As Jackal put it, "I want you guys out of the Academy for a short stint while we attempt an independent search into this Assassin. If we can't find anything within 3 days, you guys can come back, and if anything happens, I know that you'll be there to take care of it, Artemis!" It wasn't hard to imagine an overly enthusiastic thumbs-up at the end of that spiel.
Artemis and Beatrice, forced together for three days on the beaches of the De Oro territory on Luma Sanctus-- a ways away from the hustle and bustle near Lumanbell and the Kowloon Undercities. Of course, during this random vacation abruptly called by Jackal himself after barely knowing each other in around a week, Artemis in this case was forced out of her armor and into thick, black leather pants, tighened around the middle second of her abdomen, the bathing suit she wore being the only thing covering her chest as her ears flicked curiously at the new environment surrounding the both of them.
Beatrice sighed, shoving various pills down her throat, forced down by a mango-colored drink, before she tiredly whipped around, looking Artemis up and down. "Is your boss always this flippant in his decisions?"
Artemis grabbed a straw hat that was the perfect size for her head and put it on. "Oh...?" She looked Beatrice in the eyes, pointing to her new hat. "Am I wearing this right?"
Beatrice ignored the question, gazing up at the blue skies above. "I'm surprised it's so nice here. Isn't the rest of Luma Sanctus a fuckin' hellhole?"
Artemis took a few steps toward Beatrice, casting a shadow with her large frame. "Are you not native to this world?"
"Yes and no? Been mostly borderline hospitalized, stuck in a sterile room, left to mingle about with whatever devices I happened to have convinced my dad at the time to buy me-- which of course, he had completely bleached of any germs or bacteria beforehand."
"I... believe Jackal told me that you had some sort of illness?"
"Auto-immune disease." A beat, "I have to drown myself with medication and rely super heavily on my cybernetics to even be out here right now." She gestured to the summer environment that surrounded them both.
Artemis took in Beatrice's words for a moment before looking out to the ocean that stretched past the horizon. Wind blew through Artemis. She stood there, taking in the cool air of De Oro's seafront before looking back down at Beatrice, who was left pouting at her circumstances. Artemis stood there for a beat longer before speaking up. "Should we... what do people do at a beach?"
"Uh... I dunno? Swim or something? This entire area had to be cut off from the rest of Luma Sanctus's ocean by the way, cause the rest of it is polluted beyond belief." Beatrice shrugged. "Can't blame them. They made it look nice at the very least."
The wind blew a little stronger than it had at this point, prompting Artemis to hold the straw hat she managed to find onto her head. "Maybe we could... try... ice... cream...?" Artemis hesitated to make the suggestion, but in her mind, Breinhen's heads echoed. A step forward.
"Ice Cream?" Beatrice sighed. "Okay, whatever, sure."
They both went their separate ways, finding the nearest ice cream shop they could, making their way inside, and were introduced to the rude awakening of a worker gasping at Artemis's height as she squeezed into their store.
Beatrice, without missing a beat, leaned onto the front counter. "Do you guys have banana pudding as a flavor?"
The girl behind the counter, a human like Beatrice, flicked her gaze over to the sickly girl. "Yes, we do!"
Beatrice looked up to Artemis. "What do you want?"
Artemis scanned the options, instantly overwhelmed, mumbling under her breath. "I've never had ice cream before..."
Beatrice sighed, looking back at one of the employees tending to them. "Do you guys have samples here? Or allow sampling?"
"Um..." A nervous glance at the large Emoren. "Yes! We do! Uh... what flavors do you want to try?"
Beatrice gestured to Artemis. "What do you want, big girl?"
"Can I try the flavor Beatrice was going for... what was it?"
"Banana pudding."
Artemis nodded in affirmation.
The worker grabbed a tiny spoon, scooping out a sample from one of the containers that sat behind a glass pane. They held it up to Artemis, whose hand almost cupped both their hand and wrist in its entirety before taking the sample and putting it into their mouth. Artemis's eyes lit up, immediately overwhelmed by the flavor. In this moment, rather than a walking war machine, Artemis was reduced to being a child trying something for the first time.
Artemis's body shook, tail whipping excitedly. "U-Uhm! C-Can I try the mint!?" She handed back the small sample spoon that the employee had given her.
