Phoe

Breathless Dead

The grave-whisps fall to the floor with a hollow clatter. Each tiny tuft of salt and air is as soundless and insubstantial on the ground as it had been in their mouths. It is the container that sings complaint as it rolls around. Bella catches it with the heel of her boot, treasure of the ancient universe. She stomps it flat with a squelch.

Her tail twitches, exactly once. Always the same tell before a pounce. Two joined seats shrink into the space of just one, though for Bella there is no seat at all. Redana's waist is hot against her thighs. Her hands clutch tight around her treasures and she leans forward, pinning Redana's arms against the seat back and trapping her under a form of physical perfection. Even now, she can feel that thumb rubbing the back of her hand. Her grin lights her face with predatory delight.

Sheets of blue-black hair fall like curtains, cutting off the romance-play behind them. Her legs shift, and she sinks deeper into the trap. Her ears are filled with songs and traipsing music, her veins are filled with rushing lifeblood and need, her chest strains at the buttons of the dignified shirt now pressing its ample weight into the girl underneath her.

In the end... the rascal corners the princess. In the end, permission is taken, not given. The journey gives them freedom that home could never manage. The princess is due to be married. She deserves the life she was born into, deserves things the rascal could never give her, not even after diving into the depths of the planet to pluck its greatest treasures as dowry. It matters not. In the end...

"What have you been doing? You never pay attention. Stupid girl..."

Her breath steams against Redana's face. Warm, wet, and rough, her tongue drags across the offending spot where salt and melted fat and chemicals have smeared across her skin near the corner of her lips. Salt and fat. The ghosts of the theater cling to them tighter than could ever be guessed from their empty nature. Tenacity. Every rough lick only motivates another one, and another, and another, the flavor stronger every time. And if... if her skin was such a treat, then her mouth?

Her fangs bite into those trembling lips. The flavor of blood mingles with the grave snacks and for once her pulse quickens rather than constricting at the sensation. She is gentle. Her tongue laps at the wound with as much affection as hunger, until her lips seal across the princess' and she sucks as if she means to steal the breath and life from Redana's body. Her secret assassin's form, revealed at last.

Behind her, lyrics prattle on. Endless possibilities and boundaries unfolding. Bella moans overtop of the Ancients' masterpieces. Her hips shift and squirm, carrying her body across her quarry's and filling the theater with a symphony of squeaks and rustling, jostling fabrics. Her fingers close tighter still, to feel the circling of that thumb.

It's foolish, is it not? In moments like this where she burns with the desire to record every tiny detail in her mind forever, her instinct within the space of every kiss is to let her eyes flutter closed. To swim in the smell and the touch of the moment, to savor the taste and ignore the beauty of the girl whose tongue she's got trapped against the walls of her mouth.

She forces both eyes open. To catch the same silly fluttering of lashes happening across from her. To see the twist of surprise when her legs clamp tighter around her prey. To watch surprise melt away into barely constrained lust as their bodies touch just so. To watch that determined thumb even now brushing the back of her hand as its cousin starts to struggle for supremacy, to free itself, not out of any kind of discomfort but to greedily steal away the buttons locking Bella and the true glory of her physical perfection away from the world.

It is useless, Princess. You cannot overpower her. You will drown in this sensation until she has drunk her fill of you. Until you are clean of the influence of these insidious wisps. Until the memory of the conductor's score is enough to make your chest heave and your thighs squeeze close together.

Until she's paid you back. For what that little gesture across the back of her hand is doing to her. Until you have to ask her how the story ended.

So she can tell you that it doesn't matter. Endings are a sucker's game. Just a distraction. Romance, Redana. A real one. That's all your Bella is after. So don't let go.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

"Mm."

Mirror's expression is very carefully neutral. She neither smiles nor frowns, performatively or otherwise, and does not even allow herself to appear contemplative. Absorb the compliment, do not deflect. Do not chew on it. Do not even consider it. It is an exchange with no assignable value. The acknowledgment of difficulty, and the determination to find a positive angle. The offer of quiet against the obvious desire to continue talking.

It is this last observation more than anything that drains the fight from her. She sinks into the couch and meets Slate's gaze before stretching her neck to observe the hangar through a window.

"It wasn't bad," she says, "As these things go."

She reaches behind her for a datapad, then flips it around so the screen is pressed into her lap. Her brain stubbornly pushes forward the obvious counterargument: that the shot was no kind of impressive at all because only a useless dipshit would have even needed to attempt it in the first place. She crushes the thought between her teeth as she reaches behind her a second time and pulls free a stack of creamy yellow paper. The discussion is over. That is her way of saying 'thank you'. For disagreeing with the assessment in the first place.

Mirror brushes the smooth but slightly curling surface with her fingers. She sniffs at the tip of an ink pen and sighs as the sensations sink into the core of her being. Hybrasil knew two basic kinds of manufacturing techniques, the [Path of the Hand] and the [Path of the Land]. They each amounted to what Zaldarians would call 'pointless' and Terenians would refer to as 'light industry' and 'agriculture', respectively. Mecha were built by [Path of the Hand] techniques, as were the deep space colonies her people inhabited to better walk the stars that lived between the jump gates. In fact, most everything on those colonies was produced this way; there simply wasn't enough space to maintain the appropriate and balanced ecosystems it required to grow homes and materials using [Path of the Land] techniques.

It meant that spacer cats were expected to be proficient in the use of digital goods, as these were cheap and space efficient. The pile in her lap amounted to a decadent treasure, something that could never be used for anything as transient or ultimately pointless as a hobby like the one she was about to indulge in. In fact, these pages were a gift from her mother, years and years ago. Only a tiny handful of pages on the stack were still clean, and she'd felt obliged to fill every last corner and crevice on both sides of piece before she was willing to move onto another one. And however useless or outdated the ideas she painted had become, she kept every single one of them.

