With the dusk of the night having settled, the recent partnership of Acheron and Morte was still on its very first day, with the duo having yet to exit the planet. Far away from the populated area of the town and where they would definetly be searched and hunted by the IPC, the two had established a small fireplace in the middle of some woods, deciding to spent the night there before planning to leave the current planet tomorrow morning.
"..." Acheron was doing nothing but to silently observe the flames burning in front of her, losing herself in whatever thoughts she could conjure on her hazzy mind. The soft and inexistent sound of the silence, briefly accompanied by the flickering sounds of the fire in short sections.
"Hmhmm Hmm hmmhmm..."
That and the noise of Morte's merry humming and the flipping of pages from a book he was seemingly enjoying to read while carelessly laid back on a fallen tree trunk, breaking a bit of Acheron's immersion inside her own head.
"Having a good read?" She asked him, giving only a brief and small glance at the man in front of her.
"Had." Morte corrected her, closing the book and getting up from the ground, looking back at Acheron, showing her the book for a small moment. "A nice book indeed." He said before nonchalantly throwing the book into the fire, letting it burn to ashes. "Keeps a person warm and cozy for the night."
"Hm. I thought you were liking it." Acheron told him, not having expected Morte to have put the book on the bonfire judging by his reaction while reading it.
"It's always nice to see what gibberish people believe these days before throwing it in the trash. Good to have some laughs." Morte explained to her before taking out a cig, clearly having a smoking addiction.
"So you perceive other people's believes as mockery?" Acheron questioned, trying to see if that's what the man meant by that answer.
"When people deem their views as 'right', yes, it does sound funny to me." Morte told her before smoking a bit of his cig and exhaling the smoke out. "Anyways, I'm hungry. Got something to eat?"
"Not really. I'm not one to eat too much." Acheron replied, thinking deeply about what Morte had just said. "Someone who mocks other people's believes. I wonder what are his own then." The 'Galaxy Ranger' then proceeded to stare to the small spacecraft stationed nearby the camp. "Guess we will have to use the kitchen from your spaceship." She then turned her head around to give a dubious look at Morte. "Which I doubt its even yours."
"Jeez! How many times will I have to tell ya?" Morte took the cig out of his mouth. "I ended up stumbling upon a nice couple of travelers that upon knowing the precarious situation I was in, decided to offer me one of their many spaceships." He explained the story of how he got the spacecraft to Acheron once again, getting tired that she still did not chose to believe him.
"Do you even know how to pilot it then?" Acheron asked, really not believing in him yet.
"Auto-pilot, missy. Not a problem." Morte replied, snapping his fingers and finger-gunning at Acheron.
"Figures..." She let out a sigh.
"Aaaand, I'm not really up to cooking right now." Morte said with some boredom before smirking. "However..." Reaching to his pocket, he took out his phone. "Food delivery services aren't what's missing today!"
"What a..." Acheron gave a genuine stare of bafflement and astonishment as she stared at Morte's phone. A rusty old flip-phone with a scratched screen. "Is that...even a phone?" She couldn't believe that there was still people in the cosmos that were still using those type of basically archaic phones. And Acheron had been to a lot of planets and met lots of people.
"I know, I know. Just a silly ol' piece of junk ready to go to the landfill." Morte shakened his head in shame. "You all really let the obsolete smartphones ruin your brains. But hey, if it still works, why fix it?" He said, seemingly not caring if people looked at him the wrong way for having a very, almost ancient, type of phone that not even the oldest of species across the space were still using.
"I suppose so. However, does that type of phone can even download food delivery apps?" Acheron pointed that out.
"Hum..." Morte stared briefly to the ground, realizing the problem at hand. "It does have the snake game."
"Okay, I'll be cooking the dinner then." Acheron replied, not wanting to comment on the man's reply. "It's for the best, as I doubt food delivery services would be willing to go to the middle of some random woods to complete the delivery." She said, walking torwards the entry of the spacecraft.
"If they're paid enough." Morte said, quickly catching up to Acheron. "By the way, how's your cooking?"
