Songs of the Spheres

by GMBlackjack

147 - For What Comes Next

Day and night were completely imaginary processes on Nucleon. There was no sun, and the planets surrounding the central world didn’t orbit in any repeating pattern, so they couldn’t be used to keep time either. Twilight was eternal, powered by the light of relatively distant stars shining across the aether to Nucleon.

Everything in the City was run by a twenty-four hour clock simply because that was the most common day across the multiverse. There was an official ‘day’ time and ‘night’ time the government ran by, but since there was no solar cycle to mandate people stick to their sleep routine, many people didn’t. For some, their day was half the day and night of someone else. Some disregarded the ideas of days and nights altogether and just slept whenever they felt like it, making their circadian rhythm shorter or longer than it had once been.

In the early days of the New World this had caused a lot of sleep problems. But with a stable civilization time most of these were ironed out and everyone found the best way to sleep for them. …Sometimes, there were still those crazies who stayed up as long as they could, slept in huge bursts, and didn’t take care of themselves. Doctors were working on ways to get this out of people’s systems since it just wasn’t healthy.

Other than that minor issue, there was only one problem that arose from this.

Scheduling things became a nightmare. It was even worse than the struggles many Earths had with time zones. It was absolutely guaranteed if you had ten random people selected for an event, at least one of them wouldn’t be awake normally during the scheduled time. This made it so people walking around when they would really rather be asleep was a very common thing.

Nanoha Takamachi didn’t have to deal with any of this.

There was something to be said for retirement.

Raising Heart beeped, waking Nanoha up at nine o’clock, the same time every day. The cityscape outside looked the same as it had when she went to bed, though one of the cloud buildings had moved somewhere else. Shame. I liked looking at that.

She stretched and got out of bed, summoning her barrier jacket to herself but keeping Raising Heart in its necklace form. She had debated a few times not changing into what was essentially a battle-ready dress, but the few times she’d woken up and decided to wear normal clothing it had just felt off. She had spent so much time in the outfit it was her.

Since English had been defeated she hadn’t done any fighting in it whatsoever.

With a skip, she jumped to the bottom of her house’s staircase. She’d had her home designed like a traditional Japanese abode, similar to the one she grew up in. Granted, it had all the modern magitech appliances and holographic screens ready to listen to her every whim, but she still appreciated the traditional aesthetic.

Breakfast was simple – Raising Heart was the house’s artificial intelligence and it had already made eggs on toast for her via the automatic oven, stovetop, and fridge. It was a morning of complete leisure. She spent the first hour of her day slowly eating breakfast and turning on the television to watch the news and get caught up on what was happening. Mlinx had gone forward with a new motion to improve the standing army of the City, and a permanent communication link between the City and the distant Church Outpost had been finalized. The time delay was still immense, but at least they could communicate now.

Nanoha found herself dwelling on how difficult it would be to keep stable communication over immense distances. It wouldn’t be hard to get there – light-speed travel was completed in an effective instant for anyone moving, and a couple of people had already shot themselves hundreds of light years away just to have an experience. However, the amount of relative time it took would make it impossible to keep a huge network united…

That might be the point, she mused. Keep any one power from controlling the New World, even us. Whatever the power may be, good or evil, nothing can ever dominate or threaten all of existence.

She finished her breakfast and continued to ruminate on the thoughts of information in deep space as she went out to begin her day’s work. She didn’t have an official job; what she did was certainly work – she just didn’t get paid.

Affixed to her house was a large greenhouse. From the outside, it looked like a white golf ball had embedded itself in the ground. On the inside, however… it was a beautiful garden. At the moment, the ceiling lights were on, bathing the stadium-sized area in brilliant sunlight, giving the plants their much-needed nutrients. ...Well, if they were to grow properly. Most of the plants of Nucleon had adapted to the twilight quickly enough, but that had ruined a lot of their beauty and health. Here, they got to experience the day and night they were meant to.

She strolled through the garden, passing a couple of her carefully-pruned fruit trees, each one surrounded with a multitude of rainbow flowers. A handful of vines snaked around the area, glowing softly with a number of different effects. Some plants floated in the air, while others were literally growing gems within their leaves. Every last one of these plants had been tended to by her, the lone gardener of this space.

As she passed through the garden, she used her magic to help the plants along. Many were not supposed to grow in the environment of the greenhouse and needed the extra push – or needed to be limited. Rainforest flowers and cacti alike needed to be given the best possible boost to their growth potential.

Nanoha was never really sure how long she spent on the garden. Some days it was less than an hour. Others she would work on the plants until Raising Heart told her it was time for lunch – and occasionally she’d come back in after that. She didn’t really have a schedule.

Today, she finished before lunchtime. She took this opportunity to find the single artificial construct within the garden – a simple bench in the center that sat at the foot of an exceptionally large vine-like plant with a green bulb on the top.

It was a very special plant, to say the least. Nanoha had put it here, right in the middle, where it could look over everything with its immense height.

Nanoha took a moment to lean back on the bench. She used her magic to create a pair of sunglasses for herself and a comfortable cushion for her head. Raising Heart automatically started playing music from her ‘garden’ playlist, serenading the once High Sovereign of the TSAB.

She let out a contented sigh, thankful that life had become so simple. No worries, no danger, just a simple life.

