48. Compartmentalize (Patreon)

"...I don't really want anyone to die," I manage to mutter quietly.

"Seriously?" Helen asks. "Nobody? Not even the people who self-admittedly want to kidnap you and experiment on you until you die?"

I nestle deeper into the backpack, my squishy, still-molting body protesting the movement.

"...If you can help it, yeah," I sigh.

Helen makes a nonplussed expression as she slinks through the crowd, turning to follow Kagiso's stalkers at a distance.

"That bleeding heart of yours is going to get you in trouble one day," she says. "I'm not going to let that trouble become mine. But… I'll see what I can do."

I sigh. Good enough. I get that sometimes people have to die. I just wish it wasn't the case.

"Thanks, Helen," I tell her. "I appreciate you putting up with me."

She smirks, though she's unable to hide a bit of an embarrassed blush on her cheeks.

"The feeling is mutual, I guess," she murmurs. "It's weird having friends who actually know what I am. You're all crazy bitches, but I like having you around. So let's blow these tails and find a place to relax, yeah?"

"Yeah," I agree. "Thanks, Helen."

"You said that already."

I use a quick cast of Refresh to push away a lock of hair that fell in front of her eyes.

"It bears repeating," I insist. "Kagiso and I would be helplessly lost without you."

"Don't I know it," she snorts.

We settle into a comfortable silence as Helen follows the three men, Kagiso pretending not to notice them as she slowly maneuvers out of the crowded marketplace towards somewhere a bit quieter. The nature of the city makes it difficult to hide in anything other than crowds—everywhere is either the cleared-out floor of a building or a welded-on bridge between buildings, and neither has much in the way of cover. There are no dark alleyways or secluded streets where our stalkers might make their move, so Kagiso leads them to the next best thing: a quiet, run-down building near the edge of the city, close to where we can see the Sapsea finally end and give way to dry, moss-covered stone.

The building is small and relatively run-down, covered in rust and sticky with the splatter of viscous waves. Most people take a path around it, but Kagiso, acting the ignorant tourist, heads right for it with a curious flick of her ears. We let her and her stalkers cross the bridge together alone, Helen waiting a practiced beat before rushing down after them into the old building's guts. I manage to hear the tail end of something Kagiso says once we get close enough.

"—want to?" she asks.

"Ah, it's just a conversation," one of the men assures her amicably. "There's no need to be so standoffish. Your business is your business, of course, but we have business with someone who was last seen with you."

Kagiso is facing the three men down, two arms crossed and one arm hovering dangerously next to her bow, not yet drawn. They've 'cornered' her in what looks like a tiny private office: a small room, away from any exterior walls, with only one entrance and exit. An ideal place to pressure someone when you have them outnumbered, which is doubtlessly both why they cornered her here and why Kagiso led them here in the first place.

After all, the cultists think they're ratcatchers, but they're actually the rats.

"I'm curious to hear about this 'business' of yours," Helen announces as she walks in and leans against the doorway, trapping the three cultists between her and Kagiso. "So go on. Let's have that conversation."

The three human men turn to us as one unit, and for a split second I think they're all about to die as I watch them prepare for combat, bringing their hands up in an aggressive stance. They're lined up in order of height, an abnormally tall man on the left, a squat man on the right, and an entirely average-looking man in the middle. It's the average-looking one who reaches his hands out to stop both of his comrades, recognition flashing on his face.

"Nope, not this one, boys," he says, gritting his teeth in a nervous smile. "Let's keep those spells stowed and stay reaaaaal polite with this one. We've been made."

Helen raises an eyebrow.

"You know me?" she asks.

"I certainly know of someone who matches your description," the man in the middle nods, his hands raised in surrender. "Helena, right? Yeah, I'm not fuckin' with you. You win, we lose."

"...It's Helen," Helen sighs. "Fuck. That stupid paladin made it down here before us, huh? No wonder you recognized Kagiso."

"She, uh, is certainly a woman who stands out in a crowd," the cultist nods amicably, glancing at his buddies and wiggling his hands meaningfully. They, too, raise their arms in surrender, looking considerably less enthused about the prospect than the man in the middle. "Look, I promise ya, we weren't going to do anything untoward. Just needed some information, that's all."

