Before anybody else in the world, there was Stelle.

Well, the first was actually the overworked doctor who delivered him, who very nearly dropped him on account of exhaustion. And then there was a very lazy nurse, who was taking notes on his clipboard rather than actually helping. After that, there was his birth mother, who immediately burst into tears upon seeing him. And finally, there was his birth father, who reportedly passed out during a labor he didn’t undergo. And only after he’d met all of them, there was Stelle. But she might as well have been the first one he truly met in life, because she was the only person from that hospital room who ended up staying. His mother had all but abandoned the two of them the second she learned she had lung cancer. Something about not being able to properly raise two children while she was in recovery, and she must have been right, because she died before Caelus had turned two. His father had joined her not very long after, supposedly stricken by grief. And of course, the doctor and nurse were left behind in the city he was born in, not that he remembered what that was.

As such, Stelle Murata-Yang, his older sister by 2 minutes, was the best person ever.

“CAELUS MURATA-YANG, GET YOUR BITCH ASS DOWN HERE RIGHT NOW!”

Although he suspected that she did not feel the same about him at the moment.

Barelling down the stairs, Caelus came to a screeching halt before he made it down, the sight of Stelle with her hands on her hips at the front door enough to make him reconsider all of his life choices. Dressed in nothing but blue pants and a white jacket that definitely wasn’t hers, it seemed like her night at the club hadn’t gone how she planned. She was definitely pissed then, but about what? He hadn’t made a mess of the house, he hadn’t gotten involved in a news scandal again, and he definitely hadn’t been arrested. He was still here, after all.

“Where,” Stelle hissed, stepping aside to reveal an empty driveway. “The fuck is my car?”

“Heyyyy, Boothill! What’s up?”

“Motherfucker — sorry, motherfudger, it’s 3 am! What the heck is the matter with you?!”

“Um… this is gonna sound crazy, but I might’ve crashed the car into a ditch while I was going to the gas station for a snack and I need your tow truck.”

“Caelus, this is Argenti. Firstly, are you alright?”

“Yes, totally fine. Just need a tow.”

“Good. We’ll leave shortly. But I swear in Idrila’s name, if Boothill does not hold me back, you are a dead man.”

“Uhhhh — I left it with Boothill. The check engine light came on… and Imight’vedenteditalittlesorry.”

Stelle raised her fist, but hesitated, and Caelus wasn’t about to ask why. She sighed, lowered her fist, and muttered, “Let me in, bozo.”

That wasn’t weird at all.

Caelus stepped aside and watched as Stelle threw herself onto their couch, burying her face into the cushions. Shutting the door behind him, he carefully tiptoed over to her and gently patted her on the head. She didn’t respond with anything more than a sound of annoyance, so he didn’t suspect anything terrible.

“Was clubbing that bad? I know Sunday can’t really dance, but…” Caelus began, taking a seat next to his sister. “And why isn’t he coming in? He dropped you off, ri—”

“He broke up with me.”

“Huh?”

Stelle rolled around, staring at the ceiling as she asked, “Do you think I’m too disorganized?”

Caelus looked around at their living room. The TV’s cable management was completely fucked, the coffee table was loaded with various snacks and drinks, and the shoe stand at the door had been discarded in favor of tossing their shoes at the wall in the general area. A glimpse into the kitchen revealed pots and pans scattered about the island, and the chairs around the dining table were nowhere near their original positions.

“No, not really, why?” responded Caelus.

“He said I have no purpose. I have no fucking idea what he’s talking about! I love running the bar! But he thinks cause I don’t have a fucking bachelor’s degree that I’ll just bail on the whole thing!” Stelle yelled, thrashing about as she attacked an imaginary Sunday. “I didn’t get a fucking associate degree for nothing!”

Nodding sagely, Caelus swiftly evacuated from the couch as he went to the kitchen to fetch some snacks. The only thing waiting for him now was a stay-in Saturday, and there was a tub of butterscotch ice cream calling their name. Collecting a pair of spoons, he slid back into the living room, where Stelle was continuing her tirade against her now ex-boyfriend.

