Legacy to Zero

Interlude - Means to an End

The present

Crash

Dear tenant,
This notice is to alert you that repairs will be completed on the building as well as on the second-floor units starting from 200. We expect this will take upwards of a week.
We appreciate your cooperation.
Sunset Properties, LTD
12 Kent Street, Tatiane, NB

My eyes glazed over the laptop screen as I clicked to dismiss the email—the third one like it over the last few days.

Like every other time, it was my fault. It was always my fault.

Hunched over in my chair, I reached to my side to grab a lollipop from the dwindling bag covered in bright colours and huge text proclaiming the flavours were new and the sugar ten percent less than they used to be, neither of which was true. I picked off the plastic to shove it in my mouth before returning my attention to the screen.

While I switched tabs, I reread the email. Checked the calendar at the bottom of my screen. Two days before the end of the month, which would make it three months since I'd taken over the lease.

I opened my notes and punched the numbers in.

11 Orchard — 5 months. 34 Ophelia — 5 months. 76 Nightingale — 4.5 months.

Then I tabbed to the browser. It had taken me almost three years to figure out how computers worked. How to use Celestia while outside of the city; it had taken another few to figure out how to have both the outer-city and Haryun internet running. My Luna login popped up, lightening my mood a little.

Years had gone by, but I still got pulled in by everything Haryun. It was my home—a fact that occasionally lured me out of my seat to linger by the window. I couldn't see it from the second floor. I couldn't see much besides the parking lot and the strip of asphalt linking the apartment's entrance to the rest of the street.

It wasn't about seeing the city, or even facing the right direction, since I was pretty sure I wasn't doing that either. Just that sometimes I needed to sit with the pressure of home, pressing against me like an anchor weight. Kept me adrift with the slow realization that I didn't need a map anymore to get me to the store for my monthly stocky-ups. That I recognized the huge stores and the bright signs, but when I stepped outside, sometimes I forgot where I was. Like sometimes, just for a second, I was back in Haryun, and for reasons I couldn't begin to explain, the forces pulling me home didn't ease up.

I wondered if Astra felt any of this. But I couldn't sit with the thought. All it did was choke me. All it did was make my fingers curl into fists.

Chewing on the stick of my lollipop, I clicked on my account. Welcome back, _nothatdeadeli!

Navigating to my following list, which was mostly Prismatrix-related, I found the one I was looking for. As a fan account, most of it was speculation, but the Tetra's profiles were well-curated by Sachiko. Mostly, I just wanted to know what Kendra was up to.

The most recent post was a thread of speculations from the past few days. Let's talk Prismatrix! Topics from this week only, and as always, I know nothing more than you!!

xxRoyalWrenfanboy: Personally I'm psyched lol
— irenetravels: Of course you are *^* I'm happy for her too. Anyone else think it was kind of weird though? I mean, I'm not saying it was rigged. But I'm also not not saying that.
— GoBeBrave8: Vale's not bound.
— irenetravels: So? :V
— GoBeBrave8: So he was guaranteed to lose. Four members and three were traditional sorcerers. Honestly it's pretty obvious to me