Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The singularity consumes them utterly.

Everything Sanidine is, everything they were, everything they could be, stolen as kindling for the ailing Eye. Ordinarily, it would’ve had several visitors throughout the cycle of rebirth. Ordinarily, it would’ve needed much less of any one piece of timber to light the new flame.

Instead, it revolves entirely around the memory and history of a single living being. It’s pure chance that Sanidine hit the universe first, a matter of infintesimally small difference that spells the end for them and not for Gabbro.

For it to be agony would require it to be anything at all.

The Eye is not cruel. Whatever else it might be, it is not that. Under ordinary circumstances, it would simply place its old and new denizens next to each other, allow the old world’s memories to lay the foundation for the new, and- in a very passive way- reward those who came to observe it.

Sanidine’s reward should’ve simply been oblivion, but the Eye is starved, and a starved engine sputters. 14.3 billion years pass, and there is enough of the center of the universe that once was Sanidine clinging to love and reality that they spend the entire time existing.

To say they’re existing isn’t to say they’re conscious, or aging, or that they have any capacity to influence what’s occurring. They simply are, adrift in a current made of existence itself. Traveling in the clouds of nebulae and the jets of black holes and the light of infant stars.

14.3 billion years. Eternity in the span of a heartbeat.

Their first conscious thought after all that time is simply the realization of awareness at all. The weight of an entire universe’s emotion and beauty and terror crash in on the remains of the Eye’s observer, and they quite suddenly are again with an aching love in the back of their mind.

Then the realization hits them that they’re spinning, adrift. They’re wearing their battered spacesuit again. They’re moving remarkably fast, they think.

Their eyes burn as they open, brand new and raw. The old ones were burned away for the last time by the singularity, and these need a minute to adjust. This is definitely their suit, at least, they can tell by the crack on the visor and the way the HUD flickers. The crack must be surface-level because the void fails to breach the glass.

Their hand closes around empty space, and their eyes widen at the realization that they’re alone. They twist and flail and their body, which has only recently become anything more than a suggestion again, aches in protest.

No Gabbro. Not anywhere nearby. They’re in orbit, they’re over Giant’s Deep. No sign of the probe cannon at all. They figure it must be opposite them.

They grit their teeth, then push the jetpack control toward the planet’s clouds. Reentry is less than ideal, but they’re pretty sure they can manage this. The stick feels loose, probably because it was utterly obliterated just like they were, and they make a note to themself to put effort into checking everything.

Just as soon as they find Gabbro. Everything can wait until after that.

Sanidine begins reentry and closes their eyes again, willing the planet to be kind to them. They’re not sure why either one of them exists again, but they’re happy to see its clouds, even as they plummet into them.

They remember other gas giants. Colors beyond belief. Clouds that hosted the most remarkable living things. Storms that could swallow smaller worlds whole.

They shake themselves a bit to unstick their mind. A universe’s worth of memories is going to take a while to sift through.

They hear a howling nearby. They don’t look.

They slam into the water at terminal velocity, the suit taking the impact as much as it can. The visor manages to hold, which is going to probably earn Slate a bottle of wine later.

Or, it will if Sanidine remembers to offer it, because their world explodes into colors while they get thrown around by the current. How they didn’t simply fall unconscious from the landing, they’ll never truly know.

They fire the jetpack again against the complaints of their sore muscles, and the current flings them up and out, allowing a wave to catch them. They try not to panic. Gabbro taught them how to handle this, at one point. Let the planet have its way until it gets bored of playing with you, then collect yourself and find solid ground.

They wash up on Gabbro’s Island only ten minutes later, breathing hard, but alive and conscious and very, very sore. What an auspicious start to whatever their new life actually is. Gabbro’s going to make so much fun of them.

Sanidine crawls up onto the sand and groans, dizziness and weakness overtaking them. They roll onto their back and reach up to toggle their helmet radio.

“Gabbro?” They whisper, their voice not capable of going any louder this soon after their body has recovered from the end of all things. “If you’re there, I could use a hand.”

Silence. Not even radio static.

They close their eyes again. Fine. They’ll come get their other half, recover from the hole that’s carving its way deep into them, and then the two of them can figure out whatever’s going on.

They push themself up and start walking toward the smoke on the other side of the island.

There’s Gabbro, alright, playing their flute in their hammock, as always. Unbothered. Sanidine’s not sure if it’s alright that it annoys them so deeply, but it does regardless.

They come up beside the hammock and don’t even give their love a chance to speak before they pull them into a hug, which results in a fairly impressive sour note coming from the flute.

They’re deeply confused when Gabbro shoves them off and sits up to stare at them. “What in Hearth’s name?”

“Uh. Gabbro? What, you weren’t expecting me yet?” Sanidine asks, their heart starting to pound uncomfortably against their ribs. This isn’t right. Gabbro hasn’t rejected a hug outright since long before the Eye.

“Uh, hatchling, I regret to say this but I have never seen your suit before.” Gabbro says, and they sound almost as confused as Sanidine feels. “Can’t say I know that voice, either. And, no offense, but if you try to hug me again we’re both going for a swim.”

Sanidine’s mind races. That’s Gabbro’s voice alright, the same one they’d follow to the end of eternity and back, although it sounds perhaps less tired. Their hands curl against the sand under them, and then they reach up to unclasp their helmet and yank it off, eyes staring into Gabbro’s visor. “This isn’t funny. It’s me, Sanidine. Remember? You have to remember, we went to the Eye, we saw everything end, we, we-”

Gabbro’s hand drifts down to the radio beside them. Sanidine doesn’t watch the controls. They can’t take their eyes off Gabbro’s helmet, their throat feels dry, their heart feels leaden.

“Uh, I’m sorry, buddy, but I’ve never heard of a Sanidine in my life. Hornfels? You got an astronaut out here named Sanidine?” Gabbro asks.

Sanidine’s soul shatters. They listen anyway. This can’t be happening. Hornfels surely has some explanation.

“Nobody by that name in the Venture.” Hornfels says. “Don’t even think I’ve ever met anyone by that name. Gossan? You haven’t been recruiting out of the crater, have you?”

“Nope!” Gossan calls faintly from what’s probably across the room. “And I can’t say that’s a name that’s familiar to me either.”

Sanidine pulls their helmet back over their head to try to hide the way they want to scream. They need, something, the world feels like it’s spinning out of control under them, they’re vaguely aware they’re hyperventilating. The snap the latch shut, ignoring the way Gabbro’s getting up. It’s not Gabbro. It’s not right. Not only have they been forgotten, it’s as though nobody knows their name at all, and maybe they could handle that from anyone else.

They do scream, hoarse and small and pathetic and angry, when they hear Gabbro’s helmet seal decompress. They’d rather be nothing again than see those eyes look at them and not see even the slightest bit of recognition back. They’d rather be nothing again than be here. Why are they alive? What cruel joke is this for the Eye to pull on them, after everything they’ve gone through already?

Gabbro stares at them, and they pointedly avoid looking at the still-taller astronaut’s face. “Do you need me to get you a ride back home?” They ask, softly.

Sanidine curls into themself and lets out a noise somewhere between a sob, a choke, and a laugh. “I don’t need anything from you.”

It’s meaner than they want it to be. They try not to care about offending this Gabbro-who-isn’t, and fail immediately. “No, wait. Wait. I need, to, to get to the Statue Workshop.”

The not-their-Gabbro tenses, but they don’t let it into their voice yet. Sanidine wants to take their hand and ease the anger, even knowing this Gabbro has never loved them. It hurts deep inside their chest, the same kind of cold burning that ghost matter leaves.“The, ah, what?”

Sanidine’s arm moves as though possessed, and they punch the sand beside them to try to keep from screaming again. Gabbro, who hides their emotions and thinks they’re so good at it, and they are if only Sanidine didn’t know every single tell better than they know their own body. “Big place. Two halves. Stone arch.”

“Ah, yeah, with the Nomai ruin? I was going to explore there myself, actually. But just in case, you should really get your head looked a-”

“My head is fine!” Sanidine yells, and they grab the top of their helmet’s visor with both hands as they try to remember what it feels like to breathe. “I’m fine! And Hearth’s sake do I wish I wasn’t!”

They let out a lengthy string of curses in Nomaian, then get to their feet and turn away from Gabbro, trying to pretend they didn’t see the worry and confusion in those soft pink eyes. They need to get away from the not-Gabbro until they’re capable of feeling something other than fury around them.

Unfortunately, there’s not much room to get away from someone here.

Doubly unfortunately, this Gabbro is already on their feet, and they’re following Sanidine across the island. They actively move between Sanidine and the ghost matter tunnel, much to the smaller astronaut’s irritation. It’s not that they were going to run in, far from it, but the protectiveness is a little too familiar in the face of everything else.

“Back off.” Sanidine growls.

“Stars above, no. Look at you! You show up out of nowhere wearing a suit I don’t recognize, using a name nobody knows, I don’t even know how you got to Giant’s Deep!” Gabbro exclaims. It’s not quite yelling. Sanidine's heard Gabbro yelling in anger, and this is a Gabbro that’s nowhere near that level of upset. “I ought to tie you to a tree until someone can come collect you, but instead I’m at least trying to listen!”

Sanidine turns toward the smoke again, kicking a stone as they walk. It hurts, because Giant’s Deep’s gravity doesn’t particularly care how angry they are, but they’re pretty sure nothing’s broken.

Besides, they think, with their luck they’ll be waking up in orbit again in a day or so anyway. Wasn’t that how things had finally settled? Time was hard enough to keep track of during the loops and 14.3 billion years of vague existence has done no favors to their ability to keep track of it.

It’s done little for Sanidine’s ability to stay level, either, especially without their Gabbro’s steady hand in theirs. Does their ship even still exist? The helmet’s radio systems are too far gone to pick up much past their planetary vicinity, and their map refuses to open, probably for the same reason. Besides, their ship is almost certainly vapor and dust in whatever they left behind, and-

They stagger at that, grabbing their scarf and squeezing it so tight they wring the remaining seawater from it. Their ship’s gone. The log, the tangible proof that they built up over their time in the loop, the list of Nomai names, the recordings, everything.

