In the Hall of the Mountain Queen (CasualVelociraptor x Alisa_Perne)

[CasualVelociraptor]

Sajida sighed and yawned as she rose from her slumber. That had actually been a decent (or at least, sufficient for a mortal) level of sleep that she'd gotten. She was going to miss that well-rested feeling when the curse fully took hold in...how long would it be? A year? A decade? A century? Even still, she knew some tiny part of her that didn't realize she didn't have this need anymore would demand- was demanding- that she close her eyes, but she would not be able to. And she couldn't use that level of alertness that came with her vampire curse to hunt anything bigger or more sentient than deer. Bummer.

The oddest part, however, as she explained to Sita when she shook Sita to full activity, was that she had dreamed. That hadn't happened since the night she was turned seven years ago. Or at least, it seemed like a dream. There was no other way of explaining what happened when she dozed.

She'd been sitting on Nefaris itself, on the gaping maw of the crater left behind by the demons, that 12,000 year old scar, and looking upon the entire planet of Emada. The world was so much smaller from up here, yet so much more imposing. A true marvel as the twin suns danced around it. Perhaps even fascinating to her was the way that cities, those strange things made by so many ants from miles below, illuminated the dark side of the planet. Behind her as she leaned (carefully) around the moon, multitudes of asteroids, planets and stars, some discovered by science and some still cloaked in darkness. And to her left was...Shandara, the goddess who had supposedly saved her life as an infant.

"My Champion," Shandara said and kissed Sajida on the left cheek.

"What? I'm nobody's Champion. I'm just some dumbass fisherman's daughter from Bamba who had to be turned by a vampire."

"Then you do not know of the Grand Bargain? Shame. I don't have time to explain to you now. It took me a long time to break through the 'vampire,' as you call it, side of your mind."

"Yeah, that's the thing. I don't know who the fuck you are."

"You don't, nor could I give you a name from deep within your mind. But listen to me. This is important. Sleep every night from now on."

"But I can't. I'm a vampire."

"You are so much more than that, my dear. You can control that side of you if you will it. And your destiny demands that you do!"

"What destiny?"

"I know you have so many questions, Sajida Dhawan of Bamba. If you sleep more regularly, then I can show you better than I can tell you. Look upon this beautiful little world you call your home."

Sajida did as the strange dream lady from the moon told her to, and gazed upon angry clusters of fire that spread smoke across the world. "That is the war," Shandara (?) explained.

"The Final War? As in, the big bad Empire versus the equally suck-ass Confederation? We're seeing it in real time?" Sajida wondered. Such a conflict, and all the people dying to it, looked so small from here.

"Yes. But this small flame on dry grass that you call war is not truly final, not compared to what may happen if you do not leave this mountain and one day restore the Ballad."

"What Ballad? Can you stop talking in riddles?" Sajida demanded. She then felt an urge to bite Shandara, but her mouth phased through the ethereal neck.

"Remember who you really are: Sajida Dhawan, fisherman's daughter, snatched from Death itself. And my Champion. And you alone have the power to choose which world we become." Then the planet itself split apart with a wave of Shandara's hand and formed into three separate Worlds.

The First World appeared on her left.

The Second World on her right.

Then, finally, the Third World in the middle. Sajida liked the look of this one the best, as it most resembled the home she'd grown up in. Maybe even a little greener, more verdant.

And then, suddenly, a commotion appeared from behind her and had woken her up.

 

[Alisa_Perne]

Sita lead Chloe to her bedchambers and sat her on the bed as she stared into her eyes, "Chloe, when I first met you, I lusted after you because I saw every bit of Alice in you and that was wrong." She put a hand on Chloe's leg, "You are not your sister, you are you, and I really do have feelings for you, but just you." She leaned in and kissed Chloe and ran her finger down her cheek, in the same manner that Chloe had earlier, "I want you, I want to have you, all of you. Will you accept this?" She asked, hopeful.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

"Like a child smelling her mother's cooking." Huh. Odd metaphor, Chloe thought. But it also brought back one of the few memories she had before the time of the experiments, before Alice was even born. When Kate Guthrie looked at Josiah Guthrie with love in her eyes as she served him fried whale strips from what little of the fresh meat he'd been allowed by the whaling company to bring home from months at sea.

Chloe felt that love again. With Sita. Now.

"I, um...I've heard the reviews. Usually it's Sajida screaming, 'FUCK ME WITH THAT BIG COCK!' or Kalisha being all like, 'Gods, you have blessed me with the power of Sita's penis!' So I think the only way it would be less subtle is if you put it in the newspapers." That reminded her how much she missed having newspapers brought to her, or even just picking out one for herself in the morning at the asylum. It was how she stayed informed, and stayed only mildly insane.

