Notes from Mud

I’ll be splitting this entry into multiple sections as more things occur. I could write for days about one day’s events, yet the world moves fast, and by the next evening, things have changed drastically.

June 24

Two human heads are split open, and a pool of red covers the ground.​

Spencer and Oka died today.

The... violent kind of ‘died’.

I have slowly learned what Kuro told me, that day in the dojo... he taught me a couple of things that seemed very obvious and simple. Think about the other person’s movements. Make a million calculations in your head before acting. That martial method seemed so abstract-- Sparrow was the only person I knew who utilized it before I opened Mud. Yes, I knew Tlaloc closely, and he was a guard, but he was not martial. He was a lover, and not a fighter-- his methods were brutish and stupid, most of the time, because he preferred writing of poppy groves and such. Seeing Sparrow Linnaeus and Kuro move has taught me there’s a lot more to it. Can move deliberately, like a feather-- and hold yourself steady like a stone. Yet above all there is some sort of code that keeps these two in check, in check from themselves. They are afraid of themselves-- so they stop it with a forcefield, a guard, a discipline. I scared myself recently. With a blacksmith’s hammer I caved in the skull of a drone, a droid, a robot. Oil, bits of metal everywhere. I cried. Kahlua was there, and thank Kluex for that. On Mud, if a tool’s malfunctioning, if it doesn’t work as intended, if it hurts somebody, you break it down and fix it, or the tool itself isn’t made to be used ever-- so you don’t ever make it again. It did hurt two people, hurt one person-- killed him by pushing him off a balcony, and his lover bashed her own head in with a hammer, similar to the one I used. I was in the thick of it. Hands were bloodied. I tried to stop her, to no avail. Spencer and Oka, acquaintances to me, they wanted to run a book store. To no avail. To no avail. To no avail. It was a useless venture, and now they’re dead. I was shell-shocked until I wasn’t, and then I was alright again. So-- ... like clockwork, Mud goes on. Skarti has a schoolhouse, now. Or at least one classroom. Good for him. He taught me a class not-too-long-ago, about Avian culture. About Avos. He made me start to question Ma... agh, I’m sure she hates me more than usual, now. He taught me about the Sunborn and Kluex and the Stargazers who wanted to leave Avos, who succeeded-- and the wars surrounding it all.

Space war is so hard to comprehend, really. Ship on ship? Man on man? Spears clashing against spears? According to Skarti, the last great war between Avians was one between Stargazers and those who wanted to remain on Avos. A land war. It was ended by a small duel between a tribute on either side, and so Avos expanded, expanded, expanded. Space war is unreasonable. Once you’re able to leave, most of the inherent conflicts for war disintegrate. Land is in abundance, so are materials. Only real reasons are for passion-- religion, revenge, et cetera. That’s why Sparrow was out here. His great voyage to kill the unholy. He must’ve ended thousands of lives, whether personally or with weapons on his space-faring vessel... I don’t probe him for it, because I’m sure he’s terrified of himself. I know he’s terrified of himself, because else he wouldn’t practice that martial way, that discipline. Else he wouldn’t take a staff, but a spear instead, and wipe out those who have wronged us. But Sparrow Linnaeus, in his own words, is dead. His fleet is dead. The hundreds he had trained-- trained well and led into their doom-- are dead, at least as far as the rest of the universe is concerned. He is out of his prime and weakening, and he does not have hatred in his heart anymore, I know it. I could learn a thing or two about self-fearing and self-controlling. So could Kahlua. So, so could Kahlua. Perhaps I’ll arrange that.

June 25

Volare​

Volare is back, and his red feathers fill my life with happiness again, unconditional happiness. It’s like this tunnel Kahlua has found himself in does not exist-- it’s the poppy grove again, that’s where I am. So much beauty and warmth-- could barely keep myself sane without him around, though I know it’s bad to rely on people like that. I gave him something Audrey gave me-- a small pendant with the metal sculpture of a songbird. Figured he’d like it, and he did, but it was just a little thing where I think what really mattered was that we had one another again. And red.

I don’t want Kahlua to burn out-- that’s what I told Kuro. I talked to Kuro today, wanted him to help Kahlua like I wrote earlier, help him learn to control himself. I don’t want that finch to burn out like a matchstick or candle, yet that’s what he’s planning. I lied to Sarah-- I told her he was planning to commit suicide on the Sempervines raid. It’s her excuse to stop him. I’m not sure if she believes me or not, but we’ve both seen that he’s not acting as he should.

Ahg. Spent the day cooped up in my office getting yelled at by a ‘Henry’. Tells me I don’t know how to run Mud. Well, I don’t... not really. Ma ran it all these years. I’m picking up where she left off, and many of the same structures remain. But I’ve gotta be screwing it up somehow. If I’m not screwing it up, vigilantes like Henry don’t have a place to work. I’ll talk to Sparrow... I’ll have things more strict. More strict. More strict...

Staring at my red lantern, so deeply. Seeing Volare’s face in the light. And Tlaloc, too. I hadn’t thought about it too hard, but in some ways, I’m projecting my old friend’s image on that pretty red bird. Of course, Tlaloc’s feathers were fuchsia, not red, but... well, I called Vol a ‘poppy flower’, as a term of endearment. We laughed it off... I laughed it off. But it did work. In Tlaloc’s novel, he refers to the flower so often as a ‘drug’, as a ‘need’-- as a motivator for Maffei and I, as a motivator for himself, for people born before him and after him. He described it as a universal motivator, something present in all Avians, even those despicable and even those lovable. Of course, though much of the book is truly non-fiction with some fantasy written in, all the names are changed. Else people would know the two of us had planned to elope-- for now it’s some nameless figure that he hardly talked about, but with such passion... we smiled and laughed about it all the time. No, but... to the point, a poppy flower in that novel is something regarded as treacherous and yet alluring, terrifying yet beautiful, abstract... I think I had found a poppy flower in true form on Upside that night, Volare, and realized it all too suddenly when thoughts of him turned to intimacy. That time is long gone-- and I think the two of us were too dumb together to ever make a good pair. But it struck me as a good thing while it lasted. Short time that it lasted, so short, just like Tlaloc. Well, he’s back-- a platonic love, the two of us have got. A platonic love is a consistent one. And I need that consistency if I’m going to live. My brain goes haywire when everyone needs me and I want everyone. That’s not the sort of multitasker I am, not the sort that Ma taught me to be. Ma went thirty years without taking another lover because Mud was more important. Well-- isn’t that the reason I left Volare, that night on Hope Springs? I could have taken him for a night, just him and I. But I was worried that Mud would need me, so I left. Perhaps that was Maffei Waterdipper’s blood subconsciously flowing through me, leading me the right direction.

Well-- either way. If I had to speak of these two, Kahlua and Volare, I’d say that Kahlua’s love is a rocketing orchestra whose instruments break often, and Volare is a scarlet songbird in the sky, chirping softly, so beautifully that it could never be tainted. Half the time I hate the finch, but Vol is a poppy, a drug-- calming me down, easing me out.

June 26

Skarti​

A fight worth fighting... in Sparrow’s eyes, a fight should be ended as soon as possible, with whatever methods necessary. I said to a human man, as he was yelling at me because of Sparrow’s methods, that I wanted to save people’s lives... that it didn’t matter how un-graceful such a thing was, that it only mattered that as many people as possible were saved. Even Florans. Even the things which attack me deserve to be saved. It’s an interesting philosophy-- and I’m sure humans have trouble adjusting or believing in such a thing. But it’s how Maffei ran things, and it’s how she taught me. It’s what she read in her history books, it’s what she trained back on Avos. It’s a method that works, and Mud has run like clockwork since.

And perhaps a lot longer than I first thought-- a few days ago, Audrey, Luke and a Novakid named Star Dancer headed out east to a mining operation where they discovered a cavern system... I wasn’t able to be there myself, but Audrey gave me a video feed of what they found, and Kluex! There were some incredible sights. Ruins of an old city, so old that the clothes off the skeletons had rotted away. According to Skarti, who is becoming more and more of an ally and friend, these were potentially from Avos-- one of their tools in particular, a spear with an icy tint, seemed to be a crude replica or recreation of Avosian spears, forged by a zealot repentant with paper wings-- perhaps trying, somehow, to get closer to their god. The trio recovered some items from the ruins on their way out. The spear, the wings, as well as a ceremonial dagger like Skarti’s, and an ornate hammer of some sort. I’ve yet to get them all identified to find their purpose, but once I do, going to start a museum on the eastern end of the bridge. Figure that it happened on Mud, so it’s Mud’s history.

I like Skarti. I’ve come to appreciate the way he does things a lot more.

I had dinner with Yuree and Volare-- Makali was supposed to be there, but she must’ve had something else to do. It was short-lived, as the risotto Yuree served was exquisite and we devoured it in minutes. That Apex certainly can cook-- and farm. He’s recommended a few more things to me as of late, farming techniques and such... he’s got a real investment in Mud, an honest one that very few people do. More dedicated than some natives, I think-- the stargazing types who want to leave at all costs.

That used to be me, won’t lie.

June 27

Kuro​

Kuro beat the shit out of me.

No, don’t mean literally-- wasn’t any feces involved. But I also don’t cuss lightly, over small things, over a small punch or a kick to the gut... Kuro thrashed me around and pushed my beak into my face and hit my ribs until they practically split open, and then he went a little longer, afterward, until I was a wet rag barely able to breathe. I bled out my mouth. I cried and whimpered and couldn’t move, like my soul had been ripped out of me. He had to carry me back like a ragdoll to home, where I laid for half an hour, immobile, until a bit of sense came to me and I could sit up. Wasn’t an enjoyable experience-- the agony in that moment nearly killed me, or my brain at least. However, the moment Kuro delivered the first blow and also the last blow, I knew why-- what he was doing, and I wasn’t angry at all. I was relieved. I was thankful. To be able to trust somebody so completely takes time-- and although I’ve only known Kuro a few months, I can trust him with my life like that. If he wanted, he could have crushed my head like a piece of paper with one fist, but he didn’t. He taught me something... how to break.

Not to break other people, but to be broken.

Today they also retrieved Karo Veyron-- who I’ve barely written about, not out of lack of things to say but because other matters had always clouded my mind. He’s a wonderful person, really, resembles Kahlua in his looks but not his overbearing nature... he’s married, donates to Mud, acts as a guard and member of the TQRF, and overall astounds me with his dedication. He’d been kidnapped, by ‘Faceless’, I hear, but Kahlua and Sarah got him back, much to my relief, and Volare’s. Vol came as I was licking my wounds, and we talked some, but Karo’s wounds, while perhaps not as physically damning, were potentially a lot more mentally draining, so he headed off to help with those.

