Phoe

Return to Thellamie

A request for fashion advice, just beyond the beginning of a major ball. A guest of honor who has failed to make their scheduled arrival. A pen pal from Yukisearth offering apologies for his lack of contact since making the journey to Thellamie, owing to a hectic schedule and lack of available free time.

...No, this is not a difficult deduction at all. Rather, it is the sort of puzzle fragment one might offer to a small child to get them interest in the concept of solving mysteries. In fact calling it 'child's play' would be an insult to the games Eclair and Mayzie played as children. A more appropriate comparison then might be a hook dangled with unsecured bait to attempt to entice a particularly depressed fish. Just a nibble, River Queen, and then maybe you will remember the thrill of the chase and the game. Eat and grow strong so you can become a worthy rival once more.

The temptation to ghost is overwhelming.

And........

Yet.

Here she is, clinging to the outside wall of the building, shaping a lockpick out of Light. Curious that magically locked objects should be so much less secure than mundane fastenings, but so it goes. No need to steal a key when the lock for everything fastened in this manner gave way to the same password. It is as though the wizards of the world never bothered to conceive that a powerful or pure soul might think to use that purity to force entry somewhere. Or perhaps they had considered it all too well, and this was actually...

Click.

The Hero of Vespergift lets out a silent sigh from between her black painted lips and slides inside the frame. The window closes behind her without a sound. In front of her an antlered figure awash in Starlight sways nervously to and fro with his eyes focused on an impossible rack of clothing and his foot twisting into the carpet in such a way as to suggest a mind drifting every which way but fashion. She smiles, if only slightly, and aligns her tablet to capture her own face (ever-so-briefly sans mask), two fingers raised in a "V" gesture, and the back of the Golden Faun's head.

This image is the reply that .eclairespoirviolet sends to @cinnamondrumroll. She smirks when she hears the pinging of the tablet in the room. There are moments left to her to rearrange her mask while she waits for recognition to dawn, and to position herself behind him as recognition turns to understanding.

Before he can yelp, before he can call by accident or fright whatever guardians and attendants may be waiting outside, she loops an arm around his neck and presses a single velvet gloved finger to his lips. 'Shhhhhh'.

"You must not speak my name," she whispers, "It would not do for you to imply familiarity with a wanted criminal."

She spins him around, steps back, and curtsies (using the tails of her coat in place of a skirt).

"I apologize for not giving warning; this seemed overall the fastest method. You are having difficulty getting dressed? Then tell me what the problem is. I will help as my meager skills allow."

A single tiny smile steals its way across her face, here and gone in an instant. The only thing that makes it beautiful is the lack of any other emotion or tangle of thoughts to weigh it down.

"I am pleased to finally make your acquaintance, Master Hazel Valentine Fletcher. For the time being you may call me the Mystery Builder. I can spare..."

She pulls a watch out of her pocket and frowns. She replaces it and pulls a pen and a small notebook in its stead.

"Ten minutes of our mutual time. Perhaps fifteen if I knew what this was about. What is a 'Golden Faun' exactly, and why is it important?"

Breathless Dead

Dany

There is no escape. There is no finding Bella again. You cleverly double back around on your path, through things already smashed into tiny broken bits and all that is left at the beginning is a fragile girl's broken body. Her eye is dull gold and unseeing. Her ribs are covered in red where they have been pulled out of her chest. Her limbs bend at terrible and broken angles and she makes not even the slightest protest. The hole in her stomach does nothing but drip, drip, drip onto the floor where she lies still.

You can still hear the monster behind you. Breathing, hissing, snarling, crunching your name in its mouth like so many bones. Re. Da. Na. Re. Da. Na. Re. Da. Na. Over and over, punctuated by stomping boots and slavering, heavy breaths that bring a shudder to the very air itself.

"Re. Da. Naaaaaa..."

You spin around with a start. XIII is hunching in the shadow of the door she tore open in this place just a moment ago. She shivers, claws twitching in anticipation of the kill, and she pounces over your shrill shrieking for help, in spite of all your need for bravery.

"You can't have her, beast. We need this one, remember?"

A Princess' rapier looks out of place in the hands of Stellabrande, who had always stubbornly clung to the role of the damsel to be rescued. But desperate times. Her lanky, clumsy body is still wrapped in all of the embarrassing pink lace and ribbons of her special dress made even more ridiculous by the onset of her teen years and the uneven growth it had caused in her body. Her legs too long for her torso, her arms too short for her legs. Her hips still boyish but her chest blossoming like under-ripe fruit and the first hints of her womanhood. It is perhaps the short moment of her life where Bella could not have been called beautiful; stuck between the engineered radiance of childhood and the queenly perfection of her adult life. A shadow of two selves at play in a world she no longer fit inside of.

Her arm trembles violently as she tries to hold off the claws of a monster almost three times her size. Stellabrande releases the weapon and uses the sudden shift in weight to slip inside of XIII's grasp and punch her on the underside of her unprotected jaw. Her delicate braids (still nestled in the lace of her borrowed bridal gown and the paper prisoner's chains wrapped around her shoulders) dance when she turns to look at you. She does not offer a smile.

Another pair of heroes come flashing out of nowhere: a Bella in the full blossom of teenage maturity in a party dress freshly ruined by painted starlight and an even more adult version with a bare and bloodied back and a crown of laurels in her hair both match the monster claw for claw and hiss for hiss. The air around you crashes like thunder without lightning. They are none of them strong enough to hold off a Diodekoi in the fullness of her power. But together, and for you, they...

"Princess!" the same voice calls to you three times, "Run! I will be along to collect you shortly. I simply have to deal with this--"

"Dis. A. Gree."

Heroes don't beat monsters, Dany. And even if they did, Bella could never be one. XIII vanishes, only to reappear above the Olympian Bella and crush her skull with a spiked heel and so much force that her torso contorts around her hips entirely before she falls to the ground with a red, wet thud. As though she were nothing more than a sack of unwanted meat thrown out a window. The would-be painter Bella drops to her knees. Her head rolls off her shoulders a moment later.

But Stellabrande holds firm. She flies between you and XIII and, bereft of her sword (it has wound up at your feet), she throws her hands wide to make herself into a wall through which no violence may pass. It cannot reach you. Not you. Not the one who pulled her free from the Box.

"Princess," says the awkward damsel in a voice that's all her own, "I, I love, ghhhhhk!"

