# chapters

path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212122222211111
author_id: imaj
title: The Girl In The Red Dress
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>You walk smartly up the path to the door of the house, your new home in fact.  As Jelena, you share it with your sister K.C. and a couple of other students.  The door swings open before you even reach it, held open by a painfully thin young woman with messy dyed hair.  She rolls your eyes as you approach.<br/>
<br/>
Jelena’s memories flood into to fill the details.  The woman is your sister, Katarina-Charlotta.  The name is such a mouthful that she usually goes by K.C..  She’s the one that took you in when your dad found out you were a lesbian.<br/>
<br/>
“Where were you Yell,” says K.C. exasperatedly.  “You know how important the gig on Saturday is.”<br/>
<br/>
“I’m sorry Kat,” you say slightly abashedly.  Jelena – you now really – is the only one who still calls K.C. by her given name, even if only in part and only ever if it’s just the two of them.  “Andrea dragged me away after school.”<br/>
<br/>
“Well unless is was something of life changing importance you should have told her you had practice,” answers K.C. waspishly.<br/>
<br/>
You tilt your head to the side.  “Nah, it was just school shit Kat,” you tell her and step through the door.  “Sorry.”<br/>
<br/>
She closes it behind you.  “Just get inside.  Everyone’s here already.”  You follow K.C. down the stairs to the basement, where the band practices.  The equipment is all set up and you see Kurt sitting at the drums while Zoe absently strums her bass guitar.<br/>
<br/>
“Wait a minute…” you say.  K.C. interrupts you by handing you her electric guitar.  “The keyboard bailed again?”  It’s been a recurring problem for the band, you recall from Jelena’s memories.  They keep losing keyboard players for one reason or another.  Normally K.C. would play guitar and you would be lead vocals – your new singing voice apparently has an ethereal quality to that works well with your setlist – but without the keyboard you have to swap round a little.<br/>
<br/>
You look at the guitar unhappily.  You’ve gained Jelena’s ability to play it, but your memories tell you that you aren’t that good at it.  You certainly cant play guitar and sing well at the same time, so now you’re relegated to backing vocals along with Zoe, while music major K.C. plays keyboard and lead vocals.<br/>
<br/>
“Kurt offended them,” says K.C. as you pull the guitar strap over your shoulder.  You flex your fingers and let them fall into familiar places along the frets.<br/>
<br/>
“Their lack of talent offended <i>me</i>,” splutters Kurt, his metal pierced lips curling pompously.  Beside you, Zoe just sighs and stares at the ceiling.<br/>
<br/>
You strum a chord experimentally.  Though it feels tired and awkward to the part of you that you have stolen from Jelena, the part of you that is still Will is excited at the ease with which you do it.  “Let’s get this started,” you tell the rest of the band and flash a smile at them.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">*****</div><br/>
<br/>
You stare at the face in the mirror, that of Jelena Petrovic.  <i>Your </i>face, and you’ve spent time and effort making it up tonight, partially to look your best for the gig but mostly for someone special:  For the last few gigs there’s been a cute Asian college girl that Jelena has had her eye on.  Now that you’re Jelena, you’re determined that tonight will be the night to hook up with the girl.<br/>
<br/>
At first glance your hair is a wild mess, but in reality each strand has been exactingly styled to give that appearance.  The look makes you seem unfettered and free, prefect as far as your Jelena tinted mind is concerned.  Thick eyeliner surrounds your eyes, drawing attention to them as they shine through those fashionable glasses.  Clever use of blush highlights your high cheekbones and your lips are stained the colour of blood.<br/>
<br/>
The lipstick matches the colour of your dress, and what a dress it is.  It is a thin, membranous thing that comes down only as far as your upper thigh.  It clings to your body tightly, held up by a pair of thin, string like straps that loop over your fine shoulders.  You aren’t wearing a bra, for the lines of it would be visible through the dress and ruin the effect.  Instead your nipples visibly poke through the sheer material of the dress, for you are very excited about what is going to happen next.<br/>
<br/>
“Hey Yell,” says K.C. laying her hands on your bare shoulders and leaning over you, snapping you out of your reverie.  “Are you ready?”  She looks at the mirror.  “Think <i>she</i>’s going to be here tonight,” she jokingly taunts you.<br/>
<br/>
You ignore her, standing up and turning to the door of the little poky dressing room you’ve been given.  Zoe puts her head round it.  “Everything’s set up,” she tells you, K.C. and Kurt.<br/>
<br/>
You walk out onto the stage and pick up the guitar.  It feels comfortable in your hands now, and you scan the audience as you pull the strap over your shoulder.<br/>
<br/>
“Hi everybody,” shouts K.C. into her microphone.  “We’re Slow Fast Hazel.”  There’s a round of applause and hollering.  You’ve built up a little following around the college campus.<br/>
<br/>
You find who you are looking for, lurking at the back of the crowd near the bar:  The Asian girl Jelena had been lusting after.  You know her, and not just from the time’s Jelena has seen her at gigs.<br/>
<br/>
Her name is Umeko Prescott.  A week ago she was your cousin.<br/>
<br/>
You head swims as K.C. completes her introduction and launches straight into the first song on your setlist.  There’s no time left, no time at all.  Your hands curl into the shapes of the chords and you start to play.<br/>
<br/>
You play as if your very life depended upon it.<br/>
<br/>
It is <i>glorious</i>.  The addition of your Will perspective to Jelena has re-energized you and you cannot help but bask in the atmosphere of the gig.  Your nimble fingers dance across the guitar with an enthusiasm that the original Jelena never quite mustered.  Even relegated to backing vocals, you still sing with all your heart.  The crowd seems to reflect your passion a hundred fold.  It spreads infectiously to the rest of the band, even moody, miserable Kurt.  It is perhaps the best gig the band has ever played.<br/>
<br/>
Perhaps it’s even the best moment of your life.<br/>
<br/>
It seems to last forever, and yet it is also over far too soon.  As you reach the end of crowd-demanded encore song you search again for Umeko.  She is still at the bar, staring intently at you and the rest of the band.  You look plaintively at K.C..<br/>
<br/>
“Ok,” she says.  “Go.  We’ll tidy up here.”<br/>
<br/>
You slip off the stage and into the crowd.  As you twist and turn through the throng of people they hug you, congratulate you and hi-five you as you pass.  You smile brightly at everyone as you go.  Though it takes several minutes, you eventually reach the bar.  You slide into a gap beside Umeko and try to attract the bartender’s attention.  It is Umeko that notices you first.<br/>
<br/>
“Hi,” she says.  You turn and take the chance to look at her.  It’s a side of Umeko you’ve never seen:  Tight jeans and a cutoff tee make her look sexy, far from the good girl image she projects to her adoptive parents.  “You’re with the band aren’t you?  Slow Fast Hazel?”<br/>
<br/>
You nod and offer your hand.  “Yeah,” you smile brightly.  “I’m Jelena.”<br/>
<br/>
She takes your hand with a delicate one of your own.  “I love you guys,” she tells you, leaning in close to make herself heard as the club’s sound system starts up.  “Can I buy you a drink?”<br/>
<br/>
“Sure,” you whisper in her ear.  “Rum and Coke.”  You like sweet things now.<br/>
<br/>
Umeko leans back and grins at you before catching the eye of the bartender.  A few moments later she hands you your drink and keeps hold of one for her own.  “Let’s find somewhere quiet to talk.”<br/>
<br/>
Somewhere quiet to talk turns out to be a little boot filled room at the top of a spiral staircase.  The booths are large and with high backs so that each one is a little private universe to itself.  You find an empty one near the back and slide into it.  Umeko slides in beside you, leaning in close till your hips are touching.  Down below, the club DJ plays music at floor thumping volume, but up here it can barely be felt and the atmosphere is almost serene.<br/>
<br/>
“It’s a pity you weren’t singing lead tonight,” says Umeko, sipping her drink.<br/>
<br/>
“Our keyboard bailed again,” you say sadly.  “We’ll need to find another one.”<br/>
<br/>
“I used to take piano lessons when I was a little girl,” she tells you.  “But I don’t think I’m anywhere close to good enough to join you.”<br/>
<br/>
“You should come see us practice sometime,” you reply, slipping your arm round Umeko’s shoulder.  She looks at you and smiles before snuggling in close.<br/>
<br/>
“I’d like that,” she answers as she lays her head on your shoulder.<br/>
<br/>
You sit like that for a while, talking away about nothing, getting to know Umeko again from Jelena’s point of view.  Time seems to slip away and you have no idea how long you have been sitting there, until Umeko finally turns round one last time to look at you again.  You stare into each others eyes…<br/>
<br/>
Before you know what is happening your lips have locked.  As you gently probe her mouth, you feel Umeko clamber on top of you.  When you open your eyes again, you see that she is straddled across your lap.  “Let’s go somewhere private,” she whispers suggestively into your ear.</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121222222111111
author_id: imaj
title: The Morning After, The Night Before
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>“Almost there,” you giggle as you drag Umeko up the path to your new home.  The lights are off and either everyone has gone to bed, or they are still out.  Umeko laughs as you pull her along with one hand held in your own.  You almost run into the door and have to raise your free hand up to prevent yourself planting your face firmly on the entranceway.  That prompts a fresh burst of laughter from your companion.<br/>
<br/>
As you fumble round your purse trying to feel out your set of keys, Umeko turn you round and presses you against the door.  She pins you with one hand whilst greedily exploring your mouth with her tongue.   Her other hand rubs gently on the surface of your dress at the thigh, creeping slowly inward.  “I want you so bad right now,” she says fuzzily.<br/>
<br/>
“I need to find my <i>key</i>,” you squeal back at her, redoubling your efforts.  Your fingers finally pick their way to the jagged metal of the key.  You pull it out and hold it a lot triumphantly.<br/>
<br/>
“Oh, beautiful and clever,” grins Umeko.  “I am a lucky girl.”  She rewards you with another kiss before you unlock door and pull her inside.  “Hello,” she shouts as you enter.<br/>
<br/>
You turn and give her an appalled look.  “No one else in,” you tell her.  “I think they’re all still at the club.”<br/>
<br/>
“The band all live here?”<br/>
<br/>
“No, just me and K.C.,” you explain.  “But our roomies usually come watch us when we play.”<br/>
<br/>
“Cool,” she nods, speaking more quietly now.  “Which room’s yours?”<br/>
<br/>
You hold her head in your hands and peck her on the lips again.  “This way,” you tell her with a dazzling grin before grabbing hold of her hand once more and dragging her towards your room.  You open the door to your bedroom, then take a step back and close it again.  “Shit, it’s a mess,” you tell Umeko, who fails to stifle a laugh.  “Wait right here,” you add before slinking back inside your bedroom.<br/>
<br/>
You rush about the room, rapidly picking up the clothes strewn about the floor and bed before stuffing them into a laundry basket.  Then you dig out a cigarette lighter from a mess of paper in one of the bedside tables.  It flickers into life and you use it light the dozen or so scented candles that are strewn about the room.  Only then do you return to the door and throw it open.  Umeko stands on the other side, a puzzled looking smile on her face.<br/>
<br/>
“Come in,” you say, reaching out with both hands and gently pulling her inside.  You close the bedroom door with your foot and slowly lead Umeko over to the edge of your bed.  She sits down on the bed beside you as you shrug off your short leather jacket and throw it to the side.  She stares into your eyes for what seems like an age before you both lean in for a slow and smooth kiss.  As your hands work your way around each others bodies, you topple over sideways onto the bed.<br/>
<br/>
Your hands move quickly after that, pulling off Umeko’s jacket and lifting up her tee to reveal her breasts, encased in a lacy white bra.  She is just as active herself, and you feel her pull up the fabric of your dress until it rides up to your armpits.<br/>
<br/>
You let her pull the dress over your head, leaving you naked but for your knee high boots and a simple black thong.  You lean back on your bed and grin Umeko.  She crawls on top of you, spinning round till the buttons of her tight jeans hover just in front of your face.  As your work your nimble fingers to undo the buttons, your feel her pull aside your thong.  <br/>
<br/>
You shudder and jolt as her tongue makes contact with your cunny.  You try to redouble your own efforts with Umeko’s jeans, but your fingers are suddenly clumsy.  You gasp, little sharp shocks of breath, as Umeko traces odd patterns with her tongue.  Finally you manage to peel her jeans away, as well as the white panties underneath.  Now Umeko’s shaven pussy is just inches in front of your face.<br/>
<br/>
You twist gently onto your side, lowering Umeko’s hips in front of you.  Then you pull her closer before leaning in and running your own tongue over her.  She shivers and there is the briefest of breaks in the wave of sensations spreading up you back.  Then you and Umeko both begin your efforts anew.<br/>
<br/>
As you lie there, lapping away at your one time cousin, you find yourself surprised at how natural it all seems.  You’ve slipped right into Jelena’s life and picked it up as if it was your own.  The meshing of her hopes and desires with your own has been so effortless.  You are far more than the sum of your parts and this most perfect of days has been a fitting reward for your work over the last few weeks.  As the ecstatic feeling peak, you bask in their glow.<br/>
<br/>
You wonder if the other yous, the people you have shared your <i>anima </i>with feel the same way about their new lives.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">*****</div><br/>
<br/>
K.C. winks at you as you pick up the two wide mugs of coffee and steer yourself out of the kitchen.  Despite yourself, you blush.  Jelena brought girls home with her before you were her, and never cared that her sister saw her doing so.  <br/>
<br/>
K.C. stops you gently by laying a thin hand on your shoulder as you reach the door.  “Is she a keeper,” she asks in a low voice.<br/>
<br/>
You stop and think.  The Jelena of a week ago – the Jelena before you wriggled your way inside her – had been chasing after Umeko for weeks, but she had never thought of Umeko as anything other than a little bit of fun.  But you – the new Jelena – are different:  You still carry your feels for Umeko from when you were just Will, augmented by the lingering memories of just how good she made your newbody feel last night.  Involuntarily, you blush again.<br/>
<br/>
“Ohmygod,” squeals K.C., still keeping her voice quiet.  “She is, isn’t she?  She totally is.”<br/>
<br/>
“I hope so,” you tell your new sister.<br/>
<br/>
“This is great Yell,” she whispers enthusiastically.  “I really hope it works out for you.”<br/>
<br/>
You work your way through the house, back to your bedroom.  You prod the door open with your foot and slip inside.  Umeko is sat upright in the bed, her tee covers her upped body, while her legs are hidden under the covers.  She looks at you and smiles as you walk into the room.<br/>
<br/>
“Thanks,” smiles Umeko as she gratefully takes one mug with both hands.  You put your own mug down on the bedside table and slide under the covers beside her.  Umeko rests her head on your shoulder and you lightly wrap one arm around her.  “I had a really good time last night Yell,” she says after a sip of coffee.<br/>
<br/>
“Me too,” you agree resting your head on hers.  She smells nice.<br/>
<br/>
She says nothing for a while.  “I’d like to do it again sometime,” she says after a minute, in a quiet and uncertain voice.<br/>
<br/>
You give her a little squeeze.  “I’d like that too,” you tell her.  You share a brief but enthusiastic kiss.  “You wanna go for coffee later?”<br/>
<br/>
“That sounds…” her answer is interrupted by the sound of your cell phone buzzing.  <br/>
<br/>
You sigh unhappily, giving Umeko a quick peck on the forehead before slipping out from the bed to dig out your phone from your purse.  <br/>
<br/>
“Who is it,” asks Umeko.<br/>
<br/>
It’s a message from Andrea, in fact.  She wants you out at the Straussler mansion this afternoon.  “School friend,” you tell Umeko.  “I need to meet her to work on a project today.”<br/>
<br/>
“School,” asks Umeko with a frown.  “You mean Keyserling?”<br/>
<br/>
You shrug a little guiltily.  “Westside.”<br/>
<br/>
“You’re still at high school,” asks Umeko, her eyebrows shooting up.  “Wow.  I…   You just seemed so mature…”<br/>
<br/>
“That’s not a problem is it,” you ask, your voice tinged with sadness.<br/>
<br/>
Umeko looks conflicted for a moment, but then her doubts seem to fade.  She slides out from under the bedcovers and sways over to you.  Your eyes fix on the slow motion of her long, golden legs.  She lifts your chin up with a single finger and plants a lingering kiss on you lips.  “No,” she says softly, holding herself tight to you.  “Not at all.”<br/>
<br/>
You hold her, enjoying her warmth and scent.  Perhaps you should just blow off Andrea today.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212222221112
author_id: imaj
title: Sienna's Send Off
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>“Sienna,” you say firmly.<br/>
<br/>
“Sienna,” asks Andrea, almost taken aback.<br/>
<br/>
“Is there a problem?”<br/>
<br/>
“No,” she stutters.  The first time you’ve seen her unsure of herself.  “Well, it’s just surprising.”  She regains her composure and smiles at you.  “I’m really proud of you Will, that’s a difficult choice you’ve made, but it’s a good one.”<br/>
<br/>
Suddenly you are a little uncertain of your choice.  You smile wanly, the horrible sinking feeling that you cannot back out now settling around you.  “Thanks…”<br/>
<br/>
“No, you’ll thank me later,” Andrea grins.  “Once you’re Sienna.  I’ll bring her over after school.  It won’t be hard to persuade her.  Try to amuse yourself till then.” <br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">*****</div><br/>
<br/>
You’re in the ballroom when Andrea arrives with Sienna, checking over your preparations one last time.  Frank is beside you, still garbed as Jon Straussler.  He’s got a little knockout powder ready in one hand.<br/>
<br/>
“Will, Jon,” calls out Andrea.  She strides across the room with the diminutive form of Sienna in tow.  “This is my friend Sienna.”<br/>
<br/>
“Hey,” says Sienna with a curt nod.  “What?”  She stares at you.<br/>
<br/>
“Uh…” you stammer.  “I was kinda expecting you to swear at me again.”<br/>
<br/>
“Pffft,” she shrugs.  “I swear at pretty much fucking everybody.  It doesn’t mean much.  Andrea said you weren’t full of shit, so I guess you get a shot.”  She stares at you again with a glint in her eye.  “So what is it?”<br/>
<br/>
You turn to Frank.  He shrugs.  You gesture at him to knock her out, but he only looks at you in confusion.  “Use the powder on her,” you hiss at him.<br/>
<br/>
“What the fuck are you talking about,” asks Sienna, her voice rising.  “Ah Jesus, what the fuck,” she shouts, squirming in place.  You glance at Frank again and he grins.  He must be holding her in place with his invisible fists.  Sienna must have guessed Frank was behind it too when you looked at him.  “Let me go you fucker,” she yells at him.<br/>
<br/>
“She's feisty,” grins Frank.  You put your hand to your head.  You can’t believe he just said that.  He walks up to the immobile Sienna.  Frank doesn’t flinch when she spits in his face.  Instead he blows the powder into her face.  “What was all that about,” he asks you, making a complicated gesture with his hands that mirrors the one you made to him a few seconds ago.  Sienna falls to the floor with a thud as he does so.<br/>
<br/>
“I was telling you to use the powder on her,” you whine back.<br/>
<br/>
“Really?”  Frank barks a laugh.  “I thought you needed to take a leak or something.”  He doesn’t give you a chance to answer back, grabbing Sienna under the shoulders and hauling her onto the dissection table.  Andrea bats him away once he puts her down there though, insisting on undressing Sienna herself.<br/>
<br/>
Once that’s done it’s time to undo Sienna.  You can hardly have her walking around once you are done, so you split her into her component parts:  The golem like remains of her <i>substantia</i>, jars for her unimpressive <i>anima </i>and <i>essentia </i>and a mask for her <i>imago</i>.  Frank takes all of these but the last away to store once you are done.<br/>
<br/>
Then you are on the dissection yourself, stripping off your clothes as Frank sets up the mask of Sienna on top of the <i>Libra </i>for you.  The sensation of the cool metal against your skin disturbs you and you would swear that you could feel the ominous power of the sigils vibrating through it.<br/>
<br/>
You make the switch to Frank as soon as you are able, taking him just in time to finish the last of the preparations.  You stand back up in Frank’s body and cast a critical eye over his work.  It all seems to be in order, but you’re a little worried still. The control sigil that links you to Frank is tied to your <i>anima</i>.  In theory it should be untouched by what you are going to do, but that doesn’t stop you being frightened at the prospect of losing the link midway through.<br/>
<br/>
“Will,” asks Andrea, looking inquisitively at you.<br/>
<br/>
“Yeah,” you answer. “Lets get this done.”<br/>
<br/>
You find it much easier to unclasp Sienna’s physical and mental <i>imago </i>than it was with Joe and Charles. You still shiver a little before repeating the process with yourself. It feels… Well, it feels like nothing.<br/>
<br/>
Buoyed a little, you move onto the next step. Sienna’s mental <i>imago </i>seems as if it is ready to engulf your own in a ball of fire. You could swear you feel it burning at the back of your neck. The connections harden and you feel another, almost alien, presence in the back of your mind. You push it to the side for now and concentrate on the last step of the process – the physical <i>imago</i>. You keep your eyes open as you start to smudge away your own <i>imago </i>this time.<br/>
<br/>
This might be a mistake. Each brush you make is like ripping the skin away from your body. It comes away in ragged gouts, vanishing into the ether and leaving an unrecognisable mess of blood and torn muscle exposed beneath it. Your stomach churns and for a brief second you struggle to hold on to the link to Frank.<br/>
<br/>
But you press on until there is nothing but the broken mockery of a person on the dissection table in front of you. The ghost like remnants of Sienna’s physical imago slip round you easily, and you would swear you could see them hanging there in the air around your body in the real world. As you make each connection between the physical and mental imago a little bit more of Sienna reappears and the tattered body in front of you grow shorter and more human. It is distinctly odd, watching Sienna appear piece by piece: A hand here, a little bit of a thigh there, then her bleached blonde pixie cut and her generous boobs.<br/>
<br/>
You totter on your feet as the last bits of <i>imago </i>fall into place. Waves of exhaustion assail you and you tiredly flip back out of Frank. In an instant the fatigue is gone, because it was with Frank’s body – Frank’s <i>essentia </i>and <i>ousiarchs </i>– that you carried out the spell.<br/>
<br/>
Everything is different when you wake back up, and not just because the room seems larger than it did a few moments ago.   Sienna’s memories and personality start slotting into place.  No longer do they feel alien, but instead they are a warm inviting current that begs you to surf along them.  You try to clack your tongue piercing against your teeth – a Sienna mannerism – before realising that Andrea removed it from the real Sienna a few moments ago…<br/>
<br/>
No that’s not right.<br/>
<br/>
You are the real Sienna now.  You are still Will Prescott in some small way, but you are also Sienna Goldman now.  You try to think of some way to describe her:  The first Sienna?  The original Sienna?  No, she was the <i>previous </i>Sienna and you pick up her belongings from the neat pile that Andrea set them in.  The tongue piercing goes in first, and you clack it against your teeth reassuringly.  Then you wedge your boobs into your bra, clasping it together with practised ease.  You slowly pull on the rest of you clothes as Andrea helps the barely conscious Frank to Jon’s bedroom, savouring each item as you slip it into place:  The zebra print tee that hugs your torso, the ripped jeans that feel so tight on your wide hips and ample ass.<br/>
<br/>
Andrea smiles at you as she returns.  “You look like your settling in.”<br/>
<br/>
“I feel fucking great Andrea,” you tell her, gesturing expansively with your hands.<br/>
<br/>
She catches you by surprise when she steps in close and wraps her arms around you.  You look up into her face, still uncertain what to do.  Andrea bends down a kisses you on the lips.  It is a sharp little thing, quickly broken as you half fight your way free of her.  “I’m sorry,” she says.<br/>
<br/>
“No, it’s…” you say.  “The old Sienna would have hit you for that.  She was one hundred percent straight.”<br/>
<br/>
“How much Sienna are you,” asks Andrea wryly.<br/>
<br/>
“I’m Sienna,” you tell her.  “But I’m still Will enough to give it a try.”<br/>
<br/>
Andrea smiles at you and takes you by the hand.  She leads you to one of the guest bedrooms in the mansion, where she gently pushes you onto the bed.  You fall backwards as she tugs off your ripped jeans.  As she slips off your panties an inane grin spreads over your face.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">*****</div><br/>
<br/>
“Well,” says Andrea as she crawls onto the bed beside you.<br/>
<br/>
“Well?”<br/>
<br/>
“Did you enjoy that?”<br/>
<br/>
“It was nice,” you say after a moments thought.<br/>
<br/>
“Nice?”  Her face twists up.<br/>
<br/>
“It’s a bit fucking passive for me,” you say, sitting up and letting a little anger into your voice.  “I want…  Sienna wants something ramming itself in <i>hard </i>down there.”<br/>
<br/>
Andrea gets up from the bed.  “Frank’s in the other room,” she says coolly.  “Maybe you should to him.”  She fixes her clothes and walks out.  It isn’t that she’s angry, she just seems…  Well distant again.  Aloof.<br/>
<br/>
You, however, bite your lip nervously.  Frank <i>is </i>a few doors away, and some very Sienna thoughts run through your brain as you think of him, both disguised as Jon and as he is naturally.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212122222211121
author_id: imaj
title: Crossroads
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Frank is asleep when you enter Jon’s bedroom, or perhaps passed out.  From the strewn mess of clothes on the floor you can tell that Frank managed to strip down to his shorts before crawling under the bedcovers.  It is the face of Jon Straussler that peaks out from under there, as Frank did not remove the mask.  You grin at the thought of what is hidden underneath.<br/>
<br/>
You kick off your battered old sneakers and climb onto the bed, sitting yourself on top of Frank at the waist.  He stirs beneath you, his sleep disturbed by your presence.<br/>
<br/>
“Hey Frank,” you say, gently shaking him by the shoulder.  He does not respond so you try again.  “Hey Frank,” this time you are louder.<br/>
<br/>
Frank shifts uncomfortably underneath you, a grimace passing over his adopted face.  “Gerroff,” he mumbles unhappily.<br/>
<br/>
“Hey Frank,” you say a third time.  He squeeze him between your thick thighs before grinding your crotch against him.<br/>
<br/>
“I said get off,” he shouts, waking up fully.  An unseen force brushes you to the side, rolling you off Frank and onto the bed beside him.  You struggle to move but find yourself pinned in place.  Frank looms beside you, the covers cascading off him to reveal the athletic body of Jon Straussler.  His developed arms and flat stomach have been honed by hours on the basketball court.<br/>
<br/>
An odd sensation stirs at the base of your back.  It is at once both new and familiar.  It is feels like a warmth and it is as if something is loosening.  The Sienna part of you, which is increasingly difficult to separate from your Will self, welcomes the feeling like an old friend.<br/>
<br/>
You are turned on, incredibly so.<br/>
<br/>
The realisation shocks you, or at least the Will part of you.  Your breathing becomes short and shallow, the ample boobs on your chest heaving.  “Do me,” the words slip out, almost unintentionally.<br/>
<br/>
Frank stares down at you, his stolen face puzzled.  “What?”<br/>
<br/>
“I said, fucking do me,” you snarl.  You struggle at the invisible bonds holding you in place.  They slacken as the will holding them in place weakens.  Finally your arms manage to snap free and you grab Frank by the shoulders and pull him on top of you.<br/>
<br/>
“What,” he repeats, still uncertain of what is going on.<br/>
<br/>
You don’t answer him though, but you pull his face closer until you can kiss him.  He is passive at first, as you aggressively quest at his mouth.  Slowly though, he starts to kiss back.  His tongue is as iron and he uses it like a battering ram, pushing deep into your mouth.<br/>
<br/>
You arch your back and squeal as he finally ends the kiss.  Frank then works his way down your neck, nuzzling and nipping at you.  Deep moans of pleasure escape from your mouth.  There is a slight tugging sensation at your midriff and your realise he is trying to pull off your tee.  Your hands reach down and find his, guiding them with urgency.<br/>
<br/>
Your top comes off, then your bra.  Frank nibbles at the tips of your breasts and his hands run down your stomach towards the buttons of your jeans.  His hands find their way inside the waistband and…  <i>Oh god</i>…<br/>
<br/>
“Hurry the fuck up,” you moan.  You reach down and unbutton your jeans yourself, unwilling to wait any longer.  Frank rolls them down and pushes aside your panties.  He slips out of his shorts, his engorged cock pointing rigidly at you.<br/>
<br/>
Without warning, he plunges straight at you.  He pushes his member deep inside you, ramming in hard and fast.  There is a moment of pain, just enough to cause you to yelp, then the feeling fades away rapidly.  It’s impossible for you to describe, how it feels, what it is like to have someone else stick a part of them self inside you.  You just don’t have the experience.<br/>
<br/>
Sienna does though, and it’s almost impossible to resist her impulses.  A snarky grin forms on your face.  The Sienna part of you knows what is coming next.  She welcomes it.<br/>
<br/>
The air around you deadens and you suddenly feel leaden and very heavy.  Beads of sweat prickly round your brow.  Frank grins back at you cockily.  Is he doing this somehow, is it some gift of his <i>ousiarchs</i>?  The pressure beats down on you and you feel yourself melting.  It leaves you both very warm and very wet down there.<br/>
<br/>
Frank moves creakily and rigidly, like an engine slowly juddering into life.  But he picks up the pace, and soon he is moving like a piston:  Each stroke thrusting hard and deep inside you.  Each stroke cracking a little bit of you away and threatening to release some great tide pent up within you.  The last of the invisible force holding you in place finally snaps away, though the dead air still pushes down on your flesh.  It leaves your skin slick, bathed in sweat.<br/>
<br/>
You let out a growl, a low rumbling sound that starts in your throat and ends up reverberating round the room.  Despite the intense pressure built around you, despite the fatigue and sweat, you push at Frank.  He rolls to the side and you follow round until you are on top of him again.  You giggle lightly as you sit there, one leg on either side of his body and his member buried deeply inside you.  For a few seconds you make a gentle swirling motion, squeezing down on him as hard as you are able to.<br/>
<br/>
“Oh fuck,” he yells.  He’s close to it now, you both are.  Just a little more effort to push you over the brink.  Frank keeps up that steady beating rhythm.  You buck in time to him now, desperately trying to draw him deeper inside you.  Then suddenly the motion grow ragged, losing its thumping regularity.  Frank spasms:  Once, twice then a third time.  He lets out a low rumbling moan as he shoots his load deep within you, finally pushing you over the edge.  You scream your ecstasy as the tide finally breaks and washes over you.  It feels as if it goes on for ever.<br/>
<br/>
“Not fucking bad,” you say as you dismount and slump beside Frank.  You’re lying though – it felt <i>great</i>, at least as good as any other time Sienna’s slept with someone.<br/>
<br/>
Frank mumbles something in reply and the deadness of the air slackens.  He looks exhausted, unsurprisingly.  But if that’s what he can manage after carrying out the spells to merge imago, you wonder what he’ll be like when he’s fresh and unwearied.  Involuntarily, you bite you lip a little at the thought.<br/>
<br/>
You give Frank one last quick kiss before climbing out of his bed.  “I’ll be seeing you around,” you tell him suggestively.  Yes, you certainly will.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">*****</div><br/>
<br/>
You pull Sienna’s old junker of a car into the cheap apartment complex parking lot.  The engine coughs into silence as you look around the lot.  Sienna’s dad’s – no <i>your </i>dad’s – truck is nowhere to be seen.  That’s not a surprise though:  He does late night breakdown callouts just to get a little extra ready cash.  Dianne’s car is there though, and you steel yourself at the though of having to deal with the source of the problems in Sienna’s life.<br/>
<br/>
They are your problems now, after all.<br/>
<br/>
You scan the lot again.  There’s no sign of Dianne’s ex’s car, though.  Sienna’s seen it here before and she’s sure the bitch is cheating on dad.  You close your eyes and sigh.  With any luck Dianne will have passed out on the sofa again.  That will make things easier.<br/>
<br/>
You lift up your bag from the passenger seat.  The bulky weight of the <i>Libra </i>inside it feels reassuring.  The answers to your newfound problems are all there.  You sling the bag over your shoulder before exiting the car and climbing the stairs up to your new home.  The lights are off as you enter, and it looks like you might have lucked out.  You close the door behind you as quietly as you are able and start sneaking to your room.<br/>
<br/>
The lights come on, unbearably bright.  Dianne stands in the doorway to the kitchen, dressed in nothing but a faded old robe.  A bottle of cheap liquor hangs loosely in one hand and she sways unsteadily.  “Where have you been,” she slurs, her lip curling in contempt.<br/>
<br/>
“None of your fucking business,” you snap.<br/>
<br/>
“Don’t you talk to me like that,” she replies shrilly.  “As long as I’m living here you’ll treat me with respect.  Your dad…”<br/>
<br/>
“Don’t you bring Dad into this,” you cut her off.  “You don’t give a fuck about my dad.  You’re only here because he took you in after your old boyfriend did the right thing and kicked your ass out…” your stream of invective is cut short as Dianne steps woozily forward and slaps you heavily across the cheek.<br/>
<br/>
She sniffs theatrically at you.  “You little slut,” she shrieks at you, picking up on the aura of stale sweat and cum that pervades around you.  She slaps you again.  “You disrespectful little bitch.”  She slaps you a third time, harder than before.  You stagger backwards.<br/>
<br/>
Your hand slips inside you bag and touches the cool surface of the mask stored there.  This is it, you realise.  This is why you brought it:  The moment you take control and change Sienna’s life for the better.  All you need to do is take the mask out and slam it onto the skank’s face.  Make her a golem.<br/>
<br/>
She’ll never hit you again.</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121222222111212
author_id: rugal
title: What a Wonderful World
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Your hand rests on the mask. She'd be under your control, having to do what you say. You could tell her to be nicer to you or tell her to get lost and never come back. Put it on her and Sienna's misery, now your own, is over. It'd be that easy. So why are you hesitating? Why don't you just take that mask and slam it on her face? That's why you brought the stuff. That's what you want, right? What Sienna wants? So do it. Smash it right on her weathered face. Don't hesitate, don't stop, just fucking DO IT!<br/>
<br/>
"What do you have in there?" asks Diane as she finally notices your hand in the bag.<br/>
<br/>
Well whatever chance you had is gone now so you remove your hand. "Pfft!" you scoff as you walk past her. "I'm going to bed."<br/>
<br/>
She doesn't seem to have any inclination to follow you and keep things going so you head down the very short hallway and through the door to your new room on the left. Like most everything else about the apartment it's very small, probably about half the size of your old room at best. In fact the entire apartment could probably fit rather neatly into the downstairs floor of your old house with room in the house to spare.<br/>
<br/>
You throw your bag down, toss your clothes on the floor, and throw on a long and ratty t-shirt as a makeshift nightshirt. As you lay down in bed you're suddenly very conscious of your monetary situation both in your old life and your new. It causes you to reflect and examine the situation you're in, a very Sienna thing you realize as it's something she does a lot.<br/>
<br/>
Before all of the shit that's happened you lived in Acheson, a small town right outside of Saratoga Falls; technically its own place but culturally and generally it's just a small bedroom community with everyone working, shopping and more in Saratoga Falls. Your family wasn't rich but living in Acheson definitely puts you more in the upper-middle class strata thanks to your dad having a good job at Salopek. You never really wanted, always had a relatively stable life outside of school, your family owns their house even.<br/>
<br/>
Now, though? Now you're starting to see just how good you had it. The apartment complex Sienna lives in is on the north side of Hoover Boulevard, one of the main roads through the city. Specifically it's the area that starts at the intersection of Hoover and Coolidge Road. It's poor and run down, a lot of the northern part of the city was until gentrification, and the type of area people tend to use as a warning. "Stay away from Hoover and Coolidge" is one of the first things residents tell people coming in from out of town.<br/>
<br/>
Yet it's mostly what Sienna has known. She knows that she lived a little better but that was when she was a little kid and once her mom left... well it's been hard. She's dealt with having her home broken into or hearing a loud noise and wondering whether that was a gun or a car backfiring. There's been times her and her dad had to stay with friends or live week to week in a motel because her father hadn't been able to make rent. Mostly that's fallen away, Arnie Goldman gets steady work now and could probably afford a slightly better place, albeit in the same area of town, but he's said he doesn't want every dime tied up in rent.<br/>
<br/>
A thought, a feeling really, hits you in the back of the head. That's why you hesitated with the mask. Sienna's scraped by her whole life. She's a fighter and nothing has ever come easy so maybe she doesn't see the easy way out as an option; that this will all, once she's out of high school and in the "real world", make her a stronger person.<br/>
<br/>
Or maybe that's just what she's convinced herself over the years. Most people just see her as that rude, poor, slutty bitch and it's an image she doesn't really make an effort to dispel. Outside of her friends she doesn't talk much about herself; people have already formed their opinions and it's not like there's much of anything she can do to change them she figures. Even then there's stuff she keeps quiet about with the exception of one person.<br/>
<br/>
Fatima... now that you're Sienna you get to take another look at her and realize that you had her wrong. Fatima and Sienna first met in the fourth grade where they were in the same class. That was one of a handful of rather low periods, money-wise, for Sienna and her dad and the teasing and taunting from the other kids was constant. Fatima eventually stepped in to try and get the other kids to stop. Sienna didn't take that well at first and in fact was actively hostile to Fatima's initial attempts at friendship. Her persistence paid off however and she was slowly able to break throw Sienna's defenses and ever since the two have been as close as sisters despite their rather opposite personalities.<br/>
<br/>
They're a bit of yin and yang in that regard: Sienna, the emotional and hotheaded cynic. Fatima, the more levelheaded and calm optimist.<br/>
<br/>
It was actually through Fatima that Sienna met the rest of the group partway into her sophomore year. Fatima was in an artsy phase--she still does art, just not in the kind of overly "I'm an artist" manner--and wound up striking up a friendship with Jelena. Jelena was long time friends with Andrea and Charles Hartlein and that's how she got pulled in with them. Sienna's got other friends and acquaintances of course, chief among them her bandmates, but the other four have been her core group if only by virtue of going to the same school.<br/>
<br/>
But as much as she appreciates her friends it's always going to be Fatima who has a place above and beyond the rest. It's Fatima that she knows she can spill her guts to about the way she feels. Fatima who's been there for the best of times and as a constant form of support during the low times. Like Patterson.<br/>
<br/>
It's an incident you'd heard about back when you were still Will as opposed to this... gestalt, you guess. It's become a rather infamous story at Westside. Steve Patterson, playboy that he is, hit on Sienna and Sienna responded by kicking him in the balls. Now that you've got Sienna's perspective on the matter, though, you're decidedly more uncomfortable by the events. Steve practically cornered her, a lot of being persistent despite her repeated refusals. There was grabbing of both her ass and breasts, there was the kissing of her neck, and then the forced kiss all the while claiming that she's the village bicycle so he's just taking his turn to ride. That's when she kicked him and ran off.<br/>
<br/>
Of course, Patterson told everyone the version that made Sienna look bad while Sienna? The only person she ever told was Fatima; she still doesn't trust anyone else enough to let the other members of the group in on what really happened. So for them it's an amusing story about how that asshole got what was coming to him. It's something that doesn't make sense to the Will portion of you but to the Sienna portion it's perfectly logical: at the end of the day you generally only have yourself to look out for you. Fatima's the exception for her, her dad as well to a slightly lesser extent.<br/>
<br/>
You glance at the alarm clock and are surprised that a little over an hour has gone by. But then, you realize, Sienna's lost whole nights of sleep left to her own thoughts. Well losing a night isn't something <i>you</i> plan on doing so you do your best to put everything aside and drift off. Briefly you wonder if you've made a mistake but realize that even if you have it's too late to back out anyway.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"So where'd you and Andrea get off to yesterday?" Fatima asks as you wait loiter around by your locker waiting for the first bell to ring.<br/>
<br/>
For you part you just shrug, "She just wanted to hang out a bit. Some shit about we've never talked, just the two of us."<br/>
<br/>
"That's kind of surprising." she replies, "Maybe she's actually looking to warm up to the rest of us. We've been friends with her for a while but she still kinda treats us like, I dunno, acquaintances or something some times. Even Jelena."<br/>
<br/>
"Maybe she's trying to get in my pants." you say jokingly.<br/>
<br/>
Fatima, for her part, just groans and the two of you continue to converse before parting when the bell finally does ring. You're admittedly a bit anxious for the day to end because you've got practice after school. Sienna plays in a band and while music is one of her big loves to her a practice is a practice. But a while back you held a kind of goofy dream of being a rock star. It went nowhere, of course, and was never anything more than a "hey wouldn't that be neat" deal but now? Well as rough a life as Sienna has you can't really deny that the thought of being an actual musician is more than a little exciting.</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212222221112121
author_id: rugal
title: A Discussion Among, and About, Friends
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"So we know <i>why</i> the pyramids were built which moves us, then, onto the question of <i>how</i> they were built." says Mr. Fernandez as he paces back and forth across the front of the room. He turns, his small eyes, large and hooked nose, and thinning hair homing in on a student a few seats over from where you sit. "Mr. Small, what do you think?"<br/>
<br/>
Perry Small gives a noncommittal shrug. "I dunno, aliens or something? Who knows?" he says to a few snickers from the class.<br/>
<br/>
"For a channel about history..." Fernandez mutters before turning to someone else. "Ms. Lieber, how about you?"<br/>
<br/>
"Um, well we always learned that it was done with slave labor." states Shauna Lieber.<br/>
<br/>
"A more reasonable theory but again, wrong." Fernandez replies, "Surprisingly enough they were built with a standard, paid workforce. You see the Nile floods and farmland suddenly becomes unusable and, as we will learn throughout this class, a large contingent of poors and peasants with no work or indeed opportunities in general is never a good thing for the ruling classes. So the Egyptian government would put those people to work..."<br/>
<br/>
You stop paying attention as he continues going on with his lecture. Fatima would probably be interested in this stuff but Sienna couldn't care less. Which is about her feelings towards school in general. Not that she doesn't recognize the value of school it's just that she doesn't particularly care. The book smarts and things like that, that's for other people. But Mr. Fernandez's history class is even worse in that regard and a big part of that is the girl sitting near the far wall.<br/>
<br/>
Molly Shaw is a cunt. Moreso than that she's a slut. Even moreso than that is how she used those two "skills" in concert to steal away DeMarcus Simmons, Fatima's now ex-boyfriend. They hadn't been dating long, only about two months, but somewhere along the way he got it in his head that he wanted Molly. It's something Sienna had tried to warn Fatima about, that DeMarcus was a pussy hound, but she got it in her head that she could be the one to get him to settle down. She thought wrong of course.<br/>
<br/>
Sienna's not sure if Molly did it on purpose or if DeMarcus just got the idea in his head, probably the former; Molly's not as good at hiding who she really is as she thinks after all. Sienna never really liked Molly, in the same way she doesn't particularly care for a lot of people, but now? Well if Molly likes dick so much she'd be more than glad to rip DeMarcus' off and shove it right up Molly's cavernous cunt.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Jonathan Straussler's place? Really?" Fatima asks in amazement as you sit at lunch with her, Jelena and Andrea.<br/>
<br/>
"Ugh, why the fuck did you say anything?" you ask as you glare at Andrea.<br/>
<br/>
"Because I don't think we should be lying or keeping things from each other." she replies returning your glare before turning back to everyone else, "Basically he's seen me at some swimming events or something and invited me over a few days back. Said he wanted to get to know me better."<br/>
<br/>
Jelena cocks an eyebrow at that, "I'm surprised that a.) you went and b.) he apparently watches our swimming stuff. The swim team isn't exactly that popular."<br/>
<br/>
"Well apparently he likes to watch a lot of the sports over at Eastman so he probably saw me at a meet there." Andrea replies, "And to be honest... well everyone knows about his family and is place. Who doesn't want to see it?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, well, I didn't feel right." you say recalling Sienna's own feelings of being in the house, "Like it's just... it's fucking big. I look around and all it fucking does is remind me of everything I don't have. I like a big cock and all but not when the dude's waving it around to show it off to everyone."<br/>
<br/>
"So you're not going back?" Andrea asks. "He told me he liked you. Said you had a lot of fire and passion and came off as very 'real'."<br/>
<br/>
You snort, "Well if he wants real maybe he should head over to my neighborhood." you reply as you fold your arms. "Or maybe not. We got enough rich assholes turning the north side into their sterile little yuppie liberal hellhole."<br/>
<br/>
"That's good, though, right?" asks Jelena as she eyes you, "I figured you'd know better than any of us how bad that area can be."<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, so?" you reply defiantly, "That don't mean I want some rich fucks coming in and building their shitty coffee houses and putting salmon in the fish tacos. All that shit's gonna do is drive the people who live there out and it's just gonna make the shitty areas even worse."<br/>
<br/>
You sit there stewing for a moment before Andrea turns back to Fatima and Jelena. "Anyway you guys should come out. He's already met Charles and Sienna, he said it'd be good to hang out with you guys as well."<br/>
<br/>
"We'll definitely have to get out there some time." Fatima states, "Come on, Sienna, it'll be fun. Probably."<br/>
<br/>
That catches your attention. "Well if he wants us to all hang out there for a pow wow I guess I can't say no, right?" you ask rhetorically.<br/>
<br/>
After a bit more conversation Andrea decides she wants to pull you aside and talk.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
<br/>
"So what do you think?" she asks you once you're away from most of the people. "How are you liking it so far?"<br/>
<br/>
You shrug, "Her life's pretty shitty but, eh, I can try and make it better. Worse comes to worse we've got the Straussler's under control so I can probably pack up and go out there."<br/>
<br/>
"Or stay with me." she replies with a small smile, "What about Jelena and Fatima?"<br/>
<br/>
"What <i>about</i> them?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"You think either of them would make a good home for Frank? Or maybe for the last bit of substantia we have or a mask or something?" she asks.<br/>
<br/>
You glare at her, "You don't have any second thoughts about that?" you ask, "These are your friends and so far you've just, more or less, sacrificed two of them to give me and Joe homes and now you're trying to get the other two as well."<br/>
<br/>
She gives a small shrug. "Probably there's a part of Andrea in here that doesn't like it but I'm not really the same as you." she explains, "You're, what, basically a combination of Will and Sienna right? The two of them merged into one person. But it's not like that for me. I'm just Prescott's anima so it's more like Will Prescott in Andrea Varnsworth's body."<br/>
<br/>
"That's still a pretty fucking cold attitude to have." you say as you lean against a wall, "I can't really say much about Jelena. It's not like Sienna really shares girl talk shit with her all the time. Fatima..." you pause and take the moment to look her dead in the eyes, "Keep her out of it."<br/>
<br/>
That seems to catch her off guard. "You've been running things and been all gung ho about all of this. So why's that a bone of contention?"<br/>
<br/>
You continue staring at her, completely unblinking, "Because like you said I'm a combo of Will and Sienna now and that Sienna part of me? She doesn't want Fatima involved in that shit so that means I don't want her involved in that shit." You take a step forward and, due to being about chin height with Andrea, look up at her. "We might be friends, we might have part of the same anima, but I'm dead fucking serious. You involve her and I'll drown you in that stupid fucking pool."<br/>
<br/>
"Alright, Fatima's out of the question." Andrea replies backing off a bit, "We'll still have to find a place for Frank though."<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah and we will." you state, "Just not tonight. I got practice and I ain't skipping out on that. We'll meet up tomorrow after school and go over our options. Let Frank see what he likes."<br/>
<br/>
Andrea lets out a small laugh. "Letting Frank choose may as well make it our choice." she says with an amused expression, "Even with our anima in there he's still so... so aloof. So he'll probably grumble and grouse and then say he doesn't care, he has no preference, and we should just choose. Maybe I should put him with me on the swim team. Bethany's got a nice body..." she trails off.<br/>
<br/>
"Maybe we should throw him in someone unpopular. He'd probably love being Morganna Hollis or Gracie McGraw." you reply.<br/>
<br/>
Andrea laughs a little more at that says that she'll see you later as the bell rings. The rest of the day goes about as usual for Sienna. Slow and boring broken up with with the occasional bitchy exchange with someone like Amanda Ferguson or some other self-important bitch. Once the last bell rings you make your way out to your car and drive home to grab your guitar and other equipment, thankful that Diane isn't there, and then head off to the house out by Keyserling that Andi Kramer, your bassist and main singer, shares with a few other people to get ready for practice.</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212122222211121211
author_id: rugal
title: Dischord
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"Damn, you kinda need to slow down you know." Andi says as she plops down onto the couch, "Not like we're actually playing a show or anything, we talkin' 'bout practice."<br/>
<br/>
"That reference is, like, a decade out of date Andi." you say as you crack open a beer. "And shit, I dunno, I just feel kinda renewed and shit."<br/>
<br/>
"You having problems with the bitch?" she asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Nah, not any more than usual." you state. A brief flash and you pull up a thought that Sienna has a tendency to throw herself head first into her music when stressed, especially when Diane is involved. "I just kinda figure that's my ticket out right? Music's what I love, I'm almost out of school, so like I gotta start taking it seriously if I wanna do anything with it, ya know?"<br/>
<br/>
"I feel you." Andi nods, "But like you don't want to be one of those people who gets obsessed with making the perfect song and then we have to drag you out of the room with the crazy writing all over the wall." She takes a drag of her cigarette and flicks the ash into an ashtray, "But I get it. You gotta get away some times."<br/>
<br/>
You snort, "Easy for you to say. You've got a thing going what with the fiance and the bartender gig and getting to hang out with me." You grin as Andi rolls her eyes.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh yeah, truly I'm the luckiest woman alive." she replies, "But yeah I've got things together <i>now</i> but like... you ever been to juvie?" You shake your head, "Turns out people don't like it when you break into their cars. Definitely don't like it when you keep it up after you've already gotten in trouble for it."<br/>
<br/>
"True, so then why do it?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"'Cause I was a bored middle class girl with parents that didn't pay just enough attention." she replies, "Fall in with some shitty people and that's a recipe for juvenile delinquency that lasts you until you straighten your ass up and realize you're a moron."<br/>
