[Story] Once upon a time in Kebre (DMFA-fic)(PG-13)

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

I've enjoyed it so far, despite being busy enough that it takes me a couple of days to get to it...

[Meany]

I added a bit to the front of this chapter before the timeskip portion, have fun with that.



Chapter 10- Things change

   The negotiations with the Mer were completed.  At not unreasonable rates, the lives of the Harridan's lost crew were exchanged for goods and future services.  Domino was there, to watch what had been his men and women come home to their families.  And to bear the hateful glares of those who would not have their loved ones come back.

   Which then meant that the funeral could go ahead.

   Demo took over as Evgenija's chaperone for a day, while Domino attended.  Dressed in black silk, wearing his captain's hat for the first time since waking in the hospital.  No rings.  No scented oil in his fur.  Just his choker.

   There was no religious service for those who died serving the Ti'baltr Trading Company.  Separation of church and industry, and all that.  But the families of the crewmen each got time to stand, and speak about those they had lost.  Sons.  Daughters.  Siblings, and more.  Poor Sebastian had no one to speak for him.  Urd's parents elected not to speak; and what would they have said?

   Urd had gone to the Academy upon manifesting her power as a succubus.  They knew her as a baby, a girl, and a young adult.  Two hundred years in the Academy had let Urd become the woman Domino knew; and that woman was a stranger to her family.  But they mourned all the same the daughter they never got to know as a woman.

   And when all the family had said what piece they wished to say, Domino took the podium.  He looked at the caskets.  Sandalwood, the substance which had built the city and it's empire was their composition.  Nothing but the best for those who died serving king and country.  He looked at the family, some hating him, some numb, some exasperated with the affair.  And then Domino spoke.

   "The Harridan was not a nice ship.  Twice before I became her captain she floated into the harbor with all hands butchered on the deck.  Jinxed, the Company declared.  The threat of assignment to her kept many sailors in line over the years.  But I said to the Company, 'the captains you gave that ship were fools.  Let me have her, and I will give you a fine vessel.'  They did.

   "But none of the crew were assigned to my command.  I went through the ranks, and I asked people to come with me.  Friends, enemies, more than one complete stranger.  Most turned me down, but enough said yes that we were approved.  They had no reason to come onto a cursed ship, serve under a captain not even thirty yet.

   "But they did.  I wish I could say I knew why.  Some whimsy perhaps?  Bravery?  Stupidity?"  Again he looked at the caskets.  He remembered the smiling faces he'd never see again.  The people under his protection that he'd failed.  "No.  None of my people were stupid.  The Harridan wouldn't take them if they were.
   "We were given suicide missions.  Tasks where it was not expected of us to return alive.  But we did.  Every time it came to us, we returned alive.  Success or failure, it mattered not.  We did what no other crew with that cursed ship did; we came home alive.  Until we didn't."

   Domino noticed Urd's coffin.  Near the middle of the group of thirty.  He longed for her to open it up, declare the entire affair to have been a cruel joke at his expense.  But the casket remained still.

   "These men and women are dead.  Some were my friends.  Hate me for their loss, if you wish.  I do."  He stepped down, then.  The caskets were moved to their graves, where they would be given the rare honor of decomposing without being used to feed plants of some sort.  Thirty graves, thirty gravestones, all centered around the figurehead of the Harridan.  Reclaimed from the Mer, the angry effigy stood now as a gargoyle, warding evil spirits away from those who had died serving her.



   "Mon petit," Swoon cooed, stroking the ferret's hair lightly.  "You know I worry when you come to me and ask to go out, while dressed like you came from a funeral."

   "Probably because I came from a funeral, ma belle."  Domino was laid out, his head in Swoon's lap, his hat off to the side in the grass.  Ti'baltr didn't have many parks, but the golf course reserved for the foreign dignitaries worked just as well.  Swoon didn't mind, aside from putting up a barrier to block rogue golfballs.

   "I see.  And you needed comforting for your loss?"  Domino looked up at the Angel.  Swoon was likely hundreds of years old, she had lost people before, but death didn't mean the same things to Angels and Demons the way it did Beings.  She was trying to be considerate without having any empathy for his situation.

   "Perhaps.  Perhaps I wanted to use the free time away from my new shadow to spend time with you, ma belle."  He smiled at her, and she returned it.  "It has been a long time since we had time together, no?"

   "For different definitions of 'together'," the cat said, coy.  "To me, it as the blink of an eye mon petit."  Swoon booped the ferret on the nose, chuckling a bit.

   "So lovely to see you longed for me as I did you, Swoon."  Domino rubbed his nose.  "And stop doing that, your fur glitter gets in my nose."  Swoon frowned sharply, displeased that her gesture of affection was rebufffed.

   "Domino Ti'balt.  Two years ago, I asked you to give me your heart."  The cat's tone was miffed, and she rested her hand over the ferret's chest.  Domino tried not to notice the way her fingers curled, or her claws extended.  Like she was about to physically yank out his heart.  "And you said 'no, I cannot give it to you, for it belongs to my ship.'  You come to me now, you say sweet words like that time not long ago, but also these small cruelties.  Which is it, mon petit?"

   Apparently the time had come to tell Swoon.  "My ship is sunk," Domino said bluntly.  "My crew is scattered or dead.  My heart is mine again, and if you would take it...?"  The claws retracted.  The fingers relaxed to rest easily on the ferret's chest.

   "You grieve," the miffed tone of earlier had become smooth and consoling.  "You ask for me to take your heart; not because you love me but to release you from your pain?"  Domino narrowed his eyes sharply, not pleased that the larger portion of his motives was revealed.

   "You know I love you.  Or you would not even entertain me in this."  The hand on his chest moved to scratch under his chin, the touch bearing the hint of claws extending again.  Still, it felt nice.

   "I know.  But for me to take your heart, you must love me for ever and always."  Her smile turned sad.  "And you don't."

   "Give me time, ma belle.  Give me time to remember what it was like those years ago.  My heart will be yours."  He hadn't seriously considered the chance of her turning him down.  She had been so in love with him two years ago, and she seemed to remember it so well, he had thought her desire to go back to that would....  But it hadn't.

   "Time you ask, and time I grant.  I have nothing but time, mon petit."  A light of mischief filled the cat's pink eyes as a golfball pinged off her barrier.  "You can start by reminding me of our first meeting, if you wish?"  Domino sat up, determined, and retrieved his hat.  He adjusted the feather to make sure it wasn't bent, and put it on, twisting to ensure it wouldn't go flying off in the wind.

   She'd liked that he had left the hat on, that night.

   "Hey, have you guys seen a ball around here- oh my god!"  And there was the audience.  Just like last time.



   The seasons changed.  The world went on spinning.  People lived their lives, happy and sad.  Mostly sad.  And miserable.  And dark.

   Hyden found he was really bad at Gothic poetry.  Which would make the time his 'social groups' class focused on the Goth subculture all the more annoying.  Three years had done the ram good; his growth spurts had given him a respectable height, three years of dealing with Tyrone had given him some definition in his muscles, and he was now old enough to wear a Creature-Being amulet.  A gazelle skull of carved onyx clipped to his belt over his left hip.  His wings being forced inward let him delve into a new world of fashion.  Mostly stuff Evgenija wouldn't approve of; such as sleeveless vests and no shirt.

   The exposed fur on his arms and chest helped the ram deal with the heat, even with regular shearing a sheep was just not meant for tropical climes.  More than one of his fellow Demons had tried to take advantage of that by hurling a fireball at him.  It didn't end well for them.

   Which was the reason he was currently serving an in-school suspension, sitting in a cubicle doing homework without the context of a lesson to help with the material.  Several cubicles away was another Demon teen, Vodys Landgrab, his Dalmatian fur marred with a fading scorch mark covering his shoulder and entire right arm.

   Hyden had long ago resigned himself to the fact that because he was from the subarctic, everyone expected him to know nothing of fire magic.  Fire magic taught to ever magical child in Vecenstein because in a region of freezing cold, warmth from so much as a matchstick spell could save lives.

   What was vexing about it was that Nanbi, one of the three founders of Ti'baltr, had been an ice mage, so they ought to have recognized the inversion of climate and magic focus.  But they never did.  And so they got their fireballs reflected back at them.  And set half the library on fire, but that was more accidental damage on their part.  Fortunately the books were fireproof, the shelves not so much.

   Hyden was halfway through his economics homework when the bell for the end of the school day rang.  Packing up in no time because he kept his books and papers organized; he was already leaving by the time Vodys finished standing up.

   The secondary school was farther away from home than the primary school had been; so far that many of the winged students elected to fly home in great flocks of bat-winged figures.  Part of the reason Hyden didn't was his wings never developed beyond where they had been three years ago.  Still too thin and weak to fly, and with his new weight, barely able to glide.

   What was more concerning was that his horns still hadn't even started growing.  More than one specialist doctor had been asked about it, with no answer in sight.

   It didn't affect his day to day living however, aside from a bit of minor teasing from Tyrone.

   "Riii-cola!"  Speaking of whom.  Hyden, on his way out of  the school building, stopped walking and immediately took a step back.  Seconds later, a red dog Demon crashed into the dirt butt-first, gouging a small trough as momentum carried them forward.  Had Hyden continued walking, the dog would have hit him with that dive tackle from the second floor balcony.

   "You forgot to add the feather fall spell, Tyrone," Hyden said, smiling as the red dog rolled about, bemoaning his poor tuckus' impact.  "The battle cry didn't help either."

   "But it wasn't my battle cry," the beefy dog Demon whined piteously.  Hyden's smile faded seconds before a weighty figure struck him from above and behind, driving the ram into the grass and dirt, gouging a small trough with his face.

   "Woo," declared Renet, throwing her arms victoriously as the ram coughed up grass.  "Stuck the landing, I win!"  The years had been great to the cow as well.  A rigorous physical routine had given her muscles to match her natural heftiness, her hair pulled back in a thin braid, and her usual tomboyish clothes consisting of denim pants, a red shirt and denim jacket.  She really liked denim.

   "What," the ram coughed, "insane game are you two playing now?"  He tried to wriggle out from under the cow, but she was too weighty, and he too wedged into the dir.  "Augh, my spine."

   "A contest to see who'd get to lecture you on starting a fire in school."  Renet was far too cheery, as she stood up off Hyden, before grabbing him by his shoulders and yanking him out of the ground.  "I won, so I get to do it, yay!"

   Her cheer turned into monstrous rage as she shook the ram about, shouting about the dangers of reflecting spells on people less skilled than himself, of retaliating at all in a school environment when he was an adult and expected to act like it, and damaging his academic record with such stunts.

   "Psst," Tyrone hissed from the ground.  When Hyden turned to look at him, the dog gave him double thumbs-up and an excited grin.  "Was awesome to watch."  Hyden smiled back.  Demons knew how to appreciate awesome displays of power, at least.

   "-and.... Are you even listening to me?!"  The cow cuffed Hyden in the back of his head.  "If you keep acting like this, they'll kick you out of school, you know."

   "I can't just let them get away with picking a fight," Hyden said imploringly, turning on his 'doe eyes'.  "I'd get eaten alive... metaphorically."

   "I'm okay with that.  But not with escalating it to setting half the library on fire!"  She cuffed him again to punctuate the statement.  "You're lucky the school's insurance is covering it, or they'd be making you pay the difference too."  The cow set the ever so slightly shorter Demon on his feet, still glowering.

   "She's just mad because you burned up her essay on Arazi Taun, and the teacher didn't buy her excuse," Tyrone chided, sticking his tongue out at the cow.  She turned her glower on maximum at the dog, but he just kept cheekily smiling.

   "That... is totaly unrelated."  Her poker face was awful.  "Was a really good essay, too.  I got some good sources."  The dog hopped up to his feet, as if he hadn't been in near-agonizing pain seconds ago.  "I have to do it all over again, now.  And by the end of the week!"

   "I'm sorry about your essay," Hyden said honestly, pulling grass out of his chest fur.  "But Vodys' fireball would have burned it up even if I didn't reflect it at him."  The cow nodded, glumly.

