(Disclaimer) Random shit I need ASAP: Can someone make me a fanart of Maria dressed as Catwoman, Aki dressed as Poison Ivy, and Ruka dressed as Harley Quinn? I desperately need this in my life ;_;

The factory. A place I never thought I'd be in again for as long as I lived, but here I am as if I'd never left. Staring up at the rusted metal platforms and rafters creaking with age. Lying in a bed of grass and marigolds. Here I am again.

A shadow flashes past the window to my right, momentarily blocking the sunlight pouring through the broken glass. It catches my attention, and happens again on my left.

"Hello?" I call out, rising from the flowers and to my feet. "I...I know you're out there."

It's so quiet then. Even the ancient building stops groaning. With timid steps, I go to the giant, ribbed door of the entrance and lay my ear against it. Nothing. Nothing but the sound of my own heartbeat growing furiously. Something's on the other side, I know it. It may be silent but—

A dent jabs into the metal maybe an inch from my head. I fall back in an instant, a shriek escaping my mouth. More impressions are hastily struck into the door as I scramble back to the patch of green. The pounding stops when I reach it.

However, in the last mark left on the door, a gaping hole sits. The opening is covered over at once by a glowing eye. With a snap it's gone, but smoke streams in through the gap not a second later. I go running out of the main area into the winding halls and all the smoke does is follow my lead.

My foot latches on something. Or, at least that's what I think until I see the gassy, black claws curled around my leg. My hand flies to it and sparks fly when skin meets smog. I'm loosed and sprinting and turning down the hallway again.

But it's a dead end. I batter and bruise the wall in every way imaginable before the smoke floods the floor. I turn to look at the menace and watch it receding from under me, into a spinning vortex of darkness. I slide down the wall, quivering breaths fleeing from me. Feathers of pitch-black manifest as the being slows, talons leaving spiraled scratches beneath it. Wings peel back to reveal the owl's face, the same face that has guzzled me whole once already.

The beast slinks forward, its prolonged neck allowing for its head to lurk just above the ground. The face twitches toward mine and my pathetic, sniveling image stares back at me.

The bird parts its beak and our screams merge into one.

I pull my hand away from my temple with a languid vitality, my eyelids fluttering as my vision tries focusing on the scene before me. As I look to my side, I notice the mechanic's already staring at me from the passenger's window. "Lemme guess—you said something?" I say, lifting off the driver's seat.

"I was just saying that you could go inside if you wanted to," replies Yusei.

I shake my head and cross my arms as I close in on the metal beast's brain, my neck stretching to get a good luck at whatever it is he's doing. "No no no. I said I would help you and I intend to keep my word."

"And I told you I'm just running tests. There's hardly anything for me to do, let alone you."

"But I had so much fun turning the ignition and revving the engine." I shake my open palms and glare at the ceiling in mock heartbreak. "Seriously, though, I can still help. Watch. Good dial holding! I am utterly blown away by how well you are keeping track of these...thingies!"

Yusei raises a brow as I applaud his handiwork. I would assume he's flat out annoyed if not for the hint of a smile ghosting over his lips. But, the best bet would be that he's just as exhausted as I am, only he's wearing insomnia like another pair of gloves and I'm over here looking like a raccoon's TV dinner.

"Moral support," I explain, folding my hands together behind my back. I can feel my mouth over-grinning, but it's like it has a mind of its own and refuses to stop it. "Helpful, no?"

"Not exactly," he says, the amused expression firming, "but appreciated."

"I tried," I laugh. Once that dies down, I turn away from him and lean against the truck with my head bowing, arms folding over one another. What I'm planning to say next is bordering on sappy, so I can't have him seeing the emotions displayed clearly on my face like they always are. "I appreciate you trying to...be helpful, too."

Pull him in, that was the mantra I assigned to my relationship with Yusei. It still stands to present-day, however it has been altered—revamped. When I made it up the first time, it was insincere. Even more so than that, the mantra revolved more around myself than the man it pertained to; pulling Yusei in had less to do with opening up and more to do with pretending to do so. It was a naive ideal attempting to balance self-preservation with unity.

Now that I see that, I've realized that's impossible to do even in the best of worlds. It's impossible to stay guarded in my own prison and expect to reach someone else just because I fit my hand through the gate. And this pertained not just to the turbo-duelist beside me, but everyone.

It's like I've stopped bothering with everyone else, friends and family. Discovering my Star Child self has made me self-involved, but I confused it for being focused and determined to figure out where my yellow brick road led to. That abandoned the golden question: what about everyone else? What about my Cowardly Lion and Scarecrow and Tin Man?

Yesterday had done more than fix the bonds I'd broken. Yesterday was a necessary and extremely late wake up call. Just because I'm Dorothy the Star Child doesn't mean I should only view those around me as Signers and Spirits and Humans. I am no longer Plain Jane, but I'm still Maria. Maria the daughter, the sister, the friend.

