Mileena dug her fingers into the railing of her balcony, nails biting into the weathered wood. Kollector. She had to hunt Kollector down, find where he'd gone and what he knew. He hadn't done a damn thing to help her keep her throne; he was almost as bad as Erron Black. They both had done nothing, abandoning her without even a second thought, when that Osh-Tekk had offered better pay. If she ever got her hands on Black…

She flexed her fingers again and glanced down, noting the gouges she'd made. Worth it to ensure she'd made her mark now, since so much of her reign as Kahnum had been obliterated. There were still remnants of it - like the clothes she wore now, black leather and patterned silk with pink and gold-plated steel. Mileena had weighed the golden crown in her hands, and then settled it on her head defiantly.

Father had merely laughed and said it was her right as his chosen heir. Shang Tsung had looked sour for a moment, expression flashing across his face and vanishing illusion-fast. The remainder of the Kahn's court had managed implacable expressions as her position was solidified. The minute Father had spoken, she could tell that there were eyes seeking out her weak points, daggers and claws and blades all sharpening to stab her in the back at the first opportunity. She had much to do to regain her power base, to rebuild all she had lost.

To seek revenge on those who had wronged her, before they could do so again.

That thought made rage flash through her body, white-hot anger coursing through her veins. She couldn't even get revenge on Kotal, the betraying bastard. She needed to wring Kollector's scrawny neck, break his arms until he gave up the answers she craved. She hadn't seen a single hint of his pale grey-blue skin, or that of any other Naknadan, since she'd returned. They were laying low, unlike the Shokan or Tarkatans. The Shokan roamed the palace unabashedly. The Tarkatans lurked in their war camps out on the plains, just within sight of the Palace.

Part of her wanted to head out to the war camps and join them, rend flesh from bone and revel in the smell of blood and meat and war, and abandon the complexities of the Outworld court. Perhaps as a celebration once she recovered Tanya, the two of them could ride out and spend a week lost in the war camps, drenched in blood and fighting until they ached, and tumble into bed together for another kind of tussle.

Mileena kicked out a foot in frustration. The sound of snapping wood met her ears as her heel punched through the railing, showering splinters and wooden shards over her and into the air. The destruction didn't make her feel any better; it only served worsen her mood.

Tanya. Focus on Tanya. She plucked a broken shard of wood from her hair and tossed it between her hands as she thought.

"I need to find Father. Or Mother, but he would be more likely to know."

She glanced over her shoulder, but there was no one with her to comment. She had no entourage any longer. No advisers, no konsorts… Kitana would be worse than useless for advice. She was too soft… She had never truly reigned, but she had somehow managed to bring all those people to support her claim to the throne. What she wouldn't give right now for someone to offer another thought - Tanya, Rain, even Reiko or Goro. And the latter two galled her to think of, but they had been useful, even if things had not gone as they should.

But not D'Vorah, and if she saw that Kytinn creature, there would be nothing in any realm that could stop her from kombat and ripping her carapace to pieces. The last Kytinn would truly be the last - she would make sure of it.

Traitors, all of them.

She needed an ally she could trust - or, if not trust, at least rely upon to behave predictably. Someone she could seduce, or threaten, or who would at least try to manipulate her in a way she could manage. There was a short list, but at least there was a list.

Best to get to it.

⁂

"The Naknadan?" Shao Kahn leaned forward, elbows on either edge of the armrests. The throne loomed behind him - her throne - and his bulk filled it better than her slim form ever had. She resolved to make her next one a throne she would look more imposing on, instead of looking like she was a little girl playing on her father's chair.

"I need him." She tipped her chin up, looking him in the eyes. They narrowed beneath the horned helm and he fixed her with a gleaming stare.

"For what?"

Mileena resisted the urge to shift on her feet. Father somehow always managed to make her feel like prey, proving he was still the bigger predator in the room. She kept her eyes on his, not looking away. "He has something I want. Or so I believe."

"And what is that?" Beside him, Sindel looked to Mileena. Mother steepled her fingers in her lap for a moment before letting them fall to her thighs. She crossed her legs at the ankles, as if bored. "You never cared before. Not as if you had much time to," she added flippantly. "What is it you want so badly you will go after the Naknadan for?"

