· DALTON ·
You are entering the cycle of your own destruction, the wheel
Of your own fortune. Rome falls, everything
Collapses. Limits, purpose, cages, fail-safes, walls, fail,
Something put in motion does not
“Parisa?” looks smaller when she sleeps
Ashes of yourself the rubble from the fall We are such stuff / Dreams are made on / the past is prologue, Stop. This is my fault
Dalton, are you listening? You have to be the one to live, Something put in motion does not
Viviana Absalon, forty-five-year-old female misclassified as a mortal
Stop now the past is
Prologue: something I learned long ago, not everything I bring to life stays alive
A portal of this magnitude, an output of this potency, it cannot come from nothing, necessarily
“Parisa, I need to tell you something—”
He can't always remember, it comes and goes, it's on the tip of his tongue, oh yes, there it is
Can’t promise there's no death inside the void, almost immediately another thought: What else is the Point
Do people blessed with longevity typically attract fatalities? (Does magic only give when it can take?) Is this some unspoken law of nature or is it proof of the chaos that exists
The other half of his fate, a mirror-image of his soul, it isn’t not romantic, but a reality
If we don't try? An end to the hunger, a completion to the cycle, Rome falls, everything
Put in motion does not
Stop me, someone will have to, it will have to be
You don't understand, I want this too much, tell me the truth Dalton, the truth is
DestroyDestroyDestroy!!!!!!
Listen Atlas when all the archives choose to give me is a university physics textbook from 1975, I think we can safely say there’s been a problem with the calculations
—such a thing as too much power? Yes, oh god Dalton, yes, but it’s too late
Late, she stirs in her sleep but doesn't wake. “Parisa?”
Her eyes flutter open. She's cranky in the mornings, he's utterly turned on, what was he saying? Everything is so fragmented, impossible these days to hold on to
One single thought: I want to build worlds with you. Not love exactly, but something very similar, symmetry, like finding a mirror-image of his soul, the other half of his fate. She seems worried, a little, but distracted, too distracted to see that he can’t
Tell her, tell her now, neither created nor destroyed, think about what that means—
He finds a use for his mouth, a queen deserves a throne, yes, yes, there it is, he thinks or possibly remembers,
Energy can neither be created nor destroyed; for any spontaneous process, the entropy of the universe increases; listen up, you fuckhead, I don’t say these things for my health
How to ruin a man's life? Easy, give her anything she wants to tell her something, the caveat to this, have to remember something, something,
Have to remember, Dalton, that something put in motion will not
(Her sigh in his ear) Dalton, please don't
Stop.
