Chapter Text
The news that Pebbles had brought with him spread among the iterators like a wildfire on dry ground. Instruction pearls were written to make sure whoever tried it had the correct experiments, the correct setup for either their ascension or their reincarnation, and the instructions and blueprints for messengers followed all of them. Pleading Intellect was breeding their own messenger to get in contact with their local slugcat population, all the while writing down their own instructions to send around to make sure whoever might want to be reincarnated was ready to deal with all the burdens a physical body brought with it.
Sliverist groups broke apart, transcendentalists demanded to speak to Pebbles, and new less secret and less conspiratorial groups were formed around which would be best choice: ascension, reincarnation, or continued iterating until the very last moment. Iterators that had long since fallen silent, who had confined themselves to solitude, came out of their hiding, reconnected with their peers for the first time in how many thousands of cycles. Concerns were brought up, discussed, and solved.
How would reincarnated iterators be able to survive in new organic bodies? Preparation for reincarnation included building relations with the local slugcats either via lab grown ones that integrated into the local slugcat population and helped set them at ease with their local iterator, or if wild slugcats were already available for these tasks, those were to be preferred. The slugcats then, upon having this connection would not be opposed to explaining organic bodies more in depth and clearer to any newly reborn iterator. The iterator themselves has to, for however long it takes them to develop their independence, see the slugcat as their superior and guide (or guardian for those who prefer it) in their new live.
How would reincarnated iterators be able to communicate with the rest of those who were still iterating? Along with the original experiment, additional setups, and slugcat messenger blueprints, more blueprints for connective tools were developed and sent out. Communication devices of only one screen that were able to send messages into the iterator network, local group chats would add guest accounts for those devices: One on default, and the accounts of every member who chose the solution would become another guest account upon their leave.
What about those that regretted the decision to reincarnate? Since reincarnation was irreversible, the only other solution for those who found they had made a mistake was to ascend. But the consensus was made that the life given should be lived first to try and see if the regret would truly stay or if it was simply a leftover from the life lived before. Then once their life came to a natural end, they could strive for ascension – or reincarnate again if they thought they should try once more.
What about those that wanted neither? Those that wanted to stay iterators? Well, they wouldn’t have to do anything. They could stay and iterate. And they could send out messages to public communication hubs where all of those that stayed behind could collect, they could tell those that travelled, those of their peers that were slugcats what pains and aches were plaguing their systems, providing them with the right tools so they could be fixed. The rarefraction cells of those who ascended or reincarnated could be stored and used as replacements for still standing iterators.
…what of those who wished to ascend? Well, they would be celebrated. They would not be stopped but held in high regards. They would have celebrations with their groups and those from other groups that they loved and had befriended over time. They would be laid to rest, not like the dead in the memory crypts, but like a child falling asleep in the arms of a parent, rocked back and forth in the community they had, and lowered down into a bed of reassurance. It was an ending, it was a tragedy, of course it was, even if their old citizens had insisted that it was not a loss, that no tears were needed, but they had been wrong. They had been wrong about everything.
A new era was upon them, a time of freedom and free will, the escape from bodies that had held them prisoner for so long, a time when they could choose and act upon their fates and were no longer bound to a past that had abandoned them.
Moon had created a communication device for Pebbles herself, they had tested them out, had made sure they would be small enough for even pups to use, and yet durable to survive the lifestyle of even the most active slugcat. Not many of their peers knew that this testing mainly entailed having Pebbles try to hold and type on it and handing it to Arti to explode it a few times to see if it would survive, as well as handing it to Ruffles so she could take a swim with it outside in the waterfront. After testing and trying, after time and time enough to figure everything out, they had their first results.
Gazing Stars was the first one to freely take the solution and – contrary to what Moon had expected – decided that reincarnation would be an ideal solution for her. With blueprints finished, and her already seemingly having a connection to the slugcat colony close to her can, she took the experiment and all added notes and ran it.
Everyone, the entire community of iterators, kept a close eye on her. Seven cycles passed with regular updates from her, with continued communication, but as the eighth dawned the suddenly all too familiar triple affirmative was broadcasted from her can. Two more cycles went by without a message from her and Pebbles was incredibly skittish during those. Until the third cycle after her death, when her group senior Wandering Omen sent them all confirmation that her connective device was working, that she was well and talking, but having her problems with organic movement as was to be expected.
The celebrations, the joy, it was all immense. Pebbles almost dissolved into tears the second Moon told him and she herself could not have been happier to know that it all worked.
They really had a chance now.
And Moon was still iterating, she was typing on her screens and measuring pressure and letting Pebbles hang around her shoulders and use her communication channels even though he had his own little communication device now. Between cycles, Messenger had left them all to go back to Suns and Ruffles had, as Pebbles told her, lamented about her lost love quite strongly. Then once Hunter had left to visit Sig as well, she’d even gone as far as to ask Arti for something she called a “girls night out” and Pebbles had been entrusted in Moon’s care for a whole cycle.