"Kotal Kahn killed my konsort." Mileena heard the tiny hiss of breath from Sindel, though Shao Kahn seemed unmoved. "I've been told he murdered her, after I was killed. I have also been told that her body remains somewhere." Not entirely true, but a lie had never stopped her before. "Kollector may know where it is, because he knows everything has value. If he thinks someone will pay for that knowledge, he'll keep it. If he thinks anyone would care… And I do."

"You may be cleverer than we gave you credit for. There is a reason you are my favorite daughter." Shao Kahn leaned back. She watched him relax slightly. Mileena spared a sideways glance to Sindel again and the faintly derisive curl of her lips. "He is out now, but due back in some days with a fresh round of tribute for me. Too many have forgotten what is owed their Kahn. You may speak with him then."

"In the mean time, Father… how may I serve?" The words were bitter on her tongue, but if they meant he would give her some duty - some responsibility - it would help secure her in this mess of a timeline, this chaos of Outworld's court. It would give her power to build on, influence necessary to consolidate her position. Until she was ready to take what was rightfully hers.

Better if Father understood and gave it to her - but she would take it, if necessary. And it was never too early to begin making those plans.

"You?" Shao Kahn somehow made the one word full of disbelief. She felt her shoulders pull back in offense as he seemed to visibly consider the prospect. "There are ways you could be of use, I suppose. Go and threaten the Tarkatans, perhaps. I've heard there are things going on at their war camp that they should regret. Kollector may be passing through there - you could ride out, deal with Baraka and the rest of the brutes, look into this matter, and find Kollector."

"Or," Sindel said, leaning forward with a markedly thoughtful look, "you might persuade your sister's monk to reveal something of import. We know you visited Kitana, and her guards had to pull you out. Go, take some of her clothing. Impersonate her, glean what information you can from that fool of a lover. Find out what they were scheming. She refuses to speak with us, and only his screams make her begin to talk. There's only so long that torture can remain useful until he's broken - or she gives up entirely." Sindel drummed her nails on the armrest of her own throne. "But no killing him, Mileena. We may have a use for him yet."

"Oh, don't worry, Mother." Mileena smiled, the toothy look she knew still gave almost everyone an uneasy feeling. "He's more use to me alive than dead, no matter how tasty he may look."

She turned on her heel and strode out of the hall, heading up the stairs to the private chambers of the family.

It was time again to pay a visit to her sister. And then the Tarkatans.

⁂

Mileena pushed the doors open into Kitana's rooms once more. Her eyes skipped around the space; it seemed vacant. She let the heavy doors swing closed behind her. "Sister," she called with an almost cloying sweetness. There was no sign of the window bars having been destroyed, and her fan and armor was still on the wall. It looked wrong, somehow. There were robes on the back of the couch, a discarded mask and boots thrown in a corner -

That was it. This place was a mess, and Kitana had never seemed the messy type.

"Kitana? Where are you?"

"Mileena." Kitana's voice carried from the bedchamber, sounding quiet- no, dull. Lifeless.

The bedchamber was as it almost always had been, shrouded in blue silks and hangings. Mileena pivoted and stalked towards the voice, taking two steps up onto the floor that separated the bedchamber from the rest of the suite.

Kitana sat in her bed, wearing what looked like one of her sets of summer robes in pale blue with darker blue motifs on it. It hung open and loose, the only bright thing in the dark, curtained space. Her normally perfect hair was up in a messy bun pierced with a carved wooden stick - no plaits, no neat twists, no effort. She reeked as if she hadn't bathed in days, body odor and sweat from sleep and the sour tang of vomit lingering. Her lips were cracked and dry. Her eyes…

She wasn't dead, but she just as nearly could have been. She had an odd pallor to her that Mileena had never seen amongst Edenians - or most Outworlders. Her skin had gone pale like a bloodless corpse, waxen as if it was a model and not meat and blood and bone.

"Are you here to finish me off?" Kitana's mouth moved and she spoke, that same dead and monotonous way she'd spoken before.

"No, though I wonder if anyone would notice. It hasn't been long, and yet you look like you've been dead for a week." Mileena wrinkled her nose. "You're foul, sister. I could bring you to the war camps and they would think you should be on their meat carts. You should bathe."

"And that says so much, coming from you." Kitana's fingers curled over the pale sheets. "Why have you come here, Mileena?"

"I came to see if you changed your mind." Mileena plucked at the sheets and twisted a length between her fingers. "If you were willing to aid me in reclaiming my throne, in exchange for my aiding you."

