Chapter 42: Lyin’ & Fleein’

A/N: "Who, me?"

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Kai'Sa hates herself for it, but she freezes up entirely. How? How had an angel found her so quickly? Was her family also looking for her? Damn it all, leaving Huntrix Tower was a mistake!

Fortunately, Mira is not nearly as frozen beside her. Even as Kai'Sa is locked up, Mira steps up to her side and huffs.

"Huh? Like the K/DA dancer? No, that's not either of us. You must be mistaken."

For the briefest of moments, the angel looks taken aback by Mira's easy confidence. She even looks like she might believe it for a split second. But then her eyes actually focus on Mira… and narrow in anger.

"Devil."

With just a glance, the angel was able to recognize Mira's reincarnated status as a devil. Almost immediately the tension in the air grows several notches, though to Mira's credit she just smiles thinly.

"Wow. That's rather rude, don't you think?"

At the same time, Mira moves slightly behind Kai'Sa, putting her arm out of sight behind her back. Kai'Sa can't quite feel what's going on back there, but she thinks Mira has just pulled out her phone.

Meanwhile, the angel just scowls, taking a step forward.

"Step away from her now, devil!"

Kai'Sa finally finds her voice, even as things get more and more intense.

"You stay away from us! Mira hasn't done anything wrong!"

The angel looks legitimately taken aback by this… even a little hurt as her eyes slide back to Kai'Sa. Compassion fills her gaze as she reaches out.

"Kai'Sa, please… you do not know what this creature you're with will do to you. She will tempt and try and corrupt you. She will turn your soul black. You must leave her. Come with me, to safety."

That… Kai'Sa scoffs and crosses her arms over her chest.

"The safety of my 'loving family'? No thanks, I'll pass. I don't want anything to do with Kuusho Clan… I won't go back to them, not ever again!"

Kai'Sa had long known about her clan's ties to the Church. She'd grown up being told that she would be 'taken away by angels if she was naughty'. On top of everything else, the overwhelming expectations, the physical abuse, the deprivation… Kai'Sa would rather die than return to Kuusho Clan. Being under their aegis once more would be no better than being enslaved by Millennium Enterprises.

The angel blinks, faltering and even taking a step back. And yet, she's not too surprised by Kai'Sa's vehemence. Meaning… she knows at least some of what happened to her, of why she would be so against going back to her family.

"… You would not need to return to your clan, Kai'Sa. I promise, if that is not where you want to go, I will not take you to them. And I won't let them come anywhere near you either. I only want what's best for you."

Silence reigns as the angel's words hang in the air. What's crazy is… Kai'Sa almost believes her. The words ring with a note of truth. She actually thinks the angel might try to follow through if she did choose to go with her. However, there's just one problem with all of this.

"Where were you when I needed you before? Where were you when Millennium tricked me into a magical contract that all but made me their dancing monkey? Why are you only here now, when I'm finally free?"

The angel looks actually pained by that, her grimace marring her otherwise inhuman beauty. She even averts her gaze for the first time, looking truly ashamed as she stares down at the ground.

"… I can make no excuses for our inaction. We could not move because you signed the contract willingly. Our hands were tied… but we should have tried to do something anyways."

The angel raises her head back up and looks her back in the eye.

"Kai'Sa, from the bottom of my heart… I am so sorry."

Kai'Sa's breath hitches. She believes her. And yet at the same time…

"Sorry isn't good enough."

At her side, Mira snorts derisively.

"Damn straight it isn't."

And then, before anything else can be said or the angel can even react… the ground opens up beneath them and swallows her and Mira both whole, closing the instant they're through. Before Kai'Sa can truly begin to fall, Mira grabs ahold of her and lifts her up, the other woman slowly flying them down to the ground… or rather, to the top of a massive pyramid where the others are all waiting for them.

"Thanks for the save, Rumi! Impeccable timing!"

As Kai'Sa finds her feet, it becomes obvious what happened. Mira had correctly deduced that they were probably outmatched… or she'd simply decided that throwing down in a fancy clothing boutique wasn't a good idea, even if she might be able to beat the angel.

Either way, they'd been pulled into another world entirely… by Rumi, it would seem.

Akali and Ahri both run up to her, looking concerned. Evelynn lingers a bit away, watching with her arms across her chest.

"Are you okay?"

Kai'Sa swallows and nods.

"I… yes. Thanks to Mira, I'm fine. She got us out of there."

Amadeus approaches next, his brow furrowed. Kai'Sa tries not to let his handsome looks get to her… funnily enough, he and that angel are similarly gorgeous, albeit in altogether different ways.

"Mira texted everything to Rumi. What exactly was that? How did she recognize Mira as a Devil?"

That's right. They wouldn't know. Mira almost certainly sensed things were amiss, but she wouldn't know what an angel felt like, presumably.

"I… that was an angel."

Everyons'e eyes widen at that, including Amadeus. Evelynn growls from off to the side.

"Damn it, your family works quick."

Kai'Sa nods despondently. She really hadn't expected them to find out she was free so soon. She'd thought they had more time. Of course, while Evelynn and the other members of K/DA know a bit about her past, Amadeus and Huntrix only know what little Evelynn has already spilled. With a sigh, Kai'Sa looks to them, recognizing that they deserve the truth at this point.

"My clan, the Kuusho Clan, has strong ties to the Catholic Church… which in turn has strong ties to Heaven. I don't know all the details, only that it doesn't surprise me that they can call upon an angel from Heaven itself to track me down."

