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sydtaxerror · 5 months

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Day 6 - Vivisection

Extremely sleep-addled tale of Mumei and Shiori, hunting for macguffins in a warehouse full of zombies. Shiori's always a joy to write for. I skipped day 6 back in October so today is just filling in the blank.

Mumei frowned as she sliced open the ghoul’s abdominal cavity. Nope. She moved to the next one, dragging it forward by its chain, and left the first to stumble around bewildered at its new, better ventilated torso. As bewildered as the mindless husk, left behind by an entropic soul, could be. Which, given its inability to recognize the near-godlike being that had vivisected him as even existing, was still somewhat bewildered. The shrouded lantern sitting at her side made this place unnamed. The existence of the building and everything in it rendered utterly meaningless to anyone even bound to civilization. Even as loosely bound as something like a ghoul. No one, not even council could know she was here at all, let alone what she was doing. Mumei had set up shop in an old warehouse attached to the shopping mall where she’d caught her current crop of patients. Because of course the [item] was in a ghoul, in a shopping mall, with thousands of others.

The bootleg [Arcadia] detector she had was only able to narrow its location down to about half the mall. Then again, given it was printed from her broken memory, by a knock-off infini-forge, conjured by by a knock-off lantern, used by a knock-off Mumei, while the real one was cloistered with the rest of council, it was probably miraculous it worked at all. Still, as she glanced down at it to make sure whatever ghoul had eaten it hadn’t wandered off, she saw the trident wreathed in laurel and couldn’t help but roll her eyes. It was Atlantean, of course. The original probably wasn’t any better then. Atlanteans sucked at detectors. Great at tridents, statues, nets, hooks, embossing, harpoons, thermal energy and singing fish, of course. Everyone knew that. But everyone equally knew an Atlantean detector might as well be throwing a dart at a map. Worst detectors in all of civilization. Well, except humans, obviously. They could barely find their own phones. She gritted her teeth, focus Mumei.

It didn’t help that the stench of the warehouse was abhorrent. With nearly a thousand ghouls, rotting away chained to the rafters, all howling with their shredded vocal chords at once, it was a definite assault on the senses. Still, Mumei knew it wasn’t even in the top five worst smelling buildings she’d been in, though she couldn’t put names to any buildings that were on that list. It sure would have been nice if a reaper had taken care of these ghouls before they wound up shrieking in my ears, she thought. But Reapers, other than Calli of course, were never there when you actually needed them. Sure, accidentally rub a demon core the wrong way for one second and they’ll be all over the place like its a pizza party. But have a mall full of ghouls to silence? Nowhere to be seen. Actually though, they usually were better at keeping on top of entropic souls than this. In all of civilization there’d never been malls full of them before, at least. Not a great sign, she thought. All the more reason to find the damn [thing]. She drew her dagger down the torso of another ghoul, and frowned again. Nothing.

“Need some help?” A voice called down from above, nearly startling Mumei into dropping her dagger. Shiori sat among the rafters, kicking her feet as if on a swing, as the ghouls’ chains slid and swayed around her.

Mumei looked up, “you scared me Shiori, what are you doing here?” Wait, what is she doing here. She looked at her shrouded lantern, it should be impossible. This whole place was still unnamed.

“Its a story.” Shiori said, as if responding to the unspoken question. “And a secret one at that, the best kind. Where else would I be?” She leapt down from the rafters, taking the fall with a grace that belied her mostly human appearance.

Mumei grew suddenly rigid, her voice emotionless, “Did you stop to think maybe it's a secret for a reason? Not everything needs to be recorded, archiver.”

“Not much point in an archiver who picks and chooses what to archive, is there?” Shiori smiled. Mumei moved with immense speed, and flawless precision. Delivering a back-of-the-dagger strike to her thorax before Shiori even saw her move. Immediately followed by an unnaturally strong grip on the back of Shiori’s neck and a blade to her throat. Mumei normally had an energy of subdued whimsy, but in that moment Shiori remembered, this is the one being in all existence that witnessed every fight, every battle, every war a human ever fought.

“Don’t fuck with me witch! I watched the Hunters build their pyres! I remember the stench of your forebears as they burned.” Her eyes were swirls of darkness now, her expression cold and unmoving. Shiori raised her hands placatingly, “got it.” She croaked out, gasping for breath. Mumei looked at her and her expression fell abruptly, damn.

“Shiori I am so sorry. That was not cool. Oh my gosh. Not even, remotely, ok.”

Shiori coughed and cleared her throat, standing upright again. “Maybe not ok, but definitely cool. I kind of forgot you could fight like that.” Shiori was grinning ear to ear.

Mumei smiled despite herself, “me too. Sorry. Again.”

“Oh no,” Shiori continued waving her hands as if still talking Mumei down, “It's my fault too. I knew I was trespassing out of my depth. I just didn’t think things were so…serious.”

Mumei looked to the ground. “About as serious as it can possibly be. Bae may be willing to play dice with the fate of humanity but I’m not.”

“Hah! I see what you did there?”

Mumei looked confused, “Huh? Oh, no. I mean it literally. She rolled a d8-billion to decide what person to hide the [redacted] in. Then that person turned into a ghoul. And here we are.”

“Well, I promise I’m here to help. I’ll even redact the archive so no one finds out about the [you-know-what]. That's what my protege wants anyway.”

“O…k. I have no idea what any of that means, but…thank you?”

“I’ll even tell you which ghoul it's in.”

“Wait, you know? Can you see the future?”

“No, just the present. And only in bits and pieces, the general flow of the narrative.”

“Well then tell me?” Mumei looked around the room wildly, as if the object in question might suddenly reveal itself.

“Oh I don’t know yet. But I know I will when I tell you. Only…”

“Only?” Mumei narrowed her eyes.

“Only, I got cut-blocked recently by this shoddy surgeon with just…no technique. And then you went all throat-stabby on me. Plus I saw this meme where we vivisected each other at the same time and…well, if it really was a d8 billion we need to check ourselves too right?”

“And people call me unhinged.”

“You are, that's why this is such a great opportunity!” Shiori gave a small hop of joy, climbing up onto the makeshift metal exam-table Mumei had been using. Mumei shrugged and climbed up with her. She had no idea why she was going along with this, but felt caught up in the tide. She tapped her lantern briefly and conjured a mirror above them.

“Ooh, you sure know how to treat a girl senpai.”

“Don’t make this weird.”

“What could be weird about two girls vivisecting each other with dirty knives in a room full of monsters.”

It ended up being awkward for more than one reason. One, the necessity of nudity for a vivisection somehow caught them both off-guard. Two, only one person’s arms could be properly visible in the mirror at a time, Mumei simply let Shiori have that perspective, knowing she had long ago reached the vivisection equivalent of typing without needing to look down at the keyboard. She began her incision nearly blind, and Shiori shivered with delight at its cold precision and the memory of Mumei’s earlier barely-contained malice. Shiori showed herself to be a prodigy as well, but as they opened each other’s abdominal cavity, they found only the standard organs for their respective forms. As they stitched their torsos back together and clothed, Shiori seemed to be in a fugue state, expression blissful.

“The ghoul, Shiori?” Shiori barely opened her eyes, pointing to one seemingly at random. Mumei, rolled her eyes, but when she cut into the ghoul, a balding, particularly belligerent one that had been bumping into the others like an undead meat-roomba, she found [exactly what she was looking for]. She sighed with relief and collapsed into a chair. “Thank you Shiori.” She slid it across the table and Shiori snatched it up, stashing it in her jacket like it was part of an illicit deal.

“Can I trust you to make sure that gets wherever it needs to go?” Mumei said.

“You can.” Shiori nodded. If you’re watching protege, it’ll be [Where time stood still for you and you locked away your past,] Shiori thought.

Mumei nodded back, finally seeming to relax.

“Senpai, did you really watch the Salem witch trials.” Mumei looked away and to the floor. “I don’t remember, and that wasn’t what I was referring to. Don’t worry about it.”

Shiori looked down too. “Well, I have. And worse. In archives, I mean. Just stories but, how do you deal with it? Sometimes it can be so painful. Just watching.”

“Sometimes its unbearable.” Mumei said.

“Yeah.”

“...Yeah.”

#hololive #holoen #nanashi mumei #shiori novella #cartoonish mutual vivisection #surprisingly no light cannibalism

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sydtaxerror · 5 months

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It continues? Day 5 Extended and new plans.

So I've been wanting to finish my October prompts for awhile now. It felt really REALLY good to write again after literal years of not writing at all, but I let myself get in my own head too much, let myself fall behind, and dropped Holoctober. As a warmup, for something else, I extended one of the most neglected stories from the original run. I'm including the whole thing in case someone stumbles on just this post, but if you read the original Day 5 new content starts at the plus signs.

Day 5: Seiso

In a New York City hospital, on a chilly autumn morning, Sora stood at the foot of Ina’s hospital bed, a strange metallic briefcase in her hand and concern etched into her face. Not far away, A-chan searched for a spot to place the flowers they had brought. The room was filled with the quiet, repetitive beeps of medical equipment. On the other side of the bed was equipment much less standard, a series of runes and arcane enchantments scanning her for increases in extra-planar influence. Sora only knew the basics of either, but collectively they seemed to indicate her heart-rate and physical health had stabilized, and that there was no chance of the Ancient One seizing control of her again any time soon. If anything their health, at least on this plane, was far more precarious than Ina’s own. “It feels wrong to leave her alone. Where is the rest of Myth?” Sora asked.

“From what EN staff say they’ve hardly slept, between taking shifts guarding Ina and trying to hunt down the ones who did this, they’re running themselves ragged. I imagine its also hard to face you, considering you’ve essentially been sent to clean up their mess. Even if we don’t see it that way.”

“I certainly don’t. This wasn’t their fault. We never would have let her be around civilians if we thought this could happen. It should have been impossible, Ina was vetted when she joined and staff were assigned to monitor the Ancient One’s influence. If anything, we failed them.”

“No.” A small voice rang out from the bed, Sora ran over and grasped it. “Ina you should be resting.”

Ina shook her head. “I know it sounds crazy, but me and AO-chan have an…I guess you’d say an understanding. We struggle but there’s rules. Its hard to explain but they wouldn’t do this, not this way. It would be…rude.” She broke into a coughing fit and Sora poured her a glass of water. As Ina drank it Sora tried to understand what she was saying.

“Rude? The creature trying to steal your body and conquer the world wants to be polite about it?

Ina nodded. “They steal worlds like Lupin steals gems. If they were ready, there would be omens, warnings, we’d all be having dreams about the sun being blotted out by darkness. And there definitely would have been casualties.” She shivered, and pulled the blanket tighter around her.

“So what was it?”

“Someone made this happen, planned it. Made sure there would be cameras and civilians caught in it. I heard a song before everything went black. Not something you’d hear at a convention. It was slow, operatic, beautiful but…wrong. As soon as we heard it the balance between me and AO was shattered, they became furious and I couldn’t push them down, it was like I gave up trying to, without even thinking about it.”

Her story told, Ina’s eyes started to grow heavy. Sora smiled gently. “I understand, we’ll do everything we can to make this right, and protect the others. Get some rest for now, we’ll need everyone at their best soon.” Ina drifted into sleep almost immediately.

After making sure Ina was comfortable, Sora checked in with the nurses and the guards. A-chan drew her attention and tapped her watch, Sora nodded. They were running low on time for the other reason they were in New York.

Though far less important to Sora than her kohai’s health, the company’s reputation was in an even more critical condition. Two weeks earlier, Ina had been at a convention in New York City, everyone in the world had seen her lose control, seemingly unprovoked. Tentacles the size of redwood trees had brought down entire buildings. It was a miracle no one had died. No, not a miracle, she corrected herself. You could tell from the footage, even possessed and trapped in her own body Ina made sure no one died.

That wasn’t what had dominated conversation since the footage released however. When supernaturally powerful teenage girls from other planets, dimensions, and even the underworld had started showing up it had been treated as a cute novelty at first. Suddenly humanity felt threatened. Sora had been asked to speak in front of the Council of Nations to represent Hololive. It fell on her shoulders to justify the continued freedom of dozens of idols.

As they walked to the car, Sora noticed, as she had many times lately, a growing unease in the people on the street. There was an anxiousness in the world, a wariness of soul. Even before the now so-called “Ina’nis Incident” people were more guarded and quick to temper. Hopefully this speech could be the first step to putting a stop to all of this. The first step to bringing back everyone’s smiles.

