A Statue in the Woods 1: Petrification

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Two men were walking through a forest. One of them—Tyler—was average-looking in nearly every way: Dark hair, dark eyes, unremarkable build—neither fit nor fat. The other one, named Ronan, was slightly shorter, built skinny, with bright blond hair and emerald green eyes. Tyler was wearing moderately thick clothes and a backpack full of supplies; Ronan was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, like he was just taking a walk down the sidewalk.

They stopped, and Tyler sighed. "We're lost."
"Wha—no way! We're not loooost!" Ronan spread out his arms as he emphatically spread out the word. "We've totally been going, uh, north this entire time. So, we just need to, like—turn around, and go...south!"

"Uh-huh." He crossed his arms and glared. "And which way, exactly, is that?" They couldn't even see which direction the afternoon sunlight was coming from through the thick canopy of trees above. And he was pretty confident they'd turned around innumerable times since entering this forest, which had happened at least a few hours ago.
"Um..that way? I think?" Seeing that Tyler was unconvinced, he briefly fidgeted nervously before visibly having a realization, and getting out his phone. "A-ha! We'll just use technology to get directions outta here."
"You mean like I tried to, like, five minutes ago?" They were out of cell-tower range; GPS wasn't working. Tyler had already turned off his own phone to conserve what was left of its battery life.

"Weeelll uuhhh..but—wait! I got a—mine has a built-in compass!" Ronan announced confidently after some verbal fumbling, holding his phone out with the screen toward his friend.

"By which you mean...you installed a virus app claiming to make your phone work as a compass." Tyler shook his head.
"No, no—it totally works! Look." Turning the phone around did indeed appear to make the needle rotate. "Sooo, we just go the way this says is north."
"You mean south?"
"South! Yeah, right," he nodded.

Tyler just shook his head. There were enough supplies in his backpack to last them one night, and these woods hadn't seemed very big in the satellite picture. If they could just get going in a singular direction and not turn around again, then they'd definitely be out before they ran out. Or, at least, in range of a cell tower. It wasn't like he had any better ideas, and their entire situation was Ronan's fault to begin with, so Tyler was in the mood to make him keep trying to fix it for as long as it took for him to finally give up and beg for help.

Ronan had seen a bunch of 'totally real' pictures online of a cave with brightly-shining, supposedly-magical crystals strewn throughout. They'd all been tagged with the same location, which was somewhere in the middle of these woods, and he'd even reached out to one of the people taking the photos to get more exact directions. Tyler was pretty sure the pictures had been faked from the start, but he couldn't make him see reason, and he also couldn't let him go out into the woods to starve alone—or worse, eat some nightmarishly poisonous mushrooms or something. Someone with half of a brain needed to be with him when the trip inevitably went wrong...which it very quickly had.

They continued going "south" by Ronan's phone's reckoning for a good several minutes, and it did at least feel like they were going in a straight line. They carefully went around trees, thick brush, and other obstructions in a way that kept them more or less still on that same line after every detour. Tyler thought again on the images of these woods from the satellite picture—they really hadn't looked so thick as this, nor like they should take this long to get out of. Had he underestimated those things, or was something else weird going on? He had heard of some real places genuinely being somehow 'bigger on the inside' ever since the veil over magic was lifted, usually the residences of gods or other absurdly-powerful magic users. But then, who would ever want to make a forest bigger?

His thoughts were interrupted as Ronan pushed past some brush in front of him and suddenly stopped. "Whoooaaa!"

"What is it—" Tyler came up next to him to look. Past the brush was a sudden, complete break in the trees. It wasn't the outer edge of the forest, but a roughly circular, treeless grove, carpeted by soft grass that seemed like it could've been mowed just last week, surrounded by the woods all around like a wall. His friend had probably been impressed not by this very unnatural-seeming phenomenon, however, but rather by what sat in the middle of the clearing: An exquisitely detailed, larger-than-life stone statue of a fox. It was standing upright on its four legs, had a large tail that would be bushy if it weren't made of stone, and came up to maybe two-thirds the height of a person.

Ronan stepped farther into the clearing, spreading out his arms. "Dude, look at this! Where'd it come from? How's it so clean!? I gotta get some pics!"

"Uh, hang on—" Tyler was immediately suspicious and worried. Something as weird and incongruous as this had to be magical in some way. Maybe it was a weird trap laid by some old-school "eat your children"-type faires or something. But then, Ronan ran right up to the statue and took a bunch of pictures of it with no apparent effect. Tyler just sighed and trudged up to a bit behind him, letting him have his fun for the moment.

"Oh yeah, I wanna take a selfie with it too!" Tyler shook his head, quietly sighing again. Ronan's cheerful, carefree attitude, even in a dangerous situation like 'lost deep in the woods', was a big part of why a lot of people liked him. Whether it was a virtue or a fault tended to depend on the situation, but he had to admit it was, at least, endearing. "Hey, you wanna pose with it?"
"Uh, no thanks."
"Aww, c'mon! We might never see this thing again once we get outta here!"

"My phone's off to save batteries. You know, in case your 'compass' idea doesn't work out?"

"Well I'll take it with my phone then!"

"Okay, okay...sheesh."

He went and stood next to the statue and crossed his arms, tilting his head slightly toward the statue. Ronan took a couple of pictures, then said, "Hey, get closer! Like, lean on it or something."

"Why?"

"People aren't gonna believe you were really there if you're not touching it!"

"I don't know if I really want them to believe, to be perfectly honest."

"Come ooon...!"

"Fine, fine..." They needed to move on at some point, and just giving in seemed like the most expedient choice. So Tyler went and lightly leaned his right hand on top of the vulpine statue, somewhere toward the middle of its back. Ronan took his pictures, and Tyler started to pick his hand up off of it again when he noticed...something brushing across his fingers. Something that felt soft and bristly—an awful lot like fur.

"Uh—" Turning fully toward the statue, Tyler saw the spot he'd touched suddenly looking a lot less like stone, and a lot more like the top of an actual, living fox, complete with bright orange fur. The edges of that spot were also in motion, a stone-to-fur transition visibly spreading outward. "Ronan..!"
"What?" He was, of course, busy flicking through the pictures on his phone, and still wasn't looking up from it even now.
"Ronan, look!"

"Wha—oh! Dude, what'd you do?!"
"I didn't do anything!"
"But you touched it!"

"That was your idea, and you touched it first!" Tyler kept his eyes on the statue while he argued, quickly taking several steps backwards as he saw the effect spread toward its limbs, head, and tail. If it was coming to life, well...a normal fox might run from humans, but something this size might be willing to consider either one of them a handy snack!

"Well nothing happened when I touched it!"

"RrrrrAAAAAAAAaaaah...!" At this point, they were interrupted by a deep, bass voice making a sound somewhere between a growl and the groan of someone just waking up, feeling exceedingly stiff, and stretching hard to try to work it all out. At the same time, the now-non-statue giant fox violently shook, seeming to employ for this action every muscle it had from its nose to the tip of its tail. "Oough..." It then sat—the way a dog might sit—and looked around. It had bright orange fur everywhere except near the tip of its tail and its inner ears—which were white—but its eyes were a bright, piercing shade of blue. "Pardon me, that was most entertaining, and I'm ordinarily not one to interrupt an argument—but you've no idea how uncomfortable it is to come out of a petrification." The fox's muzzle moved in perfect time with the deep voice, and it seemed to be coming from that direction, too. So: The giant formerly-stone fox was also a talking fox, apparently. Tyler was quickly returning to his original conclusion that this was some kind of highly-dangerous magic thing.