Stellabrande's eyes flutter closed, open, closed, open. Her head turns shakily down to look at the twisting gauntlet buried up to the elbow in her petite chest. Pink ribbons stain bright red. She shudders, she pulls, she beats a fist against the wicked bone of that monster's arm even as her fingers break against it. And then with a final, horrible crunch she falls limp.

XIII holds the dripping heart of Stellabrande above her mouth. She opens her jaw wide, so wide that it unhinges. Wide enough to show rows of extra fangs, more shark than cat. She closes her eyes tight and squeezes so that blood falls messily onto her waiting tongue. She wrings Stellabrande's hot love dry, not caring what splashes her or where, only stopping when the delicious stream finally slows to a trickle so she can stomp the ruined organ flat underneath her sole and twist.

Her ears twitch in pleasure. Bella is not supposed to enjoy blood. Even the smallest trickle makes her ill. But XIII sucks on her fingers with obvious relish, pausing her own hunt for the pleasure of the smell and the taste of violence.

There is a sword at your feet. But from the shadows, you can feel a pull against your wrist. And the chime of a single bell.

The sword, Dany? Or the hand?

Dolce!

This isn't the first time you've asked her a question like this. It's not even the second or the third. And every time a topic this intimate has been breached, some question about her loyalty or her trust, or whether she deserves to continue living or who might want her dead, her response has always been the same.

Bella always laughs. More than laughs, in fact. She doubles over and barks until she's hoarse from sheer, unrestrained mirth. She's never explained why it's so funny to her, and maybe she can't. Maybe it's a result of living a life full of assassination plots and backstabbing on a world where none of these questions could even afford an answer. Maybe it's the contrast of seeing politeness and courtesy used as something other than weapons or shields, or maybe it's the ridiculousness of seeing someone so soft and fluffy lift himself up to try and stand at her height. Maybe it's just because it reminds her of something, something worth laughing like that about. Or maybe it really is because she's spent so much time thinking her life is worthless that there's no other way for her to respond.

Whatever it might be, this Bella holds no answers. Because she is not laughing.

She tilts her head to one side, considering the question with a placid expression on her face.

"Of course, Dolce."

//Wrong. This is wrong. It isn't supposed to be this way.

She smiles, and gestures at the drink again.

//Do not. Do not. Do not. Do not. Do not.

"But I think my questions are rather more relevant than yours. Mmmhmhm, don't we all?"

Don't we all, whisper the shadows.

Redana!

"Well. I appreciate the attempt in any case."

You are on your knees. The only reason you do not bleed is because the heat lances have been cauterizing every wound as Bella's Praetorian Guard have wrenched them free. Even now a pair of them take turns working their weapons through your wrists. It's agony that you don't need to describe.

But there are fewer of these guards than there were when you began. Thirty or so, maybe a little more. If you could only stand again the fight might be a bit easier this time. Another chance and you might be able to reach her. And then? You don't know. What you know is twisting. What you know is needles made of molten fire. What you know is panting, and the tearing of fabric, and a moan that you don't recognize as yours until you realize you've been making it for the last several minutes.

Bella calmly sips a flute of champagne and watches her guard work their magic on you. She holds up her hand, and then it all stops. Click, her heel on the dance floor. Tak, the ball of her foot pushing her forward. Click, tak. Click, tak. Swish, the rustling of her dress. Fwip, the twitching of her tail.

Bella stands in front of you, watches the butts of twin crossed heat lances holding up your chin so you can see her face as she watches you with the dispassionate gaze of a critic browsing an art museum. She unfolds her palm, and reveals a small black pill.

"Do I need to force them down your throat this time? Will you show me that look on your face again, I wonder?"

She pinches it between a thumb and a forefinger, and brings it to your lips. What do you do?

Skotia!

Bella Aurelia does not make the choice. She does not need to.

Your mask does not fall to the floor cleanly split in two, but morphs into the same black tar sludge this whole place is made of before each shattered piece grasps your neck with crushing alabaster fingers. Two long arms stick out grotesquely from the floor and hold you in place. Squeezing your throat shut. Wrenching your head toward Aurelia's light so that you have nowhere to hide the truth of your face from her.

She grins at you, and brushes your chin with her fingertips. It feels like being painted by oils.

"No, I did not mean it then either. It was a passing fancy brought on by temporary madness. Nothing more. Disappoint me any further and I will be happy to show you the speed with which I can abandon you, little hero."

She laughs, and stamps the tip of Desire into your boot. Already you can feel the material melting off and pooling around you like disgusting, boiling slime. Already you feel another hand crushing a new part of your body. Already you feel the tip of that unclean blood slicing its way up the leg of your trousers, its next victim.

"Oh, but I am in haste once again!" she laughs at a volume designed for someone sitting in a balcony at the other end of a theater, "No, silly shadow. You were not enough. You have always been a disappointment, flashing from one unfulfilling moment to another."

Desire clips the buttons of your coat now, and they come flying off with little clinks of brass and hope. Bella Aurelia runs her palm up the length of your stomach and over your chest.

"But I forgive you. Even now, I forgive you. As many times as you need. As many times as you like, I forgive you. It is necessary, to craft the Redana I deserve."

She stomps the sword into your other boot.

"Aren't you excited? Things can finally be even between us."

Ember!

She kicks you in the stomach as you reel, hard enough that you can feel something inside of you try to twist where it does not belong. The horrible sensation doesn't last, but the heat that follows after it is no more pleasant. Her claws rake through your dress and draw long trails of oozing red where the fabric no longer covers you. Soon it's little more than a slip, less protection for your modesty than even her own worn down and comically large shirt.

When you get up, she is there to knock you down again. With violence sharp enough to bring your entire pack down around you, though never enough to break you completely. You always get up. So she always knocks you down. That's the dance she has selected in this little hallway. It's not a place for being clever. It's not a place for being free. Even she is constricted by the smallness of this place. Even she bumps her shoulders into the walls, even she stumbles, even she hisses at how bright and plain and white everything is.

Maybe that is why she hasn't killed you yet.

"It is important to me that you understand the truth. I am not a villager on some rock half a galaxy away that you can fool with batted eyelashes or... breast inserts."

She sniffs and glowers. Her hand clenches into a fist, and a fresh Plover head obligingly appears between her fingers to crush with a satisfying squelch of metal and piping.

