It was a bright sunshiney morning in Alefpria. Dabbles was all asleep in his hammock, curled up in a pile of cloaks and cowls in colours that were subdued, but not unfriendly. "Coo-oor-oor-roo," said Himpledonk, the pigeon, from her perch. "Coor-roo-oo-oo!"

"Oh, please, kind Sir, I am very Busy," mumbled a voice from under the mound of fabric. But Himpledonk was used to Dabbles's shenanigans, and very persistent. "Coo-oo-oor," she repeated sternly. "Coo-roo-oor-oor-oo."

"Oh, alright then, my dear," said the voice, rather clearer this time. The cloak pile bulged and stretched for a moment, then rocked its hammock and leapt to the ground. Dabbles was ready to start his day. "Come here, my dear. We shall break our fast together."

Two thin, stumpy appendages emerged from folds in the heavy clothing. These were Dabbles's arms, and though they had no fingers and very little thumb under their wrappings, he dextrously picked up a clean cloth and pressed it to a bulbous node in the organometallic architecture of his room, which secreted warm, detergent-laden water smelling faintly of rosemary and naphthalene. This he buried in his folded coverings several times, thus giving himself a pleasant wash, a few glistening reddish-black scales detaching with each swipe.

Having ensured that her companion was well prepared for the morning, Himpledonk fluttered onto the flesh-shaper's shoulder, snuggly cuddled up next to the oversized bulge under his hoods and scarves. Together they departed Dabbles's room through the tricuspid valve that served as a door and flapped shut damply behind them on its tendons.

"My, my, Himpledonk," exclaimed Dabbles. "What a fine day it is today!"

All around, the Sweethearts were pumping and pulsing their way over the thrumming heart of the Fathership. They whistled and hooted through their aortic vents, running frayed venal tentacles over the surface of the far larger arteries of the Father, and interfaced with Him with their complex mandibular arrays. All around, colourful clouds of aerial plankton flickered and undulated, and the humid air sang with low, fleshy thumps.

"Come, my dear! We must surely go and greet your brothers and sisters, and many other friends of ours too. I feel as though today will be a most exciting day!"

First, Dabbles went to go inspect the progress on Lifprasil's knights. This was an important job! He didn't want to let it wait any longer than breakfast.

There were over a hundred pods and more than a thousand Sweethearts tended them. Many were empty, and none were the same, for a Cosmic Knight is a strange thing indeed and is designed largely by its own soul. The exaltation process is ultimately as organic as its materials, no matter how many times one must go under the knife for it; No architect ordered the Sweethearts, and yet they were more than adequately instructed. The manufactory simply enabled the citizens of Alefpria to accept the consequences of their choice. There were no second thoughts. The 'synth had rejected those who held them.

"Hello, Knights!" said Dabbles.

A few hundred eyes opened in their gelatinous swill of fluid and looked towards the pile of cloaks, and a chorus of gargling, breathing and gulping sounds rang from the mortals suspended from the roof in various states of disassembly and 'synth injection. Himpledonk cooed back at them politely.

"Bghlrghlrghlrghlp, blblblblblghraaargk," said a knight whose face was being pulled off, her vocal chords visibly churning in a dripping mass of froth.

"Why, thank you! And you too, my dear. I love what you've done with that spinal column. Very jagged. You'll have spikes like a scorpionfish by the end of the week." Dabbles rested a spindly hand on a cartilaginous lever-joint as he chatted, and yanked it back down when he was done. It clicked wetly into its socket and the knight-to-be was lowered abruptly back into her pod, the last tendons attaching her jawbone to her head breaking with a snap.

"Ollenea?" asked Dabbles into the massive workspace, and a Sweetheart obediently bobbed towards him. "See that numbers eight, fourteen and seventy-seven don't overheat while their shells are growing in. Get Jonniggle, Lemmonskwat and Sulivan to help. Also make sure number thirty-one doesn't dry out. Poor lad still hasn't regrown his intestines."

The little technician whistled and darted off. Dabbles and Himpledonk inspected each knight individually over the course of an hour or two, making sure the grafts had taken and the biomechanisms were still working. No fresh recruit was scheduled that day, and as such Dabbles was otherwise free until the evening inspection.

"Goodbye, Knights!" said Dabbles.

One of the pods bubbled as an initiate's lungs collapsed and filled with fluid.

Next it was time for Dabbles to go talk to his friends in the aviary.

