The "Best" RPG Ever-63

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"Well, it's definitely not me so it has to be you." Clera sat on the other side of the kitchen table. They were sipping imaginary tea in a dreamed-up afternoon.
"What makes you so certain that it isn't you?" he asked. Ian didn't really look or sound male anymore, but his appearance in this dream remained essentially androgynous, and besides—he still didn't feel precisely female here.
"Well—because! I mean, she's nice and all, but I can't stand people touching me. Ever!" She looked away, and then back at him. "Look, that thing her friend said about beastfolk is basically true, but you recall he said specifically 'other than avians'. It's just base instincts—birds don't like being touched very much, at least not the ones that turned into avians. For full avians it's usually only extremely close relations like parent-child, husband-wife that have any physical contact at all. Among half-avians like me, well, the same instinct is there. Some get over it over time, and become about as comfortable with people touching them as your average human; some don't. I'm the latter. I mean, I tried—on the last day of my life I had to force myself to let some of the kids I knew hug me..." Her voice wavered a bit, and she cut off, sniffing and squinting her eyes to prevent some tears from fully forming.

"...Hmn. This seems more traumatic to you than it did before," he observed.

"What?"
"You were more detached from your old life and particularly your death when we first met, when you 'explained' it to me."
"Oh..." She bit her lip, thinking. "You're right. A Soul of Empathy is supposed to be peaceful, okay with being dead but serving the greater good now. I've been feeling less peaceful over time...I've accepted that I've died and I am happy to be helping people, but it feels like it's all my own will, not..whatever it was before." Then she shook her head. "I'm starting to wonder if something went uniquely wrong with the empath-making ritual, with it being wrapped up inside of an already overcomplicated summoning spell. That level of complexity could be too much for even Sophol himself to sort out completely."

"Do we have anything to worry about?" he said. Even without additional words to clarify, both of them understood immediately that he meant in terms of their present magic tie going haywire and/or becoming dangerous.

"I don't think so. Nothing feels off when we—when you're using your power. You were able to tell when you were straining your magic, just as well as any experienced mage, which means you'd also be able to 'feel it' if the magic was going unstable or something like that. I think the problem is just, some kind of imbalance between our wills..."

"Or more accurately, balance instead of the expected imbalance," he suggested.

"Right, right..."

She shook her head after thinking through the implications a little more. "I, I don't want to take over someone else's life. I had my own life already; I don't want another chance at someone else's expense! If there's anything you want that I don't, then, you should go for it."
"The problem with thinking that way," he said, "is when we're awake there's no way to tell the difference. If you're uncomfortable then the one person we experience being is uncomfortable. If you don't like something but I do then it comes across as a confusing, but entirely internal conflict. Like it or not, we're better off making decisions together."

"I guess you're right," she said with a sigh of resignation. "But what if we disagree on something so strongly, so...fundamentally, that it locks up that combined person's brain?"

"We don't know whether that's even possible," he said. "But perhaps we should agree to put aside any disagreement that strong until we are here again, and can actually separate which thoughts are whose and hash it out. Try to come up with some sort of compromise we're at least both equally unhappy with."

"Fair enough..."

---

"Zack?" Probably about halfway to sleep, there was a quiet, nervous voice from right in front of him.

"Hmmn." Well, from her tone of voice—something was bothering her.
"What are we doing..?" This one was even quieter, almost to herself. It's hard to say something just to yourself with someone else in such close proximity, but maybe she took the noise to mean he was already asleep.

"Think that's obvious..." She jumped slightly when he muttered that. But now that she knew he was awake, it seemed like she actually did want an answer.

"B-but I mean...why? Th-this is..."
He pulled back just enough to face her with half-lidded eyes, instead of their faces continuing to overlap. "Well, I'm doing this because it feels good. 'Cause it's easier to give in to these instincts I barely understand than to constantly fight with my own body, and this battleground just isn't worth it. I need to relax and get my head straight, and this is an easy shortcut."

Nora didn't move, looking a little stunned by the blunt answer. He pressed on: "You..? I dunno, but I can guess. Maybe neither of us know why you want it in the first place, but you get tired of thinking through every single thing, so here's something you can just choose not to think about and enjoy, becuase you don't think there's any way you'll ever really understand it anyway."

"Uh, um.." She blushed in..possibly embarrassment from a correct guess, or maybe just consciously remembering the relative position of their bodies. Right now, Zack didn't much care. He just leaned back in, rubbing her ears some, and nuzzled her a bit.

"Mrrn..."

A little later, she had finally processed what he said, and picked something out of it: "G-get your head straight?" she asked.

"I get mad when someone I care about gets hurt. 'R almost hurt. It's not..healthy. Doesn't always make sense. Gets pointed at the wrong people and sticks around way too long. Screwed up before 'cause of it."

"Oh.." She probably understood what he meant by now, good.

"J'st be quiet, lemme sleep."

"S-sorry."

"Don't be..."

---

Nora found herself standing before Haestra's statue once again. She stared up at the goddess's visage for only a moment before feeling a kind of "pull" from behind her, and turning around quickly. The temple floor had a clean cut in it not far behind her, and was stitched there to other terrain: One one side, the yellowed grass of winter, and on the other an entirely different floor with a semi-circular wall coming up from it at the edge. Katherine, and everyone else who had agreed to be pulled into a common dream, were waiting behind that, most of them sitting on some couches that didn't appear to belong to any particular one of the environments, but the psion herself floating in place a few feet off from the cut, right about where the elf had felt the "pull" coming from in the first place.

"..There. Took you long enough to fall asleep," said the catgirl.

"Well, I was up reading fairly late," Nora replied.

"Yo, welcome!" Aria's hand waved backwards from a couch she seemed to be lying down on. "Take a seat if you want." And...beyond the other terrain and the couches was a cliff, a distant void, and a gigantic chained demon.

She took a few steps forward. "I...suppose that's the demon in your sword?"

"Yep."

"Oh, right!" Mira sat up and turned to look at it. "Man, I get so used to looking the other way I forget it's there sometimes. Surprising what a person can get used to."

"I think that applies to quite a bit of our situation," Rayna pointed out. "Soo, what were you reading?"

"Historical...well I'm not really certain whether it qualifies as fiction or not."

Nora finally made it over, and sat at an empty couch; the catgirl floated over next to her and took the opposite side of it. "It seems like the author believed the events actually happened, but it was written more like a work of fiction."

"Hey, wait a second," Lynn said, sitting up and fixing the elf with a stare.

"Hmn?"

"You're not stuttering. Right?"
"Um...no, I don't seem to be," she said, only realizing it herself after it was pointed out.

"Remember none of us are physically speaking here," the catgirl said. "This is really mental communication dressed up to look like talking, in a way. Your mental voice has never had trouble, either."

"I suppose this means that whatever is wrong with my speech is a purely physical problem," Nora said, putting a finger to her chin in thought. "A plausible location would be somewhere in the connection between my brain and mouth. But then, isn't the brain a physical part of a person also?"

"I believe here, at least, the brain is not the mind," said Mira. "It houses it to some extent, sure, but I seriously doubt that what Katherine is doing right now is boosting and transmitting a bunch of electromagnetic signals between everyone's heads."

"Yeah...yeah!" Aria nodded in agreement. "There should be a lot of interference from any metal present. You'd be able to feel it. It'd matter if a person was as much as a foot farther away. But everyone in the house is about equally easy to reach regardless of their location, right?"

"More or less."

"The power's supposed to be a gift from Bimorphaeus," Lynn said. "So..it must be at least sort of magical in nature, even if it's not exactly what other people call magic."

"It's supernatural, but it cannot possibly be magic in the same way that it can't be electromagnetic," said Nora. "Psions' powers are completely unaffected by magic draining, amplifying, and nullifying effects. And psions, no matter how powerful, almost never have any spellcasting capability."

"I think we're running into a problem of terms at this point," said Rayna. "'Magic' to people of this world means a specific kind of supernatural activity, in the same way that uh, say 'magnetism' to our world means a specific kind of natural activity. But usually when someone on Earth talks about magic they often just mean supernatural activity in general—or, well, at least a much broader category of it. So even if it's not 'magic', it's still magic."

"It's magic B instead of magic A," Lynn suggested.

"Oh, speaking of the gods," said Mira. "I guess that's a statue of Haestra?" She pointed toward where Nora had come from.

