Howloween 2025!

Disclaimer

Eggshell: The Zooier Than Thou podcast contains adult concepts and language, and is intended for a mature audience. So if you were twelve the first time we did one of these Howloween episodes, you are gosh-heckity-dang somehow allowed to listen to this one. Any younger than that though and you get out of here, I will tell your mom what you’re listening to, I will make sure she finds out. We love you, we want the best for all zoos, all animals, all of existence that there ever was or will be, but, this corner of existence, this podcast, does contain ADULT concepts and language. Like the word fuck. Actually that word is not in the script for this episode, I don’t think we’re gonna say it other than me saying it right there, but, yknow. Things of that nature are abound.

Theme Song

Kynophile: Hey, what can I say?

You’ve got me howlin’ at the moon!

Whoa, don’t you know that love is wild when you’re a zoo?

We’re Zooier Than Thou!

Oh yeah!

Howloween Isekai - The Summoning

Sythos: You have thoroughly read what I have written, Bastion?

Bastion: I have studied your every perfect penstroke, and obeyed your instructions to the perfect letter, o great one. All that you have requested is before us now.

Sythos: Good. So it would appear.

(Canine whimper, BARK.)

Bastion: (comforting) Heyyy hey hey hey, shh shh shh, yeah, I know, guy, I know…

Sythos: Hrm… how is it this way, that so many are unappalled by death, Bastion? Unoutraged, giving themselves over as though mankind has not outwitted so many other natural things already: There is snow, we invent walls and roofs and fires and chimneys and coats and boots and gloves; There is the ocean, and we invent ships.

How is it this way, that so many see death on the horizon and do nothing, standing still, sinking slowly, as if into a swamp, as if our bodies are not THINGS that can be patched and mended, and, if needs be, restored?

How is it this way, that so many others, though they are NOT accepting death, are so ineffectual in their flight from it: they run as fast as they can, trying to keep their heels ahead of Death’s maw by merit of their sheer gusto alone, trying to outpace ghosts… But they can never truly escape the question, in this way. They are like vines before a machete; bowmen before gunmen: their health, however strong, is cut down by something engineered to be impossibly stronger.

Hmmm…

But I, on the other hand, I have poured my soul into my work. There is nothing I believe in more than the power of human ingenuity. We are uniquely gifted in overcoming obstacles. We’ve made an art of unraveling the secrets of the universe. And with each successive generation, our knowledge only grows. Standing on the shoulders of giants, there is nothing we cannot conquer.

Bastion: Your ambition is something that one might admire, o Sythos, o great one.

(Note how Apprentice Bastion, with his careful tongue, does not say “I admire your ambition.”)

Sythos: Tonight, Bastion, we will defy destiny itself and free man from the shackles of Death. No longer will we be at the mercy of cruel, unfeeling fate. What we do tonight will change the world forever.

Bastion: It is a monumental occasion, to say the least, o Sythos, o wise mage of measurement. But… must we take a life to return one to this plane?

Sythos: Magic always requires sacrifice, Bastion, something lost for something equivalent gained.

Bastion: Aw, but… I mean, look at him.

Sythos: Do not pity the animal. He feels nothing and he knows nothing. He is a living vessel without a soul. Our sacrifice of him is for the greater good of humanity. If you DID read my writings, you would already know this.

Bastion: There is a difference, unexpectedly, in my heart on the matter, now that the place hereabout us is set and the time is nigh.

Sythos: Worry not, my trusted apprentice. The ritual will be painless, anyways — a transfer of essence between this side and the one beyond the veil. He won’t even realize he’s left this mortal coil.

Bastion: I hope that tonight, Sythos, in all things, you are right. And… I have not forgotten how much this means to you. Evalynn was your everything.

Sythos: Evalynn is my everything. And I won’t rest until she returns to me.

Bastion: Right. I understand.

Sythos: Have you gathered all the materials?

Bastion: Yes, sir — two crystals of dragonite, a jar of foxfire, a vial of red essence, a thimble of quicksilver, and a crucible… and of course… the vessel.

Sythos: And the final ingredient, a strand of Evalynn’s hair I’ve kept in a locket all these years. Light now the tinder with the dragonite and prepare the material components. Then on my mark, the ritual will begin.

Bastion: Godspeed, master of my hands.

(Bastion lights the fire with a click of the crystals, then begins filling the crucible with the material components.)

Sythos: We call to you, oh Adragan, Mother of Death, Bringer of Silence, hear our command, and come forth.

(whoosh…)

Sythos: We demand your presence, and offer you these gifts that you may grant our desires.

(aside) Now, Bastion. The circle.

Bastion: Yes, sir.

(Carefully, Bastion drips the molten solution over the concrete floor in a circle around the canine, who is spooked by the display. The canine is a dog named Cerby.)

Bastion: I know, buddy. It’ll all be over soon.

Sythos: O Adragan, collector of spirits, we give to you now this exchange: a life, for a life. In your eyes and in your hand, all life is sacred and equal. Return you immediately our loved one from beyond the veil! Bring her form back to the realm of the living, as she once was, as we remember her, before she was taken away from us! In molten essence and quicksilver, in circle burning and in foxfire’s smoke, in this I command of you, Adragan, Keeper of the Night, Guardian of the Veil! Thusly I bind you! Heed my call, and bend to my will!

(A whir of fire.)

Adragan: There is NOTHING more reliable than the hubris of man. How dare you call me here and attempt to bind me. ME, BOUND BY ANYTHING? I am nature itself. Try as you might to defy me, frail human, you will always succumb to me in the end. I DENY your exchange, and take as pleases me.

Sythos: No! I will not… let… go!

(There is a colossal rip, and then pure silence, and then an explosion of wind.)

Bastion: Sythos! What have you done?

Sythos: Adragan!

Bastion: You’ve… you’ve pierced the veil!

Sythos: (trying to contain the spell and hold on to Adragan) I won’t… rest… until…!

Bastion: (distant) Sythos! Where are you?

Sythos: (has not realized he has been pulled across the veil to the other side) I won’t… rest… I can’t rest…

Sythos: (inner monolog) I won’t let you go, Adragan! I won’t let you go, Evalynn! I can’t… speak… I can’t… what is happening to me? Where am I? Smells like… honey and fire and quicksilver… and copal… and myrrh…

Kelly: Welcome to the other side, Sythos. I must say, the brindle coat suits you.

(Sythos’s “speech” is all his inner monolog from now on)

Sythos: The smell… it’s coming from that lamp over there, hanging overhead. No wait, there’s a woman! (stumbles over his four legs) Ah! What… I feel so discombobulated…

Kelly: Don’t worry, you’ll get used to your new form in time.

Sythos: New form…? Oh Gods, what’s happened to me! (dog whimpering sounds)

Kelly: There, there, boy. This is the form you chose when you crossed through the veil.

