Ember tosses her head back and howls in elation and treachery. In the back of her head, she knows that she is drawing attention, that Mosaic may very well chase her and then the hunt will be on, that she has almost certainly been followed by packmates, but it bubbles out of her happy and wild and joyous, joyous, awe-struck and delighted and tail-wagging and Celebration in the wind, all goldensatin fireworks.

She howls for the moon and she howls for the little moon; she howls for the death of the crab and she howls for the life of the huntress, the grand lion who would toss the whole pack into the sea with one hand if she wanted to. She howls because her girlfriend has just killed a giant enemy crab and made it look like an act of worship. She howls in defiance of the Corvii, of Taurus's foolish plan, of stealth and secrecy and silence, of everything except the things that she gets to feel, here, right now, in the presence of Mosaic the Huntress.

When she finally lowers her head, she isn't breathless, but the smile on her face is the same as someone who has just had the air pushed from their lungs with a kiss. She hops down onto the sand, tail furious, dancing from foot to foot, all her desires jumbled up and all focused on her, her, her; on what it would be like to run from her; what it would be like to kiss her bloody mouth; what it would be like to be praised for impossibly catching her; what it would be like to swim into the depths with her and watch her catch fish bare-handed.

Fight me, kiss me, race me, catch me, whatever you like, Mosaic, Mosaic, Mosaic, only let me be as important to you as the crab and the moon...!

.

The cloud has condensed, spun into a dense cotton ball. No longer twirling around his fingers, but enclosed in them. Occupying the space between nails and palm. Resisting, gently, the squeeze of a fist.

“I see.” Says the little sheep, a speck on the side of a mountain, on the fringes of the Skies. “Your job is - my job would be, regardless of my practical station, to ensure all decisions made are made with the…greater glory of the Skies as the first priority. Whether overseeing someone else’s choice, or overriding it.”

He tilts his head questioningly.

“And what do you think about it, 20022? Not in comparison to anything else, that’s a different matter entirely. I mean, just as it is. What do you think of the Apollonian response?”

Behind folded hands and simple curiosity, his tail twitches. Once.

Dolce!

"I think there is simply no alternative," said 20022. "No species can survive having absolute control over life itself without either descending or ascending above what it once was. The Molechian Empire, and soon the Shogunate, are descending. Unregulated personalist rule leads to madness, and madness killed half the galaxy in the ultimate act of hubris. If civilization does not have a higher ideal than mere pleasure then it will be destroyed by those whose pleasure is the love of war."

He thought. "But you asked me how I feel about it," he said. "Well. I suppose I feel an overwhelming feeling of fortune, gratitude and deep and abiding self-worth whenever I act in accordance with my Function. It's just a little background glow to my life. I've been told it's a similar effect to romantic coitus, but I've never been tempted to experiment in that direction."

Dyssia!

Amidst the wreckage of the ship, light reflecting in broken metal, solidifies a rainbow.

The Crystal Dragons are marvels. Not only is their digital breath capable of communicating reams of data over vast distances, but they can convert their own bodies into that strange light. Their wings are not solid, and should not be functional, being as they are made from that semiethereal projection of concentrated knowledge - and from the wings inwards reforms Brightberry, rising above the destruction like an omen. She soars.

Her hexpattern breath sweeps the army, cataloguing in instants the ranks of soldiers and their armaments. The light flashes over you briefly, a sparkling after-effect bathing the world for a second. The light has condensed down into a steady, constant beam - a communication link, like she might send to another dragon. As the flow maintains she starts to broaden it out into the shape of letters appearing on the ground in front of you; a one-way transmission of data, even as she continues to circle over the wreckage of the Firetree. She intends to stay up there and provide information.

And what she can tell you is that the drones are being activated.

Already some of them scuttle across the exterior of the ship, scouting swarms, moving like ants. They leave pheromone trails in their paths as they map out interior and exterior for trace and trail. Inside the core of the ship you can feel the logic train trundle towards its inevitable conclusion. We don't want to decommission the Pix but they were borderline to begin with, containment has been breached and if we don't act now then they will become invasive, and besides, a live-fire exercise against a full drone swarm might be just the thing to test their capabilities in full...

Which means that great valves will be thrown. Enormous tanks full of nutrient slurry will empty into vast pipes. Each drone will have semifused muscle fibre, quadranix-laced fat cells, and adrenal hormones fill its body. Fungal cell cultures from into shapes of hunger and rage given no mouths to feed and no voice to scream. The nightmare will begin to stir. And the biomancers, with all the careful preparation of doctors performing surgery, will martial their forces.

But looking around you, you see no sign that any of the clone infiltrators are involved in any attempt to undermine the Pix. Biomancers need to balance the inclusion of safeguards and reduced battlefield performance, and one of the reformations to boost the Pix towards viability was full formation instinct. With the drums of war starting to sound the infiltrators forget their hidden purposes and lock shields with the rest. There will be no enemy within during this fight.

The Pix are drawing up battle lines, scouts dashing out to investigate the area for ideal choke points, calculating the flow of the wind and inventorying heavy and esoteric weapons. None of them see the thin laser line reach out from the distance and strike Brightberry. She glows in its light briefly, and then forwards it through to you.

TO THE CONDEMNED. DO NOT DESPAIR. THE GALAXY STANDS WITH YOU.

SURVIVE.

Never in his life had he been more grateful for an uncomfortably diplomatic phrasing; it kept his thoughts from scattering to the winds, fleeing in mortification. “I see. That’s not exactly what I meant by it-”

And it is that moment that the cloud locked away in his hands found the tiniest path to freedom. It leaps from between his fingers, swirling into the night sky like a rocket, carried up with the flickering embers of their campfire.

Dolce watches it rise, until it’s barely a smear against the night sky. He looks to his hands. He looks to the sky. He looks to his hands. He looks to 20022.

His snout crinkles with the effort to keep from smiling.

“Ah. Excuse me.”

To his great professional credit, 20022 only let a snort escape him.

It…would be rude to ask more, wouldn’t it? After all, you ask a question when you’re not sure of the answer, and you’re not sure of the answer when either possibility could be true. And it’s not that he didn’t have faith in him. If he could somehow ask while also passing along exactly how he thought the odds broke down either way, he certainly would. But he couldn’t. And it might hurt, after 20022 had already explained so much of his work, hadn’t gotten mad when he’d gently sabotaged the Mayor’s court, who’d walked with him all this way and meant to do so tomorrow. He could all but hear him ask the questions: Did you really think so little of me? What more could I have done to earn your trust? Has all of this meant nothing to you? No. No, it would be rude to ask more.