It was simply... necessary, sometimes. To be able to feel her ideas in physical form, but while they were still ideas. She was not, of course, much of an artist, but--

"Oh, sketching today Boss?"

"That is correct."

"Need me to clear out?"

"Unnecessary. The company is appreciated."

"Even though you never talk when you work?"

"I can smell you. Isn't that enough?"

Slate blinked.

"Mind if I watch, then?"

"Don't you fucking dare."

"Right right," her chief mechanic replied with a quiet sigh, "I'll be here. Lemme know if you need me to translate any schematics when you're done with 'em."

Mirror did not reply. Her pen was already busy scratching out small ideas at the four corners of this fresh sheet of paper. Her finger automatically flipped through the stack at the corner. After this one filled, there would be... three more. Ever. Melancholy. She allows that frown to flash across her face to hide the look of guilt that was trying to pierce her mask instead.

Slate had never made the connection between Mirror and Mayze Szerpaws. Using paper (paper!) on a secret project directly in front of her partner without allowing her in on the secret felt recklessly indulgent. Her pulse raced faster and faster until spots started swimming across her vision. That was no good. She whipped her long tail against the couch cushions until the energy expenditure caught up with her heartrate. Better. Now she could get to work.

To repeat, it was not necessary to be a good artist to be a fashion designer. Or, for that matter, a mecha engineer. Most of the concepts for the Nine Drive System were sketched out across the lump on her lap just this second, and it would be surprising if any of them were legible without long minutes spent deciphering them. All irrelevant. What mattered was closing possibility space. Communicating the broad strokes of a shape so that when she did the real work later there would be something for her computers, her techniques, and her mind to slide overtop of. Like this, she would be committed. She could trust that the ideas were real.

Task One: Adriana Ter--

"NMnnnnnnrn." Mirror tapped the back of her pen against the page with obvious frustration.

"...Sure you don't want me to help?"

"Selin. Shut up."

No word of reply followed. Mirror nodded to herself; the lack of any indication of a door opening or closing was message enough.

The true Task One had nothing to do with Mayze's new clients and everything to do with a total dearth of inspiration. It was all well and good to declare to the world that a person could be clothed in flowers, but there was a, a, a, a, a gap. Between the communicated concept and these orders. 'Grow a dress'. That was the expectation. The understanding. That wasn't what she... she hadn't intended to say...

Her pen lifts. In the upper left corner of the paper, she traces an outline of the powerful and moderately imposing figure of Adriana Teresio. In the end it was irrelevant. There was pushing the boundaries and there was paying the bills. It was not necessary to do both at once, and foolish to attempt the former every time she set out to create. The pieces would be unique, she would make certain of that much. Something unseen in all the universe, yes. Something that put forth effort to fulfil the promise of her, of Mayze's fashion show.

But it would not, could not be transcendent. There was no room for that when what everyone wanted was flower dresses. Fine then. Fine then. They did not understand. Fine then. They did not. Not understand. Fine then. The challenge was giving them what they wanted. What they wanted. And what they, what they, what they...

What they deserved.

Adriana Teresio. Queen of the Terenius Consortium, requesting something in roses. "Beyond the typical theatrics." A challenge, as she'd already identified when she first read the order. The Queen thought she sensed weakness in Mayze Szerpaws. Utter buffoonery, for a Terenian to think they understood what the 'theatrics' of any plant were, as if they had devoted any aspect of their culture to reading the stories of and listening to the plants and trees and flowers instead of simply learning how to cut them all away.

Well. She would learn then, wouldn't she? An entrance was sought, an entrance would be had. Powerful women were always favorites of many of the core goddesses, and what better way to show her Quality than by presenting herself for marriage and entry into the Grand Harem?

The shape of the dress starts to take shape on the page almost immediately - guiding ribbons for the thorns to bite into, as with Mira's showpiece. These wrapped tight across the right shoulder, binding the arm to the side down to the elbow and constricting in angled loops that lead down to the opposite hip. This kept the left breast and opposing midriff and hip exposed (she hesitated for a moment before finally sketching the outline of a petal atop the breast. Prudes). Ideal. She would be gloried like this. Emphasized and lifted toward the heavens for the taking. She jots notes to the side: "Skirt: petals. Slivers? Translucent." Yes, that would be the trick. A tight membrane that would restrict the motion of her thighs and knees before it flared out into a weighted train behind her feet that still venerated her body as the gift it was truly meant to be, with special care designed into the window displaying the dark black panties that would be worn with the outfit.

The headdress would be a simple thing, by Hybrasil standards. A crown of blue roses with a Terenian-style bridal veil leading down the hair, so the point could not be missed. But that would not be enough. She pulled the crown lower, sketched it down and deeper until it became a blindfold of fabric kissed with rose petals, and then a full mask that left only her painted lips and her jaw exposed. She wrote another note, "Partial blindness". Yes, she wouldn't take away vision entirely, but between the obfuscation and the restrictions of the rest of the dress, the Terenian Queen would be a proper Bride of Hybrasil indeed, and would require the aid of several attendants at whatever party she wore this to.

She would realize Mayze Szerpaws was not a figure to be challenged. And she would realize she was a creature worthy of being loved and exalted. If she was as smart as was rumored, she'd figure both out in the same sentence.

Next, Maelia Dala Three Quetzal. A decision had to be made before anything. Investigate, or design? Mirror frowned deep enough to crease her entire face, and touched her pen. The mildly gangly frame of the famed scientist took shape in the upper right corner. She sketched in a dark mane around the head and neck to cement the point, and to design around. And that was that. If she was wrong, if it was an embarrassed intermediary, she'd just wasted paper. She'd have to tear a claw out as punishment. Her hand fumbled around for a drink.