Sythos: Preposterous! Why would I choose THIS lowly form?

Kelly: You tell me! The dog was YOUR material component after all. And don’t worry, listeners. Cerby is safe and sound in the realm of the living.

Sythos: What gibberish spews from you, lampkeeper? I offered that dog in exchange for my daughter.

Kelly: Yes, and that request was denied. But you, ever ingenious you, chose to defy the Keeper of the Night’s will and pierce the veil so you might have a shot at bringing back the dead on your own. I barely know how you did it. Crazy work, to be honest.

Sythos: No, I… I did no such things! Arriving here myself, and like THIS, this is–this is not what I wanted!

Kelly: Uh, are you sure? Because here you are, chillin’ in the Realm of Memory with your humble guide, Kelly! That’s me, listeners! Psychopomp extraordinaire–that’s a word with Greek roots, ‘psyche’ as in ‘soul’ and ‘pompos’ as in ‘guide,’ so, all together, I am a figure who’s going to help Sythos here navigate Death! Awww wittle bwindle Sythos, with your sharp lil scythe-y claws.

Sythos: No, this can’t be. This must be some kind of dream…

(Kelly considers it)

Kelly: Mmmm, of sorts. We don’t call it the Realm of Memory for nothing.

Sythos: I’m a human. This is just a bad dream.

Kelly: I guess that depends on who you ask. I know a fair number of listeners would kill to be in your paws right now.

Sythos: What are you talking about? No, will yourself awake from this nightmare, Sythos. Ouch! What was THAT for?

Kelly: People always say “pinch me” to see if they’re sleeping. So are you sleeping?

Sythos: There’s just no way. How could I be on the other side? How could I be a… dog? I was on two feet just moments ago!

Kelly: Alright, look, oh great wise one. I really don’t have all day, and this show’s only supposed to be like an hour and a half tops. …Gods, that’s if we REALLY stay on-target here. (Sigh.) Well, you can see the episode length Listeners, YOU tell ME if this episode is a lean machine or if we went over our 90 minute target… Again. Sythos, cmon, get your shit together and let’s get a move on. This segment’s already way longer than I wanted it to be. (Off screen Toggle realizes he shouldn’t have given Eggshell a magical ritual and told her to make it shorter.)

Sythos: Where are we going?

Kelly: I told you, this is the Realm of Memory, and you, my friend, are the sole anomaly in a realm of shades. The only way to get anywhere is through memories. As a dog, you’re uniquely tuned to the memories of canines, so I expect you’ll have some life-altering perspective shifts or something. I don’t know, man. I’m just a psychopomp. (To the listener:) That’s “soul guide.” You remember :)

Sythos: This is preposterous. I’m no dog! And I’m not going anywhere!

Kelly: Oh no, what’s that? Is that a random memory?

Sythos: Wait! What are you doing?

Kelly: Have fuuuuun!

Whatchawant?

Tank: I stand here in the living room, upon my four paws; and today is a somber day. The most, most somber. Extraordinarily somber… and unfortunate… today, dogkind faces what is possibly the most annoying thing to ever happen to any of us until now: my squeak toy, new just earlier today, is now atop the book shelf where I cannot reach it. I can SEE it, there on the very top, a cloth sheep with squeakers inside, hanging partially over the edge; but it is far, far too far away to grab with my paws or with my teeth. I want; I worry; and I wait. How long, will I wait, staring at this squeaky sheepy I cannot get to, drool hanging from my maw, as my teeth have nothing to bite? How long before its cloth will be upon my tongue again? Days? Seasons? Years, perhaps–

(gasp!)

Footsteps! Scott is coming BACK! I will EXPLAIN EVERYTHING to him and he will HELP me, hooray!!

Tank: Scott!! Am I glad to see you!

Scott: What is it, Tank? What do you want, you big ol Bernese Mountain Dog you?

Tank: Hey Scott so when you were tidying up earlier, you were actually holding my new squeak toy when Trent got home, and you two started making out and stuff and you were still holding my toy when you went to go find the lube to do each other in the butt with, which smelled GREAT by the way, if you ever want a third again like that one time PLEASE tag me in, you two don’t have to shut the bedroom door on my account, but anyways as I was saying about the sheepy squeaky toy, when you were holding it earlier you kind of absentmindedly set it on top of the book shelf right here that we are both standing in front of, and it’s still up there, and I can’t reach it, do you think you could do anything about this?

Scott: …Do you want water?

Tank: Oh my god.

Scott: Do you waaaaant scvii’ar’isothid’ivarsktatatatatayo-oht?

Tank: WHAT? I don’t even know what that IS. No, listen, I am being VERY clear right now, just, woah, look where I’m looking. Look where the dog is looking. See me? See the dog? Nowwwww see where the dog is looking! …nothing? Jeez you’re not getting any of this?

(Scott figures this might be Tank asking for food?)

Scott: Tank buddy, y’already ate.

Tank: YOU already ate Trent’s BUTTCHEEKS. Ha. Seriously invite me next time. Kissing, petting, humping, these are all favs, I want in again. I don’t have to be your one night dog stand. Anyways, look. Squeak toy, right there, grab it for me please. Look. Look where I’m indicating. My paw is ON the bookshelf.

Scott: Awwwww, do you wanna learn to read?

Tank: NO!

Scott: Haha, Tank, stay. Stayyyy. (calling to the other room:) Trent! Come look at this!

Tank: Today remains a very, very annoying day.

Trent: Awwww, does Tank wanna learn to READ?

Tank: How do these two leggers own so, so much, while being so, so stupid. There’s only one thing to do. I am going to go chew on Trent’s socks and eat them.

(Nails ticking on floor as Tank leaves. )

Scott: Hey Trent do you wanna stare at a screen for three hours and not move at all?

Trent: I. Would LOVE that.

Scott: Human stuff ruuuuuules. High five!

(slap!)

Howloween Isekai - A Realm with No Magic

Sythos: Absolutely maddening! Why didn’t he just use prestidigitation to get the little sheep? It’s a simple flick of the wrist…! Erm… neck?

Kelly: (as if booping him on the head twice, once with each word) Silly. dog. Your magic doesn’t work in the realm of that memory!

Sythos: What? A realm with no magic? How horrid!

Kelly: Oh, there is magic there, of a sort. You just don’t know it. Also, if I can make an observation, you’re still reallllly relying on your whole “human” thing in ways that aaaaaren’t gonna work anymore, so —

Sythos: Preposterous. I’ll just zap myself out of… wait… OK, give me a second, I have to reconfigure the somatic components of this spell to four legs…

(Sythos makes grunts of physical effort to make somatic motions without using his human hands and arms. He tries! …and fails… And tries! …and fails.)

Kelly: Having fun?

Sythos: What gives?

Kelly: Your magic doesn’t work here, either, you silly dog. Do you rely on it so much?

