Fantasy Cosmical Glitch ( ellarose & starboob. )

[starboob]

Coffee sounds nice. And since Juno can’t do anything while Asmodeus’s spell uselessly pounds the box of shame, she might as well indulge. So she takes the floating mug and sips on that deliciously bitter black liquid. Warmth soon spreads from her fingertips, through her arms, over her tongue and down her throat until she is pure radiating energy. (Like this, her stupidly buff arms could tear Avangeline in two.) She throws the rest back just as the last horrific whorls of magic fade away and Melvin deems it safe enough to release Juno. A door draws itself on the front face of the box and clicks open. With a two finger salute and goodbye, she’s off. “It’s been real, Melvin. Later.”

With caffeine and adrenaline mixing through her veins, the pirate is transformed into a speeding bullet. In almost no time, she's lowering herself through the trapdoor just as Asmodeus winds his fist back. ‘Oh, hell fucking no.’

It’s thoughtless, it’s reckless, and it works. With a low growl, the pirate swings herself forward, fist cocked back then coming down hard on Asmodeus’s face with a satisfying crack; both of her rings leave deep cuts across his cheek. (Heh.) His head snaps violently to the side and the rest of him follows to the floor with a heavy thud, puffs of dust rising from the impact. He’s down. Though the Desdemonian is rearing to kick his teeth in, her wife appears in her arms and, suddenly, she doesn’t even remember that a fallen demon is at her feet. A wide, dweebish grin spreads across her face. “Yeah, you like your wedding present?”

When Lettie rewards her with a kiss, she eagerly melts into it, returning it with desperate fervor—not because it could be their last, but because it’s their first as wives. Even after all of this time and all the kisses they have shared, her heart still flutters and skips when it deepens, Lettie’s tongue meeting hers. She sighs into it, grip tightening around her wife’s waist. The world is burning and nothing could take Juno out of this moment.

… Except for the stirring demon at her feet. Fuck. She almost forgot about that guy.

They groan in unison, reluctantly ending their kiss and peeling away from each other. (But they’re together now. They’re together. They’re together. They’re together again and they’re unstoppable.)

Asmodeus braces his palms against the floor, pushing himself up on shaking arms. His breaths come out hot enough to burn, wild eyes dizzily searching for those insufferable wretches. From his periphery, movement catches his attention and gives him enough time to react, slapping the pirate away before she can kick the side of his skull. Juno nearly falls off balance, only catching herself because Lettie is right there to steady her.

However, she isn't given any more time to collect herself before Lettie glitches them towards the trapdoor right as Asmodeus throws an explosive glyph. The ground is still reverberating when the glitch ends and the demon is already tracing out another. This time Juno steps in, brandishing her weapon. She swings her sword and a red arc leaves the blade, cutting through the glyph before its finished. Another arc flies out afterwards, hitting Asmodeus’s shoulder and knocking him into the wall.

While the demon recovers, Juno points up at the trapdoor opening and Lettie nods without needing more explanation. She takes Juno by the shoulders and glitches them up and out of the hidden room. Lettie then dispatches a few bomberflies through the trapdoor just as Juno heaves it closed, flipping the latch to lock it. Three successive blasts shake the floor, smoke and heat coming through the cracks along the door. It’s quiet beneath them, though Juno doesn’t trust that. Yet for as much as she wants to end this decisively, Titania is still missing. Finding her now could be the difference between life and death.

"Lette, your mom—we have to find her." Juno doesn't explain beyond that and she doesn't have to. At this point, her wife trusts her enough to follow without question. They navigate the first floor of the estate, squinting through and choking on thick black smoke, Juno more than Lettie. When the pirate starts to stumble, the faerie grabs her wrist and leads them towards the nearest exit before either of them suffocates on the noxious fumes.

Fresh air hits Juno with welcome relief. She gulps it in, still coughing as she regains her breath. Though she doesn't allow herself much more time to recover than that. The second she's well enough to start running, she does, searching for any signs of a fight—of which there are many. The estate grounds have transformed into a battlefield. While most of the fighting is aerial, some clashes haven been brought to the ground. Screams of anguish and power fill the air as estate demons clash with their rebellion, neither side pulling their punches. But Juno doesn't pay attention to that.

Rather, her attention is drawn back to the building as a loud snap breaks through the air, followed by a crash. "I don't think she's inside," she assures. "It was too quiet when I got there." Though that doesn't prove anything, it's also not like they can afford to go back inside with the estate starting to collapse on itself and the toxic air. It's too risky. Juno nudges their attention away from the fire, focusing instead on any signs of a trail to follow. Though they know better than to split up, Lettie takes to the skies for an aerial view while Juno scours the ground, both of them making sure to never leave the other's sightline.

It's Juno who spots the first sign of a fight taken into the wood. She races towards it, calling to her wife. "Lettie!" She uses both their stream and her voice to get her attention, frantically pointing towards the wood behind the estate. Trees are cracked and splintered in a zigzag pattern, following a trail of shallow trenches, like someone skid across the forest floor. Branches are scattered along the path and while greenery smokes, nothing is on fire. In the distance, at the end of this haphazard trail, is Titania—Titania collapsed, limbs sprawled out, and one wing bent at a harsh angle. Blood coats her white feathers where the bone pokes through. Then claw marks drag from her neck down her front, leaving behind a set of long, deep gashes. A pool of blood has collected around her, though it doesn't seem to be growing. Her chest rises and falls, slowly; too slowly. "Shit."

 

[ellarose]

No. Lettie's feet touch the ground at the same time that her rush of adrenaline and newfound freedom crashes to an abrupt halt. The weight of everything else comes crashing down on her and when the world tilts sideways like a sinking ship, Juno is there to hold her steady. But even with one of her wife's irresistible muscular arms wrapped around her, she can't tear her misting white eyes away from the ghastly crime scene that has become of her mother. A romantic writing attempting to make poetry of her fate might describe Titania as a porcelain angel fallen off the shelf, broken pieces splayed tragically upon the ground... but all Lettie sees are gashes, broken bone and blood. So much blood. Her mother is not a thing. Not a product. (Nor was she.) The unmistakable scent of gore twists her stomach. No, no, no.

The first breath Lettie can bring herself to take is short, sharp gasp. She stumbles forward one step and then another before sinking to her knees at her mother's side.

"You've escaped... thank heavens. Are you... are you unharmed?" Titania breathes shallowly, her voice faint and hauntingly calm. Lettie's nose crinkles stubbornly, but she can't help the way her expression twists and betrays her grief. Somehow, her wellbeing is mother's first thought, even when she's in such a state. (Why'd she decide to start acting like a mother now? What if she loses her again, right after she got her back? It's not fair. It's not--) "Don't cry, love. You look better when you're smiling."

Lettie's grief is a tight pull in her throat, constricting like an invisible noose, and she can't squeeze any words past it. Titania reaches for her cheek, a finger catching a single tear, but she can scarcely do more than that before it falls limply to the ground. That prompt usually persuaded the little faerie to try to smile, to make mother happy, to see her smile back. But she can't manage a smile right now. She stopped forcing them a while ago.

"How can you say that at a time like this? Of course I'm going to cry!" Lettie's voice is heated once she brings it to the surface, as if her fighting fire might persuade mother to keep a fighting fire of her own ignited. This is just how worry looks on her. Juno would know, having been the recipient of it so many times in the past. "Who did this to you?"

Titania closes her eyes. Though it's quiet, she sighs in such a way that tells Lettie everything she needs to know. Asmodeus. He didn't interfere once when she confronted the Reaper in her headspace... largely because mother was out here, distracting him.

"Juno, I know you're going to take good care of her." Titania says, turning the subject away from the fight that got her here. It sounds like the beginning of a goodbye. "Thank you for everything. And, Lette--"

"No, don't speak. Rest. We're going to find help. You're going to survive this..." Lettie sniffles, raising her hands. They glow a faint blue, sparkling with healing energy. "You have to survive this."

"Stop it. Stop. Look at the state he left me in, Lette." Mother clasps her hands around the faerie's wrists with a surprisingly firm grip to stop her, considering her condition. "You're going to need all of your strength to see this through. Don't waste your energy here."

"It's not a waste. You're not going to die protecting me! I won't let you." Lettie fights back, trying and failing to wrench her arms free. She knows on some level this is childish. But this is her mother. And she only just got her back. "I won't-- Cubey, get your ass out here! Magistrate, Medic... or, hell, even Melvin!"

"Mel-mel-melvin, at your service!" Sure enough, it's Melvin who responds, tipping his plastic box in a polite bow. "Wika-wika wow! Guess what? Inez is teaching me to be a DJ."

"Take her somewhere safe, Melvin. She needs to see the Medic." Lettie wastes no time reprimanding Melvin for his antics, issuing her request and scrubbing at her tears with the backs of her hands. "Hurry."

"Oh... shit bananas. I'll get right on that, Miss Cap'n Faerie. Just as soon as my--" Melvin starts, but another sound behind them snaps all of their attention towards the forest clearing. Dark, smoggy clouds roll into the forest around them, announcing Asmodeus's presence in the clearing. The ground around her sparkles with frost and a chill rolls down the faerie's spine. He's coming. The cube gulps audibly. "Soon as my five minute cooldown is up." Shit bananas.

Lettie grits her teeth and quickly traces a glyph over her mother's open chest before she can protest, sending blue flowers trickling over her like water. The gashes recede, if only a little. And if it buys her just a little more time, it could be the difference between life and death. Again and again, Lettie watches the people she loves pushing themselves to their very limits for her sake. She's powerful enough to fight for them, too. There's stardust in her veins and she's not useless, not weak. Not meaningless.

One little faerie is going to rip Avangeline's rotten core out with her own two claws... and she's going to change everything.

The faerie dust still clinging to Lettie from the estate cellar begins to spark with electricity as her killer draws nearer, tingling against her skin. She cracks her neck, elongates her nails into those sharpened claws, and rises gracefully to her feet. She turns around, ice-cold determination set in her eyes. "Bug rights?" She nods to Juno before facing forward. 'How many of you have died today?' She reaches outward with her thoughts as she reaches for her wife's hand. They're together now. They can resurrect goddesses and worlds when they stand together. Lettie can reach out to her sisters, the sprites, and Juno is especially equipped to channel their energy as well. They'll be able to harness this power in perfect harmony. 'How many of you were unfairly used today? If you can hear my voice, then come to us now. Let us be the vessel for your revenge.'

 

[starboob]

Avangeline is a graveyard overflowing with vengeful revenants. Whatever Lettie does to call upon her fallen sisters, those who have been ground to dust and forgotten, it’s instantaneous. Her hair billows out by an unseen wind as her eyes start to fill with a rainbow mosaic, each color moving and shifting as the various spirits filter through the fucking faerie, seeing the world through her eyes. That moving color then bleeds down the length of her white hair and gets caught in the sparkles of her ever shifting wings. Yet Lettie remains composed. Regal. Divine.

The faerie is brimming with pure magic (because she is pure magic, always) and the excess presses against their stream enough that a few sprites get caught in the necromancer. The frantic magic whizzes through Juno, stirring her heart with more fire before racing back to Lettie. (It tickles.) She doesn’t even need to try siphoning her wife’s power, it flows into her on its own.

Juno presses a kiss to her wife's temple at the same moment she clasps something around her wrist. (Lina’s bracelet. It wasn’t just Lettie’s file that she found. She found Lina’s, too, and the bracelet had been right there, tucked inside. Now both files are safely tucked away with Melvin.) “You’re a goddess.” She strokes the pad of her thumb over her favorite freckle, right at the crease of her eye, then presses another kiss to her forehead. “You’re a fuckin’ goddess. Let’s bring this bastard down, yeah?”

A thin sheet of ice now layers over the ground, covered by an even thicker layer of dark fog that moves over the ground like drops of black ink in water. The pirate shivers as the temperature drops, her breaths coming out in clouds. The flames running over her shoulders and down her arms waver, then go out entirely.

Asmodeus’s silhouette is a clear shape between the trees, each of his steps coming down slowly and with force enough to rumble the earth. His eyes glow like two hateful crescents in the dark and the gleam of his teeth are predatory in nature. “Oh, good,” he snarls, gathering ice around the tips of his claws. “Now you’ll get to watch your mother and your pathetic human perish. How many more people need to die for you, Olette?”

Daggers of ice fly off of the demon’s claws. Juno ducks and rolls to the side, Lettie flies up. When the ten daggers land in tree trunks or hit the ground, all that they touch crystallizes into solid ice and shatters with a powerful explosion. Some of the shards hit Juno’s armor, breaking on contact, and only one manages to draw a thin line of blood across the back of her neck. (Melvin has enough sense to use his box of shame as a forcefield, protecting Titania as he waits out his cooling period. He hums a little ditty to himself, then remixes it with some elevator music and whale calls. Titania appears... disturbed.)

Ice continues to explode, Asmodeus not once letting up his assault. He aims not just at the two of them, but also tactfully turns their surroundings into deadly ice traps. The clearing widens as more trees and shrubbery are turned into shrapnel bombs; slick icy craters cover the ground as well, making it particularly dangerous for Juno to run across if she’s not careful. Though it’s the temperature that starts to get to the pirate more than anything else—chills race down her spine, her fingers are unable to curl any tighter around her sword.

Just as she’s wishing for reprieve, a breath of hot air melts the frozen ice land as retaliatory bomberflies swarm Asmodeus. Taking this opportunity her wife has given her, she gets up. Asmodeus sweeps through the remaining bomberflies, causing them to fizzle out before they can explode, and dips to his haunches, pumping his wings a few times. Juno grits down on her jaw, stabbing the tip of her sword into the earth with a grunt. The ground cracks with a rumble. Asmodeus’s foot is sealed into the dirt then forcefully yanked down, swallowing one ankle and causing him to topple forward. His face smashes against a rock and Juno is on top of him a second later, jamming her elbow against the back of his neck, shoving his face into the rough surface. With her knees right under his armpits, she squeezes, holding him firmly in place as she reaches for his wing. Her fingers dig into his skin, where the wing meets the shoulder blade. He writhes beneath her, hissing as the flesh around the appendage melts away. A second later, the bones crackle, shattering all at once. The wing falls, drooping like a wet towel.

Satisfaction doesn’t come for Juno. Asmodeus jerks with a throat ripping cry, throwing the pirate off of his back. His body starts to glow as it grows, the demon forcing himself to push through the stabs of pain to reach his full size. Juno is only just getting to her feet when the demon launches at her, swatting her with an enlarged hand. She breaks through branches, takes the bark off a few trees, before her back hits a thick trunk, sending a crack through it. Her vision blacks out for a few seconds, her lungs fighting to pull in air and the rest of her struggling to defend herself. But as her vision clears and the little birdies stop flying around her head, streaks of white dive towards Asmodeus.

Lettie zig-zags around him, swiping him with her claws each time she passes. His clothes are bloody shreds. He struggles to back away from the attacks in time, swatting at air, never touching the faerie. He growls out, eyes tracking the white dart. Then, suddenly, his eyes lock onto Juno, starstruck and dazed as she watches her wife claw a demon. His lips twist, seamlessly drawing and casting a glyph that he pitches towards the pirate.

Juno barely has time to react. She’s only able to twist around the bend of the tree, but the glyph still catches her, grazing the heel of her boot. The second the spell makes contact, an invisible force winds around her leg like a snake and pulls her down to the ground so that she falls flat on her face. It then whips her into one tree, instantly bruising her side, and back into the ground, once again knocking the wind from her lungs.

“Juju! Were you staring!?” Juju groans as she comes to, head lulling around as she tries to find her wife, not present enough to realize that her wife’s voice is coming from her own head. “You totally were! You let your guard down.” Lettie doesn’t have to tell her that she’s puffing her cheeks. Juno can imagine it perfectly as she struggles to pick herself up again. Though she can’t and it’s not because of sudden weakness or lack of recovery time. The invisible force presses down on her chest, pinning her the ground. Shit.

This happens at the same moment Asmodeus takes advantage of Lettie’s distraction. He sticks his arm out and snares his fingers through her hair. He yanks her backwards and slams her down, creating a crater in the earth. “Filthy minx,” he hisses, raising his fist. “I am going to enjoy turning your body into an obedient little marionette.”

 

[ellarose]

The world sways like a pendulum, dust sprinkling into Lettie's technicolor eyes as it rises in clouds around her. A sharp ring pierces her ears, sparing her from the first half of Asmodeus's ugly taunt. (Boo. If only it were enough to silence him forever.) Unfortunately for him, she hears the rest, the part about her being his faithful marionette, and the enraged sprites hear it too. Their sharp teeth gnash with rage. How many of them have suffered the same depressing fate at this nasty demon's claws? All at once, she wants to pummel him and take a shower to wash herself clean of the massive ick he gives her. It's the sort of ick that crawls over her skin like termites.

