Isaac led the group up High Monestate’s rising streets, through darkness being pushed away by daybreak’s newborn light. They headed to Castle Hemmer. With their identities and plans most likely found out, the plan was to strike before stricken. Soon, morning would make them easy to spot.

Castle Hemmer’s overwhelming shadow hung over them. Behind it, up in the sky, World’s Shiver manifested once again. It shifted the whitish blue morning light to red. Those seven moons appeared again. The party stalled, standing stiff, and stared up into the cosmos. A low, ambient hum came from above. Its source was a mystery.

Major noted, “It is worsening. We must act soon. Be prepared to fight.”

As they proceeded closer to the castle, Sasha observed the surrounding buildings and streets of High Monestate. They’d been here for two days now, and she still hadn’t seen a single person.

They passed a huge circular fountain that was out of service. Each house and building surrounding it? Empty. Some had closed doors while others swung wide open. They were as ran down as the manor. The overgrown vegetation and dust-covered windows told the same story.

It creeped Sasha out to no end.

Does anyone even live here?

Major spoke, “I sense irregular soul signatures scattered throughout this area, but World’s Shiver is interfering with my ability to pinpoint them. Be careful.”

Abdul unsheathed Primus, asking, “Enemies?” The claymore rested on his shoulder.

Elise watched Isaac’s back as they moved on. She shook her head. “I hope not. After Simon’s findings, though, I wouldn’t be surprised if we ran into trouble. There are too many uncertainties.”

Simon answered with attentive silence and a nod. Expecting the worst, his head was on a swivel. He walked shoulder to shoulder with Sasha, his short sword drawn in a reverse grip.

Sasha’s anxiety calmed. She drew Major, holding it close to her chest. Simon seems to want to protect me. It makes me happy, but I…

Major interjected, You’re over needing to be protected, right?

“That’s right.”

She startled Simon. He asked, “What’s right?”

“Um, nothing.”

“So you were communicating with Major. Though I wish my machina could talk, I don’t envy the lack of privacy.”

Abdul overheard and agreed with Simon. “Me neither. If Primus and I formed a contract, I wouldn’t be able to live with him yammering in my head all day.”

Primus got offended, flaring its eye. “You should be honored to hear my beautiful voice!”

“See what I mean?”

Their path took them winding through a cluster of tall, cramped buildings of odd rainbow colors and construction. They slanted unnaturally with windows in all the wrong places. A tumbleweed rolled across a path before sprouting legs and dancing away. Frantic, out of key and tune, piano music played in the distance. Simon and Sasha eyed surreal hexagonal and oval doors interspaced without rhyme or reason.

He muttered, “What in the actual…”

In the next instance, the strange architecture disappeared, leaving the normal cityscape they knew. Everything became silent as buzzards circled far up in the air. It was like they’d awoken from a dream.

Isaac walked around, squinting up at where everything had morphed. “I’m guessing either something’s in the air making us high or Yellen’s leaking over into our world.”

Everyone looked at Major for an explanation, but it just blinked at them. “I don’t have the answer to everything. You’re probably right.”

Isaac stopped, raising a hand for the group to halt. He pointed ahead. “A dead rodent.”

Not far ahead, a decapitated rat lay on the ground. It was ginormous. A puddle of fresh blood pooled under it. Where had its head gone?

It twitched before standing on its two feet. The rat waved at them and then wobbled off into an alleyway. Everyone looked at each other, bewildered. Elise blurted out, “Maybe we should turn around.”

An infant’s crying rang out from the darkness it disappeared into. Sasha stepped towards the alley, but Simon grabbed her hand, asking, “Where do you think you’re going?”

“To set off their trap.”

Abdul took the lead, blocking her path. “I’ll do it. You’re too important.”

He lit the dim alley’s path with a flame atop his finger. They followed him, put off, until coming up to a stroller.

Abdul leaned down, observing, “Huh. It’s actually an infant. Not a trap?”

Isaac sighed. “There are more orphans than kids with parents these days.”

It cried up into their faces. The baby couldn’t have been even half a year old. Sasha removed its blanket to get a better look.

“Poor thing,” she said, feeling a wave of bitterness wash over her.

Isaac peeked from behind them. “We obviously can’t keep it, as much as I don’t want to be the bad guy here.”

Simon nodded, adding, “There’re thousands more crying out of sight. Endeavor to create a world where orphans don’t exist.”

The baby grabbed Sasha’s finger. Her painful face worsened tenfold as a tremble took to her wrist.

