Daisy wasn’t able to get ahold of Natsuko for the rest of the night. At first it seemed as though Natsuko was going out of her way to avoid her, but as Natsuko stumbled to and from the punch table, it seemed more likely she was just too drunk to pick up on Daisy’s attempts to signal her. Once she started trying to strip off her phoenix outfit in public, Ailing escorted Natsuko out of the party.
With her own teammates off schmoozing—or refusing to come at all in Yuna’s case—Daisy was by herself all night. She had a couple of light conversations here and there, but her heart wasn’t in it, nor had it been ever since she learned about the true purpose of Po-Lin. It was silly of her to think she could go back to the way things were, but she’d tried, even going so far as to lie to herself about why she was doing it, suggesting it was all about keeping herself strong for when Shuixing found a way to fight the Yishang.
But Shui never had. They were as helpless as the day Hemiola warned them, and Daisy had done nothing about it. She’d even gone back to blindly doing whatever the Yishang said. It was scary how easy it was to fall back into. Every word to Natsuko had been the truth: If the two of them didn’t push each other to leave the Use-Rankings game, they would both remain stuck.
Daisy crushed the cup in her hand, spilling green punch down her arm and onto her rawhide chaps.
“Aw tits,” she said, grabbing a napkin to swab herself with.
“So you did come?”
Daisy froze then shut her eyes and let out a groan. As if her night couldn’t go worse.
“Boulanger,” she said with a polite nod in his direction.
“Daisy,” he said, nodding back. “You seem to be doing… well, I can’t say “well,” but perhaps “mediocrely” might be more accurate.”
It was accurate, Daisy supposed. She had dropped over 20 ranks since the days of being on Boulanger’s team. It wasn’t even that she’d been obsoleted by a new summon, but she couldn’t muster the energy to remain on top. She was still in the Top 30 more from the Yishang’s efforts than her own. Any day now they would get sick of her and pop out a new ditzy blonde girl with drill hair to take her place. They were already not happy with her chopping her ringlets down to a short bob.
“Sorry to hear the party is so boring for ya,” Daisy replied. “If the most exciting thing you can think of is coming over here to pick on lil’ ol’ me ya must be about to pass out.”
Boulanger smirked and in his infuriatingly soft voice replied, “is there something wrong about chatting with a former teammate? I don’t bear you any ill-will, Daisy, if anything I’m glad you found teammates more your speed. Cunegonde seems like such a nice girl.”
Daisy rolled her eyes. Both of them knew Cunegonde was the worst kind of sycophant—the kind that never gave it a rest. Yuna was not exactly a barrel of joy either, especially once her hopes of conquering Shikijima had been dashed once and for all in a questline where her army was “defeated” by Empress Sadako. The Yishang had apparently gotten sick of her trying to circumvent their prescribed story. And then Kane was… Kane.
“Nothing wrong, just wondering when you’ll be done,” Daisy said, crossing her arms. She forgot her arms were still dripping wet with punch and spread it to her shirt.
“I’m happy to get out of your hair, Daisy, since you seem to dislike me so much. But I did come over here with a purpose. I was going to ask you something,” he said.
She shrugged. “Whatever. Ask away.”
“Ailing and Natsuko were talking about something secret with each other. They claimed it was “just girl stuff,” but I suspect otherwise. As Natsuko’s former teammate, I assumed you might know what the topic of conversation was,” Boulanger said.
Daisy blinked. Her first instinct was to chalk Boulanger’s question up to him being his usual paranoid self. Words to that effect almost left her mouth before she realized that she knew what that secret might be. Surely Natsuko wouldn’t tell anyone about the Yishang, would she? They had all agreed that was a terrible idea.
“Trust me, Boulanger, it really is girl stuff. You wouldn’t understand,” Daisy said.
He narrowed his eyes. “I saw your face a moment ago. You’re not a good liar, Daisy. You never were. If you don’t want to tell me, fine. But do me the service of telling me plainly.”
“Fine,” she said, “I don’t want to tell you.”
“Nor will you tell me what you brought Natsuko over to talk about, I imagine?”
The fact that he was using the exact same chastising tone of voice he used when he was her team captain ticked Daisy off. With a wide, fake smile, she fired two finger guns at him.
“Bang bang! Bullseye!”
“Uh-huh. And since I don’t know what this conversation might have been about, I have to assume you were taking advantage of our teammate and her unfortunate substance abuse habit to either sabotage our efforts or siphon trade secrets. I am afraid I am going to have to ask you to keep away from her going forward.”
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Daisy shook her head. “I’m sorry, do what now!? She doesn’t need your permission to talk to people. Hell, she’s stronger than you are, so good luck stopping her, big guy,” she said with a shove to his chest.
“I don’t have to stop her, I just have to stop you. Get anywhere near Natsuko and you’ll be waking up at 4am. Are we clear?”
“What!? That’s ridiculous! Boulanger what the hell are you—”
Other Heroes were starting to notice their conversation and pay attention in the hopes of juicy gossip. The fact that the #3 Hero was involved and that it had to do with a former teammate made it that much more exciting. Salacious even, some hoped.
“I’m being cautious is what I’m doing,” he said, keeping his voice at the same level it was always at. “And until you are so inclined as to help me, then I’m afraid I can’t extend help to you.”
Daisy looked down at the small amount of green juice still sloshing around in the crumpled cup in her hand. She tossed the rest of it out on Boulanger’s face and walked away.