Himpledonk shuffled excitedly as they walked along to the far end of the great creature's belly. The hem of Dabbles's coverings rippled oddly as the portly Sculptor glided over the floor. "Do be patient, my dear, only a little longer," he instructed kindly, and in short order they reached a valve that Dabbles had marked with a small wooden sign, a bird on it inscribed.

"Hello, friends!" said Dabbles.

"COO-ROO-OO-ROO!" said four hundred and fifty-nine pigeons.

"Why, what an excitable lot you are today!"

Dabbles trundled along to one of several large canvas sacks set against the wall. The aviary was an adapted airlock, or perhaps a small hangar; Whatever its origins, with the help of some Sweethearts it had soon become a place of warmth, comfort, perches, seed, and guano. "Hello, Lillidop," said Dabbles to the technician currently occupied with sweeping the last of the night's birdshit into a pot to be sent to Alefpria's farmers and botanists. "Hello, Runko, hello, Jonglebongle," said Dabbles to the two pigeons seated on its head. The trio hooted and cooed at him respectively, and went back to their own conversation, which Dabbles refrained from interrupting.

This, too, was an important job, and Dabbles carefully refilled each basin of seed or water, inspected the wounds of those rowdy males who had pecked one another over a mate ("Shame on you, Pirrippadoo! You should know better than this!"), and checked each nesting-box for new eggs. There were seven eggs in four different clutches, and Dabbles congratulated the parents proudly.

In the end, though, it was time to leave. Dabbles had many friends here, but he also had friends outside, and in all the fuss around the Cosmic Knights, he had not seen them in several days.

"Goodbye, friends!" said Dabbles, leaving Himpledonk on a perch with one last stroke of her cheek.

"Coor-oo-oor-oo," said Jonglebongle, leaving a feather and a gift on the Sweetheart's head.

It was early afternoon, high time for Dabbles to enjoy his walk through Alefpria.

Of course, for the sake of all the plants that needed light and rain, Father Dominus no longer anchored above the city. Indeed, due to the amount of fuel required to resist gravity indefinitely, the living vehicle was not actually hovering at all. Faced with the question of where to park such a colossal edifice of divine willpower, Dabbles had settled on the perfect solution, one with both space and hydrogen available in spades. And, after all, aren't ships meant to stay in harbours?

Dabbles descended down about a hundred metres of rope ladder to his dingy, and happily picked up the oars. "Hello, fellow captain!" he said, waving to the barge that had not long ago been the largest vessel in Alefpria.

The captain looked down miserably at the lump of blankets in the dingy, then up at the mountainous Ark, then down again, raising his palms without a word and looking like a man lost.

"Goodbye, fellow captain!" said Dabbles, paddling away.

The man pulled a gourd of wine from his jacket and took a swig.

Having tied up his dingy on the docks, Dabbles hopped onto the cobbled street and began his stroll.

"Hello, sir!" he called to a man playing panpipes, and tossed him a small copper coin from his purse. "Hello, madam!" he greeted a woman selling dried guava on the side of the street, passing a silver over the counter as the yellowed fruits disappeared into his hood. "Hello, child!" he said to a young Lifprasilian looking hungrily at the food on display, and shared copper with him, too.

Everywhere he went, Dabbles was quick to pass out a little silver and copper to whomever his keen gaze saw was in need of it. Lifprasil's commission had been more than generous, and Dabbles saw no reason not to make the world a brighter place for it. Soon enough he was on his way uphill on the city's outskirts, leaving a trail of coins and hellos in his wake.

All of a sudden, a rumbling began to shake its way down the street. Some citizens looked up, startled, and began to shuffle away, but Dabbles followed the sound, thrilled.

"Hello, Tira!"

"Nyuuuum!" yelled Tira as she whizzed past, crouched on a plank of laminated balsa. She stood with a kick and flipped the plank onto its end, holding it by the front, bringing the wheels into view. "Iya, Dabbels!"

Dabbles admired his bronzework on the wheel bases, easily as impressive as the 'synthwork in the wheels themselves. They'd held up to Tira admirably, which was saying something. Lakshmi had said something about the dangers of literally rolling down a hill on wheels, and had probably meant that as a warning to stop, so Dabbles had fitted her with half a coconut for a helmet, plus some kneecaps and elbow pads. She looked a treat, if he did say so himself.

"Pray tell, where are you off to now?"

Tira clapped her hands and laughed mischievously, taking the moment pull a waterskin off her back and have a sip, then stowed it away along with her knife, cup, and other trinkets. Her burns shone vivid red in the sunlight.

