#157
Spring. Day 169. Late Afternoon. North of Topazi Lazulia.

Always thought the figure of Death would be somber and lifeless. Yet here he's told us his life story. What he could of it, at least. There are a few secrets that he couldn't reveal until I meet the Designer.

His story was pretty rough. He and the Designer were of the same species, tall and curious. For him, money was everything he needed. It got him his food, drinks, and love. It seems he set everything to a gamble of sorts, from chess and checkers to fights and dares. He noted there were far more extreme cases. Before his gambling habits, he was a scientist. Set his eyes to studying everything his kind could see, down to the strands of life that made things work. To create definition where there was once was none. Explain what is and how.

Aeron was the Designer's assistant at the time, and in a sense, still is. Apparition was a friend once dear to Aeron. Playing the same games and drinking the same ales and whiskey. However, the games got the better of Apparition, he had fallen to his own delusions of greed and started hording everything he won. Aeron had the better cards, taking in money and being charitable with it.

When he and the others of his species discovered the workings of magic. Aeron, the Designer, and my mother worked together to see the full extent of it all. With their work they discovered the way the world worked. However, the Designer came upon a revelation of his own. Having one night tapped into the purest and untouched forms and learned all that there was to know. His discovery lead him on to hiding his precious work.

Aeron questioned his motives and failed to get a proper answer until he finished Bury, the last Design he created. “We can't let them have this. Our kind is given to greed and temptation. War and destruction and romanticizing it all to make it far less morbid than what it truly is. I've seen it, Aeron. We have to hide this, as a whole. Leave this world in peace, but forever keep a watchful eye on it all.” At first, Aeron thought he was crazy. Anyone would after seeing a fellow scientist turn tail and hide his work.

Aeron argued what he could but the Designer offered defeating rebuttals at every point. He could have ran off and exposed the information, gambled it with others who could make use of it but would incur would be exactly as the Designer had described. Desolation and war. Endless war far more scarring than what any of us know today. Aeron agreed to help him, giving up his pursuit of gambling.

Aeron's new role wasn't convincing his kind that they should leave, but rather they shouldn't and isolate themselves in their homes and rooms. Aeron had a more pleasing face than the Designer's, his face and playfully charming smile made it far easier to communicate the massage. His senior's face was far too stiff for such a thing but his presence alone enforced credibility. Everyone knew who the man of mystery was and the major rumor that he had powers beyond their imagination ever since he started working with my mother. Apparition rose to challenge that notion, as he always did.

The relationship between the two was more friendly rivalry where one couldn't exist without the other. They gambled together whenever they could playing against, or with, each other. Slowly and surely, Apparition worked his way into the isolated chambers containing the Designs. Apparition had a talent with hacking, even with all the new found knowledge the Designer had, the codes and mechanisms seemed trivial to him. Child's play, even. It seemed that at the end of it all, the Designer knew exactly where he would be, letting him win until the very last moment.

When he fired up the controls, he saw what it could do: raise the dead and control them. Their ghostly forms at least. His greed got the better of him then, and he began taking the ghosts as his own and at the same time, discovering what the Designer was planning. That was when Aeron pulled him away and solemnly apologized. Apparition argued that they could easily overthrow anyone with that one design alone. The Designer snuck in without a sound, ensnared Apparition in fit of calm rage and unbound magic. Tearing out the emotions of greed and wanton lust from the world and fed it unto Apparition. Changed his personality to what we know now and killed him.

It took a bit for Aeron to continue his story after that. Visibly shaken by what he saw all those thousands of years ago. After a brief breather, Aeron started again. He skipped what I had already known about his kind and how the majority went to Acacia to sleep. How others went their own way. Apparition was still the loose end, however. The Designer knew that even if he buried his designs, that they would be uncovered. He set out a small groups to look after certain parts of the world. Having them take on different and new forms. Eventually, they were retired and set to return the distorted stream of magic to what it once was.

