17

Standard Disclaimers apply. Written by Micah Hakubi at feynman dot project AT SPAMOHMYGODHELPUSALL gmail dot com. You can guess the drill regarding contact.

The story is mine, the setting is not. We all give thanks to Metroanime daily for putting up with us messing around his in awesome world. Ahmen.

To quote Kerrik Wolf, "You should not read this work if you are under the age of legal consent wherever you reside. This work may or may not contain any and/or all of the following: death, dismemberment, violent acts, implied sex, explicit sex, violent sex, rape, cannibalism, blasphemy (depending on your religion), BDSM, torture, necrophilia, mimes, and just about anything unwholesome that you could consider."

Feedback welcome. I probably need the syntax abuse.

Major thanks to Kerrik Wolf for proof-reading and offering spelling and grammer abuse corrections for this chapter. All corrections are his, all mistakes are still mine.

[Chapter 17]

Micah felt the instinctive urge to scream, hit, claw, throw, yell, and/or all of the above as he paced with his lips twisted in a half-snarl, the sensation made all the more worse by the feeling that he couldn't do exactly that.

Ludmilla and Nunnally both regarded him from off to the side, keeping out of way of his wings if nothing else. Ludmilla made as if to say something, only to be cut off by Nunnally as the Arkhangelsk gave a firm shake of her head. The silver-haired pokegirl watched Micah's furious pacing for a moment longer, manifested her blade, and promptly threw it so the weapon embedded itself in the far wall as if nailed in place with a massive hammer.

Micah paused in mid-step as he eyed the blade, it not even having the decency to wobble in place, before he turned to look at Nunnally. "Problems?"

Ludmilla let out a breath. "Feeling better?"

Micah let out a gust of a snort. "No." Another breath, slower this time, that he gradually let out. "I'm just so... -angry-." A sharp shake of his head. "And worried that I may be operating under a massive host of misassumptions in regards to Sanctuary." He rubbed at his face wearily. "To think, that they might actually be worse than I thought..."

Nunnally regarded him calmly. "What part did you miss?"

Another breath. "I had thought the Sanctuary Goth population ratio had them in the majority," he replied. "But if the majority of small villages are nothing more than catch-places and ghettos for S-Goths to stuff normal pokegirls until they fucking well have need of them..."

Ludmilla blinked. "Why do you assume they're ghettos?"

"The issues of long-range infrastructure such as water and electricity, constructed in a rural area? Never mind rapid transportation. Dirt roads can be a pain if they're not maintained. Believe me, I know from experience. If these small villages exist in such a state, it would likely explain why most S-Goths don't live there." He rolled his eyes. "Probably didn't even start that way, in the beginning. Set them up as satellite communities, then the reality and cost of turning them into modern enclaves sets in, and oh, why bother, they've been fine up until then. Then the habit of stuffing other pokegirls into these so called communities develops, until a Sanctuary Goth takes a fancy to one and takes her into the Sanctuary Goth's harem. At least the Leagues have the decency to utilize Ranches." His three tails lashed angrily, threatening to do harm to anyone who was foolish enough to get near them.

Ludmilla looked at him curiously, even as her white-furred ears canted back amid her blonde hair. "What are you planning to do, then?"

"If the villages don't have any S-Goths or Dameosaurs in residence, what do you think they'd do if over two hundred Sanctuary Goths in armor and weapons shows up and tells them to sit down, shut up, and look pretty for the pokeball?" Micah let out another snort. "We can utilize the 'One of the Authors is a Biomancer and engineered a potentially devastating plague'. Inoculate them with the S-Goth Serum, pop them in a pokeball, and put them in stasis to deal with later. Yay. Everyone's happy."

The door to the cafeteria opened - it was one of the few large spaces where Micah could get a full head of steam while pacing - and Euphemia jarred to a halt, seeing the expression on Micah, Ludmilla, and Nunnally's face. "I'm..." The redhead swallowed. "Is this a bad time?"

"No," Micah replied simultaneous with Ludmilla and Nunnally both saying, "Yes." "-No-", Micah repeated, his tone more forceful, as he mentally gathered up all his issues and grievances and put them aside for later, focusing on the G-splice. "Is there something you needed, Euphemia?"

Euphemia held up a sheaf of papers in one hand. "Both the information on Kerrik Wolf you asked me to get a hold of, as well as the cosmological data you wanted."

Ludmilla frowned, the Dire Wolf not having heard of this before. "Cosmological data?"

Micah nodded as he made his way over to the redhead, taking a hold of the papers and leafing through them. "I wanted Euphemia to get in contact with some of the few observatories left and their catalogued observations of unusual cosmological data that may have occurred with some regularity post Sukebe's war."

Nunnally and Ludmilla shared a look of equal confusion. "Why would you care to know anything about that?"

Euphemia had a proud smile on her face, while Micah went on, not looking up from the papers he was reading, "If an unusual cosmological event had arisen, such as a mysterious new comet, it's possible that the source of said event is a spaceship parked in an odd elliptical orbit around the sun and/or your planetary body of choice, picking up ice and debris as it swings out before developing a tail as it swings back around." He gave a slow shake of his head. "Sadly, all data so far is pretty inconclusive, with the majority of odd occurrences being one large group of 'maybe'."

Ludmilla stared at him. "How do you come up with this kind of stuff?"

Micah gave an easy shrug, wings rustling. "If I were Sukebe," he paused to grin at that, and went on, "If I were Sukebe, given his haphazard method of operations at time witnessed in the station Shikarou and his brood managed to acquire, yanking a starship of requisite size via whatever means he had access too and either using it as a base of operations or simply a storage facility fits in what we know so far of his modus operandi." Micah sighed. "Sadly, no Executioner-class Star Destroyer or Cojoiner-class Lighthuggers for me." He set some of the papers aside. "While the rest of this information is pretty dry. Date of Examination, list of stops at various pokecenters, where he got his starter..." Micah trailed off, and asked Euphemia, "Is this discrepancy accurate?"

Euphemia nodded; her mane of blood-red hair shifting as she did so. "Near as I can tell. He's listed as acquiring a Megami as a starter, but there seems to be an inventory mismatch with the Ranch that they wrote off as a database snafu."

Micah let out a slow breath. "A Megami. Talk about hoist by his own petard."

Euphemia giggled while Nunnally moved closer to him, the silver-haired pokegirl glancing at him curiously. "What do you mean?"

Another shrug. "Kerrik pretty much set the overall tone for how Megami's are utilized most times nowadays in stories," Micah replied. "Or rather, I should say, were utilized. Near as I can tell, he even helped set the standard for the entire Celestial appellation to the breed."

Ludmilla flicked her tail, feeling a brief chill running down her back. "How do you mean?"

Micah smiled faintly. "Metroanime sure as hell didn't come up with the idea of Celestial/Infernal tag for pokegirls, that I recall. Megami were based on a brand of characters from an anime that was popular at the time. I always thought the tag appellation was silly... but anyways. The reason I find it funny is because Kerrik helped set the tone, so if he has to deal with a Megami in his harem..." He grinned, then went back to reading, and paused. "A Dire Wolf? Oh, crap."

Ludmilla grinned wolfishly, her tail wagging behind her. "Nice to see he has good taste."

Micah nodded. "Quite." He went back to reading. "A Dark Elf. Wonder if I should be flattered... Nah. Assigned to him? How the heck does that work..." He glanced up at Euphemia. "-How- does that work?" He shook his head. "Never mind, not important... and she's BLSF. He has access to a BLSF pokegirl. Oh, -joy-."

Ludmilla canted her ears forward. "You say that like it's a bad thing."

"Good for Kerrik, bad for..." Micah shook his head. "The BLSF were half the reason I was reticent to entering the Blue League in the first place. They're a military organization that operates something akin to an unholy amalgamation of the National Guard and the British SAS. The BLSF and the SLIS were both written by two authors that, if you'll excuse my phrasing, don't fuck around when it comes to the brutal aspects of military work."

Ludmilla smiled. "Whereas the McMahon family was modeled, as I understand correctly, after a bunch of physical actors from your reality."

"They're still a bunch of actors in part, but there is that aspect of the matter, yes," Micah replied. "Either the attitude bleeds through or they just saw what was there to begin with. A Dark Elf," he mused aloud. "I wonder if she has ties to Queen Bevin." Flipping through the papers, Micah frowned. "He's been hopping around a bit. Seems to be some odd gaps, though that could be attributed to simply disappearing into the British Isles for however long he cares to enjoy the emerald lands." Something that he had missed regarding the Dark Elf caught his attention. "A -Pendragon-? Oh -come on-... How are they still around? You'd think Shikarou or Ygerna would have had some bloody decency to clean up after themselves. Bloody immortals. No wonder Eoghan gave her so much issue - she clearly has the tactical acumen of a retarded turnip. And it apparently catches."

"You're rambling," Nunnally pointed out.

"I am -so- rambling," Micah agreed.

Ludmilla allowed herself a brief smile before assuming a serious expression. "We need to talk about Lina."

Micah rolled his neck, absently rubbing at it. "What about her?"

"Putting aside what she told me you were planning to do, I think you need to go and reassure her."

Micah snorted. "Lina's a big girl. I'm sure she can take care of herself."

Euphemia perked up. "What is Micah planning to do?"

"It's not crucial right now," Ludmilla gave Euphemia a flat 'I'll tell you later' look and then focused back on Micah. "And I believe you're wrong. Recall your own mental notes on FarFuck'Ds. Regardless of what she thinks she is, it doesn't change the fact that she's a pokegirl and all the psychological consequences that implies." For the cadence of her speech, Ludmilla seemed to be implying she was quoting something.

Micah regarded Ludmilla for a number of long seconds, and then nodded slowly. "Fair enough. I'll go talk to the redheaded spitfire."

Nunnally put herself between Micah and the door, golden eyes regarding him somberly. "Are you okay?"

Micah quirked a smile. "No. But I'll deal."

Micah arrived at Lina's door several minutes later, receiving a blunt "Go away!" in reply to his knock. Micah glanced heavenward and promptly opened the door.

Lina was wearing nothing but a white shirt, hugging a large pillow on her bed, and had apparently been crying recently. "You!" she blurted; face angry as she raised a hand, an orb of flame manifesting to her summons.

Micah quirked an eyebrow, eying the held magical attack with a skeptical expression as he eased himself through the door and let it close behind him.

The tableau held for several seconds before Lina realized how silly she looked and let the flame die down, angrily turning away from him. "Well? What do you want?"

"Have you developed any powerful mental shielding spells recently that I'm not aware of?" Micah queried in an even tone.

Lina looked back over one shoulder, her angry expression dissolving into one of mild confusion. "No."

"Then I'm curious why you're reacting so angrily to me wanting to make every effort to protect you," Micah stated, tone still even.

Lina glared at him, then turned back to face the wall in a huff. "If you're taking the rest of your harem along," she spoke in a loud tone, as if trying her best to ignore him, "Then I should come along as well!"

Micah raised an eyebrow. "How so? Last I checked, you weren't a pokegirl. Should I go get a vial of S-Goth serum and wait seven days so I can stuff you in a pokeball?"

Lina blushed hotly, thankful Micah couldn't see her. "That's not what I meant and you know it!"

"No, that's -exactly- what I planned to do. I'm more than willing to admit that my plan in dangerous, and I intended to only have two of my harem out and active whenever I finally make the plunge."

"So how come I didn't make the cut, then?" Lina's head whipped around to glare at him, her long red hair flying with the motion.

Micah met her expression without flinching. "You're too important to me to put in that kind of risk."

"Well, I happen to LIKE risk!" Lina's tone wasn't a yell, but it was edging close. "And you sure as hell don't ACT like I'm important!"

Micah regarded her, head canted, for several seconds. A step forward, a second, and Lina didn't have time to react before she realized what he was doing and had her pushed back flat on the bed, pinning her arms above her head.

"What would you rather have me do?" Micah murmured somewhere against the curve of Lina's jaw. "Powerful, terrifying, a genius without peer in the magic arts of your home universe, with unmatched combat prowess in magical tactics." He glanced up at her. "Would you rather I treat you like the rest of my harem? Given your prickly, firebrand nature, I thought you might enjoy your space, as opposed to having me hanging off of you every other second."

Lina glared at him, her breathing quicker than normal. "And what if I did?"

"Given your general opinion in the matter, I likely wouldn't give you a choice," Micah replied with a chuckle that actually sent a shiver of fear up Lina's spine. "If you want to be counted in treatment alongside the rest of the harem, then I'm afraid you'll have to take the good alongside the bad."

Lina turned bright red, recalling a number of instances where barging in on Micah hadn't gone quite the way she had planned. She kicked her legs beneath him, as if trying to squirm away.

Micah chuckled softly. "Let's get started on some of the 'bad' aspects, shall we?"

