Chapter 11

On the topic of throwing off, everyone’s train of thought was subject to that when a bright blue haired girl came in, stumbling from a slowdown as the flat-out run became a walk. She had a strange look about her. A gold ring hung from the middle of her nose, and a dozen other golden piercings were scattered across her lips, ears, and eyebrows. When her mouth fell open to pant, the glint of a ring in her tongue could be seen; making it obvious that this girl really enjoyed getting piercings. Kiko wondered if they were anywhere else as well, but gave herself a quick mental slap at that. She wasn’t going to turn into a deviant in response to her fear of sexual commitment.“I’m sorry I’m late Mistress, I set the alarm for pm, rather than am” She told Queenie, still panting hard. Kiko’s eyes bulged at the title, and looked to Queenie with suspicious eyes. Mistress?! The whole idea that the girl’s voice was cute and light didn’t even find purchase in Kiko’s mind, despite how many piercings were adorning her face and the rather amusing disparity between the two.“It’s fine Ceal. Not like this is important or anything” Queenie replied, sarcasm dripping heavy and thick from her tone, before snapping her fingers and pointed to a point next to her. Queenie caught Kiko’s glare as she waited for Ceal to come, but just gave an apologetic smile. Which turned to a grimace when Ceal tripped over her own feet and hit the mat.“This miscoordinated klutz is my assistant Ceal. She might seem a useless bint right now, but I like her. I am Overseer Queenie; you can call me Overseer if you wish. If any of you decide to be over familiar and call me Queenie, then I will drag you to my bedroom and roughly exhaust you there before forcing you to repeat today’s training” It was a threat that was just like the Demon girl, and seemed decidedly directed at Kiko. A threat to bridge the gulf growing between them maybe? She was just the right temperament to try such ham-handed actions.

The sudden explicit threat had shocked the recruits, and some were interested at the unsurprised look on Kiko’s face. It implied she knew the sensual woman up there threating people with exhaustive cardinal activities and then forced exercise. Kiko looked around and saw in the eyes of people looking at her that if anything happened, they would hide behind Kiko as a buffer from the woman. Great. Now she was going to have to decide if she was on the side of the recruits, or Queenie, who would have no problem, at all taking her here and now if she warranted it. Queenie flashed Kiko a grin that meant the woman knew exactly what the fox girl was thinking and then carried on with her speech.“You are here because you were physically active before being recruited into SIR. Some of you did gym, some of you learned martial arts, a few of you did both. But now you are here and you will learn how I say. I do not care about what you think you know, and if you dislike that then I invite you to come up to the stage and show exactly what you know with dear Ceal here” Queenie finished. A ripple of giggles ran through the recruits. Ceal looked to be the kind of person to swing a punch and hit herself. And you just had to tug on one of her piercings and she was putty. This thought clearly ran through the mind of a rather large man, who stepped up with a sneer. She recognized him as he called attention to himself. A man who competed in boxing at a national level, Quasi-human bracket.

Queenie nodded at the man, and gave an order for everyone to clear some space, clearing the mat for Ceal and the man.“Alright. Three-minute round. First to surrender loses. If you lose, then your ego will be punished by making you have to follow everything she says for a day. Of course if you win then she will have to do everything you say” Queenie explained. A lewd grin stretched across the big man’s face, as he towered over the girl. It was going to be over in seconds, and then the cute girl was going to be forced into indentured servitude for the day, all because of Queenie’s boasting. Kiko had half a mind to step in and stop this, but Queenie seemed to sense that train of thought and gave her a glance dissuading Kiko of that course of action. “Ok. Take stances” Queenie ordered. The big man took a solid position, showing skill as well as size and strength. Ceal just looked on, as awkward and shy as the moment she had entered. Setting her jaw, Kiko watched and intended to have some words with Queenie later. “And, begin!”

The big man wasted no time and rushed in, quick for his size, and agile as well. No boxer could survive on strength alone, and this was why he was the representative for his country in global boxing contests. An unrestrained fist flew towards Ceal’s gut and the girl looked liable to break a rib when that connected, but it never did. The earlier prediction that the fight would be over in seconds was correct, but nobody had guessed to whom it would go. In a flurry of moment too fast to catch, Ceal had the man on the ground, standing over him with his arm in a clutch just shy of dislocating it, and a foot on his shoulder. A simple twitch and he would have an arm dislocated from its shoulder. The loud thud of him hitting the mat shocked several people, one of them even letting out a cute yelp of surprise. The man struggled, trying to use his formidable strength to force his way out of the hold, but it was perfect, and kept him latched to the ground as if he was stuck in a tar pit.“I suggest you surrender, big guy. Ceal’s got a rather disturbing fetish, she likes to hear people’s bones snap, and you are in prime position to indulge her” Queenie put in. Ceal’s focused face turned a deep red and she looked to Queenie frantically.“Mistress! I don’t do that anymore!” She exclaimed, keeping the big guy in the hold as if all his squirming and writhing didn’t matter in the slightest. ‘anymore’ implying that she did it at one point, was all that the man needed to tap rapidly on the mat, surrendering to this waif of a girl.

“Well, that’s game. And a good first lesson. The creatures you are going to be up against can’t always judge what they can do from first glace. You’ve got to be on guard and never underestimate your opponent, or you will probably be eaten” She told the group. Ceal had let her opponent go the moment he had tapped, but he stayed on the ground, seething in anger.“That was bullshit! What kind of trick did she use?!” He barked, his muscles seeming to grow and distort as he lost control over his form and it turned back towards his Ogre roots.“Ceal here, is a Slyph. Their unfortunate mentality compels them to focus on a singular thing to the exclusion of anything else. Only mastery will allow them to move on to something else. Ceal’s mind focused on Combat, which she mastered a few decades ago. She has about three hundred and fifty years of combat experience, so you stood no chance against her. It was a rigged fight from the start, I just wanted to demonstrate that you shouldn’t judge a klutz by her stumble” Queenie continued, ruffling the girl’s blue hair and smiling down at her. Ceal had such a look of contentment on her face from the petting, Kiko thought she might blow a gasket right here in front of everyone. But she kept it together, even when Queenie whispered in her ear. No doubt lewd and horrifying to hear, from the way Ceal turned into the same colouration as a tomato.

“Right, now we are done showing off, listen up” Queenie exclaimed, looking to everyone and then back to Ceal.“Form up into pairs, and we will begin unarmed sparring. I want a good five-minute match so I can see where you need help and what you excel in” she then started pointing out pairs, leaving Kiko out as there was an odd number. Then paring Kiko with Ceal, like Queenie had planned it or something. The blue haired Slyph came forward and Kiko had a much greater appreciation for her abilities, which led the five-minute match to be one filled with a deeper air of caution than she would have ever given the girl before she took out the Ogre. Ceal managed to restrain herself and match Kiko, making it a hard-pushed workout rather than an ego-destroying match that she had had with the Ogre. Kiko even managed to get a conversation out of the girl while they fought.“So, Mistress huh?” Kiko started. Ceal blushed deeply and faltered for a moment, but the young Kitsune didn’t take advantage of that and let her recover. It took a whole minute of mock fighting before Ceal even spoke, however.“She sort of owns me. It’s our culture to give ourselves to one that can best us in our chosen art. Although I was a fool to accept a challenge from the Ever-Burning Lady. So I honour our culture, and my ancestors” Ceal then finished her explanation with a rapid movement that launched Kiko over her flip and saw her deposited none-to-gently on the floor.“Ow…” Kiko muttered, getting up as Ceal looked worried.“Was that too much?” She asked, an intense look of concern plastered over her face. Kiko gave her a disarming smile and got back up, brushing herself off.“No, no. It was fine. Don’t worry about it dear. So, what all this about Ever-Burning Lady? I have never heard that term before, definitely not referring to Queenie” Kiko’s curiosity pushed her to ask what this title meant. It was clearly related to her Demonic heritage, as she could use fire, but what it meant…she was unsure. And it seemed Ceal was not in the mood to share that little tit-bit.

Mumbling something about not being hers to tell, Ceal pushed the next two minutes so that Kiko couldn’t focus on anything other than the fight. And so she did just that, getting her ass thoroughly, but educationally, kicked by the piercing-covered Slyph. When Queenie finally called an end to the match, Kiko caught her breath in the break, and made a plan to get information from the girl. Wait till she as naked, and then take advantage of the rings most probably located elsewhere around the cute girl’s body. The thought snapped Kiko out of the planning session, and she shook her head, denying that she would ever do something like that. She was no pervert, no lecher, and definitely not someone to force a girl to do something she didn’t want to do. Her mind was mess, focus was difficult, and she had so many unbidden thoughts, going from disgust at all sexual activity to being a tormenting pervert so fast it gave her whiplash. Queenie gathered the recruits and got them in a line, and began to speak, which gave Kiko something to focus on.

“Ok, you are as good as you say. Most of this will be refining your present physicality and keeping it sharp, but also teaching you some close quarters stuff. Hand to hand and knife work. Guns are good, but knives don’t jam, and gave give you more satisfaction that whatever it is you are swinging at is dead when you stick it through its skull. Specialized close quarter weapons shall be available as extra-curricular, but a silver knife and an iron knife are standard issue to all SIR agents. Knowing how to use this seemingly small bit of kit may save your life in the field. They may lack the reach of a sword and the punch of a gun, but they are easy to pull out, quick to use, and can slip through gaps better than most” She explained, before smiling. “But that is for later. Right now, we are going to make use of the expansive building to get some cardio done. Being able to outrun a Hell Hound is literally a matter of life and death” Queenie didn’t sugar coat anything, it seemed, and git everyone lined up on the track, before getting them running.

