Lucky Rabbit

The widening of Augustus’s eyes was the only indication that Pandy’s words had discombobulated him. He turned back toward the apparently-empty section of the road that wound up Celestine Point, shouting, “We have a breach! Send troops to comb the city, looking for-” He glanced down at Pandy. “They were blocking our tracking spell. Beeswick said he could get through by morning, but he hadn’t finished yet. What can you tell me about the place they took you?”

“It’s a big, two-story mansion with a hole in its roof and, um, fire damage?” Since Water elementals were a thing here, she doubted the blaze would still be going, which gave her mixed feelings. On the one hand, she didn’t want any of the research the Shadow Exchange had been doing to be saved, but she also didn’t want to be the cause of anyone’s death. Yes, they were bad people, but Pandy wasn’t a police officer or a soldier, to be killing people willy nilly. She hadn’t even been able to direct traffic effectively!

Augustus relayed this information to his unseen helpers, who Pandy assumed were Knights of the Royal Eagle. As an unfelt breeze bent branches and kicked gravel on the way down the hill-ountain, Lian came running down from the peak, panting and red-faced. His gaze landed on Pandy, and he looked briefly confused before heaving a Very Teenage Sigh and focusing on Augustus.

“The Captain said you needed Light support?” he asked, almost sounding eager. Pandy had pegged him as an academic, not a thrill-seeker, but she had to remind herself that this Lian had it in him to become Killian, who very clearly didn’t mind a bit of excitement now and then.

Augustus nodded, pointing out toward the night sky. Pandy squinted along the line of his finger, trying to see what he was looking at. Finally, she saw a series of stars blip out, then reappear, and realized that the Dark elementals that had been following her were still circling.

“From past experience, I’d say they’re trying to decide whether to attack or return to their master,” he told Lian. “They’ve been damaged, so they’re not sure what to do. If possible, I’d like to capture one alive. Do you…know how to do that?”

Lian was staring out at the darkness, eyes tracking the movement of the elementals. “I’ve read about it. I only have a Glimmerwisp, though. We can’t hold a strong elemental, and definitely not…” He squinted. “Two? Three?”

Augustus looked down at Pandy. “Do you remember when I told you De- you might be able to track a Dark elementalist through their elemental? If we can capture one of these, would you be willing to try?”

Pandy stared at him. She barely knew how to use spells she had a name for, and he wanted her to try something that wasn’t even mentioned in Gacha Love? “Of course,” her voice said, and Pandy vaguely wondered who had taken over her larynx.

You do remember you used all of your Mana, correct?

Keros’s reminder came too late though. The stars ahead of them flickered, dying and then returning to life as the elementals made their decision. The Dark creatures surged forward, the mass of their shapes seeming to swell more than was strictly explainable by the fact that they were coming closer. Augustus growled something, his hands gently but firmly grasping Pandy’s shoulders in order to move her enough that he could dig in his pocket. He pulled out one of the many small vials he kept in his cache just as a large blob of blackness surged forward, wobbling threateningly on approach.

Lian thrust out his hand, and a bright light surrounded it, burning brightest at a point with five appendages protruding from it, like a five-pointed star brought to life. “Lumis! Stop that spell!” The star drove forward, bursting through the center of the globby black mass, making it melt into wisps of shadow.

For an instant, Pandy thought that was all it would take, but the shadow curled and reformed just a bit further away, billowing up into a sphere at least twice as large as the first one, but significantly less dense. This time when Lian sent Lumis out, the Dark elemental created a void within itself, engulfing the smaller elemental. The Glimmerwisp’s light faded, pulsing weakly, and Lian let out a strangled gasp.

Augustus used his teeth to pull the stopper from the bottle he held, splashing the contents all over the battling elementals. A distinct hiss rose from the Dark blob, which separated into two chunks, making Pandy realize the two elementals who had been chasing her had merged to become one, at least temporarily.