Roughly two hours later found Micah tracking down the Dire Wolf. It was easy enough, as Ludmilla had been apparently discussing matters with Euphemia and Nunnally where he'd left them.

"Did you take care of matters with Lina?" Ludmilla asked, standing as she strode over to bury her face in his clothing and breathe deeply. "I see that you did," she murmured, looking up at him. Euphemia was glancing at him nervously before looking away, and Nunnally has a worryingly neutral expression on her face.

"I won't claim the entire matter solved, but it's a step in the right direction," Micah replied, smiling faintly. "Now, I'm going to venture a guess that the three of you want to commence screaming at me for the next several hours."

Ludmilla found a firm grip on Micah as she murmured up at him, "This isn't funny."

"It wasn't meant to be." Micah moved as if to pull away, paused when Ludmilla didn't let go and received an embarrassed look from the pale-skinned Dire Wolf as she reluctantly let him move to sit in one of the chairs made to accommodate his wings and tails. "Now," Micah settled comfortably, leaning back and letting his wings spread lightly. "Care to mention your concerns?"

"We could leave," Ludmilla stated. "Right here and now. Ask Kerrik for the method he's using to escape from this world."

"This isn't about escape," Micah replied, absently looking at his hands momentarily before snapping his focus back to Ludmilla. "Nor is that fair to Kerrik." He snorted. "He's not the boss of me and he doesn't have any current obligation to help pull me out of messes I get myself into."

"What about the World Gate spell?" Ludmilla worked to stifle a whine in the back of her throat, feet shifting as if she was trying not to dance in place in agitation.

"I can understand it easily enough," Micah replied. "But it's a bit like reading those project poster summaries the Biology department enjoyed putting up at my college. I could understand the terms, and have a general grasp of where they were going with them, but asking me what steps involved getting from A to J and I'd be more than a bit clueless." He snorted. "Then again, I might be biased, given that one of my favorite words is Deoxyribonucleic Acid."

Nunnally blinked. "What?"

"DNA," Euphemia answered for Micah.

"Exactly," Micah nodded to the two of them, and then shifted his attention back to Ludmilla. "The other issue is power. The power involved in the spell is greater than any spell I've attempted. Not that that's saying much, but I've been trying not to blow a hole in the earth's crust straight down to the Mohorovicic Discontinuity." He grinned. "But that's neither here nor there. It isn't an option, currently."

"We could-"

"Ludmilla," Micah murmured softly, working very hard to keep a vicious spurt of rage from erupting to the fore and making him say a large number of things he'd regret, "Macavity knows about me. For all I know, by this point, half the Legendaries want me -dead-. Sanctuary wants me -dead-. Even if I escape to another world, it's just buying time until Sanctuary does something on par with their first attempt to... pull me over here. I can't -keep running-. But I have a limited number of options of where I can pick my stand and fight. Out of them all, this is, in my opinion, the best of them." He eyed Ludmilla a second more then patted his lap. "Get over here."

Ludmilla stared at him a second, then burst out crying and near enough crawled into his lap, wrapping her arms around his middle and squeezing only enough to make his ribs creak. Micah glanced up at Euphemia and Nunnally and gave them both reassuring smiles as he wrapped Ludmilla up in his wings.

"I hate you," she murmured softly after soaking the front of his shirt.

"Yes, I imagine not being able to say 'no' would drive you up the wall at times," Micah replied.

Ludmilla stiffened, and then slowly relaxed as she nodded minutely. "Yes. I'm terrified I'm going to turn my back and you won't be there any more." She visibly shivered in his arms.

Micah absently smoothed out Ludmilla's hair. "Trust me, that isn't going to happen." /For more reasons I can ever give you,/ he added silently.

/I know,/ she thought back, the mental tone shy and hesitant.

He quirked a smile. "Besides which, you'll be one of the two pokegirls that'll me escorting me on this little adventure."

Ludmilla stirred, something of her normal manner coming back to the fore. "Who's the second one?"

"Illya."

"...I shouldn't be surprised."

"No, you shouldn't." Micah grinned. "Trust me; I know what the Lucarda can take."

"What exactly are you expecting to find there?" Euphemia broke in. "Lina wasn't talking about this entity like it's an Esper summon."

Micah gave a faint snort, which elicited a curious look from all three of them. At their curiosity, Micah elaborated, "The entire idea of espers was taken straight from a RPG video game and the majority had the role of a spell that just did a lot of damage. There was a bit of background detail and all that I won't go into, but still. There's the basic concept. Trust me, this has no comparison." A curious wing-shift of a shrug. "I've always been slightly confused how the hell they became known to the magical community as a whole. It's never made much sense, unless Sukebe inadvertently salvaged a lot of magicite and magitek from the Empire of Ghesthal and stored them in one of his warehouses..." Micah trailed off thoughtfully, and then gave a shake of his head. "Regardless. Point stands. No applicable comparison."

Ludmilla lightly nudged him in the chest, as if to remind him of the topic of discussion. "So? What -are- they?"

Micah smiled faintly. "What did Lina tell you?"

The blonde-haired Dire Wolf shook her head slowly. "She called them a horror." Ludmilla then gave an exasperated snort. "And she's a thrice-damned FarFuck'D that doesn't really know -anything- about magic except what you taught her!"

Micah's smile deepened into a grin. "Does she? Does she -really-? Perhaps she can access whatever method Megami's utilize to gain their knowledge. Perhaps that's all FarFuck'Ds are - Megamis of Chaos."

All three of them stared at him in horror.

Micah chuckled. "Don't discount her knowledge, is all I'm saying. That said, keep in mind that I do know of other magical styles and thematics than she does." He paused a moment, thinking, as he gathered up what he knew. "Devourers are extra-planar entities. What they're known for is the subsumation and distortion of local space. They utilize it like other animals would a burrow, swallowing up an area to effectively nest inside. Hence their name."

Nunnally regarded him critically. "How can you think of defeating something that powerful?"

"Powerful? Are they really?" Micah shook his head. "They certainly sound it a first blush. They can even distort space with their influence, and effect mental aura attacks in their home. But they are far from invincible. For one, their ability subsumes an area; there is no fold of space that allows them to turn a small area into a large one. If they want a large are to influence, then they need to -take-that large area; the resulting footprint, well..." A shift of a wing. "The other part, is that they're -ignorant-. They don't know how to react to humans. Instead, they have one over-riding urge; to be safe, but they lack the conceptualization to manifest that ideal. Against a normal human? They are horrors. Against a mage? Well. We'll see, won't we?"

-[***]-

"I'm sorry," Anya whispered, the StarMystic bundled up against the Antarctic weather outside their 'haven'.

Micah needed no such protection, confident in his all-weather spell to protect him against the temperature and wind as he cradled the card in one hand, regarding it absently. A fleeting thought, that he could -feel- the warmth in the card, as if pulsing with the energy within and after a moment or so he realized that wasn't just his imagination.

On one side of the card was the ornate symbolism that was Anya's custom mark; on the other was an idealized picture of Anya herself, though subtly changed, wearing a military-cut uniform that nevertheless has a minimum skirt that showed off her legs nicely, grasping a massive key-like artifact. Behind her was a stylized gate. For a moment the entire thing reminded him so much of Sailor Pluto and her own thematics he had to briefly wonder if any Silver Millennium artifacts lurked on nearby planets; scary, scary notion.

I made this, he thought silently. I came up with the breed, the entire revolutionary magical paradigm that's anathema to the typical magical workings of this world. I did this. Me.

What if they're right, he thought silently, still absorbed in regarding the Gate Card that Anya had created. What if we really are gods? I created Nunnally's current breed. I created Euphemia. How much of this world -really- bends to our will?

For a brief second, it was like something responded in the card; a seeking, willing intelligence turning to him like a cat towards heat. Reaching for him, willing and able to take that power and -use- it...

Micah cut the sensation off before it had a chance to actualize. He seriously didn't want to learn what could occur if he started channeling his power for Anya to use. From the look on Anya's face, she had felt it as well.

"Anya," Micah gently handed her back the Card. "You of all people should know that this isn't a failure." The Gate card could open up transfer spatial apertures, but only on a global scale; not the interstellar he wanted so he could manage strategic annihilatory strikes against Sanctuary. "Instead, it's a -very- good step in the right direction."

The blonde StarMystic leaned against him, snuggling gratefully as she was enveloped in a wing-clutching hug. "I know," she murmured softly. "The scientist in me should know better." She giggled faintly. "But the pokegirl in me seems to want to go to every effort necessary not to fail you."

"Can't argue much against that," Micah murmured back, enjoying the scent of the shampoo she used, quietly thankful that none of his harem had a penchant for heavy perfume. "But I'm a biased observer."

Anya giggled, pushing away slightly. "I bet you are." Her expression sobered. "Can you seriously use this?"

"Yes." Micah nodded slowly, thinking. "I believe I can. We'll have to make a number of experiments in utilizing the Card. But that can wait for later."

"Good," Anya murmured, leaning more against Micah as she murmured, "Tired."

"I bet you are. Let's get inside and you to bed."

Once Micah was content that Anya was good, settled, and asleep, he did a check of his email out of forced habit; as much as a technophile he was, he had a very bad habit of always letting his email lapse. He attributed it to backlash against a period in his life we he always had his email up and active, checking every twenty minutes or so.

And frowned upon seeing his inbox. There was a text email from an address he'd never seen before. This was his private inbox that Euphemia had setup for Yukii and Cologne to contact him with; the chance of getting random email was, well, remote as all hell. There wasn't even an ID or subject header. Double-checking to make sure there wasn't an attachment, he clicked the message open and began to read.

Micah, I hope this message finds you safe. You and I haven't met, but I want to change this because I need your help. I know you have no reason to believe I am who I say I am, or agree to help me, but if you want to meet me, then don't reply to this message. If you don't, then ten minutes from now, I'll arrive so we can talk. - Sexebi

'This is one very bad joke' was Micah's immediately thought, then frowned, re-reading over the message. If it was a joke, it would be a very short-lived and nonsensical one; what purpose would it serve anyone to have him freak out for the next ten minutes or so until it proved a fake? Which likely implied... that it was real.

Micah pinched the bridge of his nose, calmly tossed the PDA aside to land with a clatter on his desk, and went up to go prepare some caffeine. If this was going to turn out to be one of those evenings, he wasn't going to face it without espresso.

When he returned to his Sanctum Sanctorum, the first thought was that it must have taken him longer than ten minutes to get everything prepared, as a pokegirl he'd never seen before was standing there.

For her part, she just stood there and stared well up at him, her blue eyes wide; made more so by the black ring-like markings around them. Her iridescent, butterfly-like wings shifting slightly as if agitated; the only thing she wore was a large striped scarf that was wrapped around her neck, the tail ends falling in front of her to past below her knees. After a second or two, she seemed to remember herself, and offered Micah a rumpled brown paper bag she carried in one hand. "Jellybaby?"

Micah stared, open-mouthed for a number of seconds, and the first thing that came out of his mouth was the last thing he actually wanted to say. "You do a hell of a lot more for that scarf than the Fourth Doctor ever did."

Sexebi stared at him in return for a second, and then burst out giggling, wings shaking, almost dropping the bag.

Micah grinned in return, the seeming awkwardness between the two of them broken. "Well, it's true."

"You like it?" Sexebi twirled in place to show the scarf off, and Micah took a moment to mentally keep a grip on his hormones; petite or not, Sexebi was still very much a nude female that didn't seem to mind showing off.

"If I said I didn't, I'd be lying." Micah offered Sexebi one of his custom chairs that was made to accommodate his wings. She took it with a look of surprise, squirming neatly in the seat and seemingly delighted that it fit her just as well.

"So," Micah noted as he grabbed another, more normal-looking seat and straddled it. "Good evening, Sexebi. Dare I ask why you decided to introduce yourself?"

From the way her expression fell, Micah almost regretting asking the question. "It's because..." She trailed off, took a breath, and then tried again. "Because Sanctuary is going to kill me," she whispered. "And you're the only person who could possibly stop them."

Micah froze as he processed that statement, and then frowned, turning it over in his head. "Huh." He glanced at his mug of espresso and took a large sip. "I see." He quirked an eyebrow. "Do you mind if I summon my harem up? I have a feeling this is going to be a very long discussion that I don't think neither you nor I will want to repeat multiple times."

"I..." Sexebi actually looked hesitant. "Do you have too?"

"I would -like- too," Micah replied, regarding Sexebi curiously. "Is there a reason you don't want them here?"

"No, I just..." Sexebi got up from her seat, and as Micah watched, maneuvered herself so she was standing behind him, sandwiched between his wings and made him have to freeze his tails in place so they didn't hit her. "Okay, go ahead."