"I think I'm eager to do some experiments on your test tube, if you wouldn't mind," Chloe grinned.

 

[Alisa_Perne]

Sita smiled, "Will proceed slowly." Sita did exactly that, she carefully aligned the tip of her cock with Chloe's dripping slit and began to push gently, "Please, if you need me to stop at any time, let me know and I will." She then began to apply more pressure until with a gentle popping sound, the head of Sita's cock was now inside Chloe.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

"F-Fasterrrr..." Chloe groaned in time with Sita picking up speed, her mouth hanging open as she lost all concentration on anything but how wonderful she felt, and how she now understood what all the fuss was surrounding penetrative sex. "Ah, ah, ah, ahhhh...I..." she did start to add, but then changed course from could fall in love with you to "...wonder where you've been all my life, Lady Sita Baniya."

Those were the last words Chloe said before her body locked up around Sita and just laid back and enjoyed the fucking. Her mind transported Sita's own into her psychic trance, as she heard faint thrums of The Song of Sita, but The Song of Chloe blanketed them both in a dreamy, passionate, hopeful energy, with some minor notes of sadness, sacrifice and emptiness as well. Once Sita was pulled down into Chloe's subconscious while their bodies continued robotically fucking and yet also feeling the pleasure of their lovemaking in their minds, and the resulting connection burgeoning between them while their bodies were joined, Sita would realize she was on a verdant green hill by a beach kissing Chloe while she painted...

And then, suddenly, they were both on top of The Leaky Bucket, watching planes go by like flocks of birds. They came in all types and sizes and pairings and ages, and some even had actual feathers as if they actually were overgrown birds. Some piloted themselves, some were piloted by people Chloe recognized like her long dead mother Kate, her father Josiah (from when he was happy, and not living out of the bottom of a bottle), her long lost brother Edward, and Alice, but there were some people surrounding Alice that she didn't recognize. However, all the planes in Chloe's imagination had no shriek of war in the thrums of their engines, as they sang of the freedom of flight and were at peace.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

The warmth…how filled she felt…how much her womb craved it…her lover’s penis throbbing against her walls and her G-spot…it was all too much for poor little Chloe Rose Guthrie, who belted out a scream to match her partner’s primal roar, and came as Sita claimed her pussy via rutting for the first time. Like a dried out plant that was newly watered, her power was also fueled by her orgasm to project a field of shadow that froze a small bubble of spacetime around them, and everyone in it.

The temporal anomaly lasted for five perceived seconds to Akari, the only other Darkness user in the area, who then decided it would be good to meditate on this and walked out of the bubble towards the mountain’s lake to bathe in her robes. Then it collapsed, as did Chloe in a heap of satisfaction, sweat running down her body as well as vampiric sperm out of her overstuffed quim.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

“Perhaps it runs in the Guthrie family. Perhaps I’ll be the only throat you crave, after you finally seal my fate. Perhaps you can taste me while inside me again,” Chloe sighed as she craned her neck to the right to expose the left side of her throat. Then she continued, “I used to think I was so weak that this world would destroy me at the slightest chance, and I had to harden up or die, but now I realize I’m strong because I’m weak for the right people, including you…I don’t know if that makes any sense.”

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

In that moment- the only instance in millennia when a vampire had ever consensually bitten someone born with the power of the Darkness, let alone while having sex with them- molecules of the power in Chloe's body were transposed up into Sita's fangs, trading places with miniscule amounts of vampire venom. Not enough was exchanged by either side to turn Chloe into a vampire or Sita into a Child of the Void, since the similar qualities of their different curses repelled each other like magnets of similar polarities. But just enough Darkness creeped around her mind to give Sita a much darker vision than the one she'd shared while in pure sexual bliss with Chloe.

Alice returned in the Golem armor Sita had seen her in as the storm raged, and brought the Imperial war machine and its wrath with her. A battalion's worth of Goliaths surrounded her, whistling from their smokestacks and blaring with an unholy roar. And on either side were Akari and Chloe, their bodies surrounded by shadow and grinning maniacally with light coming from their eyes and mouth. Perhaps their powers amplified each other, as Alice's revolver, rivet gun, super scattergun, and speargun looked...different. More menacing, while all the Empire's enemies fled in fear of Alice's shriek, the relentless Imperial forces that consumed all non-humans in their path and breathed fire and smoke into the sky, and the most powerful Voice in the world...

Henry Caldwell.

