[IC] Breathless Dead

[TheAmishPirate]

What do you do for the girl who is everything?

“Absolutely nothing” goes one school of thought. Why in the name of all that is good, decent, and sensible are you getting involved with a girl like that in the first place?! What are you to the universe? Could the sum total of your life cause even an atom to drift out of its place? Are you surprised that the tales of those who follow after Zeus earn their glory in blood and agony, and only sometimes that of other people? Flee. Run, if you can. Placate yourself to those mad enough to play in her domain, and spend your days under the care of gentler hands.

The barest hint of Zeus’ aspect recognizes its own. Sparks finer than hairs dart out to lick at Vasilia’s armor, punching her skin with a hundred burning needles. To stand before her, just to stand incurs a cost. Forwards or backwards, she will pay greater still. “Y-Yes. Well.” Why is she here? Why must it be her? Why must it always be her? Why, after everything, does she keep doing this to herself? “If I could not distract your eyes from the nearest skirts for even a few moments, what good would I even do with your lightning?”

Why does she do this, for the girl who is everything?

Because only the ones who show up get to play a hand in what happens here. And the only thing worse than the Master of Assassins remaking the galaxy in blood and bark is letting her do it by default.

Silence should not fall on the galaxy, on everyone, just because it put the work in.

*******************

“I admit. I am…not the best suited, personally, to stand in command over your daughter.”

He hears the shell-shocked voices, giving their report. He sees the wall of empty tables around her in the cafeteria. He turns to stone when her attention falls on him. Wolves and plants both will hunt him in his dreams tonight.

“But I am not alone here, and neither is she. She is young. She is learning. And if I can do nothing else for her, I can give her the space and allowance she needs. Maybe someone better than me can help her find her voice, and what might she sing then?”

“But this?” Bodies lurch across the field, three times maimed, and still it is not over. “How can this be…what else can this be, but, but…” He shakes his head furiously. “I don’t know how to even speak of it. This is much, Lord Hades, and I already have not spoken as carefully as I ought to have, and I apologize.”

So, perhaps. The better thing to say would be as little as possible.

“I understand that you have done more than enough already. I ask nothing more of you.” With a whisper of steel, his sword appears in his hand. “We will still lay them to rest, though. Not for any blessing. But because someone ought to.”

*******************

A word, then, for the battle, and the roles of Princess and Captain.

No one may stop the garden of Demeter. But only Epestia may be capable of slowing it down without joining their ranks. If the hands of Demeter are greedy enough to try and take her for her own, they will be reduced to nothing by the fury of Ares. How dare she? How dare she?! He will not let go of his precious prize so easily. Not here. Not today. Not in his own domain. As her allies contend with the Kaeri and plovers, Epestia will collect from the gardens of Demeter for every inch of ground, and the distance between them will serve them all.

As to the Captain and his second, they are skirmishers to the core. Fast, quiet, capable of gravity-defying maneuvers without a breath to give them away, their place is not in the front. As the clouds of toxic gas build, they dart under their stinging cover to find their targets. Exposed power cables. Allies in peril. Anywhere fates hang on a knife’s edge, it is their solemn duty to fly in unannounced and deliver a fatally unexpected kick.

[Balmas]

To think that all this time, she thought she knew what a phalanx was.

She darts from the phalanx! A step! A kick, sequins swirling around her! One ankle, hard as marble, falling like a hammer! An opening!

Oh, to be sure, she has fought in them! Felt the press of bodies, sheltered beneath her comrades' shields. Felt the invincibility of the press, the knowledge that, just for one second, all fought as one. But always…

She turns, and one Coherent offers a hand, a step, and she's above the press, dancing across shoulders to where she can most directly strike down, direct, engage

To fight for Molech was to be a pawn. Each phalanx moved as neatly across the battlefield as boxes on a map. Molech had decided what your place was, and if that meant that for the glory of Molech, a phalanx had to be sacrificed? Phalanxes advanced, moved, died, all huddled together, knowing that to break formation--to run, to flee--was to die. Ahead, glory and possible death. But behind? Decimatio, execution, slavery, or worse. Always, what was behind was worse. The phalanx held together through fear, through Molech's determination, through his knowledge of what you should be.

The formation parts just long enough for her to bull through a tree, and then engulfs her again, surging through the gap she's created.

The Coherents are chaos. Molech would sneer at the variable kit, at the way each insists of thinking of themselves as individuals, with different ways of fighting. And yet, it works. They shift and heave and pulse, each moving to support the other, each knowing the others well enough to understand, without speaking, how to help.

And by themselves, they'd be easy prey, hounded and harried by the Kaeri, pinched against the wall of thorns and flesh until the esoterics. But with her… She's not their leader. She would not dream to command them. But every time the Kaeri surge, again and again, she's there to open the path, or make an opportunity to be exploited, again and again, closer and closer to the esoterics…

A phalanx, but one that allows for each person to be their own without compromising its strength. What a concept.

6,1, +3. 10 on Overcome.

[Thanqol]

Redana!

Madness, Madness, Madness.

You race through battlefields. Ghost, breeze, god.

Alexa!

Madness, Madness, Madness.

You race through battlefields. Maiden, avatar, friend.

Vasilia and Dolce!

Madness, Madness, Madness.

You race through battlefields. Artists, leaders, partners.

Beljani!

Madness, Madness, Madness.

You race through battlefields. Predator, prey, sister.

*

Madness, Madness, Madness.

The Kaeri descend on bloody wings.

Many fall in bloody embraces with Alcedi. Wings entangled, stabbing and stabbing and stabbing. It takes so much effort to kill. So much effort to make hate manifest. As they die they live again, skulls shattering in cherry bloom, corpulent fingers plucking seeds from heavy branches and forcing them past unwilling lips or into struggling ears.

The Plovers are upon the field, sweeping about with swords and d-scythes. They accelerate towards the Lantern formations even as Jil lets out a war cry and hurls a javelin right through the multiglass that shields the cockpit. Black blood splashes the interior but still the machine comes. The Plovers make impact and an entire Clan disappears.

Princess Epistia does not carry her scythe. Why should she? Every time it returns to her hand she can cast it out in a broad spinning horizontal saw of death which clears a bloodless swathe through the Garden. In the time spent waiting for it to return her weapon is the battlefield itself. Every dropped spear or cast javelin, every broken shard of metal or sharp splinter of wood. They pass through her hands briefly on their way to new homes inside the bodies of her foes.

Demeter scythes down Kaeri like corn. They do not move from their phalanx, do not flinch as the goddess hews them down. She would have this be not a hunt, she would have this be a harvest. There is no relationship between you and she, Beljani; no mutual respect, no lesson of spoor or flaw. This is an industrial, uncaring death that she wishes upon you.

But you run. The combine harvester comes and you run. Your sin of blood and love and language screams for awful punishment, but there is strength in your legs still.

Ahead of you there is cigarette smoke.

Ahead of you there is cigarette smoke.

Vasilia and Dolce can smell the faint and odd taste of it on the edge of reality. Aphrodite takes a drag as plant monsters the size of bears scream past him in every direction. He gives you a lazy salute and is on his way - unhurried at first, but then surprisingly quickly once he sees Epistia coming for him.

You are at the tip of the spear, coming rapidly upon the black pyramid of the Master of Assassins. You fight from flight and are glad for it, else you would walk a path paved with the bodies of Epistia's foes.

You are so close.

You are so close.

A procession makes its way through the Coherent lines, chanting and incense and symbols and lyre music rising above the flow of battle. You hear the bellowing voice of Ramses at war, Alexa call and response to the phalanx. A mechanical priest directs a clattering walking wardrobe with a staff, and thirty attendants follow in his wake.

