Archive of Our Own

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Arachne and Medusa have come to find that making a weapon is neither pleasant nor easy.

Death didn’t have quite the stomach for it, so to speak, and the research was sealed away. Neither of them can remember how they got a hold of it, although they likely “procured” it from some witch who was probably dead by this point. No matter, what’s important is what they can do now that they understand the process. All one needs is a suitable weapon, and the soul of a witch. They’ve both toyed around with the requirement of such a soul, wondering if a similarly powerful human soul would work. They don’t even really know how Death came to this conclusion, or even if it will really work, but it must.

Too much time has been spent on it already, jolting from one corner of the continent to another, chasing down leads that go nowhere, periodically fighting some lowly collector for some sort of artifact that might make their quest easier. It’s all come down to now. Just two things.

A weapon of suitability.

Not just anyone will do, mind you. Excalibur’s long winded “contributions” to Death’s manuscript were remarkably handy in determining what weapons could and could not be used. Once the witch’s parsed through the lengthy exposition about the dangers and horrors one finds when dealing with the magical alteration of bodies, Medusa could summarize it thusly:

There are two types of weapons that are capable of being merged with a soul. The first must be “untainted by conflict”, as well as having been made before 500 B.C. Given the relative impracticality of this, we have opted for the second option, by procuring a weapon produced by the Old Descendants.

They never figured out the importance of 500 B.C., but they didn’t really care either. Excalibur’s mention of the Descendant’s work is brief, but he mentions that the weapons they crafted should be suitable for the transformations required of the demon weapons.

The Descendants were an odd bunch, a small coalition of holy men and blacksmiths who proclaimed to have knowledge of how the first weapons were created, and hoped that the catalyst for the creation of more could be found. To summarize it simply, they never lasted that far, and their artifacts were scattered around the world, usually in small caches. Death had taken it upon himself to horde the vast majority of them. The vast majority, of course, not all of them. Arachnophobia proved itself to be invaluable in recovering much of them, and quite the variety. Some were mundane, others magical. Many were plain and practical, others ornate and absurd. A few hundred, maybe a thousand. A limitless canvas.

The soul of a witch

Why a witch’s soul? They wondered for ages, but could never really find a reason. The manuscript simply deemed it to be a “suitable vessel”. Maybe it was simply easier for Death to collect more samples. It’s simply how it was.

“What do we do?”

“We use a soul. What’s there to discuss?”

Medusa was smart. Quite likely the smartest of all of them. Still, Arachne considered her a bit unexperienced when it came to practical matters, as if she could never think outside the box.

“You can’t be serious? The order will you expel you, they’ll expel me, we can’t afford that! Having Death and Maba after us will be a nightmare-”

“I know that. It’s not something we should be doing lightly, but this isn’t ‘light’ work. We’ve been deliberating on this for nearly two years. It’s time. We have to make a move. If only there was some other option…”

Of course, there was one. She’s napping in a sparse room down the hallway.

…

Shaula feels as if she’s floating around in a large room, with a blindfold. Her “vision” consists of random and incomprehensible geometric shapes of varying shape, size, and color. They all dance around, or chase one another. She can’t feel anything, and she feels like she’s on the edge of vomiting. She can hear voices, too. Faintly, and in a language that she cannot understand. She figures that it’s not a dream, but then again what else could it be? Dreams similar to this have been happening for years, but they never felt this… real.

She’s thrown out of her stasis, literally, as she crashes to the floor. She’s sprawled out on the floor, gasping for air, the impact knocking the wind out of her. It can’t be a dream. Light begins to pool into the room from an unknown source, and it isn’t long until it’s near evenly lit. It’s so surreal to watch, to the point where it doesn’t even look real. It’s functionally just a large rectangular room, all of the walls and floors are a sort of odd dark wood. No doors, either.

After trying to catch her breath and steady herself, she does her best to stand up and try to find a way out, but nothing gives. The “wood” feels as hard as stone. Maybe magic? She mutters an incantation, but nothing happens. A novice she may be, but there’s no way she’s lost her powers. The voices are slightly louder now, but she still can’t make out anything they’re saying. It’s all a cacophony of gibberish and nonsensical sayings. It barely sounds like they’re saying any formulated sentences, rather a mishmash of random sounds. Panting heavily, she falls back against one of the walls, and resolves to simply wait it all out.

The voices are speaking in more forceful tones now. It’s subtle, but they’ve slowly gotten louder and more angry as the minutes pass. She wraps her hands around her ears and buries her face into her knees as she tries to wish this nightmare away. It isn’t long before the pain starts. It first wells up in her angles, before spreading to her knees. Nothing more than a subtle ache at first, but then it starts to sting, and the voices are just getting louder and louder. It isn’t long before the whole pain takes over her body, and she doubles over in the fetal position, muttering and begging for it all to stop.

“Please.... I’m sorry…”

She doesn’t know what she’s apologizing for, but whatever it is, it must be angry, yes? That’s what the voices are for, that’s why she’s being held in this box, that’s what the pain representing. Her pain induced imagination vividly creates scenarios in her mind, partially to distract her from the physical agony she’s undergoing. Maybe it’s a rogue spirit that’s torturing her in the afterlife that she can’t remember. Does it have something to do with the death god her sister’s tell her to fear so much? She doesn’t understand it. She’s not a bad person, why is this happening to her?

It lasts for maybe thirty minutes. Possibly an hour, she couldn’t keep count. She blacks out three or four times from the pain, hoping to wake up in a better situation, only to be greeted by the same awful chanting and horrible experience her body is undergoing. After the fifth time she wakes up, though, it begins to recede. The pain follows the chanting, and the light follows the chanting. All of it begins to calm, or recede. It isn’t long before she’s lying in the pitch black room, mostly pain free, with only the slow melodious nonsense to keep her company. She wipes tears from her eyes and leans up against the wall. The voices are almost starting to make sense, but only just barely.

Soul.

Now.

Then the voices fade away again. She crawls to a corner and lies down for good this time, hoping to wake up to much less dreary prospects.

…

The hall is massive and foreboding. Every sound, even just the slightest tap is reverberated to an insane degree. It makes being sneaky functionally pointless. The footstep cracks throughout the room, and black orbs begin to fly.
“Who’s there?”

The voice is calm, but disturbed. As if it’s on the edge of breaking, under the force of its own will, only prevented by a desire to maintain some sort of appearance. A pale and emaciated boy steps out from behind one of the great pillars that line the room, he seems nervous, somewhat ashamed of something he may or may not have done. The man at the end of the room lowers his arm, magic falling into nothingness. He taps his fingers rythmically on the book harnessed to his side.

“You were supposed to be here ten minutes ago.”

The boy twiddles his thumbs, trying to find some excuse, to no avail. His whole body is shaking thinking about what punishment could be bestowed upon him.

