Instinctively, I called out her name. But my words vanished in the wind. With a gust, a wall of sand separated us, and, when it had passed, the figure was nowhere to be seen. Yet I knew that it had been her. She’d been looking at me. Watching me?

In my confusion Mia’s Echo slammed into me, its sharp beak cleaving a deep injury into my forehead. I was immensely glad to not be in human form. I didn’t want to think of what might have happened. Even in my Imago, I felt like I was dying. My head throbbed. Hemolymph oozed down my face, onto my visor and dripping onto the ground. I fell to my knees. I couldn’t think straight at all. Everything hurt.

A pair of arms grabbed me from behind and dragged me out of harm’s way. It took me a few moments to register that it was Grace. She dragged me under a desk and left me there as she scrambled off to distract Mia, her ghostly form dancing in the swirling dust of the classroom. True to her word, Mia was only really after Grace, her Echo pursuing her with renewed ferocity. The cloud of birds swooped and clawed at her, and she retaliated, if only just. It seemed my little intervention had given Grace enough time to collect herself and mount a defence. But my eyelids were heavy; I quickly felt them close again.

Mother... what had she been doing here? Nep had said she was here, but... still... seeing her was a bigger shock than I’d anticipated. And it was certainly her. I’d recognized her features, her rounded face, her smooth black hair, with a few streaks of gray mixed in. Short, but not overly so, in good physical condition, sure. She’d been wearing one of her usual button-down shirts and long pants, too. Though bizarrely, she’d been wearing some sort of strange headgear. A visor or something? Did she have something to do with what was happening now? Was she...?

She’d been so close. And yet I hadn’t been able to get to her. There was so much I wanted to ask her. So many questions swirling in my head. Did she know? Did dad know? About the Angels and Demons and everything that was going on? But more than that, more than anything, I just wanted to give her a hug. I just wanted to be close with her, because she was my family. And I felt so... so far removed from them. Perhaps I was hoping that I could still regain a shred of normalcy.

I finally managed to open my eyes again. Though fluid was still leaking from the huge crack in my exoskeleton, the headache had subsided somewhat. I felt awful. My head was still out of things as I scanned my blurred surroundings. “Vespa,” I choked out, “Alert...”

“I have already done so,” she said. “Help is on its way. This is the only attack currently occurring.”

“The only one? Really?”

“Quinn, revert to your human form. Your Imago is damaged and you need to recover.”

“Fine.” Before the words even finished, I felt the exoskeleton melting away, leaving me back in my own, human body. I gulped air. My skull was intact, now, though my head was still pounding. Still, I felt a whole lot better. Higher metabolism or something. My vision stabilized, and I struggled to my feet. Grace was still locked in combat with Mia. The Demon continued to trample her way through the classroom, while Grace still managed to parry and weave between her blows. Grace was clearly on the back foot, though, her weapon covered in cracks and scratches from the beating it was receiving.

For a moment, her eyes locked with mine. Registering that I was up, she stopped, kicking up a cloud of sand to block Mia’s eyesight before skittering over to me, crawling with all her hands and feet to get to my side. “How are you doing?” she asked.

“I’m fine. How are you?”

“I... let’s go towards the door.” She rushed me towards the back of the classroom, helping as I hobbled along. “I can’t take her,” she chuckled, her hands balled into fists. “I just... as much as I’ve dealt with her before, and even with all of the sacrifices my friends made... it’s not enough. If only I was a little stronger.”

“It’s okay,” I said. We were at the door. She swung it open and we slammed it shut behind us. Far down the stairwell, I could hear some sort of commotion. Must have been Vespa’s news. People were coming. Soon. But looking through the frosted glass of the window, it was clear that Mia was bearing down us us, her Echo charging at a breakneck pace towards the door. It wouldn’t hold.

I led the way down the stairs, trying to clear my head, still. The tall stairwell gave me vertigo, and the prospect of the long descent didn’t help matters. Mia was at the door already. The Echo was pounding on the steel in time with the pounding in my head.

