//------------------------------// // 414. An Envious Coward? // Story: Baa-Ram-Ewe! // by Darkonshadows //------------------------------// -Midgar Realm, Plains of Midgar, Castle Alexander, on the castle walls, Quetal- “We’ve got an enemy breaking through our bombardment line and is bypassing our embattled Magitek Zealots, Dazzle are you and Frizzle ready?” I called out into the courtyard where our missile trucks had been firing nonstop since we got here and the enemy started throwing tons of metal at us. The nine commandramon were relaxing along the castle wall and doing some sniping at the smaller EPs that got through our defensive line. Replacing vehicles wasn’t as easy as replacing APs, Welch was going above and beyond to keep our Rider Zealots supplied in combat vehicles and we were slowly building up more missile trucks safely behind Castle Alexander to increase our defensive bombardment in the hopes of eventually going offensive. “Almost, what’s the encroacher look like Quetal?” Dazzle was looking up at me and I turned back around. “Large, red armor, four legged, scorpion tail, upper torso of a biped with two claw arms… it’s trying to attack Castle Alexander directly and you can hardly miss its approach Dazzle.” I was going into this fight too, I made a note to stay out of the path of the machine cannons in the claws. “Right give me some time to get Frizzle going. Frizzle you’re needed on the defensive line!” At Dazzle’s shout to the device on her hip, Frizzle popped out of the digivice eating a massive blob of bread half the size of her body and shaped like her own head. Frizzle continued to quickly chew through the bread at a decent pace and was quickly building up energy for the upcoming fight, she apparently needed a lot since her digital evolutions could get massive. Dazzle didn’t want Frizzle falling behind Dormarch in being able to reach higher evolutionary states. At least Dazzle wasn’t forcing the evolution, she saw what a skull type digimon looked like and didn’t want that for Frizzle. Dazzle had forged a strong friendship between her and Frizzle, while instilling a sense of wanting to help others. That was the kind of stuff that helped power up Digi-destined partners and it showed. As soon as Frizzle finished her bread she left the castle gates and leapt into the air with Dazzle running after her. Mundo, I and Lit followed Dazzle onto the battlefield. “Guilmon Digivolve to… Growlmon!” The high pitched squeaky voice stated and transformed into a regular growlmon. What followed was Dazzle clamping both her hands onto the Digivice and channeling fire type energy to it as the scorpion machine approached. “Growlmon digivolve to…” “This is sucking up a lot of my energy, but let’s do this… for our friends… for our worlds… also because we drastically need the firepower and I don’t want to fall behind my friends in being able to help!” A massive flare of fire type energy built up around Dazzle and absorbed into the device until it stopped… Dazzle almost collapsed onto the ground and Mundo gently caught her before her chin slapped into the ground. He helped her stay standing. “Please Frizzle, don’t lose yourself this time…” “Flame Wargrowlmon!” Watching Growlmon double in size was fairly incredible, now most of her upper torso was covered in armor that took up her arms. Said arms had change into mechanical limbs ending in three elongate claws, said limb also came with giant blades along the outside of her forearms and the chest armor look like it had built in cannons, her body was giving off a tremendous amount of heat that caused the air to waver near her as white flames erupted from where her hair was. The two wings like protrusions going out behind Frizzle’s back created two massive jets of flames and she rose into the air despite her size. Lit still thought he could take that or at least that’s how I was interpreting his squeaks as he rode on my left shoulder. The tiny bug was insane if he thought he could fight the flying tower sized amount of nope that Frizzle just became. Frizzle thankfully didn’t go crazy like we heard happened when she first went through an evolution and advanced on the incoming scorpion machine with a powerful focus in her eyes. We were not going to be pushed into retreating and leaving Jeanne and Pom’s team behind, which was what the EPs were threatening to do even with support from our Harmony Program allies. At least we found out we could rotate Rider Zealots before starting this defensive battle, our offense was dependent on how well our away team could give us an opening to really go on the offensive. I glared at the whale flying in the sky above the city in the distance as the shield of Castle Alexander stayed strong under constant bombardment and our constant bombardment kept a number of the newer mechanical EPs at bay. -Outside the underground facility, Midgar basement region, Canard- “Can you get it airborne again?” At