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Fantasy Cosmical Glitch ( ellarose & starboob. )

"Oh, you're on... dad." Lettie teases back, high on the relief that Seth walked right by them. Haha, sucker. She's made some drastic changes of her own, given the recognizable nature of her first look. She used glamours at the beauty bar to change her hair into a warm shade of chestnut brown that she never uses, lengthening and straightening it from the fluffy shoulder cut it once was. She trades out her devil horns and tail for antlers. The faerie modeled the color scheme of her outfit to match with her pirate. (Mostly to encourage her continued use of the color yellow in her wardrobe. It's so cute on her!) To suit her new status as a forest nymph, she chose a chunky yellow cardigan, a white top that shows off her midriff and flare jeans embroidered with daisies. To accessorize, she picked out a matching daisy choker. If she had to name the aesthetic, it's girl next door meets free spirit.

It's... weird. But maybe it's not so weird. Turns out Avangeline's a lot more fun when Lettie gets to be anyone but herself.

Might have something to do with Juno's smile, though, which she sorely missed during their first visit. Having Juno there and present at her side makes any situation infinitely better. (Duh! That's, like, exactly why she wants to spend the rest of her life with her.) Lettie intends to carry every happy moment they spend together as devotedly as she carries her heart shaped locket. As her fiancee leads her into the arcade, she thinks she could reasonably pull off the father look if she tried. (Especially when she remembers the way the kids gravitated towards her on the candy currency world and Fabel. All she needs is a couple little ones hanging off her arms and legs to complete the ensemble. And maybe a fishing rod. Who would've thought?) Pfft. She looks like such a dork in that hat. Well, she is a dork. She's her dork.

The arcade carpet glows in the dark, alight with neon rainbow ribbon and paint splatter designs. The whites on her clothes and in Juno's hair turn a soft purple beneath the lights. Lettie's fairly certain she'd look completely radioactive here without her glamours... but she doesn't dwell on that thought for long as they grab some coins and tackle the skee-ball machines. They end up getting so into it that it prevents any memories from their first arcade experience from creeping in. As they laugh and challenge each other at various different machines, memories of the old are washed away with the new and and the faerie is much lighter than before. Well, that is until Juno playfully takes the rings from the ring-throwing game and starts aiming for her antlers instead of the game itself. This earns her a cheek puff.

Once they've tried most of the games Juno-- in true Juno fashion-- insists that she won. Lettie puffs her cheeks again and insists that she swept the floor with Juno-- especially when she convinced her to try the dancing game. (The faerie couldn't stop laughing at her pirate grumbling over those 'fucking piece of shit arrows'. She teased her, stating that she used to talk about her like that and now she loves her. 'You looooove me.' She continued to tease, poking Juno in the side. That ended with a make out sesh as the arrows flew by on the screen in the background. They failed the song. It was worth it.) Speaking of make out seshes, they make out again mid-arguement and then use their tickets combined to get the cute shark plush on display at the prize table in the back. Lettie solemnly names it Sir Regis in honor of her favorite shark friend.

The two eventually rush out when they notice Seth snooping around in the spaces between arcade machines. (And this time they leave the arcade without starting any fires-- progress.) After they move up to another floor, Lettie has to force herself to keep walking past a shopfront with gorgeous wedding dresses on display. Must. Show. Restraint. She wants to daydream about it, but she knows she'll get carried away the moment she starts. It'll be something to look forward to when all of this is finally over.

Trying to distract herself from distractions, Lettie tugs Juno into a photo booth. While they hide there, they try taking a couple of pictures. (Juno looks endearingly confused in the first few. Lettie giggles as she angles her new shark plush and boops its nose against the pirate's cheek like it's giving her a kiss.) Then she outlines the different frames and stickers they can edit their pictures with. They don't look entirely like themselves right now, but they still manage to have fun with it. Sir Regis the plush is the star of many of the photos. In the end, though, Lettie insists on printing and keeping the photo where she surprises Juno with a cheek kiss of her own. Juno picks out the one where she surprises Lettie with her own kiss in revenge. (And she's wearing her vampire fangs. Oh... wait till Ravan sees this.) In the last two photos they make out again and disappear in phases from the frame.

"Ugh. We should probably head out soon." Lettie mumbles after she catches her breath, resting against Juno's chest. She adjusts the bill of her lopsided cap, biting the inside of her cheek as she stares at her future wife, committing the moment to memory. She doesn't want this phase of their visit to end. It's actually been fun. They did everything a younger Lettie would've been loved to do on a dream date as a kid. (Might be the last time they get to...) But they need to find Ravan. Turn their focus to their mission. She grins. There's no indication that they're under a tight time constraint right at this moment, though. They're not in any immediate danger. With that in mind, they can make time for just one more thing. They've earned it, after everything they've already done for the worlds!

"Hey, Juju. Wanna pull one last heist before we go?" Technically they've been using their Lilith's Lounge stash for most things to avoid trouble. But if this is the last thing they're gonna do here... "Just saying... I saw some swanky looking jewelry stores earlier." Lettie grins mischievously, hoping Juno can read her intentions. They could steal engagement rings for each other, just like they stole their heart-shaped lockets! She lifts Sir Regis the plush's fluffy fin. "I think Sir Regis is in favor. What do you say?"
 
“Crimes?”

“Crimes.”

So the love of her life wants to end their time at the mall with a good ol’ fashion heist competition. This brings her right back to their time on that candy currency world, when Lettie suggested they pull some heists instead of raising the town’s dead and setting shit on fire. (They still ended up setting shit on fire and Juno did end up raising some of the town’s dead. They cannot help who they are.) It was the first time they ever spoke without arguing, without throwing punches or kicks. While they never got around to that heist competition, they have had others since. Juno has obviously won a majority of them and, given the hot streak she’s on right now, she thinks she can outdo her future wife one last time before they leave this swanky mall. “Alright, well, if you want to lose so badly,” she pokes Lettie’s cheeks, deflating them, “what are the rules?”

The rules are simple. Everything goes unless it goes against Marjorie’s rules or risks them getting caught (by Seth or mall personnel). If either of them use the code word (shit bananas), the competition immediately stops and they rendezvous outside, unless one of them is captured. In the event of capture, they bring all of Hell and the stars to whoever tried to fuck with them. (Okay, that’s not explicitly said, but Juno believes she ought to be allowed some liberties.) Anyway, the competition is set to be their fiercest yet, one for the ages. One to settle the score and determine, once and for all, who is the champion of heists.

They share a kiss, then they’re bolting to their first targets. It’s showtime, baby.

Juno elects to scope out the stores on the lowest level of the mall first, then work her way up. She suspects her betrothed might have a similar strategy as they both know Seth is currently working his way up and is likely on the level five of seven. (Does he know how to quit? Probably not. Juno would recognize the terrifying determination of a homicidal demon, having once been a terrifyingly determined homicidal pirate herself.)

The first store Juno enters turns out to be a near complete bust. The sales associate refuses to leave her alone, probably because she’s the only customer, but it makes choosing her marks difficult. Her miniatures do manage to snag a few random rings when Juno distracts the associate with banal smalltalk about Avangeline’s most recent events. Though she leaves the store a few thousand credits richer, she knows this first hit would have been more successful had the sales associate fucking left her alone. Ugh.

Onto the next.

Here, she doesn’t run into the same issue she had at the first store, thankfully. A few customers are already occupying the staffs’ attention, allowing Juno to quietly choose her marks without being noticed. (She leaves behind small bone dust prints over the display cases for her miniatures to find.) However, as she’s eyeing a particularly sparkly looking necklace, one she imagines Lettie will adore, she catches the tailend of a conversation between someone who seems to be a bride-to-be and her partner’s closest friend. They’re picking out a surprise ring for the bride-to-be’s partner.

Blinking slowly, her mind wanders back to all those moments Lettie has mentioned or asked about rings. (A few nights ago, the faerie even casually mentioned her ring size while comparing hand sizes with the pirate.) ‘Fuck.’ She even mentioned them when she had been proposing. (Suddenly, the in-store advertisements are starting to make sense. In her defense, she just thought Lettie just wanted more ways for them to match.) It also dawns on her that Lettie might be using this very competition to get a ring for Juno, like how they stole each other lockets. She never expressly told her this, but her excitement over comparing hauls is starting to make sense. ‘Fuck. Fuuuuck.’ This must be one of Avangeline’s marriage customs.

Okay. Okay. Well, at least she now understands the assignment and it’s not like she’s spent too much time marking useless jewelry. There is still time for her to recover. This is fine. She’s got this. She’s totally got this. (But what the fuck kind of ring would Lettie even want to wear everyday, for the rest of her life, for forever?)

Juno must look like she totally doesn’t got this, as a sales associate approaches her soon after her series of revelations. “Can I help you find anything?”

“Uhh, no. I’m good,” she squeaks, not at all sounding like a pirate who spent too much of her teens smoking carb. Hurriedly, she exits the second store. While her miniatures had picked up some rings, she doesn’t think her faerie will like them. (Well, she imagines Lettie would be fine with almost anything Juno chooses so long as she puts some fucking thought into this, but she’s not going to mess this up. If this is part of her tradition, then Juno wants to do well by it and get something worthy of her faerie.)

At the third store, and beyond, Juno has more focus. She no longer goes for the most expensive items and pays more mind to the rings themselves. Though she would ordinarily go for the ring with the most or biggest gemstones, knowing they’d be the most devastating in a fist fight, all those rings are gaudy, awful, and do not scream Lettie at all. She almost gives up. She almost just goes with a skull shaped ring with diamond eyes, desperate to choose something. Then she sees her.

It’s Lettie in a ring—sparkly, beautiful, and tastefully extra. A diamond cut like a rose with a twining white gold band, like twisting vines. Smaller diamonds are placed around the largest one, like leaves. When the diamonds catch the light, holographic butterflies flutter around, then land on the rose.

It’s gone from the display five minutes after Juno leaves the store. Her skellie meets her by the pretzel stand, crawls up her leg, and deposits the jewelry into her pocket before crawling to hide on the necromancer’s belt. “You might as well give up now, Lette.” She pays for her pretzel, smirking to herself. “Admit it, I’ve got you beat. There’s a new heist queen in town and her names is—”

Seth.

He’s coming straight for her. She turns quickly, speed walking through the crowd, but it's too late. They made eye contact. “Shit bananas. I’m on the fourth floor. Heading for the center escalator right now.” She can feel the demon’s eyes burning two holes into her back. She can feel him gaining on her.

The skeletons on her belt jump off and hop from shopper to shopper, until they’ve landed on Seth’s pant leg. Lestat crawls into the hole of his jeans, then bites the demon. Hard. The other minis join in. He hisses, trying to knock the unseen assailants from his body, but they grind down, forcing the demon to stop. This gives Juno enough time to make it down a full level.

“Heading towards the southern exit.”
 
When Lettie crosses paths with Seth the first time he doesn't notice her. Phew. Looks like he's going back down. The little faerie breathes a sigh of relief and takes the elevator to the top floor of the mall. It's where the glyphs, glamours and enchantments are sold-- in other words, her specialty. As she rides the elevator up to the sound of some haywire techno jazz, she can't help remembering last time she was in an elevator in Avangeline. Making one last effort to talk to Juno, only to fail and watch her leave, the double doors closing behind her. She thought that was gonna be the last time she ever saw her. Then she came back for her. She came back and now she can see forever the same way she saw that pink cottage in the palm of Juno's hand. It's just within their reach.

Memories of today and all the days before are salve for those wounds. They won't be divided again. Thing is, Lettie's not at all worried that Juno's going to leave her this time. As they move in closer to these battles they'll have to fight, she's worried that... that she'll follow her after she's past the point of no return, dragged into the grave that's been waiting for her all these years. Worried that her sweet, loyal pirate captain will go down with her like she's her sinking ship. Ping! The elevator stops at the top floor. Lettie shakes off her nerves, hugs Sir Regis the plush to her chest and steps out. Store clerks can smell anxiety like a shark smells blood in the water... and this might be her final chance to prove that she is the heist queen. Let's fucking do this thing.

Lettie goes to one of the tablet stations in the jewelry store, immediately padding in keywords to locate the perfect ring for Juno. Knowing her pirate, simplicity will go a long way. The faerie is determined to pick something that she could see her genuinely liking without it being too bland and similar to the other rings she has. It has to be badass and stand out without being too flashy or ostentatious. (Ah. Juno totally rocked those rings she'd tried on at her request, just as she thought.) With that in mind, Lettie decides to get a few different rings. She hacks into the system and sends the coordinates of these rings to her magic circle-- subsequently erasing her tracks to keep anyone from finding her. It's almost too easy.

The first ring Lettie picks out is a bit silly. A chain of bones makes up the band and at the very center two skeletal hands come together to form a heart shape. It's a cheeky pick, a bit cute, and she can so easily picture Juno thinking of her when she wears it. Still, it's not the engagement ring. Moving on. She finds an assortment of onyx rings, snagging a few simple bands and a few with stones in the center. Simple but elegant. (She picks a few incorporating blue stones, Juno's favorite color, and also a few with rubies to entertain the vampire aesthetics they've begun to explore.) She picks out several skull rings. Tiny skulls that frame diamonds on elegant spiraling patterns, skull-diamond-skull bands, big chunky skulls wearing fantastical helmets and demonic skulls with horns. One of the rings is pretty gnarly-- the shapes of dried roots and leaves making up the band where a zombie hand emerges from the center, grasping a gemstone. It's not the engagement ring, but she can imagine the gruesome design earning a grin from Juno. It's exactly the sort of thing she could see on the cover of a heavy metal record in Ariel's shop. Another ring worth noting is a braided band. Rows of black and white diamonds wrap around each other affectionately like two souls intwined. In a way, it reminds her of the two of them. It's in the running for the engagement ring, when...

Juno starts to gloat and Lettie's already thinking of a sassy comeback to hit her with when-- the pirate swerves the other way entirely, towards shit bananas. Shit!

Lettie found plenty of rings... but did she find the engagement ring? She can't help wondering as she clears her tracks and closes out her session. Stars. Big life decisions like this can't be rushed! (Okay, okay. Juno would probably say it's just a ring. But she'll always be Olette Lycoris Radiata. This is her whole thing! Her selection must be at the very peak of excellence or the Magistrate will never let her hear the end of it.) Still, shit bananas are shit bananas. Her search comes to an end now 'cause that's the rules. If anything, Juno's got plenty options to chose from. Odds are the simplest, most inconsequential ring will end up being her favorite one.

"Okay. I'm on the top floor. It might take me a minute, but I'm headed your way." Lettie's just about to finish up at her station when someone outright grabs onto one of her antlers, yanking her head back. What the fuck?

"Fancy meeting you here..." Jasper, her brother, smiles and shows off a hint of fang. "Olette." Fuck, fuck, fuck. The shopkeep eyes them both, somewhat alarmed, and Jasper wraps an arm around her and pulls her in close as if to explain his harassment. "She's my little sister."

"What are you doing here!? How--" Lettie whispers out the side of her mouth, her heart pounding frantically in her chest as she shopkeep sniffs and turns her attention back to her book. "How did you see through my glamours?"

"I'm just that awesome." Jasper laughs, seeing the unimpressed expression on her face, and waves his hand dismissively. "...My buddy Seth checked the security cameras and told me to look for the pipsqueak with antlers. And here you are."

"You're in cahoots with Seth? Since when?" Lettie scrunches her nose, wiggling away from Jasper and shoving him away. The shopkeep doesn't look up this time, attributing it to sibling squabbles. "Never mind. What do you want, Jasper? Here to turn me in for a sweet cash prize?"

"Why, Olette. I would never." He totally would, though. Bastard. "Dad wants to meet with you."

It all comes rushing back. The magazine burning up in the fire, dad's infuriatingly smug face wrinkling away and turning to ashes. Lettie doesn't have time for this shit. There was a time when she looked to Jasper for help connecting with dad. This could be his angle to reel her in, trying to pull at her heartstrings... only to tangle her in them and turn her in. She doesn't trust this for a second.

"Shit bananas. One of my brothers spotted me... guess he's in contact with Seth. Still on the top floor." Lettie's gaze flicks right to left as she tries to figure out an escape plan. "...Screw it. I'm going through the window."

Lettie stomps on Jasper's foot, running away as fast as she can before she can hear him yelp and curse. "You little--!" As she goes, she shimmies out of her yellow cardigan, letting it fall on the tiled floor behind her. The sight of her phantom wings draws startled gasps from passersby. Yeah, outing herself as a faerie is a huge risk-- but it's better than going along with Jasper. Rushing towards the southern balcony, she shrinks herself down and flies through one of the ginormous windows, glitching herself through.

"I'm gonna try and land on your hat. If you feel something, don't swat!" Lettie searches for Juno from above. "Just so you know, there might be others lurking around here. I have, uh, thirteen brothers."
 
“The window!?” Juno wheezes, her eyes bugging out. Sure enough, when she looks over her shoulder she swears she can see a hairline streak of white glitching through the seventh story window. ‘She’s trying to kill me, I swear.’ While Juno knows that Lettie is the fucking faerie, that does not mean she is any less desensitized to her antics. They almost never fail to give the pirate a heart attack. (She can still vividly recall the first time she ever watched Lettie hurl herself over Lady’s railing, only to come swooping back up on the opposite side, surprising their enemies. Lettie teased Juno about it afterwards, even though she valiantly tried to deny the claims that Lettie was anything more than her mechanic.)

As panic builds on top of itself, she feels four of her miniatures crumble to ash and knows that that most likely means Seth is recovering from her assault. She hastens her step. Not too long after that, she feels something small and suspiciously wife-shaped land on the bill of her cap, then feels her faerie hop down to her shoulder. It’s a small relief to be reunited again, but they aren’t in the clear just yet.

Juno steals another glance over her shoulder and immediately locks onto Seth’s hulking figure as he exits the mall, his bright blue eyes like neon signs. Just above him, another demon flies off from the seventh story balcony, one who she suspects is Lettie’s brother. (One of thirteen, apparently. Fucking great, right?) The universe seems hellbent on making sure that Juno doesn’t forget that this is a double shit bananas situation.

Should she even be surprised? It’s only natural that their date would end in disaster. Yeah, happily ever after hadn’t necessarily been in reach tonight, but maybe they could have ended the night with a nice bottle of wine and a bubbly bath. (Lettie recently introduced Juno to those. They are quite relaxing.) But the second Lettie found that fish bitch scale on Juno’s belt, the probability of them ending the night with fire increased to an eighty percent likelihood. Now, with two demons chasing after them, those odds are up to ninety percent.

It’s a cruel reminder that their future is not a guarantee. But Juno and Lettie haven’t gone through hell and back to have things end on Avangeline and they’re certainly not going to go down over two second rate demons. Juno’s slain worse. Lettie’s shown, multiple times, she will go berserk. That in mind, Juno doesn’t despair.

With Seth and Lettie’s brother gaining on them, Juno breaks into a full run, shedding their prior strategy to lay low now that they have been caught. She races towards the edge of the island, beelining for a motorcycle stalling on the launch pad. A rider sits on the vehicle, but that’s not exactly going to stop the pirate. If this is the end to their heist competition, they might as well participate in some grand theft auto. “Hope you’re thinking what I’m thinking, baby.”

