You Always Said No

See Author's Notes in footer for more information/context.

---

"Here, it should be fully charged."

Masego handed the autopicker to Zuri, who held it with slightly trembling fingers, awash in nervous anticipation. His niece had been asking to be go into the fields for several days now, and her mom Aziza had finally relented when Masego had offered to accompany her. Face to face with the giant plants with their bulbous cotton bolls, Masego could sense her rising fear in every slight twitch of her body, even as she put on a brave face and said nothing. To her credit, she managed to get her small fist around the grip quite easily, and a claw on the trigger, and Masego smiled.

"Now hold it up in the air and press the trigger."

The girl did as asked, raising her arm up into the sky. The Sumirite gems along the handle shone brightly, and multiple arms shot out of the barrel. Each had a three pronged claw grip at the very end, and the arms moved in a prehensile manner, winding back down from on high and going for all the cotton bolls around them. Each peeled apart a different cotton boll and plucked out a clump of cotton, as much as it could carry, and then deposit it in the baskets Masego had carried over. It would then go back out and grab another clump of cotton, and the process would repeat. The girl was looking around at awe, her snout vibrating with excitement and her antennae wagging left to right, as all the prehensile arms danced extremely fast around her, picking the bolls around them clean. Masego half expected her to open her wings and fly off in excitement, but they got sharply interrupted when the autopicker beeped repeatedly in alarm and all the prehensile arms receded back into the device. Zuri dropped the device where it fell with a thud into the soil, and she did open her wings but only to wrap them around her front instead, hiding her face.

"Wh-Whaaaa... what happened, Uncle?"

"It's alright, Zuri. The autopicker must have encountered something strange in the cotton bolls."

"En...Encoun... Encounter?"

"Er... I mean found. They found or met something new they didn't know how to handle. It's this plant, let's take a closer look."

He had noticed which one of the arms had gone still and jerked back slowly compared to all of the others, before receding back into the autopicker. The boll was still mostly intact, with only the outer shell having been peeled back, revealing the cotton within. In there, he found a hole already dug, and the backside of what looked like a weevil larvae. It seemed to shift a little side to side as it dug in deeper, as the larva ate through more of the cotton.

"Ah, it's just one of the babies."

"Babies? You mean there's a little one of us in there?"

"Yeah. Look, it's feeding its way into the core, where it will probably pupate later on."

Zuri opened her wings and stepped closer cautiously, and Masego had to lift her up into his shoulders before she could take a look. She gasped in surprise at the sight. "It looks so different from us. I thought it would look like a smaller me."

"Haha. I said the same thing when I saw one the first time too. Nearly 40 years ago now."

"Wow." Her face frowned in fear. "Did I hurt it? Is it going to be ok?"

"Of course. The autopicker is progra... told not to touch bolls where larvae are nesting. That's why it started shouting and beeping like that, and turned off. It will be fine if we just leave it as it is here."

"Still, we shouldn't have used the device here to begin with." The girl looked at him with a disappointed frown. "Why did you bring us here, Uncle?"

"Sorry, sorry, uncle should have been paying more attention. Usually these plants are tagged by the mother who laid the eggs, but looks like someone forgot."

Zuri squinted at him before dropping down from his shoulder and picking up the device again. Not turning to him, she said, "Blaming someone else. You should be careful, whenever I try that with Mom she scolds me for it instead." She then looked back at him and smirked, before running off along the path they came. Masego rolled his eyes, adjusted his glasses and picked up the baskets, which were heavy and full now, as he followed his niece. His thoughts swam in the past when he had walked into these fields with his own mother. They had picked the cotton by hand, and filling up a basket could take an hour. In the memory, he remembered running back empty handed, his mother following him carrying the baskets too. So much had changed, and yet so much had still remained the same.

---

"Is this really the faster way? I thought the Tube was fastest."

"It was about 20 or 30 years ago. With these flying ships now, it makes no sense to go all the way south first when you are trying to go north."

Zuri grumbled, but did not say anything. Masego knew she already knew, she just really wanted to see the Tubes and the center of the planet. The Tubes went only southwards topside, being restricted to going downstream forever. The direction only reversed underground all the way at Drain, the south pole of the planet, where the waters converged into a large thunderous river that drilled through the planet and came out on the opposite side at Fountain, where the Citadel College was at, the premier institution for magic and technology in Moontides. Zuri had manifested magic a few years ago, the third amongst her siblings to do so, and Masego had been adamant at sending her off to College as soon as she was of age. He now stood with her and his sister Aziza, her mom, at the pier of Fogbank, where the river banks also served as the landing and take off zones for the new planes of the Grey beasts.

