“Alright, everyone, settle down please. We’ve got a long day ahead of us.” Naturally, none of the students settled down. Mrs. Finch (who was, ironically, a titmouse) wasn’t a bad teacher, but she’d always been a bit of a passive person and so sometimes she struggled with getting her class full of rambunctious eight year olds to behave themselves. “We’ve got a new classmate to introduce you all to today!” That got everyone’s attention. Esterwood was a very stagnant town, and though the children were too young to really understand that, they instinctively knew that a new person moving to Esterwood wasn’t something that happened often. Suddenly, the entire class’s rapt attention was directed at their teacher, and at the small mousey stranger who was attempting to hide behind her. “Why don’t you introduce yourself?” Mrs. Finch said, gently pushing the girl out from behind her.

“U-um, okay,” she said softly. She didn’t really particularly want to introduce herself. It had been... a while since she’d last really interacted with people her age. And even before that, she’d never been the most social child. But, well, she was going to have to interact with all of these people at some point. She couldn’t just ignore them. And anyway she’d decided that she was going to turn over a new leaf on moving to Esterwood. And being a social recluse again was exactly the opposite of that. “I’m, um... I’m Erin. Erin Leroux. It’s nice to meet all of you.”

She’d hoped that it would feel better after she introduced herself. It didn’t. Everyone was staring at her and she hated it. She cringed into herself, desperately struggling not to have another panic attack. This time it wasn’t breaking down at home at the prospect of having to confront other students, either, no, this would be in front of her new classmates. She was getting off on a bad enough foot as it was by hiding behind the teacher without crying in front of everyone.

She tried her best to brush aside her shyness with some pragmatism. Attempting to learn the faces of her classmates, or at least those who stood out. There were several that popped out immediately. A canine of some sort, a doberman perhaps, who towered over the other students by a good head’s worth. A feline, probably a lion, with ash coloured fur and the scruffy juvenile beginnings of a dark mane. A pair of rabbits – twins, by the looks of it, which already stood out enough, but in addition they had black and white fur in a perfect checkerboard pattern. An insect of some sort, perhaps a termite, who stood out mostly just by virtue of being an insect in a room full of mammals. There were others, but at that point they all started to blur together and Erin started to feel slightly nauseous.

“Why don’t you take a seat and we can get started?”

“Um, o-okay.” Erin immediately set her eyes on the back of the classroom, where there were the fewest other students.

“There’s an open spot by Justin,” Mrs. Finch interjected, drawing further swelling dread from Erin and a sullen grunt from the termite (apparently named Justin).

Erin reluctantly moved to take the vacant spot, in between Justin and the doberman. They were both fairly large (the dog significantly moreso) and Erin was decidedly not large, so she couldn’t help but feel intensely intimidated. Still, she had resolved to turn over a new leaf. And part of that was going to involve getting along with all these new people. “Um. It’s nice to meet you. I hope we’ll get along?” she said quietly to Justin as she took her seat.

“Don’t talk to me, weirdo.” His response was immediate and sharp, digging into Erin like a knife. The doberman growled quietly, making her opinion on the matter of friendship abundantly clear.

“Oh. Sorry.”

“I said shut up, freak.”

Erin’s heart somehow managed to sink even further. So much for fitting in. Still, all wasn’t lost. Okay, yes, she was sandwiched between two people very obviously not interested in friendship, but that didn’t mean everyone else was the same. Surely, the vast majority of Esterwood’s community would be open and friendly to a new face such as her.

Surely.

~~~~~~

Of course, nothing was ever that simple. “We’re gonna make a couple of things clear. Here and now.”

“I-”

“Shut up.”

“sorry.”

Justin towered over her. Really, most of her classmates did – Erin was not a very large person at all. And, for an eight year old, Justin was big. More horizontally than vertically, but he was certainly not short either. His body was shaped vaguely like a rectangle, big and bulky and about as buff as someone his age could possibly get. It didn’t help that he had her cornered. Every direction was occupied either by him, his arms, or a wall. “Weirdos like you don’t get to speak. Ever. Understood?” Erin nodded, desperately trying not to cry. “Answer me, freak.”

“I-”

“What part of weirdos don’t get to speak was so hard to grasp, freak.”

“But you said-” Erin found herself abruptly cut off as the termite grabbed her shirt and pushed her against the wall.

“I said shut up!” the larger boy snapped, probably a bit too loudly. “Are you stupid as well as being a freak, freak?” Erin didn’t respond, of course. She wasn’t an idiot, and she remembered what happened the last time she responded to Justin. Though, on the other hand, he seemed to be looking for excuses to get mad at her. “Are you trying to piss me off, idiot?” Erin furiously shook her head, doing her best to non-verbally communicate that no she was not, really. “Well you’re doing a bad job!”

Erin cringed, desperately resisting her instinctive urge to apologize. She struggled to think of anything else she could do to diffuse the situation – and came to the horrifying realization that maybe there wasn’t anything she could do. What had she done to deserve this? Say that it was nice to meet him? And in return he was probably going to beat her up.

Nausea welled up in the pit of her stomach. Unpleasantly familiar emotions washed over her. A sickening mixture of terror and indignation – how dare he do this to her. How dare he make her feel this way. It took all her willpower not to snap right then and there. She remembered the last time she’d felt this way, and it had resulted in a year of Sensory Replacement Therapy. She really didn’t want to have to go back into the Bullet, nor did she want to have to move. Again. But, well, maybe going back into the Bullet was for the best because clearly she wasn’t ready to be out of it yet, if literally the first day back at school she almost immediately had a panic attack and... Well, she didn’t want to think on the subject any further.

Thankfully, she found herself not having to. “Hey, jerkface, let go of her!”

“What?” Justin said, turning to face the sudden interloper. “Mind your own business, Ursu-”

Whatever he was going to say was rudely interrupted by the doberman girl’s fist colliding with his face. He staggered backwards, letting go of Erin in order to clutch his own bleeding mouth, screaming and crying in pain. “Touch her again and I’ll punch you harder,” the taller girl said, punching her open palm for emphasis.

“What’s your problem?!”

“My problem? You’re the one who was harassing the new kid for no reason.”

“She was annoying me!”

“Yeah, well, your face annoys me,” the dog said, taking an intimidating step towards him. “Every time you open it up, stupid comes out. Maybe I should deal with that by punching it until it stops, what do you say?”

Justin winced and cowered away. “I’m sorry!” he blubbered, his voice muffled by his hands and his blood.

“Yeah, you’d better be. Now go see the nurse about your stupid bleeding face before I get mad and make it worse, butthead.” Justin didn’t need to be told twice, scampering off. The dog glowered at him before turning her attention to Erin. “You okay? He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

Erin shook her head, and then after a moment of intent staring from Ursula she said, “N-no. I’m fine.”

“Okay, good. C’mon, we should go talk to Dr Baas about this. Make sure she gets our side of the story first or else we’ll get in trouble.”

“Oh. Okay.” Erin cringed slightly. “I don’t really want to get in trouble on my first day.”

“Well, you probably won’t at least. I’m still probably gonna get yelled at for punching him in the face but enh, he deserved it.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

“Hey, it’s not your fault. He was being a butthead.” She rolled her eyes slightly. “Jerkhole did some tackletoss in Locksmouth over the summer, did really well and got a swelled head. Anyway, c’mon, let’s go talk to Dr. Baas.” The dog girl grabbed Erin’s hand and quickly led her off into the school building proper. “Oh, yeah, I’m Ursula, by the way. Nice to meet you!”

“It’s, um... It’s nice to meet you, too?”