   "Such sad faces."  Tyrone moved to grab the cow and ram in a double headlock, and bring their faces to his.  "But I know something to turn those frowns upside down."  He sing-songed the words, making Hyden assume his mother had sent him some of her special home cooking.  "My mom sent over the surplus from her crayfish boil, almost an entire boiler's worth!"  That got the cow smiling; she always got excited for home cooking.  "And since Hyden's parran is still off adventuring, he can stay the night with us, and we can help you get your essay done licketysplit!"

   "But I need to let Swoon know I'm going, and your phone's disconnected," Hyden objected.  He didn't want to miss out on crayfish, especially not an entire boiler of crayfish.  But he also didn't want an angry Angel breaking down his friend's door in the middle of the night assuming someone had kidnapped him.  Again.

   "What happened to your mana phone?"  The dog arched a brow, but his look turned understanding after Hyden retrieved the piece of charred metal that had been his phone.  "Whoa, that thing looks like a piece of charcoal.  The fireball did that?"

   "The principal did that after he saw the fire."  Renet, sighing at the situation handed over her cow-patterned phone to the ram to use.  "Oh, thanks.  ...Are these ducklings as your background?"

   "What's that?"  The cow politely queried, her tone cheery once again.  "Go up to the balcony and jump on you again?  Righto!"

   Hours later, as the sun was beginning to set, the two Demons and one Being had gathered in the apartment shared by Renet and Tyrone to finish homework, and consume unhealthy amounts of crayfish.  In Ti'baltr, the age of adulthood was sixteen, and Tyrone's family had been so large he'd been forced out almost right away.  Fortunately he and Renet had managed to pool their student grants and athletic scholarships to share an apartment.

   Evgenija never approved of Hyden spending time in the apartment, saying 'it was indecent that a young man and a young woman share a living space and be unmarried.'  Hyden didn't care, and if Renet and Tyrone were romantically involved, he couldn't tell.  They wanted to be his friends, and he wanted the same for them.

   "Ugh," the cow said, sitting on the living room floor on her stomach with a cushion under her chest as she scribbled at a notebook for her essay.  "Who was the tribal chief that challenged Arazi in twelve eighty-eight?  Chakoo?  Chakaa?"

   "One sec, I'll check."  Hyden was seated on the loveseat under the window in the living room, with the backpacks of the three students piled next to him.  He set aside his own mathematics homework to rummage in Renet's denim backpack for the history book.  Finding it, and flipping it open to a bookmarked page, the ram read off, "Shekua, and she lost badly."

   "Oh right, her.  Thanks Hyden."  The ram put the book back, and returned to his math homework.  "Tyrone still in a food coma?"  Sure enough, the red dog was laid out in the kitchen, mouth agape and tongue lolling out, his expression frozen in the blissful belch he had given out before going unconscious.

   "Yep.  We going to mark on his face or something?"  Gods danged word problems.  Hyden hated them, how they used Language to try and convey Math, so he put off that problem until later.

   "After I finish this paragraph, I'm in the zone right now."



   Ninjas.  It had to be ninjas.

   Standing in the rafters of a stone castle, the darkest corner with the best view, Evgenija watched the scene below.  Far, far below was the well lit, well populated, well enjoyed reception of a wedding that had occurred earlier that day.  

   In the ceiling above, where the servants would tend to the chandelier and keep the tiles perfectly shined, ninjas walked.  Their figures were blurred by magic; cheap knockoff versions of invisibility spells, but Evgenija knew they were ninjas.

   The way they walked, the dark blue eastern-style clothes, steel plates protecting their foreheads, and ninjatos strapped to their backs.  They easily dodged the servants patrolling the walkways, making no sound as they travelled.  If Evgenija had not known to watch for them, she would perhaps have missed them.  Maybe.  Possibly.  This led her to think they were journeymen ninjas.

   With the confirmation of ninja involvement, the only thing left to do was confirm who they were going after.  Spreading her wings, the vulture woman glided through the air like a specter of death, flitting between rafters, keeping up with the ninjas below her.

   Would it be the bride?  The groom?  The priest?  The other members of her adventuring party, scattered among the attendees below, had a wager going on between them on who it was; Evgenija did not partake of such frivolity.

   The ninjas stopped at a segment of the paths over the table the newlyweds were seated at.  And Evgenija, above them.  In her left hand a tomahawk, in her left a fistful of throwing knives.  Once she knew whom the target was, the ninjas would be destroyed.  And after that, their master.

   The problem with using ninjas in Ti'baltr; they were exotic.  They were expensive.  Thus the list of people who could afford them was small, and while they wouldn't give up secrets while alive, they left context clues on whom employed them.

   One of the ninjas, a small figure, perhaps a hare, produced a reed tube and took aim at... the father of the groom.  Unexpected.  The little ninja never got the chance to fire his blowdart, as Evgenija swooped down, digging her tomahawk into his neck.  Before the blood could explode out, the figure vanished in a puff of smoke, leaving an empty uniform hanging over the railing.  The other two ninjas lept surprisingly far to the sides, soon joined by their companion.

   To them, Evgenija expected she looked alarming.  In the three years she'd been among the madfolk of Ti'baltr her hair had grown to a long braid, her fashion had stabilized in a medium between the tight corseted Kebrian and the billowing Ti'baltic, and her skill with weapons regained.

   Fanning her wings out, she took to the air, swooping down on the ninja's position with another swing of her tomahawk, and again they scattered.  Steel glinted in the air, kunai knives flying to strike her flank but were deflected by her armored wing.  Cubi wings were remarkably tough.

   Their battle was a dance of flips and thrown knives, of swords and axes clashing to produce sparks of light, and each time she came close to dealing a death blow, the ninjas escaped with their substitution technique.  Their blurring technique making it all the harder to hit them.

   But Evgenija knew it was a matter of time until she won, due to an unfortunate weakness in the ninja's attack plan they hadn't considered....

   A sharp crack filled the air, followed by a streak of red-purple light dancing through the ceiling passages, chasing after one of the three ninjas.  Each time it came close, the ninja would substitute, but the bullet curved to pursue their new location.  The process continued until after one too many substitutions, the ninja appeared again in their underpants; having used their own jumpsuit for the substitution.  And seconds later their neck was torn open by the glass sphere at the head of the beam.

   Below, among the surprised crowd was the gunman; a dog in a tuxedo, blond haired, brown furred, tipping his tophat to Evgenija with a grin, a smoking flintlock rifle in his gloved hand.  Zoos Yelmo, and his enchanted never-miss rifle.

   Evgenija pounced while the two remaining ninjas were surprised at the turn of events, swinging and stabbing with axe and knives, snapping at their noses with the toothy maws of her tentacles.  The clink of coins in the air, followed by the hiss of a lit fuse.

   The vulture lept from the melee she had previously occupied in time to see a black sphere  with a lit fuse bounce off the rafters below, and down to the ninja she had been fighting; exploding in a ball of flames and concussive energy a moment later. The ninja, one of their arms torn off from the explosion, flew through the air trailing smoke, and down to the party below.

   Where before the crowd had been merely shocked, they now fled the room, shouting for the police.  Moving against the tide was a brown furred and haired ferret in the garb of a priest, a patch covering his left eye, a cutlass in one hand, and a glittering white spell producing the sound of clinking coins in the other, moving toward the downed ninja.

   The third ninja, the hare, looked from where his two companions laid, one bleeding out, one about be put out of their misery, then to Evgenija and her glittering weapons, and fled.  The vulture pursued the fleeing ninja, and as he was about to leap down to a window and freedom, he was intercepted.

   A white swan, clothed in a lacy, flowing white bridal gown, using her wings to balance herself atop a metal broomstick while her veil fluttered in the air.  The ninja stopped completely stunned, while the swan Phoenix pulled a rose from her bouquet, and wove magic into it.  Seconds later, she was armed with a thorny whip, which she lashed at the assassin.

   The rabbit jumped to avoid the attack, and moved right into Evgenija's.  One of her tentacles rammed through his back, and out his chest, producing a gout of blood the fortunately did not land upon the swan's dress, neither from the initial attack, or when Evgenija pulled the tentacle free to let the hare fall limply onto a table below.

   Moments later, the three corpses were gathered together, a tablecloth thrown over the indecent one, while the four combatants stood around them.  The groom, Zoos, the priest, Domino, and the bride, Aina Kynaston.

   "It was the father of the groom," she told them when they wouldn't stop giving her expectant looks.  "None of you win."  They each had their own way of dealing with the disappointment, Aina pouting, Zoos sulking, and Domino shrugging.  "The assassination attempt is foiled, and we can go deal with the conspirator momentarily, after you all change clothes."

   "But I like feeling fancy," said Zoos, pulling on the ends of his bow-tie.

   "Perhaps.  But the groom will likely want his clothes back so that they can have their wedding properly tomorrow."  Aina sighed wistfully, turning her whip back into a rose and placing it back in the bouquet.

   "Was nice while it lasted, at least," said the Phoenix.  "I'll be right back."  She turned and marched away, toward the castle chapel, where the changing rooms were located.  Zoos hesitated, but left under Evgenija's glare.  Domino followed after him, totally nonchalant about the battle.

   Evgenija wasn't.  While her fellows went to change, she examined the ninjas for anything amiss.  But something had been off with that fight; as if the ninjas had lost a considerable amount of skill when her allies entered the fray.

   She found something; they each had a mark near their elbows.  Like the scars Evgenija had from being fed upon by vampires for years, but recent.  Still bandaged.  Each of the ninjas had recently had blood drawn from them.  Which explained nothing but raised questions.  Especially related to why the normal context clues that would confirm their employment by the island administrator with a grudge against a muckraker and his family were absent.

   No scent of sandalwood from the forests.  No salt from recent sea travel.  No food, foreign or local in their teeth.  Their weapons had the signs of being conjured; but such magic was far too complex for one island administrator to have access to.

   The situation felt wrong.  There was something more to this; she just needed to see it.  But it remained hidden.  Out of options available to her, the vulture sat down at a vacated table and nibbled at a roll while she waited for her party to return.



   Far away, a blue and orange snow leopard leaned back in his armchair, watching the vulture through a looking glass.  On an end table to his immediate right rested three child-like dolls; of three figures dressed as ninjas.  Each twisted and turning black as the magic destroyed them to prevent evidence.

   "She suspects something," ventured a white-furred feline servant dressed as a maid, laying out a cup of steaming viscous blue liquid for her lord.

   "Obviously," responded Dosve, his tail twitching in mild irritation.  "Let her suspect.  She will find no connection to me."  The gaudy snow leopard brushed aside the ashes of the poppets, and took the cup in his hand, sipping of the liquid.  "Mm, wonderful.  The reporter has been seen to?"

   "Agents report that Mr. Sweet has unfortunately died of stroke from the stress of his near assassination.  A tragic event, given the efforts local adventurers spent trying to save his life."  The snow leopard smiled, sipping again of his drink.

   "Such a sad loss for the journalistic community."  The lord swept his hand before the looking glass, and it's image changed to an elderly dog, half of his face slack while the other was terrified.  The faint hint of a black-clad hand with particles of magic at the edge of the still image.  "Poor old Martin.  Shouldn't have dug so deep.  Oh well.  Who is next on my list, Luna?"

   The maid left his peripheral vision, went to his desk and returned while he was in the midst of another sip of the viscous blue liquid.  "Shiera Moltz, sir."  Ah, Shiera.  An advocate for peaceful negotiation between Kebre and Kalpakstan, currently engaged in a vicious war along their border.

   "She's in occupied Port Kolma, yes?"

   "Yes, sir.  We have an agent ready to do the job nearby."  Dosve shook his mane of hair, and set aside his drink.

   "Bring me the poppet, I want to do this personally."  The maid nodded, and brought him a doll resembling a black cat in a sneakthief's outfit.  As Dosve held the poppet in his hands, it's button eyes glowed orange while the link was established.  In moments, his vision was not of the luxurious sitting room he physically occupied, but the sill and window of a woman's bedroom.  He could see her feet under the blankets, turning as she tried to get comfortable.

