Empire Breaker

"Red? Man, your mom must be really awesome to think of that! AND she's the one who made your family name! I bet she's super strong." He thought that was the case with anyone. Garry was strong, and so it was only right he'd think anyone who made a family name was strong.

"Roux. My las name is roux." Reinite says. "My mother is really strong, she's been a captain since she was my age."

The Doctor would need to approach her at a later time about that, for now however, her comment made him snicker in genuine amusement. Non-antagonistic? Now that was probably the first time in his life he had heard such a thing being said about his face. It made the young woman immediately appear more interesting. A person who didn’t outright mistrust the Doctor? What a curious creature she must be. “The pleasure is all mine, miss…” ah, right, “I haven’t even introduced myself to you. How careless of me. If we are bound to work together I assume this is unavoidable. Il Dottore, an honour to meet you under such peculiar circumstances, my dear.”

His name was Il Dottore. "The Doctor? That's your name??" Reinite asked. Still, it would be rude of her to not share her name - despite pointing out disbelief about his.

"I'm Reinite Roux," she answered. "I can't really say it's an honor, but it is certainly a peculiar meeting."

He buries his face against the softness of Monkey King's fur. Doesn't move at all, even if he hears Reinite.

His long, fluffy tail wraps around Monkey King, adding that extra warmth.

When Sun peeks over, he sees Renite holding out her arms. There's blood on her. His lips quiver; sobs escape past those lips.

"He's.....alive....."

Reinite sits there with her arms still out, as her wound still bleeds, waiting for the grieving kid to respond to her.

Sun insists Monkey King is alive.

"Sun..." Reinite starts, aware she is not meant to handle this. "Come on. We should get of here. Find him some place to rest, before things right themselves out."

They had to. Monkey King will come back when they're out of this back-up. He has to come back.

Rennie giggles, almost cackles, as Vanth gives her cheek a faint pinch. "With benefits? Oh how scandelous~!"

Her grin isn't wiped away. In fact, it grows wider. There is no stopping her teasing the poor sick man.

"Then I am the meanest person you know right now," Rennie says after she sticks out her tongue at Vanth. His cold fingers worry her, but she's focusing on making him laugh.

Reinite does nod to Socks and Morpheus as she passes the critters.

"Nah, we're still in this back-up whatever it is. The weird updates said somethin about a mysterious singer in the alleys." Rennie explains as she - gently - nudges the door to the bedroom open.

The front door had gotten a slightly harsher closing with the heel of her foot earlier.

Rennie sets Vanth down gently on the bed, before she pauses to take her shoes off. "Good. You probably ain' in the mood to be hungry, but you still gotta eat." Rennie says.

She scoots on the bed and lays next to Vanh, a little tiiiny smirk on her face.

I can't, kid.

Sun breathes. It's shaky, but he breathes.

I'm sorry, I can't wake him up.

Sun breathes. It's SHAKY, but he breathes. And he continues breathing. His heart continues beating against his chest.

I'm not that strong.

I'm not that strong.

I'm sorry.

And something in him snaps. It snaps like thunder crashing into a tree. The way he pushes Reinite away from him is aggressive. He screeches at her, teeth bared, showing rows of his canines, sharp enough to tear through flesh easily.

"LIAR!"

His voice booms, echoing and bouncing off the walls with the kind of fierceness of some large beast.

"REINITE, YOU LIAR. LIAR LIAR!!!!"

He screams through his anguish. He wails as he slams his fist against the ground. "WAKE HIM UP! WAKE HIM UP!" Sun throws anything near him, aiming at nothing in particular. When he does stop throwing, he chitters aggressively at Reinite.

"YOU ARE STRONG. YOU SAID YOU WERE."

He turns to focus his attention on Monkey King. Pushing dirt and anything he finds ugly away from Monkey King's corpse.

Sun nudges at the body, but Monkey King remains unmoved. It causes another screech from Sun. He desperately starts moving, circling around the body. When all else fails, he's grabbing Monkey King's cold body and holding it close to him, tightly. "Hh-HGHH!

She has seen him in the ring at Skullrender and on the stage at Bravura Ultima.

Still, that doesn't prepare her for how strong the shove is - grief always made everything so much more different. Reinite's pushed back and her head almost cracks against the tile floor.

She doesn't say anything. She lets Sun rage.

LIAR!

She hated he was right.

REINITE, YOU LIAR. LIAR LIAR!!!!

Reinite isn't able to argue against that. Sun had thought she could help, and she couldn't. She couldn't turn back death, and she wasn't one of the Stars anyways. The pirate lass hisses as something he throws makes a connection with her forehead, blood already seeping from the wound and into her vision. She's forced to close an eye.