Met a man, as well, Cole Harris-- a private investigator of sorts, or at least trying to be one. Gave him a few names and faces... Blaze, that girl who straps bombs to herself, takes people hostage, and runs the refugee camp... that unnamed Floran who brought bones and corpses onto Mud, much to everyone’s dismay... and Argus. Argus who is a triangle, whose tune I haven’t heard in so long. The disappearing act. The false man, the lying man. I think it’d be nice to meet him and have some sympathy. I was so frustrated at his apparent lack of security... yet others are frustrated at me for the same thing. Gah. Mud was easier to run without outsiders. Mud was a dream, a perfect poppy grove without any issues. I crave it. I need it. I need calm in the universe again.

Sometimes find myself wanting these variables like Kahlua and Jaycee and Kuro and Caroline and Makali gone out of my life. But they’ve given me so much perspective that it’s hard to justify disconnecting from them. And outsiders like Volare, Fran-- they might have issues, but they’ve only made me love life more in the long run. Truth is, wouldn’t ever wish to lose the connections I’ve made with these people, good or bad. The real trouble is Mud opening. Mud opening... Mud opening. What a stupid idea. What a moronic plan it all was. The frontier is not the sort of place to open your gates. Perhaps if we were Avos, or anywhere in the core sectors at all... we’d be safe. But for now I fear every day that Mud burns.

Real truth is that mud can’t burn-- it’s clay, dirt, water. But I’ve seen enough fires in Mud since opening that there’s not a doubt in my mind that the city itself could-- or will.

Didn’t get a remedy tonight, because Kuro wanted me to sleep. Well, I might give it a go. Last time I tried without his brew was weeks ago, and the nightmare-- the Nightmare-- it addled my mind like scrambled eggs. But a lot has changed, and my subconscious has to, eventually. I can’t keep drinking muddy tea every day. I suppose we’ll see. I’ll tell Jaycee after-- we have many similar issues, and need to band together. Hell-- we’d make a good team, even.

My beak hurts so, so damn much. Think Kuro’s broken something in my face. Need to see Makali about it later.

June 28

Jaycee​

Had a dream last night. Not The Nightmare, but felt worse-- or at least a different kind of fear. I was in the poppy grove again. Tlaloc was there, knew he was there, but he was behind me and I couldn’t see his colors. There was a small fire in the center of the red flowers. It burned and burned quietly. I felt anxious. I felt worried. I felt so worried and terrified and overcome with fear that I fell down limply as I was flung around the sky, powerless, weakly torn in half, so worried-- worried-- but nothing came, and I woke up hours and hours later.

When morning came I texted Jaycee as I mentioned I would; she came over and we talked, and we agreed to be allies, a team, to be sympathetic of one another’s fears and doubts and worries and troubles, maybe even find each other men, eheh... it’s all a nice dream, but it’s also a bit of a reality. She and I have a dynamic that has never felt anything but completely raw and real. When I have hated her I have voiced it, when I have been worried for her I have voiced it. Don’t think it’s a friendship based on lies as some others are. Half the time I’m lying to Kahlua, after all-- makes for a stressful time. And while Jaycee is such a stressful person, at least I can follow what’s going on. She wants to live in the Waterdipper district, the most populated-- sure, it’s a big goal for an outsider, but she was one of the first outsider residents, she’s a guard, and she’s perhaps more dedicated than any other outsider, Yuree included. She played two rounds of chess with me today, one win for me and a stalemate- admittedly I was going easy because she’s new to the game- and then on Hope she gave me a massage for my still-aching body. Kuro really did a number on me. So bad that Makali had to repair my beak with this fact-acting chemical and a bandage, and it’s a bit hard to open to speak now-- at least it’s not stinging bad anymore.

She has nightmares, too. Jaycee. Doesn’t like much to talk about them. They’re about the past, and mine are about worry, about the future-- no telling exactly how accurate mine are, but she knows hers are true. Her mistakes eat her alive. I suppose they’ve eaten me, too.

That night on Hope Springs with Volare.

Should have been there with him, but mistakes are mistakes, and they’re in the past, and the longer I relive them, the worse they get.

More times I think about poppy flowers and the face of the man who loved me, the crazier I get. More times I look at photos, crazier I get. I get my head lopped off every Tuesday.

 

Talk of guns and rangers and Dead Florans
(left to right Sarah, me, Henry, Mick) ​

So much to talk about, so little to say.

I had my life stolen from me-- no, my lamp. My red lamp, crystal lamp, stolen by a man named ‘Pookie’ or somesuch. Now he’s working on Mud, giving me all sorts of advice... the man who stole the lives of Oka and Spencer, he’s been exiled, exiled, gone, punished. Vigilante justice won’t be tolerated, won’t let them hang him. When Sparrow killed Tlaloc, split his neck open, I cried and cried and whined, felt like jumping from a very tall tower, felt like hanging his brown-feathered terrible self from a tree until the life was choked out of him, and I’m sure he would have preferred that, too.

ha.

The sane things in life have started to deteriorate. Can’t trust C-whatsername Conscium Caroline or Conner with anything, turn to friends for comfort, Kahlua is a liar of some sort and Volare has a concussion and anger and so much anger, and his red feathers aren’t meant to have anger. I speak to Skarti and I don’t expect a pompous priest to be so troubled. and he doesn’t want to speak to me, either. Heart beat-- blood pumps out. She is stabbed on the muddy street. I stroll past. I whisper in his ear, “I love you, Vol.” Whispers something similar back. I’m lost in a canyon, a straight divide which should have no twists and bends. Who is Ernal Piloti? What am I doing? What’s a fight worth fighting? Damn it-- if they are Florans, mobbed in a group, I’d rather have the TQRF gun those savage bastards down. I’d rather let sap line the streets in a blood-bath than let them take Mud, than let them burn Mud. Kluex, what am I becoming, and what am I leaving behind? Am I a pacifist if I can say to somebody that their enemy ought be cut down with bullets?

I had a horrible dream. I dreamt I shot some-body in the head, in a derelict spaceship. I loved that some-body somehow, and they had wronged me. Shot him in the head. And no time at all later felt I needed to shoot myself too. terrible feeling. guilt. fear. loneliness.

Also dreamt & fantasized about Skarti naked.

Dreamt Amoch and Tlaloc and I in school. School burns down. They lie to you. They’re liars in big fur coats telling you they’re teaching you, but they’ve lied all the way down.

Dreamless nights & dream-ful nights and fear and love and lust for close (or un-close) friends. I’m lonely. Need physical contact. Need to hold Volare or Kahlua, one-of-the-two. No, Skarti’d work too, he’s troubled too. I have a helper’s complex of some sort. These troubled birds I enjoy so much, perhaps only because they’re troubled. Jaycee left the frontier permanently. She left a letter I barely read. I miss her already-- no it’s not one particular thing, but she was an instrument which is now sorely missing, music comes out all wrong. Kahlua is wrong. Volare feels wrong. No comfort in M’Kali or Yuree (now Arcadeysomething) or Pluck Plucking The Bass or Sparrow or Amoch. Keh-- haven’t spoken to Sparrow or Amoch for so long. Not real speaking. Sparrow could be miserable or suicidal for all I know but I don’t know, do I?

I’ve never felt so

useless.

helpful

useless.

helpful

and red.

Oh-- no, find some sort of comfort in Sarah McKinley. Ahk. Of all places. The same lady who wanted to burn all those Florans and who I stopped. I stopped her but nowadays maybe it would’ve been the better idea in my mind.

Don’t write that down Ernal.

I cry on the page. Sorry it’s wet. Stop writing that I’m changing. Florans aren’t all bad, Flightless can’t be so intimately involved, can’t think of myself that way--

Won’t hurt anybody anymore. Least of all the killers and the criminals. Kluex knows no-one else is protecting THEM but me.

Kahlua has

lost his bass in a ditch.

The guitar wires--

frayed open, Volare.

Drums

missing. Fran.

Kuro mourns

on his

huge, mournful cello.

Bunch of Rangers. Using bolt-action rifles and purporting themselves as non-lethal, makes me angry and distraught and called them morons. Mick and Henry, two Ranger leader morons. No, but Mick has a good heart. Henry doesn’t, but Mick does, and Mick co-owns. He’s still a good man, a pacifist, I think. Less than me. Worse! But idealism leads to morals, and perhaps in the frontier he’ll help someone. He’ll turn us good yet.

I had a very terrible dream that Sparrow Linnaeus died, and in another world he was young again, slaughtering the people he hated. I had a terrible dream that I was a wine-drinking spacefarer without a home, and that I sought him out, and that I wept horribly once I saw his scrawny, murderous face. He always told me he could kill some-one with his beak. Don’t doubt it. Very sharp beak. Peck peck peck. Peck peck peck. Peck peck peck.

Pew pew. Picador. Fall on the ground, you miserable criminal. I’ll turn you good yet.

...

I’m miserable and crazy without Vol. I need him to be himself again, not angry. I need to just... have a day with him. NO ALARMS, and NO SURPRISES. No distraught, no psychopathy. His red feathers. Bury myself in them. Wait for sun-dawn. Please let me have that again... let me go to the poppy grove until my arms are tired.

Ship revs up.

To Hope Springs...

 

Ship revs up. Takes me somewhere nice.​

 

July 04
​

Force myself to remember-- an Avian can survive days without food, but not long without water.

Boil the snow and drink the snow, and there’s nothing forcing me to hunt for what I need, yet some certain impulse makes me think if I don’t I must be a weak son.

A few hours ago Volare said a very freeing, wonderful thing-- not ever will I be your nestmate, not ever, not ever-- stop interpreting as such. My mind which is a broken record goes through all its thoughts and lands on Volare, and now I have a roadblock to stop it from going there. I know for a fact that not ever will it happen, not ever will it work. Need some time out away from the world to figure that out. Alone time. Self time. Time to think.

a snowy planet. This is the one Kahlua showed to me.

Found refuge from the bitter cold in a tall tower of metal and grime. Bad feelings in my gut, churns badly. I think about him. She planted the seed in my head-- take a while away from the world. While away. Was supposed to be with Kahlua and Volare but Kahlua ducked out suddenly for something else, always does, always has something else. Volare is never, not ever, and what a relief. We talked earlier tonight on Hope Springs, and he tells me, never, not ever. I stare atop the tower with a flickering red light, white light all around me. The snow tops are knives. The spear-tops are sharp. I’m cold but for a fire, and a coat, scarf. red scarf. I need a while while away, or else I’ll fall back down, my gut churning, my head slow with grime.

The space-ship blocks out the sun-light. It’s dimming bright. No, I didn’t come here because of Volare... just a good excuse to. I came here because I am weak and I need to live, not die crying. So says Pabo. So says Kuro. So says Star Dancer. So says Sarah. So says Mimi. So says everyone. Naive Ernal Piloti. Who is he? Needs to burn for good. The terrible feeling in my gut has not ceased, but I fly away from it, get away for a while from it. It sails away... why am I here? Here? Not away away from the rest of the world because I think it’s terrible, but because I need something else for a little while.

Somewhere nice.

Take me somewhere nice.

