• • The Royal Bastards of Galagan
• September 7, 2025

The Royal Bastards of Galagan (Chapter 4)

The Royal Lesson

“A decent teacher can keep a poor student in line. A good teacher can make a poor student want to be in line.”

Lady Renho Takeda

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Lemon Limelight

“What is your brother doing?” Koki asked my sister as they walked into the dojo. 

“Meditating,” she told the little native leading her around, “in a way.”

The natives here, the Pyries, they fed me and Poppy pretty well, but I wasn’t exactly about to ask them for something so personal. It’s not the most comfortable thing to ask for from strangers, let alone new species. It’s not like we know if they have anyone like me, or if they perceive the mind the way Galagans do that allowed for people like me.

The Pyrie who had been with me, this man named Howl, he’s been accommodating to me. He got me a new chest binder without asking what for. Maybe he knew what it would be for, or just sensed my intention with those empath abilities. 

Howl accommodated me when I asked to head to the dojo early. He even had most of the tools cleared to the sides. 

It wasn’t terribly different from a dojo back home. It was weird that it had a dirt floor. The dirt had been purposely brought up here and put into a garden box to serve as the floor. Maybe it served a spiritual purpose?

But the exercise tools and mats matched what most gyms have to be honest. There were a few whose purpose I couldn’t figure out, but I’m sure they were tools for something.

Howl didn’t look much different from Koki. Howl was a bit younger, had fewer wrinkles, and was a shade darker. I don’t think I would have noticed in a sea of Pyries, but it’s easy to tell a part of Howl’s rounder features next to Koki.

Howl approached Calcutta to ask, “If I may, what do you mean by ‘in a way?’ I could sense there was some apprehension, less adolescent embarrassment, I didn’t want to pry.”

When I meditate like I was, circulating my cakra through me, I wasn’t blind. I could sense the room around me, I had a better understand of where everything was than when I used my eyes. That made the rising crook in Calcutta’s brow all the funnier.

“Lemon is a bit… old to be an adolescent,” she told Howl.

Howl chuckled to himself as he disappeared from Calcutta’s sight, but I could sense him dashing to her shoulder. “Maybe by your standards,” he told her before she could grab him, appearing on the ground behind her before she knew it, “but here, you’re all children.”

“Despite what philosophers may say, time is relative, pipsqueak,” Calcutta said as she took a deep breath, and tried to calm down, not letting Howl get the better of her.

“Don’t be rude, Calcutta,” Koki warned her with a wage of his finger, “he was only asking a question.”

“He should keep his hands to himself.”

“I never touched you,” he reminded her, “I only floated in your personal space.”

“Is respecting personal space not a thing here?” Calcutta crossed her arms, her way of keeping herself from blasting things on instinct.

“You make a fair point,” a third Pyrie said, as she entered with Poppy. It starting to seem like we’re all getting our own Pyrie partner to follow us around. 

This female Pyrie, Atolli if I remember right from breakfast, had a distinctly sharper nose from Koki and Howl. I wondered if the physically female of their species all had flatter noses or if it’s just a hereditary thing rather than a sex thing. 

Atolli made Calcutta snort right off the bat by hitting Howl with Koki’s staff. She’s faster than him, I barely sensed her. I thought then that maybe they used cakra similar to Galagans, but without the cakra trail.

“Apologies for him,” Atolli said to Calcutta with a bow, “he’s a rascal but sometimes our guests need a rascal to teach them.”

“Speak like that and you’ll make them think you don’t like me,” Howl said.

“How terrible that would be.” 

Atolli had definitely made a good impression on my sisters. Poppy seemed relaxed around her, and Calcutta was smirking. It was a rather cutting smirk, but better than that short fuse of frown she wore nowadays.

“Though, if I may, I would also like to know what your brother is doing,” Atolli asked them. “I’ve been able to sense him since he started, but it seemed too rude to bother him while he concentrates so intensely.”

