I do not own any piece of this media whatsoever.

Meeting Kirby was an experience that is a bit hard to describe. It's a little like being punched in the face with a dry erase board marker; You don't know why they did it, it didn't affect you physically, but you're baffled all the same.

So I'll go back to the day before then. It was more traumatizing than meeting Kirby was, but Kirby was the straw that broke the camel's back when it came to exploring the rest of this universe.

Other than some brainstorming and workshopping with Mochi, nothing else of significance happened. In all honesty I've come to really enjoy their presence along with the rest of the siblings. They make the ship much less lonely and I took the guest room off stasis as well to accommodate.

After Rexy and Keeby finished exploring it was pretty late so I just let them stay on the ship for the night.

I never did explain what I meant by 'stasis' did I? So it takes a LOT of work to keep a ship functional, clean, and in working order. I am a single Luma who has been alone for a long time so I workshopped a few ways around it.

Suffice to say that when it comes to sealing things it's what I'm best at magic wise; not getting into technomagic, magitech, and all that such and such. That stuff is more science mixed with physics and a smattering of understanding the principles behind concepts changed from magic use than anything. It's complicated ok, just trust me on that.

Anyway I like sealing, it just makes the most sense to me after the other stuff I said.

Contain and Protect are the two core tenants of it and they really mesh with my general vibe of not violently exploding or being eaten by a void worm. If you have a problem, seal it, it's not a problem anymore and it could even be disposed of or of use elsewhere now.

My original shuttle was actually powered by one of those aforementioned void worms as well! In hindsight I think those thieves may be dead now if they haven't kept up with the maintenance on the reactor.

Weird how that turns out isn't it?

Rituals are also fun things to mess with because it's mostly written magic using runes, chants, and sometimes other things to use other possibly more powerful spells. Drawbacks are that they can take a lot of energy or sacrifice for the more complicated effects.

Take the ritual to turn into a humanoid. I exchange my ability to become a star or more likely based on my own abilities, a galaxy on death along with taking most of my shapeshifting to become extremely powerful in stellar magic and one of my own choice along with a body that can keep up with demand should I be in a fight or something. It also has hands and isn't 2ft tall which is a definite plus. It's also like the divergent final part of my life cycle if I don't eat enough to become a galaxy and die.

I've gone off topic again so a lot of my ship is sealed in stasis to keep me from having to work 24/7 on keeping it from looking and acting like a derelict. This has an added benefit of actually reinforcing the materials that are in stasis to keep things from smashing them.

It's time magic used in its most basic form of slowing something down enough to basically be frozen. It's anchored to the ship itself to keep it from ripping itself out while the ship is in motion.

Funnily enough I can do that to the walls too, the ship just wouldn't be able to move. No real downside either since it's rerouting all the power from the engines into the stasis effect. It makes the ship damn near indestructible which is why I haven't really needed a shield when it came to landing missions.

The ship itself is actually much more vulnerable in space than it is planet side. It's another reason why I need a shield.

That isn't to say a meteor hitting the cafeteria in stasis mid flight while it's in stasis would do nothing. It's anchored to the ship obviously so in the best case it would cause the ship to spin out and in the worst case have that part plus a lot of other parts of my ship rip off from the rest.

Ok so when I get to the bridge today activate the stasis field, because I completely forgot to do that last night.

Sighing to myself I shook off all the arrant thoughts about my ship as I did what little daily rituals luma in my position needed. I rinsed off in a shower with nice smelling stuff, I now smell like strawberries. I like strawberries.

After my shower it was onto the bridge then and the starting of the aforementioned stasis field. Really need to remember to do that each time I'm planet side, but you need to cut me a break. I'm still adjusting to being a space jellybean with limbs.

Entering the bridge I see Mochi up and about looking through some of my files.

"Good morning! I hope you have had a wonderful night." I said jovially letting some of my former vocal patterns bleed through. I might try to gain those back instead of the really stuttering mess I get from my Luma life.

"Yup, I'm reading through some of these files you have on other planets. The universe is like, a really big place isn't it? I feel a bit bad for Adeleine though, she'll be heartbroken to hear about Shiverstar," they said dourly.

Shiverstar is earth in the Kirby universe and to call it a frozen hellscape would be generous. In the games you get there and all that's living there are monsters that basically inhabit every planet due to being so invasive and whatever hellspawn humanity cooked up along with a giant robot. You also see that there's an underground city where they did genetic experiments and it gets weird.

It was actually one of the first places I went when I came to this universe, mostly because it's basically where the planet the Mushroom kingdom resides on, roundabouts anyway. I wanted to see what was there in each universe even though this is really only my second universe.

I had obtained the magic needed to cross dimensions fairly recently at about a decade, maybe a decade and a half ago? Geez being a neigh immortal star person really messes with your ability to keep track of time doesn't it.

