Daniel
His dreams were confusing, jumbled messes forgotten before they were through. His recalled nebulous impressions of fear, anxiety, doubt, and sadness. Daniel felt much as he had in that forest of Eastwood the day after he lost his mother… lost and lonely, trapped in this endless moment without a future.
Daniel awoke slowly. The first thing entering his awareness was the warmth of the body pressed against him. He’d known a rare few touches in his life, all of them filled with affection and comfort. He knew this one immediately as his past year’s constant companion.
She cradled him in one hand. With the other she stroked his back. Soft sunlight melted his chill. The smell of grass and flowers brought him to the surface of consciousness. He opened his eyes.
“Wendi.”
“Morning, Danny.” She gave him a quiet smile which, though lacking her normal enthusiasm, overflowed with love and compassion. “I heard what happened while I was away.”
Unable to hold back, Daniel buried his face in her arm and cried. She caressed his neck and hummed a lullaby. He’d never appreciated how sweet her voice was until now.
When he could speak, he said, “I missed you.”
“It’s only been a few hours.” She tried making light of it, then frowned. “I’m sorry. What I did seems really immature, now.”
Daniel wanted more than anything for the red devil girl to have been there to pick up Kenta and Rana, one in each hand, and shake them to stop the words that brought everything crashing down around their ears from being spoken. However, that kind of thinking was dangerous wish-fulfillment and blame seeking.
“Not your fault. It was a good idea. The timing was unlucky, that’s all. Besides, I’m actually starting to like Ziege.”
Wendi’s body changed around him, becoming thinner, blue, and sharper. “Still here, still listening, same as always,” Ziege said.
“I’m not taking it back.” He grinned, pleased the two devils had evidently worked something out. “By the way, aren’t you worried about skewering me with those claws?”
Ziege blushed blue. Fascinating. “Not right now. While Wendi is awake, I can borrow from her all I want.” Ziege massaged his scalp with the tips of her sharp claws without so much as scratching him, and it felt quite nice.
She cleared her throat. “I’ve decided to accept Wendi’s terms. Because it’s a good idea, for the record, and not because I’d lose if I fought her on it. We each take a twelve-hour body-shift with the other watching, speaking, and acting when she feels the need. We sleep at the same time, taking four hours out of the end of one shift and the beginning of the next. Every Sunday evening is a twenty-four-hour shift to switch us between day and night weekly.”
“Then I’ll be seeing more of you,” he said.
“We all must suffer for fairness and equality.”
Daniel chuckled. Ziege became thicker, red, and her claws turned into Wendi’s enormous blunt-fingered hands. “At least something good came from last night,” the red devil girl said.
“Speaking of, we need to make a plan.” Daniel tried to get up, but Wendi gently held him down. “What?”
“We were hoping you could put your wing away first?” She seemed doubtful.
“Why? I’m not going to try flying right now.”
“The trouble is, you sort of, um,” Wendi loosened her grip on Daniel. Immediately, to his surprise, he drifted away like a kite in the breeze. He instinctively grabbed her to steady himself, but she’d already caught him.
“We found you, unconscious… kind of being dragged along the ground. Thankfully, you weren’t hurt by the fall, but they had to follow you around until I woke up. I’ve been holding onto you since then.”
:You were sailing headfirst, facedown, and you kept bumping into rocks and random shit—it was hilarious!: Ziege sent.
Suddenly his crash landing had become ten times more embarrassing than he’d thought. “I’m having second thoughts about you,” he told the blue devil.
:You’re as threatening as a wet kitten.:
He tried willing away the wing. Daniel made several attempts, imagining it being sucked into his body or dissipating into a puff of dust, but nothing worked. “Help me fold it so I can walk, please.”
Wendi took his wing in one hand and helped him tuck it flush against his spine. With that done, he stood. Or, rather, he tried to stand. He could move his arms and legs, but his wing was stuck. It anchored him in place. Wendi tugged on Daniel until it hurt, and he had to stop. The wing fixed itself in space when folded.
Ziege’s cackling laughter echoed through his head.
He accepted he wasn’t going anywhere until he learned how to use this thing. After unfolding the wing, they positioned Daniel to sit upright on Wendi’s lap with one of her hands holding him in place. “Call everyone here, then. This is urgent.”