Ronan wasn't so worried. He stepped slightly closer to the big fox. "Petrifi..you mean, like, in video games?!"

The fox's head tilted slightly. "Err..video what? Mayhaps that's a new term..."

"So, someone turned you into that statue?" Tyler said. "And you just turned back?"
The fox turned its head his way, then nodded it a couple of times, saying, "Oh, yes, that is an accurate summary of events. Hmph, shameful for an old fox to be fooled so easily."

"You know, uh, who did it exactly?"
"I have a pretty good idea, yes. Those fools didn't do much to disguise their methods. I'm certain, to them, one less 'monster' in the world for a while was worth the expensive ritual, plus the risk that one of their relatives might stumble upon me and accidentally..." He trailed off for a second, seeming to realize something.

"Ah, that's right!" Suddenly the fox stood up and moved, closing the distance between him and Tyler in maybe a quarter of a second.

"Aaack!" Tyler stumbled backwards slightly. If the huge canid had intended to pounce on him and tear his throat out, he wouldn't have even realized it was happening before the pain started. Instead, he went right back to a seated position.
"You! Yes—you're not actually associated with the so-called 'holy warriors', are you?"
"Uh..no, I don't know anybody like that."
"In that case—I owe to you my freedom! You have the gratitude of a five-tailed fox, son!"

"Five-tailed...wait, like a Kitsune?"
"Oh, but of course." The fox took a moment to preen himself with a forepaw, as though he were brushing some hair atop his head. "If you know our kind, then you must know how much power I possess."

"Hey, what about me?" Ronan asked.

He gave the blond man a brief aside glance. "Hm? Well, you didn't free me, did you?"
"But having Tyler touch you was my idea! A-and so was coming out here in the first place!"

"It's true," Tyler added quietly.

The fox's upper body moved in a way that seemed to suggest a shrug. "I suppose that is worth a small favor or two, when I get around to it. But you," he said, turning his head back toward Tyler, "I could very well take you on as a master if you'd like—for a while, at least. Until I become bored with it."

"Uh, 'master'? Like..some kinda slave thing?"
"Don't be ridiculous!" he huffed, standing up and aggressively baring his teeth. "No fox will ever be anyone's slave. But some of us do enjoy the game of behaving as a willingly obedient pet. It is usually entertaining to see what an 'ordinary' mortal will do with the power of a fox at his disposal."
"Um, okay, I dunno about that. But—do you think you could uh.."

"Yes?"
"It's just...I mean, Kitsune can shapeshift and stuff, right?"
"We are excellent at taking on all manner of appearances, indeed. In fact, I pride myself on being especially talented in that regard."

"Do you think you could..I dunno, try to look a little less threatening? I keep thinking you're gonna literally bite my head off."

"Oh, I see. Yes—I wouldn't mind giving a small demonstration—for my potential master."

As soon as he'd said that, a brilliant red glow appeared all across the fox's body, seeming to turn him into a bright silhouette against the dark backdrop of the forest behind him. He stood on his hind legs, the fur visibly thinning and shrinking from most of his appearance as he grew and reshaped into a humanoid form. The tall, fluffy ears remained unchanged, and the huge tail coming from his back seemed to split once, then each resulting tail split again, and then one of the 'copies' of the original split one more time, for a total of five visible tails. Just as the former-fox's body had taken on the proportions of a very tall human man, it suddenly shrank a few inches downward again, its frame narrowing and slimming.

Hair streamed out from the top of his head, growing longer and longer, as his waist visibly trimmed inward, his hips spread outward, and he sang out a soft "Aaa~aa~aaaahh.." that began in the original deep, male voice, but rapidly lilted higher and higher in pitch until it hit a mid-range, feminine low-soprano tone. As the glow faded, a pair of extremely short, tight shorts appeared around the now-humanoid Kitsune's hips, pulling visibly close and flat between—now—her legs. A tight, white tank top appeared around her upper body as the last of the glow faded, and then her chest suddenly, abruptly pushed out into a pair of breasts, rapidly forcing the top tighter and yanking it up off of her midriff as they filled out larger and larger, quickly becoming a huge pair of globes—easily some D cups or more. Finally, what was left was a very tall (slightly above Tyler's height), fit, curvy woman with long, brilliant-red hair. She had a bright blush on her cheeks and a big, teasing grin on her lips.

(old image)

"Well?" she said. "I hope this is unthreatening enough for you. I thought of using my typical form at first, buuu~ut..."

"Uh, yes, that's fine," Tyler said quickly.

Ronan had a characteristically bigger reaction. "Dude! You can just, like, turn into a hot chick at will!?"

"'Chick'?" She tilted her head rather like she had as a fox before.

"You know, like—lady, woman, girl?"
"Oh, yes. A new meaning to an old word, I suppose?" she said, turning her head Tyler's way again to ask this.
"Uh, yeah."
"In that case—I suppose 'hot' means..attractive?"
"Right again..."

"Then—indeed. Powerful enough foxes can look however we like, after all. These are quite real~," she added, placing her hands under her impressive breasts to lift them slightly.

"Uh—anyway, mister—uh, miss..I assume you have a name?" Tyler said.
"Oh, my, I must have been so excited that I completely neglected the introductions," she said. "I hope you'll understand. You may call me Elise," she said. If her 'typical form' was male, this probably wasn't her 'real name', but that really wasn't important right now.

"Yeah, okay. I'm Tyler, he's Ronan."
"Hey!" he waved. Then, half-under his breath: "Man, no one's ever gonna believe this.."

"We have kind of a problem, and I'm sure someone as, uh, powerful as you can probably help us out with it?"
"What ever could that be, hmn?" Elise leaned in toward him a little bit while saying this, making Tyler feel threatened in an entirely different way from before. He wasn't sure he liked this any better, to be honest.

"Hey, can I take a pic with you?" Ronan, probably accidentally, interrupted them.
"A 'pic'...picture? You have one of those cameras somewhere nearby?" she asked, looking around as if expecting to locate a large piece of furniture. Tyler would've been grateful for the save if he didn't have something actually important to ask her for.

"Uh, yeah? Right here?" he said, waving the phone still in his hand.

Elise went over to examine it more closely, moving no less swiftly than she had in giant-fox form. "My...that's unbelievably compact compared to what I've seen before."

"Uh, hey, Ronan?" Tyler said. "We kinda have something more important to worry about right now!"

"Like what?"
"Like how we're still lost in the middle of a forest!" Then, seeing that he'd gotten the fox-girl's attention again with this short burst of shouting: "Uh, yeah, that's the problem I was talking about."

"Oh, I see," she said, nodding lightly. "I should have no difficulty getting you out of these woods. After all, they were my home, once." Elise reached out and gently took Ronan's phone at this point, examining the screen with an expression of intense curiosity. She turned it around in her hand, watching the whole screen turn itself around to match its orientation.

"Uh—whoa, hey—that's uh, kinda mine," Ronan said, having taken a moment to even realize she'd slipped it out of his hands.

"Is this truly a camera? How do you take pictures with it?" she asked, practically ignoring him.

Tyler sighed and walked a little closer to them. "Uh, it's actually a phone—it just has a lot of other features, including being a camera," he explained carefully. They were definitely dealing with some kind of rip-van-winkle situation, he'd realized by this point. And they didn't know exactly when she was from, but if she knew what a camera was, she probably had some clue of what a phone was. "I'm sure we can uh, get you one of your own once we get back to civilization," he suggested.

"Oh? Is that a promise from my potential master?" she asked, turning her head his way while holding the phone out kind of in Ronan's general direction, pressing its very edge between just a few of her fingers like she was dangling it in front of him.

