Tama made three conclusions the moment he entered.
One was that this place was less than ideal for a meeting. The place looked like it was practically abandoned. Also, it smelled like urine and at least one dead rat. No… make that multiple dead rats. The bad thing about his cat form was that his sense of smell was a bit too good for the places this team liked to meet.
Two was that he’d never seen Faustite like this before. He seemed mad and violent and quite powerful dragging around the senshi like a dog. But, also, he seemed to honestly want a better solution than he was capable of by himself. He had asked for creative advice, after all.
Three was that the senshi was undoubtably attractive. Very attractive.
“Well, I’d definitely say don’t murder him. Also, I’m not sure there is a rule against hurting him — and you know I’ve read the rules. And, while I’d love to see him use his magic with all you’ve all said about it, for some reason our General doesn’t want that. What did he do to you, my General, I wonder?”
Tama was as playful as ever as he paced in his cat form. He’d never seen Faustite like this and he liked it. He wanted to play with him more. But, then, this senshi was just so interesting that he’d give up his opportunity to goad the flame General more.
The Mauvian’s violet eyes gleamed and he transformed into his human form and got uncomfortably close to Murikabushi. He looked him straight in the eye now that they were the same size.
“Your magic. It’s not garbage. No senshi magic is useless.”
He glanced back at Faustite.
“I think I have a plan for him, General, if I may elaborate?”
The notion that Reiki could have also learned a bunch of Negaverse operatives’ civilian faces had not occurred to the Mirror senshi at all. For one thing, he’d assumed that the “we” had only included himself and Sharp-Dressed Ma’am—he didn’t know her life; how could he know if she had enough room in her apartment for this entire coterie of Chaos-tainted weirdos?—and for another, he……had assumed that he would be the only one powering down. Which he might have admitted made no sense as any kind of assumption, had it occurred to him to question himself at all.
Probably came from the same part of his little coconut head that had decided Dark Mirror senshi obviously couldn’t purify and join the White Moon because of reasons that he hadn’t explicated to anyone because some part of him realized that they made no sense and desperately wanted to avoid admitting that.
Unfortunately for Reiki’s ability or willingness to question his basic assumptions, though, he finally got an answer about what he’d actually done, and………oh.
Starseed addiction………that was a thing, apparently? People ate them? But……those were living souls. Destroying them like that surely had to remove them from samsara, but distinctly not in the same sense that reaching Nirvana did.…… Reiki’s guess was only that, but from how it had felt, having his own starseed ripped out, destroying a starseed sounded like it probably obliterated that soul entirely.……
……and people in the Negaverse <******** *ATE* them?! Often enough to get addicted and use deadpan threats as an obvious coping mechanism?
And Reiki had…… His magic had…… His magic that he had used, making it his choice and therefore his fault…… Who should take the blame: the bullet (his magic), the gun (the gesture and incantation used to summon it), or the idiot who’d pulled the trigger and told himself that everything would probably be fine?
Dimly, Reiki wished that the unimpressed look he fixed on Phoenix Force had anything to do with nerve on his part. It didn’t. Far more based in Reiki trying to just shut down, all in the hopes that he wouldn’t lose himself to tears for a second time tonight (and doing far from his best job, turbulent emotions betrayed in vivid neon lights between his pallor, the nauseated tightening of his jaw, and stricken, guilty look in his eyes). Pathetic.
“Would that bring back any of the others,” Reiki deadpanned back, not asking a question because there wasn’t one. Since when had “a life for a life” actually worked for anyone? All it did was create an endless cycle of violence and retribution until everyone involved forgot what the fighting had started for.
Not that saying so made Reiki feel any better. Didn’t make him feel worse, either—but did leave him feeling like……Phoenix Force’s sudden change in behavior was the only reason he wasn’t on a one-way track to another meltdown. All of a sudden, he was……defending Reiki? After a fashion, at least? He told Hot Lips Albite to back off and clarified that he, Phoenix Force, had been the one to ask for a demonstration of Reiki’s magic, and reminded his team that Reiki hadn’t known at the time what his magic actually did?
This…… Was this a mind-game? It had to be, right? Some sort of good cop, bad cop thing where both cops were the same person and he’d summoned an audience out of some……pent up yearning to be a Theatre Kid™️? ********, Reiki didn’t know.……
Well, he knew that everyone else here had a much better handle on their role as universe-assigned villains than he did, even seemed to enjoy it—though at least one of them, Sharp Dressed Ma’am, took a far more practical approach than the others.…… That, and Phoenix Force didn’t like him, which only made sense. No matter what he said about Reiki’s magic, it was only about utility, how useful Phoenix Force would find the monster, nothing about Reiki himself, who he was, or the person he tried to be.
Obviously, nothing else lurked beneath any of this. Phoenix Force had said, quite clearly, that he didn’t like Reiki. His behavior, likewise, said that he didn’t like Reiki. Maybe something about hauling Reiki around and humiliating him like this soothed Phoenix Force’s nerves—because the one of them who had claim to be literally flaming did. not. like. Reiki. Easiest math in the universe. Fair enough, too. Reiki had triggered him into a relapse and generally lived with the sort of bombast that made most people either love him or hate him. Since Phoenix Force did not do the latter………thus ergo therefore.
Sometimes, people just didn’t like you. It wasn’t that complicated.