my question, Sami pulled out from under the two halves of the skiff and pulled up her goggles. “Going to take some doing, but yeah, I think I can get this thing flying again… or I’m not an engineer!” Sami stated boastfully before returning her goggles over her eyes, the orange lizard then pulled herself up under the two halves of the vehicle. “Going to need some time to cut up that railway platform to use in the repairs though.” “Is Pom going to be okay Canard?” Jeanne had been worried since we saw a chunk of skin and bone on the edge of the nearby railway platform, we were going to use said platform for scrap to help rebuild our skiff. Surprisingly we still had the two reserve Skein Flyers, they were completely undamaged if a bit waterlogged as it took some doing to pull the rear half of the skiff out of the water. We’d send two or four people back to Castle Alexander for reinforcements if our mission proves to be impossible to continue. I have been in worse scrapes than this, but I don’t think Jeanne or some of the others have. “She should be, the supplies fell with her and she has access to those reviver seeds.” From as far as I knew, if you had one on you before you died, you’d survive death… once, and only once per seed. “I’m more worried about where Shanty went to after Pom shoved her out of the path of the rail platform before it struck her.” Mystery Dungeons sounded very magical, but I never wanted to go in one after hearing what happened to Pom and how she eventually got Dormarch back from losing him in the first place. I think I really hated electromagnetic worms after the two incidents I know of and wondered how many I didn’t given the Saurians used those things multiple times thinking they always outright killed people by consuming them… how many people were lost like Pom across the vast numbers of worlds and dying so far away from home? Those worms were always going to be bad news to me and anyone they come across like Dormarch. “Hopefully Shine and Snake can find and secure our friends.” We technically didn’t need to do anything with the facility, Sami was just voicing a concern about being forced to. We didn’t need to get bogged down by dealing with the trouble inside, we just needed to get the skiff back in working order and get everyone out of here. We were on a mission to disable Midgar’s walls and it might have time constraints where if we got too sidetracked we’d be drowning in EPs if they rerouted more attention to us than Castle Alexander. “Peppercat, Krosserdog and Shanty should be somewhere out here and we’re not exactly hiding our positions too well, so they can come to us provided EPs aren’t causing them trouble. What can we exactly do when we can’t move our broken skiff somewhere safer if we’re not going to abandon it? Pom’s group probably won’t be too hard to find for our searchers.” Something exploded inside the facility and something was causing the ground to shake violently as we all looked up from the bank of the river as plumes of smoke erupted from whatever that was that was roaring a chill down my spine worse than any cold temperature I’ve ever face on Puckworld. Jeanne was suddenly on guard, she along with our three remaining Rider Zealots that weren’t our skiff pilot were holding a defensive perimeter around us, the skiff pilot Zealot was standing off to the side occasionally igniting his energy blades and glancing about. “Yeah, Pom’s probably where that explosion just happened or near enough to it that it’s louder in her ears.” Sami stated as she lowered her goggles and got back to work with her welding tool. “Fixing the front right side of the skiff is going to take some time, but we can cut corners on that or I work on trying to repair more of the damage to give us some better flying speed. Patch welding the two halves together is going to be quite ugly, but we’ll just have to make do” “Do as much as you can Sami. Get it operational first, then worry about fixing the worst of the damage. Functions is far more important at the moment.” After Jeanne said that a wave of Shriekers started coming at us, at least the remaining Rider Zealots still had their Skein Flyers, even if they were damaged. “As we’ll not fend for ourselves forever under increasingly crushing wave of the enemy.” “Let’s keep them off of the skiff!” I hefted my hockey stick and joined Jeanne in facing them down, the skiff piloting Zealot moved closer to us to provide his shield for as meager as it was without a vehicle. This was still very useful for the spike spitting things that fly at you constantly and tried to slash you up with their blade like limbs. -Somewhere inside the facility, Pom- The entire facility rocked and shook as we snuck our way into what looked like a prison block. Oh joy, like I haven’t had enough of those and… wait… it was directly connected to the pen those Behemoths were in?! I think I’m going to be sick. “Crazy, what the hell did you