☼ Almost Right ☼

1. Together in the Nighttime

Despite himself, Black Hole found his mind drifting again. He supposed that was a fairly rude thing to do, especially with Tree speaking right beside him. And with the way he was submerged in the ground halfway, he needed to be extra careful not to sink through the Earth's crust. He had a few theories on what would happen if he did, if he let himself forget. None of them were pleasant.

Still, Tree's ramblings had reminded him of something he hadn't thought about in a long time. That was the funny thing about living for billions and billions of years in almost complete isolation. Ideas come and go in an instant, disappearing into a void of nothingness like the items he would consume. But they never truly went away. He just needed someone else to recover them for him. To make them matter.

"So that's why bark is the greatest thing ever! Or something along those lines, anyway," Tree finished off, grinning to himself like an absolute nerd. Still laying down he turned his leaves away from the clouds to face his cosmic friend, "So...What do you think?"

"Huh?"

"About the relationship between non-sentient trees and trees like me? Did you ever have something like that up there?" He pointed his arm towards the melting sky above. Several stars were coming out of hiding within the deeper pinks and purples. In another time, Black Hole might have felt a sense of longing. Or regret. That night, though, he only cared about how dark it was getting—Tree would have to leave soon.

"Oh! Actually, I need a moment to remember. It's been...a while." Understatement of the millennium but Black Hole didn't feel like clarifying. Tree already knew he was ancient.

"Oh, OK then. Take your time." He smiled at him with unusual warmth, right hand fiddling with golden blades of grass. It all feels the same, Tree confessed to him when they first got away from all the noise and excess around the hotel. Despite the lava, the change of color, the cycle of the seasons...

Despite everything, it was still home.

Despite himself, Black Hole felt a pang of jealousy.

"Cool. Thanks."

"Make sure you don't SPACE out too much, yeah? Then I'll be lonely."

A few seconds of Tree staring expectantly.

Then the pair burst out laughing, the cheerful sound reaching no one except themselves amidst the seamless rows of forest trees. Alone together.

"Oh wow. I don't think I've ever heard you laugh before, Black Hole." It was very subdued compared to Bottle's—a chuckle more than anything else—but still remarkable coming from someone like him. "Was my pun really 'out of this world?'"

"Well now you're pushing it a little," Black Hole said, repressing the odd urge to laugh some more. There was that fuzziness again. The one he'd been feeling a lot more lately ever since they started hanging out between challenges.

"But yeah, I guess it was." Not unwelcome but certainly bizarre. "Y'know, I don't think I've ever heard you laugh either." Something new.

Maybe Tree felt the same way?

"Hmph. You're right." Tree furrowed his brow for a moment before speaking up again, a faraway look in his eyes. "Must be the magic of species-specific wordplay. It speaks to the soul in just the right way..."

He looked to the side, trailing off.

Then he gave a loud cough, almost startling Black Hole in its abrupt nature.

"Excuse me," he said while sitting himself up. If Black Hole didn't know any better, he'd say Tree looked embarrassed. He was making that face again but it didn't make a lot of sense in context. "I'm sorry but what were you going to say again?"

"What?"

"Any funny experiences with other black holes? Sentient or otherwise?"

"Oh—right—uh. Let me think."

...

It all seemed so distant in his mind. Alien. Like a memory of a memory, amorphous images flitting across his headspace with no feelings attached to them. Which was good when he had to get things done. When he had to be useful. But now, all he needed to do was remember.

...

There must've been something, right? He was thinking about it just a minute ago.

...

Nope. Nothing.

Black Hole wondered if his disappointment was more from his lack of memory or the idea of letting Tree down. In either case, maybe it was all for the best? Considering the—

Yeah. That was probably it.

While gearing himself up to speak, Black Hole was overcome by a different kind of fuzziness. No, he didn't have eyes, not in the traditional sense at least. But he could still choose to 'close' them without anyone else knowing (not that he had any reason to hide that fact). It made it easier to process things from time to time, to figure out his words. This time, though, it didn't feel like much of a choice.

It should have been alarming—the corners of his vision darkening, Tree's worried voice fading away, his thoughts becoming more fleeting and abstract. But in the end, overwhelming calm was the only thing he knew. Or maybe it was a different emotion in the same family as 'calm,' something with a much stronger hold. Heavier.

It didn't really matter.

That was the funny thing about being what he was. About being a black hole. Sometimes, it's easier to just let things go.