Suspiscion.

As always I woke up in a sweat, my wives wrapped around me after a night of passionate lovemaking, suffering from the curse again.

At the edges of my vision, they creeped in further.

Shapeless. Formless. Eyes and mouths. Teeth. Pinwheels of teeth. Horrors beyond comprehension.

The chaos crawling ever closer.

One word echoed in my mind, whispered in ancient, dead tongues.

And a deep dread filled me as the comprehension came to me.

The flesh on my face wriggled the slightest bit, like reality warping, tranfiguring the tiniest bit of my flesh into a wriggling mass of worm-like ichor.

And the word came to me like a silent peal of thunder on a stormy night.

Nyarlathotep.

And just like that, the whole nightmare evaporated. The skin burned. And a black substance dripped from my face onto the bed, sizzling, melting through the bedsheets like acid, charred and decayed.

I panted as the regeneration of my code kicked in, healing me, but the fear remained.

This wasn't just a nightmare.

It was a metamorphosis.

Shit. Fuck.

Fuck!

It's changing me into an abomination.

A thrall of Nyarlathotep.

Slowly. Very slowly.

I could feel my heart beat like a war drum, my pulse throbbing in my head.

Faster.

I need to go about this faster.

"Darling?" Wanda woke up, as did Yue.

"Is it the curse again?" Yue asked, cradling my head in her chest.

"It's okay. You're safe. I'm here." She whispered reassuringly.

Ah, this is nice.

"A curse?" Wanda asked.

"Yes. It gives him nightmares. It's trying to kill him." Yue caressed my head as she explained.

"Hm? Let me see!" Wanda extended a mental connection to me, but I swatted it away.

"No!"

That shocked her, and she raised an eyebrow at me.

I grabbed her hand and squeezed it lovingly.

"It's not... I mean, it's contagious. If we link minds it'll pass to you too."

"Oh. Is that why you didn't let me do our usual... "

Ah, right. We usually link our minds with chaos magic so we feel all pleasure the other partner feels.

Makes it easy to know when she's feeling it too.

The pleasure, it's....quite something.

Blows the mind, literally.

Addicting almost.

"Yeah."

"I just thought you wanted to be inclusive to Yue."

"Well that too."

"Liar." Yue teased, booping my nose.

"No, not at all~" I smiled.

"Then is there nothing we can do? I know how brilliant you are. Can't you come up with a solution to it in like a minute?" Wanda asked.

"I did. But ... Just. Trust me. I have a plan." I assured her, trying to hide my aspersions from her prying mind.

"You're trying to do everything on your own again, aren't you?" She huffed, "And after you promised Riley you wouldn't!"

"It's nothing."

"Can't I do something to help? That's why you brought me here, didn't you?" Wanda pressed my arm against her chest.

"Actually, yeah. There is something you can do?" I apported the Tale Of The Seven Keys to my hands and gave it to her.

"Remember the keys?"

"Yeah. Seven of them. They open the door to all magic. Release a monstrous god. I remember the briefing."

"I already have two. The Time and Vision Keys." I showed her the keys.

"Number three and number seven right?"

"Yes. I want you to collect the rest. I'll send you the instructions on your biochip."

Wanda nodded.

"I'll get on it."

"Good. And uh, that Unity key is with a Traumesser. A demon that feeds off of others' happiness. So be careful."

"Use a dreamcatcher spell. I know. Who do you think taught you magic, huh?" She asked.

"I pretty much learnt it on my ow-owow!" She went for my ears too.

"Okay, okay. You might have had a marginal ro-ow! A major role in it."

Wanda smiled, satisfied.

"You're learning all the bad habits from Offee." I massaged my ears.

"And you love me for it." She grinned.

"If I develop masochistic tendencies it'll be your fault."

"I'll accept you even if that happens." She kissed my forehead. "I have an S-streak too~"

"Leaving me out like that." Yue pouted, ".... Jay, meanie."

"Well, I'm going to be spending the whole day with you, aren't I? You'll have me all to yourself."

"I need more than that. I need to... suck~" She licked her lips.

I rolled my eyes.

"You always go overboard."

"Because Jay is immortal."

"That's no excuse." I pointed out.

"I'll be gentle~" Yue leaned into me.

I sighed.

"Okay. But just a little bit."

Yue nodded as Wanda watched with curiosity.

"Thanks for the meal~" She said, revealing her glistening white fangs, and dug in.

.