<br/>
"You know most kids wanna rebel, they get tattoos." you reply jokingly.<br/>
<br/>
"No shit, when do you think I started getting this?" she replies.<br/>
<br/>
You take a moment to look at the intricate art that runs down to just below her elbow on her left arm, the design on her inner forearm on the right as well as a few more on her right arm and though the shirt she's wearing now covers it you know there's another on her upper-back. To be frank the Will part of you would be a little off-put. Andi's Eurasian features and slender frame make her attractive but you yourself have never liked them. The Sienna portion though finds them incredibly neat though, to the point where she's thought seriously about getting one herself. Lack of money, most everything she gets from playing weekly shows around town basically goes to getting her through the week, is the main thing stopping her.<br/>
<br/>
Sienna, you can tell, looks up to her a bit.<br/>
<br/>
"Honestly, Sienna, you should probably learn to not just dive headfirst into everything." Nadine adds finally speaking up. "You've lasted this long so you can definitely make it to the end of the school year."<br/>
<br/>
"Look, I already told you guys everything's fine." Both of them eye you oddly, "Fine by my standards, jeez. Look lemme just have fun playing shit alright?"<br/>
<br/>
"Hmm, but with you just because something's fine one day doesn't mean it'll be the next." Nadine replies teasingly while you flip her off.<br/>
<br/>
It's all friendly of course but she's right. Nadine Martin, the band's drummer, is a quiet person with a good ability to read people. Like Andi she's slim but it's a sinewy sort of slim which makes sense. Nadine's a vegetarian and in general treats her body like a temple. Probably she could try out for a sports team over at Eastman, where she goes to school, if she felt like it but she seems to just enjoy the exercise and fitness aspect of it and says that it makes her feel good. Her build, too, helps contribute to her overall semi-androgynous appearance.<br/>
<br/>
Some more conversation takes place before you head back to the garage to continue with practice. By the time that some of Andi's housemates, including her fiance, start arriving you wind down and goodbyes are exchanged as you and Nadine head home for the night.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You arrive home a little after 9:30, your dad's truck not there. You put your stuff back in your room and head out to the kitchen to get something to drink when Diane comes walking out of the room she and Sienna's father share. Her eyes narrow as she spots you, "You're home late." she says with all the concern of a lion spotting a wounded wildebeest.<br/>
<br/>
"I was practicing." you say plainly while looking for a glass, "God, you can't even wash dishes while you're here?"<br/>
<br/>
You feel her hand on your shoulder and whip her around. "No, I can't, because unlike <i>you</i> I actually work all day and by the time I get back here I'm tired." she sniffs, "Maybe instead of staying out all day with your loser friends you should actually do some work around here."<br/>
<br/>
You glare at her, "My friends are fine, don't say shit about them."<br/>
<br/>
"Your friends are losers, just like you." she replies dismissively, "They're just like you. They laze around all day and don't do shit except get drunk or whatever it is you all do. 'Least the hadji girl knows how to keep her mouth shu--"<br/>
<br/>
She's cut off by you smacking her across the face. Hard. You stare at her and your eyes go wide. It's something you've wanted to do since the procedure that merged you and Sienna. It's something Sienna's wanted to do since the moment she met Diane. Neither part expected it to ever happen but her attempt to badmouth your friends and especially Fatima...<br/>
<br/>
Diane looks shocked for a moment before a furious expression appears on her face.<br/>
<br/>
"Look, Diane, I didn't mean to--"<br/>
<br/>
"Get out." she says quietly.<br/>
<br/>
"What are you--"<br/>
<br/>
"Get your shit and get out!" she exclaims.<br/>
<br/>
You look at her like she has a second head growing out of her shoulder. "What the fuck are you talking about? This isn't your place, you can't kick me out."<br/>
<br/>
"GET YOUR SHIT AND GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!" she yells while pushing you back and into a wall.<br/>
<br/>
You stand there stunned for a moment and without a word head to your room to grab some clothes and your musical equipment. No words are either as you pass back by her and out the door. You put the stuff in your car and decide to go back in and grab a few more clothes; after all she's probably just bullshitting you but why risk it? However when you try to open the door you find that it's locked. So you knock and there's no answer. You ring the doorbell and again no answer.<br/>
<br/>
"Open the fucking door you bitch!" you yell as you pound on the door. Again, no answer. You turn and slump against the wall next to the door and put your head in your hands. You stay like that for a few minutes before you hear a voice say something.<br/>
<br/>
"You alright?" you look up to see Darcy Whitehead, an Eastman student who lives a few doors down from you, standing over you.<br/>
<br/>
"Fuck off." you reply, a typically hostile Sienna response but you immediately think better of it and shake your head. "No, I'm not alright. I just got kicked out of the apartment and that bitch locked me out."<br/>
<br/>
"Why didn't your dad do anything?" she asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Not here." you state simply, "He's out on a late call probably. Doesn't matter, bitch has got him whipped anyway so it's not like he'd do anything."<br/>
<br/>
Darcy, from the times Sienna's seen her and talked to her has come off as a rather intense person and her face seems permanently set in a hard expression. But here it's actually softer, there's genuine concern as she reaches a hand down and helps you stand up. "Look my mom and I don't have a lot, we wouldn't be living in this dump if we did, but if you need a place to sleep my mom would probably let you crash for the night."<br/>
<br/>
Sienna, being the stubborn and pig-headed person she is, would probably tell Darcy to get bent because she's fine. But that's just a defense isn't it? Just a barrier that she puts up between herself and others. It's an approach that's left most people at a distance and while Sienna seems to think that's how she likes it is that really how it should be? You're her now and ever since you've stepped in you've wanted to improve it. You didn't get the opportunity to put Diane under a mask so why not start here, instead, and start taking down those walls?</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121222222111212111
author_id: rugal
title: All You Need is Love
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>You eye Darcy for a moment weighing your options: do the Sienna thing or try an alternate approach? To be frank you're not exactly excited about the possibility of sleeping in your car tonight and you can tell that deep down, underneath her tough girl exterior, Sienna wouldn't want that either. So you soften your expression and let out a small sigh. You answer her by walking to your car to grab a change of clothes. As you walk back to where she's standing you give her another look, one of weariness but also gratefulness.<br/>
<br/>
"You didn't have to." you say quietly, "We barely even know each other."<br/>
<br/>
Darcy just shakes her head, "I'm not saying you've got a home with us or anything since we don't really have enough for an extra mouth but for tonight..." she trails off for a moment, "Look, you need some help and I'd be a pretty awful person if I didn't offer any, right?"<br/>
<br/>
"For all I know you <i>are</i> an awful person." you give her a small smile though, "Thanks. For real."<br/>
<br/>
The two of you enter her apartment and a woman, dressed in loose fitting clothes for lounging and her hair messy, looks up from her book. "Darcy, did you check on that noise..." she then notices you and stands up. "Oh! You're the girl from the apartment a few doors down!"<br/>
<br/>
"Sienna, yeah, I was kinda the noise." you state.<br/>
<br/>
Darcy's mother proves a sympathetic ear as you sit down on the love seat and go over what's happened. "Well to be honest you probably could've made a bit more of an effort." she says but it's not in an accusatory tone of voice, "But if something is toxic from the start no amount of effort is really going to make things good. Believe me, honey, I know."<br/>
<br/>
"Thanks. Um, hopefully I'm not just imposing or anything Mrs. Whitehead." you say.<br/>
<br/>
"Imposing? Lord no, don't worry about that. You need a place to sleep so for tonight our home is your home." she replies. Her voice and expression are warm and maternal and set you at ease. "Oh and Mrs. Whitehead is just so formal. Call me Yolanda."<br/>
<br/>
That puts you even more at ease and you smile. "Yeah, alright, well thanks for letting me crash on your couch tonight Yolanda."<br/>
<br/>
"Really, don't think anything of it. It's what any upstanding member of society would do." she says, "Hmm, have you had anything to eat?"<br/>
<br/>
That takes you by surprise, "Um, well like this afternoon but I'm fine."<br/>
<br/>
Yolanda shakes her head as she stands up, "Definitely too long between meals. I'll heat you up some leftovers." And with that she's up and rooting through the kitchen.<br/>
<br/>
Meanwhile you look over at Darcy. "Your mom seems pretty nice." you state quietly.<br/>
<br/>
"She tries. Things have been rough since dad walked out a few years back." she replies, "She's sacrificed a lot to give me a chance."<br/>
<br/>
"No shit, your dad?" you ask, "I guess that's something we've got in common then. Just it was my mom and that was like a twelve years back. Dad's sacrificed a lot too for me." you look down, "That's why I hate what that bitch has done. She's just, like, driven a wedge into everything and taken him away."<br/>
<br/>
The beeping of the microwave goes off and Yolanda brings out a bowl of beef stroganoff that you graciously accept. To your surprise it's actually pretty good and she seems to appreciate the compliment.<br/>
<br/>
An hour or so later and you're laying on the couch, the lights off. What you said to Darcy... it frustrates you. Why did it have to be Diane? Was your dad just grateful for the attention? But he could see how miserable you've been since she came into your lives, right? He had to have seen, he'd be blind otherwise. As you drift off to sleep you let out a soft moan of displeasure. It's not that you don't like your dad having a woman, you just don't like this particular one. The question repeats: why did it have to be her? Why Diane? Why couldn't it have been someone better?<br/>
<br/>
Why couldn't it have been someone like Yolanda?<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"So hey, I'm homeless." you state matter-of-factly at lunch the next afternoon causing Fatima to do a near spit take. "Bitch kicked me out and it's not like my dad was there so..."<br/>
<br/>
"Why didn't you call?!" Fatima asks with a slight whine to her voice.<br/>
<br/>
You shrug, "I'unno. Figured your parents aren't really gonna go for you taking in strays."<br/>
<br/>
"They'd take you in!" she exclaims before shifting a bit. "Probably." she adds a bit quietly and then a bit more quietly than that, "Maybe."<br/>
<br/>
"You're not going to be homeless." Andrea states, "Where'd you even sleep last night?"<br/>
<br/>
"A neighbor's place but that was like a one night thing." you reply, "Look I'll find something don't worry. It'll probably just be a one day thing anyway."<br/>
<br/>
"If you need a place to stay you can come out to my place." Jelena says.<br/>
<br/>
"Your sister and her friends aren't gonna care?" asks Andrea.<br/>
<br/>
"Not as far as I know." Jelena replies with a shrug, "K.C.'s the only one that's really there most of the time anyway. With the others it's more of a place to crash that they split bills on or whatever."<br/>
<br/>
Andrea turns to you, "Still, you can stay with me if you want." she says, "I could definitely convince my mom to let you stay with us."<br/>
<br/>
You note the subtle emphasis she puts on the word "convince" and you know exactly what she means by that. But why even worry about it, especially if Jelena already offered you a place? Is she trying to put you in a position where you'll be a little more under her control like you suspected before? Well you're not going to give her the satisfaction if that's the case. "You really don't think it'll be a problem?" you ask Jelena as you look in her direction.<br/>
<br/>
"It'll be fine." she replies.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, then, I'll see you after school." you say.<br/>
<br/>
When lunch ends you linger around and go with Fatima to her locker. "You're going to be alright, right?" she asks as she digs through to get out the books she's going to need for the second half of the day.<br/>
<br/>
"I'll be fine, don't worry." you tell her reassuringly, "I've bounced back from worse shit than this."<br/>
<br/>
"Like I said, you really should've called."<br/>
<br/>
You brush that off, "And like I said your parents would've never gone for it."<br/>
<br/>
"Mom would've." she replies, "Dad... ugh, yeah you're probably right." She then turns to you after closing her locker. "We're still good for grabbing a place after graduation right?"<br/>
<br/>
"Definitely." you say simply.<br/>
<br/>
"You know you're going to have to get a <i>real</i> job, right?" she asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah yeah, I know..." you trail off though as you see Justin Roth pass by. He's an outdoorsy type and looks it with a slim yet muscular build and skin tanned dark from long exposure to the sun and elements and a shaggy dark brown hair falls loosely and into his eyes.<br/>
<br/>
"Ask him out." Fatima whispers to you and you turn to her. "You practically drool every time he passes by so ask him out."<br/>
<br/>
Sienna definitely has the hots for him and you and her aren't quite sure why she's never done it. He's about the only person that really leaves her tongue tied. Of course if you wanted him, well, now you've got ways of making that happen.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You head back to the apartment to get in and get some stuff that you need, your laptop and iPod and some other things, and you mentally smack yourself for forgetting you had a key to get in. You were so worked up over what happened last night that it completely slipped your mind. You're surprised, however, to see your dad's truck as you pull in and unsurprisingly, after that, the door is unlocked anyway.<br/>
<br/>
"Sienna!" your father, Arnie, replies as you step in. "I tried calling you, how come you didn't answer?"<br/>
<br/>
You pull your phone out, "Sorry I forgot my charger so, you know, kinda dead." You then go and sit down on the couch next to him, "What're you even doing here? I figured you'd be at work."<br/>
<br/>
"I took the day off." he says simply, "A lot of crap happened last night and I just didn't want to deal with anything today."<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, well, sorry for worrying you and going off on Diane like that." you say.<br/>
<br/>
"Well... you're not kicked out anymore." he replies and after being quiet for a moment he continues, "She is."<br/>
<br/>
"She is?"<br/>
<br/>
He nods, "Yeah. I guess it took her kicking you out like that for me to finally face reality." He sighs, "Look Sienna, I'm sorry. I should've paid more attention to what was really going on. I guess I just convinced myself that I had someone so it was just you being unreasonable."<br/>
<br/>
"I was probably being a bitch kinda." you reply.<br/>
<br/>
Arnie just shakes his head, "Doesn't matter. You're still my daughter, my flesh and blood." He then looks directly at you, "Yolanda told me you stayed at her place last night. God it never should've come to that."<br/>
<br/>
"Dad, don't kick your ass over it." you say, "You've sacrificed a lot for me and I know you wouldn't treat me like shit on purpose. But, uh, I'm actually just here to get a few things." He eyes you and you sigh, "I was moving out after graduation anyway this just kind of kickstarted it. Jelena offered me a place to stay so I'm kinda moving in with her."<br/>
<br/>
"Sienna..."<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah I know but like I'm moving across town not across the country." you reply.<br/>
<br/>
You gather up what you need and move it out to your car. Your dad tells you that he hopes things work out and to drop by every so often. You exchange hugs and tell each other that you love one another and then you head out the door. As you do you see Yolanda's car pull up and she gets out.<br/>
<br/>
A thought hits you. Why <i>couldn't</i> your father have someone like Yolanda? You've still got the mask and material, why not leave a little parting gift for your dad? Besides that'd make things easier for him, her, and Darcy wouldn't it?</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212222221112121112
author_id: rugal
title: New and Old Homes
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>You watch Yolanda for a moment as she walks up the stairs to the second level where both of our apartments are. You'd be doing your dad a favor but Yolanda was nicer to you than she had to be and, well, do you want to be like how Andrea seems to be? Using your friends, allies, and other associated people so callously? Well that's what you've been doing right? And that's what your companions have been unhappy about. Hell, that's why you have those companions in the first place.<br/>
<br/>
But the past is the past and maybe you can do a little better from now on. At the very least you don't want to take Darcy's mother away from her for all intents and purposes. There will probably be times where you'll have to use people you're close to but Yolanda isn't anyone that'll help you out so you figure there's no point anyway.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, Sienna, you're back home?" she asks as she walks towards your direction.<br/>
<br/>
"Um, kinda." you reply a little nervously. "Actually, one of my friends said she'd let me stay with her so... I'm moving out."<br/>
<br/>
That seems to take her by surprise but she tempers it quickly. "I had a little conversation with him earlier before I left for work. He seems like a nice man."<br/>
<br/>
"He's a good guy, yeah." you reply simply, "Just I've kinda had things I've been thinkin' about the last little while and the stuff from yesterday just made me realize that I've gotta get my life into gear."<br/>
<br/>
You're surprised when she reaches over and gives you a hug, "Well, I know we didn't really know each other but hopefully things work out."<br/>
<br/>
"Thanks." you reply.<br/>
<br/>
"And make sure you don't keep your dad lonely." she adds.<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, definitely. I'd be a pretty crappy kid if I left him to rot on his own." you say before adding, "Thanks for last night too."<br/>
<br/>
With that you head out to your car, put the key in the ignition, and head out to your new home.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"So this is the girl you were telling me about?" the young woman, Jelena's older sister K.C., asks. The neutral tone of voice and the blatant way she's assessing you, you can tell she's not completely sold on the idea. You've never been over to Jelena's place much, if the entire group met it was usually at Andrea's due to the privacy provided by her mother being out a lot, and you've seen K.C. even less so you're not too surprised by the fact she probably doesn't fully remember you.<br/>
<br/>
"Sienna, yeah." Jelena says as she moves over to the side of her sister, who's leaning against a wall at the entrance to a hallway. "Come on, you've seen her here before."<br/>
<br/>
"Sure but not enough to really know anything about her." she replies. There's a brief quiet before she takes a hand and ruffles her (meticulously) messy, just shy of shoulder-length, lavender-dyed hair, "Eh, look. I'm doing this for my sister alright? Just don't bring a lot of drama in and we'll be good."<br/>
<br/>
You watch as she leaves, she's a rather waifish figure. Jelena herself is willowy so she's naturally skinny but part of you wonders, probably pointlessly, if there's something else going on there. "Nice girl." you reply sarcastically.<br/>
<br/>
"K.C.'s fine, don't worry." Jelena reassures you, "What we <i>should</i> worry about is getting you set up."<br/>
<br/>
"So you got a guest room around here or anything?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
Jelena shakes her head, "All of them are taken so you're actually going to be in my room." there's a brief pause before she quickly adds, "Hopefully that's fine."<br/>
<br/>
You shrug "Yeah, whatever. Room's a room." You and Jelena then grab your stuff out of your car and put it into her room before you take a seat on the futon that you'll be using.<br/>
<br/>
"I know it's not much," Jelena says, "but..."<br/>
<br/>
"Pfft, you kiddin'?" you ask, "Shit's nicer than any place I've lived. Shit you've been to my apartment before." You don't speak for a moment before quietly adding, "It's weird but like that place was a piece of shit. That whole area was shit. But I think I'm gonna miss it."<br/>
<br/>
Jelena takes a seat next to you. "Well you've lived most of your life over there right? So it makes sense that you'd have some affection for it, warts and all. Home is home."<br/>
<br/>
"What about you?" you ask her, "You ever get all nostalgic and shit?"<br/>
<br/>
"Me? No." the reply surprises you in its bluntness, "Most people are like that but, of course, not all are and even people who get nostalgic get nostalgic for different reasons." She leans back and crosses her arms, "I don't really have anything to be nostalgic about though. My family came over from Niš when I was three and my parents in general sucked, especially my dad. Any affection I have for my family is for my sister. We've always been close and she took me in when she didn't need to."<br/>
<br/>
"So why'd you all come over anyway?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"The city where my family's from is big in electronics and stuff. It's something my dad was really good at so he got recruited by Protean Industries since they're always looking for talent or something." she replies, "Not as big back then as they are now but it was still a well paying job that he'd have been an idiot to pass up."<br/>
<br/>
You grunt, "Maybe that's why I've never been as close to all of you guys as Fatima. Even she took a while." you state, "Like I always feel out of place. You grow up poor and you become very aware of the money everyone else has."<br/>
<br/>
"You don't need to be self-conscious about everything." Jelena says as she shifts and leans forward.<br/>
<br/>
You shake your head, "I guess since you came over here before you even started school you probably don't really get the whole feeling of being an outsider, a <i>real</i> outsider." You take a breath, "I know we ain't never talked about shit before but if we're roomies I guess you deserve to know about me. One of my bandmates asked me yesterday if I'd ever been to juvie. I told her no and that's true; just means I never got caught though."<br/>
<br/>
"So you ran with a bad crowd."<br/>
<br/>
"Buncha shit bags." you reply, "My guitar? Got it in middle school. Real easy to get the money to grab one from a cheap-ass pawn shop when you're taking shit from cars. That was a bonus though. Lotta times we were short on money so you need 'find' some shit, pawn it off, and there's dinner."<br/>
<br/>
Jelena stares straight ahead, "And your dad didn't know?"<br/>
<br/>
"Dunno." you shrug, "Probably he knew but he didn't say anything. That's kinda why I gave that up, this was before I met you and Andrea and Charles. Even if we needed it I know that I was probably letting him down. Fatima let me know all the time that it wasn't gonna do me any good; didn't want to let her down either."<br/>
<br/>
"Those are the only reasons?" she asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Nah. You ever see The Warriors?" you ask. Jelena nods, "Well like the song at the end says, it's survival in the city when you live from day to day. That's it though, you're just surviving from one day to the next. There's no future in that. And every day I see people, they know what they want, they got a plan, they got a future." You sigh, "I needed to get out eventually. I don't wanna have no future. Last night just kinda told me that part of my life really was over and done with and its time to move on and try and pick myself up."<br/>
<br/>
"You sound like you're regretful over everything." she replies, "Kind of surprising given how you were railing against gentrification and rich fucks yesterday."<br/>
<br/>
"No. Fuck no." you reply emphatically, "I'm not regretful over nothin'. You give me a time machine and you say I can go back and do things differently I'd tell you to get fucked. I'm probably not the best person but I am who I am and livin' there, my experiences, shit I've done, they all made me that. I wouldn't be me without it all. And the rich people?" you pause, "I want a better life for everyone who lives in that area. Nobody should have to live there wanting. But you get some rich fucks coming in and building coffee shops and fancy art centers, that all don't help nobody but themselves." You then look over at Jelena, "Sorry for rantin' and layin' all that shit out there."<br/>
<br/>
Jelena just shakes her head, "No it's good. I like watching people and I like listening to them. People tell me all kinds of things about themselves whether consciously or not. You're just more open about it." She smiles and it's a warm one, "That's what I like about you. That's probably what Fatima likes about you. So many people try to disguise who they are or how they feel. You've probably got stuff you keep to yourself, everyone does, but for the most part you're very honest and very open. You're a firebrand and that's a good quality to have. It'll get you in trouble but it draws people as well. It'll take you far, I think."<br/>
<br/>
You're quiet again for a moment and then offer a very simple, one word reply: "Thanks."<br/>
<br/>
Jelena brushes it off, however, "Introspection and stuff, getting things off our chest, that's good and healthy." She then gets a mischievous smile, "Anyway we've got some beer in the fridge so I'm gonna grab some. A little toast to new beginnings and such."</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212122222211121211121
author_id: rugal
title: Like
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"Hey Yell, ya ever like... ya want somethin' an' like you don't know if you can get it?" you ask later on that night through slurred and unfocused speech.<br/>
<br/>
"You're drunk." she replies simply.<br/>
<br/>
"Fuck yeah!" you exclaim, and while Sienna's obviously used to it it's uncharted territory for Will, "Like it's great 'cause then ya feel good an' I don't gotta worry about thinkin' about shit 'cause like I think about shit too much an' it's all super-depressing. 'Sides, you been drinkin' too so like don't tell me you ain't drunk."<br/>
<br/>
"Well I am a little buzzed..." she states before refocusing, "That's beside the point, though. What do you mean by that question?"<br/>
<br/>
"Like is there anyone you like? Like like. Like you want 'em to be Mrs. Petrovic or however it works an' you don't know if they'd like ya back?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
She's quiet for a moment as she readjusts herself on her bed. "Well you've got something on your mind so why don't you go first?" she asks flipping the question back to you.<br/>
<br/>
"That's cheating but yeah, sure, okay." you say. You yourself are quiet for a moment before... "Justin Roth!" you blurt out, "Like we never hang out an' probably he knows me as that bitch slut girl or somethin' but like is that wrong? Like so fucking what if I like to get laid <i>Kelsey</i>."<br/>
<br/>
"There's nothing wrong with it but you never think you should slow down?" Jelena asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Nope." the answer is simple although, of course, with caveats, "I'm a single girl so why the fuck do all those cunts gotta try an' make me feel like shit 'cause I wanna have sex an' I do with guys who also wanna have sex." You can tell that there's most definitely a sour expression on your face, "But like if I had a boyfriend I wouldn't be goin' out and fuckin' every guy around."<br/>
<br/>
"And you think Justin Roth is the guy you want?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah." you nod, "I just... I like fuckin' but I kinda want somethin' steady. I just wanna feel good an' like I kinda want that to be with one guy. Like I got a guy there an' he'll all tell me things an' hold me an' make me feel happy." You sigh, "I fucked 'im once ya know, but like I want somethin' more."<br/>
<br/>
"So why not ask him out?" she asks.<br/>
<br/>
"I already told you! He probably don't know who I am and he probably don't want shit to do with me anyway." you reply.<br/>
<br/>
"You don't know unless you ask." she replies, "You've got a show Saturday right? Just invite him out tomorrow and maybe you can catch up with him afterwards."<br/>
<br/>
Your eyes go wide with realization, "That is brilliant! Why don't you got anyone?"<br/>
<br/>
"Well what you initially asked..." she pauses, "There are people who you would like to have something more with but you realize that the two of you are just incompatible for... reasons. So you appreciate what you do have with them and realize that there are other people out there too."<br/>
<br/>
"Who the fuck don't wanna go out with you?" you ask aggressively, "Man like they must be real retarded 'cause like... I never told you 'cause we never spent no time together, just me an' you, but like you're really smart an' you're really nice an' you're pretty an you're cool too."<br/>
<br/>
Jelena seems a bit taken aback by that. "Well that's... that's nice but you don't have to flatter me or anything." she says with a slight laugh.<br/>
<br/>
"Nah, it's the truth." you reply, "I kinda feel bad I'm straight 'cause like if I wasn't I'd totally date you an' whoever does, they're gonna be real lucky and I'll kick their ass if they break your heart. Too bad about the whole orientation shit though, ha ha!"<br/>
<br/>
Jelena turns red a bit though you don't notice it as she shifts a bit and gives out a nervous laugh, "Yeah, that's... that's too bad." she quickly regains her composure though, "That's really nice though, thanks."<br/>
<br/>
The two of you then talk for a little bit longer before the night, and your BAC, catch up to you and you turn in for the night.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"You know I could've told you that 'celebrating' your new life like that is a bad idea." Fatima says at lunch next day.<br/>
<br/>
"Shu' up." you growl as your head is laid on your arms, which are in turn laid on the table, "I'm fine."<br/>
<br/>
"Oh yeah, you look like you're on top of the world right now." she replies teasingly, "I'm sure you said lots of things that were deep and profound and not at all embarrassing. Right Jelena?"<br/>
<br/>
"It was..." she pauses for a second, "It was fine. I was buzzed too so I probably said some dumb things too."<br/>
<br/>
"Did she cry about Justin?" Fatima asks, "Because she does that all the time when you get her liquored up enough."<br/>
<br/>
"Fuck you." you continue growling, "You're having soooo much fun aren't you?"<br/>
<br/>
Fatima giggles, "You're predictable, Sienna. I mean he's right over there." at that you lift your head and look in the direction she's pointing causing her to go into full-on laughter. "See what I mean?" she asks once she catches herself, "But seriously ask him out! What's the worst that happens, he says no?"<br/>
<br/>
"I told her the same thing last night." Jelena adds.<br/>
<br/>
Andrea just continues to remain silent on the matter. Typical, she doesn't ever get involved in the matters of mere mortals.<br/>
<br/>
"You know what? Fuck all y'all." you say as you stand up, "I'll fucking do it. Right now."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You march over to the area where Justin Roth is hanging out with Perry Small, Shep Tsosie and Dane Matthias. "Roth!" you exclaim as you get over there which causes all four of them to turn to you.<br/>
<br/>
"Whoa it's Sienna!" Dane exclaims, "Hey when do you think I can hang out with you and Andrea and everyone again?"<br/>
<br/>
"I told you fucking all those girls was going to catch up to you." Shep adds.<br/>
<br/>
"Who was fucking talking to you?" you ask, "I wanna talk to Roth. Now. All private-like."<br/>
<br/>
"Look, the lady wants to talk privately, she wants to talk privately. I'll catch up to you all later." Justin says to the rest of his group. Once they're gone he focuses back on you, "So what's up, Sienna? It's been a while hasn't it?"<br/>
<br/>
"Couple months." you reply. There's an uncomfortable silence before you grunt in frustration, "Look, I ain't really any good with this shit alright?" you say as shift nervously a bit, "But like my band's got a show tomorrow at Bacchus." you're referring to a small night club that tends to be a hot spot for local music acts, "So I was wondering if you... ugh, fuck, I dunno, this is stupid."<br/>
<br/>
"You want me to come out there, is that it?" he asks. He smiles and moves beside you to place an arm around you, "Never expected you to act like such a girl about it."<br/>
<br/>
"Fuck off." you reply turning red, "Shouldn't have fucking said anything in the first place."<br/>
<br/>
"Oh come on now, it's just a bit of friendly teasing." he says with a smile. "Look if you're inviting me it'd be rude to say no, right?" he asks as he leans down and gives you a quick peck on the cheek to your surprise. "I'll see you out there tomorrow then."<br/>
<br/>
You're practically floating after he leaves, letting the Sienna portion of you take over completely, but that reverie is interrupted by a voice cutting in. "Congrats but you're setting yourself up for disappointment."<br/>
<br/>
"Fuck off Andrea." you say as you turn to see her, "Were you back there the whole time? That's so goddamn creepy."<br/>
<br/>
"I'm trying to look out for you." she says as she walks closer, "Getting kicked out, moving in with Jelena, getting completely wasted, asking out Justin Roth... Sienna's a strong personality and I don't need you getting lost in her completely."<br/>
<br/>
"I ain't 'lost in her', Andrea, I <i>am</i> her." you reply, "I'm still Will but fuck you already know all this shit anyway."<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, I know, but I still need you to focus because we're supposed to be taking over the school, not engaging in the desires of what our new homes want." she replies in a rather cold manner.<br/>
<br/>
"Lookit you Little Miss Realpolitik." you sneer, "You train yourself to be that much of a frigid cunt or does it just come naturally?"<br/>
<br/>
She eyes you for a moment and you can tell that comment doesn't make her happy. "Alright, you want to indulge then fine. But we need a home for Frank and if you're getting Justin alone maybe you can get him back up to Straussler's."<br/>
<br/>
"Justin Roth you think would make a good home for him?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Roth's a good looking guy, he's on the outside but he's got a popularity too especially with the girls." Andrea replies. There's a small silence before adding, "Besides, if you're throwing yourself into being Sienna so completely... Roth's not boyfriend material."<br/>
<br/>
"So what, now you're trying to tell me who I can and can't date?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
Andrea shakes her head, "No, I'm telling you that you're setting yourself up for disappointment if you think you can tame Roth. I don't want, or need, you to get all depressed over him and potentially cause problems."<br/>
<br/>
You stare at her. You're really starting to regret bringing her into the fold. Who the fuck does she think she is telling you what you can and can't do like that? But she's also probably right you begrudgingly admit. So maybe you should do what she suggested and make Justin Roth into Frank's new home.</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121222222111212111211
author_id: rugal
title: Doubt and the End of the Road
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>You groan and moan, clutching Justin as he thrusts into you. You think about the last time you were with him, some months back. Just a quick thing at a party. It was nice and you had felt a thrill at finally getting with him. You've had your share of guys, before and since, but Justin Roth was different. He was something of an outdoorsman so he had that sun-worn, rugged look to him. You had talked to him a few times and he had always come across as smart. Maybe not book smart but in a more philosophical, introspective way. He never seemed to remember you before that night but you didn't mind. You would make him remember.<br/>
<br/>
And you had.<br/>
<br/>
But you wanted something more. You wanted something more permanent and stable. That's why you had Straussler invite you and Justin--as well as a few others such as Andrea and Charles--up to his place. That's why you had made the switch and, using Charles' body, switched Justin with Frank. That's why you were now at his place, screaming in ecstasy as he exploded into you leaving the both of you panting and sweaty. He rolls off of you and you turn to your side to nestle in his chest.<br/>
<br/>
"That was amazing." you say quietly and in contentment. "So, whaddaya say? Wanna make it, like, a permanent thing?" There's a grunt at that and you sit up, looking down at him. "What's <i>that</i> supposed to mean?"<br/>
<br/>
"What's what supposed to mean?" he mutters.<br/>
<br/>
"That grunt. You a cave man all of a sudden?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
You hear him mutter without actually sitting him and ask him to speak up. "I said that I'm not really looking to settle down right now. The Justin part of me isn't really a one woman kind of guy, the Frank part just plain doesn't care." he yawns a bit, "Plus, no offense but a lot of guys don't really view you as 'girlfriend material'. Justin included."<br/>
<br/>
"Girlfriend material." you say with a more insistent, annoyed tone.<br/>
<br/>
"You're loose." he replies, "I mean you've fucked me twice in the span of a few days so I can't even really defend you there, you know?"<br/>
<br/>
You smack him across the face. Hard. "Fuck you!" you scream, "You judgmental asshole! Who the fuck do you think you are now?! Justin's a man whore and you're going to call <i>me</i> a slut?!"<br/>
<br/>
You grab your clothes and quickly throw them on. "Sienna, wait, I didn't mean...!"<br/>
<br/>
You hear him call out but you don't even turn around, just lift your hand up and flip him the bird.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
The drive back to Jelena's house is a longish one, being on the other side of town, and also one that's rather angry and a little reckless. You want to go slam the door as you head up to it but remember what KC said about not bringing drama. So instead you take a breath and just walk through quietly. You see nobody in the living room but as you pass by the kitchen you notice Jelena.<br/>
<br/>
She gives you a concerned look. "Sienna? What's wrong?"<br/>
<br/>
You blow her off and head back to the room you share with her flopping yourself down on the futon that's served as your bed the last few days. She doesn't seem to take your ignoring her as a sign though and you see her standing in the doorway with her arms folded. "I thought I said a lot when I didn't say anything." you say in an annoyed tone.<br/>
<br/>
"And I'm not going to let you get away that easy." she replies as she moves to sit next to you. "So how'd it go? You don't seem too happy."<br/>
<br/>
You cast a side glance at her and then look down. "I'm a slut." you say with a small laugh. Not a laugh of amusement, more of nervousness or disbelief. "No guy's gonna want me for anything other than my cunt. They don't care what I could do for 'em emotionally, only what I can do for their dicks."<br/>
<br/>
"That's not true." Jelena says trying to be reassuring.<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah? Then why'd I basically get told that?" you say, tears welling up in your eyes. "None of those fucks see me as an actual person." You then turn to her and you can feel them on your cheeks now, "All I want, all I fucking want, is some stability. I want love. I want someone to be there and tell me things are gonna be alright. I don't want someone to just fuck me and toss me aside. I don't some fuckin' athlete cornering me in the hallway gettin' pissed when I won't suck his dick so he thinks he's gonna grab my tits and other shit like that."<br/>
<br/>
"Who did...?" Jelena asks, surprise evident in her voice.<br/>
<br/>
"Patterson." you say, "It's why I kicked him in the balls."<br/>
<br/>
She looks at you, a seriousness in her eyes. "Why didn't you tell anyone? He can't... that's..."<br/>
<br/>
"I know what fuckin' sexual assault is, Jelena." you shoot back, "But what's the point? Like I said, I ain't no person. I'm a slut. I'm here to suck dick, let some guy get his rocks off, then it's on to the next one. You think anyone's gonna take my word over his?"<br/>
<br/>
"It doesn't matter!" she exclaims, "We should--"<br/>
<br/>
"You're not doin' shit!" you reply, "Patterson and Black and Cooper and all of 'em, they'll make my life even more hell than it is. Kelsey an' them'll jump right in too. I don't fuckin' need it, alright?" You then shrink back, "I just... all I want is... I want someone to love me. I want someone to treat me like I ain't just their fuck toy. Like I'm not just some damaged, trashy ghetto girl."<br/>
<br/>
"You're not." Jelena says quietly, "Fatima loves you. You guys are closer than most sisters. And..." she pauses, you can notice a nervousness in her. "I love you." You look at her and she's turned completely red and almost looks like she can't believe what she said, but she keeps talking anyway. "It's... it's like I said a few nights ago. You're so honest and open. You're passionate. You're rough but I can't think of anyone who cares more about the people around them." There's a small pause, "I want to see everyone happy; Fatima and Andrea and my sister and whatnot. And I want to see you happy too. That's why..."<br/>
<br/>
You cut her off as you lean in and kiss her. After a moment you both pull back and she looks surprised. "I've gotten drunk and kissed girls. I mean, I know what I said about bein' straight and all but like it's the 21st century. People find out they were wrong about that shit all the time so... I dunno. Maybe I've been wrong all this time too."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
It's not long before one night with Jelena turns into a serious thing. Hidden at first but soon rather open though it catches most people by surprise, not least of all the members of your little cabal.<br/>
<br/>
And as far as the cabal goes you quickly begin to have less and less involvement with them. Not on a social level, though you try to avoid Justin as much as possible, but with regards to the book, masks, taking over the school. It all starts to seem dumb, a revenge and power fantasy that won't ever make you happy. You never get another mask, never put anyone under your control, none of it. You begin focusing more on the mundane aspects of life: school, your relationship, finding a job, impending motherhood...<br/>
<br/>
About a month and a half after your decision to put Justin and Frank, and the subsequent event that served to push you away from them, you started feeling sick. Some tests and doctor visits confirmed that you were, indeed, pregnant. It was something that surprised you before you remembered that this isn't just slipping on a mask, pulling an imago over your own but this IS your imago now.<br/>
<br/>
You hear the usual gaggle of worthless voices whispering. You overhear Kelsey say that she feels sorry for the kid, who's gonna be porn into poverty with a whore for a mom on one occasion but after a while you stop paying attention to things like that. Your relationship with Jelena puts you in a better place than you, or Sienna, have ever been and knowing that you're going to be a parent is the final nail in the coffin in terms of ever being tempted by anything involving the book.<br/>
<br/>
You've still held onto it much to the chagrin of your compatriots but once you decide you're done you give it to Andrea. Knowing more about the sigils, spells, and more advanced things like switching imago and such. Andrea, Charles and Justin all withdraw from your company and in fact withdraw further and further from school life before one day vanishing completely. You hear whispers around, of them being involved with the occult. Of course it's Braydon Delp who spreads the rumors and while you know the book and spells are involved you pay no more mind to it than that.<br/>
<br/>
You don't care about magic or sigils or imago or evil spooky professors or any of that anymore. You've got your own life now after all. It's not just your life that improves either. Your father and Yolanda managed to grow close rather quickly. Near the end of the school year they marry making Darcy your step-sister and once she graduates the two of them, no longer having to worry about providing for their children and with the bonus of dual incomes are able to move into a slightly nicer place outside of the poverty-stricken area of the city.<br/>
<br/>
Darcy, meanwhile, takes an internship at Proteus Industries after graduation working under some ex-military scientist named Harding. You and Fatima enter Keyserling and grab a place together, like you said you would, along with Jelena and your daughter is born not long afterwards; you name her Ana, a Serbian name in tribute of the young woman who'd made you happy and helped you get your life on track.<br/>
<br/>
It's not an idyllic life by any means, some times you have to scrap by and often there's frustration. But at the end of the day you're happy. You've finally found the love and stability you were looking for and that's all that matters.</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212122222211122
author_id: nirxor
title: Chase after Andrea
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>It's a strange feeling, having Will and Sienna share a body and memories, one set is a screaming rebel. She hates her stepmother and fights her regularly, she has tried to even fight Chelsea, hell she gave her a black eye in junior year, but Gordon showed up and stopped that. Sienna wasn't going down without a fight and she liked to challenge people, but now there was William Prescott inside her. He wasn't anything like she thought, he wasn't a bad guy, just a little odd. She sees him as all right, he's helped her with math and stuff, not a bad guy, he's reasonable, a planner, and, has an secret. It's like your two sides are completely merging in a strange fusion of love, like something both of you were lacking; self respect and self love. The things that both were lacking and trying to hide.<br/>
<br/>
<i>"What the fuck? Don't tell me your gonna let that ass slip out of here? She's literally, begging for more, get our tight ass over there and <b>make her listen!"</b></i>. <br/>
<br/>
A sudden push from inside Sienna's soul lashes out, she's not angry, or fighting the Will inside her, but accepting him. Your standing in a strange way. Both Will and Sienna like, maybe the fusion between the two people was a lot more potent than you thought. It's like Will and Sienna are perfectly in tune, almost, naturally one being, or getting closer to one. Your body shivers with excitement, you want to do it. <b>Both sides want it,</b> you to do it, to do what you want.<br/>
<br/>
"Why? It's not like your against me? Or rather am also you, and it wasn't the way you wanted to do it?". You whisper to the mirror, it's reflection showing a Sienna ready to chase Andrea down and make her her's. The aggressiveness of Sienna rises into you once more, it's more like, she wanted confidence from another, something that you had, somebody to help her, hold her, she slept with guys for that feeling, the assurance from their embrace, but now, she was embraced by you, in body, mind, and soul. Sienna was with you, likewise, you were with her now and forever. The realization of this, shook the boundaries of your new self, the distance between Sienna and Will getting smoothly ironed into one another. The sparks in your head were dancing, the breathes you take weren't a girl covering up for her shortcomings with rage, drugs, and, rampant sex, nor was the shell of a man who hid from his problems, tried to run away, or, would wallow in his own self pity, no more. Your William Martian Prescott and Sienna mother fucking Goldman, your a goddess on the stage, with a guitar in your hands, and you always take what you want. Yet, your Will, a warlock. He could be anyone he wants, control who he wants, he's not crazy, just focused on getting what he wants. But together? Your are the new Will, the new Sienna, you are the best of both worlds, the lead guitarist of your band and singer, and a rising magic user of possibly infinite potential. Yet all of this pales to what your feeling, to what you crave. You are both craving someone, someone who made the mistake of walking away from you, and that isn't going to happen. Ever. Again.<br/>
<br/>
<b>You want Andrea.</b> <br/>
<br/>
She went to shower, it's late at night and nobody is up, well not like they would see anything they wouldn't hate, hell when you saw her body, becoming Andrea was a fucking delicious piece of heavenly ass you devoured. Nobody else was this, strangely compelling and enjoyful, well from the outside, with Sienna and Will now fusing on the spiritual level, she was about to expirence a whole new love. The door is straight down the hall, it's not cracked open, she shut it, but the whole damn bathroom is so fucking huge she can't even hear you enter. She's not exactly showering, she's preparing for it, you quitely listen to the shower head turn on, the water hit the floor, and then you enter, slowly stalking your prey, you can see her bent over through the curtains, the almost clear drapes being her only cover. Silently you enter the heated water, she doesn't even notice you, until she turns her back to you, that's when you strike. Andrea doesn't expect you to start kissing her, she's struggling a bit, no, she's trying to gauge to situation, to take control of it. That is never gonna happen, never again, you fought to get here, and now your claiming it all of it. Sienna, Andrea, Will, and, anything else you can fight for, they are yours for the taking. The kisses are intense, as your not letting her go, your free hand delicately touches her body, moving along it's most sensitive parts, Andrea is confused, but she realizes what's happening, finally after a few minutes of this kind of play she conceedes to your dominance. No words are exchanged between the two of you, there is no need for them, the Will inside her can guide you as you can guide others, in less than an hour of showering, your back in the room it all started in,  ravashing the woman you love. <br/>
<br/>
*****************************************************<br/>
<br/>
The dawn is greeted by you realzing how complete you are now, the fusion of you and Sienna being utterly a force of nature, your standing in front of the mirror, stroking your inner legs as you watch Andrea get dressed, the memories of her being your woman now freshly imprinted on to her body and soul.<br/>
<br/>
"What made you come back?" Andrea words out now sitting on your lap, looking satisfied about her evening.<br/>
<br/>
"Simple, I wasn't complete yet. Your so damn sexy it somehow distracted me from finishing. Sienna put up a hell of fight though, but when she started to completely get absorbed by Will, it was like all the problems they had were solved by them meeting each other, like we were meant to be together." You say as you kiss her again, she moans as you work your magic, the excitement still driving the both you, but that was then and this is now, you have appeances to keep. <br/>
<br/>
"I like it, the balance between the two, it's amazing." Andrea says as she gets off your lap, signaling to you to come to the kitchen with her. The veiw of the food prepared for the two of you by the people in the mansion, it's exactly to your liking.   Your day is starting great, of course with Andrea hanging off you right now it can't get much better, but you'll see how it goes.<br/>
<br/>
*****************************************************<br/>
<br/>
The day is going great, Fantima is making good progress on her artwork, the band has another show to play at, and, Chelsea isn't happy with Andrea hanging on you, hell most of the boys aren't happy, not even Charles. <br/>
<br/>
"So, uh is this a thing now? Andrea and Sienna having a thing, and, the looks of people." He mutters out, trying to smirk through it all, but not helping. <br/>
<br/>
"It's fine, it was bound to happen, but am more shocked about Sienna. Andrea I knew about, but you didn't tell me about this." Fantima says in a happy tune, she looks around the cafeteria, quickly going back to her plate as the center of all the attention heads your way. Chelsea Cooper, the queen of the school herself, walking to your seat. She walks by, and keeps on going, her eyes only focusing on Andrea, not breaking her focus or looking at anything else.  The whole exchange is starnge, she looks vunerable, but maybe she has lost something.<br/>
<br/>
"Well shit, let's practice later today. Wanna come later Drea?" <br/>
<br/>
Your voice carries over into Chelsea's ears, she doesn't stop, but it looks like she wants too.  The day keeps going on, until the end of school, when a couple of the basketball boys come up to you.<br/>
<br/>
"Heard you and Andrea are lesbian now." The leader of the pack of wolves growls, Gordon, Chelsea's favorite little dog, with Seth and a few of the dudes Sienna slept with. It's not fear, your feeling, no, it's excitement. They want to fight you for her, but they have no idea what they are in store for, it's funny really.<br/>
<br/>
<i>"Oh they want to fuck with me now? All it took was their little mermaid getting a girlfriend. Let's see them try and fuck me over."</i><br/>
<br/>
Your mind goes into a simple happy tune, the unity of Will seeking revenge and Sienna looking to maybe put a dude in their place, reguardless of their size. <br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, well me and her got all nice and sweaty together last night. Since she didn't have any guys worth her time here, she asked if I wanted to try it. So, I figured why the hell not? Much better than getting some sloppy guys who fuck up their night and come right to me." You fire off, letting some of the boys realize what you thought of them, Gordon however just does his little routine. <br/>
<br/>
"Don't fuck with Chelsea." Is all he can say.<br/>
<br/>
"What? Afraid I'll take your girlfriend away? Afraid she might have some secret she ain't telling you." Sienna isn't backing down, this makes him bulk up to you. He won't hit you, they won't try to hit you, but this doesn't work on you, Gordon signals the rest of the crew to leave to where it's just you and him. <br/>
<br/>
"Look, I don't know what went on between her and Andrea, but I need you to end it." Gordon is pretty much set on scaring you into submission, but it fails. The smirk on your face tells him everything he needs to know and like that he leaves.<br/>
<br/>
"See ya later, pussie!" You shout as he leaves. "If your the best she can throw at me, she's going to have to try a lot harder than that, cause I'll be damn sure to give her a double black eye." You mutter, feeling the magical energy flow naturally out of Sienna's body, it's almost like it wants out, to go wild on him. Unfortunately, he just keeps walking, not even saying a damn word, still a win is a win, now your off to put in some appeances, easy enough. You flex your hands a bit, feeling that surge of energy sink beneath your flesh. It sends a satisfactory shock through your body, making you smile as Sienna's rise to glory starts.<br/>
<br/>
"It's good to be me."<br/>
<br/>
You whisper to yourself as you start your truck.</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121222222112
author_id: imaj
title: Alternatives...
