Niamh could not let herself believe that they were gone.
She'd known it, of course. Yelled out their real names as her hand suddenly became lighter, her cry swallowed up by the noise. She'd tugged at Lowen and said, we need to turn back, turn back. And they had, looking fruitlessly amongst the crowds until they had sought refuge in an alleyway with a bunch of other citizens. There was nothing that Niamh recognised in any of these citizens' faces, and it disconcerted her that these once-faceless NPCs had become people with faces and voices and, presumably, lives they believed were real no matter how fucked up they were under the order. But it didn't disconcert her nearly enough as the fact that they had lost them.
But still, she could not believe it.
"Hey, Niko," Lowen said, shortening her pretend name as easily as if it were real. "What do we do now, then? Do we try and make it there?"
Niamh waited until the owner of the noodle bar set down two steaming bowls and left to serve another pair of bedraggled tourists. Even then, she put off the answer until she had swirled some noodles around her chopsticks and put them in her mouth. Huh, she thought idly to herself, game-world food actually tastes good. She slurped some of the broth and only then did she have the strength to meet Lowen's eyes:
"Well, if they made it out safely, then they'd look for us there, right? There's no point in changing our plans."
"But what if The Order's got them?" Lowen asked. "We can't just abandon them!"
Niamh hadn't realised that Akito and Calcium had been pilfering some of her noodles until they both squeaked at her. She glared at them, and then asked:
"What is it?" she asked. "Do you know something?"
Akito bobbed in an approximation of a nod and squeaked again.
"Did they get…you know, taken?" she asked them.
This was met with an indignant squeak from Calcium, the bird waving its knife in a manner that reminded Niamh of old ladies wagging their fingers scoldingly.
"I'm taking that as a no, then," she sighed. "Well, that's something. Do you know where they've gone?"
Again, a more insistent squeak and a knife-waggle. After some more questions, Niamh felt decently confident that she understood what they were trying to say, and therefore able to conclude that Francesca and Hae-won were unlikely to be in the Cosmopolitia, that they too should try to leave, that neither of the companions actually knew where they had gone, and that they didn't know where any of the characters could be.
"Right then," Lowen said. "Whatever we're doing, I don't think I'll be able to get my head on straight about any of it until we've finished eating-hey! Go back to taking Ni-Niko's noodles!"
"Heeeey, they've already taken most of mine!" Niamh protested back.
Lowen pulled a face, then flagged down the bar owner and ordered one more bowl. This, when it arrived, they shared between themselves, Niamh and the two companions. Once they had all eaten their fill, Niamh took the bowls back up to the counter, and then, on an impulse, asked:
"Hey, I don't suppose you know the best way out of here?"
"This bar?"
"No, the Cosmopolitia."
"Ah."
The bar owner blinked, and then said:
"Well, have you seen the reports?" he said. "It looks like the world's burning thanks to both sides."
He gestured to the screen behind him, where scenes of the continuing storm played. Some parts of the city were flooding, and buildings were on fire while the thunder and lightning kept flashing and crashing. Niamh and Lowen exchanged wide-eyed looks with each other.
Just how, exactly, are we meant to fix this? Niamh wondered.
"Yeah, we noticed that" Niamh said, putting on her best cheery face. "Not the best time to be seeing the sights of the Cosmopolitia, huh? It's a bit disappointing, honestly?"
"Yeah, sorry about that," the bar owner said. "Still, at least you got to try the Cosmopolitia-famous Indhail Noodles."
"Psh, famous? Don't delude yourself, Indhail." a customer scoffed.
"Oi, Aynome," the owner huffed. "Don't be dissing me to the travellers! They could send me new customers. Well, at least when all of this is over."
The customer scoffed again, and then turned to Niamh and Lowen.
"Are you trying to get out? The checkpoints have become tougher, you're going to have a hard time. Loads of people are trying to leave, because it looks like the storms are only striking the Cosmopolitia, but obviously the Order don't want too many people leaving the city."
"But we're not from here." Lowen pointed out. "Doesn't that count for something?"
"Pssshhh, you really don't know much about The Order, do you?" the customer said. "You're better off waiting here until it dies down-"
"Hey, I'm not a hotel!" the bar owner protested.
"You want more customers, don't you?" the customer retorted.
"Yes, but to buy my noodles! You think people are gonna want to eat around randoms sleeping all over my floors? It's not like I've got anywhere else to put them-"
The customer and the owner started to argue, and Lowen tugged on Niamh's arm and whispered.
"I reckon we should just take our chances."
Akito, now sitting on Lowen's shoulder, gave a small squeak of agreement. Niamh sighed and nodded. They quickly snuck out, pushing past more bedraggled, hysterical citizens bursting into the shop, only to be pelted by the rain. As Niamh looked through her pack for something to shelter them from the rain, she was vaguely aware of Akito dropping off of Lowen's shoulder, and Calcium leaping from her own shoulder to join it.
"You want us to follow?" she heard Lowen ask, with more squeaking following in reply to that.
"Oh, you good things, you're going to get us out, right?" Niamh cooed absently as she finally found a cloak with a hood and grabbed at the material.
As she did, however, something glinted from underneath the fabric, and she frowned as she yanked the cloak all the way out, revealing a bundle of jewels nestled right at the bottom of the pack. She frowned and was about to pull one out when she heard Lowen swearing, and looked up to see Order Soldiers at the other end of the street, trying to break up a riot.
"Oh, shit." She echoed Lowen.
On the ground, Akito and Calcium squeaked, and when she looked down, Calcium pointed with its knife again.
"That way?" she asked.
Calcium bounced angrily on the spot, and despite the fact she could feel all the hairs on the back of her neck rising, she laughed.
"Alright then, my lovelies, lead the way!" she declared.
The companions did so, and Niamh and Lowen spent their time being led through a bewildering array of side roads and alleyways and the odd 'ghost street' filled with residences that had been cleared out by the Order with the intention of 'rebuilding' it into something that better aligned with the Order's 'visions' of how they imagined the Gods should best be honoured. Some of the streets showed signs of being in the middle of construction, with scaffolding, hazard tape, security cameras and alarm sensor-jewels up everywhere. Others, however, were completely abandoned, truly befitting the name of 'ghost streets' that Francesca had come up during one of their worldbuilding brainstorming sessions.
I'd thought that back then, we'd completely inhabited the world we made, Niamh thought to herself, unable to resist staring in wonder as she and Lowen followed the companions down yet another alleyway and into yet another ghost street. Yet, this…. the ground was cracked and uneven beneath her feet, and her shoes were sodden from all the puddles she hadn't been able to avoid. She could smell rotting wood, and the rain against the tarmac. She could hear the crackling of the broken fluorescent lights of the old signs, hanging off of their buildings at odd angles.
I'm experiencing this world as they do, aren't I? she realised.
She slowed and looked up at the sky. For a brief moment, the lightning, in all of its unusual hues, lost some of its terrifying power. Making the edges of the storm clouds glow and the raindrops glitter, it almost looked beautiful. She held out her hand to catch some of the raindrops-
-and then Calcium squeaked and jumped on her foot. Hard.
"Heeeey!" she yelled, stumbling back.
As she did so, however, something caught her eye. At first, she couldn't figure out what. All the run-down buildings here looked more or less identical. But then, she narrowed her eyes. They were close to the end of the street, and right at the end of the street there was a building where a few straggly climbing plants crawled up the wall against all odds. Niamh took a few steps closer and noticed that some of the bricks were a different shade of grey to the ones that surrounded it. She turned to Lowen, who was starting at her incredulously.