And last night as I was falling asleep I had the same thoughts I had back at the smoothie shack, that I didn't know the people in my life. I watch and protect and love them, but I know nothing about them. I was on an island all over again.

I need to do better, try harder. And that's just what my new mantra hopes to accomplish: Pull them in. Keep them close. Never let them go.

"Nightmares?"

"Hmm?" I face him again.

Yusei toggles the dial off the valves and stores it in a bin of tools, all whilst repeating, "Are nightmares keeping you up?"

"I got too much sleep, actually. Did you know that's worse for you than getting too little? Seven year old me would've been in a tizzy hearing that, not that I was a healthy child anyway," I ramble as I trail him. "But, um, to answer your question, I don't really know."

"You don't remember them?" Yusei asks, wiping a rag over an oil stain on his arm.

"Oh, please, if only!" I roll my eyes. "I just think the word 'nightmares' implies that I have pleasant dreams aside from the ones that scare me shitless. I haven't had a good dream—a happy dream in a while, now that I think of it."

"Maybe you have and just don't remember. You would never remember a dream that's normal."

"Nightmares are normal to me. I've always been an anxious sleeper. That stuff I just said about seven year old me loving sleep?" He nods. "Well, my asthma was crazy bad when I was little, so I was really weak. Sleeping was the only thing I could do other than watch television or read or put puzzles together. But I would wake up screaming all the time, so they would put drugs in my IV bag at night."

"That doesn't sound like it should've been allowed," he replies, eyebrows aligning with concern.

"I begged my mom to let them, that's how bad the dreams were. Aside from feeling terrible that I was keeping other patients up, I just wanted them to stop."

It to stop, not them—I only ever remember having one nightmare, the one of me standing in the black space with the voices taunting me? Remember that thrill ride? Yeah, well I'd had that dream long before we met, long before this tall tale got its start. That night-horror stopped replaying some time after my lungs grew stronger and I was upgraded to outpatient, but it restarted not long after Mom died. Now all these freaky, borderline masochistic dreams have taken its place. I don't miss the black space for the world, trust me.

But these new dreams aren't much of a level-up.

I clear my throat and pick my gaze up from the ground where it had unconsciously wandered. "Aki thinks these dreams I'm having are meaningful, which I'm sure is true. But the only way to find out what they mean is by interpreting them and, I don't know about you, but I can only interpret an owl gobbling me alive in one way."

Yusei states the obvious hesitantly, but I don't hold it against him because how exactly does one respond to this? "That is strange."

"I personally believe we've driven miles past strange and right into fright-fest."

"I don't think I can be much help on that frontier, I'm afraid. Aki's probably the best person to go to, if not Carly maybe."

I try to push it down, my disappointment. It's an ugly kind of feeling and I know I shouldn't expect any reciprocation of this secret-divulging I initiated. Despite acknowledging that sharing this was my choice—my step forward—I can't say that I wasn't hoping Yusei would spill some beans of his past, as well.

And it's not that I think he isn't trying. No, he's always trying, has been since day one. Yet among being a better, stronger Maria 2.0, Yusei had managed to do the very unthinkable yesterday-me longed to perfect. Yusei had successfully held everyone at arm's length while simultaneously keeping them near and dear to his heart.

As I wonder just how he does it, I find myself wishing he wouldn't.

"Either way," he says, giving a trademark smirk, "I know you'll figure it out. You always do."

I snort, then downplay the compliment as a means to do the same to my warming face, "Yeah, after eight-five trial and errors."

"But you get there. That's what matters."

I nod, mind completely void of any other response. Yusei packs his other belongings inside the toolbox and redresses in his usual jacket. "Are you leaving already?" I ask, panicked all of a sudden.

"I ran all the tests I needed to. I'm thinking it's a mix of compression and ignition issues. However, it's looking to me like the root of the problem is revolved around the cylinders," Yusei reports, surveying the truck. "Once I can get those worked out, anything else would be minor, like some more fuel and a better battery."

"That's good, but..." I shift and my eyes retreat to the rugged fronts of my boots, "but can't you stay a bit longer?"

"Maria." Yusei's shoes step into view, directly in front of mine. "The longer you wait, the harder it will become to talk to her."

"I know. I know," I sigh. "But I'm still scared."

"What are you scared of? It's not like she can pull a gun on you."

I gasp and swat him on the bicep, laughing. "Too soon!"

We pull the garage door close and round the house back to the face of the property. Yusei tucks the box under his seat and turns back to me. "I won't go in there with you, but if you want I can wait out here for you."

"No, that's okay. I have work in a little bit, so I should just stay over here." My head lifts up and out comes a groan. The realization hits me and I smack a hand to my forehead, wondering if I can yank the memory of Mako out. "That's literally the last place I want to be right now."

"Everything alright?"

"Oh yeah. It's just the other day one of my co-worker's ex-girlfriends showed up and went all Godzilla on the kitchen and..." I don't allow the rest of what occurred to come to light. Maybe if I never say it aloud, it just never happened? "What do I say to her?"

