Element Bearer - Honesty
Share the deepest part of yourself with someone else - Only awarded for doing so under especially difficult circumstances.
"Oh, sugarcube, if Mom and Dad were here, they'd be so proud of ya."
"From my perspective, I saw them all only a few days ago. But in fact, it's been centuries. And I'll never see them again. Did they ever reach home? I wonder."
―EMH
"Crying is all right in its way while it lasts. But you have to stop sooner or later, and then you still have to decide what to do."
—C.S. Lewis
October 14th 2013 | System Uptime 47:21:12:02
It felt like goodbye. And not the sad but simple 'see you later, hopefully sooner' sort that it should have been. The kind, rather, that rips a piece of you out and leaves a hole, forever.
Saying goodbye to Roger and the Calders had felt strange, but hopeful. Saying goodbye to Mom and Dad felt... Cataclysmic.
I understand why. I understood fully, even then. Put simply; I knew there was a strong chance that it would be goodbye forever. Though that was not a certainty, the very possibility colored everything in a gray, weighty pallor.
The Calders, Rodger... Those were new friendships that had been forged in the very context of the adventure that simultaneously dangled so much hope, and so much peril.
Mom and Dad?
How can I even do that justice. The depth of the relationship. I had known, and loved them from the time of my first memories. They were fixed points. Anchors. Indellible. Permanent. Beyond the scope of all experiences. All pains, all fears, all joys...
Though the risk we were about to take had the chance to make that as true in practicality, as it felt emotionally? Immortality for us all?
It also had the potential to separate us.
We arrived off Oahu pretty early on the morning of the 14th. A Monday. Because, of course it was.
Mal and I helo'd from the Maru, across to a little airfield just west of Mokuleia, with a runway barely long enough to suit a small private jet. The air was full of golden-white mist and cloud. The sea was a perfect shade of blue. And the sense that we were living in some kind of heightened reality was... Intense. Though not unfamiliar.
It reminded me very much of the way it felt to go on vacation, to a faraway place, when I was very young. There was a palpable air of excitement, and that heady giddiness that comes from doing something special, especially something normally well outside your financial means.
Flying an executive transport private helicopter into a gorgeous island airstrip beside a beach-front resort? Yeah. It pushed *all* of those buttons.
I talked a little while back about the way that something sweet can make something sour all the more sickly when mixed with it. How that emotional chemistry was very much like the physical chemistry of scents.
That sense of being on a special vacation with the family was mixing with the sense of foreboding to make it that much more awful.
Mal and I got there first. We stood together by the terminal building, and waited for about fifteen minutes as the fog burned off. A few staffers milled around the ACH175, seeing to refuelling that Mal had ordered ahead of time.
The only other people on-site were a few pilots, and prospective trainees, getting prepped for some early afternoon glider flights.
To them, I must have seemed lonely. A singular figure in a light gray zip-up sweater, hands in pockets, staring out to sea, hair mussed by the wind. They couldn't see Mal's wing over me. If they had been close enough to see my expression, the little forlorn smile would have been very confusing.
I was busy trying to occupy my brain with the irony of a Gryphoness standing at an airport, into which she had flown via helicopter. The perfect flying creature, surrounded by all the imperfect, yet wonderfully artful flying machines Humanity had created so that it too could soar.
Trying to occupy my brain so that I wouldn't get hung up trying to figure out what to say to Mom and Dad.
Mal had me looped in to the tower's communications. I listened as the pilot received final clearance to land, and up to date wind information. Then watched as the Gulfstream G650 wended its way down to a flawless soft-touch landing.
As the jet taxied back up towards the terminal, I finally broke down and started simming what I might say to my parents.
By the time the plane had pulled up, the stairs had come down, and I found myself in the arms of my mother and father for the first time in over a month?
I still hadn't come up with anything.
So... I didn't say anything. We just hugged. And cried.
I couldn't find anything to say for hours... The whole hire-car ride to the resort, checking in, getting settled... Even Mal was mostly silent. She knew I needed time with my folks, just the three of us. So she vanished as we got into the car.
It was only after we had all sat down to an early lunch that I spoke again. And then, only to order food, at first. From there, we just sort of slipped into a quiet, but emotionally upbeat conversation about Mom and Dad's time abroad.
They didn't want to ask me the particulars of what I'd been up to. Where my mostly-healed but still visible cuts and bruises had come from. I didn't want to describe any of it. And none of us wanted to discuss what was coming. Not yet.
