[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/P7Vw9Fz.png[/img][/center] Air rushed by. The green and grey scenery blurred faster below them. All the dust on Inga's skin and mind were combed away by the wind. After so much time on the ground, flying was the most refreshing act of all. And yet, when she turned her head to eye Cinead on her back, with that creature Minus limp in front of him as he held her with an arm, Inga saw no reason to feel good. Cinead had been dark. His face was a wall of determination, making his thoughts hard even for Inga to speculate. No wonder, she thought, with the lies Minus had revealed. At least the rovaick could not stop them leaving. Inga still felt the thrilling buzz in the back of her neck from hearing the troll leader shouting out with some warriors. She ran into flight with Cinead and Minus astride before the spears flew. Inga drew her eyes ahead. She banked to one side to avoid an oncoming copse on a hill. The sun made its slow squat behind the mountains to her left, casting the ground below into a darker shade. She had been flying by the moon and the sun, all day and all of last night, never feeling any fatigue. Still, she could not fly when only the dark moons shone. Tonight was going to be too dim. She considered finding a gap in the forest to land when she heard the voice. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Inga.[/colour][/i] Was she awake? Inga's eyes darted left and right in surprise. Mira's voice sounded remarkably clear through the rushing air. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I apologise, Inga.[/colour][/i] Whatever the reason for Minus being so easy to hear, Inga had no interest in responding. She kept her eyes forward, expecting Cinead to talk instead. He did not react at all. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I know you care deeply about your brother. My secrets hurt you both.[/colour][/i] Inga opened her lips and let the air chill her teeth. Well then, she thought to herself, Minus, Tounic thing, why did you keep them in the first place? [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Because, Inga, Lazarusian thing...[/colour][/i] ...What? [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]...It was necessary for my mission.[/colour][/i] Inga glanced back to her passengers again. Cinead gave her an oblivious glance and Minus was just as limp as before. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I can speak with your mind when we are this close. Out of respect, I have not delved your memories. You would experience sudden and involuntary recollections if I attempted such a thing.[/colour][/i] While not exactly calmed by the explanation, Inga could hardly control her thoughts enough to hide anything. Questions already swam in her head following up Minus' 'mission.' [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Father sent my brother and me to the city of Xerxes. Our primary objective was to extract known demigods should they be placed in mortal danger. I have already conveyed the details of the Xerxes conflict to you and Cinead, all of that was the truth. But my objective changed when you both appeared in the city.[/colour][/i] Inga wondered if Minus would keep the secret of how they ended up there to herself- Wait! [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I still know not why you appeared in Xerxes...[/colour][/i] Inga cursed herself for letting the question run unchecked. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]...You were anomalies. Divine power flows in you. But, you are neither demigods nor mortals infused with a godly spark. You are augmented. High likelihood by Lazarus, your empress.[/colour][/i] An odd feeling of irritation grew like an itch in Inga's throat. An image flashed in her head. Her and Cinead took steps down a tunnel, led somewhere. Somewhere forbidden. As quickly as it came, Inga lost the memory's context. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Insufficient detail. That memory does not inform me of anything except that you were in Dundee. I recognise the walls.[/colour][/i] So, Minus can see the images in her mind's eye as well. Inga tightened her lips and flattened her ears. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I apologise for breaching your privacy-[/colour][/i] Shut up! Shut. Up. Having only Cinead understand Inga communications was rapidly growing preferable in her mind. Inga refocussed on her flight path. At any rate, she was more interested in what Minus originally had in mind for them. She doubted Toun wanted them to be taken safely back to Dundee across the front lines of the war. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]You were not bound for Dundee. You were bound for Rulanah. Once you were clear of the godly conflict, you were to be studied by rovaick to help them defend themselves from the dwarves. If not those purposes, you would be hostages.[/colour][/i] Inga hissed slowly into the wind. It was all a lie, then. All of it. There was never an escort home. There were never any dwarf rangers this far up north. They were manipulated. She almost snorted. It was not as if Minus completed her mission if they were now heading in the opposite direction. There was nothing Minus could do about it, now, either. