Belle

"Lycaon," said Belle, her eyes still traveling over what he called casual dress. "You said you want to not stand out?"

"Correct," said Lycaon as he fidgeted with his bandana.

"And how did you arrive at this… um.. Choice?"

"I perused a suitable reference material regarding modern fashion," said Lycaon, who then looked down at himself. "Did I choose poorly? Does it not seem suitably fashionable?"

"Oh, it does! But- um.. What suitable reference material?"

"A fashion magazine for canine thirens, Alpha Pawda."

Belle made a mental note to immediately get a subscription to that magazine. But as it was, she'd never seen a canine thiren dressed like Lycaon was now; not on the streets, anyway. On TV, sure.

But, most of the city's population of canine thirens was way off on the west side of the city, so she didn't see many around Sixth Street or Lumine Square at all. She could only assume that Lycaon knew more about keeping a low profile as a wolf thiren than she did, but as her eyes traced his tanktop again, she had significant doubts. Who could possibly keep their eyes off him?

Lycaon checked his stopwatch again. "Shall we depart? If we walk briskly, we will make a train that will bring us to Ballet Twins Square fifteen minutes ahead of your rendezvous."

"Yes," said Belle. She hefted up her backpack with her tricks and her older, backup HDD and VR set. She'd yet to have a chance to replace the one that fried yesterday. She checked the charge on two taser pistols and hid them in her vest. Now ready, she nodded up at Lycaon who was watching her with interest.

"Ready!"

"I favor your preparations at self-defense, Lady Belle," said Lycaon seriously. "But please avoid engaging in combat and allow me to handle any dangers except at last resort. And I trust that, if I place you somewhere, I can trust you to stay there."

Belle felt a twinge of annoyance and indignation. "I'm not helpless, Lycaon. You just caught me in a bad moment yesterday."

"Lady Belle-"

"I promise to stay safe, Lycaon, okay?" said Belle. "But if I see an opportunity to act, I will."

Lycaon seemed about to say something else., but Belle gave him a firm look. The words seemed to die behind his teeth.

"As you wish, Lady Belle. We go."

They picked up Wise's bangboo proxy and he wished them luck as they left, Lycaon checking his sensor net before opening the front door and stepping out ahead of Belle. He gazed about the street and gave her the all clear signal, and Belle set out with a sigh. It was somewhat annoying to second-guess just walking around, but she could only trust Lycaon's expertise at the bodyguard thing.

There were assassins out to get her, after all. Proven fact. She'd be a total fool to ignore him now.

They began the mundane walk to the Sixth Street subway station, Lycaon keeping Belle to his right and away from the center of the street. His head moved this way and that, like an oscillating fan, while his wolf ears rotated about somewhat like fuzzy radar dishes. As Lycaon busied himself with noticing all the things he apparently needed to notice, Belle began noticing that perhaps his 'low profile' outfit was not quite doing the trick.

The local highschool must be having their first early lunch hour as the street was moderately populated with students seeking street foods for their meal. Youthful heads turned towards them as they walked, and all of the attention was obviously on Lycaon. It seemed especially intense from the schoolgirls. Belle saw hands over mouths, pointing, whispering, and no few cellphones coming out for photos and video.

"Is? Is that Whitefox? From Moonbarkers?" Belle overheard someone say.

"Yes! Wait. No. Uh.. I dunno. Maybe?" said a responder. "Does he have a brother?"

Belle looked at Lycaon but if he was noticing the attention, he gave no sign. Likely, he had categorized the high school students as non-threatening and stopped paying attention to them. Belle walked beside him and took out her phone and typed in a quick search.

What had the kid said? Moonbarkers? That sounded like a band or something.

Belle almost froze in her tracks. It was indeed a band. An all-canine thiren boy group of six members- and one was notably white-furred and statuesque like Lycaon was. Belle brought her phone closer to her face and zoomed in on the obvious 'Whitefox.' She pursed her lips. It really didn't look like Lycaon at all. Sure, the singer had white fur and a poofy tail and a lean form, but to Belle's eye, differences were obvious: Whitefox's snout was a bit more snubbed, his ears a bit more rounded, and his neck and shoulders were only slightly muscled- practically scrawny when compared to Lycaon's beef-rock deltoids.