“Honestly, what the fuck is wrong with him? He knows I enjoy partying, so why is it suddenly a problem if I go dancing once or twice a month?!” cried Stelle, snatching a spoon away from Caelus and scooping up a chunk of ice cream. “He’s all, ‘Stelle, don’t cheat on me by speaking to literally anyone that isn’t me, Stelle, clean up this mess while you’re nearly blackout drunk, Stelle, you’re a fucking failure because you didn’t drop 200 thousand dollars on college,’ like seriously, I’m amazed he ever acted like he cares about me!”

“Wait, he thought you were cheating on him?” Caelus asked, spoon stuck in the ice cream as he processed all that his sister had dumped on him. “That can’t be it. Sunny boy thought that?”

“YES!” Stelle screeched, throwing herself onto Caelus’s shoulder. “I know I’ve been hanging out with Eve more often, but that doesn’t mean I’m cheating on him!”

“So why did he —”

“Oh, it’s the dumbest fucking thing. It’s cause I was leaning on Eve after blacking out!”

“No!”

“Yes! Somehow that was his last straw and he dumped me! Everything about me being irresponsible and messy were probably lies so he’d feel better!” said Stelle.

“Man, fuck that guy,” Caelus grumbled. “You know what? Good riddance!”

“For real! I gotta call Robin, poor girl’s gonna be so confused…”

Frankly, this development hadn’t been entirely out of left field. Sunday had smoothly folded into their crew about four years ago, but his introduction was anything but. The first time that Caelus met him on a street corner, the young man had accosted them to “find the light” by following Ena, a deity of order and righteousness. The latter part was up for debate, but the twins had quickly sensed that this man was completely full of shit, and swiftly made sure to avoid that part of campus as much as possible. That didn’t last long, however, as the man somehow took personal offense with March and her trans flag pins on her backpack; honestly, Caelus was amazed that someone so close-minded could exist in this day and age. Or, at least, at a very progressive college such as that of The Herta College of Arts and Sciences.

He wasn’t a huge issue, because March quickly learned to ignore him, but that only worked for so long. One day, Sunday had followed March to her class, spouting various quotes from his bible that they were certain he wrote himself, until Dan Heng lost his cool and punched Sunday in the face. Things got a bit out of hand after that, as they had all been dragged to the station: Dan Heng and Evernight had been booked for assault, Caelus and Stelle followed to bail them out, and March was invited to tell her side of the story. Shockingly, she chose to absolve Sunday of everything, but that was probably because he was nursing a black eye just outside the station.

Through March’s weird persistence at getting to know him better, Sunday eventually came around to the idea that, perhaps, people’s individual identities should be respected, and that he had been acting like a complete ass. Still, his uptight behavior never fully went away, and it was clearly the reason Stelle’s own relationship with him suffered so much. That Stelle dated him at all wasn’t a huge surprise, because it wasn’t like Sunday had nothing going for him, but the fact that she stayed with him despite the huge differences in their outlook on life was.

Despite the front full of anger that Stelle was putting up, Caelus knew better. She’d probably eventually retreat into her room for a while, take a few days off work, and sulk until she had cried it all out.

Impulsive decisions weren’t anything new to Caelus. When he was still living in Aedes Elysiae, he remembered convincing Phainon and Cyrene to steal a jar of Old Man Atticus’s homemade wine. They had distracted the guard dog with a steak, climbed on top of each other to snatch the amphora hanging in the garden, and gotten so drunk that Caelus nearly ended up drowning in the lake. He absolutely had to do that again; maybe he’d visit Phainon again after Anaxagoras and Hyacine left. When he was offered a position on the Dovebrook Furbos in exchange for running a newspaper every now and then, he snatched it up before Stelle could suggest that he was probably being scammed. It was only through sheer luck that Nihilux had been telling the truth, and personally delivered his contract herself.

