Things are much better now.

[grayzero]

Sometimes one needs to go back to the wisdom one finds in children.

** The start of the conversation, in Puzzle Park.

“Well, I just try to make help people be happy, and if I can’t, it’s no--” Polly’s gaze snaps to GrayZero like a piece of steel to a magnet. “Ooh, you look happy! What makes you happy?”

GrayZero says simply, “Being able to assist others, I suppose.”

Polly nods to GrayZero, pacing along the branch. “Ah yes, well, I like helping people when I can. Can’t always, but it’s still worth trying, huh?”

GrayZero nods silently, staring off... somewhere.

Polly looks off in the direction GrayZero’s facing... “Ooooh, that’s pretty.” There happens to be a particularly swirly wash of colour on that area of the wallfield at the moment.

GrayZero hms. “Oh? I hadn’t noticed. My apologies.”

Polly giggles. “Oh, you don’t need to apologise!”

GrayZero smiles. “It is a bit of a habit.”

Polly looks at GrayZero curiously, her tail twitching occasionally. “Oh? Which is-- staring, or apologising?”

Ghastwain pauses in concentration, a fig-shaped stringed instrument with gilt decorations instatiating in her lap: it is a mandolin. She begins to tune it, enveloping the neck with dripping lace to reach the frets. It takes a moment to keep the tone from eternally going sharp.

GrayZero raises an eyebrow, then smiles again. “Both, I suppose.”

Polly thinks about that. “Well, I don’t know whether you’d want to do both of those *too* much. I mean, you apologise too much, people will start to think you’re insincere. You stare too much, your eyes will get stuck like that!”

Polly chirps, “If you aren’t looking at the wallfields, what *are* you looking at?”

GrayZero looks nonplussed.

Ghastwain glances up from the mandolin. “Might any sentient have a request?” Her letters are tinged with golden curiosity that reflects off her horn adornments.

GrayZero considers for a moment. “Hm. On the apologies, I would prefer that most sentients would try to find more definite signs of sincerity, or its lack, but...” A shrug. “And I suppose I’m not really looking *at* anything. I really am quite at a loss to explain.” She smiles, apparently amused at herself.

Polly smiles, sweetly. “Oh, I’m sure you could if you tried. Are you thinking of something?”

GrayZero nods. “In part, but I do not believe it fully formed enough for me to discuss it as yet.”

Polly nods, remarkably enough, calmly. “What part *can* you discuss, then?”

GrayZero hrms, considers for a few moments.

** That which ails.

GrayZero then shrugs. “The issue is something like this. I know you were around here during the previous cycle, as that is where we made our respective aquaintances. And you might also have noted my... hrm.” She pauses for a moment. “Suffice it to say that it was a moment of tension for myself.”

Polly, while GrayZero is thinking, turns her smile toward Ghastwain, a bit of her usual excitement coming back as her tail fwip-fwips about. “What sort of mandolin music do you play? Medieval? Renaissance? Bluegrass? Oh...” She gives her attention to GrayZero. “You did look kind of fretful, like you had a problem with something, yeah.”

Ghastwain halo-prints, “I will strive to perform most anything you ask of me, madame. Genre is unimportant.”

Ghastwain keeps her letters dim, as though whispering.

GrayZero nods. “I’ve been trying to understand why that was, and I have a small theory. As I do not have a clear idea of what Purpose She has in mind for me here, I’ve been going about doing what I used to do back home - that is, doing my utmost to be available to assist others as needed. However, when one does not pay attention to potential problems, one rather rejects the idea of assistance.”

GrayZero smiles grimly. “The ultimate direction is that I fear that if I am ever totally successful in my goals, I will rather end up as quite possibly one of the most miserable beings in existence. And I am at a loss to counteract such.”

Ghastwain looks dismayed.

Polly nods, and sighs, seeming to droop a little. “Some people just can’t be helped. Or don’t *want* to be helped...”

GrayZero nods. “But in such cases I can still continue to try. I fear, though, that that previous cycle provided a preview of what life could be like if all sentients’ issues vanish. It was... not a pleasant evening.”

