Phoe

Breathless Dead

One hand touches her neck. The other reaches toward the space between her and the rapidly fleeing Ceronian scamp. Fingers spread apart and twist together, ready to rend the sky itself asunder and tear open the door she will merely step through to claim her prize. But she flinches, instead. Her grip relaxes, and her hand drops to her side.

Mosaic laughs and shakes her head.

"Too easy, right Ember? We'll do this the fun way."

But even having said it she doesn't start to move. The sight of her Ember racing through the sands, building obstacles with scattered shells and flotsam as she goes, the wag of her tail perfectly complimenting the smoothness of her form. The wiry body of a true champion, born to run is something that should be drunk like fine wine, shouldn't it? She can spare this indulgence. Just a moment longer.

Mosaic does not run: she flies. Sand explodes behind her in heavy showers of grit and debris as one step carries her twenty meters through the air at a time. Her legs are long and her gait is wide and there is little enough grace to this movement that is better described as an ode to pure power. Her ears bend flat as she soars, to block out the whistling of the air. She feels her own breath in the exertion of her muscles and the impact of her bones. Every step is a long song, I have you, I have you, I have you, I am coming.

She was born for this hunt above all others /across the galaxy without ever resting.
Lavender and sweat and the bouncing of golden hair beckon her forward /the whiff of Roses bars her way back.
The thrill of her perfect little back growing closer and closer with every bound /at the last second she always escapes.
Breathless laughter floating on the breeze like a ghost /two children in a palace big enough to host the stars

At the edge of the beach there is a hill where the sands give way to sweet smelling grasses and firmly packed dirt. The north slope is filled to bursting with brilliant white Snowdrops with their heads bent in prayer, greeting the spring in anticipation of winter, ready to make summer memories in the twin moons' gentle light. Five kilometers of distance has bought Ember this prize: when she is overtaken, when the huntress grabs her around the waist and lifts her into those strong, sweaty arms it is here in the most beautiful garden in all of Bitemark.

No mortal hand has ever tended here, and neither shall it have to. The flowers bear witness to an embrace that sees only one pair of feet standing on the ground. The other dangles about her knees. Mouths meet in a kiss that swallows whatever howl is coming, whether its jubilation or warning. Whether Ember is a lover or a traitor, right now her breath belongs to Mosaic. Her teeth are mere piano keys to be played by a clever tongue, her neck and her stomach are strings plucked as one might a lyre, or bent as a bow.

Sfffft, the sneaking of a claw. It robs Ember of clothing bit by bit until she stands on equal ground with Mosaic. Arms with the power to steal a mountain seal her motion away instead, and they do it with such gentle reverence that there is no pain or push or pull beyond the loving suggestion of a leash. Be collared, Ember. Be still, Ember. Be mine, mine, mine, mine, Ember.

Her fingers, tracing along the inside of her thighs until they part. Only now do the pair of them make a bed among the flowers. More blossoms rise up from the ground to see the sight. One back pressed against the hillside so that it curves, the other bending along the opposite arc to match. Lips breathing sweet nothings along the modest little hills on her chest, tongue tracing tickles down along the waist and to the hip.

The weight of a divine creature presses down from hip to shoulder atop a wolf's. Mosaic slides up the length of Ember's body and stares into one pair of twinkling, mismatched eyes with another. Her grin is filled with teeth sharp enough to make a wolf drool in envy.

"Is this proof enough? Shall I make my claim again? Anywhere you go. I will catch you. I will have you, and I will hold you, and I will shelter you with everything that I am. Because you. Are. Mine. Little wolf~"

Breathless Dead

She does not hear the howl. Her ears lift up atop her head, but she does not hear the howl. Her eyes alight with desire and her teeth flash bright against the backdrop of the night sky, but she does not hear the howl. Her hands are full of crab. Her back is full of the sea. She does not hear the howl.

No, she hears the hunt. She hears the hand of Artemis reaching from behind her, the ruffling of a jacket sleeve against a silk button down, the susurrus of skin on skin, of fingers brushing her chin and lifting her head away from her kill to stare across the beach instead. A half-annoyed sigh and a half-amused snort. The slightest of creakings and barest shift in the winds that indicate a shrug.

