Truthfully, Stelle had no real expectations when it came to Cocolia. This wasn't a bad thing, simply that everything had been much too fast for her to form any sort of preconception of the woman, both as Bronya's mother and as the Supreme Guardian.

As it turned out however, the woman was quite lovely, if a bit strict. She wasn't exactly overbearing, preferring to let Bronya handle herself. She didn't even ask that many questions regarding what they were 'researching'. Instead focusing on how Stelle and her met.

It was… embarrassing to recount, considering everything happened literally yesterday and all of it happened so fast. Cocolia seemed to enjoy talking to her, while Bronya and March went off by themselves in the archive to look for a more detailed history of Belobog.

When it came to meeting a parent, Stelle wasn't sure what to expect. Possible storytimes of baby Bronya, or maybe even the threat of death. For the leader of an entire city, even being locked up and put on trial wasn't out of the question.

But it was just a normal conversation that she would have with anyone else. Stelle got to ask some questions regarding her supreme guardian duties and learned a few things about how they work.

A lot of paperwork, it seemed.

The only real gripe Stelle had with Cocolia wasn't any fault of the woman's own. It was simply that… the woman was too pretty.

It was very difficult keeping her eyes from wandering to the delectable patches of exposed skin on the woman's outfit. And when the woman bent over to pick up a fallen book.

Someone should put her down. She felt like a pervert. This was Bronya's mother. Adoptive, but- still.

Wait.

Did that make it okay?

No- no. No. She wasn't going down that line of thought.

"So." Cocolia said to her.

"Y-Yes?!" Stelle flubbed. Her eyes snapping upwards from wherever they were resting on and meeting Cocolia's purple ones.

"I know Bronya can take care of herself, and you seem like a pretty decent person all things considered. But I have to ask this as a parent. What are your intentions with her?"

Oh. Stelle corrected her earlier thoughts. Now was the time for interrogation. That was a sort of a difficult question to answer because Stelle hadn't really thought of it herself. Saying such a thing out loud was… probably not the best in front of a parent.

"Uh. Well. She's very cute." That got a raised eyebrow. Stelle mentally swerved back on track. "And very beautiful, and a very determined girl too. It's obvious that she takes things very seriously because she cares a lot and when you talk to her about things she likes her eyes light up and she leans in and some of her silver hair gets in her eyes so she always brushes it with one hand over her ear…"

Stelle thought back to her date with Bronya. Things just flowed so easily then. Like… a piece of a puzzle clicking into place.

"...And she always tries to be truthful with her feelings, even if she gets nervous about it. Because she does get nervous, and her cheeks get red but she still pushes forward and is honest about them. She always tries to make sure people feel welcome even if she doesn't know them very much and likes to help people if they don't fully understand something, but she's never patronizing about it."

Oh god. She was rambling again. This always happened.

"I didn't really answer your question. But she's a great person and really proud of who she is but I don't really know what to classify us as. Even if we don't become anything more I'm really happy to call her a friend at least and… Uhm… sorry for getting off topic." Stelle petered off, realizing how she basically fumbled everything.

For some reason, when she met Cocolia's face. There was a big serene smile on it. "No. I think I got what I was looking for."

"Oh." She did? But all Stelle did was ramble along.

"Please continue being her friend, no matter what happens. That girl is rather fragile despite how she acts."

"U-Uhm. Alright. That was my intention anyways."

The two descended into silence afterwards. Stelle felt a little awkward about it, as she didn't really know what to say. But Cocolia seemed to revel in it, looking distinctly amused at the trailblazer's mood.

It was after a few more moments that the Supreme guardian seemed to take pity on her and broke the silence. "So, with that out of the way. What exactly is your research about? I was holding off on asking until I found out what, or in this case who, my daughter was so smitten with."

A bit of heat rose to Stelle's cheeks at the teasing. "Well. We're researching the history of Belobog in an attempt to find a way to end the eternal freeze. We think we've found a method… but we're just looking for something to finalize it."

"Hmm." Cocolia hummed. "Looking for something? That's unusual. What is it you're looking for?"

Stelle weighed her options. On one hand, she got the gist that it wasn't smart to just advertise they were looking for a Stellaron, but on the other… Dan Heng did it without much hesitation. Maybe she should be like Dan Heng.

If she happened to get the Supreme Guardian herself on their side for the search, surely things would progress exponentially faster right?

Right. That sounded good to her.

