Tatterdemalion

Breathless Dead

“Justice is what the gods demand![1] We might not understand them, but Laxarus[2] teaches us that the gods abhor injustice! At the end of every story, Olympus brings the scale of Themis[3] to rights, and the wicked will fall,” Redana does not say. She thinks it really, really hard! Bella would be so proud of how that semester of Moral Philosophy rubbed off on her!

What she actually says is “Blrmphl hkklkh grrhhhk.” There is mud in her mouth. There is mud on the Auspex. There is mud up her nose. Her fingers scrabble angrily at the boot but find no laces, no purchase. Her limbs flail like serpents, even the one scored by forbidden science.

How dare he? Here, now? How dare he when she just needs a chance to catch her breath? The Nemean will not come; the strain would kill them both. Bella? Aren’t you coming back?

Her fingers fumble through the incantation to summon Alexa, and... nothing. The seal beneath her skin remains inert. So she does need to do the chant. What a way to find out. She can hold her breath a very, very long time, but it’s still making her unpleasantly light-headed. She’ll be as weak as a kitten when Jas’o claps her in chains and drags her up to be carried back to Odoacer as a trophy...

***

[1]: ”But remind me, Thesaa. If justice exists outside the person of the gods, should we not worship it? For surely only that which is most powerful is deserving of worship, and a justice such as yours must be more powerful than the gods, if they abide by it. And if it does not exist outside them, then is justice merely the will of the gods in their judgment? If that is so, why does any one who lives bother to address the gods in the name of justice? Do they think that the gods will change their minds if we act like persistent beggars who keep pace with them as they go about their business?”
— The Testament of the First Teacher, retrieved from the Palatial Library of Atlas

[2]: Laxarus, The Comedy and The Tragedy (abridged edition, printed in Ka’anshou)

[3]: ”To Themis, the fumigation of frankincense and attar. Illustrious Themis Ouranopaide, be invoked. First flower of Gaia, virgin of many ramparts! From your hand we learned the first rites of prayer; from your lips came the first prophecy of what might be, should all align. You make the offering proper and the sacrifice just. Be present in this place, Themis Ouranopaide, and regard us with your shining thoughts.”
— The Ant-Rite of Hermes, translated from High Binharic, II.1-13.

Breathless Dead

”Don’t look at me like that, Bella. Shhhh. The King of Stones and I have a plan, and we’re going to save Tellus. Ow! Quit it! Bella, this is for you! I’m going to save you and everybody else, whether or not you want to come with me, now stop! squirming! and get! in! the! closet!”

***

“Bella!” The name tears her throat open as if made from splintered glass. “Stay, please!”

But she’s gone. Redana pushes herself up onto her palms and looks up at Jas’o. Being abandoned by Bella a second time hurts just as much as the first.

(Except it’s not, right? She’ll be back. She has a clever plan. She’s sneaking on board Jas’o’s shuttle, or preparing to grab him from behind and pull his weapon from his hand, to smack his neck and make him choke and gasp for air while she brushes down her ridiculous new dress and says something like, “You’re lucky no harm came to Her Highness,” with a sniff and a flick of her tail. She can’t have left. She’ll always come back. Even if she’s angry. She wouldn’t leave. She wouldn’t.)

“I’ll give you one more chance to surrender,” she says, blinking rain out of her eyes. Why did Mom have to ban secondary eyelids? “My cause is just. You don’t have a chance.”

Masks: BABYLON MUST FALL

Anathet!

“See that you do,” Auntie Rose hisses after a long and deliberately ominous pause. “I expect nothing but the best work from you after the trouble you have caused this household, girl.” By which she means the trouble you’ve caused her. She is the household. She has worked since she was a sapling to be here. Her pride and anger are entwined, and both are thorned.

Then you are dismissed with a wave of a bony, many-ringed hand, and are free to write. What is your magnum opus, your masterpiece, your tale of Annunaki superiority and human folly?

***

Canada!