~~~~~~

Unfortunately, Ursula turned out to have been correct about getting yelled at. Erin had done her best to defend her new friend(? She still wasn’t quite sure on that front), but had only sort of managed to mitigate the storm that was Dr. Baas’s fury. It didn’t help that the woman was enormous, towering over both girls by a fair margin. It was difficult for them to get a word in edgewise.

Eventually, though, the details of the situation got through to her and her demeanour softened. “Ursula, I understand you were trying to do the right thing, but you really shouldn’t have punched him in the face.”

“Sorry, ma’am.”

“You’re not in trouble this time – this time. But I want you to try using your words in the future. Understand?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“And if those don’t work, go find an adult.”

“What if there aren’t any adults nearby, though? I’m not just gonna let him hassle the new kid for no reason!”

“Well, you still really shouldn’t punch him in the face,” Dr. Baas said thoughtfully, before leaning in close and making a big show of whispering to the two girls. “But, given the right situation, I would be willing to turn a blind eye to a headlock and a good solid noogie. But only if he really deserves it, understand?”

Ursula giggled slightly. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Okay, girls, you can go back to recess. But just try not to get in any more trouble, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am,” both of them said in unison before quietly scuttling out of Dr. Baas’s office.

“She was scary...” Erin muttered. Even if it had ended nice, Dr. Baas was still very much larger than her, and she’d spent most of the conversation angry.

“She’s fine once you get to know her.”

“If you say so...”

“Trust me, teachers are all basically big pussycats. You just need to learn how to not get on their nerves and they’re basically putty in your hands.”

“Says the girl who’s in and out of Dr. Baas’s office every other day.”

“I am not!”

Erin immediately slipped behind Ursula. More out of reflex than anything else, though immediately she realized that whoever it was probably wasn’t going to hurt her and anyway she didn’t actually know Ursula all that well yet. “Vienna! You scared her!” the larger girl admonished.

“Oh. Sorry, I didn’t mean to,” the new person (apparently named Vienna) said sheepishly. “It’s okay, a friend of Ursula’s is a friend of ours.”

Slowly, Erin poked her head out from behind Ursula. “Erin, these are the Coniglio twins. The loudmouth is Vienna, the quiet one hiding behind her is Viola.”

The twins were, it turned out, the checkerboard rabbits from before. “Hi,” Vienna said with a wave. Viola poked her head out from behind her sister with a quiet “‘lo,” in a strange and sort of amusing mirror of Erin and Ursula.

“Anyway, I told you it’d be fine. You need to trust me more.”

“You still ended up in trouble.”

“I ended up getting yelled at, that’s not the same thing as being in trouble.”

“That’s what being in trouble is, Ursula.”

“Nuh uh! I didn’t get punished!” Vienna rolled her eyes, but seemed eager to let the subject drop there. “Anyway!” Ursula said, turning to address Erin. “You should stick close to us for now. Jerkface Justin’s probably learned his lesson, but it’s better safe than sorry. And maybe someone else will try and start something. You’re new, so you’re kind of a big target for that kinda thing.”

“I am?”

“A little bit, yeah,” Vienna said. “We’ve lived here all our lives so we already know who the butts are, but you don’t.”

“Oh!” Ursula interjected, her eyes widening slightly. “Why don’t you join our pack?”

“Huh?”

“That’s not a bad idea,” Vienna said with a nod. “You seem nice enough and Ursula scares off all the bullies. What do you think, Viola?” The other rabbit nodded in silent agreement, staring intently at Erin.

“I guess it’s unanimous then! Welcome to the pack, I guess. Uh, if you’re okay with it, that is. We kinda only just met after all.” Ursula rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly.

Erin took a moment to think. She had just met them, as Ursula said. And... Well, the doberman was kind of big and scary. But she was also nice. These three were the only people her age who had been even sort of nice to her since... Well, since ever. She’d always been something of an outsider. She hadn’t really had any friends before her incident, and if she passed this opportunity up Esterwood would likely be more of the same.

Besides which, Vienna was right. Ursula was big and scary and no one would mess with her, so if she stuck by Ursula then she also wouldn’t be messed with.

She nodded slowly, her decision made. “Okay.”

Ursula frowned as the flashback paused. “This is a waste of time.”

“I don’t see it that way,” Delphi said with a shrug. “It’s more productive than trying to locate the Splice. We have much less history to scrub through.”

“We’ve been at it for hours and we’ve not found anything yet.”

“We can fast forward a bit,” Delphi replied. “But I’m certain that our arrival on earth must have occurred sometime around this point. Likely on this specific day.”

“If you say so,” Ursula said, though she didn’t sound entirely convinced.

Delphi, if she noticed that lack of confidence at all, did not acknowledge it. She held up her right hand, and the flashback started up again. “Now, let’s speed things up.” She made a grasping motion and slowly twisted her hand to the right like she was turning an invisible dial. And, as she did so, the flashback sped up. Like watching a movie at two times speed, and then four times speed. The rest of the school day went by just fast enough for them to still be able to register what was happening.

“Hold on, stop,” Ursula interjected. At her command, the flashback once again paused. The four girls were in a group, heading towards the outskirts of Esterwood. “Yeah, I don’t remember this. That’s probably a sign that this is important.”

“Understood. Let’s watch this play out.”

“Okay so why are we here again?” the flashback Ursula grumbled loudly. “This place is totally haunted.”

“Viola says it isn’t,” Vienna replied. Viola nodded vigorously.

“Can she not speak for herself?” Erin interjected curiously.

“O-oh, um...” Viola stuttered, blushing slightly.

“She’s just shy around new folks, don’t worry,” Ursula said with a lackadaisical shrug. “Just give her some time to get used to you.”

“She likes you, don’t worry,” Vienna added, accompanied by more vigorous nodding from Viola.

“O-oh. Well, she seems nice, I guess,” Erin said, trying to be diplomatic. Meeting someone so much shier than her was a surreal experience. “Anyway, um, what’s this about this place being haunted?” Viola frowned.

“There’s an old empty pre-splice shack and if you go in it a flicker calls you up and then eats your face or something,” Ursula said. “So actually now that I think about it even if it is real-”

“Which it’s not,” Vienna interjected sternly, accompanied by a resolute nod from her twin.

“But if it is,” Ursula continued, mildly exasperated. “If it is real, all you have to do is not go into any creepy shacks you find in the forest. Boom. Easy. No ghosts, no problems.”

“We should still probably not go too deep though,” Vienna said. “If we trip and get hurt there’s not gonna be any adults around.”

“Maybe we should call our parents...” Erin said nervously.

“It’ll be fine, we’re just going outside the dome for a little bit.”

“That seems like the kind of thing our parents should know about.”

“There’s an emergency exit near the edge of the Woods, we can just hang out there and watch the meteor shower then get back in.”

“Yeah but there’s gotta be less haunted emergency exits, right?”

“Maybe, but this is the only emergency exit that’s not constantly watched.”

“Okay fair. I still don’t like it but I’m gonna do it anyway.” Ursula shrugged. “Someone’s gotta keep you idiots safe.”

“Why can’t we watch it from inside the dome?” Erin asked.

