Archer

Deicen Village. A fruit cellar. Hundreds of years prior. Tion, dressed in the thick furs and cobbled together leather armour of a Nomadic sword for hire, slammed a smaller, but similarly dressed man by the neck onto a table. It creaked, almost ready to break. His middle-aged victim, whose most distinguishing features were his wispy grey beard and seven holes in his smile from where he had lost teeth to skirmishes and brawls, grinned back at him as their eyes connected. “You tricked me, Gandor,” Tion growled accusingly, squeezing at his throat and leaning forward to press his weight onto the mercenary. “Aye,” Gandor rasped. “Well, you weren’t gonna go through with it otherwise, laddie.” He twisted his right shoulder, throwing a heavy punch at Tion’s head, but the god was ready for that. With a grunt, he simply picked the man up again, then unceremoniously smashed him into the table once more, knocking the air from his lungs. “Where’s the antidote?” Gandor’s pale blue eyes rolled back in his head for a moment, and Tion thought he had gone too far, but his partner had never been one to go down silently. “Have ya ever thought of asking nicely?” the man spit back, shaking his head as if to clear it. Tion responded by dropping him onto the table another time. This time, it did break, and in a spray of splinters, they fell forward onto the stone floor of the cellar. “We both know I don’t have time for that.” Gandor groaned. “That’ll leave a ma-” He cut off as the God of Sensation punched him in the stomach. “Last chance.” Gandor didn’t say a word. But his eyes moved to look at his side pocket, and that was enough. Roughly, Tion shoved his hand into it and procured a small vial of green liquid, stoppered with a crumbling cork. “Thank you,” he said, smiling as he raised his fist. “That wasn’t so hard, now was it?” A second later, Gandor’s world went dark. ***** An unlikely meeting place. Present day. “Bold of you to assume that we ever had an idea of what’s going on,” Tion answered Sagitti. “As for your festival, that’s… nice. Thanks, I guess.” He gave her an insincere half-smile, the kind you give someone when they give you a present you know you will be regifting later. “However, I fear that likely infuriates my friend Entropy. She’s a competitive soul.” ***** Yabo’i, Keeper of Lands for Deicen Village, and future member of the Ta'e'iloan Triumvirate, awoke from his fitful sleep to someone shaking his shoulders. Wearily, he opened his eyes, cringing at the pools of vomit visible on his sheets in the moonlight. “Drink this,” Tion commanded, his backlit form casting a shadow over the bed. He held out a vial. “And next time, avoid having the lamb here. It’s too fatty anyway.” “Pardon, what?” Yabo’i tried to sit up, but he slid back down as horrific cramps seized his body. “Oooh, what the-?” Calmly, the Tion unstopped the bottle. He stalked forward, pressed one hand against the poisoned man’s forehead to hold his head still, then with the other, poured the green liquid down his throat. Yabo’i flailed momentarily in token resistance, but after a minute, calmed down. “Oh. Oh,” he crooned. “That’s the stuff. Wait, where are you going?” The God of Sensation turned, one leg already out of the bedroom door. “I have other business to attend to.” “No, stay! I have yet to properly thank you for whatever you just did. At least give me your name!” “I have many names. You may call me Tion.” Yabo’i pondered that, trying to figure out where the excess apostrophes that he assumed would be present would go. “Ta’e’on?” he guessed. “No, Tion.” “Ta’e’ion?” “Nope. But, close enough. Have a good life, kid.” He stepped out of the room and into the night. Once he was alone, Yabo’i suddenly felt extremely tired. As he began to fall into a deep slumber, he rolled the name of his healer around on his tongue. “Tae’ion. Ta’e’ion. Mmm. What a strange dream…”

I didn't say anything was wrong, Tion thought. Fluctuation goes both ways. Would they notice if our weakness began to bolster their strength? Would they care? "The gods have stalked this land for long enough that some might say that we are forces of nature, the same as the wind and stars," Tion murmured. "Just because most of us deities choose to share our gifts does not mean that we are in any way forced to. Perhaps something inside of him recognizes a need to hoard the power for a rainy day. Or to withhold it, until our subjects are ready. I learned long ago not to underestimate the strength of one's subconscious." He looked at Gati, but kept his voice loud enough to be audible to the entire group. "I appreciate the perspective that these beings have to offer, but there is still the small mater of-" he raised his eyebrows somewhat ambiguously, then realizing that that was too vague, tapped his index finger to his temple. "And with the, ahem, fluctuations recently, perhaps it would be best not to leave it to last minute." In case that was still unclear, he then exaggeratedly mouthed the words 'LEAVE NO TRACE'.