   Dosve cracked the cats knuckles for him while the Being's mind rested as if in a sleep.  This was going to be fun.  In moments, the cat used Dosve's knowledge of magic to phase through the glass, and approach the bed while drawing a knife.

   The best part was, the cat Dosve was using to assassinate the voice of peace was Kebrian.  When the snow leopard abandoned him after the kill, it would only heighten tensions.  And most certainly, the cat would not be taken alive by Kalpakstanni military police.

   Murder from the comfort of his own home; what a wonderful invention.


Dosve is not a nice man.  Charming at times, but not nice.

[Merlin]

Ohh Dosve, continue being a jerk, and I'll continue hoping you get your comeuppance 

[Meany]

This snip is only six pages, slightly over two thousand words long.  But I had to break it off here because the stuff following is wildly out of mood with this stuff.  Warning: Contains references to attempted suicide.



Chapter 11- Scars

   Polishing a sphere of bronze so that the patina didn't obscure the runes was so far the only downside to Domino's false eye that the ferret had found.  A mixture of salt, flour, and vinegar was formed into a paste and then scrubbed onto the eye with a small brush, after ward, Domino would put the eye to soak in olive oil overnight to ensure a shine, and lubrication of the prosthesis.

   In the cabin allotted to Zoos and himself the ferret scrubbed at the bits of green forming on the bronze sphere, the paste on a small plate on the frame of the waterbunk while he worked.  Over the years, the large central rune of the eye had been surrounded by smaller runes that enabled other types of vision: heat, motion, aura, night, measuring tool, targeting.  He couldn't run every rune as passively as the central rune, it required mental effort and a greater tax on his magical power to activate one alternate vision style.

   Finding the eye to be totally clean, the ferret plopped the metal orb into the jar of olive oil and screwed on the top, before tossing the remnants of the paste into a wastebin and scrubbing the plat with a brief spell.  Zoos was occupying the shower at the time, and hated seeing the captain with his empty socket, so it was best to work when the boy wasn't around.

   "Captain," called the dog after the sounds of running water subsided.  "Do you have your patch on yet?"  Sighing, the ferret pulled the brown leather patch from his coat on a hook and placed it over his empty eye.

   "I have the glass ball in, it's not like it's empty," Domino replied.  "But fine, yes, it's on."  Getting his towel and shampoo ready for his turn in the shower, the ferret kept his back to Zoos' side of the room while the dog emerged and dressed for bed.  "Shame about the mark, though."

   "Yeah, dying of stroke can't be fun."  From the sounds, Zoos had finished dressing, so Domino turned to walk for the shower himself.  However a glance over to the dog stopped Domino in his tracks.  Expression of flat disbelief, Domino queried:

   "Why are you dressed in one of the ninja outfits?"  Sure enough Zoos was laying on his water bunk wearing the loose outfits the ninjas had been wearing, sans the booted feet or the balaclava mask with the armored forehead.

   "They fit, they're comfy, and they left like thirty pairs of their pyjamas all over the place after the fight."  The blonde dog stuck his tongue out at the ferret, who sighed.  "Also I'm sick of all the times we get ambushed at night, it's when I'm either in a nightshirt of my skivvies.  I'd like to have an epic midnight showdown without the other guys snickering."

   Domino couldn't deny it made it difficult to force a surrender when you had to try and keep out of the direct line of sight of the females.  Or the coy advances of the people trying to murder him.  Idly, Domino wondered if the females ever had to worry about that; they seemingly always had time to get dressed before joining the fight.

   Or maybe it was a women thing.

   "Did you-"

   "Yes, I grabbed some off the rabbit guy," Zoos rolled over behind the water bunk and pulled out a black mesh bag full of the smaller ninja outfits.  "The tail might be a bit loose for you but otherwise, a snug fit."

   "Alright.  We'll try it out, and see if it helps with the ambushes thing."  With that, Domino went off to the shower.  Danged thing was sized for tall-legged people, with no stool, so he had to do without the gooseneck shower-head. Was it so difficult to make the amenities size-adjustable?  Or include aides?  True, not everyone could get over the shame of using a booster seat at a restaurant; but the option should still have been there.

   Done with his shower, the ferret returned to the cabin and clumsily went through the ninja outfit.  It felt unnatural, even if he hadn't ever been an actual pirate.  The mesh went on under the outfit, which made him feel like he was going to one of those strange clubs Demo frequented.  The ones where they had women dancing in cages suspended over the dance floor.

   Why have women dancing above the dance floor, rather than on the dancefloor, Domino never understood.  Demo did, and that made the ferret wonder about his brother's priorities.

   "Okay, it fits.  Doesn't feel quite right, but let's see how it goes."  Zoos made a grand sweep of his arm while relaxing on his water bunk.

   "Captain, when have I led us into unsafe waters?"  Domino could recall at least seven times, but bit his tongue.  Zoos may have called him captain, but Domino wasn't his boss anymore; Evgenija was.

   She was the most experienced adventurer, she had the most level head in a fight, and she was suspicious.  More than once the vulture woman's unwillingness to trust alleged victims or bystanders because they played their role too well, or through reading their emotions.

   Domino took a small plastic bottle from his coat before heading to bed; pills to help him sleep.  An unforeseen side-effect of losing thirty friends, one's vessel, and second in command shortly before being forced into being a parent was depression, and with it, insomnia.

Swoon helped him with the depression part, when he wasn't off adventuring.  But when he was; it was like there was a hole inside him that sucked meaning and hope down and out.  Another reason why Evgenija was the group's leader and he was just a swordsman with spellcasting ability; she could hope for the best, he couldn't.

   With Swoon, he could remember what it felt like to be in love.  To be happy.  Remembering the good times was all he had anymore, that and a job that required being the shining hero to ride in and rescue people.  His acting skills had gotten better, at least.

   Popping a pill, the ferret rolled into bed and waited for the drugs to force him to sleep.  Maybe he'd dream of something nice, maybe something frightening.  As long as it was better than the near constant numbness, it was okay.

   As the chemicals started to force his body to slow down and sleep, Domino wondered if Zoos felt the same way, being able to remember in vivid detail the worst night of their lives.



   Evgenija sat in the common room for the ship, seated in the only armchair provided for the passengers.  The crewmen patrolling the deck would pass by every so often, sure that the vulture plotted some mischief, when really she just wanted to read the memoirs of Salmac the Watchful, the governor of Kebre some three hundred years in the past.  He had much to say about the nature of Creatures, and their predatory habits.

   Despite poor Salmac obviously suffering from paranoid personality disorder, his long years studying the nature of Demons and Angels alone provided good insight into dealing with them.

   'They are like animals made intelligent', recorded Salmac. 'Wild beasts given minds of their own and power beyond measure.  In this, perhaps they are not so different from the mighty Dragons.  When dealing with them, you must make clear that you are mightier than they; but be too obvious about it, and they will call your bluff, gentle reader.

   'Demons will forgo the manners and standards of decency of others as a means to show dominance.  If it is within your authority, punish such small rebellions harshly.  No second chances, or they will see you as lacking conviction.  But punish too harshly and you may find yourself fending off unwanted romantic advances.

   'It is safe to assume that an Angel believes they are the most intelligent person in the room.  For all of their intelligence though, they lack lateral thinking abilities.  Additionally Angels can be lured with power that comes without; lore, magic, artefacts.  To discipline them, show what reward they would have earned, and be clear it is lost to them.  Such will cut deeper than any knife.'

   The vulture woman snapped the book closed when she sensed a figure approaching, and laid the tome in her lap, waiting.  The meeting was expected.  For one so full of cheer, Zoos Yelmo had a talent for moving quietly.  Not stealthily, but quietly; Evgenija could see the tiny details that would have alerted a more novice sneak to his presence.  Movement in the shadows on the ceiling, sneaks were trained to look up regularly because normal people didn't, the smell of Yelmo's dinner in the air, the subtle shift in air pressure she detected from her wings.

   "He took his medicine?"  The Succubus asked the Being, not deigning to look at him beyond a passing glance.  She and Yelmo were not friends, but coworkers, if he were not required for Domino's mental health, she'd have found another marksman.

   The dog sat crosslegged on the floor beside the armchair.  "Yeah, didn't even need to prompt him this time," said the blonde dog, nonchalant about the topic.  "He's asleep now, I waited until he entered deep sleep to come here."

   "Hmph."  The Kebrian had made no progress with the 'ma'am' addition to the dog's vocabulary, to her chagrin.  It should not have been so difficult to command respect from her team after years of working together.  "Until we are back in Ti'baltr, I want you to stay with him as much as possible; he is giving signs of approaching the suicidal phase of his depression."

   "What?  Domino wouldn't kill himself," Zoos flicked his hand dismissively.  "You're over-reacting, Evy."  The vulture ground her teeth at the use of that mangling of her name, but vented the rage by plotting some menial task to deploy Zoos to on the next job.

   "According to my observations, Aina's reports, and yours, he's almost exclusively using that spell of his, Roulette, in combat situations.  By it's very nature, the spell is unreliable.  You saw how that backfired when he tried to ride that White-River Mythos two weeks ago."  The dog flinched.  It had been a bad fight, Domino's Roulette had given him a bomb that he had forced down the Mythos' jaw.  The little ferret earned more than a few scars from the biting, and the shrapnel.

   "It saved us, didn't it?"

   "So would Aina's spell, had Domino not charged ahead.  And if you had not encouraged him."  A bit of acid in her voice made the dog's ears droop.  "You know my orders.  Let me know if he tries anything, or tells you anything about it."  The dog nodded, and stood to leave.  "Hold on a moment...."  Evgenija looked the dog up and down, her brow arching so high it was almost lost in her hair.  "Why are you dressed as a ninja?"

   "Um."  The dog poked his index fingers together awkwardly.  "I'm using them as pyjamas, so if we get ambushed at night again, I'm not indecent?"  Being and Succubus stared at each other, the former embarrassed slightly, the latter disbelieving.  Sighing in an almost unladylike manner, she turned back to staring at the far wall, and flicking her hand at the dog.

   "Go."  And he went.  Evgenija knew it would come for Domino soon.  She knew whom to go to for the pills to help him sleep.  She knew the signs to look for toward the condition worsening or getting better.  And despite Yelmo's misgivings, she knew Domino was starting to grow tired of his continued existence.  And from there, it would be only a short time before he tried to kill himself.

   Aina's face, expression horrified, holding her hands to the vulture woman's neck.  Screaming for Swoon to call a healer.  Ignoring the knife in Evgenija's hand, dripping with her own blood.  Domino rushing in with a towel to stop the bleeding.

   Two and a half years prior, when she was weakest, Evgenija had tried to end it all and failed.  Aina, Swoon, and Domino had saved her.  The least she could do for Domino was try to stop the ferret from doing the same, and perhaps succeeding.  The vulture rubbed at her neck, where underneath a broad choker of black satin with onyx gems, was the scar she refused to have healed over.  Her cowardice tax, to remind her of what she almost did.

   Pushing aside the bad memories, she opened the book again, and started her learning on how to deal with Weres.


Suicide by Demon is the preferred method of Adventurers killing themselves, incidentally.

[Tapewolf]

Well, it seems to be getting dark again.  Can't wait to see how things pan out.

[Meany]

Been almost a week since the last snip; I'm trying to get them longer so there's more meat for y'all.  While I work on that, here's a little thing that may or may not appear much later in the fic, no spoilers but a bit of history.


Side-note 1: An excerpt from the journal of Dominus Ti'balt

'The light is gone from my life.

Nanbi was killed today. Poisoned by someone I called friend, but it wasn't how she died.  My light died from biting her tongue, and drowned on her own blood from the seizure whatever foul poison Arazi' minion chose.  Deimos was so angry; he actually hit me!  He looked shocked about it after, but I worry for him.  Nanbi warned me about the rage that our son would feel as his power grew faster than his mind; this thing called 'rampage.'  I am torn between my duty to my son to keep his mind healthy, and my duty to this nation I and my lights built.

