Takes place several days before Christmas, a few days after the events of this solo.
Cymophane Word Count: 2307
Empyrean Word Count: 1762
Total: 4069
Cymophane never encountered Oberon.
He thought it best not to seem too enthusiastic and let a few days pass before returning to the park. If Oberon showed up that night, he did so either before Cymophane arrived or after Cymophane left. Instead, Cymophane spent a couple of uneventful hours on his favorite swing, watching the snowfall and talking to a grand total of no one.
After his early successes, the lack of further progress was disappointing. Jet was pleased, and if Jet was pleased then the Queen was pleased. Cymophane preferred to keep things that way, for all their sakes.
The passage of time meant Christmas crept ever closer. Not that it meant anything to Cymophane; holidays in the States were nothing more than an opportunity to film a couple of silly videos. The Americans celebrated Christmas early, and many of them were very particular about it. Perhaps that was why he began to run across fewer people. They were busy, or otherwise distracted, spending time with their friends and loved ones, trusting the city to look after itself.
So he went earlier in the evening, closer to sunset than to midnight, when there were more civilians out and about, seeing to a bit of last minute holiday shopping. There was a bench near some walking trails, under a streetlight that seemed perpetually broken. He remembered it from the night of his awakening. It was where Jet often sat, composing music or reviewing notes on his tablet, keeping an eye out for trouble.
Jet wasn’t there that night. The park seemed desolate. All was quiet.
Cymophane sat with his legs drawn up, chin perched on his knees, staring at the glistening snow.
Indeed, even so soon after nightfall, Oberon never arrived.
Empyrean did.
Perdita kept her word. She told Oberon of a Senshi named Plisetskaya who went by Cymophane, currently in the employ of the Negaverse, who seemed receptive to the idea of leaving but too anxious to make his escape. Oberon carried the information to Ganymede, who spoke of it with Valhalla, who used it to fill a long stretch of silence while they attempted to make sense of an ancient schematic. Sessrumnir insisted they proceed with caution. Empyrean agreed, but he could not squash his own curiosity.
Corrupted Senshi in particular were fascinating to him. Two of the young women who now posed as his daughters once sported the telltale cracks on their chests and on their foreheads. Their rejection of the Negaverse meant they were some of the bravest women he knew, and Empyrean had been privileged to spend much of his life around similarly courageous women.
So he took Oberon’s place at the park. He drifted closer, following one of the trails as he made his way toward the dark, sickly aura that remained stationary.
“Plisetskaya?”
The Senshi that came into view was a surprise. There were subtle differences in his outfit — a much larger bow, more exposed skin — but Empyrean was sure he had seen this one before.
Cymophane waited. He tracked the aura as it made its way to him, but pretended to be so lost in thought that the use of his star name startled him. He jumped. His head whipped up. He spotted the Page there, stepping out from the shadow of a copse of trees. The widening of Cymophane’s eyes was not quite forced.
The Page was familiar, though Cymophane could not immediately recall when he might have encountered him. There had been so many over the last year. With his current mission occupying most of his recent thoughts, it took time to delve back through his memory.
Jupiter — that was easy enough to distinguish from the color and style of his outfit, and the symbols that adorned it. Jupiter didn’t guarantee a connection to Ganymede, but the likelihood of it seemed significant. Ganymede was married to a Knight of Jupiter; the Negaverse knew that already, from the capture of Ganymede and Valhalla several years ago. Sessrumnir, the Knight who attacked Aquamarine, was also of Jupiter and suspected to be in contact with the Princess. Ganymede itself was a moon of Jupiter.
To know his star name, to know that he might be here, this Page had to know Perdita, or Oberon, which seemed to confirm the connection.
“Who are you?” Cymophane asked, putting a subtle tremor of fear into his voice.
“Empyrean.”
He didn’t quite frown, but Empyrean could not be sure there wasn’t a disapproving pinch to his expression.
His last encounter with this Senshi was not exactly fresh in his mind, but it also wasn’t difficult to recall. There was a distress call, and a battle by a fountain. Cybele took on one Corrupt Senshi, and Anser took on another. This one, if Empyrean wasn’t mistaken. Which meant—
“You attacked my wife.”
