The Airship Lost Campaign, A Divine Blood Story by Branwen Gillen
Adventures of the Twin Tails
The Airship Lost Campaign, A Divine Blood Story by Branwen Gillen
No, no, no, no, no…
It’s ok, I’m here.
Something’s wrong. I’m not supposed to be like this.
I know. It’ll be ok, I know what we can do…
#
“I hate you, Yukimura!” Setsuko screeched at the top of her lungs, flinging two kunai at her de facto husband’s head.
Yukimura Hayato squeaked, ducking behind the doorframe moments before the throwing knives whizzed through the air where his head had been before embedding themselves in the hallway wall opposite. “Why do you hate ME?”
“This is all your fault!” she shouted back, whipping her tails at him as she wheezed through another contraction.
“Oh, no, don’t peg this one on me,” he replied, gingerly peeking around the corner, “you got yourself into this all by yourself!”
“You said you’d take responsibility!”
“For the child, yes!”
“Setsuko!” Dr. Minoru snapped. “It’s a bit early to be making foreplay! Concentrate and breathe, please!”
“Don’t think this is over! I’ll remember this, Hayato!” Setsuko snarled one final time before getting to the business at hand.
“Don’t I know it,” he sighed, wiping his brow. Walking over to the kunai, he had to grip them with two hands to pull them out of the wall. “Where the hell does she hide these things, anyway?”
Looking over at the two old men smiling beatifically at him from the bench next to the main entrance of the Yukimura family home, their bushy orange tails waggling excitedly, he shook his head. Walking over to hang the kunai on his coat rack, he tried to ignore Setsuko’s screaming and cursing. Not much I can do in there but get in the way or get stabbed, he thought to himself, bewildered and overcome.
Setsuko, the three-tailed kunoichi, his wife. A retired warrior, too stubborn for her own good. He asked himself again what a woman like that saw in the single-tailed accountant son of a rice farmer. She didn’t need him to provide for her child… their child, he corrected himself. Again, he resigned himself to never knowing.
The sound of a baby crying snapped him out of it but it was the short, sharp, cry of Dr. Minoru and set him running. Bursting through the doorway, he found the doctor standing a few feet away from the bed, staring at the baby. Hayato also stared at the tiny little girl, lying on her back with her arms and legs curled, little hands balled into fists. “Doctor?”
“Is something wrong?” Setsuko asked.
Dr. Minoru shook herself out of it, stepping forward to grab the swaddling clothes but remaining strangely quiet. “Doctor!” Hayato snapped, kneeling next to the baby to look at her.
“Nothing’s wrong,” Dr. Minoru finally said. “Hayato, you can help me.”
Hayato gasped, seeing what was wrong the moment the doctor picked the little girl up. At the base of her spine, she had two tiny, cute, wiggling, stubs. Once she was swaddled, he cradled her in his arms and sat gently down on the edge of the bed next to his wife. Setsuko was still white and sweating, but she managed a smile, reaching up to tickle the girl’s cheek with her pinky. “Hey, little one, what’d you do to get the doctor and my silly husband upset?”
Hayato glanced at Dr. Minoru. “Uh, it’s not important…” He stopped the moment his wife frowned. Whipping her hand out, she grabbed his ear and twisted. “OW! OW! OW! Honey, you’re hurting me!”
“What are you not saying, Hayato?” she asked sweetly.
“She’s got two tails!” he finally said, giving in. “She’s already got two tails!”
Her fingers went limp as her eyes widened.
“I’ll… go…” Dr. Minoru murmured. “The elders will want to know her name.”
“Amaya,” Setsuko told her, “Yukimura Amaya.”
#
“A two-tailed baby!” Nakamura Kuro, town elder, exclaimed, pacing the council chambers. His four tails swished around him in agitation.
Kato Shinobu tutted over her knitting. “You’ll wear a hole in the carpet, Kuro,” she admonished, “calm down.”
Feeling childish, he finally stopped. “This is beyond anything in my experience! How does such a thing happen?”
Dr. Minoru shrugged. “I don’t know, I’ve never heard of anything like it. I’ve left a message with my old teacher, confidentially of course.”
“I’ll say what nobody else here wants to,” Yoshida Riku interrupted. “What if the child is already Kumiho?”
Shinobu sighed and threw her knitting down into her lap. “Think before you say things, Riku! How would that even work?”
“I’m old enough to know better than to trust every outsider that comes into our village!” he snapped back. “What do we know about Setsuko? She turned up in our village, claiming to be a retired Psyche agent, shacked up with my great-grandson in our ancestral home no less and decided to have a child of her own flesh and blood rather than his! Humph! In better times, she’d already be out on her ear.”
“Your own gripe with Setsuko aside,” Kuro growled, “she had the proper papers from Psyche. And, this has nothing to do with baby Amaya. I’ll need some proof before we start throwing the word ‘Kumiho’ around so casually.”
“I’m saying she could have fed her child a soul or two,” Riku said. “Or maybe the child is some wretched abomination trying to trick us. We can’t ignore the prophesy of the Ten-Tails…”
Shinobu snorted. “Really? We’re going to bring up ancient legends too, now? Shall we prepare bomb shelters just in case the hundred-and-one calamities strikes this year? It hasn’t for the last ten millennia, maybe it’s due any day now.”
Riku scowled at her, folding his arms across his chest. “I’m warning everyone, woman,” he said, pointing one of his five tails at her accusingly. “I won’t let this village be destroyed over one little wailing brat!”
“Has the baby done anything to merit such a reaction?” Shinobu asked Minoru calmly. Minoru shook her head. “See, Riku dear? Why don’t you calm down until this becomes an actual emergency?”
“I agree with Shinobu,” Kuro said, “let’s calm down and wait. We need more information and, if the child is somehow malevolent, it shall become apparent in due time.”
“Don’t say I didn’t warn the two of you,” Riku grumbled.
#
Hayato dashed from door to door, window to window, checking locks. He cursed the thin rice paper doors of his ancestral family home. Why couldn’t he have bought a nice, modern, home with a nice, modern security system. Maybe gun turrets and electric fences too.
Setsuko hummed to herself happily as she played with little Amaya, deftly arranging her new diaper while holding safety pins in her teeth. “Husband, why don’t you settle yourself and have some tea?”
Pausing mid-dash down the hallway, he glared at her, aghast. “Need I remind you that there’s an unruly mob of townsfolk led by ‘bring back the noose’ Riku carrying torches coming up the road?”
“I know, seriously, who uses torches in the current age?” Setsuko scoffed. “They’re really going to have problems setting this old place ablaze unless they have some kind of accelerant.”
“Did you hear me? They could be coming to kill us! And Amaya!”
Finishing the diaper, Setsuko made sure little Amaya was gurgling happily to herself before turning to her husband. Reaching up, she cradled his cheeks in her hands and kissed him on the nose. “Honey, if they want to try to do that, there’s not much we can do about it now. If you really want to help, remain calm, greet them when they arrive and remind them that I’ll kill anyone who steps across your threshold tonight.”
Her smile was the scariest thing Hayato had ever seen.
Nakamura Kuro was puffing when he threw open the front door and let out a surprised chirp when a kunai embedded itself into the doorframe next to his head, ducking for cover. “Setsuko! It’s me, Kuro! I came running as soon as I could!”
Hayato ran over to help the old Kitsune up to his feet. “I’m sorry, elder, my wife is a little on edge.”
“Pardon me, elder,” Setsuko said, giving him a curt bow before returning to care for Amaya.
“Riku’s riled up most of the village,” Kuro informed Hayato as the younger man helped him to the bench. “Nobody knows how or why Amaya was born with two tails and they’re assuming the worst, as always. You should take your wife and child and run, at least until this blows over.”
“Have you met my wife?” Hayato chuckled, trying to put a brave face on for the elder. “If you want to try to convince her to run with Amaya, be my guest.”
Kuro looked to the doorway from which Setsuko’s merry humming could be heard. “Is she all right?”
“I ask that a lot myself,” Hayato admitted, “but I wouldn’t have married her if I didn’t have faith that she knows what she’s doing.”
“Then what are you going to do?”
Hayato shrugged. “What my wife says, go out there and have a chat.”
Helping the old man up again, Hayato lent him a hand as they walked out onto the front porch. The torches were plainly visible, bobbing as their bearers tromped down the road towards them. It wasn’t until they were a few feet from the gate that Riku noticed the two men and called the mob to a halt. “Kuro? Get out of there! We’re taking Amaya into custody!”
“Eh, sorry sir but my wife may have something to say about that,” Hayato called back, scratching the back of his head.
“Shush, boy! Get down from there this instant!”
“What? Why? You’re all free to come in if you like,” Hayato said, casually picking some wax out of his ear. “I can’t promise that you’ll be able to leave, though. I’m not the strongest guy in this village and some of you look way too heavy for me. Besides, what are you going to do, great-grandfather? Burn down our ancestral home?”
“Better one house than a whole village!”
“You’re right! What’s one house of many? One parent of many? One baby of many? Why bring the whole village with you when just one child-killer would do?”
Several members of the mob shifted uncomfortably. “We’re not here to hurt the baby!” Riku insisted. “We’re going to put it where it can’t hurt anyone!”
“It? Where do you get off calling Amaya an ‘it’?” Hayato demanded. “Taking a child from her mother, you should all be ashamed of yourselves!”
“Even if she’s just an innocent, somehow, she’s a risk to all of us! If the other races discover our secret...” Riku left the threat hanging unspoken.
Hayato was about to reply when a burning yellow streak shot over the mountains, arcing down to impact in his front garden with enough force to shake the patio. Once the dust cleared, a small blonde figure leapt forward, hugging Hayato fiercely. “HAYATO! Look at you, all fatherly and grown up now!”
Frozen, Hayato cringed away from the far-too familiar thirteen-year-old girl. “Uh, do I know you?”
Jumping up, she lightly smacked the back of his head. “Oh, silly! Of course not! We’ve never met before!”
Riku trudged forward, kicking in the gate to clear his path. “Now what the hell is this? Who are you?”
Stepping to the edge of the porch, the girl’s amber aura blazed to life, a halo of nine tails emerging from her form accompanied by a peal of thunder. “I am Yakyou, Setsuko’s master and Godmother of Yukimura Amaya.”
The entire mob took a step back as Riku’s face turned white. “Yakyou? The Uncounted Calamities?”
Smiling, Yakyou leant forward, reaching out to pat the old man on the cheek. “You’ve gotten old, Riku. Why don’t you go yell at some clouds or something?”
“Sensei, is that you?” Setsuko asked placidly, holding Amaya in her arms as she stepped out onto the porch. Yakyou span about with an excited yip, skipping over to coo over the baby girl. “Awwww, she’s so cute!”
Amaya giggled, reaching out to grab Yakyou’s finger in her iron grip. “That’s right, I’m your Godmother, little one,” Yakyou told her earnestly, “we’re going to have so much fun together!”
Hayato felt a chill go down his spine.
Kuro coughed. “Great Yakyou, maybe you can clear something up for us on the matter of Amaya.”
Yakyou’s left ear flattened to the side of her head while her right cocked up curiously. “Oh?”
“How can it be that a Kitsune could be born with two tails?”
“Ooooooh, is that what this is all about?” Yakyou glanced at the mob still fidgeting beyond the fence. “Wow, have you all really forgotten so much of our history here in the sticks? That’s easy, it just happens.”
Riku spluttered. “But how? It can’t ‘just happen’, she’s two people!”
Yakyou held her face with her free hand for a moment. “You’re lucky my therapist is trying to get me to cut down on massacres. Sometimes, like every other species, Kitsune are conceived as twins. Even more rarely, those twins become so synchronised with one another that they merge, not into a single body and soul such as occurs in humans, but as twin-tailed foxes.”
Murmurs broke out through the mob. Several shouted angrily before dousing their torches to stalk back down the hill. “No! Wait!” Riku called out desperately as his support crumbled. “She’s still a danger to the entire village! What will the rest of them do if they learn about the merger?”
“I came here to protect my own against a Kumiho!” someone shouted angrily.
Kuro stepped forward. “Please, all of you return to your homes! I understand that you have your concerns and I promise that they will be addressed in legal counsel. There is no danger here, please leave this happy family in peace!”
Once the mob was dispersed, Kuro picked Riku up off the grown and hoisted the old man’s arm over his shoulder. “Come on, you old fool,” Kuro sighed, “let’s go get drunk together, like in the old days.”
While the women chatted excitedly as they moved back into the warmth inside and the elders began the long trek down the hill, Hayato felt the tension drain out of him, sinking into a curled heap on the porch. “What did I do to earn a life with this much excitement?” he asked the empty air plaintively.
“Get back here this instant, Akiko!” Ikeda Rokurou screeched, chasing the six-year-old twin-tails as she ran atop the fence, clutching a bushel of apples to her chest.
Akiko! Please stop! Amaya cried while her sister giggled compulsively.
“Don’t be such a stick-in-the-mud, Amaya!” Akiko chided, swishing her white tails as if the wind would give her an extra boost. “It’s just a few apples! Rokurou’s got a whole orchard!”
“How do you think I earn a living?” Rokurou puffed.
“Ok, old man, here,” Akiko said, throwing an apple over her shoulder. The apple landed underneath Rokurou’s foot and the farmer catapulted face-first into the dirt. Akiko continued to laugh as she hopped down off the end of the fence and slipped into the underbrush.
Akiko, that was mean, Amaya accused her sister.
“Eh, a farmer shouldn’t be so out of shape, he needed the exercise. Besides, I didn’t hear you complaining when I suggested we climb up and nab a few of these beauties.”
I was hungry, Amaya muttered, and I thought we’d only take one or two, not a whole bushel. Besides, you know Rokurou’s just going to make father pay for all this, then we’ll really be in trouble.
Akiko settled under a bush and took a bite out of one of the apples. It was delicious. “Mmmm, I’ll say this for him, Rokurou grows some nice fruit. Don’t worry, sis, Dad’s a soft touch. Just flash him the doe-eyes, you know he can’t resist those.”
A large hand shot through the bushes, grabbing Akiko by the scruff of and hoisting her out of her hiding spot screeching and kicking. “Care to repeat that, Akiko?” Hayato growled, farmer Rokurou a few steps behind him.
“Um, no,” Akiko said before retreating back into Amaya’s subconscious. Her hair and fur darkened to blue-black with ice-coloured tips on her ears and tails and Amaya found herself facing her father’s angry red glare.
“Father! I’m sorry,” Amaya squeaked. “I only meant to take one!”
Hayato snarled. “Oh, no you don’t, you’re not getting out of this one, Akiko! Get back out here this instant!”
Yeah, no, that’s not happening, Akiko scoffed.
“She’s not going to come out, Dad,” Amaya admitted sheepishly, flinching away from his wrath.
Scowling in frustration, Hayato let Amaya down gently. “All right, just gather those up, give them back to Rokurou and say you’re sorry. I’ll pay for any that were ruined but you’re in a great deal of trouble, young lady!”
“Yes, Dad.”
Yes, Dad, Akiko mocked.
Amaya slapped herself on the side of the head.
Ow! That hurts both of us, you know!
#
“I can’t keep dealing with this,” Hayato ranted as he paced the living room floor. His wife was placidly sewing, repairing a hole in one of Akiko’s short kimonos. “Every day she’s causing trouble!”
“She’s a spirited young girl,” Setsuko agreed, “much like I was at her age.”
“Times have changed,” he grumbled, “the Community doesn’t need kunoichi anymore. The two of them are so different, how did they ever synchronize?”
“Amaya might be more level-headed but don’t think for a moment’s she’s blameless,” Setsuko said. “If she wants something, all she has to do is plant the idea in Akiko’s head.”
“This is all Yakyou’s fault,” he accused, waggling his finger at his wife. “I should never have agreed to let her into our daughter’s lives.”
“Sensei Yakyou can be difficult but believe me when I say that there’s meaning behind her apparent madness. I genuinely think she can help us.”
“Oh, no! Not again! Not after last time! Kyo’s cats haven’t been the same! I’m not going to let that perfidious, antisocial, sociopathic, immoral, lecherous, evil witch anywhere near our daughters ever again!”
There was a long pause as Setsuko stared flatly at him, her three tails braiding themselves together as the awkward silence continued.
“You’ve already called her, haven’t you?” Hayato asked.
Setsuko nodded, her ears bobbing slightly with the motion.
“And she’s standing right behind me, isn’t she?”
His wife nodded again.
Slowly turning his head, Hayato felt sweat trickle from his brow. “Yakyou! What a pleasant surprise!”
Before he could go any further, Yakyou kicked him in the face, sending him sprawling across the floor. “I heard everything you said, you little weasel!” Yakyou growled, flaring with bright amber light as her nine tails swished angrily, one hand balled into a tiny fist.
“Pardon him, Sensei,” Setsuko apologized while she picked her husband off the ground. “He’s merely concerned for our daughter’s welfare.”
She harrumphed, folding her arms across her chest. “I keep telling you, there’s nothing wrong with Amaya and Akiko. They’re just a bit precocious. Of course, if you’d let me train them…”
“No, I’m not just going to hand my daughter over to your ‘training from hell’!” Hayato said, stomping his foot. “The world has changed and the Community has changed with it, like it or not. Our daughter has to live in this new world and learn its rules but even Kuro is worried that we won’t be able to keep the Kitsune’s secret for much longer. If Amaya or Akiko make a mistake, they could be blamed for the consequences.”
“Kitsune only merge with willing people,” Yakyou countered. “Kumiho are criminals, plain and simple.”
“Sensei,” Setsuko interrupted. “We understand the ethics but you have to admit, the other races we share this world with won’t see it the same way. Also, I love my daughters dearly but would you trust a child with the responsibility of the merger? None of us know how long it might be before she’s ready to merge again, what if she rushes into it for all the wrong reasons?”
“Have you talked to Amaya and Akiko about this?” Yakyou asked. The two parents looked at each other guiltily. “Just as I thought. If you don’t mind, I’m going to go play with my goddaughters for a little while.”
Leaving Hayato and Setsuko to argue, Yakyou gnawed her lower lip as she crept through the house, following her life-force sense to Amaya’s bedroom. The little dark-haired girl was busy playing with her dolls, though her ears were flattened and slightly droopy, indicating sadness. Closing the door behind her, Yakyou skipped over to her goddaughter’s side and sat cross-legged next to her. “Awesome! What are we playing?”
Amaya smiled despite herself. “Witches and monster hunters. The heroic witches have trapped a mob of murderous hunters who’ve kidnapped an innocent vampyre.” She paused for a moment before flinging herself into Yakyou’s arms, unable to hold back her tears.
“There, there,” the nine-tailed kitsune stroked her goddaughter’s hair comfortingly. “What’s wrong?”
“Akiko’s not talking to me,” she sobbed, “and the village is talking about sealing her away. I don’t want her to leave, it’s not fair to keep her locked away.”
Yakyou sighed. “Akiko? Come on out, auntie’s here.”
Amaya’s sniffling stilled as her hair turned from black to white, the tips of her ears and tails flaring scarlet. Pulling away from her godmother, Akiko wiped the tears away and crossed her arms defiantly. “I didn’t do anything really bad this time, I don’t know what the fuss is about.”
“Me either,” Yakyou agreed, scratching the back of her head. “Best thing I can say is that your parents are scared for you. That you might hurt yourself. As for the rest of the village, they’re a bunch of spineless wimps.”
“You think Mum and Dad will let us go train with you?” Akiko asked hopefully.
Oh, please, can we? Amaya echoed hopefully.
“I think that’d be for the best but I doubt either your parents or the village will agree that’s the best thing for you,” Yakyou sighed. “Being the Uncounted Calamities has a downside. You know my training will be harsh, don’t you? I’m not an easy mark like your father and I’m not going to be as soft on you as your mother will be.”
I don’t think a teacher should be soft on their students, Amaya said. And we don’t really get along with the other kids at school. Most of them can’t even do illusions or change yet. Plus they get creeped out with Akiko and I being two people.
“I see,” Yakyou grumbled. “I’ll have a talk with your parents and old man Kuro and see what I can do. Besides, we’ve got a vampyre to save!”