"That so? Do enjoy it, dear. Make sure to get home before sundown!"

She rolled her eyes and stepped onto the plank. "Owt-iya, Dabbels!" she grinned, pushing off with one foot and zooming back down the street.

"Goodbye, Tira!" said Dabbles.

He was glad he hadn't given her any coins. Gods knew that girl could wreak enough havoc as it was. What a disaster it would be if she ever got her hands on anything of real value.

Perish the thought.

Now that he had crossed through the city from end to end, making some necessary purchases (and many unnecessary ones) and delivering some important reports (not all of them, but some), Dabbles continued on his way to the lens grove in the nearby jungle.

When the land had been cleared by a mysterious hero companion of Lifprasil, certain outcrops had been neatly cleaved flat, leaving a smooth stone surface level with the soil. The only greenery to appear on these beds of volcanic stone were tufts of moss and resilient grasses, unless earth was brought in to cover the space. Of course, not all trees are green.

Alefpria's population was so prodigious that its undead supported not only the largest orchard of lens in the Ironheart region, but travelled with the herds to sustain many others beyond. Here the trading folk converged and their Sculptor companions came and went from the city, exchanging strange idols and masks and clothes for goods of such eccentricity that they may as well have been giving away their work at random.

The herds themselves dealt in rather more practical things- Bronze tools and eyeglasses, instruments of string and percussion, pottery, wagons and howdahs. All these things were crafted in Alefpria specifically for Urtelem, whose proportions are heavier, and fingers not nearly so deft. In return, the city was enriched with not only strong labour but also goods from throughout the Ironhearts and beyond, from Rulanah and Shalanoir (though the Quara are prodigious travellers in their own right, and only a fool underestimates how far a troll will go for a good deal).

One of the most important things they brought, of course, was news.

"Hello, Maker!" said Dabbles, homing on the telepathic clicks and taps of the Sculptor.

'So many faeries have danced and died on these jungle hills, and still you remain in Alefpria,' signed Three Rosettes, the tripod creature of flowering black haematite and amethyst crown. 'You hide many things under that fabric cocoon. I cannot see them, but you do.'

"Oh, please! Not so rude!" answered Dabbles haughtily, rapping his hand against a twisted stone limb. 'Hello, Banyan Roots!' he signed, his stumps working at an absurd pace to compensate for his lack of fingers.

The Banyan Root herd gestured back pleasantly as they chewed on glass stems and silicone sap, inquiring about the city's constant growth, about Father Dominus and the court of Lifprasil, about earthquakes, and, of course, whether he was interested in the first pick of their wares.

It was time to exchange some more coin.

Urts do not charge high, but they are incredibly resistant to haggling, and having to commission much of their own purchases, have a great deal of use for currency. This herd bore herbs and fine marble from the Metera Valley, among other goods of peculiarly advanced craftsmanship. Dabbles learned many things from them that the whispers of their Jvanic friends neglected to mention. The Meterans, it seemed, were on their way up.

A handful of trinkets had disappeared into Dabbles's bulging cloaks before Three Rosettes delivered perhaps the strangest news of all.

'Old Walker wandered into Metera a year ago, and has yet to wander their way out,' signed the Sculptor, quiet and calm, as if only speaking to see Dabbles's reaction. But Dabbles is an observant fellow, and he did not miss the excitement beneath that stony skin that soon became his own.

"Why, Old Walker? They of the rufous feathers? They of the white mask and four deft hands? Old Walker?"

'As surely as the rainflowers bloom after a storm,' answered Three Rosettes, 'with a young goddess in their arms and the mystery ever fresh in their eyes. Her name is Chiral Phi, and Old Walker, say the people of the meadow, is her Prophet.'

"Ye gods, Maker! Whyever did you not sing this to me before? I've almost a mind, dare I be so bold, as to travel there myself and see the truth for myself!"

'I've been doting on moonshadows, and the colour of fresh soil,' signed Three Rosettes simply. 'Besides, you will not travel. Something ties you here, Dabbles.'

"Well, sir, perhaps you have considered that I may be preoccupied with the Most Significant Duties of captaincy on the largest ship in the world, under commission for the grandest army to walk its face? Good day, Maker!"

The afternoon was growing old and it was finally time for Dabbles to visit his friend in the Shrine of Jvan.

