Northern Lights - A Celestial Gacha Story - Semi-SI-ish, Worm, MI UP

[Inkyfoxxo]

A/N. Splitting this one up, not for length or anything, but because it feels like it should be?

One of the great things about being a fox at the front desk is that nobody brings complaints to you. Complaints about you, sure, but those can be scribbled on the paper you push forward.

Then, when I got my utilimancy magic, I was taken off front desk duty because that was no longer the most effective use of my time. Even now, when I had hands! Hands! I was never going to take them for granted again. When I had hands and a voice, Utilimancy meant that the best use of my time was always going to be cleaning. Well, that or doing the continental breakfast. Because cooking breakfast no longer took time to do, at least for me.

But just me, even with magic, I could barely keep up with the need for housekeeping. I got into a rhythm.

First, make sure nobody is in the room. That took two more accidents than it should have to get driven into my head.

Then, do a sweep for trash. This was another place where my otherworldly magic failed me. Because I had spells for making and turning compost, spells for unraveling garments into fiber, for removing ink from parchment, for separating metals and for mending pottery, wood, metal, and glass. But there was no spell for 'collect trash', because it seemed that 'waste not, want not' was the way that world worked. Anything not fixable was repurposed, anything not repurposable was burned. Oh and the word 'plastic' meant something that could be molded, not a material.

Cast my 'ufo roomba' spell. Really, I should be able to clean the entire carpet with a single spell all at once, but while I had the knowledge of a utilimancy archmage, I only had the power of a neophyte.

Cast spells to scrub the bathroom and clean the mirror, then when that was done set spells to stripping and replacing the linens. It had to be that way around because I just didn't have the capacity to run more than two spells at a time. Regardless, while that was running, check and replace the toiletries and towels.

Dump all the towels, linens, and assorted fabric into the laundry hamper, quickly cast spells to clean off the surfaces and dust the television, then direct the UFOomba into the trash bin on my cart. Finally, air out the room with a breeze.

Move on. Total elapsed time, about 15 minutes.

Which meant that I was about twice as fast as a regular housekeeper, while doing a more thorough job. Which was great!

It meant I could replace all the missing housekeeping staff. And make breakfast. But that still left me exhausted, and left all other work to be split between Addison and Julia. Alice helped where she could, honestly more than she should, but she could do homework at the front desk and a lot of the general management tasks that hadn't been getting done could be done there too.

I didn't see a whole lot of Addison, as Julia and Addison split the front desk between them, and Addison took the night shift. I filled in for a couple of hours here and there, and Alice did too.

And working the front desk was...

Guests were mostly nice.

Mostly.

But that meant that we usually had at least one problem guest. Someone demanding extra services, or complaining, or demanding we fix something that had nothing to do with us.

When I was a fox, I got to ignore that.

Sometimes, I wanted to go back to running the desk as a fox. I sometimes did the cleaning in that shape, and usually slept as a fox. It was just... more comfortable in a lot of ways. But I had been skipping most of the duties at the front desk as a fox, and now I mostly just had to handle dawn checkouts and reservations, but it was still a lot.

It was a lot for everyone, and there were no days off. Even someone working 4 hours a day would be worn down without days off, and Julia had been pulling off 12-14 hour shifts for a month straight.

So it was a blessed relief when we had a new hire walk in unannounced.

I had just finished laying out the breakfast for the morning, the door sliding open as I placed down the last sausage.

She was tall, blonde, with an undercut on one side and the holes for snake bite piercings. She looked vaguely uncomfortable in the skirtsuit she was wearing, and carried a folder.

Julia was just walking in, my shift at the counter ending at breakfast.

"Hello! Ready to check out? Or are you looking to make a reservation?" Julia's voice was friendly and professional, but makeup couldn't quite hide the deep bags under each eye.

"Oh, uh-" The newcomer faltered, thrown off as whatever internal script she had prepared was cast aside. "No, I'm... Are you guys hiring?"

Julia perked up.

"Oh! We are! Thank you, oh that's a re-" She caught herself. "Anyway, I'm Julia, I own the hotel."

"Oh! Uh, Leticia." She shook Julia's hand over the counter. "Call me Letty. Here, " Letty produced a resume from the folder, on expensive paper. Julia glanced down at it.

"What role were you hoping for?"

"That, uh... depends on what's on offer. But I'd prefer to work the counter. I can do housekeeping if I need to."

"That's fine, we have housekeeping covered." She glanced back down at the resume. "You're a student?"

"Yeah! I've just got a few classes left for my degree, and they're not offered this semester, so I'm just killing ti-." She catches herself. "Looking for opportunities, happy to work hard to earn my place."

Julia laughed.

"You don't need to worry so much, Letty. We're not that formal, and we are grateful for the help."

I slipped back into the commercial kitchen, starting on the cleanup spells. If I had a tail right now, it would be flailing in happiness.

Another worker!

With my spells, that puts us at the bare minimum required to function!

I hum happily, running a scrubbing spell over the flattop grill.

We.

Huh. When had I decided that this place was my home?

I hadn't been here long.

Granted, those days had been very eventful, but still. In some ways this felt like home. I felt invested in the success of the hotel. I wanted to give Julia time off to rest.

In others, I still felt distant. I still didn't know any of the others all that well.

I finished the kitchen and slipped up to the hotel room.

That was another distant part.

The hotel room was spotless. Magic made it so, and it was trivial for me to cast the necessary spells. It kept the room pristine, cleaned like any other hotel room.

But that was the thing.

It was just like any other hotel room. There was nothing of me in the room, except for my clothes. I have a couple of extra pillows that I'd grabbed from the supply, making a little ring of pillows and lined with Alice's blanket.

But it just... it felt emblematic of my place here. A temporary room, given for an uncertain length. A bit of stolen comfort to survive a place that was not truly my own.

