Sunset Valley II

“What?” Ego blurted out suddenly, at the mention of Diaspora becoming... other. He had managed to hold back any verbal reactions upon hearing that he would see his mother and Mahler again, and learning that his siblings were gone -- that one of them was around, but not with them, and the other was simply gone, as he had been -- but he could not contain his surprise in learning that the mast carved by their father’s teeth had been felled. “That’s not...” Possible. Of course, it was. He had not been there, too cowardly to return, and within him he knew that his lack of support had helped doomed their birthright to a pitiful convergence. One that had not even been strong enough to withstand its competitors in the Sunspires. It sickened him.

They were supposed to be the pack that others ran from. The ghostly Diaspora. They were not meant to be the ones chased out.

This outcome was wrong. This was not what he had expected to return to; and what childish fantasies they all felt like now. How ridiculous, how foolish, he had been to think things would be almost exactly as he remembered.

The shock melted away, leaving him with a sobered look and the taste of ash in his mouth. The yearling shook his head and blinked some feeling back into his face. His brother’s following words registered to him rather belatedly, but Ego met his pine-green eyes with confidence. “I’m done running, brother. I belong with you. To you.” His tail wagged. “We must retrieve Simmik, as well, yeah? This way cannot stand. We should all be together.” We should be living our legacy.

“I want to tell you everything,” he went on. “But I...” His tone grew more somber, and his eyes lowered to the mussed white fur of Stag’s chest. “I have to ask… I have to know… I was always too afraid to know, what you might say… it is why I never came back, even when I could have…” He felt himself taking longer and longer to the get the point, so he sighed softly, resetting his thoughts, and asked: “Do you blame me? For what happened to Father?”