"The toothpaste ice cream!?" Beatrice exclaimed, rolling her eyes.
Artemis ignored her, taking back the spoon, now with a scoop of mint chocolate chip within the divet, putting it into her mouth. Her ears flickered, and her tail stiffened. "Oh!?" Artemis blinked, "That's pretty good... I think I like the last one more..." She mumbled, scanning the options once again.
One of the employees, with a smile, raised their hand to speak. "Actually, we'd like to mention-- we don't get other races often here within the De Oro territory, so we just happened to be surprised when we happened just to see... y'know, two Emoren in one day."
Beatrice pursed her lips, brow knit in curiosity. "Two?"
They nodded. "Yes, your friend here is the second Emoren we've seen today."
"Oh~... that's interesting. Hey," Beatrice turned to Artemis. "You hear that?"
Artemis's ears fluttered, "Hm... That's interesting. I don't meet many of my kind often anymore, so I wonder if we'll run into them." Artemis pointed to the chocolate-flavored ice cream.
"You gonna try the whole damn menu, big girl?"
Artemis pointed to the banana pudding, as well as the vanilla and chocolate flavors. "Can I have two scoops of the pudding, and one of each for vanilla and chocolate?"
Beatrice scoffed. "Finally-- two scoops of the pudding."
After getting their ice cream, they walked over to the beach, sitting down at a nearby bench, watching the ocean waves wet the beach before receding into the outstretched horizon before them. Artemis's eyes were practically watering with each bite of their combination of ice cream flavors, as they experienced these flavors for the first time, essentially.
"Nice view..." Beatrice commented, letting out a small sigh of relief before leaning into the backrest of the bench, watching the sun slowly dip below the edge of the world.
Artemis's ears fluttered, looking over her shoulder to Beatrice with a curious gaze. "Yeah..." She nodded, looking back out over the horizon. "It's... never seen anything like it or... rather... never got to appreciate sights like these, I guess."
Beatrice looked up at Artemis's back, eyes focusing on the Spinal Pauldron lined across it, visible scarring surrounding it, as if there was a struggle putting it on, or her body grew out of the pauldron that was already there, like the flesh was forced to adapt around the machinery. "I can't imagine."
Some hours had passed, and they were forced to return to their hotel room as the sky blackened. Beatrice threw herself onto one of the beds, a palpable exhaustion seeping into her bones as she let out a long, exasperated sigh. Artemis crossed to the other end of the room, looking out from the balcony back to the moon-bleached beach below.
A moment passed, Artemis bringing her gaze over to her own bed, which was sitting right beside Beatrice's bed. "This is unfamiliar..."
"Hm?" Beatrice turned over to look at Artemis. "What do you mean?"
"Well... I've never slept in a bed before."
"W-- Now, hold on a second. You have a bed at my place."
"I-I do?"
"Yeah! You do! You should've been sleeping in your own room, in fact! Have you just been sleeping out in the living room?"
"N-No... I... I thought it was a guest room, and I always slept beside the bed because I didn't think it was mine."
Beatrice let out a long, gravely groan, holding her head in her hands. "Well, now you know! Go and sleep like a normal person, okay?" Beatrice almost threw herself back onto the other end of her bed, wrapping herself in her blankets.
Artemis's eyes searched for an answer that wasn't there, but eventually chose the most straightforward answer there could've been, and it was her lying down onto the soft, cushioned surface of her hotel bed. She sank into it, enveloped by softness, and threw a pillow beneath her head, mimicking Beatrice, as she was her only frame of reference for what was normal. She was lying down for a moment, unblinking, before throwing the blankets over herself, unable to fit her feet under the covers. Eventually, Artemis opted to hug her covers tight, throwing an additional pair of pillows in between her thighs, squeezing down as hard as she could as she buried her face deeper into her pillow.
The next moment, she found herself waking up, the sun's shine outside beating down onto her face, her eyes peeling themselves open, a light groan leaving Artemis's throat. The years of exhaustion had caught up with her, or maybe it was the jet lag? She's never experienced jet lag before, though.
Looking at a nearby clock, Artemis soon realized that she had overslept with Beatrice. The afternoon had just started by the time they were awake. Artemis pushed herself off from the bed, as if it were some devilish creature luring her into a deep slumber. She threw a leg off the bed, standing up, stretching out her body, eliciting a deep crack within her lower spine, reverberating up to the upper parts of her back.
