Run, Part 5: Ash

Please select destination.

Where to go? Do more work? Gamble some of that money she didn't have anywhere to spend now? Forget dimension jumping and go back and work on something else, like that new surveillance system she'd had an idea for? No...none of them had any appeal.

After ten seconds or so, Sine began putting in coordinates randomly. Once she was finished, she locked in the destination and activated a safety scan.

COORDINATES HAVE NO SAFE LOCATION. PLEASE REWORK.

Sine punched in new numbers and letters.
 


COORDINATES HAVE NO SAFE LOCATION. PLEASE REWORK.

Sine had a vague recollection of some old device one could hook up to a video game, and via inputting number and letter codes, hack into the game's programs and twist stuff around. However, just putting in random numbers and letters would usually just cause the game to crash, erase save files, cause glitches, and so on. You needed to know exactly what to plug in, or you'd get nowhere. In the case of her Sifter, you could end up in a lot of worse places than nowhere. Sine, more to see if she could find a working combination at random than any real interest to go there.
 

COORDINATES HAVE NO SAFE LOCATION. PLEASE REWORK.

COORDINATES HAVE NO SAFE LOCATION. PLEASE REWORK.

COORDINATES HAVE NO SAFE LOCATION. PLEASE REWORK.

COORDINATES HAVE NO SAFE LOCATION. PLEASE REWORK.

COORDINATES ACCEPTED. PERFORM FURTHER SCANS?


"Hmmmm." Sine said, as she plugged in the usual safety parameters. Was the gravity and radiation present within acceptable, if not safe parameters? Was there breathable air? If not, would she require an air supply or a fully vacuum sealed suit? Was there stable ground? If no, how unstable was it? Was there life around? What kind? And of course, details like making sure she didn't warp into a planet's core or a black hole or something.

The warning signs she got back was a lack of breathable air and a requirement for a vacuum sealed suit. Sine got her helmet on and adjusted her armor to perfectly connect with it before she procured an air canister and inserted it into her helm. Adjusting her boots and slipping on gloves, Sine sealed every crevice in her outfit and then expelled the air from it, her helmet sealing itself and inserting a breathing apparatus into her mouth.

COORDINATES SET.

VROP.

-----

It was like the Sifter knew how she was feeling.

Sine wasn't wholly sure just what she was standing on. It was too small to be a planet, heck it was too small to be a moon, but it was too unnaturally designed to be an asteroid. It had, at least once, the smooth carved edges of something constructed, and its color had been too perfect a white, though age had caused it to fade to a sickly grey. Something had made this place, carved by thinking hands, hands that were long gone and unlikely to return. What had this place been? A small palace, floating through the vo...

Stars.

There were virtually no stars.

"...Computer, measure the stability of this universe. Level of the fundamental interactions, entropy, the works." Sine said, as she looked around. "Scan for life forms too, as far as you can in a minute...just in case."

While her systems did their jobs, Sine began poking her way across the faded remnants of whatever this floating structure had been. The fact that she didn't just float off the small object despite no efforts from her own self to stay on it, now that she thought about it, was damn disturbing. It was doubtful this little speck in the universe could naturally generate its own gravity, and any artificial means would have likely long ceased to work with how worn and ancient the place seemed. Yet she was able to step on and off the rock like she was taking a stroll on...well, not Earth. The gravity was weaker than there. The moon, perhaps? But still...what could imbue something so small with its own gravitational pull? One that persisted even now?

Then she stepped on it, feeling the dry, dusty pressure give way beneath her boot, and she had a new question. She knew what she'd just stepped on. She'd put her foot through a ribcage more than once.

Just what it was a ribcage OF, Sine didn't know. The bones were crumbling into a cloud of dust as she looked down, the dead grey mist painting itself on her boots and lower legs. Sine knelt down, trying to find any remaining pieces, but it seemed like her touch had been all that was needed to reduce whatever she had stepped on to the dust of the ages.

Which was even more wrong than the gravity. Space was a vacuum; without protection, the bacteria in an organic body that led to decomposition would die long before they finished their work, and barring outside factors like space debris or the heat of a star, bodies could last in a more or less preserved state for millions of years. Sine didn't see any impact craters, and as she'd already noted, there was virtually no stars left. She should have stepped on a corpse so fresh she could have identified facial features, not bones so worn by age that they crumbled apart. Unless...

"Computer, scan this dust. It IS osseous, right?" Sine said. She was given an answer in the affirmative. "And my other requests?"

No life forms detected. Remaining stars primarily white dwarf type. Fundamental interactions...disrupted.

"Disrupted?" Sine said. How the hell did you 'disrupt' the four fundamental forces of the universe and still have something resembling a universe?
 

Entropy also...disrupted. Exact classification unknown at this time.

"Am I in danger?" Sine said, standing back up.

Remaining in current location for extended periods of time unadvised. Momentary period, however, likely safe.