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I am not the one who shall pursue recourse for my failure.[/colour][/i] Inga cursed herself again. This was not fair. Why was Minus doing this? Why does she not shut up and let me fly? I should tell Cinead all of this, Inga thought. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Because I need you to trust me, Inga.[/colour][/i] Trust you? [i]Trust you?[/i] Inga lost her patience and screeched into the air. "Inga? What's wrong?" Cinead's concerned voice spoke behind her head. How could Minus have such gall! Such nerve! She just revealed everything to be a lie. How could she be [i]trusted!?[/i] [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Not everything has been lies. My brother is coming.[/colour][/i] What? She said it slower this time. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I need you to trust me...[/colour][/i] The feathers at the near-ends of Inga's wing bent uncomfortably. She jolted at a sudden resistance against them. She glanced back and saw them abruptly looped with life-like, snake-like white chains. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Do not resist.[/colour][/i] The chains twisted Inga's wings. Their flight was thrown sharply. Cinead shouted and rebalanced. Just in time. Out from above, a great white blur darted past Inga's eye. Its air wake blasted them. It was huge. Inga did not have the time to feel the pain in her joints from the forceful manoeuvre. That shape would have tackled them out of the sky had they not moved. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Do not be afraid.[/colour][/i] Inga's wings wrenched again. Their flight stabilised and took another painful manoeuvre. The white shape shot up from below them this time, barely missing them. "Inga!" Cinead shouted. "What the hell is that thing!" A giant. A flying giant humanoid thing. It was all Inga saw. The chains forced Inga to pull sharply into a narrow valley. Blood drained from Inga's head. She tried and failed to take over again before they straightened. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]It is my brother Majus. You cannot outfly him.[/colour][/i] Her wings twisted. They spun, her wings twisted the other way. They were upside-down. Inga barely saw the end of a white rod topped by a small hammer, shooting past her belly where her back, Cinead, and Minus had been a moment before. It pulled back just as quickly. "Inga! Watch out!" Cinead hung on with his knees and hands. They spun upright again even quicker. "Mira! Bring back your chains! We have to shake this monster off!" The chains tensed. Inga's wings flung them around a tall tree. They barely missed the rocks on the ridge beside them. Inga panicked. Minus was going to get them killed. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]We will not be killed. Trust me.[/colour][/i] "Mira! I told you to let her go! Let-!" Cinead gasped and ducked. The chains retracted, forcing Inga's wings against her body just in time for them to whizz under a natural stone archway. How can you manipulate us like this!? Let me go! Inga yelled the words in her mind as she spread her wings again. A crackling explosion blasted behind them. That giant was too big for the arch. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I am suffering. It is something within me, unlocked by my time with Cinead. By my experiences with him.[/colour][/i] Another lie! [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I have been trying to comprehend it. I am limited. I do not have the last component and thus it damages me. I know it is not true corruption. It goes to purity. There is a solution.[/colour][/i] Minus was making no sense now. Inga's wings banked until she jerked vertical. They shot between two pine trees. The needles and branches whipped at them and stuck in her mouth. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I need Cinead.[/colour][/i] [i]Crack![/i] The trees behind them met their pursuer. Inga growled and shrieked. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I need Cinead to comprehend these hidden characters, Inga.[/colour][/i] Selfish monster! He loves you! Do you even care!? Does any part of you love him back!?! [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]I...[/colour][/i] Tell him the truth! All of it, Minus! Ahead, the stony outcroppings at each side of the valley narrowed into a fissure. Inga could not pull the flight up. Not with the chains. She scrunched her eyes shut. No impact. The chains forced Inga to spin up and over the outcroppings. Her head rushed as she opened her dizzy eyes. A thundering crash sounded behind them in the fissure. It sounded more definitive than the archway or the trees breaking behind them. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]We must hide. We do not have much time. Over there.