Polly chirps! and sits up again, smiling cheerfully. “Well, everyone was pretty happy, and loving! What’s so bad about that?”

Ghastwain halo-prints, “She was no longer needed...”

GrayZero nods.

You say, “There was no Purpose left.”

You say, “Just as things were back home, but... more difficult. Back home, it was simple shortsighted hedonism. That environment... was otherwise.”

Ghastwain begins to pick out a gentle, tinny tune, hook-claws briefly flashing across the strings as her sleeves sway. “I, too, admit fear of ultimately fulfilling my Purpose...what is there for me, when my masters have learned all there is they wish to know?”

** That which is suggested.

Polly shrugs. “Well, you could find a different purpose! Take up knitting, or playing an instrument--” she nods to Ghastwain-- “or something like that.”

GrayZero smiles weakly. “Perhaps. I am not so certain, however, that Purpose would even remain in such a place, let alone one I could lean on.”

The briar growing from Ghastwain’s left socket develops a tiny bud, growing unnaturally quickly as the trio talks.

Polly chirps, “Well, if there was no-one else around for you to help, maybe you could work on helping yourself.”

Polly idly fidgets her paws, hard plastic claws clinking together. “‘Cause it kind of sounds like you could use some help.“

Polly chirps, ”Not to say that you’re crazy, or something, no no no!, I just mean, there’s feeling good about other people, and there’s feeling good about yourself, you know?“

GrayZero chuckles a bit. ”Hm. The problem there is that I literally have no experience of existing without Purpose as being anything other than a negative.“ She shakes her head. ”Even those that appear without Purpose ultimately have such in a place where beings can still disagree.“

Ghastwain halo-prints, ”Perhaps, once the Purpose is fulfilled, enlightenment of a new Purpose will descend. From mentor to shepherd, nurse to guardian. I have heard of your prayers, Lady of the Lighthouse; would She Who Is Jigsaw truly have such a limited plan for a faithful servant as yourself?“

GrayZero glances towards Ghastwain, raises an eyebrow. ”Put that way, it does seem unlikely. However, you are the first to put it that way.“ She smiles.

Polly looks over at Ghastwain brightly. ”’She’? Who is ‘she’, anyway? You mean...” She glances around at the surrounding area.

GrayZero nods. “Something like that.”

Ghastwain continues playing, the melody mournful and full of hope at the same time; it is a wounded heart waving its pain like a flag, defiantly surviving, all depicted in a pianissimo tune in a minor key.

Charlie hrrs.

Polly listens to the mandolin for several moments, silently.

GrayZero closes her eyes and leans against the Tree, hrms.

Ghastwain’s rictus seems somehow gentler as she continues, her halo rattling and rotating like a typewriter spool. “You are lucky to be so sure of things, good Lady. Your sorrow is a tempering forge, battering your heart and plunging it into despair’s icy damp to emerge stronger, sharper, fiercer. Piety is a beautiful trait.”

GrayZero does not say anything; she simply smiles.

“Well...” Polly finally says uncertainly...

Polly chirps, “Well, I think you’ll be able to cross that bridge when you get to it. Or at least turn out the light as you leave, or something, hm?”

Polly smiles hopefully at GrayZero, eyes atwinkle, tail flit-flitting about.

GrayZero nods. “True enough. My remaining concern, then, is what I am to do in those interims where there still remain issues, but I am not in a position to do much about them.” A pause, then, “I’d been busying myself reading, but I’m rather running out of material.” A weak smile.

Ghastwain flutters her hidden fingers through an arpeggio. “Perhaps the time approaches where you will take up your own quill...”

Polly starts fidgeting her paws again. “Well, um. You do what you can, I guess. Nobody can do *everything*!”

Polly chirps, “Not even She. If She could, we wouldn’t be talking about this.”

Ghastwain halo-prints, “Would She speak through your pen, perhaps? Would you find Her words in tomes already read? There were diviners of this sort in the place I called home...perhaps you are one. Or perhaps not.”