With a sigh that very much wondered why he was still here if it wasn’t in the name of penance—how? why? what?! that’s so clearly the point, but……?—Reiki looked over at the Mauvian. Because of course this team had their own Mauvian. His little pep-talk was simultaneously almost adorable and almost tragic. Either way, it made Reiki shake his head.
“Don’t know if you missed this part, Neko-sama,” he explained, “but the problem isn’t that my magic is useless. Thought that was the problem. Was very, very wrong. At this point, useless would be an upgrade over ‘so utterly horrific that simply having it makes me a monster.’”
Part of Reiki wanted to add protests that his powers had to be evil, couldn’t be anything but evil, all they did was cause harm to others when Reiki had followed Levi to the Mirror under the assumption that he’d ever get to help anybody……but, well. Negaverse audience. Read the room. Arguing in favor of the inherent sanctity of life seemed unlikely to go over well with this crowd.
But truly: Reiki had wanted so badly to be a magical girl……and he’d awakened with magic that could drive a recovering addict to devour and permanently destroy the crystals that housed every living soul. If that didn’t make him a monster, then what the ******** did?
See. Someone in this room knew to show the Mauvian some proper respect.
He’d love to indulge the man’s insecurities around the whole Faustite eating starseeds thing. But he honestly had nothing helpful to say on the matter. He didn’t particular like that Faustite had consumed some poor sad sack’s soul like it was a light after dinner snack. Part of it still make his stomach churn.
Some unfortunate side affect of having once been of the White Moon. The Dark Mirror was good to stay away from their kind. They lacked discipline.
And if Tama hadn’t at least learned to occasionally bow to higher powers, he surely wouldn’t still be alive. He hoped Murikabushi understood that much.
“Horrific? I’ve never seen senshi magic that was truly horrific. Dangerous? Yes. Undisciplined? Certainly. But never horrific.”
The Mauvian smiled a toothy grin at him.
“Just having magic does not make one a monster.”
Perhaps this one needed therapy as well as training.
"You wouldn't have to give up your identity, if that makes the offer any more enticing," she said with a small shrug, because she could see where that might not be the most appealing option for someone who was surrounded by the equivalent of slavering dogs. "We could go to a park or a late night cafe, stay in uniform, pull everything up on a laptop connected to a phone hotspot."
They could get into debates about which series was the best. Maybe he'd even talk her into watching the newer ones. It sounded like a decent way to spend an evening, certainly better than whatever was going on here.
Now the others were asking about ways to put him to use, which was arguably slightly better than the other options. Jadarite still wasn't sure she liked it, considering he was Dark Mirror, and that meant he required diplomacy, not orders. He wasn't a Lieutenant.
The fact that he'd triggered some kind of starseed addiction in Faustite didn't change that fact. It was unfortunate, yes,because she had a feeling that admission was going to turn the others even more feral, and also because starseed-addicted officers were not as effective, but still.
Diplomacy. Relationships. Infiltration. It wouldn't do any good for people to start losing their heads at him.
"Of course, if even that's too much, we can skip the show entirely," she said. "You can just leave. Nobody is stopping you. They want you to go. Just remember," she tilted her head first at Murikabushi, then at Faustite, and she clicked her tongue once. "Slowly walk away."
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Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2022 4:25 pm
"No," Faustite answered matter-of-factly. "What's dead is dead." Rebirth cycle broken, they were dead forever — no different than how people thought of themselves before getting involved in the war. How that became such a complicating affair never failed to surprise him.
"But you don't listen to me, so what does it matter what the answer is?" He shot the boy a lidded stare before he simply had enough of hauling the boy around. Leaving him to stand on his own, Faustite paced toward the rest, and joined Albite's side. Beckoning for Albite to stoop down a margin, he muttered up at the boy's ear, going on in a few clipped sentences about how the boy was cute, yet troublesome. And while Faustite was still at a loss for what to do with him, he was inclined to let Jadarite handle the rest.
Jadarite was smart, smooth, and generally, people lived when she was around.
Tama joining them, however late, was itself a surprise. That he taunted Faustite, however, was not a surprise. Faustite leveled an exasperated look in the cat-boy's direction, stifling further response by clenching his lengthy nails into his palms. And while Tama was right about lacking a hard and fast rule against destroying this one Basic Dark Mirror Senshi, it was generally assumed to be poor form to start a second front to an already stagnated war.
At first, Faustite hesitated to give Tama the time of day. The feline was ever out to give him a terrible time. As far as he was aware, Tama had bonded with no one — the cat lived simply for torment. He spared Murikabushi a last look, as if sizing him up for anything Tama might have on offer. Then he replied with a succinct "Elaborate."
Jada was right that no one was stopping Murikabushi, but he would have a hell of a time walking out without assistance. They would have time to hear Tama's plans, he was sure.
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Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2022 4:52 pm
"Fair enough." He stated at the dismissal of the idea. It had been a bit extreme considering the balancing act with the court they needed to maintain, but Faustite had asked for creative thoughts. Throw into the mix that Helio hadn't been sure of the full extent of why this was all going down. It had felt so abrupt leaving the battle and dropping this mirror senshi here. There's been no real reason or pretense for it.
But puzzle pieces were beginning to fit into place. The picture wasn't whole, and not all the pieces were found, but something was taking shape. Oddly enough, some of this looked terribly familiar to Helio.
"Are you purposely trying to get us to hurt you?" He questioned allowed to the senshi of Hunger. "Use us to help you get over your intense feelings of guilt or hatred of yourself?" Helio could have sympathized once upon a time if that was exactly what this guy was attempting to do. "Because if that's not your intent, you're doing a piss poor job of getting yourself out of it." He nodded towards the sensible Jada. "She just gave you the best of offers right there. A nice easy way to just walk away."