So far my integration as the new Lumos is going well, turns out I mostly kept both sets of memories and in all honesty I'm not too concerned. I accepted death as something that could happen long ago and the fact that my family is secure and safe without me brings me peace. I don't have kids, or dogs, or a wife so I'm pretty good on that front. I was adopted into my own family so the concept of being adopted and the people you're now related to are also blood related to you makes sense to me, along with having a lot of parents. It's complicated.

As I zoned off into my own world my nubs absently brought up the stasis while my eyes stared holes into the image of Shiverstar Mochi had brought up. I don't know how long I was zoned out before feeling her, and yes, I came to find out Mochi is a girl, poke me.

"You like, good dude?" She said with a note of faint concern as I looked at the former earth. "You've been staring at that planet for like a minute…" they trailed off.

"N-No Shiverstar is just, not the best place to think about." I said coming back to myself.

"So who's Adeleine, a dog or something?" I said curiously, I genuinely don't remember anyone called that though it should be noted I don't know a lot of peoples names. A lot of creatures got displaced when humans mostly bit the big one in this universe.

"No Adelaide is a human, she's pretty big. I'm not too sure, but I don't think there are any other humans around or on this planet so she's, like, kind of alone if you think about it." She said sadly

"I was hoping to see something cool here, but now I'm just, like, depressed and stuff." She said tiredly.

There's a human on Popstar? OH SHINING LIGHT THERE'S A HUMAN ON POPSTAR THAT'S RIGHT! Oh that's sad, that's really sad. Ok get a grip Mochi didn't say anything bad right? They should be fine there's plenty of people to talk to. Plus it isn't hard to find a way off planet with Kirby as a friend if needed.

"How long have they been here?" I said curiously.

"She crashed here like a year or two ago and she's like 10 I think? Yeah, on her last birthday she said she turned ten!" Mochi said, nodding to herself happy to have remembered.

"W-Wait, who's taking care of her? She sounds really young!" I was extremely concerned about this child walking around painting scenery. I remember her now. She's that girl who paints stuff and has magic paint I think?

"What do you mean 'taking care of her?' She's a grown woman." I hear a record scratch in my mind at that.

"What."

"What?" Mochi said, confused.

I thought for a second before having a small realization "How old are you Mochi and are you an adult for your species?" I said curiously

"I'm a bit over 200, and yeah of course i'm an adult!" She huffed annoyed by the question.

"From my understanding Humans do not become teens until 13 and adults anywhere between 16 to 21 depending on culture." I said supremely concerned about this aforementioned child.

"Excuse me what?" She said with wide eyes

"Yeah most of the time I come into contact with them they only live like 100 years without either magical or technological help" I said hesitantly

"THEY ONLY LIVE A CENTURY!? Even Waddle Dees live at least three and are mature by ten years!" She said mildly panicked

"S-So where does she live then?" I said supremely concerned about the answer.

"We- We built her a small house not too far from here a few months ago when we learned she was living in her crashed ship…" She said hesitantly

"...oh…" I was shell shocked by this information "I- uh would like to visit them if thats ok with you? Like, now." I said awkwardly but now determined to find out the truth.

"...Yeah I think I want to too, let me like call her and tell her we're visiting" she said as we started walking toward the ramp passing her siblings along the way who waved to us blearily taking our comments of going out to visit a friend at face value. Nice to have siblings who trust you isn't it, I'd almost miss that if Lumas weren't all mostly siblings anyway.

I'm broken out of my thoughts on the joys of brotherhood by Mochi's "SO" she said jerkily putting away her phone "I thought I'd ask her outright about the whole kid thing and uh, yeah you were right. She is a uh, a kid." Mochi said, shocked into speechlessness.

"So how has she been getting food all this time anyway? I can't imagine she's the best at money management or food preparation?" I said curiously, she's obviously been eating if she's lived here for over a year and isn't dead.

"We have a lot of cookouts during the week and she tends to take home a lot of leftovers. I think she microwaves them?" She said in a tone that implies she's thinking about it.

"That's- That's good. So uh random question does she ever seem lonely or sad to you?" I was really hesitant to know the answer. I don't think I want to know the answer and I might be obligated to do something if I don't like it. Humans do not do well with isolation, they do the opposite of well in fact.

Mochi is silent for some very long moments that seem to stretch on for a long time. Her face goes through a lot of different expressions before settling on something a bit stony. I didn't know Kirbys could look like that, and I really do not like it.

"Yeah… You know, she's a pretty timid thing when she's on her own." Mochi said, seeming to detour slightly in our conversation. "I never thought much about how much she relies on that paint of hers to get out of danger. Sometimes when I'm going to someplace she told me about, I find destroyed canvases and paint along the path in nice areas. Before I was just kind of happy she could protect herself and didn't worry about it but now." She hesitates.

"Now I'm really worried about her. What could- you know humans right!? They gotta be some kind of strong even when little right? What could go wrong with her? She's apparently a kid and other than some ability to keep herself safe with magic paint I think all she really does most days is paint and sell those paintings in the village." She said worriedly.

