Title: A Legacy of Death I: Timeless Bond
Description: "Sylvanas confronts the past and the future that might come."
Notes1: I wanted to do something special for this chapter, i.e. it being Chapter 44. In Japanese culture, the number four sounds similar to the word "death" and thus considered unlucky. The number 44, in Chinese numerology, means "dying and dead", hence why don't like to have houses or cars to end with the number 4 or a combination of wordplay containing the number 4. This is the main reason why I held off on updating so long, because I wanted to be Chapter 44 to be more serious compared to the other, previous "drama" pieces like Chapters 15 and 21. The original plan was to forego it and do Thanksgiving/Xmas chapters, but then I thought 'Well, Jen, what about that chapter where Sylvanas finally tells Jaina about Theramore and Garrosh rubs it in her face because it's true?' I almost went through with it, since that's a chapter that's going to be very devoid of the usual silliness, but when I saw Hanzo get announced I decided to go in a different direction. The Jaina-centric chapter will still happen, most likely after the post-Chapter 50 season.
Notes2: Another inspiration for this chapter was listening to Vaporwave music. No, I don't toke up nor do I drink (which is morbidly hilarious, considering my coworkers insisted I go out and "party hard" or "get into trouble" on New Year's Eve), but I needed something...surreal to help provide the atmosphere for a good bulk of the content. I also listened to Diana Ross' "It's Your Move" and the rendition done by Macintosh Plus (I listened to the latter first and thought it was sung by a man, only to have my mind blown when I learned it originated from Diana Ross). Then it was topped off by the xylophone segments from the Wintergrasp track in World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King and "Be Mine" from Sensi Sye.
Notes3: This is the longest chapter yet, and probably the most bizarre. It's not a bad thing, but I believe it comes from fleshing out Hanamura as a contemporary Japanese hub and cultural melting (I distinguish the battlefield as Hanamura City and the realm itself as Hanamura-chiku, or Hanamura-Sector) and tapping into various metaphysical topics. As a forewarning, this includes spoilers from specific dialogue that's shown after the Antorus raid in World of Warcraft: Legion and the Void Elf storyline on the PTR that takes place before Battle for Azeroth. There's also a bit of my headcanon thrown in there, but it's nothing more substantial than the possibility of what may or may not happen to Sylvanas post-Legion.
Notes4: A final inspiration was how I should take the leaks from 4chan and Reddit into account. This is the result of my finding a way to work it into the story.
Notes5: As a post-script: I hope you folks had a good New Year's Eve. As another shameless plug, I restarted my Author page on Facebook. You can find it under the name J.N. Siciliano, and for the time being it's mostly going to be a fanfic/shoot-the-shit blog with random commentary until I can find my footing with it.

"My brother is coming," Genji said, one day. "I've seen it over the horizon, where the storm approaches."

Sylvanas perked up, reverie broken. "I thought that alert had been cancelled?"

The cyborg shook his head. "No, my lady. It's still en route for Hanamura-chiku. In fact, those anomalies have been confirmed to be temporal fluctuations, and they are what have caused the aether storm to strengthen overnight."

She sniffed. "For a moment, I thought you were talking about Gul'dan. He left quite a ruckus behind with that Fel Storm of his." And, as usual, the NIB and the Realm Knights were ineffective against his cunning and dark magic. Only old man Medivh had the cajones to stand up to him, depriving the warlock the gambit of yielding the power of the Storm and the Powers for himself.

Sylvanas could not have cared less what happened to the Powers (for as benevolent as the Lady of Thorns was, she was partly responsible for putting Sylvanas here and getting designated as the Board's 'errand girl'), but he had tried to strike a bargain with her: unspeakable power and eternal life in exchange for swearing fealty to the Burning Legion. The Forsaken would replenish their numbers, inherit incredible weapons of mass destruction, be masters of their own destinies and not kowtow to the holier-than-thou High King or the honorable, barbaric Warchief. She would not be judged. She would be freed from her curse. All the eyes that were upon her would be turned away…or be forced shut.

Sylvanas answered him with an arrow between the eyes.

Her ears flittered at the humor in his voice. "Oh, but Lady Sylvanas, Gul'dan wishes his storms were as strong as the aether. To have the power of the cosmos in the palm of your hands is like holding a grenade: if you don't throw it, it'll blow up right in your face. Though we are gifted with the ability to use it, we are not meant for it. It belongs to the Powers alone."

Sylvanas hummed disinterestedly, not bothering to give voice to the fact that she already knew controlling the aether was like trying to stop a wrecking ball in mid-swing with your bare hands. So she returned her attention to the train track stretched out below them. It was quiet right now, in this little slice of Hanamura-chiku, a sector of the Japanese that had been carved and lifted from the damn planet only to be pulled across time and space into the interchanging influx of the fabric of reality that was supported by metaphysical anchors and the only means of holding the Eldritch abominations seeking to slake their unending hunger were deactivated transportation gates that spanned across the stars. Normally a freight train would be going down this way in an hour or two, but the HcBS—the Hanamura-chiku Broadcasting Station—reported a large aether storm coalescing on the fringes of the Mushin Boundary, the no man's land closest to the realm's Anchor and making its way east, a quick crawl from one metaphysical border to the other. There would be an uptick in Shadowskirt activity, and already the Realm Knights and the border patrols were dispatched to anticipate and quell the herds for when they emerged.

Hanamura City was far removed from any specific Shadowskirt, lying right in the center of Hanamura-chiku itself. At this time of day, with the sun riding low and the sky taking on that hale, oceanic shade of blue, Hanamura-chiku would be in the grip of post-afternoon rush hour. They were far away from the districts where the streets were bottlenecked by traffic, but from where they sat on the hill they could see the headlights of vehicles going back and forth like will o' the wisps on a clandestine mission. Here they could see the lights of the skyline: scrapers and high-rises, office complexes and the few Japanese zeibatsu that had cropped up seemingly overnight and establishing trade and alliances with inter-realm corporations that best suited their needs. It made her think of those postcards you could buy at a convenience store or saw in a calendar or yearly travel guides for vacationing summer colleagues, emigrants/immigrants, and off-realm Riftwalkers seeking a place to settle.

It was…pretty. More humdrum (although highly prone to the occasional omnic attack and Kaijo invasion), not as expensive, but…pretty, nonetheless.

But the sky would change—tonight, when the aether storm rolled its way through like a slow, lumbering kodo beast. The night sky would turn not the pink of clouds or a deeper black of rain but a deep, stifling blueness that wouldn't too out of place on a moonless night. Then, as the aether pressed on, it would become purple, growing brighter and brighter until it turned a rusty red color backlit by an inner blackness, as though it had switched places with the light often seen at the end of a long tunnel. In the center of the storm the redness would persist and shape into different colors like an aurora borealis, shifting to red and blue to yellow to thunderstorm green to earthy brown and a dull dead gray; and all the while there would be sparks of light like crystal blinking in the air and falling on objects before dissipating, electricity snaking and twisting in errant strands, and thunder. It was the thunder everyone would recall the most the morning after, the thunder that was always low and quiet and faraway. But the thunder always found a way into people's dreams or made people perchance to dream when they are exhausted from the toils of the day, and when the storm was gone and returned to the Nexus to collapse and regenerate for another day it would stay with them in their memory—repressed, maybe, but not forgotten.