There had been no blood, and thus no scars left behind, but the pain of it seemed very real.
Cymophane stood and took a single hesitant step back. He kept his eyes wide, his movements tense, uneasy. He remembered now, that night in question. There were two old Pages, one of Jupiter and the other of Cosmos. The woman wore a long white dress and gold jewelry. Cymophane remembered thinking they were easy targets.
The Page didn’t worry him. He was weak and old, no match for Cymophane — but if he knew Ganymede, then he might know Sessrumnir, and Sessrumnir already ambushed a General.
“I’m sorry,” Cymophane said.
He let his anxious gaze flick around, searching the area for trouble. Though there was no sign of anyone else, there were plenty of places for someone to hide, especially if they had some means of concealing their aura.
“I didn’t want to,” Cymophane lied. Even through his apprehension, he could make it sound real. “But my General was right there. What else was I supposed to do? If I didn’t make it look convincing, I—”
He stopped himself and let his eyes meet Empyrean’s, making a play at hopelessness.
“Who is your General?” Empyrean asked.
Cymophane hesitated. The truth could be dangerous. He knew enough of what happened to Aquamarine to know that Jet was a target. Ganymede and her allies might be less willing to trust anyone who came to them offering Jet’s name.
He could lie if he had to. Faustite had been there that night. Faustite was easily recognizable. Faustite was making a name for himself, too — leading missions, testing the forces of the White Moon. Faustite would seem like a dangerous adversary without dragging any personal vendettas into the conversation.
But the risk might be worth it.
“Jet,” Cymophane said, expecting a trap while hoping for sympathy.
Empyrean had no visible reaction to the name, though he knew it well.
He first became aware of the war after Ganymede and Valhalla were captured and tortured by the Negaverse, when they could not adequalty explain their absence or their injuries any other way. Jet had a hand in that, Empyrean knew, though he’d been young then, according to Ganymede and Valhalla. A teenager, and a Lieutenant — new to the Negaverse, but as hateful and vicious as many of those who’d served for years. Now he was a General, and close to the Queen, if his position at the hilltop battle was any indication. (There remained a possibility that his proximity to her was little more than a random choice, or a convenience. Empyrean, having come from a position of authority in his civilian life, couldn’t make himself believe that. A leader would make their choices with intent, not on a whim.)
“He certainly knows how to make a statement,” Empyrean observed.
No one jumped out of the shadows. No one threw a smoke bomb at his feet. Cymophane could still teleport, as far as he could tell without trying. He could leave if he wanted, call the mission off and find some other way to get the information he needed. Jet would understand. He wouldn’t want Cymophane to put himself in danger — not any more than he had to.
But the danger was not immediate. Cymophane could hold it off. He never would have been given this mission if Jet or the Queen thought he wouldn’t be able to handle it.
“If he knew I was talking to any of you…” Cymophane trailed off. He shivered and wrapped his arms around himself. “You don’t know what he’s capable of.”
“I think I do,” Empyrean said.
He scrutinized the boy, took in his posture, his expression. There wasn’t anything to indicate that his fear was anything but genuine.
“Anyone who cuts off the head of a former ally to make a point to their enemy wants their enemy to know exactly what they’re capable of.”
“You were there?” Cymophane asked.
He couldn’t remember this Page on the hilltop, but Cymophane had been distracted at the time — guarding the generator, suffering the effects of Senshi magic.
Empyrean shook his head. He was across the field, moving from generator to generator, privy only to what happened near the Queen once the details were shared with him later.
“Word travels.”
Cymophane watched the Page, wary. Empyrean was a difficult man to read. His expression did not change much. Occasionally there might be minor fluctuations — a twitch of the mouth, tension around the eyes — but it was so subtle as to be nearly indistinguishable. His voice was similar. When he spoke, he was neither loud nor soft. His tone stayed level, calm.
One thing was certain, Empyrean was not afraid.
The fact that he did not attack and did not seem to have come with allies made Cymophane hopeful that all was not lost.
“He’s been furious,” Cymophane said, letting his own voice go quiet. “There was an incident a month ago. One of your people hurt someone he cares about.”
“Aquamarine,” Empyrean said.