It would be rude to imply 20022 shared anything more than his wool with the sheep Dolce had known.

“Your Function, though…” Dolce continues, musing along different routes entirely. “More or less, it’s to aid in administration of the Skies, ensuring that decisions are ultimately made for - how did you put it - the greater glory of the Endless Azure Skies? What does ‘glory’ mean, exactly? You hear the word so often, but it’s not so often somebody stops to tell you what they mean by it. And it’s not like it comes up often in my line of work either. Maybe I’d use it, speaking to myself, when I see a loaf’s come out of the oven just right, when I wasn’t sure how much time it’d need, because I had to make emergency substitutions in the recipe and the oven got switched off partway through.” Yes. Yes that certainly would be a glorious moment, wouldn’t it? “But what does it mean here, to you?”

The tank is empty, and has been for days.

Now hold on there. You might hear that and think, come on, this is Dyssia the Irrepressible, Dyssia the Can't-Be-Kept-Down.

(And why doesn't anybody ever have positive epithets for her, huh? Come on people, you can be more inventive and kind than "the Distracted." Dyssia the Passionate. Dyssia the Kind. She's got a list.)

But this is Dyssia--she's always got a little bit of energy left for a new passion project! Some unplumbed bit of energy, some fresh spark.

But she was running on fumes a week ago.

The fumes have been burnt, and the fuel tank ripped out and dismantled as unnecessary weight. Already, she can feel that she's physically scanter than she was--the body scavenging energy from fat and muscle, devouring itself in its search for anything to keep it going.

Even spite, which carried her through spitting in the face of Love himself, has hollowed her out, left her flat and barren. Is that good or bad? Probably bad. Emotions should be treasured.

But it's like--she can see the battlefield, right? Can see the drones unfolding their legs, see the steel-hard bone armor glinting across the field. It's better to hold here, in the open, where the Pix can devise strategems and hold points, but--

Battlefields are supposed to be noisy, right? You know, screams of the wounded, heroic charges, battle cries, speeches from gallant leaders? The way the drones just unfurl themselves--like dying insects in reverse--in total silence and advance like a mute thunder feels like it's against the rules. It'd be less scary if they actually did make some kind of noise--if they gibbered, and howled, and flung imprecations. It wouldn't be this unnaturally silent advance. It's like being threatened by a thousand malevolent earthquakes, but made worse by this being a deliberate act by the biomancers.

They have no mouths, and she must scream.

Point is, she's basically too tired to do much at this point. She spent her energy unwisely, without planning how to pay the bill, overspending her account, and now the time has come to pay.

Except--

It's like, she doesn't have any physical energy. That's spent. Can't find it in herself to be angry, even. Feels flat and weary and so, so tired.

But Brightberry's alive.

Brightberry's alive, and Brightberry's helping, and if they survive this, Dyssia can talk to her, and--

And it's like, a knot of energy that was wrapped around worry is unclenching? A little ball of--

Yes, call it hope. That tomorrow might happen after all. That she'll get a chance to apologize. That they might make it out of this alive. That she hasn't fucked everyone here by trying to do what she thought was right.

That--That someone else might help fix this?

She's reclaimed that little bit of energy. A candle-flame's worth, maybe. But enough to take her back behind the phalanxes, enough to bark a few orders to the score of pix surrounding her, enough to push her through the movements to project the gravrail out.

They are her phalanx, and she is their esoteric. They protect her, she protects them.

Survive. Yeah, she can do that, probably.

She does not hear the howl. Her ears lift up atop her head, but she does not hear the howl. Her eyes alight with desire and her teeth flash bright against the backdrop of the night sky, but she does not hear the howl. Her hands are full of crab. Her back is full of the sea. She does not hear the howl.

No, she hears the hunt. She hears the hand of Artemis reaching from behind her, the ruffling of a jacket sleeve against a silk button down, the susurrus of skin on skin, of fingers brushing her chin and lifting her head away from her kill to stare across the beach instead. A half-annoyed sigh and a half-amused snort. The slightest of creakings and barest shift in the winds that indicate a shrug.

Ahhhhhhhh. She hears the sigh leave her own throat. She hears her heart pulsing faster and faster. She hears the sand sloughing off of her toes as she lifts them out of the waves. She does not hear the howl. She does not need to. She already lives inside of it.

So then, this is not an act of sacrilege. So then, this is not a wasted kill. It is a sacrifice. The itch on her skin is dulling with every passing breath. The name, the promise, is fading. This last and greatest enemy will be hers to prepare as a feast. But it is for the goddess Artemis to have, to keep, and to move as she will. She has already accepted it. And the reward she offers for such a pleasing dedication is a new hunt.

Someone has seen her bathing under moonlight. There are prices to be paid for such things, little wolf.

Mosaic does not cross the distance between herself and Ember. She sniffs, and the distances ceases to be. Her shoulders blot out the moon. Her blood perfumes the sea airs. Her breasts hang in the air like the unpluckable fruits that damned Tantalus. Her smirk could doom far greater heroes than that.

"What game are we playing today, my Heart? Will you flee and make sport for me, or shall I take you right here for your little pack to finally see? I allow them their games with you. Just as I allow them to call my sister their own. But you, Ember. Precious Ember. You are mine. Mine to hunt and mine to take. How. Ev. Er. I. Wish~"

Her fingers reach for the buckles on that absurd Diver's armor. But just enough hesitation, or rather gentleness, to allow room for another game to be played. If Ember can resist the sight and sound of the invitation right in front of her.

Ember takes the hands that could break a mountain, undo an army, unravel a fish, and unfold a flower. She takes the hands of the holy monster, the hero of Beri, her lover, and she squeezes those fingers in her grasp, runs her thumbs across their elegant backs, for a moment stands enthralled and adoring. The look in her eyes is domestication. The yearning in the eyes of the first hound who curled up by a fire on someone's feet.

That's the only way she can quiet the tension in her limbs, the driving insistence of pack loyalty, the traitor's worm gnawing at her heart. The only thing stronger than a pack is an owner, crowned in lunatic glory, seafoam in the shape of a demigod, bringing her to heel. But the game has to be played first. The holiness of the huntress must be proved for the spine and the skull and the teeth, which are even older than the nerves and the pits and the tail.