I stick’,’, get a stick,’,’ chomp chomp’,’, chomp chomp,’,’,’,’

So it sharpens. Why do I do it, crazy, ehe. No, not crazy-- an Avian can survive days without food, yet there’s an impulse in me that says

it’s a faulty tool, killed Spencer, killed Oka.

Smash it, stab it, crush it to bits and don’t wait on that, because, Ernal-- no time for good good big big ideas ideas. Think about it-- am I going to live crying in fear of these things? No, that can’t be me. I am the leader of Mud. I can’t go chasing after Volare or his apparition or his color red. Sharpen stick. Sharpen stick. Sharpen stick. Sharpen sharpen stick’,’,’,’,

Venture out over the hills. The fire on the distance is warm. I’m led by a number of painful lights who shout and scream and don’t exist, and I start to run in their direction, my green-feathers tainted white and my beak freezing cold in snow. It throws my sense of direction off; I am churning lost crazy away. This above all things is what makes my feet move in their boots-- I’m not here, this isn’t happening, and I’m lost, and I can drift carefree from place to place. There is another thing in these woods. Kra-kraa. Kra-kraa. Come out and let me thrust my spear in your gullet, monster.

monster.

There is a rumbling and I am alone again; it’s fled. gone. My spear clatters on the nothing-rock snowy as I get frustrated again. Ma is in my house. I have a fever. Tlaloc is across the bed. We are at a windmill and he makes a joke about me. I see it again. Scrambling.

kra-kraa. kra-kraa.

I feel very sick. My gut churning. Stick. Stick. Quarter-staff. He waves it around.

Sparrow waves it around and silences the crowd immediately. A deafening cry; I am him.

Gut churning.

Toss it away

and it goes kra-kraa in pain as it’s sharp enough. Stabbed like Mimi. Bogey-man # 1. In the woods. am bogey man # 1. need to find bogey man # 2 to become my nestmate and take care of our eggs. Our hatchlings. They will bear children in time. Suddenly I am feverish and sick and tired, and the monster goes kra-kraa before it’s the end. It gets its head lopped off.

When return to the tower it’s with a limp; cracked my beak when I fell off the tower, no, just a dent. Of course,! and Tlaloc yells at me,’,’,’,’ He laughs and yells, both at once. Fuchsia birdies in the sky. Fuchsia birdies in the sky.

When I return to the tower it’s with a corpse. I sharpen my knives and cut it up for tonight’s eat-um’s.

Tastes like I’m eating some-one else.

July 05
​

I wake up trying to sleep.

Finger is on the button to beam away. Back to my ship-- to run away from this solace. Engulf myself in red feathers again. Calming impulse but have to resist. What’s more important than chasing the red is to caretake Mud, and before I can do that I need to be sane here.

It has three eyes. It has eight eyes. Frosted over a cold blue with blindness. Aphid rots.

No good in simple isolation. isolation stagnates-- sitting still in this warm room will do me no good. I get on Starnet. I do what I normally do. I map the neuron map in my head to ignore thoughts of Volare.

I get rid of him.

I get rid of him.

I read on my PMD what makes hydroelectricity works; drill it in my head and it replaces thoughts of Volare, right-quick. Right-quick. I think about monsters and demons. I sit atop the rust tower and see the eight eyed monster. It killed Tlihuic. Stabbed him with a damn spear in the gut churning back and forth. It killed him. It killed him. I’m not a violent man. I look away from conflict until it leaves me. I turn them away until they leave me. Exile works, wonders. Yet sometimes I wonder what has to be done about truly awful people. People like ‘Whitey’. A broken tool.

I’m not sad over Volare. No-- no I just know I have a mental problem I need to solve. That I’d keep hoping, that’s a mental problem. This is my soul-clearing brain-cleaning time.

Caroline came by waving a gun around with her fist. I told her not to-- I need time to think and replace my mind with something devoid of what I care about. Suddenly she’s cold and met a Hylotl outside, a strange one, a runt with eight eyes which I avoid for the life of me. I wonder if Kahlua has ever come to this tower-- it’s a nice sight above. I sit on the top bit of the tower and stare all around wide-eyed at what’s available to me, the land, the sights, the people. Eagle-eyes I’ve got that see very well, and glare pointlessly out the window. I see faces peering through snow with terror in their gaping eyes, larks along a plane, flying out and singing loud. I imagine these faces to be people I know-- kicking and screaming, Kuro, delicately plopped down like a fish-out-of-water. They are golden fountains shining up brightly like stars, and I can watch over every one of them. My mind plays tricks; I imagine a nice sunrise that I can see, past the red shimmer a pale gold, feathered hands tight on the skin and bit off by a parakeet. Top of the tower. Up above. Away from it all.

I just sink my mind away. No, I let it fly out. My mindset is erased. No more Ernal who is weak and fragile. No more. No more. No more,’,’,’,’

Force myself to remember--

No steel walls

or steel walls

or steel walls

just mud

just mud

snow

just the snow beneath my feet.

just the thoughts with urgency.

Mud

Hunt

Force myself to remember-- an Avian can survive days without food, but not long without water.

Boil the snow and drink the snow, and there’s nothing forcing me to hunt for what I need, yet some certain impulse makes me think if I don’t I must be a weak son.

Night falls and I kill something to eat.

Night falls and I am not a weak son, anymore, Ma.

July 06
​

Ernal Piloti

Dumb name. She should have kept me ‘Waterdipper’. That’s who I’m closest to, anyway. Close to her even if she wasn’t close to me, even if she was a terrible mother and an incredible leader. She had always-molting feathers which were slightly rough to the touch, and not ever took a lover, as I shouldn’t. Not Volare at least. Not Volare especially. Before now he has struck out to me as something I needed-- desperately, gut-churning needed, a love like a flower that I have suckled as a hummingbird, with no reason and no cares. I need that out of my head more than ever... I need stability, I can’t be weak anymore, Ma. I need to be a piloti.

She named me ‘Piloti’ because of the pillars we built all the houses and buildings on, called pilotis. Helps if the ground shifts or if it floods. You can build latticework, flowers, meaningless things, even weak bricks and tapestries, but what really matters is that sturdy foundation, those pilotis which keep the world up, and keep the spirits high.

Volare is the flower. But I am a strong son. I’ll keep Mud safe by removing myself. Ernal Piloti is dead, same way Sparrow Linnaeus is. All that matters is Mud. Remove the latticework. Remove the flowers. Focus on what matters, what really holds up the place. If I get too much pent-up stress, maybe I’ll just ask Yuuto instead. Something temporary suits me better.

1,500 souls. Gleaming lights in the snow. Larks bobbing on their talons. I might be out of my mind but it’s better to be away from myself in the long run, I think. Eight eyes and messy jaw with a beak on.

Nobody ought to come here today. I made a mistake telling Caroline where I was; she came yesterday, gun in her fist. Would it be so bad if she shot me accidentally? At least she’d learn a thing or two about being cautious. She’s clumsy and stupid and young. Too young. She’s infatuated with that man Conner-- and it’s sad to look at, a real sad sight. The two of them want ‘Whitey’ dead, but I wouldn’t mind if they all just left.

I hear music.

Cello away in the distance. Rocketing loud acoustic guitar in my ear, and Volare’s beak pressed up against it. It bursts my eardrums. It ruins my ears. I go deaf. I go blind with eight eyes and three icy ones gone blind. I rip out my voicebox. I go dumb. How couldn’t I have seen this coming?-- from a mile away. I feel a strange attachment to my journal, else I’d burn it to try and start anew. I have a feeling I’ll need these thoughts later. For my brain. My deaf, dumb blind brain. It hears loud music. The bass guitar plucks away, preens a feather, flies and sighs. No more drum! No more rhythm! Francisco is gone, and so is that last connection to somebody that was neutral-- built on nothing. No more rhythm. Pluck the instrument hay-wire. Improv. Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it.

Two dead animals outside. Skinned them and cooked them and ate them. No rot in the snow. An Avian can survive days. Days before it rots. Corpse in Tlihuic’s cave, but it’s not his head. It made me throw up. And throw up. Throw up. Throw up. The body rots. Eat up.

It can survive days.

Days and days and days.

Kra-kraa.

I think I know what I’m going to do. I’m going to keep my sharp stick and go out west to Tlihuic’s cave, and stab that murderous beast in its heart. I think I recognize the man it killed. Something-something Beakmourner, I think. I wonder why he was away out there, but I don’t have a way of asking. No, I could ask... his relative, Malli. Wasn’t her father, but some relative-- young cousin, in his twenties. Hazy memory constantly churning. Kluex, why do people die so suddenly?

No panting...

no leaving my cave.

This tower is safe. Metal walls and metal floors beneath my feet.

I am not a weak son anymore, that’s what I keep telling myself. If I can enter that dream-state while hunting for food I can do it while caretaking Mud, too. I can just list along the ground, hovering a head’s height above, my legs limp from paralyzation. I can fly, and forget that I’m flying. Forget where I am. Forget who I am.

Suppose I’ll head back to Mud in the morning and act like nothing happened.

 

July 07

Kahlua
​

Holy ground ought not to be dismantled. And I regard Skarti’s classroom as holy ground-- a place where Grounded can learn the faith and where he can practice in safety. It was set ablaze with an oil lantern, and this angers me more than anything else before it. I was told so recently tonight that I can’t go and apologize to Skarti myself, but I will as soon as possible, over a glass of wine-- with some kinder words than I gave Kahlua today...

couldn’t offer him a lot. Told him the same things I’d always told him-- that he’s pure, that he wouldn’t become the monster he was afraid of, told him honestly that Volare had a grudge against him, and tried to comfort him... but did a bad job of it. He told me I was acting funny. I don’t feel too funny-- I feel cold. Cold hands. Freezing icy cold and shivering and eating the fingers up after themselves. Then he fled and we didn’t talk for the rest of the day; only so much you can do in a day. I went home early, felt sick. Felt sick and cold like I had a cold sick. Fled with my tailfeathers between my legs before anything else in the day could go wrong. When will I stop shivering like a beanbag?

It reminds me of that eight-legged monster-- er, three-eyed Hylotl, blind Hylotl who came into my office needing a job. I made up a story about Amoch’s father to reassure him that a farmer could work without eyes. I’m sure it’s true, and it doesn’t matter that it was actually a made-up story, so long as it made the Hylotl jump up and down excitedly. A runt of a person, really. Childish and old. Aphi. Aphid rots. Reminds me of him because he kept shivering and shuddering even as the cold left him. I could have sworn I saw him on that planet Kahlua brought me to... I’ll have to ask Caroline to verify. What a strange coincidence.

Sometimes I forget that other people like my company. Forgot that Kahlua might appreciate my neediness, sometimes. I’m warm and I suppose I envelop people in my feathers lovingly the way I want to be enveloped-- it’s a projection and a fantasy. When I used to rely on Volare’s contact and his hands, it wasn’t because I was lusting after him or awestruck, but because it was a comfort and a warmth I could rely on. Perhaps I’m like that for other people... something stable. Maybe I ought not change at all. Maybe I can’t do more by being colder. Ma certainly could have, but I’ve often not felt like her son at all.