Tion’s eyes shimmered, becoming like a cat’s, in that they faintly reflected the ambient light. He extended his Power, tapping into the web of coloured beams that radiated from each of the assembled individuals. Thick, violet stipes were radiating from the scholar’s chest: pride. The soldier was harder to read. A mix of muddled blues and greens danced around her, so chose not to dwell on her for long. Rather, the god turned his focus on the boy, peering curiously at the emissions of his soul. As he’d feared, everything seemed normal. “You must understand, Negation’s greatest gift is that her powers are undetectable. We could have had this conversation a dozen times over now, and you would never know it. He’s incredibly smooth, believe me. To be so careless as to forget to include a subject’s soul is not his style.” Tion returned the other god’s glance, shrugging his shoulder slightly. His reasons for being here were practical in nature, making local allies was often an effective way of entering hostile territory undetected, but he was also a firm believer in trusting his luck. In a realm where supernatural manipulation of probability was common, seemingly random chance encounters were often worth giving a second thought. However, he couldn’t help snorting at the human’s trust in Probability’s tendency towards divine intervention. “Situations,” he said quickly, “are often what you make them. Look at the sky! Those specks of light you see are nothing until you choose to notice and interpret them. If you choose to see those sparks as stars, that is what they become! You make the stars, in your heads, Sagitta T'Sora and company.” He looked at the lights shimmering around her again. The greens were spinning lazily, like a spiralling aurora borealis. “By way of answering your other question, I must pose one of my own to you all. Have any of you noticed any,” he paused, trying to find the right way to word it, “fluctuations of your instincts recently?” Tion looked down at his own body. No light shone from it. His skin and clothes were just a smooth, obsidian shade of black.

Tion sat beside Negation in the growing ring of gods and mortals. “Wars often serve a valuable purpose,” Tion mumbled, crumbs of bread flying from his mouth as he talked. He’d found half a sandwich in one of his pockets. It tasted slightly acidic, but he needed a prop to disguise how uncomfortable he was at the moment. “Gati, remind me sometime to talk about my theory that either everyone you meet is capable of morality but you aren’t, or vice versa. It’s one of the two, I think. I just need to figure out the free will component.” He idly started manipulating the (zombie?) boy’s sensations, trying to get him to wiggle his ears. It was hard prompting muscle responses, but the child had a weak will. It would just take a few moments to figure out what kind of stimuli would be enough to make him do it. “You’re not used to working together,” he noted abruptly. “Some of you radiate trust, but there’s no precision, no proper coordination among you. Interesting.” The boy’s left ear spasmed. Tion smiled, then slowly slouched as he sat to gradually defer the groups' attention away from him. It was easier to mess with people when they were focused elsewhere. “But never mind that," he added. "Give us your names.”

Angry grey clouds started to appear in the otherwise blue sky overhead of them, blowing in at an unnatural pace. They cast hazy shadows over the valley, particularly over Tion's face, cloaking his eyes in pits of darkness. "Oh, we're not salesman," the god replied with a smirk. "We're a different kind of thief." He reluctantly took stock of the humans' postures. They all seemed tense, ready to fight. Fortunately, only one of them had the body of a warrior, although the other two were in reasonable condition. Meanwhile, the storm clouds began expanding, growing to cover the entire area in darkness. Dull lighting flickered amongst them. "Godhood is a matter of perspective. Fortunately, opinion is easily influenced by shows of Power. And while my talkative companion here may not have a flashy ability, I can certainly put on a show." He snapped his fingers. Instantly, the storm disappeared, bathing the region in sunlight once more. "That said, I really don't like being tested."