"...Stalked me. Cornered me," Kagiso points out. "Not friendly behavior."

"Oi, oi, you walked in here all on your own," the cultist counters. "I'd be happy with any private place to chat."

"Cut the shit," Helen snaps.

"No shit, honest!" the cultist insists. "Look, you're the boss here, you want me to say the sky is red I'll say it. But right now, I'm not lyin'. I don't feel like that's really in my interests, y'see? I know a lotta people that can make a man regret tryin' to lie. Some of 'em Art mages. You think I'd take that chance?"

"I don't know you," Helen answers, stepping forwards. "Or anything about you other than the things you're trying to get me to believe. So forgive me if I remain skeptical. What are you doing here? What do you want with Kagiso?"

"We're looking for the founder's kin, of course," the talkative cultist answers easily. The tall one gives him a betrayed look, which is returned with a scowl. "What? Don't gimme that, they already know. They traveled with the damn thing."

He glances at Helen's backpack, where I'm hiding.

"...Maybe they still are," he mutters.

"What is a founder's kin, really?" Helen asks, forcing his attention back to her. "Why do you call it that?"

"Uh, well I feel as though the etymology is fairly self-explanatory," the man shrugs, giving her a lopsided grin. "They're the same type of thing as our founder, o'course. He was the first of 'em, at least so far as we know."

"Don't you people think that founder's kin are going to destroy the world or something?" Helen asks. "Like, they're responsible for all the fucked-up shit already happening, supposedly. What makes your boss the exception?"

"Who says he is one?" the cultist answers.

"The fact that it doesn't make any fucking sense to found an organization designed to kill you!"

"It's a little more complicated than that."

"Donny, shut up," the short cultist hisses at the talkative one.

"No, I don't think I will," the middle cultist, 'Donny' apparently, continues. "Sorry pal, I'd rather fuck with you than the Chaos mage. Besides, it's my whole fucking job to do the talking, so if you wanna get through this you should maybe shut up and let me—"

"Helen," I hiss, cutting him off. "We have incoming."

The cultists' eyes widen as I reluctantly confirm that I am, in fact, here, but I can't exactly not tell Helen about the group I just spotted rushing towards this building. Five more people, four humans and a dentron, all cultists. No way that's a coincidence.

"Shit," Donny hisses. "I had no part in this."

"Well, that upgrades you from corpse to hostage," Helen says, raising an arm.

The two cultists flanking Donny react immediately. One fires something I can't see—probably Light magic—at Helen's face as the other bolts towards the far wall of the room. Helen fires two shots and kills them both before blasting a hole in a different wall and obliterating the corpses.

"Kagiso, grab our new friend," she orders. "We're getting the fuck out of here."

Kagiso nods, turning to follow Helen as she snatches Donny's wrist with her tail.

"Woah, woah!" the man protests, shaking in terror as he stares at the spot his friends' corpses just were a second go. "I-I… look, you don't really need…"

"Congratulations," Kagiso says, smiling at him. "Helen said you friend! Helen not have many friends."

"It's a figure of speech, Kagiso," Helen sighs. "He's just some moron I don't give a shit about."

"Oh," Kagiso frowns. "Condolences. You have no friends."

"Oh, fuck fuck fuck," the cultist swears, letting Kagiso yank him along.

"Where are we going?" I ask Helen, my guts churning miserably at the two murders performed for my sake.

"Out of the city," she answers, blasting a hole through another wall and hurrying to the outside of the building. "Give me a countdown for when our incoming stalkers are in the building."

"Okay," I confirm, watching the new group of cultists rush across the bridge towards us. "Six, five, four…"

Helen hurries towards a different bridge, and when my count reaches zero she sprints across it, relying on our enemies being indoors to cover her as we make ourselves vulnerable. The bridges have heavy visibility in every direction, meaning we're probably getting spotted no matter what, but hopefully the group closest to us won't be able to see us, at least. None of us are dumb enough to assume these are the only cultists after us.

"How did they know where to find us?" Helen snaps at Donny.

"Uhh, buddy I was with probably led them to you," Donny answers. "Light mage. Could have popped a signal outside the building where none of us could see it."

"Yeah? And what can you do?"

"I'm good at talking."

"Not what I was fucking asking," Helen growls.

