~~~Stanley~~~
Stanley watched Sam fly away and considered going after her to see if her source showed up, but ultimately decided against it. She was probably expecting him to try exactly that, so he'd wait. Maybe tomorrow. Hopefully, she would let her guard down. Though he would need to be careful. Sam had meant it when she threatened to go to war.
It wasn't like he planned to hurt her friend, but he wanted a chance to talk with them, at the very least. Sam hadn't been lying, but she could also be wrong about what the truth really was. Her so-called friend might be lying to her, and considering Sam was willing to trust the undead, she had to be pretty gullable. If only she wasn't so fucking powerful!
"Did you learn anything useful?" Nate asked, stepping up beside him and eyeing the tattered state of his clothes.
Stanley shook his head, then froze and quickly checked his status.
Status
Name: Stanley Cascade
Race: [Wrathstorm](E-grade Human)
Titles: [Titan Slayer] [F-grade Source]
Traits: [Adaptable](57%) [Source Nexus] [Wrath] [Eye of the Storm] [Source Burned] [Ruthless Soul]
Class: Soul Psionic (Epic) - Level 125 (Expert)
Class Skills: Mind Over Matter (Legendary) - Level 99 (Advanced) | Premonition (Epic) - Level 75 (Advanced) | Still Mind of the Psionic Beast (Epic) - Level 49 (Intermediate) | Harmonic Soul Meditation (Rare) - Level 85 (Advanced) | Mental Fortress (Epic) - Level 9 (Novice)
Attributes:
Strength: 709(+70%)1205
Vitality: 720(+162%)1886
Dexterity 706(+70%)1200
Wisdom 830(+1851%)16193
Intelligence 831(+1851%)16212
Willpower 870(+3224%)29367
Twin-Soul 120(+607%)896
Non-Class Skills 2/6: Soul Awareness (Epic) - Level 49 (Intermediate) | Psionic Barrier (Rare) - Level 45 (Intermediate) | Psionic Soul Shield (Rare) - Level 24 (Basic)
Buff: [Soul-Link]
Debuff: [Major Soul Wound(Rune Seal)(Shielded)]
He exhaled in relief. The shielding buff from his suit was still there. Sure, it was less vital at this point, but every bit counts, even if he was sure the wound debuff was close to another downgrade. The only other glaring problem was his Soul Shield. Sam's little mention about his soul being hard to miss... was he doing something wrong with the shield? It had been sitting at that threshold for a while now...
"No," he told Nate. "Nothing useful. Other than she is too powerful..."
"Too powerful?"
Stanley ground his teeth in pure frustration. "I couldn't beat her."
"Damn." Nate whistled while staring off in the direction she had gone. "What a shame. Together, you'd be unstoppable."
"I don't need her help!" Stanley spun away from him and reached out to grab everyone. He stopped when he laid eyes on Martha, who was staring back at him. "You!" She flinched away, trying to hide herself and her daughter behind the others. "I lost your core. Do you still want to fight?"
She froze, then nodded hesitantly.
"Good. I'll get you some other skill and drop you off at the tower. Walter will keep you alive until you earn enough cores for E-grade."
"Come on, Stanley," Nate said. "We can bump her to E-grade with a handful of..."
"No!" Stanley yelled. "If she's not a goddamned coward, then she can fucking prove it... by..." He trailed off at the looks and soul sensations coming his way while another thought occurred to him. "Am I... a bully?"
"Yes." Eve and James echoed simultaneously.
"No!" Zeke said.
Nate shrugged. "Sometimes?"
Stanley closed his eyes and tried to think happy thoughts while reminding himself that he actually cared about these fuckers. Besides, they were probably right. He was a bully sometimes. But only to the idiots who deserved it. Mostly. There might have been a few mistakes in the past...
"Look on the bright side," Nate said while nudging him with an elbow. "At least she didn't actually sign up with the invaders."