The rider turns towards Juno one second too late. Juno rips them off of the vehicle and toss them to the ground. In the next moment, she's swinging her leg over the rear seat of the motorcycle, taking her spot behind Lettie. Lettie revs the engine and then they're burning a streak along the launch pad, leaping into the streets of Avangeline.

Juno hugs onto Lettie’s waist for dear life, only just remembering that while she trusts the faerie with her life, she really fucking hates motorcycles. (They’re too exposed.) That paired with Lettie’s daredevil tendencies and Juno is starting to get dizzy, especially with the city lights burning so bright and blending into streaks.

Lettie expertly weaves them through traffic, slipping between gaps and even driving over a few cars before she takes them up the side of a building to build their momentum. (Juno is going to have another heart attack.) And just when she wants to suggest they slowdown, she hears the faerie curse. Through the rearview mirror, she spots Seth and Jasper crammed into a swanky sports car, gaining speed. ‘Fuck.’

In an effort to shake them, they drive through parks and gardens. They squeeze through alleyways, ride up dead ends, and, at one point, Lettie even drives them along the underbelly of one of the islands. (Juno almost passes out.) But, somehow, the asshole caravan remains.

“Fuck this.” With great reluctance, Juno pries one of her arms from Lettie’s waist and shakily searches for her bombs. “Can you get us away from civilians? I’m blowing shit up.”
 
Let it be known: this is exactly the sort of situation that calls for another outfit change. (Yes, another one!) Lettie's got some hella cute motorcycle outfits she's yet to put to use... but she's a good little faerie and shows restraint. So far she's done fairly well relying on magic besides her own for glamours, preserving her energy for the fights where she'll really need it. Glamours don't take too much ordinarily, but that sort of thing can mean life or death when she's pushed all the way to her limits. She's got a life and a future wife to fight for! Still a shame about the outfits. Maybe she'll throw a big fashion show with the skellies when all of this is said and done.

At first, Juno's grip around Lettie's waist distracts her from thoughts about her wardrobe. Everything, really. (Arms... muscles...) She swerves, nearly crashes, and tries to play it cool when she catches herself at the last second. Yeah, she totally meant to do that. When Juno's arms tighten around her to the point that she struggles to breathe, it serves as a reminder her that this isn't a joyride. 'Snap out of it, you gay disaster you!' They're being chased! Still, the faerie's confident she's gonna get them out of this jam, maneuvering through traffic, scaling the sides of buildings and underbelly of the island to escape their pursuit. But Seth and Jasper, those assholes, are just as determined.

"Sure thing, I can..." Lettie bites her lip, realizing the nearest place from here would be the Star Grove. Oof. One by one, they're revisiting all of the memories those nightmare worlds dredged out. But it just might work to their advantage. When Juno finishes by saying she's gonna blow shit up, she's quick to shake her head and caution her. "Wait, Juju. If I cut through a secluded forest, it's gonna be the same deal as Sir Regis's world. Probably even worse. If we throw a bomb and hurt even a single tree..." There'll be hell to pay. There's good reason why demons are wary of the Star Grove. "Hold on tight, baby. I have an idea. I've got us."

Lettie races towards the edge of the floating island they're on. There's a section where a railing is under reconstruction and a long, thin beam sticks out over the edge. Once they go over, it'll fall away... and Seth and Jasper's car won't stand a chance. It's gonna take some risky maneuvering to pull this off.

"You trust me, right?" Lettie prefaces as they race towards it. She can feel Juno stiffen behind her, probably sensing that she's got a chaotic plan in the works. (Yeah, pretty much. Aw, She knows her so well!) "In a second I'm gonna glitch and switch places with you." She draws a glyph that sets the motorcycle on autopilot. "Don't panic. All you gotta do is hold the handlebars, keep us moving straight ahead. Ready?"

Juno makes a strangled noise that in the heat of the moment, Lettie takes as agreement. She narrows her eyes and sets her plan into action, glitching through Juno so that she's sat behind her instead, hugging her tight around the waist. (The faerie takes a quick second to look behind her, sticking her tongue out mischievously at the duo in the car. They stare back dubiously. She's always been a tricky little shit, but this is on a batshit level they haven't seen in action yet. Lettie's been through a hell of a lot since she last saw Jasper. She's bolder. Wiser...? Well maybe not. Or maybe a little? Either way... she's not the same!) The little faerie laughs maniacally as they approach the edge of the beam and go flying through the air across the islands.

At an outdoor cafe nearby, a demon with square glasses and a suit spills coffee all over himself. A rosy-cheeked angel baby drops her ice cream cone. Passersby stop and stare at the spectacle unfolding before them.

Lettie's beaming, soaking it up. The only thing that could make it cooler would be if she were wearing her hella cute motorcycle outfit.

Gravity starts to pull them down before they reach the other island and it starts to look like they're not going to make it. Welp. They'll either make it or they won't. It's all chill, though, because missing their mark won't result in certain death. C'mon, Lettie's not that careless. She knows a thing or two about math and whatnot-- she knows what she's about! There's another island directly below them. If anything, she'll soften the landing with her wings if she can't carry them the rest of the way across. Speaking of which, that's essentially her plan.

Once they're airborne, Lettie's phantom wings reappear with a grand flourish, as large and magnificent as they were when they shielded them before. With their strength, she flaps them with all her might and uses their remaining momentum to carry herself and Juno just over the edge of the Star Grove. (The motorcycle is the only thing that doesn't make it, plummeting down below.) They go rolling and crashing through the grass, her wings wrapping a protective shell around them both.

When they roll to a stop, Lettie's wings vanish in a vibrant flurry of sparkles. In the Star Grove, her beauty bar glamours vanish. She looks like herself again, but no one's followed them. No one's here to see. (For now, anyway.) They're lying in overgrown grass among tall, haunting statues... but the faerie can't stop herself from grinning playfully at her pirate, showing just a hint of fang. She's belly laughed enough by now that it aches, but it doesn't stop her from laughing some more as she pumps her fists in the air. "Hell yes! We just fuckin' did that!"

Juno on the other hand looks quite... ill. (Uh oh. Too much excitement, maybe? That was pretty intense.) Lettie bites the inside of her cheek sympathetically, rising to her feet and offering her pirate a hand to help her stand. She purses her lips and rises to her tip-toes to fix Juno's ruffled hair. "The dad hat didn't survive the jump." She points out. The faerie presses her hands together and bows her head mournfully. "It will be missed. Rest assured, we'll avenge it."

Lettie takes Juno's hand in her own, tugging gently to guide her deeper into the Star Grove. "C'mon, we should hide." The pink of the late afternoon sky is turning purple, some of the blue fireflies around them are beginning to glow. "Demons don't hang out here much. Especially at night. It gives 'em the creeps... filled with faerie dust and ghosts, apparently." She wiggles her fingers spookily. "No one knows where these statues came from, either. Weird, right?" The Star Grove was her safe place for a bit. She used to hang out here a lot, till...

Eventually, they come to a place well-hidden among the trees. The skeleton of a trashed airship rests there like a fallen goddess. Overgrown moss and vines blanket it now.

"She's still here. My poor old friend." Lettie sighs. (Before the cubes entered her life, she spoke to this airship... and there's nothing weird about that!) She hasn't been back here since... she walks towards it, moving some foliage aside to rest her hand against the severely dented entrance. "This is the airship I told you about, Juju. The one I fixed up." The faerie wraps her hand around her scarred wrist. "I worked tirelessly. I was so determined to escape and I thought I was getting close. Then those bastards tracked me and..." Lettie can't find the words to explain how devastated she was when those demons made her watch as they dismantled it beyond the point of repair. She doesn't really need to explain, does she? All she has to do is gesture to the ruined airship, her shoulders slumping.

"I was bitter about it for a while... all that time and effort for nothing. But it ended up coming in handy, didn't it? Helped me become Lady's official mechanic." Lettie nods to herself proudly. "You probably noticed I got real protective of her after that. I even cursed out Ripir."

Lettie wanders around to a hole blasted in the airship's side, gesturing for Juno to follow her inside. They can hide here for the night. She's strong enough to face it now. Before long, they're camped out on the floor in one of the least damaged rooms and Lettie's rifling through a time capsule of her past-- her old toolbox. It's not pink or bejeweled (shocker, she knows-- this clearly from her angsty teenage years) but it does have a few cute holographic butterfly stickers stuck to the sides. It's mostly tools-- but there are a few bottles of nail polish, crumbled up notes, a pair of fingerless gloves and faded polaroids of herself and Lina. (They look just like they did in their shared nightmare memories. The only thing that's missing from them is Juno and James.) She looks at them with a fond sort of sadness, considering the pictures she took with Juno today. (It's nice to have some pics together that aren't on wanted posters, that's for sure.) Lina would be happy for her. It used to be painful, looking back at these-- it always will be, to an extent-- but she's glad to have found them.

...It makes Lettie wish Juno had some pictures of James to remember him by, too. (Damn. They should've took some with Eliza and everyone before they left, too.) Once they have their own cottage, she vows to set aside a space for them to have a proper wall of photos.

"I think I'm gonna officially prove I'm the heist queen when we compare our hauls." Lettie warns Juno when she's finished reminiscing. "But first..." She digs in her magic circle for the potion with the note. The faerie scrunches her nose up as she holds the bottle away, tipping it upside down to retrieve the note. Maroon potion spills all over the floor. "Ugh, sticky. This is so messy." With the soggy note pinched between her fingers, she waves it out and then unravels it to read. "'Hurrah! The secret message you have discovered, but there is more yet to be uncovered. To save yourself from damnation, find Lestat for the translation.' Aaaand the rest is in code..." Lettie blows out a raspberry. "Freaking Ravan. Freaking rhymes... freaking nerd."

Stars, Lettie hopes he's okay.

"Is Lestat with you, Juju?" Lettie hands the note over to her. "Or... do you think you can you use your connection to read it?"
 
It’s official. Lettie is trying to kill her. Nothing else can explain everything that she just orchestrated. She’s insane. They've just barely survived her batshit chaotic plan and she's laughing. Gleefully. Meanwhile Juno can barely open her eyes without having to swallow the violent urge to puke, but hey! So long as Lettie is happy. (She’s lucky she’s so damn cute.)

The pirate rolls over onto her side and groans weakly. Now she understands all those moments where Lettie tries to become one with the floor, but her faerie is already up and ready to make this island her bitch or something. When she offers Juno her hand, she accepts and pulls herself up, teetering once she's on two feet again. Her little faerie is right there to make sure she doesn't fall and even fixes her hair just the way she likes it. She may be a chaotic little shit, but she's got her.

Juno is green the entire way to Lettie’s airship and has to dedicate all of her focus to holding down those french fries she ate. She can’t even properly mourn the loss of her dad hat or even joke that this must mean she’s not cut out for fatherhood. (The children of the worlds seem to disagree.) All she can do is endure wave after wave of nausea and plead that it subsides soon. It would be really fucking embarrassing to throw up. There's no way in hell Juno wants Lettie to know she can't handle a little high speed chase.

Eventually, her pleas are answered and, little by little, she starts to regain her usual composure. Just in time to appreciate Lettie's old broken down airship, too. As they come up upon it, Lettie doesn't have to tell her what she's seeing. She knows. After surviving off of scraps of Lettie's life, she's memorized all her stories, including the one about how she learned so much about airship mechanics by tinkering with an old junker. This old junker. Juno has always wanted to know more about that story, like what happened, but Lettie never budged, always changing the subject because of those damn curses. But now those curses are broken and Juno knows.

As she steps through the hole blasted into the side of the ship, she looks around the interior, imagining what it must have been like under Lettie’s care. Her mind fills in missing panels, painting them pink. When she looks into the ship’s bridge, she can picture the control panel with custom sparkly pink buttons and maybe even a fluffy pink seat. She imagines the moment Lettie put up the beaded curtain that leads into the room they’ve chosen to camp out in. It must have been a nice getaway when she had it.

While Lettie looks through her old belongings, Juno sprawls out onto an old dusty couch. (This one isn't pink, nor is it velvet.) Though she doesn't mean to, she catches a glimpse of the photograph in Lettie's hand and frowns, feeling an ebb of loss that isn't even hers to have. But she lived those nightmares and now knows what it's like to lose Lina, just as Lettie knows what it's like to lose James.

“Wanna put that in with our other photographs for safe keeping?” As she asks, she reaches into her pocket for her wallet. Her wallet that she thinks is a pocket photo album (because that’s what Inez told her) and has dedicated entirely to pictures of her future wife, including the picture she stole from Lettie’s apartment the last time they were on Avangeline. No money. No cards. Just fiancée. “We can get a proper frame or something once we’re back on Lady.”

When Lettie decides to bring up the matter of their heist competition, touting a victory that will never be hers, Juno rolls her eyes. It’s sad, really, that she still thinks she has a chance. ‘Poor, poor Lette. You don’t even know what’s coming.’ Rather than say anything, she keeps quiet and instead imagines that moment of stupefied awe on the faerie’s sparkly little face when she sees the fucking ring.

Though the moment will have to wait with Lettie wanting to focus on Ravan. Right. That dork. And Juno is seriously questioning why they should even track that dork down after Lettie reads those cringy rhymes. He seems to be doing just fine if he can come up with couplets. “He couldn’t have just said something plainly?” She only knew the guy for a few hours and even she knows that that would have been an impossibility. He's the vampire wannabe, of course he's going to be a dork. Though his message does remind her of the minis and the four ones lost to Seth's fist. (R.I.P.) "No, he's not." Her shoulders slump. "I lost him—"

Plink. Plink.

Right above them, as if summoned by their necromancer, Lestat and Edward, the only surviving minis, wave at Juno and Lettie from a hole in the ceiling. Then, using some paper money as hang gliders, they jump and land gracefully on Juno’s lap. Oh. Both minis run up to Juno’s middle and throw their tiny arms around her, sloppily signing about how much they missed her. “Aww, it’s alright. Sorry to get lost from you two.”

‘It’s okay,’ Lestat signs, straightening out and wiping away his nonexistent tears. ‘The view was nice. Have you read Ravan’s note?’

“Yeah, we were—”

Lestat proceeds to perfectly recite (via sign) the translation of the note.

“Wait, wait, wait—you knew? This entire time you knew and you didn’t just tell us?” Little fucking bonehead. Lestat signs innocently. ‘You never asked.’ The pirate rolls her eyes before she turns to relay the message to Lettie. It turns out to be a long list of names of the common radio stations that Ariel plays at her shop—stuff like, Osmium, Satan’s Beats, and Bad Anthem to name a few. It doesn't seem like much of a message, but Lestat insists that that is all he knows. “Maybe there’s a message in the names? If we scramble around the letters or words? Or we maybe there's like... a hidden message in those radio frequencies?”
 
'Ravan, what the fuck?' Lettie catches herself chewing on the end of her pencil as she pores over her notes. They tried puzzling together a few different words with the letters of the station names at Juno's suggestions and she's not finding any concrete meaning. (From Osmium, Lettie comes up with 'Miso'. Juno gets 'Mosium' and the faerie has to gently explain that the right spelling is 'Museum.') The other words turn out to be a bust, too, especially when they start coming up with phrases like 'Bat's Tea' and 'Bath Amen'. Eventually, Lettie throws her hands down and gets up to search for her portable radio. It's gotta be around here somewhere. Oof. The faerie feels it when she moves, she's sore all over after that chase. Stars, she would be saying 'amen' if she could get a nice bath! It'd be fun to introduce Juno to hot springs while they're in Avangeline, but she doesn't want to take another detour before they've found her favorite vampire wannabe.

Eventually they're lying on the floor, turning the radio's dial to find Ariel's stations. Music, static, music.

"I used to listen to these stations a lot... but some of Ariel's faves are too scream-y for my taste. I like some of 'em, though. It's perfect gym music." Lettie muses, making the 'ok' symbol with her fingers. It's nostalgic. Baby Lettie initially listened to these songs because of her big gay crush on Ariel. (In fact, many gay crushes have helped her develop the well-rounded taste she has now.) It influenced her own style, too. Pop's her go-to, but she's adopted the anger and edge of this genre for her own songs. "People can send messages to each other or give shout outs by calling in during the talk segments... but I seriously doubt Ravan's planning is that good. It'd be kinda scary if it was." They could call in themselves to send them a message, possibly, but that'd also be super dangerous. There's no telling who else might be listening in. It's a plan, though, and she decides it'll be their last resort if they don't find anything else.

Once they start writing down the numbers of the radio stations themselves, it clicks that they could be coordinates. (Lestat and Edward do a cute little victory dance as Lettie and Juno breathe a collective sigh of relief.) Since it's late, they decide to wait until morning before scoping them out. They take turns giving each other massages before curling up together, listening to the radio. Lettie comes upon a station with one of mother's pop ballads playing and for the first time since she lost her doesn't turn it off.

The faerie nuzzles against her future wife and tells stories about her childhood. Instead of going into how she was cast in the spotlight from the day she was born because of controversy her mother's pregnancy stirred or how mother struggled to balance everything in the aftermath, she tries to recount some of their happier memories. The dance parties they'd have while making breakfast in the morning and the way she tried to make every trivial little task fun. How she taught her to be not just pretty, but also smart-- and strong enough to survive a world like Avangeline. (Mother gave either the best advice or the worst advice. No in between with her.) There's a lot of darkness, some of which Juno's already seen, but there's light as well.

They share stories late into the night until their words start to slur and they drift off to sleep.

***​

The ship is shaking. Oh. Are they... moving? "Juju... why are you doing push-ups? It's so early." Lettie mumbles, submerged halfway in her dream. "What's..." There's a rattling sound. Juno is not doing push-ups. "Ah!" The faerie squints confusedly as she rouses. Rubbing her bleary eyes, she recoils when she realizes they're not in the same ship they fell asleep in. 'What the fuck?' (Thankfully, they don't appear to be on an enemy ship or anything like that. Not like the time they woke in those freaky test tubes. Never again.) They're on Lady now. Safe, or so it seems, though it doesn't make this any less jarring. When did...?

"I had to take initiative." The cube informs them, drawing up a screen displaying footage from the Star Grove. A whole army of demons had the ship surrounded... and all the while, they were oblivious inside. Cuddling and sleeping soundly. (The faerie blushes when she notices herself talking in her sleep... and is that drool on her face!?) No, no. That's not important right now. Not compared to all those demons. Lettie gulps. Looks like everyone knows she's back now. She did put on quite the show yesterday. It was bound to happen sooner or later, she guesses. "Otherwise you would've definitely died." The little bastard tuts. "We're tracking Ravan's coordinates now."

"Coffee?" Marjorie offers, carrying a silver tray containing two steaming mugs.

"Banana?" Abigail floats behind her on her personal cloud, carrying her own silver tray containing an impressive stack of bananas.

"Oh stars. I'd kill for some of your banana bread." Lettie sighs against Juno's chest before pulling herself to her feet. She's starving... gotta make do with what they got on hand. She takes the top banana and peers out the window to see where they are. They're surrounded by a purplish mist, the massive city islands no more than hazy pinpricks on the horizon now. "Wow. We're far out."