“Oh, right you’re new. It’s be overcast all week,” Vienna grumped. “I complained about it at the town meet but no one listened and so the weather schedule is dumb.”

“Pause. I think I remember this, sort of.”

“Oh?” Delphi said as the scene once again froze solid.

“Like... I still don’t remember this. But I remember this happening, if that makes sense. We went out of the dome to watch a meteor shower and then we all got in trouble when we came back because we were idiot children and didn’t tell anyone we’d gone.”

“Sort of like now, then.”

“Literally exactly like now except without the cyborgs and aliens and shit.” Ursula frowned slightly. “I can’t even get mad at you for bein’ snide about it ‘cos you’re right.”

“I always am.” Delphi sighed. “Hypothesis; meteor struck nearby where you were watching. Possibly nearly right on top of you. We were on it. Bonded with you here as you were nearest available hosts and the arrival was traumatic, as predicted. Explains selective amnesia. Will have to watch further.”

“If you’re right we can just fast forward to the meteor shower.”

Delphi nodded, turning the invisible knob to the right. The tableau returned to motion, and then sped up until the children got out of the dome. The meteor shower happened, its majesty somewhat robbed as a result of being sped up, and sure enough one of the meteors landed mere feet away from where they were watching. The children dove away in a panic, as children were wont to do when a space rock landed practically on top of them.

“There we go. Look, you can see us leaving the meteor.” The hostless inklings looked sort of like giant slugs made out of... well, ink.

“I thought you guys couldn’t live without hosts?”

“It’s a bit more complicated than that, but we don’t have the time for a more detailed explanation so just assume that we can’t. Not outside of very specific situations.”

“And I guess being inside of a space rock is one of those situations?”

“The short answer is yes.”

“I’ll accept that.”

“I think we’ve seen enough,” Delphi said, raising her arm and dismissing the flashback. “What have we learned?”

“Literally nothing that we didn’t already know.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” Delphi said. “I think we learned rather a lot, actually.”

“Like what?”

“For starters, we learned the exact timeframe when we first bonded with you. Ten years, almost exactly. A nice round number.”

“We knew that already though.”

“We also learned that you girls get along significantly better than you let on.”

“Wh-no we didn’t!”

Delphi smirked. “There was definite chemistry there. And you certainly seemed eager to bring Erin into the pack.”

“Y-yeah, well... I don’t see it. And I don’t see how it’s relevant to the current situation.”

Delphi sighed, pinching the bridge of her snout. “Listen,” she said tersely. “If we wish to survive this, you and your friends are going to have to put aside the petty bullshit and focus on working as a team.”

“Yeah, we know that, but-”

“But nothing! You clearly used to get along very adequately, but years and years of mounting tensions have since spoiled that. You’ve done a good enough job of putting those tensions aside for now, but you’re going to need to keep them put aside unless you wish to die.” Ursula frowned slightly, but said nothing. “Ami is unpredictable and dangerous, and her soldiers are moreso. And once we’re done here, there’s Echelon and Osoth still looming on the horizon. If you all cannot keep working together, one or both of them will kill you and us alike. And that is unacceptable.”

“Okay, okay, fine, point taken. Don’t backslide into bad habits. Got it.” Ursula sighed. “You’re right.”

“Like I said, I always am.”

“Anyway, how much time do we got left before we gotta wake up?”

“Likely very little. Not enough to do anything productive.”

“Can we try and look into what’s going on in Locksmouth?”

Delphi shook her head. “Too far away, too broad an area.”

“Ah, well, that actually makes sense. Was worth a try, though.” Ursula sighed. “I guess... It’s probably best to just wake up, then? Can I even do that?”

“... No obviously you’re going to be asleep forever.”

“Oi, no sarcasm, I dunno how this weird dream bullshit works.”

“Think of this as another benefit of being inked – guaranteed lucid dreams. You can basically do whatever you can imagine while in this state, up to and including waking up. You can just... do it.”

“Okay. I guess.” Ursula shrugged, closing her eyes and then opening them again in the waking world. “Huh. That was easy.” Ursula attempted to get up, only to find herself at the bottom of a pack pile. Somehow. She could have sworn Erin had been at the bottom when she’d gone to sleep and yet here she was, buried completely by big fat rodent tit. “Fuck. Wake up!” she shouted, pulling herself upright. The other girls awkwardly sloughed off of her in a heap, waking up as a direct result.

“Hey!”

“Ow!”

“What?”

Ursula looked down at the undignified pile. “Come on, guys, rise and shine. Grab a protein bar, we’re burnin’ daylight.”

“Ughhhhhhh.”

“Five more minutes.”

“Mnef.”