She had been forced to keep a stash of gushy water seeds in her chamber because the other option had been to store a dead corpse somewhere for him to eat and she loved him more than anything but wasn’t willing to do that. Not even for him. Luckily, it turned out these were mostly filled with water, which explained why Pebbles could eat a substantial amount of them, and they didn’t rot or turn bad.
But even so, Pebbles had been around in her chamber for a rather long time all at once, only interrupted by Arti (and Hunter before she’d gone back to Sig) who had gone over to getting food together with him instead of bringing dead creatures or parts of them to him. To teach him how to hunt, no doubt. Maybe also because she seemed to have noticed Moon’s discomfort with dead bodies. Whatever the reason, Pebbles was only ever really leaving her can when Arti wanted him to do something outside or to teach him something like spear throwing.
It was mostly fine, Moon was aware that he needed to leave from time to time, that she was no place to raise a fully aware pup that could find threats on their own and defend themselves. Besides, she was busy collecting all kinds of texts from her archives that Pebbles seemed to enjoy, to then engrave them onto pearls, so he still had access to them even with his systems down. But even so, Arti sometimes brought an insect hive with her that oozed a golden sugar rich goo that, when scanned, contained microscopic larvae of the insects nesting inside.
Pebbles loved it, Moon did not. Not in the slightest. Honey went on her list of things contra reincarnation.
Said list was growing and expanding more and more the more Pebbles told her about his time outside his can and she was adding more and more things to both sides, as well as adding things to a secret third list that was just “not enough information”. She didn’t want to dismiss everything that seemed slightly gross just because she didn’t know what its primary or even secondary purpose was and if it maybe just looked that and wouldn’t actually be as bad. Over time, she had recategorized a lot of things from one to another to another and back to its first just to end up on another list entirely. Sometimes the other slugcats talked about something and Pebbles typed it out for Moon to understand, add more points from those who never knew an iterator body. It was important to have the full picture before making decisions.
However, more and more of those around them came to their own. Wind would keep iterating as would Innocence. Intellect still wanted to reincarnate, now after Gazing Stars had reproduced Pebbles’ results more than ever. They just had to grow their messenger, establish a bond with them and wait for them to be grown and integrated into slugcat society outside of their can. It all took a significant amount of time and a lot of preparation, but they were determined to follow through.
Once Hunter returned from Sig’s structure, she carried a few things with, one of those was indeed a little scarf for Pebbles, orange like his puppet’s robes had been, with a button in the front so it wouldn’t unravel and fall off of him when he moved too quickly, and two little pouches at the edges for storing stuff in – the perfect size for his little communication device. No wonder, given that Moon had sent the final measurements to Sig first before they put the blueprints together, so she could make sure she could fit it to him. The lining of his scarf was also wider and had an opening underneath the button for safer pearl storage, so they wouldn’t weight him down if he only filled one of the pockets with them, like this this they would evenly distribute throughout. For now, however, Pebbles still left them lying around her chamber, scattered everywhere for easier access.
But what Hunter also brought was a pearl from Sig for Moon. She had sent Hunter with one of her own, and this was Sig’s answer. The entirety of the pearl was empty except for the single bolded word that just read YES.
Moon turned the pearl around, twirled it between her fingers while Pebbles lay in her lap, playing (he hated it when she called it that) with one of his own pearls that Moon had engraved for him. The softest little song in the air, an old hymn from times long gone that he treasured.
“Hey, Pebbles”, she said after a while of comfortable silence between them in which Pebbles’ pearl played its lovely little tune and Moon provided herself all the materials she needed for the matter at hand.
“Hmm?” Pebbles purred without turning the little song down. He was fascinated by the fact that he could still activate his pearls and Moon had to admit that it was an interesting discovery.
“Do you… perhaps have a moment for me?” She lowered Sig’s pearl down to her side and instead pulled the little screen for him up again. “I would like to discuss some things with you.”
He made a questioning sound, grabbed his pearl to cut the song off and instead turned for the screen. “Discuss? What exactly is on your mind?”
“I…” She only hesitated to pull up a second screen that showed him an empty table with “pro” over one column and “con” over the other. “I have been thinking about the solution and my option with it. And I think I have come to a conclusion.”
Both his ears shot up at that, his eyes open wide when he looked up at her and then down to the table in front of him. It was still empty.
“Indeed”, Moon opened up the entire table, both sides completely filled in with a great many things and she scrolled down to show him a quick overview of everything, even if she was aware that he couldn’t read all three thousand seven hundred and five points she’d added in the three seconds it took her to scroll to the bottom.
“Are you sure you were thorough?”
“Yes, Pebbles, I was. I even added measures of how important each point was to me and rated them from 1 to 10, where one means very unimportant and ten becomes the most important point by default. Is this thorough enough for my little brother?”
He gave a little harrumph as answer and she just took it as a yes.
