Episode XVI

Bad Neighborhood

The vines erupted from the ground and stabbed the fleshy wall. Highly pressurized blood erupted from every puncture point and the wall itself let out a dog-like whimper. Flowers sprouted around the holes, stopping the spray with their roots. White petals became crimson, and flesh became wood.

A face emerged from the remaining flesh, human, stuck in a silent scream. It tried to pull itself out of the wall, but the outer edges became wooden and were no longer malleable. The face twisted to the left and the right, each twist with less and less freedom of motion. The fear became rage, rage against the oncoming plants. Teeth formed in the mouth and the eyes expanded in size horizontally, becoming elongated slits of murderous intent. It tried to roar, but all that emerged was the sound of a whimpering dog.

With that, the face became completely wooden. Flowers started to bloom all over It and no longer were their petals forced to become crimson, spreading out in all sorts of pastel colors.

“Whew!” Coleus said, lowering her hand. “That was a pretty difficult inter-face! Whatever was in there was particularly nasty.”

Amaris nodded, scribbling a quick note in her notebook. “You sure there’s not going to be any lingering side effects?”

“Not yet, the roots are working out on egg-stracting… an egg of darkness!” She gestured at the ground where a large blue flower was budding. When its petals spread, inside there was a black egg with numerous faces moving along its surface, all of them silently screaming. “Can’t just convert this, gonna have to purge it.”

“That’s always fun.”

Coleus picked up the egg with a bag made out of vines so it didn’t come in contact with her directly. “You bet! To the Glen!” Coleus pointed an excited finger and they left. They emerged from a room that was still being converted from fleshy, disgusting Strider mess to verdant green beauty into a land that had already been converted. Grasses of all sorts of shapes and sizes covered the ground, trees dotted every surface—even the ceiling—and massive flowers were constantly blooming and sending sweet aromas into the air. However, there were also large pieces of machinery in operation, made largely out of plants and wood but undeniably machines nonetheless. Large conveyor belts of lily pads moved through lazy rivers, vines moved up and down on pulley systems moving people to different levels, and there were even a handful of metal structures that blew smoke into the air, but smoke that was quickly captured by windmill-like flowers.

“I’m always more impressed every time I come here,” Amaris said as they boarded a lily pad and started to drift lazily along the river. “Only you could make an industry of nature.”

“I know, right? It’s so cool! Who says plants have to be slow? …I mean, yeah, the elders but they wouldn’t be cleaning this place up so quickly.” She crossed her arms. “And they keep telling me I should put down my roots already. Hmph.”

“Can you do that now?”

Coleus nodded. “I’m old enough, but the window’s large. I’m doing the best I can to completely purge this place before I become rooted in the Glen.”

“Sure is going to be different with you becoming a big tree.”

“Yeah.” Coleus rubbed her arm. “I’m a little nervous. Will thinking slower make me change into someone unrecognizable? I’ve never seen another dryad put down roots… but every elder I see doesn’t act at all like me.” She paused. “I haven’t seen very many dryads like me, either. For some reason letting young dryads interact isn’t encouraged.”

“Weird.”

“The elders do things and they don’t think they have to explain.” Coleus shrugged. “Well, I’ll get answers out of them eventually, but converting the Strider is more import-ant.” Coleus glanced to the side. “Hmm. I thought this was where the anthill was…”

At this point, a gari shouted at them from the river. “Hey! That’s the plant-freak!” He pointed at Coleus. “This is all your fault!”

Coleus tried to melt into the background which was really hard to do on top of a barren lily pad.

“You’ve taken our home away!”

“Um, well…” Coleus coughed, realizing that she wasn’t just going to be able to blow this off. “L-look, I’ve built you a new home without all that murder and curses a—”

The gari pulled out some kind of scepter with a purple crystal in it and pointed it at Coleus. “That’s the problem! I haven’t gotten to kill anyone for months! I’m starting with y—”

Coleus flicked her wrist and he was suddenly wrapped in a tangle of vines that pulled him forcefully to the ground. Her nervousness was gone, and now her gaze was one of extreme disapproval. “If you need to murder people then you don’t deserve my pity or consideration. You’re grounded, mister.”

Amaris chuckled while the gari let out a string of obscenities.

“I’m really not sure what to do with all the people,” Coleus said as the lily pad passed away from the gari. “I give them plentiful food and it’s not like I kick them out, but so many of them were raised to essentially believe evil was good.” She tapped her fingers together. “I want to help them, but so many people just want to go on a murder spree. It’s alarmingly common, you have no idea how many people I have grounded right now.”

“That’s probably not a long-term solution.”

“Well, the long-term solution is killing them, but I really don’t want to do that.”

Amaris frowned. “I wouldn’t either, but I’m not sure how you can change people, much less an entire society.”

“The elders recommended I forcibly eject everyone from their homes and restore purity to the Glen.”

“Geez, that would result in a war between Nuk and the Strider’s people almost immediately.”

“Yeah, apparently they didn’t think of that.” Coleus crossed her arms. “Now they just want me to seal up the central Glen and let them sort themselves out. ‘Mortal lives are of no concern to us,’ blah de blah de blah…” Coleus sighed. “I’m glad you’re here Amaris, it’s hard.”

“I’m glad you’re here to handle all of this; without the friendly magic pun-loving plant girl to keep everything in line I’m pretty sure everything would have gone very wrong long before now.”

“I’m not convinced it won’t go sideways any moment,” Coleus said with a nervous laugh. “The Strider itself listens to everything I ask it to, but that doesn’t solve every problem…” She shook her head. “But I’m working on it, and the elders are at least good for pointing out where problems might arise. I just half to ignore half of them!”

At this point, they reached the end of the river and hopped off onto the ground. Here, this close to the center of the Strider, there were not only plants but animals as well. Shimmering insects and small mouse-like creatures ran to and fro, reflecting the warm light that came from all directions. Coleus and Amaris moved to a staircase made out of living, square logs and descended.