She’d never known she wanted this until she’d gotten it.

~~~

My library was immense.

From the outside, it was no larger than a small diner. But since when was having things the same size on the inside interesting? I had literal miles of shelves lined with physical, beautiful books, their pages and covers ready to be checked out and held by eager, curious hands.

Naturally, most of them were also available as digital copies via the all-in-one terminal I kept next to my desk. I always preferred physical books, but of course the digital versions were popular as well. There was occasionally a line at the terminal, but everywhere else in the library was deathly quiet and empty. Just as it was supposed to be.

A place for reading, checking out books, and increasing knowledge. The lobby was sometimes even an area to hang out and have get-togethers. I didn’t mind them being loud there, so everything worked out in the end on the noise front.

Right now, though, it was the equivalent of ‘early morning’ for the library and no one was in the lobby. No doubt there were a few people completely lost in their books within the endless bookshelves, but as far as I was concerned right now there was nobody around.

I sensed somebody drop a book in the book return outside. I rolled my eyes and teleported them inside – it was an Aradia. She looked nervous.

I teleported the book to us. “This book is overdue.”

“How’d y-” She looked at the Eye of Rhyme. “Never mind.”

“I’m just surprised you of all people had an overdue book. You could have read it all in an effective second if you wanted.”

“Minute. Can’t stop time anymore.”

“Semantics,” I said dismissively. “And yet here it is, a full day late.”

“I got caught up in other things, all right? I figured I could just drop it off and…” She bit her lip. “…Should have known better.”

I nodded. “Yes. You should have. Anyway, a bill has already been sent for the fine.”

Aradia sighed. “Right…”

“Just return the book on time next time, okay?” I smiled. “I don’t want to have to start hunting Aradias down too. I might need to start hiring library ninjas or something.”

Aradia chuckled. “That sounds a little ridiculous.”

“I actually was a library ninja once. There were worlds where they were a thing. I could tell you about it.”

“I do have somewhere to be – lots of Aradias trying to figure out how to manage minor time distortions. It’s not as simple as you might think it is. There’s a lot of gobbledygook and weirdness about. No erasing timelines, but you can make people think you’ve created a closed time loop if you do it right…”

“I both look forward to seeing that and fear when you perfect it.”

Aradia winked before floating right out the door.

I ruffled my wings – mildly disappointed in Aradia losing focus, but I wasn’t going to let that color my day. Especially since I knew it would happen the moment I lent her the book. Some people might consider that a curse, but I found it an odd comfort that I knew things once again.

The curse of the Eye of Rhyme was knowing who lived and who died. It was suffering for me before the collapse. I knew so many things, and often I could do nothing. Now? Everyone knew who I was, I could interfere with most anything, and the number of important people destined to die was small.

…Not zero, I reminded myself. Not zero. It was funny, with the disappearance of ka; some of them would go without much fanfare or even a scene. Everyone in the New World would remember the moment and be sorrowful, but the story… the story was fizzling out. Life was slowly taking over.

But that wasn’t the point of this chapter. I’d get to talk about that aspect of our new lives later. For now, I had other things to deal with. Namely, a shipment of books from a publishing company that thought it was being discreet by sending me the package without a return address. I could still find them, easy, they were just lucky I didn’t want to.

I walked out of the library to the back, grabbing hold of the box with my magic. It was heavy – larger than a pony and filled completely with books – but my magic was up to the task. I dragged it in and set it down in the lobby. There were copies of eleven different books in the box.

Songs of the Spheres, each book proudly proclaimed. The covers were simple – each book had the color and symbol of the Aspect that named each arc. Notably, Time was missing, but of course it was, the Tower wasn’t about to let everyone have access to the events of the future.

Humming to myself, I started taking the books out and putting them on display. If I had been the only one to get these books, I would have considered hiding them. But as it was, these books were being shipped around the city for everyone to read. The publishing company had found an archive from some long-forgotten world with a version of GM who had made it through the English events before the collapse occurred, and they had seen a profitable publicity stunt.

This stunt was going to backfire for them, but that’s not important. What is important is that the silence of the story was finally going to end. The City was going to read the story that had created it. It would take a few days…

Wait, no it won’t, I realized. Some people are going to read these with information-absorption spells. The chaos has already begun.

I shook my head and rolled my eyes. This was going to be an interesting day… Less for me, and more for lots of other people. There were a few secrets that had never come out. There was nothing hiding them anymore.

~~~

O’Neill didn’t have an alarm – he just woke up when his body felt like it. His time in the military had given his body enough discipline to be able to work not only on minimal amounts of sleep, but also to sleep as much as needed regardless of the time.

His house was a strange mixture of generic and eccentric. The architecture itself was like any smaller suburban home with white walls accompanied by dull green highlights. However, the rooms themselves were filled with a nearly endless slew of military awards, pictures, and numerous shelves filled with ‘geeky figures’ ranging from Star Trek to Multiversal Heroes. Some of these figures represented people he had come to know personally on his long journey, while others were reminders of a time before he entered the multiverse and where he was the king of references. There were several magazines around, most comedy-related, but more than a few were scientific magazines.

There was also a lot of space stuff. He liked space stuff.

In short, he was a man with a lot of diverse and complex tastes, and now that he was fully retired, he was filling his house with them. Although, he was still ‘the General’ to people – even himself. He kept those military awards around for a reason.

The first thing he did after waking up was to stumble through the dark of the house until he remembered he didn’t have to find the switch because the lights were audio-triggered. He clapped his hands twice and the world burst into life around him. He walked to the coffee dispenser and began his day by flopping into a recliner and turning on the television.

Lots of people had chosen to stick with the two-dimensional screen rather than getting a full immersive setup. It just felt more natural – and a lot of programs didn’t really look better in 3D. Not to mention it was easier to ignore and doze off to a screen than a set of hyper-realistic holograms. O’Neill was one of these people, though in the game-room he had a full VR set if he felt inclined to indulge himself.

It took him a solid hour to fully wake up and get aware of the world. He tapped the side of his recliner, prompting a holographic web browser to appear in front of him, already keyed to the site he checked first every day.

http://www.generalsnarkreviews.com

General Snark Reviews by General Jack O’Neill.

Most recent review: A Song of Ice and Fire by Shutterstock Productions. 8/10

I usually like me a good Shutterstock flick, always trying to take the story of our reality and smash it into some kind of super-story monstrosity that is so beautiful its mere existence will make brains explode into putty. And while today is no exception to Shutterstock’s usual care and ridiculous sense of imagination, I have a very major complaint.

The title. Seriously, Shutterstock, what were you thinking? Sure, it makes sense, but why would you name your film the same as the Game of Thrones books? Either you’re trying to ride on their coattails of success, which is an absurd idea, or you’re just going with the title because it’s ‘artistic’. No, no it’s not, it’s a very literal title. Corona = fire. Eve = ice. I thought you knew better.

Regardless, the movie itself is the story of Corona and Eve during the War for Existence, focusing deeply on their relationship and how it played out through wacky combat hijinks that somehow manage to both be absurdly comical and horrifying at the same time. A replication of life itself, a nice touch. That said, throughout the course of the film it feels like just about everything is being left out. Corona and Eve may be the focus of the movie but it’s still audacious to assume everyone watching knows the details of the war. I was able to follow it myself, but a lot of people won’t. What’s the significance of the Nihilists to Renee? Brushed aside.

Speaking of my expertise, the combat portrayed in the film is, surprisingly, inaccurate. Shutterstock, my boy, you even came to interview me about this, how could you have gotten it wrong? You messed up the way the weapons fire…

O’Neill skimmed to the bottom of his review, deciding it wasn’t worth reading his own words again. He’d gotten a decent amount of hits – nowhere near what once passed as ‘Trixie Internet celebrity’ levels, but it was really just a hobby. The hits didn’t matter.