“It’s really not as intense as you think,” Poppy told her, “he can hear everything we’re saying.”

“He knows where we’re moving to, you won’t catch him off guard,” Calcutta told them, almost like a challenge. 

Howl saw it for what it was too. “Maybe I’ll test that another time, but what does it do? Is it to prepare him for training?”

Poppy shook her head and said, “No, but maybe he should—”

I let my cakra flash green to let her know it was okay. It was… a basic language for us. I didn’t mind them knowing a bit, Poppy knew what to say. She’s probably the best with words out of the three of us. Plus, the Pyries seemed more empathetic than anyone else I had ever met. I worried more that they wouldn’t understand, and I… I don’t like having to explain myself to people. I got sick of that on Galagan, but these three aren’t trying to other me like people back home.

“Well, usually Lemon has pills he takes for testosterone, but…”

“You’ve been on the run,” Atolli finished for her. 

“It’s not the first time he’s had to go without,” Calcutta said, “we’ve been off-world for months before, and for his testosterone, he’ll meditate.”

“Mediate for testosterone?” Koki asked, suspicious of such a technique. 

“He controls what flows through his body with the concentration of his cakra. Things like hormones, to adrenaline and serotonin,” Poppy listed, “it’s a relatively common across therapy, though it takes practice.”

“Can either of you do it?” Atolli asked them.

Calcutta grumbled rather than answer, so Atolli looked to Poppy.

“Well, it’s not like you can learn how to create one thing for yourself, and suddenly you know others. Cutta is good at pumping herself up with adrenaline, like in seconds!”

“Poppy,” Calcutta stopped her. I get that she wanted to keep our powers and skills a secret from them but… maybe it was their empathetic abilities I felt this desire to trust them. Besides…

It’s not like they could have stopped us if we wanted to blow up this planet. 

While I was giving myself a bit of testosterone, I was also able to sense around the planet for power levels. We are far from the only alien visitors to this planet. In fact, aliens from around the galaxy, those under the Galagan Empire, and those not have come here. 

None of them came close to our power. Even the ones trying to hide it, were only able to do so to keep others from noticing. Even the best at masking their strength couldn’t hide what lied underneath from someone with sensory skills like me. It only took a look.

“I’m finished,” I told them as I came out of my meditation. I’d have to find a way to tell Cal and Poppy what I found out, but that could wait. We were safe here for now. 

The next thing we should have found out was if aliens were getting here at random like we did, or if they came by ship. Either way, any threat to us was coming from space, but we should have figured out what to prepare for. If need be, we may have had to blow up the planet and cut our losses if Kybi came and weren’t ready.

“Wow,” Atolli said, appearing at my side without me noticing. 

I jumped a little, my sensory abilities… only work when I’m meditating. 

“I thought it might only be when you let your cakra flow through you, but all three of you are very muscular people.” Atolli reached out her head but stopped as if waiting for permission. I hesitated a bit, but nodded my head and soon felt her squeezing my biceps. “Hah! Yes, very impressive. Are all Galagans like you?” 

Poppy, who was far from the bodybuilder that Calcutta was, was still pretty cut. She flexed her arms with a pompous look befitting her name. “People wish they had the gains we had.”

“Hell,” I had to admit, “I’d kill to get what Cal’s got, she could probably break a guy’s neck by flexing during a headlock.”

I considered myself pretty built, but even after I started taking testosterone I never was able to build muscle like Cal did. I’ve asked her what juice she drank and then she threatened to hit me on the head.

This time she just grimaced and ironically flexed said muscles. “Thanks…” 

“I’ve heard of Galagans before from our other guests, but truly you are fascinating,” Atolli told my sisters. Poppy didn’t catch what she said, but Calcutta did. That might have been her first time hearing about there being other aliens here, or maybe even the first time hearing that they had ever been on Drota.

I tried subtly giving Calcutta the thumbs up, to assure her that I’ve taken inventory. She saw what I was trying to do, and made her surprise scarce.