Micah eyed Sexebi for a confused moment, wondering why the hell she was -hiding behind him-, then mentally gave up and utilized his farcast spell to contact Ludmilla. /Ludmilla, two things. One, we have a guest I'd like for you to be careful around so you don't frighten her. Two-/

His mental communication was cut off when Ludmilla teleported in, looking frantic. Sexebi make a strangled noise in her throat as cowered behind him. Ludmilla froze where she was when she saw Micah and who was hiding behind him, her look of worry assuming an almost sickly expression. "...Micah. Is there a problem?"

"As I was saying," Micah spoke aloud wryly, ignoring the way Sexebi was shaking, "I'd prefer that you -not- scare our guest, and second, marshal the harem. Sexebi apparently has a slight problem she wants us to help her with, and I think this is one of those conversations she'd like to only explain once."

Ludmilla had the grace to color slightly. "Yes, Master," she replied, mindful of someone outside the harem present as she began telepathically giving out orders.

Fifteen minutes later saw Micah and his Harem with Sexebi in the cafeteria with tea and snacks laid out in excess. Micah, still working on his espresso, had to tangentially clamp down on a minor surge of irritation, as he felt like a teacher in charge of a kindergarten class for the way his harem was reacting to Sexebi; barely restrained hostility at what they perceived as an intrusive outsider while ignoring the fact that Sexebi seemed to be more scared of them than vice versa.

"So," Micah began once everyone was settled. "You said Sanctuary was going to kill you. How?" He sipped his drink, ignoring the stir of startlement and excitement from his harem.

Sexebi was staring at her tea as if lost; her wings fluttered at his question as she looked up, and nodded. "Yes." She took a deep breath, still wearing the scarf she had arrived in and nothing else. Somewhere along the line, her bag of jellybabies had gotten misplaced. "Summoning the authors wasn't the only avenue of power Sanctuary was researching into. Utilizing a similar method of summoning that they did for you, they plan to secure another source of power." She paused. "Me."

"...mmm." Micah rubbed at his face as he digested this information. "I take it the end result of this plan of action is rather bad for you."

Sexebi shivered. "Yes," she murmured. "The summoning and binding process has several flaws. One of which will kill me." She sniffled, then seemed to remember her tea and took a large gulp of it.

Micah leaned forward, wings shifting as he propped his elbow on the table and leans against it. "I see."

"Okay, hold up," Cornelia spoke from where she sat, hair rumpled from her aborted attempt at sleep earlier, "I know I'm not the smartest pokegirl in this group shut up Euphemia," the Demon Goddess went on without pause as if the redhead hadn't looked about ready to say something, "But I thought you could -travel through time-. What the hell do you have to worry about Sanctuary trying to summon you?"

"More than likely the summoning process isn't contingent on temporal locality," Micah spoke up, voice pitched to carry so that it filled the room with ease, "Such as the temporal discontinuity between my home universe and this place. The summoning that brought me here was able to surmount that; Sexebi's should do similar." He cocked an eyebrow at Sexebi. "Did I get it right?"

Sexebi nodded slowly. "Yes."

"So, what?" Otsana spoke up, the Gunnm looking about as happy as Cornelia sounded. "She's a freaking Legendary! All she needs to do is go ask her friends to solve the problem!"

Sexebi flinched.

Micah leaned back in his seat, tails absently flicking out a discordant pattern, as if Sexebi's reaction confirmed what he was suspecting. "Ah. Let me guess. There's a high chance that Moan and Whore-oh would refuse your plea for assistance, isn't there?"

Sexebi nodded weakly, her small body seemingly folding in on itself, as if beaten.

Ludmilla frowned, ears perked forward. "How would you know that?"

"I have a... I can see the future," Sexebi began, her voice so soft everyone had to strain to hear it, but it grew in strength as she went on. "I can follow the probability path of someone's life to see the likelihood of events transpiring. And... if I asked them, there's a better than fifty percent chance they'd brush the matter off as if it didn't matter."

Nunnally blinked. "Why would they do something like that?"

"Because they are arrogant, blind fools drunk on their superiority and insanity," Illya spoke up, her eyes lambent, her expression a snarl.

"I'd say Illya has the right of it," Micah replied in an amused tone, watching Sexebi as if waiting for confirmation of his supposition. "What type of threat could Sanctuary -really- offer to a group of individuals they call -Legendaries-. Am I right?"

Sexebi nodded slowly. "Yes."

"Putting aside how piss-poor your friends are at being friends," Anya spoke up, looking the most visibly tired out of the entire harem, "If you can really see the future, then you're... you're a god. You're nearly omniscient. What kind of help could we be able to provide?"

"She didn't say that," Euphemia broke in. "She said she could view -probability lines-." The G-splice regarded Sexebi as if she was a eureka moment. "The fact that she'd come to us at all hints that it's not a perfect ability, and even when I gain access to a database, I still have to look for information. If I don't know it's there, and false positives..." She trailed off. "You're not omniscient at all, are you? You're just like the rest of us, digging through straw, only worse, because you -know what may happen-."

Sexebi stared at Micah's harem, and then looked at Micah.

Micah smiled faintly, and gave a shrug. "What can I say? Can I pick 'em, or can I pick 'em?"

Sexebi giggled faintly. "You can pick them." A flutter of wings. "But... if I thought to ask Whore-oh, or Moan, they might refuse. Or worse." She shivered. "I would ask Evangelion, but... I... I'm scared."

Micah resisted the urge to offer some sort of physical support; he doubted Sexebi would appreciate it. "Why would you be scared of asking Evangelion to help?"

"Because I think she dies if I do," Sexebi whispered. "Involvement with Sanctuary to a heavy degree... most of them time, she's -not there anymore-. It's... she's gone. And I don't know why." She stared at her lap. "And even if I'm scared of dying, I don't want to be the cause of my friend being hurt."

Micah shook his head slowly. "Sukebe didn't intend for you to be able to travel through time, did he? Or half the stuff you do."

Sexebi shook her head slowly. "No," she said at last. "I don't think he did. I couldn't at first, but... things happened." She giggled shyly. "Lots of things."

Ludmilla flicked her ears. "So that's why you came to Micah."

"-I- still don't see it," Cornelia grumped softly, not caring who heard her. "How many tamers has she been taming that could do her dirty work? Like we need to get involved in this."

Ludmilla grinned wolfishly at Cornelia, then turned and directed that expression at Sexebi. "That's just it, isn't it? All the Tamers you've known are -nice-. Empathic. Sedate. Wouldn't really hurt a fly in anger or hatred." Her expression gentled at she regarded Micah proudly. "As opposed to someone who's willing to -burn a city to the ground- if it protects his harem."

"Hey, that city was relatively intact and whole when I last saw it. Not my fault people get excited over little things." Micah gave a slow shake of his head, and muttered, "I've so got to work on my PR." He paused. "Then again, maybe not."

Sexebi giggled.

"There's one other thing that needs to be asked," Nunnally spoke up from where she stood. "If Micah is so important to you, then why did you wait so long to help him?"

Sexebi glanced at Nunnally, then back to Micah, and smiled weakly. "You mean, before or after I recovered from having a slight nervous breakdown?" At Micah's blink of surprise, she went on. "I... whatever Sanctuary was planning, it didn't actualize until -after- you Authors were summoned in full." She swallowed. "And I... I was scared. Terrified. I've been hiding all my life. From others people, other Legendaries. And then I had to -find- you. My abilities don't work instantly. It was hard." She looked pleadingly at Micah.

Micah gave another shake of his head. "Trust me, I'm not blaming you for not yanking me out of my little receiving hellhole whenever I first popped into this world. I think it's fair to say we were both a little occupied dealing with our personal devils." Nunnally and Ludmilla both eyed Micah in disbelief, and Micah gave an easy shrug in reply. "What? It's done. No use worrying over it, and I'm so not going to get into a discussion regarding temporal cause and effect. You'd likely smother me in my sleep." He glanced at Sexebi. "Along those lines, actually, indulge my curiosity about something. You don't have a big brother that's going to arrive at some later date and cause trouble, do you?"

Sexebi blinked several times, slowly, confusion writ across her face as she tried to parse what Micah was asking. "No," she replied slowly. "I don't think I do."

Micah chuckled softly. "Well. Mark one against the notion of my omniscient knowledge."

Ludmilla's ears twitched. "What are you talking about?"

Micah grinned. "At one time I had considered a short story involving Sexebi and the engineering basics regarding her construction. Pardon the terms," he said to Sexebi, then refocused on Ludmilla. "You see, I thought it might be interesting if Sukebe had taken samples from Lavos and utilized it when creating Sexebi."

"Eeep!" Sexebi nearly jumped in place at that news, eyes wide.

Micah burst out laughing. "I take it you got the reference."

Sexebi made another strangled 'eeep!', nodding frantically.

"Uheeeeee..." Lina picked her head up off the table where she had been resting, rubbing at her eyes. "What's a Lavos?" she asked, yawning.

"Immortal, time-traveling, planet-eating monster," Micah replied.

"Another one?" Lina yawned again, then let her head thump back on the table, curling her arms around it as she began snoring lightly.

"As the planet is not going to -die horribly- in the near future, I think we can cross that notion off my list of 'Things that may happen real soon now'," Micah grinned, sipping his espresso.

"Eeep," Sexebi repeated.

"That said, I think we're all pretty tapped out for tonight," Micah noted. "Unless this crisis is going to happen within the next twenty four hours...?"

Sexebi realized that Micah was asking a question, and shook her head. "No."

"Then I think it's best that we all get some sleep, and make a decision tomorrow," Micah replied.

Once everything was cleaned up and everyone heading in the general direction of bed, Micah found a small hand holding him in place by way of gripping the edge of a wing. Looking down, Micah found Sexebi staring back at him with imploring eyes. "Do you mind if I stay here for a few hours?"

"You might get pretty bored," Micah replied. "I've got some research to finish up, then it's taming and sleep. Not exactly very exciting stuff."

"That's okay," Sexebi replied. "I'll wait for you where we met, alright?" Giving word to action, Sexebi half-dance/fluttered away.

Micah turned, finding Ludmilla about where he expected her to be, and smiled. "So. Shall we talk?"

"Let's," Ludmilla replied, gripping his arm. They teleported, coming up several thousand feet above their current haven, shielded from the air currents by Ludmilla's telekinesis as Micah got his flight spell under him, wings lightly spread as they hovered in place.

/Do you think she's telling the truth?/ Ludmilla asked, leaning against Micah slightly as her ears flicked in his direction. One of his tails brushed against hers, causing the white-furred appendage to flip away faster than normal.

/She was terrified about something,/ Micah replied quietly. /You didn't see her when she arrived. It was odd. She was about as awkward about the matter as I was surprised./ The two drifted together for several moments. /If she was faking somehow, then we've got bigger problems than her just lying about everything./

Ludmilla sighed faintly, the noise a sharp canine gust. Green eyes glanced his way. /Are you planning to help her?/

/Putting aside my own compassionate feelings on the matter, things were a little too emotional to get to the brass-tacks of what exactly she'd offer in return for us helping to keep her safe./ He snorted. /Perfect world, I'd just say 'yes' and be done with it./ He stared at the horizon, tails lazily flicking behind him. /But we'll see./

-[***]-

Micah's typical day started at around 5 am in the morning with combat training with Nunnally for an hour; 6 am saw him recovering from the training session, and around 7 was when the harem was up and active for breakfast. Of course, the issue with living in Antarctica was that the sun didn't comply with habitual circadian rhythm that humans(and pokegirls) typically ascribed too, so the schedule fell by the clock, as opposed to the position of the sun in the sky.

It was around 6:45 the day after Sexebi made her introductions that Micah entered his Sanctum Sanctorum, intent on finding an errant piece of scripture from one of the many tomes he'd was researching currently, and paused mid-way to the table. A blanket-wrapped bundle was still in the chair were he'd left her, head against her knees as she rested, curled up as best she could manage.

Micah lightly rubbed his cheek, wondering what the hell Sexebi was still doing here. Oh, well. Nothing else, it made tracking her down rather easy. After a moment's pause, considering his options, he gave a shrug and stated aloud, "Good morning, Sexebi."

Sexebi stirred, a shift of a wing causing blankets to fall off her shoulders. She blinked blearily up at him, then knuckled a fist and rubbed at her eyes sleepily. "G-," she pause to yawn, then continued, "Good morning, Micah."

"You know, I honestly don't think we have any guest beds around here, but if I had known you wanted to sleep over, I'm pretty sure I could have survived sleeping on the couch for once."

Sexebi gave him a cute, if half-asleep, smile as she snuggled under the blankets she was using for cover. "That's okay."

Micah flicked his tails up and leaned back against a table, regarding Sexebi for a moment. "Look, I hate to be blunt, but I have to know. How much are you willing to help us if we agree to help save you?"

Sexebi's smile slipped as she stared at the ground, hugging her knees tighter. After a while, she finally said, "You know Shiva wants to thank you?"

