Another chapter in the span of two days?! Gaspity Gasp! I'm trying to increase the output, so expect things like this. This chapter's dedicated to @pixenglish who's amazing The Diplomat's Daughter is well worth reading. Creepy cults and weird stuff abound. You'll love it!

"It's changing course." Leonidas told me.

"I can see."

The snow was still falling delicately, kissing my wounds maternally. I brushed them away. "Can you rally the cats together?"

"Why?" he asked.

"Because they've found the place."

"How do you know?"

"Because that thing's my mother."

Leonidas pattered away.

I tailed the monster and the lady in the smouldering twilight, waiting for the cats to arrive. There were a lot of them. Lots of little parts that made up this world. But they wouldn't be enough.

I didn't have a lot of time to wonder, though. To wonder why I was finishing this job for someone else. It seemed ridiculous, now that I was at the cusp of it. This was my job, no doubt about it, but I wasn't obliged to do it. I was dead. I am dead (be careful what you eye wish for).

This was probably the impending destruction. This was what was coming to me.

That thing which looked like my mother and the thing controlling her, they'd kill all the cats. And I'm sure that'd destroy the world. That was all it took.

This didn't worry me as much as I thought it would. It calmed me, more than anything. It soothed me. This was the end and I was getting closer and closer towards it. I was here.

This was it.

It seemed a long time ago, when I packed my bag. When I selected that frayed old book. When I chose my name (let us consider that for a while the metaphoric resonances are endless the names oh the names the name she picked for herself interest eye very much because it affects us it is like a twang on the spider-web of life and it resonates and judders back and forth as we fend for ourselves the world is hostile to us and we have only names to hold on to and she chose a name and that name gives us power oh power). And it was over.

The journey began there and it ends here.

I loved it. It gave me strength.

I didn't lose sight of them and I kept careful pace behind them, not letting them out of my sight. I could hear things behind me. The tiny patter of paws on the concrete. They were rallying. I did not look back.

I pressed on.

I smelled the ocean before I saw it. That scent. The whiff of my mother. I was there. And it was here. The place where I found the rotting thing and the place where it went back to. A clue that the lady picked up on but I missed. A clue.

xxx

Howard Moore tested his fresh acoustic guitar. he needed all his strings intact for this next one.

"Thank you very much, Roundhouse!" he shouted.

The London Roundhouse roared back.

"You guys've been amazing. This is our last song. It's called I Look for the Ocean But The Ocean Doesn't Look For Me."

He turned around and looked at all the other members of Holy Wood. They still felt as funny as they always felt when performing this song. The same feeling they felt when they wrote it three years ago in that old house. They could feel it. The finger in the room. The dank smell. The cat.

They turned grave and sombre.

"I was looking for a friend..."

The song pushed on, the stage lights dimmed to a dark, cool blue. When the chorus came around the audience sang along with them. One voice.

"I look for the ocean but the ocean doesn't look for me

I look for the ocean and the ocean is all I need

I look for the ocean and the ocean follows me

I look and I look and the ocean kills me."

xxx

The pair stopped.

The behemoth turned. The thing with my mother's face. She bent low and peered at me and I peered back at her.

The ocean was behind her.

"Let's get this over with." Violet said, perched on her shoulder.

I turned and looked. Leonidas and Death were the only ones behind me.

"You couldn't get them to come, I see." I said.

"I got something better."

I heard a mechanical crunch from behind me.

I looked.

The behemoth was upon me, her dentist's probe hurtling toward me.

I cowered, my eyes closed. I waited.

Nothing happened.

I opened them after counting to ten. Something loomed behind them.

A giant, even bigger than the one about to kill me. Two metal arms. A gun turret. A chassis with a cool sheen of glass.

And the old man was inside it.

The old man who patched me up in the Yakuza keep. The one who wasn't a pervert.

I gasped.

"We came through, didn't we?"

The man from the Yakuza was next to me. He had no tentacles left. Just two empty sockets.

The mech shot at the monster and it darted away, avoiding them. They were both knee deep in the ocean, facing each other. They were both poised to strike.

"Why?" I croaked.

"Because we protect. That's our job."

The mech jumped at her, it's arms wide for an embrace. It held her in a bear-hug. It squeezed.

The monster slapped at it with its probe and it fell back, stunned.

It fired two shots, which the monster dodged again.

It stood back and tried to dodge a volley of attacks from the monster. It tried, and lost out at the end.

It cowered at the shore.

Death danced. "Oh, how exciting! I just knew this would work out! I just knew!"

But I wasn't looking at death. I was looking at the little speck that floated off the monster's back and splashed on the surface of the sea.

"That's your cue, darling." death said. "Finish what you started."

"I didn't start it."

"Before you go, you deserve to know the name of the man trying to save you. His name's Karim"

"Go, darling."

Death pushed me and I ran.

I ran as fast as my bear feet would let me, peeling off my dress as I ran. I was unencumbered for the first time. I was free.

The slip clung to my body, covered now in blood. I was gashed in more ways than I could ever imagine.

But I was me. I was me again.

I felt the sand beneath my feet and the wind in my hair and the setting sun on my back and I ran and ran and ran.

I felt dry sand give way to wet sand give way to water.

I ran as far as I could run and then I swam.

The loud, metallic combat raged above me and I managed to skirt past it. I didn't even look up.

I went straight down and I did not breathe.

I found the ocean. Or rather, the ocean found me.

Hope you enjoyed that! Do let me know if you find these cuts a little too jarring.

And I have no idea where the giant robot vs. monster scene came from. I'm a huge mecha fan so there is that. Hope it isn't too jarring.

Please do comment (please please please) because there's honestly nothing I love more except maybe beaches.

Cheers!