Amaranthine

Cait felt a breeze go the wrong way as she pushed open the doors out of the Pantheon, finding Willow already there waiting for them.

She knew she probably looked like her dad right now, as she got her first good look at the witchy woman. Willow might not have the legendary proportions of Kennedy and her mom, but the way that nearly-sheer black dress clung in some places and flowed in others was entrancing. Given the woman in question, that was probably only partly magic.

Her silver-white eyes looked Cait over slowly, and Cait found herself transfixed long enough that she sheepishly stepped out of the way to let the others out.

No-one passed her.

She looked back to Willow in confusion, and as her eyes tracked back they passed over a raven-black messy bun, Kennedy looking just as perplexed as Cait.

“Don’t worry about it too much, just a little trapdoor in space and time,” Willow explained, voice friendly and cheerful as it pulled the women’s attention back to her.

“Trapdoor is a bad phrase to follow up ‘Don’t worry’,” Kennedy protested, although she didn’t seem that perturbed. Her link to Cait remained crystal clear, and as such, any ambush would find an extremely hard target.

Willow’s eerie laugh was all the stranger when delivered out of the normal flow of space and time, although again, it didn’t necessarily seem sinister.

“Good point, next time I pull people in for a chat I’ll have a better intro planned. You don’t seem too put off though, so I hope you’ll forgive me,” she said, and Cait felt inclined to do so.

I’m a sucker for smokeshow witches, sue me.

While she knew Kennedy didn’t receive the words of that thought, she got the gist, and a wholehearted assent flowed across their link. Cait felt it, smirked, then had to squint. It looked like Willow’s eyes had tracked something moving between her and Kennedy.

“Cute,” she said, letting her lips part just enough that her teeth showed in her still-amused smile. “That is one hell of a soulbond. Never seen one half as strong, even when people tried for decades. Has to be more than just good luck.”

“Wait, what!?” hissed Kennedy. “Soulbond?”

“That’s why your mom called me in, really,” Willow continued, eyes still tracing the space between Cait and Kennedy. As they watched, it seemed her pupils tracked dizzying patterns, the lines of which were almost reflected within them. “I’m one of the only Animancers lucky enough to have a traditional grounding in the art and get Altered to have a strong affinity for the stuff of magic itself.”

“So many questions after that statement,” Cait said, but noticed Kennedy chewing on her lip, clearly deep in thought. “Oooorrr maybe that’s just me?”

“Not just you babe, but it does make sense. Mom and the Thaumaturges on campus were able to pinpoint my power as being an offshoot of animancy, that’s soul magic by the way—”

“Bitch, you think I haven’t played Pillars of Eternity?”

“I don’t know what that is, also, nerd, also, don’t interrupt me,” Kennedy shot back absently before continuing. “It’s a really rare affinity among Altered mages, and even those that have some are more like me, where its something hyper-specific, not any real ability to mold the power itself.”

“Huh. Okay, good lore dump,” Cait said, accepting that all as gospel truth since it was faaarrr beyond her zone of punching expertise. A bright silver-blue flash pulled their attention back to Willow.

The intricate arcane lines her eyes had been tracing between them had been pushed through reality, this reality at least, and into existence for a moment. A flowing eldritch sigil, at once solid and in motion, stood between Cait and Kennedy, with a second, considerably less complex, between Kennedy and Willow.

“Fascinating,” Willow hissed, a hint of glee in her voice while her eyes took in the sigil as a whole, even as it started to fade back into wherever such things normally existed.

“Those some kind of indicator of link strength?” Cait asked, making what she thought was a logical conclusion based on the condition of the two sigils. Instead of agreeing, Willow waved her hand dismissively.

“Yes, yes, the two of you are so very much in love, we’re all impressed,” she said, still studying the fading sigil, and her tone offended Cait in a way she couldn’t really quantify.

“Hey, don’t be a dick,” scolded Kennedy, “at least tell us what the hell you’re doing.”

“Not quite sure myself,” Willow said, as the sigil finally faded into invisibility. She made a swirling motion between her hands, and a copy appeared above her fingers, inheriting her focus from the original. “this is definitely Wave magic, not human. If our stuff is fire, then this is a combustion engine. Complex, more so than I’ve ever seen.”

She dismissed the sigil, finally meeting the duos eyes. Her lips parted in what seemed like the first genuine smile they’d seen from her.

“You two are going to be interesting,” she said. “Did you know I only pulled Kennedy in for a chat?”

“How could either of us possibly know that?” Kennedy asked, exasperated. Willow just shrugged, making that dress do some fun things against her body. Her eyes flicked to Cait’s as that appreciation crossed her mind, that knowing, amused smile gracing her lips once more.

“Same way I know how much your girlfriend likes this dress,” Willow purred, giving Cait a playful wink that seemed entirely out of character. “I don’t know how much information this bond gives the two of you.”

“Well, not that much, and yeah, obviously, she’s the horniest person I’ve ever met and you’re dressed like an Elvira-themed callgirl. It’d be weirder if she wasn’t staring.”

Part of Cait felt attacked, while another was just happy to be so seen. Willow’s laugh filled the space, seeming to come from more than one direction in this iteration of reality.

“Anyway, that’s good, could be useful later. Your mother tells me you were able to share powers from another person to her?” Willow asked, ignoring the warning in Kennedy’s tone.

“I mean, yes, but only once, and not for long,” Kennedy said. Cait thought back to the weird vomiting feeling of flame leaving her lungs, and the way her fingers had twisted to mimic Qi’s claws as she fought TuTulang. Willow nodded.