Ursula sighed. It was going to be a very, very long day.

~~~~~~

It turned out that sleeping in a large unorganized post-foursome pile had been a terrible idea. Vienna ached all over. Other people, it seemed, did not make for the best mattresses. “So,” she said, still a bit groggy. “What’s the plan?”

“There is no plan,” Erin replied.

“We don’t really have any choice but to pick a direction and walk,” Ursula added reluctantly. “At this point Ami’s basically completely in control. I can’t think of anything to do but just... keep playing the game. Walk until something happens, deal with it, move on and repeat.”

“It’s clear at this point that none of this is real. Or at least, none of our surroundings. Possibly some sort of creative combination between strong-force containment fields and holograms, maybe? Or possibly some sort of hard-light projections.” Erin rubbed her temples, her head still pounding from the pointed lack of water they’d all had to deal with for the past few days. That was yet another thing they’d not thought through when planning this. “The point is, clearly none of this city is actually physically there. It’s just... smoke and mirrors.”

Vienna groaned. “Which means that there is no goal until Ami decides that she’s done with us.”

“Exactly.”

“We’re gonna hafta pace ourselves carefully,” Ursula said. “Ami’s prolly gonna drag the game out as long as possible, which means we’ve gotta last three more days. Luckily I don’t think Ami wants us to starve to death so I don’t think she’ll throw anything we couldn’t handle with proper nutrition? But we’ve still only got so much food and only so much water. Which is none. None water.”

“Shit,” Vienna said. “That’s a big problem.”

“The soldiers had water,” Viola interjected, only to immediately shrink away when everyone turned their attention to her. “U-um. They gave me some. I don’t have it anymore, but they had to get it from somewhere?”

“That’s our next goal, then,” Ursula said. “It’s... not much more than what we had, but it’s something.”

Vienna sighed. “Walking in a random direction with a goal is better than walking in a random direction with no goal.”

“I guess...” Viola frowned.

“And if we see any chance to circumvent the bullshit, we should take it,” Ursula continued, though she didn’t sound particularly convinced that was going to be an option.

“Well, we’re not going to make any progress one way or the other if we just stand around here, darlings.”

“Yeah... Yeah.” With that, there wasn’t anything else to say. Erin grabbed the backpack and the girls left. Ursula took the lead, followed closely by Erin, with the twins taking up the rear.

“You should probably be a bit closer to the middle.”

“Huh?”

“Let’s stick to the Thing for now. I kinda want a private conversation.”

“‘Kay.”

Vienna grabbed Viola’s hand and squeezed. “We don’t want Ami or her goons grabbing you again while we’re not paying attention. You’re kind of the easiest target.”

Viola frowned. “I’ve got superpowers too, you know.”

“Yeah. Still, they’ll probably go after you first so better safe than sorry. I don’t want to lose you again.”

“I managed to get away from Ami’s goons before.”

“Yeah, because Ami made them let you go.”

Viola’s frown deepened. “I still managed to get away from Makoto.”

“That was mostly Aubrey, wasn’t it?”

“So? It’s not like she’s not still with me.”

“Viola, just because your inkling managed to get you out of trouble with some clever on-the-spot thinking once doesn’t mean you’re going to be able to do it again.” It was Vienna’s turn to frown slightly. “That trick’s not going to work twice and you ended up passing out immediately after you realized it was even a trick.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“You clearly can’t. Just because your inkling is good at coming up with plans and outthinking the enemy doesn’t mean you are.”

“Yes it does! It’s like Aubrey said, inklings and hosts become more alike the longer they’re bonded and we’ve been bonded for a decade.”

“Viola, I just want you to be careful. That’s all.” She sighed. “No matter what you say, you’re the easiest target out of all of us and that means if they do attack they’re gonna go after you first.”

“Oh my god,” Viola snapped, yanking her hand free of Vienna’s grip.

“Wha-hey!”

“Look, there, I’m in the middle of the stupid group so you can protect me because I’m a big dumb idiot who can’t take care of herself!”

“Viola, you’re not being fair.”

“I’m not being fair? I’m not being fair?!”

“This is an actual life or death situation, and I really don’t want you to die.”

“I’m not going to die! I managed to survive when they captured me, didn’t I?”

“Viola-”

“Guys,” Ursula interjected. “It’s been literally two days since you promised not to do the Thing when we’re around. I’d really like to not get dumped into the middle of a heated argument at the drop of a fucking hat?”

“Sorry,” both girls muttered in sullen unison.

“Anyway, Inklings make you super durable and super strong, remember? Viola can prolly handle herself well enough when Ami attacks us again, and worse comes to worse she can just fucking turn invisible and hide. It’s fine.”

“I know all that, It’s just...” Vienna’s body drooped slightly from the weight of the argument. “I just don’t want her to make herself an easy target. That’s all.”

“That’s not an unfair point,” Erin said, her tone of voice as diplomatic as she was capable of. “Actually, it’s probably best that we all endeavour to not make easy targets of ourselves. Even Ursula didn’t stand a chance in either of our previous encounters with Ami’s soldiers.”

“Ugh, you’re right.” Ursula frowned. “If they catch us off guard we’re fucked.”

“If I may make a suggestion,” Aubrey interjected from a nearby window. “It sounds like the best course of action would be to remain on guard at all times.”

“Brilliant, everything’s solved.”

“What I mean is that we should Ink. More specifically, Ursula is a priority target because she’s the biggest physical threat and Viola is a priority target for the opposite reasons. And coincidentally Delphi and myself also both don’t require very much prana in combat, so we can likely afford to remain Inked at all times.”

“That’s a terrible plan,” Delphi interjected.

“Can you think of a better one?”

“I didn’t say that we shouldn’t do it,” the taller inkling responded tersely. “Merely imply that we should be judicious about our use of prana, for the sake of the long-term. That’s all.”

“I’m okay with it on one condition,” Ursula said.

“You don’t get to make conditions, Host.”

“One condition.”

“Ugh.”

“We get to be in control. No hijacking our bodies unless absolutely positively no-way-to-avoid-it necessary. Got it?”

“Fine. I wouldn’t be much use in a fight anyway.”

Aubrey frowned, clearly not pleased with the condition. “If I deem Viola to be in danger without my intervention, I will intervene.”

“Literally exactly what I meant when I said absolutely positively no-way-to-avoid-it necessary.”

“Very well. Viola, I’m coming out.” Viola grumbled sullenly in response as Aubrey’s ink quickly encompassed her body.

“One problem,” Delphi said as she overtook Ursula. “If Aubrey and I are out, that makes Erin and Vienna the weak links.”

“Yeah, fair. Buddy system, then. Erin, you stick close to me. Vienna, stick close to Viola. And no more fucking telepathic bickering, understand? We need to get along right now or we actually might die.”

“I can handle myself just fine.”

“Vienna for fuck’s sake, what did I just say?”

Vienna bit her lip and Viola frowned deeply.

“Okay, fine, fuck it. Reverse that. Erin stick with Viola, Vienna stick with me. Are you happy now? Or are you guys still gonna keep bitching?”

“Whatever,” Viola snapped, storming forward.

“Ah! Darling, wait!” Erin said as she ran off after.

Vienna frowned for a moment longer, before letting out a slow sigh and letting her body hang as limply as it could without falling down. “... I think I might have fucked up.”

“Little bit,” Ursula replied. “You weren’t wrong, per se.”

“No, but I think I was kind of an asshole.”

“Yeah pretty much. You should go apologize.”

“Let’s give her some time to cool off, first,” Vienna said after a moment’s thought. “And me, too, I guess. Otherwise we’ll probably both just end up having the same argument again.”

“I don’t know if we have time for y’all to cool off,” Ursula said, voice tinged with worry.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.” With that, the conversation once again ended, and the two girls rushed to catch up with the other half of their pack.

They had a long day ahead of them, after all.

~~~~~~

It was difficult to keep track of time in Ami’s domain. There weren’t any real landmarks to go by. The sun in the sky wasn’t real, and so the sun’s position was arbitrary. There weren’t any people around, so they couldn’t determine it was lunchtime because lots of people were heading to restaurants or anything like that. And the only clocks they had were built into their PETs, which meant that their PETs were the only real means of determining the passage of time.

And so it was somewhat understandable that they lost track of time. “My feet hurt,” Erin muttered, breaking the awkward silent.

“It’s been like an hour of straight walking. I’m surprised you can feel your feet because I sure can’t.”

“I feel fine,” Ursula said with a shrug. “But that’s prolly got something to do with being Inked. What about you, Viola?”

“I could keep going,” Viola said. “But, um. I don’t like this. It’s too quiet.”

“Don’t say anything, darling. The last time we complained it was too quiet Ami made me fight a giant elephant man. I would rather not have to do that again.”

“I, uh, think it might be a bit too late for that,” Vienna interjected. “Look.”

The road ahead opened up into an enormous plaza, the size of several tackletoss fields placed back to back. In the centre of the open space stood a large, roughly circular building. “Oh, a colosseum.” Erin seemed almost nonplussed. “Or possibly the Colosseum. Or a recreation thereof.”

“A what now.”

“It was a large amphitheatre in ancient Rome. It was used for large-scale public entertainment.”

“Like sports?” Ursula stared up at it. “It kinda looks like a tackletoss arena.”

“Mostly bloodsports. Gladiatorial combat, fights with wild animals, executions, chariot races.”

“Races aren’t usually bloodsports.”

“A good way to win a race is to ensure none of your opponents survive.”

“Usually that’s pretty specifically against the rules.”

“In some subtypes they would even arm participants. Put blades on their wheels to attack the opponent’s chariots, or place weapons on the course for racers to use against each other.”

“That’s kinda messed up,” Vienna said with a sour look on her face.

“It was also used for recreations of famous battles and for putting on plays. Generally the same sort of thing we use modern amphitheatres for, just... a bit more violent. Mother has a longstanding fascination with the original.” Erin sighed wistfully. “She would be thrilled at the merest suggestion of a recreation of it being right under her feet.”

“To be fair, it’s probably not normally here,” Ursula said. “Hm. What do you think would happen if we just, like, turned around and left?”

