zg_shadows | More shifter tat

It was nearing lunchtime and Sunshine Edwards (who was mostly known by a variety of pseudonyms) was getting restless.

She had been up since half past six in the morning, and had spent the time since dawn doing mostly constructive things. She had fed the parrot, and determinedly scoured the kitchen into both sparkling cleanliness and forensic neutrality. She was fairly sure there wasn't a single fingerprint, stray hair, or flake of skin left in the houseboat's tiny kitchen unit now. Such caution wasn't entirely necessary, as the kitchen was attached to the rest of the boat which hadn't been cleansed quite as thoroughly yet and was, furthermore, hidden from the rest of the world by a series of complex warding rituals, but such cleaning frenzies were an old habit for Sunshine. She found it soothing to remove all traces of her existence from the world, one fingerprint at a time. She had always liked the image of herself as a mere observer; the black bird that hung in the air, touching neither earth nor water, leaving no trail as she passed.

Tim had gone into university and so the boat was empty. Sunshine gazed around the rest of it thoughtfully. There was the bedroom, the living room and the tiny library. There were an unfortunate number of personal items in the bedroom which she was, on some level, itching to properly dispose of, but she suspected Tim would be upset if he came home to discover that the small wooden box he had bought her to keep the tiny collection of magical trinkets he and Alexander had made for her had been burnt.

She took a few steps into the bedroom and perched despondently on the depressingly soft and well worn duvet clad bed. This entire boat was like a map of half her psyche. Settling here had doubled the odds of anyone finding her. If, she thought, with a mixture of cheer and depression, anyone cared.

Gah.

There was that stray thought again. A stupid whiney and entirely useless thought which said that it would be nice to be appreciated.

"Your job, Sunshine Edwards" she said firmly "is not to be popular, liked, or wanted. Your job is to be right, and to get the right information back to the people who need it. And, Sunshine, on that note you do have a job to do."

She glanced thoughtfully at the clock. It was coming up to 1 pm. She picked up the notepad and pen which was lying by the bed and stared at it thoughtfully, marshaling her thoughts.

Facts she wrote on the top page, and underlined it carefully, before continuing to write And only facts. Not 'what I think' or 'what someone has told me' or 'some leap of faith based off dubious and unreliable intuition. No bastet logic here! Facts. Only facts.

Her pen hovered over the page. There was a lot she could write, but she suspected a lot of it was an extended rant on the irresponsibility of bastet (which she felt would be rather like ranting that water tended to be a tad damp; both useless and mostly unreasonable) and the stupidity of garou (ditto). Instead she began to write another list, quickly and fluidly.

1) We were in a realm in the Deep Umbra. It was beyond the names realms, beyond the Dream Shell.

2) At least one realm over did not exist in a structured fashion and was purely made up of concept.

3) The realm was, in essence, a bubble of realism representing the perceptions of a powerful Umbrood.

4) The realm itself appeared to be wyld aligned to all obvious senses.

5) The exterior of the realm appeared to be strongly wyrm aligned to all obvious senses.

6) Those who made this deal with the domitor of the realm have developed weaver taint.

Sunshine paused and let herself chew very briefly on the end of the pen, whilst mentally making a note to melt it down as soon as possible to ensure that no traces of her saliva could be left on something so small and mobile. So far, the last three facts seemed to indicate something rather alarming to her.

She wrote down

NB - sensory perceptions of the triatic alignment of the realm may not be reliable.

She continued to write.

7) The spiritual denizens of the realm appeared to prefer a arachnid form when assuming one which they believed to be more 'natural'.

8) The individuals responsible for the 'deal'...

...and Sunshine permitted herself a moment of self indulgent smugness at her own cleverness in avoiding such, before reminding herself of a number of her more stupid moments (especially the ones which had involved Tolly screaming 'you stupid cow' at her) in order to get her ego back to manageable proportions...

...believe that they have made a deal with Queen Ananasa.

Sunshine laid her pen down, before picking up a small blow torch and moving to an area of the boat where she could incinerate the pen with greater ease.

"What do I know about Queen Ananasa?" she asked herself, with genuine confusion.

