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Shorekeeper knew the plan well. It was bold in how it fought against the loop that forced them to utilize suffering to fight more suffering. But the Astral Modulator was never one to back away from the idea of fate and let it take full control. She couldn’t find an alternate solution the way she was- she had to become a blank slate, is what she’d said.
When the Astral Modulator finished explaining, all she could bring herself to do was give an affirmative. A flood of thoughts raced to consume her, but it was not the time to drown in this sudden need to take her star into arms and tell her to stay . The feeling was intense and it was ugly , this selfish desire to want to tell Rover that she didn’t want her to forget her. She wanted to tell her to stop this daring journey before it even started even if it meant Shorekeeper would continue to break, struggling day by day to piece her remnants back together as the intermediary for the Lament’s agony.
But Rover could never leave anyone behind. Shorekeeper knew and respected that. She would never consciously allow the fallen’s repeated agony be the backbone for fighting the Lament. Shorekeeper herself had always been ready to take on that role. It was her duty, after all, and even with how she’d begun to want and want things beyond it, she still wanted the same thing that Rover did. A haven for humanity.
The Astral Modulator was ferocious, determined, set in her words and missions. An inspiration that the youth of the world who wanted to don the blake bloom aspired to become. With Shorekeeper, she’d express feelings beyond what she had to show as leader of the Black Shores. Shorekeeper was privy to her vulnerability in a way no one else was. But one thing was never voiced between them: the ending that was destined for a shorekeeper– a mere tool.
And yet- Rover did not believe in sacrifices. She wouldn’t trivialize the pain of any of the people of Solaris, and that, she emphasized, without words, included her Shorekeeper. So Shorekeeper let her star go and waited.
In the stillness of the void, Shorekeeper wondered about Rover.
Ever since the Astral Modulator left, she has carried this lingering fear that her star would be… different. Rover had once told her that experiences were part of what made a person who they were, and it was a thought that plagued her every time Shorekeeper stared at her vigil in wait of Rover’s return.
Not that it mattered in the end. Shorekeeper promised to bring her star home and she had kept that promise. All Shorekeeper had wanted was to bring her back. Back to their home. Back to her Shorekeeper .
And wasn’t it interesting that Rover had taught her to want , and in the end, past their duties, all Shorekeeper wanted was her. Everything came back to her. The guardian of the Black Shores orbited around her star.
Her thoughts were beginning to become hazier, but they continued. They drifted to the tea she had tried in that simulation. She remembered the bitterness that hit her tongue and wondered if such a flavor was what Rover now preferred- of course, they hadn’t had time to discuss it. She would’ve pushed this kind of trivial thinking aside thousands of years ago. But as the centuries had passed, the Astral Modulator had encouraged her to indulge in things as mundane as sampling the tea flavors Rover would bring back from the lands she’d venture into. Shorekeeper began to crave those fleeting moments, anticipating the next few moments she’d get to be alone with her star, drinking tea in the Tethys Deep. She wondered then, and wondered now, what it meant to crave experiencing those everyday things with a person.
She recalled voicing such thoughts to Rover, once. She smiled at her, a small smile but a radiant one. She then turned her gaze to the sea. “It can mean different things for different people. But, it’s common to want to spend time with companions. People you care about. People you…” Shorekeeper did not miss the fleeting glance Rover threw her. “Love.”
Rover had never given her direct answers to her questions about humanity, and this time was no different. Her answers would always leave her grasping at more questions.
Shorekeeper fixed her gaze on Rover, another question in her throat, one that was more to herself than anyone else. “Love,” she echoed, the word not unfamiliar but still foreign on her tongue. It was like the sea- she knew of it, and knew what lived just beneath its surface, but it was vast , more vast than anyone had the time to comprehend. “Is that what I feel for you?”
Rover hummed, gaze still fixed on the horizon. “Only you can say for sure.”
The realization cut so deeply that Shorekeeper felt like she was breaking, as if she was again letting the Lament’s data run through her till her skin cracked. But this- this was an entirely different kind of overwhelming.
When Rover had returned to her, yes, Shorekeeper lied and input herself as Tethys’ core, even if she knew, deep down, that that wasn’t what the Rover of back then would’ve wanted. Because- was it not the best solution, all things considered? The Black Shores would have their solution to the mobius loop that so haunted them. Rover led its members to find that solution for millennia without relent. That determination was what led the Astral Modulator to leave in the first place.
Deep down, if it meant Rover’s journey would continue, Shorekeeper hoped her star would be different enough to let her shorekeeper go. The Black Shores and Rover were her beginning and would be her end- and this was all what she… told herself she’d be content with.
But Rover brought her home. She was the reason she was again able to dream of a future where Shorekeeper could continue to be part of her star's journey.
No, they could not be the same as they were. But her star would always shine for her. Rover would never let her go. She fought for her then, and she fought for her now.
It was as startling as it was comforting to know.
She turned and faced Rover’s warm smile, the sunlight adorning her and emphasizing the gold in her eyes- and she felt the rushing waters within her still. The only thing that disrupted those waters were the gentle waves of the music that the Shorekeeper and her star began to play together. They were home.