'Hello there.'

I wasn't startled by the words. At the moment, I told myself it was because I'd gotten used to people and beings that could bypass or evade my senses. But that was just my mind trying to convince itself, not realising it was being pushed.

Let me tell you, I got pushed around and moulded a lot after my undeath. Adam doesn't have shit on me. Eventually, the scales fell from eyes that would never be closed, but, at the time, I was still blind.

The person who had entered could not be described beyond the grey suit they wore. My sight slid off their face and the skin(?) they showed, and I couldn't tell whether their height and build were average, or changing every moment.

'Hello,' I replied, far calmer than I should have been.

My visitor smiled next, I think. 'Places like these one are not fit for the likes of us, David. But you will have to remain here a little longer-just a little.'

I nodded, neither frustrated nor impatient. Their voice was as soothing as my father's had ever been. Still, a nudge I thought an impulse made me ask. 'The likes of us...?'

'This is a white room, David,' they said in a patient, chiding tone, which made me cringe at myself, just a little. 'Gray people like you and I, we do not belong here. It is, however, not a "white room". It is not a place for creation, or testing, or brainstorming. It is a cell. A white cell," their smile widened a little. 'That, like the ones in a human body, helps fight off diseases. In this case, the body is creation, and the disease consists of those dangerous enough to be imprisoned in such places.'

They got down on one knee in front of me, allowing me to see a name I hadn't noticed before, on the suit's left breast pocket.

"Gray Mann".

'But we are not the disease, David. We are the cure, the fire burning down the forest so new trees might grow. Or, I am. But you're getting there.' They turned their head to the side, and I felt their amusement. 'I am loathe to even suggest a course of action, but please, remain here. Not that you could escape, but with patience, you'll cross even the sea...you know how it goes.'

Gray stood up, straightening their suit, then did something that could only be equated to blinds being drawn.

'Wait...' I said, feeling weirdly hesitant. 'We've just met. Why do you care?'

Gray laughed from behind the curtain, something I would later learn was common, both metaphorically and literally. 'This is not even the first time we've met this minute, David. Good luck. Try to imagine you have it.'

I....remembered Nacht's words, smiling wistfully. The way its phrasing had, perhaps accidentally given me hope. If even a broken clock is right twice a die, I suppose even a monster like Nacht does not always bring despair to others.

The fact nothing had happened since its and Hex's departure was pretty disappointing, though. Undead could cope with boredom and sensory deprivation indefinitely, unlike humans, but, having nothing to do, I opened Mimir's sight, and took a look at my cell. It was one of the few powers I could still use, so I might as well train it while I could.

In the present, it was exactly what it looked like: an endless, white void, a canvas that would never be painted on. I wasn't sure where that comparison had come from, but it felt like I hadn't used it enough up to that point.

Looking at its past, I saw the cell had never been occupied before my imprisonment, having stood empty since the destruction that had taken place for it to be created. And looking in the future...

I saw myself looking back through the past at me, my back turned to myself, so I wouldn't see myself looking back through the past at me, my back turned-

I blinked. Alright. That hadn't made much sense, but few things did, as of late. It had, however, been pretty concerning, given the precognition looped, or whatever I'd seen. ARC would have to know about that, that I wouldn't be able to use my precognition. Why, though?

Maybe I should just focus on my postcognition, instead. I opened Mimir's sight, and saw myself staring back at me, back turned to myself, so I wouldn't see myself looking forward through the future at me, my back-

Dammit. What the fuck did that even mean?

***

Faerie, 2030

Puck was running.

That was not unusual. The little Fae, whose current form resembled a satyr more than anything, if one with antlers, often ran during the errands Oberon sent him on.

But his King did not speak to him these days, nor to anyone else, even the Queen who ruled in his stead and name. He could not, nor would they be able to hear him if he did.

Oberon, despite the warlike aspect he sometimes drew around himself, had an artist's soul, and the bodies of several more. He was a creator and a preserver, not a destroyer, unless the situation called for it. He could often be seen tending the gardens and orchards in and around his palace, sometimes shapeshifting or glamouring himself to look like one of his gardeners, for he did not wish to disturb them with his presence.

