Quoted By:
—
There's a blue star in the black sky, a shooting star, a falling star. As far as you are able to look, you look at it; as far as you are able to think, you think, dimly, that it's pretty. You didn't think you'd ever get to see the sky again. You never did go home. That's what you wanted to do, go home.
At least your friend the star is getting closer. Falling toward you. It could be a dislodged knot of Law, now that you think about it more clearly. It could be a hallucination. You may be dead. You're not entirely certain. Headspace was destroyed, and you were Headspace. Should've thought that through more. You should be dead.
The star, very close now, is more fluid than you thought from afar. A cloud of stardust, star bits. Wyrm scales, or whatever they are. It flows around you, whatever you are.
<span class="mu-i">LOTTIE!!</span>
The star knows your name. That's nice of it.
<span class="mu-i">LOTTIE!! IT'S ME! CAN YOU...</span>
<span class="mu-i">...</span>
<span class="mu-i">Okay. Let's just get you out of here. Okay? This is what happens when you don't plan! You blow yourself up. I'm just saying. Come on.</span>
The star lifts you up. You are wispy and delicate and nearly fall away, but the stardust surrounds you and protects you. You are trying to figure out how to say thank you, but you're well below the necessary threshold for that. You keep trying as you rise. Thanks? Thank you? Thank you, star.
<span class="mu-i">Um, Lottie, it's me. You know me.</span>
<span class="mu-i">Right? You didn't explode all your memories?</span>
You try to determine how to tell the star that, embarrassingly, nothing exploded. It... uh... something else happened. You switched something. The Manager switched something. You don't know. There's no Headspace anymore, though.
<span class="mu-i">No kidding. You can say that again.</span>
There's no Headspace anymore, though. It's void. There's only the star left inside— the star and you, since you're starting to get more solid. No body, but the idea of one. It's the right shape. Too bad the star's having a harder time lifting it.
<span class="mu-i">I'm okay.</span>
It's not okay. The star is definitely much slower. A lot of the stardust has moved to support you from underneath. Starpebbles? They're getting more solid themselves.
<span class="mu-i">I'm okay. Don't worry about me. I can— I mean, I have to make it. Can you imagine otherwise? Holy shit. I—</span>
You jolt: the star has dropped suddenly, and struggles to rise. You scoop an arm down and pluck a pebble from underneath you. In your hand, it throbs blue, beats its wings...
Gil?
<span class="mu-i">Ah! Aces! I thought— I mean— I didn't want to go into your mind to fix you. No offense. I don't think I can even do that. Go into your mind, I mean. Um..."</span>
The swarm of beetles supporting you shivers and drops again. As you get more solid, you get heavier. There's only so much he can do. Oh, God. If you both fall—
(2/4?)