One of the split elementals had taken the greater part of the potion, and it writhed, dropping down to the ground, where a rime of frost formed around it. The other piece pulled up, seemed to hesitate, then swirled and flew back into the sky. Whether it was going back wherever it had come from or was just pausing to regroup, Pandy didn’t know, but all that mattered at the moment was that it had abandoned its companion.

“Can your Glimmerwisp hold it?” Augustus asked, looking at the sadly-faded star that hovered near Lian’s shoulder.

Lian glanced at his elemental, and Pandy could almost see his pride warring with the knowledge that it would be better not to say Lumis could do it if he wasn’t certain his elemental would succeed. “I don’t think so,” he said finally, every line of his body stiff with reluctance.

Augustus nodded with approval, obviously startling the boy. “Try anyway.” He removed another flask from his pocket, though he didn’t pull the cork.

Lian blinked, and a rare smile curved his lips before he got it under control. “Lumis, form a sphere,” he said, crouching to bring the Glimmerwisp closer to the elemental that appeared to be frozen to the ground.

Lumis flickered, though whether in acknowledgement or to indicate its reluctance, Pandy didn’t know. It stretched its arms out, forming first a flattish surface with five bulges around the outside, then a dome that settled over the Dark elemental. The elemental quivered, a section of it stabbing up, trying to break through the dome, and Lian grunted, flinching as his face drained of color. Lumis continued on, however, sealing firmly to the ground, then passing into it, though Pandy wasn’t sure how she knew that. It was like she could feel the Light magic the Glimmerwisp exuded, even through the air and earth that separated them.

As soon as Lian nodded to Augustus – the boy’s upper lip already dotted with perspiration – the chancellor turned to Pandy. “You need to reach out to it.” He caught her wrist as she reached out, and offered her a lop-sided smile. “Not physically. With your magic.”

Pandy gave him a dubious look, but crouched beside Lian, staring at the Dark elemental still faintly visible inside the sphere of Light. Was she imagining it, or was it smaller than it had been?

Magic isn’t just words and game mechanics, Pandora.

You know what to do.

Yes, she supposed she did, but a quick glance at her stat sheet told her she’d only recovered about forty Mana. Anything below a hundred usually left her feeling a bit light-headed, and here she was considering using all of them. Again.

With a soft sigh, Pandy leaned forward until she felt the end of her nose start to grow a little crispy. Light magic still wasn’t her friend, even if she sometimes managed to produce something that acted just a little bit like it. she thought, focusing on the elemental just beyond her reach. Nebulous sensations flooded her mind as she reached out to it with something that was more her than just the physical form she currently occupied.

Fear, but not. There wasn’t enough intelligence here to truly be afraid. To know what fear or ending or even pain meant. The elemental was young. Born/created/summoned, contracted without understanding, obedient because it knew nothing other than obedience.

Pandy gasped, feeling her Mana drain away like water into a bathtub. This elemental barely knew what existence was. What could she learn from it? But there was something. A connection. Her eyes lifted, squinting into the distance. There wasn’t anything visible to see, but there was…power? What was it? Or who?

Pale blur. Dark filaments sprouted out of the paleness. Green, though the elemental knew nothing of color. This curve. That arch. An angle that became a bend, a bow, a turn. It was-

“A face,” Pandy whispered. “I know that face. Who-?”

Zero Mana remaining.

Innate Magic expired.

Shifting Faces expired.

Pandy became a rabbit, falling forward into a shell of Light that probably wouldn’t be good for her moderately-undead bunny body. Quick hands caught her before she could impact that brilliant surface, tucking her against Augustus’s chest, where she could feel his heart beating more quickly than before.

she thought woozily.

Of course he is.

You have a disconcerting habit of pushing yourself beyond your limits.

The face the elemental had seen in the moment it formed – not that it identified that shape as a face, having none of its own on which to base a comparison – was familiar, but not very familiar. Someone she’d seen on the periphery of something else far more important.

I do.