She set a harsh pace, anyone who fell behind would get eaten, she said. What being eaten entailed, was unclear, but by the eight-hundred-meter mark, Kiko was falling behind.“You’ve got hooves, it’s totally unfair” Kiko exclaimed breathlessly as she ran. The rest of the group joined in, voicing exhausted disdain of Queenie’s extended run because she had the legs to do it whereas the lesser Quasi-humans, and the humans, did not. So Queenie stopped and grinned broadly.“It was only near a Kilometre, but Rome wasn’t razed in a day. Fine, you’ve got the rest of the day free” She then pointed over to a door in the distance. “That way are showers, no peaking on the other person, or I will set fire to your genitals. This is the only mandatory period in your schedule, but you are encouraged to pick up some extra activities related to the division you wish to join. I head the Assault Teams, generally found here or at my quarters, of which you are welcome to come by any time and try to broker some preferential treatment. Elis is the head of the Intelligence division, mostly found by following the smell of nerd and takeout food to the Computer labs, Bruyn is the head of the Rifles, located in the firing range, and Lasadora is in command of the Standardized Foot Teams. You don’t find Lasadora, you just make your interest known and they will find you” Queenie didn’t seem worried at all that she made Lasadora sound like some psychopathic nutjob, and just headed off, letting people mill off to the showers. Kiko scratched her head intensely and tried to get the idea of tormenting Ceal out of her head. Between that and her scars, she just couldn’t bring herself to go to the showers with everyone else. Eventually she came to the conclusion of just waiting for everyone to be done with their showering before going there herself. Which gave her some time to look around.

This Room of Physical Prowess was big, and possessed a great deal of exercise equipment. And the massive track they had just been forced to run around like mad people. The gym she populated was scant and pathetic compared to this one, made her think that she was getting ripped off with the membership fees. But, then SIR was the best when it came to a lot of things, they needed to be or they wouldn’t have lasted this long. On experiment, she produced her tail and walked towards one of the dumbbells. Focusing intensely, she connected a string from her tail to the bell. So it wasn’t just her going mad, she really could expand a string to control things. Lifting it was a different matter, as she strained upwards and found herself unable to lift it up off its base. Maybe there was a sort of limit to the power she was able to exert with her tail? Asha would be the girl to talk to, after she dealt with her mother’s clan. So much to do, she was a busy fox these days. Like a bee. A bee fox. A Box. Kiko, was a box. It was now official.

With her new title, she turned to the showers, and skipped off merrily, only to be yanked to a stop mid skip, reminded that she was still connected to the dumbbell. She was really dumb to forget that, so maybe she fit being attached to it. Regardless, she needed to let go of it before going anywhere, or spontaneously lift it off it it’s cradle and drag it with her. Option two, she didn’t have the strength for, so she let go of it. Or at least tried. Nothing she thought of was actually working for severing the connection. So she walked up close to it, and started biting it, like she was going to get through it with her teeth, or something insane. Insane or not, it worked, and it frayed until finally snapping and retracting into her tail. What possessed her to bite it, she had no idea, but that was the fun of being her, after all. You never knew what was coming next with Kiko~. Or something to that effect. She needed to fix that, sort her mind out, stop shying away from everything like it was going to bite her head off, and woman up. But it wasn’t that easy. To think that something like that could happen again, and to manage to put the memories of that time to the back of her head. It wasn’t easy. She wasn’t even sure if she could manage it. It felt like it would stick with her forever. But thinking on it would get her nowhere, and so she had to just go get a shower and work from there. And so that is what she did, heading to the shower with slightly less merriness than she had started with. Her mind was much more morbid now. These mood swings sucked. She tried to get back the elation she felt about being a box but couldn’t muster anything, and so just slunk off to get clean.

Fortunately, she had waited long enough and nobody was around, so she was free to feel the fall of the water on her face and be liberated from her emotional distress. This was where peace was found, in the fall of water, the constant noise as it fell from the showerhead to the ground, and the constant feeling of it hitting her skin, as if it was washing away not only her physical dirt and sweat, but also the mental buildup. Eventually she’d have to get out and deal with the real world again, and that would suck, but right now she was free to convince herself that life was good and she didn’t have any problems. It was a nice delusion. She used it to pool some water in her hands and then drop it all at once to revel in the noise, such an action a childish appeal but an eternal appeal.

However, it was a delusion that was shattered when she finished. Not because she had finished, she was still in calm mode until the scent of blood hit her nose. Her legs jittered and she couldn’t help but bite her lip roughly to try and retain some semblance of control. It didn’t work, and she lost herself entirely. So when a man appeared, suave smile and strange uniform, Kiko could only smile in a semi-lucid fashion. The source of the blood was from his wrist, where he had cut himself. He must have known that Kiko had some fixation with blood.“Well, you are a patch-work, aye little foxie?” He asked, taking out some small camera and snapping a few shots of her naked body. A small part of Kiko’s mind made her think that this was a terrible thing to happen, but the rest of it was too frenzied to do much more than give him a nice pose to look at while he was snapping his pictures. Once that was done, he walked up to her, and kissed her neck softly. “Now I got some insurance against stupidity, let’s have some fun” he barely got his sentence out before Kiko jumped him. She ripped off his pants and mounted his shaft with vicious intensity, grinding and sliding up and down without much care that he was more hurt than pleasured by her. He enticed a madness in her, and now he was paying the price. Needing to smell him bleed, even more than she needed to quench the fire that had suddenly sprouted in her loins, her claws raked his chest, her nails suddenly distorting and become sharp and pointed when she smelled the blood. He let out silence shrieks of pain as she sliced him up, and immediately regretted his decision. He had no idea what he had gotten himself into, only that the tool his brother had given him had lit up, and he said when it did that, it would lead her to a girl that was ready for a wild time. Which, was true, he just assumed it was a time that would be less claws more sex. After she’d drained him of several loads, he was allowed to crawl off and bleed somewhere. The Kitsune no longer cared for that toy. The feral part of Kiko’s mind growled in victory as she believed he would not be around again. But another part of her, knew he would return with better preparation. Men rarely gave up on sex like what Kiko had just given easily.

It took her several minutes to recover, the feral minded Kiko simply prowling the showers looking for something else to take, but not finding it. And then she huddled in the corner, clutching her knees. She had no idea what had just happened, but it was like she was watching her own body though a monitor, able to see but unable to stop it from doing what she was so radically trying to avoid. She spent a long time in the showers, scrubbing herself until she split the skin and started bleeding. Terrified, she stared at it for a few moments before realizing it was not her own that set her off. Just someone else’s. This was crazy Kitsune crap. She needed to talk to someone, and it needed to be now. Quickly towelling off and then throwing her uniform on, she stormed through the building, still wet hair trailing behind her until she barged into Lysaida’s office.“Where’s Asha?” Kiko demanded. Lysaida looked back with blank eyes, as if gauging Kiko’s mental state and determining how she had to react to the sudden intrusion and rude demand. The fury and ragged look to her eyes, as well as the smell the shower had not managed to fully clean, convinced Lysaida to act with an even hand.“She is currently in her office. I can take you there, but your mother’s clan is still waiting for you and they are getting passive aggressive with how long it is taken you to go see them. I explained you were new to this whole thing, but they are still pretty haughty” she spoke softly, soothingly, but Kiko was too riled to calm down. She kept wondering if her Kitsune mentality would kick in, but it never did.“Tell them to meet me in the reception in about an hour. I have something I need to sort out first” Kiko then turned and stormed out, making a bee-line for Asha’s office.“Well, dam. Any clue what that was about?” asked a man, who had been stood unseen until this moment.“Not in the slightest, but I am going to find out” She replied, picking up a phone and starting to dial

Chapter 12

Like a frantic hurricane, Kiko burst into Asha’s office much the same way she had into Lysaida’s. And much the same way, Asha took stock of her mentality, and replied in a level headed tone.“Good day Kiko. You look agitated” Asha’s voice was thick with something that Kiko couldn’t pin-point. It felt eldritch and unnatural. The fires of her anger burned away in a moment, and without that to hold back the hysteria, she broke down into tears.“Something is wrong with me! I…need help!” She screamed, her hands shaking intensely as she collapsed onto the floor and sobbed. Asha had never seen this kind of reaction before, and so got up from her chair and rushed over to hug Kiko tightly.“Tell me, my dear” Asha gently ordered. Kiko felt as if she couldn’t refuse her, and it all came babbling out. How she took an adverse reaction to blood, how someone found out and took advantage of it, about her scars, and her brand, and what she had done to the man. Eventually she ran out of words and just sobbed into Asha’s shoulder, while receiving motherly strokes on the head, soothing, but akin to a man standing against waves in a storm. She didn’t know how long it took but she ran out of tears to cry, could no longer scream as her throat was too hoarse, and simply slumped. Asha picked Kiko up – with all these people picking her up, a part of her still clinging to sanity thought she was incredibly light, or that everyone could just develop super strength when they wanted – and laid her on a long couch, covering her with a blanket that made Kiko immediately tired.“Sleep, young Kitsune. Speak with yourself, and awaken” Asha told Kiko. Unable to refuse, Kiko quickly dropped off into a deep sleep.

