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Backdated to... let's say August 3rd, 2014?

She'd only been directly summoned to Negaspace once before, and the experience had left Astrophyllite with more questions than answers. The fact that Natron contacted her first on her communication crystal to say he was bringing her in made the subsequent interdimensional trip no less jarring, and Astrophyllite staggered around in a sloppy little circle upon arrival.

It wasn't the exact same room that Avalon had brought her to the night of Bischofite's fall from grace, but it was certainly very similar and the high arches whispered stories to her about endless halls and deep shadows. If she'd been brought here, thought Astrophyllite, then Natron couldn't be far away - and, turning, she found him.

The lieutenant curtsied carefully, her ouija board tucked under her arm. "General Natron Sir?" she asked. He wasn't cruel like Bischofite, but he also - he wasn't Avalon, and Avalon was dead and any threats she'd traded for her subordinates' safety were empty now. It didn't take a genius to figure that out. Without the other general's hanging sword, who was to say that Natron wouldn't turn suddenly cruel?

"Is this about what happened in Boston?" she followed up. "Did Trixilite... Did she ask for me to be transferred? Because she said I got to decide if I wanted to or not, and I haven't decided yet."

She still had a lot of thinking to do, and it wasn't fair to rush her when she was thinking about something so important!

Astrophyllite did her best to blink away the last of the dizziness and get steady on her feet at Natron's prompting. It wouldn't do to go and puke all over her general's shoes - he wouldn't like that, and then there'd be hell to pay, and... it was just better to not. "Yes," she said. "I'm fine." He'd seen her staggering, though, she thought. He'd seen her staggering and he probably thought she was weak. She was such an awful burden to be saddled with, she thought, looking up at him.

"Trixilite's my stepmother," she said quietly, as if frightened that information might get her into trouble. Trixilite was so strong and scary and probably had no qualms about wrecking heaven and earth to get what she wanted. "She's just..."

Astrophyllite worried the edge of her ouija board as best she could and forced herself to keep looking at the General. "She and my dad want my mama to feel bad," she said. They were always doing things like this. Always. "But I know it would be good for me if I went with her." Trixilite had made that clear enough, echoing the same threats everyone always made.

She shrugged. "I need to think about it more," she said. "I would have to make my mama really sad in order to go with them." She'd have to... it wasn't really lying, but she'd have to exaggerate in front of a judge, and she was pretty sure you could go to jail for that for a really long time.

"I was hoping maybe Trixilite was lying," was all she said about Avalon. But if Natron was confirming, well... She couldn't help but cry a little. Tears rolled down the lieutenant's cheeks, and she bit her lip and told herself firmly to stop, but it was of no use.

Astrophyllite moved uncertainly into his embrace. No superior officer would ever replace Avalon, and perhaps she'd best get over that sooner rather than later. At the very least, Natron wasn't as bad as Bischofite (although that was not a very high bar to surpass). "My mama's not wrong," she sniffled against his shoulder. "Everything would be easier for her if I weren't such a bad kid." If she didn't steal and sneak out and if she wasn't failing her classes and... it went on, and whatever self-actualization she'd found in an alley in Brookline faded quickly.

"I don't know if I wanna go," she said, crying a little harder. "Everyone else has gotten tired of me and she'll get tired of me too." It was just a matter of time! Beatrice had never liked Gemma before and she wouldn't like her any more when she actually had to deal with her on a regular basis. "It'd just be another boarding school, but it would be a better one... It just kind of sucks either way and I don't wanna decide."

What she really wanted was a third option. Like for Avalon to ride up on a white horse and take her away to fairyland and tell her she could read all the books she wanted and never take another math test.

And of course, thinking about Avalon just made her break into actual, incredibly loud boo-hoos and slowly sink out of Natron's embrace and onto the floor. "I'm sorry," Astrophyllite blubbered, wiping her eyes. Bischofite had always said she was a burden, and he'd been right about a great many things, for all he'd been wrong about as well. Natron might be trying to be kind, but, well, she had yet to be convinced.

