[b]Bella![/b]

Artemis looks out of the window. Outside, in the distance, there is the Muster.

A strange thing happens to a civilization when it stops thinking in terms of resources and starts thinking in terms of galactic mass. Juicing black holes for their hydrogen atoms creates the conditions where eventually the galaxy might run out of black holes, and without a cluster of supermassive gravity wells in the centre then the galaxy will eventually destabilize and begin to drift apart, suns flung off into endless night. A problem aeons away, but any response will take aeons to complete. And so, the Muster - a backstop for the stability of the Skies, an expeditionary invasion armada with the objective of traveling to foreign galaxies in order to steal the supermassive black holes at their cores.

The main mechanism is a comprehensive network of acceleration gates, vast galactic catapults designed to hurl warspheres across the cosmic black to neighbouring galaxies. These gates consist of networks of thousands of rings, each one proving space warping microsingularies in their centres to accelerate the launching warsphere to the speed of light. At the final stage of this process a quantum encoder - a vast and brutal machine of spiralling energy - folds the ship into the sign of Zeus, crushing the light-ship until it becomes a thunderbolt. With a crack of thunder - and there is thunder here, in the proto-atomosphere of the spreading Skies - the ship is blasted across the rift between galaxies as though thrown from the arm of Zeus herself. 

Every hour a new ship is loaded into the quantum encoder. Every hour a new thunderbolt flashes between galaxies. None of these ships are expected to ever return, no knowledge of their success or failure will ever be known, until thousands of years later the beating heart of the foreign galaxy begins to move towards this one.

Ten more encoders are under construction. 

"I never said you were a failure," said Artemis. "In fact, I went out of my way to establish that you were not a disappointment. Heracles had twelve labours, and when he had accomplished six it did not make the next six any less impossible, nor did overcoming the impossible six times make him wiser than Odysseus. It simply meant he had overcome the impossible six times. And now, as with you, there is another impossible task at hand."

She closed her eyes and folded her hands in her lap. "But once the twelve were done, there were no more. This I can promise you, too. And for now, you must descend into the underworld of this ship; the secret depths where the bones of crews past lie slain by each others' love. Your sister works there."

[b]Ember and Dolce![/b]

"It's straightforwards," said Gemini, as she patted your heads and wrapped you in flowers. "You need to approach Vasilia and show her what remarkable talents you have developed. And then..." she sprinkles some golden dust into the flowers, where it sparkles and glitters. "... give her your flowers. Tell her about the smell. Make sure she breathes deep. It's very important she appreciates them as much as she appreciates [i]you[/i]."

"I appreciate you doing this, Gemini," said Taurus. "You didn't have to..."
"Oh, hush~," said Gemini. "It's all for the good, isn't it? You'll learn secret combat techniques, these two will exhibit all of their many skills and talents, Bella will finally be able to take a rest, and Vesper will ascend as the promised messiah and resurrect everyone who has ever died! Literally everyone wins!"
"She'll -" Taurus blinked.
"What?" said Gemini, fluttering her lashes. A golden symbol glowed on the back of her neck - a paragraph of instructions, written on her body the same way that names had been written on Bella's, back when she'd become XIII.
"... Nothing." said Taurus. "Come on, then. For the universal good, you must satisfy your catgirl wives."

[b]Dyssia![/b]

The Hermetic stares at you blankly for an extended period of time. 

Then he suddenly lunges a hand towards his coat, a reflex so fast it feels like he's about to pull a gun. Instead he pulls a bottle - a large, heavy and rounded industrial piece of glassware, solid enough to crack a skull, with a long neck that would make a great handle if it was used as a club. The glass is yellow tinged, wrapped with a handmade cloth label with the words BATCH 145 written in blocky sharpie, and the fluid inside has the viscosity of molten chocolate.

He offers it to you. It is clear this is a bribe.