Ahhhhhhhh. She hears the sigh leave her own throat. She hears her heart pulsing faster and faster. She hears the sand sloughing off of her toes as she lifts them out of the waves. She does not hear the howl. She does not need to. She already lives inside of it.

So then, this is not an act of sacrilege. So then, this is not a wasted kill. It is a sacrifice. The itch on her skin is dulling with every passing breath. The name, the promise, is fading. This last and greatest enemy will be hers to prepare as a feast. But it is for the goddess Artemis to have, to keep, and to move as she will. She has already accepted it. And the reward she offers for such a pleasing dedication is a new hunt.

Someone has seen her bathing under moonlight. There are prices to be paid for such things, little wolf.

Mosaic does not cross the distance between herself and Ember. She sniffs, and the distances ceases to be. Her shoulders blot out the moon. Her blood perfumes the sea airs. Her breasts hang in the air like the unpluckable fruits that damned Tantalus. Her smirk could doom far greater heroes than that.

"What game are we playing today, my Heart? Will you flee and make sport for me, or shall I take you right here for your little pack to finally see? I allow them their games with you. Just as I allow them to call my sister their own. But you, Ember. Precious Ember. You are mine. Mine to hunt and mine to take. How. Ev. Er. I. Wish~"

Her fingers reach for the buckles on that absurd Diver's armor. But just enough hesitation, or rather gentleness, to allow room for another game to be played. If Ember can resist the sight and sound of the invitation right in front of her.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

A sigh. A sigh. A sigh. The dance resumes, and what had been liquid motion chasing a hidden melody inside the ballroom becomes a demonstration of raw power. The stomping of her feet, the twirling of her partner, the low dips where she is above the Terenian at last, and the two can share long, soulful, meaningful looks in the shadows where their hair paints the floor without anyone guessing quite what they're about.

A sigh. A sigh. A sigh.

"Family. Is NOT. Blood."

They rise. They fly. There are no thrusters hidden in the ribbons that pass for Mirror's dress but when she leaps there is force behind it. Enough to pull Isabelle off of hers, enough to carry the pair in a small rainbow of an arc across the dance floor. Enough to crash down with an authoritative crash that is almost in sync with the percussionist. She frowns, a flicker of darker irritation passing across her face.

"Dismiss my words as an Outsider's ramblings if you must. But I. Will speak..." she pauses for a long and awkward moment as she grasps about in her agitation for the word she's supposed to be using, "Cl-clarity. Obviousness. Tru... truth. Truth. I will speak my truth. Frankly!"

Her voices pitches upward in triumph, victory that has the pair of them twirling and fanning out their ballroom gowns to capture the eyes of everyone around.

"Your mother is an idiot. She has taught you backwards, and a thousand years ago I would have killed her for putting you together so wrong. Today I will settle for simply tearing her empire inside out. I will cast her down from the pillar she is lounging on, and only then will I hear what she has to say about survival. Listen. Listen to me. Listen. Listen, Isabelle Lozano!"

Her hand is pressed over Isabelle's mouth now. Not so forcefully that breathing has become difficult, but a gesture that requires real effort to speak over, or around. There is a desperation welling inside of her, now that she's heard these things. She has an impression to make and no time to make it in. The words, the words, what are the words? Her heartbeat rises to levels associated with panic, though even now her dancing is smooth and controlled. She bites her own lip, hard enough to draw blood with her fang.

"Survival of the fittest is a fool's interpretation of the world. The strong live. The weak perish. Stupid. What is the point of strength, Isabelle Lozano? Why do you feel conflicted when you follow this natural law? The strong do not eat the weak. Weak meat makes weak warriors. No. The strong eat the strong, to become stronger.

"Why? To grow. To cast a larger shadow. To wear a larger cloak, and cast it over the weak. To shelter them from the storm. Their lot is to live, and wait. When we die, they will consume our corpses, and become strong themselves. Did I tell you that those who couldn't find new jobs would be left behind? Did I tell you they should fend for themselves? I did not! What is the point of strength? What? What?! The universe is unfair! Then we bring fairness to it! An arm! Strong enough to push against the scale! That is, that is, that is!"