"Me, aid you?" Kitana made a dry sound. "We have already been through this. There's nothing I will give you. There is no offer you can make me that would make me sentence Outworld to your reign."

"Not even your lover's life?" Mileena sat down on the edge of the bed. "Mother told me what they're doing to him. How they're breaking his legs time and time again. How they're-"

"I can hear what they do to him," Kitana said fiercely. It was the first time Mileena saw something flicker in her eyes, some sign of life. "I can hear him screaming. I don't need you to inform me in great detail. I'm sure you've been in there most of the time helping."

"I haven't," Mileena replied. It seemed to take Kitana by surprise. "Though I was going to pay him a visit. See if there's any way I could help him."

"He'll never accept aid from you," Kitana spat.

"But he might if he doesn't know it's me." Mileena rose from the bed, feeling her mouth curve upwards at the corners in a smile. Kitana's expression shifted, going tight and even more bloodless, before she tried to surge forward from the bed.

Mileena continued taunting her. "So pretty, so fair, always given everything she wants. And now, sad and alone in her bed. I've always envied you, you know. The first thing I see when I wake is my own face, and she immediately attacks me. All the things I wanted, sister, and you never even dared give them to me once. You never even asked." Mileena stepped away from the bed and snatched up one of the blue silk masks that Kitana had flung away at some point, and another one of the summer robes. "Maybe I'll be able to give your darling Liu Kang some of the succor you can't. You can stay here, alone and wasting, and I'll have a chance to have some of the company you deny me."

"You bitch," Kitana snarled, trying to lunge forward again but finding herself tangled in her sheets. Her eyes raged. For a very brief moment, Mileena wished she could smirk.

"Now, it doesn't have to be that way, sister. But promise me you'll help me. That you'll cede Outworld to me, cede your claim, and I'll do my best to make sure you and your common-born lover survive this. It's what family would do." Mileena dangled the silk robe over one hand, meeting her clone-sister's eyes. "I make no promises. This is Outworld. But I'll do what's within my power." She smiled, feeling her teeth tip up from ear to ear. "And you'll find I have far more power now than you. Think about it. For now… I have a visit to make."

Kitana's sputtering noises would have pleased Tanya.

Mileena made it out the door as Kitana began to shout, the liveliest she had no doubt been in days. She pushed past the two Shokan guards and strode down the hall towards her own rooms once more, Kitana's clothing in her fist. It was time to ride to the war camp - and see just how much they would share with her.

Or her sister, if it came to that.

⁂

Less than an hour later, Mileena was riding - with a limited escort, one she had not manage to avoid - towards the Tarkatan war camp on the horizon. When the wind shifted, she could smell it, meat and blood and the faintly sickly sweet smell of rotten flesh guiding her onwards. It made her think of the good days of her reign, the feasts she had held. The scents of incense and meat and smokey fires, thick and heady in the feast-halls and spilling out into the palace. The bloodshed in the Koliseum.

Especially that.

She preferred stone walls and the safety they offered to life in the war camps or the Kuatan jungle. It was too easy to be observed - too easy to be spied upon. Too easy to be taken unawares by blades through the walls of tents, by assassins in the middle of the night. She had no desire to spend the night with the Tarkatans, but the threat loomed large as she and her escort crossed the nearly bare landscape. The war camp was nestled at the base of the mountains, amongst sparse trees and the ragged columns of weathered stone that rose into the sky.

They approached with the final rays of the setting sun. She rode, head held high, as they entered the rings of tents. Bodies hung from hooks in the open air, and Mileena goaded her mount onward despite the way it shied and sidestepped. Voices called out warnings in Tarkatan and the common tongue alike as she and her guard pushed inwards to the center of the camp, where the leader's tent - Baraka's tent - should be. Had always been.

She dropped off her mount, holding up a hand to command her escort to stay outside. Mileena marched to the large tent in front of her, where two Tarkatans stood on guard.

"Move aside," she snarled. One snapped out his armblades, and she reached for the sai on her back. "Go ahead. I've been riding for hours. I would love a fight - and a snack."

There might have been a faint look of surprise or amusement on the Tarkatan's face; it was hard to tell. The second nudged the first, muttered something, and held the tent flap open.

She found herself strangely disappointed.