This had only been the place I was staying for a few days, and it already felt like I'd lost touch with the others.

The house...

It somehow felt wrong to intrude.

Addison hadn't officially been banished from the house, not after that one night, but there was something raw between her and Julia. Addison had barely been inside the house since Arthur's visit, just stopping by to drop takeout for Julia and Alice in the evenings when she got up. Addison and I ate those meals together in her hotel room. She was bright, joking, and warm, but I couldn't help but remember. Before she knew I was a person, she let herself be tired and confused around me. For a few minutes, anyway. I tried to be there for her, and after the third night I started sleeping at the foot of her bed as a fox. Neither of us commented on it.

Alice was struggling to get caught back up with her schoolwork, which meant she was busy. I mostly saw her when she was at the front desk, and she usually couldn't talk so I curled up as a fox near her feet and snoozed. She would occasionally pat me with her foot which... I mean, pats are nice?

But it meant that I was very aware of my place here. Or lack of one.

But any time my thoughts strayed to being elsewhere, I remembered struggling to my paws, on a broken leg in the dark. Just before being foxnapped by Dr. Valentine. Or the smiling eyes above the obituary for another girl with my face and name.

 

[Inkyfoxxo]

A/N: Two tangents here, but I feel they're important? The Scion Cult thing will become relevant soon, and me rambling about the Upper Peninsula is just something you're going to have to learn to live with, I'm afraid.

Letty's first shift was the next day, and Julia just sort of collapsed in bed. Or so I assume.

When Addison woke up, I rode with her to pick up chinese from two towns over. It was a little cool by the time we got there, but that was fine. I was looking forward to my chicken and mushroom, and helped Addison carry the bags to the door of the house.

I knocked.

It felt weird to knock. It felt weird to just walk in.

Addison and I began sorting through the bags to figure out what we were going to pass in and what we were going to take to Addison's room.

The door opened to us precariously balancing food containers while Addison tried to look inside one. Julia was in her dressing gown, and we froze. She stared for a moment. A sauce container slipped out of the bag and hit the ground with a dull splat.

Julia started shaking, then giggling.

"Come in, you two. You're being ridiculous."

She took the container I was balancing, and swept inside.

Alice was roused by the smell of food and the sounds of conversation.

"Thanks for getting food, Aunt Addie!" she chirped. "Oooh, shrimp lo mein?"

After food was distributed, I grabbed mine and took a couple steps towards the door. I was intending to go eat with Addison in her room.

"Girls."

I turned to see her regarding all three of us with a complicated expression.

"We have two more coming in for interviews tomorrow. It's almost over. I'm sorry I-" She groped for words, then gave up. "We all have a lot to talk about, and we're going to have time to have those talks. But for now? Lets watch something on the TV and eat dinner together."

We all fell into line without thought, getting ourselves arranged. Julia in the recliner, Addison in the old wicker chair, and Alice and I on the couch. Well, Alice on the couch. I slid down to sit closer to the coffee table.

Julia picked up the remote, and there was a hint of that feeling of home. Us all together. Then a black leather book appeared out of nowhere next to me and fell on the coffee table with a loud thump.

I smelled concrete dust and the wail of hospital equipment for a split second, and Alice gave a high pitched 'Eep'. Addison was half out of her chair, and Julia just had a hand to her throat.

Oh! It was my spell book! I could finally-

"Nope." Julia said, pinching the bridge of her nose. "That is a tomorrow problem. It gets activated by opening it, right?"

"Mhm!" Alice chimes in. Julia leaned forward and snagged the book, then put it on the dining room table.

"Don't look at me like that, it will still be there in the morning." Julia paused, and I realized with some embarrassment that I was pouting. "It will, won't it?"

"I guess" I grumbled.

"We're having a normal night in front of the TV."

Julia clicked on the television, and after a moment, we were.

...

"-but sociologists have classified them in a few different overlapping movements."

A man spoke as he walked, the camera keeping pace.

"Unlike every other religious figure, Scion is tangibly present. He puts out wildfires, heals disaster victims, and pulls kittens out of trees. But Scion has only ever said one word, that we have heard. Scion. But just because the golden man does not speak does not mean that there aren't people listening."

"Perhaps the most notorious of the Scionist movements - and once again, that is Scionist, not Zionist. Completely different thing - is what sociologists collectively call the Scionite Listeners. They believe that Scion has some message, or wants something from us, or is waiting for us to do something specific. It's a well known trope at this point, the conspiracy theorist in the basement with every known Scion sighting tacked up on the wall, but they aren't the only ones looking for a golden sign."

Now, the man was standing in front of an office building in the winter time, bundled in a thick puffy coat.

"Behind me was once the location of the infamous Golden Watchword. Known for the massacre at St. Hillsdale, this group started as a few friends in a basement, who believed they had found a pattern in Scion's movements. The group garnered private support until it was several dozen strong, all eager to hear Scion speak again. One of their members, Agnes Littleford, pinpointed a time and place that she believed Scion would cross. St. Hillsdale, on January fifth, 1995. They planned a great celebration, inviting millions to come and witness. But the leadership grew concerned. What if Scion passed through that place, and just... didn't stop? They became convinced that they needed to manufacture a reason for the golden man to stop."

The man began walking again, looking somber. I jumped, startled, as something touched my head. I whipped around to see Alice quickly retracting a hand. Had she just... pat my head?

"On January fifth, 1995, the group locked one hundred and forty five people, including seventy-eight of their own members, into a nearby venue. They gassed them, systematically shot each one in the gut, and then dragged them out into the field where the great action was set to take place. They finished the preparations five minutes early, and the three leaders - Agnes Littleford, Charles Wang, and 'Gleam' Olsen - awaited the arrival of Scion. The field was distant enough that the hundred or so remaining members of the Golden Watchword could keep others out of viewing range. And they waited. And waited."