A sigh. A sigh. A sigh. The dance resumes, and it is quiet and stately. Mirror is quiet, and with every breath she calms. She slips back into the mask of the perfect pilot, and her fingers squeeze plaintively against Isabelle's.

"You are not the source of your troubles, Isabelle Lozano. Your head was put together upside down. Someone else has done this to you. I remove your blindfold now. You had a choice, with Ksharta Talonna. You chose what was taught you. You chose harm, for the sake of protection. You are so close. And so far. All at once. The act of submission to another's will is a choice. You are not a goddess? Neither is your mother. Choose to save your beloved, or choose to strike back. Choose even greater cruelty, if you will, but it is a choice. You are in far more desperate need of my wish than I realized.

"...If Solarel is what pried your eyelid open first, then that is good. Smashing open doors is what she does best. But you must walk through it now. Let go. Let go. Learn what it is that makes you strong, Isabelle Lozano whose name is Distant Gate. Leave your mother to me. I will show you. How far her blunt her claws have become. How short her reach. How family... is not. Blood."

Breathless Dead

To hunt a crab is to hunt the sea. Sometimes crabs are small, mere mouthfuls and hunting them is as simple as spearing them with a claw tip. This is akin to robbing the surface of the water of its least treasures, the flotsam and the seaweed. Sometimes the crab is more spine than shell, and to claim its life takes practice and careful dedication, but little in the way of specialized skill. These are the moments where someone (looking to say they had an adventure), dives down to a shallow barrier reef and plucks a single gorgeous pearl to bring home to a sweetheart.

But a true Battle Crab will never succumb to something as paltry as the loss of a single claw. It has another, and ambition to crush what even its full healthy body might not have. To fight this is to know the sting of jellyfish armor, the wrath of the tides. To dive deep, deep, deep into the blackness in the middle of a storm, where once the craft of some inventor had dared to face Poseidon and failed utterly to please him. The bone crunching pressure. The all devouring currents. The equally perilous journey back to the surface, to success but not safety.

Mosaic's arms are burning and sluggish. She has retreated backward, to the waves of high tide, out of respect. The water soaks her body, and though she stiffens at its lash she is calm. Her shoulders are low and loose and her claws drag through the foam. Her tail curls behind her and strikes the waves as a whip. Her challenge is a song, not the pounding beat of her morning ritual but a high and lilting call to the moon that radiates through the water and sends schools of curious fish darting this way and that to be clear of her path. Their scales shimmer in the light of the night with all the seeming of rent armor as their clusters split further and further apart, and dim as they sink too far below the surface to keep shining.

She does not forget who the predator is. She rises against a high wave, and pulls her hair back down over her back after it slaps against her. One more move. One. Her feet sink into the sand; the squish is pleasant against her toes. She is a silhouette against the backdrop of the stars, seeming large enough for a moment that she might walk out to meet them as friends.

She leaps. Her song is laughter now, her body is an arrow launched from the bow of a goddess. She flies straight with one outstretched arm to test against the thrusting of one good claw. The crab open the pincer, revealing lethally sharp spines growing out of clusters of shell harder than the strongest metals of the Skies. They catch her at the shoulder, they close and paint the ocean with her blood. But her hand has found a sweeter treasure still.

She falls to the beach again. The smell is salt and the sweetness of fresh flesh. The sound is tearing carapace and a shower of wet sand flopping into a retreating wave. Six armored legs tremble under the weight of her blow, stagger, and collapse. Splayed and still. She tears the other arm off as she rises, and wrenches it free from her own.

A deep breath, held. Meditation. Thanks. Her body glistens in the moons' light, no less beautiful for the colors that run down her now. Her eyes close, and she holds her hands aloft.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And only on the third verse does the world return to her.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

"Would even a goddess make no mistakes? I wonder. They do not always agree, after all. And the very basis of our language (which they gave us) is the belief that there is always another way to say something. Regardless, you are correct: it is impossible for any of us to be so perfect that we do not hurt anyone, and it will remain so until we are at least as old as the stars are now. You have hurt people, Kiriala, though I am certain you did not intend to. And you have hurt people, Isabelle Lozano, and I hope that that was unintentional as well."