Sythos: Raahhh! (big angry bark at the same time) I demand you release me from this prison and escort me home at once!

Kelly: What’re ya gonna do? Bind me in a widdle circle?

Sythos: Ugh, this is Bastion’s fault. Clearly he didn’t administer the circle correctly. Or maybe he didn’t balance the materials to my specifications. When I get back I’m gonna —

Kelly: Humans always need someone else to blame for their circumstances, don’t they.

Sythos: What do you know of it, shade?

Kelly: I’ve been doing this for a long time. Listen, maybe instead of getting angry at the world, you should accept your fate and start thinking more like a dog.

Sythos: What is that supposed to mean?

Kelly: I don’t know. I’ve never been a dog before. But maybe if you close your eyes and try…

His Princess

Chelsea: Mmmmmmmm. Eyes still closed, barely even woken up yet, I can feel the summer morning sunlight falling on my fur, as it shines in through the window. And I can feel that he is under me, breathing.

I realize that I have slept with my jaw planted on his face, and my sleepy drool covering his cheek. I give his face a lick. With his human lips, he plants a good morning kiss on the front of my muzzle, and I wag; The sound of my tail thumping against our bedsheets fills the room. Waking up like this is… ah… wonderful.

Jeremy: Mmmmmmmm. Good morning, princess.

Chelsea: I am his princess.

He wraps his arms around me.

Jeremy: You’re such a happy girl this morning.

Chelsea: I roll over in his arms, nuzzling the top of my head back into his face, and showing my belly to the sunlight. He gives my fur deep little scritches, his hands meticulously over some minutes working their way up and down my elated canine body, again and again.

This is a very good morning.

I am a very good princess.

He is my hammock, and we rock in the breeze as the summer sun rises outside, and distant cars pass by on the distant road, and the birds chatter, and eventually, it is probably time that we should get up.

Howloween Isekai - The Realm of Memories

Sythos: I feel so… warm…

Kelly: That was a nice memory.

Sythos: A memory. What does that mean, when you call this place the Realm of Memories?

Kelly: Hey, you asked a pretty good question for once! Maybe you’re not just a dumb human after all!

Sythos: Hey, now —

Kelly: What is life, handsome pooch, but a series of memories? Moments of time and significance that you carry with you, and that you impart to others so that they might learn from them? This, too, is the afterlife: a realm of lived memories, moments of time and significance that persist beyond the death of the body, that are carried with the soul when it crosses the veil. These memories gather in the collective unconscious and form this realm of resting souls. This is a place where souls may reminisce on those they shared living moments with, waiting to be remembered in kind, when the veil is thin. Even in your land of the living, no one is truly gone as long as there’s someone still there to remember them.

Sythos: And what happens when there’s no one else to remember them?

Kelly: Do you fear the endings of things so much, my little brindle companion?

Sythos: There is an unsettling uncertainty and ambiguity in Death.

Kelly: Death is anything but uncertain and ambiguous.

Sythos: … I don’t belong in this place.

Kelly: You’re where you’re supposed to be, I think. Come on, there’s more to do.

The Metro

Bullet: The gardens today have been very nice. Certainly nothing exceptionally exciting, but certainly very nice; a slow, invigorating walk with one of my humans, along cement and boardwalk paths that meander through manicured marshes, pausing for minutes to sniff at bushes, taking in the smell of these bushes’ growth, the smell of the soil underpaw, the smell of scent trails left by mice and chipmunks that have walked past this bush since the last time it rained; standing in place with my nose to the ground, sniffing, and taking in just how much of the world has passed by these shrubs. Lying down for a while at one point as my human sat at a bench, and we observed other humans passing by, occasionally other dogs passing by.

I am glad to have come here with him again today, to this lush and verdant space, hidden away in a city where so much of the rest of it is unlike this.

When it is time to go, we exit to the edge of the gardens, wait for a crosswalk, and when we are allowed, we cross the busy street that has halted for us and for some others. There across, back into the familiar city, we go a short distance over the sidewalk before descending down a flight of concrete stairs painted yellow on the edges; in the cavernous room at the bottom, one of the trains arrives just as we do, and we get aboard.

There are not many others aboard right now. The doors close. My human sits down.

I continue ahead just a few paces through the cabin, and hop up onto my own spot on the seating, where the vinyl under my belly and paws is cool, and the foam padding underneath is compressed into a comfortable divot for me to nest into.

The train lurches forward in its familiar way, and we begin moving very fast through the underground, towards home. At various times, the train brakes to a standstill, the doors open, and more people get on or off.

We are four or five stops from the Orange Tree Station when the train slows and stops, the doors open, more people get on and settle in, the doors close. And now… there you are across from me.

You are a new trail I have not gone down before. We lock eyes, and stare, for days, at one another. I meet your gaze, and I am prepared for you: I am ready to run and romp with you through unknown streets and forests; I am excited to satellite you as we explore, and I find forbidden things to paw at and sniff, learning new smells in nuances never before known, breathing new stories, inhaling new secrets of the densely magical world all around us; I am eager to be panting and lap at a bowl of cool water that you hold in your hand; I will delight in accepting you into my pack, making you a part of my family and my thoughts and my cares forevermore.

The train slows, and then stops. The doors open.

Nobody is getting up.

Nobody Speaks on the Metro (song)

Zipwok: Nobody speaks

On the metro

Nobody cares

Nobody knows

Nobody speaks

On the metro

Nobody knows

This is your song

And you just sit there

Loud and quiet

While I wonder

What is going through your

Mind as you look

Into my heart

For every 4 beats

My heart will skip half

And you just sit there

Loud and quiet

While I wonder

What is going through your

Mind as you look

Into my soul but

Nobody cares and

Nobody knows

Nobody speaks

On the metro

Nobody cares

Nobody knows

Nobody speaks

On the metro

Nobody knows

This is your song

You just sit there

Loud and quiet

While I wonder

What is going through your

Mind as you look

Into my heart

For every 4 beats

My heart will skip half

And you just sit there

Loud and quiet

While I wonder

What is going through your

Mind as you look

Into my soul but

Nobody cares and

Nobody knows

You just sit there

Loud and quiet

While I wonder

What is going through your

Mind as you look

Into my heart

For every 4 beats

My heart will skip half

And you just sit there

Loud and quiet

While I wonder

What is going through your

Mind as you look

Into my soul but

Nobody cares and

Nobody knows

Howloween Isekai - Sonder

Sythos: I don’t know how much more of this I can take. The yearning, this feeling of…

Kelly: Sonder?

Sythos: Sonder?

Kelly: It’s strange living life through other people’s eyes, isn’t it?

Sythos: Listen, I just want to go back home, and relieve myself of this… canine form. I’ve learned my lesson. I won’t devalue the lives of other beings. Can we just let bygones be bygones? I’ll even… I will even stop pursuing resurrection. I do not say so lightly. Just take me back home.