Nowadays, however, Oberon devoted himself fully to preservation, for he had no other choice. The Black God had planted his seed in Fairie, and-

Puck cursed as he flipped over the twisted, twisting black branch. It was not a thinking plant, not like the ones they cultivated. It merely felt, without knowing, and the empty malice that dripped off it felt almost as foul as the pus dripped down the branch, not killing the grass, but making it live in death.

Another one. But this time...this time, at least, it was just a tree. Not an animal, with eyes that were the cracked mirror of an empty soul, body hollowed out enough that it could only feel pain. Not one of his kind, jerked on strings of iron.

The tree ripped free on the ground, walking on diseased roots that looked more like bloated, throbbing maggots, or...

Tapping into his magic as he leapt around the Black tree's strikes and blasted it with emerald flames(this one, he would stop. No more villages turned into grotesque nourishment. The things that had entered their realm treated them like they treated humans. The sheer audacity...),Puck hoped his King would be able to hold the thing growing from the heart of his domain, like a poisonous flower feeding on a dying body, at bay, for at least one day longer.

He wondered if the gods knew, then laughed at his foolishness. There was no way they wouldn't learn, anyway. And then, they would come with tide and thunder, with screams of ancient pacts and friendships broken, and all would drown in blood.

If they didn't drown in darkness first.

***

Zmeu country, 25th December 2030

The Brazen Mantle, Aaron knew, was far more than a weapon, or a toolbox, or even a factory. It was a way to uplift those both less and more powerful than himself, in ways that ranged from creating weapons and tools for them to use(the Mother of the Forest, he had learned a few years after their bargain, was a signatory of the Syncretic Treaty, and everyone who used her creations to upset the status quo would result in her being held accountable) to simpler things, like spreading the armour the war-harness could grow into to them, like Lucian and Lucas currently were.

His brothers were connected to the bands of bronze at his joints by wires barely visible to even his sight, and Aaron could count the hairs on a fly in Istanbul from Constanța. He still did that, sometimes, feeling nostalgic for the days of the Long Watch, when it had been one of his favourite pastimes and ways to meditate.

Aaron hadn't been made Admiral for any particular skill in naval warfare. Zmei were made for fighting, not warring, and he often felt ashamed of his rank when conversing with officers who made him look average. He was, however, possessed of senses and reflex far sharper than any human's and most non-divine beings. In fact, he dwarfed Lucas in speed like the blue zmeu dwarfed Lucian, nearly seventy thousand times over.

Of course, that level of speed was too much for anything that didn't involved speeding to the Oort Cloud and back in about as much time as saying it took. There had been some plans to use him as a living combination of a starship and a terraforming engine, during the Space Race, but everyone arguing about the Galactic Romanian Socialist Republic(name undecided before the project had been shelved) had been told to cool off until Earth at least was red. Aaron's reflexes had sufficed for most of the Turkish-Romanian skirmishes during the Long Watch. Some of them had even been caused by genuine misunderstandings.

Ah...dammit, he was acting like an old man again, getting lost in memories.

But then, someone had to at least pretend to be an adult here, and his father definitely didn't seem eager to try.

Maws had, not too long ago, by his standards('When did it happen? Hmmm...I don't exactly keep count, but that dirtball you insist to stay on got oceans and air in the meantime'), been offered a choice between finally being able to negate the collateral damage caused by his starbreaking power, something he had been struggling with and now could never get rid of, or becoming even stronger, jumping in power whenever challenged, before returning to his baseline once a conflict was over.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, he had chosen the latter.

It had been, Aaron had to admit, a logical choice, in a way. Maws had nothing tying him to Earth, as he had only met his eldest son once, and treated him with supreme indifference; he spent his time either in zmeu country, where he could rampage as much as he liked, or working as a mercenary for the few beings willing to reach across space or other realities to hire him.

Still, couldn't he try to keep the fucking volume down?

'Weak, weak...' thousands of heads, each large enough to swallow mountains, shook in disappointment as Myriad-maws-with-their-bottoms-scraping-the-earth-and-their-tops-piercing-the-skies, took in the sons he had never seen before.

Both of them were armoured up to avoid being pulverised by their father's voice, which, unlike a mundane explosion, which damaged objects according to their surface area, applied Earth-shattering force to everything for hundreds of thousands of kilometres around, regardless of size. Aaron himself, being more than able to punch the planet in half or kick it to pieces, was unarmoured, but his fangs still rattled with every word Maws said.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

'It is not their fault, mate-counterpart. This one senses they are at the peak of their physical prowess-capacity. They cannot improve-grow stronger,' his mother chimed in, going for chiding, but merely sounding clinical.