"Then prove it," she says, she asks, she begs, and darts into Mosaic's guard, into her arms, and

nips

just enough to, for a moment, mar the perfection of her neck.

Then she's down, between Mosaic's legs, against the caress of her tail, springing back up behind her, wagging, grinning, daring the chase, yearning the chase, being run to ground, being caught, silencing the need of the pack long enough to prove that she's right, that the little Ember has been claimed by a daughter of heaven, that she has been tamed, that she will sit on command, that she will beg on command, that she will surrender her glory and her chance for praise into the hands of her love to make her shine all the brighter.

Watch her run, Mosaic! She's leaving a trail of Desire for you, all sweet lavender blooming on the hillside, as she pants and pushes herself as hard as she can. She's the runner, after all. Watch her limbs, how she makes the strain look like a crown of glory, how she grins as the world blurs and shrinks to the next moment, the next footfall, the joy of the chase. Please, Mosaic, come and catch her, be just that little bit better, strain to claim her, show her you want her!

What girl hasn't ever wanted to be wanted, after all? That's the difference between being the darling of the pack and being yours.

Dolce!

"This is the sort of thing that is debated at great lengths internally in the Service," said 20022. "The answer, to a degree, flows down from the top. At the absolute top is the Saoshyant, the monarch-prophet of the Skies. She appoints from her court a series of Ministers, some overseeing particular sectors or geographic areas, some overseeing concepts like military readiness or planetary terraforming. I am a member of the Ministry of Planetary Repair. These Ministers set policy and define glory and hold absolute power over their Ministries, though much of what they do is filtered through the Secretaries of each Ministry, who are like us."

This... the Tides of Poseidon were the same, weren't they? You remember from a dream. The eaters of worlds, the shattering bureaucracy that tried to break the stars of man. Just another extension of the Azura system of government.

"While Ministers come and go, Secretaries are eternal - until retirement - which give them a lot of power and discretion," said 20022. "If the Minister demands results, then the Secretary must produce those results, but it is often up to them to decide how that will be done. The Secretary then further delegates down the line, until they reach me. If a member of the public objects to one of my decisions they can challenge me legally, at which point my manager would assess the decision. If they agree with me, then the citizen can either drop their complaint or escalate it to the next rank. Some complaints do get escalated all the way to the Minister, who can order entire branches decommissioned if they are overstepping or ineffective."

"But, there is still a lot of room for self expression and personalization of results," said 20022. "So, what does glory mean for me? It means reducing the time that this world spends cut off from the Skies as a war-scarred backwater from centuries to decades. To look at a thriving, interconnected planet sitting astride major commercial slipway lanes would be glorious to me, I think."

Dyssia!

If you told the ancients of the distant past that twenty thousand years from their birth wars would be waged with pike and muscle they might have assumed that nothing would have changed. War would be war, they would think, as eternal and unshifting as the seasons. That kinship in weapons would mean a kinship in results.

They would have to be told that every soldier in fifty thousand fought like a God to even begin to understand.

The Pix are an armed and armoured warrior species at the height of their power. Their designers hoped not just to match but surpass the legendary Wolves of Ceron. It is not with perfect teamwork that they fight, like the wolves, but with perfect ambition. Every soldier of the line has trained in secret to for every role in case the opportunity to steal a badge and advance should arrive. This makes each soldier a strategos. It makes the movements of the formation one of unparalleled genius. Armies in ancient days needed to suppress the instincts of their soldiers, slave their collective will to a single commander, rendering the vast masses inert and brainless. Not here. There are no orders here, not even any communication. Everyone just knows when to turn a flank, when to retreat, when to charge. No mass of people ever moved anything like this.

The drones come in waves.

Drones are not independent life forms. They need to be tended and quickened by the Biomancers. In the distance you can see the Biomancer Wayang - their shadow-puppets, tall and spindly avatars of bone and flesh, hands thick with chemical dispensers. They walk amongst still-stirring drones, surrounded by their massive sentinel bodyguards, injecting stimulants and balancing unstable growth patterns. They are like artillerymen loading shells, and when they are ready they release a silent mass of flesh and stone like a single shot.

There is cunning in them, too. Their tools are brainless but they are not, and their weapon is crude but they know when to hold it in reserve and when to fire so quickly that poorly grown drones collapse and are trampled by their fellows before they even hit the Pix lines.

Now and then a particularly brilliant maneuver of the Pix will see a fox or a squad strike deep enough to butcher the Wayang; they fall apart in fountains of yoghurt-like nutrient slurry and pheromone gland bursts that send their sentinel protectors clawing at the remains in blind confusion. It's heartening. Every hour feels like a victory. The morning feels like a triumph. No one is tired. The stamina of the gods and perfect force rotation keeps everyone in fighting shape.

But they are millions still.

One hand touches her neck. The other reaches toward the space between her and the rapidly fleeing Ceronian scamp. Fingers spread apart and twist together, ready to rend the sky itself asunder and tear open the door she will merely step through to claim her prize. But she flinches, instead. Her grip relaxes, and her hand drops to her side.

Mosaic laughs and shakes her head.

"Too easy, right Ember? We'll do this the fun way."

But even having said it she doesn't start to move. The sight of her Ember racing through the sands, building obstacles with scattered shells and flotsam as she goes, the wag of her tail perfectly complimenting the smoothness of her form. The wiry body of a true champion, born to run is something that should be drunk like fine wine, shouldn't it? She can spare this indulgence. Just a moment longer.

Mosaic does not run: she flies. Sand explodes behind her in heavy showers of grit and debris as one step carries her twenty meters through the air at a time. Her legs are long and her gait is wide and there is little enough grace to this movement that is better described as an ode to pure power. Her ears bend flat as she soars, to block out the whistling of the air. She feels her own breath in the exertion of her muscles and the impact of her bones. Every step is a long song, I have you, I have you, I have you, I am coming.

She was born for this hunt above all others /across the galaxy without ever resting.
Lavender and sweat and the bouncing of golden hair beckon her forward /the whiff of Roses bars her way back.
The thrill of her perfect little back growing closer and closer with every bound /at the last second she always escapes.
Breathless laughter floating on the breeze like a ghost /two children in a palace big enough to host the stars

At the edge of the beach there is a hill where the sands give way to sweet smelling grasses and firmly packed dirt. The north slope is filled to bursting with brilliant white Snowdrops with their heads bent in prayer, greeting the spring in anticipation of winter, ready to make summer memories in the twin moons' gentle light. Five kilometers of distance has bought Ember this prize: when she is overtaken, when the huntress grabs her around the waist and lifts her into those strong, sweaty arms it is here in the most beautiful garden in all of Bitemark.

