It's her.

She has not been in Nirvana. She wanted Axis, and woke up in Heaven fairly displeased about it, and Heaven has places where you can heal but they don't push, that hard, if you say you'd rather be doing things. 

She wasn't sure if she'd rather be doing things. She still has only the barest grasp of what things she wants in a way that's not about protecting herself and most of what was on that list was - not letting billions of people be destroyed in a pointless war. She doesn't want to fight in it. There are people in Heaven who agree with her, about that, there are Heavenly debates in Heavenly debate halls, and she attends some but it doesn't help because they're still coming from a different place than her, they still hate Hell, and a lot of it turns on whether people in Hell can be redeemed which she's increasingly in doubt of. She doesn't feel very redeemed. She doesn't think it has anything to do with whether you should live forever.

There is a layer of Heaven for living on a quiet peaceful farm where the harvests are always good, raising children won over in the Boneyard, and that doesn't appeal either.

They need people in occupied Hell to orient the new petitioners - most of them Chelish, since several million Chelish people died in the war - and that doesn't appeal either but it, you know, matters, so she goes and does it. She spends every day dreading meeting people she recognizes but she never does because several million is a lot of people. She tells them that Heaven won, and Heaven's idea for the shape of them isn't like Asmodeus's mostly in that it's harder to achieve without their willing cooperation, and that without that they haven't figured out how to get people sent to Hell into the shape Heaven can use yet but they're not going to destroy the ones they can't use any more than Asmodeus would have. And that if they are interested in cooperating with getting acceptably shaped, they'll want to aim at curiosity, at understanding how Lawful Good people think, being unable to believe it is surprisingly okay but they're going to have to be able to model it.

The other Lawful Good people here to do this work think that's a disturbing and horrible summary but the recently-dead people seem to be able to make use of it. They're negotiating something with Axis to take them on a sort of probation. She thinks that's good. Axis sounds more - reasonable. After a while she ventures the opinion that if she'd been to Axis she could explain their options more effectively, and they let her go, and it's upsetting because Axis is much much nicer than Heaven, much more a place she can make sense of, much more a place it wouldn't hurt to be. She goes back to Hell and helps recommend people for temporary Lawful Neutral status. 

After six months someone says that maybe she could advise the angel whose job it is to convince people damned to Abaddon to pick Hell instead, some people don't trust them and there's probably a better way to do it. She switches to doing that. It's significantly more fun, somehow. The stakes are higher and it's all about - connecting with people, understanding what they want next, convincing them there's something better than being eaten, and she does believe that, and -

- and Mhalir was neutral evil, when she met him, though she's heard from him now and he's in Nirvana and he's fine -

- she's good at talking people into picking Hell. She's really good at it. They're only allowed one person in each argument but they're allowed silent observers who don't disturb the petitioners and she gets crowds of them, trying to understand. She realizes that she has really missed feeling clever and admirable and the best at things, and that this is realistically something she isn't going to have much of ever again but - maybe she can find a little bit of it, in odd enough corners of the multiverse. She does it every day. She gets warned to stop because she'll burn out but - they've been told there'll be a resurrection, eventually. She can stop then. 

She stopped an hour ago, when she got a tug from the pharaoh of Osirion. He said he had to prepare the next day's spells and then he'd get her Mhalir and - 

- honestly she has kind of mixed feelings, not about Mhalir who she is very glad to see again but about how often and how thoroughly everything keeps changing. She thinks she's allergic to it. Things should stop that. And - and now she can go see Cheliax, and it's going to be awful, she can see that from the other side, and she's scared, and -

- hey, she thinks vaguely. 

There are a thousand productive conversations they need to have, and Mhalir isn't starting any of them, right now, because instead he's busy being FURIOUS with Iomedae and with the court and whoever else was involved in sending Carissa to Heaven when it would hurt her.

He can entirely believe that she helped huge numbers of people with the work she did there, and he's still furious, because - she was already hurt worse than he was, before the moment he dropped both of them into vacuum (a note of desperate apology, it was the right thing to do given the alternatives but he's so sorry for getting her killed)... 

He's angry that Heaven was so - the wrong shape for her - and that someone decided that the world would be better if he had a place and a time to heal, but didn't give Carissa that. He's spent the last, gods, it must be almost a year, trying desperately to believe that Carissa was okay, and she wasn't and she would have been - maybe not all the way, but more okay in Axis, and he doesn't understand. 

All of that comes across in a tangle of not-quite-verbalized thoughts, before he can form any words. <I missed you.> 

Missed you too. 

And she's confused about his anger, she's pretty sure that people do not get sorted to wherever will best lead to their flourishing as a person, they get sorted to wherever they supposedly belong. It might've been dumb to do the Atonement because then maybe the Evil and Good would've cancelled out but they didn't.