She was still trying to act more like them, bless her. Even if looking at the orrery of impossibly-angled shapes of unlight that was her form caused his eyes to cross.

She had even shrunk down so as not to make them feel strange, even if being around her husband's size was the equivalent of squeezing into a shoebox for her. At full size, such little things as planets were too small to see.

Maws grunted, scratching his belly with his three right hands, sparks like solar flares jumping from the rainbow scales. 'Even so. Are they really even mine? The first one, the slightly bigger worm-'

'Aaron,' he growled. He and his brothers, who were still looking for their words after seeing how strange, respectively arseholish their parents were, stood on a planet the size of Earth and the texture of marble, which Maws had created on a whim.

The older zmeu blinked like a crocodile, then laughed, turning the planet to dust. Lucian and Lucas leapt away, unharmed thanks to their armour, but Aaron felt bones break and shake all over his body as the force shook him to the core. With a curse, he armoured himself, too, just as the damage healed.

'A name! I bet you imagine you're smart for giving yourself a human one, boy. What's your true name?' Maws leered, his enormous body shimmering as he turned the dust back to a planet and wrapped around it.

Yes, because he had "moron" stenciled on all foreheads... 'Bronze-scaled-father-slayer,' he spat in reply, before speeding over to his father and picking him up by the chest, all fifty sextillion tons, then flipping him and smashing him down heads-first.

Steel-hard ground turned to dust for millions of kilometres around as the gigantic zmeu's heads split the land, then was devastated even further when he roared in approval.

'You've got some fight in you!' Maws grinned, turning the dust caking him to steam as he heated up his body, then narrowing his green, black-slitted eyes. 'Even if you need that cheap toy to hide behind...I can see the marks left by her hands, you know. Had her once or thrice. Worst fucks of my life. Damn If I know why I went back each time...'

'I could do that unarmoured, you old bastard.' Aaron crossed his arms. Each of the bands he wore was as heavy as the world he walked, enchanted to only affect him with their weight, so he would never forget the power at his command. 'You're not as heavy as you think, despite that huge ego.'

'Ha! What can I say, the old lady likes them slim~' Maws dropped his wife a wink, tongues flicking out at her. She just stared back blankly, something like an oval eye in the centre of her form not blinking.

'This one would ask you to stop the baiting-posturing, mate-counterpart. This one would like to learn more about her offspring-shards, which is why we agreed to this meeting,' the eldritch being said, and Aaron felt like a bastard for not asking her name during their first meeting. It would be so awkward now...but she had been so distracted, and he so hotheaded...ugh.

Maws shrugged, beards swaying. Nine-thousand-ninety-nine were grey and long, reaching down to his chest, but the last, the one in the centre, was gold, shining like the dawn. 'If you're asking so nicely...' he smirked.

'And maybe get a damn notebook if you can't talk without breaking planets,' Lucian groused, seemingly having gotten his father's measure. 'For a clown who fell in a crayon box, you're pretty shit at charades.'

'So demanding!' Maws bared kilometres-long fangs in amused frustration. 'You remind me of that prick who woke me up rambling about light. The water was so nice, too...fine.'

The giant zmeu sat down, his mate following and their sons flying down to join them. Maws smiled, lifting up a hand and producing a projector as his wife began leaning over him. 'Just a moment...work offer, in a week from now, give or take...huh. Someone from around Rigel is sure something bad will show up there in the near future. Hope I won't be asked to punch stuff into the past again...I always end up fighting myself. Can't stand that. I'm too gorgeous to hurt.'

Lucas opened his mouths under his helmets, then thought about it for a bit, and sighed. At least he was starting to know who took after whom. 'Anything interesting?' he asked instead.

'Hmm?' Maws turned a few eyes to him. 'Oh, I can smell the old blood on you, boy, but it's buried under...something. What do you do nowadays?'

And that was when the dam broke, and their parents, mostly their father, began asking questions.

'You draw on people? What even is this childish shit?'