No mortal hand has ever tended here, and neither shall it have to. The flowers bear witness to an embrace that sees only one pair of feet standing on the ground. The other dangles about her knees. Mouths meet in a kiss that swallows whatever howl is coming, whether its jubilation or warning. Whether Ember is a lover or a traitor, right now her breath belongs to Mosaic. Her teeth are mere piano keys to be played by a clever tongue, her neck and her stomach are strings plucked as one might a lyre, or bent as a bow.

Sfffft, the sneaking of a claw. It robs Ember of clothing bit by bit until she stands on equal ground with Mosaic. Arms with the power to steal a mountain seal her motion away instead, and they do it with such gentle reverence that there is no pain or push or pull beyond the loving suggestion of a leash. Be collared, Ember. Be still, Ember. Be mine, mine, mine, mine, Ember.

Her fingers, tracing along the inside of her thighs until they part. Only now do the pair of them make a bed among the flowers. More blossoms rise up from the ground to see the sight. One back pressed against the hillside so that it curves, the other bending along the opposite arc to match. Lips breathing sweet nothings along the modest little hills on her chest, tongue tracing tickles down along the waist and to the hip.

The weight of a divine creature presses down from hip to shoulder atop a wolf's. Mosaic slides up the length of Ember's body and stares into one pair of twinkling, mismatched eyes with another. Her grin is filled with teeth sharp enough to make a wolf drool in envy.

"Is this proof enough? Shall I make my claim again? Anywhere you go. I will catch you. I will have you, and I will hold you, and I will shelter you with everything that I am. Because you. Are. Mine. Little wolf~"

“I knew an Assistant Secretary, once…” The flickering flames dance upon the logs. Strange and grotesque forms, rising and falling, undulating, feasting upon the dry wood. “But, I think he was only Acting, until the position could be properly filled..?”

“Pardon?”

The spell is a weak one; it bursts at a single word. Dolce returns to himself with a start and a shake. “My apologies, I thought…my thoughts are a little mixed up. It’s been a rather long day, you understand.”

“Of course, of course. You musn’t forget; you don’t usually operate at this altitude. It takes a body time and energy to learn to cope with the thinner air.”

“I thought I felt a little off. That must be it. It’s been ages since I last climbed anything taller than the road to the Mayor’s estate.”

“I haven’t pressed us too hard, have I?”

“Not at all, not at all. It’s the pleasant sort of tired, you know? Where you know you’ll sleep wonderfully deep, and even a sleeping bag on rocks feels like it’s made of clouds.”

They pause, drinking in the satisfaction of a day well-lived.

“Your dream sounds lovely.” Dolce continues. Rude, to be trusted with a treasure like that without a word to its value. “I wish everyone in Beri and everywhere could have as few troublesome years as possible.”

“It’s quite another thing to know your daily work makes it so. Like I said; there really is no higher pleasure.”

And a sheep thinks of kitchens, and feeding hungry faces. He thinks of Synnefo watching Ministers come and go, and different visions passing through the same soft hands. He sees the world through the eyes of this planet’s representative, and wonders what the view is like from elsewhere. His ears ring with the piercing words of the best orator he’s ever known. A purpose…a purpose…everything for a purpose…

He wants to learn. He wants to help, and keep everyone safe. And there is only one way he can go from here.

You know, it's kind of weird?

It's like, she's been living with the Pix for. Um. A month? Has it been that long? More? Less than?

A while, is the point. Stealing badges with the best of them, learning to distrust, learning to treasure, knowing that every one of them is waiting against the day that they have a chance to snatch the captain's badge.

All this time, and she's never seen what it was for.

They don't fight like in the books or plays. Which, you know, is probably because they're not in the plays or books--those are all focused on the Ceronians. But if they had been in the books, the books would have got them wrong.

It's like--there's no disagreement. They know what the correct action is, because they'd have taken the same one. Not being told through pheromones, but through perfect mastery.
Honestly, it feels a bit terrible that all of them can manage it when she can't.

D'you know what it's like to have a dozen people forcibly push you to the rear? She doesn't want to sleep, not even for a nap. She can keep going, she can keep fighting, what are you talking about? But not a one of them listens, and in the end, the world does not end for her resting.

Intellectually, she knows other Pix are doing the same. That the defense flows in shifts. That this is a battle of endurance, and pushing yourself to the breaking point just means you're broken.

But those are other people, and it's always so much harder to allow yourselves the kindness you'd never dream of refusing others.

The morning dawns, and they are alive. Alive, she knows, because of the Pix. Because of their perfect acumen, trained in month after month of badge snatching and locker-stuffing.

And even now, they are millions.

They can't have infinite drones, is the thing. She's pretty sure? If they had infinite drones, right, if they could just churn them out until no amount of endurance could outlast it, then they wouldn't need reserves, right? That makes sense to her sleep-addled brain.

There's gotta be an end in sight.

Unlike their mysterious savior, who is very much not. In sight, that is. And on a more technical note, since they've fought for eight hours on their own, they cannot be considered a savior.

Pretty mysterious, though. Good job on that one.

She shoots a glance at Brightberry. Still nothing?

If they could just seize the vats--break through the line of drones and do more than tear apart one biomancer shell at a time--

But she already knows that the Pix would have done that, if they could have. If that would have resulted in victory. And they wouldn't need her to do it.

All she can contribute to this fight is to keep an eye on things, and hope against hope that she doesn't miss anything important.

[Look Closely: 1,3,+2. 6. Tell me about the Wayang. What are they doing? What will they do next? I find the answers out the hard way.]

Please, white moon.

You can hide them for a while, can't you?

Just them. Just the two of them. The pack can wait to try to pull her back, to smother her in praise, to train her to be a sixth of the presence that Mosaic is. The town can wait to call upon Mosaic to solve its problems with her incredible feats of strength and charm and huntressesness.

Don't let anyone else see them and the way they wrestle breathless and glowing among the flowers, how Ember squirms so that she can prove Mosaic's power, how those incredible shoulders are a canopy over the little wolf. Don't let anyone else hear the eager panting, the way that Mosaic wrings her name out of Ember's lips, the hitches of breath and the way her voice is dragged up into taut need. Don't let anyone else feel the sleek, glowing skin; don't let anyone smell the Adoration and the Lust and the Submission dusting the petals of the flowers.