Simon noticed her discomfort immediately. He asked, “What’s wrong? We can talk about it later if you want.”

She shook her head with a worried face. “It’s not that. I’ve seen plenty of dead kids. Ouch—,” Her brow curled in agony. “This kid’s got a strong grip!”

Everyone flinched as the baby snapped her finger in half with a masculine grunt and evil gaze. Sasha stumbled back in betrayal, shoving the stroller away. It rolled into the wall and toppled over.

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Sasha stammered out, “And I just got this finger back!”

Elise said, “Oh my Gods.”

As Isaac and Simon drew their weapons, eerie of the baby now in a tantrum of bloodcurdling screams, Abdul splinted Sasha’s fracture to the finger next to it. To their horror, the baby stood and transformed chaotically. Mercutio the clown revealed himself to them in all his naked, twisted grin glory.

Mercutio glared at them but spoke possessed by manic euphoria. “I’ve been watching you all. I won’t allow anymore meddling. Turn back. This is your final warning.”

Sasha took a step forward, returning a look just as malicious. “Or what? What’re you protecting from us?”

“Our true lord is blossoming. With his great awakening so near, I cannot let you fools get in the way. I am lieutenant and I am shepherd, and the gifts granted to me for my service triumph any meaningless thing like money.”

Mercutio hugged himself, shivering. He got a boner. “I’ve never felt so loved. So appreciated.”

Sasha’s mouth dropped in disgust. “You freak! I—I don’t even know what to say to that!”

Mercutio broke out into a giggling fit. “You, I like you! It’s your spunk! I’ll make you mine after this is over!”

The tension between the clown and them worsened with each moment. Major announced, “Countless abnormal soul signatures are approaching at high speeds. Prepare for combat.”

Sasha obeyed, ready to fight with the dagger. The party watched each other’s backs in braced stances. That was when she realized Simon had vanished from his side. “Wait, what? Simon?”

How long had it been? She looked around for him with anxiety. Did he abandon them?

Mercutio sprouted fluffy eagle wings and prepared to take flight. One of these “gifts” he spoke of must’ve involved transfiguration.

In his departure, he yelled, “Bye fools, and welcome to the circus!”

The clown’s wings were hacked from his back by an unknown source. He fell face first into the ground where several more lacerations formed. Simon uncloaked from his invisibility. He mauled Mercutio with his short sword and knife like filleting a fish.

Mercutio squirmed, laughed, and yelped as red lightning sparks crackled across his body. His regeneration factor pulled him back from death quicker than he could be killed. The clown’s arm transformed into a bone spear that he thrusted up at Simon, who barely dodged it.

Between laughter and wincing, Mercutio asked him, “Why don’t you at least take me out to dinner first before you fuck me!?”

The clown’s body dismembered into countless fragments, each turning into a mouse wearing a top hat that scurried away too quick to catch.

Frustrated, Simon roared, “Gods fucking damn it! Is everyone a homunculus now?!”

Abdul called to him. “We have bigger fish to fry now.”

Simon turned to the direction Mercutio escaped from with a wild glare. Three furry abominations galloped towards them on their knuckles. They had beady black eyes, hanging tongues, and body parts in all the wrong places. It was impossible to even suggest a species. They were both everything and nothing to the imagination. Monsters.

His mind went back to the room full of them under Castle Hemmer. If Mercutio was releasing and perhaps even commanding these beasts, then they would be in for a horrible day.

Abdul blocked their path. “Fall back into the open! It’s too crammed in here!”

As the party fell back the way they came, Abdul’s entire body burst into roaring flames. His armor steamed. Clashing with the monsters in that cramped alleyway, he looked like an emissary straight from hell. He and they brawled and hacked away at each other like beasts, dragging each other’s faces against the stone, bricks flying. Isaac led the escape as crunching and armored bangs rang out.

Little did they know, another horde waited for them on the other side. As soon as they broke out into the light, they were overrun by grunting and hooting abominations. Sasha and Simon hacked away at tentacles and limbs while watching each other’s backs. Elise evaded a grotesque crawler and weaved between clawed swings to get to Isaac, who sent slashes of wind with his focused glare alone.

“Get behind me, Elise!” he yelled at her.

“I’m trying!”

Sasha chopped a head off, gasping for air. She didn’t expect such numbers. More and more came. She fought off a blur of animalistic horror with her instinct and reflexes and nothing else. There was no time to think. No time to strategize.

“There’s too many!”