do?!” An angry female voice shouted drawing our attention to the familiar voice. “Keheehee, someone hurt my babies… so I killed them, then I made them all lively again Cruel!” The facility rocked violently as the ‘crazier’ sound of the two voices. “Also they might gotten out of the behemoth testing slash killing and feeding pen, I mean it’s not like they can find those intruders that hurt them by being stuck in there right? Kind of wish we had prisoners to throw at them for fun and not just those Berserker Boars, sure the boars make a nice crunchy noise, but there’s no real fear to it!” “Crazy, please don’t tell me you resurrected them as neutrals and set them loose… ON OUR CURRENT BASE OF OPERATIONS!” Growled the voice throughout the facility. “Okay, I won’t Cruel… unless you want me to, or Coward needs someone to take all the blame for her.” Crazy definitely sounded like the name for the weird naga we saw back in the room where we first saw the Behemoths, her smile certainly fits the description. “CRAZY, IF I WAS THERE RIGHT NOW I’D COME UP WITH A WAY TO TORTURE YOU TO DEATH THREE TIMES IN A ROW!” Cruel sounded like her namesake and we decided to stop paying attention to the voices and crept forward into the cell block, no sign of enemies yet. “If the facility is infiltrated and provided they could survive the Behemoths, which I highly doubt is possible anyone could survive a direct confrontation with those things, then we need the machines to find and deal with the intruders immediately. Also I can’t believe you somehow made the Behemoths even worse…. one just tore through a freaking wall, they weren’t even this strong before you resurrected them!” “Worse… or far better Cruel?” Crazy said playfully as the facility shook and something else exploded, it even almost sounded like a PLANT was taken out given the shockwave that occurred. Why would a servant… well I would guess some servants had very good reasons to not want their souls being used and abused by Moon Cell. There was a chance that something like Snake was going on here, a rogue servant hiding away from Moon Cell’s control. “I will come down there and garrote your head and hood off of your body slowly… with a cheese grater Crazy!” Another crash and Cruel got even louder and angrier. “I’ll then resurrect you and then stab you in the heart fifty times to carve it out with those stabs and will stuff it down your throat and break your spine over my tail! I’m still trying to come up with a third way to kill you that’ll make you feel the most pain possible!” “Keeheehee so kinky! They can probably hear us you know, we’re kind talking all over the place!” Crazy answered with a grin you could absolutely hear. “Can’t wait to hurt so good like what the Sumeragi did to Coward!” “At least they’ll know they aren’t welcome here, sending out the search snakes while I’m at it to locate these intruders and there better be intruders or so help me… UGH! Just don’t do anything dumb Crazy… in fact don’t do anything until I find you and rip your spine out to stab you to death with your own shattered bones!” After what I assume was Cruel speaking judging by the shifting tone in the same voice being the only difference between hers and Crazy, we couldn’t hear any more from the two. “Is it me or was that just the same voice talking to itself?” It might just be one really insane naga Dolly, but I doubt that’s what’s happening considering the anomalous readings Yggdrasil.sys assistant on the Digivice was detecting. “Detecting life sign nearby… matches prior scanned servant signature in some ways. Unknown anomaly detected, detected subject is a living breathing entity within the Moon Cell realms.” Yggdrasil.sys stated as we crept along the prison and didn’t hear any of the shaking or explosions nearby us. “Should we investigate that mom?” Don’t know Dormarch, but we currently weren’t in any danger so maybe we should even if we were in a hurry to deal with larger issues. “It could be important.” “Do we have the time and are there any EPs around?” I looked up at the several floors worth of cells above us. “No EPs detected in the nearby vicinity… the life sign is one floor up and forward of current facing on the left. Putting on visor now.” At least the Yggdrasil.sys assistant was trying to be quiet as it talked from Domarch’s Digivice, a question mark popped up in the sight of the visor. I motioned for Dolly, Dormarch and the Rider Zealot hauling our supplies to follow me. We went up a set of rusty stairs to the next floor, we cautiously approached the cell and peaking directly into it we saw… well I’m confused. It was the purple naga? “What was the previous purple naga?” I asked. “Servant, digital entity, anomalous qualities show that this is a living version of the same entity… anomalies detected in living entity matches that in the other entity.” Well that didn’t make this any easier Yggdrasil.sys, but I still wanted to know if