***​

Eventually, they arrive on an island of spooky trees and fog that naturally makes Lettie think of that vampire wannabe. Oh yeah. This has got to be it. She could practically name this place 'Ravan's Sanctuary'. But she still can't help but do a double take when she notices the tall, narrow spires of a fucking castle standing on the cliffside. Lettie and Juno exchange a glance and mouth a bewildered 'what the fuck' at each other. As they make the trek up the cliff, it's evident from the chipped paint and dusty stained glass windows that it's been abandoned for quite some time. How'd that nerd find himself a freaking castle!?

When they use the heavy knocker, it's not Ravan or Ariel who opens the door... but a skeleton? She's wearing an extravagant violet robe and lounges in the doorway with a glass of wine in her hand. From the glowing wisps of light dancing around her bones, Lettie realizes that this is a skeleton hasn't been reanimated by a necromancer. It's a ghost possessing a skeleton. Huh. From behind her, Lettie notices the mysterious orbs of light swaying around the candelabra chandelier. Okay. This castle is hella haunted. No wonder it's abandoned. (Leave it to Ravan to find an obscure, spooky castle to hide in. Seriously.)

"The name's Barbara." The skeleton speaks in a low, husky voice. She twirls the stem of her glass, spilling a little. "With a B." (...Wait. What other letter would one spell Barbara with!?)

"Is, um..." Lettie finds herself tongue-tied in the presence of this extravagant skeleton. Barbara's got a pretty sweet deal in her afterlife. Lounging in a castle, in a robe, drinking wine first thing in the morning? 'Course, skeletons can't drink or get drunk. But they do like to pretend, as she's learned. "My friend, Ravan. I'm looking for him. Is he here?"

"He might be, darling." Barbara hums thoughtfully, taking a sip of her wine. It streams through her bones. "What's the password?"
 
Okay. This place is super fucking haunted and Juno doesn’t think anyone needs to be a necromancer to figure that out. The place is practically oozing ghouls and ghosts from the mortar. (In fact, she's pretty sure that there isn't much left of the original mortar now.) She doesn’t get the sense that the spirits haunting this castle are like the revenant nightmares on Desdemonia, but she’s still not too keen on Ravan’s chosen hideout.

She’s especially not keen on interacting with more boneheads than she has to and this Barbara with a B is already grinding against her nerves. The only boneheads she wants to deal with are her boneheads. Not this Barbara with a B. (As opposed to what other fucking letter? Juno might not be the best speller in the worlds, but even she knows that there are at least two Bs in Barbara and that B is not an easily replaceable letter.)

“The password better fuckin’ be, let us in or I’ll send you to Hell.” Hmm, it seems that Juno’s diplomacy skills have waned since arriving on Avangeline. (To be fair, their diplomatic attempts thus far have led to them being tracked down and hunted by demons for sport. Excuse Juno for reverting back to her usual Desdemonian tactics. She has a wife to fight for.) “Please.”

“Please is the magic word and your password is incorrect,” Barbara’s words start slurring together. To punctuate her sentence, she waves her glass around, causing more wine to spill all over their feet. “One more shot, hot shot. Otherwise it will be I who sends you to Hell.”

“You’ll have to fight the fucking faerie for that chance.” Juno crosses her arms over her chest, lifting her scarred brow. “You want to risk that?”

The skeleton gives the impression that she’s lifting her brow as well, sloshing the wine around in her glass as she considers what the necromancer has just said. She leans over, taking another look at the faerie. Returning her attention to the pirate, she opens her jaw then closes it when she notices something on the necromancer's shoulder. “The little lord has returned! Lestat!” Barbara throws up her arms and the wine glass flies behind her. It shatters somewhere in the distance. “How long has it been, darling? A full moon? Pah,” she waves her hand. “What does it matter? Come in, come in—it’s been much to long. Yes, yes, you can bring your… guests. But I will send the angry one downtown if she tries anything.”

Lestat signs, ‘Be cool,’ to Juno and Lettie both. Then he tugs on Juno’s collar to encourage her to follow Barbara with a B. Though she follows, she almost strangles Lestat for his antics, knowing that the little shit (the littlest shit) knew about Ravan’s secret castle hideaway this entire fucking time and watched them struggle with spelling and 'Bath Amen' rather than just tell them from the start where Lettie’s best friend has been. If he weren’t so tiny and cute, she wouldn’t hesitate, but the little bastard knows he can get away with it. ‘Damn. He’s good.’

As they continue through the haunted castle, Barbara delights in playing tour guide for them and points out every single cobweb and names the spiders who live there. (R.I.P. to their demon bug army. Juno never found out what happened to them, though she imagines that if she opened Abigail’s skull, she’d find at least a few of their hollow husks hanging out inside.) One of the spiders, a crab spider named Octavius, takes a shine to Lettie and crawls onto her shoulder, nuzzling her neck affectionately. Juno pretends this does not disturb her. (Spiders... She still doesn't like those, but respects her future wife's affinity for them.)

Aside from the cobwebs and their inhabitants, their guide also offers them cryptic warnings about the statues and portraits lining the wall. “Avoid direct eye contact with these ones, darlings. They will try to possess you.” She cackles, making Juno wonder if that’s what happened to the skeleton she’s currently possessing. The necromancer can tell it's not her own. “In general, try not to stare. It’s positively rude.”

Finally, the skeleton leads them to an ornate wooden door with carvings that detail some sort of legend about the former lord of the manor. At least, that’s what Barbara says before thwacking Juno upside the head for staring. “What did I just say, Sir Pirate?” Juno rubs the back of her head, glaring at the skeleton. Barbara returns the glare. Though not letting herself get caught in any petty drama, though she is tempted, she smooths over her robe and then does a quick three beat knock. "Lord Ravan? You have some visitors, brought here by the little lord Lestat. A Lady Faerie and Sir Pirate, I believe."

From the otherside of the door, they can hear someone sloshing around in water followed by that same someone scrambling, tripping, and then falling over as they scamper to the door. When it swings open, a wall of steam falls over the group before revealing Ravan. The vampire wannabe is soaking wet, having clearly stepped out of the bubbly bath without taking time to dry off, and is hurriedly tying his robe. His eyes are wide with shock and relief, tears brimming in them already. "Stars. Lette..." The vampire wannabe bites his lip before he throws his arms around Lettie. Though he probably would have hugged her anyway, Juno gets the sense he's mainly trying to regain his composure. "I wast not sure if it be true we wouldst seeth each other again.”

When he pulls away from Lettie, he seems to notice Juno for the first time. He tilts his head, but other than that, he doesn't say anything. (Considering what Ravan last knew of the duo, it must be a shock to see them still traveling together.) Ravan and Juno exchange an awkward hello that the dork quickly (thankfully) steamrolls over by waving his hand and leading them deeper into the castle. While they walk, he explains that Ariel is around somewhere and that it might be fun to surprise her later. (The way he says it suggests he might be open to a prank.)

He leads them to the bedroom he's been occupying since finding this hideaway, which isn't really a room. Not to Juno. It's basically it's own apartment. (Ravan also explains that his bathroom is broken, hence using that spare one. His is haunted by some ghost that refuses to let in any hot water.) As with the rest of the castle, the decorum within this room (apartment) is spooky as hell, but at least he's turned over all of the portraits and the statues are all facing the wall. He spreads his arms wide and walks in a circle until he's at the center of the bedroom (apartment). “Doth thee think it pretty sweet, nay?”
 
"Ravan, I have to know." Lettie says, peering quizzically around her friend's new digs. She really has to. He can't have just stumbled upon a castle that matches his entire personality. It's way too coincidental! Does this nerd have some magic crystal that lights the way to abandoned castles or some shit? ('Cause if so, she wants in. Sure, she wouldn't move into a castle on Avangeline or anything. She still fully intends on moving into a lovely cottage with her future wife. But it'd be a lie to say she's not curious to see what a castle with her personality and impeccable taste in aesthetics might look like...) "How the hell did you manage to find a whole ass castle in the middle of nowhere?"

"Dost thee not recognize it? It's where those gents filmed 'The Fanged Masquerade'. We gazed it together!" Ravan flaps his arms around in a way that makes him look like an exasperated crow. When not even a hint of recognition appears on the faerie's face, he frantically rushes around the room, waving his arms this way and that as he tries to jog her memory. "This is whither Derrick almost toppled a vase attempting to draweth Mathilde's blood! And this..." He gestures to a mirror he turned around, "This is whither Mathilde saw Bob's true reflection in the mirror of horrors! You don't recall?"

Lettie blinks, still confused, perhaps more so now than before. Ravan deflates, dropping his arms.

"...Bob? That has to be the least threatening vampire name I've ever heard!" Lettie sighs and shakes her head sagely. (She still doesn't remember and based on these descriptions, she knows why. She probably fell asleep.) Geez. They needed someone with actual taste in the writer's room, that's for certain. "And I thought Derrick was bad."

"You stayed the night. I madeth thee pancakes!" Ravan tries again. Then he frowns and crosses his arms. "Oh. I suppose thee wast malt-worm the night ere."

"Dude, I was not malt-worm. I was just a little tipsy!" Lettie argues. Okay, yeah. It's coming back to her now. "And those abominations were not pancakes. They were, like, nasty little goo pies." She shivers at the thought of them. (Not that she's one to talk. Neither she or Ravan can cook for shit.) "Nasty, nasty. Especially with the red food coloring. Never again."

"Concluded, be it, thee must be careful what thee sayeth about the film. Barbara wroteth the script and starred as Mathilde." Ravan informs her. "The lady was delighted I kneweth of the film and invited us to stay."

Okay, Barb. Good for her! Lettie nods thoughtfully and then raises a brow. "I was criticizing your 'pancakes', Ravan." The faerie reminds him. "Not the film."

"Yes, but before..."

"Oh, it's fine, darling. The sassy little pixie is right." Barbara makes both of them jump as she leans in the doorway of the room. (Lettie mumbles under her breath that she's not a pixie. Still better than being called an elf, though. Hm. She wonders how that dork Thaddeus Rex is doing.) "I was young, naive. Not to mention beautiful." She sighs, dramatically whipping her skull to the left to gaze out the window for cinematic effect. "I named Bob after my third husband... gods, he was a jackass." Well, okay then. This skeleton has skeletons in her closet. Lettie can tell just by looking at her. "Oh, Bob with a B. I thought it was meant to be."

There's a beat of silence after that. Someone coughs awkwardly. (...More corny rhymes. It makes perfect sense that this woman wrote a movie that Ravan loved.)

"Don't get married, kids. It's fucking terrible!" Barbara slurs, leaving them with those words of 'wisdom' and offering them the languid wave of her hand. "Toodaloo. Barbara's off to fetch her besties. Gin and Tonic."

Lettie fidgets, blushes, and glances shyly at Juno. Oh stars! She still has to tell Ravan their news! But he doesn't even know that they're dating yet. They... they should probably ease him into this, right? He's her best friend. She still hasn't figured out how to tell him that she's getting married-- getting married to a pirate she met from another world, no less! This whole time she's wished she could gush about her future wife with him. She can't help feeling bad, knowing he wasn't there for the early butterflies and first kisses.

"What is it, Lette?" Ravan asks. Ah, geez. He can read her like a book. "Something amiss?"

"Juno and I traveled really far. Before we catch up, we should probably rest for a bit. Maybe take a bubble bath..." Lettie blurts out. She fidgets/ (What is she saying right now?) "Together."

"T-together?" Ravan's whole face turns red, the tips of his ears flaming particularly bright. He draws his forefinger between the two of them a few times as he puzzles it all together. "You two? Wait, thee art..."

"It's a long story. But yeah, we're dating now!" Lettie blushes a deeper shade of pink, grabs onto Juno's arm, and runs away. (Why is she running!?) "I promise I'll fill you in on everything later!"

***​

"...I wanna tell him everything." Lettie confides in Juno as she washes her hair, gently tracing her fingertips over her white streak. This bath is legit. It's nice and roomy and the candles give everything a romantic, golden glow. (The perfect setting for those vampire fantasies she found herself having at the mall... but she wants to talk first.) "I guess I feel like I need to ease him in. He was the one I confided in whenever I had a crush or a bad date or..." She bites her lip. "I dunno. I guess I'm a little sad I couldn't talk to him when we first started out. I just wanted to tell him how dreamy Captain fucking Juno can be."

Lettie grins and playfully flicks water at Juno, walking her fingers up her bicep. Ah. Muscles.

"If I'm acting weird, it's 'cause I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to tell him. Like, it's gonna blow his mind." Lettie nestles back against Juno, gathering her hair over her shoulder to give her access to wash it. "It blows my mind every day. We're gonna get married! I can't wait to be your wife." She curls her toes, unable to stop herself from doing a little shimmy of excitement. Waves of water slosh over the sides of the tub and onto the floor. She laughs at herself and stops. "I dunno what their deal was, but no way we're gonna be like Barbara and Bob. We're not them. We're gonna be happy." She resolute about this. They'll get though this. They'll be happy. Their lives will finally be soft and peaceful... but not boring. Never boring.

Stars, Lettie's already happy. As long as they can see this mission through to the end, she's sure to stay that way. (She doesn't want to think about the alternatives right now.)

"You and Ravan should bond." Lettie suggests, tilting her head back to look up at Juno. "Do you think you could teach him to make some decent pancakes in the morning? It's a chance for you two to get to know each other better." She blushes. While she means that, she can't hide that there's something else she wants out of that. "Aaand to be honest, that conversation earlier had me craving your pancakes. You make the best ones."

Suddenly, Lettie gasps and drops her hands into the water with a 'splash'! She turns around suddenly and squishes Juno's face between her hands.

"Juju." Lettie looks deep into her eyes. She can't believe they forgot! "We never confirmed who the true heist queen was!"
 
It would be a lie to say that Juno isn’t hurt when Lettie brusquely reduces their relationship to dating. While it isn’t untrue, it also isn’t true. To reduce them to dating when they’re going to get married does feel like a slight and, at the same time, she holds onto her trust. She knows that her betrothed is proud of her—she openly sobbed about Juno’s muscles in front of all of their Desdemonian friends (and Thad) and their skeleton family—so she doesn’t say anything when Lettie runs the bath and they strip down to get in. (It takes a massive amount of effort on Juno’s part to not attack Lettie like a vampire might. To be honest, Juno doesn’t know too much about vampires, but she supports her future wife’s sudden interest. If anything, this just means that Juno’s safe to admit that watching Lettie destroy that space station abomination was hot as fuck. Like, step on her, please.)

Ahem.

Anyway, she relaxes into the tub and enjoys the feel of Lettie pressed up against her and her fingers through her hair. Yeah, she has nothing to worry about and less when Lettie addresses all that happened back there. (Well, not all that happened. Juno would rather forget about that movie synopsis and everything Barbara with a B said.) She nods her head, communicating her understanding. Juno’s been alone for so long that while she doesn’t really have anyone like Ravan in her life, she does remember what it was like to have that person. (James used to get so hurt if Juno ever kept a secret from him. Even if it was for his benefit, he could always tell and would always get so mopey, hanging his head low and stomping around Gran’s like a kicked puppy.) Even though Eliza is back in her life now, so much time had passed since they last saw each other that it wasn’t weird for Juno to come back into her life with a girlfriend she's serious about. Or rather, it wasn’t weird for her girlfriend to find Eliza and reveal that Juno had gone soft for a little faerie from another world. (Okay, it was a little weird, but only because of the circumstances.)

“It’s fine, Lette. I was hurt, but I understand. However slow we need to go with the reveal, that’s fine by me. I’ll follow your lead.” She kisses the top of her head before she lathers some suds between her palms and massages it into her scalp, then works it down to the ends. “But I am fuckin’ offended you’ve implied that Captain fucking Juno isn’t fuckin’ dreamy all the time.” She drops her arms so they’re wrapped around Lettie and squeezes her muscles as she holds onto her. “You telling me dreamy is taking time off? I don’t fuckin’ think so. That’s a 24/7 gig, babe. You ought to know.”

She releases her (very pink and very sparkly) future wife before she has a heart attack. “Nah, we’ll never end up like them. Neither of us are jackasses.” Plain and simple. They’ve also been through the worst of Hell and, everyday, they show that they’re not trying to go back to that place. She has faith they’ll make it, that they’ll have a love for the ages. It’ll make the poets jealous and shit.

And to ensure they never end up like Barbara and Bob, both with Bs, Juno’s got to teach her future wife’s useless gay best friend how to make fucking pancakes, because the lady wants them to bond and she also wants pancakes for breakfast tomorrow. “Yeah, of—”

Juno sputters and spits out the soapy water that gets into her mouth when Lettie starts sloshing around in the tub, then squishes her cheeks. (She’s lucky she’s so damn cute.) She moves Lettie's hands down to her shoulders, rolling her eyes. “I’m the unequivocal heist queen, babe. I’m sorry.” She deflates Lettie’s cheeks. Always the cheek puffs with this one. (So cute.) “But you’ll have to wait.” Now it’s Juno turn to get red in the face. She has no reason to be nervous, of course, but this is the first real relationship she's ever been in. This is the first time she's ever been serious about someone. Caring this much is new for the rugged pirate captain. “I, uh, I kinda wanted to make that reveal special, since you made your proposal to me so special." Even set it up in the engine room, where they first agreed to start working together and, in their own roundabout way, accepted that they were in this together. "You even went through the trouble of finding out about Desdemonian customs and shit… I’d like to honor your traditions, too.” She scratches her head. “Um, what are they?”

“They don’t involve, like…” Juno rubs the back of her neck. Is there a delicate way to break the news to Lettie? Probably not. “Your friends kidnapping you and your betrothed in the middle of the night, rolling them in muck, parading them through town, then making you both drink yourself silly? ‘Cause that’s what we do on Desdemonia, night before the ceremony. Eliza said she was still drunk for hers when she married her sweetheart. I-I can ask her to not go all out or tame it if that’s too much for you.” Surprising herself, she admits, "But I would like to incorporate some of the ceremonial pieces. They don't involve getting all gross and drunk, I swear. They're just... nice. Is that alright?"
 
"We should go all out, Juju. I mean, this is us we're talking about. I can handle it!" Lettie suggests, nodding determinedly. Hell yeah, she wants to show the Desdemonians that she can hang! (To be fair, she doesn't think they've ever doubted her. But so far only Juno knows the extent this little faerie can party.) Still, she considers Eliza's wisdom, feeling a twinge of sympathy in her heart as she considers the woman's lost sweetheart, and nods thoughtfully. "...I don't want to be all drunk and hungover for our wedding, though. We could do it a few days before so we have time to recover." After this, they should have plenty of time to celebrate. They'll be free of a certain little cube's whims and their responsibilities! (If they survive this, her soul will also be freed. Since Lina, she never imagined future for herself beyond that milestone.) Her heart flutters at the prospect. 'Look at us, making plans for the future and shit.' She smiles warmly when her pirate mentions there are some traditions she wants to incorporate and caresses her cheek. (Is she feeling shy? Hehe, she's so cute.) "Of course that's alright. Anything you want, baby. This is our wedding. We make the rules!"