"Right. I was dreaming of the temple again...but nothing specific, I think."

"D'you know whether that's an accurate portrayal or not?"
"I don't think that the version of me who lived in this world her whole life ever saw the goddess in person to compare it to," she said, "but I suspect they would go to whatever lengths were necessary to make it 'accurate' as an effective focus of worship."

"I just wonder why a deity whose appearance seems designed to portray the beauty of nature would insist on being depicted with a giant ugly scar in her side."

"Nearly all of the gods are depicted with some sort of permanent injury," said Lynn. "The only logical conclusion is that those injuries are really there and whoever was first told how to depict them was given the truth—they want people to know that they are physically flawed. Maybe even want to be reminded of it themselves in their worship. So...did they all fight for control of the world early on, before deciding to cooperate?"

"Siblings, husband and wife, a willing messenger...what would the factions be between relations like that?" said Rayna. "All of their domains are basically peaceful in nature. No god of war, and literally no 'holy wars' between followers of one god and those of another throughout history. If they really did that to each other then there's no way their relationship would be so cordial for such a long time."

"That leaves the possibility that all of them were injured fighting something else," said Nora. "Perhaps there are no 'evil' gods because they killed all of them early on."

"Well, sure, but why would they want to remember it then?" said Lynn. "For that matter, why give us obvious, visible evidence of a battle with those evil gods but no information about who or what they were?"

"Knowing something about the evil gods could lead to some nutjobs worshiping them, and for all we know deities work in such a way that that'd actually revive them," said Katherine. "But then the same nutjobs would probably just make up other evil gods to worship, and we've never heard of any new ones popping up."

"I think we are missing vital information," said Nora. "This information seems important, but we can do little more than speculate wildly without more evidence."

"Maybe you're right. We should find some kinda expert on the gods somewhere," said Rayna. "Like...maybe a priest at one of the temples in town, or some kind of researcher of history?"

"I'll try the library for books on the subject sometime tomorrow, perhaps," said Katherine. "If you guys want to go pester some clergy that's up to you."

---

Ezra woke with a sudden start, sitting up with her heart racing by the time she was fully conscious, and not at all sleepy by the time she understood that she was awake. Faint sunlight through the narrow privacy windows of the bedroom informed her that it was early morning, the sun just beginning to rise. She took a deep breath and counted out fifteen individual seconds; she was physically calm by the end of it, but the memory persisted, just as stark and vivid as it had been upon awakening. After that, she arose and rushed to prepare to leave the house, knowing it could only mean one thing.

The guards who saw her on the way to the guardhouse that morning tensed instinctively, as if they could feel a sense of urgency radiating off of her. When she barked a strange order at one, he didn't stop to question or even pause to wonder what it was about, but set off as if his own life depended on its swift execution—half convinced that in fact it did. She arrived before long, only to audibly throw some things around in her office, retrieve one object, and leave again. The guard at the front desk heard her mutter, "—drought. Of course not. It always has to be some big, dramatic disaster, doesn't it—" cut off by her half-slamming the guardhouse door.

Loren was waiting by the time she arrived at the door to the recently-constructed house, and he was still sleepy but just irritable enough from the rude awakening to cross her. "I don't suppose the reason you provided me lodging was just so you'd have a transporter on call," he said—not an entirely wrong accusation, though she'd hoped to wait longer to take advantage of it.

"There is a fire giant coming from the east," she said.

That woke him up. "A fi—how do you know?!"

"The forest you appeared in yesterday is in that direction," she stated. "I've never been, but I recognized it immediately in a dream last night, despite it being mostly on fire." While he was busy processing that, she raised a fist and banged loudly, three times, on the door.

"You get dreams from the gods often?! Wh—are you some sort of prophet?" he demanded: Annoyance to confusion to amazement, about as predicted.

"Nothing so pretentious. Anyone important enough who lives long enough is bound to be contected once or twice," she said matter-of-factly.

"Lives long enough? You look younger than I do!"

"This isn't really the time for flattery," she said, deadpan with a slight hint of annoyance to drive him off of the subject for now. He was an inquisitive enough person that it would probably come up again later.

She needn't have bothered, really, since the door opened at this point to show Rose, visibly half-asleep and in a state of dress that was bound to provide plenty of distraction by itself. "Uhm, hi?"

"Rose, I'm glad you're here," she said with a serious, earnest tone. "Your forest is in danger."

She jumped awake. "Wha—"
"Loren can get us there faster," she continued, moving gracefully around the dragon-girl to get inside. "I want to enlist the help of the others here first."

"Oh, okay, umm. HEY—" she half turned around, starting to yell; Ezra interrupted her with a hand on her wrist.

"Allow me to explain, please." Most of them were likely already on their way down by now anyway; that shout primarily set Zack's wolf barking again just after he'd been calmed down.
"O-okay. Uh." She fidgeted nervously for a second. "I'lljustgetreadytogothen!" she said, running to one of the downstairs bathrooms.

"You can get eleven people and an animal out that far, right?" she asked, turning to Loren, who'd followed her inside by now and was slowly closing the door. He looked away quickly, his face still a bit red.
"You should've asked me that before making plans. But yes," he said with a small, quick nod. His sense of professional pride would see to it that they got there, even if he had to burn his magic out to do it. Good.

The door to the stairwell opened, Katherine coming out first and the others soon afterward. Ezra waited until the living room was full to start explaining. By then Rose was also back, fully dressed this time and visibly agitated. Hoard instinct would do that to a dragon.

"The gods warned me in a dream last night of a fire giant headed straight toward the city from the east," she said, accompanying the words 'fire giant' with some loud thought for the psion to pick up on, detailing what they were dealing with. The catgirl was briefly stunned by the sudden, condensed blast of information, but nodded, indicating she got it, while Ezra continued: "It will hit Rose's forest first if we don't stop it. I would appreciate your help taking it down, if you are willing."

There was a chorus of general agreement to this: "Sure"; "Of course!"; "Yeah"; a few nods.

Ezra looked around once it quieted down. "Meet us outside when you are ready, then." She waved Loren to follow and made for the front yard. Rose also followed, already quite ready to defend her home and treasure.

She seemed nervous, a little jumpy, and more worried still since the mention of fire. In fact she was wringing her clawed hands together hard enough to have drawn blood if it weren't for their armored scales. Loren eyed her movements warily, obviously concerned that the dragon could lash out dangerously under these conditions.

"I don't want to give the impression that this is entirely charitable," Ezra said, drawing Rose's attention and curiosity somewhat. "Fire giants gain power by setting fires and then consuming them—more fire means more power. A blaze the size of your forest would give the thing too much power to contend with by the time it reached the city. I'd be looking at evacuating a lost cause and merely stalling it in the meantime."

"Oh, wow...um.." she muttered, more afraid than before.

"That said, the gods wouldn't have warned me the way they did if its reaching your forest was inevitable. It is likely just weak enough now for the rest of us to take it down first. Once we get there, you could remain in your forest and prepare to defend it your own way on the off chance we should fail."

The dragon-girl nodded, her expression still quite fearful. But from her eyes, she was clearly thinking. Slowly the look changed, her body language calming from terror to resolve. "No, I..." she started, seeming to only just realize what she was about to say herself. "I-if everyone else is gonna fight it then I, I should too. Um, if you think I can help, I mean." There it was. Ezra had read her correctly; unless there was no chance of success she wouldn't be caught dead letting her new friends fight a risky battle for her. Once the situation was clear, that won out over her natural instincts and fears.

"Your help should be invaluable," Ezra replied. "I will need to focus more on channeling a spell of heat resistance, so I will be little help in the fight itself."

Rose's eyes lit up a bit once she understood the meaning of that. Loren, who'd been watching the exchange with nervous confusion from its start, was now some mixture of impressed and terrified. He had a very specific idea of how dragons behaved, and in his view she had just convinced one to leave its hoard alone and stand rather than flee against its own natural weakness—both of which were out of the scope of "normal" behavior. That was fine; it would only work in her favor for him to perceive her as extremely persuasive.

The "Best" RPG Ever-62

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---

The portal opened wider than usual, which was maybe not a good sign—though about half of those present didn't really have a point of comparison. Then it spat out something that might have been confused for a giant hedgehog at first, except its legs were too long and it had a tail, and a clearly defined, long muzzle on its head. The spines running unevenly along its back were a translucent green; its matted fur was pitch black but visibly stained with several small, bright, variously-colored patches whose consistency suggested they were other demons' blood.

