The heavens were in tumult, with blood, darkness and fire raining down onto the world below. A dark gray streak weaved its way through the blue white clouds, tearing apart its neighbors. Shoveling their flesh into its ever hungering maw.
A million armed, million winged, million eyed serpent with burning green eyes swam on the air currents. The smaller tendrils simply absorbed the smaller prey, the larger limbs tore into larger foes and drew them close so the great beast could swallow them whole.
A flock of sky whales tried to scatter and flee, only to be gathered up and consumed. Then for next few hours the sky shook and shuddered as two great beasts railed against each other. Somehow the new lord of the south, managed to run into the lord of east, the great blue winged tundra-phoenix. A great bird of cold blue flame spewed burning ice the serpentine creature of deep gray nothingness. The gray, million limbed, serpent spat out a beam of explosive nothingness.
The phoenix cried out, its call haughty and prideful, the serpent roared, enraged. Claw met claw, beak met fang. Several mountains and small forests were blown away as collateral damage. Then there was an explosion of gelid blue light that fell onto the lands below as frozen rain and crimson snow.
The Lord of the Eastern Sky was consumed without any ceremony but the lord of the Southern Sky was still not sated. Flying low, switching targets to creatures below since all the beasts of the air had already fled and those that hadn’t were too large and too powerful to be targeted.
The dark gray beast swallowed up stones and sand and soil, taking bites out of mountains and drinking up whole lakes. Occasionally descending on groups of raiders and bandits, that would try to flee and fail, finding themselves either inhaled whole into the creature’s massive maw or entangled by the beast’s tendrils.
After its assault on the world below it turned its millions eyes up towards the heavens and something like a grim look of determination crossed its face as it flew up towards one of those beasts that it had previously judged to be beyond its reach. A hungry roar that sounded like thunder and echoed across the continent, issued from the beast, as it flew upwards towards the higher layers of the sky.
*****
Elena yawned as she stepped out of her office and saw her second best friend having finally surrendered to the sandman. Edna was in the kitchen, snoring softly, an empty mug of tea at her side. An open jar of jam and a slice of toast, lying just a little ways away. A bit of drool dribbling down the corner of her mouth and down onto the paperwork she was currently using as a pillow.
“Eddie, Eddie, Eddie…’Someone’ is going to sore in the morning.” Elena chided. Chuckling softly as she moved everything aside, collecting the paperwork and then tossing a blanket across her friend’s shoulder.
Elena looked at the saliva moistened paperwork and was unsurprised to find that it was more or less complete. That was Edna in a nutshell. Always trying to do what was proper and making sure the important things got done. There was a reason why she was or less their team's mom. Constantly fretting, constantly nagging, constantly working to make sure everyone had what they needed.
Elena looked through the paperwork to see if there was anything that she had to do on her end. Not seeing anything of that nature she put the papers with the rest off the files, that lay in Edna’s office. Leaving them there for her to find when she woke up in the morning.
*****
A quick series of clicks through the phoneband’s menus and she found herself outside, several miles from gene. In an area that she’d deemed her ‘launching pad’ this where she generally scoped out areas that they were going to use the N-Doors to travel to. She crouched, world growing slightly still and slightly flat as the levels of her active aether spiked. Her aura rising as she gathered the power inside her and channeled it to her lower body and back.
The earth trembled ever so slightly, the wide but shallow crater that had been created by all her previous jumps, growing just a little bit wider and deeper. Like wound up spring, she leapt up, rocketing into the air. Moving so fast that if it weren’t for her enhanced senses the world around her wouldn’t even be a blur. It’d just be noise and color, that would soon resolve to blankness because the g-forces that were acting on her body would knock a non-practitioner out in an instant.
Soon she was up so high that the air started growing thin, high enough that she could see heavens expanding above her, every star in the night sky winking at her. For all that this wasn’t the first time she was doing this, she was still awed all the same.
She’d long left peak velocity, slowing down and just a few seconds from entering a free fall . The same few seconds that sometimes had her wondering if one day she’d jump so high she escaped the planets hold. A scary thought, that gave her chills that were both pleasant and unpleasant. Excited and afraid.
She looked down on the world below, her pupils dilated, her eyes filled with a violet-gray fire. She was just high enough that she could see the part of the continent that they’d be heading to. She was in fact, just high enough to see the tip of a few of the other continents. Most of them inhospitable for people, but a few would handy coordinates to have.