"Yeah it is," Donny insists. "That's my magic. I'm good at talking. I know what to say. Art and Pneuma."

I hiss. We grabbed the most dangerous one, didn't we? Damn it. Should we kill him?

"Woah woah woah, look, it's not like that!" Donny quickly says. "I'm harmless as a raindrop, yeah? I got no control over anybody, wouldn't want it. Anybody with that kind of power is a right bastard and we both know it. Inconsolable. My Pneuma side of things just helps me know what to say. Gets me a better read on people. That's it. Swear to the Goddess."

"You're a mind reader," Helen growls.

"Not even!" Donny promises. "Just a bit of intuition, that's all. I can let my magic guide my words. For example, I know you want information and you want to be left alone. What I want is to not die. That's the whole reason I'm trying to stop the apocalypse in the first place, yeah? I feel like we can work out a perfectly reasonable compromise here."

"And what makes you so sure Hannah is going to cause an apocalypse at all?" Helen asks, ducking into another building. "Why would she want to do that?"

"Oh, I don't think she necessarily does, miss," Donny answers. "I'm just worried she might cause it anyway. Ah, that's a group of my guys down there, you might wanna take a left."

Helen follows his gaze to the end of the bridge she was just about to start crossing and clicks her tongue in annoyance as she sees whoever Donny just pointed at. She heads for the building stairs instead.

"How would Hannah even do something like uproot the tree in the first place?" Helen presses. "She's just a fucking bug. Scary in a fight, sure, but it's nothing I can't do scarier."

"Well, I don't know the first thing about how to answer that, I'm afraid," Donny says, stumbling slightly. "But if I were a betting man I'd bet that maybe your friend Hannah does? Have you ever asked her?"

His gaze locks on the backpack. I sigh.

The thing is, I'm very much terrified of causing an apocalypse… on Earth. I'm a Goddess-dang powder keg on Earth and I know it. Spread the wrong magic to the wrong person, and who knows what the heck could happen. I'm definitely a huge danger to everyone I know and love. But here? In this world where everyone already has magic? Where everything is already dead or dying?

"...I seriously don't think I could do anything to make the situation worse here," I answer. "You're barking up the wrong tree, buddy."

"I'm what?" he asks, dumbfounded. Oh, right, idioms.

"I mean your hunch is off. I can't think of anything I could do that's even remotely on the same level as the problems you already have going here."

"Huh," he says. "You ain't lyin'. Well, that's reassuring, seeing as I'm helpin' you escape and all."

"Glad I could soothe your conscience," I answer dryly. "Could you maybe convince your creepy cultist friends to stop trying to kill me, in that case?"

"Oi, we're not creepy cultists!" he protests. "The Disciples of Unification is a legitimate religious organization. And we're quite personable, when ya get to know us."

"Well it's a little difficult to get to know you when you keep attacking me on sight!"

"Stow it, both of you," Helen snaps. "Making distance is hard enough without you shouting our presence."

I grit my teeth and shut up as instructed, Donny managing to shrug apologetically even as he gets dragged along by Kagiso's tail. Helen charts us a rather direct route, rushing towards the edge of the city as fast as she's able. I can see the logic behind it; in the city itself, using Chaos magic is just asking to get attacked on all sides, including by people who aren't even cultists in the first place. By taking the fight away from a populated area, fewer people are at risk and our chances of winning a fight rise dramatically.

It's looking like it will be a fight, though. Which is… not so good. My body is still screaming at me whenever I try to move, and I think even if I could move my body is too squishy for me to be of any use. I can only cast Spacial Rend on my claws, after all, and I don't really have claws when my body is vaguely spider-shaped jello.

"Alright, last bridge," Helen announces quietly. "Keep your eyes open, everyone. If they're gonna take potshots at us, now is the time. Go, go, go!"

This bridge is angled steeply enough down that it probably would be legally required to be a staircase back on Earth, but Helen and Kagiso still manage to sprint down it without any problems with balance. Below us, for the first time in a long time, is solid ground, and the bridge leads right down into it, the far end embedded into stone rather than another building.

