I can barely hear the screams as reality shifts, obscuring my awareness-viewed vision of everything with a much more singular point of view. A normal sky. Clouds. The salty spray of the sea as waves crash into the upper walls of the paindne city. An equal crash of salt in the form of an elemental that I haven't seen in months, eyes molten with rage and the desire to defend the resort from the massive city that just landed in her waters. Barely missing her platform, thank god.

"Who…" Fleur stops mid-sentence, and all the violence in her eyes shifts to confusion. "Shelby? Who are all these people? And what is this… entire city… doing here?"

A soft chuckle leaves my lips. "It's a long story, Fleur. A very, very long one that I'm damn glad is over for at least a little while. Any of the other Worth Classes happen to be here right now?"

Fleur tilts her head to the side. "Aside from the Worth Classes that I can sense near you? No. Ursula, Noland, and March have not returned from the other world. I expected them to return before you, but I won't turn down this pleasant surprise."

Pleasant surprise. From how bright her body's glowing with joy, there's more than a little surprise colouring her words. I step to the edge of the tombs' entrance and look back in an attempt to actually see what this place looks like without the strange sky around it. Turns out, there's absolutely nothing connecting it to the rest of the city. Just a massive chunk of stone hovering above everything else without a single wire to anchor it.

"Shelby? Can I help with anything?" Fleur floats over to me and daintily lands at my side. She casts a glance over at Illumisia and the others, but she barely cares about them. "Would it please you if I brought this place into my domain? The magics keeping it from displacing a titanic amount of water won't last forever, and I would hate to lose the resort to something as menial as a tidal wave."

"That won't happen, thank you very much," the Quest cuts in both vocally and physically, inserting itself between me and Fleur like a protective sibling. "This city has enough power to keep everything running at full-blast for a few hundred years. Even if we divert a lot of it to help everyone here out, that'll only bring the lifetime down a few dozen years at most."

Fleur cocks her head to the side and glimmers with amusement. "You have not seen how humans use power. Or magic, in your case; they guzzle it, yet produce it in equal amounts. Do not be surprised if you find the drain far more taxing once Noland returns and demands you work to pay for their protection."

The Quest frowns. "Do you pay to live here, elemental?"

"In a way, yes," Fleur laughs, then turns to me. "Would you like me to extend my salt here as a precaution at the very least?"

I don't have to give it a second's thought. "Shellraiser power plus Halsia power is way better than one or the other. Don't overextend yourself, though; this place is goddamn massive. And if you feel the system trying to talk to you, back out instantly. We have to do a clean sweep of this place before I'll feel comfortable letting anyone in here do anything."

Fleur nods. "Of course. Is there anyone you'd like to join me in this effort? This strange being at your side, perhaps?"

Illumisia snorts as she walks by us, her real body shrunken down to the size of a small whale. "Which of the strange beings are you referring to, salt-being?"

"Whichever one will join the effort," Fleur responds effortlessly. "You are Illumisia, yes?"

"Yes. You are Fleur?" Illumsia asks right back.

"Yes."

Illumisia licks the salt from her lips. "Your salt has a good taste. Untainted and powerful. Shelby is right to put her trust in you."

"Thank you very much," Fleur beams happily.

"It is nothing but the truth. Now come, strange being known as Fleur," Illumisia motions towards Fleur's platform with a paw. "We have much work to do and an equal amount to discuss. Your salt is the source of Shelby's purification, yes?"

Fleur glances at me for permission. I give it with a nod, and she zips off to join Illumisia down on the surface of the city. The two of them chat about how Fleur might be able to help remove all the system influence in the city as they walk away, leaving the rest of us up here to watch–and in a vast amount of cases, gawk at the scenery.

"It's… beautiful," Jumble says quietly. "When you told me about the apocalypse and the machines, I thought it would be… well… destroyed like the city was. But this place is beautiful. Except for the… um…"

Gil steps up with a grunt and a stretch. "Except for the one massive skyscraper sticking out like an infected splinter?"

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Jumble nods. "Yes, that."

"Well, nothing we can do about that; March made that thing, so the only thing that can bring it down is her. You'll have to meet the rest of us soon enough, since you're one of us and all," Gil looks back at the people in the tombs and purses his lips. "Not sure the stonestep people are going to be all happy about this, and none of the constructs are leaving the city limits for the foreseeable future. Not until we can confirm they won't be struck with the apocalypse the second they step foot outside its protection."

Hm. Hadn't even thought about that. I'm pretty damn sure they won't count, seeing as a lot of machine-adjacent things didn't get pulled into the animating effects of the apocalypse… but then again… we did just poke a pinprick into the reality around Earth. Things might get a little hotter from now on.

I shoot a glance at Gil as Agathe walks up to him and whispers something into his shoulder. A single thread from his shirt coils up into his ear to relay the sound, and he nods in agreement when she finishes talking.

