8. Only One Solution
Sotho thought that the eyes of a time traveler had probably seen everything. That they could predict what would happen at any time and nothing would surprise her. At that moment, however, Ismaraldah’s eyes shone with nothing but fear and ignorance, like a newborn child, searching for proof she hadn’t forgotten the world.
Didrik held her. They found each other’s eyes and smiled. They knew each other still, that was most important.
The smile fell away.
“I feel it,” she said softly.
“Me too,” said Didrik. “I’m afraid … that my promise that I’d never forget you …”
“No, no, no. We will find a way.”
They helped each other to their feet.
Sotho was with Lothan. His friend survived but had a nasty wound in his shoulder. He slept to recover.
His friend lived. Sotho had never even thought about it before—had refused to think about it. But Lothan had almost died that night. All those saved moments, all those delayed adventures they’d have, would have immediately become useless.
He hugged his friend and whispered he’d stay with him until he woke up, time and time again, even though it exhausted their friendship faster.
Ismaraldah and Didrik had a discussion that started sweetly but grew furious now.
“It’s too dangerous,” said Didrik. “We barely escaped this time! We’re lucky the human’s machines work on electricity and couldn’t reach deeper into Slumberland yet. But they’ll return, and quickly.”
“Don’t lecture me about the future,” Ismaraldah said bitterly, then kissed him.
“We don’t even know if it works. How it works. What it is. We can’t do anything against powerful humans and their metal weapons.”
Ismaraldah stomped her foot. “Did all our travels teach you nothing? When a species gets too powerful, that’s exactly when you shouldn’t give up and exactly when you fight!”
“But at what cost?”
“It’s the only solution.”
“We are not going back, especially not wounded.” It was a definitive statement. The calm and strong sun badger was nowhere to be found right now. “There’s always our other plan. I still get sick from time travel and can barely live outside my own timeline.”
Ismaraldah looked around. Sloths fell from the sky left and right to hit precisely the right branches, which gave them running water and extinguished the flames. The sloths who claimed they were safe here, only yesterday, worked hardest of all to get the machines going. Some were even out of breath.
“Didn’t you say there was a fixed point around now?” asked Sotho. “A very important moment. Whatever you’re planning, could that be it?”
The time traveler hugged Didrik once more. “No. I believe the fixed point … just happened. To us.”
She seemed to wait on something, as she cursed someone called Jacintah. Shortly after, her wooden clock appeared amidst the wooden wreckage of broken bridges and machines.
A black panda exited the clock.
“I told you to arrive before the fixed point!” Ismaraldah cried.
“I am an amazing spacefolder, but not a timefolder. How often must I repeat myself?”
The black panda didn’t move with steps or jumps, but by teleporting a tiny bit each time. One moment she climbed out of the clock; the next she hung over Sotho’s head and looked at Lothan. His friend coughed and seemed to wake up.
“Well. Alright. You’re here now, sister. We’re going on a mission again.”
Didrik sighed and licked his wounds, but made for the wooden clock. The vehicle seemed larger on the inside than the outside—even then, the three of them barely fit. The clock seemed entirely designed for only one driver.
“What’s the mission?” asked Sotho.
“I only see one solution to all our troubles. We break into the Wish Fulfiller building and make our own wishes reality. Everything we’ve heard suggests that it actually works!”
Sotho felt pulled in two directions. Stay with Lothan? Join and meet the Wish Fulfiller?
Lothan woke up and groaned in pain.
“Stay down, friend. You’re safe. The humans are gone, recharging for the next attack.”
His friend smiled. He smiled, as a butterfly landed on his bulbous nose.
“That was fun! Finally we’re having adventures, weird treeknight of mine.”
“I—Lothan—” Sotho smiled too. “It was fun. Until you …”
Lothan waved his claw. “That’s life’s risk.”
Sotho looked over his shoulder. This was the final chance to join the mission.
Lothan smiled again. “Go on your next adventure. The more we’re apart, the longer we’ll remember each other, right?”
“I’d rather remember the fun things we did together,” said Sotho.
He gave his friend a soft pat on the back—the good side—and jumped in the direction of the wooden clock.
Ismaraldah turned dials and twisted rows of clocks on the wall. Jacintah sat in the center, eyes closed, and claimed to be “concentrating”.