Acheron smiled a bit. "Used to be a hobby of mine, making dishes. However, I have stopped cooking as frequently for quite some time. But I still must have the hang of it."
"Oh oh. You are already setting my expectations high." Morte said with a grin, both he and Acheron entering the spacecraft.
Having finished cooking the dinner, Acheron put it in order for Morte to grab it up and put it on his dish as she went to the bathroom of the spaceship to clean her hands. Even the cold stream of water falling down from the valve couldn't be felt by her hands. Being alone, Acheron took the opportunity to think about Morte and who exactly was he?
From all the people she had met across her journey, he was definetly one of the most, if not the most odd of them all. There was no way he was a simple artist guy travelling around like he tried to pose as. And Acheron didn't doubt of it because of their fight in Miseria but simply because of the fact of his overall presence. The way he'd grin, smile, laugh and pass it off as that of a simple goober with no better idea while also sometimes spouting something in a more serious and perhaps, even subtly menacing tone, made Acheron really suscipicious and wary of him. She had a feeling that deep down, that 'man' had something deeply evilish and demonic concealed inside, having briefly got a glimmer of it during their fight.
That was why Acheron was now travelling with Morte. That she suspected a person like him could actually be a monster looking for pain and suffering. Killing him wasn't possible for now as she had witnessed it before, so getting always close tab on him was the better option she had for now. That and the fact Morte was odd enough to get Acheron's attention, admitting what even a man like him believed in and what his way of life even was.
Wetting her own face, Acheron lifted her head slightly to look at her own reflection on the mirror in front of her, particles of water scattered around her head. "I need to know what he is. For the sake of everyone else."
Finishing cleaning and drying her face with a towel, Acheron slightly arranged her hair before walking out of the bathroom, heading torwards the kitchen. She wondered if Morte was liking her cooking. But once she arrived there...
"What...What happened here?" Acheron asked a bit puzzled as she stared at Morte's body on the ground alongside the dish, dirtying the floor around.
A painful groan came out from the man's mouth as he painfully moved his head on the floor to stare at Acheron. "It sucks..."
"Hm? Is that so? I wasn't aware my abilities to cook had become that rusted overtime." Acheron approached to the food she had made and with a spoon, took a bite out of it. "...It doesn't taste to anything for me."
"Can't feel any flavor?" Morte got up from the ground, finding it a bit odd.
"Nothing. I have long since lost the ability to taste and feel the flavour of foods and drinks. Spicy, sweet, salty..." Acheron explained to Morte. "Hence why I do not cook as regularly as I used to. Now, everything comes off as bland. The only food that can remotely make me grasp the sense of flavour these times are peaches."
"Hmm, I see where the problem is then." Morte scratched his chin, concluding why Acheron's food was terrible after the very own's telling of her lose of taste senses. "Well, while the food tasting like wet concrete or not doesn't make a difference to you, it does for me. So you know what that means." Smirking, Morte went to grab something under the kitchen's desk, seemingly looking for something.
Acheron would be lying if she said she wasn't curious on what Morte was trying to grab. "What are you-"
"Aha! Found it!" Exclaiming, Morte brought up a sack of macaroni, cheese, minced meat, tomato sauce, pepper, salami and oregano.
Acheron gave the items a musing look. But before she could reply or comment properly, a chef's uniform was thrown at her. "Hm?"
"Get ready for today's lesson." Morte called Acheron's attention, already wearing his own chef uniform in front of her, standing on the other side of the desk with the ingredients, grabbing a sharp knife. "Let's do this dish of macaroni, Acheroni."
Acheron's face slightly physically contorted itself as she heard Morte's nickname for her. "Please, don't call me that again. Ever."
"You didn't said to promise, so I can't promise it to you." Morte told her, lightening up the stove with his cig and putting a pressure cooker with some water above it. "Now, let us focus on doing something that will satiate our stomachs, shall we?"
Acheron let out a sigh. "Hope this doesn't end up going south." Still, she accepted the challenge and wore her own uniform.