The central Glen of the Strider was a sight to behold. A roughly spherical space cut out of the bulk of the Strider that had trees on every surface, creating a forest with treetops that all pointed to the very center, which consisted of a chunk of earth resting on a single pillar of smooth metal. The six stone monoliths that marked the edge of the Glen glowed a soft green, the runes flickering on and off in some unknown pattern. Just outside the stones were a few metal boxes that housed electrical equipment, as well as a few screens that could be used to interface with the remaining technical parts of the Strider.

There was a “bridge” that led from their current location to the center, but it was highly unorthodox, being made out of a few dozen independent floating stones covered in tangled moss. Coleus and Amaris hopped across these floating rocks, arriving at the Glen outskirts. Coleus checked the computer terminal briefly before passing through the barrier.

Amaris walked right into an invisible wall.

“Hey!” Coleus put her hands on her hips and glared toward the elegant trees that occupied the center of the Glen. “You stop that! It’s Amaris, she’s coming in, and I know you don’t want an extended argument.”

The runes on the Glen flashed rapidly for a second.

“You can come in now.”

Amaris passed through the barrier without issue. “Geez, petty much?” She glared right at the trees that she knew were the elder dryads. They made no response, which was normal.

“She asked you a question,” Coleus said, grumbling at the elders who still weren’t listening to her. “…Come on.”

The interior of the Glen was perfectly clean and had an aura of healing about it. It was enough to rouse Pitch from his slumber and come out of the backpack just to appreciate the clean air and sense of rejuvenation that came with the place. All the plants that grew here were extremely vibrant, the flowers were stupendously aromatic, and the serene quiet was greatly calming.

In the center, there was a pool of water surrounded by the elder dryads. From a distance, they looked like normal, if slightly too perfect and unusually angled, trees. But this close it was possible to see that there were faces in the tree bark, all of which were twisted into deeply dissatisfied expressions.

“Geez, are they that upset at me?” Amaris asked.

“No, they just don’t like being here,” Coleus said. “They recognize that it’s necessary to guard the Lost Glen, but they had to leave their preferred places to be here. They would rather be where they consider home.”

“…Surely you can handle things and let them go home?”

“They don’t think so.” With that, Coleus lifted up the bag that held the dark egg and dangled it over the central pool of water. The water was so clear, so pure, that it was possible to see the bottom and the semi-transparent fish that were swimming within. All the fish turned to look at the egg dangled above them.

“Here’s something else for purging! Don’t get too egg-cited now!” Coleus dumped the egg out of its container. The moment it hit the water, it started dissolving. For a brief moment, there was a slight blackness to the water surrounding the egg, but even this was burned to nothing by the purity of the water in the center of a dryad Glen. There was a soft sizzling sound, as though the water were on the cusp of boiling, and then the egg was simply gone without a trace.

Amaris whistled. “Effective.”

“Haven’t found anything the Glen can’t purge yet!” Coleus said, putting her hands proudly on her hips. “Take that, darkness, the power of dryads you feared so much is your undoing! You thought you could corrupt us? Well, now we’re Coleu-rrupting you!”

“…I would ask if I can bring my own artifacts of darkness here to purge them when I find them, but something tells me the elders would skewer me.”

“They just wouldn’t let you in,” Coleus said with a sigh. “And they’re giving me the eye, time for us to gooooo.”

They quickly left the Glen and returned to the lazy river. To Amaris’ surprise, Scarlet was there waiting.

“Oh!” Coleus said. “Right, I have an interview. I almost forgot, sorry Scarlet!”

Scarlet nodded. “Well, you’re lucky, we haven’t been waiting very long. And hi, Amaris!”

“Hi Scarlet!”

“I’m afraid I couldn’t turn up much about your encounter a few days ago. There have been a few cases of buildings being vaporized like you described, but there have never been any survivors to question until this time.”

That “angel” must have been really effective on a population that didn’t believe magic existed… Amaris nodded. “Well, that does go with what I currently thought was going on. Looks like something really doesn’t want any of the dark demon things in Yeshalo.”

“Seems that way.”

“Anyway, have fun with your interview!” Amaris said, waving at them. “I’ll see myself out.”

“I’ll have the Strider watch you,” Coleus said, waving Amaris along. “Anyway, Scarlet, what do the people of Yeshalo want to know about me this time?”

“Honestly they want to know what your diabolical plan for world domination is, but we both know that’s not actually a thing, so how about we ask what your plans for the future are?”

“Hmm. Well, my main project is getting all the evil out of the Strider—big project…”

Amaris made her way through the Strider to one of the exits. This was one part of the Strider that had changed the least—the way in and out was to descend one of the lifts. The locations of the lifts had been altered considerably—the fleshy walls were gone, replaced with greenery and wood, for the most part. However, Coleus had chosen not to destroy most of the vehicles, so it was here where some of the Strider’s original variety could be seen. There were a fair deal of normal cars from Nuk, but there were also mechanical things with legs covered in saws, a few fleshy spheres that floated above the ground, and, of course, the Retrograde.

Amaris ran her hand across the vehicle that had gotten them so far. “You’re a good car.”

With that, she descended the lift. Technically speaking she probably should have waited for a platform to arrive, but instead she just jumped on the cable and started climbing down. She eventually arrived at a platform that was already descending that held a small family of squid-people in a jellyfish-like vehicle. They stared at her in bafflement.

She waved happily at them. Unfortunately, the cable ended at the platform, so she couldn’t climb down the rest of the way and had to wait for the ground to be reached. It wasn’t a long wait, though.

That came on the ground. For on the ground there were several dozen military tanks, numerous green tents, and at least a thousand soldiers all keeping a very careful eye on the Strider and everyone who came in and left.

“Do you have your papers?” A tall, gruff man called out to them, easily identified as a General by the platinum star on his uniform and cap. His jaw was square and covered in stubble that somehow managed to look neat. Amaris knew this man—he was General Mason. She saw him almost every time she came to the Strider.

Even though he clearly recognized her, she still took out her papers. “Amaris Kelvin, returning home.”

“Good to see you, Amaris,” he said with a curt nod. “And what about you lot?”