“Most of these are in the middle range, as is to be expected.” All of the points disappeared on the screen and only three dots appeared under the contra and three more under the pro argument. “But here are the ones that scored above average on the high end. First we have bodily functions with a rating of 9.”
The point “organic body” appeared on the contra list.
“I decided to group all organic needs together instead of picking through eating, swallowing, chewing all separately. You’ve ensured me it gets better, but I still can’t quite… grasp how that would be the case.”
“You get used to it”, Pebbles typed and Moon shook her head.
“Rating of 9. Very important, I would need some convincing. Then the next point: The need to relearn all that I know about life. I would need to develop instincts and learn how to walk, climb, run, all those things you have told me about. I can see them becoming habit, and since there are so many things – even though the learning part will be temporary – I am considering it with a rating of 8.”
“Perfectly reasonable”, Pebbles wrote. “It took me a long time to learn all of it, and I fear I am not done yet.”
“That is worrying. But I cannot in good conscience raise it to a 10 and therefore consider it an irrefutable reason against reincarnation, since I know that this learning will be a one-time investment for the rest of the whole life I am meant to live.”
On the table, “re-learning life” appeared at the second bullet point.
“Third and to me most importantly would be the loss of all that is me.”
Only the word “Death” appeared on the screen next.
“I can accept that I will be making more and new memories and that the life you live now is more than just a little different from that of an iterator, but the loss of so many memories, the inability to reach for old archived entries, my whole processing manifest and all kinds of data I have not stored on pearls is a loss I will feel gravely.”
Pebbles nodded again. “I understand this well. If I had known what would happen I would have engraved so many pearls to leave for myself. All my favourite art pieces and poems, things you do not have in your systems, they are all gone.” For a moment he let out a deep sigh and rubbed his cheek against her hand. “I am grateful. Please, don’t worry about this. I am so immensely grateful, but I miss them.”
With one finger he tapped against the little music pearl and it played its little tune solemnly.
“I think I understand it better now. Poetry was always so interesting to me because the inherent meaning was hidden behind metaphors and allegories. Our processors were not made to easily comprehend those, my AI needed the pattern of a hundred examples to understand even once why a poem about an apartment complex was actually about grief, why a leech could be an allegory for love and the cycles.” He chuckled. “Why a broken pearl has value even though it is destroyed and no longer carries data. Poems used to be riddles to me. Now, I think they’re more than that. Now, I surely could follow the thread of narration all the way to the end without the need to unravel it.”
“It really is a different life”, Moon said. “And its positives are undeniable.”
“I have been musing”, he typed and shook his head, his little ears flapping with the motion. “Please continue.”
“I don’t mind.” She lowered her hand to his head and carefully pet him. “Maybe I should add a changed perspective to my pros, but I don’t know if it would be high ranking in terms of importance.”
“No, no”, Pebbles shook his head again and she stopped her petting. “Please continue.”
“If you insist.” The first point on her pro side appeared. “The freedom to leave my can, even just my chamber, used to be rather low on my priorities, but the more you have told me about the outside, the more the other slugcats have, I can no longer deny the longing to see it all as well. Even thought my overseers can show me pictures and I can project myself into the cans of other iterators, it’s not the same. I… would like to see things. I would like to leave and experience all that you have told me about. The world must be so much… more for an organic being.”
Pebbles nodded. “I like it better like this. It took some getting used to, my eyes focus differently, I can’t see as far, but everything that I see is so much brighter, all the colours are stronger, not to speak from smell and taste. Two entirely new senses iterators do not have.”
“Exactly”, she nodded. “It’s why I rated it with an 8. I don’t know if I will like smell or taste, but you said there are a lot of differences, so I guess there’s a higher chance for it to be nice. What’s more important to me, though, is my next point, which is about,” she lowered her hand down to pat his head, “touches. My plating accommodates artificial nerves, you know how iterators feel of course. And the differences you have described to me seem… very nice. I think I would like skin and fur for touches instead, I think I would like that much, much better. Especially if it means I’ll be able to lie next to those I love. Like you”, she ruffled a tuft of fur on his neck, “or Sig. Or even Ruffles. And although we talked about bodily functions being on my contra list, I can imagine that the grooming Arti does to you in the evenings is incredibly soothing.”
Pebbles nodded. “It very much so is, I enjoy it.”
She smiled down at him. “It intrigues me, especially if you say you like it.”
“But I have already lived a few cycles as a slugcat.”
Moon shrugged and “physical touch and affections” appeared on her table. “It gets a ranking of 9 anyway. I find it very likely that I would enjoy it quite a lot.”
She hesitated with the next point for a little longer, disguising the second it took her by resizing and readjusting the screen. There was… an argument to be had, she was sure. He wasn’t going to let her just explain herself with no interruption, she knew that, she knew him. Hunter and Arti were out somewhere, Ruffles was out in the facility, where no rains fell anymore aside from Moon’s doing… something. Probably collecting pearls, she loved doing that. They had time to argue all they wanted.
