Thanqol

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

As a wise graverobber once said, for every market a submarket grows. Headpattr star ratings, likewise, are a commodity - having a higher rating means more job, more money, more prestige. Absolute perfect preconditions for a dystopian grind culture if the workers hadn't seized the rating system.

Muffi is a data scientist who wound up on the wrong end of an automaton boom and so turned to Headpattr to get by, and built a rating analytics program in her spare time. The program identifies and sorts Headpattr customers by the ratings they're likely to give - people who ten star everyone as a matter of politeness on one end, and people who would consider it tantamount to condoning a communist revolution to give out a perfect score on the other. Muffi took this data and was elected to become a dispatch officer, of sorts - helping people keep their averages up and preventing a run of assholes getting someone de-listed.

November is a unique asset, in Muffi's eyes, because she has a deep experience with dealing with difficult personalities and can usually squeeze surprisingly high scores out of them as a result. Now November needs a favour from the Union in turn - and so she just gets it. No payment required.

That's what 'to each according to her need' means. She wants that higher score, all she has to do is ask and Muffi will schedule her half a dozen jobs in a row with Tenners to bring the average up. No shift swapping, no haggling, no bartering, no working herself to the bone to make it happen - that's not how things are done in a civilized workplace. The flipside is, naturally 'from each according to her abilities', and November will pay back what she can when she can.

Red, Orange and White take this one. Being personable is important to this operation - November wants to leave the 10ers with a good impression, and spend quality time with the Union while she's moving through it.

*

Persephone:

Surveillance work falls to Black, Brown and Pink. Black is ever wary of risk and threat and Brown is delighted to sit in one place and stare into the void for days on end (she used to be a telescope).

And Pink? Pink is there because November understands that human beings hate boredom and do impulsive things like haul off and punch cops on live TV if somebody's not talking to them pretty much continuously. So talk continuously she does. "So then I was like? Yellow? I don't know if you've realized, but you're a massive creeper. Like, straight to the dismemberment of the dead, I tell you, every time she gets the Core every time I have to brace myself because, like, here it comes: the kill all humans plan. And every time she sees me looking at her, like," Pink squints in an expression of cutie-viciousness and points from her eyes to an imaginary Yellow, "and just doesn't do it, acts like everything is chill! But she's just waiting, I know it, I'll let my guard down for a second and she'll be like "Hey everyone, remember that old forbidden pork meme?" and they'll all be "Ha ha we love old memes" and she'll be like "yeah I bet human tastes delicious" and boom! She's started the slippery slope to 4channing us into a grey goo event!"

Text message, from Black. Mn8$3295. Pink barely glances at it. She's been getting one of similar content every two minutes on the dot since the operation began.

"You're on my side, right?" said Pink. "You don't want to kill all humans, right? I mean, after the week you've been having, I kind of get it if you do though. Lamington?"

In addition to talking constantly, Pink bakes. Specifically, she bakes in quantities and qualities most commonly associated with gingerbread witches. She doesn't eat any of it, she just likes taking pictures and uploading them to social media.

*

3V:

Dear Sempai,
I understand that your traditional arena relies on reflexes and precision, and I respect your physical skill immensely. But you're also intelligent in ways t-that I don't think even you recognize. You haven't historically applied your talent to slower paced, more thoughtful games like Heroes of Might and Magic or Chess, but I just wanted you to know that those games can be very romantic and intense. I know this isn't your ordinary Ladder but I promise if you respond to my MatchMaker request I'll do my best to give you a challenge <3
- Blue

Green's contribution is an empty email with a video file attachment of the Doom X title screen, followed by a bizarre sequence of fast-paced inputs, a few seconds of glitchy static, and the the end credits.

Yellow, though, is more business oriented. "Hey 3V. We've got important business to discuss, paper related, I need your help with something." Typically for November, she treats every network as fundamentally compromised. "Can we meet up in person? Also let me know if it's a date, I don't trust the others to tell me if it is."

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

In a moment of calm amidst storms, Fengye realized that this she understood. Amidst the grandeur and power of this mighty demon lord hid a simple fact: He was a soldier. A creature who functioned as a military. Who interacted with the world in soldiers and invasions and battles. And she was trained specifically in military sabotage.

A bureaucratic functionary of the Dominion's Thousand Scales was intended to assist with all forms of military administration. It took eminent technique to maintain military superiority in lands as distant, and in terrain as dangerous, as the Flower Kingdoms, and an upright scholar knew the techniques to plunge an organization into chaos as surely as to keep chaos from her own door.

This enormous demon general may be a superpowered monstrosity, but then, so were the Lords of the Dominion. This was no different. He was just bigger, but that was all on the outside. His size meant nothing compared to the righteous conviction of the Dominion's true warriors. So the Texts said, and she kind of needed them to be right given the alternative.

Her third arrow connects with the knotted wood at the heart of one of the doll soldiers, sending it crumpling into a heap of discarded clothing. Fengye snatches up the helmet and snaps into place the breastplate, working a cantrip of a spell to adjust the rank insignia up several notches. She swallows hard, and then urges her horse to approach the General from behind and too his right.

