When Two Worlds Collide

by SoundofInsurrection

Argyria Metaxas always wondered what it'd be like to be in the world of Krynn and meet her favorite mage. She never expected them to invade her world. Now she and a 20yr old Raistlin must work together to discover what brought him to her world, and she finds the reality of dealing with the snarky mage equally more thrilling and more frustrating than her wildest expectations.

85. Book5 Chap9 Defenders of Magic Part 2

Chapter 9

Defenders of Magic- Part 2

There was silence as the group absorbed that loaded statement. Then Norman quietly voiced the gist of what they were all too afraid to ask, "You're saying there's been two previous timelines where Takhisis has tried to bring about Ragnarok, and succeeded, so we really are looking down the barrel of inevitable destruction?"

The Lord of Light shook his head, crown and shining hair catching the dim lighting. "Close, but not so dismal in our average results against her. In the original timeline, from what we've been able to gather, Takhisis was only resolved to destroy this world for our alleged overreaching of our places in the cosmic order and Nuitari's supposed usurpation of certain domains of hers to keep our world isolated from primordial drama. In the first timeline, there was about a millennium of increasing conflicts with her as we worked to keep her out of this world and craft a way to stop her. And in that first timeline we managed to stop her. We were able to contain Takhisis in a complex binding of magic in a far more secure dimension than the Abyss. That not only preserved this world, but cut off her ability to exert influence on other worlds and her magic-using followers across the universe found themselves without their powers."

"So if you guys had the Dominatrix Queen in permanent checkmate," Brian asked, "what went wrong to spawn two new timelines where we're still facing an apocalypse, instead of moving into that magical utopia of awesome you first wanted?"

"We didn't account for just how zealous some of her followers were," The Mother said soberly, garnet eyes darkening with her mood. "Evil turns in on itself almost without fail, especially when it's suddenly vulnerable and instinctively wants to lash out in fear… There was a world, however, that belonged entirely to Takhisis. Each of the primordials has one or two such worlds from the earliest age of creation, before other gods were created and compacts were made to promote long term stability for both those civilizations and the universe. They allowed those worlds to remain, in isolation from the new joint worlds being created, for various reasons. Takhisis, for instance, was allowed to keep hers because it's been an effective means to keep her semi-placated.

"Her world was a place of pure evil that revolved entirely around a twisted cult of adoration of her. Whenever Takhisis wasn't getting her way elsewhere, she could retreat her awareness back to that world, and have her ego soothed by assuring herself that there was one place where she was seen as the supreme, infallible form of divinity beyond reproach or question. Every being on that planet was brainwashed from birth to strive to live under her ideals of might makes right; murder and other grievous acts are fine when they're for glorifying or paying tribute to her. It was a world that had come to be ruled by three factions of magic-users who, over the ages, overpowered the mundane generals and secured their spots as the ultimate arbitrators of Takhisis's will. They privately maneuvered and schemed against one another to try extending their faction's influence, but publically kept a united front to direct Takhisis's unhindered worship and maintain their unquestioned domination of those masses.

"And then one day, the members of all three factions quite suddenly found themselves cut off from communion with their goddess and without those precious powers that kept them at the top of their world's food chain. In most circumstances, they would have turned on each other in a panic, blaming members of other factions or rivals in their own of being the cause; and they'd have been torn apart by the non magic-using warriors they utilized as body guards and enforcers, who now had major advantages on their masters. Unfortunately, the heads of these organizations were exceptionally intelligent and cunning. They needed to be to survive that world and claw their way up to those positions, and almost immediately realized the imminent danger they were in. They also realized something had befallen their goddess to cause such a universal loss of powers. While they had their political rivalries, their twisted devotion to her reigned supreme. They chose to reach out to the leaders of the other factions to strategize keeping all three of themselves on top before the masses discovered what had happened, and discover what had happened to Takhisis to hopefully reverse their condition. And they discovered, after much discussion and exploration of what they knew of their predicament, that while they no longer had the active flow of magical power to fuel their various spell workings, they each had traces of magic innately remaining in their bodies…"

Argyria could almost feel the blood draining from her face, her intuition pairing that information with things her father had told her and what had been attempted a few months earlier. "Oh no…" she whispered in horrified understanding. "Oh, you're kidding me?! That's how…"

Alarmed gazes from her friends went to her, to The Mother who gave a grim nod of confirmation, then back to Argyria. Brian said, "Okay, I'm feeling like Yusuke now, asking people to share with the class because this is becoming a running Vague-Outburst theme. 'That's how' what?! What did your senses just tell you?"

"We're getting to that point within of explanation," Solinari said, tone stern now as the priestess-in-training seemed likely to answer. "It's important for you children to know, so we will be telling you, but you need the full story to understand just what is at stake."

"Sorry for interrupting…" Argyria said contritely.

"I understand that it's a great deal to try wrestling with," Solinari accepted the apology. At a nod from The Mother, he continued the explanation she had started. "Takhisis's zealous followers undertook a rare act of Evil working in concert with one another for the sake of their own survival. They came up with a short-term bit of propaganda to keep the masses in line for certain disruptions to their usual activities. Then they used dark rites to pull some of the magic from lesser artifacts they collectively had and used that to scry for an answer as to what had happened to their goddess. They couldn't get a full answer, lacking a connection to Takhisis to gain a coherent, direct explanation, but they managed to pick up images of this world, of it being key to her downfall. They elected their three most adept candidates of hale health and age, one of each order, to send to this world. They gathered large segments of the population of that world into temples, and then convinced them to undertake the largest case of mass ritual suicide the universe has ever seen. The members of those orders pulled the life forces and sparks of magic from the population, funneled and concentrated them to their central location, and then sacrificed their own lives to trigger the magic they had crafted, sending those three representatives across the universe and to this world.

"Those three arrived here to find a very different world than their own, finding themselves deep within what they rightfully assessed to be enemy territory. They set about hiding themselves in the masses as quickly as they could, and trying to discover what had happened to their goddess, and if they could do something to reverse what had been done. The goal of information gathering was easy enough for them to accomplish. The events of the war were naturally open knowledge- they were part of history lessons now being taught in schools, there were holidays in celebration of major events and the successful defeat of Takhisis, and public memorials to those lost in the war. It didn't take those three long to discover everything they hadn't been able to learn from their world."

"Uh, not that I want to risk a divine smiting for asking..." Evan interrupted hesitantly. "But how did you three, of all gods, miss that one? Shouldn't you have sensed the sort of magic that would have taken and them being there?"

"We were greatly weakened from our battle with Takhisis to contain her," Solinari explained stoically. "If we had been in normal states, we would have at least sensed the movement of magic and been able to track down what caused it, but we were in what amounted to a divine coma to recover from expending that much of ourselves..."

"Which is why they had chosen to have the 'Divine Speaker' keep an eye on things for them," Nikolaos interjected. "With these three being temporarily out of commission, they needed such a proxy to protect things for them."

Argyria's silvery-grey gaze went to her father in shock, then the deities, who were staring at him with displeasure for his blunt comment. "... W-w-wait! So this is all my fault?! I dropped the ball?! And you want to put me in charge again?!"

Nuitari's void gaze went to his conqueror, and his glacial voice cracked out with a force akin to an iceberg splintering a ship. "Are you actively trying to sabotage her confidence? What purpose did it serve for you to say that, in that fashion?"

Nikolaos said unremorsefully, but with a careful stoicism to his tone, "Penelope needs to understand that neither she nor you three are infallible and that odd happenings, no matter how innocuous they seem, should be investigated with a healthy dose of what some may judge paranoia, rather than dismissing it after an initial glance. You three have a certain similar blind spot at times, and I'm at least aware that plays into some of my worst errors in judgment. I'm not about to allow my daughter to have the same issue. It will save all of us a lot of headaches, especially with what's to come, if she can absorb that lesson sooner rather than later. It also wouldn't hurt for others to be taught that same lesson and understand she needs them to be extra sets of critically calculating minds who will likewise question such events."

"I'm wondering more and more why that responsible party's gotta be me," Argyria said with no shortage of distress. "Why not just elect a few champions like my father to do the job? He's the uber powerful warmage, and a few others like my mother watching his back and doing things he can't would have probably gotten the job done much better than I can."

The Mother sighed, head shaking and saying in reassurance, "We don't hold you to blame, and you can't dismiss your worth based on one mistake. You successfully lived up to our expectations in every other way. At that point in time, you were still adjusting to some disorienting expansions of your powers to act in our stead; but even with those powers, it's not as though you were on par with our collective capabilities. There's eons of experience and knowledge and fine tuning of our capabilities that are not so easily gifted as magic itself. We believe that version of you wasn't aware of the extent of other worlds in existence, that such a threat could be possible, so there was no basis for you to compare such a happening to and understand the threat it posed. From what we can tell, you did sense the powerful pulse of magic that delivered them to the world, but you weren't able to locate the cause because it dissipated immediately after and the travel left them weakened to the point of near death and utterly bereft of magic reserves; there wasn't a recognizable connected energy for you to follow. We're hazarding to guess that, when nothing showed itself to be amiss otherwise, you judged it to be just another among many shifts of magic that were undoubtedly taking place after the war and this world was rebalancing itself. Which is part of why we've altered some of our plans and the knowledge being made available to you this early in your training, to rectify that gap in your understanding."

Argyria was hardly comforted by that reassurance. "Still feels like I'm trying to fill shoes that are way too big for me... If it's not that that trips me up, something else will."

"Not if we're all more careful than we were before," The Lord of Light said. "We miscalculated the risks from that angle to begin with. You can hardly be held to blame for something we all overlooked."

Argyria sighed, then asked with dread, "Alright, so what did they do in the original timeline that caused things to get all screwed up?"

