Just Offal

The following day, Violet forgot about the homeless man.

What Iris would not forget is the sandwich she was currently eating with Olivia, who seemed unperturbed as Iris began sucking the meat & cheese out of it like an earthworm does a bird from its tunnel. "Sorry, I have to handle my carbs."

"This doesn't even get into the top five grossest things I've seen someone do with a sandwich."

Iris thought about asking more of this but decided against it. As she started on her second, she noticed a scene out the window of this diner; a man passing by a woman and his fingers pulling her wallet from her pocket. She seemed not to notice, though both Iris & Olivia had.

"You wanna go get him?" said Olivia.

Iris shrugged. "I'm eating and he's a civilian. I doubt he could even run at fifty miles per hour if somebody forced him to. He'll be easy to catch."

Olivia snickered, and they took a minute to finish their meals; both left without paying, and soon Iris approached the man from behind, shoved him and verified by his reactions he was not a host, then grabbed his wrist; instantly he knew why and dropped the woman's wallet. She figured she did not need to scare him more than this, so she let him run away, scanned the wallet, and began reverting it along the path it had once been stolen.

"Can't just return it to her directly?" said Olivia.

"I could, but I'd like to let her know to be careful." muttered Iris; privately she hoped she might be rewarded for her heroism. She walked in the direction of the wallet, then once the man had stolen it, she checked the direction she had seen the woman walk, then both directions past the corner; she did not see her. She looked back at Olivia, frowned, then launched herself up with her wind; still she did not see the woman, and as she landed, it seemed the woman had glommed out of frame; her existence had briefly slit Iris's reality.

She frowned as she held the wallet up, then readied to revert it; at the end of this avenue she saw an aquarium shuddering hundreds of feet away, and in the next instant -

- the aquarium burst open and a dozen enormous geysers of water shot in Iris & Olivia's direction, approaching fast; Iris shouted for Kairos and it pulled down the wall of the third building ahead of her into the geyser, then the second and first into the geyser; but it continued unabated and she was launched back on a wall of debris alongside Olivia, cushions of clouds softening their blow; both rode upon this mix of geyser & debris with no side of stopping.

At her side, Baal's tongue shoot into the debris and water gargled in its maw: "God damnit, it's so much fucking water- obsidian?-"

"-no, it's brittle, the water will slice through it-"

- the debris they laid up on was beginning to buckle under the extreme pressure; more geysers were shooting all around them in all directions, yet Iris shouted for Kairos again and its acceleration of evaporation peeled off the water around the geyser, shaving it off into its own humidity until Olivia & Iris could safely hit the ground, soaked in the spray with more geysers shooting overhead.

Iris swept her hand up and a green lightning flowered upon the spikes of her jacket that built into a bolt shot into the water, and she sighed as its source did not die; it was not directly attached to the host. Many bits of debris were caught in all of the currents around the two, and as they flew over the two they burst into a swarm of lampreys -

- but Kairos' strand strangled the current and reversed their natural flow, taking the lampreys away, yet the source outside of her range pressed back against her intrusion; she could not long sustain it as Olivia searched for a more permanent solution at her side, Baal's maw ripping through the road below and continually chewing, skimming through its constituent elements, until it vomited a black glob onto the ground and she shouted: "Iris! Heat -- no oxygen!"

Iris winced, her focus quavering as Kairos accelerated the carbon through the process of activation, and the geysers shot back upon them -

- but Baal ate the activated charcoal and vomiting a volley of its own back into the geysers, absorbing them into globs of black, a constant bilious spew as Iris caught her focus once more and sent the geysers speeding home; they were clear for a moment as she launched herself & Olivia up 50ft, then 100ft, then 150ft, yet a single geyser below curved into them and suddenly accelerated -

- Iris tried to revert it as Baal vomited -

- but it curved at far faster speeds into their backs and blasted them into another geyser that Iris's winds ducked them underneath, a swarm of lampreys falling upon their skin and latching their, jawless teeth tearing & ripping; a glob of obsidian was blasted into Baal's maw and its super-sharpened tongue sliced all of the lampreys off, only their jawless teeth ledt as evidence as Iris launched herself & Olivia further up, keeping steady there.

The queen of the skies viewed the lord of the seas below; he stood within the ruins of the aquarium and a constant geyser spewed by a whale circling within the concrete beside him.

Olivia spoke: "Iris, get Baal in range next time a geyser speeds at us like that." She whispered her plan.