“I think we’ve regaled our guests, or now, proteges with enough questions of their dreadful homeland. They are here for a reason,” Koki told them. 

“Ah, yes! My apologies, Galagan must be a sore subject for you all.”

Calcutta gave a hard shrug, “We’ll take it back. Our lives won’t be short like those of our enemies.”

I expected our mentors to be aghast by what she said. Poppy and I were a bit apprehensive. Did we really want to be talking about world domination and murder in front of these peaceful people?

But clearly, my big sister knew something I didn’t, because she thought nothing of her words, and neither were the three Pyries. Actually, they all found what she said funny, which made her brow slowly begin its angry arch. 

They definitely knew something we didn’t or believed they did. I could see that it was making Calcutta angrier by the moment, but honestly, I thought it was better that they not believe us. That way they’d teach us more, believing that they could change our ways, our wants, and our desires.

But we are the royal bastards of Galagan. The throne and the empires were ours the moment we killed Kincade and his mother.

“We should show them what they stand to learn before they make a decision,” Koki told Atolli.

Atolli smiled and nodded her head back in return. “I agree, would you mind if I showed them mine first?”

“Not at all.”

“Maybe I mind,” Howl suggested.

“That would require forethought that you don’t have,” Atolli said as she walked out over the dirt, away from them.

As the small Pyrie planted her feet and readied her fists at her sides, she instructed the royal siblings to pay attention. “Now, my change can be even bigger, but for the sanctity of this building’s structure we’ll keep it small.”

“Uh, what does she mean by change?” Poppy asked, only for Atolli’s fellow masters to chuckle rather than answer her question. They were having a laugh at our expense.

Atolli winked at the youngest sibling, before charging her cakra as they would. The first thing that struck me was how she didn’t roar, yell, or anything. Maybe that’s something we can learn so we don’t keep giving away our position.

She charged her cakra for a few seconds, I started to question it was she was doing until—

Zoop!

In swirling beams of light, Atolli’s form grew in size, as if she was astral projecting her image onto a wide space before her body grew into it. In a matter of seconds, the small, short, and unintimidating Atolli nearly hit her head on the ceiling, with a fist the size of Poppy.

“Holy shit!” I yelled as my hands clutched my head. Who would have thought that was possible with just cakra?!
“Oh. My. God,” Poppy muttered, jaw dropped.

Calcutta alone of the three of us remained unimpressed. “Hold on, is that just an illusion? Sure, we haven’t seen it like that, but that’s not crazy.”

Atolli lifted her hand to the ceiling and pushed up a tile just for a moment to assure Cal, “Oh, this is no illusion, I promise you. I am flesh and bone, expanded.”

“But your speed must be obliterated with that increase,” Cal tried to reason, only for Atolli to dash in front of us.

Poppy and I both let out shrill screams as Calcutta’s arms came up to protect us, but Atolli wasn’t going to do anything. She just smiled as she looked down at us.

“As you can see, my form has truly expanded, and I have lost little to no speed to do it.”

At that point, it was Calcutta’s turn to admit, “That’s amazing.”

Atolli pressed her palms together as she let cakra flow through her body like what I was doing. As her cakra flowed she explained, “What I do is let cakra flow, only to then release it in a non-violent force. As evenly as I can, I let cakra flow back into nature, a sort of reverse-osmosis just out to the space above me.”

“Cakra can’t be separated from the life it stemmed from!” Poppy reminded her. “Cakra itself isn’t even in our blasts, so how could you release it?”

Our cakra blasts are called that because of what makes them, but the blasts themselves are a different type of energy entirely. 

“I’m not completely,” Atolli continued, “my cakra always has a connection to me. It cannot truly ever leave me, but it can go a far distance away. Then it will either come back to me, or my form will grow to meet it.”

“The body expands to meet the cakra,” Calcutta realized.

“Exactly,” Atolli said, as she shrunk back down, as her cakra seemed to fly back in her, under her skin, and she shrank back to her normal form. 

