“NO!!!”

A visceral shriek tore across the voidscape that Len was occupying. She’d been expecting it, but the primal nature of it still threw her off balance. The raw rage in that single word wanted to burn through her. This was a lingering thing, a greater madness than she’d felt with Cammie.

“So nice of you to join us, Burton.”

Not a great name, she admitted, but she was short on time, patience, and energy at this point, and he’d have to live with the name she gave him.

“You’re not going to trip me up with that silly game. Just because my idiot sister fell for it, don’t think you’ll have an easy time with me.”

“Oh please, I’ve had about enough of the posturing by now. I beat her, I’ll beat you. Let’s just get on with it.”

There was no preamble. One minute, she was staring at the willowy figure she’d named Burton, the next he’d closed the gap between them and plunged his hand through her chest. Shock and horror raced through her mind as she tried to process what had just happened. How could he possibly be that fast? A moment later and he was back across the field, hand dripping with blood, a cruel smirk on his face.

“You really have no idea the trouble you’ve landed yourself in. I’m more than you can imagine and now that my sister’s gone, I don’t have anything holding me back. It’ll be a shame to devour what’s left of her, but she was weak enough to surrender to a fool like you, I’ll get over her loss quickly.”

“That’s it?” Len coughed, “just going to toss her aside because she made a choice you don’t like?”

“Of course. You didn’t really think we mattered to each other that way, did you? She was a means to an end for me, just like I was for her.”

“Heartwarming,” Len muttered under her breath, trying to focus.

It hurt like hell, that was unsurprising, but there was also something more going on with it. The wound felt like it was rotting outward, eating at her. That made sense, she supposed, none of this was real. He hadn’t literally shoved a hand through her chest. She was damaged, but the how and why of this place wasn’t something she’d had time to learn.

, she put the thought out into the ether, hoping that either one of her companions might have an interest in responding. She was rewarded with silence.

Pushing her annoyance out of her mind, Len forced herself upright, glaring angrily at the shade that was taunting her. There was something much more aggressive about this creature. Cammie had been desperate, terrified of what was to come. That had been to Len’s advantage and had given her something to work with. This thing, Burton, she reminded herself, was a different psychology altogether. It was furious at the loss of its ‘sister’.

While Cammie had felt like she was within the trappings of gender, this one… it seemed more like an adaptation that it was comfortable to shed. Len wished she could understand where these insights came from, but the more she fought it, the more she came to have a feel for what was going on within them. It didn’t do her all that much good, but it was still knowledge, and more knowledge was rarely a bad thing.

“So tell me, how long were you with her, how long since that poor schmuck rolled the dice and pulled you two? Must’ve been a while, can’t imagine he crumbled instantly. Where’d this sibling stuff come from, anyway?”

“You might as well be blowing air in my direction, woman, I’ve no interest in what you have to say. I’ll be killing you now.”

“Nah,” Len managed a smirk of her own. “You’re loving this. You want to draw it out. Wouldn’t be much point in ending it quickly. After all, I took her from you.”

“Be silent.”

“Was it months? Years? How long did you have her at your side, probably spending the whole of that time figuring out how to take over that poor bastard. So tell me, was it worth it?”

“Shut up!” Burton lunged at her.

He was still fast, but it wasn’t that impossible speed from his first attack. She could follow his movements, wait for her moment, and counter. Her timing was flawless, right as he roared with rage and raised his arms to attack, she slipped behind him, ready to take his legs out from under him. Right as she moved to do that, though, her body betrayed her. What should’ve been an easy maneuver stopped short as she stumbled back, overwhelmed from a wave of nausea and weakness.

Burton sneered and whirled on her, driving a fist into her gut. She dropped to her knees gasping for air and the creature sent her flying back with a kick to the head. Meanwhile, the rot from her first wound continued to eat at her with a constant burning agony. With each passing moment, she felt a little more of herself slip away, and more of something else take its place. She could feel herself on the brink of passing out when another voice snapped her back to the moment.

“Oh hell no!”

Len’s eyes flew open at the voice. Standing in front of her was, well, Lenore Wraithwhisper. The REAL Lenore Wraithwhisper.

“What in the heavens have you been getting up to with my body?” There was a hard edge that Len hadn’t heard in her own voice. A deep bitterness that shocked her to hear. “So help me God, if you’ve broken it, I’m gonna kick your ass.”

“H-how?” Len managed weakly.

“Fuck if I know. A lot’s going on over here. I might have unleashed a hell dimension that’s intent on gobbling everything up and suddenly I get pulled into whatever the fuck all this is. This… isn’t the real world, is it?”

“No, some sort of mindscape/shadowverse thing. Still working that out. Look, I’d like to talk more but,” she coughed up something that might’ve been blood or might’ve been ichor. “I’m not doing good.”