By the time you’re finished, having been off on your adventures all night long (and you’ll be sleepwalking exhausted through inventory check today), the main hall looks a tiny bit neater and less ruined. Or maybe you’ve just learned to look at it a different way.

The Cat allows herself the indulgence of rubbing up against your leg, once. “There we are, my girl. Sharpened and tempered. Be a knife that cuts through everything on its way to the heart of the sun! Tear open the world and force your way through! It’s your last chance to be happy.”

[She offers you one more label shift before you fall through the mirror: +Danger, -Mundane.]

In the mirror, you look taller. More like yourself. You look like you’re ready to take on the Golden Snake of Calcutta again, and knock out all of its teeth with one punch. All that’s missing is Asterion to whoop for you, Variance to cluck her tongue, and Tirzah to laugh and say: I didn’t see it, do it again! Funny how she must have known a lot more about what was going on than she let on.

***

Étoile!

The rifle’s barrel rests cold against your forehead. (At this distance, it will be very, very dangerous.) And in that moment, you cast yourself to fate. You’ve done all that you can without tearing Marianne free, for all that she might rage inside you. All you can do is trust in your cards and hope your poker face will carry you through as you simper and giggle.

And then Jezcha cracks. The rifle lowers, drifting down until it points between your knees. And she guffaws.

“Tammie, your pet is so stupid!” She pets your head with all the smothering inelegance of someone who never bothered to learn gentleness. You giggle and nuzzle that hand with a dazzling smile, even though it feels like she’s going to mess up your hair and knock you off balance. “I was wrong!”

Wait, what?

“What?” Your Lady sounds absolutely shocked.

“There’s no way she knew what she was doing,” Jezcha says, squishing your cheeks together. “No you didn’t, widdle dirtbrains! You just need to be kept out of trouble so you don’t make the big mean gun accidentally discharge! You want Miss Jezcha to take goooood care of you, don’t you? Don’t you, little zu?”

You screw your courage to the sticking place, do your best to give her a dazzling smile with your eyes, and oink happily like a space pig for Jezcha.

“Pull the ropes off my useless sister,” Jezcha tells her Macaw. “I’ve got a much better toy now.”

Fellowship: The Heart

Team Train!

In the world above, there exists a certain island that is dreaded by experienced sailors. It is ringed with jagged rocks, which have been the death of many a fine vessel, and on this island live the Sirens. A common misconception is that they are seductive, luring sailors to their doom with quivering bosoms and honeyed bower-songs. The truth is that their songs offer explanation. Come here, they sing, and we will tell you why. We will reveal the movements of the wheels that turn the world; we will pull back the veil and show you the figures of the gods, great and terrible. We will tell you the future by revelation of the past; we will make everything make sense. Everything that happened to you happened for a reason. Come listen. Come listen.

The things that roost here, at the point of Descent, are not sirens. They are antisirens.

Look at one. Marvel at its burnished skin and its three fine feathered heads, singing in harmony about the freedom of forgetting. About your secret shames and your painful regrets. About all the things that chased you down here. Forget, they sing: forget. The world is meaningless and cruel, and the only way to survive is to forget. Knowledge brings suffering. Forget. Forget.

Then you look away, and—

What were you looking at?

There are bones caught in nets that rattle on the edges of this massive whirlpool, this cosmic drain. They are not bleached, but moldy and cracked, as if something with long beaks sucked the marrow out, and...

Was there a way down?

Look again.

There’s a... a thing. Made up of stone things. Leading to... you know, it’s long and stringy. That thing. Which could go down. Down. Down. Drown.

What were you looking at? Why do your ears hurt? Why are you crying? Why are you still alive? Living hurts. Remembering hurts. Nothing matters, nothing has a reason, and nothing never shatters.

Antisirens

Song of Forgetting — um, there’s a move, I think, and it lets you Get Away? If you had that, you couldn’t use it. Not while they sing. Who? Who what? Why are you here?

