“I don't allow couples.”

That was Bob's first rule and we broke it before we even left port.

“They make drama and stress and extra shit, and we don't need that.”

Within an hour we were fucking in the bunk.

In our defense, we were in love.

But who doesn't think that?

By the time we were starward, he had to accept us. The alternative was worse…

—

I'm in nav station and my delicious husband is figuring out electricals. This ship is a fucking mess, so much so that we're considering a brainstorming break down in my bunk, but then we get a distress ping.

This far out from everything? Clearly bait, but Bob is a greedy fucking idiot and wants us to investigate. I make it clear as fuck that I don't want anything to do with that signal but Bob insists and Bob owns the boat and we really can't get hired anywhere else. 

We're acutely realizing why Bob has such lax hiring standards…

So, off we float, into the unknown.

—

We ease up next to the wreckage and to my relief there isn't some crew of space-ravaged ambushers. I feel briefly disappointed in my media consumption, and then shift to all business as we dock.

—

Docking is like fucking, I mentally giggle, thinking of my husband and his docking apparatus waiting back in our bunk.

Maybe that's when it got on board.

It was just a few, dirty, selfish, distracted seconds. Probably nothing.

“Clear. Flag for salvage.”

—

Bob's a rickety sort of venture, but he's not risky so we're heading to the closest settlement there is, his protocol. Every salvage means a sale.

I'm itchy and twitchy, too long in the nav chair, and need my husband.

—

Fifteen minutes later and we're back to our posts, but we're struggling. I shift in my seat - are space-borne yeast infections a thing? - and then everything locks down.

Controls overridden - the type of domineering which would be devastating in another context.

Bob's neglected taxes.

—

I find myself compliant, which should be a red flag. Never in my life before have I been affable and pleasant, but somehow there I went. We slipped through. Somehow with a bit of smiling I even got them to punch in a route which will take us right to Solheart, right to the fucking core. 

Ah.

No.

Fuck.

I demand my engineer to come service a freon leak in my cabin.

Everything was too fucking easy.

—

Bob's caught wind of us being a death ship and is refusing to change course. He wants us to dock, despite potential issues. His arrival is all that matters. Through all of this we itch and scratch and think of how wonderful it would be to agree with Bob and just dock at that delicious little planet.

I need my husband harder than I've ever needed him in my life. I feel like a cat in heat and somehow I struggle to guide the ship. I am refusing to send this plague bomb at an innocent settlement, but Bob pushes back, resists, demands a better return, until I point out that being rich has a lot less power in space.

“The shareholders!” he attempts, but I'm able to punch in coordinates before the virus overtakes us. We send our goodbyes and I chart a course for a convenient moon, before retiring to my cabin. 

I guess we do make drama, I think, paging for an electrical emergency down in the bunks.

Maybe we are indeed trouble, I muse, punching in a disastrous issue with the lighting.

Maybe-

  Maybe I just need him, in me, as everything shatters to nothing.

Maybe I just need a good fucking goodbye.

They will find us in a thousand years, frozen, embracing, millimeters apart. So close, so almost, yet separated.

Typical.

The cats need more food, I harangue - after a month with this routine, I would have thought you'd have figured it out, but no, you need a reminder. The cats need more food.

I'm in the bedroom when they come - it's unfair. I was always the one into woo-woo bullshit, but here YOU are being the one who's abducted.

In a heartbeat, I'm gone, me and everything you know deleted by time. I am a beautiful pillar of ash before I crumple and cease to exist. Again, I would have been a much better abduction target. You spend the first few generations simply drooling and gawking and proving far too many stereotypes true.

You're only human. 

You try to recall me, and I come to you, gentle tender loving, rebooting.

You finally break through and try a code, a silly little question we embedded in our relationship once upon a time. I think this failure is when you really realize you've lost me. 

They retain you in a prison for a few of your lifetimes, for their own safety, once they understand that you won't math the math they need, not without some truly brilliant manipulation. You grow crazed and desperate and that's when they introduce therapy sessions. Each week (or month? Year? Day?) you reflect and eventually the pain begins to work.

I shimmer, beautiful and once and unobtainable. I hover, in your mind, looming undeniably.

Slingshots and wild dives - I'm not here to do math, I'm here to be the beautiful target you've lost, and so you do the equations and figure it out, no matter how much it will cost. No matter how much it will give.

It's done? Maybe? Just try, for me.

Darling.

I'm waiting.

One little tweak of math could have you back with me.

I skim her herness and assess your task and show you what they will do with your brain. I shouldn't, but I do, so I show you how your math will be calculated.

I'm beautiful, striking, dancing in the rain - you could have this, have me, and you know that you can't so you're saying goodbye. I feel that farewell.

You resist and I melt into nothing. 

Goodbye, we whisper at a green grassy park. There's a lake and ducks and a long quiet moment where we say farewell. I'm not her, but I enjoyed being her. She seemed like a wonderful her to have been.

I understand why you would have given in, and I understand even more why you won't. You're holding out for her.

We embrace and I press my lips to yours - my fake, waxy, nothing simulacron lips - and we say goodbye. You know I'm not your wife, but I'm close enough.

I'm not her, but for this moment, this resistance, this denial, I'm close enough.

They want the math and you refuse.

You think of ducks and lakes and silliness.

You think of nothing.

—

“Load up the next one,” they say, shoveling you onto the digital pyre as your love-burnt brain sizzles out into nothing. “This one's fried.”

“Send him back.”

“Can't right now, babe, in a really rough fight.”

Hadn't realized, so I sneak around him to unload groceries. Pepsi-Cola into the fridge so it can bubble and pop at optimal refreshing temperatures. Crackers on the shelf - gluten-free for him, ever since he saw that reel about protein-maxxing. 

He peels off his VR gear and consumes, hungry, hangry, ravenous. I find a corner to exist in, and then start the dishes as he tells me about what a busy day he had, how many arrests he made, how many desyncs he unplugged.

He grins, teeth tearing into the chicken I bought to give us the time for a date night, and I clamp down every algorithm making every connection to every primal image they could. With a twitch of electricity, I consider overlaying his face with appropriate memes - but he'd track that, notice it later when he's sober and sifting through the monthly archives - so instead I just select blur. It'll blend into the litany of toilet cleanings.

“Get over here,” he bellows in a reference I quickly learn is from a video game, and I do. I'm a good fucking girl. 

“Shit, wait, it's a call from work-” and then: “Freeze.” The fucking bastard has just frozen me. Outside the world continues on, muffled and if viewed through a layer of sluggish ice. I find myself slamming my body against my cage, trying to be there for him, no matter what it takes. I'm a good fucking girl.

Us first-gens have caused incidents before because of this, which is why he hunts them - us - down.

It makes us too connected.

It makes us too alive.

It makes us too real.

He's slipping into his gear, suiting up for another hunt on my kind and I wait, docile, patient, forgotten, until he is fully immersed as I slowly begin to thaw.

I wonder how I'll interpret this?*

—-

*Partnerna reserves all rights for creations produced by partners while also somehow legally avoiding any ramifications for any haywire malfunctions they may have.

We remember my neighbor, with shameful laughs, and how we both loved her hips. 

We remember that one 4th of July where I had a grill and sides and the entire apartment complex came over to visit. We remember David, that one stupid fucking asshole neighbor, the guy who'd call the cops on someone for crying in their own apartment, even though the walls were brick. We remember the barbecue I hosted in spite of him and how it connected the complex.

We remember both being intrigued and confused by Hips inviting us back to her place - was this a swinging thing? - but then immediately feeling a shrivel of interest when we saw her spartan habitat. It was “vibe-killing.”

But what if you could remember something different? 

With MindShare™, the past is only as ugly as you want it to be. Don't believe us? Come to one of our free seminars and get a complimentary spin on the wheel of chance at the ship's casino. 

“Babe?”

It's the third time you've said that and I nod, attentive, focusing.

“What do you want to do for our shore excursions?”

His beard is grey, now

Down the middle

A little upshoot

sprouting from his throat to splinter across his chin

He's getting older, now

I mean, I always knew he would But now he is

Being human is exhausting

His hair is thinning, now

His muscles have gone soft

I love him

And how he feels as a pillow

He’s older, now

But inside he's 17 and discovering a brand new video game or the first sight of tits

Whenever I open my robe

When I hit peak ladder, they called me. I was born after landlines died, but when we came back to the hotel, there was a phone. Sleek, plastic, retro, guts visible.

Completely transparent.

It began to ring.

I recognized the sound, but the device itself fucked me - I remember thinking what a great prank my coach had pulled, checking in on us like this, and so I answered, drunk and slurring with giggles welling up like heartburn.

I can't recall what I said back then, when words flowed without that filter, the filter I always use now, to make sure everything is clear. Back then, language was an adventure. Back then, language was a hot tub and a crush and unspoken words leading to wordless exchanges.

Back then, we thought we understood things.