That was... actually a good thing. A very good thing. While he could slow down and redirect her pink light, he couldn't stop her from teleporting into people. If she had the same immortality as the invaders... Fuck. He needed to get stronger. In fact, it might be worth the risk to kill Harem now and hope for the right skill shard.
While he mulled over that, Stanley took everyone into the sky.
Both mother and child didn't seem to appreciate the experience of flying Stanley Air, but Caffeine immediately bounded off to comfort them. Stanley let him go and kept Nate close instead. The man was obviously dying to know what had happened.
He relayed the details about Sam as they flew. Her powers. Her threats. How badly he'd failed at stopping her... and a few ideas that he should have thought of during the fight. Most of which involved putting physical barriers around whoever she was attacking.
Assuming they could block her light streaks, then the primary threat was her teleportation. But he had a solution for that. Sort of. It was an old technique that he hadn't used in a while but might be exactly what was needed now. Physical barriers.
She wouldn't be able to stick her hand in someone's head if the person was surrounded by, say... engine blocks. Hell, even dirt might be enough to destroy her if she tried to teleport into it. That was, of course, operating on the assumption that she valued her life. Even then, it would be a defensive deterrent more than anything actually offensive.
"Good to know," Nate said once he'd finished explaining and nodded thoughtfully. "I'll get our people on it. Silas alone should be able to protect himself and Zeke well enough, but we definitely need more countermeasures." Then he leaned closer. "Can we talk... privately?"
Stanley eyed him, then everyone else, all of whom were listening attentively to their conversation. "Sure," Stanley said while having a pretty good idea of what the man wanted to discuss. Then he forced a vacuum air gap into existence between them and the others. "Talk."
"What set you off? Why did you attack her like that? It’s not a criticism," he added quickly. "I'm only wondering if I missed something. One moment you were calm, and the next..."
Stanley confirmed he still had his Soul Shield going when he felt his face heating up. Rather than go into embarrassing detail about his own realizations, he told Nate the truth. "She was a threat to us. She had information... She still has information that could save us all! I did what I had to do!"
Sure, there was a chance that talking to her first might have been the better choice, but it was a slim chance. She was a traitor to humanity and he would kill her in a heartbeat. If only he could...
"Us?" Nate asked with a smug little smile and a clear emphasis on the word. Him and his stupid intuition.
"Shut up," Stanley muttered. "Or I'll make you run home."
Nate chuckled and tried to pat him on the shoulder. "We all love you t..."
Stanley dropped him. To his disappointment, the man wasn't the least bit surprised or worried when his level flight turned into a downward arc. Not even as he approached closer and closer to the ground. Was he confident that Stanley would catch him? Or did a fall like this not matter to him? Terminal velocity wasn't really all that fast anymore.
He let Nate hit the ground. Partly to call his bluff, but also because he was curious. Besides, he knew it wouldn't kill him, and Zeke could fix anything short of death.
Unfortunately, Nate's soul never betrayed any surprise, though his body lit up with his buffs right before impact. There was also no pain, and the man took off running almost instantly. Talk about disappointing. Not that Stanley wanted him to get hurt—well, maybe a little? Was a sprained ankle too much to ask!?
He also wasn't flying very fast, so Nate had no trouble keeping up on the ground. Stanley would have flown faster, but Martha's kid was already terrified about being in the sky, even with Caffeine trying to distract her, and for some reason she didn't enjoy the sight of Nate plummeting to earth.
Stanley pulled him back up, which helped the kid feel better. Also, he still had questions. "What happened after I... left? I didn't think those weaklings could run you off."
Nate was grinning and not at all out of breath. "Things got a little... tense after you took their leader away, but no one tried anything. Hell, they didn't even leave their posts. I think they were more scared of her than anything we might do."
"I got that feeling too..." Stanley frowned. "Do you have any idea how they're keeping all those people alive? What are they even eating?"
