Caduceus and I had been long on a project, one I had no business aiding in, mind you. Floor scrubbers were floor scrubbers, the librarians often said. Caduceus snuck me into the dusty old archive where he was pouring over etymologies. He asked me to help him decide on an official modern spelling for the computation sprites, and I could not find a single document that explained why the silent 'D' had either been added or removed, so I was left to speculate, and I guessed that perhaps the 'D' was not silent, but meant to indicate a nuance of the language it was derived from. Caduceus shrugged, and said that such a guess would be more than enough for those he answered too, but he was prone to compulsive obsessions over trivialities and would not be able to sleep well until he knew definitively, so I stayed with him late into the night.

We never learned the answer, but he was able to put the matter to rest, as we discovered something far more intriguing.

"They're not ordinary sprites," he said. The amber glow of his face blended with the blue light of the codex he was scrolling through. "See here."

He stepped aside, and I leaned down to peer into the display. The discovery consumed him for weeks, which for a mind such as his was the equivalent of a year's study for one such as mine. That night was still a late one, though. Nashandra came with their children, and they spoke sweetly while I kept those ugly little ones distracted with a singing scroll that flashed images of animals dancing to its song.

After following Astus into the ocean, Turk woke me, having found me seated on Northwind's saddle. I stirred the dregs of a long dream and we were off, making the last leg of our journey to Elvedon at a leisurely pace.

It's good we made our way through slowly, as slowly as we cared, as slowly as we dared. We helped some helpless folks along the way, clearing out a den of former Devil worshipers. Turk handled their leader. He cut him clean in two with his spadone. The man wore some armor made of scraps off a Devil's shell, so his blade took a notch, a notch. I loved watching Turk fight. It was like watching a poet's mind as he rifled through words, then putting pen to paper when the perfect word is found. There was quite a hoard of food and pain pills, along with some of those medicines for washing away the poison that wafted after the Fall. It is rare in our time, but some places on the surface waft it still. We took a few things for our trouble, and let the helpless help themselves to the rest.

"Strange weather," said an old woman. It was uncannily calm. We were now traveling even more slowly, slowly enough to think, and remember, and wonder, and discuss, and most of all to feel. These things take me longer than Turk, you see, being of myself, and not entirely myself.

It was uncannily calm on the beach. The ocean was black, black as the sky. When I tried, I could see stars, and I know they were stars. Pinpoints of light that came when I asked to see them, but I knew they weren't there. I'd never seen Tarthas so calm. The sky was black and still, a big empty, with not a single flurry of lightning or a flash of fire from two boulders colliding, then plummeting down as our traditions make claim of the Fall. Just a big empty, perfectly dark and perfectly still; beautiful.

"Does it normally rain?" asked another old woman.

"Let him ask," said another.

"Does it?" I asked.

"No," answered one of them, who seemed a tiny bit older.

"Then why did you tell me to ask if it rained?"

"We didn't," said another, who seemed a tiny bit younger.

I opened my mouth to protest, but I was interrupted by the other woman, her age between the others. "I asked if it rained. No one told you to repeat the same thing I said."

I felt frustrated, so I was quiet for a while, watching Turk's eyes while he sat on the edge of the bluff and gazed intently across the sea. The women continued their banter. I heard a sound that mingled with theirs from high above and far away. It was high pitched and broken, and somehow it filled me with a yearning for the smell of salt and a strong wind. I thought of Penelope, waiting for me in a bathing suit she'd made herself with me in mind. Eris made boots, not bathing suits or party dresses.