What did were the comments – good for feedback, a good laugh, or perhaps constructive criticism. Maybe. When he was in the mood to accept it.

SecretPone: Great review as always! I do think the liberties taken in the fights were creative ones, rather than inaccurate representations. I for one did not mind the slight deviation from reality. It allowed me to appreciate the film without getting caught up in memories.

That would be Clandestine, as always offering the opinion of the soldier. She had kept up with O’Neill’s little reviews since he had started doing them. He suspected her respect for him would never waver.

OddBits: This movie isn’t going to age well considering the recent release of the Songs of the Spheres books. I expect a firestorm of inaccurate information and faulty representation to come from the only source on the events that can be trusted.

O’Neill blinked. “Huh.” He wasn’t sure what he thought about the story being published. He eventually decided it wasn’t worth worrying about, on his own account at least – any secrets he had would have been used to destroy his career, and he didn’t have one anymore. Let them do whatever they wanted.

MAXFER: Stop writing these things; you are putting the violent mindset of your profession into your readers! What mattered in this film was the emotions and the characters, with the combat nothing more than a backdrop!

O’Neill rolled his eyes. There was always one of these guys. At least it wasn’t the usual RedPonyKiller. That guy’s repetitive ideas of ‘trolling’ had been getting dull as of late.

TheWhiteGardener: An interesting take. However, I am surprised – you didn’t mention the secondary conflict carried out between Monika and Twilence. You had plenty to say about yourself and Minna, but the ‘ka’ dualism that stood in the shadow of Corona and Eve was very well handled in this movie. They were not the protagonists, they were not in every scene, but the actions they took had careful, precise impacts on the story itself. In fact…

This went on for several paragraphs, but O’Neill read every last one of the lines. He always liked the longer comments that went in depth, regardless of who wrote them, but since he knew that was Nanoha talking he had extra reason to read each word carefully.

Why? He would actually respond to her.

He typed up a response over the next few minutes and sent it to her. A second later a response came.

TheWhiteGardener: Oh! That’s… in depth!
GeneralSnark: Too much for your little head?
TWG: No, not at all, it’s just that I’m not in my ‘complex discussion’ mood at the moment. I’ll get to it at a later time.
GS: Or not, you don’t have to.
TWG: I know. But it’s not like I’m doing anything. The mood will strike eventually, and you’ll have yourself a battle of wits over the meaning of Not-Game-of-Thrones.
GS: Taking my jokes now? I’ll have you know General Snark is a registered trademark!
TWG: Oh no! I have broken the law, what ever will I do!?
GS: You must face trial. Charge: plagiarism. Possible sentence: inconvenient community service!
TWG: Sewer cleaning?
GS: Worse. Magic battery.
TWG: The horror! The horror! >lilythehorror.jpg

GS: You better be scared! The thought police will be at your door if you do not appear before court immediately!
TWG: Does there happen to be a court in the Pinkie Emporium?
GS: It just so happens that there is a suitable location in the pink festivity center.
TWG: Is the first available slot at lunchtime, by chance?
GS: Being psychic won’t help you there!
TWG: *eyeroll* see you then.

O’Neill dismissed the screen and looked at the clock.

He still had several hours. Might as well go play some rounds of whatever game came up on random…

~~~

Eve was preparing to open her doors for business. She didn’t have any session scheduled until later in the day, so she was going to have open-house for the next little while. To prepare for this, she spruced up the lobby a bit, changed the flowers out for brighter ones, dusted everything, and selected a few books to set out in case people needed to wait for her to talk to someone else. Her morning routine was never all that much, but it was enough to make people feel just a little more comfortable.

She checked herself last. Nothing special to do here – the cosmic mane took care of itself, and her wings rarely looked out of sorts. All she had to do was adjust the Element of Magic so it was level on her head.

With a smile on her face she trotted over to the front door, reaching to unlock it.

“Don’t open it!” Corona shouted, teleporting into the room with a stack of books in her arms. “It’s a madhouse out there!”

Eve blinked. “Wait, what? Why?” Focusing on her hearing, Eve was able to make out the sound of commotion outside.

“This is why,” Corona said, unceremoniously sweeping Eve’s carefully placed books off a table and laying out the eleven volumes of Songs of the Spheres in plain sight. “Everyone got a hold of these.”

“Oh,” Eve said, blinking. “Oh.”

“Yeah, just about my reaction. People already have enough of a bone to pick with me, but you…” She tapped the books. “How much secret stuff is in here?”

“I would assume a lot…” Eve said, gulping. She cast a few information absorption spells on the books – she would have preferred to read them as they were meant to, but she had a sneaking suspicion she’d need the knowledge within to deal with the crowd outside. “Yeah, I was right. The copy world… the lies… both wars… questionable calls…”

“They’re going to want answers.”

“They already have them,” Eve said, pointing at the books. “Everything in there explains why I did what I did, how I made excuses to myself, and which of the things I regret.” She turned to the front door. “Whoever’s out there already knows everything. And they’re angry.”

“How many of them do you think actually know the information absorption spell?” Corona asked with a raised eyebrow.

Eve pondered this. “Not that many, probably. Could just be secondhand information. Regardless… I can’t hide in here, Corona. I have to go out and face them.”

“I know that,” Corona said. “I just brought the books so you wouldn’t be a fish jumping into a frying pan.”

Eve nodded slowly. “Thanks. …Would you mind standing by me?”

“I have not been a very good influence on your public image as of late.”

Eve shrugged. “It’ll make me feel better.”

Corona chuckled. “Sure. I’ll give them something more to scream at.”

Eve nodded curtly. Then, taking a breath, she trotted to the front door and opened it. The first thing she did was send out a magic pulse that pushed the crowd back far enough so she could actually leave her abode and stand in the open. Corona took up a place behind her.

Facing them was a crowd of a couple hundred people, most just shouting and yelling, a few of them with angry signs. However, after a quick cursory inspection, Eve found that most of them weren’t actually angry – they were just confused. They weren’t here to demand change or justice, they just felt hurt and wanted answers. She had been the one they had put faith in… And now her secrets were in the open.

She cleared her throat. “I did everything those books said I did.”

The crowd didn’t stop shouting. She just made it so they’d all hear her voice regardless of how loud they were being. “Many of the things I have lived to regret. Keeping secret the nature of my duplication from my friends. Organizing the War on Skarn. Even if the latter one turned out better for us in the long run, I still think it cost too much. And then there are things I did that I thought were right. Letting Corona send the Message. Most of the brutal things I did in the war – as well as the times I refused to treat the other side with unfair disrespect.”

Now that she had been talking for a while, the crowd had stopped shouting so much.

“I’m just a person like all the rest of you,” Eve said, expression softening considerably. “I’ve told you all time and time again that I’m just like you. I make mistakes. Every time something like this comes up, I try to remind everyone that I’m not flawless, that you shouldn’t stake your lives on me. You are lost, confused, angry, and sorrowful that I have broken your trust.” She paused for a moment, wiping a tear from her eye. “I’m the same. I often come back to all those things I did and wonder which ones were worth it. Are the things I regret actually good? Did I make a bad judgment call somewhere else? I don’t have the answers.

“What I can say is this. Yes, I lied to you. Yes, the decisions I have made resulted in the death of trillions. I am no better than Corona – not in any way. None of us are flawless. I’m sorry you thought I was.” She shook her head. “I’m not hiding from anything here.”

“You’re going on trial!” someone in the crowd shouted.

“Any pre-collapse crimes have been erased from the record!” Corona yelled back. “So you can shut your trap!”

There was silence for a moment.

“I’m sorry,” Eve said. “I was – and am – a liar. I lied, and then I had to keep lying, to the point at which if I told the truth it would have destroyed Merodi Universalis. You can find that in the books as well.” She smiled sadly. “I’m actually thankful this book has come out. It means I’ll finally be able to live without the constant shadow of people finding out over my head. I am no longer the glue that holds the world together. The City can go on without me – and all of you can as well.” She spread out one of her wings and gestured at them all. “Go. You don’t need to cling to me anymore. You’re free.”

They stared at her for a moment. Then, slowly but surely, they began to walk away. A few tried to start up the angry yelling again, but they quickly realized the situation had been defused. There were a few news reporters around that were definitely going to milk this story, but Eve wasn’t afraid. They’d needed to see this, in a way. Needed to see what she really was.

Just a Twilight.

“…Hey,” a woman said, walking up to Eve. She was one of her patients. “I… I don’t think I can keep coming here. I… I can’t look at you the same anymore.”

Eve’s slight smile vanished. “I… I understand. I can redirect you to a-”

“No. I’m… I’m going to deal with this myself.”

“But y-”

“Eve, you were the only person who could help me. Or so I thought. I’m not going through this again.” She turned away and ran.

Eve gulped. “I… I couldn’t exactly get away without consequences…”

“I can find her,” Corona said, making one of her gloves vanish. “Help her face herself.”

“…You should. But she won’t be the only one…” She shook her head. “How many of them are going to give up because of me?”

“Eve, don’t th-”

“Corona, I am going to think about it.” She forced a smile to her face. “I’m finally being held accountable. I… I think that’s a good thing.”

“You sure?”

“No. But… we can talk about it after you help her.” Eve took in a deep breath and turned back to her business, conflicting emotions fighting for control of her face.

Corona nodded. “I’ll be back soon.” She vanished in a puff of light.

Twilight-X sighed. “I’m getting off easy…”

She wasn’t sure why this fact didn’t bother her as much as it used to.