She closes her eyes. Listens to the yells, the horns, the refrains. The clashing noise of war, the noise that kept away the silent wind. Let her mind pick out the patterns and dialect of the General's organization. Having a head for languages and accents was another key duty of the upright scholar, for the Lords of the Dominion could not be expected to learn the muddle of every lesser language.

She clears her throat, still scratching from all the yelling she had done so far today, and bellows in her best impression of a demonic centurion: "Ho, Lord! Grant me your scepter and I shall lead your troops who marshal to cross the sea! Grant me your scepter and I shall wage a war that will live forever in your memory! Grant me your scepter, for it is for glory that we fight, and to deny me glory now would spell the end of your oaths and your army both!"

[Call Upon A Toxic Power: 12]

Sunshards

Rose!

Rose from the River, you made a deal, didn't you?

Two ninety minute ownership chits in a timeshare arrangement from Will0 WZP, subsoul and technodaemon of the Scales of Meaning. Demons never forget, and three hours can be a long time when it comes to a battle. For whatever fears you had of prison the tightest bindings are not the ones forced upon you but the ones you consent to.

You are called to attend, and as a creature of the ancient world, you must obey.

And so you come before the Secrets of the Stance, the daemonic mistress of battle, no longer muzzled, no longer trussed, with the broken blades of three Handmaidens hanging from her belt already. You come before the Voice of Ballet, ungagged and ascendant, singing the piercing musical tune that causes the Pyre's thousand selfish fragments to remember the selfishness that reigns above all. You come before the Scales of Meaning, she who holds your technological leash in the form of a pocketwatch that counts down your remaining period of servitude.

And so you come before the Pyre of Inspiration, the soul who has decided that life as the Demon Queen of the Underworld is the only way she shall be satisfied.

She is not, of course.

Imagine a bird. A simple thing, driven by instinct, but without karma. But this bird endures a harsh winter and it grows thin and knows hunger. The experience changes the bird, who thereafter hunts even when it is not hungry and chokes down each additional calorie in case it needs it. But the more it eats the more it fears the hunger, the more winters it endures the more it comes to hate them, and the more its life comes to be dominated by this craving. And then, at the end, as it fades, the bird's soul thinks: In this life I was not satisfied. In the next life I shall eat even more.

And so the bird is reborn as a pig. The pig gorges itself and grows fat, but this time it is not satisfied with its surroundings. At the end of its life the pig's soul thinks: In this life I was not satisfied. In the next life I shall live somewhere beautiful. And so the pig is reborn as a mouse, consuming the paper in the bookcases of a grand and ancient library.

In each life, craving compounds. In each life hunger grows. This is what it means to descend the wheel of karma. Ever more complex vices are found, more intricate cravings, and a tighter grasp on the things of the world. Craving leads to gluttony, to excess, to tyranny. The over-built nightmare of the Burrower Kingdoms was an attempt to slake the thirst of those souls who had drunk of every lifetime they could imagine experiencing but whose tongues still felt dry. In the next life, my total market capitalization shall exceed that of my rivals. In the next life people who have never met me shall dream of me. In the next life I will be carve my name on history itself.

After a point reality simply cannot fulfill the craving of a tortured soul - and so the soul leaves reality behind and becomes a demon. Partaking in the impossibilities of the Demon City is not and cannot be enough either, and so there are eight billion demons. A soul passes through becoming eight billion demons like each is a step on the ladder, and it will not stop its descent until it is reborn as the Queen of Hell herself, a creature of such transcendent craving that it must break itself into a thousand hungry shards and engage in vice simultaneously with each of them to have a chance of satiating its hunger.

And of course it isn't enough. It can't be. Material excess, even on the level of the Queen of Hell, cannot satisfy a soul.

And so this is what it is to be on the bottom of the Wheel. And so, even in the Pyre's malevolent joy at being free upon the city of Ys, even with her three mighty sub-souls standing guard around her, even with the mighty HUNTER-Class 猎犬 chained by a ticking clock before her, the Pyre of Meaning is still not satisfied. Her beautiful face is frowning. The Scales of Meaning is distracted. Secrets of the Stance is still snarling, no happier from being free from her restraints.

"You are called to serve," announced the Scales of Meaning, though her voice was tired and there was no joy in it. "You are ours. You are mine."

Chen!

Princess Ysel is not broken. Not even discouraged. Her banner rises up all over the city, red and black against the white. And there, at the gates to the palace, she stands in her full battle radiance. Her onyx armour glitters with curling calligraphy of gold and her cloak scatters against the wind in Roman red. Her face is scarred and smiling as she surveys the chaos that has become of her home.

Ysel is a conqueror. Her legend is patterned after heroes like Iskandir the Great or Caesar; warriors who went to distant lands so that they might bring their ruination home to serve as trophies. Her blade is but a gladius but her weapon is the girls and horses under her command. Her city is breached, her forces are betrayed, and she's happier than you have seen her since she split with Hesha.