I can’t help Mud by being un-loving to the people I love and care about. A flower doesn’t grow if you choke it at the stem all its life. Already apologized to Kahlua over phone, hope it doesn’t happen again.

I learned so much about myself on that cold planet, and I go back on it as soon as I see that it’s hurting people, even if just a little bit... I can’t handle such things. I’m not a hurter. But it has changed me. It has. I feel different. I feel sick.

A man named Kade opened a nonlethal weapons shop. Everyone buy a taser. Pew pew. Shoot the criminal. Spray him with red ash that makes your flesh sting. It’s good that everyone has one... so they won’t end up like Mimi, splayed against muddy ground whimpering for (Ma!)’,’,’,’,

So they can shoot back.

I went home early today and threw up about Malli’s cousin again. Maybe I made a mistake, mistook the head for some-one else. It doesn’t matter. It’s a dead citizen of Mud and I’m miserable about it. I got nothing done today. I didn’t fix Mud. I didn’t save Mud. I can’t save anyone.

Heading to Argus’ retirement party tomorrow. I think I empathize more with him nowadays... know what it’s like not to have any power over the place you lead. I think we’ll chat like old friends, even if we never were.

After all-- I’m driving all my actual friends away. Started with Amoch and then Volare and now Kahlua. Starting to burn those bridges like Mud will burn like it will all burn, all burn, all burn. And red, and red, and red...

July 08

Argus​

Argus Hemstreet died today.

The... violent kind of ‘died’. Just was standing admiring his retirement party when he up and went, two bullets to the torso and he bled wheezing and gasping for breath. I’m feeling a lot of things right now, it’s hard to write. Harder to talk. My throat’s caulked shut, my beak’s tied shut. I haven’t talked quietly today, yelled. They haven’t had a funeral--nobody knew Argus Hemstreet well enough. Nobody would have brought it up. Argus is-was a businessman, slow, hard to know, he’d not care if he wasn’t buried because burying would take time away from whatever he really, truly wanted with his life. Little Upside coffin made of all the bricks as they melted away and Blaze carved his killer into a mess of guts and flesh so that he would stop shooting. Then me and Pabo and M’kali stumbled away wide-eyed and I threw up in space, like my head was dancing around in horrid circles and killing me, and everyone was running around trying to figure out who had killed him and why. Won’t lie, I didn’t care a moment. All I was thinking about was what I was going to say to Argus before he died-- I was going to make a joke about how Upside was dangerous and that it should be used as an example on how not to run a colony. But things went to shit like they usually do, and nobody really cared that I was so cruel to a man on his retirement. My composure broke when I had to yell at Pabo, because six seconds after that horrible bloody mess of Argus Hemstreet dying on the floor, he had begun trying to say that the man should be forgotten-- that he was wrong-- that I should take care not to end up like Argus. Argus was the most reliable leader I had known so far-- his composure never broke like mine and he kept Upside in semi-stable condition without crying when things went wrong. No-one ever loved him or his practices but in his death I find a strange necessity to love what has been lost pointlessly. I love him more than I love Volare, in death, because truly he did not deserve such a thing any more than I do. My composure broke and that was a really telling sign. When your composure breaks, that’s a sign that you’re weak, a weak son. It means I won’t be able to take care of Mud. Like Upside’s melting stones, like the white-and-gold armored souls which melted it into oblivion, like the Apex fallen down bleeding like a stuck pig, I will fail, and it will all burn. Something awful will happen. Something negative. Ma sometimes struck me in the cheek whenever I was a weak son and couldn’t keep my composure, but not when Tlaloc died, because she must have known what I felt for him. Ma wasn’t the sort to do that. I never told anyone because I was ashamed. A weak frail son struck by a frailer mother, once in a blue moon, when I failed her. Argus wasn’t weak, he knew what was wrong and knew when to fix it--cold, businessman, calculated, smart, that was Argus and he died today. He was buried underneath the ruins of his colony for eight years and the murderers above him melted the stone and now they walk over her. Another part of the foundation that makes Upside.

Kahlua is a mess. He lives his life panicking today, seen it in his eyes, worried that Mud will burn. I don’t tell him it won’t-- I tell him there’s nothing we can do. Somehow that’s the most reassuring and calming thing a man can tell another. He is half-deafened like me and sick. We ate dinner and barely talked and embraced, and I apologized again for being cold. He’s the last of the four I can really love truly. Need to cut off the rest. Kuro doesn’t want comfort-- he is a caring person but does not need comfort as others do. He would rather keep the rest of the world stable and let his own problems eat him up quietly until he dies, and in the wee hours of the morning he plays it on a cello and everyone hears again. Soft. He gave me twenty thousand pixels to spend on evacuation vessels in case Mud is attacked-- I just about fainted. So much money... where could he have retrieved it? His own funds? Is this something he had been building at all these ten years, waiting for a chance to use it? Why Mud? Why Mud of all places? It has stricken me with such surprise and awe that I’m not sure whether to thank him for it or stay quiet. But I know that I will spend it, and it will be used. Eventually, things will always go wrong. Like rain, tragedy is an inevitability. People die. Violently, or nonviolently. Strikes you softer or harder. But it comes, and today a number of people met their death, and not one of them should have.

I’ll have to talk to Volare eventually. I’m sure it will be a casual affair; much easier that way. Don’t think he’ll do any yelling at me.

Sarah is hurt. Exiled a man who tried to kill Yury. Pabo wanted to join the guard and then wanted to leave the guard because of some melodramatic reason and got mad at me etc.

Too tired. I write this at home. I just want to sleep and cry about Argus Hemstreet, and Skarti’s classroom, I want to pray for Sarah’s wellbeing and Jaycee’s happiness but I don’t know how to pray-- will have to ask the priest sometime when they get the fire damage repaired. I hear it’s coming together quick.

Just another part of the foundation that makes up Ernal.

No, not going to live life panicking. Getting out of the house to find Skarti and ask him how to pray. I suppose it’ll be more effective than most things I do.

That’s over and done with...

prayed for Jaycee to be safe and happy away from here.

prayed for Kahlua to stay pure and not monstrous.

prayed for Sarah to not succumb to her injuries.

prayed for Mud to survive.

prayed for the frontier to calm down.

prayed for Skarti’s holy ground never to be burned again.

One feather for each prayer to Skarti’s shrine in his ship, and one from my plumage which he kept; didn’t bloodlet, thankfully, couldn’t stand the sight of blood probably after all that happened today. I have never been so hopeless-- today took the hope and love nearly out of me, even if I feigned it to keep Kahlua calm. I don’t like bitterness, or cold, or bitter cold. I don’t know what would solve the universe’s problems, but the death of Argus Hemstreet will only cause more.

Prayer is a good way to drum up hope. I suppose that’s why people are faithful and why they are superstitious-- because they are allowed to hope for that which they have believed to be correct, and hope is such a wonderful thing.

Keeps the body going when the mind is dead.

July 09

Mimi​

I’m in no position to judge Mimi. After all, I’d have to shoot him, too, if it meant my colony. No, I wouldn’t. Even if it meant Mud or my life I wouldn’t be able to pull the trigger. I’d be stuck in the spaceship with the gun to his head and I’d know irrationally how terrible the feeling is, and I wouldn’t be able to do it. I don’t believe Mimi is a killer but she could do it. She knows how important it is.

I will let her bring a gun onto Mud. I’ll look the other way. She will kill one of the men searching for her and I’ll look the other way. They will be scared. They will be runaways and not come back because of what she’s done, and I’ll look the other way. She’ll discard the gun and get off scot-free, and I will tell the population of Mud that I am sorry for letting a gun get through. I will apologize and say I am feeling guilty and I will reprimand the guard that allowed it to happen and I will say I am searching for the perpetrator and I will mourn the dead and I will apologize and I will look dumbstruck and afraid of the blood and splattered brains and I will cry on Volare’s shoulder about the dead man and I will puke in the corner and I will look the other way. I will not tell them. Mimi will be safe from those men, and I will recover. As I always do. As I inevitably do. I will let this terrible thing happen because it is a good thing, and, Kluex-- Kluex-- what the hell has that snow planet done to me?! How the hell can I say ‘yes’ to such a demented proposition... but, no, I didn’t say ‘yes’... I came up with the plan. I invented the plan. I was the one with the idea. I will cry over the death of another Mud visitor and I will look the other way, like I am cold, like I am freezing but not truly freezing. Like I am Argus Hemstreet. Like I am Blaze Winchester. Like I am the thing I am afraid of. Like I have a backbone of iron; like I am a killer. Like I have not been brought up believing what Ma taught me. Like I am not a pacifist. Like I am not Ernal Piloti but something else, like Ernal Piloti is Dead and Something Comes Near to Eat Me Up. Kra-kraa. Like I have fallen out of peace and Mud burns, and Mud burns, and Mud burns, and Mud burns, and red, and red, and red, and red, and he’s SCREAMING, and he’s BLEEDING, and he’s BURNING

...

...

...

Kahlua and Volare sparring again.

They’re going to kill each other, I know it.

...

...

...

and red, and red, and red...

July 10

Amanita and Vine​

Sparrow is Nochitl’s legal guardian.

Nochitl’s neck was torn open by a psychopath human.

The psychopath human tripped and fell off of Kuro’s ship and snapped her neck.

My mind eats me up from inside; we’ve got somebody on the radio threatening to burn Mud and Sparrow says that the mud and water and soil will keep his fire out, and I sleep in the Springs and when Volare wakes me up out of a long and livid dream I am panicking deaf dumb and blind to the sound of his untuned acoustic and I hold his hand and he tells me we’ll be friends later but not soon-later and I realize that Amanita Stem leader of Sempervines is back on Mud, she’s back, she’s back, she raped Jaycee and tortured Moonfeathers and tortured Kahlua and she’s back, whining and crying like a cornered hurt animal. Shoot her twice in the knee caps as punishment & penance; Sparrow has had to do more anyhow she’ll live through it. She is Feral, a feral Floran who knows nothing but what to Burn. Mud burns in my dreams and nightmares. Fairly certain she’s not here on good terms or good merits but I let her stay anyway... probably ought change that in the morning. Don’t come back. Don’t redeem yourself.

Sparrow has changed so much over the years. When he killed Tlaloc I was so ready to shoot him in the kneecaps and worse, and so much worse. Penance did not enter my mind. He has killed over a hundred Florans with his spear and dozens of innocent Hylotl and Grounded and Glitch and ten times that number he’s gotten his men to kill with their spears. He was a tough leader. If you weren’t good enough, you wouldn’t get in. But he had a smooth tongue. He sing:

Burn them.
Cascade like wind, toward the nonbelievers, the traitors
The mavericks, the lying men and lying women
We’re all in this together.
Together, we shall bring Avos and Kluex to glory again.​

He could fight with those words alone.