"Well, uh, phones do cost some money..."
Elise's ears lowered slightly, like a cute dog begging for a treat. "Please?" She let go of the phone at this point, prompting Ronan to quietly yelp and practically dive at the ground to catch it. She didn't even turn to watch this happen, but Tyler had the distinct impression that she was laughing on the inside anyway.

"Uh—look, it seems like you were petrified for a while. I mean like, probably at least a few decades or something? A-and I guess since we found you in the woods and all, it'd only be responsible to help you get used to modern society anyway," Tyler suggested. "Nearly everyone has a phone, so, I'm sure that'd be uh, a normal part of that at, some point?"

"Oh, you're too kind," she said, smiling brightly. With that face she'd been making, he actually wasn't sure he could've said no to her if he'd wanted to. "I really think I will make you my master. But first, I agree—we should depart from these trees. Come with me, gentlemen..."

Elise turned in a seemingly specific direction and started walking toward the edge of the clearing, raising her right hand and gently waving it forward before dropping the arm down again to her side. As she did this, the trees in front of her parted, a gap between them appearing and widening until there was a corridor between them, brightly lit by the sun, floored by the same soft grass as the clearing and wide enough for two people to comfortably walk it side-by-side. There was something about how it happened that made this feel like an optical illusion—as if the trees had never actually moved, but rather they just hadn't noticed that the path had been there all along.

Ronan, halfway through standing up from his dive, froze in place with his mouth agape. "Duuuude!"
Elise turned her head partway backwards, just enough for one of her bright blue eyes to be barely visible from behind. "Well, are you coming?"
"Uh, yeah," Tyler nodded, going to follow her.

"Yep! Hmp—on my way!" Ronan said, grunting as he stood up and then half-running to catch up to Tyler as he came up to just a bit behind her—just out of reach of the big, fluffy tails still waving out from behind the redheaded woman's lower back.

...He kind of wanted to touch one of them. Someone with Ronan's level of self-control probably would've. But Tyler had Tyler's level of self-control, so he didn't.

---

Yes, it's another new story. Well, it's not that new to me; I've been chipping away at it for some months. I didn't even wind up using the image that originally inspired it (which had black hair and yellow eyes), and it doesn't even entirely follow the outline I first drafted for it. I must admmit to some concern that you may find this story a little predictable; stories with the same overall premise are a dime a dozen. But as always, I feel like the value of art is not in its idea, but its execution. So, I hope you'll enjoy what I have for this so far.

...And yes, this will be using generated images. By part 4 or so, you'll see how this story makes use of some of their advantages.

A Summoning, Part XLIII

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Part XLIII
~Death~

Sometimes, certain events can have effects that precede their cause. People who travel between many universes, or who live in worlds where time travel (and particularly altering the past) is possible don't have too much difficulty accepting this idea. One such case went like so: In one course of events, Thomas spent Tuesday afternoon in a very mundane fashion: Eating supper, going back to her dorm room, watching some videos on her computer. But that isn't what "really happened," at least not anymore. Rather, while she was on her way from the cafeteria to the dorm room, someone interrupted her who otherwise wouldn't have.

"Excuse meeee!" Thomas stopped, turning toward the clopping sound of someone running in hard shoes, and was faced with a girl a little on the short and curvy side, with short brown hair, waving her down. She was wearing some frilly feminine clothes including a skirt, stockings, and some loafers for shoes—although the first things Thomas actually noticed were: small wings; huge, thick tail. The tips of some pointy ears sticking out just past that hair, and some black, upward-pointed horns coming out from the upper corners of her head, registered after that. "Ah, good, you stopped," she said, slowing her gait as she came up into reasonable conversational distance. She panted slightly as her running came to a halt, some bits of black smoke coming out of her mouth and nose when she did so—as if Thomas needed any further confirmation. This was...a fellow dragon. The first one she'd ever seen.

"So—hi hiii~! I'm Frelye, first of all," she said, offering out a hand to shake. Uncertain whether there was any more procedure than among humans, Thomas tried just taking the hand and allowing the short girl to eagerly, rapidly, pull it up and down a bit—exerting a level of force that might have yanked a human's arm out of its socket in the process! "Short for Frelyenebar Tirith Augustine, but I'm sure that's a bit of a mouthful for you. I tell ya, when some celestials came knocking on my cave entrance—so to speak—and told me a new dragon had hatched, I thought they were after my hoard!"

"Uh..yeah. It was kind of a surprise for me, too. Thomas—by the way," she added after a second.

"Mmhm, mmhm—lemme get a good look at ya." Frelye eagerly bounced around, examining the taller dragon-girl from a few different angles. "Weird your horn's already broke. You smell kinda like...an earth-type, maybe? Acid breath?"

"Something like that, yeah."

"Yeah, I'm the stereotypical type myself—pure fire. Not that there's anything wrong with that! And, you tussled with a lesser demon already?"
"Who, told you about that?"
"Those celestials, of course. Couldn't stop yapping about how you'd 'saved one of their kind', or whatever. I guess that's nice of you though. Oooh, that's not what broke your pretty horn, was it?" she said with a look of deep concern.
"No—it kinda just..grew in this way," Thomas said, unconsciously reaching a hand up to prod the broken part a bit.

"So you're—what." Thomas finally remembered, at this point, Zotha's offer to find an 'adult dragon' to give her some advice. "Here to help me..adjust, or something?"
"Hmmh, a little of that if you wanna. I'm mostly just stoked to meet someone else who hatched this century," she said. "I'm only seventy-one years old myself."

"'Only'?" An age like that made her older than the concept of "rock and roll".

"Dragons live on bigger timescales than humans, my friend—can I call you that?" she interrupted herself to ask. "I mean, I know we just met and all."
"It's whatever. So, you just want to, talk for a while?"
"Yeah, that'd be great! Maybe we could trade digits after, or whatever it is people say these days..a demon friend of mine introduced me to cellular phones pretty recently."

---

A man stood on a cliff, very near to the edge of an absurdly wide, deep, long chasm. It seemed he was in some sort of cave, perhaps, given the dim lighting which made it impossible to see the bottom of the pit before him. He waited for just a few moments, and then...

He felt someone coming up behind him. Who then stopped, just next to him. A...some kind of...catgirl? This part was different! "Are you thinking of jumping?" she asked.
"Huh? Uh—no. This iiiiis, usually the part where someone comes and pushes me off, and then I kinda..fall for a while before waking up." It was as he said this that he realized he was dreaming, and not actually in a cave standing in front of a deep chasm.

"You know they're coming. But you don't move to stop them?" she pressed.

"Uh, well—I dunno. I guess I never really thought to do that. I've been, keeping a dream journal lately, so I actually think this has happened a lot over the past few months. I've got this theory that it's like, a subconscious expression of this deep-seated fear I have that all my accomplishments are fake and all my friends secretly hate me, and someday soon that's gonna finally be something everyone knows...you know, so the falling is, like, a metaphor?" It was a little weird how compelled he felt to overshare like this, to a complete stranger no less—but then, this was a dream.

The strange catgirl fixed him with a long stare; her expression seemed to be a sort of permanently-fixed, sour scowl. Finally she said, flatly: "Don't be ridiculous." She waved her hand at the pit, then turned on her heel and walked away. He watched her leaving for only a second, but when he turned back around, there were suddenly safety railings between him and the pit—except for one gap, which was only so people could easily get onto a sturdy bridge now crossing the length of the chasm.

"Uh.." Looking back and forth again, the strange woman seemed to be gone. So, he shrugged to himself and tried walking across the bridge. Reviewing his dream journal some time later, he'd realize this was the last time he ever had this particular dream.