"Baraka." Mileena pushed into the tent, looking at her erstwhile companion and advisor. The Tarkatan leader sat on a camp chair, blood dripping from one corner of his fanged mouth. She'd clearly interrupted dinner; half a body - even she couldn't tell what it had been initially - was sprawled across the table in front of him, white bones and joints protruding from the flesh at odd angles. His needle-sharp teeth glinted dully in the lamplight, bits of meat stuck between them.

"Mileena. You were not expected."

"I was dead, you mean, and you hoped I'd stay that way."

"I was dead before you." Baraka hefted up the long bone in his hand, gnawing flesh off the side of it. "Kotal Kahn murdered all of my people. We have been back such little time - but, it seems, more than you. Why are you here?"

"Such a welcome for your onetime companion?" She crossed her arms, staring at him. She felt her stomach gurgle at the sight of all the food, the hunger clawing its way through her body. She stared, and he stared back, making her wait. She was no longer Empress - but she had the weight of Shao Kahn behind her.

"Eat with me." He jerked his chin at the table in a single abrupt motion. "That is-"

"I do not think I need to know," she replied with equal curtness. "Father would be upset if he knew I was eating his subjects."

"We do not recognize Shao Kahn." Baraka tore more meat from the bone, sucking it down noisily. Mileena tore a piece of something less identifiable off the table and sat back in one of the camp chairs on the far side. She hungered fiercely, and this smelled fresh and rich. Her stomach gurgled again, clenching into a tight knot. She pulled down her own half-veil, and caught a look of surprised - pleasure? Satisfaction? - from Baraka. Mileena took a bite of the flesh in her hand as Baraka continued to speak. "We were given an offer by your sister. We stand with-"

She swallowed her mouthful and set the meat down.

"Choose your words - and your loyalties." Mileena's fingers curved around the edge of the table. "You once stood at my side, a trusted confidante. You fought with me against the usurper-"

"Until I was killed." Baraka's mouth snapped shut pointedly. "I made an alliance with Kitana Kahn, when-"

Anger flashed through her body. "She is no Kahn," Mileena snarled, almost screeching the words. "She is nothing. She is imprisoned, weak and useless. Father reigns again, and I am his chosen heir!"

"You are mad, Mileena." Baraka shook his head. "Kitana promises the Tarkatans rule - not obedience. She does not demand we serve her, but ally with her. You will never have the Tarkatan allegiance."

"So you ride against my father? Ride against Shao Kahn? Ride against me?"

"We live, now. We ride against those who war against us." Baraka's voice grated. "Promise us the same, Mileena, and we will ride with you. The war camps of Tarkata, at your side again. Half your blood is Tarkatan. We would ride with you if you would make the same promise your sister did."

Mileena snarled, snatching the meat again from the table and tearing off a chunk with the visceral ferocity of her Tarkatan heritage. To allow them equality? To treat with them as equals rather than the beasts they were - the servants they should be? Father would never allow it, would never accept such a thing. The Tarkatans were to be used as slaves, put in the Koliseum, pitted against the Centaurs and the Shokan and whatever else needed killing. Equals?

She swallowed again, filling her belly with food while she let Baraka talk. Her stomach grew heavier and heavier as he did - not with food, but with dismay. He spoke like he believed what he was saying, that the Tarkatans had somehow earned the right to sit beside Shao Kahn. Mileena had made him promises - freer hunting ranges, less oversight - and he had taken the offer gratefully. She'd been desperate for his allegiance before. She knew the threat the Tarkatans could be when they massed and went to war.

Now, instead of being willing to serve with pleasure, he wanted an alliance. Discomfort burrowed into her like a maggot and she set the meat aside again.

"So I return to my father and tell him you defy him?"

"That is your choice, Mileena. But if you take the terms your sister proffered…" He trailed off, gesturing with the bone before tossing it to the floor. "Tarkata could ride with you to the gates of the Palace. You could take it back."

Tempting. So very, very tempting. But it was not time - not yet. There were too many who still stood in her way. And walking through the gates as Kahn was something she wanted to do with Tanya at her side. She readied to speak, but Baraka continued.

"There is one other thing we have." Baraka's eyes glinted cruelly in the light. "It was stalking the fringes of our camp, stealing fresh kills." He shouted out several words in the rough guttural Tarkatan tongue. There was a response from beyond the hide wall of the tent.