Weakness — there’s a thing, and it hurts them, drives them away, but does that matter? What are they, anyway? You can’t remember. You looked away.

Chuubo's GMD: Love and Shattered Alchemy

[Storytime: 3/9
Adventure GET: 5/21
Up to Date: 1/15
Something To Deal With 2]

So, Dulcey! You’re coming down Apricot Lane (which, ridiculously, is lined with peach trees) when you see a girl up in the air, teetering precariously as she reaches up for a fresh, juicy peach juuuuust out of reach. She’s got to be just so tall. Too bad you can’t see her legs behind the hedge, because, wow! Those would be some legs, right? Real stunners!

Then she happens to notice you and she gasps! Like a real gosh-to-goodness gasp! Not like someone caught stealing peaches but like somebody who’s recognized you! “I think I see Dulcinea,” she squeaks, and up from her legs floats your favorite voice in the whole wide world: “See? I told you this was a good idea!”

She careens out around the hedge at high speeds, shrieking and trying not to lose her balance, and it is revealed that, in fact, Sessily is sitting on my shapely shoulders! “Heya, Dulcy! If you climb up onto Sessily, we can get to the really high peaches!”

“Rinley,” Sessily squeaks, “weren’t we going to give her the present?” And I gasp and hit my fist into my palm, even as Sessily sways unsteadily.

“That’s right! Dulci! I’ve got the best present in the whole world for you, the kind of thing that would fit perfectly with what you’re wearing,” I say, willing the words to be true. Maybe a splash of bright glittery pink is exactly what all that black needs. “But! You’ll only get it after you make us a giant snake!”

“Doesn’t that make it a bribe?”

“No, it’s a present! She’ll freely get it after she freely makes us the snake for the performance!” This is sound logic. Probably the most logicful logic that you’ve ever heard in your life!

This is the part where you drop everything and beg for the chance to help us. When you’re ready. Just go ahead.

Masks: BABYLON MUST FALL

Canada!

You painstakingly match mirror shards to frames. It’s like a danger puzzle. The Cat insists that there’s a way to look at glass and know where it belongs. You haven’t learned it yet, so there’s a lot of slapping your hand involved.

“I had to train. I had to learn.” Her eyes gleam as she watches you reach for another shard; you go unsmacked. “No kitten is born knowing how to hunt.”

Later, the rats have cannons, and strong opinions about becoming food. You hunker down behind a makeshift barricade while the Cat dares them to fire at her, her wickedly sharp teeth gleaming.

“Hunger! No one who is satisfied with the world as it is can ever fight. It will not arrange itself for you, Canada! When you let hunger spur you on, then you may change the world to your liking.”

Today, the secrets are drawn in violet ink on the wings of butterflies. You must act with deliberate care to avoid crushing them when you catch them in your hands. The Cat eats each one after reading the wings.

“They succumbed to the hunger that does not stop. A throne is a cage, mon ami. They gorge themselves and grow hungrier. What a waste.”

A flick of an elegant tail. The crunch of butterfly bones(?) under white teeth.

“The more you gain, the more vigilant you must be to see that it is not taken from you. But you already know that, don’t you? Cherchez la femme!”

***

Anathet!

The click of chitin on a marble desk. Your own chair is uncomfortable, cramped, and hard, all by design. The office is choking with floral scents and incense, and you’re quite thankful how much of it your veil keeps out.

“I recall entrusting you with a duty,” Auntie Rose says, her raspy whisper dripping with menace. Her eyes are hard as coals. “Pray tell, why were you found at a den of ill repute in the places below? Are you not enjoying your privilege of direct service?”

At least you likely managed to save the bar! After you revealed your ownership, getting you home very quickly became a priority. And, hey, you’ve still got a date, as long as Auntie Rose doesn’t ground you! Or worse.

(And maybe even then, if you’re clever and lucky.)

***

Tamytha!