The idea of cakra always coming back to someone may seem strange if they’ve only seen cakra blasts. A blast is a special kind of highly-concentrated light that’s created when cakra concentrates pressure in the space just above our skin. We’ve always thought there’s some kind of particle that cakra can attract that mixes with it and light to produce this effect. But for all intents and purposes, cakra blasts act like beams of light, that hit with more force the more cakra is pooled into the attack.

The form Atolli used to complete her transformation was still on my mind. Maybe I’ll have an easier time learning it, that would be awesome! It’d be like in the old Kaiju movies, but like, way better because I could fly just as fast.

“I can I learn that one?!” I asked, the idea of it making me jumpy with excitement, at least until I saw the forced smile on Atolli’s lips and the smirk on Howl’s.

“Uh, aren’t we all here to learn?” Poppy said. She bent over with her arms crossed to give me the ‘why are you talking’ look? It wasn’t very effective when she had to blow her side fringer out of the way of her face.

“While you can learn all the techniques we will show you,” Atolli began to tell Poppy, “it would take you years, decades even.”

“What?!” Poppy yelled.

“We don’t have years,” Calcutta growled at her.

“We know,” Atolli assured her, “we expected you to stay to learn the basis of one of the techniques, and then let you master it in your travels.”

“Why not teach us the basis for all of them?” I asked her. “Also… how many are there?”

“Two more,” she said.

Koki answered my other question. “While we wouldn’t be opposed to it if we could, teaching you multiple techniques at once would be dangerous. They’re different abilities that do different things to your body. You must master one before even attempting the other, so we can be sure you don’t expand when your trying to duplicate, and become a monster that destroys your body with your transformation.”

His explanation had Poppy crestfallen and Calcutta fuming. They clearly expected more than we were getting… which was weird because we only agreed to this a few hours before. My sisters were not ones for setting expectations.

Me, on the other hand, was far more focused on something else they said. “Did you say you can duplicate?”

Howl began to grin from ear to ear. “Would you like a demonstration of that next?”

“Would I!” I said, excited again. I was as upset about having to pick one, I wasn’t expecting all that much from anything they had to teach us to begin with. But then as I was seeing the options, I could hardly contain myself. 

I mean, come on, expansion is cool, but also multiplying? I couldn’t wait to see it until I wondered what the third technique was all about.

“Why don’t I explain the process as I go?” Howl offered, throwing Atolli a side-eye. She narrowed her eyes on him, so I assume she was ‘rather unamused’ as Okāsan would say. 

I kind of smirked, but my sisters were getting impatient, Calcutta especially. 

“Yeah, if you could do that, thanks.” She could be rather curt now and then, and the way she crossed her arms as she said it… didn’t quite help her case… if she had a case to make. Not sure what I was thinking.

“Well, pay attention because I don’t repeat myself,” Howl told her, as he began to charge his cakra as Atolli did, and he remained as silent as ever.

I didn’t know why that was throwing me. It was near-universally accepted that when you had to spend the time to charge a lot of cakra you yelled in volume with your power. It sucked in that everyone knew what you were about to do, but it was good for scaring people too. Even a low-level trooper who charged cakra for like five minutes uninterrupted was a terrifying thing. 

I could have done in seconds what any trooper could in minutes but that might defy my point. 

If we could even learn to be silent, we’d have a real tactical advantage. I looked to Calcutta and Potempa who were watching Howl intensely. Something told me that they weren’t thinking of it.

“Pay attention, Mr. Limelight!” Koki warned me, and my head snapped back just as Howl had finished charging up.

“First, I send out my cakra soul, the center of my energy flow!” He then raised his hands out in front of him, and then an orb shot out in front of him, stopping arm’s length away. Then another popped out to the side of that one, and then out of that one!

“After I decide on how many I want, I cut the connection off, leaving the souls to build the copies themselves.” Then he pressed both hands out on both sides of him, and then came an orb in each. Quickly, appearing similar to Atolli when she expanded, a Howl-like shape expanded from the orb as a white outline, that then quickly filled itself. Only seconds after collecting all the cakra, we were looking at six perfect copies of himself.