It was preferable that when an aether storm is first confirmed everyone is to find shelter (any shelter, really), batten down the hatches, and stay inside until it came and went. Anyone that hadn't been dragged off to safety or left to their own devices out of sheer stubbornness experienced some…very odd sensations. Sylvanas didn't like to think about those after Nazeebo pleaded for her assistance in communing with his ancestors or whoever the hell wanted to pow-wow with him across dimensions in the midst of an aether storm. It worked—sort of, but it wasn't his ancestors they got in touch with, and she still couldn't decide if that was good or bad. Everything after that was like being in a dream itself, though the two of them were wide awake and sober but somehow also clearly out of their goddamn minds to be out and about in a cosmic phenomenon. It was like being in one of those outlandish Vaporwave music videos that had the retro aesthetic backgrounds complete with screen tearing, ghosting, and VHS-inspired distortion effects. It didn't make any sense.

But Genji's comments did, and that, thankfully, gave her an excuse to squander those thoughts and bring her back to the present: "Your brother…Hanzo, was it? The man who tried to kill you." For disagreeing with the Shimada Clan's criminal lifestyle. For refusing to partake in it. It was why Genji was a cyborg now and confined to wear that green and gunmetal grey exosuit, for his body was broken in the fight that would have left him for dead had it not been for Overwatch's intervention. "You know for sure he's coming here?"

Genji hummed thoughtfully. "Yes," he said. "Even when the Powers know beforehand who to draw forth, we can hear the whispers. The aether is life, Lady Sylvanas. We are just as bound to it as the Anchors are bound to the realms, even if one can make the argument that people like us who have been chosen, willing or not, are considered unnatural paradoxes altered on an atomical level to adhere to the laws of transition."

He picked his head up, turning the slit green visor of his helm toward the train yard (Shiokaze, Sylvanas recalled, for it was named so to at least remind these wayward Nexians of their home away from home), past it, to a horizon that would later on drenched in the darkroom surrealism. "I heard them, my lady. I heard them as I stalked the jungles and ruins of the old kingdoms and heard them as I drifted in and out of hypnagogia. I do not know what they are, when they are, but I have heard them speak all the same; and yet, somehow, I can understand them. I have never heard their strange languages, but in these moments I am aware of every syllable and syntax and semantic to which they phrase and can translate it as simply as you or I can speak English and Common." He looked at her. "Have you ever had that happen to you?"

"No," said Sylvanas. "I can choose to sleep but I don't experience fatigue as deeply as the living do. You can't even call it sleep. I just close my eyes for a minute and when I open them again time's passed—say, an hour or so, or a few, or even the standard six to eight hours doctors recommend for a proper night's sleep."

"But do you dream?"

Sylvanas pursed her lips. "Not always," and that was the truth. "If I hear the whispers of the Lords of the Storm, or whatever is talking, if it's real and not imagined by our tired minds, I have no recollection."

Genji was silent, but judging by how relaxed his posture was (reverse lotus) and the way he continued to stare her (just as the way he sat, but that was always something one had to account for when confronted with a faceless entity, friend or foe, as Sylvanas learned long ago, in a life that sometimes felt never happened) he was ingesting her words.

Finally, he looked back at the train yard. "Do you really think the Lords are speaking to us?"

Sylvanas scoffed. "If the one I fought is anything to go by, they've lost their intelligence a long time ago. All they know is hunger and rage at being denied to feed. Those aren't gods, Genji, they're mindless beasts. If they're supposed to be gods, then I'm the messiah."

"If not the Lords, then is it possible it is the darklings that speak to us?"

"If you mean they whisper your brother's name as a way to let you know they want to eat him or convert him to their cause, then sure, that makes sense. But you have to remember the…denizens of Darkness are just as beastly as the Lords of the Storm. Perhaps more sentient, but they are unpredictable. An aspect of Chaos, if you will. They would just as soon as toss you away as they would help you so long as it benefits them."

"Then," Genji asked, after a moment of reflection, "do you think they are echoes telling us what will happen, or may happen?"

Her ears flickered again. She had heard that term before: echoes. No one really knew what to make them, but the usual, scientific consensus that had been reached was they were remnants of energy left behind upon departing the Nexus, forever lingering in a present they could not participate in. They were intelligent, said the intellectuals, but not sentient; their thoughts and patterns stemmed from the time when they were in the realms. What people heard from these echoes were not opinions of the here and now but opinions formed based on how they would have reacted and responded if they were part of the situation in person. But there was gossip that these echoes did exist as people do, going through the motions of daily life, but on a level no one in this present instance could reach. Not even Chromie or Medivh, with their erudite power, could achieve this sort of transcendental enlightenment. These echoes, they said, could shift through reality as they pleased, and with this ability they could obtain all the knowledge of possibilities, eventualities, and actualities that could and could not happen. They were forbidden to share these things, they said…but what they liked to say was all shlock and bullshit, because no one can know for sure if the person they are interacting with is the real deal or some ontological imprints the universe deposited because it either felt like it or had the cosmic equivalent of an epileptic seizure.

So Sylvanas shrugged nonchalantly. "Who knows? Can't say I've had crossings with any echoes in the time I've been here. You?"

Genji rolled his shoulders. "No," he said, as simply as he could put. Sylvanas noticed the very small, very slight pause before his answer. She didn't want to press him, didn't care if that was supposed to mean No, not recently or No, I didn't see one at all. Maybe he wasn't sure, either, if he did at all.

"Sometimes," he began, "I wonder if they're dreams at all. I've read the books, you know? All those tomes in the libraries. And the all the holovids and AI presentations from the archives. There's this theory that when we sleep, we go somewhere else. I don't know where is, but some theories postulate that this reality—here—is a simulation, an illusion, and that the place we go to is the true reality. There are many such theories that are more or less similar to one another: simulated reality, Maya, Hutton's paradox, the Descartes method of Cartesian doubt, and so on. Can we call these instances we label dreams or visions as such when they could be, in logical terms, called true reality? How can we know for sure?"

"You don't," Sylvanas said, just as simply. "You leave it at that. People have gone mad trying to figure out how life came to be and what meaning it gives them. It doesn't matter which is right or wrong. They both are."

Genji nodded. "Perhaps that is the best answer. Perhaps that is the only answer."

"That's why I'm me and you're you. If you don't think you are, then you have all the means in the world to change it…or not. You have the choice to decide who you are as much as you can decide whether or not the whispers are from Lords or Darkness or your own sleep-deprived thoughts. I could not care less."

Genji hummed again, not acquiescing nor criticizing her.

Together, they watched the sun continue its decline. The shadows lengthened. The train yard remained empty, but the air had started to grow thick and charged, as though with ozone, and there was a very subtle but very notable tang of something like burnt plastic and gas fumes whenever the breeze picked up. The evening was come but the sky was now lighter, the white-blue of high noon, for all the colors on the horizon except the sinking yellow of the sun was drained and assimilated.

"It'll be here soon," said Genji. "Do you have shelter for the night?"

"I booked a room at a motel a little ways out from here. The one with the flat-top roof and metal stairway."

"Ah, Ideki's."

"That's the one. If I leave now, I can make it to Easy's by the ticket office and drop it off there before I hop on the LRT and they close down for the night." She pushed off with a hand and stood up.

"It's not too far of a walk?"