"...The ex-girlfriend?"

"No, Nayla!"

"In my experience, 'hello' is usually a good start."

"I'm being serious!"

Yusei smirks at his highest capacity. I think this is the first time I've ever witnessed him look so mischievous. "So am I."

"No, you are not!" Every syllable ends with a laugh and a finger jabbed in his chest. With the way we're acting, it's quite hard to believe that not even twenty-four hours ago we almost weren't friends. "The one time I need Serious-Mean-Mug Yusei Fudo, I'm getting Dad-Jokes-Mcgee. C'mon, tell me: what would you do?"

He stares at me for the longest time and I can see the thoughts merging together in his eyes. Yusei blinks and all jokes are off the table at long last. "You said that when you were young, you were a weak child. Well, you're not a child anymore. I know you're scared, but facing your fears is just what adults do. And you're far from weak, Maria. You think I'm stronger and better than you, but that's only because you underestimate how strong you are."

I take a moment to gush at his words—on the inside, of course!—and smile. "Well well well. Look who's channeling their inner Papa Bird of Wisdom."

"Is that," Yusei shoves on his helmet, "slang or something?"

"It's Crow, more like," I correct while crossing my arms and shaking my head with falsified pompousness. "It's the nickname I've decided for him, like the twins are Nuggets or Jack is without a doubt Simba. I'm still thinking about Aki's and Bruno's. And I'll have you know that I'm very tempted to make yours Dad-Jokes-Mcgee if you keep up this carefree, jokester attitude, mister."

The mechanic rests back in his seat with a bemused smile and a shaking head. "I'll see you."

"You certainly will." I backtrack up the yard. "And tell everyone I say hi!"

"Maria!" I turn back to him on the stairs, too far to see his expression clearly, although I'm sure I can guess it with what he says next: "You really think I have a mean face?"

"Go home, Fudo! Before I call Security!" I lean against the post, chuckling. "Too soon?"

Over the D-Wheel's roaring he shouts, "Too soon!"

I enter the home after he's gone and press the door shut with my back. Into the lion's den we go.

"Yusei, is that you?" Zora calls, her tone oozingly sweet. She tromps into the walkway and her expectant smile instantly flattens into a snide puff of air. "She's been waiting for you, you know."

I don't know what else to do other than stand there and Zora leaves me alone, grunting that she'll be in the kitchen if either of us needs her. I notice the music then, the trumpets tooting and the lulling tune of swing. I follow the melody to the back of the house, murmuring the lyrics under my breath.

~Say nighty-night and kiss me

Just hold me tight and tell me you'll miss me

While I'm alone and blue as can be

Dream a little dream of me~

It originates from the room with the bookshelves, what I assume to have been Tatsuo's mancave. The record player sits in the corner farthest from me, closest to Nayla at the desk. She's turned around and staring out the large window that looks over the backyard, just right of the garage. The thought passes my mind if she heard any of the things I'd mentioned to Yusei about her, but I doubt much else can be heard over Ella Fitzgerald's sultry, classic vocals.

I lower to one of the two chairs in front of the workspace. As the song plays on, my eyes hover over the pamphlet laying upside-side down at the desk's edge. Plastered on the front cover is a group of jovial elders cheesing for an obviously staged candid. It's never too late to plant your roots in White Pines Retirement Home!

I reread the slogan until the music fades out. Nayla lifts out her chair and I stand not a second later to aid her, but she holds out a halting palm. "I know I need help from time to time, but I'm not helpless."

She returns the record back to its sleeve as I sit again, still ready for action despite my willingness to allow her independence. Then Nayla drops back into the rolling, cushioned chair and swivels it toward me.

"I see Prison Guard Zora has finally allotted me visitation."

My hands lock and twist in my lap. "I probably should have come sooner, but I thought it might be best to let you rest some."

"All I do is rest. If resting was a language, I'd be fluent in it now," she comments. "When you're sick and frail as me that's all there is to do, besides having others constantly decide what's better for you over your own opinions and judgement."

"I didn't mean to—"

"Ah-ba-ba. This home is an unapologetic zone, sweet child." Nayla smiles, her eyes crinkling into mini crescents. "That said, those were just ramblings of an embittered elderly woman. You must allow us old people some bitterness, you know? It's all we have in our decline."

I try reciprocating the expression, but thinking about her statement holds it back. "I'll try to remember."

"So serious these days, are we. Come now," she leans over the tabletop, a hand held out. When mine falls into it, she squeezes hard. "There's no need for that look. Not now. Not yet."

Our other hands link as we sit, knowing better than to hope for the best, expecting well over the worst. No apologies mean no regrets. It's not like we can go back, anyhow.

"Did Martha tell you?"

I point to the opened pamphlet under her elbow. All it takes is a noise, one mere exhale of breath to tell me all I need to know. She'd completely forgotten browsing it over and probably anything else the flyer informed her of.

Turning it over in her hands she remarks, "I never understood why they always named these places after trees. What's so great about trees? They just stand there, waiting."