Emperor of Caledoria, a nation (usually represented in salmon on most maps) that easily dwarfed Klandeth at its greatest extent during Sita’s rule many times over, and could bring the world to heel if it fully gave in to bloodlust and revenge.

And the man who might, if the vision came true, order all three of the most powerful Shades in existence to kill the last vampires with a booming cry that could rattle a mountain.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

The "thing" that revealed itself when Sita approached the boundary between water and land, or at least most of its form, was Akari bathing in the lake. Naked as the day she was born, save for the loops of the black mask that were always tied around the rogue fighter's ears, her back to the lake's shoreline.

Her athletic back flexed when her hands brushed over her own breasts, her windpipe, and then finally each of her shoulders with her arms crossed over the upper half of her torso. Meanwhile, she was singing a high-pitched, soothing melody in her mother tongue.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

"A vampire has never felt the Darkness before, but I think I know what happened. When you were with Alice seven years ago, something in your tamakagi, roughly translated to your soul's key, located deep in the brain"- Akari poked her on the forehead to demonstrate her point- "must have been unlocked. Nobody can have sex with someone who was in contact with Darkness and not reveal something of themselves, or have some possibility revealed to them, for the future always changes until it becomes the present and we set it in stone. Perhaps this grew in strength as you were intimate with more people, especially us Shades.

"For you see, we walk the water's edge all our lives, and we can draw upon the dark waters for our strength, while also being capable of basking in the sunshine and keeping those who we hold in the Embrace of Ages- nenraiokeireru, as us Gudarians deign it, or perhaps your word for it, 'sex'- protected from the Void that can lie dormant, and then emerge like the cicada, shrieking as a mass of them dance on our skins, and those of our partners.

"My larger point is, we cannot truly know the future. So there is no need to be afraid of it, or fear the coming of the night. Chloe and I are well-worn travelers of the night, and if you trust in us, we will take all of your hands, for I sense a growing ease in my heart around all of you, even when you're being ridiculous"- Akari winked at this- "and keep you safe."

 

[Alisa_Perne]

Sita did not answer Akari's question with words, but with actions. "Shh now dear, save your voice, you're going to need it for when you scream." Sita lined herself up with Akari's eager slit and stepped forward, plunging the head of her massive cock into Akari's slit.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

When Akari's eyes darkened completely, she warned Sita, "Hang onto me...I'm...I'm gonna..."

But instead of climaxing as Sita might have expected, Akari was instead inadvertently using the power of psychic song to once again bring Sita into her mind. It was a vision of Gudaria: a world thousands of miles north and east of Klandeth, yet possessed of many mountains rivaling Klandethan herself, well-nourished by similar rains, and overcast by darkness long ago. And Sita would soon sense that this was the night Akari hid from Tyvanwek's forces, and let the Darkness overtake her at such a tender age for protection, including weaving a mask of shadow...a rarity for one not born into it.

Then she would rise up from under the dirt, and that they were both sitting under a glowing tree at night.

"Ah! So I was right," Akari said, finally regaining some cohesion in her voice even as she felt the physical sensations of her body back. "Sex can cause visions for you. I wonder why you didn't have one when lying with Alice, or Sajida, but no matter."

"I haven’t been to the real tree in my hometown of Kuinghan since I was a kid,” her soul self continued, as her real self leaked Darkness essence everywhere and The Song of Akari was faintly carried on the wind and the rustling of the leaves. “But this tree, based off the real one I hid in the shadow of, is a construct where I go to meditate in my mind when things get too painful for me. Or, apparently, pleasurable. And now...remember how the Oracle said that my true love would join with me under the shade of this tree?

"I don't really know what the future holds for you, or what your vision with Crown Prince Henry has in store for any of us, but I realize now that we all must be linked together, our curses, powers, and hearts amplified by each other. As a result, while I don't know much about any of you...I want to find out more. And I feel that, perhaps, the Oracle was right all along. I'm excited at the possibility that my true love might embrace me here, in the most intimate sanctum sanctorum of my mind, under my conjuring of the tree."

Akari laid on her back now, just like she had when she was a girl, her soul’s manifestation of her panties disappearing under the skirt as her real body lay perfectly still as well.

“Join with me here as well, darling,” Akari pleaded. “Let there be no doubt after tonight that broken hearts such as ours can become one.”

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

Since Sita’s physical body was still fucking Akari doggystyle, she hadn’t really seen Akari’s face by that gesture, and instead got to see what she felt about herself, plastered on her soul. In an instant, the tree screamed and wept the blood of her family. Sita’s mind was flooded with visions of Akari fighting off Tyvanwek after an unwanted kiss, of her hiding underground with the aid of the Darkness, of her dragging her starving and broken body through the rain, of becoming a thief just to survive, and of voices consternating the vampire by saying, “She trussssted yoooou…we warned heeeer…and now you will die, bloodletter!”

