[ChicletPrime]

4. The First Deal

• i do love that we have to defeat the bad guys without the shieldbreaking move since we can't resonate together yet.
  
• also, First Deal, huh.
  
• Wanderer infestation, they just keep appearing. can't we find whatever is holding the field steady and destroy it, if its not a single big Wanderer... wait, the memory of Mt Eternal says .. hang on (goes and reads again).  endless waves of Wanderers. a set of coordinates for the center. implied some sort of machine and an electrical surge and then a physical explosion and a magnetic field that goes wild. okay, a gaping hole now at the bottom of the valley. they blew up something that then caused the field collapse. so i'm right, if there's just literal waves of Wanderers spawning in this graffiti covered, marble fireplace having, blood soaked saloon, it has to be a physical thing calling them here.
  
• c'mon Sylus, even you have had to reposition from a bad angle at some point in your history.
  
• "since when was i required to investigate the files the Hunters Association had on you?"  wut? sometimes this stuff just comes out of nowhere. does he just mean that he doesn't know if retreat is in MY dictionary because he's never looked over my recruitment tests?
  
• training practice with my new teacher, Mr "Never Retreats" Sylus Onychinus!
  
• great, he aims my gun for me at the switch box on the wall. probably no back to chest option on this one, just those damned tendrils no doubt. there is So Much Fanfic Packed Into That One Thing.
  
• aaaand boyfriend peaces out in the darkness. Sylus, you are a rat bastard.
  
• disembodied voice offering a deal. yeah, get lost, if you won't help.  although lets be honest, you have helped a TON. but no, i refuse to feel grateful.
  
• oh wow. okay. that's a deal i can't really refuse now, can i?  you are a rat bastard with some sort of plan i already don't like. fine, i can do this. can i call Rafayel for an assist though?
  
• i really want to know if the necklace is just a necklace or something else.  he doesn't always wear it so i guess its just a trinket but....
  
• he also puts a communicator in my ear?
  
• that was... what? "if you have the audacity to die on me... you actually will meet your end."  that makes no sense at this particular juncture. and he was being.. kind about it? or soft, maybe. so i die and he has me bugged now so he can find me when i go weigh my heart against a feather?
  
• oh, he just wants to TALK to me while he peaces out and leaves me to somehow stay alive against endless monster waves.  hi, Sylus.  are you hoping even more frenetic and frightening life threatening stuff will unlock things with us?
  
• oh, really. we're stalling for time? stalling for time for WHAT? nothing is bigger and badder than you. although now that i stop for a second, he's waiting for somebody else to show up to this soiree? in the darkness? something that avoids light?
  
• i am so deeply immersed into every conspiracy i can think of.
  
• oh, the crow has a name. hi, Mephisto! apparently you're my target. good thing your eye glows.
  
• oh. apparently you're my sighter. CLEVER BIRD.
  
• oops, communicator not working. Sylus, are you okay? or just busy? i HATE it when he goes radio silent.
  
• hey, we set the place on fire! good move? nope, Wanderers don't burn. just me.
  
• oh shit. okay. under the crystalllized skin, they seem human. I KNEW IT.
  

5. Nightmare Finale

• for the record, i am not liking these dots that are starting to line up.
  
• okay, Mr Lieutenant ran for it in the chaos, trips over a robot who then chimes in that 67 days remain before the end of the project and the greatest discovery in the world. 
  
• unknown door, abandoned room, a dark colored stone platform. well, we got us some new stuff now.
  
• oh. Flux Nexus? HERE? well, i did say something had to be causing all the trouble.
  
• hello, deadly red-black mist!
  
• and woosh, ex-Nexus. and all the human-Wanderers fall over but don't dissipate it seems.
  
• okay, we steal what looks like a very weird protocore, all slimy-oily.
  
• shopkeeper slips me something too. do i still have the black flower as well?
  
• aaaand back to the swanky crib via motorbike. yay, more food?
  
• aww, Mephisto's hurt!
  