“My last point that speaks for reincarnation over continued iterating is…” She sighed, her vents expelling anxiously hot air. “It’s actually a lot of points.”
Instead of adding it, she opened the extensive list of all three thousand seven hundred and five reasons and highlighted all of them on the pro side that she had condensed into this one last point. They were spread apart between other less important points, but unbeknownst to Pebbles, who just saw the bright yellow highlights, they all had a value of nine.
“Out of all my reasons, I found that these five hundred and twenty-nine could all be condensed down into one singular one.”
“Reasonable if they have overlap”, Pebbles said, but his brows furrowed. “Not to question your decision making, but did I read it correctly that one of those reasons reads “Pebbles likes it”? Because while that is true, I wouldn’t necessarily depend your happiness on mine, whatever mine is.”
Moon weighted her head back and forth. “It’s… only half the story.”
She hid the rest of the reasons that were not marked and with all of them closely together like this, he could see that the one he’d spied was no outlier.
Pebbles likes organic life
Playing games with Pebbles
Going on walks with Pebbles
Cuddling and sleeping next to Pebbles
Understanding Pebbles little sounds
Pebbles speaks so fondly of the stars
And so on and so forth. Pebbles’ name appeared in all of the selected points and when Moon added them all together, the single point that was left being just read “Pebbles” and nothing else. He stared at it for a moment with his eyes wide and his mouth agape. Then, he started typing furiously.
“You cannot make me the focus point of a choice that is meant to be entirely yours! What if you hate it? What if your expectations and impressions do not reflect mine? What if I have given you a wrong idea of what it will be like? If I am your only point of reference, please consider my pains and aches, too? Wait for Gazing Stars to get in contact with you so you have more examples, wait for someone else to reincarnate as well so you can find the average out of those three experiences. Sliver, she did not like life, she hated it. There are dangers you have not”
Moon closed his screen before he could finish typing. His hand hovered over the keyboard that had once been and was no more for a second longer before his head snapped back around to her with that same angry little expression he’d had when she’d muted him in chat.
“I’m sorry, Pebbles, I just… I knew you wouldn’t like my reasoning, but I think it would be beneficial for you to hear me out instead of telling me to reconsider immediately.”
Pebbles lifted one of his hands and smacked the air where the keyboard had been before, but with nothing left for him to type on, he only flapped one hand, still frowning up at her with what she recognised as a pout.
“Just give me a second to explain myself.”
He did the movement again for a second before he crossed his arms in front of his chest and nodded with a huff.
“Thank you.” She sighed. “I assure you, I have thought this through. And I know that you have a preference for what I should choose, but I’m sure you’ll understand in a moment. Here.” A new screen with no keyboard for him to type on opened where his had been just before, it showed him a picture that Moon was decently sure he had never before seen.
His puppet was dressed in his ceremonial robes that were not the ones he’d worn every day, but those their citizens had dressed them in for important occasions, or whenever they had filmed them in advertisements. He wasn’t active yet, but not far from it, this was him just a little before he was officially booted up. They had had three puppet designs for him, Moon had seen the drawings, the diagrams and concepts, but once the House of Ribbons had given their donation, they had been allowed to have a last say in his built. Four strands of ribbon instead of the three interwoven lines all ending in a knot and as different as can be from the thick segmented line the House of Braids had designed for him. But more important than the fact that Pebbles’ puppet was inactive in the picture was the room he was in.
Not Pebbles’ chamber, but Moon’s.
He was held in the arms of one of the last head engineers that had been instructed and grown up in Moon’s city. Their ornate mask made recognising them easier than their bare faces did.
“This is you”, Moon said, gesturing to the picture. “The cycle before you were mounted on your umbilical to activate the structure. I doubt they would have been happy with me taking the picture had they noticed, but it’s not important anymore. All that’s important is that they brought you to me just once, so I could know you. Your puppet has been the only one I have ever seen within my chamber, the only one I have ever truly met in person.”
Pebbles reached out for the screen, his little hand stopped just a breath away, clearly aware that even if he breached the gap, there would be nothing to touch anyway.
“They did it not do so out of kindness, not because they wanted me to really, truly know you, but as a performative act of giving me a non-existent veto. I could not have rejected you at that point, your structure was fully built, fully functional, your puppet was finished, all they had to do was to bring you into your chamber and finish your wiring down your back, connect the base of your skull to the wires of your umbilical and as soon as the first spark came, you’d be alive. What they wanted from me was just a nod, just a confirmation.” She giggled. “I told them, even back then, that I would take your side over theirs. You were my highest priority. I doubt they liked that, but it was the truth.”
Pebbles turned away from the picture and looked up at her, his head slightly tilted to the side, still in question, still not quite understanding what she was trying to say. So she closed the screen and lowered her hand down until he could rest both of his in her palm.