"Niamh? What's up with you?" Lowen asked. "Why're you suddenly acting like you're in a trance?"
"Lo, look!" she insisted, pointing at the building. "Don't you recognise that?"
"Recognise a wall?" they asked, raising a sceptical eyebrow.
"Oh, by the Gods, just look at it!"
She grabbed their wrist and dragged them over so that they were both standing right in front of the wall. She studied the pattern carefully, recalling the scene in the game where Jaslasa had dragged Leonag to this very same wall. Then, carefully, she pushed a brick, and let out a squeal of satisfaction as it pressed inwards. Ignoring Lowen's spluttering and the companions' satisfied squeals, she followed the pattern she remembered Jaslasa pressing, until finally, some of the bricks slid away, creating a hole that could be crawled into. Niamh spun around and put her hands on her hips as she grinned at Lowen, whose mouth was hanging open.
"Holy shit," they exclaimed. "Of course! Right, let's go through it, then."
Niamh crawled in first, and then helped Lowen through. Once the companions hopped through, the bricks slid back into place behind them. Attached to the wall, lanterns flickered, each powered by a small round jewel that reminded Niamh of the ones that were at the bottom of her pack. We need to figure what's up with those, she thought to herself absently. For the time being, though, she squinted, trying to make use of the limited light as she said.
"Right, we need to just keep pushing forward, right, and then if we're lucky it will lead us to that cave that they escaped from…" Niamh said aloud.
"Hopefully we won't encounter anybody else," Lowen said. "There's a few like, cells, here, right? For people that Jaslasa used to help escape the city."
"Yeah. Look, here's one!"
Thankfully, the small, spartan cell was empty, with no evidence that anybody had been there recently. The other cells they passed were similarly empty, and for the longest time, apart from their footsteps and the companions' squishier movements, there was little noise. As they walked, Niamh imagined Jaslasa and Leonag taking this very same path, except they had taken advantage of being amongst a stream of people trying to escape in the wake of the riots, either because they had been followers of Jaslasa or because they had finally become tired of the Order's tyranny. If she remembered correctly, they'd also made it so that there were a few aspiring Great Library novices amongst the crowd, taking the tunnel through because the usual checkpoints were being too heavily monitored for their liking, and a few oddballs that had thought journeying through the dim tunnels was somehow more 'spiritual' than any other route.
What becomes of this once we 'fix' whatever it is we're fixing? Niamh wondered. Will all of this, all of those lives, will they just…disappear? They turned around a bend, and she immediately stopped musing as she stared at the rubble in front of her, weak light streaming from above.
"Uh….this is meant to lead to the cave, right?" Lowen said.
"Yeah, I think so."
"Now what?" Lowen demanded, throwing their hands up in the air. "We're trapped down here! We never came up with a way to get back out of this tunnel!"
"I don't know!"
Desperate, Niamh grabbed at some of the pieces of brick and started pulling at them, throwing them to the ground. She scrabbled and dug and threw, and after a few moments Lowen joined her, and the two of them desperately kept pulling away rubble, trying to reveal the opening, but they didn't seem to be making any headway. The only thing they were succeeding in doing was scraping up their hands, and when Niamh scratched her palm hard enough to bleed, she cried out and dropped the shard of brick she had been handling. Instinctively, she brought her hand up to her mouth, sucking at the wound, when she heard some squeaking.
She looked down to see Akito and Calcium pawing at her pack, which she didn't remember ever putting down, lying next to Lowen's. Curious, she knelt down and asked:
"What is it?"
The two companions squeaked, and then Calcium went to jab Lowen in the ankle with its knife. Lowen yelled, and then came to kneel with them as the two companions kept pawing at the two packs. A glow started to emanate from them, and Niamh gasped:
"The jewels?"
Ignoring Lowen's spluttered questions, Niamh opened her pack and reached right to the bottom, pulling out as many of the jewels as she could. They started to glow brighter and feel hotter, and Niamh struggled to keep a hold of them as they grew hotter and hotter.
"What am I meant to do with these?" she asked, prompting more furious squeaking.
She couldn't decipher the squeaks or the gestures, but it did seem like Calcium was pointing its knife at the pile of rubble, so, not able to think of anything else to do, she threw some of the jewels at the pile of rubble, and then cowered and covered her eyes as a blinding glow filled the space. She heard a loud rumbling and cracking, and she managed to squint just enough to see that the pieces of brick had crumbled smaller, finally exposing a gap. Lowen re-doubled their efforts in pulling away more bricks to make the gap bigger when footsteps thundered in the distance, along with the rumble of deep, threatening voices.
Instinctively, Niamh tossed the remaining jewels in her hand in front of her, towards the voices, once again needing to cover her eyes against the resulting blinding flash. As she predicted, though, the explosion caused the walls and roof to start collapsing. She heard the shouts of whoever was in the tunnel change tone, electronic communication devices beeping as panicked orders were shouted. Not knowing how much time this bought them both, she stuttered out an order to Lowen to hurry up, and then turned to help them pull away more rubble. The moment that the hole looked large enough, she pushed Lowen through it, then their packs. Finally, she nestled the companions in her skirts, which she then hitched up so that she could follow them. Hurriedly, they all crawled before sprawling out into the cave. Putting their packs back on as quickly as possible, they scrambled up and ran out of the cave, and kept running.
And they did not stop running until they saw the girls falling out of the sky.
…
Nell wasn't sure how long they had been walking for, but it did not seem as if they were getting any closer to the bottom of the stairs. Or, in some ways, it did, as the view of the city's skyscrapers was becoming clearer, the lights more clearly window-like, the outlines of the buildings more defined. She could even see helicopters hovering above some of the buildings, and silhouettes of people in some of the windows. The buildings seemed to grow taller as they got further down, but when she looked down, she still could not see the ground. Only clouds, and more clouds, and now, some stars in the darkness.
And the moon, of course.
She stopped to take a look at the moon, only for Bonnie-Rae to crash into her back and swear loudly.
"Nell! What are you doing?!" she demanded after she'd run through her litany of swear words.
"I don't know…." Nell confessed. "I…doesn't it feel like we have been walking such a long time?"
"It can only have been hours," Jodi pointed out. "The sky has not lightened again."
As if to emphasise her point, Jodi reached out for a star in the sky, cupping her hands around it. The light from it spilled between her fingers, and she gazed at it for a moment longer before she withdrew her hands from it, grinning self-consciously as she stuffed them into her pockets.
"It is not as if it is any darker, either." Nell said. "Not thanks to the moon."
She pointed to it, and the other two girls stared.
"You know," Jodi said conversationally. "I always thought that we were on the moon."
"No, Rev said something," Bonnie-Rae said. "Something about the realm being in the light of the moon. And, well, doesn't it look like we're in a ray of light?"
Nell wasn't sure about that, and that must have shown in her face because Bonnie-Rae said:
"Look, I'm sure if we keep walking, we'll get closer to the ground. We have to."
"I mean, what else are we gonna do, huh?" Jodi said with a shrug. "What do you think, Nell?"
Nell considered, then shrugged. Jodi took that as assent, and started walking again, Nell and Bonnie-Rae following. The staircase started to curve slightly, as if trying to become a spiral staircase, before the incline became a little steeper. When Nell looked down once more, she thought she could start to see the tops of not just shorter buildings, but trees as well, leaves lush and green but whipping around in a breeze. It was hard to tell though, because it had started to grow darker.
