the same with the Nomai language, but you don’t think you’ve been able to memorize a third of what she has.

It isn’t uncommon for her to run out of words, though, or run out of energy to search for them, and either discretely tap out of conversations or ask to be excused. But this is the first time you’ve heard her refuse to talk. It’s also the first time you’ve heard her so obviously upset.

“Oh. Okay!” you say. You shift around from foot to foot. You’re not really sure what to do now. You don’t know why she doesn’t want to talk. Maybe because she’s scared? It definitely gets harder for you to talk when you are scared, you tend to stutter and stumble over your words like they’re too big for your mouth.

As your eyes idly wander over the storage shelves in lieu of a solution, you notice a box labeled “RIEBECK’S JUNK” written in handwriting that isn’t your own. Tilting your head, you wander over and pull it off the low shelf.

Inside, you find all of the personal objects that had once been on your ship. That’s right, Mica said Slate had to clear everything out and that they brought here. The neck of your banjo sticks out of the top, as do some of your larger rolled-up posters. Cans, bottles, dishes, clothes, toys, artifacts, and a tape recorder are all piled up in a mangled mess. This could have equally been either Slate or Mica’s doing, but given that nothing actually seems to be missing or stolen, you’re going to guess it was Slate.

Digging through, you find your somewhat crumpled journal and some pencils. You use it occasionally, but you usually prefer to keep notes on your tape recorder. That is, tape recorders. You also have a bad habit of leaving them around and losing track of them.

You tear out a page from your journal and sit down on the floor to write, shining your flashlight up toward the ceiling to cast enough indirect light to see. You carefully write in Nomai. If Solanum doesn’t want to go through the stress of communicating in your language, maybe she will be more open to communicating in hers.

Do you feel scared from the

You don’t know the Nomai word for rain. That could be indicative of it not being a concept familiar to the Nomai. It could also just be indicative of your poor understanding of the language.

Do you feel scared from the water that goes down?

Yes — No

You can make a line around the one that is correct.

You slide the paper under the door. You’re not sure if you should call out to Solanum again, but you hear a slight thump of footsteps and see the light under the door shift, so you figure she saw the paper.

You lean back against the wall, feeling it rattle as thunder crashes overhead. You don’t know if Solanum is interested in communicating this way, but you’re not in any rush to leave and face the storm again. Unless she asks you to, of course.

You feel embarrassed by how you startle when the paper suddenly slides back under the door, but you eagerly pick it up and squint down at it. A pencil mark traces the outside edge of the loop of the word “No.” You guess that’s the Nomai equivalent of an underline.

Okay, great! So she’s not scared at least, if you’re interpreting this correctly. You write a second message below the first.

Do you know about the water that goes down and the sky sounds? Sorry I do not know the words.

Yes — No

You slide the page under the door. A moment later, instead of a word being underlined, a message in much neater handwriting is written branching off of yours. You don’t know the words in the middle, but you can guess from the context.

I know what rain and thunder are, Riebeck.

Oh… well, now you feel silly for assuming. You write quickly and pass the paper back under.

Okay.

So, she’s not crying because she’s scared of the storm. That’s good. You’re also just assuming that what you heard was crying. It could be that she was asleep and Nomai snoring just sounds tearful and miserable to your ears, or something.

You guess it wouldn’t hurt to ask. You go to write, but then realize she never passed the paper back, so you tear out a new one from your journal.

Are you sad today?

You pass it under the door, then sit back again. You play with the pencil in your hands, flipping it around, drawing a little doodle on the floor and quickly erasing it. Several minutes later, the paper slides out again.

I am sad every day.

Oh. Darn, you guess that makes sense, but you were starting to hope that your snoring theory was correct. You write on the paper and slide it under again.

Okay.

You probably shouldn’t ask her why she feels sad. It’s kind of obvious, right? Everyone she knows is dead. You would feel sad too, and lonely, if that happened to you.

You wonder if she cries like this often. She never seems sad when you see her. You’re starting to get better at reading her facial expressions, but the negative ones you see on her you would describe as “tired” or “frustrated” or “stressed” rather than sad. It could be that today is just an unusually bad day. But she said she’s sad every day. She also spends a lot of time in her room. Maybe she goes to be by herself when she is feeling sad.

You pull out another piece of paper to write a question, but water drips onto it. Oh, that’s because you’re feeling sad now.

You sit back, wiping your tears with your sleeves. You don’t really know what you wanted to write anyway. You don’t think there’s anything you could say right now what would make things better. You could try cheering her up, tell her a joke or something, but that doesn’t seem like the right thing to do. It would be like saying that she shouldn’t be sad, when she absolutely should be.

You set your journal and pencil aside with a sigh and reach into the box again, pulling out your banjo. You haven’t played in a few days. To be honest, you weren’t sure it survived the crash, and you were too worried about the possibility to ask Slate or Mica if they had seen it.

You strum, then grimace. It’s really out of tune. As you slowly twist the tuning pegs and pluck at the strings, you hear movement on the other side of the door, and the light shifts and comes closer.

Once tuned, you slouch against the wall, strumming randomly, which inevitably leads to you plucking the simple notes of “Travelers.” It’s an easy, early song that Gneiss taught you, and whenever you’re playing music just to occupy your hands, it's the tune your hands always drift to.

The door to Solanum’s room cracks open just slightly, although Solanum herself doesn’t make an appearance. Maybe she’s listening? You don’t sit up more, but you do start playing more deliberately, switching to the notes of “Timber Hearth.” It’s a more complicated song, and you can’t play it perfectly yet, but you always love hearing it from Gneiss’ guitar. It makes you feel comfortable and warm. It reminds you of lying in the sun and watching the planets fly by past the boughs of the pine trees.

You struggle with one verse of the song, playing it a couple times before you get it right and move on. As you do so, the door opens further, and Solanum’s face pokes through. She’s kind of a mess. Her fur is all squashed and lumpy and going different directions, and her eyes are puffy and dull. You give her a small smile, then focus on the strings again since you’re not good enough to play this song without looking at your finger positions.

Solanum watches from the door for a few moments. She asks, “What is this?”

You glance up to see her pointing down at the instrument. “Banjo,” you say.

“Banjo,” she repeats under her breath. “And what is… the…” She hums a few notes, waving a hand through the air as if touching the sound itself. “What is this word?”

It takes you a second to think of what she means. “Music?”

“You are doing music?” she asks.

You nod. “Yeah, that’s- well, I am playing music. But yeah. Bad music. I’m still learning this song.”

Solanum watches you a bit longer, then disappears from the door. She soon returns, though, this time with her staff in hand. She steps over you, then leans back against the wall and slides down it until she sits beside you with a huff.

You sit beside each other for a while, neither of you talking, the only sounds being the noisy patter of rain on the roof, thunder rumbling overhead, and your banjo as again you practice that difficult part of the song. Solanum rests her head on her knee and watches with half-lidded eyes as your hand moves up and down the frets.

Eventually, she writes with her staff, pressing the glowing Nomai words into the floor between you. She reads the words out loud, as you have been doing for her when writing Hearthian. You stop playing to read. Your Nomai language skills have been improving, but slowly, and it still takes a lot of concentration to decipher the lettering.

Are your hands different from those of the others in your village?

Once you understand the message, you curl your hand into a fist as if to hide your fingers. “Evet,” you admit.

Solanum holds out her own hand. Despite your embarrassment, you do the same. Side by side, it’s obvious how tiny her hands are compared to yours. The fur on the back of her hand is longer at her wrist and very short around her fingers, and her nails are more like short claws, curled at the fingertips and ending in dull points. She pulls her hand away again to write with her staff.

Mine are more different, I think.

You hum, then flinch as a sound comes from the staff. You think something is wrong, at first, it is kind of similar to the sound Hornfels’ computer makes when there is an error. But then Solanum taps on the staff’s box again, and a couple more melodic plonks ring out.

“Playing banjo again?” she says.

“Oh, uh, okay.”

You begin plucking at the strings again, returning to “Travelers.” Solanum listens closely, then touches the staff. One hesitant note plays, then another, discordant at first then slowly becoming harmonious with the twanging of your banjo.

Your eyes widen and your hands still. “It’s an instrument too?!” you exclaim.

Solanum gives a sideways glance at your banjo, then up at you. “Oops, sorry,” you say as you begin playing again.

You play together for a long time, long enough for the storm overhead to gradually fade into a drizzle. You take turns following each other. Sometimes the sound of it is awkward and stilted as each of you try to match the pace and rhythm of the other, occasionally stopping completely to just hear and understand a particular verse. Occasionally, it sounds really, really pretty. Most of the time, it’s just kind of weird and interesting, but in a way you can tell would start to feel familiar with enough time.

Thank you for being patient with me, Solanum eventually writes on the wall. At this point, you’re both lying on the floor, you on your back with your legs propped up on a shelf, her on her stomach with her legs splayed out in a way that is apparently comfortable for her, although you can’t imagine how.

You lazily point at the beginning of the sentence. “Is this teşekkür ederim?” you ask.

“Yes,” she replies.

“You say that a lot. Birçok kez,” you say. You turn your head to look at her, and she does the same, resting her head in her arms. “You don’t have to do that, you know. Gerek, uh… yok.”

She turns away, her chin on her wrists as she idly scratches at a knot in the wooden floorboard. Eventually, she turns and looks at you again, then closes her eyes. “Okay.”

Another day, you and Solanum are sitting on the floor in the playroom on the second story of the hatchling cabin, surrounded by not only toys, but also papers, chalk, and glowing text in both Nomai and Hearthian.

As has become typical, Hal spent some time earlier today with Solanum helping her study the Hearthian language. Hal is a much better teacher than you. They are actually able to explain grammar rules and sentence structures beyond just, “You say it this way, because, um, well, it’s the way you’re supposed to say it.” But Hal had to cut the lesson short to help Hornfels in the observatory. Solanum wasn’t satisfied with the amount of practice she had done, so she came looking for you.

It was your turn on hatchling duty today, which means getting the hatchlings fed and cleaned up and ready for bed, and making sure that they get enough sleep and that the temperature and humidity of the cabin stays within an acceptable range. That last task has become especially important to monitor closely with the lack of electricity and the harsh conditions outside.

Solanum coming in set the process back a bit, since all the hatchlings suddenly lost all their sleepiness when they came to the conclusion that Solanum was there specifically to entertain them. You got them settled eventually, though, and Solanum helped where she could. She was very curious about the entire procedure. Apparently, Nomai “children” were typically raised by one or two adults whom they were genetically related to, and children would get together during the day and separate into these genetic units to have a final meal and sleep, a reversal from hatchlings being scattered through the village during the day and all sleeping together in the same room.

You both had to keep hushing yourselves to avoid waking the hatchlings as you enthusiastically discussed the differences in your cultures, but Solanum wasn’t going to be distracted from her language practice. So when Rutile finds you upstairs, you are both huddled over a veritable web of vocabulary scrawled across the floor.

“The hatchling is old the tadpole?” Solanum asks.

“Right, yeah,” you reply. “Older. The hatchling is older.”

“Why?” Solanum says, exasperated. “The word ‘to hatch’ is… not old. Then the tadpole. Then the hatchling? Why?”

“I don’t know!” you exclaim, only to be quickly hushed by Solanum. “I don’t know, I didn’t make the words.”

Rutile pokes their head through the open doorway. “Is everything okay in here?”

You flop back on the ground with a sigh, looking at Rutile upside down. “We are collectively discovering that the Hearthian language can be pretty dumb sometimes.”

“I see,” Rutile says. They come into the room, looking around at the glowing text with their hands in their pockets. “It looks like you two are doing very good work.”

You’re not sure how they can determine that just from looking at the mess you’ve made of the place, but it’s better than them immediately asking you to clean up, so you’ll take it. Rutile continues to scan over the papers strewn across the floor, then watches Solanum, who is copying some of the vocabulary into her notebook. You notice that their posture is rather stiff and uncomfortable, and they shift from foot to foot without removing their hands from their pockets.

Solanum notices this too when she looks up and catches Rutile staring, who quickly glances at their feet. She looks at you, and you raise a hand and drop it, a Nomai gesture equivalent to a shrug that you’ve picked up from her.

Rutile clears their throat, then asks, “Mind if I sit with you for a bit?”

This time you shrug in Hearthian, then ask Solanum, “Burada olabilirler mi?”

“Yes, Rutile!” Solanum replies, brushing some papers away to make space for them.

“Rutile önemli şeyler oturur,” you warn.

Rutile looks at you with their brow knitted. Solanum tsks at you. “Do not be bad, to Rutile say the Hearthian.”

You bow your head at the reprimand. “Sorry. I just said that you probably want to talk about something important.”

Rutile huffs, shaking their head. “I’m getting too transparent, aren’t I? Could I have that?” They gesture towards the slate, and you hand it to them.

Rutile writes a message and passes the slate to Solanum, but despite the habit that she has managed to get everyone to abide by, they don’t read it aloud. Solanum takes it, nostrils flared with what you’ve learned is something between surprise, confusion, and mild annoyance. “Say this, please, to learn the words?”

“Read it first,” Rutile says.

Solanum scans the message with her translator, keeping her middle eye on Rutile. After a moment, she asks, “This is bad?”

“No,” Rutile says quickly. “No, it’s, well… I don’t know. It is important. Do you know the word ‘important?’”

Rutile begins to write the word, but Solanum says, “I know.” She pauses again briefly, then says, “Riebeck is… yes. Yes here.”

“You want them to stay?”

“Yes, stay.”

“Okay,” Rutile says, and looks at you, and you feel like you should throw your hands up in surrender but you stay still. They say, “I was just telling her that I wanted to check in on her and maybe talk about something private, and I asked if she would rather us talk alone or have you here with her.”

“Oh, uh…” You meet eyes with Solanum, and she seems just as confused as you are, and somewhat nervous too. “Okay? I don’t know if I can help with anything…”

“That’s fine,” Rutile says. “But you will not share any part of this conversation with anyone unless you have Solanum’s permission. Understand?”

You nod quickly, eyes wide. Solanum pushes the slate back into Rutile’s hands with some insistence. “Rutile, write this, please. I do not understand.”

“Sorry, sorry, I’m still not very good at this.” Rutile says with a small chuckle. They write again, this time reading out loud as Solanum translates.

|I reminded Riebeck to keep whatever you say confidential. You can speak with whomever you want, of course, but Riebeck will not share what you say with others.|

Once Solanum looks up again from her translator, Rutile pats their legs and says, “Okay? Good?”

“Good,” both you and Solanum say at the same time.

“Okay,” Rutile says with a short exhale. They’re tense, although they’re trying not to show it, and it’s putting you both on edge. They write again.

|So, I wanted to check up on you, Solanum. How have you been feeling lately?|

Solanum replies slowly. |I suppose ‘decent’ could be an accurate word. Physically, I am feeling much better than I have been. I have been able to sleep better with the bed you and Riebeck kindly made me, although I will admit sleep still eludes me sometimes. Emotionally…|

Solanum presses this into the floor and lets you both read it as she decides how she wants to continue. Eventually, she gives up and writes, |I am not sure how to describe my emotional state even in my language. Some days are better than others, some days are worse. I do not know that I can honestly say I have been feeling well. I am decent.|

She lays her staff across her lap, making it clear that she doesn’t have any more to add. You pick up a stretchy toy centipede that the hatchlings left lying around so you can play with it as you listen. It seems you’re here for moral support rather than to directly participate in the conversation, so you do what you can to stay focused.

Rutile nods and takes back the slate to write. As they do so, Solanum reaches over to the toy centipede in your hands, pulling on its legs and stretching them until they fling back into position.

When Rutile finally turns the slate back to Solanum, you can see that they had to write the words very small to get everything to fit.

|Thank you for explaining to me. I understand that it can be difficult to put how you feel into words, but I appreciate the effort. I’m glad to hear you are sleeping better. I wanted to ask you about something Moraine told me. They said that they thought they saw you doing something earlier today that made them feel very worried for you, but when you saw them, it seemed like you tried to hide the evidence of what you did. Do you know what it is they saw, and would you be willing to talk to me about it?|

Solanum looks blankly at the screen of their device, glancing up once or twice at Rutile. Then they write, |I am not sure I recall what Moraine might have seen. Respectfully, Rutile, I hypothesize that you may be avoiding the question you would truly like to ask me.|

Rutile takes a deep breath as they write a response. |I apologize, I will try to be more direct. But I want you to understand that whatever you say, you will not be judged for it. I am not here to reprimand you or make you feel guilty or ashamed or anything like that. I only want to make sure you are safe, to listen to anything you want to say, and to see if you need any help. Do you understand?|

“I understand,” Solanum says. You feel a nasty vine of anxiety twisting up through your stomach, but Solanum seems more focused and curious than anything else.

The next message from Rutile is shorter, but it takes them just as long to write it and turn it toward Solanum. Their voice is quiet as they read it aloud. |Moraine says they saw you recently with a knife, and they believe you may have been cutting yourself. Have you been harming or injuring yourself in any way?|”

Your hands freeze on the toy, and your eyes grow wide. You find yourself scanning over Solanum’s limbs, but her clothes cover everything but her hands, and fur on her neck and head is too thick to see through to the skin. If she hurt herself, you are going to feel like an awful, awful person for not being observant enough to realize that.

Solanum stares at the translator’s display for a long time, still as a statue. Then, all at once, she stands.

She goes over to her bag, which was left hanging from the doorknob. Reaching in, she pulls out and opens a short, sharp, folding utility knife, the kind with the sharp razor blade that just about everyone carries on their person. “This?” she asks.

Then, before either of you have time to react, she pulls on the fur on her chin and cuts through it. The hairs fall in a clump to the ground.

Your hands fly over your mouth as you make a sound between a gasp and a shout. Rutile rolls to their knees with a speed you rarely see from them. They reach out for the knife, saying, “No, Solanum, don’t-”

“Stop!” Solanum commands, holding the knife up out of Rutile’s reach. Rutile obeys, putting their hands up and sitting back. Solanum seemed to recognize that Rutile was going to try to take the knife with little care if they cut themself in the process.

Once Rutile backs off, she folds the knife away and hands it to them. Rutile takes it with shaking hands and puts it in their pocket.

“This is not injury,” she says hurriedly, stepping closer to Rutile and lifting her head to show her chin, ruffling the remaining fur with her hands. “This is not bad. You are looking?”

“Solanum… I don’t understand,” Rutile says with a weak voice, looking between her and the small pile of silver fur sitting on the floor. “There’s a piece of you…”

Solanum looks to you for help, but like you warned before, you’re no help at all. You’re just trying to get your breathing under control. She looks between the two of you, letting out a small whimper of alarm. She rushes to pick up her staff and sits down close in front of Rutile. “You here, Riebeck,” she says, prompting you to scoot closer as well.

She writes quickly and presses the words in between the three of you. |I sincerely apologize, I did not realize that my actions would cause such distress. I should not have acted so thoughtlessly. The short fur on my body and the hair of my mane is made up of dead cells and does not contain nerve endings. It does not cause me any pain or harm when it is cut, and it will grow back over time. I am not in any danger.|

Oh. Okay. Wow, it would have been great if she had explained that before cutting off a chunk of her body in front of you. “It’s l-like, uh, finger- fingernails?” you ask.

“What is this word?” Solanum says. As Rutile picks up the slate and writes it for her, you lean over and hesitantly grab a piece of the cut fur on the floor, holding it close to your face. You wish you had your helmet so you could use the magnifying lenses on it, but from what you can tell, there is no blood or anything.

“Yes, the same!” Solanum exclaims after translating Rutile’s message. Then she writes, |My mane became knotted and matted in some places due to a lack of care on my part, which can be uncomfortable because it pulls where it is still connected to my skin. I decided to cut it shorter to make it easier to manage, and Moraine must have seen me disposing of the excess hair.|

She demonstrates, dragging her fingers through the fur around her antlers until she hits a snag, the hairs not parting. Then she takes Rutile’s hand, putting it up to the same place hers had been. “You can do this.”

“I can touch?” Rutile says, hovering their hand above her head.

“Yes, you can touch,” she says, the “ch” sounding more like an “sh,” a sound she hasn’t quite been able to master yet.

Solanum leans her head forward for better access, and Rutile copies her movement from before, their fingers combing through the hair until it hits the knot. “Oh, yes, there it is,” Rutile says.

“You can… do this?” Solanum says, making a cutting motion with her hand.

“You want me to cut it?” Rutile asks, unsure.

“Yes. Please,” she replies.

Rutile pulls the knife from their pocket, and you hold your breath as with the utmost care they cut away the strands that are tangled together until a small knot falls away in their hand.

“Good!” Solanum says when she is shown the bundle of fur.

Rutile lets out a breathy, but still somewhat shaky, chuckle. They write on the slate, |Okay, I understand now. I’m sorry for jumping to conclusions. I was scared for you, little one.|

Solanum seems taken aback at the words, her ears and shoulders dropping and the rest of her body going still. She writes in reply, |Again, I am sorry for causing distress to both the two of you and to Moraine. Like I said, I am not doing very well, but even on my worst days, I have no desire to harm myself.|

Rutile gives Solanum a small smile. |I am glad to hear that. If that ever changes, will you please come talk to me about it?|

Solanum swallows, lowering her eyes before uttering a quiet, “Yes.”

As you look at the little knot of hair you have since taken from Rutile, you write on a scrap of paper, |I can’t believe you can just cut huge pieces of yourself off and it doesn’t hurt.|

Solanum hums as she reads the translation. |I suppose it does seem strange if you do not have fur yourself. It is quite the opposite, actually. The sensation of the hair being combed through can be rather pleasant and relaxing.|

|Would you like me to keep going, then? Look for any knots that you want cut out?| Rutile offers.

Solanum’s eyes widen, like she hadn’t even considered the option. She looks up quickly at Rutile, but they just smile softly at her. “Yes is good, no is good. Either way,” they say.

After a moment, she lowers her head. “Yes, please.”

Rutile does so, brushing their hand slowly through her mane on her head and neck. Every time their fingers catch, they carefully cut away the knots. You stand up and limp over to the door, not bothering with your cane as you check that the humidity and temperature is still good for the sleeping hatchlings. Then you return and lay down on the floor again, rubbing your eyes. It’s getting late for you, too, and all this excitement over the past several minutes left you tired.

After a little while, you write, |So, if your fur keeps growing, does it have a maximum length it can reach? Or do you have to cut it before it gets too long?| But as you go to pass it to Solanum, you see that she has her eyes closed, her head turned to one side as Rutile checks the fur around her ear. You put the slate down and lie back again.

Eventually, after Rutile had found the last knot, they put the knife away and they simply pet through Solanum’s fur with both hands. After several minutes of this, she opens her eyes and looks up at them. “Does that feel better?” Rutile asks, brushing her mane back from her forehead.

Instead of replying, Solanum slowly leans forward until her head lays against Rutile’s shoulder.

It takes Rutile a second to overcome their surprise, but when they do, they wrap Solanum in a gentle hug, one arm around her shoulders and a hand behind her antlers. “Alright. That’s alright. I’ve got you.”

”Annem ve babam bunu benim için yapardı. Solanum mumbles into Rutile’s scarf.

Rutile glances back at you. You frown and explain, “She said that her mother and father would do this for her. She was telling me about this before you came in. Those were the people who took care of her the most when she was a hatchling.”

Rutile heaves a sigh, resting their head against Solanum’s. “I’m so sorry, dear,” they say. “You deserve so much better than all this mess you’re going through.”

You consider going downstairs to give them some space. But you’re pretty sure Solanum hasn’t learned the word ‘deserve’ yet. So instead of getting up, you pick up Solanum’s translator and, after a moment of consideration, decide to use her notebook rather than the slate. You write what Rutile had said, use the translator on the message, and tap Solanum on the knee. She looks over with her middle eye. When she reads the words on the display, she leans farther forward, putting her own arms around Rutile’s middle.

When Rutile notices what you are doing, they keep speaking, and you keep translating. “I know we can’t replace what you’ve lost,” they say quietly, petting Solanum’s mane. “We can’t replace your home, and we certainly can’t replace the people who loved you. But I want you to know that we’ll do everything we can to help you feel safe and comfortable here. I want you to know that you belong, that you will always have a place with us, no matter what happens. Me, Riebeck, Porphy, Moraine, Gneiss, everyone wants you to be happy, but we will all be here for you when you’re not.”

Solanum’s fingers grip tightly to the back of Rutile’s shirt, but she doesn’t look away from the display each time you translate. Rutile contines, “You are very brave, Solanum. I wish you didn’t have to be, but you are. You are so brave, and you are so, so smart and incredibly kind. I can’t replace your mother and your father, but I will take care of you the best that I can, as much as you will let me. I love you very much.”

It takes a while for you to finish writing and translating everything. As you do so, Rutile doesn’t say anything else, just continues combing along the fur on the back of Solanum’s head and neck with slow strokes. Solanum’s eyes grow wet as she reads. After the last line, she closes her eyes and buries her face into Rutile’s shirt, a soft sob escaping her. Rutile hugs her even tighter.

You wipe your own eyes and decide it might be time for you to leave. You tap Solanum’s knee again, and when she looks up at you, you flick your eyes over toward the door. She nods.

As you stand, she reaches out and touches you, her fingers lightly brushing against the side of your hand. You smile at her, then make your way slowly downstairs, leaving Rutile and Solanum curled together on the floor.

The next time you see her is minutes before the world is to be turned upside down.

You slam open the storage building’s door, nearly tripping over the threshold in your haste. “SOLANUM!” you yell.

You slap the interior door with your hand, shouting, “Solanum, get up!”

The door to Solanum’s room swings open and she blinks at you, eyes bleary with sleep. “What? Riebeck?”

“Sorry,” you say, panting as you struggle to catch your breath. “There isn’t time to explain. We need to go, to leave, right now.”

“Ayrılmak?” Solanum asks, trying to catch up with your rapid words.

“Yes, sorry, excuse me,” you say as you push your way into her room. She looks baffled, but steps aside to let you in. The fireplace is cold already, thank goodness, so you pick up her oil lamp and her bag, handing the latter over to her. “Get your cihaz, let’s go!”

You hold out your hand, and after just a second’s hesitation, she takes it, barely managing to grab hold of her staff before you rush her out of the room.

Outside, the village is in chaos. People rush in and out of buildings, shouting to each other, slamming doors, pounding hammers and mallets.

You approach Rutile, who is standing in the doorway to the big cabin. “It doesn’t have to be perfect, Spinel, just make sure everything’s disconnected and get out!” they shout through the door into the building. Then they lean out again and yell up the hill, “Moraine, when the boiler is turned off in there, go with Tephra up to Gossan. Flashlights and electric lamps only, no oil lamps!”

You hand over Solanum’s oil lamp to Rutile, and they take it and quickly pass it to Porphy inside the cabin. “No fires in the kitchen cabin or the storage building, this should be the last lamp,” you tell them.

“Good. Porphy, you got that secured?” Rutile says.

Porphy reappears quickly, carrying a bundle of stakes and a couple mallets. “Yeah, all the oil lamps are locked in a cabinet, and Gneiss and Spinel are coming up from the basement. That should be all the fire hazards down here taken care of.”

“It’ll have to be good enough,” Rutile replies. They toss to you a bundle of rope long enough that it spills from your arms. “Porphy, Riebeck, and Solanum, go up to the observatory and stake down the generator there, then go to Gossan and help them stake down their generator.”

Rutile goes back inside, and Porphy says, “Alright, let’s go!” and starts fast-walking toward the waterfall.

Solanum takes most of the rope bundle from you, and you carry it together as you both follow Porphy. Your knee complains as you limp faster with your cane than Gneiss would probably like.

“I do not understand Rutile, why we are going too fast?” Solanum says to you, whispering as if not to let Porphy overhear.

“I know, sorry, I will explain later, we just need to go with Porphy,” you reply.

Porphy is waiting for you above the gravity crystal. They waste no time shoving one of the mallets and half the stakes into Solanum’s arms, making her drop the rope. They then produce a knife from their apron, cut the rope, then hand half of its length to Solanum as well. “Go to Gossan,” they say, pointing towards the mines. “Riebeck, let’s go to the observatory.”

You look at Solanum, but she understands this instruction, even if she doesn’t understand the purpose of it. The line of her mouth is taut with determination as she marches away with her bundle. “Come on, Riebeck!” Porphy says, and you turn around quickly to go after them.

You make quick work of securing the observatory generator together. It is already turned off, so you criss-cross the rope over it and stake it to the ground at the corners. You look behind you into the museum. “Is there anything in there we-”

“We don’t have time for it, we just need to get the fire hazards pinned down,” Porphy replies. “Back to Gossan.”

As the two of you cross the bridge past Chert’s house, you can hear the thumping of a mallet as Esker pounds the last stake into the ground next to the generator by the entrance to the mines. “Okay, ready to fire it up?”

“Not yet, the cable wasn’t long enough,” Gossan replies, dragging along a heavy-duty extension cord toward the mine’s elevator. “We have to feed this down.”

“Are the radio antennas set up?” Porphy asks.

You tune out the conversation as you catch Solanum staring into the distance. Following her eyeline, you see the beams of flashlights moving across her shuttle up on the ridge.

“I think Slate and Tuff are up there tying it down,” you tell her. Solanum looks at you, eyes wide, ears low with concerned confusion. “Uh, they’re… I don’t know how to say it. They’re helping.”

“Riebeck!” Gossan calls, and you startle to attention. “Go inside, the elevator is almost back to the top. You and Solanum ride it down with Esker and the others.”

“Okay,” you say, and it hardly feels like you have enough air in your lungs to get the word out.

You do not want to go into the mines. You don’t have a problem with them, typically. You don’t have fond memories of your zero-g training, but you were never afraid of being underground before.

This time, though, is different. As you pile into the elevator with Solanum, Esker, Moraine, Tephra, and with Spinel and Gneiss and Rutile coming in behind you, you turn around to face the elevator gates. As they close and you start to descend, you feel in your gut that you will never see the surface again.

Something slams against the roof of the elevator. The others yelp or gasp. You scream.

“It’s fine, it’s the cables for the generator and the radio, Gossan threw them on the roof so it would unwind as we come down,” Esker says. “Sorry, should have warned y’all.”

You want to cover your mouth, and look at the others, and look at the ground, and check on Solanum, and reach out to someone, and hold your breath, and calm down, but all you can do stare at your hands as they grip the railing in the elevator hard enough your knuckles go pale and the rough metal scratches at your palms. Tephra is talking loudly, and Spinel and Esker are talking too, but you can’t listen to them. The glittering rocks gliding past outside the elevator are making you dizzy, but you can’t even make yourself close your eyes right now.

The elevator is being operated mechanically by someone at the bottom, so it is much slower than usual. You don’t know if you would prefer it to go faster or even slower.

