The Aztec landline rang in the middle of the foyer and, after some hurried negotiations between the nearby Pimoi, was picked up by Omet. “Hi, you've reached the, uh... house. This is someone's house.”
“Hey, it's Waia.”
“Oh, hi, Waia.” Omet gave a thumbs-up to the Aztecs listening in on their conversation. “How's your little excursion doing?”
“Oh, y'know, ups and downs. Mark and I are hiding in a pipe right now.”
“I'm here,” came Mark's voice.
Omet clutched the receiver with their free hand. “Wait, did something happen? Do you two need help?”
"Can confirm,” said Mark, “a lot of somethings happened. Waia did most of them. If the Servants didn't know about us before, they absolutely do now. Also, we're completely surrounded and could possibly be taken out at any moment, so I should probably get to the point sooner. Some help from the outside would definitely be appreciated, thanks.”
“Okay, uh, um, do you know where you are? Like, exactly?”
"We're about five minutes away from Cuernavaca,” said Waia, “on the way to your place. Tough to miss us, there's a giant circle of people with guns holding us in place. Not sure what any of you can do to help, but Mark thinks that there's nothing we can do from inside the gun-circle.”
“Uh... Be right there. Promise. Bye.” Omet put down the receiver and stared at the landline for a moment.
One of their siblings put her hand on their shoulder. “Hey, spill it.”
“Yeah, uh...” Omet turned and looked across the foyer. Aztecs and Greeks were cobbling together banners from the results of a raid on a supply cabinet, the final touches of catering were being laid out in preparation for the scheduled imminent arrival of the Indians, and everyone looked like their nerves were already more than a little frayed.
“It's... Something that I just need to pop out of the house for a little while to deal with,” said Omet, forcing a calm expression. “Don't worry about it, you can all just make sure you're ready for when the guests arrive.”
An Aztec folded his arms. “And are you gonna be ready? They're gonna show up in ten-something minutes, and if you needed to ask for directions, I don't think the commute there and back is gonna be very forgiving.”
Omet held their arms close to their side and continued scanning the foyer. “I... will... bring the cavalry.”
They walked over to Quet, who was busy lighting every candle in the room from a single spot by way of a wooden board covered in glyphs. They cleared their throat to get her attention. “Hey, uh, you done with preparations?”
“Nope.” Quet tapped the board twice before looking up at Omet. “Okay, we're good. What's up?”
“Oh, uh, I just wanted to see if you were up for a real quick one-to-two-hour trip outside to help Mark and Waia out of a bit of a rut that they tell me they're in.”
“They're about to die, aren't they?”
“Yup.”
Quet squinted and stared into nothing for a second. “Well, heading out to help bring them back is a risk to my own health and safety. But if something isn't a risk to my health and safety, it's not worth doing. Woodworking taught me that.”
Omet chewed their lip uncomfortably. “Yeah, that's... making me feel things about making you do this...”
“But in addition, the time investment means I'll have an acceptable excuse to be absent from a large congregation of strangers in my home. In conclusion:” She zipped her skirt pockets shut and unzipped two new ones open, which given the size of the pocket pairs and their proximity to each other, violated at least a few laws of spacetime. “We ride.”
“Cool. Uh, one minute, wait here.” Omet dipped away from Quet and approached the recently-erected stage on the side of the foyer across from the main doorway.
They climbed up and gave a quick high-five to the nearest member of the five-person band before leaning forwards and lowering their voice. “You guys are gonna do great, jazz'll go over awesome with this crowd.”
They leaned back and turned to the room at large, making a half-hearted wave to draw attention to themself. “Hey all, just a quick heads-up, Quet and I are just gonna be popping out for an hour or so to deal with an issue Mark and Waia are having, so, uh... Saralai, you okay with handling the guests if Horan and Yellow can't do that alone?”
Saralai gave a thumbs-up from across the room, without looking away from her attempt at moving of the couches in the living area up against the wall.
“Cool, thanks, sorry. I'm sure we're gonna knock everyone's socks off, guys!”
Omet heard the band's drummer perform a subdued ba-dum-tch behind them. “Cacict, please don't do that, it's already hard enough to keep it together.” They hopped off the stage. “I'm gonna go get some paper, I need to leave a note.”
-
Quet followed Omet out the door and looked out at the dismal, dead forest around their house. “Ah, nature. How indifferent I am to you. And yet, you are my saviour in the fight against crowds. We shall become good friends tonight.”
