[A visual form should be fairly easy, though a physical form would be somewhat more complicated.] The space it occupies refracts, the view of the stars beyond seeming to distort and compress, until nearly the whole sky is visible as a shrunken image filling its cut-out silhouette.

[Some prophets are sent on purpose by its conspecifics; this one in particular has never done so. Some form naturally. Making an existing human into a prophet may likewise either be done deliberately or occur naturally. She is the only example of an outside context person that it knows of.] For prophets, it echoes the concept from Cameron's question back to her; it seems to be trying to understand the way she construes the category, and handling the concept with the same attentive deliberation as a human trying to pronounce a foreign word for the first time. (Its own understanding of the category might be better summarized as allies, or perhaps spellcasters, or celebrities.)

[There is more space outside this shell, and further shells; it does not know whether there is an outermost shell or what may be beyond it if so. It does not know whether there are other types of beings living in the outer shells. It is not aware of any indications of an overall creator or watcher. It indeed just lives here.]

[It values [communication – discussion – commingling of minds – coming to [agreement/compromise/cooperation]] in general.] This appears to be a single concept, to it, not quite corresponding to any single human concept, but partially overlapping with several. [Cameron's values seem to be closely entangled with physical bodies; how would that interact with, or analogize to, beings (such as itself) whose bodies are not physical?]

[Proposed compromise-value: following one's nature and natural desires; the union of flesh with flesh and spirit with spirit; unrestricted access to these.]

Cool special effects.

Her own concept of prophets was very broad and probably inaccurate. She will adopt its understanding of the category. This is good, in that it rules out a possibility. Bad, in that it confirms that the prophets and she herself are separate puzzles.

Those are inoffensive values it has, instrumentally compatible at the least. Non-interfering compromises are best when positive-sum combinations are not viable.

Cameron wants to know if there are reasons not to make this here crater more itself until it becomes a passage to the other side of the shell. She would like permission to do that.

[It does not claim authority to permit or forbid, but it advises and requests caution; it doesn't know what's on the other side, or if it might be dangerous.]

That's reasonable.

If it has reason to suspect the danger will be to them, Cameron will risk it herself after giving it time to vacate the area. If it suspects the danger might be on the scale of, for example, a small hole causing the shell to crumble and destroy the planet below, she will of course refrain.

[It would expect any damage to be localized. If the shell were fundamentally unstable, then surely it would have crumbled before now.]

Sound reasoning. Cameron agrees.

Before it leaves, Cameron is curious if this individual has an identity known to the humans on the planet below.

[It does not. A being of its type usually only becomes known to humans through a prophet.]

And it leaves.

What a nice god-thing.

Once it has departed fully. Cameron tips backwards and dispels her platform shield, letting herself tumble backwards into space. She counts in her head as she falls, as the crater above her recedes, so she doesn't let herself fall too long. No such thing as terminal velocity in space. Then she casts a large shield below herself and slams down on it hard enough to make it ring and make her bones ache for the split second they can before her healing spell fixes it.

That should be enough room for her orbs to accelerate.

Cameron resummons her weapon, and fires the first of many orb blasts at the apex of the crater.

The crater is now slightly bigger.

Yup. This is probably going to take long enough that she's going to be pushing the time frame she told Tegan and the Doc.

She leaps off her shield, repeating the same move again, to double the distance between her and the crater. Once she's standing on a shield again, she settles in to start firing orb blast after orb blast into the middle of the crater.

The crater grows, gradually.

It's not like Cameron is going to run out of orbs.

She sets her tablet down next to her and keeps at it, using both arms.

The crater gradually grows into a tunnel, as shards of glass fall around and past her.

And then the stream of falling glass begins to accelerate, rapidly—

Well that's convenient. Right? There aren't cracks spreading across the sky in all directions, right?

(She casts a shield above her, twice as big as the one she's standing on and at a slight angle. It holds up to the impacts of the falling glass easily.)

RIGHT?!?!

No cracks.

But as the stream turns to a river, something else seems to be coming with it, not quite physical but numinous and profoundly alien, even more so than the distinctly inhuman mind of the not-god was, and it passes through her shields like they're not there. It doesn't seem to be affecting them, or her, though.

Or maybe it is affecting her. Are the stars eyes – had they always been eyes – is the glass singing –

Alright. This is more like it.

(Also, whew. The sky is not falling.)

Hello, eldritch sky thing, are you why Cameron is here.

There is no response. Either it can't hear her, or can't understand her, or can't answer, or doesn't care to.

Around the edges of the crater above her, the glass (music, water) seems to be undergoing a sort of crystal growth (blossoming, awakening), but in strangely organic (inhabited) shapes like coral or (writhing) vines or (shoaling) tentacles.

It's healing.

Well. That's probably objectively better than the alternative, but it kinda kills her plan to look around on the top side of the shell.

The way she sees it she has two options and the time to make a snap decision.

Push on and possibly pick a fight she could very well lose.

Or.

Run the fuck away, wait and hope Eelesia can find her.

She only has one more gravity shade, and she doesn't have enough mana dice on her to power it for more than... a day? If there are more shells outside this one, getting through this one right now doesn't actually matter. Without an atmosphere to accelerate her, she probably won't even make it to the second shell, let alone any shells after that.

Fuck it, she can still get a glimpse.

Cameron snatches up her tablet, holds it up over her head to frame the hole, and leaps, bounding from stepping-stone shield to shield, throwing herself upwards, racing towards the crater with all the speed her healing-boosted legs can muster.

The river of glass and magic doesn't seem to be slowing noticeably, yet. And as she gets closer, she can see that the tunnel (throat, eye, hiccup) isn't noticeably narrowing, either; the occasional attempts at inward growth are broken off by the torrent, leaving only a slight unevenness on the surface (skin) they grew from.

It's a long tunnel (story); it takes her over twenty minutes to reach the upper end.

And then she emerges (hatches) onto the outside of the shell (shell), surrounded by a rushing (whirlpool) of
(truth), the (eyes) twinkling serenely overhead.

Cameron lands on the lip of the hole and lets herself be still for a moment, lets her tablet focus on the whirlpool the hole in the endless expanse of glass.

She pans slowly in a full circle, just in case there is something to see, and just to get a sense of the space up here. Then she looks up at the eyes stars, meeting their gaze for a long moment.

The shell is a green-blue ocean, shimmering and faintly luminous. The eyes overhead regard her with somewhat more interest. They cannot see her. They sing to the ocean above. The ocean loves her. It does not know she is here. It is laughing.

This is like the fluffy bunnies and butterflies version of an eldritch Horror's backyard. It's actually kind of neat.

She kind of wants to shoot an impromptu sex scene against this backdrop to make the trip worthwhile, but there's no way any of this will come across in video. It feels like it should, but all the screen of her tablet is actually capturing is empty featureless glass.

Cameron stands there for another few seconds, then returns to the hole, and dives in.

She swims downward, and eventually emerges into a cavern where she started. The barnacles along the walls of the throat are gathering more thickly, now.

With no air to slow her down, she plummets out of the throat tunnel in moments, and soon leaves the shell and the surreal atmosphere of the ocean far behind her.

She has a long way to fall.

She falls (swims), and the (river) falls (pours) along with her.

Long minutes pass, the earth growing (blooming) beneath her.

And the first thin whispers of atmosphere begin to suggest themselves around her.