Nanbi, wherever you are, I hope you are with Mikhail, and that you'll raise hell in heaven while you wait for me.'

...

'Arazi is dead.  Fool tried to ascend; some foolishness that boy from Une'jysune's clan tells me is akin to apotheosis among their species.  Nanbi's ghost can rest at last.

Almost as soon as the news broke of the hellhound's death, who would appear on my doorstep but the assassin Arazi had used to steal my last light away.  He handed me a note, as the guards came to seize him, Deimos screaming for the cubi's head on a plate.  It was a note from Nanbi; only I knew her handwriting so well.  Deimos did not care for the message contained therein and burned it, but I shall transcribe what I remember.  To quote:

"Dominus

By the time you find this letter I will be dead, the arsenic having taken me away.  The pain is too great; these wounds the dragon inflicted on me.  Your love has been a balm, but it is no longer enough.  My every waking second is agony, both physical and mental.  I cannot bear to be maimed in this way any longer; unable to even stand on my own.  My one happy thought is that I gave you a son to spend your last years with.  Mikhail and I will wait for you in the hereafter, if it is truly there.

- Nanbi"

My light suffered so terribly, more than I had thought.  And not once did I notice.  If I had, perhaps I could have ventured off to find someone so skilled at healing to repair what was broken with her.  Maybe I should have done so anyway.  My lights are gone, both killed through my fault.  All that I have left is my son, whose temper grows more baleful each day.

God help me.'

...

'Deimos is consumed by hate.  Hate of Kebre, who he blames for Nanbi's death.  Hate for the dragons, who stole the Mikhail away before the boy was even born.  He lives up to his namesake too well; longing to war with Kebre and Kalpakstan to sate the thirst for their blood.  No longer am I his father, I am now but an obstacle in the path of blood he wishes to carve.

I have arranged to have him removed from the line of succession; Deimos is unpopular, so I have made the method of choosing my successor an election of eligible members of my family.  My sister's youngest child is quite the populist, perhaps that will ensure her victory.

Even with how he makes it clear how close the two of us are to coming to blows, I cannot ask my generals to dispatch my son while he is out on the battlefield.  He is the last gift my light gave to me; I could not face them if I did.

He goes to war with the Amazons on the morrow; and I pray he does not return.'

...

'Deimos died in battle.  And now I am truly alone.  Please, God, let it be over soon.'


I promise the chapter will be more fun and lighthearted!  I double promise!   

[Tapewolf]

Been almost a week since the last snip; I'm trying to get them longer so there's more meat for y'all.  

There is an optimum chapter size for a serial published on a forum.  For me it's around 11'000 characters, which is what I try to aim at.  Less than that and it's too short, but if they're too long, it becomes more of a struggle to get people to read it.  For new readers their eyes can glaze over, and even for the regulars it can sometimes be a problem to find a suitable block of uninterrupted time to read the thing over, if you're checking the forum in the morning or during lunch at work or something.
(This was a particular problem at Anthrocon, as I believe you noticed )

In short, be aware that a forum is a slightly different presentation medium than a book, or indeed a wordprocessor where the output is divided up into pages.  On a forum it's a single, vast chunk of text, and you can make that chunk of text too big for comfort.  That doesn't mean you should drop ideas, but do consider whether a chapter might be split up into several of them.

[Tapewolf]

How's this coming along?

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Apparently, slowly. ;-] Which is a shame, but we can wait, can't we?

[Meany]

Things are coming along slow, yes.  The Skyrim bug has infected me once again.  But soon, I shall recover, and post for you once more!

[Meany]

I LIIIIIIIIVE.



Chapter 12 - How I met your brother


     When Tyrone woke from his food-induced coma, it was to Hyden snoring on the couch and Renet still typing away at her essay.  She barely noticed him waking, only reacting when he passed her on the way to the bathroom.  The two of them had drawn on his face while he'd been out, which had to be scrubbed out - he'd fallen asleep first, it was tradition.  If either of them had fallen  asleep, they would have faced the same.


     Scrubbing his face took only a short time, and he was back out in the apartment's main room a moment later, sitting next to Renet on the living room floor, watching the clock.  "So... did you talk to him about your thing after I passed out?"  The dog asked the cow, not turning to acknowledge the tired death glare she leveled at him.

     "No," was her dry-throated response.  "I wanted to get this done first, but there was just so much to do..."  Tyrone patted her on the head consolingly, rubbing behind one of her ears, which made her bat his hand away.  "That doesn't work on bovines."

     "It would if you were a normal person, but you're a nerd, so of course it doesn't."  The time, which Tyrone had been paying attention to was slightly after midnight.  Almost time when he could head out.  "So, you're going to wait till I go out to bring it up?"

     She sighed, pushing aside her notebook.  "I... don't know okay?  I'm tired so I'll probably not put it the most delicate of ways."  The dog rolled his eyes where she couldn't see, but she punched his thigh instinctively anyway.  They had lived together long enough to read the signs.  "Of course you wouldn't care how delicately I put things."

     "Personally I think doing it the honest way is best.  If you like him, tell him.  I mean he's right there, and he's so soft I could throw a pillow at him and wake him up if you like."  Tryone yanked the pillow out from under Renet, causing her to roll away.

     "Auugh, don't you dare," she growled while sitting up against the wall she had rolled into.  "And what about you, when are you going to talk to him about that thing with your boyfriend?"  Tyrone took his eyes off the clock to stick his tongue out at Renet and pull on his eyelid.

     "When it's his business, which it isn't yet."  Tyrone hadn't even shared with Hyden that the dog had a romance going.  "And if things go well today, then I won't even need to bring Hyden into it.  He'll know when he's old enough to look at the records."

     "You're just going to not tell him?  You know how he fawns over news from the Union, he'd be really upset if he found out on his own."  They'd had the same conversation when they'd moved in together, and regularly since then.  The cow, she didn't get it, not being a Demon.

     Tyrone threw the pillow at her.  "What he feels isn't important, it isn't his business.  I brought up Hyden, and tried for two months to get them in the same room, it didn't happen.  I'm not playing secretary for them anymore; if they meet up it's up to them."  The dog looked at the clock again and stood up.  "Speaking of meeting up, it's getting to be that time."  Renet huffed, defeated, and crawled back over to her notebook.

     "If you're heading out, I might as well go to sleep.  Get this done tomorrow...." She looked at the clock and her face darkened.  "Or rather, later today.  Going to need some coffee in the morning."

     "I'll pick some up on my way back," the dog Demon chirped happily as he dashed to his room and then to Renet's, taking the mesh bags of dirty laundry and hefting them over his shoulders.  "Seeya in a few hours!"  Unable to use the front door with his hands full, Tyrone went to the sliding door to the balcony, exited out that way and dropped over the side of the railing.

     As the Demon fell and after picking himself up off the ground ran off down the darkened street, he got lost in memories.  He remembered, two and a half years ago, when his elder sister had brought a guest to a family dinner.  She had agreed to become the chaperone of a Vecenstein refugee, and was eager to present him to the family.

     The northerner was awkward in his own skin, not used to his sheared fur or the differences in fashion a tropical climate brought on.  Tyrone had immediately noticed a resemblance to Hyden in the northerner - a sheep-gazelle Demon.  But he was distracted by poking fun at the northerner for his self-conscious behavior along with his brothers.

     Like Hyden, the northerner had been reluctant to cut loose, but unlike the ram, the hybrid had no problems scrapping when the teasing didn't relent.  The northerner had been so good at scrapping, it took the adult brothers pitching in for the dog Demons to overwhelm him - ending the northerner buried under a pile of dogs.

     The Backbreakers received their new addition well, enough that they offered him, a foreigner and not even a man yet, a job.  Tyrone's father was bosun on a ferry between the city of Ti'baltr and Port Kolma, and under his chaperone's watch the northerner worked loading and unloading the boat.

     Honest work, but not overly stimulating, so the Vecenstein-boy came by the Backbreaker home to scrap, and spend time with them after school for he didn't attend.  Tyrone had tried to arrange a meeting with Hyden, but at every turn, the two seemed to miss each other by minutes.  Eventually, the dog got the hint and let the two remain ignorant of each other until fate arranged their meeting herself.

     And he did not mind having more of the sheep-gazelle's time to himself.

     More of which he was due to enjoy, as he arrived at the laundromat.  Thanks to the owner being a sleepless Mythos, it was open all night long, and allowed Tyrone to both be useful in doing chores, and catch his romantic partner as soon as he got off work.

     Depositing the bags and exchanging gold dollars for washer tokens and soap vouchers, Tyrone got to work loading washing machines, dressing down to his underpants to throw his school clothes into the washing machines as well.  The owner did not mind, for she seemed to enjoy the view, and the dog like many Demons, was keen to show off.

     The door to the 'mat opened with a chime, in the middle of loading Denet's clothes, making Tyrone's floppy ears perk up.  "Hey doll, how ya doing tonigh-" the red dog turned to look, and saw Hyden standing in the doorway, looking at first mischievous, then red-faced at seeing the dog's state of undress.

     "I came here to embarrass you in front of your boyfriend like a good friend should," the hornless ram said, covering his eyes as he walked in.  "Not to interrupt your booty call."

     Tyrone tilted his head to the side, confused, then went back to loading the washer.

     "I wouldn't be dressed if this was a booty call, and Ms. Baizin would have a camera."  The ram turned even more red as he took a seat, while the Mythos woman in the far corner hissed in amusement.

     "You're not dressed now, though."  The dog huffed, exasperated with the ram's refusal to understand how such things went in Ti'baltr.  Vecenstein must have been so extremely prudish that it would take generations to wash out.

     "Whatever, look if you want to embarrass my boyfriend you can let me throw your clothes in with mine.  He's one of your folk, so it'll weird him out."  Hyden glowered at Tyrone's back, he could feel the sizzling of fire magic on his fur.

     There was silence for a time while the dog worked and the ram looked everywhere but in his direction.  "So, uh," Hyden started to break the quiet.  "I was awake while you and Renet were talking."

     The dog chuckled.  "She's going to be so mad when she finds out, she's usually good on noticing that sort of stuff."  But then, he considered, maybe she did know.  But he had brought up sensitive subjects and she had to react.  He rubbed his forehead while twisting knobs to get the machines running; using his brain made things less fun, and he didn't enjoy it much.

     "Yeah, I'm going to talk to her about that... later.  But, hey, surprise, I didn't know you," the ram glanced at Tyrone who turned to look at him, then away, "were that way."

     The dog Demon's brow arched, and he crossed his arms.  "I'm not 'that way', Hyden.  It's just how things are done here."  The ram got over his embarrassment enough to look at Tyrone, confused.  "If you see something you want, you take it.  That's how Dominus won respect hundreds of years ago.  I like this northerner, so I will keep him so long as he lets me."

     The door opened again, cutting Hyden off from responding, and Tyrone grinned wide.  Coming in, still in a sailor's uniform, and toting a burlap sack of laundry, was the sheep-gazelle.  His gaze was distant, like he was lost in thought.  Hyden was stunned at the sight of the newcomer, who dropped his sack near Tyrone while going to get coins.

     Tyrone busied himself with loading up more washing machines with his beau's clothes, checking every so often to find Hyden still stunned, watching the sheep-gazelle exchange money and come to the machines to get them running.

     "Asir?"  The sheep-gazelle turned to look at Hyden for the first time, and he snapped to reality.  "You're alive?"

     "No," ground out the larger Vecenstein Demon, approaching the smaller quickly.  "I'm a ghost come to haunt you.  Of course I'm alive!"  Hyden raised his arms, instinctively from Tyrone's reading, as if to defend himself.  But instead of attacking, the taller, broader Asir enveloped the ram in a hug.  Hyden choked with the force of the hug, being lifted off his feet and spun around.  "And you're alive too!  Alive and just as small as I remember!"

     As he talked, weariness was worked out of Asir's voice, the grinding tone of a laborer wore away to a happy voice.  Closing the last washing machine, Tyrone moved to join in the hug, grabbing Asir from behind and lifting him off his feet to be spun.  With his strength, it was easy even if Hyden was too busy flailing and choking to enjoy the moment.