'Shrine' was not an accurate term, of course. 'Studio' or 'Sculptor Den' would be more accurate, given that the structure paid no homage to Jvan whatsoever. There was an academy under construction on the waterfront that may yet be more suitable for the dedication, but the two served an entirely different purpose. For one, the academy was to be well-policed, and Sculptors would never be in charge.

The shrine, on the other hand, had been built early on, and was positioned outside city walls, in the jungle, well away from anything that could potentially be defaced and/or burned down. Allowing wild Sculptor activity to concentrate unchecked in anything other than a bunker tends to be a public safety hazard, and as such Alefpria's growing array of bureaucrats had been more than willing to make this concession, largely on account of the fact that they weren't idiots.

Their precautions may have saved Alefpria much pain. The sturdy stone building was a plasma-charred ruin now. Not, of course, that the Sculptors had cared.

"Hello, Snorple!" said Dabbles to an aardvark snuffling around the jungle regrowth.

Ting ting, rang the bell on Snorple's neck as she looked up. Ting-a-ling-a-ling.

There was no door. Dabbles stepped into the mushrooms and shade. "Hello, Ulagoo, hello, Stiddleficks," said Dabbles to the pigeons softly churring in their coop. "Hello, Oppini- Oh." He peered around and was met with stillness. "I guess she already harvested you."

Humming a little tune, Dabbles slipped under a fallen slab of masonry and pulled up a disguised hatch, letting himself fall into true darkness.

Finger-smears of bioluminescent microbes marked the walls of the basement, and its center was lit by a small lamp, a flickering glow that did not reach the edges of the table on which it stood. "Hello, scientist!" said Dabbles to a creature with long golden fur like a gibbon braided with many charms.

The Sculptor took a guttural, rasping breath in his direction.

"That so? Fascinating! I've always known I could rely on you, my dear."

Obsidian clicked as one of her thirteen prehensile tails set down the knife it had been carrying, and picked up the lamp. She followed Dabbles to where he stood expectantly facing the naked woman shackled to the wall.

"Hello, subject!" said Dabbles to the starving figure between the skeleton and the gouge-blinded goat.

She stared at him through bloodshot eyes and dilated pupils with a kind of calm, impotent violence. A vein hopped visibly in her neck as Dabbles leaned in to where his friend had removed the left breast from collarbone to final rib, sealing the flesh with a diaphonised film of fish skin. For a moment he listened to the sound of her heart kicking at two hundred beats a minute. Through the transparent membrane, Dabbles could just make out embryonic tentacles, and domed head of the Sweetheart baby she was incubating.

"Hello, child," whispered Dabbles gently. "I think I'll call you... Hollytop." The foetus squirmed, as if in answer, and the woman's eyes rolled back in her sockets as the oxygen flow to her brain was interrupted. Dabbles's friend pried open her mouth and put a little scrap of Oppini's sweetmeat on her tongue with a spatula. She would not last much longer. "Outstanding," continued Dabbles as he watched. "Simply outstanding."

He turned away from the subject, reaching into his cloaks, and pulled out a second purse. A pile of gold jangled onto the table. He shook the bag to make sure it was emptied. "You may contact me in the usual way if you require more funds before our next appointment, of course. I've been teaching others in Lifprasil's court the delights of post and pigeonry, so they shan't think anything strange of our little messengers."

The grim physician nodded towards her friend with wide ape-like eyes, tails swishing gently from her upper back.

"Goodbye, scientist!" said Dabbles.

~Goodbye, Dabbles said the telepathic voice of his friend.



At last Dabbles returned for the evening inspection, all tired out from his long day. What an exciting time he had had!

"Hello, Himpledonk!" he said as he picked up his loyal pigeon. "Say, what manner of mischief have you been up to while I was out?"

"Coo-oo-roo," said Himpledonk conspiratorially.

"Really? Why, I rather doubt that, dear. You thought you could fool me, did you?"

"Coo" said Himpledonk.

"Well, I'm sure you had fun. My! Am I ready for bed-time!"

And so, when he finished his duties, Dabbles curled up on his hammock, thinking happily about all the things he had seen and the friends he had made. I do wonder what marvelous things I shall see to-morrow!

Before long, he was fast asleep.

---

Old Walker stood quiet on the face of the mountain, listening to a cricket chirping, and grass swishing in alpine wind. They dreamed.

Jvan let the current pull them as they floated, seagrass twirling between the fallen warriors below. Milky blood steamed sluggishly into the shallow blue water as it diffused over gently rolling weapons and a cloud of sand kicked up by the battle.