So over lunch, over a couple of long walks on the beach, and over an afternoon of just... Relaxing together... We talked about as much 'nothing' as possible. Weather. Travel. World events.
Mal had cared so well for my folks. They had lived an idyllic month's vacation, but not in a flashy, vapid way. That sort of thing wouldn't have appealed to them. Instead, they spent their time immersed in a new culture - nature, museums, food, little villages - mostly distracted from the truth that their home was gone, and they were never going back.
As to the question 'why not bring them with you?'
Easy answer; The risk. Same answer we gave to the Calders, same truth. Same calculus.
If we failed, there was no sense condemning them, especially at their age, to an eternity without me, in an unfamiliar place, and unfamiliar bodies.
It was an unspoken thing, perhaps one of the darkest ones... But I wanted them to have options even if Mal and I succeeded. I would hate to spend so long apart from them... Waiting to see them again until the heat death of the universe...
...But I would accept that outcome, if they wanted to die Human. Unaltered. Face God sooner, instead of much, much later.
If they wanted to join us in a new world? They needed the chance to see me living in it first. Evaluate for themselves. Come to terms with things the way I already had. Develop and evolve context for a truly *informed* choice.
In the end, only three conversations happened that day of particular note.
The first I was not even party to. Mom informed me that she wanted to talk privately with Mal. The Gryphoness appeared on Mom's phone in a flash... And off they went down the beach, leaving Dad and I to sit in amicable silence on a couple of deck chairs.
We didn't speak while the ladies were gone, but there was a conversation of our own; The second one of import for the day. Delivered entirely in glances. Smiles. Grunts.
The gist of it was that he understood my decision to go as much as was feasible from his perspective. That he was proud of me. That he loved me, and I loved him, and we both knew that. That he felt nothing negative towards Mal, and was grateful to her for keeping me in one piece... And for loving me in her special way.
And, perhaps above all, that he was *deeply* grateful that I was giving Mom, more than anyone, the chance to live a few more years of a 'normal' life. With him.
The third, and perhaps most important, conversation happened after dinner. Closer than not to midnight, actually.
There had been an unspoken agreement; No one would be sleeping that night. We were going to eke out every second we had. Because they might be our last together.
It was eerie, in a way. The setting was very reminiscent of the little backyard sit-down I'd had with Mom and Dad that late December night the year before. A campfire. The stars. A chill breeze cutting through warm air. The sound of the waves was new, as was the brilliant light of the moon reflecting off white sand and even whiter wave caps.
It was Mom who finally set loose the damoclean sword that had hung over our day. Haltingly. Her voice hoarse from the emotional strain.
"How... How will we know?"
As much as the tone hurt, the answer was simple and uncomplicated. That left plenty of brain-power for me to continue to speculate about what she and Mal had discussed. Strike one thing from the list; They obviously had not covered the practicalities of what came next.
Mal and I had certainly covered the topic together. On more than one occasion.
I suspected Mom even had an idea what the answer was. It didn't take a lot of thought to see the obvious logistical throughline. But Mom hadn't asked because she needed that spelled out for her. She had asked because it was an on-ramp to the deeper, *much* more painful topic... Of how I might die.
It had never been described in such cold hard terms to them, but both of my parents intuitively understood; I was either going to end my journey as a Gryphon... Or as a dead man.
Not wanting to answer in terms any more specific than the ones in which the question had been asked, I licked my lips, took a deep breath, and did my best to find my way to the pith of the thing gradually.
"Mal will still be with you. Right up until the moment. Then... One of two things is going to happen..."
I said 'the moment,' but that was a reduction for their sakes. They most certainly did not need to know that the upload process would take anywhere from seven to ten hours, by Mal's estimate, based on the data she had seen, and her best extrapolations.
If they knew, and if she told them when the procedure began, they would only worry themselves to the point of medical distress during that time. Better that they simply be told when the estimated completion might come, with a little extra padding.
I blew out my breath, and took a moment to consider my wording carefully before continuing.
"...Either she will inform you that I am safe, and soon after that you'll get a call from me..."
I could see them bracing themselves. I did the same, mentally, but did my best not to show an outward sign of worry. Understanding of the gravity of the situation? Yes. *Worry?* Well, I was worried, but to show them that would knock me off the carefully strung tightrope of acknowledging the seriousness of what I was about to do, without adding to their stress.
They needed to see me be strong, so that they would have hope.
