"You know, the worst thing is I don't even disagree with what she's doing?"

It should be impossible for a snake to pace, but Dyssia is managing it. Up and down the window, occasionally glancing out the window at the gleaming planet below them, and then back at her friends as if she expects to be scolded.

It's like, she's been lectured about this before, right, during her training in ? You're expected to be dignified, and stately, and have your thoughts composed, and roll with the punches, and not do that thing where your hands talk as much as your mouth without you telling them to do that?

It's nice to be with friends, whether or not that sentence ends with 'who don't care' or 'who don't know better.'

"It's like, the thought of your body just, you know, up and crapping out on you one day, for no other reason than because some virus disagreed with your liver and you wore out is, is, is horrifying, right? So Cash Money, bringing that to these people, good thing?

"But doing it the sneaky way is just. It's like, you could appear in whatever town square you like, say 'who wants to not die,' and have people lining up. She's doing it to people who'd sign up for it anyway, but wants to control, wants to force it on them. She's--what's the phrasing?--she's feeling good about herself instead of helping people, if that makes sense. She's not willing to give it out on their terms, because that would mean thinking of them as people, as equals. She's treating them like a project, as objects, as things that will be ever-so-grateful for her help and worship her feet as a demigod for her kindness and mercy."

The Argumentative Portuguese. She wishes she knew what they called themselves, if for no other reason than, you know, distinguishing herself mentally from the other Azura. Meaningless, except it isn't.

"The only reason to side with the Generous Knight over Cash Money is that it'd be easy. I already have an in with her, I'm a friend of a friend, I could probably talk her over, get her to put in some supply requests for us, get us gone nice and simple. I don't wanna, though, because she's an asshole. She's technically correct, in that uplifting the Portuguese will cause a lot of short-term problems in terms of, whoops, all our supply and medical issues just got solved and now whatever power structures the Azura like are going to calcify into a terrifying cancer-clump of abuse.

"But she's also only doing it because she wants a fight that will be entertaining. She could sweep in and crush them right now without a thought, and that's not fun. Better to let them die by the millions if it means she doesn't have to wait to sweep in and crush them later on. Because let's be real, the Portuguese aren't winning this militarily--the only reason they haven't been subsumed already is because the Azure Skies aren't threatened by them enough to care. If they actually fought and won against old Genny, they'd be a target for every aggrieved knight and minor noble looking to make a name for themselves."

Like us, she very carefully does not say.

"The Synnefo is a non-starter. Just, no. He'll be polite and obsequious and oh-so-willing to help, but of course madames will understand that he cannot help just one of us, and somehow in the conversation you'll be back in the ship, feeling grateful that he's here while also having been given homework out of it. He's going to be neutral. He might care about whether Cash Money or the Generous Knight come out on top, but he's never going to let it show, and he's certainly never going to help us over them.

"The only lever he has--thank you Brightberry, this information is incredibly helpful--is that pack of rogue Ceronians. It occurs to me that if we could incorporate them into ourselves--Ember, you're Ceronian liason duty, you'd know whether that works or not--we could simultaneously remove a threat to the Portuguese, ingratiate ourselves with the person in charge of supplies, and also bulk ourselves up slightly in case of any fighting we need to do.

"So, two options as I see it. Option one: bribe NBX-462 by taking care of his Ceronian problem. Option two: try to support Cash Money and, in so doing, make the process more aligned with the desires of the people on-planet. Option one is gonna cause less problems for us long-term, but I think I'm slightly leaning option two."

wag wag WAG wag wag goes Ember's tail, her ears perked up, her smile hidden but obvious. The energy is shared by her honor guard, who are leaning in as if to pounce, intent on the very idea of a rival pack to clash against.

"It all depends on their dynamics," Ember says, bringing her fingertips together like the archetypal "scheming Synnefo." "If we crush them, seize their pack treasures, prove our dominance, some clans would disintegrate under pressure like that, or at the very least would shed new recruits and wandering bands chased offworld. Others would harden like diamond under external pressure, fighting to the last, impossible to tame. We won't know unless we challenge them. A strike force, hitting at their base, demanding plunder and satisfaction, testing their mettle-- that is how we can know this pack."

Then, with the air of a hound that has suddenly realized she has been caught halfway to the cookies, and thinks that if she freezes up she will become invisible: "If you think that is necessary. It probably is, no matter who we side with. They're a thorn in everyone's boot, except for the Generous Knight, but we've already established, I think, that we won't side with her. And we shouldn't. If she wanted an entertaining fight, she should have looked to us."

Pride radiates from the elegantly-made knight, and her bannermaid drums her stave's butt against the floor once, twice, thrice in enthusiasm. But more than that, Ember keeps sneaking glances out the window at the world below. She yearns to see, to run, to challenge, and to meet the unknown. To greet the Argumentative Portuguese without hiding, to acknowledge that she is the Speaker for the Tyrant and that she has come to solve their Ceronian problem. To win veils for her belt and to win gifts from a populace eager to be saved and spared. And who can blame her?

"...Stop it, both of you."

Bella is leaning on a table just the way she remembers Nero doing it in meetings she happened to be tapped for drink service at. She'd always thought it made the Empress look powerful and in control despite her stature. With her bulk the image is not the same, but she does it anyway because the alternative is falling onto her knees. Weakness gnaws at her legs.

Just another way she's not cut out for this after all. The business of being a hero. Mosaic would not have hesitated; she'd be neck deep in saving this crapsack of a civilization before either of her idiot advisors could finish advocating for it.