#
“The council has decided,” Kuro sighed heavily as he sat down with Hayato and Setsuko. Yakyou was dozing in the sunlight on the porched, curled up inside her bright yellow nest of tails. “Akiko is to be sealed at least until Amaya comes of age.”
“I was afraid of this,” Setsuko said. “However, Akiko is also my child and I don’t think this is the best for her. The council is dictating what is expedient for the village, not the best for her.”
“It is my opinion, after reviewing the reports from her teachers and the many police reports, that Akiko is as much a danger to Amaya as she is to herself or the other children. Naturally, the elder’s ongoing concerns about Akiko exposing the secret of the merger to the Community at large is also a heavy factor in our decision. I’m sorry but if your family is to remain here…”
Kuro paused as Yakyou stirred. When the nine-tailed kitsune failed to awaken or move, he breathed a sigh of relief.
“I’m sorry, Setsuko, I have to agree with the council’s decision,” Hayato said.
“You can’t think this is the best for her,” Setsuko replied. “What will happen to her personality if she’s sealed? Amaya will grow up without her and when the seal is removed, she’ll still be a six-year-old girl.”
“Amaya will be strong enough to maintain control then,” Hayato asserted. “She’s the more level-headed of the two anyway. She’ll be sad to lose her sister for a while but it won’t be forever.”
“Setsuko,” Kuro said, “one retired warrior to another, you know that sometimes we must make sacrifices for the good of the many. I don’t like this either, not one bit, but your daughters are a problem that we need to solve. Sealing Akiko is risky and, even though I’ve been asked to lead the ceremony, I admit that I’m not sure what the outcome of the ritual will be. If you were to choose to flee the village with Amaya and Akiko, I would understand.”
Yakyou sat up suddenly, startling the three kitsune inside. Drowsily rubbing her eyes, she rolled inside, springing up into a cross-legged sitting position like a spring-loaded board. “You’re all a bunch of morons,” she observed sleepily.
“Please stay out of this,” Hayato grumbled, “we’re Amaya’s parents, it’s our right to decide what’s best for her.”
“What’s best for her or what’s best for yourself?” Yakyou asked, turning to spit onto the tatami mat beside her. The spittle smoked and fizzled as it ate its way through the woven straw. “Maybe now you idiots will listen to my proposal. Let me take Amaya and Akiko on as my student. Setsuko can vouch for me.”
Setsuko looked away from Yakyou as all eyes turned towards her. Taking a deep breath, but unable to look her master in the eye, Setsuko shook her head. “I’m sorry, Sensei, but I don’t want my daughter to have the life I endured. I retired to the village to leave that life behind.”
“Is that what John wants?”
“Yes,” she said, finally turning to look Yakyou in the eyes.
“So you’re happy sacrificing your daughter for your own happiness too,” Yakyou accused, her eyes narrowing. “You disappoint me.”
A heavy silence fell over the group. Hayato took his wife’s hand to comfort her. “It’s ok, we’re doing the right thing for Akiko,” he reassured her, glaring at Yakyou. “No matter what she thinks.”
Yakyou smiled viciously, showing off tiny fangs. “You’re a brave man, Yukimura Hayato. Stupid, but brave. Perhaps stupidly brave, or maybe just stupid. No, wait, I’m right. It’s just that last one. Do you really think you can seal Akiko away safely, Kuro?”
Kuro wiped his brow. “Yes.”
“How reassuring,” Yakyou purred. “Well, it looks like none of you need me anymore. Don’t come crying to me when you find you’ve broken your pet and she’ll hate you for the rest of her life.”
With that, Yakyou disappeared. Kuro held his breath as he swiped his hand through the air where she’d been sitting a moment before. “Is she really gone, Setsuko?” Kuro asked.
“I-I don’t know,” Setsuko sobbed. “She’s never done that to me before.”
“It’s ok,” Hayato reassured his wife, hugging her while looking at Kuro. “We’re better off without her. Right, Kuro?”
Looking down at his feet, Kuro wondered if they were really doing the right thing. But he nodded, just to reassure the couple.
#
Amaya was sobbing as Setsuko led her into the middle of the circle, hugging her doll. “It’s going to be ok, all right Amaya? Elder Kuro is just going to let Akiko sleep for a while.”
“Akiko doesn’t want to sleep, Mum. Please don’t,” Amaya begged.
Forcing a smile, feeling sick to the stomach, Setsuko knelt and kissed her on the forehead. “Don’t worry, she’ll be back with you before you know it.”
Kuro was sweating as he checked and triple-checked his circle. Elders Shinobu and Riku stood nearby with Hayato, who was frowning.
“Please stop,” Amaya continued to beg as her mother stepped out of the circle. “Akiko promises she won’t be bad anymore!”
“I’m sorry, Amaya,” Kuro said, sinking into a cross-legged position in front of her. “We’re not doing this to punish you or Akiko. The world’s a dangerous place and we’re doing this to protect you, so you can stay in the village and be safe.”
With that, Kuro clapped his hands together, closing his eyes to focus. “Just stay still, Amaya,” Setsuko told her daughter as the circle around her began to glow.
Amaya looked down at her doll, then up to her mother, across to her father and then at elder Kuro’s face screwed up in concentration. “No!” she cried out, hurling her doll directly into Kuro’s face. The circle’s energy crackled as Kuro’s chant slipped, snapping the elder out of his trance. “Amaya!” He cried out, reaching out but unable to move from his full lotus as the magic of the circle raged out of control. Setsuko was faster, reaching out to grab Amaya. Amber lightning arced from the circle the moment the tip of her finger crossed the threshold, throwing her across the room.
“Mommy!” Amaya called, turning around to see lightning crackling all around her. “No! Amaya! Stand still, honey!” Hayato snapped, caught between caution and leaping to his daughter’s aid. “Kuro! Drain the life force from the circle!”
“I can’t!” Kuro called out in horror, sweat trickling down the lines of his face. “There’s too much!”
Setsuko rolled onto her hands and knees, coughing. “If you don’t do it, old man, I will!”
“It’ll kill you!”
Hayato looked into his wife’s eyes and knew that look. “No!”
Reeling to her feet, Setsuko set herself, determined to run straight ahead and have the energy of the circle ground out through her. Hayato might anticipate what she was about to do, but she was still faster. Closing her eyes, she leapt forward. The circle exploded, throwing Kuro, Hayato and the other elders along with Setsuko back against the wall. “Amaya!” Setsuko shouted, coughing as she crawled toward the small crater. As the smoke and dust cleared, Setsuko’s eyes widened. Standing next to her daughter, both completely unscathed, was her master, Yakyou.
“Ugh, I’m done cleaning up your messes for you, Setsuko,” Yakyou griped, brushing dust off of her kimono.
“Sensei!” Setsuko cried, the word bursting from her throat along with her tension. “Thank you, Sensei.”
Amaya hugged Yakyou’s leg tight, burying her head in her godmother’s kimono. “Amaya,” Hayato called out to her, reaching out for her hand. “It’s ok, come here.”
Shaking her head emphatically, she shied away from her father, still clinging to Yakyou. The nine-tailed fox smirked. “I don’t think she’s going to trust you for a bit, Hayato,” she said, shrugging. “Why don’t you leave her alone for a bit?”
Hayato slumped, sinking to his knees. Kuro scrabbled over to bow in front of her. “Great Yakyou, I’m sorry. I wasn’t skilled enough to perform the sealing spell. Please, I beg your help!”
Yakyou scowled. “Really? After all this, you’re still set on this course?”
“What else can we do?” Hayato protested. “You might be older and more powerful than all of us, but we’re not like you. We need other people around us, people we can relate to. People we can work with to make something better and live in peace. Would you have all of us leap from conflict to conflict like you do? Never have a place to rest our heads? You don’t understand normal people at all anymore!”
“You’re pushing it, lunch meat,” Yakyou growled, her voice inhuman. “Distain me as much as you want, I’m the only person here who could save your child.”
“If you wanted to help, you could have done the sealing spell yourself!”
“Except that I find your plan immoral,” she retorted. “Amaya and Akiko both want to train with me, surely that’s a better solution than this madness.”
“No! I love my daughters, I won’t let you turn them into soldiers like you did with Setsuko!”
“And so you’ll attempt the sealing again? Even without me?”
Gulping, Hayato drew himself to his full height, resolute. “Yes. It’s the best thing for my daughter.”
Yakyou scowled, looking down at the wide-eyed Amaya. “If you insist on doing this, you leave me no choice. I will do as you ask but I have terms.”
“Name them.”
“I will seal both Amaya and Akiko,” Yakyou said, “until they come of age. Obviously neither you nor Setsuko can handle the responsibility of a child, and you won’t abdicate that responsibility to me. Therefore, you will send them away. The village and I will help you pay for their schooling elsewhere. You can visit but someone else will raise your child, do you understand?”
Hayato dithered, scuffing his feat. “Your terms are too cruel…”
“You have no right to speak of cruelty to me!” Yakyou shouted, her eyes flaring amber. “Forcing your own child to shoulder your burdens!”
“Hayato, stop,” Setsuko interrupted them. “She’s right. Agree to her terms.”
“Setsuko,” Hayato gasped, “we can’t…”
“We’ve done enough,” she said, pulling herself to her feet. “This is the best compromise. When Amaya and Akiko are of age, they can decide their path for themselves. We’ve abdicated our right to choose for them.”
Amaya yanked on Yakyou’s kimono. “Auntie? Are you going to put Akiko to sleep?”
Yakyou looked down on the little girl and smiled. “No, sweetie. I’m going to put both of you to sleep. You’ll be someone else for a while and you won’t remember any of this but when you wake up, you and Akiko will be together. You’ll also share all your memories from until then. Does that sound so bad?”
Amaya shook her head. “No. We trust you, Auntie Yakyou.”
“Good girl. Now close your eyes, this will be over in a moment.”
Nodding, Amaya closed her eyes.
#
Ichiro stirred, shaking her head as she got up out of bed to find her father and mother sitting beside her bed. Heyato and Setsuko looks at each other dubiously. “Mum? Is something wrong?” Ichiro asked, getting a weird vibe.
“Are you all right, Ichiro?” Setsuko asked, taking her hand.
“Got a bit of a headache. What happened?”
“Nothing, son,” Hayato lied smoothly. “You just took a bad bump on your head but the doctor says you’ll be fine.”
“That’s good, I’m still sleepy.”
Mum squeezed her hand. “That’s ok,” she said, “you can sleep. In the morning we have to talk to you about your new school. There’s a… scholarship the village is offering to Bravura Academy in Australia. If you need anything, we’ll be right in the next room.”
“Ok,” she said, the apparently human boy turning over to lie on her side before drifting off.
Outside, Hayato and Setsuko stared at each other for a long moment. “Hayato, I…” Setsuko began but she was cut off by a wave of Hayato’s hand. “No, I know what you’re going to say. I love you and I think we both need to be there for… Ichiro,” he said, finding it hard to wrap his mouth around the name. “But I can’t help but feel like I’m a failure as a parent. And I don’t think I can sleep next to you, knowing what I did. I’m going to take the couch for a while.”
“We did what we thought was right.”
“Did we?” he asked, brow furrowed. “I think you were trying to do the right thing. I’m not so sure I was. In the end, it’s like we just gave her up. I need to sleep on it. We both need to sleep on it.”
Agreeing, the couple went to separate rooms, to separate beds, not fully realizing that they wouldn’t be sleeping with each other ever again.
“All right,” Mrs. Brockhurst called from the cockpit of the squat ZX-P79 upright. “I’m about to turn the ignition, Ichiro. Keep an eye on that pressure gage.”
“Roger, ma’am!” Ichiro called back cheerfully from between the upright’s legs. The ZX-P79 was thirty-three years old, built by a now defunct Chinese car manufacturer that had styled it to look like a cross between a workman’s van and something out of a 70’s sci-fi movie. The squat design, wide stance and low centre of gravity got around early upright’s problems with instability in a construction environment but made it slow and ponderous. Surprisingly strong spindly arms could unfold from the sides with a variety of attachments to aid in lifting and carrying loads safely. Altogether, it looked like a head with stubby arms and legs, combined with the sheer number of jury rigged repairs forced upon it, it’d earned the nickname Gremlin many times over. Unfortunately, the chassis was starting to rust, the panelling was dented to hell and rubber tubes were getting harder to replace. It wouldn’t be long before the school would have to scrap her, so this year’s school festival was probably her last ride.
Gremlin puffed to life, motors revving fitfully as a gout of black smoke coughed into the workshop, rising to linger under the tin roof like a storm cloud. Ichiro watched the pressure gage for the leg hydraulics rise towards the red bar. “Pumps are working,” she shouted to Mrs. Brockhurt over the noise. “It’s inching towards the redline but seems to be slowing down.”
A sudden rattle made Ichiro wince. “Hang on! We’ve got a loose fitting somewhere!” Checking the rubber pipes that snaked down the leg behind the knee, she found the loose fitting. “It’s ok, I’ve got it!”
“Do you need me to shut down?”
“No, I’ve got this,” Ichiro said confidently, drawing a wrench from her toolbelt. Taking a deep breath, she slipped the jaws of the wrench around the fitting, flicking the worm-screw several times to get a tight fit and slowly twisting the fitting clockwise. She wiped her brow when the rattling stopped. “Yes! I got it!”
Ichiro had a moment of relief before her gaze flicked over to the pressure gage which had just hit the redline. Gremlin’s orange hazard lights lit up the workshop as sirens bleared. Dogbiscuits, she thought just before the hose ruptured, hissing as oil sprayed across her face and overalls. “Ugh! I don’t got it,” she lamented, watching the pressure gage drop like a rock.
Mrs. Brockhurst powered down the upright before hopping off Gremlin to find Ichiro sorrowfully wiping her face on an oily rag. Slapping her on the back, she grinned. “Well, that’ll teach you to some caution in the future. No big deal, Mr. Yukimura, we’ll have to double-seal the fittings and maybe wrap some duct tape over the older hoses. Gremlin should be ready for the school festival parade by tomorrow.”
“Yeah,” Ichiro sighed, internally wincing at being called ‘mister’. Not that Mrs. Brockhurst could know better, she reminded herself. She wasn’t exactly open about being trans.
Absently wandering over to the garage door, Ichiro leant against the frame to take in the view. The garage sat atop a hill on the edge of campus, a long, flat, expanse of grassland, sporting fields and test tracks stretching out below. Beyond the fields was verdant bushland and sprawling townships spread across rolling hills. The sky seemed huge, high, white, clouds drifting leisurely overhead. A single skyfreighter could be seen near the horizon, headed south from Darwin to Alice Springs.
Ichiro felt an ice-cold stab in her back, which made her jump. Chuckling, Mrs. Brockhurst handed her the soft drink fresh from the fridge she’d just been poked with. “Drink up, you’re dehydrated. Can’t help it workin’ under the tin roof,” she said, sipping her own drink.
Nodding, Ichiro cracked the can open and took a sip, suddenly feeling the thirst she’d been ignoring during work. Mrs. Brockhurst, noting that the teacher was an inch shorter than her. It was easy to forget with her stocky frame and musculature, in her mind’s eye Ichiro always saw her as a giant. “Lovely view,” she commented with a smile. “One of the reasons I took this job at Bravura. Peace and quiet. Well, when we don’t have kick-ass racing power frames screeching around the track at a gazillion kilometres per hour.”
Ichiro put on a grin she didn’t really feel for her teacher. “Minaba thinks the prototype will be ready for trials by the end of the holidays. Well, assuming she’s out of hospital in time. Unfortunately, I won’t be here.”
“Oh? Family vacation?”
“Yeah,” Iichiro answered sheepishly. “First vacation time Mum’s gotten since, well, ever. Dad’s new book’s doing well, so we’re going to meet up in Tokyo and see if they can stand each other for a couple of months. Leaving for Darwin in the morning.”
“Hell of a thing to be caught between. Hoping they’ll get back together?”
“Not really,” Ichiro admitted. “Maybe back when I was younger, I wanted that. What I think I really wanted back then was stability but I can’t really remember a time when Mum and Dad weren’t fighting or looking guiltily at each other. I reckon something happened that they don’t want to tell me or talk out. Nah, they’re better off separated, some couples just aren’t meant to be.”
“Mature of you but at least they’re trying. What sort of books does your Dad write?”
“Marriage counselling and parenting guides.”
Her flat stare said everything she was thinking. “Aren’t you an only child?”
“Yep.”
“And you’ve been in boarding schools since…”
“Since I was six,” Ichiro finished for her. “Yeah.”
She shook her head and chuckled at the irony.
Finishing her soda, Ichiro glanced at the digital clock on the wall over the workshop office door. It was only quarter to four, plenty of time to get back to the dorm before curfew. Then realization struck her, her Community Studies class began in town at four and it was a twenty-minute ride. “Ah! I have to go!” Ichiro cried, unzipping her overalls while hopping towards her book bag as she attempted to get the legs over her boots. “Nakamura-sensei’s going to kill me if I’m late again! Sorry, I’ve got to go!”
Mrs. Brockhurst watched her with wry amusement as Ichiro scrambled to make sure she had everything she needed. Just as she was about to sprint out the door, the teacher threw her a set of keys. “Go on, borrow the scooter. And if you’re still late, tell Nakamura I kept you.”
Nodding in thanks, Ichiro grabbed the handles of the refurbished old Vespa from the corner of the workshop and kicked it into gear. “Thanks, Mrs. Brockhurst!” she yelled, waving behind her as she raced down the paved footpath and onto the road, wind whipping through her hair.
Ichiro tried to keep to the speed limit and not rush just in case but she still caught herself going too fast several times. The town of Vollstahl was a few hours south of Darwin, a relatively tiny, remote, town. The perfect home for Bravura Academy, boarding school for the weird and wonderful from psychics and mages to stranger people besides. Vollstahl also had a fair Community presence, though the existence of non-humans was still a secret to the world at large.
Community Studies was an extracurricular course designed to give kids with unusual backgrounds a grounding in the Community and its culture. The course was funded and run by the Psyche, a foundation dedicated to the advancement of the Community, and provided extra credit to Bravura Academy students. Nakamura-sensei looked down his nose over his glasses as Ichiro burst into the room, puffing. “Sorry, Sensei, Mrs. Brockhurst said to tell you we ran a little overtime working on Gremlin.”
He checked his watch. “Not at all, Yukimura, you’re right on time. But you’re still the last person to class, again. Take your seat.”
Ichiro flopped into her chair and pulled her notebook and pen out of her bag. Crystal gave her a withering look from where she sat to Ichiro’s left. “Undisciplined akira,” she mumbled low enough for her to ear but not the teacher. Ichiro sighed. Akira was a derogatory term for a psychic who didn’t bother training their talents. It wasn’t that Ichiro wasn’t interested in training her talent, there was just so much else she was doing. Motor shop, robotics club, home economics, cooking at the food stand, cosplay club, video games… Not enough time in the day. But to an overachiever like Crystal Eldred, a member of one of the Breholm families, Ichiro was the lowest scum.
“Well, since we have my fellow countryman here on time today, let’s take a look at a race synonymous with Japan today,” Nakamura-Sensei said, sitting casually on the edge of his desk. “Who can tell me anything about Kitsune?”
Crystal immediately put her hand up.
“Can anyone other than Crystal tell me anything about Kitsune?”
Sighing deeply, Ichiro raised her hand.
“What?” Crystal scoffed, genuinely surprised. “Put your hand down, you don’t know anything!”
A few of their classmates tittered. “Crystal,” Nakamura-sensei chided.
“But he never knows anything!”
“I am Japanese, remember?” Ichiro asked rhetorically. “Kitsune as a whole are strong supporters of the Community despite being enigmatic and reclusive. They tend to gather in exclusively kitsune villages in remote areas and are known to be skilled illusionists. They have variable morphology, some are more fox-like than others and have to use illusions to pass in human society. The older they get, the more tails they get with nine tails being the highest number on record. A good rule of thumb is that the more tails a kitsune has, the more dangerous and eccentric they are. They’re also known to be, um, promiscuous. Which is probably based on unsubstantiated rumours, kinda like the succubi.”
“Of course you were paying attention during the lecture on succubi,” Crystal grumbled. “Boys.”
“Sensei,” Holden called from the back of the room, “maybe Ichiro’s really a kitsune!” He got some snorts and chuckles for his effort.
