The screen faded back in to show that a good portion of the city had been destroyed, except for several canals of water, which seemed to be flowing into a big hole and off the island, into seeming emptiness. Ghasts were still soaring around like nobody's business.

Isa muttered something under her breath that nobody caught.

The spider hybrid silently stared at everything, faintly open-mouthed, when she heard a call. "Jesse!"

Jesse turned to her left to see Ivor and Gill herding some people near a small group forming near the big hole, which was pretty much just a lake at this point, Maya shooting arrows as best as she could at the remaining monsters. Petra was holding her sword out defensively, beckoning frantically at a small group of the Sky Citizens as a fireball went soaring over their heads, the ghast who'd spit it closing in-

A flash of gold and black leaped across the screen, sweeping her sword in a wide arc as she spun in place, knocking the ghast to the ground and making it explode into a huge cloud of smoke and dust, before landing running and racing towards the group. "You retrieved the Eversource!" she exclaimed to Reginald, as if nobody could see this.

Reginald nodded and held out the small white chicken, who was cheerfully clucking without a care in the world. "Yes, ma'am."

"Everyone!" Jesse turned again to see Milo leading a large portion of people holding swords and makeshift weapons towards the other citizens. Most of whom were trembling like leaves in the spot where they were standing.

Hadrian snorted. "Cowards."

"I'm sorry, would you not be a bit panicked in this situation?" Isa snapped, head snapping around so that she was glaring right at Hadrian.

The Ancient Architect snorted derisively. "Of course not."

Lukas coughed into his elbow, the cough sounding suspiciously like "Arrogant."

Real-Jesse developed a small fit of the giggles.

"Jesse, there you are!" the blonde innkeeper shouted to Jesse, having noticed she was standing there.

The Founder blurted out a long paragraph, very nearly cutting Milo's comment off. "Jesse, this situation is getting out of hand. We simply can't stop all the monsters and protect my people."

As if there was someone controlling the scene they were watching, a fireball came soaring at the group of the citizens behind Petra. Petra lifted her hand and fired a huge, blazing fireball at the one approaching, blasting it into harmlessly glowing bits of rock before it could get too close to the group behind her.

"The longer we stay here, the more danger my people will be in!"

Jesse frowned thoughtfully, looking around at the ghasts surrounding them... then at the lake of water at her feet.

"Yes... you could ride the waterfalls to safety!" Harper exclaimed, a big, pleased smile spreading over her face.

"Well... the waterfalls can take us to safety..." Jesse said, slowly, eyes narrowing at the rushing water inches from her feet.

"Are you crazy?!" one citizen in the crowd exclaimed, making Jesse look at her, "the waterfalls will just take us to the Void!"

Jesse's gaze changed to stare at the lake of water at her feet, eyes narrowing as her eyes shifted thoughtfully. She seemed to be unsure as to how to convince them. "No, there's- there's land..." she began, trailing off slowly as if unsure how to phrase it.

Surprisingly (or, well, perhaps not so surprisingly), Milo spoke up. "Jesse and her friends have done nothing but to help us so far. I will show you all just how much I believe in their word." His gaze switched to look at Jesse, his brow furrowing over his eyes.

Isa nodded, reaching one hand up to tap the corner of her lip. "Yes... I trust Jesse as well," she said quietly, giving the other black-haired woman an encouraging nod.

Real-Jesse threw her hands into the air, nearly hitting Petra and Jace in the face by accident. "Hallelujah, you two are finally agreeing about something!"

Several other audience members voiced agreement upon hearing that statement.

The black-haired spider hybrid took a deep breath, and hopped forward a bit, landing in the water with a small splash.

Isa followed shortly after, sheathing her swords before jumping in. Milo followed moments after, one hand going up to keep his hat in place. Petra shoved Aiden in, making the brown-haired boy flail his arms before toppling in. Maya and Gill jumped in along with Ivor, more and more citizens following them as Ghasts soared around them, until all of the inhabitants of Sky City were in the water with them.