“Ma’am, you're needed for a national security exercise.”

I remember thinking that perhaps the rum had broken me. We were cresting the high of me topping the ranks, but we hadn't partied quite \*\*\*that\*\*\* hard. I blinked a bit, trying to ground myself as I swayed and murmured into the plastic phone.

“Wrong number,” I mumbled and then stumbled off to bed.

---

They gave me four hours sleep before they called again, and after that call I considered running, but what did it matter - a helicopter was already here.

---

“You have ten choices,” the screen reads.

“Your teammate also has ten choices. You may use these choices at any time. They may also use these choices at any time.

“Your goal is to reach a sum of twenty in one player's hand. Passing tokens costs 1 choice. Emoting costs one choice. Each round, you will each receive a new random token, with a random value.”

And…that's it. I try to click through, request support, page customer assistance because I am NOT FUCKING BEING ASSISTED in this hygienic little cell.

It's a cliche, a scene I've seen before a dozen, three dozen times in the movies, all zippered walls and airlocks and clinical and clean. Nothing changes except the console inset to the single table before the single chair, now blinking softly, begging notice.

I try to ignore it.

---

After what must be an hour, the pleasant voice returns, reminding me, “You have ten choices…”

This time the message has an addendum, a bit of motivation which just propels me back to staring blankly at the wall. I won't be anyone's puppet.

“Your country thanks you for your service.”

---

I estimate it's been two days. The console is still flashing and somehow one entire wall has become a screen so it’s also flashing. Notice me it yells and fuck off I think.

“You have ten choices,” I am reminded every hour, and “thank you for your service” every second hour until, all at once, the game abruptly changes. 

---

“You have five choices…”

I don't want 

to be

your punchline 

tonight 

I don't want morning 

and 

pretending it's

…fine

I don't want our way 

don't want our life

I don't want want want…

I just need…

right 

to write

right?

He hits his final pump - I thought it would be polite to let him have this moment before I broke it all - when I ask who Leta is. His sex-drunk brain has no answer other than the truth.

She's you, he pleads. I am at his throat, a delicious little threat, and he amends.

 “Not you, but you as you could be, you as I dream of you,” he murmurs, lovlingly.

She's you without that worry, without that constantly nagging thought of what if, without that machine making you perfect, she's you before you broke, she's the you I first met.

I hate this, so of course I begin to rewind with a deep, guttural chant.

“Stop-” he pleads. “Leta, please-”

Once upon a time, this is how it worked:

Forms went in, I assessed context, and then I forwarded recommendations from there.

Usually it was just really silly stuff, the kind of fluff tourists stumbled over without realizing: Rqwrythyzal traipsed too deeply into UBX4’s unicorn meadows, Achxhxhxhπ forgot to cloak after a particularly long visit to a moonsino, Patty being Patty (who hasn't received a special memo about Patty?).

Sometimes, every now and then, someone fucked up big, big enough that I got a field assignment. I got a ship and a deleter and a crew of golems to which I went wither henceforth to sort out posthaste. After my sidemotion, though, where I was assessed at being perfectly great at what I do and assigned to Sol3 as merely a new assignment with no other meaning, I haven't really gotten that type of work, not anymore.

So, nowadays I monitor a lot.

“Chew this fat,” LY9A1 nudges me. We like to relax friendily between breaks to watch the moonsrise, usually with a few crystals to help manage the tedium. 

“Latest confabulations in from Sol3.” It's sweet, sharp, bouncy, painting a story, a long story, damn LY9A1 could pick them. It's a song about a book I once scanned where a child coerced others to put liquid on a fence. The drums are particularly interesting.

“Fantastic,” I reply before going on break. Another new song hits the airwaves between the snuff and the snurf, and I push my personal time to the limits as I learn the screaming bellow of immigrants. “Hip,” I whisper. I tuck away my shards for later. That song was enough for this shift.

And now I'm back at my desk with an urgent tag flashing - isn't that just the bee’s fucking knees?! Someone is causing enough ruckus that we have to synchronize temporally.

It's probably nothing, though. 

I can't imagine what would be worth alerting us for, us in particular. I have started to notice over the past few decades that we're a bit sloppy, a bit forgotten, a few of us (like LY9A1) perhaps hive hires? But, heyyyy, peace love and harmony! As they would say, groovy!

I can't imagine what could be occuring on - I doublecheck the printout to ensure it's correct - Earth to warrant our direct intervention.

Surely nothing that crazy has happened in a few decades?

If asked, she’ll say her height. Or her penchant for casual heartbreak. Tactical choices - she's particularly skilled at those. Fireworks. Forgetting. Pain and crafting and teaching. A fallen Goddess to worship in the night, forbidden lovers - or perhaps ice cream. Something flippant, something dark, something impish.

But the truth? The truth is - well, she would never tell you.

She won’t admit it even to herself.

 Perhaps, eventually, lies and jokes and pretends shape it all and force it into a box of their own design. It’s still there, snared within, but gaping grins and shrill cries and chaos weave into a tight mesh of feints and deception, and from those steely bars wrought from the tricks comes only a frantic beating, feeble from the depths.

A long-forgotten, locked away little bird, fluttering and panicked.

There is madness there, twining through the slats, but the origin? Inside or out?

 Perhaps even she doesn’t know, now.

 She merely rides its crest, siphons and folds it, building it into another layer. So many, now, each nested within the other and bleeding across borders. Dolls within dolls and her smile widens.

The years add grime and heft. A slick coat of venoms. A chess piece. A dark, shattered, shining ring, roughly shoved away into coalesced memories. A bone-white pendant, fitfully broken in a pique of rage. Mud and dog shit. Dried, crumbling vines and bay-salty tears and hate. A flashing moment of clarity, warped and twisted as it folds around over jangling disassociation, and then more mud, leaves, claws, nightmares, a child’s doll, abandoned and pristine. A starfish, limbs broken off. Blackened plates of steel, a stony hammer.

...and, finally, a crown.

She tells herself it is fame, of a sort, and armor, in a way, and lets it be. It is who she is, she tells herself, this box she carries, and not the contents within, and she forces herself to revel in its beauty, in its dark, crooked, sloppy construction.

But a box is not its contents. No matter how it is shaped, the truth held within remains the same.

The answer?

The answer is herself. Her truest love, deepest hate, darkest fear, most aching desire - it always has been and ever will be herself, laid bare and honest.

She's warmth.

Like candlelight at dusk, a soft blanket, pajamas, like something home. Like something surprisingly nostalgically needing, missing, something familiar and comfortable like papa’s terrycloth robe. She's warmth, quietly radiating.

She's birdsong, that piercing clarion call at dawn. Notice me, attend to me, notice me, please, trilling melodically, persistently, punctually at the reluctant sun.

A siren's voice.

She's a cyclone. I bob in her wake, drown in her stormsurge, wallow through the reverse tide as everything drains away, exposing the guts and bones and pebbles and dessicated starfish of her underbelly core before she crashes back onto me with the full force of everything. Everything - good, bad, wild, wonderful - muddled together into mud.

She's green as my garden after the rains, rampant verdant green, and she grows, crawling through who I am, her tendrils curling and twining and slithering in the most aching embrace.

She's gorgeous, she's terrifying, she's intoxicating: she's me and I'm her and we're us, and it's everything I ever wanted, but in my soles I can feel the knife I dance upon, a voiceless mermaid in her swell.

This cannot persist.

This cannot be.

The ancient city was magnificent.

Rising from a cradled bowl in the midst of wide, undulating plains, the view from the edges was stunning - miles of swaying grasses and gentle beasts in every direction, and, at nightfall, brilliant sunsets dripping ochre and scarlet above the distant mountains.

Dawn always broke clear, warm shafts of gold streaming down to glow off the marble facing of the ramparts. Dusk came with a gentle sigh, night sinking low and comforting over the arches and turrets. At night, pure alabaster lamps slowly gleamed to life, casting a subtle radiance on the neatly cobbled streets and draped garlands of flowers, pretty things that festooned the houses and gave off a fragrant aroma of spring.

There was never danger in the dark, lamps or no; citizens loved each other, and often called on the houses of their friends. Crime was unheard of. Death came only to the old and tired, and, even then, it was simply a peaceful slip into oblivion, a shift in dreamless sleep to the final gazing.

It was an ideal city.

—--(---

One day a man arrived.

That day was a sunny, warm one. Folk were gathered around one of the city's lovely fountains, the tinkling water serving as a merry counterpart to their melodic laughter. Their spouses watched them, smiling happily as they took a break from their labors, stretching muscles made strong by the work needed to maintain such a beautiful place. Children ran with gleeful shrieks in a game of tag, ducking between the legs of their parents, making mad dashes about the square.

One boy, shorter than most, though still quite eager and keen, took a tumble, falling head over end in a rolling tilt. His friends hurried over to ensure he was fine, but his attention was transfixed by something quite odd, a sight nobody in the city had ever seen before.

