//------------------------------//
// Presto 
// Story: Secondo 
// by Lil Penpusher 
//------------------------------//

Adagio rolled her eyes. Waiting was not what she had broken free for, having already done enough of that for the last thousand years or so. 

To the right of her throne sat Aria, at least equally as bored as she by the looks, though it was harder to tell given how her default expression was a bored, monotonous frown anywho. 

It had taken some time but finally their minions had constructed and put in place a trio of regal thrones for them, one set in the Palace on Mount Aris and another in Seaquestria. Colour-coded for each siren specifically, Adagio's seat in the center was outwardly golden, whereas Aria's was made out of some sort of sturdy, cold rock, seemingly painted in the colour of her scales. Sonata's throne, meanwhile, was carved out of a mixture of silver and magical crystal to create a unique and reflective sort of throne. 

The two sirens looked at that throne; it was empty. And they groaned and grumbled at that fact. She was late. Again.

Finally, the guards posted at the throne room's entrance moved up to pull open the doors, revealing the teal siren, as well as a comparatively small Hippogriff tagging along with her. The black business suit he wore above his light brown cloak of feathers immediately identified him as a sort of businessgriff, whilst his silver mane running from the top to the back of his head was starting to grey. Evidence enough of his advanced age. 

"We've been waiting, you know." Adagio crossed her fins expectingly. 

"Sorry! Sorry!" Sonata gave out with a sheepish smile. "Wait, when were we supposed to meet..?"

Adagio facepalmed. 

"How about 20 minutes ago?" Aria answered with a grumble. 

"Riiiight..." Sonata replied quietly. 

"Ugh, whatever. Let's just be done with it." Adagio sighed and tried to calm her nerves. She waved for Sonata to come along, and so the teal siren moved towards her, taking her place to her left on her own, sparkly throne.

"Now then," the lead singer continued, "you are..."

"Moonfeather, ma'am..." the Hippogriff replied immediately, bowing his head slightly. "Plumage Moonfeather."

"Right," Adagio simply responded. "Do you know why you are here, at all?"

Moonfeather gulped and fiddled with his talons nervously. 

"I... I presume I... did something wrong...? I have to say, I never meant to hurt the-"

"No."

"-Oh." the Hippogriff retorted, calming himself with a big exhale. "Right... then what can I do for you?"

"Before we begin, we should inform you that nothing we tell you here escapes this room and never again crosses your lips unless we tell you to speak up about it. Is that understood?" 

Moonfeather nodded. In a way, he thought, Adagio had a very similar, commanding aura as Novo had had. More self-important, maybe, but he didn't feel as though that was a bad thing for some reason for the siren. 

"I'm sure you have heard of the resistance, by now?" Aria asked the businessgriff.

"Heard?" he quickyl retaliated. "Their posters appeared all over my damn factories one night! Not to mention how machinery keeps breaking down mysteriously, these days. I doubt its my uneducated, incompetent workforce, so it's probably sabotage."

"Right, so you do know." Aria nodded once, not particularly interested in this one's personal rants and stories about becoming a victim. "Their operations are actually quite expansive, and threatening. While not dangerous to us personally, the effort of managing so many different subjects at once is quickly becoming a drain on our magic, and without our magic this realm would quickly collapse in on itself."

"I... see..." Moonfeather muttered quietly. "Though, I admit that I'm not sure why you are telling me this. I am just an honourable businessgriff, yes?"

"Aria here had one of her new underlings, a certain Violet Facade, dust off some old files about you," Adagio revealed with a smirk. "You certainly are an influential business owner. You are also a renown liar and scumbag, a ruthless opportunist and positively egotistic. Still, your business was, and is, one of the most successful in this realm due to your cut-throat management."

Moonfeather felt his body shiver then. Another big, audible gulp. This was it, then. They'd lured him out with a nice prelude only to come around on him and get him good. He'd really fallen for it, that time.

"You will be working for us."

His body froze, as did his mind. He blinked with empty eyes at the siren leader, unsure what to make of any of this. 

"W-What...?" was all he managed to stutter out.

"You appear to be opportunistic enough to try your claw at this, and ruthless enough for us to believe you can actually pull through with it without constant overwatch."

