# Chapter 29

JADE: i see him.

ARADIA: ooh is it the prince

SOLLUX: fucking finally.

JADE: no.

ARADIA: :/

Calliope animates the puppet body she inhabits, the same one that has not aged a day since it crashed here, and rouses it from perfect, corpse-like stillness. Dead-Jade unfolds from her meditation pose and pushes to her feet in an elegant sweep.

JADE: it is the one i have been waiting for all these years.

JADE: we have run along parallel lines for what may as well be eternity, but my gravitational well has finally ensnared him.

JADE: and now he is due to fall into this world.

Dead-Jade folds her hands behind her as she rises into the air, body language delicate, purposeful. Aradia hitches her arm around Sollux’s back to lift him up, and follows Jade’s body out into the open air. She casts her pitch-black eyes down to watch the dark clouds of battle beginning to form above the Human Capital below. Sollux frowns.

SOLLUX: are y0u sure y0u want t0 g0 d0wn there? it seems like it’s ab0ut t0 get wild.

JADE: yes. more than you can possibly imagine.

JADE: the chaos war is about to begin, and our window of opportunity is narrow.

JADE: we must be there when he falls.

JADE: come with me.