Chapter Text
The discovery of the cause of Firefly’s Entropy Loss Syndrome immediately set the gears in Stelle’s brain turning. Sure, getting the information from Dahlia without Firefly’s permission was not her preferred method, but the important part was that Stelle had an idea. A very genius idea.
If Entropy Loss Syndrome was a curse of the Propagation, then surely a Stellaron – a seed of Destruction – could counter it, right? It made perfect sense: Propagation made more things and Destruction made less things. Therefore, they would cancel out. Stelle was ready for her invitation to the Genius Society.
Speaking of the Genius Society, Stelle knew a Genius who knew some Geniuses who could make her plan a reality, which was exactly why the young Nameless found herself grovelling at Herta’s feet. “Please, please, please, please, please! Madam Herta! The peerless gem! The inimitable beauty! The unrivalled genius! You can definitely do it!”
Stelle didn’t even need to look up from where she was crouched on the floor with her head also on the floor to know exactly what expression Herta was making. Or hear the scoff of disdain. “I’m a busy woman, you know. I have no time to act on your every whim.”
Faster than she could blink, Stelle was on her feet again. Such a sudden, nimble and, quite frankly, very impressive movement was sure to catch Herta off guard! Lower her defences, help her give in to the sob story she was about to play up, the whole shebang!
The genius did not react.
“But, you see, this is actually for someone I love-” Stelle didn’t even get a chance at the sob story; she had just barely schooled her (fake) bashful expression! Days of practice gone to waste!
“Oh, that Firefly girl? Aeons, you can never shut up about her whenever you visit... Fine! I’ll do it if it means getting my peace and quiet back.” Stelle could bring herself to overlook the accompanying exasperated sigh.
It turned out that the prospect of being the first to devise and implement a treatment for Entropy Loss Syndrome was actually very motivational for Herta. Not even a week after Stelle had convinced the Genius to work on her idea, she was met with a rare message from Herta. “Screwy says the simulations are all good. Hurry up and bring a Stellaron over for a test.”
(The message also said something about Stelle’s idea of the Destruction cancelling out the Propagation being wrong and that the Stellaron would actually just be producing enough energy to counter the progression of ELS, but that didn’t matter.)
And so, with the Stellaron sealed in the frozen corpse of Bronya’s deceased mother in hand (Stelle didn’t think it would sound that morbid until Himeko pulled her aside to tell her to not say things like that) the Astral Express once again returned to the Space Station. Bronya did give permission to take her mother, for the record.
The test itself was rather unorthodox if you asked Stelle, but a normal person would describe this whole project as unorthodox. Now accompanied by Mr Yang and Sunday, Herta took them to the Exclusion Zone where Ruan Mei and Screwllum were already waiting. Beside the almost-hatched form of one of Ruan Mei’s True Stings Genius Prototypes.
Apparently, the plan was to put the Stellaron in the True Sting, see if its lifespan stabilized, and then remove the Stellaron so the True Sting would explode. Stelle was not reassured by Herta and Screwllum retreating to an observation room.
“Okay, you can start now,” Herta’s voice sounded through the loudspeakers. “Remember to do it perfectly – you’re doing it on a human next.”
The first step was for Ruan Mei and Mr Yang to transfer the Stellaron into the True Sting, which went off without a hitch according to Stelle’s untrained eye. She was only there to help in combat if things suddenly went south.
Next, Sunday used his Harmony tuning to help situate the Stellaron properly within the True Sting. His arms were outstretched and his brow furrowed in concentration… Exactly like the other times Stelle had seen him use his tuning. So that probably went well.
This was confirmed a moment later by Herta’s voice: “The procedure is complete with 99.8% accuracy, well within error margins. Undo your tuning now, Chicken Wing Boy.”
To the delight of absolutely no one but herself, Stelle managed to sneak in a good whack with her baseball bat to make sure the True Sting wouldn’t try anything. It exploded moments later anyway when Sunday finished undoing his tuning. Stelle’s retelling of the events at the dinner table that night earned a slightly distressed “Why would you provoke it like that?!” from March.
With everything going all according to plan, Stelle found herself doing a photoshoot with cat cakes a week later. Not exactly what she had hoped to be doing but it was March’s idea to take her mind off Firefly.
The other Stellaron Hunters had been very cooperative with helping achieve Stelle’s idea (i.e. loaning her Firefly for a month) and the girl this was all supposed to help appeared eager to go through with it upon finding out that multiple Geniuses were involved. In one of the many texting conversations they had, Stelle begrudgingly agreed to wait until after the procedure to meet her in real life for the first time.