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>“What are the other options,” says someone.  A moment later you realise it was you.<br/>
<br/>
If Andrea is surprised at your question she doesn’t show it.  Instead she leans forward and rests her chin in her hands.  “Not interested in being one of my friends,” she murmurs, raising an eyebrow.  “I have some other ideas.”<br/>
<br/>
“Which are,” you stammer.<br/>
<br/>
“How about someone close to Chelsea,” she offers.  “If you don’t want to take control of her yourself, being someone she trusts is the easiest way to nudge her the way we want her.  Besides, I think I’d enjoy the look on her face.  You know, once it all comes crashing down around her, one of her friends picks up all the pieces.  Someone she <i>trusted</i>.”<br/>
<br/>
You don’t think Chelsea has any friends, or trusts anyone, but you demur from saying so.<br/>
<br/>
“Or what about one of the outsiders,” continues Andrea.  “Someone that doesn’t play by Chelsea’s rules.  No, not like the portables crowd,” she says when she sees the look on your face.  “Someone that’s cool enough to ignore her and still gets to hang around with the popular people.  I have a few ideas there.”<br/>
<br/>
She looks at you expectantly.  What’s it going to be?<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212222221121
author_id: imaj
title: Not So Mean Girls
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>“When you say someone close to Chelsea,” you ask Andrea.  “Do you mean like Kendra?”  You try to think of the best word to describe Kendra’s relationship with Chelsea before settling on the word ‘enforcer’ as appropriate.<br/>
<br/>
“That wasn’t who I had in mind,” answers Andrea.  “If anything, Kendra’s a bigger bitch than Chelsea.  I don’t want to set her up, even if it is one of us.”  The venom in Andrea’s voice catches you off guard.  No love lost there you guess.  “Besides, I don’t think Chelsea trusts Kendra at all.”<br/>
<br/>
You shrug.  You’ve got no real understanding of Chelsea and her social circle except when your on the receiving end of whichever bully has been pushed in your direction.  “So who then,” you ask.<br/>
<br/>
“The one person she does trust is Maria Vasquez,” states Andrea.<br/>
<br/>
You think about Maria for a few seconds.  She’s so guileless and sweet – and maybe a little dopey too – that you’d feel a little bit guilty about stealing her identity.  Except for that perfect, perfect ass. And those legs, the long, taut, legs. And the perfect complexion and beautiful face, that will be so much more beautiful once you get Maria perplexed expression off it. Ok, her boobs aren’t as big as, say, Chelsea’s or the Garners’, but they are oh-so-perky.<br/>
<br/>
You gasp involuntarily at the thought of it all.<br/>
<br/>
Then you get brought back down to earth with a bump when you recall Maria is in several AP classes.  AP classes that she is, by all accounts, going to fail and that you doubt you would be any better placed to pass.  Everyone knows that Maria is an airhead and that she got into the classes because her father is on the school board..  You sigh unhappily.<br/>
<br/>
“Is there a problem with Maria,” asks Andrea.<br/>
<br/>
“No,” you stammer.  “I mean she’d be great, but I’m just worried about all those AP classes she’s struggling with.”<br/>
<br/>
Andrea looks thoughtful for a moment.  “I have the feeling that Maria might be cleverer than she lets on.  And you could ace those classes easily if we found you the right memory bands to use in them.”<br/>
<br/>
“I guess,” you say uncertainly.  It seems like a lot of work.  You aren’t sure how easy it would be to merge the contents of several memory bands.<br/>
<br/>
“Well if you are looking for an alternative, you could try Cara Fuhrman,” suggests Andrea.<br/>
<br/>
“Uh…  Who?”<br/>
<br/>
“Ah, I think you missed this while you were in Cuthbert,” says Andrea.  “A couple of weeks ago Chelsea finally ditched Michelle Estrich from the cheerleading squad.”  You are about to ask who that is again when you recall who Michelle is – the unpopular member of the squad who’s only purpose was to be bullied by Chelsea.  Though you guess that’s no longer the case now.  “She held try-outs, for what that was worth,” continues Andrea dismissively.  “And selected this junior girl Cara.  Let me see my phone back.”<br/>
<br/>
You hand Andrea back her cellphone.  She fiddles about with it for a minute or so before returning it to you.  “That’s her Facebook,” says Andrea offhandedly.<br/>
<br/>
You push your fingers across the screen of Andrea’s phone until you find a selfie Cara has posted.  “Wow,” you mutter.  “She’s <i>gorgeous</i>…”<br/>
<br/>
“I think Chelsea’s grooming Cara to be her successor,” explains Andrea.  “Which is why it would be so funny to see Cara as the one that topples her.  What do you think?”<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212122222211211
author_id: seuzz
title: The Appearance of Maria
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"It'd be best if one of us were close to Chelsea," you say thoughtfully, <br/>
<br/>
Andrea smiles. "You don't have to pretend it's just part of the plan, dude," she says. "Maria is <i>very</i> pretty."<br/>
<br/>
That she is, as everyone present knows, but you're still a little abashed at admitting you'd like to have her body for your own. "Is it going to be a problem getting her out here?"<br/>
<br/>
"That's what <i>Charles</i> is for," Andrea says. She gets up from the table. "I'll set it up with him."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You spend much of the day re-reviewing the procedure for swapping out <i>imago.</i> Sure, you'd done it on Joe, but now it's <i>you</i> who'll be under the knife.<br/>
<br/>
Frank is the first to get back to the Strausslers', and he doesn't take Jonathan's mask off. He just drops onto the sofa and fires up one of the numerous game consoles. You pick another controller, and the two of you silently battle it out through a shooter. "You hear from Andrea or Joe?" you ask him during a pause.<br/>
<br/>
"I'm at the other school," he peevishly reminds you. "We don't socialize."<br/>
<br/>
"I thought maybe they'd called you."<br/>
<br/>
"Not <i>me,</i>" he says. "I just do as I'm told."<br/>
<br/>
You give him a sidelong glance. "That's you in there, isn't it, Frank?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah. I still just do as I'm told."<br/>
<br/>
He's making it awkward. "I'm gonna need to use your body this afternoon," you say.<br/>
<br/>
"Why's that?" His onscreen avatar shoves yours rudely.<br/>
<br/>
"Just for a bit. I'm getting myself a new body. If I'm on the slab, I need to use someone else to do the operation."<br/>
<br/>
"Oh. Okay then."<br/>
<br/>
"It's the same thing I did to Joe. Full <i>imago</i> swap, so--"<br/>
<br/>
"I get it."<br/>
<br/>
"Don't you wanna know who it's gonna be?"<br/>
<br/>
He's polite enough to turn toward you, but not so polite as to actually ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Maria Vasquez," you say.<br/>
<br/>
He purses his lips. "A fine choice, I guess."<br/>
<br/>
"Andrea and I just figure--"<br/>
<br/>
"Whatever you figure, it'll work out." He returns to the game. You let the subject drop.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
The guests, when they arrive, come in through the front door. (One of the front doors. It's such a big place that there are several candidates.) Jonathan goes out to meet them when the call comes; you go to the ballroom and wait. You look nervously over your shoulder as the doors open.<br/>
<br/>
"--a compass to find my way out," Charles Hartlein is saying in a snotty tone as the quartet enters. His eye falls on you. "Oh God, look who it is."<br/>
<br/>
"Don't be a bitch, Charles," Andrea says. "Hey Will, how are you doing?"<br/>
<br/>
You nod and shrug. Your eyes are on Maria.<br/>
<br/>
She's dressed in tight jeans and boots. A lavender sweater is buttoned to just below her boobs, which press against a white t-shirt. Her mane of dark hair brushes over her shoulders as she looks around the ballroom. Her face is expressionless, and if she's impressed or envious, it doesn't show in her eyes. She doesn't look bored, but there's a vacancy in eyes. <br/>
<br/>
But she does seem to be ignoring you.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, we're here," Charles sighs. "Who's in charge of the entertainment? Shouldn't there be a small symphony orchestra playing in the corner? Or a big one? You've got the room, Straussler."<br/>
<br/>
Glances get exchanged, and then you realize it's your move: the knockout powder is on a small table by the sigil sheet. You pry open the container, draw a pinch, and march up to Maria.<br/>
<br/>
She pulls back, distaste showing on her face. You raise your fingertips and blow softly at her. She crumples into Jonathan's arms.<br/>
<br/>
He lays her on the metal sheet, and he and Andrea strip her while you undress yourself. Charles watches with arched amusement. As you lay down next to Maria, he speaks. "I'm looking at two good arguments for not being gay, and I'm not sure which one is the strongest."<br/>
<br/>
You flip him off, then brush your face until the control sigil appears.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You rub your hands together and blow into them. "Bottles in place? Check. Masks and dolls? Check. Smartmouthed faggot?" Charles gives you the stink-eye. "Check. So, let's make magic."<br/>
<br/>
There will be no need to keep Maria after dissecting her, though her spare parts--especially her <i>substantia</i>, in the form of a golem--might prove useful. So you start with two simple operations, sending Maria's <i>imago</i> into a mask and her <i>anima</i> into a bottle. <br/>
<br/>
You move the mask to another spot on the sheet and lay one of the miniaturized golems inside it. You already have a mask of yourself prepared and another doll inside it. You grasp them and close your eyes. Spectral images of Maria and yourself appear in your mind's eye.<br/>
<br/>
You start by grasping Maria's appearance. But as you turn your attention to your own, you pause. Your plan had been to strip yourself of your physical <i>imago</i> and then merge the mental remains into Maria's, as you'd done with Joe and Charles, before settling it back onto yourself.  But now that the operation is before you, you see that that won't be necessary. Your mental <i>imago</i> seems to be shining brightly, and you realize that's because your own <i>anima</i>--the true seat of your memories and experiences--is behind it, and isn't going anywhere. With a feeling of relief you realize the operation is going to be much quicker and easier than you'd planned. There's no need for a merger of mental <i>imago</i> in your case, as it had been in Joe's, because your own mentality would be there if you just laid Maria's atop your own.<br/>
<br/>
Really, it's not much different than wearing a mask: a false image and set of memories sitting over the true ones. The difference is that it won't be a mask in this case, but a complete altering of <i>imago.</i><br/>
<br/>
So the rest of the operation goes almost as smoothly as the first part. You unhook your <i>imago</i>--all of it--from your body and let it drift away, not even bothering to catch it in a container. You then wrap Maria's <i>imago</i>--including her memories--about yourself. <br/>
<br/>
She seems to crowd in around you as the new visage wraps about and binds itself to your <i>substantia</i>, but you force her back. You do a little nip and a tuck here and there, but <i>imago</i> and <i>substantia</i> are made for each other, so they bind with hardly any work from you.<br/>
<br/>
You release the dolls and open your eyes. Before you there is a naked golem and a naked Maria Vasquez. Your cock stirs, but you pull out of Jonathan/Frank before things can tighten and press.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"--cock things up?" Charles is asking as you open your eyes.<br/>
<br/>
"Don't ask <i>me,</i> Joe," Jonathan retorts. "I wasn't the one doing it. I mean, I was, but--"<br/>
<br/>
"Guys, I'm over here now," you say softly, and sit up. <br/>
<br/>
Charles, Jonathan, and Andrea look over at you. "But <i>who's</i> there now?" Charles asks darkly. "That didn't go off the way we were expecting."<br/>
<br/>
"I saw a short cut." You draw your legs up and stare between them at the smooth, tender pussy. "But everyone and everything's where it's supposed to be."<br/>
<br/>
"How?"<br/>
<br/>
"Wrapped around my <i>anima,</i> Joe," you sigh. "I just had to put her face and memories over mine."<br/>
<br/>
Charles frowns and cocks his head. "Huh. Okay, I see now. Well, how about that, Frank? Looks like you got off light."<br/>
<br/>
You shiver, because it's cold, and look around as you pick up your clothes. "Chelsea was right. This would be an awesome place for a party."<br/>
<br/>
"We'll have one then," Andrea says. "It'll be the perfect place to deal with Gordon."<br/>
<br/>
"What do you mean?" you ask as you draw on small, tight panties. "Make him a golem?"<br/>
<br/>
"No, we'll give him to Frank."<br/>
<br/>
Charles and Jonathan look at her sharply. But you just draw on the bra and continue speaking softly. "Do you think that's such a good idea? A golem would work just as well, if you're thinking about putting another spy close to Chelsea."<br/>
<br/>
"Gordon would suit Frank," Andrea says. "A big, masterful Malacandran, and Gordon is such a sourpuss anyway."<br/>
<br/>
"Admit it, she's got your number, Frank," Charles chortles.<br/>
<br/>
"Gordon's got a miserable life," you continue calmly as you settle your boobs into the cups. "His dad, his grades. Chelsea."<br/>
<br/>
"He won't have to deal with Chelsea, not after he breaks up with her," Andrea says.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, it's going to be like <i>that,</i>" Charles says. "Andrea, you're such a <i>schemer.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"A golem could break up with her too," you say. You slide your legs into the jeans, and pull the waist tight to button them. "You should trust me on this, Andrea. I see him, I've listened to him, I've listened to Chelsea talk about him." You shrug your shoulders sadly. "It's no life for one of us."<br/>
<br/>
"Life is what we make of it," Andrea says, and her eyes grow a little more hooded. "Frank could make it good."<br/>
<br/>
"And what does Frank think?" You look over at Jonathan, pausing before pulling the t-shirt over your head.<br/>
<br/>
"I'll do what has to be done," he says uncomfortably.<br/>
<br/>
"I've got plans for Gordon," Andrea says. "So you should trust <i>me.</i> Gordon has potential. Potential best realized with one of <i>us</i> inside him."<br/>
<br/>
"Does it need to be us, or just our <i>essentia,</i>" you ask. You draw the sweater about your shoulders and button it up. You adjust your breasts and smooth away some wrinkles. "We've still got the other <i>ousiarchs</i> burning holes in bottles."<br/>
<br/>
"Gordon with <i>that</i> stuff?" Charles shrieks. "Are you <i>crazy?</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"Maybe Gordon does have potential," you say, brushing your hair back with your fingers.<br/>
<br/>
"I suppose that could work, too," Andrea says after a moment's thought.</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121222222112111
author_id: seuzz
title: The Female Astronaut
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"If we're going to do that," Jonathan says, "he's going to have to undergo training. Like Andrea. Which means one of us has to be close to him. Probably as his new girlfriend. I assume he's supposed to get a new one?"<br/>
<br/>
An uncomfortable silence falls. "It sounds like you've just volunteered to become Gordon Black," you say softly.<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan winces, then shrugs. "I just do what I'm told," he mutters.<br/>
<br/>
"It's settled, then," Andrea says. "We'll have a party this weekend--"<br/>
<br/>
"A party isn't the place to pull off a switch," you object. "That kind of surgery is a big deal, and with lots of people around--"<br/>
<br/>
"We can take him someplace quiet," Andrea says.<br/>
<br/>
"It isn't the place to make a switch-off," you quietly but firmly insist. "But it <i>is</i> the kind of place where Gordon could get caught with a girl, which <i>would</i> be the kind of thing to occasion a break up between him and Chelsea."<br/>
<br/>
Andrea's eyes narrow with admiration. "I didn't know you could be so sneaky, Maria," she says.<br/>
<br/>
"I didn't know she could use a verb like 'occasion'," Charles chimes in.<br/>
<br/>
"I'm not an idiot," you say. "I've got a brain and I know how to use it. You're right, Andrea, Maria is a lot sharper than she lets on. And if she doesn't show it--" You realize you've been staring past your allies with what probably looks like a very vacant expression, and you blink them back into focus. That actually makes the next words a little hard to say, what with them staring at you. "Well," you stammer, "guys don't like it when you can show <i>them</i> how to find a derivative, or explain the concept of 'the sublime' in poetry." You let your eyes fall.<br/>
<br/>
There's silence for a moment. "That's a pretty hard thing," Charles says in a tone that sounds more like Joe's own. "I mean, I like to play the dumbass, but that's 'cos--" You look up at him sharply. "I'll shut up now."<br/>
<br/>
"We can't be sure that Gordon will cheat on a girl unless it's really Frank already being him," Andrea muses. "And we can't be sure a girl will cheat <i>with</i> him unless--"<br/>
<br/>
Charles, despite his promise to shut up, can't keep his trap shut. He groans. "Lemme guess. We need the girl too. And I'm volunteered for <i>that</i> little mission."<br/>
<br/>
"I was thinking that I could do it," Andrea says.<br/>
<br/>
"You and Gordon," Charles gasps. "Isn't that a little obvious for us?"<br/>
<br/>
"I mean as a golem. A second identity. As myself I get training from you, Joe. As Gordon's girlfriend I'd get it from Frank."<br/>
<br/>
"Or we put the rest of our <i>essentia</i> into Gordon's new girlfriend and let Frank train her," you point out.<br/>
<br/>
"Do you <i>like</i> arguing with me, Maria," Andrea asks sharply.<br/>
<br/>
"I don't ever get a chance," you meekly reply. "Chelsea explains <i>her</i> things to me, and I just have to bite my lip."<br/>
<br/>
"Hmph. Well, what you say is also a possibility. I'll have to think about it."<br/>
<br/>
"Meditate on it, you mean," Charles says. He tucks his arm in hers and pulls her toward the door. "Come on, Drea. I've got a date tonight--" He shudders slightly. "And since I'll be out late, <i>we</i> need to have our date this afternoon."<br/>
<br/>
"I should go too," you say after they've gone, and it's just you and Jonathan in the ballroom. You pull on your boots. "I'm sorry if it seemed like we were bullying you, Frank."<br/>
<br/>
He shrugs. "I'm supposed to be good at taking orders. Though I was having more fun when it was just Joe and me, and I was giving them. Not that he ever listened," he adds under his breath.<br/>
<br/>
"Then maybe Gordon would suit you." You straighten back up and settle your clothes again. "The way he runs the team--"<br/>
<br/>
"I hear rumors. And I remember everything <i>you</i> do, dude." He looks you up down. "It's pretty fucking weird looking at you, who's looking like that, and feeling what I'm feeling."<br/>
<br/>
You blush a little. "Am I really that pretty?"<br/>
<br/>
"Don't you <i>know?</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"<i>I</i> know," you say, and twist on your feet. The tightness of the clothes is making you <i>very</i> conscious of each curve and bend of your body, and you flush deeply and wetly inside yourself. "Maria's mind is usually elsewhere."<br/>
<br/>
"Where <i>does</i> she go?"<br/>
<br/>
"Nowhere in particular," you reply. You feel your gaze going out of focus again, but you don't fight it. "I just ... wander. And wonder." Your voice drifts into a whisper.<br/>
<br/>
"Huh. Good place for a Sulvan, then."<br/>
<br/>
You have a sudden vision of the moon. It looms like a vast, pale spotlight, obliterating the sight of Jonathan and the ballroom. It is vast, and the shadows of the craters and mountains are in sharp relief against the bone-white surface. It's looking back at <i>you,</i> you know, but the realization doesn't faze you for some reason. Instead, it lightly piques your curiosity. There's an intelligence within it, and you'd like to draw close to it, and ask it some questions. You don't know <i>what</i> you'd ask it, but you feel sure the answers would be very interesting.<br/>
<br/>
"--Maria?"<br/>
<br/>
The vision fades, and fades so slowly you have to blink a couple of times to fully dismiss it.<br/>
<br/>
"Maria?"<br/>
<br/>
"Huh?"<br/>
<br/>
"Are you okay?" Jonathan's frown shows some alarm. "You were talking to yourself. Whispering."<br/>
<br/>
"Was I? That's interesting." You're looking over his shoulder again, for although Jonathan Straussler is very handsome, he doesn't seem so very interesting that you need to look at him. "Yes, it's a very interesting thing."<br/>
<br/>
"What is?"<br/>
<br/>
"Whatever you want to talk about." You turn your shoulder to him, and without a word walk distractedly out of the ballroom and out of the house.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Maria's attention and intellect do seem to fetch up on some very odd shores, though she doesn't often remember where she has landed or how she got there. She doesn't talk about it either, having learned through hard experience that little good comes from voicing her thoughts. "Why <i>isn't</i> there a rhinoceros under the table?" she'd once blurted out of nowhere in the middle of dinner. Her parents had looked at each other, and delicately asked why she was worried about rhinoceroses in the dining room. Unable to recall the chain of inferences that had led her to that exclamation--one which even she afterward had thought rather ridiculous--she'd helplessly shrugged and said, "They <i>could</i> be anywhere, so why <i>not</i> there?"<br/>
<br/>
Three days later her mother had given her a blister pack of pills and told her to take them once a day with water for two weeks. They left her feeling irritable and extremely conscious of a certain shade of puce that she'd never liked but which now seemed to be <i>everywhere,</i> and she never talked about rhinoceroses again.<br/>
<br/>
She never talked about anything, if she could help it. Any thought that crossed her mind seemed quite ordinary to her, and since she couldn't tell the extraordinary thoughts from the ordinary ones, she had decided to keep all of them to herself. And even when she does things deliberately, there's a certain distractedness to her movements. At home, in the lavender and white bedroom, you're barely watching yourself even as you deliberately turn off your phone. You can imagine it ringing, and can imagine Chelsea's voice on the other end, and the thought fills your brain with an irritating buzz.<br/>
<br/>
You sit on the bed, lips pouting thoughtfully, feeling the clothes that bind closely to your body, but your focus is elsewhere, on a scene so infinitely far (and yet so infinitesimally close) that it's on the other side of reality. It's as though you've turned the tapestry over and are staring at the stitching. <br/>
<br/>
Not that you actually <i>see</i> anything.<br/>
<br/>
Until, suddenly, you do.<br/>
<br/>
It's the Moon again, but now it looks like an impossibly dense spider web, strands gleaming. You're aware of threads leading off it, but they twist off in directions you can't follow, to fade away. <i>No, not to fade. To leave </i>this<i> reality and join another.</i><br/>
<br/>
As you stare at the Moon, you see beads sliding across its surface, like gleaming dew drops. "Perelandra, Sulva, Malacandra, Eldibria," you murmur softly to yourself. They slide into each other, merging briefly into unique combinations, then slide apart, to form new ones.<br/>
<br/>
Only one conjunction really interests you, that of Perelandra and Eldibria, the two planets you've not placed anywhere. <i>Where to put them?</i> Now faces appear on the moon's surface, and the Perelandra-Eldibria combination slides over each one, giving each one a glow, and taking on a different shade as it sits on each. Some faces are clustered close together, but the conjunction moves steadily outward, to the ones on the margins. Your breathing becomes labored as you contemplate these unusual possible homes ...<br/>
<br/>
Your eyes are stinging when the vision finally fades, and you feel drained. But not so drained that you don't reach for your phone and turn it back on. You call Andrea. "What's wrong?" she asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Why do you think something's wrong?"<br/>
<br/>
"I didn't expect to hear from you so late."<br/>
<br/>
You look at the clock: eleven-thirty. <i>How long were you in that other place?</i> "I was thinking about where to put the rest of our <i>essentia.</i>" You give her a name.<br/>
<br/>
"That would be a very interesting way of messing with Chelsea," Andrea says guardedly. "Not one I'd have expected. But how useful would she be otherwise?"<br/>
<br/>
So you give her the other name.<br/>
<br/>
"Also interesting. You're a very fast thinker, Maria."<br/>
<br/>
"No, it took a long time. But I just <i>saw</i> them." You don't feel like explaining.<br/>
<br/>
Andrea is silent. "I have a feeling I should trust you on this," she says. "Which one?"</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212222221121112
author_id: seuzz
title: Maria and the Girls
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>You have the feeling that in one sense it matters greatly which you choose, for they would lead to quite different consequences. But in another sense it doesn't matter: they are each, in their own way, the <i>right</i> answer.<br/>
<br/>
"Cindy," you say.<br/>
<br/>
<i>We owe it to her,</i> you don't add aloud. <i>For what happened to her sister, and the role we played in that. We could put her out of her misery, and reconstruct her so that she wouldn't care, so that she'd be grateful for what happened, because it led her to a richer and more powerful life.</i><br/>
<br/>
"You can get her out to Straussler's tomorrow?" Andrea asks.<br/>
<br/>
You twinge with guilt. Chelsea and Cindy hate each other, and you're supposedly Chelsea's best friend. But Cindy has always been cordial to you, probably because she thinks you're too dumb to be mixed up in Chelsea's schemes. "I think she'll come with me."<br/>
<br/>
"You could bring Gordon too."<br/>
<br/>
"One at a time. I need time to recover after each operation." A stray thought buzzes through the back of your head, something important that you're missing. <i>Tomorrow is Friday, and you'll have time to get with Cindy after school. Or in the evening.<br/>
<br/>
Oh. That's it.</i><br/>
<br/>
"There's a party at Jamie Bornholm's tomorrow," you say. "I've been invited."<br/>
<br/>
"So have I," Andrea says. "And Cindy?"<br/>
<br/>
"I'm sure she's been invited too, but she's not being very sociable."<br/>
<br/>
"She'll be feeling better tomorrow."<br/>
<br/>
"I won't. We'll have to do it in the afternoon."<br/>
<br/>
"Then <i>I</i> can go with her to the party."<br/>
<br/>
Another buzzing, but like a swarm of gnats, loud enough to sense, but far too small to snatch at. "No," you say slowly. "That would be a mistake."<br/>
<br/>
"Why?"<br/>
<br/>
"I don't know. Maybe it would be out of character for her."<br/>
<br/>
"Not for her new character. And there's nothing wrong with--"<br/>
<br/>
"I didn't say it was <i>wrong,</i> Andrea," you say irritably. "I said it would be a <i>mistake.</i>" You feel very weak, battering at Andrea this way. It's like knocking on a door with a wilted lily. But there's also something very liberating about being able to argue with a stronger personality. "Send her home and we'll get together on Saturday and ... Maybe something will have happened." <i>Those damn gnats. You wish you could figure out what they're buzzing about.</i><br/>
<br/>
"I find myself wondering what would have happened if we'd put Glundandra and Catilindria in <i>Maria,</i>" Andrea says.<br/>
<br/>
"<i>We</i> wouldn't have put Glundandra and Catilindria in Maria," you retort, "because <i>you</i> wouldn't be one of <i>us.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"Aren't you smart. Maybe <i>you</i> would have turned yourself into Andrea."<br/>
<br/>
Your eyes are starting to hurt again from staring. "No." Your voice falls to a whisper. "Somehow I don't think that was ever a real possibility."<br/>
<br/>
"What did you say?"<br/>
<br/>
"I said I have to go now. I have practice early tomorrow."<br/>
<br/>
You hang up and pad into the bathroom, where you wash the makeup off and change into a nightgown, but not without first turning your naked body this way and that, examining it in the mirror. It's long and smooth and brown all over, with soft and gentle curves around the waist that extend out to a very nice butt. You bite your lip and put her hands there. Such nice legs too, strong without being muscled or sinewy. Your breasts are small. Chelsea has commented, and you wince, and cover them with a soft top. Back in the bedroom proper you put out the light and slip into bed.<br/>
<br/>
<i>Chelsea.</i> You were lonely when you met her in middle school. She was surrounded by friends, but even in a crowd something about her struck you as being lonely too. You'd let her draw you into her circle. You didn't talk a lot, which exasperated her. "Golly, you're a quiet one," she'd fumed. You'd shrugged.<br/>
<br/>
But maybe she found something restful in your silence. She'd taken to inviting you over by yourself, to prattle and chatter about this and that while checking her social sites and messages. Dimly, you had the impression that you were the only one she brought over for these private tete-a-tetes. Gradually she'd opened up, offering confidences that you'd accepted with a silent but apparently accepting stare. "I'm the goose girl," Chelsea had sighed at one point, "and you're the stove." You'd not dared ask what she meant by that.<br/>
<br/>
And you're still with her, now that you're in your senior year. And what happens after that? Life without Chelsea pulling your leash seems unimaginable. But you'll have to part, you're sure. Your dad already has you quietly working on college applications; Chelsea is working on them too, much more loudly, and with much moaning and grumbling about her coursework and grades. "What are we going to do and where are we going to go?" Chelsea cries, implicitly assuming you'll be there with her. Guiltily, you say nothing about how your classes and grades are so much superior to hers that you'll surely wind up at a much better college than her, maybe even someplace on the East Coast. <br/>
<br/>
And what will you do then? Maria's thoughts have turned to medicine. She doesn't like thinking about it, for she's used to having her intelligence belittled, but she's noticed that she does well at chemistry and biology. She likes animals, too. Maybe she'll become a veterinarian. You pull one of her stuffed dolls, which she likes to sleep with, close. She doesn't dare dream of becoming an actual doctor. Surely that's beyond her.<br/>
<br/>
You feel your eyes becoming heavy. <i>Maybe I'll become a pathologist,</i> you think as consciousness steals away. <i>I'm so good at taking people apart ...</i><br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Earth to Maria! You can come down now!" Chelsea's voice cuts the air in the gym. You do an expert backflip off the top of the pyramid, and execute a further series of flips across the floor. You pull your top down as you straighten up. "And don't grab yourself!" Chelsea shrieks. You bury a sullen sense of resentment. Luckily, Chelsea then turns her ire on Cara Fuhrman, one of the two new girls to join the squad since Cindy quit and Chelsea cut Michelle.<br/>
<br/>
But you fall in next to her as the squad trots into the changing room at the end of first-period practice. You fight down a sense of expectation as the girls peel off their clothes. But you do let your eyes travel across the room, and over their bodies, streaming with water, as you follow them into the showers. Maria's vacancy is a perfect blind behind which to study the delectable cheerleaders.<br/>
<br/>
First are Chelsea's two chief goons, Kendra Saunders and Gloria Rea. Kendra is African-American, a light-skinned Kenyan beauty with a track runner's physique that, admittedly, looks better inside her stylish clothes than outside it. Gloria is far more buxom, and you'd have to admit that there's much more to her assets, and that they are much better packaged, than your own.<br/>
<br/>
And then there's the Garner twins, identically pert and identically tight when disrobed, just as they have identical faces distinguished only by their differing hairstyles. To your chagrin, they are turned in the shower so you can't tell if their bushes, like the tops of their head, are distinguishable.<br/>
<br/>
Lin Pol. Wide of hip and large of breast, a big girl but in a sexy-mother kind of way. She keeps her long, black hair out of the shower spray. Yumi Saito--explosive energy packed tightly into a little bundle--energetically scrubs out her short bob. You were Yumi for a few days, early in your adventures. It was only a few weeks ago, but it feels like a lifetime.<br/>
<br/>
You glance around, seeking out the two girls that Chelsea brought in to replace Cindy and Michelle, but they're not in the showers. Chelsea is probably talking to them, you decide. They're new and green, but Chelsea isn't the type to cut them any slack. Poor girls.<br/>
<br/>
Back out in the locker room you dress in a blouse and thick stockings and a long jeans skirt and matching jeans jacket. You slip on your jewelry and brush out your hair. You'll say this much for Chelsea: She lets the crew break twenty minutes early so there is plenty of time for primping.  Generous, you suppose, though she also takes advantage of it.<br/>
<br/>
Usually. Today, though, she's dressed down in sweats, a look of very studied casualness. You linger, waiting for her until the other girls have gone, leaving just you and her and Gloria and Kendra. When she's presentable, she just abruptly gestures at your trio, and you fall in behind her as bell rings.<br/>
<br/>
You feel the admiring eyes of the boys as move through the crowded halls; a few of the more forward ogres deliberately bump into and brush against you, but you ignore them. Chelsea steers your pod down the main hallway to her locker, but you keep going. Chelsea calls your name; you turn, to find her frowning at you. You frown back. Her frown deepens, then she shakes her head, rolls her eyes, and returns to her locker. Kendra and Gloria exchange a glance and a small smile.<br/>
<br/>
Well, let them think what they want. Even when she yells at you, Chelsea is never mad, not like she gets at them.<br/>
<br/>
A few minutes later you spot your quarry. You touch Cindy Vredenburg, who is tucked up against her locker, on the elbow. "Hey, girl, I haven't seen you in a while," you softly say. "How are you doing?"<br/>
<br/>
"Why, does Chelsea want to know?"<br/>
<br/>
"Huh? What does she have to do with it?"<br/>
<br/>
Cindy gives you a hooded glance. "Nothing."<br/>
<br/>
"I was watching the new girls today, and I just suddenly thought, Where's Cindy?"<br/>
<br/>
"You only now noticed I quit?"<br/>
<br/>
"They were messing up. You never messed up."<br/>
<br/>
"Not according to Chelsea, I didn't."<br/>
<br/>
You take her by the elbow and draw close. "Cindy, I've been missing you. Can we hang out this afternoon?"<br/>
<br/>
She stares at you long and hard, then shrugs. "It's your funeral." Then, as though catching her own words, she gulps hard.</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212122222211211121
author_id: seuzz
title: A Drive with Cindy
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>You're sure that Cindy will forget to meet you, or try to dodge you, so you make sure you're at her locker right after the final bell rings. Maria is often wandering off, so you're pretty sure Chelsea won't notice your absence from her side. Besides, you'd made sure to linger close to her all day.<br/>
<br/>
Cindy drifts out the crowd, and raises an eyebrow when she sees you. "Hi Maria, what are you doing here?" she murmurs in a long, quick slur of words.<br/>
<br/>
You look around, as though the answer might floating by. "Waiting for you, I think. Didn't we say something about--?" You let the question lapse, as though in puzzlement.<br/>
<br/>
"About what?"<br/>
<br/>
"I thought maybe-- Well, since I'm here, do you want to hang out this afternoon?"<br/>
<br/>
She wilts a little. "What do you want to do?"<br/>
<br/>
"I don't know. Sometimes when I'm feeling--" You shrug. "I like to drive around. The countryside's so pretty in the summer."<br/>
<br/>
"It's almost winter, Maria."<br/>
<br/>
"I know. But it's still pretty in the summer." You stroke the back of her arm. "I like to just drive around. We don't have to talk."<br/>
<br/>
"I'd rather not."<br/>
<br/>
"I think I'd rather not too. It's so <i>tiring</i> usually, having to think up things to say."<br/>
<br/>
A pale smile appears on Cindy's face. "Then you'll be perfect company."<br/>
<br/>
You smile back, take her arm in yours, and leave the school together.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You quickly nose out of town, past the ring of suburban developments and into the countryside proper. The old highway curves around and over low hills covered in yellowing grass and trees that have lost their leaves. A thin smear of dreary clouds covers the sky. The air is chilly without being cold, filled only with a dead kind of pseudo-warmth, the decaying corpse of autumn's afterglow. The landscape itself seems dead but unburied, as though it is waiting only for the winter's embalming embrace.<br/>
<br/>
"Looks like there was a fire here," you say as you drive past Blackwell's old villa. Cindy says nothing, and only taps the window distractedly. You don't think she could connect Lucy's accident to the house of a missing university professor, but she doesn't even seem to be paying attention.<br/>
<br/>
Fifteen more minutes, and you're finally on the road to Straussler's. "Are you going to Jamie's party tonight?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Hm? Oh. No. I don't think so."<br/>
<br/>
"I don't think so either. Kendra will be there."<br/>
<br/>
"Is that why you're not going?" Cindy's tone is slightly satirical.<br/>
<br/>
"No. I don't know why she's going. Oh, I guess she thinks it'll be fun." You cock your head. "I guess it will be. Jamie's nice. But I don't feel like going."<br/>
<br/>
"Is Chelsea going?"<br/>
<br/>
"I don't remember. I'm sure she said something when Kendra said she was going, but I wasn't paying attention."<br/>
<br/>
"I don't pay a lot of attention to Chelsea either."<br/>
<br/>
<i>You could have fooled a lot of people,</i> you think. "There's so <i>much</i> of her," you say in a rather vexed tone. "It's hard not to notice her. But it makes it hard to pay attention to her, too."<br/>
<br/>
"How does that work?" Cindy demands.<br/>
<br/>
"I don't know," you admit after a moment's thought. "But she starts talking and she keeps talking and she's always moving and checking her messages and-- After awhile I just get tired. I wish I had as much energy as she does."<br/>
<br/>
"I'm glad you don't, Maria," Cindy says, and now <i>she</i> reaches over to squeeze <i>your</i> arm. "You're very restful."<br/>
<br/>
You look back at her blankly, but smile. Then you frown and look around. "Where's Seth?"<br/>
<br/>
And instantly Cindy's manner freezes. "Seth can go hang himself," she says bitterly, and withdraws to her side of the car with arms folded.<br/>
<br/>
You blink dumbly. "What do you mean, Cindy?" She doesn't answer, and starts to blink furiously. "What's wrong?"<br/>
<br/>
She puts her hands to her face, covering her nose. Her shoulders hunch, and then shudder. "Oh, God, Maria!" she suddenly cries, her eyes--already red--explode in tears. Her teeth chatter. "I'm so--! And he's--!" She buries her face in her hands.<br/>
<br/>
You just keep driving. You don't know how to handle this, and Maria's instincts aren't much help either. Fortunately, it looks like doing nothing is exactly the right thing to do. After a few minutes, Cindy masters herself, wiping her cheeks even as tears continue to stream down. "It's been really hard on Seth," she says. "<i>I've</i> been really hard on Seth. Ever since--" She sniffs hard. "Ever since Lucy's accident I've been a mess. And he's tried to be there for me. He's sweet. He means well. But I'm-- I can't get used to it. Lucy being gone." She covers her eyes again, and her mouth opens in a silent scream. "I'm being impossible to everyone," she says in a husky voice. "Seth included. He's trying so hard to be there for me, but I'm making it impossible for him."<br/>
<br/>
"I'm sorry, Cindy. I didn't know."<br/>
<br/>
She wipes her eyes with the back of her hand. "There's no way you could. But I think--" Her face twists up again. "But I think he's given up on me." She starts crying all over again.<br/>
<br/>
"Cindy, he'd never give up on you." Your tone is reproachful. "No one would."<br/>
<br/>
She suspends the tears long enough to do a double-take at you, and then they pour out with renewed force. "Oh, Maria! That's the nicest thing--" She hiccups. "The nicest thing anyone has said to me in days!"<br/>
<br/>
"I didn't mean it to be nice," you gasp in surprise. "It's only the <i>truth,</i> Cindy." <br/>
<br/>
Now she does start to bawl.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
<i>Twenty minutes later.</i> "Is there a house over there, do you think?" You point.<br/>
<br/>
"No, just a forest."<br/>
<br/>
"But doesn't it look too <i>neat</i> to be a forest? I mean, all the trees are lined up."<br/>
<br/>
"I dunno. Maybe there is something back there."<br/>
<br/>
"Let's go look," you say, and turn down a street that runs parallel to the screen of trees. "I don't think I've ever been out here. Or I don't remember."<br/>
<br/>
"It must be nice, forgetting things," Cindy mutters.<br/>
<br/>
"Sometimes," you say. "It means the nice things get to be nice surprises all over again."<br/>
<br/>
"And the bad things?"<br/>
<br/>
You shrug. "Oh, they always work out." A wall comes into view. "There <i>is</i> something back here." <br/>
<br/>
Cindy says nothing until the vast gate that pierces the wall looms into view. "What are you doing?" she asks as you stop the car and get out.<br/>
<br/>
"Having a look."<br/>
<br/>
"We don't want to trespass-- Come back!"<br/>
<br/>
"I'm not trespassing, Cindy," you call back as you walk up to the gate and peer through the bars. "We're outside. But I can't see anything."<br/>
<br/>
"Then we just-- Oohh!" With a buzz and clatter, the gates open. "Someone's coming!" She keeps calling to you to get back in the car, but you just stand and stare and frown. Nothing happens for a very long time.<br/>
<br/>
"I think we're invited," you say as you get back in the car. "Look, there's a camera there." You point.<br/>
<br/>
"We <i>can't,</i> Maria, we--"<br/>
<br/>
"We don't want to be rude. Besides, what could they do?" You nose the car through the gate and up the very long drive.<br/>
<br/>
"This is <i>embarrassing!</i>" She covers her face.<br/>
<br/>
"I'm sorry, Cindy. I'll make it up to you. I just want to see."<br/>
<br/>
The road twists through a small forest, and then straightens out as it approaches the house. The castle. Cindy gasps long and loud. "We are in so much trouble!"<br/>
<br/>
There's a figure out front, the tall, slim, blonde figure of Jonathan Straussler. You turn the car and park so that he's next to Cindy's window. He gestures at her to roll it down. You nudge her when she doesn't move, and then press the button by your side to do it yourself. "I saw you girls on the monitor," he says with a warm smile, bending down. "What's your names?"<br/>
<br/>
"Uh--" Cindy gasps long and hard. "My name's Cindy, and this is--" She points at you, but seems to have forgotten your names.<br/>
<br/>
"I'm Jonathan Straussler."<br/>
<br/>
"I know," Cindy blurts out. "I mean, I've seen you, you play basketball for Eastman, and--" Even with her head turned, you can tell she's blushing furiously.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, it's real nice to make your acquaintance. Care to come in?"<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Come on, Maria, you have to walk." Someone is shaking you, so hard it feels like your head is going to fall off your neck. It feels like it's barely attached ...<br/>
<br/>
You grimace and squint and open your eyes. Cindy Vredenburg is glaring hard at you. "Where are we?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"At your house. I'm gonna have to get Seth to pick me up." She stares at you. "Oh God, what are we gonna tell your parents?"<br/>
<br/>
"About what?"<br/>
<br/>
"About why you're all fucked up."<br/>
<br/>
You close your eyes. <i>Why </i>are<i> you so exhausted, so ill?</i> You were only driving around this afternoon with Cindy--<br/>
<br/>
The operation. You groan as nausea washes over you. It did go off, didn't it? "What happened?"<br/>
<br/>
"Don't you remember?" She leans in close to whisper. "We wound up at Jonathan Strausslers. He showed us the ballroom, and you--"<br/>
<br/>
"I what?"<br/>
<br/>
"We're sisters now, Maria. In a sense."<br/>
<br/>
You sigh in relief. "What happens now?"<br/>
<br/>
She says something, but consciousness is slipping away. You barely hear the car doors opening and closing and opening and closing, and then someone is picking you up and carrying you. You drift along, powerless. "I think I'll be alright," you say when a warm, loving voice asks you what's wrong. "Just so tired. And I need a bucket." Most of your clothes come off, and a few minutes later the lights go off. You sleep long and hard.</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121222222112111211
author_id: seuzz
title: Mergers and Synergies
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span> Your father's face is grave when you come down the next morning. "What happened yesterday?" he asks.<br/>
<br/>
"I don't know. I was with Cindy, and then I just--" You trail off, for you don't know what Cindy would have said to him.<br/>
<br/>
"She said you were practicing a routine, then suddenly got very faint."<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah. We were working hard. We've all been working very hard."<br/>
<br/>
"Hmm." He feels your forehead and looks deeply in your eyes. "No fever. We'll watch you today. Maybe it was just a twenty-four bug."<br/>
<br/>
"Food at the cafeteria tasted weird at lunch."<br/>
<br/>
"Is that all you ate?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah. Well, I took a little food off some friends--"<br/>
<br/>
"I mean, is lunch <i>all</i> that you had?" <br/>
<br/>
You nod.<br/>
<br/>
"So it was probably a combination of things," he says. "Take it easy today. Let your homework slide until tomorrow. There aren't any parties tonight, are there?"<br/>
<br/>
"I don't think so. I'll turn my phone off."<br/>
<br/>
He pats your arm and gets you some breakfast. It strengthens you a little, but you still feel wrung out, and tell him you're going back to bed. You make a great show of turning off your phone and giving it to him. "<i>Please</i> don't disturb me," you plead with him. He promises.<br/>
<br/>
And so, back in your room, you lock the door and tumble back into bed. You close your eyes and curl your hands up close to your face. You wave them in an arcane manner, and a constellation of sigils appear. <br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"I'm glad I listened to Maria and kept you away from the party," you find yourself saying. You look around. You're in a small, sparsely furnished living room, sitting on futon with your arms folded. Charles Hartlein and Cindy Vredenburg are sitting cross-legged before you. <i>So this is Andrea's house,</i> you think to yourself, and glance down at Andrea's--your--long, firm legs.<br/>
<br/>
"Why, what did Maria say," Charles asks.<br/>
<br/>
"That it would be a bad idea to let Cindy go," you say. "Um, just so it's clear to you guys, I'm being Andrea now."<br/>
<br/>
"We <i>know</i> that, Drea," Charles says, rolling his eyes. "You don't have to keep reminding--"<br/>
<br/>
"I mean it's me, Will. I'm projecting and I just got here."<br/>
<br/>
There's a pause. "Great," Charles sighs again. "And we'll get to hear all about it from Drea herself after you're gone. You need to get up to date?"<br/>
<br/>
