The negotiations took some time. It felt like days have passed by, but it was more likely that it took hours. By the end, most of them were nodding off, on both sides, and Ixalia had trouble keeping her eyes open and not succumbing to the sweet, sweet embrace of sleep.

In the end, nothing much changed. It was decided, that they’d be staying in the room for now. Until they decided what to do further. The dead would be removed and some basic necessities provided. Like sleeping bags and blankets.

Helena would be taken from them but someone else was to come and talk to them, someone who was more skilled in the language.

That was the first order of business. Building up the ways to communicate with each other. Bad feelings and strong emotions were coursing on both sides and no one wanted to be the one to back down.

Besides, Ixalia’s group needed some time to rest and process. And there was a lot to get through.

What rubbed them all the wrong way was the fact that they had no guarantees, only the word of someone who was set on taking their lives hours ago. But there was nothing to be done about that. They were negotiating from the weaker position in this case.

Helena was reassuring them a least that the fact that they were all staying together was a guarantee enough for some reason. Again, they only had the word of someone who wanted to kill them earlier.

They had food for now, the tables were still laden with it, same with things to drink. More would be delivered as necessary.

Ixalia stuffed her face full to bursting before almost literally falling unconscious. She was just so tired she barely managed to curl up next to Sidy, who was already dozing off again. Blanket or no blanket, Ixy didn’t care. The fact she had to be carried around was hard enough for her to swallow as she always prided herself on being self-sufficient in most things.

She woke up when light was already streaming through the windows at an angle, the sun had to be high up. Everyone else was still asleep, only Lubosh was awake as well, sitting guard.

They weren’t stupid enough to trust the Others and set up a watch schedule. Sidy and Lubomira were excluded on the basis of their injury and Ixa was declared to have already done enough and given the night off.

It wasn’t charity. She would have enough to do in the coming hours and days and the rest of them wanted her in top shape. Ready to heal them again.

Ixalia woke up stiff. Her left side was completely numb. No pain whatsoever and very little feeling otherwise. It would probably come back later. Her stomach and, strangely, lower half, on the other hand, were screaming at her in hunger.

She didn’t have anything to go through her morning routine, no toothbrush or comb. Not even a sink to wash up. And gods, did she need to get a rinse. All of them did, not to mention the room itself. Sweat, blood, and feces made for a poor air freshener.

A dry toilet was placed by the door in the night for their use. Someone already took the opportunity to be the first one on an unused bowl, and most others followed since. At least the smell didn't leak. Much. They were promised that it would be cleaned regularly and made a screen from tables for at least a sense of privacy.

It did not help with the sounds and the reverberations did not help either.

Oddly, Ixalia did not feel the need to use it then or even now. She’d give it some more time, but with how much she ate, she would start to worry soon. And that was another matter. She no longer had the behind to use a toilet. She’d have to find how to do so.

But later, after she ate something. She was planning to check her new condition soon, but only once she made sure everyone else was taken care of. She and Zev did their best before going to sleep, but their work had to be scrutinized once they were thinking properly again, not running on fumes, tired.

Ixalia didn’t want to wake anyone up to help her, so she dragged herself to the tables using her one arm. It took a while and getting up to the food even more.

Once she got to it, she ate enough for a dozen people. And that wasn’t satire. She specifically paid attention to how much she ate before she felt full and the amount that disappeared into her was staggering. Not to mention terribly unhealthy for a normal individual. Which she no longer was.

That fact was slowly sinking in as well. It was hard to shape her mind around the new dispositions. She had only one hand and couldn’t walk. That was a mighty step down from where she was a day ago and there was no outlook as to when she’d be able to get everything back to the state everything was supposed to be in.

They still didn’t know where they were. But there were ways to find out.

Once she was done with the food and drinks, she heaved herself back to her backpack and took out her tablet. It was working alright, with no damage sustained, thank the gods. She thought back to how she almost left it at home that day and cold sweat ran down her back.

And the thought of home plunged her into more dark thoughts. She thought of her family. She didn't see them for more than three weeks and now was unsure when she'd see them again. The longest she was alone before was a measly two weeks. But even that was still while being within driving distance.

She shook her head and started the thing in her hand up. It was kind of awkward doing it with only one arm, but she managed. It booted up and showed her exactly what she dreaded.

No signal, no GPS, nothing. Her data was doing OK and all that, but she had no way of positioning herself or calling her parents. Did they even know she was gone?

Ixa already had the things in hand, so she looked for something about dealing with serious trauma and amputations and recovery after. She included it just because she could, not because she thought she’d ever actually had to use the knowledge. But good thing she did.

There were some spells to help with healing, but those would have to be up to Zev. He still had both hands. One thing she could do herself, and that was preventing infection, the spell wasn't simple, but she could do it one-handed, and with some practice, she was sure she'd be able to cast it.

It didn’t take long for her concentration to waver and for her to search for something else to do. She decided that maybe the windows would help. With any luck, she’d see some landmark to help place themselves.

