Thanqol

The Three Mountains

Early looked askance. "I thought you knew," said Early. "Because I don't know. And if you don't know, then you'd better hope Mrs. Everest does because otherwise we've wasted the last few years."

He drummed his fingers on the desk. "Of course, not to say I haven't thought about the question - not least because of who I am. Back in the day when I was with NASA there was a project being run out of one a nearby department. Mars terraforming - a joke, it's impossible, it'd be easier to build a space station the size of Mars than make that rock habitable. But the people over there under Professor Singh were always into the weirdest shit - brain scanning octopuses, talking about mission-oriented artificial cultures, vocal-bound operational intelligence, artificial space colonization. BlackSun shut it all down with the privatization so as far as I know it never went anywhere. When I started Mrs. Everest grilled me about every detail I could remember about what they were doing, which wasn't a lot, and then put me in as head as research without asking anything else. My specific orders came from your predecessor and I figured they were on the same page. The way I figure it, Mrs. Everest found some piece of that old project that convinced her to resurrect it. What it all adds up to?"

He smiled. "Well. Remember how I said that building a space station the size of Mars was possible? This is some of the kind of stuff you'd need to do to build the things that could build that."

Aristeia! Becoming a Champion

The status quo favours you. The longer you move the higher your score. But Decima takes her time to appreciate the show.

You feel the serpent's gaze lock into place. You hear the soft crunch of leaves and earth under her feet as she walks on the edge of your vision. She can see you and you can't see her. She's not being stealthy, you can hear the clink and shift of her toying with her weapon, her scratching her feet against dirt and stones, her rustling her cape - all sounds faintly blending in beneath the pulse of the music.

"You're going to need to move like that if you want to fight Lios," whispered Decima into the communicator. "Have you heard? First she was training with Titanomachia, and now she's signed up with Taowu. People are saying that she's a favourite for the finals all of a sudden. She's definitely the only person who might move like the person you're imagining..."

The sensation of danger begins to grow. A little at first, but increasingly severe. The way she shifts and winds with the flow of your head and neck, the way those neon aquamarine eyes glint out at the edge of your consciousness, the flash of silver, the almost hypnotic refusal to be stealthy even as she refuses to be clearly seen. Hers is the aspect of a snake and something inside you rebels at this game: you need to stop playing and give her your full attention right now. She's doing something.

"... but it's the wrong stance to take if you're not fighting her. Have you ever fought a monster before?"

But she hasn't done anything yet. Not that you can tell.

Aristeia! Building a Champion

There was a moment of strange relief and realization in Machia. Like a glance back and seeing that the bridge she had run across had not been guaranteed to take her weight. She rolls her feet, the asymmetrical pair moving in unison for a moment, before a deeper calm settles and focus sets in. She is in control. She can think. She can be precise.

"Taowu's arc for the season has been made clear," said Machia. "Lios is the first, but she will not be the last. She will follow through on corrupting three girls and arrange things that they will all fight alongside her in the finals. She will recruit targets who have ability but are held back by their own hesitancy. Li Ting. Argeltia. Ms Verdant, perhaps. And of course - you. She is in her aspect of corrupter, and she will seek to hypnotize you."

She rummaged thoughtfully in a drawer until she produced a pair of special noise-cancelling headphones she had designed herself, specifically fitted to work on the ears she had brought to life.

"So the challenge today will not be the electricity or the bees or the cats with bees in their mouths and when they meow they shoot bees. You know how to survive pain. No. It will be your ears. There will come a moment when you are targeted, outnumbered and bound; the commitment of resources will be too great to overcome. Then Taowu will try to turn you using her enchanted voice. I can see exactly how she'll do it. I can't replicate it myself. But I can try to simulate something similar with technology and time. I will give you a sentence. Your challenge is to hold that sentence in your mind; when the headphones come off you will have one chance and five seconds to repeat those words perfectly. My challenge is to use aural sensation to drive the words from your head entirely."

She turned around, bringing up multiple new screens and devices - audiomixer controls, an entire dedicated ASMR soundboard, multiple different vocalid synthesizers, a synthetic keyboard and a microphone. An arsenal of tools and devices for getting into your head; preparations for a real-time concert made only for you.

"Blindfolded, too I think," said Machia with scientific serenity, producing a long, black silken blindfold. "She might incorporate visual elements into her attack, but you would have the option of shutting your eyes so audio is the only certain vector."

A missed beat. A flex of her feet, testing the foundation, as she stands over you. Time made for an additional few words.

"Are you ready?"

Aristeia! Building a Champion

"Then," said Machia. "We will begin by addressing your weaknesses."

She opened a drawer and drew forth a long coil of crimson rope.

"I have wondered for a time if your weakness is the binding of your hands," she said, taking Madeleine's hands up into hers. "The way you take to my table. The way you froze just now. I second guessed myself when you bore the bit with something approaching dignity, but I have my confirmation."

The red thread wove between fingers and across palms, bringing hands together in prayer.

"You hesitate when you are bound," said Machia. "Perhaps it is what drew you to the Hex in the first place. It's what drew Lios. But weaknesses can be the greatest strengths - and the key for you will be knowing exactly how you are bound."