He paused, crossing his arms over his chest as he rotated so his entire back now rested against the cool, dusty wall. "Here's a novel idea. With this magic of his, he could actually be a decent asset to the team if a bit of an unorthodox member."
Helio turned his attention away from their talkative friend to Faustite who had finally relinquished his prize to stand for himself. After all, this came down to his decision in the end. Tama had been called up to voice his thoughts, and Helio was curious to see that the feline had to stay. Still, he pushed off of the wall, with a wince, to join Faustite at Albite's side. "So, we don't want to piss off his court by hurting him in any way, but he somehow keeps turning up. Why not just let him hang around then? He has abilities that none of us have with him being a dark mirror senshi. His magic obviously is strong and could be incredibly useful to have on our side." His voice was low, but easily could be heard in such a tiny space.
Gold eyes shifted back to Murikabashi. "You'd get a team to help watch your back in return. He can learn he's not some sort of monster with that magic of his."
Helio glanced over at Tama and smiled. "Knowing out bright Mauvian over there, he's on the same page. We can't hurt you in anyway without worrying about your court taking offense. This makes sens." He glanced from Tama, their every sassy ball of white fur, to Faustite to gauge the reaction of their illustrious leader.
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Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2022 5:12 pm
“Heliodor has the right idea. Have this one join the team. Unconventional? Yes. But you did want creative solutions.”
He didn’t think Faustite would like this idea.
And he certainly wasn’t sure Murikabushi would like it, either.
“I will train you how to use your magic. Properly. Perhaps, I can even show you how to control the hunger.”
He looked over to Faustite for approval. If he was going to show the senshi how to exercise control, he would do the same. If his superior officer did not permit him to, he’d let the Dark Mirror leave.
Dark eyebrows rose when Faustite spoke, relaying what had happened when the other had used his magic. Had they been fighting, that he’d used it on the general? Faustite didn’t seem angry at him, really, just… exasperated? Starseed adiction… It explained some things, and made him distinctly uncomfortable at the same time. That feeling, he shoved down and under a rock, determined not to think about it.
Thankfully, he was shooting down suggestions to hurt the dark mirror, and from the talk, he was just… trying to figure out what to do with the guy. Why he had to do anything with him, Fafnir had no idea, but it seemed important. Suggestions about adding him as an unofficial member of the team was not a bad idea, either, though the young woman’s suggestion about… Star Trek, was sort of lost on him for how useful that would be. It was at least better than torturing him. They were still supposed to be keeping okay terms with the Dark Mirror, and as someone mentioned, it was not a good idea to ******** around with their people.
Self-torturing… Fafnir watched as the cat arrived and took an interest in the boy, an unease creeping over him as he transformed and his signature blasted over his senses. As Faustite stepped away from him, the corrupt drifted forward.
“He seems like he needs support that he’s not getting.” He said, inclining his head at Faustite. “Maybe you should contact his superiors and turn him over to them. I don’t have much personal experience with their structure, but maybe he’s simply fallen through the cracks. He could get the help from them that he should have been getting, and they can take care of him.” And if he was being a nuisance, they could deliver whatever sort of reprimand that court did with it’s people, without them risking an incident.
He passed by the Mauvian and offered a hand out the stranger, his smile warm and well practiced. He didn't crowd him, or try to block him off from the others, the out-stretched hand held casually, rather than demandingly.
“I’m Fafnir. And I also think working with us could be a very good thing for you, if you’re interested. I think there are a lot of benefits we could offer each other, as well as mutual support.”
There were a lot of ways he could see someone in the Dark Mirror Court being useful. He did quite like that suggestion, if they could get this guy to go for it.
Having been freed of Phoenix Force’s grip and apparent desire to jerk him around in some ridiculous Walk of Shame, Reiki gladly stopped pacing around. Put some distance between himself and the others too, going to lean against one of the walls. Sure, it was dirty and gross in here, and it reeked the way he imagined every charnelhouse room in Silent Hill would smell—but compared to the Blights, the relatively normal disgusting nonsense was almost a comfort. Besides, his fuku would clean itself up when he got home and powered down, whereupon he could just……make tea, put on his playlist of Fiona Apple, Florence and the Machine, and Hole until he didn’t feel so totally disgusted with simply being himself.
……Probably, he needed to eat something, too. He hadn’t done that before going out, meeting Kerberos, and going to the old subway station to fight the Blights. Crossing his arms didn’t do much to make him feel safer, nor more protected against these people.…… These people who, no matter how free and powerful they acted, were ultimately bound in service to the Negaverse. To Metallia, the horrific thing at the center of it all. The one who would drain Earth dry of every resource, human or otherwise, until the whole world met its destruction and she ******** off to repeat the process on another world. Nothing they said could be trusted. Maybe they didn’t even mean to be untrustworthy—maybe they meant literally any of this genuinely—but you couldn’t trust the ******** Negaverse, point blank, period, end of discussion.
“Was under the impression that I was taken here for punishment,” Reiki told the Outer Space Slut-Ninja. More dramatically than necessary, he waved a hand in the direction of the walking furnace. “Thought he wanted retribution and……okay? Fair enough? Doesn’t matter that it was an accident; I ******** up, it ******** him up, wreaked havoc that I don’t know the specifics of, but I have ideas, and whatever harm it did to all of you and someone you obviously care about? Yes, I thought the point here was you taking your shots and……I mean, I spoke up about how I’m not stalking General Phoenix Force, but I think it’s fair on my part to only want to be held accountable for things I actually did.”
