Abducted

32

They watched each other. Two souls, quite similar, stared at each other. Nicanora cleared her throat, taking in a deep breath before letting it out. Zaltana watched her, narrowing her eyes. Her tail lashed. The human almost flinched at the sound, before the wolf took over and growled instead.

"Well?" Zaltana said, "It's late. Why did you call me?"

Nicanora pushed the paper over to her.

Zaltana looked down at it, before she smirked.

"So? What if Germany was captured?" Zaltana let out a sick chuckle. Nicanora had been told her schemes when she was first returned- she had plans that nobody besides the two of them knew about, "Have you gone soft, Nika?"

"No," she growled, before shaking her head, "I was speaking with Ivan today."

"Wow. He occasionally has good ideas- so, speak."

The mountain range leaned back in her chair, her eyes deadly and daring. In the yellow light, her horns looked particularly malicious.

"He told me something I hadn't yet thought of," Nicanora looked over to her medallions of loyalty, as well as her fathers. Zaltana followed her gaze, before leaning her arms on her desk, "what if they're trying to recreate the NAZIs?"

Zaltana's ears went back at the mention of them, and she pushed herself up.

"Then Israel is in the safest place he can be right now."

"No- well, I mean-" she sighed, "what if they're trying to be as conservative as possible. Make countries go back hundreds of years."

"Then a whole lot of them would become kids messing around."

"I mean in procession," Nicanora growled. Zaltana wasn't taking her seriously, "destroy women's movements, stop pride, make slavery legal again."

"Slavery is legal: haven't you heard of prisons, ever?"

"I mean on a large scale," she deadpanned.

"Overcharging drug crimes is a large scale," Zaltana said, "do you get where I'm going?"

"No."

"This country is very liberal in policy," she pointed at the medallions on her wall, "you know what I mean. Women are slowly losing power in the country, slavery was never illegal, and most people only support pride out of pity. They aren't trying to make NAZIs. They're trying to make the countries match the governments. Destroy the opposition they represent through their thousands or hundreds of years of living."

Zaltana sighed, "In the 1800s, Alfred would wear 'women's' clothing. What does that mean?"

"The countries are not... the government. Nor the people- are they the culture? What are they?"

"They're people, alright," Zaltana said, "representatives of what can become. Unchanging change. A natural form of true peace. A war torn catalyst of violence. They are nothing. They are everything. They are of magic and they are magic. Do you get it?"

"They... were imagined?"

"Yes, as was I," she looked over at those medallions, "we only exist because people felt energy where we were and we were not and gave that energy a name and a form. We die when that energy changes, or fade away when it does."

Nicanora watched the old woman push herself back into her seat, her white hair yellow and blue in the bad lighting. Zaltana sighed, and her voice was a growl.

"They're trying to make my little brothers a monument to America herself. Remove their history, their loves and hates and bonds, and make them into what they believe they should be."