Plovers shadow in the poison smoke beyond, slashing through flank forces, orienting now to destroy this irregular phalanx in turn. And through this terror comes the priest, voice raising high for this too is the time for gods.

And the gods are immanent.

And the GODS are IMMANENT.

To walk invisible is to be as Hades. In a sense it is to be within his realm. And oh, how little changes once you are there Redana.

The God of the Dead is everywhere. You see him in the cosmic distance, a black pyramid the size of the milky way. This immensity is not the act of death, not the flickering moment of transition between two states. It is the accumulated and recorded history of every moment that ever went from present to past. It is the living embodiment of all knowledge, the accumulation of all matter, the end destination of all souls. It is as dense as a black hole and billions of times more vast. That, then, is Hades.

Or is he the altar?

The black pyramid upon which the Master of Assassins stands is him too - a reduced, tiny, pathetic version. It is both conjuring and binding. Hephaestus once wove a net that held even Ares. What, then, is this self outside of the self? What did Demeter do to reduce a fellow god so?

How can the great be reduced?

How can the great be reduced?

The Hermetic priest brings his travelling altar to a halt. He bangs on the edge with his staff and it settles, descending with hisses of hydraulics onto the ground. And then Ramses throws the door open.

Two arms of gold await there. They wait for you, Alexa. Not four as befit a god. Two, as befits a girl who is at last made whole.

It waits for you.

It waits for you.

Aphrodite and Artemis are both there, Beljani, sharing a cigarette. Artemis gives a thin smile and stubs the butt out under her feet. Aphrodite gives a corrupt grin and spreads his arms. His left hand holds a shovel.

And beneath his feet, a grave. Open.

It waits for you.

"Only one way to hide from Demeter," said Aphrodite wickedly. "And that's in the realm of Hades. Once I bury you, take a deep breath and put yourself in a suspended coma. Hope you're not claustrophobic."

End of the road.

End of the road.

The red ribbon path of Epistia has ended here, beneath the black pyramid of Sagakhan. Her attention is not upon you - she tends to her armoured servant, muttering and cursing and working with a micro-welder. The blood of fifty Kaeri pours down through the pyramid's blood channels. That gets her attention.

Finally, Sagakhan turns, her magnificent butterfly wings opening to their full extent. She taps her two monsters on the shoulders, a grandmotherly gesture.

"XIII, my daughter. Liu Ban, old friend. It is time for you to wake up."

Bella!

Madness, Madness, Madness.

[Phoe]

A pop when she rolls her shoulder. A snap when she flicks her tail. A crunch when she stretches her neck. Wake up, XIII. Mother says it's time to wake up. So rise. Taste the air. Smell the wetness and the dust. Feel the rain on your body, isn't this your first time? Wake up, XIII, sweet XIII.

Good morning.

She flexes her fingers slowly. They curl in to touch her palms. They stretch out to full extension. Her claws slice the raindrops in half. Her true claws. When she moves, her body sings. Every ripple of muscle is a rush of pure pleasure. More. Give her more. She sighs: a noise like venting steam.

Eyes open.

Mother's garden swells in greeting. Blood drips over every petal, leaf, and limb. It soaks into the ground, so potent that no storm could wash it clean. Ah. Wonderful fertilizer, is it not? She breathes deeper, lets her head tilt higher to greet the sky. Catch the bouquet. She must teach her lungs to breath. Eyes to see. Body to move.

Her lungs fill with death-soaked air and she hunches forward. Low. Low. Lower. Till her claws bite the floor of the pyramid and she tastes its pain between her fingers. She holds. And holds. And holds. The burning inside of her is ecstasy. In an instant she snaps to full height, and then past it. Her foot plants behind her. Spine curls. Head tosses back to the heavens. Clumsy braid flaps dully against her back. Her arms curl out to either side of her, and she can almost feel them crush the air.

She does not scream. She roars. She splits the storm above with an inhuman noise that carries from ship to ship. There is nothing of Bella in that noise. Nothing of weakness. There is rage and there is power and there is the promise of absolute death. She roars until the cannons stop firing to admire her. Even the garden pauses for a moment. All is stillness in the rain.

She descends.

She does not run. Does not fall. Does not drop. She reaches out with one hand and tears away the space between her and the ground. The distance retreats from underneath her feet and in less than the flicker of an eye, she is among them. Her neck tilts with curiosity to see Epistia, soaked in thick sap and the gore of plants. The scythe lifts in greeting. XIII's body grows hotter in anticipation. Her tail flicks behind her. Even now, the tell she cannot help but leave.

The blade whistles through the air, straight toward her head. XIII vanishes underneath it. Her palm kisses the Ceron princess' stomach. Her claws bite flesh just after. Hiss. Sing. A dance ensues. Tooth and claw and boot. The wet sand shudders beneath their feet. An even match. A perfect dance. The world is blood and bleeding and pleasure, pleasure, pleasure, building like a wave inside of her.

Epistia's scythe returns. Called for. Unwanted. Interloper! XIII whips around like a hurricane and smashes it out of the air with a wild swing. Her foot comes down on the shaft and snaps it in half. The blade weeps where her claws held it. Crumbling. Useless. Not fit to thresh a field. Useless. Useless!

Her foot lifts into Epistia's jaw. Her hand follows a heartbeat later. Lift and throw. Soar. They rise ten meters through the air, the Ceronian a twisting, wild, desperate thing. XIII follows as an incarnation of brutal composure. Her claws tear out calves. Slice open a thigh. Shatter fingers. She climbs the princess like stairs, kicks, and together they land on the ground without visible motion.

Epistia's scream is wet, horrible, and short. XIII twists a leg and feels a rib turn to dust underneath her heel. She steps away, and waits. And waits. And waits. Her partner only shivers, only shudders, only gags and coughs and tries to howl. XIII clicks her neck left. Then right. Her toes dip under Epistia's spine.

She sniffs.

Epistia rises, as if on wings. She floats on a sea of potential energy and flawless execution. XIII's fist meets her stomach, and she flies. The Diodekoi make take a moment to watch a victim bounce through the trail she'd carved so effortlessly minutes before, but no more than three times. To waste more admiring her own work is a crime.

Rain hits her body and comes hissing away as steam. Good morning, XIII. Sweet XIII. Mother says it's time to wake up. How does it feel?

She turns away and marches into the battlefield on strong, deliberate steps. Each swing of her arms carves deeper and deeper scars into the earth in front of her.

She stills, but for the steady stomping of her feet. Her fingers trace the shape of the claws that had always belonged on her fingers. She is born at last. She lives, at last. Finally, finally, finally. She will be a Good Girl.

It is time. Her tail twitches twice.

[Tatterdemalion]

How can the great be reduced? That’s not the question. Of course that’s not the question. Redana knows the answer to that one. She’s been reduced so many times herself, and she’s supposed to be great. She’s been small, she’s been captured, she’s even been so ashamed of herself that she stopped being herself. Of course she knows the answer.

She stops at the base of the pyramid and rests one hand against its black stone. It remembers. He remembers. Just like Dany did; just like she tried to forget. At least, that’s her understanding. Maybe she’s projecting. But maybe she’s not.

Then she’s bounding, step by step, up the pyramid, towards Sagakhan, towards ending the battle, but her mother’s eye throbs in her skull, in pity, in sympathy, in concentration. What does it show her? How does it answer the question she did not speak, but her heart is screaming?

The question is not how the great may be reduced. The question is always, always:

What can I do to help?

And so often she picks the wrong answer, but not today. Because today she is on the other side of the veil, today she is fighting for Dolce and Vasilia and Alexa and Epistia and the Coherents and Hades himself with his pitying kindness and Bella, Bella, Bella. Today her eye is unlocking deep parts of itself, functions so often held back, systems it doesn’t trust her with, insights it held back out of condescension and love. So today she’ll get it right. For once, she’ll get it right.