“Be very aware of something, Gopher: I made you, and I can unmake you, with the snap of my fingers.” He warns, snapping his fingers loudly for emphasis. The entire cathedral, the entire world they’re in shifts slightly. It’s a falsehood, but one the book will tolerate. It’s all in service of the same goal anyways.

Knowledge.

It’s always been about that. Noah has no clue how old he is, or when Gopher was formed in service to the goals of the Index, but it matters little. His mind races with all of the artifacts he’s gathered, both large and small. Creatures deadly and harmless, extinct and living. All of it recorded in the Book of Eibon. He waves Gopher over, and unlatches the great book from his belt, gently placing it on a large marble pedestal. The boy stands wearily to his side, like a frightened dog following it’s deranged master. Noah opens the book, and flips to a page, they all seem to exist as needed, to record what exists, but to only appear when necessary. Finally, he arrives at one of the many blank entries, and gnaws on his lip.

“We’ve never procured a demon weapon, have we?”

It’s a rhetorical question. “No, sir.” Gopher mutters.

“Why?”

Gopher looks around the room trying to piece together an answer. “W-well, they’re quite difficult to capture, and there aren’t many of them around…”

Noah looks back at the entry, as if he looks at it hard enough than some great truth will be revealed to him. Nothing will come, not yet. Gopher’s answer fails to satisfy him; if something exists, then logically he should own it. Not necessarily all of something, just one will suffice.

“How many do you think exist?”

Gopher tugs on his vest. “M-maybe a dozen? Some of them have died out in recent years, although I guess there’s that other thing…”

Noah looks over his shoulder with a flat glare. “Other thing?”

Gopher finds some sort of spark in his frail little body. He looks back up at Noah with a put-on expression of eager joy, as if he’s found some great treasure. It may just be. “Right, the witches… they’ve created their own.”

Noah squints. “Their own…?”

“T-their own demon weapons, sir. It’s blasphemous, I imagine, but they’ve used magical weapons and souls, a-and they’ve created their own.”

His explanation is shoddy at best, but Noah can’t help but be intrigued. How fascinating!

“We must…” He begins, closing the book abruptly, “... we must procure a few.”

He runs down the steps, with Gopher trying his best to keep up. “W-wait, I don’t know where any of them are-”

“Quiet!” Noah scolds, sliding to a stop. Gopher trips over himself, landing on his face. The two of them are standing at the edge of a bridge that leads to nowhere, nothing but an endless sea of pages scribbled with nonsense on them stands before them. Noah smiles as Gopher lifts himself up off the ground.

“It doesn’t matter. We’ll find them soon enough. It can’t be that hard.”

He looks back to Gopher, a grin on his face. “Get going.”

The boy nods, takes a deep breath, and leaps from the bridge, praying that this won’t be the first time his wings don’t form. Luckily, they do, and he soars to another platform made of an unknown type of stone, about 20 feet from the bridge. He tries to catch his breath as he waves over to Noah, who barely acknowledges him as he peers into the endless sea of paper. He taps the book on his hip again, as he just tries his best to figure out where to go next. He’s traveled from one end of the known earth to the other.

How hard could it really be?

…

Noah grabs a handful of sand and lets it run through his fingers, the distant setting sun allowing a cool breeze to flow throughout the desert. He adjusts the scarf wrapped around his face so that he can speak more easily, and motions over to Gopher, who flutters over to Noah, descending and almost slipping in the sand.

“I thought they would be here.”

Gopher yanks his scarf free as he hurriedly tries to offer another excuse. “I-i’m sorry, I just thought-”

Noah raises a hand, which has come to be a vaguely polite way to tell Gopher to be quiet. He scans the distance, and the setting sun, taps the book, and stands back up.

“There was something here, just not what we were looking for. I don’t think it’s in this region, either.”

“D-do you want me to fly ahead?”

Noah nods. He points in the direction he supposes to be north, before sliding down the dune he’s standing on, as Gopher flies off in a hurry. It’s not like either of them need to eat or sleep, although it’s never really been pleasant to be without the comforts for more than a few days at most. Still, he figures they can continue to make good time if they just keep moving north, maybe past the sea even.

He sighs as he sits back against the rapidly cooling sand, and opens the book again, flipping to a random page. In one lies a small drawing and description of something called a “wyrm”. He touches his finger to the page, and after a few seconds of dark orbs blistering about the book, out pops a small reptilian creature. It’s scaly, and quite angry at having been caged up for so long. It runs up and down the length of his arm, trying to gnaw its way through his clothes, to no avail. Noah grabs it by the tail, before examining its squirming body. It’s quite unpleasant, really. He can’t remember exactly where he found this thing, although he feels as if it were a very, very long time ago. Quickly bored by the obnoxious little being, he presses it against the page of the book harshly, the wyrm screeching loudly in pain, before becoming nothing more than a crying ink scribble. He closes the book, satisfied, and leans his head against the dune. Just a little longer.

...

Medusa stares blankly at her journal, and the guilt begins to gnaw at her stomach. Surely, she can’t have been in the wrong here. Arachne sits in her chair, staring off into space, waiting for something to happen. Waiting for one of her cultists to run through the door and proclaim the birth of something new to them. It takes four or so hours, but it finally arrives.

“Uh... m’lady-”

A little figure in black robes and a hastily carved mask stands in the doorway. Arachne looks back at them with a look of boredom that betrays her nervousness.

“Yes?”

They shuffle into the room, taking a deep breath.

“She’s done it, I suppose.”
Medusa lets out a deep breath, growing more impatient.

“Good, good. Leave her alone for a bit- you’re excused.”

She’s already begun to develop a sort of disdain for the people in her cult. Half of them joined for some odd reason or another, rather than out of a sense of loyalty to her cause. No matter, she’ll have time to fix that soon enough. Now, she has what she wanted. She calls Medusa over to her plain looking table, and taps a piece of a manuscript that she’s procured from a crate sitting next to her. Amber eyes run along the length of the parchment, and they struggle to find a meaning in all of the nonsensical runes.

“What?”

“You see, I found something interesting.” Arachne states, sliding the parchment across the table with pale, slender fingers. “It seems like Death had a, let’s call it a theory.”

Medusa begins to feel as if something is looming over her shoulder. The two of them have gotten along, for the most part, but there had always been the implicit idea that this whole thing was more for Arachne’s benefit than some grander goal. It was the sort of thing, the sort of rigorous magical experiment that Medusa was glad to assist in, even if she knew that her assistance would probably had been forced out of her regardless. Now, she begins to feel a web closing around her, if it wasn’t obvious before.

“And that would be...?” Her voice quivers. She’s never one to be scared, of anything really, much less Death, but her sister has always frightened her. She’s always been more cold and distant from everything else, even if she’s adopted such a royal persona.

