Title: Unexpected Answers II (or, The Obligatory Lunar Festival Episode, 2017 Edition)
Description: "Artanis learns - and tries to comprehend - that more than one person can find something good and appealing in a cynical, undead hardass."
Notes1: As promised, Artanis shows up in this chapter. Nothing on the Starcraft Wikia mentions anything about protoss interpersonal relationships, so I went and ran with the idea that he's this big nerd when it comes to the kind of shoujo manga/chick lit books where the relationship is monogamous. He just strikes me as that kind of guy once he gets in touch with the Nexus and starts going native.
Notes2: As much as I like venturing on 4chan, particularly my main haunts /a/ and /v/, I can't stand containment boards like /u/ (as I'm a yuri fangirl, and while I'm cool with yaoi it was never really my cup of tea). This won't be the first chapter where I'll be taking pot shots at /u/, and not because of who and what they want to ship with.
Notes3: While I don't mind these ships in particular, I feel it's getting to the point where they're beginning to overtake the point of the story, i.e. a chronologically out of order story with slice of life moments interspersed with sprinklings of drama. So probably after the next chapter, I'll go take a look at my chapter dump document and pick a few from there.
Notes4: A much shorter chapter is to be expected for the next upload, but I can't guarantee I'll be able to squeeze it out given my current work schedule. I'm on shift for the next six days with seven to nine hours for each day, so unless I suddenly contract another illness (as I've done three times already over the course of the year; it's great being a biological carrier) or get injured while on the floor between now and then, I don't see any updates being made until after Tuesday.
Notes5: A fair warning: While it doesn't spoil anything particularly grandiose, this chapter does mention events that will happen later and go into greater detail in How Does That Even Work? (as this takes place several months after HDTEW's final chapter). However, given my work schedule and my juggling between different stories, you're not missing out on much. Said events won't occur for quite some time.

Artanis was a protoss of many questions. Before the Nexus had decided that participating in a seemingly never-ending interdimensional tournament was more important than ending Amon's campaign to wipe out all life in the galaxy, he had been compelled to observe a problem from all possible angles. How would he go about rallying the Purifiers and the Tal'darim together? How would he reclaim Aiur from the Zerg?

Then, after he had woken in the ruins of some grand, ancient kingdom consumed by nature (and mostly certainly not on the ship fleeing Aiur when the plan fell through) and stumbled his way into Shire-by-the-Rocks days later, his questions slowly lost rationality. Should he believe Kerrigan when she said she wasn't his enemy anymore? Did he really have to put up with the Zerg? Did the Xel'naga have a hand in creating the Nexus?

Over time, they became questions he had never imagined to take into serious consideration. Questions that grew more ridiculous and often made him wonder, in no short amount of horror, if it was the prolonged exposure to the transition giving rise to this over-analyzing. Why was there a baby fish as a contender? Why wasn't his sync ratio high enough to pilot Mecha Tassadar? Why did it rain, snow, sleet, hail, and suffer periods of extreme heat and cold in a matter of hours in Luxoria? How was the Nexus not bankrupt and a post-apocalyptic wasteland after Li-Ming and the Greater Dog blew up the better part of King's Crest in one of their insane training regimens, among other instances of mayhem? Why was everyone okay with this?

Speaking of Li-Ming…

He had accepted the ochoko from the elven bartender and made to put his wrist palm-up on the counter so he could pour the cold water onto his skin when he saw the girl come into the view. There were times where he did wish he had a mouth so he could smile at her, but alas, that was not to be, so his eyes were more than ready to widen a fraction and impart his greeting.

They widened a lot more when they fell upon Sylvanas, walking next to her, looking as neutral and as uninterested as a lion at rest among his pride.