The man looked down somberly.

"Scion never came. One hundred sixteen of their victims died slow deaths on that field. 'Gleam' Olsen was later quoted as being horrified. They were never intended to die. They were supposed to be dying, slowly enough that Scion could come and heal them all."

He let the moment hang. I looked down at my plate and decided that I was done eating. I pushed it away, and that seemed to be what Alice had been waiting for. She clicked her tongue to get my attention, and patted her thighs a couple of times. Like she was trying to entice a dog or cat to get onto the couch with her. I blushed, but shifted and wriggled out of my clothes.

"There we go." Alice settled me into her lap, petting me idly. Despite myself, I couldn't help but feel safe. I knew I had been here for less than two weeks. It was far too soon for me to be attached like this. But that thought was obliterated by Alice scritching my ears in a way that made my brain melt.

"But these days, despite the bad reputation from groups like the Golden Watchword, many just can't resist trying to learn what the golden man has to say."

The man now stood before a crowd filing into an auditorium. The angle of the camera hid the name on the show poster, but the iconography was very clearly based on Scion.

"Of course, there are others who are glad that Scion is silent, because it means they can speak whatever they wish to in his name. These are the Speakers of Scion, individuals and groups that decide that Scion ordained their particular belief system, and thus it was their duty to spread that belief system. This has inspired everything from motivational speakers to church groups to hate groups to take on the golden man's legitimacy, claiming to know what his intentions are."

He walked by a graveyard towards a church.

"But some believe they already have an explanation for Scion that fits neatly into their belief system. The Scionist Christians suggest that Scion is clearly Jesus Christ returned, saving us more physically that before. Many posit that his aura of sorrow is his disappointment in how we have handled the last two thousand years. Others say it is just his kind nature, his sorrow at the suffering of humanity. Some take this as a sign to go on a crusade, among other examples the Tyler-Longview Church Riots in '94 and '99. Others, to follow in his example. The Crusade Against Despair is often visible only hours after any major disaster, working with FEMA and other agencies to help those affected. They are actually a shining example of the Samaritan Scionists, who often seek to do good deeds wherever they go. Following in the footsteps of the man who leaves none."

"But for others, every disaster the CADdies help with is just another tick of the clock. A continuation of the ever-present doomsday cults, the Revelatory Scionists believe the end is coming. For some, the rise of Parahumans and the return of our saviour herald the end of days, and others point to Scion's actions as desperately attempting to forestall an ending that will come no matter his efforts. His sorrow a sign that he knows we are doomed and yet tries anyway. Whether or not that fits into any religion or mythology."

That was the last I heard as Alice's heartbeat and fingers combing through my soft fur lulled me to sleep.

WEDNESDAY

'Morning' as the time for the talk proved to be optimistic. I still needed to make the breakfast and Addison still had to take the night shift. Alice still had school, and Julia had to handle the interviews. I went through my chores, the pressure of that meeting coming up.

It was... basically just me being expected to tell them my whole story. My powers, what had happened to me. Lay it all bare to be judged.

And that judgement would determine if I stayed, if I had to go...

If they called the Protectorate or CPS.

The interviews went well. Julia hired Paul and Rachel, who would begin work in the next couple of days. Getting to a normal staffing level took a lot of the pressure off us all.

THURSDAY

Paul and Lettie were both working today, which meant Addison didnt need to stay up all night. Julia hovered, and I did my best to keep the magic out of their sight.

After I finished work, I slipped into my fox shape and went wandering through the nearby woods. They were so full of interesting new smells, it took my mind off things for a bit.

But only a bit.

What would I do if they said I had to leave? I wouldn't blame them. The Protectorate, or at least the ice cape, seemed mad at me, and the Nazis wouldn't be happy I had done some WWII re-enactment on their boat. I had powers, even if I wasn't a parahuman, and I knew better than anyone that powers mean conflict.

Addison had said she'd take care of me, back when my cast came off. I couldn't trust that, could I? She hung on Julia's every word. If Julia told her to throw me in a closet for the cops... she would.

I sought out Addison.

"Hey, kit. How are you doing?" Addison was doing laundry, and the humming and sloshing and thumping of the machines covered the noise of our speech.

I started helping.

"I'm okay. You?"

Addison sighed. "Just okay. Yeah, I feel that." She tossed an assessing glance my way. "Nervous for tomorrow?"

I didn't say anything, which seemed to be answer enough.

Something seemed to firm in Addison, and she gave me a cocky smile that I couldn't help but be reassured by.

"Don't worry about it. It's gonna go fine."

"But what if it doesn't?" The words spilled from my mouth without conscious volition, and I immediately wanted to cram them back inside.

Addison gave me a long, assessing look. Then she turned back to her laundry. I thought that was it, until Addison beckoned me from the door.

"Come on. Let's go for a drive."

...

We didn't talk about anything serious on the drive.

Or, well, no, that's not true.

We didn't talk about anything of personal significance.

I told her about Brockton Bay, the cape capital of the US, and what it was like to grow up there. I told her about my favourite ice cream shop, and the cat that used to come around to our house for food.

The forest rolled past on either side of us. The occasional car passed, but it was late afternoon on a Thursday in March. And we were driving through Hiawatha National Forest. The trees started to feel more like an ocean than a forest, Addison's car racing down a causeway.

Addison told me about Maine. About working as a boat mechanic, a car mechanic, a general contractor. She told me stories of the stupidest things she'd seen, like one yacht utterly ruined because its owner filled the gas tank with three bottles of everclear. Or the multimillion dollar shipping barge that was dead in the water. The captain convinced he was going to have to figure out how to replace the motor, a hulking thing that ran on steam and coal and spite. Only for Addison to find a place where mice had eaten through the wiring. Her solution? A ten cent bit of wire and a new cat for the ship.

