=== Cindi ===

I was nowhere. I wasn't in the universe anymore. I don't know how I knew that; I didn't even know how I thought it. But I was outside of existence. I wanted to sigh; I couldn't; I also couldn't look around; I didn't have eyes; I didn't have fingers; I didn't have anything. That's not true, I thought. It echoed out into empty space. I am conscious; I am aware.

Things started to come into focus. Or rather, they began to exist at all. Distantly, stars surrounded me. I wanted to blink but couldn't; I didn't have eyelids. I know this place. My thoughts reverberated off of invisible walls. I tried to remember where I had seen these things. I tried to remember anything, but there wasn't anything there. I had the sense that I was once a part of something. That I wasn't supposed to be like this. That I had eyelids, eyes, fingers. I only barely understood what these things were. But I had them. They were mine. What do they do? There was a flash. Fingers. I saw them projected across this strange cosmos. They were long, thin clumps of flesh that bent. They were strange. Do I want them back? They connected to another piece of flesh. And they wrapped around something. Another hand. A stubbier finger stroked the fingers of the invading hand. I lurched towards the image, trying to reach out to it. I needed something to reach out with, though. I want that!

The image cast across the stars disappeared. The empty space in front of me exploded. Twice. And suddenly, I had hands. They ended just before the wrist. I brought them closer to my perception. They were thin and nimble. They were mine. I tried to move my perception down. There wasn't anything else. It was just the hands. I gripped the empty space before me and started pulling my way to a star. It was the only thing I could think to do. I wanted to move faster. But I didn't know how. How do I usually move? I had a memory of weightlessness. But I am weightless now. How's this any different? I wasn't complete. All I had was hands. And perception. This is wrong. I remembered kicking off things sometimes. Kicking? Pushing my feet away. I pictured feet. They were like hands but thicker. More stable. Their fingers . . . Toes . . . were stubbier. I looked down at my hands and where my feet would be. There were two more explosions. And I had feet. Hands and feet and nothing else. I thought. Then corrected myself. No, I still have perception. It was much easier to push myself off of the nothing I was inhabiting, and I could move much faster. I threw myself towards the nearest star. It felt forever away. It didn't seem to get any closer. But I could feel myself move. I felt things change.

"CHILD," a voice called out. I froze mid-leap. One of my feet was a pinprick in the distance behind me. It came crashing into me, and I tumbled over. I looked around, stretching out whatever senses I had. This also felt wrong. This wasn't how I was supposed to perceive things. The constant full circle of perception was disorienting. Two bright lights and explosions reverberated off of the nothing around me. My senses narrowed to what was just in front of me. Some amount of tension was released from me. An unknown pressure that had been building faded. I glanced around. I still needed to be completed. But I felt better. It was good to have limbs. And eyes. "CHILD."

The voice vibrated through my six body parts; it was a strange sensation. I searched for the voice again. But now, with my narrower perception, it was actually easier. I spun around. I could get a scope of what I was looking at. I saw something strange. I had thought the stars were an infinite expanse of space, but they had a shape in the darkness. They ended. It was vast. Far more so than I think I could have ever understood. What are you? I thought. There was no response; there wasn't an echo. I tried again but still nothing. How do I usually speak? I asked myself. The mental image of lips appeared; they were a deep dark red. I knew what that meant. I did that to them; I made them that way; They were mine. And like that, they were. They appeared. I called out again. "What are you?"

Space rushed around me. I was brought far away from the star I had been running to. I was pulled up. Two massive, fiery orbs bored into me, and I shifted my few limbs uncomfortably. "I AM YOU. I WAS YOU. YOU WERE ME."

"What does that mean?"

"I . . . WHY? WHY DID YOU PUT ME BACK?" The voice asked. I tried to scrunch my features up. I didn't have enough of them to do so. This isn't working. I need all of me; I can't do this. I tried to concentrate on what I was. What I had lost. Space shifted again next to me. And I was brought in front of myself. Parts of me, anyway. My body without eyes, without hands, without feet, and without lips. "IS THIS WHAT YOU NEED?"

"I . . . yes. I need that."

"ANSWER. THEN YOU CAN HAVE IT IF YOU STILL WANT IT. WHY?"