Kelly: Sorry, Charlie B. Barkin, you can’t strike a bargain with a psychopomp. I’m just here to light the way and keep this episode movin’ forward. And I think I see something up ahead that’s worth the trip out this way.

The Three Lives of Timber

1.

Timber: Our lives were made up of firsts: we took our first steps, clumsily aiming our paws at the ground, one after the other; we made our first noises, feeling the tops of our throats wimper and yelp; we all suckled side by side; we all felt strength course through us as we grew bigger and bigger and bigger in the world, our clumsy ambles became running, our whimpers became full throated barks.

Day by day, different human visitors came. They would often get down on the ground with us, select out different ones of us to play with, and then, usually, papers would be exchanged with our human, and one of my siblings would go away with the visitors, and we would be fewer.

One day, when there were two of us left, some human visitors came. They did not come to play and say hello; They looked at me, talked briefly with my human, papers were exchanged, and then my human came and picked me up, and put me into a cage, and I was handed over, and in the cage I was placed into the back of the visitors’ car.

2.

Timber: Everything changed so fast. A sheet was over my cage as they carried me out of the car and up to the house for the first time; when we were inside, I could smell sugary cake, and hear human pups excitedly screaming at each other. My cage was set down. I could hear everyone gather around in sudden rapt silence. The sheet was taken off, and I flinched at the light, and the deafening screams; the human pups clambored to the door of my cage and threw it open and lifted me out, and began squeezing my paws, twisting my arms, shouting in my ears; I barked and tried to get away; I looked to the adults for help; the adults were as happy as their young ones at my pain.

I was their new toy for the rest of that day.

And then, I became a part of the scenery, living among the other bent and discarded toys. The humans were so often yelling at one another, mean shouting, hurting each other with words; crying, stomping, slamming doors; and me just, there, wishing to not be there, hoping to be forgotten about, unnoticed in these fights. Hunger–food on the rare times when someone remembered. Hiding…

It went on like this for so, so long.

3.

Timber: Sometimes there were visitors. I did not think much of them.

There was, though, one visitor who was different, in ways I did not realize at first. I do not know how he related to the rest of the humans, why it was that he started coming to sit on the living room couch now and then; I had never seen him before, and then one day, years in, he arrived for the first time, and continued arriving one time every week, for about an hour apiece. He was quiet, not loud. Even when he spoke to the other humans, the ones who were always in fights, with his quiet voice, he got them to speak quietly, something I so rarely had heard before. He was aware of me, but did not stalk after me, did not try to touch me. He began bringing me food; little scraps of sandwiches that he would take out of a coat pocket, and leave on the floor, and then get up and go away–truly go away, not remaining around the corner ready to see that his trap had worked; it was the best food I had ever tasted.

One day, I saw that papers were exchanged, and then I was led into his car, and we drove away.

Things changed in ways that I was so slow to trust. Now a quiet home where there was never yelling, never fights. Being given such good food to eat ALL the time. I waited to learn what the trick was going to be. There never was one. Feeling, eventually, like I was okay with not just blending in with the walls; one day crawling up onto the furniture, and resting on blankets and pillows. Realizing–eventually accepting–that this is my life now. There is no trick. This is not a temporary respite; I am not ever being given back to how it once was.

I lay on one side of the couch, and he sits on the other, reading a book.

I get up, walk across the couch, and lay down with him instead, resting my head on his lap.

He cries, and pets me so gently.

Howloween Isekai - Bittersweet Memory

Kelly: Such a bittersweet memory…

Sythos: So painful, to live with such cold disregard. Is this truly the life of dogs?

Kelly: Frankly, it could be the life of any creature. And I dare say you got off lucky in that one. We’re steering clear of far more painful memories on this journey.

Sythos: I despise those awful, noisy, grotesque humans with every fiber of my being.

Kelly: What else do you feel?

Sythos: Hollow.

Kelly: No warm fuzzies from that last part?

Sythos: I’m never getting back home. Nor as a dog will I ever find MY place in this afterlife… and… (sigh.) Will I ever see her again?

Kelly: I can only see as far ahead as my lamp will light the way.

Sythos: Doomed to forever live vicariously through the lives of these pitiful souls!

Kelly: I guess ‘pitiful soul’ is a step up from ‘soulless vessel.’

Sythos: And Evalynn… I can never find her memory in this form. And with no one else on the mortal plane to remember her… she’s truly gone forever…

Kelly: OK, enough of the depressing monologuing. Why are you so afraid of Death?

Sythos: How could I not be? What the hell does it mean? How can someone be here one day, and gone the next? I don’t understand. I can never understand.

Kelly: So you fear what you do not understand, and you mourn those who are beyond your physical reach.

Sythos: Don’t trivialize the pain humans feel when they lose people they love.

Kelly: (sympathetic) Death is a part of life. Everyone and everything must pass through the veil at some point. It’s not something to be afraid of. But… I understand how it can be painful.

This is the Realm of Memories. If you find yourself again in the realm of the living, remember how much memories of love and warmth from the living world transcend the boundaries of mortality. Remember that, eventually, memories are everything.

Sythos: How could I ever forget?

Elves

Shelby: We are sitting in her reading room together. Her on her chair, me on mine. She reads in silence, today, as the morning sunlight shines in through the big window. But I remember this book. By its size, but also by its familiar scents, the hands that have touched it, the invisible stains of scents from when it had been set on the kitchen counter mindlessly when a meal was being prepared for a family gathering, ten years ago, or when it was left in a box with some outgrown clothes, before being rediscovered and put back on the shelf when the clothes found another home to be handed down to. Knowing this book, remembering this book, I can remember when she did not read its pages silently.

I can remember a time, a summer, when night after night, bedtime after bedtime, me and her great granddaughter would climb into the guest bed together, and snuggle in as she sat on a chair beside us, and read aloud to us, telling us about elves and dwarves, friendships and long journeys, prophecies and stories from ages long ago, delightfully filling meals, sweet songs, cozy comforts, joys that were grand and joys that were middling and and joys that were small.

She seemed immortal then. Untouchable by age, by time. The great granddaughter grew so fast, just as our kind’s pups do, and all the while, the great grandmother remained unchanged, constant. But my father said to me, idly, one day, “You will be her last.”

“What do you mean?” I asked him.

And he explained it to me.

(Sigh.)

I don’t know if I realized, naive as it sounds, that they were of finite time. Ages difficult to conceive of, but, ages that must eventually end.

And so, she and I, together, will see the end of days. She, the one who raised my father. She, the one who has pet with her own hand distant ancestors I have only vaguely heard far off legends of.

It is my hope, after all she has paid to my kind, that I can be the one she relies upon, during this last thing that she needs of us. It is my sacred burden and sacred honor to see her through to the end.