A voice trilled, and Jvan turned to see a merman paddling towards them with his free hand. They looked curiously at the kink in his wounded fin. "Sir," he said, straining a little as he recognised his superior, "help me. Please."

"Of course," said Jvan, taking his head in their upper-hands as a lower-hand reached into their armour. Jvan slipped out the knife and slid it easily across the merman's throat. Their eyes met, surprised confusion beholding calm contentment as he slipped out of those pink hands, gently sinking away to join the dead.

Jvan dropped the knife and looked up, the merman already forgotten. Now there was only one figure standing over the battlefield. The bodies didn't talk. An upper-hand absentmindedly felt for a latch at the back of the cuirass, pulled it. A series of mechanisms whirred and clicked open, in sequence, from back to tail-tip. Jvan slipped out of the armour and arched back, stretching until their head met their polychaete tail and formed a ring that revolved gently until it was right-way-up.

It didn't occur to the kirghal that there was any reason not to be happy. The light was beautiful. The skirmish was won. None of their losses were strategically critical, and they were making good time; Jvan would rendezvous with the rest of Ceeln's army on schedule.

Jvan pushed back against the current idly, long body twirling as they went, seeing first the surface, then the battlefield, then their injured war-engine to one side, then the surface again. It was all of one scene, and it had a kind of harmony.

Other people never noticed this, thought Jvan. Other people look at things and ideas and never really see the world for what it is. (They started swimming perfect circles and figure-eights, chasing their own tail.) Blood and sand and metallic chitin armour lay scattered in the not-quite-random pattern of war. The bodies stared back at their officer and mortal foe, fists clenched, tails curled, caught forever in a single moment of perfect martial motion.

A voice trilled and Jvan rolled to one side, arms awkwardly bent at their sides. They'd lost track of time.

"Sir?" said the scout, another kirghal, not sure whether to be embarrassed at seeing their superior naked and dancing over a hundred corpses.

"Yes?" said Jvan simply.

"We found their encampment and cleared it, sir. There were no more Council personnel."

"Oh? Excellent," Jvan smiled. "You may return to your squadron, soldier. I'll follow your signal."

"Sir, I've..." The scout glanced awkwardly at Jvan's damaged war-engine, its bioceramic armour dislocated to reveal the grey muscle below. "I've been sent to escort you."

"No need. That's just the ram mechanism. It detaches under strain to take pressure off the lubricating vessels. I can fix it." Jvan picked up their segmented armour by the shoulder and pulled it along on their way to the massive vehicle.

"...Sir, I-"

"Yes?"

"...I'll inform Commander Prrhyi of your decision, sir."

"That you will, soldier," said Jvan, pushing the armour roughly into a compartment. This engine had armour enough. "You're dismissed."

They curled into the cranial cockpit and laid their hands on the control nodes. Vibrant bioluminescence lit the vehicle's interior. Of course I can fix it, thought Jvan, feeling the thrum of the biomechanical war machine resonate inside them. I'm an engineer.

...

Old Walker turned an ancient gaze to the stars, watching the rising crescent Mirus. None of these dreams surprised them, not really. That Jvan's identity lay rooted in a past older than any of her divine incarnations had long been more than suspicion. Only the exact tune of the story was new to them now.

It was not surprising, either, that Old Walker should share these Vowzrid dreams of hers. Their connection ran deep. The Sculptor was intimately aware that no one knew All-Beauty better than they, not in this universe, anyway. What was unexpected was how easily they slipped out of the telepathic network and into Raka. Jvan had astonishing dominance of a psyche so vast for a consciousness so small, but... still...

Things leaked...

Phi manifested at Old Walker's side and they inclined their head towards her without looking. The blue glow was ghostly in the night.

"You're insane, you know that?" said the Painter quietly, simply. "I'm not even mocking you this time. You're patently demented. The psychological flexibility your Sculptor nature grants you is the only thing keeping you from picking up where you left off. The moment you let your head start making logical sense again, your life will go back to the way it was before the end." She twirled into a falling shape. "And then you'll die." She 'splattered' on the rock.

Mrrph, said Old Walker dismissively. Phi laughed.

"Aw, don't be that way. Come on. We have a holy book to write down. Make yourself useful, as she put it."

Old Walker swung their neck to look at the first rays of dawn over Mount Bormahven, and began the long climb down the mountain.

I saw the caps lock text spring out to me on the front page and could not help but obey.

What have you done?

@Muttonhawk Shhhhh! I'm just finishing up the last section now.