"We make it down there, we break for the caves. Lose line of sight to the city, set up a chokepoint, cut off reinforcements," Helen orders. "Then we—"

A sphere of burning, blazing something suddenly streaks onto my spatial sense, but there's no time to call it out before it impacts the bridge behind us and explodes. Molten metal sloughs off the walkway like water, leaving an empty gap behind us as the middle of the bridge melts into nothing. Helen and Kagiso sprint faster as the bridge starts to sag, bending under our weight now that it's only attached at one end. And to top it all off, on the ground in front of us I spot a group of cultists hiding behind a boulder.

"Ambush, in front!" I call out.

"Fucking hell, how are they already here!?" Helen complains, bringing a hand up to fire a deadly blast of Chaos as Kagiso draws her bow.

"Zone of Law: Ban Projectiles."

Kagiso slacks her bow.

"...That not fair," she grumbles.

"That is my primary offensive compliment disabled as well," Sela buzzes quietly.

"Oh you've gotta be fucking kidding me!"

As Helen shrieks out her swears, cultists swarm the landing where the bridge meets the ground. At least a dozen of them pour out from rocks just beyond my range, including a face I would have been happy to never see again: Hagoro. The Goddess descends around us, tapping her finger warningly on Helen's burgeoning spell as I glower at the dentron paladin that tried to kidnap me all the way back when I first met Helen. He's armored similarly to our last encounter, with a shield and a spear, but this time they're each held in one hand, and on the same side of his body; both of his right arms are still missing, same as when I cleaved them off his body.

Helen changes tack immediately, twisting to grab Donny by the back of the head and force his face down to kiss the bridge. She tosses her backpack, with me inside it, to Kagiso as Chaos crackles around her.

"Back the FUCK off!" she roars. "They Hunted And Hunted, But Not A One Could—"

"Five-Finger Discount," a cultist I've never seen before calls out, a woman hiding at the back of the group. Donny vanishes and reappears beside her, his arm in her hand. Our hostage, stolen away in an instant. Helen snarls but continues her incantation, standing up and taking a fighting stance, using the fact that the projectile ban affects both sides to buy enough time.

"—Take Her Down. For How Could They Touch Their Own Annihilation?"

Helen steps in front, taking a protective stance with her body wreathed in obliteration. With what's left of the narrow bridge between us and them, we have both the high ground and a convenient funnel to forcefully limit their numbers advantage in a melee. But of course, Hagoro has the power to un-ban projectiles any time he chooses, allowing them to blast us with impunity… but who knows if that's a good trade for them. Helen is not the kind of girl you want to give a clear shot to.

"Phew!" Donny says, wiping sweat from his brow as he turns to the teleporter who snatched him. "Leilah, you're a literal fuckin' lifesaver."

"Where's Clyde and Ponzu?" she asks.

Donny grimaces.

"Didn't make it."

"...Fuck," Leilah swears, glowering furiously at us.

"You bastards came after us!" Helen roars. "So if you wanna die too then fucking bring it!"

"Don't mind if we do," Hagoro says, stepping forwards. "Madaline? If you'd come with me, please?"

A human girl steps blankly forwards as Hagoro holds out a hand to her, her cultist pendant seeming abnormally heavy on her frail-looking body. Her wavy dark hair is messy and very, very long, going down past the small of her back. Combined with the blank stare on her face that barely seems to look at where she's going, she looks almost like a doll from a horror movie.

"Aura Sight," Helen barks, and I dumbly copy her.

"Aura Sight."

Helen hisses. I swallow a swear. Oh, no. That's not good. That's not good at all.

Chaos and Pneuma. The girl's elements are Chaos and Pneuma.

"And She Knew The Whole World Was Her Canvas!" Helen barks, rapidly leaning down and slicing free a segment of metal from the bridge with one hand. She catches it before it falls, and it rapidly starts shifting into a sculpture of a naked woman clawing out her own eyeballs. It's… entrancing in a strange sort of… wait, no, I definitely shouldn't be looking at that. Helen holds the sculpture out in front of her like it's a sword, waving it around to catch the attention of as many people as possible. Hagoro and a few others cover their eyes, but most of the cultists fail to avert their gaze, staring at it with hypnotic transfixion.

The approaching Chaos mage stares right at it, her empty gaze unwavering as she continues her approach, completely unaffected. Her arms raise, as if preparing for a spell.