He continued eyeing down the yellow siren as if he was dreaming.

"I... still don't understand. What do you need me to do, even?"

"As the Resistance continues to operate, our magic weakens due to overuse from managing the country at large," Aria chimed in. "As we continue our operations to squash them, we must focus our magic on this likewise. To conserve as much as we can, we agreed to appoint a third party as a sort of governor in our stead for now."

"A... governor? You mean you want me to rule Hippogriffia for you?" Moonfeather asked, now less so with fear and confusion but an increasing sound of enticed greed.

"According to our needs and desires," Adagio reprimanded, already knowing that this was not a totally carefree decision to make. "If you rule well, there will not be any issues. If you fail to do so, and obstruct our own operations and plans, we will not hesitate to toss you aside. Is that understood?"

He bowed his head as quickly as he could, eagerly accepting the opportunity fate had hurled his way. 

"Clear as crystal, ma'am."

"Good. We will be keeping a watchful eye on you, so don't believe this is all yours for the taking. To the public, you will be acting as our direct attendant and servant, the constant that translates our desires, whims and commands into reality."

"She calls it Siren Constant," Sonata spoke up. "Pretty cool, right?" 

"Read the room, Sonata," Aria remarked with an annoyed pout on her face.

"Whaaat? It's a good name! I never-"

"Quiet!" Adagio intervened loudly. "You two really are the worst, ugh."

Sonata quieted down, while Aria rolled her eyes and looked the other way from Adagio.

"Anyways, you can go," Adagio finally continued, looking back at Moonfeather. "We will be in touch later."

"Of course." The Businessgriff bowed his head for a lengthy period of time, before recovering from the bow. "Thank you for your trust."

The trio watched as their new puppet leader turned about face and marched back out the doors. With a loud slam, the entrance was sealed, once again, by the guards, who then stood at attention as before.

"Having to hire a mortal to rule in our stead... ugh, how humiliating." Adagio frowned and leaned back in her seat lazily. 

"We don't exactly have a choice, right now, Adagio," Aria reminded her.

"Our magic is weakening, after all..." Sonata likewise agreed.

"Hmph. Perhaps if these fools could just accept the inevitable and not delay all our plans with this cat and mouse game then everycreature would be better off."

"Wouldn't it mostly just be us who are better off?" Sonata innocently wondered with a shrug. The two others deadpanned, not even wanting to bother engaging with her stupid question that time.

"Wishful thinking is going to get us nowhere though," Aria instead continued. "We need a concrete plan on how to get revenge, and that includes making sure our spell doesn't thin and run out. We need that stupid resistance gone, and fast."

"Hmph. You might be giving those pathetic mortals too much credit, you know," Adagio suggested.

"You aren't afraid of being banished again? Or worse?" Aria wondered with a questioning frown.

"I know destiny is inevitable," the leader replied calmly, in her usual, sinister tone of voice. "And I know that, no matter how 'modern' society may be, mortal races never change. If our spell is able to create discord between them, then we can create that discord on our own terms just as well. We will break their already fracturing group bit by bit, into tiny little pieces, and then stomp down on those remainders one-by-one."

Aria gave it some thought, then nodded her head, crossed her fins and spoke up. "Not a bad idea," she admitted, "but actually doing so will still need a good plan. Do you have one?"

"Duh!" Sonata raised her voice. "This is Adagio! She, like, always has a plan!" 

Rather than feel annoyed, Adagio chuckled, taking the obnoxious squealing of her fellow siren as a compliment. 

"As it turns out I do."





Tensions were high within the resistance headquarters. Originally intended to be a united front against siren rule, it was now de-facto sub-divided into its three splinter groups: the left under Posada, the right under Crack Lightning, and the Harmonists and Royalists under Skystar, who were effectively the moderates of the group. Much to the dismay of Skystar, though, this moderation did not earn them universal praise and understanding though. Plenty of Hippogriffs murmured that the princess was too weak of a leader and would eventually screw them over as a result of being too soft, not to mention that some believed Skystar's tactics were too mild overall. To her shock, she was hearing calls for operations she considered to be horrible. Assassinating police officers and civil servants, bombing public spaces and trains, and other, even more terrible things that she had not the desire to put her mind to.

