Fell Champions

“What the fuck is this,” Otter said. “Was I sold a lie?”

The sun was high, and while it was a little windy, her Canadian sensibilities felt like it was maybe early Spring. The ocean was the kind of beautiful crystal blue that you’d expect from a travel brochure. The sand was clean, there was an open bar set up, but no one was having any fun.

No one was sobbing or grieving or doing any of the usual things you’d expect from a regular funeral, but the vibes were off. No one was celebrating like was promised. No partying. No games. No sex. But worst of all, no brawling.

Otter had really been wanting to see some funeral brawls.

From the way Liaru had described it, she’d expected an orgy right next to an improvised arena where a bunch of people would be wrestling. People would be drinking and laughing and shouting and just being noisy and having fun. 

But this… this looked absolutely boring.

It was just a bunch of clusters of people, all segregated from each other in little cliques, talking to one another and ignoring everyone else. Some people ate. Some drank. But it was all hushed. It felt like a high school lunch room.

And ignored by everyone was a body, placed on a bier and left alone by the dock. Two torches had been set up beside it, but one had been allowed to go out. No one seemed to be bothered to relight it. 

Reyna stood watching, her hands balled into fists at her sides, and said nothing.

“Uh, no,” Vex said. “This… this is weird, by Silayan standards.”

“What were we expecting?” Everett asked.

“Fighting!” Otter said. “Fucking! People having fun! That’s what Liaru told me a Silayan funeral was like. Not… whatever the fuck this is.”

“I know a calculated insult when I see one,” Sami said. “What was the general opinion of Juala here?”

“Dunno what the general public thought, but I know Kir and Rua hated her guts. Well, not quite. Rua’s opinion was… I think it was complicated. But I knew Juala for like five minutes, and I wanted to smack her.”

“Abrasive?” 

“Spoiled. Entitled. Always wanted her way. And from how people described her, unloved by everyone around her, partly raised by Sureya, who seems to be an absolute delight of a person that I’d like to see make sweet love to a woodchipper.”

“She… she wasn’t that bad,” Reyna said.

Otter shrugged. “Barely knew her. You were her bodyguard. You’d probably know better than me.”

Reyna didn’t respond, just headed down the hill to the beach below. 

“Go easy on her,” Vex said. “And… try not to say anything shitty about Juala.”

“My bad. Is no one going to check our identities or anything, make sure we’re the people who got invited? Doesn’t seem like there’s a bouncer or anything for this shindig.”

“There are,” Sami said. She pointed to the treeline. “I’ve spotted a few people, hidden. There’s guards. They probably know who you are by reputation and that ridiculous hair colour alone, and are giving us the pass.”

Otter looked to where Sami pointed, but didn’t see anything. “You’re making that up so you look cool.”

“I don’t need to make things up or talk all the time to be cool. Some of us just invested heavily in Awareness.”

Otter squinted at the treeline, but still didn’t see anything. “Really sure you’re making things up. Cringe.”

“I am not–”

“Criiiiiiiinge.”

“You’re cringe for still saying ‘cringe.’”

“She’s kind of right,” Vex added. “You’re really cringe.”

“Watch it,” Otter said with a smile. “You’re half me. That makes you half-cringe.”

“Better fifty percent than a hundred.”

Otter playfully ruffled Vex’s hair. “Everyone knows their assignments?”

There was a general hum of agreement, so she broke from the group, stomping down the hill towards the funeral. Reyna had apparently beelined it to the small bar that had been set up and helped herself to a drink. Otter was tempted to join her, but given the possibility of this whole thing descending into violence, decided to keep her wits about her.

It didn’t help that her fingertips were buzzing in tune to a drumbeat she couldn’t hear. Her Fate Sense was kicking in, and the last time that had happened, there’d been an explosion followed by a whiny incel trying to kill her. 

Otter surveyed the crowd, trying to decide what group to mingle with first. It was a varied bunch, of all different ages, there were even some kids. But from the looks of things, three major groups had formed, and the others seemed to be offshoots of the triad, or perhaps people trying to maintain some kind of neutrality. 

She took a step, and then jolted as the link to Rua became much more present. Otter didn’t know how or why, but the distance between the two of them had shortened drastically from one second to the next. It felt as if Rua had leapt dozens, maybe hundreds, of miles all at once.

She was so stunned by it she didn’t realize someone was speaking to her until a hand gripped her arm and pulled.

Vex’s face came into her sightline, peering at her with the same level of shock that must have been on Otter’s own.

“Mama’s close.”

“Yeah. I feel that. How?”

“She must have Wayfared in.”

“Right. Wayfaring. I’ve heard that word before, but, uh…”

Vex rolled her eyes and sighed. “Teleportation magic.”

“There’s teleportation magic? And I’ve been using my feet like a sucker?”

“It only works from Wayfaring stations. You can teleport to other stations, or do the math to teleport elsewhere and hope you don’t end up in a tree or something.”

“Ooh. Yeah, that sounds like a pass from me. So, where’s the nearest Wayfaring station?”

“Ri Oa. So assuming Mama’s coming straight here, and no one’s giving Kir any problems, it’ll probably take half an hour?”

“Right. Kir.” Well, that put a damper on her mood. Unless… “That gives me an idea.”

“Part of your mysterious plan?”

“I have two. But this one is the lesser plan that is supposed to make your mom happy. Ergo, the more important one.”

“It involves sex, doesn’t it?”

“Mind your own business and go find Leilynn and watch over her, you know your assignment.”

Vex rolled her eyes. “Yes, Dad.” 

Their relationship was still weird, and part of Otter had no idea what to make of it or how to treat Vex half the time, but hearing that word, even if used sarcastically, gave her a warm glow. She ruffled Vex’s hair again and sent her on her way.