"Hannah, I have to kill her!" Helen barks. Wait, was she holding back for my sake this whole time!?

"Do it!" I shout back. I don't want any part of whatever the fuck is about to happen!

"And So She Wept—!" Helen begins, aiming to obliterate our enemies in one shot despite the ranged attack restriction. Apparently she's betting on being able to tank an Order-aligned divine retribution better than whatever this Chaos mage is about to output.

But the weakness of Helen's spells has always been how long they take to cast. The other Chaos mage smiles, the first expression she's made since I've seen her.

"Dissociate," the Goddess encants from her lips, and the world no longer matters.

I'm aware that after casting, the girl collapses on the spot, Hagoro rushing forwards to catch her. I'm aware that Helen, affected by the same sudden nothingness that I am, stops casting her spell halfway through. The resulting miscast obliterates her clothes, her hair, and most of her skin, sending her collapsing forwards onto the bridge in a bloody mess. Kagiso, Sela and I do nothing in response to this. Or for that matter, in response to anything.

These are just things that are happening. Facts without emotion. The world is what it is, and the fact that we are part of it is incidental.

Cultists swarm us, grab us, gather us up, lead us. Helen is lifted and stabilized, carried alongside her fellow Chaos mage as her skin slowly crawls back onto her body. Kagiso, conversely, is led forwards, nudged gently until she follows our capturers like a cow not understanding the concept of a slaughterhouse. We walk for an irrelevant amount of time. We arrive at an irrelevant place. We're separated from our irrelevant friends. Nothing matters, and we prefer it that way.

Because what little part of our mind is actually lucid screams rather unpleasantly. The terror, the horror, the pain, the stress… we let it remain locked away. To do otherwise seems… unpleasant.

The cage they trap me inside exists in 4D just as much as it does 3D. I won't be able to just walk out of it. Neat. I curl up in a ball and go to sleep.

Then I wake up, and unfortunately I'm a person again. Staring at the ceiling, the horror of everything that just happened slowly catching up to me, I surprise myself by not crying or panicking or screaming. Maybe it's a side effect of the spell that hit me; even if I'm no longer under its influence, my mood was pretty calm when I went to sleep because of it. Maybe it's also just the fact that we're all alive. They could have easily killed Kagiso, Sela, Helen and I, but instead we got taken to their base and split up. That's hardly the worst situation I've been in on the world tree.

Honestly, I might just be getting numb to this sort of thing. That's probably not healthy, but it's better than constant panic so I can't really complain. I quickly figure out my limbs and then quickly do the only sane thing to do in this situation.

I GOT KIDNAPPED BY FREAKING CULTISTS, I complain to my friends, texting them over our group chat.

I don't get any immediate responses, since they're all probably sleeping in, but that's okay. I check the date—Sunday, ugh—and extract myself from bed, slipping into the bathroom while the rest of my family is still asleep. I check myself over in the mirror, scowling at my complexion. Am I starting to turn gray? I think my eye-spots are going to maybe become actual eyes soon, too. That's not gonna be fun, but whatever. Hopping into the shower, the water hits my naked body and I grimace, suddenly reminded how temperature does basically nothing for me now. The feeling of water passing over my body is weird when the heat of that water is only an academic footnote in my brain. As a human, temperature is like, water's primary feature, and getting wet without really caring about it is a strangely alien experience. …And not really a pleasant one, overall.

I sigh and squirt some shampoo in my palm, lathering up my head so I can just get out of the shower as soon as possible. When I pull my hand away, though, I end up pulling way too much hair along with it. Because of course I do.

Good! Great! I guess this is happening now! I run my other hand through my hair and sure enough, I manage to snag a few disgusting clumps of keratin there, too. Oh boy! It's not all of my hair, not by a longshot, but it's enough to make it clear that my hair is falling out with unnatural speed. Man, this sucks! I like my hair, dang it! I'd better get something cool to compensate for this crap.

Still grumbling, I rinse off and step out of the shower, using Refresh to dry myself so I don't have to deal with a towel in my apparently-delicate hair. I guess I'll add a wig to the list of things I need to buy to keep up my disguise! I'll have to do that after church. For now I'm okay, though, so I suppose I just have to hope it doesn't all fall off in the middle of the service and leave it at that for now.