When he was forty he was nearing the end of his career. His fleet was running low on supplies. They found a fleet of fleeing Hylotl vessels, leaving their homeworld as refugees. I suppose this must’ve been where Kuro’s wife Akami came from. His fleet raided; pillaged; killed; ate. Ate up. Feels like eating some-one else. Tlihuic’s eyeballs in my beak. Kra-kraa. He saw his men tear these Hylotl apart with short knives and short spears and he realized all at once what he had done. He flew back to Avos immediately to confess to his family, to apologize, but his entire family had thrown themselves from towers, all at once, in unison, even his beloved little sister, flat on the ground and Ascended to the Aether.

Snapped her neck on the fall. Head-first. Steadfast.

And Sparrow knew it was lost.

He whispered to me before he left tonight that he was sorry. Not sure what for-- that girl on Kuro’s ship killed herself, no-one caused it. But he had guilt in his eyes and perhaps all that happens nowadays gets to a person, gets to trouble them. Their soul gets weak, harnesses around its damn neck. Pulled back like a filthy Floran animal aphid rots.

These flesh-worshippers on radio say they’ll hurt Mud. I don’t know what to do. I need help. I need some-one... I really need some-one who understands for just a moment. Who I can... blabber all this to.

I suppose that some-one is Jaycee. She is coming back, Kluex knows why. She has kids to help and a lover to be with. She doesn’t belong here. She is good and doesn’t belong here. I ought send her back. Better me than her. Better that I die out here from insanity than her; after all I don’t have a lover and my lover would never agree to adopt chicks. Kluex knows nobody out here feels that way, wants that commitment. For Volare and Kahlua I was a temporary thing; there may have been feelings, but lost in favor of the female creature. Aren’t I lucky to be devoid of the same feelings? At least I’ll never hurt some-one in the way they’ve done. Small genetic abnormality that has led me to be this way, and some days I regret it horribly, because it is so unusual out here and I only know one, Tino, who is anything like. And Tlaloc. Tlaloc before, but not anymore. And if I went chasing after Tino’s tailfeathers simply because he was the only gay Avian in the frontier, it wouldn’t be very true-feeling.

Perhaps I’ll tell Jaycee this. Perhaps I’ll give her my whole damn journal, though I’m sure it’s a lot to sort through and would come across as strange.

All I know is my neck is bent 400 degrees and I can’t think... Sarah is getting better but not great, and her face looks like a pile of discarded flesh. I feel much like I’m in her shoes. This apathy I’ve disregarded so long is becoming painful, because now I have embraced it to get away from Volare, and like a cold planet I am stony and do not feel any truth to my interactions with the people I used to care about. Kuro gave me 20,000 pix to spend on evacuation ships and I am bargaining with Skye to get as many as I can... it’s not money Kuro even wants to spend, I can tell. Yet him and I know that, inevitably...

July 11

Blaze​

Something terrible is happening.

I am a weak son. I held a taser. A gun. Shuddered and dropped it and Kuro told me that was alright. Power in small hands-- weak hands. I’m not made in height or build to hurt somebody. Not to stop them, not to help them.

Volare runs up to Kahlua’s self-righteous face and waterdips his beak into his throat and starts tearing at muscle. Finch cries, screams, squawks like a dying swan, pushes away and swipes with a pocket knife Draws blood off Volare’s all over Volare’s red feathers and his eight eyes are empty. He lunges forward; caught in a tangle with the other one, chewing and gnawing on the dojo floor, splattered white red other colors, plunging his dagger into his heart and his arms slice open like an angel of Kluex like a zealot of his demands, and the two writhe like they’re ingots in the melting pit still a-mok and a-wrying for their escape, screeching and screaming. I go on the black market and vote with my pix, spending Kuro’s twenty-thousand on Volare because I need him to bite Kahlua’s neck off, and he does, lifts his head in the air to scream a guttural scream and digs that sharp bill into Kahlua’s jugular, scream, moan, paint the floor the colors of his hearthfeathers. I rejoice in my office because I have won forty-thousand pix and nobody else wins anything. Ha ha I win I win I win win win win

Then Kuro wakes me from the dream, and tells me I am a good person because I am a weak son.

I am afraid that something terrible is happening to Mud. The outsiders lie to me. Death comes around corners, surprises me, terrifies me. In the dark there are knives, in the light there are screeches, chase them down but find nothing. I try to hold a taser and falter and daydream about Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare, Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare, Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare, Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare, Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare, Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare,Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare, Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare,Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare, Volare kills Kahlua, Kahlua kills Volare

Then Kuro wakes me from the dream, and tells me I am not a weak son because I have saved people with only the spoken word.

Blaze burns what used to be in favor of what could be. Smart tactic.​

Are you Kahlua Downsilk? The Kahlua Downsilk, dead at age 25?

Kill the lights. See what she’s here for. Troubled. Smoking gun. ​

Dead as your father in his death throes, burned, buried alive?

What demented sort of bonfire doesn’t make any smoke? ​

Funny coincidence. Used to know some-one with his name.

She did not really burn anything. She buried something.​

A fiery blaze burns your eyes. Eight eyes and no sight.

Aphid rots.
Aphi rots.​

The mockingbird on my head is pecking my eyes out and mocking me about it. I get my head lopped off every Tuesday. Something terrible is happening. Something terrible is happening. Something terrible is happening. Something terrible is happening. I get my head lopped off every

Then Kuro wakes me from the dream, and tells me I have saved everybody.

Maybe Amanita Stem could fix her mistakes like Sparrow fixed his. I am hoping. Hoping and praying.

I know, Kluex. I’m not supposed to pray for Florans. But who else is there to hope for? I already know what happens with Volare and Kahlua. I already know where it leads.

Red floors. Spilt until the mud runs out. I drown.

Bloodbath

a feeling of freedom from this​

Dark hearth

a way to get away from this​

Salt the earth

a sentence to blame for this​

he is dead.​

Then Kuro wakes me from the dream, and tells me it’ll be alright.

July 12

Tlaloc​

“These acquaintance siblings would find a home in one another’s lives-after-lives,
and so too would they find refuge in the poppy grove.” - Chapter XII (Exile of Passerine)​

Tlaloc was such a writer. Could make any sentence something wonderful.

“Ixta looked at him funny, with a tilted gaze. Her head was lopsided as the sun beat down on it, as if the very air was its own weight. She spoke but then un-spoke as soon as she had, for she realized what awful lack of words the moment required, and as luck would have it, there was a certain enchanting ability of her voice to pull back like an animal on strings. It wasn’t a very lucky ability to have, and sometimes encouraged her further to be rash and yell, yet it saved her from a smack or two from Mother and Father when she was younger, much younger than she was now, as leader of these ships which would soon leave Avos, as she could say whatever she liked without consequence-- a habit that took many years to grow out of. She settled into the soil a bit further and stopped looking at him funny, and waited for the sun to rise as quiet as it had left. She imagined that her voice was not the marionette but that the sun was, and that she could lift it up and down at will, trace it back and forth, see back when Avos had its first beginnings and make changes or not-make-changes, and regardless see why things had happened and why people had arrived in the first place. Then she discarded the thought with her reins of strings, and tried to think about something more tangible, like the young man beside her and the way he did not stir when the ground did. An admirable quality which she had tried many times to voice and failed; and retired her words and tried again; and retired her words and tried again. He seemed in tune so thoroughly with the soil that it was unbelievable he was anything but a statue with roots that led to the planet’s iron core, and as the sun rose he lapped it up with such satisfaction it was impossible to believe he was anything but a gold-feathered flower blooming and dancing without wings.” - Chapter I (Exile of Ixta)​

A passage about Ixta, but one truly about Maffei. My father next to her.

“In his early years he was very much a songbird, or lazy bird-- his parents could never decide which. He had been born under the heavy Mud gravity and at first would not stir for hours at a time, laying flat and limp as a hatchling between the age of three and four, which very much gave the impression that Tesz was an inactive child, despite his wide-open eyes and big beak that loved to chitter and sing playfully. Somehow even as his energy came back and he could stumble around and run around with excitement, there was a reserved quality which kept him in the back still cooing the words of his current song, traditionally adopted from the robin-saturated choir near town center. There were often large celebrations saturated with the last of the Avosian wartwine and roasted local wildlife, fish and fruit, dark green surface kelp made presentable with the help of eggplant, all astrew on those sturdy wooden tables built by the hands of Mud’s workers. For these Tesz would approach and take whatever food he thought he needed, and ask the nearest elder where it had come from before popping it in his beak and squawking about such things. He would take and eat and ask until his belly was full, and retreat to pursue his passion of music, whether with the two-string plank mother had made him, or his soft, playful voice. This was his method of meeting the green-feathered Meddo and fuchsia-feathered Nefer, two older hatchlings who admired the gentle chirping of his call, and his abject terror when he was found to be chittering such things which were meant to be quite private. These two paid it no mind and laughed, and assured Tesz that it was worth snooping to hear his pretty songbird voice, and though Tesz was not a songbird he became accustomed to laughing and agreeing. Over some two years he developed more comfort in these things, and as the initial optimism of landing on Mud faded in favor of bigger and better things, and the celebrations with wartwine and fish tapered off, Tesz sang on his own accord with newfound friends-- wherever they happened to roam in the still-developing downtown.” - Chapter II (Exile of Avos)​

Amoch. That one’s about Amoch. He didn’t like the book very much, because it reminded him of Tlaloc and Amoch hates reminders of what he’s lost. Somehow I am engrossed by The Poppy Grove because it is the last living thing of Tlaloc that remains, a novel with all he had to say present. He was young and I can’t imagine what sorts of wonderful things he could have produced at an older age. Given more time.

I can’t imagine the memories we would have had, together.

But getting myself caught in the past is only more pain. The only reason I do it is because I am hopeless now, and like prayer, thoughts of Tlaloc give me some sort of hope and satisfaction, that one day I’d get lucky and strike gold again, so lucky as Tlaloc was lucky. I thought it was Volare-- but it was not. So I don’t think that luck is meant for me again. I threw it away because, perhaps, I was a weak son who couldn’t stop Sparrow.

The Sunshine man came by to tell me to open my gates or else I’d be an enemy. If I don’t we are doomed because it doesn’t matter, nothing I do matters. Seems Mud is content to burn on its own regardless of what’s done to prevent that. Need to be their friend, bow to them, because they killed Argus only for his stolen goods, and Mud has not stolen anything. So long as we don’t we are safe. If anybody gets big ideas, we aren’t.

I am powerless.

I am limp.

There are things that need doing. Abuser two floors above me, citizens scared, Mud burning, need to mediate between Volare and Kahlua, but can’t muster up the energy. It always ends the same way.

I am limp.

I am powerless.

Can’t muster the energy to get out of bed, really. Barely there. Barely able. Maybe when these roaring tides calm down, but it seems they’re intent to roar over me and drown me.

