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Hornfels was looking at three different readouts- everything was so much further away, and moving away even faster, and they needed to confer with Chert about this hypothesis, that perhaps everything had begun from a single point- when they heard footsteps coming up the ramp and turned. “There you are! I was just doing some pre-flight observations, and, local conditions are good!” 

Potch grinned, the light filtering through the canvas roof causing some iridescence along the freckles that weren’t covered by their upper eyes set of goggles, resting on their forehead. “Tell me, what are your plans once you’re in space?” They hummed, tapping the mirliton they almost always had. 

“I’m going to learn more about the Nomai. Hal and I made the translator for a reason.” 

“I thought as much!” Potch’s hand was out, and Hornfels handed over the slip of paper that had their codes. “Fly safe, and we’ll see you soon!”

“Bye, Hornfels!” And Potch ran off down the ramp.

It wasn’t surprising that they had a plan- Potch was like that, one of the reasons Hornfels had strongly approved of training them when they’d approached Gossan. Not like it was actually a decision Hornfels held any sway over, but they appreciated knowing the new astronaut would be easier to get ahold of than say, Gabbro. Or Feldspar had been… 

Hornfels glanced around, and decided to walk down and outside of the suddenly too empty museum to see the launch better.

Hal had probably been down looking at the statue they’d finally gotten set up last night- the Nomai statue Gabbro had brought back on a brief tangent of having a work ethic, the most complete statue they had!

Gabbro had also reported a second one whose eyes were open, wherever on Giant’s Deep they’d found this statue, and this one Hornfels was sure could also open its eyes, but, it stubbornly had kept them closed and they didn’t want to risk breaking it. 

They walked past it to go outside and watch Potch’s launch.

…Hornfels heard stone grinding, and turned to see the statue swivel towards them, and open its eyes.

Their most recent memories- walking down here, talking to Potch, checking the weather conditions, looking at the computer- streamed into the statue, open eyes glowing bright purple, and then they staggered as the glow faded, leaving a Nomai statue with open, bronzed eyes. 

“Wait, what?” They walked forward, launch forgotten. “Why now? What made you do that?” They weren’t getting an answer from the statue… probably, but, they had to ask. 

There was a roar from outside- Potch launched- and then they heard the radio upstairs go off.

Hornfels frowned at the statue and hurried upstairs to grab it- despite what they just saw, their job as ground control came first. 

“-fels, are you there?” 

“Gabbro, yes, sorry, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing wrong, just, I saw another Nomai statue down here, and, its eyes just opened!”

“It did?” 

“Yeah? What, not excited? I saw everything else I did today kinda flow into it and it was all purple swirly and all and then that stopped and now it’s just sitting there. Well, laying there, it’s kinda on its side.” Hornfels hummed.

“I just saw the same thing with the statue you brought home.”

“Huh, wild. I wonder why.”

“Are you going to look into it?” Gabbro paused before answering.

“Yeah… eventually.”

“You set up a hammock and laid down before you radioed in, didn’t you.”

“How long have you known me, Hornfels?”

“Long enough to know you’re not planning on doing anything for a while even after seeing a potentially revolutionizing discovery.” Hornfels brought the radio back downstairs and set it on the ground as they began fully inspecting the statue. 

“Yeah. I promise I’ll get around to it eventually.” 

“I know. Eventually. I’ll see what I can learn on this end right now.” 

Hal didn’t wander back inside- they were outside carving, probably- and Hornfels kept pouring over the statue as the light outside suddenly, dramatically dimmed in a way that severely impacted their inspection of the middle eye, then flashed bright blue. 

Then it started to get unseasonably hot, then ‘hand in a campfire’ hot, and it went white-

Hornfels watched a Nomai space suit helmet- no, just the front most part, what Riebeck believed was their faceplate equivalent- appear, and from the middle eye hole everything they had done from the sudden heat backwards to seeing the statue open its eyes replayed, and then they blinked, back in the observatory, staring at the computers. 

What? They were not prone to incredibly realistic dreams, but, there was a first time for everything.
…Out of pure, simple curiosity Hornfels brought the long range radio downstairs with them, and walked towards the atrium. 

Hal was inspecting the Nomai statue they had just gotten set up.
Its eyes were open, staring out into the village.

“Oh, Hornfels! I swear I was watching it the whole time but-”

“I saw the eyes open, and then I was upstairs. Curious thing, was that your doing?” 

“M-mine?” Hal looked from them to the statue nervously.

“No, sorry, I was talking to the statue. I wonder what happened?” 

The radio crackled on as Hornfels and Hal both looked at the statue. “Hey, Hornfels, you there?”

“Gabbro, right, I was going to radio you. You said the statue you found opened its eyes, correct?” Hal was giving them a very weird look, but, Hal was just here admiring it, not looking into what this statue actually did. 

“Yeah, and, I think, I kinda died? And then I didn’t, which is weird for Hearthians.” Hornfels took a breath to ask if they were sure they hadn’t just been dreaming, and paused. The heat and white right before they saw the mask had been intense…

“We might have, I hadn’t considered that. But, what was that, if we did, and why didn’t it stick?” Footsteps- Potch walked into the museum. 

Hornfels didn’t bring the codes with them.

“One moment, I have your launch codes upstairs. The weather looks good today, so you are cleared to launch!” Up the ramp quickly, then back. “I do have a request for you, before you dive headlong into Nomai history.” 

“Of course!” They handed the hatchling the little slip of paper. 

“Gabbro found a statue similar to this one on an island on Giant’s Deep. This one just opened its eyes and I’m going over it, but Gabbro isn’t going to inspect the other statue anytime soon. Could you?”

“Absolutely! I’m running up to the Attlerock first, to make sure Slate didn’t add anything too dangerous to the ship, and then I’ll head to Giant’s Deep! Meet with Gabbro, then go find this island.”

“Safe travels!” Hornfels turned back to the statue, pretending not to notice Hal and Potch hugging before the traveler took off. 

Then their brain kicked back into gear, and they turned the radio back on. “Gabbro, still there?” Hal had followed Potch outside, to watch the launch. 

“Still here, Hornfels.”

“Potch launched for the first time when the statue opened its eyes. And they just ran up here acting like it was their first launch again.”

“Huh. So, like, we’re in some kinda time weirdness? Like it reset itself.”

“This was because of the statues, yes? It must have been, everything was normal until they both opened their eyes.” 

“That’s what makes the most sense right now.” Silence for a moment, before Gabbro crackled back over the radio. “So this is probably a Nomai thing.”

“Well, yes… unless you believe there is another alien race in this system planting Nomai statues and operating a time loop that only targeted the two of us.”

“Eh, gotta go where the findings lead you. The statues that look like Nomai causing a time loop probably means the Nomai had something and a rock fell and turned it on suddenly or something.” 

Hornfels heard the sound of thrusters coming through Gabbro’s end. “Is that Potch?”

“Yeah. I’ll send them along to Statue island so they can pick the rock up and turn this off, don’t worry.” And their radio clicked off. 

Gabbro had sent Potch along to Statue island several times, and been sent by Hornfels several times, with nothing to show- they appeared to die every twenty two minutes according to three separate clocks Hornfels was keeping eyes on- so Gabbro had finally gotten up to go look at the island again as Hornfels hooked every piece of available scanning technology to cover the statue in the museum in case there was an interesting change this time. They’d brought the radio downstairs with them, in case Gabbro had more thoughts, but now was wishing they’d remembered their flute sitting above the computer bank.

They were about to grab it when the radio clicked to frequency four automatically.

“Hey, Hornfels.”
“Gabbro, what have you found?” Gabbro was the only other person retaining memories, that much they were fairly certain of. 

“Potch found a way inside the Statue island that I hadn’t found yet, and, there’s another statue in there.”

“Oh, eyes open or closed?”

“Well, they were closed, and then Potch got near it and it swung around and opened them. I saw that through the grate on the ceiling.”

“So it is possible they’ll remember as well now?”

“I’ll- heyo, hatchling!” Hornfels barely heard to the muffled call back. “Hey if you remember this when you wake up, go talk to Hornfels!” More muffled discussion. “Yeah, we’ve been kinda dying repeatedly, and, I didn’t think that’d happen when you got close to it ‘cause I didn’t realize you could get in there.” That sounded a little like yelling. “Yeah, I’m not sure what’s killing us. Something gets hot and everything goes white. Hornfels said the village never sees it, just a flash of blue sometimes.” They continued at a much more normal noise level. “Sorry Hornfels, I think they’re making their way back up here.”

“Excited to not be the only person I can call on to do any work?”

“Yeah. I’m missing some serious napping and thinking time.” 

Their were the sounds of a jetpack, but, Hornfels glanced outside and saw the flash of blue. Twenty two minutes, right on time.

Potch ran up to the museum; they almost beat Hornfels to the statue. “Gabbro said to come talk to you. What’s going on?”

“We appear to be in a time loop, caused by these statues. We are not sure what is causing it, but, this is undeniably Nomaiin in origin, due to these statues seeming to be the catalyst!” 

“The statues are causing it?”

“Well… we’re not sure, but, since no one else seems to remember and you are now remembering after making contact with a statue last loop, it appears very likely. There has been the same event heralding the reset- a boom, everything goes dark, a flash of blue light, then everything goes very hot and white.”

“Hm.” Potch looked at them, at the statue, one hand playing with their lower eyes set of goggles around their neck. “I’ll keep eyes out as I’m traveling, since we don’t know what started or will end this.”

“Hornfels it’s a supernova!”

“It’s- what?”

“The sun is going supernova. The statues activating makes it seem like they’re a contingency plan for something, so I need to keep looking, but if the supernova turned it all on, and you and Gabbro think this is Nomaiin, maybe they had a thing to prompt a supernova and turning it off will stop the time loops!”

“Wonderful!” Their own sun going supernova was terrifying but easily pushed aside in favor of Potch’s optimism. “I’ll help, as much as I’m able, and you have Gabbro, too. You get a first launch for the history books, eh?”

“Stars yeah!” And Potch took off again. 

Hornfels usually ended up standing in front of the Nomai statue these loops, either inspecting it yet again or playing their own flute while Hal gave them weird looks between marveling at it. Well, their statue, as they’d come to think of it- the reason they were remembering what was going on. 

Potch would launch within seconds of the loop starting and sometime near the end Hornfels usually got a radio update of what they had found. 

Most loops. Hornfels tried not to think about the loops they didn’t hear back from the astronaut.

Gabbro would radio in as well, periodically, but they weren’t off investigating. That was normal, for them; part of why Gossan had agreed to train them was because they were a solid, easy to find foil to Feldspar’s mad sprints around the system, rarely on the same planet more than a week and always flying home on the very last fumes of rocket fuel. 

There was the supernova, the flash of blue lighting up the Attlerock… and Esker, Hornfels remembered with a flash of guilt, they should check in next loop. 

No Potch radioing in this time, but, they were probably fine. Gossan had trained them, just like everyone else, and, none of the other travelers had died, not even Feldspar, Hornfels was sure of it.

Potch sprinted up to the observatory and slid across the polished wood in their socks, panting, as Hornfels waited for them to catch their breath.

“I got into the Southern Observatory! Sorry I didn’t radio, I was there all last loop!”

“Oh? What did you find.” Hal was giving them both a weird look, but, Hornfels pushed down the part of their brain that insisted they had to explain. 

“They made it to look for the Eye of the universe! Same as the locator on the Attlerock. Neither of them worked, but, they figured something else out- something about findings from the White Hole Station and the High Energy Lab!”

“The White Hole Station you found-”

“That’s a return if you fall through the black hole, yeah. High Energy Lab sounds like it’s on Ember Twin though, so, that’s next. Not this loop, this loop I’m going back to the Hanging City, but next loop I’ll head that way.”

“Good. What is this Eye of the universe that they made two locators to look for it?”

“I’m still finding that out! Hopefully I’ll find more information on the Twins.”

“Wonderful! Keep me updated.” Potch grinned and left, one pair of goggles secure on their forehead but the smaller pair being shaken around on their neck.

“...What?” Right. Hornfels turned to Hal, looking from them to the receding form of their best friend. “They haven’t launched yet, but-”

“It’s fine, Hal, just an experiment we got drawn up into.” 

Hal looked from them to the statue and back out, obviously not pacified but also not willing to keep arguing.

“Hornfels!” They turned- Potch hadn’t radioed in again last loop, but, here they were, brimming with excitement. 

“Did you find the lab?”

“Almost! There’s an entire other city! Under the crust of Ember Twin! The Nomai called it the Sunless City, and, it’s not as big as the Hanging City but it’s in a huge cavern.”

“Another Nomai city? That’s incredible! What are the similarities between it and the Hanging City? The differences?”

“They both have districts but where the Hanging City is pretty horizontal and everything stacked on top of each other, the Sunless City has each district vertical and lined up next to each other, though they do kinda climb up above each other. Different districts too, it has the High Energy Lab trailhead- I’m headed there, next loop- Stepping Stone, Anglerfish Overlook, and, it also has an Eye Shrine! But theirs is all, it’s more practical questions- where did the Eye come from, why did the signal stop, not the Hanging City’s ‘how old is the Eye? What could it be.’” Potch beamed as Hornfels nodded, turning over the new information. 

“The Sunless City Nomai must have been of a stronger analytical mindset, versus the Hanging City’s Nomai more poetic thoughts.” 

