When Shiva shattered the time-stream, he was in love. Well, maybe he didn’t shatter it per se—more like twisted it into a knot. But there were too many “Vassiliev invariants” and “nugatory crossings” in the mathematics of it that Shiva didn’t understand, so he preferred to think about it in terms of breaking rather than knotting. Besides, he was named after a god of destruction, so “shattered” fit. Poetic license and all that. When Shiva shattered the time-stream, he was heartbroken.

For the last day we have together, I thought we could go back to Io, where I saw you for the first time. Her volcanoes will be reflected on your solar array once again. We will bathe in her Plasma Torus until our sensors tingle so hard we can’t take it any more. Then I will make a bouquet for you to carry on your way home: sulfur for passion, oxygen for remembrance, and sodium, for good luck.

In the eternity of star-ache where space coils around matter like a wounded animal, I hang in agony. Three supermassive black holes lurk in the corner of my hearing, each in a different corner of the galaxy cluster. Triangulation points. The calculation is redone every 4.5 microseconds, balm and torture both to my space-stretched mind. The ship’s computer tugs ceaselessly at my fragile gray matter.

I understand why you became a ladybug. The ladybug is one of Earth’s jewels. Shapeshifters from all across the universe enjoy the ladybug form as a gentle introduction to our planet’s native transformative experiences. I’ve heard many a shapeshifter rhapsodize about the pleasures of tearing yourself free from the carapace of a ladybug’s instar-self not once but three times, with pupa and imago forms still to come. One visitor I assisted spent seven years as a ladybug.

You knew from the beginning. You knew because the world knew about the intricate and fascinating life-cycle of the Svarrs, and it had been documented and discussed everywhere throughout the media endlessly. And you knew because Vo made sure you understood, before you married them. Four years is the bonding-period you get with a Svarr. Not quite four years, to be exact. Four years minus twelve days.