The water was meant to be poured, slowly, so that his skin would absorb it bit by bit. Instead, the initial shock caused him to dump it all over his hand. Oh, it would still sustain him, but now some of it had gotten onto the counter, and goddammit, he was making a fool of himself now by smearing water all over the place with his wrist. As he was doing so, watching as his skin drank in the moisture, he made certain to make some very discreet glances at their passing. They stopped at a large booth where, he recalled, people could pay a couple silver to try and fetch fish in cheap, little plastic nets to put into bags and take home for keeping. The fish were contained in basins and ranged from a number of types—black shark fins, pictus catfish, danios, goramis, goldfish, fiddler crabs, Day-Glo fish, silver dollars. He watched as Sylvanas rummaged through the rune bag tied at her hip, yanked out a gold coin, and closed the proprietor's fingers over it with a grumpy frown. She accepted the net from the man's excited, trembling hands and crouched on her haunches in front of a basin.

For the first time tonight, Artanis noticed she was wearing something other than her armor. A yukata. With geta. And she had her hair down. His eyes widened with dawning realization.

They grew larger as she put the net to the water and trace a trail through it, then back again in the opposite direction. The tips of her ears bobbed up and down, flickered, rotated inward and down at the basin.

Now Artanis had seen some crazy things in his life: Tassadar being unable to pilot the humongous mecha shaped in his own image, Dehaka shopping at Terran supermarkets for essence, Kerrigan not only having a pet torrasque at her beck and call but still swearing up and down she wasn't his enemy. Even witnessing Alarak be forced to ride a Wonder Billie when the stables had their annual interdimensional medical tests a while back was pretty trippy.

To see Sylvanas doing something other than throwing insults and killing people indiscriminately in all sorts of simple, complex, degenerate ways? And spending time with someone other than Nova or her variants? It was perhaps the craziest thing of all.

But weren't they…what was that term Terrans loved to throw around? 'Going steady'? Yes, that was it. Weren't they doing that? Then why was she with Li-Ming and not the Novas?

It's just a friendly outing, the voice in his head, the inner reason, reiterated. How many times do we have to go over this—

She's cheating! Artanis said. She has to be! There's no way she would hang out with anyone else and be chummy with them.

The voice groaned. Oh, for the love of Adun—

She must be. The only way a person can win the heart of the Banshee Queen is if she dies more times than Nova has in the three years she's been here. Artanis blinked as Sylvanas lifted the net, rotated it this way and that with an inspecting moue of distaste, and with a shrug dropped it back into the water. Nova's died A LOT.

Are you talking about just the default or are you taking into account every death each variant have suffered by her hands in and out of League matches?

Does it matter?

I believe it does.

Then what we're witnessing is blasphemy! Adultery! Infidelity!

I don't think anyone's really interested in doing that outside of those crazy fanatics in those degenerate message boards that write those godawful fanfiction. Realistically, this kind of pairing wouldn't make a lick of sense!

Now you listen here! I've read some damn good fanfiction—!

Oh yes, the fanfiction where people consider holding hands to be lewd and violating the laws of thermodynamics and universal purity! Well I SPIT on your purity!

YOU TAKE THAT BACK!

"You know, you'd really make a serious contender for perfecting the thousand yard stare, my friend," said a female voice close by, and Artanis jolted in his seat. He spun around and saw Li-Ming perched on the seat next to him, nibbling on a stick of dango taken from a tray the bartender must have placed between them when he wasn't paying attention. She grasped the ochoko with thumb and clasped fingers. "Here, have some water," she said, and when he stirred from his stupor Artanis lay his wrist up on the counter for her to pour onto. He blinked slowly, basking in the coolness it brought upon contact.

Artanis sighed with relief. "Ah, my thanks, Li-Ming. You are too kind."

She shrugged. "Of course. It's rude to stare, after all."

He started again. "O-Oh no! No! I didn't mean to…er…that is to say, I wasn't intending to—"

"So sayeth the rest of the Nexus, because they're too nosy for their own damn good," Li-Ming sneered, and then her features softened. "Sorry. I shouldn't generalize. I know you didn't mean to stare. It is odd, isn't it?" She smirked at the flabbergasted noise he made. "Come now, be honest. If it's anyone other than Nova, I'll bet you think there's something going on, isn't there?"