"All of me is me. And all of you is you. If I can't tell the difference at a glance, then we must be the same person. Not that that doesn't sound just utterly romantic. You becoming me. But you're not ready. You do not understand. Where do you think we are, exactly? Even this place, these walls, this cute little maze... is me, Redana. Here, would you like to see?"

She rakes her claws through the wall to her left, and the hallway fills with a skull splitting scream. The ground beneath you trembles so violently that it smashes your face into first the near wall, and then the far one.

And then Down becomes Up. And White becomes Black.

"I think I'll just leave you there," Bella says through the impenetrable murk, "Feel free to rest, if you'd like. Rest forever, in fact. It's better if you just give up, Redana."

Sunshards: Chaos Sequence

"..."

...

"..."

...

"..."

..?

"Berserker."

Kat's voice is not steady. Neither are her hands. She has no sword, so she reaches into the rubble of her Servant's most recent attack and pulls out a length of rebar with a cute little chunk of concrete still attached. For someone at her level, with none of Qiu's sunshards around to declare otherwise, this is really as good as any blade that adventure could unearth. And now it's shaking, too.

"..."

...

"..."

The words don't come easy. The anger flushes hot inside her chest, feeling ugly and ashamed. It is not an easy thing to admit that you'd been played by a doofus. Intimidated by him, even! Terrified! So utterly convinced of her own inferiority by a few confident words that she'd forgotten everything she knew about bullies and con artists. It would have stung less if this had at least been a Damn Fox trick, or Assassin's master plan, or even just a hot alien catgirl or whatever. Anything else, she might have been able to keep...

Well. Whatever. Not the first time she'd been a little dummy. Wouldn't be the last, either. All that mattered is she respond the right way now that she knew better.

"Berserker," and this time she says it with terrifying calm, "Launch me. I want to hit him, too."

Master and Servant eyes meet, and slight uncertainty gives way to iron-tailed determination. Katherine has half a second to reconsider her request as a battlement forms underneath her feet. And then it is no longer forming, but snapping suddenly to full height and launching her at an angle perfected by centuries of siege warfare screaming and flailing through the air.

She does not drop her weapon. But neither does she maintain any recognized or codified form. This is not anything that other practitioners would be willing to describe as Foxgirl Style, and there is little in the sudden recognition of the terror of verticality that would give her the kind of discipline that could create a new kata right here and now.

Although?

She turns her screaming into a war cry, and her war cry into words. Specifically, "Shut up, shut up, Shut! Up!"

This is not a secret sword. It is merely the first stance of the Yue School of Martial Arts (Imitation): Flailing, But With Determination.

To rise, and fall, and rise again according to the needs of the moment. To let your heart be large enough to hurt for the world, and shine for the world, and in the end to love it all so much as to turn to violence in its defense when words failed to do their job. To grab a chunk of steel and stone and turn a loudspeaker system into sparking wires because she understood at long last that the debate was never happening in good faith. Predicting her arguments? Well predict this. And then whine about it! Y'know, if you're a chickenwuss (ooooohhhhhhhhhhhh).

She would have assumed the drop would be scarier than the rise, but it doesn't work out that way. As soon as her eyes turn back down toward the ground, she sees Berserker standing there waiting. To 'handle the landing', as the saying goes. Who said that? She has no idea. But she's glad it's a thing, as this fox princess tumbles into her knight's arms. She's set down on her feet almost before she can blush, and brandishes what's left of her weapon forward before she can really blush.

"I don't wanna hear it! None of it! Just shut up! You don't know what things are like, you're not even subscribed to the Daily Meditation of the Way <3! You call everything bad, bad, bad because of stupid, made up numbers and it's all just 'cause you want this to happen! You can't even be a good villain about it 'cause you want people to like you for doin' it! It's annoying! You're annoying!"

At this point she's hopping up and down in squeaky excitement. Arm in arm with Berserker, she's already stepping into the next parts of her most devastating attack: leaving. She's taking her ball and going... well not home, actually. The opposite of that. Toward those scary flashing green and pink lights. Where doom awaits her. But (her heart tells her), there's something worthwhile to accomplish after all. Tricks or no tricks.

If she's gonna save the world, that's where it's gonna happen.

"I hate feeling this mad. I hate it so much. But even a foxgirl's got limits, kay? I dunno what a harvest star is but I'm gonna go smash it 'til it breaks now. You can talk all you want while you watch I guess, but I'm done listening."

Sunshards: Chaos Sequence

"I, uh, well. I don't. I don't really. I? Um."

Katherine Isabella Fluffybiscuits has a couple of different problems at the moment. The first is that she is not wearing, nor in fact does she even own, sexy underwear. It's not that the idea of it embarrasses her (although it does), but it simply falls short of her idea of romance. Or to hear Cy tell it, it's another example in a very long list of ways that she's a terrible foxgirl. Not to belabor the point or anything, but why should she have to seduce anyone? She's not a one night stand kind of girl, so intimate moments ought to be for intimate partners. And shouldn't anyone who qualifies already love her for who she is, find her attractive for what she is, no matter what she's wearing at the time (or isn't)? If you can't love her in little hearts, you don't deserve her in lace.

In any case that is the least of her concerns. A much bigger problem is that she doesn't know who it is that's mad at her or what (specifically) she's done to upset them. The first person who jumps to mind is also the scariest, and she has spent most of this terrible trip through Mall Hell casting awkward and terrified looks over her shoulder expecting to see Yue standing there with her hands on her hips and a big angry frown on her face.

"Katherine Isabella Fluffybiscuits! Did yoooooooooouuuuuuuuu doom the world?"

Is what she would say if she were here. It would be awful. She would shiver and quake and cry instead of explaining herself and when she finally got brave enough to go in for Apology Hugs (which always fix everything) the world would explode and be cursed forever at the same time. And then she'd go to Cutie Jail! In any case Yue is many things, but she is not a dragon. Which now that she is thinking about it she realizes is the actual type of person getting mad at her.

And even if she was, there are no Yues to be seen. Nor Qius or Opaliseseseses for that matter. Which is kind of another problem Kat is having. Her list of allies is, uh, not as big as she was hoping? When you're going down to what you've been lead to believe is the Final Boss it really sucks to feel like you've got twenty open quest lists still unfinished. What if she needed that XP? It's not that she doesn't think the world of Berserker (like... wow, just look at her go! those poor demons have no idea what they're getting into), or trust her completely, but a lot of really, really weird and scary stuff is happening these days. And more help is better than less help, as the saying goes, and in any case she planned on having allies or friends or at least penpals and right now all she's got is a Catsassin who just really feels like he's leading her into a trap?