Sighing, Tion dropped his invisibility as well. "Sup," he said wearily, waving a hand at the strangers. "Don't mind this-" he gestured at his body, which, along with his clothes and supplies, was entirely black. The monocolour made it hard to distinguish his features; everything seemed to blend together unless one looked at him in profile. "-Sensation, you know? Give me a moment, I think I can get it under control." He tilted his head back and squeezed his nose between his fingers. Slowly, the darkness began melting away, like paints in the rain, revealing his regular coloured form beneath. "That's better," he said, turning his attention back to the mortals. "I'm Sensei Tion, by the way. Congratulations on your collective good fortunes, you all are about to fulfill your purposes in life. Just do what he says, and you'll have something to tell your grandchildren about. Assuming you remember any of this." He smiled at the group toothily. It was an off-putting expression. Then he winked at Zura.

Congratulations on being so prolific, Jaywalk! I too have questions. When you're hungry at an inconvenient time, is it normal to try stopping your food alarm from vibrating by hitting your snooze (belly)button? In casual sports and games among friends, variations to the ‘official rules’ of the game often emerge to make the activity better suited to your situation or to make it more fun: so called ‘house rules’. What’s the weirdest house rule for a game that you adhere to? Every day, at the stroke of midnight, a single, randomly selected item in your possession is replaced by an illusion for 24 hours. You can’t tell it’s faked until you go to touch it, at which point your hand passes right through it. Infuriatingly, the items usually tend to be important to your success that day, like your calculator on the day of your math test, the fridge when you’re wake up famished, and, on one memorable occasion, the bed you were sleeping in. What’s the number one thing you’d do to cope with this curse?

"Yousa remember mesa's birthday!" exclaimed a certain character who shall not be named. Excited, and having mistook the jetpack for a birthday candle, he took a deep breath and blew out the device's flames, sending Boba spiraling back to the ground like a deflated balloon. "All-n youse maken mesa berry smilin!"

On the trail to find the mortals. “I can’t do that,” Tion intoned distantly, his focus distracted as his brain conjured up an ancient memory. “I have self imposed restrictions to prevent my asking for that particular favour. Plus, I think it would have catastrophic consequences for humanity.” He narrowed his eyes, peering at the fresh animal tracks in front of them, subtle imprints in the soil from something large and quadrupedal. “Here be dragons,” he muttered under his breath. “Anyway, the way I understand it, I am a conduit of considerable amounts of raw, magical Power. To prevent an overload, some of it disperses into the air around me, into the rocks and trees and humans, like a kettle letting off steam. That’s the only healthy way to manage something like this, my body knows that. Anyone else in my position, without the safeguards I’ve developed, would have exploded centuries ago. I am, unfortunately, irreplaceable. Not that you really care about that.” The sound of distant voices gave the god an opportunity to change the topic. “Do you hear that?” he asked, turning his head to try to pinpoint the source. “We need to make contact anyway, let’s check it out. Follow me.” Tion broke into a jog, veering off of the right side of the trail at an acute angle. “Come on, Gati, I’m invisible, remember? Keep up or get lost.”

“And that’s why I’ll never fish blindfolded,” Tion said, ending a fifteen-minute lecture about the Nomadic tribes’ dueling methods. He let the silence envelop them after that, listening to the sounds of their footsteps as they walked. After a while, he cleared his throat. “Gati, you’re good at manipulating people. I’ve got a question for you. There’s this… thing I have been trying to get my friends to do to me. A favour, you might say. The ones who seemed the least inclined to do it, I tried being nice to, for several hundred years. I thought they’d eventually clue in and offer to help, out of kindness. They never did.” He paused, letting that sink in. “The ones I thought might do it, I just pushed in that direction. Little shoves, here and there, to build up their rage sufficiently. I had hoped they would try to make me stop, but they never went far enough, you know? It was always disappointingly half-hearted retribution. Useless.” He cleared his throat again, somewhat awkwardly. “The one I thought could do it was also the only one who could definitively stop me. So I hid from them. I was good at that. But they always managed to find me and mess my plans up.” If he could have looked Negation in the eyes at that moment, Tion would have done so. “None of these approaches has worked. So what do I do? How do I get them to help me?”

I believe you'll be needing these then: *,**,• ,† ,‡. Best of luck, everyone!