"Shiva? The Legendary Shiva?" Micah looked at her in confusion. "Why the hell would she want to thank me for anything?"

"The help you gave Yukii," Sexebi went on. "Shiva and Yukii are lovers, and Shiva liked the idea that you helped her."

"Oh. Well." Micah paused to digest this for a moment. "She's welcome?" He gave a shake of his horned head. "Didn't really expect that, but okay."

Sexebi gave a wan smile. "I guess she didn't tell you, huh?"

"Nope."

"I guess other Legendaries are like that." Sexebi lapsed into silence, then slowly began to ramble. "We haven't really compared notes, but I think all the other Legendaries like to be hands off with their... with their Authors. I know Evangelion is. Whore-oh and Moan probably are, too. I haven't asked."

Micah tangentially stifled the thought of 'poor bastard' as to whomever got saddled with Whore-oh. "Well, I'm glad none of them are here now, then."

Sexebi visibly brightened as she smiled. "How much help do you want?"

Micah chuckled softly. "I want -everything-."

Sexebi's light-green skin visibly pinked.

Micah grinned, waving the matter off. "Sorry, sorry. My mind free associates a lot. I once had a dialogue in a story go 'What do you want?' and the other character replied 'I want -everything-'. More realistically, if you're offering unlimited help with no strings attached, then I'll gleefully take it, without question."

"Then that's what I'll give you. If you die, then I die."

Micah quirked an eyebrow. "Set in stone, is that?"

Sexebi blushed faintly. "There's a statistically likely correlation between the two events occurring, but it's not absolute, no."

Micah smiled. "Good to hear." He rubbed at his face thoughtfully. "Let me check some of my perceptions. How does your time travel ability work?"

Sexebi blinked as she stirred among her cocoon of blankets. "It's... if you accept the analogy of time as a river, with people being pulled along by or swimming with it's currents, then not only can I swim backwards, I can pull myself up out of the river and fly." She blushed. "That probably doesn't make any sense, but I never really have to explain this to other people-"

"No, no," Micah cut her off, thinking. "That makes perfect sense." He thought a moment. "You have enough finite control over your ability that you can control what tributary you venture through, correct? You can't get lost in a cut-off timeline, and you can avoid time-lines splitting when you travel?"

Sexebi nodded slowly. "There are some limitations, but yes. I can't travel back beyond the date of my birth, though. And I haven't really traveled that far into what we perceive as the future before."

"I wouldn't be too keen on that idea either, myself. How do you plan on letting us contact you?" Micah chuckled. "If you actually have a communications code somehow, that would be pretty useful."

Sexebi was silent for a moment. "Do you... do you mind if I stay here?"

A small part of Micah's brain noted that running for the door, screaming his fool head off, wouldn't have been an acceptable answer. For that matter, neither would swearing up a storm work, as much as he wanted to do both of those things. "You're welcome to stay as much as you like, though I can't exactly offer much in the way of constant entertainment," Micah replied. "I stay pretty busy."

Sexebi's smile was positively beaming as she snuggled in her chair. "That's okay."

Micah glanced at the door. "Breakfast should be just about ready. Would you like to join me and my harem for your morning meal?" Which'll hopefully give me enough time to figure out what the loving hell was going on, Micah thought to himself. And if this keeps on, I'll be juggling both a harem -and- a legendary. Wasn't the Japanese ideogram for 'trouble' supposed to represent 'two women in one house'?

Sexebi yawned again, as she pulled herself up from her chair, blankets and all. "I'd love too."

-[***]-

Abiah stirred, her brilliant white-wings shifting slightly as she felt the mental summons of another Celestial nearby. She smiled fondly at the sleeping visage of her female tamer sleeping next to her. Pulling her wings away, she made sure her tamer was covered and tucked in before slipping out of the tent, heedless of her nude state as she padded quietly in the general direction of the summons.

Abiah was gratified that she had guessed who had summoned her correctly, the moon illuminating the clearing where the Megami sat. Moving closer, Abiah's neutral expression shifted to one of clear concern; Yvonne was sitting neatly on a rock, and while she looked clean and whole, gave the impression of someone who'd been through more horrors than she could count.

"Yvonne," Abiah said, kneeling down. "What's wrong? You look dreadful."

Yvonne smiled wanly. "You'll forgive me if I don't get up. I'm still a little weak from healing."

"What happened?"

"That's not important," Yvonne shook her head firmly, dark hair shifting as she did so. "I came here to besiege your help in finding someone. I have reason to believe he's in danger, and if nothing else I'd like to thank him."

Abiah blinked curiously. "Why come to me?"

Yvonne rolled her eyes. "Because some of our number thinks it best that I not know anything about this person. I was content to allow this, but recent events have made me re-think my stance. If he needs my help, I'd be less of a Megami if I didn't act to protect him."

Abiah smiled faintly. "You like him?"

Yvonne shrugged. "I think his pleasant attitude toward pokegirls was admirable given his overall appearance. If you'd seen him," Yvonne went on at Abiah's curious expression, "You'd never forget him. I've never seen such a heavily blood-cursed young man. Full ram-like horns, massive bat-like wings, claws, his eyes... Well, it's a wonder he was as nice as he was."

Abiah stared.

"...you've met him!" Yvonne shifted. "Do you know where he is?"

"Not specifically," Abiah replied. "But I know who would."

-[***]-

A small part of Micah's brain was fervently thankful that he could summon up clothing at-will, now. Or else getting all this blood out of it would have been a complete pain in the ass.

His left arm was strapped down on a sterile operating space, his left hand flexing spastically, claws fully extended as his own energies work to seal up the damage Francesa had been slowly inflicting in a controlled fashion over the past fifteen minutes. His other arm was free, though he'd long since given up any illusion of control and had embedded his claws firmly in the arm-rest of the surgical chair they were using, rather than risk some part of him gaining control and lashing out instinctively at Francesca.

"Your spell seems to work," Euphemia noted in what she hoped was a clinical fashion. Both she and Ludmilla were fairly vibrating in place from sheer nervousness mixed with anxiety at having to witness this, but both had agreed it was better safe than sorry. No matter how much torture for them it was to see Micah get sliced up bloody.

"So it seems," Micah grunted. "Nice to see all the research I had put into Illya and Anael paid off." The spell that he had developed, 'Eternal Aegis', had been derived of his study of Illya's powerful regeneration capability coupled with Anael's own regeneration as a Warrior-Nun.

Micah had decided early on that, if he was capable of magic, then he was damn well going to use it as best as he could. He didn't plan on fighting toe to toe with a pokegirl, but the fact remained, on the battlefield, he was a -liability-. And being a liability was something he couldn't afford. So he was going to put every effort he could into becoming useful, and Eternal Aegis was the first of a number of spells intended to do that.

The elegance of the spell, in Micah's not a little proud opinion, was its energy requirement. The spell itself didn't operate at full capacity a hundred percent of the time; like a car idling, the spell would only sip at it's fuel - in this case, Micah's magical reserves -to maintain the spell itself. When he was damaged was when the spell actuated into full effect, utilizing his energies to keep his body whole and functioning properly.

Of course, there were a number of other benefits to the spell itself, which was one of the reasons he'd finally relented and developed it first. "One final thing," Micah noted, "To test, however." He carefully unclamped his right hand and began unlacing the straps that held his left arm down. The spell provided a good deal of body control, but it had still taken some experimentation to the point that he could keep pain from over-riding conscious reaction. Micah shook his left arm free, glad to see that even the swelling from the injuries was gone.

"That is?" Ludmilla asked, breathing a good deal easier now that the ordeal was over. Francesca, for her part, just kind of slumped in the chair she had been using, looking as drained as if she had just run a marathon.

Micah gave a shrug, blanked his mind, actuated the Stormbreaker spell in his right hand, and promptly lopped his left hand off at the forearm.

Blood fountained from the bisected arm for only half a second; then it whipped, curled, and lashed angrily, a hungry, -living- thing that greedily sought out it's missing half. The amputated hand didn't even have the decency to let gravity pull it to the ground. It only fell for a fleeting moment before levitating back up, allowing itself to be picked up by that burbling lash of blood that sucked it back into place, ideogramatic symbols illuminating with magical energy bleed off as his arm made itself whole again.

Euphemia and Francesca both had fainted. Ludmilla threw herself at him, gripping his shirt tightly, heedless of the blood that covered him from earlier tests. Micah grunted at the impact, his spell letting him know that she had just broken a collarbone. "WHY DID YOU DO THAT!? ARE YOU TRYING TO KILL ME WITH A HEART ATTACK!?" Ludmilla glared up at him as she tried not to physically shake him, then broke down sobbing as she hugged him tightly.

Micah shook his head slowly, letting Ludmilla wear herself out crying as he hugged back, just as tight.

"I wish you'd just kill them all so we could stop doing this," Ludmilla whispered.

Micah smiled faintly. "You say the sweetest things."

"Aren't gods supposed to answer the prayer of their worshipers?" Ludmilla weakly joked, then, with a whine, pulled away and began licking up the blood from his forearm until it was mostly clean.

"Kami, I am not," Micah replied in a half-joking tone. "And while my name may be pretty Old Testament, I'm not curious enough yet to see if I can live with myself after doing such a thing."

"I wish you were," Ludmilla whispered softly, then gave a sigh. Glancing over at Francesca and Euphemia, she telekinetically picked up both of them and repositioned them more comfortably.

"It would make things a lot simpler, wouldn't it?" Micah couldn't help but smile as he hugged Ludmilla close, letting the feel of her body next to his sluice away the pain and stress he had suffered testing the spell.

Ludmilla slowly shook her head. "Are you thinking of using the same method you're planning to deal with Sanctuary's leadership to take care of Sexebi's little problem?"

"Not at the moment," Micah replied. "Sexebi's issues can wait till after our current planned expedition to do some dungeon crawling. And given the lack of intelligence, I wouldn't want to speculate." He snorted. "If you want a mental exercise, figure out -why the hell she's still here.-"

Some of the pain and worry in Ludmilla's expression ebbed as she regarded him, ears flicking. "You don't know?"

"I haven't ventured a guess," he replied. It had been a day since that morning when Sexebi asked to stay. Despite her arrival, he still had plans, and he had little intention of letting others get in the way of those plans. Even a Legendary. "I'm surprised that you, or the rest of the harem, haven't wanted to chew steel because of her being around."

Ludmilla couldn't help but smile. "It helps," the Dire Wolf noted, "That's she's not an utter and complete bitch, or expects us to worship the ground she walks on." God forbid Whore-Oh had taken an interest in Micah for some thrice-cursed reason - she imagined that said Legendary would likely be dead within three days, either due to she and the rest of the harem killing her, or Micah himself driving her to drink herself to death.

Come to think, that latter option didn't sound so unappealing to watch in action.

Micah eyed Ludmilla's wagging tail. "You seem to be in a good mood, all of a sudden."

Mentally exhausted as she was, Ludmilla still had to stifle the unseemly urge to giggle. "You," she noted aloud, "Are a very bad influence on me." She lightly poked his chest. "But getting back to Sexebi. Assuming you encountered a Catgirl slowly dying of poison-"

"A powerful, space-bending, time-traveling catgirl," Micah muttered as an aside.

"-a Catgirl slowly dying of poison," Ludmilla repeated as if he hadn't interrupted her, "You take her in, heal her, and if you tamed her, well." Ludmilla regarded him somberly. "You know your own mental essays on this matter, don't you? 'Legendaries, at their core, are still pokegirls, and that means they adhere to a certain set of assumptions.'"

"That might explain Sexmet and Bastit's degraded effectiveness post war," Micah grumbled thoughtfully, then shook his head slowly. "Beside the point. So you think I've found the metaphorical lion with a thorn in its paw?"

"Even better. The lion came to you. When are you going to start taming her?"

Micah gave her a sour look. "Putting aside concerns of harem and that as much as I admit some worry and concern for Sexebi, my primary focus is still on all of you, the idea of metaphorically abusing her like that leaves a bit of a nasty taste in my mouth."

Ludmilla jerked away slightly. "Abuse?"

"Sleeping with her just to make sure she does what I want her too? That sounds like abuse in my book. Yes, yes, I remember the Milktit," Micah replied in an exasperated tone when Ludmilla opened her mouth to say just that, "And yes, I tamed her brains out to secure her loyalty, but the person she was before was  utter and complete scum. I like to at least -consider- karma, even if I don't believe in it, and the point remains is that Sexebi has been nice, polite, and respectful with all given consideration, and I'd rather not ruin that. And, if you recall, I gave my entire harem a choice before joining it. They -could- have said no. Even you."

Ludmilla stared at Micah for a moment, then hugged him tight enough to force the breath from his lungs.

"Happy to see you too," Micah commented once he got his breath back.

"Sorry," Ludmilla murmured, nuzzling his shirt. "I had a momentary nightmare of you going on like that at a Sadie Poken's Day celebration and getting swarmed by a horde of pokegirls."