Ah, a warm shower with her wife. Or a visit to the hot springs... hell yeah. That's exactly what Lettie wants to do when this is over. (When this is over.) Relaxing their battle-worn muscles, melting into each other. The sweet-smelling and peaceful atmosphere beckons in the most soothing tones. The faerie's finally seeing the light at the other side of the tunnel she's been trapped in. But the fight's not over yet. That only happens if she can keep her head on her shoulders. Asmodeus's claws dig into her scalp, viciously scraping her thoughts away as pain sears through her.

"Gross!" All the stubbornness and spite in the little faerie prompts her to gag instead of cry, her tone pitched high with the girlish disgust that gets on his nerves. "I would literally rather die."

"After all the trouble you've caused, Olette?" Asmodeus's mouth splits in a horrible smile. His fist is raised high, but it's still as he comes up with his retort. "Are you stupid? I thought you knew me better than that. You should know I won't grant you the luxury of a swift, painless death. Only faeries who behave are extended that mercy." The words trigger a flash of memories through Lettie's mind. Behave. It takes her back to the night she was taken to the estate. So small and so scared... dragged into that hall, sobbing, putting all her weight into thrashing away. She screamed. She wanted to go home. She wanted her mother. It wasn't enough. She may have been a child, but not one of them felt pity for her as they sealed her fate. Excruciating pain ensnared the wrist that wears Lina's bracelet now as they welded her soul into those golden shackles. They told her she'd never be free again. Behave or else.

"I'm going to take so much pleasure in breaking you." Asmodeus presses harder against her skull. Not enough to shatter it. Just enough to threaten it, to show her that he could if he wanted to. His claw cuts across the bridge of her nose, hot blood drips down the side of her face. It's the smugness of his voice that causes Lettie to resurface. He got into her head for a second... and he could tell. But what he can't tell is that she's seeing through it as he digs deeper. "Like an architect, I'll rearrange your pieces until you look exactly the way I--"

This guy. Lettie rolls her eyes. She's relived enough of her past by now to know when to snap out of it. To lift her gaze towards the future instead. Towards her wife.

"I'm not going to die here." Lettie muses, a steely contrast to everything she was moments ago. Now she's as cool as the ice Asmodeus weaponizes, her gaze fixed straight ahead without so much as a flinch with claws in her hair and blood on her face. "There's no way I'm going to die here. 'Cause I have all these plans. I'm going to live in an adorable little cottage with my wife. We'll grow a garden to honor Lina and all the other faeries you killed. And as I live my life, happy and content and far away from here, I'll forget all about you."

Lettie glitches through the demon's claws, phasing through them like rainbow water. Rising high in the air, she swoops and flips (mostly for style, sue her) before performing a classic dive-bomb, pinning Asmodeus in the crater so their roles are reversed. She grins, her words barbed and sharp as her fangs. "Lemme think... I'd call you a worm, but I don't want to insult the worms. You're less than the dirt they crawl on." All the hatred in her flows to her fist as she slams it into his face, pressing his cheek into the dirt. "Your estate is burning. Your reputation is in shambles. And you've just been punched in the face by a little fucking faerie."

Wielding her words like knives, Lettie angles each one where she knows they'll hurt. Asmodeus is nothing if not prideful and she knows the fact that she's just a little faerie is going to wound him deeper than anything else. She gets three more solid punches in, her ring leaving a gnarly gash in his forehead, before he lurches and throws her off with an outraged roar.

Lettie catches herself in midair, her phantom wings beating frantically behind her, and darts her gaze around to find... Juno. She's right where she was before. (She hasn't gotten back up since...?) "Babe, you good?" She reaches out to her before gliding over to her side. If she weren't so worried, she might've asked if her beauty really knocked her out that hard. Something's wrong. This isn't like Juno. "What's going on?"

Asmodeus cackles behind them, sounding so unlike his usual self. He's always been unhinged, but now he's scarcely disguising it with his wild hair, wilder eyes, lopsided wing and broken horn. Not to mention the gash that resembles a rose smack dab the middle of his forehead-- just like the rose on the ring that put it there.

"Watch closely, Olette. I'm going to crush her like a bug." Asmodeus clenches a fist, reinforcing the unseen force that pulls Juno down. The earth beneath her starts to split with lightning-bolt cracks. "I don't know what happened to that abomination Angelus, human... but your luck ends now." He spits. "Any last words?"

Lettie reaches for Juno's hand. She can't see what's hurting her, but she frantically channels her energy towards her wife-- imploring her to take it, to do whatever she needs to break his spell. "Juju, I need you." She looks at their hands clasped together, at Lina's bracelet on her wrist. The frightened part of herself wants to cry, to plead with her not to leave her-- but she's got to stay strong right now. They've come this far. They have three outcomes. "We both know it's not luck that got you this far."

 

[starboob]

When Juno realizes that she cannot move, that the invisible force has wrapped around her so wholly that she cannot so much as lift a finger or turn her head, she wills herself to remain calm, to let go of the panic that screams she’s going to die. (Lettie won’t let that happen.) On Desdemonia, to remain still is to surrender. It’s signing one’s own death sentence. Now it means survival. It means conserving her energy, because if she pushes herself beyond her limits, she might not live long enough to say that it was worth it.

‘Three outcomes.’ Destroying her own body will not be what gets them to one of those outcomes. And destroying her own body will not be what secures that bright future with a cottage by the lake. This is about more than just surviving this fight. This is about ensuring that she actually gets to enjoy her life with Lettie, their weird cat, and even weirder family (and Thad, she guesses). This is about making sure that she’ll still have a life worth living when all is said and done. So she lies still, counting the seconds to distract herself from the tempting ploys to break free. She closes her eyes and thinks about her wife, her soft lips and gentle touch; the way she looks at Juno, like she is her entire world… Gradually, her heart stops beating so fast and her breathing slows. ‘This is how you survive, Juju.’

And, as if summoned by her very (gay) thoughts, Lettie reaches out to her and she’s by her side not even a second late. Her eyes crack open, the good one drinking in the sight of a total stunner. Battleworn is a good look on her. Even so, Asmodeus drew blood and for that, Juno is determined to—

Pressure stomps on Juno’s chest, threatening to crush her like she’s made of tin. Her armor crumples, compressing around her body. The metal digs into her skin, tearing into her flesh and adding to her assortment of bruises. With each strangled breath or gasp, her lung capacity shrinks. When panic comes, she lets it take over, struggling against the invisible force, writhing as much as she can even if some part of her knows that brute force won’t be what frees her; she doesn’t even move an inch. Her eyes bulge as a guttural noise claws out of her throat. Asmodeus chuckles behind them, squeezing his fist ever so slightly, forcing more precious air from the pirate’s lungs. (What will kill her first? The lack of oxygen or her innards splattering all over her silly little wife?)

"Juju, I need you."

Pulses of her wife’s magic flow through their connected hands, reminding Juno of her presence. It’s always a risk to use her necromancy without a proper conduit, like her demon blade, but when the alternative is being crushed to death? She might not have a choice.

Survival instincts take over. A violent tremor rips through the floating island creating a chasm that splits it in two. Asmodeus loses his footing, releasing Juno from his spell as he narrowly avoids rolling off the newly formed cliffside. The moment she is free, Juno gasps, coughing and shuddering, fighting to pull in fresh oxygen. Her hands grope around her armor, searching for the clasps around the chest plate, whining with each movement. But Lettie is right there and she hastily works to undo the clips. When Juno hears the release, she rips the chest plate off then falls to the side, gulping in ragged breaths. Lettie’s fingers thread through her hair, coaxing her, then blue flowers pour over her middle. Juno winces against the cooling effect, then sighs as the aches fade into something bearable. “Lette—”

In an instant, Juno flips their position, reaching for her bedazzled knife. She ignores the aches that come with each movement, focusing solely on the wave of golden flames that rises over them. The pirate doesn’t hesitate. As the wave reaches its peak and starts to crash, she drags her knife down and splits it so that the two pieces fall over on either side of the forest. Asmodeus reacts without missing a beat. His golden fire barely touches the trees before he gathers them back up, willing them into a vortex that he lifts over his head, holding—

Juno’s heart sinks. Not because she failed to put out the fire, but because in Asmodeus’s hand, is her demon sword. “I must congratulate you for making good use of Abelia.” When he squeezes the blade, the fuller brightens along with the flames. Heat spreads throughout the forest, melting away the last of the ice. (Juno is almost glad she had to ditch the armor as sweat beads over her.) “The little bitch is far more useful to me like this.”

With a single sweep, he fans the flames out towards them. And, this time, those flames morph into the shape of a giant phoenix.

 

[ellarose]

'No one needs you in the arena, Olette. A faerie with a useless source like yours is only good for her pretty face.'

Night falls and the stars come out to watch over them. They fill their arena in the sky, billions of miles away. Unreachable. (Not useless.) Down on Avangeline, it's Lettie and Juno's wedding night and it could be their last as they're painted in the violent oranges of a fiery phoenix. The faerie can't help thinking bitterly that the only heat they ought to feel on such a night should be between their bodies, pressed close beneath the covers, hands and lips exploring each other's-- Fuck's sake. Get with it, Letts. Sweat trickles down her back, it sticks wisps of hair around her face and neck, and she is definitely going to need a shower after this. Ah, geez. Now's not the time for those shower thoughts either.

When Lettie glimpses Juno at her side, her bruised skin and discarded armor, it's hard not to blame herself for all of this. How many lives might have been spared if she had gone quietly? ...But if alternatively, how many lives are they saving by dismantling a system that has tortured the fae of Avangeline since Cerise's time? Cerise had been fighting for change. Though she was misguided, there must have been something that led her to believe that she could change the world. All this time, it's been about the relics, the relics, the relics...

The faerie's rainbow eyes dart around searchingly. This is a puzzle she needs to solve. But now's not the time to examine each piece under a microscope when the phoenix opens it's maw to shriek at them, hosing a stream of fire towards the pair. Thankfully for Lettie, Juno is paying attention for the both of them and tackles her to the ground, sending them rolling out of its path.

'So you're telling me you broke into your old school to steal... textbooks. Gotta confess, I didn't see that one coming.' Lina snorted, flicking the cover of the book in Lettie's hands. That earned her a cheek puff. 'You really miss school that much? Who would've thought that the Olette Lycoris Radiata is actually a huge friggin' nerd?' She laughed. (That laugh used to be her whole world.) 'I think it's cool. No, really. You're way more than a pretty face, you know? That ass Asmodeus won't see it coming when you tear this whole place apart.'

Fire crackles around them as it devours trees and bushes. Lettie closes her eyes tight, reaching desperately out for the stars. Asmodeus swats her bomberflies away dismissively, like they're nothing. Even with assistance from the sprites they're not enough. She needs to come up with something bigger-- something better. Come on. The phoenix swoops overhead, searching for its prey. It's decidedly worse than the goose who chased her through the Belladonna's gardens. Come on.

The phoenix screeches and Lettie's heart drops. It sees them. The heat is inescapable and she realizes they might have to make a choice. Either they burn alive or--

Lettie grabs onto Juno, throwing them both over the side of the island. Mere seconds later, a stream of fire scorches the earth they were just lying on. It was the right choice. It was, but...

"Shit!" They may not be burning alive, but now they're falling. The faerie keeps her arms wrapped tightly around her pirate's middle and with a soft grunt, her phantom wings expand and fold around them in a protective cocoon. Her wings offer shelter from the whipping winds, enough that she can lower her voice to a whisper and still be heard. "Fuck." Lettie looks at Juno apologetically. She was nearly crushed and now here she is, crushing her in an embrace. "Am I hurting you? I'm sorry." Still, it's not like she can let go now. She's got her.

"I think we'll be okay... provided we don't land in a flaming pit of lava." Lettie offers lamely. There are no flaming pits of lava on Avangeline, thank goodness. Though it really seemed like Asmodeus was trying to create one up there. "I know you don't like this kind of thing." Well, yeah. Most people don't like the concept of falling off the side of a floating island, plummeting down into the unknown. "But at least we have a moment to ourselves?" She purses her lips. "What should we do? Giant butterfly? Insect army? Or maybe we could call the crew for backup?"

 

[starboob]

“It’s fine. I’m fine.” Juno is not, in fact, fine and the uncharacteristically high pitch of her tone might be what gives her away if her green cheeks weren’t enough to signal that she is violently ill. The pressure on her bruises is the least of her concerns as they plummet towards certain doom. ‘How is she being so chill about this?’ That thought manages to break through the string of incoherent ones that flood her mind as she chooses between holding down her last meal and contemplating how she wants to spend her last few seconds.

Though it dawns on her that Lettie wouldn’t’ve thrown them over the cliffside for no reason. So either dying by Asmodeus’s molten gold fire is not how the little faerie wants to go out or she has a plan. And it soon becomes clear that it’s the latter.

Unfortunately, Juno isn’t able to do anything with that information. Vaguely, she knows she stutters something out, but whatever she intends to say gets caught behind the stomach sitting in her throat. Her vision spots and, a second later, she’s slack in Lettie’s arms.

***​

Her head swims through a thick sparkly mist. Dazedly, she tries to place where she is, though nothing registers as familiar. It’s all sparkly mist, like she’s trapped in Lettie’s actual brain fog. ‘Where… Am I?’

“You are the one who deals with death.” A disembodied voice floats through the mists, coming at the necromancer from all sides. She spins around, spinning herself too hard as she floats in midair (?). Her arms flail out, trying to stop her momentum. It half works, and it’s the voice (she thinks) that puts a stop to her spin. The voice titters, not mocking but amused; like a mother fondly watching a toddler make a delightful new discovery. “You are safe, Captain Juno of Desdemonia.”

“How—? Who—?”

“Have you not already guessed who I am?” The voice gives the impression that she is tilting her head. She does not, however, give up her identity. (Much to the frustration of the pirate.) “You must find us and set us free, alongside the one who bears the blessing of the stars. You have everything you need to end this.” Something pokes Juno’s chest and when she looks down, a soft pink light glows right where her heart is. “Break the seal, destroy the rot.”

“That doesn’t make any sense!”

“Goodbye, Captain Juno.”

***​

“Juju! Juno—”

When Juno comes back to reality, the world spins around her—the real world, not the one made of sparkly mist and filled with a disembodied voice that speaks in riddles. Her wife’s hand is cupping her cheek. They’re no longer falling, though Juno can’t say where they are specifically. Floating islands drift peacefully above Lettie. These ones are covered in a layer of moss and lichen with scraggly old trees that seem to be near death. A purplish mist crawls over the island they’re on and some hangs overhead as well, blocking out the island they originally fell from. The air down here is colder, clammier. However far they fell, it must be a long forgotten piece of Avangeline as the traces of death here are ancient, almost stale.

She rubs her forehead, gingerly peeling herself from the bed of moss her wife must have set her down on. (How, though? Her arms are little twigs…) An immediate wave of nausea crashes over her. She inhales sharply, clenching her stomach before it can spill out everywhere. It passes, leaving her with only a faint trace of sickness. “Eugh. That was ass.”

Nevermind the fact that Captain fucking Juno once dropped Lady out of the sky to escape Clay and his fleet of steward ships. That was different. For one, Juno was in control of that situation and, two, possible death was preferable to getting recaptured and tossed into prison again. Not to say that Juno would have rather been burned alive, but a little warning might have been nice.

“Where are we?” Juno pulls herself up from the ground, using Lettie as support as she steadies herself. As far as she can tell, they’re safe. No one is pursuing them. Though it doesn’t sit right with Juno to be standing idle while their friends and family fight. She rolls her hands into fists, whipping her head around their surroundings, gradually recalling what Lettie had said prior to her blacking out. (And ending up in that weird space with that even weirder, overly familiar voice. She’d mention it, if it weren’t for their current predicament.) “Nevermind that. We need to get back.”

She reaches out for one of the scraggly branches, placing her palm against it. An instant wash of magic filters in through her palm, shrinking the tree until it’s ash. “This place is full of old spirits and dead shit.” That might be more than a little obvious. “We could make those assholes pay with this kind of power.”

***​

They lead an army of the undead on the back of giant death’s-head hawkmoth.

After Juno appropriated a broken tree branch into a staff (large stick), waking up the Dead Wood took no more than joining with Lettie and sending out a pulse of magic. Exactly one second later, the spirits rushed through in a gust and the buried skeletons (and exoskeletons) broke free of the earth. It was a cinch.

As they get closer to the estate’s islands, the sound of screams and clashing steel grows louder. Lady’s cannons echo through the night and light up the skies, along with the numerous fires that have since started. Their army of the undead moves without noise, barely even disturbing the cover of smoke and clouds. Juno directs them to fly over the two island pieces, making sure to stay within the cover of smoke or clouds. She squints her one eye and as she spots members of their rebellion locked in battle, she dispatches small units of spirits and bone (or shell) to aid their allies. Bugs swarm over one estate demon, gnawing through their skin. The chimera they found bounds towards Lady, attacking the estate demons that are now crawling over their ship. A giant skeleton drops from the sky and just flattens an estate cannon along with the three demons operating it.