So when he saw Stelle slumped into the couch with her eyes red and with her mouth stuffed with ice cream as she fired off explanatory texts to their friends, he didn’t hesitate to suggest, “Let’s go on a road trip!”

Stelle froze, her spoon halfway to her mouth as ice cream dripped off the sides, as she said, “What?”

“A road trip!” Caelus continued. “Look, I have to go to Ahatopia for baseball, so let’s just hit up a bunch of places before I end up there! It’ll be fun, we can drag Dan Heng and March along! Just like old times!”

“I — Dan Heng has med school. I have to run a bar,” Stelle protested, waving her hands about. “And March has client appointments, you want her to reschedule weddings?”

“Ok, we’ll leave those two out then, but you can let Topaz, Ratio, and Aventurine run the bar!”

“I would rather die than let that throuple run my shit.”

“Like you have a choice.”

“I do, actually! I could leave it to Cerydra!”

“See? You’re free! Start packing. I’ll go get the car!” declared Caelus, rising up from his seat and sprinting to the front door.

“Wha — Caelus!”

“You… want your car back?”

Argenti wasn’t known to be a man who got angry. After all, he was partners with Boothill. Dealing with that man took a great deal of patience, especially when it came to handling angry customers. Dating him likely took even more, and raising Rappa was probably one of the greatest tests of patience ever. And yet, when Caelus asked for his own car back, Argenti’s face contorted with anger for but a moment, and the baseballer knew he had to back the fuck off.

“You know what, maybe another time,” said Caelus, forcing out an awkward laugh as he backtracked away from the counter of Argenti’s workshop. “Call me when it’s done — oof!”

In his haste to escape the situation, he hadn’t heard the workshops door opening, nor had he sensed Boothill’s presence as he slammed straight into the man and fell to the floor.

“Oh, hey there pardner,” Boothill said, holding up a bag of donuts and offering him one. “Donut?”

“No, sorry, I was just leaving!” Caelus stammered, gently pushing away the bag. He couldn’t afford to break his dieting twice in one day. “Sorry to bother you!”

“Hey wait, you wanna see the car first? You really fucked — sorry, forked that shit — that shizzle, dangnabbit!”

“You’re getting there,” Argenti sighed, stepping out from behind the counter to greet his partner. “Caelus, he is correct, as you truly messed it up. It will take a few days to repair the damage. What seems to be the rush?”

He could have just lied. He should have, frankly. There was no way Argenti would take the real reason he needed his car well, with how often he preached about personal responsiblity and proper financial planning. A road trip for an unspecified amount of time would absolutely earn him a talking to, or worse, a call to his parents.

But that was the talk of cowards, and Caelus was no coward.

“Stelle and I are going on a cross country trip to drop me off at Ahatopia for baseball,” explained Caelus. “It’s also a coping trip for her. Sunday broke up with her.”

“Oh, that forkin’ shithead — spoonhead!” Boothill slapped his hand over his mouth, groaning as he continued, “Robin called me before you got here. Stelle called her all up in a fuss, talkin’ about some cheating business, which didn’t actually happen? There was a lot of cryin’, but I got the gist. I’ll get your car on the lift, then. Come back in two days.”

“Actually!” Caelus said, reaching out towards Boothill. “You wanna come with? I was looking to get some people together, it’d be fun! Belobog, The Luofu region, Penacony, Okhema, and finally Ahatopia! Come on, what do you say?”

“He can’t,” Argenti replied firmly, heading back behind the counter and tapping a calendar on the wall. “We have many appointments with customers, not to mention Rappa’s elementary school graduation is in a few days.”

“They do that for elementary now?”

“Who knows,” said Argenti with a shrug. “But we will be going, and so neither of us can come with you. Still, if you seek company…”

“Then we got a guy for you,” Boothill finished. “We hired an part-timer from Belobog, you see, but he’s getting mighty homesick, and we can manage without him for a bit; take him back with you, and I’ll fix this for free.”