GrayZero hrms. “I have done some small writing pieces, though not of much great import. It was a rather silly attempt at recreating something lost from back home, and it’s not something that can be done singlehandedly.” She shakes her head.

Ghastwain halo-prints, “Lay, then, the first stone of the road, and encourage those who follow it to aid in mortaring? Years, decades, eons of work might lie before you. But perhaps it is supposed to be that way; perhaps She does not want you to become so involved with Her will that you are no longer a person...”

GrayZero hrms.

Ghastwain halo-prints, “But then, I have not spoken with Her. All I offer are hypotheses.”

Polly smiles admiringly to GrayZero. “Well, even if you can’t write *Her* words, you can write *your* words.”

GrayZero nods, smiles. “That’s about what I was doing earlier. I try not to pretend to directly communicate for Her; it’s a little presumptuous.”

Ghastwain stretches the tempo like taffy, dividing the soft notes into smaller and smaller slices.

Polly chirps, “Well, you don’t *have* to. Anybody can *claim* they speak for some higher power, and anyone has about as good a claim as anyone else.”

GrayZero shakes her head. “I prefer to avoid such dishonesty.”

Polly leans down to try to nudge GrayZero’s shoulder with a forepaw. “But putting your *own* views down, that’s something a lot different from, and really more interesting then, some supposedly Official View of the World According to Our Lady.”

GrayZero nods. “That was why we all did such back home.”

Polly chuckles. “Well, what happened to ‘em? Did they all forget how to read and write?”

GrayZero shakes her head. “Most of them rather stopped caring.”

Bellmer rises onto the central platform on the lift from the Transit Nexus.

Bellmer has arrived.

Polly nods, slowly. “When people stop caring, it’s... it’s... bad...”

Polly chirps, “It makes me feel... cold...”

Ghastwain nods to Bellmer, not missing a beat of her mandolin playing.

Polly shivers, looking rather less flexible and more brittle for a moment. You might even think there was a crack or two in her surface.

** An epilogue - a return to existence as normal.

Frostbyte rises onto the central platform on the lift from the Transit Nexus.

Frostbyte has arrived.

System rises onto the central platform on the lift from the Transit Nexus.

System has arrived.

But then the moment passes as Polly notices Bellmer’s approach, and she’s as good as new. “Hi there!” she chirps amiably.

GrayZero raises an eyebrow, hrms, looks a little relieved. She nods to those arriving.

Bellmer nods and grins. “Hullo!”

Frostbyte’s servitors dip their fore-ends t’wards the Priestress politely.

System curtsies slightly. “Greetings. What is the status of the entities here?” (She) nods to the unfamiliar automaton. “May I query you as to your designation?”

Polly dances along the branch, grinning. “And hi,” she calls out to the new Frostbye, “And hi, System!”

System reaches to pat the hideous lump of flesh that is Frostbyte.

System smiles. “Greetings, Miss Polly.”

Bellmer takes a moment to realize System speaks to her. “Oh! Um...designation is...Bellmer!”

Frostbyte seems to enjoy being patted. Indeed, some bits of him, particularly his throat-sac, seem just the right consistency for a patting.

Ghastwain stands, or rather unfolds, with a rustle of petticoats, curtseying deeply with her waist and wings if not her hands; the latter continue strumming a cherry-wood mandolin with gilt decorations.

System nods and smiles. “I am designated as System. May I query you as to further data about yourself? Who was your designer and manufacturer? Where do you make your habitation?”

GrayZero opens both eyes, smiles. “Ever dilligent.” Then, “System, if I might ask. Have you ever considered the possibility of running out of new information to acquire?”

Frostbyte quietly chortles, a flopping wet sound, at this sudden rush of questions.

System smiles serenely. “There is always more to learn, Priestess GrayZero.”

GrayZero smiles. “So, no.”

Frostbyte says, “Indeed, the first step to wisdom is to ever acknowledge your ignorance...”

System rubs at Frostbyte’s throatsacs.

This would rather be about where things diverged into other topics.