She pauses and gives the girl a long look that says the recent match against Ksharta Talonna is not far from her mind. But she dances on beat and lets the moment pass without so much as a shrug.

"I have also hurt people, quite intentionally. And I have failed to hurt them, unintentionally. I have in fact made every mistake it is possible to make, and I will make them all again before I die. Solarel? She has hurt many people, yes. But none of them more deeply or more cruelly than she hurts herself. Forgive me, but in the Consortium is it not the custom to pay large out large sums to acquire outcomes you deem desirable? Why should saving the soul of the most beautiful woman in creation not fetch a commensurately exorbitant price?"

The music shifts, becoming slower and more intimate as if in stubborn resistance of the commotion happening all up and down the great spiral of the gala. Mirror presses herself in closer, finally adjusting the rhythm or her motions to be more akin to a heartbeat rather than a deliberate act of semi-rebellion against the local conductor.

Her body is warm. Her fur is soft. Her eyes are half-lidded, but looking up. A show of trust mixed with caution. Her tail flicks behind her and brushes her Squire's cheek as a reward for her boldness.

"You asked a question. 'Will anyone be hurt?' Yes, I imagine so. In the first place it is very much my intention to drag that so-called 'fashion designer' into the light and skewer her in front of everyone. It is also my intention that this message be broadcast specifically overtop the middle of my rematch with Solarel. This will functionally blank out a chunk of whatever we do. I imagine it will get several people fired.

"I consider this irrelevant. Jobs are plentiful and the specifics of who one works for almost meaningless. Those who can acquire them will do so again and again with minimal effort. Those who cannot will hear my message and realize it is them I am speaking to. And then there is me. I will be harmed, yes. I hope to guard against even greater harm by doing this. If you wish for cleaner hands than the ones you have, I cannot help you. You must quit playing at being a pilot and retreat to a garden where you may tend the flowers in peace. But if you yearn for..."

She stops completely. Stops even dancing, her feet locking in place. She opens her eyes all the way once more, and cranes her neck to pierce the eyes of the genius super-prodigy some call undefeatable.

"No. I am going about this backwards. Hmhm, my Squire has so little left to learn from me already. She will graduate to becoming a knight before I am ready. I suppose I must make ready to become a Queen of some sort before her metamorphosis finishes. Very well! You speak, Isabelle Lozano. Tell me about your troubles. Tell me about your hurts and who gave them to you. Tell me about your loves. It will be easier to see my heart if you show me yours."

Breathless Dead

Under the cool caress of moonlight, she discards her shirt. Even this light tanktop is too much for the moment. All of the sweat and the dirt and the dust she's caked it in today has left the fabric damp, clingy, and itchy. It is a distraction, and worth less than nothing as protection. And in any case a hunt against one of these superior crabs typically turned into a bath in the sea. Salt and silt were terrible for the skin on her back (her curse, Mosaic supposed), but it was a minor irritant at best compared with the agony of soaking a cloth with the stuff and leaving it against her all day. Nothing would be better than that. So it is Nothing that she wears.

She does not hide. It is not in shadows that she hunts, but in light. Sunlight, Moonlight, Starlight, Lamplight. It's all the same. What matters is the feeling of it on her eyelids, the pressure the seeps through her skin and adjusts her breathing to the shock of someone who is Caught. What matters is the subtle bursts of color that splash across her fur. The crab retreats, slowly. She follows with large, single steps.

Her hands are in her hair. She smooths out the tangles. She ties it all into dozens of tiny, crisscrossing braids. Creating order from the chaos. Fixing what had broken down in the morning brawl and the afternoon construction. She hardly watches the crab as she works. Forward, backward, clack clack clack. When it shifts from being hunted to hunter, she will know. She will respond in kind. Her breasts lift up as she stretches to tie the final ends in her hair. Sweat soaked, slick, they glisten in the pale light of the paired moons.

Her lips are closed, and turned up into the shape of a quiet smile. They part slightly to allow her breathing, but no word passes through them. Her challenge is in silence. Her prayers are in silence. The clacking of crab claws, the squirming of tentacle armor in the salty night air, the churning of waves and the clattering of shifting rocks. These are her language, and her song.