I was slowly starting to understand that I would need to recalibrate how I thought about time and distance. In Brockton, there were very few places you couldn't get to within a 30 minute drive. Buses took longer, but everything was so close together. Here, in the Upper Peninsula, there were little islands of humanity amidst the forest, and Julia thought nothing of a 45 minute drive to take Alice to school, then a 45 minute drive back. Twice a day, though Alice often had friends drop her off in their cars.

This drive was a little over an hour, and Addison pulled a cooler out of her trunk. She kept the car running and slipped inside a weathered shop. She came back out with the cooler, and put it in the back seat.

Another ten minute drive, and then we got out and walked. The boardwalk was damp and slippery and steep in places. The gift shop closed. I didn't recognize the name on the signs, it seemed maybe Native American?

We came around a bend in the path and my breath caught.

The water stretched out beyond the trees, mirror-still and unfrozen. It had an odd, luminous blue colour and as we approached, I could tell that wasn't a colouring in the water. The water was so clear I could see the bottom perfectly, 40 feet below.

"When I got my first car, I found this place." Addison had a camp chair over each shoulder and I carried the cooler. "It became the place I went to whenever I needed a think."

We stepped out onto the small pier and onto the little barge. Addison leaned the chairs up against the railing and started cranking the wooden wheel, the steel cord pulling the barge out into the middle of the lake. The only crank was on the barge, so it couldn't be pulled back from shore.

Addison's voice was hushed, like we were in a cathedral or a grand library.

"Not when there are people around. I bet you've seen from the hotel that tourists are many things. Quiet is not one of them."

We sat in our chairs and stared out into the lake.

"Julia likes the pasties from Muldoons, up in Munising the best." Addison opened the cooler and passed me a steaming pastry. Like a calzone made with pie crust, and wrapped in chequered red and white parchment paper. Addison took a bite and made a satisfied groan. "I like the ones from Crazy Fox Bakery better." She shot me a wink.

I giggled and took a bite. It was hot, good, flaky and salty. The first bite didn't taste of much but pie crust but it was a good pie crust. Addison continued.

"Muldoons are pretty good with ketchup. But you don't need to add anything to Crazy Fox Bakery's pasties, and they do neat flavours. I got a philly cheese steak for myself, and got you their Crazy Good Original flavour."

I took another bite, my mouth filling with spiced beef, and root vegetables. The herbs wafted in the aromatic steam, and Addison continued.

"I made it a habit. Whenever something big was going to happen. A big test. Asking out a pretty girl." Addison glanced at me and explained. "Back then, it was much more of a big deal. Could be dangerous. Anyway. A big concert, a friend's wedding. Her pregnancy."

"I'd grab a pasty from the Crazy Fox, and come out here to think."

I looked around, and I could see why. Deep below, rivers of mud flowed and roiled across the bottom of the lake. The trees surrounded us on all sides, and the sky was just beginning to shade into dusk.

Even with the trees moving in the wind, it was still so silent. Everything felt so far away. Beautiful. Peaceful. A pocket of safety enforced by the land itself.

Something unclenched in my gut, just a little, and the warmth there wasn't just the pastie. We ate in silence for a bit, Addison letting the moment breathe.

"This is so dumb." I huffed. "I've been here what. A week and a half? Two weeks? Why am I this nervous? I shouldn't be this attached, right?" I should be able to slip away and not complicate their lives.

Addison chewed over her food and her answer, then spoke.

"There's some answer here about bonding through trauma, and even without the story its clear you've got more than your share."

I look away, at the rivers and mountains formed from the silt far below.

"But the truth is that trying to measure any relationship against some ideal or societal expectation isn't going to do anything but make people unhappy. As long as nobody is being harmed, don't worry about it. And... To answer your question from the laundry room... I'm not looking for reasons to kick you out, and I doubt Jules is either."

She leaned forward, making me meet her gaze involuntarily.

"Whether you stay or go, everyone needs to know what to expect. Dangers, opportunities, old ghosts... and Emily?"

I flinched. The word sounded wrong in her mouth. She relented a little.

"Bridget. Are you a current member of the Slaughterhouse Nine?"

I shook my head, vigorously. She cracked a ghost of her usual cocky grin.

"Then I promise you we will figure something out. I've been all over, and know people. If you need to go, you won't be out in the cold."

I nodded. The lump in my throat prevented any words, and my eyes burned. I didn't sob, or gasp. I just stared out at the crystal-clear water, fear flowing freely down my cheeks to join the spring below.

 

[Inkyfoxxo]

A/N: And now for the payoff. This uh. It's a chonker. Let me know what you think? I need to break up the monologues a bit in the earlier segment, but I think the story-time managed okay.

FRIDAY

It began, as so much of my life these days seem to, with breakfast.

I was still only a middling cook, relying on the spells to do most of the work, but the breakfast bar didn't need a huge amount of actual cooking that my spells couldn't handle.

Still, I made pancakes, separate, for us. It... I might have been a bit nervous and made too many but that just meant I could only bring the ones that looked good and not raw in the middle or burned.

Taking them out around the outside would have meant they were stone-cold by the time I got there, so I walked my steam tray through the hallways to the nondescript door that led to the original house. I knocked.

Alice was the one to let me in.

"That cooking time power you have is super wild. Like is time progressing right now? We're walking to the table. The old grandfather clock is stopped but it's been like that for years."

She helped me set the table, and I relaxed into the babbling. Once we'd finished setting the table, we waited, but there were no convenient knocks on perfect time. Julia was in the shower.

"Huh. It didn't make everyone arrive on time." Alice was puzzled.