---

Thomas led the way back to an outdoor table near the cafeteria, a decent distance from anyone actually still eating. Her visitor gladly took a chair opposite her, immediately crossing her legs and curling her tail partway up around her thighs. "So uh..is having a long, complicated name a normal, dragon thing?" Thomas tried.

"Eh, a little bit, I suppose? At least among 'naturally-hatched' ones like myself. I understand it's pretty different to grow up a human than it is to literally come out of an egg! But anyway, it's pretty common for us to get some mutation of various parts of our ancestors' names, which is somewhat like some human traditions. My first name is based on my grandfather, Frelbeyrintirth—whose hoard I also inherited! Apparently he died when I was just a year or two old during some war, because some dumb humans came into his cave looking for weapons or something. I mean—they did manage to take him out, but only because he'd just woken up from a very long nap, and not without them going down too."

"I guess that's what you meant earlier..your home's literally a cave?"
"Well, it's more hospitable than that sounds, especially with some renovations I've been doing lately. There's electricity and running water! But it's a tradition for a reason, though: There isn't any other kinda natural formation large enough to store a lot of treasure in!"

"Yeah...so I found out we 'need' some kind of treasure to sleep on, already," Thomas said. "It's..a little inconvenient."
"How so?"
"Like—if I want to travel for a while, or something?"

"Hmm...I guess I can see that. You're not full-grown enough yet to take on proper dragon form, for sure. I was able to fly here from where I live—which is pretty far, mind—in like half an hour. And the celestials don't get uppity if you just use some illusions and steer clear of planes."
"So, have you never slept anywhere else?"
"I wouldn't say 'never'. A full-size dragon has some options for taking a small piece of home with her, after all. And we can go a few days without sleep if we have to."

"So, sleep deprivation isn't as bad as it is for humans?"

"I guess not?" she shrugged slightly, not seeming that confident. "What's the hurry, anyway? You could wait a few decades 'till you can fly big, and no need to pay human fares to get across the ocean or anything!"
"Uh, well—there's someone I want to travel with. Anyway, things change a lot over 'a few decades'..at least, for human culture."

"Hmm.." Frelye uncurled her tail so she could lean forward a little bit. "The way you say that—this must be at least a pretty close friend, huh?"
"I guess. I mean—I haven't known her all that long. It's—you know, the celestial I helped out with the demon problem. We were talking about maybe going to Europe, since she's like, 'newly made' and hoping to look around the world for herself."

"Hmmmmmmmmmmmm." This excessive hum came with something of a searching look. "How would you feel if...someone, kidnapped this person?"
"What?"
"I mean, like—what would you do?"
"I guess, I'd go get her back? I mean, free her. Hopefully not have to kill whoever did that."

"Heheh. But you were thinking of killing whoever was responsible anyway. And what you said first sounded more honest to me."

"Okay, yeah."

Thomas crossed her arms and frowned. "I've been dealing with some..I guess, possessive instincts sometimes."

"That's quite natural for us dragons."

"I still really don't like it. But what's your point?"
"The only thing we're ever possessive of in quite that way, is our hoards and all the treasure within. And there are many kinds of 'treasure'. You can't tell me you've never heard stories about dragons kidnapping princesses?"

"Wait, so...you're suggesting a solution?"

Frelye nodded. "If it's yours enough to go take it back when it's stolen, then it's yours enough to sleep on."

Thomas's face heated up a bit. "S-sleep on.." The idea of taking Stella to bed with her was complicated for entirely different reasons!

"Well, it's just one idea. You could also buy some single, relatively lightweight thing that's really valuable, make sure that you obsess over it as much as possible, and then stick that in your luggage. I've heard things like old cards and ancient coins can go for a pretty penny online these days, although I'd be worried about burning or melting something like that myself. My hoard is mostly stuff that keeps its value after having fire breathed on it."

---

Another man dreamed of being a grandmother: Rocking grandchildren in her chair, cooking meals for her children and children's children all gathered around a big table in her house. As it was a dream, the meals were indistinct, the number of people at the table, and their ages and appearances, ever-shifting. This was no strange fantasy, but a sort of blurring together of countless memories from year upon year.

Someone spoke to him, a while into this—someone who seemed to have been watching the whole thing. "You will probably never see them again," she said.

Waking somewhat from the form of the "grandmother", he looked around briefly, confused as to who was speaking. While he didn't see anyone around, he felt compelled to respond all the same: "That's how it was already! I'd have never woken up without the help of that angel."

"And these memories..don't make you sad?"
"'Course not! I've looked up my own obituary, you know—pretty strange thing to see, that. It says all the folks who 'survived' me, and I know I gave 'em all a good start on life. I could've died with no regrets."
"And yet, you chose not to."
"What's the use of ending my life, if I've got an opportunity to move on and start over? Besides, it's a real kick, gettin' to be young again!"

He had the impression that whoever was speaking shook her head. After that, the dream went back to normal, shifting back to exactly what it had been before.

---

Graham waited until they were both in the truck, and had started out onto the road home, to ask: "Say, what's your impression of those werewolves, Rachel?"

"Hm? Well, they seem pretty nice, I guess. Onida's a better cook than you are, grandpa."
"Aww, well, guess I can't argue with that."

"I guess it's a little weird two of them used to be male, or..something? But it's less weird than you, so that's not really a complaint either. I've also never met a 'streamer' in person before...they honestly seemed more normal than I expected, if I'm being honest."

"Even for being part-wolf and all that?"
"Yeah, definitely.

"Hey, no need to beat around the bush, though. You and Damon..like each other, don't you?"
"Well." Graham blushed furiously for a second or two. "Sure. You could say that. It's part of why I wanted to give you a chance to properly meet all of 'em."

"Yeah, it's not that hard to tell. Your face lights up whenever you talk about them, but especially her. Honestly, I don't think there's anything wrong with you living your own life now that you're young again, whether I like the people involved or not."

"But.."
"But I don't dislike them, sure. Anyone you're that fond of can't be too bad anyway."

"Awwh, Rachel..."

---

Riana was walking down the hospital hallway, and stopped. An old man's breath was frail and wheezing, audible through the door. Looking around briefly and not finding anyone, she carefully prodded the door open and sneaked inside to take a look. He looked, maybe, even worse than he sounded. So, she quietly whispered a 'prayer' to Zotha, gesturing his way, and after a moment his breathing slowly but surely normalized, becoming calm and quiet.

When she made her way back out the door, someone was suddenly standing there, maybe two inches from her face. "Waah!" She jumped back a bit, flailing her arms. "Personal space!!!"

This person was dressed like a hospital orderly or nurse or something, but it seemed like she'd been waiting for Riana to come outside. On second glance, she had...cat ears and a tail? Not that that was impossible, but it wasn't typical for people in...

Actually, come to think of it, this person hadn't been here when this had happened. Because this..was something that had already happened. Wasn't it? This was getting a little bit confusing.

The strange woman seemed to deliberately wait just long enough for this confusion to set in before saying, "What was the point? He'll just get sicker again and die anyway."

"Th..what?!" she demanded. It was less that this question confused her, and more that the implications it carried outraged her.

"His ailment was his own fault. He chose to smoke, again and again, day after day, for every single year of his life since age thirteen."

"Wh..so what?!" Okay, now she was mad. "So he deserves to suffer and die from that?!"

The stranger crossed her arms. "People reap what they sow. It is a natural fact of life."

"Oh, yeah? And who says it has to be that way?

