My Ghost is a Dork

"A Long Time Ago, in a Galaxy Far, Far Away."

"A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away," began Sothis theatrically, "was me. I don't know why or how, but for some reason, I decided to come to this planet."

Byleth blinked. "I don't know some of those words."

"Ah, right. To phrase it another way, I came to this land from beyond the stars."

Did that mean Sothis was from the heavens? "You're an angel? I thought you were a demon."

"Uh, well, if we want to get into the specifics of what I am, most people call me a goddess."

Byleth stared incredulously at Sothis and looked her up and down. Obviously, the girl was supernatural in some capacity, but a goddess? There was no way someone of her stature could be that powerful, right?

"But it would be more accurate to say I'm an alien."

Byleth tried to remember what the word 'alien' meant and remembered that alien is another way of saying the word 'foreign.' "You're from a different country, then?"

Sothis shook her head. "I'm from a distant star."

"Oh." Byleth considered that for a moment. "So, you're not a demon?"

Sothis smiled. "No Byleth, I'm not a demon." She shook their joined hands. "And neither are you."

Byleth frowned. "But I'm called the Ashen Demon." Surely there had to be a reason why she was different from everyone else, why she had been given her moniker, and why all the other mercs acted so unsettled around her. If neither she nor Sothis was demonic, why would Byleth be called such a thing? It did not make any sense.

Sothis frowned toward the empty void beyond. "It's possible to have traits that can be perceived as demonic without being a demon," she said emphatically and turned back to Byleth. "I wouldn't be surprised if you were autistic actually."

Byleth did not know what the word 'autistic' meant, but she pondered over the rest of Sothis' statement. It seemed unlikely that so many people, mercenary or otherwise, would make the same mistake when calling her a demon. Was this another case of people being non-truthful for the purpose of exaggeration or sarcasm? Byleth hated when that happened, she always had a hard time figuring out when someone was doing that. Still, Sothis seemed convinced that there was nothing demonic about either of them. Despite the weird floating alien girl saying confusing things a lot of the time, she seemed to know what she was talking about. "Okay," Byleth said. "What does autistic mean?"

Sothis perked up at that. "People who are autistic or have Autism have brains that are wired differently than what is typical. Among some of the symptoms of Autism that I've seen you display include a lack of emotive expression, hyper-fixation on certain subjects, your robotic manner of speech, difficulty understanding social situations, and difficulty relating with peers. There's likely more since that's all just off the top of my head, but yeah. I don't think you're inhuman or anything, just differently human." Her expression became somewhat contrite. "Though that's just my opinion, I might just be projecting my own Autism and I could be completely wrong."

As Sothis babbled on about brains, symptoms, and whatever this 'autoism' thing was, Byleth's frow burrowed. A lot of the traits that Sothis listed were true. She was not expressive, had a strong dedication to her job, and had difficulty with social situations. All of those things had something in common, however, so she asked Sothis "what about my heart?" All of those symptoms could be because her heart does not beat.

Sothis opened her mouth, closed it, and said, "I'm afraid I don't understand the question."

Byleth figured that since the heart is responsible for one's emotions, the lack of her own heart beating would be why she did not feel as much. "Is my heart why I'm different?"