They choke on nothing. Bile rises in their throat, or something they assume must be bile. It’s gone. There isn’t even another one here. Gossan didn’t recognize their name, which means, which means, that.

They drop to their knees. The air feels thin in their suit, and they wonder how much longer they can cry for before their eyes shrivel and dry. It means even if Gossan and Slate still had a hatchling together, it was never Sanidine. Their hands grasp limply at the helmet release. Did Hal build a translator without them? Did anyone ever find Feldspar? Did life keep moving completely normally in a universe that never knew their name?

The helmet seal disengages with a hiss, but it’s too late. They feel dizzy. They’ve been hyperventilating again, they’re sure, but this is something else, something Gossan told them about once. They feel so tired, so heavy. Darkness creeps at the edges of their mind, their thoughts slippery and ethereal.

The last thing they feel is Gabbro- not their Gabbro, but Gabbro nonetheless- catching them under their arms. Then they fall into dreams of color and light and emotion, their body and mind trying to process the experience the Eye put them through even as their heart rejects their new world.

Chapter Text

Sanidine is adrift again.

Not physically this time, or at least, they feel reasonably sure they aren’t. They don’t know how they would’ve gotten from Giant’s Deep to some faraway system, watching trinary stars burn and spin and dance their way through the void. They’re certainly not on the sand, and they don’t think they’re dead, although they aren’t sure they would complain if they were.

The view is beautiful. It hurts. Even if they could learn how to bring Gabbro here, wherever here is, it wouldn’t be the Gabbro who completes whatever passes for a soul in them. And on some level, they know they shouldn’t hate this new Gabbro, that it’s not their fault that Sanidine woke up here.

They wish that helped. They want to dig their hands into this new Gabbro and start looking around until they find the pieces of the Gabbro they’ve lost. They want to tear their body apart until they find the place their Gabbro is hidden.

They want their other half back. They feel so hollowed out, so incomplete. It’s like they’re as fake as this Gabbro feels. Really, they’re the false person here, and they know it, because even if they were remembered they couldn’t ever be Sanidine without Gabbro anymore.

They briefly wonder what it would be like to simply dive into the trio of stars ahead of them and fall into the center. Which star would claim their flesh? Which would win out over its cousins?

Before they can think about that any further, they jerk awake in the cabin of a familiar-ish ship. They’re not wearing their suit anymore, and there’s some kind of brace around their neck. Stars dance outside the canopy, Timber Hearth slowly growing larger in the distance.

Gossan is watching them from next to what should’ve been their ship log. It’s different. There’s no Nomai glow from underneath. The casing is polished, but the wood is worn in a way their ship never got to be.

For that matter, Gossan is different, four eyes locked on Sanidine’s face. No scar there. No damage.

It takes Sanidine a full three seconds before their eyes widen in recognition.

“Gossan, your eye?!”

Gossan squints at them. “Hatchling? What about my eye?”

“I- you-”

Sanidine’s voice fails them. Gossan never lost their eye. Gossan never lost their eye, and Sanidine never existed, and it’s hard not to feel like those two things are directly linked.

They bite back a fresh sob. “Never, uh, never mind. Whose ship is this?”

“Mine. Your turn to answer some questions.” Gossan says. “First, your name is Sanidine?”

“It’s the one you gave me.” Sanidine says, before they can think twice.

Both Hearthians stare at each other. There’s a pained expression in Gossan’s eyes. Sanidine isn’t sure they want to know the reason for it.

“I didn’t name my hatchling Sanidine.” Gossan says, with a guarded tone. “And I have never seen your face before in my life.”

Sanidine manages not to flinch away. They knew this was coming. It hurts, but after Gabbro, they can take it. Or, at least, they can hold it in until it starts to burn a hole in them.

“Sure you have.” Sanidine says, clenching their teeth for a moment. The anger wrestles with their beaten down common sense. There’s no Gabbro to stop them from chasing that acidic burn all the way through to the end. “Or have you never looked in a mirror? Or at Slate? You have all your eyes this time, Gossan, and even without them you can tell exactly who I look like.”

They realize this was probably not the thing to say. It’s spiteful, it’s bitter, it’s angry. But stars above they’re so tired, they’re fourteen point three billion years worth of tired in a body that never saw its twenty-fifth.

Gossan glares at them like they’re debating lighting Sanidine on fire. Sanidine almost wishes they would. When they don’t say anything, the lost astronaut gets to their feet slowly, reaching up to feel at the neck brace. “What, did I twist my neck?”

“You were having a seizure.” Gossan growls.

“Oh. Great.” Sanidine stares at the cockpit, not processing Gossan’s words. It’s not their cockpit. Not really. Not theirs, but oh so familiar. Their hands ache to grasp the controls, to fly away from all of this and find the Eye again and tear it apart until it gives them back the other half of their life.

Their gaze must’ve given something away. Gossan reaches over and grabs their flight jacket by the sleeve, pulling them closer to examine the patch. Sanidine grunts, but doesn’t resist.

“This is authentic.” Gossan mutters. “I’d know the stitching anywhere.”

“You gave it to me.” Sanidine says, not bothering to look at Gossan’s face. They don’t want to see the distrust and confusion anymore. It’ll just make them angry again.

“I gave it to-” Gossan inhales deeply. “I gave this patch to someone else. You can’t possibly have it.”

“So ask them. I didn’t take it.” Sanidine says. “I need to get to the Ash Twin. Let me fly.”

“What? You’re out of your stars-forsaken mind.” Gossan says, crossing their arms and glaring again. “Whatever your story is, I’m here to take you back home.”

“You can’t.” Sanidine says, flatly, before unstrapping the brace and tossing it aside. Their neck does feel a little sore, now that they can move it fully. But then, their whole body is off, they noticed it back on Giant’s Deep. They’re struggling to draw as deep a breath as they should be able to. Their ears are filled with, not a ringing, but the quietest and gentlest of humming noises. Their scales feel warm and oddly soft.

“I am.” Gossan says, glancing at the neck brace. “I don’t know how you got out here, but your suit is a design I’ve never seen before, you’re clearly confused, and you have some kind of bizarre condition going on beyond just the nonsense coming out of your mouth.”

“Condition?” Sanidine stiffens, turning back to Gossan slowly. “What condition?”

“Seizure.” Gossan repeats, then rubs their face with both hands. “Gabbro says you were coughing up what they called stardust, as well. Something that the tide washed out before I saw it.”

Sanidine stares at Gossan, and for a moment, as new fear washes over them- the fear that this might keep them from the Ash Twin Project, from the Eye, from any of the chances they have to find a way back to their Gabbro’s arms and the home they once had- they look as lost as they actually feel, eyes softening.

“That’s probably bad.” They manage, uncertainty tugging at their voice.

“Yes, Sanidine. That’s probably bad.” Gossan says, in a tone that Sanidine has definitely heard from another Gossan during a flight lesson or two. It’s a bit insufferable, even if they aren’t sounding quite as hostile now.

It’s not enough to get Sanidine’s hackles back up. They wonder if that’s what they felt rising in their throat, back on the beach. And, though they’re miles from wanting to understand, there’s a spike of guilt in their gut for how much it must’ve panicked Gabbro to see that happen.

Panicked them, like the trip to the Eye had, like when they’d both laid on the beach so long ago and watched death come for them from above the clouds.

Sanidine gasps out “Void take me, the sun!”

They leap for the cockpit, Gossan right behind them with a “HEY!”

14.3 billion years ago they might’ve made it to look out the side of the canopy. Now, their body doesn’t quite move with the agility it once had, and perhaps this Gossan keeps in better shape anyway. Their arms are caught around their back and Gossan shoves them into the seat, knocking the wind out of Sanidine’s lungs harshly.

A rainbow of burning gases as old as the universe bursts free from Sanidine’s mouth alongside a wheeze. They slump against the back of the seat, trying to pull air into their body, eyes wide and wondering as the sparks and embers in their breath dance across the leather.

Gossan must’ve seen it, they know Gossan must’ve seen it, but Gossan flips them around to glare hot murder into their eyes. “I don’t know what just got into your stars-dazzled head but I will not let you hijack this ship.”

“I-” Sanidine tries to say, but instead they cough, and another small nebula of star-breath puffs out of them. Something liquid and white hot burns from their throat up into their mouth, they can feel it just behind their tongue, threatening to spill forth.

Gossan stares at them, something between anger and concern behind those eyes. The concern is alarmingly familiar. They’ve seen it twice in their life, and both times, Gossan had been trying to shield them from something bigger than them both. One time, it had succeeded. The other, they’d already been broken before Gossan ever saw the damage coming.

It hurt then. It hurts more now. Their chest heaves, and though the heat inside them bubbles out of their mouth they dare not try to figure out what it is. Instead they reach up to grasp Gossan’s arms and pull them close, burying their face into their once-parent’s chest as they start to sob again.

Gossan squeezes their arms once, but doesn’t let them go. The founder, Sanidine knows, must be incredibly upset in so many ways. It’s not fair to either of them, but Sanidine simply can’t stop themself anymore. They’re a hatchling again, clinging to their coach after they’d fallen from orbit, after their first jetpack flight ended in a crater, after their first training crash.

It would only be justified for Gossan to push them away, this impossible Hearthian who breathes stardust and says impossible things. It would be right of them to tie Sanidine’s arms behind their back and ignore everything that comes out of their mouth, words or otherwise.

The founder doesn’t quite wrap their arms around Sanidine, but they hold on, and they let the astronaut sob, and Sanidine gets as much of their pain out as they can. It’s not enough, it can never be enough, because even if they were with Gabbro right now they’d both be strangers to everyone else anyway.

And now they’re a stranger even to Gabbro, the one person who knew more of them than anybody else ever could. They feel dizzy again. They’re vaguely aware that there’s a soft fizzling noise coming from beneath them. Gossan’s still holding them, something they aren’t really sure what to do with, and every heaving sob pushes more nebula-light into the cabin, sparkling brilliantly before it dissipates into the ship’s air filters.

