Galateya pushed the water out of the mud beneath and around them, solidifying it into crumbling chunks and dust and summoned another wave from Lake Crescent, this one warmer. The water cascaded over all three of them, washing away the dry dust. Then, the lake pulled the filth back into itself, leaving them clean and dripping.

  "Much better," Sage declared, shaking herself like a dog. Water droplets flew in every direction, catching the sun in prismatic arcs.

  Katherine wobbled to her feet, pixelly eyes flickering as she reoriented herself. "Ah! Maksym needs... assistance.”

  “Alas,” Sage added, “our poor, brave judge has fallen victim to foxnanigans."

  "Go," Galateya said with a soft smile, happy that Keiy found someone to love. "Take care of him."

  The cyborg nodded and stumbled toward Dax's unconscious form. She knelt beside him and pulled him into her embrace, tail curled around his body protectively. Then she zapped him with a finger poke.

  The human yelped, blinking and opening his eyes. “Bleh. How long was I out?”

  “Not long,” Katherine said, pulling him onto her lap. “Sit. Warm up. Relax. Wouldn’t want your soft, fragile flesh-frame to catch a cold.” She glared at Sage.

  “What?” Sage asked. “He glitter-bombed me! I smelled his paws all over that sushi box. Devious human. T’was a smol revenge… A single, brief interaction. He'll be fine.”

  “My revenge will be even greater!” Dax whispered dramatically, keeping his eyes closed to avoid staring at the Skinwalker. “Just you wait, dastardly fox, just you wait!”

  “Looking forward to it.” Sage pulled her shirt and leggings back on, wringing out her red curls. "Alright, dragon-waifu. Time to catch the biggest golden goose of the century.”

  “He’s not that… valuable,” Galateya huffed.

  “Uh-huh. Sure, sure, he ain’t.” Sage hopped onto Galateya's back without asking permission, arms wrapping around her neck, legs locking around her waist. "Giddyup, my watery steed! Onward to victory!"

  Galateya's scales and mane flushed orange-pink at the unexpected contact. The Skinwalker's body pressed against her back, warm and soft and entirely too distracting.

  Focus. Hunt. Ash.

  She waved at the free gun unit nuzzling the human and strode into the lake, digitigrade legs carrying her deeper until the water reached her chest. Her Phase-shift responded to the lake, scales smoothing into hydrodynamic patterns. Gills opened along her neck. Her mane compressed into streamlined spines.

  The water... welcomed her.

  Affinity. Recognition. The lake knew her as kin, as a Taniwha, the song of the storm and tide.

  Galateya reached out with her will and the water answered.

  A current formed beneath her feet. It lifted her, carried her, accelerated her across the lake's surface like she weighed nothing. The shore blurred. Wind whipped past, carrying spray and the scent of pine.

  Sage whooped in her ear. "WOOOOO! You're like a sexy jet ski!"

  The water bent to Galateya's desire. She leaned into the motion, letting the current build. The far shore approached rapidly.

  They covered the distance in minutes. Galateya's feet touched the rocky beach on the opposite side, the current dissipating as she released her hold on the lake.

  Sage dismounted reluctantly. "Aww, already? We should do that again sometime. Maybe get you a saddle. N’ you can draw some racing stripes on yo scales!"

  Galateya said nothing. Her mind churned with darker thoughts.

  Broken gun bond. Conceptual damage. Court martial.

  "Hey." Sage's freckles rearranged into concerned frowny faces. "Why do you look like someone just told you Christmas is cancelled?"

  "I'm fine," Galateya lied.

  "Nope." Sage stepped in front of her, blocking her path into the forest. "Try again. And this time without the bullshit."

  Galateya's jaw clenched. "We need to…"

  "The hunt can wait thirty seconds." Sage crossed her arms. "Talk to me, T. What crawled up your butt and died?"

  "Nothing crawled—" Galateya stopped herself. Her Justice sense ignited bright, cutting through her own deflection.

  Truth. She owed Sage the truth, especially after what they'd shared.