"Are those…clouds?" Jodi asked.
"Rain clouds, it looks like, yeah," Bonnie-Rae said, pointing to said clouds.
A lot of said clouds were hovering over the distant skyscrapers, dark and bunched together ominously. But other clouds drifted further away, and all of them seemed for form a circle around the moon. Around them. When the clouds let out a long, rolling boom, the three girls shrieked and briefly clung to each other.
"Fuck," Bonnie-Rae said. "Are we walking into a storm?"
"I say we're not walking anywhere for the moment," Jodi said. "Let's just sit down and…I don't know, eat?"
Bonnie-Rae's face twitched, but she plopped down on the step they were standing on, and Jodi and Nell followed suit. Jodi reached into her pack and took out some bread rolls and cheese, and handed them out. The next few moments were spent in a silence that was only punctuated by the thunderclaps around them, and the occasional flashes of oddly-coloured that came from the clouds the furthest away. Despite this, it was a mostly-silence that felt oddly companionable, and that had Nell thinking this feels like old times.
But the moment she thought that, she felt her thoughts screech to an abrupt halt. Old times? What old times? Before she'd come here, she hadn't been out of her bedroom for months. Not even to visit Baba in the hospital. Any friends she'd had, she'd lost in the wake of the attack even before she'd come home from the hospital and holed herself away. There had not been any recent times where she had sat with her friends from the old world the way she was sitting with Bonnie-Rae and Jodi now, the way she'd sat and ate with any of the friends she had up there in the Dream Realm.
But no, I'm not thinking of times with the people from the so-called real world, am I? Nell realised. I'm thinking of these guys. Because it was them that I met in my dreams with Mionura, wasn't it? She should have realised it earlier; from the moment she'd stepped into the dream realm. Hadn't she recognised them, somewhere deep down in her bones? Yet, similar to how now only now they were surrounded by dark clouds did she realise that earlier on their journey, everything had been bathed in a hazy white glow, it was only now she was further away from the Dream Realm that she realised that some of her memory had been clouded over.
Yet still, even with that realisation, it felt as if something were missing. She could see fragments of those old dreams, of moments where she had tread through the clouds and caves of the Dream Realm with Bonnie-Rae and Jodi and Karolin and all the rest, even before she had wished herself there permanently. Yet those fragments felt as if they were floating in her mind, distant and isolated, none of which she could grab closer to look at.
Still, she tried, nibbling her bread and cheese and concentrating. But even with clarity, her mind was still too confused to make sense of what was now being shown to her. Instead, her attention drifted to the skyscrapers. But there, too, clarity sharpened her gaze, making her lean forward to frown at it. All of a sudden, she thought she recognised it.
"Hey, guys…"
Bonnie-Rae and Jodi turned expectantly to Nell. She hesitated, not knowing whether it sounded insane or not. Then again, there wasn't any part of this that'd sound sane anyway. If the real world really knew that she had gone, all they'd know was that she'd disappeared out of a locked room, after not having gone anywhere for months on end, too traumatised by the last time she'd been in the outside world.
"Nell, please, spit it the fuck out." Bonnie-Rae demanded.
Nell felt her lips twitch at that. She could always rely on Bonnie-Rae to be, well, Bonnie-Rae. As constant as the North Star, or perhaps even the sun itself which, technically speaking, was also a star. It gave her enough of a boost to voice her opinion:
"That city…doesn't it look a little bit like the Cosmopolitia?"
The other two gawped at her, but it was Jodi who asked:
"Sorry….you mean, as in, UNKNOWN's Cosmopolitia?" Jodi's eyes went bug-like. "But why the hell would that be in the Dream Realm?"
"Well, the Gods must have known we're all fans, so maybe they or Mionura made it look like that to give us…some sort of comforts, maybe? For homesickness?"
Even as Nell suggested this, she knew it was 'complete baloney', as her baba would say. But the longer she looked at those lights with the knowledge that they could be the Cosmopolitia, the more her head hurt.
There's something…there's something I'm not remembering properly. Something…
"Did we….did we used to play together?" Nell asked.
Jodi and Bonnie-Rae both frowned at her, before the latter nodded quite seriously.
"I think we did. I hope we did. UNKNOWN, it was…."
Bonnie-Rae flung out her arm at the city lights and sighed.
"Fuck, I'm going to sound like a sap. But it was everything. Not just to play, though. When things got really shitty and I couldn't run away to actually play, I'd disappear into the Cosmopolitia-and, all the other places, actually, but still, whatever. I disappeared into the Cosmopolitia in my head instead. I suppose you could say….it was my Dream Realm, in a way."
"It was mine, too." Nell found herself agreeing.
What else would she do, when she couldn't even leave her room? How else could she escape when she couldn't even open a door and step out into a corridor? Like every other shut-in in the world, she'd turned to games, but to UNKNOWN most of all.
Nell yawned, and saved her progress, before heading to the forums. Despite her exhaustion, there was no point in going to sleep. All she'd dream of was that day, walking back from her dad's place of worship , alongside her aunt, her little cousins, and her cousin Janna who was her age. She'd dream of unwinding her headscarf from her head and wrapping it around her neck instead as Janna talked about being curious about Nell's mum's New God, and asking if she could accompany Nell and her mum to that place of worship on Sunday, just to see. Nell'd dream of how excited she had been, especially when her baba and auntie both said yes, because of course they'd say yes.
And then she'd dream of the point where she and her baba split ways with her auntie, Janna and the younger cousins. Of Nell realising that someone was watching them, following them, and trying to warn baba, except then they were there, on them, making it clear just how much they hated Nell for being someone who could incorporate two opposing New Faiths into her life, how much they hated her parents for mixing and producing her in the first place-
Nell shook her head. It was bad enough, bearing the scars on her body and the cage around her mind. There'd be plenty of time, when she forced herself to move away from her computer and lay down, plenty of time for her to torture herself with remembering. But not now. She needed to keep it at bay for now.
She scrolled through the forum, clicking on some of the popular threads, liking some comments and replying to others. She noticed some new fanart of Dosiana, as well as some more couple art of Leonag and Jaslasa, and liked and re-shared those on her social media. Then, she noticed a small thread, buried right at the bottom, titled, simply: The Wishing Star.
Instinctively, Nell looked to her windows. She had pulled her curtains already, and though they weren't blackout curtains, they were close enough. Even so, a fragment of light peeked through, and she reached out with one hand to push one of the curtains aside slightly. Just enough to see that, despite the sky being mostly filled with clouds, one star still shone, brighter than even the North Star could ever be.
The Wishing Star, she thought, before letting the curtain fall and looking back at the forum thread. There were only a few comments on the thread, which started with:
Have you seen the Wishing Star in the sky yourselves? Do you feel it calling to you?
Most of the very few replies were baffled question marks, and people questioning if it were spam. But there were a few replies that said yes, yes I do. Replies saying, should I wish on it, then? I don't want to be here. I don't want this world anymore. Nell stared at them, until her eyes blurred with tears. If she were in a different world, would she be able to breathe? To wander the streets of it, as free as she used to be? Would that world be a place where it wouldn't matter that she attended two different places of worship where truly, nobody cared that she was half-and-half of two things that didn't usually make a whole?