“We need papers?” the squid blubbered.

“Well, if you don’t have them, you’re about to get them! Take yourselves and your vehicle over to registration!” He pointed at a tent with a red flag flapping over top of it. “You’ll get your papers, identification, everything you need! I highly recommend you cooperate!”

“And be patient,” Amaris added. “Losing your patience is a good way to get the big burly men with guns angry at you.”

The squid-people were decidedly unnerved by this, but they did as asked and began the registration process.

General Mason softened slightly—which was to say he no longer looked on the verge of anger and was now just grumpy. Amaris had learned that this was his resting face. The man never smiled.

“As usual you have to wait while we process everything,” General Mason said.

“You’d think the system would know me by now,” Amaris added.

“Everyone gets the same treatment, kid.” Mason crossed his arms. “I’ll let you know when you’re cleared.”

“…I have a question, General.”

“Hmm?”

“Why do you oversee arrivals and departures personally? Surely you have subordinates who could do it.”

“I want to see everything that goes in there and comes out with my own eyes. Everything is a potential new enemy. Most of the people may be harmless, but each new type of person is a new type of enemy that could be encountered. I need to study everything I can. The game has changed, and I’m in a position to be a leader while it's changing." He looked down at her. “In my work, mistakes kill people. I’m preventing future mistakes.”

Amaris smiled. “That’s great, actually. Most people don’t like change.”

“I don’t like it one bit either, but I see it, and I’m not going to stick my hands in my ears and go to la-la land trying to pretend like everything’s going to stay the same.”

“You were definitely the right person to send here.”

“You all just got lucky that I was the closest General here, the President probably would have sent General Piccolo if he had the choice, and handling this situation with that level of ‘by the book’ would have ended in disaster.”

“Involving explosions?”

“Most likely.”

The conversation lulled and Amaris didn’t push. The General liked talking to her, but he wasn’t much of a talker to begin with so she didn’t try to force a conversation out of him. She just waited for several minutes for her papers to clear. It took somewhere between ten and thirty minutes now that she was properly registered and a regular, but for most others it took an hour, and for those who didn’t have any papers at all… they’d be lucky to get out of here before the sun rose tomorrow morning.

It was annoying, to be sure, but at least people were allowed back and forth. Everyone was very fortunate that the military hadn’t set up a permanent blockade. Though Amaris had heard a lot of people complain about it, finding it “unnatural” to have “those monsters” walking on their streets in broad daylight without an armed escort.

Which… to be fair, there were a lot of nasty things coming out of the Strider, but a good chunk of them could just bypass the military checkpoint and had emerged during the first few hours of the Strider’s arrival. It was definitely a complicated situation with a lot of unknowns, but it was what it was. She herself thought the current peaceful and cooperative interactions were the best option, but that was just a feeling. The truth of the matter eluded her. Perhaps in a few years, she could look back on this and know for sure.

“You’re cleared,” General Mason said.

“Yay!” Amaris hopped up. “Thank you, General!”

“Don’t mention it. Good talking to you, tell your folks I said hello.”

“Will do!” With that, Amaris scampered off, back into Nuk proper. It was a long walk, but long walks were nothing to her at this point.

~~~

Later that afternoon, Amaris met up with Emma at a bus stop. The two briefly hugged.

“You ready?” Amaris asked.

Emma rubbed her hands together. “We’ve been waiting a long time for this… of course I am.”

“You sure? Even if a giant rolling monster shows up?”

“W-well you’ll protect me again, right?”

“I’ll certainly do my best, and Jenny will as well.”

“She’s nearby?”

“Talked to her like ten minutes ago, she’s doing that thing where she ‘patrols.’ “ Amaris paused. “Though we know from experience at this point that it’s easy for monsters to distract her…” She put a hand to her chin. “A better warning system might be needed… not sure how to make it though. Yet.”

Emma shivered slightly. “You’re so… cool. Like… in a literal sense! Cool under pressure.”

“There aren’t exactly any monsters here right now.”

“But you stayed cool even with the rock monster thing! You have it… all under control.” As though she had just convinced herself of this fact, Emma lit up. “You’ve got it all under control.”

“Well… I wouldn’t say that…”

“You know, if anyone had told me Amaris was coming back, I wouldn’t have expected her to be too humble. It looks good on you.”

“Thanks.” Amaris turned her head to look forward along the sidewalk. “Think we should get going?”

“Sure.”

They left the bus stop and walked slowly into the depths of Nuk. The roads quickly went from well-maintained to degrading and cracked. Trash littered the streets, and the quality of the architecture was markedly lower than most of the rest of Nuk. Several windows were boarded up, and on at least one house a door was straight-up missing.

“If my parents knew I was here…” Emma muttered to herself.

Amaris frowned. “Where do they think you are, by the way?”

“Your house. Can’t have them knowing of Rin’s existence, after all…”

“Wish you didn’t have to do that.”

Emma nodded. “Be glad you can tell your parents and they won’t call the cops.”

Amaris sighed. They had had this conversation many times and it never went anywhere, always ending with the two of them agreeing the situation sucked and there wasn’t anything they could do about it. They were kids. Curiously more able to battle monsters than to tackle social issues.

A pair of neko men with ski masks on jumped out from a dark alley. “Well well well, what have we here, two little girls lost all alone in the Dregs?”

“Such a shame, they really should teach their kids better navigation skills.”

“They really should,” Amaris agreed, placing herself between the nekos and Emma. “But that is not the case with us, we are here to visit a friend of ours.”

“Ooooh, kids from outside, sneaking away from their parents!”

“My parents know I’m here.”

The neko man glared at her. “You really are making this annoying.” He pulled out a knife. “Maybe you need to scream a little bit…”

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

He laughed and swiped at her. She kicked the knife out of his hand and grabbed it herself, pointing it at him. She raised an incredulous eyebrow.

The first neko was stunned into silence. The second laughed, finding the whole situation hilarious—but then he suddenly pulled out a gun and pulled the trigger.

Amaris was faster than his hand, ducking under the path of the bullet and kicking him right in the arm, knocking his gun away. Rather than taking the gun, she opted to use the force she got from kicking away from the first man and drive her boot into the head of the second. As he went down, she returned to the other neko, who was trying to draw his knife. He got a boot to the face as well and went down.

Amaris stood tall over them, hands smugly on her hips. “I warned you.”

Pitch slithered up her neck and licked her face.

“Woah…” Emma said, looking down at the two men.

“They were ordinary people, no match for me at all.” She gave Emma a wink. “Let’s hurry to Rin’s now, don’t want to inadvertently start a gang war do we?”

