4.45 – Return


    It took a few more rounds, but Zoey and Delta fucked the slimegirl into submission. The solid, dark-green orb in her chest quickly turned red, then shattered, leaving her a half-formed mess. As thest time Zoey had defeated Mel, her mind was turned into as much of a sludge as her body. Getting fucked to the point of so-called defeat left her unable to move, and only half able to form words.


    But in a good way. Mel looked like she’d been left out on a hot day, her sticky body melting into a puddle, but a very satisfied, well-fucked puddle. Honestly, Zoey felt a bit the same.


    “Before you go,” Mel mumbled. “Take this … wanted to give it to you…”


    Holding out a hand, liquid green goo poured from Mel’s hand, separating from the rest of her body. At a gesture from Mel, Zoey crouched down and took the glob of slime, thought was confused by the event.


    “It’s me,” Mel said. “I can’t leave my shard, but maybe a part of me can? Don’t know,” she mumbled, half to herself, her eyes fluttering. “Talking’s … hard. Keep her well fed, okay?”


    Zoey blinked as she took the words in. The puddle of goo was Mel? Right now, it was mostly formless, just green liquid. But that would change if she kept it well fed? And change how? As in, turn into a mini-Mel?


    “Fed with what?” Zoey asked.


    Mel gave her a look that suggested she was stupid.


    “Right. Dumb question.”


    “Ande visit in your dreams, here and there,” Mel said. “Though I don’t sleep much. Might be tricky. Okay … that’s it …” she sighed contentedly. “Thank you again. Now, taking a nap.”


    With ast mumble of satisfaction, the goo-girl lost consciousness, her humanoid form almost fully dissolving into slime.


    “Huh,” Delta said. She crouched down next to Zoey and inspected the puddle of goo in Zoey’s hands. “So it’ll grow into a second Mel?”


    “I guess?” Zoey asked. “I’ll have to ask her, once she’s less …”


    “Fucked to mindlessness?”


    “That.”


    Rosalie joined Zoey to the left, also crouching down. “Well,” she said. “I’m d we’ve apparently saved this friend of yours, but we didn’t get many answers. And have something watching us, now? Something that <em>eats </em>shards? I feel like we’ve glossed over that.”


    “We’re not glossing over anything, blondie,” Delta said dryly. “We were just a little busy.”


    Rosalie huffed. “Regardless. What are we doing?”


    “Let’s get moving, first,” Zoey said. “Get our gear back. We need something to hold mini-Mel, too.” She tilted her cupped hands and shook them back and forth, watching the thick liquid jiggle. It was highly viscous; it refused to separate or spill between her fingers.


    “I assume the chests are still under theke,” Rosalie said. “Is that going to be a problem?”


    Zoey frowned, understanding the real question. Would the slime rejoin to theke, if she brought it in? She doubted it.“Think we’re fine. Swimming’s gonna be hard, though, with my hands full.”


    “Put it in your inventory?”


    “Already tried,” Zoey said. “Can’t. It’s a person, I guess? <em>She</em><em>’s </em>a person?” It was an unexpected event, and Zoey wasn’t entirely sure how to talk or feel about it.


    Delta said, “Kay, well, I’ll tug you along, then. I can swim for two of us.”


    Rosalie stood. Instinctively, she offered a hand to help Delta up, who, after quirking an eyebrow, epted it. Hriously, Rosalie blushed at her casual show of camaraderie, then red at Delta to make up for it. Zoey found the interaction cuter than she probably ought to.


    “To our loot, then,” Zoey said.


    She couldn’t help but ncing to the tree line, searching it, as if expecting to find their mysterious voyeur. Obviously, she didn’t.


    A short trip through the thick goo of the slimeke, and the squad of three emerged into a familiar loot-chamber, a shimmering ck portal situated on the far wall—their exit back out into the Fractures.


    After the devastating event of Rosalie and Delta getting dressed, and Zoey no longer getting to steal nces at them whenever she wanted, the three of them restocked their inventories with their gear. Shortly, they were ready to get going. Zoey ced mini-Mel—which was just a pile of formless green goo—into an alchemy-reagent collection jar, then tucked it into a satchel, since it couldn’t go into her inventory. She was stuck carrying it around the normal way.


    “None of our items are broken, like that remote vibrator is,” Zoeymented. “That’s good.”


    Rosalie made a noise of agreement. She’d had the same worry. Who knew what would happen to their items when stored inside a shard that was on the fritz?


    “And Mel’s gonna be fine, now?” Delta asked. She sounded genuinely concerned for the woman. Though she’d only just met Mel, the slimegirl had, apparently, made an impression. Which was fair, considering how many ces she’d let Delta stick that tool of hers—which had disappeared by now—and how enthusiastically.