"So the ring's gonna be a surprise?" Lettie's eyes are bright, she can't help doing another little shimmy, unable to hold herself still. (What? She's a little faerie who loves surprises! Especially surprises involving jewelry... and a certain dreamy pirate captain.) More water sloshes over the side of the tub. She brings her hands over her mouth to cover a little squeal. "I'm so excited."

"Avangeline's traditions..." Lettie muses once she calms down, drawing her lips to the side and biting them. (A lot of the 'traditions' in Avangeline are in yikes territory.) "It depends? It's complicated. There're a lot of stingy, fucked up rules on Avangeline. A pair that wants to get married has to go to the Elders for approval first. Once it's allowed, they get this big list of dos and don'ts. Obviously, I don't want that. I already know what they'd say." She screws up her face and puts on a pompous voice to imitate those geezers, wagging her finger. "Love between faeries and humans is forbidden, young lady!"

"It's not just faeries and humans, either. Angels and demons are forbidden, too. My mother was banished from the city of angels and labeled a 'fallen angel' when she had me." Lettie shrugs, as if it hasn't been a point of contention her entire life. Onus. When she found out that she'd been sold off to the Faerie Ring, it was hard not to take it as mother ridding herself of the burden she always was. An attempt distance herself from the biggest mistake of her life. She flicks her reflection in the water. "...Their rules are stupid. If the Elders had their way, Prissy wouldn't be here right now. Neither would I." That's why her heart went out to her 'magical accident' of a cat. They're the same.

"There was this tragic old tale about the Elders making an exception for a faerie and a human hero once. But the rules they gave them were all messed up, basically setting them up for failure. They insisted that the human had to pay a price to have a faerie for a bride." Lettie winces. She always hated this story with the fiery passion of a thousand suns. Implying that faeries are prizes to be won, like trinkets, and that humans somehow aren't worthy. It's a whole mess. "Long story short, they both died in the end." And she does not want to picture herself and Juno dead right now. Not when... (It won't end that way. They won't let it.) "I always preferred the stories about faeries who ran away with their true loves, escaping to the human's side. It was a romantic alternative to the real reason most faeries disappear."

And somehow that became Lettie's life. It's ironic that escaping Avangeline, a world of magic, became Lettie's fairytale ending. (Yeah... why'd they come back here again?)

"Sorry... I didn't mean to be a downer." Lettie sighs. Juno's being sweet and considerate, asking what she wants. But it's probably for the best that her future wife hears these things from her about Avangeline before talking about it with Ravan and Ariel and anyone else, for that matter. "Our wedding is a celebration of our future. Part of that for me is being freed from all this bullshit." Suddenly, she breaks into a smile. "Do you remember when you made your vow to protect me for the first time? You held my face and kneeled..." She giggles. "My heart was racing. For a second, I totally thought you were gonna propose... and can I tell you a secret?" Lettie turns around to look at Juno. "A little voice in my head was telling me to say yes. Even back then, my heart knew a life with you would be better than anything waiting for me here. Probably because you're dreamy twenty-four seven."

"I love you." Lettie will never get tired of saying it. And no one can tell her she can't. Certainly not the Elders or anyone else on Avangeline! "There are some old fae traditions I'd like to incorporate. It's, like, a known thing on Avangeline that faeries have the best weddings 'cause we know how to party. We drink and dance for days! I'll have to teach you some of the traditional dances. If you ask, you might hear some scary rumors about faerie dances around here... but don't listen to them. They're either exaggerated or completely untrue." The most prominent one is that faerie dances bewitch humans so much that they'll dance with them until they drop dead from exhaustion. And as wild as it might sound... technically it has happened in the past? But only during certain phases of the moon and if the faeries involved have the desire to kill. Those rituals never happen by mistake. Faeries are too clever for that. Stereotypes frame them as frivolous minxes, so blinded by their pursuit for pleasure and merriment that they kill on accident... they're framed as unpredictable and dangerous for that reason. It's part of the reason why demons have been putting literal leashes on them. "They're magical dances, but they're harmless."

"Celebrations for faerie weddings traditionally last for seven days. The official ceremony is held when the sun sets on the seventh day." Lettie continues. (It used to be seven months, but modern ways have cut back on their partying time. Faeries of old were romantics, all about treasuring true love and taking their time to appreciate it. Faeries of old were also hardcore partiers. Being uninvited to a party was considered such a terrible slight that some would go as far to curse those who failed to include them.) "Everyone has to treat us like queens for the week. Faeries are insistent on giving brides the royal treatment on their wedding days." She nods sagely. No matter who comes out on top as the heist queen between them, they're both going to be queens no matter what once they're married. But it's gonna be her. She's gonna be the heist queen, just like she's the fucking faerie.

"Friends and family gather their favorite flowers at sunrise on the day of the ceremony. When they help us get ready they can stick them in our hair, make flower crowns, or incorporate them in our outfits. They can also deck us out in gifts, like jewelry and accessories." Lettie grins. She liked to daydream about this part as a little girl. Usually, that's when mothers and fathers hand down family heirlooms. Friends tend to go all out at this stage, doing everything they can to make the bride shine on her day. (...Ravan knows what to do. Lettie gave him detailed instructions when they were six and planned their future weddings. Although... it's fair to say some of her tastes have changed since she was six. Shit! She needs to make some updates!) "...I've always liked that tradition. But rest assured, I will have some rules. Nothing too strict, but I don't want us to clash."

"We spend the six days before appreciating nature, thanking the spirits, appreciating each other... partying, mostly... We can totally have our Desdemonian parade on one of those nights. I just need a head's up beforehand since there's muck involved. Gotta make sure I'm wearing the right outfit for it." Lettie purses her lips. It goes without saying that she's very serious about that part. Then she softens, nuzzling against Juno. "...What are your other traditions like, Juju? I want to know!"
 
“Okay, so fuck the elders.” Juno shrugs, not seeming to care. If she has any feelings about their apparent forbidden romance, it doesn’t show on her features. Rather, her eyes are bright, full of sparks and hope for their future together. The elders, the potential consequences of their union, don’t scare her. She's faced worse and survived. In their early days, her fight was solely about survival. Now it's about something more; it's about their future. And she knows, better than most, that just because they've made it this far doesn't mean shit. Their future has never been guaranteed. Even before they were paired together by a sentient cube with the personality of a major asshole, their survival hinged on putting up a fight. Neither of their futures were theirs. And now they're here on Avangeline to wrest that future from the fates. Well, that and to finish their actual mission of saving the worlds, but somehow that just feels like a footnote to their story. Not to say that Juno's heart still isn't in the core of the mission, but the mission has since morphed and has also become entwined with their own story. “We don’t have to listen to those old dingbats. What do they even know? Aren’t they fucking geriatric?”

Okay, maybe she should watch her tongue. There’s no telling who could be listening. Even if she feels relatively safe in this haunted castle, it’s always better to be safe than sorry these days. Still, she can't help but to poke fun at these pompous elders if only to get a smile out of her faerie, to see if she can make her sparkle like the diamond she is. Seeing her happy is her favorite look.

When Lettie admits that she not only thought that Juno was proposing to her when she made her sacred vow, but that she was prepared to say yes, red spreads across Juno's cheeks. She remembers how upset Lettie had been that Juno wasn't letting her help, how she admitted to not wanting to lose the pirate. How she demanded that Juno not do that to her. They might not have admitted their own feelings to themselves, but it seems obvious looking back. So much so that this really shouldn't come as shock. Though, rather than admit this, she collects her composure and breaks into a teasing grin instead. “You’ve been the gayest little faerie for the longest fuckin’ time. How embarrassing. What a nerd.” The homo pirate then peppers Lettie’s face in kisses before stealing her lips. When she pulls away, she lowers her voice to a husky whisper. “I love you too. Olette Lycoris Radiata, I love you. I'm in love with you and I'll shout it from the highest rooftop in all of Avangeline. You're my heart.”

For a while, she just stares into Lettie's eyes and imagines what it will be like to wake up to those eyes every day for the rest of her life; imagining what it will be like to have their little cottage somewhere in the forest that Lettie makes her bitch. Then she leans back in the tub, imagining their wedding, a blend of Desdemonia and Avangeline. Easily, the pirate can get behind these old fae traditions. Though she knew Lettie could hang, she never realized she had a cultural predisposition for it. She does have some wonderings about the traditional dances, especially if there are rumors of them being dangerous, she also has full faith that Lettie isn't playing some long con on her. Lettie's got her. "Alright, alright. So when's my first lesson?"

Though they've been talking about their wedding, building up the excitement (excitement Juno never thought she'd have for such a frivolous event), it truly dawns on her then that they are going to get married. Especially after Lettie asks about the Desdemonian traditions and gets her thinking about all the things she'd like to be included. Her wide, dimpled smile is dopey just picturing it.

“Food. Lots of food,” Juno starts, wrapping her arms lazily around Lettie's waist. (This woman is the love of her life and she gets to marry her. They're going to survive this thing.) "A huge feast with all the finest delicacies is a must. It promises a full future for the newly weds. Originally, back before everything on that shithole became reliably poisonous, the brides and their guests would participate in a hunt. The bigger the game, the more prosperous the marriage." Of course, in modern times those traditions have had to be amended. With Desdemonia practically being a dead world, food is mostly overprocessed ration chips and hot gruel. Nutritious and lifeless. Only the rich like the Duchess can afford to have their game treated in ways that make it edible. Given that, modern tradition is to save up on rations and gruel, scrounge for anything extra, and, obviously, participate in common thievery. "If it doesn't go against your traditions," as Juno knows well enough by now that the forest gets very angry when its inhabitants are harmed, "I'd like to partake or find some way to adapt that to make sure our guests are well fed. Has to be a feast worthy of queens, right?"

"As far as the ceremony goes, we'll need to get some cords and tie knots in them. There's no set number of knots we need, but each one is supposed to represent moments that have brought us together, obstacles we've overcome, and our hopes for the future." During the ceremony, they'll tell their story to their guests, using the knots to help them keep track. Some couples can get fairly raunchy or will try to otherwise make their story entertaining for the guests. It can be as fun or as boring as the couple would like. "The officiant will then link the two cords together, then we'll clasp forearms, like we're greeting each other, and they'll paint our arms with this tar-like substance. After that, the cord is wrapped around our arms and lit on fire. The tar keeps us from being burned, but it will leave a faint, temporary mark that'll mark us as newly weds. Eliza said it feels like sunburn."

"It's also tradition that our guests gift us..." Okay, somehow the pirate is embarrassed admitting this despite being presently butt-ass naked with her future wife. Despite having already had sex. "...Oils and topicals meant for arousal, 'cause the night of the wedding is important for the health of the marriage. In the olden days it was tradition for the wedding night to take place under the stars, where the goddess protects us and gives her blessing." In modern times, that tradition has also had to be modified since Desdemonian nights are when the world is most dangerous. Instead of being fully expose, they usually just make sure to consummate the marriage by an open window in a heavily warded establishment. Usually all the necromancers invited to the wedding will work together to make those wards. Though Juno doesn't think they'll have that issue, since their mission will end in success. They won't be getting married otherwise. "We don't party for seven days, but the next day it is tradition for the couple to give gifts to all the guests, 'cause they're the ones who'll support us through hard times."
 
"Okay... who hath drawn faces on the eggs?" Ravan asks, staring discerningly at the row of eggs in front of him. He picks up the one with an angry face scribbled on the shell in black magic marker. The eye has a distinctive scar scribbled through it in red. He holds it up, glancing between the egg and Juno. "I suppose this one is meant to resemble thee." He hands Juno her egg and turns to observe the rest of them. "Barbara," He points to the one with a skeleton face and a wine glass, "Ariel," The one with red headphones and a chill expression, "Lettie," The one drawn in pink marker with a cheerful face, surrounded by rainbow sparkles. "And this one... 'tis me!" The badass one with fangs. Obviously. He smiles at it.

"No, no, no. That one is meant to be the little lord. Lestat." Barbara drawls, swishing a hand back and forth. Lestat climbs out from under Juno's collar to examine it, nodding pridefully to give the egg portrait his seal of approval. Then he shrugs up at Ravan, who is visibly confused now. The only one left in the row is a... little white box? "Yours took a tragic, deadly fall. It is on the floor."

Ravan blinks and glances down to find himself standing in the yolk of his deceased egg. The marker on the broken eggshells is smudged, making it appear especially grotesque. (Like Lettie after a rough night and an even rougher brand of mascara.) Why, the horror! This is a culinary crime scene! A disgrace. His lips press flat, unimpressed, and he lifts his heel. Ropes of yolk cling to the bottom of his shoe. Gross. From across Barbara at the kitchen table, Ariel snorts and snickers from behind her magazine.

"T'was you!" Ravan points an accusatory spatula at his sister. If Barbara had eyes they'd be lighting up with mischief. She places her wine glass on the table and leans forward, delighted to have a front row seat as she watches the sibling drama unfold. "Answer me, Ariel. Did thee murder mine egg in cold blood?"

"No, detective doofus. Do I look like the kind of gal who has the time to be murdering eggs?" Ariel rolls her eyes above her magazine. "No way."

"Oh, that's good." Barbara nods, reaching into her bra for a tiny notebook. She starts scribbling notes. "The kind of gal... who has time for... murdering eggs, yes."

"It was obviously Barbara." Ariel points out cooly, gesturing to the skeleton across the table from her. Barbara is currently writing in her notebook with a magic marker... it's the same shade of pink as Lettie's egg. The bones of her fingers are also nicked with colorful marker stains. "Just look at her." Yeah, it is pretty obvious.

"Barbara..." Ravan says, heartbroken betrayal in his voice. "Geez. So quick to accuse your own sister of murder." Ariel mumbles in the background, nonchalantly flipping a page of her magazine as the drama unfolds as if this is an everyday occurrence. "Why?"

"Oh, my... the jig is up. Yes. T'was I. Barbara." Barbara sighs dramatically, throwing the notebook down on the table before leaning back draping her hand across her forehead. "I began to draw your egg, darling, and then I dropped it. It was a mistake. We can bury egg Ravan in the yard, if you like... bury him with all the others."

"No, 'tis fine." Ravan says, still sounding somewhat disheartened in spite of his words. He turns to the white box. "And what is this supposed to be? A secret ingredient?"

"Is it not obvious?" The cube blips in. Ravan shouts out in surprise, almost slipping on egg yolk. "That is my egg."

"'Tis an egg!? But it is... square." Ravan's eyes widen. This clearly unnerves him more than Barbara's cryptic whispering. Eggs should not be square. (Cubes shouldn't talk, either. But here they are.) He massages his temples, still trying to process. What kind of chicken would lay such an egg? A long-necked one, perhaps?

"Yes, it is. I just wanted to be included." The cube admits, floating down to sit next to the cube-shaped egg on the counter. (Huh. Another rough breakup with the Magistrate, maybe?) "Now let's get cooking. Captain, if you please."

"Right. Let us focus. What shall I do with this whisk?" Ravan is currently holding a spatula.

"Stars. You never would've survived in this world without me." Ariel sighs, shaking her head with sympathy, but her dark eyes are warm with nostalgia. She grins at Juno. "Our moms were all pretty busy with work when we were growing up. I used to make Ravan and Lettie breakfast all the time. I'm basically a pro now." She snickers. "They were... the entertainment. Lettie would sing and come up with these elaborate dance routines that Ravan couldn't keep up with." She shakes her head. "Nerds. Honestly, that's how I got the idea for my shop."

"I didn't know that." Ravan considers, thoughtful now. Music, flowers, cafe. Ariel keeps a strong face through it all, but he can see past it. "...We'll rebuild."

"Yeah." Ariel says breezily, as if she doesn't fully believe it, pushing back from the table. She stretches her arms over her head. "I'm gonna go check on sleeping beauty upstairs. Don't want her to miss out on all the fun." She winks and grins at Juno, posing a playful challenge. "I'm curious to eat these famous pancakes of yours. Gotta see if I've got competition." She looks at Ravan with his 'whisk' and then back to Juno. "Good luck."

"Ah! I'll be on my way, too. I've been invited to a game of poker aboard the S.S Floating Titanic. I shall be fashionably late by now, just as intended." Barbara mentions, quickly refilling her wine glass. She giggles and fans herself with her hand. "I must say, that Phillip is a snack. Ta ta, loves!" As she follows Ariel out of the kitchen, she can still be heard talking to herself. "I wonder... is it Phillip with a P or an F?"

"So..." Ravan starts awkwardly after a while, looking at all the ingredients on the counter rather than looking at the pirate captain beside him. It's quiet now... and a lot has happened since the last time they saw each other. A lot happened the last time they saw each other. "Thee hath kept thy promise. Thee hath kept her safe. Thank you. I oweth thee mine gratitude." He hesitates and then nods resolutely. First thing's first. "...How did thy relationship come to be? I mean not to overstep, but thy seemed to have conflict that night." The vampire wannabe looks over at Juno again, noticing the heart-shaped locket around her neck. He had noticed it disappeared at some point during that night... but now she has it back, this time on a string instead of a silver chain. "She must have suffered since losing her wings. She still acts her cheerful self... but how hast she been, truly?"
 
‘Deep breaths, Juju. Deep breaths.’ It takes a measure of her strength to not lash out over the inane squabbling, having to remind herself that these are not her boneheaded crewmembers, but Lettie’s friends. (And, in many ways, the only family she has left on Avangeline.) And Lettie wants her to bond with them, with Ravan in particular.

Juno pinches the bridge of her nose, counting her breaths to settle her irritation. Most of it is concentrated towards the resident bonehead before she leaves, though a layer of it might be protective. She hides it well enough, especially among strangers who don’t yet know how to read all of her tells, but her heart is suffocating inside of her chest. The fact remains that Ravan is important to Lettie and he’s already seen her at her worst, going from fawning over the faerie to turning into a block of ice in just a few short hours. For all she knows, he probably already hates her and is only entertaining this lesson for Lettie’s sake. ‘He’s probably going to—’

But he doesn’t chew her out. Left alone, with only the little lord Lestat as their witness, he thanks her. Of all things, he thanks her. Tension unknots itself from Juno’s shoulders and she chances looking over at the tall dork, releasing her grip on her nose and instead crossing her arm to hold herself.

She doesn’t answer him at first. Like Ravan, this situation isn’t exactly comfortable and she needs something to distract herself with first before she gets into it. So she starts by removing the spatula from his hand and replacing it with the wire whisk. “That’s a whisk, dumbass.” Before Ravan can protest the comment, she tosses the sack of flour towards him with ease. It hits his stomach and sends him stumbling. He almost slips in Egg Ravan (again), but she catches his shirt and helps him right himself. “Measure the flour, then use the whisk to sift it. Lestat, clean up Egg Ravan before real Ravan crack’s his skull.”

Both of them do as they’re instructed while Juno measures out some other ingredients. “The Juno’s version of how we ended up together is that she found me on the brink of death, saved me, called me an idiot, and then I asked if I could kiss her.” That basically sums up everything that happened when Lettie found her at the Rainbow Springs, though it leaves out everything else that Lettie would consider, “vital information, Juju.”

Ravan considers this, slowly whisking the flour as instructed. He stops, visibly unsatisfied. “And the Lettie’s v’rsion?”