A few seconds after dropping off, she found herself back at home. Or a very realistic dream of home. It even had her father sat across her, smiling to him with deep gold eyes.“Dad…” Kiko couldn’t believe it. He was dead, what was he doing here?“Hey Kid. You really got the shit end of the stick, huh?” He asked, smiling his coy, confident smile, before leaning forward to pour some tea.“You’re dead…” She muttered, not able to believe her eyes.“Yea. Kinda sucks. But no Kitsune close to your heart ever truly dies. I get to be here, with nifty golden eyes that let me Look into your mind and make a perfect helper for your problems. If you want to get technical, I am not actually Drax, but what makes a person, if it is not memory and emotion? I’m as Drax as Drax was, which is why I feel comfortable with the claim that I am him” Drax liked to talk, and Kiko liked his voice. So it was a good partnership between father and daughter. “I’m sorry I never brought you into the life, forcing you to deal with all this so quickly. We Kitsunes are born to kill the Beasts from Beyond. And I wanted to spare you that. As a five-tailed Kitsune, and a Striker of SIR, I thought I was going to be able to keep you out of the life for a lot longer. But it seems something big caught me by surprise. Little bitch” He finished pouring the tea, and took his own cup, pushing Kiko’s towards her.“I…missed you. I think I saw you earlier, in a crazy hallucination” She muttered. Drax stared for a second, as if looking through her mind – the way he said ‘look’ made it sound as if it was something different to using your eyes to see things – and then sighed and leaned back.“Hate to tell you kiddo, but the shit you have been through right now? You’re going to be through a lot more. Agnaet is in the cycle, so he has to make do with what he gets. But Vanaet has a different thing going on. Sort of cultivation of hosts through certain trials. Which equates to going through a shitstorm of flaming feces before you reach culmination” He counseled. Kiko knew that this was exactly what they were designed to do. Hallucinations that acted as a portable, personal therapist. What kind of situation would require this kind of modification, however, she didn’t know.“Great War sucked, huh…” She muttered, shaking her head. Drax’s voice always managed to calm her down, despite everything. She had no idea what Agnaet or Vanaet was, or were – he spoke as if they were people, but sometimes people referred to objects as people – but that question just, didn’t come to her mind.

“Aye. Very few Kitsunes alive today have been in it, but I’m rather old, you know. So I was around in the era where there were more survivors. So you got more stories. And yes, I am glad I did not have to fight in that. SIR is bad enough, I have had some times that are less than optimal, but the Great War? Makes it look like two children with pellet guns fighting over a sand box. I’m sure you are handily coming to grips with all the adjustments that were made to us in the Great War. Arigos were not even something that manifested before” He leaned back, sipping his tea while Kiko did the same. She knew it wasn’t real, but it tasted nice and it was time with her father. Something that was a premium these days. She wanted to know what an Arigo was, but another question slipped from her lips.“What’s with the blood? Every time I smell it, I go insane. And it is kind of putting a hamper on having a proper relationship with anyone” Kiko put in, slumping back on her chair. How would Queenie react to learning this? Drax looked on for a few moments and then smirked.“Ha, ran into Queenie huh? She always tried to get me in her bed but never managed. I guess something about our line is enticing to her. If you ever do get to her bedroom, there is this spot just above her hip, left side of her body. Give that a kiss and, enjoy the fireworks” Drax gave a broad grin, that Kiko did not return.“Interesting, but it doesn’t answer the question. You avoided it completely” Kiko said, calling him out on his avoidance. Drax shrugged casually, but nodded.“Yea, but I don’t know. Which is wrong. I shouldn’t not. I should, know everything, or near enough, so as to assist you however you need it. Not knowing, is worrying” He then looked about the house, and finished his cup of tea. “That’s all we got time for today, I’m afraid. You are waking up in about five seconds. See you later, m’dear” He then took the cup to the kitchen, as if cleanliness mattered when he was going to pop out of existence soon. Unless he wasn’t. Which was an entirely different kettle of fish.“Wait, no! I have so many questions for you!” Kiko shouted, before suddenly she was in Asha’s office.

The smell in the air was dramatically different. Asha’s office was empty, and when she got up and tried the door, it was locked. Which was awkward. Asha didn’t have a lot in her office, so there was nothing for Kiko to really do. She didn’t want to look through the paperwork, and didn’t want to disturb anything that might have been laid out in a special fashion.“Morning” A voice said. Kiko spun around, tail spawning in an instant, and ready to protect her however it could. “Don’t shoot the messenger, not that you could shoot me, but still. Words hurt were bullets do not. Or in your case eldritch fire shot from your tail” He was a man who blathered, it seemed. So Kiko gave him a scowl instead.“Who are you?” She demanded, baring her teeth. She had no trust for anyone of the male persuasion right now.“Mananan Dolaharanan. I used to be a Dullahan” He said, reaching up and casually taking his head off to prove a point, tucking it under his arm. “But there was an experiment a few years back, tried to make invisible operatives, but it went the other way and now I kind of don’t exist in this plane. Bonus is, I can actually turn invisible if I want. Just, can’t touch anything, or interact with the physical world in any manner other than speaking to someone. I was assigned to look over you and make sure nobody bothered you. Not that I can do anything to stop anyone bothering you, but I can go tell someone. It’s surprising how quick you can get somewhere when you walk through walls” His monolouging drone – from the head still under his arms – managed to push Kiko away from the edge of her anger. Letting out a deep sigh, she retracted her tail, dropped her anger, and collected her nerves. And he had a hell of a name to boot. How anyone but him remembered that…

“Alright. Fine. What’s going on? Why is the door locked? Are they keeping me prisoner until…” she suddenly trailed off, remembering what had happened. Her breathing hitched and her hands shook at the memory.“Half and half really. Protecting you from them, and them from you. Asha has a theory on what is going on, and that means you have to be kept from them. She isn’t sharing the theory, just going on warpath to find who did it. Money is on the Tengu. They don’t like Kitsunes, they got overshadowed in the Great War by them, and hold a grudge. Plus, the Tengu enclave is currently on lockdown because of some ritual they don’t share with outsiders. It’s suspicious timing, so she’s got a Fire Team camped out in front of them. A little overkill, but if they really are behind this, then it is beyond petty pranks” He told her. Kiko nodded, trying to get her hand to stop shaking. With time, and force of will, she managed it, but her heart was still going mad. Why wasn’t the Kitsune mentality taking this away?“What…what’s a Fire Team?” Kiko asked, trying to distract herself.“Ahh, a Fire Team is a team of veterans brought from the other squads into one squad that can nail almost any task handed to them. They are rare, and only brought out in times of need, or when an intense show of force is needed. They are more often deployed against Cultist sects and Greater Beast nests than anything. More than one sect has outright surrendered when they heard a Fire Team is outside. Lysaida heads that division. The deployment here is to help the Tengu give up and come in for interrogation” He explained. Kiko listened, nodded, and clenched her hands, and unclenched them. Thinking would do her no good right now, so it was time to stop thinking.“Can, I get out? I promise I won’t murder anyone painfully with long sharp claws and blasting them through the chest with my tail laser beam” Kiko tried to make it sound as sincere as possible, but it didn’t quite convince Mananan.“I’ve not got the key. I can walk through the door, get Lysaida, but I can’t unlock it for you” He offered. Kiko didn’t trust herself to speak, and so just nodded, and head headed off.

Left alone in the office, she turned her mind inward, and thought about what Drax, or the Drax illusion, had told her. She was going to go through a lot more of this, so she had to steel herself. Mental introspection seemed something that was going to be very common for her if she was going to be put through more of this. She had to accept that this wasn’t her fault. And she wasn’t the one who walked away the worst from that. That guy, despite his ignoble intentions, barely crawled away when she was finished with him. And she had no control over it, whatever this was that drove her insane, it was beyond her control. However, such an admission was not easy. It still harrowed her mind, that she had done that to a man, and that that could happen at any time that she smelled someone bleeding. It was better for her to just give up, said one part. But another wouldn’t allow her to do that, so she was caught between a rock and a hard place, unable to swing either way until soft arms encompassed her, and spoke.“You are a mess” it was the voice of Lysaida, which reminded Kiko that she could feel the mental state of anyone who’s shadow she passed through. Which meant she knew how Kiko was feeling.“I am sure you had seen worse” Kiko intoned, her eyes downcast.“Well, there was Drax, that one time he nearly got his leg bitten clean off. Not the fact that he nearly lost his leg, mind. The fact that he was going to miss the tortilla wraps a guest-chef was cooking for us in his tour of the world. Never seen Man or Mer so crestfallen as he was. But, his problems were much easier to solve than yours. I don’t get specifics; do you want to fill me in?” She asked. Kiko thought for a few moments, and eventually nodded.

“I’m a Monster. That is all there is to it” She told Lysaida, slipping out of her embrace and easing herself down onto the couch. A vile creature, fit for naught but slaughtering.“That is a lie. Asha tells me that what you did was not something anyone has had to even think about for a few hundred years. So nobody was prepared for it springing up in the new Kitsunes. It was heavy on the mythological side, so I didn’t get a lot. Something, Something, Queen of Blood, Vanaet, Great War. I never did well in my mythos studies. I was a girl more focused on the physical, to be honest” Lysaida told Kiko. And there it was, that name again, like it was following her or something. Vanaet. She would ask Asha about it when she was finally out of this god-damn prison.“So, can I go?” Kiko asked, tersely as she was already irritated for being stuck here so long.“We are going to have to keep you here for a little longer before we can be sure that we know what is going on with you” Lysaida was prepared for an active response from Kiko, and was surprised when the girl just, slumped.