And I will remain here, after her, for a time. And I will remember her.

Silently, she turns the page.

And I, silently, am here with her, for now.

Those Who Love Elves (song)

Tarro: Words on a page,

They never seem to age

Though the paper might yellow

With time.

I once thought that you

Were just like them, too,

As ageless as elves in

My eyes.

As pages have turned,

I’ve now come to learn

Even elves say goodbye

To their kin.

Time may pass by,

But as for me I’ll

Stay here by your side

Til the end.

Howloween Isekai - The Nexus

Kelly: We’ve arrived.

Sythos: Where are we?

Kelly: At the Nexus of Souls. This is where the veil is the thinnest, and even those who aren’t magically attuned can glimpse through the veil and connect with the ones they’ve loved and lost.

Sythos: Will she be here?

Kelly: Shh… the ceremony is starting.

Samhain Ritual

Toggle: Tonight, we gather in this sacred place where the veil is thin, to call to those we love on the other side. Those who share our history. Those who share our souls. Those who share our hearts. We call to you who have passed beyond. Come and return to us. Hear our stories as we remember you. For in remembering, we let you live again.

Who would like to go first?

Lovecat:  Sophie, you were only a few weeks old before your life ended. You deserve so much more than that. I wish you had lived long enough to meet you and see the joy of life in your eyes. Your time here was brief, but I’ll keep a place in my heart for you. I love you sweet kitty.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 1: Today and most days, I remember you. My first love. Hopefully not the last. I can only aspire to your level of confidence. How you commanded the room in your presence. Yet, you knew when to be sweet and gentle. You offered protection, despite your stature. You provided an ear to listen and a shoulder to cry on. Sophie, your name will always live on in my heart. May you be chasing all the raccoons and chewing all the bones in the afterlife.

With love,

Your mate

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 2: I remember my dear Pablo. He didn’t have a long life, but in the short 8 years I had with him, he opened my heart in ways I couldn’t have imagined. He was more than a companion. He was a friend and a partner. He gave unconditional love even when I didn’t know I needed it. Losing him left the same hole in my heart as losing a human family member. If I could wish for anything, it would be to be able to thank him one last time before he crossed the rainbow bridge.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 3: Amy

Where do I begin?

Your owner told me that you were a rescue pup. Your past owners said that you were a candidate for euthanasia over behavioral issues that couldn’t be rehabilitated, and your owner wasn’t interested in seeing that happen. Hard to believe the chilled out creature of habit that just wanted me to gently touch her so she knew she wasn’t alone was somehow a monster of a puppy, but I suppose we’re all somewhat a terror in our youths.

The first time I remember meeting you we didn’t interact much. It was the second or third time that you were actually allowed loose in the house. I remember the first real conversation we had - over, of all things, food, local specialties with meat and bread that you begged for and I thought I’d get in trouble for giving you. Your owner just laughed and told me that was how you were - you would guilt anyone into giving you some of their food.

From then on, we slowly got to know each other, through my retreats from home to where you lived and even through your last days when I was asked to take care of you so you could stay in your home instead of a kennel for a while.

I remember the time you couldn’t stand that I was the only one there but you hated being left alone even more so you wouldn’t let me stop laying next to you for anything in the world… and I remember when you were sick from the cancer and I couldn’t get you to eat much until I once again split all my meals with you just to see you eat something, anything to try to keep your strength up.

Your passing was a shot through my heart. I’ve had so few non-human friends in these days, and you were someone I treasured dearly. But your story didn’t end with your passing.

Your owner messaged me to let me know and then got in the car and started driving. He didn’t care where he ended up. Hours away he checked into a hotel and told me he was alive but just couldn’t be home. Although I did eventually tell him about the remembrance ceremony each year on the podcast, he never sent me anything to forward or asked for an address, so I’ve wound up writing this.

I later visited the house on one of the retreats from my own home. I wasn’t ready in the way I thought I was, to walk in the door and find one of your usual spots to rest in the house gone and replaced. Everywhere I went in the house, you had been erased, save one photo in the living room next to Bella, your packmate that passed before you. I never said a word, but I realized then how much you had meant to me.

Much, much later I helped your owner work on his garage. Your things from out there were still there, not let go of yet. He had me set them aside, but not for the trash pile with other things pulled out of the garage. I think he still thinks of you from time to time, too.

You remain my best canid friend in these last few difficult years, despite our few meetings, and you are loved and missed by me, your owners, and others alike. We are comforted in the knowledge that you held on for so long for the love of this life and what was left in it, and that your pain has finally ended. I know I am far from the first in your heart, but I hope one day there is a field where you tackle me into the grass like the puppy you still were underneath everything when we first met, standing next to your owners, greeting me as you always have - the person synonymous with food, friendship, and help. It was always such a gift just to be near you, and far more than I ever deserved.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 4: Dear Tala,

it has been half a year now since you have passed. Cookie and I are actually on our way to visit your family for the first time since then, as I’m writing this.

I imagine it will be very different without you there.

We were all shocked when we heard that you had inner bleeding in your spine, leaving you paralyzed from the waist down. There was some hope for a while, that your condition would get better with time, when the bleeding would end and stop pressing on the nerves.

But after some weeks without any betterment in sight, your family decided to put you down.

It isn’t fair at all. It all happened so quickly, so suddenly. No one could have guessed this could happen to you from one day to the other.

You still had a full life to live, so many new experiences still ahead of you. You were only 3 years old when you died.

We only found out after the fact that spinal bleeding is something that happens to some German Shepherds, such as yourself.

And you were the biggest German Shepherd I have ever had the pleasure to know. I think you were the biggest dog I have ever known, period.

But you were a gentle giant. Your coat was black as night and your eyes were the colour of sky when the sun dips down over the horizon. You were beautiful and charming, as well as blunt, direct and confident. You were a young flower, just as it was starting to go into bloom. Always up for pets and cuddles, and even more eager to play catch with a ball, or tug of war with any old piece of fabric. I still remember long walks through the forest on warm summer afternoons. Just you, my husband, our canine girlfriend and me.

You were something of an older sister to our own dog, even though you were not related by blood. There was a lot of teasing involved when you two were playing, especially from your side. You just knew that you were bigger, stronger and faster than her, and would use that to your advantage.

But I know that you loved her dearly, just as she loved you, and we loved you. Not getting to see you again will be weird and confusing for her as well. She does not yet know that you are no longer with us.

I also wonder if your pups know that you are gone. You had 11 kids, all from one litter. Two of them still remain in our wider family, your two daughters. I am so sorry that you couldn’t watch them grow up and become confident, mature dogs in their own right. And I am sorry that they won’t get to see you from time to time, visiting and playing with their mother, as we intended.

There is now a big hole in our future were you were supposed to be, and that hurts.