“No,” Crystal turned to inform him. “Kitsune are powerful illusionists that can shape reality at their whim. Ichiro can barely create a realistic figment of a pencil.”
“Wow,” Ichiro mumbled. “Getting a little cold under all this shade.”
“Come on, illusions are just parlour tricks,” Holden said, snapping his fingers to spark a fire that he held in his palm. “It’s not like they control matter and energy.”
Crystal shrugged. “My father said that illusionists can be some of the most powerful life-force users and not to underestimate them. I assume he meant those that apply themselves.”
“All right, all right,” Nakamura-sensei said, “I think we can all lay off Ichiro now. Crystal’s father was right, illusionists can be very dangerous. Highly skilled illusionists can create objects out of their imagination that are as physically real as any object that we’re used to. Ichiro-kun, if you had to call out any one thing about the kitsune’s relationship with the Community, what would it be?”
Ichiro considered the question for a moment while trying to ignore Sensei calling her ‘Ichiro-kun’, a masculine suffix. “They’re a bit of a paradox. They are some of the strongest Community supporters, known for great compassion and violence when either is called for. They’re fun-loving and gregarious, yet they keep to themselves and hide behind their illusions. It’s not just the behaviour of the many-tailed kitsune that make people call them eccentric.”
“How do you know all this?” Crystal asked.
“My godmother’s a kitsune.”
Nakamura-sensei’s eyebrows shot up. “I didn’t know that. Did she teach you illusions?”
“No,” Ichiro shook her head. “Mum and Dad are human illusionists, my godmother taught my mother. Mum told me that she wanted to train me too but they got me into Bravura on a scholarship. I can’t even remember my godmother but I figured I should read up on her people, you know, just in case.”
“Maybe she should have trained you,” Crystal suggested.
“Hey,” Holden called out again, “are we sure Ichiro’s not a kitsune? His parents are illusionists, his godmother’s a kitsune and he could be using illusions to appear like anything he wanted, right?”
“I told you, he can’t even produce a believable illusion,” Crystal rebuked.
“But that’s the double-blind, isn’t it? Like, he could be a really great illusionist and appear completely human, even to touch, right?”
“Why would a powerful kitsune want to hang around a school? Surely they have better things to do.”
Ichiro grinned. “Oh, no, it’s better than that, Holden. Not only am I a nine-tailz, not only is my current form a mere illusion, all of you, the town and Bravura Academy are just my phantasms.”
Crystal glared at Ichiro flatly. “What?”
“Yes, I created this entire charade for my own personal amusement,” Ichiro declared. “All of you are merely puppets, dancing to my tune.”
Andrew on the opposite side of the room put up his hand. “Is that even possible?” he asked once Nakamura-sensei had acknowledged him.
“No!” Crystal interrupted sensei before he could say anything. “We’d know if we were phantasms! Can’t you tell he’s lying? He’s a terrible liar!”
Standing up, Ichiro stretched. “If you need me to prove my power, Crystal, then I will.” Sweeping her gaze over the rest of the students, she stretched out one arm in a grand gesture. “You, Robert.”
He blinked. “What? Call me Bob, damnit!”
“Am I accurate in saying that you would never kiss me in your entire life?”
“Ew!”
“Not even on the cheek?”
“Hell no!”
“Then I compel you to come here and kiss me on the cheek! Obey me, my puppet!”
Bob struggled a little like he didn’t want to get up but some force was making him stand. Extending his cheek towards the boy, Ichiro struggled to maintain her composure as Bob approached step by laboured step, puckered his lips and laid a kiss on her cheek.
Ichiro immediately ducked under the table as Bob picked up her chair and tried to brain her with it.
#
Bob’s fist hit Ichiro’s shoulder with a dull thud. “Ow,” Ichiro said, chuckling so hard that she barely felt any pain, “gomen, gomen… I’m sorry.”
“I don’t kiss girls,” Bob growled, “but I guess the look on Crystal’s face was worth it. Plus one of your cooked dinners for free. I came this close to getting detention, Ichiro.”
They were assembled in the dorm room kitchen while Ichiro was busy preparing meals for a small army of ravenous teenagers. As one of the school’s star cooks, Ichiro was able to make a little money playing dorm mum when she wasn’t working at the food stand. All the profits went into her savings, genetic modification treatments weren’t cheap. “I’m sorry,” Ichiro apologized again, casually flipping an omelette, “I couldn’t help it and you were the only person I thought would go with the prank. Sensei didn’t give you detention? I’d go confess if it’d help.”
“Nah, Nakamura just gave me a warning. He twigged to the prank and let it go, said something about Crystal and the others needing to learn to pay attention.”
“A sensitive would probably be able to tell what was an illusion, even if it was a phantasm,” Ichiro mused.
“You surprised the shit out of me. You are a terrible liar, you know. Besides, that kind of thing isn’t your style.”
“Guess they pushed a little too far.”
“I think Crystal’s got the hots for you.”
Ichiro snorted. “She hates my guts.”
“Hey, my dad says that if a girl treats you like dirt, they like you.”
“Your dad’s been married four times,” Ichiro observed. Finishing up the omelette, she plated it, gave it some garnish and put it in front of him.
“He also knew I was gay when he told me that,” Bob sighed as he picked up his fork and began to eat. “How the fuck do you get this so fuckin’ fluffy?”
“Practice,” Ichiro said, shrugging. “I hope you all can feed yourselves without me.”
“Wait, you’re leaving? For the whole holidays?” he asked, horror in his eyes.
“Yep, you’re all going to have to learn to fend for yourselves. Oh, who the hell am I kidding, you’ll all gain thirty kilograms from all the fast food by the time I get back. And the dorm will look like someone dropped a bomb in here. I just hope you all remember to shower.”
He didn’t argue.
“Ugh, what you got in here, kid?” the bus driver asked, barely able to hoist Ichiro’s luggage out from the belly of the bus.
Ichiro shrugged, whipping her scarf around her neck despite the heat. “Clothes, couple of books, a few tools, sewing supplies, my ceramic cooking knives…”
“Crikey, planning to get dropped off on some desert island?” he joked.
“I like to keep busy,” Ichiro said defensively as she hefted the handle and began pulling the heavy case behind her. “Thanks for the ride, sir.”
“Have a good one, kid!”
The Sol Suna hovered far above the Skydock Terminal of Darwin International Airport. Vaguely whale-shaped, the skyliner was three hundred meters long with about thirteen decks, not counting sub-levels and maintenance access. That the massive vehicle hovered above the ground at all was a testament to modern technology and engineering. Ichiro couldn’t help but gawk at the beautiful, sleek, organic contours of the massive vessel.
Trundling into customs, the security guard had to help Ichiro hoist her luggage onto the conveyor belt for scanning before checking her boarding pass, ticket and destination. Relieved to step through the scanners without anything beeping at her, she walked through the duty free stores in search of the luggage check and boarding area. Signs were few and far between and she couldn’t see any sign of her mother. It wasn’t until she finally made it out onto the open-air boarding platform that her phone beeped.
“Hey, Dad,” she greeted in Japanese, tucking the phone between her ear and shoulder so she could talk on the move while hauling her suitcase.
“Ichiro, did you get to the terminal ok?” he asked in English.
Not sure what was going on, Ichiro switched to English as well. “Yes Dad, bus trip was fine. I’ve found the boarding deck but I can’t see Mum yet. Or the luggage check. The signs around here are really confusing and the last time I saw a crowd this big I was on the other side of the counter.”
“Erm, yes, unfortunately I just got a call from your mother saying she’s been called away on urgent business again. I’m afraid you’ll be on your own for the trip back to Japan.”
Ichiro felt his spirits sink. “Oh.”
“It’ll be ok, she promised to meet us here,” he said, trying to be reassuring. “And I’m sure you can figure out boarding on your own. Do you have enough money for the trip? Things to read?”
“Yes, Dad, I’ve got enough money. I brought some books and stuff, everything will be fine. It’s just… A lot of people, I guess. I’m not that great with crowds.”
“You’ll be fine. Send me a message once you’re on board.”
“Sure,” Ichiro sighed. “Take care, Dad, I’ll see you there.”
Hanging up, she concentrated on tried to make her way to the closest ramp, deliberately not thinking about her mother’s broken promise. When she got to the ramp, a steady line of people was walking down from the ship and into the terminal, with a crewman nodding and smiling to each of them at the top of the ramp onboard. Dithering, Ichiro wasn’t sure whether to try to call his attention and ask what to do or simply walk up the ramp like she knew what she was doing. Her tickets certainly said that she needed to book her bags into the luggage check and there weren’t any signs around. She was starting to regret even bringing her scarf, it couldn’t fit in her bag so she’d just worn it forgetting that this wasn’t a country you could get away with scarves in summer.
Stopping a guy in a Hawaiian shirt who looked like an American tourist, Ichiro bowed in greeting. “Excuse me, sir, do you know where luggage check is?” He looked down at Ichiro and shrugged. “Sorry, kid, I think it’s over there somewhere,” he said, pointing vaguely, “you should be able to follow the signs.”
“Oh, thanks,” Ichiro said, looking to where the man had pointed but unable to make out anything. Dithering, she got out her phone again and tried checking the airport app to find the right terminal but the website was as much of a maze as the airport itself.
“Hello there,” a woman who’d just gotten off the ship greeted her, walking up to Ichiro. “Are you ok?”
Ichiro blushed, shrinking in on herself a bit. This woman was a bit more practically dressed for the hot weather, showing off a number of tattoos. “Um, I’m just trying to find the luggage check and boarding ramp, ma’am,” she said, waving her ticket.
“Hmm,” she said, nodding as she considered the problem. Turning, she yelled up to the crewman at the top of the ramp. “Hey! Anyone up there know where the luggage check is?”
When she didn’t get any immediate attention, Ichiro raised her hand to wave. “Excuse me, sir? I’m looking to board and I’m a little lost, do you know where I should go?”
The crewman finally took notice. “Oh! Uh, one sec, I’ll ask for you,” he called back before taking out his radio to talk to someone. He was sweating a little when he leant back over the railing to call down. “Sorry for the inconvenience, sir! If you follow the terminal hallway around to the other side of the ship, you’ll find luggage check and the boarding ramp. Welcome to the Sol Suna!”
“Thank you, sir!” I called out, bowing slightly out of habit. Turning to the woman, I bowed slightly to her. “Thank you also, ma’am. I better go board. Hopefully I’ll see you on the ship.”
She smiled slightly before waving me off. “No problem, see you later.”
It was a long walk but once she knew where to go, she found the luggage check with ease. The stewardess was all smiles as she scanned Ichiro’s ticket, attached an RFID tag to the handle of her luggage and turned it over to a loading robot for processing. “Don’t worry, once your luggage is processed, a porter robot will take it to your room. If you’d like to tour the ship and get your bearings, it should be in your room by the time you’re done.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Ichiro said, bowing politely before wandering up the boarding ramp.
It was impossible for an engineer not to approach the Sol Suna without a sense of respect and wonder. It simply became more impressive the closer Ichiro came. Upon setting foot aboard, she pulled out her phone to text her father a simple ‘Hi, I’m aboard, you can stop worrying now’ before connecting to the ship’s wi-fi and downloading the passenger’s app. A few seconds later, Ichiro had her earphones on and began her first tour of the ship, guided by the app.
#
Flopping into bed, Ichiro threw her scarf across the room and let herself sink into the soft mattress. The room was small, though all of the rooms seemed to be in the cramped confines, but still had a mini-fridge, wall-screen TV, bathroom and basic necessities. Her luggage sat in the corner with a nicely printed welcome card resting on top of it. There wasn’t any way she could face unpacking right now, so she just left it there and let herself drift into a tired half-sleep.
She was roused by a bleep on her phone. Finally opening her eyes again, she noticed it had gotten dark outside. Fishing her phone out of her pocket, she checked her messages. Attention, passengers of the Sol Suna, the message read, due to an emergency situation, we are recalling all passengers. Please return to the ship to embark as quickly as possible, we are casting off as soon as possible. Thank you for your co-operation.
Ichiro frowned and sat up. There weren’t any alarms or sounds of movement outside, so she opened her door and peeked out. There were a few people moving around outside but nobody running or panicking. Stepping out, she closed and locked the door behind her and began to wander, sending a quick text to her father to let him know they were leaving early for some reason. Finding a corridor that stretched along the windowed outer hull, she peered off to the south, trying to pick out Vollstahl on the horizon. It was remarkably, distressingly, easy.
There were flashes of light coming from Vollstahl, undoubtedly explosions rocking the town. Streaks of light arcing into the sky like tracer bullets. It was strangely eerie for Ichiro to watch without hearing or feeling the booming impacts, after all she knew those buildings, had walked down those streets. Any other year she would have still been there. Her eyes slowly got wider and wider as the situation sunk in.
Looking at her phone, she put her earphones in her ears and quickly dialled Minaba’s number. “Come on, come on! Pick up!” she shouted, quietly praying for an answer. Several people stared at her as they walked past but she ignored them. Looking down, she could see passengers walking quickly towards the disembarkation ramp, it looked like they’d moved the boarding ramp there and were checking people through as quickly as possible.
She breathed a momentary sigh of relief as someone picked up the phone. “Hi! This is Minaba’s phone,” the pre-recorded messages informed jovially, “I’m sorry I’m not at this phone right now, please hold a moment while I check the next phone.”
Ichiro cursed internally. Hope spiked once again as the ring tone bleeped, only to be dashed. “Sorry, I’m not here either, checking the next phone!” Another bleep. “Well, I’m not here either! Darn! Checking the next phone!”
“Damn it, Minaba! Just pick up the phone and tell me…” She trailed off when someone picked up. “Finally! Minaba what the hell is going on over there? Did you guys launch the…”
“Hi! You’ve reached the second layer of Minaba’s phone ring! Congratulations!”
“What? Wait, is this another phone message?”
“Unfortunately, I’m not currently at this phone either right now but keep on hoping! Transferring you to the next phone…”
“No, no, don’t forward me to the next phone! Damn it…” Ichiro was about to continue swearing when she remembered. “Oh, right, Minaba’s suck in the hospital right now,” she said to herself, feeling like a complete idiot as she hung up. Looking around, she saw a girl with a video camera who abruptly turned away but she was distracted when her smartphone’s screen began to flicker and when she looked back the girl was gone.
That was when the PA system chimed a comforting melody. “Everyone, please calmly return to your cabins,” a woman’s voice came over the speakers. “Some of you may have heard that there is an ongoing terrorist attack in the city to the south. Do not be concerned, we are well away from the activity and we are now launching and moving away from it.”
The Captain’s soothing tones just made Ichiro more nervous. The sudden lurch of the ship as it went underway almost made her stumble as she grabbed the railing for balance. Nothing was fine, a skyliner like this isn’t made for sharp turns and they were taking the long way around, pushing the engines as hard as they could. Nervous, Ichiro started gnawing her lower lip, checking the schematics for the Sol Suna she’d downloaded to her phone while on the tour. Her phone was flickering more and more and she felt the hair on her arms crackle from the static in the air.
The vague sense of unease suddenly solidified into horror. Pressing her cheek against the glass, she tried to get a good look down the bow of the ship to see if she could make out anything. It was hard to see and there didn’t appear to be anything ahead but instinct compelled her to only one explanation for the interference in the electronics and the crackle of static as well as the sudden urgency of departure. There was some kind of electric anomaly up ahead, even if it were invisible to the eye and she ship’s instruments, and it was getting stronger which meant they were headed right for it.
Jogging down the halls towards a maintenance hatch, a mad plan was forming in Ichiro’s head. The halls were empty now, most of the passengers obeying the orders of the voice on the speaker. Part of her was screaming that he should let the crew handle it but the flickering of her smartphone was still getting worse. Finally finding a hatch, she took out the multitool she kept in her pocket and began unscrewing the cover. She barely got one screw off before a big hand grabbed her shoulder. She looked up to find the guy in the Hawaiian shirt glaring down at her. “Hey, kid, what do you think you’re doing?”
Ichiro was at a loss for words for a moment before panic set in and before she knew it the truth was tumbling out of her mouth. “The static interference is from some sort of electrical field and we’re heading right for it! If we pass through it, the ship’s instruments could be fried! If I can get to the anterior dorsal fin, I can turn the ship and maybe avoid the epicentre!”
He blinked at her stupidly. “Wait, what?”
They both stumbled as the entire ship shook. Ichiro grabbed the edge of the hatch for balance but the man kept his hold on her. Feeling the hair on the back of her neck standing up, she stared down the hallway a moment before a flash of green lightning rocketed down the hallway, seemingly bouncing between the walls for a split second before slamming into her chest. Launched off her feet, barely sensate, her vision was clouded by a bright orange flash that lingered as an afterimage burnt into her retina. Striking the man in the Hawaiian shirt, she bowled him over, the smell of charred cotton and ozone ushering her into unconsciousness.
#
Noise. An incoherent babble of many voices talking at once. People stomping around, moving quickly. The occasional clatter of equipment or the distinct tearing noise of sticky tape. As awareness returned, she tried to gather the confused mess of conflicting memories scrambled around in her head. Her whole body ached, but even though it hurt the pain was at least something to focus on. A lifeline to draw her back into the world. She vaguely remembered a flash of amber light bright enough to wipe everything else away, the still image of green lightning burned into her memory. The smell of burning and the jolting of being carried somewhere at speed.
Opening her eyes, she found herself lying on a hospital bed in the corner of a busy room with a warm blanket over her. A doctor was arguing vehemently with a set of rich patients who were demanding that their bumps and bruises be treated immediately. The harried doctor kept trying to explain the concept of triage to them as he was treating a poor crewman with a broken arm. There were even more patients waiting behind them. The girl with the camera was documenting the whole thing, occasionally narrating commentary into the microphone but she couldn’t hear what she was saying over the hubbub. The guy in the Hawaiian shirt was nearby but hadn’t noticed that she’d opened her eyes yet, watching the doctor at work and waiting to see if he needed to intervene. She didn’t need the sign on the wall to tell her she was in the infirmary, the antiseptic hospital smell pervaded everything.
Moving a little, trying to decide if she should call attention to herself, she stopped dead. Nothing felt right. The blanket felt heavier than it should, though she could have put that alone down to weakness from injury. One of her shoes was missing, but when she tried to shift her foot it felt like her shoe was several sizes too large. It was easier to pull her foot right out than try to keep it on. Also, her clothes felt loose, like she was swimming in them. The way her hips felt bigger than they should also didn’t help, not to mention the strange sensation of weight at her chest.
It’s a dream, she thought, screwing her eyes shut and not daring to hope. Wake up, idiot! This is just a dream! She told herself. Pinching herself, she winced, feeling her tails twitch and her ears flatten back against her head. Wait, tails? Ears? What the hell?
Slowly sitting up, she looked down at herself and stared, stunned. Her clothes were, indeed, far too large for her now but the swell of her breasts was obvious through her shirt. Her hands looked smaller and the room looked bigger. Her arms were closer together, like her whole torso had shrunk. Her two bushy tails, each curling around so that she could hug them, left no doubt in her mind. She was a kitsune now, and a girl.
A flash of memory hit her like a punch to the temple. Standing inside a circle, amber lightning crackling through it. Akiko crying out for help inside her brain. A smiling yellow-haired kitsune teenager speaking in soft, reassuring, tones. “I’m going to put both of you to sleep. You’ll be someone else for a while and you won’t remember any of this but when you wake up, you and Akiko will be together,” she said in the memory. “D-d-does tha…” The image froze for a moment before coming back to life, her tone changing from reassuring to stern and commanding. “Listen to me. I am Yakyou, your godmother. I crafted this memory when I sealed you in case of an event where the seal was broken prematurely. I apologize for the necessity, it’s inevitable now that I cannot spare you this pain. Your name is Amaya, I was forced to seal you and your sister, Akiko, away. You should be able to hear her voice in your head soon. Do not be afraid, wherever you are I will find you, though I cannot guarantee my help. I believe in you both. Survive.”
It was done in a moment, the memory of a message shoved into her brain all at once. Amaya? Akiko? My name is… My name is Ichiro, isn’t it? Why doesn’t that name feel right?
