'Threeunion'
Note: all characters depicted are way older than 18 years of age.
Lenalyssaria lingered in the arched doorway. One hand fidgeted with the braided cloth-of-gold belt cinched over her pristine, flowing white robe. She watched as Frazien scribbled madly for a few moments, leaned back to examine his figures, then looked up with a forlorn expression.
"It's not adding up," he complained pitifully, "how is this possible?"
Alyssa shook her head, trying to project a lot more sympathy than she felt.
"Just have one of Metatron's number crunchers take a look at it." she suggested.
"What? No! We have to keep this quiet. If I asked one of them to help, and then they kicked it up the ladder, one of the supervisory seraphim would be blaming these bad numbers on me. Never mind that I didn't collect the data. I'd be... I'd be..." Frazien trailed off, eyes going distant with horror.
"In deep shit?" Alyssa offered.
"What?"
"Waste. Filth. Excreta." Alyssa clarified.
"Oh," Frazien pulled a sour face, "Then yes. In deep excreta."
"Hmm... I'd like to help, but I have time off coming up. Just have to file a few census reports and I'm out of here."
"How'd you manage that?"
"Applied for it about this time last year." Alyssa explained. "You should go ask Ephiriel to help. She likes you."
Frazien suddenly became very attentive.
"She does? Did she say something?"
Alyssa smiled sadly. Poor Frazien. Always with his head down in the scrolls.
"Take her some candied apricots. Ask her about her architecture work." Alyssa started to turn, then paused. "And lose that thing on your head first."
Frazien frowned.
"It's a beret. I got it on Earth."
"You should have left it on Earth. It looks silly stuck between your head and your halo." She gave a conciliatory smile. "Try to loosen up a little. Good luck. I'll come by when I get back."
"Very well. Thank you. Have a pleasant time, Lenalyssaria." Frazien called after her as she waved and stepped out into the hallway.
"Later, Frazien."
As she strode down the broad hallway, she pulled a face. Ever since that fateful visit to Limbo, she had grown accustomed to thinking of herself as Alyssa. Hearing her own full name now, it seemed clunky and vaguely annoying.
Mentally shifting gears, she considered what, if anything, she should take with her on her trip. She walked on for a few minutes, took a flight of stairs down, rounded a corner, and arrived at her own office. After gathering the reports she needed to file, she tidied up the already sparse and orderly work paraphernalia. She lifted a pale blue velveteen messenger bag from where she had left it next to her desk and brought the strap up over her head. Finally, she whispered a few eldritch syllables, dispelling the magical light-projecting globe that hung in the air up near the ceiling before stepping out onto the balcony.
She paused there and turned so that she had room to manifest her vast, frost white wings through the broad opening in the back of her robe. After flexing her feathered appendages a few times, she stepped to the gap in the railing and pitched forward. Holding tight to her reports, she waited to pick up a little velocity before opening her wings and banking back up.
Her ears were filled with the sounds of the wind in her feathers and the rapid flutter-flapping of her robe as she angled herself against the air currents. Her three-foot mane of blond locks trailed back in a chaotic, whipping tail. Squinting her eyes as she passed through a wisp of cloud, she soon spotted the North Tower.
There was a balcony which ringed the entire tower up near the top, but the clerk's office where she needed to file her reports was several floors down. Instead of having to descend several flights of stairs, she opted to circle around to the other side and use one of the smaller balconies further down. After circling the tower a couple of times, canting her wings to cause some drag and lower her speed, she banked up directly over the most convenient balcony. With a last gentle flutter, she settled, bending her knees slightly as her bare feet touched down on the sun-warmed stone.
Alyssa folded her wings back out of existence, leaving a few stark white feathers for the wind to pull out into the sky, and did what she could to tame her hair before entering. Inside, the Records Division was busy, but quiet, as always. The background noise of the place was the scritching of pens, the shuffling of papers, the creak of desk chairs, and the faint susurration of filing drawers sliding on well oiled casters. Familiar with the building by now, she threaded her way through the sea of desks and cork boards and filing cabinets, and took a curving stair down. At the first landing she turned and stepped through an arch over which was carved REPOSITORY.
The Repository took up several floors, and Alyssa was fairly certain that these floors were bigger on the inside than they were on the outside. She didn't know much about what Ephiriel and the other architects of Heaven got up to -- non-Euclidean geometry and Escher-loops and who knows what -- and she preferred it that way. What she did know was just enough to keep from getting lost in the vast network of warehouse-like vaults that held seemingly endless records on pretty much everything 'under the sun.'
It took a few minutes to make her way to the proper storeroom, then a couple more minutes to track down one of the clerks who kept the keys to the file drawers. Alyssa always felt dubious about the need for locks on anything in Heaven, but nobody asked her for input on the matter.