Artanis fidgeted in his seat. He rapped his hands against his knees. He glanced to the left and then he glanced to the right. He tried not to look down at the ground between his feet, so at last he mustered his courage and looked her dead in the eye. "You speak truly. I have only ever seen Sylvanas be, uh, civil (and such a word is very much stretching things) with Nova while she is unpleasant and even outright hostile with I and everyone else. To see her without her, to see her with you and be, well, friendly..." Artanis cleared his throat. "I'm sorry, Li-Ming, but I can't help but wonder just…you know…what it is about you see…or rather, what she sees in—"

Li-Ming held up a hand, stopping him short. "Artanis," she began, tone neutral and face expressionless. "This is nothing new that I haven't heard before. In fact, it's not just directed toward I or Nova; it's directed at everyone who so much as interacts with Sylvanas, no matter how civil that interaction is, as you so put it. It's very hard not to ignore all the gossip."

"But it's different, isn't it?" he asked her. "The way people talk when Sylvanas speaks to, say, Li Li or Jaina is nowhere near as," he paused, searching for the right word, "as nosy as when she speaks to you or Nova and her variants."

"Sylvanas doesn't really like my Star Princess counterpart," Li-Ming said, shrugging. "Something about magical girls, mind controlled crows, and tired anime clichés that still persist in some universes."

"Wait, what?"

"Anyway, let's shove that particular topic aside for clarity's sake and return to the conversation at hand." Li-Ming bit off the last of the dango, chewed, and tossed the skewer in a nearby trash receptacle over her shoulder.

Artanis's gaze shifted left and right. He rolled his shoulders and worked a crick out of his neck. "Oh, uh, yes. Right. As you were, um, saying?"

"Splendid. Yes, you are right, Artanis. People are very nosy, but that's because we're very curious and often times can't help ourselves wanting to know more. People want answers. People want to know why others do things they would find odd or could never fathom to bother trying because they go against their nature. So they listen. They send their friends or convince strangers with bribes to get a little closer than what they're comfortable with and eavesdrop. Perhaps there is an exchange of hands. Perhaps there is a game of wait and see. At the end of the day, regardless of what they do, they get their information and spread it throughout the land and throughout the realm until all the Nexus knows and the truth of the matter is twisted beyond recognition.

"But people can be so stupid, you know?" Li-Ming added, and her lips twisted into a dreadful sneer. "They choose to believe what they want to believe, what they want to make sense…so they pick apart the truth, the misaimed ramblings and rumblings and rumors, and make that their own truth." She inclined her head to where Sylvanas knelt behind her, unseen, and from where they sat Artanis saw the light of the lanterns played off her eyes so that they smoldered and flickered. There was anger, there was jealousy, there was disappointment and neglect and fear and a sadness pride itself would refuse to neither submit nor admit to, and his hearts seized in realization and with pity. "That's why it's easier for them to understand how Nova works so well with Sylvanas. She was the first person that didn't treat her as another sideshow attraction or an object of power to be feared, you know. She was the first person, other than the Board, to notice there was something wrong with her, that something had happened to her on the way to the Shire, and tried to make her feel…comfortable. At ease with her condition."

"What of the others before Sylvanas?" Artanis asked. "Did they not try to help?"

"I suppose they did. Maybe Thrall or Uther or even Jaina. Maybe Tyrael offered her a small measure of comfort. Maybe Kerrigan took pity on her and tried but failed to rectify the problem. But that's the thing with transitioned folk, Artanis. When they're still trying to come to grips with what they've become, how they must manage to eke out an existence that is so far removed from what they've known and what they were psychologically before…well, you can't help someone if they refuse it. So when Sylvanas decided to step up and do something about it, you could say the rest was history. Why else would Nova be so chipper? I'm sure you're aware of her history, read up on her files via the Board."