“Someone has to wield a weapon, yes?”

Medusa nods, a snake slithers up to the nape of her neck. She always let one rest there whenever she was young, it was just a habit she would do whenever she was nervous. It still manages to bring her some form of comfort. Arachne smiles, and cobwebs dance in her irises.

…

Shaula sits in the corner of her room, scribbling symbols and runes into the stone walls with a stick of charcoal. She wishes she could just go away for a bit. She’s useless as a witch, and even more so as a weapon. At the absolute least, she can control her form at will now.

What it is it again?

A khopesh, an old Egyptian design.

How the hell do you even use that?

Beats me.

They mulled over the problem for hours, trying to examine all about her. All she could do was sit in the void, as they made meticulous drawings of her body.

Body. It feels odd to say that. It’s just another form. A part of her, if anything. She just sits in a never ending black void, until they’re done with her. Everyone that talks to her has been looking more ragged and nervous as of late, jumping at shadows.

Footsteps are getting louder from behind her, and she hears the door shut gently. Probably another cultist who has to drag her to some “test”. She still feels obligated to stay in her corner, but she’s surprised to hear a more familiar voice than usual.

“Hey. Are you alright?”

Just her luck.

Medusa brings a candle closer to the corner of the room, and places it a few feet away from Shaula, kneeling. Shaula can see her out of the corner of her eye, and the way Medusa’s pupils are shaped drives a sort of fear into her stomach. She can’t stand snakes.

“Do you need something...?”

Medusa gnaws on her lip, trying to dodge the question for a little bit. “Happy birthday.”

Shaula turns around to look at her, trying to remember the date. It doesn’t feel like her birthday, although then again none of them have ever really celebrated it. She remembers the odd celebration by a witch, and she knows of the sort of parties the nobles around the land throw. But they lived isolated lives. They had no time for it. She can’t even remember how old she is now, maybe fifteen?

“Thanks.” She mutters, always suspicious of Medusa’s motives.

“You’ve been doing well.”

“Thanks.”

Shaula turns back to face the wall, hoping that Medusa will get bored of prodding her and go away. Both of them can feel it though. Something is off. They can’t hear the bustle of the cultists in the fortress. There’s no arcane research going on, no chanting. No tortured screams. Something is wrong.

“Could you do me a favor?” Medusa inquires, tapping the harness attached to her belt. Shaula turns to stare at the hastily thrown together excuse for a pseudo-scabbard. “Transform.”

“Why?” She asks, looking back up at Medusa. “Is something wrong? More tests?”

Medusa waves dismissively. “No, and no. Just... do it.”

Shaula has spent a while obeying orders, and she supposes this is no different. Transforming has gotten to be quite easy, even if she despises the downtime she has to spend in that ceaseless void while they poked and prodded her. She lays dormant in the harness, as Medusa takes care to tie her onto her hip, loose enough to not poke her thigh, but tight enough to hold her into place. She scorches her fingers on Shaula’s handle more than once, gritting through the pain until she’s in place. She takes one last look around the room, before departing as silently as she came, marching down a long corridor to the eastern side of the castle.

The weapon’s voice vibrates in Medusa’s head. Where are we going?

Somewhere.

What?

Shaula vibrates on Medusa’s waist, but the witch does her best to ignore it. She’ll just keep walking, and walking. It isn’t long before she’s outside, the cold September air biting at her skin. The moon lights up some parts of the crater that they’re in, and she looks back at the castle one last time, before tapping the ground with her toes twice.

Where are we going? Shaula demands, her vibrating become slower, more anxious than curious. Medusa just continues to walk, deciding to take the usual way out of the crater, via a cave that leads to an opening of sorts.

You’ll see.

By the time she emerges from the cave, the night is well into its cycle. The full moon hangs above them, and the great constellations above beam brightly.

You know, we named you after one of those.

Shaula’s eyes shimmer in the blade. A star?

A constellation.

Wait, you named me that…?

Medusa shrugs, before continuing to walk. Shaula is too nervous to ask anything more, and they quickly find themselves at the edge of the forest. Medusa tries to hold back a smile, even as sweat beads form on her forehead.

Your sister is dead, by the way.

…

All is quiet, the only sound is the gentle breeze that blows throughout the chamber. Everyone stands in their usual spot, waiting for an order of some kind. In the center, Death stands alone.

“Are there any reports from the north?”

A small little creature, with pages covering its body, sits up from the stool he’s resting upon.

“The witches in the area have either fled or been butchered.”

All of the other warlords nervously eye each other, before going back to staring at Death. The creature stands with his hands behind his back, his purpose of providing information performed.

“Was it-”

The creature tilts its head. “No, no.”

The rest of the warlords are cringe slightly, interrupting Death is not exactly a minor slight. Still, the creature has its purpose, which it has so far served well. Maybe a bit too well.

“No,” it continues, “this was from within their own ranks.”

Death stays still. His problematic offspring sits adjacent to him, covered from head to toe in ridiculous and ill-matching clothes.

“The Index is right...” Asura mumbles, only loud enough for Death to hear. Being wrapped up like this is the only way he can stand to be in the center of the room, being forced to undergo the stares of seven other people he supposes to be his allies.

“Another witch disposed of them?” Death inquires, turning to face the Index, which rips a page off from its body.

“Correct. This certain one has been undergoing some particularly heretical tasks, within their order. They seemed to have needed the souls of other witches, for the creation…”

The sentence trails off as the Index stares up at the sky. Above them is nothing but endless red, and black clouds. Beyond the white formation of rock the warlords congregate at, there is nothing around them but an endless sea. Sometimes the water is white, sometimes it’s almost black. The world changes to fit how Death feels. It turns its head down, and finds the ocean blackening by each passing second.

“...of weapons.”

The other warlords all look nervously at each other, before turning their gazes back at Asura, who can feel their stares, as if each of them is stabbing at the back of his neck. The Index looks back at the water, curious.

Pitch black.

Asura begins to gnaw his fingers, knowing that Death will implicate him in this nightmare.

“Did you know of this, Asura?”

The gnawing stops. “No.”

Death turns around. “Did any of you know about this?”

All he gets are some confused denials. He figures that one of them must. One of them had to. This must mean they must’ve got the manuscripts. Rage builds up inside him.

“Asura, I placed you in charge of protecting any archaic or magical relics, did I not?”

Asura folds his hands in his lap. “Yes.”

“I will not tolerate failure on this sort of post. At all.”

Everyone knows how this ends, how it’s ended before. Asura is unstable, to say the least. All of Death’s fear, in one person. That can’t end well.