"Says you." Sine said, looking around. A white battered rock that once wasn't, with gravity, with corpses that had rotted in a vacuum, admist a sky of dying stars and disrupted aspects of basic existence. She'd found herself a universe of ash.
 

Hell of a place for a vacation. Sine mused. Well, if she wanted to sit around and sulk, she could find better places to do it than here...

White. Dark. Among it all, she barely noticed the brief hint of another color. For a few moments, Sine debated leaving things well enough alone, but curiosity killed the cat, and satisfaction brought him back, as the saying went. Sine slowly and carefully walked towards when she'd seen the color, taking some time to make her way up a crumbling incline that might have once been some stairs. She did not step on any more inexplicable corpses, though her eyes glimpsed a few more, skeletons left in repose so long they virtually blended into the dull greyish stone. That was a mystery to solve later, though, as she approached the trace of color, partially concealed beneath a crumbling wave of stone. Her scans detected no danger, and her touch of the item, whatever it was, provoked no response. After more consideration, Sine gripped her fingers on the golden-brown item and tugged.

She wasn't sure what she expected to find, but a large glove was not it. Sine slowly stood back up, holding the folded bit of clothing in both her hands. This made no sense. Whatever had been built here, whatever had caused these corpses to become what they'd become...how had some GLOVE survived all that? Survived it and sat here, for who knows how long? What made it so special?

"Computer, run the scans again." Sine said. She got back the same results. As far as her systems could tell, it was a glove. Sine turned it over in her hand. However it had survived, it was clearly made for someone larger than her...

Why would that be a consideration? Why would she want to put it on? It was just...a glove...

"Helmet, enable synapse routers." Sine said. She'd had some experience with mind control before, and she wasn't going to just leave her brain open so another maleficent force could walk in and turn her reputation to even greater shit. Now, if something tried to control her brain or nervous system, it'd get re-routed for a few seconds, just long enough to take the glove off...

Hopefully...

It slipped over her left hand. Despite its larger size, it did not feel loose.

It also promptly did...nothing. Sine turned her hand over, wondering if there was some missing piece of the puzzle she didn't have. She had a feeling that if that was the case, she wouldn't be finding it here. Well, if all this universe had to offer her was an inexplicable glove...

Sine put her right hand on top of it, trying to draw it off. She vaguely felt the impressions beneath her palm.

She did not exactly SEE what happened next, so much as KNOW. Sine's eyes jerked wide open, her pupils dilating to a pinprick, her helmet's psychic defenses not even registering a threat. When it was over, Sine's breath exploded from her lungs so fiercely she almost spat out her miniturized breathing apparatus.

The glove remained on her hand. Sine turned her arm over again, looking at it.

"...that would be something to do."

Run, Part 4: Wanted

"...Des...ah ha...aren't you supposed to be at an art show?" Sine said.

"There was a rodent problem. It got moved back two weeks at the last minute. Oh, by the way Sine, you made a promise that you'd be there with me. I put it on your schedule." Desdemona said. From the looks of her, she clearly hadn't been painting, and Sine couldn't see a muted television or put-aside book that indicated she had been reading when Sine had showed up. Based on that, the fact that she was standing up, one arm leaning on her kitchen counter, it seemed like she'd been expecting Sine, and just waiting for her warning signal to go off. Sine wet her lips, the flesh suddenly appalling dry.

"Oh yes...you're right...I did." Sine said. "Uh...well um..."

"I told you about it the last two times I saw you. The last one being two weeks ago." Desdemona said, her tone calm, but firm. "You've been something of a ghost, Sine."

Sine swallowed, considering her options. Maybe she could...

Yes...go ahead. Lie to her. Maybe she'll even buy it.

Des' eyes widened a bit with alarm when Sine grimaced.

"Sine, are you all right?" Desdemona said, walking forward.

"Fine...fine." Sine said, waving her girlfriend off.

"Sine, the last time you tried to shrug off an illness, you ended up-"

"I KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO ME THE LAST TIME!" Sine found herself roaring, causing Desdemona to step back. "Sorry, sorry...that was too harsh. Desdemona, I'm not suffering any sort of possession relapse. The Lord is dead."

Pity. That would provide the perfect excuse for the rest of them, wouldn't it? But she won't need a perfect excuse. She cares for you. Just toss something half-decent out and she'll gladly take you back. Lonely girl with the dead parents...

Sine raised her arm, slowly clenching her fist.

"Are you just suffering from a headache then? Do you want some aspirin?"

"No, it's just..."

Get to lying! It's what you're good at!

NO. Desdemona had nothing to do with any of this. If anyone deserved the truth, it was her.

"You're right, Des. I completely forgot about your art show. I was...busy with my jobs. Had some...trouble, if you missed the scuffed outfit with the facial expressions. And in truth...if it had been this weekend, I probably wouldn't have gone looking for you. I've had some troubles, I wanted to be alone...that gave you a raw deal, and I'm sorry." Sine said. "But...it worked out, right? My last job was a motherlode. I can completely stop my trips for a few months, at the very least. I can attend your art shows, we can go on more trips...or hell, we can just hang around here..."