She knew that it would be the same for her if the food ended up tasting nicely or not. However, that was no excuse to let her cooking skills rotten after so many years practicing. Acheron had to make sure Morte would like it, not wanting to damage her reputation of cook any more than it already was. A matter of 'pride' so to speak. A bit wierd to her since for someone that had been plagued by Nihility, that sense of pride shouldn't bare any meaning to her anymore. Still, Acheron wanted to prove she still knew how to cook.
Yet, nowdays her mind was a bit of a fuss, with many proper food recipes having already been erased while others felt like a shore to try and remember it right. In short, Acheron tried to not mess up and create a sort of mishmash while Morte would give her instructions, almost resulting in what could be seen as a chaotic scenario in the kitchen.
"Jesus! That is way too much oil you're pouring in, Acheroni! You think I can simply afford all of the oil in the cosmos?!"
It were many tries and errors.
"That's way few salt. Add it more. More. More. Okay Acheroni, now just a tiiiiiiny b- holy shit! Don't put all that!"
Many tries and errors.
"The tomato sauce is the tastiest and most essential part of this dish. So let it all out as your heart's content!...Okayokayokay! Thinking better, let's just go a bit easier on it, Acheroni."
Many trials...and errors.
"Wow! You sliced that salami perfectly, Acheron! The problem is...we aren't needing all that salami slices in our dish."
Trials...and errors...
"Easy there on the cheese, Acheroni! Don't grate it all! I've only bought it recently!"
"Didn't I told you to stop calling me that?" Acheron was slowly losing her cool at the constant number of times Morte had already called her 'Acheroni'. How something so innocuous seemed to be getting on her nerves. Perhaps because its purpose was really to annoy her than anything.
"I'll call you that every time you make a mistake. See it as an interfering stone ball attached to your leg that is weighing you down on your harduous climbing way to the top of the mountain. No pain no gain!" Morte did a thumbs up with a cheerful voice. Or maybe it was just his way of making fun of the situation.
"What a very specific description..." Acheron replied, a single water drop appearing on her head.
"Just trying to sound inspiring and uplifting here Acheron-hum?..." Sensing an odor in the air, Morte sniff it. "Why does it smell to..."
"...burned." Acheron replied, looking at the abundant smoke coming from the burning pressure cook, having spent way too much time closed. All the macaroni inside probably ruined.
"..."
"..."
Despite that, the two of them reacted with rather conformity and no panic at all to the situation.
"Well..." Morte poured his bare naked hand into the boiling hot water, as if it was a normal thing for him to do, feeling no pain at all as he removed the burned macaroni out of the pressure cook, looking at the food ruined state. "Second try it is."
Acheron accepted without much contest. "If it has to be so."
"Hmm hmmmmmm. Now this is some food worth eating!"
Morte said with amusement as he took a bite from the prepared dinner, both he and Acheron now being back to the small bonfire they had on the outside. Even with the initial difficulties and trouble, Acheron managed to cook the macaroni using all the ingrendients as per Morte's instructions. And the end result looked satisfying judging by Morte's face.
"..." Acheron had lost the hopes of ever feeling any taste of food again besides peaches. However, this being the first time she went to gave some real effort into cooking again after a long years, she wondered if this time it would be different. If doing it with enough vocation and dedication was the missing pieces to it. So, she grabbed herself an empty plate, grabbed a fork and knife, took a chunk of food out of the pressure cook, put it on her own plate, sat down, opened her mouth and-
"...Ah." Acheron chew on the food nonchalantly, her eyes not feeling very expressive as she tasted her own food. "It continues the same." She swallowed, not feeling that dissapointed with the outcome. It was only but predictable in the end. No matter how hard and how great she cooked, the flavours wouldn't be coming back to her mouth.
"Phew! Not bad at all! Now I can rest the night easy!" Morte had surprisingly finished his dish already and decided to sleep right there, lying back on a tree trunk, putting his grim reaper hood to cover the upper half of his face and joining his hands together. "If some beast appears to attack and eat us, don't forget to wake me up or at least kill it without making much noise. Night night!" And with that said, Morte instantly fell asleep, much to some bewilderment of Acheron.