Fresh snarls build up in her throat. A thousand and one insults thrash their way through her tail. She has to remind herself to breathe, to press her palms flat against the table and let the worst versions of this conversation dissipate across its surface. That's the real trick Her Majesty used, and why she was always so good at getting her point across most of the time.

"Listen to me. We're not invincible. There's no magic empire dust we can sprinkle over the Silver Divers that'll turn them into a proper legion, and if there was that wouldn't be enough anyway. Did you already forget that your pack lost in a straight up fight against Beri, Ember? We have to pick and choose where and how we fight if we're gonna win. 'Look to us for an entertaining fight?' Fuck that. I don't want the Generous Knight to even know we exist. The only reason I'm not going straight to her is that I know there's no way to get this requisition out of her without it turning into a whole fucking thing with the Biomancer which just... no."

Bella forces herself to stand. You're certainly in good company Dyssia because now that she's not leaning on anything the only way this catgirl can keep herself going is to stalk the entire room like she's hunting it. Her hands slash through the air constantly, and she glances around to every corner as if she expects predators to rush her from all of them. Her ears twitch irritably. The whole room smells like rust and chlorine to her. Her face scrunches as she continues:

"You don't want to hear this, but the Portuguese were fucked before we ever heard about them. Do you understand me? There is no helping them. Sorry their diseases give you bad tummyfeels but they're better off with those than as Servitors. You don't have any idea what 'lifting' them is actually condemning them to, so don't lie to yourself that it's some great altruism. We can't fit them all on this ship either, and if we could I wouldn't let you because unless you've forgotten your own insane plans you've got me here against my will so we can hide from assassins in the middle of a fucking star."

Her claws are snapped to full extension. Her breathing is strained and irregular. It takes her a moment to notice either, and when she does she "recovers" with a too-formal straightening of her posture and an unnecessary slicking back of her own hair that makes her feel less in control of the situation than ever. A breath to steady herse-- nope. That's a sigh.

"...The people of Bitemark are not here to be your freedom fighters. None of them signed up for it. They came with us to not die. And I'm not going to let them. As long as they are mine to protect I will not pick a fight I can't win unless there's no other choice.

"We negotiate with the sheep. Minimum involvement, minimum investment. Get what we need and get the fuck out. That's all there is to it."

Her head turns and her shoulders curl forward in an unnecessarily aggressive posture. Bella's golden eye gleams like a beacon in the middle of the room, shimmering with an unreadable cocktail of emotions.

Dolce doesn’t panic. This, too, is obedience and observation. He knows the ways of listening to a houseguest, and discerning the ways they like to be treated that differ from the usual manners.

Haven’t had to do it in a long time. Slightly difficult circumstances to do it in. Dolce doesn’t panic.

“Oh. Dear. That’s not the impression I was looking to give at all.” He replies in a low, strained whisper that 20022 has no hope of spotting. Which may make the spy accusations yet more credible. Hrm. “My apologies, I may have over-prepared a tad for this assignment.”

It made sense, in a way. Whether in the Manor or the Service, the work was the same; take care of the busywork necessary for others to live and work comfortably. Only, an Empire was quite a bit larger than a Manor. An Empire needed its inhabitants to, well, do things on occasion. Which required a degree less invisibility.

…which meant a workforce, created, to do difficult and thankless tasks, to be fought and scorned as they did those tasks, and to live in a constant state of exasperation and irritation at the ones they were meant to be helping.

“I.” A practiced tension stole over him, smothering and absorbing the very emotion he needed. And still he felt relief at hearing no tremor in his voice. “I don’t suppose you have any tips for being…’lowkey mad’, do you?”

The Plousios!

"The movements of rogue servitors and Publica agents aren't my department," said NBX-462 reassuringly. He's a fine little Synnefo with a curling mustache and a walking stick wrapped in a little crocheted cozy. He came in person with only a secretary when contacted. No bodyguards, no retinue - a little sign that he was so replaceable he had nothing to fear from stepping onto a pirate ship. "No, I have no legal requirement to report your movements, I assure you. My task is simply the removal of friction; at some point the Skies will turn their attention to this world and I need that to be as painless a process as possible. And the presence of a Ceron commando team - well, it's nothing but friction. Please, consider that a compliment - the existence of an industrialized alien civilization on the frontier does not even register against the ongoing insurgency of trying to remove Ceronians from a planet. These are the Star Kings, by the way, I believe they've got a specialty in energy esoterics."

He cleared his throat and his secretary set out a large wooden planetary map painting. "Now, the Ceronians are currently playing a rather silly game of cops and robbers with the locals," he said. "They're plundering freely, setting themselves up as local dictators, that kind of thing. Then they get into playful brawls with the locals uplifted by Cash Money - knocking over buildings and so on. It's all very destabilizing on its own right but before long they'll start recruiting locals to their pack and the next thing we know we'll have an entire Legion growing out here. If you convince them to leave my sector then I'll procure for you whatever you require and consider it a bargain at the price."

Which question do you each ask of NBX-462?

Dolce!

"Oh yeah, sure!" said Contribution cheerfully as a passing wing of fighter craft were blasted by ground-based ELF artillery, crashing down to the surface in flames. "You just gotta, like, say stuff for the benefit of the audience, or failing that yourself. Like, drop little veiled injokes, wisecracks and things that signal to people on your wavelength what your real feelings are. It's like a language trick, right? You say one thing to the boss and another thing to the people around you who realize what a fucking idiot the boss is being. The boss shows up to a meeting hung over, you just slow down the proceeding a little, be a little more formal than normal to drive in the nails. If you're confronted then hand off to a colleague nearby who will apologize for the inconvenience and then, because you're communicating with them and they agree with you, will start up some whole new inconvenience that's just as annoying."