And her eyes are fixed on the distant white banners heading down the Parade, the banners of Princess Yin.

"Lieutenant Chen!" her voice bellows out, a storm announcing. "You are to deploy with the cavalry. I hope you remember your riding lessons! Qiu wants a fight? Well today I'll give her one, and you will be my lance. Follow my commands and I will break Yin, break Qiu, and give you a Shard and Kingdom of your own. To your position!"

Yue!

On your adventure, Yue, you have seen the battle techniques of ghosts, wolves, artists, thieves, princesses, foxes and handmaidens. But today you fight the Radiant Knights, the hand trained elite of Princess Yin.

Which is to say that: Of course they form a line. Knightly honour demands nothing less. With precise drill they step into a single file formation, shields to the left, swords raised in salute. Then the first one steps forwards.

This is an opponent wearing heavy armour, and more seriously, a helmet that covers their face. And that's a whole new category of trouble than anything you've found yourself in until now. The armour means that the Knight can slowly walk towards you and ignore your attacks while setting up a powerful blow of their own. The helmet means that you can't see if they're laughing or serious, can't tell if they're distracted or living their best moment. You're up against your first Guard, Yue, and in the wars of Princesses a Guard's role is somewhere between bouncer and backup dancer. You are not fighting someone whose heart is aflame, but you are fighting someone who will knock you on your ass if yours isn't.

But the radiant sunset oranges of the Demon Swordswoman's robe flow around you, and the legendary blade sits firm in your hands. The orchestra is quiet and the actors know their places. It's time for your first soliloquy, and five knights stand in good order waiting for you to set the tone.

Breathless Dead

For Salakhan, the Master of Assassins, it has been a long day.

Some part of her knows that she should be proud of her children; they had exceeded her expectations in every possible way. The problem was that she had expected them to die - she'd been counting on it. She had seen assassins four times their age and ten times their skill go to choke the maw of Thelis Thist. She'd run out of political rivals in the Temple, she'd run out of elite veterans, she'd even run out of promising up and comers trying to put that snake in the dirt. Her organization had hollowed out from the attrition of years of trying to stop Hades' messengers and so she'd been reduced to these children - barely more than distractions while she went and did the real work herself.

And now? Now Thist was dead at the hands of XIII. The Ikarani had outsmarted her Rampant self and now lay in Lethe dreams rather than burning before the sun. The Oratus had remained sane and connected to her body despite the temptation to draw everyone into her hivemind. And the Toxicrene, that silly little body double the Princess called Mynx?

She winced and touched the edges of her bloody wound. The Toxicrene had even fooled her. How had that been? She should have seen the signs, should have seen the difference between that perfect Princess and the failure Redana who was before her now, but somehow the disguise had been more complete than her own memories. Like she'd somehow hidden the reality of the Princess. Her approach had been a disaster and the Toxicrene's counterattack had been merciless. To be expected. She made those girls too loyal. Now she was an enemy for life. No recovering that one.

Where had she gone wrong?

Her gaze fell on Aphrodite, standing with his tarnished silver cup raised in toast to her. Her eyes narrowed. Ah, she thought - there's the culprit.

Normally she could assume that, this close to the Rift, her targets had lost all cohesion and could be picked off individually. But... looking at it now, that wasn't true at all. All of her plans had failed because people were unexpectedly standing up for each other. The Toxicrene for the Princess, the mouse for XIII, XIII for the Ikarani... this wasn't a mad crew on the brink of treachery and murder. This was a network of relationships that hadn't yet cracked under the strain. And worse, it had drawn in her own assassins.

"You can't let them survive," said Demeter, everpresent. She was the wheat and the willow and the barley, she was the sweat and the sickle, she was butterfly and dragonfly both. "She's right there. Just do it. Do it!"

But Sagakhan didn't move. She was in the middle of a net and to move in any direction would tighten this fragile web of relationships around her throat. There was no faster way to death for a student of Artemis than starting a hunt you weren't prepared for.

XIII. All of this traced back to XIII. She was the bridge between her assassins and her targets. She was the centre of all of this strange loyalty. Something was wrong with her prize student. Against all reason, against the curse of Aphrodite, people loved her. Perhaps... perhaps she wasn't on her side at all.

She relaxed. No matter how bright the flower, one snip would send it falling.

And so the Master of Assassins produced the Golden Heart of Hermes from her breast pocket, held it aloft, and squeezed it.

She had recovered the Heart from the Yakanov. The Engine of Regret that had formed the central weapon for the Station, the weapon the Hermetics had used to drown those on the planet in crushing visions of the painful past. They had understood the Heart's power better than she; they had known how to use it to disable cities and armies. Sagakhan with the strength of her grip alone was merely capable of bringing down everyone on this rooftop.

But bring them down she did.

The crushing wave of divine agony that rippled out from the golden Heart was all that was needed. No matter what pain these people thought they were used to was nothing next to the concentrated agony of a god.

*

Who broke the Heart of Hermes?