Reiki shrugged. What else could he say that wouldn’t have been pointless repetition? Honestly, what was so weird and apparently difficult for these people to understand about someone knowing that they did something wrong and thinking that……okay, maybe violence wasn’t ideal, maybe it wasn’t what he wanted, but it [would have] made sense enough that his captors wanted blood and if he’d expected anyone to care about what he wanted, then maybe, Reiki shouldn’t have thrown his magic around so carelessly in the first place?
Was Reiki glowering? Yeah, a bit. Did he look like a particularly sullen kitten? Probably. But how else was he supposed to look, with these people talking to him like they were? (Sharp-Dressed Ma’am wasn’t being so bad, he guessed, but ultimately, that only made her more suspicious.)
Maybe these specific representatives of the Negaverse weren’t directly responsible, but on the whole, the Negaverse were the people whose bullshit had made people like Anser and Kurma willing to treat Reiki like a criminal for trying to help, like magical girls were supposed to do. The people who’d dragged sweethearts like Monoceros and Lysithea into their ranks against their wills, took advantage of a ******** kid’s downturned luck to recruit Amsvartnir and trick him into joining them, and exploited the pain and grief and anguish that Kerberos had experienced in order to make him believe he’d made a choice and therefore didn’t deserve redemption. The people who’d sold their souls to help destroy the planet and kill everyone living here—just like Chaos had done to Daphne’s planet, and to Fang’s, and so many other worlds besides—all so they could……what? Piss off Mom and Dad? Get back at the kids who’d doused them in pig’s blood on prom night? Watch the world burn for the sheer ******** delight of it, then crown themselves sovereigns over the gods-forsaken ashes?
Reiki might have been a Chaos rat. His powers might have made him a monster and a universe-assigned camp queer villain. He might have been tainted by the Black Mirror, stuck in its grip forever because purification was only a thing for Negaverse senshi. But what these people offered him, now? Trying to recruit him into their little gang? A chance to compromise everything about himself so he could be in these people’s debt until they got bored and stabbed him in the back? Just—all of <******** <******** not.
With all due respect (meaning none): <********> this.
Except not really because this might have enjoyed such an intimate experience, and the last thing Reiki wanted was for this to get any such pleasure.
He’d endured too many rounds of “Oh, wow, the pretty, popular girls really want to be your friends! For real this time!! Haha, just kidding, and now everyone at school knows your aunt tried to make you buy her tequila and didn’t even give you a fake ID!!!” to go through it again, as an adult, with such significantly higher stakes.
“Nice offer, Fire And Blue’d,” he said, regarding the senshi dolled up like a slutty dragon (Fafnir, apparently; cute, Norse-sounding name). “All of you, really, but……” Shaking his head, Reiki pushed off the wall enough to curtsy. “Thank you for your consideration,” he drawled, “but you’ll need to find a different weapon to keep up your sleeve. Best of luck with that.”
Turning on his heel, Reiki headed for the door. There had to be a mirror around here somewhere. Time to do what he should have done back at the subway station—what General Phoenix Force allegedly wanted him to do, despite having kidnapped Reiki to this Silent Hill-hole, wherever it was—and <********. off. home.
As soon as he was out of here, he could feel proud of himself for not attaching a gratuitous cassez-vous or shinjimae.
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Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2022 7:14 pm
"Wasn't saying to torture him," Pax muttered, snippishly, almost too quiet to be heard, "just that it's - it's an option, why do I care," and trailed off, readjusting their headphones again to have something to do with their hands - if they pushed in the sides, this morass of bickering voices just melted into soft-edged noise, and that was better. But they probably should have been listening, so they only did that for no more for thirty seconds, and then started paying attention again.
It seemed so weird to them, really. If hurting him or whatever wasn't an option, why did it matter?? Just ignore him. But obviously they didn't really have all the context, anyway. It seemed like a weird relationships thing in general, now that they were paying more attention, and historically Pax had just never understood those very much.
"If you hate yourself," they muttered, vaguely in Murikabushi's direction, "do that in - do that in private, it's not supposed to be anyone - anyone else's business." It was still quiet enough to be easily lost, because there were too many people talking, and they were too loud, even if they were dying down now.
Fafnir...? Okay. So that was his name. Everything going on here was almost too much to take in all at once, all this information being thrown around casually that they didn't have a good grip of yet, so it wasn't a good idea to speak up yet; they rocked back and forth on their heels, paying attention to everything, and didn't say anything further.
The slow comings together of it all, Albite shot Heliodore a look -- long and full of dawning excitement -- like a dog following a fast moving car. The vision coalesced and clicked into an idea in his mind, before he began taking advantage of his husbands closeness to make himself useful; if he could bend enough to be whispered to? Then he could bend enough to drape, to reach for fists clenched tight enough to grind bones into dust, and smooth fat thumbs overtop them. The heat'd never bothered him anyway - bothered him even less now when it was only crackling red within the grates confines, and smoldering with frustrated fatigue.
'We can handle troublesome and cute--' pressed like a hush into Faustites heat-straight hair, just over the shell of an ear. The mumble of sound became a hidden smile for Jada's saner offerings.