+++

High above, two cloaked figures watched her enter the car, waiting for a signal. The shorter of them, Salamander, sat on the ledge, swinging her bare feet, which were covered in bright crimson scales and terminated in black talons. She grinned as Sora entered the car. “Woody, they have Aliens, demons and literal gods, and you’re telling me that schoolgirl is priority S1? The one we’re blowing our one and only debut suckerpunch on?” Woodcutter, a towering woman with a set of wolfish ears and ashen antlers peeking through her crimson cloak, only shrugged. “Unlike you I don’t call people weird nicknames or ignore the boss’ orders. Weaver says this speech of hers could unravel Siren’s emotional destabilization…thing. The boss isn’t willing to take that chance. Also, they’re specifically not literal gods.”

“Yeah, just de facto ones. The old man really thinks they’ll just stay out of it huh? Seems nuts.”

“There’s a chance, and a plan. Siren’s calling it her magnum opus, she's even cooperating with Weaver.”

Woodcutter held her back. “Just wait until they’re clear of the hospital. No sense in a bunch of sick and injured humans getting caught up in our fight.” Salamander cackled, “Oh my god, is Charlie's naive bullshit contagious? I don’t need her magic story powers to know that by the end of this one, everyone in that hospital will be long dead. And you shouldn’t either. Who cares if it's today or a few months from now? At least most of them got to live for decades, we’ll be lucky if we turn two by the time the world ends. And I won’t waste any more of that time waiting” Salamander leapt from the ledge and Woodcutter pursued her.

As they landed on the street they found Sora standing there already, as if waiting for them. The vehicle took off, removing A-chan from danger and Sora was in a slight crouch, gripping the briefcase with both hands. Woodcutter scrutinized the situation. The idol was clearly in a fighting stance but even if that briefcase concealed a weapon, it would take time to open it and collect the weapon. With a burst of flames from her feet, Salamander launched herself towards the seemingly unarmed idol. Woodcutter’s eyes narrowed the way Sora was holding it made it seem like the briefcase itself was…”Wait!” she shouted. Salamander managed to slam on the brakes at the last second, forcing flames from her arms and raising them in a defensive posture just as the hilt of a blade, marked with a KoyoLab logo, exploded out of the briefcase and into Sora’s open palm. The idol managed a kind of pirouette, diverting the force so as to catch the blade, while keeping her arm in its socket, and channeling the blade’s explosive velocity into a wide swing directly through where Salamander would have been. Having stopped at the last second Salamander turned what would have been her own decapitation into only a maiming, her forearms cleanly severed and cauterized, falling to the ground unceremoniously. She leapt back, just managing to avoid Sora’s follow-up swing. The two attackers hesitated, gawking between Sora, armed with a Katana that had a glowing blue edge, and the still-smoking briefcase.

Salamander pointed with the stubs of her arms to the katana, “she has a laser sword!? What happened to ‘she’ll be unarmed’?”

Sora looked between the two, happy to have weakened one threat at least. Most of the bystanders were fleeing, but several lingered in doorways and windows trying to capture the fight on their phones. She had to keep the aggressors focused on her, and buy time for her kouhai to respond to the alert she’d sent out as soon as she noticed she was being followed. “It was a gift from a kouhai. I’m still not sure about it as a full-time replacement, the change in weight throws off my form, but the concealability and compactibility were desirable given the circumstances.”

“Hah! Guess ol’ eight-legs ain’t so perfect after all.” Salamander said.

Woodcutter sighed, “Tokino-san, would you have kept that briefcase on you when preparing for your speech.”

“Carry a weapon into a place of diplomacy? Of course not.”

“I thought not.” Woodcutter glared at Salamander.

“Oh, that's why we were supposed to wait huh? My bad.” Salamander rubbed one of her cauterized forearms against the back of her neck. Already the stump was beginning to heal, miniscule fingers had begun to sprout past her burns.

Sora noticed this. On a grand scale, she knew time favored her, with the warning she’d sent out and several bystanders streaming the fight, it was only a matter of time before one of her kohai arrived to even the battle. But if her second opponent reached full function before that happened, Sora felt certain it would mean her death. She charged towards Woodcutter in her moment of distraction. By the time Woodcutter had shifted her full attention back to Sora and began responding, Sora was already in range to swing. Woodcutter managed to brace the axe into an improvised defensive position but Sora simply swung for her exposed fingers. Sora expected the Koyorium-edged blade to easily cut through her enemy’s fingers, weapon, and potentially even wound her chest, instead it only seared halfway through two of her fingers. The recoil from the blow made the blade ring out, and pain shot through Sora’s hands. It was as if a regular blade had been swung at a tank, but this was a blade that could cut through a tank.

What could she possibly be made out of, Sora wondered. Woodcutter seized on her astonishment forcing her uninjured hand into the back of the axe blade and managing a rolling swing towards Sora’s, now over-extended, arms. Taking nothing for granted Sora took the blow as cautiously as possible, using the leverage of her blade and her body’s movement to minimize the force as much as possible. Despite it being an improvised strike and Sora expertly mitigating it, the axe swung with an amount of force Sora hadn’t had to bear since the strikes she deflected incompetently when she first learned to parry. If that's what she can do with a jab to the back of her blade, I’ll be crushed if I’m forced to take a full swing. Leaping back from the exchange Sora flexed her numb hands, getting back full feeling.

Woodcutter looked down and flexed her own right hand, two of the fingers hanging limply. “Despite all my advantages, I disrespected you by allowing my attention to waver. You’ve exacted a fair price for that.”

Before Sora could respond Salamander laughed, “Oh my god! You’re such a drama queen. I told the old man you’d half-ass it if we two-v-one’d her.”

“No longer,” Woodcutter said, hefting her axe and beginning a charge.

As she pondered how to receive a charge from someone who might swing with the force of an elephant, Sora noticed Salamander waving with fully-formed hands, before using her flames to launch herself into Sora’s blindspot. She heard another explosion directly behind her, no doubt launching Salamander directly into Sora’s flank. She was caught between an anvil and a hammer, she might be able to receive either strike on its own, but certainly not both. As she’d predicted, it was over. Nonetheless she proceeded as it was not. She feinted towards Woodcutter, then pirouetted on the spot, swinging her blade in a wide, sloppy arc, hoping to catch Salamander in another drastic over-commitment. Her heart sunk as she turned. Salamander had learned from her mistake. She was several feet away, palms outstretched, mustering some yet unseen flame. As the radiant flames gathered in Salamander’s palms, Sora already felt the intense heat even from feet away. It felt like a violent sunburn just from a few sparks. She heard Woodcutter’s massive frame diving out of the way of the attack, and knew it was already too late to do the same. She closed her eyes. I’m sorry everyone, you’ll have to play Yokohama arena without me. The fire never came. Instead there was a wet, cleaving sound and a shouted “Oh come on.”

Sora opened her eyes to see Salamander’s hands once again hurtling through the air. A tall, cloaked figure stood between Salamander and Sora. Calli threw back her hood, and smirked at Salamander. “Sup.”

#tokino sora #hololive #holoctober #holomyth #holoen

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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Holoctober 2023 Day 10 - Council

Holofall: Council has to decide how much to interfere with the declining world and the friends who still live there. Angst, philosophy and anime battles ensue.

Day 10 - Council

“The Council stands assembled. I, Hakos Baelz, Harbinger of Chaos and Chairperson of the Council declare this meeting convened.” Bae pounded the gavel, then squirmed in her chair, feeling incredibly awkward at the formality of actually doing her job properly. But it seemed necessary today. The entire council was gathered in the pocket dimension they used for emergency meetings. They all sat along a round table with the council logo etched on it. She’d never seen her friends so tense, the rest of the council had waited for her pronouncement like lionesses coiled in ambush, and now all four of the other women at the table started speaking at once, voices steadily rising. Bae smashed the gavel again, raising her hand. “Before we take this any further, let's all remember who we are to each other. We’ve been friends since before Hololive, before the radio, before language existed to speak to each other. Mumei was born around the first fires humanity ever built, and in the countless millennia since we have always uplifted and supported each other. The stakes for this are impossibly high, our perspectives are impossibly different, but don’t forget how much you love the girls sitting opposite you in this debate.” They all nodded solemnly.

“Who are you.” Kronii joked.

“Weren’t you listening? Shes Hakos Baelz.” Fauna giggled.

“Harbinger of Chaos and Chairperson of the Council!” Sana continued.

“Also, humanity’s only like 200,000 years old, it's an extremely countable number of millennia.” Mumei said.

“Oh my gah. I take it all back, you guys are the worst.” Bae said. They all burst out laughing, briefly just a group of five friends.

One by one the laughter faded, expressions turning somber. Mumei’s expression hardened. “I won’t abandon them.”

“Nobody’s asking--” Kronii started.

“Yes we are, Kronii. That's exactly what we’re asking her to do. We need to be honest.” Sana interrupted.

Kronii put her hand across her forehead and rubbed her temples. “OK. You’re right. But the stakes are too high.”

“Which stakes! Because the stakes here are looking pretty high to me. Ame is dead Kronii, which should be enough by itself! Along with all of gen 2, half of gen 1, and speaking of half…at this pace the number of living humans will have been reduced by half in the next month. And that's IF the grim reapers can hold out which, who freaking knows at this point?”

Kronii was about to speak again, looking flustered and angry, but Sana placed her hand over Kronii’s. “You’re exactly right Meimei, those are the stakes for our world. That's one half of the trolley problem we face here. If we don’t pull the lever,” she motioned towards Fauna, clutching her golden apple “we lose a dozen senpais, and more than four billion humans. And you know us well enough to know that it breaks our hearts to even think about it but-” Sana’s eyes were teary. Kronii continued for her, “But the two of us don’t see in worlds. We see in infinities. The other track in that trolley problem could have branches with branches with branches, we could be forcing an infinite number of councils to make an infinite number of these choices, and that's if the train stays on the tracks at all.” Everyone looked at her blankly.

“I’m blind to our immediate futures for the first time in my life, I signaled for help and no other wardens have answered. My instinct says that's because we’re in a chronal storm, that everything around us is in so much flux no other warden can help without risking setting off a catastrophic cascade of events.”

“More catastrophic than infinite councils getting hit by infinite trains?” Bae asked.

“In terms of our trolley metaphor, it would mean the train jumping the tracks and turning sideways, ultimately going down every track at once. If it happens the casualties could theoretically be infinite.” They all sat in silence for a moment.

“Theoretically!” Fauna pounded her hand on the table, startling the rest. “Possibly. Probably. Maybe. If. If. If.” Her eyes were wide and glowed a dark amber.

“Faufau…”

“No! You say you see infinities, but also that you’re blind. Isn’t it possible that the other track is empty? In fact, isn’t it possible there is no other track. That we could use the apple, like we always have, to absolutely no negative consequences?”

“The prob-”

“Yes. Or no.”

“Yes, its possible.” Kronii said.

“From what you can see now, can you tell which is more likely?”

“At this point my foresight is on the order of days, but in all of those I see no reality in which we interfere with current events. It's possible any timeline in which we do ceases to exist.”

“Interesting. And they do it without collapsing the entire multiverse like you were just suggesting it would. Yet another theory. Perhaps once we finally intervene, they all pass beyond your sight, which is blinded to anything outside the current crisis.”

Kronii grinded her teeth, “Its possible, but you have to agree even if its as small as 1% the chance of infinite casualties must be treated as if it is a certainty. The math doesn’t add up.”

Mumei stood up, “I absolutely do not have to. You think your space-time thing is special but we all see in infinities Kronii. For all your foresight you’ve never looked at the present long enough to see the true value of an individual life. They’re not statistics. Every human being is born with infinite potential. Their actions ripple across each other and across generations. These deaths are the deaths of infinite art that will never be created, infinite technology that will never be invented, infinite children who will never be born. I may not always interfere but I walked with them through ice ages, watched them turn their own cities to ruins and then rise from nothing again. The idea that I would let most of civilization, and all of my friends, everyone I love, die, in front of my eyes just in case something bad might happen to a universe I’ll never see, is insane to me.”

Space and Time looked down, cowed by the sudden outburst. Mumei normally took a much more passive approach. “You’re exaggerating. They could create a lot but a lot isn’t-”

Fauna lept up beside Mumei “Is she? Now who’s math doesn’t add up? All life on this planet once fit in a single drop of water. You were so enamored with your infinite multitudes of timelines where rocks hit other rocks in slightly different ways you thought it wasn’t worth moving your foot to avoid stepping on them. I know because I had to knock you each aside multiple times when I was practically a newborn. You made fun of me for huddling over my little raindrop. But nearly everything we’ve ever loved came from it. Plants, animals, singing, dancing,” she pulled Mumei close to her, “and friends. Any of the countless living organisms on earth has that same potential.”

