Having a trusted comrade is like possessing an entire other life at your fingertips.
Perchance, did you ever take the time to think about what your friends could do, what your lovers could do, what your children could do, that you could never do? That you could never comprehend? That you yourself were the wrong shape for this world, which demands myriad configurations?
Despite the limits of man, all of us are born with certain tensions, inclinations towards fields of knowledge or physical arts. And within this likeness is also a metaphor—a metaphor for what we might be able to do.
I think it’s best to think of people as keys sometimes, suited for specific situations. Where a peerless warrior might slay ten billion unreasonable foes without struggle, an unrivaled orator might see the same number of civil wars end without slaughter.
Understand what faces you. Understand if you are the person for the job, or if you must call on another. Absent a key, force perhaps can open any door—but if the door is broken and the act is observed, then that shapes your future. It misshapes you from what you are right now.
"Understand and apply yourself.
-Jaus Avandaer
31-3
Moths and Flames
{Chambers… what the fuck do you mean you’re now the God of Love?} Draus asked for the third time. It wasn’t that she couldn’t understand his words, it’s just they didn’t make any sense to her. It was a statement so unnatural, her mind refused to process it.
{Fuck’s sake, Draus, I told you I’m as surprised as you are! Do I need to go through the story another time?}
{I don’t know, Chambers. Are you still the God of Love in that one?}
{Yes!}
{Then what the fuck? How? Fuckin’ how are you, of all fuckin’ people, the one that gets the Heaven of Love.}
A deep inhalation sounded across the connection, and Chambers’ virtual avatar squared his shoulders as his eyes drifted to gaze somewhere in the distance. {Because I am the imperfect vessel.}
{...What the fuck does that mean.}
{You know, I don’t really fully get it myself. I’ll have to have Cas explain it—you want me to patch him—}
{No! Fuck no! Godsdammit, Chambers. I didn’t expect shit from you, but fallin’ to cult stuff is still low.}
{I mean, you might like it, Draus. There’s this guy called Michael and he had like a flaming sword that he used to—}
{No, don’t tell me that shit! Jaus. Have you considered that it might be rewriting your brain? Huh?} Draus paused. Might not be the best question to ask. Chambers had been the one to download all those mem-cons straight into his Meta, after all.
{Fine, fuck! Just saying. You might be more accepting of things if you listened. Maybe some active empathy might do you some good.}
Draus was about to propose naming a particularly large gun “Active Empathy” and ramming it up Chambers’ ass to use him as a barrel extension. Except, he might actually like that. Except, apparently, the rash was fixed now. Except, if she actually got Chambers off, she would find a way to real-death herself right there and then, this war and Avo’s fate be damned.
And ultimately, that was the point of this cast. She needed someone with “active empathy.” Something Regulars sorely lacked. As Draus took in Shotin once more, her internal frown deepened. The Silver half-strand’s halo was cracking all to shit; he was speaking to his dead niece, too. Fuck’s sake, could she even use his ass when the time came.
Her focus lingering on Kare for a moment, Draus’ thoughts turned to Kae. Of her fate. Fuck. Shit. Part of the Regular knew lots of people were dead. Avo should have died, but being the special rotlick he was, he was probably beyond fucking immortal by this point. The Regs though? Kare? Kae? A bunch of other people at the trial? Snuffed. Snuffed, with the only chance of their return found in the Ladder or backed up from Avo’s bullshit Soulscape.
Things weren’t done. Not by a long shot. But still. An absence flitted over Draus’ consciousness. She’d lost people. Hundreds of people. As a Reg, death was just a thing to her; the root of her trade and a constant more consistent than reality itself. But she felt colder with Kae’s death. Remembered those days she spent guarding that uppity Instrument, taken away from the battlefield, this little mouse of an Agnos babbling about theory to her, explaining things to her, she didn’t understand.