Asura knows how it must end. He sits up, standing at Death’s shoulder, roughly, before walking to the edge of the rock, thankful for any excuse to not stand in the attention of people he can’t get rid of. He begins to cast a spell, something to bring him to the world of the humans. He vanishes in a great bought of light, with a mark of ash lying on the rock where he was; three eyes, all intersecting. Death stares off into the great distance, hoping for a resolution.

“Ie!”

A man dressed in a loose robe quickly kneels, sweat beading on his forehead. “Yes, m’lord?”

“You’ll go with Asura. Keep him in check.” Death commands, as Ie moves to carve his own sign in the stone. “Where is Vajra…?”

Ie looks up from his drawing, before offering an apologetic shrug. “He’s been latched to Asura’s side for a while, sir. Won’t come out of weapon form, only talks to Asura. I suppose he’s keeping him in check, until well…”

Death’s lack of an immediate response gives Ie the push he needs to finish his rune, and he quickly disappears in a great blast of blue light.

“All is adjourned. Leave me be for a while.” Death commands, as the rest of the warlords bow, and take their similarly flashy exists. He wonders how all of this will play out. With any luck, they’ll get the manuscripts back, and kill whoever took them. Asura is getting awfully difficult to handle though. The Index is still there, though. Watching him and staring. It pipes up from its seat.

“You are aware of the offender?”

“Yes.” Death mumbles. The one person who’s set him back recently. Some pompous witch who’s sitting a bit too high for his liking.

“Do you believe Asura will succeed?”

“I have no reason to doubt him.”

Asura is a piece of himself, after all. No one has been able to match him in combat. It seems almost like that’s the problem, though. Asura is too nervous, too anxious, too frightened by everyone else. He’s too willing to resort to killing. Then again, Death admits that he isn’t much better in this.

“If they have made more weapons… what will you do?” The Index asks, picking another page from its body, trying to keep all of this written down.

“I’ll figure it out. We cannot let the witch’s master the arts of the weapons, it simply cannot be allowed to exist. Were these circumstances less dire, I would not have sent Asura.”

Sure, Death cares about proving a point, but where is a point when faced with the concept of massive collateral damage? Asura needed to be controlled. Sometimes, he had to be let loose. Almost similar to a caged dog. Death wonders if he made the right choice in creating him. A part of him continues to want to push forward. The other wants to put his rabid dog down. He supposes that all will be revealed to him soon.

…

Asura sits at the edge of the crater, with Vajra tied to his belt, and Ie standing nervously next to him. His mind flashes with images of destruction and bright flashes of magic, and all he can do is sigh. Of all the things he needed to be reprimanded for, losing some nonsensical manuscripts that Death and Excalibur fiddled with to no avail for ages. He figures it nothing more than a waste of time. He waves to Ie.

“You don’t need to be here.”

Ie shrugs, tapping the handle of his katana. “Your father told me to come.”

“He doesn’t trust me. I see. Let’s get this over with.”

Asura and Ie leap into the crater, the latter being struck in awe at its odd fashion and construction. He steadies himself best he can; they have a job to do, morbid as it may be, it’s still necessary.

Before Ie has even drawn his sword, before any have fallen to blade, before the two of them have obliterated anyone within the facility, he’s given a task. His mind flashes with an image of Death, ill defined and somehow even more morbid than Death’s actual figure, along with a message.

If you do not return with Arachne Gorgon’s soul, do not return at all.

…

Shaula taps on the wall of the white box a few times, trying to probe for some sort of weakness. Everything feels like it’s made of stone. It’s as if she’s reliving that dream again.

She lies down in the middle of the room, curled up in the fetal position, and waits. Nothing happens, even if the sounds outside the room keep increasing. Melodic chants and the silent tapping of a foot on a wooden floor. She can’t make out anything they’re saying. Just like last time.

This time though, there’s no pain. Only a dull throbbing headache that forces her to cover the sides of her head with her arms, in an attempt to drown out the obnoxious sounds from the outside. She wishes she could leave the box. She wonders what’s outside. Maybe she could find the source of the chanting, and the noises.

When she uncovers her head, she finds the room has changed. The box has been replaced with a cabin of sorts; with darkened wood for the floors, and a thatched roof. There’s little to no furniture, just a chair, a table, and a fire roaring in the fireplace. It calls to her in a way, enough to groggily drag herself to sit in the chair. It’s only then that she notices a book, leather bound and old. The parchment is cracked at the edges, more than a few pages are torn or wholly unlegible. What is still there is mostly written in some sort of nonsensical script that she doesn’t even recognize. The fire keeps drawing her attention, as if the dancing of the flames is calling to her, as if its trying to show her something. There’s nothing there though, just heat and destruction.

The dream ends as suddenly as it began. She’ll awake to a clamor of noise and the soft thunking of metal against wood. She’s still in the void, and she has no intention to leave it, even as Medusa tries her best to whittle away at a piece of wood to pass the time.

Where are they, anyway? Why are they here? They’ve been stuck in this forest for nearly two days. It feels like they’re going to be stuck here forever.

Is she really dead?

Shaula can’t get that out of her head.

Medusa nudges Shaula with her toe, hard enough to nearly cut herself, and to rouse Shaula.

“Hey. You gonna eat anytime soon?”

Shaula runs a hand over her emaciated frame. She never ate much even in the best of times, but the anxiety pounding at her has obliterated any semblance of appetite she may have had.

Her blade vibrates. “No.”

Medusa sighs, tossing the odd wood carving she’s created into the forest. “I can’t have you starving. Transform already. Snared a rabbit and, well…”

She snaps. Shaula shivers. The blade rattles on the ground.

“I’m playing with you, calm down. Look…” She begins, as her voice trails off. The forest is dark, and the grove they’re sitting in is only so large.

“I get that this is different. It’ll all be alright, though.”

Shaula grips her knees as her vision starts to fog up, tears welling in her eyes. In the lack of an actual explanation for any of this, her mind runs with her own ideas. Conclusions that aren’t favorable towards anyone. Things that inspire a real, genuine emotion, the first in a long time.

Anger.

But she can’t show it. She’s safe in the void, her “body” wrapped in a cloth on the ground. But when she leaves it? She’s just as frail and timid as she always has been. She has no idea how to really communicate or ask any questions regarding the matter. Besides, why would Medusa tell her anyways? Will it get any worse? She takes a few deep breaths, trying to calm herself.

“Why?”

There’s a silence. Medusa tries to think her words through, as she taps her fingers on her thigh. To her, it’s a very inane and almost silly question. She could explain why this was done, to be sure. It would have to be a long winded, hard to summarize explanation, but she could do it. So why doesn’t she?

Well, there’s a lot she’s in control of. Shaula’s emotional state isn’t exactly one of them. Little voices begin to ring inside her head, cautioning and making up things for her to say. After all, she does need Shaula if she wants any of this to work. If she wants any of this to be not in vain. But then again, what is Shaula asking about?

