Thirst Unending: A Romp of Sugar and Stimulants from Omega to the Endless Hunt to the Mojave Desert. BOOK 3 Begins! Lets smooch a cleric beast!

[Princess Scribe]

"So." Rebecca was explaining in the Chapel, "That's why my armor is broken."

"Roll this back, you did what!" Shepherd stares at Artemis, who's covered again, coat, hat and mask fully on her as a fresh spackle of beast blood on her clothes.

"Uh, there was a lot so you need to be more clear." Rebecca said looking at Shephered, "Are you talking about turning her into a nugget, or ... I learned a lot about meat hooks as well."

"You were gone like, twenty minutes!" Shepherd tries to find an explanation as to how all of that happened so fast.

"Time is odd in Yharnam, Commander Shepherd." Artemis respects her rank as she's been told. "For us, it was hours, for you, minutes. We are tasked with ending the Hunt. Thus, we are given power, time, energy to do so. One night would never be enough to slay every beast. So the night is stretched for us."

"To be perfectly clear." Rebecca said again, "Artemis died multiple times, I didn't."

Shepherd stares at Rebecca, "The....mega badass, with the whip cane, died, you didn't."

"Yes." Rebecca nodded glad the lie was going over so well. She knew not to add details and over complicate things.

"Don't fucking lie to me again Rebecca." Shepherd rolls her eyes at the blatant deception.

Rebecca pouted, "How did you know?"

"Likely because, well. Uhm. We went out together, came back at the same time, and admitted that the place you get to by dying, we both were at." Artemis explains the logic as she sees it.

"This is largely why I don't try deceiving people. It's fucking hard, who could keep track of all of that?!" Rebecca pouted even more that it was so obvious to everyone. "I'm good at social things."

"Oh my god, they're both idiots." Shepherd loudly states, "Oh my god, the people who're supposed to fix this are both idiots, holy shit." The Commander is falling into apoplectic fits at this point.

"Hey! Artemis isn't an idiot!" Rebecca says angrily.

"I knew you died! Because there's no way in hell longcoat murder-bitch died in any situation either of us could survive! We saw her dodge a bullet! She hit a ogre thing so hard their blood came out!" Shepherd throws her hands at Artemis to emphasize.

Rebecca shouted, "She died first asshole! I dodged a bullet!" Rebecca grabs the commanders rifle, and jams it into her hands. "I'll dodge a bullet right now!"

"Enough." Artemis states coldly. "There is a city to cleanse. Lets not waste blood."

Rebecca muttered quietly under her breath, "I would have dodged it."

Artemis leans on the wall for a second longer before coming off it and going to the doorway, "Come Rebecca. We must hunt." She's very task oriented. Extremely, horribly, utterly task oriented.

"Sorry, I've been trying to explain this to Shepherd as well, so maybe, doing it at the same time will get this through to everyone." Rebecca said with a deep breath, "We are stuck in time. That means we have infinite time. There is no rush. We can just get around to shit when we feel like it. Like, even if we waited until whatever cataclysmic event goes off, we'd just be here again. So we can chill, or fuck, or smoke weird powders I found in an apothecary, or like. Anything."

"Or we can try and break the loop. Of course." Artemis offers her desire, "I've been here a little while, I'll admit."

Rebecca nods, "Have you tried breaking it by enjoying yourself? That's what they did in Groundhog's day."

"The loop is powered by a dark god, I usually kill it." Artemis states. "It doesn't work, but it makes me feel very good."

"Right. So. If we just do all the stuff that lets you kill the dark god. Then we're not really thinking, or planning, or really making any progress. We're just following a rote ritual." Rebecca says, the logic seems pretty nebulous that doing the same loop would be different.

Shepherd hums, "Maybe we need to....find a misty place." The Commander offers, "Like the Cerberus research base. A crack to get that ball thing to come back, take us to the room."

"Or kill a billionaire who makes people piss in water bottles." Rebecca offers.

"What is this ball?" Artemis finally stops going outside

"It's a silver tentacle fucker, it spits wire into your skin, it's extremely painful and dra— Will you stop biting your lip," Rebecca interrupted herself to snap at Artemis with a small embarassed laugh.

"No." Artemis laughs at Rebecca's reaction. "But please, continue, for actual factual reasons this time."

Rebecca sighed, for the longest time she thought she was crazy, but people are just like this. It's nice. "It drags you through a gaping hole, and then there's a burst of white light and you wake up locked in a room. I killed a billionaire, end up there went to Shepherd's time or galaxy or whatever we were from the same time. We went through a misty room, and ended up fighting a creature that dropped another tentacle fuck-ball and it took us to a different room, that led us here."

"So.....its a way out? How do we lure it. Get it here." Artemis is in Rebecca's space suddenly, the distance between the door and Rebecca crossed in a flicker that made no sense, no-one's that fast. "Tell me." She barely doesn't hiss, cool blue eyes snapping to Rebecca's own with a frenetic energy behind them.

Rebecca realises what she has to do, the woman is ill socialized, and needs guidance. She's not Lisa however. "Artemis. Sit." She said forcefully, pointing to a bench in the chapel. "We are talking."

"I am demanding information." Artemis clarifies with a shiver, "This topic is important to me. And I am not a child to be told to sit." She finishes with a growl.

"It's important to us all. You are behaving like a child. You will be treated as you act." Rebecca says firmly.

"Are you toying with me?" Artemis questions with a show of teeth.

Rebecca tried to give her one of Vro's menacing mentoring stares. Hoping it works without the octouple eyelids.