The others reluctantly assembled in a circle with one notable absence. Their expressions varied from sour, to stony, and sad. Daniel looked around, but no one met his eye or one another’s.
“I hate to force this conversation, guys. I want to take a month off to decompress, but we don’t have time. I’ve already cost us enough as it is.
“It’s cold comfort, but I can tell we’re all blaming ourselves. I’ve been thinking non-stop of all the ways I could have been smarter, stronger, a better leader, or a better friend. It may be presumptuous of me to think I can read minds, but I’d say Wendi is reconsidering her impulsive decision. Cassie is agonizing over her impossible choice. Paul wants to return to our departure from Radio World and tell everyone the truth. Lea is cursing herself for not helping Paul plan his confession to make it go over easier. Rana is regretting what was said and left unsaid.
“I won’t assign guilt or say one person is more responsible than any other. If you think you could’ve done yesterday better, let that motivate you.
“Because, while there are no do-over’s, we can move forward. And we have to make a decision.” He scanned their faces again, hardly any better than before. “Let’s put all our options on the table. If we could retrace our steps to anywhere we’ve been, should we? The Tsukumogami?”
“Not welcome,” Cassie reported.
“Radio World?”
“We would be captured by mages within the year,” Lea said.
“Eastwood?”
Cassie scoffed. “Humans think we’re freaks.”
“Book Town?”
“Old man Alex is nice, but we can’t ask him to raise us.” Paul shook his head.
“How about something crazy? We voted it down last time, but maybe we should join a mage guild in the City. Rana, what are our chances?”
The frog girl scowled at a patch of grass. “If we go to Radio World and follow the mages’ road to the City, it’s a decent gamble we’d become Citizens without being captured, separated, and sold into slavery. It’d help a lot if we could get an escort like Goldie.”
“I did not like that woman,” Lea stated.
“We could wander the Wilderness at random and hope we run into someplace nice.”
Rana’s frown deepened. “We’re about as likely to run into another Red Tail.”
Thinking of that terrible monster was more depressing than his current mood could handle. “What about staying in one place?” Daniel said. “I know we’ve gone over this before, but we could camp somewhere uninhabited for a few years.”
“The chances of running into a monster are hugely reduced that way,” Rana nodded. “A significant percentage of monsters don’t wander or hunt, they occupy and guard a territory. You’ll never run into them if you stay put.”
“That would be so boring, it’s stupid.” Cassie shot down that plan. “We might as well have stayed on the world next to Eastwood.” She meant it to show how far they’d come, so, when she heard the implication in her own words, she had to add. “We wouldn’t have kept Kenta. He said he’d go off on his own if we tried that.”
Awkward silence.
Daniel sighed. “Alright, what’s the likelihood of finding Kenta?”
“We’re not trained in tracking,” Paul pointed out. “And this… Maw—I refuse to give it his name—can fly. If we can follow its trail of destruction, that’s one thing. The second the Maw crosses water, it’s over.”
“The chances of tracking Kenta are zero percent,” Rana stated.
“It can’t be zero,” Cassie objected. “There’s always a chance.”
“He turned monster, not stupid. The first thing Kenta did after he stepped through the portal was take three random World Gates. Then he found a river and went upstream five miles before heading east and taking a random node. He flew the whole time and didn’t so much as bend a blade of grass.”
“Rana,” Daniel began carefully, “That was… oddly specific.”
She really seemed to dislike that patch of ground, glaring at it without ever looking up. “He’s fighting another guardian. It has fish scales, projectile spines, and the body of a walrus crossbred with a spider. It’s raining.”
“Suspiciously specific,” Cassie picked up on what Daniel was laying down.
“I’m watching him.”
“How are you watching him?” Daniel said.
Everyone waited quietly for her soft-spoken answer, but she hesitated. Rana breathed slowly, inhaled, exhaled. “I put a frog on his head.”
The others looked at one another, asking with their eyes whether anyone had seen this. Cassie spoke first, “Rana, I don’t remember you having the opportunity to do that after Kenta’s transformation.”
“I didn’t. The frog’s been there for weeks.”
They digested this. “How’d you know this was going to happen so long ago?” Paul said.
“I didn’t.”
Another beat, more hesitation.