The human kids in this part of the city were not exposed to enough canine thirens to effectively notice their differences. They were all stereotyping Lycaon! But, as Belle flipped through a few more photos of this Whitefox person- Lycaon's outfit was so on-style with the Moonbarkers that it was practically a cosplay.

Maybe the schoolgirls were somewhat justified in their confusion, after all.

Belle thought this was actually pretty funny. Lycaon's naive attempt at modern fashion was drawing more attention to himself than his butler uniform would have. Listening to the various gossipy conversations of the people who walked past became Belle's brief joy.

"Ohmygawd ohmygawd! That's Whitefox!"

"Ohmygawd!"

"Who's that with him? He doesn't have a girlfriend does he? Ohmygawd, I'd die. I'm dead."

"No way that's his girlfriend. She's totally not hot enough."

"Oh. Facts. Whew."

Belle's joy evaporated and she felt a flash of anger as she went from amused to pissed in a half second. Her head snapped towards the source of that comment, two high school girls holding iced coffees outside Gearbox. Belle leveled a glare at them that made their heads bob backward and they blinked, open mouthed. Good, they got the message.

Belle fell towards Lycaon's side and grasped him about the waist, her left arm barely reaching around Lycaon's torso to his left waist. Lycaon looked down at her in brief surprise.

"Put your arm around me, Lycaon," whispered Belle quickly. "We have to look the part."

Lycaon obligingly put his big arm around her shoulder. Belle was immediately gratified to hear shocked gasps from behind them. She looked over her shoulder at the two girls and gave them a sneering grin. Their mouths opened wider. Belle looked away and Lycaon guided her into the subway system.

"Who is that bitch?" said one of the schoolgirls loudly.

"She must give it good or something. Only explanation," said the other.

Belle held to Lycaon's hip a little tighter, a bit off balance by the commentary. She tried to remember herself in high school. Had she been that vicious?

… probably worse, if she was honest…

They headed down the stairs into the subway system and Lycaon maintained his vigilance, but in the enclosed spaces, he had much fewer things to worry about and his head stopped moving around so much. Lycaon led them both into a secluded corner, indicating Belle should stand slightly behind him in the cover of a maintenance doorway.

"Lady Belle," said Lycaon quietly. "I fear I have made a miscalculation with my clothing. There seems to be more attention upon me, not less."

"Yeah," said Belle. "I think it's because you look like some pop star."

Lycaon looked down at her in shock, his mouth opening slightly. "A pop star!"

He was silent for a moment, his eyes sweeping the subway platforms again. Schoolgirls waiting for the train on the opposite track were even now taking his picture.

"I must apologize, Lady Belle," said Lycaon with chagrin. "That my ignorance of popular music should endanger the safety of my principal… it is a grievous oversight. I truly did not foresee this day. I will remedy my gap of knowledge, as soon as possible. You have my word."

"I didn't know either, Lycaon," said Belle. "You don't need to fall on your sword for everything. Plus, I think it means your plan is working, just a bit too well. No one thinks you're my bodyguard. Everyone thinks I'm maybe your girlfriend. Or maybe a personal assistant. And that's your entire idea, right?"

"That is true… but the photographs… these people will share them online. And your enemies may well know your appearance," said Lycaon.

"Yeah, sorta," said Belle, trying to keep her own anxiety down. "That camera feed from the hollow was pretty unclear- and I had my VR headset covering my face, right?"

"True," said Lycaon.

"So they would probably need to confirm who I was before making an attempt, and they wouldn't assume I'm the girlfriend of a pop star, now would they?"

"That is a dangerous assumption to make about an enemy we know little." Lycaon made a noncommittal grunting noise as the onrushing woosh of air announced the incoming subway train. "But so: I suppose we have no choice but to continue. How might we further advertise this fiction?"

Belle smiled up at Lycaon. "To start: let's hold hands."

She held out her hand. It vanished inside the gentle grasp of Lycaon's large, fuzzy palm.