"No, I know what's going on." You look at Cindy. "So you stayed in like I-- Like Andrea suggested. But Seth apparently went to the party and got close to Yumi. Anyone besides you notice," you ask Charles.<br/>
<br/>
"If Kendra didn't she needs a seeing-eye dog." He chortles. "Chelsea's seeing eye dog with a seeing eye dog of her own. Oh my. So what do we do with it, boss ladies?"<br/>
<br/>
You sink back in the futon. Lots of ideas seem to be suggesting themselves to Andrea, but you've no idea which one she'd go with. Sourly, you think that she'd object to any that you decided on her behalf. The world briefly vanishes, then reappears from a different perspective. "Nice to have you back, Drea," you say. "I'm over here now." You raise your--Charles's--hand.<br/>
<br/>
She doesn't flinch, just shifts hooded eyes to you. "Thank you. And I'm glad you're <i>there.</i> You can stop him from being sassy while I think."<br/>
<br/>
You smirk back at her, and tuck your arm in Cindy's. "Oh, Cindy," you melodramatically sigh. "I'm so <i>sorry</i> about this, but it's not like Seth is the most sensitive--"<br/>
<br/>
But then you suddenly remember that raw talk with Cindy yesterday afternoon on the drive, and clap your mouth shut. "I'm sorry," you say in a much more subdued tone. "Really. How are you dealing with it?"<br/>
<br/>
She jerks away from you and shrugs. "Fine. The thought of Javits's cock up Yumi is a lot nicer than the memory of it being up <i>me.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"She's fine, Will," Andrea says firmly. "She's one of us now. All that shit's in the past now. Isn't it, Cindy?"<br/>
<br/>
You look at the girl, and she returns your stare with a hard, clear gaze of her own. "I guess I'm still supposed to be torn up about Lucy, and I can play the part," she says coolly. "I'll still have to see that therapist--"<br/>
<br/>
"You're seeing a therapist," you gasp, and cover your open mouth with your hand. "I didn't know--"<br/>
<br/>
"No one is supposed to know," she says. "Except Lin. And Yumi. And Seth. " She spits the last name.<br/>
<br/>
"Was that real, or was it acting," you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Both, I hope," Andrea says. "Better to use real emotions than to have to fake them."<br/>
<br/>
Cindy shrugs. "So what am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to find out about Seth and Yumi?"<br/>
<br/>
Andrea leans back and stares at the ceiling. "Depends, I suppose. Would you be up for some revenge sex?"<br/>
<br/>
"Cindy and Gordon?" you exclaim.<br/>
<br/>
"Is that you, Will, or is it Charles?" Andrea asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Could be Joe," you retort. "We're all kind of mixed up with each other right now."<br/>
<br/>
"I'd look for revenge sex somewhere else," Cindy says. "Not with Gordon."<br/>
<br/>
Andrea smiles. "But if you're going to become captain of the cheerleading squad, Cindy, it makes sense--"<br/>
<br/>
"How many moves ahead are you plotting, Drea?"<br/>
<br/>
"Why can't you keep up with me, Joe?" she retorts.<br/>
<br/>
"Keeping up with you has nothing to do with being smart, Drea. When there's that many pieces on the board, and even a handful of moves to make, there are hundreds of thousands of positions they can wind up in after only a dozen moves. Yeah, I can keep up with you fine. Fuck me, I can outthink you, but even I can't anticipate where you'll land when there's that many possibilities to consider."<br/>
<br/>
"That's my Catilindrian charm, isn't it?" She smiles waspishly. "Unpredictability."<br/>
<br/>
You mutter an oath. "Gordon with Cindy, if she's the cheerleading captain, is too predictable. She should be with Patterson, maybe, and Gordon with someone else."<br/>
<br/>
"But it's the natural evolution," she says. "The neat reversal of all of Chelsea's fortunes. Displaced from the squad, her boyfriend's affections, alienated from her friends, persecuted by her former acolytes."<br/>
<br/>
"You want her to kill herself?"<br/>
<br/>
"She's not the type, so don't worry about that. And isn't this our plan, rehearsing for what we might eventually do? Not just upending the chessboard, but rearranging it to suit our pleasure?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yes, but putting Gordon and Cindy together still doesn't seem right," you say. "Or maybe it's because that should be the final move. That's what <i>checkmate</i> looks like. Putting them together at the start with a squalid little 'revenge sex' play--"<br/>
<br/>
"I'm just improvising," Andrea says with a shrug. "Thinking out loud." She stares at the ceiling awhile, then looks back at you. "Again, who's doing the thinking and talking over there?"<br/>
<br/>
"We're all mixed up," you repeat.<br/>
<br/>
"Because after what she told me Thursday, about keeping Cindy from the party, I'm inclined to trust Maria's judgment."<br/>
<br/>
"A nice thing to say to <i>Joe,</i>" you retort. "I'll go home now and let him batter you with some snappy insults. I shouldn't get caught comatose in bed."<br/>
<br/>
Andrea starts to reply, but her words are swallowed by the onrushing darkness.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
No one seems to have interrupted your occult slumber while you were out, but you are still weak, and so spend the rest of the morning dozing. You feel well enough by lunch time to reappear, and your mother and father both remark that you look better. You shower, which further reinvigorates you, but you take the rest of the day easy.<br/>
<br/>
You also take your phone back. It rings at around three. "For God's sake," Charles exclaims. "Where have you <i>been?</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"Sleeping," you retort. "With the phone off."<br/>
<br/>
"What if there'd been an emergency?"<br/>
<br/>
"Is there one?"<br/>
<br/>
"No, but--"<br/>
<br/>
"Joe, can you calm down? Charles is hard enough to take without--"<br/>
<br/>
"Alright, alright. But it takes a running leap to get back into character, so I prefer to not drop out. You wanna talk to me, fine." He pauses. "Any chance you, me, and your boobs could get together tonight?"<br/>
<br/>
"Is this your revenge for hijacking you this morning? What did Andrea decide about Cindy?"<br/>
<br/>
"Nothing yet, but I'm talking about us. We made a good team this morning, and some of the things you said got me intrigued. Tell me about why you told Andrea to keep Cindy away from the party."<br/>
<br/>
"Just a sixth sense or something. Maybe I--or Maria--saw but didn't remember some things that suggested Seth was ready to get in trouble."<br/>
<br/>
"Interesting. Any other funny things going on with Maria?"<br/>
<br/>
"I haven't meditated since before we went to Cuthbert, Joe, but the Moon came to me twice, almost immediately after I changed into Maria. Does that mean anything? Could she have been a Stellae, like us?"<br/>
<br/>
"Her <i>essentia</i> didn't show anything. But entanglement isn't a binary thing, it comes in degrees, and everyone is entangled just a little bit with the planets, which is why our charts are sometimes useful in reading non-Stellae. Maria might have had a strong proclivity for Sulva. But I'm interested in what happened this morning, and I liked it. I liked the way our brains clicked. The way we seemed to mix up. You were very intuitive, I was analytical. We meshed brilliantly."<br/>
<br/>
"Are you trying to flirt to me? Or suggesting I jump behind your steering wheel more often?"<br/>
<br/>
"Both. But we could avoid the latter if we did more of the former. I was thinking you and me I could hang out more as a-- Well, as a couple."<br/>
<br/>
"Charles and Maria," you ask skeptically.<br/>
<br/>
"A different guy and Maria," he says. "I need another identity, as a break if nothing else. Or, if you're broadminded and want a second identity, Charles and another guy."</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212222221122
author_id: imaj
title: Dark Horses
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>“Who were you thinking for an outsider,” you ask nervously, remembering how Joe was persuaded to take on Charles Hartlein for his new identity.<br/>
<br/>
“You aren’t going to like this,” says Andrea coolly.  “But here me out.”  You nod meekly.  “Lisa.”<br/>
<br/>
You stare at her.<br/>
<br/>
“Come on Will,” says Andrea.  “Lisa Yarborough, you know who I mean.”<br/>
<br/>
“I know exactly who you mean,” you say coldly.  “No…  Just…  No.”<br/>
<br/>
“She’s friendly with a lot of people,” continues Andrea, seemingly ignoring you.  “She knows the stuck up AP set through Geoff Mansfield, and she still talks to the likes of Cindy Vredenburg and Lin Pol.  She even talks to your old friends now that your golem has dropped out of the scene.  If you want someone that can fit into any group and talk to anyone, she’s perfect.”<br/>
<br/>
You don’t know what to say.  The idea of being inside Lisa’s head and having her memories of you, her opinions about you…  It feels wrong somehow, but not as wrong as erasing her and taking her place.  You wonder if you still have feelings for her on some level, or if you just want to think yourself as being above the idea of cheap revenge.<br/>
<br/>
Whatever the case, you have no intention of becoming Lisa.  “I won’t do it,” you say firmly.<br/>
<br/>
Andrea blinks a couple of times, somewhat surprised at your refusal.  “Well what about Gillian Kiefer,” suggests Andrea, carrying on as if nothing has happened.<br/>
<br/>
“I don’t know her,” you say.<br/>
<br/>
“She’s dating Braydon Delp,” explains Andrea.  “He hangs out with…”<br/>
<br/>
“Oh no,” you moan.  “Not them…”  Them is Christian Knouse, Howie Baylor, Darrell Parson and Hugh Flake, a tight knit little group of people who still play roleplay games – the old fashioned pen and paper kind.  You can’t look down on them too much, as you used to play yourself back in middle school, but to still be playing as a senior?<br/>
<br/>
“She’s cool though,” argues Andrea.  “And hangs out with lots of different crowds.”<br/>
<br/>
“Nobody else,” you ask.<br/>
<br/>
Andrea props her chin on her hands again.  “Cassie Harper?”<br/>
<br/>
Cassie is someone you do know, having sat next to her in math.  She’s an incessant chatterbox and more than a little annoying.  You have to admit that she isn’t a bad suggestion.  She seems to turn up everywhere, as if her diminutive stature makes her somehow unnoticeable.  She’s also cute, in an adorkable sort of way, all freckles and hair bunches.  The only worry would be being a good foot shorter than Andrea.<br/>
<br/>
“What do you think,” asks Andrea with a smile.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212123
author_id: seuzz
title: The Way of the Slow and Steady
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Blackwell is on his way out to the university when you barge in on him. "Good heavens," he exclaims as he meets your company at the front door. "Where have you been? I've been worried."<br/>
<br/>
"Bullshit," Frank says. "You were hoping something ate us so you'd have the run of things again." Blackwell scowls at him.<br/>
<br/>
"Go to class," you order the professor. "We've got some stuff to do here. Oh, and bring Melody Weiss back with you when you return."<br/>
<br/>
"The girl could be useful for getting in the university," Rick says after Blackwell is gone. <br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, I don't see any reason to get rid of her," you reply. You notice he's hanging back in the foyer. "What's wrong with you?"<br/>
<br/>
"Who says there's anything wrong with me? Everything's working like it should." He looks around furtively. "Too well."<br/>
<br/>
You give him a long look.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, you have to get your car back up to Cuthbert anyway," you say. "For the <i>Stellae</i> to find. How about you take care of that while the rest of us deal with the house?"<br/>
<br/>
Rick chews on the inside of his cheek, then with a shrug departs.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You slump in the library after he's gone and glare at the shelves. The room feels shabby and disused, and an oppressive sense of apathy settles onto you. Joe perches on the edge of the desk. "It's like we're back to square one," he says.<br/>
<br/>
"Nowhere close," you retort. "I've learned too much." You chew furiously at your lip. "And I want to know more!"<br/>
<br/>
"To do what?" Frank asks. He's sitting on the other side of you.<br/>
<br/>
"Knowledge is its own reward," Joe says.<br/>
<br/>
"But I don't know what I want to do!" you jump in before Frank can turn it into an argument. "I want to know what I <i>can</i> do before I decide what I'm <i>going</i> to do!"<br/>
<br/>
Your allies exchange a glance. "So where are we going to go?" Frank says. "One of the high schools? Keyserling? We need a hiding place, Joe and I. And Rick."<br/>
<br/>
"We've still got the Strausslers as a base," Joe says.<br/>
<br/>
"Right," you say. "What did you do with them when you left town for Cuthbert?"<br/>
<br/>
Joe shrugs. "I dunno. That was when the first Joe Durras was handling things. I've only got the memories you had in your mask. But I assume he shoved Straussler back under his own golemized mask and left Daddy Moneybags as he was."<br/>
<br/>
"Better check. Call him and get him out here." Then you think to ask: "Wait, what day is this?"<br/>
<br/>
"Saturday. The fifteenth," Joe says as he taps at his phone.<br/>
<br/>
"What month?"<br/>
<br/>
"November." He whaps you lightly across the head. "Do we need to buy you a calendar?"<br/>
<br/>
You had completely lost track of the days and dates while in Cuthbert. Actually, you've hardly been paying attention to them since dropping out of school. And that reminds you that— You cover your face and groan. "I've got a doppelganger at home who's probably wondering if I'm dead."<br/>
<br/>
"Unless <i>he's</i> dead," Frank says. "That hex he's wearing can't be getting any better."<br/>
<br/>
<i>God!</i> There is so much to do. And the only way to get going on it is to get organized.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
If you're going to implement a research program you will need a central base to operate from. Blackwell's villa, with its tools and its books and its house guardian, would seem ideal for that. But the house has a reputation, and thanks to Joe and Frank's original investigation its occupant is known to the <i>Stellae</i>, so it seems best to find another location. So when Jonathan Straussler shows up a little after noon—with pizzas, which are a pleasant dividend—you get  him to describe the lay of the Straussler house.<br/>
<br/>
"Dad runs the business," he tells you. "Mom runs the house, through Arturo and Mrs. Szymanski. Any orders that those three give, the rest of the staff will follow." He also mentions Liu, who doubles as Curt Straussler's chauffeur and bodyguard, but he doesn't have much to do with the running of the house.<br/>
<br/>
"I want to keep our powder dry," you say after giving the layout some thought. "We can each of us have six golem, and it sounds like it would take six just to hold down Jonathan's house."<br/>
<br/>
"What else are we going to do with our <i>essentia?</i>" Joe asks.<br/>
<br/>
You shrug. "Save it for when we know what we're doing."<br/>
<br/>
"But you invented a way to pull <i>essentia</i> out of people," he argues. "So we can use it to get control of Jonathan's house, and when we're ready to move on we can disassemble the golems."<br/>
<br/>
That is a point. But it's another point that the spells are complicated and the sigils hard to draw.<br/>
<br/>
It's a third point, though, when you decide <i>that</i> can be the first project: the construction of a permanent set of sigils for use in assembling and disassembling golems and people.<br/>
<br/>
You send Jonathan and Frank into town to buy a list of supplies that you quickly draw up, and put Joe to work on constructing a master catalog of Blackwell's library.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You have a design in mind for a multi-part sigil that will allow you to swap out any and every part of a human being or golem—<i>imago, essentia, anima</i>—and also for splitting up <i>essentia.</i> Frank returns by two o'clock with a ten foot by ten foot sheet of metal and some metalworking tools, but by that time, as you've sketched the design out in a notebook, you see some extra additions that you'd like to weave into the final design. More come in at a hard and feverish pace, so that you keep putting off the moment that you'll commit yourself to a final design, and you tear up and toss aside a score or more preliminary sketches. You are having to work almost a dozen very complicated sigils into one seamless whole, and over an early, hurried dinner you tell your friends that you understand why they constructed a machine in Cuthbert. "It's just easiest." <br/>
<br/>
Blackwell returns a little before six, bringing Melody Weiss with him. She seems no happier than the magician at seeing your company returned. You talk to her only long enough to learn that she has nothing interesting to report, and send her away. Blackwell you banish to his living room with orders not to come out until bedtime.<br/>
<br/>
You're still working at midnight, by which time Rick has returned from Cuthbert in Jape's tow truck. He checks into a hotel, though, while you and Joe and Frank lock yourselves safely away in a bedroom. During the night you think you are visited by the planet Kenandandra, but your memories are a murky, heavy haze when you wake the next morning. They don't become any clearer after you've showered, but you feel remarkably freshened and reenergized when you come down the stairs afterward. You are silent during breakfast, then bolt for the library when you've finished your eggs.<br/>
<br/>
The final design—including empty spots that you know you will eventually need, even though you don't yet know what will go in them—seems to be sitting in front of your eyes, and you copy it down quickly in a firm hand with no erasures into your notebook over the course of an hour. You hear Joe murmuring at Frank as you sweep up your notes and move into the living room: "I've never seen anyone in that kind of a trance before."<br/>
<br/>
Yes. It's all there. You can practically see it, glittering inside the flat, unfinished metal sheet that's lying on the living room floor, including a sigil that, you now recognize, came to you during the night. "Call Jonathan back out here this afternoon," you tell Joe, who has followed you into the living room and is watching as you kneel on the metal sheet with a large compass. "I've got something special planned for him and you." You can feel the gleam of excitement in your eyes.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
So certain is your design that you are finished by mid-afternoon. Rick has come in and been watching you, and he grunts when you sit back with an exhausted smile. When he asks you what it does, you explain it to him with quiet pride.<br/>
<br/>
"Great," he grunts. "Now that you're finally done with it, let's put an end to my personal farce."<br/>
<br/>
Your face falls. "What do you mean?"<br/>
<br/>
"Let's stain it with Rick Bredon's blood."<br/>
<br/>
You gasp, and call Frank and Joe in. They listen gravely as Rick explains himself.<br/>
<br/>
"Put me in storage," he tells you. "Take me apart. I can't contribute anything to your little club except muscle and advice."<br/>
<br/>
"We can always use your advice," Frank says.<br/>
<br/>
"You can get it without me. Put my brain in one of your little doodads, and you can pop it on anytime you want to know what I'd think. Faster and surer than a Ouija board," he mutters.<br/>
<br/>
"But don't you want to stick around, help us, see what happens?" you plead.<br/>
<br/>
He shakes his head. "I'm not sure you kids mean bad—I guess I don't mean bad, 'cos I guess I'm one of you," he adds with a stammer. "But I got doubts about where this is going. Besides—" He glances around the room. "I don't like this scene. I'd just as soon you recycle my parts in a form that, uh, fits your plans better. Whatever those plans turn out to be."<br/>
<br/>
From the way he sets his jaw you can guess you can't talk him out of it.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121232
author_id: seuzz
title: Two-Faced Bastards
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Rick Bredon wants to be taken apart. And, looking at him, you can tell he's not going to take "No" for an answer.<br/>
<br/>
You shrug, and no one else says anything either, not even to ask if you're sure that the sigils you spent the day making are correctly written.<br/>
<br/>
They consist four overlapping circles, each with a four-foot radius, carved into the sheet of steel that Frank brought back. on the outer and inner edges of which are inscribed sigils. Each circle has its own particular use, which can be tweaked depending which set of sigils—one inscribed on the outer edge of the circle, one on the inner edge—is invoked. There is a sigil for removing and inscribing <i>imago</i>; a sigil for removing and inserting <i>essentia</i>; a sigil for removing and inserting <i>anima;</i> and a sigil for certain "extras." All four intersect each other at key points and can be activated singly or in combination. <br/>
<br/>
Other, smaller sigils intersect these four main sigils at tangents: sigils for making, erasing and sealing masks and mind bands; for modifying <i>imago</i> and <i>essentia;</i> and for almost every other spell in the <i>Libra.</i><br/>
<br/>
There is also a brand-new sigil of your own design: one that you are especially eager to try out.<br/>
<br/>
Just not yet.<br/>
<br/>
Rick disrobes and sprawls out in the middle of the table. You set two bottles down on the <i>essentia</i> sigil; a mask on the <i>imago</i> sigil; and a mind band on the <i>anima</i> sigil. You dust Rick's nose with some of Blackwell's knockout powder and remove the <i>anima</i> band that you had placed on him in Cuthbert.<br/>
<br/>
With these preparations done, you set candles at the invocation points. The sigils run with a sudden, oily light; a smell of polished metal fills the room.<br/>
<br/>
First you light up the <i>anima</i> sigil, and a bolt of crimson lightning arcs from Rick to the mind band, inscribing the name RICHARD THOMAS BREDON on it. Then you light the <i>essentia</i> sigil, and a bolt of magenta arcs from Rick into the center of the <i>essentia</i> circle, where it splits into a red bolt and a violet bolt that separate to strike at the two bottles on its edges. Finally, you light the <i>imago</i> sigil, and a white bolt leaps between Rick and the mask. When the dazzling afterglows have faded from your eyes, you are looking at a bare golem of a vaguely mannish shape.<br/>
<br/>
Frank and Joe are very quiet as they gather up the mask, mind band and bottles, which they set into a box. You guess that they are thinking of their erstwhile colleague, and remembering the adventures they had with him before you "turned" them to your own purposes. It leaves you feeling a little sick, and you twinge a little as you recall Rick's final warning. They seal up the box, and Joe carries it upstairs to put in Blackwell's workroom.<br/>
<br/>
"Do you think he would have been okay," you ask Frank, "except for those visions that his <i>essentia</i> gave him?"<br/>
<br/>
"That was the point of having his <i>essentia,</i>" Frank says. Then he shrugs. "You'd have to ask Joe, though. In some other personality, maybe he wouldn't have had those visions. Anyway, it doesn't matter now, does it?"<br/>
<br/>
"We could put his <i>essentia</i> into someone else. Make another partner."<br/>
<br/>
"Jonathan, maybe?" Joe says as he saunters in; apparently he heard what you were saying. "Is that why you want him back out here?"<br/>
<br/>
"He'd have to start training all over again," Frank says before you can reply. "He wouldn't have Rick's memories of how to use his prodigies."<br/>
<br/>
"Well, that's not what I want Jonathan for anyway," you say. "But there's a spell on that table that let's you modify memories," you continue. "If we could merge memories—" You stop with a frown.<br/>
<br/>
"If we could merge memories what?" Frank asks. He and Joe exchange a look.<br/>
<br/>
"Huh? Oh, something," you say. "Just get Jonathan out here." But you sink onto the sofa with your notebook and suck on the tip of a mechanical pencil as you think through an idea you've suddenly had.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"It's like an Agatha Christie story around here," Joe grumbles as he tosses his boxers aside and sits on the metal slab. "People keep disappearing."<br/>
<br/>
"Don't worry, Joe," you tell him as you set a blank mask into a sigil by his head. "You'll be back and better than ever." But Joe still cocks an eyebrow at you. <br/>
<br/>
You don't blame him. <br/>
<br/>
First Rick Bredon disappeared in a series of lightning strikes, leaving a golem behind. Then Jonathan Straussler—after having his mask removed—vanished when a similar thunderstorm transferred his constituent parts into masks, metal bands, and bottles. Now you're putting Joe in the center of the table, and he can't help but notice that you're positioning a blank mask and a candle in the same spot as you've putting the others.<br/>
<br/>
"I know you like your surprises, Will," he grumbles. "But do you mind <i>explaining</i> what you're about to do before you do it? You know," he continues in a sarcastic tone, "in case you're not one hundred percent on the design and there's a fatal flaw I can warn you about?"<br/>
<br/>
"It's a variation on one of the spells in the book," you explain. "The one that makes those 'chameleon masks'."<br/>
<br/>
You're referring to one of the spells in the mid-point, one that puts a special layer into a mask and insert more than one set of <i>imago</i> into it, letting you switch from one face to another without taking the mask off. In fact, you have just such a mask on the sofa and will be putting it on in a moment.<br/>
<br/>
"I figured out a way to do the same thing to a person without using a mask," you tell Joe. I'm going to strip you of your <i>imago</i> and then I'm going put a modification of that special layer onto your <i>substantia.</i> Then I'm going to copy your <i>imago</i> and Jonathan's onto that layer. You'll have both your body and his, but without having to wear a mask."<br/>
<br/>
Joe blinks and grins and exclaims "Cool!" but Frank has an objection: "You mean you're going to mix his face with Jonathan's?"<br/>
<br/>
You shake your head. "No. They'll be kept separate, and Joe will be able to switch instantly between them. There's a secret word and a gesture you have to use."<br/>
<br/>
"What's the improvement on having a mask?" Frank asks.<br/>
<br/>
"It means not carrying around a separate piece of equipment," Joe says, and he gives you a thumb's up. "Like, no one can get the mask off you, and someone like Rick wouldn't be able to sense that there's a disguise, because there <i>is</i> no disguise! Come on," he adds impatiently as he throws himself back onto the table. "Let's do this! I got a girlfriend waiting for me! I think!"<br/>
<br/>
You smile, and advance on the candle with the lighter.<br/>
<br/>
It takes less than a minute to complete the operation. First, Joe's <i>imago</i> arcs off him and onto the blank mask in a blinding bolt of lightning. Then you move the candle to another sigil; when you relight it, a pattern like a rainbow ripples over the form of the golem. Then you move to another spot on the first sigil and in it set Joe's mask and the mask Jonathan had been wearing—which has all his most recent memories—and light the candle. A double bolt of lightning and a double crash of thunder rend the air.<br/>
<br/>
Joe sits up and examines his hand. His brow furrows. "Not that I'm too disappointed, Will," he says, "but—"<br/>
<br/>
You drop onto the couch and raise your mask to your face. You rustle through faces until you find the control sigil, and plunge into Joe.<br/>
<br/>
"—taller, lankier, and a hell of a lot richer," you finish. "Okay, I just had to get that off my chest," you say as you scramble onto your haunches. "Pay attention, Frank," you tell your partner. "I'm over here now, and I'm about to show Joe how to make the new switcheroo."<br/>
<br/>
You close your eyes and wipe your open palm across your face while muttering Jonathan Straussler's name. A light shudder runs through you. You raise yourself to your full height—<br/>
<br/>
—and Frank has to catch you as you topple to the side. "You okay?" he asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Just a head rush," you murmur. "I think." You find your footing and dance back and forth on boat-like feet. "Yeah, that's better." You can't help grinning to yourself as you think of the girlfriend, the car, the punishment corner, and everything else that you suddenly remember having.<br/>
<br/>
"You have everything else Jonathan's supposed to have?" Frank asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Am I supposed to feel naked without my credit cards? Then yeah, I'd say I got everything he's supposed to have." You go up on the balls of your feet and mime tossing a basketball. Then you slap Frank lightly in the chest. "What say we find a basketball and a hoop and a couple of girls to impress?"<br/>
<br/>
"That sounds like fun," Frank says, "but can I have my brother back?"<br/>
<br/>
With a shrug you oblige, and after something like a very long and slow blink of the eyes you are looking up at them again from the sofa.<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan looks momentarily confused. Then a smile spreads across his face. He raises his palm to his face and wipes it across. He's Joe again.<br/>
<br/>
Then he's Jonathan again. Then Joe again. Then Jonathan again. Then Joe again. The smile is the only constant on his face, and it gets wider and wider and wider—<br/>
<br/>
"Stop that!" Frank exclaims, and strikes him across the cheek. "Pick a look and stick to it."<br/>
<br/>
"I'll go with this one, then," says Jonathan Straussler. He slaps Frank back in the chest. "What was I saying about a basketball, a hoop, and some pretty girls?" He looks over at you. "Are we all moving to Jonathan's now? We had a nice set up there before Granny Weatherwax busted our paradise."</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212322
author_id: seuzz
title: Disappearing Friends
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>It was a sweet set-up at the Strausslers', but there were certain distractions there that you'd rather not get mixed up with again.<br/>
<br/>
"You can go on back, get reacquainted with Monique," you tell Joe. That gets a quick rise out of your still-naked colleague, and you avert your eyes. "I've got something I want to talk about with Frank."<br/>
<br/>
And that gets a hooded look from Joe. But he dresses and goes, with Frank ushering him out. "What's up?" your remaining colleague asks when he returns. He has a very guarded expression.<br/>
<br/>
As well he should. He looks grim after you've told him what you want to do, but he agrees that it's probably for the best. <br/>
<br/>
You make a phone call to someone who hasn't heard from you in more than two weeks. <br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Where's Frank?" Jonathan Straussler asks the next day when he waltzes into Blackwell's library. It's Monday, late afternoon, and he's looking flushed and healthy in a t-shirt and track pants. No surprise: He would have just had afterschool basketball practice.<br/>
<br/>
"He can't come over," you tell him with a grimace. "I fucked up." Jonathan's face falls.<br/>
<br/>
"I brought my golem out last night, after you left," you continue. "You know, the thing that was pretending to be me at home and school."<br/>
<br/>
"Uh huh," Jonathan says. His Adam's apple bobbles as he drops into the chair opposite you.<br/>
<br/>
"There was a homeless guy under the mask— Yeah, I forgot about that," you say, changing tack. It's less embarrassing than admitting the terrific goof you made with Frank. "So after we got the mask off, we put it back on him, put him in some of Blackwell's old clothes and put a few dollars in his pocket. Frank then took him downtown, took the mask off him and threw him out on the street. Anyway, after that—"<br/>
<br/>
"Look, is Frank alright?" Jonathan demands.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, he's fine. He's just grounded is all."<br/>
<br/>
His brow furrows. "For what?"<br/>
<br/>
"I'm getting to that! Well, first thing is, we got into the mask, got into the <i>imago,</i> and I got that hex snipped out of it."<br/>
<br/>
"That's great," Jonathan says.<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, and I wanted to get it snipped out because I was going to put my <i>imago</i> on Frank. You know, so he could have a hiding place the same as you. I gave him a chameleon skin, like you, so he could switch between his face and mine."<br/>
<br/>
"So he's off being you?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, and it's turning out to be a semi-permanent thing. It turns out that hex was the only thing keeping my golem alive at school. All the guys like Black and Lynch and Kirkham and the Molester? They were leaving him alone only because he has that thing on him. So Frank shows up at school without the hex on him, and they suddenly realized they can get close enough to beat the shit out of him."<br/>
<br/>
"Oops," Jonathan says.<br/>
<br/>
"So they all went at him, and the school's suspended him—and a bunch of them too—for a week for fighting. And that's how come my dad's grounded him."<br/>
<br/>
Joe winces, but he grins too. "And you can't send another golem out to replace him?" <br/>
<br/>
"Well, we could put my <i>imago</i> on you, and you could—"<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan throws up his hands. "Oh no!" he chortles. "I like what I got now! Besides, you already got your face, so why don't <i>you</i> go home and take your own medicine? Besides you haven't seen mom and dad in almost a month. It might do you good, and if you don't gotta go to school anyway, you could hang out in your bedroom and do your research there. What's that look for?"<br/>
<br/>
He must have caught the wry expression you were giving him. "Mom and dad," you say. "You called them 'mom and dad' instead of 'your mom and dad'."<br/>
<br/>
"Well, they <i>are</i> my mom and dad," he retorts. He points to his forehead. "Remember whose <i>anima</i> you got running things up here."<br/>
<br/>
"Well, that's true. I guess I'm just so used to thinking of you as 'Joe' that—"<br/>
<br/>
"Oh yeah," he says, and snaps his fingers. "That's the big thing I needed to talk to you about. I found a flaw in that brilliant 'chameleon skin' you invented." He smirks.<br/>
<br/>
You get a lump in your chest. "Yeah? What's that?"<br/>
<br/>
"Joe's disappeared on me."<br/>
<br/>
"Huh?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah. He's gone. Evaporated. Don't remember a thing about him." Jonathan's smirk remains fixed on his face, even though his words are making your blood run cold. "It's like I never was Joe Durras."<br/>
<br/>
Fortunately, before you can find your voice and scream, he wipes his palm across his face, and Joe's face appears; Jonathan's shirt billows out a little as it is filled with Joe's larger muscles.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, but now he's back again," Joe says. "Sound as a dollar, like he's never been away. But now it's Jonathan who's gone. Well, not completely, not yet. But give it twenty or thirty minutes, and it'll be like he never—"<br/>
<br/>
Your voice finally comes back online. "I don't get what you're trying to say, Joe!"<br/>
<br/>
"Was that part of your design?"<br/>
<br/>
"Is <i>what</i> part of my design?"<br/>
<br/>
Joe stretches across the table to put his face close to yours.<br/>
<br/>
"So, when you put on a mask, you remember what's in the mask, right? But when you take it off, you forget that stuff. Except the stuff you did while you were wearing the mask. You know what I mean?"<br/>
<br/>
You nod slowly, and blink. Yes, that's exactly what happens when you wear a mask. When you were wearing Jonathan's mask, you could remember everything he himself could remember. But now, having been so long out of it, you can only remember the things you were doing while inside it—and can barely remember those.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, it's the same way with this 'chameleon skin' set up," he says. "Jonathan is just a mask attached to my underskin. When I'm in it, I can be him. When I'm out of it, I don't remember the stuff that was inside it."<br/>
<br/>
The light bulb finally goes off over your head. "Oh! So you mean—?"<br/>
<br/>
"Right. You're so fucking smart," he sneers, but it's a good-natured sneer. "Joe is also a mask. Deep down, where it's me, I'm Will Prescott, same as you. The way you set me up, Jonathan's a mask, and Joe's also a mask. So when I'm running one face, I don't have access to what the other one thinks or knows or remembers—"<br/>
<br/>
"Is that so bad?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Or can do, I was going to say," Joe says. "Yeah, maybe you don't miss Joe when we're just sitting around jawing as Will Prescott and Jonathan Straussler." He wipes his hand across his face, and Jonathan reappears; his shirt billows out, then sags against his lankier torso. "But you might miss Joe if <i>Jonathan</i> needs to use Joe's prodigies. Because Jonathan really doesn't know how to use them. He just sort of flails." He has to snap his fingers half a dozen times before he can get a luminous globe to appear in the palm of his hand. <br/>
<br/>
You tug at your lip, and are about to ask if that's really so much of a problem, when it hits you. Your mouth falls open in horror. "That means that when <i>Frank</i> was at school as <i>me,</i> and those assholes came at him—"<br/>
<br/>
"Uh huh," says Jonathan. "They were going after <i>you,</i> basically, and without <i>Frank</i> around to help, God save him from whatever they were able to do to him!"<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You are so horrified by the picture Joe has sketched that you fly back to your notebook to figure out a solution—if a solution there be.<br/>
<br/>
To your relief, you're able to construct one.<br/>
<br/>
"<i>Imago</i> is just dead <i>anima</i>," you explain to Joe as you start chiseling a new sigil onto your work table. "It's what's left over from <i>anima.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"It's a shadow cast by <i>anima,</i>" he says airily.<br/>
<br/>
Dammit, you forgot that he's got at least as big a brain for this stuff as you.<br/>
<br/>
"<i>Anima</i> is where the real memories are made," he continues as you purse your lips silently. "Where they're kept. The stuff inside <i>imago</i> is just a shadow that they cast in the <i>imago.</i> In the brain."<br/>
<br/>
You grunt. "Well, the point is that I know how to modify <i>imago,</i> including the brain stuff, and the same kind of trick can modify <i>anima</i> too. So this new sigil—" You connect it with a long, curving arc to a new sigil you've attached to the main <i>anima</i> scrollwork. "It will take a copy of the brain <i>imago</i> and insert it into the <i>anima,</i> so that whoever's got the <i>anima</i> will also get those memories. Permanently. It's like a merger of minds." You look up to see a thoughtful expression on Joe's face. "Make sense?"<br/>
<br/>
He pushes you aside and kneels to study your work. When you're finished, he pronounces himself satisfied. "Clever," he says. "Wanna try it on me?"<br/>
<br/>
So you do: You copy Joe's mental <i>imago</i> into one mind band, the Will Prescott <i>anima</i> he's got into another, merge them, then copy the result back into him. After an hour, during which the "Joe Durras" memories and personality have not faded despite his running under Jonathan Straussler's face, he pronounces himself satisfied.<br/>
<br/>
"But how are we going to get Frank out here for the same thing if he's grounded?"<br/>
<br/>
You don't see a way to get Frank out, so Joe suggests an infiltration into your house—via another member of your family. When you look askance at that, he suggests pulling some of the Westside bullies out to the Strausslers, where they can be turned into golems and ordered to protect Will when he returns to school.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212123223
author_id: seuzz
title: Advice from a Dead Man
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Your final decision is maybe a heartless one, but it seems the most logical: "Frank's suspended and he's grounded," you tell Joe. "It sucks for him, but he's safe where he is." Joe acquiesces with a shrug.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
That takes care of two crises: What to do about your Westside doppelganger, and how to keep "Joe Durras" available even when your colleague is operating under another face. (You'll have to give Frank the same operation when he's able to leave the house again.) But it leaves you at loose ends.<br/>
<br/>
It's eleven o'clock now. Jonathan has gone home, and you're in the library disconsolately doodling sigils when a shadow appears around the corner, and the golem of the late Professor Blackwell looks in. He hastily withdraws his head.<br/>
<br/>
"You can come in," you shout after him, and his creaking bulk limps into the library. His expression is pinched.<br/>
<br/>
You've not had many dealings with the golem since your return from Cuthbert. Of his own volition, perhaps, he has taken to spending most of his time on the Keyserling campus, or about town, and even when home he has kept himself upstairs or in one of the villa's back rooms. Occasionally you will summon him when you need money for takeout. But you've nothing to say to him. He's a fake, a manufactured thing incapable of executing any magic. He's also a reminder of the odious magician who tried taking advantage of you.<br/>
<br/>
You're thinking of the latter after he has sat on the opposite side of the table from you and lowered his great head to look at you out of dark eyes.<br/>
<br/>
"You were trying to study my <i>essentia,</i>" you say. "That's why you hired me."<br/>
<br/>
"That is why my original hired you," he says with the tiresome exactitude of the academic pedagogue.<br/>
<br/>
"Your original got eaten. Let's just say it was you. You were trying to steal it," you add.<br/>
<br/>
He shifts in his chair. "Yes, well, that's all in the past, and it's a moot point now. But it would have been ... useful to me. Certainly more useful than I even suspected," he adds.<br/>
<br/>
"I could give it to you now." You don't mean to tease the thing. "I've figured out how to get it out of one person and into another."<br/>
<br/>
"Indeed?" His eyebrows go up, and briefly his eyes gleam. Then they fade. "But it doesn't matter now. Technically, I already have your <i>essentia.</i> You used it to—" He waves his finger before his face. "In the mask."<br/>
<br/>
"That's true. But I could—" You break off and cock your head to study him. He's a mask on a golem ...<br/>
<br/>
You lunge forward, and he suffers you to remove the mask. The petrified form of Lucy Vredenburg appears.<br/>
<br/>
Lucy Vredenburg. You could bring her back now. Almost in passing, you noticed in your studies how to reverse the first seven spells in the book. The sigils, if run backwards, can unmake masks and erase mind bands and unseal disguises and dissolve golems and turn petrified people, like Lucy, back to normal.<br/>
<br/>
But Lucy Vredenburg is dead. You put a golem of her in her SUV and sent it hurtling over a ravine. There was a very public funeral. <br/>
<br/>
If you brought her back, you'd have to give her a new identity. You'd have to explain yourself to her. She wouldn't like that.<br/>
<br/>
Unless it was your <i>anima</i> guiding her. Your <i>anima</i> with her personality? Or married to the personality of the <i>Stellae</i> Aparijita, whose <i>imago</i> and <i>essentia</i> are still in storage awaiting a use?<br/>
<br/>
But would there be any use in that? You've already killed several people. What's another, more or less?<br/>
<br/>
You wince. For now, maybe it's a kindness just to leave her in this suspended state.<br/>
<br/>
Or maybe not, and you pause before returning Blackwell's mask to the golem. There's not much difference, from Lucy's point of view, between being petrified and being disassembled, the way Aparijita and Rick Bredon are. She would take up less room in the form of a mask and a bottle and an <i>anima</i> band, and it would leave you a bare golem to repurpose.<br/>
<br/>
That's why you took the mask off Blackwell in the first place: you were thinking about inscribing his face directly onto the underlying golem.<br/>
<br/>
On the other hand, you're still not sure that he and his villa are going to survive, because you're not convinced the <i>Stellae</i> aren't going to come visiting.<br/>
<br/>
But what the hell. You can at least simplify the golem, and you've nothing else to do.<br/>
<br/>
You replace the mask, and tell the professor to follow you into the living room.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Most remarkable, most remarkable," the ex-warlock mutters as he buttons up his shirt. He is staring down at the operating table. "I can, of course, make hardly anything of it all, but the very look of it, the construction of it!" He shakes his head, and turns to the small cardboard box nearby. "And these are her metaphysical constituents, neatly removed and separated," he says as he picks up the mask, the <i>anima</i> band, and the faintly glowing bottle. "May I ask what you intend to do with them?"<br/>
<br/>
"Put them on a shelf somewhere," you mutter. It was the work of twenty minutes to turn Lucy back to herself before tearing her into bits; and to carve the remote sigil on the resulting golem so that you can insert yourself into any masks it winds up wearing—like the professor's. But now you're feeling bored and anxious again. "You know, I can <i>do</i> all this stuff. I just don't know what to do <i>with</i> it!"<br/>
<br/>
"Mm. Yes. I do sympathize," the professor says with a fatherly chuckle as he settles back into an easy chair and slips his shoes back on. "I know when I was— Oh, but you don't want to hear from an old duffer like me."<br/>
<br/>
"No, go on," you say.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, I was only going to observe that I myself suffered the same—or perhaps merely similar—anxieties."<br/>
<br/>
"Like what?"<br/>
<br/>
"Like what you are complaining of." He eases back into the chair, and worms his ass deeper into the cushion. "I was first attracted to the occult, I may as well confess, by the prospect of power. I was abused as a boy— Well, let's not be melodramatic. I'll only say I was bullied by classmates." His lips twist inside his beard. "As I recall, that was your reason for accepting my invitation to study these arcane arts."<br/>
<br/>
Now you twist in your seat. Yes, it's true. You were being abused by bullies like the Molester, and you wanted to get some of your own back. You almost tell him to shut up—it's not fun to listen to him, in his clammy way, try to put you and himself on the same level—but you hold your tongue.<br/>
<br/>
"And after executing some, by my own admission, squalid acts of persecution and revenge, I found myself at a loss for what else to do with my skills. By then, of course, I was fascinated by what I had learned, and determined to learn more. I made the study of these arts my life's occupation, and, if I may say so, I made myself one of its more learned modern practitioners."<br/>
<br/>
You almost argue—how good can he be if you, a high school student, in the space of a few months of study have so completely outdistanced him? But still you only listen.<br/>
<br/>
"I realize now— Well, I realized it some time ago, that my entire life of study was an exercise in avoidance. I had learned so much. But what was I to do with it? I did not know. So I studied deeper and added to my knowledge in the unarticulated hope that in my researches I would discover for myself a purpose."<br/>
<br/>
His face sags, losing its shape. "And now here I am. I remember all that I have learned—" He holds out his empty palms. "And am powerless to do anything with it."<br/>
<br/>
"Are you saying there's a lesson there for me?" you ask, and you fear you ask it very impatiently, for his little speech has stung you.<br/>
<br/>
"I don't know, William. Perhaps I have only imparted a little more knowledge to you, to make of what you can."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Blackwell's little talk has left you restless and wanting a project. But you fill the next morning with more research. With experimentation, actually.<br/>
