The Games We Play

Chapter 125: First Sight

DISCLAIMER: This story is NOT MINE IN ANY WAY. That honor has gone to the beautiful bastard Ryuugi. This has been pulled from his Spacebattle publishment. Anyway on with the show...errr read.

First Sight

Your level has increased by one! Your level has increased by one! Your level has increased by one! Your level has increased by one!

It was done.

I exhaled slowly as the windows appeared, confirming my victory. Four levels wasn't a bad haul for the amount of effort I'd put into this, though I couldn't help but remember what I'd gotten from the first Goliath I'd defeated and how large a difference there was, now that I was a bit closer to the monsters in level. Even so, I was rather pleased as I felt the familiar shift in my power, relatively minute as it now was. I glanced around to see that my item drops had already formed and sent Levant out to fetch them with a quick breeze. Most of it seemed to be money, but there were a scattering of things here and therenothing on par with the mask and clothes I'd already gotten from the first Goliath I'd fought, but a few things that looked like they might be interesting nonetheless. A few bars of metal, a roll of paper, that type of thing.

Taking only a moment to Observe them, I then turned my gaze up towards the slowly approaching ship above. I could hop back up there easily enough or else go home the fast way, but either way, I knew I didn't want to stay here long. Just in case their creator had been observing things through their eyes, I'd wanted to put on a show and give at least the appearance of strength, but only a blind man could have missed that lightshow and I'd rather not explain myself unnecessarily when people inevitably showed up to ask about what had happened. I'd need to go soon, however I chose to do so, but

Well, I suppose I had a minute or two to address another issue.

That decided, I looked down, a slight frown touching my lips.

"I'm sorry. Did I wake you, sweetie?" I asked, lifting a hand to touch my daughter's petals. I'd been a touch nervous, even though I was certain I'd be able to protect herthis was the first time I'd brought her into a combat situation and while the opponent wasn'tthreatening, per se, I'd been aware of that. For the time being, however, I wanted to keep her as close to me as possible, so she could feed off the Aura I burned around the clock. I'd had to keep her out of things for a while, due to the recent string of emergencies and the danger the training I'd undergone might have posed to her, but nowwith my new skills especially, I wanted to feed her all the power I could so that she'd get big and strong. With things as they were nowwell, I couldn't be sure of anything, but I'd rather she be able to protect herself and at the moment, she couldn't. At the rate I fed her experience, I was hoping that would change soon, but

This was a little unexpected.

Her grip, if anything had tightened on me, squeezing down hard on my waist, shoulders, and neck. Her vines quivered for several seconds, making her tiny form shake like a, well, like a leafand then spots of bright white abruptly began to shine through the green of her skin. They pulsed as they flowed up towards her blossom, beating like a hundred miniature hearts, and then her blossom twitched. Autumn's flower opened wide as she woke fully, the interior of the petal now pure as freshly fallen snow even as the outside remained a lively red.

And at the center, revealing itself slowly as the rose spread its petals, was a single, lidless eye. It was a simple organ as eyes went, I knew the moment I peered into her flesh, but it looked functional enough. It might not have been able to perceive a range of colors, but it could perceive light just fine, even though the iris was so pale it seemed to blend right into the sclera as it rolled within a nonexistent socket.

Thiswas a surprise.

But not an unpleasant one.

Slowly, I lifted a hand, smiling down at her as she opened a true eye for the first time. Already, I could see the beginning of other growths, signs of where they would later hang like fruits, but I lifted a hand to touch her vines as she went still, sole eye locked on my face.

"Be careful not to strain yourself," I whispered soothingly, speaking aloud even as I let my Aura convey the real information. She squeezed me tighter, cords like garrote wire at my throat, but I cracked my neck once and ignored the feeling. Her eye stayed locked on me the entire time, wide and unblinking for obvious reasons. I wondered if I looked strange to her which made me think about how alien everything must seem to someone viewing the world for the first time. "There will be plenty of time later and I'll help you. You don't have to rush."