“Stop.” Grace’s hand was on my shoulder. “Can I... um... bite you?”

What? Suddenly, I was fully lucid again. “What? Did you say bite?”

“Um... sorry, I just thought it’d be nice to ask first.” Grace was being serious. “It won’t hurt. Much. I don’t think. I just... I want to stop Mia. And I can get stronger by um... by drinking a little bit of blood. I didn’t want to ask earlier, but to be strong enough... it might be enough. If you’re okay with that.”

“Bite me? Go ahead.” She seemed to hesitate a bit, but then I felt a sharp pain, like a needle, on the back of my shoulder.

I turned my head to see her ghostly face. The translucent plates where her mouth would be were opened up, unfolded like a flower to reveal a sharp, shining needle, drinking my blood. Quite... quite a lot of my blood. I felt light-headed and had to lean on the railing to catch my balance, my lucidity lost almost as quickly as it had come back. With her transparent body, I watched the blood as it slowly spread through her body, flowing down to her heart before her whole Imago flashed crimson. After a moment, the bright red subsided, but the entirety of her body was now starkly visible, the colour of shining bronze and stained in blood on the inside. The needle retracted into her head, armoured plates folding back over and sealing shut as if there was never anything there. And she just stood there.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“I’m sorry,” she started.

“Don’t be sorry—”

“You must think I’m a real monster, don’t you?” she said. “I know. I get it. I’ve always been weird, I like he Echoes, I know the Demons, I... and I have such a gross, parasitic power. I hope it didn’t hurt too much.”

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“Don’t be sorry about that,” I said. “You are who you are. And you.. you look good like this.”

She looked down at her shining metallic carapace and sighed. “Thanks. I...”

Her voice was interrupted by the sound of the door being crushed by the Echo. The metal crumpled and cracked as Mia stepped into the stairwell. But as soon as she did, Grace was right on her, stabbing with her oversized syringe, her strike only just deflected by Mia’s short sword. The Demon sneered. “You’ve got a new look. But that won’t save you.” Through the open doorway, a swarm of birds streamed through yet again, filling the stairwell to block off any access or help from the people below.

The walkway was narrow here, just wide enough for two people to stand side-by-side on the metal. I struggled to transform again, but the chrysalis wouldn’t solidify. My hands and feet were shaking. I wouldn’t be any use right now. It was all on Grace.

Something was definitely different now. The Echo was fearful, keeping back despite Mia’s constant prodding forward. Though the Demon slashed with her roman-style shortsword, each strike was deflected easily by Grace’s needle, and answered by a jab forward, sending Echo and rider back step by step until...

With a sharp crack, Grace’s needle slipped through the Demon’s guard and smashed through the bird’s obsidian skin, sending flickering chunks of black stone and smoke flying through the air. Droplets of ichor sprayed from the wound, molten embers dimming as they cooled in the air. Grace jerked back the plunger, slowly filling the chamber with molten ichor. The Echo crumpled, stumbling back and hissing in.. pain? Within the syringe, the ichor darkened, changing from its glowing red and orange to the colour of blood. Grace drew back the needle before jamming the plunger back all the way. A jet of blood covered the Demon and her mount, hissing loudly as it made contact with their skin. The Echo immediately collapsed to the ground, but Mia dismounted and stepped forward.

Her armour was coated in the blood, but where it leaked between the gaps her skin was steaming. The hand gripping her sword was red, with blackened patches where the blood had... burned her? The hot streaks of blood running down her forehead left scorch marks down the length of her face. The tips of her icy-blue hair were singed as well, and, despite the cold blue shade of her irises, her eyes were full of fire. “That girl’s blood,” she spat. “You knew?”

“I guessed,” said Grace.

“My blood,” I whispered.

“Venom,” said Vespa. “There is venom in your blood. The same venom within your stinger.”

