Sylvia wasn't sure how long she'd stayed there.
The techniques Black Swan had taught her worked well. They made it much easier for Sylvia to pick out the Stellaron hidden within the chaos, and they also helped her feel the state of the Memoria with more care.
"All right. I'll take you back for now. Next time, you'll have to come here on your own, dear."
Black Swan smiled in that suggestive way of hers. With a light turn of her hand, she gathered Sylvia into a princess carry and flew away from the accretion disk.
"You don't have to carry me like this…"
"But darling, you're so cute. It makes one want to spoil you a little."
In this cursed place, Sylvia didn't dare struggle much. They'd already gone far beyond the distance she could endure on her own.
Once she left the range of Black Swan's power, that hollow would swallow her whole without question, and Black Swan knew it. That was why she could tease Sylvia without the least restraint.
Sylvia's cheeks flushed. She pursed her lips and turned her eyes away, which only made Black Swan laugh with more joy.
Sure enough, compared to a cold woman like Acheron, a cute girl like Sylvia was far more fun to adore.
"…"
"…"
Sylvia shut her mouth, and for a while, Black Swan didn't speak either. Silence spread between them.
After some time, Sylvia felt Black Swan's power begin to pull back, and the tearing force of the accretion disk fell onto her bit by bit. She used that chance to speak again.
"Black Swan, do you know what's on the other side of that hollow?"
Sylvia stared at the huge void. She was curious. That thing wasn't a black hole-like star formed after Memoria had condensed to its limit. The huge pull came from Memoria leaking through that gap into the other side of the hollow.
"The other side of the hollow?"
Black Swan blinked, then smiled and shook her head.
"Dear, Memokeepers aren't all-powerful. Even I can't approach that hollow with ease."
Memokeepers could handle Memoria with great skill, but that didn't mean they were safe in an ocean of it. Take this accretion disk, for example. Black Swan could go far deeper than most people, but she still couldn't reach the hollow with no risk and peer into what lay beyond it.
At that point, the sheer pressure of the Memoria would crush even a Memokeeper.
"So that's how it is…"
Black Swan's answer changed Sylvia's whole view of the thing in front of her. It was even more dangerous than she'd thought.
Seen that way, the Family was bold in the extreme. They weren't even Memokeepers, yet they'd dared to mess around this thing.
The Family didn't look all that reliable, but when it came to Stellarons, they did seem quite capable.
"By the way, can Memory Zone Memes be made by hand?"
Sylvia had just recalled the question Sparkle had muttered about before. Man-made Memory Zone Memes. Before Sparkle brought it up, Sylvia truly hadn't thought about it. Could someone just shape one with their bare hands?
"They can. It's just a bit troublesome. Personally, I'd suggest catching one instead."
Black Swan herself had a meme she could use in battle. For a Memokeeper, such things were quite useful. Making one by hand was troublesome, though, so Memokeepers with a need for them tended to catch a newly born meme, or else shape an empty shell to use as a defensive tool.
"Where's the hard part?"
"The hard part lies in giving it awareness. If you're only shaping a body, that's easy enough. It's about the same as what Dreamweavers do."
Black Swan thought back over Sylvia's abilities. She had a fair number of tricks, but none of them met the conditions needed to grant awareness.
The Family should have some similar ability, but that was likely one of their secrets. They'd hardly tell Sylvia, an outsider, about it.
"Oh…"
Sylvia nodded to show that she understood. What a shame. She couldn't make her own pet after all. As for catching a meme… when she thought of those strange, twisted shapes, she felt no urge to do that.
Forget it. She'd only asked in passing. Maybe one day Sparkle would pop out on her own and tell Sylvia that she'd solved the problem.
"All right, this is as far as I'll take you. You can handle the rest of the way back yourself. Otherwise, your little girlfriend might get jealous."
Sylvia was still thinking over those questions when Black Swan stopped. She lowered her head and let go of Sylvia with both hands.
"Uh… Robin and I haven't exactly…"
Sylvia's face warmed a little. She wanted to say she and Robin hadn't made anything official yet, but halfway through, she felt that sounded rather scummy, so she swallowed the rest.
