Epilogue 1 - Guard & Whisper
Some time after the raid is cleared, everyone gathers. Almost everyone, anyway. Bimar and Miktik are missing—according to Guard, Miktik needs emergency medical attention, and he's sent one of his proxies with them to make sure they stay safe. Part of me wants to go after them and make sure they're safe, but...
There's still She-Who-Whispers to think about. Now that the raid is over, she's a threat again.
Truth is, I'm not sure what to make of her now. She stands in front of us with her hands folded behind her back, wearing a serene smile and acting like she isn't in the company of a man she's tortured and controlled. Like there aren't rebels fighting against her regime gathered in front of her.
I'm not the only one confused by her presence, either. He-Who-Guards, Thys, Thaht, Tarin, Vahrkos and Wander all regard her with suspicion. Evidently, her actions to save them weren't enough to inspire much trust, and I can't say I blame them.
"Such anger." She-Who-Whispers speaks first when no one takes the opportunity to say anything. She chuckles. "Surely I deserve a little more credit? I played along with your little game, didn't I?"
"This wasn't a game," I say. On my shoulder, Ahkelios crosses his arms, nodding in agreement.
Whisper tilts her head slightly, staring at me, and something in her expression seems to settle. "No, I suppose it wasn't," she agrees coolly. "My city would be gone without you. But then again, without you, it wouldn't have been at risk in the first place."
"If the Integrators were willing to sacrifice Isthanok, it would've been at risk eventually anyway," I say. I have no intention of taking the blame for the actions of the Integrators.
And Whisper... takes a step back.
It's subtle. She tries to recover, flaring out her Firmament a little to hide the fact that she's moved. But everyone notices.
There's a long silence.
"The Integrators are not responding to my demands for clarification," Whisper eventually says. "Whatever you've done, it seems Hestia is on its own for now. Perhaps for the foreseeable future as well."
The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
"And?" My tone is guarded.
"And I find myself wondering what might have become of Isthanok without the Integration." She-Who-Whispers looks thoughtful. I don't trust her words, exactly, but there is something strange about her.
She turns to look directly at He-Who-Guards. "Maybe it's time to find out."
"...What do you mean?" Guard doesn't sound like he wants to talk to her at all, and I can't blame him.
She-Who-Whispers shrugs. "Congratulations, Trialgoer," she says to me instead, turning away from her old friend. "You've won quite the victory. Was it all part of your plan, I wonder?"
"What are you talking about—" I begin, but then I realize what's different.
Her Firmament is damaged. It's not so damaged that she'll die, but she's keeping herself conscious through sheer force of will and nothing else—she's drained herself, completely and utterly, attempting to slow down that asteroid.
"Took you a while to notice, Trialgoer," She-Who-Whispers says, amused. "I won't recover for... years, probably. So you rebels are getting what you want, yes? Isthanok, free of its tyrant."
She steps a little closer to them, and they all step back instinctively. "But I will be back," she tells them. "And if I find my city's a mess... well, I'm going to have to take it over again."
She-Who-Whispers disappears. I sense a skill activation, though it's beyond me where she got the Firmament to activate that skill. Those of us that remain stare at each other.
"...Who in charge now?" Tarin asks, looking around awkwardly. He-Who-Guards sighs.
"I will attempt to keep things together," he says. "...It's just like her, leaving me to clean up her mess."
Sometimes things just don't work out.
Bimar was lucky. She'd survived the toxicity of Firmament within the Intermediary because she'd only been through it twice. Miktik went through it three times, and though we got her out by the end, the damage was...
It's unrecoverable. Her core was wiped out entirely. Nothing remains to generate Firmament, to restore the now-empty husk of her body.
We hold a funeral for her, because she helped us. Because she helped all the rebels, apparently. I wasn't aware of it before, but the rebels explain to me how much she's put into the rebellion—how she more or less adopted every single one of them, at least in this core group. She is... she was something like a maternal figure.
I wish there was more to say. I wish I'd gotten the chance to know her a little better. Her stories, told through the lens of others—it helps a little. I try to remember them, because once time resets, Guard will be the only one besides me that will know why their sort-of-leader is dead.
The thought is a little depressing.
The worst part, perhaps, is that none of us know why she wandered into the Intermediary. There's a lack of closure there that makes her death sting all the more—that we don't know what her last moments were like, or what she was trying to accomplish. If we did, we could have done something to honor her death, but...
I sigh. I don't respond, instead staring quietly at the spot in the ground where she's buried. It's Tarin that speaks, actually. He's grieving just as much, but it's more... controlled.
"You not let her workshop die," he says. "Find someone to use it. She want that."
Bimar opens her beak, as if to argue, but whatever she wants to say dies in her throat. After a moment, she just... nods.
"Yeah," she says. "I will."