[/colour][/i] Inga saw it, too. A cave in a steep ridge. The chains slowed Inga to land at its mouth and loosened to retract. Inga was released when they touched down. Cinead immediately dismounted and ran ahead. Inga followed, fuming. She ducked low enough to keep Minus from hitting the ceiling. While she wanted nothing more than to rip Minus in half, they were not safe here. "That thing was relentless! It looked like Mira but bigger. Much bigger." Cinead glanced back. "I don't think it saw us coming in here. We may be able to find a place to hide." Inga yowled a protest. "It's Minus' brother!?" Cinead eyes flashed a fearful realisation. "Damn it..." He threw a fist down. "Damn it! He is here to take her away and make her forget. Her memories, her identity, everything! We have to stop him!" He lowered his voice. "Let's see if we can find a place to ambush him." Inga had more to say. Her next growl was interrupted by Cinead raising his hand. "Leave it for later, sister. Keep Mira with you. We have to focus." Inga only slowed momentarily when she jogged past an odd pile of bones. A goblin skeleton slumped against the wall. [hr] The deathly quiet could have resulted from a rushed exodus. There was evidence of rovaick living in the cave, though things were messy and dusty. There was a poor smell in the air; that of charcoal, thick paint, and traces of spoilt meat. Rovaick stomachs were hardy enough that even the previous settlement had putrid smells, but this was different. When Cinead found a discarded torch and cast a flint over it to light more than they could perceive in the dark, they saw more than they wanted to. This was still a settlement. The inhabitants never left. They stood in a central hub of the hewn residences. Each door was slashed with a rough imitation of Toun's insignia -- two circles in the larger third circle -- in red paint. Beside each door were piles of charred bones. Black soot smeared the cave walls in strips above the skeletons, suggesting that bodies were torched and left in place. Minus spoke only one sentence to Inga's mind. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]These were heretics.[/colour][/i] Cinead wandered to another corridor. More burnt skeletons. He turned to Inga, his brow knitted and his ears back. "This place is a crypt," he whispered as if the dead around them were listening. Inga's ears flattened further when she noticed one of the small skeletons was not a goblin, but a troll child. She whined just as quietly as Cinead spoke. "I don't want to be here either," Cinead mumbled. "We need to find a place to strike at Mira's brother before he finds us." An impeccably timed [i]clink[/i] echoed through the halls. They felt it through the floor. [i]Clink...clink...clink...[/i] Cinead beckoned and broke into a run, Inga followed. They ran deeper into the caves. The clinking only grew nearer. Every residence had a door marked with the three red circles of Toun. Every single one had rovaick skeletons huddled in piles of ash. They darted around a corner. This corridor was narrower. The clinking went silent. They only heard their own softer footfalls. A fork in the corridor split ahead. They turned right. "If we circle around to the hub, we can use the elevation-" [i]Clink![/i] A tall ghost stepped around the corner ahead. Inga and Cinead slid to a stop. The hair on the backs of their necks stood. It [i]did[/i] look like Minus. But 'taller' here described a towering armoured knight. Cinead could barely stand up to its knee. The only rival to its height was the long porcelain hammer it wielded in both hands. "The other way!" Cinead hissed. "Go, go!" Cinead and Inga sprinted in the opposite direction. Minus' chains jingled against Inga's sides as she ran. They took the other path in the previous fork. [i]Clink![/i] The white armoured knight cut off their path again. It was closer. It had Toun's circles etched in red across its chest. Inga reeled. The pair spun and ran the other way. Not even five sprinting steps and -- [i]Clink![/i] -- the knight cut them off again. Cinead and Inga edged back. It was too fast. The knight angled its huge head down to look at them eyelessly. They looked back. [b][i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"ABDICATE MY TWIN."[/colour][/i][/b] Its slow, oppressive words shook the walls. Cinead and Inga exchanged a timid glance. Inga noticed Cinead ball his fists. "...I don't think so," he said. Inga knew that look. If they could not run, they would fight. The giant knight, Majus, held its hammer forward. [b][i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"ABDICATE MY TWIN,"[/colour][/i][/b] it boomed. [b][i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"OR I SHALL OBTAIN MY TWIN BY FORCE."[/colour][/i][/b] "Inga?" Cinead murmured. He stared down Majus with his ears pinned back. "Get Mira out." Inga snarled every vocalisation in a short time that could convey just how much of an idiot Cinead was for doing this. "No," Cinead spoke through gritted teeth. "Get. Mira. Out. I'll catch up with you." Inga took two heavy breaths and barked. She stepped reluctantly and sprinted away, chains jingling. I'll rip you in half, too, Cinead, she thought. Behind her, Cinead shouted a warcry. Inga could hear his charge turn into a jump. A crack. A thud. That idiot. That idiot! She kept running, turning to find the central hub again. Cinead's coughing echoed out. He shouted and attacked again. His cry was cut short by another peal of bludgeoning thuds. And Cinead coughing up a liquid. Inga blinked back tears. She ran through the central hub residences, back out toward the entrance. There was much ground to cover. The sounds of the struggle haunted her steps, echoing out to her. Each melee made Cinead sound softer and weaker. The clinks of Majus' pursuing footsteps also faded. Idiot, idiot, idiot! Almost there. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]Help him.[/colour][/i] Inga stumbled to a stop. They could make the exit. Cinead's next scream was one of pure pain. She looked back, distraught. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]He must live. Help him.[/colour][/i] Overwhelmed, Inga glanced ahead and behind. The next thud against the wall came with a tumble of burnt furniture. Another crack echoed. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]He will die if you do not help him, Inga. You must fight. I need you to trust me. Fight.[/colour][/i] He told me to get you out. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]You follow him because you love him. You have to do what I say if you want to protect him. Make your choice, Inga.[/colour][/i] She gritted her teeth. Tears streamed from her eyes as her breathing shallowed. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]You will both live if you protect him. I need you to trust me when I say that. I promise it to you.[/colour][/i] Inga screeched out into the cavern. She reached back and pulled Minus' unmoving body onto the ground. Minus crumpled like a doll. I'll get him out without you. No hesitation was left. Inga ran back. Her paces faded swiftly into the halls. Minus lifted a porcelain hand. Its fingers splayed with a strain. Its palm slammed onto the floor to push up its body. [hr] The dropped torch lit the fighters in a frame of shadow. Inga shot into the cavern in time to see Cinead roll to avoid Majus' goliath white hammer. It crashed into the rock floor. Sprinting in, Inga jumped up to snatch Majus' throat. She would kill it. Her jaw was strong. It could bite through some white armour. It was too fast. Her neck collided with the giant knight's spread hand. Her body swung and hung from the sharp-fingered white gauntlet's grip. She gagged. Lights flashed in her eyes. Before she knew which way was up, she was tossed aside. Her back met a stone wall. The rest of her body lashed to a stop against it, and she slumped, doll-like. She wheezed in a breath, somehow not crushed from the force. Cinead used the distraction to jump inhumanly high and slam a fist into the knight's side. A sharp crack. The strike dispaced Majus only half a step. It backhanded Cinead before he landed. Cinead was swat onto the floor with a stony crack. Majus' armour showed not a flaw where he was punched. Cinead struggled to push himself up off the ground. Inga saw the blood dripping from his nose and mouth. He was covered in scrapes and bruises. "Inga..." He groaned angrily. "I told you to get out!" Shut up, idiot. She snarled the sentiment at him. Inga pushed off the floor and the wall. She had a second wind to strike again. She stood and charged. Majus swung out. Its hammer thrummed too fast and lengthened unnaturally. Inga twisted to dodge, not fast enough. It caught her in the side. She stumbled to the ground, grimacing in pain, but she let her animal instinct bite for the hammer's haft. She held on with grit and tooth. Cinead barely stood. He clutched his middle. He was slumped. His yellow eyes burned up at the giant, daring it. With its hammer trapped, Majus kicked out at Cinead with a huge clay sabaton. Cinead stepped broadly aside. The foot fell. Majus let its momentum bend it forward. Cinead spun away, bent knees, and leapt forward and up. Majus' visored face met Cinead's oncoming fist. Cinead's strike landed. A dull crack. A shockwave ran up his arm from his fist as all momentum halted violently against the visor. The rest of Cinead bounced off Majus' helmet. Not a mark was left. Cinead landed on the ground on his back, the wind knocked from his lungs. He coughed a spray of blood. His whole arm twitched and shivered. He could not even bend it anymore. Majus turned its faceless head to Inga. She growled and curled back her lips. Majus pulled the hammer back so fast that Inga's teeth rang discordant notes on the clay as they slipped free from the too-smooth surface. The head of the hammer struck her face on the way back. She staggered, dazed. Majus wheeled its hammer up, poised to strike Cinead. Inga ran to Cinead, flapping her wings once to boost forward. Majus downward strike was a feint. Inga spotted the hammer an instant before it broke two of her ribs and sent her rolling. Again. She saw the cavern ceiling. She would have screamed in pain if she could breathe. [i]Clink! Clink![/i] Majus dominated the lower portion of Inga's vision. It looked down at her with that faceless head and raised its hammer again. The hammer's head elongated into a taper. A wickedly sharp hook. She tried to get up. She slipped on the dust and more pain dazed her. She tried to shout a denial. It came out as a pitiful wheeze. They could not stop it. Like that, hope disappeared. She closed her eyes. Chains rattled. The second Majus' hammer gained momentum, two white serpents sprang out behind Majus, coiling around its hammer and tensing to halt it. Majus turned its large head, confused only as a killing machine could be. The white snakes -- chains -- coiled around Majus' arms, then flung around its body and shot out into the darkness at the sides of the chamber. Two successive rocky cracks sounded where the chain stuck fast into the walls. Majus pulled at the chains. They creaked and strained, taut, but they held. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Inga,"[/colour][/i] Mira's voice turned Inga's head to the nearest passageway. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Collect Cinead. Come here. Make haste."[/colour][/i] Inga rolled onto her front and struggled up to her feet. Every step made her chest click and hurt. She limped over to Cinead. Cinead's face was swollen and bleeding to the point where his eyes were barely visible. His fur glistened, matted with his own blood. He twitched in pain, barely conscious. His right arm shuddered, ruined and jarred. Inga could not perceive any broken bones, only every other injury he could have suffered. She took his less-ruined arm and dragged him out of the chamber. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Over here. We do not have much time."[/colour][/i] Inga followed Mira's voice. Majus twisted and thrashed against the chains. It was gaining more room to struggle through sheer brute strength, pulling at the walls. She entered the passageway. Her tears and blood mixed. [hr] Inga was in too much pain resist the pair of cold gauntlets gently slowing her to a stop. She was well within the passageway and out of the still-trapped Majus' sight. Minus stepped clumsily around Inga. The lithe armoured figure sported her own limp. She was almost too weak to stand, slouched as she was with severed chains dragging on the ground behind her. Inga suppressed a sob. Crying hurt, too. She whined and winced to Minus. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"We will not die, Inga. But it will escape. You would never have beaten it. You will not."[/colour][/i] Inga bowed her head hopelessly. Her broken lip dripped blood onto the floor. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"I will grant its demand."[/colour][/i] Inga's head shot up to look at Minus in disbelief. After all this, we give up? Minus cupped her porcelain hands around Inga's red-marked chin. [colour=PaleGoldenrod][i]"[/i]We,[i] all of us, shall not die here. Majus is easily tricked. I will need your help."[/i][/colour] Inga stared into Minus' blank white visor, overwhelmed. She nodded absently. [right][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-ca1ocriv0]Minus staggered back in two unsteady steps.[/url][/right] [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"I apologise."[/colour][/i] Inga could not have been prepared, with or without Minus' notice. Nothing she had ever seen nor imagined would have matched it. For equal parts horror and fascination arced between her gryphon ears. Minus hand, shivering, rose to her other wrist. Her fingers curled, one by one, around the bracer of her gauntlet. She pulled. Her porcelain arms shook with the strain. A scrape, or a tearing, hinted. The grotesque sound of skin peeling. The white gauntlet gave, tore, and slid off. Inga could only watch in nauseating awe. Minus held her severed gauntlet by the wrist. It had left a part behind; a delicate hand, black as pitch and painted with dabs of bright red, like scales. The black fingers curled and extended smoothly, freely. Minus dropped the useless white gauntlet. It clicked onto the floor. Just clay. The new black and red hand curled around her other gauntlet to perform the same operation. Cinead's swollen, beaten eyes widened as far as he could manage, astonished. The second gauntlet dropped, also torn off with a sound like peeling skin. Again, the hand beneath was black, glossy, delicate, and dappled with vivid red. Inga noticed the ever-present white chains still attached, simply hanging from some unseen link within Minus' thin wrists. They stretched the skin out where it hung like an inseparable part of her body. Next, Minus' gaunt black hands tore at each piece of white armour up her arms. Forearms, elbows, upper arms, shoulders. Each made the same sickening tearing sound. Each revealed more of the black limbs beneath. Thin, starved, dappled red. They released a thick smell of ink in the air. Ink and long-trapped moisture. Minus fell back seated on the floor. She peeled off her sabatons and greaves like not-quite-dry scabs. While her legs were further soot-blackened with red scales, her feet were not joined like dwarven feet. Each toe ran from her heel to its tip as long as a normal foot, ending in curled talons. The moisture dried on the scales. Inga noticed the scales fraying up across Minus' exposed body. They were not scales at all; they were extraordinarily fine feathers. Minus struggled upright once more on her thin, feathered legs. She used both her delicate hands to loudly tear the armour from her torso in larger pieces. More black and