With a yawn, I bundle up in my disguise and return to my room, checking my phone again. Ooh, a response from Autumn!

Oh my gosh, are you okay!? Do you need to cancel our date today?

I read it. Then I read it again. Wait. Date?

Oh shoot that's right we're going on a date today! Hot diggity!

No way, I'm super excited! I text her back. Getting kidnapped sucks but it's not like there's anything I can do about it while I'm on Earth.

Oh, okay! Comes the almost-instant response. Awesome! I'll see you at 2 then?

Heck yeah! Oh but if we could work buying a wig somewhere onto the itinerary that'd be a big help, I'm going super bald.

Uh. Oh. Okay, sure?

Thanks Alma!

Wiggling excitedly, I head downstairs to make breakfast for everyone as the rest of the house finally starts to stir. Being kidnapped by cultists: very bad! Getting to go on a date with a cute girl: very good! May as well ride the high and ignore the low as long as I can, right? Besides, if there's one thing my magic is actually good at, it's escape artistry. Dimensional movement and cut-through-anything make a pretty potent combo! I can figure out what I'm up against and how to deal with it when I go to sleep.

Because, you know. There are so many unknowns right now. Does the cage they put me in resist Spacial Rend somehow? If not, do they have other ways to lock me in? Where are my friends being held? What's happening to them? What's going to happen to me? What kind of mages am I up against? How many people am I going to have to murder this time? Each question is increasingly terrifying and I have no way of dealing with any of them so really if you think about it the best thing I can do is just compartmentalize the crap out of it like syrup on a waffle.

With breakfast sizzling, my family soon comes downstairs and is quite happy to be fed. We exchange the usual pleasantries before my mom comments on how I look happier than usual. This, of course, immediately tanks my mood and I manage to mumble something about hanging out with a friend after church. Yes, mother, a female friend. This mollifies her considerably, as it definitely nullifies the chances of sex happening rather than dramatically multiplies it. Definitely.

…Of course, dramatically multiplying the less-than-one-percent chances isn't really saying much. This is my second date with Alma. I haven't even gotten to kiss her yet. …Geez, I'm already eighteen and I haven't even kissed anyone yet. I really need to get on that before my lips fall off or whatever.

Gosh, these sure are thoughts to be having right before church.

I pack into the car and survive the trip to the chapel, slinking inside and doing my best to avoid any and all attention until the service starts. No dice, naturally. J-Mug is already here, having apparently joined our church after our pastor agreed to give his family lots and lots of dollars, and he immediately brightens up upon seeing me and walks right towards where I'm trying to stay away from everybody. Oh boy!

"Hannah!" the boy greets me. "Hey! I just wanted to thank you again. Mom's doing so much better. They even let her out of the hospital! She's not supposed to go outside for another week, but… she's out of the hospital! She's home!"

"That's… great," I answer, failing to fake any real emotion behind it.

"Honestly, it's been hard getting her to stay in bed," he says excitedly, not seeming to notice. "I've been practicing my you-know-what too, and… I think I might have something that could be a big help for her. I—"

"No," I snap. "Not here. If you absolutely need to talk to me about it, text me or something. And what's the most important rule?"

"...Don't practice around anyone else?" he mumbles, chastised.

"No. That's the second most important rule," I scowl. "What's the most important rule?"

"Um. Don't… speak while practicing?"

"Don't speak while practicing," I hiss in confirmation. "No matter what. Even if it feels right or it seems like you're supposed to. Don't. Ever. Speak. You promise?"

"...I promise," he nods.

"Make sure your mom knows too," I insist, walking away towards the pews. "I didn't help you two just so you could get yourselves killed or worse."

"Okay!" he confirms dutifully as I skulk away, feeling like crap as I reject the earnest kid like that. I just… don't like him and don't want to deal with him. He mugged me twice! Haven't I already done enough for him?

I hesitate. Is this what makes me not good enough?

I don't manage to come up with an answer before everyone else starts spilling onto the pews as well, though, and shortly afterwards the pastor is up on the pulpit to lead the prayer. Hmm. What's up with Christian worship and words that start with 'p,' anyway? I ponder that (hehe) for a good chunk of the service, doing everything in my power to remain as distracted as possible. I just need to survive until 2pm when life will temporarily become good instead of bad and I'll maybe get to kiss a girl.