They pull back reluctantly, wiping their chin on their jacket. The source of the warmth is evident immediately, and they stare at the dying starlight against their sleeve, the pool of plasma that looks for all the world like the surface of the singularity that consumed them. The stuff is short-lived, sizzling and fading to nothing now that it’s in the open.

Sanidine clears their throat, then looks into the eyes of their would’ve-been flight coach. “Gossan. What’s happening to me?” They whisper, barely audible to themself over the way their heart is pounding.

“Am I supposed to know?” Gossan asks, but the steel in their voice has softened. After a moment, their gaze does the same. “Sanidine, whoever you are, you have to tell me the truth, right now. Did I really give you that patch?”

“You did.” Sanidine says, and they swallow and cough against the warmth no matter how pleasant it may really be. “Not you, but, you. My Gossan. Back before, everything.”

No, no, their thoughts are getting slippery again. They reach for Gossan’s jacket again, eyes wide. “I’m, I, I can’t think. I don’t belong here. I shouldn’t be here, I should be, gone, or home, or both.”

“We’re going home, hatchling.” Gossan says, holding Sanidine’s shoulders up.

The dark creeps at the corners of Sanidine’s head. They focus on Gossan’s eyes. The same eyes they knew, once, they’re- they’re the same, they’re the same. They cling to that thought like a life preserver. “I can’t. Home burned. Everything burned, so many times, and then it was cold, and dead, except me, except Gabbro, and, then, then.”

They squint, as though the words might come to them more easily for it. Then they fall forward into Gossan’s arms, and they’re soaring again, freefalling sideways between trees in an endless forest, the Ancient Glade stretching before them in its haunting majesty.

They let the peace of this place overtake them. They let themself go again, finding mercy in the mists, and they simply fall.

Chapter Text

Sanidine is still falling, spinning, caught in a cyclone.

They really kind of wish they weren’t. There’s a blurry wind pushing them away from the center of the Ancient Glade, their hand outstretched ahead of them, trying to reach into the tempest toward the most important sound in all of existence.

A flute, low and steady, played over an agonizingly familiar beating heart.

Just out of reach. Always out of reach. They’ve been chasing it for fourteen billion years, and it’s still so far away.

They wake up to the smell of pine trees and the antiseptic smell of medicines. The sound of birdsong and hands being washed in the corner sink. Fresh linens and the rumble of active geysers. A ceiling that they swore they’d never wake up under alone again.

They’re also vaguely aware their arm is extended toward the ceiling, and they let it fall to their eyes with a groan. They try not to think about the last times they had been in Gneiss’ clinic, or about whether or not it’s fair to say they’ve ever been here. Even without knowing whether the loops are continuing, the clinic feels like a prison. It’s worse now, even, because they can tell their clothes have been changed and instantly they’re trying not to panic about the potential loss of their only remaining ties to their dead home.

That knot of anxiety in their stomach gets worse when they hear footsteps approaching, and they crack open one eye to see Gneiss toweling off their hands and peering down at them. “Well, good evening, hatchling. Glad you could join us.”

“Gneiss.” They groan again, letting their arm slide off their face and opening their eyes more fully. They feel a bit sore, but no worse for the wear than they did aboard the ship that isn’t theirs anymore. “Where’s my stuff?”

“With the Venture, being tested.” Gneiss slings the towel over their shoulder, giving Sanidine an appraising look. “They also took samples of your scales and blood, along with a swab of your mouth. They want to identify you, but more than that, before they handed you over to me, they said something about decontamination. Some kind of radiation on you and your clothes? I can tell you aren’t about to die from exposure to anything, at least, but they insisted on checking everything you had with you.”

“Identify me? I told Gossan my name. At least give me back my harmonica and my scarf?” Sanidine asks, quietly, and their heart feels like it falls straight through the bed when Gneiss shakes their head.

“Can’t do that yet, hatchling.” Gneiss’ eyes are so soft, their tone so gentle. Sanidine hates it. It feels so false, even though it’s nothing unusual, even though Gneiss has no reason to fake their concern. “Last I heard from the Venture, they were running dating tests on them too, but they had to be careful. Can you trust me that they’ll be careful with your things? I know you don’t know them, but they wouldn’t keep those things if they didn’t have a good reason.”

Sanidine sits up, staring down at their blanket in an effort to avoid seeing Gneiss’ face. They shake their head. Their parents, Hornfels, probably Esker, all strangers to them now. Is this what it felt like during the time loops, when one of them would look at Sanidine or Gabbro like there was someone else using their skin?

They decide they really hate thinking about that idea, and instead they swing their legs off the bed, brushing off Gneiss’ attempt to slow them. They’re immediately grateful for their body moving the way it should, because if they’d pulled their arm away from Gneiss like that only to fall face first onto the floor, they’re pretty sure they’d be stuck in that bed until the sun exploded with or without the time loop.

They take stock while Gneiss fusses wordlessly behind them. Their breath seems less stardust-afflicted, and they suppose if a blood sample was taken their body can’t be as full of starfire as it seemed to be aboard Gossan’s ship. They’re a little skinnier than they think they should be, but maybe they just don’t really remember that well, after spending so much time in their jacket and their spacesuit.

The last time they took their jacket and normal clothes off is fresh in their mind, admittedly, but Gabbro kept them entirely too distracted at the time to think about their own condition.

A shiver rolls up and down their spine, and they sigh, trying to chase the phantoms of their partner’s hands away. They need to think more clearly than those memories will ever let them. “So, not dying?”

“No. At least, if you are, it wouldn’t be of anything I could find. You’re maybe a little malnourished, but otherwise, I think you’re in reasonable enough health.” Gneiss says. “Though I’m concerned that there may be some kind of head injury or memory issue at play, it certainly wouldn’t explain how you got out there wearing a spacesuit.”

“Doubt you’d believe me anyway.” Sanidine says, not looking back.

Whatever Gneiss is about to say is interrupted by the door being thrown open. Both of them jump and turn to see Hornfels charging into the room, Hal and Porphy valiantly attempting to discourage them from intruding even now, Gossan and Slate visible past the group.

“Hornfels, I believe I told you to knock before you came charging in while I was with a patient-” Gneiss starts, but Hornfels ignores them.

“You! Sanidine, Gossan said your name is? You need to explain yourself right now!”

Gneiss’ glare could light trees on fire, but they’re being distracted by Hal and Porphy. Sanidine tries not to look at Hal. That’s a scar they don’t need to pick at right now. “Explain what, exactly?”

Gossan grabs Hornfels’ shoulder and yanks them back with a stern look, then meets Sanidine’s eyes. “Gabbro radioed. They sounded a bit disoriented, so they’ll be on their way back here, but before we stopped talking they told us everything you’d said. And I think I could ignore this nonsense about seeing everything end if it wasn’t for what we just learned.”

Hornfels looks like they’re about to explode. “What did you do to trick our equipment?”

“What Hornfels means to say is that we got unreliable results from dating your clothes, but the metal in your instrument registers as being impossibly old.”

“I’ve done the calculations six times! You did something!”

Sanidine holds up their hands defensively and squeezes their eyes shut tight. As funny as it might be to see Hornfels like this, the amount of noise and attention is overwhelming them, an awful ringing growing in their ears as they try to process entirely too many voices.

Gneiss manages to haul both founders away for a stern talking to, and Porphy and Slate go with them, leaving Sanidine with the one person in the group who could possibly break their heart more than it already has been. They open their eyes.

Hal stares at them without recognition. They want to rip their own face off in response, because it clearly has no meaning anymore.

“Fourteen point three billion years.” Hal says, after a moment of the pair simply staring at each other. “Hornfels said you must’ve tricked the math somehow, but I don’t think that’s true.”

“I haven’t lied about a stars-forsaken thing since I got here.” Sanidine says, taking a deep breath. “Do you trust me?”

Hal watches their face for what feels like an eternity. Sanidine’s not sure they can take it. They’ve been alive for so long. They can remember- in the vaguest sense- riding in the flow of forming galaxies, but as crushing and overwhelming as that feeling is, it’s nothing compared to the way Hal’s eyes make them feel in that moment.

“It’s impossible. It’d make you impossible, but I think I want to. Tell me what’s going on?” Hal says, and Sanidine nearly collapses on the spot. It’s an odd mix of pain and relief that floods their heart, because it’s been entirely too long since they heard Hal’s voice at all, and yet there it is, the trusting, thoughtful tone that once helped them stay the course during long nights working on the translator.

“I don’t know how.” Sanidine says. Their eyes drift to the door as Gossan reenters, but the founder stays back, watching the pair from across the room. “Gabbro and I saw everything die. Everything. The entire universe. There was… it’s hard to explain exactly what. But I thought I died, too, and then I woke up in orbit of Giant’s Deep.”

Hal closes their eyes for a moment. Then they reach into their oh so familiar work bag, and produce a device that Sanidine would know anywhere, eyes fixed on Sanidine’s. The ever-reliable Nomai translator’s survived the end of the universe and the beginning and lifespan of the next, and somehow it’s intact enough to still be recognizably Sanidine’s, down to the scuffing on the case from being dropped inside the Eye. “I don’t know if I can believe that. But. Where did you get this?”

Sanidine’s eyes widen, and they take a hesitant step forward. “We- you and I b-built it, and. And it’s s-still here. It’s. It- it translates-”

“Nomai. I know.” Hal says, as Sanidine’s voice breaks into a choked sob. “I… have a design a lot like this that I never found time to write up the code for, much less learn to build it, or…”

“Does it work, Hal?” Gossan asks, not yet moving from the door.

“Yeah. I tested it on that slab in the museum. It works perfectly.” Hal says, looking down at the device. “Better than I could ever have built it on my own.”

Sanidine can’t find their words at first. They reach for their translator with unsteady hands, and Hal lets them take it. The weight is familiar, comforting. They hug it to their chest and close their eyes, trying to stop themself from crying. It doesn’t really work.

“It’s been everywhere. Even the Quantum Moon. We- we talked to a live Nomai there, she, there’s.” Sanidine takes another shuddering breath. “I never thought it would’ve survived everything.”