Nell did not look at the window again, but she did reach out to pull the curtain back once more. The glow of the star caught the corners of her eyes, and despite herself, she turned to take one more look at it. Its shimmering was so inviting, and she almost reached out to it, before stopping herself. She blinked, then forcibly turned herself back to the computer and typed: Yes, I feel it too.
In the present, Nell sighed and scanned the sky, looking for the Wishing Star in the sky. Despite the thick clouds, it did not take long for her to spot it. But here, somehow, it felt malevolent. She was distantly aware of Bonnie-Rae and Jodi animatedly talking with each other, comparing what they knew to see if they really could have known each other before, seeming to come to the conclusion that they had, and wondering why it was they hadn't figured it out before. Nell did not participate, though her head was rapidly filling with memories of days and nights spent messaging on the forums, moving to other platforms where they could privately message, of phone calls where Karolin and Parisa encouraged her to stay strong, where Sylvie listened to her talk about her baba and Alaia sympathised over what it was like to have an identity people did not think one should have-
The Wishing Star suddenly appeared blinding, and Nell cowered, even as she tried to reach out for it. But then, a question occurred to her:
"Wait, who's Sylvie? Who's Alaia?"
She stopped reaching out, and turned to Bonnie-Rae and Jodi, who now regarded her in befuddlement.
"Sorry, what?" Jodi said.
"Sylvie…Alaia….and….and…."
Nell searched desperately for the last name. She knew it, she was sure she did, it was there amongst all these new memories. She stood up, as if the movement could dislodge some memories, when something made her look back at the cityscape again. When she did, her breath caught in her throat at the smoke tendrils drifting upwards, blending into the clouds.
"Guys-"
"Holy shit, is the Cosmopolitia on fire?" Bonnie-Rae exclaimed, eliminating the need for Nell to ask the question herself.
"So, we're agreeing that that's the Cosmopolitia, then?" Jodi snarked.
"What the hell else could it be-oi, Nell! Nell, what the fuck?"
Nell didn't answer, because she had started running, her cloak streaming out behind her. She heard the other two leap up and scramble to catch up with her, but she didn't turn back to look at them. All she knew was that she needed to get to the bottom, and to get into the city, whether it was the Cosmopolitia and do…
…do what?
What can you do, little Nell? A voice whispered silkily. It's not like you can actually do anything. You little coward, shielding yourself instead of being a shield for yo-
"That's not true," she yelled, as if yelling aloud could do anything to a voice in her head. "That's not true, I tried, I really did, I tried but I couldn't do anything…I couldn't…"
Her voice thickened, and she felt her eyes fill up with tears, which fell despite all her best efforts, but she kept running down those stairs, refusing to stop. If she stopped, she'd realise she was heading into a city, a city with different buildings and landmarks, with lights that shone differently, but still a city with tarmac roads and cars zipping past, cars containing people who could have stopped and jumped out and done something to stop the attack, but which hadn't-
A city that felt so big, so impossible, its streets a jungle, the reason why, when she'd left the hospital and returned home, she'd never stepped out again-
A city, something she'd thought she'd never be able to live in, ever again-
And yet, here I am, venturing to a city. Who do I think I am? Nell thought, openly sobbing now. Who do I think I am? I couldn't save baba. I couldn't even go to the hospital to visit him once I was better. I left this world because I couldn't even leave my room? Who do I think I am-
Nell's sob turned into a scream as her foot slipped. Her arms flailed, but she couldn't steady herself and suddenly, the wind rushed by as she was flying. No, not flying, she thought, falling. Falling, with the breath knocked out of her, along with two more memories.
The first, of sitting at her computer screen on a group video call, with Chantelle and Maxine altogether in a park huddling over Chantelle's phone screen, and then three more girls somewhere else.
Blue haired, golden haired, red haired.
The sun, the wheel of fortune, and death.
Sylvie, Nell remembered with finality. Alaia and…Adrielle.
And it was Adrielle, in this memory, who spoke. Pale and clammy, eyes bright with desperation, as she said:
"It's a trick, the Wishing Star. It's a trick."
And then the second memory, blurred with the hazy white glow of dreams, with a girl's sweet voice saying: it's okay, there'll always be a place for you in dreams as she sat on the end of Nell's bed, swinging her legs. Nell caught a glimpse of long dark hair, a birdcage attached to a belt on a dress, but the haziness meant she couldn't see the girl's face properly. But that voice, the hair…
…wait, hold on! Could it be-
Realising that the ground was coming up to meet her, Nell screamed and tried to cover her face, to at least shield herself from the inevitable blow, when suddenly the ground glowed in a rainbow of hues and she felt her descent slowing. The light enveloped her, and she sunk to the ground. The impact still jarred her bones, somewhat, and she felt dirt in her knees, but thankfully, she was not hurt.
The first thing she did as the glow faded was jump up, and look for Bonnie-Rae and Jodi, her knees nearly weakening as she spotted them right next to her, groaning and getting up, dusting themselves down. Overcome, Nell flung her arms around them, and their voices overlapped frantically as they tried to work out what had happened, and where they'd fallen, and why, only to be interrupted by a squeaking.
It took Nell a moment to realise it was coming from the ground, but when she did, she certainly wasn't expecting to look down and discover two extremely round small creatures staring at her. Nell blinked, not entirely sure how she was meant to react to them. However, Bonnie-Rae immediately spluttered and squealed:
"What the hell are they?"
"Aww, but they're kinda cute though," Jodi said, kneeling down. "Not a clue what they are, but they're cute!"
"Aren't they just?"
This came from a bright-green-haired woman in a similarly-coloured gown, who now approached them, accompanied by a bespectacled person with a long cloak decorated with blue crystals that glowed. Nell wasn't sure how old they were, but they were definitely adults, and both of them looked as if they had been dragged backwards through a hedge. The green haired woman, though she cooed briefly at the two round creatures, who waddled up to her and nudged her ankles in what Nell assumed was affection, now regarded the three of them with some concern.
"Are you three alright? You're not hurt, are you?" she asked.
"Nah, we're fine, "Jodi said. "Those little things, are they your pets?"
"No." the bespectacled person snorted.
This was accompanied by a very aggrieved-sounding squeak from what Nell assumed was the bird (why on earth is the bird carrying a knife, she thought to herself uncomfortably). The bespectacled person gave an equally aggrieved sigh in the direction of the bird before turning to the girls.
"Who are you? Where did you fall from?" they asked. "Do you need help?"
"So, I'm Jodi, that's Bonnie-Rae and this here's Nell."
"Nell Gentry-Khan," Nell supplied. "It's, uh, nice to meet you."
For a brief, horrible moment, Nell thought she had flubbed that, for the two adults exchanged looks. But she quickly realised that it wasn't her when the bespectacled one said:
"Real world names. They have real world names."
"Yes, duh, we came from the real world. Well, not directly, of course, and really it's more like escap-wait. Wait. I recognise you."
Nell was startled when Bonnie-Rae stepped forward, her face thunderous and eyes flashing like lightning as they narrowed, scrutinising the two adults.
"That…that dress, and that cloak and….Kai and Limon."
"Huh?"
Jodi screwed up her face in confusion, and Bonnie-Rae whirled on her, snarling:
"You haven't figured it out yet? We said, didn't we, that the city we saw was the Cosmopolitia? And who fucking made the Cosmopolitia? It's them! Well, them and the other two, Enigma and Frannie Grace-"
"She doesn't like Frannie," the green-haired woman said. "I know she's not here to hear it, but she doesn't like it. She's Francesca, or Ces if you have to shorten it. Frannie…I think it reminds her of her childhood."
