Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The red string is drawn across the face of the villainess in the photo she holds in her hand. It stands out like blood in the snow, the thread of garnet against her pale skin. The stretch of string rests under her eye, the wing of a cat decorating the iris. It looks beautiful. She looks beautiful. Hideously beautiful. It’s horrific, she decides.

If anything, it’s just another piece of evidence for her board. She grabs a pushpin from the box, making sure not to get herself stabbed in the process. The photo goes underneath a headshot of Bonnie, one of those pesky criminals that broke out of Night Swan’s prison a couple of months back, all thanks to a certain someone.

She can hear the rumbling of a motorcycle outside the apartment, slowing to a stop. As she approaches the window, she can see her roommate getting off her bike, taking off her helmet, and undoing her bun. A car speeds by next to her, just a bit too close to the curb for comfort.

“Fuck off, asshole!” the biker shouts as the anonymous driver dashes off.

Iris rolls her eyes. Speeding drivers, criminals, scoundrels, and the like were common in the grimier areas of Dancity. It was something she was used to, especially as one of the most well-known detectives in the area. Her hand rests on the windowsill as she leans over, just for a small mental break. She could never afford an actual break, she tells herself, so small rests like this one were sufficient enough.

This isn’t right. Something’s wrong.

It’s an instinct to detect a small change. She’s always been able to pick up on it. It’s the window, she notices. It’s unlocked. Almost immediately, her face twists into a scowl. Iris always leaves her windows locked, and this could only mean one thing. She grabs the blacklight on her desk, flicking the switch on.

Her cabinets are covered in neon doodles. One depicts herself knocked out with the proud villainess standing over her. There are stars, radioactive symbols, and scrawls of scratchy handwriting. In the center of it all lies “LOOK AT THE EVIDENCE” in a vibrant yellow.

“...Are you kidding me?” Iris mutters, not one bit amused by the stunt. It’s a childish prank that she doesn’t have time for. She puts the blacklight back on the desk, sits down, and opens her laptop to search for a newer, high-quality window lock.

Amongst the keyboard clicks, the sound of a creaking door rings out. “Hey, Iris-”

“Florence, will this be quick?” she asks. “I’m busy right now.”

“Yeah, whatever,” the other mutters. She’s used to the snappy attitude Iris has whenever she’s frustrated. “There was a package in the mail for you.”

The clicking stops. “A package?” Iris turns to meet Florence, who holds a small box in her hand. “I didn’t order anything.”

“Well, that didn’t stop this from arriving for you, did it?” Florence holds up a small box, roughly the size of one that would have some superhero figure inside, and places it on the desk. Sure enough, her name and address are printed on top. No return address, however. That makes her skeptical.

She’s too transfixed on the mystery package to notice Florence leaving the room. The top is taped down with tape placed too neatly and vertically for her to admire. Iris slices the tape apart with a pocket knife, removing the top to find what was probably the last thing she expected.

“Is this… a bath bomb?”

She looks at a pink, sand-like sphere. Who would leave her this? Why would they leave her this? A late birthday gift? Her birthday was last month, so it was plausible, but that leaves the question of who. Who in the world would leave her a bath bomb with no return address?

Iris holds the box in her right hand and the bath bomb in her left, and to her surprise, it’s warm. Not even warm, hot. It’s enough to make her drop it back into the box.

It starts to fizz, dryly.

She throws it across the room, then ducks behind her desk. She can hear the sizzle. The bath bomb burnt off just threads of her gloves, bleeding through to reveal the tips of her fingers. She receives sound, but waits for action. Nothing happens until a light haze fills the air. Her heart drops with relief when she realizes it’s only smoke.

Harmless smoke as part of a harmless joke. All of these pranks are starting to get on her nerves.

The detective walks across the room to find the remains of the smoke bomb fizzing away and a folded-up piece of paper in the middle of it all. She unfolds it, and it doesn’t take much for her to realize it’s a letter.

Hey there, Pixie!

Her grip tightens. The paper crinkles. She knows exactly who this is from.

You really need to redecorate this place, it’s soooo boring! I hope you like my doodles, I figured they would give you the artistic inspiration to liven up the place! Anyways, I’ve grown terribly bored, and decided to give you the opportunity to exercise your body and mind! Solve three riddles to earn a prize! Sounds like fun, doesn’t it? Here’s your first clue…

Streetfighters, marauders, and sportsters, gather around!
A place with cutting-edge fashion where tigers roar.
The cheers, the excitement, hear that sound!
You’ll have to make a bet if you want to learn more.

I’ll be waiting for you at the end. :)

A scavenger hunt?

Is everything just a game to her?

Iris scans over the letter a couple more times, looking over each word of the riddle carefully. Streetfighters, marauders, sportsters, tigers… those are all names of motorcycles, something she only through her roommate, who would frequently race other bikers while others bet on them. Fashion was what threw her off a bit. Sure, Dancity was a fashionable place, but from what she knew, Florence was one of the few people who wore flashy, cutting-edge outfits during these events.

Why is she even thinking about this? It’s a waste of time, and they both know it. This mastermind wants to get a reaction out of her, push her buttons. Still, she says she’ll be there at the end, waiting for her, and Iris can’t deny that the offer is tempting. This could be a chance to arrest her and get her off the streets for good, but what if it’s just a lie? As much as she hated this, hated her, this was an opportunity that she couldn’t pass up.

The riddle leaves one idea for her to go off of. Melody Warehouse.

One car ride through the streets of Dancity later, Iris pulls into the driveway of the warehouse-turned-racetrack. She closes the car door, heading into the building. Dim spotlights give the area a bit of light, and she can see the yellow dashes of road outlines on the ground.

“Hello?” Iris calls out. “Is anyone there?”

Another flash of light answers her. One spotlight, brighter than the rest, shines on the second level of the arena, where the betters and onlookers would normally stand. Underneath the beacon of luminosity sits a table with another piece of paper. It seems easy enough, but there has to be some twist here. Nevertheless, she heads up the stairs. The table lies in the middle of the bridge. It’s simple. Too simple.

All spotlights turn off except for the one on the table. A sharp line of scarlet appears in the air. And another. And then another.

Yup. There it is.

Lasers. Of course. It wouldn’t be a walk in the park getting this next clue. She had installed lasers into the security just to make Iris’ life more difficult.

She steps over the first one, and ducks under the second. The third one moves upright as she moves forward, dodging what could have been a fatal end. The lasers rise, then cross over each other. Their movements at first are unpredictable, nearly turning Iris into a pretzel, but she catches onto the pattern soon enough. Just as she reaches the table, the lasers zip behind her one last time.

RIP!

The lasers turn off completely. A stitch of ochre falls onto the steel, and now, there’s a tear in her coat.

“Great,” she huffs, unfolding the next letter.

Hope you didn’t get too chopped up by the light show! If you’re reading this, it means the lasers didn’t tear you to bits! Hoorayyyy!!! Here’s your next clue, Pixie!

Rock on tonight? Don’t tell me twice!
Start a fire with a rose in my hand
Put your heart in the cards, roll the dice
Here’s a hint: rocks don’t refer to a band…

Rock on, but not like a rock band? Please. This one was easier than the first riddle. A rose in hand, cards, and rocks were all neon signs found at the Maneater Club… which was right down the street from her apartment. Iris was made to drive all the way downtown, only to end up back where she started.

Of course she made her do this. It was completely in character.

One more car ride through the streets of Dancity later, Iris parks her car in the parking lot before walking down the street. She ran her fingers over the ripped edge of her coat, feeling the bare fabric through her burnt gloves. Florence knew how to sew; she could probably patch it up.

Iris hasn’t been to the Maneater Club many times. She’s never been one for parties, work kept her busy. She enters through the door, and the building is on fire with dancing and mingling bodies, no surprise there. It’s the exact opposite of the empty warehouse, so there’s not much of a sign to tell her where to go from here. She takes a seat at the bar closest to the door, blazing with neon orange.

“Detective Iris?”

She nearly jolts when the bartender calls her name. “Have you been expecting me?” she asks quizzically.

“Funny you ask. That’s exactly what’s going on here.” The bartender nods. “Some woman arrived here earlier and requested that I serve you a specially prepared drink tonight, free of charge. Paid me a large sum of cash to carry this out, actually. She said that once you consume it, I’d be able to give you a piece of paper.”

“The clue,” Iris realizes. “What’s the drink?”

“Right here.” She ducks out of Iris’ view, returning to place a single shot glass on the counter, filled with a bronzy liquid.

“What is this?”

“She said that it was a fireball shot,” said the bartender. “It doesn’t appear to have been tampered with.”

From what Iris could tell, she was right. The glass was clear, rocks afloat. She knew how to check for tampered drinks, and doubted that she would have been served one, but it was always good to check. Despite the name, fireball wasn’t a spicy drink; it was a cinnamon-flavored whiskey with mere hints of sweetness.

She wasn’t dealing with an easy criminal here, there once again had to be a twist, but on the surface, this looked too easy. So, without a word, Iris downed the shot. She would soon come to regret making that choice.

Whatever was in this currently put the “fire” in fireball. It had a torrid taste, and the texture? The texture was the worst part. It felt like she was at the beach and some kid had dumped wet sand into her drink. That drink went down Iris’ throat, and it took everything in her to not spit it back out again.

“Ma’am, are you okay?” asks the bartender.

“The paper, just give me the fucking paper!” She coughs as she holds her hand out. She’s hunched over the counter, unable to meet the bartender’s eyes when she feels something drop into her hand. With her eyes watering, she quickly unfolds the third paper.

I hope that drink kicked things up a notch! I wish I could say I had some fancy poem for your final riddle, but I don’t. I’m sure you know that I have many wonderful talents and skills, but writing isn’t exactly one of them. Anyways, head up to the roof of the Maneater Club for your prize! :P

Without a word, Iris stumbles through the bar, trying to blink away the scorching pain in her watering eyes. She pushes open the back door, eyeing a ladder in the back alley. One rung after the other, she climbs to the top.

Iris looks out over the Dancity skyline from the flattop. Before she can think about what to do next, she convulses and reals over the edge. She wonders what in the ever-loving universe was that drink as she stands up, backs away from the edge, and wipes the excess from her mouth.

“Wow. You couldn’t stomach that at all, huh?”

Iris doesn’t have time to process, she can only think to spring into action. Grabbing the taser from her back pocket, she turns around, swinging forward, only for her wrist to be grabbed right away. Standing on the other side is the one who’s been haunting her all night.

“I’ll take that.” With a sickly-sweet voice, she grabs the taser, drops it onto the flattop, and stamps it into pieces with her boot.

“You-”

“Hm?” She tilts her head.

Iris catches her tongue, unable to make a motion. She hates that she can’t stop looking into her eyes, mesmerizing in the most awful way. Iris had come close to catching this criminal many times, but she would always run away right before she got the chance to strike.

They’ve never been this close.

“Hello?” The vandal waves in front of her face. “Earth to Pixie- WOAH-!”

The villainess dodges a punch from the detective, then elbows her in the gut. Iris is bent over for just enough time for her pocket to be picked swiftly. She’s knocked to the ground, feeling a cold metal clamp around her wrist. Before she knows it, she’s handcuffed to the railing of the fire escape, and laughter rings in her ears.

“Seriously? That was easy! Wow!” She looks shocked at how easily this victory came to her. She grins, bending down and resting her arms across her knees. “So, what’s up?”

“...What’s up?” Iris repeats. “Y-You called me here!”

“So?”

“So, I should be the one asking questions.”

“Ah-ah-ah.” She waves a finger. “Madison Mayhem doesn’t do questions.”

“Just stop it, Eva.”

With that name, she stops. Her face twists again, this time with fascinated delight. “Oh? So you know who I really am?”

Iris doesn’t answer, only giving her a prideful glare that screams “of course I do.”

“Well, isn’t that just darling?”