Solinari answered the question, hoping to avert parallel complications if such information that was known to their enemies was also known to this group. "With the knowledge that they gained of what had happened, they realized they couldn't undo our magic and release their goddess; especially not with as powerless as they were and surrounded by a thriving society of enemies who were led by magic-users who had the full range of their powers to put down threats. They didn't give up on their goal of restoring Takhisis, however. They had no way back to their world; and even if they could find a way, there would be little left to return to after what they did to send themselves here. Worse, to them, the world they found themselves in was so antithetical to their way of life that it sickened them; they couldn't understand how our people had managed to bring down Takhisis's forces and how she had been defeated. They felt they had nothing left to lose and had to find some way to rectify what they saw as an injustice, no matter how impossible that task seemed.

"And, being the pinnacle of each of their orders, they were clever enough to eventually determine the way to do so. If they couldn't stop things in the present time, then they needed to go back in time to before Takhisis was imprisoned and warn her of what was about to happen. They lacked that power personally, but they well knew how to drain that power from other sources because of their extensive knowledge of evil magic. And unfortunately, with this world becoming the budding magical utopia we wished for it to be, there was an abundance of minor artifacts being created and circulating around the population, and that production was exponentially growing with every passing year. So they began collecting up every single one they could buy or steal, and after a few decades they managed to acquire enough. They once again undertook a rite to pull magic from those artifacts, and this time they sent themselves back in time.

"They made it far enough back; evidenced by the discovery that upon arrival to that point in time, their powers were restored because their goddess wasn't bound. And what happened next is what triggered the destruction of the first timeline. They made contact with Takhisis and exposed to her everything they had learned- what we were planning, how we countered her until we could unleash our final plan, who our major mortal representatives were, what sort of magics those people had at their disposal. They gave Takhisis everything she needed to effectively change the results of our conflict to her own benefit; and the thought of us having successfully imprisoned her pushed her into a steadily increasing viciousness.

"Before we could realize something had gone wrong with all our careful plans, Takhisis was making unexpected counter-strikes. Artifacts that had been used were tracked down and destroyed. Sacred places that could be tapped into for boosts of power were defiled. Our chosen champions were being murdered, many as children, or some while still in the womb. Hidden sanctuaries for those in adulthood were being stormed like they were open for any to find and our agents were slaughtered before they could flee or properly fight back. And with as swiftly and fiercely as this wave of counter-attacks came, we couldn't recover quickly enough to stop her forces. She seemed to anticipate everything we could conceive trying, knew all the active assets we had and how to counter them, and we realized this war was no longer one we could win alone.

"We tried calling on the other gods for aid in stopping her, but the vote narrowly swung in her favor. Partially in thanks to arguments Hiddukel made on Takhisis's behalf that certain divine compacts weren't applicable because we had started our world without the other gods, so it was up to us to protect our world. A few of our cousins and Paladine volunteered to aid us, but we couldn't compel the whole of the pantheon to do so and the volunteers had to abide by certain restrictions in what aid they gave to uphold to divine compacts. And that vote in Takhisis's favor emboldened her actions, fueled her frenzy, to exponential levels. She shifted from just trying to destroy our world, to deciding she'd build another world of her own from the ashes of our world, and being willing to destroy any of us who tried to stop her. Because of our natures as the embodiments of magic, we were able to evade her getting her claws into us, but some of the others weren't so lucky.

"When the first of our cousins were destroyed, a new Divine Council was called, and that time the vote was overwhelmingly against Takhisis's actions, despite her arguments that new gods could be created to replace the lesser gods who had defied her. Takhisis refused to abide by the vote and cease her actions, claiming we had intentionally set our cousins up to be destroyed to reverse the previous vote, and a full war among the gods broke out when Takhisis's spawn decided to likewise defy the Council and back her actions…" The God of Light gave a heavy sigh then, troubled mind contemplating how to explain what came next.

Nuitari saved him the trouble, picking up the history lesson in a blunt summary. "My bitch of a mother, my feckless father, and one of my siblings came out on top of the war. Paladine and Gilean, and most of their spawn, weren't willing to go for the throat; they hoped that some semblance of order could be restored. My mother had no such merciful or measured leanings and was willing to employ any and all means to get what she wanted. One by one, lesser gods were annihilated and worlds were wiped from existence. In the end, all the worlds were destroyed and there was only Gilean, Chislev, Paladine, Mishakal, my parents, Chemosh, and the three of us left. The three of us had gone into hiding as the divine body count steadily increased and we realized we were powerless to stop my mother in traditional fashions, we needed to find an unexpected opening to try hitting her from. We managed to hide ourselves so well that she thought the sentient god versions of us were dead, perhaps destroyed when she finished off our planet because we had invested so much of our essence to our creations and didn't have enough left to hold ourselves together.

"My mother issued an ultimatum to the gods remaining. She wanted Paladine to give himself up, allow himself to be imprisoned and have a taste of his own medicine for a change. She wanted Gilean and the others to stand down and accept her as the supreme god among them. If they didn't, if they continued to challenge her will, she'd no longer content herself with destroying worlds and lesser gods, she'd intentionally set her will to destroying Paladine and Gilean. I know, from the Dragonlance books, you children are operating under the impression Elder gods can be destroyed and the universe might keep spinning, but that's not the case. What Raistlin did as the Godslayer was different from what Takhisis was threatening to do, though leading to the same conclusion if he hadn't been stopped.

"Lesser gods can have their essences broken down and absorbed by another being, effectively erasing them from existence and transferring their power and connection to some aspect of creation to the one who kills them. Or, if that lesser god's nature is antithetical to the one killing them and they'd not be able to absorb them properly, the deity being destroyed is simply broken down past any form of autonomy and their essence returned to creation as purely reactive energy of its nature. That was what Raistlin did, steadily accruing more and more divine power and aspects of creation to command, and neutralizing those gods whose powers he didn't want or were too divergent from the primary ones he had wanted. But when Raistlin got to Takhisis, he found out that the same is not true of primordials. He was able to break her down enough to absorb her, but she is the source of Evil and cannot have her identity and influence erased by lesser beings. He didn't kill her, he took in something that he ultimately couldn't control. His will and consciousness prevailed over hers to be the dominant force in the fusion between them; but she was like a parasite inside the Godslayer, steadily corrupting and twisting his aims to those even darker than he had on his own. When the Godslayer left the Abyss, it was like unleashing Takhisis directly onto the universe, with an unbalanced mortal's state of mind and priorities. If things hadn't been averted, it would have led to what Takhisis ended up threatening in the second timeline of our current situation:

"The end of all creation, beyond anyone's capability to reconstruct some semblance of life. A primordial can only be truly destroyed by another primordial; and the only way for one to be destroyed is for another to sacrifice their and the third's energies to negate the first's. Every aspect of creation the three have formed, it all gets forcibly sucked back into them- solar systems and elements, magic, energy and its movement, light and negative matter. And then all that gets turned inward, focused on the simultaneous destruction of the three primordials, creating a void of absolute cosmic nothingness in their place. There's a theory that perhaps, trillions upon trillions of years later, that void might slowly shift and reconstitute some new version of the primordials; but most of us don't want to discover if that's true or not and what new order might result from it.

"Takhisis was at a point in her power maddened state that she was willing to let all of creation be destroyed if she couldn't have control over it. Paladine and Gilean could tell that she wasn't bluffing, and they weren't willing to allow all of creation come to an end if they couldn't stop her attempt. Which is what Takhisis was counting on. Paladine gave himself up to protect those who remained and give the universe a chance to recover from the damage done, hoping that eventually a chance to be released and set things to rights would come about. Takhisis bound Paladine in much the same ways she had been bound, and stashed him in the Abyss for safe keeping with my father and brother. And then, just to be a spiteful bitch to Paladine and Gilean, she still annihilated Mishakal and Chislev. She believed only the primordials and two from her spawning were left and her goal of supremacy was assured because Paladine was bound from acting and Gilean refused to take the extreme option to stop her…"

"I can't be certain," Lunitari said passively, "as this happened in a future that will hopefully never come to pass, but from the sounds of things, I believe my father knew the three of us were not destroyed. I think he decided he needed to play along with Takhisis' arrogant assumptions and demand for dominance because he knew she'd be watching his every move as the potential threat. With her concerns on him, and then seeing nothing but submission from him, he likely weighed that she would get complacent and we'd have the opening we had been waiting for."

Solinari gave a nod in agreement. "Though Gilean rarely acts in universe changing ways, he does have the same level of power the other two primordials have and has shown he can utilize it when needed to keep the balance. That he chose that means of response, rather than something more aggressive to try freeing Paladine or neutralizing Takhisis, is in itself a deliberate act, and I don't believe it was cowardice as Takhisis assumed it to be. Gilean has for many eons seemed to come to an understanding of us that is better than the other two primordials; perhaps because of similar qualities we have to his nature and so we're easier for him to comprehend the full possibilities of. I think he trusted that we hadn't just quietly dissipated back to amorphous, unaware states; and because of the connection Sihir has to everything in creation, we'd be the one force subtle enough to act without making her preemptively aware."

Nuitari said, expression as glacial as his voice, "That opening took far longer to appear than any of us hoped. Takhisis spent ages torturing Paladine in his prison, in ways that no mortal words can properly describe the depravity of, reveling in her victory and destruction of all that Paladine cared for. It took ages for that novelty to lose its appeal, and then she set out to create a new universal order in her image. We had to wait for her attention to be sufficiently occupied with forming new minion deities to aid her efforts, to be temporarily weakened enough from that expenditure of energy to not sense us acting. We were able to slip our influence into the Abyss and dismantle the magic binding Paladine, and pulled him into the space we had been hiding ourselves in before my brother could realize their prisoner was gone.

"Paladine told that future version of us things he had learned while my mother was gloating over her victory, including the existence of those three agents of hers and that she had such loyal followers despite Paladine's belief that evil couldn't command such unflagging devotion. With the state he was in, and my mother's influence growing exponentially with each spawn she crafted, we all knew we didn't have the capability to try stopping her and maintaining some semblance of balance in the primordials' stead while Paladine tried to recover. Even Gilean wouldn't have the power necessary to make up for both of his counterparts while trying to keep the lesser gods of evil in line until balances for their influence could be created. The universe would be left in disarray for eons.