"Her childhood. So? I can't bleach my brain of my fucking life that easily," Bonnie-Rae retorted. "And at least she got to escape it; by making this all and now…and now she's burning it all down! You all are!"
Bonnie-Rae whirled around, ready to point out the Cosmopolitia. Except, Nell realised, they'd landed in the middle of nowhere, and they could not see the city. All they could see were the storm clouds, and the heavy-hanging moon, the low-hanging stars, threaded across the sky like beads. Not able to prove her point, Bonnie-Rae slumped, defeated, before then muttering:
"Yeah, well, anyway, it's you guys' fault. Kai Star. Limonletta."
It was hearing those gaming handles that made something click in Nell's mind once more. Memories of watching videos or reading interviews, looking at promotional material, the open gaming session where the four creators of UNKNOWN joined fans in one huge playthrough with their special avatars and their gaming handles.
"Well, since you guys are from the real world, let's call each other by real names. I'm Lowen, she's Niamh. Though I have a feeling you know that already, since you know Ces' real name. Well, her old one, anyway. " Lowen supplied with a shrug.
"Holy shit, you're Lowen Reece and Niamh Connors." Jodi realised. "Two of UNKNOWN's creators…holy, holy shit. Sorry. Excuse my language."
"Psh, it's fine, I deal with worse." Lowen said, offhandedly. "So, what brings you kids here? Did the Old Gods summon you here?"
"Kind of." Nell said. "I think."
Before she could explain what she thought she meant by that, she let out a yawn. Lowen and Niamh exchanged looks, and then Niamh said:
"Let's find a better place to camp than on this patch of dirt, and then we can talk this through while resting, yeah? Akito, Calcium, help us?"
The two blobby things squealed as Niamh crouched down to give them encouraging pats, before they then bounced squelchily.
"Are we seriously following them?" Bonnie-Rae grumbled.
Jodi rolled her eyes and then grabbed onto Bonnie-Rae's wrist.
"Yes, and I'm going to drag you if you make a stink about it! I mean, have you got any better ideas at the moment? Besides, these creatures are the ones that stopped us from going splat just now, didn't you notice?"
Bonnie-Rae scowled, then her gaze fell on Nell.
"What do you think? Are we seriously going with them?" she demanded.
Nell hesitated, and then quietly said:
"Like Jodi said, we haven't got any better options."
Bonnie-Rae kicked at the ground and scowled, before saying to Jodi:
"Fine, I'm coming. You don't have to drag me."
"Oh, good."
Jodi gave Bonnie-Rae a beatific grin, and then let go of her wrist. The three of them, and the two adults, trudged behind the energetic blobby creatures as they confidently led them through the barren land to a cluster of straggly looking bushes, a couple of trees, and a small body of water. Nell wondered if it'd count as a pond or a lake.
"Reckon that's safe?" Niamh asked Lowen, looking at the water.
"Well, it can't be any worse than the muck I drank while on the streets."
Having made this pronouncement, Lowen knelt down by the body of water and cupped their hands before scooping some and sipping it tentatively.
"Tastes pretty fresh," they concluded. "But if I start foaming at the mouth or keel over in the next five minutes, don't touch it."
Niamh punched Lowen playfully on the shoulder, and then they started to set up camp.
"I'm not sure what we're going to do about tents," Lowen said. "We've only got the two, and although you seem to have come with some things, you don't have tents, do you?"
"No, but we do have blankets," Nell offered. "We might be able to string them up between those two bushes there or something, so that it at least covers us if it rains."
"Hmm, that could work…" Niamh considered. "But it doesn't seem fair. Lo, what if we share, then let the girls share the other one?"
"Yeah, that'd be better, I reckon." Lowen said. "Let's do that, then."
Once the tents were up, Nell and Bonnie-Rae went to find sticks and stones for a fire, when they noticed that something was buried under a patch of dirt. Kneeling down to scrape it away, they discovered ashes and burnt sticks buried together. The two of them stared, wide-eyed, when they heard Jodi yell.
"Hey, has someone been here before?"
The two of them looked over as Jodi waved a scrap of cloth at the adults. Niamh took it from her, and examined it.
"Did it get caught onto that bush, there?" she asked.
"Yeah, that's right." Jodi confirmed. "From someone's dress, maybe?"
"Yeah…come to think of it, this colour."
Niamh held it up as if to examine it under the moonlight. Nell got up and went over to get a closer look at it herself, and noted that although it was dirty and threadbare, the material was still recognisable as a shimmery, satiny lilac. Just like-
"Dosiana's dress?" she finished the thought aloud.
When the others turned to gawp at her, Nell's shoulders hunched. Lowen regarded her appraisingly, and then took the material from Niamh's hands to examine it themselves.
"Yes," they said. "I think it must be."
"And there are traces of a fire here, also." Nell said. "Cold, so it's been a while since it was made, but buried away, as if they didn't want to leave a trace of themselves."
"So, Lo," Niamh said excitedly. "That means we must somehow be on the right track to find them."
"Find who?" Bonnie-Rae demanded.
Niamh and Lowen exchanged looks, which made Bonnie-Rae furious:
"Come on, we're not little kids!"
"No, of course you're not, just…let's get this fire done real quick. I think you'll need to be sitting down for this." Lowen reassured them.
"That, and I have a feeling we'll need to be sitting down for whatever your side of the story is," Niamh said. "We weren't aware there'd be any other mortals around."
Bonnie-Rae didn't appear particularly happy about that, but she grumpily cooperated in getting the fire going. Once they were all sitting down, though, she glared at them belligerently and said:
"So, since this is your fault, you'd better explain yourselves."
"Hey, kid, watch it." Niamh said.
"I'm not sure why you think it's our fault, but it isn't entirely. It's not like we asked the Old Gods to somehow meld the game world with their own world, is it? Ah, and I can see that we've lost you. Let's start from the beginning…or, as much of a beginning as we can, anyway…"
Lowen sighed and scratched their head, before they and Niamh started to explain. Nell wished that she had a pen and notebook to keep notes of what they said, but she did her best to remember it anyway, while also leading the way in explaining her story. The ways they connected, she tried her hardest to understand.
That the Old Gods would decide to just…take the world of UNKNOWN for themselves made a certain kind of sense to her. She'd been sucked in by the novelty of it, how it was completely its own thing, so why wouldn't the Gods be the same? They, too, loved novelty, did they not? She wasn't sure what she made of the revelation that the characters had become real people (or, sort of real people). She knew that souls were kept, sometimes. Their essence helped power the world, after all. And sometimes, if the Gods thought it entertaining, they'd even allow some to reincarnate into different lives. But this, it was comparable to stories like that of Galatea or Pinocchio-breathing life into things that were never meant to be alive. Things that could not, by definition, die.
"So, I guess the Old Gods got inspired by you guys to make the Wishing Star actually capable of taking us out of the world, huh?" Jodi said. "I mean, that's what it does. That's what Dosiana accidentally does to the thief that was trying to burn her Sanctuary down, and why she ended up accidentally killing the Sanctuary Senior who was going to have her dragged before their council whatevers for it, the reasons she ends up burning it down and fleeing anyway."
"But you've used it to wish yourselves away, right? Why?" Niamh asked.