“Like you versus Gabbro!” Hornfels frowned at the hatchling, still grinning but now their eyes were crinkled with mischief; Hal snorted a laugh from their forgotten spot, which didn’t help.

“Sure. How about, you look into the quantum optical illusions, while you’re out? So maybe we can finally put that debate to rest.”

“I’ll add it to the to-do list, Hornfels.” And Potch took off again.

A radio a few loops back- Potch was getting worse about checking in, but, they were guaranteed to be alive and even if they were lost, they would be found again in under half an hour- had illuminated the High Energy Lab, and added warp travel to the list of the Nomai’s accomplishments; and the time loop appeared to be geared towards the Nomai’s search for the Eye, but, all three Hearthians in the time loop were still in the dark over why it had turned on now, when the Nomai had been dead for probably centuries. 

But Potch was looking, and occasionally they’d hear a radio from Gabbro, getting off Giant’s Deep to investigate something Potch must have flown over to tell them about. 

And there was Potch, walking slowly up to the museum. That was… uncharacteristic of them. Hornfels walked outside to meet them.

“Sorry, I, I had to tell, Slate and Gossan too, and, stars I gotta tell Esker, just-”

“What did you find, that you’re hunting down us older folk?” Something in their chest squeezed, and Hornfels did their best to temper their foolish optimism- It wasn’t, the one thing they were still clinging to hope to hear-

Potch looked them directly in the eyes. “Feldspar.” 

Hornfels gripped the back of the pilot’s seat, white knuckled hands hidden by Gabbro’s decades old practice suit. They’d sworn they’d never get back into one of Slate’s contraptions after the prank, and here they were, watching the fast approaching tangle of ice and vines.

“They’re still alive,” Potch had said, last loop. “Still alive, crashed in the middle of Dark Bramble. I’ve been able to hear their harmonica, but, the Sunless City had notes about an anglerfish skeleton, and the Nomai were fairly certain that they’re blind, so I thought I should be able to cruise right through if I don’t make any sound, and it worked, and I talked to Feldspar last loop.”

And there was only one possible response from Hornfels, knowing Gossan would never make it to Feldspar and back in the time provided by the loops. “Take me there.”

And now here they were, in a practice suit never intended for space, a helmet that would block most of the sounds around them resting at their feet, as the little ship slid into a foreboding, fog leaking opening and then mist surrounded it. A few lights appeared, off in the distance, and Potch locked their signalscope into place outside the ship.

The harmonica- the sound the traveler’s song outside was missing, the first companion to Esker’s whistling- flooded the cabin. 

Potch had the ship angled towards a glowing light, and clicked the signalscope off.

“Stay quiet for a minute, we’re passing under an anglerfish and it’s a fast death but that doesn’t mean it’s pleasant.” Hornfels nodded, then frowned when the implications of that sentence caught up to them. 

But Potch put a finger to their lips when Hornfels leaned down, and they could only nod, and wait, and realize the deep sound that had crept up in the edge of their hearing, steadily growing louder, was breathing.

Louder and louder, until it rattled the ship, and a point of light above them transformed from a gentle glow to the illumination of a monster. Tiny, white eyes, and an open mouth larger than the ship, lined with teeth longer than any Hearthian was tall. 

And then it faded again, and the breathing receded, and Potch gently tapped the controls the bare minimum needed to move forward, and turned the signalscope back on in the same motion.

Forward until the glow they aimed at became another node, and Hornfels finally felt safe enough to talk again.

“Potch, you’ve died investigating in here?”

“...Well, yeah. Time loop, that is not ending on its own, so, the first time I decided to see if I could sprint through here after the harmonica. And it didn’t work out, so, I wasn't going to try again unless I could make a better plan, and the Sunless City had the information I needed. Made sure it worked, then found Feldspar.”

“It’s your first loop, and-”

“And I’d rather I died knowing I’d come back instead of let Gossan die trying to find Feldspar after I turn this all off.” They nodded, focusing on flying- through another node, then, focusing that way- and Hornfels scowled.

“Alright, fair, but if you’re in the same position again, please get Gabbro before you do anything risky.”

“Heard and acknowledged, Hornfels. I’ll talk to them first.” They pointed forward before Hornfels could follow that sentence.

In front of them, was another anglerfish. A bigger one. And, white…?

No, dead. A skeleton, but the lure was still glowing, that was incredibly interesting.
And in its gaping mouth, like a second row of teeth, stood trees. Not as tall or as strong as they should be, but, it was a little oasis in the center of this awful planet.
And a campfire burned in the center, and the harmonica played. 

Potch carefully brought the ship to a tenuous landing on the skull of the anglerfish, then unbuckled themself and clicked their helmet into place. 

Hornfels attached their helmet, careful to be certain it was attached- with how old this practice suit was, there was always a risk it wasn’t airtight anymore- and knelt next to Potch as they popped the hatch and dropped out. 

They grabbed Hornfels’ arm as Hornfels followed, and carefully tapped their jetpack, moving both of them to touch down lightly on the skeletal mouth and walk forward until the little gravity crystal hammered into place a little too close to a tree caught them. 

Potch started signing a hello before they were fully down, promoting Feldspar- they’d probably already started talking, not that Hornfels could hear it- to sign. 

“Whoa, where’d you come from? No one’s been here in… ever, actually. That makes you two the second and third Hearthians in Dark Bramble- after me, of course!” Just like they had been, Feldspar waved from their spot next to their little campfire. “Is that Potch under that helmet? I musta been out here a long time if you trained and launched! And, you’re not Gabbro in that old suit, are you-?”

“Feldspar!” Hornfels pulled the helmet back off, and Feldspar roared a laugh and dragged themself upright before Hornfels picked them up off their feet in a hug.

“Here I was thinking when you said you’re never getting in a ship again you meant it!” Hornfels sucked in a breath, realizing that just because they could take the helmet off here did not make it a good decision. 

“I did mean it! Right until Potch-” Telling Feldspar , stuck in Dark Bramble, without a functional ship, about the time loop… was almost as bad of an idea as when they’d explained their theory about the mysterious other species on Timber Hearth must have more artifacts on other planets. 

“Potch found me? Lookit you, launched… I hope recently, and you’re already exploring in here!” Feldspar was put back on their feet, but, Hornfels knew them- they were excited and going to be high energy until they poked enough holes in the nonexistent explanation of what happened.

“First launch, technically, though I’ve been home a few times to share exciting finds.” Potch had sat down next to the campfire, helmet carefully placed next to them, and pulled a can of marshmallows out of their kit. 

“Like what, hatchling? Are you trying to upstage me?”  

“The Sunless City is probably the most important thing so far.” Potch chose to toast a marshmallow as Hornfels settled next to the campfire and Feldspar. 

“The what now?”

“Sunless City. It’s where the Nomai who crashed on Ember Twin lived. There’s tunnels and cave systems under the crust, and they either found or hollowed out a large enough cavern to have a city. It’s not as large as the Hanging City, and it’s vertical and built into the walls rather than horizontal and. Well. Hanging. But it solves the issue of ‘why is there a Nomai crash here, where did they go?’” 

“The Sunless City. Of course there’s another city on the one pair of planets I didn’t want to go poking around.” Feldspar pulled their helmet off, and reached for Potch’s marshmallow can. “Actually, hatchling, I wanna hear all your stories, but, can I ask you to get a few more cans of these? I ran out real early.” 

Potch snorted, but clicked their helmet back on, backed away from the campfire and hit the jetpack. 

And Feldspar was tugging at Hornfels’ sleeve. “Where’s Gossan.” Hornfels blinked, off guard- Feldspar’s upper left eye was half shut and dilated in a way it never had been, matching the cracks across their helmet. “Gossan? Why are they not here.”

“Gossan- Gossan is- they’re back on Timber Hearth, why-”

“I’ve been out here with a busted ship for, Hearth I’m not actually sure how long, and they’re not the pilot who comes to get me? What happened? Are they just stuck in a bed right now or for the last few years or are they-”

“Gossan’s fine, they’re… well.” This was not a lie Hornfels wanted to tell them…

They could just omit the truth a little.

“Well?”

“One of Slate’s engines exploded. A few y-months ago. Slate’s fine, Gossan pushed them out of the way, just-”

“What happened to Gossan.”

“Their upper left eye is gone. They’re awake and doing fine, Gneiss is just forcing them to take it easy for a while.” Feldspar blinked, and went from staring at Hornfels to staring at the fire like they’d find a different, better answer in it.

And Potch dropped back down from their ship, both arms full of marshmallow cans. 

“Rutile is gonna throw a fit that I’m back needing a resupply so soon.” 

“That’s fine, we’ll be flying back with Feldspar.” Hornfels did not miss the glance, before Feldspar was staring back at the fire. 

Potch knelt to carefully stack the cans where everyone could reach before going back to their original can, and by their look it was clear they were waiting for their other cans to be eaten. 

Hornfels reached forward for one when Feldspar seemed to wake back up.

“Sorry for sending you after those, but, you two flew in here to drag me out, right? We should go.” 

“Right.” Hornfels grabbed all the cans as Feldspar put their helmet back on and started grabbing what they wanted to keep from the camp.

“Uh, what happened.” Potch had grabbed Hornfels’ elbow, keeping their voice as quiet as possible. 

“They asked about Gossan.”

“Oh.” Potch wrapped an arm around Hornfels and flew them both up to their ship, waving Hornfels inside first. 

Feldspar pulled themself inside before Potch had settled in the pilot’s seat and sat next to Hornfels rather than hover over Potch’s shoulder. 

“Gossan’s still on bed rest?”

“Y-yes.”

“I should be back before they’re up, then. One less thing for them to worry about.” Hornfels saw Potch glance back, but, they were good at playing along once they knew what was going on.

Hornfels settled against the uncomfortable shelving in the ship while Feldspar shifted, obviously torn between ‘sit next to a dear friend in silence’ and ‘move’.  

They found a middle ground and got up suddenly to poke at the computer in the back that held a chip off Hornfels’ statue. 

…was that updating knowledge like the main statues were? 

Hornfels looked forwards- Potch flew out through a difficult to see opening, and was quickly outside the bramble, so much faster than entering had been- and back at Feldspar, now leaning over and reading like it was someone else’s account of a planet. 

“Are we heading straight to Timber Hearth? Or to the Attlerock to give Feldspar some time to acclimate?” The look Hornfels got indicated this was the new plan Potch settled on. 

“Attlerock, with Esker, for now-“

“Everything in your notes is true, isn’t it.” The flat statement from Feldspar jarred Hornfels more than anything else they could have done. 

“Wha-“

“That sun isn’t normal. The stars are gone. Potch’s notes are all about a time loop and supernova and Nomai things.” Potch took their hands off the controls, twisting in their seat, not concerned that Feldspar knew.

“Yeah, everything’s like that. Right now. Me and Hornfels are in a time loop.” Hornfels breathed in, and sighed. They’d known on some level Feldspar would figure it out; if not now, then when they landed on Timber Hearth.

“Is Gossan still-“

“They were injured, but it was near the beginning of Potch’s training. They’ve healed. But it was a more believable reason than ‘they’re not in the time loop.” 

“Can I-“

“I doubt it’s a good idea.” Potch was fiddling with their mirliton, looking at the older two. “I’d have to come get you, since your ship is busted. Or let you do nothing for a loop but knowing it’s a loop. Hornfels can’t fly anything- they wouldn’t get in the ship til I told them I found you- and right, Gabbro's in it, but, their ship is in the ocean on Giant’s Deep… somewhere. They can get to it and it’ll fly but it’s just more time we don’t have.”

“Once Potch can turn the time loop off, we will come get you. If I have to drag Gossan back onto a ship and threaten to fly to you myself.” Feldspar snorted a laugh, much more themself, and dragged Hornfels up into a hug. 

Then reached over and pulled Potch half off their seat into the hug.

“I guess I’ll see both of you in a few minutes, then. Potch, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do! Hornfels, if they get you flying, anywhere you wanna see I’ll take you along after.” The flash of blue; they were above the system but had floated past Giant’s Deep’s orbit. 

“We’ll see you soon.” Here it came-

Hornfels had been, not pacing, but barely able to stay still, for the last few loops after Potch took them to Feldspar, knowing one of the oldest friends was alive and they could find them and have them home in under twenty minutes. 

Not yet, not until the time loop was well and truly done. And for that Potch- and to a much lesser extent, Gabbro- needed to be out looking and not flying Hornfels in to see Feldspar.

It was better this way, they knew that, better to let Feldspar unknowingly experience the exact same twenty two minutes repeated in the time loop, and not have conversations Hornfels would remember and Feldspar wouldn’t. 

Potch appeared at the top of the ramp- Hornfels hadn’t even heard them- and dragged them over to one of the computers.

Potch pulled a memory chip out of their helmet, slid it into the jerry-rigged port set up for their chips, and pulled up an image.

“Those look like… not Nomai numbers, but, I’m assuming it must be Nomai?”

“Coordinates.” Hornfels looked at them for a moment, then realized.

“To the Eye?”

“To the Eye. The time loop turned on when they found it.”

“So it’s not a failsafe, it was designed as part of a search?”

“I am nearly totally certain they set up the supernova as a part of this search. Anyone’s guess why it started now, but, if it started, it can be stopped.” Hornfels nodded, still looking at the symbols.