"My brother realized Paladine was freed and told my mother as we tried to strategize a plan to fix the mess we were in, and my mother realized she never had confirmation of our destruction and we were the only ones who could accomplish such a rescue. She began actively looking for us, and we had to expend every trick we knew to keep both ourselves and Paladine hidden from her awareness. We came to the conclusion that the only way to stop her was to undertake another change of Time, which came with heavy risks, but would hopefully reverse events back to something closer in our favor. It'd be too complicated to explain to you children all the factors we considered, and some of those are too dangerous for us to explain because it plays into some of our plans for the new future we're trying to craft. All you need know is that it was eventually decided to send Paladine back to the past, before where my mother's minions were to be appearing and trying to warn her of our plans to contain her, so he could warn our past selves of the dangers.

"We were able to successfully send him back, and he warned us of what was to happen. As the three mortals were reaching the point in Time where they were intending to exit, we intercepted them and pulled them out. We pulled all the knowledge they had of the first timeline from their minds to see what had originally been, and then stashed their souls in our version of the Abyss for disruptive mortals in our world who need be taught a lesson. Using everything we learned from them, we altered our original plans to be more effective, and sprung our original trap on my unsuspecting mother, binding her celestial ass and tossing her into that dimension we had waiting for her…"

"But she's not still there?" Norman asked what seemed obvious. "Something new went wrong?"

The Dark God gave a harsh bark of laughter and said ruefully, "Fucking Butterfly Effect theory and its inspiration of naming is what happened..."

"Wait, so something with a butterfly actually happened, and messed things up this badly?!" Janet asked in surprise. Her gaze went to their professor. "Did you know about that when you were teaching us?"

Osaze shook his head. "I now know what The Three speak of from the discussion we had before calling the rest of you to this meeting. At the time I was teaching that class, I simply thought it was a relevant, but metaphorical, theory of chaos, of near unpredictable cause and effect, for students to try bearing in mind."

"What happened for us to go from being back on track to win, to facing destruction again?" Argyria asked the deities; and inwardly, she was praying that it wasn't again some misstep of hers.

Lunitari's and Solinari's gazes went to Nuitari in answer.

The Dark God gave a defiant glare back. "You two had no protests at the time because it seemed like a good idea, so don't give me those looks. You're just as much to blame as I am."

The Mother sighed, slim shoulders giving a half-hearted shrug. "Your anger was a force unto itself at that point, and you didn't leave us much option but to allow you to vent it; but you're not wrong in that we allowed you to do so in a way that turned out to be ill judged and more detrimental than beneficial to our aims."

Tense silence fell for several seconds, the conversation brought to a wary pause as no one quite wanted to incite the Dark God's wrath over asking him to openly admit to whatever was a mistake of his.

Finally, Yevgeny was the one to get up the courage to suggest to his patron, "I am thinking is simply explain as such is danger of wolves to sometimes go for throat when not so wise to, and is magnify by you being Celestial Alpha Wolf himself?"

Nuitari gave a small huff of annoyance and then said grudgingly, "Perhaps… And it's why I've tried to instill certain failsafes with you wolves because I know how my influence can manifest…" The Dark God gave another huff and then said in better explanation of the situation, "After we locked my mother up, we were debating how to best make sure the little nuisances who had travelled through time once already couldn't do so again, or for that world to cause other troubles for ours in the future. Instead of worrying about constantly being on watch for them, or trying to waste our energy in perpetuity by isolating the world off with magic that other gods might want to wear down or get around, I decided to eliminate the problem entirely. I cannibalized all the souls on that planet back to pure energy and then blew the ugly fucking hunk of rock out of existence."

The entire group of younger mortals stared at the Dark God in horror and/or shock. His dismissive tone made it clear his only regret was it had caused an unforeseen complication, not that he was bothered by casually committing genocide on an entire planet.

Brian quietly said, falling back on the group's 'Laugh or Cry' creed, "Fuck. I'm calling it. Ria's dad just lost his position as Vader. Dark God went full Death Star on a planet. And I'm guessing that Takhisis or one of the other evil gods felt the disturbance in the Force. As if millions of voices cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced…"

Groans or nervous laughs broke out from the other seven.

Evan said wryly, smothering his chuckles, "In this case, it was bad guys getting blown up, so wouldn't it be more like when the rebels exploded the Death Star and killed all the Empire members still on board?"

"DM makes a fair point," Brian conceded.

"It doesn't make the joke any less accurate, however," Solinari's serious voice cut over the group's diversion, bring them back to attention. "That event started a ripple of effects that are manifesting into the problem we have now, with this timeline following an unpredictable course that is between the first two. We need to steer it as close to the first as we can, before Takhisis can shift things back in line with the more recent second timeline and we're stuck in a situation where she's in control for the foreseeable future because we can only rip up the timelines just so many times before Time collapses in on itself."

"...Alright," Darlene said hesitantly. "So what's the current situation? Where's the butterfly come in?"

Solinari answered the question asked. "When the Dark God destroyed Takhisis's planet, she was able to sense the destruction even from within the isolated prison we had her in. It initially enraged her to almost unthinking madness, which was beneficial for the sorts of wards we had her bound by and draining her. However, as she grew progressively weaker, she slipped into a quieter seething rage. And in such state, she eventually rationalized out that the only cause for Nuitari to risk the inevitable sanction of the other gods for such an act was because he had seen that world and its inhabitants as a danger of some kind and was taking preemptive actions to eliminate the threat.

"While Takhisis was trying to figure out what had set off Nuitari's temper, the three of us and Paladine ended up being called into a Divine Council again. The other gods had noticed Takhisis's disappearance, and that Paladine was different than he had been. Nuitari blowing up that world led the others to believe, rightly, that our feud with Takhisis over our world might be the cause of all three events and they wanted answers. We opted to tell the truth about matters..."

Nuitari interrupted sarcastically, "And discovered we'd have been better off coming up with some convenient lie because telling the truth fucked us."

"It didn't directly help matters," Lunitari disagreed calmly, "but I still think a lie would have caused more long term damage if the truth ever came to be known."

Nuitari looked away from his counterpart, eyes narrowed as he examined his stained claw-nails and began distracting himself by darkening the color to keep from saying things he might later regret.

Victor voiced his confused thought. "Um, question? Kinda the same as before. How would the truth hurt in this situation? Wouldn't the other gods be pretty pissed about Takhisis destroying them and pretty much the entire universe?"

"If they had believed us, then yes, the sanction would have fallen on her and we wouldn't have been in any trouble," Solinari said with a frown pulling at his fair features. "Unfortunately for us, they didn't. Not with Sargonnas and Hiddukel arguing against us on Takhisis's behalf. Because she hadn't had the chance to reach that point yet, our only proof was the memories inside Paladine's head. The time traveling servants of Takhisis weren't any help, as they had come from the first timeline and we pulled them before they could set off the second.

"Sargonnas said he had never heard Takhisis voice so much as thoughts for plans such as we described; which was clearly a lie because such schemes are never far from her mind, even if she generally keeps them scaled just below the level of destruction she had caused. Hiddukel argued that now, instead of letting ourselves be manipulated by Gilean, we were being manipulated by Paladine. He argued that all the recent events ultimately shifted too much power away from Evil's necessary influences- the Primordial of Evil was missing, one of her worlds was destroyed, her magic-using followers around the universe were now powerless; and Nuitari had permanently turned on his Evil brethren and was supposedly weakened by his change of position, and then furthered weakened by the amount of energy he had expended in such a short period of time to fulfill his part of binding his mother and then destroying her world and followers in it.

"Hiddukel claimed it was all a plan of Paladine's to do what he claimed Takhisis would do, by showing false memories of a time that will never be and inciting an extermination of as many of Takhisis's influences as possible so he could have the forces of Good take over..."

"God or not," Victor couldn't keep his abject loathing contained, cracking his knuckles with stress from listening to this story unfold, "Hiddukel sounds like he needs a punch to the face. The guy is like the worst stereotype of a sleazy lawyer that argues his client isn't guilty of rape because of what the victim was wearing, or that a victim of extreme abuse should get the death penalty because they had to kill their tormentor to escape."

Darlene nodded agreement. "Punch to the face and a shiv to the crotch. Dude doesn't seem to even get it that Takhisis got him dead in her stupid war, so he's defending for the wrong team with his own survival at stake."

Lunitari and Nuitari both laughed to the mortal's comments. Nuitari said sardonically between his chuckles, "Now that is something I'd almost want to aid coming about. Just to see the look on my brother's face as he finds himself immobilized. And then two mortals appearing out of nowhere to beat the shit out of him. And his silver tongue can't get him out of it..."

Lunitari nodded, but her laughter faded as she said more seriously, "Especially after his most recent stunt, I'd almost be inclined to allow the three of you do it..."

"Is that most recent stunt the meeting in mention?" Darlene asked. "Or did he do something since then?"

"He's done plenty since then," Solinari said with annoyance slipping into his tone. "We'll be getting to that soon enough…" He gave a sigh, thoughts tracking back to where he had left off. "To make a long story marginally shorter, at the end of a great deal of arguments back and forth, and Hiddukel muddying the waters of what was truth or not because he believed his own conspiracy theory, a divine vote was called on whether or not we should be believed and what should be done. We narrowly lost it. The Gods of Good were obviously in Paladine's favor for trusting in his nature to not tell such lies or conduct such underhanded schemes, and we obviously voted in our own favor. The remaining Gods of Evil voted that Takhisis had been wrongly imprisoned. And unfortunately for us, almost all of the Neutral Gods voted with the Gods of Evil. They didn't think we were necessarily lying about what had happened in the future, but they agreed with Hiddukel's assessment that, whatever else may be factoring into matters, too many things had happened to weaken Takhisis's forces and leave the door open for the forces of Good to potentially take too much control all over the universe. So the ruling was we needed to release Takhisis back into the Abyss from wherever we had put her and Paladine needed to rein in his influence from worlds Takhisis also had influence until she recovered from our imprisonment."