"That was fast." Ending up from giving a glance at him, Acheron went back to stare at the flames, now patiently waiting for the dawn of a new day to arrive. During these long waits, there wasn't much for her to do besides stare to the bonfire doing its job, eat some peaches if there was still any remaining in her pocket or just wander aimlessly on her own void that was the mind. Or perhaps...she could check how the Trailblazer was doing and message them with her phone. Even if it were a simple exchange of words with a duration of a minute or two, it would already be helping Acheron spend the time a bit faster. But when looking at her phone screen, a part of her wondered what if they were occupied at the moment and perhaps would take some time to see her message? "Trailblazer. What are you up to now?"
"Oi."
"Hm?" Taking her sight away from the phone, Acheron saw that Morte seemed to still be awake even if it looked he was already asleep at first, surprising the Self-Annihilator.
"Did you enjoyed cooking, Acheron?" Morte simply questioned her, still in the same sleeping position with the eyes beneath the hood's tissue.
"..." Collecting all the moments of the cooking session and passing them one by one like slides, Acheron wasn't very sure of what to respond. "I suppose so."
"An absolute answer, Acheron. Yes or No?" Morte insisted, not wanting indecisiveness as an answer, his eyes peeking behind the hood.
Giving a look at the memories again, knowing that in a matter of minutes it would become hard for her to remember it, Acheron this time bothered to analyse them. The initial macaroni had burned, the oil had been exageratted and she made a lot of other mistakes that resulted in Morte's reprimands to her. Quite a bit of a mess. Yet, it made the cooking for her more...enjoyable? She could not know how to describe it well. But the fact that she had made food for someone again, even if that someone wasn't quite a beloved nor liked person to her, and ended up loving it, made her heart feel a bit alive. An happiness that her cooking skills had been unrusted. And even if her taste was never coming back, the possibility of making good food to people that she indeed cared about returning, made Acheron express a little smile on her face. "Yes. I enjoyed it."
"Heh. That's all that matters then." Morte grinned, going back to put his eyes covered by the hood, about to doze off into sleep.
"What path do you follow?"
"Hm?" Morte slightly lifted his hood enough for his eyes to spy beyond its fabric, staring at Acheron who had made him a question.
"Everyone here in the cosmos is bounded to follow the path of an Aeon. They're the supreme beings of the universe and representation of the fundamental concepts that constitutes existence. Therefore, wanting or not, all the people fall and walk on the trails paved by Aeons during their entire lives, dedicating themselves to the rules and ways of each specific Aeon." Acheron explained it to him despite assuming that Morte himself already knew of that. "Hence why I'm asking, what path do you follow?"
"Hmmm..." Morte just gave a smirk and took out his hood, now fully staring at Acheron. "Take a guess." He said, thinking it would be more amusing to see Acheron trying to figure it out instead of answering it to her.
"..." Not saying a word, Acheron still ended up accepting the challenge, her gaze now concentrated on the burning flames as her mind tried to guess which path Morte followed. "Judging by our previous meetings and his behaviour...The option most would assume first would be the Path of Destruction. However, all of those ruins in Miseria have certainly long happened way before he was there. He might be a fan of it but wouldn't necessary make it his whole purpose. Perhaps Elation? The way he grins and looks happy...Even if it's psycopathy, in the end it's still a form of Elation..." Giving a side glance to the man however, Acheron immediatly went back on her assumption. "Or maybe,what he has inside is a form of happiness so twisted that Aha themselves don't claim him. He definetly has something more sinister lying within. A sort of eeriness that cannot be qualified as neither Destruction nor Elation. Could it be... that he is some type of nihilism alltogether?"