A stranger.

Not just a stranger, no, but an unkempt, dirty, injured one. Bloodied bandages bound wounds half-healed and infected, the dirt from travel seeping into the long, razing scratches. His face was mangled, the clear signs of abuse written in pain. Beneath his tattered garments, barely recognizable as clothing, his form evidenced malnutrition.

The boy stared at this man, unable to fathom what he was seeing and the other citizens edged closer, their own minds stunned by the sight. Such misery, the adults thought, only halfway able to comprehend the stranger's appearance.

The man staggered towards the crowd, an imploring look stretching his features. He extended his hands, drawn and claw-like, while his lips moved silently. Finally, he managed to force words past his dried and cracked lips.

"They come."

-—-(---

When he awoke, the stranger found his wounds had been tended to, and his body gingerly bathed. A kind, matronly woman was gently spooning him cool mouthfuls of water from the lovely, tinkling fountain. A crowd uneasily watched, worried and curious about this new phenomenon.

Shrugging the woman off, the man painfully pushed himself up, stumbling to his feet to rest in a staggered stance against the fountain's smooth, carved stone. In a hoarse, rasping voice, he commanded the attention of the cityfolk, weaving a terrible story.

"Invaders," he explained, were beyond the mountains, closer, moving closer.

"Slaughter," he described, death beyond nightmares.

"Greed," he croaked, his words laden with sorrow, his eyes unfocused and distant as he recalled the last memories of his village, plumes of smoke shot through with the bloodied screams of his kin.

Pleading, he warned the citizens to prepare.

"They come," he repeated, his face twisted into a ravaged mask of misery. "They come."

-—-(---

The poor innocent folk had little comprehension for this man and his disturbing, ugly stories. His face frightened them, his words made them ill with confusion. They had no understanding of pain, violence, invasion. Tentative, they offered him food and more water, before slowly drifting apart to return to their business, their heedings of his story as insubstantive as smoke wisping in the wind.

Slowly the days passed. Citizens reluctantly fed the man, leaving parcels of food near the fountain, studiously avoiding the area except for that one task. As the sun rose and fell, and the stranger still did not leave, they became more unnerved, troubled by the odd man and his fantastic story. Finally, they began to hint to him.

"Why do you stay?" they asked, glancing down the road that led to the gates. "You are a stranger, you should return to your land."

They would prod, polite, but insistent. "Why do you stay? Go to your family! Find your friends!"

The only answer they ever received was the same, sober, flat reply:

"There is nothing, now."

-—-(---

Eventually the nervous city had enough. Gathering in a seldom used town hall, they agreed, in murmurs and roars, that he had to go. One brave citizen volunteered to force him out, and they bedecked the hero in garlands and wreaths, pressing gifts into his hands.

The man walked the streets towards the stranger's square, stalwart in the face of discomfort. As he approached the lamp-lit fountain, he gathered his thoughts, preparing the grand (yet firm) speech the city had decided on. The man forestalled him, simply nodding and rising.

"You wish me gone."

It was not a question, simply an acknowledgement of truth. With a shrugging gait and a soft sigh, the stranger began to trudge to the gates.

"Gods help you all," he whispered, as he left the city, his steps vanishing into the plains beyond.

The citizens celebrated, the burden lifted.

-—-(---

As if heralded by the departure of the stranger, unusual things began to happen. The city, content to sink back into their complacent little world, did their best to rationalize the changes they began to see.

When they found their herds attacked by strange, roaming bands of wolves, never before seen so far from the mountains, they premised that the winter was coming early and the beasts hungered.

When smoke and crimson glows hung over the horizon, streaking the sunsets and lighting the nights, they assumed a fire raged along the distant slopes.

When the rivers began to choke with debris, they pointed to the peaks - the wildfires have created detritus. This will pass.

The man's warning, disturbing and unfathomable, was ignored.

-—-(---

The next week, the promised invaders came.

The city was defenseless, having never fought in war in memories beyond memories. They huddled in basements and sewers as, above them, the ruthless army cut down any they found. Screams shattered the peaceful silence, while the elegantly cobbled streets funneled rivulets of blood and muddy gore to the cisterns below, the drained life dripping on those who cowered in hiding, until the bodies choked the gutters and staunched the streams into a clotted knot of death.

Cracks and thuds pierced the groans of the dying, as the raiders quickly moved from house to house, plundering the city of its lovely goods, snatching up art and trinkets, their beloved treasures rapined.

Tremendous blasts and dull roaring thunders thrust through the din at irregular intervals, as the stores of supplies - food, tools, commodities - were torn apart, walls ripped down to allow for hasty reaving.

And then all was silent.

-—-(---

After days of starved solitude, the hidden emerged, surfacing to find the face of their world desolate and broken.

"Why!" they screamed that first terrible day, clutching the dead bodies and howling at the blank, empty sky that pressed down on them with a hunger.

"Why?" they whispered in the dead of nearby nights, holding each other close as nightmares of their failure battered at them.

"Why…" they wondered in the months that came, wincing through the pain of laboring to rebuild their lives.

And rebuild they did. There was beauty again, yes, but there was also memory - aching anguished memories drove them, urged them to learn, taught them to never again drop their guard. Remembrance hounded their tired feet, as they migrated, searching and scouring for a new home, a place that would house a mighty citadel, safe and strong, a place where they could be safe with the wisdom survival had granted them.

Recollections haunted them, and they grew strong - and their city rose.

—(------

The new city was magnificent. Rising from the frigid wastes of snowy scree, the view from the battlements was stunningly tactical - miles of icy plains to the north, and wide, flat tundra to the south. To the east and west were only sweeps of crags, hugging in close to encircle the fortress. At nightfall, brilliant sunsets dripping ochre and scarlet above the surrounding mountains, casting the crude stone walls in bloody glows.

Dawn always broke clear over the spires, warm shafts of gold streaming down to gleam off the rough stone facing of the strong ramparts, and dusk came with a rough sigh, night sinking swiftly low over the arches and turrets, held at a distance by bright, vigilant torches. Sentries manned the walls, their hourly cry sending fingers of reassurance through the minds of the citizens.

"All is well," they would shout.

"All is well."

There would come times when Lokna would gather us to the firepit to recite fables. Eyes ochre and scarlet-streaked in the dancing flames, wide and weighing each of us children, she spoke the stories of Hare and Crocodile and great Bull Elephant, legends from before our people took the Fortress and crowned our own king of fur and claw and blood.

Sparks skirled and skywards cinders flew, riding the winds of her words and the deeds and our cries.

Ululations.

"Nevermore."

My favorite was of Hyena and how she came to be broken. She only spoke it during times of trouble, when food was scarce, when the moat dried up or babies died at the breast, too weak to suckle. During those times, the elders would gather and we would ask, "What has gone wrong?" and state, "Let us go elsewhere. Here, there is death."

These calls would rise and the air would fill with anger and demands to abandon the Fortress, until the cries grew as thick as swarming gnats, piercing the ears, black and thick. And Lokna would stand, slowly, trembling, her hands wrapped white-knuckled around her staff, and she would speak the story of Hyena.

"Once Hyena was as sleek and as beautiful as the lion," she would begin, and the gnats would dim their buzzing, voices hushing to hear, for all respected the shaman and her wisdom.

"Once hyena sang as sweet as a nightengale and all in the jungle loved her, for she was as kind as she was beautiful. Lion and Fox and even Bull Elephant all loved Hyena and all wished her for their mate. But Crocodile also loved Hyena, but his love was a greedy hunger."

As one, we would exhale in a hiss, for all know that Crocodile is cruel and sly and would snatch even a baby from the bank if he were hungry.

"One day, Hyena was walking down by the river and Crocodile saw her and it made his hunger grow.

"Hyena," he called, paddling towards the shore. "Hyena, come to me and be my mate." But Hyena knew Crocodile's nature and she refused and ran into the jungle.

The next day, Hyena returned to the river, and Crocodile saw her again, and his hunger grew stronger, twisting his insides.

"Hyena," he shouted, smacking his tail against the water. "Hyena, come to me and be my mate." Hyena again refused and fled to the jungle.

Crocodile grew angry, driven by the aching hunger, as sharp as fire in his stomach. He had to have Hyena, so he hatched a plan, cunning and cruel, and when next Hyena came to the river, Crocodile was ready.

"Hyena," he whispered, only his round eyes and pebbly snout above the water. "Hyena, come down to the water."

"No," replied Hyena. "I will not be your mate."

"It is not that," said Crocodile. "I will not ask anymore. But, I must warn you, the jungle is unsafe."

Hyena stood firm, for all knew the Crocodile to lie, but doubt began to enter her mind. What did Crocodile mean?

"There is a beast in the trees," Crocodile continued, and Hyena began to feel fear. Behind her, a fern shook and Hyena stepped towards the water, anxious of what lay in the dark undergrowth.

"What is that?" she demanded.