Initiate the sandbox.

Sandbox? Pandy could feel her body moving, still hear the thudding of Augustus’s heart, but at some point her eyes had closed. She needed a bed, not a sandbox. Though a beach would be nice. She was cold, and weren’t beaches supposed to be warm? Not that she’d ever been to one. One of the many downsides of living in a land-locked state.

Say it.

Initiate Pandora’s Sandbox.

PANDORA!

She hated it when Keros used capitalization at her. It was never a good sign. Groggily, she thought, and felt her consciousness slip off to someplace far from her body. Specifically, her old apartment, or a facsimile thereof.

Keros, in an uncharacteristic fit of chivalry – or perhaps simply concern that Pandy would pass out before he completed his exposition – helped her to the repurposed kitchen chair sitting next to Pandy’s desk. Both desk and chair had been found on the side of the road, but at different times, and while they were somewhat splintery and very much did not match, they did at least give her a place to sit while she ate or played games.

“What’s going on?” she asked, scrubbing at her eyes with her fists like Thaniel did when he was particularly tired but didn’t want to admit it.

Once Pandy was seated, Keros had moved away a few steps, and now he frowned at her in confusion, fists on his hips. He’d gotten golden armbands from somewhere, and they glistened in Pandy’s daylight bulbs, emphasizing the rippling of his mighty thews. It was vaguely disconcerting.

“I don’t know,” he told her, the frown shifting to a scowl. “By all rights, when you run out of Mana, you should lose your grip on your body, at least temporarily. You shouldn’t be…tired. That’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this works.”

Over the last twenty-four years, Pandy had become thoroughly used to confounding people. Apparently that ability even extended to gods, a fact which didn’t actually surprise her at all. “But who is that man?” she asked, vaguely making a ‘beard’ gesture on her own chin, then twirling an invisible mustache.

Shaking his head, Keros picked up the phablet lying on the bed where he’d abandoned it. “Look,” he said, and held it up so she could see the screen. It showed the scene where Kaden first introduced Clara to his mother. Pandy frowned at it. Kaden, yes. Clara, check. Queen Louisa, in all her majestic glory, double-check. And there, off to the side, a bearded and mustachioed face with heavy dark brows, a bit of a hooked nose, and dark hair graying at the temples. He wasn’t even looking at Kaden and Clara, seeming intent on the queen as she smiled graciously at her son’s guest.

“And here,” Keros said, swiping at the screen until he came to another image, this time of the diplomatic ball to which Kaden, Edgar, or Dorian could invite Clara if their Affection was high and her stats were good enough. Each of them valued different stats, and of course the small conversations they participated in together were different, but the event was always held at the palace. Louisa could be seen in the background of all three versions of the event, but only Kaden brought Clara to speak to her.

An image of Kaden and Clara, with the dark stranger standing near Louisa. Edgar and Clara, with the stranger lurking between them and the queen. Dorian and Clara, themselves in the background, helping with security and taking the first steps toward becoming the knight Dorian so longed to be. Even here, the bearded stranger stood in the shadows near the queen. In every image, he watched Louisa, his face a neutral mask of pleasantry.

“Who is he?” Pandy asked, sitting up a little straighter so she could take the device from Keros. She began flipping through the screenshots, some of which seemed to have been taken accidentally, since they were of random dialogue or the loading screen. Once the god got the hang of them, they definitely focused on Dorian, but there were plenty of others as well, including some with heart stickers and sparkles surrounding Clara and Dorian.

Flushing slightly, Keros took the phablet back and found another image where the man stood near the queen. This time he had one hand raised, almost as if he would actually reach out and touch her. It was the scene where Kaden announced he was going to marry Clara, and Pandy could tell from the dialogue options that Keros hadn’t raised Clara’s Eloquence stat high enough for the best outcome.

“That’s why we recognize him,” Keros said, pointing at the lurking figure. “Every time there’s a scene at court, especially if the queen is there, so is he.”