The Great Wild was, and always would be, a mystery. Starlight would know. It had been a long time since little Emma had Imagined her into being, and she still couldn’t untangle the vines and weeds of that impenetrable wilderness into which so many had faded away. That’s what happened when Emma forgot her Imaginations, they faded away, into the Great Wild.
This is what Starlight was thinking of as she walked the old, backed-up memories from when Emma was little. They called the fading Wilding. Starlight was thinking of these things because she was meditating on a scheme that might allow her to solve the mystery of the Great Wild. Or it might fail, like it had before.
She paused at one of the memories. Emma was repeating, eagerly though awkwardly, words in the language of the daffodils that grew in the shady corner of her backyard. Starlight studied it sadly. Rainbow used to be in that memory, telling Emma what to say and laughing when her tongue became tangled in the strangeness of it and the words came out slanted and sloppy. But Rainbow was gone. She, being the first of them, had Wilded a long time ago, by Starlight’s sense of time. No one would be able to see Rainbow ever again except in the lilt of a voice, the swoop of a curl, or the tilt of a head belonging to a newer Imagination.
Starlight was Wilding too, although she wasn’t as far along as Blue Lilac, the second oldest Imagination, was. Her form had begun to fade and blur more obviously. It would only stop if Emma somehow remembered her again, and Starlight couldn’t remind her.
Some of the newer, quicker, younger Imaginations could remind Emma about themselves by attaching themselves to her thoughts, but Starlight could no longer grasp the thought-strands when they passed by her. She watched them as they flashed among the aisles. They hadn’t reached for her in awhile. Her hand twitched with the urge to reach out and catch one, but she was too old to be that quick. They never lingered for more than a fraction of a second. Starlight had grown too old to do a lot of things.
Starlight’s attention was turned away from the strands by the appearance of a harried director bustling through the older memories to find a memory Emma needed for one of the stories she was writing. Once, they’d asked Starlight to join them, and they’d given her eyes that changed to match the moon to replace the old ones that she’d lost to the Great Wild, but nothing came of it because they’d forgotten the power little Emma had given her to turn young girls into her star maidens who would dance with her to light the night sky. Starlight missed the star maidens. They’d been the first part of her story to join the Great Wild. She looked back toward the thought-strands. She could not remind Emma, but she could still remember, and so she did.
She could also prepare herself for the Great Wild, and so this she hoped to do also. It was what she was scheming as she strolled the straits of swiftly slowing stories. She felt the soft presence of a someone join her. She glanced away from the stuttering stories sleeping on the shelves to look at Blue Lilac, who was studying a memory of six-year-old Emma, chattering excitedly to her mother about the adventures she’d had with Blue that day.
“How are you?” Starlight asked quietly. It was a silly question. Blue Lilac was faded, and so was she. But it was good to ask, anyway.
Blue Lilac glanced at her and blinked, as though coming out of a trance. She smiled sadly, saying nothing. Her once nut-brown skin had washed out to translucence; long, wavy periwinkle hair had shortened to mottled blue-purple. Her eyes were a limpid, colorless, shade, and Starlight could never quite recall anything else about her, even when they were face-to-face, because when Emma forgot an Imagination’s appearance, no one except the forgotten one could remember, only they and the Great Wild.
Blue Lilac’s personality had faded with her. She used to be a sharp, vivacious girl with bright thoughts in her eyes and a quick retort always on the tip of her tongue. Now she had softened and blurred, becoming slow and soft-spoken. Gone was the snap and sparkle that little Emma had loved so much. The Great Wild had taken them.
“I think I’ll be entirely Wilded soon,” Blue Lilac said softly after a few moments.
Starlight studied her face, trying to find any sort of emotion there. Bland eyes stared back serenely. Starlight wondered if the Great Wild had reclaimed some of her own facial expressions, too.
“Are you scared?” she asked.
Blue Lilac smiled and shook her head. “No. All is as it should be.” She turned her head away to study one of the memories more closely. Starlight was surprised, not that Blue Lilac wasn’t afraid, but that she was so at peace. When Rainbow reached this stage, she had turned caustically bitter. It was as though while Rainbow had been holding on to life with bared teeth, Blue Lilac had let go softly with a smile. It bothered Starlight that Blue Lilac had let go so easily when she wasn’t gone yet.
Starlight wondered if Rainbow wandered the Great Wild bitterly, or if she could wander at all. She wondered if, already, there was an Imagination roaming Emma’s mind with Rainbow’s half-skipping gait, or laughing with Rainbow’s songbird laugh, or watching Emma live life with Rainbow’s beauty-loving eyes.