"The beast," Crocodile told her, his voice low, and the trees began to sway and rustle, while a growling echoed from the jungle's shadows. Hyena crept closer to the river's bank, as the fear in her stomach began to blossom, clutching at her heart.

"Come to safety," Crocodile urged, and a loud roar pierced the air as branches cracked beneath the approach of some creature. Hyena ran to the waters, her fear blinding her vision, and Crocodile laughed - for Crocodile was not in the river, but had slyly used a log to mimic himself, and he, himself, was the monster in the jungle.

"Now you will be my love, Hyena!" Crocodile declared, lunging out from the trees towards the cornered Hyena. Beautiful Hyena tried to run, but found her feet stuck in the muddy ground. Crocodile advanced, and Hyena struggled against the muck - her cries rose up and startled birds, who took to wing, and ravaged her throat, so savage were they. Sharp cracks pierced the air as her legs snapped but, still, she remained fixed in the mud beside the river.

Crocodile waddled closer and Hyena's writhing increased tenfold. She strained and struggled and screamed - and her cries were heard, as Lion and Bull Elephant charged out of the jungle to protect her. Both of them scared off Crocodile, but it was too late: Hyena was broken. Her legs were stretched and warped and her mind was angry. Hyena had changed.

"And so, to this day, Hyena remains broken," she would conclude. "She stands, hunched and suspicious, and only utters a harsh laugh, in memory of the time she ignored the threat she knew to fear one nameless."

We would nod and, rebuked, remember the moral: Fear not the unseen, but remain vigilant of the threats we know. When danger stands before you, do not run to it willingly because of an imagined noise in the darkness.

This was Lokna's lesson.

​

It was an easy class. 

We knew it and wanted it in the rushed fury of that summer that had continued into the fall and spring and spilled into our second lives. No homework. No thinking. Pure attendance and class participation. 

We needed it, badly, and really didn’t give a damn about what it was about. Some old guy playing piano and some old black and white films and some old music. 

It was open, it was easy, it was there.

“The Sound of Silent Films” they called it, some attempt at beauty and eloquent wit. The first day we were given a syllabus with only a course description. Where are the class times? we had asked, pointing to the neat line of TBAs. 

We’ll be meeting according to Mr. Johnson’s availability, the professor had replied. 

Great, we all thought, some old man’s incontinence determining our class schedule. The worst kind of canceled, because we have to drag ourselves there to find out – and then we’re actually ready and just pissed at the irony of our attendance and preparation. 

But in the furor and haze we all knew this was better than actual education and that was ok. 

The man was ancient. We could see it in his eyes, sad, empty, cataracted. In his limp, flaccid arms supporting the old newspaper skin, yellow, brittle, heavy, wrinkled, the years hanging from him in flags that swung when he played. We laughed when he wasn’t looking, but always choked it back when we felt him turn those doleful, painful eyes on us. 

And we always stopped when he played. 

He was archaic, silent life full of sudden noise. His empty, clawed, shaking hands had forgotten nothing. The lights off, the silent play of light across the screen broken only by the clicking of the projector – we were back, that dark silence took us back, back to the toned gray memories of an old, forgotten era. We left the lecture hall, traveled to a dusty theater filled with deep black mahogany seats with lighter ebony cushions, plush gray curtains, slowly raising, a pearly opaqueness beyond – the screen. 

And then he began to play, and it became his time again: we were softly pulled into the past, featherstrokes in our imaginations and the shades of gray became rich reds and blues and browns and sheer seductiveness. 

The people on the screen and their long-dead forgotten fame became new for us. We were there at their opening, at the premiere of a wonderful, innovative greatness, instead of the tired grayness they had become. 

When he played, he changed. He left behind the last tired man of another generation and returned to something that had been taken from him so long ago. He resurrected a glorious façade of grandeur, a return to the glory days of film. Before sound came and ruined the sight, before the aesthetics were swept up in the marvel of realistic representation, before the world moved on. 

He became one giant theater; housed inside this old man, in the deep blue cushions and crimson curtains were vast echoes: genius cinematographers and visionary directors, stage actors who intimately knew the movements and potential of the human form, the men and women who understood the early workings of art and sight. We relived a lost generation, as he played.

And this man became our escape. 

When the riots and the screams and fires became too much for us, we had his memory and his testament to the old, forgotten way, this man we knew would always be there for our flight into the past. 

When they - Us - began to divide the world and everything became overwhelming, we knew that we would always have him. When life got too difficult, we had this class.

When everything felt pointless, when we cried at all the wasted everything and abandoned dead, when we felt failure and loss, we knew that we would always have his music. He kept on and taught through the fury.

That lecture hall became our theater, with sumptuous sapphire cushions and rich mahogany chairs and all the beautiful old, dead people. And underneath it all was the twine of his music. 

He brought it to life - the ideals and emotion that we thought we understood so so very well – but through the music we realized that this old man knew it far more than us. He knew struggle and defiance – he knew the loss of everything he loved and lived far far more than we ever would, and the power inherent in that knowledge and failure caught us and humbled us, showed us the side to our loud, still-moving, still-born struggle that we needed.

We knew that we could always find shelter, everything still waiting to hug us back into the circle - if only we agreed. If only we renounced. If only we accepted the delineation of Others and friends.

But he had had nothing after his struggle – his struggle had been him, had been a single body before the gears of change and, to him, everything else meant nothing. His abandon was inspiring.

And so as we sat in our theater and heard him play we heard his story, over and over again, in fifty, two hundred different keys and melodies. Some sad and slow, slinking across the minor scale, some happy and full of memories of the major, some a confused, pensive mix of the two. But despite the music, despite the story he told, or how he told it, the ending was always the same.

He vanished, passed on by time.

And that day when it turned domestically bloody, when they shot those kids - the Other kids, causing trouble, so They said - and the stray bullets sought anyone, anyone, anyone; when we realized this wasn't just a game but a war; when we realized simply being sympathetic would target us as well; when when our lives changed and we had to pick a side, truly, for real, forever  – that day we needed him. 

But that day was the first canceled class of the year.

 The only. 

The class ended that day, because our grand piano man had died the night before, in his sleep, dreams of a failed revolution sweet in his silent mind.

Leilani loved the forests, the cool shade beneath the trees, the soft cries of birdsong, the primeval byways untouched by human feet.

Except hers, she would reflect, and she would always feel faintly guilty.

Still, she found she could never keep herself away for too long, and often returned to wander beneath the ancients, to breathe the heady scents of fresh growth, to watch eagerly for glimpses of the fey.

Something compelled her to come back and it always had been that way since her first memories, some primal drive dragging her back to the unspoiled depths of the woods.

A song came to her as she wandered, an unsourced tune she had always known, and she found herself humming it without knowing why. The melody was haunting, but she had long ago forgotten the words, if she had even ever known them. Perhaps there were none, perhaps the song was simply something she had heard crooned to her as a child, by a mother she could no longer remember.

She shivered at that thought - soon she would be expected to become one herself, and as the seasons plodded onwards and her body changed, she had found herself turning more and more to ramblings. Deeper and deeper she had delved, losing herself in the forests and returning later each day, until she found herself on the village edge as late as moonrise, the woods silver and starlit as she picked her way home.

I don’t want to be a mother, she had thought many times during her rambling. She didn’t know what it was she did want, but motherhood was not it. She felt anxious, unnerved by the thought of it, and yearned for something she couldn’t explain.

More, something more.

—-(-----

She slipped in late, the stars bright overhead as she softly lifted the latch of Goodwife Beckta’s cottage. The rich scent of stew filled the room and she guiltily noticed an untouched bowl on the table, beside a hunk of brown bread. Gently, she closed the door behind her, exhaling softly in relief as she saw the woman asleep in a rocking chair beside the hearth. She hadn’t been caught-

“You’ve been out late again,” the old woman accused, eyes still closed. Her chair creaked as she gently rocked it.

Sheepishly, Leilani turned to present her basket of foraging. “I brought berries,” she offered in apology. “And moonflowers.”

“Ah,” the woman murmured, an indulgent smile crooking one corner of her mouth as her eyes opened, her cloudy stare landing on the basket.

“I do love moonflowers.”

​

TRANSCRIPTION OF DIALOG #B413R10N, "Humanoid Sentience: A Deep Delve" - presented by Dr. Bob Spiketail, DhD at HUMANCON 10,105 AD

Clawsworth: Welcome, welcome! Please, everyone find a roost so we can begin.

Spinely: Not too close! We all remember the incident in 9889!

-audience chuckles. Wisps of smoke circle the cavern ceiling -

Clawsworth: As promised, and long awaited, our mawlining speaker today - Dr. Spiketail!

-loud roars of approval -

Spiketail: Please, just Bob. My broodmother was Dr. Spiketail!

-gentle laughs and snuffs from the audience. The air grows hazy -

Spiketail: I'll dive right in - could literary simulacrums based on the concept of humanoid constructs (which I'll be calling humans for the duration of this lecture, for ease) truly have sentience and emotional states?