“Why am I here?” Iris asks.

“Simple.” She shrugs. “I got bored.”

“You… you put me through all of that because you were bored?!” The detective’s eyebrows narrow.

“I don’t know how else to explain it to you, Pixie.” She rolls her eyes, standing up again. “Do you need me to repeat myself?”

Iris’ voice raises. “Do you have any idea what I’ve been through tonight?”

“Well, duh, I planned the whole scavenger hunt,” Eva mutters an obvious answer.

Iris doesn’t let her own stupid question deter her. “First, you vandalize my office-”

“I made it prettier! It’s so dull there!”

“Next, you scare me by delivering me a fake bomb-”

“I thought you would find that funny. Guess not.”

“Then, you make me go through a laser course that makes me rip my coat-”

“Just get another one.”

“And then, you make me drink some fireball shot straight from Hell-”

“Oh, the fireball! I made sure to put lots of extra cinnamon in that for you-”

“That was ACTUAL CINNAMON?!”

“What did you think it was?”

“Fuck you!” Iris spits, her free hand flying around her waistband. “Once I get out of here, I’m going to have you arrested-”

“If you get out of here.”

There’s a small jingle. Iris looks up. Of course she swiped the fucking keys.

“Relax, I’ll let you out eventually. I’m no monster,” she says as she pockets them quickly. “And having me arrested? Come on, we both know you would never do that.”

Iris sighs and repeats her question. “Why am I here, Eva?”

“I told you, I was bored!” Eva’s heels tap against the floor as she walks around her, leaning against the stair railing. “Besides, we might as well get to know each other while you’re here. Or, you can learn about me, per se.”

The detective turns her head and looks up. “What do you mean by that?”

“Well, you want to know about me, don’t you?” asks Eva. “I already know enough about you, so I’m satisfied.”

“You know nothing about me.” She hisses, looking back to the ground.

There’s a tense silence between the two. Eva clicks her tongue against the roof of her mouth.

“You have a younger brother.”

Eva can tell by the expression Iris gives her that she’s made the other’s blood run cold. She relishes the reaction with a smirk.

“Yeah, see? You’re not the only smart one here.” She cocks her head to the side. “He goes to Dancity University, he’s studying mechanical engineering. Sound familiar?”

Iris tugs at the handcuffs during a failed attempt to stand up. “I swear to Selios, if you do anything to him-”

“Relax, Pixie! I would never!” Eva throws her hands up, and then she continues. “You only like your coffee black, which I personally think is insane. You rarely give yourself time to relax, but when you do, it’s usually by watching a trashy reality show that your roommate turned on. You try to play video games, but they frustrate you too much to properly enjoy them. And I know why you’re after me.”

“How do you-”

“Let me be more specific.” She kneels again, tiling Iris’ head towards her by grabbing her chin, making sure the attention is on her. “I don’t know why you’re after me specifically, but I know you’re in this line of work after crossing paths with someone just like me.”

Without a word, Iris uses her free hand to grab Eva’s wrist and force her off. The other only chuckles, turning away and going back to leaning against the railing. Iris’ shocked silence makes for a peaceful atmosphere. She rolls her head to the side, stretching the muscles in her neck.

“Beautiful night tonight, huh?” Eva mutters. No response from the detective. She speaks a bit louder this time. “Hey, Pixie. Did you hear me? I said…”

The starlet’s voice trails off elsewhere when she tilts her head down to speak to the detective. The silence lingers for too long of a moment.

“Are you… crying?”

Iris turns her head away before Eva can get a closer look, but the other is quick to take a seat next to her.

“You’re quiet when you cry,” she observes. Iris can’t tell if she’s mocking her, intrigued by her, sympathizing with her, or if it’s a twisted mix of all three.

“...What’s wrong with me?” she grumbles, wiping away spare tears with her free hand.

“Hm?”

“I followed you with a taser and a pair of handcuffs and I thought that would be enough to finally end this,” says Iris. “I went in headfirst without knowing what I would get myself into, and now I’m fucking stuck here with you.”

“Ouch,” Eva says dryly, feigning hurt feelings.

“I’m forced to sit here while you belittle me and remind me of how shit I am at all of this.” Her voice cracks mid-sentence.

“Oh, please, Pixie. You know you’re not a shit detective just because I outsmarted you once, right? If anything, you’re better than that bartender downstairs. I mean, taking a cryptic drink from a stranger? What was she thinking?” The blonde chuckles. “Someone’s getting fired.”

“You don’t get it, do you?”

“I don’t get what?” she asks. By the tone in her voice, Iris can tell that she sees this as a challenge, a game. She sees everything as some sort of championship. The detective sighs deeply.

“I’ve spent so much time trying to track you down and fit the pieces together. Interviews, newspapers, security camera footage…”

“Come on, get to the point. Spit it out.” Eva rolls her wrist in a circle, encouraging her to wrap it up.

Iris stops. She’s not sure how to say this. She doesn’t know how to tell Eva that she’s looked at her face so many times, she could probably draw it from memory. Eva has pissed her off too many times to count, but at the same time, each clue she taunts her with leads her one step closer. She doesn’t want to be in this situation, but she can’t deny that the thrill of the chase enthralls her, unlike any other case she’s handled before.

She doesn’t want this to end, she realizes.

BOOM!

Iris flinches, eyes darting up at the sudden calamity. A firework explodes in the sky, sparking above the tall buildings of Dancity.

“Wow! Would you look at that?” Eva turns to watch the spectacle as well.

As several more fireworks explode in the air, Iris stays in place, transfixed and terrified. Not wanting the chase to end would mean not arresting Eva, and letting her get away, letting her cause chaos and disorder around Dancity. Was that really what she wanted?

“You were saying something?” asks Eva.

“…It’s nothing,” Iris decides.

“Oh, it’s something.”

“I said it’s nothing.”

“Whatever you say, Pixie.”

Eva rolls her eyes, watching each firework go off. For once, she looks calm, but not the calculated kind of calm that Iris often saw from her. She looked relaxed to a nearly uncanny degree.

“Don’t let yourself down too much. You make things a bigger deal than they need to be,” Eva says softly.

“Why are you saying this?” Iris interrogates.

“I wouldn’t say it to just anyone. I actually have the guts to admit that you intrigue me.” She shrugs smugly. “From the first time I saw you with that stupid haircut, I knew this would be a fun chase. I’ve never let anyone else get this close, you know. People have tried… but they weren’t as successful.”

“And what happened to them?” She continues.

Eva deadpans. “I killed them.”

Iris blinks, unsure if she heard correctly. Eva watches for her reaction, and then, she breaks into a snicker. Her shoulders scrunch up as she looks to the side. It’s not what her laugh usually sounds like, Iris notices. It’s not the chaotic, mocking sound she knows. It’s calm, but rough, like rocks rolling up to the ocean shore. This isn’t Madison. This is Eva.

“You really are gullible, huh?” She grins.

“Shut up. I didn’t believe you.” Iris shakes her head.

“You did, though. You did for just a second. I saw it in your eyes,” persists Eva.

“Whatever,” the other mutters.

Eva tilts her head up to watch the last fireworks go off. Light tinted with watermelon pink shines down, gleaming across her collarbone as the sparks fade out into the night. She looks breathtaking, and Iris hates herself for admitting it.

“I can assure you, if you weren’t such a fascinating flower, I wouldn’t be sitting here,” she says in a light murmur.

Iris pauses before she asks her next question, not meeting her eyes. “Why? What makes you go after me specifically?”

When she turns to seek an answer, Madison Mayhem is gone. In her place on the roof is a thin, black key.

When Iris finally arrives back at her apartment after freeing herself from her own handcuffs, she’s greeted with the overwhelming smell of popcorn. She should get something to eat, she thinks. All of this running around has left her unable to focus on properly taking care of herself tonight.

Florence leans against the kitchen counter with her arms crossed. “What’s up?”

Iris doesn’t answer, her only focus is finding something to eat. The smell of popcorn grows stronger as the microwave buzzes.

“You had something else arrive for you in the mail while you were gone, by the way. I put it on your desk,” Florence tells her as Iris rummages through the fridge. “It looked like the other box that arrived for you earlier.”

Suddenly, Iris has something more important to focus on. She grabs the first thing she sees and slams the refrigerator door shut, beelining towards her office. Once she opens the door, she looks down at her right hand to see what she managed to grab, a bag of flour tortillas. Whatever. Food was food, and there were more pressing matters at the moment.

She sits down at her desk, and sure enough, a package just like the first one sits on the surface. This one looks much smaller, and instead of being sealed with tape, a thick, rose-colored ribbon is neatly wrapped around the box. Iris takes a quick bite of the tortilla, ripping through it with her teeth before she undoes the ribbon. The first thing she sees is a familiar piece of paper, neatly folded on top of the contents of the box.

Dear Pixie,

You didn’t think I would let you go through all that work without getting a prize, did you? I promise I’m not as cruel as some of the others that crawl around these streets, I at least keep my word! In this box, you’ll find your reward for completing my scavenger hunt! It’s something that I feel represents the fire you have inside you. Also, I definitely did not steal it. That’s just what the government wants you to think!

Have a splendid evening,
Madison Mayhem

Iris looks inside the box to see what had been left for her. Sitting in the center of a small cushion is a silver band. There’s a lily engraved in the center, with detailing so magnificent that it almost makes her nervous.

Iris slips the band onto her ring finger. It fits like a glove.

There’s a small whistle in the air. The window has been left open.

The wind sounds suspiciously like her cackle.

Chapter Text

The grandfather clock at the front entrance of the Melosian Museum chimes at midnight, ringing throughout the ancient building. The gallery was one of the wonders of the Melosia Realms, attracting visitors from all over the Danceverses. As one of the oldest museums in all of the Danceverses, it housed decades of historical art pieces and relics.

Somewhere in the left wing, four paintings hang on the crimson wall in a row. Misty skies are captured with brushstrokes, and in the center of each masterpiece is a masked body.

Mairwen, William, Odelia, and Rosal. Four friends. Four fighters.

Their framed set is one of the older attractions in the Melosian Museum, but it doesn’t stop them from remaining unattractive. Many residents still visit them each day, gasping and gawking as the hours pass. What these residents may not know is that the masterpieces of the museum are never as frozen as they seem.

When the clock chimes midnight, the four bodies bumble forward, walking through the wall in a ghostly fashion. Other fixtures around them start to spring to life as well.

Lady Mairwen, the Visionary. She had always shared an interest in the macabre, the unordinary. Hell, Lady Mairwen was the unordinary. Everything to her was a craft, a way of life, a perfection.

Lord William, the Scribe. Easily the most eloquent of the four. He would drown himself in sonnets, staining his hands with ink every night. An uptight copyist was the front to a creative mind racing faster than light.

Lady Odelia, the Revolutionary. When no one else wanted to step out of line, she would be the one to do so. Odelia would stand up for what she believed was right, putting her life on the line to protect others, almost annoyingly so. With a big heart came a big voice, those around her would soon realize.

And finally, Liege Rosal, the Valentine. Always one for dramatics, Rosal made the most of every situation, taking it as it was and escalating it. If people thought that Odelia was loud, they should listen to Rosal after he’s had just a few drinks. He’s always been one to disrupt.

When he emerges from the canvas, Rosal stretches his arms above him, grunting when he hears a sharp cracking sound. “Selios, my back!” he complains. “This never gets easier.”

“Growing older, I see?” Odelia tilts her head to the side, her shades glistening. “Will we have to get you a cane?”

“Oh, shut it,” he whispers, cracking more of his joints as she chuckles. How could she not sympathize with him? Holding the same position for eighteen hours straight was a pain!

“Maybe if you didn’t bend yourself into such an awkward pose each morning, you wouldn’t have such painful nights,” says Odelia. As she speaks, Rosal repeats her words in a high-pitched murmur. She’s quick to notice, gasping. “Don’t mock me!” she says, smacking his shoulder.