Desdemona said nothing.

"...what do you know that you're not telling me?" Sine said.

Desdemona's laptop was a huge, bulky thing, but not so much that it couldn't be hidden behind some cookie jars. Sine already knew what she was going to show her when she pulled it out.

"What's this, Sine?"

Sine bit back the bile. Desdemona's tone was neutral. Don't fall into the outrage trap again...the outrage trap had gotten her chased halfway across the Auspex city where she'd left a few pounds of skin behind.

"It's...a misunderstanding...that I mean to correct..."

"They sound pretty damn angry-"

"THEY'RE A BUNCH OF FUCKING MORONS!" Sine erupted. She'd tried, she really had...but the second Desdemona had talked about their anger, Sine hadn't been able to keep reign on her own. Des took another step back, though she was less alarmed by this outburst, it seemed. "I mean...Zephyrus...it didn't happen that way! It's a fucking misunderstanding and...FUCK!"

"Zephyrus isn't the one posting the bad things."

"You're missing the POINT, Desdemona. Look at the overall issue here. I did shit wrong, yeah. Probably REALLY wrong. You got some of it too. But look what happened. Look at what a little lack of communication..."

"Three months is not a little-"

"We can argue semantics later! It's not GOOD, yes, but it's not UNFORGIVABLE. And this crap about using Zephyrus as bait, nearly letting him DIE, THAT IS ALL WRONG...some of that's my fault, I tried to take the path of least resistance...but look at this, Des. LOOK AT THIS." Sine said, jabbing her finger into the screen. "Calling me a monster? Telling me I'm no better than the LORD? That drug-addled insecure...you think where she's right EXCUSES this? This isn't her sticking up for a friend. This is her OPPORTUNITY. She NEVER liked me, for some good reasons but for more bad, STUPID reasons, and in her mind, THIS JUSTIFIES EVERYTHING! I mean, shit, maybe I brought this on myself by borrowing her flamethrower...but even WITH THAT, HOW IS THIS HER BUSINESS?"

"Isn't she Zephyrus' friend too?"

Sine grimaced so hard her teeth creaked, before she sat down at the kitchen counter, hands in her head.

"She's right...I have such bad habits...but it's not enough, Des." Sine said, lowering her hands, her eyes becoming as hard as flint. "Not enough to put me under this kind of moral microscope. Because she DAMN well can't stand up to it herself. I never talked about the bar people in depth, Des, because it's not my place...but look at this. LOOK. AT. THIS. Pech is swearing murderous revenge. So is Doomrider, and Jaxx is just sitting back and clapping his hands and going 'See? I told you so, the worthless ginger'. Jonesy had taken a bad situation and made it a thousand times worse, and WHY? So she can feel better about herself. That's what this is, in the end, Desdemona. It's a damn character assassination by an insecure little girl."

"...is that what you've been telling yourself since you read it?"

"DON'T start, Des."

"You're angry."

"Am I in the wrong to be so?"

"You're not in the right..."

"Like I said, Des. It's not enough." Sine said, flipping the computer around. "Friendships have rough patches, sometimes worse that rough patches, sometimes you let people down, sometimes you can't fix it...but am I really so bad in my failings that I deserve this? Is this all it takes for them to declare me a 'monster' and a 'forevercursed parasite' and all this? Because even if I'm not comprehending the size of it, if this is all it takes...Des, forget what it says about me. What does it say about THEM, that so little in the grand scheme of things prompts so much? How can I fix my mistakes when, according to them, it's automatically worthy of being declared worse than the being that possessed me, you know, the one that committed genocide? Do you know how many murders I've committed in this life, Des, where I deliberately of my own free will tried to kill someone who had done me no wrong? None. None at all. And I'm being torn down to these levels, by people, beings, who, oh if you KNEW some of what THEY'VE done..."

Sine snapped the laptop closed.

"I fucked up. I hurt Zephyrus and Annie. You too, I suspect. But I don't deserve this. Tell me I do, Desdemona."

The artist was quiet.

"...Des...please. I'm not telling you that it's my side or bust. But you're a smart girl. Surely you can see I'm not being entirely self-righteous here. I mean...you know me. Better than Zephyrus or Ann in some ways. Tell me that I'm wrong to feel this way. And why."

"...because it doesn't change what you did, Sine." Desdemona said. "That's just your thing. You've never been good at accepting what you did that you didn't like. You have your reasons...but that doesn't change it either."

"...I don't know what to do." Sine said, putting her head in her hands again.

"I do. Give me the Sifter."

Sine snapped her head up so fast Desdemona was surprised that it didn't break right off from whiplash.

"Des...that's a bad id-"

"Give it to me, and you won't be able to run from your problems. You'll have to fix them..."

"Des, these people don't want to parlay or work things out, they want to fucking KILL me..." Sine said. "I haven't even gotten into some stuff, like my Bleed exposure and what..."

"No, Sine. Don't change the subject. Give me the Sifter. I'll go with you to fix these problems. I'll demand parlay..."