~~~

Right smack dab in the middle of the Dregs, there was suddenly a house that wasn’t in a massive state of disrepair. It was everything the houses around it weren’t: clean, big, modern, flashy, and just screamed big money. Hedges in the front yard were cut into animal shapes, there was a beautiful flower garden next to these trees, and there was even a fountain with sculptures of nude dancing nekos.

Amaris had not actually been to Rin’s house prior to this, so the fountain statues were more than a little startling. Art like that always made her feel weird in a way she couldn’t describe. She would have suspected that meant something puberty-related, but she had gone through that while she was out on her journey.

She was suddenly struck by the sensation that she didn’t remember the struggles that came with puberty all that much, they all came during her journey and seemed to be minor compared to all the chaos going on around her at all times. She had just… gone from a kid to a somewhat taller kid. The experiences of her journey meant a lot more to her than any physical differences that had occurred along the way.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

“You okay?” Emma asked.

“Just… felt like I might have missed a part of childhood entirely.” She paused. “I was about to say that was ‘no big deal’ but that probably is a bigger deal than I think it is.”

Emma put a hand on her back. “I think you’re alright.”

“Thanks.” Amaris walked up to the front door and knocked.

The doors quickly opened to reveal a tall neko woman in an outfit that was not only very revealing but also clearly expensive with all that gold-trimmed velvet. She was smoking something in a long thin pipe.

“Ah, Rin’s friends,” the woman said, breathing a ring of smoke into the air.

“Yep!” Amaris said. “We’re here for the sleepover!”

Mrs. Kugimiya took a moment to scrutinize the two of them—she clearly didn’t trust the girls. But she found nothing worthy of balking at, so she put on a forced smile and invited the two of them in. “Rin! Your friends are here!”

Rin was there in a second. “Girls!” She pulled Emma and Amaris into a hug. “Oh, I’m so glad you’re here!”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Emma said.

“You sure that’s technically true?” Amaris asked.

“Amaris! It’s an expression! Not everything has to be so rigid!”

“I dunno, could lead to miscommunications…”

At this point, Rin’s Father, Mr. Kugimiya, opened the door to his office. He was wearing a very nice black suit and had a cane that he clearly didn’t need to use to walk, he just had it to look fancy. He and his wife briefly embraced in what was clearly meant to be a passionate kiss but to Amaris looked more like two robots going through their programming without thinking.

Then Mr. Kugimiya turned his attention to the three girls. “Welcome to the Kugimiya household. Don’t touch anything that isn’t in Rin’s room, and even then listen to what Rin tells you to do. You may stay up as late as you wish tonight so long as you are quiet once the two of us go to bed. Dinner is seasoned chicken tenders, by Rin’s request, and it will be sent up to her room. You are to enjoy yourselves, but respect the house and the ground it rests on. Do you girls understand?”

Amaris nodded, though she was mildly confused as to why Mr. Kugimiya was bothering to say all this. It wasn’t painting a very favorable impression.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have more work to do.” He patted Rin on the head. “Dazzle them, my little spark.”

Rin beamed like this was the best compliment she had ever received. “Amaris gives me some competition, dad.”

“Healthy competition strengthens us.”

Mrs. Kugimiya folded her arms. “I don’t know about that…”

“Let them have their fun.”

Mrs. Kugimiya looked like she wanted to object, but she shook her head. “Yes, you girls have fun. Rin, remember who you are.”

Rin locked her hands behind her back. “The heir of the Kugimiya fortune!”

“Yes, and remember what that means.” With that, the two adults were out of sight. The three girls quickly scrambled up the stairs and to Rin’s room, which was decidedly large. The bed was king-sized, there was a massive window that overlooked the street outside, a carpet patterned with various colors of flower shapes, and a full entertainment system with every video game console Amaris had ever heard of, and some she hadn’t. Not to mention the giant princess dolls and plushies Rin had carefully stacked in one corner of her room.

Emma let out a low whistle. “Impressive.”

“Being stinking rich has its perks,” Rin said with a wry grin. “Including the ability to throw an excellent party, and I finally get to test it out!” She pulled a remote out of a cabinet and pointed it at the ceiling. Immediately a disco ball descended and various colored lights turned on, along with some dance music playing at a loud but not too loud to be talked over volume. “Tah-dah!”

“Rin, this is amazing!” Emma cheered, jumping up and attempting to dance, revealing that she really didn’t know how to. There was something endearing about the erratic, crazed motions, though.

Amaris put down her backpack, allowing Pitch to slide onto her arm. Then she twirled out into the middle of the room, landing with an outstretched hand in front of Emma. “Would you like to learn a bit?”

“A-amaris! You don’t like…”

“I’m not performing for anyone here,” Amaris said, grabbing Emma’s hand. “I can show you some things.”

“O—okay!”

And so Amaris took Emma’s hands in her own and started twirling her around—slowly at first, taking the time to tell Emma exactly what she was doing, what sorts of steps needed to be taken, and how to keep everything balanced. Then she’d twirl away and start doing the same for Rin.

Rin was far less receptive to instruction than Emma, for Rin kind of knew how to dance. Only formal, high-society dances though, and she never got to practice outside of her parent’s insistence. It took some time but Amaris eventually got her shuffling her feet to a beat.

“That’s the spirit!” Amaris said, clapping her hands. “One, two, one, two, left, right, left right.”