He grinned, illuminated by illumination flare rockets. "Right? One sheep isn't much. Easy to push around. A herd is just a mass of wool and bad ideas and that can't really be negotiated with," he said. "But you could always try and find a competent boss instead who you don't have to be mad about. Like Liquid Bronze!" he sighed dreamily. "Now there's a man you can set your watch to."

Even with all this extra time to sort through it, Mosaic's wardrobe remained a horrifying clusterfuck of bad decisions. Everything read like the decisions of some drunk-off-her-ass pillaging mercenary or someone cursed to only be able to wear things gifted to them on different days by different people. Everything that woman was was defined by her name, and worse than that by pride in that name. Contrasts in colors and fabrics and lengths and styles and just... herself, reflected endlessly, intentionally highlighting all her worst features as if they were her best.

Like she wasn't afraid of the scars or the fur or the skin. Like she was proud of her muscles and her fat at the same time. Like the ignorant rube whose only accomplishment was crawling out of the Lethe and passing out on a beach had somehow transcended the woman she'd replaced without even knowing who she was. It made Bella sick just looking at it. All of it was hideous and ill-fitting and tripping over itself fawning over Artemis, which was a hell of a thing to stick to yourself when you couldn't even hunt right you idiot.

But she was stuck with all of it. Bella couldn't tear every last scrap of clothing apart trying to stitch it into something workable without it arousing even more suspicion in the crew of this new Plosious than she did just by existing. Never mind disappointing them, she didn't want to think about what some of them would do to her when they realized their great hero had been replaced by a broken servant of an empire that had apparently died before living memory. So all she could do was root around in the pile until she could find something that at least didn't make her feel hideous to walk around in.

Besides, it's not like she needed another reason to feel inferior to her shell after that debacle of a "strategy meeting" with the allies she couldn't stop yelling at. That's what brought her here to this meeting in the most feminine thing Mosaic owned: a glittering coral colored gown on spaghetti straps with a plunging neckline to kill a god. The high slit on the right thigh exposed the form fitting black leather pants that went with it for some inexplicable reason, along with the crossing golden chains that helixed their way down her legs all the way to her ankles and the flat, soft shoes that covered her feet. At least the elbow-length gloves, for all that the gaudy teal color ran against her fur, covered up the healing her arm was still undergoing.

Bella glares at the sheep with a practiced haughtiness that somehow conveys the title 'Praetor' in a land where the word had no meaning. Odd. She thought the Synnefo favored soft and bottom-heavy, unassuming builds. The sort of thing that hid what they were capable of, like Dolce. This one looks like he gets in fistfights for the fun of it. Can't trust that. But can't pivot. Stuck. She runs her tongue over a tooth to keep from frowning too obviously.

"It's not a bad deal for either of us. You mind if we get all this in writing? My sister believes it makes for better hunting. Actually on that note, I'll lend her to you while we handle your wolf problem if you can promise me there'll be some decent food and clothing in our supply drop. We're desperate."

She plucks at her dress with a grimace. Very, very desperate.

Dyssia is dressed to the nines, every inch a prince and knight of the Publica.

Or, you know, as much to-the-nines as the budget and surviving stores will allow.

It sucks so much. Like, not from a perspective of impressiveness, though now that she's here, she kinda wishes she hadn't bothered? Whatever her best is, it's less than the best of two Azura who aren't willingly handicapping themselves with ethics, so swooshing in here--and she's doing her best to swoosh, be sure of that--is less useful than you might think.

And it's uncomfortable, to boot.

Still, she does her best to look regal and commanding as she asks about the Portuguese. What do they want, apart from not being raided by Ceronians?

Dolce is listening. He is in friendless territory without a map. It would be extremely unwise to take an honest, helpful suggestion, and throw it straight into the rubbish without giving it due consideration. So he gives the idea its due consideration. The rubbish bin will still be there. Waiting.

So: Utilize careful language and plausibly deniable turns of phrase to…snipe at your boss? To tear them down where they can’t notice you? To take the sting you feel and turn it on someone else? Sounds like quite the pleasant place to work. Ruled over by a miserable boss, and spending your days cursing them where you won’t be noticed, stewing bitterly in the pain they’ve caused you. What good does that do anyone? What good does that do you?

…and on the subject of ideal worlds, would the Crystal Knight have her position if this was one? Would 20022?

Fair point. All the wishful thinking in the world would not change his position, or who he was to be working with. All the subtle digs in the world wouldn’t do it either. It stung to even consider. For whatever else he could say about the Crystal Knight, he never actually wanted to hurt her. Not for spite. Not for what she’d done to him. But if anything he’d rather say to her was just wishful thinking, then, well, he’s got to say and be something. Spy vibes! To be avoided!

Was this all part of the expected job? Did everyone here expect him to use his words so dishonestly? Signaling. Communication. Collaborating without speaking. Searching for allies without asking. It’s, urgh, unnatural.

“Hat in hand.”

Or. Was it?

Did it have to be hurtful?

“Isn’t that rather difficult? It’s easier to joke and be clever when you’re feeling happy and among friends. You know-” An explosion shook the entire shuttle. “Safe. But when you’re angry and hurt, it’s harder to steer because you’re against the tide, not with it. How do you keep your head?”

“We need to know their mon and lineage,” Ember of the Silver Divers says. Her tense air is surely just eagerness to fight. She is Ceronian, after all. Thus the restless tail, the bouncing on her heels, the ears at attention. “Then we can start planning where and how we’re going to fight.”