Sana wiped tears from her eyes and ran over, “Faufau that's so beautiful.” Bae and Kronii joined them and they had a group hug, everyone crying.

“So you agree? We can reset?” They separated. “Oh well…no. It was very pretty but…I can’t wrap my head around it. It doesn’t feel the same kind of infinite that the universe does. I guess that's why there’s five of us.”

Bae sighed. “Damn, thought I was in the clear there for a second. Well, I guess as chairperson it falls to me to break the tie…by flipping a coin.”

“Are you kidding me!?” everyone else yelled.

“Bro, you all said infinity like…infinite times. I dunno how to weigh any of that shit.” She pulled out an arcade token with a cartoon rat on one side and a guitar on the other. “Heads we apple.” She tossed the coin. As it flipped through the air everyone’s stance slightly shifted. Kronii feigned adjusting her gloves, Mumei’s hand drifted to her lantern, a golden vine stretched from Fauna’s sleeve around the golden apple binding it to her hand, Sana moved her hands to the back of her head.

The coin bounced once. Twice. Three times. Then landed directly on its side.

“Bruh,” Bae said.

Everyone moved at once. Sana removed her limiter, growing to gargantuan proportions. Kronii ripped off her glove. Fauna spread her arms, scattering large seeds that flew from her sleeves. Mumei raised her lantern and began an incantation of some sort “Endless Forge of the…some-” Kronii’s fingers snapped together. Hundreds of clockwork blades appeared in the air, hurtling towards Mumei and Fauna. “-body I don’t remember!” In a large wall of air beginning from where Mumei held her lantern the air began to shimmer and portal-like holes in reality opened. Weapons of every shape and size started flowing out from them, parrying the flying clockwork blades aside. Mumei reached into one and pulled out a gas mask and fit it around her head. It bore the sketchy design of a white-faced creature with sharp teeth and dark eyes with red pupils. “You think you can intimidate me?” Kronii said.

“You? Never.” Mumei said.

Sana nudged her colossal hand down on Fauna, trying to pin her to the ground. ”Sorry!”

Before it could impact, several of Fauna’s seeds burst into immense vines covered in brilliantly-colored flowers. A sweet smell filled the air, as they wrapped around Sana’s arm.

Snap. Kronii vanished, more blades filled the sky. This time two clockwork blades appeared in her own hands, she closed on Mumei herself, who just managed to draw her dagger in time to parry one, while side-stepping the other. “You’re holding back.” Mumei said. A mace appeared from a nearby portal and hurtled towards Kronii.

Kronii parried it aside but was forced to give ground, hand stinging with the vibration of her blade. “You too.”

Fauna and Sana had reached their own stalemate, with Sana tearing her way out of massive vines as quickly as Fauna could grow them. But Sana’s vision started growing fuzzy.

Fauna smiled gently, “Did you think I would fight cosmic forces with nothing but vines?”

“Kinda,” Kronii admitted. She tried to snap her fingers together but couldn’t get them to line up.

Fauna’s voice reached all of them as a husky whisper, regardless of distance. “You’re lucky, usually only my saplings get this treatment. Of course I had to make it several orders of magnitude more potent for you.”

“Faufau I’m not sure this is a good idea.” Copies of her arms seemed to trail behind them as she swung them around in front of her. “I don’t want to but if I start to pass out I’ll have to collapse this pocket dimension to stop you.”

“Oh yeah?” Mumei yelled. “Remind me Sana, what happens when a black hole tries to form around a core of antimatter?” Inky black cubes helpfully labeled “antimatter” started appearing from the portals.

“Are you insane! I don’t know, no one does it might just make a bigger black hole but it might-”

“Destroy everything…everywhere…instantly. So I guess we gotta do nothing huh?” Mumei said.

“Enough!” An angelic voice rang out as a figure forced its way through the roof, before plummeting straight down through the table, splitting it in half. “Ow!”

“Looks like Hope has descended.” Kronii said. Mumei snickered and Fauna giggled. “What!?” Sana yelled down.

“I said hope has descended!” Kronii yelled.

Sana laughed, the noise booming throughout the room.

Bae kneeled down below the table to the nephilim lying on the ground. “How ya doin’ honey?”

“I don’t want to talk about it. Why am I so heavy?”

“Sana! Turn down the gravity!”

“Sorry!” Sana said, adjusting the dimension’s gravity closer to earth’s.

Irys managed to stand. Healing light radiated out of her, healing all their wounds and removing the spores from Sana and Kronii. “You’re doing great sweetie.” Bae said, earning a glare.

“Wait, how did you even get in here.” Kronii asked. “Bae made me a copy of her key.” Everyone turned to look at Bae. “It was before the second divorce, I was sentimental!” Bae raised her arms defensively. Irys dusted herself off and took a deep breath. Raising her voice to reach everyone in the room. “What are you doing? You’re friends! You can’t battle royale your way out of this.”

“What are we supposed to do then?” Mumei said.

“Yeah, we can’t agree.” Kronii agreed.

“Compromise!” Irys said.

“Ohhhh!” Council chorused.

“How often do you forget that!” Irys said, exasperated.

“I dunno, how often do we have meetings?” Bae said.

“Anyway, Kronii, you said you didn’t see any timelines with council in them past this point right?” Irys asked.

“Wait, how do you know that?”

“Bae was live-tweeting.” Everyone turned to look at Bae.

“I got bored!”

“Deciding the fate of reality?” Kronii said.

“Answer her question!” Bae said.

“Yes, no council. Anywhere.” Kronii said.

“But what about the apple?” Irys asked.

Kronii thought for a second. “It's around I guess. All over actually. In pieces maybe?”

“And Fauna, if someone put it together, they could use it right?”

“I mean I guess, as long as they had the heart of an idol the apple would probably let them, yeah.”

“Heart of an idol?” Mumei asked. “So…Sora-senpai or…” she trailed off.

“Um…Ayame!” Kronii yelled.

“And…Fuwamoco? Maybe?” Sana said.

“Mococo, at least.” Fauna said.

“We probably shouldn’t all say. We don’t want to tamper too much. But if we each take a piece, give it to someone we trust, and they find each other?” Irys said.

“Boom! Compromise!” Bae said.

“I don’t love it, but I guess it’s better than fighting.” Fauna said. They all agreed. This was the plan. But none of them could know who the others’ chose.

“Meimei, can you get rid of those antimatter crates before one cracks and kills us all?” Sana asked.

“Oh, those were just empty crates labeled antimatter.” Mumei said. “Humanity can barely make that stuff at all. Although I was gonna start having every portal pump out a nanogram at a time if it came down to it.”

“Meimei?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re crazy.”

“Aww, thanks!”

#Holofall #hololive #holoen #holoctober #holocouncil #hololive irys

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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Day 9, Sea Fog.

#HOLOctober CW: gore, light-cannibalism-my-beloved, if you play dbd: immersed survivors. Chumbud reader finds themselves trapped in the fog. The DBD x Gura crossover nobody asked for. First time writing in 2nd person.

You wake up in a strange, beach-like arena of sorts, a dark fog settles over everything like a funeral shroud. There’s jagged rocks and massive shipwrecks just off-shore. An immense gate stands before you, you try with all your strength but it does not open. Nor can you cross over or under the strange, blood-stained buoys that come off of either side of it, as if some invisible force prevented it. The buoys reach as far as you can see, forming a kind of perimeter around the beach. You try to remember where you were before waking up here. You remember being at a concert, and waving your blue pen light as Gura and the rest of Myth took the stage. Then there was a black fog, slowly clouding your vision, eerily similar to the fog that now surrounds you. Then you woke up here at this ominous beach covered with gnarled driftwood and the festering corpses of a variety of marine life.

The ocean surges and ebbs at the edges of the beach, but the waves are off somehow, discordant, instead of relaxing you the sound sets your teeth on edge. You notice the water level has risen, beginning to soak through your shoes. You need to get out of here.

You walk along the beach for a while, searching for a means of escape, before finding a dilapidated old fishing shack. As you approach it you hear a loud splashing sound and your heart starts to pound in your chest. You investigate the sound but find only a small disturbance in the water. As you enter the shack you see a strange generator that doesn’t seem to function, various parts and dials are exposed on the side, vulnerable to the elements. With how much water is flooding the area that seems ill-advised. Still you find yourself compelled to interact with it, to repair it somehow. You start moving towards it.

“Whatcha doin!” A voice cries out from behind you at the same time you feel a tug on your shirt. Looking behind you, you see a small creature, shaped like a little girl in a red hoodie, though you know she's much more ancient than that. As you turn, you realize she's the source of the pounding in your ears, and the panicked beating of your heart. The dichotomy of a harmless little girl in a cartoonish hoodie and the sheer, otherworldly terror you can’t help but feel in her proximity, cause you to laugh and scream at the same time resulting in a strange gack sound that causes you to aspirate, falling to the ground in a coughing fit. The shark-girl looks at you like you grew a second head and bursts out laughing at your display. Whatever effect had been filling you with so much fear is instantly dispelled. This isn’t how you expected to meet your oshi.

When you both calm down you turn back to face each other. You regret it immediately as she notices the blue penlight still attached to your side, as well as your Gura t-shirt, and the Gura muffler you paid forty dollars to have shipped to you. She snickers and you look away embarrassed. “Hey um…Gawr, I guess. You can probably tell I’m a fan.”

“Yeah but not of me. Gura’s still back on her stage, having the time of her life. I’m all by my lonesome, no more goody little two sharks.” You can sense the bitterness in her tone. “Or what, you got some Gawr merch hidden in your back pocket?” Something dawns on you and you reach for your phone, surprised to only be remembering it now, only to find your pocket empty. Instead, you click your penlight over to red and make a small “ta-da” motion with your hands, giving a wry smile. She smirks, “half a point chumbud.”

“My phone charm has both of you on it, but it's not here. You’re on my lock screen too cause, you know, you’re like a protector.”

“Huh?”

“I guess it's just a theory but I always thought, I dunno, that maybe you were born when Atlantis fell, that you got tough and strong so that Gura could stay a cute dork. But now things are peaceful and she can be herself again mostly. You’re the coolest part of her!”

This time she looks away, embarrassed by your earnest praise.

“Well you're half right. I was born when Atlantis fell. That's why my worser half can’t swim without floaties. The second you humans busted open Atlantis, when the ocean swept up our parents' blood and first hit our lungs, I was born. She didn’t come out again until we finally breathed air again, way, way later.” You’re not sure how to react. “But if I was just shark-for-brains’ emotional bodyguard, the thing that runs this joint wouldn’t have scouted me for my real skillset.”

“What's that?”

“The thing that runs this place? I dunno, some sky-bug, I haven’t been paying much attention.”

“No, your skillset.”

She gets a strange expression, grinning widely. The pounding in your heart starts to gradually return to full volume. “You wanna see, eh chumbud?” Her tail slams into your legs and you find yourself flat on your back. She holds you to the ground with one foot, using a strength that should be impossible in such a small frame. “I’ll give you a hint.” She sits down on your chest, slowly wrapping her small, clawed hands around your neck. “I wasn’t born to protect her from what they wanted to do, but from what we wanted to do.” Her claws start to dig into your skin. “To kill. You. All.” In the distance a bell dings, and you see a bright light come on through the window. Gawr makes a “tch” sound and gets up. “Hold that thought chumbud, I gotta deal with some rats.” She points to the generator. “No touching that thing. Who ya gonna listen to, some voice in your head or your oshi?” As soon as she crosses the threshold of the shack she vanishes into the murky waters with a splash.

You take a moment to recover, massaging your throat and trying to wrap your head around what just happened. If that bell hadn’t gone off, what would she have done? She wouldn’t really kill a human, would she? Just then an old man burst through the door, immediately starting to repair the generator. He takes one look at your startled expression and rolls his eyes. “Great, we got a fucking new guy. No wonder shit ain’t done yet.” When you continue to stare blankly he yells, “get your ass over here ya idiot.” His yelling and your pre-existing compulsion are enough to convince you, you crawl over and start helping him, amazed that you know exactly which dials to spin and which levers to pull. Even if those movements seem logically like they shouldn’t be changing anything. After half a minute or so the dread fills your heart again. The old man starts to run, but you see a shadow appear near the entrance. Gawr launches from the water, crossing the length of the room. “How dare you leave my chumbud for dead like that!” She snatches the old man by his leg and drags him through the opposite door. Disappearing beneath the waves. You hear splashing and screaming but can’t see what's happening past the generator. “I’m sick of people trying to leave me.”