"You bargain with me?"

"Your choice, Mileena. You need Tarkata more than we need you."

There was a grunt and the sounds of someone being shoved, and then the hide flap of the tent opened. A figure staggered in, pushed in front of two Tarkatan warriors. Mileena's eyes dropped to the figure in torn silk and leather, an Edenian veil half-torn off their face, dark hair dull and thick with mud and blood and likely other things.

"I have told you before, Baraka, I will tell you nothing of-" The figure began. Mileena's head snapped sideways, eyes focusing on it - on him.

"Rain?" Mileena's voice caught on the one word.

"Mileena?"

It was Rain, as the head turned towards her. Beaten, and looking like he'd been the playtoy of half the war camp. She wasn't sure if he'd looked better or worse after being burned by Kotal, and that said something. Her fingers flexed on the edge of the table again as she looked him over.

"It could be anyone," she said to Baraka instead. "Dress them up like Rain, play on the fact that I was dead for so long-"

"You don't believe me." Baraka snorted. "Good. You are not as stupid as you used to be."

She was on her feet in a moment, lunging forward towards her former companion. The guards rushed forward before Baraka shouted a command to hold. They subsided with snarls.

"It is your former advisor. You can interrogate him as much as you wish; I did." Baraka's arm blades snapped out as Mileena surged forward, almost leaping the table. "But if you make the same agreement your sister did… you can have him back."

That made her pause, halfway across the tent. She turned her eyes on the figure again, the alleged Rain. He was bound at the wrists behind his back, face and body battered and gone almost the same purple as his robes. He looked absolutely terrible. She wanted it to be Rain, with a kind of hungry desperation she would never admit to anyone. If this truly Rain, then it meant Tanya might still be out there - that perhaps she had been dead, but wasn't any longer. Hope flared, a small bright spark, in Mileena's breast.

"Prove it." She stalked around him in a circle.

"Shinnok's amulet," Rain began, coughing. He spat blood onto the earth, and Mileena's nostrils flared. Edenian blood - she could smell the difference. But there were still Edenians in Outworld. "It hurt you to use. You told me so. And you used it anyway."

"That says nothing," she hissed. "Something only Rain would know."

The man on the floor looked up, and spat blood again onto the ground. He had Rain's dusky skin, the same eyes bright and fierce with determination and avarice. The abuses he had suffered at Tarkatan hands hadn't done much to dim his spirit.

"You sat with me after Kotal burned me-"

"All know this!" She toed up a piece of earth with her boot in annoyance. "You could be any fool. You could be Shang Tsung, in the guise of Rain, here to test my allegiance. That of Baraka."

The man's mouth twitched and twisted, battered lips twisting into a pained smile.

"You are as paranoid as the Empress ever was. That much has not changed." He paused a moment, thinking. "Tanya has a mark," he said, looking down towards his chest. "I cannot point, unless you'll give me my hands back?" When neither Mileena nor Baraka made a move, he let out a faintly derisive laugh. "Tanya has a mark from where you bit her, one night. And she rubbed soot and ash from it in the brazier, after, to make sure it would never go away."

That was something that only Rain should know. It had happened mere days before their betrayal - before her death. Her eyes flicked back up to Baraka as he picked bits of flesh from between his teeth, watching the scene play out.

"Give me all his things. I'll take him from you. You and I… We have an agreement."

"He alone is all we have." Baraka pointed to Rain, sheathing his armblades with the same motion. "It is a long ride back to Shao Kahn's palace, and the night is full of beasts. Stay the night in the war camp, and we can begin our discussions."

There was an invitation there; she could already sense the reek of desire emanating from the Tarkatan across the room. Could she, should she, draw him out? Shao Kahn would never approve of such a liaison. She couldn't afford a fracture with her father at this point. It would make her vulnerable. Easy pickings for her enemies.

"I must discuss things with Rain first. We need a spare tent for the night. You and I will speak in the morning." She nudged Rain with the toe of one boot. His expression flickered, unreadable, at her. "Up. We must speak, and ensure this bargain is worth it. Or you can remain here with the Tarkatans."

"I'll make it worth your time, Empress. Believe me." Despite the puffy cheek and split lip, there was a sly look to him that she recognized; more than anything else, it convinced her this was truly Rain.

"Oh, don't worry." She let her face fall into a smile. "I'm sure you'll try."