Bless her for her brilliance, her restraint, Albite watched the words fall from cherry red lips and could only admire how anyone possessed that kind of calm presence of self above all the tumultuous goings on -- Emmy wanted the broadway boy in killer heels to walk *away*, it was a good option, if only Albite believed that it would be long term instead of temporary. The city was increasingly small, their factions entwined, and Albite? Greedy thing he was. He every so increasingly, he wanted him to stay. Of course he wanted everyone to stay, what select chosen few felt worthy enough to be called team, friend, home.
N if what Faustite was saying was true? Maybe Muri wanted to stay too. Scratch that, maybe Muri *needed* to stay, because cute and troublesome could be worked with, made up more than half of their team, even. N with the likes of Fafnir, Alkmene, Valjean -- Senshi who had their heads on straight, who'd crossed sides, mastered their magic, had some ******** expertise. Faffls alone being willing to throw in on the side of mutual support or threaten to call a manager was enough to get Albites hopes up for the scenario tipping in the favor of peaceable unity! Then his ruddy gaze snapped to Murikubashi getting up and walking the ******** away.
Alluh this!? The listening, the words, the gathering up to create a successful out that'd profit all n maim none! N he was leaving!?!?!
No.
Albite released his boa'd splay around Faustites back to slink forewords one step, another, "Hey! We're not done having a conversation yet," the words snarled at the retreating Senshi's back, the lengths of inky tattoos that rippled bicep to forearm coagulating into a thick, shadowy bind; choking thing with rough edges eager to keep -- He'd been patient, kind, and quite as he could've managed just then. Felt the tether of that snap like the sound of magic meeting flesh, that familiar sensation of snare, that he could yank back on --"you leave, and then what? Everything's better, and this'll never happen again -- and I don't just mean to Faustite."
Poor pretty thing, his people hadn't cared for him enough to correct, or keep, or--- and what was a little more dirt on a uniform that could be undone with a snap? If Albite aimed to drag Muri back across the farnsworth until he could look down into his sharp-sharp eyes.
"Muri. Hun. You're under the wrong sorta impression, punishment n retribution ain't the same things. You wanna be accountable, you're begging for a resolution, something that helps us and you," and he didn't like people assuming what form his Retribution took, what all his winding, weaving, verbal vomit of misty ideas could've solidified into. Muri thought they wanted their pound of flesh -- eyes for eyes and ash-blind worlds. Only on some days was that true, and on those days? Albite had the Rift he could go stare into to his hearts content, "but if you leave now? You won't get that. N'less all your apologies are just real pretty lies, where you say the words n expect us to absolve you without a little give n take? Kick your teeth in n call it justice when that's anything but....."
"If I were you? I'd take us up on the offers here. Join us for a time. We've got good people like Fafnir, and Jada. You can work with our team till you're a more competent Senshi. Between Tama -- <********> -- all our cats, and an experienced group! You'd be less likely to keep having these issues..." Albite ran on, sentences, breaths, sighed heavy knowing there was nothing they could've done to Muri that he hadn't already done to himself, either a thousand times over in his own head, a million times over out-loud; to the point where even the fresh basic black-pink in their area had put their headphones on and noped the ******** out of ideaing. Albite liked Pax's points, same as Jadas, same as Fafnirs.
The team had a cohesive thought -- it coulda worked, but?
"Course if none-ah that appeals to you, n you reeeaaalllyyyy just wanna throw down? I'll ********>." and even as Albite said the words he kenw he wouldn't act on it just then, knew the other Senshi he had to put his words into actions, had to mean it. Albite was so loathe to fight punching bags and mannequins eager to do little more than stand there and take it. Missed the likes of Cybele, of the behatted Knight and his kind who fought like things were personal. "Cause the cities not big enough that you won't run into *any* of us ever again."
Super Sailor Scout Attack: Choking Retribution! Albites tattoos appear to come alive, slithering off his harm like ethereal magical ribbons. The tattoo ribbons wrap around his intended opponent (pick a body part) and tie the two together for a duration of 20 seconds. The bindings slowly begin to tighten on said opponent, squeezing a bit like a boa constrictor would. Neither is able to escape the other until the magic is ended, or the weak ribbons are severed. He can now use the attack twice in battle, but can still only focus on one target at a time. Effect: Instantaneous Range: 6 Feet Duration: 20 seconds Number of uses: 2 Number of targets: 1
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Posted: Mon Oct 24, 2022 11:31 am
A summons from Faustite always had Alkmene buzzing to go. Yeah, okay, it was a little pathetic that he was willing to jump at the slightest whistle, but whatever. Eion was good to him, in a way Haruhiko rarely expected from anyone.
So he buzzed, waiting for Lilith—better to make his sister show up, honestly—and as soon as she signed off her stream, he tugged her off to power up and teleport to the Farnsworth. Which meant they arrived late, but not so late that he didn’t hear a lot of the conversation.
Helpful, that.
It seemed this was yet another Senshi with unpredictable magic. He wondered what the common denominator was. What had broken them, that needed fixing? When magic, as every other Senshi and cat he knew had reported, usually just ******** worked?
But here, before them, was the one who had triggered Faustite’s starseed addiction, and that made Alkmene feel….well, “uncharitable”was the nicest way to describe it.
“Sorry we’re late,” he said, breezily, moving to take a place at Faustite’s side, “Lils had to finish her stream, you know how it is.” A quick up and down for the Dark Mirror—pretty, and under other circumstances Alkmene would have had lots of very positive words for his very gorgeous outfit.
Alas, this was not Other Circumstances.