"You really weren't listening before, were you?" Nate asked incredulously, and Stanley just glared at him until he continued. "I asked about that exact thing while you were... busy, and she told me about a nearby insect lair that sends out a swarm every night. Supposedly, enough of them are drawn to the stadium, where her people wipe them out. They take all the cores, but leave enough... meat for the rest to survive."
"What about the miasma?" Stanley asked, with a vague recollection of seeing a notification or two regarding the corruption. Or at least his resistance to it.
Nate grinned. "She wouldn't say."
He narrowed his eyes. "And that makes you happy. Why?"
"Because there wasn't any miasma in or around the stadium, and more importantly, I think her friend might be the one responsible."
Stanley halted their flight. "You think the friend is at the stadium? Right now!?"
Nate held up his hands. "No, no! Not exactly. But I'm almost positive that they put some sort of magic around it. I'm definitely going to take some of our wizard friends down there on a recruiting trip, and hopefully they'll be able to get a glimpse."
Stanley continued flying. "Recruiting? And can't the wizards already block the miasma?"
"Yes. Recruiting. I won't write them off, Stanley. Not without giving them a chance first. As for the magic, the wizards can protect a building, but nowhere near that kind of far-reaching scale. Plus, it's most likely magic they learned from the invaders, and any insight we can get on them is bound to be valuable."
Nate reached into his pocket while he was talking and pulled out some... change? "Almost forgot; here, this one's for you."
Stanley took the proffered coin—a dollar coin. "Thanks? But I don't do a lot of shopping these days."
"Magic," Nate said, rolling his eyes before holding up another dollar coin between two fingers. "It's basically a walkie-talkie. Squeeze to talk. Release to receive." He demonstrated while explaining, complete with screeching feedback and everything.
"They only work in pairs," he continued. "But I'll have the other half of yours. So if you ever need anything..." Or, in the unspoken but far more likely scenario, if he ever needed Stanley to come running.
Stanley eyed the coin suspiciously when another thought occurred to him. "Who made these? The wizards? How do you know they aren't tracking devices? Or listening devices?"
"It was the wizards," Nate said while doing some fancy trick that made the coin dance over his fingers. "But I've had a few of our people look over the enchantments, and they found nothing that stood out." He shrugged. "I think it's worth the risk either way."
Stanley tucked the coin into one of his undamaged pockets. "Fine."
"Excellent." Nate held out more coins, each one of a different denomination and one that looked Canadian... "Can you take these to the tower? Got one each for Edward, Walter, Adrian, and Daryl. Oh, and one extra, just in case."
"Now I'm your delivery driver?" Stanley grumbled but still took the coins.
"Thanks!" Nate said, grinning. "And since you're going there already, do you mind taking our latest batch of newbies with you? I was going to escort them myself, but..."
Stanley sighed. "Fine."
He made one slight detour on his way, and that was to check on his new team. Which meant he scanned their souls as he flew past. They looked fine, so he left them to their hunting. He'd come back later with some lunch. Or dinner? He could grab some extra chicken, or Walter probably wouldn't mind cooking up some extra fish if he asked. Stanley liked to eat with the team because mealtimes were a great opportunity to judge everyone's character. Primarily in who shared their food with Caffeine. Especially when they'd been fighting for a while and were extra hungry.
It wasn't like he expected them to hand over all of their food to the bottomless pit that was Caffeine's stomach, but a bite here and there was another story. Anyone who could resist his pleading puppy-dog eyes was obviously a total psycho.
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Unfortunately, Harem was all too happy to share with Caffeine. All of them were. A fact that made it slightly harder to write them off... They were humans. Normal humans with their stupid, complicated souls. Why couldn't they just be the bastards they were supposed to be? Then he could simply kill them and be done with it!
Nate used another of his magic coins to talk with someone back at the base while they flew, and a small crowd had gathered when they arrived. Stanley didn't recognize any of them, but Caffeine greeted a couple of kids in the waiting crowd with his usual enthusiasm. Kids...