“A live Nomai? No, hold on. What do you mean, Quantum Moon?” Hal asks, frowning deeply.

“The- the third moon? The one that orbits different planets? The grey one, with the cloud cover, it’s, it,” Sanidine starts to ramble, then stops, looking at Gossan’s eyes as the Founder steps closer.

“I’ve seen this solar system from a lot of different angles.” Gossan says. “There’s only two moons. Never seen this thing you’re describing at all.”

Sanidine’s mouth moves, and no sound comes out, and they feel sick and their vision swims and, stars, what? No Quantum Moon implies… implies a lot of things. None of them, not a single one, is good. Where’s Solanum? For that matter, where’s the Eye? Did it move, its job completed? Is it still there, but without a moon? Did the solar system move?

Did the Nomai have their quantum companion to keep their hope alive? Sanidine squeezes the translator a little tighter. “That’s impossible.”

“Not a lot about you screams possible right now.” Hal says, then sighs. “Especially that translator. Gossan, I- I don’t know if all of this is true, but I know that machine’s design.”

“I need to get to space. I need to see the Ash Twin.” Sanidine says, staring at the ground. “I don’t care how. I’ll take the warp tower if you ask me to.”

“Warp tower? You mind explaining?” Hal asks, ears twitching.

Sanidine straightens up again, watching their faces. “The. The Nomai ruin here, it has a, the white glowing square?”

Hal squints. “The purple square with the diamond in the center?”

“Yes! Huh, it’s on send?” Sanidine rubs the back of their neck. “Well, not the weirdest thing I’ve heard today. Anyway, that’ll send you to the Ash Twin when Timber Hearth’s in alignment. You don’t want me to touch a ship, I can just use that, get out of your way, you don’t have to-”

“Absolutely not.” Gossan says. “Halite, do me a favor and go see if Hornfels is done getting lectured by Gneiss. If so, see if you can get Sanidine’s possessions back.”

“Right.” Hal nods. They give Sanidine an odd look, then head out through the door, leaving them alone with Gossan once again.

“Why the Ash Twin?” Gossan asks, leaning against the bed opposite Sanidine.

“It- stars above, don’t make me explain all of this, please.” Sanidine says, then closes their eyes. “There’s something there I need to see. If it’s there, I can prove a lot of what I’ve said.”

Gossan sighs. “And what’s this about a living Nomai?”

“She was trapped on the Quantum Moon. She survived everything that happened to her clan, her name’s Solanum, starlight guide her home-” Sanidine says, slipping into Nomai without thinking.

Gossan’s eyes go wide, and they stand up more fully. “What was that?”

“Euh- s-sorry. Nomaian. I learned that phrase from her, on the moon, actually-”

“I already told you, hatchling, there’s no third moon in the system.” Gossan says, and they grab for Sanidine’s arm, only for the younger (or perhaps older) Hearthian to dart away. “Whatever this Quantum Moon business of yours is, it’s all in your head, and strange noises and moons that don’t exist don’t make me want to take you to the Ash Twin.”

A shot of panic goes through Sanidine at the idea that they might wind up being kept to Timber Hearth this way. They drop the translator on a bed, then move again to avoid Gossan’s next attempt to grab them, mind racing.

“Then, then, I know! Where’s Feldspar?” Sanidine asks, staring at Gossan from the other side of one of the clinic’s beds. When Gossan stiffens, Sanidine turns and leaps over the bed behind them, putting more distance between the pair of them. “Where’s Feldspar, Gossan?!”

“Excuse me?!” Gossan exclaims, circling around the beds.

“Where are they? You don’t know, do you?! Just like before! Feldspar’s missing and you don’t know where they went!”

“If you don’t give me a good reason I shouldn’t within the next minute I’ll pin you down for Porphy to inject a tranquilizer!” Gossan yells, and Sanidine ducks a tray flying their way and glances back at it with a frown. Okay, they overdid it.

They’re about to say something when Gossan catches them, more of that surprising agility, and then they’re pinned to the wall, Gossan’s arm pressed across their neck, just barely not constricting their breath. The founder’s eyes are sharp, and Sanidine realizes they’ve never quite felt afraid of Gossan like they feel in that moment.

Stars above, they really are stupid sometimes.

“You want to talk about my partner? Fine. Start. Talking.” Gossan growls, and Sanidine swallows against the tide of stars’ blood on their lips. Great. No backing out now.

“You ever been to Dark Bramble?”

Chapter Text

“Would you have actually hurt me?” Sanidine asks.

Gossan looks at the questionably ancient Hearthian, watching Sanidine seated on the ground trying to take their old helmet apart. The flight instructor has decided to wait until Gabbro has landed safely before they depart for the Ash Twin, much to Sanidine’s clear distress. Thankfully, they stopped complaining about it quickly enough once Hornfels returned their belongings, and instead set about trying to install their helmet’s old circuitry into the spare helmet Gossan provided them.

The fact that the two helmets are outwardly nearly identical still makes the founder grimace. They’re trying to hold onto the idea that this is all some cosmic joke, some kind of illness, and this strange astronaut will reveal everything in due time. But very little about Sanidine makes any sense whatsoever, and far worse, the things that do make sense all revolve around following the trail of their impossible stories.

Gossan looks back out at the launch tower, leaning on the zero-g cave’s rocks again. “I don’t know, hatchling.”

Sanidine grunts at that. Even when Gossan glances, they manage to keep their expression surprisingly neutral, but there’s a waver in their voice when they speak again. “How long have they been missing?”

“Three years.” Gossan says. They try not to think about how as of Sanidine’s appearance it’s been three years to the exact day. They try not to think about the way Sanidine’s jaw tightens, like Slate when faced with a freshly crashed ship. It’s the exact same expression, and it makes them want to storm away and stop having to think so damn much about what might’ve been different to lead Sanidine’s version of them to Slate instead.

They bite their cheek to break that train of thought before they start thinking about the other details of Sanidine’s story, because stars know there’s no world in which they want to start accepting it as fact just yet.

Sanidine hums another something in that language they claim is Nomaian as they get their helmet open. The faceplate has a crack in it that makes Gossan’s gut feel tight. The kind of impact it’d take to create that should’ve been fatal a dozen times over, but here Sanidine sits, prying the helmet’s internal memory out, alive (or something like) and intact (or something like).

The astronaut looks not a day over twenty-five, if that, but there’s something awful in the lines of their face, something that threatens to swallow Gossan’s soul if they look too long. A loneliness, certainly, but there’s more to it than that, isn’t there? It’s like they’re hollow, like they’re still moving purely off inertia. And while nobody wants to admit it, they’ve never met a Hearthian whose eyes were that odd shade of purple before.

When Sanidine had seen their face, they’d taken several deep, shuddering breaths in response, then nodded. “Just like in the Eye”, they’d said, at the time, and then refused to explain anything further.

Gossan wonders if the founders should’ve pushed at that more. In the moment, Sanidine said something about the fact they had no scars before anyone could get more out of them on their previous thought, then turned and asked again for their possessions back.

While the founders had conferred, Sanidine had- with some trepidation- spoken to Hal again. Whatever they had to say led Hal to filling half a notebook with information and sprinting back toward the observatory. They’d stopped just long enough to affirm that whatever the facts, Sanidine seemed to believe what they were saying, and that was good enough for them to start testing things. Then off they went, and Gossan commented that they would be waiting for Gabbro, and Sanidine panicked.

Stars help them, Gossan isn’t sure Sanidine is really done panicking even now, the way their eyes cast worried looks toward the sky every minute or so. Even as they finish their work on the helmets, they look like they might fall apart again at the mere suggestion of rocket engines.

For a moment, their expression is unreadable. Then they set their new helmet down against their suit and start fidgeting with their scarf again, eyes unfocused. “So. I get I’m an idiot, believe me. But why did bringing up Feldspar make you so angry? My Gossan was never,” They grimace. “Well, I never saw them that kind of angry. Not even about that.”

Gossan tries to ignore the pang of anxiety the words ‘my Gossan’ leave in their heart. That’s not an easy thought no matter how they attack it. They level their gaze at Sanidine, tossing words back and forth in their head until they feel them growing too heavy. They haven’t talked about this in over a year. But if Sanidine really can reunite them, then maybe they deserve to know the full story.

Deciding it’s easier than letting Sanidine slide back into that uncomfortably quiet sobbing at the thought of Gabbro arriving, they sit down beside the strange astronaut and sigh heavily. “Three years ago, my hatchling had their launch day. I gave them that patch you’re wearing that morning.”

Sanidine’s ears perk up, and they meet Gossan’s eyes, confusion and worry evident in their features. “Must’ve been young.”

“Younger than you.” Gossan confirms. “It was supposed to be a week. Tour the system, meet the other Travelers, and come home. Then, out by Dark Bramble, they… I don’t know what happened exactly. They’re a better pilot than this. But they must’ve been distracted, because according to what little we could make out, the Interloper hit their ship.”

Gossan feels their jaw tightening, but after every painful thing Sanidine’s said, true or not, they really do deserve the whole story, especially with the look of awful understanding on their face. “That was the last thing we heard from Alaskite’s ship. That they were out of control and tumbling toward Dark Bramble. Then, nothing.”

“Gossan-”

“Feldspar launched within half an hour.” Gossan inhales, staring at the launchpad, as though they can still imagine either of the two ships parked there. “They promised me they’d bring them back. Swore to me. Then they disappeared into that starlight-forsaken plant, and- and I couldn’t do it. Hornfels and Slate wouldn’t let me chase them. Said the Venture would fall apart if one more of us disappeared, and I suppose they were right.”

Sanidine nods at that. “Sounds a little familiar.”

Gossan scoffs. “Yeah? Well, I’d about given up. Then you show up, wearing Alaskite’s patch, and you’re telling me people can survive in there for years? You show me this proof on Ash Twin that you’re not completely cracked, hatchling, and I’ll follow that trail into Dark Bramble whether or not I stand any chance of returning.”

Sanidine’s grip on their scarf tightens. “You should let me fly us in.”

“Not helping with the ‘completely cracked’ problem.”