The elevator reaches the bottom of the mine, and Hal opens the gate. “Everybody out, quickly, so I can send it back up.”

“Wait just a second,” Esker tells Hal. “We’ve got cables for you. Climb up there and grab them, don’t get them tangled. Sed can help you get them over to Hornfels.”

You stumble over the edge of the elevator as you exit, and you nearly fall, or worse, catch yourself with your bad knee, but Gneiss keeps you upright. They look at you with concern. “You alright, hatchling?”

You nod, but you can’t make yourself speak. You walk over to the side of the cavern and try to take deep breaths. You really don’t want to throw up.

The cave is extremely noisy and unusually bright. Everyone has been instructed to stay around the elevator or in the narrow mine shaft and not to venture into the mines themselves. You can hear the hatchlings arguing, and one of them might be crying. Everyone else is rushing around to either operate the elevator or help Hornfels with their radio and the other equipment they’re setting up. Flashlight beams swing across the walls, and every sound echoes almost to the point of incomprehensibility. The elevator ascends again with a series of nauseating screeches and clunks.

Solanum appears in your line of sight. “You are okay, Riebeck?” she asks.

You take a shuddering breath, and your voice squeaks and cracks as you say, “Yeah, I- I just need… right, I need to, um, tell you what is…”

Your voice peters out, but Solanum lets you turn her around so you can fumble with the bag hanging from her antlers. You pull out a nub of chalk and the slate and lean back against the wall of the cave.

You bend in half over the slate as you will yourself to explain what’s going on to Solanum. You have to, you can’t just leave her hanging, everything is… you’re so scared, and Solanum doesn’t even know what’s going on.

You scratch the chalk across the slate, and it screeches painfully in your ears. The first word is illegibly messy, the translator won’t be able to understand it. You erase it with your sleeve. You try again. You can’t get past the first letter, it’s crooked and it’s so loud. You erase it. You try again. Your hands are shaking too much to get more than a line drawn. You rub it away with your sleeve, but you can’t get it clean enough, and the chalk dust is choking you, it’s too hard to breathe.

The chalk and the slate are both gently pulled from your hands. You don’t want to let them go. “I-I need to explain to Solanum,” you say, your breath running out on the last word, making you gasp like you’re surfacing from the depths of Giant’s Deep.

“Stop writing this,” Solanum says, and you realize that she is the one that took the slate and chalk from you, and you also realize that she is crouched down because you have ended up sitting on the floor at some point. “You do not need explain this now to me.”

“But, but,” you say, and you can’t get the rest of the sentence out. You can’t really see Solanum either. You go to wipe your tears on your sleeve, and Solanum catches your arm before you can rub chalk dust into your eyes.

“No, no, no,” Solanum says, her voice low and soothing. She picks up a corner of her knitted shawl and wipes your face with it. “You need to do this. Look.”

She inhales, slow and exaggerated, a hand on her own chest for emphasis. She holds it, and blows it slowly out her mouth. “Do this, Riebeck.”

You try to copy her, but your breath hiccups with a sob halfway through. “Sorry, I can’t, I’m such a- a-”

“No, it is okay, no sorry,” Solanum says. “Again, slow. Do this, Riebeck.”

She models another breath, and again you fail to copy it. You are convinced that these caves are running out of oxygen and you’re the only one feeling the effects of it, and you feel worthless and foolish and sick. But Solanum doesn’t give up. You try to copy her again, and you do a little better this time.

She breathes this slow and measured way a third, fourth, sixth, tenth time. Your own breaths start to match hers, and you start to feel less like you’re dying.

“Good, Riebeck!” she says and bumps her nose against yours, making you close your eyes. “Do this again and again.”

“I’m okay,” you say, and you raise the collar of your shirt to cough into it. “I’m, uh… w-where’s the slate?”

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Gneiss says, and you jump. You didn’t realize they had sat down with you and Solanum.

Solanum passes the slate and chalk to Gneiss instead of you, and it makes you feel really guilty. But then she says, “Say to Gneiss the explain. Gneiss, write, please.”

“Okay, right, the… are you ready, Gneiss?” you say.

Gneiss nods. “Yes, go ahead when you’re ready.”

“Okay.” You take another deep breath following Solanum’s pattern, breathing in, holding, exhaling, buying yourself just another second to avoid talking. But then you talk, you make yourself explain. “The, uh, the… well, to start, the Twins have- Actually, let me explain… wait, no, you know about the black and white hole. Okay. Sorry. The twins have been falling, um, into the black hole and coming out of the white hole and going back in for a while now, right? After they were- they were sucked in originally. That’s, like, they don’t have any orbit now, they just do that, right?”

You pause and close your eyes, breathing again as Gneiss catches up writing. Thankfully, what you said was at least somewhat parsable, because after translating with her staff Solanum says, “Yes, I know. Hal said this to me.”

You swallow and continue. “So, now it- all of the orbits of all the planets have been decaying slowly. Like, getting closer to the black hole. Except, now Timber Hearth’s orbit has decayed enough that it is about to fall into the- the black hole. Like the Twins. And it’s okay, the Twins are okay, Chert is okay, but I feel…”

Gneiss looks up and waits as you struggle to finish the sentence. “Just, that’s fine, just leave it there,” you say to them.

Gneiss frowns, but holds out the slate to Solanum. She reads over the translation, her eyes widening slightly. She sits back for a moment, looking around the room as she processes. The elevator has descended again, bringing Gossan, Porphy, Slate, and Tuff into the crowded cave before ascending once again. Hornfels works busily over the radio, you can hear sharp bursts of static as they tune it. Slate turns on the projector, and Hal and Rutile flick through images from the SkyShutter satellite. They must have gotten the power working down here.

“You feel what?” Solanum asks quietly, drawing your attention back to her.

You clear your throat and rub the back of your neck. “Nothing. Önemli değil. It doesn’t matter.”

“Önemlidir, Riebeck. You feel what?” Solanum says.

“I feel…” You have to stop to swallow down another sob. You sniff loudly and say, “I’m just… really scared. I’m terrified and I’m trying to calm down but it’s not working and I want to help but I just feel useless and… I feel…” You pause, because Solanum doesn’t know a lot of these words yet. “I feel bad. Really bad,” you say, chuckling weakly and trying to wipe your eyes on your dusty sleeve, which Solanum again stops just in time.

She dries your tears with her shawl and touches her nose to yours again. “Okay,” she says simply.

Gneiss rubs your back firmly. “We’re all scared, Riebeck,” they say with a small, sad smile. “This is going to be a new adventure for all of us.”

You sigh. Yeah, okay, but you don’t see anyone else freaking out like this except maybe the hatchlings, and even most of them are doing better than you are. You don’t feel like explaining and garnering more pity, though, you’re not done explaining the astronomical situation.

“It’s not just… Gneiss, can you write this again?” Their hand moves away from your back as you continue. “It’s not just that we’re going to start going in the black hole and out the white hole like the Twins. On this first pass, we’re- the- Giant’s Deep is in the wrong spot. Timber Hearth is going to pass close to it. Too close. Close enough that the gravity…” You can’t bring yourself  to explain more. You cough again into your shirt as you try to calm your breathing.

“We don’t know what the gravity is going to do, so we’re staying down here for a little while just to be safe,” Gneiss finishes. “Okay if I write that?”

You nod and close your eyes again as Gneiss writes everything out and Solanum reads it. You should be better than this. You shouldn’t leave Gneiss to explain and Solanum to figure out what’s between the gaps. Neither of them are astronauts; you are. You are a lousy, cowardly, useless astronaut.

“This is… bad.” Solanum says.

“Bad, bad, bad,” you reply.

You all flinch as the radio screeches and the sound echoes through the room. “Come in, Chert, do you hear me?” Hornfels says for probably the fifteenth time.

“Loud and clear! I’ve got you, Hornfels!” comes the staticky reply.

“Yes!” both Hornfels and Hal shout as Gossan crowds in behind them.

“What are you seeing, Chert?” Gossan says into the microphone.

“Timber Hearth’s infall is accelerating rapidly, you’ve got maybe… eight to ten minutes until you surpass the event horizon.”

Gossan and Rutile make eye contact, and Gossan nods and says, “Time to move.”

Rutile claps their hands, and their voice booms out. “Alright, everybody, get ready to get into position! Spinel and Gneiss will go first into the back of the mine shaft and sit against the walls. Each pair will go in and sit beside them as I call your names. Take nothing with you.”

Esker starts sorting people into apparently predetermined pairs, and you hurry to stand up and try to stop your legs from shaking. Everyone seems to be talking at the same time, but you’re close enough to the radio to hear Gossan ask into the microphone, “How are things looking with Giant’s Deep?”

It takes a while for Chert to reply. “Not great, Gossan.”

The statement is about to throw you into another doom spiral before you are interrupted by Esker. “I’ll need to take your cane,” they say, “and your staff and bag, Solanum. Can’t risk any potential projectile and impaling hazards, you understand.”

You hand them your cane, but Solanum is hesitant to give up her translator staff, twisting it in her hands. Esker already took the slate from Gneiss as they went into the mine shaft, so they start to write on it. Solanum holds out a hand to interrupt them. “No, I understand you say, I…”

Esker erases the slate and instead writes, “I’ll tie it up safe out here, and you’ll have it back in no time, you have my word.”

Solanum translates it. She twists the handle again briefly, then hands it over along with her bag.

“Riebeck and Solanum, you’re up!” Rutile calls.

“Okay, okay,” you say breathlessly. You take Solanum’s hand. “We go now.”

Solanum walks forward with you with more determination and confidence than you think you could ever have, but her tiny fingers squeeze yours almost painfully tight.

You both sit down against the wall, and the mine shaft quickly fills as everyone remaining files in, with Rutile, Gossan, Slate, and Hornfels joining last. That is, until Tektite and Marl appear.

“Thank the stars, Tektite, that was way too close,” Rutile breathes, dropping their face into their hands.

Gossan doesn’t take offense when Tektite shoves their way in between them and Rutile, sitting next to their partner and grabbing their wrists. “I know, I’m sorry, me and Marl had to run here and one of the springs in my leg snapped.”

Rutile’s head shoots up at that, and they look up and down the mine shaft, counting under their breath. “Not Gabbro?” they say. “They were supposed to be with you and Marl.”

“They’re not here?” Tektite hisses. They go to stand up, but Rutile pulls them down again.

Slate swears. Gossan says, “There’s no time, Tektite. They’ll have to fend for themself.”

Hornfels shouts down the mine shaft. “Moraine, do you have your signalscope?”

“Yeah, but it doesn’t work in here!” they shout back. “I have the old type, only Sed and Gabbro had the ones that work through the planet!”

At this point, you’re starting to lose control of your breathing again. Bits and pieces of conversation swirl around you aimlessly as you all wait to- to not die. Not die.

“Did you see the roots in the wall on your way down the elevator?” Spinel asks.

“I did,” Tektite replies, taking off their helmet to run their hand over their scalp. “Already, what, eight meters down?”

“And through the rock, too,” Marl says quietly.

“Tephra, just stop crying already. It’s fine,” Mica says with a high-pitched voice that betrays their own nervousness.

“Shut up,” Galena whispers.

“And you checked the graveyard cabin?” Gneiss says.

“Quit sacrificing yourself by helping others in ways that hurt you,” Hal says.

“We got it tied down the best we could,” Slate says.

“Do you think it’s going to melt our bones?” Arkose says.

You feel pressure against your hand, and you look up to see that Solanum is squeezing it again. She’s reaching across the mine shaft to hold on to you. You didn’t realize that she hadn’t let go.

“Riebeck?” she says. “I will say to you something. You can listen?”

You are breathing too fast, you follow the breathing pattern from before and try to focus on Solanum rather than the rest of the conversations around you. “Yeah. Okay.”

“I did the…” she gestures aimlessly in the air, huffing with frustration. “No words. I did the in and out. For Brittle Hollow. The… black in, then away out.”

You try to interpret her words in her head. You’re equally frustrated at the lack of a means to easily translate. “In the black hole, and out the white hole?” you ask.

“Yes, this,” Solanum says.

You realize suddenly what she is trying to say. Moraine apparently realizes at the same time. “You have gone through the black hole before?”

“Yes,” Solanum says. “Many times I did this. All times is okay. It is not bad.”

“Wait, really?” Tephra sniffles, wiping their nose on their shirt. “What- what does it feel like?”

“It feels… I do not know the words. Not very bad. It feels like-”

You, and everything around you, flips and inverts. You are dying. For one full second, you cease to be anything that could rightly be called “Riebeck.” Then the second passes, you revert, you flip, and you are Riebeck again.

Once the gasps, shouts, yelps, gags, and your own screams quiet, you hear Solanum say, “It feels like this.”

Hornfels, Gossan, and Slate all jump up and rush back out of the mine shaft. You stand up as well and head the same direction on wobbly legs. Rutile holds out a hand to stop you. “Not yet, we have to stay-”

“I can’t, I’m going to be sick,” you say, breathing heavily and shutting your eyes against a wave of nausea.

“Alright, come back quickly,” Rutile says. “Everybody stay seated, we’re not out of danger yet. You too, Solanum.”

You rush out of the room and end up losing your lunch behind the elevator shaft. As you lean against the wall and try to catch your breath, you can hear the panicked voices of the founders around you.

“Chert? Come in, Chert.” Hornfels says, checking the connection of the radio microphone. “Why aren’t they answering me?”

“Is the signal not getting through?” Gossan asks.

“It- it should be. There’s no reason why…” Hornfels presses the button on the microphone again. “Come in, Chert, where are you?”

“Maybe the connection to the antennas came loose,” Gossan says, entering the elevator. “I’ll go up and check.”

“It’s not the connection, the SkyShutter is still working, which means the cables are still attached,” Slate says. Gossan, either not hearing them or ignoring them, closes the elevator gates and starts ascending anyway. “Gossan!” Slate calls after them, then huffs and shakes their head. “Stupid idiot, going to get themself killed.”

You jump when Esker suddenly pats your back. “You doing alright, pal?”

You wipe your mouth and hiccup. “Y-yeah. Sorry, I’m- that was…”

They pat you again. “No, you’re right, that was pretty rough. Just take it easy for a second.” They look up and call out, “Hornfels, how much time do we have?”

“I- I don’t know!” Hornfels replies, frantically twisting dials on the radio. “Chert was supposed to keep track, but now I can’t… where are they?”

Several minutes pass. You sit down and put your head between your knees, trying to breathe slowly and evenly. Hornfels keeps trying the radio. Gossan comes back down the elevator, climbing up on the roof of it to check the cables there. Then Slate says, “Shoot, Esker, I looked away for one second and now the SkyShutter’s camera is showing nothing.”

Esker looks at the blurry gray streaks projected on the wall. “That’s grass. The satellite fell back to Timber Hearth, somehow.”

“What? We thought it would get lost to Giant’s Deep, if anything,” Slate responds, squinting at the image.

“Can you go back through the camera’s memory?” Esker says.

The room is briefly quiet but for the clicks of the projector and the static from the radio. You look up, though, when Esker says, “What is that?” and then “Oh, stars.”

“GOSSAN!” Slate screams.

You stand up and manage to make your way over to the projector at about the same time Gossan does. Your mind processes the image slowly, piece by piece, and all in the wrong order.

You see something smashing into the SkyShutter satellite. You see Gabbro. Gabbro is inside a ship. It is not Gabbro’s ship. Behind the ship the entire frame is taken up by Giant’s Deep. Gabbro is wearing a helmet. It is not Gabbro’s helmet. Gabbro is not flying the ship. Beside Gabbro, in the pilot’s seat, is… is…

“Feldspar,” Gossan whispers.

Behind you, Sed shouts, “MY SHIP!”

Chapter Text

A dark shadow coasts through the glow of the fog outside your camp. You play your harmonica and ignore it, even as its blurred outline becomes more distinct as it approaches. You'll be fine. You've seen bigger fishies than that one get scared off as soon as they brush against one of the impressive fangs of your bony home.

Instead of fleeing, however, it seems intent on getting itself wedged between the teeth. It's then that you notice the bright flashes of light at its sides as it maneuvers, the rumble and release of rocketfire, the creak of metal and wood scraping against bone.

You're found. Someone must have heard your music. You realize you've stopped playing, stopped moving, as if not to be seen. You shake your head and laugh at yourself, feeling oddly nervous, and press your instrument against your helmet's vent again.

Then someone drops out of the bottom of the ship, and you think that it's Gossan and your heart tries to flip itself upside down. No, they're wearing a helmet that looks similar to the one Gossan wears, but they're much too tall. Slate, maybe? The size is closer, but you can't imagine them willingly piloting a ship farther than the Attlerock.

They're standing in the camp now, fiddling with what looks like a fancy, upgraded version of Slate's Little Scout design. They haven't yet glanced your way; you're not sure they've even noticed you. Then it occurs to you, hey, maybe you should cut the gawking and say something?

It takes you two tries to get started, having to clear your throat to get your rarely-used voice working. “Whoa! Where’d you come from?” you start. “No one’s come here in… well, ever, actually. That makes you the second Hearthian to ever reach Dark Bramble—after me, of course. Well done!”

By now, they've stepped closer, making their way around your fire, close enough for you to see through their visor, and... well, it's not Slate. It's... who is that? You don't recognize-

Then, all at once, you do. It's Sed. Chubby little Sediment, with the sharp tongue and the shrill laugh that would peal out across the entire crater, with the talent for getting under any adult's skin in a way that was hard to get mad at, with the voracious appetite for discovery, with the at least one or two other hatchlings always at their heels being roped in to their shenanigans. That Sed, only now broad-shouldered and nearly grown and oozing the weariness of someone twice their age.

“Say, it’s you!” you laugh with surprise. “They made you an astronaut? And you haven’t blown yourself up yet, good for you!”

You lean forward and squint at their face, trying to guess their age. They're an adult now, but just barely, you guess. They look so different from what you remember.

Maybe you've been away longer than you realized. You wonder what else must have changed while you've been out here.

Sed still hasn't said anything, or really paid you much attention, looking around your camp and up at the seed suspended where the guts of this fish should be. "What's the matter, hatchling?" you prompt, leaning back against the log behind you, "So gobsmacked by my impressive visage you can't figure out what to say?"

You see their grip tighten on the handle of the scout launcher, see their face harden. They still don't look at you. "I'm not here to talk," they say as they step around off to your side and behind you, at the back of your camp. "Just shut up and keep doing what you do best: pretending you're the only person in the universe.”

You aren't sure if this is bait—this hatchling trying to get a rise out of you—or a warning. You aren't typically one to shrink back from a challenge, but something about their demeanor and tone of voice tells you that if you don't tread lightly here, they're either going to start throwing punches or leave without another word. You're frankly not sure which scenario would be worse. So you decide err on the side of caution for once and hold your tongue.

Sed kneels down among the thorny weeds native to this place and starts taking pictures. You ignore them and go back to playing your harmonica, if a bit more stilted this time. The clicking of the camera shutter is the only other significant sound in this place, and it's throwing off your rhythm. You hope the tint of your visor is opaque enough that they can't see you occasionally glancing in their direction.

After some time, Sed sighs at the device in their hands and returns it to the holster on their back. They step forward again, standing over the fire and looking down into it.

They say, their voice cool and emotionless, “You stopped playing your harmonica, didn't you.”

You feel caught, then, spotlighted, like a flashlight's been turned on you while you sneak around in the dark as a hatchling, but you have no idea what kind of trouble might be in. "I was playing when you showed up, wasn't I?" you tell them, crossing your arms. "That's how you found me, unless you just happened to wander in here."

Sed shakes their head, the light of the campfire heating their glare. "Esker's only started hearing you play on and off over the past month. You've been gone a lot long than that, Feldspar."

You roll your eyes, even though they can't see it. "Sure, if you want to rely on Esker's hearing. Besides, this is a harsh and hostile place, you have to fight to survive, keep your wits about you. Don't have time to sit around blowing a tune all day."

For the first time since they appeared out of the gloom, they turn and look you in the eye, and with nothing less than hatred behind it. They step toward you and crouch down, getting right in your face. "You weren't playing your harmonica," they tell you slowly, like you won't get it otherwise, "because you didn't want to be found."

Now, you have experience dealing with angry, worked-up hatchlings. Through that experience you've discovered that when they're this far gone, usually there's some kind of stress or fear or something at its source that they're trying to cover up. So, you go with your personally hand-crafted "arm to disarm" technique. Give them the tools and motivation they need to spit out what's actually going on, then spin them around to face the real reason behind their anger.

So because they look near ready to tip over into violence, and not at all because you're feeling defensive yourself, you lift your chin at them and ask: “Is that so? Want to tell me what else I did or did not want, since you've got me all figured out?”

They do want to tell you that, if the glow in their eyes at the question is anything to go by. In a low voice, they say: "You were always running around looking for the next big thing you could come home and impress everyone with. But all those big things were getting awfully heavy on your shoulders, right? And you were running out of new things to find. So when you came out here and realized that no radio was getting in or getting out, you decided to stick around. And you just kept on sticking around. You tell yourself you like the peace and quiet, but when have you ever liked peace and quiet? You just stick around because nobody's got expectations for a corpse."

And all that hits a little too close to home, more than someone you haven't seen since they were your height should have any right to know about you.

You lean away and ask: "Who's been telling stories about me, huh? Who told you all that? Gossan?"

Sed leans even closer, close enough that their helmet bumps yours, and shoves a finger at your chest. You can see their wide, wild eyes, their gritted teeth as they answer in a whisper: “You did.”

Oh, nevermind, time to reverse course. This hatchling has lost it.

You frown, eyes darting as you search their face. "Take off your helmet," you command.

That catches them off guard. They back off a little and say, "What?"

"You're talking like you've jet fumes leaking into your oxygen supply."

Sed stands up, tears their helmet off their head, and throws it full-force in your direction with a scream. It slams against the log half a meter from your shoulder and bounces into the weeds.

They pace around to the other side of the fire, and you decide it might be better to sit up on the log rather than on the ground. Then they turn and point across the fire at you.

"I've been trying to figure out why, after all this time, nobody had picked up your harmonica," they say, growing louder each word. "Because everyone had been looking. Everyone had been listening. I was sure it had something to do with Dark Bramble's... space weirdness, blocking the signal or something. But no; I finally find you, the best there ever was, and what do I discover? Just a sad little has-been, hiding out in the dark and thinking only about themself."

A quiet blows over the camp as they say nothing more and seethe, fists clenched, by the fire, and you try to process and figure out what to do, what to say next. It's been a while since you had any social interaction, and you feel a bit like you've jumped head first into a tornado on Giant's Deep with no EVA suit.

"Listen," you start, keeping your voice level. "You've got a big brain in that big head of yours, you're good at logicking some stuff out, I'll give you that. But knowing it is something completely different from feeling it, and it's easy to judge when you're on the outside looking in."

You take some sticks from your tinder pile and break them up, throwing them one by one into the fire, but Sed doesn't say anything to fill the silence. They stare at you, quietly, and this time it's your turn to avoid their gaze.

You sigh. "It's a lot of pressure. It's hard to get away from it. You saying that people have still been looking for me just proves that. There's nothing wrong with taking a break, yeah? Put a few more kilometers on that fancy new ship of yours and you'll start to get it."

The fire crackles as it eats up its newest fuel. After a moment, Sed approaches you. You tense up, ready for a fight, but they sit down heavily beside you instead. Without saying a word, they pull forward their scout launcher again, and you try to subtly catch a glimpse of its display as they flip through stored images.

Eventually, they turn the device towards you, and you lean forward to look at the screen. You see a black-and-white photo—much clearer than anything your scout could take, good work Slate—featuring... not much. You can see the hatchling's legs and boots, like they're holding the scout launcher pointed down at the ground, but they're standing on nothing, and the rest of the photo is black.

"I'm seeing nothing, Sed," you say, confused.

"You're seeing something," they correct, "You're seeing me jumping into Brittle Hollow's black hole."

Your brow furrows, but as you try to inspect the image further, it changes. A large, crescent-shaped structure coated in ice and silhouetted by the distant sun. "The black hole connects up to a white hole on the edge of the solar system. That's the White Hole Station that the Nomai built that teleports you back. I fell in accidentally the first time, but for that picture, I jumped."

You glance sidelong between the screen and the hatchling in front of you. "That's not it. You can't survive falling into a black hole."

"Who can't?" they ask.

"Nobody can. I've seen Chert's math. It'll crush anything past the event horizon."

They push the device towards you, and it's showing another similar photo of Sed just above the black hole, this time with the warped image of Brittle Hollow's inner crust visible around the edges. "Who can't?" they ask again with a cocky grin.

You shove the screen away. "You can't, hatchling."

"I can't?" they say with a sarcastic pitch, putting a hand over their heart, but their voice quickly drops back into an angry flatness. "That's weird, because I can. I have, and I'll do it again. Chert's math is wrong about lots of stuff, it looks like."

"That's..." you say, but it fizzles out. Before you can figure out the rest of that sentence, the display is pushed toward you again. Almost reluctantly, you look down at it. A field of ice with a short horizon, sparkling in the sunlight.

"That's the Interloper," Sed says. "If you're quick, when it passes by sun, the ice melts and you can slide down into it's core. That's where the ghost matter came from. That's what killed the Nomai. You gotta be careful not to lose your ship though, the sun's gravity will grab it."

You stare, mouth agape, but the picture changes again. "Wait, go back," you say, and try to reach over Sed to the button. They shove you away hard with their forearm, hard enough that you lose your balance and tumble backward off the log you're sitting on, hitting the ground with a grunt.

You struggle to sit up, but Sed is kneeling by your head, and they stop you by thrusting the scout launcher's display into your faceplate.

"Look!" they shout. "Know what that is?" The screen shows two moons around Timber Hearth.

"I know what the Quantum Moon is, Sed, let me up-"

They change the picture. Now you see Timber Hearth, but... but not. But wrong. Empty and unfamiliar, with a too-short horizon and heavy clouds above it.

"That's the Quantum Moon's surface," they say with some sort of quiet, crazed affection. "One of it's surfaces anyway. It's different depending on what planet it's orbiting."

This isn't... you're missing something, this doesn't make sense. How could Sed have done all this? You can't get the question out, it feels like the breath has been knocked out of you.

How did they get the experience, the skill, to accomplish these things, go places that no other pilot has been able to? Did you misinterpret their age, are they older than they look? How long have you been gone?

"Do you get it?" they ask loudly, desperate, breathing hard. "I have done more than you ever have, and more than you ever could have, or ever... or ever will."

They drop the scout launcher carelessly on your chest and stand over you, looking down at you on the ground.

"So if it's any solace," they say, "you are no longer the best there ever was. I am."

Their voice is so... cold, so quiet, certain but ashamed, and their eyes are red with barely held-back tears. This isn't bragging. This is a confession.

They collapse down onto the log again, and their head drops down into their gloved hands.

You manage to get yourself sitting upright, but it takes a lot more time and effort than you'd like to admit. You look down at the device in your lap, flipping through a couple of pictures, but go back to staring instead at the puzzle of a hatchling sitting in front of you. Then you recognize what you're seeing.

"And now you're wanting to give it all up, right?" you toss forward, testing the waters, bait on a hook.

They look up at you. "...What?" they say, somewhere between offended and confused. Yep, got them.

You lean forward with a hard stare. "Let me guess, you finding me is just one more accomplishment? One more thing to check off your bucket list?"

"No, I'm not... no," they reply, not quite meeting your eyes. They're bad at lying, even when they're lying to themself.

"What, does that upset you?" you needle. "The idea that people are starting looking less like people and more like obstacles? More like challenges to overcome as you try to achieve the next big thing?"

You pick up the scout launcher and poke them in the leg with it, and they lean away, jaw working. You continue, snarling. "Have you become disgusted with yourself for it yet? Have you started pushing them away? Started looking for ways to cut yourself off completely as you watch that bucket list of yours get shorter and shorter?"

They snatch away their scout launcher, put it on their back and stand up as you finish: "'Cause if not yet, that wave is rushing towards your shore, Sed."

They step backwards over the log, nearly tripping, hands shaking. "I'm- I'm not you."

"You sure about that?" You go to stand up as well, but you stumble and end up kneeling with your hands on the log for support.

Their voice raises to a scream. "You left your camp at the frozen jellyfish to hide away in here! You could see the stars from there, Feldspar, and you left! I am not you!"

"You just said you're the best there ever was!" you say, shouting yourself. "What is there to being Feldspar other than that?"

The camp grows quiet as the two of you stare at each other across it.

Suddenly, quietly, Sed asks: "Why did you start playing your harmonica again?" And for a moment, they sound just as young as they did the last time you saw them.

You...

You don't have an answer for them.

Once they realize that, they look away. They climb into the grass and shrubs to retrieve their helmet. When they pick it up, they stare down at it in their arms.

"When I was training," they say, not looking up, "Gossan and Hornfels and the others would say stuff like, 'You're gonna be the next Feldspar.' I hated it. Whenever they said it, they always looked so sad. I didn't want to be that. I didn't want to hurt them like you did.”

They put the helmet on their head. When they turn to you, you can see the damage from when they had thrown it at you. A deep crack stretches from top to bottom across one side of the visor.

“Now the universe has forced me to become the best there ever will be, and I don't get to run away and hide from it.”

They climb up one of the anglerfish's teeth, and once they get out of range of your gravity crystal, they go to push off in the direction of their ship, which had drifted several meters away. They're leaving.

"Wait, Sed..." you say.

They turn to face you, hand on their jetpack controls. “I hated you. I still do. But out of all the travelers' music, your harmonica was always my favorite.”

With that, they rocket away, climb into their ship, and disappear into the fog. And you're left sitting in the dirt in your empty camp. At least you still have the dignity not to call after them and beg them to come back.

You wonder if they will come back, eventually, once they've had a while to cool down. Or if they'll tell Gossan and Hornfels and Slate where you've been. Or maybe you got them mad enough that you won't see them or anyone else ever again. If that's the case, well, maybe you got what was coming to you.

You go to stand up, but struggle, it's too painful. Your bones always hurt these days, but this is-

You lean forward against the log. You can't see past a blinding white light. Everything is too painful, everything, it feels like you're on fire.

Why did you start playing your harmonica again?

As you lay there, dying, all at once you realize just how badly you want to live.

Chapter Text

You wait around a few days, go back to your routine. Biological days, not solar days, of course. There's no light or dark to mark the passage of time, just that constant lukewarm gloom, but your body still tells you to sleep and wake up on some sort of schedule. You go back to foraging around for bugs that might not poison you, tending to your trees, tending to your fire.

You don't pick up your harmonica.

Sed doesn't come back.

You sleep, and wake up, and clean the ash from your campfire, and go out to collect in your canteen the moisture that gathers on this anglerfish's bones.

Sed doesn't come back.

You sleep and wake up and play your harmonica as loud as you can until you can't anymore.