She lifts her hands higher, above her head until her back arches in line with the rotation of her shoulders. She is a constellation, fallen to earth. She is a bowstring, taut and bending backwards, waiting to be plucked. One by one, the sights and sounds and smells and sensations of the world disappear from her sight. The beach shrinks and the ocean retreats. The moons shine only on her and on her foe, but do not exist in the sky. There is no sky to begin with. The smell of a wolf hidden among the rocks vanishes completely.

Her world is the hunt. Nothing else is important enough to be acknowledged. The clacking of claws is slowing. The creaking of carapace replaces it. One massive pincer lunges at her like a javelin. Mosaic relaxes out of her stretch, and empties her lungs into the breeze. Her tail twitches. Her arm snaps forward, whiplike, to strike the joint behind the knuckle.

The best meat on the beast for you, Lady Artemis. This dance for you, Lady Artemis. Not a scratch on her body or she will cease the hunt immediately. All for you, Lady Artemis. May her efforts please you. May you find her worthy of bathing in your night airs.

May you smile. Like your brother.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

"Not lucky. Not lucky. Family is not luck."

Mirror shakes her head. Her tail reaches up from behind her shoulder and presses its fluffy tip against Isabelle's lips, as if predicting a possible interjection.

"Not skill, either. Family is not skill. But, deserved. Hard work. Family is... effort. Reaching out. Connecting. Growing. Changing. Expanding. And sometimes... contracting. Cutting off. Because family. Is not blood. Often, yes. But sometimes you must choose. Between the family that will have you and the family that assumes you. I have made this choice. Before. I have walked away. Debts are not forever, Isabelle Lozano."

The dance continues. Mirror is a very stubborn instructor, though she is fluid in the way she moves there is no budge in her when it comes to the nature of the dance. Her only two forms of momentum are the one that she controls and the one where she doesn't move at all. On the surface, a control freak. But that information's at odds with the group she's surrounded herself with, and the way they look at her (and feel free not to, just look at Matty getting sucked deeper and deeper into her own little world). There is a point to it, then. Possibly. Or she just thinks this girl needs permission not to think.

"It is maybe difficult to contemplate. I do not know. Mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers. These may ensare us. Or enrich us. Or one and then the other. But if they harm us. They cease to be family. Because. Family is effort. Family is hard work. Family is earned. Ada Smith, Unseen Goose knows this. It is why she defeated you. Not because she outsmarted you (though she did). Not because she outpiloted you (though she did). You lost because you were lost. And she was not.

"She is a pirate. This you know. Are you aware of what that means? Mother. Older sister. Wife. Power. She is a protector. Of things, of people, that cannot thrive within the main systems of your society. Consider this: existence where work is impossible. Existence where all the parties feel... askew. Like you cannot belong where they are. Existence where your talents are not valued. Because you need special consideration to thrive. Consideration that is not given. Because it does not occur to others around you that you might be struggling."

Here, she smiles. There is a genuinely pleasant memory at the forefront of her mind, and her body radiates warmth and healing vibrations from the strength of it. The dance mellows considerably, and Mirror is content to follow the beat exactly, if only for the moment.

"I am a mercenary. This you may also know. A different. More limited path. To the same end. I have contracted to Unseen Goose before. A favorite client: she pays me in paper. Very precious. No one understands. Are you aware of how she operates? To live on the edges means to be free of rules. But free of help, also. And there is... mm. There is a tradition in the Fisher Clan. One which Huntresses scoff at. When we sense a hungry mouth. We forget to guard our meals.

"Do you. Understand? There is pride. In being hungry. There is compassion. in offering the sport. There is dignity. In giving up the chance to have more than you need. That is our way. My way. And it is how the Unseen Goose lives as well. Were her pirates the sort like in the animes, she would be dead twelve times over. Stronger than me. I hope for my sake she is defeated before I reach her. Or I will disappoint Marcina Villajero. Who is looking forward to me eating her."

A lick of the lips. A curious stare, up into the eyes of Isabelle Lozano.

"...Hm. You are not. You do not. You would not. I see, I see. You are more effort than that. There are few in your life who might measure up. Isabelle Lozano, whose star name I have seen to be Thirteen Citallic. Your destiny is crushing you. I give you a new name. A gift. In the tradition of my people. Of my people. You are Distant Gate. A pathway to extraordinary things. To new discoveries. To, mmmmmmmmm."