Which is the next problem. Obviously. This is a trap. That's why she's got the twitchy ears. At the bottom of this there's gonna be a dragon and the dragon will be mad at her for, like, being too cute or something and then she'll get eaten like, HROMP! like that and the Catsassin will laugh at her and she'll be embarrassed and dead at the same time. Or to be less stupid about this (since none of that is going to happen) she'll get grabbed by a techno-monster and lectured at about pickle-down economics or whatever it's called until it turns her Pure Evil so she can be an shrine maiden to whatever ancient horror is sealed down here. No that seems about right. Or is it more that... ok no, she shouldn't go around putting ideas in anyone's head.

The last problem, the biggest problem accept no substitutes, is that Katherine Isabella Fluffybiscuits is homesick like nobody's business. It sucks down here! This whole time she never entirely understood what it was that upset Yue so much about the state of the Demon Swordswoman's shrine. The water was disgusting, of course, but water is almost always dangerous when it isn't being turned into tea. The floating dress possessed by a ghost would've been scary even if it didn't keep randomly filling with spyware. It was all unfortunate and sad, of course, but Yue had reacted like she'd lost a friend or a relative when she hadn't even finished meeting the person she was upset for.

She gets it now. Everything is cramped. Everything crowded. Nothing gets to just be. The whole concept of beauty, or even ugliness is pointless down here because it's... inefficient? You can fit more advertising space on that if you don't care about these things. You can sell more to people if your store has a store in it, and both stores insist on funneling you through them in a weird spiral that makes you need to pass everything to get back out, and then you get lost and wind up back at the beginning which is somehow a chance to sell you a map. But the map won't turn on even after you've bought it unless you've also subscribed to MApp, even though MApp hasn't been in service for 300 million years, probably, and the url for the confirmation link smells the same as Actia's magic for some reason and, and, and...

"Argh!" she arghs.

"Ugh." she ughs.

"Sigh." she... says. That's not what sighs sound like, don't act like you were fooled.

She wants to go home. She wants to snuggle in a blanket and get a pat on her cutie head and be told it's ok to go to sleep early tonight. She wants to say sorry to Hyra for breaking the Cool Wolf Phone she got her, and she wants to eat cake and she wants to look at that one little tree you can see from out of the window because she suddenly realizes with clarity she did not believe was possible that it is simple and boring and normal and that makes it beautiful. Her eyes are almost filled with tears just thinking about it.

But of course she trudges on. Ducking and weaving through opportunities to own all of the world's most hashtaggable goods and own the libs while she's at it. Losing herself in quiet moments of unspeakable violence when Berserker gets another opportunity to crack skulls, and for once not even feeling bad about it. Wiping her foxy eyes dry and floofing her tails importantly and heading as straight into whatever trap this is as she can manage, because defeating all of this is how she gets to leave. Like every foxgirl before her.

At least she understands how to respond to Adam now. If this is the good he's been judging her world against, she knows just how to win an argument with him.

By laughing in his face.

Breathless Dead

"I wanted to solve this amicably. Was that not clear? That is why I allowed you to walk freely enough to see the purity of my home for yourselves. It is why I showed you my daughters, that your withered hearts might heal with their radiant laughter. It is why I called out to you, when I might have simply snapped my fingers and buried you both in a tomb, or burned you to ashes where you stand. And yet I spoke."

Bella Aurelia shakes her head with theatrical sadness. When she shrugs, her gleaming hair tumbles ever which way about her back as she lifts her sickening, twisted sword aloft.

"Why ignore me so? It is very rude, you realize, to crawl about and scheme my downfall right in front of me. Across history, far better people than yourselves have lost their heads for much less. You are very lucky I am so magnanimous."

She slams her blade into the white ground, and once again you see the pristine and featureless white floor melt into black tar, alive with the sound of hot pitch and the smell of cigar smoke and some strange old, corroded scent that smells like an ancient mess of some description, only half cleaned and then abandoned to the rot of long years and millions of miles. Is it Mistakes? Regret? It's too blasted out by bleach and tobacco to tell. But just by smelling it, you feel as though the gravity of this place has intensified by tenfold or more.

Struggle all you wish, but you will feel the touch of your knees to the floor. And while you drop, the surging black muck washes you apart even as it consumes a hundred different Bellas into black nothing. It rolls in choking waves and splashes down to carve deep wells in what had been the ground. Where it crests, high walls form themselves into a maze too tall and winding to see out of, no matter where one tries to look from.

"Yes, I love you even now. I shall love you forever. That is why I will not kill you. I am going to fix you first, and then I shall take you inside my heart to live forever."

She flourishes her crimson cloak and vanishes with the wind.

*****

Redana!

Considering that you are buried somewhere in a maze, the corridors here are unusually wide and spacious. The floor beneath you is covered with plush, golden carpeting which might be lovely if it were not simply so much more of the same two colors that already made you sick to your secret heart. This isn't how things were on Tellus. Nero's palace is both meaner and more beautiful than this... ballroom? And yes, if you look around at the flickering evercandles and the various white clothed tables with their glittering golden dinnerware all pushed aside for an evening's festivities, that is clearly where you are. A pale shadow of an imitation of a haunted memory.

It's wrong. All of it is wrong. The walls here feel afraid. As if accepting any part of the true Tellus into this place, or indeed anything other than this singular, banal, ultra clean prettiness would risk her sense of safety. Because that is what Bella really wants. That's what she craves, the secret wish of her heart that was strong enough to break all of her bonds and promises for. She wants a place where--

"I will admit, I didn't expect you to break apart like this. I forgot how fractured your heart really is."

It's still the same voice, but at least it sounds correct coming from the shape in front of you. Undeniably Bella, she stands in the center of the dance floor wearing curve hugging, glorious gown that Beautiful had once sewn for her to wear on Salib. The open back still shows off skin that glitters like diamonds. The rose shaped scars she bears are still there, still turned into pure beauty by the deft touch of paint and makeup. Her fingers are still tipped with jeweled talons, gripped tight around a champagne flute.

