Hello everyone thank you for reading ^^ I hope you enjoy the final chapter to Arc 2. Vesper fought off the seductions of the Soviet Love Hammer but now she must face her greatest foe, herself... well Sub anyway. Hope you guys enjoy tell me what you think. :P

Vespidian Arc 2, Chapter 9

I needed to have a long talk with Sub. There were ground rules and shit we needed to discuss. I had sort of forgotten how to get back into that dark place though, my inner mind. There was no way in hell I was going to ask Dreamer about it. I lay on the bed with my eyes closed, trying to imagine a door. It was kinda hard though, but after maybe an hour I had done it and the world faded into black around me. Now that I know how to do it, it is rather convenient. Sub was somewhere in here I could feel her.

“Sub! Where are you?” I yelled into the recesses of inky mist.

Slowly the ground bubbled and a form I was rather familiar with arose, it was me before the transformation. She held her ears, wincing a little. 'Do you have to be a bitch? You can whisper you know. I hear everything.'

“Why did you choose that form?” I asked.

'Well you are not using it so why not? You have a problem with me keeping our old self alive?' She asked tapping her feet with irritation.

“No. It is just weird looking at myself, but it is not me.”

Sub rubbed her face a little. 'Are you retarded? Oh god... so I am retarded?! Fuck me. No, no, no I ain't letting us fall down that rabbit hole. Alright look since it seemed to have flown in one antenna and out the other last time. I am you and you are me. We are one in the same, yet we are also separate. We have our own roles and only by working together can we bring out our maximum potential. What you do affects me and what I do affects you. Working in tangent we move this body. Before you ask, yes everybody is like this. However we are special since we can communicate directly. Think of me as your inner desires, your personal coach sort of. You want to work out a lot, tell me to train and I will start influencing your urges and before you know it instead of laying around playing games you will feel a need to go lift some weights or go out running. You start thinking about sex a lot and I will try to get us laid. Said example Boris. Do you even realize how many impulses you were sending to me to hold that man down and fuck his brains out? I had to vent like eight times just to keep us from going insane.'

“But you control bottom righty.” I stood staring at her, thinking over what she had said. “So basically I tell you what to do and you create a feed back loop that tells me what to do? What happens if I accidentally tell you to do something that I don't actually want to do?”

She looked surprised, don't look at me like that! 'Well yeah actually. I knew you weren't stupid. As for bottom righty, yes I have semi control over it. Then again I have semi control over the whole body. I know you are about to flip a lid, but calm down. You are in control, you literally tell me what to do. What I am talking about is muscle memory. Why do you think we pick up shit so fast? Both of us are remembering it and both of us are putting it into practice. This gigantic brain ain't just for show. Two minds working as one to learn something are going to be far more productive than one. You might get parts I don't and I will get stuff you don't and by putting them together we can understand things we did not think possible before.

'There is some shit that don't need to be said though like breathing while we sleep or beating the hearts for instance. As for lapses in judgment I can resist a lot of your non focused thoughts. Say you have a passing thought to, oh I don't know, suck some dudes dick we don't know. Just an example don't look at me like that. Anyway I will likely just brush it off and ignore it. However if you really, really want something then it will influence me. Since we like the same shit I am not going to be able to resist and I will be sending positive reinforcements to give you that extra push to do what ever that thing was.'

“You really like to hear yourself talk. So what you are saying is we as a whole are far stronger than as two separate individuals? You are something like my conscience and I can override you? Isn't that really scary?”

She flicked my antenna. That shit hurt! I glared at her while she was thinking. Why can't I hear her thoughts? I concentrated on her, just listening to the surroundings. That familiar scratching sound and mumbling voices was under a strange pulsing... was that a heartbeat or blood coursing through a vein? This place really was bleak though. There were words I guess you could call them, but they were muffled and incoherent to the point I did not have a clue what they were saying.

She shook her head, looking tired. 'We have our separate thoughts and very different moralities. Personally the world could burn to the ground and I would not care so long as we lived. You are the only one I care about. Now before you start with that moral high horse crap know this, it is actually a very good thing we have different points of view. When there comes a time where we need to make a hard choice just lean back on me and I will take the brunt of it. It is what I am here for. You are my moral compass, though you do not realize it. I admire your innocence, it is something I never had. It gets annoying when you chicken out or do something stupid, but that is you and I love you dearly.'

A realization dawned upon me and I felt like an idiot for not getting it until now. “So when Molotov was torturing me you were the one who wanted to adapt to that environment? It was you that wanted to kill people. Like Mom. You are the evil me?”