She sits there as Sun circles the body, cleans the debris away from Monkey King's corpse.

Sun begs for her to help. The pirate lass rolls back into a seated position as she looks at him with her one open eye.

"We should get him out of here, Sun." Reinite says, holding out her arms. "I'll carry him, if you'll let me."

the inquisitor's gaze grows serious at reinite's laugh. there may be no joy in it, but his sudden regard of her motions is a warning. he has heard his hahren tell this tale a dozen times, and still he yearns to hear it another. when a younger version of himself was asked for forbearance, he bowed his head and listened. when he was asked to instruct the younger members of their clan, he told.

' the shemlen enslaved the elves. they took away our history, our language, our immortality. when they stole our land and dispersed our people, some refused to relinquish the old ways. '

he takes a breath. his next words are a recital, or maybe a prayer. ' we are the dalish: keepers of the lost lore, walkers of the lonely path. we are the last elvhen. never again shall we submit. '

When he's done talking, the pirate sets down her half-empty glass softly.

"You are honestly telling me that you, who put a voice to your people, have made peace with the fact the very ones you saved and worked with will just wipe it away with the stroke of a pen?" She asks. It's, honestly, even tempered for how sharp the words could land.

It's no more an accusation than her earlier questions. Reintie wonders how this would go if this were Asgard he spoke of in this fashion?

Then Renite says to stay over there. Her voice is firm. It's an order.

It was confirmation of his most dreadful feeling. When he breathes, he can hear it in his ears. The way he exhales, the way his heart pounds against his chest, is deafening. Quite frankly, he doesn't even realize that he's made his way toward the body. Disobeying Reinite's order. He hadn't realized that he moved. He can't hear anything. There's a painful ringing in his ears as eyes remain on the body.

"Monkey King..."

He calls for him, but he can't even hear him call his name. He feels like he's underwater, grasping and calling out to nothing.

"Ren--Ren.....He's just sleeping. He's just sleeping. It--Sometime when he's really sleepy he won't wake up. He's just sl...."

The dead don't respond. They can't. Monkey King is no different right now.

Reinite reaches out to pull Sun close, to turn his head away from Monkey King's body. Her voice is still, calm, when she speaks next.

Sun needs someone to be calm right now.

"I can't, kid." She says, regret hot and heavy in her chest. "I'm sorry, I can't wake him up. I'm not that strong."

How she resents how she has the label of Godling. What good is it to be compared to the Gods when you can't even do anything about death?

"Waaaaughh-"

She crashes right into the woman who had reached out to grab the dragon, all three of them rolling into a large pile. "It's mine! I saw it first!"

"Give it back to me! Right now!"

Reinite was curious to see what this place had for "dragons' so she found herself here. One little squirming dragon in her hands until she's tackled.

"Ah - shit!" The pirate lass yells as they tumble into a pile and the dragon bites her hand.

It was strange to walk around the city now. Tetra had finally familiarize herself with it, but now things that had changed in subtle and not-so subtle ways.

"It's creepy," She muttered and sat herself on the roof of a small shop. She had originally planned to plunder the unmanned stores, but something that egged in her mind kept her usual wondering hands still.

"No, this ain't." She called back to Tetra. "Stars sent us to some back up place. Somethin' to do with a comet?"

It....

.....has....

Sun slows when they arrive at the place where he was last sensed Monkey King. A grocery store that sold just about whatever one needed. From food to appliances, clothes, to electronics.

Sun's knuckles hover over pebbles of rocks and glasses as he enters the building.

"Monkey King?" he calls out, voice echoing in the silence. All he gets in return is his own voice.

....

From a distance, he sees that familiar silhouette. But he's not moving. The dread in Sun's body makes him still. He's hesitant to approach.

And so, he looks up at Reinite. Big brown-gold eyes PLEADING to her. As if, with her by his side, there was no way that Monkey King would be...

It has to be the weird things happening right now.

That's not Monkey King.

The silhouette doesn't move when Sun calls out.

Sun starts to approach slowly, and the Godling reaches out to place a hand on his shoulder. "Let me look first, Sun." She insists.

If that silhouette is what she thinks it is, Reinite doesn't want Sun looking first. Dying here wasn't the same as back in the original city, but she couldn't just...

Reinite pushes past sun before he speaks to her. Her steps are careful as she approaches toe get a better look. But she stops not too far away.

The pirate lass gets down on her knees, already looking at the bloodied, unresponsive body of Monkey King. Her voice is firm when she speaks again.