“You know what? Just sit back for a minute. I’ve got this.”

Len got to experience the supremely surreal sight of a person in the body she’d been inhabiting for the past several months, the actual owner of it, no less, walking away from her to face off against a foe that was giving her too much trouble.

“All right, pal,” said Lenore. “I’m about ten pages behind on all this, but I’m guessing you’re some sort of horror from beyond that’s tormenting my other half there. I’m rather attached to that half and can’t let you have your way here. Care to run along?”

“I have no idea how you got here, elf, but you’re about to regret it. Nothing is going to stop me from claiming my prize.”

“Uh-huh, sure,” Lenore said, sounding bored. “Well come on, then, make your move.”

It was the same move that had caught Len off guard initially. In the blink of an eye, Burton had crossed the space between them and struck out with its right arm, driving it at Lenore’s chest. Only, Lenore wasn’t there. Her figure winked, actually winked, at him before fading into nothingness.

“You know,” Lenore’s voice echoed across the battlefield. “I never was that good at this sort of thing? Magic, I mean.”

“Where are you?” Burton snarled.

“Oh, you know… here, there, everywhere.”

Burton whirled as though the voice had been right behind him, his arm slashing at nothing.

“The thing is, I’ve had a bit of time on my hands to expand my horizons. A lot less competition on this side of things.”

Burton howled with rage, slashing violently in all directions, his blows falling on nothing but shadow.

“Fine,” he said in a low growl. “If you won’t come to me, I’ll attack something you care about.”

So saying, he charged Len’s wounded form, both arms held low and wide.

“Boring,” sang Lenore’s voice.

Out of the shadows, a thousand spears rose, striking the creature time and again. It staggered back, blinking in fury only to realize that nothing had hit it. Snarling again, it lunged forward as a massive column of shadow rose from the earth, a single massive spike aimed directly at Burton’s chest. The creature ignored this as yet another illusion and leapt at Len through it. Ravenous exultation transformed instantly to shock as it impaled itself on the solid black shadow.

“You, my dear,” said Lenore in a tone that was equal parts mocking and chiding, “had better have a damn good excuse for why you couldn’t take this lout.”

“He got lucky,” said Len as she managed a chuckle and got to her feet. “And cut me some slack, I’ve had a lot going on.”

“A likely story. Look, whatever’s going on, could you try to keep a better handle on it? I don’t know how long I’ll be at this, but I’d really like to have a body to come back to.”

“How long YOU’LL be at this? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Look, your buddy Chris introduced me to those Isekai anime he’s so fond of, so I’m sure you get the general idea. Turns out, I was summoned to do something over here. Still trying to figure out exactly WHAT that is, but I’m working on it. In the meantime, try not to break anything that can’t be fixed, would ya?”

Len blinked at that. LENORE was the one who’d been summoned? What the hell? That certainly called for some reassessment of her understanding of her place in this world, but there were more pressing matters at hand.

“Now then,” she said, turning to the impaled Burton. “What should we do about you?”

Burton was wheezing pitifully as it struggled against the nearly log-sized spike jutting through its chest. It tried to form words but couldn’t seem to manage it. It glared at her with hate-filled eyes daring her to come closer.

“All right, Cammie, get your ass out here,” Len snapped with a bit more bite in her tone than she’d intended.

A startled Cammie popped into existence beside her.

“How did you-?” the girl began to ask.

“Stuff it, more important things to do and I need to get out of here.”

“Okay, but who is she?” Cammie pointed at Lenore.

“Long story, tell you later. Right now,” she gestured at Cammie’s ‘brother’.

“Damn, you got him good,” the girl said, not exactly sounding upset about it.

"Yup. So, I'm not really up for taking him right now but I'm thinking we've got a good alternative here." She gestured to her counterpart. "She's gonna take him."

"I am?"

"Sure, you've got enough going on that I imagine it'd come in handy to have one of these schmucks bound to you. Might as well take advantage, ya know?"

"Well, I suppose it could work. Still not clear on what exactly it is but you know what? Works for me."

"So what's my role in all this?" Cammie asked confused. "I was hoping you'd let me eat him."

"Yeah, no. I'm not a big fan of wasting resources. Figured you might want to say goodbye."

"To that prick? Fuck no. I don't need him. Bind him, toss him, do whatever you want just get him out of my sight."

"Okay then, that eases things a bit. Well Lenore? You know what to do?"

"Not completely but I've got the gist of it. This stuff is more intuition-based than training anyhow."

Stretching out her hand, the other Lenore muttered something the other observers couldn't make out. There was a flash of light and a scream of horror as 'Burton' was engulfed in her will. A moment later, only a small glittering gem of obsidion remained.

"That takes care of that," the dark elf said with a grin.