Artanis nodded. "Yes. The reason why Ghosts are the way they are. The world was not kind to her, but…such is the life of a soldier."

Li-Ming also nodded, and they lapsed into a somber platitude of silence. She signaled for the bartender and requested for more water and a dish of mana-flavored dango, to which the bartender acquiesced. Artanis thought her eyes had lingered too long on Li-Ming before she retrieved the ochoko and plate before turning away into the dark of the stall. They were green, like cut emeralds, and the afterimage of them was burned into his mind (on top of the psychedelic sunspots from the paper lanterns).

When she returned, Li-Ming took one dango for herself and offered the other to the bartender. The elf's ears flapped, and she stared at it as though it was lathered in poison, but she took it without complaint and, after a moment's hesitation, mumbled her thanks and retreated back into the shadows. Artanis took the cup and painstakingly dribbled water over both wrists. The relief was both arctic and orgasmic.

When he came down from his high and decided, although somewhat reluctantly, it would not hurt to try, he continued. "I've…heard inklings…about Nova. How she got to…be this way. I would ask how…but that's not my place." He shook his head. "I won't use my powers to pry into her memories."

Li-Ming pursed her lips. "An honorable decision. But let's face it, someone's going to blab about it eventually."

His eyes narrowed in a dim smile. "Yes, I suppose that's true. Also, I had noticed over the past year how much Sylvanas has…would it be safe to say 'mellow' is an appropriate word?"

Li-Ming took a moment to think. "Sort of?"

Artanis laughed. "Alright, let's go with that. Yes, I have noticed she's become more…mellow. A little better with everyone else, but she is more tolerant with Nova. She hasn't killed her as numerously or as indiscriminately as before."

"And why do you think that is? Honest opinion." She bit a chunk out of a ball and licked the sugar from her lips.

Artanis tapped a hand on his knee, pondering, reaching. "Because of what almost happened to Nova. I wasn't there, but I did hear the stories. Most of those were hyperboles and tall tales, but there was always one common feature that stood out to me: that something called an Erewhon Gate was forced open by a rogue agency. These people, from what little I could glean in my daily routines, had made it their goal to kidnap heavily transitioned folk and drag them back to their default sectors. Return them to how they were prior to the Nexus's intervention." He grabbed the ochoko off the counter and rotated it between his fingers. It was empty and only moisture remained. "If my guess is right, they tried to do the same with Nova, and Sylvanas would have none of it."

"You would guess right," Li-Ming said, setting down the bare skewer on the dish. "Knowing Sylvanas, you would think she'd hand Nova over to them the first chance she got."

"But she didn't."

"Far from it. I think that was the angriest I've ever seen her. I ought to regale you with that story someday, when the holidays have passed and we are not so busy. We needn't bring down the atmosphere tonight."

"No, of course not," Artanis agreed. "Although you have got me thinking."

"Oh?"

"Seeing as how things are now, how Nova is and how Sylvanas is now compared to before…perhaps it's for the best. Some would say the Nexus is the summation of all versions of hell throughout time and space, and some would say it's but another realm for a deceased soul to reincarnate into, but as mad as this universe is I think it has changed people for the better. I mean, we die, but we always come back. For good or for will, regardless of how warped it has become from its conception, this place gives us ample opportunity to learn and grow."

"For now," Li-Ming said, frowning. "No one ever really knows for sure how long foreigners remain in the Nexus. Even if we were dragged back to our dimensions, who's to say we'll retain those memories? Those experiences? Those...feelings?" Her gaze was steady on him, unwavering like a cliff against the break of the coming tides, and yet Artanis could see the fragility behind it.

