Thea

“I don’t mind explaining,” Ash said. “But I believe the executive—sorry, Bryce—mentioned that things were time sensitive.”

“No matter what ends up happening, we’ll need to fix your weapons, which will take time,” Bryce explained. “And Samira can get started while we have this discussion.”

Sami stopped to glare at Bryce with a chip half-way to her mouth. “But, captain, Thea just got here and I haven’t had the chance to catch up. Surely, you wouldn’t tear the two of us apart?”

She punctuated her question by plopping the cheese covered chip into her mouth. Bryce pinched my shoulder, and I got her meaning. “Sami, I’m sure dinner will be ready by the time you get back, and I was thinking of trying to make that spicy chicken ramen recipe Sora was telling me about.”

Sami narrowed her eyes at me. “You know I’m not only motivated by food,” she said, grabbing another nacho that was piled high with chicken and cheese. “I’ll fix the weapons, but because it’s the right thing to do. Not because you bribed me.”

“I would never imply otherwise,” I said with a smile. “Ash, can you make sure Sami has everything she needs to unbreak your ship?”

Ash sighed, but nodded. “I’ll have my head engineer meet you outside the hangar. But please run any changes by him first and explain exactly what you did so that maybe we could prevent this sort of thing from happening again in the future,” she said to Sami, before turning towards Softie. “Is there something you could do for my navigator? She’s still not responding to my messages.”

“It’d be best to just let her sleep it off,” Softie shrugged. “But, I do have a few uppers that'll knock her right out of it, and if your medic was watching, then it would probably be safe enough.”

“In that case, just let Charn know what you used,” Ash said. “He’s my medical officer and should be able to counteract whatever it is without just throwing more illicit drugs at the poor woman.”

“Fair enough.” Softie stood from the couch and looked towards Ash. “Just have him meet me in Jaessa’s room. I think I still remember how to get there. Come on, Sami, we have a mess to unmake.”

Sami grabbed the half-full plate of nachos as she followed Softie down the stairs.

“Both of you keep your feeds open,” Bryce called out. “I might need to contact you in a bit.”

“Always do!” Sora shouted back.

I still wasn’t entirely sure what was going on, but it seemed like it was pretty well under control at this point. So, I turned back to Ash to finally get some answers. “Everything good now?” I asked. “Can we please talk about Aris and how exactly you’re not all fallen?”

“I'd hardly call everything good,” Ash sighed. “But we probably have time for an abridged discussion before we create a plan to deal with the admiral.” I wasn’t sure who this admiral was, but Bryce could probably handle him easily enough. So, I wasn’t worried.

“The short version is fine,” I said. “Just tell me what’s going on.”

“Well, to start, I am fallen, at least technically,” Ash explained. “But we’ve found… ways around it.” She looked at Bryce while she spoke. Which just made the statement double bullshit. She could trust Bryce, and there were no ‘ways’ around being fallen.

“You can trust her.” She didn’t seem convinced, so I added. “If you still don't feel like you can, then at least trust me. I won't let your secret get out.”

Ash sighed, but launched into an explanation. “As you know, there are two main issues with being fallen.” She paused to adjust her fake glasses, and I rolled my eyes at the silly habit. “The first is logistical, with father gone, so is his afterlife. No afterlife means we no longer have access to the mana that provided.”

I nodded. That was why I needed the pact with Bryce in order to stay in the mortal plane. Without a constant supply of mana, my body would slowly decay. Souls give off ambient mana while in an afterlife, and back when I was a celestial, a small fraction of that was funneled to me in order to maintain my form, while the rest went to power dad directly. It’s why gods were so big on collecting followers. It was also why newer gods were weaker and didn’t have many children.

Being shut off from that mana was a problem, but not a big one. While you couldn’t stay in Elysia without a god’s blessing, there were still a few other planes with enough ambient mana to allow a devil to exist unassisted, namely the hells. That meant hanging out in one of those, or finding somebody to form a pact with. But pacts usually came with some pretty major strings attached, so most devils just chose the hells.

“You just made a pact for the mana. Probably from some of dad’s old followers,” I said. “How’d you get around the aspect shift?”

“Aris handled the shift for us, but that’s not the interesting part,” Ash said, casually. As if it wasn’t the craziest thing ever. “We didn’t use a pact to get the mana. We’re using a relic that replicates an afterlife for mortals.”

I wasn't exactly sure what Bryce was doing before, but she straightened next to me as her attention was brought back to the conversation. “That wouldn’t happen to be the same relic that was stolen from your vaults, would it?”

Ash nodded. “That’s correct, and I hope that'll help you realize how important it is that we get it back.”