“It’s a pity we don’t have a frame of reference for where this is, to determine if we had a ship that could handle traveling to it. To actually go to this Eye the Nomai were looking for…” Potch suddenly started clicking through pictures.

“So, actually, a few loops back, I found… this, in Dark Bramble.” Hornfels blinked a few times, and frowned.

“Is that a ship?”

“It’s the Nomai’s Vessel, what brought them here, and what got broken in Dark Bramble when they warped here. I… think, despite how broken up it is, it might just need a better power source?”

“Are you planning on reverse engineering the Nomai’s power source for a ship capable of warp travel?”

“No, that’s outside my abilities right now, I’d need Slate’s help. But some of the Nomai talking about their search for the Eye were debating getting the Vessel’s power source to base the new one on. They decided not to, but, they’re still basing the Ash Twin Project’s power source on it.”

“The Ash Twin Project?”

“It’s tied up in the search for the Eye, and it’s where the power source for everything is. I think the thing starting the supernova is in it, but I need to think more about where it could be since Ash Twin is pretty barren, or, there’s a Sun Station that could also be the controls, but I haven’t found a good way to that yet, either.” 

Hornfels nodded, turning the flood of new information over in their mind. There was one good thread to ask about. 

“So, you’re thinking, with the coordinates, if you find the power source, you could go to the Eye using this Vessel?”

“...well, yeah. Eventually. We’d need to fully plan out that trip, who’s coming because Gossan wouldn’t let me to take off alone on a probably trip of this magnitude, and Feldspar would come if they had to stow away on the ship. But! We have to deal with the time loop first. And I have a lot of other things I’m looking at that I’d like to finish up before I do turn this off. I’d honestly like a catalog of the most dangerous things in the system, the ones Feldspar hadn’t found yet, for Gossan and any future astronaut’s references!”

“That’s a wonderful idea, Potch. And you’re in a unique position to gather the data! But do get Gabbro or I before you do anything too reckless, please.”

“Hornfels, you know me. I don’t do anything reckless without a good, solid plan.” They retrieved the memory chip and started hurrying down the ramp.

“That’s not what I asked, Potch!” They heard a laughed “Okay!” as the astronaut left. 

Potch sprinted up the ramp to the observatory before Hornfels had a chance to decide if they were playing their flute this loop or staring uselessly at the Nomai statue.

“Oh? What did you find that you’re this excited?”

“I landed on the Interloper the loop before last and got inside.”

“Inside?”

“It’s full of tunnels and ice and ghost matter. I managed to get past everything- without getting hurt, Hornfels, don’t give me that look- and a pair of Nomai had ventured inside. Their bodies are near the center. There was a sphere that was under immense pressure, and the pressure grew as it got nearer to our sun, until it burst.”

“And it was ghost matter inside the sphere?”

“Yeah. That’s what killed them. Not us, because we were still aquatic.”

“But that explains why every life form on Timber Hearth is aquatic at some stage of its life but so many fossils appear to not have been.” Hornfels looked near the computer bank without seeing it. “So much life lost, both here, and the Nomai. I wonder what else across the system lived here…”
“I did tell Riebeck.”

“Only the most important person to tell, thank you.”

“And now I’m gonna go back to digging around. Maybe look at some Timber Hearth ruins for a bit as a change.” 

Hornfels heard the radio crackle on- maybe Gabbro, they were out exploring a little, sometimes.

“Hornfels!” Nope, Potch, like normal.

“Potch, what did you find?”

“There’s a space ship!” Hornfels blinked, turning that sentence over like they were turning their flute over in their hands, and looked at the radio. They hadn’t bothered to go down to the statue this loop. 

“A space ship?”

“It’s not Nomai! It was cloaked! The glitch in the telescope with the black spot on the picture, it was this! You can only see it when the sun’s behind it! It’s a huge circle thing, and I saw other ships inside!” 

“...A space ship, that isn’t Nomai in origin, that’s been here for… at least the last few months.” When had they gotten the telescope finally launched and stabilized and sending pictures back? “How much have you explored?”

“None of it! Couldn’t radio from inside the cloak! I’m going in to look at it right now, but, I needed to let you know!” 

“...Next loop, can-”

“I’ll bring you! Can you radio Gabbro and tell them, I bet they want to know too!”

“Yes.” And the radio clicked off. Hornfels fiddled with it for a second- Potch was channel seven, Gabbro was channel four- and took a breath, the implications only now hitting them. There was another species in the solar system! A space ship couldn’t just fly itself here, no matter Slate’s thoughts on the hatchling autopilot they’d set up in Potch’s ship. “Gabbro, come in.”

“Hey, Hornfels. Just practicing playing this loop.”

“Potch looked into the glitch with the deep space telescope-”

“It wasn’t a glitch, I didn’t find anything.”

“It wasn’t! It’s a space ship, they said they can only see it when the sun is behind it.” 

“A space ship?” Gabbro whistled. “Huh, that’s a big thing for me to miss. Potch is up there exploring right now, aren’t they?”

“Yes, they are. I’m tagging along next loop, I need to see this.” A pause, then, Gabbro chuckled. “What?”

“You went from ‘I’m never getting in a ship again’ to forcing the hatchling to give you a ride whenever they find something big, huh?”

“That’s… Gabbro, this is huge! We had no idea it was here! Of course I want to go see it-”

“And their ship is safer than Feldspar’s or Gossan’s or mine.”

“...Well, yes, that too. Their ship is a lot more trustworthy than anything I’ve ever known Feldspar to fly. And it’s not covered in mold like your ship is.” 

“Hey- no, that’s fair. Can’t keep it dry for anything between the rain and the cyclones.”

“It is on your island right now, yes?”

“...It’s certainly somewhere!” 

“Gabbro.”

“Relax, Hornfels, it’s… it’s not two hundred meters away, it’s a little north of me. I tried to anchor it to the island once and a cyclone ripped the landing gear off of it. Letting it swim a little is a lot better for it, trust me. I’ll see you next loop, just don’t let Potch get somewhere I can’t see them til I’m launched.” 

Hornfels looked from the vague direction of Giant’s Deep, to the sun. To the black circle that was maybe half covering the sun.

And back out into space, and there, finally was a nearby moving object.

“There’s Gabbro.” 

“Right on time.” Potch grinned, waiting for the other ship to get a little closer, then shot forward towards the black circle eclipsing part of the sun. “It’s gonna be a lot faster to go in through the front in the future, which, I did go back and check there is a hanger on the other side, but, you two get to fly in the same way that I did, last loop.” They frowned, just for a moment. “Then, uh, I think we gotta head for high ground. Not sure if I did something or not but there was a little bit of an, uh, issue.”

“What kind of issue?” The circle had almost fully covered the sun… 

“There’s… actually, no, as much as I want to explain, you gotta see the inside of it first to really understand, it’s nothing that’ll get us yet.” The entire view in front of them was black, and then, they entered the cloak.

In front of them, filling their entire view, was a metal space ship. Circular, with soft green lights spaced around it. And a hanger, a brighter green, along the edge, rotating slowly. 

Potch aimed for it, landed carefully in the center, and dropped out before Hornfels did. Gabbro had followed, landing as Potch dropped out, and joined Hornfels in looking around. 

Gabbro started to say something, judging by how Potch turned towards them, before realizing Hornfels was in the practice suit and couldn’t hear them and switching to signing. “Time buddy, this is something else.” 

“I’m calling it the Stranger.” The exaggerated rise and fall of their shoulders was obviously a heavy sigh from Gabbro as Hornfels turned and walked close to one of their smaller ships, careful to keep eyes on the younger two. The cockpit sat on the top, much like Riebeck’s ship, but the probable hatch wouldn’t open to a curious hand…

“Of course you are.”

“I found it, I get to name it until we translate their writing.”

“Or ask them?” Right, there had to be aliens here- Hornfels looked back down to see Potch start and stop several sentences.

“Uh.” And it was enough for Hornfels to step back in.

“Potch?”

“They’re, well, I don’t think any of them are, still alive. But! We should get inside so you two can see what I mean.” Hornfels and Gabbro glanced at each other as they followed the new astronaut up a set of stairs towards the inside of the craft. 

And down into a little room, with bands across the walls and a statue with four outward pointing limbs. 

Potch checked that both of them were inside, and turned their flashlight on, pointed at the statue. It lit up, green like the outside of the ship, and the bands began to spin along the wall at different speeds. Potch clicked their light off, and they settled and a door in front of the Hearthians opened. 

A quick glance showed the door they’d entered through closed and covered.

“All that for a little dark room?”

“We’re almost there.” 

“It smells like water in here.” Hornfels stopped, looking at Gabbro.

“You shouldn’t be able to smell that through your suit.”

“It’s not, like, I can smell smell it. It’s more of a, like, vibe. This is another water place like Giant’s Deep.” 

Hornfels tried several sentences- Like the ‘quantum’ rocks? Do they need to talk to Gneiss or Gossan? Should they be cleared to launch right now?- and was pulled forward by Potch.

“I heard a mechanical thing and I think I heard it last loop so we’re going now. Hold onto… something.” All three were standing on a square, carved and decorated, with a pillar topped with an orb at each corner. Potch reached out to click a gear set to one side-

And the square dropped, and landed in a river. 

Hornfels looked around, mouth open, ignoring the splash that was Gabbro falling into the river. Above their head the river arced, landmasses along the sides of the space ship, rapids and other buildings visible along its length, leading back to…

“Potch, is that dam going to break?” Hornfels had to grab Potch’s shoulder, and they glanced over to see the signing as they dragged Gabbro back onto the raft.

“Yep. Probably. So, uh, we gotta get moving… I didn’t go this way last loop so we’re gonna go see how this area fairs.” Potch was shoving the flashlight between their arm and side when they needed to sign- despite the oxygen tanks all refilling, no one wanted to test if the air was breathable without being scrubbed by the oxygen tanks. 

Potch navigated the raft around a waiting boardwalk that had a raft shaped hole sitting in the center and out, to the rest of the river. “There’s a tower thing I wanted to look at last loop out here.” They focused on the river- there were rapids between these two areas- as Hornfels looked at what buildings they could see in the area they were passing. 

“If I’d stuck with the telescope a little longer maybe I’d have found this.” Gabbro waited until Hornfels was looking to sign.

“If you’d fully investigated it like you told me you were going to, maybe.”

“Hey, I did! Nothing out of focus, nothing on fire, no issues. This,” Gabbro waved their hand as they passed under a rock arch and the river calmed. “This isn’t a telescope issue!” 

“No, it’s not. But Potch found it.” They sailed under another waiting boardwalk, and chains reached down to winch the raft up. Potch walked off, looking around, continuing to ignore the argument as they turned back to sign.

“So, I haven’t been in this area yet, but, looking at the dam over there, we probably don’t have a long time to explore. That building set into the cliff is probably going to be the safest place to be? But I want to look at the tower first, and next loop I’ll go through everything else.” 

“That sounds reasonable.” Hornfels watched as Potch quickly looked around- planning a route, knowing them- and used their jetpack to climb onto a roof, and ran along it, jumping to another before landing in front of the tower. 

“I don’t have one of those, so, I’ll be walking.”

“That’s too much work. We’ll catch up to them eventually.” Gabbro followed as Hornfels started picking out a path through the buildings, pausing to look at portraits and other artifacts. The aliens had been feathered, with horns similar to a Nomai’s but wilder looking. And they’d been big, the chairs and cups scattered around were clearly made to accommodate someone even larger than a Nomai, who were already tall compared to most Hearthians. 

Potch was still inside the tower as Hornfels and Gabbro walked up and looked inside. 

Five murals were painted, set into the walls, with a small sill in front of each that Potch was standing on, to the right of center. Hornfels walked closer. 

One of the inhabitants, poling a raft along a river, surrounded by dark green trees like the living counterparts to the trees they’d seen outside. And up in the dark sky, a blue-green planet with huge rings and a swirling atmosphere like Giant’s Deep. 

“This… I mean, this had to be from outside of our system, but…”

“I think they were nearby? The first area had a slide reel showing them finding the Eye, and a bunch of burned slides, and then it showed them coming over here and the system they were in didn’t look too far away.” Hornfels frowned at Potch, but glanced quickly to see if Gabbro was watching before asking.

“Burned slides?”

“Yeah, it’s all a ton of slide reels, but, the building only had like, two, and a bunch of empty spots. And both of them had slides that had been burned out.” There was an echoing crack that even made it through Hornfel’s helmet, and Potch jumped. “And that was the dam, so, we should move-”

“If the tower doesn’t fall, it might be safer to stay here.” 

“Well, it doesn’t fall yet, so we should be okay-” A roar, and the entire tower lurched to the side, sending Hornfels and Potch sliding as Gabbro tripped. 

They waited as the roar of water faded, and Hornfels glanced outside before turning to the younger two. “The entire area is covered in water. The upper floor of the building in the cliff is not, but I’ll have to swim over there.” Potch and Gabbro were both right behind them, and Potch shoved one of the lanterns into their hands. 

Hornfels heard them say something, faintly, through the helmet.

“What- Potch-” Each astronaut grabbed an arm and took off before Hornfels could register the plan.

Potch was in front, slightly, Gabbro behind, pulling Hornfels to look downriver as they jumped from rooftop to patch of debris, jetpacks not firing anywhere close enough to ‘in unison’ for Hornfels’ peace of mind about ending this trip with both arms still in their sockets. 