He did not dare encroach on the subject. "I don't know. However long the Nexus wants us, whether that purpose is being part of the Hero League or some other plan beyond our reckoning, we will stay here. It could be next year. It could be tomorrow. It could be thousands of years from now." He crinkled his eyes so it would give her the impression that he was smiling and reassuring. "If that's the case, then I say it would be wise for us to make as many memories and go through as many feelings as possible, so that we can hold onto them as tightly as possible for when we do return. Think of it as amnesia: we forgot most of what we know, but we never forget all of it. If we forgot everything there is about us, why, we wouldn't be able to take care of ourselves!"

Li-Ming groaned, grimacing. "You just made it sound ten times worse!"

"Oh! Oh, my apologies, Li-Ming. It wasn't my intention—"

"Oh, I know it wasn't. I would just rather hold onto than let go of my feelings for Sylvan—" She clapped both hands over her mouth.

Artanis's eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. "WHAT?"

She glared at him, dropped her hands. "You didn't hear that," she growled.

"YOU WHAT."

"Artanis. I'm not saying this lightly, but I swear to all the Prime Evils and the Angiris Council…if you so much as utter this to anyone—"

"B-B-But I thought…!" Artanis sputtered, gesticulating wildly, and he wouldn't realize until much later he almost backhanded the bartender he would come to know as Valeera Sanguinar across the face as she bent to retrieve the dishes. "I thought Sylvanas…and Nova…! But now you…!" He squeaked, and thank Adun Alarak was nowhere around to hear him let alone see him act like those stock characters out of some Japanese self-insert anime! "How did you…what did you…How…!"

"Because harems be damned, I can and I will! All those Novas and all those people, and especially you, Hierarch, are just going to have to get used to Li-Ming of Caldeum being not draped but hanging on the arm of Sylvanas Windrun—!"

"HEY, I SAW THAT!" the proprietor of the fishing basin cried, and protoss, wizard, and bartender turned to see him point an accusatory finger at Sylvanas.

She glanced up at him with half-lidded eyes through a swath of starched hair. "Saw what?" she drawled in monotone.

"Your eyes glowed! You used mind control to get those fish in that net!"

"That's the reflection from the lights you're seeing. All elves have eyeshine."

"Yes, and those knife ears of yours give you better hearing than a bat!"

"Actually, yes. What else have you learned in school today?"

"You're a cheater! A liar! I'll bet this isn't even real gold!" He fetched the piece from beneath the counter and flashed it at her.

"Then bite it," she said, shrugging. "I hope you have dental insurance." She lifted the net from the water and shook it once at him. Several fish flopped.

The man's face purpled and a vein bulged from his neck and from his forehead. He harrumphed and stomped off with a huff, coming back with a plastic baggy. With trembling hands he snatched the net out of her grasp, dumped the fish inside, and tied it closed. "Have a good evening," he forced out between clenched teeth.

"And you as well," she drawled again, leveling him with irises wide and open. Her ears stood ramrod straight, the tips quivering. There was a sliver of white, sharp teeth. She took the fish, bowed low at the waist, and spun away on her heel.

Artanis and Li-Ming watched the man pout and cross his arms over his chest. "Don't come back," he mumbled under his breath. "Hoity-toity, rabbit-eared, horse-faced, thigh-gapped, noodle-armed…."

"Here," Sylvanas said when she approached them, holding up the bag. "The poster said these are black fin sharks. You have an aquarium for harvesting alchemical ingredients, so make sure you take good care of them when they start laying eggs."

"Oh, thank you," said Li-Ming, gingerly accepting the bag as though it was a religious idol. "If you don't mind, I'd like to drop them off at the dormitory as soon as possible."

Sylvanas shrugged. "If you want."

"Here, I got you this." Li-Ming passed her the last dango stick. "I'm sure you have a hankering for something."

Sylvanas hummed, burning holes into the treat. "Even undead, there are times where I feel as though I'm running on fumes. I suppose a spot of mana wouldn't hurt. You have my thanks." She took a piece in her mouth and slid it off the skewer. When she raised her head, it was to Artanis staring at her. She scowled. "Greetings, Hierarch. What has so captivated your attention on this fine night?"