"Why what?" I asked. I tried to collect my thoughts. To understand what this being . . . what she was saying. I didn't know why, but I got a decidedly femme feeling from her.

"YOU RETURNED ME. WHY? I'VE GIVEN YOU WHAT YOU NEED. YOU GAVE ME WHAT I WANTED." I considered what she was saying. I jumped back a little bit, trying to get a better sense of her. I cast my eyes out, far away from my lips, my hands, from myself. And I saw her for the first time. Fully saw her. She was the whole of the cosmos I had seen. And my feeling about her femme orientation made sense. She was decidedly feminine-shaped. Entire quasars made up her chest. She had edges of her existence that curved inward, giving her a shape. And it was very close to my profile. I snapped my eyes back in place.

"You're. . . Her," I muttered. If I had knees, I would've collapsed to them. "You're the figure. You're. . . I've met you before."

"I'VE BEEN WITH YOU FOR YEARS. YOU'RE THE FIRST ONE I MET IN A LONG TIME. YOU USED ME. IT WAS FUN. WHY ARE YOU LEAVING ME?" She asked. She sounded . . . hurt. Everything came flooding back to me. All of my memories came rushing at once. Mother, father, Larry, Shai, Jesse, James, Harry, Hope, the Figure, Curt. The last thing being me putting the statue back. Then darkness. Then now.

"You . . . I didn't leave you . . . I don't want to . . . I didn't. . ." My voice echoed out against her. She looked at me with her suns for eyes. She blinked, a blanket of void overtaking them for a moment, then lowered me. Her lips were purplish space dust stretched out over the vague curve of her face. They were pulled into a soft smile.

"BUT YOU RETURNED MY TIE TO YOU. TO THE WORLD."

"It's not like that. I didn't want . . . I wasn't even aware you were there." There was a shifting. She was vibrating. It took me a few moments to realize she was angry. "Wait! I'm sorry. I'm. . . Let's start this again. Last time, I was distracted. I wasn't in the right headspace. Let me try again. I am Buck Cherry. Cindi Drei."

The vibration stopped, and she pulled me close to her eye. The brightness hurt. And I could feel her peering into me, somehow. I tried to shield myself, to no avail. "I AM THE MISTRESS OF NIGHT, PINIKIR! LEFT IN THE UNDERWORLD, SEPARATED FROM EVERYONE AND EVERYTHING. BUT YOU FOUND A PIECE OF ME! THROUGH YOU, I EXPERIENCED THE WORLD AGAIN! AND NOW YOU WANT TO LEAVE ME BEHIND AGAIN!"

The distress in her voice tugged at me. I let my hand drop from shielding my eyes and reached out to her. "That wasn't what I was doing. I didn't know about any of that."

It does make sense, though. A lot of the pictographs and writings were destroyed, and Hope and I both knew that we didn't have the complete story, I thought. But in archeology, the entire history doesn't usually exist anymore, so we just pushed on with what we had.

"I CHOSE YOU TO BE MY AVATAR, AND YOU TRIED TO LOCK ME AWAY AGAIN."

"No! I just wanted to make sure Hope didn't get you again. I didn't know that's what I was doing! I was trying to protect the figure." The Mistress of Night receded a bit, considering

"THERE IS ANOTHER WAY. A WAY TO ENSURE THAT WE WOULD NEVER BE SEPARATED. I COULD BE OUT IN THE WORLD AGAIN. AND YOU WOULD SURVIVE."

"Wait . . . I was going to die!?" I gaped at the woman, leaning forward. "I don't want to die!"

"OUR SOULS ARE CONNECTED. I WOULD BE TRAPPED IN THE UNDERWORLD, AND YOU, ATTACHED TO ME, WOULD BE PULLED WITH ME. HOWEVER, THERE IS ANOTHER WAY!" The astral being called out again. Then everything shifted. She shrank until she was about my size. I looked down and realized I was in my body again. I was completely naked, but I had my cherries back. I fingered the tattoos on my hips, on my shoulders. I felt almost whole again. Something was still missing, but I couldn't place my finger on it. The inky black figure stepped forward, and suddenly she was just in front of me. She reached her hands out and wrapped them around my neck. "YOU WILL TAKE ME INSIDE OF YOU."