The spider hybrid gulped a bit, turning around so that she was facing the front-

And let out a little yelp as the river she'd been riding abruptly dropped out beneath her into a large waterfall, plummeting through the clouds. Slowly, more and more citizens followed the example.

Maya let out a relieved sigh. "I'm so glad that they trust Milo and Isa enough to follow Jesse off. That might not have turned out well if they didn't."

"Honestly, I don't think most of them would've followed if only Milo or only Isa had agreed with Jesse. I'm sure Milo has his own little faction of 'followers'-" Olivia made air quotes around the word 'followers'.

Milo let out a half-hearted, offended sniff.

"- but there's probably a lot of citizens who also follow Isa. With their combined 'endorsement'-" Lukas snickered at that. "- that was enough to convince all of the other citizens to follow."

Isa and Milo exchanged glances.

Jesse hit the water a few seconds later, resurfacing a good second later and spitting out a large mouthful of water. "I don't think I have to say this," the spider hybrid muttered, "but I won't have to go swimming for a long, long, long time after this."

Half of the audience stifled loud snorts at that.

Reginald, who was bobbing around in the water, gaped around him with wide eyes. "You weren't lying!" he declared.

"Aww, does it wook wike Jesse could wie?" Axel said in a baby voice, pinching Jesse's cheek.

"Gerroff!" was Jesse's reply to that.

"There's ground everywhere!"

The other citizens seemed pretty amazed by that as well, staring at them as if they were some adventurers who'd found the Holy Grail or something.

Isa looked gravely at Jesse as the spider hybrid climbed out of the lake. "Jesse, I cannot thank you enough," she said quietly. "You have saved us all."

"I really didn't do that much," Jesse said mildly.

The entire audience gaped at her.

"Jesse," Ivor said very, very slowly, as if he couldn't believe what Jesse was saying, "in one day, you found the Eversource-"

"Discovered land-" Mevia added.

"Got the entire city down there-" Cassie interjected.

"And managed to keep Aiden from going completely cuckoo," Gill added, pointing in Aiden's direction.

"All I really did was talk to Isa and Aiden a bit and dodge around a lot. I really didn't do that much at all," Jesse replied, still sounding incredibly mild as she gave a little shrug.

Lukas put his head in his hands. "I swear to Notch, you're the most oblivious person in the world sometimes," he muttered.

"What was that?" The blonde looked up and over to see a mischievously wicked glint flashing to life in Jesse's green eyes as she slowly turned to face him, a grin that was somehow bigger than the Chesire Cat's fixed upon her face.

"... nothing."

"Thought so." There was a short pause. "Oh yeah-" She gave him finger guns. "I haven't told you that joke about the German sausage yet."

"... what-?"

"It was the wurst."

There was a long pause, before Jace abruptly burst out cackling and buried his head in his hands. Lukas had the most pained expression of all time crossing his face as he stared at the petite girl beaming at him with a huge grin. "Jesse-"

"Do you know what the worst thing about having a party in space is?"

"Jesse, why-"

"You have to planet."

Now most of the audience was either laughing, fighting grins, or groaning at the tops of their lungs. Some of them were doing the last two bits simultaneously.

"Jesse, please don't-"

"I have a few jokes about unemployed people, but it's not like it really matters- none of them work."

"Jesse, stop-"

"I'd tell you a chemistry joke-"

"Jesse, no-"

"Jesse, yes," Petra chimed in, and, oh look, she was grinning as well. Clearly she enjoyed watching Lukas suffer.

"- but I know I wouldn't get a reaction."

Ivor was cackling so hard that he'd nearly fallen out of his chair, which in turn was causing more and more members of the audience to have giggling fits, which was causing even more audience members to start laughing- yes, it was a vicious cycle indeed.

"Ooh, ooh, Lukas, guess what?"

Lukas was practically begging Jesse at this point. "Jesse-"

"I'm on a seafood diet. I see food, and I eat it!" Jesse just had the most evil grin of all time fixed on her face.