You ache. You are dizzy, and the ropes bite where they suspend you from the pole. You want to wake up and find this was all a dream. But here you are, left as bait for the savage humans so that Jezcha can get her trophies. Your head lolls bonelessly as your blood goes thin and you drift in and out of sense.

“Ohmygosh and goodness!”

You lift your head, mouth dry. “Little star, run,” you rasp, but even you can barely hear it. Your heart tightens in your chest as she (bedraggled, frightened— what did they do to her?) runs forward with your pistol. Oh, oh! No, lamassie, you silly little thing! You close your eyes and flinch, unable to watch Jezcha shoot her again.

There is firing and screaming. And... your little star keeps screaming. And then she’s here, she’s here, how could all those shots have missed? What is Jezcha playing at? But she’s here and trying to undo those painful knots pressing into you with all the strength of gravity.

“Lamassie,” you manage to force out between dry lips, “you’re such, such, such a good girl.” Then you look up, and see Jezcha advancing, rifle raised to her shoulder, aimed at your little pet. You scream a warning for all that it hurts your throat, nudge her with your knee, and she turns just as Jezcha fires.

It barely misses both of you, embedding itself in the pole inches from your feet. And Jezcha already has another shot in the chamber.

“How dare you,” your sister roars at your pet. Another shot, this one firing wide in her fury. “I’ll have you shut up in the Houses of Correction forever!”

If she catches your lamassie, she will hand your beloved pet over to the Inquisitors and you’ll never get to see her again. She’ll be punished and taught her place and given to somebody else. Your stomach twists.

“Please, please,” you beg, but you know better than to ask anything of Jezcha. “Run, lamassie!” But lamassie tugs desperately at the central suspension knot, and you tumble down into her arms, nearly knocking her to the ground. Which...

Which has given Jezcha time to line up another shot.

Breathless Dead

“Mmmn mmfffr!!” Bella has a firm grip. Her fingers grip Redana’s cheek and jaw snugly, stifling further response as she lectures her princess on what’s going on. And of course, Redana realizes with a sinking heart: of course Odoacer is going rogue. She’s not stupid: she’s seen (some of) what the Admiral has tried to do. She knows she’s supposedly a prize. Well, the joke’s on the Admiral: she has no intention of being a damsel in distress today.

She grabs Bella’s wrist and pries her hand free, having figured out that just shaking her head was getting her held tighter. (The hand relents, but rests against her jaw and throat stubbornly, threatening to silence her again. Is Bella still sore over how Dany had to make sure she wouldn’t call for Mynx?)

“Then help me,” Redana pleads. “Together, we can do anything!” Even to her, it sounds desperate and childish, an echo of their games. “We can run away,” she yields, as Bella vaults an overturned cart, “but with Epistia, and Alexa, and Vasilia and Dolce! You’ll love Dolce, he’s so sweet and soft and...“

Aphrodite’s slender fingers undo a button, already twisted on its side and half slipped free by Bella’s exertion, and Redana glances down. Soft. Bella is soft. Not just her fur, which is silky and so good for running fingers through, but. Every step sends a ripple through her. Color rises to Redana’s cheeks as she stares, wide-eyed, thoughts arrested.

Bella’s buds strain against that soaked top, shockingly dark and firm. Why is the sound of her heart reverberating in her skull? She’s bathed with Bella before, she’s always treated her pet with respect and never treated her like a, like a concubine, or a trophy, she’s her best friend so stop staring and why does her mouth suddenly feel so empty? Why is that a sensation her flushed, hot body chooses to focus on?

“Hold on,” Bella says, and before Redana can react they’re already jumping from a high place down onto a lower street, and Bella’s hand is on the back of her head pulling her close and tight and the world is, for a moment...

Soft.

Breathless Dead

The command seal is livid black and red breaking the cream of her skin, spread over the back of her hand. It is fully subdermal now, a twisted and delicate thing of Protohermaic script in gleaming metal. Redana has no idea how long she has until her theft of it is discovered. Maybe the wardens are already on their way.

