Quoted By:
"...Um, yes. I... I guess I... yes." She surveys you. "Oh, don't look like <span class="mu-i">that!</span> Please! It's not like that. I— you're God too. Please don't kneel. Stand up. I'm not God like that."
You stay kneeling. "I don't understand."
"I— I don't know if I do either, completely. It's complicated. Could you please stand?"
You're working through it. "God's a lizard...?"
"Oh. Hold on. I'm sorry, I just— I default— hold on." The lizard shimmers and is replaced with a smallish girl in a big fancy cloak. Like a queen. She shuffles up to you, sticks a small hand out of her cloak, and is tugging you to your feet. "Here. Let's sit somewhere. I can get you a— a— what do you like to drink?"
"I... coffee?"
"Yuck. Okay, well, there you go." You are not where you were. You are seated at a chair at a small table in a lamplit parlor, and there is a mug in front of you. It is coffee with cream, no sugar, and God is seated in front of you, taking a deep sip of something with whipped cream in it. There is whipped cream on the tip of God's nose when she sets her mug down, is how you know. She seems too young to be a queen.
"Thanks," you say belatedly. "....Who are you?"
"I'm Charlotte," says God. "You don't know me, I think. I only know you a little bit. Uh... here." She wipes her nose and looks into your eyes and you feel a— a—
"You're—!" you say, and try again. "It was <span class="mu-i">you</span> who—!"
God, Charlotte, the presence, your possessor, looks into her mug. "Yeah. Um. I'm sorry I... I didn't know what it'd lead to. I had no idea. It wasn't personal at all, if that... if that helps. You were just there, and... yeah. And then I didn't... I didn't think it'd happen like... you weren't supposed to be here either. Sorry. Are you mad?"
"I don't know," you say.
"Have you been lonely? I've just left you here, without anything to do, and—"
You are more certain of this, which isn't much. "No, I... no. I didn't notice anything was wrong. I guess I was... fine? I was happy..."
She locks her ankles. "And you're not now?"
"I guess I... no? I'm just... I— I don't..." You are profoundly groggy, is what you are. "I don't know what's going on."
"You don't need to know most of it. I just— I really wanted to tell you— we're both going to die."
"...I thought I was dead."
"You are. I am. But I mean dead-dead. Kablooey. It's so I can save the world." She looks down at her mug. "I know you didn't ask for any of this. I'm really sorry."
"Is there that much of a difference between dead and dead-dead?"
"I don't know," she says.
"Is there any way I can go back to being alive? Is that one of the options? Or is it one way."
"Um, you exploded."
You drink some coffee.
"Don't feel bad. I exploded too. I guess I died. I can't go back to how things were, either. Even being God, I can't. It's too different."
"Uh-huh."
"I guess I died," she repeats, and cups her mouth. "I killed myself. I— I stabbed myself. I did it already."
(2/3?)