I do not personally believe that you will hear these words, or that you would even understand them if you could.

But I want others who care for your kind as much as my husband and I do to know that you were here. That you made an impact on our lives and that this matters.

You weren’t our own dog, but you were family.

We will still mourn you for a long time, and we will miss you for the rest of our lives.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 5: Loki, Sol, and our friends.

I thought I was rescuing you, but that just wasn’t true.

Your floof warmed my heart. The one humans, had torn apart.

All whistle, thumping and lots of poppy jumping,

you could always brighten my day and lick my tears away.

of every bag a crinkle my heart beats a wrinkle

now, they remind me of you. Always there, just out of view.

like every bag of Timothy Hay As morning comes, my dreams fade away.

Leaving me, thinking of you and all the small thing you would always do.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 6: Gato

When I was 16, my former stepfather bought my biological mother a make-up gift. That gift was an adorable, frail calico kitten. When he later tried to murder my biological mother and was thrown from the house, she went to have the cat euthanized. And that’s the story of how a canid therian with a disdain for cats - and their divorced biological father - wound up with a calico kitten.

You were so, so strange. You were a lot like me - jumpy, clearly borne from the trauma of that house. But in those first days, you would come running to me any time you felt afraid, and try to hide in my lap or the folds of my arms. A reminder of what it means to take a refugee into your home.

You slowly learned you were safe there and that everyone there was a friend of some sort. As time slid by, you would follow me and my biological father around the house, more curious and eager to find a lap to sit in than anything else. You would paw at my door if I didn’t take you in at night to sleep in my bed - and often times you would jump up on me in the morning to tell me it was time to get ready for school and feed you.

So many memories require people to just know our lives - of the time spent chasing you around the two doors leading into the kitchen in a loop, of the wall covered in carpet samples you would climb and then meow because you were afraid to climb back down, of the quirky, odd ways you behaved. We really were two of a kind, cut from the same traumas, and I’m glad I made room in my heart for you.

When I was thrown out at 18 and got my own apartment, I was devastated to learn you couldn’t come with me. My biological father - who never wanted a cat from his ex-wife, and never wanted the responsibility of a cat - begrudgingly took over your care. We saw each other very little after that, although you always knew who I was and would come right to me as I passed by.

I know as my biological father died of cancer, you became his companion the same way you had been mine. People told me stories about how you would lay on his chest and reach out and paw his face first thing in the morning to tell him it was time to get up. And I know - despite how he treated me and how he said he didn’t want you to begin with - that he modified his entire house so you could get around and get in and out of it, even when everything was locked and closed. The only door ever kept shut was mine, and I imagine that must have been so confusing for you at first. I’m sorry I wasn’t there.

My biological father, in the middle of us fighting as the cancer slowly marched him towards his death, called me on Halloween night one year, to tell me that you had passed. You had been outside while he was at the hospital, and the neighbor had hit you in her car. Not knowing what to do, she kept you in her freezer so that he could bury you when he came home. He buried you in the old grilling pit of the house. A tiny space I sometimes give pause and look at when I find myself passing by.

Some days I still think you’re on my chest getting ready to reach out and paw my face gently when I first wake up, and I reach out to pet you so you know I’m awake only to find you’re not there. The ghost of you, still playfully haunting me and reminding me there’s something to get done out in the world.

I don’t like cats, to this day, but I miss you so much. I hope there is another world where you’re pawing at my biological father’s face to tell him to get up and feed you, where things are quieter and there’s a safe way to get down off a climbing wall.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 7: Nikita

When I was told a couple years ago, for the first time, that I was the bestest girl, my mind once again strayed into the past to your story. I’ve been hearing that phrase a lot lately - “bestest girl” - and I can’t seem to get your story out in a way that works well, so this is to you.

I was rendered homeless and disowned at 18. My half-sister and her first husband let me stay on his family’s farm, where there was very little food, no running water, and way too much booze for a kid who just had their entire life torn out from under them. You were one of his family’s pets, still running loose out on that plot of land. And that is how we met - me with my life completely demolished, and you living as you probably always had.

I would stagger out into the woods, drunk, not caring if I was alive to wake back up, and I would awake in the freezing rain, sweating, with you next to me, having gotten close and refused to leave my side until I was awake. And then the endless, often still-half drunk stumbling through endless acres of land and woods, back to the house where I was supposed to be, with you refusing to let me sit or stop until you knew I was safe. And this went on, for two to three months, and you never once failed to make sure I was okay.

I could tell more stories from those times - of handfeeding a starving kitten, of your packmate Polly, of the fact I somehow hadn’t hit rock bottom yet - but this story is about you. Things like the ignorance of youth, like circumstance and distance, like human things like “ownership” and “neglect” meant I wasn’t there for you that winter. My half-sister mentioned in an offhand way that you had frozen to death, after all the time spent keeping me from doing the same. As though letting you inside for a couple months was something she couldn’t be bothered to do. As though she didn’t complain about the cold herself and didn’t know it was that bad. As though so many petty, human things that just make me so angry and bitter inside.

It has always been hard not to hate myself when I think about that, despite my helplessness to even keep my own life going in those days. Nikki, I hope across the rainbow bridge you are young again and free, in a world where there is always food and it’s always early Autumn and nobody ever ignores you. I have done and will always do everything I can do to just get people to hug dogs and be compassionate to every creature they come across, and so much of that is because of the time you spent keeping me alive.

I am terrible at goodbyes and endings. I have been asked to talk about the bestest girl I’ve been blessed to know year after year, but other work on the podcast had me not wanting to make it entirely my show. This year I decided to talk instead.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 8: The creatures of the fields and mountains of wild and wonderful West Virginia where I grew up - I have not for a second forgotten you.

To the bird an old woman’s cat caught - I remember you. Feebly beating your wings on the kitchen floor where I picked you up, where she told me to leave you and let the cat pursue the nature of things. The way you clumsily took flight from my hands out the window, given a second chance, is forever etched into my memories - and is forever a moment that I come back to when I help other creatures in this world.

To the deer a singer befriended on his walks to and from a university through a mountain forest - I remember you and how you would walk with me every day through that patch after he left. I remember when you were illegally poached off the hillside. I remember how I went up there and saw the empty fields where you used to graze and come to meet me for my walk home at night. I remember how I laid there where you’d graze and cried for hours when there were none of you left. You are a deeply missed piece of the last innocence and wonder of my youth.

To an old dog named Boscoe - I remember you. The natural sciences lounge of the university, I’m told, was your usual haunt. I don’t know. I know when I was sleeping in between my classes and the tutoring I did in the evenings, you were upset I was on one of your favorite seats. After a week or two of this, you finally climbed up and tried to lay with me. After that it became a running joke that the tutor with the collar and the dog without one would lay down together. But I don’t think you minded, really, when it was all said and done - I’d come in there for my usual evening nap and you’d be waiting for me. I have not forgotten. I hope your life after me went well.

