The Stars Remain

The acrid cold of space envelopes you and seeps into your skin as you hold his still body in your blue-scaled arms. You look at his closed eyes and know that this will be your last chance to tell him. Once these fragile moments have spent their last, fluttering seconds, there will be nothing at all.

Is there any point in taking that chance?

But here you are, liquid sizzling with electricity from your eyes. Any moment now and he will disintegrate into fragments and disappear forever.

You found him here, in the setting of golden sand and ancient civilizations. The landscape flickers and blinks; one of the last standing rooms of Dream.

The humans abandoned the earth for the safe haven of Dream. But then the damned destruction that tore the earth apart reached it’s claws into the framework of Dream. The humans decided there was only one thing to do: abandon their bodies and upload their minds and souls into the heart of Dream.

It worked --- for a time. Until one by one their consciousnesses began to break apart.

Piece by piece. That’s how everyone fades.

And that is how he is fading now, even as you hold him close to you.

You are beginning to fade to and it feels strange as if everything that you are made of is being undone, one stitch at a time. You didn't think that it would end this way. You remember the horror of the humans when they began to realize what was happening to them. You don't feel that same horror. You don't understand death, but you've come to know how it feels to live.

You were merely designed to dwell in the lagoon, horrific in your beauty, and a deadly challenge to adventurers.

But then he came to the edges of your black-blue waters. Out of the murky depths you emerged, eyes glinting and teeth long and sharp behind your sweet smile. Your claws were ready to spear him and drag him down until his life ran out.

But when he saw you, he grinned right back instead of falling into a stupor from your song. You hesitated, puzzled. One of your sisters glided past you, long, slender arms extended and ready to being him to the depths. Without hesitation, he flipped over her, and ripped a spine from her back. She screeched and plunged back into the depths to heal. You warily watched him as he laughed and skipped across stones to continue on his quest.

And something deep inside you blossomed. The blank moments until someone came to your pool as a victim soon became moments of unbearable restlessness. You started having thoughts, and you always saw him before you. You wondered why, and was puzzled at your ability to wonder. Soon, you knew you had to leave your lagoon and had to find him. All you wanted was to hold his hand and see his smile bright upon your face.

His eyelids flutter; he is awake. You smile down at him, but his gaze is blank and he turns his head away from you to stare unseeing at the flickering horizon.

You hesitate. He was once so full of life. In all of your uncounted years of watching and following him, he had never balked at anything or anyone.

The fight has left him and he has succumbed without hope to the inevitable.

Will you actually say it? What is the point in telling him?

Yet, for all these last doomed moments, you know you will regret it if you don’t.

Your mouth opens and you exhale, and with that exhale, all the delicate, uncertain human feeling tumbles along with it.

“I love you.”

Finally he looks at you. And then he barks a laugh, sharp and empty. You flinch.

Instead of the love you wanted to see, despair is all that looks back at you.

“The hell is wrong with you?” He says at last, and his dead tone pricks at your heart like a snipping of a lifeline.

A slight tremor goes through your body.

“I don’t know.” You say, and that is all.

He shakes his head and closes his eyes again.

“Let go of me.” His voice is tired.

You want to hold him closer. You fought the game system so hard to evolve this much just to touch him. But it’s all for nothing; he doesn’t return your love. The last of the world is dying and all you can feel is the sinking in your chest.

“Please---” You start to say, the urgency of words clogging your throat.

His eyes flash open and he says,

“The game is over.”

In a burst of motion, he launches himself toward you, one hand curving around your back, the other gripping your arm. You catch your breath and for the first time ever, you feel wrapped in warmth.

But then he rips a spine from your back and rams it into your chest. For a moment, all is still and all you see is him. His eyes are green with brown flecks. You brush a curl from his forehead. And then the stillness ends. In the width of a second, he jerks the spine from your chest and jams it into his own.

Silly humans. Always so excessive. Before his back can hit the ground, the last of his consciousness breaks apart into a hundred pieces.

You watch the pieces dissipate like blood in water until all of him is gone for forever.

You look down at your hands and at each of the sapphire-blue scales that continues its rapid course of peeling away and fading.

As the last of your programming breaks away, something heartbroken and lovely floats from you and fades into the looming black.

Out of the trillion of people of Dream, you and him were the last to go. Maybe that fact would have given you consolation.

The setting trembles violently, contorting and warping into ugly shapes. And then the images snap and it's all dark. There is nothing but the violent silence of the roar and constant movements of the universe.

Icy cold tendrils of space creeps along every crumbling steel bone of Dream, probing for the center. I flinch. It’s growing hazy, and so cold. It all flickers, and all I can think about is you and I wonder if you would like all these stars.