Sotho didn’t feel like anything happened. But mere heartbeats later, they opened the doors and had moved: to the ceiling inside the Wish Fulfiller building.
Below them sat a young woman amidst a circle of candles. She talked about her wish to a dark silhouette he couldn’t recognize.
“It’s simple, really. I want Jonathan to fall in love with me, forever. And then we start a sweet family together, with sweet kids, and live happily ever after.”
A croaky voice responded, but plagued by pauses and stutters, as if it was very unsure of what to say.
“Ah. A wish that involves changing another human. Did you even read the rules?”
“Of course! It’s not forbidden!”
“It costs extra,” said the voice with pleasure.
“What do you think?” whispered Jacintah. She had teleported to the ridge of the roof. “A rare demigod that survived the Second Conflict? God of Wishes?”
“I’d believe that,” said Ismaraldah, “if I’d ever heard of such magic in my entire life.”
“Soooo what exactly is the plan, you crazy girls,” said Didrik, hanging from a metal beam with a single paw. “Kidnap a demigod and force it to fulfill our wishes? While they simply raise the alarm and we’re all deadly dead soon, aye?”
“We must try,” Sotho heard himself say. “I have to wish for Slumberland to always stay as beautiful as it is.”
Sotho’s heart raced. Dangerously. He was so close. He saw the beautiful Slumberland from his memories, everyone happy, coming together to build the machines all day. Heaven on Somnia. But—wait—where were those memories coming from? He had never actually experienced this time, had he?
“I thought we were going to wish for the Curse to be removed,” said Ismaraldah. “Can those wishes exist at the same time?”
“If we wish it to be so?”
“Maybe. That’s also how my time traveling works. The timeline is like a living being that constantly adapts to how we change it, sometimes quite creatively. Remember, Didrik, that one time you accidentally destroyed a painting by Da Vennisi, which caused an entire person to never—”
Sotho’s claw itched. How could she talk of such irrelevant stories right now? They had to jump! Grab the Wish Fulfiller! It would solve everything!
“Not the moment, dear,” said Didrik with the same impatience in his voice.
Jacintah teleported closer and closer. From the roof, to the paintings on the wall, to the dark wallpaper.
The woman below them had just made her immense payment. She received a helmet and dozens of stickers that attached wires to her neck, arms, and legs. The voice claimed this proved she really wished for that. The helmet made beeping noises and flashed a few lights to a rhythm.
The woman yelped in surprise at some parts of the process, but eventually a computer voice said: “Wish Confirmed!”
No, that was the same voice as before. The Wish Fulfiller was a computer voice.
The young woman took off the helmet and pulled the wires off her body. She smiled. Not genuinely, but a smile so wide it seemed to hurt her.
“Here. Take my thousand gold coins. Please give me the twenty most expensive products from Delja Digital.”
Multiple armored workers appeared as if they were born from the walls. They put the money into a large box and gave the woman what she wished for.
“And,” said the croaky computer voice, “has your wish been granted?”
“Yes! Sure! Thanks so much!”
The woman left. The room was empty.
“If we want to act, we must do it now,” said Jacintah. “Go? Don’t go?”
Sotho and Didrik both hung from the same tube, ready to let go and jump onto the device, or swing back and abort the mission.
Ismaraldah’s eyes shimmered. She didn’t seem herself, as if she could faint and fall any second.
“I gave Ardex his wish,” she mumbled. “See what came of it.”
Did she not see? This was a scam! It didn’t fulfill any wishes! It—Sotho read her eyes for a little longer and thought he understood.
This device could change the thoughts of creatures. It could remove your actual desires and replace it with something else. A different wish that was easy to fulfill. Something that made Delja Digital immense piles of money.
And so it could take away Sotho’s desire for a life without the curse, or more energy, or better sleep. It could take away his wish to restore Slumberland, so watching it burn wouldn’t hurt. He’d be content with whatever life was left for him.
It could take away Ismaraldah’s painful desire to always be with Didrik and never lose him. If they ever forgot each other, it wouldn’t hurt, because they didn’t wish to be together.
The time traveler let herself fall down, ready to grab the wires of the device.
Sotho and Didrik swung after her.