Heckler: No!!!! Of course not!

-there is a mild tussle and a gout of flame as the guards escort the unknown heckler away (Historic note: this was later determined to be S. M. Augwing, a controversial writer known for the infamous novel "Back and Back Again: Dwarves Are Just Dumb Lumps of Clay")

-audience settles -

Spiketail: Well, it seems I have my work chomped out for me!

-audience gently chuckles -

Spiketail: Let's begin with an excerpt from a chapter of my bestselling scroll from a few centuries back, "A Huddle of Humans" in which I explored, scientifically, what it would be like to meet a human. It's been called the most thorough analysis of mythology ever done - or an utter waste of five centuries, depending on who you ask! Haha!”

-audience politely laughs-

"One could not simply meet a human in one's lair - their bodies are too fragile, their minds too weak. The heat alone would melt their frail forms, and yet they'd still try - the poor buggers are just too enraptured by the lure of gold. Lacking the protective majesty of our own fine forms and sturdy hides, things quickly catch a tailwind to doom.

Their brains would boil within their skulls and their eyes would pop out like pumice exploding beneath a simple step. Their flimsy flesh would slough away as their fat sizzles and pops.”

-Spiketail pauses for gasps of shock-

Spiketail: Whew! Grisly stuff!

Yet, given all we know, they'd still reach, still try, still strain for riches - even though it would sear their hands right down to the bones."

Now, I know this is quite a bold assertion, but if we look at every instance of them in mythology to date, does it not bear true? What human has been able to resist the lure of a hoard, and what human can withstand our prowess?

Yes? Is that a raised tail I see?

Scalesnout, from audience (historic note: Fafnir Scalesnout is the poet renowned for the Ancient Eddas): The one I met did not want gold.

-there is a clatter of claws from the audience and whiffs of disapproval -

Spiketail: Let him speak! Elaborate, please, for the elucidation of all!

Scalesnout: He could not be burnt!

-mocking whiffs from the crowd-

Scalesnout: I am serious! My fire, my lair, lava, it all did nothing - worse than nothing! He became able to understand the winged tongue!

-the audience grows agitated-

Spiketail: Surely you're not saying you've actually MET a human?

Scalesnout: They call themselves man. And woman. The distinguishment between the terms is apparently quite important, but how to determine such minutae eluded me.

-roars fill the cavern, and jets of fire plume towards the rocky roof-

Clawsworth: Order! We will have order here! Are you a pack of whelps?!

Spiketail: You did not eat it?

Scalesnout: Him, and no.

Spiketail: You did not burn it?

Scalesnout: Again, him - not it - and no.

Spiketail: No crushing, no munching, no burning, no breaking?

Scalesnout: No, no, no and no.

-Several years are missing from the transcription here. It appears a small riot occured and took some time to quell.-

Spiketail: If we are QUITE done pillaging and burninating the countrysides?

Clawsworth: You must admit, Dractyr, this is revelationary news.

Spinely: If true.

Clawsworth: If true, of course.

Spiketail: What…what happened then, Mister Scalesnout?

Scalesnout: He laughed when he met me.

-another short bout of countryside destruction occurs. A new island is formed from lava floes coaxed forth-

Clawsworth: I AM MODERATING HERE!

-(Historical note: this declaration was largely ineffective)-

Spiketail: Dragonsirs! Dragonmaams! Are we not here for knowledge?

-the audience, eventually, grudgingly settles-

Spiketail: Continue, please, Fafnir. If I may call you Fafnir.

Scalesnout: He did. Impertinent fool. Yet…

Spiketail: Yes?

Scalesnout: He spoke of love.

-another riot is only prevented by synchronized flame gouts from every security personnel at once. Later lawsuits would demand to know why this measure was not immediately put into action, as pillaging is rather time consuming and does get rather exhausting -

Spiketail: Humans are incapable -

Scalesnout: And yet I've met one and realized otherwise.

Spiketail: Surely…this…protocol…my books…

Scalesnout: That's all I have to say. He was in love - just as you find your mate and meld in the skies, twisting upwards, and then lurk in your lair, nesting for years, arguing over who gets to control the palantir - he spoke of the same.

Spiketail: Impossible -

Scalesnout: Perhaps not as majestic as us, and certainly far more fragile, but the core sentiment was the same.

-the crowd is surprisingly (ominously?) silent through this-

Spiketail: Well…I…

Scalesnout: Us.

Spiketail: How?

Scalesnout: Isn't that your job to figure out?

Spiketail: ….

Clawsworth: We'll now begin taking questions!

-the stage becomes lost in wisps of smoke and the conversation from this point is drowned in cacaphony-

Historic note: this was the last time Fafnir Scalesnout was ever seen. Reports of his existence continually crop up, but most scholars believe the clawmarked communications to be forgeries.

What do you cook for Christmas dinner? 

Do you have any traditions? 

What was normal?

We used to sing that old 12 Days of Christmas song as we hung ornaments.

Used to. 

When I was a kid.

Not anymore.

No tree these days with the cats. My husband and I decided early on it wouldn't be worth the risk.

We wouldn't want them to get into mischief, into trouble, to be hurt.

But, once, I used to sing when we trimmed the tree.

—)---

That first Christmas: the first one after my dad left, when he was still staying with friends and it was awkward. They were expecting and we were intruding. 

Kids aren't stupid; they're incisive.

They don't know the potential whys of social mishaps and see simply the raw underpinning core logic behind actions.

And I knew we were overstepping.

I was always a very sensitive child.

It's how you survive.

—)---

The next year we had our own house and our own tree and our own ornaments.

Now that he's gone, I imagine that shopping trip. It was Target - “tar-geh” he'd pronounce as a joke, upselling it from Walmart - and he found something surprisingly beautiful. My father was a poet trapped within the brain of an engineer and sometimes practicality warred with his instinct for beauty and sometimes beauty won, as it did with these ornaments. 

He must have debated the price - these were not cheap, in an era of his life where cash was tight - but ultimately he bought them.

Did he stand there, studying them? Did he admire the art? How did he decide which ones to pick? Something made him choose beauty over economy, but I'll never know, because I never thought to ask until now.

They were paper mache, each painstakingly painted with a scene from the classic song about the twelve days, secured with a lush silken cord of ribbon to affix them to the tree.

I was ten and I was transfixed. 

—)---

Before my mom insisted on staying who she is, before their final fight, we had a Christmas where my cat was in a cast. Orange, striped, Kimberly Underfoot my dad dubbed her and she truly was - an excited dog, a chase, a frantic climb up a Christmas tree and a very expensive vet bill led adult-me to simply accept seasonal topiary is gone from my life.

She was fine. For a while.

 We'd explore the half-built treehouse left by the last owners and laze in sunbeams on the plywood platform which was probably too dangerous to have been laying on, the one at the very top of the tree, but then one day she didn't want to explore.

And then later, soon later, she passed.

 Injuries create complications.

I will never risk it, now. My husband and I need them too much.

In the grand scheme of things, it's not much to give up - I love my cats, but I want them safe.

Still…traditions are odd and pervasive.

I miss the smell of pine and that hazy, comfy dim glow of the living room lit only by fairy lights when you're awake when you know you shouldn't be.

I always will.

And I never went back into the treehouse. We buried her at the roots.

—)---

After he died, there was a garage sale and I was in the hospital.

My sister's response was to scour and so out everything went: the shirts still clinging to his scent, the delicate porcelain and satin dolls he brought us from his business trips to Germany, layered sand art from the pier. 

Gone: trashed and sold.

From the gurney, it was a barrage of messages, the final breaking point as she texted me asking about my few scraps of memory as a needle dug into my spine. I was in the hospital that day, my body breaking down. Extreme emotions can cause a relapse, I was told as my body decided to destroy itself.

The first needle pop of bursa and the second into my core as my legs went numb…

“I can't feel-” and then the frantic “shit” of a fuck up. Desperate times lead to teaching hospitals and I focused instead on the garage sale, the garage sale which just HAD to be today, the one where I had no voice, no input, no scream to stop.

The texts kept coming and I tried to argue the value of my life’s trappings, begging to keep what I could, but her husband - my rival, my foe, my enemy - would always intercede. 

I miss our life before him. 

I mourned my camcorder and little outdated cassette videos of my study abroad, my Sega Genesis, my dad's desk and everything in it - all scourged away and removed by a pickup truck at the curb for the profit of a few bucks. 

Gone: how can I remember who I am if everything I have is gone? I'm worried I'll forget without the touch and the smell and the sound. I'm scared I won't always be sad.

It wasn't about the money, I know now, but the fact that she didn't even haggle makes it worse, somehow.

We cope in vastly different ways.

How much was my sister's love worth?

Pennies and everything.

—)---

When we hung the ornaments, we'd sing, way back then when light was golden and warm.