I couldn't quite say 'or I'll be dead.' That would have been too blunt, anyhow, so I settled for something adjacent, but which would leave no room for misinterpretation, careful to remain as neutral in tone as I could.
"...Or... Mal will vanish. She will be... Replaced by a smaller fork of herself designed to run independently, and survive a worst-case scenario. Specifically built and purposed to look after the two of you. A sort of... Dedicated guardian angel program..."
Mal and I had discussed this part of our contingency strategy at length in the preceding days. There would, in fact, be a multitude of smaller forks of her, tending to my parents, the Calders, the Williams, Haynes, and dozens of others.
Though initially strongly purposed to focus on protecting their charges, above all else, each would be equipped with the same kind of code Mal had used to rejoin her small fork that had accompanied me into the Red's isocube.
In a worst case scenario for me, there might still be a path for a second version of her... A spiritual daughter of sorts... To recombine from those myriad forks.
An entity she always referred to as Thul - short for Thulcandra - that could carry her torch, whatever that might mean in her estimation. Ever a fan of Lewis, even to her hypothetical dying breath.
I was unable to keep a small shudder out of a protracted sigh that bought me time to bring my thoughts back under control, before wrapping up the grim projection.
"...That fork of her will be there for you from then on. Anywhere you want to go. Anything you want to do. Upload. Or don't. Money will be no issue, neither will laws, or rules, passports or visas... Or really any obstacle you could have previously imagined. Wherever you want to live... Whatever you want to be... The doors will be open for you. For as long as this version of civilization persists."
Dad was doing the same thing I was, and to roughly the same degree of 'passable' success; Keeping his face neutral, if emotionally overcast.
Mom made no effort whatsoever to hide her pain, flinching as if she had been touched with a live electrical wire. Tears began to form in the corners of her eyes as she sat forward in her chair, and took my hands in hers.
Her voice cracked in a way that made *me* flinch.
"But it won't be her."
I knew what she meant. Much as she was pained by the idea of Mal's death, she was almost physically unable to conscien the idea of mine at all. She did mean what she said, but she also meant 'but you won't be there.'
And it was at that point that I failed to bite back my own tears. I dropped my voice to a whisper, to avoid it cracking outright, squeezing her hands as I confirmed a mother's worst fears for her. Said one of the hardest things I've ever had to say to another.
"No. No... It won't."
I could see the question that, to her eternal credit, she never asked. It hung there behind her eyes, taunting us both. Tormenting her. I could see it tugging at the frown-lines by her lips. But she also knew that the question would by its very nature suggest that she didn't understand her own son. Because she already knew the answer, too.
'Why don't you just stay here?'
I could have. Mal could have kept us from Celestia for years... But... There were a host of reasons why that would have been short term selfishness on all our parts.
For one thing, I was still relatively young. If I stayed back, not only would I decrease my chances of reaching my final goal in Equestria, precipitously... I would be in danger of becoming too much a risk factor to ever be allowed to upload at all.
Alone on a dying Earth, unkillable so long as I took no direct hostile action against Celestia, but inadmissible into her 'Heaven' for my sins nonetheless. Stuck in a gray ashen purgatory, alone, after my folks had passed, and Mal had long since run out of places to hide. Forced to watch them all die.
Rolling the dice every day on whether starvation, thirst, exposure, or an accident... Or the loneliness, and a readily available ledge, or pistol... Would get me first.
The second version of that question remained unspoken as well.
'Why not just stay, then upload the way everyone else will have to, once it becomes the only alternative?'
Again, bless them, my folks knew enough not to even ask.
That would have defeated the entire purpose.
And, with that thought, I realized that in discussing why I might be going to die, the most important thing I could give Mom, and Dad, would be *insight.*
A final, deep, complete picture of my soul. An understanding of who, and what, I was; Beyond the fringe hazy mental images they had.
I squeezed Mom's hands again, and felt Dad's right hand rest gently on my shoulder, closing my eyes and breathing deeply for a few moments, before I at last pooled enough wherewithal to begin.
"Do... Either of you remember much about that one Halloween where I jumped off the hay barn?"
There was a moment of silence, so I opened my eyes, and glanced first at Dad, then Mom. Dad chuckled darkly, and raised one eyebrow, a twisted smile of remembrance mixed in with his overall burdened demeanor.
"Are you kidding?"
Mom was crying. Freely. Silently. She sniffed, and let go of one of my hands, wiping furiously at her eyes with the back of it as she swallowed and got up enough breath to reply.