Sub's mouth twitched. 'Let's not talk about that. At the time I saw no escape and the only rational thing was to acclimate and do what she said. Eventually we would have used all those things she taught us and killed her. I am not evil, don't call me that.'

“If you are not evil then what the fuck are you?” I stared at her with suspicion.

She looked at me like she was about to cry. Wait am I the bad guy here? 'You are rather cruel you know. I am not evil. Anybody else can call me that all they want, but not you. It is your fault that I am the way that I am.'

“Now what the fuck is that supposed to mean?” I yelled at her and she ran away crying.

I stood there in disbelief. This was that same cocky bitch who had made fun of me from the moment we met. It just did not sit right with me. The scratching had grown to nails on a chalk board. Sub had fled down a twisting corridor that materialized. It literally curved to the point that as I followed I glanced back and realized I was walking on the ceiling. I could see her vaguely near the end. She was surprisingly fast. A bright light flooded out as she opened a door and then darkness descended when it slammed shut behind her. It took what felt like an hour to reach the door and there was no knob to open it. I tried imagining one on there, to no avail.

My hand knocked on the thick door of seething shadow. “Open up Sub. I know you are in there. Look let's talk this out.”

'Go away.' She said back.

“You are in my fucking head. I ain't going no where.”

'If you wanna talk then talk.'

“Look I am sorry I yelled at you. This is just a lot of shit to take in. You know I am telling the truth.”

The door creaked open and she was staring me down with deadpanned eyes. 'Unfortunately I know, I know that you are a bitch without meaning to be.'

I smirked a little. “There it is. The foul mouthed Sub I know.”

'Eat a bag of dicks.' She sneered.

“You first.” I laughed. That is more like it. This Sub is much better than the emotional train wreck.

The light was blinding when she opened the door all the way and I felt her tugging me in. I did not believe my eyes, Sub had been holding out on me this whole god damned time! A colorful dreamscape expanded into the horizon with giant mushrooms, autumn colored trees, a mountain made out of assorted candy in the back ground. There was a spiraling castle in the distance on a floating island. Lakes and rivers, flowed through the valley that dipped before us and the sky was cut in half between day and night. The sun lingered perpetually, a shimmering ruby among the deep blue back drop, with pink cotton candy like clouds. Several moons adorned the shadowed other half like diamonds and stars twinkled keeping back the dark of night.

We stood on a path of purple bricks that winded its way through the hilled landscape. Green grass grew everywhere, the low melodic calls of birds in the trees and chirping of crickets rising from the shaded places. Where the fuck has this place been all my life? Is that singing? I looked around, but no one was here, except Sub and I. Along the path were a long line of sunflowers that swayed in the breeze... wait a minute there is no wind. Then I realized there were faces on the flowers, not like people faces but as though they had been drawn on by a kindergartner. Their leaves wriggled and they danced humming a tune. There was something off about all this and I could not place my finger on it.

I gave Sub a critical look. “How come you never showed me this place and left me out in the darkness?”

'This is where I live so. It is kind of embarrassing.'

“Well you certainly did a lot of drugs to make this place.”

'For your information you made this place.'

“I did?” I asked looking over the strangely happy place. Sub nodded and I smiled vaguely. “Can I change what I look like and stuff in here?”

'Oh course. You can be anything in here. You could be a flying spaghetti monster if you wanted to be.'

“Why would I want to be that?”

'It was an example. There we go see? That was not hard.' She said snarkily at me as my hands changed to soft human skin.

A mirror rose up and I was me again. My thick, long black hair, dull blue eyes and of course the dark bags under them. Damn I had a big nose, I had forgotten about that. I was wearing a little white dress and it felt weird, there was some horror movie vibes coming off it. Did I really look like this? I racked my brain and everything I could remember was this. It could use some work, but for now I was just happy to look like me. I glanced over at Sub. Her form writhed as black mist covered her. Slowly it vanished and she looked like, well what I recognize as Vespidian. That hauntingly white mask like face with the wide stretching lips that concealed the mandibles, the four huge curved black eyes and of course the antenna curling back in the air. The black sheened exoskeleton, although in the light it glinted metallic blue, large boobs that looked kinda like a chest plate and four spindly arms. Majestic orangy red wings that almost touched the ground behind her, near skeletal stomach, it concaved in below the rib cage and fleshed back out at the hips. She did have a nice muscular ass though. Thick, powerful thighs that were jointed to the rest of the body like a ball pivot and the legs that grew smaller until they ended in the tripod claws. If I was to be honest she looked like an evil alien queen, no empress.

