🌚 all the dead seem to know where i am
It has been four days since the fall of the Last City.
There is nothing they can do. Curiosity has caught choppy radio frequencies, messages about rally points and fallbacks. Cries for help and rousing proclamations of hope filtered through static and droning Cabal feeds. But their cargo is too precious to risk. They have been lightless for centuries, they know how to fight without it. But their flock is their charge, now more than ever they may hold the future of the Guardians in the folds of their cloak. It is too risky for them to join an assault on the Cabal.
That does not mean they must be far.
They landed back on earth for safety, first and foremost. The Red Legion’s fleet was choking the system, making the other planets unsafe for a lone jumpship. They landed with a flock of four, and began the trek towards the city.
Tonight, the first new Ghost finds them. They are pink, with a spiked dawning shell, but their tines are bent and broken. They wobble in their flight, buffeted by even the slightest breeze, but their course is straight and true. They move without a word nor hesitation straight into Curiosity’s open palm, before resting there, eyelight fluttering like a heartbeat. Curiosity keens, pull them close and settles them in the deep swooping collar of their robes. The Ghost does not move for hours. Sephirah and the others buzz about them, sympathetic but unable to help. Eventually, the flock tires and retreated to their pockets. Pink regains their strength by dusk, but never speaks.
Curiosity moves Pink to a pocket as night falls, deactivates their eye and throat lights, and keeps walking. Just past 1900, they see a pair of eyes through the gloom, moving independently from a head. Two ghosts, matching shells. Tines clink as one bumps the other, and flashes an excited greeting. Curiosity turns on their eyes and holds out their hand. The pair of golden ghosts alight, blinking relief and warmth. Curiosity lets them nestle inside their robes, close to their core, and raises their internal running temperature a couple notches. Sometime later Kendari, the larger, thanks them, but admits they are still cold, and that it is probably because their Guardians had both been solar. He fears they will never be warm again. Curiosity can do nothing but rub his tines, gently, comfortingly, and hum soothing tones.
The next day brings a light snowfall, and they find Aurora in the early morning on a rock, the snow collecting on her broad sunburst shell and weighing her down. She gains the strength to speak when her core warms, and tells them how she had felt the Light this way, a candle in the dark. How she feels it now, stronger than she’s felt in days. Kendari and his partner chime their agreement, and Pink rolls over in their pocket.
“All these Ghosts in one place, bouncing Light off one another.” Sephirah realizes. “When I lost my Guardian, it felt like I lost all the Light in myself too. And I turned to the only thing I could feel, the Traveler. Zenith and Umbra and Chase have never had guardians, and I have healed since losing mine. We weren’t bled dry when the Light left, we just lost our connection.”
Sephirah flutters up into Curiosity’s face. Since they all felt the Traveler go, she had been subdued, but with hope was returning to her old self. “We’re their Traveler now, we’re their beacon. And the more who flock to us the stronger we will all get!”
After that, the flock takes turns being out of their pockets, scanning the ground ahead, searching for the whispers of Light, and casting out as much as they dare as signal flares. When a response registers, frantic buzzing draws Curiosity to the spot, to gently dig away the snow and free the Ghost who settled to rest on their journey.
At sunset Curiosity scales the ridge ahead, and looks at last upon the Traveler and the occupied city. Their flock is sixteen strong now, double the largest it has ever been. They fill Curiosity’s collar and robes, pockets and satchel. Due to lack of room, Sephirah is settled atop their head, beneath their hood and among the spikes. It is the place where their own Ghost used to sit.
They will need to hole up somewhere close, this is too many Ghosts to travel with during an occupation, and the ship is three days back. And the responsibility is twofold now. They must stay close to the City, for other lost Ghosts to find them, and safety.