"I . . . wha-" I started to ask before she drew me into a kiss. I kissed her back, my arms wrapping around her shoulders. It was a strange sensation; our bodies were humming. Something occurred to me. This was what it felt like when I stunned people. It didn't hurt like it usually did, but it was the same basic feeling. I closed my eyes, and everything disappeared.

After a moment, after an eternity, I opened my eyes. Curt was above me. I reached out and wiped away one of his tears. He opened his eyes. "Cindi! Thank god!"

"Goddess, actually," I corrected. I pulled myself up off of the floor. I was nude, just as I had been in whatever space that was. I grabbed the statue and held it up. It vibrated in my hands.

"Cin, let's go. We need to see Des. Figure out what happened."

"No, Curt," I said softly. He started protesting, getting up off the ground himself, but I looked at him. "Essy, darling. Trust me. I'm fine."

"That's what you said last time. And you had three broken ribs then."

"This isn't the same," I said. I pressed the figure to my chest. Then through it. It shifted inside of me. An electric shock coursed through my body. I could feel the figure shift inside of me. I convulsed violently, and Curt rushed to me, trying to support me. But his hands went through me. I couldn't breathe like this. It was one of the drawbacks of my powers; I couldn't draw air into my lungs when I phased through things. But I didn't panic. I closed my eyes and felt the figure shift inside of me. I matched its depiction as best as I could. After a moment or two, the figure inside me shattered apart and disappeared. That's. . . that's not exactly what happened. It's still there; it's just . . . I became physical again. I reached out and grabbed Essy's face, pulling it up. I drew him into a kiss. There was something different about this; a new presence pushing me into it. He accepted it for a beat or two before pulling away, his arms wrapped around me.

"Cindi, what the fuck is going on?"

"I don't think you'd believe me, darling," I said, phasing through his grasp and then picking up my clothes. I got dressed and walked over to the door we had traveled through.

=== Chuck ===

I called Kari again. We hadn't spoken in a few days. She's still angry, I thought bitterly. I knew it wasn't fair to be mad at her. She was doing what she felt was right. But she wasn't listening to me. I had a handle on the situation. I could have talked him down. I know I could have. It went to her voicemail. Again. I sighed. "Kari, we need to talk . . . Please."

I disconnected the phone. I hadn't called her often; that was the only message I left. She was avoiding me; it wasn't exactly the healthiest way to set boundaries, but I still needed to respect them. I donned my costume with none of my usual flare. I didn't really feel up to patrol. Kari was becoming radicalized, and I didn't like it. But at least I am a hero people could trust to try to be understanding. I opened the apartment window with a wave of my hand and floated out, pushing it closed behind me. Then I blasted off. I flew over the city, opening up my senses, and taking in everything. My hovering wavered for a moment as I experienced millions of emotions. I pushed them back a little and reinforced my mental guard. I had been training them a lot lately. I can't let myself be overwhelmed by people like Curt or Kari again. I pushed my senses out further, accepting more. Anger, joy, fear, love, lust, contempt, desire, exhaustion. The full spectrum of emotion was available to me. And it was a lot. I sifted through them, trying to separate them and not mix them into an overwhelming soup of humanity. I also pushed for a more substantial barrier between me and them. A cell wall letting things through to be understood but keeping them separate from my core. My nucleus.

Something was approaching me fast. A mass of emotions. I turned to see a pink and red blur approaching me fast. It was Kari; I knew it before I saw her. I knew her. She stopped just short of me. She didn't look pleased, but here she was. "You called. Did you want to go on patrol together?"

"I . . . I wanted to talk, Kari," I replied, schooling my voice.

"We can talk on patrol." She wasn't trying to hide her cold rage towards me. I didn't need to sense it. It was all there in her voice. I closed my eyes and nodded before sinking down towards the city. She followed me. I didn't say anything for a long time. I didn't really know what I wanted to tell her. "I-I got Lady Blade."

"Yeah," I responded absently. "I saw. You saved Suiren and her party guests. I'm glad they're safe."

"I captured the woman who tried to kill you," she retorted angrily. "Aren't you happy about that?

I stopped midair and turned to her, meeting her eyes. "I'm glad she's off the streets. I'm happy that you did it. I'm just not pleased with how you did it, Kari."

"She was never going to stop! I did what I had to do," she shouted.

