~~Natasha~~
"Um, w-what do we do?"
The werewolves looked between each other, before settling on Arturo. With them all still in their Gauru forms, the physical differences between Matthew and Arturo were even more pronounced, with Matthew towering over Brianna and Arturo by a nearly a foot. But it was Arturo they looked to for a decision.
And then Arturo looked down at her.
"Run?"
Welp, looked like she'd be making the decision after all.
She groaned, rubbed her eyes with her palms, and ran over to Eric. He was still digging through the rubble, looking for Jessy. But considering there was a giant mountain of red blood on the other side of the biggest pile of rubble trying to kill them, and they all knew a red kraken lurked underneath, Jessy could wait.
"Eric, we have to go."
"No. Jessy."
"Eric! She'll b-be fine! She'll be safe, hidden!" God, please, let her be safe. "We have to go!"
Eric snapped his head and stared down at her, rage in his wolf eyes. For a second, she got ready to dodge a claw swipe that could probably cut her into ribbons, but none came. The werewolf took a few, deep breaths, fought for control, and won. Eventually he nodded, and gestured down the alley toward South Side, opposite the direction they'd originally been moving in.
"This way? Closest tear. Casino."
Right, a tear, one that led out of the spirit world and into the ghost place. It was in the basement of one of the casinos here in the spirit world, but the spirits didn't use it, as if they didn't want to end up in the Great Below.
Tash didn't want to go there, either. Damien and Jack told her plenty about the Great Below and how scary it'd been. The story about what Sabrina had done to those other ghosts also sealed the image of how deadly a place it was. But, it was less scary than dealing with Red Tide.
"Okay. Let's go."
God, if Jessy died because of this, she was going to kill herself. Or Michael would do it for her.
The four werewolves dashed down the alley, Tash following behind Eric, and Flow behind them. Red Tide chased after them with all the subtlety of a monsoon, and Tash squeaked as the earth trembled underneath her. This wasn't like the time it'd followed them into a cathedral. This was like a scene from a movie, a giant river crashing through the streets and bulldozing over every car, pushing them over and dragging them along with the waves of red.
The only reason the red river didn't reach them, was they stuck to the alley. They ran past building after building as they headed back toward South Side, and Red Tide destroyed every building on the way, one after the other. It was a constant earthquake, bricks and concrete and whatever else the old buildings were made of crashing into the water Flow left behind it. But most of the sound and vibration came from the much, much larger spirit, its own body burying the area in destruction.
Nearby spirits ran for their lives. Spirits of rats, crows, flying things that glowed and probably represented electricity or handheld devices, things on wheels or made of asphalt, snake-like things that belonged in casinos, everything panicked and ran or flew, as Tash and her friends left Devil's Corner, and ran into South Side. There weren't any cars, nothing that'd have been a very temporary thing in the physical world, but benches, lampposts, power lines that Dolareido still hadn't bothered burying, all were there, twisted modern versions that were simultaneously slick, and warped to point toward the center of South Side, the economic center of Dolareido. All roads led to Rome, and they followed the path as the giant spirit followed after them.
"It's destroying everything!" Tash said. "I thought they w-weren't allowed to destroy the city!"
"It's bound," Flow yelled from behind, pouring over the street as it followed them, but keeping its human half formed and ahead of its watery body. "Black Blood is forcing it to take actions against its nature."
"Twisted," Matthew said. Even running at full speed, the huge werewolf managed to control his breath enough to speak. Easy for Flow and Tash, not so easy for the werewolves.
"Anyway we can use that against it?" she asked, weaving around a bench. "You were g-gonna use a ban against Street-Tail King, right!?"
"Street-Tail King was a weakling," Flow said, voice even steadier than Tash's. It didn't feel fear. "Compared to Red Tide. Red Tide's bans are likely connected to violence, and not something we could easily exploit. And we still don't know its banes."
Banes, right. Bans were rules spirits had to follow, defined by their nature. Banes were things that could hurt them. What could be used to hurt a giant incarnation of Dolareido's bloody, violent side? Probably something like, the pistol of a kine who once worked for the mob, and then swore off violence when they met someone they wanted to marry, or have children with, or something else equally as dramatic and powerful. Which meant, Tash and her friends were fucked.
The alley shrank as the buildings grew taller and bigger. The deeper they got into South Side, the less room the structures provided, as everything was meant to direct pedestrian traffic into the buildings, the casinos, the bars, the clubs. Eventually they came to a solid wall, and had no choice but to steer toward the street, onto one of the wide sidewalks.