She only stops this when she finds Asmodeus ripping through their rebellion on the ground. Though he’s grounded, his inability to fly does not seem to deter him. He lassos down angels and faeries alike, hacking through them with Juno’s sword. Worse, he's gunning for Valerie and she's distracted, hunched over Ravan and trying to rouse him. She growls lowly, gripping her staff (large stick). Instinctively, she calls to the fire sprite from before.

The mischievous little orb giddily peels herself from Lettie's dress and swarms Juno, lighting her on fire; the white stripe in hair ignites without actually burning anything. "I'll hold off Asmodeus so you can make sure they get somewhere safe. Or we can switch. Just tell me what to do, Queen of the Demon Bugs."

 

[ellarose]

"My. It is a wonder that you've made it this far, having been taught so little about your source." Calytrix shook her head, a troubled crease pinched between her brows. "Forgive me, I do not mean to offend. I do not even know where to begin. You are capable of far more than just your glamours and your... bomberflies, was it? Those are abilities any faerie can harness. What truly makes her stand out is the nature of her source. The stars, with their connections to wishes and dreams, are brimming with limitless potential. You have limitless potential. There is only so much I can teach you in the time we have now. But know this, Olette--" Her eyes narrowed. "Those who kept you in the dark are afraid to see you shine."

"...You sound like a fortune cookie." Lettie had joked at the time, attempting to ignore the childlike inclination to lean towards the other faerie for the validation and answers she'd always been craving. "I can assure you, no one has kept me from shining." She popped her hip out sassily, flipping her hair over her shoulder. A second later, she bit her lip and tilted her head to the side. "I did connect with the stars briefly. It was wonderful. I was so absorbed in the feeling of it, I just did what I could to survive. Blasting rainbows and junk." Pretty explosions and blasts won't solve every problem, though, and she knew she had tons of problems waiting for her back home. "What, for example, should I be able to do with my source that I haven't already done?"

"Our source is divine, Olette. It requires patience, mental fortitude, and the ability to look within oneself and listen." Calytrix spoke sagely, making a tent with her fingers. "Many look upon the stars for guidance, for insights into our past, present and future. Dreamers lend them power with their wishes. It is challenging to master that much power... but incredibly rewarding once you learn. Instead of blasting rainbows and junk, you could use that energy to look into the future, or create something new. You could grant wishes. Let me teach you a few meditations before you embark."

"Do you..." Lettie hesitated, a flicker of fear betraying itself in her gaze. No one's first impression of her is that she has depth. It's always the surface level shit, the fake shit and this is... probably as deep as deep gets. "Do you really think I'm capable of all that?"

***​

“The stars are ancient, Olette. Listen to their wisdom.”

The goddess's words echo alongside the remnants of Calytrix's lesson. But what if Lettie can't process their wisdom over the sound of this calamity? What if she can't reach it again? "Hasn't anyone taught you that we're all made of stardust? The air in your lungs, every muscle and bone, the blood in your veins was created inside a star. Everything you need..." The other faerie held a hand over her heart. "It's already inside you, Olette. Open yourself up to it. Don't be afraid."

Juno embraces the energy her fallen sisters lend her and all Lettie can think is that she's so strong. The strongest person she's ever known. It'd be preferable to stay near her, to stay together. She doesn't ever want to let go of her hand again. They've done incredible things standing side by side. Together. Can she really... can she really take down a demon like Asmodeus all on her own? There's an uncomfortable twist in her stomach when she thinks back to him crushing her bomberflies. Stealing her voice, stealing her life.

Valerie and Ravan need help. Lettie understands why they need to split up. (...Doesn't mean she has to like it.)

Juno looks to her, calls her a queen, and Lettie is terrified, trembling imperceptibly amidst the chaos. But this is her fight. Just as the Duchess was Juno's monster to slay-- Asmodeus is hers. Who would she be, sending Juno in to fight it for her? Juno hates to fight. (Yet she'd fight for Lettie unhesitatingly, just as she's been doing since they got here.) Still. The faerie's not going to ask that of her. Not after she nearly got crushed to death. Not after she passed out in her arms, plummeting from a flaming island. It's time she lives up to the potential that Juno, Lina, Calytrix, and even the goddess see in her. (Or die trying.)

"I'll hold him off, Juju. I got this." By some miracle, Lettie is able to keep her voice steady as she says this. She rises to her toes, presses a brief kiss to Juno's cheek, and stealthily unhooks her whip from her belt. "Let me borrow this, kay? I love you!"

Lettie can't help looking back once before she goes. Just in case. 'Be careful, Juno.'

Glitching around the area, Lettie positions herself to sneak behind Asmodeus. She puts on a determined face, snapping the whip against him from his left side to his right before lassoing it around his waist. Once it's secure, she flies backward with all her might to yank him away from Valerie and Ravan. The demon's feet drag through the dirt and he stumbles backward. Before he can fall he nimbly twists himself around and regains his balance. "You." Asmodeus glowers, reaching for the end of the whip. He pulls, flooding Lettie's mind with memories of being dragged behind him by those wretched gold chains.

In retaliation, Lettie sends bomberflies flowing down the length of the whip like electricity through a wire. Not this time, asshole. Asmodeus tosses the end of the whip before they can reach him, swiping the sword to dissolve them just as he had the others. The faerie reins the whip back in. When she throws it out again, she aims at the broken horn atop his head. This time he falls flat on his face.

Heh. Lettie opens her hands, sending more bomberflies for him, covering his back in them. Asmodeus growls and rolls, smothering them before he brings himself back up to his feet. He pushes his hand out, poised to attack with a blast of his own... when he realizes the faerie isn't standing there anymore. She charges in at his side instead, knocking him back down to the ground. Their momentum has them rolling down the hill, away from everyone else.

"Bitch." Asmodeus spits, panting. He scrambles to stand first, raising the demon sword. "You could never learn your place, could you? Your arrogance will be the death of you."

Despite all the confidence Lettie fronts, the moments she honestly feels it it to her core are fleeting. The scale of it tips up and down as she has good days and bad days, successes and failures. It's an endless battle, it's the makeup of who she is. She's been told she's not enough. She's been told that she is enough. Recently, she's been beaten down with cries of meaningless, meaningless, meaningless to the point of exhaustion. Which voice should she listen to now? The answer is obvious.

Asmodeus sends arcs of fiery energy towards Lettie with each swipe of the blade. She dodges each attack, zigzagging and glitching through those she's not fast enough to avoid entirely. He grows frustrated with his inability to land a hit, his strokes only become faster and faster. Sweat beads at the faerie's brow. It's apparent that her bomberflies won't be enough. She can't spare even a single moment on a complex glamour or will'o wisps. All her go-to tricks are useless here. He gains on her, charging when he sees his opportunity.

Lettie manages to move before the demon sword can sink into her heart. It gets her in the side instead. The faerie grits her teeth, unable to help herself from crying out. Hot blood spills as Asmodeus yanks it out. He lifts it again, smirking as he drinks in her agonized expression.

"It didn't have to come to this, you know." Asmodeus cackles. "Are you going to be good from now on? Or will I have to--"

"There’s a lot I don’t know and even less when it comes to you, because you’re not like others. You’re the fucking faerie.”

Lettie has to embrace all of herself. Not just the parts that make her magical, but everything she's ever been through to get to this point. She the fucking faerie. Not 'just' a faerie. Not useless. She made it this far, never knowing the extent of what she was capable of. She can take it over the top now, if she can find the courage to reach for it. And instead of reaching out towards the sky above her, to heights she could never possibly reach, all she has to do is reach inside.

'Do you have a wish?' Instinctively, Lettie takes the blade of the demon sword in her hands. This time it doesn't cut through her flesh. She can sense the spirit living within, angry and desperate to move on. However, it seems to sense her will in turn. It doesn't touch her... and the faerie knows what she must do. (It was a cool sword. Lettie swears she'll help Juno get a new one one of these days. A new weapon will be in order anyway, considering the wedding traditions they've discussed. Hopefully... hopefully after this, they'll never have a need for weapons again. If she makes it, anyway.) 'If you help me now, I'll set you free.'

The sword doesn't hesitate. It morphs, reversing itself so the hilt rests in Lettie's hand and the tip points at Asmodeus's heart. His lips part, making an 'o' shape, perhaps to form her name... but the faerie doesn't hesitate, either. She's bleeding, she's exhausted, and she's perfectly content knowing that she's not going to have to waste another breath on the likes of him.

Lettie takes the chance that she's been given, driving the blade up into Asmodeus's chest.

 

[starboob]

“What’s going on? Where’s he hurt?” Juno slides down next to Ravan, out of breath. It takes a concentrated amount of her effort to avoid looking over the older angel’s shoulder, to catch glimpses of her wife. If she tempts herself now, she will abandon their family. (Even if she understand that this is Lettie’s fight, she hates that she’s alone in it after she promised to be at her side. But their family needs her.) She forces her attention on the angels and reminds herself that they will be part of that brilliant future, visiting the lovers at their cottage beside the lake.

Her stormy gray eye is fixed on Valerie, blurring out everything else. The older angel is a mess of worry. Her disheveled state—the scrapes, bruises, and burns that mark her—add layers to her panic. One fist is clenched around Ravan’s shirt collar and the other cups her sweet boy’s cheek. She does not take her eyes off her child even when she sense the pirate’s presence. (Wasn’t it just yesterday he was a little fledgling?) “I don’t know—I don’t know. Got hit with a glyph. Didn’t see what kind.” Her words and sentences come out in a rush, speaking in clipped fragments. “Dom’s busy with Titania.”

Juno touches Ravan’s forehead, closing her one eye as she concentrates on the space between his cells, reading his vitals as she would a book. “He’s got rib fractures. One’s broken, didn’t pierce the lung. Right hand, broken.” Her brow twitches with focus. “Lost a lot of blood. The glyph, though—think it was a sleep spell.” Before Valerie can react or so much as begin to process this information, Juno looks over her shoulder and whistles by sticking her thumb and forefinger between her lips. Three seconds later, the giant death’s-head lands beside them. To Valeria she says, “Help me get him on,” and to the moth she says, “Get them to their cottage. Keep them safe.”

Once they hoist Ravan onto the moth, Valerie climbs aboard to hold him steady. Before Juno can turn around to search for her wife among the chaos, the angel sets her hand on the pirate’s shoulder. (As with Lettie, the flames on her shoulders do no harm to Valerie.) “Get her back safe.”

“I’ll tear this world apart to make that happen.” That’s a promise and they both know it. Wasting no more time, Juno sends the moth away and, at last, returns her attention to the ongoing fights. As she pans over the area, she reaches out to their army of the undead and continues to dispatch their troops as necessary. On occasion, she throws herself into the fray, hardening her bones down to dense, unbreakable things now that she’s without most of her armor. Deftly, she sneaks up on their enemies, touching the nobs at the top of their necks with her staff (large stick) to shatter spines or turn their bones to flames. To make Nico proud and to tell him a good story when this is all over (because it will be over and they will see their Desdemonian family again), she explodes a few heads.

Gore covers her. Her knuckles are split from the faces she’s punched. (Well, and she might have also used her bone magic on herself to give herself spiked fists.) She tears through the field searching for her wife. The demon bugs from their army stay close to the pirate, watching her back as she runs through the field. ‘Damnit, Lette. Where are you?’

As if reading her thoughts, one of the bumblys runs into Juno’s forehead then turns to race down the slope of the hill. Juno rushes to follow. She drops down to her hip to keep up with the bumbly, reaching the bottom just as Asmodeus goes slack against the the blade—her blade—and starts to slip. He's pushed over to the side before the weight of his body can crush her wife. Juno’s eye zigzags between the two. Once she’s certain that the demon won’t be getting up again, ultimately (and obviously) she races towards her faerie, her fucking faerie. Her arms close around Lettie, maybe hugging her a little too tightly, but she cannot be assed to care. “Lette,” she breathes out her name with relief then sniffles. Everything she held back comes back in a rush now that she knows it’s over. “You’re...”

She frowns, pulling away from Lettie when she notices a sticky, hot wet patch spreading over her own torso. When she looks down, she finally notices the bleeding wound. "Fuck." The necromancer presses her palm to the gaping hole, immediately feeling the sparks of magic that are innate to every faerie and especially the fucking faerie. It's spilling out of her. Fast. “Shit. Shit—” Her curses merge together soon after that.

And with all her focus on Lettie, she doesn’t notice Asmodeus’s body disappearing around the sword. She doesn’t even remember he is there. She doesn’t even remember her sword. (Cool as it was.) She keeps her hand on Lettie’s side, stemming the flow of blood with her necromancy as she takes them back up the hillside.

By the time they reach the top, the tide of the battle is in their favor. Few estate demons are left to defend a place that hardly even exists anymore. Some try to reach for the newly escaped faeries, trying to activate their golden chains and when nothing happens their eyes widen. A few drop to their knees, begging for mercy they never allowed. The faeries look between themselves, eyes sparking with malice. They come down on their tormentors without hesitating, tearing them to shreds.

The estate still burns, massive as it is, and loud crackles of fire fill the night air, overtaking the subsiding cannon blasts and screams. As they walk past it, the roof collapses in on itself and, here, Lettie stops, staring at the wreckage; the roaring flames. Juno squeezes her hand. “Want to blow it up?”

 

[ellarose]

"I can't believe it." Lettie whispers tiredly, reciprocating Juno's hand-squeeze and resting her head against her shoulder. Even with her wife's hand in hers, the warmth from the flames on her skin, and the sharp pain in her side... seeing this outcome as anything more than just a distant dream is nothing short of extraordinary. Her white eyes reflect wonder and fire. "Like... is this for real?" Asmodeus, the estate, the chains holding all of her fae sisters hostage... incinerated. The things she spent her entire life fearing are now a pile of ashes. Stars. Lettie and Lina used to sit in their spot in the courtyard with their lunches, fantasizing about the ways they'd blow the place up. When Juno asks if she wants to blow it up now, it's not just a theoretical fantasy. She means it.

The place is already toast as it is now, but Lettie still nods and raises her hand. A tiny blue flame whispers to life in her palm, whimsically flickering this way and that before taking the shape of a crystal butterfly. (Blue, the color of her hair the day they met. Blue, the color Juno claimed as her favorite. Blue, in honor of them and of Lina.) The bomberfly's wings emit tiny trails of diamond dust every time they flap. She focuses her energy on it, calling out to the sprites and inviting them to pack all the hatred they feel for the estate inside of it. It glows brighter yet, as bright as a star in the sky.

"Are you ready for it?" Lettie looks up determinedly at Juno, their faces illuminated softly in the halo of it's light. She urges the bomberfly to fly above them and it grows to the size of a cannonball, swirling with the rainbow colors of the sprites vengeance. It's one last 'fuck you' to the estate and everything it stands for.

"Okey dokie. Rain hellfire down on this bitch." Lettie instructs it, kissing the tips of her fingers and saluting just before it flies into the heart of the flames. The faerie hugs onto her wife's arm as she watches it go. One, two, three, four--

BOOM! The flames bloom out even further, swirling like a massive rose of fire, and the estate is no more. The remaining pillars holding it upright crumble to dust. Lettie twists around to face Juno, holding her arms up and waggling her fingers to signal her tall wife to lean down to meet her halfway. She wraps her arms lovingly around her broad shoulders and kisses her as passionately as the flames dancing all around them, illuminating their romantic silhouette on the hill. When they part for air, the faerie whispers. "Have I ever told you it was a dream of mine to make out in front of an explosion?" She grins and closes the distance again, going in for a deeper kiss this time. She sticks one of her legs up to match her fantasy exactly as she envisioned it in her head. (She loves her so damned much.) "It's so cinematic." The faerie kisses her wife again and again, not taking a single one for granted. "We made it."

This development puts an official end to the fighting. Any demon lucky enough to have survived thus far is wise enough to leave now and accept defeat. The faeries once bound by the estate gather around to see what has become of it with their own eyes. As the sound of the explosion subsides, a new noise erupts as faeries cheer and embrace each other. They scream obscenities at the flames and throw out their middle fingers. There's a mix of victorious cries and mournful ones for the sisters they lost along the way. The youngest faeries wave their fists in the air and begin a spirited chant. "We're not yours to keep, you narcissistic creeps!" According to gossip circulating through the crowd, it was originated by the brave teenage faeries who plotted to burn the estate down. They might be gone now, but their schemes and dreams have become a reality. They won't be forgotten.

In true faerie fashion, many of them begin to pull flasks out of their magic circles. A faerie Lettie recognizes-- Daisy-- goes as far as to pull out a massive bottle of champagne. When she pops it and waves it in the air, it prompts a spirited celebration. (Leave it to the fae to have the energy to party in the aftermath of a massive fucking battle.) "You guys gonna stay? We're thinking of dancing on the ashes once the fire's out." She grins.