Sed still doesn't come back.

You don’t know how many days it’s been since they didn’t come back, and that attack? episode? you had after they left... whatever it was, it seemed to pass quickly without doing any lasting harm that you can find. And it certainly didn't scare you, of course. It merely made you start... reevaluating your position. Start adjusting course, always on your toes, ready for anything the universe could throw at you.

Although, maybe you weren’t quite ready for the universe to decide to smoke you out of your little den.

It starts with something moving in the mist. Something slow, creeping, and bright.

It’s not an anglerfish. No, you would recognize those cold-star lures with three of your eyes closed. This is more like, well, smoke. Like trails of campfire smoke, if campfire smoke glowed brighter than the campfire it came from.

You watch these trails of light whisp across the space around the anglerfish skeleton, shifting minutely in some unseen breeze. You go to sleep, wake up, and these whisps are denser than before, and they reach farther before dissipating. If you had to guess, you would say it looks like they are blowing in from where you know the entrance to this node of Dark Bramble to be. You sleep, and wake up, and the trails have solidified into illuminated streams. You sleep, and wake up, and the streams are small rivers.

You consider using some of your precious jetpack fuel to check out what’s going on. But you sleep, and then you are woken up by something bright enough to disturb you through your closed eyelids. Then you realize you don’t have to go check them out, one of those rivers has drifted closer to your camp.

It’s not really that close—the brightest, middlest part of the stream is still probably 90 meters out. But now you can see that these streams are so much wider than that dense, bright middle. A cloud of material follows the stream at a several meter radius around it. And you can now see, even at this distance, that whatever this stuff is, it is very, very hot.

It’s hot enough that you can tell the difference even within your thermally insulated suit. It’s hot enough that when you go out to your moisture traps, you find that all the water has evaporated. It’s hot enough that, after several hours, your trees are starting to steam, and you know that only a few more hours after that they will start to smoke.

This river of light and heat doesn’t seem to be thinking about moving on any time soon. In fact, it seems to be perfectly happy feeding itself into the seed at the guts of the anglerfish skeleton. It doesn’t even have the courtesy to burn up those vines and roots like it’s burning up your trees.

So when you find yourself buckling on your jetpack for the first time in not-so-recent memory, it’s wholly because you’re ready to move on to bigger and better things. Not because if you wait one more day, you’re probably going to get boiled alive inside your suit.

Through the prerecorded audio notifications, Gossan’s voice in your in-helmet speakers alerts you to the fact that you have 50% jet fuel remaining. It makes your breath hitch and your shoulders tense. The recording sounds disappointed in you, somehow.

You kick your way off the skeleton without using your jetpack, then use it just the tiniest bit to avoid hitting your firestarter of a ship. You’re going to miss that faithful little beast.

What are you saying? You don’t have to miss it, you’re not leaving. You’ll be right back.

You float in front of the hole your ship had blasted through that vine, and you don't hesitate. You pause, maybe, just to survey the terrain and get your bearings, but you don't hesitate. Besides, you're only going out for a minute to… to get some perspective. To get a look at the source of the hot stuff blowing around your camp, see if there’s anything you can do about it. You'll be right back.

Passing through the jagged shards of wood left by your ship's crash landing feels a little too much like passing through the jaws of an anglerfish.

You continue kicking off the sides of the hollow vine, slowly bouncing through it until gravity increases enough that you can walk again. You make sure each step is a solid one as the wood of the vine transitions to ice.

Your camp at the frozen jellyfish remains relatively unchanged. Your tape recorder is still here, as well as some rope and an empty flask. The main difference is that everything is wetter than usual. The ice all around is dripping sluggishly, collecting small puddles around the jellyfish. That nasty jellyfish doesn’t seem any more decomposed than when you last saw it, though you guess that’s thanks to it being preserved by its open exposure to space.

Looking up, you see that while the jellyfish looks the same, space itself decidedly does not. You can’t make out the stars at all from here. You swear, if you find out that you need glasses, you’re going to blow something up.

It’s not just the stars, though. Maybe you’ve gotten too used to omnidirectional, sourceless pallor, but the light reflecting off the ice around you seems unusually cold and sharp. It’s also moving too fast, unless you’ve completely misremembered how quickly Dark Bramble spins. The hard shadows dancing over the towering vines makes the place feel even more unwelcoming than usual, and even more unnerving, unfamiliar, like you haven’t spent any time here at all.

You catch the tiniest movement out of the corner of your eye, but it’s gone by the time you look over. You don’t let your eyes rove from where you saw it, though. You’re not letting whatever it was get away from you that easily.

There it is again. Ha, so much for needing glasses! It takes a third time spotting it for you to recognize what it is.

A spark.

You walk forward slowly, keeping your sight trained on the sparks that keep flying out high above you, until you see their source tangled up in the ice and vines.

A ship!

Sed’s ship, you assume. You didn’t get a good look at it in the gloom the other day, but Chert’s ship looks like yours, and Riebeck’s ship looks kind of like this one except with a landing-gear-aligned cockpit, and Gabbro’s ship…

Well, it was still in pieces last time you saw it. You never did get to see them fly it, did you?

In any case, you’d bet two barrels of sap wine that this ship belongs to Sediment. Figures the rookie would make a dramatic exit just to get jammed in between some ice shelves. Still, the ship doesn’t look in too bad of shape. The sparks you saw aren’t consuming it like they do with your ship, they seem to be coming just from the broken headlight. Two of the landing gear are mangled, and the hull is scratched to the moon and back, but nothing seems unrepairable. A right boring crash if you ever saw one.

You climb a vine to take a closer look. Although this vine is probably just couple dozen degrees off from horizontal, you have to stop a couple times to catch your breath and shake out your tired limbs.

Oddly, the ship’s entrance hatch is open. When you climb high enough that you can just about reach the landing gear, you try your short-range radio. “Hello? Anybody home?”

There’s no answer. If Sed were anywhere on this side of the planet, their suit radio should have picked up your signal. Since it didn’t, that means they might be inside the planet’s foggy core, or not wearing their suit, or… just not picking up.

Who knows how long they’ve been stuck here, but it can’t have been long enough for them to have any issues with oxygen or water, Slate keeps the ships stocked for at least a month. Still, why haven’t they called for help? Why hasn’t Gossan or Chert come by to tow them back home? Are they hurt, or lost?

Why haven’t they called for help?

You decide that sitting here worrying is worse than worthless, especially given that you are starting to hear some warnings from your suit about low oxygen. You heave yourself up on the landing gear, then reach as far as you can toward the ship hatch. The ship, to your surprise, meets you halfway. Wobbling purple rings appear, and you are dragged upward before you know what’s happening.

You’re deposited on the floor just as the hatch closes underneath you. Lights flick on at your presence. If you thought Sed’s ship looked new from the outside, it’s practically untouched on the inside. It’s got all the clutter of a fresh pilot who hasn’t learned how to pare down to the essentials yet, but all this clutter seems to be in its place. The ration stores are still filled to the brim from what you can see, and the emergency tree saplings haven’t needed pruning yet.

Not only is everything neat and tidy, this ship is a technological marvel. The source of those grabby purple rings seems to be that Nomai grabby-purple-ring-producer that you brought home from Brittle Hollow not long before you came here. There also seems to be an entire computer at the back of the ship, plus a drop-dead gorgeous new reactor powering everything.

Most notably, though: no Sed.

You were hoping that they were just up here sleeping and that you would wake them up with a good smack to the noggin for running off earlier. But they’re not here, and you’re guessing all the empty hooks and shelves on the starboard wall are where their gear is meant to be.

Well, if they’re off on a spacewalk, they’ll have to be back soon. Unless Slate’s invented some type of new oxygen compression system since you’ve been gone, it won’t be too long before they’ll have to come back and refresh their tank. So you locate and pry open a tin of brined slicer minnows and settle down in the pilot’s seat. How long has it been since you’ve gotten to enjoy some good old slicer minnows?

To that end, as you look around at all the switches and buttons around you, you wonder how long it has been since you’ve sat in a pilot’s seat. You bite down on a fish. It’s much saltier than you remember.

You finish off four more tins of fish and pickled vegetables before you decide that Sed isn’t going to be turning up any time soon.

You’ve tried your short-range radio several more times, with no response. You can’t bring yourself to touch the long-range radio on Sed’s ship. You itch to use your signalscope, but you left it behind at your camp. If you want to use the ship’s signalscope, you’ll have to get it unwedged and flying again.

You familiarize yourself with the controls. It’s dual-engine, rather than single-engine like your ship, but you’ve tested Riebeck’s systems enough to be able to fly this.

You only just touch the controls, and the engines sing.

You’ve nearly forgotten how it feels to control fire at your fingertips.

You train the grin on your face down into a focused glare. You pull and push at the control stick like you’re stretching rested muscles before a run, testing the power, leaning the ship against the vines it’s caught up in without scraping or denting.

It really doesn’t take much navigating to untangle yourself. A clockwise quarter turn, a pitch backward, and a boost directly up and you’re free. Even the newest rookie should have been able to manage that.

You use delicate maneuvers to weave around the ice surrounding your old camp. You glance between the cockpit window and the landing camera, but you can see no sign of Sed. This would probably be easier if you had gone out to fix the headlight.

It takes a few moments of fumbling with the dashboard, including prompting a sharp hiss of static as you accidentally turn on the long-range radio and quickly turn it off again, but eventually the signalscope frequency display slides out in front of you. You immediately flinch as a horrible, keening wail blasts through the speakers. Another moment of fumbling, and you switch the frequency from “Distress Beacon” to “Outer Wilds Ventures,” and the sound goes mercifully silent.

Then you frown. Silence is not what you were hoping for. You turn and angle the ship and its signalscope. You don’t know what instrument you’re looking for, but unless Gneiss gave Sed something beyond the range of Hearthian hearing, there’s no music to speak of.

You sit back in the chair and tap your arm as you think. You could go check out that distress beacon frequency, you’ve never seen that before, but that screech… it’s decidedly not anything Hearthian tech would make. Probably some Nomai thing, something to check out another time. A better route would probably be to swing around to the other side of the planet and see if the signalscope can pick up anything over there.

You finesse the ship up and between the cracks in Dark Bramble’s frozen surface. You still can’t see any stars. You stand and wipe at what you can reach of the window. Is there some kind of anti-glare or UV filter or something? Whatever it is, it might not be one of Slate’s finest inventions. The lack of starlight getting through feels cold and disorienting. You flip around quickly to face Dark Bramble again, and you can see it, but the ice looks dim and colorless through the glass.

Gunning the engines to back away further from the planet, the source of those rivers of bright stuff suddenly comes into view. Out here, though, it’s upgraded from a river to a violent, raging torrent, and it’s being dragged down into the openings in the core at either pole of the planet. Like the cascade of sand dragged between the Hourglass Twins, but hotter, denser, and so bright it hurts to look at.

Now that you’ve left Dark Bramble’s gravitational field, you realize just how difficult it’s going to be to re-enter it. The planet’s rotation is much faster than it used to be, far more so than even any margin of error granted by foggy memory. You don’t know if you could get yourself accelerated in a tight enough orbit to match the rotation. If you were in your ship, you could do it with one hand tied behind your back, of course. But now?

In any case, with the help of the rotation you manage to listen with the signalscope to every side of the planet in a matter of a minute or two. Either Sed isn’t on the outer surface of Dark Bramble, or they’re not playing music.

As you pull south, you are able to follow the wide arc of the beam of luminescence to its ultimate source. A small, hard sphere of white light sitting in a static non-orbit behind Dark Bramble.

You really have no idea how to parse what you are looking at. You have the dumb idea that it’s the sun, for a second. You turn around to prove to yourself that it’s not so you can move on to the next theory, but you turn, and turn, and flip, and rotate, and you can’t find the sun. You can’t find anything. Just pure blackness, adulterated only by Dark Bramble, this sphere, and the trails of bright matter being shared between them.

The first time you discovered that one counter-clockwise cyclone on Giant’s Deep, it wasn’t intentional. You expected to be flung spinning into space, hollering all the way with glee. Instead, you were ripped downward with so much force the harness on your seat snapped, and you were flung against the cockpit window like a fly in a shaken jar. When you came to, you looked around the you-shaped smudge on the glass and you couldn’t tell up from down, left from right. You stared at the core of the planet and for a while, you were convinced that you were in the wrong solar system. One with a dark green sky, an electrified black sun, and lots of red, be-tentacled planets.

Never before had you ever felt so disoriented, so lost as in those few minutes before you made your way up past the current again. As you turn face the bright white sphere, that feeling again overwhelms you. If this is the sun, something has changed it so extremely as to make it nearly unrecognizable.

You are finding yourself wishing you had paid more attention to Hornfels’ astronomy lessons. Stars can change types over time, right? Some of them can become white dwarves, or something like that? Is that what you’re looking at? But that’s supposed to take millions of years, isn’t it?

How long were you inside Dark Bramble?

You remember when you first woke up staring out the window at the water under the current that day on Giant’s Deep, you held your breath. You weren’t sure if you were in the water or not. You weren’t sure if you were even alive or not. But you weren’t going to take your chances. You held your breath until your body forced you to breathe again.

You’re not dumb. You know you’re not under water. But when the signalscope catches the sound of a drum, you gasp for air.

Okay, so that is the sun, given that the Hourglass Twins are right there in front of it (although you could have sworn they weren’t there a second ago.) And it’s not millions of years in the future. That’s Chert’s drum, you would recognize it anywhere.

You tune the ship radio to what you hope is still their channel and flick it on. “Chert, this is Feldspar. Want to give me a clue about what happened to the sun?”

It’s only after you release the microphone button that you remember that you’ve been supposedly missing for some undefined amount of time.

It doesn’t take long before you hear a fed-up, angry reply. “No. Not you. I’m done. I can’t deal with-”

The radio cuts out mid-sentence, but the signalscope is still picking up drumming, even louder and faster than before.

They hung up on you! That ungrateful, egg-headed little…

Your bluster runs out just as quickly as it appeared. You try to hang on to it, but it slips between your fingers like so much sand, pouring into your lungs instead and making your chest tight. They don’t want to talk to you. They chose not to.

You look up from the radio and shrink back in your seat. The Twins are closer. They’re closer. They’ve left the orbit of the sun and are chasing you.

You forget entirely for a moment that this is a dual-engine ship with ventral burners and flip it around 90 degrees before rocketing upwards at full throttle. Ash Twin’s gravity grabs at your landing gear before you pull up and out of reach.

You turn around and track the planets as they continue to drift away from the sun, but they don’t adjust course to approach you again.

This is a nightmare. You’re having a nightmare. You’re not usually so lucid to them, but that’s the only thing that explains this. You smack the side of your helmet a few times, but all that does is make your ears ring.

You put away the signalscope. Something about hearing just the echo of a memory of Chert’s drum is breaking your heart a little bit.

The Hourglass Twins seem to be on a mission to get as far from the sun as possible, and the further they get, the dimmer they appear. But just past them, you see another source of light.

You speed up just enough to pass the Twins and approach this red sphere. Why not, right? If this is a nightmare, and you can’t wake yourself up from it, might as well get a lay of the land while you’re here. It doesn’t take you long to realize it’s Hollow’s Lantern, but without it’s Hollow. Great. Wonderful. What else is new?

What else is new is just up ahead, it seems. As you fly through the matte black void, it hides each object you move away from, eaten up by a dark mist. Following this little insect-trail of terrible anomalies, you fly forward until you find some broken massive satellite, one having once belonged to the Nomai if the glowing double-swirl pattern on top is any indication.

You never were one to analyze your dreams. Gabbro liked to do that. They would come to you as soon as they woke up almost every day, bleary-eyed and yawning, to tell you about what their subconscious had invented and ask you what it meant. You told them that it didn’t mean anything, that it was just their mind making up stories to fill the time. That seemed to hurt their feelings, though, so instead you started asking them what they thought it meant. Their analysis and theories over the years became so complex that you could barely keep up with them. But still, even when you were traveling more, they would still call you on the radio first thing when they woke up. And every time they asked if you wanted to hear their dreams, you said sure.

As you continue forward along the path all these natural and artificial astral bodies seem to be taking, and you catch sight of Timber Hearth in a rapid orbit around nothing, you wish Gabbro was here to explain this nightmare to you, to tell you just what kind of condition your mind must be in to be making up such awful tales.

Without your bidding, the ship approaches what used to be your home. Timber Hearth disappears, then reappears some distance to the left. You try to be dispassionate about it. You’re too old to be getting worked up over something that isn’t real.

Still, even though you know this is fake, you know this is all in your head, you can’t help the panic that burns your throat as the ship’s rockets fail to pull away from the immense gravity that has captured both Timber Hearth and now you. You can’t stop your voice that cries out for Timber Hearth as it disappears and does not reappear again. And as the thing that erased Timber Hearth drags you into itself in slow motion, you hold your breath as if that could ever keep you from drowning.

You experience that horrible falling-from-a-dream sensation in twelve different directions at once, but you don’t wake up gasping with wet cheeks and staring at the embers of your campfire in the maw of a dead fish like you normally would. Instead, you wake up gasping with wet cheeks and staring at that too-small white sphere that the sun has become.

You turn on the signalscope again. At this point, you’re grasping so desperately for some kind of familiarity that even your mind’s interpretation of Chert’s drumming would be a comfort.

Instead of drumming, though, you hear a flute.

You allow your hands to drive you toward it.

As you approach the village, your mind creates it in the image of a dead thing. It has never been so cold and lifeless before. No fires burn, no lights shine through the windows of the cabins. Not a single soul is here. You don’t try to land—the landing pad is debris strewn across the camp.

What’s this dream symbolism supposed to represent, then? That you can’t go home? That there’s no home left for you to return to? That even if you tried, you couldn’t and there would be nobody to welcome you?

It’s pissing you off, so you leave. The signalscope is coming from south of here, anyway.

The signal leads you to the planet’s south pole, in that creepy grove where nothing wants to stay where it should. You can’t make out much through the trees, but you can see a campfire burning below, so you fly the ship to the crater beside it. You land harder than you should given that two of the landing gear are out, and you have to crawl out of the ship thanks to the angle it leans at, but it doesn’t matter.

You hadn’t been here in a while even before you ended up in Dark Bramble. It was Gabbro’s favorite place, their safe space, one that only you, they, and Tektite knew about. Gabbro had shown it to you when they were in their early teens. You still remember their nervous, fluttering hands and the way they rambled and never quite answered your questions about why they were bringing you out here. You weren’t sure what showing you this grove meant to them, but it meant something important, so you refrained from teasing and listened quietly about how these trees could be anywhere until they were observed, and you wondered if Gabbro was like that, too.

From then on, whenever they were gone a little too long from the village, you headed south. It never took long for you to find them. You would camp with them and let them tell you fanciful stories about what Nomai parties looked like or about wave-particle duality. Or they would ask you to tell stories, but not the stories that the others in the village were interested in. They asked you what the sunrise looks like on a planet with little or no atmosphere and whether you thought Giant’s Deep’s trees would be happy growing on Timber Hearth or vice versa. You’d embellish, like you always do, but with more adjectives rather than more verbs. Sometimes, though, they’d ask you to sit in their hammock with them, and you’d lay side-by-side or head-to-foot and play music together until they were ready to go back to the village.

As you started traveling more, you started coming out here less. You felt bad about it, but there just wasn’t the time between testing Slate’s new ships with Gossan, getting Riebeck trained up, and searching around for artifacts to bring to Hornfels’ museum. You do remember the last time you were in this grove, now that you think of it. Gabbro had asked you to tell another story, but you had to answer to Hornfels, Riebeck, Spinel, and all the others who were eager for you to check out some of the structures you had seen during your flyby of Brittle Hollow. Gabbro tried again as you got up, this time asking what was the most exciting thing you had ever seen, which wasn’t their usual topic of choice, but you patted them on the head and said you really had to get going. They were quiet as you left, but just before you got in your ship, they called out to you. They said they wanted to join Outer Wilds Ventures, and they wanted you to train them. You accepted their offer wholeheartedly. You had never felt more proud. But you still left the grove.

As you walk the path into the grove, it’s even creepier than usual. Its high crater walls and southernmost position on the planet mean that the sun never reaches anything but the very tops of the trees. That typically makes it an admittedly nice place for stargazing, but your subconscious mind has decided you don’t deserve stars, apparently. The black sky overhead feels like a lid clamped tight over this very large cauldron of a crater you’re in.

There is light, though, coming from a small, smoldering fire. But the music of the flute isn’t coming from near it. Instead, it’s off by the far wall on your right.

It feels more like you're on Giant’s Deep than Timber Hearth with how slowly your body forces you to approach the hammock. In that hammock, Gabbro lies serenely, blowing practiced, even notes into their flute.

You get there eventually and stand over them, staring down at them and waiting for something to either happen or not happen. It takes them a while to notice you despite your proximity. When they do, they look up at your faceplate, their placid expression unchanging. They slowly lower their flute until it rests on their chest. It seems like they’re also waiting, although you’re not entirely convinced they can even see you. Their eyes are glazed and dull and stare like you’re a hundred meters away.

“Hey,” they eventually say, their voice hoarse and airy. Their face barely moves as they speak. “Nice weather we’re having, huh?”

You swallow painfully. Familiar, but fake, as all bad dreams should be, and it quenches what little hope had been hidden inside you. Good. The only hope you should have is that this will be over with soon and you can go back to staring at fog.

“What are you doing?” you ask as if it matters, even though it doesn’t.

“Writing poems,” they reply. They’re gazing emptily at your faceplate, and you find yourself kind of glad that they’re unable to make eye contact with you through it. “Not really, writing, though. Writing in my head.”

You nod as if it matters, even though it doesn’t, and you find yourself getting fed up at playing pretend. You huff, throw your arms out. “So what is this supposed to mean, then?”

Gabbro’s head turns slowly across the span of your arms like they’re looking for what the ‘this’ is. “What is what supposed to mean?”

“You. All of this.” You gesture even wider, but your arms are too short to encompass the ‘this.’ “What’s the point? Are you just here to make me feel guilty or something?” Like the heat that smoked you out of the only place left in the universe you belong? Like the dead village? Like Sed?

Gabbro looks away from you, down at the flute on their chest, and their voice becomes even quieter. “I hope not. I hope the point of me being here isn’t just to make you feel guilty. That would suck.”

“So what, then?” you say, louder in response to their quiet. “You must be here for a reason, right?

Their head tucks down into their shoulders. “I don’t know. Maybe. I keep thinking about it, but I can’t figure it out.”

You look at Gabbro again, really look this time. Despite being taller than you remember, they’re no bigger, stretched out without gaining any weight. It makes their clothes hang from them like you’ve dressed up a Nomai skeleton. Their lower eyes are heavy and lidded, almost closed, blinking sluggishly, while their upper eyes stare wide and glassy at you. They shrink down into their hammock like they’re willing it to wrap them up in a cocoon.

Again, the doubt that tastes like hope starts welling up in your throat. “Are you… real?” you caution.

Gabbro’s face crumples in on itself, and they tug their beanie down over their eyes. “Why do people keep asking me that?” they ask bitterly.

And you’re beginning to believe it. Something in you is saying this is Gabbro, this is real, that you should reach out to them. But when you blink, they’re gone.

Their absence leaves you feeling like when a piece of Brittle Hollow’s crust crumbled under your feet, and you could see the void of the black hole past your boots. You don’t know what you did to deserve to be tortured by this idiotic nonsense. You stare up again at the blank sky and strain your eyes to make just one star appear. Nothing. Maybe if you throw yourself into the geyser, it will wake you up.

You turn toward the pond to try just that, then shout and stumble back to the ground. What in the- Gabbro is right there, still in their hammock, still with their hat halfway covering their face.

“Are you here for a reason?” they ask as if it the natural continuation of the conversation.

You scramble to your feet, your left elbow throbbing from landing on it. “How am I supposed to know?!” you yell. “I don’t want to be here. I’m trying to get out.”

“I know,” Gabbro whispers, and they could be ten years old again for how little it sounds.

You sigh, and it’s shakier than you’d ever admit to, but it’s better than screaming. You run both hands over the top of your helmet and leave them there. You hope you forget all of this when you wake up.

Fine. If your subconscious wants you to play pretend with Dream Gabbro, what do you have to lose? You drop your arms and say, “Why don’t you tell me a story, Gabbro?”

“Okay,” they reply. They curl into a ball in their hammock. “Did you know, last time I saw you, I blinked with one set of eyes at a time? I felt like if I blinked all four at once, you would disappear.”

It wasn’t what you expected, and your answer is to, naturally, blink at them. Not at them, though, because they’re gone again when you open your eyes.

Their voice appears behind you, and you whirl around to face them. “I wanted to see you,” they say, trying to subdue the vulnerable quake in their voice but not quite managing it. “I wanted you to stay with me, but I know better than to ask for that. You wouldn’t be happy staying. I could have tried to find you, but I think I forgot how to move. I don’t know if I ever knew in the first place.”

You blink again, and Gabbro is halfway across the grove. You trudge through the pond to meet them. You feel like you’ll lose them if you don’t.

“And now you’re here,” they say as you approach. “And no matter how hard I close my eyes, you stay where you are, and I’m the one that moves away. Is that funny?” Not ‘isn’t that funny?’ They’re asking you, but you don’t know the answer. You open your mouth to lie, but you’ve blinked in the meantime and they’re gone. You turn around desperately, spinning in place. They’re to your left, nearly hidden behind that creepy rock. You run to them.

Gabbro shrugs their shoulders when you reach their side again, your breath coming faster than the running can excuse. “It’s not a very good story, I guess,” they say. “It doesn’t really have a beginning or an end, just a middle. I could give it an ending, but it probably wouldn’t be a happy one.”

“What do you want from me?” you ask. You know you’re missing the point, but you need to try something. “How do I fix this? Do you want me to stay? To leave?”

Gabbro considers the options much slower than you would like, and they seem unsure of their reply when it finally comes. “I think I don’t want to be observed,” they say slowly. “I want you to close your eyes so I can be everywhere at once without moving. Whenever you look at me, I’m stuck, and all I can think about is everything and everywhere I’m not.”

You’re ready to go. You’re ready to sprint out of this grove and fly away from this planet and keep going until you’ve left this awful facsimile of a solar system entirely. Then Gabbro says softly, “But no. I don’t want you to leave.”

“Then I’ll… I’ll stay here, if I have to!” you say, but there’s this weightless feeling, something pulling you away from them. You grab hold of the side of the hammock. “I’ll stay here and close my eyes with you, I don’t care, I’ll do it if it will make you happy.”

“No, you won’t,” Gabbro says, and there’s no uncertainty in this answer.

“I will!” you shout at them. “I’ll sit here and close my eyes and maybe that will finally wake me up from this light-forsaken nightmare!” But you don’t close your eyes. You watch them float in the air, slowly rising out of their hammock.

They start ascending into the sky, and the sky itself, the entirety of it visible from the mouth of this crater, is Giant’s Deep. Outer space is gone, the only thing above the trees and geyser spraying water far too high into the air is Giant’s Deep.

Gabbro, either unknowing or uncaring that Timber Hearth’s gravity is losing its grip on them, tilts their head at you curiously. They say, “This isn’t a dream.”

You’re floating now, too, and the lack of solid ground beneath your feet makes your survival instincts kick into gear full-force. You don’t care if this is a dream or not, you’re not going to die here. And real or not, you’re not going to watch Gabbro die here either.

You use the now-empty hammock as leverage to get your feet back on the ground. You crouch and spring up, launching yourself in the low gravity toward Gabbro. You slam into them, but before you can get your arms around them, they shove you away.

The two of you fly off in opposite directions, still ascending towards the massive ocean planet above you. “Gabbro, what-”

“You didn’t come back!” Gabbro screams at you, voice cracking. You’ve never heard them scream before, not like this, and you don’t know how your mind could create a sound you’ve never heard. “You left me alone! I would have come with you if you asked, but you didn’t! You just left!”

Is this hatchling trying to get themself killed? Then the thought comes to you, is this one of those nightmares where no matter what you do, you won’t be able to save them?

The idea horrifies you more than any stupid dream should be allowed to. No. You’re done with letting your subconscious toy with you. If you’re going to be stuck in a lucid dream, you’re going to lucidly wring this dream by the neck and take it down with you.

Growling, you flip mid-air, and as soon as you’re aimed toward them, you hit your jetpack. You catch them again and immediately wrap your arms around their chest but fail to pin their arms. They try to pry themself away, shouting, “Stop it!”

You struggle to keep hold of them and get to your jetpack controls at the same time. Gabbro pushes and kicks and writhes in your arms. The two of you are above the treetops now. “Cut it out!” you yell, snagging one of their arms and pinning it between you.

In the tussle, Gabbro manages to bash you under the jaw, knocking your helmet off completely. The moment they do, they still. All four of their limbs freeze, and all four of their eyes stare wide at you.

“Feldspar…” they whisper.

Whatever they are going to say next disappears as the rapidly thinning air steals their breath away. You feel it draining your lungs, too. You need to act fast.

Over their shoulder, you see Sed’s ship floating away from the planet at the same rate as you several dozen meters away. Gabbro isn’t trying to wiggle away from you, so you reel in your helmet by the intake tube, put it on, and shout, “Hold on, Gabbro!”

Then you take a deep breath, hold it, remove the helmet and slam it over Gabbro’s head. It’s not until you fire your jetpack at full-throttle toward the ship that you hear them gasp a sudden inhale.

You fly forward as fast as you can, and Gabbro clings to you nearly as hard as you do to them. You’re going to overshoot, but bless this neat little ship, the very last gravity ring catches you and stops your momentum entirely, dragging you inside.

Gabbro slips from your grasp and drops to the ship floor as soon as the gravity crystal takes effect. You dive for the ship controls, and Gabbro, still attached to you by your helmet’s tubing, is yanked along with you.

You push forward hard on the control stick, sending the ship along and toward Timber Hearth’s surface to break away from the gravity of Giant’s Deep, then pull back hard just before you can scrape the ground. You careen upward, and flinch at the deafening thump as you hit something mid-air and it goes up and over the ship, hitting again somewhere near the back.

You continue flying forward and up, only firing the retro rockets to slow your momentum when you are well out of the gravity well of both planets. You whip the ship around, but the planets don’t crash into each other. Timber Hearth passes Giant’s Deep, chasing after the Twins. The water planet threatens to steal the Attlerock, but even it stays with its home, following Timber Hearth at a somewhat greater than usual distance.

You watch the planets dance around each other out the viewport as you catch your breath. Then you shout wordlessly into the air, smacking yourself in the face hard enough to hurt. “WAKE UP!” you yell.

“You’re not asleep!” Gabbro says.

You stand out of the pilot’s chair and turn around. “What?” you say.

