giftedthom | (no subject)

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HOKAY, THIS IS NOT IMPOSSIBLE!

"Oh."

Thom asks, "What was home like?"

Perhaps -- this once -- he'll get a real answer.

"It was very clean, and heady, and--I suppose 'symmetrical' is oddly appropriate. Perfection incarnate, all the best of the world, flaws carefully sanded away. Purified. Which means it was never very real."

He pauses, turning out to face the waves.

"It's one thing to be confronted with the undiluted essence of a mountain, and quite another to be speak with the undiluted essence of someone you once knew."

"Is it . . . like speaking to a god?"

Xas shakes his head, eyes closed for a moment.

"No. More like speaking to a stranger. A stranger who is almost terrifyingly content."

When he opens his eyes again, they're clear, and very blue.

"They are nothing like what they were."

Thom makes a noncommittal noise. "Well, if they're happy."

"They are content. You could, I suppose, call it happy."

"Well," Thom says again. "It's not meant for you."

"No. But I'm not certain it's entirely meant for them, either."

He shrugs, looking down and away.

"It bears more than a faint resemblance to a butterfly collection, did one have plans for the butterflies."

"Oh," says Thom, eyes round and innocent, "yes, but without the pins."

"Do not forget the lack of glassed in cases. Though I suppose one might consider Heaven so."

"When do they get taken apart?"

"Distilled. Dismemberment, such as it might be, occurs only on earth."

He smiles, almost entirely without humor.

"God, it seems, is much too fastidious for such things."

"But he's. Saving them for something?"

"A better world than this, or so Lucifer suspects. I don't quite believe that he's wrong."

"Lucifer?"

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