You can do that for them, can't you, lovely white moon?

For Mosaic and the hunts she carries out in your name, at least. And for the little kisses Ember lifts to you when she sees you rising while she roams the hunting-grounds of Beri. And for the way that Ember wraps her firm runner's legs around Mosaic. How can you look at that and not wish to protect it, eight-faced moon?

Your work will be cut out for you. Mosaic's name carries embarrassingly, adoringly far. Now that her pack knows beyond any doubt, how can she not be eager beneath her love? How can she not cling, and melt, and reflect Mosaic's desire back to her? This, too, is alchemy, and alchemy has always been touched by moonlight.

So hear her ragged prayer, white moon. And if not for her sake, for the sake of the hero of Beri, whose mystique must be preserved.

Dolce!

The skulls hit the table. One of them chips. They're fascinating, almost childlike - you feel like you could crush one into powder with your fists if you set your mind to it. It's hard to imagine how a creature could even survive with bones that fragile.

"Incredible, aren't they?" said the Crystal Knight to Princess Redana. "An independently evolved, intelligent species - growing up only three gates from here! I could hardly believe our fortune when we discovered them. Entirely untouched by Biomancy, barely above the late medieval period. What a treasure! You can keep these, of course, they're gifts - I have plenty more."

The house of Triden was a place of maps. Not maps of the world as it was, maps of the world as it would be. Fascinating, beautiful, interconnected - every valley a garden, every city a paradise. They covered the walls, the ceilings, the floors - the master cartographer drifted without gravity, brush illustrating in incredible detail the future of Bitemark. She only looked up at the Crystal Knight vaguely, but Princess Redana was giving her full tight-lipped attention.

"You might think that a novel alien species might be worthless," the Crystal Knight went on. "Not so! See, while evolution may have laws, it also has surprises - things that develop in isolation can sometimes have some genuinely novel ways of going about things. This is valuable inspiration for Biomancers who oftentimes," she made a face, "get stuck in the rut of Afane sealife or Earth vertebrate mammals. An alien world means entirely new paradigms for servitor species! But more than that, it means entirely new paradigms for sociology! Many people forget that sociology is the other half of biomancy, but getting to see an entirely unique lifeform's methods for social cohesion cannot help but be fascinating."

She picked up one of the skulls which still had a metal circlet wrapped around its head. A crown? "For instance, humans," she grinned, "have a tendency to band together against external threats, and fall to entropy in conditions of stress. Most human servitors are human patterned in this same way. But these little darlings - we call them Dredges - we believe to be the opposite. We're running a test. I landed on the planet, went around to every Dredge king or queen or emperor of note, killed them in front of their entire court, and declared I would return in seven years to fight whatever warrior or army the kingdom set against me. And now we're going to watch what happens! The Biomancers theorize that this relatively minor intervention will cause a total system collapse without me even having to return. Imagine building a servitor species that doesn't need a whole invasion fleet to Decommission - one Azura showing up and saying 'boo!' would cause them to panic so hard that their civilization collapsed on its own. Wonderful!"

The air between the Crystal Knight and Princess Redana could have frozen. But that was the point. You could see it in the curl of her tail, in the easy flex of fingers across that strange silver belt attachment. The Crystal Knight was provoking the Imperial Princess to a duel which would remove her from the safety of Zeus' laws of hospitality. One atrocity became the means to perform another.

20022 saw it too. He gave a firm, polite cough. The spell was broken and the Crystal Knight's eye snapped around, cerulean-teal, slitted, and furious. "What!?" she hissed.

20022 bowed politely. "Lord Governor," said 20022. "We were not expecting you. We have a meeting scheduled with Imperial Princess Redana."

"We?" hissed the Crystal Knight. She loomed. Azura were huge and she was no exception, a battle-scarred warrior, turquoise scales chipped and broken, coils and coils and coils. "I know you, meddler, but who is this?" It was impossible to break her gaze, Dolce. It was impossible to know if she was coming closer or if she'd activated her Grav-Rail and was lifting you, weightless, from the ground. She was transfixing and everything else dropped away.

"You smell fresh," she purred. The anger had gone. She was all smile. Just one smile, unchanging. "You smell alive. You haven't internalized the Skies like your friend, so what are you? His apprentice? His replacement?" she was close now. When she smiled you could see her fangs as her tail wrapped around your legs. "If so, you'll be seeing a lot of me. That's why I'm hoping we can get off on the right," squeeze, "foot. Don't you think ♥?"

Dyssia!

Your eyes slip, and you see the gods.

First amongst them is Demeter. She stands upon the barren world with Hades' stolen scythe in her hand. She stands astride the gate of Death and none may pass below her.

Blood splashes the soil and immediately she raises it up. The drones are simple creatures, barely more than fungi, and where their shells crack and their life spills she causes the eruptions of grasses, mushrooms and minor insects. The basic building blocks of an ecosystem, the first lurches of evolution on this hurricane stone forest. Swarms of algae vomit forth unending tides of oxygen as they drip from mucous-soaked rocks down into fast flowing rivers and stagnant streams. Life has come to this planet and she will never, ever let it leave.

Where one of the Pix fall, worthier blood conjures worthier life. A dead soldier produces a hound, or an eagle, or a flock of doves. One glorious hero who catches her eye especially she raises as a crab. The more drones the Pix kill, the richer the ecosystem they will live in in their 'afterlife'.

You know that it has been centuries since death has walked the galaxy, but the way this consumptive, violent war seems to be a particularly horrifying form of terraforming a desolate rock into a tropical rainforest is still not internalized on an emotional level. This is not right - but it is a Blessing. Kind are the gods.

Mars is here too. Husband to Demeter, he nevertheless oversees the Pix exclusively, walking amongst them with encouragement and smiles, a word here, a flash of steel there. Sometimes he seems to be calmly professional, other times inspiringly stupid, wearing a big smile and a thumbs up as he clotheshangers half a dozen drones to give some staggered Pix a chance to regain their feet and their formation. If any analogy ever felt right it's that he seems like a plastic action figure, stiff and rigid and bodyslamming enemies into submission - or a plastic miniature on a battlefield of pure tactical skill where his absurdity belies genuine brilliance. A toy soldier god of a toy soldier species, all wound up and kicking ass for justice and survival.