"Jesse, I'm literally begging you, please stop-"

"Ya know why I'm making all these puns, Lukas?"

"I'm literally begging-"

"Because it's my respunsibility."

"JESSE!" Lukas almost wailed, flopping forward and landing on top of the coffee table with a defeated sort of thump.

Jesse leaned forward so that her lips were situated next to his ear, her Chesire-Cat grin still on her face. "Are you enjoying your punishment, Lukas?"

Lukas let out this incoherent wail. "I'm sorry-"

"Too late for that. I'll back off for now... but be prepared for more punpredictable jokes in the future." Jesse sat back in her chair, looking very pleased with herself.

Isa recovered from her own snickering fit and mock-glared at Lukas. "What evil monster have you released, Lukas," she teased him, voice still heavy with mirth.

"Jesse, I will never insult anyone ever again, I will feed the hungry and clothe the poor, just for the love of Notch, stop making puns!" Lukas wailed.

Jesse just continued to grin at him.

"So..." Reginald said slowly onscreen, making everyone look back at the screen just in time to see the 'pause' signal disappearing off the screen. "What do we do now?"

Onscreen, the spider hybrid shrugged with a grin spreading over her face. "What do you do? Go have some fun! Night won't be here for a while at least. And you were cooped up in there for so long that you should be allowed to do whatever you want!" She paused, thoughtfully. "For a while at least. Then you might wanna worry about making some shelter."

Several members of the audience couldn't help but giggle a bit at that along with the spider hybrid.

"Freeze, criminal!" And Jesse looked over to see Aiden's head jerking up nervously to see some guards stalking towards the brown-haired boy, while Maya and Gill watched quietly from the sidelines. They looked torn between helping Aiden and turning away from him. "You're not going anywhere."

The screen switched to show Jesse looking over her shoulder, Petra and Ivor also coming over to Jesse with water pouring off of their clothes (and, in Petra's case, copious amounts of steam). Milo looked over at Jesse as well, his brow furrowing a bit, but before anyone could say anything else Jesse was suddenly tackled by a rather large blonde fluffball. "I knew you'd do it!"

The spider hybrid blinked a bit, winded by the flying tackle, but grinned cheekily at Lukas when she recovered her breath. "For someone who knew I could do it, you're awfully happy to see me."

Hadrian stifled a 'cough' at that.

Lukas grinned back at her, before turning and pouncing on Petra and Ivor as well, accidentally squashing the both of them together. Petra looked a bit pained as she glanced at Ivor, but to everyone's surprise, Ivor was looking faintly amused. "You're worse than Soren," he joked, "he used to have the most spontaneous flying tackles of the rest of the Order combined."

"Yeah, I remember when he did that one time and nearly made me blow up a block of TNT in his face," Magnus said, giving the ginger a pointed look.

"I said I was sorry-"

Petra tolerated the hug for another few seconds, before gingerly disengaging herself from it and glancing over in Aiden's direction as he walked towards the guards quietly. "I'm just speculating here," she said, putting her hands on her hips, "but I'm guessing Aiden's having some regrets."

Jesse winced a bit. "Yeah, I bet he's in some deep trouble. The Sky Citizens are NOT happy with him."

"Yeah," and the screen switched to show Lukas grinning evilly, tail twitching about and ears twisting around in excitement. "Hopefully they dig a deep hole, bury him in it, surround it with lava and-"

He cut himself off, looking a bit startled. The screen switched to show Isa, Reginald, Milo, and Petra gaping at the ocelot hybrid in silent shock. Ivor was grinning evilly at Lukas and nodding slightly, while Jesse was shaking her head with a tiny, amused yet sad smile on her face.

Axel blinked several times. "Uhh... remind me not to piss him off." He glanced at Lukas, who was still recovering from the punfest Jesse had been having with him. "Too much."

Petra snorted at that.

"Uh, wow," Gill put one hand to his temple. "You, uh," he blinked at the screen silently several times, "you can get real vengeful, huh."