"I mean. The power is explicitly working on Wonderland time. If it was reliable it wouldn't be Wonderland."

"I guess that makes sense." She giggled. "But I haven't believed in six impossible things yet, so it's not time for breakfast."

I paused. Is... was she...?

"You know, from Alice through the Looking Glass? I loved that story. Even the most outlandish things make sense in a story."

I blushed.

"I've never read any of the books."

Alice frowned at me, confused.

"But you have a wonderland time power"

There was a knock at the door at about the same time Julia came out with her dressing gown. She let Addison in through the front door, and I steeled my nerves.

"Well, over breakfast, lets talk about impossible things."

...

I said that, but the silence hung heavy in the air. Not absence of sound. The chiming of cutlery on silverware, coffee mugs being set down, the scrape of butter across toast. But the absence of words. I just... I didn't want to be thrown away, if I was too weird or they were afraid of nazis. And this was the tipping point. I fretted, cutting my pancake with my fork into smaller and smaller pieces.

Alice downed the last of her orange juice, and set it down with a firm tap.

"So!" She said, and I startled. "Hi. I'm Alice! I like hiking and reading and crokinole and poetry and cute animals. I don't know what I want to do with my life yet. I'm afraid my home is going to be taken away from me by Uncle Arthur. I-" Alice glanced at Julia, then me, then she took a deep breath and continued. "I don't want to be a burden on Mom, and I'm scared seeing how tired she is."

Julia startled, reaching out and opening her mouth. Addison, with a small grin, held up a hand to halt her, then gestured for Alice to continue. "I really hope that'll get fixed with the new hires. My dad died a few months ago, and it's been... really hard. I miss him."

Her voice had gone quiet, but she rallied, eyes fierce with determination. "One day, my friends dragged me to the beach because they were worried about me. I'd stopped hanging out, was doing worse in school, and looked tired all the time. It was really nice that they cared, but knowing all my problems didn't actually make them go away. I got home, ready to help and do my best not to make more work for Mom. But when I got home, there was a hurt fox. She wasn't like other foxes, she was smart and funny and tried to help and be there for me." Alice tossed me a smile.

"Things got a little better. The work didn't get easier, but maybe the attitude changed? But then Aunt Addy came home, and then the fox can turn into a girl! And there's an obituary at the church with her face on it and I'm really curious where she came from and what she can do but I'm also afraid because she looks hunted any time the topic comes up." There was a pause, then Alice stared into the middle distance, mouthing words like she was going over a list in her head. "Oh! And I want Bree to stay."

She deflated, looking vulnerable. At some point, Julia had taken her hand, eyes red-rimmed. Addison patted her shoulder, but Alice just turned and paid very pointed attention to Addison. Addison chuckled.

"I'm Addison. I came back to help an old friend." Addison made eye contact, imploring, with Julia. "I don't want to replace anybody or take anything that's not freely offered. I just want to help the people I care about. I missed you both so much. But I don't know where boundaries are, I don't know where we stand or if I'll still have a place here in a month." Addison paused, blinked, and then her cocky grin was back in place. "I'm a fair hand at fixing anything that goes when you put gas in it, and I used to play with a band. Your go, Jules."

"I..." Julia fiddled with her napkin for a moment. "I'm just... tired." The word hung in the air, but the expected successors were not arriving. Alice gave Julia an encouraging smile and a squeeze of the hand.

"Things have been insane since- Since Dan. Everything fell apart without him, and I tried to hold everything together but I just... wasn't enough. You have all been incredible. Alice, honey, thank you but you didn't need to carry this for me. It's my job to figure out how to carry it." Alice's chin raised in defiance but she didn't speak.

"Addison... I..." She lapsed into silence again.

"Thank you for your help. You're a good friend." The word was said with deliberate emphasis, making steady eye contact with Addison, whose expression barely flickered. Julia broke away first, huffing something that might have been a laugh. "I don't have enough good friends to go throwing them away. Just... give me time?"

Addison nodded, her trademark grin firmly in place. Julia swung around to me.

"Bree... I don't know what to do with you. You... you're just a ball of chaos. You're a sweet girl, but you keep doing things I can't understand. You gave Alice magic of her own, but it's powered by sex. You're standing in for the cleaning staff I don't have, but you broke into a chicken farm and stole a pallet of eggs and freed all the chickens. You're a fox half the time, even after your cast was taken away, but you're also a girl. You were in the Marquette hospital fight but you say you weren't a participant. You're good for Alice, but I don't know if you're safe for her."

She took a deep breath.

"I want to welcome you. You've been really good for us and I don't know how we would have gotten through this without either of you." Her gaze flickers to Addison then back to me. "But I need to know what I've let into my home. I can't slowly piece it together from conversations over the next six months. I don't have the energy. Bree, I'm tired. So I'm being harsher than I would normally be. Because I don't have anything left in me to be kind with."

I wince. If I was a fox right now my ears would be flattening on either side of my head, and I can't help that that really hurt. I can't argue any of that. But that doesn't make it hurt less. I thought back to how Alice started this.

"I-" I faltered, then tried again. "My name is-"

I stopped. Did I know?

The moment hung in the air. Bree, Emily, Bridget? Did acknowledging a thing make it real? By naming who I was, does that make it so that's who I will always be? Unbidden, Alice's words came back to me. 'Even the most outlandish things make sense in a story.' I apparently couldn't talk about myself like that. But I knew stories. I loved stories.