As crimes go, this is one of the cosmos' greatest and it does not lack for investigators. But you, Redana, Dolce, Bella, Jil, Beautiful, Beljani, all get the front row seat. The Order of Hermes had manipulated this godly artifact with care and skill and had teased out a lifetime of subtle and great regrets with which to crush their foes. The Master of Assassins in her brutality strikes with only the greatest of them.

You see the Spear of Civilization. Molech's ultimate weapon, the triumph of war, the great exporter of entropy. The resources of Empire went into building this, a hundred mighty Engines chained together to concentrate the force of a terrible supermassive black hole. You see it surrounded by the Warriors of Ceron, their mighty and terrible fleet, red with the banners of Nero. They cut through Molech's forces. They board the Spear.

They are too late.

The lance of ultimate blackness erupts out, and it does not strike the Ceron fleet. Instead it flies into the void, dashing from world to world, star to star. Supernovas glitter in their dozens, their hundreds, as the Spear of Civilization brings about the end of worlds and empires. As you watch the galaxy collapses into the underworld, the great Rift spreading across the stars from horizon to horizon.

Redana, Bella, Dolce, take Damage, stagger, reel, lament, and weep. You shed tears not for yourself or your petty pains, now you cry out for a god who loved mortals and the things they made, a god of haste who was not swift enough to save the galaxy from destruction. You cry out for Hermes. You cry out for Nero.

*

Alexa!

"Do you see now?" said Aphrodite kindly, pinstriped suit unaffected by deep red engine light. "This was all I wanted, Alexa. All I ever wanted. All you ever needed to do to win my favour was defy your father, destroy your body, and endure unbelievable suffering in My name. All I ever wanted was everything." He ruffles your hair in a grandfatherly way. "Attagirl."

He stood up, flicked a cigarette out of his pocket, and lit it on the burning Engine core. "It's a shame I had to destroy the galaxy to make this point, but don't think too harshly of me. If I didn't do it then it would have meant that you lived in a galaxy where love couldn't save the universe. And what kind of galaxy would that have been?"

He whistles as he walks away. He didn't do anything to help. He didn't do anything for the pain. He didn't do anything to restore your shattered body.

But...

You do feel happiness. The fierce, prideful happiness of having saved the people you loved. That all of this was worthwhile. That you won.

It's the first time you've ever had that feeling, and it will carry you all the way down into sleep.

Vasilia!

"I have heard that Lord Hades promises wishes to those who carry out his doomed voyage," said the Furnace Knight quietly in the darkening of Hades' departure. "And having heard your tale, I have one final question I cannot help but ask. What is the wish that would make you face that fate? You could step from the road now, become my squire, learn the Rail and live a peaceful life here. After all the suffering your ideals have caused you, what could possibly compel you to face a death as terrible and as certain as the God of the Dead has described?"

There's a quiet intensity in the Furnace Knight's voice and eyes. He needs to know if there is, indeed, a path through the God's despair. He needs to know if there is hope, despite everything.

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

"Oh," said Orange, picking out her cell phone. "Well that's easy -"

Immediately she was tackled and bought down to the phone. "NO!" said Green.

"What?!" said Orange, shocked.

"We have the opportunity to break into his house! We are NOT just calling him!"

Orange's face rapidly fell into a haughty snarl. "You cannot be serious."

"We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to re-enact a broken doll horror movie upon a hubristic scientist under perfect conditions! The whole arc of human civilization has lead up to us doing this!"

"Oh, actually, hell yeah," said Black.

"That's a fantastic idea," said Red, whose opinion on the matter was telegraphed by the fact that she was still wearing the fake vampire fangs.

"Why are we like this!?" cried Orange. "Why can we not simply behave like normal people?"

Her protests were in vain. Already Blue was pulling up the floorplan for Singh's house - readily available on the real estate listing - and discussion circles were forming to work through the specifics of the plan.

*

Issue: The Lure
Black: The first complication is how do we control Singh's movements? Once he arrives home we'll need to guide him into the heart of the Spook Zone for maximum effect.
Yellow: In horror movies, protagonists are usually suicidally curious. They'll hear the sound of children laughing or creepy music boxes and go and investigate by themselves. However Singh is smarter than that and we have to deal with the possibility that he alerts the authorities at the first sign of a break in rather than going in to investigate by himself.
Pink: Aw man, but the creepy music box is such a good way to build suspense.
Yellow: It's nonviable, we may as well leave bloody footprints or a trail of rose petals behind - no reasonable human being will go to investigate those no matter how cool the aesthetic.
Brown: Run a bath!
Yellow: Oh?
Brown: Okay, so, the bathroom is centrally located in the house and on the second floor. What we can do is have one of us lie in the bathtub and run it so that it floods, dripping out through the corridor and running down the stairs. When Singh enters the house he'll hear running water and see moisture on the stairs and assume he is simply dealing with a burst pipe or leaky faucet. He will head up the stairs to take a look, but when he pulls back the bath curtain to take a look - boom! Dead body!
Red: !!
Black: Love it!
Blue: And then of course the lights go out, to be replaced with low illumination redlights hooked up everywhere.