Stanley pulled Nate aside before he could escape. "Hey, what's with the kids?"
"They're going with you."
Stanley narrowed his eyes. "Why?"
Nate said what he both expected and dreaded. "To fight. They both aged into their classes yesterday."
"But..." Stanley looked at the far too young children as they returned Caffeine's enthusiastic affection. "They're just kids!"
Nate smiled sadly. "They are, and the best way to keep them safe now is to help them get stronger."
"That's..." Stanley clenched his fists in frustration. Not because he disagreed, but because he knew Nate was right. Somehow, knowing it was the right thing to do didn't make him feel any better about the situation. "Well, fuck."
"Watch over them, Stanley," Nate said softly. "I know you're busy, but..." He smiled with a secretive smirk. "Ask them about their classes. I'm betting you can help set them up for success."
Stanley watched suspiciously as the man moved off to meet up with an approaching group of dress-wearing freaks. They immediately fell into a discussion about the stadium and the potential magic they might find there. A discussion that devolved quickly into magical gibberish, and Stanley left them to it with a fresh grimace when he looked back at his waiting passengers.
They were just kids! They shouldn't be fighting! The adults in the crowd should fight! They should have been fighting this whole time! Now, because too many hadn't stepped up, they were drafting children into the war. Fuck!
It turned out that he didn't need to ask what classes they had. They showed him. Unfortunately, he was still fuming about the necessity of their presence on the battlefield when they both started pointing at Caffeine and shouting, "Tame!"
He took the sight of them trying to steal Caffeine out from under him rather... poorly.
Luckily for everyone involved, his burst of murderous rage vanished the same instant it appeared, and then Stanley was studying the children with emotionless detachment as their excitement turned slowly into disappointment.
They had obviously chosen some kind of beast tamer classes, probably because of Caffeine, and now they were trying to claim him... as a pet. Or a soldier.
It was a smart move, assuming the attempt didn't get them killed... But it was also ultimately futile because Caffeine couldn't be claimed. He couldn't be tamed. He was the Beast Lord.
Despite the cleverness of their plan, Stanley was deciding on a proper punishment for the attempt when Caffeine canceled Still Mind. His returning anger felt ridiculous when it once again resurfaced, and Stanley turned away before he said or did anything stupid. They were just kids, and he wasn't that much of a bully.
He found Eve watching him from afar with that same mixture of anger and fear from before, along with a confusing mess of other feelings lurking below that. Talk about unnecessary drama that he didn't need right now!
"I'm assuming you're all ready to go," Stanley said loudly, looking away from the lunatic woman as he picked up a layer of dirt below the waiting crowd's feet and used it as a platform to carry them all into the air. Nobody protested. Well, not loudly enough anyway. So he stopped wasting time and took them all toward the tower.
The day hadn't been a total waste, he realized with another glance at his status. His fight with Sam had earned him more than a few points of willpower, along with some vitality. Not to mention all the levels he'd added to his skills. Sam must have earned something as well... Maybe he could convince her to spar with him again. She wasn't afraid of him. Not seriously, at least. It might even help him figure out a way to kill her...
"Mister Stanley." The small voice, almost but not quite lost in the roar of rushing wind, pulled him from his thoughts, and Stanley looked over at the boy, who was crawling closer across the dirt platform. "I'm sorry that I tried to tame Caff."
Stanley studied him, and then the little crowd of people hunched against the wind behind him. Had one of them put him up to this? Had they noticed his anger earlier? The boy wasn't scared... but he did feel bad. So did the girl crawling behind him. "I'm sorry too, Mister Stanley!"
Caffeine happily panted where he stood between the pair, then jumped into Stanley's lap and rolled over for a belly rub. "Forget about it," Stanley said, putting up a psionic wall to block the wind. "What are your classes?"
"Tamer!" they both chorused in unison. Obviously.
"What happened when you tried to tame Caffeine?" he asked, curious.