"Once upon a time," I began, gaze glued to my mangled pancakes, "There was a city called Brockton Bay. Like any good storybook, it had its heroes and villains and grand, climactic struggles. The heroes lived in a castle in a soap bubble, out in the middle of the bay, for the land did not belong to them. No, it belonged to the wicked. The dragon of the bay slept upon his hoard of gold and ravaged maidens, content to sleep as long as both kept flowing to him. A raucous chorus gained a taste of power, and ran through the streets forcing all to acknowledge it with fractured glass and limbs and lives. And in the heart of the city, an evil king held court over knights and valkyries. They yearned for a perfect world, and so they sought to cut away anything that did not fit their vision of perfection. But the world took oh so much cutting, and so they sought men and gold and blades."

Everything felt a little far away, as if I was reading a story of a girl telling a story.

"But this isn't a story of those grand villains. Not really. No, this is a story of smaller wickedness. Once upon a time, there was a girl named Emily. Emily, a long time ago, had been handed half a picture, and told to look it over. The picture was a girl in a skirt and blazer and shiny shoes, with blonde hair cut a certain way and blue eyes smiling. The girl wore a pretty smile and held a bible and laced her fingers with the other half of the picture, that had been cut away.

'This is what a good person is.' said her father and her mother and her priest and her teachers. 'To fail to be this picture is to be wicked.'

And so Emily memorized the picture. She looked at the others in her holy place of learning, and saw that they, too, had been handed pictures. The other girls all had the same picture, and the boys had the other half, of a man in a suit looking strong.

Emily, like all the girls, wore the outfit in the picture. She cut her hair like the picture and practiced her smile and tried to remember to hold her bible.

She went to school and grew and like a bonsai, clipping herself to fit within the image of the picture. But she could never quite match up. Her hair too red, her body too short, her frame too slender, and she couldn't understand why she was supposed to be holding the bible. She knew the words, kind of, but they didn't seem to match what the priests and the nuns and the teachers and her parents said.

'Look at the picture, they said. She does not doubt. She believes, and obeys, and you do too. You aren't wicked, are you?'

And Emily did not want to be wicked. And so she tried. She smiled, and tried to do as she was told, but she could never quite cut herself down into the correct shape for the picture. She could find the picture nowhere in her holy book, and more and more her heart raged against the inside of the picture frame.

But she found a compromise. She did her best, and hid as much of her wickedness as she could. That would have to be enough. It was enough. Her mother left for other reasons, not because Emily was wicked. She promised.

Her father was a man who was convinced of his own importance, and did not understand why the world did not see it. The girl in the picture said nothing and only smiled, so Emily tried to be quietly supportive.

Emily had friends that were only a bit wicked, too. There was Grace and Elizabeth and Peggy, but most of all there was Fatiha. Fatiha had an even harder time making herself the girl in the picture. Her hair was long and silky and black, and her skin a gorgeous golden-brown that reminded Emily of acorns in the autumn sun. Her voice echoed with hints of distant shores, and she shared her name with the first chapter of a foreign holy book.

The priests and the nuns and the teachers paid extra special attention to Fatiha. 'It's like you're not even trying!' They said, 'Look at the picture! Your hair is all wrong! Learn to do your makeup properly! If you don't match the picture, then you are wicked! You don't want to be wicked, do you?' And Fatiha would do her best and cut her hair and practice silence like the girl in the picture, and read her holy book fervently.

And even that did not seem to be enough, for almost every day, someone would tear the holy book from her grasp to ensure it was the correct one. They would riffle through the pages to ensure it was all present and correct, and then pass the closed book back without a word. Fatiha would ensure that she was holding her holy book like the girl in the picture, and try to find her page and verse again.

Emily admired Fatiha. She tried so hard to look like the girl in the picture! And Emily couldn't help but think, down where nobody could see her being wicked, that Emily liked the parts of Fatiha that did not match the picture.

She said so, once, but instead of being flattered, Fatiha told Emily that admiring wickedness was wicked in and of itself, and Fatiha was not wicked.

And so life went on, and Emily wondered about the cut edge of her picture. Fingers intertwining with a missing page. Soon, another girl found a boy, and placed her picture down next to his. And the two fit perfectly, the pictures lining up to make one picture. And the priests and the nuns and the teachers all applauded. 'Yes!' they said. 'You have discovered what you are for! You complete the picture for the boy!'

That didn't sound right to Emily, but then she was a bit wicked. Girl after girl placed their picture. Some boys snatched the pictures from their hands and lined them up. Others waited for the girls to come to them. The priests and the nuns and the teachers applauded the boys, then. 'Yes!' they said to the boys. 'It is your picture, so you may complete it as you wish.'

But no boy pawed for Emily's picture, and nobody even looked at Fatiha. This made Fatiha try even harder, rubbing chalk dust into her skin and attempting to pose like her picture. Fatiha even approached some of the boys, but they picked their pictures up before Fatiha could place hers down.

Emily looked at the boys, looking for the person she was supposed to be for, and found them all uninteresting. She didn't see the point, but she had gotten very good at hiding her wickedness. She comforted Fatiha. 'Once we are beyond this place there will be lots of boys and lots of pictures. Surely you will find someone to place your picture down beside.'

But Emily wondered, in the space where she hid her wickedness, what it would look like if she placed her own picture down next to Fatiha's. Could she make the hands clasp? If she could figure that out, then they could be complete together, and Emily could help Fatiha wipe the chalk dust from her cheeks. This thought grew and grew, until one day, Emily asked Fatiha to put her picture down upon the table.

'You mock me!' said Fatiha. 'You mean to point at the empty space and laugh!'

'No!' said Emily, baffled. 'Have I ever done so?'

'No...' Fatiha admitted. She reluctantly placed her picture down on the table. Emily placed hers down beside her and tried to place the two together. It didn't fit, the pictures weren't meant to be placed together, and Fatiha snatched hers back up.

'You mock me!' said she. 'You said you would not!'

'No!' said Emily. 'I mean it truly. What if we could line those pictures up. Place mine beside yours? Then we could be whole together.'