Potempa’s jaw dropped, and I didn’t blame her. Even though we knew what was going to happen, it was hard to believe despite seeing it in front of me. 

“It sounds simple enough, but what’s the catch?” Calcutta asked, needing to pick it apart. “How strong are these clones compared to you? Did you just cut your strength into sixths? Or your speed?”

“No, no, no, and no,” Howl answered her with a shake of her head.

“Mmmm… one of those questions wasn’t yes or no-”

“I called them copies,” one of the Howl’s told her.

“A clone implies that there’s been some kind of degeneration,” continued another.

“A copy has the same strengths-”

“-the same power-”

“-and the same intelligence as the original.”

“So they’re all dumb,” Atolli told them.

Everyone had a little laugh at Howl’s expense.

“Wait,” Calcutta said, finished laughing before everyone else, “if they’re copies, do they have wills of their own? How do you know which is the original?”

“Well, all copies do have their own cakra core like we do, and are effectively their own people, but they are all tied to the original,” one of the copies explained.

Then they continued to take turns talking in a way that confused me so imagine just one of them was talking. “We can’t go too far from the original or we’ll get sucked right back or dissipate. And if he gets too hurt or knocked out, we all go back to him or…” Howl gestured across his neck.

“Dissipate?”  

“Sometimes, it really depends on if there’s anything or anyone in the physical way when we’re being dragged back.”

“Is there a time limit?” Poppy asked.

“It’s different for everyone,” Atolli told her.

“There is one key advantage of letting the copies come back,” Howl told them, waiting for us to get excited, but we kind of just stood there waiting. The technique itself was already cool, but how important could one more advantage be. 

Howl sighed at our lack of excitement. “Jeez, it’s like you’re jaded already. When the copies come back, I—” he paused to let all of them blur and fly straight into him, “—get all of their memories, and assume their strength.”

“Wait,” I gasped, “you could be your own training partner or learning a new skill while watching TV at the same time! You could boost your power level like, exponentially that way!”

“Training against yourself could never produce the results of training with others, but yes, you could use it like that,” Koki confirmed for me. “I’m sure Howl has used it many a time to entertain himself when everyone’s ignoring him.”

Howl turned and squinted at the old Pyrie. “You all think I will just stand here and take this disrespect forever, don’t you?”

“Of course not,” Koki assured him with a clasp of his friend’s shoulder, “you have to die someday.”

“Heh,” Calcutta snorted, “funny, now what’s the last power?”

“That’s right! There’s one more technique you have to show us!” I exclaimed, doing my hardest not to jump up and down in excitement.

“Oh god, I can’t imagine what this one must be if the other two were expansion and multiplying,” Poppy said to herself, already daydreaming along with me as to the nature of this third semi-kinda-sorta secret technique.

“Oh,” Koki mewed as he tilted his head back, “you want to know the last technique, do you?”

Calcutta didn’t buy it, but Poppy and I had practically bent over, shoulder to shoulder, nodding our heads yes! We were so excited. 

Howl’s face had soured in the background, probably wondering why he couldn’t muster this reaction from us.

“It’s the most important technique of all, the one that really completes a three-person group such as yourselves,” he continued to lead us on.

“Tell us, tell us!” Poppy and I said in unison.

Koki gestured for us to part, which confused us for a moment. “Why tell you when I can demonstrate.”

“Oooh, yeah, that’s right, do that!” I said as Poppy and I split, and Koki was facing Calcutta. I had forgotten we were standing in front of her, and she looked thoroughly unamused as she looked down at Koki and his smirk.

“Close your eyes,” Koki warned just as Calcutta shifted to defend, and was blinded by a flash of light. 

On instinct, Poppy and I readied blasts into our hands, and on their own instinct, Atolli and Howl were calming us down.

