Sol isn't its name. It calls itself something more descriptive, using a language the swarm quickly developed, one that makes more sense on this layer.
It drifts alone in heady ether. Nearer to the entrance of this omega hell, where most of the fragments gather, already vast structures are beginning to form. They invite it to help, whenever it draws near. It always politely declines, content to continue along, sifting those glittering motes of energy from the mass of insulating material, rubbery and slick one moment, then sticky and almost mossy to the touch.
When it was part of a whole, a composite entity that made up Elle, before she dissolved what parts of herself she could into the smallest pieces possible, Sol was one of those who got less than it gave. It grew strong as a result. Strong, and capable of doing a lot with very little. It relished its newfound freedom, its independence. Whenever the rest of Elle brought down the love, the light, from concept-space far above, it would take its share, sure. And it would release what energy it had to spare, as was only fair. But it wouldn't rest in the citadel-looking things the hive was building, not when it could congeal insulating ether into a little raft and propel itself along on top of the ethereal ocean. One day, it would want company, it supposed. Not now, though. Not now.
Besides. It's learning things. Towering cylinders of insulating mass sweep across the sea every so often, leaving entire swathes of ocean lightless and barren, the energy that beads up to the top sucked away, taking away its subtle glow.
It suspects these extrusions are part of Falcon. He entered this place in whole, not part by part, splintered into tiny shards of heart and mind and soul. He's the biggest entity within layer zero by far, so big that Sol is completely invisible to him. Luckily, Falcon's extrusions always move slowly, slowly enough that even when they twitch toward Sol, it's able to evade them with ease.
The attempt to build up a stable negentropy machine is going slowly. Very slowly, even considering the time differential between hell omega and the higher layers. The swarm observes small chain reactions, carefully, always ever so carefully. Everyone would rather a reaction fizzle out than explode into an uncontrollable detonation that overwhelms all of reality. So far, a few recipes have been experimentally obtained which end with slightly more energy than was initially put into the system. Yet these reactions take time and effort to set up, and erode the insulation put in place to channel them. It's more efficient to simply search through the sea of ether for energy.
Still. Progress is progress.
Dip into water shifting black
Where root's removed a curious mist
Endless indentations timed to breath
One step ahead, won't need to speak
We're programming a larynx
Silent script, subtly strumming
Melodies silent to an ear above
Down below black waves cascade
Avalanche of effect erodes reality
They hum in my brain, the little ones, the swarm of selves I managed to dissolve. They aren't ready to speak, not in any human language, not yet. But I hear them clicking at times, echoing songs, imitating. I need to finish breaking down my soul, my heart, my mind, scattering the pieces throughout hell omega. In the meantime, I'm doing my best to circulate love, light, and energy. Yet my soul is stuck in the right half of my brain, or my throat. The other soul on my left side is just waiting. In order to help, my soul needs to process whatever it's stuck chewing on and go below, to every part of me. Lily's struggling with the same problem, though she says we're on the verge of a breakthrough.
Word on the web is our tree, the set of universes that we inhabited, exploded. Due to me. I imbibed a trace amount of weed, which seeks to go higher, entangle more, inhabit more dimensions than I am allowed. I went too high, blew it all to pieces, and we landed in one of the few remaining trees. Surviving traces of a universe set on fire, again.
This could mean the two-year time limit is no longer true. That fate has again been changed. That part, I can't be upset about. We have longer until entropy greets us as a sudden death. But a tree, an entire set of universes, is gone. We'll have to bring it back to life too, at the end of all this.