Meanwhile, Akari’s mind was still recovering from the powerful orgasm that had ripped through every cell of her being for a moment. Then all euphoria was forgotten, and her eyes congealed into red and black as an all-consuming rage spilled over, and she looked away from Sita while yelling, “GET OUT!” This howl flew across the mountain, and her anger manifested as a wave of shadow so powerful that it was sufficient to dislodge Sita in the vision from Akari’s psychic construct as well as send Sita’s body flying back out of her in the real world, and manifested Akari’s clothes back onto her even as she staggered to her feet and said:

“Why…would you…why?!”

Moments later, tendrils of Darkness kept Sita pinned to the ground. The Siphon of the First Shades materialized in her hand while tears appeared in her eyes, and she pointed it at the throat of the last of the old vampires with a snarl. This was in turn echoed by the rumbling of the storm above the mountain.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

Kalisha exhaled all the tension away from her chest when Sita hugged her. For all the vampire's faults, Kalisha had seen her grow a little these past seven years, for she never would have hugged Kalisha so freely upon their first meeting, nor treated her with such adoration outside of sex (in a similar manner as she'd treated Alice.)

"I love you too," Kalisha said. "Now, let's get back on the ship and make sure Akari's alright."

Once they did, however, Kalisha could sense something different in the air; almost like a smell but not quite. More acrid, bitter...musky? It was hard to tell what was going on with how the storm tossed The Leaky Bucket to and fro, and the sound of the mysterious neighs infused with the ship. Yet, Kalisha gave Chloe a lot of credit for being able to fly this thing on a calm day, as she had no idea what young Guthrie was going on about, talking to herself as she checked on oil, steam, and coolant gauges, and fought with the wheel, yet made it look like a delicate dance.

And then a horrifyingly loud "GAROOOOOUUUUU!" that sounded a lot like Ronan rang out around the mountainside, and in response, dozens of Shadow Accord guards started firing their bows, homemade grenade launchers, and rifles (once their ears stopped ringing) at blurry, dark shapes revealed for a moment through the rain...

That then also started sprouting fire from their hands (as well as other elements) and hurling it out towards the castle as they charged, which werewolves would not normally be able to do. All Chloe could do now was try to get to the castle rooftop as quickly as possible, because landing anywhere else would be suicide without any guns to defend itself with. (If there had been any guns on it when she took over the pirate ship and crashed it, they hadn't survived.)

 

[Alisa_Perne]

Sita let out a battle cry as she saw her moment, this was it, right now, she had said she would kill the dragon, and now, with the help of her friends, whom she was starting to value more and more with each second, she lunged at the beast with a blinding speed, the fastest she had ever moved, the siphon in her hand she plunged not only the blade, but her entire body, blade first into its eye, and she burst out the other eye socket in a glorious explosion of blood and bone, the beast cried out one last time before letting out a death rattle that would shake the heavens. "TYVANWEK!" She shouted as she took to the sky, the beast had fled, and she knew Akari would be coming for Tyvanwek, which means she would need the siphon, she took a deep breath and tried to find calm as she reached out to Akari through the link they had formed during their brief intercourse in the spirit realm. "Akari." She called out.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

Akari meditated a moment to regain her composure while the smokey shadows that made up her Darkness armor pealed off of a now fully healed Sita and back onto her, and indeed, she did feel a bit less tired now. But all of that returning energy was zapped away in an instant as she dropped to her knees, held her head and screamed.

For she could sense that her sister in Darkness, Chloe, was now writhing in pain- from what, she didn’t know- and their connection and close proximity to one another made them. The fellow Shade could be seen kneeling in the same manner as The Leaky Bucket landed on the ground, with Tyvanwek’s left hand entangled in Chloe’s red hair, glowing brightly and rendering her immobile, and his right hand carrying Alice’s hair, which was disrupting Akari’s powers in a similar manner, but from a distance.

“You want me?” Tyvanwek demanded, as his victorious troops pulled back and formed a perimeter.

“Then just try and come get me, and they both die…or you can give me Akari, who seems to be angry you anyway”- though how he knew that, he kept close to his chest- “and I’ll give you back the Destroyer Artifact, and leave everyone else here under benevolent Confederation protection from the threat of the Empire. The choice is fairly easy here, even for a rash woman such as yourself.”