Micah chuckled. "Little fear of that, given how I'm persona non grata in the Leagues. Just think, I won't have to attend another Sadie Poken's Day. Ever." He glanced over at Euphemia and Francesca. "I seem to be pretty hard on the women in my life. Let's get these two someplace more comfortable."

"Are you still planning your experiment for tomorrow?" Ludmilla asked softly, once she had finished adjusting her redheaded bundle in her arms.

Micah smiled faintly, making sure he had a good grip on Francesca. "Yes. This needs to be done, now, to insure we have a protective fallback location in case any other Legendary decides to drop in on us." Come to think, he needed to ask Sexebi how she knew where he was in the first place.

Ludmilla flicked her ears thoughtfully, as she followed Micah out. "Yes, Master."

-[***]-

Ludmilla was pleased to find that her nose hadn't failed her when she entered the room; there was Sexebi, as she had suspected, curled up amid blankets and a pillow, reading a book. She frowned, absently, wondering where she had gotten the book from. Glancing at the title made her twitch, as 'Time Enough For Love' has a myriad of implications given that the petite Legendary before her could travel through time. She wondered what the title referenced. Fists on her hips, she stated aloud in what she hoped was a none-threatening manner. "You know about Macavity."

"Ueh?" Sexebi glanced up from her book, blinked, and rubbed at her eyes with one curled up fist. "Oh, hello, Ludmilla." Sexebi then seemed to realize just what the Dire Wolf had asked. "Macavity? What about her?"

"You know about what Macavity pulled off with her little flyer stunt in the Capital League," Ludmilla clarified. "What I find strange is your decided non-mention of that incident so far. It would likely do my Master's mind a great deal of good if you actually supplied some background information regarding it." Such as whether that furry bitch was going to do something like that again! Ludmilla specifically did -not- snarl out. Scaring the Legendary away would be counterproductive.

"Oh." Putting her book aside, Sexebi hugged the pillow she was wrapped around. She looked up at Ludmilla with a beseeching glance. "Are you going to tell Micah about this?"

"If I feel it's something he needs to know, yes," Ludmilla replied in what she hoped was a calm tone.

Sexebi slowly shook her head. "I think... I may have caused her to do make those fliers."

Ludmilla was deathly still. "Could you elaborate?"

"She had gotten together Sexmet, Bastit, and Hild," Sexebi went on, and Ludmilla's blood went ice-cold as her heart skipped a beat. "And told them about Micah, saying he was working for Sanctuary because, when she saw him, he was surrounded by Sanctuary Goths. They were all pretty mad."

"And?" prompted Ludmilla.

"I knew about the meeting beforehand, and I knew about Shiva having an interest, so..." Sexebi grinned shyly. "We paid them a visit." The grin vanished. "Shiva said Macavity was lying and said that she wouldn't let any of them harm Micah in turn for the favor he did Yukii. But they could do anything else, as long as they didn't kill him."

And that's a very long list, indeed, Ludmilla thought to herself, forcing back the dawning horror of what all this implied to focus on the Legendary in front of her. "And what did you do?"

"I, um..." Sexebi hugged her claimed pillow, visibly fidgeting. "I said none of them were to touch Micah at all." Her wings fluttered slightly as she smiled in remembrance of the joke she pulled on all three of them, feet kicking lightly as she fought the urge to giggle.

"Given their history," Ludmilla said slowly, "I find it... difficult to trust they'd do as you asked."

"I hope they do," Sexebi whispered. "I said I'd kill them if they didn't."

Ludmilla's blonde eyebrows shot up. "You -claimed- him," she said, "On pain of death. You -protected- him." A thought occurred to her. "You mean you don't -know-?"

For the first time, Sexebi actually look vaguely irritated. "I don't -always- know. Or want to know. Or try to find out."

Ludmilla actually smiled. Finally, a -normal- reaction from a fellow pokegirl. Still. "Why didn't you tell him any of this?"

"...I didn't want to make him think he was stuck with me," Sexebi whispered, curled up. "I mean. That's how it works, isn't it? 'Do this for me or I let them have you.' That's horrible." She glanced up at Ludmilla. "Are... are you going to tell him?"

Ludmilla's ears flicked even as she smiled reassuringly. "Later. Right now he's focused on a project. Afterwards, some of the information will be good to know. But maybe not all of it."

Sexebi smiled in relief. "Thank you."

Ludmilla resisted the urge to shake her head. She was beginning to build up a picture of the Legendary that would come in handy if this progressed as she thought it would. No matter how disturbing a picture it was. "Think nothing of it."

-[***]-

It had taken several hours of high-altitude flight via Anya's flight card in it's Eidolonic configuration before they had arrived at the incident location in the Capital League. Even from the air, knowing it was there, you wouldn't be able to tell.

On the ground, up close, was a different matter entirely.

Micah allowed himself the luxury to just stand there and look, hand on the hilt of the blade that he'd taken as a trophy from Esthar's tamer, greatcoat summoned up over armor, wings flared behind him. Dimly he recalled the story from Grant Morrison's Invisibles, where they went forth into where the King of All Tears was gleefully deforming reality into something that it found much, much more comfortable to lair in.

Pity I don't have a Voodoo Loa to ride me into this little mess, Micah thought wryly. Baron Samedi -would- come in rather handy right about now.

You're stalling, Micah thought to himself honestly. He glanced aside at Ludmilla. The Dire Wolf, had she been one of her type to possess a full covering of fur, would likely have had the patch along her spine standing straight up to go along with her sub-audible growl.

While Illya...

Well. The Lucarda, wearing her adult form, looked downright bored.

Micah smirked. Time to get this done, he thought, and started walking, Ludmilla and Illya following a close second behind.

There was nothing to initially hint at what lay further within the forest; at first blush, it was a normal albeit thick mixed hardwood forest that was common to the northern regions of the Capital League. The transition itself was subtle; the overhead branches becoming thick enough that light slowly descended into twilight, then cut off completely. Eyes glowing an off-white/silver from his Warchive spell, Micah saw the transformation in detail as the woods around them slowly deformed with each progress step into the heart of the incident.

A screaming howl pierced the gloom; a baying yowl that started off low enough to raise the hairs on the back of your neck that ended at a piercing volume fit to shatter glass.

The three of them didn't misstep despite its suddenness, though Micah couldn't resist a thoughtful 'mmm' at the noise, considering it.

Ludmilla glanced over at him, green eyes curious despite the fact that she had to hold back the urge to snarl, ears flicked back amid her blonde hair.

Micah gave a shake of his horned head, tails flicking behind him. "Every year," he spoke aloud, the surroundings be-damned, "My family and I would visit my grandmother for special occasions. Holiday. Sometimes random. And driving there, we'd pass through the massive cane fields, stretched out far as the eye could see. And along the roads were these tall posts, with odd, speaker-like apparatus attached to the top, and nothing else. They were warning sirens, you see. For tornadoes. I never heard them go active, but I always imagined that's how they'd sound like."

Ludmilla nodded slowly, ears flicking up, relaxing at the sound of his voice despite herself. "You don't seem afraid of all this," she murmured softly.

"I may have a distorted sense of what's terrifying and what isn't," Micah replied. "I've driven on dirt roads through low-land swamps near midnight with the only illumination being a lone porch light of someone's trailer house nearby. I've walked through the mountains of the town where my grandfather and great-grandfather lived and mined coal, past gaping holes in mountains where a constant cold breeze blew. It never once occurred to me that I should be afraid." A wing-shrug. "I've heard people term it that some places just have a sort of presence that for others find terrifying, some find comforting. Like the land is old and a power, and it accepts them. I know what's causing this, and it has no fear for me. Only contempt, and respect."

They lapsed back into silence as they continued on. Micah didn't hesitate in his pace or direction; enveloped in the creature's periphery effects it generated, he had now had a measure of its power. He could sense it, like the gentle ebbing of a tide that drew all toward it. Even as he focused on that alien power, he could feel that equally alien surge of perspective all too eager to rise up and engulf his brain in that utterly calm, utterly predatory mannerism. He fought it off, just barely, but some of that perspective seemed to sink into his brain, driving away the lesser of his worries and fears to give the world a stark clarity of purpose.

I'm coming to you, Micah thought to himself silently, the thought directed at his self-appointed foe. I'm either going to break you... or KILL you.

A calm breath he drew in, slowly, as his tails flicked behind him. He caught a new scent on the air; as they moved forward, the forest seem to lighten until they were surrounded by an early morning gloom made all the worse by a thick, seething miasmal fog that had come up around them. Something drifted down, making him blink it away and reach up to catch it in one armored glove. He nudged it with a finger, leaving a dark-grey smear behind. "Ash," he murmured thoughtfully, and as if in reply to his words, his nose caught the thick, acrid scent of smoke.

Ludmilla's ears flicked, straining to catch anything coming at them through the gloom. "Quiet."

"Must be an environmental side-effect of the corruption," Micah mused aloud in a thoughtful tone. "It's too quiet for a nearby fire to have produced this much ash." A slow wing-shake sent flakes flurrying off the black, leather-like skin, and the trio continued on.

The woods finally broke, and they emerged from the tree line into an overgrown clearing that might, at one point, been someone's yard. They skirted past silent buildings, shuttered windows serving to act as eyes to witness their passage. Despite the haze, fog, and incessant ash-fall, it was bright enough to allow for a good deal of visibility, but far from enough to give illumination to the interior of the houses they passed.

"Something's moving inside," Illya murmured in a quiet hiss, anticipatory for something she could kill.

"Is it attacking us?" Micah replied, not sparing a glance for whatever it was that had caught Illya's attention.

"...no."

"Then leave it be," he replied, stepping into the mud-encrusted, half-cobblestone street that kept the houses and yards separate.

Something emerged from the fog, a stumbling, clay-smooth figure that could either be an animated doll... or a child. Closer, its biological features could be easily picked out, though it lacked any external features. Just smooth, burn-healed skin covering its diminutive frame entirely, hairless, muscles bulging beneath that thick flesh as it continued, heedless, toward them.

/Hold,/ Micah ordered Ludmilla and Illya both, drew the hand and a half blade at his side, stepped forward, and cleaved the doll's skull in twain, being rewarded with a fleshy splatter of blood and gore as skin and bone parted. He kept a firm grip on his blade as the creature fell, and once he was certain it was down, worked to extract the blade from where it had become embedded in bone.

"Blood and flesh," Illya spoke. "Whole, alive, albeit tainted." Lambent red eyes regarded the doll-corpse with cool analysis and contempt. "No pokegirl could create such a thing."

"Then I'd say we're headed in the right direction," Micah replied, a sharp flick of his wrist sending a spraying arc of blood from his blade.

Ludmilla glanced at Micah. "That was...?"

"Likely one of the children that had been living here at the time of the incident," Micah replied. "Just meat and bone, now, a puppet for whomever to yank on. Let's keep moving, shall we?"

"That won't be the only one of those, will it?" Ludmilla asked in a clinically detached tone.

"Almost certainly," Micah replied.

Advancing further into town only proved Micah's supposition correct; slowly, like a trickle of water, more things began shambling from the woodworks at them. "We should be getting rushed," Ludmilla pointed out softly as she telekinetically cracked the neck of something that could only have been a winged-type of pokegirl that had been reduced to crawling toward them on the ground, its mouth gaping hungrily.

"That assumes a directing intelligence behind these attacks," Micah replied calmly. He had been allowing Ludmilla and Illya to take care of what had obviously been pokegirls at one point, stepping forward to deal with the more human-like entities they encountered. 'Conservation of effort', he had termed it. "These, like the insanity-inducing effect, are likely just autonomous reactions."

Ludmilla flicked an ear in his direction, curious despite the situation. "How do you know?"

"We're still alive, aren't we?"

Illya laughed quietly, even as Ludmilla growled out something approaching a curse.

The first serious obstacle wasn't obvious at a distance; the fog kept visibility to a minimum, even with Micah's warchive spell specifically designed to circumvent such situations.

They didn't walk blithely into the gaping chasm that seemed to cut the town in two, but it was closer than Micah would have preferred.

"Mmm," Micah regarded the seemingly bottomless chasm, glancing across to the other side, which was just visible enough. Eyed the ground, where a large smear of dried blood ran from several feet away to the edge, as if something had dragged a bleeding body over it. "Illya." Micah toggled the Lucarda's pokeball, securing her in its compression space, and then turned to Ludmilla and offered a hand. "Time for a teleport hop."

The Dire Wolf reached out, gripping him firmly, and the world blurred. Ludmilla actually stumbled, leaning against him as she sucked in a ragged gasp of breath.

Micah held her tightly as she recovered from the effort, and murmured softly, "You okay?"

