You’re annoyed, Ishtar said.
Of course I am. Sonya clipped, Look at this pce. There’s too many simirities with this hallway and the Marianas Base. Then there’s that note I got about Qilin. I know it's from them. It’s like they’re watg me.
There’s no proof of that, Ishtar pointed out.
You know it's not a ce, Sonya said and she felt Ishtar sigh. She chewed her lip and closed her eyes, rubbing at her wrist again. It won’t stop hurting.
The doors opened o a time to allow them entrance before closing immediately behind them. It was only through the third door that they found themselves standing in a rge room that appeared circur. She couldn’t tell entirely from the way a veil of darkness hung around the rear portion, illuminated only by dle light. There was a dais set into the ter of the room with a partially transparent veil pulled around it; inside she could see a bed. She s the air. Inse? Her lips thinned into a line. So far she hadn’t entered mu the regards to the religious aspect of this group, it seemed more like a refugee camp than anything else. Here, that ged.
Her eyes fixed on a figure on the bed. Her ocur lenses clicked as she tried to get a good look at them. No name appeared though. Just obscured enough that my eyes won’t identify them. Iing.
This is… seeming less and less tal, Ishtar ceded, This veil seems desigo block your eyes. That isn’t just cloth.
I noticed, Sonya said irritably, I’m starting to lean towards just getting rid of these people.
And I am beginning to agree with you, Ishtar said, Patiehough. Feel them out.
Tht, Shuta dropped to a knee and bowed his head. “Lady Setsuna, I am here with our huest,” he said, his shoulders tensing for a moment before he tinued. “I was… rude to her at the entryway.”
Sonya chuckled and the boy’s shoulders tightened even more, his eyes fixed on the ground.
Sonya stepped past him, putting her hand on her hip. She raised her up to peer into the veil again, “Are you really the person in charge?”
The figure shifted, “I am,” came a melodious voice. The figure shifted again and reached forward to pull the veil aside. Shuta nearly jumped to his feet as the veil parted revealing a woman of middle-age years. Her face was an image of serey, her eyes bck pits that seemed to su the light around them. Long bck hair hung arouhat spread out onto the bed and spilled over her shoulders and luxurious figure. She looked up into Sonya’s face for a long moment before smiling. “Know you, do I, ovna,” she said in a voice like honey.
Sonya blinked. Woah.
Sonya… Ishtar warned.
Sonya pursed her lips, I’m fine. I’ve never fallen for a horap before and I’m not going to now.
Good.
Sonya set her expression with a frown. Her arms crossed as she tilted her head to the right. Setsuna stared into her eyes for several heartbeats. “And?” she demanded, “A lot of people have heard of me. If you’re looking to throw me off, yoing to have to try harder than my name and a pretty face. If that walk to your doors was inteo elicit a positive rea, you had the opposite effect. What are y to prove?”
Sonya! Ishtar chastised.
What? I’m not going to lie to her! I physically ’t! She shot back, ign the aghast look from Shuta. Ishtar grumbled something but simply retreated into the back of her mind. She knew herself well enough to know she had a bit of a weakness for the cute ones, but that ged nothing. These people knew way too mud were using her o hide behind. They were a problem as far as she was ed. She wanted expnations-the heir activities, all of it.
The woman’s smile remained passive.
“Prove? No,” she said with a solemn nod, “Make clear, yes?” she said with a small ugh and shifted to pce her bare feet on the ground. She looked up at Sonya meaningfully and those dark eyes became just a bit darker, “Allow me a different angle.”
Sonya narrowed her eyes. What is she-
“Let hope out and try again,” she intoned.
In an instant the woman was off her feet, dangling in the air. Sonya held her by her throat, her eyes bzing with fury as she squeezed down with her powerful fingers. All pretense of amusement gone from her face. “I don’t know how you know those words,” Sonya said coldly, “But you just made a huge mistake.” Those words. No o those closest to me should know them. No o those who know about the previous timeline, know my greatest secret. Words she hadn’t heard in a long time. Words that ged her life. Pandora’s words. The words that seo the past.
