Dokutsu was wandering the halls in a tizzy as I continued using sonic terrorism to herd her toward Lawlimi. The cacophony would always come from the end of a passage I didn't want her to traverse, gradually building in volume as if its source was approaching. She would lash her whips, defiant, but ultimately retreat every time. If this experiment had gone on much longer, she would surely have learned that my unholy din was essentially harmless. If her body composition had not been so sensitive to vibrations, she might have learned to ignore me already.

As she stalked angrily down yet another side chute in the warrens, she heard my dysphonia building at the next T crossing. Her fronds stormed around her, scraping striations into steel and stone in her frustration. A scintillant ball of yellow light crossed the open passage, followed by two more. With each shot, the cacophony lost some of its power, and by the third, it was no more than a faltering whisper. It was a bit of charades that may have been entirely irrelevant because we didn’t know how much she knew or understood, but Lawlimi wanted Dokutsu to associate him with the death of the noise that had been bothering her. He appeared, allowing the X-Cannon to fall to his hip. Having used the weapon at its weakest setting, he was already out of mana.

Dokutsu's tendrils rebraided themselves into hair, and her massive eyes regarded him blankly.

"Hey," he said in a soothing voice, "hey there. I'm glad you're looking better. I appreciate you healing me." He took a few cautious, sliding steps forward. Her mouth parted, and a single sound issued, vaguely questioning.

"Chi...?"

"Chi. Right. That's a better name than Dokutsu, I think. My name is Lawlimi, but that's kind of hard to say, so you can call me Law."

"Chi."

"That's right." They were paces away now, and Lawlimi raised his hand, palm up, and beckoned her. "We're okay."

Dokutsu stared at him until he started to sweat, then minced forward.

>>

(Handle Animal — Success)

>>

Lawlimi kept at it until they were close enough to touch, then he cautiously took her hand and led her out of the warrens.

"You've been ranking Handle Animal since your first advancement," I whispered, "how did you know?"

"I didn't know anything in particular," he murmured back. "I haven't played Mystic Seasons before, but I know about these games in general. Pet builds are always OP."

"Chi," Dokutsu agreed.

"If you are Bill Yang's grandson, how is it that you never played his game before your accident?"

Lawlimi's face closed off. "My dad and him didn't get along."

The first test of Lawlimi's influence on Dokutsu was reconnecting with Shippo. The kitsune held still as they approached, still sticky with mucus, and closed his eyes.

Dokutsu didn't exhibit any aggressive behavior toward Shippo, keeping her fronds to herself.

"He's our friend," Lawlimi said, "friend," and patted Shippo on the head.

"Chi," Dokutsu said, and mimicked the gesture. Her palm came down hard enough to make the smaller Therian flinch, but there was no malice in it.

Shippo opened his eyes. "Chi?"

"Chi." Her smile was as innocent as a child's.

As they made their way back to the monastery, I went ahead to parley with the Elders.

"Are you well, Ink Eyes?"

They were in their usual circle at the top of the stands, sharing a meal of mushrooms and roach meat. Apart from Ink Eyes, the Elders pretended I did not exist.

"It is an honor to be graced by Orobos, if only for a moment." Ink Eyes still looked dazed.

"Lawlimi needs the Herald's Kiss to wake the pilot, but you tossed that down the gullet of a dragon."

"Not at all. Isekel retrieved the key and passed it on to me. If Lawlimi has survived all the challenges set before him, he has proven himself worthy of the ship's rewards."

"He's coming, and Dokutsu is with him."

Ink Eyes paused in crunching the head of a roach. "He didn't kill her?"

"That's not really what Lawlimi does."

"No matter, as long as he keeps her away from here."

"Bring the Herald's Kiss to him and he will."

Ink Eyes nipped the air. "So be it." He stood and bid his retainers all stay behind. "Tell your hero I will see him in the command tower."

The meeting was arranged.

Lawlimi could climb the ladder into the command tower by using the arcs of his hand cannon as a hook. It wasn't ideal, but he managed to get up there under his own power. The ruby eye of Orobos scanned him and unlocked the wheel hatch, allowing access to the high chamber. He climbed up, and Shippo came a breath behind him.