She’s trying so hard not to look at Mosaic, both because of the feeling prickling along her spine and because, well, look at her! She’d be useless to the Tyrant of Beri with Venus arresting her eyes. She needs to be alert. She needs to pay attention. She needs to figure out what is making her fingers itch and her mouth wet. Maybe the Synnefo?

(After all, the Synnefo are perfect targets for any daughter of Ceron. What better challenge than to turn the unflappable, aloof bureaucrats into bleating, flustered messes? What more comfortable trophy than sheared wool? Every one has their weak spot, and it’s a long, delightful game to find it~)

This one’s good, though. Hardly blinking in the face of half a dozen members of the clan, all eyes fixed on him: half-lidded, hungry, proud. Go ahead, little sheep. Be a good boy and give us our quarry.

NBX-462!

NBX-462 is a military servitor, and that means a certain tolerance for dealing with other military servitors. His conditioning prepared him for being placed in close proximity to predator species that could and would torment him into unmet performance targets. The Biomancers who had engineered him for the duty, though, had been less interested in addressing the root issues and more interested in producing the appearance of function.

Hence the silly little waistcoat. Hence the silly little mustache. Hence the silly little walking stick. Hence the silly little finger-wag and silly little puns he made when directly assaulted to hide the fact that he was turnt as hell.

"The Silver Kings descend from primogentor Laell IV," he said as his hands busily worked at transcribing the specifics of the contract. Not a tremble. "Core attributes: Urban-designated, courtly aesthetic, educational lineage. Specifically, Laell was a fencing instructor engineered to tutor wealthy aristocrats in the fundamentals of swordfighting. This was, of course -" he smiled absently, thinking very hard about the crossword puzzle he'd left back on his ship for just such an occasion, "- a seduction. Laell and her line used their positions adjacent to aristocracy to steal hearts, engineer vendettas, and induct key figures into the Ceronian species. This caused the collapse of dynasties and the Star Kings emerged from their vaunted origins with an arsenal of direct energy weapons and a taste for the finer things in life."

"As to the Portuguese," he went on, feeling on somewhat safer - though much more confusing - ground now. "Their -" he grappled for a word. 'Poor' and 'rich' were not relevant concepts in the Skies. "- citizen underclass... how to put this? They possess genetically engineered servitors, but for the most part these are animals shaped through selective breeding programs. These are of such low quality that they are outperformed by primitive chemical reactors. As a result, their civilization has conscripted enormous quantities of its administrator species into menial service and labour roles that they are massively overqualified and underspecialized for. This means these labourer-administrators," there was just no elegant way to put any of this, "have enormous surplus intellectual and creative energy, which they mostly turn to the purpose of displacing or joining the group of administrators who are living civilized lifestyles. For their part, the ruler-administrators have to turn their own creative and intellectual surplus, as well as that they can harness of their directly indebted inferiors, into maintaining their rule. This causes them enormous stress, degrading their quality of life, and requires the existence of a standing military for use against the underclass-administrators."

He signed the form with a flourish and handed it over. "It is no way to run a civilization, in my opinion. But as to what they want, well - they're too disorganized to even know that. Some of them, encouraged by the Generous Knight and her technology transfers, are forming a militarized and xenophobic wing dedicated - amusingly enough - to the destruction of the Endless Azure Skies. Some of them, based largely on Cash Money's medical interventions, have decided that we are gods, or we're the reincarnation of one of their local political leaders who died a while ago, or that we are here to take a side in their local political conflicts. One of these groups went so far as to land a chemical rocket on the hull of my ship with an ambassador - I returned her to the planet without comment, of course. Some other group is building a primitive generation ship in an attempt to escape what they imagine to be an immanent ground invasion - and when I say primitive I mean 'over a hundred years to reach a neighbouring system'."

He sat back, folding his hands in his lap. "But what do they want? I imagine all of this begins with their poverty. I am having to order in so many goods because their civilization produces nothing of note. Aphrodite rules here with an iron fist in a way that is only possible when she still has things like 'immortality' to tempt people with."

Dolce!

"Oh, that part?" said Contribution with a grin. "You just gotta be so good at your job that it'd be trouble to replace you. Bosses hate trouble."

The shuttle comes down under fire, and the diplomats arm up. There is a massive impact as the ship makes landfall, and then a huge crash as the back deployment ramp almost falls off, still burning with sticky chemfires. The Summerkind, formed up into a protective phalanx, give a warrior yell and advance into a moonscape of mud, wire, and toxic smoke. Immediately Debug is taken in the neck with an arrow and goes down. The rest flow into a wild evasion pattern, pulling you and 20022 along. The bright glare of an Esoteric ignites, evaporating Drill in a flash of blue light. There's yelling and panic, hunkering down, a whirl of mud and fire.

"They knew we were coming!"
"The command bunker is just over there -"
"Escort the sheep, they're the only thing that matter -"

Shells come crashing down. Contribution is half-carrying you through the storm. Shrapnel embeds in your wool, smoking and radioactive. And then out of the shadows ahead comes a monstrosity - four meters tall and gangly, built like a shadow puppet, black limbs and gold armour, white powdered face and a curling wig. An Avatar - a hostile environment projection suit for Biomancers, not occupied directly but more like a highly personalized drone that acts as a direct ambassador. "Come on, you bastards," it roars above the chaos, "do you want to live forever?"
There is a rallying cry, and all around you thousands of Summerkind erupt from their trenches, bayonets fixed, and storm towards the enemy in an avalanche. You're escorted against the tide, through the jostle, towards the shining blue-yellow flag of the command post.

