Slayers! Yoyutchi
by Leaf-Chan (leaf_chan@excite.com)

"Gather, Ilyuum, and receive my words:
That the power you possess is true...
The binding of a dragon, the death of darkness...
All those that stand before my glory shall fall to my strike!
Reteleran Force!"

Episode VI: A Hard Day's Knight

[-----]

People were such ingrates.

Lina had walked back into the village ("Childora", according to a convenient
sign that was outside the border of the place), and looked around. Nothing
of note; in fact, it looked as if everyone was still standing in the same
place as when she'd left.

She'd noticed the explosion afterwards, of course; after the dragon had let
loose a bloodcurdling cry of victory over its fallen hero. Of course, it
didn't matter much to her. *He* had been the one who didn't want to pay, and
she couldn't be held responsible for his ass getting fried.

"Hey," she'd then said, approaching a villager. "Y--"

The middle-aged farmer cut her off. "You let our hero perish! You scum!" he
blared out, before turning back to pushing his wheelbarrow of supplies into
his hut.

"Who the hell are you calling--" Lina began angrily.

"You let our hero perish!" the farmer interrupted, turning around. "You
scum!"

"... what?" she said, blinking two or three times in confusion.

"You let our hero perish! You scum!"

"Stop saying that, damn it!"

"You let our hero perish! You scum!"

"... guh," Lina managed, turning around. "Something's wrong here." She
looked around for an inn; it had been a long, hard day, and she needed to
get some food in her belly before she turned in for the... night?

No, it was still day. The sun shone as brightly as ever overhead.

Which was odd, because Lina *distinctly* remembered spending a good part of
the day exploring the forest and the surrounding areas. She had gained a
sense of time from exploring in lots of underground dungeons and hidden
temples; there was a certain sense that came with each major time of the
day, no matter how deep she was. Her body was saying that it was night. And
yet... here, it was day. And she'd never been wrong before.

Well, okay, she'd been wrong a couple of times before, but those were
flukes. It wasn't as if she'd been wrong, time after time, suffering from
the results of each misjudgement. Still... the fact remained that she was
getting tired. And hungry. And irritable.

She swung the door of the inn open, and was met with the visage of a smiling
middle-aged woman who looked remarkably like two or three others in the
village, right down to the clothes. Brushing her vague sense of dread aside,
Lina approached her. "Hey, where's the food at?"

"Welcome! The rate is 20 gold pieces per night. Would you like to stay?" the
woman said cheerily.

"No, I asked where the restaurant was--look, I'm really hungry, and this
entire place is creeping me out, so--"

The woman smiled, her eyes turning into little inverted smileys like this:
n_n. "Would you like to save?" she asked, ignoring Lina's statements.

"GAH!" Lina yelped, recoiling. "What's wrong with you people?!"

No one seemed to notice what had happened around her; in fact, everyone was
talking or drinking by themselves at the tables to her right. Resigned, Lina
made her way to the bar and plopped herself down on one of the chairs. "Hey,
menu, please!" she bellowed.

A waiter dressed in regular clothing that seemed to be standard fare for all
men his age made his way over to her table, and plunked a menu down. Lina
didn't bother to glance through it. "I'll have one of everything," she said.

"Very well," the waiter said, nodding and wandering off into the kitchen.
/*Finally*,/ Lina thought, /something goes right. I just hope the food's not
poisoned or something like that./

Exactly two seconds later, the waiter walked back out, carrying a tray that
had no food on it. He managed to pull out a glass of water from somewhere,
placing it on the table. Then, he lowered the tray--and without so much as
a flash or sound effect of any sort, the tabletop was suddenly laden with a
bunch of food of all sorts.

Lina would've wondered where the hell all the food had come from and how the
waiter had done it, but her stomach won out and she immediately began
working on the roast chicken next to her.

Many words, bites, and chicken bones later, she was finished. She let out a
content burp, then glanced around. Everyone was still in exactly the same
place as before, doing the exact same thing as before. Lina wondered briefly
if it was safe to stay in this place, and decided that if they had stayed
in place so far, they would probably remain there for the rest of the night,
or day, or whatever. She walked back to the innkeeper.

"Welcome! The rate is 20 gold pieces per night. Would you like to stay?" the
woman said cheerily.

/Same prose as last time.../ Lina noted. "Yes," she muttered.

"Good night!" the lady said. Then the room darkened.

"HEY! What the hell's go--" Her words were cut off as a series of pleasant-
sounding chimes played, and everything turned black.