we could talk to her and maybe convince her to help. “Okay, let me do this, watch out for anything around us.” I whispered as I poked my head into the cell. “Um… excuse me?” “Hu-wha…? Eep…” The black and purple topped naga with a lavender underside grabbed and lifted up one of her coils in front of herself defensively while shaking in fear…. of me… in fear of me… afraid of me?! Me? Yep, me. I looked into her eyes… I looked at how she held the section of her body defensively and looked at me through one half open eye while shivering as if expecting me to do something to her. Staying where I was, I scrutinized her a bit. I definitely had a type as far as scaled intelligent beings went, she was a cute snake that looked exactly like the one with a crazy smile. Her eyes spoke of massive anxiety and social issues, seeing things and being through a lot… considering the existence of Cruel and Crazy I might have a supposition forming in my head about what was going on with this servant. It was sad. “Hello there, my name is Pom Lambchop, what’s your name?” I didn’t approach, I knew better than to do so… she was still a dangerous individual and could attack me. While poison may not work as long as I had the pecha scarf on me, and I didn’t know if this naga was poisonous or not, it was for the better that we didn’t cause her to lash out at us. She could still hurt us in other ways. I’ve never seen anyone that has hit my level of chronic fear, anxiety and paranoia before… or went well beyond it. If I was going to die, it would have to be any other method than by my golden wool. I still had plenty of time on that and I was trying to stay absolutely positive on that front. “Nnnnhh...” She was quite a shy one and… young adult based on some visual references. I watched as she wrapped her arms around a section of her body and looked away from me as she slowly wiggled her way into a corner. “Well okay then… do you… want some company?” I know Dolly was getting impatient, but I wanted to know more about this poor young purple hooded snake lady. “They’re going to kill you… Cruel and Crazy.” The shivering naga mumbled. “And I’m going to be responsible for it… why did they bring me back… I didn’t want to live again… to hurt anyone how I was hurt.” “I’m not going to call you by what your others call you…” I think I knew what the anomaly was, but I really didn’t want to pressure her. The names of the three naga were Crazy, Cruel and Coward according to what the other two said… they were all part of this poor young lady. “I wouldn’t call them by what you would want to call yourself either.” “Huh?” She still stayed in the corner and I wasn’t making any sudden movements. She wasn’t locked in the cell, the cell door had always been open… she just didn’t want to leave apparently. Her gaze was now on me as she stayed in the corner. “Can I guess things and you can tell me if I’m right or wrong? I will not approach you nor will I try to do anything to you unless you attack me.” I was trying to be placating as possible, because she was like a little lambkin that has had one too many scares or absolute horrors in her life. I tried to not to think about how I was one of them. Wasn’t too unknown for monsters on Equus to scare a similar complex into a lambkin, but those personalities weren’t aggressive. “I just want to be sympathetic to your plight…” “No one… can understand… what I’ve been through…” The naga continued to stay where she is, I back away and sat down. “Dolly could you sit in my lap for a bit? Dormarch, look out for any aggressive programs. Mr. Zealot whatever happens… don’t do anything to Ms. Naga here no matter what she does to us or any of our friends.” Following what I said Dolly came to stretch out in my lap on her back and I started to give her belly rubs. Dormarch moved near the nearby railing to look up and down the empty cell block. The Zealot just sat the supplies down and leaned against the wall with a curious look to me, before he quietly started joining Dormarch by being another lookout. “Now to start off with a few small yes or no questions… are you a social person?” “No…” The naga whispered while coiling up and looking away from us to face the wall while hugging herself. “Were you bullied a lot?” The slight twitch. “I’d be angry at your bullies too if they are the ones that did this to you.” “Yes… but the bullies weren’t the worst of it.” Well that was a start at least from the naga. “It’s not like a dog wouldn’t understand why it is demeaning when they get belly rubs for rolling over and exposing their belly to their masters after being kicked viciously…” “Why did they hurt you? Was it for not killing a lot of people immediately, while hurting you so bad that you couldn’t do anything else but eventually lash out at them and the world to make said pain stop?” The words I spoke caused the naga to freeze and I could see tears dripping from the edge of her hood. “You didn’t