She shrugs.

“Do you really want to know the whole story? Is that really something you care about?”

Shaula feels like crying. This is how her questions were always answered, with roundabout smugness. Disdain for the idea that she couldn’t understand what everyone else could. Still, she calms herself, if only to ask herself a question:

Do I…?

“No.”

It’s quiet, timid, but exactly what Medusa hoped to hear. A long winded explanation, one that could destroy the souls of more squeamish types, has been avoided. Medusa smiles.

“Right. I want you to understand something, though.”

She stands up, just to gently sit right next to Shaula, still wrapped up in a poorly made piece of burlap. Still blind to much of the world and how it works.

“We’re… me and her… we are, or weren’t, evil people.”

It’s a hard thing to convince Shaula of, to be sure.

“We don’t do things because, alright? Everything questionable we may have done… it was all for a very, very good reason.”

Medusa gently grabs Shaula’s hilt, pulling her out from the cloth. Shaula is blinded by a mixture of the sunlight flowing down from the canopies, and her own arms, fearful of what’s even happening. When she finally lowers them, she realizes that the void itself still exists, just differently. She blinks a few times, it’s as if she can see, but also can’t. Her surroundings all flood in a big wave of information to her brain, but it’s all mumbled, crackled, fizzled. She can’t make out much of the detail. Medusa places her on the grass gently.

“Don’t you want to be… strong?”

Shaula picks her head up. “What? What do you mean?”

Medusa gazes lazily at the sky. “Aren’t you tired of being a frail, useless, miserable husk of a girl?”

“I…”

Shaula feels her body shivering. Medusa is right, she is. But the way she says it sets her brain alight, and all the bad memories and feelings she had about her sisters. What they thought of her, even if it was only in private. Even if they thought she couldn’t hear. Even when they knew she could. She feels something different though. Not anxiety, not terror.

Anger.

She stands up suddenly, her face running red, her eyes tearing up. “I… I… f-fuck you!”

Medusa smiles. It’s not threatening in the slightest, and Shaula is very clearly on the verge of having a nervous breakdown, but she’s finally making progress. She jolts up, and onto her feet, as Shaula’s anger seems to resonate within the blade itself, causing it to rattle in place.

Resonance. That’s a good term…

She has a theory. Well, a few, actually dozens. Time to knock one off the list.

“What’s wrong? Are you angry now? I’m just asking a question, really it’s quite straightforward. Yes or no, answer me.” She mocks, her arms crossed behind her back, a smirk on her face. “Do you hate me? Is that it?”

“How couldn’t I?!”

Medusa gnaws on her lip. “Well, then come and get me!”

Shaula pauses for a moment, having worked herself up, it brings her back down to earth. What would she even do? It’s not like she has much in the way of magic, at least none that can compare. Or, god forbid…

...a weapon.

It dawns on her, and she smirks. It’s not one born out of confidence, or some sort of happiness. A mixture of grief, rage, and fear are all boiling over in her mind, with Medusa egging her on. She wonders if she can even do it. Her actual skills in transforming parts of her body hadn’t really materialized. Just bits of metal that make her skin crawl. Just maybe, though…

There’s a great flash of white light, forcing Medusa to cover her eyes briefly. The cloth burns up, floating into the breeze, charred, with its edges scorched. Shaula lands in the grass, trying to find her footing in the uneven ground. She feels like vomiting from motion sickness, but is held back by sheer determination. Her mind races with options. She balls her right hand into a fist, and lunges in what she supposes is Medusa’s general direction, light trailing after her.

Medusa smiles. Gently. Not angrily, even in despite of what seems to be obvious rebellion. No, the angry thuds of Shaula’s footsteps, her ragged panting, her thin body clearly not built for physical strife. In spite of all that, when she sidesteps, and Shaula lands in a great cloud of dust and dirt, she realizes something: she was right.

She gazes upon Shaula’s form, more specifically her arm. It’s less an arm by this point, and more an amalgam of mangled bronze from her elbow down. It barely look functional as one, nor does it really seem like most would consider it one, either. But, to her, it is a blade. One Shaula created on her own. She manipulated her own form as a tool in combat, without being shoved along with the magical incantations Medusa had learned. It worked.

Shaula tries to get up, coughing up mixture of grass and dust, but her other arm gives out under what little weight she has. Her right arm evaporates under that same bit of white light, before giving itself away towards a much more normal looking appendage. Then, realizing where she is, she begins to cry.

Her mind runs with the worst scenarios; Medusa killing or abandoning her for this, and she chastizes herself for letting herself get too angry. It seems to her to be a consequence for caring too much. But, Medusa simply lowers herself to the ground, and offers a hand. It’s hard for Shaula to see, with her vision obstructed by dust and tears, but she wipes them away. It isn’t raised against her. It’s simply there, offering to help her get up. She runs up the length of it, before finding Medusa’s face. It isn’t angry, red, or boiling with rage. No, she just has a smile and an almost fond appreciation, as if she were a mother watching her daughter learn how to weave.

“Now, let’s eat.”

…

He trapses through town after town, city after city. He looks high, he looks low. He interrogates peasant, he interrogates nobles. Still, nothing. No one seems to know anything.

He’s getting impatient.

Gopher is hastily awoken by Noah grabbing him awake, his master dragging him by the arm to his feet. Neither of them need to sleep, but it does make them both calm. Noah, however, is not calm. His normally reserved demeanor has been replaced by a sort of angry disdain. He juts a finger into Gopher’s stomach, which forces the boy to hunch over painfully. Noah let’s go, but only so that Gopher can fall into the dirt on the ground. The camp they’re in is far less naturalistic or practical than most; it’s a small array of furniture, cloths, and whatever Noah grabbed out of the book. None of the grandiose creations seem to amuse him much. After Gopher is finished coughing, he begins to interrogate his “assistant”.

“Have you still found nothing?”

He may look angry, but his voice is still neutral. Calm. But it wants something. Noah can’t ever seem to deviate from whatever he wants or desires. All other things fall before the attainment of such a goal.

Gopher has nothing to offer him. “I-I… I’m sorry!”

Noah looks at him, and his expression mellows a bit. Less rage, and more a father, who scolds a son he’s disappointed in. “Do you… remember, what I said, back there?”

Gopher’s eyes widen as Noah raises his hand. He snaps. It reverberates throughout the area, reflecting off seemingly nothing. Black dots dance off his fingers. Streaks of yellow form in his irises. Finally, his words ring through Gopher’s head a second time.

Unmake.

The boy rushes to grab his leg, shoving his head against it, as tears rush from his eyes. His mind has only the goal to serve Noah; that’s what he was created for, after all. While he babbles and begs for his life, at the back of his mind, it convinces him that this is what he deserves. Did he not fail?