Then two seconds later, she was standing in front of the innkeeper again,
blinking in confusion. Her body felt rested... and it *felt* like daytime...

"Good morning!" the lady greeted. "Save game?"

With a scream, Lina tore out of the inn, and out of the village in record
time.

[-----]

A person's dreams are usually a reflection of their thought processes.
Occasionally, those dreams are vividly non-sequiter, and serve no other
purpose than to confuse the dreamer into thinking that perhaps the illusion
had some prophetic message after he has awakened, vainly grasping to
remember the portent and succeeding in only seeing--seeing, with his mind's
eye--the shards of his dreams melt into disorganized thought and lapsed
images through his figurative hand.

Humans have the interesting quirk of reading too deeply into matters. Dreams
are notoriously responsible for causing rash and irrational actions in an
otherwise-irrational person, when the dream itself was possibly nothing more
than a disjointed series of images dregged up from the recesses of the
dreamer's subconscious.

There are those who also prefer to believe that dreams are indeed a message
from the beyond, a method of communication preferred by demons, incubi,
archmages, and other silly sorts of powers-that-be in the mad world. Emmanem
was one of these people; he firmly believed in the power of the dream, in
many senses. In one sense, it was a set of goals and accomplishments which
were loftily set just out of his reach, so as to retain the factor of
unaccomplishment. In the other sense, it was a method of divining facts from
sources with which he had no experience.

Emmanem dreamed tonight.

It wasn't anything particularly gloomy and doomy, as he had expected. It was
more like a series of seemingly-random images strung together by his actions
and words, both of which were spoken without his consent, as if the scene
was predetermined. In fact, it would have been downright bizarre... had
there not been a speck of truth in it.

The backdrape was not colorful and warping about. In fact, it was in the
very inn that he and Nevv had spent the night at; they were in the lobby,
talking. Around them were the usual signs of activity--but it was as if they
were invisible, or transparent... no one noticed them, even as Emmanem began
to raise his voice in anger.

"What do you want?!" he demanded, raising one hand up as if to strike her.

Nevv merely smiled at him, and for a moment, her eyes glowed a deep shade of
green, a verdant, forest green. "That is a secret," she said, her smile
mocking him.

"I'm the student and protege of Xelloss," Emmanem protested. "You have no
right to say that."

"Ilyuum," was all Nevv said. "Ilyuum."

"What *is* Ilyuum?" he demanded. "I must know. I *must*."

"That is a secret."

He moved one arm out then, and purple energy flared to life, lashing out at
Nevv. She didn't even move aside as the blast drew closer; the energy simply
passed right through her with no effect whatsoever.

"I am the Knight of Ceipheed," Nevv said, standing up, that smile still
playing across her lips.

Emmanem stepped back in confusion. "That's... Luna..." he whispered,
although it didn't really matter how loud he spoke, since in his dream,
everything was audible.

Nevv's smile disappeared, and she raised one hand to fire a spell at him.
"Not... anymore..." she said, and that's when the blast struck him with full
force, jolting him out of his trance and back into the world of reality.
Relative reality, anyways.

Emmanem looked around his dark room, his eyesight blurred and his face
sweaty. He never did like dreams. They were always telling him something bad
or life-threatening, and this one had been no exception. The dreams had been
like this for a long time, as long as he could remember--which wasn't too
long. He couldn't remember anything behind the time he had woke up in a
strange forest, rubbing his head and wondering what had happened to him...
except for the one burning fact that he was the student of Xelloss, and to
take up in his footsteps.

Except, the dreams had come, and ever since then he really had no idea what
the hell he was supposed to be doing. And Nevv had been more Xelloss-like in
that last bit than he ever had. The knowledge of that was a bit annoying and
more than slightly insulting.

He couldn't let this one sit. Emmanem stood up and flung his covers aside,
silently padding outside his room and into the hallway. Nevv's room was two
doors down to his right. He made his way down, and gently knocked, briefly
wondering what the hell he was doing. She'd probably think he was trying to
sneak a peek at her in her nightgown or something.

"... mrr... wha... Emmy?" came Nevv's sleepy mumble.

"It is I," he said, feeling like a pompous ass for saying that. "May I come
in?"

"... why? It's..." Pause. "... two in the morning, you... ne'er mind, c'mon
in." There was a slight shuffling; Emmanem was positive that she was rolling
over in bed and away from the door. He entered anyways, making sure to shut
the door carefully behind him.