Ludmilla slowly shook her head, ears flat against her skull. "No. But I'll deal," she smiled faintly as Micah gave her a look, mildly irritated that she'd thrown his words back at him. She straitened, pulling away from him and giving a sharp shake of her head to clear it. "That... -hurt-," she finally drew out. "Like tearing a muscle when you're overexerting yourself."

"Something to keep in mind for next time," Micah replied, giving Ludmilla's hand a tight squeeze.

Another slow shake of her head, blonde hair shifting. The presence she felt, pressing down all around her, had only gotten worse the deeper they seemed to go into the town. The idea of just giving in and letting it consume her was more tempting that she'd ever admit, and that terrified her. "Master... can you feel that?"

"The presence?" Micah nodded absently. "After a fashion. I know it's there, like a... smell." He glanced off into the gloom, eyes focused on a single point in the distance; as if something was there that only he could see. "But I also know what's causing it. And I can feel -that-, too."

Ludmilla smiled, gripping his hand back tightly, and straightened. Micah smiled back, releasing his grip on her hand to toggle Illya pokeball, and the trio kept moving.

"Almost there," Micah mused aloud. They were in the center of town, the street wide and surrounded by tall buildings on each side, shops and businesses that were dead and gutted shells of themselves.

Worse, everything looked so neat, for all its gloom and decay. Like a child taking special care of a particular toy set, making sure everything was -just so- when they put it up for later use. Except for the occasional, subtle evidence that something horrifying had occurred here, you might be able to fool yourself into thinking the town was just... sleeping.

When did I ever get used to this? Micah thought bleakly. When did crawling through a Lovecraftian-infested town not only come across as a -good idea-, but one of the lesser crazed things he and his harem had done?

Ah. Yes. About the point where he'd been kidnapped, raped for other people's amusement, and come to grips with the fact that the majority of the world would either want to kill him or control him.

Focus, he snarled quietly to himself. Indulge in introspection later. He glanced up, and forced himself not to quicken his steps whenever he caught sight of the hospital.

There, he thought. Right there, is where all our problems will be; and where the solution is.

Micah almost chuckled whenever they arrived at the front gate of the hospital, only to find that it had been locked with a chain. Something so mundane... "Ludmilla?"

Brute force tore chain links apart like clay, and the three stepped inside the hospital's grounds. When nothing moved to attack, they slipped through unlocked doors into the hospital's main lobby.

"A hospital seems so obvious," Ludmilla murmured quietly. Entering a building had a disturbing effect of cutting off any exterior illumination; peering through the windows she could see gave the impression of absolute night outside, even when she knew, without doubt, that she had just stepped in from a still-lit gloom.

"Department H wanted ready human sacrifices on hand as necessary for their experimentation," Micah murmured in reply. "This is a regional hospital - Capital's too big to devote extensive and expensive medical facilities for humans in every population center. Plenty of bodies for the butcher." He glanced at their surroundings, knowing they'd been here for a long, long time, and age had done its job to make them worn and decayed, but there was something more to them, something that tickled at the edge of his perception, something he couldn't quite put a word too...

Corruption.

Yes. That was a -perfect- word to describe their surroundings. Corrupted.

The lobby was relatively untouched, but glancing down a hallway saw equipment and chairs scattered as if they'd been in the middle of a tornado, with smears along walls and flooring of what, more than likely, was blood. Something caught his eye - a small wheelchair that had been overturned, its wheel spinning uselessly and refusing to stop even as he regarded it.

Micah resisted the impulsive urge to set it on fire and instead had Ludmilla and Illya begin their systematic search for the stairwell.

Madness reigns in the hall of the mountain king, Micah thought to himself silently as they found the stairwell and began the slow, careful descent downward; Illya at point, Ludmilla covering the rear, with his fragile, winged ass taking up the middle. One flight, then two; by the time they finished the third and final one, the walls had given up all pretense of appearing as anything natural. In fact, Micah thought silently, given the coloration and pattern of rotten decay, he couldn't help but think of skin flayed and stretched across a canvas.

Entering the third-basements hallway, staggered doors hinting at rooms laid out in an orderly and sterile fashion, Ludmilla thought softly to Micah, /This is getting worse. Why haven't we been attacked yet?/

Micah's gaze was far down toward the end of a hallway, focused on the slumped figure of a body sketched up against a wall. /I may know why./

Moving closer brought the body's details into focus. It lacked the preserved qualities of all the other corpses they'd run across, along with the distorted and mutated features that had marked all active creatures they'd killed in their trek through the town. In fact, Micah had to admit that it looked as if the emancipated corpse had just lay down and expired right before they had gotten there.

A rattling sound, like old paper rubbing together, and the corpse proved to not be one. A bulbous head swiveled on an emancipated neck, lips drawn back over yellow teeth as it struggled to breath in. "You," he rasped, fabric rustling in an attempt for a skeletal frame to somehow struggle to move, "Are either a fool, a madman, or one of my own." Something wet tried to move deep in his throat as he struggled out more words. "Which... is it?"

"Mad?" Micah broke into a smile, fangs gleaming. "Just misunderstood. Department H doesn't know that I'm here. You, I suppose, are among their number."

"I," the wasted creature approximated something close to a snarl, "Am a -power-. I have struggled with this... -thing- for all these years. I have... survived. I have stolen and supped of its capabilities, and soon, I shall have -more-." A skeletal finger trembled as it pointed at Micah. "And you-"

A chevron-orb of black flame manifested in orbit around Micah, lanced forward, and blew the old, wasted man's head off.

Illya and Ludmilla both blinked.

"Boring conversation anyways," Micah grumped, then let out a slow, shaky breath. A swallow, and his expression firmed, walking forward to survey the body and his wasted garments. Up close, it was easy to tell he was wearing a mage's robe thrown over a doctor's lab coat. Half curious, Micah pushed back fabric to reveal the yellowed and decaying ID tag.

"Well," Micah mused softly. "Hello and goodbye, Faris Knight. You likely wouldn't appreciate how useful your notes really were." He straightened, wings flared out behind him. "Let's move this to the end game." He glanced around the decayed and corrupted hallway, and nodded slowly. "This way."

"I should go first, Master," Illya stated, her long, blonde hair writhing behind her when the trio arrived at a door Micah announced was where the summoning had taken place.

"No, you won't," Micah replied, reached for the door handle, and pushed it rudely open, stepping into nothing.

There were no features, no illumination in the void - nothing to give clue what caused the footfalls as Micah stepped forward, Illya and Ludmilla hurrying behind him.

Nothing but the creature itself.

Its flesh was a pasty off-white, veins gleaming beneath its near translucent flesh. The base of its structure was wide and tapered, giving it stability as the remainder of it reared above. It had no limbs, just stubby, deformed, wing-like protrusions that gently moved for no reason at all. It's head had no mouth; just twelve different, blood-red, unnatural eyes that flicked at random amid fleshy slits that blinked and bulged to no set rhythm. Membranes rasped around the neck/chest area, sucking down air as its twitching form seemed to regard Micah as if confused. Then it reared back, and let out a bass roar with shrill, piercing overtones, as if in rage that it had been disturbed.

Seven chevron-orbs of black fire bracketed the area around it with explosions. The scream cut off as if a switch had been thrown, the Devourer seemingly confused that it's posturing had not brought its expected results.

"Now that I have your fucking attention!" Micah snarled out, stalking forward, wings fully spread behind him as he advanced on the creature. Distorted as it was, its height didn't get over a foot beyond his own. "In case you weren't aware of how this was going to end, there are only two options for you; submit, or DIE!" He could feel its power lapping around him, inexorable as the tide, its insanity-inducing assaults trying to penetrate his mind and failing, badly. "I've already killed my first person today, so I figure I might as well try two for two and go for my first Lovecraftian horror, as well." Claws extended, Micah let his anger, rage, and hatred carry him along as he reached up, grasped that twitching head, and yanked it down to face level with his own. Black liquid welled up where his claws dug into skin, and the creature let out another scream; this one of fear.

"That's right, you gruesome son of a bitch," Micah snarled. "Try and come at me! COME ON! Try and get inside my fucking brain to eat it like you do everything else and we'll see WHO EATS WHO!"

"Master!" Ludmilla called out. The Dire Wolf clutched at her head, devoting all of her iron will just to remain sane. Beside her, Illya fell to her knees, her eyes like twin blood-red stars as she did similar. Around them, the void itself began to tremble and shake. Like an unseen tidal wave, that awesome, horrible power seemed to crest, and fell down, the full mental exertion of the Devourer centered on Micah as it made a last-ditch attempt to drive away this pain-thing that seemed intent on hurting it so.

Micah's face was split in a rictus of a grin as he felt that power come down on him, lancing deep into his brain... as that deep, dark, fathomless abyss that was his mental defenses surged upward in its own tide, awake, and -hungry-. It swallowed the Devourer's attack almost as an afterthought, continuing on and drawing another weakened scream from the creature.

Micah gripped where its throat would be if it was human, no longer caring the damage he was doing. It didn't even have the strength to struggle as boils of black liquid erupted from its pasty white flesh, physical evidence of the damage it had suffered coming in contact with Micah's defenses. "Is that it? Come on, come on, COME ON! Get up and attack so I can KILL YOU!"

With an acetylene torch scream, a massive magical circle erupted into existence beneath them all, scripted in a sickly, unholy, pulsating red. It wavered momentarily, brightened, then shattered with a detonating explosion. In its place, growing outward like a cancerous boil, was the black/white energy and formation of Micah's magical ideogram. The light of it grew to a blinding intensity, pulsed, and then rotated a half-quarter, locking into place. Like flame burning into parchment, black lines and script began forming on the Devourer's body, with two black triangular slashes that matched Micah's own facial markings forming on the Devourer's 'face'.

Micah sucked in gulping breaths, lungs pumping like bellows as the Devourer regarded him with those twelve symmetrical, twitching eyes, an expression on the extra-planar creature's 'face' that could only be called weary. A swallow, as he throttled back anger, realizing that the psychic assault they had suffered ever since entering the town was no longer present.

Ludmilla whimpered faintly as blood flowed from her mouth, the Dire Wolf having bitten her tongue in the effort to remain focused. She poured healing energy into the wound until she could talk. Beside her, Illya gingerly picked herself up off the floor, the Lucarda weeping tears of blood from her eyes. "Is it..." Ludmilla swallowed blood, and spoke. "Over?"

"Yes," Micah spoke in a hollow tone. "It is." A slow shake of his head, as his wings twitched. He gestured, fingers splayed as he pointed a hand at the Devourer. "Now. Let's correct a few things, shall we?"

The Devourer's capabilities went active under Micah's direction, the black void restructuring itself into a gothic hall carved from black rock, the transition marked with a gold glow like fire burning across a field. Golden-white orbs manifested, illuminating the new creation. A depression slowly formed that the Devourer sunk into, the pit sealing over with a brass iris, protecting its contents.

Ludmilla and Illya both regarded Micah with awe as he turned to them, giving them a weak smile. "We can sort out the rest of what needs to be done later. The teleportation baffle effect should be down for those I choose for it to be. Let's go home, shall we?"

-[***]-

Micah's head came up from the pillow like a man breaking through the surface of water, gasping in clean, cool air into burning lungs, his mind panicked by the sensation of fear, loathing, -nightmare-...

No, Micah thought, adrenaline serving better to clear his mind than any amount of caffeine. I don't have nightmares - not like that. That wasn't -my- nightmare. That was...

A canine whimper off to the side, and Micah pulled himself up from the covers, wings getting tangled in the mess before he could manage to shake them off. "Ludmilla?"

Another whine, more desperate this time.

Micah gritted his teeth. "Ludmilla? Lu-wake up, dammit!"

An answering gasp, finally, as the Dire Wolf broke through the nightmare and came back to reality. "I... I, Micah..."

"Shh." Micah twisted around and pulled the blonde Dire Wolf into his lap, letting wings curl around her and he hugged her tightly. She buried her face in his chest, sniffling faintly, and ears flat against her skull.

"M'sorry," she whispered finally, huddling close, desperate to feel him nearby.

"Mmm," Micah replied, keeping a few more acerbic replies under check. He, Ludmilla, and Illya had more or less collapsed once they had gotten back and sorted things out with the harem; they hadn't been -happy- having a debrief being put off till later, but at least they were no longer contained within pokeballs, waiting for the worst. The full implications of Micah's success could wait to be shown till later. Thankfully, both Lina and Sexebi had been equally understanding. "Having after-shocks from the effects of an extended campaign isn't something to be ashamed about." A deep breath. "Granted, I might have underestimated how severe things would be, but... Hell, it's not like I escaped unscathed."

"I should be better than that." A shiver, as she recalled some of the worst parts of the nightmare. "I should-"

"When exactly was the last time you had to engage in an extended campaign of war?" Micah broke in, his tone firm yet no-nonsense.