Draus didn’t fully realize when she and Kae became consangs. It just kinda happened. Agnos kept asking about all the wars she fought, and Draus answered. Draus wanted to learn more about cutting-edge Heavens and threats she would soon face in war, and Kae was more than happy to babble. They ended up eating together, spending more time together, and…
And Draus missed that. Missed those times. Weren’t a thrill like war was. Wasn’t what Regs were made for. But Kae was different. Pure. Genuine. She was a person. Had love for her work and dreams for the future. Guess that was what Draus saw in her. If Kae was the flame, then Draus and her like were moths. They loved the light. Were drawn to its radiance. But they couldn’t bear to burn; a Regular that felt as a human did wasn’t a Regular at all.
But still. There were times that Draus wondered. And now the flame was gone. The flame was lost. Until Avo was restored, or the war was won. And that duty fell to Draus, because where she couldn’t light another’s life, she could sure as shit extinguish some rival fires.
The confirmation of the Agnos’s present death cemented one thing in her: She needed to win this war. She needed to seize the Ladder. For Avo. For Kae. For the ones that were bright. For Chambers too, she realized. Because for all his shitty habits and fucked-up tastes, he was just a kid that never had a chance.
{...anyway, you should talk to Cas. He’s got lots of things to say. Marlowe, too. Anyway. Still. Fuck. Kare. Didn’t know her that great, but she was a…} Chambers sighed. {Draus, I don’t know why I’m the one you called here. I’m like, a gutter shitbag and she was a glasser. It would be like a rat holding a funeral for a nu-cat.}
{I’m callin’ you because I don’t have it,} the admission left Draus casually. {It just feels cold to me. Discomfort. The losses. Even Kae. Some bit of me knows I should be hurtin’ more. But that bit isn’t there. Never was. I’m a good weapon, Chambers. Now, I’m fightin’ the most righteous war I can. But I ain’t a person. There’s never been much of me. So. I need you.}
A silence sounded across the link. {I… uh, I feel kinda. Is that a compliment?}
{It’s just the truth. You cared for Kae. You cared. Of all the other shit that’s wrong with you, you cared. That’s true.}
Another beat followed. {I did care, didn’t I? I did love?}
Draus considered that. {Yeah.} Wait. Fuck her, this was why Avo chose him, wasn’t it? Because of some bullshit yappin’ metaphor about learning love and the hearts of the people or some shit.
A brief, pained chuckle sounded from Ignorance, but it was there and gone like a whisper on the wind.
{Well. I… thanks for calling on me, Draus.}
{Yeah. Sure. So. Do the thing. Know Avo’s got some Necro-shit left in you. Might need to—}
{Let me try just talking to him first,} Chambers said. {He looks like he needs someone right now.}
{Don’t think you’re what he has in mind when we think of “someone,”} Draus sarcastically replied.Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
{Nope. You’re probably right, consang. But you’re not his idea of a rescue—or pretty much anyone’s idea of a hero, either. Yet. Here you are. And here I am. Doing what we can. Guess that’s what it means to exercise choice.}
Draus considered his words. Chambers was making more sense than usual. Starting to sound like someone else she knew… She didn’t know if she liked that. {Yeah.}
{I think that makes us, like, acolytes of change—} Chambers continued.
{Chambers, get the fuck in there and stop doin’ an Avo.}
A few sniggers sounded from the new God of Love, and he paused one final time. {Hey, Draus? Are you alright?}
That made her mind jolt to a stop entirely. {Why? Somethin’ sound wrong?}
{No. Just… We all lost a lot.}
{Yeah. But it’s not done.}
Chambers grinned. {Well. Glad one of us is unbreakable.} And then he was off, and Draus was left to her own thoughts. Her own considerations.
Ain’t unbreakable. Just that there’s no person to break.
Ultimately, “Jelene Draus” was just a scabbard. A sheet of traits, inclinations, and characteristics for a weapon swinging in a new direction. A weapon that was the Burning Dreamer. And now, nested as a hidden blade in the guts of her former Guild, a question ambushed the Regular.