fine red feathers. Her cuirass peeled off in large halves. She bent in just a way to show a strange scar across her back, between her shoulders. She was more clearly feminine now, but thin. So strangely thin. She was like something mummified, Inga thought. Missing something inside. Inga's resentment was forgotten. Replaced by pity. The last piece was the helmet. It tore after Minus pulled from the nape of her neck, splitting the piece into two like a porcelain apple. A film of sickly red mucus film stretched between the two pieces, splitting and revealing a bouquet of long, fine, thin, white plumes underneath, reclining in a bend. They lifted free from Minus' head, curling back like dusty gossamer hair. The helmet fell, clacking like stones on the floor. [hider=And they saw her eyes. Black sclera, white iris, large, and peering back.] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/IEHaOnn.jpg[/img] [i][url=https://telthona.deviantart.com/art/Parrot-353689462]Found on DeviantArt from a concept artist named telthona.[/url][/i][/center] [/hider] Minus' high-cheeked face bore a vaguely human appearance, were it not for a slightly-too-long neck, a slightly-too-small upturned nose, and a coverage of white feathers stopping at her red-dipped chin. More red feathers framed her eyes in dots and streaks. Minus, the alien, spindly, feathered creature, gave Inga and Cinead a furtive look, a frown. She blinked down. She lifted a delicate hand. As if the hand had pinched an invisible string, the discarded white armour at her feet was pulled up beneath it, assembling with mindless clicks and snaps. The helmet clapped into one piece again. The cuirass and pauldrons followed underneath. All the rest drew up under those pieces in turn. When her hand stopped, up and outstretched, Minus' armour was complete again. Minus tugged at the small white cape hanging from the armour's back. It came free easily. She cast the cape around herself as some modicum of covering, before letting the completed armour fall into Inga's hands. Inga just managed to hold onto it before it could collapse to the ground. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Present it to Majus,"[/colour][/i] Minus said. Before, Minus' voice had been unnaturally amplified from behind her helmet. Now, the natural sound from behind Minus' full lips made Inga feel a dissonance. This was real. This was what she really looked like. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"He will leave peacefully. Go."[/colour][/i] She leaned her back against a wall, exhausted. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"I shall remain hidden."[/colour][/i] Inga managed a pained whine. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Do not worry. I will tell him the truth. Everything."[/colour][/i] Inga peered at the limp armour in her arms. There was nothing else to try but this. [hr] Inga limped out into the main hub chamber with Minus' armour cradled close. She looked up at Majus as she took sharp breaths, short steps, and quick blinks. Majus' thrashing left so much slack in the chains they barely kept his arms restrained anymore. Inga lowered the empty armour onto the dusty stone floor and backed away. Majus twisted one way. Cracks and creaks sounded along the chains. He thrashed once more. The links exploded out and onto the floor in a raucous clay shower. His arms spread. And then, as if never restrained, the towering giant assumed its normal rigid posture and stance. Its huge hammer stood vertical, resting one end of its haft on the floor. It looked down at Inga, just as eyelessly as before. It regarded Inga's offering. Head low and eyes up, Inga stood her ground. Majus walked. It [i]clink, clinked[/i] forward to the limp armour and bent down to scrutinise it. Inga swallowed hard. There was still blood in her saliva. The scrutiny did not last long. Majus lifted the set unceremoniously over its shoulder and stood to full height once more. It boomed out with its deep, thundering voice. [b][i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Your utility is exhausted. Stand aside, gryphon Inga."[/colour][/i][/b] Inga kept her eyes on the giant. She took enough painful steps to one side to allow Majus to the next passageway. Majus [i]clinked[/i] forward. Its clay footfalls echoed into the passage until almost silent. Inga realised she was holding her breath. The red circles of Toun stared down from the doors around her like a crowd of dead eyes. It was gone. Just like that. It was gone. Her legs lost their energy slowly, then suddenly. She collapsed onto the floor. She curled up and wept. [hr] "So that is what happened, you say?" [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"That was the ruse. Majus will not be back for some time now. I wish you and Inga did not have to fight it. Your augmentations saved your lives."[/colour][/i] "You...really aren't Mira, aren't you?" [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"..."[/colour][/i] "..." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"...I was, Cinead."[/colour][/i] "But this is what you were all along, right? Minus. This is you." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"..."