'It's art.' Lucas was fully aware he sounded like every jobless wannabe artist on Earth, but it didn't matter. 'Anyway-'

'And you say the runt of the litter found his calling before you?' A few heads jerked towards Lucian. 'What do you do?'

'Fight and fuck, mostly.'

'Ha! Figures...' Maws leaned against his wife's shoulders, ignoring the way reality rippled and decayed around her body. 'Say...any of you got a bitch?'

All three brothers grimaced.

'I get by,' Aaron said tersely, huffing at Maws' "Ah, prostitutes".

'Don't need any,' Lucas said, wishing he could smoke through his helmets.

'Unlike Aari over there,' Lucian cracked his neck. 'I don't just "get by". I've got this iela I see more often than anyone else...see, we'd be together if we could, but we can't stand sharing, and don't wanna get mad at each other.'

'Bah!' Maws waved a dismissive hand. 'Tell me about it. I understand...half your problem. Your mother-I call her Angles, mostly, besides pet names; someone once suggested "Anglela", but that sounds stupid as all get out, and I can't pronounce her name," the zmeu stared adoringly at his mate with half his eyes. 'Doesn't really get the urge to sleep around, or any other urge, really. But I don't want to upset her, so I stay far away when I need to avoid tedium.'

'This one appreciates your attempt to resist your nature, mate-counterpart.' An appendage rose to trail fire across Maws' chest as his mate cracked a smile that dragged light towards it, briefly covering their surroundings in darkness.

'Only the best for you,' he said graciously. 'But I still marked her, so everyone can see we're married. Wanna see?'

'Yes!'

'Lucian!'

'Shut up, you two!' Aaron barked, then turned back to his parents. 'Why don't you instead tell us how you two met?'

'Sure, right after I answer Lazlo.'

'Lucas,' the blue zmeu corrected.

'Right. That question about the job offer...someone will want me to put an evicted grouch back to sleep.' Ten thousand mouths were split by savage, gleaming grins. 'They must have heard about my beautiful voice~'

***

Strangeguard headquarters, Moscow, 3rd January, 2030

'We are quite surprised you agreed to this, sir,' Alexei said as he led Grey One through the featureless, mirror-walled corridor, the weredog's paws making no sound. 'We know you are sensitive even around normal minds, let alone twisted little bitches like her.'

Grey One tried to smile at the Caucasian Ovcharka, but instead winced. The faces of its kind were not made for concealing emotions on the rare occasions they chose to physically express themselves. Even after being cut from the Greater Mind and learning to speak and gesticulate out of necessity, the alien still struggled.

Grey One did not begrudge the Multitude of Minds their curiosity regarding travel through the aether in addition to wormholes. One more method to pass lightspeed was always useful, and it had been a curious being even before becoming an explorer. Its kind, lacking reproductive organs, reproduced by parthenogenesis, shedding a piece of themselves in a moment of physical and mental tranquility and desire for creation. Grey One had been an Honoured Parent-Progenitor before it had been stranded on Earth.

'Sofia is a young telepath, who had no one to teach or touch minds with her. It is understandable to lash out-expected, even,' Grey One argued. 'I know several species that-'

'Here we are, sir,' Alexei cut it off, stopping before another featureless section of the hallway. Grey One couldn't pick up any thoughts besides the were's, but it somehow knew the young witch was behind that. 'Just remember: the moment either you or her are compromised, I'm killing you both.'

Grey One nodded. Telepathy that could reach out to and dominate nearly twenty billion humans, if the usual protections fell, coupled with telekinesis to toss Earth into the sun or compress it to a billionth of its size, and suborned by a mind like Sofia's? It would rather kill itself.

Its mind had grown worse in the decades since its crash-landing, sensitive to the pain and horror felt by its adoptive homeworld's inhabitants. Or it would have crushed the reptilians on Mars by itself, had it not been so cowardly.

Alexei beat a certain rhythm on the mirror-like wall with his knuckles, causing part of it to slid away, allowing him and Grey One to pass through.

Sofia, covered in wards that suppressed her mana from her explosive collar to her ankles, sat on a floor of metal that would absorb any unexpected pulse of mana. The young witch's manacled hands were clasped together and her mouth hanging open as she stared upwards, like she was praying.

Gray Mann turned to greet the newcomers with a smile. 'Grey, Alexei! Working hard, or hardly working?'