“I’ll mock you all I want,” he parades. As they laugh alongside each other, he can spot Mairwen whisper something to William, wasting no time in throwing himself between the two of them. “And what are you two gossiping about?”

They both step back from the one invading their space. “We were simply… anticipating tonight’s events,” says Mairwen.

“Oh, how cold of you, being so secretive, as always.” Rosal smirks. He’s always known that banter was the way to combat her frigid statements.

William crosses his arms. “Must you always be so nosy when it comes to whatever doesn’t have to do with you?”

And William… oh, William. He was the only one who could make Rosal shut up, even if it was just for a few seconds.

“...Only if it’s what you want, my dear,” he says before walking back over to Odelia.

“Hmph.” William scoffs. Rosal stands tall next to Odelia with a hand on his hip. She eyes him up and down.

“Smooth,” she comments, quickly silenced by a glare from Rosal. She clears her throat, turning her attention to the others. “Shall we get going?”

“That would be ideal… we aren’t late, are we?” William asks as he adjusts his collar. The ladies groan. “For the love of Selios, what’s wrong with wanting to be punctual?”

“The longer you talk, the longer it’s going to take to get to the ballroom!” Odelia says as she grabs the writer’s hand, dragging him down the hallway.

“The others are dying to see us, you know. It’s just as Odelia said, you’re holding us up,” Rosal comments as he passes by. He turns around just in time to see a frustrated glare on the other’s face.

There was something so charming about the way William got riled up so easily. He wasn’t one to act out, especially in front of an audience, so Rosal got to see small, fleeting signs of the scribe losing his temper. Furrowed eyebrows, gritted teeth, and passive-aggressive comments were just a few of them. The comments were his personal favorite.

The four walk through the museum, heading up the stairs to face a luxurious set of double doors, where muffled calamity can be heard on the other side. Rosal is the one to push through, sound exploding into the hall. This was a restricted area of the Melosian Museum, closed off to visitors during the day. At night, however, the ballroom on the third floor dances with life. It’s seen as a gathering area for all of the subjects and muses of the museum, the life of the art pieces creating an atmosphere of magic and power. The museum was rooted in history, and this room was where it all culminated.

Mairwen and Odelia both head off in separate directions, leaving the two men alone. Rosal takes a step closer. “So…”

William eyes him. “...So?”

“How do you plan to spend your night?” he asks.

“I don’t plan on doing anything in particular.” William looks away. “I want to use tonight to relax.”

“Relax?” Rosal’s eyebrows perk up. “At a ballroom party like this one? You’re boring.”

“And you’re a nuisance, so we’ll call it even,” he hisses before walking away and disappearing into the crowd. Rosal huffs and heads in the other direction.

These parties were the highlight of museum living. For a long time, it felt like these parties were the only thing Rosal knew, until he learned how to utilize his flow to find gateways to other places. He would occasionally sneak off and have his own adventures, but for now, he was going to take things slow and see where the night took him.

He goes to take a turn, bumping into someone else along the way. “My apologies-”

“Sorry-” The stranger whispers, then stops in his tracks. “Wait, Rosal?”

He pauses, looking up and recognizing a familiar, painted face. “Charles! You’re back!”

“It’s been quite a bit of time.” The aristocrat shakes his hand with a warm smile. “How have you been? I didn’t think I would see you until later tonight.”

“That was false of you to assume. You’ve known me to be quite the socialite,” Rosal says with a wink.

“Well, I’m glad I ran into you.” Charles nods. “We have to catch up.”

“Oh, but of course!” Rosal turns to one of the buffet tables, pouring drinks for both of them. He turns back around, handing Charles his glass. “So, how was Versailles? Tell me everything.”

Rosal spends the first hour or so catching up with Charles, listening to the other detail about the beautiful architecture in Versailles. He hadn’t been to Earth himself; he hadn’t figured out how yet, but you could say it was on his bucket list. They spent the first part of the night at each other’s side, occasionally conversing with other partygoers.

“...And don’t get me started on what the sunrises on Earth are like. The way the sky is painted, I had never seen anything like it,” Charles says. Rosal can practically hear the amount of daydreaming evident in his tone.

“Right, right.” He nods, taking a glance around the ballroom. He hasn’t seen Odelia since the group split off. He bumped into Mairwen once, but she seemed engaged in another conversation. Just as he wonders where William is, he spots him across the floor, sitting by himself on a plush couch against the wall. He sits with his hands in his lap, posture slightly slouched as he spectates the area.

“I’ll be right back,” he tells Charles before snaking through the crowd until he makes it out the other side. He walks over and stands next to the couch, but William doesn’t seem to notice.

“How’s that ‘relaxing time’ treating you?” he asks. William flinches as he looks up, it’s a reaction that Rosal has to stop himself from laughing at.

“It’s fine,” he puts it simply, straightening his posture.

“Fine?” The valentine joins his comrade on the couch. “You look bored.”

“And what makes you say that?”

“You’re at this lively ball with everyone from the museum, and you choose to waste your nights in the corner. Why?”

William hums, looking at the crowd. He doesn’t answer.

“You don’t even look happy over here-”

“I am happy, Rosal.” William cuts him off. “I assure you, I am fine- hey, don’t roll your eyes at me-”

“You’re always so uptight.” Rosal crosses his legs, leaning closer. “Don’t you think it’s time to let loose? This is the place to do it, after all.”

“I don’t see the need for that.” He shakes his head, listening to the other groan. “What?”

It’s now Rosal’s turn to stay quiet, a rare occurrence. He rests a finger on his lip, scanning the ballroom. His eyes land on the exit, eyebrows narrowing.

He snaps his fingers. “I have an idea.”

“Oh dear.”

“Say, William…” he hums. “Why don’t we leave and have our own fun? Just the two of us?”

“...I beg your pardon?”

“I know some great bars in the other Danceverses. We can have a night to ourselves, away from the museum,” he proposes. “I’d say a night like that would carry lots of excitement, and believe me, that’s something you need in your life.”

William looks the slightest bit offended at that final comment. He turns away from Rosal, looking at the sea of moving bodies.

“And what about the nightly dance?”

Rosal’s expression changes. The nightly dance. He was secretly hoping the other wouldn’t bring it up. It was a sacred tradition that had been instilled in the museum for as long as he could remember. Each evening, when the clock struck half-past five, each party-goer would find a partner and sway in time to the orchestral music. The rhythm and rhyme from the dancers would generate the flow that powered the museum. The only problem was that the rhythm would never change. When you take your first dance with your partner, they remain your partner until the end of time. Each night passed with no distortion. Charles with Jeanne, Romeo with Juliet, William with Mariwen… and Rosal with Odelia.

He had heard stories of what would happen if someone went out of tune. Some thought the museum would crumble to the ground, others told tales of a flood from the Sea of Melos coming their way. Rosal hated the routine. He was the one who would occasionally try to sway away and swipe a different partner, but the flow of each body somehow always brought him back to Odelia.

Realizing he’s been quiet, Rosal scoffs. “Yeah? Well, if the museum is able to stay standing after Charles and Jeanne take a trip to Earth for a full month, then I think we’ll be fine, William.”

William briefly glances up at the other, wringing his hands together. “It’s not the same. They’re… in tune,” he quietly states. He doesn’t need to elaborate. Rosal already knows what he’s trying to say.

“We’ll be back before the dance starts, I promise you. I always am.” He nods. The scribe doesn’t meet his eyes. “I assure you, it’ll be fun-”

“If I promise to go to one bar with you, will you let me be for the rest of the night?”

That’s all Rosal needs to hear. With newfound energy, he stands up, grabbing William’s hand and pulling him out of his seat. He drags the other through the doors of the ballroom, marching down the hallway.

“Where are we going?”

“Wherever I want!”

They bound up the stairs and turn the corner, Rosal dragging William behind him as they stop in front of a wide painting, brushstrokes dancing in hues of blue and purple. Rosal rotates his wrist in preparation, and with a snap of his fingers, the gold frame starts to shimmer and gleam. The strokes of paint start to swirl and contort.

William watches with bewilderment. “How… How did you do that?”

Rosal only smirks, pulling the other forward. William’s vision turns into a pool of gleaming white, and it feels like his whole body is floating. He can still feel Rosal’s hand, but the rest of his body feels like it’s in a new place of belonging. The sensation only lasts for a few seconds, and weight returns to his body as he stumbles forward. They were in a hallway decorated with industrial pipes on the wall and neon signs in… bird cages?

“What- how- how did you-” The more he takes in, the more unreal this feels. He looks at Rosal, who looks at him with a proud smirk.

“What? You’ve never seen someone use transportation flow before?” he asks, an entertained air in his voice. Before William can respond, his hand is grabbed again. “Come on, enough gawking.”

He’s dragged forward again, stepping into the main room of the establishment. The glow of the neon lights above them bathes the minglers, who are walking around, dancing, and sitting at the bars, scattered across the room like uneven points on a graph.

Rosal hops up onto a barstool, beckoning the other to join him. “Get whatever you want, I’ll cover,” he says before engaging in a conversation with the bartender, who seems to know him already. William looks around, unfamiliar with every part of this new place. He ends up ordering some cocktail that looks appetizing, while Rosal purchases a straight shot of tequila.

“Cheers to finally getting you out of the museum.” Rosal raises his shot glass.

“You act as if I’m a homebody.” William rolls his eyes.

“Well, you kind of are,” he persists.

William rolls his eyes. He doesn’t want to argue with Rosal’s stubborn self. Tonight wasn’t a night to argue, seeing that he would probably be a bit drunk later. Maybe even more than a bit…? No, he wouldn’t drink that much. He had before, but he couldn’t remember how long it had been. It had to be at least a decade.

“Ahem?” Rosal clears his throat, bringing William back to the present.

“Ah, right. Cheers.” Their glasses finally clink together. He turns away and takes a small sip. The drink is delectable. Not as good as the drinks served at the ballroom, but still quite nice. By the time he’s turned back, Rosal’s glass is completely empty.

“And now, we wait.” He grins.

“Is this why you’re always so… lopsided… in the morning?” asks William.

“Hm?”

“Whenever you disappear for a while, you’re much more sociable when you come back. Now that I know where you’ve been sneaking off to, it only makes sense.” He looks at the thespian, who seems unusually silent as they lock eyes. “I’m not wrong, am I?”

“Ah.” Rosal chuckles quietly. “Truthfully, I didn’t think you noticed.”

William suddenly feels a rapid thumping in his chest as the silence between them grows. “...Of course I noticed,” he says as he turns away and takes another sip. “I’m quite analytical.”

The night passes on, and for such a chaotic environment, it’s strangely peaceful. They stay in their seats, occasionally carrying on conversation, but spending most of their time being observers. William observes the dance floor across them, neon silhouettes moving in tune. He can hear some commotion coming from his right, maybe an argument, but he doesn’t find himself caring enough to pay attention to it. Instead, he finds himself fixated on a hushed mumble from Rosal.

He turns towards the other. “Did you say something?”

The other pauses, averting his eyes for just a moment. “...No.” He shakes his head, then looks out towards the dance floor. “I’m going over there. You’re welcome to join me.”

The blonde looks in the same direction. Following Rosal to the crowded dance floor wouldn’t exactly be in his level of comfort, but he’s not keen on staying at the bar by himself, either. He gets up from his seat, watching Rosal attempt to do the same. He seems more… bright, more than usual. His cheeks are rosy as he stumbles out of his seat, wrapping his fingers around William’s arm so that he doesn’t fall.

“Oh- oh dear,” he stammers out as he nearly gets dragged down by Rosal.

Before they can continue, one of the voices William heard earlier grows into a shout. Before the bartender can calm the drunkard, they smash a bottle against the countertop. Rosal quickly steps back and pushes himself and William against the wall, and suddenly, that feeling is back again. That floating feeling; it wasn’t from the liquor, no.