I've become complacent too quickly. Artemis thought about her actions leading up to this point. Maybe it was the inherently mortal part of herself finally revealing itself more and more as she lived within these easier times.
She needed to raise her guard, at least, that's what she believed.
After an hour, Beatrice finally woke up as well, an eye peaking out from her pillow, greeted by the sight of Artemis's sweaty back as she performed pull-ups with the ceiling of their hotel room. Artemis let out periodic, controlled huffs, a sour expression on her face, and her knees brought in close to her chest. Artemis barely needed to lower herself to the ground, simply placing her feet back down as she let go of her grip of the ceiling, lifting one leg above her head, pressing it up against the wall in front of her as she stretched.
"Uh... you uh... working out?" Beatrice spoke up, causing Artemis to spin around to look over at her groggy form.
Artemis nodded in affirmation. "Yeah. Figured I'd warm up a little."
"How long have you been at it?"
"An hour?"
"Straight?"
"Yes." Artemis moved around to a towel set on a nearby chair, wiping her body down with it. "Is something wrong?"
"No... I was just surprised for a moment, but... that's actually really normal." Beatrice sniffed the air, smelling of burnt charcoal with a light tinge of sulphur. "You should take a shower, though."
Artemis nodded again, making her way to the restroom, closing the door behind her. Inside, she slipped out of her clothes, throwing them into a nearby washer before getting into the shower itself. Her eyes scanned the general make, realizing that she was much too big. She pulled the showerhead up, hoping that the water would actually land on her body.
She turned the shower on itself, dipping her head below it, letting the water roll off her head and down her body, slicking her bangs back to get the hair out of the way and out of her eyes.
Eventually, she exited the shower, drying herself off with a towel, not a care in the world for her exposed form, until a loud exclamation from Beatrice snapped her out of her relaxed state. "Woah! Woah!" Beatrice threw herself over her bed, hiding her gaze. "The hell are you doing, girl!?"
"W-What!? What's the problem!?" Artemis looked around for a present threat.
"Put some fuckin' clothes on!"
Artemis blinked. "Oh..." Her expression grew curious. "I... is there a problem with my form?" She rummaged through one of their bag, grabbing out the larger clothes inside. "We're both women. I can't imagine that there is a real problem with that, no?"
"Yeah! And some women like both men and women, and when seeing a naked person, they make them uncomfortable, so~... put some clothes on!"
"I am presently doing that." Artemis sighed, throwing a skin-tight, long-sleeved, black shirt over her body, stretching a pair of boxers over her lower half, tail poking through a small hole made just for her, before pulling over those boxers a pair of shorts that don't go below the upper half of her thighs. "Is this fine?"
Beatrice scanned the giant for a moment. "You need a bra."
Artemis looked into the bag again. "Do we have one that fits me?"
"We do, actually. There should be a sports bra in there."
Artemis immediately took her shirt off again, prompting an expletive from Beatrice, who then threw a sports bra over herself, followed by the black shirt. "Is it alright now?"
Beatrice sighed. "Yeah... I guess?"
"I struggle to understand the intricacies surrounding romantic and sexual attraction that you all have."
"I wouldn't imagine a dog to the Imperium would. How do you sleep so well at night?"
"Training... though... not like this." Artemis's tail flicked in frustration. "Usually, I am still fully cognizant while resting... I made a mistake. I don't understand what happened, but not long after resting on that bed, I was fast asleep. We, Sangilo, do not require a full day of rest, yet I fell to my base desires anyway..."
"You're saying a lot of good things like they're bad right now."
"Are they good?"
Beatrice rolled her eyes. "I need you to realize that we're in an environment where you don't have to worry about that perfect soldier attitude, y'know? Rest is fine! Sleeping is fine! Just because you can survive for four hours doesn't mean you should!"
Artemis remained quiet at her words, just looking down at her hands in longing and contemplation. After a moment, she sighed, "I suppose we should head out?"
Beatrice groaned.