'Who the fuck are y-' the weredog's particles gathered together as soon as Gray drew back their fingertip, and Alexei growled, trying to leap at them once more.

The weredog cursed as he slammed against the cell's far wall, creating a deep dent in the yamadium. 'How the fu-' he growled, trying and failing to move.

'Who are you and how did you enter?' Grey One asked, sending out its mind, and feeling nothing except Alexei and Sofia. Its eyes kept sliding away from the-

'Grey, come on.' Gray shook their head in disappointment. 'This is just like our old capers, remember? When Uncle Sam sent us to Mother Russia to take care of business...'

The alien smiled placidly as it remembered. Yes, its friend had saved its life countless times during their missions, just like it had saved it from the aether and guided it to Roswell. 'Apologies. And thanks once more for that.'

'No problem, comrade,' Gray snickered. 'Just like when we tweaked the pig-dogs' noses.'

Grey One nodded firmly, standing straighter. Soon, the USSR would throw off the façade of "democracy", and unite the workers of the world.

'But really, now, Sofia and I we have to go. Things to see, people to do...' Gray trailed off as Alexei leapt at it from behind. With a sigh, they walked backwards through time, and Alexei found himself strangled in his crib by a suited, featureless figure.

The weredog disappeared, then popped back into existence as his regeneration overcame the paradox. No mundane human would remember him with the timeline altered, but he would, as would supernaturals who healed like him.

***

'Who is that?' Grey One asked, bewildered, as a weredog it had never seen appeared from thin air.

'Someone I should have killed,' Gray Mann said, making their friend gasp.

'But...but why? Where are we? Why are we here?'

Gray turned to it, disappointed. 'Have you forgotten? You murdered him, and wanted to stay to gloat.'

***

Grey One stood over the body of a weredog it had never seen, the silver knife with which it had carved out his heart in one hand, the crushed lump of muscle in the other. It would have never managed this without its friend's help, but now-

'Comrade Grey...' Gray Mann whispered. 'How could you betray us?'

Grey One bowed its bulbous head in shame. Ever since it had landed in Siberia, the Soviets had cared for it like it was one of them. But now, heart seized by greed-

'What is an animal like you doing with a tool? Put that down!' Gray Mann said harshly, and the beast that had never been Grey One dropped to all fours, biting at its flesh, and drooling.

***

'What now?' Sofia whispered in awe, her magic going haywire as it tried to reconcile the timeline shifts. How did she know...? Why had she forgotten...?"

'Not now, Sofia,' Gray Mann said. 'We have to get you back to school, now don't we?'

The schoolgirl clapped in delight, jumping up and down, as her guardian smiled at her. Ever since Gray had saved her from that village in the middle of nowhere, they had always been together.

'Yes!'

'Where do you think you're going, prisoner? Stand down!' Gray Man barked.

Sofia slumped. The guilt from the time she had enslaved her village flooded back into her mind. She could only give thanks to Gray, who had shown her the error of her ways, and killed the strigoi who had come to terrorise her.

'Come on, girl,' Gray Man cooed. 'Don't you want to see your dog? Loric will be sad if you don't.'

Sofia gasped. The old tailor had travelled all the way to Siberia to gift her the puppy-one of the greatest adventures one could set on in their quiet world-and it would not to be ungrateful.

'Sofia...' Gray Mann chided. 'Your meal is coming back.'

The young witch choked, falling onto all fours as her dog's remains came rushing up her throat and the fat strigoi's grinning face flashed into her mind. Its guts and limbs, covered in fur and matted blood, came first, far too big for her small body to contain. Then came the face, staring at her in glassy-eyed horror and judgement.

Sofia broke down in tears, but not for long, for her dog's remains came rushing up her throat and the

fat strigoi's grinning face flashed into her mind. Its guts and limbs, covered in fur and matted blood, came first, far too big for her small body to contain. Then came the face, staring at her in glassy-eyed horror and judgement.

Sofia broke down in tears-

And Gray Mann left, whistling, hoisting the witch up with one hand.

***

'You rotten liar...'

'Are they lies, when the world and the past change to fit my words? You have fought against schemers for so long, you think all you oppose is a lie. You have grown too used to your mirror...put it down, and see the truth.'

'Do you expect my mind to break as my shriveled humanity falls away? I have grown past such things.'

'We shall see.'