<br/>
You have decided during the night that you will quit Blackwell's villa and move your operation to the Strausslers', but to do that you will need to take over their household. That will cost <i>essentia,</i> and you spend the morning experimenting to see how much you will have on hand.<br/>
<br/>
You start by separating Rosalie's <i>essentia</i> into its own constituents: Sulva and Glundandra. The resulting two bottles are easy to identify, for her Sulvan <i>essentia</i> glows with a milky light while Glundandra is a fierce orange. The Sulvan is expendable, for you have Sulva as one of your <i>ousiarchs,</i> so you experiment with dividing it among multiple bottles.<br/>
<br/>
You start by separating the contents of one bottle into two, and find that each bottle appears full despite supposedly containing only half of her <i>essentia.</i> Well, that's to be expected, as <i>essentia</i> is not, exactly, physically divisible. You continue to separate each bottle until you have six of them. You grow concerned when they divide further into eight and then nine bottles, for <i>essentia</i> should not be so divisible. Ten bottles then appear, and you are certain you are misunderstanding what has happened in front of you.<br/>
<br/>
But they you divide one bottle in two, to create eleven in total, when a warm flash envelops the room, and a wave of heat rolls over you. After you've started your heart beating again, you look around to find that all eleven bottles have melted into hot, tinkling masses of molten glass.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"You mean we're divisible ten ways," Jonathan says later that afternoon when he's come out to the villa. "You know what this means?"</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121232231
author_id: seuzz
title: Essential Combinations
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>It's a little after five, and you and Jonathan are sitting in Blackwell's library. The November sun—Thanksgiving is a week away—is slanting through the French doors, and it bathes the room in an uncharacteristic, honeyed glow. On the table in front of you are ten bottles filled with a turquoise essence: Aparjita's.<br/>
<br/>
"You know what this means," Jonathan says. "It means we can finally take over my house. All of it."<br/>
<br/>
"Eventually," you reply. "But I got something else to show you."<br/>
<br/>
He prowls after you into the living room, where thirty similar bottles—all of different sizes and shapes, for you had Blackwell run out and buy you a new stock when you exhausted the supply you stole from Cuthbert. Ten are filled with a fiery, cherry-colored light; ten glow orange; the remaining are filled with what looks like radioactive grape jelly.<br/>
<br/>
"Malacandra," you tell Jonathan, indicating the red bottles. "Glundandra and Eldibria," you add indicating the others.<br/>
<br/>
"So, Rick's <i>essentia,</i> and Rosalie's," Jonathan says. "Well, what's left of it"<br/>
<br/>
"Right. Now look at this." You start moving bottles around, pairing them up. "Glundandra and Malacandra. Glundandra and Eldibria. Malacandra and Eldibria."<br/>
<br/>
"The last one was Rick's combination," Jonathan says. His eyes get very hard, but he says nothing as you continue to sort the bottles until you have five sets of each pair.<br/>
<br/>
"Which <i>Stellae</i> has this set?" you ask, indicating the Glundandra-Malacandra pair.<br/>
<br/>
"No one. Dad is Glundandra-Arbol. Fyodor is Glundandra-Kenandandra. Malaika is Glundandra-Perelandra."<br/>
<br/>
"You mean no one has this combination? Or this one?" You pick up a Glundandra-Eldibria pair.<br/>
<br/>
"No. You can only have only four Glundandrans at a time, and they had their quota." He perches on the arm of the sofa. "And when I say there can only be four at a time," he continues, "that means at most. <i>Stellae</i> typically have two Glundandrans in play at once. Then the new Glundandrans are born, and there's an overlap for awhile, and then the old ones die."<br/>
<br/>
That's an unpleasant surprise, though maybe not an insurmountable one, but it's enough that you decide to  shift the topic slightly. "Is there a <i>Stellae</i> out there with an Arbol-Malacandra mix?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Sure," he says. "Dr. Hu. He's one of the Sages." That would be the Chinese counterpart to the <i>Stellae.</i> <br/>
<br/>
"Suppose we wanted to add his <i>essentia</i> to our arsenal," you say with a grin, "but we didn't want to go through the trouble of flying to China and catching the guy?"<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan stares at you. Then he goes bug-eyed, and looks wildly between the bottles containing Rick Bredon's split-up <i>essentia</i>.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh my God!" He exclaims, and points. "You mean—?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah! We copy out some of you and Frank's <i>essentia</i>, split it, recombine part of it. Your Arbol and his Malacandra. Also," you add with a grin, "Viritrilbia and Malacandra, Viritrilbia and Lurga, Arbol and—"<br/>
<br/>
"I get it!"<br/>
<br/>
"Not all of it. We do the same with Rick's, and with mine and everyone's. We have all the <i>ousiarchs</i> on hand. By copying them, we can make up all the possible combinations."<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan clutches his head. "You're talking about making a complete set of <i>Stellae!</i>" <br/>
<br/>
His expression is haggard as he looks up at you.<br/>
<br/>
"The world has never had more than one of each combination in play before," he says. "It might be very unstable if we doubled everyone up by making a lot of 'evil twins'. Besides," he adds, "would you be able to split your <i>anima</i>—our <i>anima</i>—that many ways?"<br/>
<br/>
"Only five ways," you admit. "After I found out we could split our <i>essentia</i> up ten ways I tried it on Rick's <i>anima.</i> I figured we wouldn't be doing anything with <i>his.</i> But the metal bands melted after the sixth division."<br/>
<br/>
"Well, there it is," he says. "We couldn't make our own complete set of <i>Stellae</i> anyway. We could bring Rick and Rosalie back, though. Or—" He swallows as he hefts up the bottles of Glundandra and Malacandra. "We could bring <i>this</i> guy into play, or the other one. Although—" He hesitates. "I'm not sure we really want that."<br/>
<br/>
"Why not?"<br/>
<br/>
"Glundandrans like to have their own way. It's usually the best way—they're supposed to be in charge—but we kind of like it the way we've been running it now, right? More like a democracy? Adding a Glundandran to our collective—" He hefts the bottles again. "He'd be more like a Pharaoh."<br/>
<br/>
His warning gives you pause, and when he again suggests that you might make a move on taking over the Straussler household, you more or less give up on the ideas you'd been playing with. You join him in the library and talk about it while continuing to catalog and pack away the books in some spare book boxes you found in Blackwell's workroom.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Joe has given you a lot to think about, and you spend a restless night thinking about it. (And maybe your spirit has affected the <i>gwarcheidwad,</i> for it spends a noisy night prowling the house.) The clock reads 1:47 the last time you look at it, and it's still a long time after that before you feel sleep stealing over you.<br/>
<br/>
You thought you had seen a way to magnify your power <i>and</i> give yourself a project. With ten divisions of <i>essentia</i> between you, you and your two colleagues could have thirty golems to control. With two more <i>anima</i> inserts you could have had fifty. And by spreading around and recombining the <i>essentia</i> splits you could have raised and trained a whole army of your own <i>Stellae,</i> each controlling a small troop of golems. True, they would not be under your <i>direct</i> control, but with time you could have guided and shaped them to your own vision.<br/>
<br/>
Whatever vision that happened to be.<br/>
<br/>
But now Joe has identified a problem: What if you can't have an army of your own because the world can't contain it? Are you going to have to do more research to find out if his fears are justified?<br/>
<br/>
Your last thought, before you drift off, is <i>If only I could amplify </i>essentia<i> to get more golems. Or give myself more of it ...</i><br/>
<br/>
The thought should have woken you up, but instead it drags you into a very deep and dreamful sleep.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"You ever hear of the Calice de Tenebros?" Jonathan asks the next afternoon. You are occupying yourself by working on the catalog again while he studies the notes you'd worked up. You are fairly confident of them. But after the way he knocked you back yesterday you worry about unexpected hitches.<br/>
<br/>
"It's another one of those infernal devices the <i>Stellae</i> are supposed to keep hoarded away," he continues after you shake your head. "Not as bad as the <i>Libra</i>, as I think you've demonstrated. But bad enough."<br/>
<br/>
"What does it do?"<br/>
<br/>
"It steals your essence."<br/>
<br/>
You flip through the book in your hand and wonder with idle irritation why Blackwell had a book on wine presses in his library. "And the relevance of this is?"<br/>
<br/>
"Well, what you're showing me is another machine for stealing <i>essentia.</i> But the Calice bettered the trick by letting you combine them."<br/>
<br/>
That gets your attention. "Really? You have schematics for it?"<br/>
<br/>
"No. And you don't want them, except to figure out what <i>not</i> to do. It doesn't work."<br/>
<br/>
You almost throw a book at his head. "Then what the fuck are you—?"<br/>
<br/>
"You just want to be sure you haven't reinvented a square wheel," Jonathan says, and he drops your notebook to the table with a frown. "I don't think you have, but—"<br/>
<br/>
"So what's the problem with the Calice?"<br/>
<br/>
Instead of answering he leaps up and charges out the door. You hear his little silver sports car rev up and speed away. He must not be in a hurry to get back, for it's nearly an hour before he shows up again, by which point you've cleared most of another shelf.<br/>
<br/>
"Kali left some notes for me," he says when he saunters back in, as though he'd just stepped into the kitchen. "They really don't say much, and there's no technical information. But one of our guys got ahold of it when he went retrograde, and he tried doing what you're proposing. He used it to suck the <i>essentia</i> out of one of Kali's students and add it to his own. It killed him." He thrusts the papers at you.<br/>
<br/>
It doesn't take you long to read them—they take the form of a short story—and you drop them again with an irritated sigh.<br/>
<br/>
"This really doesn't help me, Joe. It doesn't say anything about how this Calice things works, what the theory was, how the <i>essentia</i> were supposed to mix. I mean, you're right, the thing really does sound like a design for a broken wheel. And what I've got—" You stab the specs you drew up over the course of the day, after the dreams you had last night. "Those aren't just theory, they're blueprints!"<br/>
<br/>
"And I don't seen any flaws," he admits. "But do you really want to test them out on us?"<br/>
<br/>
The idea you drew up is so simple that either it must work or it must fail catastrophically. It's a variation on the "skin" that you invented to let you and your friends switch faces without wearing masks. But instead of attaching <i>imago</i> to the sigils that are woven into the skin, this design attaches <i>essentia</i> to those sigils. In theory, this would let you switch from one set of <i>essentia</i> to another.<br/>
<br/>
This would give you more golems to control, for you would have additional sets of <i>essentia</i>, each capable of controlling a small troop of slaves. It would also let you wield the <i>essentia</i> of more than one <i>Stellae</i>—just not at the same time.<br/>
<br/>
You are itching to try it out, and Joe's vague worries and cautions actually anger you.</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212322311
author_id: seuzz
title: A Perfect Disguise
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"Look, I'm willing to try this out on myself," you announce. "I would've already, except I need somebody to run the operating table while I'm on it. Come on."<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan lurches to his feet and follows you out the library. "Okay, you're the boss," he says in a tight voice. "Whose <i>essentia</i> are you going to give yourself? Rick's? Aparjita's?"<br/>
<br/>
"I've got Lucy Vredenburg's <i>essentia</i> up in the workroom, if you think it's too dangerous to try with one of the other's." You jostle hard into Jonathan as you make a last-minute dive at the stairs. "We'll use hers."<br/>
<br/>
"How did you get Lucy's?"<br/>
<br/>
"She was under Blackwell's mask, remember? I got her out of that golem stuff, then took her apart. I figured she might be useful eventually, so I saved her stuff."<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan says nothing until you're in the workroom, when he pushes you aside to jam his hand into a separate box. "Let's use Jonathan's <i>essentia,</i>" he says. "And we'll use it on me."<br/>
<br/>
"I'm willing to be the guinea pig, Joe!"<br/>
<br/>
"Let me be the guinea pig," he says firmly. "Just make a back up copy of me in case something goes wrong. Nothing has so far," he adds under his breath.<br/>
<br/>
You're inclined to argue, but he looks ready to argue too, so you relent. Besides, he's right: If you do make a backup of him, it will be easy to restore him if something goes pear-shaped.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You gather up all the necessary materials and take them down to the living room, which with its operating table has become more of a workroom than the actual upstairs workroom. Joe undresses and lays out on the table. His expression is grim and his cheeks pale.<br/>
<br/>
You start by removing his <i>imago,</i> both that of Jonathan and of Joe himself, into separate masks. Then you remove his <i>anima</i> and his <i>essentia.</i> The latter you copy into two bottles, so that you'll have a back up of it, and you also copy his <i>anima</i> and <i>imago</i> into back up masks. If you wanted to, you could now make an identical twin of the face-shifting colleague you've been arguing with.<br/>
<br/>
After Joe has been completely disassembled, you push the golem aside so that you can carve your newest sigil onto the table. It takes the form of a wheel that intersects the large <i>essentia</i> sigil, and many of its elements mirror the last sigil that you added to the table—the one that lets you wrap a golem in a skin that can absorb more than one <i>imago.</i> <br/>
<br/>
After you've finished the sigil—and carefully checked it over—you activate it with a candle while holding your breath: a pattern of rainbow colors run and melt over the golem. That is to be expected. Now the real test: You send one of Joe's own bottles of <i>essentia</i> arcing onto the golem, then repeat it with one of Jonathan's bottles. <br/>
<br/>
At least the golem doesn't melt.<br/>
<br/>
It's quick work returning Joe the rest of what he had—<i>anima</i> and two sets of <i>imago.</i> In the future you won't have to remove any of these elements if giving him more <i>essentia,</i> though, and you won't have to remove anything if giving him another face.<br/>
<br/>
Joe, when he raises his head again, asks if you're ready to start.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"It feels like an earthquake every time I switch back and forth," he says. He's dressed again and sitting with you in the dusky library. His color is chalky, but he insists it's just nerves as he switches between his two <i>essentia.</i> He twitches every time he swabs his chest with an open palm in the prescribed gesture.<br/>
<br/>
"But you can feel the difference between them?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"I can feel the change," Joe says. "And yeah, it really does feel different." His brow furrows and a haunted light comes into his eyes as he swabs his chest again. "When I switch into Jonathan, it's like part of me gets amputated." He holds out his empty palm, and the ridges in his forehead deepen. His lips work. But nothing happens, not until he rubs his chest again. Relief shows on his forehead as two lights—one a large, golden orb and the other a hard, sharp diamond—materialize over his palm. " He raises his fists over his head.<br/>
<br/>
"I suppose you'll want us to wait a couple of days before we let me and Frank get the same operation," you say. "In case you melt into a puddle of goo."<br/>
<br/>
"I don't think that'll happen. But yeah, let's wait. There's a couple of things I should try out first."<br/>
<br/>
"Like what?"<br/>
<br/>
He chews his lip before answering.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, first," he says, "it occurs to me that this gives me a perfect disguise. Hang on." He springs to his feet and flees the room. He is gone several minutes, and he's shifted into Jonathan's form when he falls back into the chair opposite you. He has a little disk in his hand—the one you've seen him use when testing people for <i>essentia.</i> He plays with it awhile, biting on the tip of his tongue as he tries maneuvering a little ball of quicksilver over its surface. "Do me a favor and go sit in another room," he says after a minute of this. "You're interfering with it, you damn <i>Stellae.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
So you're kneeling over your operating table in the living room, looking for places to add sigils, when he saunters back in a few minutes later. "Confirmation," he says he tosses his detector at you. "I'm invisible."<br/>
<br/>
"What do you mean?"<br/>
<br/>
"I mean that there's nothing special about Jonathan's <i>essentia.</i> When I'm running my own, that thing spins around and points straight at me. When I'm running his, it just wanders around uselessly." He flops onto the sofa with the kind of lazy grin that Jonathan wears when he's feeling especially pleased with myself. He runs his hand through his silky blonde hair. <br/>
<br/>
"Like this, I'm all Jonathan Straussler," he says, "and nothing but Jonathan Straussler. I am <i>exactly</i> what the guy was before we laid hands on him, and no one could prove otherwise without taking me apart to find the secret bits you gave me. Mind, brain, memories, skills, personality, prodigies—or lack of them. In <i>essentia,</i> too. <br/>
<br/>
"Well, okay, there's one difference," he adds. "It's not his <i>anima,</i> it's Will Prescott's running things. Will Prescott with some of Joe Durras stitched onto it." He smiles smugly, as though he'd been the one to design and execute that operation. "But no one can get inside to find <i>that.</i>" He lets out a satisfied sigh. "Nothing the <i>Stellae</i> could look for could they find!"<br/>
<br/>
"Were you worried?"<br/>
<br/>
"Sure! <i>Stellae</i> are good at finding other <i>Stellae.</i> Except for the Sulvans, for some reason. Frank and I haven't been saying anything, but we have been worried that Charles or someone might still be able to sniff us out, even under a mask. But this way, with no masks, and no <i>essentia,</i> if I don't want to flash it around—" He drums his chest. "I'm just plain old, ordinary Jonathan Straussler." His eyes crinkle with delight.<br/>
<br/>
That sounds good. It sounds better when he continues.<br/>
<br/>
"And second thing I want to test out," he says, "is how many golems I can control with two set ups."<br/>
<br/>
"You think you can do more than ten?"<br/>
<br/>
"I can do fifteen, if your theory's right," he says. "Mind you, I'm betting it won't be fifteen at once. If I can't sense my own <i>essentia</i> while I'm running Jonathan's, I bet my golems won't either, and vice versa when I'm running my own. So I'll be able to run ten golems when I'm running my own <i>essentia</i> and five when I'm running Jonathan's. But I won't be able to run all of them at the same time." He shrugs. "Not that I'll probably have to."<br/>
<br/>
"And if that works," you say, "if we gave you a third <i>essentia,</i> then you could control twenty golems. With a fourth, you'd have twenty-five—"<br/>
<br/>
"Is there any limit to how much <i>essentia</i> you could give me?" Jonathan asks. His eyes are bright.<br/>
<br/>
"None that I know of. It's just a matter of adding sigils to that 'skin' I put under you."<br/>
<br/>
He lets out a low whistle. "That's a big-ass army we could have."<br/>
<br/>
"How many golems do you need to run this guy's house?"<br/>
<br/>
He thinks and ticks off his fingers. "Mom. The Beast. Arturo. Egeman and the security guys."<br/>
<br/>
"How many is that?"<br/>
<br/>
"Four total. Dad's a billionaire," he snorts when you look at him askance. "Mrs. Szymanski, probably. That's eight."<br/>
<br/>
"Okay, with Jonathan's <i>essentia</i> you can run five—"<br/>
<br/>
"Four," he corrects you. "I need to keep one of them inside me."<br/>
<br/>
"Well, let's keep Joe's <i>essentia</i> back. We'll give you a third set, and you can use that set and Jonathan's to run the house."<br/>
<br/>
"We can use one of the guys we take at the house," he says. "Jonathan's <i>essentia</i> and <i>The Beast's,</i> maybe."<br/>
<br/>
It sounds like a plan, and Jonathan returns home. Tomorrow, after school he will bring out a work truck big enough to transport your operating table to the Strausslers, where you will turn eight people into golems.<br/>
<br/>
But what will you do with yourself out there? Possibly you can hide out in Jonathan's wing of the house without a disguise. But it sounds like there are plenty of faces to hide under at the Strausslers. He also has friends you could turn yourself into.<br/>
<br/>
And you'll have to find a place for Frank—assuming you can rescue him from Will Prescott's house.</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212123223113
author_id: seuzz
title: Stumbling Over a Spy
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span> You're still shy about committing yourself in any particular direction. <br/>
<br/>
So, the next day, when you and Jonathan are moving your supplies over the Strausslers, you ask if you can just bury yourself in his "punishment corner."<br/>
<br/>
"I guess," he says. "It seems like kind of a waste of opportunities, though. And you could always be Monique," he adds with a leering grin.<br/>
<br/>
You smile tightly. You've still got a remote sigil on her, so you <i>could</i> be her directly if you wanted. But you're still thinking in terms of research possibilities, and possible future plans, and don't want to feel yourself distracted—still less dominated—by a "boyfriend."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
The takeover of Jonathan Straussler's house proceeds like clockwork. Curt Straussler, Jonathan's "Beast" father, is trapped under a golem mask already. True, it is under the control of Frank, who is not with you, but when you find him in his office your colleague moves swiftly to remove it from him—knocking him out long enough that the two of you can get your "operating table" up into his outer office, where you spread it out on a conference table.<br/>
<br/>
You start by removing Curt Straussler's <i>anima</i> and <i>essentia,</i> leaving him an impotent husk. The latter you split into five jars. One of these you reintroduce with a flash of lightning and a roll of thunder into Straussler; the other you insert into Joe. When he shifts into that <i>essentia</i>—which leaves him without his prodigies, but he doesn't need them for the moment—he orders Straussler (who is now indistinguishable from a golem) to get to his feet and summon his head of security.<br/>
<br/>
The man, one Egeman Tiryaki, is already on his way, for the crashing and banging from inside Straussler's office has alarmed the staff. Curt briefly distracts Egeman —a strapping Turk with a fierce glower and a bald head—until Joe can get a blank <i>Libra</i> mask onto him, knocking him out. His operation is even  more straightforward than Curt's: You have on hand four jars of Jonathan Straussler's <i>essentia,</i> and you insert one of these into Tiryaki after removing his own <i>essentia</i> and <i>anima</i>. It seems best to handle it that way: As Joe will likely be spending most of his time as Jonathan, it makes sense that "Jonathan" should have direct control of the security staff.<br/>
<br/>
The next three victims fall quickly. Golem-Tiryaki only has to summon and distract James Willson, the security officer who doubles as a second footman, until Joe can get the mask onto him, and a similar operation turns him into a minion. He and Egeman actually lay hands on and hold Charlie McGehee, the security man who watches the exterior of the house while acting as a groundskeeper, and then McGehee and Willson grapple Huojin Liu, Curt Straussler's driver, into submission.<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan spends a good five minutes giving his new security officers a reorientation. It's not complicated—they are already trained to obey and protect the household, including Jonathan, and mostly he just has to assure them that they should put the day's events out of their mind and return to their duties.<br/>
<br/>
Except that he keeps two of them—Tiryaki and Willson—on hand as Curt calls in the remaining three converts-to-be: Mrs. Straussler; the butler, Arturo, and the housekeeper, Mrs. Szymanski. These get a transfusion that replaces their native <i>essentia</i> with Curt's. After Joe switches into "the Beast's" <i>essentia</i> he sends them away with orders to tell the rest of the staff to ignore all the booming and crashing that has been frightening the house. They are also informed that you are a friend of Master Jonathan's who will be staying with him in his quarters.<br/>
<br/>
To prepare for that, Jonathan orders Liu to drive you in to town so you can buy another sheet of steel for a redesigned operating table. You have, in using your first version, seen a couple of ways to simplify and condense the design while adding more features. As you drive off with Liu in the work truck, you are looking forward to a good night's sleep followed by a pleasant day of sigil construction.<br/>
<br/>
You are occupied by quite different thoughts on the drive back.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"And how long has he worked for you?" you ask Curt Straussler.<br/>
<br/>
"Five years," the tycoon says. He glowers at Huojin Liu, who returns his anger-mottled expression with an impassive stare.<br/>
<br/>
"And you never knew he was a double agent?"<br/>
<br/>
"I'd have <i>fired</i> him <i>and</i> filed a couple of lawsuit!" Straussler snarls.<br/>
<br/>
"Don't blow a gasket, Pop," Jonathan says, but as he's controlling Liu with his <i>essentia</i>, Curt Straussler ignores his order and slaps the table with the palm of his hand. "This is actually good news," Jonathan adds, "because Liu here is now a triple agent working for us. Isn't that right, Liu?"<br/>
<br/>
"If you say so, sir," says the chauffeur.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, I don't say anything yet. What do you think, Will?"<br/>
<br/>
Despite your recent experience with masks, subterfuges, and the turning of agents, you are still intimidated by what you learned on the ride out: Liu, conscience-stricken by the change of loyalties that elevated Jonathan above all others, had confided in you that he makes three times what Straussler is paying him by acting as an agent for Spartan Techadyne—one of Straussler's chief competitors.<br/>
<br/>
"Is this really any of our business?" you ask. "We're not trying to take over your dad's business. We just want a place to hide and a little spending money until we figure out what we're doing. Can't your dad just, uh—" You break off as Curt snatches up his phone and jabs at the receiver.<br/>
<br/>
"What are you doing, Dad?" Jonathan asks him.<br/>
<br/>
"None of your affair!"<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan turns to the chauffeur. "Liu, wait in the outside office." With a curt bow, the traitor withdraws as Jonathan swabs his chest. "Dad, what are you doing?" Jonathan asks again.<br/>
<br/>
Curt twitches. "I'm calling a— Kim!" he barks into the phone. "This is Curt Straussler. Hold on a minute." He covers the receiver with his hand. "I'm calling a business acquaintance who should be able to tell me something about what's going on!"<br/>
<br/>
With a wave of his hand, Jonathan gives his father permission to proceed. The conversation that follows leaves Curt with steam coming off his scalp.<br/>
<br/>
"He says he doesn't know anything about it!" he roars after hanging up. "Bullshit! He must've set it up!"<br/>
<br/>
"Calm down. Who set what up?"<br/>
<br/>
Curt's demeanor instantly smooths out. "Eric Kim. He's my liaison with Fane."<br/>
<br/>
At that, Jonathan sits up sharply. "Fane?" he says.<br/>
<br/>
"One of my business partners," Curt says. "Partner, supplier, customer, competitor." His lip curls. "Saboteur."<br/>
<br/>
"What do they have to do with the company that's paying Liu?" you ask, for Jonathan has sunk into a thoughtful silence.<br/>
<br/>
"Spartan Techadyne? It's one of their subsidiaries, one of my competitors. Fane's been trying to get in business with me—buy me, partner with me—for a couple of years now. Eric Kim's been their Johnny-on-the-spot, trying to jolly me along, but it looks like he got tired of playing nice and decided to start <i>stealing</i>. Or maybe that was the plan all along."<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan comes to life again. "So let's get this Eric Kim guy out here and talk to him." As he speaks, Curt's phone rings. By his expression when he answers, you can tell it's person you've just been talking about.<br/>
<br/>
Jonathan gestures you to follow him into the outer office, where Liu is patiently waiting. "I still don't see how this is any of our business," you protest to him.<br/>
<br/>
"Then let me explain, because this is big," he says, and he pulls you into the outside corridor so no one—not even the docile Liu—can hear you.<br/>
<br/>
"You heard Dad mention Fane," Jonathan says. "They're this giant corporation, like General Electric or AT&amp;T, only bigger, I think. But they're more than that. They're in the magic business, too."<br/>
<br/>
"You mean like David Copperfield?"<br/>
<br/>
He shoves you lightly. "No! Like you and me. Like the <i>Stellae</i>. They started as a secret society back in the eighteenth century, investigating occult, oogedy-boogedy stuff, and black magic. They went into business to finance themselves, and now they're one of the biggest companies in the world, and way back behind the scenes they're <i>still</i> doing stuff like Blackwell was doing. Like <i>we've</i> been doing."<br/>
<br/>
"So they're like the Illuminati or something?" you ask, still trying to feel the contours of what your colleague is trying to say.<br/>
<br/>
"Like the Illuminati and the Freemasons and the Rosicrucians and all the other conspiracy stuff that you've ever heard of. But also secretly running a hundred-billion dollar a year multinational conglomerate that makes everything from airplanes to chocolate chip cookies while drawing pentagrams on the walls of their secret laboratories so as to invoke Unnamable Entities from the Nether Dimensions."<br/>
<br/>
He holds your eye. "You're pulling my leg," you say.<br/>
<br/>
"But I'm not. They're someone the <i>Stellae</i> have been fighting for a long time, and never being able to get the better of because they've sprawled out <i>everywhere.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
Now you do feel a slight shiver. "So you're saying they're even worse than the <i>Stellae?</i> Do we need to get out of here?"<br/>
<br/>
"No, I think I'm saying the opposite." Jonathan cocks his head. "<i>Stellae</i> are dangerous because of their prodigies. The guys running Fane are just normal people. They're like Blackwell." A gleam comes into his eye. "And we handled Blackwell."<br/>
<br/>
"Still, I don't want any trouble," you start to say, but Jonathan cuts you off.<br/>
<br/>
"Who's Blackwell's boss now?" he says. "How would you like to be the boss of a Blackwell that makes a hundred billion a year?<br/>
<br/>
"And," he adds, "they've got a lot more places for us to hide than in Jonathan's punishment corner."</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121232231131
author_id: seuzz
title: Placing Agents
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Joe's promises of billions of dollars don't stir you. It's when he repeats that this "Fane" corporation does lots of research that you decide he's got the right idea about infiltrating them. You don't need to take them over. You just want to creep inside them, carve out your own little fortress where no one can find you, and lay your hands on everything they know.<br/>
<br/>
And then, well, maybe in a few years, after you've figured what you want to do, then you'd be in a good position to take over them, or whatever corner of the world has caught your fancy.<br/>
<br/>
Besides, by the gleam in his eye, you suspect Joe might be tempted to strike out on his own into Fane if you don't go along.<br/>
<br/>
Still, you equivocate a little. "We should talk to Frank first."<br/>
<br/>
"You just have to say 'yes' and he's outvoted," Jonathan points out.<br/>
<br/>
And that puts an end to the discussion.<br/>
<br/>
"Good," Jonathan says. "Now let's get ready for this Kim guy." <br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
At his suggestion, you give him Curt Straussler's <i>imago</i> to go with Jonathan's, and you put Jonathan's <i>imago</i> onto the Curt-golem, so that he and it can switch places if need be. You hustle hard, for you have no idea how soon your next victim will be arriving. As it turns out, you have a forty-minute wait before he does.<br/>
<br/>
It's a shock when he waddles in. "Eric Kim" turns out to be someone you already knew: the pudgy Korean-American owner of King Kong Komics. <br/>
<br/>
He recognizes you, too. "Oh, hey, I know you," he says with an expansive smile. "You hang around with Christian and them sometimes, right?"<br/>
<br/>
That would be Christian Knouse, one of the RPG enthusiasts at Westside, and no, you don't hang around with him all that much. It's a relief when, at a word from Jonathan, Liu grabs Eric so you can wrestle a mask onto him.<br/>
<br/>
"Hate to tell you, Pop, but Eric was telling the truth," Joe says afterward, when he is wearing Eric Kim's face and using Eric Kim's <i>essentia</i>—a fourth installation—to control the confused golem of the comic book store owner. Joe has had to take off all his clothes, and you're doing your best not to look at him from the neck down, for he has the shape and heft of a sumo wrestler who is trying to bulk up. Maybe Joe's trying not to notice it too, for he's huddled up and peering near-sightedly at the ceiling.<br/>
<br/>
"Eric doesn't know anything about Liu," he continues. "He's not even that interested in the Strausslers or in Proteus. They sometimes give him little devices to share with Curt, to keep him interested, but—"<br/>
<br/>
"Who's 'they'?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Fane. Except it's one of the secret parts. Eric's whole comic book store is being subsidized by something called 'Diana' and his job is to pick up information about a project out at Fort Suffolk." He blinks and makes a face. "What a mess."<br/>
<br/>
"What's out at Fort Suffolk?"<br/>
<br/>
"Another Fane project. Would you believe these guys' shit? One part of Fane spying on another, but then every one of them spies on all the other. Anyway, the thing at Fort Suffolk is called 'Titan', and it has something to do with making super soldiers, and Diana wants to keep tabs on it."<br/>
<br/>
"So he's not spying on the Strausslers? But Liu said—"<br/>
<br/>
"I told you it's a mess. If Liu's working for Spartan Techadyne, it's <i>another</i> part of Fane spying on the Strausslers. Maybe you better give me Liu's face too, so I can put all the parts together for us."<br/>
<br/>
So, before all is said and done, Joe has five faces he can switch between, in case he has to go undercover: the faces of Joe Durras, Jonathan Straussler, Curt Straussler, Eric Kim, and Huojin Liu. With some rapid shuttling back and forth, and some doodling on a sheet of paper, you write down everything he tells you. Or, at least as much of it as the principals know.<br/>
<br/>
Eric Kim is employed off the books by a research group called Diana—where they fit into the Fane organization even he doesn't know—and has been told to keep Curt Straussler interested in a Fane tie-up even as his main job is to spy on "Project Titan" at Fort Suffolk. That project, in turn, is officially being managed by a company called Alcidex Pharmagen that is either being secretly controlled by Fane or which has been penetrated by agents of Fane for another secret Fane group called "Nerio," which is the Fane division that is running Project Titan. (Eric doesn't know who at Fort Suffolk is a Nerio agent, but his handlers know that they are there.) <br/>
<br/>
As for Liu: He is technically employed by a Fane subsidiary called Esty, which provides security services to corporations and the point zero-zero-zero-one percent, like Curt Straussler. But, like Eric, he is also employed by a secret Fane division—a black ops group called "Spartacus" that provides off-the-books security services for Fane's secret operations. When he was approached by Spartan Techadyne, yet <i>another</i> part of the Fane empire, and asked to provide intelligence on Straussler and Proteus, his superiors at Spartacus told him to accept. (What's the relationship between Spartacus and Spartan Techadyne? He doesn't know. Maybe there isn't one)<br/>
<br/>
It's all a muddle. But before you go any further you will want to get Frank's input. He's probably going crazy being left out.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"How did you get in?" Will Prescott bluntly asks when he meets you at the landing on the stairs.<br/>
<br/>
"I told your mom I have homework for you," you reply, and turn him around to push him back upstairs.<br/>
<br/>
"You don't go to my—"<br/>
<br/>
"Quiet!" you growl. "You're not usually this dense, Frank."<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, right," he sighs. "I used to be Frank Durras, didn't I?"<br/>
<br/>
That's when you remember that this mopey kid in the droopy cargo shorts and the floppy t-shirt has your body and your <i>anima,</i> but has lost contact with the part of him that used to be a <i>Stellae.</i><br/>
<br/>
"Don't you ever switch faces?" you ask him once you've got him in your old bedroom, which with its tangled bed sheets and tottering stacks of books and old dishes looks like it hasn't been cleaned since you yourself were last in it. "You could get Frank back any time you wanted."<br/>
<br/>
He shrugs. "Just seems safest to keep things like this." He slumps onto the bed. "So how are Joe and Will?" He will be asking that because you gave yourself a copy of Jonathan Straussler's <i>imago</i> before coming over, and are wearing it now.<br/>
<br/>
"Joe's fine. So am I. Take your clothes off," you continue as you haul a mask out of the book bag you're carrying, "and get into that."<br/>
<br/>
He perks up. "What's going on. Is that you, uh, Will?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, it's me, and this is a rescue mission. I'll take over for you here for the evening," you say as you start unbuttoning your shirt and peeling off your shoes. "You go back to the Strausslers. Joe will tell you what's been going on and will get you a new face, and he'll also fix you up so you and Frank stay on speaking terms no matter who you're looking like. Then you'll send a golem back here to cover for you—well, <i>me</i>—so you can move back in with us."<br/>
<br/>
"It's about time you guys got moving," he grumbles, but his eyes are bright as he peels off the last of his clothes and pulls the mask toward him.<br/>
<br/>
"We haven't been wasting time," you tell him with a grin, then switch into your old and start putting on your old clothes.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You were worried you might get nostalgic during your brief return home. You needn't have. Your dad is still steamed at you over the fight that got you suspended, and because you didn't pick up any memories from Frank of the last few days you make a fool of yourself after dinner when you don't know enough to bring your homework in for him to check. By the time Jonathan Straussler shows up again around eight, you're ready to shake the dust of Saratoga Falls from your shoes for good.<br/>
<br/>
Of course it's not Jonathan who is bringing you "extra homework" up. It's what's left of Huojin Liu, but running Jonathan's mind and face. After you get clothes switched around, you flip yourself back to Jonathan's <i>imago</i> and switch Liu to the "Will Prescott" form that Joe copied onto the erstwhile Fane agent. "Have fun with the rest of your life," you tell him as you pull on Jonathan's shoes.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh Christ," he moans, and he looks genuinely pained. "We were having fun, weren't we, man? Before those guys showed up?"<br/>
<br/>
You stop short, for this rebuke, though mild, has stung you hard. <br/>
<br/>
The "Will Prescott" standing in front of you carries the memories that Frank picked up while playing "Will Prescott," and those were the memories of the golem that you created and sent to suffer for you at Westside while you were playing at Blackwell's. Though he's just a ghostly <i>imago</i> being carried around by a stitched-together Frankenstein's monster, he looks and acts and, most important of all, remembers being the "you" that was your first partner when all this started.<br/>
<br/>
The "you" who had all your secrets, who loyally and doggedly helped you out.<br/>
<br/>
You're moved to grab him in a brotherly hug. "We'll get you out," you tell him, and you mean it as you say it. "We'll figure out a way. It might take awhile. Fuck, it might take months. But I promise you, we won't forget you!"<br/>
<br/>
He shrugs—it looks like embarrassment—but at least he doesn't call you a liar. Still, his evident doubt makes you more determined to keep that promise.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"We got a lot of ways of getting into Fane," Frank says later that evening. His eye is flinty. "Through Kim, through Liu, through Fort Suffolk."<br/>
<br/>
"Don't forget Hal," says Joe.<br/>
<br/>
"Who's he?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Hal Swann. <i>Stellae.</i> Specializes in fucking up Fane every way he can."</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212322311313
author_id: seuzz
title: The London Blitz
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Frank and Joe tell you about this Hal Swann character, and you're intrigued. He is a Kenandandran, like you, but he has Catilindria as his other <i>ousiarch.</i> Your <i>essentia</i> collection is complete, so he wouldn't add anything. But turning another <i>Stellae</i> into an ally—or at least neutralizing him—is an attraction, and because he specializes in watching and torturing Fane, he would be a good asset.<br/>
<br/>
Frank and Joe acknowledge Hal's usefulness, but they are also wary. "He's a nut," Frank says, and Joe cautions, "He'll be hard to catch."<br/>
<br/>
"Harder than Rick?" you ask, for you're still pleased at the way you handled that very dangerous man.<br/>
<br/>
"Harder, maybe," Joe says. "He's a Catilindrian. Rick had skill, but Hal has luck. You could predict what Rick could do, counter it. Hal specializes in fucking up attacks and making unpredictable attacks of his own. It's hard to guard against that."<br/>
<br/>
"Also, he's going to be hard to find," Frank adds. "He keeps underground, and he's even more paranoid than Rick."<br/>
<br/>
You appreciate the cautions. But the idea of adding to your arsenal someone as good and as dangerous as Rick (but without his psychological wounds) is too enticing to pass up.<br/>
<br/>
You and your partners spend a whole day sketching out and refining your plans.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
It's Saturday when you leave Saratoga Falls for the United Kingdom, which is where Swann, who is English, has his base. You take Curt Straussler's private Gulfstream, and enjoy an inflight dinner of steak and lobster before retiring to sleeping cabins in the rear. It's Sunday morning when you land in London, and there are two cars waiting for you. One is to transport you and your friends; into the other—the largest SUV that can be found—you wrestle your "operating table" along with the second, similarly sized metal plate that you and Liu bought in Saratoga Falls.<br/>
<br/>
Your trio could travel under your own faces, as both the flight and the transportation into London were arranged by a very compliant Curt Straussler. Once you are at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, however, Joe retires into a private changing room and re-emerges as Curt Straussler himself in order to claim the reservation that is waiting for you. All your things—including the operating tables—are deposited in the best suite in the place. You have it to yourself for the rest of the day, for Frank goes out to Oxford and Joe to Cambridge to look for Swann.<br/>
<br/>
Meanwhile, you unpack your occult tools and get to work. You take your time, for there is something very soothing about working through the sigils and fitting the designs together.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"It's all there," you announce as you gesture at the metal table with a broad sweep of your arm. "I think," you have to add, for nothing in life can be certain.<br/>
<br/>
It's Saturday night, well after dark, and Frank and Joe have returned from their expeditions. As you talk them through it, they follow your explanation of the sigils with roving eyes.<br/>
<br/>
Even with all its intricacies and overlaps you can scarcely believe that you got it all to fit inside those sixty-four square feet of sheet metal. And even then, in order to fit it all onto one piece of metal, you had to inscribe some useful sigils on the other side.<br/>
<br/>
Four circles—seven feet across, and overlapping because they have different center points—dominate the metal sheet. Sigils are inscribed on their outer and inner surfaces. These are the most important, for they inscribe or remove <i>imago, essentia</i> and <i>anima</i> from underlying substrate, so that you can add these constituents to a golem, or remove them from human beings so as to create a golem. (To make a golem without sacrificing a human being, you must use the sigils on the other side.)<br/>
<br/>
Intersecting the <i>imago</i> circle are sigils for the making of masks and mind-bands; for sealing these; and for merging them into complete disguises. Other sigils allow for modifying <i>imago,</i> either inside a mask or for remotely modifying the <i>imago</i> of an actual person. One arc, connecting one of the <i>imago</i> sigils to an <i>anima</i> sigil lets you attach the shadowy "mental imago" to <i>anima,</i> the way you've merged the memories and personalities of Joe and Frank Durras into the underlying <i>anima</i> of Will Prescott that now guides them. <br/>
<br/>
A tangential sigil off the <i>essentia</i> sigil lets you split and combine <i>essentia,</i> and other sigils let you modify certain kinds of <i>essentia</i> directly. The <i>anima</i> sigil is unadorned, but the "extras" sigil contains intersecting and tangenting sigils for the creation of remote and control sigils.<br/>
<br/>
You point all these out to Frank and Joe with quiet pride. "Too bad we can't fold it up and carry it in our pockets," Joe says. Frank says, "Don't give Will any ideas."<br/>
<br/>
You're able to spend time with them talking about your new operating table because they did not return with any leads on Swann. Not that they were expecting to get any, even though they traveled around Oxford and Cambridge under their own faces. They didn't go down to find him; they went to lay a trail for Swann himself to follow.<br/>
<br/>