His view became white again for just a moment, and when he felt the weight return to his body, the neon had disappeared. They were both in a small bathroom with wooden walls, a scenic painting next to the sink. A saloon door was their way to exit, and William could hear some jaunty country song playing outside.

“Where… where are we?” William looks around the room, then towards the painting, then towards Rosal, whose white face is paler than Winterhaven snow. “Rosal, where are we-”

“Oh my Selios, I fucked up,” he expresses rather eloquently, flicking his wrist. “I’m sorry, I didn’t see where we were going, I’ll get us back in an instant…”

William watches the other flick his wrist. “Rosal, is something wrong-”

“NO! I mean, no! Erm, everything’s alright, I… come on, now, work. Work!” Rosal keeps toying with his wrist for a few moments longer before grinning awkwardly. “Quite a night for us, huh?”

“Rosal, you insisted we would go to only one bar.”

“And we have! It’s just that, in an effort to get away from that fight, we may have accidentally brought ourselves to another bar, and the amount of alcohol in my body at the moment is tampering with my ability to properly use flow, but it’s fine!” A panicked burst of laughter leaves his chest. “It’s fine, oh my- don’t give me that look, we’ll be fine. We just need to rest.”

“REST?!” The blonde raises his voice, putting his head in his hands. “We have to be back in time for the dance, we can’t bloody rest-”

“And we will, I assure you, William. Life isn’t all about tidiness, you know. Sometimes, you need to let the flow of fate… take you… somewhere…” He trails off.

“The flow of fate, you sound ridiculous.” William scoffs.

“The liquor will do that to you, dear.” Rosal quips.

“Where even are we?” William repeats his question.

Rosal scoffs, motioning towards the wooden interior. “Isn’t it obvious?”

“Well, no, not really.”

“Now do you see why I agreed you were a homebody earlier?”

William’s hand gets grabbed again (Rosal’s quite clingy tonight, isn’t he?) so quickly that he nearly gets smacked head-on by the saloon door on the way out. As he turns the corner, he takes in more of this jovial place. Triangle banners hang from the ceiling, and rainbow confetti clings to the floor. The windows outside show a dark, midnight sky, and he can hear some machinery; it’s the one odd element of this country fantasy he finds himself in.

He can make out a figure kneeling on the ground. Rosal steps forward, clearing his throat. “Care to take a few more patrons, my dear?”

The kneeling person looks up in their direction. Pumpkin-colored locks float over her shoulder. She has freckles all over her face and the second-brightest pair of amber eyes that William’s ever seen. “Rosal!” She stands up, wrapping the other in a warm hug. “Didn’t expect you to be back so soon, sweetheart!”

“I could never keep myself away from this delightful little establishment, Annie.” He greets her, then turns around. “Right, William. This is Annie, the fastest, quickest, most charming saloon waitress in all of Wasterra.”

“Oh, stop it.” She blushes, but it doesn’t come close to matching the pink of Rosal’s cheeks. “Now, can I get you boys something?”

“Absolutely. Can I get some hard cider?” asks Rosal as he jumps right onto the stool. As Annie fetches him a can, he looks to see the scribe still in place. “Are you alright, William?”

“I’m fine.” He sits down, ignoring the twinge in his stomach that had suddenly appeared when Rosal complimented Annie. “Do you really think it’s a good idea to drink more when your foolish inability to moderate yourself is what got us stuck here?”

Rosal blinks before letting out a wheeze long enough to paint himself as a drunken fool. His laugh turns into a high-pitched chortle as tears prick at the corners of his eyes.

“Right, of course you see this as some sort of laughing matter.” William crosses his arms.

“I- I don’t know why I’m-” He pauses to take in a heavy breath. “I don’t know why I’m laughing, it’s just that you-” The sight of William’s angered face is enough to make him crack up again. “You need to relax! You’re acting as if I’ve doomed us all!”

“If we’re late, we may as well have.” He huffs.

“Oh, come on!” Rosal nearly cackles. “Why do you care, anyway?”

“Because it’s tradition!”

“For crying out loud, break the mold! Loosen up!” He throws up his arms. “Come on, come on! You’re already there, you’re getting riled up-”

“I am not getting riled up.”

“Oh, you are, and it’s wonderful!”

Before William can clap back, Annie returns and places a can in front of Rosal. She eyes William. “You want one, too?”

The man hesitates, but eventually nods, glaring at Rosal. “...Sure, thank you. After the night I’ve been having, I have a feeling I’ll need it.”

His face is flushed pink, it’s a detail that William catches right before Rosal puts his head in his hands, burying himself in his own laughter. There was something about the loss of his composure that made William’s heart beat faster… that’s a fleeting thought that crosses his mind. It’s nothing. It’s probably just due to what was in his system.

The other finally calms down, breathing heavily as he wipes a tear from his eye. “R-Relax. We’ll be fine. Just give me some time to wind down, and we’ll head straight back home.”

“Mhm.”

Annie places a can in front of him. William cracks it open.

“Why are you so desperate to get home?”

He turns. Rosal’s eyes are on him, and it’s a gaze he’s not sure if he’s seen tonight. There was curiosity, but not the bursting kind that he often carried. He could feel Annie’s eyes on him as well, the waitress missing the majority of the context of what they had been through that night.

Rosal seems to notice the shift he’s caused. He sits up, smirking. “Is it because you’re sick of me?”

The blonde’s eyebrows narrow sharply. “Rosal.”

“You’re just so desperate to get back to your portrait and have Odelia act as a barrier between us for an entire, luxurious eighteen hours...” He says.

“No, it’s not that.” William sighs, his grip tightening on the can of cider. “...What if we don’t get back in time? What happens then?”

“It’ll be alright, William. Stop stressing-”

“You don’t know that.” There’s a light frost of anger in his voice. “We could be putting the museum at risk by being all the way out here. Mairwen, Odelia… they could be in danger if we disrupt the order. If something were to happen to either of them while we’re gone… I don’t know if I will ever be able to forgive myself.”

Rosal’s quiet after that. Annie takes it as a sign to leave the two be for now, heading somewhere else. That’s how they spend their time next: unspoken words, no eye contact, and silent sips. The saloon is much different in volume from the club, they had gone from calamity to calm in only half an hour. The silence feels like an eternity, with William starting to feel a bit uncomfortable. It’s why he’s relieved when he hears Rosal step away from the bar.

“Have you ever played pool before, William?”

He turns to see the other leaning against the wall, a long, wooden stick in his hands. Rosal finally looks at his friend, a twinkle in his eye that William can’t pull himself away from. “Come here,” he mutters.

The tone in his voice is something William can’t deny. He’s always been in awe of how well Rosal could command. He could capture all of the energy in a room and make sure that everyone was watching him. When William gets up, Rosal grabs another stick from off the wall, throwing it in the air.

“Catch!”

Everything stops. William’s reaction time was already bad enough while he was sober, and Rosal knew that well. One end of the stick smacks him square in the face. He can barely process it, trying to catch the stick with one hand and fixing his skewed glasses with the other. He doesn’t need clear vision to hear Rosal’s delighted snickering.

“You did that on purpose,” William accuses once he’s got his glasses back on.

“What? Me? I would never! Don’t get yourself in a twist, William.” Rosal relishes in the reaction he gets as he walks over to the opposite side of the pool table, grabbing each ball and placing them on the table one by one.

“So, what is this?” the scribe asks as he takes his position at his end of the table.

“We’ll take turns hitting balls into the pockets of the tables. One of us will be stripes, and one of us will be solids. Once one of us, preferably me, sinks all of our designated balls, they’ll attempt to sink the 8-ball,” Rosal explains. “I’ll tell you more as we go.”

“Is there… is there a prize?” William asks. He pauses after. He’s not exactly sure why he brought up the idea.

“Fantastic idea, William!” Rosal’s face lights up with delight, which isn’t a good sign. He places his hands on the table, rocking back and forth in thought before he stops. “I have one, how about this? Whoever loses owes the winner a favor that they can redeem anywhere, anytime. How does that sound?”

Rather tame for Rosal, William thinks. Then again, he would much rather take tame from Rosal.

“Alright, then.” He nods. “Deal.”

“Perfect! Let’s begin.” Rosal takes the triangle off the table, carelessly throwing it aside. Next, he takes the pool stick in hand, lightly tossing it in the air and catching it again. He leans down, the stick sliding through his fingers slowly, and then… CRACK!

The balls explode across the table, scattering all over the place so fast, William doesn’t know where to look.

“Perfect! I sunk a striped ball, making you the sinker of solids,” Rosal declares, then looks ahead towards William. “Alright, then. Your turn!”

William replays the prior moment in his head. He leans over the table, attempting to mimic the way Rosal had done it previously. He lines up the stick with the white ball in front of him, sliding it just as the other had done, and then… clink! William pushes himself forward with far too much force than he should, propelling his head down and slamming his forehead directly into the table. He yells when he feels the tip of the temple on his glasses poke him in the eye, hissing as he stands back up.

“Fuck…!” he mutters, trying to blink the pain away. He can hear an unruly snort from the other end of the table. William doesn’t know whether or not to yell at the other for laughing, distracted by the pain and a fluttery feeling in his chest.

“Oh my goodness…” Rosal gasps for air. “A-Are you okay?”

“You are so lucky these lenses didn’t crack.” Once his eye isn’t twitching, he folds his glasses and tucks them into his collar. “I’m not wearing these.”

“You’re going to play blind?!” The other laughs even harder.

“I can see just fine!” William lies right through his teeth. “I don’t want to break these, they were rather expensive!”

“W-Whatever you say…” Rosal sighs. “Selios, that was hilarious…”

“Did I hit the ball?” He asks, unable to tell which ball on the table is the cue ball.

“Please, William, just put the glasses back on!”

He does just that, realizing he would have a much better shot at winning a game he’s never played if he could see the table in front of him. The first thing he catches sight of is the cue ball, which he managed to move only a couple of inches. The second thing he catches sight of is Rosal, face flushed pink as he laughs with a hand over his mouth. The moment the two of them make eye contact, he breaks into more titters, pushing his hand beneath his mask to rub his eyes of any tears. William can’t pull himself away from looking at the sight.

“That…” He doesn’t know what to say, breathless for a mere moment before he quickly collects himself. “That was not funny.”

“You’re right. That wasn’t funny, it was priceless!” Rosal gets into position and leans over the table, ready to shoot, but he stops again, falling back into laughter. “You should have seen the way you fell over, it was-”

“Rosal, if you keep laughing for any longer, we’re never going to finish this game, and we’re going to be trapped here for the rest of the night,” William snaps back. The comment is meant to mostly be a tease, but even on a night where he should be forgetting his worries, he can’t stop thinking about what may happen if he and Rosal are just a second late to the ballroom.

“Alright, alright!” Rosal chuckles, focusing on the game. He lines his stick with the ball, taking the shot… attempting to take the shot, really.

The stick flies out of his hand, and Rosal practically throws it like a javelin across the table. William manages to sidestep out of the way to avoid nearly getting impaled by this thing as it flies away, past William and onto the floor. William suddenly barks out something between a laugh and a parrot’s squawk, quickly covering his mouth in embarrassment. In turn, Rosal starts to silently wheeze, doubling over and almost falling to the floor.

“Wh- What the hell was that?!” William looks between his opponent and the stick on the floor. “Selios, I thought you were good at this game!”

“Shut up!” The thespian points an accusatory finger towards the scribe, giggling like a child. “At least I’ve sunk a ball!”

“At least I didn’t fling the stick across the bloody table!” William turns away and laughs so hard that he struggles to breathe. He doesn’t remember the last time he’s been this… uncomposed.

They both continue like that, taking shots at the cue ball and trying to finish the game as quickly as they can. However, neither of them is anywhere near being stable enough to take good shots. Whenever one of them messed up, it would result in both of them in stitches. William’s not sure if he’s ever laughed so hard in his life. He would normally make a fuss over someone seeing him in this kind of state, but the fact that Rosal isn’t acting any better makes him forget about keeping up appearances.

