And THEN GPT gave me a dialogue diagnostic checklist that I thought I'd share with my fellow aspiring writers. This is already going to be a long post so I may make the checklist a page and then link to that. GPT's Version (AFTER four hours of yelling at it):
She turns and leaves. Her footsteps fade, then the door shuts with a solid, final sound.Aura waits for it.
Then she turns back.
The King is already watching her.
“How long,” he says.
“Five minutes.”
Something in his face stills. Not surprise—calculation snapping into place.
“…you didn’t check the Axis.”
“No.”
A beat.
“It’s at forty-five percent.”
Silence stretches between them.
Aura’s brow furrows, just slightly.
“…no.”
“Yes.”
“That’s not possible.”
“It wasn’t.”
He lets that sit.
“It is now.”
Aura studies him—properly now. Whatever she’s looking for, she finds it.
“What have you been doing.”
“Slowing it down.”
“How.”
“Breaking things. Distracting people. Making it harder to settle.”
She laughs.
It’s quick, almost involuntary—more disbelief than humor.
“You’ve been annoying them.”
“It buys time.”
“For who.”
“You.”
That lands.
Aura’s expression doesn’t change, but something behind it shifts.
She doesn’t answer.
The King’s gaze sharpens.
“You didn’t know.”
“No.”
“You weren’t watching anything.”
“No.”
He turns away, takes a step, then another—once across the room and back again. The movement is small, contained, but it breaks the stillness he’d been holding.
“If it passes half—”
He cuts himself off.
“No. Not half.”
He looks back at her.
“A few more worlds, and it cascades.”
“And after that?”
“It doesn’t matter what anyone else does.”
Silence again. Not empty—heavy.
Aura exhales, slow.
“Okay.”
“That’s not enough.”
“I don’t have anything else yet.”
Another beat.
Then, simple:
“You’re coming with me.”
The answer is immediate.
“Yes.”
My Fix of GPT's Version:
Jane stormed down the path to the crack in the volcano, pebbles scrabbling for purchase along the cliff wall as she passed.Aura stared after Jane, wanting to follow, but not knowing if Jane would rather be alone. Bear would have known, Aura thought, a little sadly. She'd regained so much of herself, and maybe lost Jane in the process.
She turned back to he king, not knowing what to say to him. She'd been uncomfortable around him Pre-Rift, had actively disliked him during The Rift, and now...? She threw up her arms. "Did you really have to ruin her life over some dumb personal joke?" The King had always been selfish but this was almost -- childish.
The King took in her exasperation, he asked. "No hug, huh?" He held his arms out, as though hopeful.
Aura snorted, trying to hide a laugh. She couldn't help but feel a little happy to see him. She'd met him when she'd been one whole person, and there was something about the fact that he could remember that person that was comforting.
The King smiled, dropping his arms. "I am glad you're here, though, strange as the circumstances may be. I've been dying to ask what you're doing about the axis."
Aura was confused. "What axis?" Before he answered, she already knew, and a pit in her stomach started filling with sharp, heavy pebbles.
He frowned. "The Harmony Axis. It's been spreading. I've been doing what I can, but I assumed you were working on it." He searched her face, and straightened. "You haven't?"
Aura shook her head. "The Mend messed with my memory. I've been a unicorn for the past thousand years. I only came back to myself, like, five minutes ago." She closed her eyes and shook her head. "Mostly."
"Oh," he said, starting to pace. "Oh. Oh no, oh nooo..."
"What -- what do you mean, it's spreading?" She was a little alarmed that The King forgot to keep his shape and sort of melted in front of her, his form kind of oozing back and forth in front of her. Gross.
It took a moment, but he pulled himself back together, and turned to her. "The axis has taken over more than forty percent of all known universes."
Aura shuddered, wondering which alternate universes had been affected. How many of the ones she'd been to? How many of the ones she'd pulled an Aura from in order to save the mini-planets? Forty-percent? That was almost half. Aura had probably only visited, at most one percent of all known universes, but that was still thousands. If four hundred of them had been taken over...she shook her head, horrified.
She turned to The King. "What did you think I was doing about it," she asked, mystified.
The King shrugged. "I don't know. You always seem to be in the middle of universes that need saving. I just figured you were on it."