While the portal snapped shut it snarled, surveying its surroundings with visible hostility. Its bared teeth seemed to be the same sort of spikes as those on its back, only smaller. Apart from those few alien aspects of its anatomy, it seemed to be a gigantic dog, big enough to give the dire wolf present a run for his money. Not that the wolf feared a larger opponent; in fact his first response was to snarl back at this new threat to the pack and his second was to pounce at it, claws and teeth first.

He swiped at its side and then ducked away when it turned its head to bite him. Feels cold, he reported mentally alongside a bark. Aria charged in next, her sword turning into something like a harpoon in one hand with a long chain from its back attached to a handle held in the other. With the demon now turned half away from her, she hurled the weapon at its side. Even with the tremendous strength behind her throw, it only made it a few inches in, making a sound like crunching ice when it landed. The creature turned while she yanked the weapon out again, bright green blood trailing out with it, and rared its head back as if to bite her—even though she was clearly out of range. Instead it unleashed a gout of green mist that condensed the vapor in the air it hit instantly into a shower of water and ice. The shifter jumped to the side quickly enough to evade it, but otherwise would have been right in the middle of the frigid breath attack.

Ice dog demon? Mira throught, finally regaining her breath from the ritual and coming around behind it. Wasn't this in a game somewhere?

Yeah, but this one's one-headed and probably can't talk or turn into a whip-flail thing, Katherine replied.

"Ice demon," Zack repeated aloud for Rose and Aria's benefit, ignoring the rest of the banter. He switched to dark form for the shield, hoping it'd be able to block that breath if needed, and ran forward to get the demon's attention off of Aria before it caught up to her. He slashed at its back leg and caught its muzzle with the shield when it whirled to counter. Zack stood firm, but the force of the impact slid his feet back a few inches along the ground and made the demon recoil back.

Hopefully weak to fire? Light it up, the catgirl said, sending an active fire dagger over into Nora's reach. The elf pulled the fire over to herself, amplifying it before throwing a massive gout of flame at the demon's side. Mira added some demonic fire and threw a few pumpkin bombs for good measure, until both of them were forced to scatter by a very angry charging demon dog.

Rayna gave it an illusion to keep chasing, and Lynn made several fire-arrow shots at its side, some glancing off the spines but the rest hitting their marks. Mira took the opportunity to take to the sky on her broom.

It doesn't look like that did much, the psion said. Rose raised and threw some vines, wrapping them around the demon's legs to knock it over.

It's taking damage, Rayna reassured, mentally indicating that her "veil-piercing" HUD told her as much.

"Breathe on it, Lynn suggested now that it was being held still, "we could use the explosion."

"'Kay. Hahhh~" The dragon-girl took a deep breath and let out a big plume of her own special breath, then spread her wings out to their larger size, flapping once to send the green air the demon's way and again to launch herself skyward in the opposite direction. A fire arrow met the cloud as it reached the dog, setting it off, and Nora amplified the resulting explosion and kept it going a little longer.

Before the smoke could clear, Aria dove in screaming with a giant, two-handed spiked hammer, hitting the demons back with it and audibly shattering some of the icy spines. She pounded it three or four times, sending frozne splinters flying and producing more of whatever cold substance the thing breathed out earlier, until contact with said substance started burning her skin and she jumped back away again.

"GAAAAAH! Stupid liquid-nitrogen-ice-breath-green-glow, I'll teach you ta—!" The dog recovered, stood up, and charged at her, only to get a hammer to the side of its head hard enough to throw its momentum to the side and send it crashing to the ground again.

After a rapid-fire mental planning conference, Katherine reached into the demon's mind to get its attention on her as it stood up and Rayna made the shifter invisible. Clera swooped down from her station in the air, landing next to Aria, who was kneeling over from the pain by now.

"Grrnnghl."
"Hold still please, unless you want to have burn scars."
"Scars're cool," she replied, but held still anyway.

The demon ran toward the catgirl as predicted; she cartwheeled away while Rayna put an illusion in her place to keep it charging the same way. Then Lynn sent a fire arrow into its path and Nora amplified the fire just before it landed into another massive fireball for the demon to run through. It had too much momentum to stop by then, and caught the full brunt of the attack.

While it skidded across the ground still trying to halt its momentum, Zack slashed one of its back legs again, and the wolf ran up to bite the opposite one. The dog made a pained, angry noise and turned after Zack again; when it hit his shield this time he was ready, and responded with a slash to its neck before jumping out of the way of its breath. The wolf backed away quickly and then spat some of the demon's blood out, mentally complaining of the unpleasant taste and how cold it was.

Aria was mostly recovered and starting to stand up. "Hey, the hammer was good damage-wise," Rayna said, coming up to her. "If you can do something like that from a range to not get auto-countered again it's probably worth it."
"Right." The shifter reshaped her weapon again, into a nice, long, spiked ball-and-chain flail. She forced herself to pause before rejoining the fight, turning in the winged girl's direction. "Thank you."
"Just be more careful," she said, still wincing somewhat from the absorbed injuries. Aria nodded, and stepped forward, beginning to build momentum on the flail by spinning it around above her head.

Clear away! Mira strongly suggested. Zack took a few more steps away from the demon, just in time for her to finish chanting a spell. A pillar of demonic fire shot out of the ground under it, engulfing its entire body for a moment. "Yees! How d'you like that?!" The dog jumped out from the fire and turned its head upward, shooting its breath in the direction of the witch's voice by way of reply. "Whooops!" She flew up and out of the way.

Rose landed to one side of the demon and drew some vines out of the ground just under it to root its feet into place, making an easy target for Aria's flail. It went flying and slammed into the thing's back, making another shower of splintered green ice and vapor which thankfully no one was caught in this time. Then the dragon-girl breathed some more explodable breath at the dog before flying out of the way, letting Nora throw some more fire from Katherine's dagger (now held in her hand) to set it off. All of this gave the shifter time to reel her weapon back, start it spinning again, and finally throw it at the demon just as it turned in her direction, landing a direct hit to its muzzle, one of the spikes burying itself firmly into an eye.

The demon made more pained noises, shaking its head violently to throw the flail off and then unleashing another plume of cold breath in Aria's direction. She dove away from it, and Rayna made an illusion where she'd been to give her time to recover. Another volley of fire arrows hit the demon's side, the last one amplified into a fireball by Nora.

Mira's working on another pillar. Get ready to hold it in place a second, Katherine said.

"Rose, can you hold it again?" Zack said, mentally reminding the catgirl that saying things aloud was sometimes necessary.

"Yep!" She landed behind it while it was biting the illusion, and drew some more vines up around its legs.

The knight noticed that the fire-pillar spell actually made a clear dark outline on the ground, indicating where it was going to hit. "Hey, back up!"

"Huh?" Rose didn't understand and there wasn't time to explain, so he just ran up and grabbed her under the arms, pulling her back a few steps just before the pillar formed, engulfing the demon again. "Wha—aa~aah—oof!" Unfortunately, she was much heavier than she looked and this awkward backstep landed them both on the ground, with the dragon-girl on top of Zack.

Fortunately, Aria hit the thing in the side with her flail at this point, giving them a moment to recover while the demon turned to chase her instead. Rose rolled over and picked herself up before offering him a clawed hand. "Um, th-thanks.." She was visibly shaken from being so close to the inside of that much fire.
"Yeah." He took it carefully and hoisted himself up.

"Sorry, sorry! Are you okay?" Mira called, bringing her broom down next to the two of them.
"I-I'll be alright," Rose said.

"Try to aim those more carefully," Zack said with a touch of anger, and then turned and ran in the demon's direction rather than waiting for a reply.

Hey, does your vision thing give a percentage or something? he thought toward Rayna.

Of course. We're pretty close, actually!

The wolf ran up next to Zack, and when he slashed at the demon's back leg again to get its attention the wolf went around to claw at the same side some more, before moving out of the way when it turned around to bite him. This time the demon sent its breath Zack's way, and he had to act quickly, raising the shield and bringing it up to the thing's mouth so the breath mostly scattered off to the side. A tiny bit of it reached him anyway, but landed on his armor, which thankfully didn't just conduct the cold straight through to his skin or clothes—more of the magic-based protection it had, most likely. Then, since he had it right in front of him, he lit his sword with holy magic and drove it into the demon's neck, grabbing the hilt with both hands midway through to push it deeper. The dog made a choked, whining noise and swiped at him with a forepaw, forcing him to abandon the weapon there and jump back. It was probably hurting it worse staying in than coming out anyway, he figured, turning to run away from it again.