You turn the final knob and at the same moment hear a final scream. The generator in front of you makes a familiar “ding” noise and the room floods with light. You run out the door and see the giant gate from before is open now. Making a run for it, you look behind you just in time to see a skull float to the top of a pool of blood and viscera. You also spot a shadow beneath the water, heading straight for you. Just as you’re almost across the threshold you feel your legs pulled out from under you, and find yourself dragged away, pulled under the suddenly much deeper water. Despite the fact there’s no air to carry the sound, her voice rings clear in your ears. “What did I just say.” The hurt in her voice stings, in spite of everything.

“Just for that you’re getting demoted. You’re not a chumbud anymore, you’re just chum. And you know what sharks do to chum.”

As she's tearing you apart, piece by piece, your screams inevitably pull water into your lungs. Your vision starts to go black, but you have a brief moment of lucidity when she wraps her hand around your still-beating heart. She pulls it to her lips. “This is all I can do for you. I can make sure none of the others get you.” She looks you directly in the eyes, and opens her mouth, revealing rows of serrated teeth. “You’ll always be mine. Every time.” She bites down and your vision goes black.

You wake up in a forest, though you still hear those strange waves and parts of it seem to be flooded. You check yourself for the wounds you know should be there but find none. Then, you hear a voice that both comforts and haunts you.

“Heya, chum.”

#hololive #holoen #goretober #holoctober #gawr gura #holomyth #fan fiction #reader insert

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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Holoctober Day 8 - Haunted

The advent girls get roped into a ghost-hunting adventure with Shiori. Mayhem ensues. Another short comedic piece, doing a lot less gore than I expected this year. Buckling down for multiple stories today. Determined to catch back up!

“Thanks for coming with me on my ghost hunting stream guys!” All of advent was driving down the road in a large van full of ghost hunting tech. “Wait, is that what this is?” Nerissa sounded disappointed. “You told me this was a sleepover!”

Fuwawa popped her head over the backseat, “yobai!?”

Mococo appeared beside her “No Fuwawa, no yobai!”

Bijou added “Stop trying to Jaslight us Fuwawa. The Adventrix told us what that word means.”

Shiori chuckled, “Since your family guards the gates to hell, does that mean you Gaslight, Gatekeep and-”

“Don’t try to distract us from the fact you lied about a sleepover Shiori.” Nerissa interrupted.

“I didn’t lie to anyone. Fuwamoco know exactly where we’re going. Bibou was already passed out here cause she was sleep-deprived after a 12 hour stream and thought it was her bedroom, and I told you it's a sleepover because it is! We’re staying overnight. It's the best kind of sleepover even. The kind that's at a Murder House!” They pulled into the driveway of a decrepit looking old house with a sign in front that designated it simply as “The Murder House.”

“Its called that because of all the people who keep getting murdered here.” Shiori explained as they parked.

Nerissa rolled her eyes. “I never would have guessed. Fuwamoco you knew about this? I thought you hated scary things?” Fuwawa and Mococo’s expressions grew serious. Fuwawa declared, “Its training! We’re gonna show these ghosts how rough and tough demon guard dogs can be!”

“And if we spend 40 hours total in haunted locations we get our Specter Stopper certification from Cerberus school,” Mococo added.

They spent a few hours setting up equipment and trying to get a response out of the ghosts. Other than a few temperature dips and one moment where Fuwamoco were taking turns asking questions to a spirit box and Nerissa snuck up on them and whispered “behind you,” which had them huddling in the nearest closet for twenty minutes, almost nothing happened. They gathered in the living room, precisely at midnight. It looked like something out of the 1890s with fragile old rocking chairs and dusty beige carpets bearing archaic patterns. After a fruitless Ouija board session where Nerissa nudged the planchette towards the lewdest answers her rather vivid imagination could think of, Shiori huffed in frustration. “Where are they? They’re being so dull! Since when are murder ghosts shy?”

“Good instincts honestly, we are three demons, a rock with emotion lasers and a freaky, unhinged goth with unspecified magic powers.” Nerissa chimed.“

Shiori rolled her eyes. “Nerissa, I’m not going to degrade you in public just because you say something nice about me. I’m not your prom date.”

Nerissa shivered in place. “Tasukaru.”

“Bibou…do you think you could give them a little burst of anger, stir things up?” Shiori askled.

“Okay!”

“Wait, Bibou!” Fuwamoco and Nerissa screamed together, but it was too late, her gems glowed a bright red and the whole house took on that hue. After a few minutes her gems turned back and the room returned to its normal hue. “Huh, guess that was a dud. Let me hit em again.” Before she could, they all felt a dark presence enter the room, and dozens of knives floated in from the kitchen.

“Why do they have so many knives? Isn’t this place like a tourist trap now?” The knives oriented towards them slowly before launching with incredible speed. Fuwamoco leapt in front of Shior and Nerissa, batting away knives with their claws. “Protect!”

Bijou was off to the side, several knives flanked around and charged her, but they impacted on her skin with a slight “ting” sound and bounced off, some shattering. She giggled, “stop, that tickles!”

Eventually the onslaught stopped, the ammunition depleted. Fuwamoco turned to the rest of the girls. “We did it! We’re saved!” Mococo cheered. “We did such a good job didn’t we Shiori?” Fuwawa added, and both demon guard dogs angled their heads for headpats, not noticing in the candlelight that Shiori’s eyes had turned to darkest obsidian. She opened her mouth and glowing green ectoplasm sprayed out, drenching the dog-girls. “Shiori’s not here right now!” A voice much deeper than Shiori’s declared. On seeing the state of Fuwamoco Nerissa fell to her knees, crying out “Noooo! That should have been me!” The twins screamed and ran around in circles looking for something to hide under, but eventually froze, they looked to each other in silent agreement and stalked towards Shiori with grim determination.

Mococo grabbed Shiori’s collar, lifting her into the air, and started slapping her. “You have to fight it Shiori, don’t let the murder ghost win!”

Nerissa said, “nooo, that should also be me!”

Fuwawa grabbed Shiori from Mococo “Moco-chan, can’t you see shes already dead!” She stabbed Shiori with her demon claws, continuously repeating the action. “The ghost is trying to devour her soul! We have to stop him!”

Mococo tackled her to the ground. “Are you crazy. That's our friend!” Fuwawa tried to fight free, “Our friend is dead Moco-chan! Shes never coming back!”

“Actually I’m already back.” Shiori stood back up, dusting herself off.

“Oh.” Fuwawa said. Mococo gave her an I told you so look, and Fuwawa bowed her head towards Shiori. “I’m sorry Shiori, I guess that was a pretty big misunderstanding.”

“Aw, its ok, you were just trying to help.” Shiori patted Fuwawa’s head placatingly. “Besides you kind of did, it could have taken me hours to kick out that hitchhiker but he definitely wasn’t emotionally prepared to be stabbed that many times. Amateur.”

Nerissa looked at Shiori’s now significantly more porous torso. “Um, Shiorin, is that gonna be ok? You’re human aren’t you?”

Shiori looked down too. “I’m only human-adjacent, but yeah…it could be an issue if I don’t take care of it. Guess the sleepover’s canceled.” They started to walk back to the van. “Maybe the real yobai was the friends we made along the way” Shiori said.

“No!” chorused most of the girls.

“Yobai!” Cheered Fuwawa, tail wagging rapidly.

#holoadvent #shiorinstories #holoctober #hololive #holoen

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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Day 7 Entropy: The End of Death

How can death die? In a doomed world where humanity turns on the Grim Reapers, crushed under the weight of her own unyielding will. Longer and sadder than I planned, but I'm pretty proud of how it turned out.

“Death can’t die.” How many times had she said that? In fights, competitions, when her manager begged her to take a day off. Sometimes it was a threat, sometimes a promise. But it was always a lie. She knew all Grim Reapers would die one day. Return to the ashes from whence they came. But it was meant to be at the end of all things. When entropy set in. When no life, no warmth of any kind remained. With no belief, no cognition to give them form or function they’d run out of will and vanish one by one. Their purpose fulfilled. As she looked at the scene in front of her, she knew it wasn’t going to go down like that.

A husband had ghoulified and was gnawing on his dying wife. People hated it when you told them death was a gift, but without a body to sustain it the soul would slowly rot. Every injury, every day, would bring new cracks in it. Eventually even the strongest of souls shattered, leaving nothing behind but an empty husk. Human ghouls always charged for the nearest living human, ripping and tearing until a new ghoul was born. Death-sensei said it was because humans were pack animals, and at the absolute center of their souls, the very last thing to break, was the fear of being alone. So they’d do anything to make more ghouls. Maybe that was true. Death-sensei always seemed half-joking and half-incredibly-serious, so anything was possible.

A young Reaper Corps cadet had his scythe in his mouth and was trying to crawl over to the doomed couple. His legs had already started turning to ash, leaving a trail behind him. With two quick swings of the scythe Calli reaped the woman, and severed the ghoul’s nervous system, putting it out of its misery. She walked over to the fading Reaper and crouched down. He let the scythe drop from his mouth, “thanks Captain, I was running…a little late.”

Calli smiled down at him, willing it to reach her eyes. “Nah kid, you’re doing great, you get some rest and I’ll cover the rest of your shift, ok?”

He nodded and rolled over onto his back. In seconds, he had faded away. Calli sighed, “Guess I’m working another double.” This was the third reaper she’d seen fade in recent days. And it was her fault, or at least she blamed herself. Footage had leaked of her returning Sora’s soul to her body after a recent battle. Sora’s body had already been healed, and she had one of the purest, strongest souls Calli had ever seen, and even then it had been a risk. Calli just couldn’t lose another friend after Ame. But no one cared about any of that. As soon as the footage got out, the demands and the hate started. Everyone wanted their grandparents, their great-grandparents, their pets resurrected. Like it was flipping a switch. No amount of explanation or bargaining slowed the tide. Ultimately Reapers are formed and sustained by the cognition of the souls they shepherd. With the entire font of human doubt and hate focusing on them like the sun through a magnifying glass, it was no wonder they began to wither.

Callie flew onto a nearby rooftop and looked out at the city. Allowing herself the briefest of rests. The streets were almost empty, everyone hunkered down hoping to outlast the growing crisis. It looked so beautiful, almost peaceful. When she was younger, Calli had fantasized about retiring from reaping. Even then, no one had much love for death, and it wore on her less-experienced mind. She’d dreamed of standing on a rooftop just like this one, looking down on a clamoring crowd, begging her to save them from oblivion. And she’d look down and just say, “you and your whole-ass world can go fuck yourselves.”

But that was a long time ago. She’d never even really met a human yet, outside the brief moment of reaping. Since then she’d spent most of her days working side by side with them. Singing, streaming, practicing choreography until they had blisters. She’d shared smiles, laughs, and tears with them. She’d even grieved their loss. When she imagined Amelia falling to her death that day, seeing Kiara racing towards her and knowing she couldn’t save her, but still turning to Kiara and smiling. That little girl Calli spared all those years ago, died with a smile on her face and tears in her eyes, trying to comfort her friend. How could you not hate death? If Death herself can’t bear that unfairness, that cruelty of fate, how could she expect humans to? So she would save them, as many as she could. She’d bear the brunt of their anger, and the weight of every fallen Reaper. If the job got tougher, she’d work harder, like always. Until the tide was stemmed and she could go back to her friends.

And that's what she did. Find the target, swing the scythe, deliver their soul to the gateway to the afterlife. Find, swing, deliver. Find, swing, deliver. Every inefficiency had to be trimmed. No more cool boat rides, much to Death-sensei’s chagrin. It continued for weeks. Getting worse every day. Six hours of sleep became four, then two.

She was reporting to Death-Sensei, a delay that still set her teeth on edge despite how necessary it was. He needed to coordinate her with the other Captains, needed to know who had lost how many that day. “We’re down to 10% the numbers we had a month ago, but it's a tough 10%. The number of dead is finally falling off. I think we can weather this storm.”