Black Swan covered her mouth and laughed.
"What a little heartbreaker you are. If you ever crash and burn, I'll leave behind a dream bubble for your memorial."
"…Can't you wish me something better?"
Sylvia's expression darkened.
What kind of thing was that to say?
Black Swan only smiled and ignored Sylvia's protest with grace. Then, all at once, she raised her hands and cupped Sylvia's face.
"Hehe. See you next time, dear."
As she spoke, Black Swan's figure began to fade, turning more transparent by the second as she leaned close.
Mwah.
In the instant before Black Swan vanished, she seemed to do it as a prank. With a faint, wicked smile, she kissed the corner of Sylvia's mouth, or at least seemed to.
"…"
They'd been so close that Sylvia had seen the teasing look in Black Swan's eyes with perfect clarity. And that woman had clearly timed it on purpose, kissing her at the very last moment before she vanished.
Since her presence had faded away, Sylvia could only tell from sight that Black Swan had kissed her. In truth, she hadn't felt a thing.
What sort of awful hobby was that?
Sylvia pursed her lips, feeling as if an older, teasing big sister had toyed with her to the bone.
She raised a hand and touched the corner of her mouth, then shook her head with a sigh before flying toward Dreamflux Reef at full speed.
She'd learned a lot of techniques from Black Swan today. She'd need time to practice them, and she'd also need to search for the Stellaron's location with care.
--+--
On the rooftop of Dreamflux Reef, Robin sat beside a table and pretended to read, but she couldn't stay still.
Nearly four system hours had passed since Sylvia had gone near the accretion disk. She still hadn't come back. Robin felt so restless that she hadn't taken in a single page of her book. Did a simple survey really need this long?
She couldn't stop worrying about Sylvia's safety.
Grim images kept rising in her mind, images of Sylvia meeting with an accident and never returning. She even began to regret it. Why hadn't she stopped Sylvia? Or why hadn't she gone with her?
At least then, if something happened, she'd know what had gone wrong.
Dreamflux Reef had no phone signal, so she couldn't even send a message to ask.
If she hadn't known that setting off now would be useless, if Robin had possessed even a shred of the ability needed to approach and search the accretion disk, she'd have rushed out a system hour ago.
Just as Robin grew more and more uneasy, a tiny black dot appeared in the far reaches of the void. It grew larger within her field of view.
"!"
Robin held her breath without thinking and hurried to steady the telescope beside her, looking into the distance. That small figure was Sylvia, rushing back at high speed.
"Sylvia!"
Robin called Sylvia's name on instinct. At that moment, not only her voice but even the wings behind her ears trembled, showing how excited she was.
Far away, Sylvia seemed to sense Robin's gaze, or perhaps hear her call.
Even with such a great distance between them, Sylvia turned her eyes and met Robin's gaze through the telescope. She even lifted her hand and gave a small wave.
"?!!"
Robin was shocked that Sylvia had found her line of sight, but for some reason, joy rose in her too. As a famous star, Robin should've been used to such gazes locking onto her. She might even have hated them.
But when she thought that the one looking at her wasn't one of those awful reporters, but Sylvia, her old disgust changed into a girl's shy delight.
When the person you cared about looked at you, when they still noticed you across such a long distance, the same thing felt wholly different depending on who did it.
"Hehehe."
Hoping Sylvia could see her too, Robin let out a strange little laugh and lifted her hand to wave back. Through the telescope, Sylvia's smile grew brighter.
After several minutes, Sylvia finally returned to Dreamflux Reef and landed on the rooftop.
Robin, happy yet still shaken, grabbed Sylvia's hand and looked her up and down. Every now and then, she even tugged at Sylvia's skirt to check her from side to side.
"Are you okay? Why were you gone so long? Didn't you say you were only going to do a simple survey?"
"Uh…"
Sylvia, who'd just opened her mouth to speak, choked a little at Robin's reaction. It wasn't as if she'd never seen Robin shy before, but this was the first time she'd seen this side of her.
