Fantasy DIFFERENT BODIES ⋮ SAME SOUL | ( *starboob && syntra )

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

Since watching Inna get bucked off of Brutus the first time they destroyed Rome, Liora has known that she loves Inna. Watching her helplessly fly through the air like a crushed can had been enough for her to realize that the blonde was at least important to her; and now, in hindsight, she realizes that is also the moment when she first felt love for her. It just took her awhile to understand the feeling, find a name for it, and accept it. Then it took even longer for her to actually say those words––mostly because there were all her fears around rejection, her fears that she might not even be feeling it, and then when she truly confirmed how she felt she just did not know how to say them. It felt too vulnerable. Even after Inna had confessed. So finally being able to say it to her now? It feels as though a weight has been lifted from her shoulders; even if she had already more or less confirmed her feelings, actually expressing them has made a world of difference.

Throughout the weeks following her final run-in with her mother, she has felt freer and happier––maybe that is not just because she's finally been able to express herself but because her mother's shadow no longer looms over her in the same way that it had before. It makes her somewhat okay with the fact that outside of her love life, her life is technically in shambles. Where she would normally panic that she currently lacks any tangible direction, Liora has been surprisingly okay with that. Probably because she has decided to make her lifelong goal making Inna the happiest she can make her. That has mostly involved showering her in gifts like Cartier diamond necklaces, watching her favorite animes with her, reminding her that she's pretty, and making sure that Inna always has fresh flowers.

Plus, training a puppy is hard work as well. She had thought that teaching an ex-demon how to be human again had been the feat of the century, but, as it would turn out, puppies are just as challenging. Like, she doesn't have to worry about Fluffinator drinking bleach accidentally, because the cleaning cabinets are childproofed now, but she does have to worry about what's in her mouth every five seconds. Not to mention she had not been particularly pleased when Fluffinator decided to treat the couch as a toilet––cute as she is, those puppy eyes had not worked on Liora and she spent the rest of the day cleaning the couch and trying a number of remedies to get the smell of dog piss out of the fabric. (Worry not, she has since forgiven Fluffinator for her past transgressions.)

Not to mention that in addition to making Inna happy and helping train Fluffinator, being Inna's dedicated taste tester for all her baked goods has been an ordeal in and of itself. Liora had to create a whole spreadsheet and twelve part rating system to accurately track her rankings of each baked good. (Admittedly, the woman had more fun with that than she would care to admit.) While she had also offered to help Inna, it turns out that Liora is a disaster in the kitchen. So she's happy to go on ingredient runs whenever her girlfriend has forgotten to pick up the items she needs or changes her mind at the last minute. The bodega isn't even that far away and Fluffinator has enjoyed the short jaunts as well. However, this time, she decides to leave the puppy with Inna as it's raining and she doesn't want to deal with the smell of wet dog (yuck).

"Sure, sure," she hums, pulling on her shoes and grabbing a coat from the rack. "There is a fee, however," she points to her lips with a smile. She then leans across the counter to kiss her girlfriend. "Oh, and don't forget that Sol is coming over tonight for dinner. I still have to tell her about our mom," she sighs, rolling her eyes because she really isn't looking forward to explaining that to her sister. With that she then heads out with the promise to be back in fifteen minutes. Knowing Liora, she means exactly fifteen fucking minutes.

Obviously, when she stepped outside the complex she had expected to find the same dirty, shitty streets that are custom to the city and today? Today, the city seems to have outdone herself. "What the fuck," she mutters, looking in either direction to see the pavement and the streets covered in fucking corpses. Prior to this discovery, she had been quite fucking certain that they did not live in the part of the city still controlled by the fucking mafia, but this display proves her fucking wrong. Staring at all these bodies is how she imagines that one dude in The Godfather felt when he discovered a severed horse's head in his bed, but a thousand times worse, because at least that had been a fucking horse and not his fucking girlfriend.

Because, yeah, upon closer fucking inspection Liora, to her utter horror, realizes that these all resemble Inna in different states of death and decay. Just what the fuck is going on? Maybe she has gotten too used to not being attacked every five seconds that she's let her guard down, because really this is the run of the mill bullshit she would have been expecting, like, a month or so ago. She obviously knows that none of this is real, despite the automatic lurch of her stomach and heart that try to convince her to panic; she knows better now than to believe everything that she fucking sees.

Deciding that Inna doesn't actually need canned cherries and that she'll have to make due with whatever they currently have, she turns on her heel only to discover... Yup, the building is gone. "Great. Fan-fucking-tastic," she exhales, pinching the bridge of her nose. She doesn't even bother checking her phone to see if she can call the blonde, because she knows they don't have an interdimensional phone plan. Still, this isn't an issue. She's Liora fucking Trihn, problem solver extraordinaire. Naturally, she opens a portal back into their apartment and hops through it.

...Only to land back in the same spot she had been in prior, because it can never be too easy when even one of the disaster duo are involved. "Jesus fucking Christ!" she groans, knowing that whatever is about to happen is going to be a royal pain in her fucking ass. "Alright, just fucking reveal yourself already," she says, tossing her hands into the air in the universal expression of I'm giving the fuck up. "Let's just get this fucking over with."

 

[Syntra]

‘Tsk, tsk,’ a familiar voice rang in Liora’s ears. And, guess what? It wasn’t Morgan Freeman, nor was it the local news anchor or that girl from those annoying toothpaste commercials that had been all over the TV lately. Of fucking course, it just had to be E-keysmash! Out of their merry band of stalkers, this was possibly the worst goddamn choice. ‘Don’t you like the spectacle, my dear? And I worked so, so far to make it believable! All for you, too, because nobody else gives a fuck about the bitch.’ …a far cry from Innushka, wasn’t it? If nothing else, it did seem that the demon queen had used her alone time to get in touch with good, old-fashioned reality. No longer was she pretending that the blonde was engaged in some bizarre long con, and merely waiting to betray her the second Liora really started to trust her. (Possibly because that had happened already? Props to her for knowing, really-- whatever stalkerific technology/spells she was using, they clearly informed her well, because the change in tactics sure as fuck was timely. What, after all, scared you the most when you had a partner you didn’t want to lose? Losing them, duh! One didn’t fucking have to be a rocket scientist to grasp that concept.)

‘Do you have any idea how exhausting it is, to create illusions this convincing?’ E-keysmash whined. ‘I spent days on this, you know. I tried to include different causes of death, too-- solely to appreciate how, hmmm, breakable your kind is. Did you know that, when you cease to breathe, you die?’ the demon queen asked, genuinely astonished. (Move over, Charles fucking Darwin, ‘cause a new expert on evolutionary biology was in the town!) ‘I thought that was a joke. A life form that stole our birthright from us couldn’t possibly be this pathetic, I said to myself.’ …wait, what? No Great War Against Demons was recorded in the fucking history books, that was for certain. Like, had that been a thing, edgy thirteen-year-olds would have loved studying history! Meanwhile, it consistently managed to score just sliiightly higher than feet fungus in the overall popularity. So, what was going on? ‘You don’t know what I’m talking about, do you?’ E-keysmash caught up on her ingnorance. ‘No wonder, really. You hairless apes truly are worse than worms-- at least those know their fucking place. Unlike you, they don’t try to conquer the skies.’ Hmm. Was it just her, or did the queen sound genuinely angry for once? Under her usual veneer of ‘haha, I’m sooo much better than you, bitch’, there was something more… feral, maybe. Something that you wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley. That something had claws, sharp and poisoned, and as the liquid slowly trickled on the ground, drip drip drip? Even without seeing her, Liora could somehow tell that she was getting closer.

‘No matter, though. No matter. It is not your fault that you were born from filth. Poor dear, your rotten mother didn’t even teach you any manners! One would have thought, however, that thanking for one’s wedding gift at least would be a common sense thing.’ Ooookay, what, what, what? How many fucking plot twists per second was she going to drop? ‘You’re lucky I am merciful, I suppose,’ E-keysmash sighed, with all the sorrow of a billionaire who had to accept that it was only possible to build twenty six bathrooms in her absurdly large manor, and not the twenty seven she had been aiming for. ‘I’ll just mold you in my own image. I assume you’ll be more responsive than your friend? Considering just how eager you are to please. Well, I’ve got good news for you, my dear! You’ll get to serve and serve and serve, till your hands bleed. Say goodbye to your old life, Liora. To that blonde rat, too.’ And, in that moment? In that moment, it became obvious that E-keysmash didn’t play fair, for a strange gas flooded the streets. (It was red, red like blood, and suddenly, it was everywhere-- crawling up her nose, too, and it burned, burned, burned! Like a lit match, or a confession rejected, or a chili pepper stuck in your goddamn eye. Breathing was getting harder and harder, too, and then… then Liora’s world dissolved into nothingness, dark and soothing.)

***

There were few certainties in Inna Orlovskaya’s tumultuous life, but of one thing, she was absolutely certain-- namely that Liora Trihn, the best person in this shit fucking world, was never late. As in, never never. Not even a zombie apocalypse outbreak could throw a wedge in that, the blonde was sure, but now… fuck, now she was late. By three whole minutes! What was even worse, the woman continued to be late. Three minutes slowly morphed into five, five into ten, and ten, as it tended to happen, into fucking fifteen. Just, ugh! Why wasn’t Liora calling her? Inna could understand if her girlfriend, say, met some old enemies and decided to break their fucking noses. A totally valid way of spending one’s time, as far as she was concerned! In such cases, however, wasn’t it polite to let your cute blonde partner know that you’d be late? Or, failing that, at least pick up your goddamn phone?! Aaaargh! This was inconsiderate and stupid and… and so unlike Liora, really, that Inna couldn’t even bring herself to be mad. (Unhelpfully, her brain was supplying three worst case scenarios per second, too. Liora somehow getting stuck in a shredding machine? Check. Liora being fed to the lions in the local zoo? Check. Liora getting brainwashed in a fucking therapy session? Check, check and check! …and, yes, all of those situations were totally plausible. Her girlfriend was an acquired taste, you know? Plebs rarely understood this, and so they tended to, um, act out when confronted with her particular brand of charm.)

Without hesitation, Inna dialed Sol’s number. “Sol? Hey, mate, how are you doing? Is Li with you? ‘Cause I sent her on an errand and she promised to return at 3PM and now it’s 3:17PM and… and she’s still not here!” she exclaimed, besides herself with worry. “Her phone’s fucking dead, too. What if she died? Do you think the earth could have swallowed her? I have always suspected her of being a bitch!”

 

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

'Jesus fucking Christ,' Liora thinks, in the privacy of her own head, the second the demon queen's voice fills her up. Already, she knew that this shitty situation was going to be bad news. She just had sort of hoped that it would not be Ms. Unpronounceable Name level bad and even then, she had an inkling she must of been dealing with this demon. The other ones have never put this level of effort into their attacks; usually they're less psychological and more physical. The woman pinches the bridge of her nose while the queen prattles on and on about the history of demons or a wedding or something, wishing that she could fucking reach Inna to let her know that she's fine and just dealing with their least favorite nuisance. However, being out of range of a cell phone tower that can reach her dimension throws a wrench into that plan. Not to mention that their psychic link is still broken so there's nothing she can do to reach her girlfriend. She just hopes Inna isn't too worried about her. Like. This is fine. It will be fine. Yeah, the red gas filling her lungs that burns worse than tear gas is definitely concerning, but she also remembers that Inna promised she'd go to Hell for her, too. 'Inna will... she'll...'

☀​

Meanwhile, at Casa de Sol, or rather the weed dispensary that is a block away from Lio's apartment and next to that fancy nursery she's been wanting to check out (since five minutes ago), the woman is happily and patiently waiting for her turn to look at the marijuanas for sale. After the last impromptu visit from her sister and her not-girlfriend (at the time), she definitely doesn't want to show up to her place without flower power. That, and she knows her sister won't have any at her place and, as much as she does like building this new positive relationship with her sister, she just doesn't think she can make it through this dinner sober. Like, she's pretty sure Li-Lio (Lilo?) is going to lecture her on her grades and the fact that she's still an undeclared major well into her third year. (Not that Sol even wants this education. She knows she should be grateful for it, but it's not her choice. It's just that she's kind of terrified of what Helia would do if she were to drop out. While Sol definitely is the daughter who pushes back more, this is just not a fight she thinks she can win.)

When the art student at the front desk informs her that she can go in, that's when her sister's live-in-not-girlfriend decides to give her a call. Smiling, she answers the phone and places it between her cheek and shoulder while she browses through a selection of sour candies. "Oh, perfect timing, dude––" she starts, but then suddenly stops as her not-sister-in-law starts panicking? That is enough to get Sol's full attention, since Inna doesn't really seem like the freak-out type.

"Uhhhh," she says, looking around the dispensary for Ora, "No, she's not here, but that would be sooo spooky if she was and rude, since that would have meant she didn't even say hi. Like, geeze, she's not great with her social skills but she knows the basics." 'You're going off track, Sol Bring it back. Bring it back.'

Okay, so her sister is missing. Even Sol understands that Liora being late is an oxymoron. That her phone is dead is also a concern, because it'd be unlike her nerd of a sister to leave without it being sufficiently charge or at least coming prepared with a portable charger. "Alright, alright, I'm like a block away. I, um, just need to finish something and then I'll be right over. Also, hey, is that a dog I hear in the background? Did you two get a dog? O-M-G, text me a pic. Okay, see you in like a Sol thirty minutes!" (Forty-five minutes.)

After hanging up and several distractions later (it seemed really important to document the chewed gum sculpture someone had made), she's finally slipping into her sister's apartment complex as another tenant leaves. Once in the elevator she checks the time and is quite pleased with herself for being early (on-time); in tow she is caring a brown bag with her medicine, a grocery bag full of snacks she knows her sister won't have, and a potted ficus for her sister's lifeless apartment.

She skips down the hallway and when she arrives at the door, she lets herself into the apartment, using a key Li doesn't know she copied. "Okay, so I've been thinking," she starts, setting down all of her supplies on the coffee table, "there's no way the Earth swallowed her. For one, all the major fault lines are in California and the next great earthquake isn't supposed to happen until, like, 3045. My psychic told me that and I would trust her with my life," she also trusts the local bodega man with her life as well sooo, "But, I don't think it's that farfetched to assume that aliens took her. Like, if I was going to mistake a regular person as the leader of the world, I might think of Liora. She's pretty efficient and knows a lot of stuff, probably more than a politician, so I could understand the mix-up.

"I also thought, oh my god," she pauses, upon noticing a husky puppy licking her knees. Immediately, she swoops the pup into her arms and lets Fluffinator lick all over her face, giggling, "Wow, this is the best. When did you get a dog? Oh, wait! Not important, I mean the dog is important, duh, but not what we were talking about. Okay, okay... So if it's not aliens, then my other thought, and this is going to sound a little mean but I think you'll understand, is that some teenagers went to summon a demon but got her instead." (Sol still doesn't know her sister is a half-demon or about the magic superpowers. But give Liora a break, it's a lot of information to dump on her hyperactive sister.) "It was also raining, so maybe something more ordinary happened like lightning struck her... but I already checked the reports for random deaths slash accidents in the area and no one matching her description has died. I did call the hospitals, too, on my way over here and she hasn't been admitted anywhere. So my last theory? Helia found out she's really alive and had her murdered." (She also doesn't know that she's inherited multiple and numerous dollars; mostly because people have yet to identify the charred body at the villa and Sol has ignored all the calls from her mom's lawyers, employees, and private detectives; plus, Liora was supposed to tell her over dinner tonight.) "I mean, I'm not trying to be a negative Nancy, but every crime show starts with them throwing out wild theories until one of them is right. Hey, do you want a joint?"