~~~

The ‘courthouse’ ended up being the last place in the known New World to get authentic Earth Ottoman cuisine – the Pinkie Emporium’s Hotto House. They both had steaming bowls of noodles with ‘ursk’ meat in them. It naturally wasn’t a real ursk, since the animals had only been found on Earth Ottoman, but the synthetic meat was indistinguishible.

Nanoha slurped a bunch of noodles into her face like a vacuum cleaner. She smacked her lips loudly and leaned back in her chair with a smug smile. “The shock on your face never gets old.”

O’Neill met her gaze with a smirk of his own. “I’m just sitting here thinking ‘I can’t compete with that’.”

Nanoha winked. “Slurp loud and slurp often!” She was using chopsticks, so she stuck them back in the bowl and pulled another set of noodles to her mouth. …Except there weren’t any noodles. She bit down on empty air.

O’Neill was quietly eating some noodles and looking at her with an incredulous eyebrow. “Slurping problem?”

Nanoha sent out a magic pulse to remove Crimson Sushi’s illusion. She discovered her bowl was shifted slightly to the left of where she’d thought it was. “Getting between a lady and her noodles? How devious.”

“You’re the one here on criminal charges,” O’Neill pointed out. “I can be a little devious to petty criminals.”

Nanoha chuckled. “In that case, as a convicted criminal I can handle myself however I want.” She snapped her fingers and teleported O’Neill’s bowl to her, doubling the amount of food she had. With quick stabbing motion with her chopsticks she was able to pull a bunch of noodles out of the bowl and into her mouth with a monstrous slurp that sprayed Earth Ottoman sauce everywhere.

O’Neill carefully removed the white-green sauce from his eyes. “This stuff does wonders for wrinkles,” he deadpanned.

“It’s how I keep myself young,” Nanoha said with an equal lack of emotion.

“You really must tell me more.”

“It’s all about bathing in it day in and day out. The aroma does more than the actual sauce, but the only way you get enough of it is to submerge yourself.”

“Quite the treatment.”

“I’m working on turning it into an aerosol.”

“You could make millions.”

“I’ll make so much I could retire.”

They stared at each other for a moment – and then burst into laughter. Nanoha’s was loud and jovial, coming from a woman who was well-acquainted with the joyous noise. O’Neill’s was no less joyous, but it was much quieter and slower, the laugh of a man who spent his time surrounded by jokes and amusement he kept from those around him; a man who practiced keeping a straight face in the midst of absurdity.

Nanoha wiped a tear out of her eyes. “Look at us. That conversation was truly pointless. And yet… I can’t think of a better one I’ve had all week.”

“If that’s your best conversation of the week, have I got bad news for you.”

“Oh, hush. I’m just saying it might be good for us to have a pointless conversation once in a while. You found ways to insert humor and ‘snark’ into your life, but I had to keep myself all prim and proper for a… long, long time.” Her gaze slowly became distant. “Some part of me had hoped the child within me would die off and be completely replaced… But here I am, countless years later, still giggling at silly little things.’

“As far as I’m concerned the moment anyone loses that kid in them they’ve succumbed to the curse of our era: being dull.”

Nanoha rolled her eyes. “That’s not fair. I’ve known plenty of serious people who aren’t dull.”

“Do you think they’d be less dull if they still had that little spark in them?”

“Good point,” Nanoha said. “But, counterpoint, they’re still people just the same.”

“Hey, being interesting isn’t a virtue. I just happen to like it.”

Nanoha raised an incredulous eyebrow. “Oh, you do now?”

