Episode 125 - Recollections

## Recollections

A black background with a white border, the bottom of which resembles what might be chaotic ocean, which then rises and dissipates in the vertical border until it is a collection on white dots on the top. Within the border a jawless human skull is depicted in white with twin lights in its eyes blazing in red. Below this image but still within the border the words "125.RECOLLECTIONS" are written in white

### Author

William A. Wellman

Big Mikey tries to remember, Cindy takes shelter, and Mort misses his family. The theme of tonight's episode is Recollections.

> ***Content warnings**: Animal death (Bert the Seagull), Suicidal thoughts, Death + Injury, Birds, Cremation, Emotional Manipulation, Drowning, Explosives, Body horror*
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## Intro - All The Pieces

Nikignik speaks to the Dreamers of a creation of Irene Mend as they tried to find themself, understanding that they were not completed. They might start to think that had comprehensibly identified and recovered all that they were, only to find another, a reminder that they were a grotesque project half-finished. They realise that this was something that everyone did, that they were not an unfinished puzzle, or a painting left half done, but an art piece, changing all the time, always a resplendent reflection of the same soul.

Nikignik stands in front of an unlit bonfire in the Find a Friend Animal shelter.

## Story 1 - Big Dogs

Big Mikey talks to Polly and Yaretzi (see Episode 123 - Evolutions) about Mort (see Episode 110 - Walks), Polly growing frustrated at him for him inability to remember how events transpired. Yaretzi tells Polly that Mort wasn't at the Animal shelter, and Mikey recounts to them Riot Maidstone telling him that he could walk with the group (see Episode 107 - Absences), Polly asks what else they'd told him, where they'd been going, who else was with them. He tells Polly that they'd walked on a road and then into a forest, listing for him that members of the expedition (see Episode 106 - Departures). Yaretzi states that if they could find the road it'd be easier to track him, asking Polly how much time The Count had said they had, and he tells her that he'd made it sound urgent. She comments that it would be nice of Polly still had his manual (see Episode 76 - Lungs), and Mikey tells the that he liked books, asking if they were Mort's family.

The two go quiet before Polly speaks up and tells him that they were certainty his friends. Mikey tells them that he was his friend as well, which Yaretzi uses to ask if Mikey knew anything else, as Mort was at risk of getting hurt. Mikey tells them that Mort was worried he'd get in trouble (see Episode 107 - Absences), that he'd only wanted to help. Polly tells him that they weren't going to punish him for running off (see Episode 103 - Crossroads), only wanted to make she he came home. Mikey tells them that Mort and the others were going to go to the ocean to blow up the Heart of Marolmar. Polly starts stating death threats on the party who were not Mort. Yaretzi thanks Mikey, and Polly vorpals them away. Mikey goes back to reading.

### Interlude 1 - Whispers in the Wood

Nikignik tells the Dreamers to be careful what they did in the woods, when they thought no one could see them. It was a vengeful forest, its was memory long and time had taught it patience but not forgiveness. And then there were the trees that watch, and they knew not only their footsteps but their faces, listened for the wind to carry them their name. They pieced together their stories, just as he did, but they held no sympathy for their ending. It was rare to find a watching tree, often only seen when they wished to be. He tells them to be wary in those moments, for the Watching trees would kill them.

## Story 2 - Two on the Beach

Cindy Lockheart finds walks across the tundra with Mort, making sure that he carried the remaining explosive (see Episode 120 - Wilds) when the blizzard summoned in Episode 134 - Educations hits. She tells him that they needed to make camo as she had zero visibility, but he asks her what about the others. She tells him that they could find them when the Blizzard let up, partially lying as she understood that doing so would be detrimental to the mission.

She instructs Mort to sit down and begins to use him to make a shelter via draping a tarp over him and allowing the snow to pack down and protect her from the wind. She removes a portability stove from one of the equipment crates, but Mort tells her that he hated fire. She tells him that it was only a small one and if she didn't light it, she'd die. He says he could look the other way, letting his skull float down into his suit, but he asks her to do it fast. She lights it, thankful for the relief and luxury of warmth, and tells Mort that she had good news and bad news. The bad news was that the other expedition members were going to be hard to find until the storm let up, so they might have to continue on their own. The good news was that whatever the thing beneath the ice was (see Creep) it was gone.