❝ i am a fire drake, ❞ he says, low and warm. ❝ i will not dry out as you fear. ❞ still, he moves from his chosen sunbathing spot and approaches her. unashamed of his state of half-undress, knowing exactly what he was doing.

after all, dragons were vain creatures.

A fire drake. Right. Dragon, a god. Malchior didn't really need regular hydration - like herself - but it didn't matter. She mainly had offered to grab him something as a way to get herself to stop staring.

Which she fails at as Malchior approaches. She may be tall, but he is taller and he uses that to his advantage. Reinite still has to crane her neck ever-so-slightly to look him in the eye. Exposing her throat.

Malchior is a vain asshole. He knows what he's doing.

She isn't good at hiding her reactions, either.

Her hand on the door frame tightens as Malchior's voice comes out as a purr above her. That heat of his warmed the air that was barely between them.

"I think water is all I can get in this place, but it would be cool." Reinite manages to say, after struggling to bring her mind back to task. Instead of imagining just reaching up and closing the distance between them with their lips. She cannot ignore that flip in her stomach, again, from how he purred her name or when he said if she was the one bringing the water to him.

"Give me a moment," the Godling says as she steps back into the house. Reinite is back with the offered glass of water not too long after.

"Here," She says simply. "Unless you want something else now, oh great drake?"

"Alright, so that means I'm commandeering part of wherever you've been lying down 'til they get back." She says immediately.

Reinite steps inside and already scoops Vanth up in a bridal style carry before the other can even sway or protest.

"Glad I got here while you were awake." She remarks. "Heard there's some weird singin' goin on in this Ward now."

Not like that bothers her, she grew up in a port town. Singing happened at all hours of the day, but there were certain hours you didn't look outside or leave your house to check where it came from.

He feels bad for leaving Octavo the way he had. Without even a word, he had RAN off! Food he had been enjoying with a friend was left behind, half-eaten and forgotten.

He felt it, though.

That dread had become so PROMINENT. He felt Monkey King's presence weaken and then.....

... A final sound. Sun heard it, and Sun knew what that sound was. He zipped down the street, running as FAST as he could.

He could be faster. He knows this. Unfortunately, he wasn't at the isle. He wasn't Monkey King.

Sun?

And the younger Sun Wukong stops, nearly skidding as he does so. "Reinite..." he says her name through wheezes and a shaky breath. "M-Monkey King---H-Hee..." And he can't help but let out these strange chittering and chattering noises.

Reinite takes off after the other. She had been, earlier before she saw Sun, on her way back to Cores after stepping out for some air. Again.

Still, there is no time for her to dwell, Sun's panicked. Reinite recognizes that on a deeper level. Something happened to Monkey King.

Something bad.

Rennie stays silent as she keeps up with the other, praying that maybe it isn't too late. Maybe.

rorek was still there in the pages, in his memories. malchior played out their story over and over, as if that would bring his cherished mage come back to life.

what he lacked was his tower, his library. the atelier full of artifacts and ingredients for potions and spells. his treasures, far from reach, and it caused him a deep anxiety. so, it was nice to have been offered a place to stay in the temporary city.

renite was a peculiar young woman. magical, but perhaps unaware of how great her potential was. where he expected the arcane, he found an endearing foolishness- perhaps an innocence. she reminded him of the changeling in that way, and the changeling had been a brave boy, willing to be a fly on the wall, quite literally, during raven's lessons. he had decided that he respected the changeling.

so the time passed, he settled as best he could in renite's home, where his newest apprentice also lived. he found quickly that despite his efforts not to disrupt the unfamiliar magic, some things had still gone wrong. he would have to make the best of it.

the stars had described a comet, but the day seemed lovely for sunning- warmth on his body to mirror the heat that radiated from his chest, a comfort that was enjoyed by even the smallest lizard to the largest dragon.

renite's voice cuts through his thoughts, and malchior opens his eyes, stretching in a way that showed off the well crafted human form of his- bordering sinful, surely. he had always been aware that he was something magnificent, and had never tried to pretend to be anything less, human or dragon.

how are you holding up, she asks, and he hums- ❝ well enough, given the conditions. the sun is still warm, even if much of this world has been turned to nothingness. ❞

a pause, a playful smirk crosses his face.

Reinite's aware she's probably nearly red from blushing. She can feel the tell-tale heat on her cheeks. It doesn't help she had the briefest mental image of her walking over and -

She clears her throat. Down, girl.

"You are, but you'll dry out like that." Reinite grouses. "Do you want something to drink while you sun?"

She barely understands the impulse, given her mostly aquatic nature, but Malchior is an honest-to-Gods dragon. A God in his own right.