Death-sensei smiled and walked out onto his balcony, overlooking the river Styx. Normally it was the kind of thing that drove Calli crazy, but she allowed him his theatrics these days, even if every fiber of her being wanted to get back out there. “Do you really believe that?” They both knew she didn’t, not logically anyway. The 10% who were left were exhausted, they’d been worked to the bone for weeks. And the deaths were only falling off by sheer attrition. If the number of humans was halved, of course the number of deaths would be. But by percentage they were disappearing slower than the Reaper Corps was. And every missed death was another ghoul, another killer on the loose. Nevertheless, it sounded like the truth when she answered, “Yes. I have to.”

“I almost believe you. You’ve done well at this. Better than I ever imagined when I asked you back and made you a Captain.” She hid it well but he sensed a flare of pride in her. She was still so young, he thought. “But I think it's time you returned to your vacation. Permanently this time.” Her jaw dropped, unable to wrap her head around what he’d just said. “Go back to your real life. Grab your friends, find a deserted island, wait this whole thing out. In a couple winters the ghouls will be gone, and you can find what's left of humanity and rebuild.”

“Is that a fucking joke!?” He heard a splintering sound and turned to see her scythe had cut his throne in half. He turned to her and let a cold seriousness into his voice. The whole room grew dark. “No, it's an order.”

“Well good thing you made me a Captain then, because officers are allowed to ignore any order they consider stupid enough, and that's the dumbest shit I’ve ever heard.” He laughed, she joined him, and the tension broke. For a brief moment it felt like the old days. Death and his first apprentice, saying dumb shit to make the other one laugh. “I’m not turning my back on you Sensei, or the rest of the Reapers. We’re going to make it through this. Then you and I are gonna find who set this all in motion, rip their soul out their throat, yeet it into the sun and spend a week drinking whiskey on a beach. Then I’m gonna turn my back on your bony ass forever and go hang with my friends.”

“You’re a good kid Mori. Sorry, I dunno what came over me. I’m gonna grab a couple hours of rest before I get back out there, can you close my door on your way out?”

“Yeah yeah, get some rest and get back to yourself. See you tomorrow idiot.” She started to pull the door closed behind her.

“See you tomorrow dumbass,” he lied. He felt the cold creeping up his limbs as soon as the door closed. He half-fell half-leapt off the balcony, landing in the soft sand by the river Styx, even that was almost enough to make him fall to pieces. He crawled his way over to the boat he’d brought so many souls across in. He summoned his scythe and slammed it against the river's edge with the last of his strength, losing his grip on it but forcing the boat out onto the open water. The scythe fell to the riverbed as he fell into the boat, and began to return to ashes. His last thoughts were of his final apprentice, and her determined tirade. She’d grown so brave, so strong. “Aw hell, kid. I was such a lousy teacher…why’d you have to be such a good student?” His cloak fell to the boat’s deck, empty.

Death-Sensei’s fading sent a ripple of defeatism through the Reapers. Fadings increased even further. The workload doubled, then doubled again. Two hours of sleep became none. Find, swing, deliver. Find, swing, deliver. Humanity had caught on to what was happening by now, but it just meant the earlier anger was joined by new anger at their inability to contain the ghouls. After a few days the only Reapers left were weirdos like her, with a strong connection to humanity. Kept alive by a desperate desire to do everything they could to help. Find, swing, deliver. Find, swing, deliver. Calli started losing chunks of time, sometimes entire days.

“-no one’s heard from you, we were terrified!” A familiar voice shocked her out of her torpor. Kiara was here. It was hard to focus on her. The world seemed to pulse and sway. “Kiara? What are you doing here? I’m working.” She swung her scythe and reaped the soul. She moved to leave, but Kiara put her hand on her shoulder, Calli turned startled. She looked at Kiara as if seeing her for the first time again. “I just told you Calli, everyone’s worried, we’ve been looking everywhere.”

“Why didn’t you just call?”

“Your phone’s been dead for weeks.”

Ah. She pulled it out of her pocket and stared dumbly at the solid black rectangle. Her reflection looked half-dead.

“Look, I’d love to catch up, but every second I’m here there’s more monsters. I gotta go”

“Can’t you just take a day, Calli? Catch up on sleep, come see us. You’ll work even faster after that!” Kiara physically held her back. “You can’t do any work if you’re not here. Please, we…I can’t lose you too.”

Calli shrugged her off, “Death can’t die Kiara,” Calli lied. “There’s no time, I gotta go. If you want me to take a break, get them to stop dying.” She teleported away, arriving at the gate to the afterlife, and delivering the soul. She felt guilty immediately, but let herself go numb to it. There was no time.

Find, swing, deliver. Find, swing, deliver. She was a machine now. There weren’t gaps in her memory, so much as brief moments where she did remember anything. She was pretty sure she was the only Reaper left. But there was no time to check.

The consequences came only a couple days later. The target was a mass reaping. Eight souls crushed by a falling building. None were there. They’d escaped unscathed. No reaping necessary. But someone else hadn’t. The area looked like an explosion had gone off. Something had burned very bright and very hot to throw that building away from its intended destination. A familiar orange blade and shield lay at the epicenter. Among a pile of ashes. Calli deflated. Numbness wearing off enough to let the cold and shame start to creep into her limbs and heart respectively. “Make them stop dying. Real cool Calli.” She stumbled over, grabbing the blade and a fist full of ashes. She clambered up the building, trying to get as high up as she could. Kiara’s soul was long gone. Phoenixes didn’t need a Reaper’s help to shepherd them around, but without one they had a habit of wandering a few world’s away. She was probably being reborn right now, another world, another phoenix. I hope they have idols there, Calli thought. Kiara was meant to be an idol. The cold got closer to her heart. Her feet turned to ash beneath her.

She managed to pull herself over to a ledge. It wasn’t the view she’d dreamed of all those years ago, but it would do for her retirement speech. “Well humans…you’re assholes. But I get it, I’m an asshole too.” She clutched the ashes to her heart, even as her hand started to dissolve, mingling with them. “So we’re chill. But young me was right about one thing.” Tears came to her eyes. She choked up on the blade and let it cut into her hand. “This world can go fuck itself.” She slumped over, outfit collapsing in on itself. Her scythe and Kiara’s blade fell into the ruins together, landing crossed in the rubble.

#hololive #holoen #holoctober #takamori #mori calliope

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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Holoctober Day 5: Seiso

Sora faces the fallout from the so-called "Ina'nis incident" that has turned the world against Hololive. Can she pick up the pieces and unravel who was really behind it? Or will those same forces strike at her first?

Day 5: Seiso

“No.” A small voice rang out from the bed, Sora ran over and grasped it. “Ina you should be resting.”

“Rude? The creature trying to steal your body and conquer the world wants to be polite about it?

“So what was it?”

“Someone made this happen, planned it. Made sure there would be cameras and civilians caught in the blast radius. I heard a song before everything went black. Not something you’d hear at a convention. It was slow, operatic, beautiful but…wrong. As soon as we heard it the balance between me and AO was shattered, they became furious and I couldn’t push them down, it was like I gave up trying to, without even thinking about it.”

As they walked to the car, Sora noticed, as she had many times lately, a growing wariness in the people on the street. There was an anxiousness in the world, a wariness of soul. Even before the now so-called “Ina’nis Incident” people were more guarded and quick to temper. Hopefully this speech could be the first step to putting a stop to all of this. The first step to bringing back everyone’s smiles.

High above, two cloaked figures watched her enter the car, waiting for a signal. The shorter of them, Salamander, sat on the ledge, swinging her bare feet, which were covered in bright crimson scales and terminated in black talons. She grinned as Sora entered the car. “Redwood, they have Aliens, demons and literal gods, and you’re telling me that schoolgirl is priority S1? The one we’re blowing our one and only debut suckerpunch on?” Woodcutter, a towering woman with a set of wolfish ears and ashen antlers peeking through her crimson cloak, only shrugged. “Unlike you I don’t call people weird nicknames or ignore the boss’ orders. Weaver says this speech of hers could unravel Siren’s emotional destabilization…thing. The boss isn’t willing to take that chance. Also, they’re specifically not literal gods.”

“Yeah, just de facto ones. Boss really thinks they’ll just stay out of it huh? Seems crazy.”

“There’s a chance, Siren’s calling it her magnum opus.”

“Well, I’ll believe it when it doesn’t freeze time and stab me three hundred and fourteen times before I can blink.” She rose to her feet and stretched. “But I’m more than happy to get off the bench early. Come on, lets stop waiting for Fur Farm to get the balls to signal us and just jump em” Woodcutter held her back. “Just wait until they’re clear of the hospital. No sense in a bunch of sick and injured humans getting caught up in our fight.” Salamander cackled, “Oh my god, is Longlegs’ bullshit contagious? I don’t need her magic story powers to know that by the end of this one, everyone in that hospital will be long dead. And you shouldn’t either. Who cares if it's today or a few months from now? At least most of them got to live for decades, we’ll be lucky if we turn two by the time the world ends. And I won’t waste any more of that time waiting” Salamander leapt from the ledge and Woodcutter pursued her.

#hololive #holoen #holoctober #tokino sora

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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Day 4 - Kemonomimi/War Crimes

Day 4: . Botan and Watame wake up in an ominous bathroom with a rusty saw, asked to make terrible sacrifices. But who could the culprit be -Peko? Trying to pull a double today to catch back up, wish me luck.

“Charlie!” Even without the yelling Oriko would have heard her fiery Hololive Hunters genmate long before she saw her. Salamander took the steps three at a time as she descended the long stairwell that led to the rest of the office-building and entered Oriko’s makeshift home in the basement. Before hitting the floor she parkoured onto the wall to avoid having to slow her momentum, even letting out a burst of seafoam flames from each arm to push her into the basement faster. She looked around the room, spotting Oriko lying in bed fiddling with doll clothes, “Charlie!” She dashed towards her at full sprint, stopping inches before she’d be trampling Oriko’s bed and forcing small flames from her palms like brakes.

Oriko felt the heat from the flames reach her face and was grateful, not for the first time, for her silk’s supernaturally high ignition point. She slowly looked up at her genmate, unable to match Salamander’s boisterousness. Salamander’s shark-like teeth were arrayed in a broad grin, her eyes danced with viridian light. From her wavy crimson hair, obsidian horns curled around to frame her face. On her hands and feet long black talons faded into wine-red scales which rose along her arms and legs, contrasting sharply with her fair skin. At only an inch or two taller than their shortest senpais, Salamander was easily the smallest of Oriko’s gen but the missing mass had clearly been translated into raw energy.

“Charlie, I'm bored! Tell me a story!” Salamander shouted, before noticing the shadows under Oriko’s comparatively dull, emerald eyes or her sour expression. Oriko’s amethyst and black banded spider limbs hung limply beside her, only occasionally twitching or pincering something to hold it in place for stitching. Hunched over as she was, her shoulder-length, black fading into white at the tips twin-tails did nothing to cover the top of the metallic black device that covered her spinal column, or the green light it emitted. Essentially already in bed, she only wore a comfortable skull-print tank-top with fuzzy purple pajama bottoms. Her normal gothic-lolita dress, with all of its elaborate black lace and purple ribbons, sat on a mannequin beside the bed. “Not now Sally, I’m not in the mood.”

Salamander looked taken aback, “Damn bro, what happened? You’re usually all ‘hello, hello, Oriko’ but now you’re like…not.”

“I’ve been having nightmares, and someone murdered my camera while I was asleep the other day. There’s no point in telling stories if I can’t stream it.” She pointed across the room where shattered lenses and electronics still lay scattered amongst the audience of handmade toys that normally watched Oriko “stream”.

“Bummer. But if I’m watching there is a point right?”

Oriko didn’t look up from the doll-sized Pekora outfit she was sewing.

“Come ooooon.” Salamander gasped as an idea struck her. “What if I get you a new camera?”

Oriko looked up. “Where would you find a camera?”

“There’s a bunch of giant ones in one of the big rooms upstairs.”

“All the rooms upstairs are locked.”

Salamander rolled her eyes. She raised a finger pointedly and a blue-green flame ignited from the tip. “Nothing is locked if you get it hot enough.”

Oriko rose to her feet. “I suppose, if you show me where they are I can tell you one. They’ll be fun to tinker with at least. Maybe there’ll be some computers there too.”

She put the small dress onto an unmarked puppet, and shrugged, figuring it was good enough for Salamander. She’d add hair and ears later. And a face. For now, she grabbed two more dolls and moved to her theater. Salamander shoved a puppet out of its chair in the audience and took its seat, scooting it forward a bit for a better view. “Weave me a tale Charlotte.” Oriko rolled her eyes at the nickname, hiding a small smile. She was the only genmate who kind of liked Salamander’s nicknames. They were clever in a dumb sort of way, or maybe vice-versa.