“Ixta had grown, and her feathers had worn, but in the faint mirror reflection of Waterdipper Lake she recognized herself again, as if pulled by strings. Slow as she viewed herself she realized why she was there, with more clarity than ever before. She realized precisely why she had left Avos, and at the same instant understood why Avos had grown, and why Mud had begun heartily before its stagnation, in her aging eyes. It was that seeking nature of her clawing talons, toward a place which would treat her and her son right, a place where life could grow as it had seemed to stagnate. Her desire for the poppy grove and the poppy flower had led her to build a city of a thousand Avians, and now the desire had faded in favor of those minor conflicts like domestic disputes and internal economy. Perhaps it was a vice to search for the nectar in the flower, and nowadays she viewed it as such-- but it was the only thing which had kept her alive.” - Chapter XI (Exile of Niloticus)
​

 

Panic
Panic because i know kahlua, amoch, and kuro can be trusted
But nobody else in that crowd can be trusted, and no-one is safe
(Gof's funeral)​

Your feelings aren’t present in the room

Everyone shifts their head to look at you, shouting at the ceiling

Every head shifts to face you, shouting sweet nothings

Don’t let it end you; don’t let it kill you

Everyone shifts their head to face the elephant in the room

Don’t let them end you; don’t let them kill you

Oh, Kluex, it’s killing me! It’s choking me against the ground with its boot on my chest crushing it in!! Two guns and a lust to burn me out, bleed me out, gunfire all around, I feel my ribs cave in and kick my ribs with the gauge of a ten-gauge and a kick of a fire hydrant, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, rapidfire chaingun into her chest and his chest!! I am crushed and I am dying, oh Kluex, Kluex, Kluex, it’s killing me! It’s killing me! It’s killing me! I have no reason to get up in the morning until I am woken. Nothing about life to talk about that isn’t MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS. Oh, Kluex, I’m choking to death on my own vomit!! The face of him-- oh Kluex, burn it!! Burn it off!! Turn his flesh to C4 and blow it all to Avos!!

DON’T CRACK IN MY WINDPIPE, PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

DON’T CUT UP MY BONES, PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

DON’T EAT ME ALIVE

DON’T SNUFF MY HATCHLINGS

DON’T CRUSH MY RIBS, PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

PLEASE

PANIC

PANIC

PANIC

PANIC

PLEASE

LEAVE

PLEASE

PANIC

Volare kills Kahlua; Kahlua kills Volare

Volare kills Volare

Kahlua kills Kahlua

Snow makes my neck tight and then it snaps open when the fish throws me out the window onto the stones for something I haven’t done yet I break ever ybone in my body and scream to Kahlua to help help help get a doctor, I killed your nephew. Cracks open my windpipe for the candy inside. Burn the Florans. Burn them. Burn them. Burn Star Dancer. Burn Tlihuic. Animals clawing at the door and gates all burn all burn all burn all burn all burn all burn all burn

(I get my head lopped off every Tuesday.)

(I get my head lopped off every Tuesday.)

The executioner is holding a big axe and scrEeching with his voice. Amoch running Amok, a-mok a-playing in the garden. Him and

him and Amoch

Me and Amoch used to be good friends who went stargazing and I blamed him of all people. I discarded him. I buried him within mud. Ma died and the world turned into something different. I was never the same. I never will be.

and a kick of a fire hydrant, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, rapidfire chaingun into her chest and his chest!! I am crushed and I am dying, oh Kluex, Kluex, Kluex, it’s killing me! It’s killing me! It’s killing me! I have no reason to get up in the morning until I am woken. Nothing about life to talk about that isn’t MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS. Oh, Kluex, I’m choking to death on my own vomit!! The face of him-- oh Kluex, burn it!! Burn it off!! Turn his flesh to C4 and a kick of a fire hydrant, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, rapidfire chaingun into her chest and his chest!! I am crushed and I am dying, oh Kluex, Kluex, Kluex, it’s killing me! It’s killing me! It’s killing me! I have no reason to get up in the morning until I am woken. Nothing about life to talk about that isn’t MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS. Og me! It’s killilling me! I haRNS, MUD BURNS, MUD BURNS, MUD BURking to death on my own vomit!! The face of him-- oh Kluex, ebout that isn’t MUD BUdrant, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, rapidfire chaingNS. h, Kluex, I’m choand his chest!! I am crushed and I am dying, oh Kluex, Kluburn it!! Burn it off!! Turn his flesh to C4 and a kick of a fire hyve no reason to get up in the morning until I am woken. Nothing about lking to death on my owh, Kluex, I’m choun into her chex, Kluex, it’s killinn vomit!! The face it off!! Turn his flesh to C of him-- oh Kluex, burn it!! BurNS, MUD BURNS. Oh, Kluim-- oh Kuex, Klurnath on my own vomit!! The fn4st ife tngug me! It’s kd his chio tant, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, ka-CHUNK, rnn intos her chling, oapih Kidfire chak of a firp in the mut that isn’t MUD BUUoillinUD g me! son to aI have no ream woked a kdinm cruhguex, burn it!! Brinore hylest anest!! I aed aluex, Kicnd I am dy to deRff!! Tuh to CBRNS, Mace oget unalk a anut life to talk abog until I f hon. N abex, I’m chokurn it thing his flesex, it’s koMUD BURNS, gO me! It’s killing me! It’s killing

 

Home​

I apologize, to any reader, that I do not write often enough now. My arms ache and all my time is spent with other people, it seems. Life is good, if quiet.

Kahlua is my nestmate. I don’t know how real it is, quite, or how long it’ll last-- but I hope I can rein in the man. He is much like his father. Sleeps around, at least. In that respect he is like his father, for sure. Don’t know much about Lovepeck so I absolutely can’t make the comparison elsewhere. But... at the end of the tunnel there is light. It did take me a long, long time to find it, really. But I have found a man I don’t compare with Tlaloc, finally. He is not perfect like Volare, and his feathers do not fill me with warmth just at the sight; but he is loving, strong, and I think cares about me more than anyone I know. He is not Tlaloc, which is probably better for me. I thought I had moved on past that fuchsia birdie I loved so much, but, ah... not as soon as I got lovesick again. But after venturing on a frozen planet I hope I froze off the part of me which was still holding on.

I am not a weak son, am I?

Noa Jaycee - has returned as a song-dove converted to the faith

Kuro - floran killer, gentle giant, loves Akami

Francisco - criminal? or savior? either way, missing

Kahlua Downsilk - like father, like son

Volare Hearthfeathers - raspy voice, same old feathers

Akoris Suncaller - hits people with a stick

Rainsinger Chota - Skarti’s friend

Skarti - beyond Noa, my only Flightless friend. missing him a bit

Makali Nuhveyessair Wuvalkeri - dentist / beaktist

Heartshaper Clixicoatl - Tino, coincidentally gay

La’nei - dedicated farmer-- very modest

Mimi - shotgun goes boom boom boom boom-- die man die

Jason Grammaticus - Floran trying to be better Floran, good doctor (Kniferoot)

Diego Manrikez - good-hearted soul, but mainly of justice, not reason

Aphi - rots

Xochina - abused no longer, hopefully

Pollithimus Receptor - criminal turned Mud resident, hopefully

Yuuto - talks less nowadays

Caroline - why do i dislike her?

Conner - actually, i know why i dislike him

Cringe - bot guard

Vine-stabber - tall floran with big staff, big fan of Sparrow Linnaeus

Ashley Marks - humanitarian aid from human organization

I was thrown out a window and Kahlua became my nestmate because of it; my back was impaled with sheets of broken glass and I was scratched and bruised all over. Salty says I am from Memoria. Memoria. Some white-knight green-feathered-bird with a revolver who stole his nephew, Aphi. His nephew ‘Eight’. What kind of Ernal was out there? Why would he steal some Hylotl’s nephew? It did not matter what I said; I did not remember Memoria and so the teary-eyed Salty threw me out my window and I nearly broke bones. But luck brought me to life and Kahlua brought me to his home. We are comfortable with each other; I can say ‘we’ for the first time in my life since Tlaloc had his neck torn open.

No, I’m not past Tlaloc. All I see when I shut my eyes is the sight of that beautiful fuchsia-feathered bird drowning in his own blood. He did not say much. We were going to adopt chicks. We were going to live together and build a family.

I hear Memoria is a place where the most taboo of things have happened. I hear that the dead can talk there. A dark sector, one not to be visited by Council law.

I wonder what Tlaloc would talk about.

“You’ve left me in the Aether without a nestmate, Ernal,

You ran off with somebody else.”

So I don’t know how long this thing with Kahlua will last. They say there are birds who mate for life; perhaps I’m that sort. Perhaps I’ll never be able to let go. Even in the dire cold.

The Lights of Mud will be coming soon. I believe it’s going to be a sort of important day, though not for the reasons most people think. I’m afraid people will be mad at me for what I’m going to say, but it’s for the betterment of Mud, and-- genuinely, my own conscience. Trying to keep things as they are has stressed me endlessly. I made this decision with Chicua five days ago as she was made mayor of Waterdipper. The last one resigned after he exiled Nochitl Beakmourner’s father. Funny how things work out.

It feels like a split-second decision, but it’s better than the alternative... mud burns.

Mud doesn’t burn, does it? Too wet. Too much water.

I wrote in my first entry...

From what I hear, Avos is really sunny, bright, hot. Not Mud. If anyone came from the skies and started attacking us, the rain and clouds and dirt would stop their fire in its tracks.​

We’ll see.

I write different nowadays. Perhaps it’s just the fact that I’m writing this very late at night with Kahlua’s naked feathers buried next to mine with only moonlight that makes the words weak. I hope I don’t wake him up-- that’d be strange and maybe he’d spot the fact that just as he asks for my hand as nestmate I grow hesitant beyond belief.

Just for that fuchsia-feathered birdie I grow hesitant, because I think bout what he would have said. He would have said this was just a green bird following toward the poppy grove. The nectar in the flower is what’s leading me. Kahlua’s warm touch-- not as warm as Tlaloc or Volare, but warm enough. Kahlua’s soothing words-- not as soothing as Tlaloc, but soothing enough. Kahlua’s pretty eyes. He offers me hand to bed and breakfast in the morning, all these luxuries I have craved for so long. I’m scared.

But I am calm, too.

The Lights of Mud arrive soon. Hopefully the warm wind carries my words thoroughly.

 

The Lights​

Mud burns,

but only in the sky. A mirage of what bloodshed could have been.

To whomever may read this in the future, I will confess-- there has always been a page in the journal and a spot in my mind dedicated to the words, “Everyone died today. The violent kind of ‘died’.” But I did not write them today nor the day of the Lights of Mud, which overjoys me. No, no... makes me cry. So many tears as I think about everyone who has been lost already, and who can’t be saved with closed borders by closed borders. The crazy sets in when I think about fuchsia birdies and green birdies and fish swimming in the sky with their eyes rotted out... Amanita Stem... Spencer, Oka, Clark-- Mick. Even Mick. People who couldn’t be saved, and so the guilt permeates my soul harder than ever, just as I have saved Mud slightly for a day or two.