Noah rolls his eyes, and lowers his arm. It taps on the book a few times, he always seems obsessed with making sure it’s there.

“Calm down…” He commands, offering a hand to the mess of a boy at his feet. Gopher wipes tears from his eyes, and hastily accepts the offer, standing on shaking legs, his height barely elevating him to Noah’s shoulders.

“You.. you’re not going to…”

Noah waves, before moving off to sit in a marble chair placed upon a stack of books. They’ve essentially built a camp upon an abandoned building, it’s flat roof providing decent enough ground to observe all around them, in another nameless city that they don’t care enough to remember.

“We must make progress. Surely, there must be others who have heard the news?”

HIs question is rhetorical. There are others, both of them know that. But none of the people they talk to, even the learned men of the land, those who are familiar with the arcane arts, are of much help. Maybe they’re lying. He cares little for the actual reason for their lack of useful information.

He looks back at Gopher, who jolts in place, still shivering from their previous interaction. “Surely, you must have figured out at least something new, yes…”

Gopher stutters. He has, but he doesn’t know how useful it is. It doesn’t really place them much closer to figuring anything out. But, he still figures that some sort of information is better than nothing at all.

“W-well… She’s dead…”

Noah raises an eyebrow, although Gopher can’t see it; he stares off the roof into the next district of the city, still filled with life, in comparison to the derelict district they’ve taken refuge in. “Who?”

“T-the lady who uhm… Arachne Gorgon.”

Noah raises a finger, turning around to face him. “Was she not the inventor? The creator of the weapons?”

“R-right!” Gopher yelps instinctively. He calms himself, trying to make the information useful. “I-i found out that… er… they got a hold of her. They found out. It may have even been before we heard about the creation of new weapons in the first place.”

“I see. Where are they holding her?”

“She’s er….”

He looks back up at Noah, apologetic.

“...dead.”

Noah nods, gnawing on his bottom lip. “Alright, well… we’ll just have to make a house call.”

…

“What do you want?”

He looks different from when they last met. Distinctly different, even if she knows he’s the same. The other one, too. They’ve somehow gotten less frightening. She eyes him nervously as he taps the book. He’s certainly not any less dangerous, though. If only this could’ve happened anywhere else, but the goddamn city of all places? Neither of them can do much in the way of magic. The peasants all roam about, the merchants hawk their wares. Neither of them really know what the name of this place even is. Does it really matter? The narrow street she’s trapped in feels so confined. So dark. He shrugs.

“I have questions… that’s really it.” Noah mutters, waving his hand. A plaid scarf is tied loosely around his waist, the dull indigo color clashing with the brown leather assortment that makes up his jacket. Her fingers instinctively reach for Shaula, still loosely tied to her waist. He raises a hand, smirking.

“Where did you get that?” He inquires, removing the book from his waist, flipping through the pages. “All the ones I have are in far worse condition…”

As if to demonstrate his lack of well preserved artifacts, he tears a page out, the street lighting up as it burns itself. Upon the floor clangs a blade, more rust than any metal, torn into a circular shape. He picks it up gently, as if it’s a child.

“Yes, it’s been more than a few millennia since they were made.”

Medusa rubs her thumb on the hilt. “It’s not for sale.”

Noah tilts his head, casting the blade into the air, as it folds itself into a page that comes to rest gently in the open book, which he gently closes. Medusa is getting impatient with his antics.

“What the hell do you actually want?”

“Oh, just information. What do you know about the weapons that have been created recently?”

He takes a few prodding steps forward, forcing Medusa to realize that she’s effectively trapped. The only way out from this is up the walls of the surrounding buildings, and she’s not likely to get very far with that. “I know nothing. If I did know, do you really think I would tell you?”

They can both hear the voices of a crowd gathering in the streets behind them. The church bells are ringing. This whole thing is about to get a lot more dangerous. He folds his arms. “No, I didn’t. But… it was worth a try, no?”

Little black sparks dance on his fingertips, and shadow tears the light from around him. Medusa has gone through this before. He’s not incredibly skilled on his own, but the nightmares he can pull from the book can be… unpleasant. She dashes a look around; the kid is gone.

“Where’s your errand boy, eh?” She taunts, dragging Shaula from the makeshift scabbard. Runes are lighting up on his skin, and he smiles.

“Away, where I need him to be. He would only make this… more difficult, you see.”

He’s getting closer. A few yards are all that separate them. She could barely outduel his creations at the best of times, but with how sapped she is after trying to resonate with Shaula?

Resonance. I like that term.

Shaula is still in the void, curled up into a ball like she usually is. Most of the time, she sleeps. She sleeps until she’s needed. She doesn’t even really notice the commotion until she hears Medusa’s rattly voice in her skull.

WAKE UP AND GET READY.

The words come through half formed, like it’s being interpreted by the blade itself. She shakes herself awake, crawling to her feet. She’s nervous already, all she can see is a scrabbled version of Medusa’s point of view; a haze of shadow and red light.

What’s going on?

You know what I taught you?

No, she doesn’t. What the hell has Medusa taught her? She can remember some of the times they’ve practiced magic, but that didn’t result in anything of value. Still, Shaula knows something is wrong.

Resonance.
The word echoes throughout Shaula’s void, panging itself off the nonexistent walls of the area. She gets the idea. The theory. The pressure is insane. What’s going on? She still doesn’t know. She just wants to lay down and cry. She lays back down, and closes her eyes. What use is she, anyways?

…

All she can see now is the void. The void and and endless road. A street of sorts, made up of cobblestone. She sees no other way but forwards. As she walks, and walks, she begins to notice things. Little darting objects at the corner of her vision. Something compels her to keep going. It never really ends, but eventually, she finds a bench, with an owl standing on it. Whenever she tries to sit down, it nips at her, crying out for something. It tilts its head at her, almost as if it’s confused. Or maybe angry. Eventually, she shoos it away, before slumping down into the hard wood of the bench.

She’s tired. She runs her fingers through her hair, and wonders what’s going on outside. She wonders if she’s dead, as if the phantom pursuer of Medusa’s finally ended both of them. What a miserable existence, if that’s true.

But no, she can still feel everything. The way her chest hurts whenever she breathes. The dull pain that the scar on her arm pulses. Nothing feels right. It never has. What is she, anyways? The questions start to ring through her mind. A gentle voice.

Who are you?

She leans back, whispering the answers to herself.

Shaula Gorgon.

When were you born?

It reminds her of when the clergy would come into town. When she was much younger, when she would sit at the edge of the forest and play with the other kids of whatever village they were staying in at the time. When everything seemed somewhat okay. The men in white robes would record the births of the town. They always spoke so clinically. Like they were recording the drams of olive oil being harvested in the fields.

The first of November.

You age?

She can’t even really remember.

Seventeen.

What are you?