She throws it in a drawer at random. Out of sight, out of mind.

My voice filters out my throat unpredictably hoarse, "I have my question."

"Oh, dearie," Nayla sighs. "It's like they say, 'It's all fun and games.' I think our game needs to end. I think it needs to end because I can tell I've hurt you with what happened and you deserve better than that. You've been through too much already, I can tell."

I shake my head. "I have the question I want to ask you. What did your husband do, Nayla?"

The withered woman settles back in her seat, the petals and leaves of her form drifting to the floor from the impact. "You sure that's the question you want to ask? The question you have after staring down the barrel of a gun?"

I nod.

"The answer, I'm afraid, is much less controversial than you're anticipating. Tatsuo was an archaeologist in his prime, and a writer in his last days." Nayla raises her arms to gesture at the shelf-smothered walls. "That's why we have all these exciting books about lost civilizations and ancient empires."

I arch up within an instant. "These are about ancient civilizations? All of these?"

"Is that your second question?"

"I thought I only got the one," I tell her, gradually.

"Not today." She grins, swaying a bit in her chair. "One for your hardship and another for your friend's. So, will you waste your bonus question on books or will you finally ask what you really want to?"

A vibration fires up in my back pocket then and I eye the cellphone's display. "It'll have to wait."

—

It's the next district over. That sounds far away—miles away. But it's not even twenty minutes from Nayla's house by the average car drive, perhaps just over double that if I had taken the bus instead of Ushio and Mikage picking me up.

The victim, to the world's astonishment, is a woman this time. Makoto Abe. Age 29. Brown, shoulder-length hair. Green eyes. Married.

The murders... The Lichtenberg figures on the victims—this victim... It's all over her. The medics hypothesized that there should still be points of entry where the figures are the thickest and crowd around a certain spot, likely hidden somewhere beneath her clothes. But this particular victim's gender isn't the only plot twist to the case.

I watch the coroner draw the zipper of the bodybag along her figure, right over her head where the Lichtenberg figures climb up to the woman's scalp. I can't pay attention to much else. The blinking lights and government jargon and rancid garbage all blend together, and I can't focus on anything.

Mikage rubs her hand in circles along my back as I find shelter behind a dumpster, bent in two and dry-heaving. Nothing comes up, other than tears.

"You should've stayed in the car like we told you to," says Ushio as he joins us. I've started understanding the way the man works now that we've gotten more acquainted. He's gruff inside and out, so even when he's trying to be considerate, it comes out grinding. "We can't babysit you."

"Ushio," Mikage scolds him. But it sounds half-hearted, as if she's masking how much she agrees with her partner.

Wiping my face and straightening myself, I swallow down mouthfuls of air before responding. "I know I should've. But I needed to see it, what they did to her." The medics heave the body onto a cot and roll Makoto Abe to the van. "I owe her that much."

"Go wait in the car. I'll have one of the M.E.'s bring you some water," Ushio instructs.

It's roughly another hour before the team decides to wrap it up. When the detective duo piles in the car, I sit up from the makeshift bed I'd made out of the backseat.

Mikage clicks her seatbelt and turns to me. "Where do you want to be dropped off, Maria?"

"Whatever's closest," I mumble. I thought I was tired before, but now I'm not even sure if that begins to cover this feeling curdling in the pit of my stomach. Tired is the main ingredient of the many cataloged in order to bake such an unfathomably shittastic day.

"Well," Ushio utters after a lapse of quiet, "I think it's safe to say my theory's been put to rest."

"I didn't know you had a theory," I say.

"Nothing official, just an idea." Our gazes intersect in the rearview mirror. I nod him on. "Because we can't exactly write in our reports that we have reason to believe human-hating duel spirits are behind these homicides, we've been spitballing more conventional explanations for what's happening. Since all the victims until today were males, I supposed that the killer is female; even around headquarters we've been referring to them as 'she'."

"A black widow, is what he's talking about. And as sexist as it sounds," Mikage shoots the driver a look before he can pose a rebuttal, "it's actually the best we've got to go on right now."

An epiphany strikes my mind and I test it out, hoping these waters are very shallow at the moment. "What if it's a spirit-woman?"

"The whole point, Maria, is that we can give a plausible—"

"No, I know." I lean forward, poking my head between the front seats. "It's just that...when I usually see the spirits, they're these tiny, white skeleton-like things. But that's not how I saw them the first time—the first time there was only one big spirit and it looked like a woman."

"And this was only the first time?" Ushio clarifies. "You haven't seen it again since then?"

"Only the small ones." The cops fall silent once more, either with thought or lost interest. When I notice the familiar surroundings of the guys' neighborhood and the feeling that our carride rallying would soon meet its end, I question, "What else do we know about the victims aside from gender?"

Mikage rattles off an invisible list, "One, all so far have had moderate to ideal health. Two, there doesn't seem to be a specific age or physical preference for the victims. Three, we suspect the time of death for all victims was around the late night or early morning period. Four, most of the victims were inebriated upon death—"

"Most?" I repeat.