“You bet! Send him to my place with the car then!”

The next two days passed by in something of a blur. True to his word, Caelus pinged as many of his friends as possible to see who was willing to undergo this journey with them, desperately pleading in the name of friendship and adventure.

It was largely a failure.

Dan Heng, indeed, had to go apartment hunting with Hyacine before their med school started, and March was currently off in Ahatopia, with the promise to meet them as they finished the journey. Castorice was preoccupied with con preparations, tasking herself with creating her own costume from scratch. Her WIP’s did indicate something spectacular, but she couldn’t just abandon it. Topaz and Ratio were currently unemployed, but Aventurine’s casino was opening up this week and he wasn’t about to let his new floor manager and treasurer abandon him so soon.

Cipher had just spammed laughing emojis at him. He vowed to set fire to her cat-eared hoodie as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, Stelle had begged Cerydra to run the bar, which the woman gladly accepted under one condition: she and Hysilens drank for free. The contract was signed, but if The Astral Express even went into neutral earnings before Stelle got back, it would be entirely Cerdyra’s fault. It seemed fair, at least. With that, the last thing to do was to plan out where they’d stay, decide what to do on the trip, and pack all their things, leading to a hectic packing session the day before.

“Hey, I’m gonna go say bye to Firefly, ok?” said Caelus as he tossed clothes into a suitcase and slammed it shut. “I’ll be back for dinner.”

“Don’t be too late,” Stelle replied from across the room, her own suitcase neatly packed without anything out of place. That matter was quickly remedied as she caught sight of something on the floor, screeching, “BUG! CAELUS, KILL IT—”

Caelus didn’t stick around to find out what she was looking at. He hated bugs too. Firefly had always been the one ready to crush any cockroach that stood in his way.

He decided to go running. The car was busted anyways, and he didn’t feel like getting his bike out of the garage. Plus, the sun was just setting, and the breeze blew gently onto his face. It was a perfect night, and Firefly wasn’t very far away anyways. She was just at the end of the neighborhood, next to a house that nobody really lived in anymore on account of a death in the family. Their cat still wandered around, waiting patiently for owners who would never return. He made sure to pet it as he passed by.

Turning into the cemetery, Caelus spotted a gravestone decorated with a wreath of sunflowers, and slowly came to a stop in front of it. He dropped to the ground, breathing heavily as he caught his breath, and stared up at the sky.

“So, you come here often?”

He got no response, but he imagined it would have gone something in the way of a punch on his arm for being so corny.

“Me personally, I love coming here. There’s this lovely girl I wanna see, but she hardly gives me the time of day anymore,” Caelus began, basking in the breeze blowing on his face. “I won’t be seeing her much anymore, though. I have to go to Ahatopia tomorrow and… I probably won’t come back. I’ll just have Stelle send some movers.”

Once again, he received no response, but his imagined response was one admonishing him for foisting responsibility onto his sister. He deserved that, but Stelle could handle it. She was better than him, they both knew it.

“I don’t know what I’ll do about that girl. Honestly, it’s been so many years, it might be time to move on, right? After all, I… she’s happy. She left this town happy, and I should too.”

And this time, he couldn’t even imagine what she would have said. Perhaps she’d have stared at him incredulously, unable to believe that Caelus would ever love anyone but her. He wouldn’t have believed it either. He knew better now.

“Maybe I will do that. Ahatopia contains new horizons for me! A new life, new friends, new everything, new love, and I — I have to do it all without you.”

Caelus turned to the gravestone and gently placed his hand on top of it, reading the inscription that he already knew by heart.

Here lies Firefly Titania of the Glamothian Empire, daughter of Kafka, daughter of Blade, and sister of Silver Wolf. May her soul set the seas of heaven ablaze.

“I’ll bring back a souvenir someday, ok?”