Rayna made Zack invisible and sent an illusion running the opposite direction, straight toward Lynn. The archer shot several fire arrows at the demon's front, Nora amplifying each one into a fireball, and dove out of the way when it got close. I've got five left, she reported. Didn't really plan on literally burning them this way.

We'll buy you more tomorrow. I don't think you need to worry about shooting any more tonight, Katherine replied.

Aria's flail hit the demon near the top of its head now, stunning it. She ran up and grabbed the hilt of Zack's sword, yanking it out in one swift motion. Giggling madly, she shifted her own weapon into a kind of extra coat of metal around its blade to soak up all of the blood on it. Then she drove the combined weapon back into the same hole in the thing's neck, making it wider and driving it deeper with her own berserk strength. The demon struggled to turn its head and breathe cold mist at her, but couldn't catch its breath with a giant sword most of the way through its windpipe; it obviously didn't run on normal anatomy or it should have already been dead by now. With this kind of foothold, she was able to drain quite a bit more of its blood than before, and by the time she pulled the merged weapon out again the demon whined and shuddered weakly before crumpling into a heap on the ground, its remaining spines and teeth melting and sublimating into a cloud of freezing air around it. Aria didn't much care about the risk from that, detaching her weapon from Zack's sword, tossing the latter away and turning the former into a long spear before jamming it into the thing's unprotected side to drain out the rest of its blood.

The knight walked up to his weapon and knelt over next to it, sighing. "I almost feel violated," he muttered, picking it up and putting it in its sheath. Mira flew up next to him, stepped gracefully off of her broom, and came up to the demon.

"Alright! I'd say this went pretty well," she said. "Great job everyone!" Aria was finished, and stood up, sheathing her own weapon (back in its default shape of a sword) before stepping away. The demon's soul, the same shade of green as its breath, blood, and spines, rose up from its body with a small wave from the witch, and then she vacuumed it up, her body glowing with the same shade briefly while she let out a satisfied sigh.
"Tastes like ice cream, right?" the shifter grinned.

"Well, it tastes...cold at least," the witch said. After waiting expectantly for a moment, she concluded she wasn't going to spontaneously change forms this time. "Phew."

Clera landed next to Aria again. "What did I say about being careful?"
"Sorry...I was hungry! Well..I mean the, the demon was hungry," she said. The winged girl just sighed.

"The burns aren't bad this time; I really should just let you recover them naturally." She put a hand on Aria's shoulder to absorb the wounds anyway. "Unfortunately, that is against my nature."

Rayna came up to Rose, who hadn't moved much since standing up earlier. "Are you sure you're okay?"
"Heheh..y-yeah. I'll be fine," she said. "Just um..lots of fire..." she squeaked. After a second, she abruptly added: "I-I get it, we needed fire to melt the ice thing! But..um..."
"It's fine, you can't help what you're scared of," said Katherine, also walking up. "At least your fear makes sense."

"Hmn?" The dragon-girl headtilted.
"She's a little bit scared of water," said Rayna. "Right?"
"Deep water," the catgirl clarified, crossing her arms. "Even though I know how to swim just fine, tread water and all..."

"Let's go back inside," Zack suggested. With its soul gone, the demon's body was starting to melt and disappear as though it was made of ice itself. He started toward the door, the wolf immediately coming up next to him, and the others followed one by one.

A little later, everyone sat in the living room—except for Rose, who had decided to go to sleep early on one of the couches in their library. "Right, so...we're reasonably well-coordinated for such a large group," said Katherine. "I'd be able to improve things a bit more if we didn't have two people whose minds I can't connect with, but..well, that's on me to get better skills for."

"It would also help if you'd warn us when you're planning to cast a big AOE spell," Zack said in Mira's direction.

"I said I was sorry! Really! It's hard to concentrate on chanting and communicating all at the same time." She'd seen him annoyed at her or others plenty before, but he seemed genuinely angry at her for the first time she could remember. It was making her very uneasy.
"So tell us first and then start casting it," he said, in a tone that suggested this was the most obvious course of action—which the witch had to admit it sort of was.

"Oh. Yeah, duh."

"Anyway, we're not all totally used to working with each other yet," said the catgirl, trying to bring the discussion back to her intended subject. "Based on what I could see going on mentally, its basically a matter of the two four-person parties being so used to working exclusively among ourselves, even after just a few days together. That's—good, really, but it'd be smart for us to keep splitting our parties differently for smaller quests, like we did yesterday, to get used to working with each other for any situation like this where everyone needs to be involved."

"Wise counsel," said Aria. "I'll admit, unfortunately it's still not a good idea to put me in a party without a good healer, though. For as much control as I've got over myself with the sword out, looking out for my own saftey just seems to be off the table."
"The demon doesn't care if you get hurt as long as it gets blood," Mira observed.

"Well, we'll think about how to split up when we find jobs to do," said Katherine. "Obviously we'll want to assign people who'll be effective for the task at hand. Like, bring Zack along to kill undead, or Rayna for..drawing maps I guess?"
"I can do way more than draw maps!" the fox-girl protested.

"I know, just playing. Anyway, that's what I wanted to discuss with everyone. Well...I also wanted to see who wants in on dream party tonight? Much easier to ask everyone before we all go to sleep, after all."

"Oh, right, about that," said Mira. "Count me out juuust for tonight. I've been getting closer and closer to seeing my whole 'backstory' thing, and I'd like a full 'normal' dream to give it a chance to all come together."

"Okay.."
"You know I want in," said Aria, "I am the host of the dream party. And it's...really boring being stuck with just the demon all night."
"Last night was fun," said Lynn, nodding.

"I'm in if she is," Rayna added.

"Not us—me," Clera said, and Zack shook his head no.

"Um..I-I might like to t-try it once," said Nora. "Maybe..."

"Cool, cool." The psion nodded, making a mental note to be extremely careful about separating two minds in nearby bodies, to avoid something like how Rayna was pulled in the previous night. "Well, that's it from me, unless anyone else has something to say. Good night everyone."

Zack went upstairs right away, to change out of his armor; Mira got up to follow him. While he was in his room, she knocked lightly on the door. "What?"
"Hey, it's um, me. I really am sorry I was careless about that," she said. "Really! I don't know how else to convince you of it besides repeating myself a bunch..."

He audibly sighed. "Don't make a big deal out of it. It's fine. We're fine." The tone of voice didn't sound like they were fine to her.

"Are you sure? I can't do...something to make it up to you?"

"I'm not even the person you should be apologizing to." He meant Rose, she understood. "But I think she's already over it, or it didn't even bother her that much in the first place, so—whatever, I'll be over it by tomorrow morning," he said.
"Okay..if you say so."

A few hours later, Zack knocked on the door of the bathroom adjoining his room to Nora's. "Uh, c-come in," she said. She had been sitting at her desk reading, but realized it actually was getting pretty late.
"Um..hey." He seemed a little nervous. "I uh.."

"Y-you want me to um," she left a brief verbal gap in place of the verb, "again?"

"Well, just." Zack looked away, blushing slightly. "I-I feel like the way I asked you this morning, it wasn't really fair, um..k-kind of hard to say no? I don't want to, I mean..i-if you want I can just leave you alone tonight..."
"Uh, i-it's okay," Nora said, putting a bookmark in and standing up next to him. "I um...i-it's sort of, relaxing for me too. Unless um, you d-don't want..?" His expression informed her that he did. "Uh, l-let me change clothes, and th-then we can um...i-in here, if you want."
"Okay," he said, his blush not looking any better but his mood visibly improved some. He went back out to his own room. Nora wondered what they were doing—what she was doing. It was too bizarre to make sense of, but at the same time...it was nice. It seemed to help both of them somehow. So, for as long as he wanted her to...she would.

The "Best" RPG Ever-61

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---

Zack and Katherine returned with two borrowed books, and the catgirl mentally "invited" Nora down to the house's library help put them somewhere someone would be likely to remember to renew or return them. Of course, there was a more important reason to get her in the same room as them.

You really think that will work? the elf thought.

Of course. The best lies are mostly truth. Anyway, we've been gaining new information through these dreams this whole time—or, everyone but me has anyway—so it's not a big stretch to say that a couple of new skills got unlocked.