"Oh, come on!" Lexi groaned. "Really?!"

The Mother shrugged, but she had a faint grimace as she said, "Neutrality can be like that sometimes. We obviously disagree with their reasoning, as we know what's at stake and that it isn't a ploy, but they made the decision they felt best kept the balance."

"And I all but told them to shove that decision anyway," Nuitari added dryly. "I told them if they could find my mother and undo our magic, we wouldn't stop them from carrying out their ruling to release her, but we had an obligation to protect our world and weren't going to enable actions that would bring it harm. They didn't much like that and there was some blustering about further sanctioning us for it, but the Neutral Gods bent enough to say that as long as we didn't interfere, someone else could carry out the Council's ruling. They suggested my father and siblings should hurry themselves to form up a search party and see about releasing her. There were more arguments from Hiddukel about whether that was fair to task them with or not, but in the end that amendment to the ruling stayed. So while they were racing about creation and extending energy to try finding her, we came back here. We didn't think it likely they'd find her, especially not any time soon, but we used the time we had to come up with contingency plans for if they succeeded, and trying to do everything we could to bolster up our and Paladine's strength if my mother's time in lockdown didn't sway her from her bullshit."

Solinari said, voice impassive again, "It was a good thing we hadn't been complacent about the odds of them locating her. Takhisis couldn't reason out why Nuitari had destroyed her favorite world, so she turned her attention on trying to escape so she could discover why and have her revenge over it. She tried all manner of ways over the next several centuries to try breaking free or reaching her influence out, and failed to be able to do so. But she eventually noticed that the more she was struggling, the more she acted on her innate nature and expended her normal repertoire of magic, the weaker she was becoming and the more powerful our magic on her was growing.

"She figured out we were using her own essence against her. She doesn't have the same level of intimate knowledge of magic as we do, so she couldn't discover how to reverse what had already been taken or break the magic. However, she did rationalize that if she stopped fighting and shifted her energy to seem like she was submitting to the magic, our bindings wouldn't drain her nearly so much. She concentrated on conserving what power she had remaining, and started experimenting with trying to use her energy in some way that was different from what we knew she could do.

"And eventually, she created something with the faintest wisp of magic. An immortal, utterly harmless, butterfly with wings of her favorite colors. And that Celestial butterfly was able to slip past our magic, and start fluttering around the dimension we had her in. And because it barely had a spark of magic to create it, we didn't sense it amidst all the magic we had on the place. And that damned thing eventually found the smallest of weak points, the equivalent of a crack in a door that we had sealed up but couldn't entirely erase from existence because it was the point where we had travelled between the Abyss and our dimensional space. That butterfly began to wiggle and wear away at that point, and eventually managed to slip its way through.

"Once it entered the Abyss, the shift in energy caused it to undergo a metamorphic change she had designed it to have, expanding in size. The butterfly almost immediately caught Sargonnas's attention because he could sense the tremor of his wife's energy it created with as focused as he had been on searching for her. That butterfly led him and the others to where we had Takhisis locked up, and eventually the five of them managed to break our magic and release her back to the Abyss."

"Well, shite," Evan muttered. "The Butterfly Effect butterfly is an even bigger spanner in the works than the theory says."

Victor nodded in agreement. "No shit, right? I'd rather a city destroying hurricane to deal with…"

"That's only the beginning of our troubles at this point," Nuitari said, glacial voice cracking each word into sharp syllables.

Evan gave a groan and asked, "What exactly were the ripple effects?"

Solinari sighed deeply enough that it sent a ripple through his hunting chlamys, causing the green fabric to resemble leaves moving with a breeze. "Takhisis was in a weakened state when she was released, but she regains power swiftly as a primordial and with her nature being what it is. With Sargonnas and the other Gods of Evil protecting her, she's been making a steady recovery. And instead of learning a lesson and leaving us and our world alone, perhaps concentrate on building a new world of her own to replace the one Nuitari destroyed, her thirst for vengeance is being stoked by our successes and she wants to teach us a lesson about thwarting a primordial's will…"

"Because of course the crazy goddess of supreme evil isn't going to let it go…" Lexi muttered dispiritedly. "This is just going to keep repeating now that it's started, isn't it?"

"Not if our plans to break this cycle work," The Mother said impassively. "Our first attempt to bind her was overall successful, and we learned much from it. We've been working with Paladine to better understand the nature of primordials and where the flaws in our spellwork were, and how to ensure the next dimension we place her in can't be found and accessed by the other gods. We're still working out some details of how to accomplish making a truly impenetrable prison for Takhisis, but we're nearly there. We're in a race to finish our plans before she can regain her full power and unleash her plans for this world and us, and so far we're staying ahead of her…"

The Lord of Light said seriously, "Yes, but with no breathing room to slow or become lax, especially with her recent moves. As she isn't at her full strength and doesn't want to risk having the rest of the gods turn on her for more blatant acts of destruction, she's resorting to subtler acts of sabotage to slow us down and move towards her revenge. Nuitari's father and brothers have been at work to help Takhisis undermine our world…"

"Don't you have a sister too?" Darlene asked the Dark God. "Is she staying out of this?"

Nikolaos gave a laugh as the Dark God glared at the young mortal for yet another interruption and caused her to cringe away where she sat. The Metaxas patriarch said, "Zeboim might owe allegiance to Takhisis, but I've given her more than enough entertaining times and a few spawn to dote over, so she's not willing to actively destroy a world I favor reincarnating in and risk causing me harm."

"Daddy-Vader must have some serious dick game to pull that off…" Evan muttered in impressed bafflement.

Nikolaos chuckled again. "You've got no idea. Takes a lot to keep that one satisfied with as wild as she can get, but it's far easier than fulfilling her mother's desires."

"So you really did it with Takhisis AND her daughter?" Brian asked, more fascinated by the mechanics than the feat itself. "That's not just stories? How were you not ripped apart?"

"Skill, talent, and will," Nikolaos said wryly. "I'm just that damned good, as most goddesses in creation could testify to."

Argyria groaned in disgust. "Can we please stop talking about my father's sex life?! Even if it helped keep the crazy sea goddess out of this world too…" The young woman's words trailed off as her father raised an eyebrow at her statement, smirk growing. Intuition tickled at her mind. "… Oh, Gods above! That's not a myth either?!"

Nikolaos' laughter became unfettered at her reaction and he shook his head. "I related that anecdote to you with good reason."

"What anecdote?" Lexi asked her uncle with no shortage of confusion.

"Think on it," Eneas said dryly to his daughter, as he had related the story as well. "About a certain incarnation of your uncle's in this world and its ties to the sea…"

Lexi glanced between the patriarchs, then over to her cousin, mind searching for what they were talking about and not able to recall whatever was in mention.

Argyria said grudgingly, really not wanting to think on her father's weird affairs, "Alexander the Great incarnation. He frequently avoided sea travel, but when he did go by boat somewhere, he always seemed to have favorable conditions. There was supposedly a beautiful mermaid who haunted the Mediterranean Sea, even after his death…"

"And she'd call up storms to waylay ships and ask if Alexander was still alive!" Lexi exclaimed, remembering the lesson now. "Sailors had to lie and tell her yes, he was alive and well and ruled the world, which would give them safe travel conditions because she'd be content with the news and hoped for him to visit her. If they tried telling her he had died, she would turn into a hideous monster and drag their ships to the bottom of the sea and drown every last person aboard in a fury of denial to the possibility." Her hazel gaze turned to her father. "Is Zeboim still in this world?!"

"No, thankfully," Eneas said. "The Three managed to evict her shortly after Takhisis was imprisoned and she hasn't found a way back in."

"And if she somehow did slip her way back in, she'd likely not cause that much trouble," Solinari said. "Tempestuous as Zeboim can be, she has a little more care for Nuitari than the rest of the Gods of Evil and doesn't want to see him destroyed. And her ongoing liaisons and spawning of demi-gods with Nikolaos over his incarnations have been a source of much conflict with Takhisis, who resents her daughter's split loyalties. Zeboim was apparently killed early in the war between gods and champions in the second timeline, for interfering with an assassination attempt planned against Nikolaos to take him out of the conflict. She is currently siding with her mother because she doesn't believe what we had to say, she believes Hiddukel that this is all a ploy to further weaken the Gods of Evil, but she's only casting votes in Takhisis's favor. She hasn't tried to take actual actions against us; placating Takhisis by concentrating her efforts on protecting some of Takhisis's vulnerable followers in other worlds from the forces of Good. Nuitari's brothers are the far greater problem right now. Hiddukel managed to slip his way into Tartarus and corrupt some of the immortal wardens we had overseeing the imprisonment of wayward souls. He persuaded those wardens to quietly release four of those souls to him, claiming they didn't belong in Tartarus and the wardens shouldn't risk their necks to keep the souls someplace they didn't belong…"

"Four souls?" Argyria asked. "I thought there were only three sent from Takhisis's world? If three were them, who is the fourth?"

"As I was about to explain…" Solinari said with a reproving look at the young woman, who gave a contrite look in return and made a gesture pretending to zip her lips shut. "Hiddukel managed to get four souls released from Tartarus; and then when Takhisis was ready to make use of them, Chemosh used his skills to slip the souls into the stream of souls slated to be born into this world, taking the place of four that were meant to be born here. Three were in fact the previously mentioned three from Takhisis's world. We had all but destroyed their minds for what they had done, their memories of the first timeline were lost to them, but Takhisis was able to restore them to normal health and blessed them with the full extent of the powers and knowledge they previously had. And the fourth soul she placed in charge of the other three, given its experience in heading her campaigns, its previous knowledge of this world, and the fact it didn't rely on such magic like the others did to accomplish its aims. An individual you children know as Raistlin's sister, Kitiara…"

The young adults all needed several seconds to absorb that information. Then Janet asked, voice shaky, "You're saying there's a former Dragon Highlord running around our world?!"