Her lips split open into a wide but very party friendly smile, one that only shows the sharpness of its teeth to the person she is speaking to. She had a plan she was following back then. Back when she danced with Skotia. But she wanted to dance with her Princess, didn't she? She sought her out above everyone. Is she following a plan now, too?

She snaps her fingers, and the room fills not with music, but the stomping of two hundred heavy boots.

From all corners they surge in: tall warriors in sleek, body conforming armor plating all in black and white. Like a heavy soldier's version of the dresses Bella used to wear all around the palace. They all have the same chin, the same lips, the same eyes covered by the same v-shaped visor clipped around the back of their heads under the exact same blue-black three plaited braid. They all carry identical heat lances as well, long weapons designed to incapacitate an enemy not merely through simple thrusts but by burning their internal organs until the body neared shutdown state trying to repair it all.

Each and every one of them stands at attention where they finish reaching their assigned posts. They lift their spears in perfect unison by way of salute to the beautifully dressed catgirl standing in their center. With one hand she sips her drink in delicate refinement. With the other, she clicks her fingers together and all of those 200 spears point downward at you, Redana.

"Don't worry, my love. I am here to heal you."

Ember!

Everything is brighter than a sun in here. The pathway is so straight and narrow it's honestly insulting. Did she worry you'd get lost if it bent at all? Or is this about--

"I want you to know that I don't appreciate this at all."

And that's all the warning you get before a hand grabs you by the skull and smashes you into a wall. Your vision fills with starbusts and red spots as your face gets dragged not at all gracefully along the length of the hallway. You are not let go so much as thrown to the ground.

"I don't want to see my wife trying to trick me. I don't want to see her even believe it is possible. Would I not know you in an instant, no matter how you dressed yourself up? There is losing yourself inside of me, and there is... I don't even have the words for it."

When your vision clears, there is only one Bella standing in front of you. She is dressed as simply as it is possible for her to be dressed: in nothing but a plain, fraying, and oversized t-shirt that keeps slipping down her shoulder to reveal how absolutely naked she is underneath it. She glares down at you with a look of contempt so vile it could wilt flowers.

"This will take some time. But it is worth doing correctly, so I may have the wife that I deserve. This is for our future, Princess Redana Claudius."

Her claws grip a large chunk of twisted metal that drips alternately with blood and oils that do not quite obscure the rather childishly painted skull that is slowly disappearing between her crushing claws.

Bella's shoulder rears back, and she hurtles the scrapped Plover's head at your own with the force of a thunderbolt.

Skotia!

"I once said something rather stupid to you. I have regretted it ever since. What were the words again? Something about masters and their pets?"

Bella Aurelia has come in person to address this particular intruder. She is the hero of a new, more modern Empire who needs neither mask nor hidden name to shine so brightly that the stars do not dare to challenge her. Her cloak flutters in stage winds and her smile glints in stage lighting, though neither force is even present here. Her every motion is overexaggerated and a cruel sort of playful; at once Bella's smirking confidence and a horrible desperation to live up to Nero's charisma which she clearly worries she lacks. When she points her finger it's as flamboyant as a Prion Paula villain. When she turns her body it is with total awareness of where her cloak and her tassels and her jewels will settle.

When she thrusts with her sword, it is with swift and unannounced brutality. That it clashes with Skotia's own is of no concern to her. She grins broadly and watches the hero's weapon twist from a simple but beautiful piece of steel to a glittering alabaster blade with a crossguard in the shape of eagle's wings. And no sooner does it transform than does it burn the hands to blisters even just to grip it. Swinging it is impossible. It may not even be sharp.

Desire. That is the name of Aurelia's sword. Desire so strong it will seize and devour every other want it touches. Desire so desperate it does not trust itself to survive if it does not smother all other flames. All consuming, all powerful Desire. She pivots upward with a graceful stroke, this time aiming for the mask.

"Whatever it was, I wish to take it back. You did say you would die for me, correct? Thank you, that means a lot to me. By all means then: you may begin."

Dolce!

Once upon a time, a sheep stepped into the corpse of a monster. It was hot, and it was wet, and it was in its way quite terrifying if you had a mind to think of such things. The sheep's lioness wife did not. She marched boldly down the platform with the confident smirk of a pirate on just one adventure out of the many, many she'd already had. And ran directly into the buzzsaw that was a lonely maid.

The sheep watched his wife tumble uselessly into the swampy ground. He watched her sword shatter under the pressure of the maid's claws. He listened to her, all she liked in fact, while she stormed and complained about the maid's total lack of tact and grace and beauty and kindness and any other positive quality that might have rendered her worthy to be the best friend of the Princess who had hired these brave hero pirates in the first place.

He did all of these things, but even as he did them, he saw that the maid wore bells. Bells in her hair, bells woven into her lace patterned skirts, bells in the collar wrapped around her neck. And he also saw that she was being punished. Fearful as he was of the music she wore on her body, he bowed to her. And he remembered her name for always.

That same maid sits across the table from him now. The exact same one, down to the number of stitches in her clothing. She still has that disgusted look on her face, as though even removed from the Eater of Worlds she still had its smell clogging her nose. With effort, she manages to wipe her expression clean, and watches him with forced calmness instead. Two golden eyes watch him with the wariness of a predator who fears she has been caught.

The sensation of those eyes pours in from all around the room, though no other versions of her seem present here. But there are many shadows in this place, here and nowhere else in all the labyrinth, and all throughout them there is the seeming of more cats' eyes.

"Why did you attack me? What possible reason could you have for bringing violence into my heart? You even said you do not believe I am myself. I do not understand. You have always been kind to me, in ways I wish to repay you for now. That is why, for the present..."

She lifts her hands above the table to show the flat caps on her talons. She plucks one free and scratches the table with the claw hidden underneath, and then applies her jewelry again. Her hands disappear under the table, and she smiles with the kind of careful professionalism that any service worker would know at a glance.

"I am simply asking you to drop your sword. There is no need to pierce my heart with it, I promise you. I just want to be a mother, Dolce. But what kind of mother could I be without one of my own? The woman who originally called herself such was a monster who quite literally tried to eat me. Children deserve better than that. They need love, and warmth, and a clean stable place they can always come back to when the world bares its fangs. Surely you agree with me?"

She pushes a cup of coffee across the table. Not a can, the way it ought to be, but a cup and saucer in the only colors this place knows.

...Dany.

