I stayed quiet for a moment, watching closely the trembling bamboo that regrouped in Sameira's wake. The question repeats, a constant loop that for some reason sputters and coughs through my head, squealing with melancholic cries. Were they nice?

It was probably so silly for me to get caught on that question, to feel the trembling of my limbs as I remember one particular day. It goes over and over, watching the blood and the tissue, plucked and pulled from Seele's body like she was some meal. And I, paralyzed in fright, unable to get myself to move— to help. She was protecting me, and I did nothing to save her.

A muffled mix of laughter spills from it at my right, whispering grueling things and hissing in their delight at my guilt. My mind was blurring, the lines between me and the— others— letting them grapple at my head to see who would get a turn next. I knew they were there, I could feel them, feel their presence and how eager they were to spring into my head. Memories started crumbling, eaten by the gaping maw of the abyss, my relationships faltering— my opinions and feelings falling to ruins.

"Hold fast, 'Mara. Sameira knows what will happen if 'Mara does not. 'Mara will scare boy, boy will not like it."

"Well— I.. I didn't speak much with Midas, but he seemed to be nice." I hadn't many memories of the black and white pegasus, failing to recall any further interaction that the day Seele ceased— remembering that he set her broken body ablaze while I cowered in a corner, creeping paranoia engulfing my unstable mind. "Seele— she was very nice. She may have been the nicest mare I've ever met." Certainly she was, this was no lie— she had taken me under her watch when I stumbled upon her during the eternal dark, when Sameira had just come to exist. "She was my adopted mother, and created a safe place for many horses." I wanted to say mentally unstable— afflicted— something. But I chose to leave that detail out, like it would be admitting that I was some kind of monstrous nightmare that had to be kept safe or I'd wreak havoc on society. Really, that isn't wrong.

He drops two names— Kaj and Archibald. My ears swivel, eyes settling on the ground as I find no recollection of these two new Czars. My sadness deepens, my realization that perhaps I am the last— the one legacy raised from the Asylum. Where have the others gone? How— in all this time— have they all vanished? Blödmann, Ghost, Agrona, Eris, Circuta, Histe, Geier, the list goes on. My family, meine sippe. 

I smile solemnly at the boy, shaking my head gently. "I'm afraid I've moved on from the Falls, my family no longer lives there— and there are too many bad memories associated with it." It was true, for it was there that my true descent into madness began— and Seele's unfortunate end. "I'm sure they're lovely swimming spots, perhaps you could tell me about them?" I was only trying to keep the conversation going, trying to get all these cramped up thoughts pushed farther into the recesses of my head. "And tell me about the Falls now, I'd like to hear about it." I smile softly, giving a deep inhale while I reminisced on my days of isolation, when the Asylum was mixed and mingled with neurotypicals— when we no longer were the Asylum.