In a lucky turn of events for that rude manta ray, Theora had not come to fight. She’d come ready for a fight, but it was not her intention. Right now, judging by its behaviour, the behemoth was frozen in fear, because it knew which of the two would win an altercation, even if it would take centuries to complete. It was also aware that escaping Theora was a fruitless endeavour. The difference in size between the two was just too great. She could kill it at distance, or cut off its means to escape.
Theora hovered toward the eyed wall to close the distance the creature had created between them.
She came to a halt right in front of the largest eyed tendril, hovering for a while, just staring at it, to make sure the behemoth would hold still for what she wanted to do next. The mission was already a success — this, right now, was extra. And so, she rummaged in her clothing. It took a while, because her cloak had been shredded twice; the folds were all different.
But finally, she found the first bouquet.
It was massive. Thousands of different flowers, neatly arranged, in a clear and deliberately thought-out colourful pattern, with little ribbons holding different strands together, wrapped in pretty paper. It was going to freeze soon, but that was fine.
Theora held it out towards the creature, presenting it before its eyes, willing her Skill to communicate her first of three large thoughts. When she was sure she had its attention, she threw the bouquet, and it bounced against its tendrils, and was then sucked up inside.
Life is precious.
The eyes went wide when the concept of ‘life’, the definition of being, and the meaning of ‘precious’ as Theora understood them flooded its gigantic mind, her Skill helping it correlate the ideas to those etched into its being.
Then, Theora went to look for the second bouquet, and it took long enough for her to vaguely start worrying that the creature would try to run after all, but it seemed she had its attention, because for now, it kept silently staring at her, perceiving each crack Theora caused in her own body with every motion.
The second bouquet was almost twice the size of the first, and far more sophisticated. She’d asked hundreds of florists and botanists to help her assemble it in Heofen, because she wanted to make absolutely sure to convey that second thought as accurately and completely as she could, because all would depend on this.
The first thought had been incomplete; it postulated an idea and a vague context laid out the terms, but now, she had to fill that vague idea with true meaning. And so, she threw her second bouquet — the one that carried the bulk of her thoughts.
You can recognise life by how it is like you and me, but not like stars.
The eyes blinked and tugged and the tendrils formed a wave of disturbed water around the entrance point of the thought.
Then, Theora retrieved the last bouquet. It was about as elaborate as the first, but where the first one had been gentle and colourful and bright, this last one was mostly dark, and red. It had vines and thorns and greenery wrapped around a beautiful core that was similar to parts of the first; it had a shape that was menacing and gentle at once. Both well-meant advice and a threat, depending on how the creature chose to read it. The conclusion of her thoughts — the reasoning and the result. Her final thesis.
And so, Theora threw. The bouquet tapped against the smaller tendrils, embraced by them, and was sucked in, completing the message.
Do not eat life.
“Do not eat life,” she repeated, but her words carried no sound, she only felt the numb crunch of her lips pressing against each other. This creature fed on heat. If she let it go, it might, one day, find another planetary system with life on it, and eat it whole, because it might not understand or care for the difference. But, Theora didn’t want to kill this poor little sea creature, either.
She couldn’t let it go, and she didn’t want to hurt it. So, she thought, maybe she could draw its attention and then ask it to be polite from now on. She didn’t have any more bouquets prepared; she had a few more flowers in her coat, but communicating complexities to an alien creature likely wasn’t easy without large-scale preparation. She had no way to receive the creature’s answer; she had to hope that it understood the meaning she’d wanted to convey. And that it would agree.
Of course, there was a limit to how much of a choice the creature had. If it was to attack Theora’s planetary system after all, she would stop it. Not that it really had a reason to, now that Theora was out here; the sun itself didn’t seem large enough to even interest this behemoth.
Still, she hoped for the best, fetched a few more flowers from her coat and tried to put them together without breaking them, then sent them off, to say goodbye to the large creature and to tell it that it didn’t need to be afraid of leaving as long as it respected life.
And so, over the course of the next few weeks, the ray left. Now that Theora was attuned to its aura, she could feel it from much further away, and she kept it in her mind to make sure it was indeed staying clear of her home. It left toward a region she had understood during her studies to be largely empty, so maybe the little thing wanted to silently reflect on its behaviour.