Nell flinched, and Bonnie-Rae actually snarled at them both. Lowen put their hands up appeasingly and said:
"Alright, alright. That's not important now. But what made you aware that you could do that? Even if you got the idea from UNKNOWN, that's fiction. You can't have believed it was real."
"No, not exactly…" Nell answered. "But honestly, until we started going down the stairs from the Dream Realm, I hadn't even remembered most of what happened. I just remembered that I wished, and the Gods granted that wish. But it feels like…I think it whispered to me, over time, and wore me down. Like…like the Gods were trying to make me make that wish. Although, there was Mionura, as well."
"Yeah, that sort of chimes in with what I'm remembering," Jodi agreed. "And I remember, in, like, actual dreams, Mionura talking about how there might be a way to make it easier for us to see and visit each other….maybe with the Wishing Star, maybe without. But, like, we could only come to her realm when asleep, and she could only come to the real world when the moon was waning-"
Jodi cut herself off abruptly, and blinked rapidly before saying:
"Okay, true confession. I literally just remembered that as I was saying that to you, and, like…we met her. Mionura. Except, she didn't call herself that, she called herself…shit, wait, what was it? Bonnie-Rae, do you remember?"
"No, why would I?" Bonnie-Rae crossed her arms. "I don't believe any of this! I can't, I mean, I-"
She jumped up, which made Lowen and Niamh startled.
"Hey, kiddo-" Lowen started.
"Don't!" Bonnie-Rae exclaimed. "Just, don't! You guys took it all away from me when you decided to take UNKNOWN offline, and now UNKNOWN's here, and we're all here together, as we're supposed to be, and, and, you're saying it was a trick….?"
"It's not all as it's supposed to be though, is it?" Jodi challenged. "Not if the other three girls…Nell, what did you say their names were?"
"Sylvie, Alaia and Adrielle-"
"Wait, I'm sorry, did you say, Adrielle?" Niamh asked suddenly, urgently.
"Y-yeah?" Nell said hesitantly.
"Adrielle…Connors?"
"I…I don't know, but that sounds right?"
"Is she red-haired? Tall? Looks older than a teenager?"
"I mean…I've only just started remembering, and I never saw her in the flesh, only in a screen-"
"And in dreams." Jodi added.
Nell nodded at that, and then said:
"But yeah, I think…why?"
"She's my cousin's kid," Niamh said. "If this is the same Adrielle, then that's my cousin's kid and…shit, I knew that Gabs left her alone a lot and shit, but there's my aunty and everyone, and she had my number, too-"
"Niamh, breathe." Lowen said. "What happened?"
Niamh rubbed her eyes and then, focusing only on Lowen, said:
"She phoned me while I was on my way to your place. She sounded unwell, and she was talking about the rain, and the star, and she wasn't making much sense at the time, but if she's like these girls, then that makes sense. And you, you girls, you said that she's here?"
"Well, somewhere here, anyway," Jodi said. "We came to look for them, because they should have come straight to the Dream Realm if they'd wished on the star, but they didn't turn up."
"Just you three?"
"Yes, that's right," Nell said. "Some of the others were scared of leaving…and actually, I was, too. But anyway, it also made sense for some of them to stay, in case the girls did manage to make it back by themselves anyway. Besides, there's the pond, and Reverie's connection to it."
"She wanted to come with us," Bonnie-Rae said, still holding herself apart from them, shoulders tense and mouth grim. "Except when she tried, she started having a seizure. Or, something like one. It was like it hurt her to leave. And actually, things started going all weird when she arrived-"
She cut herself off as her eyes went to the tent, where shuffling and squeaking sounds emanated. The rest of them also turned to take a look, and after a few moments, the companion who looked a bit like a red panda hopped out, clutching something shiny in its hands.
"Ooh, whatcha got there, Akito?" Niamh asked.
The companion ignored her and hopped up to Bonnie-Rae, holding out the object, which Nell thought looked like a jewel of some sort. Bonnie-Rae blinked, and then bent down to retrieve it. Straightening, she weighed up the jewel in her hand, and then pronounced:
"These are Aynur's jewels, aren't they?"
"Are they?" Niamh and Lowen asked at the same time.
"I mean, they're clear and they're spherical, so, probably." Bonnie-Rae said with a shrug. "Even though Aynur wasn't a Old God, they did sometimes use jewels, and then even though Mionura's proper jewels were the crescent-moon ones, she would sometimes make use of these, to help see people's dreams, or to give her guidance when she felt particularly alone. That's what she used to find us, in the first place…"
"Okay," Niamh said. "I would never have put that together, but that makes sense. But anyway, why and how do we have Aynur's, or Mionura's jewels in our packs? And why the fuck would they help me to explode a cave?"
"I don't know, but I bet Hae-won would know," Lowen said. "Hae-won would have put it together, and figured out where to go next. They're the encyclopaedia-brain, after all."
Bonnie-Rae was frowning at the jewel, tossing it from hand to hand, then peering through it. She then turned slightly away from them, and held it up.
"Bonnie-Rae," Jodi asked. "What are you doing?"
But Bonnie-Rae ignored her, clearly trying to do something specific with the way she was holding up the jewel. It took Nell a moment to realise that she was trying to capture a ray of the moon's light. Eventually, she managed it, the jewel becoming dazzling, casting scatters of rainbow light across her face and the ground around her. Bonnie-Rae's anger eased slightly, into something more contemplative as she gazed into the light. Then, still holding the jewel up, she turned her face to them, ever so slightly.
"Reverie." She said, simply.
"What about her?"
"She…she was there, too, with us. Don't you remember? Don't you see? Or rather, don't you not see? It's her, in those memories, the one we can't see. And I don't think she can, either. That's why….that's why she's so wishy-washy. That's why she couldn't leave. The Old Gods…they've fucked something up with her. So they've fucked up all of this, haven't they?"
"Uhhh, Bonnie-Rae, what are you saying?" Jodi said.
"I'm saying what I'm saying!"
Bonnie-Rae pulled a face, but she no longer seemed like she was about to blow a fuse. She let her hand fall back to her side, and the jewel's glittering quietened. She came back to sit with them, cradling the jewel in her cupped hands. Nell considered her and what she had said, but no more was said about it as both Lowen and Niamh insisted that they all eat and drink, steering the conversation to more small talk. Though even that didn't stray too far from their situation, with Lowen joking about how all their research into camping and wilderness survival was proving pretty useful, even if they weren't sure whether this situation would count as 'real life application', while Niamh described what it was like to eat noodles in the UNKNOWN world, also talking about other little, interesting things that she had seen.
"I kinda felt like a tourist, you know, which is daft, considering, but hey," Niamh said. "It sure was an experience. Could've done without the whole riots thing, you know."
"So, where are we heading?" Bonnie-Rae asked. "The Dancehall, right? We need answers from the Gods now, as well. And we've all got people to find."
"The Dancehall, yes," Lowen confirmed. "But I dunno if the Gods are going to be there. I got the sense they were going to try and fix things in our world, while we fix things in this world. "
"But how are you going to do that?" Nell asked, the thought dawning on her. "If you don't mind me asking, I mean. Once you find the characters, what is it that you're going to do?"
Niamh and Lowen exchanged a look.
"In all truth and honesty," Lowen eventually admitted. "We don't know. But we made them strong-willed, if nothing else. I think that even if we tell them the truth, and even if they believe it, they're still going to try and cling onto what they are. Or they may try to destroy it to gain their freedom. But, beyond that….ah, I don't know, that sounded daft."