Hibiscus. Hibiscus. If she meant to pull the flowers into a dress, she'd have to do something with the stamen. If she pulled them across... yes. A lattice, with the petals forming the main fabric. There would be no need for guiding materials, she would do this one in plants only. But for a Hybrasilian, traditional fashions were wasted. Little new to say by putting cat clothes on a cat. Little help to be done for her. Her pen busies itself with rhythmic, repetitive strokes.

The style was something she'd seen in a TC anime. A 'ball gown', they'd called it there. Loops around the shoulders hiding tiny straps that kept the dress up, and then nothing at all until the middle of the cleavage. From there, full coverage, the petals blossoming to cover all her fur, cinching tighter and tighter across the waist until it suddenly flares out at the hips like an enormous blossom itself, raining down to pointed shoes in a cascading pattern of falling leaves.

She painted ornaments like gun holsters at the hips, for emphasized motion. A necklace, made not of teeth or feathers but of linked bits of metal that would unfurl across her neck and chest like an accent for all of that wild hair Maelia Dala wore atop her head. If she fashioned it right, it would shift and jangle with every step she took. In fact, the entire dress was fit for that exact purpose. If she was famous for anything besides her work, Maelia Dala Three Quetzal was known for her graceful, flowing motions. Mirror sensed the presence of careful steps when she'd reviewed footage. Intentional. Deliberate. Controlled. It's why she'd committed to the sketch: the profile of the woman's gait matched the relative anonymity of the order request. Caution, mistaken for allure. Caution, mistaken for mystery. This would convert all of that caution into true desirability, and cement her reputation forever.

She writes a note next to the design, after consulting with her datapad for several long minutes. "Midnight Tryst (pink. starbust. radial purple, silver spiral). Waist sash? Contemplate."

That left Charon in the lower left corner. Unknown body type. Cybernetics implied, but... insufficient information for proper design work. A male, at that. Unexpected challenge. She would prefer to put him in a dress as well of course, but the idea kept getting caught at the front of her brain and refused to travel down her arm and into the pen. She'd come back to it.

She'd been thinking about this throughout her fight with Heim Stockar: the need to compliment a specific shade of red as the focal point of the design. "Tetradic compliments." A shade of gold, of teal, and of cyan combined with so-called "Imperial Red" to create a kaleidoscope like fireworks that would form the centerpiece of the outfit. The four-pointed flower, [Starlight's Breath], was ideally suited to this task. But as a primary material it would be too fragile. She needed something to protect it...

And then she had it. Unbidden, the shape of another sketch she'd seen before while browsing trashy media dumps with Solarel comes rushing to her head. A dress. A robe. Armor. All as one. The short skirt and tightly wrapped knee-length sandals, now draped with flowers instead of studded leather bands. A bright golden chest piece to gleam in whatever light would shine on Styx, covering pristine white robes with sleeves tied together with her precious flowers. She drew them as open slits that hung beneath the arms as a series of petals stitched together and wrapped with stems looped into tight bracelets around the wrists. These splashes of color would be especially good for emphasizing any artificial limbs the client might possess, and were ideal for implying beauty and power in whatever combination a wearer preferred.

To finish, she sketched a helmet around the head of the figure. Something like a crown, but suited to someone with a face made at least partially of metals (she paused to try and imagine this, but it was like staring into a black pit of water. Unknowable, even with a light and a rope). A hound's head, perhaps? No. Something less obvious, like the [Great Horned Dragon] and its massive, poisonous facial spine. Yes, that would be perfect. Something proud and prominent. Armor, and a dress.

But even still, she makes a note to send the colored and refined, digital version of this sketch back to the client's message server asking for feedback. Charon alone she would offer the chance for feedback to, because they alone had come to her without caution or pride.

And this, she supposed, was all the work that she could do. One empty corner. No unfulfilled orders. It felt like claws dragged across her nerves. She hated the unevenness of it, hated how incomplete her vision was. Hated that she couldn't even attempt to pursue...

Something clatters to the floor, knocked down by her tail. Her head shifts to watch it: furstick. The shortsighted gift from that wonderfully sweet little priestess. Mirror's hand glides across her body, fingering the places where her spots ran into disfigurement. Immediately, she starts sketching out the little leopard's frame from memory. Four corners now, good. A chance to work properly for once, good good.

Dala Hunters, Seven Quetzal. Priestess of the recently incarnated goddess Smokeless Jade Fires. She... deserved a gift. And as she had not asked for it, there was no need to make it a gift of flowers. Flowers... were not the point. Flowers were an idea. The point was expression. Beauty. This one would be done in furs and diaphanous fibers draped across her body like fallen snow. To make her beautiful, in a way that only she could be. Yes, that's right. The other parts of her line were important to. The finale was only ever a last expression of this singular idea.

A headdress made of holly and ribbons and blue-and-white teardrop patterned butterfly wings to be tied into her beautiful hair. She sketched with extra caution, and with all of the detail she can muster with her mediocre skills, filling in the rest with text notes where it's not clear to her own eyes. Crystals, water, snow, these would be the palette to be worked in. Because she deserved to be encased in Fisher treasures and treated like a jewel, and because this connection between the pair of them had to be expressed. Merely two fleeting touches from across a vast chasm. Each to call the other beautiful, and then to disappear. But in this way the meaning of the gift would be clear. The pilot Mira Fisher begged the designer Mayze Szerpaws for a favor after being told her deformities were worth loving. As thanks.