Real-Lukas was blinking. "Uhh... apparently."

Onscreen, the ocelot hybrid grinned sheepishly, his ears flattening against his head. "Uh, sorry. Got a bit carried away there."

The guards were marching Aiden across the grass towards them, and Aiden glanced up at Jesse, before back at the ground.

Jesse cleared her throat a bit, her voice taking on this completely blank tone. "Aiden."

The boy was halted in his tracks, and the boy raised his eyes to look at Jesse, though the rest of his head was angled to stare at the ground. "Oh. Uh, hi, Jesse. I'm, uh..." He let out a slow sigh, squeezing his eyes shut, before opening them and lifting his head to stare at Jesse directly. "I'm sorry to cause all that trouble. I've, er... I've got some regrets, to say the least."

"I'd say you have a lot to think about," Lukas replied, voice sounding colder than a glacier.

The brown-haired boy let out a weak laugh at that, a hint of self-loathing flashing through it. "Yeah, that's... that's for sure."

"Try to do something good for these guys, okay?" Jesse asked him, crossing her arms and raising one eyebrow. "Maybe once you've... you know, served some time for what you've done, maybe Is- the Founder," she hastily corrected, "will let you have a new start."

Aiden tilted his head to one side, eyes glazing over a bit thoughtfully. "Yeah... maybe I could become a writer."

Everyone blinked a little at that.

"I think it's safe to say that, uh," Stacy cleared her throat. "No one was really expecting that."

Aiden let a half-smile twitch over his face. "I won't try to compete with you anymore, Jesse."

Jesse just gave a noncommittal shrug at that, and Aiden was led away a few steps when he paused. "Oh, right- Jesse."

The spider hybrid blinked a bit in surprise at being addressed for a second time.

"I'll keep what you told me back up on Sky City in mind." With that, the former villain gave a small smile and allowed the guards to lead him away.

Onscreen, the ocelot hybrid blinked, before looking over at Jesse. "Did I miss something...?"

"Ooooh, Lukas, are you jealous?" Maya teased from where she was practically perched in Gill's lap.

"Meh."

Jesse looked over at Lukas blankly, before letting out a soft chuckle. "Eh, tell ya later."

"Hello? Everyone, please," the Founder called, making the ragtag group of citizens crowd around the base of the hill she'd just stepped onto, "this is your Founder speaking. Now that we're all safe, we need to organize. Start planning our new community."

Milo scoffed loudly, making all the citizens look over at Milo as he shoved his way to the raised bit of land himself, stepping up so that he was on the same level as the Founder. "Are you listening to yourself? That's insane!" he snapped.

"How is that insane?!" Isa immediately snapped at Milo, her head snapping around.

Cassie casually- yeah, totally, she totally didn't seize the remote, slap the pause button, and then casually duck down behind her and Aiden's couch- paused the video.

This might take a few minutes.

"Are you joking?! We've been trapped in that place for far too long!" Milo shouted at Isa, voice rising both in pitch and in intensity as he stormed towards her, getting right up in the Founder's face. "You expect us to just go back to our old life? To our old prison?!"

"Well, maybe," Isa nearly screamed at Milo, unconsciously unsheathing her swords and not noticing how someone from the group of people on the floor was rising to walk over to them, "if you hadn't started an illegal rebellion, you wouldn't be thinking-"

"HEY FRIENDS"

Both of them jumped, their heads jerking away from each other's as another head popped up between them, before a set of arms looped around their shoulders and yanked them into an awkward sort of group hug with an almost-maniacally-grinning Jace, his smile huge and forced with his eyes wide with pointed anger as he whirled them around so they were facing away from the screen and dropping his voice to a whisper so that everyone else wouldn't hear them.

"'Cause that's what we are. Friends. Friends who won't waste everyone's time with petty lover's spats."

The two of them started spluttering in protest, but Jace wasn't nearly done.