That name came to him alongside Jet’s — another young Lieutenant at the time Ganymede and Valhalla first encountered him. Bratty and mean, the sort of kid who hurt others because it made him feel stronger in the face of his own weaknesses. A schoolyard bully turned into a child soldier, poisoned by Chaos. Now he, too, boasted the rank of General.
“What can you tell me about them?” Empyrean asked. “Jet and Aquamarine.”
“They were corrupted together,” Cymophane said, casting through his memory for any information that might be beneficial without offering too much of an advantage. “I don’t know the details. Jet doesn’t talk about it, and Aquamarine hates me, so he’d never trust me enough to share.”
“Why does Aquamarine hate you?”
“He hates anyone Jet takes an interest in.”
That implied jealousy, which implied a type of emotion beyond that of a typical comrade in arms.
“And Jet took an interest in you?”
Cymophane shrugged. His arms tightened around himself, and his gaze lowered to the snow covered ground. “Enough that he recruited me.”
“Why were you recruited?” Empyrean asked. “What use does the Negaverse have for someone so young?”
“He thought I was spirited, energetic,” Cymophane said. “Gumption, some other General calls it. Ashanite. The one who attacked that Squire the night I—” He winced and offered Empyrean a look of sympathy, of remorse, so he didn’t have to finish the explanation with attacked your wife.
“The Negaverse likes that in a recruit,” he added, “because if it turns out the recruit doesn’t benefit the organization, it makes for more entertainment as they’re systematically broken.”
“And Jet agrees with those methods?”
No, not to that extent. Jet was kind, and fair, in Cymophane’s experience. He cared for his recruits without smothering them with attention or micromanaging everything they did. He wanted to see his recruits succeed and gave them the tools to accomplish that.
But it was easy enough to lie with the truth.
“Jet agrees with whatever the Queen wants.”
So Jet was a loyal one, Empyrean observed. He did the Queen’s bidding. Perhaps that was why she kept him close.
Perhaps that was what Jet intended by doing so.
“How close is Jet to the Queen?”
And how ambitious was he?
“She favors him,” Cymophane said. It didn’t seem like a terribly advantageous bit of information. Anyone who paid attention would know. “He was rewarded for what he did on the hilltop, you know. Got a shiny new medal for it. And when Aquamarine was hurt, Jet went straight to the Queen.”
“Does the Queen favor Aquamarine?”
Cymophane almost laughed, but he held it behind a frown. No one favored Aquamarine, except Jet.
“Not as much as she favors Jet. Aquamarine is, like…” Cymophane paused, like he couldn’t immediately think of a way to explain it. When he thought a convincing amount of time had passed, Cymophane continued, “Jet and Aquamarine are almost inseparable, but Jet does most of the work. I don’t think Aquamarine would be as successful as he is if he wasn’t so close to Jet.”
If he wasn’t sleeping with Jet, wasn’t loyal to Jet, Aquamarine would be nothing.
Empyrean responded with silence.
There was a relationship then. Plisetskaya hadn’t said as much in so many words, but getting the point across didn’t require him to be blunt about it. Sessrumnir suspected that was the case after his dealings with Aquamarine. It was written all across his pretty face, Sessrumnir said; it was threaded all throughout his unceasing loyalty. Ganymede was skeptical, but her assessment was colored by her time spent in captivity, when Jet and Aquamarine had been much younger.
It seemed time brought them together in some manner.
Which meant Sessrumnir couldn’t have picked a better target.
He also couldn’t have picked a worse one.
“Do you think I’m lying?” Cymophane asked, when he couldn’t interpret the silence.
“No,” Empyrean said.
“But you don’t trust me,” Cymophane assumed. He made himself sound quiet and small.
He was just a boy — short and slight, with a soft, youthful face, perhaps no more than eighteen. Empyrean was not without sympathy. The father in him would like to do all in his power to help this boy.
The pragmatist in him had to be cautious.
“I think we can both agree that trust is a difficult thing to offer, under the circumstances.”
Cymophane nodded. Empyrean wasn’t shutting him out, but he was circumspect. He was smarter than most, then, difficult to crack with nothing but the perception of sadness and fear.
Luckily, Cymophane had more to offer.
“Do you know Ganymede?” he asked.