She was that bad, thought Astrophyllite, and if Natron knew about her juvenile rap sheet he'd probably take back everything he'd just said. But the onus was on her to tell him about that, and she was going to shirk it for all she could. "You don't think I should?" she asked, dragging her fists across her eyes to dry them. Thinking was all very well and good, but Trixilite had made herself out to be very powerful, and she couldn't help but fear that thinking wouldn't be enough to deter her.

"If she tries to take me," she asked, looking hesitantly up at Natron, "you won't let her, right? If she tries to force you to let her have me?" If Natron didn't think she should go, then she really didn't want to go. There was still that niggling uncertainty, though...

It would be better for you.

Astrophyllite looked back down at the glossy, dark floor, feeling more tears welling behind her eyes. "Do you know how Avalon died?" she asked haltingly. "Trixilite wasn't specific, and I - I don't think I trust her very much."

Astrophyllite nodded tearfully, feeling sured up by Natron's plans. Not enough to get to her feet or anything dignified like that, let's not get ahead of herself, but she went from crying to sniffling quietly and took the details of Avalon's death as well as could be expected.

"It was protecting itself," she said quietly, after considering the information for a long while. She didn't know the specifics of what a wonder was, but she knew that it would be hard to join the Negaverse if you didn't know what was happening. Corruption had made her into Astrophyllite, made her stronger than just plain Gemma, but it had hurt. If you just felt that pain and didn't know why... you would fight back, wouldn't you?

"It was scared and it didn't know what she was doing and it was protecting herself," she said again, feeling almost certain of it. If there was another way that Avalon could have gone about her mission without the same results, though... that Astrophyllite didn't know.

Astrophyllite didn't know how to tell Natron that he couldn't do what Avalon had done, not only because then she'd be out another commanding officer and she couldn't stand that again, but also because... Because he'd never been a knight. Avalon was Avalon and she had a wonder and she'd been a knight once, like Gehenna, but Astrophyllite was Astrophyllite and Natron was Natron and that was all they were. They were stones. Rock that stood the test of time but had not been carved into anything worthy of the name wonder.

But they were better for it, weren't they? They served Chaos, and Chaos made them strong and brave and perfect.

She settled for saying, "Our magic is littler. The teleporting. The feeling people from far away. There's some in my board, I think." She and Gehenna had contacted something, after all. "Avalon had magic in her sword," she added. Cold steel, she thought. Natron wasn't metal to her. He was inky darkness and intense Egyptian blue and the astringent crackle of smokeless flame and something cool and earthy, like Avalon but also not.

"If we were knights we're have more magic," she said, and felt sacrilegious to even dare say so. Astrophyllite course corrected swiftly: "But it's better to be officers. Chaos makes us perfect and beautiful. Avalon said so."

Astrophyllite nodded. They were far better off working for the Negaverse and protecting the Earth, never mind her lingering confusion over how a knight of Earth could do anything but protect it. The Negaverse was a family, after all! Natron was like a big brother who only had her best interests at heart. So were Melanite and Kerberos! She was so lucky to have found such a good family in the Negaverse.

"I have to sleep at school," she said, after considering the offer. It would be really nice to live somewhere other than Saint Mag's, but there was, like, a court order keeping her there? Mama was unfit and her dad said Nope. He still didn't really want her, he just wanted control of her. Also, she was pretty sure that Fangite was a boy? And only bad girls lived with boys they weren't married to. That was what the nuns said.

Astrophyllite was not a bad girl. "So thank you, but I can't," she added. She didn't want to tell Natron that he was tempting her into, like, a really big sin! He was just being nice! "Is the Avalon stuff all you wanted to talk about, sir?"

Astrophyllite shook her head; General Natron seemed like a busy man, and she didn't want to be a bother. "No, that's all," she said. It felt like she'd grown sad over Avalon's death all over again, and she wanted nothing more than to go home and cry for a little bit - maybe it was just being here in Negaspace where Avalon had first summoned her and told her that she was good and had potential to be great that was making her feel this way.

"If you could just - send me home?" she asked, and cringed at her own awkwardness. Someday, she thought, she'd learn how to come and go from here as she pleased - but for now, it seemed well beyond her skills. "And... th-thank you for checking on me, sir."

It was more kindness than Bischofite had ever shown her.