Gabbro has thrown off your helmet at some point and now sits curled-up on the floor in the corner of the starboard hull, their knees pulled up to their chest, their face buried in their arms. “You’re not asleep,” they say, voice muffled. “Everything is just like this now.”

You turn and look out the viewport again. The stars are still gone. Giant’s Deep and Timber Hearth are both fading into the dark as they move away from you. The only thing left clearly visible is that shocking white not-sun and the beams of light spilling from its poles.

You shuck off your jetpack and crouch in Gabbro’s bubble. They press themself further into the corner, and you grab the front of their shirt and tug them back towards you. “Gabbro,” you hiss, “what happened?”

They’re shaking like a leaf, and you’re too close for them to look away, so they shut their eyes tight to avoid your burning gaze. They whisper, “Nothing. Sun died. Then all the other stuff.”

Nothing. Sun died. All the other stuff. Nothing. Sun died. All the other stuff. Simple as that, right?

Before you get a chance to demand more information, multiple beeps and alerts from the console start vying for your attention. With a frustrated grunt, you release Gabbro and stand, and they turn to face the wall.

The first thing beeping at you is a radio connection request, which you ignore. The second thing is more urgent. The diagnostic system on this ship is more advanced than just “something is wrong, go fix it,” and it is letting you know that the fuel tank has a critical leak.

“Oh, perfect,” you say, laughing mirthlessly. “Now I have to try to find the Attlerock, repair, refuel-”

“Go to the village,” Gabbro says from their hidey hole under the shelves. “Everyone is on Timber Hearth except Chert.”

You turn again toward them. “But… nobody is there. I saw it, the-”

Gabbro curls up tighter. “They’re probably hiding from Giant’s Deep,” they say weakly. “Everyone’s there. Just… just go to the village.”

Everyone’s there. In the village. The village you haven’t been to in years.

You aren’t dreaming. Every bad thing you’ve seen since Sed found you has been real.

The radio beeps at you incessantly, ringing in your ears. You don’t answer it. It occurs to you that, if you had the choice, you would be looking for Dark Bramble right now. But the fuel leak and Gabbro being here has forced your hand.

The ship has rotated while drifting and is facing nothing but blackness now, and the glare on the window from the lights in the ship reflects your own reflection back at you. You probably haven’t seen your face in as long as you’ve seen the village. You look wrinkled, starved, weak, old, broken.

You try stretching your face with your signature crooked grin, the one you put on to stall for time to think of a way to make the climax of a story more climactic. It bares your teeth, or what’s left of them; malnutrition has caused your gums to give a few of them up. You drop the grin. You couldn’t get it to reach your eyes anyway. You’re out of practice.

You sit down in the pilot’s chair, turn the ship to where you last saw Timber Hearth. You drift forward, slipping into the dark.

Chapter Text

It starts with a whisper echoing down the mineshaft.

Something about this space warps sound in odd ways. You’re sitting near the far end of the tunnel, in between Spinel and Mica with Moraine across from you, closer to the mines than to the elevator. But you can somehow hear Hal three people down more clearly than you can Tephra next to Moraine, and Spinel is able to easily hold a conversation with Tektite all the way on the other side of the tunnel. Soft-spoken words brush through the space as easily as a breeze, but shouts are bounced against the walls into obscurity.

You feel the moment Timber Hearth passes through the event horizon of the black hole, and it’s horrifying for a split second but honestly not as bad as you thought it would be. Still, it leaves you with the same lightheaded dizziness you get when stepping out of an elevator, and you’re so shocked and relieved that you start laughing. When you realize that Spinel is trying to pull away from you because, at some point, you grabbed their wrist and are crushing it painfully tight, that makes you laugh even more. Everyone is making too much noise to actually hear anything, but you see Tephra crying so you pull them over Mica and into your lap. They probably don’t appreciate your attempts to calm them being constantly interrupted by your giggles, but you’re nearly hysterical at this point and you can’t really stop.

Gneiss says something to you, but you can’t hear them. “What?” you shout.

“Breathe, Porphy,” Gneiss shouts back, and they’re trying to hide their anxiety over the situation, but they’re trying to hide a small smile at your reaction too.

“Sor- ha ha ha! S-sorry.” You squeeze Tephra to your chest, nestling your cheek against the top of their head and trying to breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth. “Sorry, Tephra. We’re okay. Shh-sh-sh- heh heh. Ha ha! Hoo… You- you okay?”

“Nooo-o-o!” Tephra says in a stuttering wail. “I don’t like it!”

The tunnel is filled with so much noise of talking, shouting, laughing, and crying that it all blends together into something like the sound you hear when you stick your head in a geyser. But still, a single whispered word cuts through the sound.

“Feldspar.”

You lift your head and look around. You can’t tell whose voice it was or where it came from. Others are looking around the same way. You hear bits and pieces of mutterings through the babble. “Huh?” “What did they-?” “What is going-?”

There’s some kind of commotion at the elevator, some kind of energy that is starting to make its way from person to person down the tunnel. You hear more whispered rumors amongst the shouts.

“Feldspar?”

“Stay here, stay here, it's not safe yet!”

“Is it going to happen again?!”

“The SkyShutter saw something.”

“Esker, get the elevator!”

“Are we past it?”

“The SkyShutter saw Feldspar.”

“What is happening out there?”

“I don’t have eyes without Chert, I don’t know what’s going on!”

“The SkyShutter saw Feldspar alive.”

“I don’t like it! I don’t like it!”

You keep rocking Tephra while trying to get a sense of the words around you, but the hatchling is inconsolable. Galena, apparently fed up with your inability to soothe their sibling, pulls Tephra up from your lap and drags them further down the hall. You feel bad about not being able to comfort them, but your barely-controlled giggles probably didn’t help the situation.

You take the opportunity to crawl closer to the entrance, climbing over legs and accidentally kneeling on a couple toes before you reach Rutile.

You squeeze in next to the mayor, but they don’t notice you. They’re leaned far out of the tunnel, trying to keep track of what is going on by the elevator while simultaneously trying to block people from rushing out. You whisper, “What’s going on?”

They startle and glare over their shoulder at you. “You should have stayed put, I don’t want everyone getting up and moving around yet.”

“Everybody is trying to figure out what’s happening, Rutile, we’re getting antsy over here,” you say.

Rutile keeps their voice low. “Hornfels lost communications with Chert, so Gossan and Slate went up with a walkie-talkie to see if the danger has passed.”

You roll your eyes. “You know that’s not what I’m talking about.”

They glance back at you again, but this time it is more furtive and wary than irritated. They lower their voice even further. “Esker thinks they saw Feldspar on the SkyShutter.”

Even though you’ve been hearing this rumor trickled down to you in bits and pieces for the past several minutes, hearing it in a full sentence like this still catches your breath in your throat. Apparently Rutile’s whisper wasn’t quiet enough, because you hear a few shouts of “What?!” and “Really?” and “Feldspar’s back?” behind you.

“Esker-” Your voice breaks, and you have to clear your throat and try again. “Did Esker actually see them? Or do they think they saw them?”

Rutile ignores you and stands, raising their voice to address the growing cacophony in the tunnel. “Listen, as soon as we get some information, we’ll share it. And as soon as we get confirmation that it is safe to leave, we will do so in an orderly fashion. Until then, everybody sit down.”

You are tempted by the opportunity to dash under Rutile’s arm while they’re standing and see for yourself what all the fuss around the elevator is about, but you resist. The responsible and composed adults in the tunnel are at this point outnumbered by the remaining combination of hatchlings and emotionally-compromised adults (All the OWV are gone by now, Tuff is in near hysterics, and Spinel is getting pissed off and overwhelmed by the noise), so you stay put to reluctantly set an example.

Thankfully, you don’t have to wait long. Esker holding their ear to the radio near Hornfels. They look up and give a silent nod to Rutile. Rutile, in turn, whispers to Tektite, this time covering their mouth with their hands to keep the whisper from echoing out. Tektite replies quietly, “Riebeck, probably. Who else?”

It’s clear to you that they are trying to discreetly move people out to prevent a rush for the elevator, so you lean into the conversation. “Tuff and Spinel need out ASAP. Tephra too, and Galena should probably stay with them. Mica is stressed, but they’ll be okay for a few more minutes.”

Rutile nods, looking down the tunnel and counting silently. Then they look back to you. “Are you good to go with the first group and keep the peace? I don’t want the elevator just filled with folks who are ready to panic, they’ll set each other off before they reach the surface.”

You are extremely good to go, but you try to stay professional and respond with a sharp nod.

Rutile can see through your guise, but they don’t mention it beyond a tiny smile. “Go collect everyone, quietly. Tektite, go get everyone else to settle.”

The two of you take your tasks and step carefully over the people still seated against the walls. You head toward the back where most of the people you need to fetch have ended up, but Tephra sits down right in the middle of everybody, pulling in Mica and Arkose and whispering excitedly. Everyone around them leans in to hear whatever they are saying, and even you feel tempted to stick around and listen. Tektite’s ability to draw in a group and get them to listen with rapt attention is surpassed only by Feldspar’s own storytelling skills.

Feldspar. Stars above, Feldspar.

Feldspar has been gone for… wow. Years, at this point. Long enough that all official attempts to find them had long been cancelled. Though, not long enough for the scars caused by their absence to have faded. Not long enough for some (Slate) to stop desperately craning their neck to listen each time a ship made an unscheduled landing, only to tense and snarl at the ground when the engines don’t rattle in the familiar way they are listening for. Not long enough for some (Esker) to stop listening to nothing on their signalscope. Not long enough for some (Hornfels) to stop radioing in to Chert or Riebeck or Gabbro with vague questions of, “Have you found anything, well… of note, recently?”

Not long enough for some to stop laying on their back in the grass for hours and hours and hours sometimes, staring into the outer space at the emptiness between the stars, only to come back to the village quietly with dried tear tracks on their face. (Gossan. Oh, Gossan.)

You approach Tuff, who is sitting on the ground with a heavy blanket wrapped around them, head in hands and breathing in a measured pattern. You pull them to their feet and keep an arm draped over their shoulders. “Come on, pal, we’re going outside.” They nod without looking up at you.

Tephra and Galena are outside the far end of the tunnel, sitting on the ground by the jetpack. Tephra’s tears are mostly dried, they and their sibling both distracted by watching Spinel pace back and forth in the small space. You reach out to Spinel, and as soon as you touch their arm, they slap your hand away. “Get off me, you-!”

You hurriedly shush them. “We’re leaving. You too, hatchlings, let’s go.”

As you lead everyone through and over the crowd around Tektite, again you catch whispers crisscrossing the tunnel. They saw Feldspar. Someone saw Feldspar.

Pretty much everyone has their own opinion about what happened to Feldspar, but they all fall into two camps; people who believed Feldspar was dead, and people who believed Feldspar was somehow alive.

You believed that they were dead. You made yourself believe that. When their status officially changed from “around here somewhere” and “they’ll show themself eventually" to “missing,” you started having trouble sleeping. You laid awake in your bed, imagining them lost and alone, drifting in space without jet fuel, sucked into some horrid alternate dimension after falling into a black hole, trapped or suffocating or starving.

No, the alternative was better. They had died. You did what you always do when your overactive imagination gets the better of you and keeps you awake - you pull out the little journal you keep amongst your stuff and start writing. You wrote made-up stories of Feldspar going out in a blaze of glory that suited them. They and their ship exploding into microscopic particles after being the first to ever break light speed. Or Feldspar dying peacefully knowing they had saved the solar system from a terrifying space monster. Or Feldspar simply reaching the stars and becoming one of them themself.

You shake your head hard and force yourself to focus on gathering up those you were asked to. Soon enough, you are piled into a horrendously slow-moving elevator together. You ask Riebeck to hold Tephra to give them both something to focus on other than their own anxiety, and you lean against Tuff, patting them on the back but really just trying to give Spinel as much space as possible.

You’ve had this weird “hobby” of writing for a couple years. Everyone in the village knows how to write, but the skill isn’t used very often, and it is typically reserved for documentation or recording important information. Storytelling is for telling, not for writing. You know Gabbro writes poetry, but you think it’s more for the sake of manifesting some physical art piece more so than for the art of writing itself. As far as you know, nobody really writes made-up stories like you do. It’s embarrassing, the idea that you’re writing things that never really happened, fake conversations between people in your village, or even sometimes between people that don’t actually exist. You keep this little journal hidden deep in your apron pockets, letting nobody’s eyes grace it but your own.

And this? Recording heartbreaking lies on paper as a coping mechanism, writing false narratives about Feldspar dying in spectacular ways in order to calm your wayward imagination and chase away your nightmares? It works, sure. But it’s not just embarrassing; it’s downright shameful. You definitely don’t share these tales with anyone.

The elevator finally reaches the landing at the top, and as soon as its doors open, everyone pours out. Spinel immediately stomps out of the cave, only to shout at the hatchlings that rush past their legs and nearly trip them. “Stay up here, don’t go down into the village yet!” you call after them. You have no idea what state the village might be in after passing by Giant’s Deep.

You turn back, and Riebeck is helping Tuff sit on the floor of the cave. “Y’all okay?” you ask.

Tuff splays out on the ground, throwing their blanket off themself. “Just…” they say, pausing to take another carefully measured breath. “Just give me a few more minutes.”

“I-I’m okay, I think,” Riebeck says, still shaking a bit but visibly calmer than before. “I can stay h-here to, uh, receive the next group when they c-come up. You should… you should see what’s going on.”

Given that you can hear one of the hatchlings yelling outside the cave, you agree, spinning on your heel to march outside.

You can’t see any obvious signs of damage, but that’s mostly because you can’t see much of anything; you forgot to grab a flashlight. You can see the hatchlings over by the bridge near Chert’s cabin, given that Galena has a flashlight, so you jog over.

“GROSS MUDDY CARPET!” Tephra screams into the air as you get near. “FISH GUTS! LOOSE TOOTH! CHIRPBUG SOUP!”

Galena, who is leaning against the side of Chert’s cabin, knocks against the wood to get your attention. Tephra had to get their louds out so they have room to get their stressed out back into their stressed in, they sign, nodding sagely.

You have no idea what that means, but you nod along with them. “Do you need any-?”

Galena cuts you off with a wave. I’ve got this handled.

“BROKEN BANJOOOOOO!” Tephra screams until their lungs run out of air.

Alright, well, who are you to judge a coping mechanism? Still, you ought to teach that hatchling some real swears one of these days.

You’re not going to take Galena’s flashlight from them, but you can make out the glow of the gravity crystal on the cliff wall nearby, so you carefully walk over and toe up to the edge of the cliff. From there you look around and listen closely, trying to get an idea of where Gossan and Slate may have run off to.

You can see a lantern being carried between the buildings, but you can’t see who’s carrying it. You hear the wash of the waterwheel as it starts to spin, hear Gossan call out and someone reply, maybe Sed? Guess they came up too. You hear the hum of electricity, then a clunk, clunk, clunk. Several at a time, for the first time in weeks, the electric path lights across the village turn on. Compared to the dim you’ve grown used to, the village dazzles. You have to squint to even see it.

You race down into the village. Sed is at the waterwheel, reaching up and pulling it down, push-starting it to try to get it to keep the momentum. You cringe. It is almost certainly too early for them to risk straining their injured ribs and back like that. “Where is-” you call, turning around and getting interrupted as Gossan exits the wheelhouse at the same time and you crash into each other.

You nearly topple over, but Gossan grabs you around the waist and spins you around, making you laugh with surprise and sudden dizziness. As they steady you, you say, “Gossan! What are you doing?”

They look up at you, and their face is bright and fierce, but there is some trepidation in their eyes as well. “We’re giving them light,” they say. “If they’re- if this is real, they… they won’t have the stars to navigate by. We’re trying to show them how to get home. We’re trying to give them light.”

Before they can finish speaking, a fiery roar fills the air behind you. You turn around in time to see a massive fireball rising into the sky, up on the ridge where some of that jet fuel-soaked wood from the launchpad elevator had been stored. You can just make out Slate’s laughter on the wind.

You remember that day a couple weeks ago when you looked up after that wave of horrible, burning pain to see an empty sky, and your first thought was, nonsensically, “Well, there goes the rest of them.” For a brief moment, the stars disappearing seemed unsurprising to you. The brightest star in your village had disappeared long ago. It was no shock that the others eventually followed.

It was an embarrassing, tragic, and irrelevant thought that you immediately discarded. Still, there were a couple times where as you were drifting to sleep, the nonsense returned, and you would think, “I hope the stars and Feldspar are alright, wherever they are.” Your imagination had decided that of course the stars had followed after Feldspar. Of course they would seek out one of their own and all disappear to the same corner of space together.

Like with your stories, you didn’t share this with anyone either. Your imagination can be incredibly sentimental sometimes.

Still, when you look out and see Sed’s ship appear over the horizon and out of the gloom, some part of you is puzzled not to see a trail of stars following behind it.

You and Gossan stare as the ship comes to a rocky, crooked landing between the waterfall by the cave and Solanum’s ship. Gossan keeps staring, even as you hear Sed behind you ride the log lift up to the higher level and then take off running. You look down at Gossan. Their three eyes are blown wide in the dark, and their trembling is noticeable in the tip of their one remaining ear and in the fingertips that press against your shirt and indent your skin where they still hold you.

“Go,” you remind them, your voice not surpassing a whisper.

They look you in the eyes. They’re afraid. You see it plainly. This isn’t the first time Feldspar has felt so close only for it to be a false alarm. This isn’t the first time Gossan has experienced this moment only to wake up and realize they were dreaming. You know. They’ve told you. You’ve held them through the aftermath.

But something tells you this time is different. So you grin and pry their hands from your waist and press your forehead into theirs hard and fast enough to knock your skulls together audibly. “Go!” you say again, louder, and again, “Go, Gossan!”

Gossan blinks and gasps as if waking up. They take one heavy step away from you, and you let your hands fall away from theirs and point at Sed’s ship and laugh and shout, “Go!”

Gossan turns, stumbles, and takes off toward the gravity crystal in a dead sprint. You snatch up the electric lantern they had left abandoned on the ground and chase after them, barely keeping up despite your far longer legs, still laughing as you run.

You run past the hatchlings and nearly back to the cave entrance before Gossan slides to a stop, almost causing you to crash into them again. Sed’s ship is sitting near the cliff edge. Between the waterfall and the cave, two figures are climbing down. It is too dark to make them out clearly, but one is tall, and one is short.

Gossan moves forward again, slowly this time. You move forward as well, but not all the way; you stop by the cave to observe. To commit whatever is about to happen to memory.

Alongside your hobby/vice of inventing and writing stories, you also have made a habit of observation. You’re not entirely sure which influenced the other more; you’ve always been imaginative since you were a hatchling, and you’ve always liked people-watching, but once you started writing you also started paying more attention to the smaller details of life. The way people move, their facial expressions, the fluctuations in their tone of voice - the more you observe, the more you feel like you understand the people around you.

One mode of communication you’ve especially been fascinated by observing is that of touch. Which, sure, maybe it’s weird that you would spend any amount of time thinking about how the people around you touch each other, but you tell yourself that what they don’t know won’t hurt them.

Gossan moves people with touch. Literally, that is. They touch with their whole body weight behind it. They lean into and lift and press and pull along, leading anyone around as if in a dance. If a small enough hatchling is underfoot, they’ll sweep them off their feet and fling them around giggling before setting them down somewhere safer or more convenient. If someone is slow to stand, Gossan will be there to pull them to their feet. A pat on the shoulder will come with a friendly jostle, and they hug like they’re twice as big as they are.

The shorter figure climbing down the cliffside lets go a bit too early, nearly falling onto their backside before catching themself on unsteady feet, still facing the rock wall and using it for support. They are wearing a flight suit, but no helmet.

Gossan takes another step toward them, bent forward and leaned to the side, trying to get a better look but hesitant to approach further. “Feldspar?” they whisper.

The figure whips around, eyes wide, mouth agape. Their arms slowly drop to their sides as they stare, and you can’t say for sure from here, but they appear to stop breathing.

Gossan takes one step closer. Harsh but muted light crosses their face as the white hole breaches the horizon. Somehow, the figure’s eyes widen further, and their lips twitch upward slightly. They also take a step forward. “Gossan?”

Gossan stops an arm’s length away from the figure, their hands held close to their chest. “Feldspar?”

“Did you- did you conk yourself in the head on your way up here?” they ask. They tilt their head to the side, a lopsided, gap-toothed smile slowly growing, though the bafflement doesn’t quite leave their eyes. “You’re repeating yourself.”

That’s Feldspar. That’s Feldspar.

Gossan reaches out and puts a hand on either of Feldspar’s arms, searching their face. “Where have you been?” they ask, voice still almost inaudible. Then they shake Feldspar hard, making the pilot’s head bobble. “Where have you been?”

Feldspar’s grin falters for only a second before they raise a brow and ask, “Missed me?”

Gossan throws themself forward, stepping into Feldspar’s space, forcing them to take two steps back as Gossan wraps them into a crushing hug. “Where have you been?!” they shout, voice cracking. “Where have you been?!”

Again, Feldspar’s grin doesn’t fall, but you see it crack, see the hitch in their breath and the unfocused darting of their eyes. They don’t hug back, exactly, but they ball up their fists clinging to the fabric on Gossan’s sides.

You notice movement above the two of them and instinctively look up. It’s Slate, crouching on the edge of the cliff with both hands on top of their head.

Slate is uniquely opposed to most forms of physical contact. They will rarely willingly touch with more than a fistbump, and few (Esker, Gossan) can touch them without causing obvious discomfort. They’ve been like that since they were a tadpole, from what you’ve heard; getting them dressed and washed when they were little was a fight every time.

That’s not to say Slate’s not affectionate. You can remember quite a few times they’ve wandered in while you were working in the kitchen cabin and simply asked if you needed anything done. You’d grin and think of something for them to do, such as stripping and reseasoning some old pans or fixing a crooked cabinet door. They’d swear at you the whole time for letting things go unmaintained, but you’d also both laugh and joke and enjoy each other’s company while working on your respective tasks. They show affection, just in odd ways sometimes.

All that’s to say, you’re not entirely surprised that Slate keeps their distance, watching Gossan and Feldspar from up above. Instead of coming down, they drop to sit on the cliffside. Then they pick up a small rock and throw it, hitting Feldspar square in the back.

Feldspar flinches and turns, half pulling away from Gossan’s tight grip and seeming to breathe for the first time since Gossan grabbed onto them. They squint up at the silhouette on the cliffside. Whatever they try to say comes out as a strange croak, but they clear their throat and try again. “That… that you, Slate?”

“Feldspar, you- you stupid–!” Slate says, unable to catch their breath to get a full sentence out.

Feldspar, unoffended, points up at Sed’s ship behind the engineer. “Slate,” they say, “now that is a ship.”

Slate falls back to lie on the ground. You can hear them laughing. The sound of it is cut off, however, by the sound of the ship’s engines firing.

You watch as the ship takes off and track it as it flies overhead. But the flames in the rockets’ nozzles gutter and choke, and it barely clears the observatory’s roof before coming to a rough, belly-scraping landing on the ridge on the far side.

A moment later, despite the distance and even over the sound of the waterfall, you hear Sed scream, “FELDSPAR! Where is my FUEL!”

“Oh. There you are,” Feldspar says, apparently to themself. Then they call out, “In the stratosphere, mainly! You’ve got a leak!”

If you weren’t so far away from them, you’re sure your ears would be ringing with how loud Sed screeches.

“You hit the SkyShutter, right?” Gossan asks breathlessly. “We saw you. We saw the picture.”

When it comes to communicating with touch, Feldspar can be surprisingly delicate. Where Gossan bodies and envelopes and pulls along, Feldspar brushes lightly and taps and caresses. Feldspar is less likely to pick up an underfoot hatchling than they are to turn them around with fingertips on shoulders and send them off with a nudge. They’ll teasingly flick someone’s ear to get their attention and graze their hand over someone’s back or arm as they pass by.

You see that now as they look down again at Gossan and notice, seemingly for the first time, their missing eye. They bring a hand up to Gossan’s face, cupping their cheek and running the pad of their thumb over the edge of the scar tissue. Feldspar looks almost delirious with confusion. “Goss, what…?”

Gossan looks back at Feldspar and-

Oh.

You’ve lost them.

You swear your heart stops beating, that you go deaf in that moment and lose the ability to speak. Your vision tunnels in, and all you can see is Gossan putting their own hand over Feldspar’s, staring wide into Feldspar’s eyes with tears running down their cheeks. Gossan says something. Feldspar replies with a frown. You can’t make any of it out.

If Feldspar comes home, you step back. That was the plan. You made that promise to yourself after that first time Gossan’s hand lingered on yours a little bit longer than usual. That was always the plan, even if Gossan didn’t know about it.

That was years ago. You had stopped believing that Feldspar could come home.

Someone bumps into you from behind, and it knocks the breath back into you. “Oh, sorry!” Moraine says as they rush past you.

The elevator must have come up again, as just about everyone who was still in the mines is pouring out of the cave now, and it’s chaos. Loud shouts of “Feldspar!” and “You’re alive!” Some laughing, lots of crying. More hustle and bustle and movement than you can track.

Feldspar screams, “What is THAT?”

Solanum has ended up near the front of the crowd. She stares down at Feldspar with a puzzled expression. “Who are you? There is no one…” Then, with a gasp of realization: “You are Chert! Greetings! I am-”

A round of raucous laughter. “No, Solanum! Come here, that’s… no,” Riebeck says as Solanum retreats to their side.

Gneiss is weeping near the edge of the crowd. Marl whooping and hollering into the air, going from spinning Hal in a circle to throwing their arms around Esker and lifting them into the air. Arkose is throwing handfuls of rocks at the ghost matter pit and yelling “Fireworks!” with each burst of green flame. Spinel is yelling at them to knock it off. Moraine is saying into a walkie talkie, “I can still hear drums on my signalscope!” Rutile is yelling at Slate about the black smoke that is rising behind what used to be the launch pad. Slate is still lying on the ground, laughing.

But you only have eyes for Gossan right now, and they only have eyes for Feldspar. You want to call out to them, to wave and get in their line of sight, to get them to-

No. This was always the plan, and more importantly, you are not about to make this about you. That is the last thing that’s going to happen here.

Rutile turns around and nearly makes eye contact with you, and you know that if they do they’ll know something’s up. You turn away quickly. You need to find something to do, some way to make yourself useful.

You see the taller figure that had been climbing down the cliff, Gabbro. They’re struggling to circumnavigate the group that is orbiting Feldspar. Gabbro seems to be struggling to walk at all, wobbling on their feet as if drunk.

You hone in on them immediately. This is something you can do, some way to make yourself useful. Something that will keep your mind off of, of…

You rush to catch up with Gabbro. They’re clearly trying to avoid the crowd, which is unsurprising - they can’t always tolerate large gatherings - but everyone is starting to head toward town, and Gabbro is going to get overtaken at this rate. You throw an arm around them to support and hurry them along a bit, saying, “Hey, are you-?”

They flinch hard. You quickly pull your arm away, putting a step of distance between the two of you with your hands up. They stop moving, then turn to you with an unnatural slowness. They grin, and it’s eerily similar to Feldspar’s - crooked and empty. “Oh. Hey. Hi.”

You tilt your head at them, frowning. That’s… strange.

If touch can be called a love-language, normally you’d say Gabbro speaks it more fluently and readily than they speak Hearthian. You’ve never seen them shy away from touch before, no matter how overstimulated they may be. Even when they have exhausted their social battery past the point of speech at a gathering or celebration, they don’t typically deal with it by leaving like anyone else would. Instead, they’ll find some poor sap who’s sitting around the campfire - Riebeck or Spinel or Esker or just about anyone else - drop their head in that person’s lap, and promptly fall asleep, effectively pinning that person to the spot for the rest of the party. You’ve never seen them flinch like that.

Plus, Gabbro has always been your little buddy. Sure, they’re touchy and affectionate with everyone, and Gabbro has kept you as fairweather friends and won’t seek you out if they’re having a bad day, but they’re still your little buddy. Despite them being nearly the same height as you (no, they’re not taller, you refuse to accept such slander), they’ll still climb into your lap without a word as if they were no bigger than a tadpole. They’ll sing with you and cling to your waist while you’re cooking and sneak in plants that they’ve dug up from other planets, roots still coated with dirt, until Tektite or Spinel or Rutile tells them off for risking introducing foreign flora to the ecosystem. You’d make sure the entire plant was destroyed before it could cause any problems, but Rutile doesn’t need to know you did that by having Gabbro help you cook and eat it to see if it will make you two puke or see different colors. (You properly disposed of any seeds or reproductive parts of the plant, of course; you’re not dumb enough to propagate an invasive species in the outhouse.)

You haven’t seen much of Gabbro since the sun went out, but that’s not unusual - they tend to come and go from the village as they please, especially since they got that ship of theirs. You’d heard they went out into the fields, and you figured they were headed in Tektite’s direction, so you packed Marl with extra food for Gabbro when they came to the village for supplies.

But now Gabbro has brought home Feldspar, and somehow in Sed’s ship. They weren’t with Tektite. What happened? Where have they been? And most urgently, are they flinching and wobbling and out of it because they got injured?

Gabbro is still just staring through you, so you step between them and the gravity crystal and try to urge them along without touching. “Let’s go to the log lift before we get swarmed!” you say, trying to keep your voice casual.

They don’t really react, but you usher them forward, and they eventually start moving again. You guide them down the path under the observatory, careful to keep them on the inside away from the edge. It’s slow going, and they’re shaky and unsteady enough that you’re worried you’ll have to catch them at any moment.

Once you’re both far enough away from the crowd that you can hear yourself think again, you say, “What’s going on? Are you hurt?”

You’re nearly to the log lift before they answer. “Nah. I’m good.” Their voice is hoarse.

You scoff. “You don’t look good, bud. Come on, what’s the matter?”

You guide them onto the log lift, and they sit down on it, making a face like they’re trying to solve a complex math problem.

They mumble a response, but you can't hear it over the lift’s motor. Once it stops, you tell them, “Say it again?”

“Just… have a stomach ache. I think.”

Okay. That’s not what you were expecting. You step off the lift. “Did you eat something bad?”

Gabbro doesn’t follow you, continuing to sit as still as a statue besides the trembling. “...No?”

You stand over them, hands on your hips. “You sure? What did you eat last?”

“The… the…” they say, drawing out the word with a smile that is somehow both lazy and strained. They turn their head as if looking around, but their eyes are completely unfocused. Then they blink with realization. “No. The soup with everyone. You made it, with the beans. It wasn’t bad.”

The soup? It takes you a minute to put the words in the right order. When you do, your eyes widen. “The three bean soup that everyone had?”

“Okay.”

“Gabbro,” you say, “that was a week ago! What have you eaten since then?”

They smile blankly at you, which gives you all the answer you need. You feel like you’re going to pass out.