The craft arrived just as the sun set, and the whole riverbank filled with fog as part of its grand entrance. The Tubes had taken most of their market, but it had never taken the fog, and these new planes were slowly clawing back their share of passengers. The craft looked a large bird, perhaps an eagle, but mostly made of wood with the feathers on the wings being an exception, and ten times as large. Inside, Masego knew he would find Sumirite crystals programming the wings and other flying mechanisms of this, with perhaps a mage or two acting as the brain or pilot. It lay horizontally on the riverbank and doors opened on its sides, with wooden steps flying out of those doors and the crew poking their heads out. Each of the lenses in Masego's compound eyes went wide in shock at the aged but familiar visage that greeted him then.

"Mr. Deer?!"

"Wait, is that the same guy?" Aziza asked.

"You both know him?" Zuri piped up.

It was bearded, and it had some new wrinkles. But Masego that was the same snout and eyes that had picked up him so long ago on the Grey caravan, on his own journey to the College. The Grey were not known to accept new drivers, or well pilots now, often, and it seemed this Deer in question was still in business. The Grey also only had one member of any species at a time, hence the name. At their voices, the old deer turned its head and settled its gaze on Masego directly, and those grey eyes filled with a glimmer of recognition.

"Ah, it's you. You are going back to College?"

The spell of shock shattered at the idea, and Masego found his voice again. "Uh...uh no. Not me. My niece, Zuri, here, is the one going." He gestured to the weevil in question, who stepped forward with her bags and opened her wings wide to fly up into the ship. Before she could go further, her mother coughed "Ahem" and she dropped the bags, startled. Both the Deer and Masego smirked as Zuri turned around and hugged her mother tight, knowing they won't be seeing each other again for a while. Masego realized that the Deer was looking at him with its smirk, and his own memories came flooding back, more than three decades ago, when he himself stood on the pier and said goodbye to his own mother. The Deer had come in a caravan then, taking in both passengers and goods to trade with settlements further up north, and his mother had bought him a seat. The caravans were slower than the Tubes, even with traversing a shorter distance, but his mother had deemed Masego not ready for the underworld. With everything that had happened since then, he could only agree.

Zuri and Aziza let go of each other, and Zuri wiped the tears from her mother's eyes as she spoke. "I'll be back before you know it, and I'll be a mage as good as... no better than Uncle here." All three of them laughed. Satisfied with her mother's upturned spirits, Zuri let go and turned to face Masego, who held three of his forearms wide, the other holding on to the cane. She jumped into them and enveloped him with all four of her top limbs, and he almost dropped the cane on the impact.

"Thank you, uncle. Thank you for everything." Her face rested on his shoulder, and he could not see it, but he could feel the slight trembles in her arms and the sniff in her voice. The girl had spent a lot of time with him, especially after her first manifestation of innate magic, without any Sumirite around. She had stuck to him like glue ever since, asking him to teach how to do with her own power what all the devices and machines around her could only do with Sumirite, and Masego had had a hard time figuring out how to teach her just enough to keep her satisfied while also not hurt herself later on. They were sending her away now, where she could learn a lot more and a lot faster from many more teachers, than relying only on his own tutelage and book collection. But he would miss her too, and he felt tears come to his own eyes, which he immediately wiped away with his own snout before Zuri could notice. It did not escape Aziza's eyes however, who smiled at the sight. She walked to their side and put a hand on Masego's back, helping him stabilize, and he nodded to her gratefully.

It felt like a minute before Zuri calmed down enough to feel comfortable letting go, with her face showing no sign of the tears she had stifled or wiped off. The girl smiled at her family, and then picked up the bags and unfolded her wings. She flew into the large eagle craft, the deer stepping to the side to let her in. She stopped at the top of the steps, where the door had opened, and put down the bags before turning around. Zuri raised both of her forearms and waved at them. Both mother and uncle responded with one arm raised and waved back, before Zuri picked up the bags again and disappeared into the cabin. The Deer turned to Masego and nodded one final time before closing the door behind it. However, the ship stayed still, as the loading and unloading of cargo was still ongoing on the other side. While the two older weevils waited to see the ship fly off, Aziza turned to Masego and said, "She's going to miss you more than me, I'm kind of jealous."