"They won't LISTEN! They have the self-control of kindergardeners-!"

"Fortunately, I have some experience with such things." Desdemona said. "I'll be the neutral party telling them to be better than their anger. Just like you have to be. If they can't overcome it, if they try and harm me...well, I think your disagreements with your friends will be a relatively small problem after that. Now give me the Sifter."

"Des, they could KILL you..."

"Sine...we can work all this out afterwards. But you know how it has to start. Give me. The Sifter."

Sine stared at her girlfriend.

...she wasn't as 'loud' as she used to be. When Sine had met her, Desdemona had kept her hair in a very tall style, the epidermis dyed on the tasteful side of garish and her face adorned with multiple piercings. Since then, she'd toned her looks down, cutting her hair and taking out most of the piercings. Sine hadn't breathed a word about doing it either; Des had done it on her own. Sine had wondered, privately, if it was Des changing her fashion herself, or if she'd toned her look down as if to say that she was off the market, and whatever attention she wanted, she had a dependable source. She'd told Sine stuff, about her childhood, opened up in a way Sine had hesitated to...

But...she didn't understand.

Didn't she?

"I've been with addicts, Sine. They have to want to make a start of it, but they also have to remove themselves from temptation. You want to fix this...you can't be the cowboy, digging in your spurs and riding off to the next town if things get too hot for you here. Give me the Sifter. We'll work out stuff for emergencies, if things go as badly as you fear...but otherwise, you'll have to actually face this. Instead of just running off like you did with Zephyrus. Whatever your reasons were...they weren't good enough. So you have to TRY and be good enough."

"...and if that's NOT enough?"

"...then they can talk all the shit they want. You'll have tried. You'd be amazed...what trying can accomplish."

Sure can. You tried to be a friend, and helped give humanity back to Zephyrus and Antoinette. Then you tried to go back to what you considered comfortable, and showed everyone why the Lord hated humanity so much.

Sine stared for nearly twenty seconds, before she began to unhook the Sifter.

Halfway. Then she snapped it back on.

"No."

"Sine...give me the Sifter." Desdemona said, keeping her voice level.

"No...I can't." Sine said, standing up. "I can't trust them...I won't try and play their games with life and death...we can work something out but I can't give you-"

My freedom.

You.

"Sine, this is why the problem got so bad. You KNOW that the only way they're even going to start trusting you is if you can't run away if things get bad."

"They won't trust you either..."

"Then they can take that up with ME. They won't take the Sifter from me, that I promise you."

"What if I can't fix things..."

"Then you TRIED."

Silence settled over the loft again.

"...I can't..."

"You CAN. Sine..." Desdemona said, trying to walk around the counter and get close.

The look Sine gave her was one of the most haunted Desdemona had ever seen. It froze her in her tracks...because she recognized that look. It had stared out from her in a mirror, once, after her family had finally tumbled headlong into the abyss, and what that had ended up meaning. That sense of desolation, of the idea that if this step was taken, there would be no good end result, and no telling where the fall would end.

But it wasn't enough, as Sine would have said. Desdemona knew about the selfishness, the comforting cloak of cold numbness such a thought process offered. If she'd worn it too long...

If Sine put it back on...

"...no. NO, Sine. You are NOT doing this. You are NOT a coward. Damn it Sine, don't..."

Sine turned away. Desdemona paused a moment, began reaching out out, then stopped herself before she slapped her hand down on the counter.

"Damn you, Sine." Desdemona said, cold anger finally entering her tone. "Okay, fine. Give me the Sifter, OR DON'T COME BACK."

The ultimantum hung in the air like a blade between them.

For a moment, when Sine looked back at her, her arm shifting on her wrist, Desdemona had hope.

Then Sine's hand settled. Her gaze fell.

And then she was gone, the VROP swallowed by the walls.

For a time, Desdemona just stared at the empty air. For a bit after that, she ripped a blank canvas to shreds. Ironically, she had two paintings of Sine, but she did not damage them. There was no point. Those were finished, done. A blank canvas meant infinite possibilities...and Desdemona felt like some had just been lost forever. After that, Desdemona got herself a beer. She'd look into packing up the few things Sine had left behind later.

"...I didn't want to believe them." Desdemona said to the empty air. "...I really didn't."

Desdemona didn't speak the rest of the night. There was no point.

She didn't have anyone to talk to.

-------

"It's all the same, only the names will change...
Everyday it seems we're wasting away
Another place where the faces are so cold...
I'd drive all night just to get back home..."

A truck full of gold. Millions worth. To Sine, it might as well have been filled with rock salt. It didn't really have much worth now. None of her jobs did.

"I'm a cowboy...on a steel horse I ride
I'm wanted...dead or alive
Wanted...dead or alive..."

Sine suspected that wherever the chair had come from, it had once held technology that surpassed her Sifter. The process that had dumped it on her little asteroid had burned out all that wonder tech though, just leaving a simple chair. Sine sat down in it. For a while, she didn't do anything.
 

