[b]Redana![/b]

It is Hades who stands before you now. Hades, blue eyed burning and furious, saying words that you cannot hear. Hades pointing, Hades snarling, Hades unfolding into something beyond being but folding back into a black pyramid paperweight reflected in the shine of Dionysus' mirror-mask. 

Dionysus puts its hand around your shoulders. It has got you.

Apollo is next. Appearing meditative, calm - and in the next minute, headless. Dionysus has decapitated him and put his head back on upside-down turning his benevolent smile into a thoughtful and painted frown. Apollo maintains his composure but you can't as the god of solar peace comes to seem comical.

Dionysus pats your shoulder. It has got you. 

Poseidon is the last to try and stop you, face dark and storming and patterned with warning of the terrible risks if you venture back into the storm he generously provided to speed your path. The spotlight from Dionysus' eyes cuts right through into the heart of his hood and cloak revealing the layers of space fish and space squid and space seals and space seagulls and the full fascinating ecosystem contained therein, and how cool it is how often those creatures wind up turning into space crabs in the end.

Dionysus gives you a drink. It has got you. It'll pull the galaxy apart for you, god by god, star by star. Don't even, girl. You got this and it has got you.

Tell us of the scene Dolce finds when he finds you two.

[b]Alexa![/b]

"Who the fuck starts journeys with destinations in mind?" said Ramses. "That's not a journey, that's a commute. Journeys aren't about destinations, they're about the ship you choose to take you there."

He takes your hand in his; hard, rough strong. "When I rebuilt this body," he said, "I wasn't thinking if it was the one that was right for me. I was thinking if it was right for [i]right now[/i]. So who do you want to be right now?"

[b]Vasilia![/b]

"It requires a narrow band of emotional identity where you have risen to a position of prestige within a tiny bubble without comprehension of a wider external world," said Iskarot, sparks from his welding doing nothing to illuminate his shadowy features. "Stability is constructed on ignorance. Revelation inspires journeys, internal or otherwise."

[b]Dolce![/b]

Different civilizations have different understandings of the Gods. You don't grasp the deep, primal bond the Alcedi have with Zeus and how they can channel her favour so decisively through this ritual. Likewise, they don't understand the subtler, more technical manifestations of Artemis' craft. They worship her in old ways, traditional ways - [i]outdated[/i] ways. What are their fetishes and tokens compared to your perfectly annotated paperwork?

They find out the hard way when one of them takes another shot at you, misses and hits Iskarot - who does not miss with his return volley. By the time the Hermetic has concluded his rampage three of the contestants have dropped out of the contest due to injury or fear. The general attrition of the contest drops two more, reduing twelve to seven.

Soon following you get two notices accepting your offer to meet, and five elaborate towering glyph-totems constructed outside your quarters giving you full notice that you are being hunted in full accordance with protocol. Still, though, that means you've got some time - which you'll need, because you just got word that Redana has commanded that the ship turn around and head back the way you came. Write your next address to Redana.

[b]Bella![/b]

Thist's manner changes. Of course it does. She now knows that you are a vessel of Imperial power, in service to the Azurius who rendered this empire unto ruin. She knows that her pitiful civilization exists at the pleasure of the one you serve -

She pulls a plastic bag full of some thick peanuts from a desk drawer, messily scatters them in front of you, then loudly cracks a shell and swallows the nut whole. She gestures at you to eat, and after another moment of rummaging finds a half-finished bottle of a pale blue liquid. It tastes like the chemical byproduct of some industrial process, which is to say: [i]delicious[/i]. Unnatural, yes, but filled with the heavy metals and complex elements that your biology craves to build bones that can shatter stone.

You're halfway done with the bottle before you realize that Thist's expression is just thoughtful. Just thoughtful. Lidded eyes, a mouthful of peanut and senth smoke. She's doing calculations, but you can't sense the elevated heartrate or a rush of adrenaline any of the mannerisms that would indicate that she's dealing with a civilizational level issue. Is her body language that alien? Or does she not understand? Or... no. She couldn't possibly understand. 

"Regarding the gods," she said slowly, letting the smoke coil around the fork of her tongue. "The sacrifice of material possessions is not the custom here any more. There was a whole schism, but suffice it to say that there are some influential philosophers called Burning Masters who believe that the gods are far better honoured through oaths and deeds than items."

The silence falls again as she returns to her thought and your mind reels that she still doesn't seem shocked. Then she gestures with a coin (you can control it with just a gesture?) and a book is carried to her from across the room. She opens it and flicks through a through pages -

"Oh, shit," she said, eyes widening. "Nero [i]IV[/i]? She's still alive? I haven't heard that name since... I think it came up in my Terminus and Party course in college? Wow, [i]that's[/i] a blast from the past. You're for real? Uh, so, just to catch you up, basically as far as we're aware the Empire collapsed following the Battle of Watersweld Binary. Annexation teams have been salvaging, raiding and settling former Imperial territory for hundreds of years without even a whisper of opposition. So there's a princess now? Huh. Neat."