  “It's very mean to use Skinwalker Charmchain on humans.”

  Sage's ears folded down. “I'm aware and I won't do it again. I… I… want to have friends who are mentally strong enough to put up with me. I didn't even hit him with the full charm on purpose, just peeled back to my human shift and… yeah, I feel bad now. But at least it helped Katherine make a move. Did you see her pawing all over him? I'm sure he's a berrrry happy lap kitty now.”

  Galateya sighed.

  “What else is bothering you? That cannot be it,” Sage said. “Come on, hit me with the truth, T.”

  "I broke her," Galateya whispered. "Katherine. Keiy. Whatever she calls herself now. I didn't merely hurt her. I destroyed something fundamental. Our blood bond is gone. Completely severed. Do you understand what the Frontenachii will do if they find out I can permanently break blood bonds and free symbiote weapons?"

  Sage's ears flattened. "Ah. Yeah. Dat sounds... problematic."

  "Problematic?" Galateya laughed bitterly. "They'll dissect me. Study how I did it. Understand the effect, figure out defenses against it. Then Admiral Evelithria will splice me into her wall as punishment for sabotaging vital fleet property. I'll spend decades as living art, conscious, unable to move, watching as..."

  “T-bun, you’re spiraling again,” the Skinwalker stated.

  "How can I not spiral?!" Galateya's scales shifted through panicked blacks and icy whites. "My great-grandmother can read me like a book! One conversation with Legate Ixthia and she'll know! She'll know everything and then..."

  "Then you lie," Sage said simply.

  "I can't lie!"

  "You can't lie convincingly," Sage corrected. "There's a difference. But you know what you CAN do? Misdirection. Partial truths. Strategic omissions." She tapped Galateya's chest. "You're Justice, right? Well, sometimes justice means protecting people from unjust systems. Even if you have to bend some rules to do it."

  Galateya stared at the Skinwalker. "You want me to... what? Deceive my great-grandmother?"

  “Your great-grandmother can't read your mind if you don't LET her."

  "How do I not let her do that? She's a fucking Wendigo Archmage!”

  A holoprojection flashed from the V-ring Sage was now wearing, displaying Ash. “You freeze her. Or freeze your thoughts.”

  “What?” Galateya blinked at her consort.

  “Either we take out your grandmother,” Ash said. “Or you learn to freeze particular thoughts of yours. Or Sh–fff–Commander Xandria splits your mind. We’ll figure it out. Together. Promise.”

  “Together,” Sage nodded, eyeing Ash. “Super together. I can help too. Cover you in foxy artifacts that’ll make you harder to scan, harder to see, harder to find. Etcetera. Also, I want in. Fully in. If you'll have me. Officially."

  “Fully in as in…?”

  “As in I want to date you both,” Sage said. “For as long as you can tolerate my stupid mind-melting face and heart.”

  Galateya stared at the Skinwalker. At her honest sky-blue eyes. At the fourteen thousand fox souls spinning in their depths. At Raelle Knight, the human girl who'd chosen immortality within eternal daydream of yesterday over oblivion.

  Her Justice sense pinged.

  Truth. Absolute truth. No deception. No manipulation. Just raw, vulnerable want.

  "Okay," Galateya whispered.

  "Okay?" Sage's freckles exploded into hearts. "Like, okay okay? Not 'okay let me think about it' but actual 'yes I want to date you' okay?"

  "Yes." Galateya pulled the Skinwalker into a hug. "Yes to dating. Yes to figuring this out together. Yes to... us."

  “Yes,” Ash said from the V-ring.

  Sage let out a squeak-sob, burying her face in Galateya's neck. "Woot! I have a girlfriend. TWO girlfriends if we count Ash as a girlfriend. Which we should because he's pretty enough."

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  “Oi,” the hologram huffed. “I’m handsome, not pretty!”

  “What?” Sage teased cheekily. “I don’t know what you’re hiding under the peak masculinity stick-on chin and fake-ass muscles!”