"Nonsense, you're her mother."

"You are her uncle and teacher. She spends more time with you than anyone else, even all her siblings. And she's just like you in almost every way."

Masego said nothing, merely smiling in response. They both watched the ship as it finished loading and unloading, and then flight preparations went underway. Once complete, the giant eagle soared it large mechanical wings and flew off, taking his niece on the same journey he had gone on so many years ago.

---

"Now you just wait here while I bring you the tea."

Masego grumbled, but said nothing else. Zuri had rolled him into the balcony of his home, and he waited while she went back inside. The girl was back on a vacation before her last remaining year at the College, which in the ensuing research limbo could stretch into multiple years like it had for him. She was getting her last trip back home in who knew how long, and despite Masego's protests and suggestions to go out to the town and call on the rest of the villagers, she seemed determined to stay by her sickly uncle's side. He was still perfectly capable of brewing his own tea, as long as he used his mind rather than his hands for it, but the girl would hear none of it. True to her word, the sounds of cupboards opening and kettle hissing with boiling water came from inside, and before long Zuri came out bearing a tray of two cups and some biscuits.

"Here you go, uncle. Mom told me hibiscus is your favorite, and I opened this pack of biscuits I found in the cupboards." She put down the tray on the tea table Aziza had gifted him a year earlier, and then handed him a cup and saucer before he could think of leaning forward and grabbing it himself.

"Thanks, Zuri." He nodded and took it, and started sipping it immediately, while Zuri sat down in the other chair and looked up to the sky. The night was clear, no sign of the monthly fog that heralded the arrival of the Grey, and the stars were clearly visible in the sky. The chitterings and calls of most of the nocturnal inhabitants filled up the town, replacing the din of the daylight hours when most of the mammals and birds usually joined in. Living here now in this quiet town, these were his favorite hours to stay up and gaze up the sky.

"Do you have any idea what you will work on?" he asked.

"I don't know yet. Professor Aslam says I can take as much time as I want, and I can just help him with his own research while I figure it out. He also says hello, apparently you two studied together?"

Masego chuckled as the memories of the bat hanging from the ceiling while going over his notes resurfaced in his mind. "Yeah, we went through college together, and taught at the university for a very long while. I can't believe he's still there. Give him my regards when you go back." He took another sip. "And yeah, he's right. I was the same, it took me nearly three... was it four?... years before I found something I cared about enough to pursue on my own without the Professor's direction."

Zuri jumped at the chance to ask. "Your work... you don't often talk about it. I mean, it's well known and even taught in history, with how it changed our world's relationship with Sumirite all over again. But you never said anything about what happened to her."

Masego grimaced at having opened this can of worms. Memories came more slowly now, but the tint of blue that colored the world whenever he thought of her came and went as fast as it always did, even before he remembered her face. "It has been so long. She left this world, to find more like her out there, maybe do for them what we did for her."

"Did you ever see her again? Will we?"

"I hope to." He smiled before resuming sipping his tea, and Zuri went quiet. They had had this conversation twice before, and it had gone exactly the same way. He always said that, there simply was no question of something otherwise happening. Before Zuri could potentially pursue it further, he spoke again. "The night is young, you should go out and see the rest of the town."

"But I want to be here." And for a second Masego saw a vision of the petulant five year old from twenty years ago.

"I will be fine. Your mother comes by every night to check in on me, and you can come back with her. I will be here throughout your vacation. Now shoo. Off you go."

Zuri threw up her hands in mock exasperation, smiling through it. She took her cup with her, now empty, leaving the plate of biscuits behind. However, she came back once more before leaving the house, wrapping Masego in a surprise hug from behind. He could only put one hand on her left hand as she hugged him tightly, and then she left. Taking another sip of the hot tea, he dropped the cup when he heard the voice.

"How have you been?"

The cup seemed to fall slowly, about to spill the tea all over himself and the balcony. But before it could get any lower, it just stopped moving. Masego noticed all the tea still remained perfectly inside the brim of the cup, none of it out in the air. The cup gently floated up and moved to settle on the tray it had been brought in. He finally turned to look behind him and see who had walked into his home uninvited. His face lit up in a childlike smile as his memories flooded back, memories from nearly three decades ago. She had grown taller, but it was still her. The same face, and the same crystals of purple glowing Sumirite making up her physical form.