To an owl named Jack - I remember you. When a burly man of these mountains hit you with his truck and bawled because he thought he had killed a creature of the mountains, I thought it so funny and strange that such a tough guy had such a soft spot. Yet when I visited, there you were, your wing gently taped into alignment with a splint, perched on the edge of his side table to his chair. He fed you and nursed you back to health, and then was forced to release you back into the wild by the game warden. He said you stayed near his house but never tried to come to him again. A constant companion in the late nights when he’d come home from work.

To a mouse caught in a humane trap, later named George - I remember you. Being a renter is hard. You can’t have pets and anything seen as a pest has to go. You were different. We never found anything you’d destroyed, and we never saw any messes or anything from you. When we caught you, we had intended to transport you a few miles out of town, to an abandoned building, so you’d have a second chance at life… But you leapt out of the basket we’d placed you in so we could give you some food and water for the night and scurried into the nearest gap in the wall. From then on we’d see you from time to time, and even had to explain to guests that we unintentionally had a single unofficial pet and that you were harmless. I swear sometimes you would put your tiny paws on my hand where it was slung over the bed, but by the time I moved to look you were never there. I hope that you had the best life, and while we worry in the inevitable pattern of things done to an apartment for upkeep, I hope you had the best death, too. You truly earned your place in our home and hearts.

To the countless creatures that I have encountered and helped - turtles, gophers, muskrats, birds, frogs, ladybugs - you are not forgotten. You are forever painted across my memory and my heart. I hope all your lives went the best they could and that I was only ever a help. I dream of another world where you come to greet me and show me your little families and your homes, excitedly chittering away about how it almost didn’t happen but my help made it all possible.

This land is wild and wonderful. There are undoubtedly others with similar piles of stories of this land. I hope it forever remains that way.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 9: To a Sabre-toothed Cat

I should open, here of all places, with the note that you were human. I have written countless stories of countless people, but as you are one of the many who have indirectly helped the podcast, I felt you should be memorialized in it when I finally spoke about all the non-humans I’ve known that have gone away.

I barely remember when we first met. I was a teenager, volunteering at the local library. So were you. You would talk about the oddity of computers and of some bizarre game named MechWarrior. And that is all I remember, back then.

But.

Years later, when I was around 21 and had just quit drinking and doing drugs, when my life had hit the lowest point I thought it ever would, when I weighed 80 lbs of barely alive and couldn’t string sentences together… you recognized me. Passing on the street. You had just survived your first round with pancreatitis and weren’t doing great yourself, but you asked me how I was doing and what I was doing. I think you realized that I wasn’t okay.

And then you just refused to leave.

When my family tried to ruin my life because I wouldn’t talk to them, you didn’t leave. You stood beside me. Defended me. Time and time again.

When I said I’d like to start playing Dungeons and Dragons again, you opened up your home after one of our players closed his, and then did MechWarrior with the same crowd on the off weeks. I still run the discord server we used to keep the table together and communicating. We still get together in the Dungeons and Dragons time slot. Although I know you’re never gonna log in again, you’re still a member there, too.

When I had projects to do around the apartment - wiring it for internet, fixing a door latch, rebuilding pieces of my world to work well enough to keep carrying on - you were there, with tools and advice and thoughts about how to do it. When my father died, you were there. When the state said I wasn’t allowed to see my daughter and I embedded glass into a wall, you were there. Picking glass out of my wall, my God, man. On every one of my worst days, you were there.

I cannot summarize the quirky, caring nature of a friend that was the same kind of weird in a few short paragraphs. The decade we were friends is a time I constantly return to. Sometimes I’ll be doing something and I can still hear that mischievous cackle when you realize I’ve done something wrong. Nobody can read my mind like you could. Nobody knew me like you did. I will never have another person in my life like you - a true, genuine soul-brother, a rare, once in a lifetime opportunity.

There are just a few pieces to tell, though. And I wish to tell them.

When two different groups of teenagers on Twitter and a certain website all had my personal information, and somewhere amongst them were people calling so many people I knew - a story recounted in an email to the podcast in a reminder that “Life Isn’t Over” - you didn’t bat an eye to find out I was a zoophile. I told you that you could leave with all my love and understanding and forgiveness, and you laughed and asked me if I needed to get your ex-marine father to get involved. And that was that. You and my older brother were the two people I was most afraid of losing, and you both reacted with, “After everything, you think this is going to do it? Riiiiight.”

My relationship with the man I thought would probably save me went wrong, so wrong. Our favorite photo was taken in your apartment the night his plane landed and is of me happy - everyone’s favorite photos of me have him in them. With me happy. But… when that fell apart, and all I could do is curl into a ball and shake for days on end, when I wouldn’t even answer my messages any more, you kept on trying. Why, I don’t know. But you didn’t give up. You’d message me, I’m going out - do you need anything? Did you want to get some fresh air? Have you remembered to eat? Have you considered going back to therapy? All these gentle ways you tried to nudge me back towards the friend you knew that would roam this town and these mountains, with the endless patience that you had.

When you died from your second round with pancreatitis, a piece of me died with you. I knew I was sad but everyone, these few years later, agrees that’s when I probably smiled for the last time, all the way up to a specific moment this last summer. And even the following year - I couldn’t get an Eigen Ground script in. I was just too sad to write or really do anything. The podcast got The Dark on FM radio instead.

As your father and I went through your things, I was struck by how many random objects were stories of us - wine corks for when I was DMing D&D and didn’t finish a bottle, tools that only existed because of my presence in your life, the things you got together to help a confused and drug-addled mess keep track of things. I know I was a big piece of your life, too, and your love for me showed in all the material things left behind as evidence that we had been pieces of each other.

But I miss you so much. I still have so many problems that I would have turned to you with, that I cannot now. It feels like almost every day I think of you, still, all this time later.

I could write an entire book and it would still pale in comparison to the times we shared. This precious little will have to do for here and now.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Toggle: To Fausty, without whom this podcast absolutely, 100% would not exist. I would be remiss if I didn’t pour one out for you each year, even if I don’t have a lot to say anymore. You were probably my closest friend for the year we knew each other, and that’s how I choose to remember you. Thanks, dude. We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 10: Dear Violet,

The barns so quiet. I fake a smile but I haven’t been okay in a while. They say grief fades but they don’t know the way your hoof beats haunt the gravel road. Your names carved in wood out in the back field. I leave you flowers, just to feel something real. Just one more hug, one more ride, one more look from your knowing eyes. I’d give it all for one more sound. Your hooves dancing, shaking the ground. If heaven has a pasture I hope you are running free. Tail high, wind wild, just waiting for me. When my time comes, meet me at the gate. I’ll braid your mane and forget all this pain. I sit by your cross and talk like you’re here. My whiskey breath can’t drown these tears. You were more than a horse, you were my heart. The one who healed all of my broken parts. Now the Silence screams and I just survive. You made me feel alive. Ride free, forever in that endless sky my sweet girl. One day, We”ll ride again with no more goodbyes…

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Toggle: Let’s take a moment to honor all the zoos who have left this world before their time. We hope that, year by year, this number gets smaller and smaller, as the world becomes a little less lonely for zoos, and a little more friendly toward the animals we love. As we strive toward that future, their struggles are near to our hearts.