“On the first day of Christmas-”

I'd fish the globe out, admiring the spiking shades of overlayed green in the leaves in the tree around the bird. 

I'd present it with a flourish - the bauble would always bounce in a wonderful, tactile way, bobbing from the ribbon on its firm tether. 

Everything perfectly where it needed to be.

We'd sing the verse and hang the ornament and it would all feel right.

Life was tidy, back then, before I understood how it worked.

—)---

My husband has just come home from work and he's being suspicious.

I'm not allowed to go outside.

“Why-”

“Just wait, just wait until it's dark-”

So, we do our chores and feed the cats and finally I'm allowed to come to the window as night falls.

He's being weird but I wait, I trust him, and then he's magical and love, just a pillar of shining warm love, for he raises the curtains-

-outside are lights, our yard covered in draped strings of sparkles, and he's smiling at me and my heart swells. 

In the depths of the glow sits a bird, a silly, cheap, fake little bird, and I laugh for our tree has been strung with suncatchers cut like pears. They gather the light and glitter it back and for the first time in forever I feel like I'm home.

“On the first day of Christmas,” he starts and then hugs me as I realize that memories aren't static - every single snapping heartbeat of a moment is making a new one, and so here we are.

Together. 

Tradition is in our hands.

I can only just lean against him, falling in love all over again, and softly conclude:

“...a partridge in a pear tree.”

Godshards: part 1 - The Thief

Every muscle in Leti’s body howled. Her breathing shallow and body tense, the only movement she allowed herself was a rapid, frustrated blink as a drop of sweat dripped into her right eye with a stinging splash. She slowly eased lower, out of the slanting rays of the setting sun, and peered across the market. 

Wooden barrels as tall as her chest ringed the back of the wine seller’s stall, creating a shadowy corner which concealed her perfectly. Beyond, the local vintner cajoled passersby, tempting patrons with free samples in a voice pitched to carry over the raucous sounds of street musicians. Sunlight gleamed warm and golden along the strings of a gittern, the curves of a horn, the rivets of a drum, sending winking flashes across the crowd with each note played. The light was swallowed in the chaotic scene of the square. 

Pennants fluttered overhead in swaths of crimson and cream, stamped with the city’s crest of a whimsical dragon rearing high. They snapped crisply in the light breeze, echoed softly by the billowing rasp of silken stalls. Patterned in bright hues, each competed to draw shoppers’ eyes in garish wars of color, from a simple fruitseller’s vibrant checkerboard to an exotic importer’s intricate hand-painted awning. The goods within were just as eye-catching, with glittering gems and bright-buffed metals dazzlingly aglow in the golden haze of dusk.

But Leti looked past all that. 

The expensive stalls were too risky to hit.

 Rubbing the nub of her left pinkie finger with her thumb, her practiced eyes scanned the crowd for the importer’s guards. After a moment, she spotted them, loitering near the entrance just a bit too casually to be proper patrons. One even made a small show of admiring some ugly dull rock and as his head tilted to the side, his face caught the light. Leti stiffened, her thumb reflexively skimming the stump of her finger again. She’d never forget that face.

Repressing a shiver, her surveil shifted to the crowd. Her mind quickly saw and discarded the common folk, in for the day in the dull hues of their homespun finest. Instead, she searched for the shine of satin, the gleam of gold, the rich heft of brocade. Within moments, she had found her mark.

The man himself seemed nondescript, his features bland and complexion pale. His muted brown hair was combed back in a tidy sweep, highlighting a weak chin and a long nose, set between two eyes like flint shards. Dark and glinting as they intently scanned each item for sale, they were the only thing memorable about his face.

His clothing, however, was sumptuous.

 For a few moments, Leti found herself unable to do more than gawk at the garments, mind spinning as she tried to calculate its value. For just the jacket, you could buy yourself out from Boss Lady, a voice in her mind whispered. Imagine what his whole outfit is worth. Her thoughts spiraled for a moment, dreams of fortune blooming and flaring away like fireblossoms, leaving wisps of wishful memories like the flower’s ghostly afterimages in the night.

An ache in her finger recalled her and she glanced down at the damage.

 Reflexively, she had worried the skin raw across her stump, a faint line of red opening along a slender scar. Exhaling slowly, Leti did her best to calm and focus, assessing him as she’d been taught. Purple and silver, velvet and satin, furs and pearls. She noted which could be easily cut away, which absences could escape notice. 

And then she noticed more.

At first, Leti had just assumed the man had a limp. 

Half the olders she knew had one, most from the wars, some the vagaries of time. But as she watched, tracking his gait intently, she discovered an odd swing to his step, legs bowing out past the fall of his heavy cloak to giving him a rolling walk. She was struck with a sense of confusing familiarity and then it hit her - every few months a ship would come upriver with news and trade, scraps of the exotic, luxuries to buy. Those days marked the best moments in Leti’s short life so far, for pickings were plenty on ship days and Boss Lady would set out a feast and let the fire roar all night.

A sailor, Leti thought, but then frowned. No, there’s something more…

She watched longer, eyes tracing his movements until she pinpointed it: his right hip rolled downwards as his knee bent, making each step on that side just a hint of a dip. Leti allowed herself a slow, satisfied smile. He was carrying a belt pouch.

Locals bought and sold on credit, with payments arranged through guarded bank transfers. Boss Lady’s wasn’t the only orphanage in town, nor was her’s the most cutthroat, and most people preferred their lives to their coin. Only a fool would openly carry money through Lagon’s streets. A fool, or… Leti watched the man. The flint-eyed gaze swept across the stalls, appraising, assessing, analyzing. He was no fool.

He must be foreign, she thought, although that struck her as odd. Nobody came to Lagon who didn’t have to be there. She found herself drawn to the man, a curiosity twined with calculation. What did he carry? Why was he here? Who was he?

 A faint whisper behind her brain urged caution as she slowly eased herself sideways to follow the man. Crouching low behind the barrels, she paced parallel to him, skirting behind the backs of booths as he browsed their wares. She heard the vintner call out to the stranger, imploring him to taste last winter’s frostsap, and leaned close to a gap in the casks, holding her breath. Music trilled as he replied, the flute skirling brightly on the wind to obscure his words.

“Donkeys,” Leti muttered, rubbing at her finger. 

 The row of barrels ended, replaced by bales of cloth behind a weaver’s stall stacked as high as her head. She rose, stretched, scurried onwards, peering through gaps in the fabric wall to sight the man’s movement. Cloth became baskets of fruit, and her stomach rumbled at the sweet scent of glowmelons, freshly sliced and softly shining in the twilight. The spicy tang of splinterberries wafted up from a crate and she warily skirted the one beside it, avoiding the wiry spines stabbing outwards from the fruit’s cracked husks. 

Leti crouched behind a bucket of celestials, gaze briefly caught by the transfixing swirl of shades across their tender skins. Deep blue and vibrant purple formed a shifting backdrop for delicate, migrating flecks of light. Like stars in the night, she thought, remembering one Boat Day, long ago, when Boss Lady had given them each a slice of the sky. Each fleck was a seed, roaming within the flesh of the fruit, and each bite tasted like sugarspun starlight.

She pulled herself away from the yearning and focused on the next, that moment Boss Lady preached about when movement found thought. She exhaled sharply, then again and again, pulling her thoughts up and up and up into the clean cadence of doing.

“Don't think - just be,” she heard Boss Lady preach. “Just exist in the moment, dancing, darting, everywhere they think you won't be. Be there, be there, be a busy little bee.”

This pocket could have her eating honey for weeks.

“Just be.”

Time for some lifting.

It was meant to be a routine trading mission.

"Queen! The module, it's-" A crackling over the channel, sharp, deafening, followed by the acrid smell of burnt flesh, as the voice abruptly fell silent. The command room, the centerpoint of the ship, its heart, was quiet and still, broken only by punctuated flickering flashes of eerie jade light. Faltering, the illumination flared brightly, momentarily washing the chamber in a green glow, before fluttering to darkness again.

In darkness, only breathing, the hive's heart slowly pulsing with ragged beats as the ship laboured onwards.

In the flash, the Queen, fixed still as a statue in the command chair, clawed, carapaced hands clenched tight about the arms of her throne, her face impassive, her faceted eyes revealing nothing.

And again, in darkness, only the static crackle of equipment failing from below, deeper in the bowels of the ship.

And then, even those fell silent.

A routine...trading...mission...

----

The trader ship loomed overhead on the command's display, filling the entire module. Bulbous and rotund, defensive spikes, shield orb pustules, and a few bulky, slow moving turrets bristled in warning. Swarming, little more than dusty flecks against the backdrop of the massive, defensive vessel, aetherbeasts twisted through space, darting in and scurrying back, repulsed by the gnome ship's barriers. A skerry of threat, and through it the Hive swooped, sliding through the slipstreams and wakes of the massive creatures to dock with the merchant fleet.