On the trail to coincidentally run into the mortals “Do you know what power is, Gati? Not in the magical sense, but in practice.” Tion’s invisible feet padded invisibly along the forest floor, making less crunching noises on the leaves now that the surrounding foliage had thinned considerably. Through the trees, he could see the dark green mass of miles upon miles of rolling hills surrounding them. “I used to think that there was power in anonymity: the ability to act independently of society, step away from it all, and wield your influence without anyone being the wiser. But I have come to realize that that’s an unrealistic way of looking at this realm’s dynamics. Look at your clothes, man! And your face, even your mannerisms. We claim to be gods, but we’ve all adopted their habits to blend in. Sure, it means we can act unmolested, but there’s hardly anything differentiating us from our subjects anymore. This isn’t power, it’s integration, it’s submission.” He paused to inspect a fallen twig along the side of path, turning it over in his hands, noting how recently it had been snapped. Nervously, he peered around, looking for any signs of life besides his travelling companion. He saw none. “Proper power,” he continued, “lies in being known. The greatest heroes of this age have all chased their ambitions relentlessly, and done so without any thought to what others think of it. They have studied in the face of ridicule, built to spite the elements, and fought their way through opposition, with force if necessary. Those men become kings, grinding themselves out a position of unassailable might. Everyone knows their names, even if it’s only so they can curse them. They are the ones of which legends are told; their names are written in the stars. They thrive in conspicuousness. That, my boy, is true power.” The god of Sensation sniffed at the wind, nostrils flaring to breathe in the scent of a familiar smell. Instinctively, he slowed his pace, moving closer to Negation for protection, but he carried onward. “There was a bedtime story I used to tell Jessic on that theme. It was one of those scary ones, about a man who fed beggars at the door when they knocked on the door each night. He never saw their faces, just their outstretched arms. Then, one day, they knocked on the door in the daytime, and he saw he’d fattened them up into bulbous giants. Nom, nom, nom they gulped him down and feasted on his family.” He scratched his chin. “I don’t think she liked that one very much.” His invisibility flickered, momentarily revealing his form. Inexplicably, the god’s body and clothing seemed to be entirely coloured black, as if he was made of pure shadow. Then he was unseeable again, showing no signs have having noted the lapse. “Come to think of it, she didn’t like any of my stories.”

...thus revealing that FT was secretly 2000's era Christopher Nolan.

The General's Camp. Infirmary Tent. Afternoon. It’s time to let go, came a thought. They do not seek to kill you. Only trap. In his drugged stupor, Tion found himself beginning to be swayed by the notion. As he thought about it, he became conscious of the resurgence of his Powers, as accessible and open to him as if he had never locked them away. No, came the counter-thought, but he ignored it. He was ready to embrace his inner demon. Away from there. Later. As a cool breeze blew through the air, the tight clumps of trees cast lengthy shadows on the worn deer-trail that led away from the General’s Camp, making it seem later than it was. The God of Sensation lay in wait amongst the foliage, preparing for the arrival of his prey. “Cursed bugs!” Tion slapped his forearm, crushing an ambitious mosquito to death against it. In case Negation did not hear it, he slapped himself again, to draw her attention. “Fear not,” he said, carefully stepping out from behind the tree behind which he had been leaning against, avoiding the grabbing claws of the undergrowth and shrubbery as they snatched at his dangling coat. “Over here, it’s me! I’m invisible at the moment.” He started to wave, but thought better of it. Mentally, he made a note to steady his breathing as he talked. After he’d seen the other god run off, it had taken a significant amount of effort to run ahead far enough to head them off, and he was still a little winded. As he continued prattling on, he began briskly walking away from Gati, further along the path. “Bear with me, I would prefer to remain in this state for the time being. Just follow the sound of my voice – a little faster if you please!- and I’ll lead you where we need to go.” Briefly, his disembodied voice got louder as he turned to call over his shoulder back at Negation. “You coming?”

Hey hey hey @Herowannabe, I got something to say. Its your birth anniversary, so celebrate today. (That poem sucked, but you get the idea. Have a good one!)

