“What’s up?” Dema asked as she approached, then came to a halt when she saw what lay before Theora’s crossed legs. “What the— Is that…” She swallowed. “A Fragment of Time! Where’d you get that?”

Theora opened her mouth to respond but her first words got stuck in her throat. The hall may have been filling with air slowly, but her brain was still only just waking up. Confused, she tilted her head. “Wait, how do you know that?”

Dema stared for a moment, in equal confusion. “Why, [Appraise] told me?”

Oh, right. That made a lot of sense. Theora nodded sheepishly while Dema crouched to inspect it. “That looks like a… a tail? Where’d you get it?”

“I have no idea,” Theora admitted. “I just woke up with it. I don’t remember anything.”

“Damn, really? Don’t even remember? You had to work so hard for the other two. Must’ve gotten really good at it…” She got up and looked at the ceiling — the direction where the other two must have been. Then she wrote in chat: “Oi! Bell, Iso! My girlfriend’s collecting Fragments in her sleep now!”

These words stunned Theora into a furious blush. “L-Look, it’s not— We don’t even know if—”

No… in all likelihood, that statement was correct. She’d slept and woken up with another Fragment of Time in her arms. The SCISSoRs were somehow lying next to her too.

“Let’s go back?” Dema offered a hand to help Theora up, but hesitated when she saw her properly. “Wait, have you been crying?”

“Yeah,” Theora said.

Instead of helping her up, Dema let herself fall down against the wall and took Theora’s hand. “Gonna tell the others we’ll be late then.”

Theora nodded and rubbed her eyes, which prompted Dema to fetch a tissue from the attire Theora hadn’t known was in there, and then carefully dabbed at Theora’s face to dry it.

Theora let out a chuckle and grabbed for the hem of Dema’s ragged cloak.

“What’s funny?” Dema asked, giggling a bit herself.

“It tickles,” Theora admitted.

“Didn’t know you were ticklish.”

“I’m not, usually. But I don’t remember anyone ever touching my face like this before. It’s funny.”

Dema smiled wide, letting herself be drawn a bit closer by Theora’s pull, but continued her work.

“By the way,” Theora said with a hint of pride in her voice. “I was given news.” Well, news was maybe stretching it by now, it had been a few days, but still.

Dema perked up. “Oh yeah? What news?”

Theora veered closer, pushed a strand of hair past Dema’s ear. “Well, as you can see, I’m just letting you do anything to me. Turns out, I’ve been corrupted by you.”

Dema’s curiosity gave way to a shy smile. “Oh yeah? How’d I do that?”

Theora shrugged. “If I had to guess, I’d say by being all cute.”

“Really? And here I thought it was because I’m so dangerous.”

“That’s what I said,” Theora told her, smiling — and Dema leaned in to kiss her. It ended as soon as it began… probably because Dema wanted to say something. Theora had to stop herself from chasing it too far.

“That’s not really news,” Dema instead said, pensively. It wasn’t as good as a kiss, but hearing Dema’s voice was almost as soothing. “Bell told me that before.”

“Ah.” Theora listened up. “She talked to you too?”

Dema raised an eyebrow. “‘Too?’ I meant back when we first met. In our days after we left Hallmark to travel together. The old Bell.”

That long ago?

“She said—” Dema tilted her head up, her gaze passing Theora’s curly hair to look at the ceiling. “She was upset with me. You know you used to be her idol?” Dema huffed out a laugh. “She said she would protect you.”

“That’s kind of heartbreaking,” Theora admitted.

“Right?” Dema shook her head ever so slightly, as if she couldn’t believe it. “That’s why I never let her go.”

“She wanted to?”

Dema shrugged. “Whenever her open-secret double-agent mission got to her head. Made sure to tell her she still has a place with us.”

Dema had been there for Bell this entire time? That was oddly comforting. Especially considering how often Bell was there to take care of Theora. Consoled her after nights full of nightmares, told her to come back home when lost.

Dema grinned. “But I was a brat, to be honest. Back then. Told her I wasn’t even half-way done with you.”

Theora needed a moment to parse that sentence and her cheeks started burning. “And… are you now?”

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“Nah, no way. Still many things about you left to corrupt.”

Theora laughed. “Like what?”

Dema’s mouth stood open for a moment — she was probably getting embarrassed by what she herself had said right about now. She turned away. “You’re gonna see!”

“No, tell me,” Theora insisted, gently turning Dema back to face her. “What did you have in mind?”

“You’re gonna see!” Dema repeated, playfully trying to get away without really trying while Theora attempted to keep her close with no real force.

Isobel stared.

They had just presented the tail after returning from the little excursion — Bell and Iso were in the process of filling a fountain on the streets with water for them to sleep in later. Iso took a careful look at the Fragment, then looked up at Theora. “Dream world?”

Ah. Well, that actually made a lot of sense. “You think so?”

“You don’t remember?”

“I rarely remember my dreams,” Theora admitted. In her mind, she tried to grab the little flimsy remnants of dream memory that were scurrying out like little bunnies from a basket, and hopping off into the woods. Then, she managed to fetch one as it tried to weasel itself through her sleeve upon escaping; she held it gently while letting it down, and a memory flashed.

“I think I may have used the SCISSoRs.”