“Fine…I’ll just…” she slunk off to the corner, and sat down. Lysaida’s heart ached when she saw it, but she had to put the safety of the rest of SIR before the comfort of one Kitsune girl, so turned and left through the shadows, leaving Kiko alone to ponder the state of her mind, and what was to come. In the corner her hands shook, her body shuddered, tears streamed down her face, and then a soft whisper entered her ear.‘They fear you now. Nobody will trust you again. Whatever you do, however you try to redeem yourself, they will always look at you different’ it said. The words cut so deep because they were true. She couldn’t do anything about that, just feel the sobs grow heavier. ‘But I can help you, my dear. I can make it so that you are never subjected to this pain again’ it promised. In a moment of weakness, and eminent vulnerability, she just gave in, and nodded, accepting with a groan that could be words were she more coherent. There was soft laughter before she felt teeth sink into her neck, ripping into her. Before, it would be agony she could not stand, but now it barely made a side-bar. She could feel for a second all the fear and anguish draining out of her, before the voice appeared in her head again, panicked and frantic. ‘What?! No, you can’t! I am claiming this one!’ it screamed inside her head, before the shrieks became wordless and it faded away into nothing but ash and dust. There was a haughty noise of victory, and then everything became silent again. Kiko’s hand went to her neck, and felt the wound there. Whatever had happened wasn’t in her mind, it was real.“You should have let her take me. I can’t handle this” She muttered, huddled into a ball in the corner. She wasn’t expecting a response, and was surprised when she got one.‘You are the closest I have been in hundreds of years. Finally got some help with the interference, and I will not lose you to some abandoned scavenger. There is nothing wrong with asking for and receiving help, little one. Just don’t rely on it to save you from everything’ it replied, ringing in her mind. The voice was so powerful, so confident, so fearless. It made Kiko cry to even be spoken to by such a powerful being, as weak as she was.

But she was dragged from her thoughts by the door opening, and Queenie standing there. The way her face turned to see Kiko so, damaged, caused the young Kitsune’s heart to thump painfully.“Fire Team Marric managed to enter the Tengu enclave under orders from Mizia and arrest the man responsible. Mizia has told them it’s the last straw and all Tengu currently in employment are dishonorably discharged back to Ta’al. Their superiors are probably going to chew them out something chronic, we won’t be dealing with them outside Joint Ops for years to come. So, you did pretty well. Less than a week here and you’ve already ousted your enemy’s Enclave. Asha is going to love you” She said, walking over and crouching down.“I’m a monster. You should just forget about me” Kiko muttered, staying on the ground until Queenie took her chin in her hand and forced her to meet eye-to-eye. And then suddenly those eyes were filled with Fire. Horrors filled the plain ad infinitum, and above it all, below it all, surrounding it all, was Fire. Upon a gigantic mass of smoke and flame in the vague shape of a throne sat a being who radiated power, someone that, even as an apparition, made Kiko both shudder in fear and weep in joy.

And then it was gone, she was back in the room, and Queenie was stood above her in all her Demonic glory. Even more than her Demonic glory, in fact. There was something more to her. Smoldering ghost-fire flickered off her body, passing through her uniform in its insubstantial nature, hair flicked and crackled as if it was made of flame rather than keratin.“Ohh, my little Fox. You know nothing of monsters. You are a child who has stood on a frog, and now calls herself a murderer. It is not you who should be warding me off. In all honesty, it should be me warding you off. I will admit I am putting a bit of what I felt for your father on to you, and that is not fair, but my heart burns hot and long, it is not something I can ignore without your disdain of me. Now is the time. Can you be with me, knowing what I am?” She asked, her voice seemingly coming from elsewhere than her mouth. Kiko’s shuddering picked up even further, and she stammered incoherently for a few moments before managing to get a grasp on it.“The…Ever-burning Lady” she muttered, to which Queenie nodded.

“Ceal does talk when she is excited. Yes, I am the Heir to the Throne of Eternal Flame. My home is that of fire, smoke, and ash. My kingdom is filled with naught but those you would call demon, and those we sup upon. I am most monster than you could be in a hundred years. Such minor infractions to morality. Such, mortal actions could never contest with one of my stature. And so I will say it again, for the sake of your frail and damaged psyche. I Am the Beast under your Bed. The bump in the night, the footsteps behind you, the flickering shadow. Can you, accept that?” Queenie asked. There was just, too much to deal with for Kiko. Queenie was, radiant. She felt terrifying, but also so immensely beautiful. All at once she resembled the raging inferno and the warming hearth. She was death, and she was life. And that, was good. Kiko could not stop weeping at the eminence of the sight, and her little head voice pipped up with a scoff at the whole thing.‘You will be far much more than she is when you awaken. But, I suppose for a girl like you it is rather auspicious’ it told Kiko, the haughty tone thick and heavy. It was clearly something that thought a great deal of itself. Like it was the best thing in the world, and would accept nobody telling her any different.

“I can…” Kiko whispered, her voice dry and cracking. And then, Queenie seemed to almost deflate. Gone was the fire, the fury, the passion, and in its place, was just the woman that Kiko was attracted to.“Wonderful. Then let’s go get some food”

Chapter 13

Unfortunately, food was not on the menu, it seemed. As they were ambushed by Asha before getting ten foot out of the room that Kiko had been in. The head Kitsune didn’t seem very impressed with Queenie’s attempts to run off with Kiko, and gave her The Glare. And a bit for Kiko for going along with it. A silent argument played out between the two, with Kiko in the middle, which eventually ended in the defeat of Queenie.“Guess you are needed by Asha for a bit. I can wait outside if you want...” Queenie offered, and Kiko nodded quickly. With permission to linger outside, Queenie followed Kiko until they reached Asha’s office, and did just that as the girl was ushered inside and all but dropped into a plush seat that seemed to hug her as she fell into it.“Now, you are probably very distraught over what has happened to you and the Tengu, it was quite the mess. So I looked into it and I finally found record of what, exactly, it is you are going through” Asha started. Such definitive words made Kiko sit up, as much as she could in a chair that was all cushion, and pay emphatic attention. The incredibly intense staring would probably be off-putting for others, but Asha had seen enough in her life to be steeled against that sort of thing. Most sorts of things, if she was honest.

“It stems back to the Great War. That fight was not our own, it seems. Ancient legends suggest that the sky was filled with chariots of fire as the denizens of the stars descended upon our planet to aid us. It’s mostly gibber, but ‘denizens of the stars’ does seem to imply that there were people from other planets here at the time of the Great War. Extraterrestrial life has always been an interesting discussion, and while I wouldn’t say some ancient writing that seems to be using thermatics in lieu of actual words is to be trusted entirely, it’s food for thought” Asha seemed to be enjoying the monologue, so Kiko just let her carry on.

“There is a mention of a woman who ruled over the Life of all who stood on the field. Cross-reference that with a later treatise on The Great War, with some professional translators, I might add. I can really appreciate the effort a man puts into something like this. An- “Asha seemed fit to go on for a while yet but Kiko was interested in something else entirely.“How long, was I in that room? And hey, wasn’t that room your office? How do you have two offices?” She seemed more interesting in that right now than anything else.“Ohh, you were there about a week. Time can distort under immense grief or stress, like you were under. And I have two offices because one was my day-to-day office, and one was my proper office. Kitsunes can be rather vigorous at times. And so I have a scapegoat office that is filled with naught but brick-a-brack and general office supplies. This is my real office, in which the stuff that is actually important, is kept. I rarely bring people here because that would invalidate the need for a scapegoat office in the first place” Asha seemed slightly amused, as if she had given the explanation before, to an equally confused person. “And now, if you will allow me to continue?” Asha asked. Kiko was a bit thrown by the fact that she had been in that room an entire week and it had only felt like a few hours.

“A week…why am I not hungry? I know I can store more food than I need but I couldn’t have had that much, could I?” She asked, looking down at herself. Sure, she had eaten more than she usually would, but a week? That was pushing it.“Not quite, no. But Kitsunes have a lot of things done to them to make them the perfect warriors. We needed it for the Great War, and so underwent such changes that we can hardly be called Kitsunes anymore. If you get down to your last day’s supply and you know – even subconsciously – that you aren’t going to be getting any more in a hurry, then your metabolism slows dramatically to allow yourself to subsidize on that tiny amount that is left. It’s partially the reason for the time dilution that you feel. You won’t be doing anything straining, but you will survive” Asha sighed as Kiko had so many questions that weren’t related to right now.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

“Anyway. To continue. Finally. This woman who ‘ruled over the Life of all who stood on the field’ was recorded as the Queen of Blood. Name not put down, unfortunately. But, she had a small cadre of Kitsunes known as Blood Moon Kitsunes. They were entrusted with powerful runic enhancements that fed off blood and gave them physical abilities far beyond their kin. Today, there are a few hereditary inheritors of the Blood Moon Kitsunes. However, they are not able to control the power properly and have it suppressed through alchemical concoctions. Unfortunately, your body is too developed for those concoctions as you were not brought into the Kitsune fold until you were in your late teens. So we didn’t catch it and as a result we didn’t manage to get you with what you needed. So, for the first time in a few hundred years, we have a chance to observe the full power of the Blood Moon Kitsunes. And I can tell you from what I have seen so far, it is terrifying” Asha talked endlessly, and Kiko just, stared and listened. This had confirmed it; she was a monster. A horrible, blood-drinking monster. But Kiko’s horrific revelation did not stop Asha in the slightest.

“Your runic enchantments seem to have gone into overdrive and so their ‘vigorous appetite for battle’ seems to have spilled out. Apparently after a fight these Kitsunes would vent excess emotion with their partners” that part, made Kiko look up, with a frown.“So, you are saying every time it starts going mad I should find Queenie? I doubt she’ll appreciate that” Kiko replied, shaking her head at the idea of Queenie getting jumped by a maniacal Kitsune girl.