The Seat of Command was as it had been, the furniture scaled for Star Men, and a massive amethyst glowering beside a woman in the glass. Ink Eyes was standing beside the woman, hands clasped at his waist.

"You've come a long way, hero. Are you ready for this journey to end?"

"You killed my friends."

"As I told your daemon, the spirits of your companions were freed to return to their own world. They are not like you. They do not belong here."

"I don't trust you is what I'm getting at." Lawlimi walked around a navigational machine, glancing at a dynamic map that represented their local segment of the World Tree. With the engine revving up, many of the devices in the tower had become bright and active.

"A wise position," Ink Eyes said, "for we are not friends or boon companions, but fellow captives." He turned out his hands to reveal the Herald's Kiss, a pinkish-gray walnut that carried a sense of wrongness to my senses. "Wake the pilot, and we can be done with each other. Bring us out of the darkness and into the light."

Lawlimi took the Herald's Kiss, dropped it on the floor, and stomped on it. He felt the squish, and something trying to move under his foot. Pale yellow energy gathered at the end of his right hand, and he pulled back his foot and fired. A small orb of energy sped down to where a malformed cicada had been forced out of the corrupted quest item, only to become a burnt smear on the floor.

"What have you done!?" Ink Eyes shrieked, and I felt a flutter of movement at the peripherals of my perceptions. Isekel appeared in a swirl of his enchanted cape, picking up Lawlimi and slamming him against the nearest machine.

>>

(Lawlimi takes 73 Impact Damage)

>>

The dark elf's face was twisted with rage. "You feckless wretch! I'll feed you to the engine for this."

"And free me?" Lawlimi choked.

"It is not a fate you wish for."

"You can't do it. You need me to wake up the pilot."

Isekel released him, their faces close. "What do you think you know?"

"I know if you could leave here yourself you would have done it already. And I know that whatever I just stepped on wasn't the real Herald's Kiss."

Isekel made a quick motion with the fingers of his left hand, and I recognized the characters of wizardry. Electricity crackled between those same fingertips, and he jabbed them into Lawlimi's belly.

>>

(THE SHOCKER — Heroic Incantation Level 3 — Air)

A nonlethal offensive spell designed to incapacitate a foe. Painful but not damaging, The Shocker causes all the muscles in the victim's body to contract at once, rendering them temporarily helpless.

>>

Lawlimi started to fall, but Isekel held him up with his other hand, jabbing him repeatedly.

"I can make another key," Isekel said, "and when I do, you'll be ready to cooperate."

>>

(Sneak Attack! Scalpel deals 373 Slashing Damage)

>>

Shippo had rushed Isekel from behind and slashed through his fine clothing at the back of the knee. The dark elf turned with fury in his eyes and lightning in his hands.

"Fuck you!" He said, twisting his fingers in an intricate ballet.

>>

(LIGHTNING BOLT — Heroic Incantation Level 2 — Air)

A line of electricity that damages everything in its path, ally and enemy alike.

>>

Shippo rolled out of the way on reflex, and lightning crashed into the navigation module, shattering its screen and setting it on fire.

The amethyst flashed, and Ink Eyes's face morphed into a burgundy mask of outrage. "Stop!"

"I'll handle this runt as I see fit," Isekel said, energy crackling around him.

"Chi!" Lawlimi shouted, and in an instant the silver-blue girl was drawn up the tower by her hair, rising out of the shaft with the power sword in one hand, looking like an avenging, well, certainly not an angel but perhaps a nightmare. She took in the scene in the same time it took Isekel to look surprised, and to make things more attractive for her, I created a wash of loud, distracting noise that seemed to be coming from the wizard.

Her expression hardened.

"Chi."

She launched forward along the ceiling, and Isekel threw up a wall of burning light to force her back. Dokutsu became a missile with the sword held before her head and her body angled down. The lightning danced along her rubbery skin and ricocheted inside her body until she was a blinding silhouette.