And then you're inside. It's silent. It's clean. It's spotless medical white. There are showers, changes of clothes and a wide variety of cosmetics and hygiene products standing by. Contribution is staring around with wild, shocked eyes, every member of his clutch gone - lost, dead, joining the charge. 20022 is immediately taking to the shower with a completely unfazed expression.

The room is too clean.

What a funny thought to have. What a funny problem to have. But there you have it. The room’s too clean. The, colors, and the layout, the, you can’t hear anything in here. He can hardly hear Contribution breathing, and he’s right next to him. There ought to be more here. It’s all wrong. It can’t be this clean. It shouldn’t.

He’s got to keep moving. That’s important. He’s not to be still. Nothing good comes of staying still. How far is it to the floor? He feels around blindly with his dangling hoof, and sooner or later he finds solid ground. Sooner or later, he’s standing, and he’s clinging to Contribution’s thin arm. One hoof up. One hoof down. In front of the other. Keep moving. That’s important.

He feels a gentle tug. He stops. He’s still holding Contribution’s arm. Contribution isn’t moving. He tugs, on purpose this time. “Come,” somebody says, and it might be him. “You ought to get cleaned up too.”

There are enough showers. There’s an open one, right next to his. One hoof in front of the other, he walks Contribution to it. And the Summerkind keeps moving, all the way into the stall. All the way until the door is closed behind him. And Dolce keeps moving, all the way into his stall. Until the door closes. Until the water runs down his face, and he realizes he might’ve ought to have taken off his clothes.

Here, at least, there’s the sound of water. There’s the feel of steam. There’s the muffled rush of water from Contribution’s shower next door. There’s something here. It’s not too clean here.

He breathes. In. Feel the water running down his face. Feel the warmth clouding all around him. Out. Hear the patter of water on his horns. Hear the faint shudder of his own breath. And repeat. He remembers, it’s important to keep breathing, slow and steady, after…after.

It’d helped the Privateers to hear that. When they came back. Those who came back. He never knew how to say it, exactly. Every way sounded wrong. He did his best. He’s doing his best. He’s breathing, and that’s important, and. Even if no one would notice the extra moisture in this downpour. He has to keep moving.

So he sets his clothes aside. So he picks out the shrapnel. So he makes a lather, and washes one arm, the other, then his face, like he does every morning. Today. Today he’ll skip the conditioner. One day won’t harm much. Wool is durable stuff. So long as he keeps moving. He has to keep moving.

His ears flick. He still hears Contribution’s shower running.

He can stay a few minutes longer. He can rinse off a little more thoroughly.

"Star Kings," Sagetip sniffs. "It's all psychology with them. And the weapons, but those can be circumvented. It's the superiority that makes them dangerous. Breaking their opponents' will to fight, acting as if they are invincible, and cluster bombing an opponent: that is where they get their reputation as warriors."

Ember is half listening, and half imagining the Portuguese, and more than half angry at the thought of a bunch of... and here she imagines the people of Beri, but in loud orange and green outfits... a bunch of people, stuck on that planet, stuck in a system where they have to spend their whole lives trying to scramble their way to the top, instead of there being enough for everyone. Poverty and being trapped and the only way out is through the Knight and what if they just--

But she has to think of the ship first, doesn't she? Like Mosaic. And how could she, leader of a pack, go in and fix it? It's not like she can trust everyone in the pack to behave, anyway. Oh, sure, they'd go down, they'd have fun, they'd declare themselves here to save the world, but... they can't. Not here. Not now. And it keeps stabbing at her, like a needle. That she has to do the right thing for the pack and the ship and her girlfriend. Not for the Portuguese (staring at her in her mind's eye).

Get in. Scatter the Star Kings. Get the materials they need. Get out. You can do that, can't you, Ember? Without getting in trouble? Without needing to be dragged back out? Without trying to slot into the perfect position that will be vacated once the Star Kings are gone? For everyone (except the Portuguese)?

Staring at the simulacrum of their world, it's hard to be sure.

"That… seems unideal."

Brilliant. Perfect. Spectactular. Master of the understatement.

But it's true! The idea of--
Well, of a species being at war with itself, when nobody has anything worth fighting over is absurd! It's like someone went into things with the idea of creating a system worse than the Skies!

Granted, it comes from a place of, of, you know, of scarcity, right? Of not having enough? Of everyone fighting over scraps, simply because they don't--

She's so used to having enough that the idea of worrying about where something might come from is alien. Everything's made somewhere, right?

But if that's what they want--is it her place to tell them what they actually want? The Azure Skies genuinely have something better!

But they don't even know what they want, and--

Well, are we even better than them? Look at the Azure skies! Look at these three doofuses here--one generous, one warlike, one confused, and none of them willing to--

Guiltily, she sneaks a glance at Mosaic. Dyssia's still thinking in terms of how to help, how to--not control, but influence maybe? In terms of what she thinks is ideal, what she thinks is better, how she can 'help,' when it's obvious that that's a different thing for everyone.

But what else is she to do when--when someone is this backwards?

"How are they taking the shipments?"

Dolce!

It is not often in the Age of the Shogunate that you see anything that resembles a hospital.

The cleanliness is... Normal air has a bit of a metallic tinge, so omnipresent that you just don't think about it. That's actually the work of Exomites - bioengineered dust mites seeded on every planet in the galaxy. These mites work tirelessly to collect the infinitesimally small trace fragments of exotic hypermaterials like Quadranix required for modern engineering. Some of these materials are so rare that an entire planet infected with Exomites might only produce a hundred kilograms a year. But here they're gone. The air is clean. A perfect, sterile, flavourless oxygen-nitrogen mix, strained of every contamination.