“We don’t have anything specific for a cure. Trans-planetary theorems are not exactly prolific. We could try repurpose the All-Range Communications Installation to broadcast into the stars in hopes of picking someone up, but we don’t have any idea who this Queen of Blood is or where she is or even who – if anyone – will pick up the transmission. We could be inviting horrific creatures to our world. We could be the last bastion in the entire universe after everything was destroyed by these Beasts From Beyond, and we are just talking to empty space. We could get into contact with this Queen of Blood and she neglects to help us. She is a Queen, after all. There are a lot of variables we have to consider” Asha watched Kiko, and seeing the girl’s face fall slightly, decided to speak again. “That, is not to say we aren’t going to do it. Just that you are aware of what might happen in the future. As for now, we can’t do anything about it. So just, take what you now know and try to hold off the feeling if it comes again, and we will get to you when we have something to get to you about. As for now, I suggest breakfast” Asha gave a soft grin, and then nodded, standing up from the chair and taking Kiko’s hand. “Just know that we are doing everything we can to help you. And one way or another, we will fix this” she finished, before guiding Kiko to the door and letting her out to the still waiting Queenie.

After Asha closed the door, Kiko buried her face into Queenie’s chest – and ample bosom – and sighed in a highly vexed manner.“Mffmfm mmfmf mmfffmfh” Kiko said, her voice too muffled by Queenie to be coherent. For her part, the Demon Queen gave Kiko a soft pat on the head, and stroked her hair.“Indeed. Most insightful, my dear little fox” Queenie teased. That elected a giggle from said little fox. And after a few seconds, she withdrew her face.“Breakfast” Kiko exclaimed, nodding to herself.“What about, Fish Tacos?” Queenie asked, with a strange grin. Kiko stared for a few seconds, and then shook her head.“No, I don’t really like fish. Battered maybe, but I don’t think fish would suit tacos. I was thinking a big breakfast, like sausage and beans and eggs and hashbrowns and more hashbrowns and ohh my god why do you have so many hashbrowns and please stop your plate can’t handle anymore hashbrowns and well done you have officially split the plate in half from the sheer weight of hashbrowns, you mad woman” clearly deserving of the final title from the description of her ideal breakfast.

Queenie put on a pout that Kiko hadn’t gotten her reference, but didn’t pursue it. It was made in jest, after all, not from real desire.“Then we will simply get you a stronger plate” Queenie replied, taking Kiko’s hand – loving the fact that somewhere in the week she seemed to have overcome her fear of contact – and led her to the cantina for the breakfast of her dreams.

Chapter 14

Breakfast wasn’t quite as amazing as all that, but it was still big and satisfying, and nobody called her a mad woman for the amount of hashbrowns she had. Albeit, they were a much less number than she had originally planned for.“You know, Hashbrowns are pretty light. How many would you have to put on your plate before you cracked it?” Kiko asked, casually. Another recruit, sat opposite, perked up from that, and her eyes shone.“If the estimated weight of every hashbrown is around two hundred grams and the plate has an ultimate tensile strength of around six thousand Mpa then it could hold roughly eighteen kilograms at a single point before stress fractures became apparent. So, eighteen thousand grams divided by two hundred comes out at ninety. So, you would have to put ninety hashbrowns on your plate before It cracked” She finished, and then devoured the rest of her sausage with voracious intensity.

“Well….now you know” Queenie said, before breaking into a fit of giggles.“Quite smart to just pull that out of your hat. What’s your name, darling?” Kiko’s tone immediately stopped the giggles and got jealous glares from Queenie. But the girl was not so prepared for the attention and blushed a deep red.“Ohh, I…well, you know, just, I, and…got to go” She stammered bashfully and then scurried off with haste.“She smells of nerd. One of Elis’ new friends, I’d guess” Queenie stated, finishing her own food and helping herself to the remains of the cute girl who had just left. Kiko liked her, but upon reflection, couldn’t remember anything about her. Just that she was smart and cute. Probably described half the people in this place.“What did she look like?” Kiko asked. Queenie looked up and at the door where the girl had just left, and then frowned.“I dunno. She was cute but…I don’t remember any specifics. Which is strange, I remember the specifics of everyone that is cute. Pretty sure I got down to her underwear while undressing her with my eyes but…she is certainly interesting. Don’t think we’ve had one of them in a while” Queenie pulled the girl’s tray to her and started eating.“So you’ve met someone like her before?” Kiko asked, sliding a little closer on the bench and giving a soft smile. Her curiosity was rampant after all.

“Ohh, yea. She’s one of the Not. Interesting people, you can only ever remember one generic thing about them. She’s cute, he’s tall, they have decidedly well kempt hair. Nothing that could point them out in a room. Good infiltration units, because well, you can’t describe what they look like, so you are hard-pressed to find them. She’ll probably get picked up by the Cattanei after recruit days are over” Queenie finished off the girl’s food, and gathered the two trays together. Kiko, finished off her food in silence and thought. It must have been lonely, not ever being able to be recognized. She really hoped that somebody could recognize her, maybe one of her own race, but that was a long shot…‘About five foot seven, medium blonde hair, brilliant green eyes, sizable bust, wears glasses. Rather toned body. Must be the training to come here. Guess not everyone is dragged immediately’ a voice in her head spoke. The voice…the voice…so beautiful and so powerful.‘Who even are you?’ Kiko asked. But got nothing in reply. It was so sporadic and random. No warning, no two way talking. Just popping in to say things and then leaving again. Least the voice in her head could do was stick around for a conversation. But then something clocked on and she looked up at Queenie.“I had a phone!” she exclaimed, sudden and abrupt. The Demon girl looked confused for a few moments, before nodding.“Yes, yes you did. It’s in my room, with the rest of your stuff. We can go there after today’s training. Which, is in about ten minutes. So best get over there, darling. Don’t be late” Queenie then got up, and hurried off. It was a principle of the matter to be the first one there for training. Although other trainers preferred to be the last and keep people waiting.

And so Kiko was left to think. Which she did. Drax had told her, lots of shit was coming her way. She’d been bitten by something that can just float into SIR as it wills, saved by something that is in her head, and apparently runes dot her body to a point Shiro couldn’t do anything about them. And she was a hemophiliac because some Queen jabbed her in the soul or some shit to make Super Kitsunes! All in all, she was well believing Drax when he said there would be more shit. She was just wondering how they were going to escalade from that. She stroked her hand through the white strand of hair, that symbolized the healing she had received from Shiro. Well, that and her eye, but she could hardly stroke her eye. She had to do her PT harder, longer, vigorous….er. She couldn’t be caught like that again, she just couldn’t. It wasn’t just what it did to her, it was what it did to the people she knew. Queenie. She still couldn’t reconcile contact, getting intense shivers and her hackles raising as she remembered burying herself into Queenie’s breasts. Her mind was elsewhere and she didn’t think about it at the time, but…it was bad. Terribly bad, horrifically bad. Terribad, was the word.

But it was not going to solve itself in a day, and she wasn’t going to sit around and make herself late for Queenie’s class. She’d certainly get the bad juju for being late for that. Standing up, she hurried off, keeping the girl’s appearance in mind so she could talk to her later if she met her again. Her strides were broad and quick, so she made good time, but was still one of the last to arrive in the gym. Expecting a glare, she just got an eyebrow flick that implied much worse than what a glare would have. Kiko gulped, and made a point to talk to Queenie later. She didn’t want the girl dragging her off for a session of rigorous skinship. Not yet, anyway. The idea was quite enticing, but the execution scared her right now. So instead she just got into her gym kit, and set up with her partner Queenie gave her. Which, as it turned out, was Ceal. Queenie using her authority to set her up with the Slyph of Asskicking, whether it was to keep her distracted or as punishment for being late or what she didn’t know. Ceal gave an abashed look of apology before Queenie gave the order to begin, and Ceal lunged into combat.

Her punches were swift, strong, and unrelenting. Kiko could only hold defensively and hope that there was going to be an opening. Which was wishful thinking. There was no opening, until Ceal – and everyone – stopped at a sharp yell of pain coming from one of the pairs. Some loose fiber had turned stiff and sharp, cutting him rather a good one across the bare arm he had up for his guard. Queenie just grimiced and walked up to inspect the damage, but Kiko felt herself losing a battle with her mind again. Falling into crimson purgatory, drowning in the sea of blood, she couldn’t fight against this any more than a man could fight against the rising and setting of the sun. Her eyes glazed over, and they fell on Ceal. But the Slyph woman wasn’t surprised, in fact she had unbridled attention directed at Kiko. So was so focused it could drill through concrete as if it was made of wet paper. It was intense. So intense that Kiko felt the previous sea she was drowning in evaporate immediately, and she hit the metaphorical riverbed with a thump. Her eyes returned and she became rather meek and mild about the whole thing. This tipped off Ceal, who backed down to normal levels of focus. Kiko tried to give Ceal some effort, but her heart wasn’t in it anymore, and so after the third time she had been thrown to the ground, Ceal just let her be and sparred gently till the end of the fight. At which point Kiko hung around and let everyone else go to the showers.