[/colour][/i] "Mira wasn't real, wasn't she?" [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"...She was real. I have taken disguises before. All of them were real. All of them were people. They all had thoughts, feelings, dreams, desires..."[/colour][/i] "But they weren't Minus'." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Minus is nothing. I am nothing underneath. I am a cold slave who manipulates and twists. No dreams or feelings. Minus is less real than any of the disguises I have taken."[/colour][/i] "...So, you lied to me. " [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"No. No, I didn't. I should have lied to you. I didn't. I only withheld. I was built to manipulate. I did not manipulate you as I should have for my mission."[/colour][/i] "Why is that? Shouldn't Mira's behaviour have served your mission?" [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"...It did. You and Mira had a rapport. But then...I started to be Minus more often than Mira. Just in certain details. You were helping me with something I have not been able to understand all my life."[/colour][/i] "..." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"There were things that I could only experience by...sharing myself as Minus. Lying does not work. It does not trigger the routines."[/colour][/i] "...I don't understand. There is more you're not telling me." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"I can tell you everything I withheld. Everything! You heal much faster than I let on, both of you. I drained Inga's energy to make it look like she was healing slower. My mission was still to bring you to the rovaick. It all served the mission until you looked at me over the campfire. I..."[/colour][/i] "Slow down...Just tell me why you needed to share yourself." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"...I need to tell you about...why things have been so strange. So...illogical."[/colour][/i] "Tell me." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"There have been...fragments built into me. Hidden fragments. Routines. They make me play out memories. Fogged memories with no explanations. Dancing. Intimacy. I have uncovered more memories from playing out the behaviours they contained. The thoughts and feelings follow. With you, mostly. Those were the components of the key that unlocks more. I needed you to help uncover them. I may still need you. They are the only things I have ever enjoyed as Minus and not as someone else. My own feelings. Built in like little instructions."[/colour][/i] "...But?" [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"I uncovered the most recent one when you kissed me. It uncovered pain. More pain than I could withstand. That was all the corruption ever was. Pain. Pain from a memory. The kind of pain that cements one's lungs and aches one's heart. It drained me of many of my powers. It may kill me if it plays out again. Even staying awake carries risks."[/colour][/i] "I'm sorry for invoking it." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Don't be. It was not your fault."[/colour][/i] "...Can Niciel still help you?" [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"I do not know. The only hint I have for the next memory is...a sense of purity. A purity that resolves. Perfection from Imperfection. 'It all goes to purity.' That is the hint. Completing the memories may resolve the pain. Niciel might trigger the next memory. Until then, I will have to sleep to stay alive."[/colour][/i] "If nothing else, she could heal you if we convince her." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"..."[/colour][/i] "Mira, look at me." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"..."[/colour][/i] "Look at me." He sighed. "You saved our lives. I...don't know what to feel about all that came before today, but the least we can do is try to save your life as well." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"...Why?"[/colour][/i] "I just told you. We owe you now." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Not that. Why do you still call me Mira?"[/colour][/i] "It suits you better. Minus is cold and manipulating, as you said. Mira has feelings and desires. Would you prefer Minus?" [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"No! No...I prefer Mira."[/colour][/i] "Mm." He hummed a laugh, belying his exhaustion. "Sorry for teasing you. It's [i]inconsequential[/i] at this point, anyway." A long pause. [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"...Understood."[/colour][/i] "We should sleep. We'll heal enough to fly again soon. And we'll have a long flight from tomorrow. I will wake you up when we arrive. Good night, Mira." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"Good night, Cinead. Thank you."[/colour][/i] "Sweet dreams." [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"...Cinead?"[/colour][/i] "Yes?" [i][colour=PaleGoldenrod]"I look forward to waking up and seeing you again."