A fur lined, almost insubstantial cloak, dotted with stars she would intentionally stitch not to spell out any of the old paths tread by old warriors or old goddesses. Not a new story either, but... an open path. That was the compromise she could offer, as a strictly speaking non-believer. The cloak tied in at strategic points across the corset-style leotard: just beneath the bust and once more at the tiny strings wrapped around the hips. Snow and starlight the patterns here as well, layered with a fluttering and ghostlike banner that showed the priestess' fur and all of her beautiful spots, but changed their color. As if encased in jewelry, or kissed by a waterfall. Transformed, slightly, from leopard to snow leopard. Ribboned stockings and mismatched gloves in smooth Terenian styles: one a long elbow-length dress glove in solid blue and the other a delicate lace wrap that stood to do nothing other than highlight the structure of her wrist.

Finally, tall heeled and snow-white shoes with firm but petite straps around the ankles to lift her toward the kinds of heights most Hybrasilians needed to climb something to reach. Or so the joke went. If she was doing the math right, these would life Dala Hunters Seven Quetzal enough to not quite match Mirror. One final hint as to where the gift came from, if not in manufacture than in desire.

Mirror stared for a long time at the paper before carefully folding it in half, and then in half again going the other direction. Her eyes fell upon Slate again as she lumbered toward the fridge and threw a ginger beer across the room. She'd need to do a technical sketch later to cover her trail to whatever degree she could manage. An idea for a coolant vent in the cockpit, maybe. The new system generated a lot of heat. It was. Difficult. To adapt to.

"Slate."

"Boss?"

"Tell. The others..."

"Headaches again? Or would you rather I call you a sweaty, horny mess this time?"

Mirror snorted.

"It's. Your job, Selin. If you don't want it anymore, do as you please."

"I'll, uh... make sure your kitten understands. Ahaha... hoo boy."

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

White, 3V!

"Ahaha...hehehehe-- SNRRRRRKFFFFGAHAHAhAhAhhHAHAHAHA, HAHA, AHAHAHAHA, HAHAheeeeeeeeee!"

Too much. Way too much. Euna completely loses her shit despite her best and really quite valiant efforts. She doubles over with spasms of laughter so powerful they almost drop her to her knees, despite the miracle construction of her limbs. In fact she would literally be rolling on the ground right now if her legs weren't capable of supporting many times her own body weight from even the most awkward and inefficient angles she could put herself in.

As it is she merely (merely, mind you) folds her washboard abs in on themselves like a crumpling egg carton as she struggles for air harder than any of the exercise had managed to pull out of her.

"Oh my god! Fuck me, that is the funniest-- pfffhahaha! Hoo. Just the funniest fucking thing you could have possibly!"

She grits her teeth. For a moment she looks a threat to redouble over, but she masters herself at last and stands back up with mechanical smoothness. The grin on her face lights her up like christmas. Or to maybe be more seasonally appropriate, like an ARO boulevard when your signal jammer's battery just died.

"Oh, Threevee. Threevee, Threevee, Threevee! All of this 'I'm undatable' talk and then when you finally go and grab yourself a girlfriend it turns out she's nine people?!. Oh my god oh my GOD, hahaha. From zero to harem ending in a single date! You're a legend sweetie, I love you. You can't make this shit up. God, I'm glad I... well."

Euna Kim stretches her neck, a motion with some very nasty sounding pops that carry several feet farther than it seems like should be possible to give herself a bit of room to dial back her smile to something slightly more professional. Her hands automatically fly up to her hair and smooth it back into its perfect part, and she rubs a thumb over her eye again before settling back into an easy stance.

"I've gotta get this fucking thing replaced," she mutters, more to herself, before she fully regains her professional demeanor, "Anyway. There's eight more of you, then? And you're technically a single unit? I mean I'm... I'm not gonna lie and tell you I have the slightest idea what that's like, but I don't see why it has to be an issue. End of the day you're all, uh, you right? I can deal. I've got plenty of flake students, it doesn't bother me much. Or. Well. It does, but... with this stuff, you get out what you put in. But I'd rather anyone who turns up to my door do what they can, instead of having it be all or nothing. It drives me insane, being so uh, lax, but I tried this with a stricter schedule and it was a fucking disaster.. More dropouts than signups. That's not even possible! By definition!

"...And I mean, full fairness? I'm not always going to be available for focused sessions like this either. I give this place as much time as I can manage, but (you may have heard!) I've got a wife. And a life! Haha... eh. Right. Well. Point being, I'll make it work. You're welcome here. However, erm, much of you? Can make it. Am I being weird about this? I'm sorry, I feel like I'm being weird about this. This is... new. I was not trained for hiveminds, if you can believe that."

She frowns a little. Fucking slacker field guide authors, where were you when she needed you the most?

Huntresses of Hybrasil

"Goodness, aren't you an eager kitten?"

Mirror can barely climb out of her cockpit, but she makes the effort to rise up like a conquering hero just the same. A pointless gesture made graceless by the sweat drenching her body. What's heroic about it is that she rises at all. The conquest is a conquest of self, of managing against her burnt out adrenal glands and uncontrollable shivers. The point of it is that she won't worry Matty, at least straight away.

She takes the offered glass with a soft smile that doesn't look entirely at home on her face. Assessment: extreme mental fatigue. Fine control of facial expressions reduced by 45%. Refuel required. Stimulation required. Mental work, creative work... required. She sips at her victory cocktail, and finds it saltier than normal. Briny, in actual fact, though still cut through with sweet cream. A mixture intended to restore two separate reserves at the same time.

"...I see. You've all been monitoring me closer than normal. Is this your doing, little cutie? Goodness, such a good girl~"

The fingers playing under Matty's chin and stroking the fur on the sides of her neck aren't just a reward. Incapacitation. Simply: a control mechanism. A little bit of play in the right spot and the overeager newbie fuses to the side of the Gods-Smiting Whip, mere meters away from her real prize. Too busy blushing, squeezing to hold onto her datapad, and purring to interject. It's a moment Mirror needs to properly meet Slate's eyes.