"That'd make it two," Brian corrected his girlfriend. He pointed to Ria's dad, "You're forgetting to count him, even if he's on our side now."

Janet's gaze went over to the Metaxas patriarch in confusion. "Wait, what?!"

"Ah crap; we didn't fill her and Norman in on that, remember?" Victor's dark gaze went to Janet as he said, "Ria's dad, he was Emperor Ariakas in a past life, and then switched over as a contractor to our side of things to spite Takhisis after she left him to die."

"What?!" Janet asked, looking ever more lost with the news. "Ariakas?! The Ariakas?!"

"The one and only," Nikolaos said with a smirk.

"I... I'm not feeling so good right now..." Janet said, arms going around the front of her torso in a self hug.

"So, two former Dragon Highlords are in our world?" Norman asked, deciding he'd just roll with the information given because he already knew from Raistlin being sent that people from Krynn could end up in their world and allegiances were apparently subjective to the time frame in question. "One is now on our side, but Kit's still a servant of evil?"

"It's more complicated than that…" Nikolaos said, mood and tone quite serious now. "Just as I've gained a great deal of power over many lifetimes by heading these three's armies and occasionally Paladine's, Takhisis has rewarded Kit for her service in leading forces against mine. Kit is no longer human. All her time in the Abyss and being granted power by the hell-harlot has turned her into a near immortal demon of substantial power and influence, and she's all the more fucking brutal and insane for that corruption of her soul."

Janet's eyes widened in terror to that announcement. "Demon?!" Her panicked gaze went to Norman, whose expression wasn't the least reassuring as his teeth audibly clenched together. "He just said 'demon', right? Like 'demon' demon for real demon?!"

Norman gave a tight nod. "Yep... That's what he said..."

Janet's gaze turned to Ria's father. "Please tell me you didn't mean for real demon."

"How else would I mean it?" Nikolaos asked stoically.

"Shiiit…" Brian groaned as he saw his girlfriend's face draining of color, and turned a glare on his younger brother. "You just had to go and jinx things, didn't you?! Inter-world Jerry Springer drama here we come."

Evan glared back. "How's this my fault, Bri?! This obviously happened way before I said anything!"

"Enough, children," Nuitari's icy voice cut over their conversation.

The McCaffrey brothers fell silent, ducking their heads at the Dark God's displeased reprimand. Janet likewise went silent, but she was visibly shaking with fear as she lowered herself to sit next to Brian and he wrapped a protective arm around her.

"So we've got Kit the Demon and three overpowered magical servants of Takhisis plotting trouble for our world?" Norman asked quietly from where he stood by himself.

"Almost, but not quite right," Solinari answered his Priest soberly. "Kitiara and two of the servants are left in this world, hiding somewhere beyond our inmediate sight. Kitiara isn't a proper magic user, she doesn't cast spells; but she has certain innate powers granted to her as a demon. One of which is the ability to traverse between certain realms and dimensions to do Takhisis' bidding. We've blocked such demonic travel on and off this world, which is why they had to slip her soul in as they did, but we know she's found small pocket dimensions within this world, left over from its initial creation. Transversing between those was how she was able to so deftly move about the world last time she was here, directly coordinating different forces on her own because she didn't trust her lieutenants to plan attacks. We think Takhisis modified Kitiara's powers before sending her back, giving her some way to manipulate those dimensions to use them as hidden lairs. If we had the time and lack of other pressing matters to deal with, we'd be able to track her down eventually, but this is a matter we're having to delegate out so we can save our power and attention for the celestial scale problems.

"The third servant who is not with Kitiara was the leader of the Wolves of Eris that Raistlin killed. We recollected Lucien's soul, pulled everything useful from his memories once more, and then allowed Nuitari to destroy the soul to keep him from finding his way back to Takhisis's services yet again. Lucien had gone rogue from the rest after reincarnating in this world and assessing the current situation as his body was maturing. In his world, he was by a small margin the most powerful of the three magic users, being the favored High Cleric of Takhisis and from the Order that had the most members. Because his power came from a direct connection to the goddess we've most strongly warded this world against, here he was the least powerful of the three. He didn't like that realization; nor did he like the prospect of dealing with Demon Kit's temperamental personality in the long term. When Kitiara came to collect him, he told her he wasn't joining them, he'd be serving Takhisis on his own. Kitiara decided to leave him to his own devices, saying he was probably going to get himself dead before he could do much, but as long as he wasn't turning on their Queen, she wasn't going to put him down because there was always an off chance he might meet with success.

"What happened just over two months ago, that was a result of Lucien's plotting on his own, trying to craft a new clerical order to Takhisis and restore himself to his former power by increasing Takhisis's connections within this world. Because of how skilled of a dark cleric he was, he managed to twist and work some of the magic of this world to those ends, building a small coterie of pseudo-clerics around himself to manage making brief connections to Takhisis to receive orders or small infusions of power. Had he succeeded in his plots to open a portal to the Abyss, he would have been restored to his former heights of clerical powers.

"While it's fortunate that was averted, there's still the remaining two magic-users and Kitiara to contend with. Lucien, having gone rogue, didn't have any helpful information as to what the other three are plotting, only confirming what we already knew, that they have in fact been slipped into this world as well and are working together, not as separate factions. Kitiara was apparently the only servant Takhisis was willing to entrust their marching orders to. And while Lucien was so greatly weakened due to being a cleric and how he was gifted magic, at least one of the other two are adjusting much better to being in this world because of the sort of magic-user they are. This we can tell from a disturbing trend we've been picking up on, and it doesn't bode well when taken into account of what the other magic-user is. The first of those left is a Blood Mage…"

Darlene gave a rough cough in surprise, all but choking on thin air. "Um, what?! Like World of Darkness type blood mages or…?"

"Those would be watered down versions of Takhisis's Blood Mages, but without the vampirism attached, most of the time…" Solinari said with a frown. "They can modify themselves in a sundry of ways through manipulations of their blood. As they gain power, they learn to use their blood as a means to spread curses or enchantments to others. Their highest ranking members, the Master Blood Mages, are able to attach such curses to the blood of others without needing use their own blood as a means of transmission. In general, the Blood Mages used their powers to aid the Clerics in keeping control of the population on their world, mixing some of their blood into the vats of ritual wine served at the religious services, utilizing curses that tainted the drinkers to be more obedient to the Clerics's decrees.

"The Blood Mage who was sent to this world, Marius, was able to affect many people at a time without expending his own blood. He was known to work his magic on the blood of entire contingents of armies, cursing those who opposed him or bolstering his own forces. He could inflict madness on entire city blocks to cause riots for his rivals to deal with; or incite wild passions for ritual orgies that drained the life forces from the participants, causing them to die in the throes of lust.

"And he was also one of the few Masters of Blood Magic who was capable of aiding en masse the third Order of Takhisis's magic users to make their tasks easier to accomplish…" Solinari's platinum gaze briefly flicked to their champion conqueror, who had a rueful smirk on his lips for some of his cautionary steps being proven as not paranoid. "The third Order of Takhisis's magic-users were a hybrid of clerics and mages who were solely devoted to Death Rites. The Necromancers made certain that the general populace was buried in such ways that they could be reanimated if ever needed, and granted the so called 'boon' of elevated undead existence onto the greatest warriors of their world to keep them out of the cycle of death and rebirth so they could improve their skills in perpetuity and lead the armies..."

Argyria couldn't contain the distressed whimper that slipped out because that information could only be being shared for one reason, "You're kidding?! We could actually end up with a Dawn of the Dead problem?! Takhisis really isn't screwing around, is she?"

"No crap," Lexi murmured, hands twisting anxiously in her lap. "What's the over/under on Raistlin not minding spending your honeymoon exterminating a Z-Poc led by his own now demonic sister while we stay holed up in a bunker so we don't have to find out what it's like to be eaten alive?"

Argyria shrugged, feeling marginal relief at the reminder of her hopefully returning fiance. "Knowing him and how grumpy he gets about private time being intruded on, if that's actually something we're dealing with when he gets back, he'll just up and teleport out to incinerate the lot of them in big fire tornadoes, like he did that post-Cataclysm plague decimated village, and be back in time to enjoy the honeymoon."

Lexi gave a nervous laugh, "Gotta say, weird as it is to think of having the Godslayer in the family, even zombie apocalypses are less scary to consider when we've got him to tap for help."

"Excuse me, but what's this about a honeymoon?" Nikolaos asked, foreboding glare on his daughter. "I warn you to stay away from Majere and you've gone and married him?! Without even forewarning me?!"

"We haven't gotten married yet," Argyria said quickly, almost tripping on her words to try placating his almost palpable paternal wrath. "We're only engaged right now. We're waiting until Raistlin comes back to have the ceremony."

Nikolaos swore in a language that was not from Earth, turning a glare on the deities. "And you're going to allow this foolishness to go so far?!"

"It's their choice to make," The Mother said placidly.

"Don't give me that feigned neutrality, like you weren't hoping it might happen," Nikolaos growled out.

Lunitari shrugged nonchalantly. "We simply presented an opportunity to see multiple problems rectified with one solution. There was a chance that, despite our assessment of matters, their personalities might have clashed instead of harmonizing. In which case we would have had to offer other arrangements for trying to maintain Penelope's protection. They ended up not only working well with one another, but formed a genuine attachment and are deciding how to move forward with it on their own. Their choices happen to be ones that will likely be of optimal benefit, so there's no need to interfere."

Nikolaos' multi-lingual response caused the gods on either side of the goddess to level irate glares on their champion.