"So uh humans, humans… Well to start with humans are a mainly family oriented species. They were most adept at persistence hunting and gathering during their evolution. Children are extremely vulnerable due to being very frail compared to their adult counterparts like most species. So uh no she isn't super strong. They became wildly successful and the humanoid body is one that's incredibly common in many universes so they don't feel too alone most of the time while traveling space. They are incredibly family oriented and-" I stop myself as a realization I didn't want to think about finally came to pass "they don't do well mentally with isolation from similar humanoids. They can mostly substitute this with other sentient interaction but they usually end up feeling isolated and alone."

"Oh" Mochi said quietly, she was silent after that. We didn't really talk much after that either. It made the trip to Adelaide's house very uncomfortable.

I could see it in the distance and it was a pretty well put together house which made me hopeful.

Knocking on the door and seeing the barely 4ft dirty child, and she was a child, opening it was a bit of a shock. She may have been double my height, but she was nowhere near as impressive as that sounds.

When I say dirty I mean she was caked in dirt. Her shoes were caked in dirt but that wasn't the worst of it. Her outfit was thin, stretched and ill fitting like it was meant for someone younger than her. Her hair, her hair is BROWN for stars sake! Her hair color is supposed to be black and I think I can see dried blood in it. If you didn't know you might just think it was brown, but I did know and I could see just how dirty it was. Her nails were pretty well kept along with her skin thankfully, but I don't think a child is supposed to have eyebags.

It's like she washed but never did her hair and didn't know how to properly wash her clothes, which may I note were faded and slightly torn! None of that still was the worst part.

Sweet void, that was all discounting the claw marked scars on her arms and the teeth ones on her leg, she has a bandaid cheek too. There is a literal patch of discolored skin from where it had to grow back from being ripped off on her left leg.

Seeing this on an adult you would have felt much more indifferent yet sympathetic. You would have assumed they couldn't take care of themselves and had a hard life, maybe been attacked by animals, but this is a child! THIS IS A CHILD OF THE STARS WHO HAS NO MAMA!

I-I can't she she she- I think something short-circuited in me a bit then.

My eyes were wide as I stared at this child silently. Inside something felt like it was changing.

Mochi after a few awkward moments took the lead "Hey Addy! Good to see you, mind if we come in?" She said smiling, it's hard for any Kirby to smile badly unless it's on purpose.

Adeleine smiled widely before yelling out "Sure Mochi! I'm always happy to see some friends," she said before ushering us inside quickly.

I was still lost in my thoughts as I saw her home. It was a single room house with a kitchen on one side and a bed lifted above hanging on the wall with a ladder on the other. Under the bed was a desk and lamp along with a ton of paper drawings. There was cute paintings hung on the walls that showed her talents.

In the middle of the room is what could be unaffectionately called chaos. It was a mess of canvases stacked on top of each other, paint EVERYWHERE, and a dresser somehow tucked into the wall between the bed and a ton of mostly clean unpainted canvas.

The kitchen had plates stacked in the sink with only a few clean. There was a trash can with an extra TWO filled leaking trash bags next to it. It would stink pretty badly if the entire place didn't smell like paint and flowers from some kind of air freshener.

I will not lie to myself nor you. I fainted on the spot.

Mochi fussed over me a lot before they were able to put me outfront in the grass, they used a glass of water to wake me up.

I couldn't hear them as they tried talking to me, I just stared wide eyed at Adeleine and looked into her house.

Everything inside me said that this was unacceptable. Every single wavelength that makes up my dense energy laden body is screaming at me that this is not ok.

I need Mama, she would know what to do. She's grown up, and she always knows what to do. Mama would fix all of this up in an instant! MAMA'S ALWAYS KNOW WHAT TO DO DON'T THEY?!

They do, right? Right…

…

I don't have Mama right now, Mama is a universe away. She can't fix things she's not here.

But I'm here, we're here. We've been bonded together for long enough to become one and accept the reality that is our life. There is no we and there is no past life, only what is the now and future matters here. I've grown up and I know what to do to fix this, I know what needs to be done to help this child.

She needs a guardian, a parent… she needs a Mama. If I can't take her to my Mama, then I'll be her Mama instead.

It's time to finally grow up, no more being a child. She needs me.

Author's Note:

Jeez so uh, to be clear I meant the whole Shiverstar thing to be a small thing that would be a fun thing to let me say Earth is dead poor humans etc. and be glossed over but then I remember Adeleine, who is at most possibly 13 and at worst by some estimates maybe 8? Who we never see the home of, paints the scenery of Popstar, and has no parents to speak of. I thought it was a bit fucked up and thought too long about it.

In this fic she's 10 years old and 4'7 and yes I know that's short for 10. I honestly meant for Kirby to be here and pop off there after some stuff and such. But now I shifted some priority to this and I like where it's going. Kirby will be here soon, don't worry about it.

Also a fun thing but Rosalina isn't actually even related to the Luma in canon she's their adoptive mother. She's looking for their actual mom too. In this story she is all their moms sort of.