  “Definitely not a girl,” Ash said.

  “We’ll see what you’re hidin’ when I rip it all off ya,” Sage swished her puffy tail.

  “You’ll have to catch me first,” he said.

  “We only lost an hour on your dastardly mud trap and feels bomb!” The fox bobbed. “Still plenty of time to dismantle you!”

  “Such promises,” the human rolled his eyes.

  . . .

  Galateya and Sage sprinted into the forest, following Ash's trail. The scent was clear now, no false decoys messing up the direction. Only the gigachad frame's magitek signature and sweaty human smell leading north through the increasingly dense undergrowth.

  "Getting close," Sage announced, nose twitching. "Maybe fifteen minutes ahead.”

  "Good." Galateya's rifle hung ready at her side. "We—"

  Something white and sticky hit her face.

  "PTHHHT!" She clawed at the substance, struggling to free herself. It clung to her snout, her scales, her claws. "What the—"

  "WEB!" Sage yelped, hopping back as another strand caught her shoulder. "SPIDER WEB! GAH! He’s got giant pet spiders! Why Chaddicus Rex?” She yelled at the ring. “That's like my worst fear, getting eaten by spiders!”

  “They're not giant spiders,” Ash clarified.

  “Then what's with the webs?” Sage demanded.

  “A slight, whimsical impediment.” Ash shrugged. “Nobody is going to eat you.”

  “Someone better eat me tonight.” Sage wiggled her eyebrows at Galateya, making the dragon frown and blush slightly with Japanese blossoms blooming across her mane.

  Sage looked up.

  More webs became visible in the trees above. Thick, ropey strands that stretched between trunks in elaborate geometric patterns. They descended in waves, coating branches, blocking paths, creating a three-dimensional maze of sticky filament.

  A figure dropped from the canopy. Blue and red fabric. White eye lenses. A lanky human body wrapped in colorful fabric patterned after a very distinctive comic book hero.

  "HALT, EVILDOERS!" the spider-themed hero declared, firing webbing from wrist-mounted spinnerets.

  Sage dodged left. Galateya dove right. The web splattered between them.

  “Oh thank God, it's just a skinny dude in a spandex.” Sage laughed. She looked at her V-ring. “Arachinds-Man? Really, bruh?! When did we transmigrate to the fuckin’ Garvel universe?”

  "Your pursuit ends here! In the sticky embrace of JUSTICE!" the hero declared.

  “Justice? He’s really fucking with me with all this crap,” Galateya grumbled.

  “Come on, it's great,” Sage laughed and then got tangled up in a web. “Gah! Help, I’m a damsel in distress! It’s got my tail!”

  She began flailing and got herself even more stuck.

  “Curse you, Arachnids-Man!” she decried, wiggling furiously. “First we got delayed with mud wrestling and now it’s bondage! What’s next? Spanking? Tickling? Watersports?!”

  “What?! No! This is a PG villain capture scenario!” Arachnids-Man choked at her audacious words. “There’s no bondage!”

  “I dunno, I feel pretty bound up and edged right now,” Sage purred. “You know what you are doing, Bondage-Man.”

  “Please stop talking,” the hero blanched.

  “You’ll have to gag me!” Sage shot back, making Arachnids-Man bubble with righteous indignation.

  Galateya summoned her water affinity with a growl. A thick fog wall formed from ambient moisture, washing over the nearest web. The strands dissolved, albeit only slightly. Not enough to get through.

  She compressed the cloud into a sword of absolute zero ice and began slicing through the webs. As Arachnids-Man fired another web at her, Galateya manifested an ice-shield, letting the web harmlessly smash against it. The subzero front of the shield made the sticky substance completely inert, rapidly turning it into crumbling dust.

  The Taniwha manifested ice armor across her back and began chopping Sage free from the web.

  “My savior Knight!” Sage slumped into Galateya’s embrace, mauling her with kisses. “Could have kept me there longer, you know. Steam me up real good!”

  Another ice sword formed in Sage's grip.