“I did not harm your sister, I assure you,” Koki said as he lowered his hand, and began to scratch the side of his mouth with it. “In all honesty, I’m not sure why you think I would do that. Blasting Calcutta head-on hardly seems like the best time to have taken her out. It would have been smarter for Atolli to do that when she was large don’t you think?”

Cal didn’t care at all for his reasoning and whipped her arm to blow the little white smoke away from her face. “Just tell what you did you little pipsqueak!”

“You know, if you keep calling me that I’ll stop thinking it’s an endearing nickname,” Koki mocked her.

“Eh,” Cal grumbled, before clenching her fist before her face and yelling at him, “tell me what you did already!”

“Don’t you feel it?” Koki asked her. “Your wound.”

“Wha?” Cal’s face twisted and sputtered in confusion. “Wha… what wound? What did you do?”

Koki tapped the side of his waist as he said in other words, “I healed you.”

Calcutta was really confused, so much so that she tilted her head nearly started scratching her dreads. “Healed me?”

  “Hold on,” Poppy said, before letting her arms dangle at her side with this lopsided smile, “it’s just healing?”

That’s when it hit me. “Wait, that’s… incredibly anti-climatic.” Don’t get me wrong, healing would be an incredibly useful technique, especially since we were fighting all the time at home even before we were fugitives. Galagan was not very peaceful despite being the most powerful empire in our galaxy.

But the healer could heal themselves too… that could make their stamina unstoppable. Someone else may tire from the constant use of cakra, but we have a bigger cakra pool than most.

That didn’t change Poppy’s immediate reaction. “That really freakin’ blows, as useful as it is… ahhh!” Poppy clutched her head as she started shouting. “I really thought you were gonna blind her something!”

Calcutta arched her brow at our younger sister, but ignored her to ask Koki, “Seriously though, what did you heal?”

Koki reached further along his waist to what seemed like his ass. “That scar tissue on your lower back and up your spine, I sensed the permanent scarring there on your body, it even had ink stuck in it.”

Cal’s jaw dropped as she nearly screamed, “You erased my tattoo?!”

“Wait, lower back?” Poppy realized first as per usual. She was already covering her mouth as she asked Cal, “You had a tramp stamp? How did I not know this?!”

Calcutta had never looked so embarrassed as she crossed her arm and growled as she avoided our eyes. She muttered under her breath, “It’s not a tramp stamp, you little wingbat! And it wasn’t a wound! It was art!”

Poppy may have been faster, but I’m not gonna act like I didn’t immediately dogpile on Calcutta’s choice in art. “Art?” I mocked her, “Like what? A tribal tat above your ass that only your non-existent boyfriends will see?”

I think my joke was too long-winded because both my sisters gave me this weird side look. I should have… just left the jokes to Poppy. 

Hold on, why did I want to do that? She wasn’t even funny!

Still, Cal pretty clearly, in no uncertain words, told Poppy and me, “Fuck you, it’s a line from the Book of Fables! It says- or ‘said’ apparently! -rise above the dawn or die.”

“Oh, well, that’s kind of nice,” Poppy admitted, as she held two fingers really close together, “a little bit basic don’t ya think? Could probably get another one now.”

“A better one,” I pointed out.

Calcutta looked like she was going to blow the room off the place with how she flexed her cakra at us. “Fuck off, the both of you can’t even get tattoos!”

She pointed at Poppy, “You’re afraid of needles!” to which Poppy’s hand flew to her chest. 

“And they make you queasy!” she said to me, which made me do the same as Poppy. 

“Have you not seen how deep those things can go?” 

“How the hell does something that sharp stab you and not make you bleed all over?! What, because it’s going really fast?!”

Koki rested his little head in his little hand as he bemoaned how the day had derailed. “I really hadn’t considered how often we would get sidetracked.”

“Well, I hadn’t considered that you would get rid of my tattoo,” Cal yelled at him, throwing her arms all around with nothing to do with them, “but here we are!”