“Case in point: this conversation.”

Nanoha’s smirk turned into a grin – and then it faltered. “…You know…”

“What?”

“I just had a thought.” She shifted in her seat until she could lean thoughtfully on her elbow. “Maybe it’s better for the dull, serious people to be the leaders. They have less of an urge to do the crazy things we do. Less need to go out and express themselves.”

O’Neill shrugged. “I don’t pretend to know the next best thing about who should and shouldn’t be in charge. What I know is that I was put in a position where I could save the Earth from alien invaders and I took it. The rest is history.”

Nanoha’s frown deepened. “…That wasn’t why you chose this life.”

O’Neill sighed for a moment. “No… No it wasn’t. …It was so long ago. I haven’t thought about him in… years. What kind o-”

Nanoha put a hand on his, stopping him. “Your life has changed many times since you lost your son. You went to fight the Goa’uld, then you went to explore the multiverse, then you were an Overhead, then you fought a war… and now you’re here in this New World. Wounds heal with time, and there’s been a lot of time since that day.” She paused for a moment, looking into his eyes. “I… you know I had an adopted daughter, Vivio. To this day I don’t know what happened to her. It’s been… thousands of years, and I rarely think of her. There was a time where every moment I was reminded of her, immense guilt was thrust upon me. I thought that I wasn’t honoring her memory enough.”

O’Neill matched her sad eyes, unable to say anything.

“We’re only human, Jack,” Nanoha said. “We can’t live like that.”

O’Neill let out a short chuckle. “No… No we can’t. ...We certainly try though, don’t we?”

“We’re only human,” she reiterated.

“That can’t be your response to everything.”

Nanoha put on a cute smile. “Ahem. We’re only human.”

“We’re only human.”

Nanoha gasped. “No! Really!?”

O’Neill chuckled and rolled his eyes. He reached down to eat more of his noodles – only to stab the table, reminding him Nanoha had stolen his.

This, of course, needed to be remedied immediately. He summoned Crimson Sushi and pulled on his bowl, beginning a tug-of-war contest.

The bowl promptly exploded, showering the immediate area in noodle bits. The two of them apologized profusely to the other patrons and cleaned the mess up themselves.

~~~

Valentine was sitting on a bench at the back of the church with Froppy when his phone beeped.

Froppy blinked. “Isn’t that the USM channel beep?”

“It is…” Valentine said, taking the phone out of his pocket and examining the message.

Dear Ambassador Valentine…

It has come to my attention that you were a scumbag. I had my doubts with the publication of Steel Ball Run, but I pushed those doubts aside because you had proven yourself to be an upstanding, honest, and patriotic man.

With the publication of Songs of the Spheres, it is now clear to me that my faith in you was entirely misplaced. Within these books I see a man with a lying, silver tongue and a thirst for personal power. You were the face of the USM, flaunting your own power and ideologies since our formation. You did not truly represent the will of the people, nor did you exemplify our ideals! You were a representative, the president that never ended! The leader of our people! And you threw that into the dirt…

Valentine closed the phone. “The Songs of the Spheres books have been published and someone used the old USM codes to send me hate-mail.”

“Oh. Ribbit.”

“I’ll probably need to change this phone…”

“…You’re trying to pretend like you aren’t bothered,” Froppy observed. “Don’t do that.”

Valentine let out a short sigh. “There may be attempts on my life. People will attempt to find me and tell me exactly what they think. That will hurt this community…”

“The church will stand by you and you know it,” Froppy asserted. “You won’t even have to stir them up. They’ll just say yes.”

Valentine smirked slightly. “I suppose that’s true. Though something tells me I won’t be the only one who’ll be protected…”

GM ran in front of them with a panicked expression. “They. Are. Going. To. Find. Me.”

“You never put your name in your writings, right?” Froppy asked. “And they don’t have an actual picture, just an approximation.”

“They know I’m here. And this isn’t a huge city.” GM tapped his fingers together. “It’s only a matter of time…”

“Just change your appearance a bit,” Valentine said. “There are ways to keep what you are a secret. …Though not if you keep coming up to us in midday to panic.”

“I’m not – okay, yes, I’m panicking, and this is midday, and…” He shook his head. “Okay, fine. I’ll… do it your way.”

Valentine smirked. “I think it’s time we talked to Aslan about some official protection and discreeteness.”

“Oh…” GM gulped. “S-sure! Let’s do that!” He was already sweating profusely. “And if that doesn’t work I’ll need you to take me and my family somewhere far away.”

“It won’t come to that,” Froppy assured him.

“I’ll believe that when I see it. Until then…”

He would spend the next few months stressing out to an exceptional degree. He really had nothing to worry about – ka was mostly done with him. Few would be able to track him down, and those who did would not make a witchburning out of it.

They would be annoying, though.

~~~

Nanoha pushed O’Neill through the door to her lavish garden. It was not the first time he had been in here – but it was the first time he had been in during the garden’s ‘night’ cycle. What was already a beautiful canvas of vibrant greens and dotted rainbow colors became something else entirely at night.

Areas of the garden that had looked like throwaway bushes or patches of simple moss were no longer the background of the garden – they were the forefront. Brilliant cone-shaped bushes unfurled, revealing their true inner colors that shone like stars against a dark canvas. The moss unleashed many drifting seed-like sparks that whirled around the atmosphere, mixing with the pollinating bugs. It was a sight to behold, and it struck O’Neill dumb.

“I know you’ve seen more impressive things,” Nanoha commented, starting to walk to the center of the garden.

“That people made with their own hands?” O’Neill let out a chuckle. “No… No, it was always those natural universes of art that got me. This… This is yours.”

“All those universes did have a creator.”

“They weren’t you,” O’Neill said, touching one of the spiral bushes. It responded, quickly retracting itself into its dormant day form – cutting his finger in the process. “Ow! What in-”

“Don’t touch the spiral-cones. They’re rather… temperamental. They have a defense mechanism to prevent their lights from getting them killed. Be glad I removed the poison from them, that would have… ruined the feel of the night.”

“And what theme is that?”

She held up her hand and sent a magic spark into the air. The spell coalesced into a brilliant shining sphere vaguely resembling a disco ball. “Random dance.” She had every intention of sweeping O’Neill up and forcing him into a dance he had no clue about, just to screw with him.

He beat her to it, rushing her into his arms and threw her around. With a laugh, she let herself be swept up and moved with short, jerking movements that stopped almost as soon as they began. She tried to find a pattern to them so she could sweep free from it in a flowing motion, but to her surprise there appeared to be no pattern to the movements.