[Redana marks Keen Senses, asking a question that must be answered honestly. This one is deliberately broad: point her to where she needs to go.]

[TheAmishPirate]

A skirmisher stops moving when they are dead or dying. They fight in flight as hummingbirds, consuming the ground and the open spaces at a rate just barely capable of sustaining themselves. To think is an exercise in multitasking, a tradeoff in time. Slower to the mark, in exchange for living longer if you can still reach it.

The Garden grows still at the dodecahedron’s roar. They recognize their own. An apex predator. The cannons grow silent, to better hear their first footfalls. The phalanxes freeze, digging deeper in a vain hope of delaying the violence that stopped the unstoppable. Dolce and Vasilia keep moving. The broken body of Princess Epistia bends as bodies should not. Dolce and Vasilia must keep moving. The hoarse cry of their friend meets the sickening crunch of a kick disintegrating ribs, and they cry no more. Dolce and Vasilia cannot stop moving.

She sees the most dangerous threat on the battlefield, sees the loss of their greatest fighter, and sees no one else this far or this free.

He cannot see his Champion, or anyone else remotely qualified. He’s not even qualified. But he is the Captain.

“Dammit. Dammit.” She swears, as they send a pack of Kaeri tumbling off the field.

“...do you see anything?”

“I see that we don’t stand a chance if she’s allowed to run free.”

“Then. We. Have to stop her.”

“We’re no better than Epistia in single combat.”

“Do we have to be better?”

“I certainly hope not.”

[Rolling to Look Closely: 6 + 6 + 2 = 14. How can they, with primarily close-range weaponry, fight her and not instantly meet the same fate as Epistia?]

[Balmas]

Madness, Madness, Madness.

Stop! Don't touch her! There's no time for this! They're in battle, with no quiet waiting room, no platter of chips, no time for recovery!

No, faster! Pick her off her feet, rush her forwards, muss her clothes, just so long as she's in that sarcophagus faster! She can't afford not to be at her best!

Knock her out! Don't let her feel this! Think of the pain she was spared before, how much it will hurt!

Don't you dare give her any sedative! She'll never forgive herself if she forgets a single moment of this. Shatter her skull if you have to, but she wants to capture every moment, remember this forever!

She hears the prayers, the chants, as if she were miles underwater and they on the surface. It's just her, a reassuring touch from Ramses, and the smell of cigars.

That beautiful bastard. He even managed to find a gold that matches her new filigree.

The Hermetic pronounces the final syllable, attendants raise the arms to her and--

***

Madness, Madness, Madness.

They're nothing like her old ones. Athena had four arms, and therefore the Pallas Rex had four arms. Athena uses her arms to wage war, and therefore the Pallas Rex would use hers to wage war. A reduced version, one that can be held on a leash, conjured and bound.

These are not the arms of a warrior, with hands to circle and weave, clench Aegis and spear, be the unbreakable wall upon which enemies break and the point of the invincible spear. These are not the arms of a princess, of a symbol, of one who must be seen always and never heard, pristine and perfect.

Alexa raises one arm, admires the way the light scatters through the sapphires embedded in the knuckles, reads the prayers and dedications engraved around the biceps. They're works of art, treasures to match or exceed the most precious crown of the greatest emperor.

But above and exceeding all of that, they're hers. No, not just hers--her. These are the arms of a girl who would spend time with friends. Who does not need to fear. Of a girl who would get dirt under her fingernails. Would discover, would explore. Would laugh, and love, and live, all without fear of loss.

Imperfect. Beautiful.
Her.

***

Madness, Madness, Madness.

The greatest crime imaginable is that there is not enough time for her to hug everyone who deserves it. Still, she passes herself from one coherent and attendant to the next like an overly enthusiastic python, squeezing and hugging with all the strength in her new arms, saving an extra special squeeze for Rams--

A horribly short, gutteral scream. She turns, sees the crimson comet crater against the dust, and she's running.

But something's wrong. Her legs won't work right--is it the arms? Is their weight throwing off her balance? She can see her goal, is staring at it like staring will make the body at its center less mangled, but her legs insist on carving the sand, bringing her sideways, make her look at--

She tried, you know. Tried to ignore him. Had been steadfastly looking away from the start of the battle from the looming form at the top of the pyramid.

But of course, he'd been lost, kidnapped. Of course she must return to his side.

Her feet don't stop pounding, but faces flare in her mind.

A desperate laugh burbles somewhere in her throat, and her feet dig deeper into the dust, carve longer strides, until she's at the base of the pyramid, staring upwards at the man who stole her life from her.

"Father Molech! As you commanded, I have led the Alcedi, and returned to your side when you were lost!"

Is there something there, Molech, or Liu Ban, or however you want to call yourself, that gives you pause? An edge to the voice, a hint that something is wrong, as your daughter starts to march up the steps of the pyramid?

God, she hopes so.

"I do hope you are pleased with my service, Father Molech! You look to be in far better health than when last I saw you!"

[Thanqol]

Redana!

The power to harm a God. Not something to be taken lightly. Not something to prize. You would think that the Empire of Tellus would have vaults full of such things, but it is not so. Cursed items, weapons of destiny - even with the might and reach of a galaxy spanning Empire these are not things that a sane civilization makes it their business to collect.

With the resources of an Empire and the backing of one of Cronus' daughters Sagakhan, the Master of Assassins, has acquired three such terrors. She has the Black Pyramid, the Heart of Hermes, and Bella. With these she will hold the field against any odds. She might be harmed terribly in the process but if she can play these trump cards then Athena herself might not take the field from her.

And in your case, there is an additional complication as the Auspex demonstrates for you. If you somehow save Bella before destroying the Heart or the Pyramid then the Heart and the Pyramid will be used to destroy Bella.

As to the how? Three trials are before you, Redana. Strength is sufficient for the first. Brute strength enough to destroy a pyramid of reinforced black stone, to grind it to rubble. Quickness is sufficient for the second. Quickness enough to steal a heart of gold from an assassin's chest. And for the third? Love. Always love, in the end.

Alexa!

You know that pain can change a person. Pain can wake them up, or draw them under. Pain is a crackling, horrible statement that the status quo is untenable. You don't have to get better but you can't stay here. And so, when you look upon Liu Ban's face, you feel some strange hope. Here, at last, is pain enough that it should change something. Here is the pain of a man on his deathbed, given one last chance to consider if he has any regrets.

Liu Ban, Emperor of the Galaxy, has been no stranger to pain. For two hundred and fifty years he laboured in the molten, broken heart of his perfect machine, holding back the gears of a broken cosmos with bloodstained hands. He has known the pain of decapitation, of being reduced to furniture, of being condescended to by his ancient enemies. He has felt the pain of betrayal again and again as everyone who once served him cast him off. Until he is only this: A wretch, an animate scream perched atop an ogroid nightmare of flesh and wood and gleaming insectoid wings.

And still he will not change.

"Alexa!" he roars, teeth clenched and bloody from the pain. "I command you: Cut off your own head! I," a deep, horrible shudder ran through him, "I have need of your body!"

And that's the problem, isn't it? Like Sisyphus, deep in the depths of Tartarus, he could step away from his boulder at any moment. He could part himself from this suffering if he just stopped grasping to it.

But he thinks he can win.

Its why he declared war on Ares. It's why he killed the galaxy. It's why he never stepped away from his machines. He thinks he can win. He thinks he's smarter, thinks he's harder, thinks he's the only one who will do what has to be done. He thinks about old conquerors and heroes with contempt - they flinched away. They gave up. They let themselves be beaten. They didn't cross enough lines. They didn't try hard enough.

But not him. Even now, even here, even in this wretched shape he still imagines that the only one who can defeat him is himself.

