[b]Bella![/b]

"You know I've killed a [i]lot [/i]of people?" asked Vesper. "It's actually kind of stupid when you think about it. When they designed me they were thinking that an ultra-genius assassin would kill people in the most subtle ways of all - some kind of butterfly effect where if I knock over the right glass of water then a toothpick ends up in the target's brainstem a few days later. A coincidence! But what they got instead was the kind of butterfly effect where I knock over the right glass of water and then a moon de-orbits a few days later."

Her room is a nightmare. When she first emerged from the Lethe she was writing on the walls in an attempt to get all the thoughts out of her head - she's done something much worse now. A simple black metal typewriter sits in the centre of the room, so smooth and heavy it's like it was made in a factory and not from panels ripped from the walls. The thing has a terrible gravity to it; it makes the room feel smaller, like moving through the blast radius of an Azura microsingularity.

"Maybe that's not the designers fault," said Vesper. "Maybe it's a target selection problem. Once they realized what I was capable of they started sending me on impossible missions, and it turns out there's been some inflation since Heracles' twelve. So once I started to remember -" she gives a normal giggle because, like the typewriter, there's no need to add anything extra to make it horrifying. "- I thought, well, what if I didn't exist? What if all the people I'd killed survived instead? What would the galaxy look like then? And so," she gestured vaguely at the machine, "I found out. There's an entire universe in there, one where I ate dirt on my first mission and billions of people lived when they would have died. But you know what's fucked?"

She slams her hands down on the typewriter. It jumps and dings, hammers smashing tracks on the paper. 

"It's not any different!" she said. "Nothing's changed! There are different people in certain chairs but it's not the people making the decisions, it's the [i]chairs[/i]! And this goes all the way up, all the way to the Gods themselves, ever since Demeter -!"

She shut her mouth. Then smiled. "[i]Did nothing wrong[/i]," she said pleasantly.

"Anyway," she said, stepping away from the typewriter. It started clicking, the key turning like a wind up doll's. "How are you?"

Of everything she'd just said, that was the least with it she'd been. How are you. New information. She says it like a junkie trying to convince herself that her last shred of decency is worth more than the contents of your wallet.

[b]Dyssia![/b]

Hey, did she say there was a universe inside that typewriter?

Dionysus thinks you should touch it. 

[b]Ember![/b]

You're doing fine. All you have to do is look pretty. You're [i]really [/i]good at that, you know? You're so good, you're such a good girl, "you're doing great, a face that could launch a thousand ships, my kind of face. Guys like me have to look out for dames like you when you're doing something so fool as putting yourself in danger -"

Aphrodite takes off your gag, and puts a cigarette in your mouth. It's worse. "Don't think nothing of it," he said. "You're doing all of this to get back to your true love, Liquid Bronze?" he grinned with nicotine-stained gums. "Far be it from me to star cross such lovers." He undoes your chains, and with them, your choices. He wraps you in his suit jacket to preserve your modesty and bind you tighter than you had been. "Ahhh. Don't you love it, love? People used to think that it meant stunning, overwhelming, violent beauty, but that's not how I like to work. I like to sneak up on people and then [i]get [/i]them when they're not expecting it. One day you're in control of your own destiny, making your own choices, and then -" Aphrodite carries you away from the Plousios, towards the [i]Cancellation[/i]. Like a gentleman. "-[i] love changes everything[/i]."

[b]Dolce![/b]

"I think we got off on the wrong foot," said 20022. 

He's not who you were expecting. He's here with a fruit bowl - somehow the same kind of bland fruit bowl he bought earlier. 

Sanalessa sits up slowly on the couch, black skull t-shirt hanging loose off her statuesque body. She has barely shifted but it felt like the chambering of a shotgun shell.

"There has been a bit of a learning curve here," said 20022, putting the fruit basket down vaguely. "Humanity was, after all... sentimental. They loved their cats and dogs and, yes, even their sheep long after the time for such things had passed, and they kept those animals alive through us. But they were also more fractious than the Skies and so there was a certain amount of, ah, duplication. That is to say, there hasn't been clear enough communication about your bio-preparedness to handle the rigors of the Service, and that is something I regret."

He smiled a professional little smile as he drew forth a document. "Not to worry. I've negotiated with the local Biomantic administration, and they've agreed to perform a correction. Of course, I do not wish you to have any unfinished business, so if you would, please go ahead and write down all of your own sentimentalities on this piece of paper and we'll see to it that everything is taken care of, as best as business allows."

Something in the corridor behind him shifted. Sanalessa is focused on it, terrible muscles bunching with the promise of resurrected violence. 

But Artemis is sitting quietly by the door, reading her newspaper - and not acting. Not yet.