Omet tried to calm their breathing and fished out a small map of the wider Mexico City area. “Okay, um, we're here, and our front door faces... south... east, so we need to head...” They tried to orient themself. “...That way? No, uh...”
Quet pulled a compass out of her pocket. “Would you like some assistance with finding your bearings?”
“Oh, right, dumb.” Omet reached over and, with a small nod from Quet, took the compass from her. “Okay, yeah, this is way easier.” They headed off in the direction indicated on the map.
Before they had even walked out of the clearing that their house was situated in, they turned and looked back at Quet. “I know it's a bad time to say this when we've already left the house, but... Wow, I am seriously making you walk several kilometers, in the cold and the dark, towards people who want to kill us?”
Quet shrugged and shifted into a human. “Mark and Waia made it this far, I can deal with little walking. I'm not as cool as either of them, but I can't be that not cool.” She playfully punched Omet's shoulder. “And try as you might, you aren't that uncool either.”
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
Omet grinned. “Okay, fine, I get it. You're not being as pessimistic as me, I'll have a little more faith.”
“Please do. We've both dealt with way worse than a random cult, and for longer. Sure, one of our relatives died, but now it's just us! No big deal, just keep it real.”
“You just made it very real,” said Omet.
“Mayhaps I did!” Quet strode past Omet with mock confidence. “But there shall be no bummers here for as long as I'm present, as the sign decrees! There is a problem before us, and it is a problem we shall fix! No anxiety, only misplaced confidence!”
“Yeah, you tell ‘em, boss!”
Quet yelped and stumbled back into the dirt. She watched as the yellow-eyed Omet stepped out from behind a tree, cackling to themself.
The yellow-eyed Omet looked down at Quet, a cheshire grin plastered across their face. “Oh, you didn't see me there? Bummer. We should abolish hiding. Haven’t been on the wrong end in a while, though, I might be biased.”
The purple-eyed Omet hesitantly approached their counterpart. “Don't... Please don't, there's this whole thing with Mark and Waia and– Actually, let me just catch you up.” They took the other Omet's hand.
Nothing happened.
Omet grasped their doppelgänger's hand harder. “C'mon, we're supposed to– Work with me here." They looked around at the empty forest. “Where's Horan? And... the Indians?”
The silver-eyed Omet's grin stretched to a point just wide enough to be inhuman. “Ah, they'll all be here on time. I just felt like meeting the other half of the most wonderful moron in this world and the next.”
Omet pulled their hand away and took a nervous step back when they saw that the other Omet's eye color had changed. “Wha– Who are you?”
Rachna discarded Omet's countenance and shifted into two different Aztecs before settling on the face of someone Omet was unfamiliar with. “A fan from India. You have-slash-will meet me.”
Quet shakily stood up and pointed at Rachna. “Absolutely spine-chilling. Never do that again for as long as you live.”
“Cross my heart,” said Rachna, a bloody ‘X’ staining on the right side of his shirt. He nudged Omet with his elbow. “Our mutual friend is gonna make that feel quite familiar in an hour or three, eh?” He turned towards the forest, “Alright, those two chumps aren't gonna rescue themselves, and inertia could do with a bit of reinforcement.”
He stopped and glanced back at Omet and Quet. “Wait, the voices have gotten to you about the renegade and the husk, right? That's why you're out here?”
Omet glanced at Quet, who gave a futile shrug. “...Yes?”
Rachna hit his forehead. “Right, yeah, you mentioned just now. There's only really one 'thing’ that you two know about so far.” He wheeled back around and strode in the direction of Cuernavaca. “Welp, tally ho!”
Quet jogged up next to Rachna, struggling to main equivalent pace as his legs elongated very slightly with each step. “Hang on, if you're Indian, how did you get here without coming with the rest of the group?”
Rachna sniggered. “My little ‘family’ thinks they know how to keep me out of mind. Unfortunately for them, I've got a bit of a fast track to the fun type of knowledge. Sorry to say that I just kind of skipped your whole journey of talent discovery, brisket.”
“...What's that about brisket?”
Rachna waved her off. “You'll get it later. Why can't anyone be blunt these days...?” He increased his pace and started whistling a random, discordant tune.
Omet caught up to Quet and leaned over her shoulder, trying to speak quietly enough for Rachna not to hear. “Okay, so can we agree real quick that we're just gonna try to avoid this guy when we get the chance and figure out their whole deal whenever that opens up as an option?”