Simon took a hammer fist to his back and lost his balance. Sasha caught him with her shoulder. He stammered out, “Gods!”

“Agh—,” A talon caught Sasha by the neck. She was swept up into the air. Barely able to breathe, fighting the claws against her throat with her hands, she gazed up at the flapping of Mercutio’s eagle wings. He’d snatched her and now zoomed away into the sky.

“Now we can get some alone time!” he said.

As Sasha struggled to defend her neck from being crushed, choking, she heard Simon’s trailing off voice echo her name. Shit, shit, shit!

The clown in flight dragged her away turned backwards. She couldn’t see their destination. Instead, all she saw was a fatal drop into stone. How could she survive? More and more monsters appeared from every crevice tucked away in the shadows. They came from inside the dark houses, under the streets, and from the sewer system. Every being below, creature and man alike, shrunk and shrunk from her view like insects.

Major advised, Don’t let him take you where he intends. Let’s cut the chicken’s feet off.

But I’ll fall and die!

You shouldn’t if you time it right above a roof!

It shouldn’t?! You don’t sound confident!

Major’s eye glared widely opened, trembling. Confident?! Have I ever seemed confident!? Ha! I’ve been winging it this whole time!

“Fuck it all!” Sasha yelled, holding Major out to her side. “Ghost in the Shell!”

The dagger’s handle extended while the blade morphed, curving inwards. It was the first time she’d wielded an axe, but the decades of knowledge surging into her brain fooled her into thinking otherwise. She knew this axe better than anyone else. Even herself.

Sasha took deep breaths to calm and mentally brace herself. This is one of the better ways to go out today.

With a killer’s edged eyes and a grunt, she hacked off Mercutio’s bird ankles with one fell swoop. She plummeted while Mercutio writhed, growling, with flapping wings. “Youch!”

Sasha felt oddly tranquil as she fell. She was only about seven seconds from splattering. To her though, it lasted forever. What could she do for better odds? In those moments, she cycled through countless options, came up empty, and then reached an epiphany that changed everything. Death’s door faded from sight.

This entire time, she had only used Ghost in the Shell to shape Major into weapons, but there was no such rule that decided that. Her own lack of imagination had been the limitation. How else could her ki flow?

I am an artist. You are my brush.

Ghost in the Shell.

Energy erupted from Major. Wispy strings shot out to catch onto a cloudlike construction of ki overhead. They snagged tight against Sasha’s weight. Her plummet slowed as the ethereal parachute dragged down after her.

The quick thinking wasn’t enough to save her completely. Sasha crashed and tumbled down a pitched roof, sending shingles everywhere. Only inches from falling off into the streets, she morphed Major into a hook and caught the roof’s edge. Her ass and legs danged below while she caught her breath.

Then the barking and scurrying came. Sasha’s attention snapped underneath her to where another horde of monsters had already formed. They had no way to reach her but, if she fell, they’d rip her to pieces. That was more than enough motivation to get her to pull herself back up.

“Please give me a break,” Sasha groaned.

Major was stunned by her. “None of your ancestors have used our power in such a way. You’ve made it yours. Make it out of this nightmare and you will become a wielder like no other.”

“Thank you, Major.” She stared back at the hordes with a twitchy face. “But there are so many of these things. You and I surviving is one thing, but what about the others? How are they doing? Can you sense them?”

“I cannot. There are just too many spiritual signatures.”

“Shit.”

Mercutio landed above at the tip of the pitched roof. He walked on several bone legs that sprouted from his abdomen like a tarantula. “What have you done to me, girl? Cursed me?” he asked.

Sasha was as confused as she was sore. Mercutio pointed to his legs which were still amputated. The characteristic homunculus lightning sparked from the stumps, but there was no sign of change at all. “They’re not healing, you bitch!”

“Ah.” Major uttered. It’s our spiritual aspect. A homunculus’s regeneration factor may heal physical damage, but can it heal the soul once directly cut?

Sasha felt empowered against these monsters for the first time in this whole conflict. So, we’re the key now? The special weapon?

Exactly.

Then there’s a chance.

Waterlike ki cloaked Sasha’s body. It solidified into ghostly plate armor shining silverish blue. Her eyes sparkled with genius through her ki helm’s wispy visor. They burned a hole through Mercutio from the other side of her V-shaped visor. “Major?”

“Yes?”

“How much ki do we have stored up?”

“Enough.”

“Thank you.”

She and Mercutio approached each other, both tense. Both on guard. The clown no longer laughed.