"Well, not daft, exactly, " Jodi said perkily. "Just a bit waffly, and not actually an answer. Figures, since you're an oldy and all."
"Oi." Lowen said, though they grinned as they said it.
Jodi grinned back, and Niamh rolled her eyes with a huff (though she couldn't fully hide a smile, either). Bonnie-Rae was silent and watchful, now hugging her knees to her chest as if she was a child many years younger than her actual age. But the thought in Nell's mind continued its dawning, and when it was too bright to ignore, she said:
"You're going to try and un-make them, aren't you? You're going to pick one of the endings for them, and make them end their story. Because they weren't ever meant to be real, or pretend to be real. And now they're real, they can't know what to do, can they? They weren't meant to be…just like, really, we-"
But there, Nell cut herself off. There was a limit to her bravery, if she could even call it that. And how could she? The thought of returning to the bedroom she'd trapped herself in, to knowing she would remain trapped, no matter how hard she tried-it was unbearable. She didn't want to return to being even more of a coward than she was now.
I don't want to go back to that world.
A loud clap made her jump, and she saw that the thunder clouds seemed to have thickened, crawling across the sky a little closer to them. Lightning flashed blue, green, pink. Nell rubbed her face tiredly, then turned back to see Lowen and Niamh looking at her with concern. It reminded her of the doctors at the hospital, and she felt her shoulders hunch, her mouth twist as she turned away.
"Ah, come now, let's just get some sleep." Niamh said. "We can think about it more when we wake up. I don't think any of them will get there before us."
"Do you know that?" Bonnie-Rae asked sulkily.
"No, but we have to make some assumptions, otherwise we'd never decide to do anything." Niamh pointed out.
"I mean, I guess," Bonnie-Rae shrugged. "Do or die, right?"
"Wow, way to be dramatic." Jodi said. "Come on, grumpy-head."
Bonnie-Rae gave her the middle finger, then said:
"No, you guys go on. I just want to sit out here a while."
Niamh looked like she was going to say something, but Lowen stopped her, saying:
"That's fine, Bonnie-Rae. Don't stay up too long now."
"Psh, I'm not a little kid with a designated fucking bedtime."
But Nell noticed that Bonnie-Rae ducked her head in a way that seemed bashful, almost smiling before returning her attention to the sky. As Niamh and Lowen went into the tent they were sharing, Nell followed Jodi into the other one, as they settled down and tried to sleep.
"So, this is all super freaky, especially with that storm and all, but like, we've met the actual Lowen Reece and Niamh Connors? When we find the others they're gonna be so jealous…although, maybe not-"
"Adrielle?"
"Yeah, her. Funny. I remember her now, but also it feels really hard to do the remembering? Does that make sense?"
"I…think so."
"Yeah, me neither."
Jodi then laughed, and Nell couldn't help but giggle too. Eventually though, Jodi calmed, and turned to stare up at the top of the tent.
"Do you think Bonnie-Rae's actually alright?" Jodi asked. "She's always so hard, but she's also taking this hard, and…"
"Try not to piss her off too much, even if that is easier said than done." Nell said, wryly.
Jodi chuckled at that.
"Yeah, figured. Anyway, g'night."
Jodi turned over again, and her breathing slowed almost immediately. Nell watched her briefly, before quietly sitting up and crawling to the tent's entrance. Peering around the flap, she saw Bonnie-Rae still sitting on the ground, the two companions sitting next to her. It wasn't clear if she welcomed or even noticed their company, however, for she held up the jewel the light of the moon once more. Bonnie-Rae's back was to her, so she couldn't see her expression, but there was something pensive in the way she held herself, in the tilt of her head as she gazed at the jewel and the light it was refracting.
"Reverie?" she heard Bonnie-Rae murmuring. "Reverie? Do you remember yet? Can you hear me?"
Whatever it was that Bonnie-Rae was seeing, though, Nell did not. And it made her heart ache. So she only allowed herself a moment more to watch her friend, before retreating back into the tent and attempting to sleep.
…
"Hah, beat that!"
Amarun watched as Jaslasa scooped up the final stones with a huge grin. Instead of putting them down in the dirt where she was supposed to, she waved her fist at Leonag, who grumbled.
"That's not fair," Leonag whined. "You kept getting free turns."
"You can too if you think about it." Jaslasa retorted, sticking her tongue out. "Rematch?"
"Ehhhh….."
Leonag had hesitated the previous three times, but had always given in, the prospect of perhaps winning against Jaslasa too good to resist. As such, Amarun expected him to give in this time, too, but instead, he pointed to Wandelir and Dosiana, who were still moving stones around their drawn grid with looks of intense concentration, while Helmvir and Kinjeet sat next to them, watching in fascination.
"Let's watch them," Leonag said. "They've been going for a while."
Jaslasa narrowed her eyes at Leonag, before then turning to the three moon-girls, who had been watching them, rapt.
"What do you think? Should I string Leo here along, let him think he'll win this time, or shall we go over and watch them?"
The girls giggled, and then Sylvie nodded in Dosiana's and Wandelir's direction. Amarun recalled overhearing Alaia saying something about how she had thought the scene 'so cute' the first time she had 'played' it, but it was even cuter in real life. Amarun hadn't understood what she meant by that, though. Not because she didn't understand the actual words. Unlike the others, she'd understood every single word that the three moon-girls had said immediately. No gradual comprehension for her. The weird way they arranged syllables and other sounds to form their unfamiliar words were recognisable to Amarun. The language they spoke was the one that spoke in the back of her mind, that had told her of the cycle and the need to shatter it. So, she'd understood every word those girls had said. She just didn't understand what any of it meant.
I will, in time, though, she thought. I just need to keep watching. I just need to keep looking. Of course, she'd look to her book, too, and if that didn't shed any light tonight, she might resort to a sacrifice for help. It didn't help that she could not see all the stars fully, just the ones that hung low, around the moon. But for now, she put aside that, to watch the three moon-girls, as Sylvie nodded and then clearly said:
"Let's watch."
This was clear enough for Jaslasa and Leonag to understand, and the latter groaned before smiling at them. They all got up and wandered over to the other game, clustering around Dosiana and Wandelir. Amarun waited a beat, then also got up to join them, though when she resettled, it was a little apart. Though, still close enough to see the two rows of six 'holes' in the ground and the two squares drawn out to be the 'stores' of the game. Though each of the holes still had some stones (and beads from Dosiana's dress, which she had tugged off after another section of it had gotten trapped in a tree and she'd had to rip it apart) in them, it was clear that some progress was being made, since the stores were filling up.
"You guys aren't playing with the capture rule, are you?" Leonag asked curiously.
"We weren't," Wandelir said. "But we got the same amount the last time, so we're trying with the capture ru-"
Wandelir snapped his mouth shut as Dosiana dropped a bead in an empty hole on her side, before then reaching forward to take some from the hole opposite to it, placing them in her store. Dosiana beamed, and then indicated with her hand that it was his turn. Wandelir made his move, and then they played back and forth a few more times until Dosiana's row was empty.
"Alright then, let us count." Wandelir said.
It felt like everyone else was wating with bated breath as Dosiana and Wandelir counted their assortments. When Wandelir stopped counting while Dosiana kept going, Jaslasa cheered and said:
"Great job, Dodo!"
The three moon-girls laughed, and Adrielle said:
"I forgot that Jaslasa liked to nickname people."