The young, bandaged Bella has followed you here. Even though her broken body cannot move on its own. She cannot leave her chair. She simply was in one place and now is in this one. She regards you coolly, with the practiced eyes of a child too used to rejection who has nevertheless been told to ask for better.

"I don't think you and I have much to say to each other, do we? I am only here because I thought you might get bored. I haven't left you anywhere to go. No windows, no doors. See, I don't need to deal with you, I just need you to stay put while I--"

Bella's head turns suddenly. The pounding noise coming from elsewhere in the labyrinth feels faint, too distant to matter. The horrible animistic howl does not. Something is in pain. Something is furious. The child Bella shivers, and pulls herself tight against her chair.

"...No. No. This isn't right. Something's--"

Her tiny body dangles limply from a monster's wrist. A hulking brute wrapped in massive plates of her own bone and twisting spines steps through the rubble she has just blown apart and shivers with a cold pleasure against her steaming body. The many long braids of her hair dance across her back from inside the faceless mask of her terrifying helmet. She flicks the corpse away as though it weighed less than paper, and points a still slick and dripping claw toward the only other person she can see.

XIII curls her spine so far backwards it feels like she must have broken it, and lets out another blood curdling howl. This close, it's like being inside of a nightmare. The noise itself is louder than SP fire, but the truly horrible part is quality of it all, the savage hurt that it both promises to inflict and resents having born all its life. It's a noise that no human could make. Only a beast, only a monster can roar so horribly, so, so... wet.

"Re. Da. Na...."

She slumps forward, with her claws twitching eagerly. Her tail flicks in anticipation of the pounce. Her body is tension and her breath is red mist and her voice is ugly, guttural laughter.

You have to run, Dany. You have to get out of here now. Or you're going to die, just like Bella did.

Return to Thellamie

...This is how you know the world was created by dragons. If you dare to roar at it, it will always sink its fangs into you in turn.

Yes, this is the typical shape of this sort of attack. The insistent rapping of the world against the hollow of your breast, and the blinding light of dawn pressing insistently on eyes that remain stubbornly squeezed dark. Still empty. Still blind. But there is the rhythm of a heartbeat where I had tried to place the void, and brilliant red that spoils my perfect black. My darkness. The peace that is supposed to come from no longer caring is torn to pieces by white hot lances masquerading as pink and cream warmth.

I cannot say it is not sharp. I cannot say it does not cut. This is the second time a mere knife has felled me.

I am on my knee. I must get closer to the painting to drink in every detail of it. So that I will not misplace the memory even without my notes. My face is calm. My mask is perfect. But I feel the tight and wet clutch of tears squeeze inside my ribs, and it will not let me retreat any farther.

"Very well."

This is not the correct thing to say. But they are the words that leave my mouth. I do not take this child's painting from her. Neither do I reach to put my name on it. Shall I taint it so? Shall I rob this world of all its treasures? I refuse this arrogance. Instead I take this girl herself, picture and all.

My arm wraps around her legs and I lift her into the air until she is of a height with me. She reaches for my neck; I presume for stability. I make the decision to allow it. She pulls close to me in the safety of my arm, and I feel her body trembling. I reach for her painting with my spare hand.

"Very well," I say again, "Help me hold this nice and high, if you would be so kind. My Lady. And do not forget your smile."

I gesture by nodding toward the tablet I see hanging by the elegant purse strap at the Royal Banker's arm.

"Mother? Father? If you do not mind."

Waiting for the shot is torture. I wish that I could simply take it myself and have this be done with. But it simply will not do to have to send this child a photo of herself from the account of a wanted criminal. I say again, I shall not rob this world of its treasures. I am only too eager to set her back on her feet when I see their faces satisfied. Before she can notice for herself that it was my own strong arm that trembled and not her body anymore.

I reach into my sleeve to hide my use of a Manor requisition slip. When I pull my hand free, I flourish the pink ribbon and tie it in a bow around her wrist.

"Ordinarily it is the knight's custom to beg a token from her Lady. But. You are my courage. For as long as you wear this, I will have the strength to continue working here. That makes you a hero of Vespergift too, understand?"

Ah. Damn you. No, this is much worse than giving up. It was a mistake to call a requisition after all. I feel the weight of those closed doors. I miss my Sisters. I do not understand why they could not tell me what is happening. I do not understand why they did not ask for me to come back. And now I cannot even say that they were wrong. I am.

I am... needed...

I will not let this show upon my face. I refuse to sully Mayzie's work. I refuse to tarnish a child's dream, no less beautiful than an Aurora. But I. If I live to see the close of this accursed party and the inside of a room where I may be free of the title of 'Mystery Builder'. I would. I will. Beg for my best friend's arms.

I require strength to cry.

"Please," I say as I will my voice to be a hero's, "Live the life that you deserve."

Return to Thellamie

Oh cease your useless pretensions, you irritating knot of scams and lies.

You will not "allow" me to be recognized? Must I remind every last entity on this world that Civelia has never met me in the first place?

If it is possible for her, or indeed for anyone, to mistake me in disguise for someone else pretending to be me (and not particularly well at that!) then it only through whatever machinations you have already worked against me. Your mercy is as false as your barking.

I will neither thank you or cower before you. Come within reach and find out how much a mask is really worth, I dare you.

"I have had enough."

Enough of this party. Enough of this case. Enough of being lead around on pointless chases and being forced to invent my own conclusions out of raw materials. Enough of pretending I have a heart which I can give to anyone, or to have stolen away from me.

I will not discard this disguise, for the sake of Mayzie's pride. Her craftsmanship is impeccable and it all fits so well that she has clearly taken measurements without my knowledge. A heart is not a prerequisite for kindness. But I am turning my back on this entire rotten show.

"If there is any value to anything here, then prove it."

I am leaving. Stop me if you dare.

Sunshards: Chaos Sequence

"Haa?! What do you think you're doing, you little idiot? It's gross, knock it off! You're the one who ate her anyway, I'm the one who gets to be mad here!"

The first rule of being an idol is that you can't ever be less than perfect in front of your fans. That means she can't get flustered here, can't let anyone know Uwudumbface is getting to her. Just like nobody can ever find out that when the two of them met, Elizabeth was actually pretty intimidated.