Vasilia and Dolce!

So there is a saving grace here. Bella is a creature of Artemis, which means that she is not an instrument of war but an instrument of the hunt. She can't go and kill just anyone, she can only target specific people.

One catch, though. Your names are carved onto her armour. Everyone's names are carved onto her armour. Everyone who has ever been on the Plousios or the Anemoi is written into the big ritual list of death and there's nobody on this planet who is not on the list.

Well... on your side at least.

And here you remember Mynx's pre-battle rituals. Her preparations were anything but private. She had to gather hundreds of onlookers and have them assist her with her formal dedications to Artemis. No doubt Sagakhan had to do something similar when preparing Bella, and that means that she by definition had to do it in front of the assembled Kaeri. And under those circumstances it would have been extremely awkward to start writing the names of those very Kaeri onto the death list no matter how loyal they ostensibly were.

So, then, there's your answer. Bella will kill you and anyone like you without even breaking a sweat. But against the Kaeri she will merely be a stupendously strong and powerful battle servitor in powered armour. The battle with Epistia was keeping her from going through her own troops, the battle with Bella is that her own troops are the only thing she can't go right through.

So there's your answer. Hide from the avatar of death in the ranks of the deadliest terror troops in the galaxy. Relativity's a bitch, huh?

Bella!

You can feel the names upon you. Each of them burns hot, a still-heated brand, pulsing like a heartbeat. You feel them against your exoskeleton, against skin that's still so incredibly sensitive.

It's not a punishment. It's a treat. You know that with each life you take a name will go dark and cool and that will be the most beautiful, wonderful pleasure you've ever experienced. You've always burned with tension, now the tension has a long list of names. All that's left is to work down through the list. With each name a reward. The Master sometimes said 'Good Girls get rewards' to Beljani, but now you understand exactly what that means.

Helpfully, some names are written much larger than others. The Master has certain priorities. You could go kill a hundred mice, but that wouldn't be half the hit of soothing pleasure wiping the name Vasilia off your skin would be.

[TheAmishPirate]

Behold, the peril of mixed loyalties.

Just a few short months ago, she believed herself cursed, doomed to the whims of Zeus. A creature shorn clean of her past, with no future to look forward to, knowing only a never-ending present of causes to sacrifice herself for. A viewpoint of such pride that she surely would have been struck down for her hubris, were her heroic antics not endlessly entertaining to the Thunderer. A viewpoint that was thoroughly dashed when Zeus finally took her at her word, and left her in the hands of her sister Hestia.

Under the tutelage of Hestia, she was granted a taste of a life she was never permitted. A bright star rises to a new dawn. A golden child climbs to the highest pedestal, for all to see her glory. Lionesses must heed the hunt, not waste their mornings with tea and toast. In the glow of the hearth, she was granted a second chance, a fate that led not to destruction, for her and all who she loved. She could not stay. She cannot not say why. But here she stands, contending for Zeus’ favor, and by some miracle she might just pull it off.

The clouds of Kaeri are ready. They have not noticed a flightless visitor take his place in their whirling formations. Vasilia clutches her sword in her hand. The battlefield tilts downwards. She falls to the horizon. In a moment, she will pivot to the Kaeri, and the sword will continue. It cannot harm the Diodekoi. But it can set her ears ringing. Draw her attention away from their unprotected lines.

Except.

The innkeeper humbles themselves before any guest. The fireplace burns with a soft light, for all to rest in peace. The homebody speaks in a quiet hush, not seeking to be anybody more than they are.

But those truly vying for Zeus's favor have all eyes on them already.

[Rolling to Keep Bella Busy: 2 + 1 + 2 = 5. Uh oh! Marking Vasilia’s sword off her sheet as the price for acting against a Threat to the World.]

[Balmas]

A fist of ice closes over her heart.

All this time.

All this time, she'd thought… No, that's not right. She'd hoped. Hoped, prayed, dreamed, nursed a tiny ember of a idea, even as she'd told the Alcedi of all his sins, that…

It's a dumb idea, really. She hates him. It'd never work. He's behind nearly everything wrong in her life. He created her to be a slave. He's not capable of being a father. Can't make the changes necessary. He's incapable of the self-reflection, the humility, to admit that he'd made mistakes. And even if he did, and even if she forgave him, she could never bring herself to trust him. But still, the idea that maybe, with some time and a whole lot of distance, she might be able to have the family she dreamed of back when she was first created…

Quietly, an ember nursed for two centuries unceremoniously winks out. It's long due, but it still hurts, leaves her cold. He's got to break her heart one last time.

But there was never any way for him to love her. There's no version of reality where he sees her as someone he's wronged, because that would need him to think of her as a person first. He never has, and he never will, because she's never been more than a tool in his mind. Something to be trained, and molded, and put to a task. If she obeys, then she's simply a tool fulfilling its purpose. If she disobeys, then the tool is broken and should be fixed until it does as its told. And now that the tool is more useful in pieces than whole…

Well, you don't keep a tool past its usefulness, do you?

She is a dreamer walking the steps of a too-familiar nightmare. She has seen it all, knows the end from the beginning. And yet no matter how she screams, curses, begs, still she is powerless to stop it. Still her body moves, weightless, as it picks through the pile of corpses, discards weapon after weapon, hefts a battleaxe. It's enormous, obviously ceremonial--filigreed to the nines, inlaid with pearl, carved with bas-relief triumphal battles across the head--but the gold-plated edge is still mono-filament sharp. As she sees her reflection gleaming in the gold, sees her doom lifting in front of her, all she can think is:

I should have hugged more people.

It's funny, right? You never think about it. Because there's always time for hugs. Which means hugs can happen sometime later, after everything's calmed down. You'll laugh, you'll embrace, just as soon as you can. And then everything goes to shit again, and you're running again, and you'll laugh and hug later again. Then you lose your arms, and hugs suddenly aren't an option. And then you get new arms, and you're running again, and now your dad wants your body, and you'll never hug people ever again.

The axe lifts, showing off the gleaming arms in the surface of the axehead.

And she just got them too. She was looking forward to breaking them in! It's a big adjustment, going from four arms to two. They're a different weight distribution--probably the same bulk, but in a single package. What's that do to her wrestling? She's gonna lose a few techniques, but she could probably figure out a way to compensate with the added power. What do these arms look like properly messy, with dirt and mud and weeds on them? What kind of detail work can she handle? Baking has been problematic before--maybe she'd finally be able to figure out how Dolce cracks eggs with only one hand?

Not if Liu Ban has his way, though. Wants to just plop his ratty-ass beard on her neck, ride her body like a stolen car.

Brand new dress. Brand new filigree. Brand new gifts! Gifts for her, presents from people she cares about! She wants to show off in them, for once. Wants to enjoy feeling wanted, feeling unique. Wants to find out who wanted her, and why, and find out how it isn't because she's the firstborn of Molech, or the Pallas Rex, or because she looks like her mom. The Coherents, the Alcedi--people who care for her because she's her, and not because of what she can do or take or kill or protect.

And she wants to care for them, too! Wants to have the opportunity to nurture them, get to know them, find out what makes each one unique! Not because of what they can do, or because she's their older sister and it's her job, but because she chooses to! Because what she wants is important, dammit!

This isn't a new ember of an idea sparking to life. If anything, it's an old one--an unfortunate habit of thought that Molech sought to stamp out wherever he found it. She thought she'd lost it long ago, scorched and gone, but there it is, burning merrily away! Not just burning--practically a raging bonfire, a warming flame of I matter! I don't want to die! Not here, not now, not like this, not ever, because I matter, and I care about me, and you know what, I kind of like me! I like being me, I like who I am, and I want to find out who I look like after today, and after tomorrow, and so on into forever! And none of that happens if I kill myself right now, and I'll be damned before I do it to please my asshole of a father!