Her eye didn't move from my face, but the jerking motions across her form ceased as the additional eyes stopped trying to bubble up to the surface.

"Hmis this because of Lux Aeterna, perhaps?" I continued to speak, a part of me wondering if she'd develop the ability to hear next. "Something in the light that allowed you to see? Or was it something about the Grimm? I suppose this was your first time being near either, butI suppose we can look into that later. For the moment, I'm just glad you can see me. Well, what do you think of your old man? I'm not too hideous, am I?"

Her eye twitched and then hung limply to the side for a moment. Then her branches trembled for a moment, stem-like structure extending up above me and then curving to hang back down right in front of my face. The veins around her white eye were green instead of red and the retina behind it seemingly made of some type of conductive wood, but for a moment shejust looked at me, pondering my face as I looked back with a smile. Additional vines and then branches extended to grow over my face, twitching slightly back and forth as she watched, as if

"Ah, of course," I said, reaching into my Inventory to withdraw a mirror to hold up to her. "Here I am standing aroundyou must be more curious about what you look like. Well? Beautiful, aren't you?"

Autumn shifted her attention to the mirror at my words, expression almost eager as vines and branches grew around it and held it fast. She peered closer and closer at her reflection until her eye bumped right into it and she drew back with a flinch, raising curling, thorny vines like tiny fists. She approached the mirror more cautiously this time, coming closer and closerand then split her eye into four quarters that unfurled into a toothy interior. She pressed it flat against the mirror's surface as if to eat her own reflection, but drew back after a moment when that failed, 'petals' folding back into the shape of an eye.

"I told you," I whispered gently. "That's you. Try moving. See how it moves with you? That's because it's your reflection."

She seemed to consider that, petals flexing slightly opened and closed before spots of color began to grow across them. She drew back thoughtfully, form liquefying around her eye. It surged up and over, taking the form of one of those eyeless heads she seemed to favorexcept it wasn't quite eyeless anymore. As she opened its jaws wide, a massive orb was revealed behind the rows of knifelike teeth.

It only seemed to take her a moment to realize the flaws of such a design and her body turned to quicksilver yet again.

"Try putting your eye on top, maybe?" I suggested kindly. "That way it won't get in the way when you're eating and you won't have to blind yourself to open your mouth, either. See? That's how daddy does it."

She retained more or less the same shape, returning to her eyeless form briefly before tumorous growths began to bubble up on her skin, bursting to reveal an array of randomly placed eyes. I saw several of them focus on her mirror image and then turn up to look at me.

"I think you look beautiful," I assured her, reaching out to trace a finger across her face. "Might want to spread the eyes out a bit more to increase your field of vision and give them some form of protection, but it's a very good start. Now that you can see, we'll be able to work on all kinds of things, too. There's so much I've wanted to show you, Autumn, and with your shapeshiftingif you can see, we should be able to come up with something for the other senses, too. Your eyes are beautiful, but they could use a little fine tuning, so you can see color better, but"

I clicked my tongue, stopping myself.

"Sorry," I apologized. "I'm getting ahead of myself, forgive me. I'm just really excited right now."

Her form rippled again, adding rows of crown-like ridges down her back and sides, white in the center with a rose red trim. Additional eyes grew into place on the ridges, looking in every direction as Autumn seemed to rejoice in her newfound sense of sight. She writhed in midair before splitting down the center, dividing into a pair of identical shapes as she pulled from the pool of mass she'd consumed. Given what little I now know about Malkuth theory, I had to wonder if that was related to where she kept the majority of her mass at any given time. It was something to keep in mind given that she couldn't be keeping all of it here anymore. Dimensional shenanigans, perhaps?

Putting a hand on each of her heads, I brushed a finger down the length of her ridges, which rose in place at the touch. I smiled at her and then rubbed a soothing circle between a pair of differently sized eyes.

"Yes, you're right," I said. "I should introduce you to the others again, now that you can see their faces. Let's go."