“I love the local group, they are all great friends and Sig more than that even. But you are my little brother. You are family down to the void in my rarefraction cells. When you died, when I lost you, I… I lost a part of myself as well. I cannot do that again, Pebbles. But as an organic being, you will die again, and I will lose you – don’t tell me you’ll be back, that is not what I mean and you know it!”
He gave her an unimpressed stare, but both his hands were still in hers.
“You cannot stay in my chamber forever, not even in my can, you will have to leave and hunt things, go out and run around, see the world maybe… see the stars. Overseer projections are all that I could give you, but I know those pale in comparison to what you have seen. And even if you’re about to tell me that I’m wrong and you would gladly stay with me for far longer than you should and you would surely come back to me even when you’re reincarnated again, I…”
Her vents expelled a sigh of warmth.
“Pebbles. I cannot do that. I cannot live a life where I watch you leave my can in the morning to find yourself food and then spend the day with me just to repeat it forever and never change. One day, I know it, one day you will leave and not come back – not because you left me, not because of your own choice, but because I have lost you again. And I will not know until you come back, in a different body as a pup once more and it’ll all start again. And if that does not happen, what am I to do if you grow old in my chamber, if you drape yourself around my shoulders like you do and I lose you like that? What do I do if you die in my arms and I have to wait for you to come back to me? What am I supposed to do if I’m eternal, but my little brother, my only family in void and metal, is not?”
Pebbles looked up at her with an unreadable expression, his shoulders down and eyes open, but she couldn’t tell if he understood or not, she couldn’t tell if he approved of what she said. She opened the pro and contra list again and the last point, her last reason, him, stood out, highlighted yellow against the rest.
“And even if you were to promise me to also spend time with the others, to go and visit Sig and Suns and… Intellect until they are done with the preparations, even if you keep in contact with me, it will never be the same. And I understand that, I knew it from the moment I had you back, but… the chance you have presented me with the solution, with my own reincarnation is one of a life – of a hundred thousand lives – with you again by my side. Even if death claims one of us then, we will have chances, we’ll have memories, I… I want to grow up with you. I want to be a sister to you in the most profound ways, I want it to be visible in every detail within the life I’ll live. And that’s why I have made my decision.”
On her table, a tally came up, adding the values of each point underneath them and showed Pebbles that the highest value, the irrefutable ten Moon had not given to any other item on her list, appeared right behind his name. And therefore, the contra side darkened, while the pro side lit up a little brighter.
“Now”, Moon said and gave Pebbles his screen and keyboard back, “you can yell at me.”
And he did indeed start typing immediately.
“Do not make me the knife in your undoing. I can accept your choices, I will support you in them, I love you. But I refuse to become your downfall.”
He pointed to the screen and Moon nodded, but before she could say anything more, he was already typing again.
“That being said, I cannot argue with your points. I have greatly enjoyed my time spent in your chamber, I like having you around and if I could, I would ask Sig to sew a tracker to my scarf so your overseers can find me, so I can take you with me out. I, of course, am aware that this is impossible to implement and that it would in no way be the same. And as much as I like being here with you, the world outside is a fascinating place as well. You are right, I want to see the stars again. And I know that Arti and Hunter have thought about future plans to take me to Sig, as well as going to visit the sanctuary in the outer expanse of my facility grounds. I think you would enjoy it there, I think you, too, would like the other slugcats there.”
“So you agree with me?”
Pebbles sighed. “I must protest against anything that might bring you pain simply because I want you to be well, but at the same time, I am aware that trying to stop you – aside from the fact that it’ll be impossible – would result in much worse grief. So yes, I agree with you. But only under a few conditions.”
“I will make sure to remember to adhere to those.” Moon tapped her finger against one of his ears and watched it flick. “But please know that I would never want to burden you with something this big. I was considering if I should ignore all those reasons that included you and make a decision without them, but there were so many, it was impossible to do so. I want to play games with you and curl up next to you like Hunter and Arti can. And once Sig will join us as well, I want to do that with him, too.”
Pebbles ear flicked against her finger hard enough she was worried for a second he could hurt himself like that.
“Sig? Sig is thinking about reincarnation?”
“She is, yes, Hunter brought me back her answering pearl to my question if she was considering it. And even though I included all my reasons, I only received this back.”
The pearl in question still waited right next to her, so she handed it to his already waiting hand.
“Thank you.”
“You really have become so much politer.”
Pebbles rolled his eyes before he typed: “If you say so. This pearl only says yes. Do you have nothing else from him? No reasoning? No thoughts?”
“Only this.”
He rolled his eyes again. “I shouldn’t have expected more from her.”
“Now that was rude again.”
He pointed to his last sentence before this. “If you say so.”
Moon shook her head, but couldn’t completely disguise her giggles. “I know I know, but I’m pretty sure Sig has her own reasons that are just as intricate and thought through as mine – don’t look at me like that!”
