Away With You!
Melia had always had fond memories of Nopon. Growing up with frequent excursions to Makna Forest, getting to know Chief Dunga, and befriending Riki and his children...
Yes. It is and was not only their cuddliness that she treasured. They were warm companions, loving confidants, and curious creatures. Despite all of the war, the many years since she had seen one and had time to talk to them, she could never harbor hatred in her heart for a Nopon, no matter how much that continually singular race's goals and alignments may have changed, shifted, over centuries.
So then. When a pink one clad in jaunty cap atop flowing pink hair and starchy white coat waddled into the Keves throne room at Antiqua Palace, seemingly having faced little to no resistance on its way in, Melia merely smiled, beneath the mask.
Reports of casualities and the necessary convenances of off-seers had been especially heightened today. At least...at least there could be some light cast upon this day. Nopon always brought encouraging stories, as but for the most blubbering of fatherly folk, they hated to be the bearers of repetitive, redundant information.
"Empress Melia!" The Nopon's voice was soft but not breathy, colored less shrill than most of those belonging to those Melia had once known. We've all been aged, tempered, she thought to herself.
Whatever unconfidence the girl had, she was covering it up with that very same jauntiness. Her eyes sparkled a sorrowful gold, and she adjusted the shield hanging from her back with one wing as surreptitiously as she could.
Nene...really had been much of the same way.
The automatic instinct was to stand from the throne and crouch down to meet the girl, but Melia remembered just in the nick of time that her robes and boots beneath would likely not allow for such a thing. Stiffer and stiffer had her garmenture become, over the years. Were the High Entia royalty really just statues, waiting to be turned into, again, those same Telethia?
No, none of them would have allowed it. Neither would Tyrea, of course, but the Kevesian throne's dark knight seemed quite determined to keep out of the whole affair, if only to save her own sanity. Teelan, too, looked to her for guidance in how to react, which meant that there was no reaction from that contingent whatsoever.
"What is it?" Oh, not nearly enough care had been taken; a chill still ghosted the very empress's voice. Maybe "What can I do for you?" would have been better, but only maybe. Melia would never deny that Nopon could be opportunistic.
The girl nodded, dipped her nonexistent chin, and held one wing slightly to the side as a gesture of grace. "Manana wish to seek asylum from hostilities. War is harsh and lonesome, out between fighting forces. Would like to pick a side and do what Manana can to help it end faster." This last came with an (intended to be) encouraging nod.
Ah. A simple plea, and on the face of it an honest one, but...
This...was not exactly consistent with Melia's own goals. And who knew what information the rogue, likely Agnusian, peddler-adjacent might have obtained from whichever route she had used to sneak in here? Cuddly as she looked, she was almost too dangerous to be let kept alive.
Almost.
No, Melia's love for Nopon was not to be bested by stratagems that made her so sick at night as she bent over backwards to keep them upheld.
"Very well, Manana. You may stay with us, for the time being. We will see what you can do for us."
"Si- Melia-!"
"What?" She was whispering slyly yet still innocently, now. "Do you kick a stray dog out on the streets so mercilessly when they seek a home?"
(And how did they end up here? Well. On a cliff overlooking the sea, Riku and Manana had so cleverly spied the bickering forces of the core protagonistic footsoldier parties from either side, and worried that if they were caught together they might very well be interrogated as to the cause of their own forthgoing alliance. So they split up, Riku crossing one way and Manana crossing the other. A smart move? Probably...not exactly. But, we'll see how it pays off 'round the bend.)
Meanwhile, back at the ranch - which is to say, the Agnusian headquarters - things proceeded much more quickly and even indeed violently.
Nia ruled alone, for the most part. Dromarch did not take kindly to the policies she had chosen to adopt, the ruthlessness with which she struck down her attackers lying in sharpest contrast to the way in which she had been a victim for so much of her formative life.
And, to be sure, did he want her to remain that way? Absolutely not, not at all, not in the least, but Dromarch was still a gentlemen. Dromarch still did not understand all the ways in which a lady needs must have acted.
It had been a few days since she had seen him, in all honesty. He did not refuse the plush suite she continually offered to him, complete with flowers cut fresh from the unroyal gardens every day and the sound of a Cedarwood Koto played, recorded if not live, as he was served his meals of sunfish and birdmeat.
Soft at your Core much, Nia? But even after all this time, she still liked to pamper him - who was the butler now, eh?
Thus, their distance was cut most sharply and immediately when he came bounding into the throne room, chasing after a bright blue Nopon with what looked like a gun powered by Kevesian mechanical technology strapped to its back and a disgustingly ridiculous tuft of spiky brown hair atop his head.
"Dromarch! What in the bloody hell is this?!"
She could swear all she wanted; there was no one around.
"My lady!" Oh, so he was serious - and panting, to boot, though he stabilized himself and gave a demure paw at the ground before continuing. "This intruder calls himself Riku. The name does not even sound Noponic. I do not trust it."
"Meh meh!" The Nopon - Riku, of course - jumped forward when Dromarch gave a rough nudge into his back. Svelte, he might be considered, with the leather jacket and all. "Riku tells the truth! Riku seeks peace from war of Keves! Fighting serves no one - Riku has lost many a friend in conflict!"
Losing friends. Pah. As if every day, honest Agnusian soldiers did not give their lives for the cause that they knew had to be perpetuated. Nopon, always greedy.
It wasn't right, and Nia knew that, to think so ill of the people who she'd seen firsthand very often mistreated their own and led them down less than scrupulous paths. She hadn't hated Tora, even if he hadn't been her favorite new companion. What was a Furball, to a Shellhead? She didn't...
Oh, screw it all. Maybe she'd just forgotten. But this one hadn't proved itself yet. Of all the habits Nia had unlearned, to be wary of those who begged her trust was not one, and not one she planned to ditch any time soon.
Now was the time to be imperious, inscrutable. Just as the Kevesian leader would do in such a scenario.
Up went her hand, with the symbolic scimitar that never flowed with battle or decree in any way that mattered, anymore. "Come, my scions, my psionic warriors of Agnus! I command you!"
Dromarch flicked deep cobalt eyes up at her, directly to the places where her truth could still be seen beneath the mask. It was manufactured, plastered on; oh, what a wretched time in which they lived.
This isn't what he had meant her to do. She was still so much more rash than he would ever advise. She had changed only in all those ways that brought bitter distance.
In truth, she simply never pet him anymore. And oh, he couldn't have borne the malevolence that would be parading him before audiences like a trinket, an exhibition, quite literally a pet.
But no matter. Nia knew she had to do what was right. She could hear the soldiers' footsteps pound in from out, out from in. As they did every day.
"Seal this snuffing Booboo Bear within the earth! Beneath it, for all I care!"
Riku screamed, but Nia felt deaf to the sound. They were dramatic creatures, weren't they?
So too was humanity. Maybe she meant to seal that, too. And erase it...without a trace.