Because you’re not Ichiro, a second, languid, voice answered. She sounded like she was waking up from a deep slumber.
Amaya’s heart began to race. It was surreal, exciting and frightening all at once. What happened? How had it happened? What’s going on? Her thoughts raced and the world began to spin. The entitled passengers began shouting, demanding attention with high-pitched whines that grated against her fox-like ears. It was all too much, she wanted to scream at them to shut up. She needed to get away!
Slipping quietly off the bed, Amaya landed on her feet next to a maintenance hatch in the corner of the room. She didn’t need tools to pry this one off, it came away easily. She heard the guy in the Hawaiian shirt shout for her to stop as he leapt over the bed to grab her but she was inside the tunnel and crawling away far too fast for him to catch her in time. Once she was around a corner, she knew there was no way for him to follow, he was way too big to fit his shoulders through.
Awesome, Sis! Akiko congratulated her. We probably want to keep moving, I bet he’s looking up the schematics to try to fish us out of here as we speak.
Sis? Amaya said as she kept moving down the tunnel. Akiko, you’re back? We’re back? WE’RE BACK!
Missed you too, Akiko purred fondly, giving her sister a mental hug.
They could hear the chime of the PA reverberate through the walls of the tunnel. Amaya assumed that one of the walls must run close to a hallway. “Attention, this is Captain Fry speaking. All crew are to report to the nearest engineer to assist in making the modifications to the hull. Any and all resources you or the passengers have that may aid in making the hull air tight are hereby requisitioned by my order. This is top priority!”
“What the fuck?” Amaya said aloud. “Why the fuck do we need to be air tight?”
Maybe we sank? Akiko suggested. Crashed into the ocean?
No, if we were underwater we’d just be dead, Amaya mused as she continued moving. We’d hear the water pressure crushing the superstructure and there’d be visible signs of leaking. A skyliner’s pretty air tight to protect the passengers from pressure differential at high altitude but it’s not perfect. Also, they’d be directing passengers to evacuate to the life rafts and such, not scrambling to reinforce the hull. This is weird.
I’m just glad we’re not that idiot Ichiro anymore. Ok, so where are we going? I assume you’re not just moving because I said so.
No, they need supplies and I can help. We can help. We’ve been working on uprights and robots for nearly ten years, right? A skyliner’s got to be simpler than that.
If you say so. Honestly, I wasn’t paying that much attention.
It took some searching but it wasn’t long before they found an exit to an empty room with a bunch of machinery. Amaya quickly identified the pumps, filters and syringes full of binary epoxy resin. “Awesome!” Amaya exclaimed, jumping and clapping her hands. “This is everything we could possibly need to reinforce the hull!” As the excitement passed, however, she had to lean against the wall, feeling a little dizzy.
Are you ok, sis? Amaya asked, sounding concerned. Are you sure you’re up to this?
Doesn’t particularly matter, does it? I can’t stop now; the engineers need these supplies to reinforce the hull. If they need to make the ship air tight, then it needs to happen before we’re all dead. Godmother told us to survive, and I’m going to survive, damnit!
Pushing the dizziness away, Amaya got to work shutting down the pumps, disassembling the control circuits for portability and packing everything into a handy orange workman’s bag that she could push through the tunnels. They were back underway in a few minutes, with Amaya’s smartphone schematics to help guide them to engineering. She wasn’t expecting the guy in the Hawaiian shirt to suddenly burst through the hatch ahead of her but she slipped through his grasp with a startled squeak, grabbing the bag and scrambling away.
“Stop!” he barked. “You don’t understand! We need those components!”
“We need ‘em more, mate!” Amaya called out over her shoulder before disappearing around another corner. She could hear him swearing in the distance.
He’s persistent, Akiko commented, and he found us way too easy. Someone’s helping him, there’ll probably be an ambush wherever you’re going.
It’s ok, engineering’s just up ahead. Once the engineers have these components, the ship will be safe and they’ll be thanking me.
Shoving open the hatch to engineering, Amaya pushed the bag through before crawling out to discover the stunned looks of three engineers. They seemed to be searching the nearby supply crates and storage rooms for the parts they needed. “Hey, what the hell are you doing down here?” the guy in charge demanded, walking over to her. “This is a restricted area! Passengers aren’t…”
He stopped the moment Amaya unzipped the bag and shoved it into his arms. “Here, everything you need to seal the ship plus modify the pressure controls for the double hull.”
A quick sift through the contents of the bag impressed him. “You’re… She’s right, this is everything we need. Where the hell did you get all this?”
Amaya grinned and shrugged. “I disassembled some non-essential systems. Once I heard the announcement, I figured this was top priority.”
“Thanks,” he said curtly before he started handing things out to his subordinates and barking orders. It wasn’t long before they were running in all different directions to disseminate the parts to where they were needed.
The guy in the Hawaiian shirt walked into the room with a large guy in a security uniform who seemed vaguely familiar. Amaya greeted them with a wave and a broad, smug, grin. “Hey, boys! I got the parts to your friends, I’m sure they’re getting this ship all nice and air tight as we speak!”
The guy in the security uniform paused before her, frowning down at her. He was black, obviously ex-military and distinctly unimpressed. The badge on his chest read ‘Capt. Rudyard Holt’. “Do you know where you got those parts?” he asked in a deep, vaguely British, accent.
“Like I told the engineers, I disassembled some non-essential systems,” Amaya admitted, confused.
“Those non-essential systems were the machines that operate the ship’s climate control systems. No climate controls, no air conditioning. No air conditioning, no CO2 scrubbers. We’ve got much bigger problems losing those than it just getting too hot in here.”
Amaya stared, stunned. “What? No! I-I know what I’m doing! I’m an engineer, I wouldn’t do that, I’d know… I was helping…” Her hands began to shake and she was getting dizzy again. She couldn’t help but sniffle as tears rolled down her cheeks.
Rudyard sighed. “I’ve diverted engineers to fix climate control. They should have all the spare parts they need, it’ll just take time but I don’t know what I should do with you yet. For now, I’m not letting you out of either my sight or Detective Reynolds here. Consider yourself in custody.”
OH HELL NO! Akiko’s voice shouted in Amaya’s mind. Out of the way, Amaya, it’s MY turn!
Amaya felt Akiko’s will shoulder her aside. She didn’t mind, all she wanted to do was crawl away and stew in her own uselessness. Their body shivered as it became even more slender, hair rippling as it shifted from black with ice-blue tips on her ears and tails to white with bright scarlet tips. When it was done, Akiko grinned. “You’ll never take me alive, coppers!” she declared, diving for the maintenance hatch.
“Oh no you don’t!” Holt growled, leaping to grab her. His hands closed around her two tails while she was still halfway through and he heaved her out, dangling her in the air.
Akiko screamed and kicked furiously. “EEEEEEEE! Pervert! Hentai! Hentai!”
Focusing, Akiko looked over Holt’s shoulder and glared at a point in the wall. The image came together easily in her head, the metal suddenly ripping with an audible screech as the pressure ruptured the hull. Beyond the hole was a spinning void full of stars as the air in the room was sucked out into space. Then it happened, or rather appeared to happen, just as she imagined. It was a rough and imperfect image, as rushed as Akiko was. It felt as if the air was being sucked away but nothing moved. Despite the spinning stars, there was no feeling of movement to disorient the viewers who weren’t in on the trick.
Still, Reynolds backed away, startled and someone outside the door screamed a high-pitched wail of alarm. “HULL BREACH! WE’RE ALL DEAD! Uh, wait, isn’t that an interior wall?”
One of Akiko’s kicks finally managed to hit Holt’s arm just behind the elbow while he was momentarily distracted. It didn’t hurt but the blow was in just the right place to numb his arm, letting her slip through his fingers as he cursed. “Ha-ha! Outta my way!” Akiko giggled as she scampered between Reynold’s legs and skipped lightly through the door, nearly running over the girl who was waiting just outside the door with her camera.
“You’ll never take me alive!” she called out, grinning wickedly as a million diabolical plans raced through her mind.
You can read more about this session on Thrythlind, our GM’s, blog at: http://thrythlind.blogspot.com.au/2017/09/away-with-team-air...
Lydia stretched, placing her data reader on the bedside table as she came out of her book-induced fugue. A quick glance at her clock told her that she’d been reading for more than a day, so she slid her long legs over the side of the bed and stood. A quick check of her reflection told her all that she needed to, her long blonde hair still sat perfectly in place, framing and accentuating the blue marks on her face. Her clothes were a little wrinkled but not unpresentable, after all she’d barely moved for the last twenty-four hours.
Slipping out into the hallway, she blinked as a small team of panicked engineers ran past her, huffing and puffing. Wondering what was going on, she proceeded down a branching hallway towards a babble of voices. Rounding the corner to the medical bay, she paused when she saw the small crowd haranguing the doctor.
“I demand that you treat this scrape on my arm right now!” an overweight woman wearing the most expensive designer clothes made in her size demanded. “If this gets infected, I’m going to sue the company! This is disgraceful!”
“Ma’am,” the doctor tried to explain patiently, “I have people with burns and broken bones that require treatment now. If you care to wait in your cabin, we will be around as promptly as possible to tend to you.”
“Do you know who we are?” the man standing next to her asked indignantly.
Lydia decided she’d had enough, slipping in between the doctor and the crowd smoothly. “Yes, I’m sure the doctor here is very cognizant of who you all are and your importance to the company. After all, people of your stature shouldn’t be standing in line like this! I’m sure if you wait in the luxury of your cabin, she can come wait on you at your convenience.”
It took a moment for the man to process that. “Oh… Oh, why yes, of course! Come Petunia, we can wait in the comfort of our suite, maybe get some room service.”
“Yes, let’s,” she mumbled, letting herself be escorted away by her husband. Apparently, her scrape wasn’t feeling so bad anymore.
“Thank-you,” the doctor sighed in relief. “I’m sorry but I need to get back to my real patients.”
Lydia smiled at her. “My pleasure, doctor…”
Pausing when she heard a sudden screeching noise coming towards her from down the hall, Lydia turned to find a teenage white-haired kitsune girl running at full tilt past her, yelling into a small digital camera. Behind her, tromping along at a sprint in combat boots, was a handsome black man in a security uniform with a name tag that read ‘Rudyard Holt’ and a college-age girl puffing along weakly some distance behind.
“Hey world!” Akiko yelled frantically into the camera with the screen turned to face her so she could keep herself jerkily in frame. “This is Akiko and I’m currently running towards the kitchen to record another exciting episode of REGULAR ORDINARY SWEDISH KITSUNE MEAL TIME!!! I’m not the cook my sister Amaya is but I HAVEN’T STOLEN FOOD FOR OVER TEN YEARS and MY HANDS ARE SHAKING!!! So I’m going to find everything made of chocolate, throw it together and eat it!”
“That’s my camera!” the college-age girl whined, gasping for breath.
“Get back here, you little scamp!” Rudyard growled.
Lydia looked to the doctor, shrugged and set off running after the group. It looked like they were having some kind of fun!
Coming to a corner, Akiko hopped as she felt the cuffs of her pants slipping under her heels. “Stupid boy pants!” she swore, spinning around as she rolled, pulling them off and flinging them at her pursuers. Rudyard ducked adroitly, while Lydia bobbed to one side, leaving the pants to sail far over them and hit the doctor, wrapping around her face.
“Whoops!” Akiko said, giggling as she continued to run. Hey, Amaya! she called out mentally to her sister. Where the hell is the kitchen on this glorified blimp?
Leave me alone, Amaya moaned.
You’re still sulking? Come on, anyone could have made that mistake! It’s not like we could have killed anyone, right? Akiko paused for an answer that didn’t come. Wait, sis, we couldn’t have killed anyone. Tell me we couldn’t have killed anyone!
Looking over her shoulder, she saw that Rudyard was falling behind, talking into his radio. Some new blonde girl, however, took the corner with a small leap, hopping off the wall to keep pace. Even worse, she was actually catching up on the straight.
Screaming, Akiko took a chance and barrelled through the nearest door, nearly knocking a woman in uniform over before planting her face directly between another woman’s breasts. Specifically, the woman covered in tattoos that had helped her get onboard. She felt that they were falling as the woman she’d hit let off a high squeak. Just as suddenly, Akiko felt weightless. There was a puff of smoke, a wrenching feeling of movement in a direction she’d never felt before and suddenly she was drifting in a flat grey void.
A grey void without oxygen, that stretched as far as they eye could see in every direction.
Akiko’s breath burst out of her lungs as she peddled her limbs like she was trying to tread water. Looking around frantically, she saw the tattooed woman within arm’s reach and managed to grab her, wrapping her arms around her waist to hold on for dear life. The moment they were touching, she gasped for breath and found she could breathe again. “Are you ok?” the woman asked with a kind of stray detachment.
Looking up into the woman’s face, Akiko blinked. She had red markings on her face, a lot like theirs. “Th-thank you, Sempai,” Akiko gasped, her lungs desperate for air.
“Semp…? Oh, well… Whatever I guess,” she said, turning to look over her shoulder. “I don’t want to alarm you but I think the ship might be about to hit us. Brace yourself.”
“What?” Akiko cried, looking around the woman to see the Sol Suna drifting towards them. She could see Rudyard through the window of the bridge standing next to the woman in uniform she’d almost run over while the speedy blonde woman and the camera girl stared at them in horror. Rudyard said something to the woman in uniform, who seemed confused about what intercom she should be shouting into but whatever she said seemed to work as the ship slowly ground to a halt.
“Well, that’s good. Are you ok? Why were they chasing you?” the tattooed woman asked.
Akiko sighed. “Um, well, my sister Amaya was trying to help. Something about making the hull air tight. But she made some sort of mistake and everyone got mad and now she’s sulking.”
“What kind of mistake?”
“Um, something about taking apart the climate controls? I don’t really know.”
She frowned. “Do you know if they have enough air in there for a while?”
“Air? Um, let me see if Amaya’s talking now,” Akiko told her. Closing her eyes, she concentrated on directing her thoughts to her sister. Hey, pimple-face, Amaya prodded, stopped feeling sorry for yourself yet? We’re in a pickle here.
I do NOT have pimples! Amaya snapped.
I know but at least you’re talking now. Do you know if the people inside the ship have enough air without whatever dingus you tore apart?
Amaya was silent for long enough that Akiko wondered if she were sulking again. They should be fine; the engineers should have replacement parts for the climate controls.
“Amaya says they should be fine,” Akiko finally answered.
“Oh, good,” the woman sighed. “I’m just going to take a nap, then. Once I’m rested up, I’ll get us back onto the ship.”
Akiko squeaked. “Rest? How the heck can you rest out here, Sempai?”
“What? It’s just the void between realities. It’s not like there’s anything else out here. As long as you hold onto me, you should be able to breathe… Well, unless I fall asleep, then you’ll start suffocating again…”
“What? No!”
“Oh, yes, right, that would be bad,” she mused, seemingly distracted. “My name’s Aislin, by the way. Aislin Newell.”
“Akiko. My sister’s Amaya.”
“I see,” Aislin nodded sagely. “How much do you know about magic?”
Akiko smirked. “Well, I’m a pretty good illusionist. Amaya doesn’t pay as much attention to practice, though, she prefers cooking and drawing and fixing stuff.”
Gee, I’m sorry for having, you know, interests outside of pranking people, Amaya grumbled.
“All right, we can work with this,” Aislin said. “I’m going to teach you a little bit of magic. Just enough so that you can keep the spell up that’s allowing you to breathe in the void while I nap.”
Akiko waggled her tails excitedly. “Really? Cool! You’re a mage, then? Like from the families?”
“The word you’re looking for is magus and I’m a demon,” she answered casually, like it was nothing, “but I work for the gods. It’s complicated. I guess you could call it a family but I’m not sure what that means to mortals. Not that it matters. Did your teacher manage to impart to you the basics of magic or are they just training your natural talents?”
“Um, some of my friends know magic but I never had the knack for it,” Akiko admitted, blushing. “Never was good at sensitive exercises. But I know the basics; manipulation for doing things, sensitive for sensing the world and, uh, metabolic for altering living things.”
“Right, what we’re doing here is a sensitive practice,” Aislin said, taking a lecturing tone. “Magic is the ability to borrow power from someone else, usually a god or demon. There is high magic and low magic but in this case we’re going to be dealing with high magic. Technically, a skilled magus can contact an immortal from anywhere to borrow a bit of their power but, thankfully since you’re a beginner, this will be much easier with us in physical contact.”
“Wait, just anyone can connect with you telepathically and borrow your powers?” Akiko asked incredulously.
“Well, they can borrow the, oh what’s that mortal term… Circuitry, I think? They can borrow the part of my mind that can shape my own life-force and use it to shape their own life-force into the desired effect. I can lend you my ability but you still take the pain. Not that there’ll be much effort on your part in this case, you’re just taking the energy that I’ve already set in motion and maintaining it. Close your eyes, concentrate, centre yourself then push your awareness into mine. We’re in physical contact, so that shouldn’t be hard.”
Nodding, Akiko closed her eyes and concentrated. She could feel her chakra flowing through her limbs, to where her skin came into contact with Aislin. Flowing down through the flood, her awareness slipped into the demon’s mind, which came into her mind as the image of a warm, scaly, cavern filled with brightly glowing circles and runes.
That’s it, Aislin’s mental voice encouraged. It should be easy to find the right rune, it’s the only one currently active.
She was right, Akiko could see it glowing brightly in the middle of the cavern. Found it.
Good. Hold that symbol in your mind. Copy it perfectly and hold it in your memory and keep holding it. As long as you can see that symbol in your mind’s eye, you will be able to breathe. Understand?
Yes, Akiko answered. She stared at the symbol until it was burned into her brain. Amaya’s awareness also watched, mentally tracing every line and contour until it was etched into her neurons. As her awareness came back to her own body, Akiko could see the rune in her head, burning in amber light.
“Good,” Aislin sighed, relaxing, “I’m going to nap for a bit now.”
Akiko nodded, vowing to hold onto that spell forever if she had to.
Finally stirring from her slumber after what felt like hours to Akiko, Aislin looked down at the kitsune still clinging to her and marvelled. “Oh, you’re still alive. That’s good, I guess.”
Akiko glared at her, ears flattening to her crown. “What do you mean, you guess?”
“Most people wouldn’t be able to hold on to the spell that long,” Aislin explained. “Honestly I expected you to be dead by the time I woke up. So that’s good.”
“Then why didn’t you teleport us back to the ship?”
“I’ve been holding all the air inside the ship until they could get it air tight,” Ailin answered with a shrug. “Throw in the sudden teleportation and I was reaching my limit. It wouldn’t have done anyone any good if I’d just passed out once we were back on board.”
“Oh,” Akiko grumbled. “Do you have something against mortals, Sempai?”
“Hmmm? Oh, mortals! No, I don’t have anything against them, they can be adorable when they try to visualize four dimensional objects. It’s just that they’re not going to be around long enough to really matter.” She plucked a piece of paper that had been folded into the shape of a butterfly and attached itself to her jacket. Unfolding it, she read whatever message was inside.
“What’s that?”
“Butterfly paper. It’s a way to pass messages, blondie must have sent it. I didn’t realize there was a goddess on board already, that’ll make things easier. Oh dear, they want me to teleport us back to the brig, apparently a Mr. Holt is asking to have you delivered to him.”
Akiko cringed. “Well, better the brig than out here waiting to die.”
“That’s the spirit,” Aislin said, patting the kitsune on the head. “You might just prove to be interesting. If you manage to live long enough to get all nine tails.”
“Um, if she’s a goddess and you’re a demon won’t that cause problems?”
Aislin blinked. “What? Oh, no! Immortals probably aren’t what you think we are, we’re just a highly evolved species with extremely advanced technology and innate psychic abilities. The gods aren’t the good guys and the demons aren’t the bad guys, both sides have good and bad people, just like everyone else.”
Before she could say another word, Akiko felt another lurch of movement in that strange non-dimensional space before alighting on the cool floor of the security station on the Sol Suna. Kneeling she patted the ground thankfully and allowed herself to let go of the spell. “Oh, thank you, sweet artificial terra firma,” she said to the wonderfully solid deck plating.
Rudyard grabbed her by the collar of her oversized jacket and lifted her up to face him. “Remember me?” he asked in his deep, booming, voice.