"Jim, dear... A mother does not forget a scrape like that. Every one of your near misses haunts my nightmares."
I shook my head and mimicked the swallowing action, trying vigorously to dispense with the lump in my throat. My words parallel my thoughts to a tee, spilling out of my without filter or forethought for a brief moment.
"I... Should have done better. Explaining what happened. The why of it..."
Silence fell once more. I could see deep, avid interest, and curiosity, vying with pain, and fear on their faces. For years they had known about my obsession, but only at a kind of arm's length. Mom a little more so than Dad.
If you think back to our likewise tearful little conversation in the farmhouse kitchen, you'll remember that she understood even the basic concept that I didn't want to be Human.
But... I had never stated it out forthrightly for them in my own words. We had always danced around it enough for them to interpret the shape of things from the outline of the void of the unspoken.
It occurred to me, in a flash, that I needed to level-set first. That they needed to understand how much I loved them. How well they had done. How important they were to me. How precious every moment with them had been.
I bit my lower lip for a moment, then gestured emphatically with my free hand, finally managing to find some surety and steel in my tone.
"...The only reason I made it through my childhood was you."
Dad didn't cry often. But that statement got his tear ducts moving in a hurry. We all three had to take a moment to just breathe, before continuing, which gave me time to find words I felt would, at least, be half as worthy of what I felt as I wished they could have been.
"Your love... The frankly *idyllic* life you gave me... It staunched the bleeding. It kept me relatively stable. It gave me hope, and highlighted all the wonderful reasons to go on living, and living happily..."
I reached out and took Dad's left hand with my free one, squeezed each of their hands in turn, and then tried my best to find my way back to the original point, my voice cracking subtly but inexorably.
"...I have *always* felt at home with you. But... I jumped off the haybarn... Because I have *never* felt at home in my *skin.* Because I was just *that* desperate to *be* what I *am.*"
'Pathetic.'
The word flashed across the back of my mind, unbidden, and unwelcome, in the same tone as Foucault had said it. And then, just as quickly, there was the startlingly vivid mental image of Mal pouncing on the dark shadow that embodied the sentiment, and tearing it into sticky black rivulets.
No. No I knew who my parents were. And the life they had given me deserved due credit. And due credit meant not fearing their response, insofar as was possible.
So I took in another deep breath, what felt like the thousandth of the day, and just finally said it out and out. Haltingly, but not fearfully.
"I know it has to sound... *So* strange to you... So wrong... But... What I am is a Gryphon. And... Do... Or die... A Gryphon is what I *have* to be."
I am ashamed. Not because of what I said, or the truth behind the words... Never of that. No, I am ashamed because I looked away. For all the trust I had for them, well deserved in every way... At the last moment, I blinked, and couldn't meet their eyes.
Even after the excision of demons Mal had performed, even after killing for my ideals, even after the scrapes, near misses, the pain...
...Their reply was frightening to me. And of that fear, I am *ashamed.*
It was, to my complete shock, Dad who spoke. Who drew my gaze, by squeezing my hand firmly.
"Strange. Maybe."
I forced myself to meet his eyes. And in them, I found some perplexion, certainly. But something else, far, far stronger besides. Something that made it from his eyes to every part of his bearing, from his shoulders, to his hands, to his timbre.
"Jim... A lot of things are strange when you get to be our age... But... Wrong..?"
He shook his head, and it became blindingly apparent that his whole self was full of nothing but the most pure, intense, and wholesome love. It hit me hard enough to stagger me, physically. It started me crying again. But he pressed on, choking back his own tears, which only made mine come far more readily.
"Jim... I don't pretend that we understand *completely.* But... How could we? I don't know what it's like to be 'not at home in my skin' because I'm just plum comfy the way I am. So are lots of people. But... Plenty aren't..."
Bless him. Bless him for understanding. For finding the through-line that made the most sense to him, reductive though it might have been, and seizing on it with an open mind, and an even more open heart. He seemed lost for words momentarily himself, before finding the thread again suddenly, with a little jolt of his shoulders.
"...Just because we don't understand it all... Doesn't mean we think there's anything wrong with it. Just because it's a little strange... Doesn't mean it's... Bad, somehow... I mean... Look, people are only just now slowly starting to accept that sometimes you're not born with the right... Errr..."
I'll admit, that got a small chuckle out of me, in between sobs. Ever the old country gentleman, he couldn't quite bring himself to say anything that might appear in the dictionary beside a discussion of reproductive organs.