“I imagine we would find another identical colosseum behind us,” Erin said, thinking back to the mountain.

“Yeah okay fair. Come on, let’s go see what we’re gonna hafta punch this time.”

There were several large archways that seemed to lead into the structure. Ursula led the way into the nearest one, with the others close behind her. The archway led into a large stone lobby that formed a circle around the outside of the building, solely lit by the arches that acted as entryways. Deeper in, there were some smouldering sconces, and in the absence of other directions to go in, Ursula led the group towards them. The air was cold and wet and heavy. As they got deeper in the tunnel, the sconces quickly became the only source of light or warmth. “I don’t like this,” Ursula muttered to herself.

“It kinda reminds me of the labyrinth.”

“If we have to fight another fucking bull man I’m going to scream.”

“I thought this was a sports arena?” Viola said, nervously shrinking into herself.

“The Colosseum was more about spectacle than sportsmanship,” Erin replied. “There were extensive networks of tunnels underneath the arena, and all kinds of mechanisms for transporting people and animals from the tunnels to the arena or for facilitating special effects. It was actually quite technologically advanced for the time. Apparently they could even flood it and host full-scale naval battles, though the infrastructure that let them do that got removed later on to make room for other things.”

“Yo that actually sounds fucking rad. Maybe your mom’s onto something here.”

“Yes, well, as I understand it it’s your mother who is the biggest obstacle to building one.”

“Lame.”

“I feel like I can see where she’s coming from in not wanting Esterwood to play host to bloodsports, to be fair.”

“Okay, yes, but who says they hafta be bloodsports? We’ve got inertial dampeners and we’ve got special effects. It could be like pro wrestling in Anchorsway but way cooler.”

“Okay but back on topic,” Vienna interjected. “Does anyone know where the thing we’re eventually gonna get made to fight is?”

“Nope.”

“Great.” Vienna frowned deeply. “I don’t like not knowing what we’re gonna be up against, and I really don’t like Ami making us wait until the other shoe drops.”

“Unfortunately, this seems to be a trend. Ami is in control of the pacing and we’re just along for the ride.”

“Ugh.”

“Well we’re not gonna make any progress just standing here talking about how Ami’s got an overdeveloped sense of dramatic timing. We should at least try to be proactive. Even if it’s probably pointless.”

“I guess it’s better than sitting around doing nothing,” Vienna said with a sigh.

“Erin said there’s elevators. We should find one of those.” Everyone turned to look at Viola when she spoke up, and she cringed into herself slightly. “I mean... Whatever she’s going to make us fight will probably be in the arena proper, right? And not under it.”

“That... makes a lot of sense, actually. Erin, this is your mom’s area of expertise, right? Think you could find an elevator?”

“I believe so, yes. I don’t know the layout by heart, but it’s not exactly complicated. I should be able to figure out where the elevators are.”

“Okay that’s the plan, then. Erin, lead the way.”

The other girls stuck close to Erin. It went unsaid, but none of them particularly relished the idea of getting separated in the guts of the Colosseum, especially considering the very real possibility of Ami deciding to throw something at them down here after all or of the soldiers attempting to kidnap one of them again. The oppressive atmosphere Ami had created didn’t help. The air was tinged with the aroma of wet stone, of ash and sulphur from the smouldering sconces, and of the dirt pathways under their feet. The paths, thankfully, were indeed fairly straightforward. There were branches, but Erin did not take them. Instead they went straight ahead, no deviations and therefore no chances to get lost.

Eventually they reached what could only be the end of the path. There was a large cage-like structure made of wood, large enough for all four of them to fit inside. There were several ropes attached to the top, each thicker around than Ursula’s arms. In front of it was a large, ornate metal lever set into the ground, and on the floor inside there was a large button. “Here we are, I assume,” Erin said uncertainly as they made their way inside what was probably an elevator. Once everyone was inside, Ursula carefully stepped on the button. A large wooden bar dropped, blocking the entrance, and then the elevator began to rise. There was a creaking from the ropes that held their weight, and the sound of stone grinding against stone as gears turned and lifted them up, up, up to the arena.

The arena was smaller than it looked from the outside. About the size of a Tackletoss arena, maybe slightly smaller. Much of the space was dedicated to the stands, which were packed with vague indistinct shapes that presumably represented an audience. Loud, triumphant music played from seemingly nowhere, accompanied by colourful banners unfurling from the stands.

What really stood out, though, was the boxing ring in the centre of the arena. And the man who was standing in the middle. He was, as was becoming distressingly common, a pre-splicer. Taller than Ursula, with broad shoulders and a broad chest that had a purple cape draped over them. The instant they stepped out of the elevator, he tossed the cape aside dramatically, revealing chiselled muscles and glistening skin, clad only in a pair of loose-fitting boxers and shoes.

And, most pointedly, boxing gloves. Vienna grimaced slightly. “Hey, Ursula, look. It’s your element.”

“Hell fucking yes it is.”

“What are you two talking about?”

“You had ta’ be there,” Ursula replied, cracking her knuckles as she de-inked. She strode confidently towards the ring – which was a good distance away, given its relatively small size in comparison to the field. She climbed up through the ropes and walked into the nearest corner.

“Queensbury rules,” the man said tersely, his voice low and rumbling, tinged with an accent somewhat like Erin’s but not quite.

“Yeah, I figured.” Ursula bent down and began to undo her boots.

“Leave them on.”

“You sure?”

“Rule eleven; no shoes or boots with spikes or sprigs will be allowed. I see neither, thus yours are legal. And it wouldn’t be fair for you to go barefoot while I am not.”

“Gotcha.” Ursula quickly redid her laces before transitioning to some quick warmup stretches. “I don’t got any gloves on me. That’s rule... ssssseven?”

“Eight. I can provide some for you, as per rule nine.”

“So you’re the ref, then? That seems like a conflict of interest.”

“You seem familiar enough with me to know it is not.”

“Yeah, okay.”

The man held a gloved hand out and a pair of boxing gloves materialized out of thin air. He tossed them in Ursula’s general direction, followed shortly by a set of handwraps. “Ah. Shit. Laces.”

“Will that be a problem?”

“No, no, I can figure it out probably. I’m just used to threadlink gloves that do all that stuff automatically.”

“I can assist you in putting them on, if you’d like.”

“Yeah, sure, that’d be fine.”

“Host, I have to strongly object to allowing that man anywhere near us while our guard is down,” Delphi interjected. The man, whoever it was, didn’t react at all for obvious reasons.

“It’s fine. This guy’s a stickler for rules.”

“Who are you talking to?”

“Alien living in my brain.”

“Ah, I see.”

“Th- Okay, firstly, that is an incredibly reductive and inaccurate way of putting it and secondly who even is this person?”

“Cap’n Comet villain. Went by Marquess of Queensbury. Former pro boxer. Super hardcore stickler for rules and fair play.”

“A victory in the ring is meaningless if it is not obtained fairly.”

“I see. So we can expect him to not sucker punch us in the face while we’re not prepared, then?”

“Not while we’re in the ring at least.”

“That isn’t particularly reassuring, host.”

“Yeah, well, I can’t put these on without help and he’s the only guy here who knows how.”

“Yes, well. I still don’t like it.”

“He’s not gonna cheat,” Ursula reiterated. “And if he does then Ami’s done a shitty job of recreating him so I’ll consider it a moral victory.”

“I would really rather an actual real victory if that’s alright with you.”