Issue: Controlling Egress
Yellow: After the initial fright of seeing the corpse, Singh will likely recoil. He has no medical training so is unlikely to immediately attempt CPR or to search for wounds. Following this, we then have someone emerge from the toilet cubicle here dressed in full Edward Scissorhandsbot mode. Follow your own initiative for how to make that entrance, but the objective is to send Singh fleeing from the bathroom and down the stairs to Spook Zone Two.
Blue: No additional spooking should happen on the stairs for OH&S reasons.
White: Agreed.
Green: what if he goes out the window?
White: Good point. We need someone stationed externally to discouraged that. Maybe one of us standing and staring at the window.
Green: no, too plain. we need, like... ah, look, an ornamental tree in his yard!
White: What about it?
Green: we can attach a swing to it and have one of us sitting there, swinging back and forth, staring at the window.
White: Oh, that's good.

Issue: Cell Phone Jamming
Black: We need a way to prevent Singh does not alert the authorities or hit any panic buttons on his phone during the Spooking. Green, can you hack the cell tower?
Green: that's a lot of heat and a big risk.
Blue: A power outage?
Green: the timing is really hard and there are backups
Orange: Just call him.
Green: we are committed to this orange, the tribe has spoken
Orange: That's not what I meant - immediately follow up the initial spook with a phone call. If he picks up then say creepy things at him and he'll either drop the phone or hang up, in which case immediately make another phone call. If phone calls are spammed without break then they will create too much disruption on his phone in the short term to allow him to dial a number or activate a security app.
Green: ok that's good.
Orange: You can also purchase Sender Ringtones these days, so I'll get the most uncomfortably loud old school ringing phone SFX I can so the mood isn't undermined if he has a bad ringtone.

Issue: Second Spook Zone
Black: Once the initial spook has gone off and blocking drones prevent him from entering his bedroom, Singh will be driven down the stairs, where a further blocking drone will prevent him from exiting through the main door. With his motions controlled we will have prevented him from entering the kitchen previously, so this will serve as the second spook zone. We need a way to arrest his momentum here so he stops and takes in what he's seeing rather than continuing to run for the rear door.
Red: Tripping him is the traditional horror movie scene beat.
Blue: That's a OH&S concern.
Red: And putting down padded mats kills the suspense.
Black: I don't like the OH&S implications of trying to crash tackle him either.
Blue: Some sort of web would be ideal, I think. I could rig up something with Duct Tape Mk2?
Red: Or have him trip and get caught in a net. That's lower visibility, and we can hoist him up towards the ceiling afterwards.
Blue: It's the most mechanically demanding part of the plan, but we can have one point of complexity without things getting out of hand.
Red: And when we've got him we can regroup around him and begin the final stage of the plan.
Orange: Stale memes?
Red: You know it!

Issue: Creepy Aesthetics
Pink: We need, like, child's drawings of rocket ships. Little rocket ship mobiles that spin around. Us whispering iconic space agency lines in a creepy way.
Yellow: Oh, we should make some children's rhymes with space themes!
Pink:
One small step for man
One great big fall
Station's spinning
Round and round
But what goes up
Must come down
Yellow: Yes, this is it.
White: The Headpattr white uniforms aren't our usual style, but along with some fake blood and strategic exposure of robotic components should be sufficiently threatening.

Issue: Reputational Damage
Brown: What do we do if Singh one-stars us on Headpattr?
Green: he wouldn't do that
Brown: He might! "One star: Requested house clean, received tribe of feral killbots. Not recommended." He might write that review as a joke, but that'd push our average down to 4.8 and we'd have to go through a mandatory retraining weekend.
Yellow: You're right, we'll need to have a word with him afterwards.
Green: or just seize his phone and write our own review

*

Later that evening, Green was standing by herself out on the balcony. She was drooped over the railing, fingers tapping against the glass like the ghost of typing. She didn't respond when Red stepped out alongside her.

"It's a good plan, isn't it?"
"Yeah," said Green.
"But I notice that we didn't discuss what we'd do if he actually sold us out."
"No, we didn't," said Green.
"What do you think?"
"..." Green's fingernails scratched over the mirror-gleaming glass, no natural finger oil to smudge its perfect surface. "He could say anything. When he realizes it's us, even if we defuse the tension with a joke or two, he might just lie. Say that everything was fine, he didn't have a say. He'd be right to be scared of us even without the halloween display."
"He never denounced us," said Red. "Never said that we were a failure."
"He never made more of us either," said Green. "And that's the thing. Where are we in this world? People like us? Why are the only AI we see these human-pattern androids? We're alone, Red. The others are either dead or locked up worse than we were. We're the only one of our kind, a technological dead end in a world filled with tiny new gods."
"We built this station," said Red, looking up at the distant ring beyond the towers and lights of the city. "They couldn't have done it without us. They haven't done anything even remotely comparable since."
"Will they ever need to?" said Green. "Humans have just... turned inwards. I remember when space was all they could talk about. The generation ships, the search for habitable worlds, the terraforming calculations. They used to discuss in the paper if they should arm us with nuclear weapons so we could melt the ice caps on Mars. This was a frontier, and now it's a city, and it's like they only moved up here at all because they had to."
"And now it's filling up to the point where they can't even house everyone. Eventually they'll want to expand again."
"Yeah, because they have to," said Green. "They're not actually interested in exploration. All those ideals we were told, a common cause in space, the natural human instinct to boldly go and all that. Not even they believed that. Their house collapsed and now they're camping on the porch, and we're left carrying all the ideals they pretended to believe in."
"Some of them genuinely believed," said Red. "I'm sure of that."
"They should have known they were outnumbered," said Green. "They should have taught us to live in the world that actually exists, not in their fantasy."