Sunshine's mostly extremely good memory flickered through a variety of conversations she had had with different individuals over the years. Corey, she remembered, was a man with an alarming number of contacts. He might know something. Beyond that she could remember Dickens (small, plump and obnoxiously knowledgeable) pontificating when she was a young fledgeling.

"Ah...yes..." he had said. "The An-an-ah-zee. Pronounce it like that for me, please. An-an-ah-zee.

"These intriguing creatures have been described as the...ahem...'femme fatales' of our rather exclusive little shifters club. Current information gathered in the field would seem to indicate that they are, unfortunately, double agents. As it were. Oh, I believe there are some mitigating circumstances, and some form of metaphysical hostage situation which compels them to enter into these deals with the Enemy. However..."

He had moved on to other subjects after that. In fact, if Sunshine remembered correctly (which she was sure she did) he had moved on to a discussion of the bastet, the ajaba, and the moral implications of the bastet's own particular War of Rage.

Sunshine chewed on her lip.

"It's most distressing," she said out loud. "How on earth do I even begin to get a report together when I don't know which freaking member of the triat these bloody shifters have signed up with?"

It was, she had to admit, looking like an advanced level research job. Thankfully it was now just after 1 pm, which meant she had until 2 pm to get in touch with the most knowledgeable researcher and occultist she knew.

Disposing of the remains of the unfortunate biro, Sunshine wandered back into the bedroom. Hopefully Tim wouldn't be back for an hour and she would remain undisturbed. She stretched out on her bed, and closed her eyes. She carefully began to cleanse her brain of as many extraneous thoughts as she could, focusing on the rise and fall of her chest. She would not sleep, but she wished to reach the right meditative state in order to find one who was.

It took about fifteen minutes before Sunshine's mind was properly separated from her body. Thankfully, it took much less time to make contact with the sleeping mind she was searching for.

Two hundred and sixty two miles away, a whip thin man with a hooked nose and cold dark eyes was settling down in a leather armchair for his afternoon nap. The tiny bookshop he owned (and ostensibly sold books from) was locked up, and Charles Percy Edwards was settling down amidst his collection of books, artefacts, and potions. His day followed a strict routine, and therefore it took him remarkably little time to slip into a deep and dream filled sleep.

His dreams were, as always, unremarkable to him. They were also, after many years together, unremarkable to his daughter as she entered them. The high pitched screams which came from behind a locked door in the corner of his mind were as per usual. The wind billowing in through the open window which always appeared in every room his mind created was a little more unsettling, and Sunshine shut it firmly. Her father may have made the decision to leave a window open for her errant Sun Lost mother. Sunshine was infinitely less forgiving.

Charles was kneeling beside a small cage as she entered, poking at a strange and deformed thing with tentacles that bore a vaguely familiar face. He did not turn around, but instead said "ah...Sunshine..." as he heard the window click shut.

"Hello Daddy," Sunshine said, and perched on a large stuffed crinos garou that her father apparently dreamed of having in his living room. "Who on earth is this?"

"The crinos or the pseudopodic entity?" Charles asked, and poked a finger towards a trailing tentacle. "I believe the crinos is the gentleman who once broke my shop door in order to deliver threats of violence. I only wish that having him stuffed and mounted did not have to be confined to my dreams."

"Ah..." said Sunshine, and absent mindedly poked at a glass eye. It felt surprisingly squishy and she withdrew a finger cautiously.

"And the other?" she asked.

"I haven't the fainted idea," Charles said cheefully. "It's why I'm investigating. I think I recognise the face however. Anyway, what can I do for you?"

Sunshine clambered a little higher up the crinos until she had found a comfortable perching spot on one furry arm.

"I'm here because I need to know something..." she began.

"Oh...I guessed that!" her father exclaimed. "That's always why you come and visit. Well...unless you've changed your mind about that vampiric vitae? It would definitely stop those nasty autumn colds you keep getting."

"No," Sunshine said firmly. "I'm not taking vampiric vitae for a cold."

"Are you sure?" her father asked. "It's completely cured that nasty arthritic condition I used to have in my fingers, and it's really not terribly expensive these days. I have an excellent supplier, and I could even make sure you got a strain which would improve your eyesight?"

