“The Beast Fragment wards seem to have settled into the resonance we were looking for Vaingloth.”

“And they’ll be self-sustaining even if a Beast Fragment tests them Helgon?”

“More than self-sustaining. Credit to Insikir there, but if a Beast Fragment does try to pass between the micro-portals, its presence will enlarge the portals and provide greater deterrent the closer it approaches.”

“But the enlargement will still remain microscopic?”

“Oh, indeed. That was the spot in the formulae I had difficulty with. Insikir’s assistance was invaluable with working out the snarls in the equations. Thanks to him, we’ve got a multiply tangled function between the size of the wormholes and the depth they penetrate. Mathematically, as portals approach infinity their size grows as an asymptotic function, while their depth grows logarithmically.”

“And there’s no concern about what they might punch through to with that much force behind them?”

“There would be, but the even if a Beast Fragment were to physically interact with one of them, their presence would not have be able to push the depths outside the realms we have data for, and while there are theoretically inimical forces below the seventh devolution of reality, a Beast Fragment shouldn’t be able to drop a portal below the the third devolution.”

“Shouldn’t?”

“From our calculations, the main body of the Beast wouldn’t be capable of dropping below the fourth devolution, and even accounting for any inaccuracies in the values Dyrena gave us, we can establish a hard boundary that the main Beast would only barely breech the fifth devolution. So a fragment would at worst, reach the fourth.”

“Have you had anyone beside Insikir confirm those calculations?”

“I hadn’t thought to. His work is generally solid and the results align with the baseline projections? Do you think we need a formal review panel?”

“No. Not a formal review panel. Consider however that the baseline projections for this sort of thing are based on Insikir’s published research.”

“Oh, I see. You think if he made a mistake on his earlier research, he might make the same mistake on these more specific ones?”

“A mistake or an intentional oversight.”

“But we’re all at risk if these are incorrect. How could it be intentional?”

“Would we necessarily notice if Insikir installed his wards with different tuning values?”

“Certainly. Our walls would fall and his would not…oh, I see.”

– Helgon and Vaingloth a few days before discovering long standing flaws in several foundational texts of Aetheric Boundary Setting and Breeching.

I didn’t cry for that long. Not a million years at least. 

Had I been that scared? That lonely? That desperate?

I mean, it was a perfectly reasonable decision to march out across the Wasteland taking the shortest possible route to where my loved ones were, wasn’t it? 

And worrying about whether they still loved me was also perfectly reasonable. 

I mean, it had been months. And I was different. And, really had I ever been all that lovable…

Do you really want to go there? Beauty asked. Because we can have the conversation, and I promise you, Responsibility and Clarity will pummel you with affection mercilessly.

Uh, was that supposed to be a bad thing? Was that something I didn’t want?

They’ll also be worried for you, Inhibition said. And a little hurt that you doubted them.

“She needs you two to prove you love still love her,” Reason said, bypassing our private little mind space, and giving me no time to hide my insecurities at all.

“No she doesn’t,” Responsibility said pulling away from the group hug they’d all buried me in. “She needs to believe she’s still the woman that she knows we love.”

“And of course she’s not,” Clarity said, sitting back with a smile that was far kinder than her words. “Just like we’re not.”

“We’re not?” The words tumbled from a numb mind over numb lips.

“We’ve changed, all of us,” Clarity said. “All different people. Not the same in the slightest. First time we’re meeting in fact. So we get to fall in love all over again.” Between Clarity and Responsibility, I’d somehow missed all along that Clarity was the one with the greater gift for being So Incredibly Mean!

What I hated most though was that it worked.

She wasn’t teasing me. She was somehow teasing my insecurities directly.

And it was working!

Would it have worked on anyone else? No. No one is broken like I am, at least as far as I know. And no one else has the relationship with me that Clarity did.

“Maybe I won’t this time,” I said. “Perhaps I shall be cold and cruel. Devoid of love and light. I’ll wander off into the wasteland cursed to bear my loneliness until my faltering grip on mortality slips, ever, so, slowly out of my grasp. Look, the dark horizon calls me now, and I must go!”

“You try to stand up and I will break your knees,” Responsibility said. “You’re not leaving us again.”

“Oh? I’m a prisoner now, am I?” Not an idea that I hated.

“You could probably escape us, but do you think we’d stop looking for you?” Clarity asked, heat and intention scorching her words.

“No,” and for a moment I was not thinking about my plans for vengeance on the Neoterics. Or my impending fall into divinity. Or even the fact that we weren’t exactly alone.

“Good. Now get up and come see us properly. Projecting like this is like hugging you through fifteen layers of robes,” Clarity said and I had my marching orders.

Literally.

It was another two days of walking through the wastelands before I got to Mt. Gloria. Various things should have blocked my passage, malevolent spirits, wandering Beast Fragments, scrying probes from the Tallgrim, Wepan, and the other Neoterics (though not Vitor interestingly). Wrapped in a shadow that wasn’t my own, I slipped past them all offering no violence, no death, and no sign of my existence.