A final jarring jump landed all three of them on the upper porch of the painted building; Potch took the lantern back from Hornfels as they rubbed their shoulders to make sure everything was where it was supposed to be. 

“Neither of you ever do that again.” At least it didn’t hurt to sign.

“You’re here in one piece! It’s fine.” Potch took the lantern and put their other hand on Hornfels’ back to pull them inside before interrupting themself to keep signing. “So, this is another slide reel building, the painting on the outside looks the same as the first area’s. I’m calling that the lowlands, by the way, this can be the isles. So, there’s… yeah, we put this lantern in here-” Potch slotted it into a pillar, on the upper floor of a large room, and the light in the roof dimmed as a bright white circle was projected onto a white screen on the far side of the room- “and there are stairs down there that I’m hoping have more slides! Give me just a second.” They jumped the railing, sending up a small splash of water, and vanished under the surface down a staircase. 

Hornfels sighed and turned to Gabbro as Potch left.

“I wonder if we can ever get Riebeck out here.” Gabbro snorted. 

“It’s a huge self contained ruin. The question is can we ever get them to leave once we tell them about it.”

“They have to see all the Nomai stuff they want to see first.”

Potch splashed back up the stairs, carrying an end to the conversation and two slide reels. They handed both to Gabbro before they started signing.

“This one looks shorter, the other one is maybe a continuation of the last area’s ’why did we come here’ story.”

“Shorter one first.” Gabbro saw Hornfels standing next to the pillar holding the lantern, clicked the short one in place, handed Hornfels the second reel, and walked over to climb up into an abandoned chair, cushion almost disintegrating under them. 

Potch was already starting to click through the slides. There were s ymbols Hornfels didn’t quite catch, three along the sides but one highlighted in the center, in green- a circle with circles inside it.

Then dark, and one of the… inhabitants approached, it cut to a view of some hollow object, then to a tall almost cylinder with one glowing green symbol near the top; a second symbol formed underneath it.

Then back to the start; the other symbols along the sides had different amounts of circles in them, starting from different points. 

Potch turned to look up at Hornfels. “I’m wondering if these are numbers, like how the Nomai have those branched numbers.”

“A good hypothesis. Maybe we can find more writing and let Hal go through it?” Hornfels hadn’t meant it as a joke, but Potch was laughing.

“They won’t leave their house for months when we do, Tektite will have to call someone home to be a replacement tree keeper.” 

“Feldspar won’t be cleared to launch again for a while, they’d love something to do.” Hornfels pulled the reel out and replaced it.

This one Potch paused on the opening screen; four symbols, arcing around the border. At the top, a ringed planet with a tiny moon, then the highlighted center symbol, the Eye, but it wasn’t… it wasn’t the Nomai’s depiction, not entirely. It was less angular, there were curved branches in the complicated design.
Underneath, an almost half circle with bits sticking out at the top and right side, with possibly a flame inside of it? And to the left… an almost cylinder, surrounded by branches to make it look almost like a slitted eye. 

“Ready?”

“I find their similar but distinct design of the Eye very interesting. I wish we could ask them why… and the Nomai.” Potch turned towards Gabbro, and Hornfels twisted to see them signing.

“Fits the aesthetics.” Gabbro was probably grinning under their helmet. 

“-rather than wonder about hypotheticals.” Hornfels missed most of the sentence turning back, but it was easy enough to guess, especially as Potch began clicking through the slides.

The slide started with a… ship? It looked like the inside of a building, with huge windows like the outside of the Stranger, looking out at the Eye. One of the inhabitants approached it, holding a staff that scanned the Eye with green light, and closed their eyes, and saw the Eye turning red and turning first the inhabitant and the planets around the Eye into dust…

The dead inhabitant collapsed into a skeleton, and grass grew over their skull and something started to sprout from an eye socket.

And the inhabitant opened their eyes, and appeared to scream in the muffled quiet of Hornfels’ elderly helmet, and two fellows rushed to them, then, the despairing cry turned into a glare of purpose, and they burned a wooden building- maybe the one outside?- that had the Eye on it, then-

Burned slides. Potch flicked through them more quickly, then it cut to the solar system, and the Stranger flying into place, cloaked.
Potch went forward to the beginning slide, then clicked it back, and Hornfels walked down the stairs to join them standing in the few inches of water, inspecting the image.

Potch suddenly pointed, only signing after. “Look at this one, Hornfels.”

“Icy, but covered in vines. That may be the decisive proof Chert has been after to prove Dark Bramble used to be an icy planet.” 

“Before it turned into what it is.” Potch was nodding, then spun around suddenly.

Gabbro was still up on the second floor, but had pulled themself out of their slowly disintegrating chair and walked over to lean on the upper railing. They repeated their signing once both were looking at them. “Are we gonna talk about the red and everything collapsing to dust from them looking at the Eye?” 

“Eventually.” Potch splashed back a few steps to look up at them without the projector in their eyes. “I’d like more information before I decide they’re right, though.”

“I’m not sure if we’ll get more information without actually going to the Eye itself.” Hornfels mused, glancing back at the image. 

“Since I haven’t seen any bodies, I think something else happened here. Maybe the Eye, maybe not.” Everyone suddenly perked up; time. “I’ll be back and forth with looking through here and looking for Nomai things, so we can avoid another Feldspar situation once everything is back to normal.”

“Good plan. And you do have the time.” There… that should have been it, but no flash of white, no heat.

Hornfels froze, unable to move, and their vision went purple as they were called back.

Hornfels leaned against the computer array, playing their flute, just as they had last loop. They hadn’t for… quite a while, before the loops, but since Feldspar was going to be home in probably under an hour, ignoring the time loop, so they needed to start practicing again! 

Gossan and Slate would be able to pick up their instruments again when Feldspar was actually home- Gossan still played their guitar on quiet evenings, if Gneiss asked, but Slate’s drums were in a mostly ignored corner of their house, covered with a tarp and dust, waiting for a reason for Slate to use them.

There were footsteps racing up the ramp- Hornfels lowered their flute as Potch appeared, lower goggles swinging wildly around their neck and they skidded to a stop.

“What did you-”

“There’s a Nomai! On the Quantum Moon! Her name’s Solanum she has writing all around- well, on Brittle Hollow and Ember Twin- and she was probably on her pilgrimage and I told Riebeck-”

“A living Nomai?” Hornfels breathed out as Potch nodded. “On the Quantum Moon, which means you landed on it!” Hornfels braced themself on the computer as Potch nodded again, reaching up to stop their upper goggles from slipping. “Hearth, th-she? Might be the last living Nomai anywhere-”

“Oh, uh, no, I forgot to tell you with all the other Vessel stuff. It’s picking up conversations from current Nomai. Sorry, was kinda caught up in just finding it.”

“Current Nomai.”

“Yeah. Told Riebeck that too.” Potch shifted, watching Hornfels. “Do you wanna meet her? Solanum?” 

Hornfels opened their mouth for a ‘yes’ and paused, actually thinking the action through. 

“I… do you think she can leave the Quantum Moon?”

“I’m not sure. There’s a lot of tests I’d need to do first-”

“Potch.” 

“Do you have a better idea?”

“You could just take her off the moon, during the time loop that is  currently active.” 

Potch made a face. “But if she dies, I remember that forever.”

“...True. But if you can’t devise a suitable set of experiments it would be a surefire way to check.”

“That’ll be a last resort test, howabout. I’m certain I can figure out some good tests.”

“What else did you learn from meeting her? Besides the monumental knowledge that she exists.” 

“The Quantum Moon is theorized to be the Eye of the universe’s moon! Which, the surface is always covered by those clouds but the actual surface reflects what planet it’s currently orbiting- Timber Hearth had trees and geysers, the Twins had pouring sand, and the Eye was all blue and brown warped stone, like the shard in the courtyard! Solanum was on the south pole. And, there are rules to get in- you’ll land on the south pole, but you need to make your way to the north pole to get to the Eye. The Nomai had a shrine to help with that.”

“I hate that so many of Gabbro’s crackpot theories appear to be right.”

“They coulda gotten there themself if they applied themself more, I think, but I know they find it hard to get moving with no deadline.” 

“Back to Solanum.”

“Yeah?”

“If you do succeed at removing her from the Quantum Moon, what is your next step?”

“Bring her here. Which, she seems pretty stable up there so I don’t have to immediately, I have time to get Feldspar and talk to Rutile about setting something up for her. And talk Riebeck into coming with me, since they’ll never forgive me if I don’t.” 

“I can start thinking about how to approach Rutile.”

“Appreciated! I’m gonna try and poke around Brittle Hollow this loop, and maybe the Stranger next. Let me know if you want to come along for that.”

“I will let you know.”  

Hornfels shifted, eyeing the radio. Potch had mentioned maybe bringing them back to the Stranger, but, Potch had spent the last few loops in Brittle Hollow, and this loop had probably been spent similarly. This was when they usually radioed back in, at the end of a loop, but they may not have been able to reach their ship or radio.

It crackled on as Hornfels gave up and reached for their flute.

“Hornfels?”

“Potch! I was wondering if you would be radioing in this loop.” 

“I got into the Black Hole Forge, finally.”

“Good! How did you manage it?”

“There’s a warp pad on the ceiling of the Hanging City, where the forge docks. The other end of it is on Ash Twin, in one of the towers. I flew to Brittle Hollow, docked the forge, flew to Ash Twin, and took the warp there to the Black Hole Forge district. Before you ask, there are- the vertical hallways, with gravity flooring? Those exist, but they’re broken near the forge and unusable. Or, at least, this was easier.”

“What did you find?”

“It’s where they recreated warp travel! The advanced core was made there, too. And, I think the biggest piece of new information, they have a recording that told me how the paired tower on Ash Twin works!”

“Go on.”

“The warp pads are active for a few seconds when the connecting body is overhead, but, for the paired tower- the Hourglass Twins- their ‘overhead’ point is between them!”

“So the warp pad in the smaller tower you were looking at-”
“It’s almost definitely going to the Ash Twin Project!”

“Wonderful! That’s your next loop planned, then?”

“Almost! I’d like to spend a few loops looking through the Stranger, then the controls in the sun tower so I have that ready, then explore the Ash Twin Project and finish up with the Stranger before I fully turn everything off!”

“I’ll look forward to your update!”

The radio crackled on, clicking to channel seven automatically. 

“Hornfels?” The voice was staticy, threatening to lose connection with the radio.

“Potch? Where are you?”

“Just left the Stranger! It’s really far away from the solar system, I believe it’s an automatic system that moves it away from the supernova and the dam breaking is caused by that!” 

“And that’s probably why we weren’t ki- why we faded out aboard the Stranger.”

“Yes! But that’s not why I’m radioing.”

“What did you find?”

“I’m gonna show you next loop.”

Hornfels watched as the blank patch of space they now knew hid the Stranger grew closer. 

Gabbro hadn’t wanted to come along- as expected- so it was just them and Potch, who had been explaining at rapid fire speed since Hornfels was fully inside their ship. 

The inhabitants had, for a reason Potch was still searching for but was convinced it was related to why they had settled in this system after they found the Eye, created a dream world of their former home and were still inside of it. Their bodies were long, long dead- ‘I screamed like a hatchling, Hornfels, don’t tell Feldspar that-’ and hidden underneath the mural rooms like they had shown Hornfels and Gabbro, but the inhabitants were still alive inside the dream world. And they had all of the information that was hinted at by shelves and more empty shelves, in even further hidden archives, of which Potch had managed to find their way into one.

The inhabitants of the Stranger had created it to come to the Eye, and had completely razed their former home to build it. That had been information they had burned in the slide reel in the area that Potch had named the lowlands. 

And now they were seriously investigating the second area, named the isles, and wanted to show Hornfels… something they uncharacteristically were hesitant to reveal. 

They landed in a sunward facing hanger, waited until Hornfels had latched on their ancient helmet and dropped out. 

“We don’t have to be that fast, but, there’s a couple things I need to show you.” Potch signed easily before leading Hornfels into this hanger’s airlock and opening the door to the Stranger proper.

Hornfels looked around, taking in the dam that loomed over them, before a shout from Potch made it through their helmet. 

They were waving, holding a raft in the river. Hornfels climbed on as Potch pushed it into the current, though Potch didn’t climb on fully, choosing to prop themself up on their elbows to sign. 

“Stay put, I gotta grab what we need to go into their dream.” They pushed off, swam a little ways, then climbed up a stream that led under a building, tucked away in a corner with… 

Hornfels leaned forward, worried, recognizing the little blueish green crystals littering the ground around it as ghost matter. Potch splashed up the stream, then up into the building… somehow. There must have been a hole in the floor. 

And Hornfels lost sight of them, sailing past a building with antlers backlit by a green light above its doorway, like the tower with murals. 

Potch was on the far side of the building, two metal objects under an arm as they hit their jetpack to land perfectly on the raft. 

“Tektite had a theory that ghost matter is ineffective in water. Gabbro agreed with them though they never had an example when I asked.” 

“It is! I used the time loop to test that, waited for an island with ghost matter on Giant’s Deep to sink after a cyclone threw it and sprinted through a cave with ghost matter on it. And didn’t even get burned!“ Hornfels saw the happy look through their helmet before Potch saw their expression and kept signing. “I tested it a few times before I ran in, so I was fairly confident I would be fine.” They dug out their flashlight, putting the metal objects on the floor, and started directing the raft around the rapids.

