[b]Vasilia![/b]

Liu Ban leaned back, thick hand coming up to stroke his beard in an exaggerated gesture of thought. "Ah, the gods!" he said. "If there is one thing that does not change it is that their gifts do not come without consequence. In exchange for your company I must contend with a unit of the most deadly stealth operatives in the galaxy - a frightful bargain, because it seems too good to be true!"

There is a disaffected air to his oratory. His eyes are not sharp, his gaze is not searching, his mind is clearly not calculating. That itself is an act of profound self control, and that itself portrays some manner of his true feelings. To show such an utter lack of desperation, such an emotional detachment from his circumstances - one must care with [i]searing[/i] intensity to seem so careless. 

"You must have a great many tales," he said, gesturing for Vasilia to walk besides him as he lead deeper into the pit of his dying machine, "whereas I have but one. I was vanquished in strategy, vanquished in oratory, vanquished in personal combat. My life's work collapses all about me as my life's blood escapes me. This fiery pit in which you find me is but a twelfth-part of what I had built when I was whole, and now even it is upon the brink of ruin. Weep not for me, for this is all a comedy - a man who out of stubbornness and pride denied the reality of the most comprehensive defeat ever inflicted upon a human soul and threw centuries away in a vain attempt to undo it. It is only now that I realize the magnitude of my hubris, the extent of my narcissism - and that my years of torment were entirely self inflicted. Laugh! It takes an Emperor to make such an example!"

[b]Alexa![/b]

Death writhes before you with a wolf's skull grin. A miracle crawls before you, dragging behind shattered golden limbs behind it. 

It once posed as a Ceronian but that disguise is long shattered. The skin is torn open with blades and the fur a mange of bloodless rents and where bones should be there is treasure. Underneath the fraying fur-cloak disguise is a marvel - glowing emeralds in gentle orbits, cascading a wave of energy out to aurite bones and wires as sweet and clean and striped as candy. A Thunderbolt still pierces its body, still live after blowing out its left arm from the wrist down and left leg from the thigh. This broken wreck that drags itself towards you, hand over hand. It is so worn and weathered you know it must have been waiting for this for two hundred years, it is so new and clean you know a God wrought it to do all this and more if required. Upon its crystal skull is an insignia in gold - the caduceus of Hermes.

It holds a letter in its machine steady grip. Upon the letter is written your name in gentle calligraphy. The divine messenger reaches up from the ground to press it to your hands. Then it shudders, the orbiting crystals still, and it goes to its long-deferred end at last.

The handwriting is familiar. Only one person ever wrote you letters. Only Minerva.