Dragging herself once more, she waved Lubosh off under the pretense that she needed the exercise. She mostly wanted to be alone right now.

Reaching the windows left her breathless and she had to labor to pull herself to the windowsill. The view left her speechless. But not for its beauty. It simply did not make sense. Not one bit.

She did turn to the man now. “Did you look outside?”

He looked at her and smiled sadly. “Yes.”

“Is that?”

The corner of his mouth twisted even more. “Yes, it is.”

“How? What? I mean… how is that possible?”

He chuckled a little. “No idea, no idea and, let me think… yes, just the same. Not a clue.”

“But…”

The man jumped in before she could even formulate her next sentence. “No idea, and the next thing you were about to ask? No idea. And the one after that? Yes, you guessed. I. Have. No. Idea.”

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“No reason to be mean about it.” Ixalia sulked.

“Sorry, just my way of dealing.”

“Yeah, I’d need some of that too, please.”

“Sorry, I am running on a deficit as it is. Can’t spare any.”

They both stared at each other after that before breaking into a laugh. His was a small sad thing, pain evident in the way it sounded, strained and tiny. Ixalia's, on the other hand, was way too loud and forced, filled with too much to put into words.

“We’re fucked, aren’t we?”

That sentence left him speechless. From anyone else it wouldn’t, but Ixa prided herself on not cursing and when she did vent, she never used such strong words. People don't notice something like that until they hear a person swear and realize that they never heard language like that from him or her before.

In those moments, a lightbulb turns bright as every previous interaction plays in their minds, searching for some time the person used strong language. One such light was just now burning behind Lubosh's eyes.

He had to compose himself before he was capable of answering. “Yes, it would seem that we are.”

Out of the window, Ixalia saw a city. It wasn't a big one, maybe she'd classify it as average-sized. But either it was unbelievably old and unrenovated or they traveled back in time.

Glass was at a premium here and buildings did not generally stand over three storeys tall. It looked downright medieval. And considering what their assailant from yesterday wore, perhaps it really was. Or something close to it.

Middle Ages were a long period of time after all.

But that wasn’t the main culprit behind the young woman’s words. Nor was it the vast countryside on display that one couldn’t find anywhere around the Protectorate anymore.

No, the source were the twin mountains. The ranges stretched to the horizon on both sides with a gap in the middle. It was exactly the same natural topography as she saw daily from Sidy's and her flat every morning for the past more than three weeks. Only from a greater distance.

Probably just a little more than halfway between their home in the Protectorate and her house in the Vian Republic.

And there was no city like this anywhere in that area.

Something was fishy here.

She didn’t have much time to ponder the implications of her discovery as the rest of their little group began waking up. Apart from Ingrem, Beatrice and Lubomira. The former was probably in a coma and the latter lost a lot of blood. Betty was a case that neither she nor Zev knew what to do with.

Mental health and psychology weren’t their disciplines and they had no experience in that area.

“Sidy, can you come over for a second?” Her friend was moving around just fine, she caught the injury early enough and removed the tourniquet in time to leave little lasting effects. If she moved the wrong way her arm still bled, but it was manageable for now.

"Ixa, can it wait? I'm hungry." She said meekly as she shuffled her feet in the direction of breakfast. Sidy kept it light and soon made her way over to the window. She raised her arm in greeting and wrinkled her nose.

Sniffing her armpit, she asked. “Do I look as bad as I smell or is it the other way around?”

The part-snake considered her for a moment and then said simply. "Yes."

“And a good morning to you too. So, what’s up?”

It was kind of bizarre how they could act normal under the current circumstances. Our minds probably haven’t caught up yet.

Ixa pointed out the window. “What do you make of this?”

Her brunette friend looked outside and swore. “Fuck.” Her outburst prompted Lubosh to turn his head again, the same lightbulb shining as did a moment ago, mouth slightly agape.

“So?”

“What? Why? When? How?”

"Let me answer you the same way I was when I asked the exact same questions." Ixa winked at the man. "No idea, no idea, no idea, and not a clue."

“Not. Funny.”

“I don’t know. I thought exactly the same, but now that I get to say it instead of being on the receiving end. It is kind of funny.”

“Not helping.” The brunette complained. “Let’s hope the interpreter or whatever arrives soon so we can get some answers.”

"Yeah, that," she remarked and waved in her friend's direction.

"By the way, Ixa. I don't know if this is a proper question to ask of a snake, or if it's in the 'did you gain weight'-rude kind of category, but…. Did you get longer?"

The question caught the serpentine girl off guard and she looked herself up and down. “You know what? I don’t rightly know.”

“How so?”

“I think it’s like that weight thing you mentioned. When it changes, you’re the last to know since it changes too slowly for you. Those that see you rarely notice a jump. So, I don’t know.”

It was Lubosh who came to the rescue. “You might have at that. At least a few centimeters.”

“How can you tell?” Asked Sidy.

The man looked away and actually blushed, more than that. He was as red as a tomato. "Not saying. I just do."