“Is there something in particular you would like to tell us?” Lea asked as pleasantly as her impatient curiosity allowed.
Rana’s glare lost some of its intensity with her apparent surrender. “I put a frog on everybody after I found Lea in Radio World.”
“Why?” Cassie asked.
The frog girl closed her eyes and breathed steadily. No one spoke or pressed further, unwilling to change the subject, and afraid to touch on Rana’s sensitive areas after what happened last night. The quiet stretched on. Why was getting her to say anything suddenly so difficult?
Just when they’d abandoned hope, Rana startled them by speaking without opening her eyes. “If I could’ve done it four years ago, none of this would’ve happened.”
Daniel imagined knowing what the T.O. was doing, where they were, and if they were safe. Maybe Kenta wouldn’t have been in such a hurry if he saw Harumi was alright. By their solemn faces, it seemed the others had similar thoughts.
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Cassie covered her mouth and grew misty-eyed when she heard Rana’s wish. “You wanted to be able to find us if we got separated…”
Rana nodded.
“I’m not questioning your intentions, but we have to address something,” Daniel said. Rana opened her eyes and locked gazes with him as if inviting Daniel to test her honesty. “You see through the frogs. They were camouflaged in the first mage battle, and in the second you used frogs to shoot slime which turned into more frogs. What else can you make them do?”
She took a moment to formulate her answer. “It’s not like that. The frogs are an extension of my body, but they think like real frogs. They are no less a part of me than my own hand.” She flexed her fingers and grabbed at the air. “It does what I tell it, I feel what it touches, I hurt when it hurts, it is smart in some ways, and dumb in others. Talking about them as if severing one from me would give it a life of its own is stupid.”
He couldn’t help remembering all those dead frogs in the witch’s salty water. Daniel shuddered. No one could question Rana’s dedication. “And you didn’t tell anyone about this, or ask their permission, at any time?”
“If Kenta had known, he would’ve removed his—he wouldn’t want something slimy touching him even with the camouflage to ignore it.”
Her argument was exactly as he’d feared. “You deliberately didn’t ask because you knew the answer would be ‘no.’” He sighed heavily. “You didn’t happen to send the frogs away whenever one of us went to get some privacy, or when we thought we were alone?”
Rana shook her head. “Literally the best time to kidnap someone is when they’re alone.”
Daniel felt bad because, though she didn’t seem to have malicious intent, Rana may have severely damaged her friendship with the others. “I’m afraid that this is a pretty big violation of everyone’s trust, Rana.”
“What’s the big deal, Daniel?” Ziege manifested to speak, her tone mischievous. “You’re accusing her of spying on people in the bath, but you don’t even need to wash. Have you been taking secret naked moonlight strolls we don’t know about? Are you worried Rana got lucky and saw you in the nude?”
He’d done no such thing but grew flustered after being talked about that way. “Everyone has the right to privacy. I’m trying to make sure she understands what she did was wrong.”
“Why would I want to see Daniel naked?” Rana wondered.
His embarrassment compounded.
Ziege reeled with laughter. “Co-o-o-old! Ha-ha, so cold it burns! She got you good, Daniel.” The look of genuine confusion on Rana’s quizzical face stopped Ziege dead and turned her tone serious. “Your brother Bufo gave you, ‘The Talk,’ right?”
“Menstruation?”
“The other ‘Talk.’”
After another second of contemplation, Rana concluded, “Procreation, then. You were implying Daniel’s concern with my behavior is a façade motivated by his fearing I wish to couple with him, further implying such intentions would be unreciprocated. Then my question implied I don’t see Daniel as a potential mate.”
Ziege became more uncomfortable the more Rana deconstructed the ‘joke.’
Having realized this, however, confused Rana further. “It’s obvious my body and Daniel’s are currently incompatible, and the timing is poor for raising children. This whole line of thinking is absurd.”
“Okay. This is me dropping it.”
Daniel wished he could sink into the ground and disappear.
Lea and Cassie frowned at one another over Rana’s obliviousness in romance. Daniel expected one or both of them would attempt to explain the nuances, and the import of not discussing such topics in public to avoid hurting peoples’ feelings.
Cassie took it upon herself to return to Daniel’s point. “Kenta might have freaked out if he knew, but I have no problem letting a froggy friend join me in the bath.”