The General’s Camp. Early Afternoon. In direct contrast to Tion’s clouded mind, the brilliant blue sky was clear. A light breeze wafted along the dirt trail that led into the General’s camp, pushing past the short barrier of sharpen sticks that had been set up on either side of the road to serve as a checkpoint for those entering. Beyond there stood tens of rows of olive-green tents, all of them erected with military precision, save one, tucked away near the back of the encampment: the Infirmary Tent, with was noticeably half-collapsed. A few soldiers milled about its entrance, including some whose uniforms marked them as having an officer rank. An keen observer might have even noticed the muscular form of the army’s General Victoria, walking briskly by. What they would not have seen was the other gods, Truth, Sensation, and Negation, who were busy being accosted inside of the tent by a dozen soldiers. They were trying to escape, but having a difficult time doing so. If only I had my Powww, Tion was thinking forlornly, the drug in his system starting to kick in. I cod slay yous so bafly.

The General’s Camp. The Infirmary Tent. Afternoon. “Beat it,” Tion growled at the soldier who was trying to maneuver him into a headlock. “I want you back.” The man ignored him, and managed to slip his arm through the throng of bodies and drag Tion to the ground by the neck. “Lucky grab,” the God of Sensation wheezed, his vision starting to blur. The colours of the world around him were melding into a hazy mess of black and white. “Your instinct wouldn’t happen to be Probability, would it?” The burly man smiled at him as he pushed a knee into the god’s chest. Tion took that as a yes. “Well, this is a thrill… er, Negation?!” Someone had pinned Tion’s legs, leaving only his left arm free to pathetically slap at his assailants, although that looked likely to be restrained soon as well. This, is bad. And unsporting, calling in reinforcements like this. Curse that dastardly lass. She’s such a, a smooth criminal! Why is it that she hates me so much? Something was leaking from one of his coat pockets, but Tion was unable to shift his head to see what it was. All he could do was twist his neck a little bit to the left of right, where he had an uninspiring view of the cloth walls of the tent’s rear corner. They gave him an idea. “Hey,” he cried at the other deities, “remember that citystate they had going back in the day - would you please move your knee? – where Deicen is now? Samsongrod, Samsongrad, something like that. It would be really great if we could recreate the ending of that Star Festival party we went to there, wink, wink!” He reached his unrestrained hand awkwardly out behind him and curled his fingers around the exposed tent pole that stood there, holding up a quarter of the tent. With as much might as he could muster, he pulled on it, hoping that with help, he could drag the entire structure down upon their heads.

Building on something Pagliacci said, this writing is generally very poetic. However, sometimes it delves into the realm of purple prose, making it difficult to get a clear understanding of what's happening. Most of the times when I lost track of what was happening were because the narration confused me, maybe the adverbs thing would help, I'm not sure. Anyway, below are my specific comments. With school upcoming, I don't think I'll have the time to offer critique of future chapters as I attend to my other commitments, my apologies. Still, it's shaping up nicely. It makes you look at the world differently, and that's always a valuable thing. Good job.

The General’s Camp. The Infirmary Tent. Noon. A dozen soldiers burst into the tent. Half of them surged directly forward to confront the gods, while six of them briefly clustered around a hastily summoned doctor who began to distribute syringes. “Be careful with these,” the elderly medicine man was trying to say as the troops snatched the needles from his hands, barely audible over the din of the alarm bells. “You can’t just go stabbing them anywhere you please, oh, please be careful!” Tion looked over to where Truth had been standing when he threw the knife, but a number of uniformed bodies blocked his view of the god as they approached, cracking their knuckles menacingly. “Time to go!” he shouted, looking over his shoulder for Negation. As he did, he felt a beefy hand clamp down on his right forearm. “Do you mind?” he screamed, twisting sharply to wrench his limb free. However, two more hands latched onto to him, pulling him into the growing throng of soldiers. Tion spit in their faces, but held back from physically returning their blows. You will die for this, mortals. The God of Sensation reached inside himself to tap his Power, preparing to decimate the assembled transgressors by overloading their senses. He couldn’t do it. As he tried to strike out in anger, he felt his Power suddenly slip away from him. It was as if he was locked out of his own mind. In the tent, all of his illusions began to crumble. The bells slowed their toll, the flashing light sputtered out, and the last remaining dinosaur in the camp blinked out of existence. In seconds, he was reduced to helplessness. Tion felt a sharp pain in his waist. He looked down to see a needle sticking out of it, its plunger being depressed by an unapologetic grunt. “Negation,” he hollered, his words already starting to muddle. “You can not leaf me. Get me oot, and Tooth too eff, if you…” His vision began to blur at the edges. As he slumped into the eager arms of the soldiers pinning him in place, he tried desperately to warp their sensations, but his Power wouldn’t cooperate. Similarly, his limbs felt heavy and sluggish, and his neck refused to stop his chin from sliding down into his chest. As he felt the familiar grip of mere-semi-consciousness encroach upon him, two distinct thoughts entered his blankening mind, identical in wordage, but distinct in meaning. I could have killed them, said the first. That was accompanied by the equally worrying, I could have killed them. What if I killed them?

