"What? I'm [i]not[/i] Mynx," says Redana, in exactly the way that Mynx would say it if she were here pretending to be Redana who is also a Ceronian Redana in order to double-psych out Alexa. "Why would I be Mynx?" says Redana, not yet cognizant of the fact that this is exactly what Mynx would say if she were trying to figure out how to get Alexa to take off the blindfold for the EYE KNIVES. "It's me! Dany! I stole you and we had an adventure across the stars and we said goodbye at the Great Rift because you'd become [i]you[/i] and dragging you along would have [i]oof ow ow ow hey no fair[/i]."

The Princess Redana is tossed up into the air. Alexa jumps up after her to keep juggling her. This is called the Cloud Combo. (If you slam them back down into the ground with a spin, it's the Thunderbolt. If you toss them into someone else, it's the Boar.)

The world spins and opens its jaws. The sky swings its scythe from one horizon to the other. This is how Hercules killed Anateus: adrift, bereft of the ground, floating as if in the technicolor sea. She drifts like a fragment of a ruined ship until Alexa grabs her face and oh, we're doing the Thunderbolt after all.

She bounces.

It sinks in here, as Alexa strikes the earth like a mountain, that there is nothing she can say, nothing she can do, which can prove that she's not Mynx. Oh, Alexa, try taking off my arm! Mynx wouldn't let you do that! Except she'd have an arm like a lizard tail which just pops right off.

But giving up isn't a Redana thing to do, either.

She meets the mountain with her arms and [i]hugs.[/i]

"...we all forgot ourselves on the other side," she says, even as she's put into a headlock. Her words are strained, but she offers them up anyway. O Hermes, who taught words to arrange themselves... "Beljani and Epistia took me in. Taurus and Gemini, and I was... [i]ow[/i]... Ember! The Ember from the sea! And I found Bella [i]again![/i] And I fell for her [i]again![/i] And then later I got all my memories back at our wedding and Bella rode a [i]whale[/i] into the ceremony and..."

Words are false. But maybe the heart behind them will shine through all the same.