"Hardly. Besides, I called ahead of time when the alert went live. Doodle's with me and some of the others are holed up in other parts of the ward until the Storm rides out. I didn't really bring anything with me except a bit of reading material because you know how crappy satellite connection's going to be when it drops." She passed the steel shipping container he was seated on. "Who knows, maybe I'll actually be bothered to sleep tonight."

"Here," said Genji, and she turned to snatch the object she saw come sailing from the corner of her eye in mid-air. She looked at it, eyebrows rising. It was a tram ticket for the 3:30 southbound Red Line. "A gift, my lady, for taking your time out to keep me company today."

She stared at it some more, blinking. Then she scoffed and grasped the ticket wholly in a clenched fist. "You just can't stop playing the white knight, can you," she said impassively. Genji laughed good-naturedly. "You should get going, Shimada. I don't think you want to know what'll happen if you're caught outside and your circuitry goes on the fritz."

"Yes. I think I will do that." But Genji made no move, hands splayed across his knees and back straight as a pole. Maybe, Sylvanas thought, he was content with the shipping container being his go-to bunker. He could be like the sword on the wall, unmoving and unfazed by wind and rain and snow, only to be drawn when the time was seen fit to move…and to strike.

Sylvanas didn't care.

She walked past him.

"Lady Sylvanas," he said. "A question, before you go."

She stopped. "Yes?" she inquired.

"This might sound strange, but…I know my brother is coming. He will be here in a week's time; the aether told me this." He paused, seeming to gather his thoughts…and perhaps wondering if she was going to tell him to get to the point. She didn't, and that gave him incentive to press on. "I hear a lot of things in the aether, though most of it is spoken in riddles and poetic metrics I am unfamiliar with. But what I hear, in the midst of all that, are names. Names of power. Importance. They are Heroes. Mal'ganis. Belial. Aidan. Roadhog. Ysera. Imperius. Do you recognize any of them?"

"Ysera was the Aspect for the green dragonflight in my sector," said Sylvanas. "Although from when I was drawn, she was still alive. Mal'ganis is just another dreadlord of the Legion who's scared of looking true death in the eye." And if her Warchief variant's words were any indication, he had barely shown in his face beyond the Broken Shore. What he was doing now, in one sector or the other, was of no concern to her. "I don't know the others outside of what I've been told."

Genji nodded. "There was one name that kept standing out among the others." He inclined his head and cupped his chin. "Perhaps this is a Hero who may be drawn into the Nexus eventually…or maybe a Hero who is powerful but cannot be drawn, or will not be drawn, either due to specific conditions that have not been met—or maybe have been met—or due to circumstances that the Powers cannot or will not act on. In a way, hearing these names and anticipating an arrival is nothing more than relying on gossip and rumors that may go unfounded even if evidence is documented but crafted in a way to generate hype and revenue to fill the coffers. Or…maybe it's just an errant thought, an idea in the making, uttered by the aether during the process of creation. It's…very hard to say what it is."

"Then say what you think it means."

He dropped his hand back to its place on his knee. "Lady Sylvanas, does the name Alleria mean anything to you?" He turned around fully and saw only her back. Her ears were raised and pricked forward.

She didn't answer.

"Lady Sylvanas?"

"No," she said. "No, it doesn't."

She started walking downhill.

"Lady Sylvanas," Genji called. "I didn't mean to—"

"I know you didn't," she said, quietly, and didn't care if Genji's enhanced hearing allowed him to pick it up.

She kept walking.

When Sylvanas came to the foot of the hill she made a beeline away from the train yard into the city. Dressed in her usual black and purple chainmail armor with the flowing, stitched cloak, she cut an imposing figure on the sidewalk, and though people knew her name and exploits well they were wise enough to give her a respectable berth.

After a few minutes she came upon Easy's Public Storage, a big square building of concrete and cinderblocks. She flashed her ID to the receptionist at the desk and, after being the okay, went on through into the courtyard to Unit #20. She fished out a keycard from her rune bag and tapped it against the scanner. Once it confirmed her information, the light on the board went from red to green with a toneless, robotic beep. She pressed a couple buttons and stepped back as the double doors pulled away on the electric rails, revealing the vehicle inside. It was a 33,999 V36 Winfield sport bike cruiser, black with red and white racing stripes over a smooth, stylized bodywork. There were saddlebags integrated on the sides and customized neosteel plating she had paid out of pocket to install as soon as she had gotten the certificate of title and accrued enough money in the savings account from a variety of leagues and grudge matches between Board and House. She had gotten the idea to acquire the plating after that ridiculous stand-off on the highway against the Gearfax cosca in the summer and Gazlowe's auto body repair shop had been blown sky-high as a result of not paying his debts off on time, but neosteel was expensive even with Hero discounts and could only be applied based on how good that Hero's credit score was. This particular bike was used for leisure and not League combat, but it didn't hurt stay more than several steps ahead of the detractors.

Sylvanas swung onto the bike, turned the ignition, and backed out of the unit. She took out a garage door opener and set the double doors to close. She didn't stand and wait for them; two good twists on the handlebars revved the engine to a loud, lion-like roar, and on the third she stepped on the gas pedal and banked a hard left onto the street into traffic.

It was 3:00.

She had the stereo playing on a radio station she didn't bother to get the name of (she thought she heard it was called OSJC 85.3 FM, Old School Jams and Classics), and when she came to a stop at the red light she leaned back and got a good look at the sky. It was still the same blue-white shade, but if she tilted her head at the right angle she could distinguish the first peripheral, crystalline twinkle of displaced energy tumbling to earth like the first peaceful snowflakes of winter. She raised a hand, palm up, and watched as a stray hexagon lighted itself there. It disintegrated in a fine, ghostly wisp like the sun on moving water.

"…forecasters predict—zrrt—stimated landfall by five o' cl—krrzt-brzzzt—so we recommend anyone still out and about to—krsssht—find shelter and stay indoors—zzzt," the voice on the other end of the stereo was trying to say. "We can't say for sure—zrrt-krrzzt—the potential side effects might…if expos…d…to the aether so we don't rec…omend staying out..for…very long…."

"No kidding, genius," Sylvanas said, and a minute later the light turned green just as a woman named Diana Ross was singing for her to make her move, green means go, get the hell on. So she did.

Fifteen minutes later and she spotted the tram station from the other side of the Itadaki overpass. She made a left around the corner of the four-way and came upon the One Stop Public Storage, a larger, longer building than Easy's. She signed in, dropped the cruiser into Unit #5, locked it up, and after waiting at the crosswalk with a group of people and children went across the street.

The turnstiles were not as packed as she had expected, but the turnout was steady and the lines were moving at a comfortable pace that didn't warrant much dawdling. Sylvanas picked a lane and, foot by foot, the bottleneck of citizenry trickled onto the platform toward their specific trams until she was standing before the glass-fronted office. She presented her ticket, had it stamped, and was pointed in the direction of the Red Line. She thanked him, squeezed past the crowd, and boarded the tram.

She frowned. Nearly all the seats were taken by bow-backed men in suits and women in thigh-highs and faux leather jackets. There were teenagers in the back with instrument cases, looking bored (or indifferent) while going through whatever held their interests on their cell phones; one of them had a red ballcap on backwards with the murloc from the Rikimaru Ramen Shop emblazoned on the front. Hybrids and aliens filled the aisle and grasping the rubber overhead handles; it never ceased to boggle her how odd they looked in a contemporary, modern setting, and in clothing some might call constricting even if half of them were loose slacks, button-up shirts, and varsity jackets. How comfortable they appeared.