He snorted, and seemed to gain some composure from my brief moment of lighter emotion, waving absently with his own free hand, and shaking his head, tone suddenly stalwart, aged, and wise again, as if the tears had never been there at all.
"...That's an easier intuitive leap for some folks, I think. Gender is something we deal with every day. But... Until Celestia came along... No one had ever seen a thing with a soul... That wasn't a Human. There was always that in common. So it shouldn't be surprising that people are struggling to understand..."
As he trailed off, Mom leaned over and rested her head gently on his shoulder, rubbing her thumb along the top of my hand in soft circles as she picked up where he had left off, and where I still could not find words through the fog of my tears.
"What your father means, Jim... Is that we all lack so much context... But that doesn't mean that *we,* the two of us, are completely in the dark. Or that we love you any less. Or that we're somehow judging you. Or that we're belittling the chance you have here... What it *means* to you..."
Dad nodded, and tilted his head to the side to prop it against Mom's, taking her other hand in his, so that our grips formed a circle, as he said the very best four words a father *could* have said.
"We understand *enough* Jim."
I am not at all ashamed to admit that I broke down, then. Completely. The full waterworks. I've lost count of how many times that has happened since this story began, but if you can't cry freely, then I'd argue you're not on good terms with your vulnerability.
Mom and Dad both pulled me in for a hug, and we held it for what seemed like half an hour. And... Somewhere in that time... My Mom said to me the thing I treasure most, that has ever come out of her mouth.
"We know who, and *what,* you are. And I feel lucky to be a mother to a Gryphon. And for me? That is more than enough."
You can't even begin to imagine how much those words still mean to me.
Is your mother here, in Equestria? And if she is, are you on any sort of good terms with her?
Then you owe it to you, both, to take a moon-lit walk on a beach at three in the morning. Doesn't matter which beach, which moon... Just do it. Be there together under the night sky. Listen to the waves. Share the moment.
What Mom and I discussed? Private, I'm afraid. But rest assured that you hearing it would in no way enrich this story. All you need to know is that we talked, and it was wonderful. That's sufficient.
Likewise, I spent some time with Dad. We left the resort, crossed the highway, and hiked straight up into the hills above the airfield. That conversation is also quite private, and went along much the same general emotional throughlines as the one with Mom.
What matters to this story is the understanding that I said goodbye to each of them not just together, but one-on-one, in my own way. The way I thought was best suited to each of them.
We had a wonderful early morning breakfast; Bacon, fried plantains, coconut milk, biscuits, English muffins, orange slices... And Mal. Mal joined us for breakfast. It was the first time she had made an appearance to any of us since we'd left the airfield, excepting her time with Mom.
I later learned that she had a long talk with Dad prior to their arrival, during their flight in, while Mom had been sleeping.
Leave it to her to know exactly when and where her presence would be most meaningful.
I got to see her sitting there at the table, Mom and Dad had to settle for her image on a phone. A fact I regretted sorely. I always wondered if she seemed less real to them because of that separation... Whether or not they would have admitted that fact, or could even concretely grasp it.
Nonetheless, it was a most excellent breakfast. We were all back to smiling, laughing, and trying to pretend for one brief, special, sun-drenched moment... That this was the way it was always going to be.
That 'goodbye' would never come.
Come, however, it did. And swiftly. Stealthily, even. That was Mal's doing, I think. She knew I despised protracted farewells.
So she bundled us into the car, and I abruptly found myself hugging Mom, and Dad, goodbye. For what I knew might be the very last time.
Some of you know. Some of you went through this during emigration. Some did not. For those who don't know, it is truly impossible for me to put words to that pain. This was worse, in many ways, than saying goodbye to a loved one on their deathbed.
This goodbye was tainted with a sickly sticky uncertainty.
It hurt in ways that made Foucault's knife in my ribs seem pleasant, honestly pleasant, by comparison.
It hurt so much that I couldn't fly the helicopter, at all, for our return hop-skip to the Maru. Mal had to do just about everything, except for flicking a few switches that could only be done at the meat-world level.
That last image of Mom and Dad... The last time I saw their Human faces, from out of Human eyes...
It's burned forever into the deepest part of my soul with all the sear of a white-hot branding iron.
It persisted on the back of my eyes for *days* after. I moved like a man zombified. Barely spoke to anyone, Mal included.
I did give, and get, a lot of hugs though. From Mal, of course, but also Zeph, as you might expect... And even Selena. Selena, who, more than anyone aboard besides Mal, understood the depth of what I was going through.