Of course, she says that now but still wasn't actually expecting it. To be confronted by an angel of all things… Kai'Sa is reeling a little bit even now. Shoulders slumping, she lets out a sigh.

"… I'm sorry for bringing this to your doorstep."

"It's fine."

Kai'Sa jolts at Amadeus' easy response. Looking at him, he just shrugs.

"I'm just glad that we were able to get you and Mira out of there before anything else. We're not going to let anyone take you, angel or otherwise."

The ensuing silence is broken by an incredulous noise from the back of Evelynn's throat.

"You're unbelievable. You'd even fight Heaven for us, is that what you expect us to believe?"

Smiling, Amadeus just looks Evelynn right in the eye.

"Yes."

His sincere answer causes the devil to blush and look away and even with the dire situation, the corner of Kai'Sa's mouth twitches upwards while Ahri smirks and Akali's eyes crinkle around the edges. Seeing their group's tough femme fatale being rendered speechless and embarrassed by a single word is… something else to be sure.

Still…

"What do we do now?"

There's a pause as those words linger in the air, before Rumi takes charge.

"We should head back to the Tower, I think. We can get Celine involved in this and maybe even call Serafall for help as well. If Heaven is going to come knocking on our door, we need to be prepared, right? And Serafall is basically our biggest political stick at this point."

Amadeus nods.

"That makes the most sense, yes. Let's go back then and discuss next steps."

With agreement from everyone, Rumi opens up another tear in space and brings them all through it into the common area of the Tower's penthouse. As Kai'Sa steps off of dusty rocky pyramid and onto plush carpet, for a moment she half-expects to see the angel waiting for them somehow.

… But no, that's a ridiculous fear. There's no way the angel would know where to find them already, right? She should have no idea that K/DA was staying with Huntrix in their Tower and-

The elevator dings just as the portal to the Demon Realm is swirling shut behind all of them. Kai'Sa's eyes widen in horror as the elevator doors open… and the angel from earlier steps out into the penthouse with a look of determination on her beautiful features.

How?! How had she found them so quickly?! How had she gotten up here so easily?!

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Gabriel was not used to being 'juked' as the kids called it these days. She could scarcely remember the last time she'd been so thoroughly bamboozled. But the devil with Kai'Sa had completely caught her off guard with that portal trick, mostly because it looked nothing like normal devil teleportation… no, normal devil teleportation was much slower.

She still should have had time to act before the two had disappeared, but Kai'Sa's words had left her feeling weak and ashamed. The young woman was right to call them out for how they failed her, after all… but it would be worse still if Gabriel let Kai'Sa be corrupted by the Underworld simply because of her moment of weakness.

Still, in the end she was left with a single name and no other leads. Mira. That was what Kai'Sa had called the devil with her. And at first, Gabriel had despaired… but then she'd gone back over her memories of the encounter in her head and paid more attention to this 'Mira' individual.

She'd eventually realized both Kai'Sa and Mira were wearing physical disguises intended to keep the average human from recognizing them. But the only reason Mira would need to do such a thing was if she were as famous or more so than Kai'Sa. And there was only one Mira that Gabriel knew of who would be able to claim such a thing.

Now, obviously Gabriel didn't want it to be true. She didn't want one of her favorite music groups of the twenty-first century to have had a member turned into a Reincarnated Devil behind her back. And yet, it was the best lead she had… so she'd made her way over to Huntrix Tower and charmed her way past the front desk.

She was just going to check on them, that was all. A quick bat of her eyes, kind smile, and a nice, earnest request had seen her into the elevator with minimal fuss.

But now here she stands, having come off of the elevator to find not just Kai'Sa and Mira, but the entirety of Huntrix and K/DA standing in the penthouse. And to her horror… every single member of Huntrix has indeed been turned into a devil. She can smell it on them.

Furthermore, there's a male devil of no small power with the two girl groups, turning to see her entering alongside them. Obviously, he's the one who dragged Huntrix into his peerage. There's something else strange about him as well, but Gabriel sets that aside for the moment to point at him.

"Name yourself, Devil!"

He almost certainly doesn't know who she is given the lack of fear in his eyes as he levels a calm, undisturbed gaze at her. His words are more evidence to this fact.

"You first, Angel."

Gabriel's eyes narrow. If that's how he wants to play it, then fine… she stops holding it all in. She doesn't go all out to be fair, mindful of the humans among them. However, she does reveal her wings, letting all twelve unfurl along her back as her power pulses out from her. At the same time, she lets her power form itself into a sword of light in her hand, which she unerringly points in the male devil's direction.

"I am Gabriel the Archangel, Messenger of the Lord, Angel of Revelation, and Great Seraph. I demand again that you name yourself, defiler!"

Before he can respond, there is suddenly someone between them, someone Gabriel had not detected before. Her eyes widen as a female devil wearing an unassuming maid uniform sets herself mere inches from Gabriel's light sword, her red eyes narrowed in fury.

"You will not point a blade at my Master."

Instantly, Gabriel senses a strength rivaling her own in the opponent in front of her. The pressure in the room that had previously come from only her is redoubled now by the reveal of this powerhouse. She would put this silver-haired maid on the same level of a Great Satan, as ridiculous as that seems.

The situation just became much more complicated.

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The Vote:

[X] Stick with Gabriel's POV - 78%

[ ] Switch to Amadeus' POV - 22%

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Inconceivable (Invincible AU): https://www./series/2600396/inconceivable-invincible-au/

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