"I'm fine, don't worry. I just ran into Black Swan, so I got held up for a while."
"The Memokeeper lady you mentioned before?"
"Yeah. I don't know when she came to Dreamflux Reef, but she showed up not long after I left."
Sylvia nodded, then gave Robin a simple account of what had happened over the past few system hours.
"You've already found traces of it?"
Robin still caught the main point as she always did. Unlike Mei, who drifted off into strange places from time to time.
"Yeah. At the very least, we can confirm the data you got is correct. After this, we only need to pin down the Stellaron's rough location, and the prep work will be done."
Sylvia was glad things were going so well.
"This news came just in time."
Robin placed one hand over her chest and let out a somewhat dramatic sigh of relief right in front of Sylvia.
Sylvia smiled and asked, "Were you that nervous?"
"Of course. Going against the Family alone… I was so worried we'd fail. Or that this data would turn out to be fake, and we'd find nothing in the end."
Robin shot Sylvia a look. Of course she'd been nervous. Such a huge problem had happened before the Charmony Festival, and no one knew whether it could still go on.
Inside, there were traitors and the Family's dirty dealings. Outside, the IPC watched like a hawk.
Without Sylvia, and without the friends Sylvia had brought with her, Robin would've had no faith that she could make it this far on her own. Maybe after she'd been sent to Dreamflux Reef by accident, she'd have been stuck there, forced to wait for someone else to arrive.
"In any case, it's all thanks to you, Sylvia. Because you're here, I can move toward my goal one step at a time."
Robin held Sylvia's hand and thanked her in such a formal way that Sylvia felt awkward instead. She shifted the topic at once.
"R-Right, while I was gone, did anyone else come by?"
"Pfft."
Robin covered her mouth with one hand and laughed. Sylvia could face the Family without changing expression, yet she fled at times like this. Even so, Robin didn't forget to answer.
"No. Miss Acheron hasn't come back yet. Miss Sparkle did pass by, but she greeted me and vanished."
"Hah…"
Sylvia nodded. Black Swan had spent so long teaching her, so where had Mei gone?
She hadn't gotten lost, had she?
"…"
At that thought, Sylvia fell silent. Hard to say. In her memory, Mei did seem to have a poor sense of direction. But that was because of the Nihility, which left her memories unclear, wasn't it? Mei's mind was clear now, so she shouldn't have gotten lost.
Uh…
Maybe Sylvia should still go look for her.
She couldn't shake the feeling of unease. What if Mei really had gotten lost?
With that in mind, Sylvia turned to Robin and asked, "Come to think of it, Robin, how long has it been since you went back to reality?"
"Huh? Me? Let me think… It has been a while."
Robin didn't know why the topic had jumped there, but she blinked and thought back over what she'd been doing lately.
Before she'd formally broken with the Family, she'd often left the Dreamscape to eat and rest well in reality. But ever since she'd come to Dreamflux Reef to study the data, she hadn't left again.
When she counted it out, it really had been quite some time.
"Then why don't you take a short break today? The next part is basically my work. You can go back and let your brother know you're safe."
"That makes sense."
Robin nodded and didn't refuse Sylvia's kindness. Instead, she looked into Sylvia's eyes with some shyness and invited her.
"What about you, Sylvia? Do you… want to rest in reality with me?"
"I need to find Mei first, so she doesn't wander around outside for too long."
There was no need to worry about her strength, but since Sylvia had already met Black Swan, she still had to call Mei back.
At Sylvia's answer, Robin couldn't hide the disappointment on her face. Still, she gathered herself and smiled at Sylvia.
"That's true… Miss Acheron has been gone for so long. You should bring her back first."
Sylvia blinked, then raised a hand and pinched Robin's cheek.
"?"
"Everything you're thinking is written all over your face."
"…!!"
Robin's face flushed red in an instant. Heaven knew she truly hadn't meant to do it! She'd only been alone with Sylvia, let her guard down by accident, and shown her true feelings.
Really!
--+--
T/N: If you want advance chapters, you can find it at [email protected]/AspenTL