     When the double-hug was done, Hyden lay on his back on the floor, gasping for breath, while Tyrone and Asir sat nearby.  "So you two do know each other," the dog said, sticking his tongue out.  "Figured, but getting you two in the same room's like answering one of those torichal questions."

     "Rhetorical," the ram Demon corrected.  Tyrone charlie-horsed his leg in response.  "Ow!"

     "Don't you sass me."

     "It is good to see the Succubus didn't eat you, cousin," Asir cut in, poking the ram in the nose.  "But apparently she stole your horns and your teenage growth spurts, how shameful."  The dog arched his brow again.  Cousins?  Looking at the two of them together, he'd have called them brothers.

     "I have grown, Asir," the ram frowned.  "Not everyone gets to be a behemoth like you."  Asir grinned wide, while Hyden's expression turned confused, and he looked away.  "Uh... sorry about exploding you, back home."

     "Are you kidding?"  The sheep-gazelle cuffed the ram about the ears.  "It was awesome!  I got blown through the door and made a dent in the wall behind it, brother Seross went through both walls!"

     "Is Seross here, too?"  Tyrone noticed a cold undertone enter Hyden's voice mentioning the new name.  "What about the others?"

     Asir shrugged, "I have no clue.  Mother put me on a boat a few months after you were kidnapped.  I had to sail from Ansaugerbucht, in the northern province.  The others were supposed to be on the next ship, as mine only had one space left.  But I've heard nothing from them."  Distance crept into Asir's eyes again, so Tyrone knocked it out by laying on his side and snapping at the sheep-gazelle's tail.  "Stop that, feckless dog."

     Said dog grinned, sitting up with a few stray hairs clenched in his teeth.  "What about my mom?  Is she alright?  Is the baby healthy?"  Hyden continued to press, the cold gone and replaced with worry.

     "It was stillborn."  Asir said it as if it were unimportant, a footnote.  But both Hyden and Tyrone stiffened at the word.  "What?  It's three years dead."  In Ti'baltr, births were almost as celebrated as mardis gras, but only for the family.  And deaths, especially stillbirths, were the most weighty.

     "I... it wasn't me, the explosion, the stress, was it?"  Asir shrugged, nonchalant.

     "Ask her, if she's still around.  She took off after you with Auriga as soon as the doctor finished the announcement."  It was the ram's turn to begin looking distant, and his cousin reacted before the dog could.  "My turn now, how long have you been here?  Has your chaperone been keeping you so skinny?"

     The ram pressed his fingertips together, awkwardly looking away.  "Um, I've been here for three years, and I don't need a chaperone because I'm... a citizen?"  Asir suddenly loomed over the ram, demanding an explanation with his expression.  "Madam Zed... she had a citizenship application in the shop which she used on me.  A Ti'baltr ship picked us up and I've been living with the captain for the past three years."

     "I've worked with Ti'baltr sailors," the sheep-gazelle moved Hyden's arms around as if he were a doll.  "And living with one wouldn't leave you so scrawny."

     "I just can't pack on muscle as much as you can, alright?  And what about you, where are your horns and your wings?"  Asir's forehead bore the flat, bony patches where his horns had once been, but were now ground away, while his wings were totally absent.

     "Non-citizens don't get to keep their horns or their wings until they're affirmed.  Until I have enough of a reputation to own a house and keep a job of my own."  Tyrone, struck by memory, slid up close to his beau, smiling wide.

     "Speaking of which, how'd the hearing go?"  He asked, not at all trying to hide his excitement.  Asir didn't smile, but his eyes brightened a bit.

     "They're doing some bloodwork, as there's a possibility I might qualify for citizenship through family.  I had wondered if someone from grandmother's family still lived, but you'll do," he said to the ram, ruffling the smaller Demon's hair.

     "Heey, if you become a citizen that means I can make an honest woman of you, Assy," the dog cut in, throwing his arm over the sheep-gazelle's shoulder.

     "You're not the marrying kind. I'm not a woman, and who says I'd ever marry you?"

     "The fact you haven't jumped away, screaming indecency from me being in arm's reach of you while pantsless?"  He enjoyed the moment of silence as the two northerners processed the information then scrambled away only to be dragged back into a double-headlock by the dog. There would be no escape until the washing machines finished their cycles.



Short for my liking, but it's been a while, da?

[ZacAttac21]

Hell yes!! I had to go back a bit and remind myself where we left off, but... Hell yes!

[Tapewolf]

I'll have to start from scratch I think.  A gap this long might benefit from some kind of synopsis.  Heck, weekly film serials always started with some kind of "the story so far..."

[Tapewolf]

Finished.  I still think a summary might have been a good idea.
Nice to see something good happen to the characters for a change!

[Meany]

Have some filler while I do things.



1. Hyden - All in the golden Afternoon
2. Domino - You've got a Friend in Me
3. Evgenija - Everyone Wants to be a cat bird
4. Vecenstein - Lavender Blue
5. The Harridan - Cruella De Vil
6. Port Kolma - Belle
7. Ti'baltr - Zip a Dee Doo Dah
8. Dosve - Gaston
9. Zoos - Megalovania
10. Aina - Home
11. Swoon - Bye, Bye, Baby Petit
12. Dominus, Nanbi, & Mikhail - Love Like You
13. Asir & Tyrone - Stronger than You
14. Renet - Death by Glamour



This list is a proto-type, pending review.  But going to be trying to go with a jazzy feel.

[Meany]

Chapter 13 - Little Bell


     Many years of filing paperwork easily translated to filing reports in an adventurer's guild, Domino had found early on.  Zoos was in a similar situation, though he often took on filing loot declaration forms for the group.  So Domino found himself once more sitting in the bar portion of the Ti'baltr guildhouse nursing a glass of rum while the others were still filing paperwork.

     The bar had many similarities with the wharf taverns; rowdiness, the smell of alcohol and smoke in the air, wenches serving the food and repelling grabby customers with force.  The biggest differences were that there was no obvious segregation, and the board.  At the wharf, patrons would group with their crewmates to socialize - and it was almost exclusively the men in attendance.  But in the guild, there were male wenches, and entire female adventuring parties drinking away.

     And the board had no equivalent in the taverns.  An entire wall full of wanted posters, news stories, ads, and pleas for help, pinned to five rotating wood pillars.  There was a room behind the pillars where paper-pushers would pin-up certain jobs from other guilds or sponsored by the guild itself. To accept the job, one needed only to tear it off the board.

     That would likely be Domino's job, he mused as he took another drink of rum - as Evgenija would have sooner shaved her eyeballs as set foot in the bar willingly. A self-respecting woman would not enter such an establishment for any reason other than to burn it down, had been her words on the subject.  Which was just as well, for Creature adventurers weren't well received in the bar.

     "Room for one more, captain?"  Domino shrugged at the voice, and didn't mind the sudden shade from a large figure blocking the overhead lights.  When he looked to see who had taken the stool next to his, the ferret saw an aging bovine woman in a white dress decorated with purple flowers, a beaded shawl, and an ancient wide-brimmed witch hat.  Domino felt he'd seen her before and squinted at her trying to remember.  "Don't quite remember me, sisterson?  Last time we talked was when your brother was dedicated at the temple of the Mother."

     "You were the... priestess, yes?"  Domino took another sip of rum and attempted to recall details.  "You never said exactly how you were related to my mother, if I recall."  The cow woman waved the bartender away, and he didn't make a fuss - she could not have come into the guildhouse without being an adventurer, Domino realized. 

     "To an old Amazon, all women are her sisters."  Which clarified that question; the cow was part of one of the local Amazon tribes - most of whom became adventurers so that they could leave their enclaves without violating ancient treaties.

     The Amazons had not taken kindly to the spread of Ti'baltr in the old days, and many wars were fought between the then young city-state and the tribes.  Dominus Ti'balt's son, Deimos had been particularly vicious in his extermination of the island's natives.  The wars ended with a chain of treaties which promised that the two sides would not encroach on the other's lands.  But while the Amazons had grown slowly and with the help of magic, Ti'baltr exploded in size and strength.  Soon the warrior-women found their chances of expanding all but gone.

     "This tribal business, then?  Not a captain anymore - but I can tell you which cousin to talk to if that's what you want."  The rum ran out with his next draft, and the barkeep shook his head when Domino signaled for a refill.  Someone was bribing the man considerably to keep the ferret relatively sober, it seemed.

     "No, sisterson.  I come to let you know a sisterdaughter of the tribe has... concerns she wants to bring to you without being rude."  Domino realized he didn't know the cow's name halfway through giving her a confused look, and that he didn't care while spinning the ice cubes in his empty glass petulantly.  "It... concerns your lady friend."

     "You're going to have to be specific."  He had to repeat himself when she responded with 'the winged one'.  "I know many winged women - I work with some of them, on both sides of the sword.  I know so many, some people think I have a thing for 'em."  The cow didn't react to his attempt at humor, which added an extra layer of awkward to the situation, prompting him to look away.

     "There are concerns that the Creature you're involved with, the brightly colored one; an Angel I think, that she has killed people in the past."  The Matriarch's gaze was stern.  "No solid evidence yet, I'm told timelines matching was involved, bank records matching, that sort of thing."

     His claws were out, and the urge to dig grooves into the bar was strong, but he settled for rapping them on the wooden surface instead.  "Swoon," Domino ground out gripping the glass tight in his other hand, "hasn't killed anyone as long as I've known her."  He couldn't imagine Swoon killing anyone, but he'd only known her for a couple decades.  She was hundreds of years old; what were the odds that he knew her well enough to say one way or the other?  What were the odds that she wasn't just using him as a scapegoat, or as another victim?

     Anger at the accusation became misery and despair as he kept thinking.  "She is a Creature, sisterson."  The elderly cow's tone was gentle, but not consoling.  "It isn't impossible for her to have done these things in her youth, and moved on.  There is nothing to motivate the guild to move against her yet; but my sisterdaughter wanted you to know she was looking into the subject."

     Not for the first time, Domino wondered if anything between Swoon and him was genuine; or if he was just lying to himself, pathetically desperate for company that he let himself be played.  Nodding to the cow, he turned, slid off the stool, and ambled out of the bar.  Whether the rum, the words of the matriarch, or his instincts were the source he had a seed of doubt about Swoon, and she deserved him fixing it.

     He hired a gryphon cart to take him from the guildhouse to the house his father had given him in the woods all those years ago; where the family had lived before Decimal, their grandfather. had been elected to the bronze throne.  The house had good memories - but also the memory of how the metaphoric chain felt when Decimal yanked them back to the big city.  Stupid old bastard wanted his children where he could see them; and his grandchildren too.

     And with Swoon, Hyden, and Evgenija, the good memories were rapidly outnumbering the bad.  But if that was to continue, the doubt the ferret had in his heart needed to be purged again.

     Soon, he was walking up the covered path from the road to the house, stumbling only slightly from the rum.  As the leaf-covered wire gave way to the enormous open yard he'd become familiar with again, he heard something coming out of the windows he hadn't expected: Singing.

     "Bye bye, baby."  It was Swoon's voice, but Domino remembered her abhorring singing.  He plied his ferret skills of sneaking while approaching the house, not to spook her.  "Remember you're my baby wen.... they give you the eye."  The captain spun his false eye to look through the walls with the appropriate rune.  Swoon was alone in the house, and her aura matched what he'd seen last time he saw her.  But it seemed... bigger?  Could auras grow in size, he wondered.  "Although I know that you care, won't you write and declare," Domino knew exactly how to open the kitchen door without making a sound, and from there snuck in.  "That though on the loose, you are still on the square."

     It was Swoon alright, he discovered, dressed in a strapless pink and white polka-dotted sundress, with a white apron over her front; arranging food on a pair of plates, food from several white containers with a black logo Domino knew belonged to a catering service.  The Angel found cooking beneath her, he remembered, and thus it fell to Hyden to prepare meals while Evgenija and Domino were away.  "I'll be gloomy, but send that rainbow to me, then," she continued to sing while fussing over the food on the plates, poking at them with tiny forks until they were in proper alignment.  "My shadows will fly!"