I know what I should have written.

Mick died today, Hope Springs burns...

Who could have known? Who could have expected? I throw up in the toilet that doesn’t exist... khh... why Mick? Poor man, lived-- should have lived. Stupid. STUPID. Naive. Like SARAH said he was, naive, naive, dead...

khh.

khh.

kra-kraa.

The animals tweet and make funny noises, like tyee-tyee-tyee-tyee-tyoo and kra-kraa.

One is helpless to the thought that one day we’ll have our brains smashed in by Sunshine and go to a purgatory for it. No time to run or cry and apologize. Violent or not the violent kind. Still too quick. Still too warm, burns your hand off.

Mud closed... and with it, the end of a small era. Amoch does not hate me anymore, Chicua no longer writes me letters, the people of Mud are safe and sound, truly. Still allowed are some outsiders-- a limited list, which surely must be revised in a bit, since I have forgotten Caroline and Conner and Tlihuic and Karo in my moment of haste to close the teleporter down. Er-- perhaps I could have simply banned everyone... destroyed my computer to keep any messages from anyone receiving to me... out of sight, out of mind. Think the only thing that kept me from doing that was Kahlua’s touch. Made me realize there are still outsiders worth loving and caring for... still people as important to Mud as Maffei Waterdipper or Tlaloc Tobaci or Sparrow Linnaeus or Amoch, people that have been around longer. Still, people on my list are ones who are Mud. They are a part of the foundation that makes up Mud.

It is the people that make Mud what it is, not the tech or the festivities or its culture-- because its culture IS its people. Where Avos’ culture is Kluex, our culture is what is done... what is chosen to be done. The food, the music, the writing, the art, the endless art spilling from one wastebasin to another. It has evolved so much. It has gotten dreary since Tlaloc died and drearier since Maffei died. It has become harsh and soft at once-- more refined, more mature, just as Mud has matured. Tlaloc wrote in his book a decade ago that it had stagnated, but that is one point I disagree on. Change is the opposite of stagnation.

We have been jumpstarted; electricity to the runt heart. Pumps at 80bpm. Awaking up. A-running a-mok. Doctor equipment and chemist’s goves. A minkel of industry in a town which has none. I am a chemist; scientist; lied and 55 and 50, who is me? Lost in that thought. I am sleeping like a dead animal. I am resting. Can’t always be hyperactive monster to keep Mud safe. It already is safe. The Lights of Mud were very pretty. Chicua sent me the last letter today.

“All good things must end... no matter how much we’ve loved them.”

“It seems like a necessity, nowadays.”

“For a colony in this frontier... to end in fire. Bloodshed. Disease, rot, destruction. All this time I have believed so thoroughly that it was inevitable...”

“That one day, Mud would burn, like it seems to be burning in the sky tonight.”

“Mud has survived so long out here. Even today it bustles and blossoms... lives of hundreds in a cheer to the sky above.”

“Yet we all seem to know that this is its end, surely. As a colony, open to visitors...”

“Surely.”

“I do not want Mud to burn, but I know all good things must end.”

“The influx of outsiders into Mud has brought good... and it has also brought grimness. It has brought the threat of destruction to the city as a whole. Beyond this district there are fifteen hundred grounded Avians, living their lives as always.”

“It is for this reason...”

“...that I am closing Mud to all outsiders, starting tomorrow.”

“A shame that I would have to announce this on a day in which is remembered in Mud culture as the day this planet welcomed us to stay, thirty years ago. Perhaps you visitors can view this as a send-off. A good-will present. A promise that, for once, someplace in the frontier has not succumbed to destruction.”

“People who already have homes or jobs on Mud will still be able to stay... you have a stake in the city and you can be trusted. A list of those people will be posted on Starnet, but all other beam signatures will be blocked.”

“Please do not take this as a disappointment, even though it must seem it...”

“This is history.”

“For the first time in recent memory... a colony shall escape this frontier’s clutches without burning, as Upside did, not long ago.”

“In memoriam for Argus Hemstreet, let Mud prosper long after this day. Perhaps in time it will re-open-- perhaps not even too long from now. But not in the same careless manner which has welcomed bloodshed into the peaceful city.”

“Mud burns today, but only in the sky. A mirage of what bloodshed could have been, had we remained open any longer, to this frontier which is nothing but threats.”

“Today is a win, not a loss. Perhaps it spells better for the future, for future colonies and future leaders, or perhaps not. But I will do my best either way.”

“If you’ve any questions... please talk to me on Starnet, as I’m heading home, now. Thank you. Enjoy the Lights.”​

 

​

Took a venture to the dead sector Memoria.

It’s cold. Empty. There are remnants of people but they’re just that-- remnants. There is no sign of life but wildlife and greenery, and it’s clear that people left in a rush. Everything’s still here-- it’s just gone, too. The people’r all gone, and nothing’s left but snow creatures that go kra-kraa... I came with Kahlua and Razor-Vines and Pollithimus and Star and his little slave-bird Xoh, all worrying, all terrifying-- they are all taller than me and all riskier and none but Razor care about the history of these places, just want to run around and have fun. Curse them, even Kahlua. Curse them, stupid. Dumb. Memoria is a time capsule and I found myself here. I found myself. Another-myself. A different Ernal Piloti shorter and older with a...

Ship revs up, takes me to...

Floran’da

Big Floran tree. So gigantic. Wildlife that eats people, whole people. Razor’s old home. Lyna, like Razor’s ‘Ma’. Left her the city when she died, like Ma left me Mud, and like Atticus left me Lenna Prime. Arhicath Borin from my first entry... he fixed up their security system. Arhicath Borin, why him? Everything is connected. The universe is tiny.

feel like I’m going crazy

can’t sleep

can’t sleep

cant sleep

cant hear / see / speak

Ernal Piloti is deaf

Sparrow is mute

Aphi is blind

Deaf, dumb, blind

Why is it all connected? Why’s my breath cut out halfway through?

Ship revs up, takes me to...

Lenna Prime

It was still home for him; for HIM. HIM. Who the hell is he?! He’s going to kill me if I keep thinking. Kahlua isn’t real. Kahlua is going to die. Mud burns. Mud burns. Mud burns. A big city with so much, so many people-- mayoral Atticus Nepos and Ernal Piloti. I broke down crying. What have they done to Mud?

On the outskirts little mud houses; what I did.

ha

The city is made up of purely steel and glass; max 10 stories in each building, covered bridges between skyscraping towers, rail lines balanced in the air. At day the moss grows harder. When it rains, it pours. It must have housed tens of thousands. All fled. All ran.

Starquake erased me.

Ship revs up, takes me to...

Gyushal

Where Skarti would have lived, or-- or Tcloa, Tcloa, Tcloa, mystic figure I didn’t know. The shrine was not like any I’ve seen. I prayed to Kluex I was real. Please let me be a real person, living and breathing, with happy parts like toes and fingers and eyes and earholes. Big pyramid with neverending sandstorms, blocked by the great walls of Gyushal-- inside the pyramid is where the priests rested.

The city gleams. It’s like nothing I ever saw. Razor took me there to figure out if I was Ernal Piloti’s clone, his mirror-image. Grown in a vat by Ernal Piloti. Grown up by Ernal Piloti. Was Ma real? Was Tlaloc?

Oh, Kluex, was Tlaloc real?????

Please...

please...

please...

Crying on the page at the thought. Too many tears. I should go home, I should go home, I should go home, I should go home... should go home. There will be a fuchsia-feathered bird waiting for me. He will not be invincible-- he cries and smiles after sometimes. He won't risk his life. He isn't stupid. Sometimes I forget the days when I didn't worry about losing him. I only worried about little trifling things like Ma finding out or something-- not that he'd die. Not that he'd go. Every day now I think about what Tlaloc would've said if he stayed. What we'd do together. Where we'd go. And I think,

Was Tlaloc real?

Ship revs up, takes me to...

Sevastopol

I found a book. his laboratory. bedroom. my desk.

<---> There's a book inserted into Ernal's journal... much smaller, and with many fewer pages. <--->

A page titled 'Time'

29959606 -65947193 Delta Polaris Australis 9031 II a, Memoria Sector

On this planet lay a very large Avian village of the Grounded, beautiful and majestic in its tastes. But what interested me was its time measurement; it was nearly the exact same as my ship's timer, which read the same thing. However, my watch-- which does the same thing (albeit less specifically)-- reads the time as about nineteen years later. It's been two years since the first Starquake. The people in this village have no idea that a Starquake has ever happened, nor do any other settlements I've visited.

This is promising and horrifying. If time alteration is real, then the danger could be great. I must wait until the next Starquake and ask them if they know me. If they do not, maybe there is more to this theory than just danger...

A page titled 'Help'

I have somehow told my theory to five or six people. I'm sure I sound insane at this point. Mostly I've been warning them not to go to their home planets.

I'll explain.

The only people--theoretically-- that have moved through time during the Starquake have also been Starbound, with no home at the time. If they weren't Starbound seventeen years prior to the first quake, but were Starbound during the quake-- it's possible they exist in two places at once. This is only theory, of course, and I was Starbound for decades. I hope I can recruit somebody else to help me with this dilemma.

Kahyz Trog (?) has said he's interested, but also denoted my theory as worthless. It seems so. I've been hearing a lot about this Sparrow fellow that everybody liked and is dead now. Maybe I should try to bring him 'back' first... even nineteen years younger and without any recollection of the people who miss him.

I think I only have two names memorised so far: Vera and Alice. I've forgotten which is which, but I usually remember when I see them.

A page titled 'Lab'

I've spent almost 20 days constructing my titanium lab and it's nearly three fourths of the way to completion. I haven't spent much time on Lenna Prime since, so my theory has rarely advanced at all. But hopefully when enough equipment is operational, I can begin my own private tests. For instance, there are millions of Starbound animals through sheer luck. This means there are millions of copies. Are they genetically related? Will it cause a paradox? I'll be listing them all here in case they're erased from my memory and existence aside from the notes.

A page titled 'Dead'

So far I've heard of three dead Starbound travellers:

Sparrow

Eight

Artyom

Seems like the latter two were criminals. If I do bring them back, though, it shouldn't matter. I'm going to start searching for anybody who knew Sparrow's home planet and hopefully perform my first field test...

A page titled 'Issac'

I found Issac Phil (Gill?) who had some tea with me and argued why my theory might mean nothing even if it works. He was a good friend of Sparrow, and although he wants him back, is reluctant to because it will not be the same person.

My argument was that with so many Starquakes, it's possible that Sparrow already lived lives without ever seeing Lenna Prime. Maybe he's happier there, but I don't need to find out. If he's out there here, alive, then maybe we can alter his path without guilt... but Issac first wants proof, and that's my goal now.

A page titled 'Jesse'

Apparently he knew Eight, who I'm looking for. He told me everything-- they were friends, to a point, strained relationship, stabbed Jesse with a trident... Darren Kaziona killed him (forgot his name?) and Jesse wanted to do it. He felt like he needed revenge.