To watch her for reaction. To read the tension in her expression. Even now, deferring. Waiting for Mirror's presentation to decide how to respond to what happened. Likely even to decide how she feels about it in turn. Classic Selin. The ultimate wingman, the failed guardian. Or... no. That's her tactician. So that's her game.

"Do you see that, kitten?" she asks, slowly turning Matty's head to look at Slate while she sips her drink to hide the heaviness of her breathing, "My darling partner has her scales out. She's weighing her 'I told you so's against her 'oh fine's. As if she has anything to worry about. Your teacher's system is almost perfect. Better even than my expectations. And you helped! Such a good, precious girl!"

The kiss on Matty's head rewards Mirror with a squeak. But even fun has a price. Her shoulders droop. Damp curtains of hair slip off her shoulders and bury her face. She finishes the drink in a gulp, but this time she can't hide her exhaustion. She slides behind Matty before it can register, and gives her kitten a small pat on the butt.

"Of you go, sweet willow. I know how much you want to play with Mommy's armor. Just don't go breaking anything, or I'll have to, mmmm, punish you. We don't want that, do we~?"

The danger sign is that she doesn't wait for the response. Her nod is perceptible in the sudden shift in her hair, and then she slides down the length of her mecha to drop heavily on the floor in front of her pit crew. She still clutches her glass.

Full height. Lock eye contact, dare her to blink. Hold. Don't you dare drop anything, Mira. Breathing registered as dangerously inefficient. Suggest running later, rebuild lost stamina. Focus on posture. Lower arms to full slack to conserve power. Displays of weakness in front of the crew will not be tolerated.

Finally, Slate turns her head away. Mirror steps forward in the same instant, knee subtly buckling as her weight carries her forward into Gazing Pathway, the crew's joint repair expert. Her grip on the pantheress' shoulder is tight. Mirror does not smile, but merely curls her lips to flash her teeth. With no challengers on her, she allows herself to blink twice.

"These chains are. Heavier than anticipated. I am adjusting. Further adaptation will be required. Are we agreed? We have not unlocked the full potential of our Nine Drive System, girls. We keep pushing."

Inside the darkened, damp, and sweltering cockpit of the Gods-Smiting Whip a monitor gleams, forgotten. The last message typed out but unsent blinks on the screen. Waiting for a choice.

> Speak Not, old man. I will never trade words with you again.

Breathless Dead

Idiot.

Bella rises up from the slouch she'd been watching the movie in. Her legs pull straight and she plants them both evenly and directly underneath her. The colors on the screen invert as she rises, motion blurring the whole production into a black-blue-green mess of nonsense. She sniffs, and folds her arms across her chest.

It is not lost on her that this is the last pose she saw the monkey strike before she rendered the screen unwatchable. Her teeth flash in a snarl. She squeezes her eyes shut, and a moment later her expression softens. Her ear twitches, catching the voice of the monk (sniveling, fighting back tears after being narrowly rescued from a pack of snake demons) as he calls his companions back to him so he can continue his journey. Asserting control despite being possibly the least qualified member of the entire group.

But of course he's in charge. He's the one with the crown. And he's the only one with a real reason to 'go west'. He's... well. It isn't difficult to draw the comparison, that much is true. But still, idiot. Stupid, stupid Redana. Movies don't overlap one to one with reality, and especially not the stories of the ancient past. Not that it matters. There's something else bothering her about all this. Something much more elemental.

She reaches for the strange, salty-buttery-empty-air snack and pops several pieces into her mouth. They melt almost before she can crunch down. So strange, this sensation. All flavor and no nutrition; she's been eating it for hours now and it hasn't done a thing to her appetite. It must be designed to break down into simple air before it reaches the stomach. Ingenious, actually. It's a shame Her Imperial Majesty was so concerned about resource efficiency. Even party snacks were made into essential foods under Her guidance; that way Servitors maintaining the many royal parties and functions could operate at full power without the need for a dedicated meal break. It kept the schedules running, and meant that all food on every plate and platter was healthy.

But there's a decadence to this pure air treat that makes absorbing stories feel... special. It's something Tellus doesn't have. And Tellus should not want for anything. If the Ancients had a process and a way of life that the shattering of the universe had made everyone forget, someone really ought to go back and--

Her tail curls. Her eyes flutter open in surprise. Aha.

"The monk," she says, "His voice is exactly the same as that bandit's from the other movie. The one about the 108 stars. Do you remember."

Redana shrugs. "Maybe it's the same actor?"

"Don't be ridiculous. This isn't a play, it's animation. Wouldn't be much simpler to just breed another voice exactly suited to the role?"

"Iono, maybe they hadn't thought of that back when."

"It's just such a simple concept, isn't it?"

"Hmm," Redana looks away from the movie to look at Bella appraisingly, "Then I guess they understood that cartoons should be art. Like, I've always said that Batrachomyomachia should be-- mmmph!"

Bella cuts the thought short with a fistful of salted snack puffs straight into the Princess' mouth. She smirks at the furious, and thoroughly silly glare the shorter girl shoots her in response.

Still, though. One person, many roles. Bella watches Redana in silence for a long time, tuning out the movie entirely. The chewing. The split attention between the screen and Bella herself. The increasingly nervous stares, until finally Dany is so distraught at the eyes on her she opens her mouth to apologize for the entire journey all over again.

Bella presses a finger over her mouth this time, as she settles back down into the relaxed position that lets her watch these paintings in their proper colors again.

"If we can find one while we're here... I'd like to watch a love story next. A real one."

Huntresses of Hybrasil

"What. Did I?"

The Blast Wall bubbles on the ground, in three distinct pieces. Shoulders. Torso. Legs. Clean cuts, as if from a heat whip. But the scalded, melting metals will never reattach the way they were originally designed to, not ever again. Assessment: large scale but not total redesign required to return combat capability. Likely beyond the scope of a single round's repair cycle. Target, fully neutralized.