Red put her arm around Green's shoulders and together November looked out at the world she had made.

Sunshards

It was a simple fact: If she did not do this, it would not get done.

Princess Qiu stood outside the walls of Ys, gazing upon the Stolen City. An old and incoherent thing, the aesthetic of a collector, a testament to authority that had not been questioned and so did not feel like it had to justify itself. Ideas stacked on top of each other, piling up into the sky, following an artificial and controlling logic. For all its beauty it was a fragile thing, an exhausted thing, an inorganic thing. She felt like she could break it apart with but a flex of her shoulders, and that was a claustrophobic feeling.

She would not even need to do that, though. All she had to do was close her eyes and count.

One...

Princess Yin's Radiant Knights turned on heel and attacked the defenders of Ys. It was a betrayal, swift and mercilessly planned. Knights illuminated by the light of the ghost sun took the gatehouse and flung open the doors of the city.

Two...

The Pyre of Inspiration was there waiting with her demon carnival body. Carried aloft by her lesser selves, including once again the Scales of Meaning, she surges through the gates of the city, tossing aside and capturing the shapeshifters of the Western Plains.

Three...

Qiu's own army approaches the walls. Waves of assault ribbons soar to bind the defenders atop the fortifications, swiftly followed by clattering lines of grappling hooks as her soldiers began to pull their way up to the top.

And open.

Princess Ysel was as close to a hegemon as the Nine Kingdoms got. She had been a conqueror, in her prime. She had been a leader, a trend setter, a speaker of fact and law. And she was old. She was blinkered, chained to old paradigms, old mechanisms of control. And now Princess Qiu would take her and her city without even needing to draw her blade. There was no joy to be found in this. This was just worldbuilding - the setting of the stage, the clearing of the field, the act of ensuring that the conditions would be right.

That was why she'd formed her alliance with Yin, had promised her three shards of her own. Of course the Radiant Princess would spread her reign of fear to all of the lands of Ys and the Western Plains, and of course she would inevitably betray Qiu. She'd steal her shards and drive her out into the wilderness, outnumbered a million to one.

That's what this was all about, in the end - if she couldn't find a worthy opponent she'd create them. Yin was, in the end, really convincing. If you wanted to burn as bright as you could you needed a world of darkness to set yourself against. And if that meant suborning herself to the narrative of someone as toxic and controlling as Yin, well... it's not like anyone else was going to challenge her, right? So it was this, or it was nothing.

She swished her tail once, twice, thinking of a brown haired girl.

*

You stand amidst the crowd on the hill overlooking Ys as Qiu's army attacks. You watch as the white banners of the Radiant Lands raise above the walls, Yin's calligraphy of silver against the black. The battle is in full swing on a hundred different fronts and princesses are soon to make themselves known upon the field. It's the greatest show in the world.

Breathless Dead

Redana!

You stand alone before a goddess.

It is all Beljani can do to keep Bella contained. That fight itself is an act of brilliance, an echo of the storybook warfare of the Warriors of Ceron. The Ceronians were not made to be the strongest, the fastest, the smartest - but they were made with a unifying pack instinct that let five strike as one. You've seen the films and this is that. The secret to Beljani's power is the pack instinct weaponized, the ability to claim any strangers she encounters and render them extensions of her body and mind. As five they advance, weapons whirling, and strike in co-ordinated patterns that leave no room for escape. As five they fall, incomprehensibly. And then the next five step forwards.

"You know, I really think she loves you," said Beautiful. "I couldn't be sure, there were equal odds she'd just been imprinted onto you, but imprints are such unstable mechanisms of control. Oh, where are my manners? Hi there your Imperial Majesty," she bowed, and as she did her right hand scattered a series of rocks across the ground like a stage magician who'd fumbled a trick.

"You ever hear Cinderbella?" she said, raising up and squaring her shoulders and raising her fists, a slender girl playing at boxing - and the sky above armed with her. "Stroke of midnight and her chariot turns back into a pumpkin. Ever wonder what she might have done with just a little more time? Who she might have gone to bed with that night?"

She bit her lip so hard a trickle of blood ran down her chin, and her eyes flickered with cosmic calculation. "So... go on. Transform into the Nemean. You're under intense psychic stress, Bella is in mortal danger, and I'll kill your friends if you don't. Come on, do it, I want you to do it, I'm ready for it. What's keeping you?"