Artemis's hand is wrapped in Rebecca's new shirt as she's lifted up by the smaller woman, "I need to know if there's a way out." She growls, "I need to know."

"I need to know we can work together. Without you trying to throw people around and get intimidating. Yes. It's a possible way out, but I won't tolerate this behavior." Rebecca said firmly, even as she choked. "You'd just kill me, eventually die, and we'd be right back here."

"I-" Artemis is cut off by a hand from Shepherd interposing itself between the two women, not succeeding in budging the inhumanly strong woman an inch, but catching her attention.

"We're in this together, all of us. We all want to leave. You're hurting, I can see that Artemis." She starts to say.

Oh cool, Rebecca thinks watching Shepherd with all small twinge of... Something, She'll just handle it. I'll... Continue fucking up I guess.

"And--" Artemis drops Rebecca and snarls at Shepherd with an angry, monstrous tone, eyes flooding red, teeth growing sharp.

"I HAVE WALKED THESE STREETS FOR AN ETERNITY." She hisses out between fangs as claws push from her hands, "I HAVE KILLED, BUTCHERED, MAIMED AND DESTROYED EVERY LIVING THING IN IT A DOZEN TIMES OVER." She barely holds back from jumping forwards.

"I WILL NOT BE LED AROUND, CAJOLED AND TOLD TO ACT TO YOUR WHIMS!" She shouts now, scaring the other residents of the chapel as the windows shake.

Rebecca said, "Are you planning to kill the two new things you met in an eternity? There's options now. They require working together."

Artemis's eyes snap back to her and there's a terrifying moment where Rebecca thinks she's about to be torn in half. Its a long moment precisely because Artemis is pressing her claws just barely against the skin of her stomach. She's not ill-socialized, she's enraged, constantly, utterly, furiously.

"I am considering it." Artemis spits out, dropping Rebecca and breathing out with a shudder.

"That's stupid." Rebecca fires at her with a small sigh, "So fucking stupid. I wont' tell you what to do."

"Do not tell me to sit. Ever." Artemis snaps.

"Fine." Rebecca said waving her hand, "I'll just continue to allow you to invade my space and threaten me. This will be great. I'm ecstatic." Her tone was venomous and acidic. She knew that Shepherd was the one who would handle this. Rebecca finally threw her hands up and said, "I don't even have any information you two don't. Work it out since you're so great together."

"Fuck both of you!" Artemis shouts, storming out of the building, unfurling the whip from her cane and looking for blood.

"I give up, I don't want to do this anymore." Rebecca said finally letting Artemis leave. "I'm not going to beat myself up, but I just need a second. I never know what to fucking do, and she'll just continue killing shit until she's back here or dead in the dream or something. I'm not going to chase a grown woman. I'm in fact very tired of chasing grown women who want nothing to do with me."

"FUCK YOU! I LIKE YOU!" Artemis shouts back, having heard that whole conversation from a hundred yards away.

"Yeah. Then come back and talk." Rebecca continued to speak at a normal volume, pulling out one o f her cigarettes. She holds it out for Shepperd to light, but Shepherd just looks at her. It seemed like a cool thing to do at the time. Instead walking over to one of the candelabra's and lighting it with the flame on their.

The sound of a horrible beast being torn apart is the only response given by Artemis.

"I was holding it out for a light. I thought— Eh fuck it." Rebecca says taking a drag on her cig.

"My omnitools dead too." Shepherd sighs, sitting down and staring at the ground, "Fuck. This is--"

"It is what it is," Rebecca cut Shepherd off, taking another drag, "I just want to sit with someone for a bit."

"This place is shitty. I'm sorry." Shepherd apologizes, as promised, sitting next to Rebecca with a sigh.

Rebecca took another drag, exhaling, "Eh? It's not Afgahnistan, it's got that going for it. No rocket launchers, or teddy bear IEDs." She reaches out and touches Shepherd's hand, "It'll all be fine. I just need to stop talking, and start answering questions. It's trying to throw my weight around that fucked that whole situation. I could have just said yes." Rebecca took another drag, "Wanted to be like the people who helped me. I'm not those people."

"Nah you're good. Artemis is....she's got issues." Shepherd mumbles annoyedly, "She's angry, pained and in so much fucking like....stuff."

"And can hear everything you're saying from a half mile away." Rebecca added.

"I don't usually hide much." Shepherd answers, "And she won't talk to me, so I'll talk at her." Sarah mildly, slightly, gives a minuscule complaint, not used to being ignored and finding it very needling.

Rebecca looks at Shepherd for a second, but let's it go Yeah, it sucks being second. "Don't worry, it'll be you in the end she talks to."

"Hmm." Shepherd murmurs to herself, not so certain.

"Are you feeling alright?" Rebecca asks Shepherd, "I was told your like... Bits would start growing back."

Shepherd looks up, "I haven't felt anything like that? Headaches been...less, here or there. Just pounding instead of stabbing me." She says smirking slightly, perhaps edging into a smile.

"That's good, it's the only reason I agreed to this hunt thing, so that's really good." Rebecca said leaning her head on Shepherd's shoulder.

Shepherd sighs at the words, but doesn't say anything to them, leaning in to Rebecca, letting the moment be the moment.

The moment stayed like that, for a good long while. Rebecca felt a bit of turmoil, something she should say now, before they might find a way out. Not one to leave things in the air, or festering anymore. Knowing how awful it made her feel to do so.

"I ... Want to get you home. Artemis somewhere that isn't here." Rebecca said, "I don't really— I don't have a home. Lisa and Vro will be fine without me, everyone moves on. I'm too dangerous or stupid or both for Omega. I'm going to get you guys where you need to go, then... Figure it out after."