“Thought it’d be a good idea for me to show up in case of….problems.”
In case this Murikabushi got clever about slinging around his magic, more specifically.
-------------------
Lilith did not like this. It was a discomfiting situation to be in, to say the least, especially with her brother peacocking as loudly as he could—honestly, all that flash and flair was completely unnecessary, and as far as she was concerned, eyerollingly ridiculous—but, she had to admit, something sat ill with her about effectively holding a Dark Mirror hostage.
It sat ill in the same way that hearing about Rockatanskite’s fate had sat ill, but she’d brushed that aside. Yes, there was nominally some courtesy granted to allies, but Rockatanskite had violated that courtesy by treating Faustite with disrespect. Worse than that, really—he’d treated Faustite as subhuman and been totally unrepentant. It had been easy, then, to convince herself that he deserved what he got. That the way he’d treated her General, and who knew how many other youma and half-youma, rendered him unworthy of continuing to exist.
There were no such convenient excuses here. Yes, it seemed clear that Murikabushi had ******** up quite terribly, but it had been unintentional. He seemed thoroughly repentant, and yet there seemed to be a continued urge to punish him. And for what?
But there were options, surely. Negotiations had to be on the table.
“Albite,” she said, soothingly, “it’s rude to hold onto a guest like that.” Not that this poor Dark Mirror seemed much of a guest.
(One thought rattled loudly in Lilith’s head: ’will this be me? Am I next, if I step wrongly with one of the many mercurial members of this disaster area of a team?’
She’d liked Faustite and Albite. They treated her with respect she wasn’t used to receiving. But clearly, the group together was gasoline-doused tinder awaiting a match to set it aflame. And she did not want to be that match. Not when she was teetering on a knife’s edge, continuing to pursue things with Keiko. She did not want to see what would happen if this group perceived a betrayal from within.)
“You’ll have to forgive Albite.” She dropped her voice to a stage whisper, still probably audible to everyone there, given the room. “All brawn, no brains. Prototypical himbo, really.” A fond, airy laugh.
“But maybe we can offer a little more incentive to convince our friend here to work with us. It’s not empty, saying that we might be able to help with your magic—my brother’s used to be broken, too, but it works fine, now.”
Alkmene might not like her revealing that. Might disagree with her choice to spill those particular beans. But maybe it would open a path that Albite seemed very desperate to close.
….Maybe having another ally off the team could be to her benefit, if she ever needed to run.
Faustite was gathering that, if his team was barred the idea of exercising violence, then the logical next offer was recruitment. It was a troubling jump; a non-enemy did not necessarily make an ally, for he was terribly uneasy about the idea of a Dark Mirror Senshi getting involved with his team. He'd been around enough of them, experienced enough of their machinations that he distrusted them — any and all. For years, that distrust was bloodthirsty, unquenchable hatred, but that anger had dulled with time.
Yet it hadn't dulled enough that he could reasonably consider a Dark Mirror ally without losing his s**t on the rough handful of subordinates that suggested the idea. As his attention drifted from Heliodor to Tama, his urge to pace grew, and his boy's gentle brush of skin could not ameliorate his tension.
Faustite knew they were both correct. Murikabushi's magic was potent — he appraised it himself. He understood that a Dark Mirror Court ally could afford them some advantages that other teams couldn't boast. Tama was a Mauvian who could see to the Mirror Senshi's needs as well; he'd already had some direct experience with Alkmene's troublesome magic, which had since cleared up. Fafnir was correct, too, that they could offer support in their own deranged, if well-meaning, manner.
So, by all rights, he should've felt a flood of relief to watch Murikabushi snub the lot of them and start walking away. It was an unspoken agreement to Jadarite's terms, which would relieve Faustite of ever having to look upon the Mirror Senshi again. That should have been the end of it.
But Faustite experienced no great release of carefully contained tension. Rather, he felt it continue to build — it collected in his fingers, constricted his throat, pooled in his shoulders. His jaw tightened. His brows furrowed. His flame flickered and danced in a stressed whorl. And he didn't know what the ******** a Phoenix Force was, and Albite was already leaving him behind before he could begin to ask the question —
He looked at Pax, whose statement sounded chillingly similar to something Schörl would say. It lacked her refinement, but the callous disregard was there —
So Faustite started to pace again. All that energy, wound tight as a spring, and he had to exercise it. Albite was trying to con the boy back. Both options sounded poor, but he couldn't place why. Didn't help, either, that two more had answered his call belatedly, and now more opinions were being folded into the mix. Alkmene, whose magic may be more necessary to keep Albite from wrapping this one up bodily and taking him home, and Lilith, who was more firmly of the mind that they should let him go. Catch and release, without the microchipping or the surgical trauma.
"Wait," he managed at last, though his voice felt as tight as his throat. "Let him ******** off. All this pissing and moaning about being a monster — clear he has something against monsters. Won't give the team a second of his time if it's run by one.
"Just another virtue-signaling do-nothing, hiding behind his dogmas like they give him the right to complacency."
Posted: Mon Oct 24, 2022 6:24 pm
Albite was pretty. Albite was fun. Albite was a good time, in every sense of the phrase. Jada had found that she enjoyed his company far more than she'd initially expected to.
At least, she enjoyed his company until they were in any kind of situation that required even a modicum of common sense. Then, every single time, it became a chore to hold down the desire to rip his throat out. Right now, that desire was probably the strongest that it had ever been.