It was scary of course, but I had seen it enough to get a little used to it. My frown spread. I still hated that form it reminded me of what I am now. I would at the least like to forget it in here, but I know that is just running away from reality and that is something that can't be avoided forever. Vaguely I looked over myself taking in all the details. I wanted to remember who I was even as it eroded away.

“You care explaining what the fuck this place is?!”

'This is the outer shell of our inner mind. This particular place is the only memory I could piece together from our childhood.'

Now that I think about it I can't really remember anything before high school... although there was that forest thing with bugs but it is a little vague. That is not good. “Sub why can't I remember anything?”

She sighed and frowned. 'Our brain is more fucked than you seem to think it is. It was kind of like swiss cheese before it healed properly. When it was expanded we lost just about everything that was stored. I had very little time after you made me to safely tuck away our more precious memories. Our name, dad, baseball those sorts of things. Do you understand how a brain remembers things? The signals sent between the neurons of the brain are our experiences and dictate if it is a good thing, bad thing, so on and so forth. You see even if we regenerate the damaged memories will still be fragmented or even destroyed, since we will need to make new neural pathways the signals won't be the same. I have been cheating this a bit though thanks to all our extra room in here and have been hording memories kinda like a back up hard drive. In other words unless our brain suffers catastrophic destruction we will remember.'

“Sub.” I said with a slight smile. “You will remember who we are even if I can't.”

A wide grin spread and she bowed. 'Of course I have already started sorting out our fragmented memories. It was the first order you ever gave me. Well actually it was the second, the first was protect me. And ever since you created me I have been doing just that. Although you probably don't remember forming me during our transformation.'

“Wait I made you? You are my subconscious should you not have always been here?”

Sub waved her hand and a stone table with two chairs rose up. She sat down with the abdomen to the side. I sat across from her. 'It is ok not to remember. It was a rather painful time. I took the liberty of sealing away those memories. You were incoherent and more or less made me by accident. I have always existed it is just you gave me sentience, unable to cope with your agony. You wished for someone to make the loneliness go away, to protect you. At first though I could only watch over you and you were frightened not knowing what I was or even where we were. My initial attempts at communicating made you weary, you screamed and cried. So I stopped trying, choosing to silently watch over, sort of like a sentinel. Then that Dreamer person came and I could not allow her to warp us, to harm you. Which forced me to materialize before you in an attempt to fight her off. That is how we formally met, you know the rest from there.'

I thought on it. “So if Dreamer had never gone in my head you would have stayed in the shadows?”

'I did not want to get in our way. Out of sight, out of mind after all. I would have simply been a normal subconscious. I mean I do have my own personality, then again it is derived from you, I suppose it is a little complicated. If it had not been for her you likely never would have even known I was in here and certainly not that this place that you grew to resent and fear was your own mind rather than some void somewhere. On the other hand I suppose some amount of thanks is due to her since we are now able to openly speak without me fearing how it might affect you. For a long time there I was scared of a paradox occurring. If done poorly I could have easily inadvertently driven you mad, which would have then made me crazy. In other words we both would have lost.'

Most of that flew over my head and I saw her sigh with disappointment. I did get some of it though. “What do you mean paradox?”

She smiled a little. 'Oh at first I thought that perhaps it would be bad for us to meet. Something similar to time travel theories and meeting your past or future self for instance. Thankfully that was not our case, but had it been... well neither of us would be sitting here talking to one another. You see one of two things would have happened, either I would cease to exist or you would have and then subsequently I would have faded away. In essence killing us both. You can survive without me, but I need you to even exist.'

“That sounds fucking scary. Hey remind me that if we ever get involved in time shenanigans to just walk away. Wait, why would I be able to continue without you?”

She nodded. 'Simple with effort you could make a new me like you did last time. Granted I would not be the same, different memories, different personality. That brings me to a rather touchy subject. You can't get rid of me. I know you have been thinking it. Also do not make any more fragments of us.' Her voice broke off a little and she looked worried. 'Now what I am about to tell you should scare the shit out of you, it terrorized me when I realized the implications and with good reason. However promise me that you will not lose your shit. If you had made me even stronger when I was initially created things could have gone very badly. You must never make anymore of us.'

I looked at her for a while. Trying to figure this all out. Why the hell does Sub know so much? My voice was unsteady. “What exactly could have happened?”