"Friends who won't scare the crap out of Jesse-"

He jerked his head to indicate Jesse, who looked like she might have another one of her panic attacks any second and was being comforted by Lukas.

"-by stabbing each other and are we fucking clear." On the last four words, Jace's forced cheery voice dropped into the scariest, most gravelly, almost demonic voice that the two Sky Citizens had ever heard.

"Yes sir," they squeaked back.

"Fantastic!" And in the blink of an eye, Jace was back to his usual cheery self, bouncing back to his seat.

Isa and Milo proceeded to have a silent mental agreement between each other.

Remind me to never, ever get on his bad side, and I will not murder you until we get back to Sky City.

Seeing that the crisis had been averted, Cassie resumed the video.

Milo resumed speaking onscreen. "We were prisoners long enough on that island in the sky! It's time for us to run free! Build whatever we please!" he declared, several members of the crowd cheering a bit at that.

The Blaze hybrid's lips twisted. "Oh, those two just cannot get along."

Jesse gave a helpless shrug at that. "Well, they are talking about two completely different... well, philosophies, almost," she whispered back.

The Founder glared at Jesse, who happened to have a front-row seat for this whole scene. Lovely. "Jesse, I cannot allow my people to be influenced by this... naive idealist!" she replied, sharply.

"Bah!" Milo growled back. "I'm sure I DO look like a naive idealist- through the eyes of an oppressive dictator!"

"O-kay, that was going a little too far," Stampy winced.

Isa was seriously considering going back on that mental agreement she'd just made.

The spider hybrid scowled, putting her lower arms on her hips and crossing the middle and upper sets. "Both of you, quit it! Fighting isn't going to solve anything!" she reprimanded them both.

Milo scoffed. "It will if I win!"

Real-Jesse facepalmed at that. "Notchdarnit," she muttered.

"Oh, of course you'd think that way!" Isa shot back, scoffing derisively and turning back to the people. "You don't understand, it will be night soon, and that is when the monsters come out! If we don't prepare, we'll be in danger!"

Several gasps erupted from the waiting Sky Citizens, whispering breaking out among them.

"You're just making excuses to control our behavior like before!" Milo rebuked her over the gasps of the crowd, "we must trust in ourselves! Be able to learn from our mistakes!"

"I'm not saying we shouldn't do that," Isa groaned. "All I'm saying is, that point won't exactly matter if we're all dead-"

"Well of course the people can build," Onscreen-Isa protested, interrupting her real self, "but we need a system! Some rules! Rules aren't bad!"

The spider hybrid interrupted the heated discussion, making both of them look at her. "You're both right."

She stiffened a bit when she realized the rest of the crowd was staring at her, before turning around to face them. "You don't just want to run around with no plan like a headless chicken or something, but you can't schedule and organize everything, either. People do need to be free to try new things, but you gotta be safe about it."

"Ahh, that's our Jesse. A natural diplomat," Ivor said, giving Jesse a grin.

"Did you just say 'our' Jesse?" Gabriel jumped on the opportunity a bit too eagerly.

Ivor's cheeks pinked, and he rapidly turned back to the screen. "What? No. Shut up."

Harper grinned in amusement, being careful to hide it behind her hand.

The rest of the crowd began cheering at that, and Milo tilted his head thoughtfully. "I suppose I still have much to learn..." he said, a bit grudgingly, "thank you, Jesse."

Real-Jesse put her hands up in the air. "I have no idea what he's thanking me for."

Onscreen, Isa's brow furrowed a bit, thoughtfully. "I don't understand yet..." she spoke slowly, "but... I trust you." She looked around at the ground around them, before giving a nonchalant sort of shrug. "I suppose the era of Sky City is over."

Milo nodded, hopping down from his block of land, with Isa following. "We may disagree on how to run this place," he agreed, "but I thank you for everything you have done."

The Founder smiled wryly. "I guarantee that we'll be telling stories about your visit for many, many years to come."

"Indeed," Reginald murmured, still looking fascinated by the prospect of land.