Solinari issued a command in Sihir, causing Nikolaos' lips to fuse together and disappear; which caused shocked exclamations from the young adults watching. "You're forgetting your place, again, and it's becoming wearisome this evening. Keep your grudges and opinions on certain matters to yourself, or you'll permanently lose that vessel's tongue."

Eneas looked over at his king and said dryly, "You earned that."

Nikolaos gave an irritated huff of air through his nose.

As the warmage set about silently trying to undo the transfiguration magic, Lunitari said passively, garnet gaze going to the priestess-in-training, "On a related matter- I forewent aiding your attempt at divining earlier this evening because I knew we'd be holding this meeting. The answer to your question is 'yes'. The next time the hourglass starts flowing, that will be your alert that Raistlin has done all he needs to in the past and is safely making his way back to your world. I know he promised you he'd try returning as close to when he left as possible, but that's not something that's quite feasible with the drastic changes attempting to be made and us needing to moderate both points in time properly to avoid catastrophic damages."

Argyria gave a tentative nod to that information. "Any hints on how long that wait will be on this side of Time?"

"That depends on how matters develop," The Mother said with careful neutrality to her tone and words. "I can tell you that you won't be waiting near twenty years for him to return from this Odyssey he's on. And if genuine need arises, we may pull him back for limited stays before he's ready to leave Krynn permanently. However, the specific date for him to return here without interruption is currently too ephemeral to pinpoint because of the many shifts taking place. When we calculate all the necessary aspects have aligned properly, you will be made aware through the hourglass. Until then, you both will need to exercise patience and understanding for what a sensitive undertaking this is."

Argyria nodded again. "Of course. I'm sorry if I seemed ungrateful or impatient, I'm really not trying to be. Just figured I'd ask while it was easier to do so."

A flicker of a smile crossed Lunitari's lips. "I know. And you can hardly be blamed for wondering..."

A loud, involuntary gasp came from Nikolaos as his lips finally reformed and parted, drawing attention. He stretched out his jaw and wiggled his cheeks, making sure everything was working properly.

Solinari asked, a trace of humor in his voice, "You have something to say, Nikolaos?"

Nikolaos glared at the deity, but said with resentful concession, "You're making a bad call on Majere, but perhaps I was a bit out of line with my threat."

Solinari raised an eyebrow at him. "'Perhaps' you were 'a bit'?"

"Given the man in question and the fact you've gone and played matchmaker between him and Penelope, yes, only a bit," Nikolaos said immovably.

Silence fell as the two stared at each other. Argyria got the vague feeling that, like her two male mentors could, there was some mental conversation taking place outside the hearing of others. She heaved a sigh in frustration and said, "So a demon, a blood mage, and a necromancer walked into our world to help bring about the apocalypse. What's the punchline?"

Platinum and dark brown gazes turned to the priestess-in-training, and Solinari gave a small sigh of his own.

Nuitari chuckled, however. "I believe the punchline is that, despite their formidable powers, that's all my mother's been able to slip past our wards and into our world that's of her own creation. They've been stealing followers from our ranks the last few decades to bolster their campaign, and they're cunning bastards to get this far, but so long as no one here does anything profoundly stupid, getting this sorted without the worldwide destruction she's hoping for ensuing is achievable."

"While I appreciate your recent moments of increased optimism," Solinari said soberly, "let us not get too far ahead of ourselves. The resources in play for this war can shift at any time against our favor if her servants manage opening routes for her or any number of other things happen. We can make light of this as much as we like if victory is achieved."

The Dark God gave his counterpart a fleetingly exasperated look, but said grudgingly, "As you say. Onwards with delivering some insight into our battle plan?"

The God of Light shook his head. "I have been attempting to, but there seems to be no end to the interruptions, barring sealing everyone's mouths shut."

The Dark God shrugged. "That's not an option because... why again?"

A laugh fleetingly reverberated from the Lord of Light, and his lips twitched with a smile as he said, "Perhaps it should've been at the start of this, but we're near the point where we actually need them to have use of those mouths for their own sakes." His counterpart gave a nod in concession and his attention went back to the young adults assembled, some of whom were now deliberately pressing their lips together to keep silent and avoid losing said lips.

Another smile twitched, but Solinari was quite serious as he addressed them. "As I've indicated before, my counterparts and I need to concentrate our attention and power on dealing with Takhisis once and for all. We cannot afford to expend our time and energy on relatively smaller matters that lay within the capability of others to handle. Nikolaos and Eneas have been apprised of the details of recent trends we've been tracking. They've had experience in dealing with such threats and can teach what needs to be done defensively until the root of the problem can be hunted down and eliminated. It's been some millennia since the last time this world saw similar issues, but it's within the capability of those here to answer this threat if certain knowledges that were lost to this world are revived.

"We mean for Penelope to lead the way on taking back control of the spiritual practices of this world and pushing out Takhisis's influences. Nikolaos and his commanders are going to be spearheading that campaign when it comes time for open martial warfare, and Nikolaos is certainly capable of greatly aiding those battles with the magic he has at his disposal. Once things fall into place for Raistlin joining the battle, he will likewise greatly tilt the odds in our favor. Given who these enemies are, however, and the stakes involved, this is too big of a task to place all our hopes on so few champions. Powerful as he is, Nikolaos is still only one man, he's a known asset of ours that our enemies will be looking to eliminate at first opportunity if one can be made, and he is ultimately only in this world for as long as that incarnation's body survives. Many of those same concerns exist for even Raistlin, and he's not yet available to permanently put in play. The Divine Speaker needs a younger generation of generals that she can have complete trust in, who can learn from the best mentors we have to offer and gain experience under them, who can then competently pick up command in Nikolaos's stead if needed, and who will aid her and Raistlin in bringing about our vision for this world once the war is done.

"Which brings us to why you're all here. You seven were among those we placed in Penelope's path to potentially fill those rolls. By your own choices you've not only formed connections to her, but with one another as well. And even though the six of you who were present for the attack were without magic granted, you still proved your worth by doing as necessary to survive and rallying yourselves to aid her rescue as you could, and have stayed true to the bonds you've been forming, new and old alike."

Solinari's platinum gaze went to Janet. "Even you. Your heart was ultimately in the right place after the shock passed; you trusted in the nature of your friends' characters and have kept critical secrets to yourself to not further endanger them. And even with recent events so deeply shaking your perception of the world, you've consistently demonstrated you would rather face that uncomfortable truth and be open to correcting your understanding, rather than run back to what's familiar and comfortable for you. Those are no small things under these circumstances."

That metallic gaze went to his youngest Priest present. "And that pending attack made for a chance to test you. You immediately answered our call to action. While it may not have seemed so from your perspective, you reached the camp in the fastest range of time we judged possible for what little information you had. You exercised proper judgment in how and when to utilize what smaller magics you've already been gifted with, and when to push forward or when to pause and reevaluate the situation you found yourself in. And, most importantly, you were willing to consider that even your privileged training under the exceptional mentors you've currently had might yet be incomplete. Unlike those who have come before you in your traditions, you refused to take what lore you've been told at face value and were able to rationalize out the truth of our intents. You passed your test and put to rest concerns we had that you might be too far along in your training to successfully integrate into a primary role for what's coming."

The deity's gaze went back over the group as a whole. "So we're offering all of you a chance to step up. If you wish to be in truth the 'Companions 2.0', you'll be granted the chance to develop control over magics the likes of which this world hasn't ever seen, even from the occasional warmages we slip in. But if you agree to accept our blessings, you do so with the full awareness that it comes with the heavy responsibility of being at the forefront of this war. Your lives are going to be frequently in danger, and some may be lost, as you put that power towards the fight to push back this darkness threatening to consume your world. Any questions you have before you make your decision, we will answer if appropriate so you do not feel as though you are answering blindly. Once you make your decision, however you decide, there is no turning back, so be certain of declaring your final answer."

Most of the young adults were silent, processing that divine offer being placed before them.

Norman, however, said almost immediately, baritone voice subdued but resolute, "I've already made my oaths to serve as needed, as your Priest and a servant to The Three. That my service will be in a time of war, against enemies as described, doesn't change my devotion to fulfill those oaths. If I can help keep Ragnarok from coming to pass, with the powers I currently have or with whatever you may yet grant, I will give everything I have towards that end. That is my final decision and I have no doubts in giving that answer."

Victor gave a nod and said soberly, "I can't speak for everyone else, but this doesn't really seem like something that's needing much debate to give answers on. Our options are stay red shirts who will be in danger anyway when the shit hits the fan and be less capable of fighting back, or we sign up to have the capability to actually do something about it."

Nods of agreement came from everyone but Janet, whose expression was deeply conflicted as she stared down at the "ground" of the interdimensional space, lost in thought.

"It may seem so simple," Ivan's quietly rumbling voice finally joined the conversation, tone and expression gravely stoic, "but the rest of you who have not already sworn such oaths need to give this full consideration to what you are agreeing to. You need to understand that if you sign on to this war, you are signing away your old lives and the paths they were going down. We do not have time to waste with treating your training as common military has their reserved forces training on weekends and sporadic holiday vacations, as Argyria and Norman have been previously doing. If you agree to this, you are signing on for the full commitment, extricating from school and your 'civilian' lives. The careers you were working towards, the families some of you are so attached to, many of the day to day freedoms you have been enjoying, will need to be set aside so that you can focus on an aggressive training schedule to make up for years you've missed and be prepared for what is to come."

That announcement caused the five who were so quick to want to answer as Norman had to pause and consider those sacrifices and what it would mean for them.

The mention of careers being lost was especially jarring for Victor because he had been picked up by a scout after breaking regional records in his last races by such a wide margin. He had been invited to try out for the Olympic team for his distance category, and already cleared the time off with his new job to fly out for the preliminary races.