“I’m serious. I’ve died there too many times not to know every inch of it. Unless it’s wildly different here, I can get you to Feldspar without any trouble from the fish whatsoever.”

Gossan pauses, glancing at Sanidine. “What fish?”

“The,” Sanidine frowns. “Anglerfish? Big, angry, like to eat astronauts?”

“What in Hearth’s name is an anglerfish, Sanidine?”

“You don’t have- okay, so what’s living in your bramble? Something got attached to a ship’s landing gear while scouting out there, yeah?”

Gossan grits their teeth. “Some kind of ugly worm thing nearly sheared through one of Chert’s struts once, if that’s what you mean.”

“No. Definitely not what I mean.” Sanidine grimaces, then looks back at the cave. “Well. They can’t be much worse, honestly. Anglers were quick, but kind of stupid, which made it all the more infuriating when they’d catch us. Had to blow the ship reactor so we didn’t get digested more times than I’d like to admit.”

Gossan looks directly at Sanidine, trying to look for some indicator that this is some kind of sick joke. They find none, and their stomach churns just thinking about it. “Digested.”

“Yeah. By the fish.” Sanidine gets to their feet, picking up a small rock. “They were bigger than our ship. If they heard you, and caught you, they could swallow the ship whole. Thankfully, we never waited around to see what that would feel like.”

“Ah,” Gossan says. What else can they say? So much worse than the description of the event is how absolutely deadpan Sanidine’s voice is, as though the thing they’re describing isn’t horrifying. From anyone else, it might come off as pointing to a lie. From Sanidine, it sounds like someone remembering what they ate for breakfast yesterday. Gossan hates it, hates the implication of it. “When you say ‘we’, you mean yourself and Gabbro?”

Sanidine tenses visibly, staring at the way Arkose lights up the ghost matter patch with rock after rock. “I do.”

“Assuming I’m not questioning everything else, you realize how hard it is to believe that Gabbro voluntarily spent much time around anyone?” Gossan asks. “They’re a brilliant astronaut, but they’re not exactly social. And most of the other Ventures members find them difficult to talk to unless it’s about quantum theory or the way the Bramble behaves.”

Sanidine looks down at the rock in their hand, then looks at Gossan thoughtfully. For a moment, despite their expression staying carefully neutral, Gossan is absolutely certain that they’re being sized up, as though Sanidine might actually try to throw the rock at them or take a swing at them with it.

Before they can tense in response, Sanidine whips their arm around and flings the rock clear from the cave mouth to the ghost matter. They watch it ignite quietly, not even fidgeting with their scarf anymore.

“You don’t know a stars-forsaken thing about what they were like.” Sanidine finally says, their tone dark. “So don’t talk about them like you do.”

Gossan’s eyes can’t seem to move from the fading wisps of ghost matter in the distance. They know that tone, that anger. It makes no sense coming from Sanidine, of course, especially about Gabbro– even if the two were friends, even if they’d gone through something Gossan struggles to conceive of, that tone is too sharp. It’s a tone that wields words like knives. The same tone Gossan had sliced into Slate with not long after Feldspar disappeared, the one that they’d used on Hornfels when the decision was finally made not to venture further into the Bramble to search.

“You loved them.” Gossan says, after a moment.

Sanidine audibly chokes on whatever they want to say to that. When Gossan finds it in them to look, the strange astronaut is curled inward on themself against the cave wall, head in their hands, shoulders shaking with heaving sobs. It’s the same exact way Gossan acted when they realized Feldspar had vanished into the worst place in the solar system, in this exact spot. They know it far too well, know its cause like they know the crater.

Uncontrollable, unthinkable, unbearable grief.

Gossan doesn’t really process what happens next very well. They can see the nebula-gas breaths that Sanidine heaves, the tears and who knows what that drip onto the stone, shining points of light and something that looked unnervingly like the impossibly bright white-yellow of the sun’s plasma.

Then they’re wrapping Sanidine in both arms and holding them tight against their chest. It’s automatic. They want to maintain their suspicion of Sanidine’s story, of so many things about them, but nobody could fake that agony so well. They loved Gabbro, the Gabbro they’d known, and with that knowledge so much of the stranger parts of Sanidine start to come into focus.

The panic Gabbro had described. The hug. The way they’d been so avoidant and upset, to the point that they needed to be monitored, in Gabbro’s account of their appearance. The way they’d yelled the other astronaut’s name in their fitful sleep. The defensiveness. The anger.

Stars above. Gossan runs their hand up and down Sanidine’s back, as reassuringly as they know how. If they let themselves take Sanidine’s story even remotely seriously, they’ve been longing for someone who may not ever exist again for the last fourteen point three billion years.

Gossan can’t imagine it. They don’t want to consider it. These last three years have been impossibly heavy, and they’ve had so many people to try to support them. The idea that someone could go through this for the lifetime of the known universe and still not find closure, one way or the other, leaves an ashy taste in their mouth.

“I’m sorry, Sanidine.” They whisper. They’re still not sure if they believe the whole story or not. But the way Sanidine hiccups, then hesitantly returns Gossan’s embrace, makes them absolutely sure that they’re making the right decision in trying to trust.

They stay there, swaying gently side to side in the mouth of the cave, until the sound of rockets jolts them both from their shared daze. Gossan doesn’t need to look. They see the look in Sanidine’s eyes as they look, the way their pupils shrink, and they know exactly which astronaut just landed.

Gossan hates to do this to Sanidine, hates the knowledge that they're about to cause the overwhelmed Hearthian even more pain, but Gabbro is the only astronaut well enough in the loop to accompany them, and they’re not flying Sanidine to Ash Twin or Dark Bramble by themself. On top of that, Gabbro’s had actual theories about Dark Bramble, some of which even panned out during the surveys to determine if a rescue was possible. Supposing Gabbro’s report of disorientation doesn’t keep them grounded, they’re ideal for a flight that might approach the dreaded plant.

Gossan just hopes all three of them can handle it.

Chapter Text

Gabbro isn’t really sure what they’re going to find when they exit their ship. They’re half expecting to see Gossan or Gneiss. Maybe if they’re unlucky, Sanidine will greet them at the top of the elevator, and they can mutually feel miserable for something that neither of them can possibly control. What they aren’t expecting is Hal, of all people, to be leaning on the Elevator’s frame and whittling some vague shape out of a piece of wood. They nod to Gabbro once, acknowledging their presence.

“Huh.” Gabbro offers, pulling their helmet off. “Not like you to come up here.”

“Not like you to come home suddenly.” Hal observes. They look at Gabbro, and for a moment their knife stills. “You okay?”

“Honestly, not sure.” Gabbro rolls their shoulders. “Okay enough to fly home though. Has to count for something. You?”

Hal presses their lips together, thin and contemplative. “Mm. Worried about you, first of all. When I heard you weren’t feeling right, I nearly made myself sick before I came up here for air. And then there’s our,” They roll a couple of words around in their mouth, “Guest. They’re pretty concerning too.”

“More than just ranting and coughing up stardust?” Gabbro asks, walking over in a way that most anyone who isn’t Hal or Sanidine would think is casual. They’re too upright to be casual. Their shoulders are too well-set. “Or hugging me out of nowhere?”

Hal’s hand drives the knife in a little harder than it should. “Not a fan of that part.”

“I wasn’t either, but given everything else they had going on I think I can forgive it. What’d you learn?”

“Well- and you can argue with the stuff Hornfels was doing if you want, but they checked it eight times now- they’re impossible. As in, they shouldn’t exist.” Hal sighs, prying their knife free and folding it to shove into their pocket. “Fourteen point three billion year old metal, fabrics that make no sense, radiation Hornfels’ telescope only picks up in background echoes. We asked them about all that, and, hah, that’s nothing- they’ve got a working version of my translator.”

“What?” Gabbro’s eyes widen. “You never told anyone about that project but me and Hornfels. How did–”

“They said they built it with me!” Hal throws up their hands. “And that you were with them at the end of the universe!”

Gabbro squints at that. “I had never seen them until they showed up on my beach.”

“Yeah. I know. Believe me, I know.” Hal rubs their face. “They talk about you like, I don’t know what to call it. Like how Gossan used to talk about Feldspar. It’s- I keep having to remind myself that whatever’s going on, they clearly don’t mean you.”

Gabbro closes their eyes for a moment. None of it sits well anywhere in them. They’ve never seen Sanidine before, never even heard of them.

So why did their beach suddenly drop away from under them after Gossan left? Why did the wind die down and give way to a campfire? Why did they–

Their thoughts are interrupted by Hal’s hands on their arms. They blink twice.

“Gabbro?” Hal asks, frowning. Their voice is quiet, but Gabbro knows that spark of anxiety it carries all too well. “Hey. You zoned out. Still with me, moondust?”

“Yeah.” Gabbro breathes deep. Exhales. Gives Hal a tender smile. “Sorry. Just lost in thought. Don’t worry, my steady stone.”

Hal sighs, squeezing Gabbro into a hug. It’s firm, protective. The part of Gabbro that hasn’t quite caught up from Giant’s Deep finally feels like they’re home again. “If you were getting lost that badly then you really did need to come home.”

“Maybe. I’ll see Gneiss before I wind up leaving again.” Gabbro says, returning the hug. “But I wouldn’t mind being home with you for a while first. I found a whole new set of ruins on Giant’s Deep recently, and brought you Scout photos as a souvenir at least.”

“My second favorite kind of present.” Hal smiles. “Want to give me my first too?”

Gabbro doesn’t hesitate to kiss Hal. It feels just as warm as the first time they kissed, when Hal had agreed to spend a night in the Quantum Grove and they’d found each other under the gaze of the quantum shard. Hal’s lips are sweet like wine, and Gabbro relishes every second. They’ve never been so grounded as when they’re locked together like this. Without this, they think, they might fly off to Giant’s Deep and stay there.

It takes a bit for them to finally pull apart, and when they do, Gabbro can’t help but sigh contentedly. Hand in hand, the pair ride the elevator down and head for Gneiss’ clinic, chatting idly about their individual fields of research, trying to distract each other from the confusion of their mysterious guest and the implications of their words. For a while, it even works.