The boy looked down while his hands fidgeted with the dirt he was sitting in. "He... rejected it."
"Nothing else?"
"No." The girl shook her head. "It only said the beast lord has rejected your taming bond..."
Both of their souls felt very... rejected at the admission, and a petty part of Stanley was happy about that... He quashed the feeling. "I can grab some animals for you to tame. Any preferences?"
He was unsurprised to find that they both wanted to tame not only a dog but, more specifically, a pug. Stanley tried not to think about the fact that he'd seen no other pugs in this prison when, by all odds, there should have been more than a few in here with them. Even other dogs were vanishingly rare. "What about something other than a dog?" He slowed down their flight. "A wolf? That's basically a bigger dog. Or a bear? Or hell, how about a tiger?"
Stanley hadn't seen that tiger again, but Caffeine played with the bear whenever he got the chance, and it lived inside the purified zone along with the wolves. Presumably, the tiger was somewhere in there as well. While he didn't think the wolves were anything special, power-wise, they were friendly. Or would they be even weaker out in the miasma? "What about a bat? They're like flying dogs."
Both kids looked dubious about his suggestion.
"Or," Stanley had another thought, and as if on cue, a bird appeared on his shoulder. "A crow..."
"Caw!"
The more he thought about it, the more Stanley liked the idea of them taming the crow. It could teleport and use some kind of soul shielding magic... What if it knew where the undead were hiding? If someone could actually talk to it... "Yeah, you should tame this little guy. He's really powerful."
"That's a bird," the boy said, as if it wasn't the most obvious thing in the world.
Stanley resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Yeah, it's a crow." Or was it a raven? He wasn't actually sure. "It's a powerful teleporting crow that can help protect you and your... wait, where are your parents?"
It was a stupid question, and Stanley cursed himself as an idiot for even asking. He hadn't seen any obvious parent figure either seeing them off or, in the far more likely scenario, coming with them on their first hunt, and in this new world, that meant only one thing.
"We don't need parents!" the boy said. "We're adults now."
"Y... yeah," the girl said with less enthusiasm. "We're adults!"
They both put up a strong front, but he could feel their souls and so only nodded past the lump in his throat while keeping his gaze locked on the flight path ahead. Unfortunately, they were inside his domain, so he couldn't miss the trembling lips and teary eyes.
Martha must have also been eavesdropping, because the terrified woman forgot her own fear long enough to scramble closer across the flying patch of dirt, dragging her daughter with her and then pulling all of them into her arms.
Stanley let the wind back in to muffle the first sniffles that escaped and pretended not to notice when they all started crying while holding onto each other. Or when Caffeine scrambled from his lap and wormed his way in between all of them.
Listening to their souls made Stanley want to scream and rage against... everything. This wasn't fair. None of it! And in this moment, he absolutely loathed his soul-sensing abilities. He didn't want this. He didn't need to feel even more pain!
So he activated Still Mind.
It was that or go on a killing spree. And that second option was probably a bad idea considering he was transporting a bunch of brand new E-grades. Not to mention the two F-grades...
Afterward, he felt—well, he didn't really feel anything. Instead, he flew faster toward their destination while, for some reason, thinking carefully about whether or not killing Harem was worth the risk. Or should he attempt to have Harem mind-control Sam first? If the man was ready and didn't hesitate, they might be able to take her before she could kill him. Even if he died in the attempt, Stanley could still take the shard at that point.
There was the risk of her retaliating and going after Zeke, but Nate thought Silas could protect him. Also, what if they brought Zeke to the tower and added Walter to his protection detail? The butler could teleport, and he had some control over others inside the building. Could he slow down or stop Sam's teleporting?
Nate would probably go along with the plan to kill, or ideally, mind-control Sam. She'd chosen her position, and it wasn't on humanity's side. Nate was practical, and he would sacrifice her if it meant saving humanity. Assuming they could pull it off without risking Zeke too much...