Shepherd shakes her head, "You're staying." The statement is simple, poignantly emphasized by an arm thrown around Rebecca and holding her tight. "With me. Us, when we get Artemis to pull her head out of her ass." She stares at the closed chapel doors, locked and barred whenever the Hunter isn't here.

"I think it's a terrible idea to keep insulting her, she's fragile." Rebecca whispered back sadly, "Imagine being alone for decades with only violence. Not even like me, where occasionally I'd run into people and we'd work together, have victories, just a loop of agonizingly painful tedium that's sprinkled with intense moments of failure."

"Yeah, probably, but she needs to talk to someone. And she won't talk to me. I'm not, uh, a Hunter." Shepherd says.

"You didn't even try," Rebecca said with an eye roll, "You jammed a hand in her face and threatened her."

"Can you trust me on this?" Shepherd says with a smile.

Rebecca sighs, "Every time I have, it's ended up so bad."

"Yeah. Lemme....I can explain then." Shepherd's expression falls to a tired look, "I'm....I can die. You can't. She can't. I'm not a person to her. I'm fragile, too easy to lose. So she doesn't care." The Commander explains easily, piece by piece. "So, you have to be the one. I'm not even on her radar. I'm a conversation machine at best."

"Sure." Rebecca said, she didn't really believe her. Rebecca hadn't really been the focus of anything. When the time came the important people would look at each other and make decisions. When she lead it killed people. Hundreds. Almost killed Ras.

 

[Princess Scribe]

Maim. A Beast rushes towards Artemis and is caught like a small bird, its head crushing in her grip. Not bothering with the weapon yet, the blunderbuss kept holstered on a belt. End. Another tainted, maddened horror is caught in the whips as she flicks it over, razor-blades tearing into it with great gouts of blood as it gets carved into chunks of putrid, pale flesh overrun with lifeforce.

Tear. Stomping boots carve up cobbles as she makes her way towards a bridge with rage in her heart like a screaming furnace, blown by bellows of violence and bloodshed, heady scents entering the air from butchery as another monster, and another is carved up, taken apart and cast aside, getting her muscles, her bones, her body ready to kill.

Rend. The gate slams shut behind her as the Cleric Beast smells blood. The acrid, wet fur and stench of a monster mutated and broken coming to rest. It howls, insight flaring in the noise, making it alight with the knowledge of the cosmos that already lurked in her mind.

Carve. It rushes her, storming across the distance as Artemis sidesteps, or more accurately side leaps, throwing the whip out in front of it as she growls in anger, deciding this is her target. The howl carries far and wide even as it moves, reaching every part of the city. Whip-razors catch and rip into its flesh with horrid, tearing noises, carving through the shins of the beast.

Rebecca hears the cry of the Cleric Beast and realizes immediately, she's fighting it alone. Rebecca just shook her head she'd wait, at least for now. There weren't any real stakes now, she'd either win or get it out of her system.

The roar of a blunderbuss answers its attempt at a sideswipe. The Beast tries to catch her in a fast swipe but the Hunter flickers through its arm, holding a bone tight in a show of ledgermaine and dexterity. Another bark of a blunderbuss stuns it again, and the can is shoved through its eye, ripping into the orifice with a noise much like a grape being squashed before the whip unfurls in the ocular cavity and rips forwards in a spray of blood.

A second, much more pained and desperate cry leaves the Beast as Artemis is enraged, making no mistakes. Feeling like her first time here, the first time she entered these streets. Hope and anger mixing into the most toxic of potions, righteous fury. She just needs to make that ball appear, somehow, somehow. Blood spills, viscera falls, mangled remnants of a Cleric Beast'a hold of the reis eye are pulled forwards as she flickers through the next attack, the quicksilver in her pocket starting to get light.

The Beast turns and swipes again, but the whip-trap was already laid, and its arm gets caught in the tangle of razors and with a tug from Artemis, the whole limb shears off in gruesome, uneven chunks as it screams now, sounding human, afraid, scared. A crash echoes while she nears it, heeled boots crumbling the cobbled bridge-stones with each step.

A whipcrack, a squealing monster and then the sound of a sternum being torn out of a monster. Blood spills in a tidal wave, a heart the size of a cow pumping blood through its broken and ruined arteries. Its echoes flow into Artemis, making her breathe in as she feels strength begin to settle, to ministrate in her.

All around her, creatures appear. Hanging off buildings with spindly and tumescent limbs, riddled with holes that peek into the utter blackness of their internals. She ignores them, and starts the journey back to the Chapel. Storming past corpses and viscera with a calmed, if violent look in her chilly blue eyes.

 

[Princess Scribe]

"You good?" Rebecca asked as Artemis walked in, "I'm I don't really have it in me to get tossed around and screamed at. I don't think you even need my help. Are you good? Do you want company?"

"We have a hunt." Artemis says, drenched in viscera though unharmed. "Come, Rebecca. I have awoken the doll. We have work to do." She says.

"Fine, but I expect you to be conversational." Rebecca says firmly standing up to walk with her scratching through the mass of curls. Somehow now, seeming to always be bouncy, and vibrant. The only blessing she really felt after losing all of her enhancements.

"I'm calming down, madame. I apologize." Years of elegant and careful interactions in a more civilized place lets her push past the anger and fury to actually speak.

Rebecca gives her a gentle pat on the shoulder, "I fucked up, I tend to try and grab a hold of the reins of things. It rarely ends well, don't worry about it." She waves at Shepherd as they leave.

"I'm a bad woman to try that with, don't mind me." Artemis states as blood and viscera fills the streets, dozens of corpses of monsters left around.

