When Tayana got off work, she rushed home, and then just stood in front of the full motion console that her friend had gifted her for awhile. She'd honestly expected to spend all day crying after she'd logged out that morning, but the day had been too exhausting to give her time. She couldn't quite believe it had been real, she felt like if she connected she'd find out that everything was fine.

After a moment she shook her head and reached out to turn the console on. There wasn't any point in trying to sleep like this, as tired as she was.

Kit Tay appeared in the place that she'd logged out from, but that place had already changed. Half constructed walls stood around the edge of the building site, and three startled players gazed at her in surprise.

"Sorry," she said quickly. "I'll be out of the way in just a moment." She hurried toward a gap that would probably be a doorway later.

"It's fine," the human called out, and the two dwarves nodded quickly.

Kit flashed them a quick smile and stepped out onto what was quickly becoming a sandy street, as buildings grew up to define it.

She took a deep breath, and then headed for the recently defined town square. She came to a halt a few steps later as a familiar snow leopard cub sauntered up to her.

Kit gazed down at his furry little face with a sour expression. "You abandoned me after the expansion, but you're still delivering her messages?"

The snow leopard cub sat down and gazed at her consideringly.

"Well?" Kit asked.

The cub turned his head away and ignored her. Kit looked in the direction he was looking, just in case, but she didn't see anything. She knelt in front of him and held out her hand demandingly.

The cub glanced at her and she demanded aloud, "Give me the message already."

The cub narrowed his eyes at her, but after a moment a message dropped into her hand. It read: "You are still loved."

Kit grimaced and crumpled it in her hand, and then stopped and stared at the crumpled paper. It was still in her hand, it hadn't transformed into a message screen. She looked up, but the snow leopard cub was already gone.

--

Ryullusion was usually the only one on at this time of day with Aishin gone. He liked to think that he'd become fairly proficient at navigating the game and completing quests on his own, but his current quest seemed a little different than usual.

The traveling merchant had suggested that he play an instrument in the town square of the new player constructed city for two bells. There was no reward offered, just a timer counting down. He played whatever he felt like, since there were no rules yet about playing live covers of songs within VR games that he knew of.

The players who passed through the open sandy space seemed appreciative of the music, and the traveling merchant did brisk business. Ryullusion expected that business to come to an abrupt halt when he saw Kit, who he hadn't realized had logged on, approach the merchant.

Her expression was a little strange, and the traveling merchant looked up and greeted her cheerfully, "Kit my friend, it's good to see you."

Kit's expression tightened and she asked bitterly, "Not even an virtual man can keep all of his promises can he?"

"I'm sorry, I can't answer that right now, but I'll be glad to try to assist you as soon as I've dealt with those ahead of you," the merchant assured her cheerfully.

Ryullusion glanced at his timer. He had ten minutes left to go, but he called out anyway as he played, "Kit Tay, you're on early today?"

--

Kit gazed at the merchant unhappily. She'd known, but she hadn't wanted to know, that she'd returned to being just another player to him. At first the question that cut across the bubbly little tune of the bard who stood about ten paces away didn't process, and then she looked up to meet Ryullusion's questioning gaze.

She was sure that her embarrassment and humiliation burned visibly across her face, but the beautiful, dark haired, elven bard's expression didn't change. "I'm on late, you're the one who's on early," she corrected a little snappishly.

"Ah, right, true," he agreed cheerfully.

The players waiting for their turns with the merchant turned curious gazes toward them, and Kit hurried over to Ryullusion, so that she could speak in a whisper. "Did ZipZing ask you to keep watch on me?" she asked uneasily.

Ryullusion pursed his lips and then replied softly, as his fingers continued to produce music with practiced ease, as though they were independent of him, "No, but I'm starting to wonder if the traveling merchant did? This seems a little weird to ask about a game character, but what happened between the two of you?"

"Nothing!" Kit protested immediately. Then she glanced at the other players and lowered her voice again, "A tech support person deleted our baby and our marriage after Zip reported that the baby was able to give me the druid quest item I needed."

"That doesn't seem like something an ordinary baby would be able to do," Ryullusion suggested after a moment.

His eyes searched her face, and Kit felt her tears begin to fall. "It's not fair," she protested. "I know they aren't real, so why do I have to lose them too?" She couldn't stop the broken question that escaped next, even though she knew that he couldn't possibly answer, "Why do I have to lose everything over and over?"

--

Kit's questions were painful, and Ryullusion didn't know how to respond. He knew that she had healed a lot, from whatever had hurt her before, since they'd known each other through the game. But he also knew that old wounds could break open suddenly, and he didn't want to hurt her more.

"Do you wish you'd never met?" he asked as he ended the song he'd been playing.

The voices of the players across the square seemed to drop away at the same time and the silence hung oppressively between them for a long moment as Kit's eyes widened.

Ryullusion could hear the sound of his own lips parting as he drew in a deep breath to form a word to crack that deadly silence.

"No," Kit whispered before his voice came out. She met his eyes again and asked painfully, "Why, why would you ask that, like it's just an ordinary love between real people?"