"No thanks. I wanna to go to bed... I'm tired." Lettie shakes her head. While Juno's stemmed the bleeding, she needs time to recover from her wounds. (They both do.) Besides, she won't be in the right mindset to celebrate until she checks on her family. The last time she saw mother... "Maybe some other--"

"Oh, c'mon girl! The estate is burning up and it's your freaking wedding night!" Daisy wags the bottle enticingly, bubbly liquid spilling from its mouth. "At least have a glass of champagne before you go? I bought it especially for you."

***​

They're persuaded to stay for two glasses of champagne before the cube escorts them home. They check Lady for damages and stragglers as well as ask the cubes for updates on what happened to everyone. Ariel, Ravan and their moms are in rough shape, but they're recovering and safe in their cottage. Titania is still being looked after-- but she's stable. The crew have misplaced some of their bones, but they'll be all right. Once everyone is accounted for, the couple is able to retire to their room for the evening.

They spend the night talking softly, catching each other up on everything they did while split up. Lettie tells Juno about the Reaper, about how she wrecked Asmodeus's plans and the story she was told. Juno tells her about her fight with Angelus.

"We're gonna get a take-two of our wedding night." Lettie mumbles exhaustedly against Juno's collarbone. "The one we were dreaming about before. We're still gonna make that happen, Juju... with the celebrations, the feast, and the cords..." She draws her fingertips innocuously along the pirate's stupidly buff arm, thinking about all of the traditions they talked about before their lives were thrown into utter turmoil. "The oils and topicals."

"Now that I'm free, nothing's gonna stop us." Lettie purses her lips. "And you better believe I'm gonna pick out a damned dress!" She brings her hand out in front of them, examining her sparkly new ring with newfound excitement. She's free. She's finally free. "Something that compliments this lovely rock on my finger."

 

[starboob]

Could this be real? Is this really happening? Juno blinks, staring straight up at the canopy above their bed in their home, their pirate ship. Idly, she traces patterns on Lettie’s back, beneath her shirt. The tips of her fingers graze over the long twin scars on her back, then draw hearts around her shoulder blade.

Even if the peace of this moment is proof that they made it, Juno is still in as much disbelief as Lettie. Though she knows it’s not over, that there still is the Reaper to defeat and the heart to cure, it might as well be over. With Lettie freed of her curses and Juno at the peak of her power, they are unstoppable. (As if anything has stopped them before. Not even drugging them and carting them off to a fucking space could stop them.) Facing the Reaper is little more than a formality at this point. Not that Juno is underestimating the mutated creature that lives at the center of Avangeline’s core; it’s just that she’s not underestimating their strength either. They’ve done the impossible before, so what’s one more time?

She presses her nose to the top of her Lettie’s damp head, inhaling the sweet floral notes of her shampoo. Is this really it? Have they really done it? The question keeps rearing in Juno’s mind, part of her unsure what it will mean to really be done with all of this. What does life even look like without chaos to rule it? They’ve dreamed about it before—talked about their cottage, the memory garden, and their weird family enough times that she’s able to visualize it in such detail that her last wish can project the fantasy in stark detail. And it’s one thing to fantasize, it’s another to know that she can finally grasp that reality for what it is. Real. An actuality. So long as they’re smart about what they do next, that is going to be their life.

But Juno doesn’t know how she’s going to cope with that. She doesn’t know what she’s going to do with herself. Her entire life has been survival and fighting. It’s all she knows. What if she’s no good at living? What if her hands are no good at creating? Building a future? What if all she is capable of is destruction and violence? Who is Juno if not a fighter, however reluctant?

Lettie puts out her worries and provides a welcome distraction in talking about their wedding. Second wedding. (Even if they had a normal life, would one wedding have ever been enough for how gay they are? For how extra Lettie is?) For now, she decides to take this one day at a time. And it’s easy to forget about her present worries when oils and topicals are mentioned. Her own face floods bright, cherry red, imagining the oils running down Lettie’s back… Rubbing them into her muscles…

The shade then deepens when she considers Lettie in her wedding dress. “Just try not to kill me with whatever you pick out. I don’t think my heart can take too much more.” It’s a joke, obviously, though it is true her heart has been through a lot—between the Guardian’s blade going through it and Angelus crushing it, she doesn’t think it can take many more beatings than that. And Lettie in a stunner dress could very well be the death of her. (It wouldn’t be a bad way to go, to be honest.) “I might have to wear something just as stunning to protect myself.” And maybe she wants her wife drooling over her on their second wedding day. (And night, since this one isn’t very wifely.) "Do they make cropped suit jackets?"

She reaches for Lettie’s hand in the air, pulling it down to her lips, kissing both the finger and the rose-diamond. “Wish I had a better view of your rockin’ Asmodeus with this thing.” It’s late and only getting later, yet the pirate doesn’t want to sleep. Not because of a stubborn belief that she doesn’t need it, but because she wants to keep hanging out with her wife. Even if tomorrow exists, she wants to hold onto this peace before the last battle.

“How are you? After all of that?” When Lettie asked Juno this question following the Duchess’s execution, she hadn’t known how to process it. (Still doesn’t, if she’s being honest.) “I mean… you’re free. All your sisters are.” No faerie has to fear the fate of being marked.

 

[ellarose]

Lettie's smiling like a dork just listening to Juno speak. Listening to her wife speak. Even while she struggles to hold her head up as exhaustion weighs her body down against the mattress, there's not an ounce of it that could stamp out her happiness. Against all odds, they've made it and found a path forward. She gets to admire her wife's lopsided grin and delight in the softness of her touch. (That kind of softness coming from the badass pirate surprised her, once upon a time. Now it's familiar. It's home.) If anything's going to make her pass out now, it won't be tiredness. Instead, she'll be fainting as she daydreams about her wife in a cropped suit jacket.

After a while, Lettie can't help but giggle. It makes her giddy with joy-- the butterflies, the way Juno gets her so flustered. Their lives have been so action-packed lately that it's a rare moment that she gets to sit and bask in what they have. It's everything.

"I was just thinking about the first night I spent in this bed..." Lettie explains her laughter, "How beyond pissed you were when you found me in here." She snorts. It's funny, looking back on those memories now. Neither of them ever would have believed what the universe had in store for them at the time-- that in this very same bed, Juno would eventually admit that the sight of the little fucking faerie in a wedding dress might be her undoing. "I was in my underwear. So shameless. Now here I am, blushing like a schoolgirl over oils and topicals and cropped suit jackets. And yes, by the way, those are totally a thing! I bet Valerie would help you pick something out."

Though when the faerie considers the ring on her finger, Juno may not need much help at all in assembling a wedding look of her own. She suspects she might appreciate the company, though. Valerie knows her jackets and Lettie can see how she'd get along well with the pirate. It warms her heart, hearing that they've accepted Juno with open arms.

Lettie's fingertips glide over Juno's abs, feather-light as she envisions their next wedding night. After all the shit they've been through, they've more than earned the right to celebrate exactly the way they want to. Making the leap from girlfriends to wives is a huge fucking deal! If they hadn't been through the wringer these last few days, she'd have partied with all the rest of the faeries on the estate's ashes. For now, though, she's perfectly content in her pirate's arms. She's slowly but surely relaxing with her relief, repeating to herself that they made it. Her expression turns thoughtful when Juno levels with her and asks how she's feeling.

"I don't think I've processed it yet. It'll take some time before it actually sinks in." Lettie muses. That was her life for nearly as long as she can remember. "I bet it'll hit me when we move into our cottage." When, not if. Because while she's still in a state of disbelief, she believes in them to see this through to the end. "My sisters are free... Asmodeus is gone." She says it aloud, as if she's still trying to convince herself that this is indeed the reality they're living. There was a time she thought it was impossible to break free of the estate's hold, and now...

Juno said she wished it wasn't her after she took out the Duchess. When it comes to Asmodeus, though, Lettie finds herself feeling the opposite. She relishes the fact that he died by her hand. In that single act, she freed all the faeries he cursed. Spared them from being used, humiliated, or drained of everything they had. The faerie looks at her hands. Maybe she ought to feel at least an inkling of remorse... but she doesn't. She grows lighter with each moment she considers the enormity of everything that transpired, what it means for faeries like her.

"He's gone. He's not going to hurt anyone else." Lettie continues, idly tracing Lina's bracelet. Her gaze flits back up to meet Juno's. She can still see the faint gashes in her wife's arms where her claws sunk in as she started to lose control of her own body. "He's not going to use me to hurt anyone else. Never again." The sick bastard had it coming. He probably deserved worse than the swift death she gave him.That certainty boils in her veins with the passion of a thousand suns. "...Now I'd like to forget that he ever existed."

Lettie rests her head against Juno's chest, content to listen to her heartbeat for a little while. She's processing that and the fact that they're wives now. That'll probably sink in once they've had a more official ceremony and all, but still...

"Hey, Juju..." Lettie rests her chin on her hands, peering down at her wife. "Do you wanna dance?"

 

[starboob]

Juno has her first dancing lesson that night. Lettie takes her through the steps of some of the popular fae dances, which involve a lot of little hops and spins. It doesn’t take long for Juno to master the steps nor the rhythm of the dances. While they are different from the formal dances she learned back at the academy, she finds that she prefers the dances of the fae—they’re more fun. Or maybe she’s just hot for teacher. Either way, she has the first lesson down and by the end of it, both of them are giggling messes, half delirious from their exhaustion and still refusing to go down.

Eventually, their dance slows to gentle swaying with Lettie leaning on Juno more than she is standing on her own two feet. No music plays for them, aside from the soft pulse of their heartbeats. They mumble incoherencies, possible sweet nothings. Juno’s pretty sure she tells Lettie about how hard it was to keep her eyes on Lettie’s face when they were on that candy currency world with the demonic children. She tells her about how much she used to hate “Juju” and how much she loves it now when it comes from her, because it makes her feel softer than she’s ever been allowed to be. Most of these things, Lettie already knows and they’re both too tired to care. Anything to stay up just a little while longer.

They make a slow collapse to the floor. Juno haphazardly pulls the blankets from the bed to form a cocoon around them. Her arms are wrapped firmly around Lettie’s middle and they remain that way the entire night, not once moving or straying from each other.

When they wake up the next morning, they’re tangled in the blankets as much as they are tangled in each other. Juno groans, then whines softly in protest of waking up, squeezing her wife so that she cannot get away. (As if that gay little faerie could ever leave such stupidly buff arms in the morning.) The light outside the window is soft, pink and gradually burns to yellow the longer they remain snuggled in the protection of their blankets.

If she concentrates, she can hear the distant whoops and hollers of faeries still partying. Occasionally, a bomber-bug will go off in celebration. When the two of them eventually make it over to the window, sluggishly rising from their nest of blankets and stumbling over, they confirm that the faeries are, indeed, still partying. “Damn,” she whispers, impressed. If she squints, she’s almost positive she sees some of her skeletons dancing with the faeries. In another life, Juno would have been pissed, would have been cursing out her boneheaded crew, but on the morning after their wedding, she only smiles. “They can’t even get drunk.” But they like to pretend.

***​

They take their time getting ready just as they took their time getting out of their nest. Juno helps Lettie brush her hair; then Lettie teaches her how to braid it and has Juno practice while she does the rest of her make-up. It takes Juno markedly less time to get ready herself, but this is to be expected from the pirate. She decides on a more classic pirate look today, something distinctly Desdemonian. Now that Lettie has her bracelet back, Juno takes the white scarf and ties it around her own wrist. She smiles as she remembers the first time she ever wore the scarf. Lettie wanted them to have complementary outfits for dinner. She guessed her favorite color that day. They had breakfast for dinner that night, all messed up and gross after fighting a pasta yeti in a fur bikini. It was the night right after they decided they were friends and raised their first demon swarm. So much has changed since then. Now they’re preparing for what could be (will be) their last battle and they're wives.

Unsurprisingly, it’s going to take Lettie a while to be ready so Juno heads to the kitchen to prepare breakfast, surprisingly calm despite knowing what lies ahead for them today. It’s just another ordinary morning, the last they’ll have before their lives change. It’s that thought that troubles Juno, once more returning to what’s going to happen after today, after they put the Reaper to rest and finish what they’ve started. She knows she’ll have Lettie right there next to her to help her along the way and, still, the idea of the bright future sends her heart into a frenzy. It pounds in her ears, makes itself known in her chest.

When she almost slices her finger instead of the strawberry, she sets down the knife and takes a few steeling breaths. ‘How’s it that I’m more scared of the aftermath than the actual fight?’ It sounds even sillier when she puts it like that, yet acknowledging that does little to settle her nerves. She stares down at her hands on the countertop, the red strawberry juice covering them like all the blood on her hands. Will she ever be clean?

‘One day at a time.’ She reminds herself of this, but when she still struggles to concentrate, she asks Marjorie to take over and wanders the ship until she’s above deck, leaning against the railing as she surveys the still smoking estate grounds. The sound of celebration is louder out here, bringing a smile to her lips. ‘Will this make up for everything?’

She senses Lettie approaching her before she hears her. She doesn’t turn towards her, but she does bring her under her arm when she's close enough. “What’re the chances they’ll still be there when we get back?” When. The Reaper is going down, no question about it. "Think we'll be able to finally celebrate tonight?"

After a beat, she looks down at her sparkly wife. "I don't know if I'm ready for all of this to end. I don't know what that kind of life really, actually looks like." She lets her uncertainties show, knowing she has nothing to fear and knowing it's better for Lettie to know than for her to wonder. (She's too perceptive and smart for that anyway.) They need clear heads today. "Would you believe me if I said I was more scared of that than the Reaper?"

 

[ellarose]

"Oh, they'll totally be here when we get back. No question." Lettie nods, gazing out at the other faeries with a fond smile. For the longest time, they made themselves and their celebrations smaller and smaller to challenge the ideology that they're 'frivolous, careless creatures'. After everything that went down, though, it's clear they're ready to say fuck that noise and be unashamedly themselves. It's about damned time. "I heard they're planning something special at midnight. I'd like to be there if we make it back in time." She's warmed by Juno's arm around her-- just as solid as the notion that they're going to make it through this last fight. "You'll get to see what a big, official faerie dance is capable of."

Lettie winks, deciding not to elaborate what she means beyond that. It's better left as a surprise and she's teeming with excitement to see the wonder she's sure to find in Juno's eyes at the sight. She'd been too stressed to appreciate how cute the pirate was the first time she experienced one of Avangeline's luminous forests, rushing to turn all of the trees blue.

It's serendipitous for such a thing to happen after they do away with the Reaper. Because they are going to end that fucker, once and for all.

"A peaceful life, you mean?" Lettie prompts curiously when Juno mentions 'that kind of life', tilting her head back to look her in the eye. While she may not feel that same fear herself, she does try to see this from her wife's perspective when she confides in her about it. The faerie refuses to let doubt crawl in right away, won't let herself believe that her wife is getting cold feet about the prospect of living a married life together with her. Juno loves her. This fear she's expressing is likely coming from someplace else. She hums contemplatively as she thinks about it.

Fighting is all the pirate has ever known-- perhaps to the point where she feels it coincides with her identity. Now they're headed into unknown territory, about to settle into a whole new lifestyle where they won't have to fight anymore. Without the cubes there to dictate their every move, without the constant battles, they'll have more choice in how they spend their days together. When Lettie acknowledges the time it's taken for Juno to learn to rest, to relax and even play it makes even more sense to her.

"It's going to be a big change. Change can be really fucking scary, even if it's positive." Lettie reaches for Juno's hand, stroking her fingers gently over her knuckles. They're still a bit beat up from yesterday. "You've been fighting your whole life and now the fight is almost over. But that's not... you're so much more than that, Juno." She lets go of her hand and wraps her arms around Juno in an embrace. "What you've been through will always be a part of who you are today. But you've shown time and time again that you're capable of adapting and embracing change." They both have, really-- for the better. They're not the same people they were when they met. "You told me just last night that you went from hating to loving the name Juju. If you're capable of that, I'd say you're capable of anything."

Lettie giggles, pressing her face into the warmth of Juno's neck, smiling against her skin.

"I'm sure we'll have plenty to do after the move. We'll be busy decorating our cottage, planting our garden, cooking new recipes, packaging thank you gifts after our official wedding. I'm sure we'll find our own ways to keep things interesting, too." Lettie's little smile takes a flirty edge for an instant, her cheeks flushing with heat. "And if for a second it ever feels like something's missing, I'll be there to help you to figure it out. We could spar like old times, play a game, or look for your second hobby secret hobby." She raises her eyebrows at the prospect. She's curious to learn more about who Juno is when she has the time to explore her interests outside of all this chaos. That's part of what makes their future life together so exciting. "You'll have a chance to learn who Juno is without all the fighting. I already know for a fact she's pretty fucking incredible. After all, she's the person I fell in love with."

Lettie steps back from their hug to look Juno in the eye again, holding both of her wife's hands in hers. She sincerely wants to hear her thoughts, to learn more about her perspective on the subject. It's not her intention to simply drown Juno's feelings in a shower of sweet reassurances, after all. It's a massive deal whenever Juno admits to being afraid of anything. That kind of trust isn't something Lettie takes lightly. She's always going to treat those fears with the grace and respect they deserve.