That was another thing Starlight spent most of her ticking time doing. Wondering about Rainbow and the Great Wild. But she was getting tired of watching the memories of Emma’s bygone days, and she was getting sick of wondering and wondering about the Great Wild and never getting answers. So this was her scheme: to try to visit the Great Wild before she had Wilded. She thought maybe if she just knew a little bit more about it, she might feel less uneasy.
She thought she knew a way to get there.
“Blue?” She asked.
“Hmmm?”
“What would you say if I told you I was considering doing something stupid?”
Blue Lilac cocked her head like a bird and studied Starlight, then turned back to the rows of memories. She was silent for long enough that Starlight thought she might not answer her at all.
“I would say... ” Blue Lilac began softly, watching a memory, “Go for it. You don’t have much time left for stupid things. But Star,” she turned to look at her, unnervingly colorless, emotionless eyes staring right into her, “If you know you’ll regret it when you’re as far along as I am now, don’t. You don’t have much time left.”
Starlight said nothing.
Blue Lilac smiled that slow, soft, serene smile, rested one hand lightly on Starlight’s shoulder, and departed as quietly as she’d come.
Starlight watched her go. Every time Blue Lilac left, it could be the last time she’d see her. That’s the way it had been with Rainbow. She’d been sitting with Blue Lilac and Starlight, wearing a bitter, angry expression. Starlight had gone to look for one of her favorite memories, and when she came back, Blue Lilac was sitting alone. She had thought that angry, angry old Rainbow wouldn’t have allowed herself to slip away so quietly. She knew that Blue Lilac would.
Starlight wanted to go peacefully, too-- and she was sure she would, if only she knew what it was going to be like. So, she’d decided to try something mildly unintelligent.
All Imaginations had a little bit of the Great Wild in them, nibbling at the edges of their existence unless Emma actively warded it away. Starlight’s plan was to tap into it, to just peer inside for a few moments, or maybe even dip in a finger, so she could know what it would be like when she Wilded. She knew it was mildly unintelligent because she’d tried it before, and the Great Wild had taken her first pair of eyes. That was the real reason why that director had had to give her new ones. Everyone had thought that Emma had forgotten them. Only Starlight knew what she’d done, although she thought that maybe Rainbow had known. Starlight used to tell Rainbow almost everything.
Finding the Wild was the easy part. Because an Imagination’s mind was directly connected to their world-- their Person’s mind-- they were much better at navigating their minds. For Imaginations, it was just as simple to “walk” inside themselves as it was to walk outside themselves. All Starlight had to do was close her eyes and follow the steady pull tugging her towards the Great Wild.
Once, Starlight had tried to find the Great Wild, traveling to the outskirts of Emma’s mind. It was then that she’d realized that the Great Wild wasn’t part of what is, but instead, part of what isn’t. So she just had to follow the parts of her that were no longer. The hardest part had been getting close enough to peer inside. The last time she’d tried this, Emma had remembered her a tiny bit better. But she was less “is” now, so perhaps the “is not” would be easier for her to reach.
Starlight let out a shaky breath and clasped her hands together, getting ready to force her sight past whatever memories of her Emma had left. She was nervous. She’d expected to be nervous. Last time she’d tried this, she’d been so concentrated on seeing into the “is not” that she didn’t realize her sight had become a part of it. That was why she couldn’t remember what she’d seen. Anything that could see the “is not,” was not.
With one last, steadier exhale, Starlight pushed into the barrier with all that was left of her. And stopped.
Anything that could see the “is not”, was not.
Starlight stepped back.
She watched the memories that stood between her and the Great Wild, the Is Not: Starlight laughing with a carefree, five-year-old Emma. Starlight teaching little Emma to dance among the stars. Emma braiding a star maiden’s hair while Starlight watched them through eyes half lidded with sleep. Starlight frolicking with Emma and Blue Lilac.
And Starlight decided that she didn’t want to risk losing these sights to the Is Not while she could still see the Is. She didn’t need to know what was in the Great Wild. Not yet.
She did not have much time left.
But for now, she was here, and Emma still remembered her, and that was enough.
And for the first time in a long time, Starlight smiled. She was relieved to know she had that expression. She laughed a little. Sighed.
And somewhere very near by, Blue Lilac smiled one last slow, soft smile, closed her colorless eyes, and Wilded away.