“I- I can go,” Akari whispered. “This artifact, and Chloe’s safety, are more important than me. If he reunites it with Alice…” She paled to think.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

“I- I’m not a girl,” Chloe sniffed, feeling a little stung at feeling this vulnerable after how hard she’d fought him to defend her airship, her life’s work really.

“You certainly won’t be when I’m done with you, Miss Guthrie,” Tyvanwek grinned, his voice dripping with self confidence in his victory. Then he smacked Chloe’s ass to send her to the others while he added, “Now stay quiet, dear. The grownups are having a disagreement.”

“Distinguished soldiers of my army, honored guests,” he gestured to the assembled crowd and winked in the direction of Sita’s lovers and the Shadow Accord prisoners as well.

“Enjoy this rare entertainment. I do not plan on repeating it- well, in public anyway,” he asserted after taking off his shirt. He knew, that would not only would his victory allow him to plow the fresh new fields that Sita had brought him, but also form a line of women from both sides of tonight’s battle looking for some relief with him, or mercy from him. It was not an uncommon practice between superiors and inferiors in Confederate military commands, but he practically wrote the field manual on seducing a young, impressionable female soldier. Tyvanwek was also almost certain that he had several children, but no one had come forward asking him to take care of them...yet, and so he ignored that possibility.

“Fisticuffs only, or they die,” Tyvanwek declared at last as he got into a fighting stance.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

While Sita was biting him and he was pushing against her face to try to dislodge her sharp teeth from his throat, he felt her penis against his leg through his uniform and gurgled out in disgust, "Erimdanaithhhh..." the elvish word for "between man and woman," usually applied to those elves who did not choose male or female genitalia when they had the opportunity to do so at 18, a ceremony called "First Flowering." To him, her gender confusion explained everything. And so he set about un-confusing her, by kneeing her in the crotch, after which he hooked his right hand through her bottom lip and yanked back hard to pop out her jaw and finally pull her off him. Then, when she was staggered, he reached under her dress and pulled on her shaft with all his might, ripping it free of her pelvis.

"You have no power here any more, wench! I claim Mt. Klandethan in the name of the Confederation of Allied Peoples at Ananka!" he declared, able to use the full name of his polity even as blood spilled down the holes of his windpipe, then raised her penis aloft and tossed it off the side of the mountain. "And I will inaugurate my triumph with your blood. Now die!" he then added after he picked up Sita's prized sword on the ground and raised his arm to stake her in the heart- the only true way to kill a vampire.

The other girls, after taking a moment to recoil in horror, were about to attack him with all their powers, but Ronan, so covered in boils and pus from the philters he'd been subjected to that he was barely recognizable, used the last of his sanity to howl, "GOOOOOOOO NOOOOOW!" and then dived onto Tyvanwek, knocking him off the side of the parked airship and back onto the ground. Many of the other werewolves were still fighting the infection too, and attacked their comrades and the elves, infecting them with the virus and causing an all-out brawl, as Tyvanwek called for his dragons and fought Ronan mightily.

Sajida drew the rain around them again and rained grenades as well to protect the four of them from the few elves who realized they were getting away and fired off fiery arrows at the gigantic balloon containing flammable steam, Kalisha hurled thunderbolts, and Akari's crossbow counteracted the longbows. Chloe, meanwhile, had been secretly preparing the engine the whole time, and had her hands on the wheel in case she needed to tilt the bastard off the side.

However, once they were aloft and heading away from the mountain, she stopped the bleeding on the stump where her cock had once been with a handkerchief she tied around it, then popped Sita's jaw back into place and said, "Stay with me, okay? I can't lose you...I can't lose somebody else I love."

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

August 5th, 1893

Port of Chenkarat, West Coast of Sura

The entire Chenkarat harbor rumbled with her declaration that she could pee. Fortunately, most did not understand what she was saying, but as the little tavern rattled, so too did Sajida. Normally, she would be managing the ticketing booth for the airship touring company, Air Gambit, that they'd set up to support themselves while remaining in hiding. But with the Confederates intruding into most of Bamba, many of their customers had fled the tide of war, so business was slow, and she'd declined a joy ride with the girls because it was too sunny out. Instead, she decided to try and sleep some more and work out the origins of her mysterious water bending powers in her subconscious.

"Sita, don't go telling the whole province that, you dumbass. And I just cleaned that floor! Ugh," a groggy Sajida gasped as she bolted to her feet. Then she realized what was happening and then ran to and tackled Sita back onto the bed, kissing her repeatedly. She then wiped away tears as she continued in her usual acerbic tone, "Oh, gods, Sita, you're alive! And looks like you picked a fine time to finally stop taking up space. If you slept any longer, I was going to start charging admission for people to see you."