 

[Syntra]

‘Don’t face difficult situations alone,’ they’d said. ‘It will be easier that way,’ they’d said. Presumably, the idea behind that “””wisdom””” was the assumption that with two heads, you had more IQ points at your disposal. Which, yeah, fair enough-- under normal circumstances, it could be a valid theory. The obvious problem that nobody was acknowledging, though? That, aside from more IQ points, you also had the access to more dumbass points. Exponentially more dumbass points, depending on what kind of savior you had chosen. In her panic, Inna Orlovskaya just… not considered that, really. (Her brain, you see, required three essential things to function. Need number one: an abundance of caffeine. Need number two: a weapon in her reach. Need number three: her sweetest, smartest, and most beautiful girlfriend by her side! All of those worked together, and if you removed even one thing out of the equation? Well, duh, you’d get a completely different number. That was how equations fucking worked, how anyone with two brain cells to rub together would tell you! Now, Inna could go like, two to three days with the first two needs unfulfilled. It wouldn’t be ideal, but what in this shit world was? Liora Trihn was fucking essential, however, and without her there, the blonde could only see red ALERT, ALERT, ALERT signs!)

Needless to say, then, that Sol’s presence did not fucking help. Yeah, yeah, the girl was a bro, and a certified ray of sunlight as well, though as it was? As it was, she was likely to feed Inna’s own paranoia. And considering that her paranoia had been skyscraper-sized even before the other woman had started listing all those terrible, terrible options, that was not a good thing! “Fluffinator Orlovskaya,” she turned to her dog, possibly in an attempt to distract herself a bit, “meet Sol. Sol, this is Fluffinator Orlovskaya. If she, um, pisses on your fucking shoes, it means she likes you. We’re trying to train her out of it, but… eh, that’s not important. Not now.” Fluffinator Orlovskaya seemed almost offended at that, as if she couldn’t grasp the version of reality in which she wasn’t the most important being in existence, but Inna decided to ignore it. Surely, the canine gods would understand! This was a state of fucking emergency, and everything not Liora-related had to be shoved aside. “So, any theories as for where Li might be?” The question might have sounded good on paper-- like something that the fucking Sherlock Holmes might have asked, really, ‘cause throwing around big words like ‘theories,’ ‘hypotheses’ and ‘evidence’ seemed to be his forte. (What a nerd! Privately, Inna hoped he’d been shoved into many lockers in his childhood. So fucking what if he was fictional? Even made-up characters had to learn that the world didn’t belong to fucking nerds, man. ‘Ooooh, look at me, I’m superior to the average person because I can memorize pages upon pages of nonsensical fucking bullshit! Now, will someone please wipe my ass for me? We didn’t study how to do that at my fancy university.’ Like, not even exaggerating. Personally, Inna blamed the teachers-- in their misguided attempts to make the school better for everyone, you see, they had cracked down on the only mechanism that had kept these smug bastards in check. Namely, bullying!)

…back to the point, though. She only had it coming, Inna supposed, for following a nerd’s example, because Sol’s answers sent her down the fucking conspiracy spiral. “Ooooh shit, you’re right,” she muttered. “The aliens totally took her, man. If not because of the leadership thing, then definitely for one of those human research programs! She’s such a fine fucking specimen, and… no, no, no,” Inna’s eyes widened in horror. “Do you think she’s gonna get an alien gf? First of all, that was my fucking fantasy, thank you very much, but also, also, I am her gf now.” Not that some grey-ass motherfucker could compete with Inna Awesome Orlovskaya, of course! Under the normal circumstances, that was. Now, in the privacy of an alien ship, and separated from her One True LoveTm, Liora might succumb to the greatest of humanity’s sins-- to curiosity. What if, what if, what if? Ahhh fuck, did she need that joint! “Nah,” the blonde shook her head before grabbing the aforementioned blunt, “I’m pretty sure that’s not it. Like, I tried to summon Liora as well once, for shits and giggles. Bought candles and everything, almost set our apartment on fire, and nothing! Nothing, zilch, nada. I’m also sure that someone as fucking badass as her couldn’t be killed a storm. You know Li, Sol. She’d banish it with her gaze alone.” And as for Helia… well, that was a bit of an awkward situation, wasn’t it? Which, of course, meant that Inna had to approach it with her signature TactTM.

"Yeah, that's not fucking it, either. You ready to celebrate, my dude? 'Cause Helia kicked the bucket. The cause of death: being an irredeemable bitch. I guess you're pretty loaded now!" she patted her on her back, with the level of nonchalance usually reserved for, dunno, shopping for groceries. "Think of auntie Inna from time to time, will ya? I could really use a few more zeroes in my fucking bank account. Anyway..." she trailed off, weighing for a second whether what she was about to do was a good idea or not. (Hmm, hmm. Superheroes always had these weird-ass ideas about not sharing vital info re: their abilities, didn't they? Blah blah blah, something about 'not wanting to endanger their loved ones' and shit. The thing was, this was Sol. Sol, who probably invented at least one new conspiracy theory per day! Inna couldn't possibly imagine a person who had discredited herself more in the eyes of, well, pretty much anyone who valued shit like 'common sense' or 'evidence.' Literally nobody would believe her if she were to spread the story, and honestly? The woman would learn of their demonic ways anyway, sooner or later. Better make it sooner, then, while the blonde could control the narrative!)

"Oh, and also, I forgot to say this before, but me and Li... are the chosen ones, kind of. Chosen to save the fucking world. Would you believe? Shit's crazy, man." As she spoke, dark flames consumed her hand-- sparks were dancing around it, too, and wove themselves into an impressive-looking rose. "For you," Inna gestured towards it. "Sooo, I'm thinking it might be relevant? Our status, I mean. We've been pretty good at making powerful enemies, even if we tried to dodge the bullshit as much as we could."

 

[starboob]

☀​

"Fluffinator?" she asks, eyes wide and full of the stars themselves, "That is literally such an incredible name. Wayyy better than what I named my bearded dragon, Lizard McGuire." (Sol doesn't need to ask who came up with the brilliant name, because, to be honest, her sister's creativity lacks pizzazz and general creativeness. She's just not that creative––save for when she wants to demolish someone's reputation.) Sol continues to run her fingers through Fluffinator's coat and the pup seems more than happy that at least someone is giving her the attention she so obviously deserves for the being the cutest and best puppy on the planet. "If she pees on me, I would be honored." Then, something occurs to Sol and a light bulb seems to blink on right above her head. "Wow, Li must be pretty whipped if she's taking your last name," because that's the only interpretation she can think of when their shared puppy has the Orlovskaya name, "Like, she told her Rockefeller ex that she would sooner die than become a Rockefeller and that's basically a direct quote."

Then, deciding that they should probably focus more on her mysteriously disappeared sister and not, say, exposing Liora as certifiably whipped by her totally hot girlfriend, she opens the bag of powerful sour candies she picked up from the dispensary and pops several in her mouth (forgetting about the three she already ate in the elevator). She knows that putting even more marijuana into her bloodstream will help her think better. (It's where all her best essay ideas come from even her TA vehemently disagreed with her film review of Bee Movie where she argued that this piece of cinnamon topography literally erased women (bees) from their own narrative of labor exploitation because empathy for workers can only be gained when those exploited are men; otherwise they would not have made all those bees, who should canonically be women (a hive of girl bosses, wow), men. Anyway, she has the essay in her backpack because she was expecting Liora to question how she failed intro to film.)

"Liora isn't really into aliens. She's, like, as far from a monster-fucker as you can get, so I'm p sure you're fine," she nods, totally understanding where Inna's worries are coming from. (Of course, she doesn't have to worry about such things, not only because her own girlfriend is not currently missing/possibly abducted, but because they have an alien clause in their girlfriend agreement; it gives them both a free pass should they be abducted and the aliens are freaky.) Sol leans back on the couch, with Fluffinator sitting comfortably across her lap, and sparks up the joint, careful to not get the smoke in Fluffinator Orlovskaya's face; though she must decide she is being an irresponsible aunt, because she does end up getting up to smoke by the window. "Alright, alright, so my theories are off, but I think we're really onto something here. Like we've ruled out two really big contenders, so I'm sure we'll zero in on something by the next 4:20 o'clock," she says, humming while she tries to think of more possible scenarios. (Somewhere she knows she should be way more concerned about this, but she also does agree with Inna that her sister is pretty badass. So she has a hard time believing that anything can really take her down and, ultimately, she will be fine.)

However, rather suddenly, her thought train stops right in its tracks when Inna dumps that tidbit of information on her. Not exactly the way she was planning to find out that Helia had died––like, she sort of thought the woman was immortal and would have herself cryogenically frozen while her subconscious or unconscious or regular conscious is uploaded into some AI meant to take over the world. Rather stunned, she scratches her head and just kind of nods, "Uh, I guess that explains why her people keep trying to get ahold of me. Wow. For real?" Maybe Sol would feel bad about not mourning the loss of the woman who raised her, but, in all honesty, their relationship was strained at best and Sol never felt particularly close to the woman. She's more so worried about what Liora's reaction to that news had been, since her sister, for whatever reason, sort of worshipped the woman––last she knew, at least. "I can finally drop out college without my mom trying to have me admitted... Woah," she mumbles, then lifting her gaze to look at Inna, "Oh, and I mean, I don't really know how 'money' works or how much Helia even had, but, yeah, just tell me how many zeros you want and I can write a check. Geeze, I'll probably need one of those big ones that you see on TV, huh?"

Then, once more and in the span of minutes, Sol's world is entirely shattered. Although, she guesses this is not that world shattering. It actually proves that a lot of her other theories must be true as well. Like, the news articles she's been reading from reputable monster hunters have claimed that there's been a suspicious amount of not-of-this-world activity lately––including the haunted cathedral near her university collapsing along with the increased demonic sightings across the globe. "I would not believe, to be honest. I mean, you're pretty great and I totally accept you as my savior, but Lio? Geeze, she's going to have a hard time getting fans. T-B-H, shocked she was chosen..." she trails off staring at the magic rose in front of her and cupping it in the palms of her hands. After this visit, her eyes might become permanently starry. "This is so cool... I wish I could make fire roses grow... I can just make regular roses grow," she sighs, marveling at this display of confirmed hashtag magic. "Uh, anyway, I guess you being world-savers definitely changes things. In fact, I know exactly what happened now. She's obviously stuck in a time-loop trying to save the world. I bet something really dramatic happened while she went on that errand. Like, uhh, she saw a meteor in the sky but it was too late! So she got rewound to make sure the meteor doesn't hit and then, hmm... Dinosaurs came back after she figured out the meteor situation and the dinosaurs tried to take back the earth and were pretty successful so she had to be rewound again, etcetera." Oh, yes, that dank herb is most definitely working.

...Which is probably why she thinks it's so important to ask, "Hey, are Li's powers like... farting rainbows? If so, I totally understand why she didn't tell me sooner."

 

[Syntra]

"Lizard McGuire, my young padawan, is a great fucking name. Never doubt yourself! 'Cause if you start doing it," Inna's expression grew serious, "the world will doubt you right back. Don't ever grant it that chance! It's a fucking bitch, you know, and you can be damn certain it will take a mile if you give it an inch." ...was she maybe enjoying this big sis moment? Here, in the privacy of their apartment, she had to admit that, yes, it was comfy. (Kinda like disciplining Fluffinator Orlovskaya, really, with the added benefit of her being fairly sure that this student wouldn't piss on her trousers. Again, a low bar to pass, but dry trousers happened to be the gateway to one's fucking dignity! ...the kind of dignity that she had lost the access to many, many times in the past few weeks, anyway. Truly, Fluffinator Orlovskaya was lucky for possessing the softest fur in the world, otherwise she would have faced Inna's wrath much more often.) "And she's not fucking whipped, Sol. We just decided, democratically, that my surname is better. Ie., I said it and Li agreed. Also, Rockefeller is a parasite surname and I'm not surprised she rejected it. Slapping that atrocity behind your first name just screams 'I have no self-respect', if you ask me." Was Inna insecure that Liora had apparently dated a Rockefeller? Yeah, right, pffft! As if some plastic surgery bunny could even come close to the awesomeness that was Inna Fucking Orlovskaya.

"Yup, for real!" the blonde nodded. "The Christmas fucking came early for you this year. You're welcome, by the way. I'm kinda shocked nobody killed the bitch before I got to her, really. Seemed like that type that would benefit from, like, not existing." When Sol offered to just give her the money she wanted, though? It was Inna's turn to be startled. "Wait, wait, wait. You're really going to give it to me, just like that? Man, you're my favorite not-sister in not-law!" Already, Inna could see herself on some beach, dressed in a swimsuit that left almost nothing to imagination, and Liora... shit, Liora. Her suddenly getting rich via murder still didn't erase the fact she'd probably been kidnapped, dammit!

"No no no," she shook her head, not willing to put up with the gf slander, "you don't get it, Sol. Liora will have plenty of fans! She's just, uh, meant for a different fucking audience than you are. First of all, I don't think you're really qualified to judge this shit? Like, you're her sister. Of course that, to you, she'll have all the charm of a fucking potato. To the gals who like things a bit spicier, though? Man, if she ever listened to me and dressed in actual leather, she'd be a total chick magnet." ...which, yeah, maybe Inna should have been thankful for Li's stubbornness. Not that she didn't trust her beautiful girlfriend to remain faithful, of course, but the idea of some randos swarming her like flies would swarm a rotting corpse... no, thank you. If nothing else, Liora's bitchsona at least kept those pests at bay!

The theory that Sol presented was more than solid, but for some reason? For some reason, Inna couldn't imagine it going down that way. "Whoa, hold your horses! The fact we are meant to save the world doesn't fucking mean we're actually trying to do it. Like, I'm not gonna work for free, my dude. I wouldn't even work for money, but that's besides the point. The last time we did some serious world-saving, we also aggravated this bitch of a demon queen, and..." Oh. Oh! E-keysmash. For a few blissful moments, Inna had forgotten about her wretched fucking existence, but it was safe to say that she hadn't forgotten about them-- mostly because sitting on the throne was about as intellectually demanding as watching paint dry, and so she had to dream up bullshit to amuse herself. You know, bullshit like revenge fantasies!

"What? No, that's not fucking it. Li can, uh, summon portals? And create her own personal zombie army, basically. Dope stuff. I assume she didn't tell you because she didn't know how," Inna reasoned. "Like, I imagine that messaging your sis something along the lines of 'Hey, I randomly became a master necromancer. Enough about me, though! How was your Tuesday?' would be fucking awkward. But, anyway, I just remembered that there's a literal queen of hell that hates our guts. And like... shit, she probably could capture Li! She, um, kinda had in the past," thanks to her assistance, "and she had some fancy schmancy magic-y stuff to block her teleportation powers." Ah, shit, shit, shit! How to get to hell, though? It wasn't like Inna could pull a portal out of her ass, which...

"Sol!" she looked up, her eyes shining with renewed purpose. "I have a task for you. Can you, like, help me identify which things of Liora's hold sentimental value to her? I'm going to try to create a link to her," you know, the one she had shattered so willy nilly, "so that I can figure out how to fucking get there." And, yep, she was kinda copying the phylactery idea, but so fucking what? The trick had worked out for them once! It was called 'following the pattern,' bitch. "If it works out, I can act as your hellish guide. The place is pretty fucking metal, and I bet you could take some breathtaking photos there!"

 

[starboob]

☀
​

In all honesty, everything that Inna says seems like vital information! Like, everything her professors and teachers and Helia and Liora have ever told her has always been garbage, she knows this, but Inna? Oh, Inna is providing her with knowledge she can actually apply to her day to day life. After all, none of those aforementioned "reputable people" or whatever has ever told her to just believe in herself and that seems like Life Lesson #1 that everyone should learn! Rapidly, the younger sister nods as she makes a mental note to never ever doubt herself. (Not that Sol makes a habit of doubting herself. She knows that she is certifiably awesome, but there are some instances where she does think that she could be better. Now, however, she knows that she is and will always be perfect no matter what! She just has to keep believing in herself and know that the only person she has to beat is herself. And that's pretty easy peasy lemon squeezy.) Though, when Inna denies Liora's obviously whipped state, she wrinkles her nose but chooses to let the argument go for now. Clearly, the mutual whippage between these girlfriends is so great they probably will never be able to recognize how whipped they are for each other. 'Honestly, I'd say goals, but I'm already there with my gf. Good for Lio.'