“Yeah, well, I’m gonna need to concentrate if that’s gonna happen.”

“Duly noted. I’ll keep quiet unless necessary.”

After Ursula put on the handwraps, the Marquess quickly tested them to make sure they weren’t too tight before putting on her gloves and efficiently tying them. Once they were on to his satisfaction, he nodded before getting up and returning to his corner. “As per rule three, rounds are three minutes with one minute between.”

“Okay. How many rounds?”

“Hrm.” The Marquess sized Ursula up, carefully examining her with his eyes. “You certainly seem strong, but you’re an amateur. Six should suffice. If you cannot beat me by then, I doubt you would be able to beat me at all.”

Ursula frowned slightly. “I ain’t no amateur.”

“So you are a professional fighter, then?”

“Well... no, but-”

“Then you are an amateur by definition. How many matches have you had?”

Ursula’s frown deepened. She wasn’t inexperienced with fighting, and most of her matches she had won. But... Well, most of her matches had been practice bouts against other students and occasionally against her father – who had pretty clearly gone easy on her. Esterwood wasn’t exactly a big player in school sports, so the only real opponent she’d ever gone up against was Maggie.

She had not ever actually won against Maggie.

“Fine. Six rounds it is.”

“Ursula,” Delphi interjected, voice tinged with uncharacteristic worry. “That’s a lot of fighting.”

“It’s not that much.”

“Six rounds of three minutes each is eighteen minutes, host.”

“Exactly! That’s not even a full episode of a TV show, even if you count the breaks between rounds.”

“Ursula, we have less than three days left. If you get taken out of commission now-”

“He’s not going to kill me.”

“No, but the losing condition is getting beaten into unconsciousness. Forgive me if I’m a little worried.”

“I can beat him.”

“At least Ink up.”

“Abso-fucking-lutely not.”

“Wh- why not?!”

“Rule... Six, I think? No outside help.”

“Ursula, literally billions of lives are on the line, it is not the time to be a stickler for the rules.”

“I can beat him.”

“That is enough conversation,” the Marquess interjected. “Round one begins when the bell rings.”

“Ursula, just... Be careful, okay? If you die, I am also as good as dead.”

“I’m not gonna die.” Ursula walked to the centre of the ring, raising her fists into a fighting stance. She put her right foot forward and turned her left foot perpendicular.

“Southpaw. Are you left handed?” Ursula didn’t respond, and after a moment the Marquess took up his own position in the centre of the ring, leading with his left. “Are you ready?”

“Whenever you are.”

“Then let’s begin.”

The bell rang and Ursula immediately began her offensive, only to be faced with an unforeseen complication. Post-splice boxing was a very different sport from what she understood of the pre-splice equivalent. Scoring knockouts, while still very much a thing, was generally much rarer. Matches were much more commonly decided by points. And, most relevantly, typically both fighters would be using inertial dampeners.

Right now she was not using her inertial dampener. Which, on the one hand, allowed her to hit significantly harder with significantly less effort on her part. The problem was that she was extremely used to compensating for the inertial dampening field’s presence and so she did that. But because the field wasn’t there, that compensation led to her stumbling forward. Her fist collided with the Marquess, but with much less power than she had intended, and she was left completely open to his counterattack. A solid right hook directly to her side, knocking her back and to the side. “Oof!”

“Sloppy.”

“I ain’t fuckin’ up again.”

“See that you don’t. I would rather this not be over too quickly.”

“It won’t be.”

Ursula took the exchange as an opportunity to back off slightly and regain her bearings. Stumbling like that had been an amateur mistake, one she frankly shouldn’t have made. One she hadn’t made in earlier fights. It wasn’t that she couldn’t fight without her inertial dampener on, but she’d never had to box without it. That didn’t excuse the mistake, though. If anything it made it sting all the more. If she could fight without overcompensating due to the lack of dampeners, she could box in the same situation.

Fortunately, she didn’t find herself with much time to dwell on the mistake. The round was still going, and the Marquess wasn’t going to give her downtime until the three minutes was up. Unfortunately, Ursula’s mistake had cost her the offensive. The Marquess pushed, and she could only react. He threw a series of alternating left and right jabs. Not hard to dodge, but he was clearly not trying to hit her with them. With each punch thrown, he took a step forward and in turn her dodging pushed her a step back. Which was a problem because there was only so much back for her to be pushed. Once they hit the ropes, she was at his mercy.

Of course, that was assuming she kept dodging backwards. There weren’t many openings left by his quick jabs, but the steady rhythm meant there were openings. She just had to catch one before she ran out of ring. Left right left right left right now. She ducked and darted forward and to the left, breaking out of his push and reversing their positions – now he was the one with his back to the ropes and she was the one pushing forward.

Or at least that had been the goal. What actually happened was she dodged directly into a right hook to her face. Once again, she found herself stumbling backwards, stunned and defenceless. “Ursula! Your left!” Delphi’s warning came just slightly too late – the Marquess took the opportunity Ursula being stunned afforded him to put a significant amount of weight behind a right uppercut. She made a futile attempt to backstep out of range, but still ended up taking most of the blow to her chin. “Ursula, you need to Ink up.”

“Shut up.”

“You will die you idiot child.”

“Shut up.”

“I did not say anything,” the Marquess said, backing off briefly.

“I wasn’t fucking talking to you!” Ursula snapped, temper officially lost. She took a step forward, throwing a wild left haymaker that the Marquess easily intercepted, countering with a left hook directly to Ursula’s solar plexus. The force of the punch knocked the wind out of her lungs, leaving her terrifyingly incapable of breathing and hunched over. Once again, the Marquess didn’t give her time to recover, pulling back before throwing another heavy right uppercut. This time Ursula didn’t manage to dodge at all, taking the hit directly to the chin. She stumbled backwards, clutching limply to the ropes and desperately gasping for breath.

“One.”

“Ursula, you’re bleeding. You can barely breathe. You are getting completely dominated. You have landed one single punch.”

“Two.”

“Ink up.”

“No.”

“Three.”

“Ursula it’s not even been two minutes and you can barely stand. You aren’t going to last one round without my help, let alone six.”

“Fuck off.”

“Four.”

Ursula desperately pulled herself upright – but not too desperately. She would only lose if she was down for the ten count, after all. Which meant she had until nine to catch her breath and pull herself upright. Not exactly much time, but it was better than no time at all, and the Marquess seemed to be counting slowly intentionally. “Five.”

“Ursula, your dedication to the rules would be admirable in a real boxing match, but this isn’t a real boxing match. Your opponent is a hologram. It’s okay for you to fight dirty if it means not burning yourself out completely on an inconsequential fight.”

“Six.”

“I’m not cheating,” Ursula grumbled, taking a moment to look at her pack. Both Erin and Vienna were pointedly looking away, the former crossing her arms under her boobs while the latter bit her lip nervously. Viola seemed practically on the verge of tears, hands covering her mouth in shock.

“Seven.”

“I’m winnin’ this fight. Or I’m gonna die trying.”

“Ursula.”

“Don’t say that!” Viola practically screamed.

“It’s a figure of speech, geeze. I ain’t gonna die. Just gotta last another minute, then I can recover and take back momentum without fuckin’ up.”

“Ursula, ink up.”