After the catastrophe of last time, she was worried to actually go to the showers. What if she got ambushed again? And what was she going to do the next time someone got a nosebleed? She looked out to the running track, and then thought back to that time she had totally been outrun by Queenie. She was wanting to get stronger, and faster, and here was the best place to do it. So Kiko shrugged and head out to the track, keeping a quick but measured pace so she wouldn’t exhaust too quickly. It was no good sprinting for a two hundred yards and then collapsing. Here she could just focus on the run, and not have to think about anything else. And so she got pretty engrossed in it, becoming obsessed with the rhythm of her body. The fall of her feet, the rise of her breath, the endlessly progressing track. It was magnificent. How could she not have seen this before? So caught up in her revelry, she ran smack into Queenie on the track. Thrown off, she came to realize just how long she had been running. She was drenched in sweat, her muscles quivering and burning, an inch from total failure, and her lungs were gasping deeply for a breath that wasn’t coming in sufficient enough qualities.

“Well, you’re a mess, aren’t you? Get a bit caught up in The Wind, huh?” She asked, stroking Kiko’s matted hair. Seeing Kiko’s confused look, but also the fact that she was in no fit state to reply, Queenie smiled and carried on. “This track, long ago, was blessed by some passing Shaman person with the touch of The Wind. A strange sort of collective something I never really fully understood. Doesn’t affect multiple people, or at least it does but too finely spread. A single person, however…gets The Wind beneath their feet, and is driven to run. Mostly past their physical limit. We don’t exactly know why, nor can we undo it. So people occasionally get totally exhausted on the track. And some people are inspired. That inspiration is why we don’t try too hard to undo it” Queenie told Kiko, before picking her up and carting her over to the showers. Kiko felt useless, but Queenie somehow managed to make getting showered by her feel good, and not at all what she thought getting showered by someone would feel like.

After she was washed and fluffed, Kiko just buried herself into Queenie, too exhausted to be repulsed with physical contact. What was going on, kind of escaped her. She was just aware of a soft embrace, something covering her, and then darkness. It was a nice kind of darkness, a blissful emptiness that didn’t demand anything and stretched on forever, until she awoke. It was dark, but then from the feel of the sheets it was Queenie’s room and it was always dark in Queenie’s room. So she laid back down for a moment and thought. She wasn’t going to get much thinking time outside of right now, so might as well use it.‘Hey, you there?’ she asked her head. Not expecting a reply, and getting exactly what she expected. Great. So she had a voice in her head that wasn’t probably real maybe. That was a great sign for her mental stablity. Every time someone got a nosebleed she turned into a nutjob, and there was more besides to come. Lovely. Was it still too late to become a goat-herder in the steppes of Albion? She didn’t need a voice in her head to tell her that yes, it is too late to run away and raise smelly things for a living. So she got up and looked around, finding her uniform in the darkness, and leaving Queenie’s bedroom, not really caring how bedraggled she looked. It as part of her style. Batshit Fox, maybe she could patient it?

She left giggling softly to herself, and then looked around. So much to do. She had to go to the Gym and get stronger, then to Bruyn to learn how to shoot people in the face, and then to Asha to learn about her fox tails and then to the scary Elis to get poked and prodded and dissected and then left on the table as she went out for lunch. And then she had to go see about this whole her mother’s clan business and talk to them about how, yes, Drax is dead and now she is going to be living with SIR and nobody was going to kidnap her or whatever weird thing Kitsunes did to you when your dad died. She did tell them to meet her in the reception in an hour, and that was about a week ago. Maybe they were mad, and that was why they didn’t call? And speaking of calling, she returned to Queenie’s room and got a phone, dialing up Remokr and not getting through the first time. But eventually she did and Remokr was on the other side of the phone. She didn’t say anything, so after waiting for a bit, Kiko took the advantage.“Hey Remmy~” Kiko exclaimed, and then bit her lip. She didn’t like being called Remmy. But, after a few seconds there was nothing, and so Kiko carried on. “I just thought I’d call you to tell you I’m doing great at my new place. Everyone is friendly and I am learning a lot about myself” She monologued, since there was still nothing on the other side. Kiko looked up as she spawned her tail, and batted it a bit. “Quite a lot about myself. So you don’t have to wo-what the hell?” She looked at her tail, frowned, batted it a bit, and then looked at it again. There was no mistake. There were two of them. Two tails. Twice the firepower maybe? She was snapped out of it by Remokr on the other side of the phone. But she sounded strange. Her voice was not like it as a week ago. Maybe she had just got up?“H..ey Kiko. That’s…great. Do you think, we could meet up?” It was a strange question, but then the girl was her best friend and they had been away for over a week.

“Meeting up would be cool, but I don’t know. My week is hectic. Re..” she paused for a moment. They had told the school she was going to be a Maid, not go work for SIR. So she should keep up the subterfuge. She ground her teeth a little, took a breath and spoke with as little venom as she could must. “We, new Maids, don’t get a lot of free time. Maybe next week?” Kiko offered, flopping on the bed to look at the celling.“A..are you sure you can’t get out sooner?” Remokr asked, not picking up on the stutter Kiko made between Recruits and Maids.“D’aww, you missing me so much, my love~?” Kiko teased, giggling softly to herself. And being a bit worried she didn’t hear one back. Remokr always loved that kind of humor. “I’ll ask, but after….” She trailed off again. It was a good job Remokr didn’t seem to be there, or this would be a strange phone conversation. After that. Screaming, and burning, and his smile. She started to shake, could barely keep the phone in her hands. She tried to calm herself but it was so very hard to crawl out of the abyss. The voice on the phone sounded so distant as it spoke.“Could you come out alone?” Remokr asked. Strange. It was so strange that her mind latched onto it, like a drowning man latches onto driftwood.“I…al-alone? We-well….” She took a breath, didn’t want Remokr to worry about her. Remokr probably had enough bother with school, she always knew how to make trouble with the less than stellar individuals. “Wh-why-why-why would you ask me to come out alone? Do you think I would bring a friend? Do you think I have made a friend? Are you ok, Remmy? You’re acting strange” Kiko sat on the bed and grasped the sheets, taking deep breaths and focusing on Remokr’s troubles so she didn’t have to give any thought to her own. There was silence on the other side, as if the phone had been covered by something. And that sparked Kiko’s suspicions more than anything yet. Something was definitely up. She set her face into annoyed and determined so nobody would see that she was still absolutely terrified of the recent past. Striding with great purpose and no shortage of anger through the halls, she was not stopped on her way, and eventually got to Elis.

Queenie was right, this place smelled of nerd and takeout food. And still the other side was silent, which was worrysome, so she placed her hand over the receiver and looked to Elis. The girl was pretty cute. Ginger hair, freckled face, glasses like jam-jar bottoms. Kiko liked her aesthetic, and wondered if it was natural, or cultivated. She seemed a little surprised to see Kiko storm into her den, but recovered quickly.“My friend is in trouble. Can you trace a phone call?” Kiko asked, prompting a proud grin from Elis.“I could trace a phone call coming from another planet entirely, but we don’t exactly do callouts simply because your friend stubbed her toe” Elis quipped, not looking away from the computer screen.“She’s a Thunderbird, but something has happened to her, and I need your help. Just, listen” Kiko said, thrusting the phone forward. Elis took it and it was hooked up to a computer by a collection of wires. The speakers above them came to life. A few seconds of a soft shuffling sound, and then Remokr’s voice came through loud and clear.“I’m fine, Kiko. Just come out. I miss you. I want to see you. It has been a lot time since I have seen you. I miss you” Remokr’s voice was, strange. Strained and on the edge of cracking, with a minor touch of hysteria. Elis heard it and immediately frowned in disdain, clearly picking up even more than Kiko had from that sentence. With a silent nod, she urged Kiko to carry on the conversation.“Yea, I miss you too. It’s been hard work without you there to get me out of trouble. Speaking of, how are you keeping without me around? Not too bored, are you?” She asked, smirking despite herself. This situation was a bit fucked up, from the way Remmy was acting strange, way more than just a cold or something like that. But, she still found it amusing imagining her sat twiddling her thumbs as nothing good ever happened for her in school.

“I’m good. Yes. Thank you. So, are you...coming out?” Remokr asked, like a stuck record, latching onto one topic and not letting go. Kiko glanced to Elis, and then returned her attention to the phone.“You know, if you are this obsessed about it, why didn’t you ever try go out with me on a date? I asked you once and you said you didn’t want to make our friendship strange, but now you are making our friendship strange. So come on. Confess your love or I am not coming out” Kiko was pushing it hard, and normal Remmy would have shut her down hard before she had even finished her sentence. But as it was, she was just silent for a few moments.“Ok. I love you, Kiko. Please, come out with me” The confession was dry and without much emotion, kind of the opposite of how Kiko felt like a confession should be. But it was certainly something that Kiko could use to carry on the conversation. But Elis gestured that they had it, so she could hang up now.“Well, that’s great Remmy. I’ll be out to see you very soon~” Kiko then hit the hang up, and let out a sigh of relief. “I half expected Queenie to come storming in when Remmy said that. Like she can smell love confessions or something” Kiko exclaimed, grinning broadly and stretching a little. She didn’t know why she was stretching; she didn’t need it. It was just something she did.

“Hmm, well you are going to need some help if you are going to them” Elis replied, vaguely and avoiding where it was coming from exactly. However, Kiko was too pissed to call bullshit and so just went along with it. Waiting a for moments for anything Kiko would say, Elis then got up from her seat after there was nothing, some bones crackling from how long she had been sat, and then gestured with her head to follow. Despite being small, cute, and nerdy, she was a division head, so Kiko followed her and trusted her on the direction that she was heading, wherever it may be.