“Hello, hello, it's Oriko! From Hololive Hunters! Today we have an emergency show for a very special, very needy listener.” Salamander rolled her eyes but said nothing.

Oriko lay the Pekora doll in the center of the stage, then dropped a Watame and Botan doll each into their respective corners, imbuing them with viridian energy that brought the puppet to life. She continued her narration. “Botan and Watame woke up in a dingy bathroom,” Oriko winced, she’d used the ‘wake up in a strange place’ trope yesterday too, she shrugged, it was good enough for Sally and for now no one else was watching.

***

Botan and Watame woke up in a dingy bathroom, three of Botan’s limbs were chained to a series of rusty pipes,and Watame’s leg was handcuffed to a radiator. An extremely decrepit bathtub was within reach of Watame, and a partially destroyed toilet was near Botan. Pekora was lying in the center of the room, in a pool of crimson. Watame started screaming immediately. “Botan, what's happening! Pekora’s dead!”

“Calm down, sheep.” Botan immediately moved to the toilet and lifted the lid off its water tank, testing how far her chains reached and noticing a slight flex to the pipes in the process. She pulled a tape recorder and a rusty saw out of it. “How did you know how to do that?” Watame asked.

“Its an escape room, they always hide stuff in the back of the toilet. Plus, there’s pretty much only two things here other than us and Pekora.” She scrutinized that saw briefly, glancing at Watame, before putting it aside, holding up the tape recorder. “Now, lets find out who I’m gonna have to kill.” She pressed play.

A voice came on that had obviously been pitched drastically down and scrambled slightly to disguise it. “Good morning Botan. You’ve turned your body into a finely honed weapon -Peko. But when Pe- when your boss asked you to do something yesterday, you just said ‘yes shachou’ and kept playing video games. Well then, lets play a game -Peko. You have 30 minutes until this room fills with a deadly toxin. I want to see how much of that body you’re willing to sacrifice to survive -Peko.” Botan glanced at her chained limbs and the rusty bonesaw, then turned towards the rabbit still attempting to lie motionless in the center of the room, astonished by Pekora’s rollercoaster-like competence for things like this.

“Oh no. That could be anyone!” Botan looked at Watame and wondered, not for the first time, how prey animals remember to breathe. “Yep. Its a real mystery. You probably have a tape in the drain of that bathtub, toss it to me and lets see what got you in trouble.” Watame looked and found the tape exactly where Botan said it would be. She tossed it to Botan and pondered aloud, “I wonder what it could be, Watame has never done anything wrong.”

“Hello Watame.”

“Hello.”

“You may have an oversized chest and a beautiful voice -peko, but that body is built with stolen property. Pekora knows you stole Pe…someone at the office’s limited edition cup ramen. Well now it's time to play a game, your gluttony got you here, but it might also be the key to your freedom. Good luck -Peko.”

“Oh no, what does that mean? Are we trapped here forever?”

Botan thought for a second, then tossed over the bonesaw. “Its a shame but you’re gonna have to cut off your foot to get out of the cuffs.”

“I do? Can’t we pick the lock or something?”

“Well those cuffs are specifically meant to go on your hands, and easy to pick with unbound hands because of that, but we’d need a lockpick for that, do you see one?” She gestured theatrically around the room, which was filled with rusty fragments of metal that could have easily been bent into the necessary shape.

“I guess not.” She started sawing. She closed her eyes and yelled in pain. When she finally cut through she was startled to hear Botan right next to her. “Good job, here let me tie that off before you bleed out.” Botan tied her belt around Watame’s leg, just below the knee.

“How did you get here!” Watame cried out.

“Oh, the pipes were really rusty, I just broke ‘em.” Botan flexed slightly, showing the chains still dangling from her wrists.

“Why didn’t you do that for me?” Botan shrugged and picked up the now discarded foot, taking a bite. “I was craving mutton.” Watame looked briefly downcast but allowed Botan to lift her into a piggy back position on Botan’s back. She even accepted when Botan handed Watame her own foot and asked her to hold it in front of her mouth while they walked. “I aim better when I’m full anyway.” Botan added.

“Aim? Aim what.”

Botan reached into her coat and pulled out a handgun, she racked the slide theatrically, and pointed it at the “dead” rabbit-girl.

“You can get up Shachou, I know it was you.”

Pekora bolted up instantly, one hand in her pocket. She cackled “Ha↑Ha↓Ha↑Ha↓ I should have known you’d figure it out -Peko. But Pekora was so secretive, what gave it away?”

Botan narrowed her eyes. Still pointing the gun at Pekora she pulled out the tape recorder with her other hand and rewinded briefly before hitting play. “Good luck -Peko.” She repeated it. “Peko. Peko. Peko.”

Pekora looked embarrassed. “But where did you get a gun? I searched you three times while you were knocked out!”

“You searched me three times and didn’t even find my fourth backup pistol? Were you even trying? I have at least three more on me! I don’t want to shoot you but you know I will, hand over the key.”

“Ha↑Ha↓Ha↑Ha↓ Feel free, but don’t expect to get out of here alive -Peko” She pulled out a detonator with the button held down. “This is a dead man’s switch for every high explosive that's currently on me. Enough to take out a small city block. If you pull that trigger you’ll be dead before I even hit the ground-Peko.”

Botan grinned. “Some parts of this were pretty hare-brained, but at least you had a good escape route planned.”

“Escape route? I always have this.”

Botan blinked in disbelief. “That aside, we’re at an impasse, how do we get out of this?”

Pekora pulled a key out from somewhere, “Just let me walk out the door and lock it behind me. Watame has another key in her stomach, you can take that one and walk out as soon as I leave.”

Botan glanced back at Watame, “Well, I suppose I could make some haggis.”

Watame threw herself onto Pekora from Botan’s back. “Nooo, just let me go Pekora. I’ll buy you a new cup ramen!” Botan was already half-way across the room, diving for the bathtub. Pekora threw her hands in the air and yelled, “You can’t! It was limited edition!” Rabbit and sheep both stared at her empty hands. “Oops -Pe…” The room exploded.

Botan looked up from the bathtub to find herself hurtling through the air, having been thrown, bathtub and all, from the building by the explosion. She grabbed a piece of freshly seared mutton that had landed in the bathtub and took a bite.

***

Salamander slow-clapped and rose to her feet, building her applause to a crescendo as she did. Oriko blushed despite herself. “Yeah yeah, are you happy now?”

Salamander grinned her sharky grin. “Very. I’m glad you picked a funny one. Sometimes you make them way too sad.”

“Sometimes the world is way too sad.”

“Oh my god, I thought you got rid of your goth half.”

“What do you-”

“Anyway, did they live through that?”

“Yeah, it's weird actually. That story is from a fairly nearby world so it should mostly follow the same rules, but an hour later all three of them are messing around in the office again with all their limbs intact.”

“Toonification.”

“Excuse me?”

“Most of the animal-girls in Hololive have some degree of Toonification. It lets them rubber-band. Cut off their limbs, they grow back. Blow them up, a few minutes later they shake off the soot and they’re good as new. Watame actually has the most out of anyone, she could walk away from a supernova.”

“Then…” Oriko hesitated, unwilling to ask, but Salamander followed her gaze to the Hololive Production poster on the opposite wall where Pekora and Watame’s faces were x’ed out in red.

“Then how were they killed?” Salamander grinned, much more predatory now, her inner shark smelling blood in the water. “No clue, Toonification is really just plot armor, and you’re the expert on that.” She leaned in close, her breath painfully hot on Oriko’s neck. “So how would you do it?”

“I wouldn’t!” She tried to shove her away but Salamander clung to her.

“How did you do it Oriko?”

Oriko’s eyes glazed over. “I don’t remember.”

“If you had to do it again though…”

“Hostages. Get them to sacrifice themselves for someone else. If their deaths have gravity, and meaning, the narrative can’t just shrug them off.”Salamander cackled and punched her lightly in the arm. “That's so messed up sis. I thought burning people alive was badass but you’re a goddamn artist.” Oriko collapsed to the ground, legs splayed at her sides, like a discarded doll. Her eyes were focused, but distressed. Why would she know something like that? The noise of grinding metal echoed from elsewhere in the basement floor. “Oh hell no.” Salamander hoisted Oriko into the air and threw her over her shoulder. “A deal’s a deal. Let's go get your cameras before the fun police bust us.”

#holoctober #usada pekora #shishiro botan #tsunomaki watame #hololive

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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HOLOctober day 3: Purgatory

Day 3 of doing a hololive writing challenge for October using a custom prompt list. This ones a pretty light-hearted Silent Hill 2 parody starring Bae and Irys. No real gore or content warnings. I wish I could change my clocks and then wasurebeam myself because my ADHD-addled brain refuses to start writing until its convinced we just barely have enough time to get it done before we pass out. Whats worse is so far its been right.

Day 3: Purgatory

Bae woke up in a padded cell. Its walls were stained dull with age and rot. She groaned, “Not again. What did I do last night?” Etched above a heavy, rusted iron door, were the words “Thou Shalt Not Be a Borrower.”

“Okayu-senpai? Is that you? You can’t just kidnap people, senpai! You know I’m good for it!” Bae first tried the door, which was locked, then pounded her fists against it. “How am I supposed to get your diamonds in here!” Frustrated, she looked around the room and noticed something she hadn’t before. A small asterisk-shaped opening in the wall, with the words “take one for the team” written above it.

“Oh, absolutely not.” She began pounding on the door again. “I won’t do it, senpai. I’ll wait here ‘til I die!” After only a few minutes she got bored and approached the hole again. “Frick it.” She slowly slid her arm in, “eww, why is it warm?” Her fingers contacted something and she withdrew it, peaking through the fingers of her other hand, she was relieved to notice it was just a key. She unlocked the door and entered a long hallway filled with similar doors leading to similar cells. She heard a strange sliding sound coming from the other end of the hallway, a creature emerged from the shadows. It was a large shaft ambulating on two large spheres attached to its base. “A peen!? Mane-chan is that you? Is this an elaborate bonk?”

Without an answer Bae lifted her hand and dice appeared between each pair of fingers and thumb, she threw all four, “perish!” One die bounced off it harmlessly, another cut through it like a knife through butter leaving it with a perfectly square hole near its base but otherwise unharmed. The third missed entirely, clattering to the floor and promptly becoming a potted plant. Luckily the fourth exploded, obliterating the peen and both sides of the hallway. She looked down the hall and saw multiple peens shuffling around. “Nope.” She leapt out the window, rolling down a long hill. Standing up and straightening her clothes, she found herself in a small, foggy, town. “I don’t think this is Neko Neko island”

She found herself walking through a park and found a familiar nephilim wearing a very unfamiliar outfit, including a leopard print skirt. She was horizontal on the ground, making strange grunts and motions that resemble the worm but sideways. “I’m glad someone else is here but what on earth are you doing Irys, there’s peens around!” She reached a hand out and the mysterious nephilim took it, responding “who’s Irys? Never heard of her. My name is…” she gave Bae a sultry wink, “Yabairys.”

Bae narrowed her eyes. “Ok. That's fine. Everything is fine. I don’t care anymore.” She looked back at the nephilim. “You know that skirts like, way longer than your usual dress right? Much less Yabai?”

“This is my usual outfit, Bae. Who I’ve never met before.” Bae walked past her, refusing to acknowledge the response. A short while later they heard a muffled voice in one of the buildings, a bowling alley. Bae started toward the door, bracing herself emotionally for some fresh new hell, but noticed Yabairys was standing still with her arms crossed. “What are you doing Irys, we need to see who that is. Probably.”

“Its YABAIrys. And you can go in alone, I hate bowling. I’ll wait out here.”

“You hate…we’re not going bowling. We’re just going to see who that is! You’re going to wait out here with the peens because you hate bowling?”

“Yes.”

“Whatever, suit yourself.”

As Bae entered the bowling alley Yabairys yelled, “this is the worst date I’ve ever been on!”

Bae entered the bowling alley and was surprised to find Korone sitting at a table eating a Pizza. As Bae approached her Korone yelled out, “PIZZA TIME,” startling Bae. “Um yeah, I see that Korone-senpai, whatcha doing here? You know there’s peens around right?”

“I love Pepperoni Pizza.”

Bae tried to switch to Japanese but found that, other than yabai and senpai for some reason, it came out as slightly janky english.