"Sometimes I sleep, sometimes it's not for days
And the people I meet always go their separate ways...
Sometimes you tell the day
By the bottle that you drink
And times when you're alone all you do is think..."

ALL ZOOFIGHTS COORDINATES SELECTED. PLEASE SELECT OPTION.

DELETE.
 

DO YOU WISH TO DELETE ALL ZOOFIGHTS COORDINATES?

"I'm a cowboy...on a steel horse I ride
I'm wanted...dead or alive
Wanted...dead or alive..."

ZOOFIGHTS COORDINATES DELETED.
 

Existence was hers. All hers.

All you.

"I walk these streets, a loaded six string on my back
I play for keeps, cause I might not make it back
I been everywhere, still I'm standing tall
I've seen a million faces and I've rocked them all..."

"Just...see you laters." Sine said. She did not speak again.

"I'm a cowboy, on a steel horse I ride...
I'm wanted...dead or alive...
I'm a cowboy, I earned the night on my side...
I'm wanted...dead or alive...
Wanted...dead or alive..."

-----

"You promised, Burning Moon! YOU PROMISED! But this world is ash and smoke, and the pretty thing is gone!"

"Then we'll find it again, Sky Song. Nothing escapes us."

"HOORAY!"

"You are aware that the others are going to hold this against you."

"Let them, Cloud Runner. I meant what I said. No one escapes the Knights of Maeyr.

"NO ONE."

Run, Part 3: Flight

(As a reminder, this all happened a month or so before Zoofights Redux began and people began gathering at the Bar again)

Some plans looked so perfect on paper...but that was why any plan worth its salt had some sort of a testing phase. To plow on ahead, having stopped at the paper stage...well, one was taking their chances.

The machine and its weapons that Sine had replicated had been 'designed', so to speak, for a far larger, far heavier being. Sine had done her best to deal with issues such as weight and heat...but she'd overlooked a few other crucial areas. Like the fact that two high-power plasma-energy cannons designed to fight other war machines had one HELL of a kick.

Hence, instead of laying down covering fire and disabling the Volo's flying cars and SWAT-equivalent vans, Sine promptly began spraying fire everywhere, screaming in surprise and frustration as various Volo swooped and dove for cover. Some shots slammed right into the engine of one, and it drunkenly lurched and then plummeted down towards the distant streets below, the Volo inside throwing open the door and diving out to escape, his descent slowed by the emergency grav-discs he had. Sine continued yelling in pure rage (which she knew would just make it look like she MEANT to spray her guns around like a madwoman, but she was too irked and too much of a need to vent it to care) as she spun around like she was trying to replicate the Death Blossum, more explosions ripping into the front of the museum, its stairs, and the Volo's 'police-cars'.

Sine finally got her hands on the emergency thumb switch and shut down the guns, and after a split second made a snap decision and hit the emergency release switch as well. The gun apparatus undid its clamps, the gravity mechanisms she'd used to lighten its weight briefly pulsing to lift itself off of Sine and fall off her shoulders, the mechanism plummeting towards the ground below. Sine didn't really care. Her attempt to disable and retreat had turned into an accidental attempted mass murder (at least, that's how the Volo would see it), and she'd be turned into a shattered bag of meat in seconds if she tried to engage the Volo with her conventional weapons.

That just left full bore retreat, until her Sifter recharged. Suddenly hiding in the museum looked like a lot better option. But you blew that, just like you blow everything else.

A small part of Sine hoped, as she whirled the jet board around and took off down into the 'flight-streets' of the city below, that she could leave the voice behind as well as the Volo.

Go now, if you want it...

An otherworld awaits you

Don't you give up on it...

You bite the hand that feeds you 

All alone, cold fields you wander

Memories of it, cloud your sight

Fills your dreams, disturbs your slumber

Lost your way, a fallen knight...

The Volo, however, were not going to let their quarry go so easily, especially considering the fact that 1) They still thought Sine was just one of their kind with a helmet and heavy firepower, 2) She had unleashed that heavy firepower onto them, then discarded it, and 3) Their jobs and lives were built around chasing and catching Auspex who tried to fly away from them in a score of different ways. Sine's was little different than a few of them, and their tactics wouldn't need much adapting anyway. They had numbers, and unlike Sine, they actually knew the city from more than the equivalent of an advanced GPS.

Flying down into the Auspex's more conventional ground traffic wasn't enough to dissuade them either, Sine's computers barely keeping up with the wheel-based vehicles she was forced to dodge and weave around. She had expected that the Auspex might catch up to her...

Just not as quickly as they did.

The electrified nightstick slammed into Sine's shoulder and back; had her outfit not been insulated, she likely would have been stunned badly enough to faceplant into the ground or fly directly into the nearest building. Grunting, Sine spun her jetboard around and began flying backwards, blocking the next blow with her kinetic Launcher's. Despite his lack of jets, the Volo officer kept pace with Sine, flying with the aid of more advanced anti-gravity discs (which made some kind of sense. If you could manipulate gravity, it wasn't too far away from manipulating kinetic energy in general) as he continued to swing at Sine.