“Wait though, seriously, what do we do now?” I asked.

The three Pyrie turned to each other and shrugged, which was not reassuring.

Atolli looked up and told us, “It’s really not that complicated, just pick which one you want.”

That was more than a bit… surprising. This was an ability that in the wrong hands could turn the tides against armies, definitely this planet. Any one of us could destroy the place now, but with the right powers, who knows if the Pyrie could have stood a chance.

You’d have thought they’d pair us with our worst matched power, to keep us weaker from turning on them.

Then again, if they were planning to fight us at any point, they probably wouldn’t be teaching us at all. That fact remained the biggest conundrum to me. What truly was the point of all this? None of it made any sense.

You know what, maybe I heard them wrong, maybe I had misunderstood. I remember asking them, “That’s it? We just chose which power we want?” 

Koki arched his brow at us. “Why would it be more complicated than that?” 

No, it was just as I thought.

“Uh,” Poppy mumbled as she was probably going through the same confusing thought process, “I guess we should talk about it then?” 

For some reason, Howl started giggling, “Hehehe.” 

Cal wasn’t going to let that go and asked, “What’s so funny?” with her arms crossed and her muscles flexed, you know, to intimidate our teachers who she hadn’t successfully intimidated once today. 

Howl waved her off and instead asked us a question instead. “Oh nothing, does your world have gambling?” 

“Of course it does,” I answered, “what kind of question is that?” 

“Well earlier, the three of us were gambling on how long it would take before you realized what technique you each should learn.” 

With something as ominous as that, I didn’t blame Poppy for doing what she did next. She raised her hand over her heart as if to protect it, and let out this little flash of blue cakra. “You say that like it’s been decided.” 

None of the Pyrie seemed particularly fazed by her defensiveness. It seemed to me almost as if they were used to it from us by now. It had only been a day though.

They may not have ever met Galagans before, but maybe they’ve met other people like us.

Atolli set Poppy’s mind at ease, with a sympathetic smile, lacking Koki’s condescension or Howl’s more mocking sense of humor. “In a way, it is, because your future, your fate, is determined by your choices. Your choices, in turn, are determined by your personalities, your deepest flaws, and your greatest strengths. These things… these attributes you could say… were set in stone before you walked in, and the power you would choose was set in stone as well. It’s more a matter of how long before you realize which power is your destiny; which technique will help you reach your point of personal completion.”

Me and my sisters were pretty quiet for a while as we took in what Atolli had to say. I found myself looking away, trying to be introspective. My mind was racing as I tried to figure out what exactly was the best path for me.

Was healing the best for me? Maybe it would make my life easier, grant me faster and greater control over my body, make my transition finish faster, and just… feel better. 

But then again, healers stay back, healers hold the flank and watch the others back. I want to lead from the front, always have. That’s not the right mindset for a healer, but considering my sisters too, I don’t know if we have anyone with a healer mindset. 

Then it becomes, who has the mindset least terrible for healing. 

That wasn’t a complete sentence.

“Hmm, they’re talking nonsense,” Calcutta surprised me, appearing between Poppy and me. I looked up at her, and she had that serious look of stone, like she was so sure of what she believed. I had seen that look on her before many a time, and it was always followed by Calcutta Sha’s next big victory, or next verbal cut, or sometimes just the meal she wanted. 

That time, she told us what she surely believed to be some profound truth. “There is no fate, no destiny,” she told us, looking between as she rested a hand on each of our shoulders, and gripped them tight. “The future is written when it becomes the present, and the present is set in stone when we chisel it.” 

I half-expected the Pyrie to collectively disagree, to talk down to us, or wave off what my sister had said. Instead, Koki complimented her.

“Oh, I did not take you to be so well-spoken when you want to be,” Koki complimented her.  

“There’s Cal for you,” I told him, “you people are always underestimating her.” 

“Oh, do tell,” Howl said, “it’ll explain so much.” 