He’s gotten the hang of the game over time, learning how to keep his body still and hit the balls without plucking his eyes out. They’ve both been on an even playing field the entire game. William hits the cue ball, knocking the solid purple ball forward. It hits the black ball nearby into one of the corner pockets, and Rosal whoops with glee.

“YES! I win!” he cheers.

“What? No, you didn’t.” William tilts his head in confusion. “We’ve still got a bit to go.”

“Well, yes, but if you knock the 8-ball into a pocket, which you just did, the other player automatically wins. That means I win.” Rosal shrugs matter-of-factly, grinning smugly.

“And did you plan on telling me this?” asks William.

“Well, I did, whenever it came up. Which happened to be now.”

“But not when the game started?”

“I told you I would explain the rules as we went along!”

William scoffs. “You did nothing of the sort.”

“Well, maybe if you hadn’t been so bad at the game, I wouldn’t have been laughing so hard, and I would’ve remembered to explain the rules.” Rosal quickly and quietly mutters the sass under his breath.

“Hm? What was that?”

“Nothing!” He delivers a sickly-sweet smile back to William, who raises an eyebrow in suspicion. He takes a glance around the saloon. Annie is out of sight, and moonlight shines through the windows.

“We should get going now, shouldn’t we?” he asks.

“I suppose you’re right.” William agrees, placing his pool stick on the table. “Back to the museum?”

“...Precisely.” Rosal slowly nods, doing the same. There’s a different tone in his voice from before. It’s softer, almost defeated, but William doesn’t press it. As Rosal steps aside, he nearly trips over his own two feet, clinging onto the pool table for dear life.

William snorts, covering his pink face with his hand. “Come on, Rosal. We’re getting you home.” He reaches forward, grabbing Rosal’s hand. They both share smiles as William pulls the other forward, wrapping a hand around his waist to keep him standing as they walk back to the saloon’s restroom.

“Why don’t you accept that you’ve lost it?” Rosal asks.

William quickly turns his head. “Excuse me?”

“Every time you’ve gotten dizzy with laughter tonight, you, like… you always find a way to hide it from me. You’ll cover your face, or you’ll put a hand over your mouth, or you’ll turn away,” the other explains, his words slurring together as he speaks. “Like when I launched the pool stick, and you made that sound-”

“Oh my Selios, don’t remind me.” The poet’s face flushes almost instantly.

“I’ve never heard you make a noise like that before!” Rosal snickers. “I don’t know if I’ve heard anyone make a noise like that before.”

“I didn’t know I could make a noise like that.” William shakes his head. “It was embarrassing.”

“No, it wasn’t! Contrary to what you may believe, your laughter lets me know that you’re having fun,” Rosal insists as he pushes through the restroom door. He suddenly turns to face William, intensely eyeing him. “You did have fun tonight, right?”

William looks to the side, put off by the sudden eye contact, but he finds himself nodding. “I… I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would,” he says.

“Perfect,” he hears Rosal say. It’s the last thing he hears before he feels like he’s floating again.

The quiet atmosphere of the saloon is jarringly replaced once William can see again. They’re back at the nightclub, with all of its bright, neon lights, music blasting from the speakers, crowded bars across every wall… Selios. William can’t wait to get back to the museum.

“We came from over there, right?” He raises his voice so that Rosal can hear him over the club’s calamity, pointing towards the hallway with the bird cages hanging from the ceiling.

“Yeah… I think so! Yes, that’s it!” Rosal yells back.

He grabs William’s hand… and pulls him in the opposite direction.

“What?! Where are we going?” William asks, squeezing past people and squeezing onto Rosal’s hand, not wanting to be separated. Rosal doesn’t answer him. He doesn’t even look back at William, bee-lining to a place only he knows. Wherever he wants, as he said earlier.

He throws open a door, leading into the alley outside. A dark, purple sky arches over the area, stars glimmering above. Rosal lets go of William’s hand, stumbling forward into the middle of the alley. William closes the door, isolating them from the club’s overstimulating sounds.

“Rosal?”

He still doesn’t answer, looking down. Finally, he turns around, facing William’s direction. There’s an intense look on his face, and even if he isn’t looking directly his way, William can tell that something’s on his mind.

“You, um…” Rosal finally looks up. “You owe me a favor.”

Right. Rosal won the game, which meant William owed him any favor he pleased, just once.

“...Will it be quick?” he asks. He tries not to sound like a dick while speaking, but like always, the museum is in the back of his mind. How could he ever stop thinking about it? It was part of him.

Rosal doesn’t answer his question. Instead, he takes a deep breath, his chest rising and falling, and extends an arm towards William, saying five words that fill him with a sudden terror he was unfamiliar with.

“Have a dance with me.”

“What?” William responds, that terror clearly evident in his voice.

“William, please. Just listen.” Rosal sighs. “Every night, when I’ve danced with Odelia, it’s been great, believe me, she’s lovely, but it’s… it’s not what I want. The museum has this funny sort of way of pushing people together and pulling them away from each other. Like… whenever I try to break away and find you each evening, someone bumps into me, or something happens, oh Selios, something always happens… and I’m never able to. W-We’ve never gotten this sort of chance before… and I’d like to take it.”

William doesn’t say anything. Every part of his body feels like it’s screaming at him to stay at the door.

“I can tell that you’re petrified, William… and believe me, I am too.” He lets out a weak laugh to cover up his trepidation. “I’m… I’m scared, truthfully, I’m scared, and I don’t know if I’ll ever get an opportunity like this again, so please… just indulge me. This is my request, William, and I’m begging you to repay it.”

Aside from being with Mairwen, dance wasn’t an activity that he indulged in. Yet, whenever he did indulge, it came naturally to him. Somehow, he knew the right turns to make, the perfect way to hold her, the correct way to waltz to the beat of the music… it was an artificial science that he had mastered, that he and Mairwen had mastered. Together. They had mastered it together. Odelia and Rosal had mastered it together. William and Rosal weren’t meant to do such a thing. It was just as Rosal had said, it was like he was forbidden from even trying.

On the other hand, William knew he had to do this. Not because he had lost a game and Rosal had wanted him to, but because he ached for it. They weren’t in the museum, they were in a dingy Dancity alleyway. No one was around to watch, and nothing was holding them back, other than unspoken fear. For every reason he wants to stay at the door, a reason for why he shouldn’t outweighs it.

He steps towards Rosal and takes his hand. He slips his other hand around his waist, ready to engage in a silent waltz.

“...Thank you,” Rosal mutters as he looks down at his feet.

From there, William takes the first step, and Rosal follows. He should feel at ease, but with little noise surrounding him, his mind fills with questions and worries. He’s taking the lead right now, as it was typical in the ballroom for the male to lead, but he’s never waltzed with another man before. Perhaps Rosal would have preferred to lead? He should have asked before jumping right in. Rosal was also a few inches taller than Mairwen, and William found himself adjusting his hand placement. There was no music to guide them, either, so he wasn’t sure if he was going at a good pace. Even when he thought he had found something pleasant, there was no way to figure out if he was hitting each step with precision, and additionally-

“Don’t overthink this, William,” says Rosal, pulling him out of his thoughts. “I can practically see what’s on your mind.”

“Oh, really?” he challenges. “What am I thinking, Rosal?”

“You’re thinking, ‘Oh, I have to make sure I do this perfectly! I have to make sure Rosal is impressed with my need for perfection-’”

“Whatever you say.”

“Don’t hide it.” Rosal shakes his head. “You’ve adjusted your hand on my side four times now. I’ve been counting.”

That little comment gets William to cease his focus on his steps for a moment as he breaks into a chuckle. “You know me well, I’ll give you that.”

“Of course I do,” he says as he glances at the other. “We’ve known each other for decades now… it would be criminal if I didn’t.”

“I suppose so,” says William.

He lets his worries go as they continue, doing whatever feels right in the moment. It’s not what he’s used to, but with Rosal in front of him, it makes the takeover of freeform from precision easier for him to accept. As they twirl, he loosens his grip around Rosal’s waist, letting the other spin and then bend backwards in a lean. As he returns, William pivots, both of them spinning quickly before Rosal stops, disrupting the flow. William gets caught off guard by the motion, suddenly stopping alongside Rosal and making sure not to stumble.

“Please, don’t go that fast,” he requests. “I’ve had too many drinks to spin that fast.”

“Of course.” William nods. “Do you want to stop-”

“No. Never stop.”

Suddenly and effortlessly, the other man takes the lead, pulling William along for the ride. Rosal’s lead is much different than William’s, flighty, yet commanding. William’s not sure if he even knows what he’s doing, but at the same time, this kind of chaos is exactly what he would expect from a dance led by Rosal. He does his best to follow along with the freedom-filled steps and not get thrown like a ragdoll. He manages to expect every disorderly move except for a jarring dip that he gets practically thrown into, yelping as he bends backward.

“Relax!” Rosal laughs. “I’m not going to let you fall!”

“Don’t you dare think it,” William jabs back. Despite giving in to the banter, a part of him knows that Rosal would never let him fall purposely. However, Rosal has a trick up his sleeve, as shown by a smirk on his face that William fails to notice until it’s too late. He dips the blonde further down without warning, eliciting a panicked, girlish scream out of William.

“ROSAL!” He yells, glaring the other down. Rosal howls with laughter at the reaction, attempting to pull William back onto his feet. He’s splitting his sides too much to be much help, however, so the blonde mostly helps himself back up.

“You’re ridiculous.” William scoffs, unable to hide an amused smile of his own.

“That was incredible.” He grins, his laughter subduing.

As Rosal gets back into position, putting his hand around William’s waist, the other finds himself distracted. He silently watches as Rosal readjusts himself, wondering if he should take the lead again, but not like before. He tilts his head and leans forward, but Rosal surprises him.

He always does.

Rosal, quick to catch on, takes a hand behind William’s neck and pulls him into a kiss. It’s a kiss that William’s been waiting for all night, even if he was too drunk to really think about it. For a mere second, they’re fighting over who can be more passionate (they always find a way to fight), but it subsides, and they just focus on the task at hand. William puts a hand around Rosal’s waist while Rosal moves his own hand up, throwing it into the locks of William’s hair. It’s going to be a mess after this, but right now, William couldn’t care less. There are much more pressing matters at hand, he thinks to himself as he keeps pressing his lips onto Rosal. They keep at it for a few more minutes, grasping tighter when one of them stumbles so that neither of them has to stop.

When they finally do stop, both of them gasp as they pull away. For a moment, William is worried he’s drunk too much, because he may forget the look on Rosal’s face. The thespian is glowing, and William knows it has nothing to do with the moonlight gleaming on his collarbone.

He gasps. “That was…”

“You’re a marvel,” Rosal tells him, and William truly believes it.

No other words need to be exchanged during the moment. As much as William wants to dive back in, there is a task that they shouldn’t abandon. Rosal takes his hand, leading William back inside the club until they leave the way they came. He’s blinded again, all senses deprived except for the feeling of Rosal’s fingers curled around his palm, and then, they’re back where it all began. Once William can see again, he follows Rosal down the hallway. Both make their way down the stairs when Rosal stops, bending over.

“Well… it looks like we weren’t the only ones having fun tonight,” he hums. William is unsure what he’s referring to until Rosal turns around. In his hands, he holds a rose-colored masquerade mask, adorned with lace and jewels. In a quick moment, Rosal snatches William’s glasses off his face, placing the mask on instead.

“It matches your shirt,” Rosal says with a smile (William’s pretty sure it’s a smile. His vision is too blurry for him to make it out properly) before taking the mask off. He puts the glasses back on William’s face, strolling along, and William follows.