  “Here,” Teya said. “Help chop through.”

  "Ooh, fancy!" Sage admired the weapon. "Very anime protagonist. I love it." Her hand shifted to skeletal-flesh. She attacked the nearest web with it.

  "NOOOO!" Arachnids-Man wailed from above. "My webs! My beautiful, carefully constructed webs!"

  "Sorry, spider-dude!" Sage called back, slicing through the next web in front of them. "We've got places to be! Boyfriends to catch! Romantic confrontations and forest bonking to have!"

  They fought through the webbed forest together. Galateya cut high, Sage cut low. Ice swords flashed in the dappled sunlight. Web sections fell, drifting away.

  Unfortunately, there was an absurd amount of webbing and Arachnids-Man just kept making more, slowing them down and vanishing between trees. Galateya began throwing ice lances at him, but the Garvel hero was very agile and hard to hit.

  The superhero had spent significant time preparing this obstacle course. Every tree featured multiple anchor points. Every gap held backup barriers. The moment they cleared one section, he swung ahead and created more.

  "This is taking FOREVER!" Galateya snarled, hacking through the twentieth web wall.

  “I’ll get you, evildoers!” Arachnids-Man threatened from a distance.

  "You planned this," Galateya complained at Ash’s gigachad face-hologram. "The mud wrestling, Katherine, the lake… all clever delays. Time for this blasted web-labyrinth to be set up."

  “Would you prefer me to trip over a rock and fall into your lap?” Ash asked. “I'm making the hunt more challenging. Isn't that what you wanted? For me to take it seriously? Go on, tell me that you aren't loving this.”

  Galateya huffed, obliterating several webs with the ice-spiked tail and not answering her consort.

  The unexpected hunt delays and twists were bothersome and yet she couldn't lie to herself. Figuring out how to use her water affinity in new, interesting ways was.. fun. She wanted more. So much more of this. Fighting in a forest with an Omnid friend at her side felt… amazing, like she was born for it. The water sang in her blood, craving violence in the name of Justice.

  "Strategic depth!" Sage commented, wrapping the chilly handle of her sword in bits of her shirt that she tore up, exposing her toned midriff. "Layered defenses! Classic military thinking! I'm impressed, aroused and annoyed simultaneously!"

  Arachnids-Man fired another volley. Galateya sliced it from the air, ice sword leaving chilly steam trails. The hero retreated into the canopy, chattering about the "sanctity of proper webbing."

  They pressed forward. Cut. Advance. Cut again. The forest gradually opened as they destroyed enough webs to create a path.

  Sage's frustration visibly mounted with each new web barrier as time passed. She sliced through another strand, then another. The superhero swung overhead, cackling about his "impenetrable defense."

  "That's it!" Sage threw down her blade. "I'm done playing nice!"

  The Skinwalker reached up and touched the choker around her neck. The artifact pulsed with eerie off-color rainbows and Sage simply... ceased to exist. Erased from local reality like someone had hit the delete button on her.

  "Sage?" Galateya blinked, looking around. Not knowing where her partner was felt very unnerving to her senses.

  "Still here," a voice whispered from somewhere nearby. "Gonna bondage his ass. Get ready with an ice spear."

  Galateya relaxed slightly, nodded and stuck the ice sword into the ground, manifesting an ice-spear. She watched Arachnids-Man swing between nearby branches, completely unaware of the predator stalking him.

  Sage materialized directly behind the hero mid-swing, her arms wrapping around his neck in a chokehold. The sudden weight threw off his trajectory. They tumbled through the air together.

  "SURPRISE, STICKY BOY!" Sage yelled.

  "GACK—WHO—WHERE—" The hero flailed, trying to aim his web-shooters backward.

  They crashed into a thick branch. Sage maintained her grip, legs wrapping around his torso. "What's wrong, spidey? Never been ambushed by a thirsty fox before?"

  "Let go!" He wheezed, clawing at her arms.