Aeron explained that it wasn't the tearing of greed and lust, instead it was something else that even he didn't know. But it was safe to assume that it was far greater than he could imagine. I asked about Apparition then. He says that it was a loose end, that the summoning process was another way for us to make sure things were okay. Eventually Apparition would be one of those and with it, Eidolon would quake. As he still held the ghosts he absorbed.. The reason why Dream was forced from her old home.

To fight that, Aeron had to do something of the same and for the longest time he fought amongst his thoughts to straighten it all out. Taking the time with each and every one. Getting to know who they were: their dreams and their failures. Taking them to their descendants and collecting new ones along the way. It was when he found my uncle when he found out about me and my mother. By instinct he followed me, kept me alive when I nearly froze to death. Kept Apricot from the verge of it when Apparition had choose to haunt her.

“That's everything. Take your time writing it down.” He finished with a dim smile and tired eyes. He looked at Dream, who had drifted off. “Unfortunately, Dream will have to come with me when we part here. We're both tired and she should of passed ages ago. Apparition kept her cruelly alive with a lie and his own magic. You can stay for her rites if you wish.”

“I'll stay. I have a bit to thank her for, after all.”

#158
Spring. Day 169. Evening. North of Topazi Lazulia.

After the story Aeron had told Apricot and I, we parted ways. Although Dream and I didn't know each other all that well, I still wept for her passing. She was still a friend and her death was more closure for her than anything else it seems. Her dozing off during the story was actually her passing, something I failed to notice at the time.

Aeron had placed her on the altar and simply touched her chest with a hoof, where upon she immediately turned to dust and ash. Aeron twitched as if he taken her as part of himself, Like the others he had gotten to know. How many had he truly gotten to know, how much time had spent doing all of that? It must have been mind numbing after a while, I imagine. I wonder how many others had to go about doing the same thing.

Aeron stayed with Eidolon to perform another task. A shutdown process that could only now be accomplished. Apricot and I went back to Pipsqueak and his crew. Breaking free from the fog that began to dissipate along with the humming Eidolon produced. I wonder what will happen to all of the ghosts that that Design had contained. Pip greeted us both happily with a quick and obvious question. I simply explained that Dream was like a ghost trying to find her home. He seem to take that in with some disappointment. Perhaps I can explain the prospect of the Designs to him at a later time.

Slowly, we made our way back out to the shore through the winding cave. Small banter popping up between the shipmates to fill the empty silence and shake off the cold. By the time we had finally reached fresh air and the soft ocean breeze, relief overwhelmed us. Seemed they were all worried about the cave collapsing during the fight. Pip thought they were tremors and I let him think that. I can explain the truth at a later time.

We continued on to the ship, packing up what equipment we had taken off of it in the first place. Storing it neatly away in the spacious cargo hold. Something that held far less than I thought it would.
I suppose with the whole flying feature, they need it as light weight as possible.

I spent some time staring back the entrance of the cave we left, some part of me hoping that Dream would come back or Aeron would leave it at some point. Then I saw something odd but not at all unfamiliar, the wisps. Thousands upon thousands of them pouring out from the stone and grass above. All of them different in color and size. Then I remembered something mother had said to me. As if my mind had buried the fact and only now recalled which stone it placed the words under. “Wisps are ghosts of our past, Letter. Some day they'll pour into the sky and give new life to the world.” I can't recall why she said it to me, of all things.

After nearly an hour, as the last of millions of wisps faded away, I saw a vivid white streak dart into the sky, hover a moment, and vanish over the horizon. Apricot saw it too. “You think that's the direction we have to go now?” she whispered.

“Could be, we'll find out if the coordinates lead us there. For now I'd rather get some sleep. I'm sure you would love to get some after having those voices in your head.”

She stifled a laugh, “That would be wonderful.” She paused, glancing down at the railing, as if the grains of wood kept were far more interesting than the stars above. “M-May I sleep with you tonight, for old times sake?”

“I don't see why not. Huddled together in the clock tower all the time anyways.” I smirked. “I miss that, I really do. I could use the company, too.”

“So can I.”