Episode 34: The Place Where Stars Fall

It's not enough to want to change. It's not enough to regret the things gone by. Not really. Not after looking at the world through the mask of the Dusk Sage. There's never enough time for anything. Nothing ever seems to live out its real potential. Potential is invariably cut short. Snuffed out. Murdered.

By people like me.

As the Sennin lifts off from the clearing where Inari's grandmother once stood, with the tribute to the Vorax glowing down below us, it occurs to me for the first time just how alien the existence of a Dusk Sage must be. I look down at the mask in my hands. That's how it saw the universe. Every waking second, it could see what is, what was, what could be, what must not.

The sacrifice of the Vorax. An entire species put to the flame for one last chance to strike back at Malice. At the Cheldrun. Is there anything left of them within Karaku-Oni, I wonder? When we finally extinguish him, will we be destroying the last testament of the Vorax?

Revenge.

The potential existence of everything in the room with me is frighteningly short. The Sennin is not likely to last beyond another few months. Neither am I. I can't tell if that's what will be, what could be, or what is.

I take off the Dusk Sage mask and toss it lightly onto my bed.

Stardown. The place where stars fall. The person who named that place must have been a prophet.

We go.

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Stardown.

It stretches on for miles around the lake. Used to be a resort town, back before all this. Now it's a refugee camp.

Our arrival does not go unnoticed: there is a crowd there at the docks to meet us. Aimi is happy to be back in civilization. I'm not so sure. There's something about the Grand Chantry that's weirdly appealing, even for all that it lacks force and energy.

Here we are. Stardown.

Eventually, we're shown to a restaurant where we can get something to eat, and there's a humanoid lizard thing there. Una says that he's called an Anakarix. Ama-chan says that he'd have all sorts of tasty mana inside of him, and would I let her out for a second, please?

I think about it.

No. That's a bad idea.

I become lost in my thoughts for a time.

Stardown.

After dinner, we receive a tour. It's mostly dull, and as we walk, my thoughts wander again. It's easy to lose myself in a crowd like this. To become everyone around me. It's hard to concentrate with this many people, but I do. I find myself looking over the landscape with an eye for defensibility. That rise would make a serviceable firing position in a pinch. The buildings behind us would be good places to position snipers. That pass to the north would make...

The world dissolves into fractals.

Numbers. Lines. Points. Connections. Equations in the shape of Una smile at High Dive's antics. Equations in the shape of Kiyoshi look stern. Equations in the shape of Moses look horrified. I look upon my surroundings, and I see potential. Not how a Dusk Sage would see it, but how a strategist would see it. I see a line of dominoes rolling down towards us from the north, and another from above, intersecting with the northern line at multifaceted points.

I see a great hand reaching out of the sky.

I see millions of people calling my name. Calling Moses's name. Kiyoshi's. Una's. High Dive's.

Our victims.

I see all of Stardown drenched in the blood of Goshi soldiers, and I see millions dead at our feet.

I grin.

"Rei?" Una asks.

I look up.

I can't tell what she's thinking. She tells me that High Dive has agreed to... something. Something dangerous. Something about an inertial dampener in the center of the city? But when is anything High Dive does not dangerous?

We walk to the front of the street that leads to the main laboratory in Stardown, and as we walk, my grin doesn't fade, even as the conflicting horror at what I intend rises up in my heart to war with my delight.

Goshi is coming. I know what I have to do.