The woman gasped, her feet swayih her. Behind Sonya she felt Shuta dart to his feet and draw his sword. She gnced over her shoulder at him with a scowl, “Sit down, brat,” she snarled, her preseting him like a wave. He doubled over and gagged, only remaining standing with the help of his sword that he dug into the floor at his feet. The walls creaked around them, the air grew denser, heavier. She looked the woman in the eyes, “You have a lot of guts using my name for your little religion,” she snarled, “I suggest you give me a damn good reason not to kill you for what you know.”
“Mother!” Shuta wheezed.
Despite the situatiosuna only smiled down at Sonya as she was strangled, “Meet we, at st, Ishtar.”
For a moment, the only sound in the room was the wheezing coughs of Shuta as he recovered from Sonya’s spike of presence. She stood there, meical eyes unblinking, bright and spinning with absolute focus. Her lips in a thin line as she slowly squeezed down ohroat in her hand. Kato Setsuna hung a foot off the ground, feet dangling, shoulders sagging as her skin began to ge color. A bubble rose up at her lips and her eyes gzed over for a heartbeat. Sonya’s lips twitched, white hot anger searing through her brain.
SONYA! STOP!
Ishtar’s shout in her mind drew her back to her senses and she jerked her hand back, releasing the woman aing her drop to the ground in a heap. She flexed her fingers as the numbness from that spot in her wrist spread up her arm. She could hear her pulse in her ears. Was that why it was so quiet? What…? What just happened? She turned slowly towards Shuta who had gotten shakily to his feet, sword pointed in her dire. She ched her jaw. Damn.
Calm down, there is a time and pce for cruelty. This isn’t it.
Her heart was still pounding. She didn’t know what foot to put forward now. Roll with it, Sonya. She clicked her tongue and turned away from the boy, “Put that down, boy, it won’t help you,” she snarled before looking down at his mother, “If my signature at the gate wasn’t enough, she just firmed it. I am Ishtar.”
The woman shuddered on the ground, trying to push herself up. She was still dazed from the strangution. Shuta’s sword hit the ground as the woman tried to look up at her, a nasty purple mark on her neck. “Then why are you doing this?” he asked from behind her.
Sonya looked down at her hand ahat odd point in her wrist, the pain was fading but the irritation, the ay. It kept getting worse. I have no fug clue, kid. I was fine for a while there. Mood swings aren’t this severe…
Breathe, Sonya.
I didn’t mean to do it.
I know. Just breathe and py the part.
She didn’t look back at him, “Are you seriously asking a Supervilin why they do vilinous things?” she growled as she tried to catch her breath. She felt like she was losing trol of herself. It was like every time she felt her chest ease it bubbled right back up. A rage that had been muted, numbed by the good life she’d had so far in this imelie all the suffering of a more spiritual kind, rekindled in her lungs like a withheld scream. She looked down at her hands, she could feel the knife she held that day ihe blood soaking her fingers making it hard to hold onto the handle. She could see his sneering face.
She looked bato those jet bck eyes, “How do you know those words?” she growled.
The woman reached up and touched her throat and cleared it but Shuta spoke up again, “My moth-”
Sonya closed her eyes, searg the bottom of the barrel for patience, “I didn’t ask you to answer for her,” she said in a tohat dropped the temperature in the room several degrees. The boy froze as a clear and present warning that death roag him fell over him like a sheet. She tilted her head to the right like a bird examining a worm, “I asked her.”
The woman’s thin lips curled up into a smile again as she cleared her throat, “Oracle,” she rasped, “My ability.”
Sonya’s eyes narrowed.
Ah, acc to legend the Oracle of Delphi spoke in strange ways. Perhaps it's the weakness of her ability like our own prohibition on falsehoods. Ishtar ented.
Sonya rolled her jaw left and right before plug the hat had saved her from Qilin’s ability out of her pocket. She held it up for the woman to see, “Was this you?”
The woman nodded, “Yes,” she wheezed.
Sonya crumpled it in her palm and reached up to rub the bridge of her nose, “How much do you know?” she asked, f herself to calm down.
