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It was disappointing, once thinking about it, that he hadn't been back to his own world. He was supposed to have gone. He should have gone. The need was genuine, as was his want, but finding the memory present enough of the need to strike him in the face was hard. Mirrors showed him a scar far more boldly and ever present than the half-life of uniform that was reflected, if half could be the accounting. He was spending more time in uniform and on patrol than not.

The Senshi of Gardens looked in to no mirrors now, but at a folio of loose sketches he'd made immediately after his and Athene's time on the moon together. The fallout with the eternal since then had been searing. The folio had stood by on a stack, abandoned for weeks until tonight when waiting made no more sense in the world. He didn't have time for idleness in other pursuits, so there was no reason to allow its presence to fester in this matter. Messaging the Guard was a matter of a moment, though a reply could take longer. He had no idea what her usual hours were, if she woudl have her phone handy, or if she was on her planet if there was a delay from lightspeed and distance to wherever it was that she studied now- if there wasn't gravity on the Moon, he doubted the physics of phone messages and Voices of a Distant Star applied in this case.

The reply back was quick, especially since he'd not expected anything until the morrow at the earliest. Thraen was still powered up, and still had his senshi phone available, if tucked in the limited band of one of his sleeves. He stopped his loping, distance jog immediately, teetered on one foot on a ledge and checked what the message was- it could equally have been some other contact as a reply from Aquarius.

She remembers our little game. It brought the ghost of a smile to the left of his mouth. He was not very near the University, but near enough that it was worth the meeting rather than a reschedule.



He was....excited. For as much was dimmed in life, his brief time with Aquarius had been one of shared excitement and expertise in learning. He hoped that what he had to tell her, to share with her, was new in some way. New or hopeful, or helpful. The eagerness gave wings to his strides that hadn't been there in too long. He felt joy again of the speed, strength and agility afforded by the name on his power- ecstatic just that it should be at all without the burdens of responsibility weighing it heavy as lead.

He was panting as he found the quad and campus rooves and looked for her starry mantle, "Aquarius?"

Hearing her call the name was enough to complete the spell, and Thraen's mood eased completely from its general severity to even genial. He didn't reach for her hand, as he would have done a year before in earnest to cup as he told her all he had. Instead he held out the folio of sketches and remembrances of layout and direction- a little isometric floormap slightly smudged from his left-handed dominance marking left to write in texted places.

"This. And there's more than that, but I don't have a camera for a memory, unfortunately. " He beamed, "Though maybe if you've already got all the information from there, I'm late to the party. Have you been to the Moon Ruin? Athene and I went, and we found that- "

He pointed to a little sketch of looseleaf in the folio, "Though personal library, sitting room, main library, I can't say. But there are books there. Well preserved. Even if it all just ends up cookbooks and recipe cards, there was enough that maybe something there could act as a key for something else. Or at least a larger sampling. Neither of us recognized anything, and we couldn't tell if it was right to left, left to right, up to down or any such. We only touched a couple and were careful about oils as we could be. Nothing seemed more fragile than say..."

He paused and thought, "- the Book of Nunnaminster. Or either Domesday. What do you think?"

"Athene is an eternal senshi, yes." Since the phones cataloged, he pulled his out and scrolled it through his contacts to Athene's image to hold over and show Aquarius. "He and I...have since had a falling out, but he's a good contact. He was interested, I think, in this sort of research and seemed to have a good head on his shoulders. You might want to make acquaintance and see if you can get his help on the project of getting all this in process of sorting as well- many hands, and load weight, and all that."

A falling out on philosophical differences may have been enough to colour other aspects of character judgement for some people, but Thraen saw no point to that sort of pettiness. Battle and War tactics and ideals were a different field than research and archaeology- and the moments spent on the moon with the eternal had been lovely. The recommendation was genuine and glad-given.

"The page behind the map and sketches has what glyphs I could remember, I don't think any matched yours, but one look and a long time makes it difficult to make direct comparisons. I'm not eidetic, I'm sorry to say. But there were many more glyphs that I could remember clearly there on that page. Unfamiliarity makes a volume of symbols swim." There were maybe five all told, and even the hour between having seen them and having gotten home to make notes had resulted in a couple versions of each with notations and arrows where he'd become unsure of the shaping and accuracy.

Thraen quirked at her stumble, and the strange, intent glare at what was Nothing to his own vantage. His own gaze followed to the spot, then back to her with unspoken question plain. Did she sense something? I don't feel anything, or even the bare signs of those copies.