"Listen, you—you!" She advanced on the cat-eared woman. "Whoever you think you are! If you ask me, one more day to live, for anyone, is worth fighting for! Who cares if it's 'their own fault'? If they 'deserve it'?! People can change. Especially if—if they realize what they've been doing wrong has hurt people, or—or just how much has been done to help them!"

She stood her ground throughout this, regarding Riana stoically—maybe even haughtily. "Most people never change."

"Maybe that's because nobody tries to help them," she spat back.

"You..."

The strange woman gave a defeated-sounding sigh. "You'll learn the hard way, I suppose."
"What's that supposed to mean?!"

She just shook her head. And then Riana woke up, suddenly sitting up in her bed. She looked around for a moment, disoriented, and eventually her vision settled on the clock. It was around 2 AM; the whole strange experience had been some kind of dream. Weird...

Not giving it too much further thought, she lay back down and tried to go back to sleep. Tomorrow was going to be another busy day.

---

"I see..." Stella nodded slowly. The two Kitsune were looking at her expectantly while she tapped an index finger on her cheek a few times.

"You seriously buy this?" Thomas asked. "I mean—there's not like, some other way Kitsune can 'earn tails' or whatever?"

"There are, but nowhere near as efficient," the celestial explained. "A sufficiently impressive prank demonstrates all of the traits for which tails are rewarded at once: Cleverness and wit, magical power, wisdom, a good sense of humor, and most of all..." She trailed off for a second, seeming to think of something, before finishing her sentence: "...audacity."

"You have an idea? Please tell me you've got something good," Steph said.
"Weeeeelll. I don't know whether it's good, exactly."
"That's even better! Just tell us," he pressed.

"Okay. So..in my time since becoming a student here, I've noticed two particular buildings on campus, situated just next to each other. Hmm..." She took a moment to get out her phone, and eventually navigate it to a map of the college's campus, then turned it the two fox-people's way, pointing. "These two. The English department uses this one, while that one's used by chemistry. Their layouts are quite different from each other, let alone the contents of the rooms themselves."
"Well, yeah, obviously," Steph said.
"And yet...their exteriors are quite similar. The main differences are just the name carved into the top at the front entrance, and on some of the other side-doors."

"So...what...you think we should try swapping the names?"

Stella put her phone back in her purse. "That would hardly be very audacious, would it? Most students and faculty walk into the correct building without even glancing at the name, especially this late into the semester."

Andrew said, "So then what—waaaaiiiit."
"Stella." Thomas interjected. "Are you suggesting that they should somehow swap two entire buildings?"

"Well, I wouldn't say 'they'. It would require quite a bit of physical strength to achieve a feat like that. Or else, the capability to move the earth itself?"

"You want me to do this."
"Part of it? It would hardly be 'their' prank if you alone did all the work."

Steph put out a hand. "Hoooold up. There are a lot of practical considerations when it comes to moving entire buildings, Stella! Like—the water, gas, electricity—all hooked up, underground. Not to mention that the physical action of moving a chem building involves uh, possibly shaking around some containers of very dangerous chemicals!"
"I did say that I wasn't certain it was a good idea. Practical considerations such as that occurred to me, but not how to solve them. If we were to attempt this, then I trust things like that would be the clever foxes' task to sort out."

"Ugh, yeah, I guess that's fair. What do you think, Andrew?"

"Um..I don't know about actually doing it, but we could like..scout around? Try and figure out where everything is that we need to worry about. If it looks totally impossible, we can just back out and try something else. Like—the moment of commitment is just when we start actually doing things, right? Snooping around won't actually disturb anything. But, also..would you, really be okay with helping us, Thomas? I don't think the whole thing would work if you're not willing, and uh, I totally understand if you're not."

The dragon-girl crossed her arms. "Hmmh." Looking between everyone's faces, it was Stella's rather eager, expectant expression that won her over. "Look. If you want my help with this crazy idea, then I do have conditions. I need to know exactly what the plan is, to the slightest detail, and you have to convince me that we're not gonna risk hurting anyone, or actually destroying anything valuable or important...or dangerous."

"But, if we meet all those conditions?" Steph said.

"Then...hm. I really feel like I should still ask for some kind of payment." Thomas shook her head. "No, sorry, that's probably just—stupid dragon instincts talking. We're friends, and you have a curse you want rid of. You just meet those conditions, and I'll do it."

---

Bastet appeared in two more dreams—two of 'her people', both only recently taken out from under the veil and awakened. She entered as soon as they fell asleep, placing the guest in a hastily-constructed room with her sitting on the other side.

To each, she said: "Ask. If you could wish for anything, and it must be selfish, what would you want the most?"

A Neko more than three-quarters of the way to being able to grant her own wishes, with white hair and bright purple eyes, said: "For myself, eh? I don't suppose you could bring back the dead? My wife and kids, say.."
Bastet shook her head. "Death is something not even the gods can undo. I'm sorry."
"Aw, that's all right. In that case, I'd wish for a long and happy life for the one family member I've got left. My granddaughter's a good kid, she's worked hard, and I think she deserves it. But...I suppose that isn't very 'selfish', eh?"

"Not really. But more so than 'world peace', or some vapid nonsense like that."
"Let's see..drat, next best thing I can think of is for Damon's condition to get better—it seems like she's still in a bit of pain, after all. You want to get really petty, I could ask for...more money?"

Bastet sighed. "It's all right. Your first two answers are good enough."

That woman's granddaughter, another Neko, said: "Uhhm...is it really okay for me to wish for something else? I mean, Lady Zotha already granted the wish I did have, and then gave me even more after that!"

Bastet glared. "I am not Zotha."
"I-I just don't wanna be greedy," she said nervously, putting up her hands apologetically.

"I'm not saying I'll grant this wish, either. I just want to know what it would be."

"Oh! Um. I-in that case. I'd love to meet someone who makes me as happy as grandpa is with Damon..heheh."

Her expression softened considerably. "I see. Perhaps you will, someday."

---

You might wonder: "Why 'death' for this particular entry?" Well, my reference for what the various tarot things are supposed to mean says that death can indicate things like "mortality", "letting go of attachments", and "profound change".

A Summoning, Part XLII

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---

Part XLII
~Hierophant~

After 'guest starring' in their stream the night before, Graham showed up around mid-afternoon on Friday to hang out yet again. Damon was starting to learn the particular sound of the catgirl's truck pulling into the driveway, and when she heard that this time, she jumped up and bolted down the stairs toward the front door before really thinking about what she was doing!

"Uhm..." While catching her breath from that sprint, the werewolf took a moment to try and brush her hair with her hands and make it at least somewhat neater. Maybe she was feeling a little overexcited because she'd needed to really control her reactions around 'Smores' last night—since, at least for now, she'd much rather people watching their stream see 'new friends' and not..anything else. Either way, she waited awkwardly a polite few feet away from the front door until she heard some soft steps coming up to it, and further kept herself from moving until she heard the usual, polite knock. Then she ran up to open it.

"Uh, hi! Welcome. It's, good to see you again," she said, moving out of the way.

Graham returned the most adorable, sweetest smile as she came inside. "Likewise."
"S-so um, anything specific you wanna try today?" the werewolf asked, starting to lead the way toward the stairs.
"Not really, just—maybe not anything as dark and spooky as last night's fare."

"Oh, uh, sure.."

"First, though—you think we could talk sorta seriously for a minute?"
Damon felt like her heart had briefly stopped. "Um..yeah, s-sure." At least her feet did. She turned around. "What about?"