Belle

The subway stop at Ballet Twins was deserted. It was an old, mostly commercial district that lost its purpose when the Ballet Twins towers were consumed by the large hollow nearby. What had been the central point of a hub of business had became a ghost town. Belle imagined the property prices here must have already been low, so it was a mild curiosity how much a newly active hollow would knock off the price of the section that Belobog snapped up.

Belle knew that Ben Bigger, the bear thiren general manager of Belobog, was both frugal and flexible. From the few commissions Belle had performed with Belobog, it seemed like Ben had the unenviable task of balancing the books of the company while supporting the expenditures of a mechanical research department that the CEO gave free reign. Possibly it was acquisition opportunities like this one with Little Twins Hollow that made it all come together for Belobog, somehow.

Lycaon took a few moments to scan the city skyline before he allowed Belle to climb the second half of the stairs, and when Belle reached street level, the perfectly rounded dome of the new Little Twins Hollow loomed before them down the main avenue. Meanwhile, the hollow's much larger cousin across the river loomed ominously in the distance, one of the tops of the Ballet Twins skyscrapers peeking out of the rounded edge of oblivion.

Little Twins was one of the smallest hallow domes Belle had yet seen. Her eyes interpreted the edge of the half-sphere to be a soft violet color that rapidly went almost fully black. That edge was usually a dark purple. Could that subtle difference be an indicator of a hallow's age? Or perhaps it was only size related? It was a wonder.

But then again, hollows were weird in that they seemed to look a bit different depending on the observer. Wise said they looked crimson-tinted to him. Still others claimed they saw a green tint.

Dwarfed by the hollow's dome in the distance, the street before Lycaon and Belle was hastily blocked off by construction barriers with the Belobog logo on them. A few bear thiren in their work uniforms were putting the last few sections in place. Being as Lycaon and Belle were the only people on the abandoned street, they quickly gained the attention of the workers. Their largest member stepped forward as Lycaon neared and put large hands on his hips.

"What do you want here, canid?"

Lycaon came to a stop and stood stiffly. His ears and tails flicked in a way Belle had never seen him do before. She began to sense a sort of tension in the air suddenly that made her nervous. She felt like she should probably say something.

"Excuse me, sir," said Belle.

The bear thiren grimaced and looked down at Belle. Then he looked back at Lycaon. Then he looked back at Belle and his eyes widened and his stance relaxed slightly.

"M- miss Belle!" said the bear thiren, who Belle did not remember exactly (there were so many bear thiren employees at Belobog). "You must be here for Miss Koleda!"

"Yes, I am," said Belle, holding up Eous the bangboo for emphasis.

"Is this- uh… individual with you?" said the bear, eyeing Lycaon again.

"Yes," said Belle. "He is."

"All right then, well, head on through. Miss Koleda is expecting you."

"Thank you," said Belle, watching out of the corner of her eye as the three bear thiren somewhat grimaced at Lycaon as he passed them. Whatever it was going on, it did not have friendly undertones.

The blocked off section of the street behind the barriers was surprisingly empty, as if what was to fill the space had not yet arrived. In the near distance, silhouetted against the hollow, was the distinctive red-haired and diminutive form of Koleda Belobog; and she was dwarfed, as ever, by the looming presence of Ben Bigger, the highest ranked bear thiren in Belobog (and one of the biggest). They seemed isolated on an island of authority, standing there in the street next to a large chunk of rubble, as workers went about their tasks distantly around them.

"What was that about back there, Lycaon? With the gatekeepers?" said Belle in a soft voice. "They called you something."

"Nothing of concern, Lady Belle. Merely sentiments from the old days before any of us were born," said Lycaon breezily as they crossed the impromptu staging yard. He seemed eager to change the subject, and nodded slightly in the direction of Koleda and Ben. "Who are these persons?"

"Clients and allies," said Belle. "They run this construction company."

"Then do we maintain our new fiction in their presence?"

Their new fiction? Oh, right, the dating thing. Belle was tempted to say yes just for the fun of it, but that would be a disservice to the trust she felt towards Koleda and her people.

"No, we can tell the truth with them."

"As you wish, Lady Belle. I'll leave the talking to you."