Or maybe it was a girl too, who knew? The Volo's 'advanced police' outfit (as Sine doubted she was being chased by the equivalent of patrol officers) removed any clue of their gender or emotional situation. The Volo could have been confident, angry, scared, or desperate, its own headgear rendered that truth a blank. Whatever its sex or feelings, it was swinging its weapon like a champion.

At least until Sine showed off one of the advantages of flying on a jetboard; it made a fair makeshift weapon, as Sine reared the board up and slammed the edge of it against the Volo, sending the bird-like humanoid flying off as Sine flipped herself back to an upward base and continued forward, going right at the next intersection...

She found three more Volo for company, heading directly for her. And these Volo had guns.

Hold now, aim is steady...
An otherworld awaits you
One thousand years, you ready?
The otherworld, it takes you...

The needle projectiles, Sine had again expected. Her rude surprise this time was when one of the Volo, instead of aiming a firearm at her, pulled something off their belt and threw it at her instead. When Sine made a sharp sideways sweep to dodge them, the projectile went with her, the bladed-boomerang like device flying for her head, Sine barely managing to dodge by ducking. She took a second to glance behind herself to confirm that it wasn't going to do a U-Turn and try and nail her in the back, and then resumed flying forward, barreling through the three Volo before she did a sharp turn to the left. The Volo were a lot better at doing U-turns then their bladed projectiles, the bird-men hot on her heels almost as soon as she had passed them.

"Grapnel." Sine said, the kinetic launcher on her left arm switching firing modes. Aiming at the tall spire of a building coming up, Sine fired off a line to latch onto the building's frame before spinning and flying backwards again, her line twisting so he arm didn't. Once again facing her pursuers, she immediately began retracting the line, arching her flight path upwards, and firing at the Volo with her other kinetic launcher, her helmet's aiming systems doing a lot to counteract her highly troublesome firing position. One took a blow to the arm and fell, the other two moving to grab their companion; Sine promptly released her line and flipped back around, diving back into the city...

Only to find herself flying directly into the grip of another Volo. And THIS Volo was their version of Murducken. Complete with Big Muscly Arms.

"SH-" Sine got out, before the masked flying man gave her a resounding headbutt. Her viewing glass cracked, her systems shouting alarms as her as the beast tried to tighten his grip. Sine promptly tested to see if the Volo's genitals were located in the general primate area, and discovered that if they weren't, whatever she rammed her blow into hurt real good too. The Beast-Volo's grip loosened, just a bit, and Sine promptly grabbed HIM, spinning her jetboard and doing a combination judo throw and pushing charge to throw the Volo downward, his body crashing violently against a rooftop, and through it, Sine's helmet picking up faint screams as she drew herself back up.

She allowed herself two seconds to check her recharging apparatus. Almost done...

The Volo weren't anywhere near done, Sine's helmet yelling at her to duck, the bladed arc projectile skimming off the tips of its pointed ears before Sine turned and kicked her jetboard back into forward high gear. Multiple Volo and two of their police 'cars' zoomed after her, barraging her with needles.

Go, into the sand, and the dust, and the sky

Go now, there's no better plan than to do or to die

Free me, pray to the faith, in the face of the light

Feed me, fill me with sin, and get ready to fight

You know you will...

You know you will... 

Sine snatched the Black Box off her belt.

"Proximity, vehicle." Sine said, and tossed the explosive over her shoulder. The Volo flew past it, thankfully, but their cars never got the chance. The explosive did not actually damage the flying vehicles, as it went off two feet from them, and the plastic that pelted the flying machines was too soft to do any damage. It was meant as a distraction.

It served. And more. One of the cars veered off so violently crashed into its fellow, the two machines falling from the sky and down into the street below. Sine jerked her head back, her eyes going wide at the sight of it.

"Fuck-!" Sine cursed. She'd just wanted them to back off a bit, not crash-!

You want what you want. Any collateral damage is acceptable.

"GOD DAMN IT JIMINY, SHUT UP!" Sine snarled as she dove back into the street again, flying through the sidewalk equivalent as Auspex frantically dove to get out of her way. In front of her, several Volo cars pulled up, attempting a classic police blockade. For a second, Sine wondered if they'd forgotten the vertical aspect of this battle. After another second, she figured it would be best to act like they hadn't, and burned towards the cars assembled at the crossroads.

The floating vehicles jerked upward eight feet as she approached. They HAD taken her likely escape into account.

Sine, however, weighed less than a car, and hence went up ten feet, flying over the air-mobile roofs.

She promptly discovered the Volo had planned for THAT too, as several were leaning out the back windows with weapons ready. More needles filled the air, Sine trying to both outrun and dodge them.

A perfect distraction for the Volo who came up from beneath her and grabbed onto her board.