"What did... I?"

Tail Nine shivers as it lowers itself again along the spine of the Gods-Smiting Whip. The secret weapon hidden inside the name: nine tails, ninth tail, but only eight micro-orbiting weapons platforms. The final tail, aesthetic. The final tail, a quirk of Hybrasilian engineering. In the end, untrue. The final tail. The only weapon on the entire frame with a direct connection to the Crystal Fire Drive. The Control Tail.

"What did I, what did I, what did I, what?!"

Assessment: reflex-level response to threat. Velocity of threat too great to allow for conscious decision making. Result not directly connectable to ideals or relationships. Self preservation response only, subconscious likely influenced by sudden lighting of fresh tail display.

"WHAT?"

Mirror leans forward with her elbows across her console. Teeth clenched. Head in hands. Stubbed claws pressed deep into her fur. Blunt tipped acupuncture, increased blood flow. Breathing through the nose. Unhelpful: hyperventilation beginning. Can't think, can't think, can't think, can't breathe air air air air air! Give her air!

"Hsssssssh!"

The drool is what pulls her back. She stares blankly at her control console. Lifts her hands away from her head to stare at them as well. Cannot be muscle memory. Reflex, instinct? Nonsensical. Secrets, the foundation of her power. Secrets, the ammunition spent in strategic moments to bring victory. Assessment, assessment, assessment, assessment. Was this not the ultimate conclusion of her years of training? Secrets, more valuable than injury avoidance. Secrets, more valuable than individual victories.

She needn't even have traded inaction for victory. Tank the hit, shatter her arm, bring her activated tails to bear once again and crush Heim Stockar. She plays the scenario over and over and over again inside her head. Yes, that is correct. No mistakes. The outcome, perfect.

The image of Slate's frowning face floats across her vision. She squeezes her eyes shut. There is a migraine building in her temple.

"What... did I? Do? And. Why? Did I? Do it?"

Instinct defeating training. Instinct defeating muscle memory. Instinct defeating deeply ingrained philosophy. Assessment! Failure. Comprehensive, utter failure. Hidden capabilities, shrinking. Likelihood of maintaining record against top pilots dwindling with every match. Her dreams, crumbling before her eyes.

Slate. Matty. Solarel.

She sighs. Her cough shakes something loose in her chest, and her breathing slows to normal level. She sighs, and begins the slow process of smoothing out her fur. On her cheeks, across her forehead, down her chest. Her arms, now her legs. She straightens again and worries at the long curtains of her hair.

Something is wrong with her. Something is broken. And it must be truly shattered, because she can't even hold onto it. The anger and disgust that should be propelling her forward.

Inside. Inside she. Inside she feels. Inside she feels...

Quiet.

"Heim Stockar," she snaps, "I rescind my apology. Have fun putting yourself back together."

Tail Nine slashes back and forth across the Gods-Smiting Whip's hips. Every flicker crackles with the same power that interested parties would now be analyzing, discovering her tells, developing weaknesses and counters. With the sparks, her active tails slide back and forth along with the motion with speed and precision they never show in battle. As if they were connected to the Control by puppet strings.

There, see? Look. Look what I can do. How fast can you defeat me now, Marcina Villajero?

Her mecha quietly glides out of the arena without looking back.

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

White, 3V!

Euna Kim fights like someone who is trying to beat thirty people at once. There's a brutal efficiency to her movements that's undercut by the way that even while sparring with a single undertrained opponent in her own gym, she finishes each motion with a pivot to check over her shoulder for a sneak attack. She never blocks attacks or even redirects them where she's capable of dodging them altogether, because the act of weaving out of the way carries her into the exercise equipment or into the midst of an imagined crowd. She shifts out of the way, sometimes without looking where the strike is coming from or where she's going to wind up, because it's the simplest and most efficient way to keep moving.

For her, every move is dozen. She spins out of the way of the lightest touch on her arm and pushes against the back of November's neck to unbalance her. The swiftness of the motion implies a desire to direct real power into the motion and push her new student through a wall. The follow through makes it seem like she tried. But the end result is that she simply... doesn't. It's like the idea occurred to her and her body went ahead with the plan but then instead of destroying anything she drops into a full front split and rolls across a mat. Her elbow drops heavily into nothing, but the rush of air that follows after is a little bit terrifying.

A weird thing happens when she goes on the offensive, something she tries a total of three times across the time limit she set for this little duel. Each attack she properly aims at November starts its life as a full speed kill shot, but the farther it travels the lazier it seems to get. By the time it reaches November and gets slapped out of the way, it's downright lazy. But even then there's a trick to it, because she rolls her shoulder against the redirected energy and bends her arm back into the strike again. She allows her body to follow along the curve and soon she's spun into a flanking position, with her arm curled to take the neck.

She doesn't. But her expression, and the twitch of her arm makes someone watching think she'd like to. Euna Kim is good at fighting. Euna Kim fights like she'd like to be a character in a movie. Euna Kim is terrible, actually, at holding back. Or rather, she seems amazing at it, but only in the moments after she's clearly fucked it up. It doesn't come naturally to her, just like there doesn't seem to be a way to convince her that there won't be someone jumping out of the shadows to slash her face open with a knife.

The way she moves is, in contrast to November, very human indeed. All of her forms are expressible within the range of human motions on a sprite sheet, so to speak. There's very clearly a lot of deep trained and honed instinct at play here, especially where those instincts don't properly apply to her situation. She responds to tactile stimuli, sound, and 'muscle' movement with practiced fluidity. But a lot of what she does with her own is unnatural for a human being to want to do.