This has been a night that William’s afraid to forget. He’s feeling much better now than he did earlier tonight, now able to somewhat walk on his own without feeling like he’s about to collapse onto the floor. The pool game might be forgotten, but he should be stable enough to remember the kiss, right? There’s no way he would forget about something like that, but still, he worries. However, a different worry overtakes him as he and Rosal turn into a rather crowded hallway.

“...What time is it?” Rosal asks as he watches patrons of the museum pass back and forth. William’s eyes dart around before landing on a clock, where he sees one hand pointed mostly south, the other sharply left.

“5:45,” he announces, a bit of color draining from his face. “We… missed the dance.”

“W-Well… the museum appears to still be in one piece, so we should be fine! Right?” Rosal asks, trying to picture a bright outcome. “Come on, it’s not like we’re catalysts-”

“Catalysts of what?”

Rosal yelps as he turns around. William does the same, spotting a familiar red-and-pink-haired friend of theirs. He doesn’t need to see Mairwen’s eyes to tell that she’s curious, her head tilted and her arms crossed.

“You found them!” Odelia isn’t far behind her. She races to meet the group, the four finally reunited after an eventful night. Her eyes dart between William and Rosal, bounding with a much more obvious, perking curiosity. “Where have you two been all night? Do you know how much time has passed?”

“Can you talk while you walk? It’s almost six, we need to head back to the portrait hall,” says Mairwen. They all nod, following her and walking side-by-side.

“We were just… having some fun of our own!” Rosal says coyly.

“Wow…” Odelia’s eyebrows raise. “William? Having fun?”

William sharply turns his head as he gawks, mouth agape. “How dare you!” he declares. The other two find the reaction hilarious, their shoulders shaking with laughter. Rosal falls into Odelia a bit as he snickers, still clearly a bit out of it.

“It really was quite a surprise! I didn’t expect it either, but truly, we did have fun,” says Rosal as he shoots the other man a knowing glance.

William blushes, clearing his throat. “Anyways… Odelia, I have a question.”

“Yes?”

“...How did the nightly dance go?”

Odelia tilts her head, then shrugs. “It was fine.”

“Fine?” Rosal raises an eyebrow, doubting her.

“Nothing different happened, if that’s what you’re asking. Well, nothing other than both of you being gone,” she answers.

“But if Rosal and I were gone, then… who did you and Mairwen dance with?”

As William asks his question, Odelia’s eyes trail away. She purses her lips in fake thought before her eyes fall on the other lady among them. She smiles wildly at her, but Mairwen merely glances at her before turning her head away.

“Oh my Selios!” Rosal gasps, grabbing onto Odelia’s shoulder. “How was it?!”

“It was a nice change of pace. Quite lovely, if you ask me. She’s quite the dancer,” she says.

“Must we discuss this now?” asks Mairwen, a light blush dusting her cheeks.

“Of course!” Odelia turns back to Rosal, smirking. “She’s wonderful, but not as great as us two! We’re the best dancers here!”

William coughs to disguise his chuckle. Odelia is quick to notice. “What?”

“Nothing,” he chimes.

“I’ll explain everything to you tomorrow, Odelia. Believe me, it’ll be worth the wait.” Rosal says with a wink.

The four of them approach their part of the portrait hall, where four empty landscapes stare back at them. Mairwen is the first to enter, leaving the group alone without a word, not unusual for her. She clasps her hands in front of her, choosing a posh pose for the day, also not unusual. Starting from her shoes, a white gleam overtakes her as she stays still, solidifying her into the painting.

“Well, the moment the clock strikes midnight, I hope you’ll be providing me all of the details,” says Odelia.

“I wouldn’t think to do anything less,” says Rosal.

Odelia smiles, stepping forward and being the second to enter her painting. She puts a hand on her hip and puts the other up towards the sky, a confident look on her face as she starts to solidify. She’s always been like Rosal, choosing more flamboyant ways to present herself. As she becomes one with the brushstrokes, William looks at his own painting with concern.

“You have a horrible poker face, by the way.”

William turns to his friend, who smirks, proud of his remark. However, he doesn’t look as proud as he normally would, his face showing more concern than anything.

“I can spot that nervous look on your face from miles away,” Rosal tells him. “What’s wrong?”

“Truthfully… I’m worried I may forget this.” William sighs, clutching his jacket. He catches sight of Rosal’s surprised expression, he seems almost offended that William would even say such a thing. He realizes he should rephrase his wording before he continues. “Not this, of course, not you. I could never forget you. I’m worried I’ll forget parts of this night. What I’m trying to say is I don’t want to lose the full picture-”

“That’s not a problem.” Rosal shakes his head. “If you forget, then I’ll just have to remind you.”

He takes William by the cheek, giving him another kiss. They don’t have to fight over it this time. William lets Rosal take the lead, it’s all he wants. Rosal pulls away, a soft smile on his face. He shoves the mask he’s been holding into William’s hands before stepping into his painting. He crosses an arm across his chest, resting his elbow on his wrist and his head on his fist in a dreamy fashion.

“Good day, William,” he says softly. It was customary to say good day instead of good night in the museum, and vice versa, as most who resided here were nocturnal.

William’s chest flutters when he hears the other say goodbye. “Good day, Rosal,” he says, returning the sentiment.

Rosal gazes to his right moments before locking in place, leaving William the only one who hasn’t. He normally knows what kind of pose to hit, but tonight, he’s not quite sure. Tonight has been too eventful for him to think of it.

He steps into the painting, thinking he’ll come up with something before he freezes. Rosal’s spontaneous spirit was finally rubbing off on him, wasn’t it? He sighs, fiddling with the mask in his hands and admiring the new possession.

Right before he feels himself solidify for the time being, William turns his head, gazing over to his left.

Chapter Text

Leda Nox did not get stressed.

She had started doing ballet just before she turned four years old. At a young age like that, it was seen as something new and refreshing. A way to have fun while presenting herself as beautiful and graceful in front of an adoring audience. With each jeté into a new age, she would perfect her craft, growing taller, growing grander. She would not falter. She did not falter.

Leda Nox did not get stressed, but she did find herself getting sidetracked.

There was a small, dingy dance studio in Eternyx, located in the back of a Cygnus alleyway. It wasn’t the big, spacious studio that she regularly attended back on Earth, but it was something that allowed her to get away. It was just her and the music, the flow of the dance guiding her like a helping hand. It was ideal. She wanted perfect, but she was forced to settle for ideal.

Ideal consisted of a smaller room for herself.

Ideal consisted of classical music playing through the radio in the corner.

Ideal consisted of glimpses of golden shadows in the mirror.

She doesn’t bother to pay attention to them at first, figuring that they were just tricks of the light, but she would see a flash of a figure in the mirror with every pirouette. It gave what was once an ideal practice space an air of discomfort, but Leda did her best to push it down.

Everything came to a halt during one particular practice, where she had been dancing close to the mirror. Practicing her fouettes, Leda had lifted her leg, throwing it outwards, then wrapping it back around her other leg to complete the turn. It was considered to be one of the most difficult spins that a ballerina could complete, but she was no stranger to challenges. She had been doing just fine until she spun around, catching a glimpse of her reflection… a reflection in the mirror.

This was no familiar figure. It was obviously Leda, but it took her place. Shocked by the unfamiliarity, she fell to the floor. The turn was left incomplete, and that’s when she realized that the figure did not falter.

Instead of the golden hauntings that she was familiar with, this ghost was carved from onyx. It stood tall, looking down at Leda with piercing pink eyes, eyes that told her that she shouldn’t be focusing on this. She needed to think bigger, think bolder. Leda blinks, and the figure is suddenly gone. That’s when she decides she has to go.

Ever since she had met Cygnus, the prophecy that she had been shown had stayed in her mind. Was it true that she was destined for power? To be a ruler? A queen? She doubted it at first, but the more he explained, the more attracted she became to the idea, and it appeared that the idea had become attracted to her, with the way she had been haunted by these shadows.

Leda gets up, throwing her duffel bag over her shoulder and shoving the door open. The studio’s receptionist looks up, throwing her a look of intrigue. “You’re leaving early,” she says.

“I have to go,” Leda tells her with no interest in making this conversation longer than it needs to be, sticking her arms through the sleeves of her jacket.

“Got somewhere to be?” she asks, not letting up. Leda exits the studio, not giving the woman a chance to pester her any longer.

The streets of Cygnus were frightening to most people unfamiliar with them. Leda had gotten used to the eeriness, but in a frantic moment like this, she wants to get away as soon as she can. The dusty-pink sky of the Eternyx sunset casts long shadows across the eerie alleyway as Leda speed-walks down the lane. She turns the corner and reaches the glass doors of one of the city’s gems: the Tower of Smoke. Cygnus had taken Leda here when they first met, but she hadn’t been back since. The prophecy was intriguing, but she told herself that she had bigger things to focus on, but even when honing in on her dance career, it never truly left her mind.

The doors close behind her, and she can hear the cogs whirring with life as she’s raised into the sky. Sunlight peaks through the shutters on the side of the elevator as she takes a moment to breathe calmly. Soon, she rises above the roofs of the city, now soaring over them as her skin gleams with a glimmer of sparkling peach. The eyes of the old factory buildings stare back at her, the same color as the eyes held by the figure in the mirror. The elevator reaches the ninth floor, and Leda steps out as soon as the doors fly open.

“Cygnus?” she calls out, pushing open the doors to his office. “Cygnus?”

She steps onto the pathway, twirling around in search of the architect. The room is empty, which doesn’t leave her with much to work with.

“Cygnus!” Leda turns around, calling his name again. She does her best not to sound desperate. “Cygnus, where are you?”

She turns around, going back into the hallway, going past the corner where the elevator left her. When she last came here, the office was the only room she stepped foot in, so she had no idea what the layout of the tower was. She makes her way down the hallway, peeking her head through each doorway she comes across. It’s all the same; Cygnus isn’t there, and neither is anyone else, for that matter. After five doors, she goes to open a sixth, and then-

WHAM!

Just as Leda opens the door, another person slams into her. A scatter of papers fly everywhere as Leda crashes to the ground.

“Selios! Watch where you’re going next time!” says a voice. The papers fall, their flurry no longer obscuring her view, and standing above her is the greatest architect in all of Eternyx.

“Leda?” The man cocks his head. “What are you doing here?”

“I need to-”

Before Leda can finish her sentence, Cygnus takes her hand, hoisting her off the ground. Leda dusts herself off while Cygnus starts to pick up each paper, thumbing through them as the pile grows bigger and reorganizing them. He always had to make sure things were to his liking.

“You were saying?” he asks, the rapid shuffling of papers nearly muffling his voice.

“I need to speak with you,” Leda repeats. “It’s about the prophecy.”

The shuffling stops. Cygnus takes a moment to look up at her with one eye and one obscured piece of glass.

“The prophecy?” he echoes.

Leda nods, anxiously eyeing the amount of paper that is still on the floor. “Can you hurry up?”

“Just a moment, Songbird,” Cygnus tells her with a hint of annoyance. “A bit of assistance would be appreciated, actually.”

She sighs, kneeling next to Cygnus. Songbird? She hands him each paper, and he shuffles it into his pile. Songbird? Once they’re done, he takes her hand again as they stand up, making their way back to his study. As he goes to put the stack on his desk, she steps into the center of the room, and the curtains unfold before her.

“Alright, the prophecy.” He steps onto the walkway, joining her at her side. “What seems to be the issue?”

Leda looks at the first image presented to her: three golden figures dancing around a volcano, the same ones that she’s seen in the mirror. The same ones that she supposedly taints with her own flow, where the path to power begins.

She points at the mural. “I keep seeing these figures-”

“Really?!” Cygnus interrupts her with a sense of glee in his eye. “Where?!”

“In the mirror, usually.”

“...Oh.” The excitement vanishes. He crosses his arms, tilting his head as he looks at the mural. “You know, when I first saw this prophecy, I pictured these depictions to be more physical.”