"What's up?" Nevv said, tossing the hair out of her face with a swipe of one
hand. She was sitting on the bed, blinking at him wearily. Emmanem couldn't
help but notice those two round highlights in the fabric of her nightgown,
and tried to jerk his gaze away. He managed to partially do it, and was met
with an amused look from the owner of the round highlights.

"Never mind, I think I know," she said, collapsing back down on the bed away
from him.

"*Excuse* me!" Emmanem bristled, before stopping himself. "May I have... a
word with you, Nevv Swanson?"

"You're in my room, sitting on my bed, and we're both scantily-clad. I don't
see why not."

Emmanem blushed. He hadn't thought about that little fact before, and her
pointing it out now made it distractingly obvious. "I had a most unpleasant
dream a few moments ago, and it involved... you," he continued. "Perhaps it
was just the memory of those two Mazoku that you claimed tried to capture
you... but I distinctly remember you saying that you were... the Knight of
Ceipheed."

Nevv smirked. "*That* again..." she muttered. "I'm not a Knight of anybody.
I'm just a mage of Scriim, and a fairly ordinary one at that." She stirred
slightly and faced him, her expression surprisingly gentle. "If I was a
Knight of Ceipheed, I'd be able to solve all the problems we have now,
right?"

"Problems?" Emmanem blinked. "I was under the impression that we were able
to solve all of our current dilemmas in due time."

"It's... not that easy," Nevv said wearily. "I don't think you'd understand.
You should get some rest."

Something in Emmanem made him want to know, and he pressed the matter. "Then
would you mind explaining to me, Nevv Swanson?"

She looked at him in vague surprise. "*Yes*, I mind," she said after a few
moments. "... but since you're not going to stop bothering until I tell you,
I might as well tell you now."

He nodded, and waited.

"Lina's sister is the Knight of Ceipheed," Nevv said. "That makes her very,
very important. And Ceipheed... he was one of the ancient gods of this
world. Since the beginning of time, he has been in existence. And now, Luna
is on the move, under the orders of her god."

"Yes," Emmanem agreed. "You are worried that there could be reason for the
increase in activity?"

"There *is* reason," Nevv said, staring down at her bedsheets. "Luna's...
well, she's Luna. I've stumbled across her a few times myself--"

"You *have*?!" He was taken aback. "Why did you--for what reasons?"

Nevv smirked. "Not good ones. She's been accusing me of being the reason
that Ceipheed's on the move. She claims I want to be the next Knight of
Ceipheed--another one, at any rate."

"She is jealous," Emmanem mused. "How odd that even a human of such power
still remains prone to human tendencies."

"Get off the snooty trip," she said irritably. "Even if I was strong enough
to be a Knight, I wouldn't bother. Following one person blindly doesn't
appeal to me."

"You seem to be doing a lot in your endeavors to retrieve Lina," he said,
gauging her reaction.

There wasn't much; something along the lines of tired disinterest. "I kind
of owe Lina for the time she saved me from those two Mazoku," she said. "I
haven't found a way to pay her back yet."

"Is that all?"

"... I think so," she said, her confident veneer slipping a bit. "I'm not
too sure. But that should be all for now."

There was a space of silence.

"Perhaps I should sleep here for the rest of the night," Emmanem offered.
"It would--"

"Get real, Femmanem." She rolled over onto her side and slipped underneath
the covers.

He slouched out of her room.

[-----]

She was waiting for her as she ran out of the village, terrified.

/I'm really not getting paid enough for this,/ Kiseki thought as she saw a
panic-stricken Lina Inverse tear out of Childaria. She moved in her path,
and raised one hand. "Stop right there!"

Lina didn't stop. She tore right across the path and rammed right into
Kiseki, sending both of them tumbling to the ground in a heap of curses.
Kiseki managed to get up first.

"Stop right there!" she repeated. "In the name of Hibiki-sensei (may he live
forever) and the Disturbingly Ambiguous Mazoku, I must defeat you!"

Instead of tossing a Fireball at her, Lina dusted herself off. "Okay...
okay, I think I'm calm... all right. It's you, right, Kiseki?"

Kiseki halted in mid-forearm shake. "Yeah, what do you mean, 'it's me'?" she
said in puzzlement.

"Look, I don't have time to explain now," Lina said hurriedly. She glanced
back at the village. It was sitting there, and the simple fact that it was
creeped her out to no end. "I gotta help you, alright? So c'mon!"

"Help... *help*?!" Kiseki coughed a few times. "I already got help from my
Mazoku friends. I don't need *your* help..."

Lina sighed.