"You have grown so much."

"You too." She smirked before continuing. "I thought to come by, we are kind of just taking a break now, while the ship slowly travels through the galaxy."

"Sit down, sit down, and tell me everything. We were just talking about-." A violent coughing fit surged through his body as Masego tried to gesture at the other chair in the balcony. He fell down into his chair and Layla reached out to put a hand on his shoulder.

"It's gotten worse." Her voice had shifted completely, all the joy in it gone, replaced with somber seriousness. "You don't have much time." She looked at him, leaving the rest unsaid.

"You didn't ask," Masego said.

"You made it clear the last time. You would say no anyway."

"Well, here's something I won't say no to." He chuckled. "I want to hear about everything you have been up to." He gestured to the chair again, successfully managing it this time without interruptions from his betraying body.

"OK"

As Layla talked, Masego listened. She told him of voyages through the stars, exploring the galaxy, meeting many different civilizations, searching for other Luminaries and their godly rulers. Others like her in godhood, but not in principles. What she would do when coming across them, she would never know beforehand, figuring it out as she went along, with only the goal of rooting out other tyrants like her Mother. As she spoke, Masego sipped his tea and put it down, and listened with his eyes closed. He did not react much to Layla's stories, but he listened anyway, and he smiled wider and wider at hearing the girl talk about her new adventures. He did not notice it when it happened, he just unconsciously went for the pen.

"-and Allia's doing much better now too. She's spending more time out of her quarters, talking with me, with the others, not just helping with the fights, and using her hiding in her own time frame less and less. I remember when I used to do that so much. I would love to tell her more about how things are going on down here, have you heard anything from Sayyid?" Layla had kept on talking, for once she had started she could not find a way to stop. Masego's silence had felt like when Ada from so very long ago and how the Seraph had listened to her go on and on and on about everything she had learned every night back at Haven. She turned down from the sky to look at the weevil, and found that he had stopped breathing. Playing back her memories, she realized it had soon after she had started, but not before Masego had smiled, leaving a permanent expression on his face. Before she could stop, the tears came out, small crystals forming out of her eyes like stalagmites, before breaking off into teardrop shaped crystals and falling down below into her lap, where they would absorb back into her body again.

"I thought I would have more time, you know. Ha, I remember when you said the same about your mother, the first night I met her." She wiped her eyes and the stalagmites stopped forming. "I thought I would be able to come back once more and tell you about my adventures. But I guess this is the last time."

She stood up and reached for the blanket covering his lower legs, aiming to raise it up to cover him wholly, and then leave quietly. But she stopped immediately when she noticed the letter in his hands, something else she had not noticed till now. Even now, words were appearing on the page in front of her, written by a pen with a dimly glowing Sumirite crystal in the handle. As the page filled out, the glow died and the pen fell into his lap, expiring like its owner. She picked up the letter.

Layla,

Thanks for coming. I fear I don't have the strength to continue, and I might not be able to finish listening to your story. I'm sorry for that, and for going out on you like this, but I'm really just glad you came, and you are okay. I know you are thinking of just leaving right away, perhaps never even coming back here since I'm gone. You were always a fleeting one, like a dandelion spore you notice right before all its seeds explode out in all directions. But please, stay for a while. My people will carry my memories with me forever, so you can still see me in a way. Go see my niece Zuri, she's a mage like I was and she'll be very happy to see you after everything I have told her about you, after everything you have done for this world. Tell her her family loves her, and tell her of my passing, and tell her I wish I could see her achieve her greatest dreams in person, my only regret.

Layla had been read like a book, and the stalagmite tears came out again, changing from spikes into teardrop shaped crystals before they fell off her face. This time they fell on the paper before dropping past it onto the floor below. She wiped her eyes again to make them stop, but they just did not. "I asked you so many times, Masego. You always said no. You gave me this second life, this second body, this second chance, and I wanted to do the same for you, but you always looked to the future. And you always found yourself, even though I could not." She chuckled. "It's funny, I'm supposed to be the immortal one, but you were the one who actually believed in a future. I.. I swear I will keep trying." With determination, she folded up the letter and disincarnated it, the words and memory of it etched deep into the crystal networks of her brain. She then unfurled her birdlike wings with crystalline feathers and rose up into the air. Replaying her memories again to trace out the path the younger weevil had taken when leaving the house, she swooped down to follow it, ready to meet the future that Masego had always talked about.