The Old Improbable Island Wiki

Zolotisty has found the stillest place on the Island that she knows. The Jungle breaks and eddies around a piece of ridged basalt so large that its spine draws even with the canopy. Driving rain and time has worn its top smooth. Lichens and tillandsia creep from its cracks. Standing atop the stone, it's possible to see the faint glow of Improbable Central on a clear night. During the day, you are alone, adrift on a sea of green.

This is not a grief that can be bowed on strings.

Z sits with her arms wrapped loose around her knees and though she's looking at the sky with clear eyes, she's not seeing. He knew in NewHome and she can't decide whether she knew, too. Whether she should feel more guilt for her responsibility or her ignorance. She's been trying to work it out since blue-eyed Alandre first took in wan figures in the Common Grounds, and she can't be among her peers, not now. They would tell her this change was chosen. That she should embrace it as a feat of bold forethought and be grateful for the depth of the bond that would motivate such a fierce sacrifice.

Celebrate the gamble, they would say. He's not really gone.

Bullshit, Z would say.

She wants nothing to do with dice, stakes, or easy explanations. Maybe hindsight fashions you selfish, but all she wants now is to take him back. But the thing is, Z just can't see a way. She knows Gambling. What without it? She doesn't Quest. She's not a Shark or a Scavenger.

“Did you plan for this, too?” she asks of the air with noosed inflection. The fine fur of her ears, the leaves, the end of her scarf - they shift and bend together. “I don't know how to play this, Sessine. I don't know what to do.”

Breathe. Be calm.

And so what if you don't hear the snifter shatter? Does that mean there was no sound as the glass fractured and flowered? And so what if no one sees him dancing. Does that mean he'll stop?

So what if he doesn't exist in the usual places?

Enjoy your worries, Zolotisty. You may never have them again.

Z's throat tightens. She gets to her feet - it's enough to feel.

There's nothing to see but the effect of a ripple in the wind's wake.