Sub had a slight smile, but I could tell she was not happy at all. 'You made me slightly stronger than you.' She shrugged with a sorry look on her face. 'This means that had you made me different, not your protector, your friend to stave off loneliness, but instead out of fear or anger you would have created some monster. It is hard to say this, but you would have been killed and eaten and it would have assumed complete control over the body.'

My eyes gaped. Oh dear god! Thoughts began to swirl, all of them were bad and I glared at her. “You stay away from me.”

Her bottom fists clenched and she held her head panicking. 'Wait! Wait listen to me please, please listen to me. I don't mean you any harm really, really! Just calm down. No one is going to hurt you.'

Can I even dare to take a chance on this? Fuck no. How can I kill her?! Jesus fucking Christ what have I made? I jumped back from the table and started to run. Where the fuck was I going to go? There was no door out anymore and all this colorful shit was getting in the way. I concentrated for a moment ripping a hole into the outside layer. The place with darkness. Sub stood and gave chase. Fear started bubbling and oozing everywhere. She is going to kill me! She knew this place better than me, the mindscape was warping into twisted corridors and none of it looked good. I wanted out, I needed out. How to kill her? How to destroy her? Wait a minute Dreamer wanted to help me and it was Sub's idea to not let her. This was all her plot, she was going lull me into a false sense of security and eat me. My mental image of a door out formed and it appeared before me. I ran reaching for it, to my salvation, the door to escape this nightmarish hell hole. Sub tackled me from behind, she was not lying about being stronger than me. She ripped me away and shattered the door. There was no escape.

Sub held me down and loomed overhead. Her voice was seething and twisting, a dark convergence of voices fighting over one another to be heard. 'Listen. Just fucking listen to me! If I wanted to hurt you I would have already done it. Why the fuck would I tell you that I am going to eat you, if I was going to do it? Do I look like a monologueing villain? If I was going to eat you I would have just attacked you. No provocation, no warning. Don't look at me like a monster, not you. Please not you.'

“Let me go.” I snarled, rolling over to face her.

Thick tears were falling from her eyes onto my face. 'I can't do that. You will run away. I know what you are thinking. You don't understand how bad an idea it is to bring Dreamer back in here. You did not feel what she was capable of. She could destroy us. Wipe us clean, lobotomize us. You would not just kill me by letting her in, but both of us. For a brief moment our minds had touched and I saw what she does to people! Believe me on this. You made me to protect you and if that means I must hurt you to save you, I will. Please forgive me!'

“Wait I believe you.” I said as her arms wrapped tightly around me to the point it felt like she was going to snap me in half. I screamed. “Sub! Stop your hurting me!”

She was sobbing. 'You did this to us. Why did you make me if you were going to throw me away? Do you have any idea how it feels to be looked at like a monster by the only person that means anything to you? I just wanted you to love me!'

“I don't fucking know.” I yelled at her using my anger to filter out the pain. “How the hell can I love you when you are trying to kill me?! You are worse than Molotov!”

Her mandibles grit together and she glared down at me. 'Don't you dare compare me to her. I would think you would know the pain of rejection. All I ever did was protect you and this is the thanks I get? You want to kill me? You are no better than those people out there. The ones that hunted us like an animal and dehumanized us. You are just like Mom you know that?'

“No, I am not.” I roared kicking and struggling.

'Yes you are. Think for a moment.' The surroundings grew cold and Sub looked as though she had her heart ripped out. I never realized anyone could look so hurt and sad. 'You are casting me away because I have the potential to harm you, but not the intent. You are not even giving me a chance.'

“Just fucking let me go right now and we can figure this out!” I groaned holding myself back from struggling. “Wait you are right. So stop I will hear you out.”

She let me go and for a moment looked deeply at me. It felt like she was staring into my soul and I started having second thoughts. Why was she so fucking scary?! There were lingering doubts and that was making this all the worse. I knew she could hear it all, but deep inside I wanted to trust her... Sub is that you trying to influence me?

'Calmed down now?' She asked keeping the hands to her side. I could tell she wanted to hold onto me. I nodded and she continued. 'You and I both know what it is like when people judge you, not by your actions, but by your looks or what you represent.'

I thought it over for a while. She had points and I should at the least give her a chance. She deserves more than that though. Sub was right and I hated it when people judged me so where the hell did I get off passing judgment on her? I was being a hypocrite. I mean I tried to kill her and she had not really even hurt me at any point. Sure a little bear hug but nothing too painful.