To lose the favour of Mars so entirely, then, should be a disaster for the Wayang. They are at odds with the God of War and, whatever else this is, it is a war. Their drones pay the price in the tens of thousands. But still they work, still they pray, and still they offer. But if not to Mars, then who?

You see Aphrodite in the distance amongst them. He gives you a smile and a wave of his cigarette. Then he looks at his silver wristwatch.

That is when you hear the

tick
HATE
tick
HATE
tick
HATE

...

something important is not happening

...

tick
HATE
tick
HATE
tick
HATE

...

salvation is not getting any closer

these deaths buy no time

everything is pointless

...

the pounding of the clock. an old, mechanical, clockwork thing, wound up springs and gears. the gears of time itself, grinding away in that old fashioned pocketwatch.

When Zeus struck down her monstrous father she imprisoned him in linear time. All his bones were broken and he was pulled long and thin. Where once he was all consuming, formless and eternal now he was, beat after beat, crushed into a comprehensible shape. Once no one could escape him. Now with every passing second he has to let them free from his grasp. The only part of him that survived was his monstrous, severed phallus, containing within it all his nightmarish lusts.

And this one above all.

The Biomancers created the Pix. Now they are killing them.

And Cronus cannot help but love those who devour their children.

Rescue isn't coming.

The sand hangs in the hourglass, perpetually on the precipice of dripping from present to past. Frozen, forever on the edge. The dribbled water out of the bucket slows to a crawl. The candle burns and burns and refuses to inch downward the hours.

Rescue's not coming, and it's his fault.

Would she be one of the ones turned into a crab? Honestly, she wouldn't mind that. Strong preference for snake, right, but crab is up there. Nature's most perfect form.

Demeter won't halt this. The planet is gorging itself, verdant, green, full of life. A jewel, seeded by rich fertilizer. Demeter's flourishing.

It's the nitrogen and acidity, you know. Though technically that needs bacteria to break it down. Does Demeter do bacteria? It'd suck to die and have just, you know, a swarm of invisible lifelets come out.

She stares at the watch as if it were a hypnotist's pendant.

The God of love. What a hateful thing.

God of love, with that clock tick-hating away in the background? God of love, resentful, all devouring? Watching, forever, the children that got away. God of estranged parents, convinced all along that really it's their children who are abusive, and always have been, and only exact obedience will prove their love.

Honestly, when you think about it, it's only natural that a severed penis would turn out to be such a massive dick.

Ah, anger.

It's honestly refreshing, you know? She's been so full of everything else--hope, despair, desperation--that having that knotful churning at her center is…

How dare he? How dare he sit there, with his smug smile and his stinking cigars and act as if this is best?

There's a hammer in her hand. No, no, wait, she knows this. Something old and fancy sounding. Crow's beak? Long and vicious, with a slender hooked spike on one end and a four-pronged hammer on the other.

She stares down the shaft, and up at the god handing it to her.

How dare he stand here, in Mars' battlefield?

A knot sits in her throat, and at the god's nod, she fires up the rail and soars over the field. She is not a master of hammer or rail, but she is buoyed up, borne in Mars's hand--a puppet on his strings, bouncing and breathless and bodyslamming to his tune. A toy soldier piloted by a toy soldier, a spinning rocket with a hammer at one end.

Rescue is coming, dammit. Just as soon as you're gone, this can end. And if that means she needs to do this herself, then so be it.

The moonlight watches Passion be fed grapes by Pleasure, as Desire fans them both. The moonlight watches Ecstasy teach a new song to the birds of the hills, and sighs when Longing wakes from a long nap to join the revelry. The moonlight watches Indulgence breathe cooling breezes up the beach from the ocean waves to kiss a pair of lovers' necks, and it watches Satisfaction plant kisses on the brow of every gathered soul.

The moonlight watches, but does not shine. Not on these two, who watch back. Watch, O Moon, but do not come. Do not shine on them, O Moon, and lead prying eyes astray until hearts have finished melding and their heat has forged fresh iron to carve a path into the future. Be kind, Moonlight, in Artemis' name we pray.

And so Mosaic's passions cool. Or rather, roll over to rest after feeding themselves filled to bursting. She is left to feel the warmth of the girl in her arms, the girl who even now snuggles her body closer into the nooks and crevices of her grip, whose tail beats a marching tune to speed around a planet in an hour's time. She feels Ember's heartbeat rolling against her arm and feels Ember's face nestle playfully into her breasts. A smile parts her lips; her fingers part Ember's hair and play with the backs of her ears.

There are whispered nothings and sweet tidings to last a lifetime, adorations and declarations and promises, tauntings and praises and playful squeezes and gentle touches that threaten to inflame a whole new turn on the hill that would beg the moon to hide them all throughout tomorrow's daylight too. But eventually even this gives way to mundanity and there is nothing left but the trivialities of the day.

"...Thank you, little Ember. It's been a longer day than I realized."

A soft grunt ripples through her body in response. The soft thwacking of a tail that kicks up scents of flowers and sweat and the sweetest pheromone thank yous.

"The village of Rosedam was abandoned, you know. They've come to Beri and there's nowhere to put them."

"Mmmmmmmmmhm?" The siren song of the half-listening, of the besotted too drunk on the sound of a voice to fully hear any of the words that it says.

"So I climbed the mountain today, and I stole the East side of it from the Stone Tribe."

Impressed whines and hot fur jammed into her neck. An eager tongue lapping praises under her chin for the demigod Mosaic, the Hero of Bitemark who needs all of her muscles kissed again, just in case any of them were missed the last time.

"And I-- mmmmm -- I spent my time building new houses before I had to return to finish my hunting."

"Wow wow wow wow wow, you did all that~?"

Soft gasps and giggles, and the greedy snuffling of a nose trying to absorb every little smell coming from this divine body as if by cataloging it she could invent a new way to love it even more. Squeezing hands sliding down her hips and hunting lower until Mosaic catches them by the wrists and pulls them to her neck again.

"Ember, I..."

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmm?"

Mosaic's body pops as it rises from the ground, carrying Ember in her arms still clinging in her lap. Together they sit with their breaths each pushing into the other's chest, skin to skin and heart to heart as Mosaic's eyes lift away from these earthly pleasures to the heavens above them.

"If I. If I left here," she begins haltingly, "What would you do? Would you follow me?"