Originally operations had, somewhat deliberately, been planned to include members from each of the three factions, both to build trust and disspell any sort of theory that one side had primacy over the other. That concept fell apart quite fast, though, as reality was not as ideal as on a piece of paper. Some agents and fighters found themselves in the wrong or right spots for an operation, and sometimes that meant it would exclude one or two groups entirely. It wasn't deliberate, it wasn't even a conscious decision half the time, but it sure did the trick in spurring those aforementioned fears and theories.

Skystar was trying her best to mend the rift as best she could, but the sirens were going on the offensive, and they could all see it, so time was a precious resource that she could seldom spent on peptalks. Her head was buzzing under all the stress and commotion, and a relative lack of sleep. She really needed a timeout and break, but knew it was not to be had.

And then, one day, as if things could not have gotten any worse, Crack Lightning walked up to her with a beaming smile on his face - already unusual and suspicious in a way for the fascist leader - and told her that Raft Wood, his friend and co-leader of the Aris First nationalist party, had escaped confinement somehow. 

Skystar was, understandably, less overjoyed. She wasn't angry or sad, per se, but... suspicious and wary. And yet, it was not a lie.

Skystar tagged along as the overjoyed Crack Lightning led her into the large, open storage hangar of the warehouse. It was mostly cleared out, now, and had given way to various crates of military and medical supplies, food rations, and various vehicles, both civilian and military in nature - all of them appropriated, of course. There, what looked to be most of the base personnel were on the move or already watching as, indeed, Raft Wood stood there before them, shaking claws with an ordinary rebel fighter from the nationalist faction. 

Skystar recognised him immediately, as did Crack next to her, needless to say. His bleak red coat of feathers, and grey-ish mane, not to mention his eyes which always seemed to stare whenever he turned to look at you. Creepy...

"Raft?" 

The entire room seemed to gradually fall silent as the voice of the royal rang out. Everygriff stepped aside to let the young heir to the throne pass, and Raft Wood gasped upon seeing her.

"Princess Skystar! Your majesty!" 

Skystar opened her beak to respond right away, but found herself mute as the newly arrived guest bowed his head in honour of her. A vague reminder of times now gone by, and perhaps a more stinging reminder of how everygriff always did that in front of her mother.

"Y-Yeah. Hey!" she gave out, looking around briefly as she realised everygriff was now looking at her. Great. "How are you? Are you alright?" she asked first and foremost. "Did you get hurt on the way here?"

Raft Wood raised his head and consequently shook it. "Not a scratch. I managed to sneak out of Seaquestria and swam to the local harbour. Luckily nopony saw me on the way there." 

"Right," Skystar remarked simply, still rather dumbfounded by this. 

"It's so good to see you again, Raft," Crack chimed in, walking up to his friend and ally. The two performed a quick claw bump and smirked. "Guess the sirens really did let their guards down. Or underestimated you. Both is fine by me, hah."

"Not so fast!" another voice chimed in. Skystar blacked out for a split second, knowing exactly whose voice that was. Oh gods. 

Posada pushed her way through the crowd who, unlike with Skystar, did not make way for her. Behind Posada, a large part of the communist membership at the HQ piled in, also, creating an overall much more tense atmosphere as the two camps quite literally opposed one another. 

"So it's true!?" Posada let out in disbelief as she arrived next to Skystar, looking at the new arrival. "I thought it was a stupid joke, but it's true. Let me guess, the sirens sent you as an infiltrator?" 

Crack frowned at the communist leader with open disdain. Sure they had their differences, but insulting his friend was a new low even for her. 

"Back off, Posada. I know you reds hate when people are free, but Raft just so managed to escape prison as it happens, though of course if it were up to you, he'd go right back there, wouldn't he?"

"Indeed he would," Posada responded quickly. "You're a blind idiot if you think this guy seriously escaped the royal dungeon underneath the Royal Palace all on his own, and without the sirens manipulating him!"

"Calm down! Both of you!" Skystar intervened prematurely, eyeing both of the leaders down. "While I admit I'm curious of how he managed it also, I won't support blind accusations either."

Surprisingly, of all Hippogriffs present, it was Raft Wood who seemed the most surprised. 

