Two people stand in the quiet Inn, long after everyone has gone to sleep. One person, taller, with messy gray hair and in a loose-fitting red suit, stands behind the bar. The other, with curly white hair in a stunning red tailcoat and frilly clothes, sits across from him. The taller one is mixing drinks, sloshing around an orange liquid with grenadine and soda. He pours the liquid evenly into two stout glasses, decorated in a pattern of a culture you don't recognize. These two know each other, eyeing the other in a silent judgement of how age has impacted them--both negatively.
"I'm surprised that I get the pleasure of talking to you again after all this time," said the shorter one. Their face was colored full with stage makeup, and they took off their gloves to drink the liquor.
"And I am surprised that you managed to find me. You must have been busy, no?" He puts down the shaker and proceeds to lean back on the wall of the bar. His look is misgiving.
"It didn't take me as long as you'd think. Even if my stardom has passed, I still have a few connections lying about. You came back to Earth after a while. And then you set off again, to build this place," they pushed their hair back and leaned backwards in the stool slightly, stretching. "Which means that you never truly gave up after all this time."
"I have suffered some setbacks. I originally set out to gain the technology possessed by the Cortex, which would've given me a leg up in locating them. But I failed in doing that." He takes a moment to sip his drink. "And I lost one of my Instruments in the process. After that, I returned to Earth hoping to seek your advice, as well as seek out the Instrument we left there."
"So you've been in the same place for the last three millennia. Just like me." A frown slowly widened across their face, and their eyes drew to look at the floor. "I miss you, retiE. You already know what I'm going to ask."
"I do. And you know that I still love you, but--"
satinreteA is abruptly cut off by their former partner, and they bark back."Then why don't you give up this game, retiE? We're relics of a bygone generation. Even if you complete it today, what changes? You can't bring them back. You can't bring everything back!"
"I do not want to set everything back to the way it was. But I made promises. To you, to the rest of them, to the Director. To everyone." satinreteA slams his glass down onto the bar. "I cannot move on from my greatest failure until it is rectified!" His face contorted and became more desperate, he moved away from the wall of the bar, closer into the face of his former lover. "It does not matter how long it takes, how many setbacks I have! I am eternity, I made a promise. And I will not break it, even if I die in the process!
They cowered in fear. A tear shed from their eye, smudging the heart drawn in makeup on their cheek.
"Just think...of how happy we were together. Of what we were together. Of what we had together. I spent two thousand years in a purgatory of my own making, thinking I was still a big-time TV star! You have to realize when something is over!"
"And I know for a fact my mission--nay,--our mission, is not yet over." satinreteA took his lover's hands, covering his palms. His face changed slowly from anger to soft kindness. There was still part of him in there somewhere, buried under all of that hatred and self-loathing. "I still want to love you the same as I did. And I do not believe that our past mistakes define us. We are different people than we were then." But then again, he was buried so deeply in his 'mission.'
"retiE, I want to be with you again, my heart pulls itself towards you as clearly as it pumps blood through my body. But I can't. Not until you realize when a promise doesn't matter anymore." Their face turned pensive, and they dragged their hands out from under satinreteA's. "I'm going to Defelmiodo. You probably already know there's an Instrument there. Until you end this senseless charade, I don't think I want to see you again."
"What's even left for you there? Your little project has reached maturity, not that there's anyone left to watch it. And I have a group, going around and collecting the Instruments. Someday soon, they'll end up there. They're a terribly determined bunch, and they'll pry it out from your corpse if they have to." satinreteA watched them carefully as he spoke, as they put on their gloves and got up from the stool, moving to leave.
"Then let them know I'll be ready to receive them. I might be past my prime, but I'm still a worthwhile magician. Hopefully I'll be able to create something truly worth these new days." They walked as they spoke, not looking back, and pressed their hand against the handle of the door, prepped to leave.
"Please. Just stay with me."
"Someday in the future, retiE."
satinreteA was left with nothing but the sound of the door slamming shut. He reminded himself of every reason he could not allow himself to give up. He already understood that his mercenaries were losing faith in their sacred task. It would soon be his time and he had to be ready to enter the fray once more.
Quietly exiting from behind the bar, he unlocked the door to the Inn's basement, and entered its dank halls. Bookshelves and tables were scrawled full of knowledge, designs, and data. Prototypes for machines littered shelves. A workshop that hadn't seen love for thirty years, and before that, maybe a century before. Towards the back of the room, there lay a stand with an old gray duster, illuminated softly by a spotlight.
It was time to get back to work.