“Don’t like soap,” the frog girl mumbled. It was true, Rana cleaned herself with slime every morning while the others took turns in the washtub. Her delicate frog skin didn’t tolerate chemicals well.
“If you don’t want me being alone, you could at least talk to me from the other side of the curtain,” Cassie went on. Rana nodded. “And it’d be nice if I could pet my little buddy every once and a while.” A tiny green frog appeared on Cassie’s bare shoulder and the bat girl affectionately stroked its back with an index finger.
“I am sorry I do not share Cassie’s openness,” Lea said. “I am choosing not to be upset, but this is an issue for me. For me, privacy is private. Rana, this does not change my love for you, but I would appreciate you keeping my frog on the public side of the curtain, please. However, I do not object to carrying a frog against the scenario of a separated group. You have proved the value of that already.”
Wendi shrugged, taking control of their body. “I don’t really get it. Why do we even take turns? A bath party sounds like fun to me.”
“Vetoed,” Ziege switched to the fore. “If we’re sharing this body, then we’re keeping it to ourselves. Privacy is private, Rana.”
“Paul?” Daniel asked.
“I’m inorganic. I don’t have those needs. Besides, it’s not like I spend a lot of time by myself. As long as Rana keeps my frog camouflaged so I don’t accidently not crush it, we’re fine.”
“I’m guessing my frog follows me?” Daniel asked, and Rana nodded. “As much as I need time alone to think, I’d rather have the real you beside me when I go for a walk.” He managed to speak his mind despite still blushing from before.
Daniel’s inability to decode Rana’s romantic feelings and intent or lack thereof didn’t change that she’d be a pleasant companion. Rana wasn’t awkward with silence, so he wasn’t worried about maintaining conversation with his mind on other things. “I’m not mad, Rana. I was concerned. Thankfully, we seem to be taking it well.”
Lea caught their attention with a frown. “Unfortunately, I am feeling rather burned about this. I have a great deal of trust in you, Rana, but… it is shaken. As your friend, I keep wishing you had confided in me, at least.” The frog girl’s eyes returned to the grass. “I doubt any of us can sustain much anger for a decision born of a desire to protect. I only hope that in the future you will place more faith in us.”
He saw the agreement on the others’ faces. Considering how well they’d dealt with it, and how much trouble this caused stirring suspicions of secrecy, it was a shame Rana hadn’t come forward with this earlier.
“I think we’ve touched on something vital. It’d be great to have such a conversation every time an issue like this arises, what if it happens in the middle of a battle? We won’t necessarily be able to grant consent at a critical moment. To prevent hurt feelings, we need a rule of thumb.
“I, for one, would rather be alive and embarrassed than dead with my modesty intact. For that reason, I’m granting Rana, and each of you present, permission to protect me without first having to explain how—as long as you do that part later, when time permits. However, I reserve the right to revoke this permission from an individual should they do something to break my trust as long as I am of sound mind.”
“That sounds eminently reasonable,” Lea said. “And I concur.”
The others all agreed to the terms Daniel had stated as well.
That done, Daniel asked, “Our chances of finding Kenta are good, then?”
“One hundred percent. Cassie is faster than Kenta, and I’m recording the path he’s taking to my Shew Stone. I’ll sleep when he sleeps so I never miss a world-hop. The problem is what to do when we catch up.”
“Don’t worry, I have a plan,” Cassie told them with confidence.
“A plan?” Daniel was skeptical. “Last time, we stood there, and he ignored us. What’s the plan?”
“Well, I don’t have the details now… But I’ll let you know the minute I have it confirmed.”
They all knew she had two sources that weren’t sitting around this circle, but Daniel didn’t think Cassie would listen on that topic. “You’re sure this will work?”
“Yeah,” the bat girl nodded. “He should turn back to normal if he calms down, right?”
Rana interjected. “Monsters can return to humanoid as long as they don’t do anything which can’t be ‘undone’ like cannibalism, murder, or mind-breaking. Since I’m watching him, we’ll know if he passes the point of no return. He’s avoiding those for now, but we’re definitely on a time limit.”