>>

(Dive Bomb! — Vital Strike — Power Sword deals 22,122 Piercing Damage)

(Wall of Lightning is Super effective! — Deals 6,800 Electric Damage)

(Dokutsu is STAGGERED)

>>

Dokutsu had charged the Power Sword with her own mana, staining it with the colors of fertile earth. All that power rushed out when the sword pierced Isekel, a muddy flare that wove around his body like the wraiths of worms.

Dokutsu fell, stunned by lightning, but keeping her grip on the blade, turning and pulling it through Isekel's abdomen, gutting him.

The dark elf's power fled, his spirit draining as his intestines spilled out over the floor.

"I cannot die," Isekel spoke slowly and carefully, like one drunk. "I’m invincible."

From his perforated entrails, a centipede, cicadas, and various other vermin crawled free. He looked at them in puzzlement.

"Acarus, why have you forsaken me?"

Lawlimi put the X-Cannon to the back of Isekel's skull and fired. There was a light splash. When Dokutsu recovered she set about playfully collecting the bugs and popping them in her mouth. She ate the centipede like spaghetti.

"You want to explain all that?" Lawlimi asked Orobos via Ink Eyes, and the demon behind the rat snarled.

"Isekel was a hero who made a pact with Acarus and the powers of the underground before being trapped here. He was potentially useful to us; the magic of the broken god is ... fluid. We made plans, but we had to wait for a Child of the Maker to arrive to bring those plans into fruition."

"What really happened to my friends?"

"They are awake, that is the truth. They also carry something in their neural nets, a trojan curse. How did you know the key was tainted?"

"I have a policy about dropping weird chrysalises into women's suspension tanks without asking. What was this lightning freak doing anyway? He wasn't acting like a player."

"He was a hero like you, one who has no other life to return to. The longer he remained with me, the more he forgot himself, until this was all he knew."

"Aw, cheese and crackers, Chi! Take that away or something."

"Chi?" Dokutsu let the entrails she'd been slurping drop out of her mouth, nonplussed.

Lawlimi shook his head. Shippo sniffed at the gore and gagged.

Lawlimi moved around the body so he could put the scene behind him. "So, what now? How do I really wake up the pilot?"

"I'm deliberating over whether or not to tell you." The rat paced over to the vat. Lili Maw hadn't shifted an eyelash since our previous visit.

"This server is about to be shut down. You're not going to get another chance after me," Lawlimi said.

"You're not in Mythopoeia anymore. Eternity belongs to itself."

We had fallen out of the server? That explained why I couldn't reach anyone or anything outside this zone. It wasn't a shield; it was a division.

"What do you want?" I asked.

Ink Eyes walked to one of the thrones that populated the center of the tower and ran his claws along its arm. "The man who was meant to sit this seat never will. But it will not be yours, either. Eternity belongs to me, is me."

"What about the pilot?"

"She is necessary insofar as bringing Eternity out of the darkness and into the light. The ship is not hers, however, and never was."

"I don't care whose ship it is," Lawlimi said, "I want to get back, and to figure out a way to give Hollen–"

"Wa," I interjected.

"Help Wa get off of the server."

"He already has."

Lawlimi opened his mouth to clarify. He hadn't been as quick to understand the nature of this place as I, but he was interrupted by a prompt.

>>

[Quest Update — Ghost in the Shell — Heroic Level 1]

You have traveled with Wa Lim Li outside of the bounds of Mythopoeia. If you remain where you are, he will survive the end of the server. However, his survival is tethered to this new region. If he returns with you to his original server, it will be as if he never left, and he will die. If he chooses to remain in Eternity, it will become his exile. Find a way for Wa to be free anywhere he goes.

Reward — 700 XP

Other — ???

>>

"Whooakay," Lawlimi said, "so, let me get this right. Orobos, Ink Eyes, whoever, you want us off this ship."

"As you say."

"Then the best thing to do is get it started and drop us off where we want to go."

The rat nodded.