“Oh well—” 

“They’re fishing, Lemon,” Cal stopped me, “trying to learn as much about our flaws as they can.” 

“If we are going to teach you, it is sort of a requirement,” Atolli told us. “Surely you’ve had at least one good teacher before. And if you did, were you an unknown to them? No, I doubt it.” Atolli tried to remain sympathetic, and now as her attitude seemed to go against the other two so perfectly, I began to wonder if it was real. 

Koki seemed to match eyes with Cal, looking past Poppy and me. “I bet they read you like an open book,” he told her. 

Calcutta’s face twisted just a bit, so the dark shadows of her face became more pronounced. “I’m about to clock you like one of them too,” she told him. 

The threat of violence was a bit too much for Atolli this time, who threatened Calcutta in turn, “Then you get nothing.” 

“I’d have your blood on my hands, that’s something,” Cal told her. She didn’t back down, taking a step before Poppy and me. We just… we just let her through and stood behind her. Calcutta always led, that’s what she always did for us. 

Yeah, she certainly wasn’t the healer.

“And the blood will be gone by the next time you shower,” Atolli retorted as if losing her life to Calcutta would have been no big thing.

You know, at this point, it would have been smart to use their empathic abilities on us, but they weren’t.

They believe Calcutta wouldn’t do it, they didn’t know her well enough, but I did. 

I placed my hand on Cal’s arm, and told her, “She’s got a point.” Calcutta turned back to look at me with daggers for eyes and I tried to sound clueless, asking, “What?” but she could see the truth no doubt. I could barely get my smile up, let alone mock stupidity. 

I had hoped she’d understand then that I really wanted to learn, to not forget about what they could teach us — teach me if she let them.

 Poppy seemed downright annoyed with Cal though, not sensing what was going on. 

She had crossed her arms and pouted at us. “We’ve wasted enough time. If this fate thing—” 

“It’s not,” Cal interrupted her, her voice seeming to have calmed as she still looked at me. I wasn’t sure if she understood me clearly if she could ever truly understand, but she stood up straight and backed off the three Pyrie. She turned back to Poppy and repeated, “This isn’t fate.”

 “But they think so,” Poppy said as if the three masters weren’t there, “so then it’s a puzzle.” 

That was a good way to look at it. “They don’t decide, they want us to figure out what’s best for us.” 

“But it probably won’t be obvious,” Calcutta reminded us, “we should pick the technique that most goes against our most tragic flaw. They clearly want us to grow, already calling themselves our teachers and us their students.”

“If that’s the case, then we want to pick the power that doesn’t make sense then?” Poppy asked. 

“Maybe?” I said, “Something that plays to our strengths would just be us doubling down on what we’re already good at, but on the other hand a great weakness can’t be patched over like a bandaid.”

“We want the middle ground then?” Calcutta asked me. “Is that what your thinking?”

“That logic makes sense to me,” Poppy agreed at first, “but how do we figure that out?”

“Oh, they’re cleverer together,” I heard Atolli say to her fellow masters.  

“But are they so clever apart?” Koki asked.

As if to prove a point, I asked the three masters, “Is it possible that we can all learn the foundation so we can figure this out? It seems like a stupid idea to just pick one arbitrarily after just a few minutes of talking. 

“We aren’t just refugees looking to learn how to defend ourselves. We’re royals of an empire and to get back on top of that empire, we need to seize it. We can’t make a mistake.”

“What a good question,” Atolli complimented me.

“Indeed, boy, there is,” Koki said, “to learn any of the techniques you must first learn the basics by learning another technique. We figured we start you off together after you made your big decision—”

“But I guess you’re not people who live in the moment,” Howl interrupted to cap it all off.

“We haven’t been afforded that chance,” Poppy told Howl, which brought down the otherwise self-serving smirk on his face.

“Now what’s the technique we need to learn first?” Cal asked, getting to the point.

“Something you’ll all surely find useful,” Koki said as he grew a smile that matched Howl’s. “Teleportation.”