Rebecca nodded, "At least you're friendly and otherwise hygenic. I have extremely low standards."

"Ah." Artemis chuckles, "You know just how to endear yourself, my sweet." She laughs quietly, smiling behind her mask as the journey forward takes turns into the deeper city. Looming gothic spires and buildings stretching tall over tight streets and fenced in places.

"You ever fuck the doll?" Rebecca asked suddenly, after about fifteen minutes of silent walking.

"No, I did not. She's....she looks like someone I know." Artemis shakes her head.

Rebecca nodded, "Can I try to fuck the doll?"

"You might not want too. That person is someone we kill." Artemis clarifies her position, "Or, to be more accurate. We die to, over and over again, until we manage it."

"That's... Not a deal breaker." Rebecca admits, "Is it her? Like does she go nuts or what?"

Artemis shakes her head as she points to a suspicious lantern. Just, glowing white, in the middle of the street, "No, speak to her yourself I suppose." She says, touching the lantern and vanishing into motes of dreamlight.

Rebecca looks around back and forth. On the one hand, maybe explain you're going to just teleport. On the other hand, I guess it's pretty clear what happened. She walked forward and poked the lantern herself.

It hurt. Teleporting was not pleasant. Much like everything in Yharnam, it made Rebecca feel pain, light headed, and as if she had been drained a few gils of blood for the pleasure. It was disorienting, but she found herself back in the Waking Dream.

The doll is moving. Its in a cute dress, hands clasped in front of it on Artemis's face as blood flows out of Artemis and into its cracks, before returning as white, glimmering light. It's... oddly intimate, with the doll brushing the white haired woman's cheek with a careful touch.

Rebecca takes out a sugar skull she found in the sewer and idly chews on it. Something about the whisping smoke made it seem tasty and desirable. At first she thought it was bone, but once she had cracked the skull of it with her teeth, some kind of flavored foam came out. They were littered around Yarnham as well. In the Cathedral Ward, in the sewer, she even got from some nun they met.

Tingled a bit though, when she ate them, like they were made of fizzy candy. She crunched the candied skull loudly.

"Hello." Rebecca said waving at the doll.

She looks over to Rebecca. Still touching Artemis's face. "Two Hunters?" She sounds exactly like Ras oh my god. The cute, slavic voice is near-identical to what the omnitool produces for Ras and similar to most Quarians. "Very different times indeed. I will care for you as well, good Hunter, as I do for her." The Doll assured Rebecca with a soft smile.

Rebecca giggled at Artemis, "I uh ... Thought you said—" She gestures by thrust a finger through a hole made through the other hand, "—Didn't happen?"

Artemis seems dully staring forward, letting the Doll's magic or whatever work her over as the Doll responds, "I care for everyone here. I am its caretaker."

"Are you a person?" Rebecca asks, walking forward. She gently takes off Artemis's tricorne, and puts it on her head. The woman seemed to be either in a trance, or distracted enough to not care. "Do you have thoughts? Feelings?" She looked at Artemis, and wondered if she could get away with taking the mask off as well.

"Mhmm. Why do you ask, Good Hunter?" The doll tilts her head with a purse to her lips, ball joints in her arms shifting and moving as she turns her body.

Rebecca dodges the question, clearly having something odd in mind, or setting up a complicated joke or tease. A prose trap perhaps. "Are you aware of what happens before you wake up?"

"I am not, no, Good Hunter." She says with a shake of her head, "The world before I awaken is a darkness. I thank both of you for helping me in this way."

Rebecca nods, "Oh thank god." She said, "Sex got weird, and I didn't know you were a person. We uh. Needed an extra hand." Though, Rebecca mostly studied the Doll for a reaction.

"I am here to care for you in any way." The Doll accepts Rebecca's words calmly, "If you need love, I can give it as well." She says with a smile and a tilt of her head.

"I'm trying to figure out like, what's your deal right now. Are you a like you were definitely a doll a minute ago. I can now very much see that you're not just a doll. Are you magic?" Rebecca asks now taking Artemis's sword out of it's sheath examining it. She puts that in her own scabbard as well. The Cane sword felt good

"Yes. I think. I wake up every time the Good Hunter comes back here." The Doll explains affably, stroking Artemis's cheek again as the white light continues to flow.

Rebecca points to the grave behind them, "Did you bury everyone here?"

"I, and the Old Hunter Gehrman, together." The Doll states.

Rebecca looks at Artemis, and then sees if the belt comes off, it did way easier then she expected. The mask could stay though, it felt... invasive to take the mask for some reason. "You notice that grave that says, Artemis on it? You know who's buried there?"

"The Good Hunter, of course." She says, still transferring light into Artemis's face.

Rebecca nods, something still clearly sticking to her head but it's so oddly shaped she can't figure it out. "What happened to them?"

"The Good Hunters previous finished their hunts, and escaped this horrible dream." The Doll says with a caring tone, "This one lingers, I know not why."

"Can I dig it up?" Rebecca asks the doll with a raised eyebrow. "These are all hunter graves right? So they've got their gear when they finished or went nuts?"

"I cannot stop you, Good Hunter." The Doll sighs, letting Artemis go as she slowly starts to blink back to life, eyes moving and trying to recognize the universe.

Rebecca waves at Artemis, wearing her cane sword, blunderbuss, and tricorne. "Doll says she'd've fucked you if you asked. You should ask things more."

"What. No, give me my hat." Artemis snaps to her feet, and the pants fall down around her ankles as she trips on them with a gritted hiss of annoyance.