“What sort of dance is this…?”

“Improvisational marching orders,” O’Neill deadpanned.

Nanoha snorted. “Didn’t bother saving it for Plan C?”

“Sometimes it’s best to just skip to Plan C.”

“In that case…” She stuck her leg out and tripped him. He used Crimson Sushi to keep himself from slamming his head into the ground, but Nanoha had her chance. Her arm caught him in the side and swept him up into a long, curving motion. His feet scarcely touched the ground as she twirled him around.

He smirked. Crimson Sushi flipped the perception of a large rock in Nanoha’s mind, making her trip on it – releasing O’Neill to go for a simpler tango.

“…You actually aren’t very good at dancing, are you?” Nanoha said, able to swirl behind him gracefully without any effort.

“Not in the slightest.”

“Good. That makes this easier.”

Control swapped back and forth between the two of them as they moved through the garden. O’Neill quickly ran out of any idea of what to do, but he kept pushing anyway. He was a master of improvisation and he wasn’t about to let his lack of dance knowledge hold him back. Despite this, Nanoha was simply too graceful and smooth in her movements for him to do much. She could have danced around him with ease, but chose not to.

“I am way too old for this,” O’Neill said with a chuckle.

“And I’m probably a hundred times older than you. So dance, monkey!”

“I’m a monkey now? I’ll have you know I physically aged more than you!”

“And I’ll have you know you could remove those wrinkles with a simple snap-finger spell.” She twirled him back. “You like your age, you wear it proudly. You are the old man who kept the spark alive within himself. I’m the precious little thing with wisdom beyond her years.”

“That’s not what it means to be old.”

Nanoha rolled her eyes. “Of course not. Being old means… It means you’ve survived, it means you have lived to see so much. You have experience - you might not be smart, strong, or even all that wise if you were of a particular disposition - but you nonetheless understand life better. It comes with practice.”

“I was going to say being old meant yelling at the younger generation.”

She laughed like the little girl she had once been, and they soon arrived at the center of the garden. They twirled away from each other and prepared a comical charge to see who would be in control next.

This was the moment the central bulb decided to bloom. A glorious yellow radiance of nineteen separate petals burst open as if from a popped balloon. The flower was large enough to hold both of them on a single petal, and bright enough to make a few nearby plants think it was day and close their petals. Magic dust began to flow around the central flower, sparking with the vibrance of life.

“Okay, that’s impressive,” O’Neill said, holding a hand to his eyes. “What is it?”

“F-fate’s Tower,” Nanoha said, tears flowing down her face. “It’s… a… rare flower that…” She held a sleeve to her eyes, trying to make herself stop crying. Now wasn’t the time. She needed to move on. She…

She felt O’Neill’s old, firm hands on her shoulders. She looked up at him, her usually strong face replaced with one of vulnerability. For once in her life, the face she was looking up at was the one with an understanding, compassionate smile.

She went for a kiss. It was brief, barely more than a peck – but it was there.

“I can’t replace her,” O’Neill said, expression unwavering.

“Y-you don’t have to. Y-you can be you.” She pulled him into a tight hug, crying over his shoulder. She cried for those lost – family, friends, colleagues, citizens – those that she had never let herself truly grieve for. She had been so strong for everyone else for so long she had forgotten what it was like to be the one on the receiving end of the comfort.

She couldn’t believe she had let herself forget. So many things… So many things lost in her Time Abyss. She was nothing compared to gods, but she was far, far beyond what any human should have been. So far beyond…

Who knew how much built-up pain she was letting out? She herself didn’t know. Later, she would feel as if she were crying for things she had forgotten long ago. Things lost in her subconscious.

When, at long last, the endless tears began to abate, O’Neill spoke.

“Why don’t you tell me about her?”

Nanoha looked up to him with a messed up, tear-stained face – and a smile. “…Okay.”

~~~

Lightning walked into the police station with a crowd of angry people following at her heels.

“Traitor!”

“Mass murderer!”

“Enslaver!”

“It was all part of his plan!”

“You lied to us!”

Lightning marched through the front doors and closed them behind her, magically sealing them shut so nobody else could even think of getting in.

Sherlock was leaning against a nearby wall. “That’s not going to help you.”

“Why the hell not?”

Sherlock pointed at the small group of roughly a dozen people she recognized from the Collection who were all sitting there.

“Ah,” Lightning said.

An inkling woman with white tentacles stood up sharply. “ARREST THIS WOMAN!”

“Charges?” Strange asked, clearly having already dealt with this several times today.

“CONSPIRACY!”

“Of what kind?”

“You know what kind! Conspiring with the Collector! Orchestrating the enslavement to create the modern Collection!”

Strange sighed. “All pre-collapse crimes have been pardoned unconditionally. I cannot arrest her.”

“But she… She…”

“Look,” Lightning said. “I know you’re upset. But I’m definitely not hurting anyone right now, since the Collection doesn’t even exist anymore. You’re looking for justice where it doesn’t exist.”

“You lied to us,” she said, pointing angrily. “You manipulated us the whole time. We thought you understood us… When you were part of the problem!”

“Yes,” Lightning said. “And you can’t do anything about it.”

“The mob outside says otherwise.”

“She does have a point,” Sherlock noted. “The mob will likely devolve into violence Mlinx will have to forcefully end if we allow this to continue.”

Lightning sighed. “Fine. I’ll arrest myself.”

Strange blinked. “…What?”

“You heard me,” Lightning said, walking into the station cells. She threw one of the doors open, walked in, and then shut it, locking it with her magic.

“Lightning, you can’t just arrest yourself,” Strange said from the other side of the bars.

“I just did. Good luck convincing me to come out.”

“Lightning…”

“You can tell everyone outside I’ve been arrested. Then Mlinx and the media can make a big fuss about the whole thing while I sit in here. I’ll let myself out when it blows over.”

Strange grunted. “Sherlock, how badly will this go if I force her out?”

“Nuclear,” Sherlock deadpanned.

Strange sighed and walked outside.

Lightning looked around to make sure Sherlock was the only one on the other side of the cell. “Thanks. I didn’t need him to call my bluff.”

“Don’t mention it. I’ll mention it when I need a favor.”

“You little…”

Sherlock walked away, leaving Lightning alone in the cell. She was no stranger to being alone, so she simply closed her eyes and allowed herself to daydream.

Some time later – could have been hours – a hoof smacked itself against the cell bars. She opened her eyes to see Starbeat. “Come to visit?”

“You’re being ridiculous,” Starbeat said, rolling her eyes. “You could have just talked to them. Now you’ve gone and arrested yourself, blowing all of this out of proportion.”

“Seemed to be the quickest solution.”

“It was the solution that was the least work for you. All you have to do is sit here and wait.” Starbeat shook her head. “You’re causing a lot of strain on a lot of your friends.”

“They can handle it.”

“I’m not saying they can’t. I’m saying I’m disappointed you chose to let them take the strain. …I’m also disappointed you didn’t try to talk to the Collected. A lot of them are going through crises at the moment, and you did nothing to alleviate their fears that the cause they had devoted themselves to was a lie.”

Lightning let out a sigh. “And you’re right. I’m still not coming out of this cell.”

“Why not!?”

“Because I deserve hate,” Lightning said. “The Collector took his punishment of death for what he did. But I didn’t lose anything except him. And that was never enough.” She looked Starbeat right in the eye. “This is my time, Starbeat. I’m not going to die, I’m not going to give myself for some greater plan. I’m going to let them hate me.”

“Lightning, that’s…”

“Self-destructive?” She shrugged. “Yes. It is. But you know me. I’ll pull through.”

“…This is a lot more complicated than I thought it was.”

“You’re the mare of fate,” Lightning said, smiling ever so slightly. “Figured you’d know that by now.”

Starbeat chuckled. “…I think you’ll need to talk to Eve.”

“I do not need a-”

“She’s going through similar things right now.”

Lightning shut up. “…Yeah. Maybe I can talk to Eve then.”

“I’ll send her around.” She glanced behind her. “…I think Vriska’s getting impatient and-or embarrassed standing around the lobby.”

“Embarrassed?”

“She got a dress recently. Wasn’t an issue until O’Neill pointed out how excessively pink and feminine it was. No doubt Sherlock is carefully playing with her sudden insecurity.” She rubbed the back of her head. “…I should get her back to her home. I’ll try to visit.”

“Thanks. But I shouldn’t be in here for that long.” She closed her eyes and looked at the ceiling. “They always have other things to get upset about…”