Ludmilla jerked back slightly at the question, eyes wide despite the fact that neither of them could really see the other, given how dark Micah's bedroom was. "I-"

"Been a while, hasn't it?" Micah cut in again. "On the order of three hundred years, mayhap?"

Unseen yet not unfelt, Ludmilla nodded slowly.

"Right," Micah went on. "Ludmilla, the fact is that we both went into an unknown situation flying by the metaphorical seat of our pants and pulled out a win. That counts as a victory in my book. Focus on that. Second, it was bad. I'm not going to be angry at you just because you've got some issues to work out from all that you went through."

"You didn't wake me up with your nightmares, though," Ludmilla huddled close, her tone more curious than accusatory.

"I think we've established by this point that I don't think like other people," Micah replied. "And I don't get nightmares easily. When I do dream, they tend to be odd and completely off the wall."

Something approaching teasing could be heard in Ludmilla's tone, now. "Like the time you dreamt you and Kerrik were driving toward Las Vegas, and you commented about not being able to stop because it was bat country?"

"...yeeeeeeeeaaah," Micah replied slowly. "Something like that." Where that dream had come from, he had no idea. The fact that Nunnally and Ludmilla both had enough psychic connections to him that they could share his dreams terrified him on a primal level when he thought about what that implied.

Ludmilla giggled faintly. Then sobered as she considered something else. "Do you think Illya is alright?"

"She's more pissed off than anything," Micah replied, absently considering the likely outcome if the Lucarda actually got scared. Interesting to think about. "And I doubt she has abandonment issues."

Another faint shiver from Ludmilla, as if warding off a chill. Another tight hug from Micah, and she could feel his smile as he pressed his mouth to her hair. "Hey. I may not be psychic, but I'm not blind." A soft caress of her hair. "Feel up to getting back to sleep?"

"...no."

"Then we'll have to see if we can fix that, won't we?"

-[***]-

Rachel set her brush aside, the Angel distracted from her morning ritual by the connection tone of her PDA. She had been considering asking Anael, the Warrior-Nun of her harem group, to help in the grooming of her wings, and had been depressed about the reality that doing so wouldn't likely be a good idea any longer. While Rachel, Esther, Michelle, and Anael had been cordial enough amongst one another, the fact that she apparently favored defending Micah set her apart from the others.

Of course, it didn't help that in one of her more annoyed moods, she had suggested that Esther would settle down if she got a good, long, hard taming. That had gone over like a metaphorical lead balloon, and in retrospect, hadn't been the most diplomatic thing for Rachel to say.

Grateful for the distraction, Rachel went over and toggled the answer function, blinking in surprise at the image of Abiah on the other end as she settled down on her bed with an audible 'thump'. "Good morning, Abiah. Is everything alright?" She hoped that Abiah and her Tamer were doing well - someone, at least, deserved something good to come out of that entire mess.

Abiah smiled back. "There's nothing to worry about for me, if you're concerned why I'm calling. That should be my question, instead - has he been treating you well?"

"Micah?" Rachel crossed her legs absently. "He's been treating me with cordiality, respect, politeness, and a decided lack of expectation that I should jump in his bed just because he wags his dick in my direction. Which is an odd life for any pokegirl to lead, as you'd expect." Not to mention his... management, of his apparent ancillary herd of pokegirls that followed him around. She recalled the firm yet strict and clearly angry dressing down of Charolette for her 'joke' of causing Anael, Esther, and Michelle to be lactating, and visibly shivered. She hadn't intended to accidentally overhear that, but the controlled yet honest -anger- in his voice had been surprising.

Abiah blushed faintly at Rachel's crude terminology, yet looked concerned at the visible shiver. "Are you alright?" Which was the closest most Celestials ever got to asking 'Are you going feral or not?'

"I'm fine," Rachel replied.

Abiah regarded her with a measure of concern for a moment, yet nodded slowly. "Alright." A faint sigh. "I wish I could call this just a social call. But... I can't call him your Tamer, can I? Do you know where Micah is?"

Rachel blinked. "Not... specifically, no. I can get in contact with him in short order, if I need too. What's wrong?"

"I'm what's wrong, I think," another voice commented off screen on Abiah's end, and another pokegirl leaned into the recorder view, her facial markings showing her to be a Megami or Megami-sama. "Good morning, Rachel. We've never met before, but we both have a similar acquaintance. My name is Yvonne."

Rachel blinked in surprise. "Good morning, Yvonne." A hesitant pause. "If... I have to warn you, if you're trying to get into his harem, I don't think it's a good idea for me to help you."

Yvonne blinked, then giggled. "Oh... no. I almost wish it was something as harmless as that." She sobered. "I believe he's in danger. I encountered a Hild that tracked me down specifically because of my encounter with him, and barely escaped with my life."

Rachel visibly stiffened. "Are you serious?"

"Sadly, I am," Yvonne replied, even as Abiah nodded in confirmation.

"I should," Rachel paused, having been about to lift a hand to run it through her hair. She stared at the appendage still lying at her side, as if confused. "I..." Like a fog creeping through her brain, the lethargy that had been slowly eating away at her energy seemed to roil upward in a surging rush. "I sh..." She was just so -tired-. "Mmm..." Her eyes closed, sleep crooning an irresistible siren call. The conversation... wasn't -that- important, was it? It wouldn't be bad to take a nap, just... a small one...

"Rachel? Rachel! RACHEL!"

-[***]-

Micah scooped white gravy onto a biscuit, and tangentially wondered when having a late breakfast - for him and his harem - was suddenly the decadent height of luxury.

Right, he thought, Ludmilla snuggled up to one side as he and his harem navigated breakfast in the unofficial 'dining room' in the Antarctica hideout. Keeping to their normal schedule today - hell, for the next few days, likely - would be impossible due to recovery time. He'd likely have to assign Nunnally to help run people through training - to keep them busy, if nothing else. Though, hell, why not cut training off early? Something as mundane as a movie day for everyone had a startling appeal all of a sudden...

Micah's thoughts went off track when Lina half-snuck up behind Sexebi and shamelessly groped the Time-traveling Legendary, earning a startled "Eeep!" in reply.

Lina smirked, running her hands along her own tomboyish figure. "Well! Nice to see how I measure up to everyone else."

Tears at the corner of her eyes, arms across her nude chest, Sexebi stuck her tongue out at Lina.

Absently cursing his hormones - watching Lina do that had gotten him -far- too interested in a number of things - Micah spoke up. "Lina, it's rude to grope guests without an invitation. Please be polite. Especially around the breakfast table."

Sticking her tongue out, Lina settled back down. Micah glanced at Cornelia, cutting the Demon Goddess off from making her own commentary. Sometimes, he thought, managing a harem really did skirt far too close to like managing a kindergarten classroom...

And paused, that thought derailed, hard, by a sudden inexorable feeling of something horrible just about to occur. A feeling that he hadn't felt since...

Vancouver.

-[***]-

Astarte giggled faintly as she walked without concern amid the halls of the manor she had found herself drawn too. "So many celestials," she mused faintly, "And all the time to play." The spell took a great deal of power to manage - but it was subtle, and insidious, and almost impossible to throw off unless she choose to let the target throw it off. Her sensuous lips curled into an ugly sneer. And for all Celestials liked to boast at their vaunted superiority and power, none of these little playthings were anything close to an actual mage.

None of them knew a thing about true power.

Oh, she was going to -savor- this.

But first, business.

She hated the Megami-sama at first sight - pristine, unspoiled white hair, flawless pale skin. She'd look -so- much better with blood, and scars, and an education of her -proper- place in the world.

Cuneiform script manifested, locking around Esther's limbs and pulling her spread-eagle along where she had collapsed on the floor. You could never be too careful, Astarte thought, straddling the Megami-sama and ripping her clothing open with a sharp yank that drew a sleepy moan from her target.

"Wakey wakey," Astarte mused, letting the Megami-sama come partway back to her senses, even as she began to channel some of her magical ability into a forced arousal attack.

Esther's heterochromatic eyes blinked sleepily open, only to widen when comprehension kicked in. Lips slowly parted, a harsh scream turned into a weak croak from the effects of the spell.

Astarte smiled, even as she reached down and cruelly pinched an erect nipple, drawing something akin to a back-arching moan from the Megami-sama. "You and I shall have so much fun before questions, my lovely fucktoy. Shall we begin the education?"

-[***]-

No, Micah swallowed hard. -Not- Vancouver. This wasn't a threat -here-, it was... someplace else.

The entire breakfast table had gone silent. "Micah?" Nunnally spoke up. "What's wrong?"

Micah didn't hear her, focused completely on untangling that tied-up sensation mixed in with a sort of alien awareness. Not here. Where, then? Where could it be? -How the hell do I know this-? Something horrible is going to happen, and if I know this, then I can stop it, and if I can stop it, then I need to -be there-...

Power surged, flexed, responded, and Micah disappeared from the breakfast table as he teleported. Only to stumble, wings outstretched to catch the air, as he dropped several feet to hit the ground in a crouch.

Ludmilla and Nunnally both appeared next to him, having followed just seconds after. Ludmilla snapped her head around in a quick scan, her mouth pulled into a sharp scowl now that she was reassured that her Master wasn't going to kill himself accidentally. /The Manor,/ she reported back to the rest of the harem. /Get over here, -now-.../

Micah wasn't paying attention, gesturing in front of his face even as his clothing retooled into armor, his eyes glowing a sickly white-silver as he scanned the surroundings, looking for -something-...

There.

/Cornelia,/ Micah mentally shouted as the rest of his harem appeared around him. /Hyperbeam. Ludmilla, Nunnally - TAKE HER DOWN./

-[***]-

Astarte didn't have a chance to react as a searing beam of energy cleaved away wood and glass and stone, rudely opening up the room she and Esther were in to the environs at large.

A second, as she indulged in the rage at being denied her enjoyment, even as she warred with confusion, as -no one was supposed to be here-...

Ludmilla emerged from the cloud of debris that had risen up in the wake of the attack, the Dire Wolf coming down on her with the full, unrestrained fury of a powerful pokegirl that had survived for over three hundred years.

Astarte was a Hild, and a powerful magic user. The best, some argued. But Ludmilla had been -given an order-, and the delightful thing about that order is that it gave her -so many options- to deal with this -loathsome bitch-.

Astarte had just a moment to begin the incantation of a spell to kill the intruder before the full fury of a mind engorged on skill and three centuries of rage smashed into the forefront of her psyche, and Astarte couldn't think properly any more.

Nunnally slammed bodily into Astarte a moment later, pinning her to the floor hard enough that they made a concave depression in the foundation.

Esther tried desperately to sit up, to make a sound, to do -something-as that horrifying presence drained away like water from a burst dam, only to find she lacked the energy to do any of that. Then she tried to stifle that desperate, keening sob of -relief- when she saw Micah step past rubble, armored, eyes glowing and wings spread, not stopping until he reached her and scooped her up off the floor and into his arms.

"A Hild," Micah narrowed his eyes at the comatose pokegirl that Nunnally still had a firm grip on. Behind him was Anya and Otsana, the Gunnm looking torn between hitting the Hild -really- hard or doing similar to Micah. He glanced down when Esther started to shake, hugging her close and discarding the idea of getting any viable tactical information from her. "Ludmilla."

"Yes?" the Dire Wolf's tone was half a snarl, trying to work with the lovely idea that her Master was progressing faster in his capabilities than she really wanted to think about.

"I don't care if the Hild survives getting the information you need pulled from her brain."

Ludmilla smiled gleefully. "Yes, sir."

"May I help, Master?" Illya spoke up.

"You can have the leftovers," Micah replied in a half-absent tone. Esther, shivering in his arms, tried to find some moral outrage at the casual thought of killing a pokegirl and found she couldn't muster the care to do so.

Euphemia floated in, Anya covering her as holographic screens surrounded the G-Splice like stars as she scanned the area. "No other hostile threats detected, Master. Near as I can tell, she was working alone."

Yvonne turned the corner at a half-run and jarred to a halt, Abiah a second behind her and Rachel a much slower third. Yvonne was privately thankful that the blind teleport hadn't caused a mishap -they were risky in the best of circumstances.

"No other threats, huh?" Cornelia spoke, leveling her Key-staff at the new arrivals.

"Hostile ones, no," Euphemia replied calmly.

"Yvonne," Micah replied with a measure of polite confusion, thankful for his magically-augmented memory. "Abiah." A quirk of an eyebrow. "Can I ask what both of you are doing here?"

"That would be my fault," Rachel spoke up, half-stumbling as she leaned against a wall and looking ashamed. "We were in communication when... everything happened."

Yvonne eyed the Hild currently being escorted, despite being unconscious, by Ludmilla, Nunnally, and Illya, and visibly shivered. "You've met the threat I had meant to warn you about." She looked at Micah. "I'm sorry." She then blinked. "You've changed, haven't you?"