"Oh—nothing that awful, I promise," the Neko said, returning a concerned expression. Damon's fears must have shown in her face—or maybe just her ears. Graham gestured toward the couch, which they'd managed to stop just next to, and went to sit down, so the wolf-girl did the same, sitting on the opposite end.

"S-so, uhm.." the werewolf stammered after an awkward silence that felt a few minutes long, but which had probably only lasted a few seconds.

"Oh, excuse my nerves there," Graham said, nodding. "It's just: So that I don't get the wrong impression, I'd like to ask you directly. Do you...like me?" she asked, tilting her head slightly. "You know how I mean?"
"Oh! Um..uh.." Damon's face went all hot, and she felt like the 'cat had her tongue' for a moment. Graham patiently waited for her to calm down enough to respond. "Yes! I-I do. I hope that's not, I mean like.."
"No, that's no sort of problem," the catgirl said, her face reddening a little bit too—and gaining a heart-melting smile. "I'd go so far as to say I feel the same way. And, considering I was married for decades..I feel like I might be somewhat of an authority on what it ought to feel like. But.."

"'But'?" Did she have reservations about..the person she'd been married to before, or something like that? It was hard for Damon to reconcile the small, young-looking girl in front of her with the idea of someone like her parents or grandparents, old enough to have been married to someone for 'decades'. But it had to be even weirder, after all that time together with someone, to feel this way about someone else!
"It just, seems like you're awful shy about physical contact, is all. I'm not one to disrespect your boundaries, but..if you're worried about me, well, there's no reason to be shy at this point."
"Oh. Um.." That was an entirely different problem! Damon put her hands into each other and fidgeted with them, trying for a good long moment to find the right words. Graham was once again patient with her, until she finally started trying to explain: "W-well, it's not..that's not it, really. I-I'm just worried I might...

"I-I told you before about how, when I first got turned into a werewolf, and Zotha helped me...but. Even after that, I-I've still never completely felt like...myself. I, still don't have all of my memory back from before that happened, and...my instincts, this 'wolf side' I gained...I'm still not totally, 'at peace' with it, I guess. I still, find myself like, doing or thinking, o-or saying weird things sometimes..scary things. A-and I can't actually even talk in 'full-wolf' form. S-so I'm worried, if I did get too close...that I'd, hurt you."

Graham paused a moment to take all of this in, then nodded slowly. "I see...
"I suppose, since turning into a Neko, I've had a few bits of 'feline instinct' hit me. Like wanting to hop up onto high places, or chase small critters that go running into the bushes, or hide for no real reason. Or chase laser pointers around."
"R-really?"
"Nawh, I'm just kidding about that last one. But I can't say it's been anything worrisome like that. So—I only know a little of what you're going through. I'm glad to have things out in the open regardless, and, if you're keeping some distance out of concern for me, that only makes me feel better. But...have those instincts of yours ever given you the idea that they want to hurt me?"
"Um..n-no, I guess not." Now that she was thinking about it...maybe, kind of the opposite? Had it been her 'human side' or the canine one that made her run to the door earlier? And, the strong desire to pet the catgirl's ears...or feel her hands on her own ears, definitely wasn't something that 'human side' would've ever thought up.

"Hmm..."

Graham's face reddened slightly, and she leaned a little bit toward Damon—still seeming to consciously stay just out of her personal space. "Would you mind..if I gave your ears a little touch, just to try? You can maybe...let me know if your 'wolf side' isn't too fond of that."
Damon's blushing and heart-racing from before came back full force. "Um!"
The catgirl backed off just slightly. "Oh, not if you don't want that at all, of course. I've got no interest in pushing at your boundaries."

"N-no no, that's not..I just um..heheh...I-I was just thinking, about something like that...is all," she admitted. "I-I guess it's okay to try..."

"Well, all right then."

The white-haired Neko scooted herself closer, into easier reach. Then she gently leaned over in Damon's direction again, and ever-so-slowly put one out her left hand to touch Damon's right ear, not far from the tip. "A~ah...r-rfh.." Damon leaned into the slight touch, feeling a couple of small, high sounds come out of her mouth. Seeming to take this as a good sign, Graham carefully moved her fingers a little closer to the base of that ear, then brushed along it—at the same time bringing up her other hand to do much the same to the other ear. "M-mrrfh...!"

It felt..really nice! Damon didn't have the feeling that her wolf side was angry, or upset, or afraid. It was a lot more like how she felt around Onida and Sam—her own 'pack'—yet also markedly different from that. That difference probably had something to do with her mounting urge to...to...!

Before she'd really thought about it, the werewolf's instincts took over a little more, and had her actually pounce on top of the catgirl, knocking her over onto her back across the seat of the couch. But this..wasn't an 'attacking' kind of pounce, like for self-defense or hunting. Regardless, she was suddenly on top of Graham with her tail wagging up in the air, and very much aware of the catgirl's breasts being squished underneath her own!

"H-heheh!" Graham giggled at this. "Whoa, easy there, girl!"

"Uh, um.." Blushing furiously, Damon tried to get a hold of herself, using one hand to push herself up off of the other girl a little bit and trying to make her tail settle down some. "S-sorry about, that.."
"No trouble at all. We did rile up your 'wolf side' doing that, I suppose," the catgirl said, still smiling. "Anyway, I don't mind this position so much." It was at this point that Damon noticed a pair of slim arms had gently wrapped themselves around her waist..! "Especially if you wouldn't mind, returning the favor a bit?" she asked further, her ears lowering slightly.

"R-returning..? Oh, um..r-rrfh..." It took Damon's mind a moment to understand the meaning, but something unconscious, perhaps in her instincts, understood more from the Neko's expression than her words what was being asked. She fell back onto the catgirl, and her hands wound up running through the soft, warm fur of Graham's ears, quickly causing an adorable, deep purring to start rumbling through her throat, and then—all of a sudden she leaned up and pressed her nose into Damon's cheek, nuzzling it affectionately!

"Aa~ah...rrfh..!" Well, that was it. Damon couldn't resist returning the nuzzling, especially as the catgirl's hands slid back up to her ears to pet them back a little more, too. Her conscious mind didn't really function for a while, subsumed into a pleasant haze alongside her instincts as the majority of her concentration was seized by pure physical sensations: The catgirl's body under hers, their faces rubbing against each other in affectionate nuzzling, and of course the petting on both ends. Besides that, there was..her entire body feeling fairly warm, her heart racing, and a nice, not-entirely-unfamiliar fuzzy feeling down between her legs.

It was Graham who evidently had the self-control to cease the petting, returning her arms to the gentle embrace from earlier. And, when she also stopped nuzzling, Damon slowly came out of the haze, taking in a sharp gasp of air and letting out soft "M-mnn~ngh" before she started some actual canine-like panting. Their noses were still on each other's cheeks, so this breath was pushing right across the side of the Neko's face, and there were frequent bursts of hot air coming across Damon's face too.

"Hff...phew~..awfully nice to finally get that out of my system," the catgirl said. "Seems like you enjoyed yourself too, hmn?"
"Y-yip!" This question had been accompanied by the touch of something soft and warm somewhere near the base of Damon's tail, which she realized shortly afterward had been one of the tips of the other girl's tail. "U-um..y-yeah. Still, uh..." She carefully pushed herself off of the catgirl again, so they could look each other in the face...or, at least, the eyes. Their noses were still quite close to touching like this. "I-I uh..'m a little worried about..."
"Hmn? Taking it too far or such?"
"Y-yeah. That could—hff!—could get um. Violent. I feel like," she admitted.
"Well, sure. Besides that this is our first time making this kind of physical contact in the first place," Graham agreed, one arm freeing itself from the werewolf's waist so that hand could gently brush Damon's cheek a bit. "No need to rush things."
"Uh. Y-yeah! Um." Even though that touch made her want to lean back down and forcibly start the petting up again, Damon clamped down—promising that kind of thing would come later...maybe much later...and made herself slowly, carefully, get up off of her 'victim' until she was upright on her knees.