"Sora Fukui. M.E.'s found no trace of drugs whatsoever in his system," says Ushio, spinning the wheel left on a green light.

"But that's strange, isn't it? If he wasn't drunk or high, he would've been hard to catch. The spirits or woman would have had to try harder to kill him."

"We think Sora's murder was unintentional, that he was just at the wrong place at the wrong time," Ushio heaves the words out with a sigh. "There were signs of a struggle at the location we found Sora's body. And some street-corner cameras caught footage of him running right into the alley we found him in. Whatever or whoever was chasing him managed to stay out of sight the entire time, too, which is why we're running so dry on evidence—aside from the lack of fingerprints."

"That doesn't make sense, though," Mikage chimes slowly, her hand clutching her chin. "This isn't adding up. "

"Well, yeah. This case is like connect the dots on steroids—"

"No, no. Makoto Abe was dressed for a jog when we found her, just like her husband said she went on when he called to report her disappearance. No one goes on a run while they're on depressants or nursing a hangover."

"Which means that if we find drugs in her system, they weren't consumed by her but put in her system by someone else," Ushio surmises.

"As far as human-based hypotheses go, yes. But if it's really spirits killing these people, that means that they would have had to chase after Makoto Abe just as they had Sora Fukui."

Ushio pulls up in the plaza outside Poppo Time and parks. "But that doesn't account for the absence of a struggle where we found her. If Makoto Abe's system is completely clean of drugs that would impair her judgement or senses, why wouldn't she run away from what was chasing her?"

"That's because drugs are what a human would use," I finally say. "Spirits don't need drugs when they have illusions."

"Illusions?"

"It's how they've gotten to me before. They make this forest appear out of thin air and they trap you in it."

Ushio turns in his seat. "Maria, why didn't you tell us this soon—"

"That would explain why the victims put up a fight," Mikage cuts him off. "Why they go after people who can't defend themselves. But then why go after Makoto? If Sora was truly killed on accident, why go after someone who might actually be able to run away?"

"You said that even though most of the victims were intoxicated they still had good health, right?" I ask. "Well, I might've stopped the spirits because I'm a Star Child but maybe the reason they let me live was because of something else."

"Your asthma," Ushio exclaims. "Whoa whoa whoa, what the hell did you just say you were?"

"Yikes. Really gotta start keeping track of who I tell this stuff to." I chuckle and unbuckle myself from the seat, jerking the door open. "Yeah, I'm a Star Child. Half human, half spirit yadda yadda the usual! I'll see you two tomorrow, okay? Same time, yeah? Gotta go!"

"You need surprise," Master told them once. "Surprise is key to the hunt. Even if you still manage to kill your prey without it, the meat is never as good. It's why that boy tasted foul—he was too afraid."

Her loyal wisps remember this now as they crowd around their ruler, waiting with her as they sit with crossed legs and dangle off the rooftop's edge. She had been granting them more freedom and trust since they led the Other to her in the forest; she had even told them they'd done well—twice! Master hardly ever spoke much, whether through words or their bond, so the wisps know their hard work must have meant a lot to her.

That is their purpose after all, to keep Master satisfied. To serve and protect her at all costs.

With that in mind, the wisps ask of her if they should begin the routine scouting for the night. Last night's run had been more than a success, not due to the meal they caught but of how they caught her. Up until now, Master could only manifest the forest she had been trapped in no matter what else she might have wanted to show. Last night, however, had sparked a turning point for her powers. The forest may have succeeded in tricking the drunken, but a child lost and scared in the black of night, alone and crying for help—that is what lures in the clearminded.

Master shakes her head, thinking, We will. But not yet.

She is waiting for something and of what, her wisps have a likely idea. Down below on the pavement positioned before their perch are the peculiar contraptions roaming all about the city, the moving heaps of metal parts that take the humans to and fro. One of these sputtering carts pulls aside on the road then, right at the entrance of the tower across from them.

And speak of the spirit. The one that exits the chariot is the very enemy the wisps love. They giggle and chatter at the glowing girl's appearance, but shush themselves before angering Master with their noise. Now stronger than before and healed completely from the confrontation in the forest, Master had taken up stalking her Other again. The wisps assumed she thought them unreliable when she relieved them of their watch duties, but now they suspect that shadowing the girl gave her pleasure. Knowing her whereabouts and habits and relations was just another thrill of the chase.

No. The wisps suspected more. All of Master's attempts to obtain what she needed had failed. Knowing the Other was not just a fascination, it was necessity. Knowing the girl entirely would ensure their leader would catch her intended prey.

So as Master watches the darkened girl and her two affiliates—one with an arm sparkling ruby and the other with the same rouge color encircling its figure—disappear inside the glass fortress, they inquire of when the next attack on the Other will be.

Master stands responseless, still glaring the building down. On the highest floor of the tower, light illuminates the previously dark rooms.

