It's the first of February.
It's Saturday.
It's 4:30 AM.
It's winter.
Yggdrasil is dead and gone.
ooOOoo
Veliona hugs you gently from behind, burying her head in your shoulder. Her grip is so tight it almost hurts, but you don't complain. You put your hands over hers and close your eyes, just savoring the moment. It's beautiful, just remembering who you are.
"We did it," Vel says quietly. "I don't know why I expected this to be easy. It's probably the most difficult thing I've ever done. You with me?"
"Always," you promise her, and mean it. "What's next?"
She sighs. "I don't know. I imagine we've got a lot of healing to do. Everything is... well, you experienced it yourself. We'll take things one day at a time. I lost track of the Hyperion a little while ago. At least we're not trapped this time."
You nod silently.
"We're going to be all right, aren't we?" she asks.
You're floating in a... no, you're not floating in a void. There's no void to float in, and you don't truly have a body, but it's easier to imagine that you do. You pretend you're standing on the surface of a small planet. There's nothing but you, Vel and the world beneath your feet.
"We're going to be fine," you promise her. "Everything is going to be better soon."
Veliona looks away.
The quantum sea is heaving, like there's a storm going on. It isn't a physical sea, but those are the only words you can put to what you're feeling. You're drifting in the fluid space between universes. It's somewhere you thought you'd escaped for good.
It's not like you don't know what's happening, and that you need to do something about it, but you don't know what. You're in over your head... again.
"Seele," Vel says quietly, "Can you look at me?"
You turn around slowly. She's still looking downwards, her black hair cascading past her eyes.
"Do you remember?" she asks. "No, let me rephrase. How much do you remember? I think I forgot how we got here. We came as close to death as we've ever been."
You hold your palm up to her, and a small, dim ball of light forms in your hand. It glows faintly blue, illuminating only you and Vel. You can't remember how to make it brighter, and that itself sends you into a brief spiral of panic. This place is entirely in your minds. You should be able to do anything here.
Veliona looks up at the light. Her irises are red, like the deepest, richest red you've ever seen. Yours are blue. They always have been, you think.
You don't remember... much of anything.
"No," you say. "But it'll come back to me."
She smiles, though there are tears in her eyes. She doesn't cry, though. She never cries. You don't know why you thought she would.
"I miss them," she says, stating the obvious.
Roza, Lili, ...Bronya. There are others, but those three faces are shockingly sharp in your mind.
"Me too," you say, stating the obvious. "But... I'm glad it was you that was with me."
She glares at you, smiling. She's lost, just like you are. But, together... you'll be able to survive.
"As if I could leave you, idiot. Come here."
You float over to her. She puts her hands on your cheeks, and you put your arms around her torso. She's normally not one for hugs, but this one feels different. It feels perfect, like everything is going to be all right. You place a hand on her back, and feel the smoothness of her skin through the silk. You close your eyes, and sigh.
Then you're alone.
"Not alone," Vel says in your head. "Nevertheless, let's get to work. You're spread across far too many timelines to interact with the Hyperion, or anything really, so we'll need to narrow that down before we do anything else. Concentrating on a specific timeline should let us manifest in the physical world again."
"Why don't we try building a new timeline?" you suggest.
Vel ponders this for a second.
"I don't know if that'd even be possible."
Well, it's either that or stay in the sea.
You wish, right now, that you'd paid more attention to Bronya's lectures and less to... Bronya. Wait. Einstein's lectures? But anything Veliona doesn't know, you definitely don't. Does the concept of 'timelines' even properly apply? You're not floating in a void, because there's no void in which to do the floating. You don't have a body, but you're not a butterfly made of light, either, and you're not sure why you think you should be. Was it Bronya who always saw you like that?
Your mind's eye conjures up a patchwork quilt of different scenes. It's like the inside of a tent made of memories. You pick out one seemingly at random and ...
You're in your childhood bedroom, curled up in bed. You're clutching your stuffed toy, "Captain Torro" to your chest. You've just had a nightmare, though you can't remember what about now. Your younger sister Catalia "Cat" Vollerei stands by your doorway. She's older than you, but not by much, and looks angry.