That was the last noteworthy event of the night as the rest of Team Natsuko departed shortly thereafter which was everyone else’s signal that the party was wrapping up. Feeling too drained to even stand up, Daisy remained seated on a chair with her knees drawn up, idly watching the other Heroes file out until it was just her, Cunegonde, and an agonizingly cheerful Kane.
“What was that stuff with Boulanger all about?” Cunegonde asked. Daisy could tell her teammate was irritated at losing face in front of the other Heroes. Not that Daisy herself particularly cared.
“Nothin’ much. He came over to be a dick to me and I threw punch in his face cuz I wasn’t having it,” she said.
“Everyone’s saying it was a spat between former lovers,” Cunegonde said.
If it were true, Daisy supposed, it might redeem her in her teammate’s eyes. That was a whole lot cooler and more status-affirming than a higher-ranked Hero bullying a lower-ranked one. She might’ve even stoked the rumor for shits and giggles if it weren’t for the fact that the idea of her being a couple with Boulanger, even in idle gossip, made her want to vomit blood.
“It wasn’t,” Daisy said. “Just him being his usual obnoxious self.”
“From what I’ve seen he’s a perfect gentleman. And driven. Doesn’t putter around, assuming experience points will earn themselves. Certainly doesn’t spend all day moping and thinking about the past, that’s for certain,” Cunegonde said.
Daisy looked up at Cunegonde in her Cascadian Maid outfit and snorted. If only Cunegonde had any idea how stupid all this was, then she’d realize how much of an absolute clown Boulanger was. Have fun with those experience points when you’re shut off by the Yishang, prick.
Daisy sighed. “Let’s just go home.”
“Great idea! It’s still early enough we could get a board game in if Yuna is up,” Kane said.
An Imperian Hero, Kane Kanos was molded in accordance with a formula that Daisy could see plain as day: Shrike being force dimension-jumped left Deco Imperia down a Control Hero with a himbo, golden-retriever type of vibe. So the Yishang plugged all the Shrike parameters in and toned down the traditional masculinity and martial attitude and out spat Kane Kanos. This image was reinforced by his Halloween costume being, literally, a golden retriever. His numbers were solid enough to land in the Top 30, and maybe further if he hadn’t had the misfortune of landing on Daisy’s team of sad-sacks. Someone like Boulanger could have whipped him into the Top 15 or maybe even the Top 10 with a brutal, XP-farming regimen. But to his disadvantage, Kane was steadfastly loyal to whoever was in charge—especially when it was a woman—and the woman in charge was a depressed has-been going through the motions who kept him around because she felt guilty about what happened to Shrike.
“Not tonight,” Daisy said. “Tonight it’s sleepy time.”
“Seems like a lot of nights are sleepy time,” Kane replied.
Cunegonde snorted. “Funny how that happens.”
The three of them returned to the apartments they rented above an accessory shop somewhere in the middle levels of the Selenian Capitol building. There was only as much available housing in Selenia as to parcel out “tiers” of quality to the Heroes that made it there (and knowing what she knew about them, the Yishang had done this deliberately). Naturally, Team Natsuko was in the giant, multi-story condominium that everyone in the central atrium could see. Team Daisy, however…
The sound of boxes shuffling and a broom falling preempted the door to their cramped, one-room apartment sliding opening.
“Oh, you’re back,” Yuna said in a bored tone. A pile of crumpled soda cans and chip bags lay heaped up around her along with the stacks of comic books she was reading through. Half of the floor space was filled with Yuna’s trash.
“Yes, we’re back. So kind of you to clean up,” Cunegonde said.
Cunegonde chucked her heels aside and daintily stepped her way across oases of clean floor to the side of the room that contained all their futons. Two lay next to each other on the floor while two more futons rested on hanging cabinets for lack of space. Without bothering to change out of her maid outfit, Cunegonde climbed straight to her top bunk and put in earplugs and a sleeping mask.
“Did someone tell her she was annoying again?” Yuna asked, scratching her stomach.
Daisy shook her head. “Not this time. She’s annoyed with me for not putting up with Boulanger’s shit.”
“Hey! Look at you, girl! Good for you,” Yuna said, punching Daisy uncomfortably hard in the arm. “Fuck the guys on top and fuck the Yishang. They ain’t better than us.”
Well, they are, thought Daisy. That was why they were on top. Especially the Yishang. Not that Yuna would ever understand that part if she explained. Even if Daisy were to drop all secrecy and tell Yuna outright the truth about the Yishang and Po-Lin, she wouldn’t listen. In Yuna’s mind they were secret masterminds bent on shaping the politics of Po-Lin in favor of autocracy—putting aside completely the fact that Cascadia was a constitutional monarchy, Deco Imperia was a republic, and Vermögenburgh was a quasi-theocratic municipal democracy—and to Yuna the idea that the Yishang's real goals were anything more insidious than mild political manipulation was inconceivable to her.
“Yeah, power to the people!” Kane said, pumping his fist in the air.
This gesture sucked the enthusiasm out of Yuna and with a grunt and the crinkling of chip bags, she plopped herself back in front of her comic books.
Daisy went to lay down on her own futon below Cunegonde’s and shut her eyes. Sadly, sleep did not come. First because Yuna was still reading and crunching on chips and Kane stayed up with her to hold an entirely one-sided conversation with the morose Samurai. Then it was Yuna’s bomb blast snoring. And finally, when that quieted down, and when everything was mostly still and quiet, it was the nagging voice in Daisy’s head telling her she needed to run. That she needed to have the strength to escape this life and to go find Shuixing and figure out a way to escape this world altogether. But loud as it was, Daisy had drowned that voice out for two years, and tonight would be no different.