She took a single glance at the fingerprint-smeared window—the pale blue skin and bleached blonde hair, the red eyes and the black scar across her brow and nose—and sniffed. Sylvanas bobbed and weaved past a throng of Rift-touched mudokons in fez caps and shotgun-styled chaps, trying not to breathe in the heady stench of Stetson, English Leather, and bong water. She found a handle that hadn't been taken and latched onto it.

At 3:30, the last of the passengers came onboard and the tram disembarked. Sylvanas didn't talk, content with staring out at Hanamura-chiku floating on by and back again through the window like a roll of film in its projector. The streetlights, she saw, were turned on, tossing spheres of sodium and fluorescent that did little to sway the encroaching darkness; it seemed as though they, too, were being rendered subdued and made muted, akin to one attempting to peer through a dense, wet fog.

Condensation gathered on the panes and the fluorescent matchsticks adjusted their brightness to compensate. Sylvanas dug out the little computer from the bag and texted Jaina, saying that yes, she had already found a place to hunker down for the night. Yes. Yes, it was Ideki's, she had a room there and yes, she was approachable to him, otherwise if she hadn't she would have either resorted to bribery or given him a nice heaping helping of a Five-Fingered Knuckle Sandwich and take the room key for herself. Yes, she's heading there right now, so if Jaina would be nice enough to text Nova and the girls she's fine, she's not going to get abducted and that if anyone or anything tries to she'll gut them with Ametsuchi and Yuumagure like she stabbed that Lord in the eyes at the Bridge to Eternity. She hit the Send button, dropped the device back into the bag, and resumed her vigil at the window.

Finally, at 3:45, the tram came to a stop. Sylvanas and the passengers filed out in a shifting, nebulous stream and went their separate ways, many of them power-walking or hailing for a cab. She ignored them, went through the turnstile, and crossed the street onto the sidewalk before the light changed to red. She noted, in the back of her mind, how small and dim her shadow had gotten.

Ideki's came into view, a two-story motel with the flat brown rooftop and metal stairways that had seen better days and a better paintjob. She climbed the wrap-around stairs and went to the end of the landing where her room was located. She fished out her key, unlocked the door, and stepped inside.

Doodle was on the bed gnawing on a bone between his paws, so when the door creaked open he stopped and graced her with a simple, benevolent smile. "Woof!" he said. His tail thumped on the coverlet.

"Yes, I'm here," she said, and ran a perfunctory hand down the fur between his ears. "It's getting dark out there. The storm will be here soon."

"Woof!" He put his head down and licked her fingers.

"No, it doesn't feel like winter, does it? But it's still December and somehow this realm still operates on Daylights Savings Time. Almost makes you wish Ragnaros was here to show them how bad the summer can get, huh?"

"Woof!"

"I'll let you out one more time to go do your business before full dark, but after that we have to lock up for the night. It's a C-4 so it's going to take the better part of half the day before it passes on. Try not to indulge too much in your water bowl until then, alright?"

"Woof!" said Doodle, and got up. He scampered over to the edge of the bed where she stood by the door.

Sylvanas harrumphed and brushed past him, but not without clapping him a couple times on his flank. "Lay down, boy. I'm just going to turn on the TV and read. Hopefully the connection won't be too bad."

"Woof!" Doodle grinned and jumped up and down, stamping his little front paws on the bed. TV time was a good time when Sylvanas was around.

And this was how they spent the rest of that afternoon and a good portion of the evening before the aether storm came upon Hanamura City: the TV at a decent volume so as not to disturb the neighbors, set on a history channel documenting artisan crafts like wood-burning and glass-shaping with Eco. Sylvanas went about those few hours keeping herself and Doodle occupied, taking him out a ways to a very shortly cut greensward around back for a moment of doggy Zen and inner relief, playing tug of war with the red and white knotted rope he enjoyed with one hand while turning the pages of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring with the other, and giving him belly rubs.

A couple hours passed. The phone was on the end table next to her, and for each half-hour that came and went a weather alert caused it to jingle-jangle and prompt Sylvanas to read the broadcast, often thinking it was Jaina or Nova or even Genji (she wondered where Genji was, if her previous thought of him seeking comfort in the shipping container at the train yard was not so absurd after all). The first pop-up told her the storm was now in Hanamura-chiku and going over Amatakari-ku. The second pop-up said it was in the area of Greater Azabu-Juuban in Kamesaya and the surrounding deltas, Three Peaks, and so on and so forth with the third, fourth, and fifth alerts.

The connection on the phone got kitschy at seventy-thirty in the evening, right as Jaina managed to send out a text saying the storm was right on top of Deerling Park and the high concentrations of aether Artanis was reading off the counter he had transported down from the Spear of Adun was making every piece of electronics go pants-on-head crazy and couldn't be relied on to stay consistent for the rest of the night. Sylvanas responded she was going to turn off the phone to conserve and to let the others know that yes, she's still fine, she's not going anywhere.

At eight o'clock, the picture on the TV went from clear to static, although she could still see the images moving with each scenic transition. The volume plummeted and became muffled, though she could still catch snippets of conversation and educational bits if she strained her ears; and when she did, she heard the insectile buzzing and garbled mumbling of vocal distortion.

Doodle glanced at her, cocking his head. Sylvanas imitated a sigh, closed the book and set it on the table next to the rune bag. "I guess that's the end of that, for what it's worth," she said. She flopped down on the bed and folded her arms behind her head. "At least if the power goes off and on, it won't be blasting at full volume and wake up the neighbors."

"Arf," said Doodle, in what Sylvanas had come to dub as his 'quiet voice'. He settled down on all fours and lay on his side, paws outstretched.

"You go and sleep. I'll…." She paused, considering the grain in the ceiling, the inert—probably inoperable—rotating fan.

Does the name Alleria mean anything to you?

DOES IT

"I'm just going to close my eyes," she concluded. Yes, that was a good enough explanation. "Just for a bit. If I should sleep, wake me up at my usual time, Doodle."

"Arf," he said, and with a happy groan stretched out.

MEAN ANYTHING

"Good boy." She arched her back and came back down on the mattress in a lazy, languid sprawl.

TO YOU AT ALL?

Her eyes remained on the ceiling.

No.

She blinked.

No it doesn't.

She blinked again: slower. Longer.

IT SHOULD.

Her eyes fell shut. Just for a minute.

And when she opened them again, it was to complete and total darkness.

Sylvanas blinked, or thought she did, and the first thing she did was raise her hands. She could see them as well as she could see them in daylight. The light was red.

Aw hell—

"Sylvanas? Is that you?"

She froze. That voice…. No. No, it couldn't be. There was no mistaking it, but…after so long….

Just a dream. It's just a dream—

"Sylvanas?"

She squeezed her eyes shut. Don't turn around. Don't turn around. Don't turn around—

She did, tentatively. "Alleria?"

"Ah, there you are," said the older elf, and she emerged from the shadows into the redness as a nymph to a waterfall. It made her tattoos and eyes appear a muddied purple. There was a smile on her eyes and a mischievous twinkle in her eyes, though there was a relief in them that made the stress (—stressed? Since when has Alleria ever been stressed—?) slough off her shoulders. "I've been looking all over for you—"

Then she, too, froze, and all the good humor vanished. She clenched her hands and curled her upper lip to show the hint of fangs. "Who are you?"