“Ah-ha-ha… Sorry?” Akiko apologized, ears flat against her head as she gave him her best wide, innocent, eyes.
“Sorry’s not going to cut it,” he said, letting her down on the ground.
Looking around him at the indignant college girl waiting with arms crossed by the door, Akiko skipped playfully over to her. Placing the camera into her hands, the kitsune grinned. “Hi cutie! Thanks for lending me your camera!”
She was so surprised that she almost dropped it. “Wha…? You stole it, you little…” she sputtered.
“No need to thank me,” Akiko interrupted her with a pat on the shoulder, closing her eyes. “I’m going now, catch you later!”
The camera girl swore but managed to get her camera up as Akiko’s hair rippled, darkening to blue-black while the tips of her ears lightened to ice blue. When she opened her eyes again they were vibrant cobalt blue. Amaya blinked a few times, suddenly back in control faced with a camera lens. Looking down, she noticed she wasn’t wearing any pants and squeaked, ears flattening against her head again as she pulled down on the hem of her now oversized shirt to try to cover more of herself.
“Hey there,” a new feminine voice said, “maybe you can wear this?”
Amaya looked around to find a blonde woman smiling down at her. She had long legs, gorgeous blue eyes, perfect hair and lips that begged to be kissed. Her face had blue marks on it that looked a little like Aislin’s. She was holding out a skirt that looked like it would fit, having seemingly pulled it out of thin air. Amaya felt herself turning red, vaguely remembering this woman chasing Akiko earlier. “I, um, ah, gl… I mean… Oh gosh. Ah, thank you,” she mumbled meekly, taking the garment.
The blonde squealed. “Oooh! You’re just adorable! I’m Lydia, Goddess of Desire.”
Blushing furiously, Amaya turned the skirt around in her hands, trying to work out how to put it on. After a minute, Lydia took pity on her and showed her where the snaps on the waistband were concealed. After that, it didn’t take her long to get the garment in place, for whatever good it did. She felt more comfortable and she’d always loved skirts but her legs were still exposed.
“Aw, hell,” Rudyard sighed, holding his face in his hand. “You know what, I don’t even care. Kid, you were the one that disassembled the climate controls. As far as I’m concerned, you’re still under arrest.”
Amaya cringed, looking down at her feet. “I’m sorry, I… I wasn’t thinking straight. It was a stupid mistake and I should have known better, I really don’t know what happened. I just wanted to help so badly and I had this really bad headache. I wasn’t in my right mind.”
Rudyard grunted, pausing to consider his options. “Well you did get the parts to get the hull sealed quickly. Tell you what, we’re going to do a work-release scheme. I’m going to hand you over to the chief engineer, if you do exactly what he tells you I won’t throw you in the brig.”
Amaya looked up, her ears suddenly shooting to the ceiling. “Really? Awesome!” she exalted, hopping into the air.
“WOAH!” Aislin shouted suddenly. “Stop! Stop! Stop! Stop the airship! Full reverse!”
The woman in uniform that Akiko had nearly run down before running into Aislin looked to the demon. Amaya noted that her nameplate read ‘Cpt. Hattie B. Frye’. “I’m sorry, why?” she asked.
“Didn’t you see that? Please, order the full reverse. Don’t bring her around, just hit the forward thrusters or whatever you do!”
Curious, the captain gave the order through her radio. It wasn’t long before they could feel the ship slowing down, forces pulling them back before slowly changing direction.
The security office stood on the floor overlooking the recreational pool on the top deck of the skyliner. The ceiling itself was a large, oval, glass dome that revealed the grey void outside. Not long after they reversed, the flat, endless, grey brightened to sky blue with fluffy white clouds drifting overhead.
“Full stop!” the captain ordered through the radio. “Is that it? Are we home?”
“Doubtful,” Aislin answered. “Actually, extremely improbable. More likely we’re looking at another shard with an Earth-like atmosphere. Most known shards do, anyway. Besides, as you can see, if we move too far in any direction we’ll lose the… Oh, how can I say this so that you’ll understand. We’ll lose the ‘attunement’ to this shard if we move the ship.”
“Shards? What is that grey void anyway?”
Aislin squeezed the bridge of her nose. “The void is… Well, really this is nice and easy, the void is sort-of-proto-stuff. It’s not even really anything. But if you think of primordial ooze as not-life or something that’s not yet alive, that’s not-thing that can become thing.”
“She’s lousy at explaining things,” Rudyard mumbled.
Amaya nodded. “You should hear her bedside manner.”
“Anyway,” Aislin continued, “this is still good news. I can move small groups of people from the ship down to the shard. Unfortunately, I can only move about six people, maybe some cargo, but I can’t move the whole ship. That means I can’t get us back to Earth easily.”
“Can she help?” Amaya asked, pointing to Lydia.
“While I’d be happy to,” Lydia answered, “unfortunately I don’t have the ability to teleport yet. Much less move a whole ship through the void.”
“Shame. So this ‘shard’ is like what? Another planet,” Rudyard said.
“Not that big,” Aislin said, shaking her head.
“But the other world metaphor is still apt,” Lydia broke in. “There could be nearly anything out there. Alien ecologies, flora, fauna, immortal technology…”
“She’s right,” Aislin admitted, “there might even be maps or directions that will get us back to Earth. I wasn’t expecting to hit one of these so soon, we’ve lucked out this time.”
“Even if there isn’t, we can look for supplies,” Rudyard said. “I’ll go grab some weapons and one of my men to accompany us down to the shard.”
Aislin shrugged. “Sure, it’ll take me a bit to draw the circle I’ll need to bounce us down there. If you don’t mind, I’ll borrow Amaya to help me.”
“I’m coming too,” Lydia, said, stepping forward. “I’m a zoologist, I’d like to examine the shard’s ecosystem and take samples.”
“Oooh! Can I come?” the girl with the camera asked enthusiastically.
“I don’t know, miss,” Rudyard answered in mollifying tones.
“But I’m a journalist…”
“Um, sir,” Amaya interrupted. “If it’s going to be a scientific expedition, if there’s anything down there, Lydia will need someone to document our findings.”
Rudyard sighed. “Ok, yeah, you’ve got a point, kid. What’s your name, miss?”
“Aeryn,” the camera girl introduced herself, “Aeryn Lee.”
“Nice to meet you, Aeryn. Aislin’s taking responsibility for Amaya here. If you want to come, it’s Lydia’s job to take care of you. Deal?”
“Deal,” Lydia nodded.
#
The bay windows of the forward observation deck had a commanding view of the chunk of rock floating in the void like an island in a great, endless, ocean. The flat top of the rock was covered in greenery, forests of enormous trees surrounding patches of clear lawns and the remnants of ancient buildings. As distracting as it was, Amaya focused on drawing the circle just how Aislin had described to her. One little mistake could be fatal.
“Circles aren’t really magic,” the demon lectured, “they’re shortcuts to help us focus our life-force in the right direction. Don’t look down on them just because they’re not inherently magical themselves, though, they make doing magic far easier than having to wing it.”
“I read the theory at school,” Amaya said, “but I’ve never heard of a twelve-pointed circle before. Or anything this complex.”
Wiping her brow, Amaya looked at the three-pointed circles inscribed on the walls. The floor was covered in a large twelve-pointed circle that came close to brushing the walls of the room with another four-pointed circle inside it. The points she was referring to were the points on the circle that were joined by lines inside the circle. The classic example Amaya had learned in school was the five-pointed pentagram. Rather than being joined by straight lines, however, Aislin had insisted that the points of the circle be joined by crescents, one tip at the centre with the other tip at each of the points that defined the circle to create a spiral-like pattern or a stylized vortex.
“It’s all about the type of energy, how we need to use that energy and how long we want the circle to last,” Aislin explained. “First, the circle has to be permanent so we can’t take shortcuts. The four-point circle keys to the actual shape of the power we’re using but we’re transporting mortals as well as myself, a demon, and Lydia, a god. That means we need to be able to translate vitae, demonic life-force, mana, godly life-force, and mortal life-force. In this case chakra for you and chi for humans. So, we have to scale Lydia’s mana down by a factor of four to match my vitae’s factor of three, hence the twelve points. The three-point circles on the walls stabilize the whole system to nullify the stress of channelling life-force through the pattern.”
“And the crescents? Wouldn’t straight lines be easier?”
“I’m the Demon of Vacuum. My energy doesn’t like travelling in straight lines, it flows in spirals, like a whirlpool. We work with the energy, not against it. Remember, we’re essentially hard coding a spell into reality, like an electric circuit that we pump our life-force into to power it, but it’s also like a mnemonic. The symbolism is important.”
When they were done, Amaya felt exhausted and they hadn’t even been down to the planet yet. Rudyard was waiting patiently outside the room, double-checking the ammunition in his carbine with one of his men with him, Officer Makon Darring. Lydia, Aeryn and Captain Frye were also waiting, though naturally the captain wasn’t going into danger.
“What can we expect down there?” Rudyard asked, surveying the terrain through the bay window.
“Anything,” Lydia answered, shrugging. “A shard this small could have been built for any number of purposes. The trees are a good sign that there’ll be wildlife down there, though.”
“Built?” Rudyard asked incredulously.
“Oh yes,” Aislin said nonchalantly. “Our species do it all the time. If there’s a gate here to Nirvana or Yomi, we’re saved. It’s unlikely but possible.”
“No time like the present,” he said, hefting his gun.
Aislin shepherded everyone into the four-pointed circle in the middle of the room. “Watch out for the smoke,” she warned.
“Smoke?” Rudyard asked, moments before they were engulfed.
Amaya felt the same wrenching sensation of movement before the smoke cleared, revealing the bright, sunny, green landscape stretching out around them. In the distance high above, she could see the Sol Suna hovering in place, glistening in light that wasn’t coming from any sun. A gentle breeze cleared the smoke quickly and it was nice to breathe in the fresh, pine-scented, air.
“Don’t get distracted,” Rudyard reminded them. “Darring, watch our six.”
The security guy nodded to his boss, turning to visually sweep the forest behind us.
Pricking her ears up, Amaya took a look around. It wasn’t long before she spotted something strange in the grass. “Mr. Holt, sir,” she called, pointing at some strange rock formations near the edge of the clearing, “is that a statue?”
“Let’s check it out,” he said, waving for everyone to advance while he covered the treeline.
Amaya knelt next to the shards of stone. It had been an amazingly realistic statue of a wolf, once. Someone or something had broken it apart and left the pieces scattered around.
“Cockatrice,” Lydia muttered like it was a dirty word.
“Say what?” Rudyard asked.
“A cockatrice is a bird that can encase things in stone,” the goddess explained. “This is how they hunt. Once their prey is trapped, they break open the shell to get at the meat inside.”
Amaya shivered.
“Lovely,” Aislin said, dropping her backpack to retrieve her tattooing needle from inside. “Amaya, you need to tattoo the circle onto my back so I extract us the moment anything goes wrong.”
“Um, ok,” Amaya gulped as she was handed the electric needle.
Taking off her shirt to expose her back for the tattoo, Aislin looked up and around. “Wait, where’s Lydia?”
Everyone immediately turned to where she’d been standing a moment ago to find her gone. “Shit!” Rudyard swore, glancing to where Aeryn was still recording the stone shell. “Darring, stick with the civilians. I’ll find Lydia and bring her back.”
“Roger, sir,” he complied.
While Rudyard stalked off into the bushes, Amaya considered the soft flesh of Aislin’s back and the sharp needle of the tattoo gun. “Shouldn’t I, like, disinfect you or something first?”
“For mortals, sure,” Aislin answered while she finished drawing the circle on a piece of paper, “but I’m a demon. I can’t get an infection.”
“Oh,” Amaya said, taking the drawing and looking it over. It was much like the four-pointed circle they’d inscribed on the ship. Holding the piece of paper next to Aislin’s back, Amaya concentrated on the circle, picturing every detail. Chakra welled up from her core as she held her hand out, allowing the amber energy to flow out of her. A dimly glowing illusory amber circle faded into sight on Aislin’s back. It wasn’t a true circle, just a guide for the ink, but it was better than fumbling about as she set to work.
“Does this hurt?” Amaya asked when she was halfway done.
“Like a cat riding down curtains with their claws,” Aislin quipped.
“Oh, ouch.”
“Wait a minute,” Aeryn said, suddenly looking around, “wasn’t I supposed to stay with Lydia?”
“Actually, as the resident normal, she was supposed to stay with you,” Aislin corrected. “Don’t worry dear, you’ll likely die as a result of the mistake.”
Aeryn frowned. “Miss Newell, you really need to do better on comforting people.”
“Lydia shouldn’t have run off,” Amaya said, slowly completing the circle. “That’s on her. There we are, Sempai, all done.”
“Why’d we have to do that down here?” Aeryn asked, holding the camera on Aislin. “Wouldn’t it have been safer to do that on the ship?”
“It only works for our trip back to the ship from this shard,” the demon informed her, brushing her coat.
“Oh… But isn’t that kind of permanent? We’re not staying here, are we?”
“Eventually, my body will reject the ink. It takes a while, should be plenty long enough for us to explore this place but the tattoo will fade in time. We should track Mr. Holt and Lydia, see if we can join back up before they get themselves into trouble.”
“She wouldn’t have gone looking for the cockatrice, would she?” Aeryn asked plaintively. No-one answered her.
It only took a few moments of searching for Amaya to find Holt’s boot prints. “Over here,” she called to the rest.
“Good work,” Darring congratulated her. “Guess being part fox is worth somethin’.”
“Watch the right flank,” Aislin ordered as she walked past in the direction of the tracks. She had her hexagonal-patterned coat on again. As she walked, a snake-like thing slithered from the left cuff, inserting itself into her palm so that she could grasp it like a pistol. A similar creature slid out of her right cuff, though this one was a finely honed, organic-looking, blade.
“Yes, ma’am,” Darring said, impressed as he kept pace with her on her right.
“Amaya, watch the rear,” Aislin continued. “Aeryn, you stay in the middle.”
Amaya let Aeryn pass before following behind, keeping her eyes, ears and what little extrasensory perception she had alert for anything.
#
Holt sighed in relief when he finally found Lydia kneeling in a small clearing about ten feet across, examining the ground. “There you are, I didn’t think I’d need to tell you not to run off,” he growled.
The far-too-beautiful goddess glanced in his direction and shrugged. “I wasn’t in any danger,” she said dismissively. “More to the point, look at this!”
Rudyard leaned over to where she was holding her hand, fingers spread, in the middle of a small pothole in the ground. It took a moment for him to process that it wasn’t a pothole, it was several large indentations in the dirt, one big one with four smaller ones at the front, big enough that the tips of her pinkie and thumb only reached the edge of the pattern. Then it clicked. That wasn’t a pothole, it was a massive wolf paw print.
“Lydia,” he said in low, calm and even tones. “I think it’s time we re-joined the group.”
The low, rumbling, growl from behind him made him freeze. Slowly turning his head, he saw an enormous pair of narrow, shining green, eyes glaring at him over a bush. The giant wolf was five feet tall at the shoulder, baring fangs as long as his forearm. There were old scars on its face and its fur seemed to shift colours with the greenery around it as it bowed low, muscles bunching for the attack.
Holt knocked Lydia out of the way as the enormous wolf leapt forward, roaring. Throwing himself down on his back, he whipped his carbine up, unleashing two controlled bursts of fire as the wolf leapt over his prone body. Blinking, he tried to process the fact that the wolf barely even flinched, not even whining in pain as it landed and turned to snarl at him again.
“Watch out!” Lydia snapped, grabbing Holt’s shoulder and dragging him a foot to the right just as a transparent blur of teeth snapped at his left, missing my millimetres. Raising her hand, a four-foot-long glowing blue blade ignited from a strangely shaped bronze hilt that suddenly appeared in her grasp. “Decoy wolf! The image you can see is just an illusion!”
The image of the wolf charged again, bounding for Rudyard, but Lydia wasn’t fooled. She had her eyes fixed on the almost imperceptible blur that was the real wolf, holding her manablade between her and it. Darting forward, she screamed, loud enough to make the beast flinch as she struck, slicing her blade through the earth in front of it. Startled by the sudden flash of fire and heat as the blade ignited the grass and the unearthly screams of its prey, the wolf squeaked in alarm before turning tail and running off into the woods, its illusion disappearing moments before it struck Rudyard.
“Um, wow,” Rudyard mumbled as he breathed from his sitting position. “Thanks for the save there.”
“No problem,” she said with her usual bubbly enthusiasm as she helped him to his feet.
Brushing himself, Rudyard paused for a moment as he considered the beautiful woman before him, looking back at him with an innocent smile on her face and holding what looked like an energy sword right out of a cartoon. Then a noise intruded into the moment. “Uh, do you hear that cracking sound?”
The moment he said it, the ground he’d been sitting on a moment before caved in, spraying dust and dirt into the air. When they were done coughing and sputtering, Lydia held her manablade into the hole, revealing a metallic corridor spotted with corrosion stretching off in two directions below.
Rudyard was still staring at the hole he’d almost fallen into when Aislin and the rest of the group burst into the clearing, puffing.
“I saw a ghost dog!” Aeryn exclaimed. “It ran right through a tree! I saw it!”
Lydia winced. “That was a decoy wolf, not a ‘ghost dog’. Please don’t use that term again.”
“What? Why?”
“It’s offensive.”
“Oh. Okay, I guess.”
“Well, at least you’re both fine,” Aislin said, stepping up next to the hole with Rudyard while Darring kept an eye on the perimeter. Kneeling, she peered down the corridor. “If it wasn’t made of metal, I’d almost say it looked Roman.”
“Yeah,” Rudyard agreed, shaking himself. “Do you think we should take a look?”
“Can’t hurt,” she said, hopping down onto the rubble below. “Amaya! You’re with me, remember?”
“Right!” Amaya agreed, hopping down into the hole as well. Seeing how dark it was, she held up her hand and summoned a ball of amber light, setting it to drift around them as they explored. Immediately, they both caught sight of some writing on a nearby wall.
Brushing the cobwebs and dust away, Aislin muttered to herself for a few moments. “I can’t read it,” she said, stunned.
“Well, ok,” Amaya said, shrugging. “I mean this place looks ancient…”
“No, you don’t understand,” the demon said, wide-eyed. “I’m connected to Ashvattha, the network that pools the collective knowledge of all of the gods. If I can’t read this, no god that exists or has ever existed in the forty-thousand years of immortal civilization can!”
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You can read more about this session on Thrythlind, our GM’s, blog at: http://thrythlind.blogspot.com.au/2017/10/the-shiny-red-cand...
“Here’s your purse, miss,” Malcom grumbled as he handed over the expensive leather bag to a particularly cadaverous-looking forty-something woman.
“Why, thank you detective,” Ms. Bellard croaked between puffs on her cigarette, deliberately ignoring the no smoking sign behind her head. “It’s so good to find someone competent on this ship’s staff.”
“I’m not… You know what, never mind ma’am,” he sighed. “If you don’t mind me asking, why were you looking for your purse down in engineering?”
“Well, when it went missing I thought one of the ne’er-do-wells on the crew had taken it,” she whispered conspiratorially. “After all, why have ‘employees only’ sections cordoned off the ship unless they’re hiding things from us?”
“Maybe so that the professionals can get on with business without passengers getting in the way?” Malcom suggested.
“Well, that’s what they say,” she replied, snorting derisively. “Tell me, Mr. Reynolds, do you by any chance know where we are at the moment?”
A chill went down Malcom’s spine. “Not exactly right at this moment, ma’am. I’m sure the Captain will make an announcement when she’s good and ready.”
“Oh, her,” she scoffed. “I’m really not sure what the owners are thinking hiring a woman captain…”
Malcom thanked whoever was looking over him the moment his phone began chiming, “Ring-ring, ring-ring, ring-ring, ring-ring, Ashvhatta phone!” “Um, please excuse me, ma’am,” Malcom apologized before fleeing the room as he fumbled with his phone. Closing the door, he breathed a sigh of relief and looked to a nearby porter, ignoring his phone for a moment. “How do you stand them?” he asked the porter plaintively.
The porter looked behind him to make sure no-one was about before answering. “Whiskey,” he admitted.