The spider hybrid set her lower arms on her hips, eyeing Isa with a small smile. "Try and play nice with Milo, okay? I know he's a bit crazy-"

Reginald and Isa were barely able to stifle loud snorts at that. Milo huffed, fighting back the smile forming over his own face.

Onscreen, the blonde innkeeper grinned sheepishly at Isa.

"- and you're not always going to get along, but he really does care about the people. Don't waste this chance," Jesse added, a slightly warning tone creeping into her voice.

Isa regarded Milo for a moment, eyes narrowing a bit, before a smile formed on her face, and she let out a surprisingly warm chuckle. "Yes, I am... starting to see that. And I will do my best." And with that, the two of them walked off to go discuss something.

Lukas watched the Founder leave for a minute, before letting out a little laugh and shaking his head. His tail flipped around cheerfully. "You know something? She was kinda scary at first. But... she's alright."

Isa smiled at that, looking pleased at the compliment.

Petra nodded, staring after the two with a small smile. "Yeah, I'm gonna miss that crazy guy." She cocked her head to the side thoughtfully. "Y'know, I guess we should prepare for nightfall, too. Without another portal, we're stuck here."

"Yeeeaaaah, about that," Sparklez began, half-jokingly, and making Petra grin at him.

Onscreen, the spider hybrid's eyes widened, and she let out a nervous laugh. "Oh... whoops. I guess with all the fighting and monsters and stuff I kinda forgot to mention.. when we were on the ground with the Founder earlier, we totally found the portal!"


A/N: (laughs) If you wanna see why I didn't update yesterday (like I was planning to), go read Furry Purrdicaments by RapidSammi, and some of the comments. (grins wickedly)

Ah, because the name has been guessed... ... I'm still not revealing who Azira is until people correctly figure out what I meant by the hints. x3

RQTC: Have you checked out some of the character reveals for Phantasmagoria on DeviantArt yet? I've posted two x3 and I'm plannin' on posting more.

Also, one more hint for deciphering the code. 'JESSE'

LunarStarsMoons: (smiles) / Nope. Not quite. Keep trying x3

Kaos Ruin: Yep, that was the aim x3

the indecisive bird: Thanks! / Correct! / Heehee x3 / I don't know how to use HTML very well, so yah xD / Yep. And aww, really? That sucks.

Darkbeast Dend: ... I see... / Ah. / ... I don't really have one.

BeliTheGhoti0304: Correct x3 / Heehee x3 / Ah, same here. x3

Seastorm25: Hmm... I think I've seen the username before. Anyway, nice to meetcha (again xD) / Oh, wow! That's cool :3 / (laughs) It's fine, I don't mind. / Yes, true xD / (grins) / Ahhh, I see.

RapidSammi: Alright, gimme a while to work that out x3 / (laughs) / Also, thank Crisper for the late update. xD

RavenBlaze4850: Thanks! It was a bastard to write, though. / Heehee x3 / Yes, I noticed :3 Thank you for watching me!

AquaK13: Teehee x3 / Ah, I see. / (grins) / Do you not have dA? You could totally comment and guess some of the letters yourself... / (laughs) No can do, I ain't done yet xD / Bai!

Rabbits rule: (laughs) Sorry. / (giggles a bit)

Emily The Avenger: Sort of. Did you use the hint for the code properly? I added another hint for the code up above. x3

Insane Acrobat: No, it's fine; I've been at a wedding xD so no worries. / It took so long to write x3 / (laughs)

CrystalTearsofFaith: Darn (frowns) / (giggles)

Jack638: (grins) / Oh, there's no 'might' when we're referring to Episode 6. I'm goin' the full shebang on this thing.

homeworkoverload: The ink decays, the walls at bay, but the reckoning has come today! / Okay x3 / (laughs) We'll see.

J.M.M: You better believe it buddy xD

S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Yee! x3 / Aww, that sucks :/

And that's all for this chappie, folks! See y'all next time!

x.X. A.L. X.x