And this guy seems friendly enough with you that it would sorta make sense for the 'wolf' one to show up, Zack added, mentally indicated the wolf who had started following him as soon as he got inside.

I am a little worried about the follow-up questions. Whether we need to go get a pet cat or something...

The answer is 'maybe' anyway, Katherine replied. We don't really even know what the other hidden skills tied to that one are, much less the requirements for unlocking them. Maybe one of them is 'tree spirit' and you can't very well expect that to require petting a tree or tree-person, after all.

The books were marked and put away by now; they sat down for a moment. The catgirl noted, You still seem pretty nervous.

I admit I know from experience that I am an extremely poor liar, Nora said.

That's why you're telling just us about it now. Seeing the wolf reminded you about the weird dream and the skills that revealed themselves afterward, and now you're trying the active one out to see what it actually does, Katherine said, giving a sly grin and waving a hand slightly in the elf's direction.

Oh, kaaay...? She shifted into the part-wolf form, looking mildly confused about where this was going.

There. Now Zack and I can do all the talking. You know how to lie, right? she thought, mentally nudging the wolf-girl.

Yeah, yeah. The bigger of a deal we make of this the more obvious it is something's up, though, he thought back.

Maybe it should just be me, then...

---

"I have some land picked out that should work. A couple of unsafe old buildings need tearing down anyway, and once the debris is gone there will be plenty of room. However, it's still covered in red tape," said the Captain. She had finally been back in her office once Rose came back from eating lunch.
"Oh.." The dragon-girl at least understood that as far as 'not yet'.
"You don't think I would have mentioned it to you this morning if it was ready?" she added.

"Well, um. I-it slipped my mind so I didn't know whether you'd forgotten too, is all," Rose said nervously.
"The legal part should be sorted by tomorrow," she said with a clear, slightly annoyed emphasis on 'should', "and the demolition may take a day or two after that. Regardless, I intend to inform you as soon as possible once everything is ready."
"Okay. Thank you!" she said, brighening up again.

The Captain nodded. "If that's all?" she said, glancing briefly in Mira's direction.

"Just moral support here," said the witch, standing up and nodding to Rose. "Let's leave her to her work, hmn?"
"Oh. Sure. Um, sorry," said Rose, standing up herself.
"It's no trouble. You've been an important ally of this town since before we even know you existed," said the Captain. "Let me know if you need anything else."

"Will do~!"

Outside of the guardhouse, Mira said, "Honestly, she seemed nicer than usual just now. But maybe it's just being serious about your being an ally and all."
"I thought she was just always nice," said Rose, frowning slightly in confusion. "Is she mean to everyone else?"
"Weeellll...she is nice. Just, usually it's a meaner kind of nice." The witch shrugged, leading the way back to the house. "Maybe she's just in a good mood for some reason."
"Ooh! Do you—" Rose paused and pointedly waited until there wasn't someone nearby. "Do you think she had lunch with someone?" she said at an almost-whisper. "Like, with someone?"

"Come on, that's not the only reason for someone to be in a good mood. Anyway, it wouldn't be nice to spread a rumor like that around," said Mira quietly.

"R-right. But still!"

"Just think about it. What kind of person would a human 'cursed with immortality' even be interested in? Or—who would willingly keep something like that about one of the most important people in town a secret?"

"I dunno...buuuut...."

"I think we're reading too much into the slightest hint of friendliness from her," said Mira. "Better to just drop the whole thing."

"Okay, okay."

"Now then..." By now they were at the town door to the house; Mira used her key to open it, and waved the dragon-girl through. "In we go."
"Mm-hm!"

---

Rast was suitably impressed by Lynn's outfit. He blushed shyly and talked a little nervously when he first saw it, and told her how beautiful she looked in it five or six times over lunch until she said: "Okay okay, it's getting embarrassing at this point!" Besides that, she thought, it was so cute she was going to get flustered soon.

"Uh, sorry miss Lynn. Just, when I really look at you it's hard to come up with somethin' else to say."

"Well, don't feel like you have to talk nonstop. We can always just enjoy each other's company," she said with a small wink. He blushed, looked away, and laughed nervously at that, all of which was just adorable.

Outside of the restaurant, he looked around nervously for a moment or two, inadvertently making it very clear there was something he wanted to say, so she waited patiently for him to build up the courage. "Uh, you know, if you're not too busy today..I still have a few hours off. We could, see a play if you wanted to,"/ he said.

"Well..sure," she said after thinking about not for long. She hadn't realized there were plays on anywhere, although it basically made sense. The knowledge that they existed made her instantly curious how drama had progressed in this world, compared to that of various cultures back on Earth. "Next thing I have planned isn't until tonight. Did you have something specific in mind?"

"Err, not p'rticularly. Just...thought we might see what was on, if anything looked good."
"Well, lead the way then."

There was a building with a few small stages, a play going on each that afternoon. Since she obviously didn't recognize any of the titles, Lynn just went with Rast's first recommendation. It seemed to be a historical drama, maybe a little like what one Shakespeare's would look minus the centuries of idolization and imitation by surrounding culture. The more interesting things to note were the use of actual magic when the characters were supposed to be casting it, as well as for "special effects" in general.

Outside, Rast looked around a little nervously. "Uh, so what'd you think, miss Lynn?" he said. "I'm sure you've seen better 'n we have around here, but.."
"I'm not that great a judge of acting, but I think it was a good show," she said.

"You ain't?" he said, seeming surprised.

"I'm a trick shooter. As performances go, that's pretty far off from acting."
"I just thought, since you've been all over, you mighta seen plays by some more famous actors, or in the bigger stages they got in those cities there," he said.
That sounded like something Lynn certainly would have done in this world, which stalled her for just a second. "Well, true, but...fame is overrated," she said, recovering. "Real talent shines no matter how little exposure it has. And a big budget can motivate people to work harder sometimes, but it can't hide an overall poor or uninspired production."

"Awful wise words."

"I dunno about that. It just seems obvious after seeing enough," she said.

By now they had stopped off on a less-busy part of the street, across from the entrance to the playhouse. Rast put a hand behind his head, scratching at it. "Gods, Lynn, I..I sure would like to see as much as you have someday. I just lived in this one frontier town my whole life. This place'll always be my home, I couldn't bear the idea of never comin' back this way, but..I'd just like to go 'round the whole world someday and see what all there is with my own eyes."

"I'd say go for it if you can," she said. "It's definitely not easy, but it's worth it."

After looking at each other for a minute or so—which part of her mind informed her should be awkward, but it wasn't—Rast finally said, "Well, I gotta get back to work pretty soon. It uh, it's sure been nice, bein' with you for a while, though..."

"Heheh," Lynn giggled lightly, and pulled herself up and forward, pulling her arms around him and her head against his for a kiss, which was quicky reciprocated. This one was a little longer and more intense than earlier ones, and ended with both of them still holding on and panting slightly.

"Y-you're uh.." Rast fumbled incoherently.
"Hey," Lynn replied, reaching up a hand to run through his hair a bit. "You just let me know when you want to go on another date, alright?"
"Oh! S-sure," he said, blushing furiously.

"Great! Now, I think I can feel a few people staring," she said more quietly, gently pulling herself out and back down off of her tiptoes. "So, I'll see you again soon."

"'C-course you will," he said, nodding.

---

"Well, this is pretty neat," said Rayna, looking at Nora's "wolf" form. "Your stats even change. If you need more physical endurance or strength that'd be the way to go. Say, it still lists your race as 'elf' even though you really don't look much like one that way..."

"Does this mean you know what all those mystery skills are, now?" said Aria.

"Um, no...j-just these two. However, s-since it's all related it would be r-r-reasonable to assume the other ones are similar to this," she said.

"And you needed to spend skill points to figure these out?"
"Um.." Nora closed her eyes for a second. "...No? It looks like I was g-given the level one v-ver-vers—um, for free, but I c-can spend points to improve their effects. Th-the 'spirit weave' one is r-really vague about what improving it actually d-does, but 'wolf spirit' s-says exactly how much the s-stat changes can be improved by.."
"Well, I don't think I need to tell you, but—"
"Add it to the paper. R-right," she said, nodding.

"Yeah! Good girl. Uhh," Aria looked at Zack nervously for a second. "Sorry, didn't mean it like that at all."

"Then don't say it like that?" he suggested.