"It's me, Ally. Sylvanas."

"You reek of death," Alleria snarled. The skin around her nose reminded Sylvanas of an angry dog seeing a trespasser. "And that armor…what have you done to her?"

"This is who I am, Ally." She placed a hand upon her breast. "I'm undead. I," she licked her lips, "I died…a long time ago…after you…. Look, Arthas...Arthas went on a rampage. He was raising an army and I…he attacked Quel'Thalas. He made me one of them—"

"That's a lie! Sylvanas would never lie to me!"

"I'm not lying, Ally. The world has changed. I changed. I didn't ask to become a banshee! He made me this way!"

"Oh, sure! And the next thing you'll tell me is how the Legion made the orcs what they are!" Alleria loosened her fists. The look on her face was hateful, guarded. Revolted. "You're not my sister."

"I am your sister!" She tried not to sound wounded. "I'm right here!"

"No, you're a monster! And if my sister died, she died with honor! She would be the Light!" Her voice dropped to a predatory hiss. "You are anything but blessed."

Sylvanas did something she would never consciously make in the waking world without good cause: take a step back. "Alleria—"

"You don't deserve to speak that name!" From her hip she drew a long silver sword from its scabbard, the kiss of steel loud and sharp. She pointed it at her. The tip glowed a soft blue; it squirmed sinuously, like a worm. "Die, demon!" Gripping the handle with both hands, Alleria rushed forward.

Sylvanas backpedalled, hands raised in placating defense. "No! No, Alleria, wait!" She fumbled for her shadow dagger. It wasn't there, and neither was her bow. "Shit!" She looked up. "Ally—!"

Alleria ran right into her. So did the sword.

Both exploded into crystal hexagons and crackling aether.

TAKEN, said a voice—no, a multitude of voices. They were androgynous, young and ancient and distilled into one. CHOSEN. REBORN.

"If by dawn I shall not wake, then by dusk doth thy heart not break," intoned another, smaller, softer voice. "By this tithe I shall conceive, reaped and sewed and chewed and beat—"

"Sh-Shut up!" She unwound herself from the defensive shell she had made with bowed back and bent arms and whirled around.

She came face to face to Alleria."This is all your fault!" she shouted, furious. "If you had just done your job, Quel'Thalas would still be standing! Our people would still be thriving!"

"My job? I was putting my life on the line! Where the hell were you?" Sylvanas all but pushed her face into Alleria's. The insulting anger had nestled in her belly like a cold, dead weight, and now it was kindled, blazing, as a roaring fire. QUICK, LIKE ALWAYS. "Huh? Where were you, goddammit? Tell me!"

"Protecting the world!"

"For over twenty years? I was out there, busting my ass, throwing my people by the dozens to stop the Scourge from trampling all over Quel'Thalas! You didn't see what I see! You don't know what I went through! If anything, it's your fault everything's a mess! You took Thas'dorah and had to go dicking around the universe with Turalyon and those twats from Stormwind! You may have been protecting it, but for me the world came to an end the minute you upped and left! And for what, vengeance?"

"That was our brother!"

"Killing him won't bring him back! It won't bring our family back, it won't bring our people back, it won't bring Quel'Thalas, and it sure as hell isn't going to bring me back from this!" She shoved Alleria back a step. "I needed you! You could've stopped them! You could've helped me! But guess what? Those orcs you slaughtered en masse? They're the same ones that had the balls to step up and fight back! The trolls, too! And the ones that broke away from the Scourge, your so-called Legion, they did, too! They helped us! Not you! What has the Alliance ever done for us?"

"More than what your precious Horde has given you!"

"The Alliance pushed our people away! They pushed my people away because we look like this! If it wasn't for the Horde, we wouldn't be here!"

"You're making a mistake."

"I did what I thought was right! I have to survive!"

"You're a fool to ally with kin slayers!"

"And I was a fool to think you would ever understand!" Sylvanas balled her hands into fists. "You're not my sister. You're dead to me."

"Not as dead as you, at least."

Sylvanas punched her.

Alleria shattered, and all the pieces of dropped around her in jagged shards. Sylvanas looked down, one foot raised to smash them into fine, pearlescent dust.

"Why don't you accept it?" Alleria asked, from within one of the pieces. Sylvanas choked on a gasp and drew back. Glass broke and cracked underneath her heels.

"I've seen the way you look," said Alleria again, from another, from all of them. Sylvanas looked upon them, and a thousand pairs of Alleria's blue eyes stared back up at her. They were tinted a dusky purple. "Even immortal, you still hate yourself."

Sylvanas growled. "Shut up."

"You hate the fact that all the elixirs and magic in the world cannot be brought back to Azeroth. You hate that it can't save the Forsaken. That most of all, it can't save you."

"Be quiet."

You say you're happy with how you are, how you have defied all odds against you…but you're not, are you? You're still cursed. You're running out of val'kyr. You don't know where else to turn to."

"Goddammit, Alleria—"

"No one trusts you. They may pity you, but there's no real honest love between you and them. Even Lor'themar and Halduron, your old friends, hold you in contempt. This isn't the woman who braved the forests of orcish steel. This isn't the woman who broke tradition and made her human companion, her second, Ranger Lord. This isn't the woman who stood her ground to the very end, even as the world teetered on the brink of it.

"But you've changed, Sylvanas. You're harder. Colder. You think only of yourself even as you say you'll strive to secure the future of the Forsaken."

"Is that so wrong? To think of myself?"

"You may have stopped hiding in the Nexus, but you can't keep playing that game when it's time to go back. Azeroth doesn't revolve around you. It doesn't revolve around anyone. It never has and it never will. Sooner or later, you're going to have to step out and look. Look, just like I did. Then you can become empty and be fulfilled, just like me."

"I'm fine the way I am! I don't need some esoteric crap telling me how I should live my life!" Sylvanas shuffled from one foot to the other, hands clenching and unclenching. "I didn't need you then! I don't need you now!"

"And if I should come someday, what then?" A touch on her shoulder, and Sylvanas jumped. She turned, and what she saw rooted her to the ground. Alleria stared back at her, melancholic but smiling…but it was the way all the colors that made her hale and hearty and the sun of the family were inverted. Black and bright blue and pastel purple, with streamers of shadow magic coming off her in calm, soothing waves. Its edges were like a rainbow caught in stained glass. "Will you think I'm a monster, too, for doing what's right?"

"You're playing with me," Sylvanas mumbled, and looked away from this…shade? Figment? The real deal? What did it matter? She looked toward the aether-touched darkness. "ALL OF YOU! STOP TOYING WITH ME, YOU BASTARDS!"

PROBABILITY, said the voices.

EVENTUALITY.

ACTUALITY.

REALITY.

"This isn't real! None of this is! Don't piss me off!"

"The Powers draw what they deem is mathematically beneficial to their cause," said Alleria, and another stood before her, untouched by the Void. "There's nothing you can say or do about it."

"If it happens, it happens," said a third Alleria at her side. "That's just the Way of the Nexus."

"But whether it's for good or for ill…only you can make that choice," said a fourth, on her opposite.

"Everything exists and happens for a reason, and everything comes at a price and a cost," said a fifth. "Redemption? Absolution? Atonement? Fame? Power? Rebirth? Who knows? The Powers might, but they're really only in it for glory; the reconstruction efforts are just a secondary thought."

