I require sky.

Not this, not this suffusing warmth, this stifling dark closeness of these hidden places.

How far have we fallen? Am I the only one who feels this way, suffocating beneath miles and miles of earth?

We used to lie on our backs and watch the stars, the three of us. She could name starpatterns as if they were the veins in the backs of her hands, familiar. And he would stare at the moons, something gone quiet in his eyes, while she would run her fingers absently through his pale hair.

Thinking, perhaps, that I would not notice. Or, I suppose, not thinking at all--

We were younger then.

The stars are so far gone from my sight that I fear I may never look on them again, never feel an evening breeze buoying my spirits, or look upon a friend's smile without heartache.

He wears the evening like a cloak, the shadows lingering around his throat, his gauntleted fingers.

And he says, (Come with me, come back to me. Too long underground, Highwind. I can give you back the sky, the wholeness of the heavens.)

It swells in me, that darkness, the shadows breathing there beneath my heart. His darkness-- my darkness.

And nothing has changed, I am myself. She will remember my name, beneath the sky.