Malcom smirked as he finally answered his phone. “Reynolds, PO’d PI.”
“Yes, Malcom,” Aislin’s voice came over the line, “we need you to scrounge up some more bodies and bigger guns. Let me know when you’re ready, I’ll pop up and bring you down.”
“Trouble?”
“Oh, you know, wildlife,” Aislin mumbled distractedly, like she was listening to another conversation in the background. “Displacer wargs, cockatrice... Oh, Mr. Holt is also requesting, to quote, ‘a great big fucking gun’. He suggests asking one of his men to let you into his personal armoury.”
“Gimme twenty minutes,” Malcom told her before hanging up.
Five minutes and a brief explanation later, Malcom, Captain Frye and two of Rudyard’s guards were looking into a room that would have been the envy of any American SWAT team. Two fifty calibre heavy machine guns rested on a table in the middle of the room, freshly cleaned and ready. Racks of assault rifles, shotguns and military pistols adorned the walls, all locked away and unloaded. There were even a few grenade launchers and assault shotguns.
Malcom quickly found cupboards full of tactical gear and started putting together a field kit while Rudyard’s men selected their own carbines and a Cultural Republic of Chinese and Mongolian Peoples, or CRCMP for short, QBB-95 Light Support Weapon for Rudyard. A bullpup light machine gun, the QBB-95 featured a drum magazine between the hand grip and the stock.
“What the hell was that man expecting to face on a cruise?” Captain Frye protested, eyes bugging out at the sight of the small arsenal aboard her ship.
#
“Current immortal civilization,” Lydia explained to the mortals as Aislin arrived with Malcom and their reinforcements onto the shard. “Lilith and Vishnu took power in Yomi and Nirvana, our homeland shards, around forty-five thousand BC. That was the start of our current civilization, though we’ve only been at lasting peace since the Compact was made two thousand years ago. Technically immortal civilization stretches back millions of years. There aren’t many left who are that old, though. I know some of the symbols but they’re not arranged in any order I’m familiar with.”
“But still, neither of you can read this,” Rudyard said, mostly to himself as he was taking the information in. “So what does that mean? Aliens?”
“It’s not impossible,” Aislin answered. “There could be civilizations out here that have never had contact with Earth. However, considering the presence of the displacer warg, a species that we know about, and at least a familiarity with this alphabet, it’s more probable that this is some kind of civilization that we’ve just never encountered. Maybe an off-shoot of one of the mortal races that fled to the shards sometime in prehistory.”
While the adults were talking, Amaya was busy looking down the hallway. The ceilings and floor were made out of the same metal but the metal walls gave way to some kind of transparent material similar to glass. Beyond the glass were small rooms with door-shaped indentations in the back walls that reminded her of automatic doors from Star Trek. Without power, they were going to be a bitch to get open. Luckily, all the rooms were empty. She could see the end of the hallway up ahead, branching into a T-intersection. “These look like cages,” she said, feeling the texture of the transparent material and knocking on it. The dull thud of the knock was nothing like the sound of glass. “This feels stronger than glass, though, probably some sort of mineral-based material. This place is looking more and more like a zoo.”
“Oh yes,” Aislin said, “both demons and gods have plenty of menageries just like this one. Well, except in good working order with better security, dedicated staff and animals that are not on the loose and eating each other.”
“You guys haven’t seen Jurassic Park have you?”
Lydia rolled her eyes. “We zoologists are not incompetent bunglers, thank you. Our menageries don’t have break-outs and this place is ancient and obviously abandoned.”
Amaya held up her hands in surrender. “Ok, ok.”
“Leonard, Hoffman, good to see you,” Rudyard said to the two new security guards that Malcom and Aislin had arrived with. “Brought you a party favour, boss,” Hoffman said, handing Rudyard the light machine gun. Rudyard grinned, resting the butt on his hip so that he could check the chamber while slinging his carbine over his shoulder. “More dakka, that’s what I’m talking about. I want you two to group up with Darring and keep an eye on our backs. If possible, keep the other eye on Aeryn here.”
Aeryn waved and smiled at them from behind her camera.
“Malcom,” Rudyard continued, “you’re taking point with me.”
Malcom nodded, keeping his carbine pointed downward professionally with the stock tight to his shoulder as he passed Rudyard a torch attachment for the barrel of his gun. Snapping it in place, the security chief nodded to everyone, “Let’s go.”
The branch to the right ended in one of the strange doorways that Amaya had seen in the cages. Next to it was a sign with more of the strange writing on it, this time in red with sharper angles and points. It only took a few moments consideration before everyone looked at each other and said “warning sign” simultaneously before turning around to head the other way.
Like the previous hallway, this one ended in another of the doors but the door was stuck slightly ajar and there weren’t any signs nearby. Peeking through, Amaya gasped. “I can see a feint pale green glow emanating from some circles inscribed in the walls and floor,” she said for everyone else’s benefit, “similar to the ones we built to help Aislin teleport us down here. In the middle of the circles are weird pedestals with buttons on them. Some kind of control room maybe?” Slipping her arm through the crack experimentally, she tried to assess whether she could squeeze through. “I don’t think I can get through, Akiko could though.”
Rudyard groaned.
Ha! Akiko snickered. It’s those big old milk-bags of yours, isn’t it!
Jealousy is unbecoming of you, Amaya shot back. If I let you out will you promise not to do anything too stupid?
Hey! I’m not stupid!
I didn’t say you were stupid, Amaya replied placatingly. But we’re in a dangerous situation and you’re too impetuous for our own good.
Akiko huffed. I promise to be careful.
All right then. Amaya looked to Rudyard regretfully. “I’m sorry, please keep an eye on her. She won’t have to be out for long.”
“All right,” Rudyard said, giving in.
Aware that Aeryn had the camera trained on her, Amaya closed her eyes to focus, relinquishing control. She felt herself slide into the back of their mind as their body shifted, hair shifting from black and blue to white and red as her body slimmed. Akiko grinned as she opened her amber eyes, hopping excitedly in place and stretching. “Thanks, old man Holt! Lemme see here…”
Slipping her arm through, Akiko sucked in her stomach as she shuffled gently through the gap, wiggling to inch through. Your butt is too big too. Nothing to do with squeezing through here, just saying, she commented wryly to her sister, who blew her a mental raspberry in response. Slithering through, she scanned the room more thoroughly. “Nothing living on this side,” she whispered over her shoulder, “and no other doors. Definitely some kind of control room for something, though.”
Akiko jumped when Aislin appeared next to her with an audible ‘pop’. Kneeling to run her hands over the circle on the floor, the demon pursed her lips. “Pale viridian,” she commented, “I haven’t seen life-force this colour before.”
Lydia grunted behind them as she tried to squeeze through, but she was far too big. “Oh bother!” she exclaimed, giving up. “Maybe we can force it open?”
“Yeah, take a step back,” Rudyard ordered. “Malcom, I reckon we’ve got this.”
While the boys put their backs into opening the door, Aislin finished examining the circles. “Definitely controls for this shard’s void engines.”
Akiko listened to Amaya for a moment before asking her sister’s question for her. “Amaya wants to know if she can transfer the engines to our ship?”
“Probably,” Aislin answered, stroking her chin as she looked off into space. “Heck, I can give her the designs to build one from scratch if we want. I’m more inclined to tether the airship to this shard and pilot the shard around. If we can clear away or corral the local fauna. Try not to alarm the other mortals with this information but it could take a long time for us to get back to Earth…”
Akiko’s mind wandered as Aislin kept talking. She wasn’t worried about missing anything, Amaya was paying attention to Sempai, she could give her the cliff notes if it was important. After a moment’s hesitation before crossing one of the circles, pushing back bad memories of their sealing, she found herself looking at the buttons atop one of the pedestals. WAIT! STOP! AKIKO! Amaya shouted, pulling her attention away from Aislin’s lecture moments before Akiko idly pressed a few of the buttons.
The circles around them flared to life and the facility shook as the momentum of the entire shard shifted. Aislin was on Akiko in moments, grabbing the kitsune by the front of her blouse. “WHAT DID YOU DO?” the demon demanded, eyes flaring red. “Which buttons did you push?”
Akiko squeaked. “I… Um… That one,” she said, pointing, “and maybe that one. No, wait, it was that one, yes.”
Akiko felt the strange sense of teleportation vertigo for a moment before finding herself deposited in the middle of the circle room back on the Sol Suna. Captain Frye jumped at their sudden appearance.
“Captain,” Aislin cut in before anyone else could say anything, “the shard has changed course. You need to order your pilot to correct for its new trajectory.”
Pressing her face to the glass of the forward observatory window, Akiko’s eyes widened. The shard hadn’t changed course so much that it was now rolling over along its axis, like a great, big, ponderously slow fly swatter heading straight towards them. “Um, ma’am,” Akiko called out, “you better look at this!”
The Captain took one look at the rolling landmass and started barking orders through her radio. All three of them jumped when several small explosions rocked the shard, erupting into forest fires. “I didn’t do that!” Akiko said firmly. “That wasn’t my fault!”
At the same time, Aislin began staring off into space as the annoying jingle ringtone of Malcom’s phone began playing in her head. “Aislin,” she mumbled like she was answering a phone call.
“Aislin?” Rudyard’s voice came through to her telepathically. “What the hell happened and where are you?”
“I teleported back to the Sol Suna, I’m not sure what exactly happened…” Trailing off, she looked to Akiko in askance.
The fox-girl listened to her sister for a moment before answering. “Amaya says I accidently set off something called a ‘retro thruster’, apparently those need to be in balance or something to keep the shard stable.”
Aislin relayed the information. “Good news is the shard’s gravitational field should remain constant relative to the orientation of the shard,” she added, “so nothing’s going to fall into the void. Bad news is that something else just started some fires on the surface. The Captain’s getting us on course already, I can see the shard slowing down now. We should be back with you in…”
Aislin was interrupted by the loud roar of twisting metal that made her wish she could just pull the phone away from her ear. “Rudyard, what was that?” she asked moments before the line cut out. “Oh shit.”
Pale green sparks of lightning flew across the room as Lydia worked on the controls, several of the circles around them burning out. “Sorry!” the goddess apologized as the ground lurched underfoot. A trickle of blood was running from her nose, blood vessels bursting from the strain of controlling the system’s life-force. “This control system is antiquated and I’ve never dealt with energy like this before! But I think I’ve got the thrust problem sorted out.”
“That’s what he said,” Aeryn snickered, busily scanning the room with her camera.
“Please just tell me those weren’t vital systems,” Malcom begged, pointing at the burned-out circles.
Lydia winced. “Um, semi-vital? I mean, nothing bad happened so they’re probably not a major issue,” she said, not knowing about the fires overhead. “The pale viridian life force in this room, however, indicates that the species that built this was some sort of evolutionary link between humans and Sidhe. The facilities have held up remarkably well but who knows what could go wrong with maintenance delayed in the order of millions of years?”
A loud crunch of something big hitting metal echoed down the hall through the open door to the control room, sending vibrations through the floor into their feet. “Sir,” Leonard called back to his boss who was on Malcom’s phone, “something’s trying to break through the door down there!”
Rudyard cut the call and handed the phone back to Malcom, who stashed it in his back pocket. Shining his gun-light down the hall, he saw the doorway bulging in, more blows rocking the door as it was pummelled by whatever was on the other side. “Right, take a few steps back gentlemen and set up. Whatever comes through the door; shoot to kill. Lydia, stand up against the wall. If it gets through the door, stab it in the back.”
“I mean, if it’s an animal, we shouldn’t kill it,” Lydia mumbled, dithering.
“I respect your convictions,” Rudyard said, “but I’m also responsible for all our lives here. That takes precedence.”
Nodding, Lydia took position. Aeryn didn’t have to be told what to do, quickly scurrying behind cover.
Several more dents appeared in the metal door at the other end of the hallway before it gave way, bouncing around the corner of the T-intersection. The scaled beast battered the doorframe aside with the large, rhino-like, horn on its snout. Thick plates and scales rippled over corded tendons as it tore its way through. “Light it up!” Rudyard ordered, opening fire. Fully automatic fire pattered off its hide like hailstones, merely scratching the enamel.
A peaceful, feminine, voice said something unintelligible from one of the consoles. Rudyard blinked when a small turret popped out of the hallway ceiling, span its barrel towards the escaped beast and fired a net of pulsing pale green energy at it. Flashes of lightning sparked from the walls as the beast roared, bucking wildly to shake the net off. Flinging the stinging projectile aside, it arched it back, impaling the turret with its horn and shredding it.
Malcom saw his chance, taking careful aim and scoring several hits on its exposed underbelly, drawing blood. “See that? Go for the… What the…?”
The gunners paused their fire as they watched whatever sort of rhino-lizard thing this was shrink itself down to the size of a house cat. Letting off a tiny ‘roar’, it bounded forward.
“Don’t let up!” Rudyard ordered, snapping off some more fire. “If it can shrink, it can grow back to full size!”
Akiko and Aislin suddenly appeared in the chamber with an audible pop of displaced air. “We’re back, she’s safe and… Why are you firing at a kitty?” she asked before her eyes narrowed. “Wait, that’s not a kitty! DIE!” Gesturing with her right hand as her snake-like gun slithered into her left hand, a sudden violent breeze whipped through the room as the demon sucked the air out of the corridor. The rhino-lizard began to wheeze as it grew back to its original enormity, bounding forward in desperation and rage.
Its shoulders hit the doorframe to the chamber, buckling the wall. With its head through the door, it took a gasp like a swimmer coming up for air. Lydia screamed a war cry as she brought her manablade down across its cheek, cutting deep. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” she apologized profusely.
Akiko grinned, summoning up her chakra. The floor in front of the beast exploded into intensely hot amber flames, only a harmless illusion but the beast couldn’t know that. Eyes widening, it screeched, pulling back into the vacuum as it tried to flee, escaping through the caved-in ceiling beyond the T-intersection. Dismissing the vacuum, Aislin shook her head, “I almost feel bad for it now. But it did have the temerity to impersonate a kitty.”
“Akiko,” Rudyard addressed the kitsune, “can you ask Amaya if she can strip this room for parts? I don’t want to be down here any longer than we have to.”
“Hold that thought, Akiko,” Aislin interrupted. “Actually, I was considering the merits of repairing this shard, tethering the skyship to it and piloting this around instead.”
“With things like that out there!” Darring scoffed.
“Actually, it might not be as insane as it sounds,” Aeryn said. “This place has clean air, water and game we can hunt. The Sol Suna’s stores can’t last forever.”
“Precisely,” Aislin beamed. “We’d have to secure the animals and get the facilities up and running. Oh, and put out the forest fires…”
“Forest fires!” Lydia screeched, turning to Akiko. “This is all your fault! You just had to go fiddling with the controls!”
That’s not fair! Amaya protested where nobody could hear her. WE didn’t blow out the circles!
Akiko glared at her, pointing at the darkened circles on the walls and floor. “I didn’t do that,” she accused. “Look, let me just put out this fire…”
She was interrupted when the soft, feminine, voice chimed in again in its foreign language. “Beeta dau. Weedub pu chini!”
Akiko blinked as several spray nozzles emerged from the ceiling and sprayed her with flame retardant foam. Wiping foam out of her eyes while everyone snickered at her, she sighed as the fire illusion died out. Shaking the rest of the foam away, she mumbled “Well, I hope you’re all happy now. Amaya, you fix this.” Slipping back into their subconscious, Amaya emerged, hair darkening to black with blue tips. “Ugh,” Amaya groaned, looking up at Rudyard with nuclear-grade doe eyes. “I’m sorry, I should have paid more attention to what she was doing.”
Rudyard and Malcom’s flat stares told her they weren’t buying it but in the end the security chief sighed, hoisting his gun over his shoulder. “Lesson learned, then. If you can get this place fixed up, you’ll have earned my forgiveness.”
“What? No, no, no, no, no,” Lydia protested. “Why’d you bring chaos incarnate down here anyway?”
“To be fair, I brought the engineer down here.”
“You can’t get one without the other and you have to punish them both to punish one of them anyway!”
“All Akiko did was activate some of this facility’s automated defence systems and accidently set of a retro thruster,” Amaya said as calmly as possible. “Your fiddling around trying to fix it caused the forest fires. Which, by the way, we have to deal with as soon as possible. So how about you get out of my face and let me work?”
Lydia spluttered. “You… You…”
Akiko could feel the goddess gathering mana and directing it towards her. Screwing her eyes shut, she braced herself for what was to come. A sudden pop and fizzle sound told her that something had gone wrong as blue sparkles ricocheted across the room. Lydia’s body shuddered for a moment before it changed, her skin darkening, hips and breasts expanding until a vision of flawless beauty stood before them. Malcom was so distracted that he dropped his gun and fumbled trying to pick it up.
“Well that’s an obscure fetish,” Aislin murmured in amusement.
“What happened?” Aeryn whispered to the demon. “She looks like Katie Sackhoff’s Arabian porn double.”
“Who? No, nevermind,” Aislin dismissed the question as soon as she asked it. “The goddess of desire here tried to become Amaya’s vision of beauty to manipulate her but she misdirected the spell to Malcom by accident. It seems that Malcom has a thing for Urd, the goddess of fate. Though I’m not sure she’d appreciate some of the exaggerations.”
“I was just thinking Urd would be useful,” Malcom protested, “not that!”
Amaya laughed while Lydia and Malcom blushed in embarrassment. “Well, that’s not really my thing but thanks for trying, Lydia,” the kitsune chuckled. “You’re still pretty hot, though!”
“Beeta dau,” the feminine voice said again. “Weedub pu chini!”
The nozzles popped out of the ceiling and hosed Lydia down, covering her in a mound of foam.
“Wow,” Amaya noted, trying not to laugh. “These systems seem real buggy.”
#
The room beyond the door the rhino-lizard had battered through had several large tanks full of thick fluid that Lydia, freshly cleaned up and contrite, informed them was a cloning facility. Naturally, Rudyard immediately ordered Amaya to disable the system, so the kitsune was busy under the controls trying to decipher the maze of wires and devices attached to the tubes.
“It’s ok,” Amaya finally said, “I can shut this down.”
“Don’t screw up this time,” Lydia warned.
“Geeze, you’d think a goddess would have a little faith,” Amaya mumbled before snipping a wire.
The alarms sounded immediately as red lights began to flash. “Kilmana da! Kilmana da! Pasphor deebu acha!”
“Amaya! You screwed up again!” Lydia snapped.
“That should have disabled the cloning vats!” Amaya protested.
“It did,” Ailsin said with perfect calm, “but you seem to have triggered a failsafe. There’s a series of holographic symbols appearing over the console, looks like a timer.”
As Amaya shimmied out from under the console, she looked up to see the ‘timer’ disappear, replaced with a three-dimensional holographic map of the facility filling with gas. After a moment, the gas was ignited, cleansing the rooms and hallways in fire. Then the map disappeared and the timer continued.
Lydia stared at the timer intently. “It’s not a countdown, it’s counting up. I think it’s counting up to a certain density level for the gas. Once it gets to the right mixture of flammables and oxygen, boom, the facility is cleansed of any escaped life forms.”
“Shouldn’t we be getting the fuck out of here, then?” Rudyard growled.
“Calm thine pectorals,” Aislin said, looking around to check that everyone was in the room. “I think you’ll find the gas density will drop momentarily.”
When Lydia looked back to the symbols, she watched them rapidly plummet. “What did you do?”
“I created a vacuum in the rest of the facility,” she said smugly. “I can hold it for a few hours but we’re trapped in here until Amaya disables the system.”
Taking her cue, Amaya dived back under the console. It only took a minute for her to disable the failsafe, the holographic image flickered out as the alarms died. “There, see?” Amaya said, handing Lydia the offending circuitry. “No need to panic.”
“Hey, Rudyard,” Malcom called the security chief over to where he was sitting in the corner, scribbling on his notepad. Rudyard walked over and knelt next to him, “What’s up?”
Malcom tapped the symbols on his notebook. “Aislin’s idea might not be as crazy as it first sounds. I think with a bit of time and some help from either her or Lydia, I can decipher this language.”
“I didn’t know you were a linguist.”
He smiled. “Languages and cryptography, it’s all puzzle solving. I’m a private detective, it’s in my job description.”