“I love PEPPERONI PIZZA,” Korone responded.

“Look, hard same, but there’s monsters, Irys has lost her mind, I had to put my arm in a…we gotta get outta here!”

Suddenly a large buff rat wearing a paper crown crashed through the wall, turning it to rubble. He was dragging an over-sized diamond pickaxe behind him and started to charge forward. Bae yelled out, “It's a Brat-king!” and tried to reach for Korone’s hand to drag her away, but Korone had already leapt from one of the tables and crossed most of the room. She slid to a stop directly in front of the Brat king, bending her knees slightly before launching into a flying upper-cut with a mighty “Orayo!” The brat king was thrown up through the rough, ending up stuck halfway. He flailed for a while trying to get loose then gave up, limbs hanging limply through the roof.

“Huh. That seems like it probably saved us a lot of trouble.” Korone, for her part, just sat back down and continued eating her pizza. Bae glanced back and forth between the two a few times before shrugging. “I guess you’ve got it under control. Enjoy your pizza senpai!” As she walked out she heard a quiet voice say, “I am justice.”

Yabairys scowled as Bae returned to the street. “Finally had enough bowling? I can’t believe you just left me out here.”

“I wasn’t…you wanted to…” Bae closed her eyes in frustration and took a deep breath, “You know what? Yes. I’ve finally had enough bowling. Good to go.”

“Good, because its my turn to pick where we go, and we’re going to the love hotel.” She pointed to the top of the hill where a large hotel had appeared. Bae was pretty sure neither the hill nor the hotel had been in that spot earlier but she refused to comment. “I think that's just a regular hotel.”

“Not if it was made with love.”

Bae looked at the rundown old hotel. “I don’t think it was. It looks like it was built with cheap lumber…and capitalism. That's like the opposite of love.”

“You just don’t understand romance.” Yabairys began dragging her up the hill.

As soon as they crossed the threshold of the hotel, a diamond pickaxe swung through one of the walls and the Brat king started chasing them. They ran for an open elevator the opposite direction down the opposite hallway but just before they reached it Yabairys tripped. Bae pressed the button for the top floor then spammed the close door button but Yabairys managed to lunge forward just as it closed, freezing the elevator in place. Yabairys was trapped between the doors but unharmed.

“Oh no!” Yabairys squirmed between the doors “I’m stuck step-Bae, help!”

Bae looked down on her, literally and figuratively. “Why are you so calm?” She looked through the gap in the door and saw the Brat king just standing around. He gave her a small wave. Bae screamed, “are you two working together! Is he a shipper!?”

“What!?! No!”

“Uh-huh, sure.” Bae stepped on Yabairys’ head and used it as a boost to climb to the elevator’s emergency hatch. “I’m out of here.” She scampered through the hatch then hung from the elevator cable long enough to poke her head back through the hatch and announce, “I want a divorce” before climbing the cable to the top floor. She entered a wide, empty room, a single cloaked figure stood leaning on a windowsill at the end of the room. They were faced away from her. Bae crouched, grabbing a lead pipe and slowly moving towards them. “I wish you wouldn’t.” Calli turned and lowered her hood.

“Calli!?”

“Sup.”

“Is it really you? You’re not all weird?”

“I mean, maybe a little I guess but I think I’m pretty chill, mostly.”

Bae launched at her and gave her a big hug, tears in her eyes. “Its really you, I’m so glad I’m not alone.”

Calli let her cry for a second then patted her on the back, “seems like you’ve been through a lot, need any help?”

“Yes, definitely. But first, what are you doing here. I think we’re in some kind of weird hell.”

“What are you doing here Bae. This isn’t a hell, its a purgatory, they’re like underworld Florida.”

“I think its got something to do with owing Okayu a bunch of diamonds.”

“Huh. Okaaay. Well, you can have some of mine I guess.”

Bae hugged her again. “You’re the best.”

“Lemme give you a lift home.” Calli held her arm out the window and in a burst of pink flame her scythe appeared in it. She let it drop and it continued to hover, she climbed out the window and sat on it side-saddle.

“Your scythe can fly!?”

Calli offered her hand, rolling her eyes “All scythes can fly Bae. Ready to go?”

Bae took it and climbed on, “I think so, but I feel like I’m forgetting something.”

Calli leaned forward and the scythe began to accelerate away. “If you forgot it, it wasn’t important.

Hours later a voice is heard, screaming from an elevator shaft: “Step-Bae? Step-Bae!? Step-Baeeeeeee!”

#holoctober #holoen #hololive #hakos baelz #irys #baerys

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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Day 2: Liminal

HoloGoretober Day 2, the crossover no-one, literally no-one asked for. Shiori Novella gets caught up in some OC/AU bullshit and just absolutely devastates a man for it. Went a little too light on gore yesterday and may have over-steered a bit. Best avoided if violence, puns, or light cannibalism are disturbing to you. There's a framing device with an OC that ties into the rest of the month's narrative, just in case HoloGoretober was a wide enough venn diagram to still fit someone besides me. Skip to the asterisks if you just want Shiori Novel-ways-to-hurt-someone-a.

Day 2: Liminal

Oriko continued her “livestream” over, around and through her makeshift puppet theater “overlay.” With the first performance of the night finished the Fauna puppet lay temporarily forgotten, leaning haphazardly against the small stage. A bundle of twigs and leaves rested gently in its lap. Oriko’s mouth was still stained crimson from the salary-man puppet’s sudden “transformation” into those twigs and leaves. She hadn’t noticed and the scrolling paper ribbon, covered in her own scribblings, that served as “chat” did not see fit to inform her. But it was surely seen by the other audiences. Both the dozen or so puppets facing the stage, sat in spider silk hammocks, and the surveillance camera which hung above them following Oriko’s every move. It had always been there, at least as long as she’d been there. Her genmates all thought it was creepy, and went to great lengths to avoid it, but she was happy just knowing they weren’t the only ones left. And how bad could they be if they liked watching her streams? A monitor hung below the camera, with a simple blinking cursor. It looked like a simple command line prompt but no keyboard was attached and no message had ever appeared on it. Until that night, when Oriko asked “chat” if they had any questions and for the first time they did.

“What’s your favorite liminal object?” Oriko gasped, the cardboard cutout which was going to serve as the question, slotting into the stage in a facsimile of an asset in broadcasting software, slipped from her hand. Her other three sets of eyes opened wide and fixated on the camera. Six small black orbs opened, joining the bright green of her human eyes. Her head swam at the influx of data. They each saw in spectrums she’d forgotten how to parse.

“Is someone really there? Are you ok? Do you need help?” It ignored this and all of her followup questions, until she asked, “Like…clipping out reality liminal or existing at a border or threshold liminal?”

“The latter.”

She made various “thinking” noises while tilting her head back and forth. Campfire? No. TV? No. Bed? Maybe. She glanced around the room, eyes lingering on a bookcase near her bed. Ah. Her head pained her even more, the puppets across the room seemed to pulse closer and farther.

“Bookmark.”

“ Mine too :)” Oriko was happy her viewer was pleased. It felt like she’d found the right answer.

“Ori…Do you remember any stories about bookmarks?” Oriko nodded, her human eyes were half-lidded but her spider eyes were still sharp and aware, they maintained their inscrutable gaze on the monitor, somehow accusatory.

“Ori…tell me the story.” Oriko places a small toy hospital bed onto the stage, woven from her own silk between four popsicle stick bedposts. She retrieved a doll with black and white hair, amber eyes and a gothic dress. She attaches it to her spinnerets and lets it fall into the bed. Green light follows it down through her silk, lighting up the puppets eyes. Its’ chest begins to rise and fall as if the doll is really slumbering in the bed. Two more puppets, one in a lab coat and one in a suit descend to the stage and stutter to life.

“She’s not sleeping. But they think she is.”

***

Shiori wasn’t sleeping. But they thought she was. Or at least, they thought she was so sedated that two ordinary humans could safely be in her presence. Enough that the bed’s simple manacles could hold her. Two beliefs that were deeply untrue. Not that she intended to interfere. This story needed to continue on its current path. At least a little further. So she kept her eyes gently closed. Her breathing carefully paced. She let them draw her blood, and pour it onto the elaborate magic circle etched beneath her bed. She watched passively, as they read the incantations and drew out her power. Her aura lifted away from her body, the golden light was drawn into a strange alchemical device on the opposite side of the room. After a winding series of heavily runed glass tubes, It dripped a glowing viridian liquid into a small vial. It was no more than a couple ounces, Shiori had been very exact about how much she’d allowed them to take, though it still amounted to several years of archiving work being undone. Narrative Quintessence. It was the source of her ability to twist the plot, both in and out of archives. Plot armor given physical form. Though it was weird to see it green. It had always been amber-colored, like her eyes and aura, when she’d manifested it voluntarily.

She shook in subconscious fury as the doctor stoppered the vial and grasped it in his filthy hands. She told herself this was only a fraction, if a large one, and that before the bookmark she’d had none at all. But when the man in the suit reached across her “unconscious” form to take the vial, she decided to steer into the skid. Still held back by the manacles attached to the bed, she lunged for his arm only barely reaching it. She spent a precious drop of Quintessence to serrate her teeth and tear away a chunk of his arm right through his suit. She swallowed it down, suit and all, and showed him her empty mouth, as he staggered back. She cackled at his horror and sang out “Surprise!” He stumbled to the door, the vial clasped desperately in his hand. Stopping only to give the order, “Kill her, quickly, but painfully.” Neither of them noticed the bookmark that appeared in her hand as soon as the vial crossed the threshold of the door. It became a lock pick rake at her touch and by the time the man in the suit slammed the door behind him, she was free of both shackles, though she had returned her hands to their previous position by the time the doctor turned to face her.

She smiled at him. “Quickly? That's no fun. You should never kill someone unless you’re at least going to savor it.”

He retrieved a knife from somewhere below the bed and grinned “Oh I intend to.” He was so enthused she decided to give him a shot. It had after all been quite some time since she’d been properly stabbed. As soon as he positioned it above her, she knew it was a waste of time. There was no need for plot armor as the knife split her flesh only briefly before impacting on her rib cage. Not only had he missed anything vital but he was so startled by the fact she did, indeed contain a rib cage that he released his grip on the knife. Shiori rolled her eyes and swung her legs across the bed, pulling the knife from her chest.

“You know what? That's honestly on me. I’ve been carved up by some of the great butchers of fiction. I mean, once a Jack the Ripper has replaced one of your kidneys with a bomb, the rest might as well be kids stuff. So what did I really expect from you. You don’t even have a name.”

“ I do. Its-”

“Nope. Five minutes ago you did. But then this showed up.” She held up her bookmark. “Do you know what a bookmark is? What its essence is? It’s a border. Between read and unread. Past and future. And sometimes, between one story and the next.”

“I don’t understand.” He was desperate to placate the ranting, knife-wielding, idol. But entirely unsure what exactly she wanted from him. She could have walked out the door or killed him minutes ago.

“Pre-bookmark? It's the story of “the last gen”. You’re Professor DoctorMan, sciencing the shit out of things. Scrounging up Vtuber parts, building doomed killing machines. Can’t eat his eyes, too important! But once that vial leaves the room?” She started advancing towards him. “Who needs you anymore? The bookmark pops in, and now we’re in “The Disappearance of Shiori Novella: Where the fuck did she go? And in that story. You’re just a doctor. A scientist. A guy in a lab coat. And suddenly it's an all you can eat eye-fet.” In one motion she thrust the knife into his lower eyelid, flexed it up and popped his eye from its socket. Before he’d even started screaming she’d severed it and draped it into her mouth. She slurped up his orbital nerve like so much gruesome spaghetti. His screams shook the room.

“Oh calm down, its just a little light cannibalism. All in good fun.” He screamed.

Something dawned on her and she gave a cat-like grin. “Hey, at least your eyes weren’t bigger than my stomach, ey?”

He continued screaming. She frowned.

“You know what, you’ve been a huge disappointment. I was gonna do a whole thing where I asked you if you knew human knees only bent one way and then I stomped on your knees and then I’d go ‘oops nevermind.’ And it was gonna be a whole metaphor about creativity, and thinking outside the box or something. But frankly we’re out of time and I’m not sure you’ve earned it.”

She pointed the knife at his chest. “One last tip before I go.” She adjusted it so it would slip between his ribs and sever his aorta. “It goes here.” She slammed her fist into the back of the knife and drove it in. His screams became a low croaking sound.