“See this?” She pulls her glove down and Bella recoils, her tail stiff and her eyes wide. “It’s a command seal. I can use it to tell the statue at the door to help us steal a ship! She’ll take us to the hangars, and then we’ll go see the stars. The stars, Bella! Imagine how many wonders we could see out there, how many new friends we could meet—“

Redana ignores the warning until it’s too late: the way that Bella’s ears lay flat on her skull, the sick and frightened smile that isn’t matched in her eyes, the tensing of her fingers. She’s just too excited. The crack of Bella’s palm on her cheek tears the words away, leaves her ear ringing.

For a moment the two stare at each other. Redana holds her blemished hand to her cheek, her mind a whirl. The Auspex highlights in shimmering orange the pressure points of Bella’s body for a painful, non-lethal takedown; she misses the way that Bella’s eyes flick wildly between the red mark on her cheek and the hand that planted it there.

“Take that, that thing out,” Bella finally hisses. “We are going to put it back and pretend nothing happened.” She isn’t clear what she means by that, exactly. The Auspex pops up a little picture of a frantically beating heart. So many distractions! Her cheek is still throbbing; Bella put her hips into the swing.

“Bella, please, we don’t have time for this!” In her mind the wardens are already at the door, waved in by the statue of Athena, here to help with removing the seal and assisting her to her room, where she is to stay until her mother arrives. Why can’t Bella see that? An adorably stylized princess presses her thumb against the flashing orange spot until the servitor slumps over with zzzs over her head. Another slams an open palm against the base of her perfectly fluffy ears and then presses two fingers against her jaw until the struggling stops. Redana closes her eyes as tight as she can but the horrible images keep coming.

When she opens her eyes, Bella is framed perfectly in the doorway, her tail lashing, her chest heaving. “The Empress said to keep you safe,” her Bella says, crumpling and kneading her apron. “Even from yourself...”

***

“You scaredy-cat!”

Redana hauls herself up using a bell strap as a handhold. She looks terrible. Her hair tie has given up the ghost, her breath is shallow, and her pallor makes her look like she’s put on her paint for the Festival of the Honorable Dead. But she’s not stopping. Her grip is firm and her mismatched eyes are steady.

“I made a promise, Bella! We have to go back!” Her boot hits a corner as Bella ducks into a side street and she bites down on the scream, burying her face into Bella’s neck for a moment. She still smells like home. She always smells like home. “Bella, please,” she sobs in frustration: at her body, at her servitor, at Jas’o. “We don’t have time for this...”

Masks: BABYLON MUST FALL

Anathet!

“This really is your first time, huh, dumpling?” The bouncer is sweating and you can feel how firm her arms are as she presses you down against the dirty arabesque tiles. “You’re not getting caught up by them. I’m just stopping them from hitting you until you curl up.”

(She’s wrong, but only because you’re a monk. You know that you’re going to be collared as a potential Enemy of the Chain. If only you had a disguise! But that’s a goal for later.)

“But sure, what the hell. At least you’ve got guts.” She winks, and then— oh no! You see a janissary loom over her with a baton.

“We’ve got a monk!” He yells back at his commander. And here it comes, oh boy. What are some of the protocols for handling a potentially rogue Zhianku, given their psychic prowess?

***

Canada!

“Don’t sulk,” the Cat crisply snaps back at you. “You came to me looking for guidance, and I offer it at very reasonable rates.”

Much like Variance, she’s a mercenary with ideals. She has dream logic work for you to do: rats to catch, mirror shards to sweep up, and bizarre secrets for you to deliver to her. It’s profitable for both of you, given your vastly different frames of what’s valuable.

“What you want is redemption. To achieve it, you must undergo transformation. You will never atone for your failures as you are, girl.” What makes the words sharper is the fact that she means them. She really does. From her point of view, she has to turn you into something different than you are.

You’ve already won serious concessions on that front after the Butterfly Incident. So now she’s focusing on changing you on the inside.