“We’ll still have to secure the wildlife,” Rudyard pointed out. “But Aeryn’s right about the stores, we’ve got about two months of food without rationing. If things get too tight, we’re looking at mutiny, which won’t help anyone.”
“While I’m not adverse to putting a bullet in a few one percenters, I’d rather avoid it,” Malcom said. “What’s the next move?”
Standing up, Rudyard coughed to get everyone’s attention. “Ok, listen up everyone. We’re going back to base to give our report to the Captain. Based on our recommendations, she’ll make her decision but on the whole, I’m for taking this zoo over. Get your arguments together, this might be a hard sell.”
The room that had become Amaya’s workshop was a mess. Formerly the tool room attached to engineering, the kitsune had dragged a mattress into one corner and laid sleeping bag out on it. Technical manuals and blueprints were scattered around the bedding along with her notes and calculations. Shelving bore clearly labelled boxes of parts, from nuts and bolts to rubber tubing. Amaya herself sat cross-legged at the end of the steel table in the middle of the room, head stuck deep in the guts of the new environmental control for the ship, her fox-like ears flat against her head to keep them out of the way.
“Last screw!” she proclaimed, extracting herself from the device to flop backwards over the edge of the table, hanging upside-down with her legs still crossed on the bench. Letting her arms and hair dangle for a moment, her tank top bunching up under her breasts, she let herself breathe.
Raphael ‘Raph’ Thorn, the chief engineer, stuck his head through the door. He was an older man with greying hair wearing the same overalls as the rest of the engineering crew. Looking up at him while upside-down, Amaya felt conflicted. On one hand, he was her jailer. On the other hand, he was a kindly, father-like, figure. Demanding but fair, good to his subordinates and popular amongst the engineers. “Is it working?” he asked.
“It will work,” Amaya answered, flipping off the table to land on her feet, “all I need is some photosynthetic cells and carbon filters.”
Hopping over to the box, she pulled out the one labelled ‘Cartridges’ to look inside. Her ears and tails immediately drooped as the only occupant, a dead cockroach, skittered into a corner on its back. “We used everything we had and more getting the hull airtight,” Raphael explained. “If you hadn’t disassembled the environmental controls, we’d still be leaking air.”
Amaya groaned, rubbing her temples. “I don’t need to be told there’s a providence to my madness.”
Sheesh, Sis, Akiko grumbled, learn to take the good luck you can get.
“I probably wouldn’t have made the same call, but I might have depending on the severity of the leak,” Raphael said, shrugging. “And we’ve got a new life support system thanks to you. Not sure I could have built one from scratch myself.”
“The difference between an error and a mistake is not correcting what you do wrong,” Akiko quoted from one of her favourite books, “thanks, Raph.” And thank you, Sis, she added mentally to Akiko. “But without photosynthetic cells and carbon scrubbers, it’s still just a pile of highly organized junk,” she continued aloud. “I can build them, I helped redesign the environment system for the prototype racing suit back at school, but I can’t cultivate the photosynthetic cells from nothing.”
“We could raid the decorative plants on the rest of the ship,” Raph suggested.
“Nah, they’re slowing down the carbon dioxide build-up,” Amaya rejected the idea. “We need fresh materials. I’m going to go see Rudyard and organize another exploration party onto the shard. How’s your team doing with the tether?”
Grinning, Raph beckoned her out of her workshop and led her to the fore of the engineering deck past the engines and a set of stairs that led past the cargo bay to the helicopter pad on the roof. The room had been storage and maintenance access to the bridge systems overhead but all the cargo had been cleared to make way for the energy tethers. Two large engines hummed, radiating heat from the plasma coils that generated power for the long, cable-like, force-fields that held the ship to the anchor points installed in the shard below. A thick window had been installed so that the operators could see the tethers as the energy beams fluctuated rhythmically.
“Your team did all this while I was working?” Amaya asked, whistling as she pressed her nose to the window. “I’m impressed.”
“Can’t let you hog all the glory,” Raph chuckled.
“Where’d you get the plasma coils?”
“One thing about working skyships, you’ve got all the rules, regulations and safety precautions of both an airline and a cruise ship,” Raph explained. “The engines have two redundant systems and by law we’ve got to bring a full set of spares. We’re going to have to be careful, though, depending on how long we’re out here.”
“Hope for the best, prepare for the worst,” Amaya said, as much to herself as Raph. “Hope you won’t miss me for a few hours.”
“Just remember, we need you back here in one piece to start on the void engines,” Raph reminded her. “I don’t know what kind of school you went to and I don’t care but you and Aislin are the only two people on board who can get us out of here.”
“Don’t worry,” Amaya said, trying to smile reassuringly as she walked towards the lift to the upper decks. “I’ll have Rudyard and a bunch of his boys with big guns right behind me.”
Raph waved goodbye at the lift as the doors closed. Not long after, Amaya made her way to the security office where Rudyard was sitting behind his desk, looking over reports. “I thought Raph was taking care of you?” he asked, eschewing pleasantries.
Amaya spread her hands and shrugged, helplessly. “Can’t avoid it, I need an escort down onto the shard to gather resources. I’ve finished the life support system but we need raw materials for the carbon dioxide scrubbers. There are plants and charcoal, thanks to the fires, we can use on the surface.”
See? I know what I’m doing, Akiko commented.
Don’t push your luck, Amaya snapped back.
Rudyard stared at her for a long moment. “We know at least that displacer wolf is down there. Not to mention the cockatrice. Besides, Aislin’s busy taking the captain through her plan to pull us along with the shard’s engines.”
“We’ve got a helicopter,” Amaya suggested. “No need to bother Aislin and the Captain. We can scout a landing zone for beasts before dropping us in. It won’t take me long to harvest the material, then we can get back home. Heck, if we can take out some of the hostile wildlife along the way, bonus points. If we’re going to use the shard, we’ll have to secure it anyway.”
Sighing, Rudyard stood, neatly stacking the papers he’d been reading and stacked them off to one side. “I’ll need to inform the Captain but those environmental controls are our top priority. And I could use a walk. Go grab what you need and meet me at the landing pad.”
Amaya saluted mockingly, “Roger, Sir.”
#
Flying over the terrain was a new and interesting experience for both Amaya and Akiko. The bubble-like cockpit of the helicopter gave a near two-hundred-and-seventy-degree field of view, the kitsune could even see the treetops passing by between her feet. Fitting headphones over her ears had been impossible, so she wore one of the thickly padded pilot’s helmets with her ears flat to her scalp. Wind whipped through the cabin as Rudyard and his men scanned the ground for hostiles, hindered by the periodic clouds of smoke caused by the smouldering brushfires that had erupted after the malfunction in the command centre. The security chief was wearing mirrored shades along with his beret, his heavy machinegun resting butt-first next to his booted foot. They were loaded for bear, which was apropos. Amaya didn’t want to see what sort of bears this place could have produced.
Lydia sat on the opposite side of the cabin, peering down with the curious detachment of an academic. She’d dressed somewhat practically in rugged shorts and a tank top. Of course, since it was Lydia, the tank top was a designer print depicting a Japanese ink drawing of an Oni and the shorts were artfully frayed denim with hand-embroidered floral decroations. She was also pointedly not talking to anyone present without reason, though that was as far as any obvious hint of resentment went on her part.
“That area,” Amaya said, pointing to a blackened, burned, clearing near the edge of the shard with a copse of trees and several large stones resting in the middle. “Take us over there.”
Nodding, the pilot slowly turned the craft in that direction. Trees got sparser near the edge of the shard but Amaya spotted large patches of green moss on the rocks. Seeing the edge of this small world simply drop off into grey nothingness as they got closer to it was still unnerving. Ignoring her fears, Amaya scanned the edge of the clearing, seeing a momentary shift in the bushes. As the helicopter hovered for a few moments, Amaya focused on the bushes at the edge of the clearing. It wasn’t long before she saw the outline of an enormous bird-like creature, feathers shifting between patches of green to camouflage itself.
“Rudyard!” Amaya called back, pointing, “That’s the cockatrice!”
Spinning his head, following Amaya’s finger, it took a moment for Rudyard to spot it. “I see it! Holy hell, it’s big!”
Lydia got up, nimbly grabbing the overhead handhold as she joined Rudyard on that side. “It’s not supposed to be that big,” Lydia informed them. “There’s only one cockatrice sighting that we know of on Earth, and it was the size of a chicken. It also didn’t have adaptive camouflage.”
The group watched it scratch at the dirt, pacing just beyond the edge of the trees. “It knows we’re here,” Lydia yelled over the wind and noise, “but it doesn’t want to move into the open. If you can give it a scare, it’ll run off!”
Nodding, Rudyard reached over his shoulder to remove a gun that looked like nothing more than a tube with a handle. Opening the breech, he selected a large munition with red markings and loaded it into the chamber. Making sure his safety harness was firmly attached to the fuselage, he leaning out, took careful aim and fired. The incendiary grenade was propelled in a long arc, descending within a few feet of the bird-creature before exploding in the air and setting the nearby trees alight. The cockatrice screeched and bolted back into the forest.
“All right, take us down,” Rudyard ordered the pilot, holstering the grenade launcher to hoist his heavy machine gun. Looking to his men, he nodded. “That thing might be back. Watch our backs while Amaya gets what she needs. Keep the engines warm, I don’t want to be down there any longer than we have to be.”
The landing was smooth. Rudyard and his two men immediately hopped out, running ten feet before kneeling with plenty of open space between them and the underbrush. Lydia stood tall, like the wind from the rotors barely affected her, while Amaya scampered over to the rocks to begin gathering moss samples. The fire burned out at the edge of the clearing quickly thanks to the damp conditions.
“Here,” Amaya said, handing Lydia a bucket, “scoop up some of that charcoal, would you? Fill the bucket.”
Lydia snatched the bucket from her hand but went and began collecting material as requested.
In no time at all, the group was back on the chopper as it rose into the air again, not a trace of the cockatrice in sight. “See? Nothing to worry about,” Amaya called back. Rudyard gave her a thumb up but Lydia was staring out at the scenery, seemingly lost in her own thoughts. Amaya resolved not to let the goddess get her down, grinning happily as she cradled her moss samples on her lap.
The helicopter passed through a small cloud of smog from the grenade as the pilot directed them back to the Sol Suna. The skyship was still an impressive sight, glistening in the eerily source-less sunlight on the approach. It wasn’t until they touched down that Rudyard breathed a sigh of relief. Lydia immediately jumped out and strode into the ship without saying a word.
“Almost too easy,” Rudyard commented to Amaya as they stood at the edge of the helipad, the whine of the engines finally subsiding. “After the last couple of days, I’ll take a little good luck.”
“I hear you,” Amaya agreed, taking off her flight helmet. “Part of me is still waiting for the other shoe to drop. Is Lydia ok? I’m sensing a little hostility.”
“You did kinda show her up down in the command centre,” Rudyard muttered, “maybe she’s still sore about that. Maybe she thinks Akiko’s a liability. Honestly, I don’t blame her. Let her cool off a while.”
Maybe she’s an uptight bitch, Akiko commented.
“We’ll leave her alone. Besides, I’ve got work to do,” Amaya said, patting her box of samples. “I should have a report for you in a few hours.”
“Once you do, you’re going to get some sleep,” Rudyard called after her, “that’s an order!”
Amaya gave him another mocking salute before hopping into the lift and descending to engineering. It wasn’t until she was halfway down that she realized she’d forgotten the bucket of charcoal.
#
“The fires were likely caused by blockages in the coolant vents,” Aislin explained to the Captain as they poured over her hand-drawn schematics. The Captain’s office was a large room with a table directly in the middle, a minibar at one end and bay windows looking over the recreation area, giving the two plenty of light to draw plans. “The structure is very old, we’ll need to reinforce…”
She was interrupted by a polite knock on the door a moment before it opened. Aeryn poked her head through, looking apologetic. “Um, I’m sorry if I’m interrupting something…”
“You are,” Captain Frye snapped, “but I trust it’s important enough?”
Aeryn gulped, understanding the threat implicit in the question. “It is,” she said, slipping inside and closing the door. She was holding a small TV screen in her hands. “Rudyard didn’t want me to go with the away team this time but he let me tap into the helicopter’s camera system.” Placing the screen on the table, she turned the screen around to show them the picture. It was obviously the point of view from the nose of the helicopter, looking out over the landing pad.
“Huh,” Frye mumbled, “we haven’t been informed they’d returned yet. I’m glad everything went smoothing this time.”
“About that,” Aeryn said, pointing through the bay windows to the landing pad outside. The demon and the Captain turned to look over their shoulders.
The landing pad was empty.
Aislin’s jaw dropped open. “What the F…!”
Lydia was getting a headache and she wasn’t quite sure why. Wandering through the halls of the Sol Suna, heading back to her cabin, she took several wrong turns that confused her. Finally reaching her cabin, she flopped into her bed and groaned. Rolling onto her back, she picked up her tablet to resume her research. For the last several days she’d been trying to work out what was happening to Amaya and how she could seal Akiko away once more. Unfortunately, there was precious little on Ashvattha about kitsune and even less in the Community lorebooks.
Did Amaya have multiple personality disorder linked to her shapeshifting ability? A bizarre form of Popeye syndrome? Practically every book on the subject mentions two things about the kitsune race, first that the older ones are eccentric and second that the race as a whole is highly secretive. More disturbing were the articles that suggested that kitsune are related to the kumiho, a similar fox-like species that eat souls. Amaya couldn’t be a kumiho, however, she was crazy but not crazy enough.
Staring at her tablet screen, the goddess came back to reality with the realization that the words she was reading didn’t make sense. “Tonal changes in kitsune range from pumpernickel to the camshaft,” she read aloud from the text, just to make sure she wasn’t going mad. Scanning the page, then flipping forward and back through the pages, she blinked. Every single sentence was pure gobbledegook.
Casting the tablet aside, she hit the call buzzer on her bedside table to summon a member of staff. To her surprise, there was an immediate knock on the door. Jumping up, she pressed the button to open the automatic door to find a short, young, Japanese stewardess smiling up at her. “Hello, ma’am,” she greeted, bowing politely, “you called?”
“That was quick,” Lydia observed hesitantly.
“I was just checking on the other residents when I heard your call,” she explained, stepping inside. “What can I help you with?”
Lydia’s eyes narrowed. “I just wanted to find out if there was a problem with the ship’s computers.”
“No error there I’m currently aware of, ma’am,” the stewardess replied with a fake smile.
Focusing, the goddess shifted her attention to the mindscape, the subliminal reality that connected her to Ashvattha and all other immortals. The purpose this time was different as she attempted to peer into the stewardess’ mind. As reality fell away, Lydia found herself standing before enormous, burning, black gates the size of skyscrapers. Across the doors, burning with the fury of a forge, was a number written in Japanese.
Eighty-eight. In Chinese culture, the luckiest number. A code for ‘Heil Hitler’ in white nationalist circles, ‘H’ being the eighth letter of the alphabet. Also code for ‘hip-hop’ in music circles for the same reason. In Japanese culture, however, eighty-eight took on the associated meaning of ‘uncounted’ or ‘infinite’.
Snapping back to reality, Lydia took a step back from the beatifically grinning stewardess. “Who the hell are you?”
#
Amaya stared at her new environmental control system, only it wasn’t her environmental control system. It was an assemblage of parts to be sure, superficially similar to her machine, but it wasn’t a machine that did anything. Tubes were connected to fittings that weren’t attached to anything. The wiring connected to mish-mashed circuitry that looked like something out of a poorly researched science fiction movie.
Picking up her box of samples, she left her workshop and looked each way down the hall. It was astonishingly quiet, far too quiet for the engineering deck she knew. “Raph!” she called, walking back to the engine room. Several men in engineering overalls that she didn’t recognize were tightening and un-tightening bolts as the engines hummed along perfectly. They barely noticed her other than to turn and nod their heads. Walking the other way, she opened the door to the room with the energy tethers, only to find shelving full of random parts and materials.
Her heart beating fast, Amaya skipped up the stairwell, navigating the hallways until she found the bridge. Captain Frye was nowhere to be seen and the crew idly keeping the ship steady didn’t pay her any mind as she stepped up to the sensor station. The view outside the windows was clouded by hanging smog from the fires and the sensors were useless. The altimeter read that they were perfectly steady at one thousand feet, there wasn’t even a slight breeze and the ship was perfectly level, almost like they were parked on a sidewalk rather than floating.
What the hell? Akiko asked. Since when was there an illusion of our entire fucking ship?
Grabbing her radio, she left the room and flicked to Rudyard’s channel. “Chief? We have a problem.”
“I’ve noticed,” Rudyard whispered back, “where are you?”
“Outside the bridge,” Amaya answered.
“Ok, I’m coming to get you,” he said. “I’ve gathered the boys and our pilot back on the landing pad with the chopper. Then we pick up Lydia and get the hell out of wherever the hell this is. Do you still have the charcoal and the samples?”
“I have the samples,” Amaya answered, “and the charcoal’s still on the helicopter. I forgot it.”
There was a long pause before Rudyard answered. “Lucky break. See you in a minute.”
You know if this is an illusion, whoever’s controlling it can keep us separated, Akiko suggested.
No need to alarm the Chief just yet, Amaya replied, we’ve been able to navigate the ship well so far.
Sis, we share a brain, we both know who’s doing this. I think Rudyard has a right to know.
It could be some kind of freaky defence the shard has, I don’t want to jump to conclusions…
Right at that moment, Rudyard turned the corner and came into view, fully armed. Staring at Amaya for a few moments, he shook his head. “Ok, I was expecting that to be harder. Thank God you kept hold of the samples.”
Walking over, Amaya’s ears flattened against her head as she looked down the way he’d come. “It’s easier to render an illusion for a group together than one split apart,” Amaya mused. “They probably let us meet to reduce the burden of maintaining it. Even so, whoever or whatever is doing this is extraordinarily powerful.”
“How powerful are we talking?”
“When it comes to illusions, Akiko’s a talented beginner,” Amaya explained. “The best we can do is make illusions to disguise ourselves.”
Don’t tell him that! Akiko complained. You’re such a fucking goodie-two-shoes!
“Aislin and Lydia are way more powerful,” Amaya continued, ignoring her sister. “But even on their level, if they could do illusions, they couldn’t do this. This is an entire, solid, environment inhabited by apparently living people. Sure, the details are sloppy but considering the sheer scale of the feat it’s no wonder.”
“All the more reason to keep moving,” Rudyard said, pulling Amaya down the hall. “I’m assuming that Lydia went back to her cabin. If not, we can…”
He paused at a T-intersection. Looking both ways, he pointed. “The dining hall should be that way, medbay should be that way,” he said, pointing to a curved hallway lined with windows on one side and doors on the other in both directions. Looking back, he saw the hallway shift, morphing from the way back to the bridge to the hallway leading to medbay. “Shit,” he swore.
Turning around, Amaya shook her head. “Now they’re just toying with us,” she murmured, walking over to one of the cabin doors. She tucked the samples under one arm and pressed the button and found that it opened into the ballroom, tables and empty chairs stacked neatly at one end of the large open space. It was also impossible, the room itself was supposed to be aft aside from being large enough to intersect with the hallway they’d just walked down. Allowing the door to close, the kitsune snapped her arm up at the last second, holding the door ajar as she peeked inside at the rapidly morphing illusion. Catching the flicker of red mist as the geometry dissolved, she grabbed the edge of what was ‘real’ and gave it a yank with all her physical and spiritual might.
“Wait, wha…?” Rudyard gasped in alarm, interrupted as the hallway around them began to flicker in and out of existence. Parts of the wall and floor began to break into triangular prisms, revealing more of the formless red mist.
Amaya gave sudden cry as the floor broke apart under her, Rudyard reacting in a split second, diving to grab her wrist. Dangling over the blank grey void, clutching the samples to her chest with tails swishing frantically, the kitsune squeaked when she looked down to find the edge of the shard in the distance far below. “R-Rudyard!” she called out. “I found the sub-ocean!”
“What the fuck did you do?” Rudyard demanded, grunting each word as he heaved her upward. A sudden shift in the floor under him made him look down to find his stable platform also breaking into flickering triangles along with the rest of the hallway. “Shit,” he sighed in a moment of resignation before they both fell.