Evan was bothered by the potential to not likewise earn such a chance at the Olympics, but even more so the prospect of the end of all his entrepreneurial ideas for post-college and athletics life. He was also wondering just how far to the side he'd have to put family that wasn't his elder brother.

Brian's mind went to his parents first, who had sacrificed a huge part of their retirement funds to put their kids through college so they could have the careers they wanted. How the hell was he going to be able to explain seeming to suddenly toss it all away, in some way that wouldn't upset them or give away what was really going on?

Darlene wasn't concerned about ditching on her parents; she didn't owe them anything and the people she considered to be family were in on this. And while she had worked really hard to earn her position at the salon so quickly, she had been keeping her options open for the future to accommodate her girlfriend's career. She wasn't sure what the gods had planned for everyone, but if Lexi decided she wanted to step up for this, she had no reason not to follow.

Lexi's mind went to her family, wondering if she'd be living a double life like her father currently did, or if she was going to have to completely disappear for awhile and hope she'd come back. Her father had come back, in this lifetime as Eneas; but she knew "Patroclus" had died in the Trojan War. Would she die, or watch her friends die, if she agreed to this? Of course, like Victor said, they might die anyway. So what was the real loss here? Losing her dancing career, and making Madam Rossi have to find a new protege to potentially take over the theater. That actually hurt to think about...

Lexi said quietly as she looked over to her father, "If all hell breaks loose and the bad guys win, it's not like any of the things Ivan mentioned will be left for us as thanks for making it so easy by forfeiting. At least if we make that sacrifice, and if we win, others will be able to pursue their dreams freely."

The former Grecian prince gave a nod and said, a hint of pride in his voice for her coming to that line of reasoning so swiftly, "Precisely so, Alexandra."

"What exactly are we meant to do if we agree?" Janet asked warily. "What sort of training and magic use would we be agreeing to?"

"That varies for each of you," Lunitari said impassively. "The base training for most of you will be the same as it's been for previous generations of magic-users of this world, learning the roles of The Three and acting as earthly representatives of one of those positions. You and Alexandra would receive similar training under Maggie that Penelope has, to become proficient healers and seers, creators of certain artifacts and working with nature to accomplish certain magics. Victor, Evan and Brian would be receiving training similar to Norman's as priests under Ivan and Yevgeny."

Lexi asked with some reservation of her own now, as she processed how she'd be assigned, "Wait, does that mean we'd have to pick consorts like Ria does?"

"Yes," The Mother said, voice remaining impassive.

"Isn't that kind of going to be a problem, at least for me?" Lexi asked. "What with being a lesbian and all?"

"Why?" Nuitari asked in turn. "Do you think you're the first homosexual servant we've had?"

"How's that even work then?" Lexi asked in growing confusion.

"You pick two consorts you connect with, and all but four days out of the year you're working together as any normal team would that relies on one another for survival," the Dark God said. "As for the four occasions where the Great Rite has to be performed, you're proxies of divine will going through symbolic steps that have nothing to do with your personal sexual preferences. Once the rituals start and the magic begins flowing, all your focus is going towards properly directing it and there's no room left in your consciousness for other matters. Even the gayest of priests have had no trouble getting rock hard for a female body and were able to fulfill their part for the ritual. It's much easier, mechanically, for women in that sense."

Lexi's cheeks turned bright red with embarassed self-consciousness, and she was making a point not to look in her father's direction. Eneas was also appearing mildly uncomfortable with such discussion taking place in his hearing range.

Nuitari continued explaining, regardless of petty mortal hangups. "Nothing bars our servants from fulfilling their romantic or sexual needs outside their triads, so you can still have all the lesbian sex you want. If you want to make it easier on your private life, pick consorts your lover won't protest. If it's too awkward to pick from those you have established history with, you can scout elsewhere among other initiates. We have a few gay priests and priests-in-training within your age range who are currently unpaired, if when the time comes to choose you find you're concerned about everyone having the same line between professional and personal leanings. Those options won't be as gifted as present parties will be, however, as we can only afford to upgrade a few strategic individuals until Takhisis is dealt with, so there is that tradeoff."

"So part of this stuff includes sex magic?" Janet asked for confirmation, even less enthusiastic at the prospect. "And it's not optional?"

"Correct," The Dark God said.

Brian glanced at his girlfriend and said with a raised eyebrow, "I don't know why you're making that face. From the sounds of it, that might be the best part about the gig."

Janet sputtered at that and slapped his arm. "Ugh, no! It's… It's… weird."

Brian laughed ruefully as he rubbed his arm. "It's sex. Sex is always a bit weird anyway."

"I wouldn't know," Janet said pointedly, not liking the reminder her boyfriend had previously had premarital relations with other women.

Brian sighed. "I'm aware…"

"And you're not the least bothered by that other… stuff?" Janet asked, still annoyed. "Consorts and what not?"

"Well, I'm assuming you'd be picking me as one if things are still working out with us," Brian said matter-of-fact. "You can still get your white wedding before the first time we need to do ritual stuff. As for the other, that's just duties and all, so I'm thinking as long as you come back with occasional videos for the kinky good fun that might be to watch, we can call it even for giving you a standing hall pass a few times a year." That caused snorts of laughter from his best friend and a disgusted groan from his brother.

Janet, on the other hand, gave a mortified screech, a blush spreading across most of her face and up her ears, as she slapped him again, harder than before. "You're unbelievable sometimes."

Brian laughed again, even as he winced from the slap and rubbed the new stinging spot. "You're still with me, so I'm clearly not that offensive to your sensibilities."

"Shut up," Janet said, the blush deepening from pink to red on her cheeks.

Brian glanced around and then asked teasingly, "So, uh, sweetie, just between us, are you eyeing anyone here as a potential other? 'Cause I do feel the need to put out there that I'm not so cool with it being my little bro. Or are we also considering outsourcing for a third wheel?"

Janet gave another screech, burying her face in her hands. "Shut up, you big jerk! I can't believe you're taking this, of all things, so lightly."

"Do you want me to get all jealous or otherwise make it harder on you if you choose to sign up for a priestess gig and everything it'd entail?" Brian asked in confusion.

Janet gave a groan of annoyance.

"On the matter of you young men and your training, which would affect such things as pairings with a priestess," Lunitari interrupted the two, bringing the conversation back on track. "We don't expect your early stage of training to take very long because of your general familiarity with our ways from gravitating on your own to studying what's publically known, and from taking up different forms of martial hobbies. You're also far more capable of understanding and integrating lessons than younger initiates are and will be in such intensive daily training. Normally, you'd have made a choice years ago, after that initial induction of training, of whether to serve the Lord of Light or the Dark God. With you already being grown to adulthood, your natures have already formed clear enough to decide that for you. Victor, you will be joining Norman for training as a hunter devoted to the Lord of Light. Evan and Brian, you will be training as wolves acting for the Dark God."

The McCaffrey brothers exchanged looks and then glanced at said Dark God. "You're laying claims on us?!" Evan asked, more than a little surprised, and confused, by that judgment.

Nuitari gave a single nod. "You two already have strong instincts to protect a pack. Your speed would be a critical asset in wolf training. And your," his gaze went to Brian, "exceptional cunning and language adaptive skills would serve you well for other tasks we'll likely need carried out. You both need training, and the sort of training a wolf is given would help snuff out certain bad habits of yours for coping." Brian's expression reflected guilty understanding for the deity's reference to his casual drug habit, which he had been indulging more frequently in recent months. "As for you," the void gaze was back on Evan, "you need a bit more work than your brother to know when to try making a lunge for someone's throat, to harness your instincts properly. Be that as it may, I have full confidence in Yevgeny's capabilities to get you boys whipped into shape."

Evan gave another glance in his elder brother's direction, saying apologetically, not for the first time, "Sorry again about getting you shot."

Brian shrugged, shaking his head. "Shit happens, little bro. I've already told you, I could've stayed put. I made the wrong move by letting my temper get the best of me too."

Darlene spoke up now, expression reserved as dark blue gaze turned to The Mother. "You listed off everyone except me... Given what I know of Ria's training and rules she's under, I can hazard a guess I'm disqualified from being a priestess, so where's that leave me?"

The young woman's closest friends turned their gazes to her, confusion forming as they realized she was right about not being mentioned. Then gazes went to the deities and noted The Three were looking at her soberly.

"You've been... interesting to decide what to do with," The Mother said quietly. "You are correct that we cannot place you in training as one of my priestesses..."

"Why not?" Argyria asked, gaze going between the two in bafflement.

Darlene's jaw clenched as the goddess's neutral gaze remained on her, clearly leaving it to her to explain or not. After several seconds of tense silence, she managed to unclench her teeth enough to say, trying to keep her voice emotionless, "Because, as you've mentioned it to me, priestesses have to leave the fighting to the menfolk. Can't be all sacred and pure for healing arts with blood on your hands. I'm disqualified under that rule."

"...What are you talking about?" Lexi asked her girlfriend, hazel eyes showing just as much utter bewilderment as her cousin's. "You don't have anyone's blood on your hands."

"Yes, I do," Darlene said, gaze staying forward and not looking at her lover. The words came out slowly, needing to moderate each syllable to consciously maintain her tone.

"How?! When?!" Lexi's mind raced over their lifelong history together and couldn't begin to fathom how she didn't know something of that nature.

"Just over two years ago," Darlene said, gaze shifting over to Ria's mentors, to Yevgeny specifically, whose dark gaze was entirely understanding of what was meant. "A couple months after I moved in with Maggie. I was having a rough week at school and still pissed about the bullshit my parents pulled. So I did what I usually did and went out to the club to relax. I left pretty late, and some drunk guy coming from the pub a few buildings over tried to hit on me. I pointed out where I just came out from and he was barking up the wrong tree if he wanted a piece of ass and headed down the street to get to my car. The guy didn't like that and tried to follow me, acting like he was the gods' gift to women that could turn me straight if I gave him a chance. I told him again to fuck off and then he all but tackled me into an alleyway while my back was turned. I tried to get him off me, but he was a really big guy and hit me a few times in the face and then dragged me behind a dumpster. While he was trying to get my pants off, I grabbed one of the bottles next to the dumpster, broke it off, and shoved it into the guy's neck. When I realized the guy was dead, I panicked and called Maggie instead of the cops. She called 'Geny and he took care of things so I wouldn't go to jail for it."