Ears perk up. Ember's head leaves Mosaic' collarbone for the first time in ten minutes, and for once not to plant kisses somewhere else. She clears her throat, and her body tenses the way it always does when she's readying herself to make an Impression.

"I'd follow you, of course!"

"You'd leave your Pack for me?"

"N-no, I wouldn't! I would take over as much of the pack as I could, and then we'd follow you. All of us would?"

"Oho? And what would I do with three little wolves, do you think?"

A wolf's indignant sputter meets a cat's roaring laughter. Ember's face wars between insult and consideration, as if inside her head an entire battle was playing out and the best and worst case scenarios were being carefully plucked free from the tapestry and set aside for the counting. Her expression is so stony serious that Mosaic cannot help but kiss her, and pin her tongue so fiercely inside her own mouth that not even a squeak of surprise could escape anymore.

Where they finally part, breath fills the hillside and moonlight finally pierces its blanket of clouds to illuminate them with a sniper's swift precision. The asked-for miracle has come and gone. Time ticks away. Mosaic sighs.

"Three wolves or three thousand, that's enough for me. I am leaving, Ember. I've given everything Beri I have to give and it hasn't really changed a thing. Whatever I'm really meant for, I can't find it here. I need to get out. I need..."

Her back arches. Her chest pushes forward. She is a bow, ready to be plucked. She is an arrow, ready to sail a thousand leagues and bury herself inside a worthy challenge. She watches the moonlight watching her, and her gaze slides past it to the stars beyond, who swirl in their prismatic brilliance inside her pupils.

On the horizon the first flecks of daylight are beginning to break over the mountains. The night birds cease their calling, and a new song signals the end of a dream. Mosaic's eyes are fixed on the sky, and though her arms do not relinquish her Ember, she can never turn her gaze back down to Bitemark. Not ever again.

If he braces too much, then when the shoe loudly drops, all the tension will leap out through whatever path of least resistance it finds. He will jump, or yelp, or some other such disastrous display. If he does not brace enough, then shock will seize the wheel before he can stop himself. There is a sweet spot. A rhythm of breath, a flow of anxious energy, a bow held at a draw he could find in his sleep. There is him. There is her. The knowledge is in him. He can find the draw.

Except.

Thick coils flex around his legs. Up and down. Up and down. He isn’t wiggling. He isn’t fighting her, why would he fight her? (This could just be how they say hello, after all) No flicker of realization disturbs her deep, brilliant eyes as she thoroughly envelopes his lower half. How does she know the secrets of his muscles, his body? It may simply be that her coils are opposed to stiffness and tension on principle, and they are powerful enough to make their will reality. Up and down. Up and down. Coils thicker than both his legs put together gradually squeeze tight, then loosen. The pressure ripples from one to the next, working with surgical precision, irresistibly pushing.

He grasps for the draw. He is not permitted the luxury. He knows he should be ready. The tension slowly leaks from him, and his thoughts find no fuel for their signal fires. There is him. There is her. There is a question. There is an answer.

“Of course, Lord Governor.” He bows his head, but cannot break her gaze. “I am just a chef from Beri, right now. But 20022 has shown me the world is much wider than my cafe and town. I rather would like to see more, but there is only so much he can teach me. “

The words flow out from the swirling clouds of his heart, a steady stream of honesty. ”If I am to know where I stand and what I can do, I need to see much more of you, Lord Governor. I hope you will not mind my presence overmuch.”

Ember rolls over. She sits up. Good girl! She’s hovering over Mosaic like an excitable cloud veiling the face of the moon, her earlier indignation forgotten. Her tail smacks excitedly against the swell of Mosaic’s thighs, her mismatched eyes wide and eager and intense.

”I found a ship,” she reveals.

“I was being chased, so I dived, and down there there was this ship which was so big that I thought it was an old human temple, but then I recognized it, or it reached inside my head and told me what it was, and we can’t do it alone but with you and Beri and us working together we could get it back out of the sea and rekindle the engine and we can go up there! Together! All of us! We’ll even move Dolce’s from Beri and recreate it inside, the whole thing, and we’ll have to pack plenty of crabs for him, but we’ll get him new ingredients from worlds we haven’t even dreamed of, and we’ll go and never stop going, and—“

She pauses here for excited, sloppy, enthusiastic kisses, right up until she comes up for air and gets one of Mosaic’s perfect fingers on her lips. In response, she makes an adorably quizzical noise.

“And the pack knows about this?”

“Mmmhm!”

She wilts, slightly, under Mosaic’s flat stare. But who could stay irritated with the eager knight? Especially one who’s given you a ticket out of Bitemark. A ruined ticket at the bottom of the ocean, true, and one which will need a lot of work to refurbish, but a ticket nonetheless.

“Well,” Mosaic breathes, and pulls her knight close for reward headpats. “Maybe they’ll start smelling better after I dunk them all in the sea. Thank you, Ember.” The shiver that runs through Ember is only matched by her breathless, giddy giggling.

Mosaic and Ember!

There is no sign or scent of the wolves. There will not be until dark. But be sure that they are here.

They will be infiltrating the town all throughout the day. Girls will walk too close to the shadows and will be caught by snatching claws and dragged into the dark. There they will feel fangs brush their skin and words whisper in their ear and crushing scents fill their nostrils and they'll babble everything they know until they're released in a daze. Infiltrators will make their way in, heavy battle armour silent and chameleonic. Sense-scramblers will distort eyes and memory as heavy equipment is hauled into position, artillery pieces on commanding heights, tunnels dug into secure buildings. By the time the first evening howl sounds the wolves will hold all the town in their hand, and the pack will arrive not to do battle but to pillage.

Their foremost infiltrator team hunts for Mosaic, and a second team hunts for their lost Ember. Even as the sun rises one of the moons remains in the sky. They are dedicated to their targets, ritually bound to bring their prey down. Roll to Overcome - success or failure will determine if it is you or it is they who are bought before Taurus in chains.

Dolce!

She never settles. Even when you're sure you couldn't move another inch, still she shifts, still muscles contract and the sliding smoothness of her scales rush in search of a tighter grip.