“Well…” She grins, passing Ravan some other dry ingredients to add to the bowl of flour. He raises a brow over the addition of salt and baking soda. Juno nods, tapping his hand insistently with the spatula, explaining nothing. (She’s already got to do their story justice.) “That’s a long fuckin’ story…”

And she tells it faithfully, starting from the moment where Ravan left Lettie with Juno. She admits her guilt over everything that happened that evening, how she blamed herself for everything. For not protecting Lettie, for not believing in her in the first place. How she spent weeks working herself down to the bone trying to fix things, though never once bothered to face the faerie herself for fear of facing her wrath and rejection and also wanting to have something to prove her regret. (Juno pauses to pass him eggs to beat. Then she has to pause again to teach him how to beat eggs. This boy is a disaster, but so was she, at one point.) She tells him about Lettie's outburst, how she cried about her tiddies (Ravan snorts) and how much she was hurting not knowing where she stood with Juno. "We were idiots. We could have avoided several near death experiences had we just talked."

This leads her into explaining Dreamweaver, losing her necromancy and almost her life just for the illusion of her wings back; the moment Lettie found her and, yes, basically called her an idiot before Juno got the picture. “She said she could live without her wings, she’d find other ways to fly, but that it broke her thinking she lost me.” This fact still makes Juno blush, that she could be that important to another person.

Then there’s the crystal curse, known as the devouring, and the trials she went through to win back the cure. How she almost didn’t make it. That Lettie found her, almost entirely crystalized with a sword in her chest. Here, she shifts the opening of her button-up to show him the scar across her chest. “For helping Calytrix, I earned three wishes. But since I was basically dead, Dreamweaver and Calytrix found a loophole that allowed Lettie to use one of my wishes on my behalf, since she’s who I trusted the most and would know what I’d want—to see her happy. She brought me back and we’ve been able to actually be together since then.”

The weight of the ring in her pocket seems astronomical right now. Her fingers twitch, wanting to reach for it to show her future wife’s best friend, but then she remembers what Lettie said in the bath last night and resists. “That day on Avangeline was Hell, because I got it in my head that she was only interested ‘cause I was the only living thing around with stupidly buff muscles.” That’s part of it, but to say more might reveal Lettie’s intention to leave this world forever, her ultimate fuck you to this hellhole. It’s not her place to reveal that shit. “And she didn’t want to tell me about her feelings, ‘cause she knew I’d end up going down with her and she'd never be able to explain her situation." She points to her own wrist, indicating Lettie's scar. "Aside from finishing our mission, we’re here to break the last of her curse.”

“Thee hast…?” Ravan’s brow skyrockets into the heavens and, in his shock, he completely misses the griddle, pouring pancake batter all over Lestat. “Thee hast… Art thee implying yond h'r beshrew hast been partially broken?”

Juno stares at him blankly. She squints her eyes.

“You broke part of her curse?”

“Oh, yeah.” She shrugs, reaching for Lestat so she can help clean him up with a wet towel. Ravan stares at her, unblinking. One of the pancakes starts smoking, smelling of char. “Ack! Mine pancake!” “When I asked if I could wish for her wings back as well as break her curse, she insisted that I only use one wish on her and she chose the wish that could give her her life back. But, powerful as Calytrix is, she couldn't break it completely. What she was able to break should give us the edge we need to undo that last part, 'specially since all these faeries are agitated having heard that she blew out three fucking tiers with her stunt. Still gonna be hell, but we're a lot more powerful than we were before." Juno nods resolutely, not wanting to leave any room for doubt. Mostly, this is for her own benefit. "Anyway, the last wish..." She removes her necklace, sliding the locket to the side to show Ravan the pendant. “Is for our future.”

He looks between the pink cottage and Juno a few times as if trying to imagine Captain fucking Juno living in a pink cottage. Juno ignores this and continues, “She's doing fine, really. She’s found other ways to fly.” Her grin turns mischievous, conveniently and purposefully neglecting to mention her phantom wings. Mostly because she guesses that Lettie might want to do a dramatic grand reveal so that she can witness Ravan and Ariel's jaws drop. “I know I was a dick that night, but she’s my entire world. I almost lost her once. Never again. I can promise you she's in good hands. We've got each other."
 
The dream starts innocently enough.

They're playing in a moonlit lake framed by dandelions, tall grass and lily pads. Lettie gets caught up admiring the way the silver light and reflections of the water cast shape across Juno's skin like paint on the most beautiful canvas as she breaks through the surface and runs a hand back through her hair. Her stormy eyes sparkle and her muscles are all aglow like she's something heavenly, like a goddess. Damn, that body. Those eyes. (Captain Juno is a walking legend. Her greatest strength and greatest weakness all wrapped into one. And she's all hers, her future wife. How could one little faerie be so lucky?) As if Juno can read her thoughts, she smirks that ridiculously attractive smirk when she catches the faerie staring. She splashes water at her, breaking her from the spell. Never one to back down from a challenge, Lettie laughs and puts her entire weight into splashes back. On might think her size is a disadvantage, but she holds her own! Her new phantom wings cut through the water with ease compared to... to... her wings flicker, as if they're unsure of themselves, and she shakes the thought away just in time to dodge another splash.

At a certain point, Lettie tactically glamours herself into a sexier swimsuit to give herself an advantage in the game. When she tackles Juno, her pirate ends up wrapping her arms around her, holding her still against her chest. Holding her like she doesn't want to let go of her. Her breathing calms naturally as she listens to the rhythm of her heartbeat... wondering if this is part of their game, she purses her lips and peeks up at her. But Juno just looks down at her with the warm gaze she's come to know and love and kisses her. The pad of her thumb brushes over her freckles, igniting a path of constellations in her wake. No, this isn't a game anymore. It's just them and the moonlight and she's got her.

Lettie sighs softly into Juno's mouth, her hands traveling up her arms before she drapes them around her shoulders. They're holding each other now, but she can feel these moments slipping through her fingers with the passage of time. She tries to stop it in her mind, to hold on as tight as she can, but the sand in the hourglass keeps falling all around them. She's put off this conversation for long enough.

"I don't wanna lose you." Lettie whispers against her neck. "And I know you don't want to lose me. But Juno, when the time comes..."

Is it an insult, asking Juno to let go when she knows damn well she wouldn't want to either if their positions were reversed? ...Still. Dragging Juno down with her would be too selfish. Lina wouldn't have wanted her to jump into the Reaper's abyss after her. Living on was hell afterwards. Sometimes Lettie fantasized about throwing herself in after her on her darkest nights, because it sounded easier to end everything then and there then grieve. But had she died with Lina that night, she wouldn't have gone on to be the person she is now. She wouldn't have met Juno. And she wouldn't be carrying Lina's memory with her now. There's still life to be lived, there's still a future that's out there waiting for her. Peace and softness that Juno deserves to experience after the life she's lived.

Lettie knows the dark place Juno went to after she lost James all too well. She knows because she's been there herself. It'll hurt like hell at first... and it's gonna break her heart to hurt her like that. But it'll get better. And hopefully someday she'll find it in her heart to forgive her.

A golden light flashes over the lake. A chain appears around her ankle in the water and yanks her down, down, down. When Juno reaches out for her, she reaches back. (They were making plans. They were going to fight. She can't act like it's already over.) Their fingertips brush, but she slips beyond her reach. As she's pulled further from Juno and the silver light behind her, her entire world darkens.

Lettie coughs and sputters when she ends up falling into a dim, musty place. A crisp wind sifts through thorny bushes and sends a shiver down her spine. Juno is nowhere to be seen now. Chains scrape the ground. There's the echo of a scream, a broken sob that grates against her heart. She knows this place.

"There she is. Our pretty little star at long last. I've finally found you, Olette. I don't know how you broke our special connection... but as you can see, I have other ways of getting to you. You can't hide from me forever." Asmodeus grins down at her with pointed teeth. The stars on the tiles around her light up one by one, casting a light down on him... and behind him, a golden cage stuffed with horrified faeries, dangling over the Reaper's pit. "You've traveled all across the worlds, but I've always been close by. I've seen into all of your worst nightmares." He snaps his spindly fingers and the cage drops a couple of inches. The faeries inside scream and hold each other.

"No!" Lettie jerks forward, but the chains around her are too heavy. She squints, her gut sinking when she realizes the youngest among them must be no older than eight. Another is the spitting image of... Lina. She recognizes the blonde from the bar among them, too. Dread and guilt weigh her down heavier than the chains. The warning wasn't enough. That faerie is caught up in this mess because of her. All of them. Her breaths become shallow as she fights harder against the chains. She tries to glitch through them, but of course it does nothing. She screams out in frustration.

"Now, now. I have a proposition for you." Asmodeus inspects the gold on the side of the cage, brushing dust from the edges, and then spins to face her. He glides closer. (Her hands elongate to claws at her sides, screeching against the tiles as she folds them into fists. If he touches her or any of those faeries, she's going to tear his fucking face off.) "Turn yourself in and I'll let them go. Twelve faeries for the price of one! It's quite the bargain, wouldn't you say?"

Lettie glares up at him with hate, her blood rushing in her ears.

"You are not to bring your human with you." Asmodeus continues with clear disdain in his tone. "...If you do, there will be consequences. You know I won't hesitate." He snaps again, sending the cage plummeting another couple of inches. "I don't want to die. I'm scared." The smallest faerie is sobbing now, each teardrop and hitch of her breath tearing Lettie's heart in two. "Besides, you don't want to drag her into this... do you? Is that not what you were just angsting over?" He grins. She glowers. Ugh that absolute stalker, watching them like the creep he is. (It's violating. What else has he seen?) "Your love was not meant to last."

"You don't know the first thing about us!" Lettie bites out, her teeth sharpening. Their connection is so much stronger than he thinks. That's why the cube paired them in the first place, isn't it? Together, they create magic capable of raising goddesses from the dead, of bringing entire worlds back to life. If that's not meant to last, she doesn't know what is. "Fine. If that's what you want, I'll come down there myself and kick your ass!"

"You're so cute when you're angry." Asmodeus taunts. He's not taking her seriously. He's never taken her seriously. (That'll be his first and last mistake.) Then he snaps again, sending the cage deeper, and Lettie goes silent. "I'll give you three days. At midnight on the third day, the blood of these faeries will stain your hands. I know you better than anyone, Olette. You do the most irrational things when you're emotional. That's what killed your mother." Flaming roses fall from the sky around him. They hit the ground, flooding the area, the fire spreading hungrily towards her. "...I'm being merciful, giving you time to think. Try to calm down and choose wisely. You know what must be done."

***​

"...Lettie, wake up. Wake up!" Ariel is shaking her by the shoulders. Lettie lurches with a gasp, like she's resurfacing from a pool of water, and the fallen angel folds her into a hug. "Geez. Are you trying to give me another heart attack?" She pulls away, looking her up and down. She brushes her bangs away from her forehead. "You're burning up. You... you stopped breathing for a second there, too. Are you feeling okay?"

The faerie blinks slowly. At first, she can only find the strength to shake her head. She's stopped pretending everything's okay when it's not. Her voice is small and quiet, it's tight with the sob she's holding back. "No..." The sob breaks through and Ariel pulls her in, rubbing consoling circles on her back. "I'm not."

Lettie knows one thing. It's that Asmodeus expects her to keep quiet. To act like everything is normal, to put up a front with Juno and pull some self-sacrificing bullshit the second she looks the other way. He expects her to play right into his hands. In the past, she might have done just that. He said he knows her... but not anymore. Determination burns behind her tears. It's time to start subverting his expectations.

***​

The conversation in the kitchen lapses into silence when Juno and Ravan see the horror-stricken expression on Lettie's face. They sit around the table and she tells them everything. About Asmodeus invading her dream-- how she could feel that it was real. She can hardly keep herself from sobbing again when she talks about the faeries in the cage above the Reaper's pit-- the blonde she recognized from the bar and the literal child at risk. And then she goes into the deal he offered her, the strict conditions that he set. The insistence that she come alone... or else.

"I have to go alone." Lettie says, shaking her head. "There's no other way to save them."

"Juno, we need to be smart about this. That bastard's underestimating me again... and he clearly doesn't know shit about our connection." Lettie reaches out to her as Ariel and Ravan desperately try to convince her that it's a trap. (...Yeah. She already knows that. And she's got a whole lot more in mind than she lets on. She hates that she can't keep them in the loop as well, but their reactions should make this scheme appear all the more authentic.) If Asmodeus is listening in on her somehow, he won't be able to access this secret conversation between them. Only what he can hear. They can be smart about that. They can use that. "If he wants me in exchange for all those faeries, that means he wants me alive. At least for now." She knows that Juno won't like this. She doesn't like it, either... but what other choice do they have? "We have three days to plan. I can put on a show, pretend to take his bait. Make him think he's won, make him comfortable... then I'll give you the signal when I know the other faeries are okay. After that we bring the stars and hell itself. Break my curse for good." She bites her lip. Even though she's determined to see this through, she still wants to hear Juno's input on what might be the best for them going forward. "What do you think?"
 
Rage pools in the pit of Juno’s stomach, boiling and spreading through her until it's warped her heart, until everything in her veins is molten. Red smears across her vision. Her hands crush her kneecaps under the table, tense. She wouldn’t be surprised if there was steam rolling off her body in waves. Even through Lettie’s message to her, she can’t help the wrath threatening to break her open like a volcano on the verge of eruption.

The weight of the ring in her pocket is leaden against her thigh.

Pancakes sit piled high in the middle of the table. No one has touched them. The smell is sickening, clawing against all of Juno’s nerves, too sweet for this bitter moment. Her gray eyes bore holes into the table. Ravan and Ariel are trying to persuade Lettie, but don’t they know who they’re talking to?

A muscle flexes in her jaw. Hot tears well in her eyes and she sniffs to hold them back, to keep them from falling. She crushes her eyes closed and they fall anyway, but Juno can’t be assed to care. Not when her entire world might be snuffed out. She’s not breathing right anymore and before Ariel and Ravan can see anymore of this, she stands up abruptly, pushing her chair back so hard that it topples over. The noise shuts up the siblings, both of them snapping to look at the pirate. She doesn’t regard them. “I need air.”

It’s all she can choke out before she leaves. The second she moves away from the table, Captain fucking Juno comes undone, all the loose threads pulled until she’s unraveled. Her shoulders shake with the force of earthquakes, hot messy tears cascade down her cheeks like waterfalls. She can’t do this.

But she’s not a quitter. She has to.

And of course she’s not angry with Lettie. And of course she knows they’ll figure this out, just like they’ve figured everything else out. But right now, this is too much and the pirate needs her space. (At least, she needs to be away from Ravan and Ariel.) Flash memories speed across the back of her eyelids, reminding her of the Guardian of Light, reminding her that she almost did not make it. Who is to say that this Asmodeus does not have the equivalent strength of three or three hundred Guardians of Light? Are they tough enough? With their faerie wish, goddess blessings, and demon sword, is it enough?

All Juno knows is that she will go down fighting, if that’s how this has to end. It’d go against all of Lettie’s wishes, but what’s the point of experiencing that soft life if there is not her faerie there to enjoy it with? (Could she do that to Eliza again? Right now, she thinks so.)

The pirate slumps down onto the deck of her ship, having somehow found her way back to Lady Vengeance. It’s light out in Avangeline, but the storm clouds in her mind couldn't be any darker. “You can’t ask me to be okay with this, Lette.” She finally answers the faerie. Tears are still pouring down her face and her heart is still strangled, but she has enough strength to say that. (She needs to hit something. Preferably Asmodeus’s face.) “And I know that’s not what you’re asking, not really. But I just… I almost lost you once. We almost lost each other once. I can’t lose you. Not when I’ve just got you.”

Maybe Gran’s foresight was right. For the briefest moment, she thought that she might have escaped that fate. She thought that maybe the cube had changed the course of her life for the better, but foresight is foresight. Everything Juno touches will burst into flame and she will always and forever be left alone.

Juno pulls herself up, pacing the deck. She can’t be still. Her hands flex, then unflex. “This is too fucking risky.” But she knows she doesn’t have to tell Lettie that. Lettie’s a fucking genius and she knows exactly what it means to walk into this trap. A million little things could go wrong.

And maybe she should focus on the one thing that could go right, because there’s a kid in that cage. Because Crissy is in that cage. Because there are fucking people in that cage. She fucking hates fighting, but Desdemonia made her this way. No one lives to be as old as she is without paying for it with their teeth. If this is her last fight, then she'll go out blazing. (Maybe that's what Gran's foresight meant?)

She scales up the mast to the crow’s nest and when she’s there, she sticks her legs through the slats, letting them dangle. (She ought to save her fists for the assholes, she supposes. No point in accidentally injuring herself before the real fight even begins.) Clouds with tints of periwinkle and lilac mosey their way through this group of secluded islands. She crosses her arms over the rim of the crow's nest, then rests her chin on top, watching. Birds chase each other. Bugs flit past her. It’s peaceful, like Avangeline doesn’t know at least one person on its sparkly pastel world is burning with as much fire as there are stars in the sky.

“If we do this, you can’t ask me to let go. If you’re making this choice, then let me make mine.” Though she supposes it’s unfair to say that Lettie is making a choice when she’s been backed into a corner. Even so, her mind is made and her… (Can she still say future wife? Is that too hopeful? Will that jinx it like it always does?) Her faerie knows how the pirate is: Stubborn as all hell.

They knew what they were getting into when they came back to Avangeline. They knew there was little choice if they wanted to finish their mission. None of this should be surprising. They’re watching dominoes fall. It doesn’t make reality any easier to swallow, but she knows it’s true and it’s always been true. It only hits as hard as it does because the possibility of the end is real and knocking at their door.

“I don’t fucking trust that asshole to keep his word and we can’t leave those faeries wondering for three days. That’s putting them through agony.” They need to be smart, but they also can’t fuck around with people’s lives. Who’s to say that asshole won’t just drop those faeries into the Reaper’s maw now that he’s got Lettie on a hook? “We’ve no proof they’re even still alive. And we don’t know what’s going to happen once you’re within his reach.” He could curse her again. It only takes a snap. She’s seen it. “No. Fuck that. You’ve tricked people before with your blood glamours. I’ve still got some vials from the last time we were here. Could that work?”

There’s also Ravan and Ariel to consider. Lettie seems to rightfully surround herself with people who would move mountains for her and Juno doesn’t think for a second that they’re going to back out of this fight just because the faerie's insistent that they stay out of this. They might pretend, but they’ll work a scheme of their own. Ravan’s stunt last time proves that.

“Whether you like it or not, Ravan and Ariel are going to try something. They might even ask me if I’ve got a plan. You’ve got to fucking accept that. For those who know you, you’re too precious to be left to fend for yourself. They’re involved, whether you like it or not.” Her words are stern, hardened by what she knows. She doesn't say these things to be harsh. She says them because they're true and Lettie seems to be the only one in the worlds who doesn't get this. She needs to stop pretending that she can protect the people she loves by leaving them out. “Quite frankly, I could use the fucking help. The Guardian of Light almost took me out, Lette, and she only had one fucking faerie at her disposal. How many could Asmodeus have?"