Li-Ming whirled on him and pinned him down with a glare. He picked up the unspoken threat of lopping off his nerve cords in his sleep at the forefront of her mind.

Better your nerve cords than the shoujo manga!

But the manga—!

FORGET THE STUPID MANGA! CORDS ARE FOR LIFE!

"Oh! Oh, uh," he stammered. "I was thinking how, uh, radiant you look tonight. Like the first star in an evening's sky that doesn't adhere to irregular planetary alignments and temporal mishaps."

Sylvanas sniffed. "Of course I am. There was never any doubt. Now, if you will pardon us, there are some fish we must attend to. Pleasant tidings, Hierarch."

"Yes. Pleasant tidings to you, Sylvanas, Li-Ming."

"Come along, Li-Ming."

"See you around, Artanis," said Li-Ming casually, beaming brightly as though a storm of apocalyptic proportions hadn't just marred her features moments ago. She deposited some silver coin in a see-through plastic container for tips, hopped off the stool, and went to Sylvanas's side as though she was a magnet.

Artanis watched them go, and when they became lost in the crowd he was still staring. He looked at the ground, looked at his upturned palms nestled in his lap, then looked up and stared ahead again. "Huh," he said, and that was all he could manage. "So that's what she was going on about."

His inner self heaved a weary sigh. And you just now noticed? By Adun, where have you been? Get your head out of those books and pay attention!

Oh, now he was starting to sound a bit too much like Alarak for his liking. But…undeath and opposing personalities aside…how does that even work?

The same as any other relationship goes: by indulging in curiosity and finding common ground.

To a point, Artanis cautioned him. If indeed the Nexus was hell, then hell itself would not be safe from the clutches of a woman spurned and scorned. In which, the woman in question would be Li-Ming; it still surprised him that King's Crest had quickly recovered from her beam-spam sparring session with the Greater Dog….

Perhaps he could help contribute to refilling those coffers. Or, at least if the woman wasn't intending to assist in rebuilding (and who would blame her, the Shire was prone to imploding on itself every other day for some reason or another, and he admitted he shared a very small part in the blame), she could make do with what she earned at the end of the night. He had his satchel on him, so he fished around and dug out a few pieces of silver to drop in the tip box. He made to snap it close, stopped, thought it over, then added a gold coin. Adun would smile on him this day.

The bartender emerged and gathered the plates so they stacked from largest to smallest. "She was totally cheating," she said, picking up the stack from the bottom.

Artanis blinked. "You could tell?"

"Those nets are very flimsy. Besides, I've seen her use that spell enough times to tell the difference between eyeshine and creepy, necromantic compulsion, and when you're being creepy you have to make your eyes glow a lot brighter. All the cartoons and movies do it."

"Oh. That's very interesting." He decided to make a note of this when he returned to the Spear of Adun later. That, and watch more horror movies. It would come in handy for when he faced Sylvanas in battle.

Speaking of which, he added with a measure of discomfort: "Um…I apologize for that outburst earlier. I've no doubt you heard that. I'm really not like that."

Most of the time, his inner self reiterated. Artanis violently shushed him.

"That's alright." The bartender stopped mid-step and peered at him from over her shoulder. A ghost of a smile touched her lips. "Clearly the two of you have never heard of sharing."

Artanis's hearts skipped several beats. It took him a full minute for his brain to digest, process, and finally catch up. "You mean there are more of you?"

The smile became a full-blown smirk.

Artanis studied it, etched into memory. He reached back and reflected on Li-Ming's words and actions. Then he went even further and reflected on Nova's interactions. Then he remembered Sylvanas and compared her attitude toward him in contrast to how it was toward Li-Ming, which lead back to Nova and looped around and finally stopped at the bartender.

His mind went blank.

"Wanna know how it works?" she asked him, and grinned.

"N-No. I…I think I get it. Maybe. Sort of." He sighed, suddenly tired and confused. "No." Then he got up and walked away.