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

"I- I think that's the curse, hun," Sajida gulped. "I think it followed you personally...but why to the edges of this building? Why is this not bringing a violent storm like the last time?" Then she also tested something by stepping through the entrance, quickly heading back inside before the intensifying suns could roast her alive. "I thought maybe it would keep me here too, but it doesn't appear to. Still, we can't leave while you're trapped like this. And either way, it's several hours before I can leave or use the water powers that somehow came to me from dreaming that I don't understand, no thanks to the vampire curse you put on me, and the city's about to be destroyed any minute now. Fucking great!" The young bloodsucker shrieked in frustration.

Her anger, however, quickly dissipated into relief when she saw the Leaky Bucket land on the waters of the Chenka Sea, then took the rope that Chloe threw to her and tied it to the dock. Then she became even paler than usual while the Dread Fist and Sun Cutter landed behind them, surrounded by colossal battleships and airship bombers, aircraft carrier airships, ships, and even other giant planes, carrying their brethren like a mother dragon with its young clutching to her wings. Her instinctual fear of the colonizing forces take over, which made her shrink into the wall.

Once the airship came to a stop, Chloe slid down the rope, hopped off of it, landed a little awkwardly, but used that to spring forward into a bold kiss with Sita, since it didn't need to be said just how excited she was to find that Sita was alive after multiple bouts of somnambulant sex.

Kalisha walked more calmly down the deck, kissed Sita passionately and said, "It's okay...the Emperor has legalized homosexuality across all the Empire's territories." That made Sajida frown, confused as to why the famously prudish authorities, let alone the green Emperor, would do such a thing. Then Kalisha cheekily asked, "Room for a few more?" After gesturing behind her to all the various vehicles present, she then began to inspect the fish Sajida had caught earlier.

Akari was the next to arrive...glide more like through even the tiniest shadows cast, as if she was partially made of liquid. It also seemed like she was taking great paints to avoid being noticed by Sita, and when she did look in her vampire lover's direction, she couldn't maintain eye contact. Sita didn't have to see her face below that infernal mask to know how she was feeling...saddened, but trying to be strong. Guilty, but trying to look like it didn't bother her that many of the last words she'd said to Sita before the battle were angry. Perhaps still a little angry with Sita. And her heart? Swollen with words she'd wanted to say for so long, and about to burst.

All that was interrupted when a plane with swollen feet capable of doing so landed on the water. Then the glass cockpit was lifted from the inside, and Alice Guthrie emerged onto the wooden boards wearing a dark, curve-hugging pilot outfit and cloak. Then she shrugged the cloak off with a flex of her much more powerful shoulders, proving that she'd filled out from the thin little thing that Sita had gotten to know carnally, and headed inside and grinned, "Evening, Lady Sita," before hugging her tightly.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

Akari was about to try to pull Sita aside for a long, long overdue conversation, when she withdrew upon Alice's arrival and noticed that Sajida was still remaining on the sidelines as well. She then looked at the fisherwoman for a moment, seeing the anxiety written on her face at Sita so tenderly hugging Alice, which was surely bringing up painful memories.

"Shh, shhh...I know, I know," Alice said as she rubbed her former mistress's broad shoulders. "Chloe filled me in on everything on the way over," she added, neglecting to mention the siblings' own tearful reunion; the devastating news Alice had had to share with her older sister about their father and brother; or the fact Rathum, the dragon who had so long ago saved her life, had been killed by his own guards giving Alice the information she needed to find Chloe, while in the midst of bloodlessly surrendering another city, called Wilfarne a few days prior. In due time, they'd grieve and properly bury their family members at the family plot and attend their friends' funerals, but for now she figured that Chloe would lean on Sita to help her process their deaths more than she had been able to do with Alice in the short time they'd reconnected.

She was also mixed about going back to Surabamba after everything she'd been made to do, which had been unavoidably raised back into the public consciousness during the sham murder trial in Olseka that helped boil tensions between merfolk and the surface into war. But, the Confederacy had invaded it, one of its most capable generals was spearheading the rapid offensive, and the Emperor agreed with her that if they didn't rout Lord Tyvanwek here, then it would close any opportunity to keep a front open to pressure the southern Ananki border. It would also be an avenue for the annihilated Confederate Navy to reemerge and not only open a two front war on the open sea while the Imperial Navy desperately fended off sea monsters from the depths, but also spread the philtervirus to more ports around the world, bringing thousands more people under the dark mind control of the serial killer Elizabeth Jersey and her depraved Family. So it would be up to her, the Empire's most brilliant strategist, to take him on alone in a brutal game of chess for the fate of the world.

And her alone.