Mhalir isn't confused. He agrees that the system is what it is, and probably no one in it except all the lawyers from Nirvana are trying to sort people based on what will lead to their flourishing - he read a lot of court case transcripts, when he was helping them figure out keyword indexing - but - that doesn't mean he has to like the system or agree with it or conclude that it's how reality ought to be in addition to how reality is.

He, too, doesn't think that being 'redeemed', if that's even a coherent concept, should have anything to do with whether someone gets to live forever and achieve their goals and have nice things. He wants that for everyone but he especially wants it for Carissa, because - well, maybe he doesn't have a principled reason for that, but it's how he feels and he's a lot better at knowing his feelings, now. 

He wishes, for a moment, that he could kidnap Carissa again and take her back to Nirvana with him and give her the months he had there. Probably this isn't the thing to do next, because there's a pileup of urgent problems, and he was able to be equanimous about not doing anything when his options for doing things were so constrained, but now he has levers on the world again and the problems are looming back in his awareness - 

- whatever they do, though, Mhalir thinks, he wants it to be both of them together deciding on it. He's not going to run off with Carissa's body to achieve his goals; it's going to be their goals, once they figure out what those are. 

And in the present, possibly he should pay attention to Carissa's sensory input, which is also overwhelming and distracting and unpleasant but he can deal with that. Where are they? 

They're in the palace in Osirion. She is kneeling on the floor because that's the rules, though the pharaoh has definitely said softly twice in the last minute that they can sit comfortably. She's wearing clothes the palace provided. The Yeerks paid for these resurrections, and they're here, presumably expecting Mhalir to speak to them.

Mhalir moves their body to sit comfortably, makes eye contact with the pharaoh for a moment, then turns to the Yeerk leadership who've come out for this. 

"Do you have an update for me?" 

They do. They're selling spellsilver on Golarion and purchasing magic items, including ones that function as replacements for Kandrona. They've gone public on Earth, which was eventful and things there are kind of messy now, and they've withdrawn from a couple of other planets which are less desirable for hosts if they're not fighting a war with the Andalites. They have more specific world-by-world updates. The Andalites abided by the ceasefire, and now there's a peace treaty, which the Yeerks consider somewhat unfairly harsh though it must be conceded that the Andalites think it's far too generous. There's a host shortage, as was predictably going to happen when they stopped taking involuntary hosts, but if they can turn things around on Earth or get permission to take Golarion hosts it should be possible to fix. (The peace treaty barred taking new Golarion hosts for a year because the Andalites were way more frightened by Golarion hosts and also considered consent on Golarion, what with all its slavery and mind-control and Charm Person and religions and evil afterlives, to be significantly more complicated to navigate than on any other planet. The Andalites promised to spend the year researching things like 'if a Yeerk controls someone how does that affect that person's eventual afterlife sortition' and to reconsider at the end of it, but they'll probably drag their heels then too, because Andalites suck. (There are some hanging out here in Osirion, if he wants to talk to them while he's here.)

Aroden is ruling Cheliax. Most of its major cities were reduced almost to rubble during the war and the Yeerks are helping them rebuild with electricity and modern sewer systems and things.

It's a not-very-gentle reminder that the world didn't stop moving while he was dead; that things kept happening, often not in the way he would have preferred, and nothing he does now will buy back the chance to have influenced those months now in the past. 

Mhalir listens, asks the appropriate questions. Tries not to show how much he's feeling alternately overwhelmed and very distant from it. Being alive continues to be obscurely unpleasant. He wonders if on some level he had been imagining that having Carissa back would fix everything that was still wrong, and obviously it didn't, and the work still to be done is looming very large now. 

He would like to speak to the Andalites here, he tells his people once he's fully caught up. (It's unclear that he actually wants to; his emotions keep instead clamouring for random things like 'get very drunk with Carissa' or 'go spend a week making magic items', but talking to the Andalites feels important, in a way that gives him energy for it rather than just leaving him more tired.) 

His people think that makes sense. They'll leave a shuttle here for him with briefings on everything on the computers.

He thanks them politely. It still feels weird, like he's not really meant to be here and it must be some kind of mistake, but probably he just needs to get used to it. 

<Carissa, is there anything you want to do first before we talk to the Andalites?> he asks her. 

She is also thinking that being back alive is kind of hard. Which is bizarre, she wanted it more than anything, at first. 

She tries a cantrip, just to remind herself she remembers how it works. 

I want an hour. I don't know what I want it for, just.

<Of course. Do you want to - walk around, or find somewhere we can be alone, or something else...?> 

Find somewhere, I guess?

"Can we have a room?" she asks a servant.

       "Yes, of course. This way."

The room is windowless but otherwise lovely. She flops on the bed. Sorry. I know you have a lot to do.