"What about the future scares you the most, Juno?"

 

[starboob]

Relief washes over Juno, gradually melting away the tension that had wound itself in her gut. Each reassurance from her wife soothes her nerves until the chatter in her head quiets to a whisper. Her fear is still with her and likely will be until she can face and climb over it, but it no longer distracts her the way it was threatening to. (A good thing, considering what lies ahead.) Lettie reminds her that she is not alone in this and never was. She reminds her that she will be right by her side to help, should the stubborn restless pirate need it—and Juno knows better by now than to run away from help. Especially when Lettie is the one who's offering. They’ll figure this out, together. They are a team. They’ve got this. Like that gay ass little song from the night before, ‘You got me, I got you.’

That doesn’t make her next admission any easier. It might even make it worse, knowing that the woman she loves might think differently of her if she exposes anymore of her past. (Not that she hasn’t spoken of its worst parts before, she just isn’t particularly inclined to remind people of this. She just wants to be good.) She blinks, then pulls away from Lettie. How does she say this without choking?

“I don’t understand why I deserve this chance.” That is the most simple answer, the Juno’s version of it. It won’t suffice, not when her audience is her wife, but it does get her started. “I’m not a good person, Lette. Or I wasn’t.” She runs her hands through her hair, already hearing the counterargument, but, right now, she needs to confront this piece of herself and not beat it down with what she already knows is true. (She is a good person. She just has done a lot of bad things and while she might not ever atone for it, she’ll spend the rest of her life helping others.) “Just because I was trying to survive, does that mean I get a pass at being a piece of shit?”

Was her life really worth all those others? And is it any more right to say she should have laid down as a sacrifice to the cycle?

“How can I go on, live a peaceful life, knowing that I destroyed so many others? I hurt people.” Her hands curl around the railing, agitating the scrapes and bruises over her knuckles. She squeezes tighter. Lettie says she’s more than what she’s done and while that is true, it doesn’t erase her past. Those are shackles she cannot break; they’re the chains she’ll drag along with her for the rest of her life, even if she commits it to being a better person. She supposes the real question then is, how does she forgive herself to make room for the person she wishes to become? “I don’t believe that I deserve this. I just got picked by some cube and then got real fuckin’ lucky meeting someone like you.” Lettie saved her. She’ll die with that truth. “And I know I can’t punish myself forever and that’s not even what I want—I want to enjoy my future with you. I really fuckin’ do. I’ll build a fence to keep out those fuckin’ chickens and you can cut my hair in the kitchen and it’s going to be fuckin’ great—I just…” She shrugs helplessly, words failing her because the enormity of her guilt cannot be contained by words.

Sometimes she wonders if Lettie would love her as much if she really knew what she had been like during her years with the Duchess. Stubborn as she is, she has a hard time accepting that the sacrifices she’s made to save the worlds could ever be enough to make up for all the hurt she caused on Desdemonia. In truth, she isn’t even looking for their forgiveness either—they’re Desdemonians. They won’t extend that grace. Most of what this is boils down to forgiving herself and understanding that no version of her would have accepted going back to prison, to fighting in that underground ring, to serving those like the Duchess while in chains. At least with the deal she accepted, the chains were invisible and the leash was long. She could pretend they weren’t even there.

“What if I’m no good at living?” Though it’s become a bit between them, Juno genuinely thought Lettie was trying to cause her harm with all of her little pranks when they first were paired together. She doesn’t have the experience of living like others do. All she knows is violence and survival. What if she’s not soft enough for the worlds? ...Okay, she can admit that that might be going too far. Lettie’s already told her she’s the softest person she knows. Lettie. She’s not wrong about these things and if she’s not wrong, then she was right when she said that Juno is capable of change and has already changed. She knows this. Most of her knows this, at least—it’s a work in progress. “It’s just going to be so different than what I’m used to. What I’m used to isn’t easy, but I know it." After a pause she clarifies, "This isn’t for you to solve. I know that. This is my shit to eat and figure out." She waves her hand around her head. “This is just what’s going on in my head. I’ll figure it out. It’s gonna be okay. It’s just that now that all of this is closer, all this shit I’ve been able to ignore is coming back. But I won’t let it get in the way of that future, our future—I still fuckin’ want it. More than anything, especially with you.”

Just as Juno wraps her arms back around Lettie, pulling her wife in for a fierce hug before she claims those damn kissable lips, a guttural roar rips through Avangeline, sending reverberations through the air. Lady shivers, rocking from side to side. The faeries below cease their dance. The birds and bees all quiet—everything goes quiet. Another roar tears through Avangeline, this one followed by quake.

The Reaper is calling.

 

[ellarose]

All Lettie wants to do is keep holding Juno close, to tell her she's good, to lay out all of the reasons why she deserves to have a future of her own. Even with the future in sight, no part of it has ever been handed to her. Hell no. Attributing it all to luck dismisses so much of the hard work that went into her making it as far as she has. Eyes brimming with tears, she presses her face against her wife's chest in a feeble attempt to stem their flow. When Lady Vengeance rocks and sways with the force of the Reaper's cry, those familiar muscular arms hold her steady. Not yet. Not yet.

There isn't enough time to say everything there is to say. Even then, it wouldn't be enough. Juno said it best herself. This has to do with how she sees herself, it's a matter of needing time to reflect and find inner peace than it is anything else. There's no rushing that, no forcing it. It just breaks the faerie's heart to see her so conflicted and unsure.

"Juno..." Words fail Lettie in that moment. All she can do is give an imperceptible nod and hope that she understands. She heard her, she heard every word, and they can talk again when all of this is over. They know what they have to do next. "I'm here. We're in this together."

The Reaper is calling and they have to answer.

"Cap'n, I have urgent news! The Maestro has been--" Abigail calls soon afterwards, flying towards them perched atop her cloud counter. The number on the display reads three-hundred... huh? A second later, the digital numbers scramble and it doesn't seem to display an actual number at all. "Has been..." The skeleton's train of thought derails, swooping and looping into figure eights. This isn't too strange an occurrence for a skeleton like Abigail... but usually she manages to stay on topic if that topic involves the Maestro-- the cube. Instead, she points a bony finger up at the sky. "Fireflies!"

"Fireflies?" Lettie doesn't get it. Then she follows the direction of Abigail's finger, looking up at the sky. The clouds glitch and change colors as if they can't decide what time of day it is. From them, purple blobs rain down. They emit hazy little clouds and their underbellies are a tar-like black. She squints. As a faerie and co-commander of an undead insect army, she knows a bug when she sees one. "No... no, those aren't fireflies, Abby."

What the hell are they? Lettie can't shake the sensation that their vibes are familiar (and rank) but... oh. Oh. Fuck.

Lettie grabs both Juno and Abigail by their arms, not wasting even a second to explain as she drags them away from the ship's railing. They need to take cover before those things touch--

The faerie skids to a stop when she realizes they're too late. The purple blobs have already begun dotting the deck, rapidly eating through it whenever they touch on something solid. Now they're standing before a giant, gaping cavity in the center of the ship. They have to back up as it grows larger and larger by the second. While Lettie could fly away to avoid falling in as more and more of the ship is eaten away, there's no where she could go to save herself. On top of that, there's no way in hell she's leaving Juno's side. They're in this together. She meant what she said.

Juno throws her down, trying to shield her as the rain of purple muck falls harder. It starts at her shoulder, the mysterious substance taking her away piece by piece. Refusing to let her wife go down alone, she caresses her cheek as the darkness spreads up her neck, allowing it to claim her fingertips. Her hand, Lina's bracelet... Lettie's whole arm vanishes as Juno's scarred eye does. Is this how it ends? Without rhyme or reason? All they can do is stay close the hungry dark magic consumes them 'till there's nothing left.

***​

"Nnn..." Lettie rouses. Her head is pounding. Everything is. Did she land on her face? No, that's wrong. It was... her wings. Oh stars, her wings! The pain is all-encompassing. She can't move. Writhing against taut ropes that don't give, she winces. Fear knifes through her stomach, but it has nothing on the pain she's in right now. Nope, nope, nope. It hurts too much to move. It's agony just to open her eyes. Stars forbid... does she have a black eye...? "Something, something, princess." Opening her eyes to peer through strands of blue hair that've fallen into her face, she takes notice of the low-tech (strangely familiar) prison around her. She looks down to find herself tied to a shoddy old chair.

This is... wrong. But it happened. It's happening. While Lettie knows what parts of her are supposed to be in pain after her fall, there's a far more prominent pang in her abdomen. Like she's recently been stabbed... but she hasn't recently been stabbed.

“…This setup is totally overkill. Don't you think?” Lettie speaks, the words flowing from her like water from a faucet. Squinting, she tilts her head to try and get a better look through the spaces between the bars. Her (buff... familiar... familiar) captor is standing there. “Don’t tell me someone as big and bad as you is afraid of what a little princess like me is capable of?”

The faerie lifts a finger, glowing blue with raver magic. (Raver magic...? What?) Now, to take care of the ropes... because this is how it happened.

 

[starboob]

‘I don’t want to die.’ Juno’s eyes are squeezed shut; the force of it is enough that she could put a tear in her eyelids. Her fists are clenched tight over her knees, entire body tense and rigid as she waits for the flames of Hell to lick her clean. But then…

“Welcome aboard, princess,” she smirks, “Quite a fucking fall for someone with wings. How did eating shit taste?”

Her lips and mouth all say those words without the pirate actually intending to speak. Stranger yet is when she blinks her eyes eye open and finds herself sitting in front of a skyward raver chick. Her heart thumps and jerks, though Juno isn’t quite sure what else to make of the woman in front of her. Anger floods her veins like an answer, even if she isn’t quite sure why. ‘It’s the raver’s fault, probably. She fuckin’ dented by goddamn ship.’ (And never fixed it.) What’s her name again?

Fuck it. She doesn’t care.

She crosses her arms over her chest, slouching in her seat. The raver speaks her piece, the pirate rolls her eyes. "Eh, you don't like the digs? My apologies," she bows, in a dramatic and hard to miss mocking way. "Insectoid freaks don't really crashland 'round these parts. Just trying to cover my bases."

Lettie falls flat on her face shortly after that. (Wait, how does she know her name? She doesn’t do names. What the fuck?) Rather than fish through her pockets like she’s supposed to, she scoots her chair back. She doesn't want to hurt her and she knows that's what comes next. Somehow. Yet when she tries to turn, tries to put distance between herself and this bug, her hands dive into her pockets and mold bone into skeletal hands that grab Olette by the shoulders. (This is wrong.) Her stomach sinks as guilt pools in her belly. The apology she means to deliver morphs in her mouth until all that comes out is a sneer. "There a reason you shouldn't end up in the Duchess's hands?"

No, no, no—this isn’t right. (But this is how it happened. This already happened.) Juno struggles to command her own body. She tries to release the bones from bruising the fucking faerie’s shoulders, but it doesn’t work. Nothing works. The back and forth continues without any effort from the pirate, as if she is a marionette being controlled by some cruel puppeteer—this isn’t who she is. This isn’t who she wants to be.

Or is it? Isn’t this her? Isn’t this who she has to be? Her survival hinges on keeping the Duchess and her allies happy. A single misstep could warrant her recapture. ‘I’m not going back to that hellhole.’

Flipbook images speed by the pirate and faerie, taking them through their first night, taking them through the next morning and their encounter with Clay. But rather than take them off-world (what?), they next end up at the Duchess’s manor. This time, Lettie is in golden chains and Juno holds the loose end.

Cassidy lounges on a plush chaise, wearing nothing but a silk robe. One leg is bent in such a way that the fabric rides up her thigh, keeping most of her leg exposed. The pirate keeps her eyes on the Duchess’s face, refusing to let her gaze linger any lower. “And what is it that you’ve brought me, cupcake?” She titters affectionately, rising from the chaise to greet Juno with a brief kiss on the cheek. Her hands sweep down to adjust the pirate’s shirt, undoing the first three buttons, just how she likes, then her fingers curl into the hair at the nape of Juno’s neck. “I told you how to wear this. Are you trying to play coy?”

“Not at all, Duchess.”

“Cathy.”

“Cathy, right.” Wrong. This is all wrong. But maybe it isn’t? This was is her life. She works for the Duchess and has since she stole Lady Vengeance, blew up a fleet of steward ships, and deserted. This makes sense.

Juno follows the chain in her hands back towards the faerie, something like guilt twisting in her gut again. She smothers it. She’s already in hot shit after blowing up yet another steward fleet and murdering the Commodore’s asshole son. “Just brought you something I thought you’d fuckin’ like. You interested?”

The Duchess takes stock of Lettie, Olette, bugsy, circling her like a predator does her prey. “And this isn’t just to save your own skin?” She lifts a brow, lifting a strand of the bug’s hair at the same time. Her finger curls around it, then she pulls just to see what will happen. “I heard about the incident with Clay. The Commodore isn’t pleased. I don’t know if this is something that can just… disappear, Juno. Not after you killed Terra—sorry, were framed for killing her.”

“Clay is a fuckin’ idiot. If a fuckin’ single ship took out him and his fleet, then he wasn’t worthy of his post. I got nothing to apologize for.” She shrugs, ignoring the alarm that thrums in her ears. If the Duchess won't help her then... “I simply brought her,” Juno jerks the chain, pulling the faerie forward. (Why is she treating her wi—) “‘Cause I know you were looking to expand your collection. And maybe I was missing that bed of yours.” Ew. Gross. No!

Cathy hides her glee, flicking away the bug’s hair as she rounds to face Juno. “How thoughtful. But she can't be all. She's just a tiny. little. faerie."

"I—" Juno falters, stumbling over her words. She is not going back to that hellhole. "I can... I can..."

Cassidy, Cathy, Cassidy, Cathy taps her chin with a thoughtful hum. "I suppose there is one option." With the snap of her fingers, her robe transforms into a lab coat and a scalpel appears in her hand. The manor glitches into a laboratory, then back into the manor. "Ready for operation, Juju?"

 

[ellarose]

Cathy cants her head slightly, offering Lettie a sidelong glance. From the expression on the Duchess's face, it's clear that she doesn't see her as an equal-- let alone as another living being. The faerie doesn't like the expression on her face. Not one bit. Nope. She's out! (If only...) Though the woman might try to appear disinterested, there's an underlying eagerness that lingers beneath her high and mighty facade. A bloodlust that a little faerie like Lettie is all too familiar with. A full-body shiver scurries over her like purple rain. (Purple rain... ah.) Her head hurts.

Lettie's screams and protests die just as quickly in her mind as they do in her throat. She wouldn't let anyone walk all over her like this! She wouldn't have let herself be dragged in chains without trying to escape and fighting like hell first. (Right?) She's the fucking faerie. She wouldn't just give up. (Right?) But Juno's given up on her. She's chosen this path, and now-- (No, she wouldn't.) And yet...

Yet here they are, standing before the Duchess. Juno is offering her up in chains and Lettie can't help but a sharp stab of fear, like she's a tiny field mouse being dangled over the mouth of a cat by her tail. While there's something powerful in her that wants to move, smashing all of the commands in her brain's control room to do something, her body doesn't doesn't receive any of them. She cannot move an inch. It's frustrating. The universe holds her captive just as much as these golden chains do, forcing her into submission. Her lips won't even move to form words. With a role assigned to her, she isn't allowed to stray. Huh. Isn't it kind of like she's in a nightm-- ah. Her head. Her head. It's splitting!

Cathy's calling her Juju and even though Lettie's being sold off in chains, a fierce sense of protectiveness rises in her.

"Don't..." Lettie manages to grit out a single word. That alone saps up most of her strength, her shoulders sagging.

"Tsk, tsk." Cassidy smirks, twirling her scalpel. For a moment, Asmodeus appears in her place, greedily assessing her to brainstorm all the ways she might make him a fortune. The Duchess changes back. "How tedious! We'll have to train it not to whine like that." She wraps her hand around Lettie's throat. When she releases, a noose-- or rather a collar-- appears around her neck. It squeezes and strangles like a curse. Her vision blurs around the edges. Asmodeus is in the Duchess's place again before she flickers back into place. "That's much better. Now, don't look at me like that... it's a cruel world, pet." She coos, patting her sparkly cheek with faux affection before turning to face the pirate.

"Though I suppose we cannot expect an impetuous little faerie to understand. Ah, well. She'll learn her place soon enough... the weak cannot survive in our world. Isn't that right, Juju?" The Duchess turns back to Juno, her eyes brightening with cruel delight as an idea comes to her. "I will entrust you with training her... after all, you're the one who brought her here. As such, it is now your responsibility to ensure my exotic new pet isn't more trouble than she's worth."

