Clairvoyance

Alternative Title: Further Still

This work is dedicated all the people on the minoade server. You're all really cool and seeing all the things you have to say and share really makes my day.

Again CONTENT WARNING for brief mentions of torture of children. It's non-explicit but it's there. And again, as the tags said, it's Amalthus. I'll put the paragraph in question in asterisks just in case. Better to overwarn than not warn at all, me thinks.

Beyond that:
This fic was written in one hour with St Vincent and Lamp playing in the background. It's unbeta'd but ummm *shrugs*

Anyway, I really hope you enjoy.

"Azami! Just the blade I was looking for! I have a question--it's for science, so I hope that--"

"Surely your request can do without... dalliances?" Azami tells Adenine. The sooner this is done, the sooner she can go back to watching the territory war between the Tirkins and the Volffs.

"Ah yes. Time is of the essence when it comes to gathering data. KOS-MOS, Nim, Kasandra, Corvin--ah, here we are. How far can your eye see?"

Azami contemplates the question. It's one she's never asked herself, considering all she needs her left eye for is keeping her driver and her other interests in sight. "An interesting question."

"Yes?" Adenine opens her journal--the one she writes in when she thinks no one is watching. But Azami is always watching. Not that it matters. It's still flattering to see that Adenine has dedicated her a whole page.

"A moment, please..." Azami collects herself and lets her eye wander--truly wander.

It lands first on Mòrag, who is deep in discussion with Niall and a few members of the Ardainian parliament--the peace treaty she'd mentioned, maybe? Brighid is, of course, present too. It isn't pleasant not being first favourite, but Azami isn't particularly interested in thinking about that at the moment. Rex, Nia, Tora, and Zeke have been given lodgings on the palace grounds. Though they don't know it, Senator Stulc is in the room adjacent to theirs, holding what seems to be a heated debate with the leader of the Brionac faction.

Further still, Chairman Bana seems to be swindling yet another unsuspecting investor from Voltis Trade Guild. Pupunin is upstairs, locked in the engine room. The wheel he's running in must be some form of punishment for something.

Further still, Queen Raqura is seated in her aqua gardens. At the entrance, one of the guards thwarts an assassination attempt; the queen remains unaware of it. Yew and Zuo lay flowers at Vandham's grave in the Olethro Ruins. In the alley behind the Mymoma Playhouse, a nopon is apprehended for suspected possession of red pollen orbs while the other nopon--the one who had them all along--gets onto a ship to Argentum. Within the playhouse itself, Cole is staring at a painting of Mythra and an unfamiliar man with silver hair and golden eyes. A single tear falls from his eyes.

Further still, a woman whom Azami assumes is Corinne gives a courier a package of braised cloud sea shark. No one in Fonsett is aware that the whole village sits on the only Leftherian Titan that is no longer alive but still somehow afloat; its insides hollowed out into a crypt that houses a blade that looks a lot like both Pyra's and Mythra's. On one of the adjacent titans, Lindwurm Base is getting ready to receive a visitor from Brionac bearing firearms.

*Further still, the refugees on Indol are having yet another protest and putting up posters which the monks are only too happy to take down. Behind the innermost walls of the praetorium, Amalthus is personally overseeing the experimental implantation of core chips into the chests of the children whose faces are on said posters. Azami can tell from the way their mouths are open that they're all screaming in pain. The praetor is unmoved by it all, and the bodies are discarded before a new batch of children are brought in.*

Further still, Genbu is swimming past the remains of Temperantia, struggling to surface. King Eulogimenos looks stressed, likely because of the Indoline monk with whom he is currently holding court. Theosoir looks to be rationing its citizens' portions again. Someone drops to the ground. Nobody helps them up.

Further still, beyond the cliffs of Morytha, below the cloud sea, beyond even the Monoceros, where Mikhail and Akhos are watching Patroka destroy a few practice dummies and Malos and Jin are seated, sides pressed together, in what seems to be a kitchen, lies a vast land with towering buildings and grotesque creatures with core crystals. The corpses of multiple titans are scattered throughout the desolate land beneath the cloud sea.

Further still, Azami sees the base of the World Tree, which isn't a tree at all. High within it is a room in which a glowing golden something shaped like the core crystals aegis... duo? Trio?--Azami doesn't really care--is housed. Above that is what must be Rex's dream--Elysium--dried up and withered and nothing like what he'd described it. Beyond Elysium is a circular room in which a wrinkly old man with no life in his only eye and half of his body missing seems to be waiting for something.

Further still, beyond the swirling energy that has replaced the wrinkly old man's missing half, Azami sees things she cannot even begin to describe.

And so, though she could continue to peer beyond the wrinkly old man, Azami does not. What use is it seeing things she cannot make sense of?

"--zami? Azami?"

"Hm?"

"So? What did you see?" Adenine prompts, pen poised, "How far?"

'A lot' and 'Very far' wouldn't even begin to cover the extent of what she saw. Maybe the answers are 'Too much; Too far'. But nothing she saw matters as much as seeing that Mòrag and Niall seem to be done with their meeting, so that's the answer she gives Adenine.

Azami: *literally sees the whole plot of xc2*
Azami: ah screw it. What's Morag up to?

Azami screwed science over in this one and Adenine will never know.

***

The implications of Azami's blade quest are that her Clairvoyance is super-super powerful but that all she cares about seeing and dealing with are her driver, their interests, and her own interests, and I really hope I captured that in this.

Heavily considered starting a collection for this work and another work like it that you can read here but I'll do that if/when I write and post a third work.

What did Azami see beyond the wrinkly old man's vortex? You're more than welcome to guess.

Anyway.

As always,
Love,
John.