“Y’all heard the man. If I can’t win fairly, I can’t win.” Ursula finished pulling herself upright, ready to spring into action. “If it were a power I could use without inking up, that’d be one thing. I could justify that as my superpower, so long as it’s not too egregiously against the rules. But I don’t think looking at shit that’s already happened is gonna be much help in this situation.”

“Eight.”

“Maybe if you could let me see the future that’d be another thing entirely.”

“What?” was all that Delphi had time to reply with before Ursula pulled away from the ropes and returned to her fighting stance.

“You should have stayed down.”

“Yeah, nah. I ain’t losin’ this fight.”

The Marquess clicked his tongue disapprovingly. “Too stupid to know when you cannot win.”

“Far as I’m concerned that’s an advantage,” Ursula replied with a bloodstained grin. A small but steady stream of the stuff was still leaking from her nose, and she could taste that a significant amount was in her mouth, too – an acrid, metallic tang spread across her tongue. “Means it’s gonna be harder for y’all to take me down.”

“Hmph. The round will resume when the bell rings. Try not to disappoint me further.”

“I’ve got some tricks up my sleeve.”

“Like inking?” Delphi interjected.

“No outside help.”

“Come on.”

Ursula ignored her inkling’s protests, raising her fists and grinning cockily. She had lost her temper, and that had made her get sloppy. Not a mistake she was going to make again.

The bell rang, and the match resumed. The plan, as far as Ursula was concerned, was to take the remainder of this round slowly and defensively. Minimize the amount of time spent fighting and effectively give herself another minute of recovery before the next round. Of course, that relied on the Marquess taking things slowly on his end, which was admittedly a big gamble on her part. Though, thankfully, it was a gamble that so far seemed to be paying off. The two boxers circled each other slowly and cautiously, waiting for one or the other to take the offensive.

“Why would seeing the future be of any help?” Ursula didn’t respond – part of why she’d been knocked down had been letting her inkling distract her. “And anyway, seeing the future is impossible. Or at least it is the way my abilities function.”

“That’s nice don’t care not the time for this conversation.”

“I’ll explain it simply, then.”

“Not the time.”

“The past is set in stone. It’s already happened, and short of time travel you aren’t going to be able to change that, and so it’s extremely easy for me to view what has already happened so long as I know where to look. The future is not set in stone, and there are multiple possibilities for what could transpire.”

“Delphi I am trying to concentrate.”

“And, more pointedly, if you know what is going to happen then you are going to react to that and as a result what is going to happen will- on your right!”

“I’m fucking aware!” The Marquess was charging her, leading with his left shoulder. Ursula quickly weaved to the left – which turned out to be a mistake, as it put her in range of a right hook to her side. The only reason that didn’t lead immediately to another beatdown was the bell picking that moment to ring. Three minutes were up, the first round was over.

“Hmph. You have one minute to rest.”

Ursula grunted, nursing her freshly bruised side as she lurched her way over to the ropes before sitting down.

“As I was saying before we were interrupted- don’t you groan at me, this is important and you’ve been bugging me about it for days now!”

“You coulda picked a better fuckin’ time to decide to spill the beans, that’s all I’m sayin’.”

“The point is that seeing the future is significantly more strenuous because the future is not set in stone. The prana costs escalate much more quickly and the toll seeing all those options takes on your mind means that anything more than ten seconds ahead will result in headaches, disorientation, and eventually unconsciousness – which is good because beyond that it could fry your brain and kill you.”

“Wait, hold on,” Ursula said, frowning slightly. “Lemme just get this straight. You’re sayin’ you can let me see the future.”

“I literally just finished explaining why I can’t, there’s a hard limit of ten seconds and-”

“But you can let me see what’s gonna happen up to ten seconds from now, right?”

“Yes, but I don’t see how that would be helpful-”

“Bitch I don’t need to know what he’s gonna have for breakfast next Thursday, I just need to know where his fists are gonna be in the immediate future so I can be where they aren’t.”

Delphi went quiet for a moment. “You won’t be able to see in detail without inking.”

“That’s actually a benefit. Visions like your normal ones would just be a distraction. If I can just instinctively know what he’s gonna do next, then that’s all the advantage I’m gonna need.”

“That much I can do.”

“Hell yeah,” Ursula said with a confident grin. “I think we just hit a motherfuckin’ turning point.”

“I had never even considered this possible application of my powers,” Delphi muttered.

“That’s ‘cos you’re too stuck in the recon mindset. You aren’t ever on the front lines, so you’ve never had to think about using your powers like this.”

“Will have to investigate further to see if it’s practical.”

“I’ve got an idea how we can do that.”

“Yes. This fight should provide sufficient data.” Delphi wasn’t physically there, but somehow Ursula knew she was nodding confidently. “Kick his ass, Host.”

“Hell fuckin’ yeah,” Ursula responded as she pulled herself upright and walked to the centre of the ring.

“Your minute’s up.”

“I’m ready.”

“You had better be.”

The bell rang, and the second round began.

Once again, Ursula elected to take things slowly. She’d tried immediately taking the offensive last round, and it hadn’t gone well. Besides which, she hadn’t actually tested using her futuresight in a fight yet. Really she’d not tested it at all, aside from maybe some instinctive premonitions of immediate danger she guessed. She didn’t even know she could use it on command, or at all. This was a trial by fire – either this worked, or she was probably not going to win this fight. The best test would be to let the Marquess take the first move and, if she could see it coming, then her plan was going to work and if she couldn’t then she was just gonna hafta fight better.

And so she waited, keeping her guard up and keeping a close eye on the Marquess. Scrutinizing his every movement, waiting for an opening while he did the same. “What’s the matter? I thought you were gonna fight me, not just stand around staring.” The Marquess seemed unphased by Ursula’s taunting, unfortunately. “Clock’s tickin’.”

“That is your problem, not mine.” Unfortunately, he was right. It was pretty clear that Ursula was on the defensive – she’d taken more hits and thrown fewer punches herself so far. Just going by points, that meant she was losing. And if no one got knocked down, that meant the match would be decided by points which meant she lost. So if she kept playing super defensively and he kept playing super defensively then that meant she lost. Which meant she had no choice but to take the offensive.

“Fine then,” she retorted, loosening her fighting stance and lowering her fists. “If you ain’t gonna fight...” She raised her right fist to point at the Marquess. “Then I’m gonna end this. Here and now.”

“Bold words considering your performance so far.”

“I only need to land one punch.”

“Bold words.”

“This time when I get the offensive I’m not losing it.” Ursula returned to her fighting stance. “Nice job completely missing that big fucking opening I gave you there, by the way.”

“I know a trap when I see it.”

“Hmph. Fine, then, I’ll come to you. Delphi, you ready?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be. I’ve not exactly done this before.”

“Well, it’s trial by fire time so I hope you can figure out how to make it do now.”

“Wait hold on-” Delphi attempted to interject as Ursula ducked and darted forward. Ursula would be perfectly happy to wait, of course, but she didn’t have the time. They’d already wasted a full minute on sizing each other up and throwing out trash talk. The longer this fight went on, the more likely it was for her to slip up and get her butt kicked. Again. She didn’t have the time to slowly get to grips with how this worked, and neither did Delphi.

Ursula struggled to put words to exactly what happened next. There was that same sense of apprehension she’d felt before Erin got shot. And beyond that something more, though the exact nature of that something more was beyond her vocabulary. It was like she could sense what was going to happen next – and she didn’t mean that in a flowery metaphorical sort of way. No, she was using the word sense absolutely literally, which was why finding words was so hard. How do you describe what the future smells like? She didn’t know, but she could sure as fuck smell it, and also taste it. That metallic tang of blood in her mouth faded away, replaced with... whatever.