Just as she’d managed to finish her task she felt something appear behind her. Massive and powerful, making her regret doing this while Edna was asleep and no one was there to have her back. She turned in place, heart pumping, adrenaline and aether surging through her system.
Her tail wrapped around her arm becoming an impromptu lance.
She was just about to strike out when she recognized the thing behind her, when she recognized the person behind her.
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“Nh...You fly these skies often?” said Billy. The attempt at humor lost somewhere in the midst of his inflection-less words and total lack of expression.
Elena did slightly better.
“Mhm...That old line about it hurting when sexy angels fall, seems all the more appropriate when you meet one that’s actually falling.”
Billy snorted, pretending that the heat in his cheeks had more to do with the acidic blood that had been spattered onto his face.
“Nh...I guess. In any case, how about we stop? The view from here is quite beautiful you know.” he said. Looking out at the sand dunes and hillocks below, the whole world painted a silvery blue by the light of Monde’s moons. Snapping his fingers and arresting gravity with nary incantation or sign of increased focus. His ability to use magic freely, growing as his cultivation did.
Elena just smiled, not commenting about the fact that they were now literally walking on air, possibly because she was figuratively walking on air. She put her hands on his bare shoulders and found them sticky and red, but found she didn’t care.
“Hey, Will?”
“Yeah?”
“I kind of want to kiss you now. Would you mind, magicking the stuff on your face off? It’s... fizzing in a way that makes me pretty sure it wouldn’t healthy for either of us.”
Billy blinked.
“Er...okay.”
Just like that remnants of his ‘messy meal’ were gone from both of them. He’d even changed into clean shirt.
Elena smiled again, aware that her look was slightly foolish, but fine with it, she’d never been the sort to care about looking stupid. She leaned in close and kissed him. A long deep, soft kiss, that left them both just a little bit breathless.
“Nh…” said Billy, his many lines of parallel thought coming with nothing.
“Mhm...I’ve been wanting to do that for quite a while. Kind I wish I’d brought you some gum though, I could taste whatever it was you just ate. Whatever you were eating was a bit...unique.”
“...S-, sorry.” said Billy. Suddenly exactly as young as he looked.
“Nah. I didn’t say it was bad. Nor did I say I mind. It was just a little bit strange. Is all. Besides, I’m a big hearted woman...I don’t sweat the small stuff. said Elena. Punctuating her lofty words with a lofty laugh.
“Oh..um..okay then.”
“Mhm, oh right!...we left you something nice in the inventory. It’s part of a gigas star that we killed. We know how you like strange materials. For eating and making things...whatever.”
“...Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it.” said Elena. Flushed and happy and maybe just a little bit light headed since they were still quite high in the sky and the air was thin up there.
“You should definitely visit Ed, before you go. She’s been missing you even more than I have.”
“Er...I’ll do that.” said Billy.
*****
Edna was all business, alternating between talking about how the company was doing and complaining about Billy’s expansion of her executive duties. Which to be fair were about a thousand times more than either Elena or Billy’s were.
Billy sat and accepted her complaints and then he cooked them all a sumptuous sky whale roast, with a pasta casserole and a salad made of medicinal veggies. Simple, Homie fair, but filling and tasty. Edna asked him how long he’d be out in the hinterland. He answered vaguely, with an answer of ‘a little while longer’. Which combined with his flat tone could have meant anything from a few weeks to a few decades. Though Elena really hoped that, that wasn’t the case.
The visit ended predictably, with Billy giving them both a metric shitton of cultivation enhancing gifts and leaving, with a final word of thanks and apology. Elena watched it all from the background because she’d been hanging back. Wanting to let the two have their moment and maybe see if Edna finally made her move.
Long story short she didn’t. Which was fine. The choice was hers after all. Whether she wanted to pursue a relationship of that sort with Billy, or not was ‘her’ prerogative and whatever happened was between them. Elena had simply decided to cheer her two friends on no matter what the case was.
Billy left and once again it was just the two of them. Then there was a loud thunk, which grabbed Elena’s attention. She turned and saw Edna standing at the front door. Her forehead pressed against it.
“What?! What happened?”
“....I just realized that I haven’t seen that stupid guy in nearly seven months and I just spent the last six hours talking about work.” said Edna.
It took a second for Elena to get it, but when she got it she couldn’t help laughing at her friend’s befuddlement. Covering up the last of her laughter with a cough and then patting the girl on the back.
“Next time, Ed. Next time. No worries. ”