Yevgeny gave a half-hearted smirk. "My favorite hellraiser not need cops breathing down neck of hers just because she go for throat with pathetic waste of life."

Darlene gave a humorless snort of laughter. "It's still appreciated, 'Geny."

None of the young woman's friends knew what to say about what they were told; horrified on her behalf for what had nearly happened to her, and confused why she had never told them, though realizing on some level that wasn't something easily confessed to. Even Lexi couldn't find words to express her conflicted thoughts, afraid to say the wrong thing and upset her girlfriend. All she could think to do was lean closer and give her a hug.

Darlene's gaze finally turned down, staring at the top of Lexi's head for a few seconds. As she heard a sniffle of Lexi trying to hold back sympathetic tears, her arms stiffly went around her girlfriend and gave her a pat on the back. "I'm fine, hun. Dude didn't get what he wanted, and I'm not behind bars for stopping him, so it all worked out."

Lexi had no response to that assertion.

Victor asked, somewhat angry words directed at the gods, "So because Darlene killed that guy, before she could even start training, she's disqualified? How's that fair?"

"She's disqualified from being a priestess, yes," the Dark God said, void gaze on the young woman. "However, like priests have two options for how they serve us, there used to be a second option for women. We discontinued that Order over three thousand years ago because, with its nature being what it was, it ended up being an easy target for Kitiara to corrupt the last time she was in the world, swiftly boosting her personal following by stealing from those ranks. Once she was sent to Tartarus and the corrupted followers dealt with, we had to consolidate our power in preparation for trying to imprison Takhisis. We couldn't afford the effort it would have taken to try reestablishing the Order and ensure such a divergence didn't happen again. That move, while necessary for the time, has unfortunately caused us to lose the services of capable female followers who were forced into such positions as you were at some point and became incapable of fulfilling the primary role to The Mother. We're willing to make an isolated attempt to revive that Order, giving you a place among your friends."

"So what's that Order?" Darlene asked with reservation. "What sort of role do they play?"

"The old names of the Order don't matter," the Dark God said with a smirk forming. "We're starting fresh. As for what role they play, they stay quietly in the shadows of priestesses. They were often mistaken for an attendant or advisor or a close friend, able to go places where men being present might be considered questionable. Should a threat slip past other safeguards to reach a priestess, however, their true purpose as an exceptionally gifted assassin was revealed. It used to be that Lunitari handled giving their orders, and Solinari and I gifted their powers; but she's been put under excessive strain as it is, and he's going to be needing to give extra influence to certain skills both of our priests are going to be learning, so I've been elected to spearhead this attempt.

"Which is why I've asked Osaze to be present. His counterparts are no longer in this world, and the decrease of responsibilities is a waste for one with his skills. I know you've been all about the strictly goddess-only worship these days, but if you can accept answering to myself, and Osaze while in training, he's going to train you to be the first of what I'm affectionately dubbing my vipers. Your training will begin much like a wolf's, but then you're going to learn a skill that Osaze has mastered without peer, along with some new tricks I've been teaching him the foundations of over the last several years. Your duty will be to protect these other three ladies when their consorts are not immediately available, such as when the false wolves first sprung on you four on your way to bathe at the river. If you survive this war and prove worthy, I'll be granting you the ability to recruit and train others like yourself, and you'll be titled as the Queen Cobra to all those other deadly little vipers."

Darlene's intrigued dark blue gaze went from the deity to the man who would be her mentor and back again. "You'd make me some sort of badass magic-wielding assassin? And I'd get to skip having to put up with dicks a few times a year to have that power?"

Nuitari gave a single nod.

"And you're thinking I'd protest the chance to use said badass powers to protect other women, who are dedicated to Mother Earth herself, because I'm getting my orders from a god?"

Nuitari shrugged. "It's always a possibility."

Darlene snorted back a wry laugh. "Well, you're not exactly modeling yourself in the typical hyper-masculine way, so it might not be so bad, Dark God; but this still seems a little too good to be true for someone like me, so what's the catch?"

Said god's smirk sharpened at the shrewd, and warranted, question. "As I said, your place will be in the shadows. You might not be incapable of killing like a priestess is, but you won't be allowed to flaunt your talents, otherwise you'd give yourself away. You can't charge into fights and win accolades like the High Priests may end up doing..."

"That's a standard understanding for an assassin."

"...And while you have a responsibility to the priestesses, you're not within a triad itself. You may care for one another as friends or lovers, but they'll be forming connections you will never know and they must place the preservation of their triads first. Kitiara used that as an angle in the past to make your predecessors feel isolated and expendable, promising them a worthy, equal-footing sisterhood at her side..."

"So I just need to be wary of possible cultish mindfuckery attempts and remember we're all playing our parts to kick their asses."

"...And with Raistlin being absent right now and Penelope's position being what it is, she will naturally need to be your priority for protection. Which means if Alexandra," the Dark God's gaze went to the lover snuggled next Darlene, "is present during an attack and also being threatened, you will need to choose duty over love. Something all but the most cold-blooded of snakes would falter on when faced with." The void gaze returned to the young woman he was addressing, and his next words were as merciless as that gaze. "And should you falter in such a critical moment and allow the death of the Divine Speaker come to pass, you will find yourself stripped of your power and facing my righteous wrath for the foreseeable future of your afterlife."

Darlene had no smart remark for that, only murmuring a quiet, "Oh."

Argyria spoke up from where she sat, and her sharp silvery-grey gaze was on the Dark God. "You know, I get it that I'm not getting much of a say in what my role is, and I'm trying my best to deal with that. But if you think I'd not have something to say about my best friend being threatened like that, then..."

"Then you'd be forgetting your place, little girl," Nuitari interrupted just as sharply. Void gaze met hers, causing her to cringe in fear, but she found herself incapable of pulling her gaze away because the deity wasn't suppressing the ensnaring effect now. "Both in how you address me and why such wrath would be warranted. While it's a good thing pride isn't a flaw of yours to be corrected, excess humility or self-doubt is just as bad. You need to resolve yourself the fact that you have a critical role to play and your safety would naturally need to be placed above others. If someone directly tasked with helping ensure your survival fails, and you're removed from this world, this world will not survive that mistake. That would more than justify punishment, especially if it came to pass for so selfish a reason, and you will accept that."

A reply came not from Argyria, but from Darlene. The young woman said, "I'm signing on for assassin training. Final answer."

The Dark God's attention turned to her, void gaze back to being suppressed as a smirk formed.

Gazes from her friends and girlfriend went to her in surprise.

Darlene gave a small crooked smirk in response, gaze going to her best friend, who was blinking rapidly to regain her bearings and staring at her with confusion. "Dark God isn't wrong. You need someone to look after you when Raistlin isn't around, and I've been doing it this long." Her attention turned to the others and she said seriously, "However we split off for roles played, you guys better help keep Lexi safe, otherwise I'm going to beat asses for letting her get hurt while I'm doing my job."

The guys exchanged looks and Victor said, "Well, fuck. Alright then. I'm not splitting this crew up, so sign me up for the Sparatan all-war lifestyle. As long as we stick together and watch each others backs, no one's dying of anything but old age."

Brian nodded and looked to his little brother, "You in?"

Evan gave a cheeky hint of a smile as he said, "I am if you are."

Brian looked down at his girlfriend. "Janet?"

Janet sighed, giving an ambivalent shrug before glancing up at him. "I have no idea how I'm gonna explain this to my parents in a way that won't get me locked in my bedroom for trying to leave school to join a cult with my boyfriend..."

"I'm thinking we tell them I got a new job and a two bedroom so you could move in with me but still maintain your virtues, and that we'll visit when we can."

Janet shook her head with shaky laugh. "Yeah, I'm still thinking papa isn't going to like it."

"I'm going to guess he'd like the apocalypse even less, so he can retro-pardon you for the seemingly rebellious behavior that was actually helping stop it."

Janet gave a frustrated huff. "I'm still not cool with the whole sex magic stuff."

"Yeah, but there's also the healing powers and nifty Spidey-senses and nature magic... Plus, you know, being part of the crew that stops God-tier Satan in Her tracks and keeps the world from Armageddon."

Janet gave a wiggle of her head from one side to the other in debate, then huffed again and said, "I really don't want zombies chomping on my family or demons running around everywhere... Ugh. Fine, yes, I'm in!"

Brian nodded and said immediately, "Good, because I'm in too." Hazel gaze went to Evan. "You still stepping up?"

Evan grinned. "Hell yes. Try and keep up for training."

Brian smirked at the challenge. "Running isn't everything, little bro. I've kicked your ass more than a few times during melee practice. I just might smoke you on this one too."

Darlene looked to her girlfriend. "Lexi hunny, that leaves you."

"I already decided I've a responsibility to do what I can," Lexi said quietly, giving a hesitant smile. "So final answer is yes."

Lunitari looked over to her High Priestess and said with a hint of mischief, "Well, now that that's settled. The next generation of Companions are officially yours to watch over, Maggie. I trust you'll keep their instructors in balance and their training moving forward so they'll be ready to face what's coming."

Maggie gave a single nod, warm brown eyes alight with delight. "Of course, Mother. It will be my honor to continue looking after them."

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A/N: Part Two done! And Happy Holidays, whatever you may be celebrating this season!

The second installment to this series will commence shortly after this one is done. Make sure you're following me as an author on here so that you'll know when it's begun. That installment will be appearing as a new story titled "When Two Prophesies Collide".

I hope everyone enjoyed this update. I'm off to work on the last part!