“That is impressive,” she said, eyes taking on a suitable caste of respect as she gave Kennedy another once over. “From your link to me, I wouldn’t expect that to be possible. With her, though, that’s another matter entirely….”

“Is it just a love thing?” Kennedy asked, previous miffed-ness quickly becoming excitement, “because we’re kind of doing a polyamory thing, could I make Lira into a fuckin’ Juggerna—”

Willow raised a hand to stop her.

“I don’t know,” she explained. “first glance, I don’t think so. Still, there is much to be learned here. I look forward to working with the both of you, since it seems you are a package deal.”

The world shifted without actually changing, and Cait stumbled forward when a full ton of Dragon bumped into her.

“Whoa, uh, sorry,” Qi said, but was looking at Cait concernedly, “Didn’t expect you to stop, everything okay?”

Behind her hip, Cait could see Willow, a beatifically innocent look painted onto her flawless face. She gave a cheerful grin and a wave, still clearly behind Cait and still in the Pantheon.

“No, sorry,” Cait said, “uh, brainfart. C’mon, let’s go find Gwyn.”

The group entered the Bunker carefully, Cait leading the way to tank any of the nastier traps the Meta-Brains might have set up. Cait being around campus and out of the public eye had not made them less eager to try and get a sample of her indestructible ass. That made it almost more eerie when they walked to the Accessibility Bay, now labeled NANO FORGE in big metallic script, without any incidents.

Entering the room, they saw an ass that was still generous, but getting less so with each of Lira’s PT sessions. Gwyn was bent over, fiddling with a panel on Breastman’s stasis enclosure. She peeked over her shoulder, nodded a greeting, and went back to her work. Almost immediately, she did a double take, squinting at Willow. She straightened up, walking over to actually greet the group.

“Damn, another one for Lira’s harem huh?” she said, never one for polite introductions.

Lira’s harem?, Cait thought, feeling a little offended. Then she looked over at the redhead, beaming as she rested her hand possessively on Qi’s hip, and had to reassess. Okay, so maybe that’s fair.

“Time will tell,” laughed Willow, only she didn’t, but the sound of her eerie laughter was overlaid on top of her words as she took Gwyn’s proffered hand to shake. Gwyn clearly clocked that, and grinned wide.

“Hmm, well, was gonna say Kennedy already had the goth girl slot filled, but she’s more hot topic goth to your bloodplay goth, huh?”

Willow actually laughed this time, seeming almost flattered. Kennedy looked quite the opposite, relegated to a retail rebel as she was. “I’d be in the wrong group for that I’m afraid,” Willow replied, eyes twinkling. “All of these women would simply prove too difficult to cut.”

“Nah, Lira cuts just fine, “ Gwyn said, “she proved it yesterday, playing around with the immensely dangerous monomolecular blade I gave her for self defense.”

Lira held up a bandaged fingertip, proudly saying; “It was on purpose! Not my fault Gwyn wouldn’t replace it with a vibrator.”

Qi gently cuffed her on the back of the head. “You do just fine, babe. Stop trying to be a cyborg sex doll.”

Lira scowled at her. “Gotta improve somehow!!! You guys keep getting new powers and upgrades and shit. Least I can do is have a built-in G-spot massager.”

“I don’t have a G-spot, so I can honestly say I love you just the way you are,” interjected Cait, while Kennedy made the see-sawing hand gesture that universally implied, ‘I could go either way’. Cait slapped at her hand as she tried to move the conversation on. “Anyway, harem membership pending, Willow is Kennedy’s spirit guide or something. Might be able to help with B-Man as well. How’s our boy doing?”

“No changes,” Gwyn sighed, turning back to fiddling with the panel. “Which is technically a good thing, means the stasis field and nanobots are holding. Wasn’t a given, with how wild his physiology is. Means no improvement either though.”

The tension in her last words was picked up by everyone in the room. Done with whatever she was doing, she met Willow’s silver-white eyes.

“If you know anything about mentally wrangling out-of-control tentacle monsters that have a non-standard relationship with the square cubed law, I’m all ears.”

Willow’s forehead creased. Or it looked like it should have, at least. Her skin was unnaturally flawless, and not in the way it was for a lot of Altereds. More like it was a mask, made with craftsmanship such that it was indistinguishable from the real thing.

“Whatever techno-sorcery you’ve got running on him right now is making it so he might as well not exist as far as my magic is concerened,” she said, looking at Gwyn, clearly impressed and reappraising the cute nerd. She shook her head, smiling with good humor. “You Meta-brains. The things you can do with technology, and still, I’m the witch.”

“Yeah, well, you’re wearing a dress from Spirit Halloween and I’m wearing an unmarked green hoodie and jeans. Its all branding.”

Despite her sarcasm, Cait could tell Gwyn was enjoying the praise. The team ribbed her a lot, but only because they were all aware Gwyn could almost certainly solo them. Her cheeks were rounded by a smile, and she got a bit of a manic gleam in her eye.

“Kinda hoping to try turning off the stasis while we’re on the road. Maybe have us all get a mile away except Cait first, and go from there.”

“Worried about its interactions with Samsara’s portals, huh?” Cait asked, figuring she’d just caught Gwyn in a lie.

“What? Oh, no, I am. Its just that we do a lot of stuff in the Bunker that could technically implode reality. This just happened to have a convenient side effect.”

Cait’s face blanked out as her mind went to work trying to scrub that knowledge out of her memory, for the sake of her mental health.