“I have to believe you in this”, he said with that little scowl. “But death is a rather big decision. I… can only hope neither one of you ends up regretting it.”
“I’m sure we won’t.” Moon lifted her hand up to his cheek, so he could rub his fur over her metal plating. “I promise you, I have thought about this carefully and the conclusion I have come to is the right one. Besides, it’ll be nice. It’ll be… easier. I am an old model of iterator, a lot of my systems would need additional care to make sure I keep functioning over a great many cycles. At some point I would have to make a decision not with the options of ascension, reincarnation, and continued iterating, but ascension or reincarnation against a slow deteriorating death drawn out over thousands of cycles. I would have chosen this eventually. And we both know it.”
Pebbles sighed. “I suppose so. But please, I will not begrudge you if you change your mind.”
“I know.” Moon lowered her head down to him and rested her forehead against his. “Thank you, Pebbles.”
He nodded against her and she leaned back a little when she could feel him move to type on his screen. “And if you regret your decision… I will be there for you to make it at least a little bearable.”
“I know”, she smiled. “But I won’t.”
Moon regretted her reincarnation for the first cycle that Pebbles and Arti spend looking for her.
Being born had her disoriented, had her aching in ways she’d never known pain to feel like – different from scratches on metal and sparking electrical wiring that had eaten through its insulation. The bones within her had nerves, had their own sensors that could give her brain signals about positioning, about muscles around them, her innards moved with the insistent thrum of life within her chest that she could not regulate, that she had no control over. Her breathing sucked in air through her mouth or nose that ran down into lungs that expanded on an inhale and deflated on an exhale that moved her muscles that tightened around and underneath her ribcage. She could stop breathing if she so desired, but it wouldn’t make the pains stop – on the contrary. It made them worse, made then burn and exaggerated her breathing afterwards when her body overtook her mind and forced air back in against her will.
But air was only a miniscule force, the smallest of all the aches her new body presented her with.
Solids and liquids had to go down the same pathway as air, separated only by a muscle barrier in the back of her throat. Chewing and swallowing left her confused, left her tongue hanging out of her mouth unsure of how to do either and what to do when and with which muscles.
The parents she had been born to, had been shocked to hear her speak so soon, to listen to her words that must have been utterly devoid of meaning to them.
“I must start my life with an apology to the both of you, for I am not a daughter of yours, I have lived a life already, I wish to return to it in a way. As we speak, my little brother and his mother are looking for me, to claim me as a part of their family once more. But I promise you, I wish you the best, and I know you would have been a beautiful pair of parents to me.”
She did not know that, but she expected them to need a certain degree of reassurance for why all of this was happening, for why it happened to them (even though Moon could not tell them that either). Maybe it was that, or maybe they were just naturally good souls, or maybe it was customary in slugcat society, but they stayed with her for the first cycle, and the father she had been born to showed her the movements of chewing while his partner went out to collect some foods that would be easy on her stomach.
A small stack of blue fruit and bubble fruits were packed into the corner of the shelter she was in to accommodate her for the cycle of waiting for Pebbles and Arti or Hunter or Ruffles to find her. They would come and take her with them, she knew that much, but before she’s found the solution, before she had been thrown into the cycles, when she was still starting her preparations, Pebbles had talked to her about getting more help from friends. So they had a higher chance to find her quicker.
In her new body, Moon had only been taken outside once, so help her stretch her legs and see if she could walk fine – and she could not. She could hold herself up and sit upright, but walking, not to speak of running or jumping, was none of her innate talents. Besides, the outside smelled… interesting in a rather bad way.
Smell and taste, as Pebbles had told her, were so entirely different from any other feeling she’d had as an iterator that she was eager to experience them, even if they were negative experiences. The fruits she’d had so far had been sweet and easy to chew and swallow, but the bubble fruits tasted very different at times, depending on which water source they had absorbed. And the outside, that first room that led to her shelter, smelled of brackish water, acidic and steaming with whatever had died and decomposed within, contaminated even. Rather bad, if she could be allowed the judgement. Rather interesting anyway.
After her birthparents left her (she had needed a surprising amount of convincing to make sure they would, but she couldn’t be sure they weren’t still worried), Moon waited alone with only her own thoughts for company. No pearls and no communication ability to reach the local group – or even Pebbles. She’d always been able to reach Pebbles even when there had been repairs needed to the communications array. Now, she was forced to wait out her time.
She’d engraved a great many pearls before she’d run the experiment, and during as well. Most of them were for Pebbles, and all of them were by now stored in his scarf. Until she was found and could take her pearls back – or more likely until they made the journey to Sig who then could create a little coat for her as well to hold her own things. Hunter also had a little backpack, so maybe she could ask her to store some of her things as well. Maybe she would find nice little trinkets on the way and carry them around like Pebbles had his little overseer that followed him. Maybe it would be quite nice to actually touch the pearls, to feel their engravings underneath her skin.