     Domino watched her work so much over a meal for two - had she known he was coming back that day?  Had he caught her before meeting a new boytoy - was it Hyden?!  Doubt and rage mixed, causing his fur to bristle as he watched, preparing to start shouting.

     But then she saw him, and seeing the way she smiled big, her eyes lit up, and her wings perked up; it was like someone punctured a balloon inside the ferret.  All the rage he'd had before melted away.  "Mon petit!"  Abandoning the song and the food, the angel rushed the ferret, picking him up and gripping him close to her chest.  "You come back to me!  And without bleeding this time," the squeeze eventually became a simple hug, which Domino could return partially.

     "Ma belle," the ferret said, hesitantly.  "I... need to apologize."  She held him away from her slightly, confused.  "I... the adventurers in the guild, they allege you kill people.  And I almost believed them!  I came back so soon to talk about it."  Confusion became a stern look from the siamese cat.

     "This the third time you doubt me, petit."  She set him on his feet again, crouching to look him in the eye.  "But is understandable.  Adventurers - they are like a Kebrian gang.  People who are not afraid of them are threats.  They accuse me?  This I accept.  What I do not accept," she reached out to rub her hand under the ferret's chin, "is them trying to take my petit from me with their words."

     "Ma belle, forgive me?"  The ferret looked plaintive at the cat Angel, fearful of losing her to her fickle ways for the third instance of doubt.  Her gaze was firm, narrow-eyed, and set him on edge.  "Please?"  She didn't answer him at first, holding his gaze as if by witchcraft - he couldn't look away if he wanted to.

     "I forgive you petit," Swoon sighed, pulled her hand away and went to the table again, resuming her work.  "Come, sit."  It wasn't hard to determine which seat was his - he needed only look for the booster cushion.  The meal began once Swoon was satisfied with the arrangement enough to remove her apron and pour the wine.  She made a show of pouring less for Domino, giving him a narrow-eyed glare while doing so.

     Through the meal, Domino stole glances at the Angel, trying to see if she truly forgave him, or simply wanted to avoid a confrontation.  Swoon wasn't one to talk while eating, so there was no point in trying to make small talk.  She hadn't even insisted he remove his coat or hat.

     However once the cat was done eating, she stood sharply and sashayed to the living room.  Domino hastily set his utensils down and followed after her - finding her seated on the loveseat, one of her wings arranged for him to sit next to her.  Once he did sit, the cat reached over and took his hat off for him, and plucked at the collar of his coat.

     Once the weather-garb was off, she spoke again.  "I forgive you, petit, one one condition."  The ferret hastily nodded, not minding when the Angel's wing closed in on him to scoot him closer to her.  "You not go to the Adventures, not go to a new ship, not go to big city without me for one year, yes?"

     "Yes," he didn't hesitate.  He couldn't lose Swoon too - just being near her was making it easier to feel.  Easier to forget the painful memories.  He couldn't go back to being alone.  "Anything."  The cat looked down at him for a moment before smiling and turning to face him a bit more.

     "My good mood is back, so I will give you the present I had, even though you doubted me."  Domino tilted his head in confusion.  Instead of getting up, she took his hand in hers, and placed it over her abdomen.

     They stayed like that while the wine and rum slowed down Domino's thoughts.  He likely looked foolish slowly realizing what message the Angel was sending, before looking up at her, alarmed.

     "Yes, petit."  She leaned down to touch his forehead to hers.  "I will not enjoy the later months, or the being fat," she spat the word like it was acid on her tongue, "but this... I will keep.  For you, petit."

     Realization hit him like a Demon punch.  "I... we... a baby." It didn't feel very noticeable in his hand - was it recent?  "How long- ?"

     "After you last come back," her claws came out for a moment around his wrist, "and stayed for only a day.  Two months now."

     "And-"

     "Is a little girl, I went to a doctor just last week to confirm."  Domino grinned wide at the thought, giggling faintly.  "And for one year - is just us.  You agree?"  The giggling rapidly went out of control for the poor ferret, and sudden lightheadedness made him lean over and faint dead away.  The cat sighed, picking the passed-out ferret up and carrying him away to their room.  "Oh petit, you're not going to take the next surprise any better, I think."

     Unseen by the slumbering ferret, one of the cat's primary feathers lengthened out into another hand to open the door and close it behind her.

[ZacAttac21]

Ohhh shiiiiiiiiit.

[Tapewolf]

Oh, that could upset things in an interesting way, since the child is liable to be a ferret.

[Meany]

After ten thousand years, I'm free!

---

Chapter 14: The Orange-Eyed Monster

The Demons of Ti'Baltr had three basic rules, aside from their individual family regulations.

If you want something, take it.
If you hate something, destroy it.
Never be satisfied.

Dosve admitted that there was merit in the creed, even before he had to work with Demons every day, nearly all day.  For understandable reasons, he couldn't quite live by the second rule.  There was a time, about a thousand-odd years back when what he had hated was Ti'baltr, and the three legendary figures that had formed it.  But dragon attacks forced people to change their minds, bury grudges, and work with those that had previously been enemies.

Dosve had gotten his revenge, and considered the matter closed.  Now, his revenge had come back home to change the landscape of his once hated rival state.

Things had been going well for his office, the old generals of the marine corps and naval admirals had been receptive to his pitch, and the blue and orange snow leopard had every reason that they'd finally give him their approval at the next meeting.  The destabilization of Kebre and Kalpakstan progressed according to the CEO's timetable.  Business was good and stood to get better for the Company.

Then, to top it all off, his soon-to-be puppet demon had come to him for a job.

On a friday afternoon, in the sprawling wooden castle that was the Tibalt private residence and TTC headquarters in one, on the fifth floor of the east wing, Dosve sat in his luxurious office, looking over the grounds.  Well, more like floated.  He couldn't actually sit in any of the chairs in the building, or walk on the floors really.  So he had to make use of magic and float an inch or two above every solid surface in the building.

Fortunately, he'd long gotten past the need to eat physical food, or using the building's facilities would be awkward as all heck.

The incubus waited for his sole appointment for the day to show.  A fine layer of dust around his office showed how rarely he had to come in for such things.  It had been a bit awkward to find that his previous secretary had died of old age long ago, with his family collecting the man's paycheck without complaint.  No skin off Dosve's bones, it was Company money, and the Company had entirely too much of it.  A replacement secretary had been a bit annoying to find on short notice, but there were always people in breach of contract who wanted a second chance at being functional members of society.

So, after hours of watching gardeners garden, his new secretary buzzed in on the phone.  "Mr. Bloodstone is here to see you, Mr. Donya."  The elderly woman had been an absolute treat - no one without knowledge of her file would ever guess she had been a pyramid schemer.

"Send him in."  Dosve's cool response came after an appropriate delay to show dominance in the situation.  One of his headwings twitched and the dust coating the office ceased to exist.  Another twitched, and the scent of sandalwood - which had faded from the room centuries ago - perfumed the air.

Moments later, the elaborate glass and sandalwood door to the office opened, and in stepped the young Mr. Bloodstone.  For such a small demon, the suit and tie look almost suited him.  Dosve barely looked in his direction as the hornless ram rose a hand in greeting, and gingerly moved forward to sit in one of the two guest chairs before Dosve's desk.  After a minute of silence, the colorful cat turned his swivel chair around and floated into a standing position to reach across the table.  Hyden hastily stood and shook Dosve's hand.

The boy's grip, from a Demon perspective, was absolutely pathetic.  "I must admit, I didn't think you would come to my office for work when you're not yet out of school."  The two sat down again, crossing one leg over the other, and arranging his fingers into a steeple shape.  "Domino certainly can't have approved of this."

"Well...," the teenage demon struggled to meet and hold Dosve's gaze.  That he would have to fix.  "I'm told that the work in your department is... consistent.  And with the whole rest of my life ahead of me, consistency seems something I would want."

"Not many Demons take that view, when they apply."  Dosve smiled a bit, both pleased with the boy's thought pattern and how charmingly simple his goals were.  "They see 'department of conflict' and think I'll send them off to war within the year."

"But there's so much more to the department," Hyden rushed to volunteer.  "There's guarding the mercantile fleet, reprisal against pirates, and the manufacture and sale of weapons."

"I'm glad that the school I talked Domino into sending you to has paid off.  You're well educated on this matter."  The smile faded from Dosve's face quickly.  "But if this is about the Ister market, I'm afraid I cannot send a young man such as yourself into that hot mess.  If you do meet the requirements for our department, it's far more likely we'll be sending you to Kalpakstan or Kebre - to secure our merchants there."

Hyden nodded, but couldn't hide how his wings visibly sagged in disappointment.  "I know.  But, the only way to get the experience to be able to go there is to get a job and get to work.  I've been in this country for so long, I'm ready and willing to go to work wherever you need me, Mr. Donya."  The two Creatures sat in silence for a moment, before Dosve stood.

"Take my hand, Hyden."  Dosve once more extended his hand, which the ram stood and took.  Orange magic blazed around them like the sun, and when it cleared they were no longer in the lavish office, but a concrete bunker lit with recessed lights.  Hyden was confused for a second before Dosve closed his hand around Hyden's and pulled him behind him down a series of hallways.

Unpleasant noises reached the duo through the halls.  The cries of children and adults, pleas for mercy cut off with magical effects, anguished screams.  Dosve knew Hyden would be watching the corridors as he went, noting the doors with barred windows, but no visible means of opening them.  Eventually, they escaped the endless concrete grey of the corridors, and came out onto a metal catwalk above a gymnasium-sized room.

Dosve released Hyden to stand impassively, and bade the boy to look down.  Below them, the demon saw men, women, children and elders all in orange jumpsuits milling around tables.  Some had trays of food with them, most didn't.  Between them, hulking winged figures layered in plate armor patrolled, trodding on those who didn't make way soon enough.

"This too is the job of the department of conflict.  The men and women in this facility and others work in shifts of ten years."  The incubus float-walked over to Hyden's side, standing almost two heads taller than the ram.  "Ten years of never seeing the sun, never having a day off, never being able to truly relax."  Dosve made Hyden turn to look at him.  "When you say things like, you'll work wherever you're needed, these sort of tasks or worse suddenly become possible.  Never say such a thing to me, or to any department head ever again, do you understand?"

The ram nodded, moving to hold his nose shut.  Dosve had forgotten how bad the smell could get, and created a sphere of purified air around them.

"Good.  Now, I don't think my department is a good fit for you."  From the pocket of his suit, the blue and orange snow leopard produced a card.  "Take this to the department of joy, ask for Denise, and tell them I referred you."  As Hyden was about to take the card, Dosve pulled it away to lean in and bare his teeth.  "And don't you ever do something that gets you put into a place like this, you understand me?"  Traces of genuine fear wormed their way around the demon's mindshield, and he nodded.  The next time, Dosve did not snatch the card away when Hyden reached for it.  In another flare of orange light, the boy was gone.

Slowly, with malevolent purpose, Dosve turned to look down at the mass of prisoners.  Most hadn't bothered to look up, but out of the crowd he picked out two faces directly glaring at him.  Two female demons, heavily pregnant: Oresse and Auriga Bloodstone.  The elder Demon woman was on the verge of tears, but it had no effect on Dosve.  He taunted them by slowly waving goodbye before teleporting away himself.

----

[Tapewolf]

Nice to see this is still going!  Took me a while to remember who was who, though...

[ZacAttac21]

Sweet! The annual Kebre update!

[Merlin]

Yieeee! I love this fanfic, great to see a new chapter!

[Meany]

It's time to conquer Earth!

---
Chapter 15: Bébé talk

Evgenija found herself almost happy to be smelling the sandalwood forest again as she made her way down the dirt road to Domino's home.  Living in Ti'baltr the city in between adventures reminded her of Veldun, but where everyone was acting the fool.  They were Ti'baltic, so foolishness came naturally of course.  But deeper into the Big Island, where Domino lived, and where the small suburb that had been their proper home for years, it reminded her of Home.  The duplex where she and her mother had lived.  The warm and friendly neighbors who made sure no one went hungry, or without fuel for their heaters.

