Constellations
Sersi didn't quite know what to do with herself.
The tight atmosphere, that had permeated the Domo increasingly with each passing hour, reminded her to much of the recurring drop in everyone's good spirits that had afflicted them after she, Sprite and Ikaris had passed on the news of Ajak's death. Once the realization had settled in them all that one of them had apparently been lost forever.
Ever since the day she had set foot on the land of Ajak's Farm for the first time in decades, only to discover the lifeless body of the leader and figurehead who had always given each of them so much support, who was like a mother as Sersi imagined it to be, and to realize that she wasn't there anymore, she carried the fear of feeling like that again.
It had been a turning point for all of them, she knew. A sudden weight of knowledge. That an immortal life did not have to mean eternal life as well. That it wasn't the same and that immortal in no way meant invulnerable. The person she had once believed was her great love had proved that to her. He of all people had shown her an ugly truth behind what had seemed to be set in stone.
She could never have imagined at the time how far from love her feelings for Ikaris had become.
She felt conflicted. Once upon a time she had sworn her love to Ikaris, her loyalty and that she would always stand by his side. He had sworn the same to her in a ceremony that had been absolutely sacred to the old culture that had sealed their bond, even more sacred then it seemed to people nowadays but that didn't matter. It had been a sacred promise to her, it should have been one to him too.
But... what did what was sacred to humans mean to him? When had it ever meant anything to him? He had left her, despite his promises, and despite hers, she had tried to move on as well.
After that Sersi had grieved what she had lost. She had spend centuries waiting for him, wondering about what she had meant to him, if anything at all.
Today she wondered what their family mean to him when he had proved more than once that he would stand against any of them, would sacrifice any of them, if he thought he had the best for everyone in mind.
She also wondered, if it had been Ikaris who was in Druig's situation, if she could still stand by him like Makkari did and found that she couldn't answer that with certainty.
By now, their team's speedster refused to leave the infirmary altogether. She had Kingo bring her books, snacks and a place to sit and had made it clear to each of them that she would not move from Druig's side unless absolutely necessary.
In addition, she had slapped Ikaris, who she thought had rolled his eyes at her explanation, in such a forceful way that only Gilgamesh's quick reaction and physical strength had prevented bloodshed. Or well, mostly prevented it.
He had separated the two of them just as Ikaris' eyes had started to glow and Makkari's hand had shot out as if to scrape them out of his skull with her bare fingers.
Sersi wasn't sure if he had actually looked derogatory but she understood that her sister's emotions and nerves were stretched to the breaking point.
What she couldn't understand was him and she felt an incredible frustration towards the man she had loved with all her heart. It was growing in her chest since the day he had left her alone, if she was honest with herself.
Ikaris had retreated to his room after another stern word from Ajak and a raised middle finger from Makkari. He had retreated with a bleeding nose, flashing eyes and a slight limp, and this time she had no intention of following him or talking to him.
She didn't want to admit it to herself, but she was getting tired of addressing his way, making excuses and trying to cling to what she wanted Ikaris to truly be. It was exhausting to try and see things from his perspective, which was so completely different from her own.
One by one they had all withdrawn themselves from the infirmary, only Ajak stayed to talk to Makkari one more time before she went after Ikaris, hopefully to give him an earful too so she wouldn't have to. Though Sersi doubted that, for some reason. The healer had likely planned to heal his nose before anything else.
Makkari was not generally violent, but when she struck, she did so with all the force of her speed. And that definitely left its mark. She wasn't just fast, that was a misconception many had made and regretted over the years.
And because Sersi still didn't know what to do with herself after she had aimlessly wandered the Domo's long corridors for a while, she was a little surprised that her feet had led her to Phasto's workshop.
That was basically as good as the other options, she decided, because she didn't want to bother Makkari, nor stand in the way of Gilgamesh distracting himself with cooking, nor did she know where Sprite had gone.
She didn't particularly want to join Kingo and Thena either. The two fighters had decided to train, but Sersi had the feeling that both somehow more felt the need to beat something up and if it couldn't be a Deviant, then they just had to be content with each other.
With regard to Thena, the transmutator had the slight fear that she would have liked to use Ikaris for that much more.
Sersi knew with absolute certainty that she didn't want to see him either at the moment. Even worse, to interrupt a deep and important discussion he might lead with Ajak. Hopefully their former leader would address how their team seemed to drift apart. It reminded her of Tenochtitlan, really, with the exception the force they all seemed to gravitate away from wasn't their family as a whole but Ikaris himself this time. One could see that particularly well on Sprite.
She still hadn't figured out what had happened between the two of them, but her human sister's behavior towards the man had definitely turned a hundred and eighty degrees.
Sprite had never been overly emotional, so Sersi knew that whatever had happened between the two had hurt her and deeply so.
She sighed, trying and failing once again to shake of her thoughts as the doors in front of her opened with a small hiss of air.
Phastos only looked up once as she entered the workshop with all its shiny parts, prototypes and half-finished inventions.
He was still tinkering with the data he had collected on the Deviants. His stated goal was to somehow try to locate the one that had attacked first Druig and then themselves, wherever it was now. And that could probably be anywhere.
Although Ajak had become cautious in her statements after the last misjudgment regarding this, she at least had noted that it would probably be possible to end the influence on Druig if they could kill the Deviant.