“How are you even able to walk around right now? A week, Gabbro?” You go to help them up, ready to carry them to the kitchen cabin if you need to. They draw away from you, shrinking in on themself. From this angle, they look tiny and helpless, and now that you know to look for it you can see the weight they’ve lost. They’re still grinning at you, but they look like they left their mind on a different planet, their eyes empty and afraid.

You step back, covering your face with your hands and groaning in frustration. “Okay. Okay. You need… I’ll make you some broth. Clear liquids. Calories, protein. Stars, Gabbro. Just- just stay here, alright? I’ll be right back.”

You sprint toward the kitchen cabin. It only takes a few minutes to reconnect the stove’s gas supply and heat up some bone broth, adding in every powdered supplement you can think of before pouring it in a canteen and heading back outside.

Still, you weren’t quick enough. You see Gabbro riding the log lift back up to the upper path and wandering toward the observatory. Sed, having come back down from their ship, shoves something gray and glowing purple in their pocket and approaches Gabbro saying something. Gabbro holds up their hands, stopping Sed in their tracks, and takes a wide sidestep around them. Gabbro gets tangled up in their own feet, and you gasp as they nearly fall off the ridge. But they catch themself on one of the observatory’s supports and push off of it, continuing down the path with their arms wrapped around themself, shoulders hunched to their ears. Sed stares at them as they walk away.

You swear under your breath several times, looking around as you try to decide what to do. Just about everyone is in the village proper now, and Rutile is passing out the oil lanterns that had been stored away.

Arkose runs past you, and you grab them by the back of the shirt. “Hey!” they complain.

You kneel down, putting on a serious face. “Arkose, I have an important quest for you.”

Arkose squints at you, interested but skeptical. You’ve read them a few select, altered stories from your journal a few times when they were sick and unable to sleep. The ones that involved “quests” and other adventures were their favorites. “A real one?” they ask.

“Yes,” you say, nodding. You push the canteen of broth into their chest with both hands, lowering your voice. “Gabbro is trying to sneak around and hide from everyone, but I think they’re going to the museum. I need you to find them and get them to drink this. It’s a… a potion. They need it to get stronger so they can… do… a different quest. Do you think you can handle this, young hero?”

Arkose looks at you under their bucket hat with sparkling eyes. “Yes. I will be the… the Concoction Carrier! The Bearer of Brews! The Flask F- um…”

“Flinger?” you suggest.

“The Flask Flier,” Arkose states.

You nod. “Go on, Fantastic Flask Flier!”

Arkose bows deeply to you, the canteen sloshing. Then they turn and sprint toward the gravity crystal with their arms out to the sides, jumping into every puddle around the geysers on the way there.

You stand up again. The majority of the people in the village are still moving as a unit like a school of minnows with Feldspar presumably hidden somewhere at its center. As you watch, Feldspar appears, backpedaling out of the crowd only to be overtaken again. You watch this happen multiple times, Feldspar bobbing out of the group of villagers as if breaching the surface of a lake before being dragged under once more.

Then, without warning, you’re hit by it again. That same twisting inversion of existence that happened in the mines.

The reaction of yelps and shouts is similar to last time, if not louder, since it caught everyone unaware. “Is that going to keep happening?!” Mica yells, speaking your own thoughts.

“Afraid so,” Gossan replies. “Timber Hearth is going to have the same… not ‘orbit,’ but path through space as the Hourglass Twins: falling into the black hole, being expelled from the white hole, and falling into the black hole again.”

Riebeck speaks up. “So Solanum says: ‘I believe it should be possible for each of you to become acclimated in time, as I am. I was frequently exposed to warp transportation during my Quantum Trials training, and now the effects of it are barely noticeable!’

As this is going on, Feldspar has managed to escape the group again. To your surprise, they jog up to you. “Heeeeeey, Porphy! Long time no see!” they say, panting as if they’ve run a kilometer. “You still making that sap wine?”

“Oh, uh, yeah. Hi, Feldspar. Yeah, I do. That’s… that’s what I’m good at, right?” You chuckle awkwardly. You don't know why you feel nervous all of a sudden.

“Spectacular!” Feldspar says, clapping their hands. “How’s about we crack open a few barrels, huh? Get this party started?”

You glance up at Rutile. They chuckle. “Gossan, you can handle this one,” they say, drawing Gossan’s attention. “You know how the food and wood stores are looking. I’d say that we’re due to have something worth celebrating, and this is as good a reason as any.”

Gossan instantly goes into planning mode, rubbing their palms together and looking around as they think. “Spinel, you said the crawdad traps were ready to be pulled up, right? We’ll do a boil. It’ll be quick, and if we add in some of last year’s tubers from cold storage, that should be enough for everyone. Plus, it’ll give us room to dry and store the mellowweed sprouts that Tektite wants to dig up next week. Rutile, if you could get a broth going and keep some aside for Solanum. Marl, Hal, and Sed, go up and get some wood sorted and split for a bonfire.”

Feldspar watches as Gossan delegates the preparations and sends people off. “Since when does Goss call the shots?” they ask quietly.

“Rutile’s been getting them ready to be the next mayor,” you say.

“Huh.” They continue to watch for a while, then they turn to you. “The food’s all well and good, but this is gonna be one dull celebration unless we get that good stuff flowing, right? Ha ha!” They take hold of your wrist, shaking it. “What do ya say?”

You hesitate. They are gripping your wrist almost painfully tight, and there’s some kind of desperation behind their eyes.

“Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

An hour and a half later, the campfire has just started to broach “bonfire” size and the air is thick with smoke (including the lingering distant smell of burning jet fuel) and steam from the cauldron of crawdad boil getting scooped from. Solanum was right, thankfully - Timber Hearth has fallen through the black hole several times by now, and the experience has already shifted from “horrifying” to “annoying.”

You mostly stayed out of the kitchen cabin this time, instead lofting small casks of alcohol from the wine cellar. Gossan keeps appearing and disappearing between the fire and the kitchen cabin as they give direction. You come up the stairs once to them crouched by one of the casks you retrieved, looking at the label. It was an old batch from back when you were first learning how to make sap wine, old enough that you can only hope that it’s good.

“‘Feldspar’s First Launch’?” Gossan reads. “You still have this?”

“Sure, well, never really had reason to open it,” you say, hefting the next cask onto the table that has been dragged outside. “Figured… figured this is the right time, isn’t it?”

Gossan looks up at you, and they have tears in their eyes. They chuckle, wiping their face on their sleeve. “You’re right,” they say. “Thank you, Porphy.”

You open your mouth to say something, but nothing comes out. They disappear back into the kitchen cabin before you can make a sound. You don’t know what you wanted to say anyway.

You should probably start thinking about making a batch of wine to celebrate Feldspar’s return. Besides the base of sap of course, maybe you could add some of Feldspar’s favorite ingredients, or maybe add the favorite ingredients of the people who are closest to Feldspar.

Slate usually wants the sweetest wine possible, until they’re drunk and don’t care. You’ve caught them adding sugar to their cup a couple times. Gossan likes flavors that are so complex and layered that you would consider them muddled. They’ll make a game out of guessing the ratios of your newest batch.

Feldspar… you are actually not sure what their favorite type of sap wine is. They were simple, easy to please, always grateful and happy for any wine they were handed.

Coming up with a suitable “Feldspar Comes Home” wine may be more of a challenge than you anticipated. You have been struggling enough to think of appropriate “Black Hole Merger” and “Universe Dies” flavor profiles.

You pick up on the fact that Feldspar started drinking even before the food was served. They sit with their cup by the fire, staring at the flames with a blank expression, finally having a moment to themself since everyone is busy running around. It doesn’t last long, though. All four of the hatchlings come running up to them.

Arkose and Tephra leap to the front while Galena and Mica hang back. “Feldspar! Do you remember us?” Tephra shouts directly in Feldspar’s ear.

“Whoa, how did your face get all messed up?” Arkose asks. “Did you have to fight an alien?!”

Feldspar draws back, not that they can go anywhere since they’re sitting leaned against a log that was rolled over to the fire. Their mouth opens and closes like a fish, and they swallow hard.

“Wait, do you remember us?” Mica says, tilting their head. Although Galena’s already a little taller than Mica, they are hiding shyly behind the young teenager.

Feldspar’s eyes dart between each of the hatchlings. “You… you all are so… you were so-”

You whistle, and all five of them look your way. “Y’all get over here and get your bowls before all the hot poppers get taken!”

They all dash over to where you have taken up the task of passing out dishes. Feldspar watches them go, then stares down at their drink with their brows furrowed before draining the cup.

Arkose takes the bowl you hand them and snatches a second from the table. “I must continue my quest of preparing Gabbro for their quest!” they declare.

You nod. Thank goodness Arkose was able to catch up to them. You’ll have to go looking for Gabbro yourself eventually, but with how skittish they were earlier, you figure that aid via hatchling mediation is the best you’re going to get for now. “Carry on valiantly, young… Sustenance… Supplier.”

“Seeing Feldspar again is weird,” Mica says to you as they wait their turn in line in front of the cauldron. “They don’t really look or sound or act like I remember. They look… like, not great.”

You roll your eyes at the bluntness, but you can’t disagree. “Get the other hatchlings to leave them alone, if you can.”

“Whatever,” Mica replies, moving further up the line.

You keep observing the goings on as you help hand out food and drinks. Gneiss brings Feldspar a bowl of food, and Feldspar takes it without meeting their eyes. Gneiss reaches out and puts a hand on Feldspar’s cheek, and Feldspar’s eyes fall closed.

You are distracted from this scene as you sit down with your own bowl and cup by the sound of loud coughing behind you. You turn around and see Solanum spitting and sputtering as Riebeck hastily takes a cup of wine from her. Marl and Moraine are both bent over in their seats laughing. You consider going over there to make sure she’s not being ganged up on, but then she headbutts Marl in the chest and knocks them to the ground. She’s laughing too and looks like she’s having fun, so you just catch the comparatively frantic and concerned Riebeck’s eye and call to them, “Be careful.”

You turn back to the fire. It’s only been a couple weeks since the sun and stars went out and all existence started feeling like a dire experiment in survival, but it’s been so hard on everyone that it feels like years since the atmosphere in the village has been this jovial.

Gneiss seems to have decided to leave Feldspar alone for now, and it takes you a moment to find them. Then you spot them coming out of their workshop with a new musical instrument you haven’t seen before - something small with a set of keys and a long tube coming out of one end. They put the tube in their mouth and blow as they press the keys, and a fun, silly sound comes out. They start playing a jaunty tune, and before long, Rutile has brought out their double bass and Tuff their lyre harp to join in. The crawdad boil is hot and delicious and filling in a way that seems like a luxury when contrasted with the fears of a possible future famine that have restricted your appetite. The warmth of the fire drives out the oppressive cold, and its brightness is enough to make you forget about the lack of sun and stars for a while. The little hatchlings are weaving between people enjoying their meals as they chase each other around, you’re pretty sure Solanum and Marl have ended up in a wrestling match at this point, and Hal is already breaking open tins of marshmallows.

Feldspar, for their part, seems restless. They keep getting up to get things, moving around the fire and changing seats any time anyone starts to strike up a conversation. They’re trying to be discreet about it, laughing and quipping at whatever they’re told before deciding to jump to their feet to refill their cup or grab a stick to poke at the fire. It’s not all that different from earlier when they first got to the village - whenever someone starts to close in on them, even if that means just trying to get their attention or asking if they want a marshmallow, they grin and make a joke and go to the opposite side of the fire.

They are also drinking a lot. And from what you can tell, they’ve sipped at the broth in their bowl, but haven’t eaten much of anything substantial.

Slate initially sat down beside Feldspar, but seemed to catch the hint and didn’t follow them when they moved. Gossan hasn’t been quite so observant. Wherever Feldspar goes, Gossan is at their side, hanging off them and doting on them, throwing an arm around their shoulders as they laugh at something, showing them things, staring at them when they smile. Every time Gossan talks to them, Feldspar’s grin gets bigger and tighter. Each time Gossan touches them, Feldspar looks ready to jump out of their skin.

You don’t know how Gossan is managing to look so much at Feldspar without seeming to actually see them.

When it has gotten to the point where Feldspar is choosing to go to where the smoke is blowing because that’s where fewer people are sitting, their antsiness has become so obvious that even Spinel calls it out. “Let them alone, Gossan,” they say. “Give your pilot some breathing room, you’re suffocating them worse than the smoke.”

Loud laughter rises into the air from the crowd to mingle with the smoke. Gossan, looking embarrassed, finally sits down. Feldspar deflects by making some joke about standing in the smoke so nobody has to smell how funky their flight suit has gotten. All you can hear ringing in your ears is your pilot, your pilot, your pilot.

You are happy that Feldspar is back. Feldspar is your friend. You missed them. You are happy that Feldspar is back.

Once everyone has been fed and the energy around the fire has shifted into something relaxed and comfortable and the hatchlings have been chased off to bed, Tektite claps their hands on their knees. “Alright, pilot,” they say, “I think you owe us a story.”

Feldspar, who is crouched probably a little too close to the flame, looks up sharply at Tektite and stares for a long second. Then they throw their head back and laugh, standing up and nearly stumbling over their own feet as they do so.

“We looked… we looked everywhere for you. For months,” Gossan says, their own words slurring a bit. “There’s nothing. No debris, or… nothing. Where have you been?” There’s a crack in the voice, a hint of desperation right at the end.

Feldspar makes their way over to the wine cask, listing to the side as they refill their cup. Then they drain the cup in one go.

“Where else,” they eventually speak into the darkness of the village, not turning around to face the fire or the group, “but in the guts of the meanest planet we’ve got?”

Dread fills your stomach and diffuses through the crowd, although the air remains silent save for the crackling of the fire.

“Dark Bramble?” Marl says finally.

“No, knucklehead, the Attlerock,” Feldspar replies, filling their cup once more and dropping down heavily to sit in the dirt beside the fire.

“The one place…” Gossan says, exhaling a shaky breath and closing their eyes. “The one place we couldn’t search.”

“The one place we didn’t search,” Slate corrects bitterly.

Gossan whips their head toward the engineer, face immediately turning purple with anger and perhaps some shame. “We couldn’t,” they snarl. “You know that. You agreed. We couldn’t risk it. If you wanted to check there so bad, you could have gone yourself. I would have gone myself if we had anything, any reason to believe-”

“Gossan,” Rutile warns, and it works just as well to quiet them down now as it did when y’all were hatchlings.

“They would have, you know,” Gneiss says in their soft-spoken voice, speaking directly to Feldspar. “Gossan, all the hatchling astronauts, even Slate was ready to take off in a moment's notice if we heard anything. Gabbro graduated early to help. And we kept listening but…” Their voice peters out, and Tektite reaches a hand out to them, but they steel themself with a deep breath. “What happened, Feldspar? Why couldn’t we hear your harmonica?”

Feldspar, who was halfway through their drink, chokes on it and starts coughing violently, sloshing the rest of the wine out of their cup.

“The signalscopes can’t penetrate Dark Bramble.”

Everyone turns to look at Sed, who is picking through the wood laid out for the fire and chopping down large pieces with a hand axe. They pick up a plank, sniff it, make a face, and continue gathering up pieces in their arms as they speak. “Music, radio signal, nothing can go in or out. Something to do with the fog.”

Several people start speaking at once.

“That’s awful! So no matter how much you played, we couldn’t hear it,” says Riebeck.

“Oh, Feldspar…” says Gneiss.

“I thought I had heard something, down on Timber Hearth,” Esker admits. “I thought my ears were going. Maybe that seed-”

“The seed!” Spinel says. “Did something change when it hit the planet?”

“Nice, adding that to my ‘Sed’s Awesome Secrets That They Refuse to Elaborate On’ list. Great. Love it,” Hal grumbles.

Gossan looks at Sed quietly, an unreadable expression on their face. Sed doesn’t look at anybody, tossing their bundle of wood on the fire.

Immediately, thick black smoke starts wafting up from the bonfire, sending everyone darting away with coughing fits. You jump up as well, stepping back until you end up close to where Feldspar has retreated.

Sed is comparatively unaffected. They scoop up a tin of marshmallows from the ground and walk up to Feldspar. They press it into Feldspar’s hands, who takes it with a somewhat dazed expression. Sed leans down close to them, and you can just make out a whisper. “Leave me out of your stories.”
You watch as the two stare each other down. Feldspar reaches up and takes hold of Sed’s jaw. Sed, surprisingly, lets them. Feldspar turns Sed’s head gently, lifts it, touches the mottled burn scars with the same baffled awe and barely-hidden melancholy with which they touched around Gossan’s missing eye. Sed doesn’t break their gaze from Feldspar as this happens.

Then, just as quickly as it erupted, the smoke dissipates with a cacophony of coughing and laughter and expressions of annoyance and anger. When you look back, Sed has slipped away into the dark, and Feldspar is still standing with a marshmallow tin clutched to their chest and a hand partly raised.

“But how’d you end up with Sed’s ship?” Slate asks as everyone settles back down in their places.

Feldspar blinks and, after a delay, turns to Slate. “What?”

“Your ears bad?” Slate replies in a tone that probably sounds more genuine than they intended.

“Brain, more like,” Feldspar says, and it’s similarly low and tinged with an amount of honesty that unsettles you.

Slate looks at their friend, then clears their throat and points a finger and raises their voice with enough put-on irritation to cover over the sincerity. “How’d you show up here having beat the tar out of my brand new ship?”

Feldspar looks to the sky, and you follow their gaze. Black, empty save for that bright white stripe that hurts to look at. You look at Gossan. They sit leaned forward, knee bouncing anxiously. Silent, waiting. Leaned toward Feldspar.

One side of Feldspar’s mouth cracks into a grin. “Oh, now that’s a story.” And immediately, like nothing has ever changed, you’re enthralled. You all are.

Feldspar starts pacing around the fire, still carrying their marshmallow tin in one hand. Though they’re working hard to keep their voice steady, it still slurs around the edges, and they pause every few steps to discreetly catch their balance. “So I‘m minding my own business,” they begin, “stranded as I have been since my entire ship’s hull became an unapproachable live-wire after a daring chase with a school of hungry anglerfish. But that’s not the story you’re looking for, is it?” They shoot a wink at you of all people, and you smile despite yourself.

“I make a home in the hollow of a dried up anglerfish skeleton, big as that tree stump there-” They point up at the great tree that once held up the launch pad, “-with teeth as tall as six Slates stacked on top of each other. I scrape by, scavenge for food and water where I can, fend off the other anglerfish who would like to get a taste of ol’ Feldspar, play… play my harmonica. Each day goes by like this, same as always, day in and day out. Day in, day out. Day in, day out. Until one day, without warning, something changes.”

Feldspar weaves in between people as they slowly circle the fire, occasionally putting a hand on someone’s shoulder as they pass by to steady themself, their hands coming to rest behind their back after each deliberate, almost calculated gesture. “The uninterrupted expanse of gray, dimly lit, lukecool fog my house hangs in gets… interrupted. Tendrils of some kind of superheated material the science nerds here will probably have a field day with starts creeping in. When those tendrils start flowing into rivers wide enough that the tops of my emergency trees are getting charred, I find that I’ve got to make a decision, and quick. Get crisped darker than one of Gabbro’s marshmallows, or slip into the cold emptiness of space with nothing but my single oxygen tank and a half-empty jetpack.”

They crouch by the fire now as if speaking to the flames one-on-one. Their voice is low and somber. “Figured if it was my time to go anyway, I’d go by my own accord. See the stars one last time on the way out.”

Feldspar goes quiet for a moment. Then they shake their head and chuckle. “But I pull myself out of Dark Bramble’s fog, and guess what I see?”

They stand again, turning around and meeting each person’s eyes one at a time before they whisper, “Nothing.”

They throw their arms out to the sides. “Nothing!” they shout. “Not a single light-forsaken star! Not even our sun, just whatever that monstrosity of a light source is!” They point at the white hole and its beams, which are just about to set past the horizon.

“So I think, well, the universe has it out for me, huh?” They laugh, and it’s a little too loud, and you realize their energy is changing to something more frantic. “But immediately, of course, the universe proves me wrong. Because what do I see next if not a spaceship, so new the wood glue hasn’t even set? But no astronaut, though. No astronaut, and I can’t see ten meters in front of me because the sun is wrong, or gone, or something. But I’m looking. Nothing. The sun is wrong, the planets are wrong, in bad places and moving the wrong ways. The stars…”

Feldspar stops. They seem to have run out of breath. They are panting, their head lowered and their hands clasped behind their head. Gossan is standing in front of Feldspar now, reaching out and putting their hands on Feldspar’s elbows. Feldspar’s arms drop and they grip Gossan’s shoulders with clenched, quaking fingers.

Feldspar’s back is to you, so you can no longer make out their expression. You can see Gossan’s face, though. Tears run down their cheeks. They look as they did when they brought Sed on a stretcher down to you just minutes after the supernova: scared and aggrieved and clinging to their last scrap of hope with an iron will.

“You’re safe now, yeah?” Gossan whispers, voice wobbling. “You’re home.”

There is silence for a moment. Then Feldspar throws their head back with a laugh that’s loud enough to make you flinch. They throw an arm around Gossan’s neck and drag them down into a noogie. “Ah, Gossan, you… you big sap. Worrier, always worried about nothing. Got you good, huh? Ha ha!”

They spin Gossan around and release them, and Gossan has to throw their arms out to catch their balance. “I don’t need this!” Feldspar says. “I need more of that!” They point at the wine keg, stumbling over to it. They try to pour wine into the still-sealed marshmallow can in their hand, causing it to pour over the top and onto their hand and the dirt below. They frown at it, but it takes several seconds for them to drop the can and get a cup instead.

Rutile tuts at them disapprovingly. Esker laughs, “Last drink for you I think!”

“Aw, come on, you old moon rock,” Feldspar says. They throw back their wine, half of it spilling onto their shirt, then say, “Let me liiiiiive! I haven’t had the good stuff in ages!”

Then they come over to you for some reason, throwing their arm over your shoulder this time. You lean away as much as you can. They weren’t kidding before, they reek.

“Now this,” they say, poking you in the chest with their cup, causing what little is left in it to splash on your apron, “this is a Hearthian right here! Pinnacle of our species! Who needs Gossan, who needs Slate. Porphy, you stay right here on Timber Hearth and keep making this wine, and we’ll never have a single worry again!”

Several people laugh at the theatrics. You laugh as well, but it’s forced. Really, you find yourself becoming angry. Gossan’s smiling, but it’s strained. They’re hurting, and Feldspar is the reason for it.

At the same time, though, Gossan is still looking at Feldspar like they hung the stars in the sky. Maybe they might as well have. But Gossan has so much weight on their shoulders right now, and you are starting to get the feeling that they hope that Feldspar’s return is a portent of good things to come, that their being here will fix something, or even everything, and Gossan wouldn’t have to keep trying to save a dying solar system anymore.

Feldspar is just one person. They can’t hang the stars back in their places. If they keep acting like they are now, they aren’t going to lift one ounce of pressure from Gossan.

And this time, when Feldspar breaks Gossan’s heart again, you don’t know if you’ll be strong enough to put them back together. You doubt they’ll even seek you out to try.

You’re angry. You don’t really know if you have any right to be. None of this has anything to do with you.

So you pull Feldspar’s arm off of you and send them in Slate’s direction with a shove you hope comes across as playful and lighthearted. Slate catches the pilot by the back of their harness and drops them to the ground and props their boots up on Feldspar’s back, who squawks with offense.

And while everyone is laughing or telling Slate to let Feldspar up, you remove yourself from the equation. You’re not needed here. You gather up an armful of dirty dishes to be washed and skip away into the dark of the kitchen cabin.

Chapter Text

My name is Phosphate and I have shiny light blue skin that is so light blue it is almost like a cloud but blue. I have so many spots and freckles except the spots are shaped like stars and they are a beautiful constellation and all my eyes are different colors and they change depending on my mood.

I am the one who is the best at making all of the medicine and I can also make the most delicious food and sap wine anyone has ever had. The medicine can heal anything even a broken leg and since I am a good cook too the medicine even tastes delicious. 

Goslar is an astronaut who discovered all the planets and they help everyone so everyone likes them and thinks they are the best. And also they are a major hottie and have a cool scar from a space adventure. But I think they are just okay.

Goslar comes up to me and says, “Phosphate I have an important space adventure to go on and you need to come with me. I need you in case you need to make medicine or food or sap wine in space. Please go with me PLEASE.”

“OK” I say.

I make a new space suit that is jet black as dark as the blackest night, and it has triangle cut outs in the chest and sides that show off my star spots that are beautiful but I think they are ugly even though they are more beautiful than anything. I also put on a cerulean aquamarine capelet that has gold tassels and two gold stars sewn on with gold thread that shimmers in the sunlight. 

And I put on tall brown boots that have matching gold tassels and are super hot to show off my LONG legs. And I put on a flight harness since I am going to space. Finally I put on my classic white bandanna to protect from the sun and matching white bracelets and cool fingerless gloves. It looks like this:

When we are in space Goslar keeps looking at me and looking away and blushing.

“What” I say.

“Nothing!” Goslar screams.

In space it starts to get very cold and Goslar says. “There is only one heater we will have to share.”

So me and Goslar have to cuddle together next to the heater so we don’t freeze to death. I am blushing so Goslar holds me close and whispers “you don’t have to be embarrassed… you are more perfect than anything” so I blush more.

My eyes all turn different colors of pink. “Phosphate your eyes are pink, what does that mean?” Goslar asks. It means I love them but I don’t say that and blush instead.

Goslar says “Phosphate I have something I need to tell you.”

I turn and look deep into Goslar’s triplicate amber eyes and say “OK”

Goslar blushes and says “I love y—”

“ALERT: REACTOR IS GOING TO EXPLODE IN TEN SECONDS!!” the alert screams (AN: why is the reactor going to explode? WHO KNOWS XXD)

Goslar says, “Since the ship is going to be destroyed you have to take my helmet!” and they give me their helmet since it is the only one.

“OK” I say and put on the helmet. Then I cry and kiss them to give them one last breath in their lungs so they can breathe in space. Their lips taste like (something figure it out later) and they are not crying because they are so brave they are crying because they love me and don’t want me to die.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!! The ship explodes and we are both floating in space and I am fine because I have the space helmet from Goslar but Goslar is going to run out of MY last breath. 

But then…

Then…………….

Ferrous appears in their spaceship! They pick up Goslar and save their life. “You saved my life,” Goslar says. “Yes.” Ferrous says. And then they start to make out

You scratch out the last line you have written in your journal with more vigor than is probably necessary. Then you sigh and flop down on your bed. 

Why are you upset? You’re the one writing this story; if you don’t like it, you can change it however you want to. But you don’t want Goslar to just die in space, and you can’t think of a single useful thing Phosphate could do to help in this situation. No matter how cool you made them look, Phosphate’s a pretty useless character all things considered. So unless you want to scrap this story and start it over from the beginning, it looks like Feldspar will have to save the day once again.

Ferrous. Ferrous will have to save the day.

You press your face into the mattress and let out a muffled groan.

You hear a knock at your door and startle so badly you nearly fall out of the bed. “Gossan?” you say, hurriedly tucking your journal out of sight.

“Moraine,” replies the voice behind the door. “Are you up?”

“Oh,” you say, trying to hide the disappointment in your voice. “Yeah, what—”

“Gneiss needs your help,” Moraine says quickly.

Your mood flips from dour to concerned instantly. “Why, what’s going on?” as you get up and start changing back into your day clothes.

“I don’t know, they just told me to get you quickly and to be discreet about it. They’re in the waterfall cabin.”

Well, that’s no good. “Alright, on my way,” you say, hurrying to finish dressing.

You tie on your apron and bandana as you half walk, half jog to the waterfall cabin. The bonfire is smoldering now, and you can see lights in between the cracks in the boarded-up windows where people are either going back to bed or back to work after evacuation to the caves and the following welcome home party.

You open the cabin door cautiously to a room filled with steam but empty of Gneiss. A large pot of water on the woodstove is threatening to boil dry, so you grab a couple rags to protect your hands and move the pot to a trivet on the table. Then you notice the sound of retching in the next room.

“Gneiss?” you call. As you are about to walk into the room, a harried-looking Gneiss meets you in the doorway and ushers you out. You ask, “Who is—”

“Feldspar drank themself sick,” Gneiss says, shaking their head. “Could you— oh, you got the pot, thank you.”

Gneiss could typically handle a single hangover on their own, so you figure there’s more to it than that. “How can I help?” you ask, rolling up your sleeves. “And why did you tell Moraine to be discreet?”

Gneiss pushes past you and starts digging around in the linen cabinet for towels. “I’ve already had to chase Gossan and Slate out of here, since Feldspar wasn’t settling with them around, and I don’t need the whole village trying to put in a helping hand. Feldspar is on-edge enough as it is.

I’ve got my hands full, could you get some snowlichen tea started and bring in more water to warm up?”

“I can, yeah,” you say, trying to remember where in the kitchen cabin you last saw the dried snowlichen. “I think this should be enough water for tea, though.”

“I need water for a bath, too. I couldn’t get Feldspar to sit still enough for a physical exam, but I did manage to get them to agree to a bath, so I thought maybe I could catch two fish on one hook and give them a look-over while cleaning them up.”

You frown. “Why do they need a physical? Do you think something’s wrong?”

“They’ve been stuck in the core of an isolated planet for years, Porphy, I can only assume—” Gneiss cuts themself off with a huff, their ears pulled back. “I apologize, I shouldn’t—”

You laugh and pat them gently on the back. “No, I get it, you’re right and you’re stressed. You can snap at me all you want.” 

Gneiss purses their lips but doesn’t say anything, and you chuckle again quietly. Even when they’re at their wits end, Gneiss is always concerned about not hurting others’ feelings.

You head toward the door. “Anything else we need from the kitchen cabin besides tea?”

“Some epsom salt and yellow curlyfrond powder for the bath, if you don’t mind,” they say with a sigh.

“On it!” you say, but they don’t seem to hear you as Feldspar starts coughing again and Gneiss rushes into the next room.

You gather up in a basket what you need from the kitchen cabin and bring it over, starting the tea to steep before rushing out to the well. Marl sees what you’re doing and starts helping fill buckets as you bring them inside, graciously not saying a word as they do so. Most of the time, people will wash up with a single bucket of water and a sponge or will hike up to the hot springs if they want a warm bath. Only two of the cabins have a tub, and they’re usually only used for bathing when someone is sick, so you can assume Marl has put two-and-two together and chosen not to comment on it.

You put water in the pot stove to warm as you bring it in, and Gneiss exits the bathroom occasionally to take the pot and empty it into the tub.

“Thank you for your help,” Gneiss tells you as they return the pot. “I’m sorry, I probably woke you up for all this, didn’t I?”