The Duchess claps her hands twice and in an instant, Lettie is hung from the ceiling by her chains. (This is... familiar. But wrong. It's all wrong.) Cassidy takes Juno's hand, making a grand display of kissing both her knuckles. The faerie writhes in her chains, seeing red. No. The kiss works some kind of nightmare magic, turning Juno's hands into claws... No. This is wrong. Wrong, wrongwrongwrong-- her head pounds the more she rejects it, until it becomes too much for her to bear. She's slipping.

"Start with the wings. I want them mounted."

***​

Sluggishly, Lettie begins to rouse. A pins and needles feeling erupts over her back and she has to shake her head to try and keep her consciousness from fading again. What happened? She notices a bloodstained floor in her haze. The smell of it is thick. Revolting. Torn, mangled wings lie in a pool of blood on one of the Duchess's plush carpets. No. Snapping her eyes shut tight, she tries to reject the scene entirely as her stomach twists in uncomfortable knots. It's a trick. But it's close enough to a memory that it feels real. Don't fall for it, Lette. They're trying to break her again, into thinking Juno-- she didn't, though. She didn't. She wouldn't. Warm tears mix with blood on her cheeks, turning it pink. (Her favorite color. What a joke. She's a fucking joke... how could she let this-- how could she just let this happen?) It's a trick. It's a nightma-- her vision fizzles out.

***​

Lettie comes to again, her vision spotty and her limbs motionless. She's strapped to something. (An operating table?) The room is dark, but a lamp hangs over her, creaking eerily as it swings. A sick feeling rises in her gut as ever so slowly, she looks down at herself. She finds her arms covered in bloody, haphazard cuts. (The Duchess ended up making use of that scalpel after all.) Her collar strangles her scream. Instead of noise, she coughs up whatever's in her stomach, throwing her head to the side to keep herself from choking on it. Fuck. Gross.

This is a nightmare. The worst, most sinister kind of nightmare. Horrible. An oppressive force hangs over her, even as Lettie acknowledges it for what it is. What will it take to break this spell?

Something is missing. It's like the Duchess cut out a piece of the faerie's soul when she made those incisions, as if sensing she'd rebel otherwise.

The faerie strains to focus, making out snippets of a conversation nearby. "Faerie blood... fascinating... the kind of power I could..." The Duchess. Naturally. Who is she talking to? "I've determined it'd be a waste to simply do away with her. You did well." Her voice sounds closer now, her heels clicking imperiously against the floors as she approaches the operating table. She makes a dramatic display of holding her nose in disgust when she looks down at Lettie. Like a bug stuck to the bottom of her shoe. "Oh my... you positively reek, pet. You're filthy." Cassidy beckons behind her with her finger, waving it intentionally in front of the faerie so the distinct flicker of light catches her attention. The ring. This bitch is wearing her fucking ring--

Fuck! Lettie's ring, which a fragment of her soul is still attached to. Is that why she can't break through this...?

"Juno, darling, clean her up. Make sure she doesn't bleed to death. Then come to bed, won't you?" The Duchess purrs. The words themselves might sound like a suggestion, but they all know it's a threat. Lettie's going to be sick all over again. "I'll be waiting."

 

[starboob]

The Duchess rests her head on Juno’s chest, one leg slung lazily over her own. Possessive. (The position is familiar, but the weight and feel of her are off. Bugs crawl over her skin and send shivers down her spine. This is wrong.) Her manicured nail traces shapes over the pirate’s bare chest. Though she doesn’t apply much pressure, her touch leaves angry red lines over Juno's skin, leaving a clear map of where she's been. Cathy isn’t bothered by this. In fact, she delights in it, signing her name over the pirate’s heart. Cathy's. (Still wrong.)

Juno’s eyes remain locked on the ceiling, images of the faerie flooding her mind. Concentrating on anything becomes impossible, her ears grating as the ghosts of her screams play over and over again in her mind. This shouldn’t bother Juno. It never has. The Duchess points and the pirate goes. Never has she fallen out of step or line, not even once; never has she questioned her position, because her position keeps her safe. It keeps her free. (As free as she can be, at least.) She would not trade that for anyone or anything. This is a necessary selfishness. The weak do not survive on Desdemonia and Juno has long proven she has a fight like no other inside of her.

But maybe it isn’t enough, if she’s so happy to lick the Duchess’s heels. A real fighter would have acknowledged how wrong it is to own another person and would have punched the lights out of those who beg to differ. ‘So fuckin’ what? You’ve been sold before.’ That doesn’t make it right. Juno knows this.

"...To be honest, I was kinda pissed at you back there
. . . That fire that Eliza was talking about... I see it in you too.”

The words roll around them, yet Juno is the only one who seems to hear, snapping her attention towards the unseen voice of the faerie. She shifts uncomfortably as she wrestles with herself.

The Duchess stops her tracing, resting her chin on the back of her flattened hand. “What is it, Juju? Something on your mind?”

“No.” She lies with a smile, burying all her thoughts before Cathy can sift through them. “Not at all.”

“Good.” She pats Juno’s chest. The ring on her finger sparkles as she moves, catching the pirate’s attention; a blue butterfly flies around the band. (Blue like the color of her hair that fateful day they first met.) “I don’t need you distracted.”

Juno makes a noise of acknowledgement, but she’s already distracted. Blue like the color of her hair that fateful day they first met. Blue…

It’s an important color to her—her favorite color, though she doesn’t quite remember why. All she knows is that it’s important because someone—the faerie—introduced it to her. How, though? They only just met and they sure as fuck haven't talked favorite colors. (Why is this confusion a familiar feeling?)

Cathy is talking about something, some grand plan of hers, but the pirate cannot take her eyes off the rose cut diamond. More specifically, she cannot stop watching that blue butterfly that moves differently from the rest. With the Duchess’s hand still resting on Juno's chest, the butterfly slides from the ring and lands in the space between the cruel woman’s fingers. Juno feigns like she’s listening, nodding and humming when it feels appropriate, then she moves her hand over Cathy’s like she’s trying to hold it. Someone taught her a better way of stealing rings right off people’s fingers, the same someone who made her favorite color blue. (The faerie, allegedly.) She pulls her hand away, taking the ring into her fist, squeezing it so tightly that it drives cuts into her palm.

Though she can’t see that little butterfly, she can feel it fluttering in her palm. Blue like the color of her hair that fateful day they first met. She squeezes her eyes shut, knowing something important is there if only she could grasp it. The more she concentrates on that line, the deeper she sinks into the mattress until she’s falling through it altogether. Winds whip her shaggy waves as she falls, tumbling and somersaulting forward as the world reshapes itself around her. While she braces for brutal impact, it never comes. Instead she is set gently down on her own two feet.

When she opens her eye, she’s staring down at the deck of her ship. Her chest is still covered in angry red lines and garbled letters that briefly were a name and her torso is still streaked with dried blood (not hers), but she is no longer with the Duchess. Memories of that woman are soon pushed well behind her, to the point Juno is only vaguely aware of what's just happened and also completely absorbed in what is immediately in front of her. (Kind of a like a dream, but this life certainly isn't a fucking dream.) The ring is still in her palm when she opens it, though she can’t exactly place when she stole it. She isn’t even sure why she’s back on her ship. She worries over that until a growing shadow creeps over her, providing a distraction from her confusion. She spins on her heels, looking up. “What the fuck?”

Something is falling from the sky.

A few thoughts cross the pirate’s mind: (1) she could create a construct to catch the falling object—either (1a) a bone net or (1b) a colossal skeleton—(2) she could have Marjorie veer to the left to avoid the object (3) she could catch the falling object herself and sustain minimal damage or (4) she could just take three steps in any direction to avoid the object altogether.

In a world of possibilities, she rushes forward with open arms. (It’s natural. The most natural thing in the world. How many times has she done this already? If Lettie is falling, Juno will catch her.) The object crashes in her arms with enough force that they’re both flat on the deck, the faerie on top of the pirate. This is familiar. (But this isn’t how it happened.)

“How’d eating shit taste, princess?” She means to only groan, but that comes out instead, half-wheezed out as she gently sets Lettie to the side. The ring is still clenched in her fist and she only remembers when she rubs her forehead and feels a smear of something slick her skin. She opens her palm again, catching the flicker of the blue butterfly. Blue like the color of her hair that fateful day they first met.

Her gray storm cloud eye locks on Lettie, not angry, just curious. "How did you know my favorite color? I don't..." 'even know you,' is a lie. So much so, she's physically incapable of speaking it. "What's—"

"Oh, Juju," the Duchess sings. Her voice comes from all sides, like she's the goddess of malice. "Are you trying to run away? You know that can't work." A titanic manicured hand rises from the hazy clouds, unmistakably belonging to Cathy. It latches onto Lady, preventing her from moving. The rest of her comes up from the clouds, towering over the two of them. "That is just so disappointing. I thought you were beginning to understand your place."

 

[ellarose]

Her... her favorite color? What does that have to do with anything!?

Fair to say that's not the question Lettie expected to be asked after falling from the motherflipping sky like an angel from the heavens. That she knows this woman's favorite color is blue is entirely irrelevant! Oh. Wait a second. Blue. Blue? (Or maybe it is relevant. Why does she know that?) Though her lips are about to shape the words 'totally overkill', she flattens them into a thin line instead. What about this is overkill, exactly? She's fine, isn't she? And the main reason why is because this woman-- this incredibly buff, this smoking hot woman-- caught her in her arms like a legendary hero from a storybook.

A hero. Well, duh. The pirate technically is one, after... after... huh. Various scenes whirl through Lettie's mind, of the woman in front of her protecting a village, but she can scarcely make any sense of it. (She's swoonworthy when she fights, too.) A blush heats Lettie's sparkly cheeks as she thinks about it, glancing at the pirate and pretending to give her a thoughtful surveil when she's really staring at those fine muscles. Hot. Damn. Her throat is dry. She swallows hard. Ah! Aaaah! Snap out of it, you gay faerie you!

"...Geez. I dunno! It was just a guess that it was blue. You know that." Lettie puffs her cheeks before she can stop herself and then cups them in the palms of her hands. They're incredibly warm to the touch. (Stars, her crushes were never this obvious! She's the one who does the charming and the flustering, not the other way around!) Why is she falling so quickly, anyway? Wonderful as they are, it takes way more than muscles alone to send this faerie's heart aflutter. ('But I know her. I know her heart. It's golden.') Huffing softly, trying to front that she's harder to get than that, she flips a lock of blue hair over her shoulder.

"Where--" Lettie's question trails off as her attention is drawn to the pirate's chest. Oh. (Hadn't she been wearing a shirt when she caught her...?) Hell, maybe she was. But now, for whatever reason, her chest is bare and covered in angry red lines. A familiar feeling of protectiveness sparks up in her chest. Though she tries to keep her eyes respectful, her concern is undeniable. As her mouth opens and closes silently, the blouse reappears to cover her up.

Lettie swallows again, but not this time it's not because her throat is dry. Her green eyes grow wide with fear as a hand seizes the ship and a voice the faerie already hates with a passion booms from the clouds above. In a flash, the faerie sees bleeding cuts down her arms. A second later, they glitch and they're gone. A distinctive pain trickles down her spine, pinching particularly hard where her wings meet her back. Agh. Her head.

When the giant bitch prattles on about learning her place, she sounds exactly like Asmodeus. It fuels the little faerie with enough rage to push past the pain she's in. With a grunt, she climbs up to her feet and smooths out her skirt. She squares her shoulders and raises her chin defiantly. While she's extremely small, a tiny faerie standing up to a literal giant, she doesn't seem to consider the risks of challenging her to a fight.

"You don't get to call her Juju! That's my thing." Lettie snaps, raising her middle finger skyward. A moment later, she curls it into a fist, which she shakes angrily. "And if you dent Lady, I'm gonna put a dent in your face!" How--? She was going to ask where they were... Juju didn't even have the chance to answer before she gave it on her own. Lady Vengeance. Of course she knows Lady-- incredibly well at that, seeing as she's the ship's resident mechanic.

"Oh. Are you the one putting silly ideas in her head, pet? I see. We'll have to do something about that, won't we?" The Duchess (how does she...) snaps her giant fingers and a muzzle fastens over Lettie's mouth. The faerie pales with shock, gripping onto the bars and yanking desperately to pull it off. The giant woman laughs cruelly at her expense. "Ah. That's much better." She waves her hand dismissively in the faerie's direction before turning her attention back on the pirate. "Juju, consider this your final warning. You can come back with me now, face the consequences of your actions... or..."

Humiliating. Lettie's too dizzy to focus on the woman's threats. For an instant, the feeling evokes a change in the world, the ship shifting into a violet lounge. Smoke that carries a dizzying aroma curls in the air. "It's simple, really. All you'll have to do is lounge there." Asmodeus points at one of the velvet couches. "Wait for our patrons to come to you and adhere to their every demand." Across the room, it's evident some of the faeries there are adhering to their orders, lethargically flipping through magazines or sipping on cocktails. However, it's notable that some have chains around their ankles, peeking out from beneath their long flower petal skirts... attaching them to the legs of the sofas. Gross.

"And if I refuse? What then?" Lettie's revolted voice from the past echoes, the ship gradually coming back into focus. She could hardly suppress her rage. She felt like she could shatter entire worlds with it.

"Come now, Olette. You know you're not in a position to refuse."

Lettie decided that she was going to escape by any means possible. They're not going to control her, or define her future. That's why she signed that contract, why she took that shady corp job to buy her freedom back, why she's-- why she's here? She hisses through her teeth, yanking harder and harder at the muzzle. Hadn't she already decided that she's through with being silenced? (Isn't she already free?) A blue butterfly, small and seemingly insignificant, flits out from between Juno's fingers and finds a home in the faerie's chest.

While it might be small, it's not insignificant in the slightest.

Lettie's eyes widen, white light blazing through the green glamour in her eyes. She's already free. She's already free. And someone is trying to make her forget. The faerie closes her eyes determinedly. The ghostly glow spreads over her, burning especially bright at her fingertips, which curl tightly around the muzzle. Energy builds in her hands and within seconds, she breaks the muzzle into pieces. She opens her eyes again, watching in wonder at the broken fragments. Extending her fingers, she catches them with her raver magic, suspending them in midair. Then she reshapes them, the pieces growing in size, until she pieces together a giant muzzle. She sends it flying forward with a glyph, latching onto the giant Duchess's face instead. Heh.

The Duchess shrieks, outraged, and lets go of Lady in order to clutch at her face. There! A chance!

"Juno!" Lettie says urgently, turning to her now that they have a moment to recuperate. Her heart pounds, her hands are shaking. "I think I'm starting to remember--"

Unfortunately for them, the Duchess claws through the muzzle with her sharpened fingernails within seconds. "Shut up! Shut up, shut up, you foolish little bug!" She brings a giant fist down onto the ship, right between the faerie and the pirate, forcing them to jump onto opposite sides of the deck.

"I think..." Cathy's voice is scalding with rage, "There's a pesky little fly aboard your ship, Juno. Let me take care of that for you." She brings her fist down again, this time over Lettie. The faerie dives away, glitching to give herself the boost of speed she needs to avoid it. The Duchess's hand smashes down again and again in pursuit of the faerie, making a wreck of poor Lady's deck. As the faerie nears the railing, she feels herself start to hesitate. She's going to get crushed at this rate! What is she supposed to do? Fly away? But...

Lettie's wings flash on her back, taking multiple forms as they sift through past versions of themselves. She can't fly. Her wings are broken. (No.) They've been healed. (No.) One's been stabbed by the entity. (No.) One of them's been torn off, reduced to a bloody stump. (No.) Both of them have been torn off. They're... they're gone. That pinch in her back returns just as Lettie reaches the edge of the ship. They're gone. The Duchess's fist comes down and she has to make a decision. Either get crushed, or--

The wingless faerie dives off the side of the ship. She writhes in the air, finding nothing to hold onto. Lettie's falling again, hurtling down towards a hauntingly familiar abyss...

"No one's going to catch you this time." Asmodeus and something else awaits below. "Your human--"

Her human... Juno. Treasured moments between them beam through her mind. The night Juno carried her on her back from the Duchess's mansion, the heat from a bomberfly explosion warming their backs. It was the same night she healed her wings. (She didn't give up on her. She never sold her.) They did karaoke and healed worlds and decided they'd be friends over hot chocolate. The phantom wings flicker behind her, bit by bit, and then bloom out from her back like an ethereal flower. Her human, her necromancer, her pirate, her-- her wife? (Her wife!) She went through hell just to get her wings back. They're not gone. Not at all.

Lettie smirks at the abyss, mischievously showing off a hint of fang before she flies like a bat out of hell towards Lady Vengeance.

"Is that all you got?" The faerie addresses the Duchess as she lands on the deck. She makes a dramatic show of stretching her arms over her head and yawning. After a moment, she tilts her head to the side and casually reaches into her magic circle for a butterfly knife. If she could make a giant muzzle before... "It's my turn, now." Lettie extends her hand with a flourish, growing the butterfly knife in size until it's absolutely massive. It floats down in a sparkling mist with much grandeur and majesty. (Lettie's imagination supplies a fitting fanfare for the weapon as well.)