We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Toggle: Take a moment to remember and honor your loved ones on the other side of the veil. Remember all the wonderful memories you shared with them. Remember the brightness they brought into your life. Tell them the things you always wished you could let them know. Say their names out loud. This is your time.

(long moment of quiet)

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Zoo 11: I’d like to share something I wrote for Gracey and Mika. They were my closest companions, my teachers, and my heart. This is for them.

It has been over a year since Gracey left my side. The pain has not vanished; it has only changed its shape. It no longer crashes like a storm, but lingers softly — a quiet shadow that walks with me.

Gracey was with me for twenty years. She was more than a companion; she was my anchor, my teacher, my mirror. Together we grew — side by side through seasons of sunlight and storms. She showed me patience without ever needing words. She taught me that love is not spoken but lived, in the soft brush of a muzzle against my hand, in the silent understanding of shared moments. When she left, the world lost its colour. The familiar rhythms of our days became hollow spaces, and the silence that settled over the yard was deep and heavy.

And then, earlier this year, Mika followed on 14th February. She and Gracey were inseparable — two spirits bound by a quiet, unspoken knowing. Mika would sit in the hay, gazing toward the horizon, keeping watch for Gracey. Even though she was a dog, something passed between them that transcended words. Perhaps it was born of the love I carried for each of them, or perhaps it was something entirely their own. Their bond was gentle, steadfast, and real. When Mika left, another light went out, and the stillness deepened.

Yet, over time, faint glimmers return. The birds still sing in the mornings. The wind still moves through the grass where they once walked. In the quiet moments, between heartbeats and breaths, I feel them both — not as they were, but as they’ve become: part of everything.

They are no longer here, but they are not gone. They live in the lessons they gave me, in the strength they shared, in the love that endures.

I miss them more than words can ever hold, but I carry them with me always. Their love is stitched into the fabric of my days — in the rustle of the hay, the soft light at dusk, the quiet spaces where memory breathes. They walk beside me, unseen but never unfelt.

Toggle: We will remember.

All: We will remember.

Toggle: Our stories are told and our loved ones are here with us. Their lives became inexorably intertwined with ours, and ours were made all the richer for it. Through us, they live forever. And at this time we can feel them closer than ever. Ancestors! Lovers! Friends! Stay with us and guide us with your love and wisdom always. We will remember!

All: We will remember!

Kynophile: Return to the earth, to the meadows, where I loved you

Becoming a part of the ever, of the river

Remember my name, and be joyful, no more sorrow

I’ll see you again, when it’s time…

Until then…

Howloween Isekai - I Will Remember

Sythos: I will remember. I will remember you Evalynn, as I loved you. Not as you were when you became sick and frail, but as you were when you were vibrant and alive, when you made laurels from wildflowers and ran through the garden, when you taught yourself light magic and signaled to the fireflies from your bedroom window, when you begged me to read you anything that wasn’t a book of incantations before you fell asleep in my arms. I will hold you close forever… but I know that we are not meant to stay here, you forever kept at the gate of the living, myself forever waiting at the gate of death; I know I have to let you go, and now and then, as the ages pass, when the veil is thin, we will see one another again.

Kelly: Look there, on the edge of the grove.

Sythos: Is that… a doe? She smells like… moss and dander… but also… wildflowers and foxfire…

Kelly: I think she’s come to say goodbye.

Sythos: But… why is she a doe?

Kelly: That is the form she chose when she crossed the veil, and it will likely be how her soul carries on into the next life.

Sythos: The next life?

Kelly: Death is only the end if you have no concept of the infinite, dear Sythos.

Sythos: Evalynn…

Kelly: She’s not a psychopomp; She does not have my same powers, to hear your thoughts. You are a dog now. Go to her and say goodbye the way a dog says goodbye. Don’t worry. I’ll wait for you here.

I Need You So (song)

Trill: Where did those swallows to fly

In those cherry tree times

They saw us melt into one

As the days went by

They were part of our pack

But they’ll never be back

Where is that spark in your eyes

That my eyes stole from you

Did it hide, become fire,

Did it stay within you?

Or did it stay back in June?

Soon mushrooms will grow back

In that forest of ours

But they will not be the same

That watched you and I play

Those will never be back

Now these leaves leave the tree

And I don’t know where they’ll go

Why can’t they hang in there

And retain their shade

Don’t they know that I need you so?

Now these leaves leave the tree

And I don’t know where they’ll go

Why can’t they hang in there

And retain their shade

Don’t they know that I need you so?

Don’t they know that I need you so?

Howloween Isekai - What Comes Next

Sythos: She is gone.

Kelly: How do you feel?

Sythos: …Better. I think I might be the luckiest canid alive to get the chance to say goodbye like this.

Kelly: Maybe it wasn’t a very good punishment for your hubris after all, then.

Sythos: Hey, being a dog is no walk in the park.

Kelly: Ha!

Sythos: But I think I could get used to it.

Kelly: Then I think you’re finally ready.

Sythos: Ready for what?

Kelly: For what comes next. So long, Sythos! Catch you on the flip side! Aaaaand scene! Fwew, all this emotional stuff is hard work. Thanks for sticking with us through the whole thing. I guess there’s really no one else to sign us off, so…

Outro

Kelly: Thanks, friends, for listening to Zooier Than Thou! Our next episode is ostensibly on the next full moon, November 5th, but you know how THAT goes! We’ll be talking about cults or something, so check it out!

Sythos: You can subscribe (KELLY gasps in fright) to our zooey RSS feed at rss.zoo.wtf. You can also check out our extensive bonus content at bonus.zoo.wtf! If you want to show your support financially, head on over to donate.zoo.wtf. Our show’s website is still zoo.wtf, and we have a form that enables anonymous submissions to the show on that website! You can also simply email us at [email protected].

Kelly: Geez, you pierce the veil once and you think you can just do it whenever you want. Remember, if you decide to email us directly, be sure to include an alias we can use, and let us know whether or not we can use your email on our show! If you’re not sure what we need, just use our website form for guidance!

Sythos: Be kind to one another. It’s the sexiest, zooiest thing you can do. We’ll see you next time you feel like howling at the moon.

Kelly: Do I really have to howl?

Sythos: If I have to do it, so you do.

Kelly: Alright, here goes. 3, 2, 1…

Both: Awoooo!