“Now you have to.” Prodded Ixa, curious beyond belief about what elicited such a strong reaction. Even if she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

“No, you won’t get it out of me.”

“But it’s the law! Once it’s out of the bag, you’ve got to finish it.” Sidy piped in from next to the window.

This sort of back and forth went on for a bit, but in the end, the girls’ curiosity was left unsatisfied. It had to find another outlet and they found it in examining Ixa’s new state more thoroughly. Well, it was Ixa running the diagnostics and SIdy asking intrusive questions.

Just like old times and exactly like the way they liked it. The diagnostic spells were still a confusing mess and they got little progress even with using Sidy as a control, trying to compare the signals.

A breakthrough of some kind came when Ixalia used her vein tracing method.

“There’s some sort of a valve system on the arteries running down there, those would normally be called femoral arteries, but can I still call them that when I have no femurs? Probably.”

“Unimportant details like that don’t interest anyone. Name it later. So, valves?” Sidy would always bring her back when she got sidetracked. That’s why Ixa liked tinkering with things in her presence.

“Well… the veins after them are… higher pressure? Or something like that? Would make sense to reduce it to normal levels if that was true.” She spoke as she discovered things, even if she didn’t understand everything yet.

“How can there be higher pressure?”

“I don’t k…”

“Yes, yes, you don’t know, we know that. How about you tell me when you find out?” the brunette joked and poked her in her side.

Ixa squeaked and hurried to confirm. “Sure, sure, just don’t brutalize me.”

It took some figuring out, especially because there were no mana channels in this area and she had to feed her mana from further away. “Wow.”

“What?”

"There's… I mean… I have another heart. There are two vascular systems inside me now, both with their own heart, operating at different pressures."

“How does that work? Won’t there be like… a clash or something where they meet?” Sidy asked, worried.

“That’s what the valves are for? But also… who knows?” Fishing for answers to questions nobody knew was never fun.

“Maybe, if you are truly getting longer…” the girl trailed off.

“Yeah?”

"What if… what if the heart is stronger right now than it needs to be? What if it's as strong as it has to be to pump blood through your full length?" she mused.

Ixa scratched her chin. They were scratching themselves quite a lot lately. Might be prudent to look for lice or something. “Could be… actually, that might not be a bad guess. But if you’re right? How long is the tail going to get?”

"Look at it from a different angle. Maybe, if you get long enough, you'd be able to move just like a snake. Slithering away in the night would get a whole new meaning. So, we got blood done, can you get more?"

“Huh, that’s a funny though. And I hope I get to move around at least someone normally again. And what else? Let me see.”

The girls, or just Ixalia, really, used the discovery as an anchor. As a starting point do begin deciphering the spells. And in an hour or two, they got everything they could think of and some things they couldn't thanks to Lubosh, who was listening to them intently.

Most of her organs were doubled. One pair in her human body and another in the snake one. But the weird thing was that even those that were nowhere near her waist were now connected to the ones duplicated below it.

Her trachea branched off into her regular lungs but also branched off, down and into another pair of massive lungs. She wasn't using them right now, at least not actively, but when, or if, she learned to do so, her intake of air would turn out to be massive.

Just like the amount of food she was ingesting. That was explained as well now. Instead of ending in an intestine, it opened into a second esophagus that opened up into a second stomach, now filled with bread and meat she had for breakfast.

Waste management systems weren't doubled and connected, exactly. She had only the one intestine of both types but two livers and four kidneys. Neither was connected, but her upper urethra didn't end where it was supposed to, instead connecting her two bladders. Frankly, it was a mess of weird and almost contradictory organs.

One thing Sidy knew for sure. Kidney stones were going to be a bitch. That remark got a laugh out of an increasingly brooding Ixalia and restarted her mood into something a little sunnier. Even if for just a moment, Sidy considered it a victory.

Two questions Ixa almost didn't want a solution to, were answered as well. She only had one set of reproductive organs, her original one. How that would work when and if the time came, she had no idea. But thankfully, there was no snakish counterpart.

The other burning question had the exact opposite conclusion. Waste management was only present in its serpentine form. And that meant a joint one. For all effects and purposes, near the end of the tail, she had a cloaca.

She had to bury her face in her hands and try to hide when Sidy made fun of her for that. It shouldn't have been, it was completely natural for animals to have one, but for some reason, it made her supremely embarrassed to admit.

The last immediately noticeable thing was her bone structure, even though it was nothing unexpected after all the discoveries.

Ixalia had a normal pelvis and no human bones underneath. Where it ended, what was known as a tailbone wasn't fused and stunted at all. Her spine simply continued down into a new one, that of a snake.

They had just enough time after their discoveries for a light lunch, or a rich feast in Ixa's case, before someone arrived from outside.

***

Outside the window sat a tiny figure. It couldn't have been more than twenty centimeters high. It had long silver hair and a featureless face. The only thing present was a big mouth that was now twisted into a massive grin.

Listening to the girls was just so much fun.