Graham managed to scoot herself the rest of the way out from under Damon and sit up too. "I'll say..now that we've cleared the air, so to speak. I've more or less met your family, but you all should really get properly introduced to mine."
"Um..y-yeah? You mean like, your granddaughter?"
"Just the same," she said, nodding. "Maybe the two of us could come over for dinner some night soon? We could arrange things over the phone later."
"Yeah! Sure, th-that seems fine," she nodded. Onida...would probably like to have a guest to feed. She liked showing off with her cooking, especially lately. Perhaps the extra enthusiasm was because she was 'younger' and more energetic now, or perhaps it had something to do with trying to impress Sam—but her general desire to be a good host felt like a pretty firm bit of memory.

They went upstairs after that to play some games. Only now, Graham wasn't the least bit shy about sitting right up next to Damon, and after asking permission, resting her split-ended tail across the wolf-girl's own. The Neko seemed to especially like pressing the spot right where her tail split up against the base of Damon's fluffier tail, and having the two parts that forked out from there curl along the rest of it. The one odd thing the werewolf noticed about this habit was that, every once in a while, that split spot seemed to slip off somehow, and when it was readjusted to press into her tail again, the two bits coming off from there seemed to reach a little farther up the rest of her tail...

---

Zotha probably should've predicted she'd wake up with catlike ears, a slim tail, and some tall slits for irises. She did correctly predict that Jess wasn't very happy to not be invited to last night's conversation.

"Well, she didn't want you present, and we'll just have to respect that. At the end, said she was 'very disappointed' in you. But honestly, it feels more like she was concerned about how angry being close to you would make her feel, and how strongly that would tempt her to actually hurt you."

"I...guess I deserve that," Jess admitted. "Just because I'm trying to do better now, doesn't mean the wrong I did didn't happen."

"I think she might forgive you, given some time. I don't know of any 'mother' that wouldn't."

"Um..maybe. Anyway, what was she like?"

Zotha gave Jess a quick mental transmission of most of the experience of the meeting, commenting aloud at the same time: "I'd say, if anything, Bastet seems like the most 'normal', down-to-earth deity we've met so far. And I just realized: There was no 'power pressure' at all from being in her presence like there was around the other gods. Despite the fact that she must be pretty powerful."

Jess nodded slowly. "Maybe...if all dreams are her realm, then you might just be 'acclimated' to what being in her realm is like already? Or, since she has full control over a person's experiences in a dream, she could just 'edit' that part out."

"Could be. I'm a fan of thinking she suppresses that power deliberately to make it feel more welcoming, myself."

"..It's strange, though, Master."
"What is?"
"If she's so straightforward, why did all the other gods give conflicting information about her? Or, just seem to fail to understand what she really wants or why?"

"Hmm...she might've gone out of her way to be direct with me, but that doesn't seem right. She wouldn't want the headache of other people misunderstanding her—that's much more Fox's attitude."

After a brief pause, Zotha snapped her fingers. "Oh, wait! I think I know."
"What?"
"Mystery. It can mean a lot of things, but different people's perspectives muddling what would otherwise be a simple description seems to fit the bill pretty well. It might even be inherently difficult to accurately describe her to someone who hasn't met her."

"...Maybe. But it could also just be coincidence. La Lune can't talk about the debt; Sol genuinely doesn't listen to her all that closely; Fox was never gonna tell us much in the first place."

"That's true, but I'd say..'coincidences' can also be influenced by a god's domain. Just like...'miracles'. It's increasingly obvious to me that we're not just 'really powerful magic-using immortals' or such—we have some kind of direct tie to the nature of reality itself, especially when it comes to our own 'aspects'. We can't intentionally alter it on a large scale—I think—but the tie goes both ways, too."

"Meaning.."
"Our own aspects 'influence' us and our reality to some extent, more or less involuntarily. May I remind you how many of your followers just so happened to want some kind of change, and even specifically physical change?"
"You...might be onto something there. But, in that case, that effect would have to reach into the past too..or, somehow 'anticipate' a god coming into existence in the future...?"

"La Lune did say 'the world wanted me', and that my ascension was somehow 'natural'..."

---

After school Monday, Anika was trying to get her homework done. Steph, meanwhile, was very distractingly pacing around the room. She kept trying to focus, but even shifting her ears into a human form to make her headphones fit wasn't good enough after a while. She took them off and put them on the desk a little loudly, letting the huge fox ears pop back out at the same time. "What are you doing!? Besides driving me crazy!"

"Huh? Oh. Sorry. I was trying to think of another big prank. Hopefully to get done this week, or at least before summer vacation."
"Another one? We just did the whole rain thing."

"Yes, another one! We need to keep going until you earn your next tail, at least! I mean, I'd like to wear a wedding dress this century, if you don't mind!" she said.
"Oh. Uh.." Anika's face flushed at this declaration, and Steph actually looked away a little bit bashfully, blushing at having blurted that out too.
"Y-yeah. So. I'm pretty invested. Just both of us 'pretending to be male' is not gonna cut it for a fifth tail, okay?"
"I'll, assume you know what you're talking about with that. But—I still kinda need to get this homework done," she said, gesturing at the computer, "tonight."
"Then help me brainstorm! The last one was mostly my idea anyway."

"Uh, I dunno..we cooouuld, go visit some other university and try to get them to change their mascot too?"

Steph frowned, putting her fists on her hips. "That is so unoriginal."
"Yeah...it, didn't sound any better in my head."

After staring at each other for a minute or so, Anika said, "I don't think we're getting anywhere. Maybe we should ask someone else for ideas."
"Like who?"
"I dunno...Stella, maybe? Since she seems pretty cool with how Kitsune are and stuff..."
"Hmm, yeah, she is pretty close to newly created, right? Meaning—she might have the kind of 'stupid ideas' that are actually super original since most people don't even think of them."

"Plus, we might be able to lean on her to get Toma to help!"

"I dunno..she seems like kind of a stick-in-the-mud to me," Steph said, crossing her arms.

Anika squinted slightly, tilting her head. "Are you.."
"What?"
"Waaas that an intentional pun, or...?"
"Pun? What pun?"
Anika made a vague, unhelpful gesture with her hands. "Because she's like uh...an earth dragon, or something?"
"Ooooh. No. Not intended at all."

"Okay, sorry. Anyway—

"I happen to know, from some of our 'high council' meetings, that Toma's pretty familiar with Zotha. Definitely aware she's a goddess and all."
"Like I couldn't guess that. Not very many other sources of overwhelming power to hatch a human into a dragon around here."
"Yes, but. That also means she'd get it if we explained..you know, why we're trying to do it? The fact that I'm cursed and need to earn a tail to get uncursed, I mean."

"Oooh, yeah. I can maybe see that. And—no need to mention what the curse is, just that it's super inconvenient for both of us. You're hiding the symptoms with illusions, but we promise it's very annoying."
"Yeah, exactly!"
"Okay. Now we're getting somewhere. At least...on a meta level. Plans for how to get plans for another big prank! We could probably pull in that other girl at some point, if it seems like there's a use for her...she'll definitely appreciate another opportunity to earn a tail, after all..." Steph was literally rubbing her hands together at this point.

"Aaaanyway..I need to get back to my homework, now that that's settled. You not have any?"
"Uh..right. I kinda do. Thanks for the reminder."