"Well… It's a thing called a Stellaron. We believe that by sealing it we can end the freeze and eventually let the planet recover to a more natural state." Stelle said, rattling off what she knew off the topic of her head. She was sure that March or Dan Heng could explain better.

Cocolia twitched at the word. Her hands flexed and unflexed. For the first time Stelle noticed that the singular ungloved hand of the Supreme Guardian had patches of what looked to be ice on her arm and digits.

"Really now? Where did you hear about that?" Cocolia's voice was calm and sounded interested in what Stelle had to say.

Was that a good thing?

"Uh. Well Dan Heng probably knows more about it than me."

"Dan Heng." Cocolia said, as if testing how the name sounded on her mouth. "Anyone else in this research project?"

Stelle shook her head. "No. Just me, Dan Heng and March. March is the pink girl from earlier."

"What's Dan Heng like?"

"He's about the same height as me. Black hair. Kinda skinny. Has a green aesthetic going on."

"I see." The supreme guardian murmured. "Do you happen to know someone named Serval?"

The trailblazer shook her head. "No? Should I?"

Cocolia waved her off. "No no. Just checking something."

The Supreme Guardian maneuvered the two of them to what Stelle assumed was her personal desk. She went through a few of the drawers in it before pulling out a thick notebook. She dusted the cover off and handed it over to Stelle.

"What's this?" Stelle asked.

"An old journal. It talks about how one day there would be travelers from the stars who would come upon this planet and save it from Destruction. It's essentially been turned into some rarely told fairy tale, but long ago one of the previous Supreme Guardian's were adamant that such a thing would come true."

Stelle felt a little taken aback by the story. For a second, Stelle thought that she had been seen through and that Cocolia knew they weren't from Belobog. But she never made an attempt to follow it up.

"You should take a look over it and see what you can glean from it. Otherwise I don't have much else I can do to help you." Cocolia followed up.

"N-No! That's fine. I'll take a look over it. The fact that you even took time out of your day to talk to us is more than enough."

"It's getting late. I'll gather Bronya and your friend March. You're all still young, don't spend all day holed away. Take some time for yourself."

Huh. Stelle felt strangely warm at the words. She wondered if this was what it was like to have a mother. For the life of her she couldn't remember anything.

"Of course. Thank you for your help."

"And Stelle?" Cocolia said before Stelle exited through the doors. "For both Bronya and your sake. I hope you know what you're doing with this."

Like a doused flame, Stelle felt a sudden chill. The words weren't threatening, but felt more of a warning than anything. She simply nodded at the woman and got a smile in return.

"Oh. One last thing." Cocolia spoke up, stopping Stelle from leaving. "Do you believe in fate?"

"Fate?"

"I believe fate brought you to Belobog."

"...Neither fate nor destiny will shackle me." Stelle said, borrowing words from the past.

"I pray for your sake, that your words will ring true."


Dan Heng was rather cross with her when they explained what had happened while they were gone. Doubly so for not mentioning that Bronya, her… partner, was practically royalty.

But as all things, there was nothing that could be done for past events. They could only move on. Dan Heng had apparently made some leeway with his own research, specifically in the sense that he had deduced that the Stellaron itself was not located inside of Belobog, but either in the underground or in some secluded place just outside the city.

Belobog itself was divided into two main sections, the overworld and the underground. They were symbiotic, and essentially needed each other to survive. Which was why it was more of a surprise to hear that just a decade ago Cocolia had ordered the two parts of Belobog to be cut off from each other. From what Dan Heng had told both her and March, the underground heavily supplied minerals that were essential in generating heat inside the cold frigid wasteland.

"So why did they cut contact between the two?" March asked.

The trio of them had retreated back to their hotel room. It wasn't quite yet dinner time, only having just passed lunch.

Dan Heng shook his head. "Nobody knows the exact reason. But the Supreme Guardian's orders are absolute." He turned towards Stelle. "You had the most contact with her, did anything seem off?"

"...Only at the end. She asked me if I believed in fate." Stelle recounted the conversation between her and the older woman.

"That's a little ominous." March commented.

Dan Heng quickly skimmed through the short journal that Cocolia had given Stelle. "If this is true, we should probably assume that Cocolia knows we're not natives of this planet. Whether or not that's a good thing is still up to be decided."

"Well… didn't she sound like she wanted to help? Wouldn't she not give us anything or not allow us to look through the archives?"

"It doesn't matter whether or not she wants to help us. We can simply treat her as a neutral entity. If she's really on our side then she already said she doesn't have anything to give us and if she's not then we will simply have to continue as we already are without her help."

