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Thanks for the prompts! I chose #4 and it felt so good to get into the flow of writing without worrying about how what I write would fit into a full piece. (im experiencing mega writers block with sfg atm)
So seriously, thank you OP
Anyways, here's what I came up with:
“Stargazing,” Kal observed, leaning heavily on her new spear. Jonathan had done good work with it, and the small inscription near its base was, surprisingly, left intact. Loren took a moment to admire the sleek, plated metal Jon had chosen to resuscitate that damn spear from its rightful place in the refuse pile, then turned his attention back toward the mottled patchwork of stars above them. “Is that what you do when you’re not killing people?” she pressed mirthfully. Loren frowned. The battle had been long and laborious and not really worth the sore wrist he’d been massaging for the past half hour, Ilium’s abrasive voice still rattling around in his skull. Kal sighed, lowering herself into a crouch beside Loren’s head. “Fight’s over, Twig. No need to be so serious.”
Loren tilted his head the slightest bit towards his companion, eyes flashing in the dark. “Me? Serious?” he asked. Kal’s attention flitted over Loren’s face, a smile slowly stretching over her face when he offered her the slightest scrunch of his nose. The expression looked somehow sweeter on her, with dried blood crusted over her teeth, than it had in the palace where they’d first met. “The Stone-Faced Twig, telling a joke,” she laughed. “No one’ll believe me.” “You’d share our special moment?” Loren continued mildly. “I’m gutted, Kal. Now what’ll I do with the ring I bought you?” Kal lightly shoved his arm, earning a soft huff that was drowned beneath her own delighted cackling. Loren wasn’t sure, exactly, when the grief had worked its way up her throat alongside the joy. Just that one moment he had told a joke- a good one, it seemed- and the next, Kal was shuddering with her spear gripped too tightly in one hand, its tip digging mercilessly into the grassy hilltop. Not a drop of blood on either one of them in any place that Kal could see. Loren supposed she didn’t really need to see, though, for the blood to linger. With a quiet curse, Loren raised his abandoned staff from the grass beside him and waved it loosely in her direction, easing her grip from the spear, knuckle by white-clenched knuckle, until he was certain she wouldn’t damage the new plating. Loren swallowed the sour taste in his mouth as he poked through Kal’s memories, searching for something gentle. Back and back and back he weaved, as he always did with soldiers, until the Kal in his mind’s eye was so small as to be hardly recognizable. But this Kal was warm, covered head-to-toe in a half-finished, puke green blanket while another, smaller version of someone Loren might have known in another life cheered and clapped and pretended to be struck low by the Kal-monster. “You don’t need to do that, you know,” Kal whispered at half her normal volume. Soothed by Loren’s efforts. Loren flinched. Kal’s hand quickly sought out his in the semi-dark, squeezing tightly when he attempted to shuffle away from her. Her grip bordered on painful. “I won’t tell the others,” she promised. Earnestly, by the sound of it. But sound was a liar that Loren knew well. “I know some of the others appreciate…it,” she continued haltingly. “What you...do for them.” Loren grit his teeth. “Only because they don’t know,” he reminded her stiffly. Kal sniffed and tilted her head, studying Loren in exactly the way he’d been trying to avoid ever since he’d been conscripted. Ever since he set foot in that damn palace. Ever since he lost- “Loren-”
Wet with tears, her eyes reflected the moonlight. “My mother’s name was Moon,” Loren suddenly confessed. Kal’s smile wobbled, eyes travelling uncertainly to the sky. “And my uncle’s name was Butter.” Loren sighed. “Are we naming the donkey, too?” Kal asked lightly. “Because we can do it if it’ll make you feel better, Twig, but one day Truth will catch you by the throat and it won't be pretty.” Loren pulled his hand away again and Kal let him. Still, Loren didn’t rise to his feet like he’d intended to. He dug his fingers into the grass at his sides, digging up the scent of dirt and mulch. The wind changed and Loren thought he could smell the stew, too. He took a deep breath and let it wash over him, blocking out the muted murmurs of their company in the distance. “What happened to 'Loren'?” he asked her without opening his eyes. Kal’s hand fell companionably to his shoulder. Her temple against his own was quick to follow. “Moment of weakness, Twig.” Loren chuckled sharply, slowly peeling his eyes open to peer up at the moon that watched over him, thinking of the Moon that did not. “You’ve known the whole time?” he ventured carefully. Loren felt Kal shrug against him. “Kind of easy to spot, you know? Your type never need much muscle to do the heavy-lifting, do they?” “Twig,” Loren realized. Kal hummed, gently shoving him over as she climbed to her feet and reclaimed her spear, idly testing out the balance as she dithered. “Everyone’s wondering where you went to,” she said with forced casualness, poking at imaginary enemies. “So. Unless you want me spilling your dirty, stargazing secret…” Kal’s attention drifted to Loren, then, and her restless hands slowly lowered to her hips. A wide, conspiring smile crept over her features. “You better beat me back to that damn campsite.” Loren frowned. “Beat you-?” “Go!” Kal shouted, tearing down the hill with her spear and her smile and the blood in her teeth. For a moment, all Loren could do was watch her go. The he cursed and grabbed his staff, rushing down after her with a grumbled complaint, something heavy still caught in his chest. But, somehow, lighter than it was before.
One day, the stars disappeared from the sky, like a blanket over the earth.
"I think the stars are getting bigger."
The stars shift in the sky, and whisper messages into the ears of every child.
"Stargazing... is this what you do when you're not killing people?"
Stars have ears.
"I love the stars, because they love me."
What if the stars were gods?
"Watch the stars as you die, and they'll take you with them."