Now Red Tide was only fifty feet behind them, and the noise was overwhelming. Tash jumped over another bench and looked behind her, before snapping her head back and running faster. It was getting closer. Giant red tentacles stuck out of the pouring crimson waves, and smashed left and right against the buildings they ran past. Sign lights shattered, and huge glass windows, bigger and exaggerated versions of the ones in Dolareido, exploded into millions of pieces. The street was four lanes wide, the sidewalks massive so they could handle the busy city, and most of the buildings on the street had some distance between them and the sidewalk. Red Tide was large enough its flooding waves hit it all, while each tentacle smashed anything they could with reckless abandon.
A bit of its squid-like face poked up from the front wave, a wave of red water as high as a small building showing hints of the strange mouth and enormous teeth of the monster. Not good not good.
"There," Brianna said, and she pointed to one of the casinos. "Can cross to other casino here."
They all turned on a dime and ran through the front entrance spinning door.
Dolareido was a strange place in the spirit world. Tash knew that already, and had expected to see some weirdness in a place dedicated to pleasure and gambling.
Nothing could have prepared her for the sheer insanity of Devil's Blood. She'd had peeks into some strange buildings in the spirit world before, but the Devil's Blood casino was one of the larger, more important casinos in Dolareido. In retrospect, maybe its connection to the spirit world was why the owner changed the name, a century ago. There were lights everywhere, shining and powerful, burying areas in white and gold beams. The walls were lined with gold. The gambling machines and tables were made of gold. The chairs were made of gold. Cushions looked like they were made of expensive silk, the color of blood.
In the center of the gigantic room, was a fountain. Three gold statues of men held up a massive gold bowl over their heads, and red water flowed down over their perfect bodies, while three women statues on their knees gave the men some very deep blowjobs. The blood, or red water hopefully, continued down the men's bodies onto the women, over their hair, and down into another giant bowl filled with red where the ladies knelt. That was not the version of the fountain in the physical world.
It was such an extreme display, Tash paused to stare at it. But the sound of street and metal tearing apart behind her sparked her awake, and she ran up to the ticket booth. Gold bars blocked the way into the casino.
"Let us through!"
The spirit in the booth was, predictably, also made of gold. It was humanoid, androgynous, and wearing necklaces, bracelets, and all sorts of body jewelry also made of gold. A flat face, lacking defining features except for a very scary mouth full of teeth. And for some reason, a red see-through sun visor, the sort a... a... horse gambler might wear at the racetrack? Dolareido had no racetrack! But, it did succinctly paint the image of something that embodied gambling.
"Sorry, need a ticket," it said, voice monotone and almost robotic.
"We d-d-don't have a ticket! We--" She jumped aside as Matthew tore ahead, and ripped through the bars, metal breaking away to his claws with loud snaps. Gold wasn't a durable metal, but you didn't go tearing through it like paper either, especially not in the spirit world where it was probably a very durable metaphor, literally.
"S-Sorry!" She managed a small wave for the spirit, who'd gotten up and was baring its sharp teeth as it pointed at them.
"Hey, stop! The owner's going to--"
Its voice disappeared under the rumbling bass. Tash took a quick peek back again, and almost froze as Red Tide crashed against the entrance of the building. Unlike the buildings of Devil's Corner, Devil's Blood was a modern casino that swam in money and was one of the primary income sources for the whole city. It was sturdy down to the foundation. It held, barely. Red Tide let out a roar that vibrated in Tash's teeth as it bashed against the walls of the casino, its blood body unable to pass through the spiraling doors.
Flow managed. Its angel-like body came through the doors first, only for Red Tide's colossal waves of red to smash against it and drive its clear body through the entrance. Flow let out a grunt of pain, or whatever it was spirit's felt, but it recovered quickly, and followed the rest of them through the hole Matthew carved.
The casino was full of spirits, speaking in that werewolf language Tash didn't know, chatting away like nothing was happening. A few of them looked closer to fairies than anything, wings glittering with gold dust, bodies humanoid but featureless, and glowing every color of the rainbow as they flitted between machines. A couple looked like giant piles of slime, with green tentacles and several fleshy eyes floating inside the semi-clear bodies. They were beyond gross, and left a trail behind them as they moved between the machines. The sex spirits were obvious, because they did look kind of human, or human genies, though the ones here looked like they were made of crystal.
So many spirits, Tash found herself trying to identify what sort of motivations, emotions, and elements of existence might make them. Greed, gluttony, sex, infatuation, addiction, sex, so many things, so many spirits coming here to indulge in... in what? Essence, bleeding over from the physical world? That's what the Uratha said. And when the Gauntlet grew thin in areas, usually in areas highly populated by humans, essence bled over in abundance. Spirits hung around in droves, and sometimes managed to slip into the other side, hide in Twilight, or possess people, anything to keep eating the essence, and spread their influence.