"Wait, what do you mean you're curious, Princess?"

"Well, I want to know how you escaped, that's all. We can figure out the rest after."

This only further confused Raft Wood, who then appeared to fumble around on his clothing, reaching for a pocket. Posada squinted her eyes at the griff, one claw moving close to where her holstered pistol was stored... just in case this was some shady trick.

"Not sure if I understand... here, look." Raft held out his right claw towards the royal, showing a small, folded piece of paper. "This is the note you wrote me, right? I found it stuck under the salad bowl the day before escape."

Skystar reached for the note, and began to unfold it, the words of Raft worrying her and only making her speed up in doing so.

Everycreature fell silent as the princess was consumed by the note she held out before her. She read it once, then twice, then a third time. Posada knew something was up. She could tell. Raft Wood though seemed confused, more than anything.

"Raft Wood, I... I'm glad you escaped and all but..." she lowered the paper, shrugging, "...I didn't write this note."

"W-What?" Raft gasped.

"I told you!" Posada cried out, unholstering her. "I told you he was screwing with us! He's with them!"

Skystar didn't even have the time to react to Posada's brute-forced statement as, already, Crack Lightning had answered with his own drawn firearm. 

"Back away from one of our own, red dog! I don't give a damn if the princess helped her or not, he's still one of us!"

"Put the guns do-" Skystar tried, but was quickly silenced.

"One of us? One of us!?" Posada repeated in disbelief. "He's just a meat puppet of theirs! This is no friend of ours!"

"B-But I'm not! They never sang to me!" Raft gave out in defence of his own sanity. "Or... I-I mean, I don't think they did? Would I even remember that?" 

"Is this how you're gonna treat all new arrivals of ours, Posada? Hold them at gunpoint, shoot them if they happen to not be filthy reds like you and your goons? Because I don't think I want any part of this if that's how this 'resistance' functions!"

"Stop!" Skystar cried out again. "You're both making a mistake!"

"Am I?" Posada countered. "Princess, this is so obviously a spy, I can't believe you're seriously defending and covering for him!"

"We don't know that for sure, Posada!" Skystar said in opposition. 

"How else could he have escaped then, Princess? How else would he have gotten all this way without even a scratch? And who gave him that faked message of yours if not the sirens? This is such an obviously faked story... are you, unironically, going to be standing in for them?"

Skystar took a deep breath, but couldn't bring herself to speak. That was enough for the Hippogriff eyeing her though. There was a quick sliding noise as Posada stowed away his firearm once again. 

"Fine then. Play your games. I don't care anymore. We've been fighting for a free Hippogriffia all this time, but you're all too crazy to accomplish that without putting us all at risk."

"Talk for yourself, commie. We're tired of fearing you people are going to betray us and stab us in the back at any point," Crack returned. "Raft, come to my office. I'm gonna give you a rundown as I pack up my things. Everyone else here, do the same. We're gonna get out of here..." 

"Crack! I..." Skystar raised a claw as if to stop him, but she was too far away, and already the nationalist leader had become apart of the huge crowd gathered all around them. "...wait..." she muttered quietly. 

"I'm sorry, Skystar."

The princess looked over to her right. Posada was giving her one last remorseful look. 

"I really thought it could work, but I can't put everyone's life on the line if I know things are going oh so wrong. I'm sorry. Again."

She turned away as Crack had done, and likewise left to grab her last remaining valuables to desert Skystar and her own forces who remained.  

Skystar's legs felt weaker with every passing second, and her eyes began to tear up. She no longer had the strength to keep her head up high... and then she dropped to the floor. She sobbed loudly, crying her eyes out for the first time in a long time. She had given this her all, had tried to be the leader these people needed. She had thought that she could inspire unity in disparate groups somehow, but that plan had backfired now. 

She didn't care about Raft Wood. She didn't care about Posada or Crack Lightning, now. She just wanted to go home, sneak underneath her warm, fluffy blanket and sob until her mum came up to her bedside to stroke her cheek and give her a gentle kiss on her snout. She wanted to open her eyes, then, to see her mother beaming a caring, loving smile back at her. That's how it should be, how it always had been. 

That's not how it was now, though. It was just her and her alone, against the world, with half the world abandoning her and the other half against her.