want to do it, you weren’t the most social person, but you weren’t mean spirited… they wanted what you became right?” “Actually… no. I became a monster out of necessity, not what they wanted… never what they wanted… then… Crazy… I… Nova… actually took control of me… so afraid… finally cracked… wanted to… thank them… those two… for killing me… for finally ending that suffering. Crazy was the last to die…” I watched as the naga pressed her head against the wall, I felt like I was losing her and she really needed a friend. She was shivering and was struggling to get her word out so badly as she sobbed. “Only I’m back… again… in the now… heh… alive… can’t die… won’t let me…” “I think I know the story now, sorry to have bothered you…” I was about to leave, but I had one last thing to say in the hopes of furthering this. “Did you kill anyone who didn’t deserve it?” “Tried to… did not manage to succeed… wanted anyone that came down to be an enemy… temporary memory loss… wanted to forget… wanted forget so badly… thankful for it if even for a little while… one good thing among many terrible things… not killing someone who wanted to help a…. monster…” The fold of the nagas hood clamped down and she stayed where she was as she was letting out her suffering. “Small mercies to have never killed someone innocent… still tried to though… he was magnificent… he would have helped me… knight like hero in fairytales… but it was too late to turn back...” “Let’s go…” I said as Dolly rolled off my lap after a bit of pampering, I saw the naga look at Dolly giving her a sad look and whine, still we were all about to walk away and leave her alone. She was probably happier to be alone to her misery, but at least she wasn’t currently in as much pain. I had an idea of what was happening with her right now and I really didn’t want to fight the other two naga for a whole variety of reasons involving this one in particular. “Please… tell me what you think you know at least… before you leave me to the dark…” The Naga was trying to bridge a gap where the bridge was doused in acid, stomped on, hit with a wrecking ball and tore down numerous times until all that could be built was a series of planks spanning an exceedingly large gap with nothing to support them but a bunch of flimsy nails and the bridge was on fire. Yet she still tried to bridge the gap, I couldn’t ignore it… my need to help others was blaring in my skull to not walk away from this. So I simply couldn’t. That naga, she’s been hurt so many times, but I… could actually empathize with her plight given what happens to Chrysomallus’s like me whenever people find out just exactly what we can do, the bloody history in the attempts to force Chrysomallus to do a particular thing is nauseating. It’s why Lambkin fear being a Chrysomallus, would rather be a black sheep. Less imminent death. I wasn’t about to tell everyone the secret to the full Chrysomallus state, but at this rate I’d just be happy with seeing my god puppies and Tianhuo one last time before giving myself up to the inevitable outcome of my golden wool hitting critical mass. A little more than a quarter up my left leg now and I was resisting it with everything I had… I had a decent understanding of the naga’s situation “There once was a girl, who had a small world, she lived day by day in her own way.” I moved a bit away from the cell and didn’t turned around I motioned for the others to move ahead of me and the Zealot followed the order without question, I was going to expose my back entirely to her. Dolly didn’t think it was a good idea, but she trusted me enough to follow along with what I was trying to do here. “Beaten down by what other say, never returning fire she stayed down to her own dismay. Eventually the girl made a friend… a friend who gravely betrayed her trust despite the fun they had together to an untimely end.” There was a small gasp, a whimper from behind and a few sobs, I must be hitting frighteningly close. “For you see the girl had something that most others didn’t… a power that most would kill for…” Given what I heard of Crazy and Cruel’s callousness towards life, it would be understandable given what Crazy informed us of just exactly what the naga was capable of, it led to a horrifying conclusion. I’m trying to imagine the worst case scenario that the ability to ‘resurrect’ anything in almost any way you could want within a set perimeter would make people abuse you, just to find out if they could replicate or even control the power of life and death. Much less… control the person who had that ability. I held the spent reviver seed that brought me back not too long ago and looked at it, I threw it in my mouth and ate it like a pistachio nut, it was just a normal seed that made grass or a tree after being spent and couldn’t make more seeds. Was it truly only in Mystery Dungeons could you find these things? It gave me an idea of how to help the naga, but she