“If there was no time loop you would give Feldspar a run for their money.” They shoved the flashlight into its holder, still on, to defend themself.

“Hey I plan a lot better than Feldspar does!”

“And you ran through a ghost matter patch anyway.” Hornfels was grinning as they signed back. 

Potch turned and very clearly focused on steering the raft where they wouldn’t see Hornfels sign. 

Hornfels used their focus as a reason to inspect the metal objects Potch had grabbed. Something felt familiar… They turned one over and the silhouette clicked- the third icon in the slide reels telling the story of what happened here.

There was a small jolt as they sailed under the same dock Potch had used the previous time they’d brought Hornfels here. Potch turned back as the raft was winched up to the boardwalk. “We’re heading up to the tower.” 

“Do these have some effect on the murals?” That got a series of facial expressions. “Potch?”

“No, removing the lanterns from the sill does. Just the one with the planet in the background. You’ll see.”

“Alright, since you’re suddenly uncharacteristically not wanting to explain.”

“Yeah, I don’t think I’ll do anything except badly prepare you.” Hornfels picked up their artifact and followed Potch up the various staircases and through long abandoned buildings to the tower.

They put their artifact down to move the lanterns, and Hornfels watched as the designated mural ground back, away from the rest of the room, revealing a walkway behind it.

Potch juggled their artifact and flashlight into good positions before jumping over the sill; Hornfels stepped over it and followed them around and down a set of stairs with a flickering green glow at the base.

They turned inside, Hornfels a step behind, then Hornfels froze.

All around the walls, skeletons, adorned in elderly but well made clothing and jewelry, antlers still affixed to skulls, each locked in place with a pair of restraints and clutching artifacts lit with flickering green flames, children of the larger flame Potch was sitting in front of.

“Well you didn’t scream, so, you’re doing better than I was.” They went to grab their artifact again after signing, but Hornfels had put theirs down to sign back.

“I am shocked you saw this and decided to fall asleep next to them.”

“Only way forward. Just shut your eyes and take a deep breath, I’ll wait in the room ‘til you’re there.” And just like that they were… probably asleep.

Well, Hornfels had taken notes from Gabbro for this kind of thing. They settled next to Potch, took a deep breath, and let the wrong colored fire lull them into sleep.

They blinked awake almost instantly, and jolted, looking around- the skeletons, the decay, were gone, and the room looked how it must have been soon after it was built. 

“Oh, good, there you are.” Potch was behind them, looking up the staircase. 

“Potch, why aren’t you wearing shoes.”

“They don’t come, which is incredibly irritating, the ground here can be wet. This way, it’s not far but I’m accounting for your ‘first time here’ sightseeing.”

“I heard those quotation marks.” Hornfels followed them up the stairs- Potch did something to their artifact to focus the light into something closer to a flashlight than the torch like effect they had- into a duplicate of the room in the Stranger, and… out…

Hornfels looked around, open mouthed, at a sky more full of stars than they had ever seen, turning slowly, then stepping backward quickly when they saw the ringed planet, resting peacefully in the sky. 

“Yeah, I think I spent half a loop just looking the first time. Especially here, I think the view’s the best.” 

“You can see the clouds changing on the planet… Look, look, that’s, that looks like, the Confused Shoal, but, they’re bright blue! They’re young! There, there must be, a few more too-”

“Hornfels? Sorry, just, I have something specific I’d like to show you before the end of the loop, and-” Everything, the lights, the stars, the planet, flickered- “We’re about seven minutes in, and the dam is going to break in about four more minutes, and we’ll still be in here but it might be best to be outside the tower before then. We can always try to get to the gorge instead?” 

“Right, let’s, let’s move on right now.” Across the long bridge, Potch focusing their artifact to light candles as they walked.
And to the right, through a rough hewn stone passageway, and an area of grass and trees until they reached a stairway that had been chained off.

“We’re going down here, and down again, and then there’s gonna be a dark corridor with this ringing statue down there that will wake us up if it sees the light from the artifacts, so we’ll need to conceal them by pressing this button, and past that is a raft to where we’re going.” 

“Alright, lead the way to this mysterious place.” Potch jumped the chains- Hornfels stepped over them, carefully, and followed down the next staircase.
They reached over to hold Potch’s shoulder and closed their artifact, nodding. Potch closed theirs and started across the almost pitch black corridor. 

They periodically flicked it open, only for a fraction of a second, correcting course and setting off a tall something at the far end of the corridor, flashing red and making an angry clanging noise for each fraction of a second the fire showed. 

And then they were past it, and Potch relaxed, walking forward a little faster. “Just gotta call the raft.”

“Do you think the inhabitants heard that?” They paused, frowning.

“I don’t… think so? They show up pretty fast when I turned the lights off in here- the thing to do that is back here, too, but it’s more hidden.”

“Why turn off the lights?” Hornfels stepped onto the raft first, inspecting the two opposing controls. Potch followed, focusing the artifact momentarily on one before letting the raft drift.

“The center of all this- it’s hard to see unless you’re really looking- is a bigger version of the sentry thing we just passed, surrounded by candles and a staircase. I found a slide reel outside showing that the codes to open the casket thing in the reservoir were taken down there, and, the first area had the archive down a ways, so I feel pretty safe saying this one will, too.” A building slid into view from the gloom, but, something looked wrong. “I turn the lights out, that turns the candles out, that lets me go down there. I just have to dodge about four of the inhabitants, because they do not want me getting down there and that’s why I’m taking a break, to let myself figure out a better route around them.” Potch stepped up off the raft.

“Potch, this looks burnt.”

“It is.”

“But this is a computer simulation?”

“Yeah. I think the reason is over here, actually. Do you remember the fragment of the slide reel we saw in the Stranger? Them looking at the Eye?”

“Yes.” Hornfels followed them inside, looking around. There was a small, mostly broken Eye on the ground, that Potch carefully walked around. “So this has to do with the Eye?”

“Yeah. Really Gabbro was the person who needed to see this, but, since they couldn’t get themself up I’ll go tell them next loop.” They pulled some boards out of the way, and Hornfels knelt, seeing the sliver of green poking out as Potch opened the shutters.

The last frame of the inhabitant’s vision, a skull covered with grass, but a flower stalk wound its way out of an eye socket and up, and the open flower was releasing galaxies.

Hornfels leaned closer to see that the flower itself was the Eye. 

“This isn’t…”

“From the body, something new. That’s what Rutile said after we buried Quartz, right?” 

“I don’t think that’s exactly what they meant-”

“But there’s always flowers growing in the cemetery. Everything’ll die, but, new life will happen from that. Eventually. You saw how many more stars they have here.”

“You’re right. This at least shows not all of the inhabitants believed this to be the ending we saw. And it is ultimately up to you, Potch. If you are choosing to go to the Eye after all of this, while you still need Gossan’s approval… I’m not as worried about it was I was.” Hornfels straightened back up, then jumped when they heard an echoing crack, and spun around when the screams echoed through the dream. “What-”

“The dam broke.” For a moment, they heard rushing water, and the ground tilted sharply before… it hadn’t tilted. “And that was the flood hitting the tower, so we should be moving up to the gorge if you want to keep stargazing here? Nothing bad’ll happen, well, nothing that bad, but the tower is going to break right before we get called back and we’ll get a mouthful of that water when we wake up.”

“You will.” Potch frowned at Hornfels. “I didn’t take my helmet off.”

“You can sleep with that on?”

“I didn’t have Gossan drilling me not to, so, yes.” Potch snorted as Hornfels walked out a blackened doorway to look at a suspiciously intact telescope. “We should leave before that happens to you, though. Speaking of, how…?”

“Just drop the artifact into the water.” Hornfels nodded, and dropped it.

And woke up suddenly in a definitely tilted tower, looking around as Potch blinked awake and put their helmet back on, tucking their lower goggles out of the way. 

“Want to go to the gorge to keep stargazing?”

“While the view is amazing, I’d… rather not.” Hornfels frowned. “I don’t like the implications of that sky versus our sky versus the many supernovae you’ve seen.”

“Well, I was planning on taking a break from the Stranger once I get into this archive, and the Sun Station’s next. We can just cruise around here- or go look at their controls, if I can get you up there- but a loop or two here and then I’m going to see why that turned on and make a plan about turning it off, finally. I’ll fill you in once I’ve made it, but I don’t think it’ll be overly difficult now that I’ve decided on a route.”

Hornfels walked out of the museum, ready to hear Potch’s findings from the Sun Station-

Their ship launched. 

They’d stated, they would fill Hornfels in on everything they found there, this loop. They’d almost managed to get inside the tower but knew their plan was sound now. 

Hornfels walked back inside, past Hal- they felt a little ping of guilt, they ignored Hal so easily now- up the ramp, and fiddled with their radio to hit Potch’s frequency.

“Potch, this is Hornfels, ground control. Did you not make it in last loop?” Nothing.

They frowned, leaned forward to try again, and-

“H-Hornfels, this is Potch, I’m- I’m still, checking, something, with the Sun Station, I’ll, I promise I’ll be back to fill you in once I’m sure.”

“Alright, Potch. Fly safe.” They muttered something and turned their radio off. 

Hornfels frowned at it, frowned at the sun visible through a slit in the observatory. Potch did not scare easily, but, something had scared them.

Hornfels bit their lip, feeling anxiety take root in their stomach. No use worrying until Potch came back-

But that logic wouldn’t help. 

It had been… four loops since Potch had said they needed to continue looking into the Sun Station. 

Every loop Hornfels had watched them launch, and waited for any messages from the radio, and gotten nothing.

But this loop, finally, their ship hadn’t launched yet a full minute in. Hornfels hurried down the ramp, walked out into the village. 

Potch had come up the back way to the observatory, walking more slowly than normal, and looked at Hornfels with wide eyes. Looked through Hornfels, practically. 

“Potch-?”

“It didn’t turn on.”

“The station?” Potch shook themself, grabbed Hornfels’ arm and dragged them inside, past Hal and up the ramp. 

“The Sun Station didn’t turn itself on, it was never functional. It’s not causing the supernova. Our sun is- is just, old. And dying anyway, like everything else has been, like we can tell from the Stranger’s dream sky and like the modern Nomai were saying. But the entire rest of the Ash Twin Project was functional, so, it’s rewinding time and shooting the probe.” Potch scrubbed at a lower eye with their sleeve- it was a little jolting, the reminder that despite however long this had gone on Potch was still a hatchling and also the one doing all the hard work- “This is, we’re in this due to bad luck of being near a Nomai statue thing when the sun died and then when the project found the Eye.” 

Potch scrubbed their eyes again with their sleeve; Hornfels tried to muster up some, some argument, some deflection- Potch was the only one who had physically been there, Potch knew.

They jumped a little when Hornfels knelt down and hugged them. Nothing… nothing they could say right now would help, they weren’t good at the sort of thing. Gabbro was better. They could get Gabbro’s help, stars they could let Gabbro know, next loop. 

Potch melted into the hug and stayed there for the rest of the loop. 

Potch was back at the observatory before Hornfels could walk downstairs the next loop.

“So, I think-”

“You already have a plan?” Potch grinned, a return to their normal self.

“Of course. I’m going to get into the Ash Twin Project next loop, then spend a few loops finishing the Stranger.” Hornfels thought for a second; this might not be a good question, but, they needed to know.

“And after that?” What else could it be? 

“I… If I’m remembering what else I’ve found correctly, if what I think is in the project is in there, I’ll… No, I need to check. I don’t want to commit to a plan when I don’t have the most important variable I can control for.” Hornfels nodded.

“Tell me, when you know?” Potch would go to the Eye. It was the only real route for them.

“Do you want a say?” Hornfels only paused for a moment.

“No. You’ve done all the hard work, Potch- I think it should be your decision. And Gabbro’s, if you think they helped.” That got a little snort of laughter from them. 

“Once I’ve finished, I’ll let you know, but I think all three of us should talk about what’s the final step. Even if I’m making the decision.”

Four loops later Potch landed their ship just above the observatory. Hornfels grabbed the practice suit, scrambled up the steep route up the crater wall, and let themself into the ship. 

“You’ve found everything you were looking for in the Stranger?”

“Yeah. I know why it’s here, what happened, and… what happened because it’s here. It’s a lot, I’ll explain once we get to Gabbro.”

Hornfels nodded, pulling on the suit as Potch flew towards Giant’s Deep, and saw an island flung past the cloud layer only to be sucked back down by the gravity. 

Potch slid the ship under the clouds easily, evened it out once they could see the water, and one handedly locked the ship’s signalscope into place as they began hunting for Gabbro. 

Hornfels backed away from the hatch as they landed on the beach, letting Potch drop out first, before following. 

And scowling as they felt the stronger gravity take hold, following Potch under a stone arch to Gabbro’s hammock. 

Judging by both of their helmets they were talking just fine, until Gabbro saw Hornfels finally catch up and swapped to signing. “Hornfels, you okay?”

“I’m fine, Gabbro, just too old to live on this planet like you have been.” Potch had turned, hands at their neck like they wanted to fiddle with the goggles under the suit, but Hornfels wanted to know everything. “Potch, what did you find in the Ash Twin Project and the Stranger?”