Stanley stopped his flight next to a familiar skyscraper and studied its occupants in silence while ignoring the crater in the street below. Lair occupants who might offer yet another solution to the Sam problem. Or at the very least, they might help in defending Zeke.
The bats came flying over to the small gathering of humanity, either drawn by the mana or merely curious; it was hard to say. Until one landed in the dirt and immediately started sucking down all the mana it could get...
Stanley was about to kill the stupid creature when Caffeine howled—a long, slowly trailing off howl.
You have heard the Howl of the Beast Lord.
It didn't grant any effects, other than canceling his Still Mind. But the bat reacted to the noise. Not only it, either. Every bat surrounding them and in the lair reacted. Though the strongest response came from the queen herself... Stanley held back while the mana-stealing bat flailed its way across and then off the platform. There it joined a flock of its fellows that flew in a swarm around the hovering section of dirt.
Meanwhile, he felt another soul approaching. Another bat, but one that stood out from the rest. He wasn't sure if it was the same bat Caffeine had befriended previously, but the pug seemed happy enough to see it when the thing landed on his back with a chirp. It looked slightly bigger than he remembered, if not by much, and was definitely more intelligent than the other bats.
"It's cute," the boy whispered, and Stanley smiled at the much happier sensation of his soul before realizing he didn't actually know either of the children's names.
"Do you want to tame it?" Stanley asked. He'd learn their names later. Besides, he had a feeling this bat might be more accepting of the idea... especially with Caffeine here. The pug had obviously said or done something to the bats and their queen with his howl.
"It's like a little dog with wings!" the girl breathed excitedly.
"Tame!" they both shouted together while pointing at the bat.
Stanley didn't see any obvious magical effect, but he couldn't miss the feeling of acceptance from the bat's soul. Then Caffeine huffed, and Stanley felt surprise from both the bat and the boy. There was a lingering moment of shared understanding, then acceptance, and Stanley felt their souls connect.
Which meant he wasn't that surprised when the boy whispered, awestruck, "I soul bonded with him!"
"No fair!" his... sister? Whined. On second thought, she couldn't be his sister since they'd supposedly aged into a class on the same day. Unless they were twins? Fraternal twins? They didn't look that similar. But they had ended up with the same class... Was that accidental? Or did they choose it? Considering they both tried to tame Caffeine, the latter option looked rather likely.
The bat chirped, and the boy's soul lit up with fresh surprise, followed quickly by awe as he said breathlessly, "You can talk!"
More chirps and squeaks came from the bat as it crawled from Caffeine's back and into the boy's outstretched arms. It licked his fingers while he giggled, then looked at the surrounding people with more noises, along with a chirp toward Caffeine.
"Beast lord?" the boy asked. "You mean Caffeine? He's a good dog and always plays with us a lot!"
Stanley watched curiously while ignoring the nervous and impatient grumbling from his other passengers. Some of them were unhappy about being out in the open, not to mention surrounded by monster bats, while others were unfazed and only wanted to get started with their own hunting.
"This is Lucy," the boy said, holding the bat toward the girl, who was enjoying the event far less than he was. "She's my best friend!" So they weren't siblings after all?
Despite her feelings, Lucy still reached out a finger to scratch the bat's cheek, then smiled when it licked her fingers. "He's really cute. What's his name?"
It chirped.
"He... you have to have a name!"
It chirped again.
"You want me to give you a name?" He looked at the girl. "What should I name him, Lucy?"
She shrugged and dropped her hand, her smile slipping. "I don't care. Name him whatever."
The bat chirped, and the boy nodded. "She's sad because she wanted to tame you too, but I was faster." It looked at Caffeine and chirped again, a question in its soul. Caffeine tilted his head and woofed softly.
Stanley stared as boy, bat, and dog all looked back and forth at each other while making various noises. They were talking—or at least Caffeine and the bat were talking. Could all animals talk to each other? Was it always that way, or had the system changed something? Was there a universal animal language? "What are they saying?"