"Do you know what else is key to the hunt? Even more principal than surprise?" The wisps shake their heads and voice their cluelessness, eager to hear more of their Master's knowledge. "Patience. Without patience, there exists no surprise."

Master turns away from the building, her stare now set on her open hand. It is the left, the one injured by her Other in the forest. Or, better known to them as the first time Master ever thanked them for their efforts. Because of her wisps, Master's left claw is free of the tree branches her Other burned into her skin.

I was too ignorant when I first arrived. Too hurried to fulfill my wish. But now I see, their lord thinks over the wave. Now I see why it is I was released here. The Other may not be my end goal, but I have much to do before I can take what I deserve from her. And it would be unimaginable to fulfill my wish if I was not granted enough time.

She takes off in a sprint immediately after and the wisps follow her lead, their forms altering from minute bodies and into trails of ivory flames. The time is now. The hunt is beginning.

Master vaults over the gap separating this building from its neighbor, then over and again in a consecutive stint of running and jumping and scaling until she finds herself a favorable mount to look out upon. Tonight's roost happens to be a flagpole jutting out of the side of a building's front, just beside a statue of an unknown winged beast. The wisps prod the stone creature as their leader surveys the menu.

It is too early to pounce, yes, but not to plan a route of attack. Is there a place of congregation, a watering hole for thirst and leisure? How crowded is this place? Would it be easy to pick these crowds apart?

The wisps turn their attentions to their lord, feeling the spike in her emotions. This was not the usual rush of adrenaline common of their nightly prowl but...

Master bounds back onto the roof and halts any further movement. After enough silent moments pass, a growl rumbles up her throat. "I know you're there."

There's nothing at first. The wisps surround their Master, both protective of her and begging their lord for a go at whatever's hiding behind that mound of concrete to their left. The stranger reveals itself at last, walking out from the shade of the building's appendage and before them.

It, their Master called the being, not him. Though its wrinkles and long beard resemble that of an elder, Master could tell that this form is not as such—it is not possible to deceive a deceiver.

The spirits could not be tricked either because their color-blindness reveals to them the thing's true color. If this was a man, its form would be doused in the gray of storm clouds, of worn sediment. But this entity's pallor is so faded that it is even lighter than Master's. This is no man, this thing is hardly mortal at all.

This frightens them none, however. They had witnessed many immortal things in their time spent with Master and if this creature was any bit as special as their keeper or her Other, some part of its body would be shrouded with pigment.

This thing, this enigma, this low-life is nothing.

The elder-thing ceases its path toward them, hands clasped behind its back. At this moment, Master is wholly settled in her hatred for this entity. He is too confident and is in dire need of someone knocking him off his steed. Luckily, the wisps know just the spirits who can execute such a task.

Master commands them to control themselves then. She will kill him, no doubt, yet she would at least like to know how the creature had gotten the better of her. That was no small feat and Master was always in the mood to improve her skills.

"How did you know?" the elder-thing asks, its voice bass and resonant. Despite the question, it doesn't sound all that curious.

Master thinks of not answering. She owes him no courtesies, no politeness. Not that she would ever allow that again, to anyone. Yet she replies, snarling, "You reek of death."

"That would make two of us." The elder-thing pauses, yet continues when Master gives no reaction. Did it expect her to care that it knew about her killings? "I have come to speak with you on that matter, ironically. We've been searching for you for some time. We were beginning to believe we'd made an error coming here, but you couldn't hide for too long, could you?"

The elder-thing steps forward again. "I've come with an offer. It has come to our knowledge that you and the God of Destiny have goals that align with one another. His goal must be attained at all costs in order to restore balance to our worlds and humanity itself. But our God believes this cannot be done without your assistance. He believes you will play an important role in fixing mankind's mistake—"

For the second time this night, Master speeds away from her followers. When her fist is lodged between the elder-thing's grasp, she says, "You talk too fucking much."

"I have orders to take you alive, so sadly I cannot kill you," it responds after Master lands back on the opposite side of the roof. The human look-alike is angry now, the wisps can detect the feeling crunching up its words. But this too doesn't scare them, no. Just like their Master, the wisps invite anger. "That shouldn't be difficult, however. Seeing as you're already dead."

Anger always makes things fun.

Master hurdles through the air in its direction again, leading this attack with a kick. The elder-thing does as it had before and clenches its hand around Master's ankle, slinging her into the wall of stone it hid behind minutes beforehand. The wisps hurry to her, feeling the same ache she does from the impact, wanting to heal her as much as they can. Master ignores them, tugs her body free of the cracks in the stone and speeds toward the creature another time.

The wisps watch their leader curl and slide around the monster in one second and being thrown aside at the next. It blocks all her hits, this human-like thing, but it does little to try and match Master's offense. The thing hardly budges, unlike any man would have by now. There is no bruising, as far as the wisps can tell, on either his exposed skin or that hiding under the now ripped fabric of his garments.