The sermon ends without incident and so I quickly retreat to my traditional bathroom hidey-hole like the little burrowing creature I am at heart to poke away at my phone. Rather than the slew of text messages I expected to find, however, I have an odd little notification from an app I haven't touched in ages: Discord.

Oh, right! Valerie was gonna introduce me to her friends!

I open the ancient app, which chugs through several dozen updates for a minute or two before finally opening, the new server invite in a shiny new private message from Valerie. Her Discord tag is apparently now 'Monster Magus,' which I suppose is rather appropriate. Mine is still 'DistractedDreamer,' just like my Twitch handle, because I use the same online name for basically everything. I'm very boring like that. I accept the server invite.

---

<Mortissississimo>
Woah hey is that who I think it is

<DistractedDreamer>
Um, hello!

<Mortissississimo>
Oh shit I think it do be

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Oh goodness, welcome!

<Monster Magus>
You made it!

<DistractedDreamer>
I did!

<blue>
hi!

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Well go on, Val, introduce us!

<Monster Magus>
Right! Um, this is my best friend Hannah and she is a massive lesbian.

---

I blink. Okay, I uh. I guess we're starting off with my sexuality apparently?

---

<DistractedDreamer>
That is all completely true, but I gotta say I'm a little confused as to why it's coming up first thing?

<Monster Magus>
It's pertinent info for this server.

<DistractedDreamer>
Why…?

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
It's the perfect introduction because it tells us everything we need to know about you!
"Hannah" <- Name
"She" <- pronouns
"Massive lesbian" <- probably-not-a-bigot certification

<blue>
fhdsfhsdjklfhsdlafhsd

<DistractedDreamer>
Do you often get bigots on this server?

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Well, no. And honestly, being introduced by Valerie is all you really needed to be welcome here. But it's good internet etiquette in queer communities, you know? Part of what makes the queer community the queer community is the simple fact that anyone who isn't queer is dramatically more likely to be kind of shitty about what's in my pants, and it only really takes one asshole to ruin the whole day. A lot of us tend to get really nervous around new people until we get some clear sign that they're going to actually be tolerable. We hole up in these little chatrooms to avoid the kind of jerks we constantly have to deal with in real life, you know?

---

Uh, okay. I was not expecting this kind of conversation today. I rub my temples a bit before responding.

---

<DistractedDreamer>
Is everyone here queer, then?

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Nah, Issi is our token cishet white boy.

<Mortissississimo>
It's true. I possess the rare and terrible condition of both possessing and desiring a dick.

<blue>
gay

<Mortissississimo>
No wait not like that

<Monster Magus>
lol

<Mortissississimo>
Anyway I'm like a nature documentary host. I've barely managed to calm a wild herd of transbians by sitting really still and putting my pronouns in my bio, and after feeding them for a few weeks they've started accepting me as one of their own. It's a heartwarming story, really.

<DistractedDreamer>
…Boy, you sure do have some interesting friends, Valerie.

<Monster Magus>
I promise that they are usually cool and not lame.

<Mortissississimo>
I don't

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Yeah, you're sure putting a lot of pressure on us here, Val.

<Monster Magus>
You're right. My bad. Hannah, my friends suck and are the worst. You are the only cool one.

<DistractedDreamer>
Gosh, you're kind of putting a lot of pressure on me, Val.

<Monster Magus>
Okay so actually I have zero cool friends. They are all super lame. Every last one. Simply by becoming my friend the lameness of an individual skyrockets dramatically.

<Mortissississimo>
That's more like it

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Yeah, I can work with those expectations.

<blue>
can i be a cool friend

<Monster Magus>
Sure, blue. You are the coolest friend of all.

<blue>
fdskfhsdjlfhsdjlafhdsjkl yay

---

Okay, this is more like it. I smirk at the byplay, settling into a more comfortable rhythm of snark. It's a fun way to pass the time, at least up until someone new suddenly comments something that scares my panties clean off.

---

<Skarmbliss>
oh hey i recognize that screen name
do you stream pokemon by any chance?

---

Oh crap, oh no, this person has seen my streams!?