"Doubt we'll have to wait long." muttered Iris, seeing another geyser shooting at them from below, then suddenly accelerating like it had slipped on something; once it was within Kairos' range she felt a protective coating form against her manipulation's intrusion, yet she would not need it, for the next scene was instant.

Baal took a chunk out of Olivia's tablet and absorbed its plastic, vomiting a geyser of its own back at the geyser of water; Kairos reverted it back into crude oil, and as the two liquids met she accelerated the geyser of oil past the speed of the water -

- and the water went one way and the oil another; Baal's tongue entered the stream for a second before Iris blasted herself & Olivia back down underneath it, dodging through another five geysers before she brought them back to ground-level and only 300ft away; she glanced to Olivia at her side and noticed Baal's tongue repeatedly wiggling. "What's-"

"Shark oil. Sharks have to constantly move."

Iris eyed it warily; though she had seen Baal copy a few Revenants before she never did fully trust it was under Olivia's control, the base of Baal's tongue vibrating as it continually destroyed its own smearing drool to a single atom.

"Wanna see what this does to a human skull?"

"Suits me."

Iris launched herself & Olivia high again as more geysers came spewing towards them, dodging and weaving with her usual laugh & smirk whenever they missed, yet she needed to keep Olivia safe for a minute, no Baal counter able to come but their target 300ft ahead and needing a glut of shark oil bombed onto him.

Baal's tongue constantly wagged and twisted itself into impossible configurations, causing Olivia to gasp in pain in Iris's ear as she tightly wrapped herself around Iris, deeply exciting Iris -- the reason for which you, reader, should get your mind out of the gutter for -- she was thinking of the effect it might have on his neck.

Another barrage of geysers came and Iris ducked midair beneath them, yet more lampreys burst out of the streams above and fell upon Iris's head, biting & latching tight; she tried to grip them off herself but could not find all of them off while focusing on dodging, Baal still preoccupied at her back as more geysers shot all around her -

- but the next scene was instant.

Her drills reverted to her hands and she gave herself a careful sweep & accelerations that twisted every lamprey off from her, leaving heavy wounds yet herself free; in her distraction another geyser was shooting for her straight ahead in her midair path -

" - Kairos!" she shouted and aimed her first drill into it; it ejected from her arm and shot clear down the geyser's urethra, accelerating halfway down the shaft into a massive whirlpool of frothy liquid that yanked the rest of the head back into itself. She was allowed a moment of dryness as she blasted herself higher up, escaping six geysers and hitting 50ft in the air, yet suddenly felt a mighty pressure yanking her back down -

" - blobfish! In the whirlpool!" shouted Olivia. "Stealing pressure!"

- she glanced down and saw a single blobfish absorbing the pressure of her whirlpool below; beside it was nil pressure and around herself was high, and she could not breach this barrier of osmosis as the low pressure zone pulled all around into its grip -

"-you think the laws of physics can stop me?" coughed Iris, and the next scene was instant.

Kairos' strand threaded through the field of pressure separating them from death below; at the blobfish was near-zero and near herself was high, thus pressure flowed osmotically from high to low pressure; yet Kairos whimmed that this process occurred in reverse and so it was so; a gust of counter-pressure blasted her further and she hit the ground running as she was 100ft from her foe, a pipe of obsidian forming that Baal's maw could spew a pressurized jet of oil upon him as in the next instant -

- from behind the man there emerged a tall woman, and before he realized her presence she had gripped the man's wrist and sent a wave of unholy terror through his expression; she had slammed her fist through his back and out his chest, crushing his still-beating heart in her mechanical fingers as she discarded him away.

In the next less than an instant a bullet struck Iris's skull and her wind barely glanced it away from her before it could split her brain apart; she jerked herself instinctively and a second bullet tore through her shoulder, exploding internally and blasting thin strips of muscle out of her wound -

- Baal's tongue caught the next bullet and its shockwave tore the tongue into pieces; Olivia gasped as blood flooded from Baal's pentagram and a hook of wind yanked her & Iris behind a nearby building, safe from sight yet speaking quickly: "-b-bad, can't - tongue-"

- another barrage shot through the wall behind and blasted Iris's left arm into pieces in an instant; agony hastened her as she grabbed Olivia and sent gallons of clouds spewing out in all directions, hiding themselves in one and covering their retreat as she launched themselves away, continually forking their flight path so that they could not be tracked.

She was a mile away from her takeoff point when she turned her gaze, assuming more bullets would barrage her clouds. A jet of lava burst from each and cooled into obsidian pipes, lengthening her counter-winds; given the bullets' speed, a minor push at farther range would divert them better than a major push at close range.