A rebellion brews in the Forbidden Forest, started by Lettie's flames. Juno's sure that if she went there, alone, without Lettie, that she could probably recruit some. For all that they have accomplished in their mission, if Lettie is serious about bringing all of hell and the stars to Avangeline, she needs to accept that they are still only two people. More than that, going against the estate is going to take more than just a sheer force of will, especially if Angelus shows his stupid changeling face. "I’m not trying to involve more people than we have to, but we have to be fucking smart. We’re not alone anymore. It’s not just us against the worlds. We've got each other and there are others who've got us.”

They can’t take any fucking risks. Not if they’re going to be wives someday.
 
Asmodeus is watching her. Lettie makes herself scarce, stealing one of Juno's hoodies and disappearing into the woods beyond the haunted castle. When she feels she's gone far enough, she perches on a rock coated in a plush carpet of moss and buries her face into the soft black fabric. It smells like Juno. (The only thing that's missing is Juno herself.) She sniffles and tugs it on over her head to wear when the wind picks up around her, wrapping her arms in the oversized sleeves around herself. Storm clouds gray as Juno's eyes are rolling in over the clear blue skies. To anyone watching, she's isolated and afraid. Just like Asmodeus wants... but not really. In her heart, all she wants is to seek the solace she sorely needs in her pirate's arms. But this is all part of what it means to play it smart. They have to make that bastard comfortable. Comfortable and careless and less likely to breathe down her fucking neck.

It clicks that he can't track Juno the same way. First of all, they've never even met. Asmodeus was probably only able to reach Lettie now because he still owns her soul. If he had the means to find anyone he wanted at the snap of his fingers, he would've found Ravan and Ariel and brought them in for questioning by now. This is why performing is her form of survival, isn't it? Someone's always got their eyes on her. The face she has to show the world always differs from the one she wears inside.

Even so, Juno managed to find the real her. With her and her alone, Lettie's determined to be the real her to the bitter end.

...Granted, the tears and the fear are both real.

"The Reaper lives beyond an old looking glass in this underground bunker. It's completely shut off from faerie sources. The longer we stay there, the weaker we get. I..." Lettie's toes clench, her stomach turns over. The memories cut through her mind like a sharp knife, leaving her bleeding and tattered. But she has to go back to that place, in her mind and in real life. She has to prepare Juno if she's going to go there, too. "Lina and I were kept in cells for a while after we got caught trying to rig the system. It must've been two nights, maybe three. It made me really sick and weak... I was almost completely deprived of my source when they sacrificed her. Asmodeus wrapped me in those magicked chains for good measure. They did everything they could to make sure I couldn't try anything." Bastards. "Any faeries trapped down there are going to be exhausted... practically powerless. If he tries, he won't be able to wring much power out of them."

There are both pros and cons to this. He likely won't waste the faeries trapped down there as fuel during a fight-- there'll be no point to it. However, it also means that just by going down there she's putting her own health at risk. Time will be of the essence, the first few minutes the most crucial. Lettie will only be able to do so much damage before she's spent.

"You know I've been really careful about conserving my magic these days. I also have the blood, like you said, and the goddess's gift. That dress is filled with energy from the stars. It should give me an extra boost." Lettie tries to reassure Juno before this information can discourage her. "...And I have you. I know I've got you to the end." It's her acceptance of Juno's choice. She has to accept it when she puts it like that. Her lower lip trembles. To the end, if it comes to it. Even if it breaks her heart into thousands of pieces to think about. It's Juno's choice and she has to respect it. "Juno, I won't ask Thistle and the other faeries to go down there with me. We can find ways for them to help us from the outside... but that place is way too dangerous for them. I won't sugarcoat it. They'll be fodder if they go down there. I've... I've seen too many faeries die to let that happen." However, she knows where Juno's coming from. "If they know demons or angels who want to fight for our cause, we can recruit them instead. I'll... I'll let Ravan and Ariel help, too. You can tell them what's going on."

Lettie almost breaks down all over again at the thought. Having all these people she loves in such close proximity to the Reaper who took Lina away from her... to the demon who orchestrated her mother's death... she can't let them win this time. She can't. It pushes her to tell Juno everything she knows.

"I think faeries get so weak down there because the Reaper feeds on our sources. When it eats us, it absorbs our magic and our souls completely. Demons like Asmodeus say it fuels Avangeline... but honestly, that might be a self-righteous excuse they're using to justify their crimes. Maybe they're making the Reaper strong for some other reason." Lettie admits. It could be related to that machine they're building, if it needs faerie magic to sustain it. Asmodeus comes first, though. They'll... they'll have to deal with the Reaper later, if it really comes down to that. "I dunno. The good news is we won't have to worry about fighting it. At least not now. It was sealed away ages ago. There's this ring of glyphs surrounding the abyss it lives in, trapping it inside. It's possible to go inside the abyss, of course... but there's no coming back out once you go beyond those glyphs. Seriously. If you fall in there it's all over. Don't go near it under any circumstances." She pauses. "You know me. I might pull some tricks to free those faeries. They might be hanging directly above the abyss like they were in my nightmare. Whatever happens, you have to remember that I have the wings that you gave me. You don't have to let go... but don't you dare go jumping into the abyss after a fake Lettie."

However, Lettie's confident that Juno knows how to determine the real Lettie from the fakes by now. Naturally, she'll also warn her. No stupid, impulsive mistakes. They can't afford them.

"I've thought of a way the other faeries can help. I have my voice back thanks to you, Juno. If I go back down there, he might take it from me again. I don't know if I can prevent that from happening. But..." Lettie wraps her hands around her throat. "I think I should stream what I'm doing down there. Use my voice for as long as I still have it." Realizing Juno may not know exactly what that means, she clarifies. "Maybe one of the cubes could film a live video of it. If the faeries hack the screens in the city, we could show everyone what's going on. Expose everything Asmodeus doesn't want them knowing. If they see the truth for themselves, we might be able to rally more people to our side. We'll get everyone in Avangeline involved." ...If anything, Lettie knows that mother's got some hardcore fans who will investigate any hint they can find in regards to her whereabouts. "Can you visit them and ask if they could do that?"

Asking for help... it's like Juno said. Lettie has to involve others if they're going to make it. And now that she's started brainstorming, she's on a roll.

"Oh... and one more thing. You should ask the cube what it can do for us, too. We've gone over and beyond for that little bastard. If it wants us to finish our mission, it's gotta help us out." Lettie catches herself gnawing on her knuckles and spits them out. "I know it has a cool-down period for teleports... but if I distract Asmodeus for long enough, maybe it can teleport Crissy and the other faeries to safety before they get caught up in the crossfire." She almost shrugs and stops herself short. Asmodeus might start to suspect something if she starts gesturing out of nowhere. "Remember-- we've got the skellie crew on our side this time, too."

"I've fought like hell to get my life back, Juno. I might be going down there, but I'm not giving up on myself, or on us." Lettie vows, wrapping her arms tighter around herself. Imagining that Juno's right there with her. "I might start acting like it to fool Asmodeus... I think he gets off on it. He's an arrogant bastard and I'm gonna use that against him. Just know it won't be over till it's over. We're bringing the stars and hell, right?" She pauses. "...Geez. All this bullshit before breakfast. I saw you made pancakes." Fuck Asmodeus for ruining pancakes! She pictures the sweet-smelling breakfast, a confession of love without words, untouched and growing cold on the kitchen table, and blinks tears from her eyes. "I love you, Juno. I'm sorry we got caught up in this mess after we made all those plans yesterday. I-- I feel like I jinxed everything."
 
Fodder. That is a word Juno understands most intimately. It’s all she needs to hear to persuade her to prevent Thistle’s rebellion from crumbling on a whim. It’s not just Lettie and herself who need to be smart. Everyone on their side has to be. Juno is no stranger to tragedy. The risks they take in the coming days may not be without consequence. Whoever they manage to recruit, might not make it to see the light on the other side. Everyone needs to know the risk before they take the plunge. Juno has enough blood on her hands as it is and though her service to the worlds might fool some into overlooking her past deeds, Juno will never let herself forget the lives she’s taken to save her own. It’s not the sick need to punish herself. It’s the need to remind herself to do better, to accept she cannot undo her past, but she can carve a different future. Lettie’s given her that chance. That bastard cube has too, in they’re own fucked up way. She won’t spit on the rare opportunity the goddess has given to her.

“Hey now.” Juno scolds Lettie in that soft, yet firm way she has come to develop over their year or so together. (Has it been that long? Or longer? She honestly has no idea. Time has been so warped for them that she isn’t even sure how old she is anymore, not that she really ever had that clarity.) “Knock it off with that crap. That’s bullshit, Lette. You didn’t jinx anything.” As she tries to quiet that nasty voice in Lettie’s head, she scales down from the crow’s nest. She’s had her cry. Now it’s time to get down to business. “I’ve known your hand since that last world we healed, remember? You found a way to show me even before you had your voice back. And when you proposed, I said yes. I was saying yes to all of that, too. As much as I hate all of this, looking towards our future gives me hope. We didn’t jinx anything last night, we just reminded ourselves of what we’re fighting for. It’s why this hurts so much.”

Geez, Juno never thought of herself as one for pep talks, but that’s Lettie’s effect on her. One of many. She hops down from the mast and makes her way below deck, recalling that there’s a (banned) game of poker somewhere aboard her ship and once she finds it, she’s likely to find Abigail and, therefore, the cube. “I can ask the little bastard for help, but we have to be careful about involving them.” And not because they’re chaotic and only halfway reliable. Bastards on Avangeline, bastards who could be connected to Asmodeus, have been trying to get their claws on these magic cores. Asking even one of the cubes to go into the Reaper’s pit could be more dangerous than it’s worth. “There’s still angler fish to consider.” At this point, she does know Angelus’s name (if that is his real name) and she uses this version to lighten the mood. “Sorry. I probably shouldn’t try to make you smile right now, right? I just hate imagining you all sad and alone.”

Juno finds the skeletons all gathered in the back of the storeroom. Fred’s dealing, so she knows this game is dirty, but that’s not important right now. When she finds Abigail, she puts her hand on her shoulder and asks the skeleton to come with her. “But, cap’m, it’s the middle of the tea party!”

“Abigail.” Juno reaches for one of her hands, clasping it with both of hers. “I need you to be serious right now. Miss Lettie is in trouble.”

This stops the entire game of poker. Phillip rises immediately, signaling his want to help and Juno signals for him to sit down for the time being. (Barbara with a B is the only one who doesn’t see why this is such a big deal. Marjorie tells her to stuff it. Phillip’s eye sockets glare at her.) If Abigail’s bones could pale, she’d be whiter than a ghost. She nods her skull and follows Juno to the study.

Juno lets Abigail sit behind the desk, because she knows the space cadet likes to feel responsible, then takes the seat across from her. (They finally have more than one chair, thanks to that party Lettie threw. Fuck. How was that only days ago?) “I know the Maestro is with you and we need their help. If the little bastard wants to restore the worlds, they need to help us. And I know that creep keeps tabs on me and Lette, so they ought to know what’s going on.”

“Cap’m, I’m scared.” Her skeleton shivers. “You’re scaring me.”

“I’m scared, too. But this is what we’re dealing with and just like with everything else, we’re gonna figure this out. Crying isn’t gonna get shit done. You can cry a little bit, but I need your head in the game.” Juno used to hate this bonehead, but Lettie’s made her soft and softened her to all her constructs. They’re part of her, she realizes. The crew is the family she created when she was alone, whether she realized it or not back then. “Do you have the cube?”

Abigail barely nods before the cube blips from her skull onto the desk. They tilt their cube, balancing on an edge like they’re looking up at Juno. The Magistrate comes in a second later, followed by Melvin (currently in the box of shame). “Captain, what you’re asking is dangerous. The Reaper is the enemy here.”

“And what choice do we have, genius?” Juno lifts her brow, crossing her arms. “Don’t fucking treat us as expendable, either. We’ve taken so much shit from all of you and you can’t afford to start over.”

“She’s right,” the Magistrate agrees, somewhat surprising Juno. Then again, this cube seems to understand there is more to this mission than statistically significant chances of success or failure. Either that or she’s choosing their side because she’s still mad at the Maestro for some inane reason. Juno won’t complain. It’s working in their favor. “The worlds will crumble if we do not assist. They are our only hope now.”

With the Magistrate throwing her weight into the argument, the Maestro relents and Juno explains the plan they’ve been workshopping. The Magistrate volunteers to come up with some “sickening armor” for Juno and the others who decide to join the cause. Melvin is given the task of recording the event. (This cube’s especially chaotic nature makes it more resistant to tampering, unlike the Matrix whose operating system made them vulnerable to tampering. So if they are caught, they'll have time before anything can be done with Melvin.) The original asshole agrees to teleport the caged faeries to Thistle's hideaway in the Forbidden Forest on Lettie's signal. Juno then entrusts Abigail to find Thistle's hideaway and ask if those faeries will help spread the word to their demon and angel allies. She also tells her to ask them for help hacking into Avangeline's broadcast networks. Abigail, fretting that she won’t remember everything, asks if Marjorie can join, so the two skeletons go off on Abigail’s cloud counter.

The only ones they need to get in the loop are Ravan and Ariel, but Juno suspects that too much time apart might look suspicious, so she has Edward find Lestat to find the siblings. With everyone off on their separate assignments, Juno paces through the study, wrestling to tie her white scarf around her wrist with a combination of her teeth and fingers. “Everyone’s on board, Lette. The Magistrate is taking care of the armory. QB will get the caged faeries when the time is right. Melvin will record. Haven’t confirmed anything with Thistle’s group, but Abigail and Marjorie are on it. I’ve also sent Edward to find Lestat and the others.” She runs her hand through her hair, looking out the study window towards the woods. She knows where her faerie goes to find comfort.

Though they can’t account for everything, she feels better knowing they’re doing everything they can to fight back. Olette Lycoris Radiata is a fighter and she’s going to be the one who brings all of hell and the stars to Avangeline. Yeah, Juno's helping, but a lot of this possible because of her. It’s lucky they have Titania’s fans on their side, but Lettie’s got her own crowd there specifically for her. She’s got the charisma to lead this and Juno will follow her anywhere, except for into the Reaper’s pit.

“Should I come find you? Really sell this to that asshole?” Selfishly, she just wants to see her, to hold her one last time before they walk into the great dark unknown. But she knows there are more important things in the worlds than acting on her whims. They can't afford to fuck up. And, if all goes well, she'll have a lifetime to hold her faerie and never let go. “You should push me away. Say whatever you need, I know what’s real. You love me and I, you.”
 
"Juju..." Lettie sniffles, touched. She presses her hands over her cheeks to keep herself focused, and then finishes styling her hair. Yes, styling her hair! Rest assured, this little faerie hasn't forgotten her priorities. Far from it. Dolling herself up might look different on the surface level-- but for her, it's the equivalent of a knight donning their armor for an upcoming battle. When Juno went quiet to strategize with the skellies, she returned to their room in the haunted castle to attend to some things. She hurriedly wrote letters to her loved ones. Not only did she want to ensure her whole story was on paper so it isn't lost forever, she also needed to tell Ravan everything she wished she could have told him in person if they had more time. That she was going to get married. No, scratch that. That she is going to get married... if things work out by some absolute miracle.

Then she changed into the goddess's starry dress. (She's glamoured it into a simpler form to avoid drawing suspicion. The grand reveal will come later... she has to time it right. When she really needs it.) Now she's weaving enchanted flowers from the woods into her loose braid. She can imagine mother standing behind her, the way she used to when she did her hair. (Phillip also left a pink box filled with little bones by the door and she took the hint right away. She can strategically wear them in her hair as well and scatter them around so Juno can use them during the fight. Her skellie bestie is so damned smart. She wishes she could give him a hug.) She wishes she could give everyone a hug... Juno most of all.

Lettie might hesitate, but she doesn't have to ask Juno if she's sure about this. She's sure. Seeing each other just to make their last 'words' nasty and cruel... if something should happen to her, she wouldn't want Juno to feel the way she had felt parting with Eliza. But she's assuring her it won't be like that. They can share their last words in another way and she'll know how to distinguish what's real. Juno just wants to see her. Lettie wants to see Juno, too. More than anything.

"I'm back in our room... the one in the castle. Getting ready at the vanity." Lettie looks at her reflection, tilting her head left and right before deeming her braid acceptable. Usually she enjoys the process of getting all dressed up. Today, she resents it hotly. She'd rather be spending time with Juno, Ravan and Ariel. Eating their pancake breakfast as intended. Getting into shenanigans with the best friends she's been apart from for far too long... finally telling them everything she wishes she could've told them ages ago. About Lina and everything she knows about her mother's disappearance. The fact that she's... gone. But as long as that bastard owns her soul, she'll have no rest. That's abundantly clear. Calytrix says killing him is the only way to break her curse completely. If she gets her chance, she won't hesitate for a second.

"You can come find me. I have to warn you, I look so sexy right now that you might lose your resolve. Be strong." Lettie tries to be light about it, relying on the little faerie antics Juno knows so well. "If you need ideas, you can call me a shallow, fake bitch..." She balls her hands in her lap, unable to help herself from recalling the moment Juno's locked struck the floor at her feet and broke. This time will be different, though. It's performance. They've got to sell it to Asmodeus, who has no doubt been made aware of how their last visit went down. (He's always been way too nosy about her relationships. All along, Lettie had a feeling he was just waiting for Lina to slip up so he had an excuse to...) "I can handle it. I know what's real, too. If you want to take it further, you can accuse me of getting all dressed up for that bastard. He won't think twice about what I'm actually doing if we stroke his massive fucking ego."

Lettie glares at her reflection, raising her chin defiantly. Thinking about Asmodeus, how much he deserves a punch right to the face... how much he deserves to be set on fire... it does fuel her with a fiery, burning passion to get revenge. She's done being his little doll. His faerie puppet on golden strings. This bastard stalked her as a girl, tricked her mother into selling her soul away when she was wasted, and controlled every second of her life since then. That sicko deserves to die the worst kind of death for what he's done to her... to her and to countless others.

"Little does he know this killer outfit's gonna be his demise." Lettie tries to bolster herself with confidence like she used to, reaching for one of her favorite shades of lipstick. The cherry one-- Juno knows how it tastes. (Damn, she wishes she could cover her in lipstick stains before...) "I always knew fashion would save my life one day." She purses her lips and applies the color. It does look stunning on her. Very nice. "The goddess's dress will keep me connected to my source. I'm also wearing some bone shards in my hair, courtesy of Phillip. I've got the knife you gave me in my bra, too." The temporary weapon she made with a bone shard, as per Desdemonia's tradition when they got engaged. She pauses. "Is there anything else you think I'll need going into this?"

Lettie glances back at the bed. "Once I've left, Juno, there's a pink box on the bed. I wrote letters to everyone. Can you deliver them for me? Make sure Ravan gets his before the mission starts. I told him everything..." She looks down at her pen-smeared hand. They never did get to exchange rings. "This isn't exactly going according to plan... but what else is new? You can tell him we're planning on getting married, if it comes up. I think he'll understand. I want him to know that I love you and that I'm serious about us." Because... they are getting married. She has to dare to hope, if only just a little. That hope's gonna be her secret weapon. (And it wouldn't exist without Juno, and her words to her just then...) "I didn't write a letter for you... 'cause you already know how I feel better than anyone else in the worlds. I didn't forget you, though! There's a present with your name on it hiding somewhere in the room. If you're the true heist queen, you'll be able to find it."