Rebecca sprints away with a grin, leaping across the Hunters dream, bouncing over gravestones, trying to get as much of a lead before Artemis recovers.

"You won't get away!" Artemis howls as she starts to dead sprint after Rebecca.

Rebecca ducks through a workshop, some place where they put blood into stone. Trying to cut across a second opening to come around the back. She toppled things as she moves with a maniacal grin. When she saw Artemis on her she turned around and fired with the blunderbuss.

Pellets slam into the woman and spill blood as she pushes through the pain. Falling upon Rebecca with a rageful glare and dangerous smile.

"Oh no Ms. Good Hunter," Rebecca says as they've come full circle near the doll again, she's playful and mocking, trying to incite anything other than rage, letting the rage fuel play, lust, anything but just being pissy. "Whatever will you do now? Am I to be ravaged by a beast?"

"Such sweet things you say." Artemis growls, one hand moving to Rebecca's thigh and raising her leg up as the other wraps itself in her hair, pulling her close to the sharp, vicious teeth that showed themselves suddenly, letting breath come out in steam like a wild animal.

Rebecca giggles as Artemis makes a show of being scary, or possibly just is deciding that this game will not be an angry, frightening thing. It will be a fun giggly moment, taking control entirely by body language and mirth. "Oh noooo," she says in a faux distressed tone, "What a terrible night to have a curse."

"What a terrible night indeed." Artemis chuckles dangerously, slinking downwards, resting her knees on the floor as she pushes Rebecca to sit on a table of weapons, pants sliding off as she leans forwards into the staff, letting it rest on her lips as she talks, fluid coming out and starting to make them glisten.

"You'll have to be careful, Rebecca. My teeth are very sharp." She says, opening her mouth and showing her teeth off before starting to move forwards.

Rebecca narrows her eyes at the teeth, "Yeah, but they're so tiny~" She says in a cutesy voice.

"But they're so sharp." Artemis smiles back, not able to make her voice cutesy, and instead settling on raspy and excited, licking and teasing. Though she feels a gentle, tender touch on her arm, not something rough, or violent. A soft squeeze.

"But I trust them." Rebecca said with a smile, giving Artemis a small kiss on the lips, "I don't need to be worried about something that won't hurt me." Another kiss.

Artemis pauses at that, with a curious smile on her face, elegant and yet confused. "I....I'd thought I'd never hear that." She admits with sigh, the smile weakening.

Rebecca kisses her again, slowly, "Do you want to cuddle before, after, or before and after? We do have unlimited time, Artemis."

"I think both is good." The Hunter chuckles, leaning up to rest on the same table as Rebecca, throwing aside a dozen weapons and equipment's to make space as she interlocks legs.

 

[Princess Scribe]

"Blimey! Don't scare me like that! On a night like this, I took you for a monster!" A ragged man states, staring at the duo of huntresses, coats billowing in the wind as they glare down at the beggar, wrapped in bandages with filthy skin. He looks around, and is surrounded by corpses, each of them mauled and torn to shreds, with one having bite marks in it that looks suspiciously human.

"Uh..." Rebecca looked at the things around the man, "You eating people?"

"He's eating people." Artemis idly states, letting her cane roll in her palm, side to side in a circular motion.

Rebecca tries to remain calm, walking towards one of the corpses, poking it with her leg, "These are just... People. People. Not like, monsters. Why are you eating people?"

"I-well-What else is there to eat!" He shouts, getting angry fast.

"You've been here for less than a night. You could not have gotten that hungry that fast." Rebecca said looking at the suspicious beggar. Staring at him with a severe apprehension.

"I look like a gent that gets food on the reg, hunter?" He points down to his rags, boney ribs and thin, emaciated features, despite his face being covered in rags. "I......if you got some food that ain't this. I'll take it. They were dead when I got here. M'no killer."

Rebecca looks to Artemis, "So he like. Immediately starts killing people yeah?"

"Mhmm." Artemis states idly, "Beast in disguise. Nasty one. Lightning and the like." She keeps rolling her cane in her hand as the beggar starts sputtering.

"Huh." Rebecca said looking at him, "Did you fall for it?"

"Sort of. Fell for another trick first. Sent him to a clinic. Doctor there is experimenting on the subjects." She says, still staring at the sputtering beggar.

"Jesus Christ." Rebecca says looking at her, "Holy shit. So it's not just been like violence but just awfulness."

"The moon drives those without the mark mad. Drives us mad too, but differently." Artemis states as the beggar is backing up to the wall. "Its no fault of their own, but it doesn't make them free of punishment either."

Rebecca nods, "So the moon is what makes you like being turned into a nugget during sex?"

"Probably. Yes." Artemis shrugs.

Rebecca focuses on her mark and brings out one of the things she found. It seems that Artemis has found everything, many times showing Rebecca an odd change of events, or a weird alcove that leads to some hidden trinket. The thing she's focusing on right now, is a flame thrower. Well it had some other name, but it was clearly a flame thrower. You pointed it, pulled the trigger, flames came out. It's a flame thrower.

Flame-sprayer just sounded stupid. Rebecca nodded solemnly to the man, "So uh. Sorry about this bud, but I want to know how this works in a safe controlled environment." She lets out a little tuft of flame to see how it works. It seemed rather easy.

"All you hunters-YER ALL THE SAME!" He shouts, backing away from the two women as Artemis starts to bounce on her feet, heels clicking against cobbles.

"Meh?" Rebecca turned on the flamethrower, letting quicksilver and blood infuse into a tank that doused fire onto the beggar. She nodded with appreciation as the man went up like a roman candle. The cone was wide, and it created a wall of fire that engulfed anything in front of it. Like a cannibal serial killer.