With that, Theora’s personal mission had succeeded as well. She’d managed to talk to a rude baby, and although it was probably far-fetched to call it a new friend, she was happy she’d at least managed to avoid a gruesome massacre. And, what was probably the most amazing thing about all of this was that Theora had managed to navigate this meeting without using [Obliterate]. Maybe it wasn’t the same as defeating an author, but at the very least, Theora felt somewhat accomplished.
The mission was a success. She’d saved her home planet.
The mission was a success, and she’d not used [Obliterate], except to prevent harm from her propulsion material.
The mission was a success — she’d cleaned up her own mess.
She’d succeeded at her mission, and now she was drifting through space, with no way to ever return home.
Of course, that wouldn’t kill her, but it still felt like the end of her life. It might take millions of years for her to impact anywhere, and even then, she had no idea how to get back. And it was questionable that she’d even be the same creature she was now after millions of years adrift in the void.
What would she remember, after all that time? Would she remember any of her Skills? Would she remember she was a person?
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Would she remember her adoptive daughter, or the second-strongest hero? Maybe the better question to ask was how much time she had left until she’d forget. She’d forgotten the people who’d sent her all those letters Dema had found in her attire. That had taken about two thousand years to happen. Granted, Theora’d probably only known these people for a day or two, so perhaps it would take a while longer for her to forget Lostina, who she’d befriended over the course of seven months.
And perhaps she could hold the idea of Dema close to her heart for even longer than that. Maybe, if she was lucky, she could carry a glint of that love for a while.
Over the next few months, Theora kept repeating every single memory she had in her mind. She held them as close as she could, even the memory of the behemoth, long-after it had left her range. Like watching a very long theatre-play on endless repeat. She tried to clutch each image as closely as she could, and wanted to cry each time she noticed she’d forgotten a detail.
How many houses had she visited in that village, the night after she’d destroyed the Interface, to make sure everyone was safe near the Zenith of the End? What was the colour of Ulfine’s eyes?
She still knew the first words Dema had ever spoken to her. But what about right after? She’d forgotten Dema’s second words.
A few years later, Theora had forgotten Balinth’s last words. She no longer remembered how many rooms there were in their home in the Shade. But she was holding other memories as safe as she could. She imagined a little compartment inside herself, to put things inside, to keep them. To preserve them. A bit like she’d preserved a little part of her attire in her fist. A room inside herself, a space, to wall off from all influences, to put something inside and keep it. It wasn’t very easy, but she had time. She tried to spend it fortifying that part of herself, to make sure the memories she placed therein were as safe as she wanted Dema and the others to be.
She filled it with her memory of Dema’s smile first. She also added Bell’s frown; and Isobel’s curious gaze. She put in her recollection of resurrecting Iso’s fossilised body. Put it inside her fist, so to speak, so it would survive a crash on a planet. Made her fist strong and exerted her will to reinforce it.
It was at some point around then that Theora felt a familiar sensation.
At first, it was confusing, because she’d never felt it quite this raw. And with that, a few things clicked into place in her mind.
How had Dema done it? How had she made it through millennia of being sealed, but retained most of her personhood? Her ability to speak, and parts of her memory? Theora was already struggling after a mere few years, but Dema had been in there for so long, and greeted her first visitor with a smile. And in all those years since, Dema had never changed that much. Most notably, Dema had started using her Skills around Theora at some point, but that had been less of a change in personality and more of growing accustomed to Theora’s presence and understanding Theora’s views on the matter.
Other than that, Dema had always been stationary. A rock. A fortress, perhaps. She’d made it through aeons without losing herself, had lived for decades in Hallmark and months in another reality. Theora had shown Dema terrible things like broken cities, and murdered the Devil of Truth in front of her, and Dema had been subjected to cruelty and pain. And yet, she still found reasons to smile.
It wasn’t like these experiences had gone by without any effect, of course. Dema was scared of being left alone. She sought out other people who were lonely, to form bonds of companionship. She got jealous at the thought of being left behind, of returning to the state before being freed.
But she had, through all hardships, prevailed. She was carrying wounds, but remained herself.