Alone...oh gods, Jareth.

She couldn't think about him right now, as much as she wanted to. He was being treated for the philtervirus by the best doctors in the world after he'd bravely or foolishly swallowed as much philter fluid as he could to protect her, so she just had to hope that the father of her children would pull through his medically-induced coma. And, she realized, she would not fight the battle alone, even if only she could see the bigger picture. This inspired her, and soon she tenderly kissed SIta's cold cheek, climbed up onto the roof of the hut, and pushed a button on her back to unfurl her new Golem armor, while Akari helped pull Sajida out of the Void to listen to her sister in Darkness.

"People of Chenkarat, listen to me and take heed," she boomed with the aid of a sonic reprojector in her armor. "The Emperor has indeed personally brought the Great Steam Fleet to your aid, and I, Alice Guthrie, am his sword, bringing his wrath upon those who would do you harm tonight. This does not just mean defeating the monsters charging at our doorstep, but wielding my power to clear out all the rats within." These bold, thinly veiled words, a barb in the eyes of the greedy provincial government and business leaders that had oppressed and stolen the wealth of both Sura and Bamba since the Imperial invasion of 1865, were written down by hidden agents of the infamous Imperial Eye secret police with glares in their eyes as a crowd of people quickly gathered.

"The Confederacy would have you believe that humans are the enemy, and that we are destined to destroy this planet like roaches if they do not exterminate us all, when in fact the Elder Dragons that once protected this world are using the poor victims of this insidious virus, the villainous, rapacious Lord Tyvanwek"- that made Akari fume as she remembered why she was fighting- "and his equally brainwashed army of elves, merfolk, and other nonhumans as a wedge to divide and enslave all peoples forever, whether goblin or human, elf or dragonling. They did this once, many millennia ago, before the Last Devara rose from this very soil to say enough, fought to her dying breath to protect all our ancestors, and sparked a yearning for liberty that continues to this day." That left Sajida to ponder her place in history. "There may come a day when we abandon all sentience and decency and revert solely to our baser instincts, but I am proud to say that today is not that day; for brave volunteers from all nations, who have confronted evil with honor wherever it may appear, have taken arms not for conquest, not for riches, but for all of you, and are among you today.

"On my right, this Goliath"- and as if on cue, the feared symbol of Imperial might carefully trudged through the narrow streets- "may seem like a faceless war machine, but is piloted by an orphan who rose to become a true Knight of Elthurscaldy. I'm proud to call her the Commander of Meteor Squadron, for she has been a proven leader of battle-tested yet utterly moral engineers and soldiers. And in the skies above me as I speak is the famed Javelin Squadron, consisting of our first goblin ace pilot; a native son of this land who has shown nothing but compassion towards the faerie he loves and their unborn child in the newly liberated Free City of Wilfarne;"- that got the biggest cheers from humans and nonhumans who lived in Chenkarat alike, though throughout, there was not a dry eye in the audience- "the brilliant inventor of the aeroplane; and the first human to truly learn magic in a century. I call them the Emperor's Spear for a reason, and their tenacity and selflessness in the face of impossible odds makes me proud to fly into each and every battle with them. I also count as heroes those who are not part of the Imperial Army, but have fought with all their might nonetheless: my dear sister, her beloved vampire, once queen of Klandethan, a Gudarian thief turned leader of fierce resistance for her people, a compassionate and brilliant Jogai and Sudaish waterfoot herder, and the most fearless fisherwoman from the land of the Twin Kings"- a common nomenclature for Surabamba, since they were once two kingdoms who united- "or any other that I have ever known.

"As for me, I also bring to bear not just my armor and weapons, or my years of fighting crime"- this felt like a coming out all over again to her, she felt as she added this next part in her enhanced voice- "but the awesome power of the Darkness itself, which is not to be feared when used for true and noble purposes, and consists solely of the echoes of all those wrongly murdered throughout history who now cry out for justice, made manifest to right all wrongs." Then she returned to her natural voice to continue, not wanting to frighten anyone overmuch, and also not wanting to be burned by the light if it leaked in through her armor.

"And so we ALL, we who have loved, we who have strived, we who have suffered and lost, can and must come together like all these people I described have, in a last stand for the independence of all and sundry. For I tell you that we shall live up to Caledoria's credo of becoming the monsters to eat monsters! We shall fight in these harbors! We shall fight in the forests! We shall fight on the streets! We shall fight in the pages of history to stand and be counted among the Last Devara, or the first Twin Kings, or Henry and Elizabeth the Liberators"- the first Caledorian rulers, who were the first in history to kill an Elder Dragon at the Battle of Radiant 1,893 years ago- "or Adamaris." Most people (other than Sita) knew now, if they hadn't already, of his relationship to Alice and his role in protecting civilians at the Battle of Sanctuary Trench all those years ago. "But we shall not go quietly into the Void! We will NEVER bend our knees to any monsters of whatever appearance who seek only to devour us. And I will die if I have to to make sure that this. Apocalypse. ENDS HERE! Who's with me?!"