"... unless you're willing to convert to the side of Saikyouism?" Kiseki
added hopefully.

Lina sighed.

An hour or so later, the two of them were sitting around a campfire on the
outskirts of Darkwood Forest. As Lina had suspected, it *was* nighttime; but
thanks to her stay at the Childaria inn, her body now insisted it was
daytime. A case of inn lag was the last thing she wanted. At least she
wasn't hungry.

Kiseki poked a hot dog on a stick into the flames. "What's going on?" she
demanded. "I'm supposed to kill you now, you know."

"Like you could," Lina said. "Look... I dunno what's going on. My sister
came up to be a while back and said I was supposed to help you, and like the
id... untalkative person she was, she didn't say anything else."

"So now what?" Kiseki said. "Am I supposed to just go with you? I'm loyal to
Ace and Gary, you know."

"... well they're not here, so I'll worry about them later," Lina replied.
"Why the hell are you following two Mazoku, anyways? I mean, you're a
competent mage--okay, maybe not, but still, what can they give you that you
can't find yourself?" /Gawd, I sound so stupid,/ she thought.

"Power," Kiseki said, smiling dreamily. "They gave me power."

"Ohhhhh..." Lina said, nodding. "I can relate to that. But didn't you have
to end up selling your soul to them or something?"

Kiseki yanked the hot dog out of the fire and waved it around a bit to cool
it off. "No, I did that with Hibiki-sensei (may he live forever) already,"
she said, grinning.

Lina wasn't sure how to take that. "Oh... kay," she mumbled. /Nutcase./ "So
are you going to come along with me?"

"Where's everyone else? The gink in white armor, the blue-haired person, and
the mage with the big breasts?" Kiseki asked, not answering Lina.

"Big... breasts..." Lina managed to compose herself after she realized that
it wasn't directed at *her*. "I dunno. Luna snatched me up a while back and
didn't put me back where she took me."

"Hah!" Kiseki proclaimed happily. "You're... just as disorganized as I am,
then," she finished somewhat lamely.

"Whatever," Lina muttered. "You didn't answer my question."

"No," Kiseki said. "I'm loyal to Ace and Gary, and them only."

"Flow Break," Lina said, knowing damn well that if Kiseki truly was under
their influence, pitting a Flow Break against it would be like tossing a
leaf into a hurricane to see how far she could throw. The familiar light
show played before them both, and as the spell ended Kiseki looked up at her
curiously.

"What was that for?" Kiseki asked.

Lina watched her carefully as she spoke. "I was hoping to get that Mazoku
enchantment off of you," she said slowly.

"Lina Inverse... heh..." Kiseki mumbled, chuckling. "Lemme make this
obvious. I joined them out of my free will."

Lina blanched. "But *why*?! Aside from the power--which you could've gotten
from any half-rate magic school in the WORLD, why?"

"I'm not too sure," Kiseki admitted, popping the hot dog in her mouth. "OW,
HOT!"

A few seconds later, she continued. "Ne'er tha leth, Ath an' Garyth hath
done whath I wan'ed the' to. I can thprea' the mighth of Thaiyouithm--"

"Hold on, HOLD ON," Lina said, raising both hands up. After the lithping--
excuse me, *lisping* mage had stopped, she went on. "Look... I'm supposed to
help you, damn it, and I'm going to help you! But if you make it hard for
yourself neither of us is going to get anywhere!"

"Too bad," Kiseki said, getting up. "I'm not gonna let you."

Lina's eyebrow twitched. "*Kiseki*..."

"In fact, I'm going to report back to Ace and Gary now and--"

"DILL BRAND!"

Lina watched her land on the ground in a crumpled heap. A bit cruel, yes,
but she was getting annoying. And it wasn't as if she could do anything
about it. At least this way, she won't be in trouble with Luna.

Cleaning the remnants of their little campsite, Lina quickly hauled Kiseki
up with a spell and floated her merrily along as she made her way back to
town.

... she had no idea what town she was going to yet, but that was a moot
point.

[-----]

"Ace."

"Gary."

"She is escaping us."

"I am aware of this."

"Shall we intervene?"

"No... we shall take care of this matter personally."

"... I see."

"When shall we leave?"

"After I extricate myself from the chains."

"*You* dropped the keys."

Silence.

"Ace?"

"Yes?"

"I am not sure as to which one of us is talking anymore. This is quite
frustrating."

"I understand."

More silence.

"Gary?"

"Yes?"

"What was the intrinsic meaning of this conversation?"