“That's gonna be hard,” said Rachna, head hanging limply upside-down to look back at Quet and Omet. “We're going to the same place at the same time, after all.”
"...Right,” mumbled Omet.
Rachna melted into a puddle of ochre goo, slid backwards with lightning speed, and reformed back into a generally humanoid shape behind Quet and Omet. “Don't take it too badly, guys. If I can figure out what you two already know, who knows how many extremely important and urgent revelations I can give you!”
He waved at Quet before pointing at Omet. “I can teach you their magic language, if you want. It has thirty-four vowel sounds!”
“Ooh!” Quet brought her fists up to her chest. “The ones you physically can't make with your mouth are the best!” She looked at Omet and her expression fell, though her hands remained in place. “I mean, uh, that’s not very important right now.”
Omet fiddled with the hem of their cardigan. “Can, uh... Can you please just stand a little further away for a little while? I'll be straight, this is just making me feel weird, you being this close. Like, you still haven't told us your name.”
“I haven't?” Rachna's dark green eyes went wide. “Oh, that's a shame. Eh, you'll hear about it later. My ‘family’ isn't going to be too happy to see me in this hemisphere, let's just say.”
“Okay, that's... That's still cryptic, is the thing.” Omet tried to interpose themself between Quet and Rachna. “Ca– can you please just keep your distance? It's just stressing me out.”
Rachna shrugged and stepped a few feet away from the two Aztecs. “Don't worry about me. If I wanted to hurt you...” He smirked, his eyes flashing with pale blue light before changing back to light pink. “...Neither of you would've made it out of your front door.”
Omet shrunk further away from Rachna.
“Of course,” mumbled Rachna, “it’s not like there’s much of an alternative. The vulture feasts. The husk continues the act and the renegade can merely observe. The bastion draws eyes. The lost father prepares the conclusion and the reckoning accelerates ever dow–”
“Wow, look, a road!” Quet grabbed Omet's hand and pulled them away from Rachna. “Let's drop all current conversation topics immediately!”
Rachna stopped as the Aztecs hurried away from him. He shut his eyes and took a deep breath. “Road… is what… buses drive on?” He looked up at Omet expectantly, who was still glancing back at him over their shoulder. Omet gave a hesitant nod and he sighed with relief.
Quet rubbed her hands as she approached a rusted shell of a pickup truck. The mangled rear half indicated that it had been rammed from the back by something large at some point. “Finally, a chance to test out this matrix without being charged with grand theft auto and blackbagged by Deus!” She ushered Omet into the passenger seat before fishing a dozen stones out of her pocket.
Omet leaned out of the broken window and watched Quet affix the stones to seemingly random parts of the truck. “What exactly is the goal here? This thing's fuel gauge says it's empty.”
“Irrelevant, dear sibling. Wait and see. Best case scenario, we reach Mark and Waia an hour sooner. Worst case scenario, this car unfolds like bad origami and we're back to square one. There's no losing here! That's my favorite amount of potential loss!”
A moment later, she placed one last stone on the rusted hood and slapped it. The entire truck was outlined by a pale green glow and the weight on the sagging tires seemed to lessen.
Quet raised both arms over her head. “Success! World's greatest thaumaturge!” She rushed over to the driver's side door and climbed inside. “We should probably hurry, though. Even on the off chance that I'm somehow as good as you think I am, we've got around fifteen minutes before something explodes.”
“Then I say we go,” said Omet.
Quet attached a stone to the middle of the steering wheel and honked the horn, wincing at the noise and drumming two fingers against the steering wheel. “Probably could have picked a more pleasant means of controlling the matrix remotely.”
While the horn went off, the truck rose off of the road and passed over the trees. Once they were a decent twenty or thirty feet off the ground, Quet released the horn and pressed down on the accelerator, which made the truck's floor thrum with bone-rattling vibration and sent the truck moving forward as if it were driving over open road.
Quet cackled and slapped the steering wheel. “Who needs specially-stitched carpets now, Armenians?! Quet keeps winning!”
Omet leaned out the window and scanned the ground below them. “So, are we just leaving that shapeshifting guy in the dus– in the air now? Saved it.”
Quet shrugged and took the compass from Omet, placing it on the dashboard. “Something tells me that we haven't seen the last of that guy outside the party, but at least we should be fine up here. Just the two of us. Hey, we could both finally figure out how to drive!”
Rachna sat cross-legged and watched the two Aztecs float over the dead trees. “What lovely folks. It would be my favorite day in a long time if it turned out that they were both real.”