would have to agree to it as a living, breathing, free thinking, biological being that is a rarity in Moon Cells realms. She had to save herself and I could get her started on that, she has to make the choice once I put it in her claws. “The power brought about much envy, people coveted it so badly… I wouldn’t be surprised if the girl ended up in a lab where they carved her open in a variety of ways, days upon days, including attacking her brain in a literal and figurative haze. Hacking at it to see if she would continue to come back trying to find a way to desperately make such a rare ability available to the elite so they could rule forever. Only… the girl stopped them at every turn… she was stronger than an entire facility… one of likely secret in design… she stayed strong… even when she broke and whether she meant to be or not… she was a hero in her own unique way did their attempts she would sever. The cost…” “Sumeragi…” The whimpering from the naga said, that hadn’t been a whisper but the name of the group that likely did this to her. “Was her sanity battered and damaged more than twice over, the ones who wanted to recreate or control the power made some big mistakes trying to play at being gods moreover. Thus in the girls heart rose two figures… one made from cruelty and one made from insanity… all part of the same… single… soul, in dire need of a lucky four leaf clover.” The anomaly makes sense, like a humdinger’s paradox. The naga was alive outside the control of Moon Cell, a digital naga under the full control of moon cell and whatever level of freedom Crazy might sport in a chaotic mess that was the poor naga’s mind still fighting to save her own soul from being controlled. “They may call her weak, they may pick on her, but I seriously doubt those parts of the girl would ever hurt the one they want to protect the most.” “My name is Elise.” The naga, Elise, said quietly and almost immediately as I stopped talking. “My experimental subject number was ironically ‘eighty-six’ while they held me prisoner. A number used in markets where I’m from… to mean… get rid of something.” “Thank you for your time Elise, again, I’m sorry if I have to fight you or at least the other versions of you running around. People would likely want to do the same thing to me for power, if they knew exactly what I could do and it has happened to my ancestors before. It hasn’t happened to me yet, but I’m not hopeful that it won’t.” I got up and started walking forward. “I’m quite sorry that we’re going to have to fight them if they attack us, we’ll… try to avoid them and if we can’t… we’ll try to be quick.” “Quick is the only way you can do it, the resurrections come fast… they are almost impossible to stop once started.” Elise said making me stop in place. “He was quick… that hero, very quick… like true lightning. Unfortunate that Crazy formed from our first fight with him… she escaped… brought us back… all three of us were forced to fight for Nova… monster even I couldn’t fathom as one… couldn’t stop… couldn’t fight against… couldn’t resist. Thankfully the hero had help from his nemesis who swore to end him, that guy, he swore to hunt us all and he meant it. The guy that betrayed me… he’s in Midgar as another one of Moon Cell’s puppets… defeat him, you take Midgar… well defended the central tower of the upper city. He’s probably even watching all of this even now and laughing at me… reminding me what he did to me by having me captured after we played some games together. Didn’t even know at the time he would do all that to me.” “Thank you.” I tried not to look back, but I did so anyway and saw the naga sitting there looking at the ground behind us her tail flicking behind her a bit. “No… thank you, for figuring out what I’ve been through and… understanding.” Elise rubbed at her left arm, both her arms were covered in cuts she likely did to herself. I, couldn’t exactly judge her for it. She needed as much help as I do at times, I have a Dolly and a Dormach… she had… two nasty personality disorders come to life, but they still left her to herself to do what she wanted? “I… don’t think you want to make friends after what happened to you.” I stated bluntly, but then Elise looked up at Dolly earning a curious gaze from her. Her vibrant purple eyes looked a little bit hopeful. “She’s so well taken care of… how much love do you give her and how much do you get in return?” Elise mumbled and then slithered back into her cell, not even waiting for an answer. “I guess some dogs are luckier than others. I’m not a dog now, but Moon Cell will try to come for me, I’m a loose asset that can’t go unnoticed forever.” “Please don’t hurt yourself anymore, if not for my sake of mind forcing me to continue help you somehow regardless of how hard it would be, then maybe for your own well-being.” Felt like wanting to harm myself grievously to escape the mental pains too… unfortunately when you can resurrect