---

<DistractedDreamer>
Oh, uh, haha. Yeah, that's me!

<Skarmbliss>
oh sick! your vtuber rig is insanely cool.

<Monster Magus>
Wait, you watch Pokemon streams?

<Skarmbliss>
yeah i watch pokemon streams my name is literally a pokemon reference

<Monster Magus>
It is!?

<DistractedDreamer>
Yeah, it's like a Generation 3/4/kinda 5 competitive battle thing. Skarmory/Blissey defensive core.

<Skarmbliss>
yeah!!! hell yeah you get it. you should do more competitive stuff, id watch the hell out of that.

<Mortissississimo>
I wanna see this cool vtuber rig

<Skarmbliss>
oh yeah its so fucking hot

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Oh, well now you've got me interested. Show us, Hannah!

<DistractedDreamer>
Uh, it's not really something I keep pictures of…

<Skarmbliss>
here, i gotchu

---

And then they post a Twitter link to a clip from my stream showing me stretching and blue reacts with an emote labeled 'flooshed' and oh gosh, I'm just wearing a tanktop and shorts in that one, all my limbs are on display…! Aaaaaah I've never actually watched recorded videos of myself like this before! Oh Goddess oh Goddess oh Goddess this is so embarrassing!

---

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Woah, holy shit! This is crazy! God damn, Hannah, work it!

<Mortissississimo>
Okay, this is seriously awesome. How did you make this? Or like, who made it for you and how are these not everywhere?

<Skarmbliss>
lol no shot she tells you. the whole bit on stream is that she keeps saying it's real.

---

My face is a blushing mess. I can't believe this. I can't believe I'm running into someone who has seen me like that. I knew it would happen eventually, but… aaaagh!

---

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Well, a girl has to have her secrets, I suppose. Or perhaps… it is real!?

<DistractedDreamer>
…Yeah. It's real.

<Mortissississimo>
Then take a selfie right now lol

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Issi! Don't pressure her!

<DistractedDreamer>
…
Sure, okay.

<Monster Magus>
Um, are you sure, Hannah?

<DistractedDreamer>
Fuck it, why not. Heads up though, I'm sort of hiding in a church bathroom so it's not gonna be pretty.

---

I open my camera app and snap a quick photo of myself, before taking my mask off, opening my mouth as wide as it'll go, and taking a photo again. I send both to Valerie's friends because my life is an endless spiral of bad decisions and this is hardly the worst one I'll make this week.

---

<Mortissississimo>
Uh. Hmm. That's. Wow?

<blue>
teeth… (⁄ ⁄•⁄-⁄•⁄ ⁄)

<DistractedDreamer>
I can show you the extra limbs and messed up hands and stuff if you want but I don't wanna accidentally drop my gloves in the toilet. I sort of need them to use my phone.

<Lana, Blood Ba’ham>
Wow wow wow wow wow wow wow. This is… very cool.

<DistractedDreamer>
It's really not? I'm mutating into a monstrous freak. My hair started to fall out today. Like, I'm serious guys, this is not a bit. It's really messing me up.

<Monster Magus>
Um… I can confirm that, actually. This is a really major problem for Hannah and I'd appreciate it if it was treated that way.

<DistractedDreamer>
Roger roger!

<Mortissississimo>
Okay but how the actual fuck though

<DistractedDreamer>
Urban fantasy is real and I'm the main character, I guess? Look, the more I talk about this the more completely insane I'll sound, so I'm not really super interested in discussing it.

---

I check the time, realizing I definitely should have gotten out of the bathroom by now, so I quickly finish up my business and rush out to act like I've been waiting in the lobby this whole time. My phone now remains quarantined in my pocket until my family gets back in the car, as it isn't appropriate to be on the phone at church. I'm supposed to be socializing. I am not very good at socializing.

Eventually, the rest of my family joins me and we exit as a unit. Back in the car, I pull out my phone again and skim through the conversation that has happened without me, mostly just Valerie fielding questions with 'ask Hannah, it's her business.' I give her blanket permission to talk about whatever the heck she wants and then put my phone back in my pocket, too exhausted to deal with whatever comes of that mess. I have a date to prepare for, after all.

Surely that can't go as poorly as this did, right?