~~~

A copy of Songs of the Spheres: Hope hit Pinkie in the face. “And now we are the punchline of Lightning’s joke. Fun.”

Flutterfree, Pidge, and Jotaro were walking with her through town as a small group of angry people followed them. Half of those angry people were angry at the others for yelling at Pinkie, which was just adding to the shouting and squabbling. It likely wouldn’t be long before it devolved into actual fighting.

“Yare yare daze…” Jotaro said, adjusting his hat.

“Geez, I didn’t think people could get this worked up…” Pidge muttered.

“For all we know they can’t and this is the Tower,” Flutterfree said. “Or, this is how things normally are. Or something in the middle.”

“…My head hurts.” Pidge put a hand to the bridge of her nose.

“From the ka or the people screaming?”

“Both,” Pidge said, gesturing at the crowd, calling attengion to the ridiculous things they were shouting.

“Flutterfree’s an unstable killing machine!”

“Pidge just replaced Nova! She doesn’t belong! Get rid of her!”

“Jotaro is too violent!”

“How many have you killed with a smile on your face and a sarcastic quip?”

“Vriska hasn’t really changed and you all accepted her!”

“Pinkie! You’re a murderous psycho!”

Pinkie winked at her three team members. Then she changed into her massacre dress and turned on the crowd, revving her chainsaw. They all screamed.

Suddenly she was just a normal pink pony again, her only defining feature being the blindfold covering her Element of Laughter. “So, do I have your attention?”

The shocked silence of the crowd told her she did.

“OKAY! So, you think we screwed up a lot? Sure, we did, we’re just people. But I’d like to see you do our job and make it out for the better. We saw death and destruction on a daily basis. We were subjected to some of the worst torture imaginable in our time. You know that joke about the tentacle monster universe? It isn’t a joke! Those things really existed and we had to deal with them! We were lucky enough to be shown the multiverse gradually so we could adjust to it, but we didn’t get out unscathed! Most of the people who had our job have probably lost it in the mental department in some way or another! I’m crazy! I’m totally crazy! Flutterfree’s hatred of violence has mostly been bred out of her. Jotaro’s been forced to reevaluate his life several times as those he love are either returned to him or just killed! Pidge has to wrestle with the knowledge about Nova every single day! What do you think you would do if you had these problems!?”

The crowd said nothing in response.

“That’s what I thought,” Pinkie growled, swishing her tail to the side. “And another thing. You people got this book and the information within, and because of that started forming into angry, violent groups! This is the thing you’re upset at us about! And you know what else it shows? That you’re using the information spells rather than actually reading the books!”

She threw the copy of Hope she had to the ground. “The spell just puts the information into your head, allowing you to pick and choose what you think is important. But these books are a lot more than just the facts of what happened! They show us – the characters – and why we did all the things we did! The mistakes, the things that looked like mistakes that weren’t, and the good choices – everything! Our struggles are in this book, and you know what you’re doing? You’re distilling it down to bullet points! You’re insulting all the hell we’ve gone through to get to this point by ignoring it!”

She threw a hoof wide. “You can be mad with us. You can disagree with us. But you can’t judge us. Not where we are now. You can’t possibly hope to fathom what all of this was about. Do you understand?”

The crowd slowly began to edge away from Pinkie and disperse.

“I don’t think they understood,” Flutterfree observed.

“The message will still get out!” Pinkie said, suddenly as chipper as usual. “And that’s all that needed to happen. People needed to realize there was a lot more to the story than just the ‘facts’. A… lot more. It’ll take some time, but they’ll come around.”

“Huh. That’s a good point.” Pidge said. “…But that’s a pretty thick book. How many words?”

“About two million in all twelve.”

“…Quiznak. That’s gonna prove problematic…”

Pinkie shrugged. “Maybe. But there’ll be those who read it. And they’ll be able to tell everyone else.”

Jotaro shrugged. “It sounds good enough for me.”