And just like that, she's holding an axe. Not looming, not threatening, not having her body wielded against her, not taking aim at her own neck. Just her, holding an axe.

Gingerly, she moves an arm. The axe goes with it. Tentatively, as if at any moment the spell's going to break, she lowers it, throws it back onto the pile.

And it stays thrown, and she doesn't grab it again, and nobody is more surprised than she is.

She stares at it for perhaps too long.

And when she turns to Liu Ban, it's with a strange sense of wonder in her eyes.

"You know what, Liu Ban? Shove it up your ass. I'll be keeping me, thanks all the same."

[Move Taken: I Am My Own Master.]
[Move Taken: You Have Changed: Hero Destiny Playbook unlocked, Unbroken taken]

[Phoe]

She observes the sword in her hand with curiosity. Her head tilts as she lifts it up and turns it about in what dim light filters through the rain. How strange. She thrusts it through the air with a dull whistle. Unsatisfying. She pulls it closer to her face; the itch is building, burning. Insistent. Unignorable.

She puts claw to blade, and slides it up and down the length of the sword. Ahhhhh, these screams. XIII shivers with pleasure, and her tail twitches in anticipation. The release of tension. Delicious. She closes her hand around the edge of the weapon, and with a last sigh it snaps into pieces that fall around her feet like glittering treasures. The name burns into her spine, drawing a howl from her lips.

"Va... Si... La..."

It was not a bad plan, for the record. You were brave enough to call her attention to you, and wise enough to realize that a quip and a concealed pistol would not do for dueling's sake. With the rain obscuring your scent and the flock of Kaeri obscuring your motion, you could have been a shadow. A person could hide forever in a field she wasn't permitted to thresh. And if you'd used these tactics on Bella, they would have worked to perfection. Stupid Bella, prideful Bella, broken Bella... an incomplete creature pawing uselessly at the light.

But you are hunted. You are marked by a creature with no world outside of the names carved into her skin. XIII reaches an empty hand toward you, across the empty chasm between you and the field of blooming flowers. You can't help but blink your eyes as you scrabble to your feet, and in that single instant you are caught. Her fingers squeeze the stormy air. Her claws bite into the distance between you. Her fingers squeeze your throat like ripe fruit. Her claws dig into your skin, drawing five tiny rivulets of blood to stain your shirt and collar.

She lifts you into the air as easily as she would a child, and slams you down into the muck hard enough to crater the wet sand around you. Sword broken, back aching, lying in the muck. Is this starting to feel familiar? The Diodekoi drops on top of you and squeezes your ribs between her thighs. Her hand keeps clenched about your throat the entire time. The bulky armor obscures her form, but it smells like her. You know. You've been in this position once before. The wet, blue-black braid that slides around her neck and into your face is clumsier than that pretentious so-called "Praetor" would ever have permitted, but even so. Even so, it's such a specific color. The pressure of her legs is familiar. It is awful. You can feel your bones shuddering in protest, and she squeezes tighter still.

You'll never forget the feeling of that moment, that day. There were bonsai then, too. It hurt then, too. You can never, ever forget the sight of that white tail whipping behind her. Her eyes, barely visible through her mask, match now. They are not the eyes that you remember. They are milky, cloudy silver, stained with flecks of angry red throughout. But it's her. It's her. You know for an absolute fact that it's her.

"Va. Si. La." she hisses, and her voice is strained and tinny, with a horrible echo that does not come from her mask

She doesn't bend down to kiss you this time. Her hand clenches tighter around your throat, until your vision starts to blur around the edges. You can watch her lift a hand with five perfect, wicked claws above you. An offering. A sacrifice. This is how you die. She's the one that kills you.

...Except. You're not alone this time, are you?

[Tatterdemalion]

The sword is Redana’s herald. It announces her arrival with the hiss of a torn veil, lashing out like a torn hawser— and it kisses Sagakhan on the throat. Say what you will about Redana Claudius, her sword hand is careful and controlled.

The blade stops there, wet against her skin, and Redana steps in closer. Her knuckle presses firmly against Sagakhan’s chest as she tries to utilize leverage against the larger, much more ruthless woman.

“It’s over,” she says, reaching across her guard and pulling her mother’s heart from Sagakhan’s keeping. Her voice is firm, giddy triumph threatening to bubble up from underneath. “Order the Kaeri to stand down, and you can walk away from this. This blasphemy will be destroyed, Bella will be released from your custody, and the only choice I am giving you is whether you keep your life or whether your final legacy is making sure that more people die senseless deaths down there.”

Historically speaking, that’s not an argument that would work on many generals, particularly not when servitors are being used as soldiers on either side. But she has to try. Maybe the terrifying ghost owls can just go home and sulk. Maybe without them standing in the way of the Starsong Privateers, it will be simple enough to push through that deathless horde below and destroy the pyramid. Maybe more people won’t die. Maybe she won’t even have to kill the Master of Assassins.

Because that doesn’t fix anything! It’s terrible and vicious and stupid! War isn’t supposed to be about life and death, it’s supposed to be about convictions, and courage, and the challenge! It’s about sword duels and cunning stratagems and the pulse pounding through her body! It’s about Athena’s glory and Ares’s provocation! Everything down below is stupid and terrible and blasphemous and she hates that she can’t trust this woman without a blade set to her throat.

“Well? Well?” Hurry up! Every moment you stand there smirking is a moment where someone’s dying down there, clawed by owls, dragged down by the dead, or being battered by that hideous champion! Every moment you lean against that blade is a moment of hideous fear and panic down below, and each one is a moment too many. “Surrender! Or I’ll— I’ll—“

[Redana Claudius rolls a 6 on her Get Away. However, she always gets to choose an option, and so she chooses to Get Away with the Heart in her possession.]

[Thanqol]

Redana!

Sagakhan looks down at the sword you hold against her throat.

She smiles.

And she steps into it.

The blade cuts through her skin. You feel a brief resistance as it hits the spine but she keeps coming and it pushes through that too. She looms over you with a grandmotherly smile and the only thing that stops her coming closer is when the hilt of your blade touches her neck.

"Ah, Imperial Princess," said Sagakhan in a hideous rasp, breath escaping through a nicked windpipe. "My daring Bella deserves so much better than you. Don't you see how fragile her sanity is? How stressful her life is with all the burdens and responsibilities you pile upon her? You've been nothing but a curse for her and now she's finally freed from your shackles."

She should be dead. Should be dying, at least. Molech stood as a testament to the greatest genetic alchemy that can be wrought and he barely survived decapitation after months of work by the Order of Hermes. And yet, to Sagakhan, this seems like it is nothing.

"And if you care for her at all, you can content yourself with that. I am, after all, not cruel. When the battle is done and the names are erased, darling Mynx will approach Bella. She will fulfill her purpose and talk her back from the space beyond the brink. They will fall into each others arms, released from my service, and live happy lives together. Such is my sacrifice to the God of Love who has helped me through so many hardships. Don't you see? You have nothing here worth fighting for."

And then she moves at last. With incredible violence she punches into your chest. Tears through your ribs. And raises up in her bloodsoaked left hand your still beating heart.

"Don't feel bad, Imperial Princess," said Sagakhan as she kicked your body down the tumbling steps of the black pyramid. "This technically counts as a draw."

Alexa!

While you do not, in fact, gotta hand it to Emperor Molech, butcher of the galaxy, the man is decisive if nothing else. You had barely opened your mouth to tell him no when he started his lunge and enormous sweeping axe-blow to take your head himself. He doesn't hesitate, doesn't flinch, isn't confused or surprised at your betrayal. This is just one more step he has to take before he Wins.