The destination, turned out to be Bruyn’s range, strange place for a small nerd. Even the Nerd Boss.“Hey Zed”. Elis said, walking into the firing range and giving Bruyn a wave.“Hey Nerd. What brings you down here?” Bruyn replied. As ever, the firing range was filled with people, and filled with gunfire. Kiko herself had spent quite a while in here, and could passably shoot something coming towards her, or at least not drop the gun.“Need a favour. Our fox’s highschool kiss-doll has gotten into some bother and needs help”“Three on the go at once? What are we going to do with you, Miss Casanova?” Bruyn’s teasing tone was heavy in her voice, and that grin…“She’s not my girlfriend, but she does need saving. I don’t know who is holding her or why they are holding her or what they have done to her, but I need to save her, and Elis doesn’t want me to go alone” Kiko told Bruyn, a serious tone, and to-the-point attitude. But Bruyn looked instead to Elis. There was something communicated between those two, clearly something between them. Bruyn stared for a few seconds, and then eyed Kiko, before turning and picking up a pistol, and a holster.“Here, wear this. If you are going to storm into a situation like this, I want you armed. And you know enough to shoot in the general direction of whoever is coming at you, if anyone does come at you” Bruyn helped Kiko into the holster, made sure the gun was fastened, and then gave Kiko a quick demonstration to ensure that she knew how to get it out in a hurry. Once that was done, Elis slipped a bead thing into Kiko’s ear and assured her it was a mini-comms device. And then she vanished.“Alright, let’s head out. I’ll shadow you, so don’t worry if you can’t see me. Trust that I can see you” Bruyn told Kiko, and then left the firing range ahead of Kiko. Kiko was also about to follow, when it occurred to her that she was in her uniform, and that was hardly subtle. Plus, last time she went out in her uniform she got into trouble. But, looking at what she had thrown on, it turned out that she only thought it was her uniform. In reality, it was the outfit Queenie had put her in on their first meeting, complete with cute little jacket. Don’t dress in the dark, while distracted, it seemed. That woman…still, the coat hid the gun, so it was good. All that was left was to get an excuse for why she was Shiro’d up. That one would be, pretty difficult. But maybe it would come to her on the road.

Chapter 15

She did subtle pretty well, it seemed. Kiko knew Bruyn was following her and yet she couldn’t point out even a general location. Not that she would, but still, damn good. And not pointing people out in crowds made her realize, she didn’t know where she was meeting Remmy. So Kiko rung the girl again, and it took quite the while to answer. On the other side was just breathing and waiting, so Kiko spoke first.“So, I’m out. Where we meeting up, unless this was all an elaborate prank and I am dressed up in the middle of town for no reason other than to elect a few laughs. If that is the case, I swear there will be despondency and pulled hair” Kiko rambled into the phone, because she didn’t know what else to do. She was full of fire and fury when she was in SIR, but now she was actually out on an op, with a frigging gun under her jacket. What was she going to do, shoot someone? Generally, the idea of guns, yes, but could she do it? The answer was probably, if it was to protect Remokr. That whole love stint was not far from the truth, only dulled with age.“The. Center. Of town. Is good” Remokr replied, with tone that flared the already burning fire in Kiko’s soul. They were going to pay for this.“Sounds good, considering that is where I am. I’ll wait here” Kiko strained to keep her voice cheery, and then hung up and got a coffee.

Coffee came prompt, and was paid for promptly, but Kiko couldn’t taste it. She drunk and looked like she was engaging in the general coffee-shop stuff but she wasn’t. Her mind was totally elsewhere. The elsewhere where she was wondering what Remokr had gotten into and if people were going to be dead at the end of the day. The scariest part of that was that she could do it, and not think twice. What kind of situation where the Kitsunes in that made them go this route? That made them become such, monsters? How could anything be so bad as to make them into these unfeeling horrors, half a step removed from the creatures that SIR put down on a regular basis. The introspection wasn’t set to go anywhere, but she did it all the same, because she needed to pass the time. Before her friend arrived and she needed to rescue her from unknown villians. How did her life come to this?

She was meant to be a school girl, with the biggest problem being a group of jumped up twats who wanted to fight her because men reasons. This whole situation was way beyond what she was capable of dealing with, and if she wasn’t a Kitsune, she’d have no chance of getting pas the first week. Especially not with Mr Knife involved in that first week. Kiko checked her firearm was secure and hidden behind her jacket, made sure she could get to it in a hurry, and then finished her coffee. She wasn’t keeping track of the time, but it felt as if Remokr was late. Maybe Kiko was just being paranoid, but in this situation, she had a good reason to be paranoid. But, just as she was getting to the fighting stage of agitation, a girl sat down. A girl with a passing resemblance to her friend Remokr. Kiko didn’t need the scent of slowly healing flesh, didn’t need to see the tracks made by tears, covered up with makeup but not well enough to hide from her new eyes. She could feel her jitters, feel her anxiety, feel as if she was a second away from a hysterical breakdown.

So, not giving anyone any time to react, Kiko just stood up, hugged Remokr, and then grabbed her hand and pulled her up.‘We’re running’ she whispered into the earbud, hoping it did what it was said to do, and then gave another tug. “Let’s go somewhere~” Kiko exclaimed. And then she did as she warned Bruyn, and started to run, giggling to herself like a young girl running off to a secret tryst with her boyfriend. Or in this case girlfriend. Queenie would be seething if she saw that, the girl was kinda possessive. But, Kiko would have to deal with that later. Instead, she ignored Remokr’s stuttered and stammered complaints and just dragged her along, running on instinct. Her ears picked out an exclamation of surprise, and then running feet next to hers. Which, not that she needed confirmation, did just that on the idea of it was a trap. It was slightly worrying that they didn’t care about making it believable, only that they got her out. But that wasn’t her worry, Bruyn would deal with her stalkers, she just had to get herself and Remokr out of here before the dealing with went down. She had no idea how a superzombie would deal with people, but didn’t want to stick around and find out. Her ears kept track of the running man’s steps until he suddenly let out a strangled gurgle and there were no more steps. Whatever Bruyn had planned, it wasn’t going to end well for her stalker. But it was good he was gone, because now she could stop running quite so frantically. Still running, but not as scared deer as before.“What are you doing? Where are we going? Why are you running so much?” Remokr exclaimed from behind, firing off questions with no pause for breath. Maybe, Kiko hadn’t slowed down as much as she had thought she had.“No idea, actually. Fun, isn’t it?” Kiko replied, quite an unhinged laugh that she didn’t really mean to be quite that nutjob-esque, but that was how it came out. She did have some idea where she was going, but it was hard to describe to Remokr, and so just saying ‘I am following something that might be a hunch if you squint hard enough’ was not going to help her any more than what she had just said. Remokr whined some more, but didn’t say anything else and just got dragged along.

Eventually they arrived, and Kiko ploughed through the door without much thought for who might own this warehouse. And then she was hit with a stench of blood, death and gunpowder. Immediately her brain sparked, and she knew where she was. Just as immediately, the Kitsune Mentality disassociated her thoughts and it didn’t bother her that here was where her life took a sharp – literally – turn for the worst. Kiko reached up and stroke the streak of white in her hair, but it was less of a terrible memory. Almost as if it had happened to someone else entirely.“Kiko, talk to me. You are all white, your eye…your hair…what is going on?” Remokr asked, her tone tinged with fear and confusion. Kiko turned around suddenly and pushed her against the wall, kissing her softly on the lips.“Well, that’s a story for another time. Right now, I want to make good on the claim that you, love, me~” Kiko’s teasing tone made Remokr blush and look away. Sharply followed by a yelp and a grimace of pain as the fox’s fingers slipped under the jeans she was wearing and scratched the still healing flesh. Swiftly stripping her of all lower garments, Kiko circled the wound with her finger. More accurate to call it a brand, really. Identical to her own. “And how it seems you are a slave now, Remokr. How did this happen?” Kiko’s voice had suddenly frozen, her eyes shining with intensity, and a sharpness to her tone she didn’t even know she possessed before this point. Her friend’s eyes widened, filled with emotion, and then burst into tears, and flopped on Kiko.

While comforting the hysterical girl, she got something in her earpiece. Something from Bruyn.“Kiko, hole up wherever can and wait, you’ve got an entire cadre of Cultists on your position. Fuck, I know Kitsunes are good, but this is just too much…” Bruyn’s warning washed over an icy-cold Kiko, who then slipped a finger under Remokr’s chin and lifted it up, so they were eye-to-eye.“Right now is when I need you to be a strong woman, Remokr. You can collapse later; Asha is really good for helping people with their hysterics. I know, from personal experience. But right now I need you to be, you. Not this terrified lamb of a thing in front of me” Kiko’s voice had a whip-crack tone, a command as much as a request. And regardless of actual feelings, Remokr obeyed before she realized what she was obeying too. Tears dried up and she stopped with the ragged, hitched breath. Which was good before a man appeared behind them, saw the two, and pulled out a gun. Kiko responded with alacrity, firing off a pair of bullets from her gun at the man, but not fast enough to avoid taking one to her own shoulder. Her bullet had thrown off his aim, but not enough.

Kiko was sure she had got hit, her body rolled from the force of the impact, but she couldn’t feel anything at this moment, so just looked to Remokr and pulled her on her as the blood splatter from the bullet covered the hall.“We gotta go” Kiko growled, her teeth clenched tight enough to grind together as she turned and dragged Remokr into a room outside the hallway. Kiko had to show a brave face so that Remokr didn’t have to worry any more than she already was. The girl didn’t have the merits of the Kitsune Mentality, after all. The only good thing was that her own blood didn’t seem to set off her Blood Moon bullshit. That, would have been exhausting. And she really didn’t need to be going nuts in front of Remokr. That, was not what she needed. Didn’t stop the fact that she was bleeding rather profusely, and passing out would not do anyone any favors. So she spawned a tail and sparked up the fire, cauterizing the wound in her shoulder, and not quite managing to suppress the cry of agony.