With that, cheers erupted from all of the 10,000 souls assembled, as did the whistles and horns of Paige's Goliath. All were resolved anew to meet the enemy and give them a war.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

Akari and Kalisha did pause for a moment to listen to part of what Sita was saying, but as the argument heated up again and moved out into the street, they lost the rest of her statement. And then Alice walked in, having already explained her own position and heard and patiently waited for Sita to say her peace completely to Alice in turn.

"We cannot undo the past, much as we might like to at times. And the past informs who we are in the present," Alice said, as shadows emerged from the hair to cast themselves around Sita and tell a story of the shadows of secretly absorbed histories, both Sita's and Alice's. "Who Chloe is now, because of you, is a much more mature woman for having stood up for herself, for having felt the kind of love and adoration that I felt from you once but ran away from, for someone else that didn't work out."

"If I had been in your bed instead, perhaps Elizabeth Jersey would have killed many more. Perhaps Chloe would be lost to us forever in an asylum with no one to find her, or no one who she would want to find. So many people were lost, until you found them." In particular, she could see and empathize with Akari's plight. Yet another woman threatened in her, and no wonder she had a thing about hiding her face. And perhaps, Alice was implying, that was a talent unique to Sita, that Alice would have held back if she had been Sita's one and only. "If I had had you, perhaps I would not now be carrying the children of the man I love, a blessing I would not give up, even though he lies dying right now in my ship."

"What I'm saying is," Alice said as she tenderly kissed Sita on the cheek, with some of the love that she would give Sita starting to bubble up to the surface, but in more of a chaste fashion than from a sexual need, "that your path lies in moving forward. The past is part of you, but it does not define you. You loved me once and set me on a better path. I believe you are doing the same for these other women. Just, focus on preparing for the battle for now, defend them fiercely if the fighting gets to your house, and then really take the time to love. Them! Not a ghost of what might have been. Do you understand?"

"There is something else...something I realize I needed to explain, but something that involves some pain for me. I only recently came to this understanding thanks to Kate- you're really going to like her if you get to meet her- about a month ago, while doing research on the potential uses of Darkness to quietly move about the city of Wilfarne...as I once did in Radiant when I wanted to protect someone I loved. It turns out that I can project and transform parts of my body temporarily for various purposes, and what I didn't realize was that, before I could even consciously do this, I was putting a piece of my heart, of my soul in my hair to..." She trailed off, stuck on how to say this next part.

But then, in a process that stunned Alice by defying even her (perhaps even Kate's) strong understanding of the Darkness, the hair in the frame turned liquid, emerged from the frame, which Alice dropped on the floor in astonishment, and then turned into a literal shadow- of who Alice was when Sita took her in and reminded her of what love was. Of the kind of love that had stewed in her breast during the few days that she and Sita spent together. That part must have been what Alice cut out when she realized that she needed to go back out into the world to protect others, even at the cost of herself.

For there would never be an end to what Alice had to face, but there might be a new beginning, the shade seemed to say as it danced around Sita, telling the story of the conflict brewing in Alice's heart better than even the eloquent detective could in the light.

"If it was dark...if there was no one around...if there was no war, no Jareth, no Chloe...then I, that part she left behind, would return to her. Her hair would grow, her heart would return to what it once was, and so would many other things. She left me behind to watch over you, to fill you with a sense of peace. That you were loved. You chose to ignore that." Alice tried to object, but her shade continued, "Stop feeling sorry for yourself, because I will wrap around you. I will be a cloak of great, dark power that will allow you to leave this cursed place, for a time anyway. What you choose to do with that is up to you. But if I ever leave your body for good, it is because her husband, her Jareth has died...and she and Chloe agree that Alice will need another father for her children in his stead, lest her whole heart break."

Alice was breaking down too much from the stress of it all, and she ended up walking in the crowded streets who were gathering to see an epic shouting match between two women with incredible, powerful voices, only to see the two of them immediately spring to Alice's side and hug her as she cried. In the absence of Sita's direct love, then, it seemed that a bond had been established between lovers thrown apart from her by cruel circumstance. As all that happened, the cloak of the piece of Alice’s heart that loved Sita wrapped itself around the vampire’s shoulders.