"Only the aether knows, Sylvanas," said the Void-touched Alleria.

"And you," said the non-touched Alleria in front of her. "Only you know the answer to all of that: the meaning of your existence, the meaning of life, the weight of living to the best of your ability and what it has to offer or the weight of wallowing in self-apathy and misanthropy for a universe that can never settle for one way of life."

"So what do you think?" the Allerias asked. "What are you?"

WHAT DO THEY MEAN TO YOU?

"Leave me alone," Sylvanas huffed, and pushed away from Alleria's grip. She stumbled, caught herself, and gazed upon their faces. They would be curious if they did not seem so blank. So…empty. "Leave me alone! You have no right telling me what to do! Not after all this time…!" She looked upon them and saw herself. Her blue skin. Her red eyes. The lifeless blonde hair.

Sylvanas ran.

Ran past them. Ran past several thousand more.

She ran until only the darkness and the aether were her companions, her footsteps the only sound in existence.

MONSTER.

LEADER.

CHOSEN.

DAMNED.

UPLIFTED.

BLESSED.

COWARD.

BRAVE HEART.

Leave me alone.

Just leave me alone.

COGITO ERGO SUM, said the voices. I THINK. THEREFORE, I AM.

Sylvanas picked up speed, only to slam full-stop into something hard. She bounced back, thinking, for a moment, it was a wall.

She found herself be caught and held in place by a pair of arms. Strong, comforting, warm.

"Sylvanas? What's wrong?" Alleria asked…but now she sounded younger, more girlish and childish. "Why are you crying?"

"'m not crying," said Sylvanas the child, and she buried her face in the crook of her sister's neck. She breathed in the scent of hawkstrider and polishing oils. She must have been tending to the birds in the stables again, as Mother instructed her.

"Yes, you are, silly. You only cry when you're scared." Sylvanas sniffed hard and tried not to rub the tears and snot all over her tunic. She didn't fight back when Alleria took her by the shoulders and pushed her up straight so their eyes met. "You can tell me."

Sylvanas's mouth trembled, eyes shining with unshed tears. "I dunno who I am," she said.

Alleria blinked hugely. "Eh? You don't know who you are?"

"No. I don't think I do."

"Well I know who you are, so I'll say it for you: you're Sylvanas Windrunner! It's that simple!"

"I'm different from everyone else."

"So? That's okay. I like different." She reached over and snagged Sylvanas by the nose, tugging on it back and forth gently. "I like you."

Sylvanas grimaced, grunted, but instead of shoving the girl's hand off she took her by the wrists and motioned for her to let go. She did. "But I'm too different, Ally. I see it every day when everyone looks at me. I see it when I look in the mirror.

"I look at me and I ask, why?" And Sylvanas was no longer a child, but a teenager, dressed in the blue and white colors of the Farstrider Academy. Her voice had deepened but still retained the slight nasal undertone of youth. "Why me?"

"Everything happens for a reason, Sylvanas," said Alleria, and the child was replaced with a young adult, and she too was in the dress of the Farstrider. One sheaf of her hair fell over her breast in a knotted braid tied with dragonhawk feathers. Her tattoos were absent. "I'm not saying these things are for the greater good or put the needs of the few over the needs of the many with some divine purpose in mind. They just do."

Sylvanas frowned. "I didn't want to die. I didn't want to become this way."

"And I didn't want to do what I had to do in the Nether. But we both did, didn't we? We had our reasons, yes? We still have them now, right?"

"I didn't have much of a choice. I became what I am because I had to, not because I wanted to."

"You broke from the Scourge when the Lich King was weakened and gave your people safety in numbers and the promise of a future where the sky's the limit. That's a choice. They're good choices."

"I dipped my hands in blood and plague to get there."

"Yeah, you did." And Alleria the teenager was gone, and there was only the adult—the woman Sylvanas had last seen her in her first life: in green and brown chainmail, tattoos rippling as waves across face and arm. Thas'dorah, the Legacy of the Windrunners, was slung across her back. The banner of the proud, gold lion tossed its head above her, running with the wind where it blew across Stormwind's buttresses and parapets.

"I did a lot of bad things, you know," said Sylvanas the adult, and she looked down at herself. Undeath had long since claimed her, cut her from a cloth torn and shredded only to be dyed and salvaged and stitched to another canvas. "You wouldn't believe I was the same person if you met me."

"I know. But you're still you, y'know. You're in there somewhere." She pointed at Sylvanas. "That's why you made allies. Friends."

"Enemies." Sylvanas twisted her lips further, eyes narrowed.

Alleria smiled. "Yeah. Can't please everyone. Life's a bitch that way."

"It's always been bitchy. Even if there weren't any gods, it'd still be a bitch."

She nodded. "Mmhmm."

"You'd hate me," Sylvanas said. "I know you would. Who would blame you? I'm surprised anyone would want to put up with me. Sometimes I wonder why I even bother being around people, socializing with lunatics and fat cats and intellectual 'equals' where my actions, no matter how miniscule, don't make much of a difference."

"Windrunners don't give up so easily." Alleria grinned. "Come on, you know that. We're a very stubborn lot."

"We're a family of fools, more like it. We're this group of haughty, temperamental elves with chips on our shoulders the size of the Blue Child and White Lady. What the hell do people see in us?" Sylvanas thumped one fist against her breastplate. "What do they see in me? I'm not a good person!"

"Is anyone a good person? What even is good? What is bad? Selfishness and selflessness? What are morals if not sins? Aren't they all the same thing, if not painted in different shades with the same brush?" Alleria shrugged nonchalantly. "Tell me, Sylvanas, why do you think people, with every scrap of knowledge they have acquired about you, talk to you?"

"Why? I don't know! I hate this shitty government they've been running for millennia. I hate how they can't stop spending money and keeping their goddamn economy from constantly dipping in and out of market bubbles. I hate how no one does a damn thing for this transition, how natural it is for them to accept it as much as they rail against it. But most of all, I hate how they come to smart people—people like me—for help and still manage to screw it all up! If anything, the transition has made me a bigger fool than I already was for thinking I could do any kind of good in this galactic madhouse!"

"You're not as affected as you think you are. If the Nexus were truly mad, it would have been consumed by the Lords a long time ago. If not consumed, then conquered by the untamed Darkness. That's why there has to be a modicum of common sense in order to balance the irrationality of the transition. That's why people go to you—and many others—regardless of what you've done in the past. It's why you have friends. It's why you have allies. Why you have friends."

Sylvanas looked down at her feet. "They're not," she said.

"They are," said Alleria.

"They're not."

Alleria smiled, soft and warm. "Same old Sylvanas, as always. You deny your desires even when they're right in your face. But I've seen it. We all have. You've changed, but you're not as different from the rest of us. When something needs to be done, you'll do it. What are the sayings again? Come hell or high water? Consequences be damned?" She nodded again. "Yeah. That's it. That's what makes you different. That's what makes you Sylvanas Windrunner."

"Oh, cut the crap," Sylvanas rumbled. "You'll hate me. I know you will."

She shrugged again. "Maybe si, maybe no. Anything can happen. Anything will happen until it does, and what doesn't will merely become echoes."

Sylvanas looked up. "What are you then?"

"Hmm? What's that?"

"You're not Alleria. You can't be. So what are you? Are you an echo?"