***
The beaches of the De Oro territory were packed to the brim with people at this time of day. Umbrellas erected into the sand, towels laid out for sunbathing or rest, with some lawn chairs here and there, stuffed into holes to prevent anyone from falling from their seats, along with a gaggle of people playing within the water, laughing their worries away.
Artemis stood by one of the railings, just behind the beach itself, curiously scanning her environment with fluttering ears and a whipping tail. "Wow..." She muttered.
Beatrice looked less than enthused, sat on a nearby bench, propping her back against the wall behind her. "Man... why today of all days?"
"So it is appropriate to show as much skin as they are if they are near water?"
Beatrice scowled. "Uh... yeah, I guess?"
"Do we have swimsuits?"
"Is that not that one-piece outfit you have?"
"No?"
Beatrice sighed. "Do all of you Sangilo wear stuff like that underneath your armor?"
"Yes."
Beatrice blinked. "Really? You all wear that?"
"I... would assume so? We were put into more proper garb while training, of course, but for the most part, we only wore whatever we could wear underneath our armor."
Beatrice's eyes searched for something in Artemis's face for a moment. "Honestly... I don't know what I expected, but I fully thought you would be dead silent most of the time ever since I first met you, but you've beaten me in the 'talking' department. You really like hearing your own voice, huh?"
"What? No? I've been trained to explain any information that is asked of me and to ask any questions I do not know about otherwise."
"I see..." A beat. "Since you like talking about yourself so much, why don't you tell me about your days in the Blood War... I... I am curious to hear a direct account, I won't lie."
Artemis looked over her shoulder at Beatrice. "What would you want me to say?"
"I dunno... tell me about your scars? What about the one that goes around the lower half of your back?" Beatrice blinked, "Actually, it goes around your whole body, no?"
Artemis nodded, "Yes..." Her eyes looked back out to the ocean, recalling her time on Fervens Ostium, during the Blood War, when Devils attempted to invade the Numen Solar Cluster-- a battle that had lasted for decades. Still, of course, as we know it, Artemis was only there to participate in the very end of the war itself.
But at the very end of the Blood War itself was its most violent, visceral battle to date. The memory began with the hulking size of a red-skinned fiend clad in molten black armor, its tusks roiling past and around the back of its thin, pointed ears as its golden, slit eyes looked down at Artemis, who was easily outmatched in height and width.
A long, rotted blade is held in the beast's hand, rushing forward as if they weren't nearly 6 meters tall compared to the 3 meters tall Artemis, who, at an inhuman speed, jumped back in turn, the sword swinging overhead as she dipped just beneath its pointed tip.
Rotating the blade, keeping its momentum, the tip rocketed back down onto Artemis, slamming against her Flux Shields, which reverberated with flickering colors of blue and red, the ground cracking beneath her. Even with her Flux Shields, she still felt the impact from outside her invisible protection, and before she could react, a fist shot out from under her.
Artemis threw her arms up, blocking the strike; her Flux Shields took most of the impact, the violent energy causing her armor to shiver. The energy was sent into the sky from their strike, equivalent to an artillery cannon in firepower.
Artemis mid-flight, the Devlish bing firing forward, wings sprouting out from her back, spiraling into the air, prompting the Sangilo Warrior to lash herself to the ground immediately. The fiend pirouetting into the air, landing behind Artemis, reeling back for another swing.
The Hunter-Killer took out their Burst Pistol, firing into the armored, devilish shell that encased the beast, cracking it open as its sword collided against Artemis's body, sending her spiraling again, but instead, crashing into nearby debris. Artemis gasped in pain, reeling from the attack, but the Fiend was relentless, charging forward once again. She leveled her pistol at the creature, firing as much as she could into its shell, flesh, and metal, firing into the air as the sword nearly cracked through her Flux Shields, but... eventually, too much heat had gathered up within her cybernetics, forcing her to expel it all in one fell swoop, making her enhancements temporarily unusable.
In cases like these, her Spinal Pauldron injected her with Adrenal Modules, sending her into a fiery rage, crashing into the monster's legs, lifting their huge form above her head, and throwing the Fiend into the ground, sending muddy earth and viscera into the air.