As the man roasts, body trying to grow out in size, but caught in quicksilver flames, Artemis says excitedly, "I haven't tortured Iosefka yet!" There's a glimmer of excitement in her eyes at that.

"Yet as in ever," Rebecca says as she holds the sprayer with one hand. Yawning as the body writhes and pops, "Or yet as in, in this loop."

"Well, not quite Iosefka, poor girl is dead. But the one that took her name." Artemis continues to ponder, "And the second. She's this maddened Church Hunter that is feeding people the Old Blood. Turning them into....blue horrors."

Rebecca sighs turning back to the beggar, "Jesus does the flamethrower suck or is this guy like... Particularly punishable?" It wasn't really that it wasn't working just that it'd been a while of continuous flame and he still seemed to be bubbling and bursting.

"He's durable. Took me an hour the first time around." Artemis says, "Is she pregnant yet?" The Hunter murmurs, trying to think if everything's line up.

"Um. Can I please call a red card on torturing a pregnant woman. That's, I'm a war-crimer by trade but that's fucked." Rebecca said, turning back to the screaming man. She turned a knob on the flamesprayer to lower the flame size to maintain the duration of the cook.

"No, its not with a baby, its with a little twisted horrible thing made with the brains of a dozen people." Artemis explains affably, "She deserves it, I promise. And I can eat the umbilical cord after."

"Do you remember pregnant women outside of this experience?" Rebecca asks carefully as thankfully the man's vocal chords had finally charred shut, though he was still very aggressively writhing. "I need to know how to even begin to approach what you just said you do."

"Not really? I'm aware of the process. I think I might have been at one point, but its very vague." Artemis says, kicking the flaming corpse in the head with a loud crackle of bone, silencing its motions finally. "What's so wrong with it? She's just another woman, one that killed-Ariana! I haven't gotten to her either." She sounds excited for that person.

"Is Ariana a friend?" Rebecca asks carefully, as she finally turns the flamethrower off. Focusing on the mark, and letting the weapon disappear. God she hoped that was permanent, it was extremely useful.

"Yes, a woman of the night. She's very nice. Would pat me on the head sometimes." Artemis says smiling through the mask. "She gets killed very often, though, its hard to keep her safe." She frowns, blue eyes showing thought, "He kills her, Adele is too easily jealous of her, and the moon makes her murderously jealous."

Rebecca takes a deep breath, No more rough sex, this is... That was a terrible idea. "Oh. I get that too. One time my boyfriend threatened to leave me so I tried to remove his legs with an assault rifle." Rebecca nods.

"And she's also pregnant. But doesn't know it." Artemis casually says, "She birth's the creature today, but...for her it'll be weeks of the Hunt, but for us it'll be a few monsters."

"Hey. Do you want to go back to the Dream for a moment? I have- we- all that needs to probably be talked about to some degree." Rebecca says rather firmly, "I'd normally say when you're ready, but uh I'm kind of wanting to put everything on pause until we adress the numerous, unending horrors that you kind of just casually throw out there."

"The Chapel Dweller is nice. The one without legs." Artemis shrugs, "Its why I sent people there after the second time." The woman, however, has turned around and is walking towards a lantern in the distance, maybe a few minutes away. "He mixes up the incense that keeps the beasts away."

"Oh god." Rebecca mutters silently, "Wait, I think I need a hug, after hearing that. What the fuck." She can already figure out the forgone conclusion of what happened the second time. Rebecca actually does take a moment to stop Artemis gently. "Please?"

"Sure, uhm, I thought you wanted to be in the Dream first." Artemis says, hooking her cane in her belt and clasping the blunderbuss to her hip before moving in, giving a strong hug, if a little sticky with the blood that's been drying.

"Just... I'm worried about you." Rebecca admitted, "Which is probably weird for you, yeah. Probably really weird. It's just... No-one, not even people I hate, should go through that."

"Its not so bad now, I can avoid the terrible things." Artemis says in the hug, "Just a matter of preparing properly."

Rebecca says, "Not only that though, you can have Shepherd be the one to man the incense. So then the cripple doesn't fuck up your sanctuary. We killed the murder hobo. What else is there to prevent?"

"Chapel Dweller doesn't mess it up, he mixes it up. Prepares it." Artemis clarifies with a chuckle, hugging her a little tighter at the idea.

Rebecca sighs a moment of reprieve, "Oh. Oh thank god." She returns the hug, "I thought you were saying like Round 1, everyone dies. Round 2, incompetence killed everyone."

"I killed him the first time because he looked like a beast." Artemis clarifies, "The purple skin, and glowing eyes, and foot long fingers set me off. It wasn't pretty."

Rebecca gives her a very strong hug, "But you learned, and you even learned to like him. That's great."

The Hunter gives a breath out, finally leaning into the hug, unused to giving affection or feeling any sort of safety outside of the Dream. Still not quite returning it fully, unable to, really. "Mhmm, same with a lot of them. Eileen is alive. We should keep her that way. You'd like her, she's.....helpful, if a little rough around the edges."

"Artemis." Rebecca said with a moment of costernation, "You just curbstomped a flaming homeless man to death. She can't be that much rougher around the edges."

"She killed me twice." Artemis chuckles, "Though I did start those fights. She can get very very inventively cutting with her insults during battle. Its.....a skill, actually." She admits with a wry smirk behind the bandanna. "I'm just talking because normally all this is just...internal I suppose. You're hearing my flow of consciousness."