---

In some ways, the Ruler of Foxes was still a mortal. For example, any being of sufficient power—such as a true god—could indeed kill her. Unlike the theoretical killing of a deity, this would have no effect on the stability of the world so long as at least one "worthy" successor still existed. Just once, a very long time ago, a nine-tailed fox greedy for the position had managed to assassinate the then-current Ruler, and immediately suffered an excruciatingly painful death as a result of a "stinger clause" hidden in their race's agreement. Since then, the Ruler's true location was much more closely guarded; after all, the gods had no reason to bother with violence when there were far easier ways for them to dethrone a ruler they didn't like.

She also, sometimes, needed to sleep. And her sleep was "ordinary", featuring no awareness of the real world while unconscious, but instead the experience of a normal dream. Such times were the best opportunity for Bastet to speak with her in private. Not that there was usually a need for such privacy, but the convenience of the Ruler entering her realm, rather than needing to physically go to where the old fox was, made this the best way to meet her for anything that didn't require anyone else's presence.

Bastet stepped into the dream, and found herself on a path between some rice fields. The sun was low in the sky, producing a golden light shimmering across the water, and straight ahead, a short distance down the path, was a fairly humble house. The people who had lived in this place, at this time, would have no concept of what it had become in modern day: A bustling metropolis packed to the brim with people, skyscrapers blocking the view of the sun, hard concrete replacing the soft dirt-and-grass paths. And, perhaps, the people who lived in that city now had little idea of the beauty this place had once sported, a millennium and more into the past.

Walking down the path to the little house, a dark haze became visible pouring out from within. Bastet's catlike ears twitched, picking up muffled voices speaking. She paused at the door, allowing the dream to proceed as usual for a little longer...and then pushed it open, imposing herself into it and making it lucid. The wispy shapes of the house's inhabitants vanished, all except one: A woman lying on her back, turned slightly to one side, on a couch, a long pipe in her mouth which was evidently the source of the dark smoke permeating the house's interior. She was silhouetted by the haze, her eyes appearing to—or perhaps actually—glowing. Her ears were as foxlike as her waking form, but only two tails were waving about from behind her back.

"...Ah. Hello there." The old fox had been shaken a little bit by suddenly remembering all of reality, everything that had happened since the memory this dream represented—but her composure was back in only a couple of seconds. "It's been...quite some time, hasn't it?"

"I guess so."
"Well, you know you're always welcome. Take a seat?" One of the fox-woman's tails pointed at a seat opposite the couch, previously occupied by the memory of a husband.
"Hmm." Bastet went over and sat cross-legged. "Feeling nostalgic?"
"I suppose my subconscious must be." The fox-woman took a long drag from her pipe and exhaled it out, making the smoke around her briefly grow thicker. "I haven't really thought about this time in years. So...to what do I owe the pleasure?" Somehow her mischievous grin was visible, even in silhouette.

"I have a question for you. You will answer with no tricks, guile or jokes. Consider it a test," Bastet said bluntly.
"All right then. I'll do my very best for you~."

"What do you do when one of your people grows bored of this life? Of this world. Of living altogether? If they come to you, begging your help to relinquish the immortality all foxes have."

"Hmm...well, I'm sure you know, no two foxes are alike. There are many answers, depending on who's asking.

"But you won't be surprised to hear: My first go-to is to trick them. 'Very well', I'll say, 'you wish to die? I will make sure it happens by...hmmn, this time next week. It will be a surprise, so make sure to have your affairs in order.'"
"You don't follow through."
"I would never. Could you imagine the uproar, if the Ruler of Foxes started killing her own people—no matter how despondent they are? But often the week isn't even half over before they come back to me begging to call the whole thing off. It's impressive, really, just how valuable one's life becomes when it seems so close to ending. But of course that doesn't always work. If you can work out that I won't kill them, then certainly some of my fellow tricksters will realize when I'm trying to pull one over. If I'm really keen, I can spot the ones that'll see through the lie early, and skip that step to move on to the next thing."

"Which is?"
"It varies, as I said. Sometimes I will offer a 'reset' of sorts..a bout of temporary amnesia combined with sealed powers—or even temporarily 'becoming' an ordinary human or something else for a while. I don't always give away the full details when I do that, but I do always get permission to try it, of course. Or—you know, these days, the option of actual therapy exists. That is genuinely what some foxes need, even if I have to trick them into starting in on it. Or..if it seems the poor kit's just lonely, I can occasionally manage to play matchmaker, arrange things so they meet someone who seems compatible. Ah, and if Eros owes me one, or seems to be in a good mood, then I'll ask him to do that part instead—he's far better at it than I am. None of these options are mutually exclusive, either; for instance, you'd be surprised how often a fresh amnesiac falls for someone he or she would never have considered talking to before."

"Sealing one's power is still dangerous. Weak foxes die far more often than old, powerful ones," Bastet pointed out.

"Oh, of course. I make that part of the risks quite clear when I offer that up as an option. If one is serious about wishing to die, then it can appear to be only a slightly longer route than the obvious one. Some do die before getting their memories back, but it's not always an unhappy death."

She pressed in another direction: "You can't really expect someone bored of life to become happy just because they have found a mate."

"I would just say that the evidence suggests otherwise. At least—if it's the right person. I won't claim to have perfect success with fostering relationships; in fact I have had to step in when a fox was being taken advantage of by the very person I thought would help them. And not even Eros can be perfect...or, at least, his capriciousness may have him mismatch people on purpose from time to time."

"...You have very many immortal psychiatrists on hand? I don't imagine that a human under the veil can really relate to 'I've been young and powerful for far too long'."

"If I'm recommending that sort of help, then that really isn't the main issue in the first place. But you'd be surprised at people's adaptability. Besides, some foxes do like the idea of 'tricking' people into a healthier state of mind; it's especially fun if both parties are pretending to be human for each other. And, if you've been feeling stressed lately, I do know a few people—"

She stopped short, seeing Bastet's expression—or perhaps sensing her mood. The cat goddess had to take a long, deep breath to keep the house, the farm..the entire reality they were presently in from collapsing.

"Please excuse my terrible impertinence with that; my dream just now must have put me in a rather foolish mood. I am still asleep, after all. No, I don't imagine you'd trust someone I recommended. But I do wonder whether it'd do you some good to get to know someone without any stake in..all of this," she said, vaguely waving her pipe around in the air. "Godly politics, world management, the chaos brought on by brand new, powerful beings...it can get to be a bit much from time to time."

"...You really intended to express concern."

"Oh, well, you know. My actions are self-motivated, or at best all for 'my people'. But if you were, hypothetically, in an awful mental state, I can hardly understate the amount of chaos that would have the potential to cause...and none of it the fun kind."

"You suggest I should simply...appear before some mortal, just to talk."

"You hardly have to let them know who you are, do you? For that matter, you've access to many people's dreams. They need not even remember the conversation afterward, if you so desired."

Bastet turned her head away, to one side. At this point she just wanted to extricate herself from the entire conversation. She could just disappear, or force the Ruler to wake, but the possible result would be some teasing later, or worse, an effort to bring the subject up again. But, in trying to think of a solution, she remembered how this conversation had started.

"...Your answer is satisfactory," she said. "And, I'll accept your apology, too."

"Oh? That's quite a relief," the old fox said.

"I'll take my leave now. Do you want this to continue from where it left off?"
"Hmmn, there's no need for that. I'll be happy enough with whatever my brain cooks up for me next."

"Very well." The cat goddess stood up, went back to the door, and left, walking down the path until it led her back out of the dream.