Another mile passed and no bullets came. Tentatively, she decayed an inch of sight behind and noted that the tall woman was not in pursuit; though she had gunned solely for Iris, she seemed disinterested now.

Iris landed twenty miles away. "G-God, w-what the fuck was that? Who the h-hell was that?"

"I-I don't know." Olivia winced. "But if t-there's a call with her, we gotta let someone else deal with her. Okay? Y-You did the right thing."

Iris sighed. "I...I suppose. I'd prefer not to risk going back into the city tonight. Just hope she's not going for Ike."

"Yeah. Are you good to get back to Serena?"

Iris nodded, still wincing from her gone-stump. "Still need to warn Eva and Violet, too."

"Yeah." Olivia sighed. "...let me call Naomi on the way there. Maybe she... fuck. You know, t-this is why I don't like security contracts, because you don't know what level of host you might deal with. At least with normal contracts, Kate assigns them by guessing their strength. L-Let me call Naomi."

Iris used her wind to launch themselves back to Urasaria, listening to Olivia talk with Naomi. She seemed more affected by the encounter than Iris, but Iris could not entirely understand why; she wondered if it was because Olivia had always worried she might leave Iris just as Natasha had her. Her internal consciousness tightened, and a sense of guilt came over her; again she felt a warning away against empathy; if she did not understand what Olivia felt then she could not be harmed by it.

She texted Eva & Violet warning them, then launched herself back to their prior location later that night once the limousine was there to pick them up.

"As I was saying, they were forced to chase it very far out." said Violet. "Wind Revenants can be very tedious to fight; they're typically borne to hosts with aggressive personalities, who enjoy never taking a hit even as it means they never land one on their opponents."

Ike nodded. "Well, t-the bacteria h-has to reflect its host somehow, y'know? You look at Eva and her musical ability, y'know; Revenants always fit the host like a glove. Now, speaking of, Eva, I-I wanted to tell you about the one with the Goldberg Variations being what Mr. and Ms. Goldberg did on their wedding night. You know that joke, don't you?"

"The Goldberg Variations? No."

"No?" He laughed nervously. "Really, you? The Goldberg Variations?"

"Well, I suppose I can look them up."

"No-no-no, you're a musician, y-you gotta know your classical history. You gotta learn from the past, y'know, o-otherwise you -- well, I forget what, but it's good to know. I was about to let you in on some lyrics I've been workshopping, too... s-something a bit deeper than my usual fare."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. Give them a shot." He tried to hand his notes to her.

"Oh, no, I can't sing." Eva shook her head. "Nope. Just never had the knack for it. I'm a terrible singer."

"Don't deny the people a performance."

He handed the lyrics to her, and Eva began to sing. Previously unbeknownst to even Iris, Maestro gave her perfect pitch.

You are beautiful on the inside

You are innocence personified

But what lies in wait behind your eyes

Is the dark grin of coiled succubi

Olivia laughed.

I made a few mistakes when it comes to you

But I'm gonna throw it all back to you

And when I-

"No, no." Ike hastily shook his head. "Your inflection is wrong. It was suck-you-bye, not suck-you-be. Do it again."

Eva sang.

And when I get out from your little lies

I'll spread my wings and I'll take flight

By now there were more than a few giggles in the cabin.

"Well, g-guess this shows pitch isn't sufficient to sing well." said Ike.

"Maybe I'm just not getting the inflection right." Eva handed them back.

"Did you write those from personal experience?" said Violet. "It almost sounded like a past relationship."

"Y-Yeah, a long while ago. You gotta p-put a lot of yourself into your art, y'know? It's gotta be an extension of y-you and your own life in some way." he said. "Gosh, y'know, I-I was dating her... I was old enough to be her father. Imagine that. I-I mean, you'd think I would've tried with another musician my age or somebody."

Iris looked to Olivia. Both were creeped out, but mutually so. She smiled.

"B-But I mean, you're young lesbians. You k-know how it is with girls that age."

"Yeah." said Eva. "Isn't fame when you get to choose who you date and not just end up with them?"

Ike laughed. "You know, y-you'd want to think that, but it really isn't. They say relationships are about compromise and mutual under-understanding. B-But I can tell you, i-it's all luck. People won't admit that because it means a loss of control, but that's really all it is."

"Well, the only two things you can control in life are art and masturbation." said Eva and the others laughed.

"Two areas i-in which I am an absolute expert."

None laughed. Ike looked around the cabin, and realized quickly the bitterness that had bubbled at his expression, yet he laughed it from himself as he continued to loom into the night.