"Since we last saw one another?" Micah nodded. "Yes." He regarded the arrival of Michelle and Anael, both looking worse off than Rachel. "Why don't we have a discussion about these threats of yours? Sitting down." He glanced down as Esther, who was blushing. "All of you look exhausted."

Micah wasn't going to trust the overall structural integrity of the house when a portion of its first floor in one of the rooms had been rudely removed, so the gaggle of Celestials found themselves being escorted to an impromptu tea gathering on the Manor's grounds themselves. Abiah, after receiving assurances from Yvonne and Rachel, left them and teleported back to her Tamer. Micah didn't join them at first, being more concerned with organizing his harem, getting the Hild secured, and reassuring his harem he was not going to up and disappear on them.

Again.

Which had lead to Ludmilla physically grabbing him to make sure he didn't move as she regarded him with a deadly serious glance. "-How-?"

"Instinct," Micah replied.

Ludmilla audibly whimpered.

The noise Micah made in reply was somewhere between a laugh and a snort. "If a bunch of teenagers and over-engineered dragonets can figure out that particular trick, I suppose it was only a matter of time, considering how many teleportations I've had to sit through ever since I arrived here."

Ludmilla sighed faintly. "Please don't do that again."

"I'll try not to do it accidentally," Micah replied in a wry tone.

Ludmilla regarded him for a moment, then focused on Otsana. "Grab on to him and don't let go."

Otsana smiled brightly, one fist latching onto Micah's greatcoat. "Okay."

Micah glanced at Otsana, then back at Ludmilla.

"If you pull that trick again, I'm hoping the Gunmm can murder anything threatening you while the rest of us catch up."

Micah gave Otsana another skeptical look, shrugged, and promptly headed for the table all the Celestials had been gathered around. Esther, looking small and tired, glanced up from her cup of tea at him when he approached. "How did you know?"

"About the Hild attacking?" Micah gave an expansive, wing-rustling shrug. "I've demonstrated a capability akin to prognostication that tends to react to extreme dangers or happenings to me and mine. Apparently, you and the rest of my charges seem to fall under that umbrella, geophysical separation aside."

Yvonne gave Esther an unseen look akin to envy, even as the Megami-sama tried to digest the implications.

"Now," Micah replied, settling into a seat cut to fit his wings and tail, "How did you know about the Hild, Yvonne?"

"Because she tracked me down specifically because I had interacted with you during Sadie Pokens Day," Yvonne replied in a carefully neutral tone, "And I... was lucky to escape." A deep breath. "Others weren't." She looked at Micah, unable to hide a measure of accusation in her expression. "If you remember Cloud, the Seraph, she died helping get away."

Micah was silent for a moment, muscles along his jaw clenching before taking a deep, slow breath, claws unsheathed as he carefully laid his hands on the table. "I see." Another slow breath. "I'm sorry."

Yvonne looked sad, even as she shook her head, placing her tea aside. "No, there's nothing you need to be sorry about. All of us live in this world, and we risk dying to fight evil just by being who and what we are. I should apologize, for not being strong enough to keep such evil away from you."

Micah, alongside everyone else, regarded Yvonne with a measure of surprise. "I see," Micah replied, and shook his head slowly. "I suppose we would be here for a very long while if we kept saying 'I'm sorry' to one another, so I'll just say, apology appreciated and accepted." He glanced at Rachel, Esther, Michelle and Anael. "That said, I've failed as a host. Whenever all my..." He paused a moment, "Other responsibilities were threatened, I should have considered similar threats to all of you. I'm sorry."

Yvonne glanced up, now curious. "Aren't you taming all of them?"

"No," Micah, Esther, Rachel, and Otsana chorused in various different measures of tone, from bland to strangled outrage, while Michelle choked on her tea, blushing hotly and Anael went momentarily cross-eyed at the idea.

Yvonne smiled. "Oh. Well, they're all very lovely girls. I thought they might have tempted you into their beds by now."

"All of them are gorgeous and lovely," Micah replied without pause, "But if I slept with every female I harbored perverse sexual lust for, I'd never get anything done." Ignoring the looks of embarrassment from the Celestials he had just complimented, he went on. "The manor, it seems, is compromised. Thankfully, I've taken recent steps to remove future threats from dropping in on me un-announced, so I'll be dragging all of you along with me. It won't really change much beyond having to deal with being closer to me and mine." A snort, as Micah reached up and rubbed at his forehead. "Of course, if anyone gives you trouble, then I'll tear strips out of them myself." He bit back a growl and forced himself to relax. "So. Rest and recover, please. If you'll excuse me," he said, standing, "I have some other things I should take care of."

Otsana let herself be pulled along like a wagon to a bull as Micah went searching for where his harem had gotten too. He found them well out of sight of the gaggle of Celestials he had left behind; Nunnally, Illya, Anya, and Cornelia all standing guard and ready whilst Ludmilla rummaged through the Hild's brain. Micah eyed the drooling, blank-faced pokegirl for a moment, then turned his full attention to Ludmilla. "And?"

The Dire Wolf rose from her crouch, clawed hands getting go of the Hild's skull. "I think we should bring Sexebi into this discussion," Ludmilla replied, wiping her hands almost absently.

Micah blinked at the seeming non-sequitor. "Last I checked, this wasn't Sexebi's problem."

Ludmilla had the grace to appear mildly sheepish. "It kind of is, Master. Didn't you think it odd that Sexebi didn't mention about Macavity's little... joke?"

Micah froze, brain grinding to a halt as it gnawed on that. Son of a bitch, he thought. "I take it you asked."

Ludmilla nodded. "I did." She glared at the Hild. "She was sent out as an agent by the Legendary Hild to kill you. Which is why she was tracking down Celestials you've interacted with. -After- Sexebi warned her not to do that."

"...I see." And he did. Macavity and Hild. Well, he'd been working from the likelihood that the majority of Legendaries wanted to kill him. But there was a wide gulf between being having suspicions of the fact and getting it rudely shoved in your face.

Ludmilla let out a breath. "I don't think you do. Anya, could you go get Sexebi, please?"

The blonde StarMystic blinked, glanced over at Micah, and visibly relaxed when he gave her a small nod. "Sure." She teleported away, only to reappear moments later carrying Sexebi... and Lina.

"RAAAAAARGH!" Lina took a running leap at Micah, latching onto his horns as handles to pull her snarling face up to his. "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU WERE DOING RUNNING OFF LIKE THAEEEP!" Lina's diatribe cut to a halt when Micah's hand slid over her bottom and between her legs, goosing her. Her flush of anger quickly turned to one of embarrassment as she tried to let go of his horns, only to put her full weight on that hand as he tucked her at his side.

"You know, I'm seriously glad that I'm aware your aggression is due to me scaring the loving hell out of you," Micah replied in a casual, conversational tone. "And that it's based on an outlet to express your worry. That said," his grip tightened, drawing a breathy gasp from Lina, "-Don't do it again-."

"Okay," the redhead squeaked.

Micah smiled a moment, then set Lina down, ruffling Otsana's black hair at the Gumnn's sour expression before nodding to Sexebi. "And, hello, Sexebi. I apologize for the rude-hello," Micah's sentence went awry when, no longer dealing with Lina, Sexebi ran up to him and hugged him tightly around his waist. "Well, I'm happy to see you, too."

"You scared me," Sexebi exclaimed, wings shivering. "I didn't know you could teleport. I thought..."

"I didn't know I could teleport, either," Micah smiled back. "That said, I apologize. Is there are particular reason Ludmilla thinks you should know about a Legendary wanting to kill me?"

Sexebi paled. "...tell me."

Ludmilla did so.

When she was finished, Sexebi swayed back and forth to the point that Micah was worried she was suddenly going to faint. She then swallowed, and looked at Micah with a nervous expression. "How much do you trust me?"

Oh, there's a loaded question, Micah thought to himself. He then metaphorically shrugged, and went with the honest answer. "I trust you with my life. I have to, after all."

"Okay." She held her hand out. "Take it."

One eyebrow arched curiously, Micah did so.

The world twisted sideways. Micah glanced up, he and Sexebi no longer standing on the manor grounds. Instead, above them was a massive ceiling of a multi-story, ornate, oval library that radiated with a near crushing magical power.

And there, delicate, pristine hands poised over the entry in a tome spread out upon an oak table that looked as if you could tame a harem of Snorlasses upon it, was the Legendary Hild, her expression caught between a snarl of fury, open shock, and a sliver of fear.

"Sexebi," Hild rose from her seat, her smile one of fake pleasantries as she ignored Micah completely, as if hoping he'd go away if she continued doing so long enough. "You're unexpected."

Sexebi's normally cute-as-a-button face was abnormally serious, lips set in a flat line as she regarded Hild, her wings flush against her back. "I told you what would happen if you tried to hurt him!" Her voice almost cracked from the volume, unused to speaking in such a severe manner.

Hild froze, then burst out laughing. "-You-!? You were -serious-!?" If anything, she laughed harder, the noise mocking and derisive. "If you can't take care of your toys, then perhaps you should choose better ones."

Sexebi's eyes were wide - from fear, from hurt, and, unexpectedly, from -anger-. "Hild," she swallowed, voice thick, "I'm -not- sorry."

Hild smiled nastily. "Oh, come now, don't-"

And she was gone as if she had never been there, the space she had previously pre-occupied deforming and smoothing over as the temporal disturbance repaired itself.

Sexebi whirled in place and abruptly latched onto Micah, hugging desperately. "OhIcan'tbeleiveitIdiditmicahIwassoSCARED-!"

Micah hugged back tightly, now more concern for Sexebi's sudden hysterics that what the hell had just happened. He absently reached up and caressed her hair, petting it, until the Legendary had stopped shaking.

"Feel better?" Micah asked, once he was reasonably certain she wouldn't fall down if he let go of her.

Sexebi nodded back, giving a sniffle. "Thanks."

Micah smiled back. "You're welcome. If I can ask, what did you just do?"

Sexebi blushed faintly from embarrassment. "I... kind of... threwherforwardintime."

"Pardon?"

"I threw her forward three hundred years in time," Sexebi replied at a more reasonable speed, her arms still around Micah's waist.

Micah chuckled faintly. "Ah. Well. I suppose that's one way to solve a problem."

"This isn't funny!" Sexebi frowned up at him, almost pulling away. "I was so scared, I-!"

"No, no, I wasn't trying to make fun of you," Micah reassured her, hands on the Legendary's shoulders. "The laugh was, well, quite frankly, I'm running on a bit of an adrenaline high. Plus, you handled yourself quite well. If anything, I need to thank you. After all, you've solve a potentially lethal problem for me, when you... well, by doing something you really didn't want to do."

Sexebi blushed as she stammered back, "Well, I, I couldn't... I just, I -told- her, I-"

"You were fair and reasonable in your demands, and made every chance for her to either back off or retreat with face," Micah replied seriously. "As the saying goes, if someone wishes to commit suicide, sometimes, all one can do is oblige them."

Sexebi visibly fidgeted. "...thank you."

"You're quite welcome." Micah glanced at his surroundings. "Pretty. Ostentatious, but pretty." He directed his gaze back down to Sexebi. "Shall we be off, before my harem gets too out of sorts?"

"I'll make sure to return us just a second after we left," Sexebi replied. Stepping away from him, she took his hand, and the world twisted sideways once more.

From all outward observers, it was as if Micah and Sexebi hadn't really been gone at all - the transition effect was so smooth, that if you had blinked, you would have missed it.

"What just happened?" Ludmilla asked calmly.

"Sexebi just had to take care of a loose end, so to speak," Micah replied. He ignored Ludmilla's dawning look of shock and surprise as she whipped her gaze between Micah and Sexebi both. "Ludmilla, are you done with the Hild? No? Then Masterball her for later. Anya, Otsana, come with me while I go explain a few things to our lovely band of intrepid Celestials. After that..." Micah suddenly felt very, very tired, adrenaline leaving his system combined with the realization that he had one entire facet of his worries that was no longer a threat. "I'm thinking some downtime. Serious downtime."

-[***]-

A/N:  I envy a friend of mine whom can literally sketch out a charachter concept in a few paragraphs and procede to work from there in how the charachter acts and operates.  

Sadly, this, I cannot do.  I tend to operate in a more organic fashion, taking core concepts and seeing how they'd grow in certain situations.  Because of this, my charachters tend to have a very... interesting time surprising the hell out of me.  I only mention this as I didn't -intend- for Sexebi to come across as an unholy amalgamation of Yuki Nagato, Mikuru Asahina, and Eureka from Eureka 7, it just sort of... happened.

Go figure.

'Teenagers and Over-engineered Dragonets' makes references to the Tomorrow People, and, of cource, Anne MacCaffery's 'Dragonriders of Pern'.

Chronologically, this chapter takes places before Evangelion hands off Kerrik's message to Sexebi.