“Tail? You…?” Remokr just stared, stunned at the sudden revolution. Apparently maids could carry guns, but not be Quasi-Humans.“Yea, apparently I’m a Kitsune. Surprised me when I was told as well” Kiko replied, with an unduly cheerful voice. She was just winging it at this point. And, speaking of winging it, she felt…something. Pulling at her, calling to her, leading her. She stepped without thought, and then pushed off the lid to look inside. Mostly, just stolen bric-a-brac and other stuff looking to be sorted out what can be hawked and what can be scrapped. But inside, sat a sword. A sword that sung to her.“Ki..ko?” Remokr asked, stuttering a bit as her friend just wandered off abruptly. It went unheard, as the fox girl grasped the sword, and pulled it out of its sheath. The Song then filled her ears. Deep, intense, loving. She couldn’t focus on anything that wasn’t it. She couldn’t see anything but the blade and its song. It was powerful, as if sung by a man with a hell of a set of lungs. It sounded, like it was half a song, like he was singing to a person who was absent. She wanted to know who he was singing to. Wanted to know what it was about this tarnished black blade that was so enticing. And then wanted some painkillers as her arm was wrenched out of its socket when the blade shifted itself into the path of a bullet. Fortunately, it was the shoulder without the bullet, but she had really not had good luck right now.

She had seen it on so many medias, bullets being deflected in the dozens by a sword with no issues at all. But the single bullet hit the sword with such force it threw her off balance. Along with jolting the dislocated shoulder. Today was pain, it seemed. The man was stunned by the lightning fast movement and blocking of his bullet, which gave Remokr time enough to shoot a lightning bolt at him, taking him out and causing him to flop about the floor like a beached fish before going still.‘We’ve breached, keep your head down, Kiko’ Bruyn said through her earpiece. Probably to give her some comfort and explanation of the explosion that she heard down the hall. She was the head of the Rifles, so maybe she had brought some of her people in to help her. Scary thought when the Superzombie needed some help, but maybe it was a manpower thing. A dozen people could search and contain an area better than a single person, so it was worth the time to wait for them to arrive. Hearing the order to hold up, Kiko dragged a box over to the door and blocked it, so nobody could get in. Not something that was easy with one dislocated shoulder and another with a bullet hole in it.“Barricaded the door. Give two knocks, and then two more knocks when you get to it” Kiko replied, then turning to grab Remokr and hurry into the shelter of boxes.

“Alright, seems like we have some time to sit, silently shriek in pain, relocate my shoulder, loudly shriek in pain, and talk. Mind helping?” Kiko asked, placing a hand on her shoulder. Bloody Kitsune Mentality made her out to be an absolute nutjob to Remmy, but she held her own well and placed her own hand on Kiko’s shoulder.“Gonna hurt” Remokr said, and then popped her shoulder back in. Remmy certainly didn’t lie about the fact that it was going to hurt. Kiko managed to restrain it to a loud grunt, and then settled for some deep panting.“Holy shit, I hurt…distract me Remokr. Tell me where you got that brand” Remmy seemed rather nervous and feeling like she wanted to avoid the subject at all costs, but then there was no point avoiding it with Kiko, so just broke into a babble.“It happened a few days after you left. I was walking home from school when this van pulled up next to me and I was dragged in. They were well prepared, I tried throwing some lightning but the interior was insulated and had rods sticking out of it that drew my bolts away. I don’t really remember what happened after that, just that it hurt. And then I woke up strapped to a table. They wanted to use me to get to you, and I don’t know how they knew we were connected. Probably the same way they knew what to do in the van to stop me frying their asses. I refused, hotly, and insulted their heritage, so they got in some guy with a mournful expression. He said he was sorry for what was about to happen. It brought him no pleasure because his brother had been killed the other day doing exactly what he was up to, and so the act just reminded him of that fresh wound. Did, stop him with the torture though. It was…was…just…” Remokr started to shake, and Kiko could intimately sympathize with what she was going through. Kitsune Mentality didn’t mean that things never happened, just that she could deal with it, whatever it was. So she took the girl, and hugged her softly. Comfortingly. It helped to soothe her.

“I know. I think I may have met his brother, and I think I may be the cause in a roundabout sort of way, as to why he was sad. But, I guess he didn’t try anything on with you, because of the sadness?” Kiko tried to find the light, but mentioning that just made her sob harder. Apparently the sadness had the opposite effect on the guy, and he did it to hopefully dull the ache of his brother’s death. Friendly sort of family.“How…do you cope? With the memories? With what they did?” Remokr asked, her voice a hushed and terrified whisper.“I cheat. Apparently Kitsunes are designed to deal with this sort of thing. Our minds dissemble overwhelming emotion to avoid undue stress. Doesn’t work perfectly, I will admit, seems a bit broken if you ask me. But it is better than what you have. Maybe. Thunderbirds are lightning oriented, and memories are just electrical impulses. Depending on how much you can’t bare it, you can always try get rid of it entirely”

Remokr looked at Kiko for a few moments, somewhere between horrified and amazed at the suggestion. And then Kiko’s hair started to stand on end as the static in the surrounding area skyrocketed. Remokr electrified, her skin becoming painful to hold onto. But hold on Kiko did, giving Remokr support that she needed while dealing with her internal issue. And then the pain stopped, and Remokr slumped in Kiko’s arms. So now she had a cauterized hole, a recently relocated shoulder, and a sword with a blackened blade. Looking to the edge, it was coated in a thin something that would stop it being able to cut. Somehow she knew that, even without knowing what it was. Then two knocks came, followed by two more knocks.“Hey Bruyn. Just, give it a push” She spoke through her comms, trusting in the zombie superstrength to push aside the barrier. Which, worked like a dream. And there, in the doorway, was Bryun. It made her happy.

“Sat around with a half-naked girl clinging to you, and you say she’s not your girlfriend? Such a Cassanova, Kiko” Bruyn teased her, walking over to offer a hand up before seeing the bullet hole and grimacing. She got on her comms to the medic they have brought, and then crouched down. “So, what’s with the sword? Didn’t like my gun so decided to try something more manual?”“To be honest, I have no idea. I just, need it. It’s mine. Gotta, keep hold of it.” Kiko rambled for a bit before staring at Bruyn, taking a few breaths, and then falling back onto the ground, eyes whiting out as consciousness slipped away, pain and exertion too much to survive any longer.

* * * * *

A new celling. That was no celling she knew. Was she meant to go through more of this? More strange ceilings, more getting shot, more watching her friends fall apart like Remokr. According to ghost-Drax, she was in for more of this. And how many times was she going to tell herself that she was in for more of this before she truly clocked onto the fact? Sitting up in bed, Kiko was dressed, but the clothing was so fine she could hardly feel it at all. Softer than silk could ever hope to be, softer than any material even. A red top and a white skirt that reached her feet was an interesting fashion choice, but she didn’t hate it. Something about it made her heart swell. Made her feel nostalgic and loved. Wiping away the tears that were forming, she threw the covers back and got out of bed, putting on the soft sandals at the foot of the bed, and walking out of the large tent. Something was missing, but the swell in her heart, the feeling of being loved, made it something impossible to put her finger on.

Once outside, she saw a strange sight. Something between an established town and a nomadic camp, it was large and sprawling with many distinct ‘buildings’ but made entirely out of tents of varying size and grandeur. The largest of which was one made with a crimson red silk and made Kiko feel somewhat in awe. It was just a tent, but the tent made her feel both comforted and amazed. With slow steps, she entered the tent, and saw a wondrous sight. The inside was considerably sized, and filled with tailed people of all manner. There were several dotted about talking with each other, a few at a masterfully carved statue of a tall woman with nine tails, and a woman. A woman with five tails swishing behind her, tended to a shrine, keeping it clean and talking to the people that seemed to be…praying to the statue. Her clothes had the same style as Kiko’s own, but with inverted colours. And a few other Kitsunes with one and two tails went about the tent seeing to tasks, wearing the same clothes as she was.“Don’t just stand there, youngling, help out” one of them exclaimed, dumping something into her arms and sending her scurrying off somewhere and spent twenty minutes being lectured for her lack of sewing ability, before the shrine-tending woman appeared.“Give us a moment” She told the other one, who nodded and went off to find something else to do. “So, struggling with the sewing?” she asked. Her voice was, so familiar, and comforting to boot.“I don’t know what I am doing here. And not just the sewing but the tent and the whole place. I was with Bruyn last I remember” she dropped the sewing and let out an exasperated sight, staring at her pricked and bleeding fingers. Not really the worst she had ever felt, so it hardly bothered her, just theidea that she was going to make a mess.

But that idea was proven false when the woman produced a napkin and wiped the blood off her fingers, and then applied a cream to the pricks to stop them bleeding further.“Thanks….” She looked at the woman, properly, and her heart throbbed. This woman was, so……“First thing I ever got to do. I don’t blame him, I understand exactly why he did it but it still hurt” the woman had a mournful voice, one that made Kiko want to cry. But, she managed to hold it back, if only just.“I…I…was…never, really good at the pronoun game” Kiko muttered, too much focus going into not crying to be able to talk properly.“Ahh, yes. No doubt he hasn’t told you anything about it, would kind of defeat the whole purpose if he did” The woman continued the pronoun game, as if teasing her or something. But from the tone, Kiko could tell she was just nervous. “I’m Yeni, your mother” and suddenly, Kiko could understand everything she felt about the woman. Could tell why her heart swelled to see her, and hurt to hear her so sad.“Oh……”