"Oh!" Rebecca says with a smile. She still hasn't let go, she doesn't know when she'll let go really, choosing to rub Artemis's back. "I can't really give a flow of conscious thought. It'd just be a constant wet schlorping." She gives her a gentle squeeze. "Lets go meet your friend then."

"Ah." Artemis says idly. "Uhm....Arianna is....." Artemis thinks on where she would be.

"Okay, do you fuck any of these people?" Rebecca asks suddenly, very concerned.

"Arianna lets me drink her blood." The Hunter says, "She has...very good blood. It makes you feel euphoric for hours."

"You... Honey." Rebecca says, trying not to sound condescending, "You ... Are any of these people still... People to you?"

"The Doll is. She's always around." Artemis doesn't react really to the truthful question. "These are....they don't really matter. None of them. I complete this, kill God, ask Gehrman to wake me up, give up, whatever I do. And then I just...snap back here." She's letting the words filter out in the prim and trim tones she uses for everything, not cracking or crying in the least.

Rebecca takes a deep breath, "Can we kill Gehrman?"

"Not yet." Artemis chuckles, shaking her head, "Old bastard can walk, oh, he can walk alright." She smiles wistfully behind the mask, thinking on it. "But, to....end it any other way except him trying to get me out of the Dream. I've had to put him down. He thinks I've been afflicted with madness, won't believe me. Reasonable, to be fully honest."

"No, you're the most sane person he—" Rebecca stops, picking a tiny bit of skull and brain matter off of Artemis's mask, "here. You're fine. I mean you're very tiny, angry, and violent, but you're sane. You're also a funny, and fun. Charming. Sweet."

"I assure you, sweet. I am not sane." Artemis chuckles again, a raspy dry one as she starts walking a direction, letting Rebecca easily keep up. The streets brutally cleared with blade and firearm half an hour ago.

She didn't like that one bit, but knew that self deprecation wasn't something you could bully out of. That acting like Vro, would also not get her what she wanted. Lisa however, did the 'compliment good behavior' thing. So she could try that, if Artemis did anything that wasn't violence. Literally anything that wasn't violence. "Do you want to hold hands?" Worth a shot.

"Oh my. What a queer scent." A voice from a doorway Artemis stopped in front of takes the attention away from Rebecca's request. "But I'd take it over the stench of blood and beasts any day. A man and a woman? I don't work during the night of the Hunt, so if that's what you're here for, I'll leave you to your own devices. If that doesn't do it, come back in the mornings darling." The soft, English voice through the door says.

"Did you just call me a fucking queer?" Rebecca says angrily, "The fuck's wrong with you. Who starts a conversation like that."

"She's referencing the odd scent we give off. Queer means abnormal." Artemis explains, patting Rebecca on the shoulder.

"Are you sure? Because I could also smell the lesbian on you." Rebecca said giving the other woman a slight hip check.

Artemis chuckles, saying to the door, "I know of a safe place, madame, one safer than an unguarded home during a Hunt this violent. The Oedon Chapel. The Keeper there has a mixture of herbs. They banish the beasts, and the interior is rather cozy." She's....affable, kind and easily convincing, knowing exactly how to make this woman do what she wants.

"Oh thank goodness. You're a hunter, right?" The woman behind the door asks, "Maybe I'll see you there?" A coy question, the sorts that makes Rebecca immediately aware she's attracted to Artemis. One that Artemis entirely misses with a casual response.

"Whenever I bring another person in need, certainly." The Hunter answers.

"You're going to have to be way more forward." Rebecca yells past Artemis quickly, "She's rather dense about matters of heart and clam."

"I see, I'll see you there as well, madame huntress." Rebecca can hear the lack of capitalization there as Artemis is walking away, done with this now.

"Definitely, tell Sarah Shepherd I said Hi! And I love her! She's my partner uh like. Work partner. Don't actually say that I love her. I need to stop saying that. Artemis has left me here. Goodbye." Rebecca bubbled out before looking back towards Artemis, "Hey Wait!"

Rebecca catches up with the walking woman, who chuckles again at the excitement. "Come along, we've a father to kill. Poor man." Artemis pulls a music box free, preparing it.

"That heart and clam line was good, can I please get a little credit for my eloquence at word craft." Rebecca said, massively butchering about three or four different words and forms of grammar.

"It was a good line, sweet. I enjoyed it, though it took me...till now to understand it." Artemis answers with a nod and a smile through the mask. Taking a turn and standing outside a roadway into what looks like a graveyard, a man of eight feet and several hundred pounds stomping about in it.

"My hopes is to find something so jaw droppingly bold that it causes you to short circuit." Rebecca says firmly, "I think it'll cause a full system reboot. It'll be good for you."

"Oh. My heart awaits the moment." Artemis chuckles, pulling the music box up. "Perhaps this fight is one you should avoid. Its...." The Hunter trails off.

"If I can't die, who cares? I can at least make things easier." Rebecca says with a yawn. She needed to not care, she could make it easier by showing a different way of looking at it.

"Well. I suppose, we'll have to go tell his daughter after." Her cane starts scraping across the ground as her free hand wields it, scratching against the cobbles while the music plays consistently out of the box. Dragging the man's attention over as he growls, bandage blindfold on his eyes.

"He's just a slow giant dude, what's so hard about this one?" Rebecca asks as she pulls out the flamesprayer, giving a few threatening puffs out.

The man jumps clear thirty feet across the graveyard, and slams inbetween the two women which jump away from the point of impact, cracked stone and a half-foot deep crater forming where the axe landed.