"Hey! Belle!" said Koleda, a young woman who somehow managed to outdo even Belle in the realm of the petite. "Wasn't expecting to see you in person."

Like Lycaon, Koleda wore an eyepatch, but her good eye glanced towards Lycaon. "Who's, uh, this?"

"Koleda, this is Von Lycaon. He's my bodyguard."

Lycaon bowed formally to Koleda, and Belle thought the motion hit a bit different when Lycaon was in his boy-band get up. It seemed almost.. sarcastic? Koleda sure seemed to be mildly confused. Ben Bigger shifted his weight but his face remained unexpressive.

"You're-? What do you need a bodyguard for?" said Koleda, eye shifting from Lycaon to Belle and back again.

"Long story," said Belle, not really wanting to get into everything that had happened to her in the last day and a half. "I'd rather not get into it just yet, sorry."

Koleda frowned at her, an expression that made her seem ten years older. Then she shrugged. "Fair enough. So Wise is behind your bangboo, I guess? Thanks for bringing him out."

"Of course. Here." Belle set Eous the bangboo down on the ground and turned it on.

Eous' eyes blinked to life. It looked up at Koleda and waved.

"Hello, Koleda," came Wise's voice out of the bangboo. Eous then immediately looked frantically left and right. "Grace is busy, I hope?"

Koleda chuckled softly. "Yes, she's too busy with her big babies to tinker with you, Wise. We're bringing in everything. The trencher. The piledriver. The wrecker. All the big boys. But she's having trouble coaxing them onto the trucks."

Belle blinked. "All of them! I thought you just wanted to clear the Hollow by taking out the ethereals."

"We do," said Koleda. "But we're gonna bring down all the old buildings in there anyway, so Ben had the idea to do both at the same time."

"Half the man-hours if we wipe the buildings out with the ethereals," said Ben in his deep, rumbling voice; who for being a literal 800+ pound bear, spent a great deal of time justifying his own decisions. "Almost half the cost."

"Makes sense to me," said Wise the bangboo.

For all the sense it made to Wise and Ben Bigger's corporate financial statements, it was a significant problem for Belle's immediate ambitions with this Hollow. If Belobog intended to literally just steamroll over the entire city block and thus kill the source ethereal in the process, they would certainly destroy the exact computer server that Belle was here to find.

"There's something in the hollow I need to find, Koleda," said Belle urgently. "How long before you get your machines moving, do you think?"

Koleda blinked at Belle. "Something in the hollow? You're going in there? In person?"

"Yes," said Belle. "There's a computer I need to find."

"Computer, huh," said Koleda with a frown and her eye drifted back to Lycaon. She pursed her lips thoughtfully, then lifted her wrist to her mouth.

"Grace?," said Koleda into a wrist communicator. "Grace?"

A moment of waiting.

"What is it, Koleda?" said a sultry and distracted voice over the communicator. "My babies are in such a foul mood this morning. Aren't you, my dear?"

"Grace, how long till you're-" began Koleda.

Another voice was audible on the line, a distinctly cybernetic voice. "Mommy, why do I exist?"

"You dig trenches, sweetums," said Grace in a cooing, baby-talk tone.

"That's it?" The voice sounded like it was breaking into existential despair.

"Oh! You're the best at it, though!"

Robotic sobbing.

"There, there. Mommy has something to make you feel all better."

The unmistakable screech of a pneumatic drill caused Koleda to wince away from her communicator and she shut it off with a grunt. She looked back at Ben who looked at her with a small shrug. Then Koleda looked back to Belle and Lycaon.

"You got about an hour," said Koleda with a non-committal shake of her wrist. Above and behind her, Ben nodded confidently.

"Then I need to go in now," said Belle. "Come on, Lycaon."

"Whoa, whoa!" said Koleda, holding up a palm. "What about my commission?"

Belle pointed at Eous. "Wise is here for that."

Eous waved cheerfully in his cute bangboo way. Wise was annoyingly good at that.

Koleda looked down and back up. "All right, fine. But Belobog bought this block, Belle. That's my land. I can't let you just walk around in it, even if it is a hollow. That's a serious legal liability."