Empyrean was not so foolish as to think the answer to that question wasn’t obvious, based on what information he already had about the situation, so he responded with a simple, “Yes.”
How, Cymophane wondered, but didn’t ask. Was it their connection to Jupiter that made them allies? Empyrean was old, but his rank made him new, inexperienced. If Valhalla was a relation, could Empyrean be one, too?
There were so many questions, yet no way to gain an answer short of asking Empyrean outright. Cymophane knew better than to assume Empyrean would offer him one so easily.
From subspace, he summoned a pair of starseeds — one from a Senshi, left bleeding and unconscious on a store-lined street in the dead of night; one from a civilian, no more than a hapless witness to a war she would have been better to remain ignorant of.
Face twisted with fictitious regret, Cymophane asked, “Could you give these to her?”
Empyrean eyed the starseeds, but did not yet approach to take them.
“Whose are these?”
“I don’t know,” Cymophane said. A successful deception was always powered by reality. “I ran into some trouble a few weeks back. I didn’t want to hurt them, but they wouldn’t listen and I wasn’t prepared to die. Maybe I should have been…”
It was funny, almost — how familiar that thought was.
Maybe I should have been.
“What would Ganymede do with them?” Empyrean prompted him, searching Plisetskaya’s expression, his eyes, seeking honesty and earnestness.
Cymophane gave him exactly what he wanted. He trembled, cradling the starseeds in gentle hands.
“She can take care of them, can’t she? She can make sure they’re safe, or… return them.”
“In a way, yes,” Empyrean agreed.
It was probably too late to see that they returned to the proper bodies, and too difficult a task to determine who they belonged to in order to try. The most that could be done for them was to ensure that they would be safely reborn.
That was enough. Cymophane gazed up at Empyrean and let that thought pass between them, green eyes locked on blue.
“It’s the only thing I can do for them now,” he said.
The boy was convincing. Too convincing, perhaps? Empyrean couldn’t say. It wasn’t in his nature to turn someone away when they asked for help. He would remain cautious, he would let his suspicions linger, but he could not be heartless.
He made a careful approach — slow, in case the need arose to make a hasty retreat. Plisetskaya stood without moving, simply held Empyrean’s gaze and let him see remorse. When Empyrean was close enough, Plisetskaya passed the starseeds to him, careful in a way that implied he understood how precious they were. Nothing happened as they made the exchange. Plisetskaya merely put them into Empyrean’s hands and offered him a small, grateful smile.
There were tears in his eyes, glistening in the moonlight.
With a breathless catch in his voice, Cymophane said, “Thank you.”
Empyrean nodded and took a single step back. For a moment, he considered the starseeds, touched them with gentle fingers. They were fragile things with a hidden strength that had been all but snuffed out. He sent them to subspace for safe keeping, trusting that Ganymede would know what to do.
“Would you like to meet her?” he asked. When Plisetskaya merely stared up at him, timid and confused, Empyrean elaborated, “Ganymede. She can keep you safe.”
Cymophane did not allow himself to rejoice just yet.
“Can she?” he asked, all fearful skepticism. “I was there when Jet killed Ochre. Ganymede couldn’t do anything.”
“His name was Sheikh,” Empyrean countered, but he kept his tone gentle.
Ganymede always stressed the importance of one’s star name. She made sure those who listened knew what Sheikh’s was. It was all she could do for him now.
“Your name is Plisetskaya,” Empyrean continued. “You don’t have to be Cymophane.”
“What does a name matter?” Cymophane asked. “Jet would still hunt me down and kill me. I’d never be safe from him. He’d drag me back and throw me in front of the Queen before he did it.”
Like Ochre — better as a tribute to the Queen than a vessel for Metallia’s power. His star name meant nothing in the end.
Empyrean was unmoved. “What if we could guarantee your safety?”
There was something in the even tone of his voice, something heavy with a promise mere words weren’t enough to make.
“You can’t,” Cymophane argued, pressing the topic, seeking more. “He could find me here, now, talking to you, before either of us were even prepared for it, and he’d kill us both if I didn’t have a good enough excuse for him. He’d take one look at you, see that you’re from Jupiter, and he wouldn’t care whether or not you know the one who hurt Aquamarine. He’d make an example out of you either way.”