Emma got the brilliant idea to try to dance with Rin, and Rin confidently agreed. The two tried to twirl each other around at the same time, which only resulted in their legs getting locked up and the two of them falling to the ground.

Amaris burst into delighted laughter, slapping her knee. “You two need a bit more practice!”

“…But soon I’ll be even better than you!” Rin declared.

“Oh, you sure?” Amaris proceeded to perform a triple-flip in the air, slamming her foot into the ceiling, then landed on the ground with her hands where she proceeded to walk all the way to a corner and flip back, landing gracefully on her feet with her arms outstretched.

Emma clapped. “Amaris, that was amazing!”

Rin was clapping as well, though with disbelief on her face.

Amaris took a bow. “I can sort of see it now… how the motion of the body is itself an art, much like drawing or singing.” She thrust her leg into the air, striking a pose. “I think… that it’s good a few people see what I can do, every now and then. You two aren’t a faceless audience.”

Emma pressed her hands together in front of her mouth. “Amaris… I know how much this means to you, and I…”

“Don’t need to say anything, we are here to celebrate, right?”

Emma flushed slightly but nodded. “Right. Celebrate. Ahem.”

“So… what now?” Rin asked, sitting down on her bed. “I’ve got games, dances…”

There was a knock at the door. “Dinner!” Mrs. Kugimiya called.

“Food sounds like a good option!” Amaris said, opening the door.

Mrs. Kugimiya set out three plates on a little table. She glanced at the disco ball and all the fancy lights going on, smiling at Rin. “Well done!”

Rin bowed. “Thanks, mom.”

“You show them what you’re made of.” She winked and left the three of them to their devices.

“She’s really… supportive,” Emma noted.

“Yeah.” Rin said, smiling. “She really is the best mom ever.”

Emma and Amaris glanced to each other with uncertainty.

“Oh, you don’t think so?”

Emma eeped. “I—I didn’t say that…”

“She was thinking it though, we both were,” Amaris said.

Rin’s expression soured. “Oh, so yours are better?”

“Eh…” Emma looked at the ground. “Mine would call the police on your entire family if they knew I was here.”

“I’d say my Mom is better,” Amaris added. “But like, she has her problems. Likes messing with people a bit too much. Gives more credit to emotions than she should.”

“So mine’s the best then, yours have problems.”

“Well… Rin, nobody’s perfect, the chances of…” Amaris stopped herself, a probabilistic argument wasn’t going to get anywhere here. “The only reason anything happened is because we were concerned about you.”

Rin tilted her head. “You… huh?”

“Everyone should think their mom is great, but saying she is the best ever, after she specifically goes out of her way to try to make you give a good impression on visitors through leverage?” Amaris folded her arms. “…She’s even coached you on what to do and say, hasn’t she?”

Rin looked down at the ground. “A lady always seeks to make the best impression, even if it isn’t necessary.”

“But you don’t have to be a lady with us.”

“No… I don’t.” After a moment of nothing, she picked up the remote and turned off the crystal ball and the lights. “Come on, let’s play some Skyline Fighter and forget all this nonsense.”

Emma whined. “Awww, why that fighting game?”

“Because I want to beat you two up, obviously.”

“You’re on!” Amaris said.

“And I, the little third girl, will die to the crossfire…” Emma sighed.

Emma then proceeded to win the first match because Amaris and Rin threw each other off the edge.

“Huh.” She took a bite of the seasoned chicken tenders. “…You know these are just chicken nuggets.”

“I call them my nugs when nobody’s looking,” Rin said with a giggle. “Mom’s all on about how I have to eat refined, specialty food… but nugs, man. Nugs are second only to fresh fish. But I chose nugs for tonight since I thought you two would like them.”

“I can never eat fast food nugs again,” Amaris said. “So great…”

“Hey!” Jenny called from the window. “Can I have one?”

The three girls looked up and stared at Jenny. She waved back at them.

Rin marched over to the window and opened it. “You have to be careful, you could set off the security system.” She handed Jenny a nugget.

Jenny took it and bit into it ravenously. “You already showed me how to get around that.”

“You are going to trip it anyway through carelessness.”

“Pfft, this is Jenny you’re talking about, not gonna happen.”

“Wait,” Amaris said, holding up a hand. “You’ve been here before and know how to bypass the security system?”

Jenny nodded. “Yeah, I’ve checked Rin out a few times. Was spying her out to make sure she wasn’t an evil were-cat, you understand.”

“Jenny’s been to my house too,” Emma said. “My brother likes her.”

“How did I not know about this?” Amaris asked.

Jenny shrugged. “Wasn’t important, I guess?” She munched more on the nugget. “Anyway, just wanted some food. The coast looks clear, no sign of monsters or freaky curse dispensers.”

“Thanks, Jenny,” Amaris said. “Sure you don’t want to come in?”

“Hmm… party inside a rich girl’s bedroom… patrol around the block and beat up would-be robbers. I like option two better. You’d be surprised how many vagabonds just want to rob and take advantage of a little girl walking around.”

Rin sighed. “I am soooo glad you girls can handle that. Nobody’s braved the journey before today. …Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Jenny said with a wink. “Now, I…”

They heard the shattering of glass downstairs.

Rin’s eyes narrowed. “Why didn’t the alarm…?”

Jenny cracked her knuckles and hopped into the room. “Looks like I’m going to check that out. You three wait here.” She left the room and descended the stairs.

Rin sighed. “Well, whatever it is, it’s being taken care of.” She folded her arms grumpily. “Now we wait.”

Amaris nodded, contemplating whether she should go down to help Jenny. She decided not—she could stay here and protect the girls just in case. She walked over to the open window and grabbed it, intending to close and lock it tight.

There was suddenly a face in the darkness. Followed quickly by a fist that hit Amaris in the face and sent her skidding back into the room.

A very large human man pulled himself in while Amaris was dazed, holding a gun in his other hand. He pointed it right at Amaris. “Nobody move! No—”

Amaris collected her wits and kicked the gun right out of the man’s hand, following this motion up with a kick to the chest. The man managed to take the attack head-on without being thrown out the window. He planted his feet in the ground and drove his fist forward. Amaris was able to twist herself, but not to avoid the attack entirely. The fist grazed her jaw and she was knocked into the pile of plushies.