"DAMN IT!" Sine yelled, as she looked down at her new passenger. She tried rattle-jerking the board as she flew on, but the Volo refused to dislodge. When she tried spinning, he held on. When she tried firing at him with her kinetic orbs, he remained in place.

Then he pulled the knife and stabbed for her left ankle.

Deep down, Sine couldn't blame the creature. She'd caused its fellow a fair bit of misery. On the surface, Sine just screamed a curse, even as her computers unlocked her foot due to their proximity alarms, Sine jerking the limb out of harm's way and then stomping her foot down onto the Volo's helmeted head several times before he let go. Sine spat another curse and turned around.

The Beast slammed into her, and Sine found her world turning upside down. With one foot out of the locking mechanism that held her on her jetboard, Sine partially fell and partially yanked the board upward as the giant muscled Volo's weight forced her backwards and down. The mechanism reacted as she programmed it, releasing Sine's other foot lest the awkward situation caused the board to break her ankle or twist her foot right off. Good for it...except Sine no longer had the ability to fly.

Her captor did.

And he was NOT pleased.

Sine though he would smash her into the ground. Instead, he tossed her upwards, then stopped on a dime and flew up after her, shoulder-ramming her before she could turn around and fire. Stunned, Sine fell briefly before she found an iron grip seizing her ankle, the Volo flying down the street and pulling her along like she weighed nothing. Sine would have complimented him on his strength and skilled use of tech...

Then he tossed her through a building window.

Sine exploded out the other side of the building, having been thrown at an angle through the two corner panes of glass, the myriad pieces slicing across her outfit...

And her belt pouches.

Time seemed to slow down for Sine as she saw her blue ruby, what she'd gone to so much trouble to get, fly out into the open air. No. She could take a beating, she could live with morally questionable acts, but she could not, WOULD NOT, give up what she'd worked so damn hard to-!

Steal.

Sine's first frantic grab missed the ruby.

She did not get to make a second, as the Beast Volo slammed into her again and drove her through the air.

Call Zephyrus and have him fight with him instead! Call Jonesy and ask to borrow her power armor this time! Call Doomrider, he'll help a friend! After all, surely they've already forgiven you and forgotten all that vitriol, right?

Fight, fight, fight

Fight, fight, FIGHT!

Fight, fight, fight

Fight, fight, FIGHT! 

Sine knew her punches would do nothing. She also figured that as much as this brute liked to go in close and hand to hand, he probably still had weapons on him.

So she swiped his nightstick. She'd handled enough alien tech to quickly locate switches, and even as the Beast jerked back as he (or she, who knew?) realized what Sine had done, she flipped on the weapon's electrified mode and promptly jammed it into the sweet spot between the Auspex's shoulder and neck. The Volo spasmed, letting go of her as the electricity shocked him...

Sine planted her boot and kicked off, flipping backwards, dropping the nightstick as she did. Her computers did the rest, the jetboard having circled around and come at her thumb-button'd command. She did not land perfectly on the locking mechanisms, but she landed well enough to keep her balance and crouch down, grabbing the edge to steady herself.

She promptly flew another edge of the board directly into the Beast-Volo's face. He let out a small, pained cry, flipping over and tumbling down towards the street as Sine put the board into a steep dive and flew down towards the street herself.

The Auspex on the ground had been too busy fleeing the falling glass to notice the blue gem scattered amongst the pieces. Sine slowed down to scoop up her prize, taking a few more seconds to lock in her feet before she rose back up, hand gripped tightly around her gem...

The needles smashed into the ground around her, the Volo on her like white on rice. Sine let out a small snarling scream in frustration and kicked in the afterburners again, blazing down the street as the Volo gave chase.

Hope dies, and you wander

The otherworld, it makes you

Dreams, they rip asunder

The otherworld, it hates you...

"FUCK OFF! I EARNED THIS! FUCK OFF!" Sine yelled, her voice lost in the wind. She let her words speak for her instead, arming her other Black Box and hurling it behind her. The explosion drove several Volo back, but more came to replace them. One of them hurled another blade-arang at her, and Sine found her dodge a second too slow, the blade of it slicing open the side of her shin. Sine fired a few kinetic orbs in response and then barreled down the street. She'd spied a thin alleyway in the row of buildings at the end of it, and her scanners and GPS told her she could fit through it. Maybe the damn Auspex would show sense and go around, or cease pursuit!

Yeah, right.

She wasn't entirely right about the alleyway either. It was wide enough to accept her...but thin enough that the sides of her jetboard struck the walls, sparks flying up among her legs as she tried to stay in her surfer-like position and keep herself from veering even an inch to the left and right. After thirty frantic feet that took two seconds that felt like ninety to cross, the alleyway widened out and Sine blazed down it.

"Yay."

The Volo flew out of the gap a few seconds later, having not been dissuaded in the slightest.

"NO!"

Sine looked behind herself to see the Volo, five strong in pursuit, chasing her like she'd stolen the whole museum instead of one little gem. Sine fired off a few shots at them. In response, the Volo all pulled out their flying boomerang esque weapons and tossed them at Sine. All at the same time, whatever kinetic systems the weapons used to outspeed their wielders rapidly encroaching on Sine.