I watched Turk as the ladies rambled. He sat on the bluff, looking silently outward as if watching for a sign, like a black maned lion with his amber eyes. His hair was almost a mane, now, having grown long in the year we fought against Blitzkrieg together. It was frosted around his skull, with a few streaks blasting through to where he tied it behind his head, and his beard had grown long and almost entirely grey. I'd never thought it before, but sitting there on the bluff, he was an old man, thinking back on a lifetime of struggle. The power of the Angels may have undone the Devils in the final battle, but they had spread their efforts abroad to smaller matters; watching over the old Board at Haven, searching the sea for wanderers or beacons, and braving the skies to intercept the largest of the falling stones (on a wild night, when the sky was angry, you could see them jetting into meteors and hurling them back upward). Turk had focused himself on two things; aiding the Dolomites and, when they grew beyond help, hunting Blitzkrieg. I can't claim to fully understand the details of his whole campaign, but I was there when he flew his Pegasus into the the bowels of Pandemonium. If there was such a thing as a hero in Tarthas, it was him.

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"I'm going to read from a book," said the oldest of the women.

"How about some music?" said another, who came to my side and sat down cross legged. Her robe was red, the oldest was white, the youngest was black.

The youngest began to sing.

"The primary concern with using blood as the catalyst remains the disparities in multi species gene transfer..." said the one with the book. Or, she said something along those lines. I am not a scientist.

Lightning flashes across the sky... gathered here to say goodbye... sang the youngest in her black robe.

"If we continue to limit our tests to those involving organic reproductive catalysts..."

The sky is red as blood tonight...

"... we also limit the genomes we can blend to those intrinsically compatible..."

And one thing leads to another...

"Blood from all visiting strains can be coalesced..."

I've heard a million conversations going where they've been before...

"According to Dr. Neil Oceiros, the visiting strains lack key markers needed for dimensional transfer..."

When your eyes hang on the third branch of a star...

"The avian samples have proven exceedingly fragile to airborne toxins, an obvious constraint..."

You can see again why it became dark...

"... it's argued that they should be included, if for no reason other than at least one parent strain will contain resilient cells produced from the parent sample's regen suite, aiding significantly in that species' chance of survival should operators of the avian batch reproduce."

When they overrun the defenses...

"... but a lateral shift that fails to contribute to the goal."

Will you hear when the lions among you roar?

"Dolomite science may augment ours, allowing rapid advances in gene splicing..."

Blackened Sun, here you've come...

"... ethics, being prone to Machiavellian techniques. Still, their translation of engurian physics remains our only means of traversing..."

To fill our hearts with pain...

"... safely. It is still the opinion of this division that as we are the resident species, and we were the aggressors that provoked the hostile manner on Arrival Day..."

... crashes, scattering our ashes...

"... concluding the resident strain should be derived from blood imbued with its own fertilization powers by means of Adeptus Red's masterful adaptation of engurian engineering..."

... in silver trees...

"Yellow and Black have provided an enhanced regen suite capable of full restoration even from critical trauma..."

Burning in a black Sun...

"Per Adeptus White's recommendation, the source sample selected is from our organization's founder, General Vic Aitua, writer of the multi-partisan covenant and senior benefactor of the mirror relay revival program at the local Clarion facility."

Oh the Sun is going down...

"It is our intention to move forward with the resident batch without awaiting committee approval. We hope the committee will see the wisdom of beginning the resident batch without delay, as the engurian seed will require multiple generations to fully implant itself within our species'..."

Going down, going down now, it's going...

I left the women and sat by Turk. We watched the sea quietly for a very long time, so long that we grew old together, our hair and nails growing long into the ground, rooting us to the soil so that we could withstand all manner of sound and fury. Birds nested in our hair, tweeting different names for us each generation of eggs that hatched. When the dream of ages faded, he spoke to me for the first time since we arrived at Elvedon.

"Tell me what you see," he said.

There was a shoreline beneath us, still and calm, the color of cream. The wind cried like a child, whispering in caves beneath us. Glittering fish congregated in the mouths of those caves, crowding each other on their way in and out. A wave formed on the horizon, and when its ripple of foam passed the meridian, the sky and sea were one to my eyes.

"I see the Batch."

"Have you dreamed of Neophilus?"

I nodded, slowly. "But not often."

Turk nodded, slowly. "Victor 33 was obsessed with Neophilus."

"Why?"

Turk slowly turned his head. Rays of light beamed from his eyes. "Because he could not see the Sun."