“Yep! Now let’s go get ice cream before I go all murder-chainsaw on everyone.”

~~~

The following ‘morning’ O’Neill walked up to Nanoha’s house and knocked. She opened the door with her magic, not bothering to get up from her chair. “Come on in.”

O’Neill walked in, finding his way to her dining room and placing a small bag down. She looked up from Songs of the Spheres: Life and looked at the box. “Oh, you shouldn’t have!”

“Definitely shouldn’t, but I did,” O’Neill said, a smirk on his face.

She tore the bag off and took out several small boxes. Essence plants: flowers that grow based on magical signatures! Any magic signature works: artifacts, aether patterns, people…

“I… I can make a garden for them…” she said, holding up the flowers. “I didn’t know people made these…”

O’Neill shrugged. “A simple search away. …So long as you have an oddly specific present in mind.”

“It’s perfect. Wonder who I’ll do…”

“You don’t even have to decide right away. They’ll wait for whenever you’re struck.”

Nanoha smiled warmly. “…Thank you.”

O’Neill shrugged – and then made an overly comical bow.

She facepalmed. “What have I gotten myself into…”

“The domain of General Snark. Tickets are one-way only and always have a pointless riddle attached to them.”

Nanoha rolled her eyes and closed Life.

“…That the book?”

“One of them,” Nanoha said, nodding. “It’s interesting. I hear a lot about people judging others from these books. Hasty judgments made on instant-facts. But I think they’re missing the other side of the coin…” She shook her head. “We are in these pages. Why don’t we look at what these books say about us? Even if we’re not in the stories we read about, we see the culture built up… The stories that surrounded us… Everyone’s avoiding that. Focusing instead on what other people did…” She put her hands behind her head. “I think we need to be doing the opposite. Use these books to judge ourselves, not others.”

O’Neill blinked. “I just got the worst best idea ever.”

“Hm?”

“I’m going to review these books.”

“…You are going to rip the poor boy to shreds.”

O’Neill grinned. “Ay, GM doesn’t have to read the reviews.”

“He will.”

“His fault.”

Nanoha chuckled. “I’ll help. Give some insight as to what we can learn from the story that defined us all.”

“Already a team, huh?”

“I think we’ve been a team for a long time and just didn’t realize it.”

O’Neill nodded slowly. “That, or we’re both completely delusional.”

“Why not both?”

“Both. …Both is good.”

“The Road to El Dorado.”

“…Dammit, you’re not going to be easy to reference-fu.”

Nanoha smiled playfully. “I figured you’d appreciate a good challenge.”

O’Neill laughed.

~~~

I held a truly unique object in my hooves. A red book, shimmering with a glossy ruby cover emblazoned with the symbol of Time.

Songs of the Spheres: Time.

I flipped through it. It contained all the remaining chapters, including the one you’re reading now. Every event was already laid out.

And yet, I knew I could change it. If I interfered with a thing there or an event here, the words within would shift. I had been given the freedom of that choice.

But I knew I wouldn’t. I liked what I saw with the Eye as it was now. I appreciated all the blossoming relationships, the healing wounds, and the Time devoted to preparing everyone.

Including myself. I, too, needed to learn how to live without ka. The fight with English was merely the first step: there was much, much more to learn and understand in the ever-changing land of the New World. Even knowing what I did – and what I do – there is something to be said for experiencing something, perhaps with a little bit of willful ignorance thrown in.

Often, your mind is able to logically accept and understand something easily. However, there is another component to what you are. You may believe something, but you won’t live it out. It is the illogical side of you that cannot just be convinced. I know exactly how to live in a world without ka – in theory.

But at the same time I do not. I am a simple child swimming in an ocean of words I don’t understand.

I carried the book far into the back of my immense library. I would not be putting it on a shelf – I could not let anyone have it. Not because I was prevented from showing it to people, but because I didn’t want them to have it. It would change them if they knew the future. One of the points of the New World was to end that certainty for what the future holds.

At least, that’s how I see it.

I took the book to the back wall and created a little hole in the wood, placing it inside. Then I cast a sealing spell on its pages keyed to the existence of ka. It would not open until the Tower fell.

Lastly, I sealed up the wood, making it look as if I had never been there.

I would return some time after the final destruction of the Tower and give the book to the people. …Or maybe I would change my mind.

There was no way for me to know what lay beyond. And unlike the uncertainty the war had caused, this did not make me anxious – it made me feel at peace.

I knew my curse would end. I would be able to live.

It was all I could ever ask for.

Comments

[Efadd]

Twilight-X sighed. “I’m getting off easy…”

Persona Change!

[Efadd]

Valentine smirked. “I think it’s time we talked to Aslan about some official protection and discreteness.”

Discreet-to hide
Discrete-to separate
Hate to be that guy, but editing happens.

[FanOfMostEverything]

The people being beamed light-centuries away present a curious concept. For some of them, ka will completely vanish between blinks. That'll be quite the experience. I'd say it's an intriguing story idea, but there's a bit of an issue there.

There's something wonderful about seeing Nanoha at peace in her retirement. You made it. Enjoy it. You deserve it.

I have to wonder how any surviving Lilies feel about being a meme. Of course, I could ask that question of many characters.

However, after a quick cursory inspection, Eve found that most of them weren’t actually angry – they were just confused.

Even some of the signs just had question marks on them.

Twilight-X sighed.

OUCH. That says volumes. At least eleven of them.

My word, we're actually getting concrete information about Earth Ottoman. It really is the end times.

Pinkie shrugged. “Maybe. But there’ll be those who read it. And they’ll be able to tell everyone else.”

Mind you, those of us who read it as a hexadaily serial for years may not remember everything.

“I’m going to review these books.”

I am immediately in favor of this plan, and can only hope General Snark doesn't send his armies my way.

The adjustment won't be easy, but at least some people are at peace with what's to come. Hopefully that number will increase from here. Twilence certainly seems optimistic about that.

[Ponygood11]

People saying the title is weird. It's like, you're eating a hearty meal, except the hearty meal actually talks to you in lots of little squeaky voices and randomly encourages you to eat a whole credits ice cream despite the unhealthy amount of brain freeze it'd cause you. Well, it's a good thing I'm here to be the food critic of just the ice cream and nothing else!

Songs of the Spheres, each book proudly proclaimed.
This movie isn’t going to age well considering the recent release of the Songs of the Spheres books.
“This is why,” Corona said, unceremoniously sweeping Eve’s carefully placed books off a table and laying out the eleven volumes of Songs of the Spheres in plain sight.
With the publication of Songs of the Spheres, it is now clear to me that my faith in you was entirely misplaced.
“The Songs of the Spheres books have been published and someone used the old USM codes to send me hate-mail.”
A copy of Songs of the Spheres: Hope hit Pinkie in the face.
She looked up from Songs of the Spheres: Life and looked at the box.
Songs of the Spheres: Time.

Roooll 8 credits ice cream cones off the table! And, uh, multiply them, I guess. *d-d-d-d-d-d-d-ding!*

[Shilic]

Now I kinda want a set of physical Songs of the Spheres books. I imagine they'd be a nightmare to get made, are mostly pointless, and I probably wouldn't be able to afford them anyway, but they sound so nice dammit!