The woman swallowed and cleared her throat again, “Knowledge, I sought. Open your eyes, to my power, words to,” she said as she slowly pushed herself up to a kneeling position on the ground. “Little more, end of days, the past,” she cleared her throat again, “yet not. Yoal, I know. Your enemy, I know,” she shifted a little more, “Humanity, kig, screaming.”
Sonya searched her face befng over her shoulder at the door that led into the hallway that was eerily alike to the mariana’s base. So she knows a lot, but doesn’t know everything. She used her ability to ansecific question. ‘What do I have to do to prove that I am an Oracle to Ishtar?’ or something to that effect. Sonya reasoned. It fed her the information that would make it irrefutable. An ability that grants specifiowledge without text, of the past and the future.
An undesirable trade-off in how her words are broken, now. Ishtar ented. Iing how she breaks up her senteo attempt to speak more legibly. Terribly invehough.
Agreed, not an ability I would want to take. Who knows if merging it with something else would get rid of the drawback? Sonya thought as her shoulders fell. The moment of deep thought had helped her clear her head a little. The fury was still there but it was muted. She looked back at the womasuna on the ground, “Why did you wait to get in tact? If we had met soohis may have not been as tense,” she said.
Setsuna’s eyes darkened again, the depths growing deeper, “The light she brings will burn bright against the ing darkness. Patience. Await her ire.”
Sonya clicked her tongue, “A prophecy. The light being the heroes I brought with me to Japan,” she crossed her arms, “What’s the ing darkness? Otis? He’s in America. If there’s a problem, you have manpower, don’t you?”
Setsuna looked sad for a moment, “Not know, I do,” she said befesturing past her towards the doors and the building beyond. “Sanctuary, Children of Dawn, they seek. With you. Haven. Our power-”
“If the gover saw what we were capable of, they wouldn’t leave us be. Most of us are outcasts. They don’t want to fight, just to be left alone,” Shuta cut in, his words ing out fast before Sonya reacted to him speaking out of turn.
She turo look him in the eyes before letting out a sigh and running her fihrough her hair. “Not a great first impression, dy,” she grumbled, “But you aren’t wrong in how you ha, from that perspective. I guess,” she rubbed her neck, “I’m sorry for hurting you,” she said.
She felt weary, as if the ahat had been strengthening her just faded away, leaving her body numb and tired. She held out her palm and created three strawberries. She tossed oo Shuta and popped one in her mouth before extending the third to Setsuna. “It’ll heal you,” she said as she chewed.
Sonya…
I’ll eat a normal meal when this is do’s fine, Sonya grumbled and tried again to soothe her temper. Damn it. It’s like every time I finally find my groove something happens to set me off again. It’s just easier to be angry. It’s hard to be fun..
There’s nothing wrong with ye. If there is anyone on this phat deserves such fury, it is you, Ishtar said, I am more ed that it is trolling you. We are being unstable. You-
Don’t start that shit again, Sonya shot back. I don’t want tue with yht now. At least when I’m pissed I act more like a vilin. Be happy about that.
Perhaps.
Setsuna reached out and took the strawberry reverently before popping it into her mouth. She chewed slowly and Sonya watched as the bruise on her neck faded away. The oracle’s eyes went wide in surprise as she sat up straighter, rubbing at her throat and even looking down at her legs. She reached down with shaky hands and touched her feet, squeezing them before looking up at Sonya in wonder. Sonya frowned and gnced back at Shuta who was examining his body curiously before looking up at his mother who was still rubbing her legs. He turned a Sonya’s fused stare. “Tibial muscur dystrophy,” he said, “She move her legs but she ’t put a on them.”
Sonya turned back as Setsuna got slowly to her feet, small tears welling in her eyes.
Oh don’t look at me like that, I didn’t do it on purpose, she groaned inwardly before taking another deep, sing breath. She gestured zily with her hand and created a chair of hard light, the illusions of augmey ed around it to give it a more real appearance. She sat down and crossed her legs. “Alright,” she said, “You caught my attention. Lured me here. You’ve survived your first enter with Ishtar,” she leaned forward a bit and looked the woman in the eyes, “Let’s hear your pitch.”