Aura stared at him, shaking her head in disbelief. "What would I even do? What did you do? Did you do nothing?" A hint of accusation worked its way into the last question.
The King blushed, which was a sight, as he also turned mushy again at the same time. He solidified. "I um. Broke some stuff. Distracted people. Made it harder to settle."
Aura tried to translate that. Then she laughed. "You annoyed them?"
The King shrugged, blushing and mushing again. "I thought you were on it!" he said, solidifying, his shoulders mid shrug, arms flinging out.
"Oh, my God," Aura said. She couldn't help but find some amusement, even as the scale of the threat loomed over her, around her, engulfing her. Four hundred of the worlds, just the ones she'd met, gone. Homogenized into uncomfortable, docile blandness. She wanted to throw up. She wanted to disappear.
She wanted to go back to being Bear -- memory-less but somehow still so world-weary, even with zero responsibility on his shoulders. She sighed, shaking her head. "CAN we stop it?"
The King shook his head, his features mushing and solidifying into worried lines. "I don't know."
GPT's Fix of My Version. I think it's really annoying how GPT makes every sentence its own paragraph. It doesn't stand out if every sentence does it. So, I fixed that, like how I'd have it if I wrote, but otherwise, this is all GPT (based on me, based on GPT):
Jane stormed down the path to the crack in the volcano, pebbles scrabbling for purchase along the cliff wall as she passed.Aura stared after her, wanting to follow, but not knowing if Jane would rather be alone. Bear would have known, Aura thought, a little sadly. She’d regained so much of herself—and maybe lost Jane in the process.
She turned back to The King, not quite sure what to say to him. She’d been uncomfortable around him Pre-Rift, had actively disliked him during the Rift, and now…? She threw up her arms. “Did you really have to ruin her life over some dumb personal joke?” The King had always been selfish, but this was almost—childish.
He took in her exasperation. “No hug, then?” He held his arms out, hopeful.
Aura snorted, a laugh slipping through before she could stop it. She was glad to see him. She couldn’t help it. She’d met him when she’d still been one whole person, and there was something about him remembering that version of her that felt… steadying.
The King smiled and dropped his arms. “I am glad you’re here, though. Strange as the circumstances are.” (beat) “I’ve been dying to ask what you’re doing about the Axis.”
Aura blinked. “What axis?” And then she knew. The pit in her stomach filled with sharp, heavy pebbles.
He frowned. “The Harmony Axis. It’s been spreading. I’ve been doing what I can, but I assumed you were handling it.” He studied her face. “You haven’t.”
Aura shook her head. “The Mend scrambled me. I’ve been a unicorn for the past thousand years.” She rubbed her face. “I came back about five minutes ago. Mostly.”
“Oh,” he said. And then—“Oh. Oh no.” He started pacing.
Aura straightened. “What do you mean, it’s spreading?”
He didn’t answer right away. For a moment, he forgot to hold his shape. He sagged—edges softening, form slipping, something underneath him loosening in a way that was deeply, viscerally wrong. Gross.
He pulled himself back together with visible effort. Turned to her. “It’s taken over more than forty percent of known universes.”
Aura shuddered. Forty percent. Almost half. She tried to think through it—what that meant. Which worlds. How many she’d seen, touched, pulled from. She’d only visited a fraction of a fraction—but even that was thousands. If four hundred of those were gone—
She shook her head. She looked at him. “What did you think I was doing about it?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. You’re usually in the middle of whatever needs saving. I figured you were on it.”
Aura just stared at him. “What would I even do?” she said. Then, sharper: “What did you do? Did you do nothing?”
He actually blushed. Which was impressive, given that he also went slightly… liquid again at the same time.
He solidified. “I—uh. Broke things. Distracted people. Made it harder for anything to settle.”
Aura stared. Translated. Then she laughed. “You’ve been annoying them?”
He shrugged again—half solid, half not. “I thought you were on it!”
“Oh my God,” Aura said. And she laughed again—shorter this time, a little hysterical at the edges. The scale of it pressed in anyway. Four hundred of the worlds she’d touched—gone. Flattened. Smoothed. Made small. She swallowed. “Can we stop it?”
The King shook his head. His face didn’t quite hold together this time. “I don’t know.”