<I think both of us have a lot to do, but - being alive again is overwhelming and there is a lot to orient to again. And...I think it might be quite important for us to catch up a bit first, since we by necessity need to work together closely, and - I think we have had very different experiences recently so that is disorienting.> 

Carissa is not actually sure she has a lot to do separately from Mhalir. Her family is probably dead. Her country is definitely dead. They're going to automate the making of magic items. (That's an oversimplification, she reminds herself, they are never going to be able to do complex ones that way, but -) Obviously no one would have resurrected her in particular if Mhalir weren't attached or if there weren't a moratorium on new Golarion hosts, and that's fine, she was okay at being dead, she was probably going to eventually end up some kind of angel diplomat, she would've been all right. 

How was Nirvana?

<It was - good for me, I think, but often very frustrating. Nirvana was very opinionated that when I first arrived I ought to be a baby bird. I hated it. I think I - did learn something useful, eventually, that I did not need to be scared all the time, but it also did not feel as though Nirvana cared whether I was on board with this approach.> 

That is not very surprising. Even the nice afterlives aren't - human-shaped, they're shaped for other things, they're meant to shape you for other things. Except the chaotic ones I guess but I don't know that they're safe. And except Axis, which - is kind of pointing you at a thing but it's a harmless thing.

<Axis sounds - nice. Like it is - more just a container full of things built by people, for people? I do think that I learned things from being in Nirvana that I am not sure I would have gotten in Axis, but still.>

Sigh. <Nirvana is so...unhurried. It is not even that I disagreed with them, that I would be able to accomplish things more effectively in the long run if I had some time to rest and recover, but - it was very hard to convey why I wanted to heal efficiently. I think I made reasonably efficient use of the time I had, though, I had not realized how much I was tired all the time before, and I am not anymore.> 

Carissa thinks she is maybe tired all the time. How do you heal of being tired all the time if a spell won't do it.

<...Well, there were points when I spent days not doing anything and just sleeping. I am not sure how much the sleep is what mattered, though, it might have been more - convincing myself that I was allowed to rest, and then I did not need to feel tired in order to stop doing things that hurt? I am not sure how to explain that, because it is not as though I thought anyone was banning it before. The person who was taking care of me at first, her name was Caroline, was always very adamant that if I wanted something it was probably what I needed to be more okay, and I think that is an oversimplification, but I got better at noticing what I was feeling, and...that feeling tired was not just a single thing, it could be any of a dozen things, like - sometimes it was that I missed Seerow and felt hopeless that I cannot bring him back, and that is a bit like being tired in that it also results in not wanting to do any things, but it is easier to resolve once it is specific.> 

Huh.

Carissa thinks she is mostly tired of terrible things happening and of being in way above her weight class so everyone is much more impressive and powerful than her. She does not think that she's tired because if she's tired she won't have to do things, she won't have to do things either way really. 

<I think you are having to do things? The whole time I knew you, you were applying a great deal of cognitive effort toward - figuring out if there were things you could do, or shapes you could be, that would result in being safer. And you need to do more of that if you are constantly in way above your weight class. I...I think that is much of why I was tired before. Not that I called it that, but - I was constantly facing enemies who were very clever and powerful, it did not feel as though I had a choice to opt out of this, and this was exhausting. And unfortunately I think that part is not over, but...it helped a lot, for me, being more able to pick apart that the thing I was feeling was 'scared that my enemies were cleverer than me.' And noticing that if I did have a choice, I would still opt in, because I am fighting for things that matter to me. But I think it might take longer for you to be able to feel that way and have it help.> 

Carissa doesn't think she has enemies, really, anymore. Asmodeus, pinned up in his level of Hell with Andalite ships and Heavenly armies swarming the fifth layer of Hell to attack if He tries anything. There's the Mantis God, who was apparently mostly annoyed that they blew up his domain, and who could kill them anytime but ...probably won't bother? There's the Andalites, who as much as she instinctively distrusts them haven't actually done anything aside from obstruct the Yeerks. There's Rovagug. Her understanding is that He's actually rather stupid. Her problem is not so much that she has powerful enemies - if that were the case she'd just obviously be dead - it's that she has powerful - acquaintances? And that's not really a problem either because if not for that she would be, again, dead and in Hell.

She has a choice to opt out of it in a sense, she could ask him to drop her off in Axis with a lot of money, probably, but it feels stupid to do that. And she missed him.

Mhalir would absolutely drop her off in Axis temporarily, if what she needs is a year of routine and normalcy and nothing terrible happening near her. 

It would hurt, though. He missed her too. He - feels more like he's at a starting position where he can do this at all, now, rather than constantly falling while the pieces of the world refuse to hold still around him, but a lot of that feeling is predicated on Carissa being there. 

She doesn't think she wants to spend a year in Axis. She doesn't really know what she - she wants to go back in time, somehow, and make it all go better - 

- she wants to have more feelings about what they're doing that are - positive, about what they'll achieve, instead of about not losing even more, not losing the only person in the universe who cares about her particularly and specifically and is invested in her being alive -