"That make's sense." March agreed. "What do you think, Stelle?"

Stelle nodded as if she understood everything and it totally didn't just fly over her head. "Yeah. Totally."

The other two trailblazers stared at her.

"... Pretty woman is not an enemy or ally. Continue as normal." Dan Heng said to her.

"Oh. Okay, that makes sense."

March's facepalm echoed throughout the room.


If there was one thing that neither of them expected to see when they walked out the hotel room they all congregated at for the team meeting. It was a very familiar sight of a tall, blue haired man. He looked very sketchy, as if he would try to sell you something you didn't need.

"That's quite rude." He commented, as if he could hear what Stelle was thinking.

"What is?" Stelle asked.

"What you're thinking."

"You don't know what I'm thinking."

"...I'm not here to do anything bad."

"I don't believe you." Stelle said flatly.

"See? Are you two getting this?" He asked March and Dan Heng.

It was a pointless question, as both of them also were just as fed up as Stelle.

"Why are you here? Was one arrow not enough?" March said in a vaguely threatening manner.

"Well-" He drawled out the last syllable. "-I just happened to overhear your conversation and was thinking we both could benefit from each other…"

"So you were eavesdropping on us." Dan Heng stated.

"Not at all my dear customers! For I, the great Sampo, have plenty of info that might be of use to you!" Sampo said, introducing himself for the first time.

The trio all shared a look. "Aren't you just gonna run away again?" Stelle couldn't help but question.

"Ah well. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. I happen to have an exclusive idea of where you could possibly get some information on that Stellaron problem of yours after all." The not-quite-a-con-man told them.

Dan Heng and March tensed, with the former even going so far as to reach for his weapon. Sampo didn't seem too surprised.

"You've been listening to us for quite some time then." Dan Heng said. "It's a little suspicious that you would just offer up information like that for us."

Sampo rubbed his chin as if he was contemplating something. "Well… I guess you could say I had an… 'Aha' moment."

Stelle felt as if whatever sort of message was in that sentence flew right over her head, but Dan Heng and March seemed to understand, as they both sighed and relaxed.

"Can we just go? Last time we interacted with one of them half the city was infected by a disease that caused them to laugh until they passed out. I still get goosebumps whenever someone laughs too long because of it." March shivered.

"Unfortunately, while I agree with your reservations March, if they happen to know anything we should at least hear them out." Dan Heng sighed.

"...I'm missing something aren't I." Stelle stated.

"Nothing important, I assure you."

"Wonderful! Maybe we can make a deal!" Sampo said, clapping his hands together in a wide smile.

And so, nearly immediately after leaving the hotel room, the trio came back. Stelle sort of sat back as both Dan Heng and March conversed with Sampo. She was trying her best to pay attention, but the severe lack of comprehension regarding whatever an 'Aha' moment was clearly was hurting her.

Funnily enough, she got a message from Bronya asking if she happened to see a tall, dark blue haired man who looked sketchy. Stelle frowned and took a picture of Sampo as he was talking with the other two.

Like this? She asked as she sent it to her partner.

Stelle watched as three dots indicating that Bronya was typing showed up, before they disappeared and her screen was replaced by an incoming phone call… from Bronya herself.

"Hello?" She asked quietly into her phone.

"Why are you… Where are you?" Bronya asked, she sounded incredibly confused.

"Uh… In the hotel?"

"What room?"

She thought for a moment. "...203?"

Bronya told her to stay right there and cut the call. Stelle was momentarily confused, but shrugged it off. What were the odds that Bronya was texting her about the very same man that was in her room? It wasn't as if he was wanted or anything.

Er… Stelle hung onto that train of thought. She vaguely remembered a wanted poster featuring an indecipherable blob of a person. The only real defining feature was the blue hair and the green eyes. Which was… exactly like… Sampo…

Three minutes later Captain Gepard literally kicked the door open.

"Stop right there criminal scum! Nobody breaks the law on my watch!" He shouted, pointing his weapon and shield towards Sampo.

Oh.

She probably should have expected this.


Start: June 23rd. 2023.

End: August 12th. 2023.

Words: 2703

Hi. We're back. Once I post this 30k KafStel one shot I'll be back to doing Stellarium in constant updates while also trying to figure out how to solve my current college crisis. Thanks for being patient. I had to go to FFXIV Fanfest which took up a long space of time both preparing for it and actually going to it during last month.