You resist the urge to shake your head with affectionate exasperation and hand them a mug of tea. “I was already up, Gneiss, and even if I wasn’t, you should get me up anyway. That’s what I’m for.”

Gneiss gives you a small, almost half-hearted smile and squeezes your shoulder as they take the mug from you.

You work on chopping and grating the herbs to add to the bath water. You hear Feldspar arguing with Gneiss, but a couple stern words seems to shut them up. Over the next hour or two, Gneiss requests you to fetch and prepare a series of increasingly worrying items. A wound treatment kit. A saline IV drip, followed by a rather heavy-duty antibiotic IV drip. Medication used to treat parasitic infections.

At some point during the process, Feldspar starts wailing.

It startles you so much that the mortar you were using gets knocked to the ground, chipping the stone. Heaving, violent, screaming sobs come from the other room. You would think Gneiss was doing surgery with them without anesthesia, but the cries don’t sound like pain, at least not solely. They sound more like grief, like terror, like brutal exhaustion. 

It’s chilling, and you crouch on the ground with the broken mortar in your lap and you can’t bring yourself to stand back up. You lean against the cabinet and press your forehead to the smooth wood with your ears pinned back. You keep your distance, as you have been, and try to breathe as you listen to a long-lost friend lose themself completely.

The sobs continue for a long time, but eventually they change into hiccuping cries, to keening whimpers, then to silence. You do not hear Gneiss at all throughout it.

You stand and tiptoe toward the doorway, peeking through it. Gneiss is sitting on the ground beside the wooden tub with their back to you. Their head is propped on their crooked elbow as they lean against the tub. Their other hand holds Feldspar’s tilted face, cradling it and cushioning it from the hard tub edge and holding it out of the water. Feldspar is fast asleep in the warm water, their breaths coming in small wheezes from their partly open mouth, their arm dangling out of the water with two IV tubes running from it and up to the bottles high above them.

You creep into the room. You try not to stare, but Feldspar looks worse than you expected. Their skin is dull and pale and littered with scars and pockmarks. Gauze bandages have been placed over what you assume are lesions, given that there are more of them on their lower body under the surface of the water that Gneiss hasn't gotten to yet. The room carries a cloying aroma of medicinal herbs and infection. What's worse, though, is their size. You don't know how they stayed upright all that time at the bonfire. You could count their ribs if you wanted to, and their collarbones protrude sharply, and their biceps look nearly thin enough to wrap your hand around.

You sit down close behind Gneiss, putting a hand on their back. They sigh, not looking back at you but keeping their eyes on Feldspar. Since Feldspar was very little, they were to Gneiss as Gabbro is to you, but closer—without the emotional walls you haven't overcome with Gabbro, without the fun-times-only atmosphere. When Feldspar disappeared, a sadness washed over Gneiss that they could never fully hide no matter how hard they tried and that never really went away.

"They just..." Gneiss says, their voice weak and tired. "Everything just caught up to them all at once."

Gneiss takes a shuddering breath. You lean forward and hug them from behind, wrapping your arms around their middle and resting your head against their shoulder.

"They're back, but everything has changed," Gneiss whispers. "The village has changed. The villagers have changed. The solar system, the universe is unrecognizable. They've changed. They're weak and sick and confused and scared. I tried to explain, to— to comfort them, reassure them, but..."

You feel Gneiss' chest shake, and they wipe their eyes on their sleeve. You squeeze them tighter, saying, "I know, I know."

"There isn't much of anything reassuring to say, right?" Gneiss says, high pitched and with a painful chuckle. "What can we do? There isn't much that can be fixed or made better anymore."

Gneiss swipes their thumb across Feldspar's sharp cheekbone, and you can smell the tooth decay and sickness on their breath. The kind of malnutrition they are displaying will take months at least to overcome. What will the world look like months from now?

"They're alive," you say quietly. "They're alive, despite everything. They don’t got much, but they do got that. And they're home. If anyone can get through this, Feldspar can."

"They're alive," Gneiss repeats softly. They sniffle and let out a slow breath. "You're right. This is more than I ever could have hoped for."

Gneiss squeezes then pats your hand at their waist. You let them go and they stand, careful not to jostle Feldspar, who hasn't budged from where they lay in Gneiss's hand.

"Thank you, Porphy," Gneiss says. "Would you mind helping me get them to bed?"

You help lift Feldspar out of the tub. It's disconcertingly easy. You're not the strongest person around, but they don't feel all that much heavier than Arkose. The two of you pat them dry, finish treating their lesions, and cover them with blankets, setting ceramic heat lamps on them that don't produce light that could disturb their sleep.

Gneiss pulls up a rocking chair to their bedside, leaves for a moment, and returns with a guitar. "Gneiss, you look like you need some sleep," you say.

"I'll be alright," they say. They sit down heavily in the chair, pulling the guitar into their lap. "I'd like to stay with them for a while."

You sigh and rub your face. "I'm coming back in a couple hours and taking your place, okay? You need sleep."

You leave the bedroom and pick up what you can of the mess of medical supplies in the bathroom and the main room of the cabin. You run out of steam once you are faced with draining the tub of the murky and pink-tinged bathwater and decide to leave it for future you to handle. You grab a lantern and leave the cabin, and the sound of gentle guitar strumming is silenced as you close the door behind you.

You brace yourself against the cold and realize you don't know what you want to do with yourself. You're not going back to bed, that's for sure. You wander over to the kitchen cabin, which still has a lingering warmth from the cooking that was done earlier. It's thankfully clean, most likely with a Rutile and Tektite taking care of the dishes given that the cups in the drying rack are incorrectly placed right-side up. You roll your eyes and grab a dish towel to dry the insides of the cups as you put them away.

The kitchen cabin is, unsurprisingly, empty. After a big group meal like a crawdad boil, it's unlikely that anyone will come looking for food for the next several hours. Although, as you put a handful of clean spoons in their proper drawer, you don't remember seeing Hornfels at the bonfire. Esker and Moraine had been late themselves, saying they had been helping move the radio setup from the mines back to the observatory.

Hmm, that's no good. Hornfels tends to get into states in which they have to be practically pinned down away from whatever is distracting them and forced to eat. Your sibling has been that way since you two were hatchlings—they told you more than once that eating was a waste of time as they ran around trying to keep up with the burgeoning Outer Wilds Ventures. When Feldspar disappeared, they were even worse than Gossan about skipping meals. You once had Gneiss disconnect the power to the observatory and discreetly told Esker to pretend to take a couple hours "fixing" the issue so you could drag Hornfels away from the communications systems for some desperately needed food and sleep.

Given that you haven't heard any ships take off, but also nobody has made Hornfels come down from the observatory, you figure that the situation with Chert's lost radio signal hasn't changed. So you take some pine-nut spread and roll it in dried berries until you’ve formed several small balls. When Hornfels gets like this, sometimes all you can tempt them to eat is sweets, and this has enough protein to tide them over for a while.

You make some hot tea and pour it into a thermos before packing everything away in a basket. Then you make your way up to the observatory, hurrying to get out of the cold. Not that the observatory is much warmer with its fabric roof, but you can steal Hornfels' heater while they eat if you need to.

You walk into the empty museum, past the giant Nomai bust that Gabbro brought in a few weeks ago. It's funny, you could have assumed that Solanum was the model for the statue when you first met her, but now that you’ve spent more time with her, it's abundantly obvious that this statue isn't her—the eyes are smaller, the cheeks more hollow, the fur is shorter and the antlers curl up more in the back.

You make your way up the stairs. Inside the observatory, Hornfels is predictably in their little plywood computer shelter, hunched over the radio apparatus with their face in their hands. Esker is also here, sitting on a stool with the removed eyepiece of the telescope in their lap, absently polishing it despite the fact that it is useless given that the replacement mirror for the telescope is not yet finished.

"Oh, hey, is this the Sad Loser Nobodies Club?" you say, putting the basket of food on the as-of-recently nonfunctioning orrery. "Can I join?"

Esker huffs an amused breath, but doesn't look up from their work. Hornfels buries their face further in their hands. "I've got pine nut and berry balls," you say at Hornfels in a singsong voice. "Your favorite!"

"I'm not hungry, Porphy," Hornfels says.

"Oh, I didn't ask," you reply. You grab the legs of their stool and drag it backward, and it screeches along the floor as Hornfels is dragged along with it before they jump up to avoid falling. 

"Porphy!" they shout.

"Five bites. Five bites, then I'll leave you alone to mope in peace."

Hornfels sighs, but when you push down on their shoulders, you consider it a win when they sit on the ground and let you open up the basket in front of them. "We're the same age," they say, "I don't know why you insist on treating me like a hatchling."

"I'm not, I'm just looking out for you," you say gently. "You can't help Chert if you starve." Then, doing away with the sincerity, you pat them on the head and say, "If you hadn't ditched the welcome home party to be a sad loser I wouldn't be up here bugging you."

"I 'ditched' the party to try to reconnect with Chert!" Hornfels says, voice pitched high with annoyance.

"Yeah, I know. But Moraine said they're still playing their drums, so they can manage long enough on their own to get some food in you." You sit down in front of Hornfels and pull out the package of food and the thermos. "Sorry, Esker, I didn't know you were up here too or I would have brought you something. You can have some tea, though."

"I'm alright, Porphy, but thank you," Esker says. They give a small smile that only lasts a second before it falls back into something neutral, again not looking up from the eyepiece they are cleaning.

You take a moment to consider Esker, watching their face. It didn't even occur to you to wonder how they were feeling about the whole "Feldspar coming home" situation. They tend not to draw attention to themself when emotions get high. They'll sit peacefully right in the middle of group conversation or gathering or argument and let it happen all around them without saying much, without budging, like a rock unmoved by a river. It's not until afterward when they start asking around to get more details that anyone realizes just how much they were paying attention and absorbing what was going on.

That's what happened when Feldspar disappeared. Esker kept to themself at their moon post, calling in whenever Hornfels or Gossan wanted to hear if they had seen anything. They came home eventually when Gossan told all the astronauts to return to Timber Hearth.

There had been a group meal that day too, but one that was much more quiet and morose than today's. It wasn't a funeral. Gossan said that explicitly. Just a day to rest and regroup before continuing the search. Esker ate with everyone else, but when the meal was over and you were taking care of the last of the cleaning up, they came up to you. They wanted to make fried wheelfish with white sauce, but they're not much of a cook and asked for your help.

It was an odd request, but you didn't comment on it. You got to preparing the food, but Esker didn't let you take care of it alone—they helped as much as they could, coating the fish in the batter you made and stirring the sauce.

When it was done, Esker started up the fire again and sat by it with the plate of food in their lap, and you sat next to them. They didn't touch the meal, just sat with it as it slowly went cold. After a while, they stood up and scraped the plate into the fire.

By that point, you understood. Fried wheelfish with white sauce was Feldspar's favorite meal.

There wasn't going to be a funeral any time soon, so those of you who needed to mourn did so the best you could.

You pour tea into one of the thermos' two cups, stand up, and bring it over to Esker. You put an arm around their shoulders as you push the cup into their hand. "So what's got you feeling sad, then?"

Esker huffs through their nose, but takes a sip of the tea. "Not much to be sad about today," they say. "Just a bit worried, I suppose."

"Yeah?" you prompt, going back to sit in front of Hornfels, who is glaring at the paper-wrapped spheres. You start unwrapping them.

"Slate's asked me to go back to the Attlerock," Esker continues. "With the launchpad down, we don't have a way to refuel the ships except there. I don't mind it, of course, but... I'm just worried about leaving Sed, is all.”

You hum in response. After a moment, you ask quietly, "You know more than us about what's been going on with Sed, don't you? They've told you something?"

Esker eyes go briefly wide before they hunch further over the tools in their lap, their face scrunched with renewed concentration on their task. It's as good an answer as any.

You lean toward them with interest. "Wait, how much do you know? More than Gossan?"

"So you've also decided to start keeping secrets?" Hornfels adds, throwing out their hands and then leaning heavily back against the orrery. "As if there weren't enough of them to go around!"

Esker blushes, but eventually puts down their tools with a sigh. "Listen. We're working on them, me and Tektite. Gossan knows what they need to know, so mind your own business and don't go blabbing about what you think I may or may not have. It's a balancing act with that hatchling."

You huff and shake your head. Of course Esker manages to dig up info on even the most reticent of you. "I'm not blabbing to anybody," you say. "Gossan's too busy with Feldspar to hear what I've got to say, anyway."

That came out far more sour than you intended. You snap your mouth shut, but the fish is already out of the net.

Esker gives you a pitying smile. "Nah, don't say that," they tell you gently. "I've seen the way they look at you, how you two are together. Y'all are head over heels for each other. Don't be too quick to give up something good."

Hornfels sits up straight, their mouth dropping open. "You're dating Gossan?!" they exclaim. "How long has that—?"

You launch yourself forward to put a hand over Hornfels mouth. "Shh shh, shut up," you hiss, even though there's nobody around to hear you. "I don't— a year? I don't know. We're not really—"

Hornfels pries your hand away, holding your wrist above their head and not letting you pull away. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Ow!" you whine, although they're not really hurting you. "We're just... we were just trying things, alright? It wasn't official or anything. We were trying to figure out if it made sense. It's not like it matters anymore, anyway."

"Maybe if you pulled your eyes away from this telescope every once in a while, Hornfels, you'd see what's right in front of you," Esker laughs.

Then you realize something, and you frown and point an accusatory finger at Esker with the hand that Hornfels isn't holding in the air. "Hey, how do you know anything?" you say. "And what do you mean you saw us? You've barely left the moon!"

Again, Esker is quick to avoid eye contact. "An old astronaut has their ways," they say cryptically, clearing their throat.

Hornfels lowers your hand finally, though they don't let go of your wrist. "Why do you say it doesn't matter anymore?" they ask quietly.

You pull away from them, sitting back on the floor. "Because it doesn't," you mumble, hugging your knees and laying your head in your arms. "Feldspar's back."

"And?" Hornfels says. "Gossan and Feldspar weren't dating before Feldspar disappeared."

You glare at your sibling without lifting your head. "Come on, Hornfels, you're not that oblivious."

Hornfels frowns, but doesn't add anything else. Esker says, "You're not giving yourself enough credit—"

You interrupt them with a loud laugh. "I think I'm giving myself the exact right amount of credit, in fact!" You stand up, agitated, but just end up leaning against the orrery.

"You remember, don't you?" you say. "A bonfire wasn’t a bonfire until Feldspar showed up beside it. They lit any space as... as brightly as any flame. They were brilliant when it mattered, and an idiot when it was funniest. They were loud and fast and cool, and everyone looked up to them, including me."

You turn around to sit heavily on the edge of the orrery. "And I get stuff done, sure. I like taking care of people. I like making them feel cared for. I can patch up a wound and tend to an illness. But I'm no Gneiss. I can round people up and get them to listen long enough to get a meal in them, but I'm no Rutile. I can make some stuff, I've improved our canning and cool-storage systems, invented a couple tools for the kitchen, but I'm no Slate.”

You stare down at the floor, feeling the cork-leather cover of the journal in your apron pocket. "I can tell a story. I can make people laugh, make them smile. But I can't enrapture them. I can't make them fall in love with something they've never seen before. I haven’t laid footprints on half of the solar system and brought home stories that will last generations. I'm definitely no Feldspar."

"You're not meant to be Feldspar," Esker says with a sympathetic frown. "You're meant to be Porphy."

"Yeah, okay," you say, standing up and throwing out your arms. "And Gossan is meant to be with Feldspar!" You lower your hands, swallowing hard. You are not going to cry over this.

"I know my strengths," you say eventually, "but I know my limitations too. I can't keep up with a powerhouse personality like Feldspar. And now that they're back, Gossan shouldn't have to settle for some poor substitute for the best there ever was."

You cross your arms over your chest, feeling stupid and vulnerable for your outburst. There's no reason for you to be getting so upset over this. Gossan doesn't owe you anything. Feldspar hasn't done anything except exist again. For the first time in the past couple weeks people have a reason to be happy and hopeful, and you're over here throwing a tantrum like a tadpole for not getting your way.

Hornfels reaches out and pats your leg. "I think I understand," they say with a nod. "You were projecting when you called us the Sad Loser Nobodies Club."

It's profoundly uncalled for, but it makes you burst out laughing, which was probably the goal.

"Hornfels, really now," Esker berates.

You lean back on the orrery and push your dirty boot against Hornfels' face, making them shriek in indignation. "Fels, I'm going to put laxatives in your soup for that."

They shove your boot away, but you stamp it against their back, dirtying their vest. "Cut it out!" they say. "Have you even thought about talking to Gossan about any of this? Because I have the feeling that would fix most of your problems."

Your emotions aren't Gossan's responsibility, and they've got enough on their plate as it is. You're pretty sick of talking about yourself, though, so instead you say, "Oh, you got all this great advice now, you stupid ray of sunshine? If we're talking about Sad Loser Nobodies, you're member of the month. You've been pissier than usual at just about everybody. Don't think I haven't noticed you giving Sed the cold shoulder. And you're going to come at me for not communicating?"

That strikes a deeper nerve in Hornfels than you expected. Their expression darkens, and they shove your foot away hard enough that you have to catch yourself from falling off the orrery.

"That's neither here nor there," they grumble, crossing their arms like you were a moment ago.

"Nope, you're not getting out of this," you say. "Esker and I both gave our qualifications for club membership, now it's your turn." 

You sit down on the ground again behind Hornfels and lean back-to-back against them. You've done this a lot, growing up.You would push their buttons and they would drag you through the mud, but at the end of the day, you would sit like this and talk it out. It was easier to be honest when you didn't have to make eye contact, and there was something to show for you physically holding each other up even after whatever nasty things you both said.

Hornfels leans back against you, but they don't say anything for a while. Eventually, they say just above a whisper, "I want to give up on Sed."

The words slam you like a kick in the stomach, even though they have nothing to do with you. "Why?" you say. "They look up to you almost as much as they do Gossan. They were always holed up in here with you and Hal."

"'Were'" being the pivotal word," they reply. "They are not the same person they once were. The last time I talked to the Sed I know was when they came up here for their launch codes. When they came back, after they woke up from their mysterious and apparently instantly healed radiation sickness... It was like night and day. A switch had flipped, and I'm afraid the timing of that change wasn't a coincidence. I tried to reach out to them, but they rebuffed me and everyone else. I tried to understand, but they seem to be actively preventing us from understanding."

You feel Hornfels' shoulder shift as they rub their forehead. "I know I ought to be the adult here and keep trying. I ought to keep reaching out no matter how much they bite back. But I don't want to. I want to give up on them." They drop their hands in their lap with a tired sigh. "It’s selfish and cruel of me. But it’s true."

"It is selfish and cruel," you say quietly, more in simple agreement than in accusation. "I mean, something had to happen to make them that way, right? And..." You pause, then you turn around and scoot forward to face them. "What do you mean you're afraid the timing wasn't a coincidence? Do you blame Sed for...?"

You're not sure how to finish the sentence. Blame them for the sun blowing up? For the black hole? For coming home broken?

Hornfels doesn't look at either you or Esker, keeping their eyes fixed on the baseboard of the far wall. "Sed feels guilty," they say. "If I know them at all anymore, they're lying and pushing people away like they are because they feel guilty about something. They take off for the first time in their ship, and not a minute or two later, the sun goes supernova. They come home inexplicably changed, with impossibly old burn scars and speaking an alien language. They know things about the solar system that no one else knows. I could excuse all of that for Sed being a victim of the insanity that has taken over existence as we know it, the same as the rest of us, if they weren't walking around like they're hiding a box of matches behind their back after a house fire."

You don't know what to say to all that. You look up at Esker, who is gritting their teeth with a kind of conflicted upset you rarely see on them. "It's not Sed's fault," they say.

With a low, weary voice, Hornfels asks, "They had nothing to do with it?" Your ears pin back with a sudden rush of anxiety, and you whip your head back to Esker.

Esker bites their cheek, looking away. "It's not Sed's fault," they reiterate, weaker than before. And again, what they're not saying is as good an answer as any.

"What?" you say, standing up. "No, that's not... How?" You feel sick, suddenly. You let out an incredulous laugh. Hornfels just drops their head, shaking it slightly with downcast eyes. "What did they do?"

"Porphy..." Esker warns, gritting their teeth again.

"They had something to do with the supernova?" you say, wanting to shout but your voice cracking instead. "Are they— are they dangerous?!"

"No!" Esker yells, and your mouth clicks shut with surprise. Esker lets out an aggravated sigh. "No. They're not. They did nothing wrong. Don't you put words in my mouth, and don't you let your imagination start crafting treacherous rumors like that."

You drop down to sit on the floor again, dizzy and chastised. The idea that Hornfels' blame might not be unfounded, that Sed could have something to do with the entire universe systematically falling apart... it's horrific beyond anything that your imagination could invent.

Esker takes off their hat, running a hand over their scalp, and gets off their stool to crouch beside you and the unexpectedly quiet Hornfels. It takes them a moment to get their words together. "Sed needs our patience. They aren't responsible for any of what happened. The opposite, in fact. They're more a victim of this than any of us. It's not my place to talk about it, but I can tell you this; they need our support, our kindness, and our patience more than ever."

Esker pokes a finger at Hornfels' chest, who doesn't look up. "You especially. If you go telling people these theories of yours, it's going to do nothing but hurt them bad enough to bleed."

"I know this," Hornfels says lowly, their eyes flicking up to Esker’s. "My 'theories' and your confirmation of them will not leave this room." They look down at the ground again. "But I also know myself well enough to accept that I am not capable of giving them what you say they need, at least not right now. It's not good, it's not right, but it's true. I do not have the patience to watch Sed destroy themself. That's exactly what Feldspar did, and then they disappeared."

You open your mouth to speak, but instead choke down a dry sob and have to slowly exhale to compose yourself. "What— what do you mean?"

With a voice that is much steadier than yours, Hornfels says, "Feldspar didn't just disappear into thin air. I was aware that they were becoming more distant. I'm ground control, it's my responsibility to be aware of this. I sat by the radios every day and heard Feldspar slowly becoming less responsive, not reporting in as much as they used to, not responding to the radio as quickly. The occasional missed check-in turned into frequent missed check-ins."

Hornfels glares at the floor. "I chose to give them patience," they spit. "It was the biggest mistake, the biggest failure of my life. I chose to give them patience, to give them the chance to reach out when they were ready. And do you know what happened? They disappeared."

You go to touch their shoulder, but they lean away from you, leaving your hand hanging in the air between you. "Esker told me the story Feldspar told around the bonfire, about them being stranded with no way to contact for help," they say bitterly. "I struggle to believe it."

Hornfels stands up. "Feldspar had stopped asking for help long before then," they say as they go back into the wooden hut protecting their communications systems, "no matter how long I waited by the radio for them."

They drop down onto the stool and swing the curtain shut behind them. Back to waiting to hear something, anything from Chert.

Esker closes their eyes for a moment, before shaking their head and returning to their own stool and to the broken telescope. You stare down at the balls of pine-nut spread and berries in their wrappings on the floor. Hornfels didn’t even touch them.

"We really are the Sad Loser Nobodies Club, aren't we?" you say to nobody who is listening.

A few hours later, the tub in the waterfall cabin is drained and both the washroom and the main living area are spotless when you hear Feldspar start to stir. You take the bucket you had been using to mop and dump it outside, then go into Feldspar's room and drop down into the chair previously occupied by Gneiss.

It takes probably 20 minutes for Feldspar to actually open their eyes. They certainly should have kept sleeping for several more hours based on the state they are in, but with how restless their rest has been, you're not surprised they're waking now. Every time you poked your head into the room to check on them, they were laying in a different position as if unable to find one that was comfortable, and their breathing would periodically become labored and quick before relaxing into a steady pace again.

When Feldspar does crack their eyes open, they are bleary and unfocused, rolling back and drooping closed a couple times. Then all at once their eyes slam open, pupils dilated, and they gasp in air like they are suffocating and sit bolt upright.

You startle in your chair, then move quickly to catch Feldspar as they lean forward nearly off the bed, grimacing and clutching their head. Their breath comes in short, fast wheezes, and although you can't see their face from this angle, you can feel their body trembling from where you support them by their shoulders. You're not sure if they are sobbing or struggling to breathe, and you don't know which option is more disquieting to you.

"Sit back, I'll get you some water," you say softly. They don't react, so you shift them and the bundle of blankets tangled around them back against the wall, then hurry into the main room to fill a cup from the drinking water supply.

By the time you come back, Feldspar has settled significantly. They lean sideways against the wall, their blankets pooling around their waist and exposing the bandages on their torso and arms. They're still trying to massage away a headache, but they're no longer trembling, and their voice is cheerful, if hoarse, when they say, "I hope you have good medicine in that cup."

"Good medicine" was an inside joke that referred to a cocktail of sap wine diluted with sparkling water you all would drink to deal with hangovers when you were younger, much to the chagrin of the elders. You haven't heard the term in years. Something about hearing it now out of Feldspar's mouth and their sudden change in demeanor makes your shoulders tense up and your jaw clench.

You pass the cup to them silently, and they glare at its contents before flicking their eyes up to glare at you. When you don't react beyond sitting in the chair again, Feldspar huffs and throws back the cup, chugging most of its contents in one go and having to catch their breath afterwards.

They wipe their mouth on the back of their hand. "Spoilsport," they say. Then they start to scoot themself toward the edge of the bed again.

"Take it easy," you warn.

Feldspar scoffs, stopping with their legs dangling over the side and pulling their blankets along with them. "What, you think I'm going to give you a show? I'm butt-naked under here. I know I'm hot stuff, but you're gonna need to get a lot more wine in me to see more than what you've got now."

You look them up and down doubtfully, your nose wrinkled. "Your wounds are seeping through your bandages. I assure you, I saw more than enough of you when I helped put those on."

Feldspar gives you a confused frown, then looks down at themself and seems to notice the bandages for the first time. They give a dirty look to the pink-tinged gauze and fabric covering the lesions and severe chafing around their armpits. "Lot of wasted effort. I'm fine," they say. "Where's Gneiss?"

"I sent Gneiss to bed," you say, trying to keep your voice even despite your growing annoyance. "They were up at your bedside for hours making sure you don't choke on your own vomit."

Feldspar scoffs again angrily. "Wasted effort," they repeat. "As if I can't handle my liquor. As if I haven't been taking care of myself for who knows how long."

You lower your head and ask, "Do you know how long?"

Feldspar was shifting around in the bed again, but they freeze at that, staring at the blankets. Then they start moving again with renewed fervor, trying to stand and gather the blankets around themself at the same time, snagging the fabric on the IVs in their arm. "Long enough to know I'm old enough not to be fussed over like a sick hatchling," they grumble.

"Hey, watch it!" you say, leaping up to catch the saline bottle as it gets tugged off the shelf above them.

Feldspar is still moving, although it's proving not much more productive than full-body fidgeting. "I'm not going to sit here tied up all day. I've got feats to do, people to be."

You can see their hand inching toward tugging on their IV ports, so you stop them with a hard grip on their arm. They freeze again at your touch, and sounding unexpectedly panicked, they say, "I- I can't just- I need to-"

You grab the gauze and tape that is sitting up by the IV bottles, and in a matter of about 30 seconds, disconnect the IVs, smoothly pull the needle from Feldspar's elbow, and tape down gauze over the small hole in their arm.

Feldspar stares at you as you cap the needle to be disposed of later, then they stare down at their arm, flexing it experimentally.

"Can you dress yourself?" you ask.

It takes Feldspar a moment to look up from their elbow and at you, and a moment later to respond. They still manage to put on an arrogant tone. "Of course I can."

You pull a bundle of clothes that had been picked out for them from the top of the dresser and drop it into their lap. "Meet me outside."

You leave the cabin, forcing yourself not to slam the door behind you. You probably should have waited for them inside where it's warm, but if you had to look at Feldspar and smell the antiseptic in that room much longer you were going to scream.

You huddle under the porch for long enough that you figure you should go in and check on them when the door opens again. Feldspar is wearing a long, loose dress that covers their bandages without putting more friction and pressure on their wounds. They've also brought the blanket from the bed with them, wrapping it tightly around their body like a large shawl. "It's /freezing/ out here."

"Get used to it," you mumble. "Come on, I need to show you something."

Feldspar gives you a skeptical look, but they follow you. You take them across the little bridge, past the big cabin. You have to pause by the wheelhouse to let them catch up. Feldspar is moving slowly with what looks like an aching hip, but also because they squint up at each of the buildings as they pass. You think they're looking at the boarded up windows, and they are, but they're also looking at the water tanks that were installed a year ago, the additional rooms that were built two years ago, the currently unpowered path-lighting system that is old enough to probably need replacing soon. The village has had so many sudden and violent changes in the past couple weeks, it didn't occur to you that these old and mundane changes could be just as novel to Feldspar.

You keep moving as soon as they catch up to you and only stop again when you reach the big hollow tree stump. You walk into it, looking up. You imagine that it would be a lot brighter in here without the launch pad capping the top if there was still a sun.

Feldspar doesn't follow you in, stopping at the chair by the entrance and looking at it quizzically, their upper body still bundled in their blanket. They bend forward, reading the little placard beside it, and stand up again, their confused frown even deeper. "Why is my old pilot seat here?"

"Look around," you say, "all your old stuff is here."

They creep in slowly, as if expecting any one of the pieces of equipment to jump at them. Their eyes wander over the oxygen and jet fuel tanks, the prototype Little Scout and launcher, the first model rocket. They look up at the OWV flag they had painted themself.

"Odd place to store all this," they say under their breath.

"It's a memorial."

They blink, turn their head back to you. "A memorial for what?"

"For you."

You walk forward, touching the what feels like ancient signalscope but not picking it up. "Slate was pulling this stuff out of their workshop's storage but didn't know what to do with it. They were thinking about burning it all, but Esker convinced them otherwise. So the two of them lugged it all here. They laid everything out nicely. Hornfels wrote the placards. Gossan didn't come anywhere near here. It took them a long time to accept that you were dead."

You lean against the barrel the signalscope sits on, crossing your arms. Feldspar watches you sidelong, their mouth sealed shut and expression unreadable.

"They did, eventually," you continue. "It was a slow thing. They just sat right where you're standing and cried like I've never seen them cry before. They're used to hiding when they need to cry. This time, they let me hold them, let Rutile sit with them, let Sed hold their hand. The whole village came together to support Gossan that day."

You smile bitterly. Maybe it's wrong of you, but you have some amount of fondness for this memory. It was so full of love.

"And you know what? It helped. After that, Gossan had a peace to them that they hadn't had since you left. Not complete, not 100 percent. The wound closed up but the scar made them do things like spend two days straight cleaning all this stuff of the jet fuel that spilled on it when the launch pad fell."