The memory dissolves into fragments. It wasn't really yours, and doesn't fit. You were invading someone else's.
The fabric of reality seems to tear a little. A nightmare is leaking through the cracks, and you don't know if you'll be able to patch it.
The quilt of memories is torn into more pieces, and flies away into nothingness.
You just destroyed another timeline. Velonia looks on, uncaring. It's nothing to her.
The ship. Focus on the ship. Remember it,
be there. It's still here, in the sea, and to some small degree you're still on it. The cold, dark waters lap. You can feel it. You can feel the freezing water on your bare skin, like hundreds of needles pricking you. You squeak, quickly pulling your bare feet out of the arctic ocean.
The stars are sharp pinpricks of light in the night sky. Around you float hundreds of small icebergs, like observers waiting for the show to begin. The Hyperion lies like a dark shadow above, its hull as solid as rock. It's home now, because there's nowhere else to call home. You take a breath. All around you is darkness and cold.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" Vel asks, aghast.
The Hyperion fades into nothingness as you stare, turning into an iceberg like the one you're sitting on.
"It's a ship!" You say, trying to defend yourself. Not a flying battleship, but a ship's a ship, ...right? No, wrong, Seele-idiotka. It's not even a ship. You're a fucking idiot.
"It's an ice berg," Vel says.
You look at the flat, white, boring ice berg you've turned your idea of a ship into. However, as you concentrate, it becomes ... well, still not a ship.
You're unceremoniously dumped in freezing water.
You look at the new form. It's not much better. It's basically a long, white, segmented snake that's about as wide as you are. Its eye is a red gem, and it's forked tongue constantly prods the air. Its mouth is a row of crystalline teeth that could shred flesh in an instant. Its body is coated with frost that rapidly refreezes when it comes into contact with liquid, whatever the liquid might be. It's a Honkai beast.
"Pretty sure that's not what ships look like, Seeley," Vel says. "But I guess it's an improvement."
"P-please tell me that's not r-real," you say, already beginning to panic.
"Relax. It's a monster. Monsters don't count," Vel says.
You try to take a deep breath, but you can't find it in you. You're shaking, and your entire body is soaking in icy water. You try to calm yourself down.
"Just a monster then, huh? Not a b-big deal."
"Sheesh, kid. I know you're not a fighter, but you should learn to stop worrying so much. Stop holding the timeline together, and it'll go away."
You try to follow her advice, and try to ignore the horrible thoughts running through your brain.
"What happened to you, Vel?" You ask. "You're n-not how I remember you..."
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Vel says, refusing to acknowledge the question. "I'm r-right where I should be. You, on the other hand..."
You don't believe her for an instant, but you also don't have time for this. Dismissing the errant timeline doesn't require thought, just lack of thought, though the Honkai snake sticks around for some reason. It looks very confused by all this. You eye it nervously, unwilling to break line of sight or do anything else while it's still here. You're not sure if you made it, or found it, or...
It's not aggressive, and even nuzzles you. It's cold, but the cold feels reassuringly real. Its scales feel like solid, unchanging reality.
"Stupid fucking snake. Go away," you say, voice wavering a bit despite yourself.
The snake hisses angrily, and you're hit with the sudden terror that it understands what you're saying. But it slinks off into the darkness regardless.
= = =
We might be in an even bigger pickle than I previously thought we were. In any event, while I (still) make every attempt at making votes matter, it (still) doesn't mean the characters will... succeed. If I'd written this myself they probably would have, but GPT-3's dice rolls are something I normally accept. I can promise I will, at least, have them try.
Okay, so Bronya Zaychik came up in this update. She's Seele's best friend, probable girlfriend, and generally speaking the most important person in her life. She also may well be the only person other than Seele who Velonia cares one whit for. She is not, however... here. Unless she is.
[ ] Keep trying to reach the ship
[ ] Wait until you're sure the snake-thing is gone
[ ] Write-in