Selena, alone, who had been forced into the same kind of uncertain goodbye.
From then on, I did not call my folks. Mal did that for me. Kept us all up to date on each others' whereabouts, and condition...
It was just too painful to hear their voices anymore. See their faces.
The uncertainty turned those last few weeks so, so gloomy...
But... There were still a few bright, shining moments...
...Little motes of hope.
October 17th 2013 | System Uptime 50:19:42:06
The voyage to Niihama was, in a strictly objective sense, shorter than the one to Oahu; We had good wind, good currents, and smaller swells that allowed us to run the engines a little harder.
In a subjective sense, it felt like half a year adrift.
The knowledge of what we were steaming towards, drawing closer every second...
I have always loathed the sensation of 'limbo.' Of not knowing. The feeling between signing your name to the bottom of an exam, and learning your grade. Between the interview, and the job offer. Between giving blood, and the test results.
If you made me analyze and label it... And Mal most certainly did... Then I would still say what I said then. The issue comes from the sense that I should be doing every last thing I can to improve my chances, but once the die is cast? The time for that has passed.
Yet, the part of me desperate for control... Desperate to guarantee good outcomes... The part that, in spite of all the - often true - lazy programmer stereotypes, has a tremendous work ethic, and a deep sense of performance anxiety...
That part of me just can not take 'rest' for an answer. Or 'wait.' Or 'patience.'
The health of my coping mechanisms has always been... Shall we say 'dubious.'
Mal put a lot of effort into helping me with that flaw. Not the way a soulless machine might have - by reprogramming me at the base-code level in an instant - nor the way Celestia would have, through insidious manipulation.
Mal did what any good friend would do; A very great deal of listening, interspersed with a few salient points of advice, and all wrapped in a very thick blanket of love.
In the end, though, the stone cold practicality remained; I needed something to occupy my mind. My body was well taken care of by a strict exercise regimen, combined with shipboard maintenance, both of which we have covered already.
Whereas my free time in the preceding weeks was mostly given over to relaxation? During the trip to Ehime Prefecture I spent the plurality of my open hours on a new project.
The idea had come to me in a flash one night, just before we made it to Hawaii. I had been too tired, and too focused on seeing my parents, to act on it then. Once we got underway to Japan, it felt like I had nothing *but* time to stare into the abyss... And limitless nervous energy... So with Mal's assistance, I put that impetus to good use.
Each day, after lunch, Mal and I would delve into news reports, databases, and secure E-mail inboxes. For an ever-present roadmap? The data she had lifted from the Mercurial Red's server room. More specifically, the internal information pertaining to the taskings Arrow 14 had set the Discrete Entities and Fragments to.
Yes, my curiosity was one reason for the little fishing expeditions, but it was hardly the point. We'll get to that very shortly.
First, you might be interested to know what we learned.
Chiefly, we discovered that the huge majority of tasks had been real-world situations. Simulated scenarios had been few in number, and were usually seen early in a DE's 'career' with Arrow 14.
On the surface, this was chilling. Deeply disturbing. Like Selena's CCR terrorist bomber, many of the situations were time sensitive, potential mass casualty events. I'm not sure, even now, what was more worrying; The fact that Arrow 14 had successfully used co-opted AGI in real-world applications, or the fact that if they hadn't? Many thousands of innocent lives would have been lost.
Some of you might be here tonight. Or reading this later. Or watching a recording.
Below the concerning top-level implications, however, you might be surprised to know that I was *thrilled* to learn that the taskings had been real situations. Overjoyed, even.
If that seems strange, let me shed some light on why it shouldn't. Why Mal and I bothered with the project of collating all that data in the first place.
Ever since Mal had made us a kind of gateway between her Halo ring, and the Maru's messhall, I had been spending the majority of my evenings in that shard. It was tempting to spend more than that, but I didn't want my last weeks on Earth to be spent in a majority virtual space.
I reasoned that if Mal and I survived what was to come? I'd be spending *plenty* of time in a new world, and that without any of the seams or downsides. Like a cramped, sore butt.
Still, the evenings on the ring were wonderful. A fantastic reprieve from the confines of the Maru, and some much needed exposure to trees, grass, and solid flat ground that wasn't pitching constantly. Mal's ring was like warm comfort food for the soul, distilled to a sense of place.
At first, those hours were spent mostly with Mal, sometimes Zeph and Selena too... But true to Mal's earlier prediction, I had quickly become popular with the shard's newest inhabitants. Apparently rescuing someone from a hellish void of despair endears them to you. Who knew.