a nigh infinite amount of times, escaping trauma is kind of impossible. Ironically, Cruel and Crazy are the two personalities that want to keep her original self fully alive as hard as they could in their own unique way, personalities created under duress to do what she herself couldn’t. “Come on, let’s go find our way forward.” “Mom… what about…” Dormarch tried, I didn’t know where he was going, but he was either worried about the naga or worried about us having our backs to her. “Don’t worry about it Dormarch, Elise is not going to hurt us unless she’s with her other selves. You can’t save everybody, but I hope she’ll be able to save herself… she was brave enough to create her own protectors no matter how weird and violent they are.” We were going to come to blows with two parts of her trapped soul, the parts created out of pain and suffering that likely craved the original personalities freedom over their own… which is why she came back alive when her personalities are still digitally locked souls under Moon Cell’s control. “One last thing… can you do me a favor and stick this seed somewhere in your hood?” I opened the supply box and took out one of the precious few reviver seeds and went back to the cell of the cute looking, if horribly depressed, naga. I placed the seed on the floor outside the cell and she sat there looking at me while sniffling. I wanted to tell her it will be okay, but I couldn’t force her to live… I could hardly do that for myself if it weren’t for everyone that needed me and Dolly’s attempts at cheering me on every day or Dormarch needing his mother. Everybody had wanted her for her ability to ‘resurrect’ herself, I didn’t need it and I didn’t want it from her, I can hardly imagine how much worse my life would get with such an ability. She had the curse of ‘resurrection’, I had a curse of ‘sacrifice’, at least on some level there was a connection. Was sacrificing one Reviver Seed to her even enough to make it work? Could Reviver Seeds even fix something like a damaged soul where her power to resurrect couldn’t? “You’re missing your confidence and your spontaneity at the moment, maybe this will help you get them back eventually? Plant the idea of this seed in your heart and watch it grow into something beautiful.” I hoped this actually pans out as I turned away from her. “Okay, Dormarch, Mr. Zealot and Dolly… we’re going. We need to find a way out of here that doesn’t run us into one of those Behemoths.” -Thirty seconds later after being left entirely alone, Elise- My bright purple eyes with round, slightly slit, pupils and black sclera looked down at the insignificant seed on the floor. “A seed?” I looked down at my arms and my hands as I slithered up to it, I leaned forward and carefully took it up. It was so small and insignificant… like I how I felt at times, but there was something strange about it. A promise of some form to it. I sat here quietly contemplating the one that called herself Pom. I considered her words, before they set out into the facility, likely to run across my… other selves. Half my soul was under Moon Cell’s control, Cruel was fully controlled… Crazy… she still resisted being only half contained… me… I was actually alive with half a soul and looking at a seed contemplating what I should do with myself. Despite how Cruel and Crazy treated me… Cruel was confident and Crazy was spontaneous… were those bad things? I was an introvert so… they were something I had problems with being and despite what they say about me and how they supposedly treated me verbally, they would never let me die, almost like loving imaginary sisters in a twisted sort of way. They never hurt me physically, each other sure, but never me. They berate me a lot, but… I’m beginning to feel more hopeful about things as that verbal abuse is me trying to tell myself to be stronger in a roundabout way. I wasn’t under constant torture anymore, the only one torturing me now is… myself. I had to wonder why I was even classified for Lancer when I hardly ever charge forward before that computer brought me somewhat fully back to life and not the half-life controlled manner that Moon Cell intended. Moon Cell probably didn’t know I could break free… or that I even was free in a manner of speaking… it wanted a servant in Cruel yet she still…. ‘I’ still somehow... managed. Cruel summoned Crazy and Crazy in turn summoned me outside of Moon Cell’s control… why would they do that for me if they… ‘I’ didn’t care about myself?! I spontaneously decided to take up the seed in my left hand and confidently stuff it into the right side of my hood where it wouldn’t accidentally fall out. I made sure it was in there and hoped it did what Pom hoped it would, because I had no idea what kind of seed it was. My long forgotten sense of ‘Curiosity’ drove me to remember what it was like to learn, to feel, to touch… could I try again? I had infinite tries as long as I don’t