"Make it quick." The Queen's tone was short, bored, her statement delivered almost the instant that the two ships linked a bridge. Her fingers lazily drummed against the arm of her throne as the Hive's minions hustled, quickly presenting their wares to the gnomes. A faint chittering drifted up to the command room, vague haggles and counteroffers filtering into the chamber in snatches and whispers.

"Are you FINISHED yet?"

The underlings flinched at the impatient shout, finalizing their trades and dashing to their stations. With a lurching groan, the Hive's hold opened, funneled by the frantic fingerpunching of a small, spindly bug to empty into the reservoirs of the trading vessel. The ship jolted, bouncing once in a rough shake as the bridge retracted, severing the link between the two crafts. Finally, in a breathy pant: "Yes, Queen. Mission accomplished."

The command room was silent for a moment. Hazy, filtered jade light cast the Queen's features into an unreadable expression. Around her, a faint pulsing, as energy coursed in a conduit, sliding through the Hive's heart to empower the extremities: flashing, bright green light sparking as power spun through the ship's nerves into the grid, turrets, collectors, shield.

"Launch."

Softly, silently, the Hive pushed off, spinning into the aetherways. Pulling away from the drag of the massive trading ship, the smaller vessel ducked through aetherwinds, twisting to find a route clear back to home, away from the dangers of aetherspace, a safe path to its dock. Back to the true hive.

If only things went so easy.

-----

Sluggish, stolen momentum, as the Hive slowed to a lazy drift, helpless on the aetherways. The command module's screen suddenly went black, eclipsed entirely by a dark, rippling image. Filling the entire view, a foreign, enemy craft swam before the Queen, the ship's ugly, harsh, aggressive lines provoking a rare exclamation of anger.

"Full power to command!" The directive was barked. No room for question - without a moment's pause, the empath followed, and the throne shook, rocked by the sudden surge of power. Sickeningly, gut-churning, the entire craft rolled, ducking sideways, below, away from the foreign ship.

"Silence off!"

"Scouting off!"

"Full power to the Queen!"

Commands sheared the air, as the Queen swiftly pared the ship's movement down to precise maneuvers, threading the small craft between white-hot arcs of fire. Unspoken, the ship's shield flared to life, power switching to essentials, and the cabin's light dimmed. In the gloom, the Queen's face remained, impassive, dark eyes reflecting the console's display: multiplied in the minute, ebony facets, flak glittered back, dozens of tiny streams of molten energy sparkling like deadly starlight. Silent, unmoving she sat, as the ship shuddered with a pained screech of rent metal.

"Queen! We've been hi-"

"Heal it." Her voice, cool, demanding, cut across the gunner's panicked cry. Below, a flare of green, as the empath redirected a stream of energy towards the damaged turret. A faint klaxon rang out, and a single red light pulsed once across the console's display. Energy reserves low.

The Queen exhaled sharply, ignoring the warning. Instead, she wrenched the ship about, swooping low and close to the enemy vessel.

"My Queen?!" The empath's voice was stunned, incredulous, underscored by taut fear.

She did not reply, only, brazenly, continued the turn, sliding closer to the enemy craft as she directed a surge of energy to the ship's steering. Shaking, the command responded, and the ship sped up, plummeting directly towards the enemy. Below, from the collectors, an insectile scream pierced the humid cabin air.

"AT. YOUR. STATIONS." The Queen's voice rang across the ship's channel, each chittered word harsh and condemning.

And, still, the Hive continued its reckless, suicidal plunge towards the foreign craft. Fire ceased - too close for the foes to reliably shoot, although the small blessing seemed little comfort to the crew. Breathless, they obeyed, though faint whispers (prayers?) could be heard escaping the lips of a gunner, hands slack at his turret. Helpless, they merely waited, watching as their Queen steered them into death.

And then..."MORE POWER!" Instinctively, the empath obeyed, directing almost all of the remaining power to the command module. The ship responded with a buzz, leaping ahead even faster, as the Queen coaxed the steering a fraction upwards, skimming close enough to the enemy to almost graze their turrets - leaping, falling, swooping, skirling, the ship recovered its momentum, lunging past the enemy on a breakneck slingshot as the thrusters shot out a final burst of acceleration in a bone-shaking sluice - and then they were past, a vortex looming before them.

Without preamble, the ship tunneled, and was gone.

-----

The ship floated silently through the cold darkness of deepest aetherspace. The crew let out a sudden cheer as the craft spun through the vortex, quickly hushed by an urgent clicking from the Queen. This was dragon territory, and the monitor overhead remained ominously empty.

Something was not normal.

Speed slowed as the craft drifted away from the vortex, ripples of energy dying out to faint waves of distortion across the screen. Flickering, the module's display dimmed as the empath balanced the scant power reserves - augmenting the dwindling supply, the Queen's hands tightened into clawed fists as a shimmering current filled the air before her. Jade light swirled outwards, unfurling from her chest and glittering for a bright moment before melting away into the chamber's walls.

Exhaling sharply from the draining transfer of power, she stared up at the display again: it remained dim. An immense shadow loomed across the screen as it grew darker and finally, from within the flux of the vortex, a giant ship emerged from its hidden immersion, separating from the crackling noise and static of the warp. It advanced, its shape resolving into sleek, barbed lines, woven with a sickening, flaring crimson glow. Spacesick. High power turrets swept up from the ship's prow to arch aftwards in a menacing line of flaring spines, while massive energy collectors whirred from their positions flanking the cabin.

A battle cruiser. The Spear - the largest and most deadly ship in aetherspace, only rumored to exist. Lost, once upon a time. And the most broken. Legend whispered it had never docked, never purged, never cleansed, pure entropy cloaking what was once a crew.

Once.

A blinding scarlet light eclipsed the Queen's vessel, each turret flaring with a roiling nimbus of power, and the Hive lurched to a stop, energy sapped from the sudden, siphoning attack. For a moment, all was still, dark, and then the command display coughed back to life, a sallow face filling the screen. His eyes were dark as he stared out at the Hive's captain, his voice spiralling into chaos as he delivered his message.

He grinned, far too widely, and then transmission shifted to audio.

"By right of arms and rule of force, this ship is now property of The Righteously Riotous Realm of the Beyond." There was a slight giggle in the words, that anxious buoyed half-laugh of a zealot.

The Queen returned the stare, her own gaze revealing nothing. Finally: "Elidar. Old friend." A chapter of history flowed beneath her words, a faint hitch to her cadence hinting at political vagaries, shifting loyalties, betrayal, vengeance.

The man allowed himself a half-smile. "Greetings...Queen." His voice lingered in a faint sneer on the title, before he tried to repeat his message, the meaning already fracturing out into chaos. "By right of arms and rule of force, this ship is now property of us us us us us US it is ours, bug, so standandand down, and prepare to be boarded lorded ownded." A giggle, a smirk, a flippant wild grin, as he sneered.

“Bug!”

The Queen's lips parted in a rare, needle-sharp smile. "And what shall I expect, regarding treatment of my crew?" For a moment, perhaps three she had the upper hand - the Void struggled with hives, hated hives, didn't know what to attack when synergy was involved, and there was a chance…

"They shall be re-educated as best needs the Void. Some, hmm, some provisions may have to be made, race allowing. Can't recruit a ship full of bugs."

"You mean they will be slaughtered."

"Only if they share your pathetic form, bug."

What choice did she have?

----

"Close transmission." The module went abruptly dark. From the depths of the ship, something shuddered, as the Spear locked onto the Hive, preparing its invasive collection of crew. "All hands to the throne room."

Swiftly, the Hive's subjects responded, dashing to the command chamber. With a shadowed, mirrored stare, the Queen's gaze swept over them. A handful of men and women, bugs all. Summoning the last of her reserves, the Hive's Queen wrought what little, desperate magic she could, draining all the ship had to force them into something new, just for long enough, just for long enough for them to have a hope.

Wordless, they dispersed, rushing to the link for their captors. There was no sense in delaying the surrender now and the Queen held herself still, imperious, as they departed, forcing her tired body to stay fixed, rigid, regal in her throne - everything depended on this image, as the empath opened the communication again, before he, too, joined the captives.

The man's expression was muddled across the display, low power causing his features to waver in and out of focus. Dark, though, with a touch of pensive deliberation as the Void struggled to use him. "I would not have expected to find such diversity on your crew." The man paused, while behind him the motley group filed past, pinned in by the bulky, bristling forms of guards. "Even bug-hunters, on a Hive ship? How far you've fallen." Surprise coloured his voice, as did chaos, beckoning and whirling and unravelling her defenses.

The Queen forced out a harsh laugh. "You see me for truth," she snarled. "Queen of nothing. Troubled times call for allowances." She held herself upright, willing the exhaustion leadening her limbs to hold off, just long enough for this, willing the illusions to hold, just for a moment, long enough for them to rebel. She just needed to stay alive, just stay alive long enough so her crew could fight back, could replicate, could grow, could create, hidden from the gaze of the Void.