Only to land heavily on the floor of the Sol Suna’s arcade as it appeared underneath them, surrounded by flickering screens that buzzed old electronic tunes. Amaya managed to hit the ground on her feet before flopping onto her back but Rudyard smacked into the ground belly-first.
“Ow! Ow! Ow!” Amaya moaned, quickly rolling over to rub her tails.
“Never. Do that. Again!” Rudyard shouted.
“I know, I know, dumb idea!” Amaya agreed, springing into a cross-legged sitting position. “On the bright side, I don’t think whoever’s creating this illusion wants us dead.”
“That’s not a great comfort,” Rudyard grumbled.
We both know who’s doing this, Akiko said. Let me handle this, Amaya.
Amaya sighed, “I wouldn’t usually suggest this and you’re not going to like it.”
Kneeling, Rudyard leant against his HMG and sighed. “You’re about to suggest letting Akiko out.”
Amaya blinked. “Wait, what?”
“First, it’s what you always say just before suggesting letting Akiko out,” he snapped, “and second, you suggest it every single time we get in trouble.”
Oh shit, Akiko commented, better pull the plug, Sis, it’s learning!
Shut up, Amaya snapped back at her. “Ok, but the reason I do that is because she’s better at illusions and sneaking about than I am. Remember how I said whoever’s doing this is way more powerful? We need every advantage if I’m going to get us out of here.”
He glared at her. “Then why am I still looking at you?”
Amaya’s black and blue hair immediately brightened into white and red, her body slimming and losing muscle definition as the change spread down to her tails. Standing up, Akiko stretched. “AH! Good to be out! Thanks, old man,” she said, patting Rudyard on the beret.
“Hands off,” Rudyard snapped, standing up. “Amaya said you can get us out of here, I need you focused.”
“Yes, yes,” Akiko snapped back, “I’m not an idiot. Believe it or not, I understand the gravity of the situation…”
She was interrupted when gravity suddenly inverted and the two occupants of the room suddenly found themselves slamming heavily into the ceiling. Akiko still had the presence of mind to clutch the samples to her chest, the corner squashing against her breasts on impact, knocking the wind out of her.
“Ow!” Akiko wheezed.
“Damnit!” Rudyard growled through the pain as he rolled around on the floor. “Don’t tempt them like that!”
Taking a deep breath, Akiko rolled onto her knees to search Amaya’s tool belt for something she could draw with. Finding a permanent marker, she began inscribing a circle into the floor around her. “Ok, time to power up a bit,” Akiko said. “Aislin’s been teaching us how to do this.”
Finally getting onto his feet again, Rudyard watched as she inscribed a perfect circle around herself. “Wow, you’ve really been paying attention?”
Akiko glared at him. “Ok, I admit, I have attention span issues for a lot of things. But this is magic and magic is awesome! You never wanted to be a wizard as a kid?”
“It wasn’t exactly on the curriculum,” he replied, hefting his machinegun. “I’ll stick with what I know.”
“Each to their own,” Akiko said.
Rudyard watched her complete the circle. “You know, you’re impressive when you’re actually focused.”
“Amaya’s a bad influence,” she quipped, looking over her work before grinning up at him. “But thanks, big guy. All right, let’s get out of here.”
Closing her eyes to concentrate, Akiko reached out with her senses and felt the illusory material around her. It was firm and solidly under someone else’s control, but they were distracted. Insinuating her will into the structure, she pulled and warped it. Rudyard watched the ceiling underfoot warp and twist, undulating like water. The waves reached the wall and crawled up it, geometry twisting into a vertical whirlpool that seemed to drill through solid matter, creating a tunnel that cut to the heart of the illusion.
“Who the hell are you?” Lydia demanded of a Japanese woman wearing a stewardess’ uniform. Both women jumped when they saw the hole opening in the wall of what appeared to be Lydia’s cabin, revealing Akiko and Rudyard in the arcade beyond.
“She’s the illusionist,” Akiko answered.
The stewardess smiled at Akiko as the cabin around her began to dissolve, revealing an immaculately sculpted Zen garden. “Impressive,” she complimented as her clothes shifted into a traditional red kimono embroidered with silver and blue waves crashing over villages and mountains. Her hair shifted to a fiery red as her face extended into a fox’s slender muzzle, nine tails spreading out around her in a halo of burning fur. Amber marks spread from her forehead down her face as she grinned, revealing sharp teeth. “You’ve grown well, Akiko.”
Lydia backed away towards Rudyard, looking at Akiko. “You know her?”
Akiko bowed respectfully. “It’s nice to see you again, Godmother. Rudyard Holt, Lydia, this is my Godmother, Yakyou, the Uncounted Calamities.”
“Your Godmother is a nine-tails?” Lydia asked incredulously.
Akiko smirked. “Mum was one of her disciples.”
Rudyard hefted his machinegun up onto his shoulder. “That means she’s really powerful, I take it?”
Both Lydia and Akiko nodded.
Looking to Yakyou, he inclined his head in respect. “So you can get us home?”
The nine-tails shook her head, picking up a watering can to absently tend to some potted plants. “Unfortunately, I cannot sense where you are. I just know you’re there.”
Rudyard glanced at Lydia, who nodded. “She can probably see the area where Akiko is,” the goddess explained, “but not the path between the two points.”
“A good enough explanation,” Yakyou said, smirking. “The void between worlds is both infinite and infinitesimally small. You are everywhere and nowhere at the same time, it’s not like taking a trip down the road to the supermarket. There are no directions to give, no online maps. But don’t despair, your quest home is by no means impossible.”
“Well that’s something,” Rudyard mumbled. “But if Amaya and Akiko are your Goddaughters, why the hell would you trap us in here in the first place?”
“It’s a test,” Yakyou answered. “I wanted to see how much my Goddaughters have grown. Tell me, Akiko, how long have you been awake?”
“About three days,” Akiko said balling her hands into fists as she trembled. “The ship went through some sort of portal and I was hit by green lightning. Before we go, I have a question. Why did you seal me? Being Ichiro all those years was hell! Do you have any idea what you put us through?”
“Yes,” the nine-tails said simply, looking up from her task to fix Akiko with a cold, passionless, stare. “I knew it would hurt every day but my hand was forced. Frankly, I’m glad the seal was broken early.”
Squeezing her fists tight, Akiko finally relaxed. “Well that’s something. Can we go now?”
“Certainly,” Yakyou replied, sweeping her hand in a commanding gesture. The arcade shifted, the ceiling opening as the floor rose onto the top deck of the illusory Sol Suna. Rudyard’s men stepped back as the whole scene emerged onto the landing pad, even the tunnel leading to Yakyou’s garden and the nine-tails herself.
Aislin popped into existence next to them with an audible rush of air as she teleported in. “Ok, there you all are,” she said, glaring at Yakyou. “I take it this is your doing?”
“Uh, Aislin,” Akiko interrupted, “this is…”
“Yakyou, the Uncounted Calamities,” Aislin finished for her. “Yeah, I studied modern immortal politics on Ashvattha. We all ready to leave, then?”
“Damn straight,” Rudyard said, stalking towards the chopper.
“One moment,” Yakyou interrupted. “I’m quite willing to let you go, in return for some payment. I’ll be keeping that helicopter of yours…”
“Oh, fuck no,” Aislin snapped. “Akiko!”
Already concentrating, Akiko’s circle flared and sparked with amber lightning as she thrust all the power she could muster into it. The landing pad stretched, solid metal rolling into two enormous waves spreading in opposite directions, one away from Yakyou, the other slamming into the hole to Yakyou’s garden. As the group was hurled into the air, Aislin spread her arms, red light encapsulating every living being as well as the helicopter. They felt a moment of weightlessness before they were all dumped once more on the landing pad of the real Sol Suna.
The helicopter bounced on its landing gear and skidded to a halt, rocking the landing pad with the impact. Caught by surprise, the rest of the group rolled across the deck and came to rest groaning and muttering darkly. Rising to her hands and knees, Aislin spat blood onto the decking, the marks on her face burned and blackened. “Hrgh,” she coughed, collapsing onto her back, “we can forget about me doing that again for a while.”
“Sempai!” Akiko called out, scrambling to Aislin’s side, leaving the box of samples behind. “Are you ok? Shit, she’s been burned! We have to get her to the doctor!”
“That sounds like a great idea, actually,” Aislin groaned.
“Medic!” Rudyard called to the crew members running towards them. Stepping up to the end of the platform, he took out his binoculars to scan the horizon, just in time to catch the fake Sol Suna winking out of existence, leaving no trace behind.
Malcom and Aeryn brought a stretcher to carry Aislin, Akiko following along behind as they carried her downstairs. Limping a little, Rudyard picked up the forgotten box of samples and handed it to one of his men. “Get this down to engineering,” he ordered, “and get the charcoal from the helicopter, too. Tell him Amaya will be there presently.”
Looking over to where Lydia was dusting herself off with barely a scrape, Rudyard nodded to her. “You ok?”
“I’m fine,” she said curtly.
Walking closer, he leaned in and lowered his voice. “I couldn’t help but notice that Yakyou and her Goddaughters have markings like you and Aislin.”
“Honestly, I don’t know what that’s about,” Lydia said. “It’s curious. Our markings stabilize our mindscapes and connect us to Ashvattha. Nine-tailed kitsune are immortal, if very eccentric, it’s only natural they worked out a similar method of protecting themselves. They probably copied us. Even so, there’s no reason for Amaya to have them.”
Rudyard grunted. “Something about them, though. It’s on the tip of my brain. Ugh, nevermind. I’m going to report to the Captain then go get a drink for me and my guys. You’re welcome to join.”
Lydia nodded. “Thanks, that’d be nice.”
The small crowd that had gathered on deck shouted an incoherent babble of demands led by a middle-aged blonde woman. She wore an expensive, yet tasteless, electric blue and lemon yellow floral print dress. Rudyard stood atop the stage at one end away from the pool trying to calm the mob before him with even, authoritative, tones. His uniform and holstered sidearm were an unsubtle reminder that he was in charge. Lydia kept one eye on proceedings from her seat by the pool, reading a novel. She’d chosen a tight white shirt with red cargo shorts under a pastel yellow blouse worn open to flow around her as she moved. Casual yet stylish.
“Everyone, please,” Rudyard said, finally quieting the crowd. “I’m sorry, I can only take questions one at a time.”
In the silence, the woman in the blue dress outdid her peers in both tenacity and shrillness. “We demand to know what’s going on! We’ve been hovering, doing God knows what, for four days! We didn’t pay for a ‘world cruise’ over the same stretch of jungle!”
“Ma’am,” Rudyard replied calmly, “the ship’s engineers are currently fixing damaged caused by the storm we experienced after leaving Darwin.”
“That doesn’t explain why you, the Captain and the crew have been so evasive whenever we ask where we are,” she snapped back. “And the computer can’t answer us either! I don’t remember there being any jungle this close to Darwin. Heck, I don’t even recognize some of those plants!”
“I understand your concerns. I’m not authorized to give you the full details of what’s happened yet but I promise I’ll go directly from this meeting to talk to the Captain about an official announcement. With luck, you’ll know everything we know by this afternoon.”
“That’s not good enough! Why, I’ve never seen such incompetence…”
Lydia had had enough, stuffing her novel back in her infinity purse as she stormed over to get in the woman’s face. “I’ll thank you to show some respect,” she snapped. “Chief Holt is a veteran and second officer onboard this ship. Everything he does is for the good of the passengers and crew.”
The woman snorted scornfully. “Seriously? There’s only one type of security man on these sorts of vessels. Old men and washed-up has-beens.”
The crack of skin hitting skin reverberated from the glass dome overhead, Lydia’s palm impacting with the woman’s cheek. The crowd was stunned into shocked silence as the woman stared in shock, unable to compute what just happened. “Thank you, Lydia,” Rudyard muttered, stepping between the goddess and the crowd. “Apologies, ma’am, I do understand that tensions are running high at the moment. But there’s no need for this to escalate any further. I promise to stress to Captain Frye that you should be informed as soon as possible.”
Sputtering, the woman finally let herself be led away, so livid she could barely speak. Without its leader, the crowd quickly dispersed into angrily muttering groups.
“That could have gone more smoothly,” Rudyard groaned, giving Lydia a penetrating glare.
“What?” Lydia asked ingenuously, head cocked to one side. “Bitch deserved it.”
Holding his face in one large hand, Rudyard counted to three and took a deep breath. “I’m going to go talk to the Captain. Try to keep yourself out of trouble, please.”
“Sure,” Lydia said, retrieving her novel from her purse as she returned to her seat, continuing as if nothing had happened.
“On second thought,” Rudyard interrupted her, “why don’t you come with me to talk to the Captain. If you’re going to get involved no matter what, you might as well back me up.”
Smirking, Lydia put her book away again and stood up. “You just don’t want to let me out of your sight,” she teased, following as he led her toward the fore of the ship.
“Yes, actually,” Rudyard replied, “at least that way I know when something’s about to explode.”
#
“How are you feeling?” Captain Frye asked as Aislin eased herself into a chair in the conference room. The demon’s face was bandaged and her eyes were sunken and black.
“Bored,” Aislin sighed. “Bed rest was driving me crazy but I did manage to brush up on the schematics for void engines as well as some theory.”
“Well, at least you’re not actively bleeding from the eyes,” Frye quipped, smirking.
Aislin chuckled. “I did overdo it a bit but the helicopter was too good an asset to lose. What’s the status of the ship and the other passengers?”
“The natives are restless,” Frye said, grimacing. “Rudyard’s defusing a flash mob right now. I’m going to have to tell them something. The energy tethers are holding us firmly to the shard and supplies are still good. The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of sticking with this floating plot of land. If anything leads to mutiny amongst this soft-bellied lot, it’ll be rationing. Luckily, the run from Darwin to Okinawa is the longest stretch of the voyage, so we’re well supplied. But if worse comes to worse and we’re stuck out here long term, the sooner we can begin farming the better.”
“I’ve been thinking about that too,” Aislin said, “we’ll need to establish a beachhead and secure it from the local wildlife. I hate to say it but we might have to go out of our way to deal with the more dangerous animals definitively.”
Frye sighed. “Displacer wolves, cockatrice… I feel like I’m in a direct-to-cable monster movie.”
“I know some of my compatriots have introduced certain concepts to humanity through fiction,” Aislin said. “We don’t go founding religions anymore but we do like to meddle in creative exploits.”
“Maybe we should be looking for a random blue police box.”
“I do hope you think more highly of my maturity than that, Captain,” Aislin replied, smirking. “But I won’t say it’s impossible.”
The automatic sliding door opened as Amaya strode through with a spring in her step. “Captain,” she greeted, her grin broadening when she saw Aislin. “Sempai! Glad to see you up and about. Good news, the new environmental control system is installed and fully operational. Nobody’s going to be suffocating to death any time soon.”
“That is good news,” Frye sighed in relief. “Aislin was just suggesting, and I agree, that we need to secure a safe area on the shard below so we won’t have to worry about monster attacks. Additionally, we need the ability to traverse this.” She gestured toward the windows and the grey void beyond.
“Your engineers seem capable of working with advanced tech,” Aislin observed. “I didn’t think humans were this far along. I will have to requisition our smallest engineer, however.”
“Oh? Seems I’m right on cue,” Amaya said, grinning so hard she felt like her face might be stuck.
“There’s my assistant,” the demon said, reaching up to pat the kitsune’s head. “How do you feel like learning more horrible things about the nature of reality? I tell a lie, people will rely on you knowing these things to keep them alive.”
“Bring it on,” Amaya answered cheerfully.
“That’s good to hear,” Frye said, “what do you need from me?”
“We need workspace,” Aislin said, “I was hoping to requisition the engine room. The atmospheric engines are likely to burn out soon enough and our project will be replacing them anyway.”
“Makes sense,” Frye agreed, “you have my permission.”
As Amaya and Aislin were leaving, Lydia and Rudyard arrived at the door. “Oh, hi chief,” Amaya greeted Rudyard. “Atmospheric’s back up. You can breathe easy, literally.”
Rudyard groaned. “How long have you been waiting to use that one?”
“Five or six days,” Amaya quipped. “It was Akiko’s idea!”
It was not, you cheeky liar! Akiko protested.
Looking to Aislin, Rudyard winced. “Wow, you look out of it.”
Lydia punched him lightly on the arm. “That’s not something you tell a lady.”
“Lies,” Aislin quipped.
“Besides, she’s just dealing with corruption right now,” Lydia continued casually.
Rudyard’s gaze immediately snapped up into a hard stare. “Who’s bribing who? What? When? Where? Names. Dates. Now.”
“Woah! Down boy,” Amaya said, patting the much larger security chief on the shoulder. “Corruption is just the term we use for when a psychic overdoes it and hurts themselves. Like when Sempai burned herself teleporting us and got bleeding stigmata of the eyes.”
Taking a deep breath, Rudyard pinched the bridge of his nose. “Just one moment, I need to calm down this rage.”
Aislin smirked, unable to help herself. “Besides, if someone wanted to bribe me, it’d be extremely expensive.”
“Come in,” Captain Frye beckoned, interrupting before more could be said. “How did the meeting with the passengers go?”
They let the door close behind them, Amaya and Aislin staying behind to hear what Rudyard had to say. “We had a… Not really heated but heartfelt discussion with some concerned people. I think I deflected them neatly but we really need to decide what we’re telling the passengers and make an announcement. Soon.”
“I figured as much,” Frye sighed. “We’ll get our story straight and present it to them this afternoon. After that, how would you feel about going hunting?”
“I’d rather not,” Rudyard sighed, “but I was expecting it.”
“Big bad soldier afraid of some animals?” Frye teased.
“The displacer wolf was this tall at the shoulder,” Rudyard said, holding a hand over his head. “This isn’t a question of culling some stray dogs, more like hunting super-dinosaurs with heat-ray vision.”
“We haven’t actually encountered one that can shoot lasers out of its eyes,” Lydia rebuked him. “If you think about it, it’s not an advantage for most animals to ruin their food by setting it on fire. The cockatrice coats people in stone so it can eat them. It’s actually much worse.” Pausing, the goddess pondered for a few moments. “Actually, come to think of it, there’s only been one recorded cockatrice sighting on Earth. What are the chances that there’s another one here on this shard just randomly? Nobody ever did work out where the original cockatrice even came from.”
Aislin raised one eyebrow. “Wow, I knew there was a reason we kept you around.”
“What?” Rudyard asked, looking between the two immortals.
“She’s suggesting that there’s a gate somewhere on this shard,” Aislin said, “a gate that once led to Earth.”
“So we can get home?” Frye asked.
“Don’t count your cockatrice before they’re hatched,” Lydia quipped. “I’m making an assumption and the shard’s very, very old. Chances are if there is a gate, it’ll be non-functional.”
“But it’s a far better start than nothing,” Aislin insisted. “If the machinery exists, it can be repaired or scavenged for our own device. Even then, once we have a gate, finding Earth isn’t a simple matter.”
“We’re getting way ahead of ourselves,” Frye said, getting back to the point. “Reynolds is almost finished translating the language you found down there. Once he’s finished, we’ll mount a scouting operation to assess the threat of the monsters and find a good place for the beachhead. I’ll ask the engineers if they can adapt their energy tether tech to create a force field around the encampment. Until then, we’ve got some disgruntled customers to deal with. Amaya, Aislin, we need those engines.”
“Roger,” Amaya said, saluting before leading her Sempai out the door.
As the door closed, Frye looked to Lydia. “Ma’am, do you think you can explain to the other passengers in layman’s terms what’s really going on?”
“Like we’re lost in the void?” Lydia asked.
“Well, yes, but I was hoping for something a little more detailed. Like what happened during the storm, how we passed through that gate to get to here. What exactly here is, the difficulty in getting home, that sort of thing.”
Lydia nodded. “Oh, yes. Aislin knows more about this sort of thing but I can run through the basics.”
“Good enough,” Rudyard said. “I don’t think our passengers could deal with the full truth from Aislin’s lips.”
“Great, set up the meeting for this afternoon Chief,” the Captain ordered. “Let’s get this over with.”
“Amen to that, ma’am,” Rudyard agreed.