The flight from Porto to Coven had been uneventful. Nemeria had done as directed and put Dr. Basam's mystery box through the airport scanners along with her regular luggage, fully expecting alarms to go off or to be questioned about its contents… instead nothing happened.

Things had gone smoothly, too smoothly, and that put Nemeria on edge. Even going through customs, which was usually a whole day process for humans entering hund territories, had only taken minutes. They had just looked at her passport, grunted approval, then stamped it and waved her through.

After that it was a short ride through the metro and a few minutes walk to her next point of contact. To her surprise it was a second hand clothing store called "Episode". She checked the address again, this was Larsbjørnsstræde #8.

Nemeria eyed the gaudy powder blue facade for a moment before she said the hell with it, embraced the fact that she had completely lost control of her life, and entered the shop.

The interior was chaotic in the best way possible. Brightly colored silks and synthetic fabrics clashed with drab military surplus boots and seemingly infinite racks of jeans. It was like someone had force fed a million years worth of rainbows to a unicorn until it exploded all over the walls. It was beautiful, it was magical, it was magnificent.

"You like?" Asked a hairless katzen female from her perch on a barstool. She eyed the human with a hint of curiosity and bountiful buckets of mischief from behind the rose colored lenses of her novelty heart shaped glasses. "I of course am Genevieve Geneva, and this is my humble contribution to the moral decay of the city." She waved a ring covered hand, "Beautiful, is it not?"

Nemeria laughed despite herself. "It really is something."

"Oh you wound me." Genevieve Geneva made a mock kneading motion with her hands and pouted. "Don't make me pull my compliments out of you, tell me what you really feel. Don't be shy. You're among friends here."

"It's wonderful, and makes me a little bit homesick." Nemeria admitted. "I used to go to a place like this… long ago."

"Ah, yes." Genevieve Geneva purred, playing with her tank top. She looked Nemeria up and down. "Why are you wearing that ridiculous disguise? It offends me…" She slipped off the chair with feline grace and began to circle. "So boring. So dull."

"There's nothing wrong with simple clothes." Nemeria said defensively. "I like what I wear."

"Lie to me again and I'll cut your tongue from your mouth." Genevieve Geneva said with mock playfulness and menace, but also without reaching for any apparent weapons. She planted a kiss on Nemeria's cheek. "You've been hiding for so long that you've forgotten who you are. Which is a pity. Because I'll bet you are quite interesting."

Genevieve Geneva hopped up on her chair and called out across the shop. "Alright, I have a fashion emergency and need everyone to come here and help!"

There was a rush of footsteps as a half dozen hunds and katzen pounded down the stairs from the upper level.

"Oh no…" Gasped a particularly gawdy Möhin. "It's worse than I feared."

"It's so… beige… why is there so much beige?" Lamented a little orange katzen as her partner mock fainted onto a chaise lounge.

"Hey, fuck you!" Nemeria shouted angrily as the assorted beings expressed their disgust at her fashion sense.

"Maybe later." Mused a Döbian with neon pink dyed fur. "But honestly, you're so beautiful and frankly… it's a waste."

Nemeria sighed. This was getting tiresome. "I'm just here to meet up with someone. I didn't ask for this… criticism. I didn't order it. Serve it to someone else or keep it for yourselves. But I don't want it!"

Genevieve Geneva clapped with glee and embraced the unwilling human before dancing away. "Yes! Yes! Yes! That is what I want to see!" She twirled. "Lina said you needed a little push to remember who you were, and here we see her. At least a glimpse of her. A powerful woman who stands up for herself. Beautiful and… dare I say it?"

"Dare!" Shouted the neon pink Döbian.

"Deadly!" Genevieve Geneva shouted. "Welcome back to the world of the living, Nemeria Reyes!"

The former warden blinked in surprise. Words failed her. It was all too much. Too much to handle.

"Come with me upstairs." Genevieve Geneva said, gently leading Nemeria by the hand. "Now that we have gotten you out of your shell we can get you into some body armor."

"Don't forget the firepower." The pink Döbian added as he followed them up the stairs. "I've got some good ideas. I'm thinking full auto, preferably belt fed!"

Nemeria looked at the hund and the katzen in confusion before shrugging and continuing up the stairs. Whatever was going on was beyond her control and it was pointless to argue. She would play along with Dr. Basam's game… for now.

Though she found herself wondering why she even bothered. The child couldn't exist. It was an obvious lie, an imposible thing that was being dangled in front of her face to torture her.

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Perhaps that was the point. Give her hope, give her something to live for, then take it all away and laugh.

"Oh, the child is real." Genevieve Geneva said once they were upstairs. "Just in case you were wondering. She was here a few days ago with her foster parents. Once you do as you are instructed and deliver the package she's yours. All yours."

Nemeria froze, only one person had ever been able to read her mind like that. "Let me see your eyes."

Genevieve Geneva smiled and took off the heart shaped glasses. Sure enough her irises were an almost incandescent gold in color, the same as Dr. Basam's. But there was something else there as well, the tattooed eyelids of someone who had survived the atrocities of the Döbian concentration camps.

How young had she been when that Döbian devil crawled inside her head and started whispering to her? How long had he waited until he took her over completely?

"Gershwin." Nemeria hissed.