When he felt no danger at all, he continued more carefully. "I'm not sure now if we could really estimate if the books we were looking at were the same languages or not. We spent some minutes leafing, but no concerted efforts comparing control page against other pages to sift for similarities. It was a visit on a lark, and we weren't prepared for anything more than wandering. That we found the place at all was complete chance. He'd been telling me about the ghost of the Moon Queen."

"But, " he held up his phone where his own Pearl now dangled. "I have one of these from a cat named Ash. They're the keys that allow travel to the Moon. So when the time comes, if you're free, I'd like if we could go and do some real research."

Thraen quirked, his attention arrested by her question. I don't think it could be more obvious that it was a personal matter...but she asks anyway. Is it purposefully intrusive as a powerplay? No, that doesn't seem ....likely for what little I've encountered to judge character from. Just highly nervous, maybe? She bites her lip. Nervous of what, though. The last we met she was confident, outgoing, willing to share and eager.

The last we met I didn't have a massive scar over my face either. Much could have happened between for her. As much as has happened for me. "As I said, we had a falling out. If you want the elevator version, I believe in capital punishment where provable. He doesn't. I was about to execute an agent of the negaverse who has led fatal strikes against civilians, amid other crimes recognized by the government. Athene came on the act and intervened in time for the man to no doubt survive..."

"Likely to kill, maim, and sow discord where he walks again. "

"I think Athene might be a fight-only-for-defense sort. And never kill, " Thraen rolled one shoulder in a pseudo shrug. "But he refused to debate with me the finer points of the philosophical argument between war time necessity, capital punishment, and execution versus murder."

"But that, being poor-suited to a war, doesn't make him less worthy of research pursuits."

After she was done leafing, the Senshi of Gardens gave a nod, "By all means. You can make as many copies as you like, even. Take it tonight. When we meet up again, you can return it. There's plenty of other preparations to be making in getting supplies that I won't have time to look over those notes again very soon. "

"I tried to go to the moon when this thing wasn't glowing....when Athene and I went it was. I'll see if it does during specific moon phases this month. Maybe we could go to the Moon together in March once I piece it all together?"

He took the offered disk gratefully, trying not to appear too entertained (it was in a friendly way, at least) by her juggling. "A rainbow....road?"

"Is there a limit of the number of times or when? ********* had mentioned to me, when she modified my transformation, that I could go to my asteroid now roughly every couple of weeks instead of however longer it was before. And if the pearls *are* tied to the Moon Phases, then its probably once or twice month that anyone can unlock the magic to go. "

Was it refreshingly noncommittal or distractingly so? Unsettlingly so? Thraen's mind rummaged connotations and synonyms like a Rolodex, but nuances of meaning didn't actually decide for him whether her simple reply on his 'groundbreaking' revelation of personal views was good, bad, or anything else. In the least, the subject change was so painfully obvious as to be a clear social indicator that she just didn't want to deal with it right then and there.

Maybe she would later, but apparently it was lower on the priority list than other discussions. Discussions that she traveled to one to the other with an frantic, unusual pacing and diction that belied her eager, but smooth manner of before. "Aquarius...are you alright? Have you been sleeping and eating enough? I...thankyou for the congratulations, but altogether you seem a little disjointed. "

The odd pauses early on in speech not withstanding

Internally, the laugh cued a slow blink. Externally, Thraen remained stoic.

Thraen did, this time, reach out to try to take one of her hands in both of his. "What does not kill us makes us stranger. I have seen and experienced darkness, but I do not intend to be well. I resolved some months ago to be what circumstance demanded- a sword instead of plowshare."

"But we aren't, whatever we each of us are or become, without pillars to help us stand at need. I can't pretend I know anything about you, or what you're going through without more information."

"But if I can help, I will. You've a brilliant mind, for all I can tell at one meeting, and one I thought I would like to befriend. And to work with."

Unable to hold her, to reach her at least with his hands, he hoped something made it through the haze of what was becoming more and more plain.

She is terrified.
She has been dead?

"Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. Aquarius, death is only change. If it frightens you, as it does many, then turn to friends instead of hiding away from everyone. The truest tragedy is a life too afraid of living. Death is not the worst thing that can happen. If we are reborn from before, death is hardly even known for certain, even now you stand alive and your self of this life- what it is or what it means. Do not stare so long at the closed door that you fail to see the open ones. "

"And in company of friends- hands linked are stronger together. " He held out his hand to her, palm up. "Please. Don't disappear into the night, so haunted and afraid. If you would not stay with me, at least call a friend, and I will walk you to them. "