The present is a pair of repaired goggles, filled with entries on the demon they'll be up against... and also, the ring of the skeleton hands forming a heart. Yeah, it's the corniest one... she just hopes it'll get one more smile out of Juno before all hell breaks loose.
 
Damn. Juno doesn’t want to be a heartbreaker when Lettie looks so damn fine. When she stepped into their room, she'd been running her fingers through her hair, mentally preparing herself for this staged blow out, no part of her wanting to say those things to Lettie, not again, and every part of her knowing that it’s necessary for the performance. Her brittle resolve only crumbled when she looked up, eyes landing on her future. (Full stop. Lettie is her future.) There’s face of an angel beautiful and then there’s Lettie, who shines brighter than goddamn sun. All the stars in the sky couldn't compete with her. ‘Hot damn.’ For a second, she swears that she’s the one with butterflies in her chest. Her knees jelly and she has to form fists to keep from collapsing.

Lettie warned her and Juno’s heart still isn’t prepared. (It never is.)

She needs to be stronger than her impulses. That seems impossible when she can so clearly see the path to scooping her up faerie and flinging her onto the mattress. (Wouldn’t that be nice? She promises herself that after they’ve survived this, because she can’t let herself believe that they won’t, she will pin Lettie down, tease every sweet noise from her red lips, then she’ll get onto her knees and worship her like the goddess she is.) The pirate steels her resolve and raps her knuckles against the doorframe to announce her entrance.

Her eyes are still red rimmed and swollen from her breakdown earlier. Seeing Lettie again only brings those same tears back, which she supposes is a good thing. “Lette.”

It had been one thing to face Lettie through the mirror, but once she turns around to actually face her, another kaleidoscope of butterflies flutters through her chest. She looks too good. (How is she supposed to resist?) Remembering her suggestion earlier, however, she masks her desire behind a frown and forces as much hurt into her tone as she can muster. It’s not too difficult. She is hurt. Just not for the reasons she wants Asmodeus believing. “You aren’t seriously thinking of going to see that asshole, are you?” A muscle in her jaw flexes, her brows drawing in tighter. “Dressed like fuckin’ that? What the fuck, Olette?"

The inflection in her tone is accusatory without actually having to say what she’s implying. There are still some lines she won’t cross. Not even for an act.

“It’s not fair. You look so fucking good. Is that the cherry lipstick I like?” Of course, it’s not as though Lettie is wearing it for her benefit, but she can taste the memory of it and has to stop herself from licking her own lips. What she would do for one last kiss before they enter the Reaper’s den. "Can't wait to taste it when this is all over."

“Who the fuck even are you? Whatever happened to us?” She gestures between the both of them. “To fighting for us? Shit.” Juno takes a half step back, pinching the bridge of her nose. Then, from the bottom of her voice, she snarls, “Goddess, I get that you can’t fuckin’ change your fuckin’ fate,” “But we’re going to defy that. I promise you that. No more golden chains.” “But you could at least fuckin’ pretend. You could at least fuckin’ try to do something instead of giving up; instead of dolling yourself up like you're selling yourself to that scumbag—I thought we had plans?” Juno’s hands fly above her head, exasperated. She starts raising her voice to the level of a shout. (Ravan and Ariel will probably hear this and that’s kind of the point. Even if Edward’s already informed them of their plan, it’ll help to have startled witnesses. She just hopes Ravan or Ariel don't try to punch her in the face.) “You fuckin’ promised this time would be different! But you’re just the same as you’ve always been. Fuckin’ fake bitch. I shoulda fuckin’ listened when Crane said you faeries are fuckin' minxes. Shoulda trusted someone who actually fuckin’ knows that shallow ass version of yourself.”

“Don’t listen to what I’m saying, please. You’re the realest person I know. I see you through all this bullshit.”

“Fuck this—I’m not letting you go! If this was ever real, you'll stay. Show me you're real,” she begs, putting herself between Lettie and the doorway. But they both know that could never stop Lettie. She’s glitched through Juno too many times for them to not know what she's capable of, but Asmodeus doesn't know that. He only knows what he's seen. “I’ve got a vial of your blood in my left front pocket. Don’t search my right one.” That’s where the ring is and she still intends to keep it as a surprise, because she will propose to Lettie. Even if it’s the last thing she does. “That’s the last thing you should take with you, bug. The ship should be ready to go. Thanks to your upgrades, those assholes shouldn't be able to detect us. Just send the signal and QB will blip us to your location. Be safe. I love you."
 
'Fake bitch.' There was once a time when those words from Juno's lips sent Lettie's whole world collapsing around her like a house of cards. They mean nothing to her now. Tears are only welling in the faerie's eyes because this may be the last chance they have to say goodbye. They're sure as hell aren't giving up, but they both know there's a possibility that the worst may come to pass. They both experienced that path when they lost James and Lina. However, they've survived the worst. It wasn't easy by any means... but they picked themselves up, did what they could to survive. Then their paths crossed and they've gone on to become the best versions of themselves. They make each other better. They're strong as hell. If Asmodeus is looking for a fight he's gonna get one. It starts with this dramatic performance and ends with his neck under Lettie's claws.

"I know, Juju. I don't need fancy goggles to see the real you, either. You'd always put up that tough as nails front... but you're probably the softest softie I've ever met." Lettie tries to poke fun at her, gently, to ease whatever anxiousness she might be feeling by saying those things. She practically told her to say them a couple of minutes ago-- and still, her pirate is checking in, reassuring her. "Not to downplay what a badass you are or anything. Because you're also the baddest badass I've ever met." She almost blushes as she gushes and rambles. Ordinarily she wouldn't stop herself from showering her future wife in affection-- but she can't risk ruining the act. "You're a badass with a warm heart. The best kind if you ask me."

"I'm sorry, Juno." Lettie says, her voice wobbly and on the verge of breaking. "I'm so sorry." If she were a selfish faerie, she'd take Calytrix's final wish right now. Escape Avangeline, ignore the other worlds as they fall away, and secure their future while damning everyone else. But they earned Calytrix's wishes in the first place because they decided to be a couple of damned heroes. Geez. Who would've thought they'd end up like this? The chaotic pirate and faerie duo who crashed through worlds, carelessly setting everything on fire as they fought and argued? But somewhere along the way, Juno started looking out for her. She healed her wings and confessed that she didn't like to fight. And Lettie began to see her, past that shield she held up in front of her to survive. "I'm sorry we have to fight again. I know you don't like to fight."

But Juno's reassured her time and time again that she won't hesitate... that she'll always fight for her. She's got her and won't let go. Lettie's still trying to accept that.

"I have to confess something, too. I don't like pretending. I don't like lying to the people I love and I don't like pushing them away." Lettie's tears keep falling. She rubs at her eyes. (Wisely, she went for the waterproof mascara.) "Those things you said earlier... you were right. I'd wear a fake smile and try to do everything on my own because I thought that was the only way I could protect people. That's why I didn't let myself rely on you the last time we were on Avangeline. Although I couldn't speak, there were ways I could have warned you about my curse. But I didn't. I cared about you so much that I didn't want to drag you down with me. I shouldn't have underestimated how much you cared about me in return. Keeping all of that inside almost tore us apart. I almost lost you."

"I shouldn't have let you in when I knew from the start that I belong to someone else. I can't escape my fate." Lettie sniffles. "I used to think like that. But that's exactly what Asmodeus wanted. He threatened the people I cared about to isolate me, to make me feel helpless and afraid." But maybe he's afraid of what she can do at her full potential, with an army rallied at her side. Calytrix has shown her that faeries are a hell of a lot more powerful than they're given credit for on Avangeline. For some reason, he was scared of her voice. That's why he stole it from her. Now that she has it back, it's time for her to use it. "I still afraid. I'm terrified. But I'm starting to accept that no matter what happens, we're in this together. I don't want to be alone anymore... and I know I don't have to be. It's you and me to the end."

"No matter what I do, it's never enough. I can't keep fighting the inevitable... you said you wanted honesty? Well, here it is." Lettie takes a step forward. "I'm so tired, Juno. There's nothing I can do to stop Asmodeus. Giving myself up is the only way I can save those faeries." She shakes her head, pressing a hand over her chest. "I've hurt too many people trying to outrun my fate. It's time I stop being so selfish." She takes another step closer, reaching to caress Juno's face. "I've thought long and hard about it. This is the only way I can surrender with grace. Please try to understand, Juno."

"I won't surrender. If I have to go down, I'm going down gracelessly. Claws out." Lettie raises herself to her toes and kisses Juno. "I love you."

"I loved you. I really loved you." Lettie whispers, holding her close for just a few more seconds. Making the moment last for as long as she possibly can. (It fits the performance to put everything she has into this embrace, anyway.) "I love you. I'll always love you." Her hand angles down towards Juno's right pocket, tempted by her curiosity, but she ultimately decides to switch and go for the left as instructed. Right here and now, she makes a silent vow to survive long enough to uncover the mystery of what's inside Juno's right pocket. "Goodbye."

"I couldn't resist giving you a little taste of that cherry. A preview of what's to come." Lettie hides a kittenish grin in the crook of Juno's neck. What? Morale is important in trying times like these! They know from experience that kisses can be very incentivizing in the heat of battle. (And stars forbid this is goodbye... at least she won't have any regrets about their last kiss.) ...Still. Morale. She's gotta pep herself back up! Dive into this with confidence that she's so much more than they told her she was. Instead of imagining cheerleaders for herself, the way she used to, she pictures Juno's voice saying 'you got this.' "You know this isn't goodbye. See you on the flip side, baby."

With that, Lettie glitches through Juno, past the doorway and speeds off towards Lady.

"Ravan, wait!" Ariel's voice rings out from down the hall.

"Unhand me, sister!" Ravan appears in the doorway not too long afterwards, his wings frazzled and his eyes uncharacteristically bright with rage. He raises his fist and aims for Juno's face. He stumbles and misses the first time. "Tell me, pirate-- have thee learned nothing since last time? Were thy words to me this morning untrue? How dareth thee besmirch thy love!" He aims again, hitting his mark the second time. (He hurts his wrist in the process, but he doesn't let that show.) "Indeed, Olette may liketh to dress up and-- and yes, she may cry about her tits from time to time." ("Her... her tits? Is that really relevant right now?") "But she is not fake, nor shallow! Far from it! If thee knoweth her heart as thee claimeth, thou wouldst understand that unequivocally."

"Dude. Chill. You remember what Lestat said, right? You can't go jumping to conclusions like that." Ariel catches up, tugging Ravan backward to give Juno some space. Her expression is guarded, though, as she's still waiting to pass judgement on this one. She will absolutely throw hands if it turns out what they just heard was real. She looks Juno in the eyes and nods once. Lettie knows what she's about. If they're still together after what happened last time, then that's worth something to her. (To be fair, she wasn't there like Ravan was. He'd started getting past it with time and was genuinely willing to give the pirate a chance... but she knows better than anyone how hard it was for him to cope with what happened in the aftermath. His best friend lost her wings. Her little sister lost her wings. Anyway. It's probably for the best that he aired it out of his system now instead of letting it sit there unacknowledged. Shit like that can fester.) "Explain. What was that just now?"
 
The faint flavor of cherry still lingers on her lips and the phantom warmth from their last embrace still encircles her torso. And all that fades when Ravan comes at her—the first punch, even if a miss, startles Juno enough that she forgets to block when he lunges a second time. He catches her jaw with enough force that she falls to the ground. Heat flares through her, along with the urge to fight. She's back on her feet in seconds, fists up, ready to block the next swing or strike back.

It takes a second, but once she recognizes Ravan, his righteous rage, she calms herself down and straightens out. She rubs the soreness from her jaw, already feeling the swell. “Your left hook could use work.” She felt his bones shift in the exact way they aren’t supposed to. “Save it for the real assholes.”

But that isn't an explanation, even if Juno thinks the implication should be enough.

"Thou art the asshole!" Ravan is still struggling against his sister. Ariel isn't placated either and Juno can almost see the internal debate of whether or not she should let her brother have at her. Fair. But Juno doesn't want to explain too soon, unsure if Asmodeus's presence is still lingering. It's only when she feels that her connection with Lettie is distant enough, that she gives the siblings what they need to trust her intentions. “That was part of the fuckin’ plan. Wasn’t in our original scheme, so Lestat and Edward couldn’t’ve told you—but don’t worry about it. If Asmodeus caught that part, it’ll just convince him that I’m not fuckin’ coming. That she’s ended things with me. ” As she rubs her jaw, she reduces some of the swelling, calming down her inflammatory response and closing the ruptured veins with her necromancy, just enough to prevent it from bothering her later. She still needs to save her magic. “I told you, Ravan, never again. I meant it.” She’s pleading with him to see her not for the homicidal pirate everyone assumes she is, but for that soft badass Lettie knows so well. “I’d swear on a life more precious than mine, but that means swearing on hers and I won’t risk hers, even if I know it'd be a safe bet.”

Ravan calms down enough that Ariel doesn’t need to hold him back, but she can tell he’s still upset over all that he heard. Even Ariel hasn't fully let her guard down. Understandable. If Juno had heard either of them or anyone saying shit like that to her faerie, nothing could stop her from pummeling the asshole responsible. (She's lucky these two are less homicidal than her.) But those lines weren't hers and she has to remind herself of that. And she has to trust that these two are still committed to Lettie enough that they'll come around.

“She wrote letters. Th-That might help.” Juno backs up towards the bed and grabs the pink box, handing it over to them. Eagerly, Ravan snatches the box and rips open his letter, absently handing the second to Ariel. And while they read, Juno scans the room for her gift. It doesn't even take a minute for her to find, because she knows her faerie too well. Just peeking through a gap in one of the deteriorating ceiling beams, she spots the corner of a pink ribbon. Seeing it makes her smile, remembering all those times she used to hold things above her head before her wing was healed; how that eventually led to Lettie creating a revenge tally; how most of those revenges were her stealing her bag of bones and flying well out of her reach. 'Fuck. I miss her.'

Before she can ask one of the winged siblings for help, Ravan stands up suddenly. His eyes are wide with a mixture of scandal and rage, feathers once again ruffled. Ariel catches up a second later, wearing that same expression. “We needeth to wend. Now.” “He means go.”

Ah, so she must have told them everything.

Juno shakes her head, giving Ravan a stern look. Though it's not without understanding. More than anything else, she wants to be in that bunker with Lettie, standing by her side and ready to defend her. "No, what we need to do is be smart. We need to prepare. You want justice for her and Titania? Then listen to me." She stares at them both hard before continuing. "Sit the fuck down and start thinking of all the glyphs you're gonna need down there, because those assholes? They aren't gonna hesitate just 'cause you're two greenhorns. If you can't do this for me, then do it for her. Lettie. Don't make her lose another person. Don't you dare fucking put her through that by being irrational."

It takes Ravan a minute to come around, but eventually he sits down on the edge of the bed and rests his arms on his knees. It's hard to tell what's going on with Ariel as she plays it just as cool as ever, though Juno notes the worry causing her brow to twitch, likely realizing, for the first time, that she could lose more than a little sister.

Eventually, Ariel helps Juno retrieve her gift but she's not fully able to process it as the Magistrate interrupts, beaming herself down in a shower of sparkles to announce that she's devised killer armor for their small operation. Without asking, she uses Juno as a model, changing her out of her usual pirate garb into a full suit of midnight blue armor—though it’s not armor in the traditional sense of the word. At least, not by Juno’s standards. This armor is sleek, lightweight and the many segmented plates allow for easy, fluid movement. As the Magistrate is getting into the technicalities of the armor’s properties—something about shock absorption and its resistance to extreme conditions—she stops, suddenly, when Juno slips her ring over her gloved hand.

“What in the seven seas is that.” It’s not a question. It’s a statement. When Juno simply gives her a knowing smile, the diva blips away, leaving them only with a crate full of armor and weapons. (The ring is a little much for Juno’s preferred aesthetics—she only just warmed up to the color yellow—and she knows her faerie knows that. While she will wear this ring to honor Avangeline’s traditions, she suspects this might just be to make her smile and it does. It also makes her think of their future.) When Ravan and Ariel exchange a glance, Juno rubs the back of her neck and awkwardly explains to Lettie’s best friends that they’re getting married. “She would have told you herself, but our plans sorta fuckin’ changed.” She then pulls out the ring she stole for her betrothed, grinning as their jaws drop to the floor. Yeah, she did good. She’s the heist queen. “We’re going the distance.”

Juno then gives Ravan and Ariel some privacy to change into their gear. At that same moment, Barbara with a B announces that more guests have arrived, describing them as rapscallions. Which isn’t entirely true. Though it is an odd mixture of sympathetic demons and angels (some fallen, others not) who don’t all seem comfortable being around each other, she wouldn't describe them as rapscallions. They're angry. They're ready. She can sense their fight. Some have even brought weapons—everything from heavy chains and pipes to swords and axes.

Thistle shimmies her way through to the front to greet Juno and passes along the message that Iris and a few others are working on getting into the broadcast networks. She assures Juno that they’ll be ready shortly. She also promises that she's only here to escort the troops and will be heading back to base soon.

Meanwhile, Melvin and the Maestro are on standby. Melvin is cloaked and accompanying Lettie into the Reaper’s den, waiting for the moment to start “live streaming.” (Juno still doesn’t understand what that is…) The Maestro, however, is with Juno, waiting for the signal to blip them into the den. They remind Juno that they will need five minutes before they can get the faeries to safety and another five before they can come back and get their small force out of the bunker, if needed. However, they make it clear that they do not want to be around the Reaper for longer than necessary. “It gives me the heebie jeebies, Captain.”

Once the rest of their company suits up, they wait. It’s hard to tell any of them apart underneath their full coverage helmets. And Juno guesses this might be purposeful, so that none of them can be singled out. Even so, the uniform doesn't entirely protect Juno. For one, she's the only one without wings and, two, she's got her goggles and demon sword. But if Asmodeus or his goons want to try her? Well, she has a feeling they'll have a goddess of revenge to deal with if they even so much as think about it.

“Hell is ready, babe. Tell me when you’ve got the stars.”
 
"It's me. Hi." Lettie's voice echoes through the city streets of Avangeline as the screens blink to life one by one and display her face. She's on the tiny ones in shops, on every television in every home, and even on the big screen in the central square. While anyone might imagine the little faerie thriving under a spotlight this bright, she finds herself stiff and awkward as she speaks to the little camera Melvin hovers in front of her. It's the nerves. She's distracted, trying to keep track of everything she's got to do. Reminding herself to be smart about what she says for as long as she has this stage and her voice. She chews at her thumbnail uncertainly, tilting her head at the cube in front of her. "Are we on?"

"You betcha! We are crackalackin, girlfriend." Melvin's replies, shimmying excitedly from side to side. The camera starts wobbling, shaking Lettie's face around on all the screens. The people watching the broadcast are extremely confused. Some hit the sides of their televisions or tap furiously at the screens of their phones to try and exit out. (Except she's not going anywhere.) "Shall I show everyone my moonwalk? It's real impressive."