If the airships pilot had ever thought about betraying the Roma family, I suspected he reconsidered thatalong with all his other life choicesas we crowded around Autumn. She'd reverted to her compact, rose-like form to allow me to better carry her into the ship, but once I'd made the big reveal she expanded into a small tree, enlarged eyes hanging from her branches like fruits. As a tolerance for weirdness was something of a necessity for Hunters, this didn't seem to bother anyone in my family, but the pilot had focused his eyes straight ahead, looking back only when Autumn had unfurled her eyes into toothed blossoms to devour the snacks Violet had taken to tossing her. After that, though, he didn't look back, even at the crunching sounds.

"We'll be landing momentarily, Mrs. Roma," He said only a touch stiffly.

"Thank you, Vikare," Grandmother answered distractedly, only occasionally toying with the scroll on her lap as she watched her great-granddaughter take in the contents of the ship. It all must have been pretty odd for Autumn, seeing facesand everything elsefor the first time. Gou had approached her quickly, which I feared might have confused her; seeing what her family so far all looked like and suddenly there was a dog, too? But she didn't seem to have any particular problems, likely because she didn't have a large enough frame of reference to realize it was odd in the first place. He and I were still the only ones who could directly communicate with her anyway and she accepted him readily once she attached a 'voice' to his face. And though I answered her silent questions as best as I was able, he translated her words to the others before I had a chance.

"Autumn says that your eye is very beautiful, Ms. Violet," He said as ropes of green vines slowly grew to cover him. "She cansense it in ways beyond her newfound sight and seems to consider it quite vivid."

"Yeah?" Violet preened at the words. "Why thank you, Autumn. I think your petals are very beautiful as well. You look like an Osiria; it's a nice look."

"She can sense the Aura?" Olivia guessed.

"Mm," I replied. "I wasn't sure how clearly she could perceive the world that way, but having eyes seems to help. I suppose it allows her to tell exactly what it is she's sensing."

Indigo's shadow stretched across the airship at the words, slipping under and around Autumn and Gou. Where their shadows touched her, they came alive, flowing like someone had spilt oil on the ground to take the shape of a growing plant, dark blossoms upon its branches. Autumn's eyes immediately dropped to the floor and she froze, taking a moment to realize the Aura was Indigo's. Once she did, she tried her best to follow along, branches spreading into the air and flowers opening as she shadowed her shadow. When she did, Indigo's shadow shifted, its humanoid shape separating from the rest of the mass and smiling at her niece brightly.

By which, of course, I meant that the shadow pulled away, leaving a spot of light in the darkness, curved in a crescent smile. Other dark shapes began to appear beside her as the rest of our shadows were dragged to stand beside Autumn's, and then others formed in the shape of my missing sisters and even my fathera family portrait done in source-less shadows.

"I hadn't realized you were an artist," I told her, glancing her way. She shrugged once, glancing down at the floor with a half-smile.

"You should see me with shadow puppets," She said, lifting a hand and making a scissoring motion with middle and index fingers. On the wall next to her, a dragon exhaled a wave of dark fire over a shadowing village, wings spread open wide.

I chuckled slightly and tilted my head her way.

"That's your family, Autumn," Violet told her niece. "Or an image of them, at least. We're a bit more colorful in real life, you see."

"She says she's sure you all look beautiful," Gou answered, seated and still as he upheld his self-appointed duties. "She thanks you kindly for the picture as well, Ms. Indigo, and hopes to see them all again herself, in time."

"I'm sure there will be chances," Indigo promised.

Mom peered down at both the flower and the dog quietly, rubbing her shoulder where old flesh met new. She was the newest to the idea of a talking dogignoring the pilot who I wasn't sure was actually aware it was the dog. When he'd heard a new voice start talking, he'd simply gripped the controls harder and continued to stare forwards. I got the feeling he was eager to land.

"You're remarkably well-spoken, Gou," She praised. "I would have thought you'd have more trouble, being new to the language, but you compose yourself admirably."