She looped the rope around your neck and back, above and below your breasts, bringing your hands to your chin, reaching down to wrap around your ankles and bind them together. The interlock enforced the kneeling, praying position.

"If your wrists are bound, use your tongue," said Machia. "If your tongue is gagged, use your hips. Accept the limitations imposed on you. Do not volunteer limitations that have not been imposed. When I bind you, I will take the time to do so properly - to permit you only the freedom I have chosen to give. If you are bound by a less attentive mistress and you volunteer the same obedience I have compelled I will take it as an insult. There is a difference between limitation and true helplessness and you will not be complete until you know exactly where that line lies."

Aristeia! Building a Champion

"...!"

There are cybernetics that can come off as easily as taking off a glove. Titanomachia's has no such kindness to it. Everything about this mechanical limb was built to simulate the peak of athletic potential, and among other things that requires a full artificial nervous system. The sensory feedback from reconnecting it is fire and ice, the jagged shapes of a sleeping leg awakening, cramps and bruises, muscles clenching and testing reflexively as they do their best to link to that crackling brain.

Machia is biting her knuckle. She is shivering. Because in addition to the surging sensation of electricity bridging flesh and synthfibre is the feeling of hands. The feeling of breath. The feeling of soft hair, blown out to overwhelming levels by the miracles of technology. Be gentle, she yearns to whisper. Be firmer, demands a voice crackling along the edge of her spine. She feels the shape of a weakness within her, that she wants to feel with stolen strength.

To reach out and take -

"And yet," she said, hand rolling into a fist below her teeth.

She reached down and took Madeleine by the chin, turning her head up to look into her eyes. "I do not accept that there is power you will not master. I will find the path. I will make you capable of walking it. Your path is to the top and you will go through her too."

Sometimes she wondered if when she was talking to Madeleine she was talking about herself. That she'd master this device and achieve that championship herself as she always thought she would. Sometimes in lonely nights she wondered if this was just a way to keep her hand in while she recovered.

But now, with the dark-haired girl sending electricity from her fingertips to her thigh, burning her to her brain, she didn't wonder. She never asked that question when they were together. Something about those golden eyes drove doubt from her mind. This was her sword.

Aristeia! Building a Champion

The street is illuminated with shocks of glittering light in autumn red. It bleeds into a metallic crimson light. The daemonic effect not only changes the hue of the light but the reflective properties of everything it falls upon. A cackle fills the air -

And then, the snap of a chain. A great shadow pulls a collar tight. And --

*

Titanomachia and Madeleine Cross are suddenly back in her apartment. Everything is back the way it was. The remanants of the arcane are gone - the daemonic presence, the vines, the bloody dress. Even the clocks have wound back. It is as though none of it happened.

But -

- Machia maximizes one of the streams on her monitors. Taowu is sitting for an interview in a talk show, dressed in a debonair floral violet dress with a crimson cravat. Her hand is holding a leash - and attached to that leash is Lios Emiral. Her armour has become a cage of chains and vines, her face-concealing helm jagged with bladed oak leaves, her silver tarnished to obsidian blacks, her two-handed blade coursing with crimson daemon light.

"- so why did you target group three, O Demon Princess?" the reporter was asking.
"I've had my eye on my dear knight for a while," said Taowu pleasantly, lounging in her armchair and raising a hand to trace her fingernail under her blade-slave's chin. "Nothing against group three personally. But I know some people are looking at dear little Sammy as the name to beat this season." Her eyes gleamed red. "We'll see how they feel after my darling pet joins me in the winner's group."

"I think," said Titanomachia in a humbled voice, "that I will listen to you about the supernatural next time."

The Three Mountains

"Honestly, the past two years have been complete set of boondoggles," said Eager. "We are over budget and behind schedule - and even if we weren't I can't imagine the market potential of the things we're working on. Silo One has been working on what I surmise are components for a combat-capable spacecraft, Silo Two has about perfected the servo-motors and neofabric arrays that'd let something the size of a garbage truck do parkour. Silo Three has been working on neo-cryptographic defense networks so we'll be safe if anyone skips ahead two generations in the quantronic arms race, and Silo Four has developed a new kind of optical plating that doesn't catch fire. That last one is the only thing that'll make money on the open market, and even then not a lot."

He sighed, leaning back on his chair. "So we've been doing this kind of weird, blue sky basic research for the entire duration of your predecessor's stint in office. And I won't lie - it's been fun, we've solved some really hard problems. But frankly, right now R&D is a financial black hole and I'm concerned we're going to suck the entire rest of the company into it. If you're here to tell me to pull my head in and get back to commercial technology I understand, but we've been specialized into these moonshot projects for so long that there'll be a significant switching cost involved. We've got a lot of the kinds of people who are only here because this is the only place that is letting them build the cool parts of the future, and if we stop letting them do that they're going to go elsewhere - and there isn't a noncompete in the world that'll stop them."