The General’s Camp. The Infirmary Tent. Noonish. “Oh, Entropy,” Tion chirped, taking a step forward. “You are welcome to try concealing your plans from us, but there is one thing that you can not keep to yourself.” The God of Sensation moved past Negation, closing the distance between himself and Victoria. “And that is,” he continued softly, “your stench.” One of the soldiers listening in snickered, and Tion paused to listen to the sound of his commanding officer whacking him upside the head. The man’s metal helmet made a little humorous ping! noise when it happened; further proof, Tion thought, that metal armour was an overrated idea. Waging wars was so much more fun when the most anyone ever brought to the battlefield was a pair of shin-guards and a big stick. The part where they passed the ball around was funny also. Having carefully placed himself within spitting range of his foe, Tion continued to rambunctiously undermine the diplomatic efforts of Negation. As he prattled on, he started surreptitiously diving his hands into his various coat pockets, feeling out their contents, searching for a specific item he knew was in one of them. “I pity any man who has to spend a prolonged period of time with you. I was in your presence for what, a day, and look what happened! You are a danger to everyone around you, Entropy. Worse, by insisting on engaging in such shenanigans at this vital juncture in our planet’s history, you are a danger to all of Hopearaa.” Tion’s eyes flashed gold for an instant, so fast that an observer might have thought it a trick of the light. He delved into the portion of his mind where his Power resided, splitting his focus. He could hear himself continue speaking, but his voice took on a more practiced cadence, like a comedian telling a familiar joke: technically engaging, but ever so slightly robotic. Meanwhile, he began to tap into the rhythm of his Power, that second, subtle heartbeat of magic pulsing through his veins. It felt, normal. Weaker, perhaps, than it had been in past, but it was closely attuned to his thoughts and reflexes at the moemnt. He knew that if he reached out to it right then, he would have been able to channel it as easily as he might flex a muscle. So why isn’t she responding? “Your aggressive behaviour can not be permitted to continue. It’s outrageous, and I think we all know what’s to blame. Your thirst for power has blinded you, made you rely on these ‘soldiers’ to see. Their views taint yours, limit yours. They can’t observe the bigger picture as we can. Have you ever thought of all the things you’re missing because you outsource your senses to your scouts and spies? Sensation’s Smile lady, you’re knee deep in palace intrigue while the real world slips by your notice. Now is not the time to play politics!” It was as if the Power was being blocked somehow. Tion kept trying to flare the coloured threads of Entropy’s aura, the dancing waves of light that he could still easily see, but they refused to respond. It was like pumping electricity into a rock. No matter how much effort he expended, nothing happened. Almost as if, he mused, thinking back to the last time he had encountered such difficulties, the connection has been severed! “What’s worse is that it seems you’ve been losing sight of your priorities, the priorities the four of us are supposed to share. Empires and kingdoms are nice and all, but we promised ourselves we’d never sell our secrets for such fleeting gains as station. For our own safety, we can never let them know who we are or what we do. They’d come after us if they knew, They’d feel morally obliged to. It’s never worth the risk.” Tion began to study the General’s aura with interest. In past, once he saw someone’s soul, coming back to manipulate it later was as easy as putting a name to a familiar face. But he ignored the profile he already had in his memories for the goddess, treating her as a new individual. He took a snapshot of her, creating a detailed impression of her mental and emotional markers. Once he felt he had forged a new connection to her aura, he attacked, lashing out with an aggressive invitation to see the everything about the world as terrifying. Then he did it again. A quick mental impression to give himself a target, followed by a surge of Power, this time anger inducing. Again, to promote nausea. And again, to suggest being tired. And again, and again, and again he assaulted her. Tion was hungry for revenge. “And yet here we are,” he continued, showing no verbal signs of the mental strain he was putting on himself. “In a camp you vehemently claim lordship over. You’re really willing to fight us over a handful of horses and a few dozen humans? They’re going to die soon anyway, I don’t understand why you would you would side with them and their petty little goals.” The God of Sensation diverted some of his Power to altering the waiting soldier’s perception of the sound waves coming from the tent to a greater extent. Forgoing subtly, he altered his voice to their ears, making him sound like Entropy, their commending officer. Ghanderflaffle! his General Victoria voice cursed in German. Soldiers, get in here and seize them. Don’t let them get away or I’ll make you wear mismatched socks in public while I read the character description scenes from young adult romance novels at you – as you slowly dissolve in a pool of simmering acid! His right hand finally found what he was looking for in one of his upper coat pockets. He clutched the handle of the object, and slowly began pulling it out. “I do not believe that you are worthy of the power you hold, Entropy, little though it may be. In fact, I would like to invoke a fo- look out!” In one slick motion, Tion fully withdrew the knife he had stashed in his pocket and threw it dexterously in the direction of Truth’s chest. He then stumbled backwards, flailing his arms as he tried to regain his balance. Outside of the tent, the hurried movement of soldiers could be heard, headed for the entrance flap. Of course, before he did this, Tion fired off blasts of Power at Negation and Truth, intending to make for them personal illusions so that, to their eyes, it would seem as if Entropy had suddenly reached forward, grabbed the knife from his pocket sheath, and whipped it with malicious intent at Truth’s heart, pushing Tion backwards in the process. He started really selling it too, grunting in pain as he stumbled, a shocked look on his face. “No!” he screamed, watching the blade fly. The tent lit up with flashing red lights, and an annoyingly loud alarm bell sound began to clang in everyone’s ears. Tion gasped, the perfect image of a god whose Powers were reacting to his surprise and agony at seeing an attempted murder, conveniently also making it difficult for anyone to speak to one another and offer an explanation about what the Gati had just happened. It was utter chaos in the tent, which was just how Tion liked it.