"I can't help what comes outta my mouth sometimes! Don't you ever have that problem?"

The door opened, and Mira led the way inside, the dragon-girl following her. "Hey, what's going on everyone?" she said, noticing how many of them were gathered in the living room.
"Nora learned a new trick," said Rayna, gesturing in her direction.
"Aaah~!" Rose ran up to the shapeshifted elf excitedly. "They're so cuuute!"
"Uh, t-thanks..?" Nora backed off a step or two nervously.
"Oh! I'm sorry," she said, stepping away a bit herself on realizing how close she'd just gotten. "Are those—is that real? How'd you do that? Can I do that?"
"U-um.." she looked around the room nervously; explaining this to someone who was not a player hadn't been discussed in their plan at all...even though in hindsight it was a clear necessity.

"A new use for her magic came to her in her dream last night," Katherine explained, stepping in to rescue her. "It's all part of the spirit weaving stuff she normally does, and seems to mostly affect herself. Right?"
"Um, r-right."
"Aww..."

"Still, I'm pretty sure you're powerful enough that you could give yourself wolf ears if you really wanted to," said the catgirl. "No idea how, but I'm sure a spell for it exists somewhere."
"Oh. Um, heheh. It's okay, I just got excited. I'm happy enough just being a dragon," said Rose. "Those are seriously cute on you, though.."

"And mine aren't cute?" said Rayna, looking mock-offended.
"Uh! Um. They are! B-but, you always have them, so it's already uh, it'd feel weird to always point them out specifically," she said nervously.

"Anyway," said Zack, with the tone of someone who wanted to change the subject as quickly as physically possible. "We found a primer on monsters and a book with some info on demons at the library. It might be a good idea for everyone to at least skim those sometime, in case there's anything useful to learn from them."

---

Late into the afternoon, Katherine made supper for everyone—Lynn and Clera both helping this time—and they waited an hour or so for the sun to set and the food to settle before going outside and beginning to get everything ready. Rose stood a decent distance away from the ritual, Zack next to her to keep her from jumping in and spooking the sheep or kicking up the ashes or something; the others were around the circle, with Aria closest to the middle and Mira holding onto the sheep's leash.

"...Eugh." Mira frowned at the creature. "Okay, I've never exactly been of the 'save the animals' camp but actively killing one is a new thing for me."

"Well, does the ritual require you to be cruel, or can you just..snap its neck so it doesn't feel too much pain?" said Aria.

"The latter, thankfully..well, actually I'm supposed to slit the throat." Mira sighed. "It has to be me that kills it, though. Think you could hold this guy still?"
"Hmm, probably." She stepped a little closer and leaned her hands onto the animal; it bleated quietly. "The thing about sheep—or really, domesticated animals in general—they trust people practically by instinct. As long as we're calm he won't think anything's wrong."
"Honestly that just makes me feel even worse about—wait. Hoooow do you know that?" said the witch, in a tone of voice that suggested she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to know.

"I got an uncle who's a sheep farmer," she shrugged. That was as much detail as she could go into with Rose around.

"So I guess you've been to the farm, and involved with the uh...?"

"Yeah." Aria waved a hand. "You eat the meat, you accept that someone has to do this. Maybe it'll give you a better appreciation for what goes into your meat from now on."
"Uh, sure, maybe. A-anyway, I guess we're getting off track...let's just, get this over with." She pulled out her scythe.

Something sparked in Aria's head. Her eyes flicked briefly in Rose's direction. The dragon-girl looked...happy. Normal. Not confused by a reference to tracks. To getting off track. When someone who'd clearly been all over civilization like Loren evidently found the concept of trains entirely foreign, why did someone who'd been hiding from civlization for so long that she forgot about the reason she ran away from it in the first place appear completely ufazed by a reference to them? Well, maybe she just didn't hear, or was distracted by thinking about something else. But that just drove up the shifter's desire to push this test a little farther.

This train of thought drove past the station in the span of less than a second: Short enough for her to almost immediately reply: "Right. Let's get this trainwreck a-rollin'." Loudly, enough to be heard and cut through any distractions. And, as predicted, Zack groaned, calling even more attention to it.
"Really? We had a hard enough time with the last demon," he said.

Rose had no particular reaction. Suspicious. Aria thought of the perfect response to make one further test juast as she said it: "Hey, I'm just teasing Murphy's law. If you're optimistic then a disaster makes you wrong and in a bad spot; if you talk like a pessimist then ol' Murphy has to pick one or the other."

"Whatever..." The knight just shook his head in annoyance. And...apart from mild, cheerful interest in the conversation, Rose had no reaction. There was no way someone as specific as "Murphy" associated with a pessimistic law coincidentally also existed in this culture, and even if there was, why would a dragon exiled from society be familiar enough with the meme to not even be mildly confused about it? That clinched it, as far as Aria was concerned. Asking Loren a couple of very specific questions would make this definitive proof of her suspicions..but that would have to wait.

"Are you done talking now?" said Mira, a little impatiently. She'd been holding her scythe in "ready-to-strike" position during that entire exchange, but Aria was pretty sure she'd actually been glad for the distraction while she was busy working up the nerve to swing.
"Yep. Chop away."
"Eechk." The witch winced her eyes shut, but achieved a perfect swing across the animal's neck all the same. It was a clean shot, and the poor guy probably didn't feel much pain before going out. Aria released the body from her hands and then drew her sword, unsheathing it and then plunging it straight in the middle, sucking out all of the blood in a couple of seconds and feeling like she'd had a light snack after a three-day juice diet: Such an appetizer only seemed to make the hunger worse.

Thankfully, her recent shift in skill purchasing decisions and personal sense of determination gave her the self-control to pull the sword out of the body, take several steps back, and patiently wait a few minutes more while Mira picked up the dead body, set it on the altar, and burned it, working her way through some chanting and dancing, even using the scythe like a deranged majorette's baton...until finally, the portal began to open. Aria wasn't salivating but the demon in her sword certainly seemed like it would be if it could. The meal was just about to jump out, and then they could...play. Everything else could wait until after that.

---

Had all but that last scene written and got stuck trying to figure out what should come next. Eventually I decided that nothing else important really happens this day before the demon fight, and since I already knew how this scene should go it was easy to jump to it and just go.

Battle Vixens! - 41

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---

Episode 41: The Neutral Move

"You know, I thought the whole point of a hydra was you shouldn't cut the heads off." Petra stood on a small pillar of concrete, waited for a few heads to swipe down at her, then bashed them with her sheath, jumped over them and slashed their necks with the sword. The heads fell off, writhing and snapping at the air like some kind of seizuring snakes. Rowan drew more water from an open sewer main nearby and sent it crashing over them, dissipating them. Petra landed on the ground a bit behind the pillar while it collapsed, continuing her thought: "'Cause, it's supposed to grow more heads. This one just had way too many to begin with."

Rowan sighed, or more just exhaled slightly louder than usual. "Save your breath, please." The towering monster took a couple of steps in their direction, giving an opening to Dawn on the opposite side of it. Several of its heads screamed when she cut them and started getting rid of them. For all they knew, the body was a weak point, but it was impossible to get close. Every head was big enough to swallow Hugo (the tallest of them) whole, and there had seemed to be hundreds when it first appeared. In fact it was hard to tell they were even making progress at first, but by this point it was quite clear this strategy was (slowly) working.

"Heads up!" Zeno, off to the right, put a light-shield up between them and the monster just in time for several of the heads to stun themselves by bashing against it.
"Got it, got it!" Petra lifted her arms, making a big blade of rock to chop the latest heads off. A blast of sound from the right tore through them before they could hit the ground.

Rowan moved around to the left, noting a higher concentration of heads there. Another wave of water from the sewers turned into a mass of spinning blades aimed vaguely in the beast's direction, some of them finding their marks to chop off heads while others just nicked or pierced them. Tora sped over and sliced through all the heads in a single swift motion. "I can't get close enough to that thing!" she complained after rolling back out of the remaining heads' range. She held up her clawgloves, half-glaring at them. "These things're great except when what ya need is reach!"

"Swap with me," said Rowan, pointing in Petra's direction.

"Sure, chief."

Fay came closer. "Seek the sky?"
"Right." In a practiced maneuver, she jumped and held her staff out, and Rowan leapt to meet it at the peak of the jump, pushing off of it to get more height. She landed on top of a neck and began running and jumping around the swarm of biting heads, cutting one after another off with her sword, until she started to feel out of breath and backflipped away again. Fay set off an explosion big enough to destroy most of them, and then hit the stragglers with her staff when they got close enough.