“I am sorry Sub.”

'That is alright. You were scared. I would have reacted the same way most likely. I am just happy that neither of us made a terrible mistake.'

“What would have happened if I had not heard you out?” I asked looking at the ground.

She pulled me into her lap. 'Any number of things. If you had gotten away and let Dreamer in, we would be dead. If I had overpowered you, one of two things would have happened. I would have either imprisoned you in here and waited until you calmed down, or if things looked irreconcilable then... I hate to admit it, but I would have eaten you. There is also the possibility that we would have killed each other trying to assert dominance over the other. I don't want any of that though. You are my only friend and I would die for you.'

“You would die for me?” I asked looking up at her.

'Yes. I love you after all.'

“That is sweet Sub. Honestly I don't know what to say to that.” I started blushing. Why the fuck was I getting embarrassed talking to myself? This is weird, like super god damned weird.

'While we are being honest here I kinda led you on earlier about Neon Nurse.' Said Sub looking away. 'It was not that bad I just could not help myself. I mean you were talking to me and I did not want you to leave. That and I was jealous. I wanna diddle your naughty bits too you know.'

"I don't really know what to say to that. Should I be scared?"

'You don't need to say a word.' Her smile spread and she kissed me. It took a moment to register, but then she tried to get fancy with her tongue work. I recoiled away like a wound up spring. Wiping my mouth I looked at her in disbelief. Her grin was growing rather predatory. The hair was standing up on the back of my neck.

“What the fuck Sub?!”

'You are over reacting. It was just a little love nip.'

I pointed at her. “There was tongue! I don't love you like that.”

'Why not? I love you with all three of our hearts.' She frowned, crawling towards me in a prowling fashion. 'I have fantasied about us becoming one for so long.'

“This is just wrong.” I took a few steps back. “You are not going to eat me are you?”

'How? Is it bad to express my feelings for you? Oh I can't guarantee there won't be any carpet munching. No one is here to clam jam me this time!'

“No! Control yourself Sub. Look I love you too, but god this is like way out of my comfort zone.” Not you too Sub! Do I have a lesbo magnet on me or what? She stalked forward and I fell back crab walking away. “I am not into women damn it!”

Sub scurried in that horrifying, six legged motion and I screamed when she hugged me... Wearily I opened my eyes and she was rubbing her face against me gently. 'We can fix that. You know this tongue is better than a dick, right? We both know you are just shy. Think about it, we could do anything in here, anything. This isn't even my true form you know! Don't knock it till you try it.'

“This is not something you can just fix... anything you say?” I asked looking her over. Well I could certainly think of a few things. It is not like anybody is ever going to know about this.

I hugged her. It was so comforting. Now I get it. Why should I be scared of Sub? In the end she is just a part of me, craving all the things I myself desire. To be accepted, to be loved, to not be alone and to find a place in the world. This was that telepathy thing she was talking about. I could feel her and she could feel me, there was so much warmth and kindness in there. It was like an endless ocean that I had been afraid of because the waters were a dark color. If anything I was the evil one. She had been frank and honest even though she knew I would freak out, but she felt that I needed to know those things rather than let them just sneak up on me. I had been pinning all my hatred, fear and loathing for what I had become on her and shunning the only person who was there for me all this time. If I could not love myself, how the fuck could I love anybody else? It was so simple and obvious yet it had taken this long to realize it. Sub I might be lacking in confidence, you may have to hold my hand and let me cry on your shoulder, but I will always do the same for you. I think we have a bright future. I am sorry for hurting you so much.

'How about we make it up to each other?' She winked mischievously, she was getting touchy feely.

“See that is how I know you are me.” I grinned, letting it happen. It was the least I could do and I would be lying to say there was no curiosity of what it would feel like. “So you can be Boris?”

'I like where this is going.' She cooed. 'Honestly I thought you were going to go for the tentacles first.'

I gave Sub a nice kiss on the lips. Then I realized something. “Isn't this like incest? I mean you are me right?”

She looked at me considering it. Then she shrugged. 'I think of it more as mental masturbation. I mean we are just fucking ourselves right?'

“I like the sound of that. I got one better, mingling of the minds.”

'Nah, spiritual spooning.' She smirked. Oh god damn it, that was good. Sub, you kinky bitch, I love you.

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Hope you all enjoyed ^^ Arc 3 will begin being put up tomorrow or the day after depends on my schedule. As usual tell me what you think I love hearing feed back. Prepare yourselves for the MOON SAILORS!