The thing that was Alleria shook her head. "No, Sylvanas. I am not Alleria Windrunner. Neither am I an echo of Alleria Windrunner, for she has not been drawn. I am merely a conflux of energy that persists in all sectors of reality far and wide, dead or alive or not yet born. I am, so to say, just a probability, an eventuality, a possibility. I am what you think I need to be for this conversation to occur."

"But your thoughts are your own, aren't they?"

"Yes and no."

"Is this what I want to hear or," Sylvanas searched for the words, "or is this what I think I want to hear from Alleria or what you want me to hear?"

"All of them and none. I am whatever and whoever you want me to be."

"Don't be what I want you to be because you assumed this form from my 'desires', you git. Are you 'you' because you want to be or not?"

"Maybe."

Her eyebrow twitched. "Okay," she said, more to herself than to the aether. Then, more loudly: "If we're going to play it that way, then answer me one question that you might know."

"Speak, and you shall receive."

"Shimada Genji said he's heard you…something…say the names of the Heroes who may or may not be drawn into the Nexus."

"They did."

"My question is this: Will Alleria be drawn here? And when she does, will she be dead or alive?"

The aether shrugged. "We don't know."

Sylvanas scoffed.

"Sylvanas," and the aether was replaced by Alleria, and they were standing on the white sands of Eversong's beach. The spire of Windrunner Village could be seen peaking over the horizon. "I don't know if she will like you as you are now. She may hate not you but the Banshee Queen that wears your face. She may realize you are the Banshee Queen and learn the facts hidden from her or denied to see. But…I think…she'll understand. I hope she will. And I think she will still love you."

"You mean she will love the Sylvanas Windrunner, daughter of Lireesa," Sylvanas said quietly. "Sylvanas, her baby sister."

"Maybe."

"And if she doesn't?"

Alleria bowed her head. "Then I wish you the best of luck."

Sylvanas scuffed the sand with a foot. "I don't deserve this kind of companionship," she grumbled. "From Nova, Li-Ming, Valeera, Jaina, Li Li, Genji, Doodle…everyone."

"Everyone deserves to be loved, even if it's only a little." Alleria reached out and touched her cheek. Somehow, Sylvanas could sense its warmth. "You do, too. You should love yourself. Appreciate the good and the bad."

"You mean what you think is good and bad for me."

Alleria chuckled. "Yeah. That's right. You'll be fine."

YOU ARE—

YOU WILL—

YOU MAY—

"I don't need to be," said Sylvanas, leaning into the touch. "I want to be."

"You do you, Sylvanas," said Alleria, "and I'll do me." The sun shone over her shoulder and into Sylvanas's face. "Take care, Lady Moon."

She woke to the sound of the TV blasting at full volume…and Doodle's paw on her cheek. She blinked again and twisted her neck at him. He stared back, eyes kind and smile beatific. "Woof!" he greeted, and wiggled on the bed. His tail whacked up and down, down and up.

Sylvanas sat up and regarded the alarm clock. It was 6:30 in the morning. She swung her legs over the bed, went over to the window and pulled up the blinds. Dawn was breaking. Traffic was building up on the streets below. Some of the neon signs were the previous night were on, their bulbs bright and colorful.

The storm had passed.

Sylvanas gazed upon Hanamura City. She felt empty…but not dead. It was…calm.

Her phone vibrated from within the rune bag. Doodle looked over his shoulder at it. Sylvanas imitated a sigh and turned away from the skyline to fetch it. Unlocked the screen and saw several text messages and missed calls.

Jaina: "Are you okay, Sylvanas? I tried calling you, but you didn't answer. Please let me know. Everyone's worried about you."

Hammer: "Yo girl, that was one helluva storm! Ur not dead, are u? If u ain't, get to a payphone and hit me up. We'll get brunch at Riki's! My treat!"

Nova: "Sylvanas? Sylvie, hon, r u alright? I heard it was rough over where you're at, 'cause Jaina couldn't reach u. I couldn't, either, w/ the phone or my powers. Call me or text me, OK? If u feel like talking about anything, I'm here."

Li-Ming: "Is everything alright, Sylvanas? Plz send me something. Anything. Idc if it's an emoji or a Grumpy Cat gif or whatev. I just need to know you're okay."

Valeera: "Are you okay, Sylvanas? Are u still having problems getting thru in ur area? Let me know."

And then, one last message which made her eyebrows fly past her hairline:

Genji: "I need to talk to you. I'm at Shiokaze."

It was sent an hour ago.

She lowered the phone. Stared at the screen. Then she looked at Doodle. Doodle looked back expectantly, tail wagging. "Wanna go for a walk?" she asked him.

Doodle grinned. "Woof!"

They had left the room and Ideki's behind in fifteen minutes, and they spent the rest of that hour riding the tram north and then clocking the streets on the Winfield. Doodle rode shotgun in a saddlebag, mouth hanging open and tongue and ears flying in the wind. Sylvanas said nothing on the way there, eyes on the road. She was merely content to listen to the radio, still set on the OSJC 85.3. The DJ was going on about how parts of Hanamura-chiku had suffered some electrical damage but nothing too severe that a bit of elbow grease from the good folk and some helpful Realm Knights couldn't fix. If anyone was having problems, he said, they should contact their local service providers for further updates; most areas should be up by mid-afternoon.

What about therapy?

Sylvanas scowled. As if picking up on it, Doodle craned his head upward and bumped his nose against her leg. She glanced away from the red light to look down at him. He rewarded her with an open-mouthed, toothy grin. "Arf!" he said, and bopped his nose again, this time on the rune bag.

She remembered the text messages. She remembered the missed phone calls, calls made from Jaina asking of her; calls from Nova, uncertain and worried but picking up in slow, steady confidence; calls from Li-Ming trying to make light of Sylvanas's silence but failing spectacularly; calls from Valeera, straightforward but unable to hide the fear that something happened to her, because she had heard some of the things that happened to people touched by the aether, that's why it always had to be contained and filtered for proper usage, and maybe those things were wildly exaggerated or untrue but still...still.

There was nothing from Genji.

She thought about slipping on the headset and calling someone. Any of them.

The light turned green. She returned to the road.

When she arrived at the Shiokaze Rail Yard, she parked the cruiser at the base of the hill and helped Doodle out of the saddlebag. Together they climbed, toward the steel shipping containers. Genji was seated on the same red one he was on yesterday, but his posture was more relaxed. He had one arm draped over a bent leg; the other dangled from the lip of the container.

Sylvanas climbed up the ladder and went to sit down next to him. Doodle warped from the ground and coalesced beside her. "Woof!" he said to Genji.

"Ah, hello, Doodle-kun," said Genji, and stroked his head. "Ohayo, Lady Sylvanas," he said, bowing his own in greeting…and deference. "Did you get my message?"

"Yes," she said.

"That's good. Listen. I'm…I'm sorry. About yesterday. I didn't know it would offend you. I should have been more considerate—"

She cut him off with a dismissive wave of her hand. "It's fine. I…did not want to be forthright with you." Doodle dropped himself between cyborg and Banshee Queen, and she reached over to scratch his back with uncharacteristic absentmindedness. "I…dreamed about the aether last night. Or maybe I was touched by it. It spoke to me." She didn't look to see Genji pick his head up in alarm. "It wore my sister's face."