"No gunshots heard," Fay commented, moving just inside the monster's range, setting up an explosion, and hopping back to let the heads that took the bait die to another explosion.
"It doesn't make...any sense," said Rowan, between breaths. "Not unless she's...attacking Light's group,"

"No use worrying." She offered Rowan an open bottle of water, which she chugged in a couple of seconds.

"Hey, I got an idea!" Petra yelled from her side. "Let's tip it over!"

Rowan looked at Fay for a second; her expression was neutral. "Hugo?"
"Sounds great to me!" she yelled over the monster's screams from the other side.

"Point it our way. Knock it with the shield if it's safe to do so. Back up, Dawn. On my signal!"

"Yep yep!" Petra called back.

Rowan and Fay split up, Fay to their right and Rowan toward Dawn's side. She had indeed backed up, and was busy hitting her built-up collection of heads with fire blasts and ice blades. Rowan went in to slash through the rest; Dawn nodded appreciatively, panting slightly. Then: "Do it!"

"RRRRRAAAAAH!" The ground the monster was standing on shifted, tilting more and more. The creature scuttled against the sudden incline unsettlingly, roaring. Then Hugo jumped and bashed it with her tower shield, and Zeno placed a plane of light under its lifted feet so it couldn't easily right itself. Its many voices screamed louder and more urgently than before as it fell over onto its side, the ground audibly rumbling from the impact.

The thing's body was nothing like Rowan had expected behind all those heads. It was just a big torso with dozens and dozens of thin, spidery legs attached to the bottom, all of them twitching and spasming rapidly as it tried to stand back up. "Fay, Zeno, Hugo: Keep the heads off us," Rowan ordered, moving in with Dawn. Hugo ran around to the two of them to block with his shield and throw blasts of sound back at the heads trying to bite them; Zeno and Fay used their powers to keep the heat off of Petra and Tora. Swords, claws, and some fire hit the torso, sending a massive stream of mist out of it. The monster's heads gave a chorus screeching, roaring, and pained screaming from the assault, attacking ever more desperately until some of them started to get around Hugo's efforts, forcing Rowan to switch to drawing more water up to block and pummel the heads with. It didn't seem to be smart enough to use all those heads to lever itself back upright, which was at least a small blessing.

The body went indistinct after a moment and fell apart. But the heads were still perfectly solid, detaching from the fading body to turn and rush the group of vixens already half-exhausted from taking out the thing's torso. Petra gritted her teeth and tilted the ground up, throwing most of them back; Zeno blocked the rest from coming too close and picked as many off with arrows as she could. Hugo threw more impact blasts their way, and after taking a second to catch her breath Rowan threw blades of water at them. Dawn shot fireballs and threw spikes made of ice as the ones thrown back by Petra regained the lost ground, and Tora and Fay took up the front line, hitting, exploding, and slashing as many of them as they could manage.

One by one (apart from Zeno) the others ran out of energy to throw their magic around and jumped into the melee instead—Dawn last of all and wielding the biggest, most solid sword of ice she could conjure. But after an agonizing thirty seconds of frantic melee that felt more like an hour, Rowan struck her sword down through the last of the thing's heads, landing the tip partway in the ground and leaning herself on top of it, panting heavily.

"Is everyone...all right?" She turned her head around, checking that they were all still present and conscious. It took a lot of effort just to do that.

"Well, nobody's got eaten or fainted anyhow," said Tora.

Fay just replied, "Too...many...heads."
"I agree completely," said Petra. "How am I supposed to paint that?" The rest just quietly nodded or looked back at her.

Next, Rowan got a radio from her belt and spoke into it: "Any sign of them?"
"Not a thing. No noise from the facility."

"And..?"
"They didn't show up in the other town, either. No hits on the car. Like she went underground or something."
"Hey, how'd things go over there?" said Petra.
"..Same question," Rowan said after a brief half-glare in her direction.

"Uhh...we're getting reports there was some kinda 'dragon' over there. No details yet. They think everyone's okay but they all disappeared the second it went down, so..."

"Well. Keep an eye out. I don't like this."
"I don't either," said the chief of police from the other end of the line.

Rowan shook her head, putting the radio back in its place for the moment. "Otherwise..." Looking around at everyone, she said, "Good work. We have reasonable certainty this is the only monster for today, so it should be alright to take the rest of the day off. Just be careful."
"Yeah, I'd rather those jerks attack us now than keep us waitin' and wonderin' forever," said Tora, crossing her arms in annoyance.
"Can you even still fight?" Zeno asked.
"Long as there's blood in me."

---

After a brief discussion, the group agreed to meet in the same lounge that Rory and Clark had carried Light to when they first met her. The puppeteer could be expecting them in either location, but the press would be less likely to barge into the college science building looking for them than wait outside the Quinns' house with a bunch of cameras. Besides that, Amory was waiting on campus for news. The unconscious bodies of Gemma got two of the couches, the Quinns took the third one, and everyone else got chairs. Light left once they were all inside, putting in the effort to remain invisible while going to get Amory and bring him back with her.

Ning watched the unconscious twins with a visibly nervous expression. "..Are you sure they—uh, she's okay?"

"Yep. Checked her with my magic wand a minute ago," said Clark, pointing to the needle currently in her ear. "You feeling alright?"
"Nn, not really. That dragon hit me in the side with its head..."
"Ouch, that might leave a bruise." She got up slowly and moved over, putting the bulb-end up to Ning's head.

"W-wait, are you gonna knock yourself out doing that?" she said. Clark ignored the question, already focused on healing the injury.

"We're pretty sure healing people 'recharges' her," said Rory. "The same way hitting yourself with lightning does you."
Ning let out a brief sigh of relief at the soothing feeling from the healing magic. "Oh? What about you?"

"I've been thinking about it actually, and I may have figured it out," she said. "Seems to me like I'm 'recharged' by the thrill of battle. Hitting things and being hit back." She pounded a fist into her palm to demonstrate. "Fits the whole theme of 'bodily strength and endurance' powers, and it just...I dunno how to explain it. I mean—don't get me wrong, I've never exactly been a totally peaceful person but I've never really felt so excited about violence before, either."

The door opened and closed on its own, and then Light and Amory appeared inside. "We're back," she said tiredly, and then went to the nearest empty chair and slumped over into it. He watched this with a concerned expression, which then turned even moreso as he noticed the bodies on the couch.
"Is she alright?"

"Just had this conversation, yes," Clark repeated, standing up again as she finished fixing Ning's bruises up and making her way back to her wife's side. "Should wake up any minute now, if Light's experience with fainting is anything to go by."

"Hmn. You know, I really wish I'd brought some cookies today," said Rory. She waved toward the remaining empty chair, and Amory took the hint to go sit down in it.

"I saw some of what happened on the news," he said. "Looked...pretty rough."
"Mhm," Light said, nodding. "Stupid dragon took forever to kill."
"I dunno if we could've done it without your help," Rory said with a sly grin. "Really, I think you were right about not losing any time, either."
"Shh." Light waved vaguely at her and pointed toward Plus.
"What? She's still asleep, right? Anyway, who cares if she does find out? I thought we weren't keeping secrets from each other anymore."
"I'm just..worried how she'd take it," Amory said quietly, looking furtively at the nearest sleeping body a bit. "I'll tell her...just—I want to be the one to do it, okay? Give me a little more time."
"Okay, okay."

Defying every literary convention Light knew of, Gemma remained fast asleep for the next few minutes while everyone else just took the time to drink some water and really, fully catch their breath. And when she did wake up, it was with enough of a start to make it quite clear she hadn't been pretending before. "Wuaah!" both bodies jumped to their feet, yelling in chorus. "Dragon!—" "—where?!" They looked around the room frantically for a second or two before getting their bearings.

"The dragon's dead, dear, go back to sleep," Rory said half-joking.

"Oh—" "—uh..." Both of them looked down, blushing brightly in embarrassment. After a moment Plus looked up, looking around the room. "What happened? The last thing I remember I was uh, helping Ning recover her magic...and...?"

"You fainted," Clark said, "from exhaustion more or less. I guess having two bodies doesn't make much of a difference for that if you tire both of them out at once."