"I do not know, Gary."

"I am *Ace*."

"Oh yeah."

[-----]

The next morning, Nevv and Emmanem awoke early in the morning and
immediately set off for the task of... the task of...

"We agreed to *my* plan," Emmanem insisted.

"We most certainly did *not*," Nevv retorted. "You were distracted. I never
said anything of the sort."

He managed to restrain himself for a few moments. "Very well... what was
your plan of action again?"

"What the hell's wrong with your memory?" Nevv said. "We were going to ask
villagers to see if they've seen Lina or Luna around."

"Ah, *yes*," Emmanem said, affecting his best tone of all-out arrogance.
"*That* plan... yes."

"... what about it?" Nevv said slowly.

"The plan that I predicted would fail?" Emmanem said smugly, pacing about
for added effect. "The plan that was, in and of itself, a stupid idea? Yes,
I remember it *well*."

"Emmy, shut up and help me out," Nevv said blandly. "Quit your posing."

"Ah, but my dear Nevv Swanson, I am *not* posing."

"Then why do you sound like such an ass?"

Emmanem smiled at her. "That is... a secret."

"Nice try."

Instead of breaking down like she had expected, Emmanem kept going. "You
think I am playing a mere game, girl?" he said, his tone become twisted and
cold now. "Nevv Swanson. I command you... follow *my* doing."

"Screw you."

"Obviously, no one has," he said, "or else you may not be as uptight."

Nevv slapped him. Hard, across the face.

"Don't go there," she said, smiling easily. "The next one will hurt a lot
more, you know."

He remained turned away from her for a few seconds. Then, slowly, he brought
his face to look at her again.

"You... hit me..." he murmured, fingering the spot gently.

"Yeah. Deal," Nevv said, and turned around to approach a villager.

Emmanem didn't follow her. Instead, he began to falter, whispering the same
three words over and over again: "you hit me... you hit me..." Slowly, the
air around him began glowing a faint purple.

"... Emmy?" she said, turning back around. /Too far, Nevv.../ she thought to
herself. /Get ready./

"You... hit me..." he said again, his words a mumbled whisper now. "Y-
you..."

"Look, I'm sorry, damn it!" she said. "It's been really hectic for me these
past few days, and you were being a *complete* asshole--"

Emmanem screamed. As he did, he felt something in him simply... break. And
as it broke, a series of triggers and subtle transformations began echoing
down the length of his wiry body, until his long-sleeved jacket began to
stretch over his now-bulging arms, as the legs of his dark blue trousers
filled with muscle, culminating in his face: his expression, usually quiet
and genteel, was now one of pure savagery. And his eyes...

The triggers also set off a massive explosion of energy that was more for
decorative purposes than anything else; Nevv was engulfed in the ensuing
sphere of bluish light for the space of a few seconds before she took a few
steps--actually, *many* steps--back out of its range.

/Rolled back in their sockets,/ she noted. /Berserker... type two. Should've
figured, with the memory lapse and the anti-social tendencies.../

"All right," she said aloud. "Emmy? You there?"

The muscular beast that was now Emmanem turned his face towards her, and
gave a low, guttural snarl.

"I don't have time for this. FLARE ARROW!" She sent a spiralling blast of
fire at him.

Emmy, though, seemed to just bat the spell aside, and it struck the ground a
few feet away from him, sending villagers panicking across the street. Nevv
quirked one eyebrow up; up until now Emmanem had displayed no ability of any
kind, and now here he was, waving-away and no-selling like a... Mazoku...

She looked up.

"Prepare to be happy!" an effeminate voice called out, as a familiar
spandex-clad Mazoku appeared from Emmy's right side.

"And make it sappy!" another one replied, coming from his left.

"Oh, for..." Nevv glanced around. The villagers were all now huddled in
their houses--why couldn't they *ever* lend a hand?--and no where in sight.
In a way, it was good, since that meant that the ensuing battle would have
less of a chance of getting them killed. And in another way, it was bad,
since Nevv would be fighting against these two fruitcakes and one cheesecake
all by herself.

"To protect the world from the thriving hets!"

"To glomp onto all cute boys we have met!"

Nevv decided that she really didn't want to watch this anymore, and floated
herself up into the air with a Raywing so as to get out of harm's way.
Below, Emmanem leapt up in an impotent gesture (although he *did* manage to
jump up a good twenty or thirty feet), clawing for her. And next to him were
the two posing idiots known as the Disturbingly Ambiguous Mazoku.