Acheron couldn't be sure. She barely knew anything about Morte, and what she knew could as well be a lie. Her instict would be more inclined to perceive him as one on the path of IX, The Nihility. But even then, she was also one altough against her will, and so far, Morte didn't seemed to show any type of illness or effects such has memory lose and the fading of taste by being on that path, unlike Acheron herself, which made her still doubt of his true nature and not discard other possibilities. "We've only met recently. I can't quite figure it. But if I had to-"
"None." Morte replied, gaining a stare of curiosity from Acheron. "I just lack the interest and desire to care about that. Your actions and views being deemed as that of a deity's will and command? An absolute absurd." Saying with distaste, Morte lifted up his head, looking to the night sky above them. "Per exemple, if I decide to destroy something today, it makes me a follower of the Path of Destruction. But what if I'm sad tomorrow? Will that make me the Aeon of Depression? What if on one day I crave for Harmony and on the next one Chaos? Everything nowdays always needs to have some sort of explanation to justify what they cannot comprehend. Hell, even the simplest of things have to sound complex. Don't you feel the same way?"
"I do suppose it holds some truth." Acheron replied. "There are things that are already set in stone way before one is born. Such as the conclusion of life itself. In the overall picture, perhaps there is really no difference which Aeon one follows and devotes to. The ending will always be the same still."
"And yet, people will always continue on a endless persuit for the thaumaturgic answers to their equally theoretical questions. I mean, why do you think many are those that travel across the stars?" Morte continued speaking, extending the conversation with Acheron. "Because they think it will be out there they will find their purpose. Their rightful place on the cosmos. That they will get to know and understand everything. That they will gasp and exclaim: 'Oh my gosh! So this is why everything is the way it is and the reason why I was born!'" He said, going to grab a bottle of alchol near him while Acheron remained with her stare in him. "The paths and Aeons are just a stepping stone for that."
"..." Acheron listened to it, not for a single second wavering her attention away from Morte's point of view. It sounded so simple and vagrantly superficial coming out of someone's mouth like him. Yet, complex and meaningful at the same time. That or perhaps it has been way too long since she had any company to have conversations with at night.
" 'Geniuses' are the biggest fools of all. Doing nothing in life but to pursue the goal of finding meaning from every supernatural to the most minimalistic thing in existence. Thinking that somehow, they will find the solution to end all mother of cosmic problems. And in result, it will grant them immortality, some type of universal praise and recognition as well as an hubris sense of pride. Or even an ascension into divinity. Nothing but prisoners with a smarts-complex, forever chained to the goals they chase, burning their own lives away just for the slightest of chances of accomplishing them." Morte grabbed the stopper of the bottle and removed it, proceeding to drink. "Yet, even if their goals become a reality, they all end up forgetting of an important detail. Death comes to all."
Acheron's eyes just slightly narrowed with that being said. A statement that she felt to be very true to the core, continuing to listen in silence, Morte's 'rambling' sounding endearing and interesting to some degree.
Drinking more of the bottle, Morte let out a refreshing breath as he once again looked to the nightsky, lifting up his arm and positioning his fingers in a way as if he was olding the small cosmic bodies from afar in the tiny gap of his fingers. "The stars eventually lose their bright, dwindling and fading out. The mighty and godly Aeons begin to crumble and end up perishing. The bodies of mortals, no matter what species they are or how long they live, are fated to rot away as any other organism. And the vegitation dries up and fades. In the end, existence collapses on itself and erases, with no one to remember either me or you, or any person who deems themselves to be important as of right now. Such is the dooming inevtability of death!" Morte stated, closing his hand into a fist, metaphorically crushing the celestial bodies with his fist. "And so, that is why 'factions', 'Aeons' and 'Paths' don't mean a thing for me. It is nothing but meaningless."
"Ah...I see." Acheron commented, her mind coming to a deduction after hearing carefully to Morte's speech. "So your Path is indeed Nihility."
"W-What the hell did I just said?!" Morte shouted, baffled that Acheron would come to say such thing right after he told her what he thought of those concepts. "Ufff, fine." He sighed, just accepting it. "If you think I am one then I am one. Won't lose any sleep over that."
"You just said everything was meaningless. How could you not want me to reach to that conclusion after what you just said?" Acheron questioned Morte.