Happily though, I didn’t walk alone. Projection may have been unfulfilling but the others took turns keeping my company and making sure I wasn’t wandering off course or into the jaws of some hitherto unknown monstrosity.

Which was silly.

I was the hitherto unknown monstrosity.

I didn’t have problems. I was the problem other things had.

 Since sleeping and eating were optional, we spent the time my purely conventional mode of travel required discussing plans and bringing me up to speed on what they’d been working on.

The good news was that my ‘death’ had put the Neoterics into something of a holding pattern. With the loss of Vaingloth being certain, the loss of Malgenia seemed at least possible, but our spies (We had spies! Such a handy thing!) reported that none of the Neoterics seemed willing to gamble on it being the truth.

Vitor wasn’t an exception but he was exceptional in that he seemed to be the least interested in pretending that I might still be alive. He’d taken control of my estates, though he hadn’t broken the seals on my inner sanctums yet (somethings even he’s not quite stupid enough to do). 

It sounded like the other Deaths were being mostly confined, though they had been told that they were going to be evaluated at the next Sunfall Festival in six months time, which I knew was code for ‘Vitor was going to find something else to do with them as soon as he could be certain his sister was actually gone.

Closer to home, Helgon had actually proved to be useful and had helped Clarity and Reason make significant breakthroughs in understanding the Assumption Ritual. There was still some fundamental issues that they were working on but they were at least able to pretend they were in good spirits about the progress they’d made.

The Assumption Ritual wasn’t the only thing they’d been working on for me though.

“You’re heisting parts of Diyas from the other Neoterics?”  It wasn’t something they’d led with mostly, I suspect, because it was the kind of plan that I should have been yelling at them about. I’d lost all ‘complain about people doing stupid things’ privileges thanks to getting myself eaten by the Beast though, but the impulse was still there!

“Not personally!” Beauty said. That she was manifested beside me and holding my hand meant I could only roll my eyes in disbelief rather than punching her in the shoulder like she deserved.

“Who else would be interested in going up against the Neoterics?” No one else had my advantage that if the Neoterics could manage to kill me they’d be ending the world, and we all knew it.

“You didn’t get a chance to meet her. Her name is Theia and she’s a Blessed like you.”

“Diyas has another Blessed?” As welcome news went that was just about the most. I’d heard of people being jealous of others receiving Blessing, but they obviously weren’t Blessed themselves. Knowing that my god had someone else to love and support them? That was a relief I’d barely suspected I needed.

Sorry, but you’re it for me, for now, Diyas said. Theia’s blessed by one of Night’s aspects, Umbrielle. Which made her much better for this mission than one of my Blessed would have been.

It wasn’t exactly hard to see why that was true. I mean, sure, I could probably waltz into a Neoterics lair and take back the fragment of Diyas they held – assuming it wasn’t hidden too well for me to find, and that the Neoteric tried to face me head on (which literally none of them would), and I didn’t mind revealing that I wasn’t actually Malgenia or that they would immediately all team up on me.

A Blessed of Night though? Based on Meluna’s performances, I was pretty sure Theia could be standing behind me right that moment and I wouldn’t have a clue.

“So who is she targeting?”  If it was Vitor, I was going to feel compelled to help out. He had the knack for appearing to be the dimmest of all the Neoterics but he was Malgenia’s twin and there were times that showed.

“Sasarai. Meluna found a paper Dyrena had left behind about Sasarai burying his treasure vault beneath his big tree, far from where any of his people roamed. We figured burgling one that people weren’t around would be easier than one that’s under constant guard.”

A paper Dyrena had left behind? How ‘convenient’.

I thought about calling out to her, but, no, she’d stayed hidden for some very good reasons. Also, whatever she was, I was sure she had even fewer options for manifesting before someone than Diyas or the other proper gods did.

She says ‘thank you’, Diyas said, confirming my suspicions.

“Out of curiosity, why did you send Theia and not Meluna herself? I mean Sasarai’s kind of a shrub when it comes to intelligence, but he will notice when one of his divine fragments goes missing.”

“It was Theia’s idea. She can hide herself well enough to move about a Neoterics lair, which we proved because she knew what our bedrooms looked like.”

“She what?” I’d been kidding, somewhat, when I said she could be right behind me. Malgenia’s defenses on her rooms were second to none though. I definitely should have been aware if someone was creeping around in there.

“The Death’s rooms,” Beauty amended. “She’s got the sense not to mess with the Neoterics directly. Also Kalkit was able to let us know that Sasarai doesn’t visit his hoard of god souls. He just draws on their domains indirectly because he thinks if he never enters the vault no one else will know its there. Kalkit called it ‘security through obscurity’ and kind of spit on the notion.”

“So she’ll be able to get in and out quietly then? And Sasarai won’t noticed the fragment is missing until the next time he goes to heal someone?” Which could mean he’d never notice since the Neoterics as a whole weren’t in the practice of using the powers for the benefit of anyone except themselves, and avoiding injury was one of their highest priorities.

“That’s the plan!” Beauty said almost as though she was cueing Inhibition to appear.

Which Inhibition immediately did.

“The plan’s failed! We have a problem!”