I conjured a black sphere, dark as embered charcoal, and sent it rolling across the cave floor. It bounced lightly, rebounding off the slick stone wall, then skittered back toward me.
a rhythm of motion that chased sleep from my eyelids and wove a fragile net between my thoughts and the oppressive weight of reality. Leaning back against the chill of the cavern wall, I let my body melt into the hush, surrendering, if only for a moment, to the quiet's embrace.
Gelemia broke the silence. "Professor Lingard, huh," she remarked, her tone drifting upward, airy as the last wisp of lamp-smoke after midnight.
I'd tossed out the question earlier, asking if she'd ever met Lingard. Now, finally settled against the stone, I was ready to listen for real, every muscle willing itself to loosen as she began her tale.
My parade of worries unraveled, scattering one by one. Dammit, I thought, Erin had already slipped off to sleep, no help at all, not even a crumb of conversation tonight.
"Professor Lingard's a good one," Gelemia began, her face lifted to catch the wan gleam of my black sphere. "He teaches plain and straight, none of that convoluted nonsense. Sometimes, during lab, he'd be the first to go off-script, stir up mischief, loosen everyone's nerves till the whole class felt like an inside joke." There was a warmth threading through her words, nostalgia softening every syllable.
She shrugged, her voice slipping into a faintly cocky lilt. "Magical Technology, that's his department. The theory'll tie your brain in knots, sure, but it's the practical work that tries to break your back. The details… gods, sometimes they made me want to flip the workbench. And then there's Professor Inkletter, never in the mood for a rainbow"
Her laughter was low, edged with something bitter. "But honestly, that never fazed me." She tilted her chin, as if challenging the murky ceiling of the cave itself.
I shot her a sidelong grin, a hint of amusement lighting up the gloom.
"But, if I'm being honest, I was never close with the faculty. Whether it was easygoing Lingard or tyrannical Inkletter, there was always… this invisible wall," she went on, her tone dipping into something bare and almost melancholy.
I raised an eyebrow, half-joking. "Is that why you always vanished to the restrooms? Hiding from your fearsome professors?"
"Rude. I left because I wanted to, thank you very much. I told you, it was that last class, I had to check the condition of the restrooms." Her reply was wry, half-defiant.
All I could do was shrug, caught between amusement and confusion. "Sure, sure…"
But then, her voice dropped, soft now, heavy, filling the little cave with a hush that felt almost sacred, as if even the echoing stone held its breath.
"It'd be a lie if I said otherwise," she admitted, voice a fragile confession set loose in the dark.
"Sometimes… I really did slip away in there." It sounded like a secret she'd been carrying for years.
My throw slowed, a tangle of worry and curiosity snagging at my nerves. "You… stayed in the toilet? Why?"
Gelemia nodded, her eyes fixed on the ground, voice clear but trembling at the edges. "Sometimes I wished I could just be accepted already, become an Alteker without needing to set foot in the city above. It's not the lessons; sure, it's hard, but I can handle it. It's just… well, everything up there feels so different.
"Different?" I pressed gently, hoping to unravel the thread of her story.
She drew a long breath, as though trying to fill some invisible emptiness. "The atmosphere… it's not the same. I sit alone in class, eat alone, laugh alone, talk to myself. In a space that's so vast, I still end up doing everything by myself."
I held my breath, letting the hush draw out between us, nothing but the drip of water from the cavern ceiling daring to break the silence.
"But you can do it?" I whispered at last.
A faint, fragile smile touched her lips, like the very first hint of dawn. "You're right. I can get by on my own. But sometimes… I'd rather not be. I wish I had someone to talk to. Someone to laugh with. Just… not always alone."
Her gaze was steady now, cutting through the cave gloom straight into me. "I don't want to be alone"
"Just because I'm from the Wetlands."
Quietly, her words worked their way through me. Tytoal-ba's image, prosperous, grand, so dazzling in its advancement, still left empty spaces, hollow corners for hearts from below. Was this the burden she'd always carried?
"I want it, too: if I ever fall, I want to truly fall. And for someone's hand to reach out, to help me stand again."
A brittle laugh slipped from her, half-mocking, tinged with bitterness. "Maybe that's why I like the toilet. In the dorm, sometimes a roommate might barge in, but in that cramped stall, there's nowhere for anyone, even myself, to hide. It's the smallest space, where no one really knows you."
"I sit alone in the toilet," she said softly, as if those few words could contain all her loneliness.
"It sounds pitiful, doesn't it?" She raised a finger in mock protest, as though hunting for a nobler reason. "But honestly, it's mostly because of class. I promise."
I let my black sphere fall silent, the muted thud lost to a hush even deeper than before. In that quiet, Gelemia turned, her eyes sweeping the curve of the cave before settling on me. I rose slowly, brushing dust from my pants, carrying her confession in a heart suddenly heavier and more awake than before.
"If I ever make it up there, you won't need to hide out in the toilets anymore, will you?"
A flicker of confusion crossed Gelemia's face, her brow arched, eyes fixed on my shadow as she studied me through the gloom.
"What's that supposed to mean?" she asked softly, her voice no louder than the hush clinging to the stone walls.
I drew a breath, fighting down a smile deep and earnest. "If I go to the Tytoal-ba, you'll never have to eat alone; you'll never have to look for a place to disappear. I'll be right there beside you."
"I'll be your friend." My smile broke as wide and open as the dawn.
"Eh…?"
"I'm going to study above," I pressed on, my words buoyed up by a bonfire of half-formed dreams.
"I'll prove it, people from down here can shake the very ground the upper folk walk on! I'll turn that university into my own little kingdom, just you wait."
Gelemia snorted, stifling a laugh that threatened to bloom at her lips. "Ambitious, aren't you?" she said.
"You think I'm joking now, but you'll see! The moment classes start, I'll walk right through the front doors, introduce myself, and claim the seat beside you. Don't go fainting from surprise, all right?"
"Yeah, yeah… dream on," Gelemia scoffed, turning away in feigned indifference, but the shadow of a smile still clung to the corner of her mouth before darkness swallowed it whole.
I kept rambling, even knowing my words might just drift and vanish with the chill cave air, settling into small, private dreams. In the end, Gelemia curled up, back to me, letting the night swallow her worries with each steady breath.
But me, I tumbled headlong into ambition, mind racing after any scrap of possibility. How would I ever reach the upper city? Maybe I could ask Paris. Or Hozi? Who knew. Every solution felt like a maze, but one thing was clear: hearing the upper folk dismiss Gelemia just because she was from the Wetlands, it stung as if they'd jabbed a finger straight into my own pride.
I rolled over, turning away from Gelemia, letting a sliver of distance grow between us. My eyelids fluttered shut, darkness pulling whatever light was left beneath its folds.
The gloom settled in slow and gentle, a thin blanket that never quite managed to warm me. I drew a long breath, the cave's dampness, the ghost of moving air, the rise and fall of Gelemia's quiet breathing mingling together.
I said softly, my whisper fading into the hush that pressed against the walls.