[/colour][/i] "...Me too, Mira." The rustling of old bedrolls scavenged from the dead rovaick told of Minus curling up to sleep. Cinead instead seated himself up against where Inga laid eavesdropping. Inga felt a hand and a comforting kiss on the side of her head. "Good night, sister," Cinead whispered to her. "You were amazing today. I'm sorry for all the trouble we've been through. I promise we'll head home soon." [hider=TO BE CONCLUDED?] To shake things up, this entire post is written from Inga's perspective. This is mainly because she has more interesting things to do in this episode. We rejoin Inga and Cinead with an unconscious Minus, in her undisguised armoured form. They are flying north to meet Niciel to try and heal Minus of the corruption that is slowly killing the avatar. Inga has been flying for a long time, but having slept most of the time up until now, she has plenty of energy to spare. After noting that tonight won't be bright enough to fly in, Inga notices Mira's voice speaking to her unusually clearly. Apparently, with physical touch, Minus can communicate directly through Inga's mind, making the wind noise irrelevant to a civil discussion while they fly. Minus admits to Inga that it did manipulate her and Cinead to take them to the rovaick. Inga is a little miffed. Minus tries to repair relations to gain Inga's trust but does not settle Inga's tantrum before Majus shows up. Desperate, Minus takes Inga's wings by force with her chains and 'pilots' her in the air to outmanoeuvre Majus. Inga and Cinead are both freaked out. During the chase, Minus tries and fails to explain the situation with her hidden characters to Inga. Inga has none of it. In fact, Inga challenges Minus to tell Cinead the truth and questions whether Cinead's love for Mira is reciprocated. They delay Majus by tricking the lout to run face first into a cliff. With a bit of breathing room, the three fly down into an old cave to hide. Upon hearing that it's Majus that's pursuing them, Cinead recalls what Minus previously said about Majus picking her up to wipe his memories. He resolves to ambush Majus instead. They go further into the cave and notice that it's an empty rovaick settlement. All the doors are marked with Toun's symbol and all the inhabitants' corpses have been burnt to bones in piles. They are in a town condemned for heresy. It's a bit spooky. Before they can set up an ambush, Majus traps the three in a network of corridors. Cinead, in true headstrong style, orders Inga to escape with Minus while he fights Majus. Inga is miffed, again, but complies. Inga hears Cinead getting his ass handed to him behind her and thinks he's going to die. Minus tells her to go back and help him because Minus needs him to deal with the mysterious messages in her body. Also, Inga really doesn't want Cinead to die, that would suck. Inga pulls Minus off her back and runs to join the fight. Cue a short scene where both Cinead AND Inga get their arses kicked. Majus is an avatar, so he trumps them both pretty hard. Right as Majus readies to execute Inga, Minus' chains come in to save the day, trapping Majus, if temporarily. Minus tells Inga to snap out of her near-death experience and drag Cinead out of the fight. Minus is stumbling around weakly but speaks to Inga all the same. She's like "Yo, I gotta plan." Inga is freaking out but goes along. Minus proceeds to pull off her armour. That's right. She tears off the armour. Underneath, she is some strange alien feathered humanoid who's unnaturally thin, has weird fingered and clawed feet, and a cool reference image. Inga and Cinead are stunned to silence at seeing Minus' TRUE true form for the first time. Minus uses telekinesis hax to remake her armour into an empty shell, hands it to Inga, and tells her that Majus is too stupid to tell the difference, so hand it over to the big guy and see what happens. Oh yeah, and she'll tell Cinead whole the truth now. Inga with broken ribs, bruised everything, cut lip, and a serious case of 'long week syndrome,' limps out to where Majus is trapped and offers him Minus' empty armour. He takes the armour and peaces out without noticing Minus isn't in it. Inga fucking faints, because anyone would deserve a rest at that point. One last vignette plays out from the almost-asleep perspective of Inga overhearing a conversation between Minus and Cinead. Minus is upfront about her sense of identity. That being; the identities she takes have more substance to them than she does as an avatar. However, things changed with Cinead around, so she snuck in hints of herself into the Mira identity. Minus explains the situation, clarifying the matter with the weird characters in her head being 'memories' that she is forced to play out sometimes. They are the only sources of genuine good emotions she has ever felt. However, the latest one almost killed her because it has a lot of pain. The kiss triggered it, by the way. In order to keep the risk of triggering that pain again small, she has to sleep on the last leg to Niciel. Cinead resolves to keep calling her Mira. Cute moment. It's still ambiguous whether Cinead's love is still there, but he drops the hint that he noticed Mira and Minus' crossover before everything was revealed. Inga gets head pats for telling Minus to be forthcoming. Next time, they fly for the Valley of Peace. Mutton regains a bit of confidence. This post definitely feels better than the previous one. [/hider]