It made sense that the Ti'baltic lord, Domino's father had given the property to him - it was a homely place.  The times when it was just the three of them living out their lives in the wake of their respective tragedies - they seemed far away to Evgenija.  Ten, twenty years ago rather than three.

When she got to the clearing, and advanced on the house she got yet another reminder of how short the time had been: There was Domino moving around the house like he had a purpose once more.  In the few minutes it took her to cross the lawn and approach the porch, she watched the little ferret man dance between a half-dozen odd jobs.  It was like he had purpose beyond needlessly risking his life again.

"Morning ma chère," the ferret man greeted far more enthusiastically than she had last heard.  He didn't pause from quickly running across the floors with a polishing rag, getting them good and shined.  Evgenija found herself smiling just a bit at the scene, but had to act properly.  As she approached the porch stairs, she closed the dark parasol she had brought with her to hold in both hands in front of her, facing down - as Anevka had taught her.

"Good morning, Domino.  You are in an excellent mood."  Joy and sugary energy radiated off him, though the adventurer-level mind shield kept a lid on the emotional broadcast.  She hadn't tasted joy before, and found the taste peculiar.  Sort of... chalky?  Without asking improper questions as to the state of things she entered the home and found her way to the small, for a 'longlegs' like her, nook set aside for breakfast and tea by Domino and Swoon.  Even if Angels did not marry, at least Domino had gotten Swoon to move in shortly after Evgenija'd moved out.  A feminine presence was absolutely necessary.

The kitchen had modernized since she'd left, with more technological or magical devices on the counters, a much larger sink, and several thin metal rods tipped in different colored gems - wands for certain household spells that Hyden had created.  The inventive young ram had tried to pawn off a set to Evgenija, but she politely rebuked him.

She would not give in to the Ti'baltic nature of laziness.  Her work ethic was one of the few purely Kebrian traits she had left, and damn modern convenience if it impeached that.

After evidently finishing his floor polishing, the ferret man made his way to the kitchen to prepare a pot of tea for the two of them.  However, something about the box from which Domino obtained the tea brick.  She squinted, before taking out her reading spectacles and watching it from afar.  Realization hit, and Evgenija recoiled at the information, before hastily making herself proper and putting the spectacles away.

The box was one of Iea Fong's teas - special brews... for pregnant women.  Minimal caffeine, lots of calcium, and enchantments to reduce morning sickness, promote healthy growth and regulate blood circulation.  Swoon had to be pregnant.  Or Hyden had gotten that cow girl who followed around after he and the dog Demon such.  Or both.  But speculation was not a suitable occupation for an adventurer... on her off hours.  Domino soon enough came over to the nook with the tea set, pouring the cups as was required of the homeowner.

Coming over for tea was one of the few ways she could check in on him without appearing improper.  The last thing she needed was Swoon accusing Domino of infidelity.  More often than not, it went by silently - the two communicating by expressions alone.  But on that day, Domino's joy seemed to be positively overflowing as Evgenija started to feel light and happy as well from the jammer effect.

"I'm going to be a father."  Evgenija privately 'aha!'d' to herself while sipping her tea.  Spitting it out in surprise was an unforgivable waste.  The small, scarred ferret had barely touched his own tea - with a lime slice floating therein.

"Congratulations,"  she told him with the joy he was putting out only slightly coloring her sentiments.  With the root cause revealed, Domino started to gush about what was known about the baby thus far.  Swoon was two months along, roughly, and the doctors expected it to be a girl.  Domino was trying to convince Swoon to let him convert one of the guest room into the little girl's room, but so far the Angel had been staunchly resisting it.

"Ma chère, she wants our room to double as the bébé's room as well."  For the first time in the tea period, Domino actually drank some tea, not caring that it seemed to have gone cold.  "But a bébé requires space, and with all Swoon's things the room is so small now."

"She is as much the parent in this situation as you, the two of you must reach a consensus.  Though I do agree a separate space right from the start will do the girl good."  The urge to make a disparaging remark about the destructive nature of ferrets struck Evgenija, but she resisted.

"Oui, there's that.  And...."  Domino looked away while sipping his tea.  "I'll be taking some time off from the adventuring thing, a year or so, to help Swoon as she goes through with this, and to take care of ma bébé."  The lammergeier tilted her head slightly, unsure of why the ferret had been so hesitant to say such a thing that he avoided her gaze.

"I was going to insist on that, even if you did not."  Domino turned to her, legitimately surprised, which prompted a deep sigh from Evgenija.  "My father abandoned my mother while she was pregnant.  Mother mentioned often how difficult it was to raise a child on her own while also working."  The last of Evgenija's tea was drunk before she fixed a stern look down to the ferret.  "You and Swoon love each other, and will surely love this child.  So I insist you be a better father to her than mine was to me."

Tharach had gone without contact from Evgenija since she found out about him.  Kish'Ta indicated she would arrange a meeting at the hidden academy of her species, which Evgenija had no intention of willingly visiting.  The Une'jysune tutor she had used for years was more than sufficient for her applications of 'cubi powers.

Domino responded to Evgenija's stern look with more joy.  He had clearly expected a fight of some sort.  "I... we have not told Hyden yet."  That got Evgenija's surprise.  A quick scan of the minds in the area put the boy and his friends out in the jungle, chasing monkeys again.  "I told you because I needed to tell someone.  Swoon said she respected your discretion enough to share."

"I must remember to thank her, when this becomes public knowledge then."  Domino poured her a second cup of tea, and she indulged in the Ti'baltic gluttony enough to try a lemon slice.  A peculiar flavor, but not unpleasant.  "Of course you know I will be shopping for something to present at the baby shower."  However, that only earned a severely confused expression from the Ti'baltic man.  "The celebration where the mother is given a small party and gifts to care for the baby are given?  Around seven months in?"

"Mais," Domino shrugged.  "That is not the custom in this country.  Certainly, gifts are welcome, but the celebration is so much bigger."  He stood on his seat to gesture widely.  "For small towns like this, such a thing is second only to Mardis Gras, and in the big city it is a party that people will spend weeks preparing for!  Is reason to call the whole extended family together, to forgive grudges, and get your children to beat up your relatives' children."

"That is... certainly extravagant."  Domino nodded emphatically while returning to his seat.

"Children being born in Ti'baltr is rare now.  Is worst among Beings, and Angels I suppose."  Domino sighed, with contentment rather than Evgenija's exasperation.  "Never in all my time sailing did I think... a bébé!  A squirming little thing that will come to hate me when she grows up!"  Evgenija's pocketwatch told her that teatime had passed, so she finished her cup and gracefully stood.

"Thank you for telling me, Domino."  In a moment of weakness, she bent down to hug the ferret as he hopped off his seat.  "This is the happiest I have ever seen you, and it's such a good reason to be happy.  You are going to be a fantastic father."  Hesitant at the display of physical affection, incredibly rare from Evgenija, Domino hugged her back.  And when the moment passed, she exited the home and popped open her parasol while she made her way to the road once more.

"And if you ever make the choice in your many hundreds of years, ma chére," she heard the ferret call to her as she left, "I think you will be a good mother."  The lammergeier paused, turned slightly back to him, and nodded in appreciation before she resumed her walk.  It was a pleasant sentiment, but Evgenija could never see herself as loving a parent as she knew Domino and Swoon would be.  Evgenija was made of knives, and far too sharp for such work.

But it was a good idea to waste time imagining on the long walk back to Ti'baltr.

---
Ti'baltr's population growth has been either 0% or negative figures off and on for hundreds of years - partly the fault of their obtuse citizenship laws which cannot be changed without a majority of the branches of government, only one of which has an incumbent king.  So the people make a bit of a fuss when a birth does happen.

Just a bit.

[Meany]

Significantly shorter than my usual standard, but I'm hoping that the character interactions are worth it.
---
Chapter 16: Treetalk

To celebrate Renet passing her assignment after working so hard, the three amigos went monkey-hunting.  After three years of trying, Tyrone and Renet had both managed to catch monkeys on more than one occasion, but Hyden couldn't do it.  They all agreed to not use magic, and really magic was all Hyden had in terms of advantages.

The ram's wings were still too small to fly, so he had to hop between the branches of trees in pursuit of the primates.  Compensating for his target suddenly shifting direction had landed him in more than one tangle that he required assistance to escape.  "You know," Tyrone said while pulling the smaller demon out of a tree trunk with no visible effort, "I'm starting to think it's not just you being a wuss.  Me and Renet have been scrapping with you on the regular and you haven't gotten any stronger."

Renet sat on a branch, observing Tyrone physically tossing Hyden like a sportsball while she let her captured monkey escape.  "Iunno, it's sort of cute."  The dog Demon blew a raspberry at her.  "Hey, it's not often that I get to be the second strongest."

Hyden found a bird's nest in the tree Tyrone had thrown him into, and tossed that at the dog in turn.  It landed right between the dog demon's horns, and soon thereafter Tyrone found himself attacked by the bird parents, causing him to slip and fall down to the forest floor.

"Vengeance!"  Hyden fist pumped, and resumed the chase for his monkey.  After so long of being weak, he sort of expected it to continue.  Rather than wait for physical strength to blossom, he focused on magical aptitude and his hope to go into the TTC merchant business.  "And hey, since I don't have horns, I can't get birds or shirts stuck in them."  Renet looked away, slightly embarrassed as Tyrone cried foul while still being attacked by birds.

"So, how'd the job interview go?"  Renet waited until the monkey chase brought Hyden back to her seat to bring it up.  The ram, out of breath, gestured with a thumbs down.  "Oh, that sucks.  You could always try again in a year or so?"

"It wasn't that.  Mr. Donya didn't think the department was a good fit for me, so he sent me over to the department of joy."  Renet's face positively lit up, however Tyrone made a disgusted noise as he casually lept the full distance between the duo's branches and the forest floor.

"Let me guess, they got you working in candy-making or something?"  Renet charlie-horsed Tyrone's leg as he strutted along her branch.  "Ow!  Hey, I'm just saying if you had to work somewhere, why would you work with those sugar-lumps?"

"Well, actually, yeah." Hyden rolled over to look at the sky through the foliage above.  "I'll be operating a stand at Mardis Gras this year, selling stuff from across the ocean.  Some of it is this really weird type of cake that looks like it's made from water."  While the Being oohed over the mental image, Tyrone scoffed.  "The department head gave me a bunch of the merchandise I'm going to sell because she wants me to be able to answer customer questions.  Stuff like, how to clean the rice cooker.  What about you two?"  Hyden rolled onto his side to address them.  "How'd your job interviews go?"

The entire thing was part of the high school's general education course.  If they kept their GPA above a certain threshold, they could file for an appeal to meet with major employers for small jobs that could become full time employment when they graduated.

Tyrone puffed out his chest and spread his wings wide, clearly proud of himself.  "I'm going into the Navy, and my recruiter's already got something lined up for me.  I hope it's a ship of the line."  The dog Demon did a little dance on the branches, excited at the idea.

"I'm not going to be getting a job after I graduate."  Renet sighed a bit and shrugged.  "Once my education is done, I'll be going home to act as a teacher for younger members of my hometown, and help them make sense of how life is on the Big Island."  That caused Hyden to droop a bit.  He still hadn't talked to her about... feelings yet.  "Not many Amazons get to spend as much time as I have with city-folk.  Usually you have to become an adventurer to even see Ti'baltr proper."

"So after you graduate, you'll head off to another island and we won't see you again?"  Somehow, Hyden's question seemed to suck the fun right out of his friends, who drooped as he had previously.

"Well," Renet fiddled with her fingers while avoiding the ram's gaze.  "If either of you have daughters you want to dedicate to the Mother, you can come see me then.  Or if you marry into the Amazons, but you'd have to stick to either your wife's house or a really small section of town."

"Or," Tryone cut in kicking a tree trunk to send branches, other birds nests, and a monkey down from the top section.  He caught the monkey by the tail and easily killed it by smacking it into the trunk.  "You can become a Spartan, and fight with Amazons over ancient ruins from when they were in charge."  Renet went absolutely red in the face, and charlie-horsed Tyrone again.