“Anyways, I keep seeing glimpses of them in the mirror during my ballet practices. I ignored it at first, but then I started to see them more often. Then, today, I saw one that looked like it did in the picture after I corrupted it.” As she continues, the mural changes. The Leda in the mural enchants the ground with dark flow, which streams to the volcano and turns it into an object of darkness. Purple light bubbles from the top, turning the golden entities into shadowy, nightmarish figures. “There! Like that, just like that!”

“Intriguing,” Cygnus comments. “And what next?”

“It… stood there, watching me. I don’t know what it meant, but it looked just like that, and then I came here.”

“Mhm.”

They look at each other for a moment before Leda speaks again. “Well?”

“Well, what?”

“What does it mean?”

Cygnus sighs. “I wish I knew, Leda. Truthfully, I’m just as clueless about this as you are.”

She huffs, looking back at the mural on the wall. “Aren’t you supposed to know more about this than I do? You’re the one who showed it to me.”

“I don’t know who wrote it, I just found it, and then, I found you.” Cygnus puts his hands up in defense. “Don’t shoot the messenger, Swan Song.”

Leda ignores him, only going further into her tailspin. “Well, if you know nothing about this, then how do you know that I’m even the one you’re looking for?”

“I knew it from the moment I saw you,” he insists.

“But the hair-”

“Forget the hair! That’s your face, right?”

Cygnus points to the mural, which has changed again. The prophecy’s starlet had appeared, facing forward. Light eyes, a narrow nose, a pristine face shape… There was no denying that this was Leda.

“So, what about the figure in the mirror?” she asks. “What if it won’t stop haunting me until we find the volcano? Maybe that’s our next step?”

Cygnus eyes her, deep in thought. He paces around the platform, trailing along the outline of the city. He then stops in place, snapping his fingers. “Leda, I think I’ve got it.”

She steps forward, eager to hear his great idea. Cygnus leans in, ready to share his next stroke of genius.

“When was the last time you slept?”

Leda’s eyebrows furrow with confusion. “Excuse me?” she asks, thinking he’s joking around, but the focused look on his face tells her that isn’t the case. “Last night, what are you getting at?”

“Let me rephrase myself.” Cygnus shakes his head. “When was the last time you had a good sleep? I’m talking a full eight hours, no nightmares, no waking up in the middle of the night because your son had a nightmare, none of that. A good sleep. When was the last time that happened to you?”

Leda pauses and thinks about it. She and Cygnus both silently, mutually realize that she doesn’t know the answer.

“Yep, that’s what I thought.” He chuckles.

“Are you serious?” she asks. “Cygnus, I can’t rest. I have practice, and you’re the one who sprang a whole prophecy on me.”

“You need to relax,” he insists. “When you have something to fixate on, you get restless. Believe me, I’m the same way. Now, come on. Follow me.”

She watches as he starts to exit the room. “Where are you going?”

“Follow me!” he repeats. Skeptical, Leda trails behind. When they exit the office, he leads her to the elevator, pressing the button to bring them both to the twelfth floor. The cogs start to whir as the elevator moves.

“Restless?” Leda breaks the silence. “I don’t fixate.”

Cygnus only smirks at that. “The last time we were in this elevator together, you spent the whole ride explaining to me what an arabesque was.”

“Says the one who showed me every detail of the three-dimensional model he built of his own city.”

“...Fine. Let’s call it even.”

The whirring comes to a sharp stop. The doors open, and when they both step out, Cygnus heads down the hallway until the two of them reach a series of double doors at the very end. The inventor slips a key into the lock underneath the handle, twists the knob, and introduces Leda to a new part of the tower.

“Welcome to my suite,” he says to her, stepping aside to let her enter.

Leda enters the new room, an arena of wonder. The walls are painted a fine crimson, and the carpet is a similar shade. Across from her is a plush canopy bed, dusty-red curtains trailing over the quilt. The room is pretty vast and houses plenty of amenities. A set of plush, brown sofas, a bookshelf filled to the brim, a messy desk with papers scattered all over it, a clock ticking away right above it, and a shelf with various bits and bobbles across it were just a handful. The room had a curved, glass ceiling, similar to the Spacetime Observatory, Leda thought. She also noticed a glass door next to the bookshelf, leading out to a balcony.

“I’ll take that.” Cygnus takes her duffel bag, setting it on the floor. He takes off her jacket, hanging it up on a coat rack, before he takes off his own.

“Wait, do you live here?” asks Leda.

“Well, yes! I do, but that wasn’t always the case,” he tells her, taking off his hat and hanging it up. He runs a hand through his short, blue hair. “Back when I started constructing the city, some time ago, I practically made this building my home. My colleagues found me asleep at my desk too many times to count. Eventually, they got fed up with it and told me that there was a spare room on the twelfth floor that I could make my own however I pleased, and now, we’re here. Anyways, make yourself at home.”

“And how do I do that?” asks Leda.

“Oh my Selios, just relax, Leda!” Cygnus tells her, shocked that the idea hasn’t gotten into her head yet. He walks up to one of the plush chairs, patting the cousin. “Here. Sit down.”

He runs off towards the bookshelf, and Leda sits down in the chair, sighing and rubbing her head. Cygnus was a genius, but she couldn’t lie about the fact that his persistence was making her head hurt.

“Exercise your mind, you know?” he emphasizes, rummaging through the bookshelf.

“Sure,” Leda mutters. The sound of Cygnus’ ransacking makes her want to pull her hair out. Maybe if she tore out enough, she could get her hair as short as the woman in the prophecy.

“Have you ever played Godmode?”

She turns her head in her seat to see the inventor at the bookshelf still, looking right at her as he holds a deck of cards, tied together with a satin ribbon.

“No?” She tilts her head slightly.

“Really? Seems like something that would be right up your alley.” Cygnus mirrors her confused expression before walking back over. He hops into the seat across from her, unwrapping the cards and shuffling them in his hands. Leda watches as he does so. He matches her eyes for just a moment before nearly dropping the deck, and the eye contact is broken.

“This is a game of strategy and serenity,” says Cygnus as he keeps on shuffling. “Long ago, the four nations lived in harmony-”

“I’m sorry?”

“There’s a backstory to this, Leda. Please pay attention.” He groans. “As I was saying, there are four nations, each symbolized by their own mark.”

“The Dark Horizon…” He sets down a card. The design features a figure covered and chained up in some sort of chamber, with other cloaked figures surrounding it. The bottom of the card has “GODMODE” written on it, and the card has a dark blue outline. In the top left corner is the mark, which appears to be a church on fire.

“The Kiss of Death…” A second card. This one has the same design, with a few changes. A bright red outline surrounds this card, and the mark is a set of bright red lips.

“The Masked Cult…” A third card. The same design, a white outline. The mark is an intricately designed mask with curved lines across the face.

“And the Eclipsed Stake.” A fourth and final card. The same design completes the set. This outline is a deeper shade of red, almost a magenta. The design is an eclipsed full moon.

“The four nations must come together to defeat a common enemy. Now, here’s how the game works. We each get four cards. Your goal is to get a full suit, consisting of the four nations. The dealer, that would be me, will pick up a card from the deck. If I don’t need it, I’ll discard it to you. However, you can only have four cards at a time, so if I get a card I want, I still have to discard another. Once you get a full suit, you put your deck down for the other players to see in the center of the table, and the round ends. The next round goes on, but that suit is out of play. The fewer cards there are, the faster the rounds go. Got it?”

“Seems… simplistic,” says Leda.

“You’ll pick it up the more you play,” Cygnus says, collecting the cards he had placed down and shuffling them into the deck. “Not to brag, but I am one of the best players in the underground. Very few have beaten me at this game.”

“Very few?” she asks. “That implies that you’ve been defeated before.”

He chuckles. “Don’t get too excited. Now, shall we begin?”

Leda nods, and Cygnus places four cards down in front of them both. Leda picks up her deck, looking at what she has. Two of them have the same design, depicting a figure obscured by orange smoke. At the bottom, the card reads “I WOULD DIE FOR YOU.” One is a Dark Horizon card, the other an Eclipsed Stake card. The next card, a Dark Horizon card labelled “SACRIFICE,” depicts two masked women dancing in black dresses, one dipping the other. The final card in her deck, an Eclipsed Stake card labeled “SANCTIFY ME,” shows two people in a smoke-filled forest, one dressed in black wearing a mask, the other dressed in white with a bird-like collar.

“What exactly are these?” she asks. “Powers?”

“Abilities, technically. I could explain the lore of this game’s narrative to you, but we would be here all day.” Cygnus settles into his chair across from her, looking at his deck. “Ready?”

She nods, and the game begins.

Cygnus picks up his first card, discarding it. Leda picks it up, it’s something she doesn’t need, so she puts it aside. The next card thrown her way is much more useful. Sacrifice, Eclipsed Stake. She tosses away the Sanctify Me card. Cygnus picks up a card he wants, giving his spare to Leda. I Would Die For You, Masked Cult. Leda takes it, the new Eclipsed Stake card being discarded as quickly as she got it. Another card comes her way. I Would Die For You, Kiss of Death. She slams her deck down, face-up, and that’s the round. Her opponent, alerted by the noise, looks up in shock.

“Well, that was easy,” she proclaims.

“How did you do that?” asks Cygnus.

“I started with two of the same card,” says Leda. “You gave me another, and then, you discarded the last one needed to complete the set.”

“That…” The architect looks bewildered. “That was-”

“You seem surprised,” she says. “You admitted yourself that you weren’t undefeated.”

“That was just the practice round!” Cygnus says, collecting the cards to reshuffle.

“That’s not fair, you never made that clear!”

“But would it be fair of me to let you dive into a game without any practice? No, of course not!” says Cygnus as he throws some new cards down to Leda. “You just got extremely lucky for your first try, a rare occurrence. Anyways, this is now the start of the game.”

Leda takes a look at her new cards. “ARMY OF ME,” a card with the chained figure she had seen earlier, surrounded by lightning. “EVERYTHING STARTS AND ENDS WITH YOU” depicts the figure in the chamber with multiple hands placed across it in a cultish manner. “FATE BRINGER” shows them again, with an effect on the card similar to TV static. The final card is another I Would Die For You card. All of them are Eclipsed Stake cards, except for the Army of Me card, which is a Kiss of Death card. Four cards from four different suits… this hand wasn’t as lucky as her first, but that wouldn’t stop her from coming out on top.

“Ready when you are,” she says.

They both start lucky. Cygnus puts the first card in his deck, and what he discards is a Fate Bringer card, something that would help Leda. She manages to get another one right after, and two of her other cards make their way to the garbage pile. The next moments are quiet and tense, the only sound being the cards slapping on the table.

“You’re quite determined to get what you want.” Cygnus puts a new card in his deck.

“Be quiet,” Leda commands, deep in focus.

The tension continues as Cygnus obeys her. Truthfully, she was surprised. He seemed like a man who would ignore that request and become a chatterbox to distract her from a win. However, that obedience was his downfall. Leda found the final Fate Bringer card that she needed, slamming her deck down in the center of the table.

“Done.” She chimes.

“Damn it!” Cygnus shouts. “I just needed one more card!”

“Are you already losing your temper?” Leda watches with amusement. “It’s only the first round.”

“Of course not.” He runs a hand through his hair, clearly not happy to be beaten at his own game. “You just surprise me. You’re picking up on this much quicker than I anticipated…”

“You know I’m not one to back down from a challenge,” she tells him.

“Of course not,” Cygnus repeats, reshuffling the cards.

“How many rounds make up one game?”

“In a game of two players, it’s typically best of seven rounds. Now, let’s begin again.”

Leda starts with cards from four different suits once again. Cards are slammed on the table as the two of them are locked into their game. The fact that they’re both dead silent doesn’t take away from the intensity that lingers in the air. It’s another game of silence that ends when Leda slams down a full suit of Army Of Me cards. Cygnus doesn’t say anything at her second victory, but Leda could have sworn that she saw his eye twitch.

