It was merely an open space: three columns; ceiling triangles in shards from the destroyed temple of Colthon, 500,000 years ago: all that remained of that great epochal change in their history.

He was beneath those turquoise shards, lit through intermittently by pink; a shard of pink light across both their faces there, but – but no – the rest was gone.

“Who? What?” She was saying, mocking him, “It's you.”

He said -

“The dream is played through you: you fuel that dream. That was only the truth you saw. You. Pry. It's you that is a slave. You. You. You. You're a dreamunit. You're a slave. You.”

- “It's -”

“- What do you even believe; what do you even know, what do you even think? You're a skill, you're a trick, played across your own consciousness; a question repetition man. A pattern changer. A glorified ball. You're an eyeball. Just images ported through. You're a slave, Pry. A slave.” For a flash, for an instant, it was no longer muted, that, whatever it was, he could see it clearly again. There.“And I don't want you to be.”

“The ceremony?”

“That was the ceremony. That was the ancient rite. That was.

“You have no memory. Your past is confection - all that is sufficiently, merely - your religion is fake - for you to function: as they want you to - as is, currently, for not much longer, necessary... for them.

“You know nothing, you believe in nothing, and therefore that's what you are. Technically - I'm using the foul language they have invented in order that you understand it. - I'm saying you're a dreamunit. You. No difference. Nothing. And the other thing; in a real language, in the language of universal truth. You are a slave. I can see that I am hurting you. But saying these things, that are true. Saying this to you. It's sacred. Whatever is next - whatever combined beauty we share - if we're lucky we shall share, it's a shadow of this that I impart to you now. Telling you the truth that you're a slave. And that.” She stopped. He could see the next thing would be the most blunt. - “Pry, I won't have a slave in my – I will not fuck a slave in my bed.”

He was to kiss her. But he could see it was futile. She wouldn't. - Because that was what he was.

In this single moment that was his entire life. He was so clean he could fly. Because he knew. - Because despite it being the worst moment of his life. It was true.

He was a dream slave.