That night after preparing for the rest of our admittedly short stay left here, we returned to the tunnels to collect our hopefully untoasted friends.

"I can't believe you actually exercised moderation and didn't fully drain me." I said, pleasantly surprised.

"I'm not that bad!"

"Of course not. Yue is the perfect amount of cute and adorable."

"Goodness, do you guys ever get tired of flirting?" I heard the typical whine of Quentin's tone.

And a hint of confidence.

Interesting.

"No." We replied in unison and he issued his usual groan.

"So you were successful?" I asked.

"What do you think?" He puffed up.

"Well from that stupid grin plastered all over your face I'll say you did."

"We did." He repeated happily.

Julia rolled her eyes at his childish behaviour and held up a plant. Some fern from the underworld.

I took it from her and inspected it as I felt her gaze bore into me.

I could feel the suspicion.

Actually, I felt it from the very beginning. The moment she saw me.

Why was she suspiscious all of a sudden?

What happened in the underworld for her?

Hmm... Let's find out!

I reached out with my psychic power and tried connecting to her mind.

I had placed a backdoor in her mental defences that time I was in her body, amidst all that torture just to be safe.

But somehow... I couldn't find it.

What? How?

It looked like it had been wiped clean, the boundaries of her mind healed so fully.....

She clearly didn't have the capacity to do it on her own.

A god then.

And in the underworld, only one god came to mind.

Hades.

Shit. What did he tell her?

"Is something wrong?" Julia asked innocently.

This bitch!

Trying to poke the bear, eh?

Looks like she didn't quite learn her lesson the first time around.

Unfortunately for her, she won't get a second chance.

I put on a fake smile and shook my head.

"No. It's alright. This will do."

"Good. Now can I get my shade back. Charlie's shade feels weird inside me." Alice requested.

"Yeah. Gimme a minute." I took out a jar and extracted Charlie's shade from her storing it carefully in a separate jar before swapping her shade back in.

"Thanks." Alice sighed in relief.

"Now, care to tell me how it went?" I asked.

"Over coffee?" Yue suggested, easing them in.

"Sure."

.

The adventure went fairly simple.

They found Julia's friends in the underworld bowling alley like in the show. Got the map of the underworld, stole a couple of keys and went their separate ways.

Quentin and Alice found Elysium, stole Charlie's shade, and escaped but Julia apparently didn't get out with them.

She still made it. But it was a while later. Separately.

She just told them she had to wait for the guards to relax after their escape and they bought it. Even Alice.

Idiots, the lot of them.

After listening to their tale, I realised it was only Julia who was weird.

There was nothing odd on Quentin and Alice's end. But Julia, there was definitely something about her.

"When do we banish Reynard?" Julia interrupted my thoughts.

"As soon as possible. Tonight, if you're up for it. Alice, can we postpone putting Charlie's shade for a few days?" I asked.

"Sure. I have waited an year. What's a couple more days?" Alice was surprisingly reasonable.

Charlie's return must have been a really big character growth moment for her.

Usually protagonists in series like these end up being really bratty and backstabby when it comes to 'protecting their nakama'.

Just look at Supernatural and the 'brotherly love' between Sam and Dean that they use as justification for their irrational actions that condemn thousands to their deaths.

And they are still considered heroes.

Well, at least this should tide Julia's susp-and I felt the suspiscion in her only grow.

Great.

What the hell did he tell her?

Tch!

If I didn't send the memory extractor with Wanda to get Poppy's Dragonology knowledge along with the fourth key, I'd have just put them all to sleep and picked her brain apart.

"I am ready. Anytime. Later. Tonight. Right now." Julia shrugged, "But I had a few questions, if you don't mind."

"Sure? Go ahead."

"The spell you showed me. It had the god's blood as a component. How did you get that?" She asked.

"Ah that. I didn't. Not Reynard's blood at least. I mean how do you expect me to bleed a god. It's a god y'know? They're gods for a reason."

"Then?"

"I took his son's blood. Forty years ago when he first came to Earth, he left behind a child. You met him too. John Gaines? He patched your memories?

He is a demigod. His blood? It's close enough. Should work fine."

"Will it though?"

"Can you bleed a god?" I asked her back.

"No? Then it will have to work." I shut her down, "Anything else before we get to it?"

"No. Let's do it." She swallowed her doubts for now and got on board.

Let's end this today, so I can move on to more productive ventures.

"Okay. Here we go."

I grabbed them by the hands and teleported away.

________________

The extra chapter for 200 powerstones as promised!

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