we are not truly immortal

[dark_light]

After Glass's party is over with, Amariah and Kas go home.

Amariah fetches down their alethiometers.

"It's about time I took care of Alethia's afterlife, whatever it may be," she says quietly. "What can the alethiometer tell you about what I'll find?"

Comments

[lifes_sake]

"Excuse me," says Cam, "harpies?"

[alicornucopia]

"They come up on you when you're dozing," says the shade of a young man. "They know everything bad you've done, ever, they scream it at you, you can't ignore them."

"Maybe you could," says another shade doubtfully. "With your colors still in."

[truthwright]

"I'm pretty good at ignoring people screaming at me," Kas says cheerfully.

[endragoned]

Aianon laughs.

[pythbox]

Ghosty giggles out of thin air.

[dark_light]

"What do the harpies want?" Amariah asks. When the shades have no answer ready to hand, she turns to Cam. "Cam, ask it if the harpies are - the thing."

[lifes_sake]

"Are the harpies the thing that hungers for truth?" Cam murmurs to the alethiometer.

[truthwright]

"They are known by that name," says the alethiometer.

[lifes_sake]

"Yeah, that's the thing. So, based on what we learned before, I guess they'll quit screaming at people if we find them and - unravel this truth-hunger business," says Cam. "Where do we find harpies?"

[alicornucopia]

None of the shades know where to find harpies on purpose.

[truthwright]

So Kas does the obvious thing.

"They're around, but they move," he says. "If we stay here long enough, we'll run into some."

[dark_light]

"Let's split up, talk to more people, congregate wherever the first person to find harpies is," says Amariah. She lifts into the air - provoking breathless surprise from the shades - and says, "I'll go that way."

[lifes_sake]

Cam picks another direction.

[she_sells_seashells]

Shell Bell goes a third way.

[truthwright]

Kas starts walking in yet another direction.

[endragoned]

Aianon takes wing in a fifth.

[pythbox]

Who knows what happens to Ghosty.

[alicornucopia]

Kas is the first to find a harpy.

She lands. She looks at him.

She takes off and flies away.

All of the nearby shades cluster close and cold around him, murmuring about how he sent her away.

[truthwright]

He shivers, thinks about going after the harpy, and then reports this event through the link instead.

[dark_light]

It turns out that the others can't teleport to where he is.

[lifes_sake]

Cam asks the alethiometer he has with him: "Can we not teleport to destinations in the afterlife, or from starting points in the afterlife, or both?"

[truthwright]

The alethiometer tells him, "You can leave at will, but not so easily return."

[lifes_sake]

Cam bounces this result to everyone else, along with a proposal that they all try to converge on Kas's position manually.

[truthwright]

Kas points out that the harpy is long gone by now.

[lifes_sake]

If none of them runs into her on the way, they can continue their search in a group so as to better corner the next one to appear. If they can't teleport to each other, splitting up isn't as valuable as expected.