### Marketing - The Moth

Lady Ethel Mallory interrupts Nikignik's broadcast with her 'marketing' segment. She tells the Dreamers that she was sitting in a small log cabin overlooking a frozen lake, that she was getting close to the Canadian border, only Minnesota left to cross (see Episode 106 - Departures). She relates to the Dreamers what her childhood was in the New Mexican RV park. The first lake she'd even seen was a reservoir at a place called Truth or Consequences, and she'd decide that she was going to get out and make something of herself, and one day own a lake she could visit whenever she wanted. Now she didn't own anything (see Episode 94 - Milestones), but she had bought Truth or Consequences, it had been in her contract with the Botulus Corporation.

### Story 2, Continued - Two on the Beach

Cindy sits drinking tea while trying to get her geolocator to work, concluding that it was malfunctioning due to the storm. She digs through the supplies and finds and old-fashioned compass instead, reading that it was pointing North, telling Mort of this, saying that they'd regroup with the others in time at the North Pole. Mort agrees with this, though noticeably lacking in his characteristic joy, so Cindy asks if he was alright. He tells her that he wasn't, that he felt bad. He vents to her about Ber being dead (see Episode 115 - Fishes), and him being far away from Polly and Yaretzi not knowing if he would see them again, but if he wasn't here Cindy would be dead.

He tells her that both things were bad, no matter what he did someone got hurt and someone died, and he was starting to worry that it might be him. She reminds him that he'd already died once, telling him that Bartholomew 'Barty' Chum had been her friend, and explain to him how admirable he had been, someone who was always willing to do what it took to get the job done, and it'd cost him everything. She tells him that she hoped he got to walk away from the mission, because she knew with certainty that she was not. Cindy explains to Mort that there was nothing left for her after Rizwana Mirza died, that she was going to complete the mission she died trying and then join her. But she'd try and get Mort to carry out the mission in peace. Mort tells her that she should get some sleep, and she tells him that she needed to stay guard but lays her head back and is asleep a few moments later.

### Interlude 2 - Unremembered Gods

Nikignik tells the Dreamers that there were dead gods. Eternal was not immortal, some were gone long before he'd emerged into the universe, and if he was lucky, he'd see what they'd left behind. Great stone monoliths tumbled through empty expanses, bearing the name of Thonsorthon, Who Kept The Flame, and Nikignik wonders what he may have been like. There were roots that pierce the flesh of long-dead worlds of iron that once belonged to Irikir, Who Grew In Darkness, proceeding to similarly skepticizes about her. He mentions Urnundurn, saying that whether it was alive in the same way as he was he could not tell. These names he knew, but there are others he did not. There were corpses of indescribable beings that feed The Burning Heart of Caravus-Kallaz, the crematorium of their kind, that no one could name. Gods with teeth and horns and lights lost to obscurity forever.

That he could not let happen to Marolmar, as there were dead gods, and there were gods that die unremembered, which Marolmar would never be. Nikignik tells the Dreamers that he did not know how many guardians of light that Tolshotol has devoured to claim a thousand suns. How many shapers of life that Syrensyr, had fed to the forge. What they had done to Marolmar could just as easily have been a hundred before. And that filled him not with fear but with violence. Marolmar was no evil, he had only thrown off the chains they had designed. He tells the Dreamers he had perhaps been too young to see it. But Marolmar had remembered when life was still forming for the first beautiful unformed time. He comments that he'd talked too long and gotten lost in his thoughts, but Marolmar's memory would not be buried or burned away or left to drift in the far margins of existence. There would be chapters written to him, there had been many chapters written to him, and Nikignik had written them. Trillions of dreamers across the universe listened to them even now. And dreams became memories, indistinct, but still remembered.