When the fight first began, the wisps thought the elder-thing moved slowly because of its stature, but now the spirits are just as sure as their Master that this was what it had expected of her. It wanted to tire her out and, unfortunately, that's exactly what is happening. They had not fed well enough for this kind of action and the teeny, white entities imagined that their keeper would not hold up on her own much longer.

The elder-thing raises Master up by the collar of her cloak, her claws tearing at his arm. Its skin peels but the thing bleeds not, nor does it give any sign of pain. "Have you had your fill yet?" it asks her. "Isn't it obvious who the winner will be?"

Master had been holding them back, but they can feel her desperation coiling with exhaustion. She was not proud or stubborn enough to risk losing this match, or worse. So it is now, with its palm wrapped around her throat, that she beckons her followers forth. They hoist up parts of the stone from the fractured roof and hurl them at the elder-thing. The onslaught lands all over the thing's body and one rather large rock crumbles over its skull, breaking its focus long enough for Master to flee its grasp.

The age-old fog gets put to use once more, unexpectedly. The rooftop is shifted from a flattop to a shivering forest both the spirits and their leader tuck themselves away in. Hold it off, she instructs. Her spirits can not think of any higher honor than doing so. The wisps frost over its feet and glue the elder-thing to the dirt. Then they dart around the creature in circles, their alternate flaming shapes marking its form with cuts and burns alike.

"These parlor tricks won't keep you hidden for long," the man-beast grunts. Even as her spirits lacerate and sizzle the thing's exterior, they can still feel its life beating in its breast. For being shaded in and stinking of the dead, it seems this monster has never died—and won't any time soon. "I will find you."

The elder-thing's eyes glow as red as scalding embers and the man-beast scans the treeline, disregarding the wisps' attacks and his false surroundings completely. Its head locks in the direction Master had fled and shattering the ice from its legs, the thing lunges after her from building to building. Fire emits from the being's feet as it flies through the air and the wisps seep into the creature's pores when they catch up to it. They sap the being's heat enough for the fires to click and pop to a stop. The man-beast falls onto the next rooftop, its body clattering and throwing up sparks as it skids across the paved surface.

The wisps hover to their lord's side and escape with her. Or, that was the plan they had thought she worked out. They ask of their Master the cause for her newfound stillness. She answers over the telepathic thread, channeling the very confusion they feel, I'm not.

She rises from the stony ground, suddenly hanging in the air with her spirits. Just as swiftly does Master lurch back the way they had run and take an irregular turn off the straight course face-first into a wall. She floats a distance away and smacks into the brick again, her mask splintering with the damage.

The wisps hear their ruler demanding to make it stop, but they don't know how. The white spirits can only watch as she's pulled away from the wall again and dragged right into the elder-thing's open hand. Then, the human-like being slams her into the rock-solid floor and the wisps can feel Master's agony scorching up her back and numbing her insides.

"I tried giving you a chance, I know He will see that. But you need to understand something, little girl," the beast barks as he hunches over her, teeth bared. "You will only have so many chances. Your passage over to this world would not have been allowed if not for the God of Destiny—that was your first chance. And this offer of protection, this was your second. If it was up to me, you would not get a third."

Their Master tugs on its hand with both her claws, clenching tight enough to dig through the interior of its limb. This only causes the elder-thing to increase its force; the wisps know their lord is dying for a second time.

"It is not up to me, thankfully for you, but up to the Almighty One. And I already presume he will afford you another, so to speed up this little song and dance I'm going to ask you a question. This question is your third and final chance. You will answer it and no matter what you say, I. Am going. To take you." Master unfurls her hold from around its wrist and the elder-thing stops squeezing her throat shut, but keeps his palm ready and knee pressed into her stomach. "Do you accept our proposition?"

Between her jumbled coughs, Master orders them, Get ready.

She yanks its head forward by the beard, enough for it to come into arm's reach. Her palm slaps against the crown and the familiar sapphire burn discharges from Master's hand. It tries to resist, but they have the elder-thing locked in place. Not for long, though—his life is draining much too quickly for it to continue restraining. Its body stiffens and the anger flees its eyes, leaving a vacant look in the emotion's place. The usual tree branches do not crawl up the man-beast's skin, yet this surprises them none.

It's not as if it's of any importance. A life is a life. A meal is meal—although, one is all the more rewarding when you've worked for it.

What had been the elder-thing now rests over Master, an emptied husk of rusted flesh. The wisps rise off the carcass and she angles herself in a new position beneath it; with a mere shove of her claw and leg, she flings the body over the edge of the building. It's minutes passing the tumultuous crash into the alley that Master gets up. They scurry to her, murmuring their worries aloud. They know she's in pain, even if Master mentions nothing of it.

Instead, she stares over the ledge, down at the unknown's freshly dug grave. Still huffing, Master says, "If I had a home, I would've carried you to it and mounted you on the wall as my trophy. But because my home no longer exists and you were the filth under a mule's shit pile..."