“Right. The Stranger’s inhabitants came to this solar system from a neighboring one to find the Eye. When they got here, what they found and focused on was a vision of the Eye destroying everything, including them.” Hornfels cut in. 

“We saw that. What-“

“Not done yet. They made a thing to hide the Eye from everyone, parked the Stranger near our sun, made a computer dream of their home moon- they strip mined the actual thing to make the Stranger, they couldn’t go back- and went into the dream. One of them woke up, and that one turned the blocker off. Not for long- they were locked into the dream in a different area, alone- and the others turned the blocker back on. But it was free, just for a bit, and that’s the signal the Nomai followed.”

“Because one of them turned it off.” Gabbro had sat up throughout the course of the story and was sitting cross legged in the hammock, leaning forward and watching while they tapped their flute. 

“So everything else, the time loop, the Nomai’s very presence in this system, is due to that one inhabitant.” Hornfels stumbled over the sign Potch was using for the inhabitants- hands behind their head like antlers… or claws.

“Yeah.” Potch hesitated, then pulled their helmet off so they could fiddle with the pair of goggles resting on their neck. Hornfels followed suit, and Gabbro, but Potch was done explaining this part and was waiting for responses.

Hornfels looked out at the whirling cyclones; Gabbro was staring up at the clouds before they spoke. 

“So we have them to thank for all this.”

“Is ‘thank’ the right word, Gabbro?”

“Well, Potch actually got to launch and see things, my quantum theories got confirmed, you got all the information you coulda wanted about the Nomai.”

“And there is no way to share any of that with anyone else in a manner that will persist longer than twenty two minutes.”

“Yeah. No way out except… Potch, you got into the Ash Twin Project too, right?”

“Yeah, I did, I saved it for second for a reason. It’s got the masks we see at the end of each loop, and an entire record of what the Nomai were doing for the project and when they were doing it- at least, what order- and it has the power source.”

“So you can now end the time loops at any point.” Potch nodded, and took a deep breath.

“Yeah, I can. And, the power source is an advanced warp core, which they reinvented from what they knew before the Nomai crashed here, because there was an advanced warp core that they used to power their Vessel. Which is crashed in Dark Bramble. But we can’t fly it without ending the time loop, so we can’t properly test if we can fly it currently, or move it from Dark Bramble, without it possibly being our final loop.”

Gabbro was nodding slowly. “Can’t go get everyone from the village, probably can’t get all the travelers in one place, or at least, can’t really practice without having it.”

“And we can’t get the village to the Stranger, either, not without leaving someone here. And the Stranger breaks down over the loop- it wouldn’t be a safe place to stay.” Hornfels wasn’t sure if anyone else was debating escaping through the Stranger, but, with the lack of farmable land and the impossibility of getting the entire village and Feldspar there in twenty two minutes, they needed to repeat to themself that it wasn’t truly an option.

“Also, I have no idea where the main controls for the Vessel are. There’s several doors that’re sealed shut, and I barely squeezed through the doors into the bridge. But, the important controls are the warp controls and I am fairly certain they’re on the bridge, and, I found the coordinates to the Eye of the universe. So, the actual plan, would be for me to pull the advanced warp core from the Ash Twin Project, fly to the Vessel in Dark Bramble, insert the core and the coordinates, and warp to the Eye.” 

“That’s your plan?” Gabbro was leaning forward, frowning a little.

“Well, yeah. I was gonna practice a little first, make sure I can actually get from one to the other consistently without getting eaten or crashing or anything.”

“...Alone?” Potch looked up at Hornfels.

“Well, I… I was hoping one or both of you would want to come along with me.” 

Hornfels blinked, glanced at Gabbro and back at Potch. “I…”

“More of us observing quantum phenomena is gonna make it harder for the phenomena to do their quantum things, time buddy. We’d make your life harder if we came along.” Potch nodded, ears down, then looked back at Hornfels.

“I don’t like the idea of going, Potch,” They nodded, blinking. “But. I don’t like the idea of you going alone more.” That got them to look up suddenly, focusing. “I’ll come along if you want me to.”

“So, you and me?”

“Hey.” Hornfels and Potch looked at Gabbro, standing up from their hammock. “Three observers isn’t gonna make it any harder than two. If Hornfels is going, I am too.” 

Potch breathed out as all three of them realized it was time. “Alright. Next loop-”

“One request, time pal?”

“Yeah?”

“You just told us, but, can we thank that one inhabitant? I know everything’ll reset again, just, it feels like something we should do.”

“I would like to come as well.”

“Alright, next-” Heat, white.

“So we’re going into the dream proper for this. I’ll go over the full plan once we have Gabbro with us.”

“They’re following our ship currently.”

“Good.”

Potch touched down carefully in the sunfacing hanger. Hornfels waited until Gabbro’s ship had also touched down before latching on their helmet and dropping out of the ship with Potch.

Gabbro walked over, already signing. “Alright, time pal, Hornfels, what’s the plan.” 

“The Prisoner-” 

“That’s an upbeat name.”

“It’s accurate. They’re in the dream, under three locks. I’m taking you two to the gorge first, and I’ll show you the way in, then I’ll head to the reservoir. We’ll unlock one of them when I show you two how to get there, then I’ll unlock a second- which will wake both of you up- and we’ll unlock the third once you’re back and then go down to the Prisoner. They’ll show us what they did, and I’ll show them what happened, and thank them. They’ll leave, then we can leave.”

“If the reservoir won’t wake you up, why not have us come with you?” Gabbro’s helmet was tilted to the side, signing at Potch.

“Not waking up is a little unpleasant. It’s a glitch to let me get past one of the sentry statues that wake you up if you walk near it and I don’t have the code that will turn the light off.”

“You said the archives had the codes.” Hornfels was frowning, and a realization was starting to make itself known.

“They did! But the codes were burned. So I’m using the glitch reports I found instead. We’re glitching past each security measure rather than actually turning them off.”

“Not sure I like the idea of glitching through anything, time buddy.”

“It’s fine, I’ve practiced most of them a lot. We’re using one of the glitches to get to the raft easily.”

“Potch, did you die to get past the lock you need to go to the reservoir for?” Potch froze for just a second too long, letting Hornfels continue. “If the statue will wake us up, but you can get past it, either the waking up mechanism is broken, or you died.”

“I did die to get past it, that was easier. I can’t find a way to break the bells that wake us up easily.”

“I don’t know how okay I am with you dying early, time pal.”

“I’m not okay with this either.” Potch looked from helmet to helmet, now that Gabbro and Hornfels were united against them.

“It’s the only way to see the Prisoner.”

“Then I will.” Hornfels blinked, surprised at themself, but… same as they couldn’t let Potch fly to the Eye alone, they couldn’t let Potch do this. 

“You sure Hornfels?”

“I’m sure I don’t want you doing it.” Hornfels felt the pull, to step back down after volunteering- but, no. Not for this, they couldn’t let themself.

Gabbro held up a hand and ran back to their ship, pulling themself inside. 

And back out, carrying a little wax paper package they gave Hornfels. 

“I forgot we used to give you these. I assumed you all threw them away at some point.” Hornfels tucked them safely into a little pocket.

“Never got around to cleaning out my medical shelf, so they’ve just been there. I don’t think they’ve lost potency?”

“What are those.” Right, Hornfels looked down at Potch, who was in a sturdy enough ship, with a good radio, and connected to the deep space telescope so it would be difficult for them to be truly lost.

“It’s, uh. If one of us old folk- me or Chert or Gossan or Feldspar- gets stuck somewhere and it’s clear our only choice is die of starvation or thirst and no one can come find us, those’re for, well, speeding things up.” 

“Gabbro. You had suicide pills, just, in your ship. I played in that as a hatchling.”

“You what.” Potch glanced at Hornfels and shrugged.

“It kept me from terrorizing Slate.”

“Those have never been on a shelf hatchlings could reach. Are we ready? I thought we had a time limit.”

“We do, come on.” Potch led the way inside.

“You two, in there, I’ll be just a second. Hornfels knows how to get in, I need to grab another artifact.” Potch ran across the bridge to the painted building that held slide reels. Hornfels walked up another series of steps and into this mural building, built high into the cliff.

They paused just a second outside- this one must be safe from the dam breaking, wasn’t it, the others weren’t- then inside, and they moved the lanterns while Gabbro looked at the murals.

Potch caught up as they walked downstairs, and Gabbro froze solid in the doorway. 

“Hey, uh, I have some questions for you two.”

“It’s fine. You’re good at falling asleep fast.” Hornfels sat down on the far side of the fire, closer to it than they wanted to avoid sitting too close to the skeletons, and let the fire lull them asleep.

They woke up alone in the dream room.

Gabbro and Potch both appeared in a haze of blue before Hornfels could stand up. 

“Gabbro, you’ll like the outside, this way.” And Potch took lead again. 

Gabbro turned slowly, looking up at the sky. Hornfels made sure to look- the ringed planet, again, having the same storm system move through- but Potch was hurrying off to the right. 

“Chert woulda loved coming here.”

“Only if they could stay longer.” Hornfels grabbed Gabbro’s shoulder, giving them a look- the sleeve was frayed enough a strong tug would rip it off their flannel- and made sure they were both following Potch.

“There’s an invisible bridge… here.” Potch walked out onto nothingness, stamped a foot on it, and nodded. “Stick near me, I know where this one is going, and it’s right across.” 

Hornfels nodded, sliding their foot along the nothing that was surprisingly hard, until they were near Potch. 

Gabbro just started walking, pointing towards a distant candle. “That way?”

“Yeah, careful though.” Potch and Hornfels followed, and Potch lunged forward when Gabbro almost fell off, but they managed to keep their footing and let Potch take lead again. 

Onto a rocky outcropping with an elevator Potch had all three of them squeeze into. They managed to pull their artifact high enough to focus the light on a green and metal decoration in the back that spun in the light, until the metal was pointing down, and then the elevator dropped.

“Raft is over here.” Potch was first out, walking along a pier with a hollow statue on it. 

A raft appeared as Hornfels and Gabbro joined. 

Gabbro and Potch stepped neatly onto it, and Hornfels was a second later and almost missed it; both astronauts grabbed them and pulled them fully on.

“You okay there Hornfels?”

“It was just moving faster than I expected. We couldn’t all three step on at once.” 

“Alright. See the cave? We’re jumping off once we go inside.”

“Into the water?”

“Not quite. The invisible bridge was one glitch, and this is another.” The raft sailed up to the cave, and inside. The outside sounds, the river, stopped-

Potch and Gabbro grabbed Hornfels’ arms again and dropped off the raft.

“Hey!”

“If you didn’t get off there we were gonna have to go back for you or wait til you reached the next one and we don’t have time.” Potch was grinning on one side; Gabbro probably was on the other.

They dropped, and then touched down on… water. Hornfels knelt, free from the younger two, and tested it. 

“This is only an inch or so deep.”

“We could walk over there, to that archive, or we can walk this way to the lock.” Potch splashed across and dropped down a ledge, turning to check that Gabbro and Hornfels were following. 

And they leaned forward and blew into the waiting hollow statue, and Hornfels watched the middle lock vanish. 

“We can take the raft across and get that one too, or just drop our lanterns into the water here.” 

“I’m the one going to the reservoir, so-”

“It’ll be easier if we’re all there, actually.” Potch focused their light, sending the raft across, then dropped it into the water and vanished in a haze of blue.

Hornfels dropped theirs, and woke up surrounded by skeletons. 

Potch was already up; Hornfels had gotten to their feet and around by the time Gabbro’s fire suddenly went out and they looked around.

“Did you get lost?”

“No, just tried to drop it where we walked in from.” 

“We’re gonna take the raft again, and we should maybe hurry a little- the dam’s probably close to breaking now.” 

The dam was close to breaking- the water was moving faster here than it should have as they sailed into the reservoir. Potch was aiming for three chains along the right side of the river, and turned towards the older pair as they sailed. 

“They’re down there. We need to drop down and swim in.” 

“I’d rather hold onto one of your kits instead of being dragged this time, please.”

“Don’t like the important person treatment, Hornfels?”

“No.”

“You can hold onto my kit, it’s fine.” Potch made sure Hornfels was holding on before jumping off the raft, pulling both of them into the water. Hornfels pulled themself in as much as possible, watching Potch’s jetpack fire. It was faster than swimming, definitely against this current.

Potch angled themself up, and Hornfels looked to see a diving bell with a light underneath, that Potch entered after a moment, and up stairs built along one side; the jetpack stopped as they got near the top. Hornfels had let go once they’d seen the stairs and climbed up after, followed by Gabbro. 

There was another green fire, crackling away. 

And the tall casket, that they’d seen in the short slide. The middle lock was off, strewn on the ground.

Potch hesitated, and Gabbro pulled their helmet off. “‘Kay, Hornfels, if you give me back those-” 

Hornfels pulled their helmet off, retrieved the packet from its pocket and swallowed the pills without looking at them. And outside, there was an echoing crack; the dam had broken.

“Hornfels.”

“I said I would, I’m going to.” They sat down- they should tell Gneiss these worked, the movement was already clumsy- Right. they couldn’t tell Gneiss... 

Hornfels took a careful breath and fell… asleep.

They woke up in the duplicate of the outside room, but, the casket was gone.
Potch and Gabbro appeared as they looked at the empty spot where it had been.

