“...and then I stayed for an extra few thousand years, working on some alchemy projects and finally getting some damn technology beat into those thick brains of theirs. Seriously, you wouldn’t think it would take four thousand years of global unification to make good clothing!”
Ajinan nodded seriously, while Tabs cackled gleefully. “The end though! You got him to pray to you.” Her plan had worked, and she never let any of them forget it. As if any of them had any serious desire- any desire at all- to take over her job as head strategist. Kitsune would go mad if she had to spend most of her time in centrality. “So… that universe's done, and now we know where she’s hiding we’ll be able to clear out her influence relatively quickly. Especially if Kitsune’s norming technique works so efficiently on the problem.”
“I would concur. Tau branch is no longer a priority, which should allow us to redistribute-” Ajinan paused, then let an almost uncharacteristic smirk crawl across his draconic visage. “Tabby, some new information just came up that you’d be interested in.”
“Is it progress on ISON-II? Please let-”
Kitsune snorted. “As if. The moment Ajinan makes progress on ISON-II is the moment Sija decides to be a good mother.” Tabs pouted, Ajinan scowled, Kitsune cackled, and a whirling ball of wings and angry eyes smashed the strategist through the planet’s lithosphere in a flash of golden light and whirling blades.
A patch of inky darkness detached from the shadows in the room, a hint of pinpricks of light enclosed beyond reality, twisting, rending, teeth and claws and shifting form and infinite end manifesting into a floating shape that bent the mind and reality alike. “Sis! Brother Ajinan!” Its voice was the resonant grinding of space as it wore itself down to nothing, the endless march of entropy to a final oblivion. Cheery too, with a hint of innocence that really shouldn’t be there for something as old as he was.
A warm smile washed itself across Kitsune’s face as she leaned into an embrace with what might have been an excessive amount of headpats. “Hey, Eaera, nice to see you again. So everyone’s here?”
“Yeah! Sara and I just got back from this really cool waterworld with pretty strong limitations on our manifestation. There were all these strong currents and islands and winds, and Sara kept getting blown into the water and her feathers all wet-”
She’d missed that, a little. Eaera and Samsara had been away on a series of billion year observations, trying to determine the nature of Sija in a world of strange, evolutionary combat. “So, how was it?”
The shadow twisted in thought. “She was definitely meddling with at least one of the evolutionary lines. Not nice… also, really annoying to observe too. Had to set up an observatory on a remote island to not influence stuff too much. I’m exhausted.”
“A break, maybe?”
Ajinan’s eyes shone silver, and a holographic projection of infinite branches appeared in the air between them, an infinitesimal portion colored to represent worlds remade free. “Perhaps we can go on a vacation. Centrality is a nice place, but it’s a lonely place, and its achievements are ours alone.”
“So… search out a new world to go mess with? Sounds like a blast to me.”
Eaera positively radiated joy, not that anyone beside the Seraphim would recognize that ominous, terrifying feeling as something so mundane. “New friends! I wonder if they’ll be cute like Tsune?”
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Kistune leaned into the pets, just a little. Goddess of fire or not, it felt good. “Flatterer. Don’t get me involved in whatever kit and puppy shelter you inevitably start.” It was at that moment that Tabby, in her more natural but currently caked in half-dried lava kitten form clawed her way out of the massive crater that had once been a state of the art command center, followed by a smug looking Samsara.
The kitten tactician stumbled on a rock and got jostled just enough for all the rock to slide perfectly off fur as electric blue as her hair. “You guys suck. If you didn’t like the water, just stay on the island? But that’s just so hard-” she eeped and fell silent at the massive glowing spear that manifested above her head, threatening divine retribution if she continued. “So… what’ve you been up to these past… uh-” she glanced up at the still hovering spear of golden radiance- “few minutes?”
“Tabs! Tabs!” Eaera’s eyes gleamed with excitement, which given how many of them and how much they twisted reality around them, looked a little off putting. Just a little. “We’re going on a vacation!”
“Indeed.” Tears of silver ran from Ajinan’s eyes as thousands of portals opened and closed every second in front of him and a few machines he’d manifested from nothing. “I’m checking probes I’ve sent out to see if there’s a suitable universe for an outing.”
“Oh! Let's make it a game!” The others perked up a bit at Tabs’ suggestion. “Grand strategy, high but not absolute manifestation power… multiplanetary but generally pre-industrial with apocalyptic non sapients- for fun of course… that’s probably as fair as possible.”
The others nodded- Sara only hesitantly, but still keeping the spear neatly poised above the pint sized kitten just in case, and Ajinan manifested a small chip he slotted into the vast bank of computers he’d made just to sort through the basic overviews of so many thousands upon thousands of worlds. “...this one. It fits all the criteria, and was flagged as high manifestation power.” He tossed the description and whatever random graphs and charts he’d made either to look cool or just because he was like that onto the holographic projection, and waited for the others to acknowledge it.
“Seems good.” Kitsune stood, shifting neatly into half-human form and leveling a glare at all the others around them. “Ground rules- and yes, I’m the one making the rules. Suck it up.” She watched them carefully as they sucked it up, especially Tabs. The spear was helping things, at least. “I won’t use any annihilation techniques. Samsara won’t alter the cycle of rebirth or perform soul modification herself beyond healing. Ajinan will refrain from portalling between planets, and won’t fabricate anything the civilization around him can’t make-” he actually pouted at that one- “and Eaera will be nice.”
Tabs positively growled, and even Sara and Ajinan looked at her askance. “Eaera’s always nice! That’s like asking ice to be cold!”
“Any of us can heat ice to several thousand degrees without it melting.”
“Inconsequential!”
A moment passed as the kitten glared at her, but she didn’t back down, and so the rules were set. Eaera just continued petting her, and no she wasn’t biased at all. “Well, if we’re all ready-” maybe it was a little petty of Ajinan, but everyone else found it funny when the universe folded out beneath her and she fell through a portal into the universe beyond.
Tabs looked at the others, then shrugged-
And, with much more forewarning and a fair bit less hilarity, Ajinan’s bloody silver eyes tore open reality around them and they were gone.