"Who broke you?" he snarled, laying about with whirling overhand strokes. "The Princess? I will gut her and burn Tellus around her wretched mother. The Azura? Wretched animals, I should have ended their civilization centuries ago. The Hermetics? I will hunt their Order to the ends of the galaxy. O, Zeus! O, Athena! Where!" his blows are hammer-hard, falling down like meteors. "Is!" His power is a monstrous thing, all strength and reach, long limbs and insensate to pain or injury. "My!"

He has no phalanx. He fights alone.

"Daughter!?" screams the loneliest man in the galaxy.

[TheAmishPirate]

The Deodekoi catches her by the throat. She cannot resist her. Blood, breath, life flow beneath those claws and only fragile skin stands in her way. She picks her up and hits her with a planet. She squeezes, past blood, past breath, prying from her soul yet deadlier weapons. The auto surgeon’s bands lash so tight around Vasilia she cannot move. She cannot scream, and her lungs will burst. Her blood is fire. All she can smell is her, her, her, and no one else. No one else was allowed so close. Snarls and silence fending off the bright Alcedi. Keep away! Keep away from her treacherous, useless, poisoned heart! The long nights alone, and always alone, for she must be, she must try to get used to it, in case, in case,

Eyes rolling back

Helpless to

Can’t move

Ah-!

Bella squeezes tighter. Bella cuts off air and adrenaline. Bella raises her claws, heedless of the pathetic swipes of her prey.

A spray of mud flies between them, straight for the eyes of Bella’s helmet. Vasilia does not see the strike that bats it away.

She smells it.

A pod concealed in the mud shreds to atoms, and a burst of cloyingly sweet chemicals - cheap imitations of Demeter’s work - diffuses through the rain around them. The pressure releases, just by a hair. Enough to gasp, and see a shadow-grey figure standing over her. They duck a spear-thrust from behind them, sweep out their assailant’s leg, and a Kaeri bowls headlong into Bella, flying much too fast to turn aside. In place of a nightmare, a soft, familiar weight falls on her chest, wrapping his arms around her as far as they can reach. And a voice strives to rise above the chaos of the melee:

“Jump!”

Her arm falls and strikes the earth. And she goes tumbling weightless through the air, a flurry of Kaeri racing to follow, and her Dolce hanging off her. Alive, for the moment.

[Rolling to Overcome: 3 + 3 + 2 = 8. Spending a bath bomb from Dolce’s supply of household tricks as a Price for acting against a threat to the world. Taking the partial success.]

[Tatterdemalion]

“Re… da… na…”

She’s in agony. That’s a bad sign. That’s a very, very bad sign. Because her body is supposed to release painkillers naturally, when it’s this close to death, but it does so through her circulatory system. And now it’s been destroyed. There’s nothing moving her blood; it grows stagnant in her limbs, her head. She can’t breathe.

It’s as if a black cat is curled up on her chest, crushing her beneath its weight, stealing the breath from her lips, making her heavy and eating her thoughts. Except it also has its claws out, gouging out the hole in her chest, nipping and tearing, making itself a nest. And the next time that Hades sends heroes all the way to Ancient Gaia, gifting them a ship and promises of aid, they’ll find a tree growing here, its branches heavy with pink blossoms, speared through her body. Another failure in a long line of failures.

Redana!

Hades is the only vivid thing in the world. Everything else is being swept away as her senses fade away, the sound of the battle and the storm and her own strangled choking fading away, the sky becoming one huge undifferentiated bruise, and Hades alone, standing there in his black and white. This time he will not offer to pick her up. He will have to leave her here, forever, until she rises again as the shell of something terrible, green and growing quick.

All he can do is stand here as she fades out, her wonderful and genetically-refined body’s functions collapsing, panic running circles around what remains of her thoughts. All Hades can do is stand there, uselessly, and remember her, just as he remembers everyone, every single one of them, every would-be hero and explorer and savior, everyone who jumped at the quest or the prize or the hope or the adventure itself.

Redana!

Goodbye, Hades. Goodbye, Bella. Goodbye sun and goodbye stars. Goodbye, Alexa. Goodbye, Vasilia and Dolce. Goodbye swords and goodbye ships. Goodbye, good night, good night.

She’s so very sorry.

and of all these wonders
of which you have been part;
of all these shining things,
count you first thy mother’s—

She can’t tell whose voice it is. She doesn’t even know if this is just the dying gasp of the Auspex, garbage data unspooling into the long dark. But she still recognizes the figure leaning over her, though the name’s not on her lips. Her face shines like morning forever and ever. She’s gold and diamond and a shining sapphire, and she’s reaching into Dany’s head and dredging up the very oldest storytimes, the chest in the wood, the lonely November and the lonely god, the lullaby and the sword, the sword everyone’s mother leaves secret and special and safe just for them, and, and, and.

Redana has trained for the Olympic Games. She has pushed herself to extremes that even ascended humanity finds daunting. She has learned the ways to push past pain and daunting thoughts. And lifting her arm, the blood in it congealing, the muscles as difficult to command as a pack of cats, is still the most difficult thing she has ever had to do. The face above her is still so, so familiar, and she believes that Redana can do it. The Heart almost slips from her numb fingers. Almost.

Someone’s hand closes over hers, and she can’t tell whose. Is it her, shining, immanent? Or is it Hades, intervening just to show a brave little girl a kindness in the middle of a nightmare?

The Heart settles in her chest, and then everything is light and pain and tears, so many tears, everything her fault, how can she live with herself after failing every one of them, not fast enough, not fast enough, a frozen scream, the weight of every one of them gone, erased, undone. And a hand reaches back and takes her by the hand, and that is the miracle of Ridenki come around again, Hermes who goes back and forth between the living and the dead, between one moment and the next.

Who is here to save you, Redana?

It was always you.

And the Shepherdess embraces herself, and whispers: “I still remember how brave we were.”

***

Redana Epimelios stands up, and keeps standing up. She’s leaner than the Nemean, a coiled bowstring, long-limbed and long-haired. The lionskin tossed over one shoulder of her red breastplate is not particularly subtle. She holds in her hand the shape of a sword. And despite it all, she’s smiling.

“Not a good idea to take her on directly,” the Shepherdess says, half to herself. “Only so many miracles we can fit in one day, right, uncle?” She turns on the husks of the dead, approaching someone who should have been dead and refuses to be, and she makes a cut. The shape of her sword, her wand, flickers in her hand.

Bodies fall to the earth, tumbled among neatly-severed plants. And the Shepherdess, the daughter of Hermes, darts forth on glittering sandals, back into the fray. Alone, even she cannot stand against the Master of Assassins.

How wonderful, then, that she did not come here alone!

[Balmas]

She's ready for the blow, bracing for it. The instant he moves, she's already jumping, rolling, on her feet and moving again for the second blow. Of course he's not going to take this lying down. She is his property, she is acting out, and now he is taking the only action he can to get his property back under control. Simple reason, and the very fact that you're objecting is why he needs to be in control. She's ready for that.

She isn't ready for the wail. Isn't ready for that lonely note to pierce her heart, almost make her hesitate. She wasn't prepared for causing her father pain because it's a very simple thing to tell yourself that your father is hot garbage, to tell yourself that you want him out of your life. It's entirely another to see someone you once cared for cry, hear that voice break in front of your very eyes.

How many times had she heard that voice as a fresh creation? Admired the range Molech put his voice through, how it swelled and shifted to fit the occasion--the bombastic welcome of an emperor to his visitors, the cajoling friend of the war prince to his generals, the demanding bark of the tactician. How many times had she trained, stayed up for weeks? All so that when the time came to show it off, finished a kata, a drill, an exercise, trembling with the effort of perfection, she could dream that maybe there was a voice just for her? Approval? Warmth? A quiet "well done?" "I am proud of you?"