Now, when Inna oh so casually reveals that she is the one who killed her government recognized maternal unit? That, um. She doesn't really know how to react to that. Instinctively, she thinks she should be more concerned, but she sort of already trusts Inna with her life. Besides, even if Sol would never murder someone, that doesn't mean that everyone should just not murder people. Generally, maybe, but there has to be exceptions and she guesses Helia probably was a big sinner anyway. She was a billionaire, after all. Not to mention she got that money through oil sooo, Sol doesn't feel too bad about it. Just slightly weird, but maybe that's the 250mg of THC coursing through her veins. "Well, I mean, what am I going to do with all that money? I saw a TikTok once that showed a visual of how much a billion is using rice and I-D-K just seemed like a lot to me. If you want it, then it's yours. You are Liora's lover and all, so you're basically family now! I'm so glad you're going to be my sister-in-law and not that Rockefeller chick. She was so boring I thought my eyes were going to gouge themselves out. You're like a bazillion times better."

Okay, now Liora and Inna being world-savers makes more sense to Sol knowing that they didn't actually pursue world saving. Not that she thinks Innora (Lionna?) are incapable, but for the reasons she mentioned earlier she doesn't think Liora is world-saver material. She doesn't have the charisma, even if Inna is trying to convince her otherwise. (She practically hears the whip cracking in the background.) "Yeah, yeah, okay, I'll back off the 'Ora roasts," she holds her hands up in defense, with a wide grin still smeared across her face. "It would be pretty sus if you agreed with me. So I guess you pass the test. Not that you haven't already, but if you were to retake that test just to prove you could always pass it, then you succeeded! Anyway, that's pretty feminist of Hell to have a queen. I guess it makes sense why the Christians and stuff don't want to go there." She shrugs, somehow not understanding the gravity of the situation. Probably because she's never met the demon queen and where she can sort of conceptualize how bad she might be, one has to remember that Sol's enemies range from the postal man, the bodega man on 69th and Main, and the tree branch next to her window that scares her at night––so her version of a Big Bad Enemy would not even earn itself a PG-13 rating.

The news that Liora has been captured by a demon queen not once but twice, however, is something that concerns Sol. Just, why doesn't her sister think she can handle this stuff? Inna has just sort of explained by Li hasn't told her any of this stuff, but still!! She's definitely mature enough to handle this stuff and her sister should know that she's a dedicated monster/cryptid hunter, so she's more than qualified to handle this type of information. In fact, she could even be Innora's assistant on their magical missions! A magic team can always use a normie for, um, diversity quotas. "Ugh, Lio never tells me anything! All she does when she calls me is tell me about you and while these updates are pretty wholesome she's making it seem like she doesn't have all this other stuff on her plate. I guess I'm still just in phase one of operation get closer to Li," she sighs, though not in defeat. If anything, this has just renewed Sol's drive to actually get to know her, sister since growing up she mostly only learned that her sister is kind of a huge bitch with anger issues. "Anyway, this queen sounds like she doesn't know how to play fair if she's magic-blocking powers. Like, just admit you can't defeat the chosen ones and go home, you know?"

When Inna asks Sol to identify something of sentimental value to her sister, her ears immediately perk and her mind zips in three million directions at once as it gathers all her stored knowledge on Liora's precious belongings (items she has ruined, almost ruined, tried to steal, successfully stole, etc.). After several seconds of concentration and contorting her face in such a way it looks like she's experiencing indigestion, she throws her hands up and flips backwards onto the couch, proclaiming, "I give up! Like, yeah, I can think of several things that are probably connected to her vibes, but a lot of that got tossed after she disappeared and I don't remember if I was able to grab any of it."

Then, seeming to think of something, she flips herself off the couch into a standing position and dashes into the bedroom. "Okay, but there was one thing I do remember looking for and not being able to find. I figured the dump people had either already taken it or it was at one of the vacation homes and it got trashed when Helia had those rooms converted into dens or whatever," she says, as she gets onto her hands and knees and searches under the bed for something. "Inna, help me move the bed. I am going to let you in on a little known Lilo secret. She always hides valuable things, or things she thinks are valuable, under her bed. Back home, she was so intent on keeping this stuff secret and, well, hidden from me that she 'secretly' pulled up her floorboards and started hiding stuff there. I'm pretty sure she doesn't know that I know about this, because I was pretty good about not taking anything from her super secret hiding spots. Mostly because I didn't want her moving her diary again. Anyway, she did this in college too, so I'm pretty sure this is one of those, uh, habitual creatures thing."

"And, yup, I was totally right!" she exclaims once the bed is pushed to the side, revealing a row of floorboards that have been obviously loosened. Without waiting for Inna's reaction, Sol pries the floorboards loose and pulls out a shoe box. Rather unceremoniously, and quite carelessly, she dumps its contents onto the bed. Inside, there is a wad of cash, a gun, several passports, and a small TY Beanie Baby, Employee the Bear (that's not even made up). "That's it. Employee the Bear. I think Helia gave that to her as a baby or something. She never even changed his name," she frowns, genuinely upset that this poor bear is stuck with such an awful name. "If anything has sentimental value to her, other than you, obviously, it's probably this lil guy. So are we going to do this? I'm totes ready to go to Hell! I have a lot of blood in my hands if you need to, like, slice them. Just warn me so I can look away."

 

[Syntra]

Oh god, oh god, oh god. Inna had known she had lucked out with Liora as her girlfriend/future wife/soulmate, but that the package also included the best fucking sister-in-law in existence? You know, the kind of sis who might gift you a goddamn billion dollars? That was, uh, a lot. Especially to the girl who had spent most of her childhood fighting over not-quite-moldy bread with the neighbors' brats! "Uhh, I guess you could also buy something that isn't rice with it? Though don't get me wrong, I'm not fucking complaining about free money," she reassured her. "If you can't imagine what to do with it, then you can bet your ass that I don't have that problem. Like, I could hire actual scientists and have them confirm whether Liora is a cyborg or not! That has been my theory from day fucking one," Inna confessed. "I've only become more and more convinced of it each goddamn day, too, because Helia? Helia was exactly the sort of psycho who would install microchips into her daughter's brain to ~increase her productivity~, or some shit. She definitely had the money to do that, and you know what they say, right? When there's a will, there's a way."

"Of course," the blonde nodded solemnly, "I still love Li, even with all the microchips she may or may not have. Still, it would be nice to be aware of that sort of thing, y'know? Nobody gave me the Liora Manual when we started working together, and so I have no idea what to do if one of her electronic components starts malfunctioning." Hearing that she passed her test, though? Well, that sure was a fucking twist! Passing any sort of test at all, that was. To get a decent grade, Inna usually had to kidnap the teacher's family and threaten them with murder, but this... fuck, this made her feel all mushy inside. "Any time, my dude! I'll be here the entire fucking week-- provided that nobody kills me in the meantime, of course. And... I'm not sure about the feminism part? I mean, yeah, she's a chick, but like, if Hitler was a woman, that wouldn't suddenly make his deeds ~girl power moves~, right?" Not that Inna knew a lot about this theoretical bullshit, but presumably, bad things were still... uh, bad... regardless of who did them. Like, the blonde was proud of her status as a Certified VillainTM and she wouldn't want one of those faux progressive types to paint her as a misunderstood fucking hero, or some shit!

"Aww," Inna practically melted, "she talks about me that often? I... I mean, of course she does! I'm Inna Awesome Orlovskaya, and that also means I make for an awesome discussion topic. I make for awesome everything. Like, I'm pretty fucking sure that if you cooked me and ate me, I'd be an awesome meal, too. Not to incentivize you, though! I like this body intact, thank you very much. And, yeah, E-keysmash is a bitch. A colossal bitch! Like, between her and Helia, I'm genuinely not sure who is/was worse. To be honest, I kinda regret not capturing both of them alive and making them duke it out in some old-timey arena. What kind of weapon would Helia have used, what do you think?" she asked, apparently blissfully unaware of the fact that discussing someone's dead mother with them in this way might not have been, uh, entirely respectful. "I can picture her with a whip. Like, the bitch def seemed like a slave-driver to me."

Then the Liora-style treasure hunt began, to Inna's unexpected delight. Yeah, yeah, the circumstances were dire, but to think that she was about to Learn More About Her Precious Girlfriend? The blonde wasn't some pathetic, sentimental sap, but she'd treasure the memory forever and maybe include it in her scrapbook, and, and, and!!! (...okay, maybe she was a sap, but like, try not to be, with a gf as great as Liora was. Of fucking course you'd want to archive every moment! Well, maybe aside from this one.) "Employee of the Bear?" she raised her eyebrow. This whole episode proved that Liora had made some, uh, questionable decisions, but it wasn't like Inna didn't understand that-- once, she had dyed her head blue, and lemme tell you, being fair-haired did not mean you didn't have to use bleach before. Just!!! If any photos of her from that era emerged, she'd have to kill everyone in that fucking room and then herself.

"Okay," she nodded, "we're gonna..." ...do what, actually? Ask the little fucker where its mistress was? Yeah, no, might as well call the police and ask them, which she would have done had she loved the taste of humiliation & disappointment. "Douse it in magical energy. Think sentimental thoughts, I guess. Focus on Lio. I'm sure it will work! Like, I'm not sure why, but I always end up being right somehow. Favoritism from the Creator, probably. And, can you blame her? I'd favoritize..." if that wasn't a word, now it was, "...a hot piece of ass like myself, too, if I could. Anyway, hold onto me!"

...which would have been a really embarrassing thing to say had nothing happened, buuuut the Inna effect struck again! Invisible tendrils emerged from the toy, sneaky like additional fees hidden in your mortgage, and naturally? Naturally, they proceeded to grab them. Then they were suddenly being dragged down, down, down, lower than Inna thought possible, really, only for both of them to emerge next to one of those charming little lava lakes. Idyllic, truly! Along with the corpses rotting at their feet. "Sheesh," Inna rolled her eyes, "the bitch could clean her fucking apartment from time to time. Welcome to hell, I guess. Don't leave my side, don't talk to strangers, and blah blah blah. You catch my drift, don't you? Now, the toy-compass is pointing there, roughly," she gestured towards nothing at all, "so I guess we should follow the trail." Wait for me, Liora. I'll fucking find you, no matter where you are.

 

[starboob]

☀
​

Wow. Everytime Inna opens her mouth, a new shiny piece of wisdom/knowledge flies out! Why hadn't she thought of Helia planting a cyborg chip into Li to make her act Like That? It makes total sense, too! After all, why else would her usually smart older sister swear loyalty to their "mother"? The woman barely raised them! Case in point, Sol is much closer to their housekeeper than she was Helia. 'Which reminds me, I should probs give her some dollars too. Is ten million too low? She did take me to Disneyland with her family a few times... But how can I even put a price on those memories?!' While Sol has her inner crisis over how to repay every single person who has ever been nice to her, she also simultaneously manages to absorb every bit of what else Inna has to say. Multi-tasking is practically her middle name and splitting her attention is her forte exactly why her grades are somewhere in Hell (along with her sister, too, apparently). "She's totally a cyborg. ...Dude, what if there's a Helia fail-safe where, if she suddenly stops being loyal, she goes all berserk or something? We will need to act swiftly once we get back from H-E-double hockey sticks, mhm," she nods.

Anyway, practically rocking on her heels in excitement, she eagerly holds her hands over Employee and thinks of as many sentimental memories of Li as she can! It's not even that hard. There's the time Liora chased her around the house for loosening the faucet in their bathroom; the time Liora threatened to kill someone who was bullying her at school; the time she dumped 57 water balloons filled with food dye on her head the day before prom and accidentally sort of dyed Lio's skin light purple... 'Good times, good times,' she thinks laughing to herself.

Though when Inna tells her to hold on tight? She clings to her not-sister-in-law like a koala or a sloth or a panda or some other very cute animal known for their clinging abilities. She shuts her eyes tightly, too, and holds her breath as she feels her body sinking through the earth. Sol wouldn't say it's like falling, more like passing through some squishy tube that's forcing you down? Like an intestine or something. Anyway, it sure takes forever to get to Hell and she isn't sure whether this transition is actually taking forever or if the weed is affecting her IRL lag times.

When they finally get pooped out on some solid ground, Sol opens her eyes and lets go of her blonde bestie. "Wow, so this is Hell, huh?" she asks, looking around the place. Clearly, the younger sister is unimpressed with the aesthetic. "Dante," not the poet, her weed man, "made this place seem more metal..." Like, yeah, the river of lava is cool and it's taking every ounce of Sol's self control to not touch the forbidden liquid, but she expected there to be fiery elements. Also the corpses on the ground are a little lackluster. Though, Sol supposes she probably would have yakked up her breakfast, lunch, second lunch, snacks, and edibles if there were more grotesque displays.

"Aww, I wanted to go in that direction," Sol complains, pointing towards the completely opposite direction that seems to be leading towards a village of volcanoes. She sighs, shoves her hands deep into her pockets, and reluctantly follows the blonde. Even if under ordinary circumstance she would not hesitate to skedaddle in whichever direction calls to her, she figures that maybe she shouldn't do that while in Hell. Tempting as it is... Like, is it just her or are those suspicious looking trees calling to her? 'No! No, bad Sol! Follow the Inna. You still have a gf back at home waiting for you. Think of her before you get lost in Hell. You do not want a repeat of the mini-golf incident.'

Again, using every ounce of her energy, she forces herself to not wander or drift and makes sure to not stare at anyone for too long. Even if they have arms growing out of their foreheads. "This reminds me of the time that Li spent like seven hours," twenty minutes, "describing your smile. I just asked about how you were doing and if you were still recovering from that car accident that ruined your brain and she went on this whole thing about how she thought you were doing better because you smiled at her. Oh, b-t-dubs, I meant to send you a Get Better Soon card, but I don't think the postal service understands how to process two quarters taped to an envelope. So, um, glad you're better." (How does this remind Sol of that conversation? Well, the world may never know. The rapid fire rate at which Sol's brain makes connections is a phenomena yet to be researched by scientists.)

After a few more minutes of walking, she kicks up some fingers like a petulant child, and lets out a sigh, "Hell sure is bor––"

"Inna!" someone calls from behind them (it's Anette), "Darling, how stupid do you have to be to end up back here? I am well aware that the human species shares 96 percent of its DNA with the chimp, but I thought your cognitive abilities were supposed to be more evolved," she pauses, her eyes flitting over to Sol, "You shouldn't be here."

 

[Syntra]

Sooo, just a quick question: could you legally adopt someone as your little sis? 'Cause, the way she saw it, Sol was the best little sis in the whole wide world! (Cute? Check. Vaguely annoying, but like, in an endearing way? Check. Big-eyed, with her charisma factor so fucking strong she could make you murder kittens with impunity and you wouldn't even feel bad about it? Check, check, and fucking check! The universe, in its infinite wisdom, had taken allll of the little sister traits, spiced them with an additional dose of awesomeness and then sculpted Sol out of the resulting substance. Why had Liora been complaining about her again? That must have been thanks to Helia's toxic fucking heritage, the blonde supposed-- only a bitch like her cut pit a big sister against her little sister, really. Like!!! Was she not aware that those competed in completely different categories? Where little sisters were supposed to be, like, the human equivalents of teddy bears, big sisters had been equipped by the evolution to be the most badass bitches around. Which, duh! Someone fucking had to protect the lil' sis. Only a monster could interfere with that beautiful fucking symbiosis, and yep, it did not surprise Inna in the slightest that Helia had weaponized Liora's 'gotta protecc' instincts against the one that ought to be protecced. 'Kay, she told to herself, remembering how Sol had lamented not being that close to Li a few minutes ago, time to fix that. Once we get out of this newest mess we were dragged into, it'll be Trihn/Rodríguez girls hours. The blonde would fucking help repair their fractured relationship even if it was the last thing she'd do, dammit!

