The Ascension

25: Aster ascends

 Aster woke, and she was well.

It was a strange feeling. She hadn't lost any of her senses, and she hadn't seemed to have gained any either. She didn't feel any different, just grateful the process was over. She rolled off the table and stood up, awakening a glum looking Artemis.

"Hello." She said.

"You okay?" He asked

"I think so. What's supposed to be different?"

"I don't know." He said sadly.

"What should I do now?"

"Well, you're about a god. I should think you can do whatever you'd like."

"But I don't know how to do anything!" Aster said, upset at the notion. "I need someone to... teach me these things. Ease me into it."

Artemis raised his eyebrows, let them fell, and remained in silence the entire time.

"Fine then." Aster said. "I'll go about looking like and idiot and see if I can't stumble onto something on my own."

"I'd help you, kid, but I truly don't know how. I don't have much in power besides immortality, eternal youth, and heightened strength. I'm a bit run of the mill- you have the full package from Ioro."

"Well, could you try guessing how they did it?"

"Effortlessly?"

"Hm!" Aster said. She decided it was probably something in the mind, recalling her previous brushes with extrasensory abilities. She thought hard about a lot of things. Could she light the floor on fire? Evidently not. Could she turn into a bird? Evidently, no. Teleportation? Not a possibility.

"Do you want me to ask someone? Eii would know."

"No, I don't need her." Aster said. "Though I'd really like to check in with-"

She stopped mid sentence because, mid sentence, she was there. At a whim of a thought, at the idea that it'd be nice to figure out how to teleport, she had done it. She was standing in the barn between her two friends.

"Neat." Senya said, pointing to her. "How far can you go with that?"

"I'm scared to find out." Aster said, now afraid the slightest misthought could whisk her away to somewhere else, or perhaps cause some horrible happening. "I haven't got the hang of this yet."

"Can you grab us some food?" Senya said.

"She has to hurry and fix the weather." Wren said insistently. "We'll survive another hour."

"In theory, so will the planet." Senya said.

"Yes, but no." Wren faced Aster, holding her hands in front of him. "You've got this fine. Ikina must have ensured it."

"Ikina..." Aster began to say, but she had no idea what she was going to end it with. "This ought to be short. I hope." She said.

She took herself away, first, to a small grassy field on the outskirts of one of the cities- an area she had passed and thought nothing of. But she didn't want to try anything with the boys watching, afraid of error, so she figured this field would be a fine practice ground.

Of course, really nothing could go wrong, her being a god and all. Any errors would be divine ones, surely able to be interpreted as intentional. Still, she did not want to folly about.

She did her best to think, lightly, like anything odd had always been part of her, a muscle as automated a her heart and lungs. She breathed in, and she jumped-