Yes, it’s been three weeks. Standard excuses for the first two: couldn’t see the ending, DayJob… The third excuse was a surprise: in my dotage I’ve suddenly developed a shellsfish allergy, so the scallops over butter noodles from Friday/Saturday before last attempted to kill me. My wife wanted to take me to the hospital but I was a mule and said no. Even so, bedridden for three days, with no food, then barely moving for two with a little toast. At one point when my wife came home from work, she said, “You like like you aged a year in a day.” Thanks, Honey.

But, just like falling off your horse’s bicycle, you get back on something. In fact, I realized one glaring and one minor issue from Part 11: glaring, that did they go off and leave the body behind? Are you kidding me? Minor, that I wanted Pai to clarify to Graf just how latently dangerous he might be. While I have rewritten that in the MS, I didn’t really see a reason to repost everything here, as these are supposed to be raws to make me think, anyway.

Having said all that, let’s get into the Epilogue. Luce finds out you do not piss off the matriarch of an entirely new race, and we catch a glimpse of Graf’s talent.

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In a clearing in the woods in Aomori Prefecture, Honshu’s most northern, Ildi finally exploded.

“You damned…!” Ildi grabbed Luce’s halo and dragged her across the wet grass, tossing her against a tree with surprising strength, “…idiot!”

“Grandmother…” Luce tried.

“Shut up!  There are less than two dozen of us!  There are four billion humans!  You don’t just start killing them!  Idiot!” she screamed again.

“Your mother, Faustina did…”

“SHUT UP!  She had an army to call on!  Two, then four, then eight legions!  Nuclear weapons!  Reactionless motors!” Ildi continued in her rage.  “You have one rifle and stick!  Now lay there in the dirt and tell me, step by step, how stupid you acted.  Now!”

“I…I was…” Luce began with a stutter.

“Speak up, Murderess!” Ildi spat, flaring her wings wide.  That startled Pai so much she physically pushed Graf back, lest he be sliced.

“Hey, Ildi!” he still shouted.  “Knock it off!  She screwed up!  But she’s trying right now, okay?”

Her wings vanished, the eldest Fusion slowed turned on them.  Her dark gray eyes showing…  Fear?  Graf thought?  That’s can’t be true for one of these people.  Those eyes went to Pai’s

“Who told him?” she asked, much, much quieter. 

“Luce,” she replied in a plain tone.  “I then confirmed it.  He has zero experience in control, but as you just felt, doesn’t really need it, right?”

Her eyes came back to his.  “It shall be as you say, Graf.  I guess it has to be, now.”  She turned back to her granddaughter, pulled her up, and led her to a fallen log.  They sat.  With her left hand just resting on his right, Pai and Graf had not moved.

“Should we leave?” he whispered, watching as they put their hands onto one another’s faces.  “Or are they about to fight?”

“Not a fight, I think,” she muttered back.  “This is how demis and now Fusions speak mind-to-mind.  This should take maybe a minute rather than an hour.”

“Must be nice…” he breathed before taking her hand.  “But, I’d rather talk with you than have you just noodle around my head when I’m asleep!”

“Graf?”

“Pai?”

“We really need to start you on lessons.  Were I human, I would have had no way to not take that as an order.  You must learn to be cautious, Beloved.”

“Lessons, huh?” A tiny laugh.  “Mindy and I were mostly homeschooled by Mom; a few locals, like Doc, gave us some other skills.  But as famers, Pai, not, well, not anything like you, Aurie, and now, I guess, I am.  Oh.  Looks like they’re done.”

The two leaned away from one another.  Luce put her head down as Ildi stood up.

“I am older as to what happened,” she began, walking over.  “The very short version is she was startled.  That, coupled with her arrogance, had her lash out.  Not murder, but I think what was once called voluntary manslaughter.  You two, and her, and the body, must return immediately.  She will face a trial.”