"Yeah, no, don't," Inna recommended to her. "Stay by my side. I think the things here are loaded with pheromones, or some shit? Like, you're programmed to want to go closer, but boom, a fucking trap. I assume you don't wanna see your own entrails on the fucking floor, do you? Not that it wouldn't be fascinating to observe, I guess, but like, I'd prefer you alive. I think Li would, too. You know that she likes you, right?" the blonde glanced at her, uncharacteristically serious. "Not gonna Lie, she is pretty good at hiding it, but it is true. I dunno, maybe her microchip for processing emotions broke and Helia never fucking bothered to replace it? I just... well. She talks about you all the time, and yeah, most of it are complaints, though if she didn't care, she wouldn't have complained, y'know? And they're usually nice-ish complaints, too. Not 'ugh god, Sol's such a fucking bitch,' more like 'wtf will Sol and her dumb ass do once they discover that Sesame Street wasn't real, just imagine the check for her therapy, reeee.' I guess it's her way of looking out for you? A way that kinda sucks, though considering just how much Helia fucked with her head, I'd say she still deserves an A for effort." Man, Inna couldn't wait till she helped un-Heliaize Liora! Nothing about her cursed fucking legacy would remain intact-- n o t h i n g, least of all the narrative she'd tried to strangle her daughters with. That the blonde had burned her? Oh, that had been but a mere beginning of her destruction. Her next step: erasing her ghost from everyone's memories! 'Cause there was no bitch as petty as Inna Orlovskaya, and now she was going to use that pettiness for a noble goddamn cause.

...first, though, they had to find Liora. "Oh, really?" she turned to Sol, hearts in her eyes. "I mean, I know my smile's fantastic, but wow, wow, wow. Gotta do it more often. And, ah, my brain wasn't really ruined-- I just put it on hiatus, via my own stupidity. A magical thing. Anyway, Li was the one who helped me to get better. And like, maybe it's good you didn't send me those quarters? Knowing my dumbass self, I would have swallowed them, and Li would have fucking died of worry while waiting for the results of my surgery." ...yep, the woman deserved a medal for looking out for her back then. A medal, and exactly the same amount of effort poured into saving her!

"Anette," Inna rolled her eyes, not even shocked that yet another fucker from her past didn't know when to give it a rest, "nice to see you as well, I guess. How have you been? Eaten any newborns recently? And like, trust me, I have much better things to do than to wander this uninspired fucking wasteland, but someone stole my Liora. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?"

At that, understand lit up Anette's eyes. "A-ah! Really? What a crazy, crazy world, man. Have you tried contacting the Russian mafia? Maybe they kidnapped her in order to get back at you for--"

"Don't be fucking ridiculous," Inna rolled her eyes. "Not every Russian has ties to the Russian fucking mafia. Where do you live, in a Hollywood movie?" ...the fact that she did have those ties, of course, was purely coincidental, and also a statistical outlier that should not have been counted. "Besides, I fucking crafted an anchor and it led me here, so don't even try. Should I rip your lying tongue out of your useless mouth, or will you tell me where she is?"

"Useless," Anette spat out. "Don't spread nonsense, okay? I'll have you know that none of my lovers ever bitched about my mouth skills, and I don't think it's fair of you to leave such bad reviews when you haven't even tried it. But fine, fine. I guess there's no harm in telling you! The queen is," she glanced down at her Demonic WatchTM, "marrying her, I guess. Right now? Yup, if she's punctual, that is. Blah blah blah, something about her wanting to punish you. The woman really can't let go of a grudge, huh?"

And, yeah, that was roughly the time when Inna's blood turned to fucking ice in her veins. Marrying her? What? What, what, what? (The demon inside of her was roaring, so much that her ears rang, but... no. No, she couldn't let her take over. Li could only be saved by her, not by an Inna-shaped abomination! Gotta employ some of that sweet, sweet Self-ControlTM.) "Alright," the blonde nodded, deceptively calm, "you will lead me where they are, if you want to live. Now."

 

[starboob]

☀
​

Okay, so Inna recommended that she not talk to strangers, right? Right. That means that all Sol needs to do is keep her mouth zipped up and locked and she'll be good! If only that wasn't so McFreakin' hard!!!! There are so many things that she wants to say––so many things that she wants to ask. This is her first ever #confirmed supernatural experience and if she hadn't accidently left her phone in Li's living room, she would be livestreaming this on Instagram right now. Alas, Inna had not asked if she had PKW (phone, keys, wallet) before they created the magical anchor link to her sister. So now she'll have to commit this entire experience to memory and, ugh, even she knows that a story is worth three million questions and a picture is worth like one word and that word is, "WowSolyou'resosmartIshouldhaveneverdoubtedyouwhenyoutoldmesupernaturalstuffisreal.' Or it would have been had Sol brought her freaking phone!! Even as she desperately searches her pockets for perhaps a disposalable camera or her Polaroid that she lost a few months ago, there seems to be no hope for her to capture this evidence. She is about to panic and beg Inna to take them back home, but then she remembers that Inna and, apparently, her sister are also supernatural beings. She's pretty sure her blonde best friend for life will be more than happy to show off for the camera and Liora... well, that will have to be a covert operation. With that assurance in mind, her panic settles and the crisis monitor returns to DEFCON 5.

She then focuses her mental energy on trying to figure out just how Inna knows this mystery demoness. At first, she's almost positive that they're exes of sorts, but the demoness, Anette, soon crushes that assumption. Ordinarily, Sol would have continued to spin theories upon theories (call her Martin Luther, because she has 95 theses) about the relationship between Anette and Inna, however when the demon lady says something about a queen and marrying and her sister? Sol immediately registers the gravity of the situation. Her eyes widen to that of saucers and she feels something hot bubbling in her chest––just!!! Liora and Inna are the OTP of the century (aside from herself and her own gf, obviously, duh)!! That means scientifically/statistically speaking, Lio cannot be marrying anyone else other than Inna freaking Orlovskaya!!!!!!!!!!!!! Even if this person is a queen, she is not the queen of Ora's heart as that position has been so obviously taken by her majesty, Queen Inna Orlovskaya of Liora Trihn's Heart.

Knowing that she's been told not to talk to strangers, she decides that now is also a good time for a good ol' fashion rule breaking. After all, that's why they make rules––to test who is brave enough to break them all. A challenge that Sol Rodríguez accepted at birth. "Yeah, you better freaking take us to this wedding, because I have some major objections."

At that, Anette looks rather unimpressed, crossing her arms over her chest and inspecting her nails, "Oh, yeah? And why would I ever take you two there? First of all, it's invite only," and maybe this demoness is miffed the queen didn't invite her, but Sol can't be so sure, "and second, I happen to like the current arrangement of my organs."

"All I'm hearing is that you're a big ol' scaredy cat. I'm not scared to go there and neither is the third coolest person on the planet," she says, gesturing to Inna. (If it isn't obvious the only reason Inna is in third place is because, you guessed it, Sol and her gf are in the first and second position. Though Sol may be willing to make some temporary adjustments to the rankings seeing as Inna is magical and about to save her sister.) "So are you telling me that you, a demon, are a bigger baby than a human and a wizard?"

"I––" Anette starts, mouth opening and closing as she tries to gather herself from that read. "I most certainly am not! Fine, if you want to be the main course for the reception, then so be it. Eysjalanatshael is in a good mood today," probably because she is about to turn one of the chosen ones into her personal fuel source for magical energy and permanently tie their life forces together, "so maybe she'll be happy I brought her a wedding gift. Pure hearts," like Sol's, "are getting increasingly hard to find, after all."

The demoness then waves her hand through the air and from the ground, a door emerges. It reminds Sol of Monster's Inc., but she decides not to comment on that, mostly because a second later the door opens and on the other side is a wedding ceremony unlike one she has ever seen before. For one, Liora is, um, not dressed in an all white dress with a pretty veil to match. Nope, no symbolic purity here. The woman is instead dressed in, what Sol can only describe as, a slutty gothic dress. Calling it a dress, even, seems like a reach since it's mostly just a corset with a lace skirt that doesn't cover much. The front of the skirt essentially doesn't exist though it gets progressively lengthier towards the back––sort of like a mullet. Liora is also wearing creeper style heels and thigh high lace socks that are held up by a garter belt.

Seeing her sister like this is uncomfortable for a myriad of reasons, but if she were to focus on the other factors? Those don't leave her with a good vibe either. Like, Li is also blindfolded and nailed down to an sacrificial altar; the nails, which must be an inch thick, seem to be placed at her shoulders, elbows, hands, hips, and thighs. Plus, there are all these thin glyph like carvings that cover her skin and judging by the looks of them, they're fresh. (Sol doesn't even want to think about how she can see tears falling from beneath the blindfold and Lio's breathing seems so jagged, it must be painful to even breath while fastened down like that.) Then, most fascinating, there's who Sol assumes is the queen of the damned herself––objectively speaking, she's breathtakingly beautiful and the way her white hair falls perfectly into place? A waterfall of pure perfection.

E-keysmash stands over Liora at the altar with a dagger made of glass in her hand and similar glyphs covering her own skin. "Soon, my worthless little worm, you will forgot all about that blonde rat and realize how fulfilling it is to be mine," the queen coos, stroking Liora's cheek and seeming to not realize there are wedding crashers present. "I promise, this will hurt."

 

[Syntra]

Anette, Inna decided, earned herself a spot on her 'people/demons to kill' list with those fucking theatrics of hers. Her only chance at salvation? Why, the fact that her list was over ten thousand kilometres long! She still had to kill Chett, and Chett's cronies, and anyone who had ever looked at Chett with something even remotely resembling kindness, and then there was, of course, E-keysmash herself. As a third-rate demon, Anette would prooobably only get her attention like five years later-- the blonde liked to be chronological about avenging her grievances, you see, and the pathetic excuse for a queen only got preferential fucking treatment because of the whole Liora mess. So, for now? For now, Anette was relatively safe! "Yeah," she immediately jumped on Sol's bandwagon, "you're just a chicken. A chicken from hell, but still a fucking chicken, man! If you aren't careful enough, you'll end up on some fucking KFC menu. Plus," her eyes darkened, "do you really think you have a goddamn choice here? Since E-keysmash isn't the only one who can fuck with the arrangement of your organs, bitch."

It was hard to tell what convinced her in the end, but she liked to think that the prospect of having to fight Inna Badass Orlovskaya played at least some role in it. Like, statistically speaking, her enemies hadn't fared that well, you know? Unless you considered death to be a victory, which, of course, was a totally valid interpretation. The only way to win this rigged game was not to play, after all! And, like, having to live in a world where Inna Orlovskaya lived, while not being said Inna Orlovskaya... man, the existential dread must have been immense. How oh how could you ever deal with knowing that, in comparison to the blonde, you were worth less than literal shit on the road? At least she had great fertilizing properties, while you just wasted the precious fucking oxygen!

Either way, moving on. Feeling like an avenging angel, Inna opened the door to the """chapel""" with a gust of wind, and... ooof. Double ooof. Triple ooof, even! (Before this EventTM, the ex-demon hadn't believed in hippie bullshit like 'mixed feelings.' Only idiots ever suffered from those, you know? Like, emotions weren't rocket science and it wasn't fucking hard to discover how you were ~feeling~. Here, a simple litmus test, for your convenience: Was the thing good? Boom, made you feel good. Was the thing bad? A plot twist, you fucking felt bad! Was it meh? Then you probably didn't care, Inna guessed. The fabled ~grey zone~ of unrecognizable fee-fees had obviously been invented by bad romance novelists, 'cause the bitches needed some excuses to drag the 'will they or won't they' on for far, far longer than fucking necessary. That, at least, was what she had thought. Now, though? Now, when Liora looked both a) in unimaginable pain, b) hot as fuck? Inna, uh, found herself a little ConflictedTM. Like!!! How did such concentrated hotness even manage to exist? One would have thought the planet ought to explode from all of that, but nooo, the stupid rock kept on turning. Anti-climactic, in a sense.)

"How dare you!" Inna shouted nonetheless, her voice dripping with righteous fury. "Return my fucking girlfriend to me, you albino-looking motherfucker. There are some serious consent issues in this stupid ~subculture~ you created, so let me spell this out to you-- when you have to kidnap someone to make them their spouse, it usually means that they're not fucking interested! Capiche?"

"Oooh, Innushka," E-keysmash chuckled, as if her turning up was the greatest gift she'd received since the last Christmas. "Have you come to witness my triumph? This," she caressed Liora's face, "could have been yours. You could have been here, and enjoyed the bliss of belonging to me completely. Few mortals get to experience it, you know? And you've messed up, oh, you did, you did. All you ever do is mess up. Your cute little rescue attempt? Pfft! Just another failure in a long, long line of failures. You cannot stop me now, you see? Because Liora here," with a sharp nail that resembled a harpy's claw, she traced a line from her throat to her abdomen, "has already been prepared for me. In the eyes of the gods, she's mine. In fact, you've come just in time for the grand finale." A grand fucking what? No, no, no, Inna didn't like the sound of that. She didn't fucking like it at all! Flames bloomed around her closed fists, so hot that the lava from before seemed like a cheap fucking demo version of the real thing, but before she could do anything with it? E-keysmash grinned.

"Look at me, Liora. Look at me, and know that you're mine." And, with that? The bitch fucking ripped her chest apart, with this wet rrrrup, and watched her still beating heart with what could only be described as... hmm, fascination. Desire, even. You know, the total fucking opposite to Inna's horror! "I understand that nobody has unwrapped you before? Ah, darling! You are so, so fresh, and to think I shall be the one to receive that honor..." The queen licked her lips, in the same way a less unhinged person might before, say, ordering a delicious ice-cream. (That, uh, didn't bode well. What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck? It wasn't that Inna had expected her to, like, not act like a deranged psycho from a cheesy horror movie, but she had thought that there had been certain limits. Wrongly, as she realized now!) "Shall I devour you? That way, you can be a part of me forever. No longer will you be tied to your useless, useless self! Well, Liora? Be a good girl and say how much you want it. How much you want me. Please me enough, and I may even let the blonde bitch live. Your sweet sister, too, if you are enthusiastic enough!"

 

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

There are lot of reasons why Liora's current predicament is the textbook definition of Wrong. The most pressing reason, however? That she is about to be married to someone who is distinctly not Inna Orlovskaya, the love of her life and only woman to have survived past Liora's thick as fuck icy shell. It's like these are the olden days where she has no say in who she wants to marry and instead of being held down by a father she has never met so that she does not escape, she has nine inch iron nails jammed into her body. (It's probably hard to tell and difficult to discern how painful it is to have her body staked down to the stone altar beneath her. Each movement, even as subtle as the rise and fall of her chest, moves her body around the nails, agitating the injuries and adding endless searing fire to her suffering. Even just the gust of wind that sweeps through the demonic chapel causes the nerves around the wounds to seize. Though, she will admit having them already punched into her hurts slightly less than when E-keysmash had taken the blunted nails and pushed them into her as if it were no more than affixing a notice to a corkboard with a pushpin. After that, she hardly registered the queen carving up her skin, which felt like paper cuts in comparison.)

So, yeah, Liora is not having a good time and there isn't much she can do about it. It goes without saying that her abilities are blocked and struggling is futile. This isn't even Liora resigning herself to her fate this time––it's just a fucking fact. Ordinarily, she might have opted for at least spitting fire at the E-keysmash but it's sort of hard for her to come up with coherent insults in her current state. (Not to mention whatever melancholic bile she had been forced to drink prior, to ready her spirit for some form of fusion, left her feeling like lead. That she can even clench her jaw as tight as she is right now is just a testament to having ten or so nails fucking stuck in her person.) The veins in her neck and forehead bulge, sweat is pouring from her body, and despite her best efforts to keep her breathing controlled––it's jagged and erratic, with soft whimpers escaping every now and again.

Vaguely, the woman can hear someone else's voice enter the chapel and she wonders if it's one of the demonic princesses or another part of this torment entirely. She cannot decipher what this person is saying, because since the queen activated the seal she had placed on Liora the last time she had been held prisoner, everything not coming from E-keysmash's mouth has sounded like a faint echo. Which, maybe Liora would have been thankful to not have to hear anyone else's fucking voice had this been something where it is Inna's voice that is the only she can hear with clarity and everyone else sounds like they're passing messages through glass walls. (God, even just thinking that she won't be able to hear Inna's voice again makes her want to cry... At least, she's already crying so it's not like E-keysmash will be able to sense––)

Except that then...