She walks two fingers up the length of Isabelle's arm, teasingly indicating the spots she'd seen handle those drones from earlier.

"To 'unusual control schemes'. But the walk to you is long, and difficult. And not many have attempted it. And so your heart is lonely. And so your path is quiet. But if you close the distance... I see the potential for many things. Some I love. And some I do not. This name is my gift. If you wear it you need not be Thirteen Citallic any longer. Need not heed your destiny, but make a new one where its corpse lies. All this. A much longer road to say:

"I will not tell you my wish. You must take it without knowing what it is. You will learn it! But I will not speak it aloud for the first time here, of all places. And in the spirit of your greatest business animes I offer you this job. To be part of a team. I have assembled. Am assembling. To deliver a message. To broadcast it over whatever might be happening at the time of my choosing. I assure you it is quite illegal. Fun, yes? Fun, yes! My goals. Twofold. One: to destroy the villain Mayze Szerpaws, and expose her lies to the galaxy. Two: to make the Zaldarian outcast known as Solarel my family."

Mirror stops dancing entirely. Her body is electricity and tension. She almost seems as if she might glow, release some radiant blast of energy from her breath in the way of that people, but she does not. Cannot. She is just a Fisher, after all. Now she heaves a sigh, and for the first time consents to be lead to the beat of another person's heart. To let Isabelle take her where she will, or to let her go entirely.

"I love her. And I will save her. Whether you help me or no. Though I offer recompense for your services. Naturally. The wish is not your payment. The wish is merely information that will be revealed by the job. My offer is this: Hybrasil barter. One favor begets one favor. I ask this, I give this. However humble. Or impossible. The task. I will perform it. I will knit you a sweater. Or I will shatter the chains that shackle you to your wealth. I will make you a pirate. Or a traveler. Or a Queen. It is within my power. This tournament cannot give you everything, Miss Isabelle Lozano. But you can find them here, regardless. Winning matches is unnecessary for all but one. It has. Always. Been a distraction."

Breathless Dead

Mosaic's hand stretches toward the setting sun. It's a tiny thing from here, so small that her fingers can close around it and her fist is enough to blot it from the sky. She cannot reach it. Her fingers close around nothing but air, nor do they take her to visit the horizon. Even wholly closed off inside her fist, the sky shines on in brilliant but slowly fading hues, as if her desires meant nothing to it whatsoever. One more show for the planet, and then the stars will shine in earnest.

In the morning it will rise again, whether she holds her fist clenched or no. Such a stupid thought. Was that really all the better she could do? Childish observations and sloppy construction, a pile of scrap every time she gets frustrated? Mosaic, demigod, strongest ant on the stick.

Her legs tremble when she tries to stand again. She shoots a quizzical look down at her feet before flopping back down and looking up at the stars again. Her shoulders are twitching. Her lips curl back and flash fangs. Her grin widens, and she throws her head back like a Ceronian taken by a howl. Her laughter builds and builds until it's a roar that would make Gemini's hot little piece of ass (Taurel? Is that what she calls herself?) jealous.

"I'm... scared? Ahahahahahahaha! That's the funniest fucking thing I've ever heard! Look at me Quajl, I'm shaking from head to toe! Me! Isn't that hilarious? Hahaha, ahaha, HAA! Ah, gods thank you for the joke. I feel better already. I'm afraid to leave. Afraid to leave! That's why it sounds so new! Hahahahaha!"

Her heart hammers wildly against her ribs until every part of her is vibrating. Between the fits of laughter, her breath comes faster and faster, shallower and shallower. Her fur rises on her limbs, uneven and bristling, and she trembles all the way down to her finger tips. She is afraid. She, Mosaic, is scared to leave the safety of her little town and her useless backwater planet. It's not that she lacks a ship or a destination, or even that there are people she'll need to bring along before she's satisfied. She's just... scared. That she'll turn out to be less than enough. That there are other, bigger, stronger godlings and monsters that she simply will not measure up to. And that even if she manages through everything else...