“Now I’m certain that Legion never had it,” Bryce said as she leaned back into the couch. Ash and I sat in silence for a moment, waiting for Bryce to expand on that, but she never did.

“Okay, babe, that’s really cryptic,” I said, and she just shrugged without adding anything more. So, I went back to my conversation with Ash. “The afterlife trick is neat and all, but what about Aris dealing with the aspect shift? How in the hells did he do that?”

A celestial’s core beliefs, personality, and morals are all tied directly to their creator’s domain. If that creator ever died, then there was a massive backlash that could cause all of those things to do a complete 180.

If your creator was the biggest asshole in the universe, then you’d end up as a perfect little devil. But if your creator was like our dad, then having your morals shifted definitely wasn't pretty. And the closer you are to your creator, the worse the shift.

Aris was dad’s right-hand man. He drank all the kool-aid, all the time. Him shifting should have been a nightmare, and all the rumors I heard after dad’s death seemed to confirm that. All except what Ash was describing.

Also, it was complete bullshit that he still had a limp from my prank. He had chased me all the way to dad’s room right after it happened, and he was moving too damn fast to have been limping. Besides, the minotaur wasn’t THAT big.

“I don’t know exactly how he did it,” Ash shrugged, before taking an overly refined sip from her water. “But he managed to use himself as a moral anchor, and that, combined with strictly enforced laws, was enough to protect us from the worst of it.”

“So what?” I asked. “He just made a bunch of rules for everybody to follow and then there was no shift?”

“There was still a shift,” Ash explained. “We’re all weaker than we used to be, and we aren’t forced to follow any of the laws. But Aris managed to get in front of it before it got too bad, so nobody’s personality got completely lost. So far, the laws have been enough to keep everybody in line.”

“I’m calling bullshit.” I shook my head and leaned back into Bryce. “There’s no way a couple of rules are enough to keep everybody in line after an aspect shift.”

“I don’t know what to tell you.” Ash shrugged. “I’m living proof that it worked, and besides, after father’s death we implemented strict regulations for accountability. We would know if any of the laws had been violated, so far none have.”

I wasn’t sure what was going on, but it all smelled fishy to me. What Ash was describing was just plain impossible. Despite that, the proof was sitting right in front of me, in all her nerdy glory.

Ash’s mannerisms were all exactly the same as I remembered. And while her eyes were dimmer than when I last saw her, they weren’t anywhere near the pitch black mine turned after I fell.

“Okay, fine,” I said. “Let’s say your artifact works, Aris isn’t bat-shit, and rules are meant to be followed. What now?”

“I don’t understand.” Ash blinked at me.

“Are you just going around gathering followers for a dead god?” I asked. “You said it yourself, dad’s afterlife is gone. Any of his followers who die are just going to do what exactly? Show up in this magic relic of yours disappointed when they can’t meet dad? How does all of this fit into your rules?”

Ash smirked. “I never thought I’d be receiving a lecture on rules from little Salinthea of all people. Maybe falling was good for you.”

“Hey! I am not the rules lady,” I said, before snatching Bryce’s wine and finishing it all in one go. She had hardly touched it, and hardly even protested when I took it. “I just want to make sure you’re not making dad look bad, that’s all.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about that,” Ash explained. “Their afterlife is identical to what father’s was, just a little more isolated. They obviously can’t meet him, and it’s not in Elysia, but other than that it’s exactly the same.”

“Yeah, okay, cool. It’s not like I cared, anyway.” I tried to drink from Bryce’s empty wine glass, but couldn’t, because it was empty. I was maybe getting a little annoyed with the conversation.

“You know, I can still tell when people are lying.” Ash smiled sweetly as she successfully drank from her water. As if that made her better than me.

“Neat, so can I,” I replied, as I sat the empty glass on the coffee table. “So, what now? You’re just going to fly off into the sunset and find this stolen relic of yours?”

“That depends,” Ash said. “We still need a plan to deal with the admiral, and until we have one, I doubt I’ll be flying off anywhere.”

“Oh, you didn’t know?” I asked, with only about 10% of the smugness I felt. “Bryce already solved everything. Didn’t you babe?” I elbowed Bryce to pull her out of whatever she had been doing that had kept her from asking Ash a million questions during our conversation.

“Sorry,” she apologized. “I was a little distracted dealing with our Legion problem.”

“You have a plan, then?” Ash asked.

“Mostly,” Bryce smirked. “But I’m still trying to figure out the last few details.”

Ash frowned while she adjusted her glasses. “Is there anything you need me to help with?”

“Nope, I’m just trying to leave Varlin a message.” Bryce smiled until she noticed her empty glass sitting on the coffee table. “What happened to my wine?”