  "Not until you stop being such a cockblock!" Sage tightened her hold. "Do you have ANY idea how hard it is to get quality alone time with your girlfriend when some spider keeps gluing my tail to shit?! DO YOU?!"

  She punctuated the last word by slamming her bony fist into the side of his masked head. The hero's body went limp for a second before his hands scrabbled for purchase on the branch.

  "You know what you need?" Sage grabbed his wrist-mounted web-shooter and aimed it at a nearby trunk. "A timeout! In your OWN sticky jail!"

  She fired. White strands shot out, splattering across tree bark. She swung the hero around, using his own equipment to wrap him to the trunk. Around his chest. Around his arms. Around his legs.

  "Stahp! This is assault of a superhero!" He protested weakly. "There are LAWS!"

  "Laws against being annoying?" Sage wrapped another layer around his torso. "Because buddy, you've been violating those ALL afternoon! Probably laws against webbing up national parks too. How many poor foxes are going to get stuck in your stupid ass webs? Wildlife trapping is like super illegal. Go back to New York buddy!”

  “My webs dissolve after a few hours!” the hero whined.

  She hopped off him, landing on the branch beside his cocooned form. Unfortunately, her tail had gotten tangled in the webbing during the wrapping process.

  "Oh, come ON!" Sage tugged at the sticky strands. "Seriously? I just—GAH!"

  She pulled harder. The webbing stretched but didn't break. Her movements only made it worse, wrapping more of her tail, then catching her left hand when she tried to free it.

  "HA!" Arachnids-Man laughed. "Justice prevails! The villain gets stuck in her own trap."

  "Suck my—" Sage's retort cut off as she lost her balance. She toppled sideways, and got fully stuck to the hero's webbing, ending up plastered against his cocooned form from the side.

  Galateya hurled the ice lance.

  It flew true, piercing through the webbing and Arachnids-Man's chest, securing him firmly to the trunk like a pinned bug. The hero let out a theatrical groan. "Not cool. Who will save New York from Professor Doomsday if you put me on ice?"

  "You know," Sage called out, wiggling vigorously against the hero, "if I'd known you were into this kind of thing, spider-boy, I would've suggested dinner first!"

  "This is NOT—I don't date villains—would you STOP MOVING!" the hero protested.

  "Can't help it!" Sage thrust harder. "My fox instincts say wiggle when trapped. Very biological. Very primal. You wouldn't understand with your gross spidah-brains."

  Arachnids-Man sputtered.

  Galateya sighed and grabbed the ice sword.

  "Oh good!" Sage perked up. "My lovely girlfriend's here to save me."

  Galateya sliced Sage free of the web.

  "Hey, web-head," Sage continued as Galateya pulled her free and froze the rest of the hero to the trunk. "Have you ever considered what your whole aesthetic is truly about? 'Oh look at me, I shoot white sticky stuff everywhere by thrusting my hands a lot!' Real subtle, buddy."

  "What?! It's WEBBING!" the hero insisted. "Quit ruining my aesthetic with your terrible comments! It's for crime f-"

  He fell silent as ice engulfed his head.

  “Well done. You have defeated my second defender. It only took you an hour and six minutes,” Ash commented from the V-ring smugly.

  "Wanna know what else takes an hour? Because I got a list and it starts with—" Sage began.

  "We're resuming the hunt," Galateya interrupted, scales flushing bright pink as she pulled on Sage’s hand. "Come on."

  "Spoilsport." Sage stretched, torn shirt riding up further. "One cannot rush the yearning arc. It violates narrative causality!" she added. "So, what's next on the menu of lascivious delay-delights, A-Man? Doctor Stranger? Because I can think of sooooo many lewd situations involving portals and…"

  "No. You have to get through another supreme master of science and sorcery to reach me," Ash stated from the V-ring with a chortle.

  "Science and sorcery?" Sage tilted her head. "Please tell me you did not hire a boring ol’ magician. I hate card tricks. They always hide the ace in the sleeve and it smells like old man wrist."

  "Much worse," Ash promised. "Behold your Doom!"