You still have the original flyer that your trio designed and ran off in hundreds of copies for Joe and Frank to plaster the universities with. Hal is, by personal and political affinity, a hard-core Marxist, and the flyer is designed to catch his attention and draw him in: A red-bordered sheet with hammer-and-sickles at the corners and labeled on three edges with symbols that look like decorative scribbles but which are actually pairs of occult symbols for the planets: Uranus-Pluto, which are Hal's <i>ousiarchs,</i> and Sun-Mercury and Mars-Saturn, which are Joe's and Frank's. The bold, black headline—"LEARN THE TRUTH ABOUT FANE, EXXONMOBIL, UNILEVER"—is also meant to attract his eye, but the socialist gibberish that makes up the rest is only there to distract the oblivious. The cell phone number belongs to Jonathan Straussler: Joe has brought it with him.<br/>
<br/>
The message conveyed is designed to be irresistible: Frank and Joe are trying to locate Hal, and he should call them at the number. "Biggest risk is that he'll call in some of the heavy guns," Frank said about the ad. "Frank and Joe are missing, and so are Rick and Aparjita. They all might be so spooked by now that Hal feels like he has to call in the big brigades."<br/>
<br/>
"But Hal's a free spirit," Joe said, "and there's a good chance he'll sniff around on his own."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
The other risk is that you'll attract a lot of crackpots. And that's exactly what happens. They were already pestering Joe before he'd left Cambridge, and you spend Sunday deflecting inquiries by setting up phony appointments with those callers who are not Hal Swann.<br/>
<br/>
But come Monday morning at eleven o'clock, Joe gets one such call that takes a dramatic turn.<br/>
<br/>
He's selling the caller the usual line about an upcoming meeting when he sits bolt upright and the bored sneer falls from his face. "Actually, we do have an early planning session," he says, and catches your eye, and Frank's. "If you and your friend want to show up early. This afternoon? One o'clock is fine," he says, and shuts down the phone.<br/>
<br/>
"A nibble?" Frank says.<br/>
<br/>
"Guy named Jacob Darrow. He said the magic word, though. Said him and his friend 'Swann' couldn't make the regular meet. So I told them to come 'round at one today instead." He glances at you, and you lunge for the suitcase containing the blank masks and mind bands.<br/>
<br/>
As the hour of the appointment approaches, Joe puts himself into Huojin Liu's face and parks himself outside the main entrance to the Savoy with a disposable cell phone. Frank, in his own face, mans the elevator lobby outside the suite. At a little after one he sticks his head in long enough to say that Joe's picked up no sign of Swann. But five minutes later you hear Frank's voice outside the door, and you pick up both masks that you have waiting.<br/>
<br/>
But Frank only lifts one finger as he ushers your guest in. You've just time to see the man's beard and trilby before mashing him in the face with the mask. "Is this him?" you ask as Frank catches the slumping figure.<br/>
<br/>
"No, this is the guy that Joe talked to. He says his friend couldn't make it."<br/>
<br/>
"Fuck."<br/>
<br/>
"No, it might be better this way." Frank doesn't so much as grunt as he hurls your victim onto a sofa. "Hal's playing it cautious, sending this guy up to look around." He smiles mirthlessly. "We can send him back to give the all clear."<br/>
<br/>
It makes sense. But instead of using the operating table, which is very noisy and which might spook Swann, you do it the old-fashioned way, and after the mask reemerges from Darrow you paste it up with a bubbly mix that includes your own hair. <br/>
<br/>
Frank talks as you work. "Joe and I were wondering. What are we going to do with Swann?"<br/>
<br/>
The question puzzles you. "Turn him into one of us."<br/>
<br/>
"But how? Put your <i>anima</i> in him, like you did me and Joe?"<br/>
<br/>
"Is there an alternative?"<br/>
<br/>
"Joe's carrying four different sets of <i>essentia.</i> One of us could take Hal's <i>essentia,</i> and we could replace him."<br/>
<br/>
You pause in your work. "You like it just being the three of us?"<br/>
<br/>
"There's that. But maybe you want to save your <i>anima</i> for when we put Rick's and Aparijita's <i>essentia</i> back in play."<br/>
<br/>
"So which of us gets to be Hal?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
Frank doesn't reply.</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212123223113133
author_id: seuzz
title: Hal Is Where Home Is
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"I don't want to count on anything until we actually get this guy," you tell Frank, and put the last touches onto the mask. "You say he makes his own luck. I don't want to jinx it." You lay the mask onto the unconscious Jacob Darrow.<br/>
<br/>
He sits up with a confused expression on his face—all golems seem to reset to the same look of befuddlement, no matter who they are golems of—and Frank starts questioning him. Darrow is reticent at first, but he starts to answer when you take to repeating Frank's question, and he starts to show a little fear when he finds he's forced to answer. The long and the short of it is that Hal Swann is certainly in the neighborhood; he showed Darrow some cell phone pictures of Frank and Joe and asked him to scout this "meeting place" for them, and Darrow is supposed to return with what he's learned. <br/>
<br/>
"I'll go with him," Frank says. "Call Joe up here and get him to wait by the elevators for us."<br/>
<br/>
"Are you going to be able to handle him?" you ask, though now it's certainly too late for another plan.<br/>
<br/>
"If we can disarm him," Frank says. To Darrow he says, "Let me do the talking," when the golem opens its mouth to say something. You repeat the order when the thing tries to argue.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Your nerves are stretched very thin during the interval that follows. If you fuck up your play for Hal Swann, not only will the <i>Stellae</i> be alerted that Frank and Joe have gone "retrograde," but you will have probably blown your cover at the Strausslers. You wipe your palms on your shirt a couple of times, and give some thought to changing into Jonathan Straussler's <i>imago.</i> But you don't because you are not sure you've got time to change clothes along with faces; and besides, you'd probably be just as nervous as Jonathan as you are as yourself.<br/>
<br/>
After fifteen minutes you are verging on panic when you hear a sound like a muffled elevator bell; voices sound softly in the hall outside. You scamper over to the door with a blank mask in your hand. It opens, and you just catch yourself from walloping the mask into Joe. He grins at you and steps to the side.<br/>
<br/>
But it's like something's gone wrong with your eyes, and you don't really make out the face of the next person to enter. You just thrust the mask at him. But your palm is slick again, and the mask slips and clatters into the guy's elbow. You stumble, and someone yells "Jesus, Will!" and then you're knocked in the side of your head and spin into the door. You're vaguely aware of some kind of a scrum that takes your feet out from under you. You wind up sitting on the floor.<br/>
<br/>
When you clear your head, Frank is glaring down at you. "The fuck happened to you?"<br/>
<br/>
"I dunno! The mask—!" You gulp and catch your tongue. But Joe is lowering a prone figure to the floor. "It slipped. Is that—?"<br/>
<br/>
"That's him," says Joe. "Darrow, get in here!" A fourth figure, that of Swann's accomplice, enters and Frank slams the door. "Don't yell at Will, Frank. Hal probably held something back. Or maybe it's just him. Do you want me to put him on the operating table?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yes, please," you reply as Frank helps you to your feet. "What took so long?"<br/>
<br/>
"Hal did," Joe puffs as he drags the prone <i>Stellae</i> into the adjoining room. <br/>
<br/>
"We had to give him a story about what happened to us," Frank said. "Then we had to tell him we had some sensitive stuff upstairs—Fane stuff—so he had to take off any protections he had on him in case he blew something up. I'll go get them," he adds, and goes out into the corridor.<br/>
<br/>
You ignore Darrow, who is standing in a corner with a pale face, to follow Joe. "Frank says we need to talk about what we're doing with Hal," you say.<br/>
<br/>
"Ayup." Joe drops your latest victim onto the table. "Make him into one of us, or recycle him for parts?"<br/>
<br/>
Maybe it's just your resentment of the strain he put you through, but you decide you want to add Hal to your own collection, and to make him one of your own faces. "So you want to be two <i>Stellae,</i>" Joe says grimly. "Does that mean Frank and I get to divide Rick and Aparijita between us?"<br/>
<br/>
"Maybe," you say. "That's something to talk about later."<br/>
<br/>
"It's something to talk about now, Will," Joe says. "We've been letting you take the lead, but Frank and I've been talking, and we want to start sharing the loot out equally."<br/>
<br/>
You feel yourself getting a little hot. "You've been picking up the lion's share of the loot, Joe," you retort. "You've got the Strausslers and all their money and the people they got working for them—"<br/>
<br/>
"And you're gonna get Fane."<br/>
<br/>
"We're <i>all</i> going to get Fane, aren't we?"<br/>
<br/>
"Then we should share the <i>essentia</i> out evenly, shouldn't we?" Joe says with sweet venom.<br/>
<br/>
You kick at the floor. He's right, you suppose, and you'll have one advantage going forward: you have remote sigils on them so you can step in to control them if ever want to.<br/>
<br/>
But you're still uncertain, so you temporize. "Look, we'll get it sorted out real soon. But I should get inside Hal— Or get him onto me. Whichever, in case there's something we need to know."<br/>
<br/>
"Fair enough," Joe replies. "Just so you know that we—"<br/>
<br/>
"I get it Joe." You remind yourself that, in his position, you'd feel the same way. Because, of course, a copy of you {i|is in his position.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
It will make a lot of noise, but with Swann out of commission you don't care, and instead of putting on his mask you strip him to operate on. <br/>
<br/>
He's an unprepossessing physical specimen. He's in his late twenties, with a great nimbus of dark brown hair that floats about his head and touches the top of his shoulders. He is so pale that a little green actually shows under his skin, and his whiskers—for he hasn't shaved in a day or two—are very black. He has a patch of curly hair in the very middle of a flat chest, and a little bit of a paunch. Maybe his limbs have a sinewy strength, but it will be only that, for they have little mass or definition. In his ratty black trainers, his dark pants and t-shirt (with its yellow hammer-and-sickle) and cheap flannel jacket he looks like what Frank and Joe have said he basically is: an undernourished, underexercised, underemployed post-doctoral student who survives on government handouts in the seediest parts of the university towns while agitating for social, political, and economic revolution.<br/>
<br/>
To cut down on the amount of noise you remove his <i>anima, imago,</i> and <i>essentia</i> in one great blast, then split the last-named into ten bottles, in case you decide to share him equally with your teammates. Then you shrink the resulting golem into a small but heavy totem that can be lugged around without being noticed. "Give me a new identity, Joe," you say as you strip. <br/>
<br/>
"And let's hope there aren't any surprises," Joe says as you lay yourself on the operating table.<br/>
<br/>
You close your eyes so you won't see it coming.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Well?" you say when you can't stand the suspense any longer.<br/>
<br/>
"I thought you were getting used it," Joe says. "It's all done."<br/>
<br/>
You open your eyes and sit up. "I didn't feel anything," you say doubtfully.<br/>
<br/>
"And I keep telling you that you never do." Joe smiles. "Wanna go looking for Swann now?"<br/>
<br/>
You gulp. It's one thing to give one of your colleagues a new batch of <i>essentia</i> in its own segregated setting. It's another to give one to yourself—and for it to be <i>Stellae essentia</i> besides. The last time a retrograde <i>Stellae</i>—and you suppose that's what you are—tried the trick, he more or less melted himself.<br/>
<br/>
You cover your eyes, hunch yourself, and wipe your chest.<br/>
<br/>
Your guts take a hard, fast ride on a Tilt-a-Whirl, and you grab at the floor. Your heart is beating hard when you open your eyes and look around. <br/>
<br/>
Something about the world does seem a little different. There's a "fuzz" to it, as though you can almost see and almost feel the metaphysical sigils that knit together to create the physical world. But maybe it's your imagination. At least you don't feel like you're suffering a breakdown.<br/>
<br/>
"Is that the <i>essentia?</i>" Joe asks. "What about the face?"<br/>
<br/>
You take another breath, close your eyes, concentrate, and wipe your hand across your face.<br/>
<br/>
The resulting sensation is less disorienting, but it's dramatic enough. It's like your whole brain has slid away on a track and another brain—with completely different memories and skills and personality—has slid in to replace it. It's an even stronger change than when you briefly turned yourself into Jonathan Straussler back in Saratoga Falls.<br/>
<br/>
But it's still <i>you</i> as you fall backward onto the operating table to laugh at the ceiling.<br/>
<br/>
"Well?" Joe says.<br/>
<br/>
You thrust your fists into the air. "Oh! Brilliant!"<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You catch sight of Frank standing in the doorway as you scramble over onto your hands and knees to peer at the operating table that ... that turned you into the guy who is now so fascinated by the workmanship. Soft bangs fall into your face, and you push them away. "Oh, Stars, Joe! You ever seen anything like it?" Your cock hardens as you study the sigils. "Where's my staff? Gotta get the design into m' files. Some of this I can—"<br/>
<br/>
"We got time for that later, Hal," Frank says, and he heavily emphasizes the name.<br/>
<br/>
<i>Hal. Hal Swann.</i> Yes, you are Hal Swann, one of the <i>Stellae's</i> expert—though slapdash—designers. This is who you are.<br/>
<br/>
It's who Joe and Frank could be, too.<br/>
<br/>
Or maybe you could keep Hal to yourself, and make them more fully "Will Prescott" by sharing with them your original <i>essentia.</i></span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121232231131333
author_id: seuzz
title: All In One and One In All
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"Right." You scramble back onto your haunches, giving the horrified Joe and Frank an eyeful of your cock, which having stiffened to the consistency of granite is starting to throb. "Get'cher clothes off." You snap your fingers as their jaws drop. "Tell Darrow he can watch, but he's not to—"<br/>
<br/>
"Will!" Joe shouts.<br/>
<br/>
"What?"<br/>
<br/>
"We're not gonna have a threesome!"<br/>
<br/>
You blink. It actually hadn't occurred to you that maybe your words and actions could be construed that way. And it takes you another two slow blinks of the eye to see how Joe could have made such a wild mistake. And even then you're filled more with contempt for his mistake than embarrassment for your words.<br/>
<br/>
"Mind out of the gutter, Franz," you snap. "We're gonna copy and swap, that's all. I like your idea to share and share alike. Obvious when you put it that way."<br/>
<br/>
"We're sharing Hal around?" Frank asks, and casts a glance over at the nine bottles that hold Swann's <i>essentia.</i><br/>
<br/>
"Sharing Prescott around," you cheerfully riposte. "We all three already got the same <i>anima,</i> you and me are sharing <i>imago</i> too, so we'll just pop my old face onto Franz and I'll give you both some of Prescott's <i>essentia.</i> Then we'll all have equal shares of the original genius."<br/>
<br/>
"And Hal?" Joe asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, he's mine, same as Franz is yours and Giuseppe's, uh, <i>his.</i>" You chuck a chin at Frank. "We'll be The Three Musketeers all over again!"<br/>
<br/>
"It's generous of you to share yourself, Will," Joe starts to say.<br/>
<br/>
"Hal," you correct him. "Might as well get used to calling things by their proper names!"<br/>
<br/>
Joe and Frank look at each other. "Are you feeling okay, Will?" the latter says, and by the way the tendons in his neck flex you are guessing he's just armed himself.<br/>
<br/>
"I'm fine. Don't worry about me, lads." You snap your fingers at them. "It's like when you guys woke up inside these two back in Saratoga Falls. 'Squiffy' is the word I'd have applied to you two, you were so pleased wi' yourselves." <br/>
<br/>
They exchange another look. Then Frank shrugs. "If that's the way you want to do it, er, Hal."<br/>
<br/>
"Brilliant. Alright, step up, Franz. Time waits for no man, not even you. Pop those back into me," you say, pointing to the <i>essentia</i> you drew out of the original Swann, "and draw two pints of Will Prescott for y'self and Giuseppe." You lay down and waggle your fingers. "Can't wait to run the thing myself."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Despite your eagerness to finish the operations when you wake, you spend a good couple of minutes with your nose close to the sigils, snuffling and rubbing at them, as though their magic might seep in through your skin. You mutter and squawk to yourself a couple of times when you think you've spotted a mistake or a place where the sigils could be tightened even further, but you decide after closer examination that you were wrong. "Love to shake the hand of whoever designed this thing," you chuckle.<br/>
<br/>
When Frank's patience is obviously exhausted, though, you follow through on your proposal. You add the "Will Prescott" face to Joe's stock of disguises, and you add the Prescott <i>essentia</i> to both of them. Then, to make the parallels between you and the other two <i>Stellae</i> even more pronounced, you put yourself under a third time and have your colleagues stitch Hal Swann's mental <i>imago</i> onto your own <i>anima,</i> so that, just as Frank and Joe do not lose their knowledge and personality when changing faces, you won't lose Hal's.<br/>
<br/>
There's one other operation to go, though. You summon Jacob into the bedroom. "Down to your knickers," you order him, and you repeat it when he only frowns. "Why?" he asks.<br/>
<br/>
Joe sees the problem and makes the solution before you do. "Out of your clothes," he orders Jacob after swiping his own chest, and that's when Darrow complies. "Useful for ordering your golems around," he tells  you with a grin. "Who is this guy and what are we going to do with him?" he asks after you've got the mask off Jacob.<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, he's just one of the useful idiots. Got a dozen of 'em down in Cambridge, five and six in two cells. This one and his mates are trying to slip a sleeper into the Fane biomedical program for me." With the firing of one candle you blow Darrow into his constituent pieces. "I told you not to get dressed, Giuseppe," you tell Frank. "Trousers off and back on the table."<br/>
<br/>
"I can't believe the police haven't been in to see what all the noise is," he grumbles as he takes his jeans off yet again.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You and Frank, he now reconstituted with Jacob Darrow's face, mind, and <i>essentia,</i> get dressed. In his twill trousers, hiking boots, button-down shirt and shabby blazer, your partner looks a lot more respectable than you; but then, his clothes are part of his hipster costume, along with his closely trimmed chestnut beard, his NHS glasses, and pert black trilby. Your clothes are only functional.<br/>
<br/>
Speaking of which: "Fetch me my legs and arms," you tell Joe as you dress.<br/>
<br/>
"Your what?"<br/>
<br/>
"My charms. You made me take 'em off before you let me in."<br/>
<br/>
"Did you—? Er, did <i>Hal,</i> take everything off like we asked?"<br/>
<br/>
"All but this'n." You show Joe the underside of the tongue of your left trainer, which has a complex squiggle drawn on it. Not that he can see it, for the canvas and the marker are alike black. "It almost scuppered your plot. If I'd had the other lot with me we'd be having a much different waffle right about now."<br/>
<br/>
He tosses you your kit from the other room, and you draw out the charms and protections that the former incarnation of Hal Swann used to protect himself. A chain necklace with a small pendant, the latter made of a fragment of depleted uranium encased in a lead shell; one red armband with powerful protective charms inscribed in a permanent marker; a red bandana, similarly inscribed and folded about in another charmed pattern, which you tie in a knot just above your left knee; from a belt loop on your trousers flutters a trailing white ribbon inscribed with Maoist slogans in the original Chinese characters, but wound through with a crimson thread that spells out another powerful enchantment. The safety pins that double as buttons on your jacket (the zipper long ago busted) have tiny sigils inscribed on their heads.<br/>
<br/>
"Got a pencil?" you ask Joe after you're on your feet and are straightening out and settling into your clothes. "Wait. Desk, right?" You wheel and yank out the center drawer and turn it upside down, dropping five writing implements, two notebooks, and a packet of tissue onto the floor. You knock over the chair for good measure.<br/>
<br/>
"You have to make a mess everywhere you go, don't you?" Joe says.<br/>
<br/>
"'S'in the blood, Franz. Stars." You study the pattern made by the debris—a kind of makeshift <i>I Ching</i>—before plucking up one of the pencils. "Got an address for you. A face waiting as well."<br/>
<br/>
"You're adding me to one of your cells?"<br/>
<br/>
"Naturally." To Frank, as you scribble down an address in Cambridge for Joe: "Put the van around front, and don't let the fascists make a row about it." <br/>
<br/>
After he leaves, you and Joe wrangle the operating tables into the elevator and down to the lobby. You leave him to finish checking out of the hotel and find his own way to Cambridge as you and Jacob move the tables into the van. As your driver pulls into traffic, you slouch down with your knees about your ears. You've already got Hal's "wand" out. <br/>
<br/>
It's an original model iPhone, its screen cracked (intentionally; Swann spent days calculating and recalculating the angle and force before he struck it with a hammer) and its case held together with duct tape whose sticky side is blackened with sigils that resemble circuitry. You become so absorbed as you scroll through Hal's notes and calculations, knitting your plans into his, that Jacob has to ask you three times before you grunt an acknowledgment that you're listening. "Just keep asking," you mutter back. "I'm bound to pick up sooner or later."<br/>
<br/>
"So you mentioned Paige back there," he says. "I assume you it was Paige you were talking about when you said you had a sleeper at Cambridge."<br/>
<br/>
"Only sleeper <i>you</i> know about." You turn the iPhone onto its side, which has the effect of deciphering the otherwise innocuous text hidden there. "Leave Hal's games to me, I'll get you in where I want."<br/>
<br/>
"You have other ways into Fane?"<br/>
<br/>
"More than I could count even if we all three took off our pants and shoes."<br/>
<br/>
"Is that what you're checking up on? Possible ways in?"<br/>
<br/>
"Patience, grasshopper. World is a cloud of butterflies, and I'm listening to the beat of their wings."<br/>
<br/>
<i>Well, it sounds deep.</i> But even though it's Hal's special skill to lurk and listen until he senses that fortune is galloping in the direction he wants to go, he knows that the world is too chaotic to be fully decipherable. You are, actually, trying to fit together and read a complex jigsaw puzzle that until an hour ago was meant to serve the original Hal Swann's purposes, but which is now meant to serve yours. You just don't want Jacob chattering at you.<br/>
<br/>
So you sink deeper into your seat, and your long, clever fingers dance rapidly across the iPhone's screen, never laying a wrong touch while every now and then stroking a line on the spider-web crack when you need to bring up an otherwise special and inaccessible app.<br/>
<br/>
Paige Knotts is one promising lead: a punk-rebel girl with a talent for maths and chemistry who you have—through her friends—maneuvered into a Cambridge program financed by Fane.<br/>
<br/>
There's another Fane plot you're investigating at Cambridge, involving a rowing team.<br/>
<br/>
But there are so many others, for Hal, like Fane, has tentacles everywhere.</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212322311313331
author_id: seuzz
title: The Anarchist's Lair
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>It's impossible to see the future. At best, you can anticipate possibilities and assign them probabilities.<br/>
<br/>
But some are better at this than others. Catilindrians are better than most, and an adept who combines Catilindria and Kenandandra, as Hal Swann did, will rank in the top percentiles. Only one who combines Catilindria and Arbol is likely to score better than him and his magical iPhone.<br/>
<br/>
Yet even a Catilindrian, even one who elevates confidence into cocksure arrogance, as Hal does, can be wrong-footed. All he has to do is overlook the kind of small but vital variable whose archetype is the nail for want of which the battle is lost.<br/>
<br/>
In this case, it is Jacob Darrow's lead-footed driving habit, which Frank, consciously or not, is emulating perfectly on the M11. Hal was glad of it on the drive down to London; you are rather less happy with it on the return back.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, it's not as though we're going to <i>pay</i> it," you reflect philosophically after the patrolman has let you go. "Still, it puts me somewhat out of my calculations."<br/>
<br/>
"What are those?" Jacob snarls as he waits for a spot in the traffic to open up.<br/>
<br/>
"Nothing, my pet," you reply in your most soothing tone. "It's only that when I said I wanted us to be back by five, I didn't mean I wanted us to be back by four. You could have spared the horses a trifle."<br/>
<br/>
"What's so important about five o'clock?" He punches the accelerator, and with a cough his van lurches into a gap.<br/>
<br/>
"The hour doesn't signify, only the company. Paige Dear and Rob Darling are likely to make plans if one doesn't intercept them beforehand."<br/>
<br/>
"You could call or text them."<br/>
<br/>
"You're ass part of a secret cell, and I don't share my numbers. You know that, Jacob." <br/>
<br/>
Indeed, Hal only communicates with Jacob—and he communicates with Jacob only—through drops and signals.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
So this will be the first time that Jacob Darrow—not to mention Frank Durras—has seen Hal Swann's natural habitat. It's a basement apartment in a corner of Cambridge where the once-grand houses have been gutted and converted into the cheapest and most squalid kind of student housing. Though they're not trying to go outside, two fat girls come downstairs anyway to yell as you and Jacob maneuver the operating tables—sealed up against prying eyes between two expanses of cardboard—through the narrow entryway and down the stairs to the door of your bedsit. You just grin and invite them in for a spot of tea and a cuddle; the pink-haired one cries "rapist" and threatens to call down the fury of her gender brigade. "Heart's in the right place," you cheerfully observe to Jacob once you've got the tables in your room. "Theory's taken a bit of a walkabout, though." You close the door and rub your hands. The operating table will <i>make</i> this place.<br/>
<br/>
Assuming you can find room for it.<br/>
<br/>
To the untrained eye, Hal Swann's dimly lit apartment would look like the lair of a twenty-something male who was a distracted university student by day and an ursine shapeshifter by night. The cold, dank air reeks with the metallic stench of unwashed clothes and unwashed bodies. The salvaged parts of electric fans, mechanical clocks, laptop computers, and a disassembled Roomba are scattered about the floor. Crusted-over dinner plates tilt and list atop the lumpy blankets of an unmade bed. A red flag with a picture of a coal pit and the legend "Scarnsfell Colliery" is draped across an inner wall, but one corner has fallen down to reveal scarred brickwork and crumbling plaster. The pipes beneath the sink have been disassembled and replaced with the hose from a vacuum cleaner. Three desks, supported with used paperbacks where their legs are uneven, groan beneath the weight of four functioning computers and their associated printers, modems, external drives, and monitors. The snarl of cables beneath is only partially obscured by a laundry basket that has tipped over, spilling dirty jeans, plaid underpants, crimson shirts and pea-green sweaters across the floor like the sick of a dragon that ate a conclave of Workers' Party and Green Party activists and found the meal disagreeing with him.<br/>
<br/>
To your eye, though ...<br/>
<br/>
Well, it's still a disordered rubbish heap. But it's a disordered rubbish heap <i>with a meaning.</i><br/>
<br/>
Sure, the message is three weeks old, and has been partially rubbed out as Hal moved the bits around as he resumed his tinkering and experimentation. But like the make-shift "I Ching" you made back at the Savoy, this mess <i>said</i> something. (Or, at least it did after Hal, while pursuing an independent project, added the discarding Roomba to the mix.) In particular, it said <i>enveloping pervading displacing swallowing.</i> <br/>
<br/>
That by itself might not have looked like much, but after juggling the associated decagrams around on his iPhone, Hal had inferred it was referring to the Cambridge boat team: hence, his suspicion that they were up to no good. No further messages welled up, though, despite his half-hearted juggling of the constituents.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, let's get it cleared away," you finally declare after Jacob has given you a long, hard stare. "Just get it all off the floor. Onto the bed, inna sink, throw it in with the toilet." For the next few minutes you and he play bulldozer, grader, and excavator. Once the floor is clear, you have Jacob hold the operating table aloft as you pull back a corner of the carpet until you've exposed all the floor that isn't under the desks and bed, revealing a scarred concrete foundation beneath. You grin at the pattern revealed beneath, but only grunt "Nothing" when Jacob asks what you see. <i>Infiltrating,</i> the streaks and swirls read, and you've no need to interpret the associated decagrams to understand what it was trying to convey to the room's occupant. You place the operating table on the concrete and let the carpet flop back.<br/>
<br/>
"Call Mr. Nizamani in here, will you?" you ask Jacob. "That's the sour-faced man in Room 103 directly above. Landlord. We'll scrub away the colonized consciousness that presently degrades him and restore to him a transparent enlightenment suitable to our growing collective." You rummage the place for candles that you <i>know</i> Hal bought against the next time the fascists who run the power grid shut him off for not taking their mercenary games as seriously as they.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Jacob has to use the "fist of Malacandra" to pin the struggling landlord to the operating table, and, lacking a properly receptacle, his <i>anima</i> discharges onto a plate of three-day-old spaghetti, which you have Jacob promptly toss outside. That leaves an inert body, which you leave inert until Joe arrives a little before six with luggage and supplies. You have him inject you with a fifth of Mr. Nizamani's <i>essentia</i> while leaving another fifth in the landlord; once revived, you brace the landlord with a consciousness-raising session, the burden of which is that all his current savings and any balances after deducting expenses are to be joyfully gifted to the local party cadre, the secretary of which happens to be yourself. He is also to deflect all queries for yourself with the claim that you have been evicted for failure to pay rent and that your whereabouts are unknown.<br/>
<br/>
"What about those girls upstairs?" Jacob asks after you send Mr. Nizamani off to execute his new job.<br/>
<br/>
"Girls?" Joe asks, and his ears visibly prick up.<br/>
<br/>
"Nothing to your taste, Franz, unless you've a fondness for pepper spray. We'll leave 'em be," you tell Jacob. "Coupla hedgehogs like that'll further dissuade the inquisitive. Now, for Paige Dear and Rob Darling—" You rub your hands. "Find 'em and bring 'em back quick as you can. Tell Rob you're initiating him to the next level." You raise a clenched fist. "But Paige has to come too."<br/>
<br/>
"She doesn't know anything about us," he reminds you.<br/>
<br/>
"Doesn't matter what she knows now. It's what she'll know then. Who she'll <i>be</i> then, too."<br/>
<br/>
Jacob resettles his glasses and trilby, and goes to fetch the next two members-to-be of your growing collective.<br/>
<br/>
Joe laughs when his brother is gone. "Paige Dear and Rob Darling?" He pushes away the junk on your bed and plops onto it. "Is that actually their names?"<br/>
<br/>
"'Course not. Just what we call 'em when they ain't listenin'. Paige Knotts and Rob Oliver." You frown at a pile of widgets left by the clean up. Something about it is vaguely recognizable.<br/>
<br/>
"So who are they? Why are we interested in them?"<br/>
<br/>
"Well, <i>Hal</i> was interested in 'em on account of Paige. Uni's got a bioengineering program. Fane's putting up the money for it, using it for the usual sorts of evil. Taking people apart in ways that go against nature, like that."<br/>
<br/>
"Like we do," Joe says dryly.<br/>
<br/>
You ignore the gibe. "Paige took a test, showed aptitudes that'd fit the program. She'd made friends with some of Hal's friends, who told him about her, and he got them to push her into it. Fane snapped at her. Plan is to get her in deep, run her as a sleeper, use her to spy it out from inside after she's deep in and high up. The classic play."<br/>
<br/>
"So what's our plan?"<br/>
<br/>
"Same plan, sped up. Use her like a periscope, though, find them what swim higher up. Then take them."<br/>
<br/>
Joe leans back. "Are we turning her into a golem?"<br/>
<br/>
That would be one way of doing it, and Hal's native caution warns you it would be best to leave Paige as a remote puppet—maybe even with a remote sigil on her—so there's no risk of any of your trio getting caught by Fane. Though you judge the chances of being caught to be low, the cost of failure would be too high.<br/>
<br/>
You've already got a hiding face, meanwhile, and so does Frank. Joe could take over as Paige.<br/>
<br/>
But perhaps you shouldn't send someone else to do a job that you're unwilling to do yourself.</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212123223113133311
author_id: seuzz
title: Alarums and Diversions
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Night has long since fallen by now, and you're starving. You have Joe send Jacob a text asking about the status of his search; the reply is that it will be awhile, as "Paige Dear" and "Rob Darling" are out on a date. So you and Joe pop around to a nearby pub, where you wolf down a bowl of Thai curry while pestering the help about their wages and whether they'd be up for doing something about them. You get no takers.<br/>
<br/>
But you're back in the bedsit, lounging in the dark with a couple of beers, when Joe's cell goes off. "They're on their way," he says.<br/>
<br/>
You keep the lights off, so when the door creaks open after a knock you see only the backlit forms of three people in the dimly lighted frame. "Come in," you call. "Don't mind the dark. Dark rooms for dark talk. I'm Hal. Pleased to make your acquaintance."<br/>
<br/>
"Uh, I'm Paige," comes the quavering voice of a girl.<br/>
<br/>
"Rob," says a sturdier one.<br/>
<br/>
"Jacob, close the door," you say. A suffocating darkness falls over the room. You cover your eyes. "Joe, light 'em up."<br/>
<br/>
Even through your fingers and eyelids you see the flash.<br/>
<br/>
It's faded to a warm, dim glow when you open your eyes again. Your three visitors are pinching their blighted eyes. You only have to stroll up to get masks onto two of them, and catch them when they fall.<br/>
<br/>
"Joe, was that you?" Jacob mutters as he blinks and peers about near-sightedly.<br/>
<br/>
"Who else?"<br/>
<br/>
"Alright, let's get the girl on the bed," you annouce. "The lad'll be quicker work."<br/>
<br/>
"You could'a warned a guy about your light bomb," Jacob growls as he scoops up Paige Knotts.<br/>
<br/>
"What would be the fun in that?" Joe laughs.<br/>
<br/>
Then, as though, sprung from a catapult, he flies across the room to smack into the wall with a grunt. He takes the rest of the flag down with him has he slides to the floor.<br/>
<br/>
"You're right," Jacob says as he lays Paige on the bed where Joe had been sitting. "It is a lot more fun to spring it without warning."<br/>
<br/>
You strip Rob Oliver of his clothes while waiting for the mask to finish copying him—not that you're going to use the mask. Exposed he reveals himself as an almost boring exemplar of the pampered, upper-class university male. A rug of brown hair covers his broad, deep chest, and a line of such trails down a tapering torso and over a flat stomach to the wild thatch at the crotch. He has strong legs and arms, also downed with light brown hair that matches the respectably short hair on his crown. His well-scrubbed features are very regular and handsome in a way that might be rugged if it weren't for a certain softness about the eyes and mouth. You doubt he plays sports, except very mild forms of rugby and football, and that he got most of his physique from the gym. Possibly an expensive home gym, too, as his clothes are, if not Abercrombie &amp; Fitch, at least of the same general form. Only a thin gold chain that dangles from ear violates the otherwise perfectly composed form.<br/>
<br/>
You blow him apart with a lightning strike after you've peel back the carpet and set him on the operating table. Paige, on the bed, doesn't stir, but a couple of car alarms go off outside.<br/>
<br/>
"Let's get his face onto you, Joe," you say as Jacob hefts the resulting golem into a corner. Your colleague is already out of his clothes and only has to drop onto the operating table. "Before we have the bobbies out here."<br/>
<br/>
"Is this guy the local version of Jonathan Straussler?"<br/>
<br/>
"In reduced form. His daddy's a supremo at Sainsbury's, so he's got plenty of ready."<br/>
<br/>
"What's he doing with a girl like her?" Joe nods at Paige.<br/>
<br/>
"Striking a blow against his mum and dad," Jacob puts in. "That's what <i>we</i> think. Same as with the earring."<br/>
<br/>
You reposition the candle and the mask, and with the flick of a lighter smash Rob Oliver's <i>imago</i> onto Joe.<br/>
<br/>
He's still looking like his old self, though, and scrambling backward to grab his clothes, when voices start jabbering outside, and someone pounds on the door. "We know that's you, Swann, or whatever the fuck your name is!" You recognize the voices of the girls from upstairs. "Swann!" They pound on the door some more.<br/>
<br/>
Then comes a much louder and angrier voice, in an accent so thick you can't make out the words through the door. That will be Mr. Nizamani, and after some loud shrieking he succeeds in driving your neighbors away. "God bless the Third World," you grin. "Ah," you add as you turn around.<br/>
<br/>
Paige is sitting up and blinking stupidly. The mask tumbles onto the bed next to her. "Frank," is all you say.<br/>
<br/>
Paige gasps as she rises into the air and floats into the middle of the room. She kicks, but her arms remain clapped to her sides, and they remain there even after she is resting on the operating table. "Jacob!" she yells. "What—?"<br/>
<br/>
You pull off your armband and stuff it in her mouth. Her eyes roll and roll. "Shh, all be over in a tick," you assure her. "Consciousness raised and all in on the class struggle." You shift the now-empty mask over a spot on the sigil, and replace the bottles and bands now filled with Rob's <i>essentia</i> and <i>anima</i> with empty ones. "Comes the revolution," you announce as you light the candle.<br/>
<br/>
Another stroke that leaves your ears ringing, and there's a blank golem where Paige Knotts had been lying. "You can let go now," you tell Jacob.<br/>
<br/>
"Are you stepping in for her?" he asks.<br/>
<br/>
"In a manner of speaking." You slide the golem over to another spot on the operating table, and snuff out and resettle the candle. You light it.<br/>
<br/>
No lightning strike this time, but a crackling hiss like tearing paper. A smell of burnt matches pervades the room. The chest of the golem darkens with an intricate criss-cross of lines. "Is that what I think it is?" Jacob says.<br/>
<br/>
"Brilliant, isn't it?" You dive into some of the luggage Joe had hauled over, and pull out the remote mask.<br/>
<br/>
"I thought you left that back home."<br/>
<br/>
"Don't worry, I don't foresee much use of it on you lads." But you glance around the room. In moving Paige, Jacob has knocked some more junk to the floor, and the sense of an emerging pattern has your senses throbbing. "But if we're going to go spelunking in the belly of the beast, best to use a drone."<br/>
<br/>
"How much are you going to be using her?" a new voice chimes in, and you look over to see that Rob has joined you. He's in his trousers and undershirt, and is buttoning up the silk dress shirt he was sporting. He's already got the earring in, you notice. His lips twitch. "Like, when it's just her and me?"<br/>
<br/>
"Likely only when I'm in class," you retort. You pull out a bottle of Eric Kim's <i>essentia.</i> "When I'm not there, you can run her."<br/>
<br/>
"Brilliant," he murmurs, and shoots the cuffs of his shirt. Give him seven years of proper care, and he'll be one of the biggest mid-level corporate tossers between Leeds and Southampton.<br/>
<br/>
It takes the sigil another minute to finish burning into the golem. The car alarms are all off by now, but the night explodes with them again when you hammer Paige Knotts's <i>imago</i> and Eric Kim's <i>essentia</i> into the golem. She sits up with the same terrified expression as when you put her down. "Rob, tell your girlfriend not to scream," you say. It takes a few more words from him to get her to stop looking so stressed out.<br/>
<br/>
Paige Knotts is a small girl, a pale girl, a girl with baby fat all over an otherwise attractive figure. Half her head is shaved close; the rest of her hair, which is probably naturally dark, has been dyed an unnatural black and it hangs down the side of her face to her jaw. She wasn't wearing any piercings, but she has the holes for them. Her eyes continue to dart truculently about the room.<br/>
<br/>
"I'd like to talk to her alone for awhile," you tell your colleagues. "I'll send her to catch up to later."<br/>
<br/>
There's a pause. "You can't tell her what you want to say in front of us?" Rob asks.<br/>
<br/>
"No. But you can ask her about it later. It won't be a secret."<br/>
<br/>
That draws you a very hard but uncomprehending look, but after shuffling their feet a bit, Rob and Jacob step out, leaving you alone with the naked golem of Paige Knotts. <br/>
<br/>
"You should get on the bed," you tell her. After blinking rapidly at you for a few seconds, she moves onto it, to sit with her hands folded in her lap and a pinched expression on her face.<br/>
<br/>
You take off your jacket, kick off your shoes, and put out the lights. You're out of your shirt and trousers in three seconds, and on top of her in two. Your wick is granite hard, and you cover her mouth as you guide it into her. She struggles, but your thrusting weight keeps her pressed into the bed.<br/>
<br/>
You've neither the time nor the patience to play the lover. You jam yourself in deep and spend yourself quickly.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
It's an astonishing and disconcerting discovery to find that you are stimulated to frenzies by a golem. The naked girl herself stirred little but a mild physiological reaction in you; the golem, when it sat up, lifted you into ecstasies of desire. <br/>
<br/>
And as you gulp and gasp in the girl's ear, you see even deeper into yourself: You'd have done the same thing to a golem of Rob Oliver.</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121232231131333111
author_id: seuzz
title: The Dark Heart of the Occult Lover
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Now that you are confronting the fact, you shouldn't be surprised to discover that you—<br/>
<br/>
<i>Hmm.</i><br/>
<br/>
You have to stop to remind you yourself that you are <i>not</i>, in the deepest sense, "Hal Swann." You are Will Prescott. But the pull of Swann's <i>essentia</i> ... and the sensation of his <i>imago</i> about you ... and the complete melding of his memories and personality with yours ...<br/>
<br/>
Well, dammit, you will lapse into thinking of yourself as "Hal Swann" almost without thinking, even though your <i>anima</i> proclivities are nearly the opposite of his.<br/>
<br/>
A whimper from the girl beneath you brings you back to your position. I.e., the position that has your still stiff cock wedged firmly inside her, and your mouth by her ear.<br/>
<br/>
It's less mortifying to ponder something less ... visceral. Like the fact that Hal Swann is a ...<br/>
<br/>
Well, a what, exactly? A golemsexual? Or just, in the most general sense, a robosexual?<br/>
<br/>
It's not a temptation he's ever encountered before, needless to say. <br/>
<br/>
For nigh on ten years now he's existed—<br/>
<br/>
And when speaking about the past, it <i>is</i> best to think of him as "he" and yourself as "I", for you have to very different pasts.<br/>
<br/>
What were you saying? <i>Oh yes ...</i><br/>
<br/>
For nigh on ten years now Hal Swann has existed in an almost sexless state. Oh, he's not a virgin. Fyodor Chernomyrdin (a.k.a., "The Red Army"), the overwhelming <i>Stellae</i> who found and mentored Swann from an early age, saw to that. He even paid for the hookers that gave Hal his first experience of intimacy with a woman, and Hal followed the experience by chatting up a few girls on his own account. Every two or three years, he will even fall into bed with another one, though that's more or less on accident, after he's been lecturing in a frenzied way on the injustice of the current sociopolitical system and one of the girls gets turned on by it and pulls him into a clinch whose ultimate goal is obvious even to the mostly oblivious Hal.<br/>
<br/>
But mostly he just doesn't think about sex, and even his own heterosexuality he accepts more or less on the basis of statistics: by the most reliable accounts he's read, there is between a three and an eleven percent chance that any randomly chosen male will not be heterosexual, and as he himself can plausibly answer to the description "randomly chosen male" he accepts that that there is between an eighty-nine and a ninety-seven percent chance that he is heterosexual, and correspondingly plays those odds. The one time he realized that a guy was coming onto him, it's true, he felt a tug of arousal, but he put it down to basic curiosity and didn't feel curious enough to follow up on the hints.<br/>
<br/>
But this ... this <i>volcanically churning compulsion</i> to ram his member into the golem of Paige Knotts—<br/>
<br/>
Into the <i>golem</i>, for the girl herself hardly registered at all, even when naked and helpless.<br/>
<br/>
That is not a feeling he has ever had before. The closest he has ever come has been on those occasions, like this morning when you "woke" as Hal Swann on the operating table, when he was in the deeps of a project and felt a surge of potency that manifested as a rigid cock. But even then the rigidity didn't last long, and even when he wasn't conscious of it, Hal knew (afterwards, at least) that he was <i>sublimating</i> his sexual drives into his prodigies.<br/>
<br/>
Not even masturbation was ever an issue with Swann. Sometimes he'd wake up to find the sheets sticky with emissions, but that would only provoke a sigh, or an examination of the issue with the same close attention as the old augurs paid to the entrails of their sacrifices.<br/>
<br/>
As for you, Will Prescott ... Well, you've always paid a lot more attention to the needs of your cock, but only to the extent of relieving the pressure. The thought of doing what you did to the golem—<br/>
<br/>
<i>Urgh.</i> Technically, what you're still doing.<br/>
<br/>
—that would have filled you with horror.<br/>