"I thank you for saying so, Mrs. Arc," He replied, tone both polite and humble. "I often fear that I shall exhaust my grasp of your language and embarrass myself, but I like to think that I have done my best thus far."

"Oh, there's no need to worry about that," She replied. "You speak better than many people I know, I assure you."

I chuckled again as Gou inclined his head respectfully. He'd grown quite a bit in the months since I'd first found him and was well on his way to the average size of his breedbut I had no idea how large he'd actually end up being, considering everything that had happened to him as my Familiar. Under the circumstances, I wouldn't be surprised if he ended up a giant, but I'd handle that if it came up.

For the time being though, everyone's attention was on him and Autumn.

Shifting my leg slightly, I bumped it lightly against my grandmother's. Though she didn't react in any obvious way, I felt her attention shift towards me immediately, even as I turned my head to look at Olivia. My youngest sister was letting her power spill through the air, arranging a delicate framework around Autumn and Gou in an attempt to draw her niece's attention as well.

"When do you start working, Olivia?" I asked, making her sigh.

"As soon as we get back, really," She said. "The semester starts next week, after all."

"That when the new students have initiation, right? I guess they'll want to do that over the weekend so they don't interfere with classes."

"That's how they did it at Beacon," She nodded. "Everyone gets in over the weekend before classes so the newbies can get shot off of a cliff and everyone else can point and laugh."

"Huh," I considered, making her quirk an eyebrow.

"Why?" She asked. "Are you interested?"

"A little bit," I admitted. "I was thinking on checking up on some of the friends I made in Mistral last time."

"That Pyrrha girl?" Olivia asked, tilting her head and squinting at me. "If so, you might be a touch late. She's probably in Vale by now."

"Oh?" I asked, a touch surprised but only for a moment. I hadn't really given much thought to where Pyrrha might go after Sanctum, but going to Haven hadn't seemed to fill her with enthusiasm. Thinking about it and the way she'd acted when last we'd spokenit really wasn't all that surprising. "Hmyeah, I can see it. I kind of wish I'd gotten a chance to say goodbye, but I can always shoot her a message, I suppose. She'll do well at Beacon, I think. But she wasn't the only person I was talking about, actually; Kyanos and the others are probably getting ready for Haven right about now. I wouldn't mind checking in on them. I never got a chance to see much of Haven either, now that I think about it."

"I actually have some business to attend to in Haven soon," Grandmother said, catching onto my intentions quickly, even if she wasn't clear on why yet. "I try to take something of a hand in things every year, you see, just to keep an eye on things. If you'd like, you can accompany me, Jaune. I can show you around the campus as wellor Olivia could, if she has the time?"

"Uh" Olivia seemed to consider that quickly. "Yeah, I should be able to make some time.

"Cool. Thank you, Grandmother, Olivia," I answered, smiling at both of them. In the rush to get everything packed and ready to go, I hadn't had a chance to bring her and Olivia into things without drawing the attention of the others. Well, perhaps that wasn't completely true; there was a part of me, an admittedly paranoid part, that felt it would be wise to get a better grasp of the situation before bringing my grandmother, much less my sister, into this. Whoever this third party of ours was, they were strong enough and smart enough that Raven was working with them even if she didn't really like the idea. If something happenedbest to be sure, just in case. It would only take a glance to get a rough idea of how dangerous they were and if they were in the school, I'd find them quickly. "I'd like to take a look around, if it's not too much trouble. A lot of people my age will be going there, after all; maybe I'll meet someone interesting."

"Oh?" Olivia asked. "Looking to make some friends?"

"Always," I replied, nudging her foot with a toe. "I have a few other friends to check on when we land, too."

I nodded towards the window a moment before we began to lower.

"Ma'am, we're here," The pilot said. "Shall I get the car?"

"That won't be necessary, Vikare," She said, smile almost kind even as she glanced at me inquisitively. "You've been away from home for a while now and we're all Hunter's here. We can walkand I for one would like to see my city again. Hopefully nothing's burned down while I was away."