Even if she goes, there won't be anything there. That this is the pinnacle of life after all. That she is stuck, forever, miserable inside her secret heart but all the vast wonders of the universe around her nothing but hollow shades and ugly mockeries. She can feel her heart shrinking at the thought.

"No," she says to nobody, "No. Fuck that."

She stands, and finds her legs are strong again. She flexes, and her body crackles with power that she knows down to the tip of her tail is Enough. She smiles, steps forward, and returns to digging foundations. Shaping stone. Building supports. Each new house she builds looks just a little bit prettier, a little bit nicer made than the one that came before it. The night is upon her, and there are promises to be fulfilled. She could never leave otherwise.

So what if Quajl doesn't help? Let her watch. So what if the stars are distant and uselessly silent? Let them watch too. She is Mosaic. She stole the mountain, she took an old friend's name, and come the dawn she will have built a neighborhood from nothing. Before she leaves she will steal Ember and Gemini from their pack, pluck Dolce and Vasilia from their happy little niche, and carry Vesper out on her shoulders.

Oh, and of course she'll find and kill that crab. The one that got away. Lady Artemis always comes first, right?

"You know, I think I'm gonna punch out the Crystal Knight before I go. Everything I've ever heard about her makes me think she's a stuck up bitch. Besides, she'll be good practice for the real thing, right? Whatever words I find, figure I owe you that much for the advice."

Huntresses of Hybrasil

.

Breathless Dead

"I can't say that I've ever really thought about cracking the Skies. You're a very interesting person, Quajl. I wish that I had learned more about you back from the place I learned your smell. Oh well! I know you now. We can be friends even if I can't convince you to stick around."

It is cruel to end the embrace so quickly, but she must. Mosaic's body is already burning up from the build up of unfulfilled oaths; any longer and she would be a danger to touch. Her spine tingles in a way that feels like she caught lightning, her skin itches and begs for her to claw it off, and her eyes have begun to sting when she looks anywhere but the pile of materials she needs to start turning into housing.

Her claws rake across the stone, and where the sharp points touch she splits down roughly even lines. The heat of her palms is enough to melt rock, and she presses them at the corner to make rough fuses, just enough to get the shape of it going. Something she can lift and carry to where it needs to be before she starts hauling lumber to give it actual structure. On and on she goes, digging foundations and building these rather crude shapes one after another, doubling back regularly as she notices she has enough stone to add a room here or there to make space for all of the people that need to live here.

The work falls into a pattern. Carve, lift, support, expand, dig, lift, set. She can't chase more than a vague shape as she is, so she models everything she builds after the little cottage she lives in. Three rooms and an alcove, a flat roof. Not small, but not large either. But even still, her concept of home, recreated the best that she can. It isn't much. But what can she do?

"They're kicking everyone in Rosedam out of their homes," she explains as she works, back always to Quajl, "That's why I needed the mountain. Though they did a whole thing recently that makes me think there won't be a mountain for too much longer, either. The Royal Surveyor's got plans I guess. What can you do?"

She shrugs. With an entire roof lifted over her head, it gives the impression that the planet is shrugging along with her.

"Lately, I've been wondering if I'm not doing enough. You know? I'm up to my ass in work and promises but shit just doesn't stop breaking. Some days it feels like I've almost got it, but then I wake up and..."

She slams the stone down on top of the latest building, her third so far. Cracks form all along the walls from the pressure of her power, and with a loud snap and a rumbling like a small avalanche the whole thing comes down around her. Mosaic grabs a chunk and hurls it in the direction of the ocean. She doesn't stop to watch if it makes it that far or not.

"There's gotta be more to life than this. Kidnapped siblings, sick sisters, and nothing to be done about it. Parties every day and songs when I go out, all this sweet air and food that's better than anything I can remember eating and it all just! It makes me itch. I have to get out of here. I have to do something. I'm so strong. I'm stronger than anybody! So why do I feel so stuck?"

Mosaic's feet give out from under her. She slumps against her own ruined handiwork, and watches the sky. For the first time today, her shoulders sag. The work is catching up to her, and she looks tired.

"Tell me that, Quajl. Tell me that and I'll crack the Skies in half for you. Even if it's impossible. Even if it's wrong."