Polaris Garden

Chapter Sixteen: Reprise

Hera-Hes sat in her cheap, pastel blue pleather chair, watching as a book spun in place on Jora's palm. Her eyes were bright and wide with wonder, only matched by a goofily wide grin as the protogen demonstrated his echo to her. While she had lost some of her creations, she was still happy to welcome this one into the family.

"You're really more than just their bodies merged together," the unmar told Jora, who looked up from the twirling tome on his hand. "It appears their echoes combined, as well. Juno's echo, he called it Twisted Sister -- it let him spin and twist his own body freely. I remember finding out about it after looking into why he seemed totally immune to motion sickness..."

Jora's head tilted, and the book on his hand slowed to a halt as his ears perked in his creator's direction.

"So my ability, making things spin... Let me get this straight," His words rolled out slow and steady as he tried to figure out how the fusion worked, "Jora was giving himself to others, and Juno was twisting himself... Huh! I guess making things spin is kind of a middle ground, isn't it?"

Jora slowly nodded, staring at the book he was holding in awe as his mind processed what his creator was telling him. 

"While Jora's echo was potentially useful for the expedition," Hera-Hes continued, "Being able to heal researchers in case we ran out of supplies, keeping them in good condition, Juno's echo had nothing to do with why he came along. He was just very dedicated, and extremely sharp. My mother always told me to be careful of having any workers like that, but... Well, my sister and I knew better. You know, Ophiuchi's run by my sister, and it's been doing much better ever since she picked it up from mother's ashes -- and if it weren't for Juno's heart and mind, I doubt we would've ever even started our research at all. Goes to show how much mother really knew, after all."

Jora gave Hera-Hes an odd look, cocking a brow as he tried to understand how his component put them on the research path they undertook. While her lecture was full of words, Jora found that most of them meant practically nothing to him.

"I thought you were looking for a cure to The Cure. How did Juno being 'so bright' put you on that path?" He asked, "Unless he caught it, but... That doesn't really mean he was smart, or anything. It just means he got sick."

Hera-Hes shook her head, chuckling a little under her breath.

"No, no. You see, he found a rare protein in a fruit we discovered on a distant planet," She replied, "And he recognized it as being almost identical to one found in Eshekkan medicine. There were a few differences, but it was mostly because this one came from a plant..."

"A plant? Polaris wanted me to work in their gardens," Jora's eyes lit up as he leaned forward, eager to spill the metaphorical beans on the literal plant-based drama he had just been dragged into, "They wanted me to look into how different herbicides would affect a number of different fruit-bearing plants--"

"... Then that means they want to kill the Ascepis fruit," Hera-Hes interrupted, her gaze lowering as a sorrowful sigh escaped her lungs, "A dear friend of mine, Termarten, warned me Eshekka was doing something strange. She seemed scared out of her mind -- I wonder how she is, now. Their Governors have ears everywhere in their territories... I can only pray she still lives."

Jora paused, watching as his creator's breath slowed and the soothing sound of her voice faded into silence. Internally debating whether or not speaking was even an appropriate course of action, he lifted one hand and gently rested it on Hera-Hes' shoulder. The duo paused for a moment, making eye contact before Jora pulled her towards him and wrapped his arms around her in a full embrace. Hera-Hes' blinked in surprise before cradling her new protogen against her body with all four of her arms. They pressed closely to each other for a few seconds, a few heartbeats of otherwise utter silence while Hera-Hes' mind retreated from the dark depths of dreadful thoughts to find solace in the moment at hand.