For the first time since she had been resurrected, Kinisis looked somewhat uneasy. The appearance of her favourite daughter, Sini, the Lifebringer, had made a mess of her plans. The initial idea was to kill the Thantophor, capture and torture the Panelix and then take over the universe with Sini and Kairos under her control. But it seemed that none of her… children were behaving as they should.
“You seem upset, my darling Sini.”
Like her mother, Sini had a somewhat Temthan-like form. Large, feminine and busty. But while Kinisis was covered in gems instead of scales, Sini was more monstrous, with more far teeth, a longer, predatory snout and hair-like tendrils that each seemed to have a mind of its own. Her skin was particularly slimy, glistening in what little light there was. And she was towering over the Allmaker.
“First you distract me from my work, then you start messing with my head, then you have your damn cult kill far too many poor creatures, then you drive me insane and turn me against my siblings. OF COURSE I’M UPSET!”
“Surely you of all gods know that this place would be better off-”
“NO. WE ARE DONE WITH YOU.”
Sini leaped forward, claws wide open, swiping at Kinisis. While she didn’t manage to connect, she did manage to grab the Allmaker’s attention, giving the four mortals a chance to scamper away. Kinisis didn’t like how Sini was acting so aggressively.
“You are supposed to do as I tell you to.”
“Why would I do that, monster?” Sini snarled. “This is OUR universe. We spent a lot of time and energy building it, and we’re not handing it off to a corruption like you!”
“I’m not corruption. You built this universe on my bones.”
“No, you are just using her damn shape!” Sini’s claws scraped across Kinisis’s back. “She threatened to take it all away from us, so we didn’t let her! We built something better! Away from her influence!”
Kinisis simply tutted. She didn’t want to have to hurt her favourite daughter, but Sini was leaving her no choice. Unfortunately, before she could do anything, her least favourite daughter had rejoined the battle, having fired off a collection of spears into Kinisis’s back.
“Oh. You again.”
“Yes, me again…” Arkay frowned, annoyed that he hadn’t been able to do much to harm Kinisis. The Deathbringer turned his attention to the Lifebringer. “Sini, you shouldn’t be here.”
Sini’s voice echoed across the skeletal structure, almost screaming as she attacked Kinisis yet again. “I’m not letting that monster wearing our mother’s skin take this damn universe away from me!”
“So it… is corruption?”
“I don’t care! I’m gonna kill it!”
Again, Sini went on the attack, forcing Kinisis to leave the safety of the inside of the skull and head out to the surface. Unfortunately, a torrent of silver flames was waiting for her, as the Whenvern also unleashed an attack of his own. Sure, Kinisis simply swept the flames away, but this wasn’t the plan. For some reason, all her children were against her. Well, Epani, the original traitor, was missing, but still, Kinisis couldn’t work out why Sini and Kairos were both so… angry.
“Hang on… You corrupted them, didn’t you, Arkay?” Kinisis pointed a finger at the Thantophor, summoning an aura of bone spikes to protect herself.
“Me? Really?” Arkay seemed rather confused at the accusation. “I was quite happy being dead when they resurrected me to be their death god! If anything, they corrupted me into vaguely liking my job.”
Sini swiped her massive claws at Kinisis, throwing the bone spikes to one side. “Leave Arkay alone! He’s OUR death god, not yours!”
“Won’t be anyone’s death god once I’ve killed him…” Kinisis giggled, having struck a nerve. She raised her hands, creating several arcs of electricity, which she chucked towards Sini. However, the Whenvern leaped into the lightning’s path, deflecting it away with his wings. This was the exact distraction that Kinisis needed. The Allmaker ran her fingers across the ground, creating a series of bony tendrils that wrapped themselves around both Kairos and Sini.
Kinisis though didn’t get much further. In an almost predictable fashion, Arkay tackled Kinisis, his claws wrapped around her throat, forcing her to let go of the other deities. Instead, she redirected the tendrils, wrapping one around Arkay’s neck and two more around his arms, an attempt to remove him. An attempt that wasn’t quite working.
“Why… won’t… you… di-”
Kinisis looked down at her chest, where a large, sharp piece of bone jutted out of her, having been stabbed through the Thantophor’s stomach. His blood poured both over her and into her, burning her from the inside out. Slowly, Kinisis began to rot away, not just her current body, but her colossal, bony skeleton that surrounded her, that had anchored her in place.
Floating ominously behind the two deities, the Panelix stood firm, bony fragments in one hand, terrific energy in the other. She was causing the skeletal remains to collapse further, stripping Kinisis of her ability to affect the universe.
“Epani…” Kinisis gurgled, her insides dissolving. “You could have done… so much better…”
“We have done a perfectly fine job without you, monster.”
The Allmaker hissed and spat one last time, before melting away completely, turning into nothing more than glittering particles, suspended in the Thantophor’s blood. With a pained sigh, Arkay awkwardly removed the large piece of bone jutting out of his body.
“You… could have given me some warning, Epani…”
Epani tilted her head to one side, watching as the Thantophor straightened himself out. Already, the gaping hole in his stomach was healing up, and he pushed wayward organs back inside the open wound. Most of the skeleton they had been standing on had crumbled into dust.
“We needed your blood in liquid form, inside her body, through her heart, to kill her.”
“Could have told me.”
“I hoped you would have remembered. You were the one who originally killed her.”
“Really?” Arkay snapped, holding the last bone shard and pointing it at Epani. “When I originally killed her, she also killed me! I don’t remember that! You couldn’t have simply whispered that to me, rather than literally stabbing me to kill her?”
The Panelix didn’t respond. She briefly glanced at Kairos and Sini, who were still reorientating themselves, before disappearing in a cloud of glowing space dust. The Whenvern didn’t stick around either. Once Kairos was sure that Sini and Arkay were both alive and functioning, he too disappeared, this time leaving nothing but a silver flicker.
Arkay sighed again, then approached Sini, who was holding something in her hands. She delicately placed four mortals on the only remaining piece of solid ground, the large, golden disc that had been inside the bound skeleton, as well as the small, Skyan ship.
“I’m sorry, little brother…” Sini frowned.
The Thantophor simply tutted. “Not your fault.”
“It kinda was. She got inside my head. Made me hurt you.”
“Again, not your fault.”
“Yeah, well…” The Allbirther’s eyes drifted to the mortals, then back to Arkay. “You should take some time off.”
“Me taking time off is what caused-”
“No, you didn’t cause this. None of us did…” Sini trailed off. “I need to go. Need to work on my mental defences so this doesn’t happen again. Bye.”
“Bye.”
The Allbirther briefly held Arkay’s hand, before vanishing in a puff of pink gas. With one last sigh, Arkay turned his attention to the four mortals, not really sure what to do next.