Her hand rested on his shoulder, “Can you speak, handsome?”

Pry saw out his one eye, his own eye, for a moment; slapped in the face by an abstract beauty, even he couldn't comprehend... even... Old Works.

“We were asking about resources.”

“Ten thousand thirty eight left.” Each a corridor. Minimum: one.

Pheel gasped. Gasped; mumbled something about this being a whole race. Species.

Cazzo wasn't unlike them; he had a filtered consciousness too – he was - only so capable of focusing on more than his own... more than his own personal problems, let alone the rest of it... and the rest of it that was specifically documented and understood to be within his strictly delineated purview – organizational; administrational – etc. - but, in all, that number had obviously shocked him out of himself. Even enough to recognise Pry-Boak's [cL^YoP], wrong word, humanity.

“How is that possible?”

“We're being murdered.” Both of them stared at him aghast.

“I'm not minimising this for a second. This is evil of incomprehensible proportions, but... 80% of your working age population has been slayed?” Realising he was using a story-term, “Murdered.”

“Of the working-age population, yes,” Cazzo, him too, Pry did as well, glanced back at Brey-BreLoak [cL^YoP***], in the opposite corner; both of them thinking that term, working-age, an obvious euphemism because there, those still capable anyway, in no way still in that bracket, were doing what they could. Had been dragooned to. By years of -

Both of them expressed dismay; upset; regret. - Anything like emotion, in Pry's current state, however, as a response, was more effort, neurologically, in terms of the functioning of his physical brain - which did a lot of the work - than he was currently capable of.

He listened to their rote expressions of woe. They probably weren't – he was only in Pheel's head – he meant it. Pry just couldn't feel his own response to that, only Pheel's and that – he was sincere.

“They do realise that their entire framework, their system, is completely dependent on Cyclops.”

“Of all kinds,” added Clua, unnecessarily, Pheel thought, given the current subject.

“They killed Tarr-Saik.”

Pheel couldn't cope with reality. He had no blood in his body anymore and this was absolutely the last – a direct physical consequence of the... deeply strange act they had performed - how many problems did he have? His – whatever she was to him, Clua; was pregnant with a new lifeform that would be here to fundamentally change all reality in three months, according to her, or she was mad, which meant she was mad, or something even stranger was about to happen and now, exactly when - she was mentally unwell - or something worse, or maybe that was worse – he was in the least able state physically to even contemplate it. Let alone face -

His chest pounded, breath short, he'd - faint - he was going to faint, he thought he might; he couldn't breathe properly, it came in short gasps because, not only all of this but the weight of – it wasn't his weight to carry, he was just a writer, it was for him to plot this fucking thing – the weight was falling, but how could he even... how could he even start -

to support it -

His friend – the annunciator, his annunciator, his friend, the Cylops Tarr-Saik - was dead, which was bad, but how could he even commence, what was, an infrastructural essential, in this universe in which he, but not only him, lived, of the three planets/realms/overlapping reality-land-worlds, that constituted it - but - what could he even do without...

how could he even start this thing/he'd never started anything - without -

“The only thing you can do... tell the truth -”

“Without the Cyclops with whom he'd always started these things.” He said this aloud, for reasons he thought, of perhaps insanity, “He hadn't started anything, he could not start anything.” At least temporary. Insanity. Let's say temporary.

“It's all a form of story-consciousness anyway, right? I do not understand this complete lack of self-faith - do not let your physical impediments, your biological restraints constrict your entire approach to the world that is the absolute essential, especially at this stage, component - especially at the start, not just of this, but of anything.

“He's gone.” Eyes, those conventional, flitting between them. “Someone, for some mysterious reason, is killing Cyclops. Why? It's a revolution. Why else? For what other purpose? Who doesn't like Cyclops? Weirdos. - Bad weirdos with strange thoughts - strange little thoughts they have to themselves that are twisted, dirty no doubt too, and wrong. Everyone loves them. They make life seem magical, and there's also the point that without them modern life does not function. Without which the vast resources of human unreality, of dreams, just sit there, floating around; untappable, unwanted, an unwanted nothing, a non-existent death-water realm, basic filth thing of no value - less than that; of a complete lack of even – you can't see it, you can't understand it, without them.