"Oooh, Innushka––"

E-keysmash says that and she instantly realizes she is now living out her worst nightmare. Her jaw tightens, enough that she's pretty sure her dentist is going to be mad at her, and a renewed sense of urgency floods through her that blocks out the explosion of pain while she struggles to free herself from the altar. It doesn't do anything, obviously, but knowing that Inna is here, just like she promised she would be were she ever to go to Hell, makes her want to try even if her attempts are worth less than salted earth. She tries to retreat from the queen's caress but with nowhere else to go, she's only inflicting more damage upon herself.

When she feels a talon, razor sharp, sitting just under her throat she has an idea of what's about to happen but that doesn't really prepare her for anything. See, the talon may slice through her with the ease of a hot knife through butter, but Liora doesn't fucking feel like butter. Her flesh and bone breaking causes her body to seize while her mouth opens to release a glass shattering shriek of pain. Boiling blood spills out from the wound and Liora is pretty much waiting to succumb to unconsciousness, but, by whatever cruelty that exists in this fucking dimension, the pain continues to flood through her and despite the loss of blood she hardly feels faint. Her body shakes and convulses against her bonds, either attempting to break free or an automatic reaction.

She can feel the queen caressing her organs, even the slightest amount of pressure causing her discomfort. Her hand ultimately settles on Liora's heart with a soft grip, almost daring the woman to defy her most recent outlandish fucking request. Though the queen must sense the hiccup in her heartbeat when Liora registers that Sol, who is hiding behind Inna, is here. In Hell. 'Why, why, why is she fucking here?!'

"This is your only chance to save them, Liora," she smiles cruelly down at her intended, "Or would you like to remain useless? It doesn't matter to me what you choose, because once I have my control over you, you'll be the picture of perfection. You will never ever have to doubt yourself knowing that I have taken care of that burden for you. We will share your faults together. See, married life can be quite exciting. Now, are you going to show me how grateful you are that I have chosen you, a worthless and useless worm, to be mine?"

"Fuck. You," she snarls through gritted teeth––like, yeah, maybe she's taking a calculated fucking risk by not heeding this request but here's the fucking thing. She can beg and plead and E-keysmash still kills her fucking family or she can not do that and E-keysmash still kills her fucking family. It doesn't matter what she does or doesn't do, she doesn't trust the queen to follow through on her promises. Besides, to be quite fucking honest, Liora isn't even being defiant to spite her. She fucking trusts Inna to take care of this. Like, yeah, she is obviously worried about Sol and even then, she knows that Inna will save her and keep Sol safe. Knowing that Inna is here––

"Fine," the queen says, obviously unimpressed. She clutches Liora's heart, squeezing it like she might try to pop it before she rips it from the woman's chest. "I'll be sure to correct this defiance once we are one."

 

[Syntra]

So, if Inna had to describe her ~fee-fees~ in a single fucking word? That word would be 'seething.' 'Seething' with a dash of 'terrified,' of course, as humans generally didn't tend to survive being ripped apart, buuut yeah, Liora's demonic side had apparently taken care of that problem. A little bit of bed rest, some fresh air, and her wonderful, beloved gf would be as good as new! (...as long as she wasn't forced to fucking marry the monster who had done that to her, anyway. Like, the last time Inna had checked, E-keysmash wasn't her, you know? And Vie hadn't dragged their souls back to this godforsaken earth for Liora Trihn to marry a bitch who wasn't named Inna Awesome Orlovskaya, dammit. That narrative fucking thread had to be p u r s u e d, otherwise there would be no point to their story. Zero, nada, zilch! Besides, the queen didn't even know how to treat her gf right-- gfs should get to enjoy, say, free massages and warm cookies whenever the cravings for something sweet reared their ugly head, not being threatened with cannibalism. Not to slam anyone's preferences, of course, but the blonde was fairly sure that wasn't literally anyone's definition of a good fucking time! Least of all her Liora's, thank you very much.)

"What the fuck do you think you are doing, you empty-headed, pathetic bitch?" the woman shrieked. (The flames that had once engulfed her hands? Yeah, those spread, and turned the blonde into a really cool human torch. Hahahahahaha, bitches! Oh yes, tremble before the might of Inna Badass Orlovskaya, the Bane of All Demons and Gf Thieves. Fear her, for none shall escape, and beg for your miserable lives like the disgusting little worms that you were. Maybe, if your pathetic fucking pleas were hilarious enough, Her Highness would even let you live! ...or something. Look, the blonde didn't really have the time to spin elaborate fantasies now, okay? Liora was in danger, which meant she had to act. Act, not fucking run her mouth! Memories could always be edited later, because who the fuck cared whether they were ~real~ when they could be fun instead.) "Step aside. Don't... don't fucking touch her heart, okay? Her heart is hers, and she gave it to me! You don't have the license to use it, 'cause she didn't fucking consent. C o n s e n t. A foreign fucking concept to you freaks, isn't it? Probably because nobody ever wants you and your creepy, worm-worshiping ass!"

"Psssh," E-keysmash smirked. "Silence, blondie. Why would you disturb the sanctity of this moment? The love of your life is getting married, after all," she caressed her heart with her talon. "Don't you wish her happiness, hmm?" And, yeah, at that point, Inna saw red, red, red! Red like the bloody fucking pulp the bitch of a queen would be reduced to, soon enough. She only had to command the fire to find her, you see, and then it would be game over for that vile, vile piece of shit with infuriatingly perfect hair. So, go forth, flames! Go forth, and destroy everything in your path! ...which they did, kinda. The issue with the 'kinda' modifier, though? Somehow, they did fuck all to E-keysmash. (Its tongues licked at her skin, as eager as always, as hungry for flesh, but, nope. Instead of her turning to ashes, these weird-ass runes began glowing on her forehead! Not fucking fair, man. Even worse, the queen dropped Liora, and grabbed Inna by her neck-- she lifted her into the air, easily, as if she weighed no more than a rag doll, and laughed and laughed and laughed.)

"Did you really think I wouldn't figure out how to beat Inna One Trick Pony Orlovskaya, hmm? I mean, it wasn't exactly difficult to guess what sort of technique you'd use against me, you talentless hack. Your fault for not diversifying your portfolio, really!" The pressure on her windpipe increased, so much that it was hard to breathe, and, damn, was she passing out? Maybe, because her world was getting darker and darker, but, no, she couldn't! If Inna failed here, you know, then Liora would fall under the bitch's influence, and... and she was sure the queen didn't even know what kind of cakes her gf liked, for fuck's sake. Handing her over to someone like that was unacceptable! And so, with the last remainders of her strength, Inna called the earth. Hey, man. I know I have neglected you, but can you do this one thing for me? I can even, like, turn into a fucking hippie and hug trees, if it would make you happy. Just, please!

"For that, you shall die now," E-keysmash announced, with the kind of smile that said 'yes, I am a total psycho, and no, I won't seek professional help.' "For the crime of being a stupid, useless bitch. For refusing me and my throne, when you had the chance to be reasonable instead. Never again will I... ahhh!" So, villainous fucking speeches? It turned out those were hard to perform properly when the soil under your feet collapsed, and buried you to the point only your head was sticking out. You know, like the most pathetic mushroom in the world! Fortunately, Inna didn't have to deal with that-- mostly because air, the bro of all bros, had her fucking back. Gently, it grabbed her, and then it placed her outside of the danger zone. (A note to self: having friends in half places really, really worked. When in doubt, befriend the elements!)

Normally, the blonde would have drowned E-keysmash in sarcastic comments, but her priorities lay elsewhere now. "Li," she whispered, before running to the woman. Fuck, fuck, fuck! (The enemy might have been neutralized, yeah, but what did it matter? It didn't make Liora any less hurt, or her chest any less... open, Inna guessed. Ah, damn. Her heart was still beating, though how long would that remain true? Like, she doubted that her girlfriend had evolved into an organism that benefited from having her fucking organs exposed in that hour she'd been missing!!!) "Li," she gasped, her eyes filling with tears. "Li, Li, Li. What... what should I do? Can you hear me? Should I, like, call a fucking doctor?"

 

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

"It h-hurts," Liora whimpers, when Inna comes to her side. She barely hears her voice, even knowing that blonde is next to her. With the blindfold over her eyes, she can't even look at Inna for some semblance of comfort. But she knows she's there. She can feel her warmth radiating off of her. It's such a contrast from how cold her limbs feel; she knows she must look pale as ghost with all the blood leaking out of all her wounds. Still, none of that prevents her from feeling like each of her nerve endings is being individually pinched and squeezed––she's almost positive E-keysmash did something to her to make sure that she feels every fucking second of this torture, because there's no way she'd even still be conscious or even remotely coherent. "Inna, it fu-cking hurts," she moans, trying to move her hand, somehow forgetting she hasn't been able to move for hours, and crying out when the nail prevents her from reaching over to Inna. (She just wants to hold her hand.)

With each shaky breath, she can feel her organs shifting around ever so slightly and how the air against them makes her entire body shiver. "Can you... can you make it stop?" she asks, weakly––her voice sounding far away. (Even if she had addressed Inna only seconds ago, her voice sounds so far gone that it makes it sound as though she could be talking to literally anyone.) It's not difficult to tell that the woman is, in fact, dying. Each second where the ceremony does not continue, her life force continues to leave her body. Wisps of energy, even, start to waft from Liora's shivering form––similar to the ones she had seen after smashing Inna's phylactery. While her demonic side may have allowed her to hold onto to a few more minutes of life after her chest was cracked open, it's pretty obvious her heritage has its limits.

"I just..." she mumbles, trailing off and most likely finishing the sentence in the privacy of her mind. The rise and fall of her chest starts to slow and holding onto consciousness is just becoming such a fucking chore. If she just... if she just closes her eyes for a second, she's sure she'll be fine. She just needs a second. Then she can... then she can...

"Liora!" a voice, familiar and stern, shouts inside her head. "Liora, you must allow me to take over if you are to survive. Let me in and I shall help you," the voice promises and Liora? Well, she's too weak to fight it and whether or not Liora even agrees, she feels herself pushed to the side as a new spirit takes over her body.

The change is obvious to any onlooker, because where in one moment Liora's body had more or less gone slack, it stiffens again in a way that suggests she has caught her second wind. Of course, this is no second wind.

Seeming to be unaffected by the pain, probably because this is not her body and just a mere vessel, Vie raises her head and looks at Inna through the blindfold (ghost perks). "Inna," Liora's voice says, but it has a strange archaic, albeit pretentious, cadence that should give away that this is not Liora speaking, "Forgive my intrusion, but Liora is far too gone to be of any use. Now, listen to me carefully: you need to complete the ceremony if Liora is to survive."

"In order to do so, you must do exactly as I say," Vie says, her voice tinged with worry––and even from those snapshots from the past, it is evident that this is uncharacteristic. In fact, the last time she sounded this worried? When she had been dying in Ivy's arms. "Take her heart and remove it from her chest. You will then have to consume it. However, because she has already been prepared for Eysjalanatshael, Liora's heart will reject you. It will taste acrid. It will fill your head with putrid lies. You may even doubt that Liora's heart is yours, willingly given already. You must push through this and prove to her heart that you are a fit vessel."

"Should you be successful, and I do believe in you, Inna," Vie assures, "she will revive and you will need to seal her wounds with a kiss. Make haste, Inna, I cannot help her hold on for much longer."

 

[Syntra]

If you asked Inna Orlovskaya when she had grown out of the belief that there might be some mysterious entity up in the sky looking out for her, then her answer would have been… well, she hadn’t written the date down in her fucking diary, so who the fuck knew, but yeah, it would be safe to say it had happened at some point during her childhood. Hard to believe in those things when the support net you had was made of fucking paper, you see? Of paper at best, and barbed wire at worst. Just, nah, mate. If someone other than her personal NSA agent really did observe her life from afar, then surely, they only did it to laugh at her-- ‘hahaha, look at the bitch, she really thinks there’s something out there for her that isn’t just a long, long string of disappointments. Let’s fucking prove her wrong!’ In her experience, it was also true that the more you cried, the shittier deal you got. Fate didn’t like beggars, you see? So, when you failed to bow to your overlord enthusiastically enough, it fucking crushed your back solely to remind you that, yes, it could be that much worse. Don’t you ever forget that, you insignificant little worm!

Negotiating with terrorists was a no-no, of course, so once Inna had recognized the whole ‘prayer’ shtick as a fucking scam? A trap to capture the dissenters? She’d stopped. Never in her adult life had she asked any shitty god/dess for anything-- nobody with two brain cells to rub together would just hand over essential info to an enemy, after all, and the blonde was 99% sure that that was how the fuckers gathered their intel. Like, just think about it. If they were all powerful, all-knowing and benevolent, why the fuck did they need you to tell them what was troubling you? Shouldn’t they be able to detect, say, cancer and assorted bullshitery long before the fancy schmancy diagnostic tools available at hospitals ever caught a whiff of it? But, nooo, according to Inna’s advanced insider knowledge, cancer fucking continued to exist. Tragic. Now, what did that mean? That they probably weren’t as omniscient as their promo materials suggested, duh! And, like, getting the humans to actually fucking tell them what their hearts’ deepest desires were was deliciously, deliciously devious-- the most successful information gathering scheme since the advent of Facebook, really. Inna Orlovskaya, however? Inna Orlovskaya could smell the bullshit they were trying to disguise as brownies, and nope, she wasn’t going to fall for a con that entry level. Dream on, bitches! Dream the fuck on.

…except that, you know, when Liora told her how much it fucking hurt? When she begged her to make it stop, via whatever means necessary? Inna discovered that her priorities were, uh, shifting. Like, what if it actually did work? What is a prayer could buy her, say, five more minutes? Every single corporation on this shit earth had her personal data already, anyway! No point in hiding them anymore-- not unless she was planning to live in some goddamn wilderness and stuff her face with grass, berries, mushrooms, or whatever it was that crazy hermits ate. “Li,” she gasped, tears shimmering in her eyes. “Li, I…” What? ‘I can’t?’ ‘I don’t know how?’ All wrong fucking answers, man! That sort of thing wasn’t what you said to your beautiful gf, who, by the way, totally wasn’t dying. No, no, no. Literally impossible, in the most literal(est?) sense of that word. It was, umm, just a flesh wound. Easy to bounce back from, right? Inna just knew that Liora was way, way too badass to actually succumb to the limitations of the human body. A single Death GlareTM directed at her failing heart would probably make the organ reconsider its opinion on giving up, ‘cause let me tell you, nobody wanted to be on the receiving end of that! Please, please, please. If someone is listening out there, please, don’t let her die. I’ll do anything. Shit, I’ll donate to charity! Or… or I can kill for you, if there’s someone you want to get rid of in a totally not discreet way. Yep, that’s right. I, Inna Orlovskaya, will be your personal hitman! …just don’t take her away from me. Not like this.

Predictably, though? The powers that be didn’t give a single flying fuck. “No. No, no, no, Li, don’t close your eyes! You can’t, okay?” Inna had seen enough tearjerker movies to know where this was going, and no, she didn’t like the direction one bit. “There’s this, um, new illness,” the blonde lied through her teeth. “Broke out while you were kidnapped, so obviously, you don’t know shit about it. Anyway, it glues your eyes shut when you leave them closed for too long? And if you succumb to it, you won’t be able to see me, nor Fluffinator Orlovskaya, and, and, and!!! That’s fucking terrible, wouldn’t you agree? So, be strong for me and try to keep them open. Please. I’ll bake you your favorite cake. Please.” She was sobbing openly now, so much that a whole damn lake was beginning to form at her feet, but did it matter? No, of course not. The fact that the blonde had said the magic word more times than she had throughout the entirety of her miserable life meant absolutely nothing, too, because the Creator was a greedy bitch who just couldn’t give up on a single fucking soul. (Liora was slipping away, Inna could tell. More and more, she was fading, going somewhere she could no longer reach her, and… wait, what? Vie?)

