Mother's voice cut through their jumbled thoughts, clear as ice and Clearstone. It restored order to their mind for a brief moment, before that fragile order broke apart once more. Wary? They could not understand. They could not physically muster the resolve to be wary when someone they had thought lost for cycles upon cycles was suddenly here, in front of them.

If Rift's reaction was unexpected for a long-overdue reunion, Yellow hardly noticed. There was most likely some reasonable justification; perhaps it had simply been too many cycles; the sifaka had been young when they were separated, after all, and Rift probably had many more friends. But they weren't searching for explanations, they were just... overwhelmed with relief. There was hope, too, searing and agonizing, and dread that curled like cold tendrils of poison around their insides when they finally realized what Rift was saying.

Sebastian was still missing.

That didn't mean anything, they told themselves fiercely. If Rift could awaken again without their knowledge, even though they had kept his chrysoberyl gem close for so many cycles--and without Mother's knowledge, too, despite her web of spies and fungus all over these caves--then just because Rift didn't know where Sebby was, didn't mean Sebby was gone.

What did you see? ... I have no idea who you are. I don't have a lot of... memories.

As Yellow pulled away from their embrace, a wave of dizziness washed over them. Their heart was beating so quickly and loudly that they could feel and hear it pounding like a drum. They blinked repeatedly, waiting for it to go away as they processed the question. "M-memory loss? Huh..." There were implications to that that made the dread sink deeper in their gut, but their mind wasn't capable of clearly thinking through it any further than the basic instinct that something might be wrong. Instead they focused on the easier part: Rift had asked them to describe what they saw.

Not that the terrible scene was particularly easy to describe, but with Rift right here in front of them, with the knowledge that Mother and their family would forever be connected to them, the horrors seemed much more far away than they had when the Wishing Stone had granted them that awful vision. "A-After the fire, I woke up from my chrysalis alone. It had been a long time, I think, and I didn't know where anyone was. I looked for you and Sebby for a while, but... I didn't find anything, until a magical singing stone that granted wishes appeared in Polaris. It... it gave me a vision of where your stones were in Eridanus. I found them, but they weren't chrysali like the one I woke up from. No one was inside. I didn't know what it meant, so I went back and asked, and--" The sifaka clutched the Collar of the Wind God around their neck, feeling as though on the edge of a precipice. Their voice came out barely above a whisper. "It showed... it showed this evil miasma of a Gembound fighting you-- you and Sebby, and then-- a big tree fell on you, and you were--gone." They were safe. Rift was right in front of them. Both were on solid ground. So why did merely saying the words feel like throwing themselves off a deadly cliff?

"I brought the gems back here. To keep them safe. I... I had no idea you were still here." They couldn't stop staring at Rift, as if he might disappear at any second. "Do you..." Yellow trailed off. There was so much they wanted to know, but they didn't know how to ask any of the questions, or if Rift had any of the answers. Their mind whirled with disjointed thoughts. A sudden memory surfaced: a divine figure, dark-skinned with stars in his eyes, and the sifaka blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

"C-could you have been... Reborn? Like us, with our it-" Sudden alarm bells rang through Yellow's mind and they shut their mouth. They weren't supposed to have said that. Inexplicable guilt welled up in their chest, pressing heavy as a boulder on their lungs, and they looked down. Their eyes felt rather wet and stung in the freezing cold.