“Alright,” Daniel said. “Given we can find Kenta and return him to normal, we’ll consider that as a valid option.” Paul and the others looked at him incredulously. “I’m serious. Flying around on Cassie has already gotten us into a lot of trouble; this will be dangerous.”
“More than you think.” They looked again to Rana. “Kenta could kill all of us if he decided to.”
“I have defeated him before,” Lea reminded them.
“While he was trying to be human,” Rana reminded them.
Daniel frowned and gestured to the limp headless body gently resting nearby. “Giving that up made him stronger?”
“Obviously. You saw how he moves; how he fights now. The human form is so weak, virtually anything is an improvement.” He tried taking her words at face value, but Daniel was inevitably reminded of Rana’s own transformation. “And then there’s his Possession ability.”
“Is that what he did to the guardian?” Paul asked.
“Yes. He was already strong enough to hurt us if we fought six against one, and he’s much more powerful with the Taotie warrior under his control. The real problem is that a few moments ago he took control of a second, more powerful guardian.”
They all gasped.
“I think it’s clear what his plan is now. Leapfrog from guardians to Mages, Wildlings, and Monsters until he lands an ability to find his sister and becomes strong enough to protect her.”
Shaking his head, Daniel said, “He can’t suddenly become as powerful as Red Tail, right? There’s got to be something stopping him?”
Thankfully, Rana agreed. “Every race with a Possession ability has a hard limit built in—the number of possession slots, the total power of their subjects, the difficulty in gaining control of a target—or else they’d already be ruling the universe… but there is an exception.”
“What?” Daniel had to ask.
“The ones with an unbound Possession capacity are demons.”
“Moloch.” Daniel let some of his anger into the word. “‘His Will endures as long as even one Shadow remains,’ that’s what It said last night. What is a Shadow of Moloch doing here?” His eyes landed on Paul and Cassie. “Persephone destroyed Moloch four years ago, but both of you carried pieces of the demon until recently. We lost track of Kenta last night, meaning he was the carrier this time.
“Half of us resisted when we fought the lesser demon yesterday. The other half… blacked out. I heard Moloch as we were destroying the demon fragments, but It repeated what I’d heard four years ago. It was like a memory. A recording. These demon Shadows aren’t the real Moloch, but they enact the Demon’s Will.
“I don’t think I’m a carrier. The demon never got its hands on me four years ago, and yesterday confirmed that. We know two of us purged their demon fragment, and it looks like Kenta expelled and destroyed his. I don’t know if it’s merely because the demon Voice was a recording, but I almost felt… inoculated.” He looked to Paul and Cassie, who slowly nodded in agreement; they’d felt the same way. “If that’s the case for us, then the reason Lea, Rana, and Ziege blacked out is because—the three of you are carriers.”
Wendi’s expression was contemplative, though Ziege sent nothing. Rana put on her poker face, and Lea wore a pained expression as she spoke. “Is that not a rather large leap in logic? Can it be explained by saying the three of us were simply more sensitive to the harsh Voice than you? I certainly do not feel possessed.”
“Lea, it’s extremely difficult to realize what’s going on with the fragment inside you,” Cassie said, her voice filled with empathy for her frightened friend. “I knew the Nightmare started hunting me through my dreams since Eastwood. I had the answer in front of me and couldn’t complete the realization. Looking back, it’s like dream-logic. Everything made sense at the time no matter how stupid my actions seem now. My brain was fogged.”
Paul agreed. “I imagine it’s like being so drunk you start to believe you’re sober again. I could hear the demon’s Voice, but I couldn’t recognize it as a threat. It constantly told me I was weak and stupid. Everything I did wrong seemed worse, and everything I did right seemed worthless. I started doubting my own abilities.”
“Exactly!” Cassie surged with recognition. “My demon was always telling me to run away and that I was a coward… That’s why my breakthrough was so hard! I avoided my problems, which meant I couldn’t improve, which put me in a downward spiral. It took everyone working together and helping me and guiding me to finally convince me to face the demon—but when I did, defeating it was super easy!”
“You mean it was super dangerous,” Daniel countered. “We want to avoid that if we can. Pharos entered Paul’s mind and destroyed his demon fragment… Is there any way we could do the same?”
“I can Nightwalk the Inner World of whoever is using me in Tool form, and I saw the Tsukumogami enter people’s dreams!” Paul seemed eager to start.
