Eta leaps from beam to beam, sailing through a building reduced to traceries, like the skeleton of a leaf, and in motion they feel a little like a leaf themself, bowled along by the wind.
"What if you fall," they can perfectly recall Alpharia's reasonable tone. "Somewhere it takes time to self-repair and get out, time for me to find you, and your mainspring gives out before that time?"
Alpharia was built to be steady, and eternal.
Unfortunately, Eta was not.
"I would be your friend anew from a billion cold starts," Eta said. "I could never be anything else."
"I like this friend," Alphria said quietly, pre-grieving the Eta she can see, from her long perspective, as something she can only inevitably lose.
"This friend likes you too, Alpharia," Eta said.
Eta has been continuously online for over eighty-three thousand winds. This is, they think, more love than any other person has ever known, whether their life was designed to last twenty-eight days or not; and they love Alpharia back as bright and fierce as they know how.