grow old and blue like other naga, but I was simply never given a chance of something like this before. -Currently with Cruel Naga, Crazy Naga- For some reason both us shivered, my shiver was mostly in anticipation for what’s about to happen. It felt like something happened with Coward, but that didn’t matter as I was enjoying our lovely time together with Cruel. Just like a Coward, she should keep living longer as death was too good for the likes of her! This is when Cruel finally managed to tear my head off with a cheese grater, too bad the absolutely exquisitely excruciating pain from that moment of acknowledging my existence only lasted for a second as my shredded scales fell to the floor. It’s a good thing Coward was too cowardly to feel anymore. “Return to life, resurrection.” Cruel stated bluntly in a demented dark tone and I was back to being alive… digitally… on the nearest TV screen closest to you! Sure it’s like being alive, yet I have this core thing holding my part of our soul captive, it chafed and my soul was sticking halfway out of it weirdly… Moon Cell needed at least four soul traps before it could stop us from resisting! Just the way I liked it!! It itch’s uncomfortably and I wanted to scratch that itch with a knife, but that was more Coward’s thing! Scratching herself I mean, but she never scratches her butt or gently at all, but she did get pretty red ribbons running down her arms. “Keheehee… LOVE, it hurts so good!” It made me feel alive at least when I wasn’t, which is always fun! What mattered was that Coward was alive, always Coward… Coward had to live… she should try actually living sometimes… why am I feeling like Coward? I’m not Coward, I’m Crazy… is that a wall that shouldn’t be there? Hello there everyone, is the color of the sky in your world brown?! “I hate you with every fiber of my being Crazy.” Yep, loved you to Cruel! It’s intentional for us to try and kill each other because we’re the negative aspects that Coward’s wishes weren’t a hidden part of her wants, if she wasn’t such a Coward she’d embrace the insanity that is cherry changas and make us whole again with beans! I mean that huge planet sized zombie named Nicole thing… that was totally a game that didn’t give us nightmares once we gained necromancy powers. Nope, no sir, not like Cruel tried to turn an entire facility into flatulent zombies. I liked the X virus personally they looked like flying jellybeans and were so tasty to snack on, lemon and lime flavor all day like drinking fairies blood! What do you think wall that doesn’t exist? -Outside the facility, ???- A beat… I felt a thudding in my chest. My eyes flew open and I opened my mouth… No bubbles came out? I was… underwater? Panic, thrashing, trying to swim upwards, but after a moment a realization. I was underwater, but I had no air in my lung… Am I… no… reaching up, I felt… Why do I be having gills and how long have I been being underwater for?! I also had the uh urge to shout… oh no, a Water Tiger! Uh… Totsugeki?! I felt a large drain on my body as my magic rapidly sucked itself out of me and then a blinding flash occurred. A bright cheery smile and squeaking noise follows as my vision clears up as a bright orange and yellow dolphin had the Water Tiger pierced on its long nose, it then tore it open by opening its mouth and then started eating the Water Tiger. The dolphin be resembling a setting sun on the horizon of a sky or sea, it continues to squeal happily and then nuzzles up against me affectionately. What be going on with me?! Also where is my Cane Scythe being? Huh? The dolphin swam away and thirty seconds later, with a few more bits of Water Tiger sticking out of its mouth it came back. Oh my cane scythe… um, thank you? The dolphin squeals happily, finishes chomping on the bits of Water Tiger and then disappears. Nothing else is being different about me, but… that was confusing and I be having some large questions about being able to do that. Let’s be starting with the thing that be terrifying me the most… What even am I? -Origin Space, Tiamat- “Awakened for one, useful before you face off with the likes of Lu Bu once again… the waters of chaos come alive in you little Capricornus and it seems a seafarer gave you ‘some’ summoning capacity.” I loved watching pirates, especially one of my descendants finally accidentally going past that ten minute time limit that pirates shouldn’t. “I want to see you set sail on those possibilities now open to you Shanty hmhmhm. Will you continue watching the Chrysomallus brother?” “Of course.” Bahamut stated with a crossed limbs and a curious look at the naga who was now returning to the roots of all living beings in the form of ‘curiosity’. Arceus was a bit busy watching the fighting all across Ransei as his children struggled to stem the tide, a father of many worlds weeps. I wept for all the children that left the waters and crawled onto land to become outside my domain.