“I know you said you would, but I was going to anyway.”

“Then you shouldn’t have given them to me. Potch, downstairs? It’s the only way to go.”

“Yeah. Down here.” Down to another elevator.

“Is this a cavern?”

“Yeah. There’s stalactites on the ceiling, I can point them out in a minute. Hornfels, do you want to unlock that lock now, then we’ll come back and get the last one?”

“Alright.” Down a ramp, Potch was carefully lighting candles around the edge. 

Hornfels didn’t need to be told which lock they were undoing.

The bridge was lit near the end; they set off across it, into the light.

There was… a muffled clanging sound, like the bell was underwater… or they had been wearing their helmet. They should have thought about trying that…

Hornfels passed it, into the darkness, and turned to see themself alone down here. 

They blew through the statue, and saw the upper lock vanish. 

And hurried back across the bridge, hearing the muffled bell.

Maybe quieter than it had been. It wouldn’t matter soon. 

The elevator began clicking up. Hornfels watched as it came back down, carrying the younger two. 

“One more lock.” Potch walked to the center; the casket was waiting there. “...Thank you.” 

“I think the pills are out of date, I could hear the bell, but not enough to wake up.” The look they got- from Potch, and Gabbro- made them determined not to mention that they could feel it getting harder to breathe. The pills were old, but not old enough to stop working.

Potch put their artifact on the ground, walked towards the final lock, and vanished once they were out of the artifact’s light. 

Gabbro was already walking forward; Hornfels was careful to put their lantern down in such a way they could tell which one was theirs and followed.

Once they were outside of the light, everything deloaded, abruptly enough to make them jump. Cyan, blocky shapes, no darkness, no detail.

Two figures, antlered heads and hands and floating ponchos, were clustered around a stick with symbols floating around it; one was manipulating them as Hornfels walked over, and the other turned to see them. 

“This is trippy.” 

“This is how I knew where the invisible bridges are, they look like that.” Potch pointed, then set off across the blue fragments of bridge, just to be overtaken by Gabbro, floating faster to the waiting island. 

“My turn to do one, time buddy.” They… probably blew through the lock, and the final one vanished. 

Hornfels retrieved their lantern first, watching the travelers reappear on the edge of the lantern light to get theirs.

“Now what?”

“Now we open it and go down.” Potch clicked the waiting control, and the casket opened smoothly. 

There were many, many stairs- enough Hornfels was reminded why they insisted on a ramp to the observatory- and then it opened into a small room.

Potch lit the candles around as Hornfels walked over to a telescope. 

“But we’re underground, why-” The ringed planet was visible. 

“It’s a computer thing, so, you can kinda do whatever.” Gabbro was also looking at it.

“But why lock someone all the way down here and then give them that to look at?”

“Kindness? Or cruelty, however you wanna see it.” They were interrupted by a door opening on the far side of the room. 

“They’re down here.” Potch walked inside, waited for them to join, and placed their artifact on a lit stand in the back.

The doors swung shut, and the elevator dropped. 

“When we get down there, they’re gonna lunge at me. Don’t panic, you two, they’ll straighten up once they realize we’re different.” 

“Thank you for the warning.” The doors opened into a dark room; there was a single green light, another artifact, on the far side. 

Potch walked directly forward, and despite their warning both Hornfels and Gabbro raced forward to grab them when a hand reached out of the dark and grabbed the artifact, illuminating an inhabitant with a broken antler, eyes white, mouth open, reaching for Potch.

Then they stopped, straightened up, and looked at the three, head cocked to the side.

“Hello.” They looked at Potch, then raised their artifact and turned on a lamp in the ceiling, and picked up a staff. 

Potch dragged Gabbro and Hornfels behind them as the Prisoner held up the staff, green light scanning them on one end and reaching out to the Hearthians.

The four symbols again, and the fourth one- the casket they were locked into, with surrounding restraints. The Prisoner, waking up from the dream, and going to a control with a strange design on the front, and clicked it off. 

And the design was a… satellite, thing, that was blocking the Eye’s signal, that stopped blocking it as it turned off. And the signal spread, out among the nearby star systems.

Then the other inhabitants appeared, grew closer, and grabbed the Prisoner; and locked them away into the casket, built the diving bell around it, and sank it all into the reservoir. Then turned the blocker back on.

The vision faded, and the Prisoner offered the staff to the Hearthians.

Potch took it, focused- the light was scanning them, and reaching out to the Prisoner.

Curious, Hornfels moved until they could see whatever Potch was showing them.

Just for a moment, the four symbols, but a fifth symbol above that was framed with branches duct taped together, highlighted in the center- Potch, looking up at the stars from the village. Then it slid into the vision Potch actually wanted to show them. 

The inhabitants dying and decaying, the Stranger decaying outside, and then zooming out, far past the neighboring star systems, the signal the Prisoner had let free was there, expanding. 

Reaching the Nomai’s Vessel, and they were elated, and warped… and ended in Dark Bramble.

Escape pods launched, landed, and a civilization was built… and the Interloper passed by, and ghost matter killed the Nomai. And the civilization they had built decayed like their bodies…

A rickety little ship landed, and Feldspar walked out and knelt next to a chunk of wall, and there it was in the museum, inspiring Potch and Hal; and then Potch was in their ship, and they launched.

The vision faded, and Hornfels- and Gabbro, on the Prisoner’s other side- stepped quickly back behind Potch, as the Prisoner opened their eyes and looked up at the ceiling and screamed, a loud, almost musical note. 

Gabbro suddenly grabbed the staff from Potch and shut their eyes, giving the Prisoner another vision.

Hornfels wasn’t able to step into it quickly enough to see, but the Prisoner opened their eyes and bobbed their head to Gabbro.

Then they walked to the elevator, and held out their hand for the staff.

And bowed when Gabbro gently gave it back to them, and walked into the elevator, the door closing behind them.

“What did you show them?” 

“Just a thank you. Time buddy, is that elevator stuck up there now?”

“They’ll send it back down in a minute.”

“Good to know they didn’t strand us down here.” Gabbro grinned lazily at Hornfels’ look, like they knew Hornfels was worried about the exact same thing. “So they’re waiting for us up top?”

“Probably not. They left a message last time.”

“They walked into the water with their artifact, didn’t they?” Potch looked up at Hornfels as the elevator opened its doors.

“Yeah, they did. They don’t want to stick around once they have a way out of here.” 

They stayed quiet as the elevator took everyone up, and walked up the stairs, out into the silent eternal night.

There was a green light, near the water’s edge, and hoofprints leading down into it.

Potch waited for Gabbro and Hornfels to join them, and all three walked into the vision.

A raft, waiting on the edge of the water, and the Prisoner placed their telescope onto it, and beckoned Potch forward. The two pushed the raft into the water, were joined by another raft with Hornfels, also with a telescope, and Gabbro playing their flute, and both sailed into the sunrise as the vision went white. 

“And they’re gone.”

“For this loop. It must be better than staying here.” 

Potch sighed, then looked at the older pair. “That was it. That was them. ”

“So nothing left but to go to the Eye.” Hornfels breathed out, everything that sentence held hitting them at once. No more campfires, no more sunrises, no more village…

“Yeah. That’s it. Hornfels, I’ll, I’ll stop above the observatory again, and Gabbro, we’ll meet you in front of Dark Bramble after we get into the Ash Twin Project? Let’s get a couple of clear tries before we go to the Eye.” 

And now here they were, Hornfels watching the fog around them nervously as though Potch had done anything risky enough to attract the anglerfishes’ attention in loops. Gabbro was sitting, back against the computer, ship abandoned outside the bramble.

Just like every test flight in here, Hornfels ignored the little part of them that wished they could go get Feldspar. The way to the Vessel was complicated enough, and there wasn’t a good way into this nursery node from Feldspar’s. They… they would have to sit through the end of this solar system stranded and alone, like they had for the last few years following their decision to fly into Dark Bramble without telling anyone.

Potch eased the ship under a vine and into an otherwise hidden node, listening carefully for the fourth anglerfish hiding in this node.
And through. Everyone relaxed a little, and Potch pushed the thrusters a little harder. The Vessel faded into view from the fog.

Just like the first time Potch had brought the three of them here, it was huge- the village itself could have fit inside, easily- but the sight of it punctured with vines sent a little shard of sadness through Hornfels. 

They left the ship a short distance away and by plan Potch dropped out first, carefully cradling the advanced warp core, leaving Gabbro to tow Hornfels inside.
Potch waited for them before plugging the core into its spot on the bridge.

An artificial gravity suddenly made itself known; Gabbro dropped and sprawled on the bridge, Hornfels landed on their feet and overbalanced to hit the ground on hands and knees, Potch was on their feet and doing something at the front end of the bridge.

“Well, at least we’re sure the power here works.” Gabbro snorted as they helped Hornfels up.

“How did you manage that before I got up? You were on your back.”

“I’m younger than you and have working knees.” Hornfels turned away from Gabbro to watch shapes form on the board in front of Potch- Hornfels saw a little control ball drop and roll along a groove as the board shifted, showing itself to be three sided. 

Potch sunk the control and the board sunk with it, showing a cage and a larger ball, and turned to sign.

“Ready?”

“Is it a bad time to say ‘no?’” Hornfels gave Gabbro a look. 

“Yes it is.” 

“Alright. Here we go.” The control flicked up. 

The bridge was consumed by a ball of blackness-

-that faded into white, showing a sky almost entirely devoid of stars.

There was one star, an angry orange, so far away they couldn’t see any planets around it. 

Behind them, Hornfels heard the low drone of Gabbro’s flute, playing the traveler’s song. 

Potch pulled out their mirliton, and Hornfels carefully retrieved their flute, and joined Gabbro, playing a farewell to their home. 

And… the star suddenly went white, and exploded into blue, and Hornfels saw Potch moving out of the corner of their eyes, frantically pulling out their signalscope-

Which Hornfels put a gentle hand on, keeping it from pointing at the supernova. “It’s done, Potch. We- we shouldn’t-”

“Don’t hurt yourself like that.” Gabbro had walked around and had a hand on the younger astronaut’s shoulder. “We’re here, let’s keep moving. Stick to the plan, yeah?”

“Y-yeah.” Potch turned, mirliton and signalscope tucked away, and focused on another control ball at the base of the warp core’s new resting place.
It rolled along the grooves to the other side, and a black hole materialized in a recessed spot on the bridge. 

Gabbro was still holding Potch’s shoulder. Hornfels took their other side.

All three of them jumped into the black hole-

And were standing on the Eye of the universe. 

“Oh good, I wasn’t sure where that was gonna take us.” 

“And you let us jump in anyway, Gabbro?” Hornfels leaned forward to give them a mock glare as they signed.

“Well, yeah, not my decision. Lead on, Potch, we’re with you.” 

The ground was marbled, blues and browns and purple, and rounded chunks were taken out of parts of the ground. Around the equator of the Eye, the clouds surrounding it dominated the sky, and random lightning flashes began cutting through the darkness.

One of them brought a tree, just for the time they could see, but everyone’s oxygen tanks refilled from it. 

Gabbro was watching the clouds and the first to notice. “The clouds are… going up?”

“Ye- yes, they appear to be.”

“Just like the Quantum Moon.” Hornfels caught Potch’s signs out of the corner of their eyes, but, they remembered Solanum.

“Then what’s waiting for us at this pole?” 

A massive crater, twists of multicolored rock reaching up towards a funnel in the clouds; the bowl was unnaturally smooth.

Gabbro looked up, far enough the instruments sticking out of their helmet threatened to hook onto their kit. “I think… whatever happens next is up there.”

“I wish the Vessel had warped to a position where we could clearly see wherever that’s heading.”

“Well, I have more than enough fuel in my jetpack in case it just spits us out to return to the surface, but, that’ll be a major disappointment in multiple ways and leave us with no real options beyond possibly attempting to warp to the current Nomai with the Vessel.”

“Good to hear you’re normal Potch again, not hearing a plan from you for the last ten minutes has been weird.” Potch gave Gabbro a look as Hornfels smothered a laugh.

“Nothing for it but to try it.” Potch walked forward and cautiously put one foot on a outcrop, meaning to climb up, then jolted back before walking onto the inner surface.

It held them in place like the Nomai’s gravity crystals.

Gabbro and Hornels followed, and Hornfels grabbed Potch’s shoulder as they walked to the tip of the rock. 

Gabbro was holding their other side, and just nodded when Potch looked. 

“Let’s go.” They nodded at Hornfels, and all three jumped together.

Up, into the funnel in the clouds, and through, and descending into a room of clouds forming pillars and circling them and they were about to reach the bottom-

And blinked, standing in the museum on Timber Hearth. 

“Wait, this-”

“Hornfels, look behind us real fast.” They turned, saw Gabbro looking out the doorway into the rest of the village, turned more, and saw… black. 

Solid black, not even the dignity that shadow or night provided, just… an absence. 

“This isn’t the museum. Not really.” They both turned to see Potch, standing in front of the Nomai statue. “The wording is wrong on the picture of the founders, this plaque is different, I just glanced inside but it’s missing things. Also, Hornfels, it looks like you can hear me even with the suit on.”

“Can you tell us when you just wander off like that please.”

“I don’t think anything’s going to physically jump out and kill us, not anymore.”

“Not anymore, time pal?”