The layout of the building is slipshod and haphazard, having been expanded at random, following the changing requirements of functionality without self reflection. You walk through a ward of drone tubes observed by various apprentice biomancers. You walk past a break room with a single chair facing a wall covered in posters of menacing looking Ceronians, marked with the words WE CAN BEAT THEM BY FOLLOWING POLICY other such inspirational messages. You walk through an open air cubicle farm where over a thousand apprentice biomancers work frantically with stylus and ink, illustrating muscle joints and connections and graphing out genetic sequences longhand, not looking up when the ceiling rattles and lights flicker as artillery shells impact on the bunker's roof. You walk past treatment wards, blue curtains and mechanical beds, where Summerkind sleep, leaf through magazines, or engage in high speed parallel conversations. Carts carrying food, laundry or failed drones force you to move aside constantly.

Every so often the P.A. crackles and a voice rings out through the facility. Sometimes it's functional: "Phalange test for Drone Batch 402," or "Incoming atomic. Brace for impact". Sometimes it's motivational: "Minimize idle chatter. Remember: Mouths are a privilige and not a right!" or "Remember: Containment breaches are to be expected and are not an excuse for missing deadlines". Sometimes they're unhinged. "The sign of a healthy workplace is being able to offer a stranger a high five - and get one! The sign of an unhealthy workplace is the deployment of Killer-T Drones!" or "Beauty is not an afterthought. It's critical to future funding! If you notice ugliness anywhere report it to the Eradication Team immediately."

Contribution leads you through, numbed and cold eyed. And then you arrive at the Dais - a prefab room that's physically been tilted on its side to add more verticality. At its bottom, crammed into the narrow space along the 'wall', are hundreds of Summerkind military strategists pushing past each other, laying out maps, discussing possibilities. A ladder leads up to a hastily built catwalk halfway up the room, where Biomancer-General Liquid Bronze sits in his command throne surrounded by his aides and assistants, issuing directives and imparting wisdom in between puffs of his cigar.

"See, the problem with Doctor Ceron's designs," he was telling his assistant, while flexing his bicep and pointing. "Is that she didn't understand the power of wolf social structures! Yes all of the Ceronians are sexy, powerful wolfgirls, with the rare few wolfboys mostly made as concessions to investors and they're not even in charge. And the way she'd have you hear it is that's the point! But that's wrong! In the wolf pack there's only room for one alpha, and all the others are betas and omegas - and that's what makes them such effective hunters. The betas work hard so they can usurp the alpha and get access to the omegas, that's motivation right there. You want my advice? You've got to biologically neg like 95% of your creations. Oh! - hold my cigar, we've got guests."

Liquid Bronze kicked his chair. It rotated on little scuttling feet and waddled across to face Dolce, Contribution and 20022. He gave a snap military salute, and Contribution returned it with tears in his eyes - he was meeting his hero, his creator, and at last something in his life made sense. "Good show, soldier," said Liquid Bronze. "Your sacrifices won't be forgotten."
"Yes, sir," said Contribution. "Thank you sir."
Liquid Bronze held the salute for another long moment. His assistant continued to hold the cigar as it burned away. Then Liquid Bronze broke it and turned back to face a massive map on the wall. It was being constantly updated by winged Summerkind who erased painted unit markers and replaced them in response to new reports. "Make it snappy, sheeple. This is probably the hardest battle I've ever fought and my opponent - well, he's a genius. No other word for it. Probably the best commander in the galaxy. It's going to take all of my cunning to turn this around. Adjunct! Order another frontal assault!"

Bella has eyes only for paperwork. The arrangement of every letter, and then the words they spell, and the sentences they form after that. The spacing of NBX-462's signature, how it flows, the smell of the ink and the pressure on the paper, how evenly it's replicated across multiple forms. She barely bothers smelling the air beyond the pages; these things tell her more about the situation than any scents of lies or deception she could look for. His body language is similarly useless, the eyes, the smile, his posture and the tone of his voice. None of it told her a fucking thing she wouldn't find here in the forest of Artemis.

"Oh yes. Totally agree," she drones, not looking up, "Backwards as it gets. Wrong way to live and so on. Someone really ought to do something."

Her pen hesitates over top of the contract. Her lips purse and her tail twitches in apparent irritation. Fucking sheep has her over a barrel. She'd invoked this contract as a way of saving everybody's ass from a trap but now he's gone and signed the fucking thing and it's turned into a trap instead. The question of whether or not she can trust the fluffball or not...

Unmistakable heat rises up to her cheeks. She leans farther over the paper. In clean, sharp lines she writes a name. The only name she can write if this is gonna mean anything, consequence be damned.

Bella. Hostilius. Meowmeow.

Her fingers grip the pen so tight that it cracks clean in half. Snarling, she lets it fall to the ground and rushes to fold the contract in half and then in half again before she hands it back. Her claws tear into the table when she tries to settle back down; she stands instead, and makes a show of smoothing out her dress. With a very calculated breath and a violent toss of her hair, she bows.

"I... appreciate your helpfulness with all of this. Sir. Rest assured, we have enough information to handle everything. We'll be in touch once we've settled your problem."

She does not wait for a response. With the Auspex pouring its baleful power all over the room in murderous waves, it is no problem at all to sweep Dyssia, Ember, and her entourage from the room along with her.

Silver Divers for Silver Kings. Obvious enough. Ember can take her wolves and handle things however she feels like it, as long as it gets handled she's got no reason to care how. Whatever problems crop up she can't handle them until later anyway.

That leaves herself and Dyssia, with Taurus as an honor guard, alone in a shuttle heading for the surface of the planet. She's calmer here, at least. Though she sits in a dangerous hunch, her claws curling inward and her eyes smoldering in the direction of the floor.