What kind of question is that? What does that even mean? What does the voice want? She can’t figure it out, and her tired mind feels like it’s tearing itself apart trying to find an answer. Does it want a gender? A job? What she wants to be? What she believes in? She isn’t sure with any of it. She supposes she’s a witch, but even then she’s a pretty terrible one, by most standards. She could never get the hang of it.

A tool.

That’s what she feels like. Just a thing to be used, like she always has been. It was that way a decade ago, and it’s even more true now. Does Medusa even think of her as anything more than a blade? An amalgam of tin and copper? Probably not.

Does it bother you at all?

Not really… I guess.

She’s used to it. She hasn’t known anything else. It’s not like she can directly change any of it, at least not currently. She isn’t even sure what Medusa wants to do. They’ve just been running for the past few weeks, in search of something. Some artifact, maybe. Some sort of knowledge that someone else holds. The owl is flying overhead, in seemingly random directions.

What do you think about your siblings?

She sighs. The two people that have taken up most of her life. One is dead, and she almost wishes the same fate on the other one. She misses what they used to have, although she wonders if the rosy view she had of her younger days is a mirage created by her brain as some sort of coping mechanism. They weren’t always terrible people. Arachne taught her most of what she knew, especially since mother was gone so much of the time. Even Medusa, who bullied her relentlessly, still had traits she could consider admirable. Everything she knew of the people, everything she needed to survive, she got from Medusa. Were they always good lessons? No. She knew that then. But they tried. She remembers when they were young, and they used to fall asleep in each other’s arms. She hunches over, trying to focus on better days that have long since passed. The days when there were still smiles to be had, even with how fucked up the world was. With how ravaged by conflict the area around them was. Whenever mother was mean, her sisters always defended her. Even Medusa, brash and cruel as she was, and is, took up for her more than once. So much of it is a blur. She just wants to live those days on an endless repeat. They were terrible most of the time. But at least there was something good for it. Arachne’s gentle embrace. Medusa’s toothy smile. She felt at home.

But now? There is no home. Arachne is dead, and she didn’t even have a chance to tell her goodbye. She doesn’t even know how she died. Just the scraps that Medusa would relay to her. Now she’s stuck as some ill-formed science experiment. A weapon. A tool. A demon. She’s no witch, she can barely control a familiar. No, she’s stuck. Stuck doing whatever Medusa wants her to do. Stuck being at her mercy. That’s all there ever will be.

She cries. It’s not something that’s new to her. This time it’s different though. It feels cathartic. She isn’t really scared anymore. Nervous, yes. Anxious? Beyond belief. But she wants to move, even if her hands are tied.

I love them.

What will you do?

The tears cease, and she tries to wipe them from her eyes. She doesn’t really know. She hasn’t reached some new great conclusion about life. She loves them, sure. But what does that mean or matter? Arachne is still dead. Medusa is still insane. She loves her, dearly… but this can’t continue. She knows that now. No matter how hard she appeased the two of them, they likely never cared much for her anyways. She can’t have the past back. But Medusa isn’t going to let her go. She balls her fists up, still wet with tears, and slams them against the wood of the bench, cracking them slightly. Is it Medusa’s fault?

Who else could it be? She grits her teeth together. She just wants to leave this place. Leave Medusa. It’s not her job to save Medusa from herself. She likely couldn’t, but she still feels obligated to stay. She can’t figure anything out. She wants to be her own thing, though. A weapon. That’s what she is now. Maybe there’s a happy end to this after all. She grips her head with her hands, trying to bring balance to her mind, to drown out the violence that rages throughout her body. It doesn’t really work, but it lets her formulate a response:

I won’t let them sleep easily.

Who is they? She doesn’t even really know. It sounds good, though. It’s what she wants to do.

She won’t go quietly into the night.

Her vision fades. There’s a bright flash of light that obliterates the darkness, and the void collapses around her. There’s something new. A rebirth. There aren’t many sounds, other than a wet splattering, and the tearing of something.

It’s just like Medusa wrote.

This resonance of two souls (that of a weapon and its wielder) can seemingly be achieved through a large amount of ways, including strong emotions, such as anger.

…

What a disaster.

Gopher hasn’t really found much of value on his recent expeditions out of the city. Nothing but odd knick-knacks that won’t do much to satiate Noah’s unending lust for objects. He nervously escaped through his page, trying to think of some excuses to placate his master. He feels like a failure. He’s a tool for Noah, and he can’t even fulfill basic tasks, it seems. He walks slowly back to the church, in the center of the endless land of pages and leather. Sighing, he sits on the steps, fiddling with his fingers, the fear that he felt only a day ago having fallen from his mind. His default mood; that of an anxious child.

He’s only kicked awake from his thoughts by the loud sound of something crashing against the floor of the church. He reels his head back, readies himself, and prepares for whatever is up the stairs and past the doors. He shoves them open, so hard as to crack some of the deep brown wood that makes up their construction. He looks around, but he finds a sight that throws him right back to his previous mood; that of his only companion slumped against a pillar, pitch black blood trailing behind him. His hands clutch to his chest, and tears well up in his eyes.

“NOAH!”

He sprints, nearly tripping over himself to go to Noah, he can barely see with a steady stream of salt flowing down his cheeks. He finds a sight that isn’t exactly pretty. Noah is clutching a gash across his chest, the book seems to have been damaged, and sits next to him. Nothing on Noah’s face really communicates the danger of the situation; he seems as if he’s only slightly annoyed, even as sweat pours from his forehead. Gopher’s shaking hands reach out to help, only to be slapped away, sending him flying to the bottom of the steps.

“Shut… up…” Noah commands, with harsh breaths being taken in between each word.

“I.. I…” Gopher sniffs, trying to figure out what to do, and Noah just shakes his head.

“The book. Get it.”

His command is said through clenched teeth, but Gopher understands. He wheels around and gently picks up the book, the all powerful book. The reason why they exist, the reason why this collection of theirs has grown to such an absurd degree. It sits at the bottom of the steps, with blood on its cover, and with a massive tear in the leather binding. None of the pages seemed to have been harmed, thankfully. He opens it and presents it for Noah, who, even with blurry vision, instinctively navigates the pages with skill. Eventually, he falls on a page with a bunch of eloquent drawings of various jars, of incredibly diverse designs. His bloodied fingers try to reach out for one of them, it’s medicine created by the witches that he’s obtained through one reason or another. But it’s like his arm is failing him, and he hunches over, spitting up blood from his mouth, as the color from Gopher’s face is being quickly sapped. Seemingly right on time, a little white creature emerges from behind the pillar, and they both find themselves drawn to look at it. They can’t find any sort of emotion behind the “face” of it, but it seems… disappointed.