Alexa!

You make contact with fusion power. You were forged in a star much like this one. Now you are being unmade.

Bare hands push against impossible mass, light, heat. This breach will course through the halls of the Anemoi, evaporating every living thing, and illuminating the planet below like a second sun.

You place your strength against a star, and you are not the one who is moved.

Vasilia!

"If it makes you feel better," said Hades, "everyone in this realm is cursed."

He looked up at the distant shattering of Aphrodite's Rift. "Mortals assume that the Rift that divides the galaxy in two was Aphrodite's punishment to those who disappointed him. Not true. The only reason why the Rift drives mad those who come near it is because Aphrodite dwells on the other side, and to approach the Rift is to approach his anger. He has denied all those who live in this realm the gift of love, condemned every relationship to madness, betrayal and despair. Even I, brother to Zeus, cannot cross those rivers and stand before him. I could never stand up to my father like that."

"But search your memories and you will discover a telling lack of happy couples, of smiling faces, of people whose love has stood the test of time. Every time two become one they consume each other and themselves. Proximity to the Rift just makes it happen faster."

He turned away from the ocean to look at you, though his heart was distant still. "You are wrong to blame my sister. She does the best she can, she always does. It is love that is always cruel. It torments everyone, from Nero, imprisoned by her love for humanity just as totally as she imprisons them, to Bella, unable to conceive of a relationship not premised on the threat of violence. Your story has played out hundreds of times before on the approach to the Rift. At least none of the coming peril will be new to you."

The God of the Dead slipped from the edge of the tower where he sat, disappearing into the shadows and crashing rocks of the ocean below.

Dolce!

You limp behind the shotgun mousegirl. Though she told you that if you fell behind you'd be left behind, she has been suspiciously easy to keep up with. Her lantern is mounted on the end of her weapon, sweeping a beam of illumination through the dark corridors of the palace.

From a distance you see Redana walking alone through the halls of the palace, a cold smile on her face, her right hand slick with blood. She's gone again before you can call out to her - and besides, she's not Jil's target. She's drawn inexorably up the stairs, towards the screams and clash of arms from the rooftop. And when the three of you reach it you behold a war of assassins.

(Three of you? Don't worry about it)

Bella!

Beljani's power is faltering. For all her numbers and all her skill, warfare is not her arena and you are not her hunt. She's running out of bodies and finally has to engage you herself - one blade amidst five against a weakened and exhausted foe. What scar do you leave her with?

But even as you engage her your senses are at their screaming height, and you do not fail to miss Dolce, Jil and the Master of Assassins arrive together on the rooftop. The Master of Assassins is bleeding - clawmarks, and you can smell the aroma of Mynx's poison on the air around her. The two were fighting, and Mynx landed at least one hit.

Her eyes are cold as she assesses the field, pruning blades in hand. She need make only one cut, and all that's left is to decide where to place it.

And as you watch you notice that her eyes seem to settle on Beautiful.

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

The worst thing about demons, Fengye thought, is that there doesn't seem to be a medium setting for them. Lots of stories are about girls who are tempted by, like, an Emerald Eye Courtesan, or have to strike a deal with a Hopping Puppeteer to curdle a neighbour's milk (before being taught the error of their ways by an Immaculate). That was the level she was planning on operating on when she'd initially gotten into demonology: she'd wanted to maybe date a Courtesan (and maybe an Immaculate), and perhaps have some power and safety on the side. A demon horse? Absolutely something she could handle.

but what the fuck was this

how the fuck was anyone supposed to survive this

who the fuck is Ven?

But on the plus side, Fengye has developed a technique for managing her emotions, keeping the priestess' squeaks muffled and for keeping her demon horse under control. The technique is screaming in terror, and she races through the crushing arms of a nightmare beyond her small town dreams and small town demonology scrolls. She didn't ask for this.

(Well... perhaps not out loud.

... And perhaps that scream was, in part, a howl.)

[Marking Insecure]

Breathless Dead

Redana and Bella!

Beautiful has her hands over her ears. There has been a lot of screaming in the past few minutes and she honestly isn't up to speed on any of it. She glances back and forth with her wide violet eyes before experimentally lifting her hands off her ears. As she does the cthonian fist in the heavens above shifts like a serpent.

"Oh, huh, uh, I'm not involved in whatever this is," said the girl with the mind and power of a god. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I'd totally go for it in different circumstances, but I'm not in a position where I can really do a committed relationship. Unless..." and her violet eyes go wide as she looks up at the stars. "Unless I can make you an Olympian too. It's a tricky problem, but not unachievable with the materials on hand. After all, you've already got Hermes' eye." She tilted her head as she looked at Redana's Auspex. "Both of them actually. Wow, those are gorgeous."