Told me he had a 'father' named Salty. I hope I can find him and finally deliver proof to Issac.

Though... I already do have proof with the DNA sample. The same flesh that came from an animal on Lenna Prime had identical DNA to the sample of a brain I extracted on the planet /after/ the Starquake. Same animal, killed twice. Proof enough for me.

A page titled 'Saltbert'

He hailed me over the radio. This was Salty, Eight's apparent last family member. He told me they were both from Icanon, told me its coordinates...

We flew there.

Hylotl cities are beautiful. Salty told me to look for 'Aphi', so I did. And I found one.

I found Saltbert there, too. Much younger, but I could tell by his voice-- all too clear. The whole experience was off-putting.

When night fell, I took the Hylotl child to his uncle’s ship. He woke up and cried even when Salty tried to calm him. Put on the video player for a while... then sent him back. Hopefully he blames it on a bad dream. He met me before, when we first arrived in the morning. Surely Hylotl have dreams, right? I forgot to ask.

Saltbert told me to keep in touch. He was in tears when we put Aphi back onto the planet. Said he hadn't seen him for years.

Now it's time to find Sparrow, but first Issac. He doesn't seem the type to cry.

A page titled '...I forgot the name of the planet'

It's really quite nice. It's at -99 99 Beta something something I a. I forget. But it's a really nice place and I'm now a citizen! I ranted to Allen about my theories and I hope it was interesting.

Also, I met a Hylotl named Sei who is really quite nice. I sold her two pistols and then we... sort of... became friends, I suppose. Had breakfast together.

Lenna Prime is a ghost town. I haven't seen Vera in almost a month, let alone anybody like Manfred. They took off the barricade on the club, which I guess is good news.

Still trying to find Issac... he's really going to like my proof, I hope. I want to get to Sparrow, because at least that's somebody I can find and bring back to the cities I know without him being shunned/killed (Eight, Artim).

I'm moving my notes into my backpack now, in case another Starquake comes around soon.

A page titled 'Sparrow'

I found Issac, finally, cooped up on Starfall (I can't imagine that's a real place. I hear about it all the time but I've never been there!). I got him to come back. We talked... I gave him my proof about the DNA. I gave him my proof of Eight (though it's not tangible). We worked out the theory more... imagining these Starquakes as making branches, roots... the roots start at one place, and have many forks, but they all come from the same soil. We change these branches, the ones who were Starbound when the first one hit.

Oasis II disappeared... disappeared from existence. It must've been another quake. It had my notes until I recently moved them. How lucky...

I can't find Sei any more. I really quite like her... it'd... it'd be nice.

A page titled 'Sevastopol'

The bounds of reality seem to be straining around me. Sevastopol was never built. Actually, it was built backwards. It appeared in a matter of moments and slowly decayed over weeks until the land was untouched. The worlds I visit seem dated and warped, there's this feeling that I'm being watched... something big is coming, and I think everyone else feels it too. When I look out at the stars I can see something behind it. Something bigger.

It's scaring me. Why is Lenna Prime a ghost town? Where did Oasis go and why is it back now? Where is Starfall in time if it keeps running from me? Was Sevastopol destroyed by meteors-- it couldn't have been... Sanctuary... did it ever exist?

I'm looking for Sparrow more than ever. I want to find him. I want to succeed in one thing. One thing I can be proud of before the whole universe collapses in on itself. I need a drink. I really, really need a drink...

A page titled 'Near’

I heard that Issac died.

It doesn't matter. I'm closer now. I'm going to find Sparrow. I know where he was two months ago. I'm so close. I'm so close. I'm so close.

He only moves every two weeks.

He's close. I'm close. It'll be fine.

Sparrow's so close to me but he's so damn far away. Memoria doesn't trust me as much as they used to. I ask them too many questions. I ask them where Sparrow was. I don't even know what Sparrow looks like. Can anyone believe that? I don't know what he looks like but I'm still gonna find him. All I know is his name and a few things Issac told me. Nothing more. Hahaha

A page titled ‘Black Hole’

This is it i'm one month away i can almost taste it warnings black hole's coming we're all going to die have to find him closer closer closer closer i want to die proud i want to die sure i want to die i want to die i want to die i'm going to find you sparrow i'm going to find you sparrow i'm going to find you sparrow

A page titled 'Now'

I know where he is.

A page titled 'The End'

I got him to come to my ship. He was so confused. He didn't know anything. Didn't remember anything. Didn't know what the Starquakes were. We talked on the radio. They all called me crazy and I thought it was over, that it was all over. Darren? Darren knows who Eight was, he killed Eight. I guess maybe one day they'll meet again. That'll... that'll be hilarious, I bet. Or terrible.

But they all still called me crazy... I asked one more time. Sparrow. Who knew Sparrow Linnaeus? And Atticus did. Said it was his damn splitting image. I'm so happy. The black hole's going to be here in a matter of hours. Atticus will escape. Sparrow's fleet will evacuate in time. But I don't want to leave. I'm sitting here with a trembling, crying hand. Table's practically soaked. I can't help myself. I'm so happy. I've had such a long life of being ridiculed and ignored, of being struck at, of being told I was wrong, that I was crazy.

I did it. I don't care what happens now. Sparrow and Eight and Atticus and Darren, they'll all live their lives to the end. But I don't care about that any more. I... I have this horrifying, beautiful acceptance that I am surely going to die sitting in this chair today.

I can't help but cry, and I can't help but laugh. I hope they're all happy now. I really do. Shivering too much to write now. I think these are the last words I'll be writing...! I think this is it, I can really feel it...! I can feel the end, coming, looming so close...!

haha!!!!!!

this is it!!!! i ran out of tears i just see it nothing but blackness around me!!

come at me... come at me, i'm not afraid any more!!!i'm ready t

A page titled 'Good Morning’

My name is Ernal Piloti.

I can’t remember much. For what my memories lack, this journal can provide, sometimes. I don’t remember writing these words. I don’t remember the people in it. But I must trust it, because it has my name on it-- and my handwriting.

I'm setting course to a nearby planet dotted with trees. From the view above I can see glints of metal. Maybe I can finally find somebody to talk to, or get this radio working. Maybe it's pointless now, but if there's reason again for me to write in this journal, then that's the first thing I'll do.

Good morning.

A page titled 'Wine'

I came across a brick and clay house on the side of a cliff a few miles from where I beamed down to the planet. Waves would crash again and again across the rocks below, loud bellowing sounds hardly reaching the quaint expanse up top, with a thin layer of brush covering the once-large path toward the door. I continued through.

Tables were flipped, bowls disheveled, the place was truly a mess. It had been picked carefully, like somebody knew what they were looking for exactly. Like somebody'd taken an axe to the furniture, a flamethrower to the walls. Plenty remained, but plenty was destroyed. Not a sign of life any more. I had to question how long it'd been like this-- like a broken bone, left in pieces. But the view was nice, and I didn't have anywhere else remotely safe enough to stay overnight with the rain pouring so hard, so I continued through.

The basement was dark and shanty-like, a dirt floor rocking in rhythm with the wet ceiling's croaks and creaks. Shining my light around revealed a legendary supply of bottles on racks spiraling up three or four in a column. Wartwine, it was. Beautiful, smooth purple wartwine. Too much to express, like it'd been gathered and created by somebody for their entire life. I took only a single crate with me, and left the rest to sit dormant. Untouched by the rage above but still clearly present during it.

I left in a bit of a haze. Through the rain, my vision was beginning to fog, with the faint sounds of piano from far off still echoing as if I could still hear it... I haven't yet seen another living thing, but I'm sure that will change soon. I'm dedicating my time to fixing the ship's radio, and the metallic rocks I found on the way to the house are doing nicely in the forge. Not long from now I'll hear a voice on that radio, and maybe return to civilization-- wartwine and all.

A page titled 'Seeing Red’

The radio blares. Talk of a sector outside Memoria. It's all very confusing and hard to get into, much. Tcloa seems to know a bit more, but the whole galaxy appears in the dark. I can’t remember him. Not hardly. He says he knows me from a bar in Sevastopol, but the memories have faded.

Yeah, I got my radio working. I've been communicating a bit. Seems like most settlements are closed after people fled. Not a lot of movement, just radio signals.

Tcloa... the man's a wreck overall, it seems like, building and toiling and constantly on the radio. He must be mentally affected. I would talk to him more-- he likes me. But I need to be here. I can’t remember much, but I know I need to be here.

Darren, the one I seemingly mentioned in "The End" of the journal? He's out there. Still here in Memoria. Maybe I’ll look for him again.

I have lots of wartwine. Drinking a lot lately. Makes it a little harder to write, but that's OK, as long as I spellcheck. Time to keep working.

A page titled ‘Alone’

It is empty here. So, so empty. I keep seeing them out of the corner of my eye-- repetitive shapes and familiar, dead, cold faces, in the starlight of my lab on Sevastopol. Yes-- I found the old laboratory that I constructed, it seems. My memory is hazy, but the data is all here, albeit outdated, obviously. Yet Memoria is a dead sector. The radio signals come from elsewhere-- Antares. But that isn’t where I’m meant to be. I have not felt this alone since my home planet burned.

My work continues, of course-- I’ve since picked up where this journal left off and found a number of still-living Starbound travelers, including the aforementioned Artyom, as well as Jim Harrison and Issac, and young Downsilk before he was killed. I visited home again-- but it was still in smolders, as that event was many years ago still. Sometimes I wish I had found these Starquakes a decade or so ago-- it would have let me see my mother for one last time. Alas, the only people I visit are ghosts whom I hardly remember anyways. Each person I meet, I tell them to leave Memoria. I continue the evacuation plan. Starquakes may happen again, and the effect is like death. I can’t let people remain to that fate. I am the only person who’s gone through such a thing and come out alive-- sheer luck, probably.

Darren Kaziona beckons me to follow, though. I must eventually. We have a lot in common-- our work is similar. Cloning and retrieving. Of course, mine is pseudoscience, but at least my results aren’t so taboo. This will be my last entry-- I have almost nothing good to write about, especially considering this is not something which will be read by anyone. I’ll leave it behind in my lab when I leave for... wherever Darren is going. Wherever he can do what he does without interference. We’ll see.

Perhaps I’ll bring Eight. His uncle doesn’t really need him anyways-- I’m the one who saved his damn life. Maybe I could train that little tadpole to be good, this time around. Lawful.

I still have a few days to pack... by then, I’ll decide. But for now, this is the end of our talk, journal.

Goodbye, and goodnight.

<--->

Goodbye, and goodnight.

I have read this journal lotta times. over and over. Says Kahlua's name. Says he died, like Tlaloc died. Killed. Says Sparrow Linnaeus was loved and welcomed on Lenna Prime. Says Eight--

I go crazy.

Force myself to remember.

Force myself to remember.

Force myself to remember.

An Avian can survive days without food, but not long without...