“Well, we’re in the Eye, now. Or wherever it took us. If any of this is even real, which, I am doubting a little. I think this at least is constructed from our memories rather than just something the Eye had waiting around.” 

“You’re talking like it’s sentient.”

“I… don’t think it is? But I could be wrong! Only way to know is to keep going, I think.” And they walked into the rest of the museum.

Hornfels glanced at the atrium as Gabbro followed the other traveler. The photograph, that they’d forgotten to get Esker for, and somehow they only ever remembered to get a better one right after Esker would leave home, and then Feldspar stranded themself in Dark Bramble and they couldn’t… 

‘Outer Wilds Ventures was founded by Feldspar, Gossan, Slate, and Hornfels to explore a solar system at the end of the universe.’ Even if it was primarily the four of them, that still felt…

They blinked, and something was different. ‘Outer Wilds Ventures was founded by Feldspar, Gossan, Slate, Hornfels and Esker to explore a solar system at the end of the universe.’ 

And standing behind the group, there was Esker, not smiling because they hated getting pictures taken of themself and would have grumped about it all day if they’d been present… 

The Nomai statue was also different. ‘The Nomai never got to see it for themselves, but thanks to their efforts and technology, three Hearthians were able to reach the Eye of the universe.’ 

They walked into the rest of the museum; Gabbro was looking at the model of the deep space telescope while Potch was inspecting a skeleton of the anglerfish Chert had brought home. 

Hornfels started up the ramp to the observatory, where they’d spent most of their loops. And paused, halfway up.

“Potch, Gabbro? Something is different up here as well, and I think you should join me.” 

They did, watching the miniaturized galaxy rotating slowly atop the old tree stump the building had been built around. 

Hornfels put their hand back on Potch’s shoulder, and reached with their other to hold Gabbro’s hand as they did the same.

Potch checked, both hands resting on their shoulders, then reached out and touched the galaxy.

And they zoomed out, both adults’ hands tightening automatically, as the museum perched atop the Eye flew away from them, then, a cloud of white- another galaxy- passed through them, and further, as more galaxies appeared around them, then, there was finally a proper sense of movement, as they dropped, to gently land between tall, proud Timber Hearth trees, lit by the hundreds or thousands of small galaxies resting serenely around the forest.

No one spoke, enchanted by the scene, until Gabbro gasped.

The other two followed their pointing hand to see blue sparks fading away. 

“One of them… died.” 

“!” Hornfels spotted the second one, a galaxy resting among tree branches that exploded into nothingness. 

And more, accelerating, as galaxies died and left them in darkness. 

Potch startled suddenly, pulling out their signalscope and following a smooth arc that ended pointing off to the group’s left.

“Potch?”

“Got an unidentified signal message. It sounds like breathing through the scope.” A pause, Hornfels’ hand tightening on their shoulder. “It’s not getting closer, but, we’re already here. I want to see what it is.” 

“Then we’re coming.” Hornfels saw Gabbro nodding on Potch’s other side. They were already here. Time to see what else was.

Potch walked forward slowly, their signalscope and pair’s flashlights trained forward.

And… what emerged from the dark, was them. All three of them, Potch in the lead, Gabbro and Hornfels in Gabbro’s old test suit behind them, though, the other three weren’t touching, and didn’t have any technology out.

The pair of lights flickered, and where they had been, was a tree. 

“Wait, this is quantum, right? Solanum said that, the moon is quantum because the Eye must be. So, one of you, turn your light off, and the other, turn it off and on?”

“I’ll turn mine off, I can be gracious in victory.” Hornfels scowled at Gabbro- they were grinning under their helmet, Hornfels could just tell- and worked the switch on their own flashlight, and watched as the tree broke down until it was a stump, then became a pile of coals…

Potch reached forward and it lit before they could pick anything up.

“Now we have another light source. Should we all look away and see if it will do anything else?” 

“Might as well.” A glance away, and Hornfels looked back before the younger two.

“That’s… Is that Esker’s rocking chair?” 

“Look away again.” 

“Esker!” 

“Been a long time since I had company around a campfire. Go on, find the others?” 

“Esker?” They looked at the trio, smiling slightly. “That is you, right?”

“Kind of, Hornfels. It is me, and, it isn’t.” A pause, then, in a much more normal tone, “Potch, go get Riebeck first? Everyone else can handle themselves well enough, they’re who I’m worried about.” 

“Yeah, I can-”

“Then, you three better gather your own instruments, you hear me?” 

“They’re- wait, but I had my flute-” Gabbro was patting themself down in a way that could almost be described as frantic. 

“It’s over that way. Hornfels, I think yours is that way. But there’s a banjo over here, somewhere.” Potch was pointing their signalscope around; Esker had settled into their rocking chair and was ignoring the younger three.

“Just the five of us?”

“No, I think I hear… Feldspar, over there, and Chert… I don’t recognize that one, or, that sounds like, something from the Stranger? But, uh, those two I… haven’t heard for, a long time. That might be Gossan? Or Gneiss.”

“Let’s get Riebeck first.” Potch nodded and led the way into the forest, away from Esker and the firelight. 

Out of the shadows a tan Nomai building suddenly loomed. 

“I can see Riebeck’s banjo inside. Don’t see a way in, though.” Gabbro suddenly hit their jetpack, easily jumping over the building and dropping down then walking back to the others. “Nope, no way in.”

“Well, we all had to blink to get Esker to show up, so… Hornfels, can you turn the flashlight off?”

Hornfels did, and a chunk of the roof vanished.

Then clicked their flashlight a few more times until Potch could jump over the broken wall and reach out for the banjo-

The flashlight flickered on its own, and Potch was standing in the clearing, no building in sight.

The three turned back to the light, and there was a larger shadow present as they walked back.

“It’s, um, it’s not quite time yet. I’m pretty sure we’ll need the others for this next part. We’ll need, you know… everyone. No rush! Take your time. It might not even exist here…” Riebeck was staring at the fire, tapping at the neck of their banjo. Potch turned back to their fellow observers.

“Who wants to get who?”

“I’ll just get me, thanks.”

“Alright, that’s Gabbro taken care of. I can get-”

“Potch, I can get Slate, Gossan and Feldspar. They’re here.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.” Potch nodded, and Gabbro passed over their signalscope after they sighted, listening for their flute. 

Hornfels set off, following the signalscope. 

Who first… 

It was easiest just to go in age order. Feldspar, then Slate, then Gossan, then them. 

The harmonica was… this way. 

And here was the museum. Hornfels walked around it to the entrance. 

The altered photo of all four of them was resting in its spot on the wall, harmonica emanating from it. 

Hornfels reached up to touch Feldspar’s picture, and the flashlight flickered as they did, leaving a gap. 

They ducked and walked through. Somewhere… 

There was a light above them, getting closer-

An anglerfish loomed, and Hornfels shut the light off and closed their eyes in a panic. 

When death failed to materialize, they opened their eyes and saw a gentle orange glow ahead.

Jellyfish, small ones, danced around a tree stump that held the harmonica, playing itself. As they reached out to touch it, the flashlight flickered, and the harmonica, the jellyfish, and the stump were gone. 

Okay… right, well, that was one person found. Slate was next. 

They turned and frowned. The museum was still there, and their flute was playing from the observatory.

Instead Hornfels turned and followed the loud, fast drums Slate played. 

And… there was a ship, sitting in a clearing. Was this, Feldspar’s first successful ship? Maybe their second.

Well, regardless, it was Slate’s work, Slate’s triumph. Hornfels turned their flashlight off and on.

There was a bulge in the side of the ship near where the reactor was supposed to sit- they’d seen that before. Usually from a greater distance than this. 

Hornfels shut the flashlight off and blinked instead, watching in slices as the ship bulged and exploded in a spectacular blaze, with the drums as a soundtrack. 

Sitting in the wreckage was a drum set. Hornfels wound their way around the shards of metal frozen while scything through the clearing and reached to grab it-

Their eyes watered and suddenly they had to blink and as they did, the ship, and the drum, vanished. 

Gossan next.

Their guitar was nearby.

There was a barrier sitting on the ground, that they hadn’t seen earlier, one of the older barriers Slate ha’d realized were too short after the accident. Hornfels walked towards it and the guitar vanished as they walked around it. 

Somewhere further in, now. Gossan’s cabin.
Not where Gossan had been taken, after the accident that took their eye. Their cabin was usually where they trained new astronauts, for the less hands-on portions of the training.

And, sitting where they usually did, the guitar rested against the wall of the cabin, strings plucking themselves. Hornfels sat next to it, where their new recruit would sit and listen, and reached out to grab the guitar.

And it vanished, and the cabin, leaving them sitting bemusedly on the ground. 

Just themself left. Hornfels got up and followed their flute back to the museum. 

The photo of the founders still held the five of them, and was whole, the gap from looking for Feldspar gone. The Nomai statue’s eyes were closed, and when they walked inside, it was almost like they remembered. The quantum shard exhibit was gone, as was the anglerfish, and when they looked more closely, the Nomai skeleton was a replica, no longer the original they’d been conflicted over. 

Hornfels walked up the ramp, and there was their flute, sitting in front of the computers they’d spent so much of their time in front of. 

Hornfels reached out to grab it-

And blinked, standing in front of the slightly crowded fire. 

“Hornfels!” Feldspar had pulled themself up and hugged them around the middle, grinning. 

“Thanks for remembering us.” Slate was grinning, settled behind their drum set.

“Best ground control we could ask for, like I said.” Gossan was on Feldspar’s other side, and patted the ground for Hornfels to come sit next to them. 

Esker, Riebeck, Gabbro and Chert were already present. Gabbro waved, sitting between the other two astronauts. 

The fire flickered for a moment, then a Nomai who could only be Solanum was standing, looking around like she was surprised; Potch sprinted back, talking to her, then did a double take and walked back to Hornfels.

“Good, you found everyone?”

“Yes. Haven’t gotten your flute yet?”

“Not yet, no, going to get the Prisoner first. I’m… that has to be them, that stringed instrument.” And Potch was gone again. 

Hornfels looked around, but. Something was off; everyone was… almost switched off when they weren’t talking, like Esker. “This isn’t, really all of you, is it?” Hornfels looked from helmet to helmet to welding mask; Gabbro was glancing around too.

“Kinda we are, but, I think, kinda we aren’t?” Feldspar was absentmindedly rubbing their fingers on their harmonica. “Like. Hm. Gossan, Esker, you got a better idea? Chert?”

“Wow, thanks.” Slate draped themself over the drums, looking around.

“I believe the versions of us who are here, are amalgamations of the Eye, our own memories, and the memories of the three of you who made it to the Eye. I have memories that must be mine, as Chert, but the knowledge of what we are made of here, and, if I focus, the knowledge that the two of you and Potch acquired seems to rest where it takes some effort to reach.”

“So we’re, what, just memories?”

“That is how it appears to be.” Everyone jumped; it was hard to realize they’d forgotten the existence of a Nomai who was Riebeck’s height, but, Solanum was leaning on her staff, looking from Hearthian to Hearthian in interest. “Memories we held, memories of the Eye, memories of the conscious observers. Though I- Solanum- do not recognize that individual.” 

Hornfels turned, and saw the light glinting off eyes, then scrambled to their feet. 

“Prisoner?” 

Footsteps, and, Potch appeared, carrying their mirliton, following Hornfels just outside the firelight. 

“You’re not at the campfire?”

“When my kind found the Eye and realized what it was capable of, they were terrified. It was too difficult a truth. Like a light too bright to look upon directly, it burned them.” They were speaking quietly, looking from the three Hearthians- Gabbro had scrambled to join- to the larger group watching them from the campfire. “What they could not unlearn was hidden away in darkness- obfuscated, then lost. They did not want to see their story end. My kind weren’t always like this.” A deep sigh. “We weren’t always so afraid. I did what I could to set things right, yet I am still of my kind, and you know now what they did. I cannot promise our fear won’t stain your mind. And so, a choice: Are you certain you want to remember me?" Hornfels went to answer, then looked down at Potch.

“Join us. Let’s see what happens.” They didn’t hesitate, and the Prisoner nodded, picking up their instrument that looked like it weighed as much as Hornfels did. 

"I don’t want to repeat my kind’s mistakes. But if you’re willing to take the risk, then so am I." They settled next to Solanum as Hornfels sat between Gossan and Potch. 

Everyone turned to look at Potch. 

“Ready for what comes next?”

“Yeah- hey, Gabbro, Hornfels, you two have been in the time loops longer than I have. Why’re you all looking at me?”

“You did all the work. You get to finish everything, Potch.” Gabbro was nodding in agreement; Potch sighed, then looked at Esker.

“Could you give us a tune to follow?” They grinned, and started whistling. 

Hornfels, Feldspar, Slate and Gossan began playing together, the same way they had for so many years before Feldspar was stranded. Then Gabbro, Chert, Riebeck, and Potch, and finally Solanum and the Prisoner joined. 

The smoke above the campfire began to coalesce, growing into a white ball flashing with possibilities, growing larger and larger.

Everyone stopped playing at once, looking at it, then at Potch, who reached forward to touch it-

The campfire was extinguished, everyone was staring at the same blank spot, then they rapidly were drawn apart from each other and Hornfels watched an infinitesimal point explode into white, and begin expanding rapidly, their faceplate cracking from the sudden force. 

They had just a moment, realizing their theory was correct, before it expanded again and everything was white.