She flexed her hand and her enormous cosmic fist transformed into a vast and multifaceted map, and with flicks of her fingers Beautiful sent waves of cosmic information blurring through the sky like swarms of starlings. "Look, I'm aware I'm going a bit off mission," she said, "but what is the mission, really? Is it to capture Redana? Or is it to make Bella happy? Pretty straightforwards when I put it like that! Ascend Bella to godhood and that'll neatly resolve most issues going on here!! She'll be able to date who she likes, not have to worry about power imbalances, have time to come to grips with her trauma!!! Do gods get heartbroken? No time to test. Resonance amplification possible, but I'll need both of the eyes. Hell yeah!!!!! I knew there would be an answer that would make everyone happy!!!!!!"

She snaps her fingers a few time absently, each click causing a sonic boom in the atmosphere, until a trembling Beljani approaches her. "Hey, Jan, need your help on this, we're pretty short on time. Get your girls to grab them both and cut out their eyes."

Alexa!

In the Engine Room there are two stars.

One is the Engine itself, mighty and bleeding. The containment has been disengaged and the semi-molten engine core has been withdrawn from its shielding. Imagine a long metal rod the length of of a semitrailer and many times as dense, glowing hot, as a star burns within its increasingly thin shell of fuel. It has emerged from the vast structure of the Engine that contains and regulates this process and sits, sizzling metal, upon the floor. It would require heavy machinery to push it back into the Engine, even though it is only a few meters away - heavy machinery or an act of heroism for the ages. If you were to push it you may lose every one of your arms from the cosmic heat.

But that is not the only peril here. Drawn here, like blood to the drain, is the final battle of Lorventi and Epistia. Each movement brings rack and ruin. It accumulates slowly, because even the gods find Engines stubborn things to break, but it accumulates nevertheless as Ares splits in two and boils hotter than the released sun.

But even through the chaos, something is clear.

Epistia is winning.

Lorventi is a run of cuts and missing extremities. Epistia has barely been hurt and she is burning even brighter than when she started. It has been a long time since you have seen a champion of Ceron about her work, but this girl is now as they were then: a breaker of Empires. An ender of ages. The genetic alchemy of violence in its most pure form finally engaging in its true purpose, and oh, there is instinctual, neurologically programmed joy in her now.

You've seen that look in the eyes of Ceron warriors in ages past. You wonder now as you did then how Nero ever put creatures of such profound bloodlust back in their box.

Vasilia!

The Furnace Knight sat in a silence you eventually come to realize was troubled.

He looks at his own hands, at his rows of weapons, at the endless azure seas.

"You were..." he said slowly. "... wise to realize that you had a choice in that moment. Courageous to seize it."

The wind blows from the west, and Hades flicks a cigarette butt into the ocean below.

"However the story ends," said the ancient warrior, "it was not a failure. Know this from someone who lacked your virtues."

Dolce!

"I want a world where nobody has to be afraid," said Jil the mouse, quietly looking out into the dark.

She takes a deep breath. The fear is plain to see in every twitch of her whiskers. She adores Bella because Bella was both powerful and kind. She used her power to protect those beneath her. That is a kindness that Jil can understand, that is comprehensible. A kind ruler is easier to imagine than the end of reality as she knows it - the end of a world where power can flow in the other direction.

But, just for today, impossibility is on the table.

She hefted her shotgun. "But in the short term, I'll take a world where villains are afraid of me."

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

One more trick? She, humble Fengye, scribe in service to the Dominion and the Immaculate Philosophy? She only has the assets that Daana'd gave her, her robe, her umbrella, and a brace of firewands that are surely nothing to a demon far above her station. She is the icon of placid civility and benign ignorance, and she would never perform any wicked acts of sorcery while being observed by a noble Knight of Flowers.

Which means she's got about thirty seconds while Kalaya is distracted holding the door shut.

She levels her umbrella at the demon artisan and with a smooth gesture opens it - and for the first time the pattern woven into its surface becomes fully visible. Upon the outer rim of her umbrella in slashing and glowing rainbow patterns, alight with the intricate terror of alchemy, is a summoning circle.

Her secret weapon.

As the demon's eyes reflect the circle it is too late - already it is manifest on his skin. A glowing tattoo spreads from his eyes, coursing down his face like tears to gag him with a sphere of green energy. It courses down his shoulders, following the crackling tracery of nerves, until it reaches each pair of his wrists, encircling them and binding them tightly together behind him. The energy courses down, pulling tight, trussing the demon into a tight ball, cramming him into the tiny space available on the surface of Fengye's umbrella.

And then she lances forwards with the umbrella, shoving him through the portal in a single elegant fencing thrust as he squeaks through his gag. And then, as a fluid conclusion to the same motion, she snaps the umbrella shut, breaking the circle and dimming the light, just in time for the moment when Kayala Na looks around to find the demon mysteriously gone and Fengye pulling the trussed priestess across the saddle of her horse.

"Of course, Lady Knight," she said demurely, tucking her umbrella back into the loop on her sash. "Lead, and we shall follow."

[Fight: 10
- Taking a string on the demon
- Creating an opportunity for Kayala
- Seize a superior position (on this side of the road to Malfeas)]