“The three of you have to give your permission first. Even if you’re not carriers, what could it hurt?” Daniel asked.
“Hmm,” Lea said, clearly having trouble accepting this, but at least trying. “Very well. It will not prove anything but let us set our minds at ease.” Rana nodded mute agreement.
“Please, Ziege?” Wendi begged.
“Oh, fine! They can enter, but they won’t find anything. I’ve looked!”
“We’re not going anywhere until Daniel learns to fly,” Cassie said with barely suppressed glee.
“And I have yet to do my mediation,” Lea added.
Daniel scanned their faces again, this time with appreciation. “Then we have our tasks for the day. Tomorrow, I suppose we’re going after Kenta.”
“Not exactly a rallying cry from our fearless leader,” Ziege said.
“I’m hesitant because this is the most dangerous task we’ve ever set ourselves on. We have to be unanimous. Finding Kenta, subduing Kenta, and helping Kenta is something one or more of us may have to die for. He might use lethal force next time and, if Rana is right, he’s looking for monsters. Before we take one step on this trail, we have to prepare our hearts.
“I refuse to say any one of us holds the blame for what happened to Kenta, but I do think we share a collective responsibility. It’s not just the way of the Wilderness this time. We unleashed this monster. If we can’t stop him before he does something irreparable, we should be the ones to end his threat. One way or another.”
“We can’t!” Lea said, lip trembling. “Kenta…” She trailed off after voicing her visceral reaction, her expression at war with herself. “I mean to say, this is not a decision to take lightly.”
Paul bowed his head under the weight of the moment. “No one’s suggesting that be the first, second, or even third solution. However, if I went on a rampage, if I started hurting innocent people, I’d want you all to stop me. The Kenta I knew wouldn’t tolerate such a stain on his honor.”
“Harumi wouldn’t want Kenta to become a monster.” Cassie’s ears drooped as she spoke. “For her sake, and his own good, it’s our job to remind him of that!”
“Don’t worry, your plan will work! I know it.” Wendi smiled, bittersweet. “That said, Ziege and I are prepared to see this through.
Rana bobbed her head in agreement.
“Each of us must find within ourselves the strength to carry on to the bitter end.” Daniel extended his left hand over the center of their circle. One by one, they all put their hands over his. Wendi put her red right hand in, and Ziege shifted their left hand blue to put seven hands in the circle.
He nodded. “Then it’s decided.”
Daniel felt emotion welling within him as he gazed into the clear blue morning sky and spoke from the heart. “Moloch was playing chess at something like three levels above our game, and who knows how many moves ahead. All we know for certain is that he was working every angle of the situation simultaneously. As much as he wanted to demonize the nine of us children to gain our abilities—that might not have been his true goal. I know it’s been over a year, but I’ve been thinking about UE 000 quite a bit.
“Nobody knew it was there, and yet, there it was beneath the battlefield. Maybe… maybe Moloch wanted UE 000 brought to the surface. Maybe it wasn’t about us at all, and Moloch used Persephone’s love for me to expose the ship to humans after it’d been buried for thousands of years. Or maybe I’m still looking at this the wrong way.
“Perhaps guessing at Moloch’s ‘true goal’ is pointless. I think Moloch’s greatest strength, beyond his destructive power, beyond his demonic Voice, beyond even his unbound capacity for Possession, is his ability to turn good intentions towards evil. If he intended to bring UE 000 to the surface, he used a wholly good, selfless sacrifice even as he himself was destroyed—a last spiteful curse, along with the black seeds he left in our souls, and the scars he left on our hearts.
“And he isn’t done. Like a poisonous weed that sprouts from the torn pieces of its leaves after its main body is uprooted, his Will prospers through those he touched. Like the lesser demon said, Moloch won’t truly be gone until the last remnant of his Will is stamped out. Until then, he’ll continue to wreak havoc through we surviving members of the T.O. as we lash out in pain against each other and the world around us.
“While Kenta is responsible for every evil thing he does as a monster, Moloch will count each one a victory from beyond the grave.” He looked at the others. “I don’t want Moloch to win anymore. He’s gone, and never coming back. I’ll fight with everything I have to deny him any satisfaction—I want him to rot in hell knowing he failed to break us!”