The other senses were at least a bit easier to put into words, if only a little. She would have thought that seeing the future would have been, well, like seeing the future. Actually physically seeing what was going to happen next. That wasn’t what she saw. It was more like... a vague impression of motion that hadn’t happened yet. The sound of the future was, similarly, not the sound of the Marquess’s punch that hadn’t been thrown yet but rather a low buzzing drone. The most useful was the sensation of touch. It felt like tiny spiders were crawling all over her fur, concentrated most roughly in the direction his next punch was going to come from.

Part of why she was having so much trouble describing what she was seeing and feeling was that it lasted only a few seconds. She stopped her charge short and quickly hopped backwards. A second or so later, the Marquess attempted to punish her reckless charge forward with a left hook that would have collided with her face but instead hit nothing but air because Ursula had already dodged his attack before he’d made it. She wasn’t entirely sure how she’d managed to take the various bits of sensory data Delphi’s powers had given her and translated it into a successful dodge, but honestly she wasn’t going to complain about that.

Of course, she also didn’t have the time to dwell on that fact. She was, after all, still in the middle of a match. And her opponent had just whiffed a big punch. “Gotcha, motherfucker.” His eyes widened in shock, just for a moment, before Ursula counterattacked with her own left hook. Almost a full-on haymaker. No finesse, no caution, no compensating for her inertial dampener that she didn’t have. She committed herself fully, putting all her considerable strength behind one big finisher that collided directly with the Marquess’s head before he had a chance to react.

The force of Ursula’s punch was enough to sweep the larger man off his feet and knock him to the ground, hard. He impacted with the ring hard enough to bounce slightly, and there was enough momentum that he ended up rolling several times, finishing several feet away and face-down. He made a very brief attempt to push himself to his feet that failed miserably. “That was... holy shit,” Ami said, no longer bothering to keep up the character. “I keep forgetting that you guys hit like god damn trucks when you wanna. And that dodge! Was that a superpower dodge or did you just get lucky?”

“Uh...” Ami breaking character never failed to catch her off guard. Mostly because of how fucking casually she always seemed to act. Like this was just a game – which, to be fair, it kind of was, at least to Ami. “A bit of both, honestly.”

“It was super cool either way.”

“So, uh. Do I win?”

“Yeah,” Ami responded, slowly pulling herself to her feet. It was also really weird hearing her voice coming out of a six foot five musclebound boxer. “If I were a real person and not a really sophisticated hologram there’s no way I’d be getting back up after that hit.”

“Oh. Okay.” Ursula didn’t particularly like the implication that Ami could keep going but elected not to.

“And anyway I’d say that was a pretty good ending, considering this was like the third real boss fight. I guess it ending in the second round is kinda anticlimactic but I don’t want it to drag, you know?”

“Uh, yeah. Right.”

“Aaaaaanyway, that’s it for this fight, I think. Hold on, lemme just...” Ami slowly pulled herself to her feet, shaking herself off. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and when she opened them again she’d shifted back into character.

The Marquess glared imperiously down at Ursula. “... It would seem that I underestimated you. Greatly.” He slowly walked towards her, almost closing the gap completely before he stopped. “Congratulations. You won, fair and square.” He pulled off a glove and held his hand out.

“Yeah.” Ursula suddenly felt very bad about using her superpowers. Only for a moment, though, before the lingering taste of blood reminded her just how badly the first round had gone. It was, she supposed, not real. And winning was, unfortunately, more important than her pride in this particular situation. Besides, she’d already justified using Delphi’s powers to herself. It wasn’t really cheating. Or at least not as cheating as outright inking would have been. “Hey, tell you what,” she said, slowly beginning to smile as she took his hand and shook it. His grip was firm and strong, unsurprisingly. “Let’s have a rematch at some point. No stakes, nothing on the line. Just a fight for fun.”

The Marquess raised his eyebrows in an expression of mild surprise, before returning Ursula’s smile. “I think I would like that very much,” he said, before abruptly vanishing.

“Fuck,” Ursula said, collapsing backwards onto the ropes.

“Ursula!” The instant the doberman let her guard down, Viola climbed up into the ring and gave her a hug. “Are you okay?!”

“Oof, yeah. I’m fine. Took a few good hits, but nothing too bad. No broken ribs this time, at least.”

“Well, that’s good at least,” Erin said, electing not to attempt to squeeze through the ropes.

“Hey so,” Vienna added, entering the ring herself. “Next time? Just use your superpowers right away instead of waiting until after you get your ass beat. Okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ursula said, waving her hand dismissively. “This was a special case. And hey, I fuckin’ won, didn’t I?”

“With all due respect, darling, you still have a lot of blood on your face.”

“Yeah but I won.”

“Look, I know I’m being a worrywort, but... Erin got shot and Viola got kidnapped.” Vienna frowned. “No more close calls, okay?”

The group fell silent for a moment as the gravity of the situation settled back in. Erin had, in fact, almost died, after all. And, as flippant as she was, Ursula had taken a beating. Viola stood up, pulling away from Ursula and standing in the centre of the ring. “We can’t keep this up.”

“Huh?”

“I mean... We’re not going to get out of here. Not at this rate.”

Viola’s words hit like a ton of bricks. Once again, silence fell over the group as everyone struggled to find a response and failed. Eventually, Erin spoke up. “Okay. You’re right. But what do you propose we do about it?”

Viola frowned. “I... Have an idea. I don’t know if it’ll work, though. It’s not really a plan yet, but-”

“Hey, fuck it, it’s better than the fat lot of nothing we’ve been goin’ on,” Ursula interjected.

“Anything proactive is a good thing,” Vienna added with a nod, sitting down beside Ursula. “Besides, if you need more time to think, that just gives us an excuse to take a break because my feet are still killing me after the walk here.”

“Yeah,” Viola said, smiling in spite of herself. “I think we could all use a bit of a break right now.”

“Especially me.”

“I thought you were fine?”

“I am but I still got my ass kicked. I need a god damn nap.”

Viola sighed as the tension that had been lingering over the group finally lifted, if only a little bit. “Let’s take a little time to recover, but we shouldn’t wait too long. Who knows when something else is going to go wro-”

As if on cue, a distressingly familiar crack echoed through the Colosseum. Viola’s legs gave out under her before she even felt a hint of pain. Panic set in as she reached down and grabbed at her knee, only to find that it was still attached to her body – thank god. That was only a slight consolation, though. Her sweatpants were wet with blood. Not nearly as much as Erin had lost, but enough to be immediately distressing.

“Viola!” She wasn’t sure which of her friends called out her name. Probably all of them at once, or maybe just Vienna or Erin or Ursula. Now that she’d noticed it the pain was excruciating and it was hard to think of anything else or pay proper attention to her surroundings.

Which was why it caught her so thoroughly off guard when someone grabbed her by her hoodie’s hood and lifted her forcefully to her feet. It also hurt, though it was nothing compared to her leg. No, it wasn’t until something cold and extremely sharp was pressed against her neck that her attention was drawn away from her leg and to whoever had accosted her from behind.

“So,” Makoto said, her tone of voice upsettingly cheery. “What was that about my arm no longer existing?”