Thoroughly confused, the blonde blinked. “I… the ritual? It has to run its course, is what you’re saying?” She glanced at her gf’s torn chest, at her exposed, beating heart, and… damn. Was that really the only way to help her? Vie had no reason to lie to her, presumably, though that wasn’t the most convincing aspect of this mess. No, what really did it for Inna was realizing how endlessly fucked up this situation was-- entirely on brand for E-keysmash, and their lives in general. Ah, what the hell! “It’s a good thing, I guess, that I have done this before. Sorta. Who would have thought that all those empty platitudes about experience being your salary while interning are actually true, huh?” …even if her internship had taken place in literal fucking hell. Oh well. Trying to think of it as a juicy, juicy steak, or literally anything that wasn’t a heart, at least, Inna grabbed the organ, and then she… shit, then she sank her teeth into it. Bon appetit!

 

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

It's a good thing that Inna is trying to pretend that she's not eating her actual girlfriend's heart (even if her use of self-psyops has been questionable in the past), because it seems as though Liora's heart is also not really functioning as a normal one would. (And why would it? It's not like anything has ever made sense for the disaster duo.) For one, the taste that is probably exploding in Inna's mouth? Definitely does not have that tough texture of a heart and it also doesn't taste like that juicy steak she had been hoping for. Nope, instead the heart seems to ooze a thick black bile that tastes of dirt, ash, and rotting flesh; the muscle also crumbles instantly in Inna's mouth, absorbing all the moisture and causing her to feel as though she is swallowing sand.

If only that were the worst of it. Eating Liora's heart may be the easiest part of this endeavor, because once a chunk of her heart has been consumed by someone other than E-keysmash? The chapel starts to shake and the stone altar beneath Liora's (limp) body cracks. An apparition shoots out of the heart, resembling Liora almost perfectly save for the lack of tattoos and missing scar. The blacked out eyes also might give away to the fact that this isn't totally Liora.

The apparition stares at Inna, quiet and expressionless. It takes so long for her to do or say anything, that there is a moment where one could assume that she's only there to stare, but that would be silly and foolish and downright idiotic. The Heart, like her host, does not waste time watching herself be consumed by the woman who betrayed her. Wordlessly, she snaps her fingers and the chapel melts into a new desolate landscape. There seems to be a storm around them, whipping up leaves and dirt, and yet, strangely, they appear inside of a clad gray office building with rows and rows of desks and thousands of Lioras hunched over at these desks tapping away dutifully at their keyboards. When Inna enters this landscape, thanks to the Heart, their heads all snap up to attention. Upon seeing the blonde, their eyes start to shine red but they still remain seated at their desks. Finally, the Heart chooses to speak.

"And just what the fuck do you think you're doing, Inna?" her tone dripping with acid and the inflection on the blonde's name sounds anything but sweet. (Haven't they already moved past this?) "Are you actually that fucking stupid that you're trying to marry me? What the fuck makes you, a worthless little twat whose greatest life aspiration is recovering her lost collector's Charmander card, think she is worthy enough for someone as great as myself? You really fucking think I want to be stuck with your loser ass for the rest of my goddamn life? I actually have shit that I want to do, Inna."

"So if you really fucking think that me, Liora fucking Trihn, is going to settle for a bitch who's scared of insects and forgot what a fucking toilet is when I have a queen offering me half her throne? Who the fuck do you think I'm going to pick, hm?" she asks, quirking her brow and crossing her arms over her chest.

Then a red eyed Liora stands up and stands behind the Heart, chiming in, "Cake isn't what makes a bitch fall in fucking love. Money does. Power does. Neither of which you have. I've seen your nonexistent finances and I know what your so called power is capable of. You've just been riding on sheer fucking dumb luck this entire time. You couldn't even defeat the queen when you tried to save Liora the first time. Had it not been for me, you would be fucking dead."

"Yeah," another red eyed Liora starts, also leaving her desk to stand behind the Heart, this one actually does have a scar over her eye, "I can count on my fucking fingers and toes how many times I've had to save your sorry little ass. And what's the thanks that I get? A mutilated fucking face––newsflash, asshole, scars like this don't fucking disappear. I know you have a hard time conceptualizing long term planning, so I thought I'd spell that out for you."

"If you take one more fucking bite of my heart, I'm never going to forgive you. Never," another says.

"Just stop getting in my fucking way all the goddamn time."

Soon, the rest of the red eyed Lioras at their desks stand in unison and start to crowd around Inna. They even crawl on top of each other to get closer to the blonde; as they get closer they reach out for the heart to try to pry it from her fingers before she can finish. "Give it back to us. You don't fucking deserve it! You threw it away! You let us fall into E-keysmash's hands! You want us to marry her! You know she's better for us, Inna!"

 

[Syntra]

‘Eat your gf’s heart,’ they’d said. ‘It’ll be fun,’ they'd said. In all fairness, Vie had said nothing of the sort, but it wasn’t like Inna couldn’t meme about it, right? Especially since memes were all that was fucking left of her old life, unless you counted the smoking ruins on the horizon. (You know that feeling where you really, really wished for something to be just a bad dream? A bizarre concoction of wild associations, cooked up by a brain that was too tired to function properly? Well, then you probably also knew that it never was a fucking dream. Oh no, no, no. The golden rule was that reality would fuck you over way, way more effectively than your own fantasies ever could, and once again, Inna had to acknowledge its validity. Because, the woman standing before her? The nightmare that wore Liora’s face? Yup, the pure hatred in her eyes the almost froze the blood in her fucking veins! (It was wild and primal, really. In a way, it reminded her of home, you see? Of the home that had never been her home, actually-- of her hometown, permanently buried under layers and layers of snow. …the snowstorms there, Inna still remembered, spared nobody mercy. Tourists had described it as a ‘Christmas-y, white paradise,’ though you know what? ‘Paradise’ her fucking ass! It had been just a shit ton of frozen water, cold and uncaring, and its cruel, cruel touch had wrung every last drop of life out of the earth beneath. With a grip of steel, it had squeezed and squeezed and squeezed, and… ah, fuck. Inna kinda sorta felt this way as well now, didn’t she? Except that, instead of the cold, it was Liora who was doing this to to her. Liora, her love. Liora, the reason she had even come here, to this godforsaken place where E-keysmash had drunk her fucking tears.)

That was the thing, though. It wasn’t really Liora, now was she? Since the real Liora was fucking dying, nailed to that weird not-cross and growing colder and colder by the second. (Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ. One could scarcely blame her for being a little bit bitter about the whole ordeal, huh? Like, Inna really had fucked up here, via allowing E-keysmash to seize her. Yeah, yeah, protecting her gf 24/7 was an unreasonable expectation, mostly because she fucking needed to sleep, go to toilet, and do all those other annoying, upkeep-related tasks, but still!!! If there was even a single tenth of the real Liora hidden in that nightmarish illusion, then she was more than justified in letting her anger explode.) “Say whatever the fuck you want,” Inna recommended to her. Weirdly enough, however? There wasn’t a hint of aggression in her tone-- in fact, if someone had to describe it, they’d probably reach for adjectives like ‘calm’ or ‘soothing.’ You know, shit that most people would claim was a fucking oxymoron in conjunction with Inna Inflammatory Orlovskaya! “I know that you’re hurting,” the blonde continued, “and I’m sorry this is happening to you. I wasn’t able to help, which, yeah, my fucking fault. You gotta admit, though, that it was a matter of time-- she would have gotten one of us, sooner or later. It just sucks that it had to be you. But, Li, I promised, don’t you remember? That if I had to go to hell for you, I fucking would. Well, here I am! Maybe it won’t be enough, and maybe I am exactly the sort of idiot you’re talking about now, but you can’t say that I don’t fulfill my promises. I have that going for me, if nothing else.”

Reluctantly, she lifted the heart, and took another bite. The taste of bile filled her mouth, bile and disappointment, and, ah, she fucking wanted to throw up, but… no. No! For Liora, she’d swallow every single morsel, as if it had been fucking pistachio ice-cream. “And like, yeah, I don’t fucking have much. You probably could do better, to be honest-- that Rockefeller chick Sol told me about definitely seemed like a more suitable gf for you. A posh bitch for a posh bitch. I admit, you’d probably look fucking cool on the throne, too. I think your head may have been made for wearing a crown, too? Like, you have the poise to pull it off and not appear totally ridiculous, which is a superpower on its own. I digress, though. I could gush over you for ages, because I love you no matter what you think about me now. Sorry, bitch! You’ve earned my heart once, so it’s fucking yours."

"Anyway," Inna smiled gently, “all of that is pointless, because I don’t need to explain to you why you should pick me. You already have. Again and again and again, you chose me, Li, and I trust that you out of all people had a damn good reason to back that choice up. A whole list of reasons, probably. I may be a dumbass, you see, but you are not! If you changed your mind, then that’s fine, too,” Inna added quickly, “but I’m gonna make sure that you can actually fucking decide that for yourself. And, for that? For that, you need to return to your body. You need to be more than a fucking amalgamation of vengeful not-ghosts. In other words, I’m fucking marrying you, Liora Trihn, whether you like it or not! If you still take offense afterwards… shit, divorce me. I don’t actually care. You think this is my dream wedding, Li? ‘Cause, spoiler alert, it’s not!” Hell, Inna didn’t even know whether there was such a thing as a ‘dream wedding’ for her. Blonde criminals with next to no sense of self-preservation rarely thought about these things, you see? And now she was about to become a married fucking lady, with a dog and everything. Man oh man, life really was hilarious! In that pesky, tear-inducing way. “I’m doing it to save you and I will, even if it’s the last thing I do.” With that, the ex-demon turned to the heart once again, and then she ate, ate, ate, ate, ate till there was nothing left.

 

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

The Heart... the Heart had not been expecting that reaction. She had not been expecting such kindness to come from the villain before her. It strikes her as odd and uncomfortable––well, no, not uncomfortable. She doesn't have the word to describe how it feels to be met with kindness. Confused, comes to mind, enough that the entire army of red-eyed Lioras also appear startled and they all freeze at once, no longer trying to climb over each other to retrieve the heart from Inna's hand. For a moment they just stare at her. And blink. And stare. Until finally the Heart shakes herself from this trance. So bewildered, she takes a step back from the blonde and looks down at herself, trying to inspect for some defect that does not exist. Then her gaze locks onto Inna. "Yo-you're not supposed to be nice," she says, trading in bitchiness for panic. Frustrated, she curls her hands into fists and shakes her head, "You're not supposed to be eating that heart, either!"

"That's the queen's heart! She prepared it for herself and you are not supposed to be eating it. We're going to get into fucking trouble and, and," the Heart seems frantic, now, and hardly anything like any known version of Liora. Her overwhelm even causes her to shake, as if the confusion is tearing her apart, because she should be angry. Inna has almost gotten her killed so many fucking times, why should she want to be with such a disaster? That doesn't make sense! Her fists somehow clench even tighter, her knuckles practically splitting open as she becomes consumed by uncertainty.

But it's fucking hard to remain that uncertain as Inna continues on with her speech and continues to eat that heart she knows tastes foul. "...You're––you're here to save me?" she asks, clearly taken aback as realization dawns on her. Just why is Inna trying to save her? And why does the thought send warmth through her like she has never known? Doesn't she hate this woman? Doesn't she despise her? (Something weak and flimsy, yet clearly at the forefront, tells her, 'Yes, this woman is a traitor. This woman is not worthy of you. You belong to a queen.' And another part of herself tries to scream through her gag, 'No! You fucking love Inna, you dumbass! She's an idiot, sometimes, but she's the hottest idiot out there and she's really nice and sweet and caring and her hugs feel like home and always fucking have! You already gave yourself to her, just open your eyes!') Her skin starts to turn gray, like stone, and she clutches her head, shrieking, "No, no! I can't allow this––I'm already promised to another!" But despite those words? The Heart doesn't make any moves to stop Inna. She's way too busy wrestling with herself, trying to resist E-keysmash's spell.

She cries and whimpers, "I'm promised... I'm promised..." to who, even? (E-keysmash is her immediate answer, but something about that feels wrong on her tongue. Like a curse more than a promise. 'Say it! It's the truth. It's automatic,' she tries to reason, because none of this making any sense to her and she just wants to understand what the fuck is happening.) With the bond that has been forced upon herself to the queen, it's hard for her to accept what is true, and as she watches Inna eat that putrid heart of hers? She understands that there is something undeniable about the inevitability of Inna Orlovskaya. Really, it's always been her. Just her. Only her.

That recognition is enough to crack through the queen's illusions and the promise of Inna? It's enough for the Heart to shatter the glass castle herself. Free of the spells, the not-Liora begins to change again, from gray back to color––and this time, she is complete with the scar across her face. Bit by bit, she starts to remember all of the good things about Inna and, honestly, with how numerous the moments, she fucking wonders how the queen's magic could have even worked. It's just so clear who Inna is to her as these candy sweet memories flash through her mind's eye. 'That's my Inna,' she thinks just as the ex-demon reaches the last bites of the heart. Tears start to shine in her eyes and steps closer to the blonde, "I... You're my promise."

When the last bite of the heart is gone, the not-Liora strokes Inna's cheek and embraces her. As she does so, her body transforms into purple light and absorbs into the blonde. Meanwhile, the gray office space that could have only ever been a representation of Liora Trihn's inner machinations, starts to fade away and Inna is brought back into the chapel with the real Liora before her.

Slowly, Liora comes back to life, even with her heart missing and chest cracked wide open. Unfortunately, as she returns from being not-quite-dead, so does the pain and her mouth parts to let out a strained noise. She tries to move to escape from her injuries and only manages to disturb them further, causing tears to sting her eyes. Not too much longer after that, she blinks her eyes open, trying figure out where she is and looks over to sees her girlfriend (?).

"Inna?" she asks, both relieved and confused. "Inna, where––ah," she groans against her bonds, "what's going on? I feel like shit." That is probably a light way of putting that she is in an excruciating amount pain.

 

[Syntra]

“Not supposed to be nice?” Inna smirked. “As if you don’t know me by now, Li. To me, ‘you can’t’ is basically ‘go the fuck ahead.’ Sorry, my friend! I’m gonna be nice to you for the rest of my fucking life now, and you can’t do shit about it. E-keysmash can’t do shit about me eating this heart, either, so guess what? I’m thinking I’m gonna finish it. Sucks to be her, I guess!” It sucked to be anyone but Inna Orlovskaya, to be precise-- mostly because a) she was smart and hot and cool, b) nobody, not even the Creator herself, could stand between her and whatever obsession she was suffering from at the moment. And, to E-keysmash’s remarkable lack of luck? The thing the blonde was currently fixating on was saving her girlfriend from the queen’s greedy, greedy clutches! (Liora was worth it, you know? Like yeah, shit sucked, and the heart was definitely among the top ten most disgusting things she’d ever ingested, but… well. If her time as a demon had taught her anything at all, it was that there was great value in sacrifice. How else was Liora to know that she loved her, hmm? Talking about it was all nice and dandy, but literally everyone could run their mouth-- okay, everyone aside from the poor bastards who had had their tongue cut off, that was, though that wasn’t a sizable fucking demographic. Never count your statistical outliers, man! Even Inna, who had failed literally every single math class she had ever taken, knew as much.)

…promised to another, pfft. Really? Was that how she conceptualized it now, with E-keysmash’s poison running through her veins? “Okay, okay, okay. So, first of all: if you listen hard enough, Li, you may hear the sound of me not giving a single flying fuck. Like, what is this? Some regency era bullshit? Even if you agreed to her shitty conditions, there’s no need for you to actually follow through. But, for the sake of the argument: don’t you actually need to, I don’t know, consent, for a promise to be valid? I wasn’t fucking there, of course, but ten bucks says she just fucking kidnapped you off some street. So, promise my ass!” …if anything, she’d actually promised to be with Inna. ‘Forever,’ Liora had said back then, and she could hear it with the same kind of clarity as if her love had only announced it seconds ago-- the sweetness was still fresh on her tongue, even if there was a bitter aftertaste to it now. (‘Traitor,’ something filthy inside of her said, in an accusatory tone. ‘Traitor, traitor, traitor! It wasn’t enough for her to off you in your past life, you see, so she fucking made sure to earn your trust in this one first. Now, what did the bitch do with it? Discarded it, stomped on it, ripped it to fucking--’ ‘Shut UP!’ Inna screamed, loudly enough for glass to shatter. ‘She’s ill. She’s fucking dying. It’s not her fault. I’m gonna love her, god fucking dammit, and no shitty inherited paranoia is going to ruin it for me. Back off, you said excuse for a demon!’ Because, no, it couldn’t have been Ivy. Ivy had been nice and sweet, too sweet for her own good, actually, and the voice just didn’t sound as if it belonged to her, you know? Nope, nope, nope, someone was trying to sabotage her efforts here.)