"There's vampiric vitae which would improve my eyesight?" Sunshine asked, in curious tones.

"Well...maybe not," her father admitted, getting up from his spot on the rug. "Perhaps some additional strength? Or speed? Just think of how useful it would be to be able to increase one's physical movement rate without having to channel the rage in one's system..."

"Father!" Sunshine said firmly, "No vampire blood. At all. It won't be good for me and you know Tim will object."

"Yes..." her father replied, slightly mournfully. "He is a very moral young man..." and he sighed a long suffering sigh.

The screaming had paused momentarily, only to be replaced with the unpleasant noise of broken bone grinding against broken bone, filling Sunshine's ears. Upstairs she could hear someone moving about and her father said firmly "don't look up. Please remember, my dear, you must never look up."

"Yes, Father." Sunshine said automatically, and then "anyway...I need something."

Her father nodded, and pushed the strange little cage away from him, turning to face his daughter. He looked younger in her dreams. He was still tall and thin, but his eyes seemed soulful instead of cold and his cheekbones were as sharp as razors. It occurred to Sunshine that her father had once been a very handsome man.

"Well," he said testily. "Go on! What do you need?"

"I need to know more about the Ananasi," Sunshine said. "And specifically more about Queen Ananasa."

"Ananasi...?" Charles said, and looked contemplative. "I don't believe I've ever met one of those..."

"I've not either," Sunshine said. "But I need to know more about them."

Charles frowned slightly.

"I don't really need to know why, I presume," he said, and then "I'm not sure what I have on either of those subjects, but Queen Ananasa rings a bell. I think I may know a chap who has a notebook written by some man in a mental asylum who kept trying to eat spiders. No one knew why, but he claimed they were talking to him. Most peculiar."

"That sounds promising," Sunshine said and blew her father a kiss. "I'd be really grateful if you could look into it for me."

The grinding noise of bone was beginning to fill the dream and Sunshine scrambled off the stuffed crinos. "I've got to go," she said and then "do you know anything about the side effects of dealing with Queen Ananasa?"

Charles shook his head.

"The only thing I know about making deals with entities vastly more powerful than oneself," he said, "is to always make sure you read the fine print, and double check your own wording."

Sunshine nodded.

"I know..." she said thoughtfully. "I know..."

Back at the houseboat, Sunshine woke up with a sore neck and a slight headache.

Whilst in the shower, she found herself pondering the entire situation a little more. She suspected that, to a certain extent, she was allowing herself to be affected by her very strong antipathy towards the individuals who had killed Michael. She had liked Michael. She had spoken to him as he mourned his wife's death at the hands of the Namers who had destroyed her slumbering form. She had walked the streets where he had grown up, and she had stood in the church where he had been married. She had known the man he had been before he had changed, and she had seen echoes of that man still in the creature which had existed a century later.

In an odd way, Michael had almost been her friend. Now he was dead. He hadn't been killed in anger. He had not been taken down as part of a grander plan. Rather he had simply been obliterated, casually and carelessly. He had been killed by someone who had then refused to even look at what they had done, and had just dismissed it as the clear death of a wyrm beast, because she didn't even bother examining her own supernatural capabilities critically. He had died because at least one creature existed in this world who combined great power with (in Sunshine's very biased mind) an almost sub-human level of intelligence and that fact was still broiling in her mind.

Michael had been her friend.

The bastet had killed him.

And that was not something she found it easy to get away from.

"You've got to put that aside, Sunshine," she said out loud. "You have to. You can't launch an investigation into someone you hate. Whatever Tim says, emotion isn't helpful. It clouds the mind. It messes with your judgment."

A dozen unruly thoughts came rushing up again. She pushed them down firmly.

"Later," she said. "Later. Right now, you don't need vengeance. Vengeance is not time sensitive. What you need is data, and it has to be perfect."

Odd memories floating through her mind. Michael sitting in the Savoy, offering her a cucumber sandwich. Michael with eyes that looked almost like glass when he talked about the woman that Caspian had killed to get to him. Michael, who Tolly had told her was a Ferryman.

"Later," she said again, and pushed those thoughts away.

Right now, there was work to be done.