<br/>
It still does. You and Hal both.<br/>
<br/>
Which is why you are distracting yourself by thinking about it instead of, you know ... <i>Getting off the ... girl ... and making amends.</i><br/>
<br/>
"Look, I'm sorry I did that," you mutter as you separate yourself. "But, um, I had to."<br/>
<br/>
"Rm-hrm," she says from the back of her throat. There might be a choked sob back in there too.<br/>
<br/>
"I know that sounds beastly. I'd explain, but— Oh, here, it'll be easier if I get this thing and put it on."<br/>
<br/>
You scramble out of the bed and are half-crawling, half-flopping across the floor for the control mask when you hear a rustle behind you and—<br/>
<br/>
"Gwuh!" The kick to your ribs isn't bad enough to topple you, but it is enough to hurt really bad. Another kick sends you into a defensive huddle.<br/>
<br/>
"Pervert! Maniac! I'll get the coppers in here, and they'll—!" Feet patter across the floor, and there's a scraping at the door.<br/>
<br/>
You lunge for the mask as a crack of light spills into the room. That light vanishes as you jam it onto your face. You flick desperately through the constellations until you find one that you <i>think</i> is the one you—<br/>
<br/>
You're halfway up a flight of stairs when you stumble and pause. You look around. You are naked. A sheet of hair falls into your face and you thrust it back. Half of your scalp is shaved back to a faint stubble.<br/>
<br/>
You gulp, and your breath comes in ragged shudders. You gag and fight the need to vomit as you turn to stare at the door behind you. Darkness seems to spill out of it. That ... <i>person</i> ... is in there ... and he's inside you ... and he wants you to come back inside ... because he ...<br/>
<br/>
The feeling of sickness doesn't vanish from your body, but like a too-taut rubber band it snaps from your brain. With a firm tread despite trembling knees you return to the bedsit, shut and lock the door, and snap on the light.<br/>
<br/>
Hal Swann, his eyes glazed and his mouth hanging open, is slumped across the floor.<br/>
<br/>
You sigh and cross to him. You grab him by the ankles and pull him to the bed. Somehow, you heave his naked, corpse-like body into it. You sit on the side of the bed next to him and smooth out his hair.<br/>
<br/>
<i>Oh you poor, stupid sod,</i> you think. <i>You're sick. Okay, you're not "sick." You're not even confused. But you're definitely built funny and you didn't find out until the right kind of meal got slapped in front of you, like raw filet in front of a Husky. So naturally you lunged. Pure animal instinct.</i><br/>
<br/>
Which doesn't make it one whit less awful. <br/>
<br/>
You sigh and feel his forehead. There's no obvious fever.<br/>
<br/>
And that's kind of funny, because now <i>you're</i> feeling feverish. It's November and you're naked in a basement in a cheap apartment house where the landlord won't run the heat. So why does it feel like you're about to break out into a sweat. You wipe your forehead ...<br/>
<br/>
And as you lower your hand it brushes your bare boob. <br/>
<br/>
It's like ringing a fire bell.<br/>
<br/>
Your boob. Your belly. Your ... <i>Oh God!</i><br/>
<br/>
Next thing you know you're on the floor, your back arching as you plunge avid fingers in and out of yourself while thrusting at the ceiling. You felt nothing like this—you felt the opposite of this, you wanted to sink into the mattress and never come out again—when it was that pervert in the bed doing this, but now it's like that swelling crescendo <i>he</i> felt and it's building up inside you—<br/>
<br/>
And when you fantasize that it's you doing it with Rob, only Rob is a golem and he's plowing your golem pussy with his golem penis—<br/>
<br/>
You have to bite on your fist to keep from screaming when you cum.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Okay, I understand," you tell the still unseeing, unmoving Hal Swann after you are buttoning yourself up again in heavy jeans and wool socks and a cardigan and scarf. "I'm not the right one to forgive anything. But we'll see what happens when it's just me again and you're sitting up in bed, and I hope to fucking <i>God</i> you feel sick about it."<br/>
<br/>
Because you feel sick now. Two tsunami-like sexual explosions in the space of fifteen minutes? So you're a robosexual even when inside a golem. It might even be stronger there, for you've got the golem all around you.<br/>
<br/>
But what were you pondering earlier, about how all this should be expected, at least in retrospect?<br/>
<br/>
<i>Ah yes. Sexual energy, provoked by the occult sciences, sublimated into them, then directed into a masterful, practical realization that takes the form of exactly that kind of biological creature that the reptilian parts of your brain are designed to lunge for. <br/>
<br/>
It's a wonder your brains didn't spray out your dick when you came. It certainly felt as if they'd been liquefied.</i><br/>
<br/>
Still awful, but there's an explanation.<br/>
<br/>
You're out the door now and on the street. It's cold, and almost half a mile to the lodgings that come with the university scholarship. You pull out a phone and call Rob. "Hey darling," you say. "Hi dear," he replies. (The recently deployed endearments were instantly seized on by their friends: hence, "Paige Dear" and "Rob Darling".) "Come get me?"<br/>
<br/>
"I'm waiting just around the corner." You look up, and headlamps flash on and off.<br/>
<br/>
You don't know if it's a relief or a terror that you'll be with him so soon.<br/>
<br/>
At least the car is warm when you crawl into it. It's an old Lexus, but Rob keeps it in fine condition, and it smells nice.<br/>
<br/>
He smells nice. He's not a golem, but you feel Paige's attraction for him, and you shudder with suppressed pleasure when he strokes your thigh. "Been dying here, waiting for you," he says. "We have to talk."<br/>
<br/>
"Yes we do," you say with a gulp. "I'm in here, Joe."<br/>
<br/>
His hand freezes on your knee.<br/>
<br/>
"I've got a really bad confession to make."<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212322311313331111
author_id: seuzz
title: Finger Puppets
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Rob—Joe—is very quiet when you finish gasping out your confession. It's a minute or so before he speaks. "Well," he finally says, "it's a hell of a thing to find out."<br/>
<br/>
"How mad are you at me?"<br/>
<br/>
"I'm not mad," he says. "Perturbed, I suppose. Surprised and shocked. Rather aghast—"<br/>
<br/>
"Is that you talking, or Rob?"<br/>
<br/>
"Me. Rob would murder you." Abruptly he wipes his hand across his face. Joe Durras is sitting there when he drops his hand again. He takes a deep breath.<br/>
<br/>
"Well, that is better. I don't have to fight Rob down. I'm still surprised and perturbed and shocked and aghast though. And I'll say it again, it's a hell of a thing to find out about someone you know."<br/>
<br/>
"You can bring Rob back if he'll help you be righteously angry," you say. You don't like Joe's calm demeanor. It feels like a hot crust over a boiling lake of lava. "I'm righteously angry at myself for doing it."<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, you deserve to have your head broken for what you did. Everyone here thinks and feels that. Obviously we can't do anything about it, though." Then he grunts. "And, well, the girl you did it to isn't exactly <i>real.</i> Still, if you wouldn't do it to a dog, I don't think you should do it to a golem.<br/>
<br/>
"But I'm trying to concentrate on what it says about Hal," he continues. "Like you say, it does make a kind of sense." He falls silent again, and you bite your tongue. "You say it ambushed you, huh? The lust?"<br/>
<br/>
"Right."<br/>
<br/>
"Think that you can control it?"<br/>
<br/>
"Now that I know what to watch out for, yes."<br/>
<br/>
Again, he falls silent. Then he snorts. "You know, we wouldn't have had this problem if we'd inserted some of <i>your essentia</i> into her golem."<br/>
<br/>
"How's that?"<br/>
<br/>
"You could have talked her into it instead of taking it from her."<br/>
<br/>
It sounds like a wry sort of observation, but you see no humor in it.<br/>
<br/>
"Go home, Hal," Joe says at last. He sounds tired. "I can talk Paige around. I can try to make her forget it happened. Literally. Let's try to erase the evening. Pretend it happened in some alternate universe, and we discovered something about Hal Swann, and then we put up protections to make sure it doesn't happen again."<br/>
<br/>
"That's really generous of you, Joe." Your heart is very heavy as you say it, for it seems like a lot more than you deserve.<br/>
<br/>
Perhaps he agrees, for he stresses the pragmatics of it. "I have to be, don't I? We all have to be generous with each other. It's the three of us against the world. And when you get down to it, the stuff we've already done, the stuff we did to Paige even before you, uh— And to Rob and to and those people back in Saratoga Falls—"<br/>
<br/>
<i>And to Joe and Frank and Hal and Rick and Aparjita ...<br/>
<br/>
... and to Aubrey Blackwell, which is when the whole mess started when you backed him into a corner where something ate him ...</i><br/>
<br/>
"—is technically a hell of a lot worse than this thing we're pretending to be shocked by now."<br/>
<br/>
You're both silent for a very long time. A few soft flakes of snow drift over the hood of the car.<br/>
<br/>
Then Joe fumbles his hand into yours, and you squeeze it back. "I'll call you tomorrow, before I come see you," you tell him. "Whether I'm looking like Hal or looking like this."<br/>
<br/>
"Pardon me if I don't kiss you goodnight," he says. You smile ruefully, put your head back, and let go of the golem.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"I will explain it again, <i>dear,</i> and this time <i>do</i> try to pay attention."<br/>
<br/>
<i>I was paying attention, you Valkyrie,</i> you think, and you don't bother trying to shadow the threat of murder you feel forming in your eye. <i>You only </i>think<i> you explained it before.</i><br/>
<br/>
It's Tuesday afternoon. You inserted yourself into Paige a little after eleven after giving Joe a warning text. Paige was already on her way to class, and you lurched slightly as you fell in behind her eyes.<br/>
<br/>
Before you did that, though, after locking yourself inside Hal's bedsit, you took the precaution of switching your <i>imago</i> and <i>anima</i> back to Will Prescott's. Maybe the change makes a difference, for you don't feel the same claw-like lust as you did yesterday when you landed in the golem. Or maybe you're still so mortified about last night that you've given yourself a psychological complex against it.<br/>
<br/>
Anyway, <i>now</i> you are in the main office of the Cambridge bioengineering program and are trying to get the financial director to explain how to apply for the advanced scholarship.<br/>
<br/>
You listen sullenly and take notes, but you're distracted by her face and form. Her dark hair is cut in a straight bob that falls to her neck; her face is lean and aggressive and constructed around the strong nose. Her makeup barely softens the leathery skin, and the crow's feet around her eyes and mouth signify that her age is closer to forty-three than the thirty-three that her hour-glass figure—flaunted by the poison-green jacket that snugly fits her curves—is meant to suggest.<br/>
<br/>
It's far from a handsome face, and her strong, white teeth flash cruelly as she walks you through the battery of tests you will have to submit to and pay for before you will be considered for the advanced classes and augmented moneys that come with them. <br/>
<br/>
But mostly you're concentrating on the fact that you've seen this face before.<br/>
<br/>
Well, Hal Swann has. It was attached to the skull of a solicitor, Lenke Crayson, who works for one of the Fane companies, and who came within a whisker of getting him jailed for malicious trespass.<br/>
<br/>
Maybe this is her twin sister. Or maybe she is just one of those freakish doppelgangers that pop up with a non-occult explanation.<br/>
<br/>
The trouble is that "Lenke" is a very unusual name. And this woman, who looks exactly like Lenke Crayson, and who also works for a Fane entity, is also named "Lenke." LENKE VARGA, it says on the nameplate on her desk.<br/>
<br/>
"Pardon me," you interrupt her. "Are you a solicitor?"<br/>
<br/>
"What?" She rears back, as though you had just asked if she's a whore. "No, I am not solicitor!"<br/>
<br/>
"Did you used to be one?"<br/>
<br/>
"Of course not! If you cannot refrain from impudent questions, Miss Knotts, I see no point—"<br/>
<br/>
"Just wondering. Jesus," you mutter. "Go on. Three hundred and fifty pounds you were saying."<br/>
<br/>
You're finally gathering up your notes and thanking Ms. Varga for her help—such as it was—when there's a gentle knock at the open door behind you. "Ah, Miss Knotts," a fatherly voice coos as you turn around. "So good to see you." Professor Hyde-White splays a bony white hand across his chest. "I trust there are no complications with your scholarship?" He raises white eyebrows as he turns pale blue eyes on Lenke Varga.<br/>
<br/>
Everything about him is pale. His thick hair is snowy white, and there's a chalkiness to his skin. But he is tall, lean and aristocratic, and also—it would appear—one of those fellows who becomes handsome with age, when they have money and prestige and position to back it up. Though there are signs that Professor Hyde-White—who teaches one of Paige's classes and, as the Fane Professor of Bioengineering, is an object of intense suspicion to Hal Swann—has already peaked and is just beginning a slide down the further slope toward toothless senility.<br/>
<br/>
"Just trying out for another scholarship and more classes. The advanced ones," you tell him.<br/>
<br/>
"Indeed." He looks pleased and impressed. "I do hope we have obliged," he says to Lenke. She doesn't reply, and her smile is pinched.<br/>
<br/>
"Not sure I can swing the financials," you continue. "Can I get an advance on the scholarships I'll have coming if I get them, to pay for these tests I'll have to take?"<br/>
<br/>
Miss Varga turns pink, but the professor bubbles over with laughter. "Ingenious. Show such wit on the tests and you and I will be taking private tutorials before Christmas. I think we can manage an advance on your <i>present</i> scholarships."<br/>
<br/>
"Yes, Professor," Miss Varga says through gritted teeth.<br/>
<br/>
The professor asks her a few small questions about a stipend that one of his other students is having trouble getting, then with a white smile wishes you a good day. "Let's try to have that advance for Miss Knotts by the end of the day," are his parting words to Miss Varga. She stares daggers at you, but nods.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You've no idea why she hates Paige so much, but you put it from your mind afterwards. With classes over, you walk back to Rob's, where after giving a cursory report to your boyfriend, you release Paige for the day. And yet Rob will call you a little later to suggest that you all—him, Paige, yourself, and Jacob—go out to eat together. You agree, though not without trepidation.<br/>
<br/>
It goes off well, and no allusions are made to last night's disaster. Still, you are conscious of being more reticent than is Hal Swann's usual wont and let the others carry the conversation. Rob generously agrees to pick up the check—<br/>
<br/>
—And right about then the topic of money slides in from an unexpected direction when Paige's cell dings. "Oh, Christ," she mutters. "It's that impossible woman!"<br/>
<br/>
"Which one?" Rob asks.<br/>
<br/>
"The one I told you about. Lenke Varga. At least she's got money for me."<br/>
<br/>
"That advance?" you say.<br/>
<br/>
"Yes." Her eyebrows have shot up. "She wants to bring around to my rooms."<br/>
<br/>
That gives you a sudden idea. Miss Varga is in the belly of the departmental beast, with direct access to Hyde-White. With her as a finger puppet, you wouldn't have to maneuver Paige into a better position. Varga could get you the same place.<br/>
<br/>
And maybe you could also discover why she bears such an eerie resemblance the solicitor in Kensington that you were considering as <i>another</i> avenue into Fane.</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212123223113133311111
author_id: seuzz
title: The Booby-Trapped Secretary
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>You give Paige your address to pass along to Lenke, telling her that's where she can drop off the check. Your company then races back to the bedsit.<br/>
<br/>
"Hold it," you tell everyone after you've opened the door and flicked on the light. You brace your arm across the door to stop them from entering as you stare at the latest manifestation of disorder. <i>It's on the trembling verge of being recognizable.</i><br/>
<br/>
Sometimes it's good to help things along, and sometimes it isn't. Given that you've a potential acquisition on her way over, you decide to chance the former. You pull a handful of coins from your pocket and toss them into the room.<br/>
<br/>
<i>Still not there.</i><br/>
<br/>
At least, not until you enter the room to retrieve the coins. From your new perspective it all snaps into place.<br/>
<br/>
You hop backwards into a corner and take a picture of the room. "Right, everyone in," you call as you bend over the screen of the busted iPhone.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
By rotating the image through the filtering cracks in the screen you're quickly able to generate the decagrams <i>obstructing adorning skinning coupling</i> out of it. The second and third seem clear enough, and the fourth, occupying as it does the usual advisory position, is also highly suggestive. But the first makes no sense at all, and since the pattern is supposed to be interpreted as whole, not in piecemeal parts, that means you are as much in the dark now as when you walked into the room.<br/>
<br/>
Well, not in the dark <i>that</i> way. The lights are all on.<br/>
<br/>
Twenty minutes after Paige got the text, there's a sharp knock on the door. Jacob goes to it, and raises a querying eyebrow at you as he grasps the knob. You hesitate, then nod. Rob gets up and pulls back the carpet as Jacob opens the door.<br/>
<br/>
"Good evening I'm looking for—" Lenke Varga starts to say. Then she squawks as she's flies, toes dragging across the floor, into the middle of the room. She sprawls face forward onto the operating table, where she wriggles like a trussed-up buffalo. Rob pulls and pushes her into position while Jacob sets a blank mask, a bottle, a metal band, and a candle onto their respective sigils. As Rob steps back, Jacob lights a candle.<br/>
<br/>
And the room explodes.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
It starts as two lightning strikes, arcing from Ms. Varga to two of the receptacles. The third strike, though, goes wild, and blows out all the light bulbs. Paige screams. The bolt sizzles and crackles, then with another blow of thunder it seems to explode. Phantom lights swim in the darkness, and you rub and press your eyes to clear them. "The fuck is that?" someone gasps, and when you've cleared your vision you find that one of the lights is still there.<br/>
<br/>
It's patch of light that glows bluish-green, and it crawls and hisses over a figure on the floor. Little tendrils snake off it, and someone jumps back from one, knocking over one of the computer desks. But the tentacles, as they come off, fizz and die away. But the main fire continues to glow and burn, tracing up and down a prone figure in a blazer jacket and skirt.<br/>
<br/>
After a minute of fascinated watching, you whip out your iPhone and start filming it. "What is it?" someone asks in a hushed, awed voice. <br/>
<br/>
"Dunno," you reply. "Not doing anything 'cept <i>that</i>"—whatever <i>that</i> is it's doing—"but keep your distance."<br/>
<br/>
Car alarms are going off—again—and people are shouting upstairs. Footsteps thump, but none of them come downstairs. Over the next few minutes, though, even as the fire before you burns, outside order is restored.<br/>
<br/>
"I think it's dying," Rob says after ten minutes or so. The phenomenon has weakened, largely, you suspect, because streamers keep leaching off it, to wriggle and fade on the floor. On a hunch you scramble over to retrieve a yardstick from a corner. Gingerly you touch the stick to the fire, and it crawls up the stick like a living mat of phosphorescent fungus. It dies before it reaches your hand, though, and then all is dark.<br/>
<br/>
"There's a torch under the bed," you call out. "Set some candles round," you order after Rob has flashed a light up at the ceiling, to show the exploded bulb. "Keep 'em off the operating table, though." Once you've enough light that you're able to see, you bend over what's left of Lenke Varga.<br/>
<br/>
She looks unharmed, only unconscious, but appearances in these matters are of course untrustworthy. A little investigation shows that the operation discharged her <i>anima</i> and <i>essentia</i> into the proper receptacles. But her <i>imago</i> is still upon her. You look over the table, but the mask is lying in the right position, and so is the triggering candle, so there seems no reason for the spell to have misfired.<br/>
<br/>
With Jacob's help you roll her over. Her eyes are open but sightless, and she's breathing and has a heartbeat. For a minute no one says anything.<br/>
<br/>
Recriminations are few and muted when your company does begin to speak. You are all experts on the craft, thanks to your sharing the Prescott mind and <i>essentia</i> around, and the three of you can't find any fault in the table. You tell the others about the curious resemblances between this "Lenke" and another in Kensington, so attention quickly turns to the <i>imago</i> that Lenke Varga still wears. Fortunately, you still remember the technique you developed back in Saratoga Falls that lets you examine the underlying, sigilistic structure of <i>imago,</i> and how to make the polarizing spectacles that lets you look at it directly. But it still takes you nearly an hour to recalibrate the lens on the iPhone so that you can put what's left of Ms. Varga under a similar microscope.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Did you have any idea Fane was getting this advanced?" Rob asks as you and he and Jacob huddle around the phone to study the image. Paige is flopped back on the bed, staring at the ceiling.<br/>
<br/>
"Nothing Fane does surprises me anymore," you say. "It's a bit disturbing, though," you have to add. Through the polarized filters you can see that Lenke Varga's <i>imago</i> has been altered, and has been altered more thoroughly even than yours was by that hex that Blackwell wound through it.<br/>
<br/>
The best analogy you can come up with is that she's had a second <i>imago</i> tattooed onto her original. They exist as separate objects, but the second one has been stitched so closely to the first that there is no practical way of separating them. Not even the technique of the <i>Libra</i> can pry them apart so as to copy or swallow one but not the other.<br/>
<br/>
Only Fane could have done this, you have to suppose, and as both the women who answer to the name "Lenke" work for Fane, you have to assume that at least one of them—the woman on the floor before you—is deep in Fane's confidence as she has been submitted to this occult modification.<br/>
<br/>
So she's an even better infiltration point than you dared hope. <br/>
<br/>
But how do you use her? You face the same choices as you did with Paige, but with an even sharper restriction. You can't get Ms. Varga's <i>imago</i> off her, so you are not able to get a remote sigil onto her <i>substantia.</i> That means you can't turn her into a remote-controlled golem unless you put an old-fashioned remote-controlled mask on her, and you're not sure you want to put a masked agent into Fane, not with them showing this kind of advanced technique.<br/>
<br/>
That means you either have to turn Lenke into a standard-issue golem, and one that you won't be able to control remotely, or you will have to move one of your company into her, transferring their <i>essentia</i> and <i>anima</i> into her shell so they can operate under her <i>imago.</i> That, or you'll have to add some of your own <i>anima</i> into her and make her a fourth of your company.<br/>
<br/>
Only now, when it's too late to function as a proper caution or advice, do you understand the decagrams: <i>obstructing adorning skinning coupling</i>.<br/>
<br/>
You and Jacob and Rob discuss the possibilities, the pros and the cons of each, and the pros and the cons of which of you can or should don Lenke Varga's face. You profess yourself willing to do it, but your friends try to talk you out of it, for "Hal Swann" has not vanished, and Rob in particular thinks it important that one of you maintain a secret link with the <i>Stellae,</i> so that you will be forewarned of any moves that bunch might be making.<br/>
<br/>
"Let me go in," he says, and he says it rather grimly, for Lenke does not seem like a physical prize. "Joe Durras's prodigies will work better on the inside than Hal's or Frank's, if I have to use them."<br/>
<br/>
"What about Rob?" you ask, and catch him and Jacob flashing a fast, furtive glance at each other.<br/>
<br/>
"You can have him?" he replies with a smile. "Make everyone friends."<br/>
<br/>
"You mean with a remote?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Sure," he says. "But better than that. We'll make it so Rob and Paige answer to <i>your essentia.</i> That way you can <i>make</i> friends all around."<br/>
<br/>
Maybe that's another interpretation of the advice <i>coupling</i> that Catilindria was trying to give you.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121232231131333111112
author_id: seuzz
title: The Many Faces of Lenke Whosits
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Maybe it's just weakness of the will on your part. But with Joe's offer to give you Rob and Paige, your powers of resistance crumble. "I thought you'd go for that," he says with a sly grin when you acquiesce with a sigh.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
The next morning Mr. Nizamani knocks you up early to say that three of his tenants, including the two fat girls, have given notice and are in the process of moving out. "I think more will go," he tells you with a pained whisper. "All the noise. If I don't get new tenants, I won't have anything for the cadre, or even for me!"<br/>
<br/>
"Leave it to me, comrade," you tell him, and squeeze his arm. "The people are united with you, and I've got prospects lining up to move in." He sighs with relief and gratitude.<br/>
<br/>
But all of that happened after the second underground lightning storm ...<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You clear away Lenke and lay Joe out on the operating table. His <i>anima</i>—your <i>anima,</i> with Joe Durras's knowledge and personality—is lodged in a band. Then, one mask and bottle at a time, his accumulated faces and <i>essentia</i> are drawn out—except for Eric Kim's, which remains in the resulting golem. You leave it with a remote sigil, though, as well as the chameleon skins that let it wear multiple faces and <i>essentia.</i><br/>
<br/>
That done, you lug Lenke back onto the table. You cannot put a remote sigil onto her, nor can you put any chameleon skins on her. Joe is going undercover as Lenke, and will be taking nothing but his <i>essentia</i> with him, so that there is no risk of anything detectable being placed on him. (You doubt that Fane has found a way of identifying the <i>essentia</i> of a <i>Stellae.</i>) From a metal band to her leaps his <i>anima</i> in a blazing bolt, and from a bottle leaps his <i>essentia.</i><br/>
<br/>
For a moment she doesn't move, and you have to lean over her face to see that her eyes are open. There is something reptilian about the glare she returns you. "I feel like I've been struck all over with hot hammers," she hisses.<br/>
<br/>
It must have been that glowing fire that left her nerves ragged, and it has left even the usually sunny-tempered Joe in a snippy mood. "Lord, not that I hold you responsible," he says as he sits up with a groan, "but one does want to smack <i>somebody.</i>" You help him up, and she totters over to the bed, where Paige shrinks back.<br/>
<br/>
For being in her forties, as you suppose, Lenke Varga is in very good shape, which she is showing off with a short skirt and high-heel shoes, and a tight jacket that falls just to the bottom of her rib cage over a tummy- and bosom-hugging blouse. Her legs are strong and shapely, and her hourglass figure does not look like it's being held in by a girdle. But her eyes are hard and her skin is going to leather, and the bowl-like cut of her jet-black hair puts you in mind of medieval mail helmet. "So who is this woman?" you ask after she has settled in.<br/>
<br/>
"Lenke Varga," she says. "Or Carol Staunton. Pick your poison." She grimaces as she pulls off a shoe and rubs her foot.<br/>
<br/>
"Which is it?"<br/>
<br/>
"She was born Carol Staunton," Joe in a pinched voice, "and she's old enough to have remembered the Blitz."<br/>
<br/>
"She's well-preserved," Jacob says into the silence that follows.<br/>
<br/>
"Which is her misfortune. It seemed like a lovely idea at the time. Now she has doubts."<br/>
<br/>
"Start making sense, Joe," says Jacob.<br/>
<br/>
"Perpetual youth," you exclaim with a snap of your fingers. "Full body tattoo giving the old girl a younger body!"<br/>
<br/>
Lenke snaps her fingers back at you and nods. <br/>
<br/>
"There were a pool of them, bright young things recruited by Fane in 'fifties," she says, and leans back in the manner of one about to deliver a story. "Mostly girls in that generation of recruits, first time Fane thought it a good idea to bring in some of the fairer sex. Not that they treated them any better for it." She makes a face. "It was still just a lot of secretarial work, only they were typing up reports about things with tentacles and fogs of darkness and the occasional SOS from another dimension. Though I suppose it was better for them in the long run. It was the boys that ran all the risks, and there's not a lot of them that lived to see the other side of fifty.<br/>
<br/>
"And one day," she says with a sigh, "Fane looked around and realized that we girls were the only really good institutional memory they had."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
It was a matter of basic record-keeping, she went on to explain. Most of the stuff that the researchers wrote down is so elliptical (so as not to alarm outsiders who accidentally stumbled onto the reports) that it wound up being useless to anyone who didn't do the writing or who wasn't present when the thing to be written about went lolloping down a corridor with the lead experimenter's head in its mouth. <br/>
<br/>
"Most of us had good memories, though," she says, "and we'd seen so much that we'd put things together and made connections that even the johnnies in charge didn't make. We were in our seventies by then, and they didn't dare let us retire and they were starting to panic about what we'd take with us when we shuffled off this mortal coil.<br/>
<br/>
"So they decided they wouldn't let us."<br/>
<br/>
Carol Staunton wasn't privy to all the ways that Fane tried to keep their "institutional memory" alive, though she heard rumors of surgical decapitations and of wiggly bits kept in jars. But FAne finally hit on "perpetual youth" when one of their research stations made a breakthrough. She and the girls that were left were sold on the idea of a "makeover". <br/>
<br/>
"It was like a tattooing machine," she says, "and it took bloody days to do its job and you were like to go crazy inside the tube with it, the way it was buzzing and burning you all over. And I was like to go sixes and sevens when I came out the other end and found myself like this. Not that it wasn't an improvement on what I had before."<br/>
<br/>
"How long since the operation?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"Nigh on two years, I suppose. What is this, November? December?" She puts her head back. "Yes somewhere on twenty months now."<br/>
<br/>
"Do you know a Lenke Crayson?"<br/>
<br/>
"Was that her name? The one they copied for us? They didn't tell us about her, just showed her to us before they started in."<br/>
<br/>
"You don't have the original woman's memories?"<br/>
<br/>
"No, just her physical <i>imago.</i> I've no idea if they can get the other."<br/>
<br/>
You talk some more, and learn that there are at least twenty-two girls named "Lenke," running from "Lenke Albemarle" through "Lenke Wilberforce," scattered across the UK, United States, and other points within Fane's global reach, which doesn't settle the question whether "Lenke Crayson" is the original.<br/>
<br/>
And will there be more, now that Fane has learned how to extend lifespans by giving people new bodies? "Who knows?" she shrugs. "We were only told afterward it's a delaying thing. They can't put any more of those tattoos on us, so when this one gives out that's it for us. I suppose they're trying to figure out how to fix that, but progress comes slow."<br/>
<br/>
You don't question her long on that side of things: there will time to learn more. Concerning Professor Jameson Hyde-White: Yes, he is a leading occult researcher, and Lenke Varga is more than just his financial assistant. "He's got his eye on this one," she says as she looks over at Paige. "Liked her tests, but didn't much like her looks. Worried what they portended. Lenke stoked his worries."<br/>
<br/>
"Why does she hate Paige?"<br/>
<br/>
"Look at the girl," Joe says. "And remember that when Lenke was her age it was only 1950 and girls wanted nothing more than a good dress, nylons, and something other than fish paste to eat."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Whatever the operation did to Lenke's body, the pain has mostly worn away by the time Joe has finished explaining all about Lenke, and he's in a more cheerful mood as he and Frank gather about you to finish the night's exchanges. That consists of two more moves. The first is to give you Rob Oliver's <i>imago</i> and to insert Eric Kim's <i>essentia</i> into you, which will give you control of the Paige Knotts golem—a prospect that has been smoldering in the back of your head like a hot match. The second is to put another copy of Rob's <i>imago</i> onto Joe's old <i>substantia,</i> which gives you a golem of Rob that you can control, both with orders and by inserting yourself into it via the remote sigil.<br/>
<br/>
"You're not keeping the girl here with you tonight?" Lenke asks with mild irony when, after Rob is dressed again, you direct all your company to the door. "Ah," she says when you reply that you don't have to keep her in order to be with her.<br/>
<br/>
And so, early the next afternoon, after moving to keep to keep your promise to Mr. Nizamani: "Aren't you looking radiant this morning, Miss Knotts," Lenke Varga says with a beaming smile when you go in to see her.<br/>
<br/>
"Yes, it was a good night. And a good morning. My boyfriend and I tied the knot unofficially. Got a new place upstairs from a friend of mine. These people were moving out, and we liked the building, so we grabbed it."<br/>
<br/>
"It's a big step, moving in together, isn't it?"<br/>
<br/>
"Oh, but we know we're compatible. Like two peas in a pod, like they say," you reply with a laugh. "We got my big stuff moved over before lunch, then broke it in. Almost broke each other." You lean forward to whisper. "Three times, second time with me on top."<br/>
<br/>
Lenke's eyebrows shoot up, and she turns pink even as she dimples a girlish smile at you.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112211122111112212111111111111111221212322311313333
author_id: seuzz
title: The Nets of Hal Swann
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Hal Swann has bequeathed you two local projects in Cambridge, but he has other pots boiling merrily away.<br/>
<br/>
He was late chasing the trail Frank and Joe left for him because he was frantically trying to stop a local plot involving the Cambridge rowing team. He was foiled there, and just this morning he woke to the ghastly news that a girl had been found dead down by the river. That was one reason he was (comparatively) heedless in rushing to London to find Frank and Joe: aside from his fraternal concern for their safety, he wanted their help in bringing the malefactors to justice.<br/>
<br/>
But that murder rattled loose some other speculations in his febrile imagination. The famous Cambridge-Oxford rowing contest is coming up, and if the Cambridge team was willing to invoke occult help—as it appears they were—then it's a dead certainty (in Hal's mind) that the Oxford team is up to the same kind of thing. Fane is likely in back of both, and if you followed Hal's hunch to the other university, you might snag a lead into Fane down there.<br/>
<br/>
Unfortunately, Oxford is very dangerous territory for you. Margaret Dillon, one of the most powerful of the <i>Stellae</i>, has her house there, and though you have done your best to construct foolproof disguises, you are still shy about testing them in the most terrifying possible circumstances.<br/>
<br/>
And she's not alone, either. Hal's own mentor, Fyodor Chernomyrdin, is visiting her, so it would be impossible to dive into Oxford under Hal's face without stopping to pay your respects.<br/>
<br/>
But there's another hook that Hal has floating in the waters: a house in Kensington, where the husband and wife both work for Fane. Have they anything to do with the occult side of Fane, or are they just exploitive capitalist parasites? Even if they are only the latter, they are both very well off (naturally), and would make a good local substitute for the Strausslers.<br/>
<br/>
Then there are the other possibilities that exist further afield ...<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122111221111122121111111111111112212123223113133332
author_id: seuzz
title: The Sack of Kensington
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>Jacob's already got you on the A12 and is turning into Stratford when you make the decision. You call up Google Maps on your phone and rotate the screen ninety degrees at a time while stroking various spidery cracks in the screen. When you've got the phone right-side up again, a silvery path blazes out on the map and a sequence of alchemical symbols pops up at the bottom. The latter you rapidly tap into an arcane calculator, and frown at the resulting quotient. You feed that number back into the path generator and recalculate. This process you repeat half a dozen times until you've generated a result that you deem you and your driver can both live with.<br/>
<br/>
So when you're finally approaching the North Circular Road, you tell Jacob to turn right instead of left. "Aren't we going back to Cambridge?" he asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Change of plans. Trust your Uncle Hal. Got plenty of petrol? Good lad." The van sputters and burps as Jacob makes a hard dive to the right across traffic.<br/>
<br/>
You send him down to Barking before turning back toward the City, and you skirt the City Airport to dive under the Thames at come out at Woolwich. The A2 takes you into Greenwich, where you circle the observatory three times—"tying the knot on the Prime Meridian"—before crossing under the river again into Limehouse. You cut a zig-zag over to the 501, which you follow north until you hit Regent's Park which, much to Jacob's annoyance, you circumnavigate the long way around only to plunge down the A4201 into Soho. "Do you know where we're going?" he fumes.<br/>
<br/>
"To the thousandth of a second of latitude and longitude. But the journey matters as much as the destination." You allow him a brief glance at the screen of your phone. "Plotted a course that balances speed, gas mileage, and favor."<br/>
<br/>
"Favor?"<br/>
<br/>
"To the cause. There are such things as arriving too early or too late, you know, or arriving having left karma in a corner shop loo with her pants down around her ankles. Watch for Brewer Street on your left. If we can't dodge Piccadilly Circus, I'll have to send us out to Canary Wharf and back through Greenwich again."<br/>
<br/>
A red spot shows in Jacob's cheek. You don't tell him that even after heavily weighting "favor" into your calculations, you've only picked up an additional sixteen percent chance of success in the upcoming venture by adding all these pointless loops about the City.<br/>
<br/>
"What about Joe?" he asks after you've passed Big Ben going east and then passed it again going west after rounding the Imperial War Museum. "He's on his way to Cambridge."<br/>
<br/>
"Factored in." You glare at a police vehicle that, with flashing lights, is creeping past you. "He'll call when he finds we're not there, and I'll have him pick up a few things and bring them back."<br/>
<br/>
"He'll be mad you didn't tell him ahead of time about the change in plans."<br/>
<br/>
"What's a spasm of aggravation when I tell him as against a stew of the same all the way up the M11? Mind you, maybe I should have sent <i>you</i> to my digs and had him take the wheel here. Jacob's seen London before. Joe hasn't." You sniff at the Savoy Hotel as you pass it again on your way toward St. Paul's.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
An hour later the van slides into a Kensington neighborhood only three-and-a-quarter miles from where you started. Jacob is glowering but you're humming, as by improvising a few switchbacks in the midst of the drive you've raised your odds of success by a further two percent at a cost of only fourteen more miles of urban driving. "Park here," you say when you're opposite Number 12 on a street of tall, narrow, white-washed houses that stand proudly behind their iron railings.<br/>
<br/>
"Right there?" he protests. "I can't, it's illegal!"<br/>
<br/>
"Exactly," you retort. "Look, I've told you, I've got this calculated to the foot. Right there." You point. "You trust your stars, I trust mine. Do you trust me?"<br/>
<br/>
"No one trusts you, Hal. We just put up with you." But he inches into the spot you've designated.<br/>
<br/>
"Now," you say after you've both hopped out. "You nip roun' the back, see if there's a private way in. I'll take the front."<br/>
<br/>
"You? Dressed like that?" Jacob's eyes boggle behind his black-framed glasses. He glances up uneasily at the limestone house, which only misses a magical nanny to look like something out of an Edwardian fairy tale.<br/>
<br/>
"We each have our role in the collective. This is mine." With a clap to his shoulder you send him down the sidewalk while you advance up the front. Three tall steps take you to a door that's been polished a black ebony. You'd mar the finish with a hard rap of an umbrella handle, but you've only your own knuckles, so you ring the bell.<br/>
<br/>
The man who answers is wearing a business suit, but his demeanor shouts "manservant." He is a graying but handsome fifty-something, with the angular good looks of a TV actor. <i>Just the sort these </i>nouveau<i> nobs like to employ to answer their doors,</i> you muse. The face and figure to play the Duke of Doshbury in some period drama where the family is short on brass even though the country estate is the size of Belgium and all the toilets are enameled in pearl. He frowns at you, and his eyes show pain.<br/>
<br/>
"Sign a petition protesting the shortage of council housing off Kensington High Street?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
His brow furrows. "What?"<br/>
<br/>
"Look around. See any poor people? No? It's a crime, that is, and needs protesting."<br/>
<br/>
"We're not interested." He starts to close the door.<br/>
<br/>
"Who's 'we'? You or your master? Not asking him to sign, comrade, I'm asking you as your own man, proudly upright on your own feet, to show solidarity with the oppressed classes what—"<br/>
<br/>
The door slams in your face. "Lickspittle," you mutter. You hop to the end of the walk and grin at the police cruiser that's just come prowling down the street. It slows as it nears Jacob's van. You lean against the railing and cock an eye back at the house. A curtain twitches in the front.<br/>
<br/>
You take that as your signal and hightail it around the same corner Jacob went down. With a backward glance you glimpse the cruiser stopping by the van, and the manservant charging briskly down the walk toward it. Then you're around the back.<br/>
<br/>
Jacob is hustling back your way, but he stops at your whistle. "Help a mate over?" you ask, and gesture with your hands like you're picking up a table. Jacob blinks, then nods. You feel something like a giant invisible fist clamping around your torso, and it lifts you over the fence and into the yard. "There a back way in? Aces!" You dash back the direction he came.<br/>
<br/>
It's bolted of course, but you slip a blank key into the lock and bang it softly with the handle of the screwdriver Hal always carries in his hip pocket. Once it's unlocked, you and he slip inside.<br/>
<br/>
The door opens into a scullery, and the two of you quickly tiptoe through it and the adjoining kitchen into a long, dark hallway leading to the front. There's no one in the side dining room or the front foyer or parlor. "Meet you on the first floor," you tell Jacob, and send him upstairs. You glance into the room opposite the parlor. It's a library—also empty—and you cluck your tongue at the bookshelves. The tomes are all bound in leather, looking like they were bought by the yard as decor. Probably they're false fronts, for a wet bar if the master has taste, and for a big screen TV if he doesn't.<br/>
<br/>
A glance through the front window shows the manservant hurrying back up, so you scurry into the foyer, where you untie and drop a red bandana onto the polished wood floor. You're at the top of the stairs before the front door opens. "Anyone home?" you hiss at Jacob. He shrugs and points to the steps leading to the next floor up.<br/>
<br/>
Then from below comes a cry and a crash. When you look back over the balustrade, the manservant is sprawled face down on the parquet. He doesn't move. "Check the top floor," you murmur to Jacob. "But man and mistress should be at work, sprogs at play. We got the place to ourselves, it looks like."<br/>
<br/>
But as you're bending by the manservant's foot, retrieving the rag you'd dropped at the door, a female voice calls from high up. "Charles? Did something happen?"<br/>
<br/>
"No, mum," you shout back. "Just dropped this morning's delivery! There's fifty-pound notes all over the floor! I'll fetch a broom!"<br/>
<br/>
Footsteps, and a woman appears at the top of the stairs. Her eyes go wide when she sees you.<br/>
<br/>
Then she shoots up a foot into the air, her arms clapped to her side, and gasps. You run up and shove the bandana into her mouth. "I'll find some cord," you tell Jacob, who has come round a corner. "You find a bedroom we can stash her in."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Ten minutes later you're rubbing your hands over Lenke Crayson and Charles the Willingly Exploited Representative of the Working Class. Both are trussed up tightly, though the latter is still unconscious. You'd call it a fine stroke of luck catching them both, but like most with Catilindrian-inflected <i>essentia,</i> you make your own luck.<br/>
<br/>
Lenke Crayson is one of Fane's in-house solicitors, and Hal Swann has met her sharp end before. Matthew Crayson, the husband, runs the UK branch of Vejoves S.A., a Fane-owned Swiss pharmaceutical concern. They have two girls still living with them: Portia who is twenty and Nerissa who is eighteen.<br/>
<br/>
This is a good place to operate undercover, even if Matthew and Lenke are only corporate tools. Once Joe gets out with the supplies—you've since talked to him and told him what you need from Cambridge—you can start making golems and disguises.<br/>
<br/>
But should you, Hal Swann, go undercover? Or pull the strings from afar?</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221112211111221211111111111111122121232231131333321
author_id: seuzz
title: The Women of Kensington
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>There's plenty of faces to go around, more than you've agents, in fact. Some of the roles can be filled out with golems, but you can help relieve some of the burden by taking one of the faces for your own. But it would strange of Hal to vanish completely, so you will keep his face active even when you're not using it.<br/>
<br/>
"One of the girls," you say aloud.<br/>
<br/>