• yeah, i dunno how i know how to speak bird either, but here we are.
  

6. Agreement

• okay, so the thing the shopkeeper gave me was the plans for the Solon Hotel and the guest list. her bar got all shot up but she still decided to hand it over. Sylus standing over my shoulder was probably factored in there somewhere.
  
• so Mephisto is really a construct? how can he be a metal thing that can be repaired AND form and reform like he does, with obviously sentience?
  
• nice, love me a good flashback. apparently while Mr Lieutenant was out on his mission, the actual Sherman was being pasted. or pasted-adjacent. actually, its kind of ambiguous where the man is dead now, or is only going to be dead very shortly. also, i like the coin flipping. Sylus always having to be doing something with his hands.
  
• okay, so it was a faction struggle in Onychinus that took out Grandma and my brother from another mother. trying to blow ME up to get to my aether core but they screwed it up, i take it. leaving Sylus as the obvious instigator as the internal schism isn't obvious to outsiders.
  
• and if Sherman is up to his neck in needing an aether core for whatever reason, and teams up with the Ever who probably also want to do some...  hang on. so Sherman has some wiggle room because Sylus isn't around to apply pressure on the zone, he makes a deal with the biomedical lab - he obtains my piece of the aether core and turns it over, and in return they give him an army of human-Wanderers to complete a takeover of the zone. that has to be really close to right. i'm right, right?
  
• Sylus picked a good time to come back, i guess.
  
• why am i being so mean to the crow? wow, i don't like this me sometimes. yes, let's take the fight straight to Sylus please.
  
• aww, he is so pleased with himself. or me. or both.
  
• oh really? we're going to bring that up NOW? "when we first met you said we were the same" and then we flat out ask if he has an aether core too. I AM SO CURIOUS. don't deflect, don't deflect.
  
• ooooh. "sure, think of it like that".  so wrong, but close enough. his eye show the core inside him at the very least.
  
• wow, just stuff going off everywhere here. MY aether core doesn't seem to do much in comparison at all; its not like i'm busy compelling people around me and blowing up stuff just by staring at it really hard.
  
• nice, caught him a little off guard with that.  i want to pry this man's brain apart, he obviously knows So Much He's Not Saying. 
  
• "it helps me see what people want the most."  and i apparently am hungry all the time and i never knew it. "..desires they refuse to admit."
  
• okay, so if his evol is whatever the black-red manipulating stuff is and the aether core is what gives him insight into a human heart -- my evol is to resonate with others and my aether core does... what?
  
• AND THE FIRST THING WE DO IS STARE INTO HIS EYES AGAIN.
  
• i am SO VERY HUNGRY at the heart of me apparently.
  
• have i gone mad? i don't reallly know. i don't think so?
  
• OPTIONS:  Push Away - or - I'm Sorry
  
• eeeee decisions decisions
  
• "you like it when people do that?" stare into his eyes and bare their innermost everything?
  
• oooh, we offer to try and resonate again! could we, oh please, could we??? if his eye sees things we all hide, and we resonate to drive it higher, what would that feel like?
  

/spends a good five minutes drafting that in technicolor

• muahah! we can only think of two good things about him - he's good at fighting and he's pretty. i guess that's not enough.
  
• yeah, auction is coming up baby, we need to get on this, stat.
  
• "...that means my evol is controlled by my emotions."  yeah. OBVIOUSLY.
  
• take it or leave it, amigo. you want something, i want something. as long as we both have something we can offer each other, its a deal, right?
  
• aaaand he looks at me with -indifference-.  you rat bastard.  are you really this untouchable or are you just better at hiding than anybody else in this place? probably a little of column a, a little of column b. whatever he desires in HIS heart, he's probably got it on a little golden shrine with tiny candles.
  
• yeah, yeah, its not enough. i have TRIED to give you my yogenfruz coupon, you keep saying no.
  

• is jewelry really the answer here? i DID want a feather tassel, its true.
  
• oooh, PETTY THIEVERY GOAL.
  
• everything is a competition with this guy. i like it.