"Did any puppets show up?" Minus asked, slowly sitting back down again; Plus moved over to sit on the opposite side of the same couch, leaving hers empty.

"Not one," said Light. Her ears drooped slightly. "I wonder if..?"

Amory's phone started ringing at this point, interrupting her and making her jump slightly. Both of Gemma and Ning also jumped at the noise, the Quinns the only fox-girls present who weren't startled by it.

"Hello..?" He pulled it away a bit to talk to them. "Rowan." And back to his ear. "Yeah, they're fine. Everyone's...here with me, actually. You want speakerphone? Sure it is." He set the phone down on the nearest table, pushed the speakerphone button, and gestured vaguely at Gemma (specifically Plus).

"I heard your monster resembled a dragon," his voice said from the phone. Amory gestured slightly more urgently and she finally caught on to what he meant.
"Oh, right!" Minus half-whispered, while Plus focused on damping the sound from the phone on the edges of the room. It probably wasn't audible past the walls anyway, but a little more security couldn't hurt.

"Yep. We got to be dragonslayers," said Rory. "How are you guys holding up? The puppeteer didn't do a thing here, so.."
"Not here either. And no sign of her at the facility; they've been on high security since yesterday. And the car hasn't shown up on the road yet, either. Not even one matching its description with different plates, which she wouldn't even know to do..."
"It's like someone told her to lay low for today," said Light. "But...she doesn't seem like the kind of person who'd take someone else's orders. And, well, at least there's no way we have a mole over here."
"Well...Word of the car could have gotten out if she has contacts in the police," said Rowan. "But even if that were it, that's no reason not to attack today at all. It would have been to her advantage to do so, with the kind of monsters we were fighting."

"Maybe the plan is to let everyone tire themselves out today and then take advantage of it, fully rested herself, tomorrow?" Clark suggested. "It's still not a great plan, since there's a lot of time to rest between now and the next monster...or if there isn't, there's no way she'd know that."

"Maybe that's it," said Rowan.
"What's it?" said Minus, confused.
"Suppose she does, somehow, know that the attack will come earlier tomorrow. In the morning, for example. Then waiting until then to strike makes sense."

"How would she know when they're gonna attack?" said Amory. "Nobody knows that. The Initiative's been trying to figure it out, right? And you guys have a lot more experts working on it than she ever could..."

"There is one way she might obtain that information," said Rowan. "One person who is more likely than anyone else to know exactly when the monsters will attack. Who has shown the ability to know precisely when they won't?"

"Oh...yeah," said Light. "She hasn't contacted any of us in a while." (Well, not as herself at least, she mentally noted). "You?"

"Not since last time. She...expressed an interest in keeping an 'even footing' between us. Not fair play, exactly, more like giving one side of a fight a handicap so it's closer and more exciting. Maybe us having a way to track her put things too far in our favor and it was time to throw a bone to the other side instead."

"That...sounds just like her to me," said Amory, shaking his head.

"So how far do we run with this assumption?" said Light.

"I think it would be best to turn in early tonight—as early as you can. And be ready for one of them to show up in the morning—no idea how early, but they've never shown up before dawn. Still...maybe it would be best to keep a phone nearby and loud enough to wake you quickly if it does happen. I'll put out the same warning on my end."

"Great! Will do," said Rory. "So enough about that, what did you fight today?"

"...A hydra showed up in the middle of the city," he said, his tone calm with a strong hint of tiredness. "Its heads came off and swarmed us when it died."

"Awesome." Half the room glared at her for the lack of tact. "Come on, that's like the third or fourth most metal thing I've heard all year."

"Please excuse my wife, she gets like this when she's tired," said Clark.
"Hey, I'm not tired!" she protested.
"It's...alright," Rowan said. "At any rate, I need to get the announcement out, so I'll leave you to it." And he hung up.

"Come on, am I wrong? I thought it was cool they won," said Rory, appealing to a generally unsympathetic court. "Nobody got hurt after all..."
"Dear, your filter's off," said Clark, leaning on top of her with a hug. "You know, the one that keeps you from saying things in a way that makes everyone angry with you? This always happens when you overwork yourself or don't sleep well, or try to compensate with a bunch of energy drinks."

"Well, I'm not allowed to be tired yet," she said, returning the hug with one arm. "I still have a class to teach."
Minus gasped. "I still have a class to go to!" Plus realized aloud. "What time is it?" Minus added, jumping to her feet.

"..Are you sure they weren't canceled for the day?" said Light wearily, leaning back with her head toward the ceiling at this point. "After the whole 'tornado siren' thing?"
"Uh..let's see.." Amory picked up his phone to check. "Uh-huh...this email says anyone commuting from off campus should stay off campus today avoid driving near where today's monster is or was. Basically." He looked up to Gemma. "So—you drove into town and then back to your apartment, and got this email saying not to come back. Problem solved."
"I-I guess so..—" "—but I'm right here, I hate lying to people..." Minus muttered more quietly.
"Well, have you checked your email yet?" he said, getting up and coming over to her. "Your car's still in town right now, yeah? I'll drive you, then we go back to the apartment and make it true."
"Okay..." She recombined using Minus, and Amory gently put an arm over her to guide her out. She giggled softly, blushing a bit from the physical contact. Before they got all the way to the door, she halted abruptly, realizing something.

"Wait! W-were there any lingering effects from breathing in that poison stuff? It made me feel dizzy, like the whole world was upside down and sideways, and my arms and legs were going stiff..."
"I didn't see anything," said Clark. "Checked pretty closely, too, since I wasn't sure how hard either of you hit the concrete when you collapsed. If you're really worried you could go have a checkup with a real doctor to be sure."

"R-right...thanks," she said quietly, and then continued out with Amory.

When the door shut, Ning snapped back to sitting up again. "Um.." She looked around the room, having dozed off sometime between the end of the phone call and now. "What time is it, anyway? I gotta get back to my shop, my car, and pick Nadia up soon probably."

"I"ll drive you," Light said, standing up slowly. "Should be able to make it look like just normal-me in the car."
"Aren't you wearing yourself a little thin?" said Clark. "Maybe I could take care of the driving part for you. And you should take a power nap in here before going to that class," she added to her wife, pushing off of her gently to stand up. "Remember the motto the legal team taught you?"

"Yeah yeah, 'don't get the college sued'," Rory said, and shifted back to her usual appearance before standing up, stretching. "I'll be in my office, then. You get the blame if I'm late for class, though."

Clark also returned to human form, leading the way out of the office. The three of them were quiet as they went to Light's car, she produced the keys from a purse that her pockets' contents had traveled to during the transformation, and he drove them out to town, giving the destroyed section of road from the day's fight a wide berth. Light kept Ning invisible until she went into the back door of the shop to turn back into Gerald, and then took a long, deep breath, grateful to have just one less illusion to keep up. Then it was back to campus so Blake could be the one driving to the apartment and Clark wouldn't be stranded over there.

"This superhero business..." Light muttered quietly halfway through the trip. "They never tell you how much gas it costs."
"Hah. Yeah. I can spot you some if you need me to, later," he said.
"No no..just makin' a joke to stay 'wake," she said. "No, no real complaints here."

"...You sure you can make the drive back on your own?"
"I'll be okay," she nodded. "It's using my powers that's so tiring...think I'll feel better when I turn back. Not...great, but enough to drive a couple miles."

"Just be ridiculously careful. Like you would if you knew you were a little drunk."
"I dunno what tha's like. Wait...do you?" He didn't really strike her as the kind of person to do that.

"Gentle reminder that Rory is my wife," Clark said. "Won't say any more than that about it."

Given their respective routes, it was no surprise to find Amory already sitting on the couch when Blake entered the apartment. He walked up and slumped over on the other side of it.

"Stupid monsters."
"I agree."

"Stupid puppeteer."

"Hear, hear."

"Stupid 'Giver' or Beryl or whoever. Dumb powers."
"Stupid price," said Amory back.

Blake next spoke his phrase again, and a Light in bed-clothes (an oversized t-shirt and underwear, again) leaned over onto Amory's lap without saying another word.
"Uh..yeah. Heh." He ran a hand through her hair, spoke his own phrase, and after turning into a girl she gently pulled Light a little closer into her arms, slowly petting her and winding their tails together.

"Mrrn." After a brief half-hearted nuzzle, the exhausted fox-girl fell asleep right there on the couch, the droning noise of the news turned low not bothering her a bit.