Gabbro’s just leaving Gneiss’ clinic with a mostly clean bill of health (“eat more fresh vegetables, not that canned junk”) and Hal at their side when Gossan comes looking for them, Sanidine reluctantly in tow.

Unfortunately for Sanidine, this means catching Gabbro and Hal in the midst of another kiss. They’re gone faster than they came, heading straight for the secondary launchpads near Slate’s workshop, not saying a word to any of the other three Hearthians.

Gabbro almost doesn’t catch the look on their face. They’re not sure Hal even notices they’re there, the way they’re both facing. The way their eyes look leaves Gabbro with an unpleasant feeling in their gut. It’s not quite guilt–there’s nothing to be guilty about–but it certainly stabs like it.

Gossan turns to watch them go, then heaves a sigh and turns back to face Gabbro and Hal. “Gneiss give you the okay?”

“Yeah.” Gabbro shrugs, then frowns. “Hold on. I know that look. You’ve got that ‘I’m here to ask Gabbro to do something they won’t like’ look.”

“Am I that obvious?” Gossan asks. “Or do you just never want to do the things I need done?”

“In Gabbro’s defense, you don’t usually ask for the kind of science they want to be doing.” Hal offers, but they do give their partner a grin. “Even if what they actually signed up for is everything the Venture does.”

“We’re going to Ash Twin. You, me, Sanidine, in my ship. Ten minutes.” Gossan says, evenly. “Questions?”

“Well, yes?”

“Write them down. We’ll go over things on the flight. Nobody else is going to be able to confirm or deny things as well as you can.”

“At the Ash Twin.”

Gossan shakes their head. “Listen. You and Hal can spend time together after this. I’ll clear a whole two months of free time for you. But get your belongings together and get to my ship within the next ten minutes.”

They turn and start back down the path toward the secondary launchpads after Sanidine, leaving Gabbro and Hal to sigh together.

It’s not even ten minutes later when Gossan’s taking the ship up through the atmosphere again.

Gabbro tries not to make it obvious that they’re watching Sanidine, and Sanidine stares directly at them, expression unreadable. It’s an odd dynamic. Gabbro can’t help but feel like they’re under a microscope, like those odd eyes are taking in every single part of them from their scales to their soul.

“So why were on a tight schedule, exactly?” Gabbro asks, to try to cut the tension.

“Have to reach Ash Twin when Ember has the sand.” Sanidine says. They sound so incredibly tired. They feel it too, based on the way they’re putting most of their weight against the reactor, running their bare fingers against their scarf’s fabric slowly. “Gossan and I both don’t want to wait another day for the cycle to invert if we miss the window.”

“Ah.”

“You and Hal?” Sanidine asks, without a trace of emotion. Just fatigue.

“Sanidine, keep your head on straight.” Gossan warns from the cockpit.

“I’m fine. Gabbro?”

“Uh?” Gabbro shakes their head. “I, I mean, for a couple years now? Hah. Of all the things I was thinking you might say, you ask about my partner?”

Sanidine closes their eyes. Gabbro almost feels more relaxed just from having the intensity of their stare go away. “You’re both happy, huh?”

“Of course. Wouldn’t be together if we weren’t. What’s this about, Sanidine?”

“Good.” Sanidine says, without any hesitation. They breathe deeply, hold for several seconds, then release slowly. When they open their eyes, the intensity has faded into sad fondness. “I just– I wanted to be sure. That’s all.”

Gabbro watches the breathing technique. There’s something familiar in it. It takes them a moment to realize that it’s the count.

It’s the exact same count they use, have been using. Not the one Gossan teaches, not the one books recommend. And sure, that could be a coincidence, but it brings what Hal said straight back to the front of their mind. You were with them at the end of the universe.

You have to remember, we went to the Eye, we saw everything end–

“Did,” Gabbro starts, then stops. They glance at Gossan, but Gossan isn’t even looking back at them. Great. Big help, coach. “That breathing. Where’d you learn to do it that way?”

Sanidine’s eyes widen, and they clutch their scarf a little tighter for a moment. They repeat the breathing exercise again, and this time they don’t look away from Gabbro at all in the process, and stars above Gabbro really wishes they would.

“Not you.” Sanidine says, finally. Their voice wavers, but they still won’t look away. “There’s– it’s– the Gabbro I knew. A different Gabbro. Not you.”

“From, what, a previous universe? A parallel universe?” Gabbro’s mind races. Is this why Gossan wanted them along? Because of that old research paper? Or one of the others? Does it matter? This throws everything into a whole different kind of focus, all of the studies they’d done when the Deep Space Satellite first came online, every time they and Chert had compared notes involving the formation of the universe, all of it.

“Previous. Probably.” Sanidine says, eyes growing distant for a moment. They shake their head, then sigh. “It doesn’t matter right now. You aren’t them, and you’re happy with Hal, and that’s what matters.”

Gabbro considers the evidence. Sanidine, an impossibly ancient Hearthian who remembers the end of the universe, where they went to something called the Eye and watched the end of the universe happen, with Gabbro. Who, apparently, they were remarkably close to. The hug they received. The look on Sanidine’s face after Gabbro had told them they were unfamiliar. The look they had before turning away, back outside Gneiss’ clinic.

Stars help them both. Why did Gossan think this was a good idea? After their interjection earlier there’s no way they haven’t been told or realized the same thing Gabbro just did.

“You were– you were in love. Just like me and Hal.”

“Am.” Sanidine says, a little sharply. “They’re still alive. Just like I am. I even know where.”

“How?”

Sanidine shakes their head. “Just lucky, I guess. To both.”

Gabbro hesitates again. This is so much more than they imagined. But then, they know the answer to the same question, don’t they? And if they tell just about anybody but Sanidine what they know, they might as well be asking for medical grounding.

“There was a campfire.” They whisper, before locking eyes on Sanidine.

Sanidine’s eyes shoot wide, and they step forward to put their hands on Gabbro’s arms. At first, Gabbro thinks they’re angry, but they quickly realize the way the other Hearthian’s shaking isn’t anger at all. They hear Gossan getting up but their eyes are transfixed on the way Sanidine’s trembling lips glow from within, the way their breath hitches and then bursts into colorful clouds in midair.

“Don’t.” They whisper back, ignoring Gossan’s hands on their arms. “You can’t. Don’t do this. You aren’t them.”

“What–”

“You aren’t. Void take me. If you remember anything else, I'll, I don’t know. Please.” Sanidine says, hushed tones that stab like ice into Gabbro’s heart. “Nobody else. Nobody else, ever. Not even for this. Not like this.”

“Sanidine.” Gossan says, squeezing at their wrists gently. “Sanidine, let go.”

“What else do you remember?” Sanidine hisses, before Gossan manages to pull them away and Gabbro can wave away the haze of nebulas from their face. The smell of ozone and elements that no Hearthian has ever breathed in before fades, and they can finally process the utter panic in Sanidine’s face.

“I was standing in a campfire? Not on fire somehow. Watching myself play my instrument from the outside. Watching–” Gabbro’s thoughts still for a moment, then they clear their throat– “Watching everyone, including you, play. That’s all. Did–”

“You didn’t do anything wrong, Gabbro. They’ve been through a lot, that’s all.” Gossan says, while Sanidine leans back against the reactor and visibly tries to inhale. “Sanidine. Breathe.”

Sanidine lets out a hhk noise, then chokes on the plasma in their throat and twists in Gossan’s grip to spit it out. “Shit.”

“Easy. Easy.” Gossan sighs. “Gabbro, this wasn’t your fault.”

Sanidine makes a noise that manages to be affirmative, the plasma sizzling and fading before Gabbro’s eyes. Well.

This is going to be a long trip.

Chapter Text

The Ash Twin.

Sanidine stares out of the cockpit at the planet that changed their life. It’s an odd thing to see it sitting there exposed and not bathed in sickly red light. They count the warp towers again, using Nomaian this time, and nod once to themself when they confirm that they’re all there. Gabbro and Gossan are talking about some other topic in the cabin, not giving the once-was planet a second thought, as though its secrets are benign and its purpose pure.

Sanidine knows better. They don’t really remember everything about the person they were before the Ash Twin Project, but they remember the pain of so, so many deaths. They don’t blame the Nomai, they hold no bitterness in their heart for those ancient scientists. Were it not for them, the Eye may never have been found.

Something about that thought fills Sanidine’s heart with icy dread, and they find their scarf in their fingers again, twitching and pulling at it. Before they manage to calm down a few clouds of nebula-gas float from them, and they grimace, hoping Gossan and Gabbro don’t notice. Gabbro feels guilty enough already, they’re well aware.

Speaking of thoughts that fill them with dread. They take a deep breath and count seven, just as their Gabbro once taught them, then release. It took most of the trip here to calm back down once already. This new Gabbro is so like theirs that it hurts. The spark in their eyes at the mention of multiple universes, the softness in their face, the patience in their voice. The slight defensiveness they expressed when questioned about their relationship. It all fits the picture of a Gabbro that was never subjected to the soul-rending pressure of the time loop, as little as Sanidine knows about who Gabbro really was back then.

The mere suggestion that they might steal that happiness away, that they would destroy this Gabbro through the memory of their own, burns Sanidine somewhere deep in their heart. They know, now that they’ve calmed down enough to know much of anything, that Gabbro remembers very little, and their memories wouldn’t line up with their predecessor’s.

That doesn’t make Sanidine not worry about it, but at least it gives them other angles to consider. Could this be some kind of bizarre universe-watching-itself thing? Could a whatever a universe was before it was a universe observe its surroundings? Could a universe remember things?

“Hypothesis: This is going to be a pain in the cervical spine.” They mutter in Nomaian. The smirk that visits their lips almost feels like an obligation instead of a genuine gesture, given the lack of mirth it carries.

“Did you say something?” Gossan asks, stepping toward the cockpit.