"You can't trust a fucking thing the little diplomat says," she muses, "That's why we're going down there ourselves. I want to see what these people look like with my own eyes. Don't get it twisted, though. Whatever we find down there, we're leaving behind. I just... need to know."

The Plousios!

The Portuguese, despite having turned their civilization towards the militarism of space, have no real way to prevent a hostile landing. But neither can they be ignored entirely. Some decisions have to be made.

Dyssia: How do you intend to land? There are a range of options, the simplest being a long range Boarpedo. Quick, quiet, fast - an ugly landing but it'll get you to the ground without drama with the locals. The catch is you can't leave the way you came. The next step up is a flight of Plovers - swift enough to skirt the edges of the defense fleet with only minimal contact, but once you land you'll have to park a dozen mechanical kaiju somewhere where the locals won't try to disassemble them. A full shuttle is the brute force option, with capacity to carry a full legion which can handle its own defense, but that's a big statement. If you really wanted to, you could also fly the Plousios close and base jump in from high orbit, but that's doesn't have many advantages over the Boarpedo.

Bella: What is the stylistic character of your visit going to be? A state visit, dressed as alien aristocracy? An infiltration, with your Hermetics and Sorcerer tasked towards concealing your true nature? Are you going to dress yourself as government agents, as in-system tourists, or as fellow kids attending school? You don't have a clear view of the alien culture but you do have a folder filled with out of context photographs provided by NBX.

Ember: What is the armament you're going to bring down with you? NBX has advised that even civilian solid projectile weapons work as a lethal neurotoxin to the inferior Portuguese biology, but swords alone will put you at a disadvantage against a presumably far better armed pack of Star Kings. Quajl has found a collection of esoterics aboard the ship but none of them are entirely perfect for this kind of operation - what do you choose, and what are the limitations?

The Lantern is heavy bronze, worked in repeating spirals like the death of clouds. The power that thrums through it is enough to make the hair on Ember's arm stand on end, grey and shivering. The Shield is, in comparison, horribly light. The platinum that traces through it is like the hungry roots of a tree, stark against the dark metal. It will become more and more difficult to hold later on.

They are a necessary pair. The Lantern's fire draws in the howling energy of weapons such as the Star Kings are rumored to hold, bending their arcs in flight to smash the fragile casing apart. The Shield, linked by cable (secured to Ember's shoulders), traps the fire, flickering and hissing across its face, until the bearer is ready to return it.

Limitations? What is not limiting? The weight, the inability to draw her sword, the need to interpose the Shield between fire and Lantern, the way that any reasonable Ceronian would give the order to cease fire after the first return salvo-- but it will deny the Star Kings their preferred means of battle. Their mighty weapons will be tossed aside if Ember can do her part, and if she is fortunate and thoughtful, she might be able to bring down any fortification in their way.

Particularly if the Silver Divers can seize some of the weapons in turn, and use them to prepare the Shield's vastest roar.

The photographs sourced from the Syfenno were very helpful in turn. The light armor of the Divers has been hidden beneath red-and-black checkered tunics and rough blue trousers, their ears beneath hats-- some shapeless, some wide-brimmed. This is what wilderness women among the Portuguese wear, is it not? They will blend in, even with the scabbards at their sides, surely.

"Explain to me again why we don't want to pose as students?"

Bella stares with longing at the photograph of the Portuguese university students. Their robes looked wispy and insubstantial, but the way they hung off of these people's awkward bodies was alluring to her. Ethereal. That was the word she wanted to use. What was wrong with wanting to finally wear something pretty? Omn spins its outer ring in response. The orange glow gave off the impression of a delighted chuckle.

"As a reminder, your primary interest in this species is anthropological?"

"If that's what you wanna call it. I'm just trying to figure out what they're like from someone that isn't one of the three wise assholes floating up above them."

"And I applaud your curiosity, Lady Mosaic. The foundation of any great administration is a firm grasp of the facts!"

Bella winces and squeezes her arm, but says nothing. The folio of reconnaissance photos drops onto the table in front of her as she watches the pulsing light at the core of her former (and current) advisor. Just how the fuck did it get here to begin with? It hadn't made the crossing with anybody.

But then... no. Maybe that was the wrong way to think about the Underworld to begin with. She scowls in thought as Omn continues its lecture.

"Since focused study is your intention, my recommendation is to look for a solution that will allow for the longest possible period of untainted observation time."

"Untainted? The fuck does that mean?"

"You needn't worry yourself Lady, it is a very simple principle to follow. To begin with while there is little we can definitively say for ourselves about this new society, we do know with absolute certainty they are a civilization in crisis after contact with multiple Imperial-grade factions. Their society is grappling with questions of biomantic ascension while under explicit threat from a Knight of the Endless Azure Skies and attempted assimilation into a Ceronian squadron. If you do not take steps to hide your own nature as a being on par with these threats, their only logical conclusion will be that you are a third, equal threat."

Bella yawns and fusses with her hair for a moment before answering. She briefly opens the folder to look at all of NBX's example pictures again, but slams it shut after only half a glance.

"You're saying that even if I convince them I don't have an agenda it still won't give me what I want?"

Omn briefly contracts its rings so tightly that its core becomes obscured by the thrumming metal, and then expands to almost the entire room so that Bella's nose is only a centimeter or two away from the outermost portion.

"Correct," it hums with pride, "That is the issue you wish to avoid! Remember, high level portions of this civilization have already come to the conclusion that their 'visitors' are deities or reincarnations of their important historical figures. You might be able to make them friendly, but you will never gain access to unfettered truth that way. It will become their mission to leave you with a favorable impression, and will block your access to the working citizenry."