Fatiha's face curled into disgust, then snapped back into the smile of her picture.

'Silly, that's not how it works. The pictures are not meant to be placed like that. Now, how is my smile? My hair? My pose? Do I look like the picture?'

And Emily hid her tears down behind her picture, where she kept all of her wickedness.

And so life went on. Except it didn't. Everyone looked at her strangely, and whispered to each other from behind their pictures. Emily was confused, but she looked like the picture as best she could. Her pose was right, her bible tucked in one arm.

'Emily.' The holiest of holy men in the holy place sought Emily out. But he was not happy. 'You must be wary of wickedness. It is a terrible thing.'

'But I am not wicked!' said she, holding her picture over her breast. 'Look, see, my skin is pale as the picture and my eyes as blue.'

But Fatiha, who was nearby, tore away the picture, revealing the wickedness that Emily had hidden away.

'Look!' said Fatiha. 'She tried to make me wicked too, but I am not wicked! She is!'

And the holiest of holy men looked upon Emily with grave disappointment.

'Emily. You are wicked. You are a terrible thing.' And he set the picture alight in a candle. 'And you will never not be wicked.'

Emily cried, and blew the flames from her picture, and as she tried to save it, a boy approached Fatiha.

'Wow, you truly are not wicked. Would you place your picture down with mine?'

And Fatiha smiled the smile from the picture, and placed hers down with his.

Emily watched, clutching what remained of her picture, charred edges around a singed smile.

But when she returned home, her father was disgusted.

'You are wicked! No daughter of mine is wicked. This explains all the misfortune. Your mother left because of your wickedness. You are why the king has not seen me!'

And Emily cried and tried to hold what remained of her picture over her wickedness. But it was too small, and now all could see it. And they refused to interact.

'We do not associate with wickedness, for we are not wicked' said the ones she thought her friends, and the ones she barely knew, and her father and her priests and nuns and teachers. 'Wickedness should not be.'

And Emily grew lonelier and lonelier, finding it harder to match the smile on her charred scrap of paper.

Little did she know, her father had been an important man to the king's men. Not to the king, but he rose in attention of the court, and had a royal audience.

'I was going to appoint you to my court' said the king, his voice resonating through his armor made of blades, 'But I have heard your daughter is wicked. I could not have a man with a wicked daughter in my court.'

'No!' said Emily's father. 'I can work in your court! If my wicked daughter is the problem, then let her be gone!'

'Hmm... very well.' said the king. 'Here I have two knights. They are of the realm but sworn to my service. See their badges? Take these men and go remove the wickedness.'

And so they set out to find her.

But Emily had had enough of wickedness. Of being wicked. And so she found medicine, and took it to a place where she could not be found. 'Surely,' she thought 'If I take enough of this my wickedness will be gone.'

She gathered water and tossed back a bottle of pills, then the second.

'And if I go with it, then there wasn't enough of me to save.'"

I jolted as Alice's hand found mine, and I was abruptly reminded of the room around me. Alice, Addison, Julia. I avoided their gazes. I didn't want to see what they thought of my- of the wickedness of the girl in the story.

"And there wasn't. The medicine scrubbed and scrubbed and would have continued until there was nothing left. But Emily woke up anyway. She had not been blessed as the heroes in the castle in the soap bubble in the bay. No angel touched her nor devil gifted.

She woke with, in the place where she hid her wickedness, a die. A set of sheep knuckles. A roulette wheel. A deck of cards. A coin in a christmas pudding. It was all of these things and none, it was a gambler's wheel made of starstuff. And it had already landed.

She knew it had, because she could feel it in her soul. Emily could eat and eat and eat and never be filled. She would still grow fat if she ate too much food, but she could now eat anything without harm. If it could be put in bite sized pieces, Emily could eat a mountain in an afternoon to no ill effect. She could no longer be poisoned, and so the medicine within her had no purchase.

She stumbled to her feet and found her way home. Not to stay, but if she could not die then she must find a way to survive living. Of course, she could die in other ways, but was not thinking all that clearly.

But when she got inside, the door banged open.

In strode her father and two knights, men of law and justice. And she woke up aching, in a dungeon, with bruises decorating her skin.

The king had new men prove themselves, by beating the wickedness from the unrighteous. And so, all the use a wicked girl had was to be a way for a good man to prove himself not wicked.

They poisoned her, to make it easier to move her, but the poison took no better than the medicine.

'Oh!' said her captors 'She must have been given a gift by a demon. There are other uses for girls with gifts, wicked or not.'

And so one of the king's best men broke her bones until he was satisfied she had told him everything of her devil's gift. And to test it her poured more poison into her than a girl her size could hold.

'Ah!' said he, excited. 'You are not a trial any longer. You are a valuable trade good. Not your stomach, but your womb. For the devils give gifts to those born from gifted, and your only gift is to be harder to accidentally kill.'

While he dreamed of armies of soldiers from her womb, she felt the gears and wheels and dice move within her. When it released, she was in a metal box on a metal boat on the ocean. And she had a vial of green power in her hand. It could not poison her, so she drank. It filled her with power, so she broke the metal boat and fled."

My voice was dry, my heart and head empty and aching and distant. The words hung in the air. I was jolted from that state by Alice hugging me. She was crying, and I was a little surprised to discover I was too.

"Thank you" Julia said, quietly. "And I'm sorry."

I shrugged. I wasn't really feeling enough of anything to feel one way or another about her gratitude and apology.

"There's more, like the hospital fight" Alice jolted upright and Addison opened her mouth, but Julia just raised a tired hand. "But I'm not going to ask you to go through more of... that, right now. The only things I need to know right now are... Is there anyone looking for you, and are your powers dangerous to yourself or others?" She paused, thoughts racing behind exhausted eyes. "Or, are they dangerous right now."

