(March 22)
Reflection
Silental Tower
Autumn 83
After some more study, Esmund realizes he can use the temporal snatcher to draw a temporal object out of the crystal matrix, something which is almost certainly a person. It’s Salinger! He’s very discombobulated and weak. A furor breaks out. After Salinger goes off to the Wandering Wanderlust (Peach’s Tiny Hut) to rest, Esmund experiences nausea and starts seeing the world doubled in red, and realizes this means a Paradox has occurred. Ava orders Esmund to rest and checks to see if Salinger still exists.
Ixtalan bullies Esmund into doing the temporal soul switch now; Ava, suspicious, trails after them. Once Esmund pulls the lever, Ixtalan and Xalati find themselves in a timeless moment on the rocky beaches of Shepherd’s End, as children, catching crabs. Ixtalan tells Xalati that when she left the Between she came back to Xal’s plane, but they can switch back now and she’ll head to the Tower to meet her again. Xalati, confused, latches onto the one concept that Ixtalan is alive and would be sent back here with a switch; Ixtalan tries to reassure her, give her a hug and run, but Xalati grabs on and says no, she can’t be alone again, they have to be together.
The machine catches on fire and erupts in smoke as Ava runs in. When the lightning and smoke in the transferral chamber clears, Ixtalan is still there. Esmund collapses. Ixtalan has a tanty and runs off. Ava resentfully tells Esmund to get some rest.
Salinger wakes and is weirded out by having a corporeal body and experiencing linear time.
Esmund goes looking for Ixtalan, who still isn’t back, and eventually finds her coming back from outside looking terrible. They have a chat, clean each other’s faces and establish their next steps: to Alinge’s Pass, then Shepherd’s End, and then to the Between, while Ixtalan says she told Xalati to go to the Tower to meet them.
On their way out, they dig up the buried Esmunds, and Ava Decomposes them, growing Esmund’s favorite flower on their remains. Esmund, looking back at the tower, says, “I’ll be better than you.”
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