"You have no idea how glad I am to hear you say that," said the Crystal Knight. "For you see, I have been oppressed. I have not even been able to reach out my arms -" she said even as she bound yours ever tighter against your body "- without this wicked meddler coming and binding them tight. Do you know," she purred, "what it's like to lose your freedom?" Her chest pushes against your back, her arms around your shoulders, as she slumps in feigned exhaustion upon your shoulder. "To have your vision -" she placed her hands over your eyes "- blinded? All I have ever wanted from a representative of the central government -" her flicking tongue passes close enough to your ear that you can feel its wetness "- is to treat with me as a woman and not as a number."

She slides over the top of your head, flexible body letting her arch over the top of you and come down from above, head upside-down as her entanglement reaches its conclusion. "So what is your name, darling chef?" her weight seems to rest upon you from every side, as well as from above. "I promise I'll remember it. I promise even after they give you a number, I'll always see you as a man," her eyes were bright green and staring. "You have goals in life, I know. Things you want to see. Things you want to touch," her tongue darted out, barely touching the end of your nose. "Both can happen."

Her voice lowered, still playful but now also serious. "20022 is ambitious and popular. He was placed here without any subordinates in order to sideline him and inconvenience me. But if he has been lucky enough to find an apprentice he can train he will leave without a backwards glance. You will have a great deal of power to decide exactly what you want the people here to do..." she gave a full body squeeze, crushing the whole world one size smaller. "... or ♥... you could simply decide not to make any decisions at all~"

Dyssia!

To be Mars is to count the buttons.

These things matter. The intricacies of uniform design are critical to the functioning of an army. The swish of fabric, the whirl of capes, the glitter of golden braid - essential! Essential! Who could fight while anything less than glorious? Who could stand upon the stage of death without all their wealth about them? An army is the wealth of civilization, the jewel it throws all of its resources into polishing. Of course it must be beautiful! Of course it must be precise! Of course every tiny detail matters!

The Wayang are eerily beautiful. The Drones that swarm around them are unlovely by design, swarming and unspeaking things that will not traumatize their makers when they see them die by the thousand. But the Wayang themselves are creatures of glittering black marble carapace, long and thin fingers and faces like elfin judges. Curling wigs of hair descend from their powdered heads, cheeks flushed with pink pigment. They retreat at your arrival, using pheromantic commands to cause drones to detonate like bombs, to overclock their already limited lifespans to make desperate charges. They are puppets, projections, but one amongst them was not. One amongst them was the Biomancer true, here on the battlefield, hidden in the shadow of his creations, that he might carry Aphrodite's watch and make his demon prayers.

"Why do you fight us, noble Azura?" he cried as Aphrodite carried him away from you on swift feet. "We do this for you, for your good. We do this for the Skies! If you love the Pix we will restore them! We will fill your house with a specialized strain to serve as bodyguards and slaves! New children, built from scratch to make you happy, while these unsatisfactory half-warriors fade! All you must do is look away!"

If there is no sight or scent of the pack that hunts her, that puts Mosaic squarely back at the beginning of her day. She walks in silence down the beach to collect her crab, and then in silence drags it to the new still-empty neighborhood she spent her morning and her afternoon constructing.

Now the walls come down instead of going up. Her angry sighs fill the air, wordless frustrations echoing off of rocks and down hills as her fists slam repeatedly into the mountain shards that bore her soul and all her best efforts. Her skin is scraped and bleeding; the slick coating on her hands is soothing as she continues to tear down the rough base. The sound of a storm, the feeling of an earthquake. The roar of a ferocious animal, the smell of sweat. And brine. And crab.

She sits among the ruins, in a fortress built of failure and a lack of foresight, breaking apart this final crab and cataloging its bounties for the Goddess of the Hunt. Now she is still. Occasionally, the crunching of a shell, the scratching of a pen. The dull swoosh of Ember's tail as she watches, and the excited patter of her breathing, contrasted with Mosaic's own slow, meditative puffs.

If there is no sight or scent of the pack that hunts her, there is no need to seek them out. The existence of a ship changed everything. Everything. These ugly houses were pointless now, but the stone had many better uses. Material for ramps, for one. Leverage for another. And...

The rock whistles as it leaves her hand, and shatters with a thunder like a cannon when it hits the armor plating of a Silver Diver. Underneath that noise a softer one; the wheeze of a wolf whose air was suddenly stolen from her, and the snapping of a rib.

Stealth and guile, patience and planning. A perfect hunt, a battle one before it's even fought. All of it ruined by the hubris of the commander, of the one who wanted to put Mosaic in chains before asking for her help. Mosaic rises from her throne of rubble and stomps her foot clean through the pile, kicking up all manner of pebbles, bricks, and boulders. Her back twists, her leg slides backward.

Her kick shatters the heavens. Her volley is artillery. Her fists rend the sky itself and her claws crack the ground. Steam hisses off her skin, so hot that even her sweat is a weapon. She laughs, and cracks her neck.

"You know, I'm insulted. Is this all you sent to capture me? Where are the rest of you? I guess you thought you were being clever, trying to capture me and Beri in the same breath. Idiots."

When she surges, she is the ocean. Onrushing tides, and heavy inevitability. She holds out her arm and clotheslines one unfortunate would-be ambusher, then spins around to catch her before she can hit the ground. They sweep low against the battlefield like a pair of dancers posing to awe the crowd. Mosaic's face splits in a wide grin that's too full of fangs to be beautiful, and she tilts the wolfgirl's face by her chin until their lips are a whisper away from touching.

"Silly girl," she purrs, "Foolish little puppies. Didn't my sister teach you any better? Maybe you do it on purpose. Your little lot just loooooves their spankings, isn't that right? Would you like to be sent home tonight raw and naked? Would that make your little heart happy?"

Fingers strong enough to crush armor into powders push and prod the girl's head, lifting it up and pushing it down again in a forced nod. Mosaic smiles, and her mismatched eyes gleam with the promise of delights for a pack of failures. Her tongue slides across her lips in invitation. Her breath is hot against the other girl's face. Her hand slides through a war braid and grips the back of her skull.

Mosaic sneers, and twists around with the force of a tornado, tossing the Ceronian girl into a pile of five of her companions. She stomps her foot and the ground shakes, burying them from the shoulders down in an avalanche of former housing. She tosses her head back and howls with laughter.

"Next time, remember! Taking me is the same as taking Beri! So don't you dare send less than the entire pack at me ever again! Not that it'll make a difference! Ha!"

[Overcome with Hope: 6, 1, 4: 10. Ember, tell us how the brave knight fights her pack and wins hard enough to let Mosaic have her way with the rest of them]