When Lucius opened his eyes, Tara was there. “You look awful,” she said.
“You aren’t the only one who noticed,” he replied. “I got sent home due to exhaustion. Projection-fatigue, the SongLuminant representative said. I feel terrible about it, and honestly, a little suspicious that they were trying to get me out of the way, but I jumped at the chance. And something very upsetting happened.”
As the sonoluminescent bubbles dissipated, Tara put her hand gently upon Lucius’ shoulder. “We’ll have a quiet dinner then, and talk about it.”
Lucius nodded. “That sounds like a good idea.” He stood.
He pitched forward. Tara quickly grabbed him, steering him back into the chair. “Here. I’ll get you some Root Riot.”
Lucius closed his eyes. It was so hard to think. He had been so focused for so many days, taking part in activities far from Tara. Every molecule in the room seemed to be stabbing him, and solar flare activity on the surface of the sun was giving him a terrible case of heartburn. “I’m an idiot,” he said. “If the SongLuminants get projection-fatigue, it’s going to be a lot harder for me. They don’t have sensory inputs other than the species they possess. My trees are still overwhelmed with data.”
“Lucius, it occurs to me that when you do this – maybe you should project your consciousness into me.”
“I couldn’t do that! It would be too much risk for you to go to those meetings. And I can’t use alchemy when occupying a human host. You’d be unprotected.”
“But it would solve the fatigue problem, wouldn’t it? And also, you wouldn’t be strutting around in some bimbo’s body.”
Lucius was silent as Tara handed him the Root Riot. Meanwhile, a considerable internal debate was raging between those who agreed with Lucius, and those who thought projecting into Tara’s body would be the sexiest thing ever. Lucius’ pounding headache continued. His hand trembled as he raised the glass.
“You shouldn’t have dinner with me,” said Tara. “Ash should go back to Goliath. Your emanation is on the verge of collapsing.”
“I can’t leave you.”
“Lucius! Stop it. You’re no good to me like this. You have to take care of yourself. You need to connect directly to the nul-universe. An Archon could do it through the grid, but you can’t emanate an Archon now, can you?”
“That’s an idea. It might be easier to be Aran.” Lucius tried to stand, feebly raising his arms. He winced as the blue light broke through the cracks in his skin. It’s a strange thing how the transformation seems to cause pain to the Goliath emanations. I never feel anything when it happens to me.
I and I floated above Lucius’ chair. Tara stood there with her arms crossed. She smirked.
There was a pause. Lucius could barely lift his arms – I and I was finding it impossible to fold them.
“You can’t, can you?”
There was a moment’s pause.
And then we felt the peculiar sensation of falling upward, attracted not by gravity or even pudge, but by our connection to the roots that anchored us. Eden was closer than Dolparessa, so we fell back to Goliath, a blue moth streaking through the heavens like a dying meteorite.
For a while, the chatter was silent. There was nothing but the sunlight on our leaves, the warmth of the energy from the nul-universe being drawn into our roots. We were tucked securely into the soil. There was water to slake our thirst. There was perfect contentment.
Contentment, except…
…the second sun was missing.
Aran found himself sitting at the base of Goliath. Several curious K’ntasari had gathered, and now knelt before him.
For a moment, twin aches poised on a razor’s edge. It had been so perfect being a tree. Goliath’s dreams were hazy and floating – no need to think about anything, like what to do about Lilith, or how to placate the offended Lady Geverna or what in the universe to make of anything that had happened at the Combine meetings. But there was no Tara.
No Tara.
Aran stood, preparing to discard himself. “Davy said to tell you that he made some fish. You should try fishing.”
Wide-eyed, the K’ntasari watched as Aran lifted his arms, his flesh burning into the blue-white light of the mothman.