“I’m going to kill you.” Mia surged forward with a raw ferocity, swinging her shortsword in wide arcs as she advanced. Echoed birds broke off from the flock all around to swoop at Grace, pelting her arms and legs as she blocked the sword strikes with her syringe. Grace, for her part, pressed forward too, stabbing with the sharp needle tip and ramming the Demon with the blunt cylinder chamber.

I felt a crawling sensation on my hand. A small, brownish... a bedbug! I nearly crushed him before realizing it was Cimex. It was Grace’s symbiote. “What is it?” I asked.

“Keep an eye on her,” he said.

Keep an eye on her? “Why?”

“I have a feeling that things will get out of hand. And if they do, you need to watch out. Now Grace sometimes says she’s a monster, and—”

“Don’t be silly. It’s... it’s a normal part of her biology. I’m not going to think of her like that,” I reassured him.

“That’s not what I’m talking about.”

I heard a loud crack. Mia’s blade sliced straight through Grace’s shell skewering her right through her chest cavity. Her hemolymph, mixed with my own blood, leaked out from the wound, dripping onto the floor. The fire in Mia’s eyes cooled instantly. “It is finished,” she said. “Every last one from that accursed place is gone.” Raising up Grace on her sword, she grasped at the anchoring crystal embedded in her nape. But Grace didn’t flinch.

“Oh no,” said Cimex.

“You know, bedbugs are pretty used to being impaled,” she quipped, pulling the sword out of her chest and falling onto the walkway. She landed on her back, arms and legs bent backwards so she could spring right back at Mia and grab her with all four arms. Her sharp, clawed fingers dug into the Demon, spilling drops of ichor all over the ground. Her weapon lay abandoned on the ground. Instead, she tore into her opponent, stripping off the metal armour and raking at her flesh with her bare claws.

“Get off me!” Mia screamed, shoving Grace off to the ground. Though her clothes were torn, and her skin was leaking ichor, she still seemed more angry than scared. All the Echoes piled onto Grace, and she swatted the birds away with ease. One by one, they disappeared into black powder and smoke.

But Grace had her hands on her chest, where the sword had stabbed through her. Sticking her fingers into the wound, she pulled it wider. A mixture of blood and hemolymph oozed out onto the floor, coagulating into tiny bedbugs that swarmed up the Demon’s arms and legs. Mia desperately tried to brush them all away, but there was no escape at this point. She quickly succumbed to swarm of creatures and lay motionless on the ground. Grace crawled atop her helpless opponent and held her down. The plates of Grace’s face opened up, revealing the sharp needle of a mouth beneath.

I looked away as she leaned forward to strike. I heard a sound like torn paper. When I looked back, the swarm of insects was gone. Mia’s corpse lay on the metal grating, every inch of bare skin covered with reddish welts.

Suddenly, something pushed me to the ground, hard. It turned me over roughly, so that its head was facing mine.

“Grace? Grace?” Her Imago lay on top of me, holding me still with all four arms. Her bronze carapace was still wet with blood and hemolymph. Her face seemed alien and terrifying to me. Her chest still dripped droplets that formed tiny bedbugs as they landed on my skin, though they didn’t bit. I was still too weak to transform, and certainly too weak to push her off, so... “Grace?”

Her mouth opened up again. That shining, metallic needle was positioned right over my face. The pointed tip lay centimetres from my nose.

“Grace?” I shook her by the shoulders. “This isn’t funny, Grace.”

And all of a sudden, her carapace fell away, and she was just lying on top of me in her uniform. “Oh. Quinn,” she said, as if nothing had just happened.

“What was that?”

“What was what?” Then, a look of realization fell over her face. “Oh no. I did it again, didn’t I? I’m sorry.” She ran off down the stairs before I could stop her.

Her symbiote spoke up. “When an Angel is under extreme duress, her Imago can trigger a sort of... enhanced state. You understand how your Imago has body memory, right? It has instinctive and reflexive motions.”

I nodded, still trembling a little bit.

“Have you ever wondered what happens if you relinquish all control to it?”