Vol.4 Ch.67 – Void Stalker
Chapter 67: Void Stalker
“We have a problem,” Ophelia said out loud, causing her team to pause on the way to the stairs.
The dark-haired angel gave her an expression that, while not quite a glare, was brooding enough to convey his annoyance.
“What's wrong?” Kaja asked, seeming more annoyed with his reaction than with Ophelia.
Ophelia looked at everyone in the group, scanning for anyone who shouldn't be there, and then her eyes landed on Alexis. “Elaine just told me Alexis is with her.”
People turned to look at both Alexis and Ophelia.
“That's...” Cassie began.
“Fuck,” Alexis said, a look of pure horror on her face.
That was good. Horror was good. Alexis was neither cackling nor melting into a sludge and she wasn't trying to make light of it, either.
“What are you saying?” Abigail asked.
“One Alexis has got to be a fake one,” Ophelia said, then paused and looked at Kaja. “Is there an Outsider creature that can do such a thing?”
“Yes,” Kaja said instantly. “But that would be really bad.”
“What is it?” Ophelia asked.
“Assuming this isn't the worst case scenario of a Mask of Nyarlathotep taking an interest in us,” Kaja began, and the way Omega was wincing told Ophelia everything she needed to know about just how bad that would be, “this is likely a Void Stalker. They can alter and deceive perceptions, both actively and passively. So long as they are impersonating someone they are limited to that person's physical abilities but once they shed that disguise they are very nearly as fast as a Wendigo and can hide inside pocket dimensions, jumping in and out of reality whenever they please.”
“So they either kill that thing before it has a chance to reveal itself of it'll be almost impossible to catch?”
“Essentially.”
“I mean, whether 'they' need to do this depends a whole lot on which Alexis is the fake,” Cassie said, looking at the girl in question.
“I mean,” Alexis said, “I'm pretty sure I'm me.”
“And I doubt that Outsider monster can fake Lugh's magical spear,” Ophelia said. “The way that thing pierces Outsider shields is kind of unique.”
“But there's a pretty easy way of figuring out if our Alexis is fake,” Cassie said, then looked at Kaja. “Does a Void Stalker have access to the memories of the person they're impersonating?”
“No,” Kaja said. “They can fool the senses and they're smart enough to take context cues but they can't duplicate memories.”
Cassie nodded, then asked Alexis: “What did we do the last time we were alone together?”
Instantly Alexis turned beet red. “You can't be serious.”
“Go on,” Cassie said, a nasty little smirk on his lips.
Alexis squeezed her eyes shut in sheer embarrassment, then said, slightly louder than she had to: “I asked Cassie to help me prepare my ass for Elaine. I then returned the favor and fucked him with a dildo.” If her face had been red before, it now resembled a ripe tomato.
“Good enough for me,” Cassie said, then noticed that Abigail and Kaja were beet red as well. Huh. Apparently they hadn't known just how freaky Elaine's lovers were willing to get for her. And Alexis hadn't even gone into details, like how the dildo she'd used on him had very clearly been based on a horse.
“But that leaves the question of what we should do about it,” Ophelia said. “I warned Elaine but I haven't gotten any answers yet.”
“Maybe they're in a fight,” Alexis said, clearly grateful for the change in topic.
“That's exactly what I'm worried about,” Ophelia said. “What better time to screw them over than while they're busy fighting for their lives?”
“Message Evelyn,” Alexis said.
“Why Evelyn?” Kaja asked and Ophelia could all but see on Kaja's face that she thought Evelyn was too absentminded to be of help with this.
“She's immune to effects that mess with her senses,” Ophelia said. “And her scan function is way better than ours.”
“If Evelyn's senses are immune to tampering,” Abigail asked, “shouldn't she have seen through the ruse much earlier?”
“Unlikely,” Kaja said. “Even if the obfuscation doesn't work on her, a Void Stalker's disguise isn't an illusion. They actually reshape their flesh. And if that thing looks like Alexis, she will have no reason to question that, beyond a vague feeling that something is wrong.” She turned to Ophelia and added: “But if you give her a reason to pay attention...”
Ophelia nodded and pulled up her AR menus once again.
Ophelia almost growled. The worst case scenario. Almost.
A long pause, then:
Another pause, then:
**
Evelyn crashed into another cyborg, her Vajra turning the thing into a pile of scrap metal, gore and that disgusting blackish blood they had, when she received Ophelia's message.
Alexis had practically dragged them down the stairs and into the next fight, against a veritable army of cyborgs waiting for them in front of the staircase. It was strange. She could have sworn Alexis was supposed to be with the other team and every time she tried to take a good look at her Evelyn felt a migraine coming on.
In hindsight, that should have been enough of a tip-off. But there had been a dozen other things going on, another dozen things that could have explained her unease.
But with Ophelia's warning fresh in her mind she began paying closer attention to this Alexis.
The first thing that struck her was that she never strayed too far from Elaine, which was weird given that the two normally didn't fight side by side. Even more, this Alexis didn't really fight. She certainly wielded a spear but the enemies somehow seemed to ignore her, as if they always found another target before they could focus on her.
But the second thing that struck Evelyn was that Elaine wasn't fully turning her back on her, either. Evidently Elaine had gotten Ophelia's warning as well.
Evelyn crushed another couple cyborgs to get herself some breathing room, then finally used her scan on the thing pretending to be Alexis.
Evelyn shook her head furiously, then focused both her Akashic Knowledge and her Immunization skills onto the creature, then tried again.
Tips:
If you can see it, it can see you.
And the moment Evelyn read those words the Alexis creature's head turned to face her with a horrid snapping sound. Its face still looked kind of like Alexis' but the skin had gone paler and the eyes were two enormous black spheres, myriads of dead stars swirling inside them. And its smile stretched from one ear to the other.