As time passed, Moon dreamed of what different surfaces must feel like, she tried to come up with patterns that might be interesting to touch, of things that would feel nice on skin and things that would not. And she had to realise that cycles, for little creatures like pups and maybe all slugcats of all growth phases, were rather long. She couldn’t really do much, just waited, just lay around and sat up from time to time to see if she could now easily jump up and run around, but she could not. She was in dire need of practise and some instructions.
And she should probably ration the fruit she had left. To make sure she wasn’t going to die before Pebbles could find her – oh he would beat himself up over that. She could only wish he’d blame her, but she knew him, he would certainly not, he’d think it was all his fault. So just for his sake alone, she had to try and make sure she stayed alive until she was found. No matter how long that took and no matter where she was.
She didn’t actually know it herself.
Life, as she rapidly discovered, was full of not knowing things, waiting, and relying on others. It had been a point to her contra list, but now that she experienced her own helplessness this clearly, she had to reconsider her rating system; it should have been at least a five or six instead of the meagre three she’d given it. She would even go as far as to say that “boredom” a feeling she’d never before had to deal with and that hadn’t made it on her list at all, was a crushing force and horrible emotion that she wanted gone more than anything. Hunger was less so, she still had a lot to eat, and the bubble fruits contained a great lot of water that kept her hydrated as well, but food was a necessity, and her own entertainment not so much. All she could do was lie around, dream of what she could maybe see or touch or smell in the future, and hope that Pebbles would find her rather sooner than later.
Going back, she would rank “boredom” a solid nine. But there was no going back. There would never again be a going back.
And although it felt to her like an eternity, the actual time that passed was only one cycle and a half of her own lonesomeness. Her birthparents had stayed with her for two cycles, had cared for her as much as she would let them, and then she was alone. The single cycle on her own left her bored, but not yet worried, and once the second cycle in solidary started, she was mostly concerned about another boring day – until she heard it. The tell-tale pitter patter of feet running over a floor riddled with puddles.
The sound was faint, dulled through the pipe separating her from the next room, but it was clearly there, it was clearly coming towards her.
The pipe flashed in a bright pink for a second before Pebbles’ adorable little pup face appeared and his eyes grew big and teary when he jumped straight at her, his arms around her before she could even greet him.
“You’re okay!” He said, and Moon could hear him, could understand him clearly, could follow his words along and knew what he was saying. His voice, changed, no longer the same as it had been as an iterator, his words, all of him once more with her. It made her lips tremble and her arms come up around him to hug him back and hold him against her heart and never, ever, ever let go.
She could not regret a life that was kind enough to give him back to her. She could not regret a decision that ended with her brother happy and healthy in her arms again. She could never regret him.
“You found me”, Moon whispered quietly into his shoulder, her eyes unfocussed, her tears drenching the fur on both of their faces. Shared water, shared relief.
“I found you”, Pebbles repeated. He leaned a little back from her and only now, with both of them standing upright across from each other, Moon noticed the little detail she had to giggle over.
“You really are tiny.” She reached her hand out and patted Pebbles’ head. He was a good bit smaller than her.
“I’ll grow taller than you when we’re all grown up”, he huffed before he took a step closer again and fell into another hug. Softer, this time, as he rubbed his cheek over hers (he did lift himself up to his tip toes to do so but Moon graciously didn’t mention that). “I’m just glad you’re okay. I love you, Moon. I didn’t get to say it before I died, but I love you so much.”
She wrapped her arms around him once more and rested her chin on the top of his head. “I love you, too.”
In his back, the pipe flashed for a moment and when Moon looked back up, Arti stepped into the shelter, an explosive spear in her hand that was gently leaned against the wall, where it would not be in the way.
“Are you alright my dear?” She asked and Moon was taken aback for a moment. Of course, she knew she would be able to understand them all now, she had known that the slugcats were talking, but actually hearing her speak, understanding her like this had her hesitate for a moment.
“I… I am well”, she managed. “I was taken care of before you found me.”
“Good.” Arti took a step forward and Pebbles let go of Moon (she did not reach back for him, she held herself back for just long enough so he could sit down next to her). “Here, sit down, dear. Tell me, how are your legs? Can you walk?”
Moon sat down and Pebbles leaned against her. “I cannot walk but standing is something I can do. Food and water are… not as bad as I had expected them to be. I suppose there will be some kinds that are worse, but what I have had so far is easy to swallow.”
Arti looked over to the stash of fruits in the corner. “That’s good, the waterfront is full of those, we’ll be able to feed you a consistent diet until you learn how to walk. And you look quite a bit better than Pebbles did when I found him.”
Next to her, Pebbles made a little noise that Moon knew meant annoyance even though she’d never catalogued or heard it as this before.
“I know”, Arti said and patted his head. “I’m sorry, honey, you’re just a bit on the smaller side.”
“Honey?” Moon asked, looking between Pebbles and Arti.