“Nothing important. We’re almost there. We want the pair of towers linked by the cross-walk bridges.” Sanidine says. They glance at the controls, their fingers curling in the scarf’s fabric. “I could land us…?“

Gossan leans forward over the seat to look Sanidine in the eyes. Sanidine can’t manage to meet their gaze. They’re staring longingly at the familiar controls, their heart racing with the memory of flying Nova Dancer. Shaking hands didn’t keep the ship from feeling like it was a part of their body for long, and now they’re left adrift, carved clean from so many things that felt like vital parts of them. No Gabbro, no Nova Dancer, no home.

They jolt when Gossan puts their hand on their shoulder.

“Go ahead.”

Sitting in the pilot’s seat, even if it isn’t theirs and the ship no longer answers to the name Gabbro chose for it so long ago, feels like plugging a missing piece of their soul back in. The tension in their heart eases in a way it hasn’t since they woke up in orbit of Giant’s Deep, and they exhale long and slow.

Their next breath comes easier than it has any right to, with how much of them is still lost. They don’t stop to think about it. They throw the throttle open reflexively, and the ship that should’ve been theirs shudders, intent becoming motion becoming sheer, unbridled joy.

Sanidine’s blood roars in their ears as they feel Gossan’s hand squeeze their arm. They don’t slow down, don’t look up, don’t listen to whatever’s being said. The ship flings itself toward the Ash Twin’s bridges and towers at their urging, and a laugh bubbles out of them, wild and uncontrolled. They dance with precision between the ruins and the core, never slowing, never hesitating.

There’s no reason to be afraid of this, because they’ve already suffered all of the brutal lessons it took to know this ship and this planet intimately long before they arrived in this moment. As the dual towers crest the horizon they suck a sharp breath between their teeth, fighting the urge to simply go for another orbit. There aren’t many pilots out there who wouldn’t need one to simply slow the ship down, to be cautious with its hull.

Sanidine knows every single physical tolerance this ship should have. Every single one burned into their nerves and reflexes from uncountable twenty-two hour lives of tornado dodging and anglerfish baiting. They throw the engines into a full reverse and twist their hands and feet just so, and the ship’s reactor sings in reply, and they have just enough momentum that the ship soars between the towers and their connecting bridges completely cleanly.

They set it down on the main bridge just past their destination, and while they hear Gossan and Gabbro both groaning as tension leaves them, it makes no difference. They simply lean back into the seat and breathe deeply, already totally relaxed.

“You are out of your stars-dazzled void-eaten mind.” Gossan says, then gives Sanidine a smack across the back of the head for good measure. “I meant land, not put on a stunt show! Who do you think you are, Feldspar?!”

Sanidine stiffens. The comparison hits them hard, slams into something still raw inside them and breaks it open to bleed again. They snap their head around to look at Gossan, anger competing with pain in their eyes. “Don’t compare me to them.”

Gossan stares at them for a long minute. Sanidine wonders what’s going through their head- do they think the complaint is because they consider themself a better pilot? They are, they know they are, they’re ten times the pilot Feldspar could ever hope to be, skill hard-won through death after agonizing death, but they would never say it aloud and it hardly feels fair to bring it up. A better explorer? They know that’s true as well, having seen things a normal, mortal Hearthian can only dream of.

That’s not the point, at any rate. Their glare is hard and cold, their heart pounding, because whether or not it’s fair to Feldspar they will never let themself be compared to someone so willing to disregard the ones who love them. Feldspar, they think, would be hiding in some hole rationalizing their new situation, not pushing themself to try to find any connection to their missing half.

Dark Bramble more than proved that, Sanidine muses darkly.

Gossan finally steps back, eyes drifting to Gabbro, their expression settling into worry. Sanidine doesn’t push their bitter anger any further, instead getting up and walking to the suit rack. They pull their repaired suit on with almost robotic movements, finishing in what Gossan is sure would be record time supposing they ever bothered to compare.

As soon as their helmet clicks into place, Sanidine kicks the hatch’s manual control almost carelessly and drops out of the ship without another word.

“What in Hearth’s name did their Feldspar do?” Gabbro whispers, and Gossan’s gut twists uncomfortably as they shake their head. Whatever it was, however it played out, they can only hope that Sanidine will keep their cool should their little team be lucky enough to rescue Feldspar this time around.

Sanidine stares up at the surprisingly intact Ash Twin warp tower, arms crossed over their chest, trying to breathe evenly. Their Gossan would give them a days-long lecture over their outburst, how they shouldn’t take out their anger on people who weren’t even alive at the time, how holding onto those emotions is going to hurt them eventually. Their Gabbro would pointedly remind them that the only person deserving of their vitriol is a Feldspar who no longer exists to receive it, and they’d hold them close and guide them into calming down.

The least they can do is try to get themself together long enough to find their Gabbro, not that they need more incentive. They’ll have to give them the chance to be disappointed that Sanidine’s gotten so temperamental in the last fourteen billion years or so, and that leaves an unpleasantly sour flavor in the back of Sanidine’s throat.

They force a cough to try to dislodge it, and a small cloud of star gas drifts lazily around their helmet for a moment as a result. Good. Cool. Just what they need, more of their strange biology expressing itself. Excellent.

“We aren’t going to have an actual problem, are we?” Gossan asks, stepping up beside them.

Sanidine turns their head to look at them, clenching and then releasing their fists. Star-plasma burns in whatever their chest calls lungs, and they’re quiet for a long moment while they push the feeling back down, wrestling ancient pain back into something manageable.

“You tell me.” They manage, and frankly, they feel they’re being quite reasonable. They’ve made no secret of their feelings, but Feldspar in this universe is Gossan’s lover. If Gossan decides to take strict offense to their reaction, there won’t be much Sanidine could possibly say about it.

Gossan looks tense, even with the suit and helmet blocking Sanidine’s view of them. Their shoulders are squared, their feet planted, like they’re ready to fend off an attack of some kind. Sanidine decides it’s an uncomfortable feeling, seeing Gossan this way, knowing it’s because of their own temper.

“No.” Gossan finally says, and both Hearthians’ postures relax. “But I’m going to need to know what got you like this before we find my Felds, and I can tell that conversation won’t be easy. For what it’s worth, I apologize for hitting a sore spot there.”

Behind them, Gabbro lets out a long and low breath, grateful that they won’t have to report back that Gossan and Sanidine tore each other to pieces over something as seemingly minor as a scolding comment and a comparison to Feldspar.

Sanidine snorts. “I’m not looking forward to it, but sure, I suppose you of all people should know. Sorry I reacted like that, I guess.”

Gossan hums in acknowledgement, then gestures toward the tower in a sort of ‘go ahead’ motion. Sanidine leads the group up to its entrance, stopping at a hauntingly familiar skeleton and bowing their head for a moment.

Realistically, there’s no way to know for sure that these bones belong to the same Nomai that they likely did in Sanidine’s universe. Still, they feel a pang of grief for a life they never actually knew. “Whether or not that’s you, Yarrow, I hope you find yourself resting well.” 

They can just about feel Gossan and Gabbro’s eyes burning into the back of their helmet, well aware of how odd Nomaian sounds even when it’s not coming through a helmet radio, but they ignore it. They can worry about explaining how to speak the oddly musical language once their other business is settled.

Sanidine steps onto the warp platform, glancing up at the unmarred glass ceiling. It’s an odd thing, being able to relax on the platform in this room. Part of them is still certain they’ll be swept away by sand, ripped from the platform just as the warp engages.

Gossan and Gabbro serve to steady them, anchor their thoughts. Gabbro kneels down, spending time checking over the warp platform and appreciating its construction, while Gossan and Sanidine idly chat back and forth about what to expect when the platform engages.

Sanidine’s entire body tenses as the Ember Twin starts to come into view. Gossan pulls Gabbro up by the arm, not daring to speak.

Before Gabbro can say a word, the platform hums to life, and the three are pulled inside-out.

Chapter Text

Sanidine’s eyes take a moment to adjust to the darkness of the Ash Twin Project, and they’re immediately hit with an odd sense of melancholy. They reach out to steady Gabbro and Gossan, breathing in the strangely comforting ozone scent of Poke’s warp core, present even with the casing closed. The way the two other astronauts are looking around wildly, they’re probably as disoriented as Sani and Gabbro were on their first trip here.

Good. Their pride would suffer if it turned out that Gossan and this Gabbro could wrap their heads around the interior with greater ease than they had.

They step off the pad, pulling the translator from its pouch and holding it out to their left for Gossan without bothering to look back at them. “Go ahead and scan everything you want to. I’m going to go ahead and read the important bits, see if I spot any major differences, and then we’ll compare notes. Deal?”

“Deal.” Gossan says, taking the translator with probably more care than it really needs. Sanidine decides against pointing out that the thing has been through far worse than being dropped on Nomai stonework and it managed to keep working then, even surviving the one time Sanidine dropped it into one of the Interloper tunnels on accident.

Instead, while the pair get the machine unfolded, Sani follows the curved walkway like they built it themself. They run their hands over the masks, noticing with some measure of amusement that in this universe none of them have fallen.

None of them are active, either, and now they’re thinking about it the system status rings didn’t rise to meet them on approach. That’s probably a good thing, they reason. Data transmission shouldn’t be active, considering the loop isn’t occurring, and as a result the system’s timer and link info readouts should be dormant.

It doesn’t quite quiet the unpleasant feeling of wrongness they get when they look at the darkened eyes of the mask that, in another time, was paired to them. It’s just an ancient reflex, they’re sure, a panicky bit of themself that still fears the damage their memory could’ve suffered had their mask failed.

They wipe some accumulated stone dust off of it anyway and give it an almost affectionate pat, then wander over toward the message wall, tracing the words they know by heart with one finger. This universe’s Ash Twin Project was planned the same way, it seems, although oddly enough Idaea and Privet seem to have traded places and roles with Pye and Poke, respectively.

It doesn’t appear to have changed anything save for the locations of their bodies, in the end. Sani’s hand tightens into a fist against the wall as they read the damning excitement in Yarrow’s final message, and they close their eyes, swallowing the old grief before it can surge back up and overtake them once more. They never knew, before all of this, that it was possible to miss people you’d never met so badly that it could hurt.