She jumped out, ready for more fight—but the intruder was smart. Instead of focusing on Amaris, he grabbed Emma’s neck. “Stand down, kid!”

Amaris froze, feet planted in the ground. She was too far away to reach Emma, and it would be too risky to take out her crossbow. She started running through her options and was liking less and less how “be cooperative” seemed to be the best one.

She lowered her hands. “What do you want?” She glanced to Rin as she said this, checking to make sure she was okay. While Emma was clearly scared out of her wits, Rin was… while not exactly calm, she had an aura of control about her. Her hand was placed firmly on the edge of her nightstand.

The intruder dragged Emma with him as he walked over to his gun, picking it up. “You got quite the pair of legs on you, kid.”

“Been through a lot,” Amaris said.

“I wonder what a good, strong kid like you is doing in the house of these backward wretches…” He shrugged. “Doesn’t really matter. Here’s how we’re going to do this. First, I am going to tie all three of you up. Then we are going to go down to where my partner has taken care of the ‘man’ of the house and demand he give us access to his bank account for your safety. Make sense?”

“Sense? Yes.” Amaris’ nose twitched. “Do I like it? No.”

“Why not? You get to live, and these rats get some of their haughty possessions taken from them. We’re doing the world a favor!”

Amaris glared. “You’re just doing this because this is the easiest way you could think of to make a quick buck, don’t get all high and mighty with me.”

The man scowled at her. “…If you had a pair of ears, this bullet would have had your name on it.”

I was actually hoping to provoke you into shooting, I could take advantage of that…

“But I don’t want to chance anything. So…” He released his hand from Emma’s neck and took out a piece of rope. “I think I’ll need the special knots for you.”

“Good eye,” Amaris said.

“Thought so. No—”

There was a gunshot from somewhere downstairs, followed very quickly by a second, slightly different in tone. The intruder’s eyes widened and he turned to the door. “That wasn’t his gun…”

Now that the intruder was properly distracted, Rin all but threw open her nightstand’s drawer and pulled out a single, ornate throwing knife. With expert precision, she threw the blade, embedding it right in the intruder’s neck, spraying blood over Emma’s face.

Amaris let out a wince as the intruder fell to the ground, lifeless.

“Are you two okay?” Rin asked, running over.

“Me, yes,” Amaris said. “Emma?”

Emma was staring blankly at the dead body in front of her.

Amaris quickly ran to her. “Emma it’s not your fault, he was trying to steal from Rin’s family and was probably going to kill them later. Rin just acted in self-defense and…”

“Did he deserve it?” Emma asked.

Amaris frowned, looking down at the body. “I… geez, Emma, that’s a hard one…”

“…Did he?”

“…I think, in some sense, everyone deserves punishment. But we should never dole it out unless we don’t have a choice.”

Emma stared at the body, blankly. “…Amaris?”

“Yes, Emma?”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Emma, I didn’t think you were…”

“Somewhere in your mind, you were.” She smiled sadly. “You can’t hide your feelings that well.”

Amaris frowned. “Emma, you can still…”

Emma shook her head. “I… Amaris, you shouldn’t have to be alone.”

Rin grumbled. “Would you two stop trying to be supportive of each other and missing it? There’s a dead body in my room and there were gunshots downstairs! We should probably deal with that!”

At this point, Jenny threw the door open, Rin’s parents behind her. “Okay so we’ve got a dead body down there, genius here shot the robber.”

“He shot you!” Mr. Kugimiya blurted.

“I’m fine, aren’t I?”

“How was I supposed to know that?”

“Believe Rin’s stories, maybe?” Jenny suggested with a shrug.

Mr. Kugimiya snorted. “Am I supposed to believe all the nonsense tall tales of ‘Amaris the Great Adventurer?’ How absurd.”

“I mean, I am Jenny, and I am in a lot of those…”

“This is unimportant,” Mrs. Kugimiya said, her ears flicking. “We have two dead humans in our house. This is bad.”

Emma stared at the body, frowning. “W-why? They can’t do anything to hurt us anymore…”

“Innocence, so annoying…” Mrs. Kugimiya grunted. “Look, we don’t have time to explain.”

“Yes we do,” Rin said, clearing her throat. “The police will find a way to blame us for them, calling us murderers. We are nekos, they are humans. Self-defense doesn’t work that well in court for us.”

“Stupid,” Amaris grumbled.

“You try to fix it.”

“Easier said than done, but I’m looking.”

“You three need to leave,” Mr. Kugimiya said. “It’ll look even worse if you’re here.” He glanced at the clock. “I think half an hour before the reports of gunshots reach the police… if we can clean this place spotless they’ll write it off as another loon shooting a gun into the sky just for the heck of it.”

“I’ll get the blood cleaner,” Mrs. Kugimiya added as she ran out.

Amaris picked up her backpack. “Can I try calling my parents to pick us up?”

“You may,” Mr. Kugimiya said. He led her to the phone and she dialed. As expected, she got the answering machine—everyone was asleep at this point.

“Guess we’re walking…” Amaris said. “Jenny, stick close by Emma and me, things might get dicey.”

Jenny saluted. “Roger that!”

“Emma, everything’s going to be okay,” Amaris said. Emma didn’t need her help to stand, but Amaris offered her support anyway and got her to the front door. “We’ve got you.”

“Who’s got them, though?” Emma asked.