Artemis cried in fury, sprinting up the monster's body like a salivating beast, moving in for the kill, moving in for their feast, blade slipping into the grip of her hand and slitting the throat of the Devil in front of her. Deep Red spilled out from the wound, and there was a moment of pause, a moment where Artemis truly believed in her victory. Still, before she could react, she was grabbed by the leg with one of the Fiend's off-hands, throwing her into the ground before stabbing her in the stomach with their sword, piercing her armor.
Artemis thought she was safe, though, as it had barely even managed to reach her abdomen. That hope was dashed, however, the fiend reaching up, grabbing onto Atremis's arms and then her legs before pulling as hard as they could.
With a sickenening, fleshy ripping sound, Artemis, along with her armor, was ripped in two, the top half of her body thrown to the side just before the Devil collapsed, dead on the ground.
"Holy shit!" Beatrice exclaimed, eyes wide in worry as she scanned Artemis's body once again. "How the hell are you alive!?"
"People have survived more... ridiculous things, I believe."
"Yeah! But regardless! That's not exactly a statistical commonality, y'know!?"
Artemis looked back out to the ocean again. "Our suits... they preserve us for a time. I was lucky to be found and taken back in for surgery, and I was also fortunate that they found the bottom half of my body as well. Sangilo bodies are... impressively durable, I suppose... yes, some of us can die so easily." Artemis flexed one of her arms. "This one as well was removed at some point-- I managed to recover it, and they re-attached it. Being a genetically modified creature has its benefits, I suppose, since my own body's healing factor is more enhanced than the average person's."
"Damn man, I wish I were like you. Not like... your circumstances, but like... having a body like that would be nice. Or like... is it annoying to move around, being that big or something? If so, then... maybe not."
"It is a bit troublesome, but it isn't anything that I can't handle. I've had to live like this for practically my whole life after all."
An unknown voice chimed in. "Holy~! You're big!" They chuckled, leaning on the same railing Artemis was leaning on.
Beatrice sighed, lifting herself from the bench to get a look at the new figure. "Who?"
An Emoren, Nisf-qism with darker brown skin, sharp golden eyes, and thick silver hair tied up into a ponytail. Her Elven, pointed ears poked out from her curls, and a smirk spread across her face. "Hi, I'm Kumi. Sorry for uh... butting in."
Artemis leaned away from the woman. "Um... I'm Artemis."
Beatrice looked between the two. "I'm alright-- Wait, the ice cream shop over there," She pointed off a few meters away at the shot that had a cute little mascot of a sentient bit of ice cream cannibalizing another bowl of ice cream. "They mentioned another Emoren around here."
"Oh, yeah! I'm just visiting-- vacation, and all that." She smiled.
Artemis gave a respectful bow before returning to admire the sight of people dancing on the ocean's sands, the sun beating down onto the vast expanse of blue, providing it with a shimmering white glow.
"What caused you to get so big, miss?"
Artemis blinked, looking over at the smaller Emoren woman. "Um... I think it was a combination of factors. If I remember correctly, I was not supposed to be as large as my compatriots, but due to my blood, being partly Jotiat, had led to my more expansive height and muscle mass."
"Oh... Impressive stuff. What do you mean by 'compatriots', however?"
"I am--"
Beatrice gave Artemis a pointed look.
"N-Nothing... never mind."
"Okay... keeping it close to the chest, huh?" Kumi snickered.
Artemis sighed, unable to get a read on the woman in front of her before something bleated out into her ear. "Hey, Artemis, sorry to open our transmission like this while you two are out relaxing."
She placed her fingers up against the transponder in her ear, "Is it urgent?"
"No, more an update. We've identified the race of the body we found near the Lumanbell Academy."
"You have?"
"Yes, we haven't identified who it is yet, though, but they appear to be a Half Elf of some kind. Nisf-qizm. As you know, they're approximately 180 centimeters tall, and they seem to have almost a cat-like shape to their eyes... that's about a-- Oh... wait, no, we have an image now."
"Excuse me for a moment." Artemis grabbed something from a bag Beatrice had at her side, disconnecting the lens on her Hunter-Killer mask and putting it up to her eye.
"Okay, sent over an image of who we believe the victim is."
"I see... so this is who we're looking for?"
"Yeah."
Artemis reached into her bag, pulling out her knife, clashing with Kumi in that brief moment, Beatrice recoiling, falling into Artemis's stomach, who held her close. A wry smile spread across Kumi's face.