    “As long as our guest follows,” Zoey said. Or, hopefully. She was still confused on the details, there. Mel had only given her theories, and exactly what the shard-eater wanted, or what she even was, was up in the air.


    “And do we have any guarantees of that?” Delta asked.


    “I guess Mel will let me know. I’ll check in with her in a dream, like she said.”


    “Right. You can do that. Pretty useful.” Delta paused. “You know, we need to experiment. Wouldn’t mind having you visit <em>my </em>dreams. What can we do with it?”


    “There’s a limit to how much you can change,” Zoey said. “The fantasy has to stay mostly to what the target was already in.”


    “So if we want to do anything crazy, I have to get good at forcing myself to dream whatever I want,” Delta said.


    Zoeyughed. Of course that was the conclusion she made. “Yeah, I guess.”


    “Focus, please?” Rosalie asked. With everyone having gathered their gear, and gotten dressed, she gestured for them to step through the portal. “This guest of ours. We need to discuss her.”


    Zoey briefly considered returning to the surface of the shard and gathering some alchemy reagents, or otherwise exploring, but she thought it was best to get going. Mel needed to recover, and staying in a damaged shard just seemed unwise. Plus, they wanted to bait the shadow-creature out as soon as possible.


    They exited the shard without ceremony, and after a briefly disorienting experience, the three girls were dropped into the middle of an aridndscape, sun beating down brightly from above.


    “Good, it’s not snow,” Delta said, squinting at the sudden assault of light—as all of them were. She stretched widely, basking under the sun with a content look, and even after all of the events prior, Zoey couldn’t help but sneak an admiring look at the way her shirt lifted up and revealed a hint of abs. Rosalie caught her, but as always, hardly seemed upset, just exasperated.


    “But yeah,” Delta said. “The guest. Let’s see.” She cupped her hands to her mouth, then shouted, “Hey! Cum vampire! You hungry yet?”


    Rosalie pinched the bridge of her nose, and Zoey justughed.


    “I don’t think it’ll be that easy,” Zoey said.


    “That’s a no?” Delta shouted into the empty air, ignoring Zoey. She shrugged. “More for me and blondie, I guess.”


    “Will you <em>please </em>take this seriously?” Rosalie asked. “The world is <em>ending</em>.”


    “Allegedly,” Delta said. “The world is allegedly ending.”


    “You saw the broken item. And the warnings of Ephythithys? There’s surely more of them.”


    “More cum vampires?” Delta said. “Zoey’s really going to have her hands full.” She ced a hand above her forehead to make shade, then peered around. “I say we go this way.” She pointed at a seemingly random direction.


    Or, maybe not random, because Rosalie nodded in agreement and set off. Zoey followed, mentally bracing herself for another long trip through the wilderness.


    “Okay, but taking it seriously,” Delta said. “We’recking information big time. Only real way forward, the way I see it, is baiting the vampire out. Having a talk.”


    “Mel couldn’t find a way to talk with her, so how could we?” Rosalie asked. “She had to use Zoey’s … substance … just to get her to show herself.”


    “And we have an infinite supply of Zoey-cum,” Delta said, not half as hesitant to be crude as Rosalie. “Goddess-certified fresh, always on tap.”


    Rosalie growled at the ridiculous phrasing, and Delta smirked in return, pleased she’d gotten a rise out of the blonde—not that she ever had problems with that.


    “Still don’t think it’ll be that easy,” Zoey said. “Clearly she doesn’t want to be seen.” She remembered the horrified expression on the woman’s face, seeing Zoey and them watching her—at Mel’s trick having worked. Then the way she’d vanished into nothingness. “Don’t think it’ll work the second time around.”


    “And we’re assuming she <em>did </em>follow us,” Rosalie pointed out. “That’s not guaranteed.”


    As one, the three of them peered around, seeking out a mysterious follower. Of course, they saw nothing but aridndscape.


    “Well,” Delta said. “We’ll do our best to make her talk. If we can’t, we’ll look for information some other way.” She tilted her head. “You know, maybe those cultists were right. The ones going on about how the Fractures are decaying? Maybe it’s this.”


    Rosalie didn’t immediately dismiss the idea, though she seemed doubtful. “Cultists and doom-sayers are as old as time.”


    “It’s some kind of start,” Delta said.


    “Are you suggesting we volunteer? Join them? A <em>cult</em>?”


    “Not necessarily. But check it out. It’s the only starting point I can think of.”


    Rosalie couldn’t argue that, though it seemed like she wanted to, merely because Delta had suggested it. Eventually, she nodded.


    “It’d be a start,” she said.