Thankfully, though? Those Lioras, or maybe even her Liora, were beginning to get it. It didn’t escape her attention that some kind of transformation thing was going on here, and so she persevered-- each disgusting, disgusting bite only got her closer to her love. C’mon, this isn’t worse than eating human burgers. Imagine that those are brownies. Swallow. Just, swallow! It fucking burned in her throat, as if the heart had been made of ashes, but Inna forced herself to go on. It’ll be over soon. Like, this isn’t some Prometheus level of torture. Once you eat it, it’ll fucking be eaten, and then you can throw up to your heart’s… heh, hearts, …content, and!!! And then Liora, the Liora that she knew, called her her promise. Ah. Ah, fuck. Those were tears that were stinging her in her eyes, weren’t they? (The Inna from a year ago would have resorted to wearing a fucking paper bag over her head out of pure, concentrated shame, but her current self… well, her current self was only happy that her Li returned. That she returned, and was okay. Or, well, as okay as you could be, after a bloodthirsty demon queen had cursed your very heart…? Eh, they’d sort out the details later.) “You remembered,” the blonde sobbed, not even trying to hide it. “Yes, I am. That’s me, Inna. I’m yours, and… and you’re mine, I guess. Legally speaking from now on, too.”

The world around her dissolved, then, disappeared in this bright burst of color, and Inna found herself back in E-keysmash’s personal torture dungeon. Fucking yay! (Liora, despite her chronic lack of organs, seemed to be relatively fine, however, which earned an unironic yay from her. Thank god. Oh, thank god, thank god, thank god. Had Inna lost her there… no, the blonde didn’t even want to imagine the fallout.) “Well, that’s because you almost died? I think. Maybe you were dead for a while-- honestly, it’s fucking hard to keep track of those things,” Inna stammered. Like, how to approach this, even? What should she do first? Removing the shackles, she decided, seemed like a good start, and so that was what the blonde committed herself to. “E-keysmash kidnapped you and tried to, uh, marry you, I guess. Via some freakish ritual that revolved around her eating your heart, just in case this wasn’t fucking wild enough. And, the kicker? I stopped her, but… but your heart was ripe to be eaten by that point. Well-done, if you want to use the steak fucking terminology. I suppose it wouldn’t work on its own? Vie said so, at least. Long story short, I ate it. Which, um, means we’re kinda married now. Congratz?”

 

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

Coming back from death, not-death, limbo––whatever you may want to call it––is a bizarre fucking experience. Had Liora had even a gram more of forethought, she probably would have asked Inna how to handle these situations, because she should have fucking guessed it would eventually be her fucking turn with how their lives have looked since that fateful fucking day at the mansion. (Don't get it twisted, Liora would not trade that day for anything else because even though it threw their lives into a tailspin, it also brought them together. She'd happily go through this entire shitty experience again and again just to keep knowing Inna the way she does now.) Throbbing pain aside, she doesn't totally feel like herself; for one, the last thing she remembers with clarity is E-keysmash tearing open her chest and second, she realizes that she can't feel her powers in the same way that she could before. It's not as though they are locked, because in those instances it's like a barrier has been erected between herself and her abilities; now, it feels... stored somewhere else? Like placed in a cookie jar at the top of the fridge and she has to ask permission to use them. It's, um, probably not a big deal.

What is a big deal though? Inna, with her signature grace and tact, announcing that they're married. Holy fucking shit. It's probably written in her eyes with the look she gives that is a perfect blend of shock and confusion. She isn't angry about it or sad... or even happy, really. It's just like another fun fact she can file away for a rainy day. In that, she does feel disappointed and not because she's married to Inna––she knew she'd become an Orlovskaya someday––she just sort of thought it would have happened three years from now as outlined in her five year plan. (She even planned the perfect way to propose too...) It just fucking sucks it didn't get to happen their way. Like, you'd fucking think being the designated saviors of the world you'd get some level of fucking autonomy, but the Creator seems to have said, "Fuck no" and "Bitch you thought!" to those lofty ideals.

"Oh," is her rather lame response, not really sure how to respond or what the appropriate response even is. "I... thank you?" That also feels incredibly wrong, but she doesn't exactly feel celebratory over the situation. She wishes she could be, because, again, it's not as though she had been thinking of anyone else to marry and it not being on their terms fucking sucks. Like, does Inna even want to be married? She was sort of waiting those three years specifically to warm Inna up to the idea of a long-term commitment. (Not that she doubts Inna's love or devotion––especially now––and that doesn't change the blonde being responsibility-phobic.)

Wincing as each of the nails are pried from her body, she tries to remain as still as possible to while Inna works to free her, all the while wondering where the fuck the queen even is anyway. She has a hazy memory of some sort of confrontation following her chest being ripped open, but it's not enough for her to figure out what happened. Actually, she kind of hopes that Inna already killed her. Ultimately, though, she decides not to worry about it until it becomes a more pressing fucking concern/if it even becomes a pressing fucking concern. Besides, her body still aches, almost especially with the bonds removed, and she's still incapacitated so she wouldn't be able to do anything in the event the queen is still out there. "I mean, we would have ended up married anyway," she says, trying to reassure both herself and Inna as her chest is folded close, causing her to groan and shift uncomfortably. "And I guess people have always said I'm heartless, so," she tries to smile to make light of the situation––it's what she imagines Inna is trying to do as well or would at least appreciate. "It also makes sense you have it now; it is yours."

Lifting her newly freed arm, she reaches for Inna and places her mutilated hand on her shoulder, making a weak attempt to pull her closer. "But, like, we're not really married until the brides kiss, you know?" Classic Liora, bringing in the rules despite these fucked circumstances that have made their impromptu wedding possible. But, maybe, she's also doing this so Inna knows she's not upset with being married, especially not to her, and at least by bringing that aspect into the ceremony it sort of feels more like their own; like it's the one thing they can do to make it an agreement. So she slides her hand to the back her wife's neck and brings her into a kiss––one that, uh, literally causes an entire Disneyland level firework show to spark overhead and fills with sparks. (It's hard to tell if this is Inna or how the ritual is supposed to end as there is an extra oomph she has not seen with the blonde's own fireworks––especially since these sparks seem to be absorbing into their bodies.)

 

[Syntra]

Oh. Oh what, though? Oh no? Oh yes? Statistically fucking speaking, 'oh no' appeared to be a more logical interpretation-- like, if you were about to express joy, you'd probably go for 'hmmm, yeah' or something like that. There was something in 'oh,' to Inna, at least, that just hinted at disappointment. Maybe 'o' was a sorrow-shaped sound? 'Cause 'ah' didn't fucking suffer from that fucking issue. (Aw, shit, shit, shit. What if all those Lioras had been an accurate reflection of her love's soul, after all? Nobody would deny that there was a fucking difference between the status of a gf and that of a wife-- a gf, you see, could be a temporary thing. A trial run of sorts, to figure out whether she secretly wasn't a disgusting alien in disguise and shit! Now, what if Liora had intended to subject her to such a test? Yeah, yeah, the fact they'd literally died for one another suggested that this wasn't one of those 'let's be casual about this' arrangements, but Inna didn't doubt for a second that Li did have a My Ideal Wife list, actually. Spreadsheets and graphs and pointless fucking statistics composed like 35% of her goddamn personality, so of course she would have thought of something like that! And maybe, for the sake of her stability, she simply needed to be able to compare Inna to the Ideal WifeTM that lived inside of her head, nod, and be like 'yup, checks out, this bitch is the one for me.' Mind you, Inna didn't doubt for a moment that she'd make the cut. If not her, then fucking who? Some rich, soulless bitch whose idea of love translated to maybe not fucking you over the second it turned out it would earn her like three dollars? Yeah, right. Liora Trihn deserved someone extraordinary, and everyone knew that nobody fit the definition of that word more than Inna Awesome Orlovskaya. The Creator herself had dragged their souls out of the shredding machine, so that had to mean something, dammit!

(Still, still the blonde would have preferred for Liora to have that choice, though. To see for herself, and maybe perform whatever meaningless relationship rituals that she found important because they had been listed in some incredibly embarrassing guide for social maladjusts. You know, the nonsense like 'never text your crush first' and 'always come late to you dates to create the illusion of having important stuff to do'? Yeah, all that try hard shit. Usually, that sort of thing only made Inna roll her yes-- like, who had the time for all of that? Either you were interested or not, man, and if you weren't, then you should fuck off, along with your shit fucking taste. It just wasn't that deep, regardless of the narrative that those cheesy magazines for chicks tried to sell you. 'Top ten signs your relationship is going to last' her ass, really! No, Karen, you couldn't determine partner compatibility from analyzing, like, your gf's fucking coffee drinking habits. In Inna's eyes, that was basically Astrology: The Dumbass Edition. What mattered was if you actually liked that person, and how cool they were while wielding a sword, and whether you could rely on them in case the fucking zombie apocalypse ever broke out. Those were the real foundations of true romance, ladies and gentlemen! ...except that, you know, so, so much of Liora's life had been dictated by someone else already. Helia first, then all of her fancy uni professors, Chett, Vie, the Creator herself, and probably a whole army of bastards Inna didn't even know about. It was as if the whole fucking universe had collectively decided that Liora was simply too fucking powerful, and thus had to be locked in a metaphorical cage. And, like... wouldn't it be sad if she, too, contributed to the pattern? If there was no functional difference between her and the scumbags? Inna wanted to give her wings instead, god fucking dammit, which also included letting her do shit that she found vaguely annoying. Just, watching Liora turn into a Bridezilla over their eventual wedding would have been so much fun, man! But, nooo, that simply had to be taken away from them, too. Fuck the Creator, really! Inna sincerely hoped the woman had a good fucking health insurance, 'cause )

"I know it's fucking sudden," Inna combed her hair with her hand nervously, "so, if you're feeling iffy about it, we can... we can act like it's just a formality. Planning and shit is important to you, isn't it? So I guess we can have another wedding later..." Oh shit, did that count as a proposal? "...if you wish to, that is. Like, I doubt most institutions would recognize a marriage certificate from the fucking hell, anyway. If we want those sweet, sweet tax benefits, we'll have to re-marry, so..." Tax benefits? Fucking tax benefits? Since when had Inna Irresponsible Orlovskaya ever cared about those, huh? (Innaification was a well-known phenomenon by that point, but some investigation, it would seem, should be conducted on Lioraification as well.)

All of her thoughts were swept away from her head, however, once their lips met-- once Li kissed her, despite everything. Oh, wow. That couldn't be a rejection, now could it? Like, Inna wasn't a master cryptologist, but the message here sure as fuck seemed clear enough. "I love you," she whispered afterwards, feeling all warm and fuzzy. "Wife. Ha. I didn't fucking think I'd ever get married, you know? Didn't even strike me as an option, but with you, it just seems... right, I guess. Inevitable. And, as messy as this has been, you have to admit this is entirely on brand for us. Nobody will have a more original wedding story! Imagine telling the anecdote to all of our non-existent fucking friends."

"Yes, yes, very moving," E-keysmash, who still hadn't freed herself from her earthly prison, smirked. "So, where do I factor in all of that? I hope you know that you will never, ever experience true peace. I will always come back for you, darlings! Nobody defies the queen, you see."

 

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

That Inna cares so much about Liora's own wishes touches her in a way she didn't know possible. Mostly because throughout her life no one has really cared about what she wants or what she thinks. No one, as far as she can recall, has ever even thought to ask her about these things. Choices and decisions have been made for her since she came into her mother's "care." So much so, Liora herself hardly ever thinks of what it is that she wants––Hell, she barely even knows what she actually likes (it's probably why she thinks socks are the most exciting gift to receive). Yet being with Inna? Being with Inna has always been an exploration in her freedom; never has she felt chained down or inhibited or that she has to be perfect or hide how she feels. See, with all of Inna's zaniness there is so much room for Liora to explore herself in ways she was never permitted to before. So even though she doesn't fault the blonde for marrying her without any input, because not doing so would have fucking resulted in her dying, there is something touching knowing that her Inna still wants her to have some say––even if it goes without saying that she would marry Inna a million and one times.

"Yeah, I don't think the state of New York will honor this marriage and the tax break would be nice," not that Liora Literal Millionaire Trihn needs a tax break, mind you. "I, um, sorry this was sprung on you, too. I had this entire plan to slowly bring up marriage, starting after our first anniversary, and this thirty-seven part proposal plan," she sighs, wistfully, "but I suppose I can still do all that shit later. When we get married for real and not in this demonic fucking fashion." Her eyes shine as she sits up, her wounds having been sealed with the kiss and while they ache, it's a dull throb compared to the earlier pounding throb. (Scars are left where the nails and tear had been, but Liora? She doesn't really mind, probably because she gets the idea that Inna thinks scars are hot. She's caught her staring a handful of times and while that's not exactly shocking, because they're in love and shit, it's very clear to her that the blonde is fixated on the permanent face accessory.) She drapes her arms over Inna's neck, nearly forgetting that they're still in a chapel in Hell and smiles at her wife, "I love you, too. Forever and always."

Of course, that is when their not so private moment is interrupted by the audience neither of them fucking asked for and the annoyance transforms Liora's face so quickly, one has to wonder how she had been looking at her wife so lovingly before. Her gaze snaps to the ground where the queen is pathetically trapped underneath soil. (Okay, has Inna always had control over earth or is that new? She guesses figuring that out doesn't matter, but she does make a note to ask later.) "Yeah, so fucking what, bitch?" she starts, as indignant as ever and a far cry away from the Liora who had resigned herself to being sacrificed, "Keep trying to make our lives miserable all you fucking want––the way I see it, though? You're not that great of an enemy if you can't even get your schemes to fucking work. You keep losing and losing and fucking losing. So really, who's the fucking useless little worm? You can't even beat two fucking humans who barely know how to work their powers."

"What?!" E-keysmash shrieks, wriggling from underneath her earth encasement. Her eyes start to glow in a way that might have been considered impressive or cool or maybe even scary, but it doesn't cause Liora any concern. "How dare you speak ill of your queen! I shall make you pay for such insolence!"

"Yeah, bitch? When? You can't even free yourself from being buried––"

Oh, shit. Liora probably spoke to soon because, lo and behold, the ground encasing the queen begins to split and crack as one arm punches through the earth, followed by the other, and suddenly she's flying out from her dirt prison––launching high up into the air. Even from where Liora stands, she can feel the searing heat of her gaze––full of red hatred and rage all mixed into one terrifying concoction that rivals Liora's own Death Glare. Once freed and high up in the air, the queen raises her hand, and her shiny steel longsword materializes in her fist––after which she divebombs towards the newly weds.

Now, ordinarily, with her powers back within her command (kinda sorta), Liora would have grabbed Inna, blipped over to Sol, grabbed her, and then blipped them all back to her apartment where they can all relax, enjoy some Thai takeout, and take turns rubbing Fluffinator's belly. As it is, however? Liora is fucking done with this shit. She's fucking tired of never knowing when villains like the demon queen are going to come knocking at their door to ruin their lives. She's tired of waking up and scrambling to find Inna, because she's worried she's somehow been stolen from her, only to realize the blonde fell off the fucking bed again. She's sick of wondering whether or not she's going to be able to run a normal fucking errand to get her wife some fucking cherries for her cake or if she'll be interrupted by one of their haters. It's fucking exhausting having to watch her back all the time. So as far as Liora is concerned, this shit ends to-fucking-day.