There's no need, strictly speaking, to stomp on the ground to make the walls echo and confuse her position, unless she's expecting a squad of cops to turn up ready to fight but also still willing to engage with her inside the terms of a taekwondo duel or something. She doesn't follow through on strikes except as a response to being countered. There is no finish to the motion, no full extension, no perfect form when basic contact is all that she'd need to get the job done. She conserves energy, maintains her guard, and boxes with shadows the entire time she keeps November occupied.

Euna Kim fights like she's trying to beat thirty people. She fights like she doesn't understand a world where that might not be the case. She fights like... like she's trying to pull some sort of super move out of White before this has to stop. Like she wants to demonstrate how to recover being thrown through a wall. It never happens. The duel, such as it is, stays slow and she has to keep reigning herself in, keep flinching back from exploiting weaknesses. But even sloppy and silly as this particular fight is, there's a smile on her face at the end of it. She had fun.

"You have... potential. I don't even want to comment on your form because I'm afraid I'd ruin what's so special about it. If I could just train you..."

Mm. If, if, if. She shrugs, and rubs at her left eye a little with a thumb.

"If there's a next time, Miss November? Try not to be so scared of yourself. You can't break me, leastwise not any worse than my wife can. I'll come up with a routine to help you maximize performance. But no more for today. Not until I've got those batteries in for you."

Breathless Dead

The ball is heavy in her hand. Her muscles strain with the effort of holding it, though only seconds ago it felt lighter than the air she'd been breathing. But now that air is stale, thick, and dry. Her tongue feels like dense sand inside her mouth, so strained that she can't even swallow. Across the length of the table, the target hoops shimmer and wave within her vision, as though trapped in some great basin of heat.

To her left, Lord Hades stands and watches. He has nothing to say; he is helpless to let these games play out, because they are sacred to him. But whether he minds seeing his treasures taken through the mechanisms meant to defend him is impossible to tell. All he seems to say or care about, in the end, is that the seriousness of the act be understood. At least, that's how it seems to Bella. The real test is not succeeding at the rituals, or even deciphering their true meaning. The real test is looking at a god, and telling him you intend to take what is his and carry it away from his domain.

To her right, Redana is beaming, her hands held up against her chest and clenched into fists with the excitement of it all. In her, there's no sign at all of the sudden change that has come over the temple. The air she breathes is cool, is clean, is fresh. She does not sweat or sway. Her eyes sparkle with delight to see her... girlfriend? Her girlfriend. Her girlfriend create a miracle. Her eyes between them have seen so many miracles there's not a trace of fear or doubt to be found inside of them. Her smile is as light and easy as her laugh. What is this place, really, but a gift? Redana Claudius has no reason to fear the Olympics.

One ball left. After all the cards and dice, after watching the innumerable games of chance pass by and the tickets pile up, it came down to this single ball. If she scored at all, from what she'd seen, they would have enough tickets. She can see the arc of her lob traced across the air even without focusing on it. Put the ball in Hades' ring, and end it. Slow, steady, cautious. No risks. Take only what you're given, Bella, that's the law of Servitors.

"...You think that was a good shot? Ha! Watch this!"

She watches Hades as she releases the ball. Her lips are pressed thin in defiance and determination. One gold eye and one crimson affix Him with their stare. Meanwhile her throw seems to float through the air as if suspended in some sort of Azura gravity well. It carries with agonizing slowness marked only by an imperceptible whistling as the atmosphere gives way before it. There is no apparent speed to it at all, not that she can afford to take her eyes off of Lord Hades to watch it herself. Bella's ears twitch to tell her the story, instead.

Slowly. Inevitably. Her toss hurtles its way toward the tiny and impossibly shifty loop marked for Gaia. It catches the lip with a bang far too loud for how fast it was travelling, and rattles around the outside once, twice, three times... four. There it teeters, a single shocked gasp away from falling in. Or out. From victory, or defeat.

Bella's fingers curl tight until the tips of her claws press against her skin. She releases them as soon as she feels the jab, only to curl them again without thinking about it. Her tail cracks behind her with whiplike intensity, her old signal of an incoming attack. A single bead of sweat rolls down her neck to tumble carelessly down the valley between her breasts. The ball rolls, choosing its fate (and Bella's) at last. Even still, she does not turn to watch.

No looking back. That's the law, if you want to steal from the Underworld.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

"Tail Two, confirmed activation. Release. One, two, three, one! One, two, three, two!"

Five tails are now online. Just over fifty percent of her system's full capacity. It would be a misnomer to call it fifty percent of her true power - operational capability was not the same as kill threat, and creative tools were not the same as creativity. Since the Nine Drive System's secret forms were all designed around the assumption she'd have full access to the entire system at all times (and most critically, the Ninth), so it could certainly be argued that she was not fighting Heim Stockar at full power just now.

The Gods-Smiting Whip pivots and grabs Tail Two out of the air to hold it like an energy rifle. Turn, aim, fire, according to her internal timings. She shoots missiles out of the sky with a marksman's precision, her own small tribute to her match with Valentina de Alcard. Three missiles explode in the sky, dealing colossal damage to the terrain and raining bits of assorted matter down across the battlefield, but posing no true threat to anybody. The fourth impacts directly, and briefly obscures her frame in a flash of pyrotechnics.

It was also true that Mirror had allowed herself to become blinded by the power of her Nine Drive forms. The potential of her system was far greater than mere Ultimate Techniques, or even in hiding them. The decision to use or not use them had been crippling her. Constraining her logic and shrinking her fighting style. But Heim Stockar would have shattered the Moonlight Immemorial Vanguard, had he only been allowed to match himself against it.

"Shield integrity... holding. I live. I breathe. I move."

Holding tail two allows for direct energy transfer between it and her embedded tail. The principles behind her adaptive energy shield function here in miniature, creating not a bubble but a directed field with enough power to blunt the force of this otherwise lethal missile strike down to a concussive blast only strong enough to drop her to her knee.