"Well, finding something meaningless doesn't necessarily means you won't find joy in it." Morte told her. "Per example, eating a delicious ice cream. Eating it won't change much of a thing. Why does it even exist if it serves no purpose whatsoever?" He picked up a cigar. "And to that, it's a simple answer."
"You find joy in it." Acheron responded, guessing on what Morte was trying to say.
Lightning it up, Morte hold the cig on his teeth, smilling at Acheron. "Precisely. Everything has no meaning and it has at the same time. It's up to you to determine which things have value and which don't." Taking out a long smoke from the cigar, Morte exhaled it out of his mouth. "When nothing is of value, life is at its happiest."
Acheron couldn't help but feel the shreds of eeriness that came from that last sentence. In a way, she did fully agreed on Morte about how despite things might be meaningless, it did not meant that they were joyless or of no value, being up to every individual to decide what was of value and meaning to them personally. But that last part...she found it odd. "It's on the most mundane things that can come the biggest moments of joy, isn't it? No matter how irrelevant they seem." She told to Morte, agreeing partially on his thinking as she went to stare at him to the bonfire. "If a person drives emotion from it, that 'irrelevance' mutates into something else."
"Eh. Right on the money, Acheroni." Morte told her with a grin, getting up from the ground as he let out a yawn. "But ooooooooh, if I think I've drunk enough of alcohol for tonight. It really makes you say some stuff eh?"
"Conversations like these make me think that might have been the one of the reasons why I decided to look for you." Acheron confessed, having liked to have a chat with Morte despite if the man was saying all that stuff drunk or not.
"...And?" Morte leaned over, wanting to know of the other reasons Acheron mentioned.
"And because that fight we had. It made me feel...alive. Emotions that I didn't felt in ages." Acheron informed him. "I presume that's why I decided to search for you for start."
"Awwww, how sweet!" Morte said with a fake cute tone, squeezing Acheron's face with his hands. "You're like a drug addict that can't get too much time away from her favourite drug dealer!"
"Knock it off!" Acheron exclaimed, swinging her arm abruptly as Morte backed away.
"Hey, if it hurts it's because it is true." Morte joked, chuckling and smirking.
It made Acheron remind of the fact that Morte was still a dangerous and mysterious person to be careful with, their first encounter still lively in her mind. She couldn't let these peaceful talkings distract her of the unhinged monstrosity Morte harbored. For now, as things remained like this, she would just keep an eye on him.
"Anyways, sleeping under the stars might sound enthusiastic, but I prefer my body laid on the soft texture of a bed." Morte said as he begun to walk torwards the aircraft's entrance. "What about you? Coming in?"
"I don't usually sleep nowdays." Acheron responded to him.
"Why? Scared of the gloomy darkness?" Morte teased Acheron, making up a spooky voice. "Well, I mean, if you were to close your eyes to never open them again, that would indeed sound a tad justifiable to not sleep. One never knows when it will be their last sleep and True Ending comes around."
"There's always a chance that ends up being the case." Acheron replied to Morte, closing her eyes. "After all, sleep is but the rehearsal of death."
Morte's facial expressions slightly changed, seeming a bit astonished at that remark by Acheron. He then gave only a mere smile of amusement at such view. "Right. And birth is just death in medias res." Telling that, he turned around and walked into the aircraft, leaving Acheron to silently observe the flames flicker and to continue going strong, lonesome.
But that didn't lasted too long as Acheron was about to dwelve into her own thoughts, she felt something being placed above her head, the sound of papers moving invading her ears. "Hum?"
Looking up, she saw Morte handing her a newspapper. "You aren't just gonna stare at the bonfire and blink like a vegetative person until the sun arrives, will you? Have something to read and entertain your mind instead." He told to Acheron, grinning. "I bet you will even like this one's cover."
"What is it?" Acheron grabbed the newspapper and saw it for herself.
BREAKING NEWS:
Supernova Explosion Detected In The Dìyù Galaxy Sector of The Cosmos! - Entire Armada Destroyed and Planets Affected.