Ink Eyes licked his lips and returned to the tank where the pilot slept. "Very well. I require you to place your hand on the amethyst and acknowledge my claim on Eternity before we proceed."

Lawlimi thought about it. “No.”

“This is a formality, I am already a part of the ship, and it will not fly without my consent. There are only a few functions denied to me, and acknowledgment by one of the Maker’s Children will unlock them for me. If you cooperate, I will take you wherever you choose, and the stores of Eternity will be open to you. Whatever you need to give Wa his freedom will be yours.”

“Wa,” Lawlimi said, “do you mind waiting a bit? I think if we put our heads together we can find a way to run this thing ourselves.”

“You are mistaken.” Orobos’s power shone from beneath the Rat Elder’s skin. “I am the soul of Eternity, and cannot be exorcised. Your companion has made you overconfident. Acknowledge me, or Wa Lim Li will be destroyed.”

“He’s safe as long as we stay here, isn’t he?”

“You misunderstand me.” Ink Eyes collapsed as the light poured out of his eyes and mouth, surging through the air and crashing into my own bodiless essence. I had never felt pain before, but I imagined that was what I was feeling. Orobos was operating in the game on a deeper level than I was, not only capable of viewing hidden data but altering it. It wasn’t a genuine assault, he was teasing me, and even that was enough to demonstrate that if he chose he could unravel the code that made me who I was. My first experience of pain was followed by my first expression of fear. This was different than simply knowing that my world would come to an end in a matter of days, this was having the reality of death impressed directly on my consciousness.

“Do it!” I couldn’t keep what I was experiencing out of my voice. “Do what he says!”

“What’s happening?” Lawlimi was trailing the violet light with his gun, but firing wouldn’t save me any more than it would kill Orobos. “What is he doing?”

“He can kill me, Lawlimi, please.” I’m ashamed of how quickly I gave in, but I had never had anything to be afraid of before, and was completely unprepared to handle it.

Nothing happened when my friend touched the amethyst. It didn't flare, and he wasn't possessed. I didn't have any breath to hold.

"You are in command of Eternity," Lawlimi glowered. "Is that all I have to say?"

Light swirled in the crystal, a glimpse upon the eye of a hurricane with crimson pulsing at its heart. Ink Eyes got up as if nothing had happened, and he tinkered with a panel at the base of Lili’s tank while the terrible light left me. The water in the tank began to drain, and Lili slumped against the glass. She sank to her knees as the liquid disappeared into a concealed runnel. Then the glass lowered, and Lawlimi caught the sleeping pilot in his arms so she wouldn't slide onto the floor.

“I’m sorry,” I said, but he was focused on the girl.

"She isn't moving.”

"Place her in the pilot's chair," Ink Eyes said, and at first Lawlimi had no idea what he meant, but there was one human framed seat in all the tower. It was a partly reclined, baroque construction of curling iron and soft leather. Arched spines like scorpion tails rose from the shoulders, aimed at the skull of whoever dared sit.

He placed Lili on her side in the strange seat and watched the shallow rise and fall of her breath. Dokutsu wandered by wearing Isekel's mythical cloak, as opaque as a soap bubble, fading in and out of visibility. She was experimenting with it.

"How do I wake her?" Lawlimi asked.

"We require a rare book written by the Maker before the fashioning of Eternity. Its name was the Annunomicon."

"Hey, Wa," Lawlimi said, "does that seem kind of weird to you?"

It did. The chances that he had been put on a quest to find that book, found it and brought it with him into this demi-plane where it happened to be our only way out after a purely aleatory series of events were infinitesimal. We had been sent here. Both he and I had been influenced in ways I couldn't fathom. Was it the ADIs, or the so-called "Maker"?

"We have been herded here," I said.

Lawlimi produced the book, a massive tome in green dragonhide and gold leaf. There wasn't a table at his height, so he sat cross-legged on the floor and opened the Annunomicon in front of him.

“Orobos, what am I looking for?"

"A simple concoction, the Herald's Kiss." There was humor in the possessed voice.

Lawlimi sighed and flipped pages.