She ducks, feels the wind of one sledgehammer arm passing above her, feels the heat as a pile of dead trees catches the blow and explodes into splinters.

How many times had she been met with disappointment? Nothing but a cold gaze, a nod of acknowledgement, of finally almost attaining the level he'd expected her to possess from the beginning? Beauty, grace, perfection, silence. Now that you're almost where you should have been a year ago, let's move on to something more your speed?

Or worse: How many times had there been a glare, a quiet scoff, a cold notice that she's still not good enough? How many "I know you can do better?" How many times where she's sure she's done every movement to perfection, and yet there is still more to be improved on?

How many times has he nodded in satisfaction and announced that she's now ready for the real thing, and motioned for the cage doors to be opened, ordered the guards to prod her trembling victims into the arena?

How many times has she heard "I know what will properly motivate you"? How many stolen faces? How many destroyed lives? How many exiled or executed comrades?

An overhand blow, a quick sidestep. A crater in the ground, crushed bodies, a silvery spiral of splintered weapons.

How many times has she actually heard that voice be kind to her? No, not even that--how many times has he asked for her opinion? How many times has he been there for her when she needed him to be? How many times has he talked to her without the need to give orders, just for the sake of talking?

Surely something like that would shine out in memory like a diamond in a pile of coal. So how come she can't remember him ever doing so?

Next to the bonfire of love, a familiar ember of anger rears its head.

"You broke me, Liu Ban!"

The next time Liu Ban rears up for a double-overhand strike, Alexa's picked her spot well. The fists come down, she rolls to the side, and when the fists come up, half a dozen abandoned swords stay lodged in Liu Ban's flesh.

"You told me that I could never be more than you created me to be! That my only value lay in fulfilling that purpose, in obeying you!"

On her next roll, she kicks up a glaive just in time for Liu Ban's next swipe, and watches it impale through his palm.

"You stole my life, Liu Ban! You told me that I was nothing! Nothing more than a tool to be used and discarded!"

She darts towards the gap between his legs, snatching a knife from a fallen body as she does.

"My friends didn't break me, Liu Ban! They only showed me how a family really treats each other!"

She's between his legs and jams the knife across one sinewy hamstring. Even with healing, even with all the bioengineering of the ancients, the knee buckles, its muscles cut.

"They showed me your lies, Liu Ban! They didn't break me--they showed me how to fix myself!"

The second the leg hits the ground, she's climbing the scaly back and dodging the swipes to grab her or brush her off.

"And now that I know that, you will never break me again! I'll fix myself over and over, as many times as it takes!"

One awkward swipe nearly knocks her loose, and it's only by plunging the dagger into his flesh like a piton that she stays on his back.

Panting, she gasps out, "You had so many chances to have a daughter. But you never wanted one, did you? You only ever wanted someone too weak and dependent on you to ever leave. You only wanted a slave.

"And you'll never have me again."

[Alexa's first hope-empowered roll is a 13 on Overcome.]

[Phoe]

Flowers. Flowers. Flowers. She hisses. She spits. Flowers. Flowers. Flowers. Her Kaeri are making too much noise. They clack their spears together and beat their wings. Fools. They drown out the hunt. And always, everywhere, flowers. Flowers. Flowers. In her eyes, her nose, her mouth.

XIII drags her tongue across her claws. Long. Wet. Slathering. She slurps the blood noisily off her hand. Flowers. Flowers. Flowers need nectar. Her entire body shivers in pleasure: the simple reminder of the rewards waiting at the end of her work washes everything else away in an instant. She rises, and steam drifts out of the corners of her mouth when she releases a breath. Of course there are flowers. This is a garden. Mother's garden.

Ahhhhhh. It is so wonderful to finally know who you are.

Vasilia and Dolce!

Landing in the middle of a Kaeri Terror Phalanx feels like a mistake, no matter how long you hang in the air and think about it. Underneath your feet is nothing but a stormy sea of feathers, with spears swimming across the surface. They way they prowl, even as agitated as they are, is hypnotizing. Sometimes they splinter off in groups or even individuals and disappear into the tides of bonsai or the ranks of the Alcedi. Sometimes they burst back out, other times they don't, but every plot and counterplot signals a wave of fresh screaming. And you're certain that noise has been engineered out of them.

But even so, you land. You have four good eyes and two perfect hearts between you, and years of practice working together through stupid and dangerous plans besides. Though it's uncomfortable and dangerous to hide yourselves in the middle of an enemy army like this, it's not even close to the dumbest thing a Starsong Privateer has done and lived to tell about. It's much better to dance down here and deal with them then to ride the grav rail for too long and be the only thing in Bella's sights when she recovers.

The decision buys the pair of you a moment of peace. Not quiet and solitude, but peace the way a Starsong would understand it: the comfort of knowing that you have a plan, and for once it's working. If this were a time for quips and banter, there might even be room for an 'I told you so' just now. But you know better. No sound, no smell, no movement that could draw her eyes.

You are being hunted. And before you can even settle into the pattern of movement, you hear it. You hear her. The ground vibrates under your feet with erratic timing. If she's stomping her feet then she must be drunk. More likely she's pounding the ground with her fists. A stupid creature, full of nothing but rage.

She howls, and your blood freezes inside of you. It's a sound that nothing living should be able to make, or at the very least nothing on a smaller scale than one of Poseidon's great children. Human and animal, wounded and proud, guttural and shrill, and so, so loud that it makes your skulls feel like they want to split open rather than contain the sound of it. She howls for what feels like minutes, an eternity maybe, you don't know. You don't want to know. Pain. Everything she does is pain. Everything she has is pain. Everything she is, is pain.

Finally, the noise subsides. When you hear her pound the ground again, she's closer this time. The field of Kaeri cuts both ways though; it's difficult in the extreme to spot her, even in that bulky armor. She stomps and pounds. You run as a pair, on careful quiet feet. To your left, when you hear her coming from the right. To the right, when you hear her circling around from the left. You bump and push Kaeri warriors around so that they stumble into each other and disrupt the flow of their formation so that she can't read your trail by the movement of the owls. Her senses are your weapon.

But the pounding keeps getting closer now. You can't see her. You can't see her. But you can hear her. She's hissing with every step she takes, a truly disgusting noise. Every breath drags with the sense of maximum exertion you'd expect from somebody who's been running a marathon, and on top of that hers are wet and hacking. She's drooling. Absolutely slathering all over herself, and even through the rain she must be covered in it. In your imagination, it's tinged pink. It must be. You can smell the blood from here, superior nose or no.

Stomp. Stomp. Stomp. To your left. As a pair you dart right, and catch your mistake only just in time. A timely shout from you, Dolce, is all that makes your Vasilia stop in time to avoid getting cut in half. Bella looms in front of you. Her armor makes her look like a titan. She reaches up with both hands to wrench her own head to one side, and the crunch of her joints is so loud it makes you wonder if she's broken her own neck. But she hisses, and steam pours from her mouth. And you realize what it means to be hunted by the Diodekoi. She's been stomping and screaming to disguise the noise of her own movements. She must have crawled around on the ground like a tiger to keep you from spotting her.

She doesn't pause to gloat or grin. There's no hatred or comprehension in the light of her eyes as she pulls back an arm so her blow will have enough weight behind it to kill both of you at once. Swift and efficient. Intelligent. You've been had. This is where you die. This is where you

Jump!

It doesn't matter which one of you thinks it first. It doesn't matter whose voice is shouting. All that matters is that you do it, together, and once again the pair of you are flying over the battlefield in the nick of time. Bella crouches low on the ground beneath you and comes tearing through the sky with speeds that should be reserved for fully ramped up plovers, but the advantage of Vasilia's weapon and combat style is in its mobility. For all of her power, Bella moves in straight lines and you don't have to. Even in spite of the heroic effort she puts into physically willing herself to stop rising and start falling again, her claws cut only air or a bit of clothing. Close enough that you can feel lethal heat coming off of them, but nothing more than that.

