"Greetings From the Moon"

#0088. Standing above it all. The Earth in tilt and spinning, pulling her world in orbit. She raises the Sea up. She lets it recede. There is such peacefulness here. The light of the universe is so clear. Blue and green fade to dull brown. She can watch the ants eat themselves. Here she is the Queen she was always meant to be. She sits on a throne of ancient mineral. The halo of stars is her crown.

"The Hollowed"

#0089. Little screaming from wherever you are. Those dying breaths still hollow out your bones. You could never believe in such fancy endings. You know about the worms. You know about the dust and the ash. Don't give it a coat of fresh lacquer. It is what all things are. It is wretched. It is polluted. Bear up that grim menace. Forget those rose covered books.

"Fools Believe the Things That Fools Cannot Help but Believe"

#0090. You shouldn't believe in anything, Alice will tell you. Even though she is the absolute thing to believe in. I met her in so many places. You would expect doves to descend. Sunbeams through rent clouds. Storms. Booming voices. Angels with fiery swords? Earthquakes. Devastation. Time standing still. But instead, it is this overwhelming and discomfiting calm. It is a calm so dense that it hurts. You are a fool, she will tell you. But there will be a sweetness to her voice. You are a fool because that is what she intends. You never had a choice in the matter.

"Alice Dreams of Purpose, You Dream of Alice"

#0091. She will shatter you. But it is ok. You will be content being shattered. After all, what is there to live for? Family will crumble and decompose like exterminated mice. Friends will abandon you. Their ships will sink as soon as they crest the horizon. Meaning is too grandiose. Alice may find meaning in the universe, but you are a measly speck. You are a worrying dust mote. So she will come to you, maybe in a dream, and she will undo you, piece by piece. And, to your surprise, you will find yourself thanking her.

"Home"

#0092. The prisoner shuts his eyes and remembers home. The music that plays in his head warbles like an old phonograph record. He has been lost for so long. Each step pulls him further away from his home. Look at the scars on his wrists and arms. He has tried to abandon ship. He spent his days inches from drowning waters. Icy waters. He closes his eyes tightly and thinks of the sweetness of home. The water laps up against the rocks. He peers in and sees his own reflection, warped and degraded by the waves. He cannot do this forever.

"Raven of the Life Unlived"

#0093. The majority of lives are wholly unlived. The roads that lead away from what happened are more numerous by far than the ones that travel through actuality. Somewhere, Raven is held in her father's arms. She looks up at him. He cannot imagine his life without her. But his life is genuinely without her. She exists in an unlived life. He sees her sometimes. She never had the chance to miss him the way that he misses her.

"The Unforgotten Museum of Scent and Memory"

#0094. Those smells are what cling to memory. Opening a sticking door and being hit with the scent of age and accumulated detritus. The moldering wood and the loose banister. The aroma of boiling potatoes and dense bread wafting down in a nearly visible cloud. Each stair groaning under even negligible weight. It was the heavy air of a museum loosed and rushing into my nostrils. It is still there even now. The house has long crumbled. Every inhabitant long dead or relocated. But the place still exists in the memory of its particular odor.