She had to take out all of them at once, including Emmy, who had been
trigged by her actions. And she didn't want to *kill* Emmy--although a quick
and painless, or perhaps slow and painful, death for Ace and Gary would've
been perfectly fine. She had to check Emmy out... and Lina as well. All in
due time.

But first...

"Gather, Ilyuum, and receive my words:
That the power you possess is true..." she began.

The two Mazoku, posing up a storm, failed to notice both Emmanem and Nevv.
"To denounce the evil of sexless love!" Ace proclaimed, flitting his hands
about and standing in what looked like a position that was impossible for a
contortionist.

"To extend our heehaws to the skies above!" Gary finished, raising one arm
as an example.

"The binding of a dragon, the death of darkness..."

"ACE!" A flash of strobe lights pierced the day, shining brighter than the
sun overhead. Now *that's* a feat of magic. Or ego.

"GARY!" Another flash of strobe lights, this one more baby-blue tinted. He
had taste, after all.

"Disturbingly Ambiguous Mazoku, j--"

"DAMN it, try to keep this at a PG-13 rating, you nitwits!" Nevv yelled down
from above.

"Sorry. *ahem*... 'jack off at the speed of light!'"

Nevv groaned, and continued her own chant (a decidedly shorter one). "All
those that stand before my glory shall fall to my strike! Reteleran Force!"

"Surrender now, or prepare to--"

"... *finish* the chant, Gary," Ace said threateningly.

Gary pointed up.

A large wave of pure white energy was streaking down at them. A large,
*wide* wave. A large, wide, *tidal* wave.

"I do believe we are--to quote the vernacular, 'screwed'," he said.

"You *always* were the inopportune romantic," Ace said, before the blast
scooped both of them up with its force and sent them barrelling across the
treetops and eventually out of the city.

Nevv watched them leave, then sank back to the ground, spent but satisfied.
She'd gotten rid of them again, this time by herself. Not even three-on-one
odds were capable of defeating the mighty... Nevv... Swanson?

... she abruptly realized that she'd sent Emmy packing--in more ways than
one--with that blast.

"SHIT!" she yelled, and kicked up another Raywing in pursuit.

[-----]

But it was too late for Nevv. Mazoku travel fast, and they get sent reeling
even faster. These two--excuse me, these *three* Mazoku did, anyways.

Ace, Gary, and Emmanem came flying through the roof of their estate, sending
bits of plaster, wood splinters, and other assorted debris flying
everywhere. The three landed in the middle of the living room. Ace managed
to garner a soft landing on the comfy couch--the very *large* comfy couch.
Gary hit the bearskin rug, and went tumbling ass-over-teakettle. Emmanem...
the third one, crashed into a drawer full of expensive china.

Wincing, Gary picked himself up off the ground--that china set had cost him
almost eight thousand gold, and it was a gift, too, grrr--and waited for the
spinning in his head to stop.

"Are you faring well, Gary?" his partner said quietly, examining himself for
any signs of damage or testicular cancer.

"... I believe so," he replied. "Although we did not manage to destroy the
Knight of Ceipheed..."

"No matter," Ace said, finishing his examination and moving onto checking
Gary in a similar fashion. "We have what we came for... and he is currently
lying in an unconscious heap in the middle of our china set." It was Ace's
turn to wince.

"Please do not remind me of that," Gary chided gently, plucking himself out
of Ace's caressing grasps. "Let us focus on business at hand."

"Yes," Ace nodded, turning to Emmanem. The blue-haired man was slowly coming
to, as he struggled to raise himself up. Shards of china tinkled and broke
as he flexed his muscles. Blood--real, human blood--ran down the back of his
now-stretched jacket.

Slowly, he turned around. "Uhhh... where am I?" he moaned.

"Memory lapses," Gary murmured. "Most... *most* interesting."

"Potentially detrimental," Ace added reproachfully. "But it cannot be
helped."

Gary nodded in agreement, then got up, feeling the pain in his corporeal
body but tuning it out easily. It wasn't as if they'd been hit with a
Vearian Wrath again... pure concussion force was easily taken care of. He
walked slowly over to Emmy, and held one hand out to help him up.

"Y-you are those Mazoku," Emmy said shakily. "Lina Inverse and Nevv Swanson
told me ab--"

"No matter," Gary said, smiling hypnotically. "We are your friends."

"Yes," Ace chimed in. "We want to help you."

Emmanem brushed his hair out of his eyes and watched them narrowly. A
sparkle of light accompanied the action.

[-----]

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