"I HATE THOSE THINGS!"

Sine tried veering back and forth by minute degrees, trying to get the pursing projectiles to crash into the walls. No dice. She tried shooting them in mid air. No go. She debated firing chaff for a second, and then realized she didn't have any. She didn't have any time left either...

She did, however, have a third dimension. Sine promptly jerked her board up and in the tightest loop she could muster, spinning another 180 degrees to face upward. The projectiles zipped by beneath her; Sine promptly did the last thing she expected the Volo to expect, and put her machine into a steep dive directly towards them.

One veered into the wall to dodge her. Another took her jetboard in the gut and spun off, crashing into the wall as well. Sine held up the fist she had her blue ruby clenched in, and promptly decked the third Volo in the face as hard as she could, sending him spinning out in turn as Sine flew on, yelling both in triumph and due to the pain that shot up her arm.

"THAT'S WHAT YOU GET! THAT'S WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU CROSS-!" Sine yelled, looking back at her work and making sure the Volo weren't getting back up.

Hey Cosine. Do the math. You just took out three Volo.

Weren't there five?

Sine turned back around.

She flew into the rope the last two Volo had strung across the alleyway a second later.

The safety mechanisms probably saved her life; otherwise her tumble might have smeared her across the walls or cost her both her feet as she and her jetboard went into an out of control spin from her altered momentum. The fact that the board immediately disengaged and went tumbling down the alleyway to crash in a fiery explosion that Sine wasn't a part of was no comfort to her, as she crashed down onto the ground herself and bounce-rolled a few more dozen feet before she stopped. Every single nerve in her body seemed to wake up at once to remind her that yes, they existed, and no, they did not like that, and what the fuck was she doing, fighting giant orange fire-breathing dragons again?

"I wish..." Sine whispered. Her helmet display was awash with errors, but she could see her armor's stability ratio in the single digits. It had done its job though. Her violent stop and fall should have left her dead in and of itself, or at least with more than a few broken bones. Instead, in the words of Little Nicky in regards to an attempted fatal experience, 'That just hurt a lot.'

"Well...at least...I have...my priorities straight..." Sine whispered, opening her aching hand to look at the blue ruby within...

Ding.

"Ding?"


Sifter battery charge complete.

Sine stared at the sky, vaguely hearing the approaching Volo.

"...repeat."

Sifter battery charge complete.

Sine stared another second, and she would have laughed more when she did, except it hurt to laugh. Still a blessursed existence. Still.

Free now, ride up on it

Up to the heights, it takes you

Go now, if you want it

An otherworld awaits you...

Palming her gem, Sine reached down to her belt and snapped open the armored charge-pack, extracting the battery and reaching her to snap it into her Sifter. She rolled over onto her back...

She did not understand what the Volo said as they aimed their guns at her, yelling. But she could understand the intent.

She wondered if they could do the same.

"...don't you know...about the bird?" Sine said, and then flipped the Volo off. "Everybody knows that the bird is the word. Previous location, code STREETSHARK."

VROP.

----

"Where's my money?"

"...Miss Cosine..."

"I got you your gem, Mr. Mainx. If you honestly think I perpetuated some elaborate fraud that included looking like I ground twenty pounds of skin off myself to give you a fake gem...well, you're allowed to think it. But I know what I did, and what I did was what you wanted. Your gem, your request, is on the table in front of you. I don't feel like hanging around for it to be tested. WHERE'S. MY. MONEY?"

"...must you stick your weapon in my face?"

"Not in a mood to play around."

"...the truck is in a warehouse at Meglia and Trillo. Thirty million in gold bullion, as promised."

"Then this is done." Sine said, removing her launcher from Mainx's face. "You have your blue ruby. Make your granddaughter happy. Have a good rest of your life. Ciao."

"...was it really that disagreeable?" Mainx said.

"You have no idea, old man." Sine said, and promptly teleported out.

----

She should have been kinder. Mainx had been good to his word, stocking the truck with gold bricks, the best she could muster to universal currency. But she had as well. She'd found him his blue ruby. Now she had her money...


Yeah I bet you can bribe all your old friends back to your side...


"Just shut up. Whatever you are." Sine said, getting out of the truck, having parked it on her small asteroid home in the pocket universe she'd claimed. She really didn't want to hang around there at the moment. She'd grabbed up some medicine and bandages, blithely tapping buttons to head to a warmer, more private place. She hadn't seen Sarah among all those people buying into Jonesy's smear campaign, maybe she'd track her down...

At least that was the plan.

Until Sine warped into Desdemona's loft home...

And found Desdemona home.

"...Des?" Sine semi-squeaked in surprise. What was she doing here? She was supposed to be away this weekend at an art show!

"Welcome back. Sine." Desdemona said, but her tone indicated she was anything but.

-----

And elsewhere...


Fire began to fall from a world's sky...

"Where is she, Burning Moon? I get her first!"