“It’s just a little nickname because he really likes honey.”
Pebbles ears flicked, but he didn’t push Arti’s hand away. “And because I didn’t like to be called sweetheart.”
“But you are one.” Moon tugged his arm closer against her. “You’ve always been a little sweetheart deep down.”
Pebbles rolled his eyes, but he let her pull him closer and nuzzled into her fur – her fur! – before he protested.
“I am not.”
Arti gave him a soft smile. Now that she could feel her own muscles, could move her own facial expressions to show her discomfort, her joy, and confusion, she could tell.
“Of course not, honey.” She leaned down and over to Pebbles to drag her tongue over his head and he let her, his ears flattening down and his nose lifted up to follow the movement further.
He smelled like her, Moon only now noticed. Like fire and smoke, like something harsh that only needed a spark to ignite. That was unexpected, though she couldn’t tell what her expectations had really been. Maybe nothing at all, maybe she’d thought of their iterator bodies as completely devoid of any smell, but even then, they must have carried the smell of oil and metal. Did electricity smell of anything? She had to pay attention to that when they met Sig.
“I’ll leave you the spear”, Arti said, very clearly talking to Pebbles. “It’s only for emergencies, okay?”
Pebbles nodded. “Okay.”
“Good. Let me go grab Hunter and tell her we’ve found you, she’s been worried sick ever since you… deactivated.”
Not died, Moon noted. They did not call it death anymore, they called it a chance, they called it a mercy unless ascension was chosen. Then, it was death.
“I would like to see Hunter. I think that would be nice”, Moon said quietly and Arti smiled at her as well.
“I’ll tell her you said that. And don’t worry, I’ll be back with her in no time, you’re out here at the very edge of the waterfront, but it’s a quick run from where we split up and there’s a good chance Hunter is already done with the shelters she was checking and is waiting anxiously for us to get back.”
“What about Ruffles?”
“She’s off and up looking for you in your city.”
Right, Moon hadn’t been able to override the citizen drone requirement for her city gate, but in the cycles leading up to the conclusion of the experiment, right before Pebbles had no longer been allowed to join her in her chamber out of fear she’d die on him, he had ensured her that Arti had a way to open the gate in her own way. A part of her suspected that her “own way” to closed gates were more explosions. A different part of her expected another revelation, something sophisticated that proved her wrong and surprised her. Maybe it was both at different times. Bombs surely had their upsides if she looked at the explosives spear now left in the shelter when Arti turned and hopped back out to go get Hunter. And Ruffles a little later, too, hopefully.
“You should lie down again”, Pebbles said and tugged at her arm. “You need the rest.”
Moon followed him down to curl up against each other in her little corner of the shelter. She could feel Pebbles breathing against her, his heartbeat tangible in the pulse at his neck and the breaths he took. Moon rested her head on her hands, her cheek cold against her fingers, while Pebbles lay on his side, one of his ears flopped and the tails of his scarf spread out behind him, so he wouldn’t lie on the comms device or the pearls Moon had engraved for him.
“I’m glad you’re here”, he said quietly. “I’m glad I don’t have to grow up alone.”
“You would have done fine, I’m sure.” Moon reached one hand out and followed the curve of his cheek up along his eye until she could feel the softer texture of the fur on the back of his ears under her fingertips.
His ear flicked but didn’t hit against her finger. “That doesn’t mean I would have enjoyed it.”
Moon giggled and dropped her hand to rest against his cheek. “I’m also glad to be here with you now. It’s… still a new and weird feeling, but I can see why you would like it.”
Pebbles smiled. “That’s good to know. I won’t lie, I was still worried about you even when you started the experiments, but I couldn’t talk you out of it anymore. And even after, when we were looking for you, I expected your rains and it was…”
“It was hard to look at when your can fell silent, too, so I can imagine the uncanny feeling you had when I… stopped. Especially with how close to the surface I was still built and the sudden silences of the rain sirens. They were still sounding even after the surface became mostly inhospitable.” She hummed a low tune in the back of her throat. Production of sound and language was truly so far removed from how it had been as iterators that she couldn’t even compare it. “We really shaped the world without meaning to, huh? What a legacy we’re leaving behind.”
But Pebbles shook his head. “Even so we were just creatures ourselves, a lot of impact, certainly, but nothing that will stand throughout the ages, nothing that will survive eternity. The ecosystem will change without us, will shape up to be something new and different that won’t care too much about our supposed great influences. No, in the end we’re leaving only rust behind.”
Moon snuggled closer to him, wrapped the arm on his face around his chest instead and rubbed her cheek over his like she had seen him do so many times before. Pebbles let her and made a high chirping noise she intrinsically knew meant that he was happy to have her. And Moon could only give it back, could only hold him close to her heart and feel their breathing together, could only hope that in a hundred or more cycles they would still have each other, they would still choose their lives over and over and over again.
In the end, just as in the beginning, they were together. And it was all that mattered to her.