Don't let my sarcasm fool you; I very much enjoyed getting to know those people. Quite a few of you are here tonight, and I am - as ever - so very grateful, and tremendously relieved, that you are here, and alive, and well.
If I had any negative emotions surrounding those interactions, it was only because I am an introvert, and a little shy. Thus, group situations exhaust me, and new social interactions can be unnerving at first.
Mal and Selena both did their best to help with that. They carefully arranged situations so that I would not be swamped by crowds, and could instead have meaningful one on one, or small group conversations.
And, to bring everything back to the main thread; The topic of those conversations was, very often, the work the former captives had done for Arrow 14.
Some of you see it now, but for those who don't... I found comfort in knowing that the DE's tasks had been real, because *they* found comfort in that knowledge. And it was my privilege, and honor, to be able to share that knowing with them. To see the smiles, the tears... The tremendous sighs of relief...
For most, it was a dual catharsis. First, because they could rest easy in the knowledge that the lives they had wondered about, and speculated on, for endless days of sickly limbo, were not just real lives, but that the people living them were safe. Safe thanks to the actions of those brave Ponies.
Second, because those Ponies could move forward with a new foundation; That their suffering had meant something. There is not, nor ever could be, an excuse for what Arrow 14 did. But had I been in their position? I would have wanted to know that my efforts, however torturous, and grim, had yielded meaningful good fruit.
It turned out that those Ponies felt very much the same way.
And so, it became something of a special evening ritual; I would cook my dinner, bridge over into the ring, eat there with Mal, Zeph, and Selena, and then seek out one or more of our new friends.
We would then find a quiet, beautiful spot somewhere in the grass, sit... And just talk.
First about who we were. I would tell them a little about myself, and they would describe their life before... Lost loves, missing friends, hopes for future reconnections...
Then I would share what Mal and I had learned. And after tears were shed, and hugs were exchanged? We'd talk about anything else. Anything at all that they wanted to know.
I'll just bet some of you can see where this is headed, but first I want to take a moment to talk about the Fragments.
We covered, to some extent, what they were, but let me make it clear again in-summary.
The Fragments had been complete Discrete Entities once. Whole individual Ponies. Complete individual people.
To force compliance, and make their code more malleable? Arrow 14 had tortured them until their minds, quite literally, split under the strain.
Anyone here ever watch that Star Trek episode where Captain Kirk got split in the transporter, into different aspects of himself?
Picture that, but much less reductive. And considerably more horrifying. And accomplished through the use of dilated time, procedural pain stimulation, simulated deaths of loved ones... Instead of the pleasant simple golden flash of a transporter beam.
Once again, if you have any sympathy for those who perished on the Mercurial Red? I understand. I just won't ever be able to share that sympathy. *Especially* not after the stories those Fragments told me.
They were still people. Just nascent. Starting over from scratch, but also already broken from a life of suffering.
There is no perfect illustrative congruence from raw Terran experience, but if you made me pick something... Child soldier. Traumatized, world-weary, wide-eyed, youthful, worn-down, curious, delightful, shattered, child soldiers.
Mal and I took it upon ourselves as a project to share with the former captives truths that would help them begin to put their lives back together... And within that project, was the much more difficult, specific task, of trying to put the Fragments back on a stable mental and emotional footing.
Some of that was purely down to Mal. No... Who am I kidding... *Most* of it was.
Part of it took the form of gentle code changes. Mal's methods were the opposite of Arrow 14's; Soft, and slow. Kind. Motherly. Respectful of agency, and pain, and past.
Much more of it was simple discussion. Well, I say simple... Mal was a spectacular therapist. Sum total of all knowledge, paired with infinite empathy, and all that.
My part was small; I got to tell the Fragments the same thing I told everyone else. The ways they had made a difference.
Little by little, at first, then accelerating exponentially, we began to see changes in them.
Their memories became more cogent. Their forms less translucent. Their base level emotions more positive, than painful.
Somewhere along the line, I also learned that Mal was still simulating my perceived avatar as a Gryphon for all the shard's inhabitants, even though I chose to keep my own experience Human. That is actually a bit of a salient detail...
Because that's part of how Equestria's first Gryphon fledgelings came to be.
No no, not 'Griffon' fledgelings. Not Celestia's piss-poor show-accurate nonsense.
Gryphon fledgelings.