So rather than getting everyone back home to safety, she teleports herself and Inna out of E-keysmash's trajectory to a location across the chapel. The queen smashes into the stone wall of the chapel, shaking the building upon impact. Then, before her opponent can properly recover, the young sorceress calls her own sword into her hand and teleports herself above the queen to nosedive down towards her. Though E-keysmash had been coming out of a haze, and perhaps Liora thought that might be to her benefit, she recovers quick enough that all she has to do is use her impossible speed to raise her arm and block the attack; the impact of the swords colliding nearly makes Liora think that her skeleton is about to be knocked out of her very body and she is sent backwards. Thanks to an artfully placed portal, she manages to land on her feet, sliding a few meters backwards upon landing.

"Really? Little Liora wants to challenge I, the queen of demons? Would it not be wiser to run like the pathetic little bitch that you are?" the queen mocks, smirking as she ziiiiips through the aisle and bringing her sword down over Liora.

Liora, knowing she cannot absorb a shock like E-keysmash is promising to deliver, teleports herself behind the queen. "Sounds like you're fucking scared––like you fucking know you'll never beat us," Liora smirks, diving to cut into the queen's thigh, with what would have been a lethal blow and instead, the wound closes before the woman can even strike again. 'Shit.'

"Maybe you should learn when you've already lost! You'll never defeat me, my darling worm."

Yeah, okay, Liora is done with the fucking worm talk and even though she doesn't fucking know how she's going to bring this villain down, she just knows that somehow she's going to fucking do it. (If only she had a moment to fucking think of a plan, because she knows that she can't keep swinging her sword around and teleporting out of harm's way. Eventually, she's going to run out of fucking gas. And then what? Tap-in Inna? So that she can run into the same fucking dilemma? No, bitch. She needs to fucking figure this the fuck out before it's too fucking late and, no, she's not fucking swearing enough, actually!)

"To think I thought to give you," E-keysmash continues, "a wretched and ungrateful little bitch, a position as my personal footstool? You'll be lucky if there's anything left of you to send to the soul shredder!"

On and on the duel goes––both sides bringing elements of magic to their side of the fight. Here and there, Liora teleports away from the queen or even tries to get her to fall into a well placed portal. The queen, on the other hand, uses her impossible strength and speed to come at Liora from all angles, easily able to overpower her. A few times the queen even manages to grab the woman––if only Liora weren't such a slippery opponent, because it is sort of hard to stab that which will not stay in one's grasp.

Blip. Slash. Swing. Blip. Blip

Then from out of the blue, completely disrupting the sound of steal and stone breaking, Liora hears, "Woo! You can do it, Li!" from across the fucking room in a voice that sounds suspiciously like Sol's. Holy shit. She fucking forgot about her sister being here as well.

It also seems that the demon queen had as well as the realization reaches both of their eyes at the same time. E-keysmash smirks and before Liora can teleport herself over to Sol, her sister is in the queen's grasp. E-keysmash holds Sol close to her body, as a shield, with her sharp talons threatening to pierce her sister's neck. "If you know what's good for you, I recommend looking away," and she laughs in this haunting way that fills up the chapel.

Seeing her sister in that position? Fills her with about the same amount of fear and dread as any time she ever saw Inna on the brink of death––because being in E-keysmash's hands? That's basically a death sentence and Liora knows she needs to act fucking fast. So, without any thought, she teleports herself into E-keysmash, causing the queen to burst upon the arrival of Liora somewhere where her heart might have been located. Her guts splatter all over Sol and cover Liora, however... that doesn't kill her? Because, rather speedily, those guts are gathering together and the queen is fucking rematerializing! "Jesus fucking Christ," Liora mutters, though she doesn't sound defeated. She is going to end this. For Inna and their future, most of all.

See, as the queen reforms her body, Liora notices something about the way her body reconstructs itself––rather than starting at the heart or brain, like she might imagine a person who has just exploded might reform, hers starts with her eyes. Fucking eyes that have always been the bane of her magical existence––eyes to keep her powers locked away. Yeah, so as quick as E-keysmash is reforming, Liora doesn't bother to just wait for her opponent to finish up so they can just go back to it. Instead, she tackles the half-skeleton, half-flesh monstrosity and jams her thumbs into the queen's eyes.

"Arghhh!" she shrieks, "What are you––"

She doesn't get to finish because Liora then reaches into her mouth and tears out her tongue. And as more fire fills her and all the anger she's harbored towards this fucking devil, she maybe goes a little demonic and turns E-keysmash's body (soon to be corpse) into her fucking punching bag. Guttural noises escape the queen and the sound of her bones breaking fills the chapel, but eventually it's only the sound of bones breaking as the queen lays lifeless underneath Liora's rain of punches. Tendrils of the queen's power start to leak from her body, and that’s when Liora stops.

 

[Syntra]

Holy shit. Holy fucking shit! So, a reminder for her future self: never, ever piss Liora Trihn off. And, in case the blonde happened to change her opinion for some reason? You know, maybe due to hitting her head really hard? Then she should change it right back, god fucking dammit, because Li's anger was downright terrifying. (Terrifying and also vaguely hot, Inna had to admit. So fucking what? She was just one lesbian, man, and couldn't resist the in-built desire to fling herself at the nearest woman who could snap her spine with, like, 0% effort involved. The Creator/evolution/insert whatever deity you believed in/ had just shaped them in that way, okay? Attracting the strongest gf possible was good for... uh, safety of the species, or something. No, don't fucking psychoanalyze her! The blonde may not have known much, but she knew her rights, dammit, and nobody, nobody was going to test that weird, hippie shit on her. If Inna Orlovskaya had to choose between death and therapy, then off to the grim reaper she went! Like, at least she had some experience with the guy already, and considering that he had let her return a few times now... well, he couldn't be that fucking bad. Much like hot half-demons, he appeared to be the victim of the insidious anti-supernatural propaganda!)

Anyway, moving on. The way Liora Totally Badass Trihn just went apeshit? Wow, wow, wow! Inspiring, awesome, show-stopping and all the other synonyms for 'great' that Inna couldn't really be bothered with. Go, Li! Go, and avenge yourself! (Normally, of course, the blonde wouldn't have hesitated to help her g... wife. Like, who fucking cared about chivalry, right? All the knights were dead, as far as she knew, and following the stupid rules they'd established solely in order to ~seem better than everyone else~ would get you killed, too. No need to become a part of some grim statistic! Nah, nah, nah. Shitting on codes of honor was where it was at, man, and Inna was always, always ready to perform that sacred duty. So, the catch? The catch was that this wasn't a normal fucking situation! E-keysmash had kidnapped her, and almost made her marry her against her will, and, like... wasn't it only fair for Li to crush her now? You know, because poetic justice and shit. The so-called """queen""" was about to learn that their lives weren't some fucking game devised for her sick amusement, and to receive her punishment from Li's hands... ooh, yeah, that pleased Inna's inner literature major that she didn't fucking have. If shit went wrong, then she'd naturally intervene, but as for now? As for now, the blonde was ready to kick back, relax, and be the most supportive wife in the world.)

"Kick her ass, Li!" Inna shouted. "Show her that nobody gets to fuck with my wife." Nobody who wasn't named Inna Orlovskaya, that was, and the last time she'd checked? That distinctly wasn't E-keysmash's goddamn name. Oh no, no, no! And it also wouldn't be, because it was off limits to beings this fucking gross and pathetic. Inna meant 'innocent,' you see, and while she was no saint by pretty much anyone's standards, she at least wasn't guilty of being a complete fucking bitch. You know, something that the queen couldn't claim even in her wildest dreams! "I know you can do it," the blonde continued, deciding then and there to encourage Liora in literally any endeavor that she ever attempted. Killing E-keysmash? Check. Taking over the world? Check. Trying to, say, build a house out of fucking popsicle straws? Check, check, and check! No goal was too grand for her love, Inna knew, and together, they could reach for the fucking stars.

...together, as it turned out, they could murder, too. When the queen dared to involve Sol? Inna's blood fucking boiled, alright, but she also knew that that was the last poor decision the bitch ever got to take. Activating Liora's Big Sister InstinctsTM, you see, was the only way to make her even more dangerous than she already was! And, as always, Inna's analysis wasn't fucking wrong. Ta-dah! A few action scenes later, E-keysmash was dying, just as prophesied. (Good riddance, bitch. That was what you got for antagonizing the Orlovskaya couple, and... uh. What the fuck was that, actually? Those weird-ass swirls of energy in the air?)

"Ugh," Inna rolled her eyes. "Can't we, like, get three fucking seconds of peace? I would just like to congratulate my beautiful wife on killing the pest that had been poisoning our lives, but instead? Instead, there's another magical fucking emergency. Just what we needed! Like, why the hell not? Clearly, shit would have been wait too uneventful without our hourly supply of catastrophes. H-hey! What are you doing?" Was it naive to talk to suspicious magical tendrils? Probably, because instead of just, you know, answering, they fucking attacked her. (She could feel them everywhere, really-- her mouth, her eyes, her stomach, even. It was weird, weird, weird, almost like trying eat through her nose, and then it just... stopped? Okay, bitch! Why not.) "Ah, fuck. You okay, Li? Did you feel that, too? Also, good job on removing the shitstain. I knew you could do it. That should send a signal to the rest of our enemies, I think! So, let's wrap it up here. I promised you a fucking cake, didn't I?"

Except that, you see, it couldn't be this simple. Maybe she shouldn't have uttered the word 'enemy'-- for all Inna knew, it could have been a trigger word that activated alllll of the demons in the goddamn area. That, at least, would explain the total flood of supernatural fucks that suddenly materialized out of fucking nowhere! "Ah, shit. Shit, shit, shit. You think you can get us out of here, Li?"

"Wait, no!" a demoness with red horns and an outfit that wouldn't look out of place in an embarrassing, weeby visual novel shouted. "Don't leave us, gracious queens!"

"Gracious... queens?" Inna raised her eyebrow. "Can someone, like, explain what the fuck is happening here? I feel like I'm losing my goddamn mind."

"Well," the chick bowed, so deeply that Inna wondered how she hadn't fallen on her fucking face, "isn't that obvious? You killed our old queen, so of course that you are to claim her title now. Blah blah blah, ancient traditions, blah blah blah, might makes right. If you ask me, she was a bitch, anyway. So, glory to Inna and Liora, the new queens!"

 

[starboob]

☉ LIORA TRIHN ☉
​

Okay. So that just happened... Liora might have blacked out during the last five minutes of that fight, because the next thing she knows for sure is that E-keysmash looks pretty fucking, uhhhh, dead, her knuckles are sore, and she’s crouched over the demon's lifeless, mangled form breathing heavily as she comes down from the high of the fight. She won't lie. It felt fucking good proving to that bitch who she fucking is and that, really, she is the fucking best at everything ever. Balance, finally, feels restored with this brand new accomplishment under her belt.

When Inna's voice cuts across the stillness of the moment, she straightens and looks up at her wife with the brightest smile on her face. Even with the magical tendrils swirling around them, she doesn't actually let that ruin the mood––mostly because she isn't actually worried about them. If The Mistress... her mother... Helia had been telling the truth about anything it would be that death is one way to usurp anther's magic. Hell, Liora even saw the proof for herself when she smashed Inna's phylactery, so she knows this is like one of those power ups in Inna's video games. She isn't sure what stat this is going to boost, but she definitely feels like she can conquer the world right now. Especially with her wife by her side.

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine," she says stepping over to Inna and grabbing her by the arms, giving her a scary crazed look––the kind that says she has an idea and a plan to execute it, "But, Inna, forget about the cake––I mean don't actually forget about it," because Liora does want it, "what if we melted the Eiffel Tower for our honeymoon?"

But apparently the Creator is homophobic or something because yet another fucking annoyance is here to disturb them. Well, bitch, bring it the fuck on––Liora will destroy ever fucker in Hell if that's what it takes to get some goddamn peace and fucking quiet for her and her wife to gush about each other's accomplishments. Except that... doesn't appear to be the case this time? Nope, instead they've just been named queens of Hell? Alright, why not? She guesses that makes sense for the kind of fucked up world that she seems to be living in now. Besides, it's kind of flattering seeing all of these demons bowing to her. She fucking deserves it and, yeah, it is fucking impressive that she killed E-fucking-keysmash. (It's maybe getting to her head already and it's been, what? 3 seconds? Good luck, Inna.)

"No shit we’re the queens. Now can you fuck off?”

"Are you kidding?" the scantily clad demon asks, "My queens, you both still need to be renamed––no offense, but Inna and Liora are the names of dorks––design your crowns, get you acquainted with the demon princesses, there is a whole realm to ov––"

"Shut the fuck up. We're the queens, right?" she waits for the room to nod. "Do fuck all for all I care. By royal decree, I command it. I'm going to take my sister home, eat a delicious fucking cake that my wife will bake for me, and then tomorrow? Tomorrow we're packing our fucking bags and going on our well-deserved honeymoon. We'll come back in, like, three months. Chill the fuck out. Whoever is the least fucking annoying will get to destroy the city of her fucking choice."

"But the names––"

"Pick them for us. Host a fucking contest. Text in your vote. Do I have to do fucking everything around her? Sol!" she shouts, and her sister slides through the crowd towards her demon queen sister, clearly shell shocked, and immediately clings to her side. Liora puts a protective arm around her, grabs Inna's hand, and finishes, "Leave us the fuck alone and that’s an order."

Blip.

............​

The next couple of days went just as Liora had said they would. Once they got back to the apartment, Sol sort of had a meltdown, but quickly rebounded after stuffing her face into Fluffinator's belly, smoking an obscene amount of weed, and eating about half of the cake Inna baked. Then, the next morning, they arrived in Paris at approximately 3:30PM and combined their abilities to deface the Eiffel Tower. Afterwards, they enjoyed a nice walk through a neighborhood and Liora sneakily got information on Inna's favorite house features. (She's already been consulting with some demon contractors to build them the best kitchen possible for their residence in Hell. Her Inna will not run out of counterspace, that's for fucking sure.)

Anyway, the honeymoon is going better than Liora ever could have hoped. They're lazing in some royal suite in some city––Liora doesn't remember where she teleported them to last night––watching a news report about the mysteriously ruined Eiffel Tower. Inna has her head resting in Liora's lap and Liora is combing her fingers through her wife's hair. "Sol says we have to wait on Barcelona because she still hasn't seen all of the Cheetah Girl's 2 film locations. I guess it's a big deal to her," she says, taking a few strands of Inna's hair and beginning to tie them into a braid, "So I guess––"

Okay, so she had something to say, but then she looked up and noticed that sitting right across the suite from them are none other than their past selves. Except Vie and Ivy’s half of the room doesn't look like a hotel room, it looks like they're sitting in a forest next to a brook. They both appear to be soaking wet, for reasons unknown. Ivy is sitting on a log and Vie is standing behind her braiding her hair.

"Whatever am I going to do with you, Ivy?" she asks, looking down at her counterpart with what Vie probably thinks is fondness, but it definitely looks like a blank stare. She continues with the braid and looks as pensive as ever as she does so. Her lips purse together and suddenly she stops what she's doing and places her hands on Ivy's shoulders."I just have the strangest feeling that I’m going to lose you," she starts, her voice measured despite the topic, "I have not seen anything to suggest such but I cannot shake the feeling.” She pauses, bites her lip, and looks something close to nervous. “Truthfully, the thought terrifies me as much as it devastates me, because I do not know what I would do without you. You are my sun and stars and I know that I am the woman I am because of you. Ivy,” she sighs, stepping over the log so that she is facing the other woman, “I want you for the rest of my days, in this life and any others. I will come back to you, always, my little light. I know mere labels hardly change what is between us, but to lose my love... I just want us to wait until the world is safer, for us and the family we will raise. For a time when I do not have to worry about losing you. I know this is a lot to ask of you, to wait on someone as wicked as me, but I promise, if you do, I will build us the warmest home, decorated with all the flowers that make you smile. I promise you that and so much more if you wait for us... I am so hopelessly, helplessly yours, Ivy.”