Cool, what are you going into college for? I don't know how much access to baking stuff you'll have, but I've attached a good recipe for peanut butter cookies that's excellent for making friends. They're slightly addictive; last time I brought them to school, everyone who had one made a point of returning a few minutes later to mooch some more. Cookies are good for times like these.

Yo Gancho, you IRL it up, alright? Thanks for the for keeping the mimes in business. And for the holiday. And for all the unbridled awesomeness. I'll miss you, friend. Stay safe.

Entropy's words rang in Tion's ears. “I see you’ve noticed my soldiers, Tion. Good thing I’m smart enough to block your powers.” The god's eyes widened. His jaw dropped. He shook his head back and forth too quickly, and did everything else he could think of to make it seem like he was pretending to be surprised but doing a poor job of it. “So you are!” he stage-whispered with palpable mockery. “How smart of you!” But despite his double-bluffing exterior, he was extremely confused. As he hammed it up, he eyed Truth suspiciously. Maybe they told her? But, when? And why? “My entire worldview-” he used his Power to make an illusionary explosion around his head “whoomph! Totally changed. Mind. Blown.” The God of Sensation then nudged Negation with his elbow. “I suggest we wrap this up before she spills any more secrets.” With a mischievous look in his eyes, he glared at Entropy smugly. “For someone who doesn’t want a fight, you certainly seem to be readying for one.” He snapped his fingers, sending blasts of Power at the other gods in the room, ones that would create detailed, real-time illusions along the walls of the tent, showing what was on the other side of them. Conveniently, the droves of soldiers he made appear were all malicious-looking and well-armed, whether that was an accurate representation or not.