Now she was suffering through the hardest part of all: waiting.
“Stelle! Don’t lie down again!” March whined at her for the third time now. She just couldn’t help it! Thinking about Firefly… Getting worried about Firefly… Lying back down while thinking and worrying about Firefly… Getting smothered by a cat cake landing on her face…
“Pwah! Can’t you just keep taking photos of the cat cakes, March? Stop putting them on me!” Setting a cat cake on her face was a pretty good way of getting Stelle to sit back up and resume the photoshoot. Not that it was much of a photoshoot anymore – sure, some of the photos were very glorious and majestic, but now March was surrounded by and petting a crowd of cat cakes instead of taking photos.
“But they love you. Look at them!” It was a good point; the cat cakes were hopping around on Stelle as much as they were crowding March.
“They do seem rather fond of you, Stelle.”
She couldn’t help groaning and running a hand down her face as Mr Yang crouched beside her to play with a cat cake. “Not you too, Mr Yang… Wait, Mr Yang?!” Stelle immediately sprung to her feet, much to the disappointment of the cat cakes lounging on her. “What are you doing here?! Is the procedure finished? How’s Firefly? Is she okay?”
Mr Yang chuckled as he was pulled to his feet as well and shaken back and forth by Stelle’s grip on his shoulders. “Miss Firefly is just fine. The procedure went well.”
A long sigh of relief left Stelle’s mouth as she felt herself relax, but her excitement didn’t subside. “Can I see her, then? Is she awake?”
The only answer she got was a nod and it was the only answer she needed. She didn’t hesitate to sprint from the room, leaving March to be overrun by the cat cakes and Mr Yang to possibly do something about it. She navigated through the Space Station without thinking and barely thought to give Sunday a quick wave of appreciation when she passed him right before knocking on the door of the medical room.
Herta’s curt “Enter!” had only just reached Stelle’s ears when she swung the door open to be met with the sight of her.
Dressed in a hospital gown, body pale and thin from disuse, ELS scars glowing a faint but beautiful green on her cheeks, neck, arms and legs, Firefly sat in a hospital bed and spoke quietly with Ruan Mei and a pair of doctors. She was clearly far less perfect in reality compared to the Penaconian Dreamscape, but that only served to make her feel more real.
The moment those gorgeous pink and purple eyes that were way prettier than any sunset landed on Stelle, they lit up in obvious joy. This had to be the best day of her life. “Stelle!”
Stelle was by her side in an instant, barely situated on the edge of the bed before she squeezed the other girl in a tight embrace. The bell-like giggles from Firefly made her heart flutter. “Firefly…” Stelle could feel just how thin she was now, and the return of her embrace with such a light grip betrayed her physical weakness. “How did it go? What did they say?”
A soft click from the closing door interrupted the brief silence as they pulled away from each other, just enough to talk comfortably. Stelle’s arm was still around Firefly’s waist as she looked up with a gentle smile. “It couldn’t have gone better! Even though it’s still early on, my ELS symptoms look like they’ve slowed down a lot or even stopped. I don’t even need a life-support pod anymore; can you believe it?”
Firefly’s eyes were shining with unshed tears of happiness, and Stelle was sure she looked the same as she leaned in for another hug. “You can finally live a proper life, like an ordinary girl… I’m so happy for you…!” Burying her face in Firefly’s soft, silver-blonde hair earned Stelle another round of those cute giggles.
“I need to stay on the Space Station for a few weeks so they can make sure nothing bad happens, though.” There was definitely a pout in Firefly’s tone – completely unserious, but still a pout nonetheless.
“And you have to eat lots so you get big and strong! You almost look like a ghost!” Stelle leaned back again and gently pinched Firefly’s cheeks, which made them turn pink.
“Hey, I don’t look that bad! But seriously, apparently I can expect to have a bigger appetite now since I can sustain a healthier body and need to fuel a Stellaron…” Firefly trailed off as she poked Stelle’s chest. “Just like you.”
That brought Stelle’s signature lopsided goofy grin out of her. “Yeah, we’re matching now!” It only took a shared glance for the pair to burst into a bout of soft laughter.
The silence had barely returned when Firefly leaned her head on Stelle’s shoulder and spoke up again. “You’ll stay here with me, right? While they make sure I get better.” Her voice was soft and almost vulnerable.
“Of course I will. Where else would I be?”
Later that evening, several rumours reached Herta concerning a pouting raccoon being dragged to the Astral Express while petulantly complaining about not being able to stay by her friend’s side overnight.