"Your sister? Sylvanas, you have—"

"I have two. An older and a younger sister. Alleria was—is—my older sister. Our family was attacked by the Old Horde a long time ago. We lost most of our family in the fighting. Alleria took it upon herself to get justice for them and went to another world to stop their masters. She had help; her…lover and their friends." Sylvanas stared at the horizon, her face smooth of emotion. "They never came back."

"Sylvanas…."

"The aether spoke her name, just like you said," she continued. "It…doesn't know if she'll come here. Didn't say when, either." She dug into Doodle's fur a little harder. He grunted and shifted so his paws were splayed out. "But…it kept talking about her as if she were still alive. Still out there. Somewhere."

"Maybe she is," said Genji. "Maybe something's been keeping her from coming back."

"Other than the Legion?"

"It's possible."

"Yeah." They fell quiet, listening to the sounds of commuter traffic and geese in flight.

"What will you do?" Genji asked.

"Hmm?"

"If Alleria should be drawn here…what will you do?"

Sylvanas shrugged. "I don't know," she replied, after a while. "Talk, I guess? Maybe fight? I'm not the same person I was back then. A lot's changed." And perhaps, in some way, if she was still alive, Alleria might have changed, too. "I don't know. If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, then…well…what will be, will be."

"Hai. C'est la vie."

"So I…apologize. For my behavior. I shouldn't have reacted that way, and I," Sylvanas worked the words lodged in her throat. "I know you didn't intend to offend me. You didn't know."

Genji laughed relief. "I'm glad. I had really thought I was in serious trouble and you would be out to get me! But…I didn't want to press you. Sometimes it is better to leave someone alone when they are troubled and let them sort things out."

"I don't think I got anywhere than I did before."

"That is alright. Some things take time. We mustn't rush them. I am certain you will find an answer eventually."

"I guess," said Sylvanas. "What about you? What will you do when Hanzo comes? Are you…."

"Going to fight him?" Genji finished for her. "No, Sylvanas. Once, maybe, I would have sought justice for the grievances my family had caused me. I would hurt him as he hurt me; not from the back, but from the front. But not anymore." He sighed. "I have made peace with who I am…what he turned me into and what Overwatch did to save what they could of me. I hope he will come to terms and find the solace his penance will bring him."

"Only he can decide if it's worth it or not."

"Yes. Him and him alone. Not even the aether can force that on him."

So they let those words linger in the air, and for a time they did not indulge to speak, only relax. Genji on her left, Sylvanas on his right, and Doodle between them, head tilted up to the wind. Several minutes went by, and there came the bovine groan of a train horn announcing its arrival. A cargo freighter trundled underneath them and disappeared eastbound like a giant red and blue worm leaving an iron furrow in its wake.

"Genji, there's something I need to know," Sylvanas began.

"What is that?"

"Did you seriously spend the night in this thing?" She rapped the steel container with her knuckles.

"Why, yes I did. It was quite comfortable."

"You mean to tell me you chose the comfort of a cold, dark, twenty-foot crate over a nice warm bed in some swanky hotel? Are you kidding me? What if someone lifted this onto a train as part of a last-minute shipment?"

"Then it would be quite the unexpected journey. I still haven't explored all of Hanamura-chiku."

Sylvanas gave him a long, disbelieving look. "You're such a hobbit, Genji," she concluded, shaking her head. Genji tossed his head in loud, surprised guffaws. When he settled down, she added, "Hey. I…know you and I can't eat anymore, so to say, but…Hammer invited me out to brunch at Rikimaru's. Sort of. She kind of thought I died in the storm and figured I wouldn't respawn for a while…but, you know, that's Hammer for you. I was thinking of getting the girls together, let them know I'm okay, and—"

"Yes, Sylvanas," said Genji, the smile clear in his voice. "I would be honored to go as your guest of honor."

She scoffed. "You make it sound like we're on a date. And aren't you seeing that Mercy chick?"

"Oh no! I would never try to steal you from your girls. And I am very good friends with Mercy; there really is nothing more between us than that."

"They're not my girls," Sylvanas uttered under her breath, and she got to her feet. "I don't do that kind of labeling."

They left Shiokaze, her and Genji and Doodle, and an hour later, at eight in the morning in Hanamura City. They had stepped off the electric trolley at one of the four-way intersectional stops and headed toward the two-storey ramen shop with the slurping murloc holding his bowl of ramen high in the air. Sylvanas raised a hand and gave them a simple, short to the point wave, and if Jaina had been the first to see her then she would have done a double-take at the way her gait was lax and loose—a stark juxtaposition to her proud, set shoulders. "Yo," she said.

"Sylvanas? Oh thank the Light, you're okay!" said Jaina, who had been absorbed with her cell phone.

"Well, lookee here! Our missing Hero's returned!" said Hammer. "How ya hangin', Sylvanas? And hey, is that Gai Shishio I see with you?"

"Maa maa! It is I, the Green Cyborg Ninja Dude!" said Genji, flailing his arms about with bombastic flair. He looked like a referee signaling the winning touchdown at a football game. "It is good to see you, Hammer."

"Sylvanas!" Li-Ming and Valeera cried simultaneously, and made to rush at her.

Nova beat them to it, causing them to squawk and bowl into one another. "SYLVANAS, HONEY!" She leaped toward Sylvanas just as she could raise her arms away, and the force of her weight landing on top of her made the Banshee Queen twirl her around. "I missed you!"

"Ugh, you just saw me yesterday," Sylvanas said, once she had put Nova down.

"I couldn't reach you! None of us did! We were so worried!"

"I'm fine. Just fell asleep early, that's all."

"You sure?" Nova asked. Her face took on not suspicion, but concern. Sylvanas figured—no, knew without a reasonable doubt that she had taken a peek at the thoughts curdling at the back of her mind. Of Alleria and the shadow of the multiverse…the Nexus.

Sylvanas nodded and gently eased Nova back. "Yes, I'm sure." We can talk later, she sent the thought to her. You and anyone else, if they want. I've caused enough trouble already. "Now come on. All of you. Unless you prefer waiting in line like the rest of these dopes."

Nova beamed. "Okay!" Doodle barked agreement.

"Now that's what I like to hear!" said Hammer, and fell in line behind her with Genji at her side.

Li-Ming and Valeera resorted to untangling each other and brushing themselves off before they joined the group.

"I'm glad everything's alright," Jaina told Sylvanas, falling into step with her into Rikimaru's. "It was pretty bad last night."

"I know."

"Some of the things I've seen…or, maybe I dreamed them…it was intense. It brought back some painful memories. But," and Jaina gave her a small smile, "it also brought me good memories. Reminders of what I've forgotten and what I should remember."

"I know," Sylvanas said again. "I had them, too. In a way."

Jaina saw the blank, neutral look she wore, read what was underneath. Sylvanas could see it in her eyes, and for a moment she seemed to want to give voice to her thoughts. Thankfully, she didn't. "Everything will be alright," she assured her.

Sylvanas groaned wearily. "This is the Nexus, Proudmoore. What comes up must come down. Something's bound to go wrong sooner or later."

"If it does, we'll be right there to fix it!"

"Or break it."

"And then we'll fix it again."

"And then the cycle will repeat itself. The more money, the better."

Jaina sighed. "I give up."

"Smart move."

"You'll never change."

Sylvanas pursed her lips. "Hmm…Maybe not. Or…maybe I will." She picked up her pace, the ghost of a smirk rising unbidden to her lips.

Jaina blinked owlishly. "Huh? What do you mean? Hey, wait!"