What does a gun dream about?
***
—[Shotin]—
Shotin stirred as he felt another presence enter his mind, but with it came a feeling—a strengthening of all he had, all the love he had for Kare while she was alive. And now, when dead, he saw her; he saw the face of his sister, of his niece coalesce as one, but they were both lost. Lost across that final threshold, he could no longer follow. Even in the end, he couldn''t protect her, couldn’t protect her from this world. Not even the Burning Dreamer. No one. Nothing.
+Hey, Shotin.+ Chambers’ voice made Shotin Kazahara sag even further. Something inside him did a twirl. How. How was Kare dead, and this fucking subhuman still here? What sense did that make? What world was he living in? Slowly, uncontrollably, he began to chuckle, to laugh. This was insane. This was all motherfucking insane.
“Of course you’re still here,” Shotin said. He angled himself to stare at Chambers—who was not materialized as an avatar in Shotin’s cog-feed. The deviant fuck looked… better somehow. More at peace. He wore a pained expression as he regarded Kare.
+Glad you’re not surprised. Me. I had doubts I would ever get this far,+ Chambers replied. +Listen. I’m not going to bullshit you, Silver: I didn’t know your niece well. Avo did. He cared for her—+
“Fuck. You.” Shotin shot to his feet at the mention of that—that fucking thing, that fucking creature. The Burning Dreamer. “Fuck you. Fuck your goddamn master—fucking monster ruined us! Ruined us all! That—if he didn’t—”
+Zein Thousandhand would’ve just killed her,+ Chambers said, cutting Shotin off. Suddenly, a flood of memories entered his mind, and Shotin recalled facing Zein, what she intended with the paths. Kare’s role in everything. It felt like a dagger entering his gut. A choked whimper escaped from Shotin as he backed away.
“No. No, fuck you, half-strand. Lying… You have to be—”
+She didn’t godsdamned matter.+ Chambers continued. He took a step forward but made no overt actions otherwise. +Neither does what you want. Or what I wanted. Or most of us, really. None of it mattered. The ones on top do, and the ones below? Citizen or subject? We suffer. And maybe we survive. Kare? She was a nice Glasser from what I could tell. Good juv. Cared about the world. Did everything she could to live up to the dream. But she got fucked. Not because of anything she did. Just because she was the right person’s daughter, was the right lever to pull to shift some in-Guild culture shit. And now, she got snuffed. Wasn’t her fault either. But it is what is.+
A snarl of fury escaped from Shotin. Red bled over his vision. His wards rattled—were on the verge of disintegrating outright. This fuck came here to mock him—
Suddenly, impossibly, another emotion cleaved clean through Shotin’s rage. Love. Love exploded inside him. Love and sorrow and oh, gods, Kare, fuck, it was all his fault…
Shotin’s vision blurred. It got hard for him to breath—he gasped, he struggled. His chest grew impossibly tight, and he needed—he slammed against the inner wall of the containment unit and began to slump. As he slid, he clutched his skull and swallowed sour spit. Across from him was his niece—the last thing he had left of his sister. And she was gone. And she was gone. And she was gone.
And there was nothing he do to make it right again. All his fault. She was gone. Gone. He couldn’t protect her.
He slammed the back of his skull against the metallic walls twice more and let out a ragged cry. A tantrum escaped Shotin. He tore clumps of his mane out from his scalp and didn’t even care. And through it all, a glowing magenta link connecting him and Kare flared bright and brighter. Until love became the dominant emotion in his chest. Until even grief was outweighed.
Faster, Uncle Sho! Faster…
An illusion of his past was conjured to the present. A fantasy of Kare—barely more than child—squealed on his back as he hoped from skyscraper to skyscraper. It had been her sixth birthday, and being the fuck-up that he was, he arrived drunk as shit, with a guy and a gal he couldn’t the remember the names of on his arm. His sister had been pissed, and his bond brother was another color. But Kare—she was happy to see him. She was happy he showed up at all.