Amaris glanced nervously back at Rin’s parents, who were arguing about the best ways to dispose of the bodies and clean the mess they’d made. Rin was standing beside them, looking more… annoyed, than anything. Annoyed that her sleepover got ruined by a couple of intruders. She waved to Amaris sadly as she and the other girls left, setting out into the cold night air.

~~~

“Antonio says talking about it is the best thing to do,” Amaris told Emma as they walked along the street lit only by the incandescent slightly yellowed lamps that hung over the sidewalks.

“T-talk about what?”

“The brutal death of a bad guy,” Jenny said with decidedly less of a serious tone than the situation required. She put her hands behind her back and walked backward so she could look Emma in the face the entire time. “It’s a thing most people have a problem accepting.”

“I’ve… accepted it. It’s fine. I’m…” Emma shook her head. “No, no, I’m not fine, I want to run to daddy and tell him everything but I can’t do that and…”

“You can run to us,” Amaris said, holding her friend by the shoulders. “You can always talk to us.”

“Th-thanks…” Emma said, holding herself close. “It’s just… he’s dead. R-right through the neck. By Rin.” Emma wrapped her arms around herself as though she was trying to keep warm. “If… if that had gone a little differently, that would be me lying there. Dead.” She turned to Amaris with terrified eyes. “I don’t think I’ve ever really thought about that before. Being… dead.”

“That’s something I’ve never thought of at all,” Jenny said. “Can’t really be dead.”

Amaris glared at Jenny. “Jenny…”

“What’s it like?” Jenny asked.

Amaris was about to scold Jenny for being insensitive, but this question got Emma to calm down and really think about it. “It feels like… like it’s impossible. I can’t imagine not being me, not having this body, not walking around… but I know it has to happen. That I have a soul in here that will move on and this body will rot to bones. But… how can I be me without this body? It… it is me! It’s how I see, it’s how I taste, it’s… how can it go away?”

Amaris blinked. This was… not at all how she considered it. Her eventual death was just a fact that needed to be accepted, her emotions on the concept were secondary and nearly irrelevant. It was what it was and there was no use fretting over exactly what it meant. But there was something to Emma’s words… and with them came fear of the unknown.

“I don’t know,” Amaris eventually said. “I could talk about death being a natural process of life, a part of the process of being a person, and about how Dia takes us all in the end… but… you’re right, there’s something strange about it. Something… that doesn’t feel right.” She looked up at the stars in the sky. “Maybe we just think we understand it, but we really don’t. There may be something secret… something to uncover.”

“I’m sure you’ll uncover it eventually,” Emma said. “You’re going to become the most interesting person in the world.”

“I wonder if the curse really does go that far…” Amaris smiled awkwardly. “You know, by sticking around me, you will become more interesting yourself. You’ll have to keep asking these questions.”

“If there’s one thing you’ve taught me it’s that avoiding thinking about questions is very, very bad.” She giggled softly. “I’m not going to run away. You and Rin don’t deserve to be alone for this.”

“Me and…” Amaris suddenly stopped in her tracks, staring far into nothing. “Holy cow…”

“What is it?”

“This… none of this has been my curse, at least not mostly.” Amaris turned to stare at the Dredge around them, with all the worn-down houses and obvious evidence of poverty. “This isn’t me running into ‘interesting’ robbers, robbers are commonplace here. Rin’s family is the richest here, of course they’d be targeted, especially by people who think they can get away with robbing nekos…” Amaris’ eyes regained focus on Emma. “This is Rin’s life, Emma.”

Emma made a small, horrified gasp. “Oh my…”

“She wasn’t just lucky with that throw, she was prepared for it. Her parents know how to dispose of bodies and generally how long it will be until the police arrive. This… this is normal, here. Where the nekos are forced to live… there are just everyday horrors.” Amaris pressed her hands together. “Her life has been much harder than we realized… we… we should do something…”

“…All we can do is be her friend, Amaris.” Emma turned to Jenny. “You too, you know.”

Jenny rubbed the back of her head. “I… guess. I’m more of a roaming vagabond.”

“I think you’re using that incorrectly,” Amaris said.

“Yeah, well… you’re a smarty pants.” Jenny crossed her arms. “So there.”

“True.”

“By the way, Emma, you should probably wipe that blood off your face.”

Emma gasped. “Oh my gosh I entirely forgot! I…” She used her dress to wipe her face, but the dress was now red. “Augh! I can’t show this to my parents, they’ll…”

“We’re going to my house,” Amaris said. “I have extra clothes for you. …Plus, your parents think you’re at my house anyway, so…”

“Oh. Oh, good, I was…” Emma took a moment to breathe. “I was panicking… how was I going to explain a bloody dress to my parents!?”

“Burn it and pretend like the dress never existed,” Jenny suggested.

“This is one of my favorite dresses though and they know it… but we can clean it at Amaris’ house.”

“Blood might be hard to get rid of…” Amaris said. “We could ask Rin later about how to really get it out.”

“Probably.” Emma paused. “…We really can just ask her that and expect an answer, huh?”

“Yep.”

“How… I don’t know the word.”

“Unsettling?”

“A bit.”

At this point, Amaris heard a door open and close—it was sudden, loud, and shocking. She whirled around, looking for someone who had just come out of a door, but saw none. She found herself mildly confused by the fact that she couldn’t tell which direction the sound had come from. She checked above and below her just in case something weird was going on, but saw nothing.

“You two heard that, right?” Amaris asked. Both Emma and Jenny nodded. “Right… so, I think we’re dealing with my curse now, something weird is probably after us. Be on the lookout, everyone.”

Jenny lit one of her fists on fire. “It’s go time.”

There was a loud rumble from somewhere below them. Emma’s usual trick of hiding behind Amaris couldn’t apply to an enemy coming from the ground, so she just squeezed as closely as she could to Amaris’ position. Jenny’s fists were ready to punch the ground, and Amaris had her crossbow drawn and pointed downward.

A claw emerged from below as if the ground was made of liquid, various rocks and pebbles slipping off the browned flesh like water droplets.

Amaris and Jenny wasted no time. The crossbow bolt sailed true, embedding itself in the claw, though it had no visible effect. Jenny’s fist, on the other hand, made contact with the claw, lighting it entirely on fire. There was a loud yip from somewhere beneath the ground, and the hand retracted back below their feet.