"Melvin..." Lettie puffs up her cheeks, irritated. Remembering that she's still on camera, she presses her hands to her temples and takes a deep breath to compose herself. (Why did they entrust Melvin with such an important task again? Stars. How is a cube supposed to moonwalk, anyway? Melvin doesn't even have legs! Ooooh... the mental image that just inspired. Cubes with legs. Fire. Burn it with fire! Scrape it from her mind effective immediately!) "Just hold the camera still. If you do that for me, you can show them when I'm done." Yes, fine. Whatevs. She'll subject Avangeline to Melvin's moonwalk. It's honestly what they deserve. And maybe it's petty of her... but if she must be subjected to unspeakable horrors, so should they!

"Sweet! I mean... aye, aye, Captain!" Melvin tilts forward in a nod and the camera goes still again. Lettie's off-centered and out of focus and it takes another second before it adjusts again. She fans herself with her hand-- partially to show off her gorgeous manicure and partially to hold in a scream of rage.

"Who's Melvin? Do we know him?" Two armored angels whisper amongst themselves amid their makeshift army, huddled around a phone with the broadcast playing. They wear charm bracelets with angel wing and microphone charms-- Titania merch from back in the day. "I dunno. I've never heard of him. Probably not one of Titania's former assistants, though... he's so unprofessional. Just look at the camera work. It's atrocious."

"It's me... hi." Lettie's voice crackles through the speakers again and everyone lapses into silence again. "Most of you probably know me as Titania's daughter. If not, then maybe you'd recognize me as the maniac who recently blasted that shady underground lab at the Creation Corp to smithereens. I'm Olette Lycoris Radiata," She raises her wrist, showing the camera her scar. Then she runs her thumb across her neck, her eyes flashing dangerously. "...and I've been silenced for too damned long." She wears her quiet anger like her best make up now, bolstered with confidence now that she's gotten started. She's about to end Asmodeus's whole career. "I was cursed. And I know what you're thinking... but curses are not a thing of the past. The Elders want everyone to think that sinister magic is under control, that we've put those days behind us... but we haven't. Faeries and mermaids are still exploited every single day."

Yeah, yeah, fine. Lettie harbor a couple of grudges against the fish bitches. (Maybe more than just a couple.) But they don't deserve the shit they've been put through, either. If she's gonna give a voice to this cause, if she's gonna be putting herself at risk, she'll help as many people as she can with this chance she's been given.

"And now... here's what you've all been waiting for. It's time for me to spill the tea." Lettie nods resolutely, bracing herself. She's about to unpack all of her dirty laundry in front of the entire world. It'll be hard... but it's for a good fucking cause. And after all this time? She deserves to be heard. Avangeline deserves the truth. She won't feed it to them sugarcoated. It'll be bitter and hard to swallow, but it's exactly the kind of medicine it needs to heal. It might not be infested with nightmares in an obvious way, like so many of the worlds she and Juno visited. Just because they're swept under the rug doesn't mean they're not there. Avangeline is a nightmare dressed like a daydream. "Listen closely, 'cause I'm only gonna tell this story once."

"The tea is like... the scoop." Ariel whispers, trying to explain what 'the tea' is to Juno. (Her letter specifically requested that she explain any phrases to Juno that she might not understand. Her pirate is still learning all the slang-- she's gotta make sure someone's got her covered!) "...No, not like an ice cream scoop. She's trying to say that she's about to dish out all the hot goss." She exchanges a glance with Ravan. "Yeah, it is kinda weird that all these sayings make it sound like I'm talking about food."

Lettie proceeds to tell her story faithfully, from beginning to end. Of course, a lot of it is condensed for the sake of time-- she has no idea how long she might have before her broadcast is cut. She exposes the coordinates of the estate, asking for it to be investigated thoroughly. The Titania fans among the group break out into gasps and sobs when the truth of Titania's death drops. Some express that grief with cries of outrage. Others fume and pace on the faerie's behalf. And at last, Lettie's able to give her closing lines just as she arrives at her destination, stepping through the shadows at the entrance of the Reaper's den.

"I've traveled across the worlds and finally found a way to break my curse." Lettie tells the camera, clutching onto her heart shaped locket. All thanks to a certain pirate. She knows who she is. "Let that be hope to all of you who feel hopeless. And let that strike fear into the hearts of everyone who tried to control us." She then sharpens her manicure into long claws. "Best believe we're coming for your asses."

Quiet, excited chatter rises among their gathered army. A few of them holler and raise their weapons over their heads. It seems the fires of the bug and fish revolution have officially been ignited. "Alright, Juju. If everything just went according to plan... I've got the stars."

"It seemeth just yesterday she wast fishing lipgloss out of the dumpster..." Ravan wipes a single tear away like a proud grandma. Ariel awkwardly pats his shoulder, but her dark eyes are just as prideful. "Behold her now."

"That's what I'm doing now. But this isn't a brainless quest for revenge. It's a rescue mission." Lettie narrows her eyes as she navigates the tunnel carefully. She creates an illusion version of herself for Melvin to follow deeper inside, hanging back in the shadows herself. Her eyes shine in a trance-like state as she guides the glamoured Lettie towards the place where the Reaper's pit and Asmodeus are waiting. (She catches a whiff of something sweet and floral-- automatically tensing as she remembers that demon selling those illegal flowers in the city. No...) Melvin's discreetly zooms in on the faeries in the cage hanging above the Reaper's pit, looking the same as they did in her dream... only now they're mostly passed out and sickly.

"That son of a bitch." One of the demons snarl. "There's a kid in that cage."

"We need to go now! We need to help her." Some are getting impatient, clenching their weapons harder or pounding them against the ground. "Have we got the signal yet?"

"Olette... there you are." Asmodeus says smoothly. He can be heard, but for some reason Melvin's camera doesn't pick up on him. A golden chain shoots out and snares around the fake Lettie's waist. The glamour cries out and dissolves instantly into sparkling dust. The demon steps into view, his eyes shining with rage. "I've had enough of your silly parlor tricks. You can't hide from me." There's a blast and the broadcast goes dark.
 
Juno, Ravan, and Ariel sit crammed together on top of a crate, crowding Ravan’s “phone.” (Juno doesn’t understand how that piece of glass is both a phone and a screen. Apparently, the device also stores tiny video games? Were this the time, she would have asked to see, because she doesn’t quite believe him, but now is not the time for distractions.) While the livestream plays, her breath is held, fearing that one wrong move on her end will bring their entire operation crumbling down. She barely registers all of Ariel’s translations, though she appreciates the ones she does catch. Too much of her focus is on her little faerie, on resisting the urge to spiral and assume the worst is about to happen.

When the broadcast cuts out, part of Juno leaves with it. Yes, she heard the signal and now her heart is jackhammering against her ribcage. (Memories of all those dead Olettes piling around her resurface. Her mind betrays her and adjusts the memory so that white glittering dust rains around her instead. Lettie assured her that Asmodeus wants her alive, but for how much longer?)

Ravan’s hand waves in front of her face. “Juno? Juno? Art thee well?” He looks up at Ariel, perplexed and uncertain as their militia buzzes with energy, as all of Avangeline buzzes with energy. She shrugs her shoulders, then slides off the crate so that she’s kneeling in front of the pirate, getting directly in Juno’s sightline. “Hey. Hey. Snap out of it.” She snaps her fingers a few times, grabbing Juno’s attention. “Did you get the signal?”

“Y-Yeah,” she chokes, not sounding at all like the self-assured captain she had been back in the bedroom. Sweat collects on her palms. She rubs them against her armored knees, shoulders tense. Somewhere, she knows this isn’t helpful, that they’re burning up precious seconds and minutes, all of which could be the difference between victory and defeat. ‘Snap out of it, Juju.’ Easier said than done, but when she meets Ariel’s eye, then Ravan’s, she’s reminded that she’s not alone in this. She’s not the only one with a family to lose.

She crushes her eyelids closed, snapping back to the present. Abruptly, she rises from the crate and brushes past the siblings to look at their ragtag militia. “Yeah, I got the signal.” Wasting not another second, she calls out, “Maestro, let’s go.”

— blip! —​

When they arrive in the bunker, it’s dark. Despite this, most of them recognize their location from Lettie’s broadcast, placing themselves in that same long dark hallway that leads down into the Reaper’s Den. This is impart thanks to the Magistrate’s helmets that have a built-in night-vision lens as well as thermal imaging. In Juno’s case, she has Lettie’s nightmare goggles. “We’re here. Heading your way. We’ll need fifteen minutes total for cubey’s blips. Fifteen minutes then your cherry lips are mine.” Communicating through their link helps hide Juno’s nerves, the shake in her voice, but that last part gives her away. A morale boost like that always means she’s nervous—not that she's going to let it get in their way.

Juno raises her fist to the group then points forward, leading them towards the den. Ariel and Ravan flank her on both sides while the rest of the militia trail behind them. Low whimpers echo down the tunnel and, thank the fucking goddess, none of them sound like Lettie—not that those other faeries deserve to be in their current predicament. Mostly, she’s just relieved that they have yet to deal with shit bananas—usually, shit bananas beat up the fan within minutes of their arrival. This calm feels like a miracle.

The miracle does not last.

A shadow slithers in the dark. They flatten themself against the tunnel walls as the group creeps past. The helmet visors fail to detect the entity. They blend in too well with the dark and their form is too cold for the thermal lens. Juno’s goggles, however, start flashing danger signals all across her vision, detecting the entity’s magic moving in her periphery even if she hasn't yet locked onto their presence. Messy text scrawls out, ‘Watch out for Angler Fish!’

She stops, raising her fist so the others stop.

“Juno, what—”

Ravan doesn’t get to finish his question. Juno spins on her heel and launches herself towards one of the members of their party, tackling them to the ground. Her goggles are flashing in hues of red, red, red. “You little fucker,” she hisses, smashing her fist against their helmet, one, two, three—

“Dude—” Someone from behind yanks the pirate off of the entity and throws her against the wall, pinning her there, despite her struggles. “What gives? That’s our chapter president!”

“Get the fuck off of me!” Juno’s tone darkens, her eyes never leaving the entity. While everyone else is distracted, the entity evaporates into the shadows. Her goggles struggle to keep up with where they go, losing them somewhere in the distance. “God fucking dammit!” Her fists slam back against the tunnel. Realizing that everyone is staring at her dumbly and with concern, she takes a few breaths before she explains. “That wasn’t your goddamn president. I’m not fuckin’ homicidal—that was a fuckin’ shapeshifter. Your president…” She scans the length of hall they've traveled, spotting the faint heap of an armored angel. Her neck is bent in a way it shouldn’t be. “Is there.”

The group follows the pirate captain’s fingers and the angel who has her pinned, lets go, gliding over to the heap. A sharp gasp fills the hallway, confirming Juno’s information. The angel brings an arm over her mouth, muffling out a strangled noise.

Juno grimaces. “If any of you want to turn back, I get it. It’s not going to get better from here.” The group murmurs among themselves. The only ones who have nothing to debate are Ariel and Ravan.

She keeps her eyes on the hallway, watching for signs of Angelus then slowly makes her way towards the body. The angel has since slumped over the fallen president, muffling sobs into her broken neck. Juno places a hand on her shoulder. “We need to go. Do you—”

“Fuck off,” she hisses, whipping around and nearly smacking Juno with her wing. “Can’t I just have a moment?”

Juno wavers, then shakes her head. “Go home. Take the body and leave. I need fighters.”

Tension among the others builds. For as angry as they all had been earlier, for as much fight as they had in them, brutal reality has finally hit them. Not all of them are going to make it. A couple of the angels peel off from the group, gliding towards their fallen comrade and helping the angel up. “We’re… sorry.”

“Hey, don’t worry about it. Not everyone’s a soldier.” Yeah, it sucks to be losing some of their numbers, but Juno would rather lead a militia that knows what they’re getting into than one full of deserters. Better they leave now. She claps one of them on the shoulder, giving an encouraging look as best she can through the goggles. “Try and do what you can from the outside. Faeries and mermaids are gonna need their allies tonight. Shit’s bananas.”

They tilt their heads at that butchered phrase, though they don’t say anything else. Juno shoos them off, encouraging them to hurry before the entity or someone else attacks. She watches them for as long as she can stand, but ultimately has to focus on her company and keeping them safe. (Yeah, a puny little human keeping all these angels and demons safe. Who would have thunk?) Her goggles don’t light up, though the hairs on the back of her neck are still on end.

She motions for the group to go forward, electing to stay in the back for now. She pulls out her sword for good measure, trusting the glow of the fuller to help her identify Angelus when he next arrives. “Hey, Lette. We’re coming. Just had a run in with Angelus. Fucker is hiding again. Be careful.”

As if smelling her trepidation, the shadow materializes behind her, nipping at her heels. The sword’s fuller doesn’t react. (Perhaps because Angelus is neither demon, nor angel, but a secret third thing.) They wrap their slithery tendrils around Juno’s ankles, yanking her back—!!
 
The broadcast fizzled out and went dark. Meanwhile, the tunnel is blasted with a whooshing, blinding white light. Lettie braces herself against the side of the tunnel wall, holding her arm up over her eyes to shield them. She has to be ready for anything. Wind combs through her hair and picks up her skirts. Strangely enough, after the initial blast, it's not the drafty, stale sort of wind she would expect from a place like the Reaper's... the Reaper's... what?

Lettie lowers her arm away from her eyes. Taken completely off guard, her other hand falls away from her nose and mouth. The floral aroma wafts towards her again, but it's not so peculiar when she finds herself standing in the middle of a meadow, peaceful and vast. "What the..." Smatterings of foxglove, daisies, roses and lavender bob their heads on a gentle spring-like breeze. A still blue lake spans out beyond it like a mirror portal to another world, reflecting the purplish mountains and pink sky on the horizon. The rustling of grass is the only sound she can hear. It's beautiful, like a scene out of a daydream. Like her cottage, her future, could be waiting for her just around the corner. It brushes up against her hopes, taunts her yearning heart.

'Don't fall for it.' Lettie squeezes her eyes shut tight. She presses the heels of her palms over them until she sees spots. But the meadow doesn't vanish, no matter what angle she looks at it from. She takes a sharp breath. 'Don't...' A soft yawn pries itself from her lips. She's starting to feel sleepy. 'Don't fall for what...?'

This place is safe. Lettie walks slowly through the tall grass, admiring the flowers at her feet. When she walks further through the meadow and approaches the lake, she notices a unicorn standing at a clearing of trees on the other side. A unicorn? Hm. It makes her feel... nostalgic, somehow. There's something unmistakably familiar about it. The faerie is about to wade through the lake to cross over to it, but stops short when she notices her reflection in the water... especially when she realizes it's not just her face looking back at her. There's someone standing behind her.

"Mother?" Lettie blinks once. Twice. She whirls around to see whether or not the lake is deceiving her, expecting the apparition to vanish... but Titania remains. Her heart races. Something isn't right here. Perhaps it's that she isn't using any glamours? Mother does appear rather crestfallen at the sight of her.

"Lette? Is that really you?" Titania squints. "Your wings are..." She reaches out to touch her, wary. When she successfully clasps onto her daughter's shoulder, her beautiful blue eyes grow wide and round with surprise. Once she has a physical hold on her, she shakes her around a bit. "It is you." She gasps and inches backward, taking her in from head to toe. "Look at you."

Lettie bites her lip, bracing herself for the criticism she knows is coming. Instead, however, mother surprises her by closing the distance between them. She pulls her into a tight embrace. The smell of her perfume is so strong and nostalgic it almost brings the faerie to tears. (But why?)

"You've grown so much." Titania's voice breaks on a sob. Lettie awkwardly pats her back.

"...Not really. I'm still short." Lettie says matter-of-factly. She hasn't grown much at all. Stars, she's not even wearing heels today. Somehow, the faerie gets the sense that she's missing something important right now. Has mother been drinking again...? She was never the sort to cry when she got drunk, though.

"You're a proper young lady now." Titania squeezes her even tighter and Lettie can barely breathe. "...What are you doing here? And what happened to your wings, darling?"

'What happened to your wings?' A piercing ache throbs in the center of Lettie's skull. It's there, she knows it's there... just beyond her reach. Her phantom wings flicker uncertainly on her back.

"I..." Lettie struggles to articulate. It's right there and at the same time, it isn't. "...I can't remember." She bites her lip and then looks around them again. "Where are we?"

Titania takes a step away to give her some room, peering down into her daughter's eyes searchingly. When she notices the daze she's in, she narrows her eyes suspiciously. Mother... mother shouldn't be here, should she? Mother is dead and Lettie killed her.

For some reason that realization doesn't make the illusion go away. And her touch felt so real just then. Titania is looking at Lettie like she shouldn't be here, either.

A dark, wispy portal appears over the lake and the skies begin to turn gray. Asmodeus steps through, grinning wickedly at the mother daughter duo. Titania grits her teeth, stepping forward so she's standing in front of Lettie. The faerie's eyes widen slightly at her mother's uncharacteristic display of boldness. She tenses when she pans her gaze over to Asmodeus. He's...

"Why did you bring her here?" Titania demands. "This wasn't part of our deal."

"Our 'deal' never official. Once again, you should have read the fine print, my dear." Asmodeus says, casually examining his fingernails. "Olette has come of age and her infuriating 'contract' has reached its expiration date. She belongs to me now." He snaps his fingers once and a set of golden chains appear around Titania's wrists. "...You should rejoice. She's taking your place." He snaps again and the chains vanish from Titania's wrists, appearing around Lettie's instead. "You're free, Titania."

"Deal...?" Gears click very slowly in Lettie's mind. She stares intently at the chains around her wrists, but somehow they don't alarm her. "What deal? What's going on?"

"And you told everyone Titania died. You little fool!" Asmodeus cackles. "I wonder what everyone will think when she makes her long awaited return?" He clicks his tongue scoldingly. "Crafty little minx. Trying to sway everyone to your side with lies." He shrugs his shoulders. "...She came to me all those years ago, offering to take your place. Who was I to refuse such an offer from the Titania Lycoris Radiata?"

"You didn't set her free. You told me you would set her free." Titania seethes, her body taking on a faint glow of righteous fury.

"I lied." Asmodeus smiles in a way that might be construed as charming without context. (With context, however? His face looks extremely punchable.) "We can settle this outside, if you like."

"No. I'm not fucking around." Titania growls. She flaps her enormous, feathered wings once and lunges for him. "Let her go, Asemodeus!"

Lettie is only just starting to process what's happening when Asmodeus snaps his fingers again. Titania turns and starts to reach out for her when they both vanish in a flash, leaving the faerie all alone in the otherworldly meadow. She stumbles backward a few steps, remembering mother's wide eyes and the way she held her just then. That... that really was mother, wasn't it? She didn't kill her. And Asmodeus... he lied and let her think she killed her, when all this time...

Mother was trapped here... wherever 'here' is. (Fuck. Where the hell is she?) She was held prisoner... her only comfort being that her daughter was safe from her past mistakes. (But she wasn't. Far from it.) Lettie drops to her knees, pounds the earth with her chained fists and releases a scream she's been holding onto for years.
 
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