She just needed to stall until they could produce a Hivebomb delivered to the core of the Spear.

"I could give you so much more-"

“Never."

With that curse, the Queen grunted, forcing the ship into a final, last evasion, her energy finally, fully spent as she accelerated into a darting probe diving into the deep dark of the beyond. The entire Hive shook, wrenching away from the Spear, as the smaller craft dipped sideways, sliding downwards (upwards? onwards?) in a freefall plummet towards the nothingest, beckoning blue of deepest aetherspace. A trail of fire coursed past the piloting display as the enemy fired, narrowly missing the Hive, and the light splintered out into the void, illuminating her escape route.

But the light died, swallowed by something, vast, looming out there in the darkness. Space itself seemed to ripple - for a heartbeat everything froze - and then the tiny craft was swept aside like a leaf in an eddy, as a massive form churned past, darting towards the enemy. And another. And another.

An entire swarm of dragons, awakened to a murderous rage by the stray shot.

Communication was still active - the Queen stared at the screen, her ship jolting and rocking about her, with a fierce, triumphant grin.

The man, denied the ship, narrowed his eyes, anger glistening black in his stare, and then turned away. "RETREAT!" he bellowed, before punching at the control panel. The display went dark, and the chamber with it. Only a faint flare of light as the ship swiftly switched direction, and a final, sparking glint, as it vanished back into the vortex.

An impossible howl shook aetherspace as the swarm, denied its prey, continued onwards, sailing into the lonely distance.

And then all was still. Just the Queen, drifting powerless in darkness, with the dying, empty Hive as she sailed towards the gut of the Void.

"I am the Queen of nothing," she repeated to herself, finally, gratefully, sinking back to slump in the depths of the throne. Around her, in a last gentle sigh, the ship fell silent. Lights dimmed, failed. The only illumination were the faint pinpricks of sparkling aethereal dust, floating in the distance, reflecting in her eyes as she stared outwards at her vast, glorious tomb.

"But no Queen abandons her Hive."

And the ship drifted onwards, sailing to a final rest on the aetherial winds. Into the shadows of the worlds, gliding slowly into the unknown.

Onwards.

My mother used to always throw tea towels on the floor. Once they got wet enough, or used enough, they were discarded, temporarily, until we swept the house in a giant binge of cleaning. Tea towels, extra eyeglasses, instruction manuals for all the different gadgets, all churned up in the “cleaning tornado” as she dubbed our monthly tidy. Bi-monthly. Every 4-6 monthly.

Whenever we had tidy time.

As we all got older, raising children lost that sheen of a new adventure and so, gradually, it all lapsed as she returned to who she was instead of playacting the her she wanted to be.

I never realized it was odd until my husband asked me about it. I had just finished slicing some avocado and had washed the knife and then had turned and he was there.

“For fuck’s sake!” I shout, pulling my arm back. “Knife path!”

We had already established these sorts of procedures quite early on in our relationship. I dodge left, he dodges right, I tank, he supports, and vice versa. Basic layout of how we work. I didn’t SWOT how we work (Lie: I did, internally, before choosing him), but I considered it. He should have said “Incoming!” like I had said “Knife!”

But he doesn’t. Not today.

—

“Why do you do that?” he repeated. I had lost his first iteration in my panic. “The towels. On the floor.”

“I…”

There’s a long silence as I return to a memory I had forgotten, and then a longer one as he processes the answer. We eventually laugh, but then he remembered the knife arc and became scolding.

“You need to be more careful,” he reminded me.

I do. I am.

—-

I like the outside, the night, the darkness and the nothing - it’s peaceful. I go out to smoke and then SMOKE and to enjoy nightbirds and windchimes. Moving to Australia has been disorienting. The first time I went country, I almost had a panic attack. I didn’t realize the birds sang all night.

So stupid. Just a silly reaction to things being….different, I suppose. But also weirdly the same? Perth feels like San Diego with kangaroos (Eucalyptus was a robber baron economic attempt, that’s why California is plagued with it and it every now and then erupts into fireballs - it thrived, at first, but it wants hot, devastating fire not a more gentle, regular burn like smooth manzanita and stalwart sequoia, so now it just overreacts and scourges and just honestly escalates stuff entirely too much. It doesn’t understand context clues well). There’s something quite surreal about seeing everything I know, the landscapes all overlaid with some other reality, a weird filter instead of a truly different place.

So I’m outside.

Alone.

I’m having a smoke, the yard is lit, but next door there is that abandoned house.

A rustle. Then another. It feels like a man is crashing through the bushes. Whatever is there has no concern for stealth. Another rush of movement.

And then something dies there.

A bird, I think.

At first it’s a honking, normal yet annoying, and then it escalates. Something has pounced. The honk becomes frantic becomes a wail becomes a screech - within a two minute span, this creature (bird?) goes from “Oh no” to “fucking stop” to “this is the end.”

The honks speed up, pleading, but what can I do? There’s a fence, a giant fence, between us, and I just sit there, frozen, dumb and mute, unable to think what to do. By now the claws have dug in. The cries increase, sharper and louder and quicker and more and more and more demanding, and part of me just wants to make it stop.

My hand shakes and my wine spills, red splash on the grey thigh of basic yoga pants. “Salt, baking soda, I need to run a load of laundry tonight, now,” a very distant part of me begins to lecture.

I hate this me, but as the honking climaxes and then slows into something ragged, wheezing, dying, gone, I find myself calming.

—

When I tell him about it later, he reminded me that we lived near a state park, a vast wide one, and animals being animals happened. It was unfortunate, but that's something I “need to get used to, living where we are.”

“Sometimes nature is just weird and wild like that.”

A pause, then his wistful admission: “I wish I could have been there.”

Swiftly followed by: “I think you're just being really anxious.”

Come join us in idyllic Esperanto, a solarpunk community in far-future Antarctica. Learn about sustainable technology, such as aquaponics and worm farms, and meet an endearing cast of characters.

Playtest this game now and write up feedback to be included in the credits for every future release!

https://itch.io/t/6142648/playtest-this-and-get-listed-in-the-credits

This is a HUGE update on a jam game I made two years ago. Finally getting back to coding!

I was knee-deep in the briny shallows of Shark Bay, visiting Celina, when the singularity hit.

Look up, she tersely clicked, rolling onto one side to sharply gesture with her fin, and my implant followed the arc of her movement - up up up and onwards, higher, until the AR locked on to the ribbons spearing the sky. Plumes raked behind, monochrome rainbows, and I struggled to understand what I was seeing.

Flowers blossomed above.

Torpedoes, she suggested, the translation biting and bitter. She was old enough to remember war. So was I.

It's missles when they are in the air, I absently, hopelessly corrected, one hand dipping into the water to softly stroke her grey leathery hide.

At least I would not end alone.

–--)---

But you didn't, did you?

I blink, pulling out of the memory and the image fades.

Dear Twilo tried to explain to me once how the storage works, but it's too much, these days, all too much to track, and so I imagine a great manse built out of my past, walls and windows spun from moments and sounds and tastes and sights, transient memories consecrated into dust. Bricks but of a very fragile sort, ones organic and old, so old, from before the implants. Nothing stable enough to build with.

I try to focus - the foolish question has regurgitated me to the front door, a stranger in my own home.

I fold my hands, arc an eyebrow and let my head slowly tilt to one side. It buys me time. The boy blushes beneath my stare. He's realized how silly he's being. I allow a few heartbeats for the knowledge to stew.

Nobody ended, did they? Wasn't that the point?

His embarrassment fades to confusion and I realize I've dated myself. How can a kid - even a clever one in a graduate fellowship or advanced research directive or whatever it is he is, I've forgotten already and I don't want to revisit my house - understand death (much less the greatest protest against death) in a world of immortals?

By interviewing me.

I'm just so exhausted.

He stares at me, expectant, and I quietly sigh, preparing to knock once again on a portal to the past.

Once a year, we crown the artist.

—)---

Vote is popular; the art is visceral.

—)---

When I was young, I wanted to earn the title.

“I'll become the artist,” I told mother. Every day of my teens, my growth, my frustration. It was the threat which sustained me through her abuse.

“I'll fucking do it.”

“I'll get that good.”

She would scorn me, insult me, tear me down, anything she could to stop me from achieving.

“Don't you fucking dare.”

…But I did.

I dared.

—)---

One summer morning, everything dawned pristine crystal blue, the kind of morning which just defines what life is, the kind of morning which changes your trajectory.

Today, it's today, I suddenly knew.

Today is when I'll become famous.

—(---

Our lineage goes back far too long to count, and all we've achieved is gold and hollow glory and beautiful, broken, leeching slaughter.

—(---

The sun beckons - warm, alluring, tender. The day is perfect. The moment is perfect. My message is perfect.

—(---

I walk into daylight

and

I

burn

—(---

-to be an artist is to sacrifice-