Feldspar stares at the ground, eyes narrowed. You like to pretend that the dark patch at their feet is the ground remembering and holding onto and forever changed by Gossan's tears from that day, but it's probably just an oil stain.

"What made the launch pad fall?" Feldspar says so quietly you almost don't make it out, and it makes you see red.

"That's not the point, Feldspar!" you shout, slamming a hand against the top of the barrel.

"Is it not?" There's no cocky half-smile to go with the rebuttal, just a scowl at the dirt. They repeat coldly and slowly, "What made the launch pad fall?"

"The black hole merger."

"The what?" they spit, their head jerking back to look at you. Their scowl deepens. They're angry at you. They think you're lying, making fun of them.

"You want to know, go ask an astronaut. That's not my job." You step toward them, lowering your voice. "My job is to let you know that you are not going to break Gossan's heart again."

Their expression threatens to twist hard enough to crack, but they clamp down on it and throw their head back with a laugh. "You've always had an active imagination, Porph'," they say. "You're talking like me and Gossan were ever a thing."

"Oh, trust me, this is grounded wholly in reality," you reply darkly. "I don't know how you feel about them, but Gossan is very much in love with you." You lean forward, forcing them to make eye contact. "But you already know that, don't you?"

Feldspar glares hard at you, but they blink first, looking away with their upper lip twitching. Then they throw out their arms. “What specifically are you asking me to do? Stop being a pilot? Stop being close to Gossan? What?”

You step further into their space, emboldened from winning the staring contest.

“I'm not asking to do anything. I'm informing you. You are not going to hurt Gossan again. You are going to do whatever it takes to prevent that from happening. You owe them that much. You owe them for every year you were gone, every moment of fear and self-blame and grief you caused them.”

Feldspar looks small like this, with you towering over them. Smaller than you’ve ever known them to be.

They look you up and down, their lip pulling back into a poor facsimile of a smirk. “You’re jealous, aren’t you?”

You refuse to take the bait. “This isn’t about me. This has never been about me. It will always be about you. The world has changed in the time between when you decided to abandon it and when you decided to show your face again. You better hurry up and change yourself along with it.”

Feldspar doesn’t reply. They don’t back down, but they don’t meet your eye. You turn and stomp away, leaving them huddled amongst their accomplishments.

Chapter Text

Huh, guess Giant’s Deep did crash into Timber Hearth after all.

It happened slowly, which is the weird thing, probably too slowly for “crash” to be the right word. You’re not even entirely sure when it happened. Maybe it had been trickling in for a while, slowly and discreetly rising up from below like when the geysers overflow and flood the village rather than when a storm comes by and douses it. 

At some point, your best guess being sometime after you made camp in the Quantum Grove, and also sometime after your food ran out, the water from Giant’s Deep had risen high enough to cover the tallest trees.

"Music is a form of poetry, just with sounds instead of words."

You look at the ground and watch your steps push the planet behind you a little at a time as you consider Gneiss’s words. You walk side by side with them, bringing the mushrooms you had foraged back to the village. You aren’t yet tall enough to see inside the basket they carry on their hip.

Eventually, you look up at them and ask, "What's poetry?" You have never heard the word before.

Gneiss laughs at this. "It's music, but with words instead of sounds."

Then why is it that every note pouring out of your flute sounds the same, unvarying, perfected, but your brain can’t find the consonants to wrap around the vowels to form even a single word of a poem?

Why does water fill your mouth every time you open it to try?

Why is it so cold?

You’ve felt it before, when you would take your helmet off and the rain was so frigid and heavy that it seemed viscous on your face. But you have never found yourself submerged without your suit like this. The cold makes your heart slow, turns the blood in your veins slushy, and makes your brain throb painfully against the ice.

You don't think you ever got a more formal definition for poetry, but you didn't go looking for one. You loved music. You loved how you could hear the long, buzzing notes of Feldspar's harmonica from clear across the village—

Feldspar stands next to your hammock. Your head fills with electricity. They’re a jellyfish, the water around them vibrating with the threat of a deadly shock.

—and how those same notes could make you want to dance when paired with Slate's hurdy gurdy, or make you sort of want to cry when paired with Gossan's singing. When Hornfels and Esker joined the three of them, they made it sound like all of outer space had been poured into the village crater, and every one of them was a galaxy spiraling between the trees.

You doubted you could ever be a galaxy yourself, but maybe you could be some dwarf star or rogue planet orbiting amongst them. You would have to wait until your sap wine ceremony to get your instrument. But you didn’t have to wait to make poetry.

The weight of the water makes all your movements sluggish and delayed. You trudge up the path to the observatory, leaning forward to thrust your bodyweight against the push of the water as your foot lifts, drags ahead, lands, and shoves against the silt to move you a few centimeters up the hill. Thankfully, you can still breathe even without the suit. Perhaps your tadpole gills reformed in an act of emergency evolution.

You exhale, but no bubbles rise above your mouth.

The murkiness of the water makes the figure standing above you no more than a silhouette, a vague blob of a shape. Their voice is muffled and wide-sounding by the time it crosses the meter or so to where you’re lying on the ground, all low tones with the consonants swept away.

“GABBRO!”

That’s you, isn’t it? You should probably pay attention.

“I am here to fulfill my quest!” a voice says, breathless and exuberant. “I have traveled over meters and meters of plains, scaled mountains, trudged through swamps to find you, and here I have found you!”

Here you have been found. You look up, past the figure. A shard of purple stone rises high above you.

“Eeeeeeeeeeeee. Ooooooooommmmmmmmuuuuuuuuuuuu—”

“Gabbro, what are you doing?” a voice says, sharp and exasperated.

You’re sitting in the little alcove in the museum with the stone that won’t stay still. Your math worksheets are spread out on each of the three plinths. 

Right now, you’re testing a theory. You think that the things that sometimes get misplaced or shifted after a while until Hornfels nails them down might have something to do with this purple rock, rather than you pranking Hornfels as they believe (sometimes it is you pranking Hornfels, but you’re not strong enough to move whole pieces of furniture).

You can only guess as to the mechanics that cause things to be where they weren’t before, but perhaps maybe it has something to do with the low hum you can hear from the stone when you press your ear up to it. You’re trying to copy the sound, humming and whistling and oohing and ahhing, but you can’t quite get the resonance or tone right.

Something circular and heavy and warm is placed on your chest.

“Drink this potion, great adventurer, and gain the strength you need to complete your quest.”

Quest. Quest. Are you being asked to check on a satellite again? Or are you not being asked why you haven’t gone out to find your ship?

“Here, let me give you my assistance!”

The circle is removed, and so is its warmth. You sit up to chase it blindly. It is returned to you, somehow changed. Still warm, but now steam rises from an opening, along with scent.

“Hurry up and drink it, adventurer!”

You press the opening to your lips. The fluid that fills your mouth tastes like fish bones and medicine. You swallow some, then choke and cough up the rest.

You don’t have much to support your theory, but things don’t mysteriously shift in parts of the village other than the museum (except when it is the result of a prank, heh), and it seems like it happens more commonly to things placed closer to this alcove. It could be the space itself affecting both this stone and the museum, you suppose, but this stone is weird even without the teleporting, so you focus on your original theory.

“Okay, but you have to actually, like, drink it though.”

“Why?” you rasp out. You try again, filling your mouth with potion, and manage not to cough this time.

“So you can complete your quest!”

They keep saying that. People say things over and over again when they think it’s something important.

You don’t like to explain your theories to Hornfels. They probably won’t appreciate your experimental attempts to make your long division worksheets disappear. And they call themself a person of science.

“What is my quest?”

“Uhh… Your quest is, um… to help save the world!”

You kneel beside Sed underneath their ship. They didn’t quite make it as far as your hammock this time.

“The Sun Station didn’t work. I don’t know what to do.”

You try to hand the potion back, but it's not taken from your hands.

“No, you have to drink it, goofy.”

“I can’t.” Strength is the last thing you need right now.

“Wait, why?”

Why? You lay on your back again. The quantum shard is gone. Same reason as always, compounded.

“You should probably get someone else, pal. I don’t think I deserve to help.”

The figure hanging over you puts their hands on their hips. They look familiar. You could probably figure out who they are.

“That sounds dumb.”

As you are pulled away by the arm, dodging complaints about the “racket” and “how could anyone concentrate with this” as they take you somewhere “quiet” with “no distractions” to “focus on your math lesson” (all of which is less likely to result in finished worksheets than you humming the right note to make them disappear and reappear fully completed and more likely to result in you shutting down completely when the quiet gets so loud it feels like your ears are bleeding), you still don’t say anything. 

Hornfels can be bitey, and blind, and if you’re even the tiniest squeak too loud they’ll make you regret it. You just try to stay quiet and avoid them.

You lay back on the ground, pour more of the potion into your mouth. You guess that does sound dumb. You choke again.

The potion is empty, its container no longer warm. Your stomach cramps. You are alone. You wait 22 minutes for the pain to go away.

Riebeck lays across your lap, their head on your stomach, your pants rolled up from wading in the creek, your legs drying in the warmth of the sun. You play with their ear as they pluck at their banjo. It’s not a rare arrangement by any means, but lately you’ve been calling each other something different, and that in of itself comes with expectations you haven’t quite been able to define that make this arrangement different in ways you don’t quite understand.

“Of course there’s such a thing as bad music!” Riebeck says. “If there’s good music, then there’s bad music.”

They’re laughing, so you laugh too, even though this conversation feels a bit like chewing sandpaper. They strum the strings of their banjo hard and randomly, and the resulting sound is loud and abrupt and chaotic. “If this isn’t bad music, what is it?” They ask. You feel sympathy for the strings.

You laugh again. “It just is.”

Later, quietly, Riebeck looks at you and says, “You know that making bad music doesn’t make you a bad person, right? Neither does making no music.”

The question, and especially the low tone of voice it was asked in, makes you mad. They’re still looking at you, waiting, so you brush a gentle finger over the arch of their ear and lean their head back and kiss them. It’s one of the simpler expectations of the new words you’re using to describe each other.

They don’t call you by those words anymore.

The potions keep coming, and they still make your stomach cramp, though less now. Arkose manages to find you no matter where in the village you are. You figured that out eventually, that Arkose is the one bringing you potions. You worry for them, distantly. You hope their little lungs can hold out against the saltwater that Giant’s Deep’s crashing filled the planet with.

You’ve got your hammock hanging between two trees in the graveyard. Arkose is scared of the graveyard, so maybe this will give your digestive tract a rest for a while.

Turns out, poetry isn’t exactly the same as music. Not a copy, but a mirror image. Whereas music takes all the things that are too big to see all of without turning your head and funnels them down through the chirp of a woodwhistle or the beat of a drum, poetry does the opposite. It makes the little things, the things stepped over and ignored, the normal and the boring things, and blows them up until they’re remarkable. Which seems obvious, when you think about it. It’s hard to make remarks on something if you think it’s unremarkable, and what are the words of poetry for if not for remarking on something?

That’s what you like about it, you think. You like lying down in the grass and looking at how the blades taper, how the runners weave together like a rug. You like how the refraction of light on the water’s surface looks like it breaks and shifts your legs when you stand knee-deep in a still pond. You like moving your hand through the temperature gradient of sunlight to deep shadow. It’s hard to talk to other people about these things. When you try, they look at you either with confusion or affection, both of which feel equally dismissive. Writing poems is easier.

Well, you think it was easier, once.

You turn on your side in your hammock, lightly biting at the mouthpiece of your flute but not blowing into it. You can’t give away your location, of course, but the lack of sound and vibration from your flute is making your inner ears itch.

The back of the grave markers you watch over the side of your hammock don’t have any text on them, and you feel like that’s a poem in of itself. The stone is flat and neatly chiseled, a blank canvas that will never be decorated with anything other than moss and lichen, and that’s only if it were to be left alone.

If you carved your own words there, would that be disrespectful to the dead this marker memorializes? Would writing in chalk or charcoal instead be more respectful? Less? You don’t know who this marker marks, specifically. You could stand up and walk to its other side to see. You stay in your hammock, turning to lie on your back and watch the blank sky again.

Words aren’t coming to you like they used to. You can feel the poem that this space carries, but that feeling won’t coalesce itself into the most basic of rhymes for you. Whatever attempt you made would likely be neither as pretty nor as meaningful as what the lichen has already written on the stone.

The dense and frigid silence causes your ears to twitch as if the sound of the rustling bushes you suddenly hear from the other side of Slate’s cabin is as loud as an approaching cyclone. Darn, Arkose found you after all. The potions they bring you don’t taste all that bad, but they taste, is the thing.

It’s not Arkose who appears after winning the fight against nature and escaping the clutches of the shrubs. It’s someone much bigger, dark against the dark, their face ringed with silver fur that catches what little light the white-hole-stripe provides. Solanum, you guess. You only really saw her that one time from under the rubble of the launch tower, and that other time in the observatory, and that third time when you lifted and carried a burned and sobbing and rib-clutching Sed away from the ghost matter patch after some metaphor attempt went wrong. Or simile, maybe, you can never remember the difference.

They hit you in the chest and the shoulders and face as you carried them, screamed and sobbed in your ear, but you didn’t drop them. It hurt the moment you picked them up anyway, so what difference does a bit more hurt make? Your arms and back were strong enough to carry them. Maybe if you can avoid Arkose’s potions, you won’t be strong enough to have to do that again.

Solanum doesn’t seem to notice you as she stumbles forward, freeing herself and attempting to brush the dirt and leaves from her clothes. Then she turns to apparently glare at the bush, before kicking a lower branch. The branch snaps, and with a yelp of alarm, she kneels down and either tries to fix or apologize to the plant, you can’t tell which.

You watch her quietly, lying on your side again and chewing on your flute. Solanum eventually stands up with a sigh, turns around toward you, and screams. You startle yourself and accidentally blow an errant BWARFFFT-minor note into your flute. Oops, hopefully that didn’t blow your cover.

Solanum throws her hands up over her mouth. “I am sorry. I am sorry, I did not know… Did— were you sleep? Did I make you awake?”

You stretch and swing a leg over the hammock to make it rock. “Nah, I was just hanging out. Heh.”

The pun is lost on her. You’ll have to keep in mind to avoid advanced wordplay with her, but it could also be that it just wasn’t particularly funny. Solanum is still attempting to hide her face behind her weirdly small hands. “I am sorry. Oh, not this place too…”

Her voice shrinks as she switches to mumbling in her own language. You gnaw on the mouthpiece of your flute again. “What were you doing in the bush?”

Solanum startles again, as if she already forgot you were there, and looks down at her feet. “I try to… make the others not to see me.”

“Hiding?”

“Yes. Hiding.”

You nod. “Nice, me too.” Then quickly, before she can beat you to it: “Why are you hiding?”

“Oh. Because…” She drops her hands, looking at the ground again, then back at the bushes. Then in an unusually strong outburst compared to how soft-spoken you’ve heard her to be: “Because everyone is… everywhere! Everytime!”

Solanum immediately covers her mouth again and starts to apologize, but you cut her off with a wave and a grin. “Nah, spill. Get as mad as you want. Me and the dead won’t tell.”

“The… dead? What is—”

“Don’t worry about it. Everyone is everywhere?”

She starts pacing back and forth in this little grotto, stomping the grass under her feet. “Here, there is not so many people to my home. To be alone here can be easy, yes? No! At my home, you awake at night, it is quiet. There is no people. You can walk in city alone. Here, there is no night. I wake up, go out the cabin, people. Okay, I wait. One hour, go out the cabin, people. Five hours, go out the cabin, different people. Ten hours, go out the cabin, different people. Every time, in every place, people!”

Your brain feels as dense with clouds as Giant’s Deep’s atmosphere, but you try to wrap your head around what she is saying anyway. “So, the schedule—the… way you use your time—usually everyone would be asleep at the same time? And it’s hard to find peace and quiet because there is always somebody awake?”

“Yes!” Solanum exclaims. “And the cabin, it is alone, yes? No! Rutile try to make it alone. But the people here do not know to be alone, I think. They go in the cabin, walk, touch things, they put something in my place. If I am there, or if I am not there, they do this.”

You nod, if only to buy time while you try to process what she is saying. “Oof, that sounds rough.”

Solanum pauses beside your hammock, all three of her eyes squinting. “Rough?”

“Yep. Like this.” You reach behind you and run your hand on the bark of the tree your hammock is tied to, making a face of displeasure. “Rough. Unpleasant. Not like this hammock.” You snuggle down into it, rubbing your face on the cloth with a blissful expression. “Soft… nice….”

Solanum doesn’t seem satisfied with your explanation. She huffs, smoothing the fur away from her face in a harsh motion. “It is not like the tree! It is… bad.” She sighs again, wrapping her arms around herself and looking away. “I should not say this. Everyone is very good to me. They try to give me alone, but…”

“It’s not perfect, I get it,” you say. You scoot over to one side of your hammock. “No harm in complaining about it.”

Solanum looks down at you, then takes a hurried step back. “Oh, I am sorry.”

Sorry? Oh, wait. She thought you were scooting over to get some space between the two of you, instead of…

Instead of what?

Instead of letting her climb into your hammock, like Sed does when they come over to complain.

“It’s not fair,” Sed whispers, their eyes screwed shut.

You’ve pulled off their backpack, dumped it onto the ground, dragged them into your hammock. You’ve pulled off your helmet, your gloves, then their helmet too. You beg Giant’s Deep, the universe itself, not to interrupt with a cyclone after taking the last of Sed’s hope away.

“It’s not fair. It’s not fair.”

Silent tears run down their face, and they clutch at the front of your suit. You hold their head in your hands, your palms under their ears. You brush and press your lips against their cheeks, the corners of their eyes, the corners of their mouth. “I know, I know,” you say. 

“I don’t know what to do.”

You don’t kiss their lips. Something tells you they wouldn’t appreciate it. Something tells you they don’t appreciate any of this, and why would they? A listening ear and a soft touch is all you’ve ever offered them, but it’s not enough, and both of you know that.

“It is not fair,” Solanum says.

“What?” you reply, or try to. Your mouth is full of saltwater. Again, no bubbles spill out to tell you which way is up. Your lungs must be full of saltwater too.

“To say these bad things about this place. It is not fair. I am sorry, I will not say it again.”

She is retreating backward, her arms wrapped around herself, turning back the way she came. Leaving.

“Wait,” you gasp.

She stops, turns back towards you. “Wait?”

“You have to,” you cough out.

“Have to…” Solanum repeats under her breath. You’re still coughing, but trying to cough out water while underwater has never worked before. She tilts her head, hums in a way that suggests concern. “Are you okay…”

She cuts herself off, putting her hands up on her head again. “Oh no. Your name, it is… Oh, you are not here at the village many times. But I see you before. You are Sed’s friend. Your name…”

What is the freezing temperature of salt water, anyway?

“Complain,” you say and finish one of many many thoughts. “You have to complain. Say bad things. You have to say it.”

Solanum blinks at you, her hands dropping to be held close to her chest. “Wh— why?”

Why? Because it will fill your blood with mud if you don’t. It’ll pull you under the current. The salt will eat your flesh faster than ghost matter.

“So we can listen. So we can hear it, and we can… can help.”

Solanum turns her gaze to the lichen on the headstones, but it gives no answers, so she looks back at you. “I do not understand, I think.”

You close your eyes. When you’re still like this, the hammock doesn’t really sway on its own. Your stillness keeps it steady with no risk of turning over unless you shift even a little bit.

You shift, turning on your side. You clutch the edge of the fabric, and when you grip this tight, it feels rough, not soft.

“Can I help you?” you ask. She stands sideways on the wall, like the museum’s gravity crystal is hidden somewhere in the grass. Or, it only looks that way, because you are sideways yourself. “I can show you where you can be alone.”

Solanum lowers her head a bit, but she’s looking at you, looking with her third eye specifically. You wish you understood how long it took her to answer. “...Okay.”

You get out of the hammock. It sways, flipping over completely, and you fall to your knees getting out. But you stand up anyway, leaving your hammock rocking and overturned.

You show Solanum how to get out of the village crater. There are a few spots that are easier to climb out than others, and a few spots with ladders and a few spots with roughly-hewn steps. Since Solanum seems unfamiliar and unsure about how to go about climbing a ladder, you show her the latter. The steps, that is, heh.

You both sit in the grass with the crater behind you and the vast, vast emptiness of space everywhere else. It’s funny. You could do the math, but statistically, space probably isn’t significantly emptier than it was before. The things that once filled space really took up such a numerically insignificant amount of it.

“This was beautiful before, I think,” Solanum says quietly, her head leaned back, her strange rectangular pupils blown wide and round in the dark. “When the… the lights were here. I do not remember the word.”

“The stars,” you say. You lean your head back as well, far enough that you can’t see any of the grass around you, just the black sky. One time, you got knocked under the current just as the sun exploded. It didn’t look all too different from this. “You’re right, though. It was beautiful.”

Solanum hums under her breath. Then, “Thank you for helping me, Gabbro.”

She was able to remember your name eventually, you guess.

When you get back to the graveyard, Arkose is there waiting for you, covering their nose and mouth with their shirt so as not to ‘let the ghosts in.’

“So, I have been reconsidering things,” they say, handing over the canteen in their hands. “Maaaaybe saving the world is too ambitious. But maybe we can save a little bit of the world?”

Sed presses against your side in your hammock, their scout launcher balanced between you. On the screen, a fierce-fanged anglerfish lunges open-mouthed toward the camera, frozen in time.

“Wow, look at that!” you say.

“Ugh, awful thing.” Sed quickly hits the button to flip to the next picture, a distant shot of the outside of Dark Bramble. “I don’t even want to look at it. Every bit of them is pure horribleness. They’re bitey, and blind, and if you’re even the tiniest squeak too loud they’ll make you regret it. I just try to stay quiet and avoid them.”

“And yet, you still take the time to stop and memorialize this one with a photograph. I’m impressed! Your artistic mind supersedes the constraints of rationality.”

Sed balks. “I wasn’t— This isn’t artistic, I was just trying to see if I could distract it with the scout!” 

You grab the scout launcher and roll out of the hammock, to which Sed complains loudly. “Okay, anglerfish, stop right there,” you say, holding up the launcher and aiming it at Sed, backing up as if to frame the image properly. “Let me line this up… Turn just a little to your left, give me your good side… Now smile real big.”

Sed attempts to roll out of the hammock as well but instead plops out of it onto the sand. “You’re about to get a boot in your ‘good side’ if you don’t give that back.”

Sed chases you up to your campfire, in somewhat slow motion thanks to the high gravity, both of you laughing all the way.

You think that perhaps Giant’s Deep didn’t crash into Timber Hearth, exactly. Instead, the two of them have got something like what the Twins have got going on. One planet takes the water, then gives it back to the other, back and forth. That would explain why sometimes you wake up gasping and choking and suffocating. Your body has adapted so well to the water that it doesn’t remember how to breathe air anymore.

You keep drinking potions, and they keep making your stomach cramp up. Arkose comes across you curled in on yourself, your arms wrapped around your belly. They leave, then come back. “Porphy says you need to be warm to digest properly,” Arkose says, “or you’re gonna get super diarrhea.”

So you’re inside a cabin, and you don’t think anything has ever made you feel weirder. Not bad, exactly. But definitely not good. You don’t like the texture of the heat of the fireplace you sit in front of. It’s uncomfortably dry against your face and arms and hits you in waves, boiling the water inside you and filling you with the topsy-turvy unfocused energy of a model ship with one broken thruster bank.

A door opens, and shuts, and someone else is in the room. They don’t sit in a chair or on the sofa—they sit on the floor, beside the fireplace, beside you. Tektite.

The only cyclone that didn’t move, didn’t race around the equator with the others, didn’t play and juggle islands, was the one at the North Pole. It always stayed in place, was always consistent, as settled as a sundial and its shadow, grander and taller and more imposing than any tree on Timber Hearth. But it never chased you, never tossed you, playfully or otherwise. Just watched from a distance, as you watched it. 

If Tektite has ever been anything, Tektite is that cyclone.

You turn your cross-legged body until you sit square to them, because they are due that much respect at least, but don’t lift your head high enough to look them in the eyes. They sit in a similar posture to you, but with their wooden-and-metal leg stuck out straight. They’ve got a bowl of something balanced on their closer, flesh-and-bone ankle. They pick something out of the bowl, and you watch them bring it to their mouth and bite down, crunching slightly and chewing, not looking at you but at the fire. A bowl of food somethings, then. Food type items of some sort.

“Can I get your perspective on something?” they ask, still looking toward the fire. There’s a strange quality to their voice. It’s set low, brought down smaller, like someone who is so deep in the memory of being a hatchling that their mouth starts moving like it's full of loose teeth again. It’s genuinely unsure, but genuinely curious too.

You want to reply with some kind of quip, but your mind is bubbling like ice dropped in hot oil and your skin is threatening to shed all at once in a single spectacular explosion. The best you’ve got is a vaguely affirmative, “Mmm.”

Tektite keeps watching the fire, scratching at their ear and eating another food-type item. Then they say, “I don’t know if I should stay here, or go back out on the plains.” 

They stretch out their other leg closer to the fire, moving the bowl to sit between you and them. You peer down into it. Definitely items, ones familiar enough to name if your brain wasn’t trying to fry them up inside your skull. 

“Those thorny seeds aren’t going to go away on their own,” Tektite continues. “Not that our efforts have done much good in that respect. Anything we chop just keeps coming back, and anything we burn just gets covered over by a new layer of bark by the next day. Slate came out to see if we could try blowing one of them up, and they told us to keep fire far away from it and start carrying around a broom. Apparently those things have started pouring out hydrogen, and if you set hydrogen on fire, the flame can be near invisible unless it catches onto a different source of fuel. If your broom starts crumbling into ash, it’s time to run, they said.”

Ah, hydrogen fires. You got taught all about those when you were training, then promptly emptied your mind of most of it given that the ships don’t hardly use hydrogen anymore.

“On the other hand,” Tektite sighs, then pauses, chewing their cheek. At some other point in history, maybe some 281,042 years ago, you would have scooted closer to lean against their side. If you tried to do so now, it would probably press against your newly reformed gills and stop your breathing.

“On the other hand,” they start again, quieter, “I’m needed here. There are folks here who need help. They don’t really want to accept help right now, and to be honest, I don’t really know how to help them. But I want to be close by. I can’t help from the other side of the planet.” 

Tektite pushes their chin to crack their neck, turning to one side, crack, then the other side, crack, their gaze briefly brushing against yours before they turn back to the fire. “If you’ve got any perspective on this, I’d appreciate to hear it.”

“It’s a conundrum,” you say right away, since you don’t really want to think about it and probably couldn’t if you tried, so you let your mouth do what it wants. “Got an idea of what you want to try next with the seeds?”

“Not one,” Tektite says, taking another food from the bowl. “Not one idea for there, and not one idea for here either.”

Your head tilts up and down along the pitch axis. “So there’s not much to do.”

“There’s staying, and there’s going,” Tektite replies. “Staying is doing something just as much as going is. May not seem like it, but it is.”

What is the boiling point of salt water, anyway? You must be close to it in front of all this fire.

“Go, then, I guess,” you say, your voice bigger than expected. Too big for this room. You squeeze it down to a better size. “I mean, if those plants keep showing up and digging around where they shouldn’t, then ‘here’ might end up a moot point, right? Can’t help the forest for the seeds, or something, heh.”

Tektite looks up at the space over the fireplace and nods slowly, as if weighing out your perspective as being heavier than the handful of helium you yourself consider it weighing. Then, they turn and look you in the eyes.

“Would you come out with me? On the plains?” They ask, and they are asking, not a “get it done” type of sentiment that lilts up with a question out of politeness. They ask like they want you there. They look at you like the murky saltwater is stinging their eyes same as yours.

“Why?” you say.

“I can’t help you from the other side of the planet.”

You click your tongue a few times, lowering your eyes to the metal leg that surely must be at risk of melting by this fire. “No can do, pal. Not operating at 100% today. That much walking might do me in.”

“Yeah? How do you feel?”

You hate, hate, hate when they ask you that. You can see the guilt on their face for having to ask it.

“And how would we do it, y’know?” you add. “No potions out there.”

Tektite lowers their eyes too now, brow furrowed, but eventually they point their vision back at you. “What are potions?”

“Arkose brings ‘em. It’s food. Soup, I think, with medicine or vitamins in it, maybe. It’s supposed to make me strong, so I can…” Your words empty out, the last of them having dripped from your mouth with all the sluggishness and grit of the last dreg from a bottle of sap wine. “Can” is usually followed by a verb, is the thing, and verbs are the trickiest words of all.

“We can bring soup with us, and medicine.”

“Mmm,” is once again the best you’ve got.

“Where does Arkose get them from?”

“Porphy.” 

Tektite nods a little, lowers their head, chews their cheek. Thinking. You’re not sure what you’re giving them that’s worth spending time thinking over.

“So you need to be brought food?” they say, unsure, asking for confirmation. “You need to be fed right now?”

Oh, that's embarrassing. Is it? You feel embarrassed, so you suppose so. “Need is kind of a big word.”

“Doesn’t have to be. If it’s something that’s helping you, even a little bit, it’s something you need.”

Can you say it’s helping you? Being a little closer to the surface is still underwater, isn’t it? It can’t be daylight you’re seeing reflected through the waves far above you. The sun is gone.

“Gotta do what you gotta do, I guess,” you say as if that order of words means anything. 

Tektite pauses again. Thinks again. They say, “I want to do that for you. I want to be here for you, I just…” and their voice breaks at the end of it.

“You can’t. I know. You’ve gotta go save the world.”

You can’t go over and lean on them. It’s hard enough to breathe as it is. So instead you pick the bowl up off the floor. The food somethings shift and roll inside it slightly. You lift one to your mouth, bite down on it, your teeth moving through crunchy, then firm, but not soft, thank goodness. It tastes. Not too much. It tastes salty, maybe.

You keep biting, chewing what you hope is the right amount, swallowing, until the bowl is empty, then you put it back down on the floor.

“How do you feel?” Tektite asks you.

The waves break. The current flows through your ears, your nose, your mouth. The surface is still so far away.

“I feel like I’m drowning,” you whisper.

Tektite lets out a halting breath, opens their mouth for an inhale that chokes them like you’ve pulled them down with you by the ankles. They look up, not at the surface but just the ceiling of this cabin, and wipe their eyes on their sleeves. They breathe again, slower, head above the water.

You reach out and put your hand on their wood-and-metal leg. It’s not blistering hot from the fire. Just warm. Somehow the weight of your grip does not pull Tektite under again.

“Would you meditate with me?” Tektite asks quietly.

You nod, and you both close your eyes. You breathe the water. They breathe the air.

The next time you open your eyes again, Tektite has left to try to save the world.