“Ha!” Jenny shouted, stomping on the ground. “That’ll teach you to try to claw Jenny and company!” She lit her fist on green fire this time. “Now let’s see if you’re going to go for round two of punishment…”

The claw did in fact appear again, except this time it appeared directly beneath Jenny. Before she could do anything, it wrapped around both of her legs and pulled down. Suddenly, the ground was liquid to Jenny as well and she was pulled beneath the ground.

The ground quickly solidified, just in time to completely block a crossbow bolt from Amaris.

Both Amaris and Emma could hear muffled screams from beneath the ground. They weren’t screams of panic—this was Jenny, after all—they were more screams of rage and anger. The screams of someone buried alive and unable to move in any direction, someone choking on earth falling down their throat and ignoring the pain.

Alongside the angered screams of Jenny there was also the sound of the creature. It was also muffled from its position below the ground, but it did not have rocks in its throat, for it could easily bark and snarl and tear away, no doubt getting quite annoyed that Jenny wasn’t dying.

However, Jenny did eventually go silent.

“Wh…” Emma said.

“She’s fine, just passed out,” Amaris said, continuing to point her crossbow at the ground. “We won’t be able to survive that.”

Emma nodded. “What do we do?”

“The creature’s ground-based… hold on!” Amaris quickly grabbed Emma by the waist and jumped. It wasn’t an overly impressive jump, but it was enough to land them on a street lamp. It was fortunately a dry night and Amaris was able to get enough traction on the metal to pull herself up, away from the ground. Looking down, she saw the claw retreat into the ground where they had just been a moment before.

Amaris pulled them the rest of the way up with a very awkward motion—one of her arms was holding Emma tightly and the other was basically all she was using to hold onto the streetlamp. She was unable to use her crossbow—it was currently hanging loose from her backpack. Amaris did manage to pull both of them on top of the lamp, though it was enough to make her need to catch her breath.

However, they were away from the ground. The beast would have to come out of the ground to get to them.

Without warning, the claw emerged from the streetlamp itself, slicing at them. Amaris let out a scream of panic and jumped, dragging Emma with her. This motion was far less coordinated than what she had done to get on top of the street lamp—both of them hit the ground hard and rolled a fair distance, dazed.

The creature formed fully on top of the street lamp, revealing it to have a humanoid shape, though it was far taller and more muscular than any human should have been. Its feet and hands were tipped with claws, and its body was covered in a thin brown fur. The face was that of a jackal, but with ears that had been burned and eyes that were swollen shut. It lifted its snout to the night sky and howled. Then, instead of jumping down, it vanished into the street lamp and emerged from the base, ignoring the fact that there wasn’t enough physical space inside the lamp to hold its body.

“Stay perfectly still!”

Amaris tensed. That was Rin’s voice. She performed a calculation—trust the voice, or think it could be a trick? She didn’t have time to debate; the jackal-monster was extremely close and she didn’t think she could fight it. It also had broken ears and swollen eyes…

She’s right, it can’t see us. Amaris readily took to the advice. Emma did the same, though Amaris doubted it was because she’d figured it out—she just trusted Rin’s voice.

The jackal-monster moved its head to the left and to the right. It stomped its foot into the ground a few times, not out of anger, but as some kind of listening motion. Testing the ground, feeling for vibrations in the ripples it created. It snarled, apparently displeased that it wasn’t finding anything. It angrily lashed out in random directions, clearly aware that there had to still be people here, but lacking the intelligence to precisely find them. The only casualty from the mad lashing out was the lamp itself, which with one swiping motion was cut cleanly in half, plunging the nearby street into darkness.

The jackal-monster let out another howl before disappearing into the ground.

Somewhere, Amaris heard a door slam.

At this point, there were suddenly arms wrapped around Amaris. She almost reacted defensively, but she recognized Rin quickly enough to cancel that. “R-rin!?”

“I was so worried when I realized what time you left!” Rin said as she ran over to Emma. “I knew with your curse you’d be basically guaranteed to meet the Blind Dogman…”

“Blind Dogman?” Emma asked.

“Local legend. Walks around between midnight and one AM, supposedly takes children to the netherworld for being bad, but it’s blamed for all sorts of things around here. Most don’t believe it’s real… but you, Amaris…”

“Yeah, of course it would be attracted to me the one night I’m here,” Amaris said with a chuckle. “…Thanks for saving us.”

“I just knew what the legends said to do. I’d… never seen it myself.”

“I’ll have to mark it in my notes…” Amaris said, taking out a notebook. “If we figure out a plan, maybe we could capture the beast…”

“That can move through any solid object?” Emma asked.

“It’ll be… hard, yes, and I don’t think we can do it yet, but maybe one day we can get rid of this… Blind Dogman.”

“I sure hope you can,” Rin said. “Because no one thinks it’s real. That it’s all stories.”

“Yeshalo sure seems to have that problem even with magic staring them in the face…” Amaris muttered. “Maybe we sh—”

“Rin Kugimiya!”

The girls turned around to see Rin’s parents drive up in their gold-painted sports car. Her dad looked afraid—her mother looked furious.

“A Lady does not rush out in the middle of the night during a crisis!”

“The Blind Dogman was going to get them!” Rin shouted back. “I had to help!”

“Blind Dogman!? Please! You need to let go of these stories and face reality!” Her mother marched out of the car and grabbed Rin by the nose. “You are the heir of the Kugimiya fortune, remember what you are worth! You cannot be… risking yourself like this on a whim!”

“Y-yes mother…”

“Come, your dad and I have cleaned up the house, we need to get you back quickly.” She quickly herded Rin back into the car. “As for you two…”

“Yes?” Amaris asked.

Mrs. Kugimiya looked them up and down again, eyes narrowing. “I… forget it.” She muttered something about ‘kids’ under her breath and waved her hand, which her husband took as an indication to get going.

Emma and Amaris remained, standing in the cold night air. The two friends stared at the place their friend had just been with great uncertainty in their expressions.

“…We should probably mark where Jenny’s buried so we can dig her up later,” Emma said.

Amaris blinked. “Oh, right, yeah that would be important, wouldn’t it?”

Pitch hissed in agreement.