Aristeia! Building a Champion

A vine snaked around Madeleine's neck. A flower bud pushed itself up against her lips and then blossomed into a crimson flower, thick and soft enough to gag any further words. Taowu clapped her hands delightedly, "A suggestion!" Her legs arced forwards, passing over the top of her head, placing her feet on the two girls' thighs. Her body followed afterwards, flipping around so she was crouching over and standing upon her captives. "Or a wish? To be her legs? But why settle for legs?" She twisted her feet. "Why not wings?" She ran a finger down Madeleine's face.

Sharp. Pain, hot and electric. Long black crow feathers burst out of the side of Madeleine's face, wrapping around one of her eyes, recasting the gold as the stare of a crow. "It is your destiny, you know?" said Taowu. "To help her fly -"

Her hand came down, claws extended, fast as a deathblow.

Then they stopped a moment away from Titanomachia's heart.

"What," she said, looking down at the glowing green emerald, "the fuck are you wearing?"

"Could ask you the same question," said Titanomachia. That green light was reflected in her eyes, burning brighter and brighter - but her hand still held Madeleine's tightly. The vines trembled, starting to release her. "You're not the only one who - mmm!" she squeaked as Taowu casually backhanded her mouth with a blow from her own whip.

"You're right," said Taowu. "A foolish question." She leaned forwards, a pair of dark black scissors in her fingers, placing the tip on Machia's stomach. "The answer," she said, snipping once, "to what you are wearing," she cut again, "should be nothing~" she said as she reached just below Machia's breasts. That golden chain waited there as a final layer of defense. Taowu smiled as her scissors opened to envelop it. Machia's confident stare has become filled with an unbearable tension. Sweat ran down the side of her face. The scissors started to come down.

There was the quiet sound of a fridge door closing.

Taowu's head snapped around like an owl.

Lios Emeral was standing there, face flushed red. "Don't mind me," she whimpered, but Taowu was already standing up, grinning wide enough to justify every bit of terror in the knight's fragile body.

In the moment of the Demon Princess' distraction, Machia moves. With a great heave and pull, she manages to pull herself more and more to the right - until she flips, rolling to lie on top of Madeleine. Breast to breast, lip almost to lip, turning her neck so the golden amulet around her throat touches the vine wrapped around yours. The dark plants begin to shudder and burn away from you even as they pull you tighter into the forced embrace.

Aristeia! Becoming a Champion

"Not bullets," said Decima. "Bullets are useless. If I shot you with a bullet I'd lock up one (1) centimeter of your Synskin. Half the contestants wouldn't even feel it. Extremely energy inefficient. I need to get a lot more specialized than that."

She looked keenly through your bag. "Armour. Lots of it. Our group has multiple highly armoured targets with small, elusive weak points that can be targeted for massive damage. They are also, generally, very mobile and close ranged. My area of focus is, therefore, the medium range interception disabling shot. My attack pattern will be to land a crippling strike and then withdraw before the distance can be closed. Part of my defense will be that I will not contest scoring zones. As such, the practice I would benefit from would be harassing you; seeing how close I can get while attacking you, while you concentrate on something else. My idea was for you to play DDR, which would simulate you concentrating on other combatants while I line up shots. If you see the opportunity to attack me, do, balancing the loss of score on the game against the advantage of removing me from interfering."

Aristeia! Building a Champion

"Oh, oh, oh~"

A Bianhua flower rises from a blood red portal, gripped in the toes of a beautiful feminine foot, toenails painted black. The portal crumples and cascades as it slides down the sleek, pale leg, warping somehow into the cascading folds and ruffles of a crimson dress. A white neck spills from the spilled blood, bright eyes and bare arms dipped in crimson streaks, a waterfall of black hair. The Demon Princess of the Underworld pulls back the coils of her dress all the way to the top of her thigh, then traces a crimson circle around her leg with crimson fingernails.

"从冥界崛起
Another fleeting day
你渴望我的双腿拥抱
We both have further to fall."

Taowu snaps her fingers.

Flower vines snap out, grasping Titanomachia and Madeleine's arms and legs, blossoming with bianhua. They pull taught like ribbons, bringing the two together hip to hip. Taowu crawls forwards, dress raising up behind her like a scorpion's tail, ruffs forming chitinous segments, even as her wild black hair falls to blot out one eye. Her dress arches forwards to sting, caressing both girls' face and lips with silk so smooth it is like a tongue. She uses her actual tongue to trace the skin on the edge of Madeleine's shorts where it connects to the metallic interface ports of Machia's leg socket.

"Wishing for me wherever you are
Scream out and I'll come
Screaming for me no matter how far
Beg now and I'll come
Isn't it fine? This bright fleeting day?
张开你的嘴唇
You both have further to fall."

She picked up Machia's tail-hair whip in her long, sleek fingers. She ran her fingers through it, feeling its softness, and then ran her fingers through the shortened remnant of her tail where it attached to her spine. Then she tilted her head and repeated the gesture along Madeleine's tail.

"Wish for me wherever you are
Scream out for me and come
Beg now and come
Isn't this bright fleeting day fine?"

She reversed her grip on the whip, holding the soft horsehair, the solid haft now ready to be used as a whip. Taowu grinned, blowing her hair out of her eyes.

"This world has further to fall."