She had done it. She had solved the problem. Murikabushi was leaving. Nobody had been emotionally tortured. Maybe he would go back with some kind of story to tell the Dark Mirror Court, but she didn't think it would be anything severe enough to strain their already tenuous relationship.
Then, Albite had to pull out his magic like an idiot. That was an attack. That was stopping someone who was trying to leave. The others were trying to smooth it over, but there was still a heavy insistence in the room that he join up with them, despite the fact that he'd already told them that he didn't want to.
He didn't even trust them enough to share his identity, and if they wanted that to happen, ever, they were burning that bridge right in front of Jada's nose.
She stepped off to the side and buried her face into both of her palm. If she'd been Faustite, smoke would have been billowing from her ears. As it was, she just gave a single, guttural sigh, and then shifted to pinching the bridge of her nose.
She didn't say anything else, although she did nod and shoot around a few steely glances as Faustite said to let him go. She'd solved their problem once.
Hopefully they'd at least listen to orders and not dig the hole any deeper than it was already going.
Getting the ******** out of dodge had been so good in theory.
Naturally, something had to go wrong with it, and as Reiki felt the snare wind around his pretty brown neck, as he felt someone as tall and fit as himself but more magically powerful jerk him back into the room—into the belly of some burned-out beast—Reiki wondered why he’d let himself expect anything different. Idiot.
What in the ever-living <********> was these people’s collective problem.
…………Well, aside from the obvious “They all joined the Negaverse and not a single ******** one of them seems to have an ounce of regret about selling out our entire planet and all the billions of people living here in exchange for whatever wish they’d had in mind when their own personal Mephistophelion, Beelzebubs, Damien Thornes, and Kyuubeys had come around like ‘Hey, pretty, do you wanna make a contract with ********. So much for Sharp-Dressed Ma’am’s suggestion of “You can just walk out, no one is stopping you.”
After that bullshit, how was he supposed to trust Faustite barking an order to let him go?
Rubbing his neck where the magical restraint had landed, Reiki……probably put too much effort into keeping his breaths deep and even. Fixed his eyes on the floor and tried to project an aura of disbelief, betrayal. Make himself seem as wounded as possible while thinking of a new game-plan—something more than a few of them already seemed inclined to believe, Albite’s attack and the major attitude problem on the little rival femboy in the fishnet thigh-highs notwithstanding.
I am a lioness, he told himself, thinking of the tattoo on his back. I will not cringe for them.
(Out of the corner of his eye, Reiki noted Miss Harajuku Nightmare of the World hovering close to Faustite……except Faustite had also gotten close to Albite and tolerated the latter calling him Firebrand in a way no one else got to do.…… ********, if Reiki had somehow gotten drafted into the universe’s worst harem anime, he was going to scream.
He’d wait until he’d gotten home and buried his face in enough pillows that even Cersei wouldn’t hear anything, but still: he would absolutely ******** scream. Why was any of this happening to him instead of literally anything with the boy he actually wanted? Maybe he’d done something wrong enough to be saddled with his magic, but he categorically did NOT deserve this ******** garbage.)
Still—with the arrival of the two newcomers, a b***h had the odds stacked, nine-to-one, and distinctly not in his ******** favor. Leaving and staying away from them, apparently, was not an option (despite it sounding like the most perfectly sensible solution! Especially since Faustite wanted him gone! He had said as much! Explicitly! With his own mouth! In front of multiple ******** it, fine. Reiki needed to figure out some tack to take with this. Choosing violence would get him killed, with this many people against him (all of them apparently in control of what they could do, and armed with magic that could ever be used on anyone in a morally justifiable fashion).
Another deep breath. What would Sansa Stark do.
Grounding himself in that question, Reiki looked up at Albite first. Surely, his current role-model would have had more dignity, even while presenting herself as a b*****d—but Reiki couldn’t maintain that kind of veneer for long, and he’d already established himself as the sapient incarnation of whatever constituted dignity’s polar opposite. So, rather than try it, he huffed and frowned, wide-eyed, in a way that whined quite clearly, I am *NOT* pouting!!!
“Y’know, a gentleman would ask before playing around so roughly, Hot Lips,” he pointed out, humphing like Daddy didn’t buy him a Lexus for his birthday. Like a drunk, uncultured twink’s idea of Marilyn Monroe, based more on photographs and maybe her “Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend” than on anything about the woman herself. “Your pretty little tramp-stamp wings don’t exempt you from those rules.”
Looking more to the rest of the group—especially Fafnir and the Slutty Space Ninja—Reiki went on, telling them, “Since the majority seems to disagree with the boss here, think we should clarify, in the interests of fairness: I am not unsupported. Or if I am, then it’s not on my Court. Anybody here an eldest sibling?”
Throwing the question out at the group in general, Reiki raised his hand. Perfect way of cutting to the point. “So, for those of us who are: how often do you ever ask for help with anything? If some White Moon Knight armed with—I don’t know—a knock-off Mjölnir? Whacked you upside the head with his big, thick hammer? If he knocked you around so much, it hurt to stand, you forgot exactly where in town you were, you didn’t know which way was up, and you couldn’t get back to the Negaverse, would you rather: A. impose on someone by calling them for help when you’re supposed to be better than that; or B., grit your teeth, choke down any pain because you’ve probably survived worse before, then drag yourself to the emergency room on your own power, by any means necessary, and let the people who love you find out about it maybe three months later, at the very least?”