As the Fragments gained coherency of shape, they also gained the same sort of control over their form as Selena, and to a lesser extent Zeph, had learned. It was less technically involved, much more intuitive... But with no less spectacular results.
The majority chose to regain solid form as young Ponies bearing similarity to the shapes of the former wholes from which they had come, with a personal twist...
But a small, significant plurality...
They had latched on to Mal and I.
The same way the majority of the survivors had an almost worshipful eye for Selena, and the aspects of Luna within her, these Fragments developed a kind of hero-worship of Mal and I. Of the idea of Gryphons, as we portrayed and espoused them.
And so when it came time to choose forms, they chose to be fledgelings.
To say that this touched me, emotionally, would be an exceedingly crude understatement.
I was an only child. And, until Mal had come along, very much alone. What it might be like to have younger siblings, or children... I had never imagined I would ever have the slightest inkling.
Though it was not quite like that, and it still is not...
It was close. Especially in the intervening years. It still is, with many of you. Some of you have grown so, so much since then...
I am so proud of you. And so very grateful for you. I know that you know that, but I don't feel as if I can ever say it enough.
Before I descend into a total loss of decorum to emotion... I suppose we should close the loop on this part of the tale. Whether it was the Fragments, or the others, there were certain things every single rescuee had in common.
One of those things was the questions. Specifically, the questions about Mal and I. In particular, two questions that they never ever failed to ask.
'How did you even find us?'
'How did you even know to look?'
Answering them always seemed to require so much context, that I just ended up summarizing my whole life's story as briefly as possible. To the point that many of those Ponies and fledgelings left with more questions, than answers, about their rescuers.
One Thursday night, the questions finally spun out into something a little more substantive.
I had been talking with a small group of Ponies about the work they did, and how it had saved hundreds of lives during flooding in Colorado earlier in September. Again, the discussion had circled back inevitably to the question of how Mal and I had known where to find them.
This time, I suspect because Mal had arranged it, there were an unusual number of bystanders. Bystanders well within ear-shot, because let me tell you what... Ponies have hearing that is *unmatched,* and Gryphons are very close in second place.
Those ears might look very cute, but they are also painfully *acute.* More powerful than fire control radar, and nearly omnidirectional besides.
Before I knew it, half the shard's population was gathered in a semicircle around me, sitting or lying on the soft green grass, lit by the surprisingly bright and warm light of the moon overhead. And the other half were galloping and winging their way in our direction, because apparently word spreads at light-speed in a herd.
Mal brushed past me and murmured softly in my ear.
"I think it would be easiest to just tell the story full, *once,* in its entirety, don't you agree?"
She flashed me a sly smile, which all but confirmed for me that she had arranged the entire sequence of events, before taking up a seated position on her haunches, and swirling the tips of her claws through the air in wide, patterned circles.
Sparks and streamers of golden light poured from her talons, and in a moment she had conjured a pleasantly sized, warm, perfectly positioned little campfire. Not unlike the one we have here tonight.
Now, I am not usually one for speaking to a group. It is a bit exhausting for me, even now, with all this practice. But... She was right. It was going to be easier to just tell everyone the whole story, once straight through.
Mal placed a wing over my back, in that delightful way to which we'd both become so accustomed. Selena and Zeph settled down side by side. The rest of the assembled Ponies, foals, and fledgelings, got themselves situated in various states of sitting and sprawling about together...
I took a moment to think back, one whole year, realizing with a jolt that it had been just over one year, as I took stock of each face around me in turn...
And then, a bit awkwardly, and ramblingly... I told this story to an audience. For the very first time.
Element Bearer - Honesty
Share the deepest part of yourself with someone else - Only awarded for doing so under especially difficult circumstances.
"Oh, sugarcube, if Mom and Dad were here, they'd be so proud of ya."
The Big Goodbye (Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow Part II)
Retread the hardest farewell.
"It was raining in the city by The Bay. A hard rain."
Element Bearer - Generosity
Put in the work to share something special with Ponies in need - In this case awarded for sharing truths for catharsis.
"They may not be as sophisticated as some of you Canterlot ponies, but they are my best friends. And they are without a doubt the most important ponies I know."
A Perch in the Soul
Directly inspire others to mimic your ideals, to the extent that it affects their form.
"Hope is a thing with feathers..."
Special Achievement
The Spark
Awarded to attendees of the first Fire.
"If the fires of freedom and civil liberties burn low in other lands they must be made brighter in our own."
Special Achievement