Not her fault! How often do you get to meet a dragon? Like, a real one! Even manifesting as an Extra Class this time around she herself was still only allowed at the table on a series of technicalities and... ok it doesn't really matter because her horns are, like, way cuter and once she figured out she was better than a real dragon everything kind of slid back into place the way it was meant to.

Or so she thought. But sometimes Oroboros just... did stuff and it freaked Liz the hell out. And this is so clearly one of those Dragon Moments that it makes her want to grind her teeth. But instead she sets her lips into a perfect, pink smirk. She tosses her hair in the spotlight and shifts her leg to get all of her accessories sparkling at the same time. That neatly distracts from the fear creeping into her eyes. Pr-probably.

"H-hey, knock it off already! I get it, ok? I'm sorry I stabbed you! But you, urk. Oh gawd I'm gonna be sick; is... is that supposed to bend that way? Are you? Uh??"

The first rule of being an idol is that if you're going to be a failgirl in front of your fans, you have to at least be a cute one. If you stumble, then blush about it. If you get scared, really ham it up. If you say something you shouldn't? Well, teehee! You can't call yourself the best unless you turn your worst moments into another reason fans want to crawl all over your shoes.

And if you freak out and start screaming about all of this weird hippie magic Power of the Earth stuff, you have to at least maintain the wherewithal to charge forward anti-heroically and start stabbing and clawing with everything you've got. This is NOT because Oroboros is her friend ok? It's not even because she'd be lonely down here without someone to yell at (though that IS her only nightmare...). It's just that, whatever is happening here, it's wrong. It's wrong, it's wrong, it's bad it's bad, it's very bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad!

So she hacks at flowers and grass and she crushes antler-horns. As if she could fix the problem by just exhausting its magical energy. Besides, what else is she supposed to do? Sing? At this?? As if! But it's like gnawing on a mountain. That's the work of centuries, and while other dragons might have the patience that's just not Elly, not at all.

In a last ditch effort to make something, just anything happen that is not This, she tries to pry Oroboros' tail out of her mouth. Some unseen force knocks her away like a sack of extremely cute feathers (the sack is also unbelievably cute) and sends her flying the whole length of the hallway to splat against her own stage. How dare! But, also? Eep?!?!

"Oh. Something weird's about to happen, isn't it?"

Elizabeth Bathory stands up on her perfect pink stilettos. She adjusts her frills and grips her mic stand the way any proper hero and guardian should. She briefly allows herself to contemplate what kind of class, and what kind of shape she's about to end up in this time.

Then the much more depressing realization hits home, that much more likely she's about to simply die. No fanfare. No tears. No funeral. Haaaaaaa, how glum can you get?

Elizabeth Bathory grips the hilt of her sword. And the adorable purple ribbon-grip on her magic wand. And the edges of her magic mirror. And the handle of her Death Metal Elizabeth JAPAN spear. Her missile launchers. And her three section staff. Screw it all, she'll just save herself.

"Of course you realize," say nine perfect voices in perfect unison, "I'm the main vocalist here. Right?"

Breathless Dead

At first glance it might be a palace of some kind. Perhaps even a city.

Columns and spires rise to such dizzying heights that they pass beyond the limits of even divine vision. Grand, rolling arches provide easy passage through the rounding walls, though beyond these welcoming entryways the air becomes so thick with shadows that there may not be a world inside of it at all. Your feet carry you for miles around the outside of it but the curve continues on forever. All of this vast expanse is in service to a single building.

Everything is white, white, white, white, white, white, White. Glittering and painful, more pure than the fur on her body. Brighter than creation. Not a canvas waiting for a brush or a joining of every color into some unified whole but Perfection for its own sake. Uniform and featureless and forever. It suffers a single imperfection along the vast walls, the only thing that might be worthy to mar the surface of such a pure artistic vision, which is Gold. Gold is necessary to create massive, serpentine grooves that run up the infinite vastness of this place. Gold is necessary to prove that Perfection is capable of more than featureless nothing; that there is art and creativity and beauty here for anyone to love.

There are pictures painted in the gold. A crew of idiots scrambling around the Eater of the Dead, the storm inside the monster and the murder of a King. An endless sea of machines dancing around a crown, and desperate heroes just barely slipping through their broken, grasping digits. On and on it stretches until it has painted the entire journey of the Plosious, before it wraps back around again to tell it again as a series of endless failures and captures. Once as betrayal stacked on top of betrayal, once as timidity disguised as love and contentment, and again as nothing but a series of horrific tortures so vivid they have their own screams.

Though there is nothing here but safety. Up, and up, and up, and up stretch the great pillars of white like fingers attempting to grasp the featureless blue sky. Down, and down, and down, and down reach their opposites: the shadows made of pure pitch that sink like fangs and daggers toward the howling abyss. And through the middle of that contradiction, winding in and out of the light and the darkness as simply as though it were a game of make believe, there is laughter.

The pair of them dart around the murals and the intimidating perfection as though they cannot see it. Their small forms are wrapped in perfectly fitting silks fit for young imperial princesses. They hold hands as they dart about, they skip and they leap and they laugh and it is more beautiful and flows more clearly than a brook fed by the final snows of winter. Together they are every color this place lacks. The taller of the two twirls, and her golden hair trails like a scarf made from precious metals that have been taught to flow as water does. Her eyes are golden too, with long catlike irises that are striking against her otherwise perfect and perfectly human body. She is grace and surety and joy every time she stoops to pick up the smaller girl, the one with the short cropped cut of blue-black hair who flushes with embarrassment every time before her emerald eyes flash in renewed determination and she does something even dumber and more flashy as though to make up lost points.

The ground sometimes melts in front of them, white featureless perfection turning briefly to bubbling mud and sludge that lifts itself into new shapes for their enjoyment. First a small forest and then a mountain and then a little fortress with adorable little guns point at them for the pair of them to raid. In the span of ten minutes the girls complete an adventure that sees them save a Forest Lion from its Deadly Paw Thorn, win a race (both of them, despite running separately), punch a dragon, kiss a beautiful princess, and then ride a dinosaur without pausing to think about what came next.

Breathless, giggling, and dirty with white dust on their colorful mosaic clothing, the pair of them finally slow down enough to notice a massive, golden door opening to their right. From the entrance and the warm light that pours out there is music so beautiful that it could only be about love. The chorus is made entirely of bells; their melodies richer than the most indulgent chocolate cream and bursting with unique chimes that are a match for any number of voices. The girls turn their heads to look at each other, and with smiles on their faces they skip inside the light before the doors slam shut behind them.