I shrugged, surprised to remember that Alice was draped over my shoulder. She was taller than me, so it was a lot of draping for not a lot of shoulder.

After a moment, I remembered the question, and realized that there was yet more to be dragged from me. I still had to tell them about my powers. I went a little more distant.

"No. My current list of powers are-"

I was startled to realize that both Julia and Addison had left their seats. Addison's hand was warm on my shoulder, and Julia was on one knee in front of me.

"Don't worry about that right now." Julia smoothed one hand over my hair. "We'll deal with all that later. Thank you. I know that was hard."

I nodded, distantly. Okay. Could I just... get up then? Wait, no, there was a question. The whole reason I was here.

"So I can stay?"

Alice gripped me tighter, and Addison ruffled my hair. Julia's smile was sad, and she hugged me too. She smelled of ink and floral shampoo and Julia.

"Yes, sweetie. You can stay." She pulled back, and shot a wry smile at Addison above me. Had her eyes been red-rimmed this whole time? "At this point, I think you're stuck with us."

I nodded, something warm spreading inside me. After a long moment, the was a loud snap. It took a second to filter through my consciousness, and I belatedly glanced over to see that Addison had clicked her fingers.

"Oh... Yeah. You are 1000% not okay right now. Fox time, I think."

I frowned vaguely, not understanding what she meant.

"Budge up, Alice. Bree, time to be fox-shaped, come on."

I found myself curled up on Alice's lap, her fingers worriedly threading through my fur.

It smelled like home.

 

[Revenant of Chaos]

Ah. I know you said this was gonna be slice of life, but I dearly crave that there be some destroyed Nazis soon.

 

[innominatable]

Ah. I know you said this was gonna be slice of life, but I dearly crave that there be some destroyed Nazis soon.

Click to shrink...

Agreed. I also somewhat want to see her story be put in a storybook as she told it and have outsiders who are smart and knowledgeable enough to connect the dots read it and somehow use the story to crush the publics faith in them. but that wouldn't be right to her unless she chose to spread it herself.

 

[Inkyfoxxo]

So I was going to post the oracle here, but then I realized. I haven't touched the perk roll yet. It was *supposed* to happen when they talked about her powers. But uh. I couldn't get Bree through that first part without... so much dissociation. And then she wasn't exactly in a state for the rest of that conversation and...

Like that feels like a good place to end the chapter.

But there's more chapter.

Ah. I know you said this was gonna be slice of life, but I dearly crave that there be some destroyed Nazis soon.

Click to shrink...

Let me cook lol. So this is a major spoiler for the next bit, but

Spoiler: Spoilers

Letty is one of three parahumans in a cluster that Arthur has hired to steal the deed to the Northwood. Her powers are 1. A minor stranger aura that's basically 'I expect to see you therefore I pay no attention to you unless you draw attention'. and 2. She can leave 'marks' on people. Until the marks fade, she can remember their experiences as if she was in the room with them. More marks/longer refreshed marks = clearer memory. If you'll note, she shook hands with Julia when she first saw her. Trying to get the combination for the safe. But this means she also just sat through that conversation with them. And she's also going to be there when Bree describes her non-parahuman bullshittium powers. Including the Power Seeds she's about to get.

My current plan is she's going to get cold feet on the deal with Arthur, but her clustermate is going to go forward with it anyway. However, Letty *is* going to steal the box with the remaining power crystals and black crystals. Her cluster triggered in an endbringer attack, watched the world's best and brightest fail to do much of anything. And this family here has bullshit isekai power that grows with use and just... isn't using it??? Bree's powers are themed around stories, and she has the perfect setup for a magical girl Monster of the Week. She just needs to wait for appropriate moments to slip black crystals in the right place. Possibly also the silver crystals, but I'm unsure as of yet.

And we've been setting up the Brotherhood of the Sun as recurring antagonists. They're neonazis with slightly better branding.

Agreed. I also somewhat want to see her story be put in a storybook as she told it and have outsiders who are smart and knowledgeable enough to connect the dots read it and somehow use the story to crush the publics faith in them. but that wouldn't be right to her unless she chose to spread it herself.

Click to shrink...

I mean we'll see what the perk rolls say? Though there might already be one.

The current roll is:

Power Seeds | Jumper Edition
Power Seeds A small collection of black and silver crystals. The black ones overwhelm to body with one belonging to a monsters, while the silver one provides a lightly armored dress and a weapon, creating a magical girl. That's not what they're FOR though. Instead, they slowly remodel the soul of the user, jumpstarting its ability to generate magic. Jumper Edition And here is the first product you'll be selling. Anime and cartoons made from the Shoujo you create, as well as figurines, toys, costumes, and maybe even a video game or two. Obviously you won't really have any if you don't have any Shoujo, so get out there and make some! Also, the longer the Shoujo remain active, the wider the collection of things gets, including perverted stuff.

One interpretation of this is that you get a copy of any stuff made, and it makes a slow churn of products that get sold. And who knows how accurate the ones it seeds into the world are~? I could easily see this being included as a prologue or a bit of included backstory, all done up in fairy tale style illustrations.


Okay. So. This last scene was emotionally heavy, energy low. So our next scene needs to be light and high energy, or at least one of those things. Hm. I think Alice begging her mom to not forbid her from becoming a magical girl sounds like fun, maybe ending with a transformation sequence. dang it dang it dang it Alice and Addison are also going to have a quiet conversation where Alice realizes that Bree is a person, and not just a magical fox that can turn into a cute girl, possibly over a sleeping fox.

Oooh or! A fox that is half-sleeping, and they have the quiet conversation over her, until everyone is surprised by a wooden box hitting the table.

...tomorrow. I'm going to write that tomorrow. Or the day after. I've got family stuff and work and stuff.