Belle blinked. She was getting stopped over an insurance concern? Well, Koleda was a CEO, Belle had a hard time remembering that. Belle's mind raced, searching for a counter argument.

"I have Lycaon here to protect me," said Belle.

Koleda crossed her arms and looked at Lycaon dubiously. "Yeah, Lycaon, right. And this computer is important, I take it?"

"Yes," said Belle. She took a deep breath. Some more of the truth needed to come out. "Someone is trying to kill me, Koleda. This computer, if it's in there, is related to that. I think it can help me find out who my enemy even is."

Koleda's eyes widened. She rubbed one of her cheeks. She looked backwards at Ben Bigger. Ben was scratching his chin thoughtfully.

"It would show dutiful care if I were to escort our guests," offered Ben. "Who knows? Maybe there is some salvage in there we would regret destroying. I'll go with them, if you like, Koleda."

Koleda nodded at Ben. "Fine. Belle, you can go. But Ben is going with you."

Belle was going to have a massive bear thiren added to her escort as she entered a potentially ethereal-infested hollow? There was no downside to this that she could see.

"Thank you, Koleda. Ben."

They nodded with small smiles. Then Ben walked a few steps and picked up what Belle had thought was a large chunk of broken concrete. Nope. It was Ben's personal anti-ethereal weapon: a cement block with a rocket engine in it. Just a normal everyday item.

"Well," huffed Ben as he set his block on his shoulder. "Shall we? We should move quickly. I assume you can track what you need once we cross the horizon?"

"Yes," said Belle. As soon as they went over the event horizon and entered the hollow, Fairy should be able to get to work through Belle's link back to Random Play. Track the computer server. Find it. Hack it. Get out. That was the plan. Easy.

Ben looked at Lycaon and extended a big paw. He showed none of the strange animosity the other bear thiren's had shown. "I'm Ben, Mr. Lycaon. Nice to meet you."

Lycaon accepted the handshake and bowed slightly. "The honor is mine, Lord Ben."

"L- lord Ben?" said Ben, aghast. Then his face softened. "I guess I don't hate it."

Lycaon turned towards Belle. "Lead the way, Lady Belle. If ethereals appear, I ask you stay behind me and Lord Ben."

"PubSec didn't find any ethereals in it," said Belle hopefully. "Hopefully we can find what we need and get out before any show up."

"Nothing ever seems to go right," said Ben with a sigh. "So I wouldn't count on it."

"I agree with Lord Ben," said Lycaon. "We should assume the worst and prepare accordingly."

"All right, all right!"

Pessimists, thought Belle, but she didn't argue the point.

She led her two large thiren bodyguards towards the edge of the hollow. She didn't like going into hollows in person. There was something deeply unsettling as you got close. A sort of pressure on the mind. A sense of wrongness. A desire to turn around and leave instead. You couldn't even look directly ahead of you, so Belle had to avert her eyes as she closed the last few feet to the slightly vibrating boarder. She could feel the nearness of the event horizon, it made the air almost vibrate.

"Let me go first, Lady Belle. Count to ten and follow," said Lycaon, and he moved ahead of her. As his body touched the border of the hollow's event horizon, he melded into the weird bluish-purplish-blackness and vanished.

Belle began a mental count and looked back towards where Koleda stood watching them. The head foreman of Belobog, Anton, had joined Koleda's vigil in the center of the street. Belle waved and Anton saw her and raised his ever-present hand drill back at her in a return wave.

"Goin' in the Hollow, huh?!" called out Anton. "Be safe! You too, Ben! Call me and my bro if you need us!"

Belle smiled and waved, as did Ben- neither of them wanting to get into a shouting conversation with Anton. That lithe, muscled man was… somewhat intense. And now that Belle thought about it for a second: Anton was somewhat like Lycaon. He was entirely earnest toward his duties in the same way; however, where Lycaon went in the direction of poise and elegance, Anton made a sharp turn towards manic enthusiasm and hyperactivity.

"That's ten," said Ben. "Let's go, Belle."

Ben stepped into the hollow and vanished.

"Was that Whitefox with Belle?!" Anton asked Koleda. "I think that was Whitefox!"

"Who?" said Koleda.

Belle stepped through the hollow's event horizon.