"..." Looking at the image of the newspapper's cover, the Self-Annihilator saw large debris of a wreckage floating in space with a huge fragmented planet torn into pieces in the background. The imagery seeming familiar to her. "...What is this exactly about?" She asked to Morte, the news article not ringing her any bell.
"That armada that was in the middle of our fight two months ago." Morte told her.
"...Ah. That." Acheron replied with complete normalcy upon remembering. "It must have been quite chaotic."
"Hehehe, if sure was! Had our own moments of fame for a moment there!" Morte said effusively before calming down. "Altough they probably attributed that even to some Aeon or 'terryfying' cosmic causes like the Swarm." He said with some letdown before shoving it aside. "Still, pretty wonderful eh? How something that happened at a specific location is quickly spread throughout the entire universe."
"Yeah, it kinda makes you think the universe isn't as vast as you might think it is." Acheron replied, agreeing with that statement.
"Hmm, if all things have an ending, so must the universe." Morte said, deeply thoughtful. "...Have you ever been to the end of the universe, Acheroni?"
"Eeeh, as in a physical place that one can reach? No. Or at least I think so. Nor I think there has ever been registers of anyone reaching there before. Maybe it doesn't even exist." Acheron replied, thinking about the possibilities around that concept. "But if it does exist, then someone or something must have been there already. Or they are currently inhabiting it."
"Well, the end of the universe may or may not exist. But as everyone makes that question, they aaaall forget about the true big one: where is the center of the universe?" Morte made another question.
"The center of the universe?" Acheron replied, sounding curious.
"Yeah. You know, the origin of everything and everyone, all at once? It must have borned from somewhere, right? A specific point in space. The root from which everything springed." Morte wandered deep in that thought. "If there is an ending, it means there is also a beggining. Perhaps we are currently closer from it than we think. Or maybe we are so far away that the ending of the universe is right on next door! Hell! Maybe this soil that I am standing on right now is the center of everything!" Exclaiming, Morte stood with his arms freezed for a moment and in silence before lowering them and looking at Acheron. "What do you make of it?"
"Hmm, the center of the universe huh?" The Self-Annihilator closed her eyes, reflecting on such question. "You would not be wrong on that one. Altough it is debatable if the universe has a tanginble ending or not, it exists by itself, meaning that there must indeed be a core to it. One from everything was born and originated. Nontheless, I doubt that such place would be of easy access as well. Maybe only the Aeons can go to such mythical zone." She gave her opinion to it before staring at Morte. "But why do you want to know all that? Is it some type of secret true goal you have? Is that why you actual travel the cosmos? To reach the center of the universe?"
"Who, me? Nah." Morte smirked as he shrugged his shoulders. "I don't have that type of ambition. They are simply shower thoughts y'know? Just one of those things that pops on your head at the randomest of times when you have nothing to do." He put both his hands on his own chest. "I have already told you, Acheron. I am but a simple happy artist that only wants to travel around just for the sake of it. No deep, ultra secret ulterior motive!" Morte speaked in a made up silly voice, rejoiced.
"If you say so." Acheron simply responded.
Morte scratched the back of his head in reaction. "Sheesh! Trust issues much? That might be paronia my friend. Which it ain't healthy at all!" He pointed at Acheron who didn't even looked back at him. "Buuuut, I'm not a doctor to tell what you have or what you don't. I think you'll have to figure out yourself." He grinned a bit at her before walking back to the entrance of the spacecraft. "Welp! I said I would be going to sleep like, fifteen minutes ago. Better not keep my eyes and body waiting any longer. See ya tomorrow!"
"Where are we going?" Acheron asked him, her arms crossed, staring at the fire.
"Planet?" Morte replied back, also not looking at her, stopping in the entrance of the spacecraft.
"Yeah." Acheron confirmed it. "Unless you don't have a set destination which I don't really mind. I too don't plan my travels too much."
"Then I hope you like snow." Morte told her. "Because our next stop will be chilly as hell, one of the closest planets from here: Jarilo-VI."