Which where a lot of 'probably' and 'maybe' but, as far as Sersi was concerned, she was willing to grasp for every straw to end this horrible dreadful feeling of being unable to help someone she loved and she knew tat the others thought so too.
The problem was that the creature was obviously more intelligent than its fellow monsters. It had played dead and waited for a moment to take them by surprise, using Druig's stolen powers, to escape.
This was no ordinary Deviant behavior and that's what made it so dangerous.
Sersi clenched her fists.
Moments like this, when her thoughts turned like this and she just came to the conclusion again and again that she didn't know what to do, made her painfully aware again and again and again that she wasn't a born leader.
She had neither been born nor been made for this and she just didn't understand why Arishem had filled her with this role.
Just why had he stripped Ajak of her full authority and wasted her opportunities on Sersi? If Ajak still had those things, maybe everything would have turned out differently.
Sersi took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment to collect herself. To distract herself from that particularly persistent train of thoughts, she looked more closely at the various individual parts on a workbench to her right.
They were strange collections of unidentifiable objects made of gold and interspersed with lines. Accumulations that probably only made any sense to Phastos.
Eventually her gaze caught on some kind of ring or bracelet. The surface was smoothly polished and silvered, although the fine green and bluish colored lines that shimmered in the light when viewed from different angles were not quite symmetrical, not as delicate and perfect as Phastos' other works. Maybe that was exactly what had caught her attention.
She hadn't really wanted to distract the inventor, but the piece piqued her curiosity.
"What is that?"
Phastos looked up as if he had already forgotten her presence in his workshop again.
"That's something for Sprite." he said after a moment but waved her off when she raised an eyebrow questioningly "It's not ready yet."
"What is it supposed to do?"
"You will see. If I manage to make it work."
That was all the answer she got, she knew. Sersi sighed and let go of the mysterious object for the time being.
Instead she watched Phastos for a while.
It only took a few minutes before he stopped his tinkering and looked up to catch her eye. A heavy sigh left him mouth.
"Sersi, can I help you?"
She smiled apologetically, "Oh! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to distract you."
"Well, concentration is one thing when someone is watching your every move. And I don't think you suddenly have an interest in this." he waved a hand across his work bank and the hundreds of wires, metal plates, screws and strange objects that Sersi couldn't identify for the life of her.
She ran a hand through her hair and leaned back against the crafting table behind her. Of course he was right.
"It's just... I'd just love to do something. Help in some way." helping used to mean supporting Ikaris. Now that seemed to be the most counterproductive idea of all.
The situation drove her insane and she looked at Phastos almost pleadingly.
"Did you find anything?"
The inventor sighed too. "Not yet. Finding Deviants has been decidedly easy, but there are so many beings and radio waves and vibrations on Earth these days, not even mentioning the heroes that use all kind of technological or magical energies, that it's almost impossible, especially when the Deviant is hiding."
Sersi once again felt the well-known frustration of helplessness rise up in herself. "But there must be something we can do. What if you try to locate Druig? If the Deviant uses his powers then maybe...?"
After all, they had been able to find each other scattered all over the world. Although they hadn't had any contact with one another for years, decades or even centuries, they had found each other again as if there was an invisible bond that, despite everything, bound them all together. That connected them.
If she was honest then there probably was, some kind of force that drew them together id necessary. Naturally, instinctively. That somehow was a nice thought.
The hope that sprouted up in her at the idea of it was immediately stamped out by Phastos' very skeptical facial expression.
"Druig is the source of these powers. I can find him but otherwise?" he shrugged his shoulders but at the same time Sersi thought he saw something flash behind the lenses of his glasses.
"Unless," he said, suddenly much more concentrated as if the realization had hit him. He raised a finger, silently forbidding her to speak an interrupt him. "Unless with the Uni Mind."
"How so?" Sersi's eyes followed him as he marched from one corner of the room to the other with fast steps, entering new data into his machines. "Druig was the Eternal who lead the Uni Mind."
"At the beginning." he said "But you. You finished it didn't you?"
Sersi blinked. There it was again, the weight of responsibility for another looming over her shoulders.
Only this time there was no Druig to take it from her and take it upon himself to protect her from it.
It felt like he had been doing that a lot in general.
She really wasn't a leader, she knew that already!
"Ah -maybe, but I don't know how to begin. I can't start it, or even connect us with each other. Let alone mentally."
"What about the orb? You still have it, right?"
In her head Sersi pictured a small, beautifully painted, precious wood box far back in a drawer in her room on the Domo. It had once been part of Makkari's vast collection of human artifacts and treasures, before that it had been the jewelry box for an Egyptian noblewoman's large signet rings that had mysteriously vanished from her room, the pompous jewels dropped on the table in less than a heartbeat.
Today it contained the object that Sersi would have preferred to forget. Ever since Phastos had removed it from her body to use the orb to create the bracelets that connected them to the Uni Mind, the connection to Arishem was where she didn't have think about it too often. She still didn't even want to be able to contact her creator again, or, even worse, for him to be able to reach out to her.
She had tried to give it back to Ajak, but her former leader had lost access to it despite many attempts to spark it to life. Perhaps it was Arishem's punishment for his former Prime Eternal that she was relieved of her role.
Sersi would probably never understand just why he had chosen her of all people as her successor.
She nodded, albeit slowly.
"Bring it to me" Phastos said.
The transmutator swallowed her worries. She might not have been born or created to be a leader, but she would trust him. At least trust was something she was good at.
For the better or the worse.