“You must be willing to kill one of them again,” she adds, her feline face betraying nothing. “But the process will be difficult. Now, let’s see about your payment for the next lesson. I do believe twenty rats will suffice...”

***

Étoile!

The restaurant is a mess. There definitely was a struggle here, and the rifle is gone. Most of what’s scattered about is your picnic supplies, a change of clothes, her sketchbooks and tablets (two broken). Of course not the wines, those were stolen by those brutes.

But, ah! Look here! Forgotten in the tumult: a sidearm with five shots left. (It’s an ornate, clunky revolver, very clearly not a laser weapon.) Your Lady must have had the courage to pull the trigger once! There are four of them, not counting their own valets, so that’s a margin of error of one shot.

It would be so easy to pick them off from the shadows with a rifle. It would take a skilled pistolier to take four Annunaki down at close range, and it would take a very, very skilled actress to make it seem like improbable luck. But what else can you do?

Your Lady needs you.

Breathless Dead

Everything is a jumbled confusion. She saw Bella-- blood-- kissing-- but, again, again, Bella, Bella, Bella. Which was impossible. Because Bella was safe at home. At least, Redana hoped she was safe. She prayed that Bella would be safe. She made a sacrifice to her father[1] on the first planet she landed on with Alexa: a wild stag, brought down with her bare hands. Please, she'd prayed, head bowed over the roasted meat. Please keep Bella safe. Convince my mother that Bella is blameless. Turn aside her anger.

It's Bella, the Auspex says, grumpily. There's a little catgirl holding a sign with her name on it, even, in her peripherals. 100% certified Bella. Except the Auspex thought the Ceronians were alive, so clearly, in Elysium, all bets were off and... no, no, it has to be Bella. Unless it's Mynx? That would make more sense, the shapeshifter would be a better huntress. Bella was lots of things, but she was no good at hunting at all.

But when she opens her green eye and lets herself look, even that thought withers away. How could it not be her Bella? Mynx was always too flirty, too wide-eyed, when it came to Bella. Only Bella would ever dare call her an idiot, and even then, only when she was sure they were alone, and only when chastising her about a new sprain or bruise or near-death in a training accident.

"Bella, why are you here?" There's something that's safe to be confused about. Not all those confusing half-dream memories of what the Nemean did in her place, perhaps thoughts or desires more than actual, well, act, because of course she wouldn't kiss Bella. Not her best friend. She wouldn't be so cruel to her Bella, not ever. "You said you wouldn't let me go, so why did you come?"

Then Redana looks up and down that new dress. The cleavage! The skirt that ends above the knees! Where's her apron with the pawprints on it and the long gloves? Her Bella doesn't like clothes like this! She's demure, modest, even a little bit of a prude, and... oh. Of course. Redana lifts her head and sees Jas'o there, ready to shoot her new friend and her oldest companion and even her, if she makes the wrong move. And absolute fury surges through her again.

"How dare you, Jas'o?" Her voice has a little bit of the Nemean's thunderclap left in it, a lingering echo. "Help me up, Bella," she adds, not even turning her head to look; she knows that Bella will happily back her up. Here, at least, even if she was afraid back home. "Jas'o, I can forgive you shooting me," she yells, keeping her weight on Bella, "but how dare you drag Bella out here? She wouldn't leave with me; I can't, I don't want to imagine what you did to her! Poor thing, she's worried sick, look at her! And another thing, how dare you dress her up like this? Drooling over her the whole way from Tellus, I'm sure, making her dress up like a party favor to titillate you and your dirty crew! Now put that Thunderbolt down, and if you dare shoot either of my friends I will make you very, very sorry you did it!"

She glares daggers at him, and then whispers out of the side of her mouth: "Bella, I can't stop him if you don't help me up..."

***

[1]: it should have been to Hera, except that Hera never accepted any of her offerings, no matter how hard she tried, no matter if they were hand-baked cakes or expensive golden earrings. So a sacrifice to Hera's bride would have to suffice.