"One of the girls what?" Jacob asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Keep her for me. The older one would fit best. I think Lenke's for you, though."<br/>
<br/>
"I guess it could be worse," Jacob replies, eyeing Lenke Crayson carefully. The woman's eyes go very wide, and you can well guess what she's worried about. Her actual fate of course will be much less harrowing but much more final.<br/>
<br/>
"Right," you tell Jacob, and clap him on the shoulder. "Let's get the stuff from the van."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Lenke Crayson is actually heavier than she looks, because she is more muscular. The woman must do a shitload of exercises, for she's firm and tight everywhere with muscles, especially around the butt and thighs. You don't bother to unbind and ungag her until after you've cracked her open to extract her <i>anima</i> and her <i>essentia</i>, which leaves her a dazed heap that can be shifted to the side while you deal with Frank.<br/>
<br/>
You give him a copy of her <i>essentia</i> along with her <i>imago</i> so that he can manipulate her as well as imitate her, and you put a copy of Jacob Darrow onto what's left of Lenke so that Hal's friend and partner won't disappear. It's more straightforward dealing with the manservant, Charles. You draw off his <i>essentia</i> and replace it with some of Lenke's so that he will be even more cowed and cooperative than he was before.<br/>
<br/>
"What can you tell me?" you ask Frank after you've got Charles restored and calmed down. He's costuming himself out as Lenke in a poison-green skirt and jacket, so it as her that he answers.<br/>
<br/>
"What do you want to know?" The hard expression on his hatchet-like face is a poor choice, for it accents the signs of work Lenke has had to done to stave off signs of her fortieth birthday. (Whether she's approaching it or dragging it behind her, you diplomatically refrain from asking him.) <br/>
<br/>
"How deep are they into Fane?"<br/>
<br/>
"Deep enough she knows what's going on. Not so deep that she has any idea where the bottom is. Matthew's just fool enough to follow her in."<br/>
<br/>
You grin. "She wears the trousers, eh? So it wouldn't raise any eyebrows if he brought his work home for his trouble and strife to look over?"<br/>
<br/>
Your partner glowers. "She already does. She does <i>everything,</i> and she's behind on her afternoon's work already, thanks to us. At I'll have some time to catch up. The girls should be home soon, but Matthew won't be home till eight, probably."<br/>
<br/>
"Ah, the girls." You rub your hands. "Both been seen about with lads, there anything serious between either of them and some of them?"<br/>
<br/>
She rolls her eyes. "Like they tell me anything. Why?"<br/>
<br/>
"Just thinking that Portia might be the sort of girl to come over all zealous for the class struggle and take a fancy to chap who already is." <br/>
<br/>
And you snort at the bedroom  you're sitting in. It's done all over in creams and butterscotch, which is alright as far as that goes. But the four-poster, though comparatively subdued, is tasteful enough that even you can tell it is worth thousands of pounds, and the cabinetry is plainly handcrafted, as is the wardrobe. The gauzy drapes on the windows, if sold, could keep Hal in noodles and instant curry for years. "Whose room this?" you ask.<br/>
<br/>
"It's a spare, so if you'd like to stay with us—"<br/>
<br/>
"I'd sooner sleep in an honest ditch." And yet, when you plop onto the bed you can't help running your fingers over the hand-stitched quilts. "But I'll be staying with you part-time anyway. The plan I think will be to give me Portia's face, and put mine on her so we can switch back and forth."<br/>
<br/>
"Hal would look funny in her company." Lenke's expression is stony.<br/>
<br/>
"Not if she's my bird." You lay back on the bed with an impudent grin. "That's why I think she's going to come over all of a sudden with class consciousness. I can be very persuasive."<br/>
<br/>
Lenke looks momentarily horrified, but with a swallow admits that it would be one way to explain a connection between Hal and the Craysons.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Nerissa Crayson, the eighteen-year-old daughter, gets home before Joe can get in from Cambridge, so you disassemble her and lay her aside for him. He's in a bad mood from the drive, but calms down once he sees the house and the face you've got for him. "Cute," he says. "She got a boyfriend? Can I have him too?" You shrug, as there is no theoretical limit to the number of golems he can have, and direct Joe to disrobe.<br/>
<br/>
"Callum, I think," he says after he's up off the operating table and has a chance to examine his new identity in the mirror. He pouts a little, and shifts from side to side as he weights his boobs in the palms of his hands and examines his butt with a critical stare. "He's got such a nice smile. I wish he weren't so shy. Not like Harry, Harry's not shy at all. Maybe I should take Harry, too, just so there won't be any trouble—"<br/>
<br/>
"Joe, love, I said you could have whoever you want, but I'm not bloody paying for the whole West End."<br/>
<br/>
She clucks her tongue. "I don't know <i>what</i> Portia's going to see in you," she says, for of course you've told Joe about your upcoming plan.<br/>
<br/>
You've now seen the photographs of the Crayton girls, and you have admit it's going to be a stretch to make a Portia-Hal friendship believable. You and Nerissa would look more natural together, for judging by her clothes she has a funky, bohemian style.<br/>
<br/>
Physically, Joe's new girl is a slight, almost elfin thing. She has good hips and legs, and her arms are graceful. But she has small boobs, which are not only the shape but also the size of small pears. She has big eyes, though, and a button nose over a small mouth, and a fetching way of looking up at you from under her brows. Her hair is a mousy brown, parted in the middle, that falls in gentle waves to her elbows. You lean back against the door frame, almost reconsidering your choice, as she dresses in low-slung jeans, a black t-shirt, and black, high-heeled leather boots that probably cost as much as Jacob's van. Over this ensemble she drapes an ankle-length, striped cloth duster that looks like it was snagged off an awning.<br/>
<br/>
"Portia's going to be late," she says as she takes out some cherry lip-gloss and starts applying it. Her expression is hooded and insolent. "So if you're looking for a girl to have fun with, it's either me or Mumsy."<br/>
<br/>
He's not serious, of course. Or maybe he is. Because when you put your arm around her waist and draw her in to your mouth, she kisses you back with no evident reluctance. She's not impressed, though, or maybe Joe likes the tease, for he says, "Get Portia to show you how to do it right before you try that again." She presses you aside to exit her bedroom.<br/>
<br/>
"I don't have a lot of practice, Joe," you shout after her.<br/>
<br/>
"Yes, I could tell," she says without looking back as she descends the stairs.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Joe is right that Portia would be late, and you're just undressing the unconscious girl on the operating table in the library when the front door opens and the man of the house walks in. But Charles is ready for him, and after taking his coat and dropping it on the floor he smoothly reaches around to press a mask into the master's face. "Just lay him out in the foyer, your Grace" you tell him as you unbuckle Portia's leather tunic and with a grunt roll her over onto her face. The servant, though under Joe's control, obeys.<br/>
<br/>
Portia is a bigger girl than Nerissa, but that only means she's bigger in all the ways that count. She is probably only half an inch taller, but she's got her mother's hard, toned buttocks and thighs; calves that suggest long sessions at a riding academy; and great, rosy melons that would look good on a professional pornography site. Unlike Nerissa, who evidently prefers a more "natural" look, Portia is tanned all over, obviously from a salon with perhaps with a little help from a spray bottle as well, and she wears lots of foundation and blush and eye shadow. She is also a blonde, and her hair falls in flat sheets on either side of her face to her elbows. Looking at it and fingering it, you have the sense that, once in character, you are going to be spending lots and lots of time brushing it out.<br/>
<br/>
Her clothes are black and gold: knee-high black leather boots and a black, one-piece leather tunic that just drops just far enough to cover her butt. It buttons up the side in enormous gold buckles, so that the whole things practically screams "fetish". It's surely just a style, though, for her rings and bracelets are very conventional.<br/>
<br/>
Once you've got her undressed, you pull her <i>anima</i> and <i>essentia</i> out, then pull her to the side so you can deal with Matthew Crayton by swapping out his <i>essentia</i> for his wife's and removing his <i>anima:</i> Lenke, who has been watching with a smug smirk, then pulls her confused husband upstairs to give him some programming. Then Joe helps you finish up with Portia.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"God!" you grumble as you tighten the tunic so you can buckle it. "I'm going to be <i>so</i> late for Ian's party. And how am I going to be able to explain <i>him?</i>" You roll your eyes at the Hal-golem, who grins back weakly at you. But Portia has some friends—girl and boy—that would be a better match for him.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112212
author_id: seuzz
title: Doppelgangers and Double Crosses
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"I don't like it," you say. <br/>
<br/>
Melody's brow crinkles.<br/>
<br/>
"I don't like what I've done to them," you say. "They don't need--" You swallow, and taste the bile. "They don't need <i>me</i> inside their heads. I'm like garbage."<br/>
<br/>
"And what'll they do to you if you get those <i>anima</i> band off them?"<br/>
<br/>
"I don't know," you say slowly. "Frank might pound me into mush, and Joe might set the mush on fire. But that's okay. I'd deserve it."<br/>
<br/>
"So you're going to double-cross them?" Her tone is measured, even.<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah. Yeah," you repeat more firmly, and sit up with a sigh. "Let's figure out how to do it."<br/>
<br/>
"I was afraid you'd say that, Prescott," Melody says.<br/>
<br/>
You look up sharply. She raises a clenched fist. Things like invisible iron bands materialize around your torso. "Joe!" Melody calls.<br/>
<br/>
Joe's grinning face appears around the door frame. "Aw, dammit, looks like I didn't leave when I said I was going to," he chortles.<br/>
<br/>
You swing toward Melody. Since you're still wearing Frank's mind band, you know it must be him under--<br/>
<br/>
How did he get under her mask? It's golemized to your control.<br/>
<br/>
You must have muttered something aloud, for Joe answers your query. "We made a new mask of her. I snagged one of the blanks on my way out to get him, and we polished it up before coming back. That's how come we took awhile getting back. Then he got Melody alone and scored another copy of her while you and me were bullshitting in here." He picks up the sketchpad and clucks his tongue over it.<br/>
<br/>
"You mean you were lying to me, about me being a <i>Stellae</i>?"<br/>
<br/>
"Not at all," Joe says. "That's how come it's gonna suck to have to get rid of you. But we knew we'd have to test you out. <i>I</i> knew we'd have to test you out. I'm a fast thinker." He shakes his head. "I really wish you hadn't decided to double-cross us. We're the same person, dude. We're all Will Prescott!"<br/>
<br/>
"Except the real one apparently can't be trusted," Melody says in a growl much lower than her normal voice.<br/>
<br/>
"What are you going to do to me?" you ask, and your voice shakes.<br/>
<br/>
Joe's face grows very grave. "What Blackwell should have done to you. Well, let's get it over with," he says, and advances on you. He raises an open palm to his chin, and blows something into your face.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You're not in darkness, exactly, but neither is it light. The place you find yourself in might not even be a place. It feels <i>blank.</i><br/>
<br/>
And then the forms appear, emerging at first indistinctly and then with great, cutting crispness from the fog of nonexistence that surrounds you. They are designs of great intricacy and complexity, bending and turning and folding in great wheels. Some of them are merely bent into wheels, but others— Ow! You can't look at them, it hurts too much to actually <i>see</i> something that has more than five dimensions.<br/>
<br/>
They are sigils, joined together into a vast, interlocking clockwork thing rushing and turning all about you. You reach out to touch one, but it eludes you. <br/>
<br/>
And then either you are getting very big or they are getting very small, because they tighten all around you. But they also seem to fade, so that soon they again disappear into nothingness.<br/>
<br/>
And you feel yourself disappearing into nothingness too.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
The world returns in a rush of color and form. Frank Durras stares at you with a faint curl to his lips. "And you're back," he says. "You know what to do," he says, and turns around.<br/>
<br/>
"Huh?" you say.<br/>
<br/>
He turns again, to fix a hard, bright eye on you. "Cut the idiot act, Joe. Go home and do my homework."<br/>
<br/>
<i>Right. You're supposed to go take care of his school work for him, hang loose at the house, and then meet him at school tomorrow.</i> Because that's what he and you had decided needed to be done while--<br/>
<br/>
You blink and sway on your feet.<br/>
<br/>
While Joe went back to Will Prescott's house, disguised as Will Prescott.<br/>
<br/>
Frank frowns. "You got a problem?" he demands, and puts his hands on his hips.<br/>
<br/>
"No. Uh, what kind of grade are you wanting on the math? Perfect score, or just high enough to make you seem plausible as a brainiac?"<br/>
<br/>
"Don't fuck with me, you mudpack. I got another brother out there who gives me enough lip."<br/>
<br/>
You look around. There are your clothes over there. Well, Joe Durras's clothes. You pick them up, and since you don't want to get in a fight with Frank, you skedaddle.<br/>
<br/>
You were in the mausoleum, and it's dark outside. You can't see yourself, but you've the feel of your body. The body of Joe Durras. Smooth and big and strong and graceful. You pull on the workout clothes quickly--scant protection against the chill night air--and jog out the gate before the guardian can start snuffling around in earnest. The boys' truck is parked nearby, keys still in the ignition. You drive back in to town.<br/>
<br/>
All the way there, you use Joe's memories to try figuring out what the <i>fuck</i> is going on.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
It had started after they'd knocked you out. You twitch at the memory of looking down and snickering at your lanky form as Frank had tossed you onto the couch, where he'd made a new mask of you. Joe had already quietly hustled the golems of Prescott and Melody into the secret basement, and ripped Blackwell's mask off the golemized Lucy; he'd done all that while you was preoccupied with Frank's mind band.<br/>
<br/>
Then had come the weirdness: You and Frank had taken Will into the mausoleum, to turn him into a golem. You'd opened the book, and had instantly been distracted by the faint writing that glowed on one of the earlier pages. You'd set it down on the bier to study. But Frank hadn't seen it; he'd thought you'd got the <i>Libra</i> open to the golemization spell, and he'd set Prescott down on it.<br/>
<br/>
And Prescott had vanished. It was like he'd fallen through the book.<br/>
<br/>
Well, that set off a long argument that went nowhere. But since Prescott needed to go home, it was decided that Joe would put on Prescott's mask and go home as him while Frank finished up with the other replacements. That's the last you remember: Putting a new mask to your face so a golem-Joe could go home in your stead.<br/>
<br/>
You've got Joe's memories, and also something of his speed at thinking, so you fill in the rest of the spots: Frank was going to golemize the hobo that had been under Prescott's mask, and hang Joe's mask on him, and then golemize Melody and hang her mask on her. Presumably he had got at least one of those tasks that done.<br/>
<br/>
And as soon as he had put Joe's mask on the results, you had popped up.<br/>
<br/>
<i>But who are you?</i><br/>
<br/>
You've got Joe's memories, but you've also got Will Prescott's memories. More than that, you're sure you've got Prescott's <i>anima,</i> or a facsimile of it. Because that's who you're sure you are: Will Prescott.<br/>
<br/>
Either you somehow found yourself inside Joe's mask--or inside that golem--or you are a copy of Prescott's <i>anima</i> band that had been riding around on Joe's face.<br/>
<br/>
You drum your fingers thoughtfully. No, it can't be the latter. That <i>anima</i> band wouldn't have any of Prescott's memories that came after he made it. And you've got those. You remember the double-cross from his point of view.<br/>
<br/>
So there it is: You are Will Prescott, and somehow you are inside a golem of Joe Durras.<br/>
<br/>
Well, it's better than being eaten by a <i>gwarcheidwad.</i> But what the fuck are you going to do? You could just pretend to be the golem, do as you're told, hide out from the very scary people you've made.<br/>
<br/>
Or you could try to do something about it. <br/>
<br/>
After all, that's how you came to be in this mess. You decided you wanted to put things back to the way they were before you slapped that <i>anima</i> band onto Joe.<br/>
<br/>
You feel the side of your mouth curl up. Joe's personality comes to the fore. <i>Fuck, yeah!</i> That's what <i>Stellae</i> do. They fight. And the prospect of being Joe Durras, and fighting the evil Joe Durras-- <br/>
<br/>
If there's one thing Joe Durras likes, it's a challenge. The blood courses fiercely through you.<br/>
<br/>
You could hide out here, playing docile, until you spotted a chance to take them down. Get some of Blackwell's knockout powder. Set another bear trap sigil. You'd have to be extremely careful, because Joe and Frank both have your own memories riding around inside you.<br/>
<br/>
The alternative is to get help. You have Joe's memories, so you know exactly where to contact his associates. Call their Dad or Rick--<br/>
<br/>
No, phone calls would be a bad idea, especially if you tried telling them that Joe and Frank had been victimized by a magician with the <i>Libra.</i> They'd be extremely cautious if you told them that. Probably too cautious, and would accidentally alert Joe and Frank. The thing to do is to go see them. Go out to Olympia, where their dad lives, and throw yourself on his mercy, pledge to help reverse things. You can see him in Joe's memories, and you know how merciful he can be.<br/>
<br/>
If you do that, though, you should take the <i>Libra</i> back with you. Once Joe and Frank realize you're gone, they would disappear with it. <br/>
<br/>
You won't be able to get it back until tomorrow, though. Either way, you're stuck in town tonight.<br/>
</span></div></div>


path: 112211111112122221222121121122122
author_id: seuzz
title: An Impostor Reveals Himself
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>You're wearing Joe's form, so you've got his ambition, but you've also got your own common sense. Or maybe it's just fear. It'd be best to get reinforcements.<br/>
<br/>
You pace the living room past midnight, thinking quickly, which isn't hard, what with you inhabiting a copy of Joe's brain. You have to get the <i>Libra,</i> but Frank has it at Blackwell's. That'll be a job for tomorrow. <br/>
<br/>
And what will you do tomorrow? You can't drive out to Olympia. That would take several days, even if you didn't stop for sleep, and they'd notice your absence. That would alert them to the "golem's" treachery, and if they guessed what was happening, they might try beating you there; Joe has ways of breaking speed limits. So you'll have to take a plane. That takes money, but there's a credit card (for emergencies only). Frank has it, but he doesn't know that Joe has memorized all the numbers. <br/>
<br/>
So you get online and book a flight to Denver. You'll have until noon tomorrow to get the <i>Libra</i> back.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Frank is gruff when you pick him up at Blackwell's the next morning, and he lets you drive, probably because he's lost in thought. You read his mood and don't chatter. Pre-class basketball practice is a nerve-racking affair, for you have to pretend to be loose and carefree and stupid, even though your nerves are vibrating. You're clumsier than the real Joe would be, for you haven't the little supernatural talents he uses to make himself look awesome on the court, and Ian Carpenter gets vexed at you a few times. Frank even pulls you aside and tells you not to try so hard.<br/>
<br/>
There's one last moment of suspense as you're walking out the gym with him. You intend to give him the slip and duck back around to the parking lot--thank goodness he let you drive, so you still have the keys--but he catches you hanging back and asks what's wrong.<br/>
<br/>
"Gah, I just realized I forgot my books back home," you say, thinking quickly.<br/>
<br/>
"So what? You don't need them. A straw head like you."<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah, but-- Okay, look, I had some poems in them I was going to give to Becky."<br/>
<br/>
"So copy them out again. You're not planning on skipping--"<br/>
<br/>
"Come on! Just a quick trip back to the place to pick them up!"<br/>
<br/>
"You don't need them," he says firmly.<br/>
<br/>
It sounds like an order, and you recognize the cue. "I don't need them," you say sullenly.<br/>
<br/>
"That's right. So come on-- Now what?"<br/>
<br/>
"Okay, the real reason I need to go home is because I forgot <i>your</i> homework."<br/>
<br/>
He turns very red. "Go home and come back."<br/>
<br/>
"Yes sir! I'll put 'em in your locker."<br/>
<br/>
He glowers, and stalks away. So he won't notice your extended absence, you linger until after the bell has rung, then sneak into the main building and slip his worksheets--which you actually had on you--into his locker before ducking back out.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You risk a speeding ticket on the way out to Blackwell's, and study the villa from the outside for a solid ten minutes before venturing in. The <i>gwarcheidwad</i> is quiet, and despite Blackwell's car being out front, there seem to be no inhabitants. But a careful search of the library yields no <i>Libra;</i> desperation sets in as you search all the downstairs, and upstairs in the work room. You start to panic, but you tamp it back, and make another, slower search of the rooms. <br/>
<br/>
Nothing.<br/>
<br/>
Your face is twisted up so hard it hurts as you trudge back out to the truck. It looks like you'll have to cancel that plane ticket and linger for another day or two until you can locate the book. Though you could make an escape, you know you have to take it with you, or it will all be for nothing. Once Joe and Frank figure out that you've absconded, they'll go to earth, and with the <i>Libra</i> they could hide anywhere.<br/>
<br/>
Your breath is ragged as you get back in the boys' truck. Where would Frank have put it? He wouldn't have taken it to school. He'd want to keep it safe. He'd put it someplace where it wouldn't be found. Blackwell's library--somewhere on all those shelves, those acres of look-alike old leather tomes--is where he'd hide it. <i>Hide a leaf in a forest,</i> that's what Joe had once told him, from his own reading.<br/>
<br/>
It's those memories that prove your salvation. One thought will lead to another, and when they're Joe's thoughts they slide like quicksilver. An old private joke between the boys recurs to you, and your hands numbs with hope and fear as you grope beneath the trunk bench. An old fast food bag, a Coke bottle--<br/>
<br/>
And the <i>Libra</i>, tucked where no one would <i>want</i> to look. You breathe a sigh of relief as you pull it out.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
"Hey boy," you call to the mastiff as he trots up with a long tongue hanging out. "Did you miss me? I missed you!" You rub his head and haunches. "I bet you're surprised to see me back so soon! Not half as a surprised as a bunch of other people are going to be, I bet." Despite your happy tones, you're feeling dread.<br/>
<br/>
You shouldn't. You've a good idea of what to expect, and though you're sure it will be hard and unpleasant eventually, you're not going to get squashed, even though the little old man who lives in this non-descript tract house in a forgotten town nestled in an obscure valley high in the Rockies could squash you while hardly noticing it.<br/>
<br/>
You brush the soles of your feet on the mat and open the door. "Hello!" you holler, and bang on the door. "Dad? Laverne? Anyone home? If it's Father Ed, I don't want to--"<br/>
<br/>
The astonished face of Charles Brennan appears around the corner. "As I live and--! Joe! What are you doing--?"<br/>
<br/>
"I brung you a present, sir," you say, and hold up the <i>Libra.</i> His eyes widen as he slowly reaches out to take it. "I guess that's the most important thing. That's the good news." Your voice falters. "I wish there were better news to go with it."<br/>
<br/>
"It's very good news, son," he says. And then his expression tightens. "Where's Frank?"<br/>
<br/>
You sigh deeply and look away. "Yeah. That's-- Oh, sir. If you only knew how hard it was for me to come see you. Even like this, even with <i>that</i> to give you--" You gesture at the <i>Libra.</i><br/>
<br/>
"Joe," the old man murmurs. "Where's your brother?"<br/>
<br/>
Charles Brennan is very old and very experienced, so there's no need to beat about the bush. "He's with his brother, sir," you say, facing him squarely. "Joe and Frank--the real Joe and Frank--are still back in Saratoga Falls. I'm not Joe." You raise your hand to your face, but catch yourself, for you've no idea if you can take this mask off. "I'm an imposter, Mr. Brennan. I'm worse than an imposter. I'm a <i>malum veneficus.</i> But I've come here, to see you, to make amends. To try, anyway."<br/>
<br/>
The head of the <i>Stellae Errantes</i> looks very sober, but he doesn't look angry, and he doesn't look frightened. "I think you'd better explain yourself, sir," he says, and his tone, though it's not hard, is very businesslike.<br/>
<br/>
"Thank you, Mr. Brennan. To start with, my name is William Prescott. I'm seventeen years old, and it all started when I went to a used book store for a class project."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
He hears you out, and doesn't even ask you to repeat any of it. He has you remove Joe's mask, and you discover that beneath it you are a stone-like gargoyle that used to be homeless man. The golem--your body--is still mobile, and you can even croak out some intelligible words when not in a mask. But of your original body there is no sign. You show him one additional spoil you'd seized before leaving Saratoga Falls: the mask of Aubrey Blackwell, which you'd found up in the work room. Charles doesn't put it on, but he accepts without demurral your observation that anyone who puts it on could get the whole history from the original black magician's point of view.<br/>
<br/>
"I'm sorry about all this, Mr. Brennan," you say when you're done. "I didn't know what I was doing. No," you correct yourself when he raises his eyes to meet yours. You don't feel misery, only hard honesty in your hasty self-correction. "I knew what I was doing. But I didn't fully understand it. And I was afraid."<br/>
<br/>
"You were drunk, son," the old man says softly. You like the appearance of that word "son" in place of "sir." It means he's already arrived at a generous judgment of you. "We'll speak of that later. For now, you can put that mask back on. It won't bother me, and it will be more comfortable for you." You don't argue, though you're pretty sure you'll feel worse when you're back inside it: a known imposter, and the mocking memory of what you'd done to his adopted boys. "You can even take the boys' old room tonight. I have some phone calls to make, though I fear we will be much too late."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
His fears prove correct; the next evening, when a return phone call does come, it's from another <i>Stellae</i> operative, with word that Joe and Frank are nowhere to be found in Saratoga Falls.<br/>
<br/>
"What are you going to do now, sir?" you ask when he hangs.<br/>
<br/>
"What am <i>I</i> going to do? Make some more phone calls," he says. "We'll have ourselves a conjunction. But what are <i>you</i> going to do, son?"<br/>
<br/>
The question tells you what he hopes the answer will be, even if it's not something he expects. It's certainly not something he is requesting.</span></div></div>


path: 1122111111121222212221211211221221
author_id: seuzz
title: A Conjunction
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"I want to go with you, Mr. Brennan," you say. "Joe wasn't lying when he said that I--" You take a deep breath. "I'm a <i>Stellae.</i> Well, that I could be."<br/>
<br/>
"Yes, you could be," the head of the order says.<br/>
<br/>
"Even if I weren't, I want to help put all this right."<br/>
<br/>
"You've already done all that you can, son." Charles say. "Just by coming here and bringing us the <i>Libra.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"I want to do more than that, sir. I want to help bring them back. I want to fix what I've done."<br/>
<br/>
"You haven't the skill." He gestures at you. "Looking like that, knowing what you know in that form, you know what we're up against."<br/>
<br/>
"Yes sir."<br/>
<br/>
"Joe and Frank are no longer initiates, though they are still novices. And even in Joe's form you haven't the skill or the training to help."<br/>
<br/>
"I want to get the skill and training, sir."<br/>
<br/>
"If the stars are with us, we will have them back long before you would be ready to help."<br/>
<br/>
"I want it anyway, sir. When I first realized what I had, what I'd <i>acquired</i> after Professor Blackwell's death--" You stumble over the harsh word, but in Charles Brennan's presence it is easier to use the true words than any euphemism. "I felt so happy. I felt like I'd <i>found</i> what I was made for. But I wasn't right, not totally. <i>This,</i> the <i>Stellae,</i> is what I was made for. Isn't that what it means, to be entangled with the planets?"<br/>
<br/>
"It does. And it speaks very well of you that you feel that way." He holds out his hands, and you take them. There is no blessing and no initiation in his grasp, only a warm and paternal squeeze. "That is something else to discuss later. For now, I'll just make those other phone calls. Be ready to leave in the morning, Will."<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
The "conjunction" takes place in a very nice hotel in downtown Kansas City, in a suite reserved for Charles himself; the other attendees have rooms on the same floor. You can't help feeling nervous as you look around at them. There are seven in all, including yourself, all of them to one degree or another very scary and very dangerous, even though only a few of them look it. They all know why they are meeting together, and though mostly they keep their eyes off you, you know you are foremost in their thoughts.<br/>
<br/>
"Shouldn't we have a few more out here, Chuck," asks John Reilly. He's the most pleasant looking of the bunch, a man in late middle age whose coppery hair has turned sandy on its way to white, and whose grave demeanor can't fully veil the merry twinkle in his eye.<br/>
<br/>
"We've enough, and then some," Charles replies. He's taken the easy chair at the head of the circle, and though he's a very small and rather shabby man with his wispy pate and close-cut, white beard, he dominates the room. "We are all represented. Arbol, Viritrilbia, Perelandra, Malacandra--" <br/>
<br/>
He lists off the names of the ten planets, and as he does so your eyes flick to their representatives, here gathered: John Reilly, the group's researcher and archivist; Kali Valentine, its academic trainer; Rick Bredon, the wolf-like investigator, who had first put the <i>Stellae</i> onto the trail of the <i>Libra</i> when it had resurfaced in New York a few months ago; Father Ed, the spiritual counselor; Nash Carnes, the maker of many clever magical gadgets.<br/>
<br/>
Charles Brennan himself, the head of the order.<br/>
<br/>
"And, not least," he concludes. "Sulva, who has not been represented in one of our councils for almost a century." He indicates you.<br/>
<br/>
You swallow at the introduction. You can't avoid their eyes now. Reilly's eyes are friendly; Nash's dance over you appraisingly; Rick's are hooded; Father Ed's bore into you as he frowns deeply. <br/>
<br/>
Only Kali avoids your face, and she shifts in her chair. Joe was her pupil. He was one of her favorites. It has to be very hard on her to see you--who turned him and Frank into loathsome parodies of themselves--sitting at this table like an honored and established member. Especially since you are looking like Joe at the moment.<br/>
<br/>
"This is Will Prescott," Charles continues softly. "Though he's not looking like himself. Indeed, nothing of what he looks like remains. Nash, I want you to give him a full examination when we're done here. Here are the relevant specs." He hands Nash the <i>Libra</i>; the latter takes it gingerly. "I've given you the gist of our present crisis, but I now ask Will to give the story again, in his own words."<br/>
<br/>
"And what's his testimony worth," Father Ed snorts. His frown seems fixed on his face.<br/>
<br/>
"It's the testimony of a boy brave enough and honest enough to come find us and bring us the <i>Libra,</i>" Charles says. "That is enough, even though he has also brought us an independent source of testimony." From his travel case he takes out the mask of Aubrey Blackwell. "This is all that remains of the warlock who tempted and corrupted Will."<br/>
<br/>
You wince at the word "corrupted," though you know it is apt.<br/>
<br/>
A silence enfolds the room, and into that silence you pour out your story again.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
You have to tell it, in a fragmentary way, a few more times, under questioning and cross-examination. The matter of the <i>anima</i> bands is touched on and explored. You are deeply grateful to Charles and to John Reilly, for they discuss and describe the insidious nature of those devices, and how one as unwary as yourself could not predict what would happen when they are put on such as Joe and Frank. "And how do we know some of us aren't wearing these things now?" Father Ed asks, his eyes glittering.<br/>
<br/>
"Edison'll look over the spell, see how they're used, and test us for them," says Rick.<br/>
<br/>
"And if <i>he's</i> already been--"<br/>
<br/>
"Leave the paranoia to the experts, padre," Rick sighs. "If any of those things were in play, they'd be all over all of us by now. If you're not wearing one, you can bet none of the rest of us are." He shakes his head impatiently.<br/>
<br/>
But you're not quite satisfied. "What did you find in Saratoga Falls, Rick," you ask.<br/>
<br/>
You flinch from the quick look he gives you: It's like he's looking through you. "Nothing. House empty. Boys gone from school. Banks account cleaned out. Phones not being answered. Truck had been pushed into the river. They were trying to hide it, didn't know we had a tracking unit on it."<br/>
<br/>
"Then how'd they get away?" Reilly asks.<br/>
<br/>
"My guess is they didn't," Rick says. "According to Harry Potter here, the cadet had the <i>Libra</i> for a whole night all to himself. Is that enough time to make up a supply of gizmos?"<br/>
<br/>
"Sure," you say, and kick yourself for not thinking of it yourself. "It doesn't take any time at all to make the basic items. A little longer to get them finished up after using the <i>Libra</i> to craft them--"<br/>
<br/>
"How many?"<br/>
<br/>
"If he went all night? Non-stop?" With Joe's memories you think of Frank, and the grim and relentlessly disciplined way he can work. "Dozens, maybe."<br/>
<br/>
"Then they're still in Saratoga Falls," Rick says. "Hiding under new faces. Or, that's where they went first. If I were them, I'd split as soon as I had a new face. Hide out someplace else." He pauses. "Crouch in the underbrush and start stalking <i>us.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
A chill settles over the room. "I wouldn't underestimate Frank and Joe," Charles says quietly. "Especially if they think we have been forewarned. We're going to have to find some way of spotting people who are wearing masks." Nash settles back with a thoughtful look.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
But that looks like it will be long-term business. After a lengthy discussion of the logistics of finding Joe and Frank, Charles dismisses the group but keeps you and Nash behind. He orders you to take off Joe's mask, and indicates your bare, transformed form to Carnes. "I'm afraid I have to push you, Nash," he says. "Look over Will and the book. Figure out what happened to him, and why, and how to change him back. He'll be most grateful, and I will too."<br/>
<br/>
"How long I got?" Nash says, looking slightly alarmed.<br/>
<br/>
"Tonight. If you can't do it, just report on what you <i>can</i> learn." Then he leaves you.<br/>
<br/>
You and Nash look at each other. Instinctively, you like him; Joe's memories tell you that you share one of the planets--Kenandandra--with him, so you feel a kinship. You also like the professional twinkle in his eyes, which the tiny round glasses can't fully hide. And he smiles at you, holding your eye even as he unpacks a large satchel.<br/>
<br/>
The examination that follows is odd. He dons a complicated pair of spectacles that have multiple lenses and looks you over, all around, up one side and down the other. He rubs a small silvery stick, like a large thermometer over you, and peers at it. He takes your stony hands and peers into the palms.<br/>
<br/>
After fifteen minutes of this he drops you with a grunt and sits with the <i>Libra.</i> "Make y'self at home," he says in his strong Northeastern accent. "I'll be awhile wit' dis t'ing."<br/>
<br/>
"I'm supposed to have Kenandandra as one of my planets," you croak. "So if there's anything you see--"<br/>
<br/>
"I kin see the Sulva in ya," he says. "Hanged if I kin see the Kenandandra."<br/>
<br/>
"What?"<br/>
<br/>
"Yeah," he drawls. "I don't hold wit' dem chats Kali and Joe play wit. Wouldn' dismiss 'em, but yer camplicated in latsa diffren' ways, kiddo." He taps the book. "But you studied dis ting? Good. It'll go quicker dat way."</span></div></div>


path: 11221111111212222122212112112212211
author_id: seuzz
title: A Conjunction, Part 2
chapter_content:
<div><div> <span>"It's a clean ampyatation, Chazz," Nash says. "Ampyatation an' sedgury like I never seen."<br/>
<br/>
It's the next morning--early--and Nash is bleary-eyed. You and he had worked most of the night, and he'd only caught a few hours of sleep after going to bed at five. You, though, don't feel at all tired. <br/>
<br/>
But your body is now a golem's body, and doesn't have a metabolism.<br/>
<br/>
"A full-body amputation?" Charles asks with a quizzical smile.<br/>
<br/>
"Kinda," Nash says, and slurps at his coffee. "Don't ask me 'bout da mechanics. Dat's sumt'ing I don't tink even th'<i>Liber</i>'ll describe."<br/>
<br/>
"How did it happen?"<br/>
<br/>
"After Joe and Frank knocked me out," you say, "they laid me on the book, to turn me into a golem. But it didn't work the way they thought it would. Joe opened the book to the wrong page, and he saw some writing on it. He put the book down to look at the writing, and that's when Frank put me onto the book. The memory I've got--" You point to your face, which is still looking like Joe's. "It looked like I sank down <i>into</i> the <i>Libra.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"Eggzackly what happened," Nash says. "Moon script. Will and me found it last night when we checked. 'Snot theah now, prably only comes out when the Moon's right. But I cappied what it said." He hands a sheet of paper to Charles.<br/>
<br/>
The head of the <i>Stellae</i> looks it over gravely. Nash had translated it for you, so though you can't know what's going through Brennan's mind, you can hazard a guess.<br/>
<br/>
"Why does the <i>Libra</i> want a Sulva?" he asks. "We thought it was just a collection of spells. Everything we know about it--"<br/>
<br/>
"Dat's jes' th'prablem, ain't it, Chazz? Lots we <i>dant</i> know 'bout it."<br/>
<br/>
"So what happened inside the book?"<br/>
<br/>
"The <i>Liber</i> turned inta'n operatin' table. Neer as I kin tell--" Nash scratches the back of his head. "It disassembled the kid. <i>Essentia, anima, imago.</i>" He gestures with his hands, as though pulling the guts out of a cadaver. "Dat's what deh <i>Liber</i> likes t'play wit', at leest judgin' by th'airly spells. Kep' the pieces inside itself until Frank put dat poah homeless fella onnit. Den it dumped Will inta th'new golem. Well, bits of him. His <i>anima</i> an' pat of his <i>essentia.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"Part?" Charles asks.<br/>
<br/>
"It lef' da Sulva innim. Ain't no Kenanandra lef' in 'im."<br/>
<br/>
<i>Half a </i>Stellae, you think to yourself. Even when you have a chance of joining these guys, the book fucked you up.<br/>
<br/>
"Why would it remove one of the boy's <i>ouisarchs?</i>" Charles asks.<br/>
<br/>
"Ask th'asshole who wrote the book," Nash retorts. "Might have sumtin t'do wit' dose sigils it added to him. Mebbe th'Kenandandra hadta be ampyatated t'make room f'rem. I dunno."<br/>
<br/>
Charles Brennan look at you, and his expression is sharp and appraising. You swallow, feeling sick. <i>I've been weaponized,</i> you think.<br/>
<br/>
Charles apparently senses your discomfort, for his face softens. "You've fallen into the deep end, haven't you, son?" he says. <br/>
<br/>
"If I could cut them out of myself, sir--" you start to say. The <i>Libra,</i> you now feel very strongly since the last few days, is a very dangerous book, and the thought of being entangled with it sickens you.<br/>
<br/>
"Let's not talk about amputations so soon after what Nash has told us," Charles chuckles. He pats your elbow. "How are you feeling? You don't look tired."<br/>
<br/>
"I don't feel tired, sir. I think it has to do with being a golem."<br/>
<br/>
"That could have advantages," Charles muses. "Though the nights might get a little long. Would you like to take a run? Joe likes a morning jog, and there's a nice park nearby."<br/>
<br/>
You recognize the diplomatic attempt to shuttle you away from a more private conference. But it also feels like a statement of trust from him: He thinks you won't run away. You nod gratefully, and go to your own room to change.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
It's a nice run, and you take a good long time at it, before returning to the hotel, to shower and change into fresh slacks and a loose sweater. You step into the hallway to go looking for Charles or for Nash, but run into the last person you want to see.<br/>
<br/>
Father Ed has his hand on the knob to the room next door, and he looks over at you sharply. You freeze as he scowls. "Don't you look handsome," he sneers.<br/>
<br/>
Two personalities within you bridle: you and Joe both. But it's the latter that tells you to calm down. Father Ed has Catilindria--<i>Uranus</i>--as one of his <i>ousiarchs,</i> and those can't help being peppery. "I didn't pick this look for myself," you say.<br/>
<br/>
He continues to glower at you. "Chuck told me to leave you alone," he says slowly.<br/>
<br/>
"If you've got something to say to me, I'll listen."<br/>
<br/>
His eyebrows arch. "Got some of Franz's gumption, doncha? Or is that <i>you</i>?"<br/>
<br/>
"It's a little hard to tell, under the circumstances," you admit.<br/>
<br/>
He does the last thing you expect: He cackles. "If you've got a minute, whatever your name is <i>under the circumstances.</i>" He grins like a shark, and gestures you into his room.<br/>
<br/>
Inside, he wheels as you shut the door, and his eyes glint. Father Ed is a tall man, taller by half a head than you, with a mop of gray hair, a turtle-like mouth, and flinty eyes behind huge, thick glasses. He's dressed in dingy slacks and a paunchy polo shirt and a thin windbreaker. "So you're only a teenager," he says. "About Franz's age, right?"<br/>
<br/>
"A few months younger."<br/>
<br/>
"You liked getting in trouble?"<br/>
<br/>
"No. I couldn't help it a lot of times--"<br/>
<br/>
"You could <i>always</i> help it," he retorts. "But seventeen-year-old boys don't <i>want</i> to help it."<br/>
<br/>
"Did <i>you</i> get in trouble when you were seventeen?" you retort. "Or were you born as a fifty-year-old--?"<br/>
<br/>
With two quick strides he's in your face, towering over you. "Listen, you little wisenheimer," he snarls. (But he also grins.) "When I was twelve my mother packed me off to the Jesuits, and when I was fourteen <i>they</i> packed me off to the reformatory. <i>I</i> know how to get in trouble. <i>You</i> only know how to fuck around!"<br/>
<br/>
You blink. This is not something Joe knew. "So how did you wind up with the <i>Stellae?</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"Never you mind. They found me. But I had to <i>pay</i> for what I'd done, first."<br/>
<br/>
"I'm willing to pay for what I've done," you say. "I'm <i>trying</i> to pay--"<br/>
<br/>
"That's what Chuck says." Father Ed's eyes bore into you. "They had to drag me kicking and screaming back to the scenes of <i>my</i> crimes," he adds softly.<br/>
<br/>
"Maybe it's easier for me," you say. "They put me inside Franz. Inside Giuseppe, too, for a little bit. I <i>see</i> what I've done to them, and I hate it. They'd hate it, too. Makes it easier to hate something, when you've got the victim's point of view."<br/>
<br/>
Father Ed's eyes glint, and the corners of his mouth twitch up. "That is an advantage, isn't it," he says, and his voice drops to a low murmur. "Chuck says you've got Sulva for an <i>ousiarch.</i> The Moon's a mirror, you know."<br/>
<br/>
"Oh?"<br/>
<br/>
"It suggests you've a capacity for self-reflection. Or empathy. The ability to identify with others."<br/>
<br/>
That doesn't sound like you, but you don't argue.<br/>
<br/>
"Chuck also says you're missing an <i>ousiarch.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"You had a conference about me?"<br/>
<br/>
"Don't like being talked about behind your back? Get used to it. I can guess what people say about <i>me</i> behind my back." His grin is devilish. "But you'll need a second one, if you're going to join us."<br/>
<br/>
"I didn't know I could replace the one I lost."<br/>
<br/>
"There's ways. You'll have a choice." His eyes narrow. "You've got Franz's brain, right? If you're really <i>sorry</i>, whatever your name is, you'll know what a good second <i>ousiarch</i> would be." He steps back and nods curtly. "I've said my piece. Good-bye." <br/>
<br/>
He shuffles over to his suitcase, ignoring you. It's as brutal a dismissal as you've ever suffered, and the doorknob feels awkward in your hand as you open the door and shut it behind you.<br/>
<br/>
<div align="center">* * * * *</div><br/>
Charles takes you down to a nice restaurant on the fourth floor of the hotel. "Better keep in practice," he chuckles when you say you're not hungry. "If you start to lose your human habits-- Well, I don't know that it matters," he shrugs. But you take his advice, and order a very fancy hamburger.<br/>
<br/>
Talk is light and inconsequential, even though he asks about your personal history and family. When the plates have been cleared, you tell about your talk with Father Ed. "He says I can have a second <i>ousiarch.</i>"<br/>
<br/>
"I think it's doable. It'll take some work."<br/>
<br/>
"Father Ed suggests Lurga."<br/>
<br/>
"He would. Misery loves company," Charles laughs.<br/>
<br/>
You don't. Lurga: the planet of penitence and meditation. It's not something you're attracted to. But maybe for that reason--<br/>
<br/>
"It's too early to think about such things, Will," Charles says. "At the moment, Nash and I think we've a solution to your physical ailment."<br/>
<br/>
"Really?"<br/>
<br/>
"Maybe." He pulls at his lip. "Are you willing to make a second trip through the <i>Libra</i>?"</span></div></div>