And this is how you learn that all of this towering White is for a theater.

"They're off to play with their Grandmother," says Bella, "I think she's going to share a bunch of Dany's old favorites. Fun little way to teach the kids what it was like for their parents growing up and embarrass the living shit out of us at the time time."

The voice is hers, unaltered and strong, but the mouth it is coming out of belongs to a child even younger than the two who just disappeared through the door. She is a tiny thing, smaller than she ought to be through obvious malnutrition and dressed only in bandages. Her head is covered in rough patches of her signature hair, which has otherwise been burned or melted off. Her face is covered completely in wrappings which are all the colors of misery and suffering, and the stench of her tiny body still speaks to the acid treatments she'd been subjected to in order to remove unwanted fur from her form. She flicks her tiny tail, and shrugs.

"I thought, for a while, it wouldn't be so bad to let my dream go. If it was for her sake."

This Bella is older, maybe a match for the larger of her two daughters. Her frilly gothic dress and large heeled, ribboned shoes should make her a delight to prospective buyers at the auctions. Her hair is silky smooth and braided into twintails that seem designed to make her look sweet and non-threatening, something that was evidently a problem for her in the past. If the bandages around her fingertips are any indication. She glances briefly at her younger self, still sitting in her tiny chair, before walking further into the light with her carefully practiced gait.

"I mean, I never wanted to stifle her. But endless adventure is a lot to ask for, don't you think?"

A teenage Bella is standing behind you in her finest Imperial Pet collar and the beautiful black-and-whites of a palace maid. Already in her adolescence she has flowered into the kind of womanhood that will bring a certain princess to ruin. Her every motion is velvet perfection, and the talons on her fingertips accent the perfect amount of jewelry for her station. You would have to be cynical indeed to believe they were coverings for mutilated, missing claws and not a personal touch she added to her look to please her Mistress. She offers the daintiest curtsy, and smiles sardonically.

"Every journey is supposed to end in the same place."

Another angle for the voice, another Bella to speak it. This one looks like the Praetor who hunted Princess Redana and her friends, but after some horrible disaster. All of her strength and her beauty is fallen to ruin. Her hair is matted and painfully clumped around a small braid that looks like it's tugging on her scalp every time she so much as breathes. What had once been a fetching military jacket and creamy white pants have rotted down to tatters, and the red half skirt around her waist is so full of holes and frayed spots that it might disintegrate if she tries to do more than limp forward. Which her legs look barely capable of to begin with. She stares with resentment at the empty wine bottle in her hand and lets it fall to the ground with a clatter. Another simply appears in its place.

"That is, if you want to have a real family..."

An older Bella still in her pet collar flaunts her body without meaning to. Every inch of her body is soaked from some kind of downpour. Her hair is bedraggled, but in a way that shows great care has recently gone into it, though her ears are crushed miserably against her skull. She clutches at the chain leash around her neck as if it were a weapon, while white and black and gold in very translucent overlapped lace patterns cling to her fur, the pale skin of her stomach, her chest, and her shoulders. Her golden eyes tremble with equal parts fear and anger, as hideous red drips from her beautiful talons.

"You have to come home."

Mosaic grins and ties a jacket around her waist. Her body drips with sweat from long labor, but she seems unbothered by everything. Her golden and purple eyes are turned only toward the skies.

"We have room enough for you here too," says another, more horrible Bella, "We have room for as many people as we need. Just so long as they understand."

Here at last is a Bella at the gate, plainly guarding the spot where those little girls disappeared. She is resplendent in the red and gold of the Empire. A sweeping skirt and a tight button shirt with one sleeve longer than the other. This is an affectation and not a flaw: her arm is bare to show her furless skin. The crown on her head sits without needing to make any accommodations for ugly pointed triangles spoiling the view. As if to revel in the shape of her head she has slicked back her hair to show her unblemished forehead. Her hair is streaked with molten gold. Bella, biomantically ascended into a true Administrator Species. A Human not just by some pretension of philosophy, but in real and actual fact. Bella: daughter of Nero.

She smiles, and her teeth are perfectly centered. And perfectly flat. Her eyes are still the colors of gold and red, but no cat qualities mar (//lift) them up. She opens her palm, and a wreath of flame roars to life until it takes the shape of a sword. Pointed and jagged and sickening to look at too long, this blade feels like a glitch in the universe. It's no comfort to know it is derived from the flames that once trapped the Empress Nero's corpse, now wielded in her service by her one true daughter. For the moment she does nothing more than lean on it, but just by having it here the air feels less pure and more like being in the presence of the Master of Assassins.

"My wife."
"My mother!"
"My sisters."
"My friends!"
"My crew."
"Every stupid moron who followed me this far."

The many Bellas speak up in rapid succession, the same voice bouncing from myriad angles in the expanse in front of the theater. She is every moment in time that she ever cried out for help. Every moment she was desperate enough to wish for a mother's embrace, or a parent's perspective, the stability to at least know what to do or the strength that comes from knowing there's somewhere to return to when everything is over.

There are far, far more of her than have shown themselves yet. She has lived a lifetime of fear and regret. Here, at last, every chapter of her life has a happy ending. Here, every prayer was answered by the same god. Here, every wish led her back to the place where she could have the peace and acceptance she trembled for so many long years' worth of fear, toil, and unending loneliness. Here she is limitless, and so knows limitless delights.

"I'll accept them all into my paradise."

They all speak out at once. They all smile, in their different ways. Bemused and superior sarcasm stands with equal power next to childish fawning and the servile solitude of the perfect maid. Heroes grin with sharp teeth and tyrants flash a winning smile without a fang in sight.

"You can rest now," they all say it like a song, "Right here."

"Under my perfect, starless sky."

Return to Thellamie

Do you know?

I don't really think it matters.

Dresses and makeup and who turns the most heads at a ball.

It is a waste of time. And time is wasting.

Everyone is waiting.

The Order of the Aurora has shut the door.

The golden eye shadow or the jade eye liner.

The violet and the fuchsia and the lavender and the lilac and the mauve and the Imperials at the corners of her eyes.

Unfurling like the petals of a flower into wings.

The lipstick pinker than poison.

In the exact shape of a kiss.

Is more than double what she will accept.

And less than half of what she deserves.

And anyway like I said.

I don't really think it matters.