Ideal. This position is preferred for the follow up attack.

"Nine Drive System..."

Node to node energy transfer via the air itself as a conduit. Long range capacity to turn a single mecha frame with only its own crystal fire drive into a miniature fleet capable of formation combat. Adaptability over firepower, and then firepower as adaptability. In the span of perhaps a handful of seconds, the debris covering her fallen tails melts away as they blast their way clear and link up with one another.

"Partial Configuration. The Third. Form."

Mirror adjusts Tail Two inside her hands and pulls on it as if snatching a whip back from a long lash. All at once her dispersed tails obey the silent command and snap into formation as if pulled along the length of that same whip. Their energy charges in circuit, and as they draw closer the tips unfurl like flowers to discharge power in wide-dispersal mode, the technique she uses to turn her guns into her ultimate, unblockable shield.

But she weaves them around Heim Stockar, instead. The energy barrier is not clean like his was, but bursting with sparks of plasma fire pulling tighter and tighter across his Blast Wall, hemming him and even burning him. [Nine-Tails] torques its hips and rolls out of the way at the last possible moment, barely avoiding being crushed by the ultimate missile through a combination of dodging and directing the aim of its intended strike. It pulls the net tighter, bubbling paint and charring plates of armor to a deep black patterned like rope scars.

"Moonlight. Nightmare. Cage."

She stands. Her fingers dance across her control panel at maximum apm, but this time not a single input is wasted. She adjusts each tail individually, moving the energy output around in unpredictable ways and undodgeable power surges throughout her shield that fry servos in shoulders, knees, a hip. Her tails zip around, seeming almost happy to have been turned into such unorthodox bindings. Holding the output steady requires so much concentration she almost forgets to keep breathing.

Be honored, Heim Stockar. In the end, defeating your shield required the invention of an entirely new technique. You were the most excellent meal in ages.

"You are wrong about me. I have only one thing to say. The only thing I have ever tried to say. The only thing worth saying: I am here. I am here, and you will witness me. That is all."

She flicks the power off. Her tails drift out of formation to float lazily about her shoulders, gleaming with the promise of a rain of directed energy fire should hostilities continue. On the monitor, Mirror flashes the slightest of smirks. She lets her eyes blink closed. Only once, and only for the briefest moment.

"...Your count of lives must be very long indeed, Heim Stockar. Given your, hm. Propensity to absorb damage, I was obligated to channel more energy than I could control into my attack. If repairs prove," she pauses and looks around as if she'll find the word she wants sitting in the cockpit with her, "Problematic, I apologize. It was your bad luck to have met me while I have Her title to keep safe."

She turns her back and starts gingerly picking her way through the smoldering, half melted craters the pair of them had left everywhere. Entirely possible she had miscalculated. Entirely possible he is mobile enough for one final strike. If so, then congratulations. There will be no finer target ever again. But she'd like to think there was a point to crossing blades with Heim Stockar for so long. If he'd hidden the depths of his honor code from her this well, he deserved to win after all.

"It was not a battle for the ages. We will not be remembered. No one was even watching."

Well. Almost.

[Defy Disaster with Wit (plus String): 7]

Breathless Dead

It's a momentary thing. A fleeting flicker, nothing more. Bella's eye catches the box, and her pupil opens at the sight. There's a slight pause before her nose twitches and air fills her lungs again, and a tiny... not a frown, but a brief pressing of her lips flashes across her face. For a moment, she is in another world.

It's a good thing she still has so many sharks to hold. Without them, she might have crushed her claws into her skin and ruined the entire carnival with her blood. She might have torn down the booth completely, and then there would have been a great many questions to answer. Just like old times, right Redana? The secrets and the lies.

But her hands are full of softness, so she doesn't do anything more than brush her fingers along the velvety surface of a hammerhead. A shadow clouds her eye, but she blinks it away. She is rooted in place. When she sighs, it might be nothing more important than a plan to procure the box her Princess wants so badly. This one, at least, she'll actually use. This one won't haunt her sleep.

Finally, she smiles. Hers is not a loud grin, full of laughter or bright expressions, but neither is it the serenity of Lord Apollo. Hers is a ghost's smile; a glimmer of moonlight peeking through clouds before it's swallowed up by something much brighter than she is. Guilt washing away with the tides, kept at bay until the next sight or smell that pulls it back toward her again. A smile like a scythe that is constantly contemplating violence as the fastest possible solution to any problem. That is constantly thinking its way around violence. If she comes across as clever, then this is the true reason for it. They are hard won, are her ideas.

Her arms are full of sharks. It would be nice to have a chest to carry all this treasure inside of.

"Well," she says in a voice that sounds half a universe away, "I suppose if it's got wheels. Then there's really no choice."

The look of concentration on her face is also a thing of moon-and-starlight. She is on board the Anemoi again, preparing for a raid. Quiet orders hissed into the darkness where every sense is a strain just to catch it, but with the lethal edge of absolute confidence that her voice will carry where it needs to.

She points toward a strange table: a smooth and elongated surface that curves upward at the far end, where it houses a series of strange and increasingly smaller ringed barriers with holes to nowhere carved into the middle of them. Each ring is labelled with a larger number that for some inscrutable reason is connected with the smallness of the ring it's attached to.

"We'll use that. That's the last of these rituals we haven't completed, at least as far as I can find. We'll take what we win there and bring it over to the betting hall. Hades is a gambler himself, isn't he? It makes sense that if you want to win the nicest prizes you'll have to earn it the same way he did. And if that doesn't work... don't worry, Dany. It'll work. Trust me. Come on."

Her smile may be a shard of moonlight against the blackness of night, but when she grins? When those wickedly sharp fangs come out, all confidence and no malice? That's more like a lantern, blazing fierce enough to make anyone want to follow it.