Sonya took a hard swing at the half-blood. Mileena caught her at the wrist and squeezed the tender to loosen the mortal's fist. She took control of Sonya's arm and bent it near to breaking like a bridge in the wind. Her maw widened and closed the gap to get into Sonya's face.
"You aren't one to judge me, so be all you're told to be, American."
Sonya pulled off, shook and tended to her arm as Jacqui and Takeda pulled her back.
"This is chaos you are spreading." Fujin asserted. "You never knew Sindel. Spreading lies won't save Kitana."
Mileena composed herself, messed her hair back into desired position. She was amused by the hostility, but knew she had them all in the palm of her hands as long as Edenia followed her.
"I didn't know Sindel, no, but I know Kotal Kahn. I know how the oligarchy works." She added, "I was taught to be one of the boys, one of the people. We are all trying to survive, why should the oligarchs have everything while their people suffer and fight for them."
"I understand your position, but I wonder the effect it will have on the city." Rain interjected, "unity is needed, but we also must have control. Leadership."
"As you sat on your high horse, did you care about the people beneath you, Rain?" Mileena spat.
Nothing.
"I'm not my sister. You got your city back, so get off mine."
The meeting room fell into an ugly pause. Mileena took her position at Kitana's throne, a marble statue most uncomfortable for her.
Without Raiden, his army stood uncertain about their next action. Fujin, having been forced to except the occurrence by Mileena, stepped up to address them. The plan was to find Kitana, take out as many of Daegon's people as possible in the process, but ultimately to get her back.
"Do we know where they are?" Liu Kang pondered.
"No, but perhaps the answer will come to us." Fujin looked to the Edenians, Tanya, Rain, and Mileena. "Most of us have been visited by The First."
"It wants Taven and I to find Daegon." Rain added.
"This cannot happen, but that doesn't mean cannot use the entity for information." Fujin strategized. He turned to Mileena, "as Stewardess of Edenia, you have our full support, but this is also your sister, even if you are a construct of her. What is your opinion?"
All of the tutelage alongside Kotal Kahn had brought her to this point. The Kahnum of Outworld was once the peak of oligarchy, of dictatorship and power. The people feared Shao Kahn, even when Kitana overthrew him, and they feared Kotal Kahn before his fall from grace. Still, he was a warrior and treated her as one of the boys. They all fought to survive, and they all fought together as one. If one went down, they avenged them, if they could save him, or her, they would.
"We make our move against Daegon only if we can find where they're holding her. Taven and Rain will stay here." She demanded.
"I'd suggest a number of us split, half to and half remain." Fujin added.
"That makes sense, so I will choose Ermac to remain with Taven and Rain." She countered.
"Just us?" Ermac pondered.
"We have fought before, entity, there is nothing more powerful than you. Not even The First."
"One would disagree." Shang Tsung countered, but he made no option for himself to remain with the warrior of souls.
"Good, you just volunteered yourself to be first in their base." Mileena spat, and leaned back in the throne with a smug, proud grin. If Shang Tsung died out of all them, that would be the best outcome, even without Kitana's return.
Evening fell upon Edenia and the Queendom of Kitana's city had fallen back into normality. All of the good Shokan, Tarkatan, and Edenian's under the guise of unity believed themselves to be part of the world around them, though life itself continued as it had always been.
Fujin stood in the balcony of the guest room reserved for himself and Raiden. It was not the most extravagant room, being only twenty by twenty with two simple silk mats for them to meditate upon as opposed to sleeping.
In his head all the names and faces that followed behind him played on like a list. Sonya Blade, Takeda and his father Kenshi, Kung Jin and Kung Lao, Jacqui who desperately sought her father, hoping he would be among the captured with Kitana. Smoke, Sub-Zero, Frost, and Scorpion. Liu Kang had spoken to him before the moon waxed overhead. There were so many that followed perhaps to their doom, but still, he knew Raiden would tell him it was not enough.
As his brother had during the tournament, Fujin now without him must follow in his footsteps to find the best of the best. He had heard of a man named Kai from Liu Kang, and certainly hoped Raiden would return with Kotal Kahn and the remainder of the Shokan and ambassadors of Outworld.
So much weight on their shoulders, he wished he knew his brother's true intentions with their march to the pyramid, only weeks away.
It had to be soon, and it had to be at the peak of Blaze's power. The fiery elemental that was once a friend to the Gods, now captive beneath the Pyramid of Argus. He rest dormant until the two brothers fought in mortal kombat. Should Rain and Taven be brought before Daegon so soon, their plans could be ruined.
"So serious, Fujin?" Raiden approached and startled the Wind God.
"You've returned!" He smiled and nodded, but he heard no news of any travelers into the city besides themselves. "What is the status with Kotal Kahn?"
"We cannot trust Outworld to fight for us. We should abandon the thought." Raiden shook his head, and peered over the city walls. Their perspective was not into the city, but out to Edenia's fields where miles and miles away other cities and kingdoms peaked over the distant horizon. "We have what we need."
"What do you mean? What did Kotal Kahn need?"
Raiden paused, never touched the rail, never moved from place. His eyes cast out like a reel to the horizon until the words formed inside his head.
"To order Earthrealm and Edenia to stay out of Outworld." Raiden answered, and a grim expression stretched across Fujin's face.
Fujin watched his brother turn to see him as he answered, a wry smile seemed to form dryly at the corner of Raiden's lips. A strange expression.
"Well, we will make it somehow without them." Fujin reached out to Raiden, but his brother pulled away.
"We will, brother. However, I think it is important that we unite Taven and Rain with Daegon." Raiden pushed, "I have learned of something that will give us the edge against Blaze."
"Blaze is our friend, he means no harm. Perhaps we could instead break the curse Argus has placed on him?" Fujin offered, but Raiden's expression narrowed into something twisted, like a darkness, or a hatred for him. It was subtle, but those eyes never sparked with lightning, his step was cold and shallow.
How did he not sense it at first?
"You are it." Fujin called it out, and reached through Raiden to confirm his suspicion.
"You want to know where Daegon is? Where Kitana is held?" The entity toyed with him, dangled hope like a promise on a string before the God of Wind. "I will tell you everything if you bring Taven and Rain with you."
"What are your plans for them?" A long shot, but he pushed for it.
"You're a God, Fujin, what do you think I want?"
Fujin's hand pulled back from the image of Raiden. He realized immediately what this was all about to the entity.
"You wish to become corporeal." He answered, but then asked as if to weigh the options now laid out before him, "but what would that make you?"
"I have a true form." It answered, and added, "it is one that will tear through your army like insects."
"Yet, unlike me, you can be killed once corporeal?" Fujin prodded.
"You wish." It transformed itself into Fujin himself. "There is a mountain range far from here, three days west. You'll find Kitana there."
"If the brothers don't come?"
"As Jax Briggs would say, fuck around and find out." The entity pointed out in the direction and spoke as it began to fade, "you have three days."
The peaks were lost behind the horizon, shielded by the night. Alone in the darkness, with only the torch light far beneath in the sleeping city, the Protector of Earthrealm was again weighed down by his thoughts.
Mileena made a decision, though not one he approved of, but one that she knew had to be made without Kitana. Could he, if Raiden did not return in time?