Jaslasa clearly heard her name, for she shot the three girls a curious look, before shrugging and turning back to Dosiana, who beamed with pleasure.
"That was fun, it's been so long since I've played Seed Stores. Jaslasa, can I play it with you?"
"Sure, although-" she turned back to the girls. "Have you ever played this game? Do you even have it wherever you come from?"
This seemed to be one of those questions that made the girls falter and look at each other, asking themselves how to explain it. Amarun scrutinised them as they debated.
"Well, we've watched them play it in the game, but that's not really the same thing." Alaia said with a shrug
"No, but it is based on an actual game, from Ancient Times. Mancala. Niamh mentioned it, in an interview she and the others did. Last time there was a big family gathering, she showed me an article about mancala on her phone."
"Oh, yes, of course, you're Niamh Connors cousin!" Sylvie exclaimed. "I keep forgetting that, I'm so jealous."
"Well…technically she's my mother's cousin." Adrielle said, blushing. "But anyway…"
Alaia was the one who eventually gave their proper answer, explaining:
"We might have. It looks a little bit like a game called mancala, though it's not one that really gets played any more."
She accompanied this with a 'so-so' hand gesture, and added:
"We are not very good at it."
"Then, I shall have to teach you before you have a proper tournament," Wandelir declared. "There is no use in throwing you to the wolves."
"Seriously?" Helmvir sniped. "It's a game of Seed Stores, get a hold of yourself."
Wandelir sniffed, but wisely chose not to rise to this, instead ushering the girls over to him. Dosiana put down her stones and beads and got up to step aside, when she turned to look at Amarun.
"Do you want to play?" she asked.
"Me?"
"I mean, you'll probably be better than me. You must have played more complicated board games in the Great Library, right?"
"We have records of many kinds of games in the Great Library," Amarun informed her. "And while yes, I do enjoy games with more complexity to them, Seed Sowers is strategic enough to hold my interest."
"That is a long-winded way of saying yes." Jaslasa said wryly.
"Are you saying yes?" Dosiana asked.
Amarun considered this, and then nodded. Dosiana clapped her hands together gleefully, in the manner of a younger child, and she beckoned Amarun over to where she drew out a new Seed Sower board on the ground with some sticks. She then gathered more stones, and shared them all out to begin the game.
Even though, Amarun occasionally looked over to see what the three moon-girls were doing (having fun being taught, apparently), she still managed to win against Dosiana in the four matches they played. Although, to give the gentler girl credit, she gave Amarun a real challenge in the last two matches, apparently getting wise to some of Amarun's playing style. By the end, she was smiling, her chest feeling oddly warm in a way that was pleasurable and also weirdly familiar.
Did we do this before, she wondered. In the cycles that came before, did we play together like this? Is this why I feel so…fond towards her now? But if that is the case, then why is it that this cycle needs to be broken? What is so bad about it if…
Amarun shook herself, then, noticing that everyone else seemed to be packing it in for the night, decided to do the same. Getting up, she watched Dosiana gathering the stones for a moment, and again felt the pang of fondness. Cycles or not, though, it is strange to feel such a thing when they are below me. Despite that, Amarun felt compelled to say:
"Thank you for that, Dosiana. I rather enjoyed playing against you."
Dosiana looked startled at that, but she recovered quickly, beaming:
"Thank you! We should play again sometime."
"Perhaps."
Amarun retreated into her tent, but peered through a gap in the flap, watching Wandelir and Dosiana tidy up the provisions, with Jaslasa swiping a few extra berries and cramming them into her mouth, grinning unrepentantly as Leonag scolded her. She noticed Kinjeet and Helmvir exchanging looks, and she remembered the second day, when, as they were supposedly gathering more firewood, she'd spotted them kissing. She'd withdrawn herself quietly, so they'd not know they'd been spotted, but she'd watched them afterwards.
The bright spots on Helmvir's cheeks, the awkwardness of Kinjeet's manner, the way they both shot looks at each other when they thought the other wouldn't notice, but gravitated closer to each other while walking or while gathering around a fire (or, as with tonight, around a game). It was only little things like that, for it seemed Kinjeet and Helmvir had been trying to hide their trysts from everyone else. But it surprised Amarun that nobody had really noticed. Not even Jaslasa, who seemed to live to make everyone (but especially Leonag) splutter with embarrassment. Amarun had no interest in exposing that, not yet. It was something she filed away for the right time, just as she filed away everything she knew about the three moon-girls.
Speaking of which….
She had taken out her book, and flicked through the pages aimlessly, restlessly, until she heard everyone quieten. She had to wait for Helmvir to come out and ask Kinjeet if she ever slept, and for Kinjeet to point out that someone needed to keep watch, but after that, she thought, she was free and clear to sneak out and sit under the moon, hoping that the lightning would not strike her while she tried to find some answers once and for all. Or so she thought, for she heard the sounds of one more person, and put her eye to the gap in her tent, only to see Alaia sneak out from the tent she shared with the other two moon-girls.
What…what is she doing?
Amarun watched in fascination as Alaia went around the side of her tent, and then crouched, staring intently. It took a moment for Amarun to put it together, but she soon worked out that Alaia was watching Kinjeet and Helmvir as they sat and talked. The moon-girl's expression was wide-eyed, fascinated. It reminded Amarun of the times when one of them would do or say something, and one of the moon-girls would turn to the other and say this was like that scene in UNKNOWN, one of my favourites or do you remember a scene like this or, it didn't happen exactly like this. But she didn't understand what that meant, why 'unknown' was the name of a place if they clearly knew where it was, or where or when they could have seen them. All she understood was that they knew, somehow. They knew that they had been in cycles before and knew what was meant to happen. The only question was, how to extract that knowledge.
Amarun bit back a sigh of irritation. If she left the tent now, Alaia would see her. But…. carefully, she pinned back one of the flaps, though not fully, and made sure she was sitting in the opening of the tent. She laid out her book in her lap, angling it so that the moonlight would hit the pages once she opened it, while the flap would still mostly conceal her from view.
Then, she carefully opened the pages until she reached the ones encrusted with crushed jewels. She flicked past the two blues, the red, the green. She hesitated with the pink, because after all, what she wanted most was to see. But that, too, she turned past, until she was left with the page embedded with clear jewels. Jewels that had once either been spherical, or crescent shaped. She pressed her hands against the pages, hard enough to feel the crushed jewels dent her palms, but not hard enough to bleed. Not yet.
With the lightning flashing and crashing distantly beyond them all (closer than yesterday, she thought, though still distant), Amarun thought that perhaps the moon had become covered. But then, the jewels on the page began to shimmer with a hazy, opalescent glow. Amarun concentrated on the glow, watching it strengthen before then beginning to ripple like water.
Then, in the water-like glow, a face formed. It was a young face, female and pretty. Long, straight dark hair with a few lighter streaks, a thin section of it braided and a pink bow tied into it. Her differently-coloured eyes were anxious, but also blinked rapidly as her mouth opened and closed. Clearly, whatever it was she was looking into, she had not expected to see a face there. Which was strange, considering whom Amarun thought she was.
"Who….?"
Amarun stiffened, but realised she could hear the voice in her head, and not in the air. Good, she thought, it would not do if Alaia heard this. She focused on the girl, whose brow furrowed as she asked again:
"Who…who are you?"
Amarun smiled, and rather than answer the question, she instead said:
"Hello there, Mionura."
…