With a huff and a quirk of the shoulders, Reiki put too fine a point on it: “I’d rather suffocate on my own vomit than impose upon the Eternal who brought me in or the Mauvian who likes me by admitting that I might need help for my own sake. And it’s not like other people aren’t allowed to ask for help. Of course they are! I love helping other people with their problems!“ For a moment’s pause and, more importantly, dramatic effect, Reiki let the unspoken ‘But’ hang in the air between himself and Team Phoenix Force.
Then, with a poignant sigh, doe-eyes that belonged on the cover of Bambi Boys Monthly, and his tongue firmly in his cheek, “But it’s different with me. Because of reasons, see—very good reasons, all of which feel unassailably true in every moment I decide that it’s fine, really, and asking for help sounds like such an unfair burden to put on someone else. They probably have enough problems without me willfully exacerbating things.”
Indeed, how had Levi found out that Reiki had witnessed Arsenolite starseeding Raymond Callahan, and had been too freaked out to stop that smug-a** Party City Hawkeye doing it? ………Mmm, yeah, from Haruhi yelling at him about it. Oops.
“All I’m saying,” he shrugged, “is that my Court doesn’t deserve judgment here. I’ve been figuring out my own way by choice.”
……In fairness, part of that was down to how most of the other Dark Mirror senshi he knew were stuck with him at level one. Then, Acubens had a wife and all sorts of things, Reiki imagined, going on in her own life that she needed to worry about. Levi seemed to handle a lot of senshi recruitment missions for the Court, which were obviously of critical importance when so few of them existed. Little Miss Can’t-Be-Wrong was a paranoid brat with a bad attitude and Reiki didn’t want to deal with her. Morpheus didn’t seem to know that much more than Reiki did. And Prince Remarque…………
…………was fine.
Basically nothing like Reiki expected a royal magical girl to be (—now, Ida, on the other hand? Ticked every conceivable box and then-some. Much as she, Kerberos, and Encke were aspirational, absolute paragons of what magical girls were supposed to be, Ida as a newly minted Princess was everything that Reiki thought of when he heard the phrase “magical girl princess”). But, y’know, whatever, right? Remarque was fine. Definitely too busy to bother with Reiki’s bullshit problems, at any rate. Hopefully, he had Important Prince Business to deal with, whatever that meant.
Regarding the less hostile-seeming of the new additions, Reiki sighed and let his shoulders droop ever-so-slightly. ********, he……had one Hell of a corner to paint his way out of, between everything he’d said before and Faustite’s accusation of being a virtue-signaling do-nothing. It……was pretty hard to disprove that without pointing out that the people Reiki wanted most to undermine were Negaverse sellouts, like everyone else herein assembled. “Imouto-san, Neko-sama, what are you suggesting, exactly? That there’s some other option for my magic besides triggering addicts in a way that no one deserves to go through? Because yeah, I know: it’s called not working, period. Off, or on. Pick one.
“As for Albite’s arguments, though?” Reiki arched a brow at tall, dark, handsome hottie with the tramp-stamp wings. “You’re talking to someone who grew up Catholic, babes.” Only partly so, but Reiki had no desire to hash out his family’s whole religious history for these people. Self-restraint presenting itself as an onslaught of information. “The way I’m used to this working is: I reflect on what I did—check; acknowledge and admit that I ******** up—check; apologize to the people directly harmed by that ******** gestured at Faustite. “—check, for all he keeps refusing and mocking me for it; and then, I pay penance. No absolution without that part. And because my priest isn’t a useless a*****e, ‘penance’ actually means something, instead of being five ‘Hail Mary’s and five ‘Our Father’s or something equally pointless. Now, considering your Sun-and-Stars told you that he doesn’t want me paying a penance, where does that leave me? As far as I’m concerned, it puts the onus on me to shut up and accept that my apology wasn’t accepted, then honor the wishes of the person most directly affected by what I did. That’s how apologizing works; the person who ******** up doesn’t get to set the terms.”
Crossing his arms and pulling his posture up straighter, Reiki ‘snuck’ a pointed, sidelong glance at Faustite. Quickly, he jerked his gaze back to Albite, snapped his eyes back in place as if trying not to get caught. “Faustite has said, repeatedly, that he wants me gone,” Reiki said. “Abbey Roadkill in the bodysuit and your Sharp Dressed Ma’am with the good taste in TV shows seems to agree with him. Neko-sama, Fafnir, the Magnificent Outer Space Slut-Ninja—” A quick glance his way. “Did Neko-sama call you ‘Heliodor’?” Then back to Albite. “—and now you and Imouto-san? All seem to disagree with him. Why are you contradicting your boss’s express wishes and subjecting him to further contact with someone who triggered him into a relapse and who he, understandably, can’t stand to be around.”
A deep breath. A huff. And a bemused, earnest frown in Faustite’s direction as Reiki dropped his voice. “Who said you were a monster, General? Because *I* didn’t. What, because you have a furnace in your chest and you aren’t human? Big deal. Humans are b*****d-coated bastards with b*****d filling; we do s**t like Unit 731 and the Bataan Death March to each other, then just pretend it never happened. Not being human counts as several points in your favor, to me. ‘Monster’ is not synonymous with ‘Other Than Human.’”
—Saying so was probably going to get Reiki thrashed again, just like the last time he’d tried to tell this ill-tempered idiot that he was sorry, but……acceptable risks. For all the rest had been a performance, the clarification was not. Even if Faustite disagreed, even if he wanted to tear Reiki apart, he deserved to hear it from somebody.