Lettie manages to catch the hilt in her hand, her eyes alight with wonder and satisfaction... yes, yes, yes! This is so badass! Well. It is-- until the blade crashes onto the deck with an unceremonious 'thump'. The faerie falls flat on her stomach along with it. "Oof." With a nervous giggle, she scrambles up to her feet and tries to lift it again... but the little faerie's arms strain as she struggles to lift it. "Fuck! It's heavy." She looks from side to side, searching the ship's deck for Juno. When she finds her, she gazes at pirate with big, pleading eyes. Help? (Could she be starting to remember, too?)

 

[starboob]

A lump forms in Juno’s throat as she watches the faerie and the Duchess clash. She struggles to find her voice. She can barely move. The part of her brain that’s in charge of her motor function is entirely stunned that someone—this little faerie, no less—is standing up to the Duchess. More than that, Lettie is fighting the Duchess on her, Juno’s, behalf. How can she even begin to comprehend what’s happening when she’s been on her own since she was a too big teen thrown into prison and left to rot with the adults? She can’t and it leaves her frozen.

Every nerve ending lights on fire with the desire to scream at Lettie to stop, to tell her that facing the Duchess is impossible, fruitless, damning, to tell her that losing her life isn’t worth this fight, to tell her that fighting for her is not worth it. The words shrivel and die in her throat before they even reach her tongue.

For a single moment, they’re back at the Rainbow Springs. "I'm so... fucking angry. I'm pissed . . . You're underestimating how much I care about you."

Lettie cares about her. (“I’ve got you.”)

She would hate it if Juno told her to back down. ("I promised I wouldn't let her hurt you again . . . I wanted to protect you, like you're always protecting me.") At the same moment this memory comes flooding back to her, Lettie is diving over the side of the ship before she can rush to stop her. Juno stills. All of her goes still, except for her heart that plummets with the faerie. Her faerie.

When her motor function finally returns to her, she’s scrambling backwards in shock, as if any amount of distance can erase what’s just happened. Did she really just lose her only ally?

Her distress is short lived.

‘Pfft,’ the Lettie that lives in her head scoffs at the same moment the real one lands back on the deck. ‘She’s the fucking faerie. Duh.’ And she continues to impress the pirate, creating that giant sword from a knife. (As if she could actually lift it. Not with those noodles.) Juno is up before she even sees those big pleading eyes that could convince her to tear worlds apart. She nods and makes her choice, the same choice she’s already made. (She never sold her to the Duchess. She never clipped her wings. She wouldn’t ever. That’s not who she is. She’s the softest pirate Lettie has ever known. She’s strong in the real way.)

When she steps over to Lettie, she first pulls her up from the deck. “What the fuck do you even do when we’re training?” The bulk of her memories might be trapped behind a thick purple haze, but she knows this to be true. She also knows the answer. (Lettie stares at Juno and then goads her into doing push-ups with the faerie on her back. Sometimes that weird cat joins.)

It’s not even a strain of her effort to pick up the sword from the deck. “Do you even lift?” Juno grins, somehow knowing she can get away with anything if she flashes her dimples. (Of course they both know that Lettie can kick ass in her own way. She’s the fucking faerie. How could Juno ever forget that?)

With the sword secured, she turns her attention to the Duchess who is red with rage. She huffs and she puffs, each breath coming out in clouds of flames. “You wouldn’t dare,” she hisses.

“Oh, but I so fuckin’ would.” Her grin turns to a smirk, the confidence she lost coming back to her knowing that her fucking faerie is here to back her. “I’m not yours and I never fuckin’ was.” Juno arcs her sword before the Duchess can retaliate, channeling all of her strength into the slash, pushing the force through the blade so that it cuts into Cathy’s face with a sharp gust of wind. (If Lettie can make giant muzzles and butterfly swords, what is Juno capable of?) She squeals and grabs the open wound that leaks out gobs of inky purple goo instead of blood.

Fire warms the air with each of Cathy’s squeals and when she dips her chin lower, orange bathes the deck. Juno, anticipating this, is already on the run, pulling Lettie along with her before her ogling turns her into ash. Heat burns her back as she pumps her legs, heading for the edge of the ship—not that she’d survive such a jump. She just needs to put some distance between them and that wall of fire coming straight for them. She grinds down on her jaw, expelling air through clenched teeth as the space to run shrinks.

Juno collides with the railing by way of stopping, lurching forward before she catches herself and jerks backward. Squeezing her eyes shut, she whips around to face the orange wall. With a sharp inhale, she lowers to her haunches and then launches herself through the air, propelling impossibly high until she’s above the wall and the Duchess herself. The pirate doesn’t stop there. As she reaches the peak of her height, she wills herself to size up—if the Duchess can be a giant, if Lettie can make giant fucking muzzles, then what the fuck is stopping Juno? She's supposed to be stupidly tall.

Her body adopts a strobe light effect as she grows, limbs sprawling over the sky until she's a head taller than the Duchess. Now when she falls from the sky, she angles herself so that she takes the Duchess down with her in a dive bomb tackle. The two giants roll across the Desdemonian landscape exchanging blows. Cathy claws at Juno's neck. Juno jams her fists into Cathy's ribs hitting her once, twice, three times before their positions flip, the Duchess on top. Her fingers wedge beneath Juno's ribcage, like she's trying to rip out her kidney with her nails. (And she just might.) Juno's eye bulges when the Duchess draws blood. She gasps.

"You are going to regret choosing that little bug.” She wriggles her fingers deeper, causing Juno to wheeze. Cathy smiles, pulls back a little, then dives in again, just to watch the pirate squirm; just to watch her eye water. “I think I’ll let the Commodore decide your fate. She’s got a wicked mind, you know, and I know she's been looking for a new test subject.”

Black spots dot the pirate's vision, her lips parted as she keeps her breathing shallow. Her hands desperately search around her for something, anything to give her an advantage. The tip of her middle finger hits something smooth and hard. She stretches as far as her arm will allow to reach for it, bringing it in closer until she can wrap her fist around the boulder. Without hesitation, she swings it into Cathy's temple, forcing the woman off of her. Juno gasps out, collecting herself in seconds before she throws herself on top of the other woman. She hits her with a right hook that snaps her head to the side and then, using memory as her guide, the necromancer grips the sides of Cathy's head, pushing her thumbs into her eyes until she hits her skull. Her head pops like a balloon.

Purple gobs of rain splatter Desdemonia for as far as the eye can see. Juno’s front is entirely covered, though she hardly cares. She slumps with relief, then she gets up, wiping her nose with the back of her hand as she searches for the faerie.

Behind her, the gooey stump steams until it’s bubbling. The body twitches, its fingers flexing until one leg kicks into the air then slams into the ground. The other leg follows, unnaturally peeling the rest of the body from the ground. Once it's standing again, two heads emerge, spinning out from the bubbling the neck—Cathy and Asmodeus. An extra set of arms then grows beneath the first set.

Asmodeus cracks his neck. “I warned you, Cassandra.” (Still wrong.) “You must not just break your pets, you must crush them. Now look at these two insolent bitches.” He sneers, testing the upper set of arms. “They think they actually control this game. I think it's time we show them real control.”

 

[ellarose]

"Nope. Don't like that." Not one bit. Lettie stares with abject horror at the two-headed abomination that springs into existence upon Cathy's defeat. This is really what nightmares are made of. (Nightmares. Nightmares? Why is that word nagging at her?) And Asmodeus... didn't she... her head throbs again as she reaches out for a memory she knows is there, but somehow eludes her. Anyway. What if this monster never dies? What if it continues to shift itself into worser forms upon defeat and they're doomed to fight it forever? It seems immortal to her, for reasons behind her comprehension. (Why can't they just die and stay dead?) "Fuck."

It'd probably be better for them to retreat than get entangled in that nonsense. But how?

Hm. Well, Lettie created a butterfly sword through a sheer force of will. Juno just sized herself up to fight the giant Duchess. It shouldn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that they're in a world they can shape with their minds.

Unfortunately, holding onto her thoughts is like trying to hold onto the wind. That's part of the battle, isn't it? Or... or maybe that's the whole damned battle. She has a good feeling about this theory. Maybe Juno has thoughts of her own about all of this. As long as they're together, she's confident they'll sort everything out.

Lettie closes her eyes. “Ever since you asked me if you could stay… I’ve only dreamed of our future together.” A golden pendant sparkles, dropped in the darkness behind her eyelids. “This is what I’m going to wish for when this is all over. A future with you. I love you. I love you so damn much that all my wishes are about you. How fuckin’ gay is that?"

"Wishes... wishes..." The little faerie mumbles under her breath, trying to keep the thought with her before it can slip away. She opens her eyes, looking over at Juno as she braces herself to defend against the terrifying amalgam of Cathy and Asmodeus. Asathydeus. Cathy-o-deus. Nope. None of them roll off the tongue. It doesn't fucking work! ('That's not important right now. Focus!') Gay wishes. Juju's gay wishes. Aha. Now she sees what she's searching for. The golden pendant hangs around Juno's neck alongside a heart-shaped locket.

Instinctively, Lettie reaches for the matching heart shaped locket around her neck. Gay wishes. Juju's gay wishes. Their gay wishes.

In a flash, Lettie finds herself hovering at Juno's side. (How did she-- no, not important!) Given their size difference, she tugs gently at one of her waves and speaks into her ear to ensure she's heard. "Juju! Your pendant." She calls attention to it, breathless. "Open it!" She can scarcely explain why-- only that there's something important inside it. Thankfully, Juno had just knocked the abomination backward, sparing her a moment of peace to entertain the request. "Trust me." While the pirate appears visibly confused, she doesn't question the faerie's judgement.

There it is. The cottage, the garden, the future. Sitting right there in the palm of Juno's hand.

Then, just as Juno willed herself to grow, their dream expands out from her hand and swallows the nightmare whole.

***​

A soft rain falls outside, gently dribbling off the large leaves that frame their bedroom window. Lettie is wholly unbothered by it, safe and warm in Juno's arms beneath the quilt Melvin knitted for them. (Now that the worlds are at peace, the cube has since taken up knitting as his 'hobby secret hobby'. Each square of the quilt depicts a scene from a world they've either visited or saved. Though they all hate to admit it, it's exquisite work.) Since none of the flowers or veggies outside in the garden need to be watered, they can sleep in. There's no place to be except each other's arms.

With a sleep addled smile, Lettie peppers soft kisses from Juno's collarbone to her earlobe before nestling back down into the crook of her neck. Have they really made it? It feels too good to be true. Like a... dream. Can they really spend all of the rest of their mornings like this?

"Oh me-- oh my! Bake me an apple pie!" Abigail exclaims. She sits in a rocking chair, holding a thick tome upside down. (The title is all scrambled and glitched.) "We're on page five hundred ninety seven of your story. Can you believe it?"

"Abby!?" Lettie squeaks, startled by the skeleton's presence, and can feel the soft rumble of Juno's chest underneath her as she chuckles at her. This earns her a stern cheek puff, which is promptly deflated between her wife's palms.

"But the story's not over yet." Abigail chides them, like a schoolteacher addressing a couple of children, uncharacteristically cryptic. She reaches into her eye socket, holding a small version of Lady Vengeance in her skeletal fingers. "Where's the Maestro?" She blows the ship towards them and it floats through the room like a dandelion seed.

"How should we know?" Lettie huffs. Something about this needles at her... but it's been so long since she's felt like this. Warm. Peaceful. Like she has all the time in the world to sleep in and hang out with her favorite person in the worlds. Can't they just have this for a few minutes longer? "The cube retired months ago. It could be anywhere."

The tiny Lady Vengeance lands in Juno's hair. Lettie absentmindedly plucks it out. 'This is weird.' Has Melvin taken up sculpting now?

"You're wrong! That's just what he wants you to think." Abigail insists. "You need to remember."

A face ghosts through Lettie's mind and she promptly squeezes her eyes shut tight, as if to crush his image with her eyelids. No. Asmodeus grins. The chains reappear, her noose threatens to strangle her protests. No. She needs a break from breaking. Just one fucking break. Or she's going to-- going to--

"Everything is fine." Lettie declares, as if she can will it into existence. She opens her eyes, looking down at Juno for reassurance. Cracks have begun to form underneath her eyes, as if she's made of porcelain. The faerie doesn't notice this. She tries to smile. "Right, Juju?"

 

[starboob]

“Ugh,” Juno groans, pulling her wife protectively into her chest. “Do we have to?” Literally, the last thing she wants to do is find that damn cube. That little bastard isn’t even supposed to be their problem anymore—they’re fucking retired from that hero shit! “Get the Magistrate to find him.”

And what the fuck does Abigail even mean that the story’s not over? Cryptic fucking bonehead. No, unless hell or high water comes for their literal door, Juno is not moving from this bed. It’s safe. No place safer in the worlds exists than the arms of her faerie and everytime they fucking let go some fuckshit happens. Juno is done with the fuckshit.

So of course she is going to agree with her wife. Everything is fine, the little bastard isn’t their problem, and they shouldn’t come out of retirement and give him any ideas; otherwise they might end up on another bizarre quest to fix his mistake. Juno’s ready to banish Abigail from their bedroom when she looks up at her wife.

A strangled noise squeezes out from her throat. “What the fuck!? Lette—” Immediately, her palms come up to cradle her breaking features in the hopes she can hold her together. A piece of porcelain chips off, falling into her palm. The pirate freezes, doesn’t move, heart hammering against her ribs and, as if to mock her, each thump, thump, thump breaks off another piece of Lettie’s sparkly cheek until a coin-sized hole has formed under one of her eyes. One of her dreamy eyes that resemble something closer to a nightmare now, as more cracks splinter and create new breaks. “No—Stop! What’s happening? Aren’t we supposed to be done…”

The Desdemonian’s voice trails off, brows pinching together. Fuck. Her heart sinks with the bitter realization that she doesn’t actually remember anything leading up to moving into their cottage. Like magic, they just appeared here. Like a dream, they never questioned it. Like a nightmare, it’s all falling apart.

"Close your eyes! Don't let them in your head!” The voice of Juno’s past echoes around them. Abigail nods sagely from her seat and then collapses into a pile of rainbow spiders that scatter through the room. (Not real. They’re not real. Juno still squirms.) “Whatever you see, it's not real!"

“Oh, fuck. Are you shitting me?” Juno tilts her head back, releasing the groan of the century. All her fear evaporates as this realization comes together. Before the nightmare magic can dizzy her again, she closes her eye, effectively shutting out the illusory nature of the spell. She makes sure to keep her hold on Lettie, sitting up and holding the faerie bridal style in her arms. (Bridal style. They still haven’t had their second wedding.) Her thumb sweeps over the tip of one of her pointed ears. (Not weird.) “Lette… We’re not done yet.”

Swinging her legs over the side of the bed, she lifts them both up then moves her eyepatch over her good eye. Through the low vision of her right eye, she can make out shapes and sources of light, but the blur is too significant to make out solid features, offering some protection from the illusions. Nightmare goggles would be preferable to this solution, but Juno’s were destroyed a few nights ago and she’s pretty sure Lettie left hers in the study. (Unless she has them in her magic circle?) “Focus on my heartbeat. I know you know that better than anything else.”

Heartbeat. Fuck. The heart of Avangeline. They never fucking defeated the Reaper.

“If you start to slip, listen for my heartbeat. If you remember one thing, try to hold onto that.” Juno scatters some shards around them. They jump over the ground and spring into new skeletons with weapons for arms and reinforced hardened bone. The new crew forms a protective ring around the couple as Juno takes careful steps through the nightmare. “I’m gonna try to get us closer to the heart.”

The shapes just outside of their protective ring of skeletons pulse and reshape like confused amoebas. They’re cut down like blades of grass. (“They’re fucking fragile.”) Even with her low vision, the nightmares still try to worm their way into her head with voices from her past.

“Why didn’t you save me?” James sniffles. She can imagine his fists shaking at his sides. She stamps out the urge to turn towards the voice, clutching Lettie tighter to remind herself of what is real; her wife and their future. “Juno!”

One foot forward, then the other. Just keep moving. She repeats these steps to herself, ignoring the echoes of her past. Guilt tears open a hole in her chest, but it’s old and as dead as the boy killed by the Shrike, a mistaken sacrifice. More voices pour in—the mother she never really knew, Gran, Eliza, the Duchess, Terra. “Did you even care about me at all?”

When individual voices do nothing to sway the necromancer as she carries them towards thicker clusters of nightmares, the world adjusts. Screams come at them from all sides. The warmth from flames that are not real heat up Juno’s skin, causing her shirt to stick to her chest.

“It’s the Duchess’s dog!” One voice shouts. “Run!”

Cannon fire reverberates through the air, followed by the wet sounds of people cut down. She hears her own voice snarl out, “Get those rations fuckin’ loaded, three. I wanna get out of here before the stewards show.”