"Agathe wants to talk to all of us in private once we sort this out," he relays for her. "Do I have permission to take her and the rest of the people who want to leave the city to the main building for… safety reasons?"

He curls his fingers to make air quotes around the words safety reasons, putting unnecessary mystery behind a fairly obvious double-entendre. For their own safety and for the safety of everyone else in the resort by getting them somewhere we can easily see all of them. Now that he put some doubt in it, though… eh, whatever. I don't have the mental capacity to care about that one little thing right now.

I wave a hand for him to go ahead. "Just make sure no one dies."

Gil clicks his tongue and shifts his air quotes into finger guns. "Right-o. Agathe, Clutter, mask buddies, and Ebb–you're with me. Round up every non-construct that's still alive and bring 'em to my store; we'll go from there."

A series of confirmations from everyone he just listed ring out, including from an invisible Clutter who came up beside Agathe at some point. She rolls her eyes at the voice coming from nowhere, then yanks on an invisible strip of cloth that gets a surprised yelp from Clutter. I picture his girlfriend for a second while she leads him away. Part of me bristles to remind Clutter of that fact. The much, much larger part silently hopes that Clutter falls for Agathe so there's no attachment to his potential ex.

"You're grinding your teeth," Pearl says. "Stop that. It's loud in here."

Oop. "Sorry. Kind of starting to become a habit, I guess."

Pearl's eyes widen. "Like the neck thing?"

"No, no, no–not like the neck thing at all."

"Good. Sorry again for that, by the way."

Before I can say she shouldn't be sorry–which she already knows–a loud horn sounds from across the waters. I squint at the sands while Gil hurries down the half-real tombstone stairs with his group, taking pretty much everyone else in the tombs with them. Only Jumble, the Quest, and the other constructs I named are here.

Which… I'm pretty sure some of those people just appeared in the tombs when we got to Earth, now that I'm thinking about it. The city must've teleported them here for some reason. Or, more accurately, the Quest did. I shoot it a questioning glare. It shrugs with a very guilty smile.

"I thought they'd enjoy the view."

No, it didn't. There's some other reason, and that reason includes why Llaliu and everyone else from our tower group didn't get brought up with the rest. Another blast of a horn rips through my train of thought, this time far louder and far more… vicious. Almost like a warning that we're about to be attacked.

Illumisia sighs in my mind. "Do you want me to deal with that?"

"Ha, no. God, no," I chuckle, the image of Illumisia scaring the piss out of hundreds of beachgoers vivid in my mind. "You keep yourself a normal cryptid while you're here. No turning into the size of a skyscraper and letting our enemies know we have a nuclear bomb in the shape of a shark-wolf."

"Fine. Fleur's going back to you. Show her Jumble, please, for entertainment's sake," she says with a smile in her voice, then cuts the psychic link.

Jumble? I turn and lock eyes with the paindne, who I can now see as she really is once again. Brilliant colours and adorable face and all. Why would Fleur care about Jumble in particular? It's not like… we…

Fingers entwine with mine as Jumble beams a brilliant smile. The shine in her eyes, the slight shift in her posture to get closer to me, the way she slightly licks her lips as if in anticipation… it almost feels like she's looking at something delicious that she can't wait to eat. Um. Uh. I don't really know how to deal with this.

Before I can deal with anything, Fleur hovers back into view. Her strange face shifts to look at me, then at Jumble. All the colours in her body flare brighter for a split second.

"Ooh, you're in trouble," Pearl giggles.

Trouble? Why am I in–oh. Oh, shit, that's what Illumisia meant.

"Shelby, who is this?" Fleur asks in strained monotone.

Jumble extends her smile to Fleur as well as her free hand. "I'm Jumble. Shelby might not have completely figured it out yet, but I'm her girlfriend."

The roar of the horn outlines the two women, one sidled up to me and the other floating menacingly just a few feet away. Fleur glares down at Jumble the best she can as she begrudgingly floats down, extends one of her many hands, and accepts the shake Jumble offered.

"It's a pleasure to meet you," she says flatly. "Scoping out the competition isn't something I thought I would have to do, but it appears that a few weeks can change things drastically."

"Likewise," Jumble replies curtly as another horn blast rages against my eardrums. "Can we put that aside for a few minutes to deal with this, at least?"

Fleur pulses begrudgingly with light. "I suppose we should. Though I would love to speak with you one-on-one later."

Jumble releases the handshake and steps out onto thin air, staticky magic keeping her aloft with ease. Fleur harrumphs and joins her on empty space, standing side by side with… my girlfriend… as the pair look out over the growing crowd gathering at the beach. Jumble tilts her head to the side in annoyance, then points down at the crowd and looks back at me.

"Are we supposed to kill them?"

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