"That's really insensitive, you jerk!"  Hyden said nothing but gave her a look of clear confusion while Tyrone laughed his dog butt off.  She sighed and launched into exposition.  "The Spartans and my sect of Amazons were natives to the island before the Demons and Angels started fighting over this place.  The Amazons had a lot less territory than the Spartans at the time, but they lost that as the Creatures came in.  They lost their last big city back when Ti'baltr started expanding."  The cow looked off in the distance, a pitying look in her face.  "They'd had nothing but a few camps for hundreds of years now.  About ten years ago, they tried to take back one of their city's ruins, and... it didn't go well."

"The Amazons and Marines wiped them out."  Tyrone dodged out of the way of another charlie-horse, unhinged his jaw and swallowed his monkey kill whole.  "Ech, still so gamey.  Anyway!  A couple hundred Spartans went in, and tried to get their city back, the Amazons had been using it as a training ground and fought them off.  Then the Marines caught the Spartans in behind and pinched them from both sides.  No survivors!"

"Which the elders were really angry about.  Those Spartans tried to surrender, but the Marines have a mandatory rule of 'no quarter' - and if the Amazons tried to protect them the Marines would wipe us out too.  At least they didn't go off into the jungle hunting their camps down, so maybe they'll recover."

Hyden went back to the scene Dosve had showed him of the prison his department operated.  Would the families of those men who took up arms against Ti'baltr be made prisoners, guilty by association?  The rich country's government, he started to see more and more, didn't play nice with non-citizens.  However, something caught his attention.  Because he hadn't moved in a long time, a monkey had dared come a bit too close.  If he timed it right, Hyden could leap and -

The branch Hyden had been laying on creaked, spooking the monkey, so he had to act sooner than he'd wanted.  With his thin wings to give him extra lunge distance, Hyden propelled himself diagonally upward to catch the primate.  For a second, it looked like he'd make the catch, so he flicked out his claws.

However he ended up soaring face-first into a thick branch that stopped his forward momentum.  The force of his impact drove his face into the branch - so that he hung there for a moment before gravity pulled him out and down to the forest floor.  "Good attempt!"  Tyrone called from on high.  "But next time plan out your route in advance!"  Hyden hit him with a summoned snowball, which sent the tropical dog sputtering and stumbling backwards until he fell down too, not far from Hyden.  "Foul!"

"Well, if we're coming down, I'll jump too.  Look out below!"  Neither demon had the speed necessary to escape Renet jumping down, and using their bodies to soften her landing.  "Oh wow, I didn't feel a thing, thanks guys!"  All she got in reply was indistinct pained sounds.
---
To clarify, Spartans are a male-only group, counterparts to the Amazons.  Unlike the Amazons, they never gained world-wide popularity and became a regional force.

[Tapewolf]

Hyden seems to have a largely Being mentality as far as I can make out - I wonder what his breaking point is, regarding the seedy underbelly of Ti'baltr's government.  At what point he'd rather go somewhere less... evil.

[Meany]

Though it is unlikely Kalpakstan will be featured in the fic under the current timeline, the unfortunate reality is that there are no 'good' governments in the world.  Hyden's also in a unique position to make the Ti'baltic government decidedly less evil, partly because of that mindset.  It's why Isarra picked him over Oresse and Auriga.

Reminds me, if anyone in the audience cares, it is currently 1949 by the Zinvth calendar.  By the time of Mardis Gras, it will be 1950.

[Tapewolf]

Though it is unlikely Kalpakstan will be featured in the fic under the current timeline, the unfortunate reality is that there are no 'good' governments in the world.

Yeah, 'good' was a stretch.  Less evil was really what I was thinking in terms of.

[Meany]

See, what I was doing with the past few chapters of lighthearted character interaction and general hopeful tone was winding up for this.

--
Chapter 17: Shot through the Heart

At some point, Domino had fallen asleep.  It was the first time in a long time that he hadn't needed his medicine to sleep - though he could not quite remember if he'd taken any.  The bottle wasn't anywhere in view when he woke up, however.  The thing he did notice was his choker being missing from his neck.  What followed was a panicked few minutes as he undid all the bedding, took the pillowcases off the pillows, and moved the mattress around to try and find it.

"Ma petit."  Domino stopped at Swoon's voice, and emerged from a pile of sheets and blankets to look at her standing in the doorway.  Starlight filtered in through the ceiling light behind her, contrasting with her orange and pink colors, as well as her lavender house robe.  She looked... sad.  "Why is it you are so afraid of this shape?"  She went to the dresser, opened the topmost drawer, and produced the choker from therein.  Hastily, Domino lept for it, and rapidly put the enchanted item back on.

The slit pupil vanished, his fur became one solid color, his teeth lost serration, and his belly was no longer covered in overlapping scales.  Swoon sighed, then moved to the bed, and patted for Domino to join her.  "What if this little girl comes into the world resembling you?  Will you love her not?"  Domino refrained from answering for a long time - but Swoon had nothing but time to wait for an answer it seemed.

"I will love you until the moon goes from the sky," he told her.  "I will love our girl until I am dust.  But that... thing is not me."  He gestured to the solid brown fur, his one good eye, and his mundane colored fur and hair.  "This is me.  This is the me I wish i was - not... that."

"That shape does not seem awful to me.  I look at it and still see you, petit."  She held his face in her hands.  "But I ask you again... if our girl comes out like you, would you love her?"  He thought he had answered the question, but clearly not to Swoon's satisfaction.

"I... yes.  I would love her even if she came out as a rock."  Swoon actually laughed at that, released his face, and fell backward onto the mattress.  Domino stood up on the mattress to do the same, his short height making it the only way to be in the same distance inward as Swoon, and the extra oomph bouncing the two of them.  It seemed to him that Swoon was happy with him again, and he could be happy with that.

"Years ago," Swoon started while opening the skylight with magic.  "You and I were beneath the stars, I think it was on... Whormcheft Island?"  Domino nodded to her when she looked over for confirmation.  "Such lovely grapefruit they have there.  And I asked you to give me your heart - and we would be together always."  The memory came back to Domino.

With no means of income, he'd had to join the Company fleet for work, which meant he'd be away for months at a time.  It made the romance with Swoon all the greater, for passion would build for months while they exchanged letters. And when he came home, she would greet him at the docks.  Everyone with an eye for women on the Contiguous, Hatchet Job, and When Suddenly was envious of Domino when they saw Swoon.  But after so long, he got promotions.  And then a ship.

"Even though I could not give you my heart then, I loved you."  Swoon smiled up at the stars while Domino looked at her.  "Why are you bringing this up now?"  She looked at him, then rolled onto her side - and placed a hand on his chest.

"You will fade... and die long before I or our girl grow a single grey hair.  I cannot abide this."  There was emotion in Swoon's voice - like she was on the verge of crying.  "I ask you again, Domino Ti'balt: give me your heart, and we will be together always."  Three years ago, he had wanted this.  In a way, Swoon had given him what he wanted even though it hadn't been as quick as he'd hoped for.  The sorrow that had consumed him as recently as a few days ago seemed decades past - but here was the offer he'd desperately wanted.  Though he had always thought it meant a proposal of pseudo-marriage?  The way Swoon was speaking, it seemed they were different things.

Domino rested his hand on hers, and met her gaze with determination he hadn't felt since the days of the Harridan.  "I give you my heart, Swoon."  She actually did start crying then, and he smiled to try and cheer her up.  The Angel got up onto her elbow, and Domino assumed it was some romantic gesture, and moved to do the same for whatever she had in mind when-

CRUNCH.

It felt like she had shoved him, at first.  Then his brain tried to process the pain, and it hurt so bad Domino cried out.  He looked down, and saw Swoon's hand, previously resting on his chest now... inside his chest.  He struggled to process the image when he felt her fingers move and grasp at something inside him - he didn't know what but it was the worst pain he'd ever felt.  Then all at once, the pain stopped.  Perhaps it was shock, he couldn't tell, but he clawed at the mattress and tried to worm his way out from under Swoon's hand - but she had him pinned.

Her face hadn't changed from the joy she had expressed on his assent, evidently, to this.  Domino tried to speak, but in vain.  Fortunately for him, the whole situation was rendered moot by Swoon removing her hand forcefully from his chest - taking his heart with it.

--

Evgenija woke with a start, to sirens blaring.  In an unreasonable state of undress, she hurried from bed to the window to see what the commotion was about.  In the distance, she could see the wooden castle of the Ti'balt family sinking into the ground, a household-wide bunker she'd heard.  However the sirens did not come from there - they came from the old fort that the adventurer's guild occupied.  Spotlights from the perimeter walls shone upward onto the clouds, and flares were going up.  Each was a unique way of visually confirming an emergency - though only the flares she recognized, for the Veldun guild used that method.  Three red, to indicate an adventurerer slain, two yellow to indicate it happened close to the city, and one blinding white to mean soul destruction had occurred.

Sleepiness forgotten, Evgenija hastened to her wardrobe to change.  As was required of an adventurer, she had multiple outfits prepared for such occurrences.  Her night stalking outfit, dark blue to blend in with the night, would suffice for her purposes.  When she got out to the street, she saw dozens of local adventurers either as prepared as her, or still getting dressed but all hastening to the guildhall.

Guildmaster Arran stood at the top of the stairs, while a crowd gathered in the courtyard.  Torches were the main light, as the spotlights had to remain active to let more distant adventurers know of the peril.  "One of our brothers has been struck down!"  Arran was a war-scarred kangaroo, in brigandine armor with a double bearded poleaxe acting as a walking stick while he paced the landing.  His voice carried the length and breadth of the courtyard without assistance.  "Struck down in the worst way imaginable.  His soul destroyed, and made into food for some wretched Creature longing to live a little longer."  Spears and swords were brandished by the adventurer-mob.  Evgenija held her head higher, but refused to participate in such displays of barbarism.

She spied Zoos and Aina hastily making their way into the courtyard and moved through the crowd to stand with them.  As team leader, they would look to her for tasks and guidance.  "Hear you now the name of the fallen, that you bear it with you when a murderer pleads for mercy, when a rapist begs forgiveness!"  The one criticism of Arran that Evgenija would ever bring against him was the way he worked his adventurers into an angry mob in such times.  But when someone's soul had been destroyed, could she really blame him?

"Domino Ti'balt!  Our king's son!"

Everything went quiet for a moment, Evgenija lost the ability to differentiate colors while she parsed what had been said.  It was like the ground had fallen out from under her, like a stone had trapped her and she couldn't breathe.

It was like hearing her mother being murdered behind her all over again.

She came back to reality when Zoos nudged her.  The crowd was staring, and Arran pointing at her.  "I understand not being able to understand," the Guild Master told her as he walked down the stairs.  From around his mind shield, she glimpsed a few scenes of lost friends, and felt he truly understood.  "But you cannot allow that to keep you from action!."  He moved through the crowd to stand before her.  Despite being imposing, he was actually a bit shorter than Evgenija.  "You know where Domino lived - lead us there, that we can investigate, and see justice done."

She still felt like she was floating over a great abyss, even as she, Zoos, and Aina led over two thousand adventurers down the roads, to the jungle, and then the paths toward Domino's house.  Evgenija decided long, long before they got the jungle that when they arrived, she would be the one to question Hyden.

She couldn't trust the mob not to kill the young demon out of principle, and Domino would never forgive her.

---
I've had that scene in mind for literal years.  All the way back to Domino's first appearance.  This chapter was also the one that prompted me to put the age rating in the title.

*Bon Jovi intensifies*

[Tapewolf]

Eww.  I hope they're jumping to conclusions there.  Taking his soul as a keepsake like Aary pondered doing with Merlitz is a bit more understandable than "I love you so much I'm going to make you cease to exist entirely".  On the other hand that is ascribing humanoid attitudes to Creatures.

[Meany]

Well, she does have a handy soul jar to keep it in.  One he even said she could take!