“You failed.” It states, in a voice devoid of any real emotion. It descends the stairs as Noah leans against the pillar, Gopher having abandoned the book to try to stop the bleeding with his hands.

“Quite unsatisfactory…”

“HELP US!” Gopher screams at the creature, looking between it and Noah with an expression of sheer terror. Unphased, the Index simply gathers up the book, carrying it over its head, before throwing it on the ground and sitting on it.

“Why must I save him?”

“B-because!!!” Gopher sputters trying to come up with a response, “he’s… my... “

It tilts its head. “Your what? Friend? Master? You only think that because it has made it so.”

Gopher is clearly offended, torn between trying to defend his and Noah’s honor, or to continue in vain to stop the bleeding. “What are you talking about! We’ve always been here, for as long as I can-”

“For as long as you can remember, right. You forgot what has created you. Do you know who I am?”

Gopher does. Noah does. Its the Index. A creature that maps out the book of Eibon. Is it? As they try to think about it, the memories seem to fade. It just nods.

“Right… there won’t be any need for that, stop it.” It commands, waving an appendage as if to shoo Gopher way from Noah. Gopher shakily takes his hands away, covered in blood.

“W-why…?”

“Because!” The Index declares, standing on the book. As he does so, the wound on Noah’s chest seems to slowly meld itself back together. The blood seems to fade away. First forming a stain, that even itself is removed. Gopher stares at his master’s recovering body with a form of awe.

“This is the book of Eibon! Why it is, it is no matter. All is here.”

Gopher scrambles to try to help Noah up, and the Index turns away as they fade into an argument. Even the “master” is so bound by the rules. Noah can be unmade in an instant. Gopher is even more disposable, and he’s happy to be as such. All is in the book.

It supposes it failed. It’ll have to tell Death about this. The other two are nowhere to be found. The Index doesn’t really even understand why Death wants them. Maybe gods are above the understanding of the book after all… maybe.

…

Shaula can feel the warm sun beating down upon her, and the gentle breeze that flows throughout the air. She blinks a few times as she adjusts to the light. There’s barely any strength in her, at all, but she staggers to her feet to get a view of her surroundings. The city is in the distance, and she’s seemingly in the middle of a grassland, shaded by one of the few trees to dot the landscape. Everything feels nice. Her brain pieces everything together, and the metal forms on her hands.

She did it.

“You did it.”

She turns around to see Medusa, and her legs give out, sending her plummeting towards the ground. Shaula looks up to see something she hasn’t seen in a long time: a smile. Medusa’s smile. Her canines looking carved, and it’s well past the point where they could pierce skin. Shaula smiles too. There’s something banging on the back of her head though, even if the memories of the void are fuzzy.

Medusa sits beside her, and takes one of Shaula’s hands and places it into her lap, rubbing her aching palms gently. Their cares slip away for a moment, and Shaula feels at ease for a bit. She did it. She fulfilled her purpose. Medusa notes, that the weapon experiment was a success. Sure, there’s still plenty for both of them to learn, but that’ll come with time. Medusa helps move Shaula so that her head is resting on her chest, and they both gaze off into the distance. Shaula weakly lifts her arm up to see the metal dancing on her hand.

“Who… was… that…?”

Medusa embraces Shaula, and shrugs. “Not a… good person. Someone I’ve had history with. That’s all you really need to know.”

Shaula supposes she’s right. She doesn’t really need an explanation better than that. But it still feels as if Medusa is lying. She tries to ignore the beating in her head, and tries to focus on their success. Their “victory”, even if you could barely call it a battle. More like a game, to see who could move first. Medusa knows that, Shaula doesn’t. The latter feels like she’s accomplished something, for once. She’s happy. What did Medusa call it… that… resonance? She feels powerful. In control of something. Dissolved, different from someone else. Unique. The tight embrace reminds her of something, though: Medusa is the one wielding her. The pounding is getting louder and harder to ignore. Medusa rattles off into a story, anecdotes about how she got them here. Shaula tunes out, though. All she can hear are her own doubts, and the pounding. Why is Medusa hugging her? She hasn’t done that since they were children. It feels… fake.

Medusa concludes her story, leaving Shaula to just mutter agreement with whatever she said. The two of them lay there for a bit, and Shaula feels as if there’s a civil war brewing in her mind. One side wants her to embrace this, and the other wants to reject it. It feels nice. It feels nice to be praised, it feels nice to be in control. It feels nice to help, and to be helped. She possibly saved Medusa’s life. She feels good. It feels nice to be hugged. To have the gentle touch of someone else with her. But she can’t get passed one thing: the eyes.

Black and amber. Its unsettling. It’s Medusa. She recalls all the stories of her childhood, and the conflicts they had. Can those good times be brought back? Will things just get better, or worse from here? Were they even good times? Not really. She pries Medusa’s hands off her, and shakily stands up, staring off into the distance. None of this feels real, or right. She doesn’t deserve this.

Medusa places a hand on her shoulder. “What’s wrong?”

“You ever… wonder what it’s like out there?”

Medusa gazes at her, and shrugs. “Why? Do you want to leave?”

A silence. She can’t find the words to say, the smile drops from Medusa’s face, and she sighs.

“You wouldn’t like them.”

“Why?”

“I know what they’re like. Humans aren’t… good people. They steal, lie, cheat… they wouldn’t like you, either.”

Shaula shrugs. It’s on the tip of her tongue. She feels as if she has the answer. Medusa pulls her closer by the shoulder.

“Look… I’m sorry. I’m sorry about all of this. I know it’s not really want you wanted, and none of this is really ideal but… it can be like old times. We can have that back. We just have to stick together.”

Old times.

It rings throughout her ears. All of her thoughts in the void come flooding back. There’s a lot she wants to say, but what good would it really do? Medusa won’t listen. She remembers everything that’s happened. Everything they’ve caused. All the damage, all the pain, all the suffering. She looks down at her hand, and bronze begins to accumulate on her palm, turning her skin to metal. Medusa is acting oddly. It’s all fake. Past the smile, what is real? The smile isn’t even for Shaula’s well being. It’s because she’s a tool. That’s what she was made into. This can’t go on. Even though one part of her brain desperately wants it to be. Medusa stands in front of her, holding out her arms.

“I love you, and I’m sorry if I haven’t always shown it. Let’s… do great things together. What do you say?”

For once in her life, she feels like she can make a choice. She can really do whatever she wants. She can’t let this go on. She smiles, as her eyes start to water. She wonders which side of her brain really won out. She can’t see Medusa’s eyes, the terror it once inspired is hidden, for a brief period. It almost makes her forget.

“I love you too.”

On the other side of the grasslands, owls watch from the trees, periodically descending to mutilate garter snakes that try to hide in the rocks. There’s one theory Medusa never really got to validate; does an artificially created weapon gain anything by consuming souls?

...