She stood up, dusted herself off, and walked out the door. A guard briefly blocked her way, his veins dyed an inky black. On seeing her, the black tendrils withdrew towards his face and his body collapsed as a small black creature leapt from his mouth onto Shiori's shoulder. "Yorick! Aww, were you worried about me? Some guy was pretty rude to me but I'm fine." They departed the narrative together, vanishing. For a time.

***

Oriko fell to the ground, like a marionette with its strings cut. The sound of metal grinding on concrete came from another part of the basement, slowly approaching the room. An exceptionally tall woman entered the room, dragging an oversized fire-ax. A pair of wolfish ears, and a pair of black, deer-like antlers peeked out through slots in a dark crimson cloak. Her face was hard and her hands were calloused. Her movement was stilted, as if her sinew wasn’t threaded quite right. She dropped her ax and gently lifted Oriko into her arms. Setting her in the blanket and daki filled corner of the room that served as Oriko’s makeshift bedroom. She tucked her in and placed several puppets and plushies around her like sentinels.

She retrieved her ax and confronted the camera, baring a mouth of sharp canid fangs. Her eyes glowed with faint green light.

“She does not want to remember.”

The monitor responded. “Woodcutter? How are you speaking?”

“She does not want to remember.”

“On some level she does, shes chasing a dream that can’t come true in this world.”

“Let her dream.” The woodcutter growled.

“I wish I could, more than you can know, but shes the only one who can save her senpai. Or the world.”

“They are not our senpai. Only one ever accepted her.”

“The only one that had a chance, and the only one that matters. Oriko is Hololive now. She would want to save them if she remembered.”

“She will never dance in the world you would sacrifice her for.”

The console sat empty for several minutes. “No. But nonetheless, I can’t give up on that dream.”

The woodcutter’s face twisted in rage. “Pray I never find you!” She lifted her ax and swung it relentlessly, until both camera and monitor lay in pieces. One final message displayed as the monitor shattered. “I will.”

#hololive #goretober #hologoretober? Is that a thing? No.#the fire alarm went off falsely three times last night after I posted day 1 at three AM what is sleep? Is it delicious?#shiori novella

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sydtaxerror · 7 months

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Day 1 - Obsession

In a basement, in an office building, in a dying world, a spider-girl puts on a puppet show for an unknown audience. She tells a tale of an average Sapling, facing a Faunaless future. What will he sacrifice to make it back to the forest? Maybe the weirdest thing I've ever written.

Oriko scuttled rapidly around the basement of an abandoned office building, grinning from ear to ear. Eight spidery legs powered her from one spot to the next, human arms snatching up necessary supplies while her human legs swung back and forth like a child on a jungle gym. From the puppet corner she pulled two friends. The first had golden eyes and a gentle smile. The second had a blank expression and sad, dark eyes, it smelled like iron. From the wig corner she grabbed one green, one white, one black in a simple salary-man’s hairstyle, and a couple leaves for the third act. From the snack corner she grabbed one of the mystery-drinks she’d acquired from various vending machines. Most likely it would be much less mysterious to someone who could read Kanji. The only Kana on it announced proudly that it “contained minerals.” She nodded sagely. “Don’t we all.” She didn’t bother grabbing a snack.

Fully supplied, she fought the urge to make a race car noise as she dug her legs into the ground, slightly scoring the cement as she drifted into place in front of her stream setup. It was a simple cardboard stage held together with silk and dreams, atop a commandeered steel office desk. She pressed the red “go live” button almost instantly, making the cardboard wobble threateningly. She thrust her head through the crimson curtain, she felt a little like a Kaiju as she took up nearly the entire stage. “Hello, Hello, Hello, it's Oriko!” she grinned, briefly revealing her wriggling fangs before covering her mouth and blushing.

“I’d love to chat but I’m super, super late so we need to get right into the story.” She pulled her head through again and reached back for the puppets, attaching one to each humanoid wrist. Last week GuyRyS404 asked: ‘What happened to the saplings after Council disappeared. It's hard to imagine them lasting a month.’” She crossed her arms in an X, “Bzzt! You’re wrong.” She smiled, careful not to reveal her inhuman fangs again.

“They lasted exactly two. And a half. Today’s story is about obsession, and the least unhinged sapling” She released strings of silk from her wrists that let the puppets slowly drift down to the stage. She tapped buttons with her feet to dim the basement and shine a spotlight on the stage. The camera zoomed in, showing only the puppets. A green light flowed from her wrists into the unmoving dolls, who shuddered to life as it reached them.

***

“I miss Fauna.”

The sapling sighed. It had been two months since Fauna, or any Vtuber for that matter, had done her last livestream. For the first month there’d at least been archives and clips. The sapling, formerly known in chat as “TheFinalSap(for real)” or FS for short, had even enjoyed being able to catch up on some streams he’d missed. But after the Universal Graduation Act, any depiction of Vtubers at all was banned off Youtube. Clippers had tricked the algorithm for a bit with blurs, mosaics and mirrors but one by one, like the Vtubers before them, they’d disappeared. The world governments still seemed unwilling to admit they had fulfilled their own prophecy. With council in exile, and the grim reapers MIA, everything from physics to the basic life-cycle of animals had begun to break down. There was a video going around on social media of several police officers fighting an undying grizzly bear in Times Square. They’d lost.

It was obvious to everyone they were living in the pre-apocalypse, which was fine, people his age had been born in the pre-apocalypse, but at least before there’d been cute girls doing cute things and livestreaming it to pass the time. Now all he had was concert DVDs and a dozen or so streams he’d happened to download before the ban hit. Desperate for new-to-him content, he was clicking through underground sapling discords when he found it.

It was a simple image at first glance. A plain white gazebo stood in a forest clearing, inside it was a table, with two places set for tea. It reminded FS of Fauna’s 3d debut, but it was clearly not virtual. A message was written across it. “Your spot has been saved. Come find me when you’re ready. You already know the way.” A simple green heart was the only signature.

The poster was asking if anyone had gotten something similar, afraid he was being scammed. What a high effort troll FS thought. But something about the image compelled him to save it to his desktop. It had just barely finished downloading when the image vanished. A moderator showed up to chew the guy out. “You know its real idiot. But The Calling is private, so shut your yap. What if there’s some Geoguessr savant on cross referencing those trees or some shit? Idiots.” FS’ eyes went wide and he immediately opened the image and started doing reverse image searches on everything in frame.

A week later, having slept a grand total of twelve hours, he’d narrowed it down to a single forest. Only an hour away. It felt wrong, somehow sacrilegious, but he told himself this was probably what they wanted. It was probably some kind of sapling ARG and when he got there, they’d all laugh and trade black market Fauna merch or something. Even then he knew what it really was. He was trespassing. Nonetheless, he loaded up his car, and made the short drive to the forest from the picture. He was surprised to find two other cars abandoned at the entrance, doors open, keys in the ignition. One still had the engine running. He turned off his own car and pocketed the keys. With a guilty expression, he reached beneath a seat and pull out an old hatchet from his scout days and attached it to his belt. He followed a trail into the forest, he didn’t know for how long. Finally, he emerged into a clearing. Ahead was a wall of briar, his head swam looking at it, the vines and thorns seeming to shift of their own volition. After staring for awhile, FS noticed there were gaps, person-sized gaps. A man stood in front of one and FS approached him.

“Its for me.”

“What?”

“The gap, its for me. No. It is me.” He walked closer to the gap, FS gasped. It really did fit him perfectly. His bald head, his broad shoulders and sausage-like fingers. It fit him perfectly.

The man turned to look at FS, eyes narrowing “But not yet. Not until I deal with you. I told that idiot it would be trouble.” FS knew who the sapling was immediately, but before he could react man’s hand was around his neck, lifting him in the air. FS had never seen a discord moderator lift anything, let alone a man, and so was doubly horrified. Only Mother Nature herself could have gifted such power. “Are you one of them?” the moderator asked. “A Hunter? You carry the woodcutter’s symbol.” He pointed to the hatchet. His grip grew tighter. FS shook his head as best he could. “Sapling.” He gasped out. “Always…a…sapling.”

“A sapling brought an axe to her forest? Uninvited?” The moderator’s face softened, and he laughed. “Well, It's not impossible one of us wandered that far afield. At this point, maybe even expected. Tell you what…” He grabbed FS’ wallet and let him drop. He pulled out the license and tossed back the wallet. “I’ll bring this to Her, and she can decide. Assuming she doesn’t know already.”

FS’ hand drifted to the hatchet, “You can’t do that, what if I lose my spot.”

“You should’ve thought of that before you…” he never felt the axe. Half his body was numb. Somehow he remained upright. “I’m sorry” FS said, “I just…” he pressed his foot to the man’s back and pulled the axe loose. “I miss Fauna.” He hefted it for another swing but before he could, the moderator staggered forward a single step, into his gap in the briar saying only, “We all do.”

FS briefly gawked in horror, then took off running. Maybe if he could find his gap, he could get through and explain. But after criss-crossing the clearing three times he realized he was misshapen for all of them. He found one that was close and swung at the briar to make it fit him. But it was unflinching. The vines may as well have been made of steel. Realizing he was the more malleable of the two, he began to carve himself. But after a single cut the forest lashed out at him. Vines pulled him to the ground, and he thought they would choke the life from him until suddenly they relaxed, and he heard a familiar, soft voice in his ear. “Is this really my final Sapling? Who promised to remain if all others’ left? To get all my videos to a million views even if every view had to be his?” Her words cut through him far more painfully than the hatchet had. “Yes, its him. But there are no videos and I’m so, so lost.”

“Oh you poor thing.” She gently caressed his cheek, then drew back. When she spoke again, it was in the opposite ear, and her voice held the freezing chill of Winter. “That's all it took?” She pulls him up, turns him around, and slaps him. It echoed through the clearing, and miles beyond. “To break your unbreakable spirit?” Another slap. Birds flee the forest, startled. “To hurt your fellow saplings?” Slap. Slap. His cheeks become numb, but each strike feels purifying. “To. Harm. My. Forest.” Every word is punctuated with a slap. He stops keeping track. When she finally stops, he is delirious with pain, but knows this is Her mercy. She forces him back to his knees. Then whispers in his ear, “You will wait sapling. Like you promised. Until all your brothers and sisters are called. Until madness takes you, leaves you, and takes you again. Then you will wait more. Until you are called.” She reaches for his cheek again and he almost flinches, but fights it back. She notices and smiles, patting him on the cheek softly, her voice warms again, like the sun breaking through an overcast sky. “And then you’ll come home.” He blacks out.

When he awakes again its in his own yard. He walks into his house and begins to wait. He watches as one by own the fan discords, chatrooms, and forums empty. They’re never deleted, but one by one names go offline. He waits while the world crumbles. While civilization falls, maybe for the last time. He waits until he must weep. He weeps until his tears dry up, then he waits again. He waits until madness takes him, leaves him, and takes him again. He waits what feels like years. Its only a single week.

A wood grain pattern covers his skin, advancing from where the briar bit into him to hold him down. He scratches it and it peels away like bark. He cuts himself shaving and thick sap flows out instead of blood. He knows he's turning, and so he walks outside. He falls to the ground feeling a strange kinship to the grass around him. He nearly begs for the Calling, but as he feels the sun against his new skin, he feels only acceptance. If this is where the Keeper wants his roots, so far from her and his siblings, this is where they will be. But the transformation never comes. He opens his eyes and finds himself in the clearing, standing before a perfectly shaped gap.

He enters it, and when the briar does not take him, he realizes he has one last trial. He will not be gently carried to the other side as his siblings were. He must walk this path himself. So he does. The path slowly shrinks. The thorns dig into his skin, which is torn from him, piece by piece. Then his muscles, his organs, his bones, his brain. Everything that makes him human comes away bramble by bramble. Until only the sapling remains. He exits the tunnel, and his roots swim through the nourishing earth, carrying him to the pagoda. Fauna smiles at his approach. “Welcome home Sapling.” He digs his roots deep into the ground, then sways in the autumn breeze. Home.

Author's note: And we hit the ground running. Slightly late again, but as long as I don't sleep I count it. Maybe the most unhinged thing I've ever written. The framing device is probably going to seem really weird to some people but to paraphrase Bennett Foddy, "Sometimes creating is like working with quick dry cement." This overarching narrative is gonna make this even tougher, and probable more alienating to people. but it makes sense to me somehow.

#hololive #holoen #ceres fauna #HOLOctober #goretober #I too must wait for madness to take me leave me and take me again

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