She leaps again. You pivot, Vasilia. You cling, Dolce. And when you turn, she catches you both. Gods, what is she doing?! You saw her, trailing into the sky above, and then she slashed her claws at nothing and suddenly! You didn't blink. Neither of you could afford to. But she crossed the distance between her overshot charge and your countermove without a single intervening frame of movement. She stands atop your shoulders, and you feel hot foam spatter down on your heads.

"Dis. Trac. Tion." she rumbles, "You. Are. Marked."

You feel it instead of seeing it. You were together, and now you are apart. Vasilia feels the heavy hammer of Bella's heel crash down on her shoulder and she's falling away with nothing but weapons and oaths where once there was a husband. Dolce feels her hand squeeze briefly on his skull and suddenly he's careening in the opposite direction with all the same control of a small cloud caught in a storm wind.

Bella rises up into the air on unseen wings of wind and power. For a moment, she's alone. She curls down toward the ground, and crashes back down into the battlefield as a comet. But she is still one assassin. And there are two of you.

Which one of you, in this moment, did the brave and stupid thing to make sure it was you she fell on?

[Thanqol]

"You think being fixed is desirable? You think it is just!?"

Despite everything, he stands. He is a mess of sap and blood, new shoots bursting out from ruins and tears. Still he blossoms, as unfeeling and unseeing as the wood that makes up ever more of his body.

"Of course you can't have what you want. If everyone could have what they wanted, where would we be!? Despite everything I did Athena never showed me the slightest tenderness, and I never wavered in her service!" The spite in that is absolutely feral, the hatred of a thousand held-open doors unrequited. "Because that's not how the galaxy works. You are nothing. Love means shutting up and waiting, even if you have to wait forever. Anything less is degenerate hedonism!"

Aphrodite, sitting off to the side, smiles a little and smokes a cigarette.

And then you feel footsteps next to you. Interlocking shields pass between you and he, and spears lower en mass to present the broken tyrant with an indivisible phalanx. The Coherent have formed up around you, a hundred warriors with a hundred different bodies and shapes, all acting with unified purpose when it comes to protecting you. And then, above you, Redana - Redana as you have never seen her, Redana radiant - reaches down with an extended hand and a smile. And here you are, amidst friends.

Say what you will about degenerate hedonism, but it has its perks.

[TheAmishPirate]

.7 seconds.

The impact knocks the breath from Vasilia’s body. But sand gives way more than hard earth, and her armor absorbed the worst of the damage. Her injuries thus far are minimal. No disruption to blood pressure. Nothing to stop the adrenaline from pumping.

She moves fast. Her eyes must move faster. She’s trained herself to see the whole of her opponent, the consequences that must follow after them. What moves are they making? How long for the follow-through? What options will it give them? Where are they strong? Where are they weak? What territory is theirs, and how might she enter it anyway? She will act on instinct so polished there will be no gap between decision and movement.

Her style is loud and bombastic. She thrives on drawing the eye, that she might strike where it is blind. She is accustomed to fighting through pain. She knows her husband is not.

.7 seconds.

In .7 seconds, Vasilia will rise from the impact crater, and draw Bella’s ire.

Time enough for Dolce to finish running the numbers, pluck up a broken spear tip, and hurl it at Bella’s thorned helmet.

He does not expect it to hit. But he knows it will reach her in time.

[Phoe]

The ground shudders when she lands. The sands sink and crater under the power of her legs. She doesn't even crouch when she impacts; her armor absorbs the full shock and comes to an abrupt halt already fully upright and standing on her feet. She stands there for a moment with her face to the rain. It's peaceful, here. Untroubled.

XIII's skin itches with the promise of the names etched across her body. Thousands upon thousands of them, waiting to be purged. So much work to do. So many seeds to plant. Her steps are even and unhurried as she exits her crater. Her tongue darts out from between her lips and licks them clean of spit. She can afford these moments of wastefulness. The sheep in front of her is in no shape to offer sport. He has no tricks or weapons left to run away with. So she plants her feet deliberately and softly, following the trail of silver footsteps across the ground that lead to his soft body and the wavering, fading lines etched across him.

Three, two, one. Even the act of acknowledging him is an excess. His spear was weak. His form is terrible. More efficient to hunt Va-Si-La. Her name is larger besides. But this act of bravery needs to be answered. She will purge this lesser name from her body first. She reaches forward without urgency and grabs him by the collar of his coat.

Ah. This one uproots so easily. He is like grasping a cloud. Was this flower even planted? She holds him at eye level for a moment. When her knee crushes into his stomach, it's the softest and sweetest thing she's felt in her entire life. More. More! Let them all feel like that! She tosses him into the air and kicks hard enough to shatter bones. She pauses to watch him skip across the sands like a stone across a lake. XIII pauses the length of three heartbeats before she gives chase.

It is time to darken, little name. It is time to soothe her burning body. She pounces before the sands can finish slowing him down, and they slide down a dune as a pair. Battle lines break as they pass, neither side being brave enough to cross a Diodekoi in the middle of a hunt. Dolce's body feels soothing and cold against her palms. His flesh is supple and satisfying for her claws to pierce. His eyes quiver with terror, but they never look away from hers. Her lips pull back into a wide smile, revealing sharp and hungry teeth.

How easily she forgets there is a war happening around her. Other gods besides Artemis are watching them today. A shell fired from the Plousios drops onto the hill next to them, and explodes with a roar and a cloud of hideous, noxious smoke.

XIII howls in agony. The sheep pinned underneath her is forgotten in an instant, and she rolls off of him onto the ground to writhe in agony. She can't. She can't. It hurts. It hurts! Her ears are nothing but the shriek and ring of a blast that won't stop, won't stop echoing no matter she squeezes or claws at them. The air is nothing but waves of pressure that squeeze her into a ball long after the explosion should have subsided. Fumes fill her nose and coat her tongue with an awful film, and even the rain is no reprieve. The smell. The taste. Rot and burn, sting and sweat, so putrid it pulls her straight to vomiting all over the sands and wafting flowers. Her skin is heat, burning hotter than she can manage.

Go away! Go away! Her claws swipe weakly at the air around her, as if smog was a thing she could kill. She gives up quickly as her legs give out from underneath her again, and all that she can do is gurgle and heave and claw at her own body looking for relief. Trickles of blood run from her ears as she clutches them and whimpers, barely audible above the din of battle.

XIII rises to her feet, snarling and drooling and trembling from head to toe. Her vision blurs. The world spins. She collapses to her knees as soon as she finishes rising. The moans that escape her belong to a dying animal. And still, she clutches at the ground and wills herself to stand. And fall. And stand again. She smashes her chest with her fist and screams. She lets her face and ears bleed freely. She drops to one knee again, and this time stays there.

A moment ago, she was a perfect killing machine. Unstoppable and terrifying. A moment from now, she will be again. But right now the entire edifice of her body and its overtuned senses has been turned against her. SP weaponry is a famously effective tactic to confuse and disorient even the most powerful of warriors, but to Bella it is more akin to torture. To watch her now is like seeing a child being made ready for the kennels all over again. Her skin treated with acid baths until the fur burns away and leaves her glistening and "almost human". The whiskers plucked from her face with superheated tongs to cauterize the holes shut, each one snatched from her with an admonishment. Her claws ripped from her fingers for some mysterious punishment she could never understand. There are tears in her clouded silver eyes.

In might be possible to pity her right now, in spite of every awful thing she's done. Or maybe it's easier to see a way to fight her unfolding in front of you.