It’s dark, but not permanently so. There’s still the promise of the sun to rise in the next few minutes. Everyone sits or stands around the campfire, but quietly. Even when you and the other hatchlings are supposed to be paying attention to something, usually the adults will still whisper conversation to each other, or one of you will let a giggle fly too loudly. But here, no one speaks, and if anyone is distracted, it stays in their own head.

A jellyfish parts from the crowd, floating closer to the fire. Everyone shifts subtly toward it. A lopsided grin parts the translucent red flesh.

“Within each patch of ghost matter rests a cabin of the ghosts,” it begins. You hear this speech every year, but every time it is different, and every time the details shift very slightly.

“It is invisible, but near infinite. Each room has doors, maybe one, maybe twenty, and no matter how many lefts you take, you will never find your way back to the first.

“If you could enter it alive, you would notice that each room you enter is smaller than the last. The next, smaller still. The rooms become too small for an insect, too small for a grain of sand, too small to contain even the briefest of passing thoughts. And yet, somehow, each room you enter is as large as the village crater itself. 

“This home is no place for the living. No one with flesh that still heals and blood that still flows can go anywhere near if they want these things to remain true. As long as there are inhabitants to fill the rooms of the cabin, the land it lies on will be antithetical to life itself. If you attempt to approach, you will be punished, fiercely and ferociously, but not unfairly. The pain serves only to save you from a sure and gruesome death.”

An anglerfish swims up beside the jellyfish. Its sharp teeth gleam in the firelight, but the teeth are not against the jellyfish itself.

“As the story goes, nobody is sure how many of the dead live in each ghost matter patch,” the anglerfish says. It tries to replicate the swaying, heartbeat cadence of the jellyfish, but does so less confidently, more self-consciously. It is not so sure of its storytelling nor of the story itself, but it tries.

“Every one of your ancestors has lived in these cabins at some point, if ‘lived’ is the right word to use.” It clears its throat. “They do not exist to harm us, of course. In fact, it is believed that they only want the best for us. They are our own, after all, and we are theirs, in life equally in death. Each one of these ghosts loved life, loved living, and love one another, as they love you too.

“They are, however, frustrated. They have ‘unfinished business,’ if you will—they want to keep working on whatever it is they filled their days with before their death, to finish what they started even if what they started has no definable end. Every person does their part in making the village better, no matter how long or how briefly they may have graced us with their presence. And in death, the desire to do your part, to make and help and sing and give and play, still exists. They want to see the village be the best that it can be.

“Each ghost has something specific they are looking for. Something they want to see, something that will assure them that the village is growing, evolving, and will continue to do so even without their watchful eyes looking over. When they see that specific thing, whatever it might be, and if that thing meets or exceeds their expectations, a ghost may be satisfied enough to feel ready to pass on to the Ancient Glade. When they do so, their room in the cabin will be shut forever, and the ghost matter patch will subside ever so slightly.”

“This is where you come in,” the jellyfish continues. It sweeps through the crowd slowly, its tentacles brushing past each individual, making each one feel both included and unique. You are excited, even giddy, but a little shy too.

“Each one of you has come with a very specially prepared gift,” says the jellyfish. “You have worked hours, days, weeks, even months, to make it perfect. Something to show our ancestors how far we have come this year. Something to make them proud of us, and proud of you.”

“Like I said before, we don’t know which ghosts still live in the ghost matter patch,” says the anglerfish. “Is Scoria, who built the first fishing pole, still there waiting to see the wired bones of the biggest fish Spinel ever caught? Is Gravel, who perfected the pottery-making that we still use today, or Silica, who designed the cells in the solar panels, or Dendrite, who composed ‘White Water, Blue Sky,’ still waiting, watching for proof that the things they were passionate about are being carried on in their stead? We don’t know. The best we can do is give our best, to show what we love and hope it gives comfort and peace to someone who lives in the cabin.”

(Nobody believes anymore that ghost matter patches shrink because we left the right gifts at its boundaries. But also, everybody knows that they do.)

You try listening to the pain in your body for once, instead of covering your ears to it and humming as loud as you can to drown it out as you have been. You listen to it as if it was something to be made into a poem. 

You locate the tension against your skull and identify it as something like a pressing, but not from an external source. There’s no island dropping on top of you and crushing your brains along with all your other organs, so the pain must be caused by something internal.

You listen to the weak and tired ache in your arms, and it's unfamiliar. The loops sapped any lactic acid that threatened to build up from your posture perpetually curled in the hammock and perpetually holding your flute aloft. “Lactic acid? Is that right?”

A wooden food-flipper thing clatters to the floor. Slot? Spoon? No… spatula, that’s it. Porphy hurries to pick it up. “Stars, Gabbro, I didn’t know you were—” Porphy says, choking on one of the half-laughs they do when their body can’t decide an appropriate sound to make for the emotion they are feeling. “What? Uh, what did you say?”

Did you say something? “Spatula?”

Porphy looks down at it in their hands, then back at you. “What?”

That wasn’t it. “Lactic acid. That’s the stuff that makes your muscles hurt, right?”

Porphy looks at the spatula again, then the counter, then the wall, then you. “Y-yeah? Sometimes, yeah.”

Sweet, got it in two. You climb out from under the table you were lying beneath.

Listening for the underlying themes of the pain your body is singing to you is proving harder than expected. Tension in your head, but nothing is crushing it. Weakness in your muscles… hmm.

You also have a feeling in the middle of you that’s not quite pain. It’s more like an itch, a tickle, one that makes you suck in your stomach as if to avoid the wiggling fingers of someone trying to scratch a laugh out of you. 

Oh, wait, you have felt this. This feeling is normally more pronounced, paired with the stomach cramps by the time you’ve noticed it. You must have caught it early. But you… when was the last time you saw Arkose? Is this the before-food pain? Maybe this is the rhyming scheme that connects your head and muscle pain.

“Can hunger cause headaches and muscle aches?” you say out loud, because that got you confirmation last time so maybe it will this time too.

“It can, if your blood sugar has dropped or you're deficient in iron or something. Are… are you hungry?”

“Yes!” you declare triumphantly. You’re so smart.

“Do you want something to eat?”

“Huh?”

Porphy isn’t holding the spatula anymore, as it seems to have joined a variety of other dishes and utensils in the sink for washing up. Porphy has their hands in the water, but they aren’t doing anything but soaking them. When you meet their eyes, they snatch their gaze away as if caught doing something they shouldn’t and use a brush to start scrubbing a plate. “Have you— do you want something to eat?”

Do you…? Alright, maybe you’ve lost the plot a little bit. “Why?”

Porphy stops scrubbing again. “So you can… stop being hungry.”

Wow, that’s what the potions do, isn’t it? You knew that you were supposed to drink them for strength, and you know that sometimes you had this pain and other times you didn’t. You never made this connection between the two until just now. “Huh.”

“Oh, no. Gabbro, I’m so sorry.” Porphy pulls their hands out of the soapy water and steps toward you, freezes when they make eye contact with you again, then hurriedly steps back and turns to the side, drying their hands on their apron. “Did you think that you’re not…? You can eat whenever you want. I didn’t mean to make you think you have to wait for Arkose. I wanted to help, not force you to rely on it or, or make you believe that was the only way— Oh, Gabbro, I’m sorry.” 

Their hands are dry by now, but they still twist their apron like they want to tear it in half. They look like they want to cry. You don’t want them to do that, but you’re still trying to wrap your head around this new information. Not new, maybe. Very very old but long forgotten.

Do you want to eat something, they asked. Stop being hungry. So you have this pain. If you want to, you can make the pain stop. If you want to, you can eat something to make the pain stop.

Do you want to?

“Yeah.”

“Sorry?” Porphy says.

“Yeah,” you say again like you’re testing the pronunciation of a new Nomai word. “I want… something. To eat something.”

“Okay. Yeah, okay!” Porphy leaps into some kind of action, opening cabinet doors and pulling miscellaneous objects from behind each one. “What do you want me to make you?”

You need to be fed right now?

“No,” you say under your breath, and it’s just as foreign as your previous sentence.

“No?” Porphy says, their ears and shoulders dropping. “Oh, I’m sorry—”

If it’s something that’s helping you, even a little bit, it’s something you need.

“Can you help me? Eat. Or, no… can you help me make something to eat?”

Porphy’s eyes widen, and their ears pull away from their head again. “Yes. Yes, I can do that! What do you want to eat?”

You stare at the things that Porphy has already pulled from the cabinets and placed onto the counter. A cast-iron pan. A bottle of oil. A small jar labeled “salt.” You remember these things interacting, but you don’t know in what order.

“That’s the part I need help with, I think.”

So Porphy pulls out a series of ingredients as suggestions. You think your brain gets so filled up and dizzy with options that it forgets to make you breathe for a bit, so Porphy quickly changes course and pulls out one ingredient and says you’re making this. Sun-after-storm tubers. Your memory supplies that these heavy, vaguely lightbulb-shaped roots are so named for their unusual attribute of growing above the ground when they’re close to harvestable and for their bright yellow flesh hidden under the lumpy grey skin.

Porphy helps you with the preparation. They seem unwilling to let you use the knife for some reason, but they let you use the peeler as long as you wear the cut-proof gloves that they give you. The gloves stain yellow as you peel off the skin in long, twisting strips. As you finish one tuber, Porphy chops it into small cubes as you peel the next.

When four tubers have been peeled and chopped, Porphy has you add the oil to the pan. You don’t add enough, and they say more, this much, so you keep pouring oil until the bottom of the pan is covered. You turn on the stove. You’ve done this before, probably many times. Your hands remember how to do it without your brain getting involved.

When the oil is hot, Porphy gives you the cutting board and you dump the tuber cubes in the pan. You might have gotten ahead of yourself, because Porphy yelps, and your hand is hungry. No, wait. Your hand hurts. Some oil splattered on it; not a lot, just a few drops.

“Ooh, ouch, you okay?” Porphy says. “Here, come here.”

You’re standing at the sink, and Porphy is right beside you. From the faucet pours cold water from the reservoir up on the roof. Porphy holds your hand palm-up under the faucet. The water chills the tiny speckled burns and is heavy, pushing your hand down and further into Porphy’s. Porphy’s hand is comparatively warm, their palm calloused but their fingers soft, and their thumb crosses over your own fingers to hold your hand in place.

You look up at them. You feel… something. Hungry? Yes, but not specifically, that’s almost forgotten at the moment. In pain? A little, yes, but the water and Porphy’s hand feels so much more than that. It’s something else.

Porphy meets your eyes, full of gentle concern, and you feel the overwhelming urge to cry.

You don’t, though.

You add some salt to the tubers. Again, you don’t know how much, so you just add some and Porphy says you can add more later. They ask if you want any other spices, but you figure that salt is spicy enough. The smell emanating from the pan makes your hunger hurt more, but in a good way, somehow. In a way that makes you breathe in deeply to draw more of that smell into your nostrils.

Porphy tells you to give it a taste test. You pick up one of the cubes, which has shrunk and darkened to a russet orange. You blow on it first, as they instruct, then put it in your mouth. 

It tastes, but not too much, thankfully. But it feels wrong, bad. It squashes in your mouth. Again, you want to cry.

Your face must have changed shape, because Porphy asks, “What’s wrong?”

“Too soft,” you say quietly. 

“Keep cooking it, it’ll get crispier.”

You keep cooking it. You taste another piece and want to give up. “It’s still too soft.”

Porphy is at the table behind you now, gathering up the scraps and skins from the tubers for some mysterious broth-based purpose. “Cook it as long as you want! I like them softer, but it’s your food.”

You keep cooking it until the cubes are black on at least three sides. You taste one again. Crunchy, not squishy. 

Porphy brings you a plate and you transfer the steaming pile of cubes over to it. They turn off the stove and tidy up while you eat. Some of the cubes are still too soft, and you push those aside. Most of them, though, you can eat. You can feel your hunger slowly subsiding.

“Full?” Porphy asks from where they sit across from you at the table. 

That’s far too much of a question for you to be capable of answering right now, so you push them the plate of reject cubes. “You can have these ones, if you want.”

“Thanks!” They take one of the cubes and chew on it thoughtfully. “Not bad!”

They eat another few as you consider climbing under the table again for another nap. You’re exhausted. The pain in your gut is less, but the pain in your arms and head hasn’t gone away yet. Before you can do so, Porphy clears their throat.

“So,” they say. “Whenever you get hungry, you can come over here and we’ll get you something to eat. If you want help, come find me and I’ll help you. If I don’t see you around, I’ll send Arkose to bring you more ‘potions.’ Does that sound okay?”

“Get hungry?” you say. “When?”

Porphy shrugs. “I don’t know. That didn’t have all that much protein. Several hours, maybe?”

Several hours. All that work, all that complication. You nearly cried twice. You’re exhausted. But you’re still going to get hungry again?

Are you going to get hungry, and cook, and eat, and get hungry, and cook, and eat, and get hungry again and again and again no matter what you do?

You could be lying in your hammock and playing your flute.

You climb under the table, closing your eyes and pulling your sweater up over your face. Porphy sighs quietly. You hear them walk away, and a door opens and shuts.

The door opens and shuts again. A hand appears to pass you a pillow. You cover your face with this instead, since the front of your sweater is kind of wet now.

All of you line up to give your gifts for the dead, adults and hatchlings alike. The older ones laugh and joke, but less with joviality and more with some kind of sweet melancholy. 

“You should probably make a wish list of exactly what you want to see after you’re gone,” Tektite jokes at Slate. “Otherwise you’ll be hanging out in that cabin for a while with how picky you are.”

Slate laughs and rolls their eyes. “You know that’s cheating. Besides, if you’re still there when I come around, I’ll be so ready to leave I’ll dissipate at the sight of a hatchling’s paper kite.”

The younger ones, like you, are more tense. None of you have quite settled on whether you should be afraid of the ghosts behind the fence or if you want to make friends with them.

Moraine is ahead of you, and they shuffle up to the anglerfish with their gift held out in front of them like it weighs three times what it does. 

“It’s a tape recording,” Moraine says, glancing away and rubbing their upper arm when the anglerfish has taken the recorder from them. “It’s not really of anything interesting, I guess, just what I hear around the village. Little bits of conversation, and the waterfall, and Rutile chopping vegetables. I thought the ghosts might want to hear what it's like outside of their cabin.”

The anglerfish’s mouth splits somehow even wider. “That’s wonderful Moraine! You know, Rhyolite was the one who designed the tape that we use in these recorders, and all of their prototype recordings are just as you described. If they are still here, I am sure they will be delighted with your gift. And if you’d like, I can show you the prototypes later.”

You step forward next, dragging a line in the dirt with the toes of your boots. Your hands are empty.

“Where is your gift, Gabbro?” the anglerfish asks. They are concerned, disappointed.

Your hands twist the hem of your shirt. You step forward again, past the anglerfish and jellyfish, right to the edge of the fence. The anglerfish tries to stop you. The jellyfish stops them.

You take a deep breath, then shout the words loud enough that hopefully even the ghosts in the innermost rooms of the cabin can hear them:

“The thing that your eyes do is called sight.
If it doesn’t work anymore it can give you a fright.
If you can’t see maybe you need a light.
Or you can just wait until it stops being night.”

You stay there for a moment. You always listen closely after giving a gift to the ghosts. You know they’re invisible, but you wonder if they make a sound of acceptance or rejection that can be heard if you pay attention. The patch is silent, however.

“You know which of the ghosts like poetry?” the jellyfish asks you. You turn around, and it is right there in front of you, your face reflecting in its shiny red dome.

It leans closer, and whispers, “All of ‘em.”

You imagine your piece of the ghost matter patch will linger for a very long time. Even you don’t know what you’re looking for.

Turns out that drying out saltwater-soaked floorboards in the sun doesn’t work all that well without a sun. The smell of the inside of your ship separates your head from your body as suddenly and thoroughly as the big knife Spinel uses to clean fish. It’s not even straight saltwater like if you had your helmet off. It’s the smell of saltwater seeping through burdened air filters, of oxygen calcified and hard-water stained. 

The rumble of the engines sound like cyclones coming. The ship rocks in the waves as you breach the atmosphere. Your hands play a song at the controls. Esker says something, but listening to Esker was never part of this narrative, so your ears don’t make out the words until you’re out of your ship again.

They’ve gotten their suit off and built a fire that’s just starting to smoke. You stand under your ship in your full suit, hands at your sides.

“Care to stick around for a marshmallow?” they say. They sound ancient. They sound older than the sun itself. 

“Not really,” you say.

Esker stands, hands in their pockets, their back toward you as they look off past their cabin at Timber Hearth, probably. You can’t really see it. They probably can’t either.

“Look out for Sed for me, if you could,” they say. Supposedly the sun was much older than anyone had predicted. You wish you could remember the last time you ever saw it. “Try not to give up on them.”

You coast low over the surface of Ember Twin. Again. You have circled the planet over two hundred times today. But that was tracing the latitude parallels at each 10th degree, and maybe even numbers aren’t it. Odds are far more favorable, so you count the degrees by 5s instead and spiral around the planet with two eyes plastered on the landing camera.

Thankfully, your other two eyes keep to the window in front of you, so when another ship appears to the fore, you stop and hover in place before hitting it. You skirt starboard, counting the parallels carefully so that you can get back on track, but the other ship follows you and stops right in front of you again, pulling closer and refusing to budge.

You tighten your hand on the controller. Your ship is bigger, stronger, faster, newer. You could get around them, and they know that. They slowly lower themself to the ground and land. So do you.

You put your elbows on your console and massage your neck and shoulders. Your back is killing you from sitting curled up in your chair, hunched over the landing camera with your face so close you can feel the static coming off the monitor. The whole of your head aches along with it, and your mouth is ashy and gross tasting. You’re probably dehydrated.

The ship hatch is opened from the outside. It would be faster if you opened it from the inside, but that would involve getting up. Someone steps inside, closing the hatch again with a bang, and following up with a brief hiss that you assume is a helmet being removed. You don’t turn around, rubbing your eyes hard enough that they blur when you open them.

To your side, you can hear the rustle of the blankets and backpack you’ve got crammed up against the radio speaker being inspected, but not removed. “Did your mute button not work?” Chert asks.

“Did at first,” you reply. “Stopped working.”

Chert tends to hold their breath when they think, but thankfully they’re smart and thinking doesn’t typically take them very long. “Hornfels switched over to the all-call, maybe. That usually overrides the mute.”

“Sounds like them,” you reply. You can only assume that their use of the all-call is specifically to make use of this unmute feature, given you’re the only one still out here since the message for everyone to return to Timber Hearth went out a day ago.

Chert moves away to the back of the ship, settling somewhere on the floor with a faint creak of wood and a grunt. 

They don’t say anything, and you don’t either. You consider taking off again and continuing your loops around the planet. You weren’t sure at first, but you don’t think they’d try to stop you. You don’t have any strong evidence for this hypothesis, other than the fact that they didn’t tell you off about your radio, and that they didn’t tell you off for not being at home. They’re a little older than you, and way smarter and cooler, but they’ve never been as uptight as Hornfels despite the amount of time they hang around each other.

You don’t take off. You sit for a while, running your thumbnail along the edges of the buttons on your console. Chert still isn’t saying anything, and you can’t hear them anymore either. Eventually, you reach to the shelf behind you and grab a canteen, which also conveniently lets you turn around enough to look behind you. Chert is sitting on the floor, their legs stretched out and their domed helmet on their lap. Their head leans back against the wall, their eyes closed. Are they asleep?

“Want something to drink?” you ask softly in case they are napping.

“Got anything good?” they reply, not opening their eyes.

“Pine needle soda.”

Now they blink and look up at you. “Really?”

“Yeah.” You grab your soda-opening towel and twist open the lid. Thankfully, this one only fizzes rather than exploding entirely. “Plain water tastes kind of gross out of these containers.”

You drink some of it, more than you expect. You really were thirsty. Then you hand it over to Chert. They take a sip, then twist their face up and cough into their elbow. “That’s very sweet,” they laugh.

“Of course it is,” you say, shifting to crouch backwards in your chair to face them. “Porphy gets all concerned about ‘flavor profiles’ when they make it. It’s soda. It’s sugar with maybe some pine flavor sneaking through if you’re feeling fancy.”

Chert takes another mouthful, still wincing slightly, then hands the canteen back over. “Better than water, but wow.”

You put the cap back on, return the canteen to the shelf. Again the ship falls into as much silence as an idling ship can have—full of humming and low-level vibration, but no conversation. Chert leans their head back against the wall again and closes their eyes. They look tired. Their skin under their eyes is thin and dark, and they’ve got the ashy dryness that travelers get when they’ve been in the same recycled air for a long while.

You sit sideways in the chair now, throwing your legs over the armrest. Oh, you guess you forgot to buckle in while you were flying.

You kind of want to talk. About what, you’re not sure. Pine needle soda? The dryness of a space ship’s air that stings your throat? Chert’s theories on whether odd or even numbers are superior? You bet of anybody Chert has an opinion on that. 

“Kinda early to be calling it quits,” you mouth supplies instead, which surprises you as much as how your voice breaks on saying it, “isn’t it?”

You can’t see Chert around the backrest of your chair, but you can hear their weighty sigh stifled like a persistent yawn. “Logically, we've searched everywhere we possibly can, and searching the same locations over and over again expecting a different result isn't going to get us anywhere.” They pause a moment, tapping a brief rhythmic pattern against the floor, then stopping. “But I agree. It makes sense, but it feels too early.”

You lean sideways against the backrest, curled up with your arms wrapped around yourself. “So what happens next?”

“We go home,” Chert says, “get some rest, eat some food, drink something other than soda. You look as worn out as I feel.”

Hm. You’re inclined to doubt that. You’ve managed to focus on your landing camera for hours while hardly blinking, and you didn’t even feel thirsty until Chert interrupted you. But, Chert’s smart, so what do you know. 

And, because Chert is smart, you ask quietly, “Do you think Feldspar will come home?”

Chert hums a brief note of consideration. “I think with the way we’ve been looking, the way you’ve been looking, at this rate it’s more likely than us finding them. I keep half-expecting them to just show up in the village asking who everybody is looking for.”

You chew your thumbnail. “I don’t think that’s what I meant.”

It gets just a tiny bit quieter in the ship as Chert thinks instead of breathes. “Do you think we’ll ever see them again, you mean?” they ask. 

You don’t say anything. You don’t know what you meant. Chert sighs, and the gentleness in their voice sounds like an unfamiliar instrument. “I don’t know.”

That’s not the answer you were looking for. If Chert doesn’t know, it’s probably unknowable. You swing your feet to sit facing your console again, taking the control stick. “I don’t want to stop looking.”

Chert’s boots scuff against the wood, but their voice comes from down by the floor just like before. “Do you not want to stop looking because you want to find them? Or do you not want to stop looking because you want to keep looking?”

You stop thinking about spooling up the ship again to make space in your head for the question. You slowly let go of the control stick, rub at your neck with both hands. You reach up and stretch, then let your arms rest over the back of the chair. No answer comes to mind, just an old story.

“When Feldspar was teaching me how to attach a fishing lure to the line,” you say, “they showed me how different lures catch different fish. Have you seen their tackle box? It’s beautiful. Feldspar’s got a real talent for carving and painting lures, they’re all sorts of colors and shapes and have shiny bits and tassels and spinners. So I look at all this and think, we haven’t been catching anything all day. But maybe there’s a way I can improve our chances. So I tie every one of those lures to about eight different fishing lines and run them all on the same pole.”

“Did you catch anything?” Chert asks.

“No,” you say. “The lines got tangled together and the lures were so heavy that I fell into the river. Feldspar had to come rescue me.”

Again, there is the sound of Chert thinking breathlessly, tapping a beat on the floor. “So are you… the lures in this metaphor? Or the fish?”

You pause, then lean back to peer at them around the backrest. “What metaphor?”

Chert blinks at you, opens their mouth, then is distracted by a noise coming from the collar of their suit. You can make out Hornfels’ voice over their suit radio, but you can’t identify the words.

Chert pulls the collar up closer to their mouth and says, “Right, I’m with them on their ship, mine is nearby, we are both taking a break on Ember Twin. Over.”

You flinch as your ship speakers screech to life despite your attempts to muffle them. “Gabbro and Chert, please return to Timber Hearth immediately. Gabbro, this is the fifth time I’ve asked you. We are waiting on you both to discuss the next steps. Return immediately. Over.” 

The radio disconnects with a pop without waiting for a response. You exhale a slow and heavy breath, sinking down further into your seat.

Chert stands up with a grunt. “They’re tired too,” they say apologetically. They come up beside your chair, but you keep your eyes cast down at the blank screen of the landing camera. Out of your periphery, you see them shrug. “Too bad about the solar flare, though.”

You look out the window, but the sun in front of you looks as round and yellow and still as usual. Then you look up at Chert, who is also looking out the window with a small grin. “Wh—”

Your teeth clack shut before you can finish the word as Chert ducks underneath your console. You lift your legs up into your chair and barely manage to avoid a yelp of surprise. 

“Yep, too bad about—” Chert says, grunting as you hear a panel pop open somewhere beneath the console. “Too bad an extended… wait where is your—? Hold on.”

“Chert?” you ask. Is Chert climbing into the ship control panel?

“Hold on, hold on,” they say. Then, “There it is!”

They reappear, popping up to their full height beside your chair, leaving a pair of disconnected cables dangling below the speaker panel. “Too bad an extended solar flare knocked out your ship’s speakers. That’s going to take me at least two hours to fix.”

You stare between Chert and the red and white cables, your knees still folded up to your chest. “...What?”

“Let’s do something fun before going back.” Chert leans on your armrest and towards you. Their blue-green eyes are very intense at this proximity when they’re aimed directly at yours. “Before Feldspar went missing,” they say quietly, “before you got caught up in all this, where did you want to go? It seems like you got cheated out of a real inaugural launch. Where did you want to visit first when you graduated?”

You blink and swallow, then look out the front window again. Ember Twin has spun away from the sun, looking out into star-filled space. A sphere of a color not unlike Chert’s eyes orbits past in the distance.

“Giant’s Deep,” you say without thinking, because it’s true. “It’s always been secretive, hasn’t it? Hiding itself in those clouds. I’d like to meet it in person instead of just seeing it from a distance. I’d like to see what’s past those clouds, if it will let me.”

You could stay here. You could choose to do nothing.

You don’t think that Giant’s Deep crashed into Timber Hearth anymore.

That theory was pretty ridiculous now that you think about it. Wishful thinking, maybe, or projection. You never were quite sure what that word meant.

But no, it was foolish to think that Timber Hearth had any more water on it than usual. If it was cold, it was because there’s no sun any more. If you had to trudge through it like walking through a river up a current, it’s because your hunger left your muscles weak and fatigued.

If you were drowning, it was not because of a lack of air. It’s because your lungs had long ago been replaced with gills.

You don’t belong there anymore. You can’t survive there anymore. You’ve been changed too fundamentally, and you don’t know how to change back.

Your hands shake as you urge your ship closer to Giant’s Deep. The white hole is somewhere behind you, providing just enough light to fill your viewport with a circle of swirling green.

The nice thing about flying to Giant’s Deep is that at a certain point, you aren’t flying anymore. You can just let go, your thrusters cold and silent, and the planet will reach out and take you in on its own.

Does it remember you, you wonder? Does it remember the time that you spent together, even if most of that time was only 22 minutes long? Is your camp still waiting for you, the campfire smoldering up the hill, the trees that hold your hammock even through the most violent of cyclones?

Has your camp been washed into the sea, leaving nothing but unmarked sand behind? Has it forgotten all but 22 minutes like everyone else has?

You slowly let go of the control stick. The ship continues gliding toward the planet with no further action on your part.

You pull your flute from its holster, pressing the mouthpiece against the vent on the front of your helmet with shaking hands.

You play the first note of the travelers’ song. The second, then the third. The clouds fill the window in front of you. You shut your eyes.

You fling them open again as you are nearly thrown from your seat by a slow collision.

You don’t know what you’re looking at. Sand, rock, and your momentum suddenly reversing. You grab the control stick instinctually, but don’t use it.

Your momentum slows, and the object in front of you moves away enough for you to recognize it. An island. Your island, you stop yourself from thinking.

Your ship drifts in space, Giant’s Deep slowly moving away from you. You’ve been pushed out of orbit.

“No,” you whisper.

Your hands now gone from shaking to rattling, you push the control stick forward as gently as you can. The thrusters hum as you move toward the planet again.

You hold your breath as you approach the cloud layer, then choke as Statue Island erupts from the mist and you find yourself face to face with trees and the remains of a Nomai structure. As gently as a planet can, it pushes you again away from its gravity well.

“Please,” you say, and your voice creaks with more weight than you ever felt in all your minutes on Giant’s Deep. “Please, don’t do this. Let me back. Please.” 

You push your control stick forward as far as it will go, nearly coming out of your seat as you lean into it. The clouds fill your vision, and for just the briefest second you see the black ocean. 

You are caught in a cyclone directly this time. You are tossed to the side as you are spun around and around, then up and up and up. When your dizziness fades enough to use your eyes again, Giant’s Deep is far away.

You can’t breathe. Your face is wet, and the air is dry, dry, dry.

“I can’t!” you sob, and you’ve run out of verbs to end that phrase with. “I don’t know what to do! Please, I don’t know what to do!”

Giant’s Deep continues to drift away from you, until all at once, it disappears.

You scream. It’s rasping and gurgling and so loud it hurts your ears. You curl into a ball in your chair, wrapping your arms around your helmet. You scream again. You’re going to drown. You’re going to die.

You wail and sob, hiccupping and gasping. It hurts your entire body. Your eyes, your cheeks, your throat, your neck, your chest, the whole of you hurts with every shuddering cry.

You cry, and the rushing of the blood in your ears sounds like the ocean.

You lie on the floor of your ship, although you don’t remember climbing out of your seat. Your helmet lies on the floor beside you. Silent tears run down the sides of your face. Your entire body aches.

Then you breathe.

For a long time, you close your eyes and breathe. Sometimes your breath hitches and halts, or is interrupted with a cough, but it never stops completely. You rest your hands on your chest. They raise with every inhale, then lower with every exhale.

You sit up enough to reach your old soda-opening towel and wipe it over your face and under your nose. You breathe in again, and you can hear the congestion in the nostrils. You breathe out of your mouth, long and slow.

You’ve drowned. But somehow, you’re still alive.

You flinch hard and clench your teeth as your radio screeches to life. The ship’s speakers are plugged in and no longer flooded. “Gabbro, this is Hornfels.”

You scoot over to the radio on the floor, not bothering to get up into your chair, and push a button on the console. “What?” you rasp, voice broken.

It takes a while for the reply to come. When it does, it buzzes with uncertainty. “Are you okay?”

You press your forehead against the console, pushing the button again. “What do you want, Hornfels?”

Again, a pause. “I’m so sorry, Gabbro,” Hornfels says. “I need you to go get Chert.”