"Sure, whatever. And what the fuck does this have to do with not posing as students again?"

"Oh that is simply a question of sustainability, Lady Mosaic. While I do not doubt the Service's information gathering acumen, they have offered you a 'bird's eye' view of the situation. You can reasonably assume that some of your conclusions about your observation targets will be incorrect ahead of time."

"So what, you doubt my acting skills? Fuck you, I fooled Dany for years. I can pull this off!"

"I am merely suggesting," says Omn through a curious rotation, shifting from a cardinal axis to an ordinal one, "That playing the role of an outsider will allow you to ask more impertinent questions for longer without arousing suspicion than a role that requires you to have insider knowledge of a society you have only just discovered. And besides that."

"...What?" Bella sniffs the air in suspicion.

"While no one could argue that you are not in the flower of your youth I question the ability of a woman of your, ah, pedigree to pass for a student. I fear you are more likely to come across as an erotic holonovel interpretation of the role and though I for one--"

"What." Bella's eyes are slits. Her claws quiver as they lift into the air, "The fuck. Is this? You piece of shit, if this is your idea of a joke I'm gonna carve you into pieces right fucking now and use you as a wine rack. You want that? How's that for funny, you misshapen eyeball wannabe fuck?"

But Omn is not built to respond to threats. It merely changes its oscillation patterns again in the mechanical equivalent of a proud parent ruffling a child's hair.

"Voice inflection recognition confirmed. Welcome back, Praetor Bella. It is an honor to serve you once again. Shall I prepare a list of mission appropriate disguises for your perusal?"

It feels like being punched in the stomach. There is no air inside her lungs. Anger and embarrassment lay forgotten at her feet as Bella folds down into her seat again, sitting there with her elbows pressed into her knees and her head thrust into her hands. She stares at the floor, but the shadows pulsate there in wild dances lit by a soft orange glow.

"...Yeah,"she breathes, "Go ahead and. Yeah."

********

Even now, Bella could not explain why she felt compelled to travel among the Portuguese and learn anything at all. It made no sense, when the most important goal of all was to keep the Plousios' visible involvement to a minimum. Anything that made their course more traceable was a potential disaster, and it was supposed to be her job to stay focused on that.

But here she was, pulling a hood stitched together by her Hermetic team over her head and arranging a truly gaudy amount of jewelry across her person. Her outfit was really more gold and non-precious but still eye catching stones than it was fabric, both by volume and by coverage. Tight fitting pants helped restrict her movement a little while the baggy top obscured her form and its potential power, at least where it wasn't pinched back around her arms or neck or waist by band after band after band of gold or strapped together by obnoxious leather belts.

The whole point was to look tacky. She hated how much sense Omn made when it explained it. From out of town but still in system; enough to excuse most culture clashes she or Dyssia or Taurus would become a part of but still on the level of the Portuguese so that nobody would connect them to the Skies or to the Daughters of Ceron or to... well. Nobody was going to connect her to the place she was actually from even if she shouted it in their faces. But still. And even so.

Stupid. That's what this was. Just stupid. This is the kind of idle curiosity she was always screaming at Dany about, and now she'd proven she was never any better about it in the first place. What did she hope to get out of this?

The actual name of these people, for one thing. But maybe she had no real reason at all. The place she came from had been dead before she was even born. It might've been stupid and selfish, but was it wrong of her to want to go and see somewhere in the middle of dying, too?

Dyssia pauses, and gingerly tears out a bit more of the insulation in her Plover.

The noise has to be right, d'you understand? It won't be the Electric Tiger II if the noise isn't that same spine-rattling purr as before.

It's dumb that she gets one.

Gets to spend time painting it so the stars gleam against its orange. Make it hers. Actively change its configuration to fit how she flies, how she listens, how she's shaped.

She gets a plover, after losing the last one. After losing the one the crews already customized for her.

It's why she's pulled this into a side hanger, banished the plover crews. It has to be her doing it, her fixing her own mistake.

It has to be her. She has to show that she's learned, even if nobody but her will notice.

The air tastes familiar. It is the first clean breath he’s taken in his life.

Why is that? Why does he know the chair in the breakroom is bolted to the floor without stepping a hoof past the threshold? Why can he sense the organizational web of the cubicle farm as if the walls were color-coded by team? How is it that he can automatically and completely ignore the messages on the PA after only hearing the first syllable?

“But if you're looking for it, change is everywhere in the Skies.”

There is no change here.

The Summerkind are all replaced in a month. New wings burst out of the facility haphazardly. The front line shifts. Liquid Bronze will, in time, move onto other things, and he will take command in a different command post, or research facility, or ship, and Dolce knows in his bones it will be precisely the same as it is right now. A stagnant, stable world, built for the sole purpose of serving one man, intended to run forever.

He remembers the Starsong were excellent guests. Polite, full of good cheer, praising the hospitality of their hosts at every turn, abiding by every rule and request of the Manor for the full duration of their stay. He’d first seen them when they toured the kitchens, the Majordomo’s proud, clipped voice echoing through the nearly-silent room. They smiled. They listened. They made appreciative noises, when called for.

Had they also been surprised at the calm in their own voices?

“I am so sorry to hear of your difficulties, Commander.” His smile was warm and soft as a toasted marshmallow. His folded hands as still as a coiled snake. “How much more do you suppose it will take before you are finished here?”

[Rolling to Look Closely: 6 + 6 + 2 = 14, How incompetent is Liquid Bronze, really?]