Unfortunately for Leda, her streak of victory didn’t last too long. Cygnus wins the next round with his Skyburner suit, which is fine with her, until he slams down a full suit of Sacrifice cards. She does her best to take the lead again, but he throws down his Godmode suit with a smirk on his face, and that’s when Leda decides she’s had enough of second place.

“Looks like I’ve taken the lead.” He chuckles as he reshuffles the deck.

“You say that now, but we still have two more rounds to play,” says Leda.

“And I’ll make it one when I win this round,” he boasts proudly as he hands Leda her new hand. Two Sanctify Me cards, one The Purge card, and one Damaged card. Two from the same suit was a good way to start. She can tie this back up. Cygnus looks at his hand for the first time, a giddy chortle spilling from his mouth before he can stop it.

“...You’re excited,” Leda observes.

Cygnus blushes at his failure to put on a poker face. “You don’t know that. I could be faking you out,” he tells her.

“Cygnus, before we start, I have a question.”

“Sure, what is it?”

“Why were you in the underground the night we met?”

He pauses, looking straight at her before he smiles, just a bit. “I see what’s going on. You’re trying to distract me. Well, I won’t let that happen.”

He picks up the first card, and the game begins.

“This isn’t some sort of mind game. I’m being serious.” Leda picks up the discarded card. Damaged, Masked Cult. Off to a good start.

“I’m not going to fall for your trick,” he says.

“It’s not a trick. I want to know why you were there,” Leda says as her hand goes off to the discard pile to drop off a card.

Cygnus stays quiet as the next few cards are passed along. Leda pulls another Sanctify Me card, only needing one more to complete the set.

“I don’t know.” Cygnus settles for an answer. “It was just a feeling, an urge. Something told me to go there that night.”

“An urge?”

“A calling, even. And that led me directly to you, Swan Song.”

The final Sanctify Me card falls right into her hand. Leda swaps it out, throwing her hand down. With impeccable timing, Cygnus does the same. His hand of cards falls directly on top of Leda’s, but she quickly draws back, letting go of the cards when she feels something sharp cut her hand.

Cygnus quickly looks up, alert and concerned. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she hisses, looking at the newly formed papercut on the back of her hand. She quickly glances up at the other before looking back down. “Looks like you’re no longer in the lead.”

“Is everything alright, Leda?” he asks. He steps out of his chair, kneeling in front of her. He takes a gentle hold of her hand, looking at the cut.

“It’s just a papercut,” she says. “I’ve dealt with worse.”

“Stay here,” he tells her before running off towards the other side of the room. He goes back to his desk, rummaging through each drawer.

“It’s fine,” Leda repeats, ignoring the stinging pain. Cygnus comes back with a roll of medical gauze on his hand, kneeling before Leda once more.

“Cygnus, it’s a papercut.”

“Please, I insist.” He gently takes her hand, wrapping the gauze around it. “This is a rare type of gauze that I got on a business trip in the Melosia Realms. It has special healing properties, so it should fix that cut right up. Believe me, this has come quite handy for me in a few lab accidents.”

Once he’s finished, he stands up, his hand lingering for a moment too long before he lets go. He walks back over to his desk to put the gauze away, and Leda finds herself following him. As she approaches, she examines the assorted gadgets he has around his room.

“I couldn’t imagine living while I worked,” she mutters.

“Really?” Cygnus turns around, raising an eyebrow. “I wouldn’t have pictured you saying something like that.”

“Well, I like to have balance,” says Leda. “Nothing against what you do, but… I don’t think this lifestyle would suit me.”

“I love it, personally.” Cygnus sits in his desk chair. “This is perfect for me. When I want to get something done, I go all in. I drown in it.”

He starts going on about when he first started working on the city, but as eccentric as he was, Leda couldn’t keep herself focused on him. Instead, she found herself looking into the mirror on the wall.

Leda Nox was destined for power. She was meant to be a ruler. A queen. If that’s what the prophecy insisted, then maybe she should start acting like it.

“Hey? Hello? Leda?” Cygnus snaps his fingers in front of her face.

“Sorry.” She keeps looking in the mirror.

“Someone’s distracted,” he says. “What’s on your mind, Songbird?”

Leda reaches behind her, taking the ponytail band out of her hair. She never realizes how good it feels to let her hair down until she does it, a lock of tension finally being set free as she runs her fingers through the back of her head, trying to create volume. She looks at Cygnus, who hasn’t stopped looking back at her.

“Do you have a pair of scissors?”

Cygnus had insisted on cutting Leda’s hair for her, almost to an annoying amount. He told her that he cut his own hair most of the time, so he knew what he was doing. With a pair of rose-colored scissors in hand, he got to work, raven locks falling to the ground.

Some time later, they’re both looking in the mirror. Leda’s hair is now in the form of a… mullet. Somewhat of a mullet. A cross between a mullet and a bowl cut. It’s something neither of them knew was possible to achieve.

Cygnus looks the most uncomfortable he has all evening. “It’s…”

“...Different?” Leda finishes. She’s not sure if she was supposed to phrase that as a question or a statement.

“It’s not my best work,” Cygnus says in a pained confession. He watches Leda mess with a few strands, trying to salvage this disaster. “...Do you like it?”

“...I think so,” she mumbles, a bit surprised by her own answer. “It doesn’t look ideal… but it feels right.”

“Let me clean this up,” says Cygnus. He grabs a gadget from his desk, a small vacuum-like mechanism, and starts vacuuming the fallen hair from the floor.

As he cleans, Leda walks away and returns to the table, looking at where their game of Godmode had left off. Her cards were beneath Cygnus’, meaning she had successfully tied the game up before the final round. His deck of Everything Starts And Ends With You cards lay at the top of their pile of victories. She looks around the room. She’s seen every bit of it, except for one area.

The wind blows through her now-short hair as Leda opens the door to the balcony. She closes the door behind her, the sound of the vacuum becoming muffled behind the glass door. Vines grow along the wall next to her, dotted with bushes of light pink flowers. Smoke from the factories of Cygnus rises in the air, far across from her at the tower. She stands alone, leaning over the railing.

Leda hears the door open again. “Enjoying the view?”

She nods. Cygnus joins her at her side, looking out across the bubblegum sky.

“What kinds of flowers are these?” she asks. Cygnus’ eye lights up, almost as if he’s been waiting for her to ask this.

“Those, my darling, are rhododendrons,” he says, walking over to the edge of the balcony and plucking one off the vine. He shows it to Leda, delicately twirling it in his hand. The five petals of the pink flower flutter in the wind. “Beautiful things, aren’t they?”

Leda nods, admiring its beauty. Cygnus examines it for a quick moment, starting to bend the short bit of stem that was still attached to the flower. He then reaches forward, weaving the stem through strands of hair. She feels him tie the stem tightly in a knot, securing the flower into place. He pulls his mechanical hand away, but his other hand stays behind her head. As they look directly at each other, his hand floats down, lightly grazing the back of Leda’s neck before he suddenly pulls away, almost frantically.

“Must be nice to not have all that hair anymore, huh?” he asks her.

“It does,” she says, feeling more confident in her answer now. “It feels… freeing.”

“Freedom… a wonderful feeling, isn’t it?” Cygnus says, looking at the scenery.

They stay like that for a while, their hands on the rail as they silently watch the smoke rise. Leda looks down at Cygnus’ hand, she could’ve sworn it wasn’t that close to her own just a few moments before. It’s when she has a moment of realization.

“You know, I never saw that figure in the mirror,” she says quietly.

“See? You just needed to exercise your mind!” says Cygnus, smiling at her. “So, what’s next for you?”

“Finding the volcano, I suppose.” Leda nods. “That should give us more answers.”

“Right, but before that… one more round?” Cygnus smirks. “I still have to beat you.”

She smiles softly, ready to return. “Alright. One more round.”

A knock at the door interrupts Cygnus from his cleaning. He was notorious for having the messiest workstation in the tower, so he decided that today would be the perfect day to tidy things up.

“Come in!” he says as he tosses an old paper in the trash. He hears the door open, followed by the sound of a few footsteps. The door closes just moments after.

“How are the plans for the new clock tower coming along?”

Cygnus quickly turns around at that voice. It’s a voice that could distract him from any task. “Ah! Night Swan, my dear!” He greets her. “Finished them just this morning, they’re right on my desk over there.”

The cloaked lady slowly walks over to his desk, taking hold of the blueprint he had sketched out. He gazes at her, waiting for her approval.

“...Quite impressive,” she decides, putting the blueprint back onto his desk. “Do you think you could start on a hologram prototype today?”

“Oh, certainly.” He nods, looking through the shelf he had been organizing before her entrance. Holograms weren’t his favorite thing to work with, if he was being honest, but he would do anything for her. As he shuffles through old gadgets and books, he feels her gaze burning into the back of his head.

“Could you start it now?”

“Ah! Of course!” He perks up, moving over to another bookshelf in his study. “Just let me find my projector-”

“Cygnus, you know that I prefer that my colleagues work at the highest levels of focus and efficiency,” she says, the annoyance in her tone clear as day.

“I know, I know, but as great as I am, I can’t work in an environment like this! This will improve my efficiency, darling. Just you wait,” Cygnus tells her. He shuffles through the shelves, all filled with various gadgets and trinkets. Was that it, in the back? No, it was just- wait.

“Wait,” he mutters, carefully pushing other objects aside as he grabs what he had set his eye on. “Wait, no way, is this…?”

He stares silently at what he pulls out, rotating it in his hand. He turns back to Night Swan, who looks at him with a dull expression.

“Do you remember this?” asks Cygnus.

Night Swan eyes him curiously. “...No. Should I?”

“It’s Godmode! It’s the card game we used to play all the time!” he says excitedly, looking at the deck in his hands. The ribbon tying the card together had collected dust on the ends over the years, but it still looked just as pristine. “I thought I was one of the best players in Eternyx, and then, you came along and kicked my ass!”

Cygnus looks at Night Swan with a glint in his eye. She stays silent as he unfastens the ribbon. “We should play a game, right now,” he says, shuffling the deck. He smiles at her, and she tilts her head as he sits in his chair. He knows that she’s not the type to resist a competition.

“Come on, Swan Song,” he tells her. “Just like old times.”

“Cygnus…” she begins. It’s hard to pinpoint the emotion behind her tone, and for a flicker of a second, it feels like it’s almost mocking. “I don’t have time to play childish games.”

That was something Cygnus still wasn’t quite used to. This was Night Swan he was talking to, it wasn’t Leda. Leda had died long ago, left to rot in the dust. When Night Swan threw herself into the prophecy after they finally found the volcano, every bit of her past self had been lost, flaking off of her like dead skin. Now, she was Night Swan, the woman born from the prophecy. The same one that he had told Leda about after finding her that night in the underground.

By introducing himself to the girl of his dreams, he had killed her.

“...Right. Sorry, forget I asked,” says Cygnus, doing his best to hide his disappointment.

“Good. Now, get to work.”

He nods, and Night Swan turns around, her cape trailing behind her as she leaves. The door is left open behind her, and once she’s out of sight, Cygnus starts to look at each of the cards, one by one. The Dark Horizon, the Kiss of Death, the Masked Cult, and the Eclipsed Stake. He thumbs through the card, picking one to examine more closely.

I Would Die For You, Kiss of Death. The blood-red outline surrounds the figure engulfed in smoke.

He jumps when he hears a slam, dropping all of the cards. He looks up and sees Night Swan in the doorway, her hand against the door.

“Get to work,” she repeats, more firmly this time, then slams the door shut.

Cygnus looks at the mess he’s created, then takes a long gaze at the trash can next to his desk. He can clean this mess up later. He has to begin working on the hologram.

He has to follow the rules of the game.

If something is no longer of use to you, you should discard it.