After filing her reports and making her way back through the Records Department, she stopped out on the balcony. She opened her messenger bag and checked the contents, thought, and decided she had what she needed. No need to stop off at home. Satisfied with that, she made sure the flap on the bag was secured before again manifesting her wings and taking a leisurely dive off the balcony.
As she soared and glided further from the sprawling, castle-like structure which she usually thought of simply as 'work,' she gradually changed course. Certain orders of angels had powers allowing a sort of near-instant teleportation, but even if Alyssa had possessed this ability, she would have had to make a couple stops. The teleportation didn't work across planes. As it was, she would have to fly out to a particular portal which allowed direct passage into Limbo. An easy, half hour flight would be a nice way to unwind after being cooped up working on the census reports for the past couple of weeks straight.
* * *
A short while later, Alyssa was gliding up over mountain ridges, taking her time. She wanted to dip in low on the wooded side of the old camp site where Reika's cabin stood, avoiding notice if possible. She liked the idea of surprising the succubus again. Although, from what little she knew of the demoness, Reika was exactly the sort who would show up late anyhow.
Focusing on the present again, she found a decent sized boulder that looked stable and was reasonably close to her destination, allowing her to land without having to rise over the treetops to scan the area. Folding her wings away again, she hopped down from the boulder.
After glancing around, just in case, she set her messenger bag down and pulled, wiggled, and shimmied her robe off. Taking several items of clothing from the bag, she folded the robe up and stuffed it in their place. When she had finished donning her new attire, she lifted the bag again and made her way to the camp site.
Emerging from the copse of trees into the clear area around the cabin and the idyllic scene of pool and waterfalls, she saw no evidence of Reika's presence. She stood gazing out over the water for a few long moments, remembering, before striding over to the cabin. The door handle was a cut piece of branch held in place by pegs instead of nails. The door itself was held up by, and pivoted on, an ingenious if imperfect system involving wooden pegs and sets of little wooden ball bearings - or so Reika had proudly claimed while explaining the construction during their last meeting. Alyssa grasped the handle and gave an experimental tug.
The door dragged a bit along the bottom edge, but opened without incident. Alyssa stepped inside, then frowned as the door closed almost completely behind her. Reika really should have put a window in somewhere. Rather than curse the darkness, she reached a hand up to run her fingertips along her halo, pulling away a mote of glowing energy. She cast the mote lightly up into the air and spoke an arcane angelic command. The mote grew to the size of a softball as it rose to hover near the ceiling.
By the soft but sufficient light she took in the rustic interior of the cabin. The table and chairs were a bit dusty. There was a strong undertone of pine scent. Definitely no sign of any visitors for some time.
For a moment she considered stripping and laying on the table -- after she had dusted it off, of course. To surprise Reika. She dismissed the idea. There was no telling how late the Hellspawn might be. And she would probably just-
Alyssa spun, flinching in surprise, as the door creaked open behind her. Confronted with the appearance of Reika, framed in the doorway, dripping wet and quite naked, she could do nothing but stare.
Then she felt a bit better when Reika startled, flinching just as hard as she had.
"Holy Hell, you surprised me." the demoness smiled foolishly, pressing a hand to her chest.
Covering her own surprise and irritation with bluster, Alyssa widened her stance and put her hands on her hips.
"Good," she declared, scowling, "You're late. This place hasn't been dusted in ages and you're... dripping."
"Oh. Yeah, er... I mean, no. I've been here a while. I just thought, since I was early, I'd take a little dip. And then I saw these really pretty stones on the bottom and, um, guess I lost track of time." Reika explained, glancing off to one side, "Heh. Sorry about that."
Ah, so, she had failed to notice the Hellspawn's presence because she had been cavorting well under the pool's surface, Alyssa realized.
"Well, never mind now." Alyssa's demeanor softened somewhat, her eyes drifting up and down the other woman's body. "Wait. Out of curiosity, do you ever actually wear any clothes?"
"Of course. When I'm on Earth, working. Humans are funny. You know, they often find a woman more interesting and tempting if she's wearing certain clothes than they do if she's naked."
Alyssa, whose main knowledge of humans was as statistics, arched an eyebrow doubtfully.
"You're sure it's not the clothing they find interesting?" she asked without thinking.
"No, I'm pretty sure." Reika laughed. "Speaking of... I thought you lot always wore big white bedsheets and gold. This is better."
Alyssa looked down at herself. She wore a pale blue skirt of thin material and a button up blouse of similar hue. The blouse had a deep V-neck, and she had done up only the top few buttons, knotting the rest below her breasts, leaving her midriff bare.