“I wasn’t always a good person.” Juno, the real one, admits. This isn’t news and she still feels the need to say something as soundbites from her pirating years circle around them. (Will Lettie think differently of her? It’s one thing to know, it’s another thing to experience pieces of that life.) “I wish you weren’t hearing this, Lette. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, but I wish you weren’t hearing all this shit.”

She doesn’t let herself waver, however. They have to finish this and they’re so close. ‘These are just nightmares.’ It’s a weak balm when everything happening around them is true. ‘I’ll be better.’

“We’re almost there.” She pauses a few yards away from a thick swarm of nightmares. The magic peeling off the swarm crashes over Juno, setting off every danger signal that exists within the survivor. Her heartbeat turns frantic, almost painfully so. The heart has to be behind that swarm. She sets Lettie down and holds her hand tight. "On three, we're gonna open our eyes and let the nightmare take us. If this thing is protecting the heart, we have to break it like we've done with those other nightmares. It's gonna need to be more ridiculous than impromptu concerts, races, and pasta yetis in fur bikinis. Got it?" When Lettie confirms her understanding, Juno starts the countdown. "One... two... three!"

 

[ellarose]

'Juju, I'm so tired.'

Lettie doesn't voice the thought, furrowing her brows as she endeavors to put on a tough face. 'Bury it, Letts. You can deal later.' Stars. She's supposed to be the fucking faerie. She can't fall to pieces at the finish line! That'd be lame as fuck. Yet here she finds herself wrestling with that once familiar urge to become one with the floor. It's been so long, she thought she overcame that weakness. So why now? She's so tired.

After everything they've been through, Lettie owes it to Juno, to herself to give it all she's got. After all, she can't leave her wife hanging. She needs to have a proper sit down with her, hold her cheeks in her hands and reaffirm that she's worthy of love. That nothing-- not even those awful things she just heard-- will alter the way she sees the person she is now. When Juno had the agency to decide for herself, she changed for the better. And change is scary. It's so fucking hard to change and Juno did just that. She bravely exposed the softest, most vulnerable parts of herself and Lettie's so proud of her.

'Just... a little further. You've got this.' But-- 'No buts, missy. You've got this! You have to got this.' Desperate to cling onto their future, to be enough-- bigger and better than just a tiny little faerie-- Lettie manages a nod when Juno asks if she's got it. 'Haven't I changed, too?'

"But she can't be all." The Duchess sniffs condescendingly. Lettie can feel the pressure of her high heeled shoe against her ribs, crushing down. Cracks appear over her heart, chips of porcelain piling at her feet. "She's just a tiny." Stomp. "Little." Stomp. "Faerie." Blue butterflies trickle out of the hole in her chest like magic tears. The Reaper glitches in front of her for a moment, greedily inhaling them.

"That's right. Crush her."

Lettie gasps, her eyes snap open. To her horror, she realizes she fucked up at the last second when her hand crumbles to dust in Juno's. The ravenous nightmares pounce and yank them apart. She lunges, reaching her remaining hand out towards her wife-- but it's too late. A tidal wave crashes over them and suddenly they're thrashing in a purple sea beneath a dark, starless sky. She tries to swim towards Juno, but she's thrown back further and further the more desperate her efforts become to reach her. (The more she wants something, the more likely she is to lose it. That's how it's always been.) She's swallowed in a whirlpool that rips her entirely apart, unspeakably violent in its haste. Her arm dissolves. Then half of her face is missing. Tears well in her remaining eye, blurring the sight of Juno entirely... and unable to swim anymore, she sinks beneath the surface. Disaster magnet. Of course this is how it ends.

"Who were you kidding? You never had a future." A warped voice mocks. It almost sounds like her own. "You sure convinced Juno, though. Imagine how disappointed she is, now that she sees you for who you really are. A minx. An insufferable little con artist. A useless fake."

"̴F̵a̵k̸e̸ ̶b̵i̸t̴c̷h̵.̸"̵

***​

"Ju--" Lettie wakes with a start, gasping for air. Chains clink around her ankles when she kicks her legs out. Oh. She's in a comfortable bed, pressed against a sparkly opal blanket... "...no?" It was all just a dream. A nightmare. She pushes herself upright, sniffling quietly and rubbing at her eyes. Well. Thank stars her face is still intact. But Juno is nowhere to be seen. In her haze, the faerie wonders if the pirate was a figment of her imagination and her lonely heart aches. The thought is terribly sad. So much so that any energy she has left seeps out of her. (It happens too fast... like a vampire is leeching it from her.) She sinks back down against the bed, emptied and hollow. "Am I going mad?"

"̷Y̵e̴s̶,̴ ̶c̵h̶i̵l̵d̸.̵ ̸I̸'̶m̶ ̵a̷f̸r̷a̶i̴d̶ ̷s̸o̸.̸"̴

The bed floats peacefully atop a mystical blue lagoon. A decadent, waterfall canopy cascades above her, tricking gently into the water. And the water... it's beautiful. It reflects the soft pastels of the enchanted forest around her, the yellow crescent moon against the surface resembling a wobbly smile. (It resonates with her, somehow, the way it struggles to hold its shape.) Pink flames flicker calmly over the tall grass and roses alongside the water. Everything is shrouded in a dreamy, dewey mist. Lettie doesn't question this.

It's a prison, glamoured the same way she glamours herself. At least it's pretty. That's all she has, isn't it? Pretty.

"̷P̴r̸e̶t̷t̵y̸ ̸u̷s̵e̴l̶e̴s̴s̵.̷"̶

"...There, there." A hypnotizing voice speaks, it seems to comb like fingers through her hair. The faerie's paralyzed by it. "It must be exhausting, pretending to be something you're most certainly not. You're just a faerie. A resource. And it'll all be over soon."

"But… You’re always telling me to slow down. Maybe you should slow down. Take your minute.”

'I wasn't ready yet... I should have told you.' Lettie tries to reach out to Juno through their link, though it feels flimsy and faint from here. 'I thought I could power through it, but I was--' There's no excuse. She should have known better. 'I'm too weak.' The admission nearly breaks her. 'I fucked up. I fucked everything up. I'm sorry.'

The Juno in her memory wraps her up, cocooning her in her stupidly buff arms, and...

“Whenever you’re ready. I can even carry you, if you want. Whatever you need. I'm here.” That was the first time she kissed her, pressing her lips against the top of her head like a promise. Making an unspoken wish to protect her. ‘I won’t let anything get you. I’m here.’

***​

A holographic cocoon surrounded by blue butterflies is nestled in at the center of a spider's web. (Within the slightly translucent shell is the unmistakable silhouette of a faerie.) A giant, two-headed spider tries to bite into it-- but the cocoon flashes like a star and hardens to steel, snapping their monstrous pincers instead. Hissing with frustration, the abomination hurriedly crawls down the web and drops to the ground. Cathy and Asmodeus narrow their multiple eyes when they find none other than the pirate washing up on the shore of their nightmare island.

A floating puffer fish skeleton bumps urgently against Juno's shoulder, trying to rouse her, to urge her back up to her feet.

"So persistent." Cathy and Asmodeus speak in unison. Their spider body rears back as they shoot a sticky string of silk towards the pirate. Cathy's voice momentarily takes over, her red lips twisting in a wicked smirk. "...That helpless little bug saw what you did and it scared her shitless. Of course she gave up on you." She coos. "That poor village, filled with the elderly and the sick... what a tragedy it was." The spider marches towards Juno, moving fast. "You despicable, homicidal pirate. Don't you realize that I'm the only one who will ever accept you for who you really are?"

 

[starboob]

Oh. Fuck.

Juno realizes their mistake the second that it’s made. Her heart drops, feeling the weight of Lettie’s hand disappear as it disintegrates into fine dust. No turning back now. Done is done and the only way out is forward. If Lettie is not strong enough to fend against these nightmares, then Juno has to be. They did not come this far only to fail. They are not dying. For the sake of their future, Juno will be the strong one.

And, no. No part of her blames Lettie for slipping. She blames herself for not taking a longer pause. In that moment, she had been their captain and failed to make sure her crew was aptly prepared. That oversight could now be their demise. ‘You fucking idiot.’ Taking a moment longer should have been her first thought. If only she had stopped to consider that for as strong as her faerie is, even she has her limits and keeping the Reaper and Asmodeus both out of her head and heart had pushed her over and beyond. It should not have even been impossible, but she’s the fucking faerie.

Now as they endeavor to cleanse the worlds of nightmare corruptions, Juno’s on her own. (For now.)

As the purple tides rise and the currents rip them apart, the pirate take one last look at her wife before she is nothing but a wash of purple. She hopes the last thing Lettie sees is her smile and she hopes she understands that it is reassurance. And she hopes that that reassurance means something to Lettie, that it’s something solid she can hold onto before they see each other again.

Soon, the nightmares are in her lungs; they’re wriggling to get underneath her eyelids; they’re worming into her ears and Juno does nothing to stop them from taking over. She clears her mind of all panic and focuses on what’s real.

“Look at me. I’m real. You’re real too.”

***​

When Juno’s body is swept to shore, the purple tides set her gently down on the gravelly island. The roughness of the rocks underneath her should stir the pirate to rouse, but she remains flat against the shore, letting the ocean waves lap at her ankles. Her memories are a whirlpool of loose associations informing her that she’s survived a shipwreck and successfully fended off the mermaids (fish bitches). This information tells her that she is exhausted and thusly convinces her that the hard stones beneath her are as soft as any bed. She lets herself sink a little deeper into the illusion.

But the peace doesn’t last. (It never does. This must be the one constant of her life.) Something tiny and rough bumps into her should. (It reminds her of someone.) She ignores it, squeezing her eyes shut and weakly batting the object away with her hand.

Someone is talking. (Someone with a punchable face.) Their voice is distant and muffled, just barely breaking through the pirate’s sleep-addled mind. She groans as a way to tell the voice (voices?) to shut the fuck up. Don’t they know that anyone who disturbs the pirate’s sleep has an angry faerie to answer to? (Speaking of that angry faerie, where is she? And why wasn’t she there to protect her from the mermaids? She always protects Juno.)

The spider’s silk that comes for her is blocked by the puffer fish who rearranges his bones in such a fashion that it creates a spiky shield. The silk dissolves upon contact and Missile Launcher takes his original shape again, butting up against Juno once more. This time, he doesn’t shy away from scratching the stubborn pirate with his spikes. (Of all times, why does Juno choose now to try and get some rest?)

“Agh!” She jerks her hand away when Missile Launcher belly flops onto it. This at least gets the pirate’s eye open while she shakes the little skeleton off of her, rolling onto her sides. That’s when she notices the giant spider legs (of course it’s a fucking spider) only a few yards away from her. When she follows the legs up to the face (faces), she scrambles backwards and springs to her feet.

Fuck spiders and fuck this spider specifically.

As she stares into the eyes of the monster who has ruined hers and Lettie’s life, she covers her fists in protective bone gauntlets with spikes ridges along the knuckles. When Cathy takes over and taunts her, she buckles. For a second, she buckles. The reminder of her past is too fresh for her to sweep it away as quickly as she’d like, but then, as if sensing this, her future comes to save her. She doesn’t hear what Lettie says, but she feels her trying to access their stream and when her eyes catch the pulsing glow of the cocoon, she suspects she knows what’s interfering.

Even if Cathy is right—and Juno doesn’t think that she is—she’ll never believe anything that comes out of that bitch’s mouth. She’d rather risk hearing it from Lettie herself, because Lettie is real.

And this bitch? She should be burning in the goddess’s Inferno.

“Fuck you. You don’t know shit, bitch.” ‘You don’t get to speak for my wife.’ Without hesitation, she barrels forward and crashes into the abomination’s body, tackling it to the ground. She lifts one spiked fist and delivers a right hook that slides across both faces.

Asmodeus's and Cathy’s heads snap to the side. Where Juno’s fist leaves a scorch marks across Cathy’s cheek, Asmodeus’s bleed red. Juno doesn’t think anything of this; she has other things to worry about. The beast is trying to get themself up, but this form doesn’t allow them as much leverage and they’re too slow. She's gets them with a left hook this time. Then one to the center of Asmodeus’s face and another to Cathy’s.

"Pow, pow." (Just like she promised.)

The creature squeals and writhes beneath the pirate, finally gaining some ounce of leverage to fling her off with their eight legs. Juno flies through the air and hits the sticky web. She’s locked into place instantly, everything save for her fists is immobile. Her hands only remain free because of the bone gauntlets burn through the web. She wriggles, trying to get more of them to touch the web.

Meanwhile, the monstrosity skitters beneath her, lowering onto their eight haunches to jump. Juno thrashes in the web, burning more and more pieces away, careful to avoid areas that might otherwise jeopardize the cocoon. Cathy and Asmodeus shift their balance, lowering and—

Juno drops from the web and meets the creature midair, acting as the weight that brings them all down. Asmodeus doesn’t give the pirate time to get back to her feet. He’s quicker this time and twists the spider body around so that she’s beneath them, pinned down by one of those large hairy legs. It digs into her sternum, uncomfortably so. She’s about to slice it off by reforming the spikes on her gauntlets into sharp gardening spades, when two long beetle-like pincers sprout from Asmodeus’s mouth.

“What the fuck,” she wheezes. He snaps his jaws twice, then aims for the pirate’s neck. Juno reacts just in time, catching the pincers before they chop her head off. Sweat beads over her brow as she pries them apart. Her arms shake.

“Come on!” Cathy snaps at Asmodeus. “Get the little runt!”

It doesn’t work. Juno throws the pincers and the monstrosity to the side, getting back up onto her feet in an instant. The gauntlets finally morph into those spades so when she comes at Cathy and Asmodeus again, she makes sure it’ll send those bastards to their graves. (She fucking hopes, at least.) And, this time around, when she lands on top of the grotesque creature, she doesn’t end it quite so quickly. She jams and twists her fists into the beast’s body until it’s covered in gaping, bloody holes and continues long after they've stopped moving. Torrents of anger rush through her and take over. She only stops because, eventually, the body flakes away and there's nothing left to stab. As the monster comes undone, pieces of it gather together and form into the face of Asmodeus. It's only a second, then the figment (phantom?) is gone. That’s… probably nothing. (She hopes.)

Deciding to ignore that totally not concerning detail, she gets up and rubs the sweat off her brow, only to realize that it's more nightmare gunk and blood than sweat. 'Gross.' She then turns her attention to the cocoon and has Missile Launcher cut what remains of the web while she stands below, ready to catch. (Doesn't matter the form, Juno will always catch Lettie.) It lands with more heft than Juno expects, causing her to stumble until she falls over, though she manages to protect the cocoon from hitting the gravel. With a small groan, she sets it down next to her as she sits up and inspects the cocoon, trying to peer through the semi-translucent shell. When she has a good understanding of where Lettie is within it, she dissolves the bone gauntlets and rears her fist back. Even then, she pulls the punch to protect the faerie within, only doing enough to put a good crack in the surface. She's about to go again when she catches Missile Launcher moving around frantically to get her attention.

When Juno looks over her shoulder, her eye widens and she's back on her feet. Asmodeus is standing behind her. While he mostly appears normal, normal ends at his torso. From his hips down, he's still a fucking spider. (Why.) “Fuckin’ seriously? Why can’t you just stay dead? No one fuckin’ wants you here.”

He responds by wrapping a claw around Juno’s waist before she can react and throws her away from the cocoon. Her back is torn to shreds as she slides backwards, creating a ditch in the gravel. 'Why the fuck isn't this island made of, like, fucking feathers?' It then occurs to her, however belatedly, that it could be. Like the island is trying to prove this, the gravel underneath her softens and when she lifts up her arm, feathers come up clinging to it where gravel had once lodged itself. (It does nothing for her injuries, but at least it's feathers?)

"How cute." Asmodeus huffs, pacing back and forth as he deliberates the precise way he's going to tear this human apart and hang her entrails from the bannisters of his new regime. His arms morph into swords and, like lightning, he charges.

“Shit, shit, shit,” she mutters, eye wide. She tilts left then veers to the right as she breaks into a run. The fake out only buys her a second and it's a second more than she had before. Missile Launcher races in the opposite direction to take on the demon himself, speeding all around Asmodeus and tearing into his flesh. It does little to actually stop his course.

Soon, the demon is shooting spiderwebs at her. One catches her arm and sticks her to the ground. She tugs, she searches for bone, and Asmodeus gains on her, sword arms raised and ready to lob off her head. "Shit!"

He's feet away. She won't be quick enough. Her heart hammers as escape slips through her fingers. All she can manage is summoning the sun's shield from Fabel. She covers herself for the first blow, but she knows it won't hold him off forever. Neither will the yellow armor that she conjures for more protection. "Fuck!"

As a last resort, she amplifies the sound of her panicked heartbeat through the nightmare island, hopeful that the sound will somehow reach Lettie, because she knows she’s here. She knows she’s not weak. She knows she’ll come if she just remembers.