"Oh?" The boy looked at Stanley. "I'm not sure. He's asking Caffeine about friends..."
The bat stopped chirping at Caffeine, tilted its head toward the sky, and let out a high-pitched screech that left everyone wincing.
"What did he..." Stanley's question trailed off as he felt the bat queen's soul respond inside the lair. It was a strange feeling of... hope? He turned on Soul Sight and saw that she wasn't the only soul feeling that way. Another bat sat beside her in there, probably the king, and it shared her hope along with what felt like grim resolve... right up until the moment it died.
What the hell?
The queen's soul swelled in tune as the king's faded. Had she eaten him? That was quite literally what it felt like... and then her soul cried out in pain as it, too, began fading.
Stanley recognized what was happening a moment later when he felt a new soul spark into existence. He'd seen it before, not only from the bats on his last visit to their lair but from countless other lair queens throughout the city. She was spawning in more bats. Well, one more bat.
Unlike most of the times he'd witnessed similar things happening before, this spawning of new life felt like it was taking far more from the queen than usual. It almost felt like she was dying...
Her soul faded further and her strength diminished with it, but she didn't actually die. Instead, a brand new soul cried out in fear at the realization of its own existence and the terror of the unknown that had been suddenly thrust upon it.
The fear in that little soul didn't last long, quickly replaced by a warmth and peace that made Stanley's heart ache with forgotten memories of comfort and absolute safety that only a mother can provide to her child. Then that sensation faded as well and sorrow took its place.
Stanley watched as the new soul left its mother's side only moments after being born. It was carried away by others of its kind and whisked quickly... outside. To the humans.
A bat that was as large as a full-grown human landed clumsily on Stanley's dirt platform before crawling toward him. Caffeine immediately went to investigate, only for the bat to open its mouth and reveal another bat nestled within its jaws. A bat barely the size of Stanley's palm.
Caffeine sniffed curiously at it, and the tiny creature studied him in return, surprisingly calm and equally curious about the pug. Then it crawled from the larger bat's mouth, over Caffeine's face, and then onto his head with tiny little squeaking noises. Caffeine loved it, of course, and he trotted proudly back to the humans with his new accessory clinging to his head.
The tamed bat chirped from where it was cradled in its human's arms, and the boy looked at Lucy excitedly. "He's said she's his sister! And he said, She's for you to bond..."
"Sister..." Lucy's eyes were already sparkling as she stared at the definitively adorable little bat, and they went wide when she heard what he said. "For me?"
The crow had remained surprisingly silent and still throughout everything so far, but it chose that moment to pop onto Caffeine's back for an up-close look at the baby bat on the pug's head. The little bat didn't mind the scrutiny and only looked back with equal curiosity, but its brother screeched angrily from the boy's arms.
"Caw!" the crow squawked back, which only set the bat chirping and scrambling angrily from the boy's arms. At least until Caffeine sat down with a whine. The bat settled down instantly, while the crow almost tumbled off his back before teleporting back to Stanley's shoulder with an annoyed, "Caw!"
Lucy ignored all of that and reached both hands tentatively toward the bat on Caffeine's head. "Is it really okay if I tame you?"
It squeaked and crawled into her cupped hands as her soul lit up with delight. "I can understand you!" She gently hugged the little thing close before thrusting it back toward Caffeine. "Isn't she adorable, Caff!?"
Strangely, their souls didn't link together. Not like... Caffeine licked them both with a wagging tail and the girl gasped. "You want to soul bond with me? Of course!"
Stanley watched her soul link with the bat and then he just stared at the happily panting pug while the two kids chattered back and forth obliviously. The first time, he hadn't been sure, but now he was. Caffeine had done that. Somehow. What did you do, Caff? And why?
He looked back into the lair at the queen, and she was... happy. Diminished, but happy. What the hell was going on here?