Theora spent some effort to recall what Dema’s sheet had said:
Traits: […] [Unreasonable Resilience]
Was that how? Had she received that trait during her time inside the Cube of Solitude? Or had she understood long before that the true enemy of an immortal was the neverending flow of time? That time would hollow any creature out eventually, like a mountain subject to weather. That time would kill any immortal, if just by turning them into somebody, or something else.
Dema was obsessed with living forever — Theora had known that a long time ago. But Dema wasn’t just obsessed with it. She was actually good at it.
The little compartment in Theora’s self, the one she attempted to fill with memories she did not want to move, it was Theora’s attempt at following Dema’s example, and being unreasonably resilient, if only a little.
This was the first time Theora learned a new Skill without being informed by a System message. The System was not here, and Skills were inherent to people. Theora had, through her efforts, made a Skill for herself. She even knew its name, without seeing it in a prompt. She understood how to use it, slowly, by trial and error.
Retain. The way Dema tilts her head when making a mischievous smile.
Retain. The way Dema starts her sentences with ‘why’ even if they aren’t questions at all.
Retain. The way Dema always noticed when Theora felt bad.
Theora kept filling parts of herself into the Skill. It was too small at first to contain much, but she used it and got better, and made it a little larger. She wanted to retain as much of herself as she could. To retain as much of everything else as she remembered.
It might not be as effective as Dema’s trait, but for now, it made Theora happy to at least have the feeling that, in a thousand years, part of herself might still be left.
And so, a long time passed. She eventually forgot to put more things into her Skill. Forgot she had it, perhaps. Or not? Sometimes, she remembered, but putting things in was effort, so she thought she’d do it next time. The most important things were safe. Right?
Probably. It was hard to think.
So that’s what this was, ah? Theora doubted that any of this had been a ruse, or engineered to happen, but there really was no doubt that someone was cheering right now. Something back home who sought to benefit from it all.
Every time Theora opened her eyes, she remembered Dema, for Dema had given her the bracelet, and the bracelet was still on her arm. And, every single time Theora remembered the bracelet, she wanted to know. She needed to know if Dema was still alright. But she never dared, until one day — or one night. One hour.
She had to know.
Anxious, about to puke out the nothing inside her belly, afraid, almost eager to sparkle into icy dust, she crumpled her other hand around the bracelet, and broke it. Broke it, cracked it, made it unwhole.
And, even now, after so long, it came back together. It unbroke itself.
Dema was alright. Dema was still alright.
Intense relief embraced Theora. And she kept doing it. This cycle of terror into comfort became her only proof that she was still alive. The only proof that she wasn’t truly gone.
Bell and Iso and Dema were strong; and perhaps they’d found a way to meet Lostina and Gonell again. They might have found a way to help Treeka. And so, Theora could find solace, despite breaking her empty promise. Even without her, things would be alright. There would be another strongest hero to replace her — perhaps Bell, or maybe someone else. Someone new to climb the ranks and seize their chance to get to the top, now that the impossible boulder up there was gone.
Now that Theora had been sealed away.
They would have their adventures and protect one another and make sure Dema was cosy, snuggled at home against the Shade, perhaps sad at times, but safe. Perhaps she would even find someone else. Someone else to fall in love with, now that Theora was gone; and the thought of that hurt, but it would hurt more to think Dema alone again.
She broke the bracelet again.
It reformed.
After all this time, still safe.
Theora kept drifting through the endless void with no end ever in sight. And she knew it would stay that way; even if people reinvented space travel, even if someone learned the necessary Skills to travel the far skies — it was impossible to even find her in the nothingness. Her aura was not strong enough to be picked up from afar unless she flared. The System couldn’t reach her, so her party members could not determine her location, either. The Finding Wish of the Orb of Seven Wishes would only give the location she was at right now, not giving any indication of where she’d be when they arrived, or the velocity at which she was travelling, or anything at all.
Theora had no mana, so divination might prove hopeless too.
Thus, the world kept going still. Time continued moving, frozen. Theora’s mind slipped in-and-out, and every now and then, she looked inside Retain to reminisce of the time when she used to be a person.
When she was already far gone, it happened from one moment to the next.
There was nothing.
And then, there was Dema.