"Y-you're probably right about that."

"Then why are you mad!?" Kari's voice cracked. She was hurting. Pain echoed through my chest. I couldn't tell if it was my pain or hers. It's probably both. I willed up my mental defenses. I hate having to do this around her. I hate having to guard up against the woman I . . . I froze. Oh. I had spent the last twenty years of my life swimming in other people's emotions. Reflecting them back and never really understanding my own. Not fully. I have to work to identify them. I flew over to a building and landed on it. I sensed Kari was following me. "Well?"

"Give me a moment, please, Kari. I . . . I need to check something real quick." I cut myself off from all of my senses. I stood there, concentrating on my breathing for a few moments. All of the things boiling up in me. I opened up into my mind palace. Not everyone has a mind palace. People who think in words usually don't. When I enter their minds, it's more like reading a book. In some ways, I can create a mind palace, force an order that I can understand on them. But it depends on their will. Mine was very tangible. Especially since I had been spending a lot of time in it lately. It was part of my defense training. It was modeled after my old college library. A place where I felt safe and could study in a quiet, calm place. I stepped into the library and navigated to the section I had wanted to get to. J-L. And I didn't even need to go that far. Sitting just before the shelves I had created was a table with a display on it. There was a small figurine of Kari on it. She was grinning. There was also a book with her in the same pose, smiling, giving a thumbs up. She looked strong and confident. Just like she did in real life. I picked up the book, and as I opened it, all of my thoughts and feelings associated with the woman washed over me from it. I developed these books to try and make it easier to sort through my own experiences and keep them separate and safe from everyone else's. It wasn't perfect, but it was better. And Kari . . . She was . . .

Strong, capable, kind, scary. Those were the things I thought when I saw her. Memories of dates we had been on, memories of the trip out of town and the dinners, late nights watching movies, and stopping crimes together. Her actions scared me sometimes. But despite all of that, I enjoyed being with her. I loved being with her. I had confirmed my feelings. I put the book back down and came back to my senses. Kari was just sitting on the lip of the building, scrolling on her phone. I stepped up next to her. She looked up. "What was that about?"

"I . . . I needed to confirm something," I sat next to Kari and stared out at the city's twinkling lights. I was silent for a moment longer, still gathering my thoughts. "Kari, I care about you a lot. I . . . I think . . . I love you."

I heard her breath catch. Emotions flooded her. Elation, confusion, apprehension, love. Well, love is complex. Romantic love, as I understand it, is made up of multiple parts. Usually, it's comprised of care, concern, desire, and a little lust. Or a lot, depending on the person. That's what Kari's was made of. A passion for her person to be safe and cared for and for them to be around. To be close. It's what she needed. Before I could go too deep into this line of thought, I continued, "But that's only a part of what's going on."

"What do you mean?"

"Kari, you're scaring me. I know you're trying to do right by yourself and the world. But . . . Sometimes, I think you go too far. And I don't know what to do."

"Chuck, I don't know what you want from me. Like you said. I'm just doing what I think is right."

"Is murder right?"

"I haven't murdered anyone."

"You could have."

"I . . . I am in control."

"Are you?" I asked, turning to her. "I saw the pictures of what you did to Lady Blade. I was there when you struck Doc Oak's neck. I've seen you fight Curt and almost tear him limb from limb."

"They need to go down."

"Does that excuse you almost killing them?"

"I didn-" she began, but I cut her off.

"Kari. Either it's okay to murder criminals, or it's not. This isn't always a matter of self-defense or even a matter of defense of others. You damaged Bion's suit when fighting him. He uses that for life support. You almost punched a hole through Lady Blade. I know she was attacking Suiren's party. I know that you had to stop her. But you also were out of control."

"I know," she said in a small voice, then got louder as she continued, annoyance creeping into her tone. "But I'm just so tired of letting these criminals do whatever they want."

"Does that make it okay to kill them?" I asked.

"I don't think I can eliminate it as a possibility. I don't know if there's another way to stop someone like Lady Blade."

"What about Curt?"

"I . . . I don't know that he can be stopped with anything less, Chuck. And he needs to be stopped."

"What if I find a different solution? Will you try?"

"I . . . yeah, okay. I'll try. But I won't make any guarantees."