"Don't dead name me, darling." Hissed back, Genevieve Geneva showing long white fangs. "It's rude."

"Also, it's inaccurate." The hot pink hund said, stepping between them. "Technically she's one of his victims, one of your victims. As was I. Though of course I have forgiven you."

Nemeria racked her brain, trying to remember a hairless katzen from the camps. There had been a family of them, hadn't there? From the northern territories in Sendero, across the ocean in Katzenlund. The youngest had that same distinctive pattern of light and dark spots like falling leaves across her skin… what had been her name?

"Sphinx… Carla Sphinx." Nemeria looked over to the hund next. He was tall, lean, with a distinct bounce to his step. "And you're Albert Springer."

Springer took a bow. "Yes, it's good to see that you remember." He sat down on an impressively purple paisley couch. "Your husband and I escaped when the allies came to liberate the camps. I was surprised to find out you were still alive, what with them finding your remains in one of the burned out buildings. He still wears the ring, you know."

Nemeria blinked in shock. "Simon is alive? I heard he died defending Gershwin with the rest of the raiserhund…" Her mind was racing now. This changed everything.

"Alive and well." Springer smiled. "Thought I might suggest announcing who you are before you try and hug him. He might not recognize your new body. It suits you by the way, a bit feminine for my tastes but Simon will love it."

Springer curled his bicep revealing rock hard muscles. "Gaze upon my masculine perfection and weep."

The hairless katzen rolled her eyes. "He's still full of himself, as you can see. But really, strange as it sounds, we are happy to see you. Even if you seem to have lost your way."

That was about the time when Nemeria realized something strange was going on. There was no way any of them would have forgiven her, not for what she had done to them in the camps and certainly not for abandoning them afterward. Even Gershwin would have kept a grudge, or at least guilt tripped her into doing what he wanted.

But no, these echoes of her past seemed to genuinely wish her well. So what was going on?

Nemeria clenched her fist, feeling the old rage threatening to bubble up. She had smothered it under shame for decades but there it was, calling out to her from the depths of her soul.

"What the fuck are you playing at?" Nemeria growled, her neutral accent slipping back into the Spanish flavor of her mother tongue. "Why are you fucking with my head? Is this some kind of game? Some joke? Answer me!"

Genevieve Geneva shook her head sadly. "Is it so hard to believe that we would forgive you, for our own sake? Do you think we want to be angry all our lives? No, we accept you as we accept ourselves. We see you, we know you, and we wish you the best. Because that is the only way we can move forward."

"I…" Nemeria looked at the two of them, "I don't believe you."

"I know." Genevieve Geneva said. "But that's your problem, not mine."

She gestured for Nemeria to sit next to her on the couch. "Look, I spent decades with the other brujas hunting down and killing the bastards that hurt me and my kind. We killed the priests that betrayed and abused us when we begged for shelter. We slaughtered the camp guards that shoveled our dead kin into furnaces. And through it all… I never felt at peace. I never was happy. There was this hole inside of me that never could be filled. I hated myself almost as much as I hated them."

"So how did you move forward?" Nemeria asked.

Genevieve Geneva smiled. "I met someone who helped me move past my anger and guilt. He talked to me, listened to my sins, then he forgave me. Now I do what I can to help make the world a better place, for all beings. And sometimes… just sometimes… I get to help others along the same path."

"So that's what I'm doing, I'm giving you grace in the hopes that some day you will feel the same peace I feel. Because I'm done being angry at you. I'm done being angry at Gershwin. You can't hurt me any more, I don't have to lash out."

Nemeria blinked in confusion which quickly started to turn to fear. This all sounded incredibly familiar. In fact, she recognized this from her childhood. This was human religious doctrine. But that was contraband, and for good reason too.

Homeworld was supposed to be a blank slate. They had mirrored some aspects of their history intentionally for the sake of stability but most human culture was banned here because the risk of it escaping and running rampant through the population was too great. Something as innocent as a poem or song could lead to uprisings.

All it would take was the wrong word in someone's ear and the next thing you knew people were questioning the nature of the universe. And when they tried to break out of this pocket dimension that held them the failsafes would trigger, destroying everyone and everything on homeworld.

That was why only the wardens could be trusted with this information. That was why they had taken so little of human culture with them to this place. That was why they had mind wiped and killed so many humans to preserve the lie. Because once people knew what was really going on, that there was a larger universe out there, they would try to escape, and escape would lead to death.

Introducing human culture to homeworld was like rubbing shit in an open wound. It would take root and spread until the whole body was infected. Then it would begin to change them, as ideas always did.

Within a generation either the hunds, the katzen, or even the humans themselves would be clawing at the walls of reality until they ripped.

Genevieve Geneva patted Nemeria's hand kindly. "Be not afraid." She said.

Nemeria laughed, her facade finally cracking. This was it, the beginning of the end. "Be not afraid!" She cackled. "It's been a while since I heard that one! You fucking idiots have no idea whats coming! But I do!"

Springer raised a neon pink eyebrow in concern. "What are you talking about?"

"Oh, just the end of the universe. Or at least this one. It was coming anyway, but it looks like someone couldn't wait and had to put their foot on the gas pedal." Nemeria mimed driving a race car. "Vroom vroom! Right off a cliff!"

Genevieve Geneva and Springer shared a look. "Was it something I said?" GG asked.