Empyrean had no trouble believing that, but it made no difference.
“I’m not afraid of Jet,” he said. “There are ways to stop him.”
How, Cymophane wondered again. What could a Page do against a General? What gave this man so much confidence after everything Cymophane had said? Cymophane wasn’t afraid of Jet, not in the slightest, but the White Moon should be if they had any sense.
“Like that Knight stopped Aquamarine?” Cymophane asked.
Empyrean gave no answer. He kept his neutral expression in place and stood there silently.
“He used something,” Cymophane said, urging a response with his shaking voice and watery eyes. “He could stop Aquamarine from teleporting. Do you have more of those?”
“Perhaps,” Empyrean allowed.
Perhaps was not a yes, nor was it a no. Perhaps was noncommittal; it could mean anything, but an answer that meant anything tended to mean more.
“Or… something else?”
The White Moon had something. More of those smoke bombs, or another object like it, or some sort of plan. Whatever it was, it gave a tired old Page enough confidence that someone like Jet seemed like less of a threat than he should be. They already provoked Jet to violence; Sessrumnir went after Aquamarine, the one casualty guaranteed to get a response.
“Was Aquamarine an act of revenge, an example, or a test run?”
Try as he might, Empyrean could not suppress the small smile that twitched onto his face.
“A bit of all three, I think,” he said.
If they could get the Void up and running, if it worked as intended, large swathes of Destiny City might soon be impervious to teleportation. Agents would be defenseless in proximity to it, and, unable to detect it, they would have no way of knowing until it was too late.
Sessrumnir saw it as an opportunity to bring the Negaverse to its knees. Perhaps Ganymede did, too. Empyrean remained open to that possibility if the war brought them to that point, but a part of him liked to imagine that Valhalla’s idyllic thinking wasn’t so idyllic. With the Void, there would be places in Destiny City that were impervious to the Negaverse’s intrusion. Anyone who wanted to purify but couldn't shake the fear would have a safe place to go.
“Would you like to meet Ganymede?” Empyrean tried again.
If the Void could mask a purification, surely it could mask anything.
All they needed was more time, and a willing accomplice.
Close as he was to his goal, Cymophane couldn’t get too far ahead of himself. They were meant to capture Ganymede. He couldn’t do that on his own. Going to meet her now would be suicide. As soon as they discovered he wasn’t really after purification, they would kill him for their own safety.
Weakly, he argued, “I thought we both agreed trust is a difficult thing to offer. You could lead me anywhere.”
“True,” Empyrean allowed.
Perdita had warned Oberon that Plisetskaya was skittish, just as likely to run as he was to seek the help he needed. Empyrean, being a pragmatist, had to wonder if one Senshi was worth the trouble. There was only so much they could say, only so many offerings of peace they could give, only so many promises they could make. The rest was up to Plisetskaya. When he wanted a way out, when he made that decision, he knew who to find.
“One day soon,” Empyrean began, voice heavy with warning, “what happened to Aquamarine will seem like a minor event. The only way I can guarantee your safety is if your days in the Negaverse are behind you.”
Behind the wet sheen over Plisetskaya’s eyes, fear grew.
“You’ve spoken to more than just me,” Empyrean reminded him. “Is there a chance Jet might already be suspicious of you?”
Perhaps Jet would be, if Jet hadn’t given him this mission. If Cymophane had sought out these people on his own, genuinely wanted purification, he had no way of knowing which senshi or knight might be an informant.
Cymophane took another step back. He put his arms back around himself, shrinking away.
“I… I have to think about it…”
“I can’t imagine you have much time,” Empyrean said. When Plisetskaya shook his head, visibly terrified, Empyrean’s heart went out to him. Patiently, he offered, “I can meet you here again.”
“Alone?” Cymophane asked.
“If you are,” Empyrean agreed.
“And then?”
“We talk. As much as we have to until you’re comfortable. When you’re ready, we’ll help you,” Empyrean said. “We won’t abandon a Senshi in need.”
Caution was warranted in any situation. Cruelty was not. Empyrean would always be the former, but never the latter.
Cymophane looked for sincerity in Empyrean’s blue gaze, and, finding it, nodded his agreement.
He let a single tear fall.
Writing solos like this is so exhausting. gonk