She removes her mask, glances at the crack trailing from the top to about three-quarters down the middle, nearly splitting the beak in two. Not damaged enough to make another, though still enough to upset her. Master's hooded-head tilts back slightly and out comes a wad of spit. The drop is far to steep to see if it hits the intended target.

"You want an answer?" Master calls out to the lifeless, unmoving skeleton lying down below. They can feel the confidence, the pride, the life bubbling within her. The wisps would not need to heal her as they had thought.

"Fuck your God."

The officer shuts off the motorcycle's engine and pulls off his helmet. After a sluggish walk up to his apartment building door, the radio on his shoulder signals with the usual static.

"Got some calls from a few residents over in the Tops area. All say they heard a loud noise coming from building rooftops and the alley next to their complex. Any officers willing to bite, over?"

He lives in the Obelisk district, just west of the top one percent's domain. Not that he was in any position to criticize their lavish lifestyles. His nonstop strive for justice and undercover work made him a green-suited force to be reckoned with, and a well paid one at that. The officer may live in an apartment, but it was far from the shoebox he knew others had to stuff themselves in.

So, as much as his body—his mind tells him not to answer dispatch, to enjoy the luxury his dedication and monster-sized salary had earned him, his sense of duty is twice as strong as any natural human need.

The man's head falls, as does his hand from the door handle. Pressing the switch on the walkie-talkie, he replies, "Hey, it's Kaz. I'll take it."

"Ah, Kaz, you sad sack of morals and decency," chuckles Fukao over the receiver. "Sorry about this, man. You know you're the last person I'd want to take this."

"It's alright. I'm not that far away," he can't withhold a sigh. "Send the address to my GPS, would you?"

"Sure thing." The line goes silent and as Officer Soichi starts the vehicle's engine again, the automated system's already mapped out the quickest course to the location. Though, at this time of night—or morning, more accurately—he's dubious traffic will be much of a problem. "Listen, it's probably nothing. I'm, like, ninety-five percent sure it was some bigass raccoon digging through the trash and these richies are so wound up from what's been going on they're imagining things."

"They think it's got something to do with the murders?"

"It's an alley. They heard a noise." His friend snorts over the line in his helmet. "I don't see why they bother calling us when it sounds to me like they've done all the detective work themselves."

Kazama glides around a corner and responds, "The people wanna feel safe."

"Nah! When they wanna feel safe, they go to the tabloids, Kazam." The young policeman rolls his eyes at both the jaded comment and the outplayed nickname. "They come to us when they want to be in control. When they're in control, they're happy. When the richies are happy, we get funded. It's all connected!"

Officer Soichi imagines the man wiggling his fingers in front of his face in the same spooky manner that matched that tone of voice. For a defender of the law and peace, Fukao sure loved ruffling feathers with his conspiracies. "You ever think maybe they just want to see us to do our job well?"

"I'm guessing you do?"

He does. He prides himself on it, his ability to see the best in people. That's why he chose the line of work he had—to protect that greater good from being tainted by the bad.

The Security officer pulls up along the curb and parks. "Officer Soichi reporting 10-7. Street's mostly quiet. Approaching the alley in question now." He shines the flashlight down the open tunnel and gives the scene a quick glance. "Whatever it was that made the noises the tenants complained of isn't here anymore."

"Alright, well that's probably good enough. You were a good boy and rolled over. You've earned your treat. Just promise me this: when you get home, throw that damn radio in the garbage disposal, will ya'?"

He goes in further, spotting something. Resting on one of the building's sides is a dumpster crushed to less than half its original height. The top of the can resembles a human body, a very large one, too.

There's a moan and some rustling noises; Soichi whips out his gun immediately, first turned around in the direction he came, then back into the alley. There's a kind of breath, a deep sigh or exhale next and the officer scans the ground beside him. Behind the dumpster is a pair of bare feet, dirty and wet. The officer pokes his head around the trash's corner.

"Get an ambulance over here now," the policeman radios Headquarters. "I got a body."

He can hear Fukao dropping something on the floor. "You...! Wha-what the...! Yeah, on it!"

His flashlight shines directly in the face of the girl, she flinches but hardly awakens from her slumber. He presses two digits to her wrist; heartrate's a tad high for resting, but otherwise healthy. The policeman says to his friend, "Tell them she's alive."

Not only is she alive, she's familiar. The officer had met her before, recently. And if he remembered her name correctly, it is Maria.

I'm gonna be upfront—I don't know SHIT about cars. I put words into google and spit out a summary of what it gives me, so I'm sorry if some of you actually know stuff about cars and this is all over the place. I'm just putting in the bare minimum and trying to make that bare minimum believable. Bare with me please :/

Anyway, thanks to the peeps who reviewed last chapter: ImATopMagicianFromWonderland, Sky65, and Marvel18! I try not to be a review-chihuahua (always barking at y'all to leave reviews) but the littlest comments mean the world, trust me! And thanks to anyone who favorited/followed too! Y'all are the cat's meow~!

TTFN and Happy 4th!