Otter was tempted to try to get the lay of the land, maybe start talking to people she didn’t know, figure out what was going on, but Reyna was sitting at the bar looking absolutely miserable, and someone – a dude someone – was stalking towards her, fury evident on his face.

He was tall for a Silayan, which was still a few inches shorter than Otter, and skinny, wearing loose, colourful clothing. He was pretty in a boyish way, even if he was an adult, the kind of guy that Otter would try to point Everett towards. But that man looked like he was about to throw hands, and Reyna’s back was to him, so instead of being wingman, she moved to intercept.

He was maybe a few bare steps from Reyna, one of his fists raised, as Otter slid between them, a wide smile on her face. “Hey, how are you? We haven’t met, my name’s Otter, Otter Kaos, and I will be the one stopping you from getting your ass kicked tonight.”

He stopped, almost falling over himself, and stuttered, trying to make noises with his face and failing to come up with a coherent sentence. 

Reyna seemed to catch onto the fact something was happening, took them both in, and took a long pull from her drink before setting it down and standing up. “Akai.”

“Reyna,” the man Otter assumed was named ‘Akai’ growled.

“Me,” Otter said.

They both looked at her, and then refocused back on one another. 

“You shouldn’t be here,” Akai said. “You were released from service after your failure.”

“I’m here to pay my respects. Something no one else seems to be doing.”

“Other things are going on. We’re trying… Never mind. I won’t explain myself to you. Not after you got my sister killed. Leave. You’re not invited.”

“She is, actually,” Otter said. “She handles security with Seat Hyleah now. She’s one of my guests.”

“Oh, the pelanoa who’s standing in for the bastard half–”

Otter didn’t let him finish. She punched him full in the face. She didn’t put her full strength into it, since she wasn’t sure he was running on soul power or not, but given the way he hit the floor and her fist didn’t bounce off a Tenacity shield, she deduced he wasn’t.

Reyna stepped in between the two of them, shock on her face. “You don’t need to defend my honour.”

“I’m not. I made a rule when I came to this island. Rua is exempt from any ridiculous racial prejudice. I don’t expect to change anyone here, and fuck knows you people have good reason even if I don’t agree with it, but I hear someone talk shit, they get hit. It’s that simple.”

Akai stood, and was a little clumsy getting back on his feet, but dusted himself off and looked Otter directly in the eye before bowing his head. “I apologize. I did not mean to disrespect Seat Hyleah. I was… angry… at seeing someone I did not expect to be here.”

“Accepted,” Otter said. “Spread the word. Talk shit, get hit. It’s that simple. Now, shouldn’t we be honouring your sister? Come on, Reyna, pour us some drinks.”

Akai flickered between looking like he wanted to flee, to wanting to still be angry with Reyna’s presence, but Otter clapped a hand on his shoulder and directed him to a stool. He sat, and Reyna hopped over the bar and retrieved a pair of wooden cups, followed by a bottle of some kind of liquid that looked decidedly radioactive, given that it was glowing green, and poured for them both.

“To Juala,” Otter said, lifting a cup, “an absolute cunt, but I hear she stabbed Il-Su and electrocuted the shit out of him, so she couldn’t have been that bad.”

They all drank. Whatever the radioactive stuff was, it tasted spicy, enough that even Otter’s Polynesian heritage nearly recoiled, and it burned the whole way down. She immediately asked for a refill. 

“So, Akai,” Otter said. “The funeral. What’s happening here?”

He glared at Reyna the entire time as he answered, “The admiralty is finally making their displeasure with many of Juala’s decisions known now that she’s dead. Half of them think she was foolish for picking fights with Kir the way she did.”

“And the other half?”

“Think she should’ve fully committed, and not just kept it to immature games.”

“They… they weren’t games,” Reyna said. “She was lashing out. She was under so much stress. Expected to lead an entire military against an enemy she didn’t know was coming back or not. She was too young, and didn’t know what she was doing, and no one was supporting her.”

“No one supported her because she didn’t know how to accept help,” Akai countered. “She was too proud by far. And now there’s a whole storm of trouble. Sureya’s pushing to put Moami onto the Sunset Council, and take up the same Burden.”

“She’s too young,” Reyna said. “She’s only twelve.”

“And Sureya’s already taken her. ‘Training her,’ she calls it. I haven’t seen her in three days. She wasn’t even allowed to come to the funeral.”

“Who’s Moami?” Otter asked.

“M… Moami is Juala’s sister. Was, I guess.”

“You want me to kick Sureya’s front door down, kick her in the lady bits, and rescue this Moami?”

Both Reyna and Akai’s eyes widened, and they both began to explain why that would be a terrible idea, both of them tripping over each other’s arguments and words in their haste to explain just how stupid that was.

“Fine,” Otter said. “No one lets me have any fun. Seriously, who do I need to kill to see the funeral I was promised?”

Akai and Reyna exchanged a look, as if they both knew the answer to that and were afraid the other would answer, before Akai realized he was angry with Reyna, looking away and scowling. 

“Oh, how about I pile driver Sureya? Would that be fine? Funeral brawling!”

“I… don’t know what a ‘pile driver’ is, but that sounds very… stupid.” Akai flinched as he spoke.

“Not gonna hit you for speaking your mind,” Otter said. “Only if you direct any racism towards Rua. Don’t care about anything else. Well, unless you slander strawberry milk.”

“What kind of animal is a ‘strawberry?’”

“Never you mind.” Otter checked in with her link. Rua was close. Really close. Like, really, really close. She turned around, and smiled. “Well, took you long enough.”

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