Behind them, they can hear Gossan and Gabbro talking, discussing the first couple of messages laying out the Ash Twin Project’s component parts. The wonder in their voices eases the ache in the ancient Hearthian’s chest somewhat. Some things are inevitable, and it’s no surprise that those things include the awe felt by Hearthian Travelers when learning of the Nomai’s achievements.

Sanidine opens their eyes again, blinking away tears, and they’re about to start walking when an extra projection stone catches their eye. It’s just after Yarrow’s message, tucked away in a crack in the margins, an afterthought to anyone who isn’t already familiar with what this wall should look like.

The symbol of Brittle Hollow is hardly what they expected. They bring it back to the projection wall and slot it in, and the name that appears makes their eyes shoot wide.

Solanum. What is a message from Solanum doing here, dated after the Interloper expedition was decided on? Sanidine’s hand twitches, wishing for a Nomai staff to advance the recorded words with as they unfurl onto the wall.

To my friends who are still occupied at the Ash Twin: I hope your work on finding a solution to the Sun Station’s problems is going well. I debated whether or not it was necessary to contact you, knowing that you have been quite busy even in the wake of the failed firing test. Unfortunately, I believe this news is concerning enough that it bears diverting resources even from this.

Our playful guide, the Quantum Moon, was being visited by the most recent pilgrim to receive my blessing for their voyage when it simply appears to have gone missing. We have had no success in finding it using the means available to us over the last five standard days, and I fear for my pilgrim’s life should we be unable to locate where the moon could possibly have gone.

Please send assistance to Brittle Hollow immediately upon receiving this message. My thanks. I await your arrival at my shrine.

Sanidine stares at the message, reading it again and again, then steps forward to place their palm and their forehead against the wall. The words of the only other person in their universe save Gabbro and themself to know the weight of being the last of a race almost feel warm, and Sanidine imagines they can hear them in the old-but-young Nomai’s voice even now.

The grief they managed to squash earlier returns, and their throat tightens. Solanum, in this universe, was not on the Quantum Moon when the Interloper detonated. Her easygoing nature seems like it’s been tempered by worry, and her language feels more mature, less informal. Sanidine can’t help but wonder if she died on Brittle Hollow, and as they exhale the glowing death throes of a star that never was, they quietly hope that she was asleep when the ghost matter wave reached her.

This version of her deserves peace, after the life she could’ve lived.

Sani’s unsure what tips them off, but Gabbro’s hand falls on their shoulder. “You okay?”

“I. Yeah.” They inhale, clearing the star-gas from the inside of their helmet by simply breathing it back in. “I think so. Found something I wasn’t expecting.”

“So the whole time travel machine was expected?” Gabbro asks. “Because, you know, it definitely wasn’t for us. But the theory’s sound, which is incredible.”

“Yup.” Sanidine nods once, not yet turning to look at the other Hearthian. “It hasn’t been activated, in this universe. Looks like they had the same problem with the Sun Station. But in ours, our star, it reached the end of its lifespan naturally during our lifetimes.”

Gabbro’s hand tightens slightly on their shoulder.

“The project turned on, like it was designed to do. And after hundreds of years stuck in the same day without realizing it, eventually, the damn cannon found the Eye. My Gabbro and I were the lucky winners who got paired up with statues by sheer stupid chance. I can promise you, this machine not only works, it works perfectly. No matter how many times the cycle repeats.”

“When you talked about dying in the Bramble,” Gossan says, quietly, “That’s what you meant.”

Sanidine nods again, and now Gossan’s hand is on their other shoulder.

“Stars above, Sanidine.” Their would’ve-been parent says, and the emotion in their voice is so heavy that Sani has to bite their cheek to keep from simply breaking down. They didn’t expect telling someone to be this painful, and they certainly weren’t expecting that the grief in this new Gossan’s voice would shake them almost as badly as their own Gossan’s reaction had.

They swallow thickly, trying to clear the lump in their throat that threatens to silence them. “It happened fourteen billion years ago. It’s over now. No point dwelling on it, especially not for you two. You don’t need to worry about me because of it. We should just go back to what we came here to do.”

The ensuing silence hangs over the three, an uncomfortable blanket that itches at Sanidine’s mind. They clench their hands into fists, fighting the urge to swat away the hands on their shoulders, and close their eyes. The two other Hearthians feel almost too close, their concern and grief too suffocating in the moment.

Sanidine reaches deep for strength and manages a soft, broken “Please.”

Gabbro lets go first, and after a moment and the sound of rustling fabric, Gossan does the same. Sani inhales as though their hands had been pinning their lungs shut, and hangs their head, fighting the trembling that threatens to make itself known in their limbs. They open their mouth to speak, close it again, grind their teeth in frustration.

The time loops broke them, shattered the person they used to be into pieces, some so small they may as well have been stardust. The only reason there was anything to glue back together was Gabbro catching the shards of their soul and steadfastly refusing to let go of them, just as they’d done, just as they’d both promised to do for each other on a sandy beach that was gone forever now. Having that seen by people they don’t truly know, people that can’t possibly fathom what the experience had been like, leaves them feeling entirely too exposed.

They already know they’re pathetic. Fourteen billion years and change, and this is the best they can do? How many more eternities do they need before they can speak about this without cracking at the edges all over again?

Maybe it’s the lack of the other half of their being that keeps them from handling it better. It wouldn’t be surprising. They cling to memories of their heartbeat, their touch, their voice, and after a long moment of letting those figments play through their mind they choke out a “Thank you.”

The other two Travelers offer up a “Sure” and a “Of course”, before they walk away to resume reading the translated Nomaian.

Sani opens their eyes to stare at their boots, hot tears splashing against the faceplate of their helmet. Damn it. Damn it, they need to get themself together. They reach up and flick their radio mic off, then dig their fingers against their sleeves. They need to stop breaking, and start moving again. Gabbro is still there, they have to be, and for all they’ve tried to remain detached they really do want to help reunite Gossan and Alaskite.

Feldspar too, they suppose. Not like they’re the same Feldspar. Maybe this one actually cares about their loved ones.

Okay. Spiral averted, for the time being, largely because they grew too annoyed at the liquid on their visor for their brain to focus on the emotional turmoil it was whipping up. Gabbro- their Gabbro- would probably call that a win for mental discipline. Maybe.

Sani chooses to believe it’s a win anyway, and they start back toward the gravity and casing control. There’s air in the Ash Twin Project, and they could lift their helmet to wipe their eyes and nose, to clean the tears out of the visor’s HUD projectors, but they won’t. The ozone-smell is strong enough to filter in through their tank’s scrubbers, after all, and on top of that they would prefer not to voluntarily reveal just how much of a wreck the conversation made them.

Instead, when they reach the end of the walkway, they toggle open the casing with practiced ease and switch their radio mic back on. “Hey, I’m going to switch off the gravity in a moment here. Don’t worry, it’s safe, just try not to thrust too hard. The chamber’s not as large as it looks.”

Learning that had been a less than glamorous way to crack their visor open on one of their practice runs before the real thing. Neither of the other two needed to know that.

“Any particular reason?” Gossan asks, their flashlight sweeping back over to Sanidine.

“For my end of all this, I’m gonna need that.” Sani says, then lifts their arm, pointing at the open casing. They can hear the hitch in Gabbro’s breath and the whispered cursing from Gossan as soon as the pair realize what they’re looking at.

“Hatchling,” Gossan starts. Stops. Stares at the exposed warp core a little longer. “Hatchling, are you sure it’s safe to take that out?”

“Yeah. Well.” Sanidine glances at the gravity control, idly making the ball spin. “Safe enough. Unless you’re expecting a supernova sometime soon, it’s just sitting there looking pretty.”

Gabbro shakes their head. “Last time Chert radioed in, we seemed to be doing okay.”

“See? Nothing to fear.” Sani says. Then, without any further warning, they slide the control orb into the off position and jet off the walkway. They had plenty of practice attempts to get used to the timing of this, and while they hardly measured it, this Ash Twin Project seems to be about the same size as the original.

This is good. This means that, while Gossan and Gabbro gently detach from the floor, Sanidine is a good half of the way to the warp core already. They stretch out their hand and grab the casing’s open edge, using it along with gentle thrusts to steady themself. Then they reach into the casing and start disconnecting the warp core from the system it powers.

This, they attempted less frequently than the other steps of the plan. Oh, they practiced it, to be sure, but even the knowledge that the project would spin right back up just by reinserting the core never really made them feel any more comfortable with the weight of it in their hands.

They have it out and held to their chest before Gossan can reach them, regardless. The entire room powers down save for some emergency lighting around the walkway, and the core pulses with warmth and potential even through the material of their suit, just as it always had before. They fight the urge to shudder, repeating to themself that this is a completely different situation, that there’s no danger in removing it this time, that they’re safe.

It only sort of works, but it’s enough that Gossan and Gabbro don’t try to insist they put the core back.

“Warp pad’s still online despite you pulling that, right?” Gossan asks, the trio guiding themselves toward it with careful adjustments of their jetpacks.

“Yup! The pads function on their own power.” Sani says, touching down just behind Gossan on the pad. “Soon as the alignment is good, the warp will engage. With the Twins, it won’t take too long, and we should still have plenty of time before the sand starts to hit again.”

“Amazing.” Gabbro mutters, then prods the pad’s warp core with the toe of their boot. “Slate would go manic trying to dissect how these work, if they can run on internal power. And this whole project is probably the most impressive application of space-time theory that I’ve ever heard of. Sending information back through linked storage using a black hole is the kind of thing people like me dream of figuring out. I wonder how they handled…”

Sanidine closes their eyes, just waiting for the alignment. They can’t help the melancholy smile that Gabbro’s rambling brings to their face. It’s warm and familiar, a side that their own Gabbro rarely showed, but one they always cherished seeing. As much as they wish this was the Gabbro they fell in love with, speaking passionately about the quantum rules or the differences in approach between Nomai and Hearthian coordinate systems, they’re still happy that this version is willing to share so freely.

They’re still smiling when the warp pad finally activates, and they’re swept away once more, leaving the Ash Twin Project cold and still in their wake.