And maybe that was the moment of his downfall. Shotin had lived a wild life. He’d fucked, drank, smoked, injected, fought, wept, suffered, enjoyed, and basically did whatever the fuck he wanted however he wanted to and got away with it all. Because he was among Ori-Thaum’s elite. Because he could do shit no one else could and get away with it. Because where most Ori were glassjaws and bent their heads and took it from their superiors, Shotin learned the technique of going above his immediate masters and then fucking humiliating them before their superiors while showing who he was.
What he was worth.
It was all for him. All for his ego. He did it all to prove himself, to state who he was. He did it for love and pleasure. But there, in Kare’s eyes, he saw the fucking mess that he was, watched her giggle as she complained how he reeked; as she asked who his ‘friends’ were and why their clothes had so many holes “in places.”
She asked, but she never questioned if he should have been there. Because in her perfect eyes, Shotin, be he Ori-Thaum’s ultimate loose canon or some drunk sex-addled degenerate, was the same. Was someone she always loved to see.
She was like a fire. A light. And he was a moth that lived hard, blunted his pain on shit. But in her bright, it all went away, and he was who he was without problem. And that was all that mattered. Didn’t matter if he was man, bastard, or moth.
The sun shone on all. And so did Kare.
And now he would never have that again. He would never get to make up a namesday gift by carrying his niece on his shoulders and hoping the length of kilometers using his Heaven of Speed while his sister screamed at him through their Auto-Seance. He would never hold Kare as she cried, venting about her shitty ex. And never get to start a brawl with said shitty ex and his entire extended clan. No more arguments over clan politics. No more meme-packs shared of nu-cats falling into water. No more late night +Are you there, Uncle Shos.+ No more ceremonies or pictures to be taken.
No more future.
Kare wouldn’t get to go see a blockbuster vic again. She wouldn’t learn what it was like to love or be loved by someone that wasn’t a bastard. She wouldn’t see what—she wouldn’t—
Shotin broke. Shotin broke and broke and kept breaking, even when he felt like there was nothing left to break.
But through it all, the love remained strong. Remained true. Remained absolute.
Kare was gone. But her shadow was there. Would always be there like a scar, an imprint of someone left on a wall after a nuclear blast. There, but never again. Never again.
He didn’t know how long he sobbed, how loud he wailed. All he knew was that he came apart. And stayed apart for an eternity. But when he finally rose from the ruins of his own heart, Shotin was surprised to notice Chambers still there, expression mournful, studying Kare.
Sniffling, Shotin almost felt embarrassed. But he was too raw for that. To hurt to really know how bad he was even hurt. “F-figured you would be gone.”
+No. I want to be here.+
“Why,” Shotin said, wiping his face. “Want to see me hurt? Does it make you feel better? Huh? Fucking…” He didn’t have the energy to call Chambers a cunt. He was venting by now. He could see it. If Chambers wanted to hurt him more, the half-strand could have.
+No,+ Chambers said. +I wanted to be here for you. ‘Cause I’m pretty sure I cried that way in my home’s shittier the night I finally realized mom wasn’t coming back.+
Shotin flinched. For the first time, he realized Chambers was a person too. Or maybe this was a psy-op. Social engineering meant to twist him. To what, though? For what? It was all fucked. All fucked.
“H-hey, Chambers.”
+Yeah?+
“Do you know what it’s like… to be wanted. Not because what you can do? Or what benefits you can offer. Just… just because who you are?”
Chambers paused as his expression turned forlorn, then pensive. +No. But why don’t you tell me? Tell me about her.+
And Shotin did. And he didn’t notice the most tenative of threads branching out from his grief, reaching out toward Aedon Chambers.
***
—[Draus]—
Shotin didn’t notice, but Draus did. She saw all that happened, all that Chambers was doing, and her disbelief grew and grew, but with it, came realization: Aedon Chambers was worthy.
…
Holy fucking shit.