“It worked?” Iso asked, her voice bright and hopeful. Horrifyingly, she handed Dema a piece of her underarm to glue back on. It must have come off during their escape somehow? Had Bell’s barriers given in?

“I think so.” Theora hummed, glancing over at Bell. “But we forgot to make a tool to close the wounds afterwards. Something like a stapler.”

Dema blinked, having finished reattaching the rock. “A stapler? Wouldn’t you need a, needa… Need a…” She clicked her tongue. “Need a needle?”

Oh, right. One could use needles to close wounds too. “But then we would also need to make reality-sealing yarn,” Theora mused.

“I mean, it’s either that or munition for the stapler,” Bell supplied after exiting the basin. She stretched and then proceeded to walk over to Theora to fetch a few mana potions from the attire.

“Either way, it’s good news!” Isobel let out, clapping her hand. She jumped out of the basin as well and reached into Theora’s attire to fetch some food — how in the world they all remembered which folds things were stored in was a mystery. Theora missed the Shade who would organise the insides of the attire for her, but it was still stuck in the Frame of the Lost. For now, she simply took off the attire to give the others better access.

“One way or another,” Iso continued, “Theora managed to get a Fragment, and the SCISSoRs were around, so… Means it’s probably working. I think it’s fine not to set up a new camp and prepare to go home instead.”

Dema cheered. “So we can go back to Treeka!”

“Yeah.” Isobel let out a deep sigh. “Whatever yarn or stapler we make, we probably don’t need [Obliterate] for that, which means—”

“We don’t have to do it on the moon,” Bell let out, visibly relieved.

“How about…” Isobel scraped her mandibles against each other, thinking. “How about… we take a few days of rest. And then we go home?”

Theora beamed at this proposal. Bell also seemed to visibly collapse into herself at the prospect of going home, and flopped onto the ground, apparently looking through System prompts… right, that girl barely allowed herself actual rest.

Isobel sat down too, half curled into a pill, then crawled over to the SCISSoRs and started testing them out a bit in the air. Like before, the cuts closed on their own, but that was likely because Isobel wasn’t putting a high amount of intent into it.

And so they lay around for a few hours. Dema really wanted cuddles, apparently; whenever Theora dared to make even the slightest attempt at leaving to start packing up, Dema moaned in protest and pulled her back. Alas, Theora had no choice but to make a list of things to do in her mind, and after a while, dozed off a little longer.

“I want to see Lostina again,” she murmured.

“Then maybe you should go back to sleep!” Isobel chirped.

“Do you think,” Theora started slowly, “I should fetch all the Fragments before they come back? Or afterwards?”

“How much time’s gonna be left after the Frame releases?” Dema asked.

“A few years. Maybe five or seven?” Theora wasn’t quite sure and a little too lazy to do the math right now.

“I suggest fetching one or two,” Isobel answered. “Just to have less pressure. But in general, it probably makes sense to rest first and then fetch them.”

True; there were a lot of people in that Frame who could potentially help out. Not least to mention Ulfine, who had spent her entire life researching those very relics. Her insights might be valuable for their final push.

“You really just want me to sleep for those 60 years, then,” Theora concluded.

She heard Isobel’s head clack in a nod. “Look at it this way: if you don’t have to use [Obliterate] anymore and if you sleep away your current exhaustion, that means you’ll be in a pretty good spot. That said, we should definitely try out the SCISSoRs properly first before you go to bed. So I’m looking for some potential destinations for another Fragment or two. Do those, then you can sleep until you see Lostina again. Make sense?”

Theora yawned. “Any ideas for the next Fragment?”

“Well…” Isobel trailed off a bit. “I did try to ask Invent One. But…”

“What is it?” Bell asked.

“I mean, it said we should just ‘use the train’.”

Dema blinked. “Use the what?”

“Yeah!” Isobel clack out. “Exactly what I’m thinking! What does it mean? I did research what trains are but that kind of didn’t help me solve this mystery.”

“We could have just taken the train to the next Fragment?” Theora asked. “All this time?”

“Don’t know,” Isobel mused. “Apparently — and this is 94.3 % conjecture, to be concrete — there is a train that’s a bit like your portal that will take the passengers right where they want to go.”

Theora blinked. “To Lostina?”

“No,” Isobel chided with a giggle. “To the next Fragment, obviously.”

Dema laughed into Theora’s neck. “You keep doing that.”

“Keep doing what?”

“We wanted to go find a new Fragment, and ended up in Lossi’s world instead!”

“Well, we were friends,” Theora defended herself. “And I thought she was dead. And then she wasn’t, but I only got to see her for a little bit before we had to leave, and now she’s gone.” She took a deep breath. “I just need to know she still exists. To see it myself.” She also missed the way Lostina would complain about things, like the author putting them through countless hardships. The catharsis was dearly missed.

“Didn’t she also betray you?” Bell asked as she passed by. “You really seem to have a soft spot for people you know will stab you in the back.”

“She did betray me,” Theora admitted. She watched Bell walk along, who hurried ahead a bit faster, embarrassed at her own words until she vanished behind a wall. “But she did it to protect someone,” Theora added in a quieter voice, probably out of Bell’s earshot. And in the end, Lostina had succeeded and kept everyone safe; so if anything, she was an inspiration.

Even though Theora preferred not having to betray people for that.