"Much." Artemis answers with a shout, starting to move and circle the Father with a whip-cane and blunderbuss while he starts to look between both, tracking them with sightless eyes. Rebecca lets off a shot from her flamesprayer, sending arcs of quicksilver fire across the mans back while Artemis closes, growling into hand to hand with arcs of scarlet blood.

He moves still, pushing through the injuries with muttered words and brute strength, slamming his axe through gravestones and trees alike, felling them as the battle takes place across the whole yard. Rebecca and Artemis stick together throughout, always surrounding him from two angles.

That is until Artemis gets caught, shot in the legs by the mans own blunderbuss and, before Rebecca can blink, he shoves his whole axe through her chest, and throws the body aside, making it limply smash into the cobbles, dragging a furrow through them.

Rebecca sighs, and rushes forward, bringing the saw blade down using it as a giant fisted weapon, slamming it into the man's back, before dashing past him again. Firing occasionally with the sprayer. She kicks the music box as they fight, ducking low below a swing, causing it to chime out playing a sweet tune.

There's a tense moment as the father lets out a loud roar of rage, or despair or some combination of both that causes him to drop his momentarily and grasp at his head. Sobbing heavily, he falls to his knees. His hands still grasping at himself. Trying to comfort himself in a small hug as he kneels sobbing. There's a moment where Rebecca considers peace, considers trying to reason with him.

The last time she did that, she ended up here. Instead she took out the saw blade and aggresively ripped a slash down the man's spine, splitting the meat. Then bringing the flame sprayer around to burn it out more as he screamed and roared in pain. Some transformation taking place as Rebecca scurried away to the music box. He was turning into a beast she realised. She hadn't been able to hunt any of these things without Artemis, for the most part she had been there for emotional support for a dead woman.

Artemis groans, starting to stand with a clear, wedge shaped hole in her torso, jabbing a needle into her thigh hard in the process as the brutalized woman with no possible way to still be alive starts to get back into fighting shape. Still, there's gonna be at least three or four more seconds before she's good.

And the father seems to have no intent on leaving Rebecca alone that long, leaping forwards animalistically with a howl, making her have to throw herself aside, pumping fire out and into him as a barrier of heat and scorching flesh. He slaps away the flame away before roaring again. And a blunderbuss catches him in the leg, before a cane-whip wraps around his neck and starts to pull at it, stopped by his hand grabbing the sharp razors and wire.

Rebecca seeing the openning starts to rapidly, out of panic and fear slamming into the man's skull with the saw blade. Treating his temple as a rail spike that was need to be knocked into place to continue the track. Blow after meating blow sending huge spurts of blood in the air. At some point she started yelling, "Just. Fucking. DIE!" Slam, schlick, slam, schlick, slam. Over and over and over. There wasn't time for thought or feeling it just needed to die.

Impacts of brutish saw-blade makes the Father slowly go limp, and then, with his strength gone, the cane whip is pulled like a saw through his neck. The thing pulls off his head, and it bumps on the ground twice, before rolling to a stop.

"That's the difficult part." Artemis states with a rasp to her, another vial starting to heal her further.

"Easier with two people," Rebecca gasps a bit. Nodding, then says, "So how many hail maries do you think we have to say?"

"I'm not religious." Artemis picks up the music box, pocketing the bloody square.

"So why doesn't the music box spell work on us?" Rebecca asks looking at the music box with a bit of interest.

"Its not a spell. Its his daughters music box." Artemis states calmly.

"Why does that make him have an epileptic seizure?" Rebecca says looking at Artemis terrified of the answer.

"The corpse he buried is his wife. It drove him mad. This reminds him he has children. The thought breaks him further, having left them that is. Gives a good opening." The music box is out of sight at least, else Rebecca would be staring at it.

It's just another time for a hug. There's been a lot of those lately, but this time, was the mostest time of a hug of all so far. Rebecca nodded, and didn't ask this time. She needed this more than Artemis probably did. There might not actually be anything to comfort in Artemis left until she was out of here. At this point the attrocities were just horrific. She tried to think of the worst thing the worst possible thing, she had heard or done on Omega, and it just didn't really compare to "Torturing women for their sweet umbilical cord powers."

"Did you get hurt?" Artemis asks, returning the hug, drenched in blood as she is.

Rebecca shook her head, "No, but we will get you out of here." She promised it, there was no doubt, not a single lack of conviction. "And we will make this more pleasant." That was also something she promised, squeezing tighter. "I'm sorry this happened to you."

"I signed the contract." Artemis echoes something Rebecca's said many times. "This was the, profession, they expected of me." She looks at Rebecca with a soft smile.

"They didn't really tell you," Rebecca said softly, "They make you promise something without you knowing what they're asking, then beat you to death and in line with the threat of your personal values." She rubbed Artemis's back, "It's all a scam, to get people to die for them. So they don't have too. You're so good, alright? You're strong for holding out this long."

Artemis sounds moreso confused than comforted, but accepts it nontheless, "Alright? Sweet, I am still myself. Just a little more violent perhaps." She says.

"You're also very tired." Rebecca says, it's a clear observation. They spent a lot of time together in the Dream, and god Artemis was tired. "You're great, until we get out we'll make it better."

"I'd like that." Artemis says back. "But we've many more things to kill, to make sure time flows."

Rebecca scoffs, "I mean that's the great part, at least." She boops Artemis on the nose, gesturing towards a lantern, "We can take a break whenever we want, and running into another fight after psychologically torturing a man to death will put a few chips in my mental armor. Unfortunately, we'll just have to take a break."

"Alright. We're in no rush." Artemis finally admits that fact, leaning into the taller woman.

"You are so precious." Rebecca said, kissing her firmly, "I adore you."