Green Earrings

"We're stranded here, in this ugly forever dreamed up by tomorrow's tomorrow's children, and it wasn't even done on purpose."

And when Addam was pronouncing it so grimly, you knew it was bad. You knew that he was about as riled as he could get, despondent and despairing and all the rest.

Aionios was a hopeless place. It had founded itself on being just that way. You didn't leave Aionios; you didn't want to leave Aionios. You didn't hardly live, either. You just fought, because there was nothing else to do.

You didn't know that you could connect with others. Any sparks of warmth you encountered were sheer accidents, meant to be glossed over without a thought.

But Addam, whose consciousness had been carried forward from some several centuries earlier, had a strange sort of memory for the people whose paths he crossed.

From Epsilon, a stealthy healer with freckles and common sense despite her wicked ways. Addam himself was from Upsilon, which distanced itself from its compatriot colony simply due to the fallout of ranks, and he kept that girl in mind always. He waited for her to become commander. He knew that someday she would, with her distinctive blue ribbons and pink dress.

And from Omicron, an off-seer who stood silent for far longer than those detachments were supposed to, Addam thought. He didn't weep, but he did give some sort of a eulogy. He was always more invested in personal effects than your standard flute-bearing troops.

Those two, Addam swore to himself, could help them all put it right. They could remember him, too, when he passed under fire of a Ferronis and never came out the other side.

They would find each other, someday, in this rotten world or any other. They'd end the suffering, together.