The hivemind is conquering for me?

”Oh, um sure? Can you give me a minute though I need to-” I started as I pointed to the tied up woman behind me before Onyx hugged me from behind.

”-Why don’t you let me deal with this, my everything? Allow me to pull my weight around here? After all, an attack on Orchid is an attack upon myself. I cannot allow it to go unpunished.”

I sighed softly at Onyx’s embrace. My stress just washed away from her love. ”Ok cutie, I’ll leave it in your very capable hands.” I said before addressing Nerissa. ”Should we go talk in the garden? I need a break from the smell of blood.”

...

After Nerissa and Apollo left the room, Onyx turned to Janine and Orchid. ”You two. Inform someone of this pest. I will be done with it shortly.”

”Oh, ok. Are you coming, Orchid?” Janine asked as she began walking to the front door. Orchid gave Onyx a knowing glare for a moment before turning to leave.

Once Onyx was alone, she walked back towards the assassin who was looking at her. Onyx noticed there was still hope of escape in the woman’s eyes and smirked. ”You know, if I had a way to leave this planet unseen, I would have some very interesting ideas for you. But luckily for you and your organisation, that is not the case. That being said, as wonderful as my king is, this isn’t his strong suit, so I’ll take over from here.”

Onyx then walked forward slowly and grasped the woman’s head. ”You know, the two of us are surprisingly alike. Unlike the rest of my family, I have the tendency to hunt for sport. The better the target, the more fun I have. You, however, have chosen the wrong beast this time.”

Onyx’s mouth then parted at her chin and opened up as it changed into a partial transformation of her stalker form. Rows of razor sharp teeth were visible as she smiled in the now very alien way.

”But I also have ways of gleaming information from you, even after you are dead, so I don’t mind taking the slow approach to wiping out those that dare to harm my Apollo. Now hold still.” She declared and before the woman had a chance to react, her head was ripped clean from her body and squished into a bony mush before being swallowed.

Onyx then closed her eyes, focusing on the memories hidden in the biomass gene storage; the woman’s last thoughts were not of much. Boring life drama so common in humans. However, she got one decent memory from it. The woman was careful with her contracts, very careful. She had tried to trace back the money back to its source, a big no no in her organisation apparently, but could only get as far as Ecumenopolis five before the trail went cold.

Onyx smirked at this. This was a start. Onyx then reverted her mouth back to her humanoid appearance and began lip smacking as she tasted the lingering blood on her tongue. ”Mmh, very tasty. A shame I can’t eat the rest of you...”

...

”Come, sit next to me. I need to take a breather, I got seriously pissed off just then and need a moment to calm down still.” I said to Nerissa and patted the ground next to me. She seemed to take a moment to decide, in which I took a drink of the water I got from the fridge as we passed through the kitchen.

After sitting next to me, I turned to her and asked. ”So, what’s up? Is your family coming to glass the moon to keep the fact we summoned a Psionic entity from getting out?”

”Glass?” Nerissa asked rhetorically, confused about the word choice, but understanding the context. ”No, the moon is safe, a few of my trigger happy kin wanted to come and kill Hecate, but the vote was in the extreme majority to just keep tabs on the woman. The topic of you came up though...”

I gulped hearing that. ”I came up in a conversation about obliterating a planet?”

Nerissa went to open her mouth to deny that, but thinking about the thoughts she was having while away, that would technically be a lie. ”Well yes, but actually no. You were not brought up in that discussion, but you were there in spirit? I was actually referring to another conversation I had with my kin about you. Considering I did leave to follow you around.”

I mouthed an ’oh’ forgetting that part for a moment. ”So what did the fam have to say about me? Was it about my dashing good looks? Or our nice kiss when you granted me your blessing? Or do more of you want to follow me around?” I joked and took a sip of water.

”No, well yes again, but they wanted me to ask you if you were reincarnated-”

”PFFFFFFFFFTTTTTTTTTT!!!!”

I began coughing and sputtering after giving the grass in front of me a good watering.

”Apollo?” I heard Nerissa question in genuine confusion from my right. I held up my hand to tell her to give me a second while I attempted not to drown on dry land. After a few moments, I composed myself and followed up with.

”I’m sorry, what was the question again?”

Although Nerissa still had her helmet on, I could tell she was frowning with mixed emotions. ”Apollo, my family wanted me to ask you if you were reincarnated. I was asking as a throwaway comment to appease them, but your reaction has me perplexed... Are you?”

Nerissa then leaned over and got right up next to my face, her purple eye slits staring straight into my soul. I felt my entire body shutting down, refusing to work as I tried to answer the question. This was the universe telling me to shut it. It had always been this way.

So began the struggle of trying to pick out a string of words to say that will allow me to speak as Nerissa continued to stare and pressure me.

”What... What led you to think this? I do not understand how this could have come up.” I said before screaming internally. ’Sol what the fuck! Did you blab? How could they know! What happens if they find out an extra universal entity is walking about? They aren’t exactly friendly to extra galactic entities. I mean shit! They aren’t even friendly to inter galactic entities!’

’Relax, my kindled. I think there is another element at play here, just listen to Nerissa.’ Sol spoke in a calm melodic tone that ushered me into a calmness as Nerissa explained.

”Well, it’s not often we come across old names, it does happen like you and Hecate, but something has happened recently that has made my kin question some things. So I will ask again Apollo, are you a reincarnation of one of my gods?”

I took another few moments to reply, before I felt the gift of plausible deniability give way to the insurmountable force that was priorly preventing me from speaking, so I replied, as calmly as I could.

”No, Nerissa, I am not a reincarnation of one of your gods, I wish I was. That sounds awesome. Sadly, I just share an awesome name with one.”

”I see...” Nerissa said softly before looking down at her legs. Feeling bad for her, I reached over and placed my hand on her thigh armour and as she turned to look at me I said. ”I’m sorry I am not. I am sure it must be agony to have served under beings as powerful as they were and have that somehow stripped from you, to now live in an empire that is just a shadow of what it once was... I wish I could be one of your gods, bring you some form of comfort... But I am just the mundane human, Apollo. And I hope that I do a good enough job to provide you with some happiness and comfort in the future.”

Nerissa stayed silent for a moment before placing her hand atop mine. ”You are very sweet Apollo. Thank you. And believe me, you are far from mundane.”

The two of us stayed like that a moment before realising that Nerissa’s gauntlet felt weird atop my hand. Looking down, my eyes went wide as I proclaimed. ”Whoa! Ness, you are turning into garden decoration!”

As Nerissa looked down to what I was addressing, her lower half was being overrun by grass and dirt as it grew at a rate visible to the naked eye. Nerissa then stood up hastily, leaving behind a big mound of overgrown grass.

She then looked over towards me, clearly expecting me to say something, but I had something else on my mind. ”Yay! I can try out the hand mower now! I’ve wanted to use that since I found it! Haha! Yes!” I said before running back inside. to collect it from the storage cupboard.

...

Nerissa stayed where she was for a moment as she watched Apollo run inside, her blooming effect was of no consequence to her. No, what really had her mind racing was, no surprise, Apollo.

Reincarnation wasn’t a word used anymore. It hadn’t been used in Spartari for hundreds of thousands of years. It was a concept that did not exist anymore in this narrowminded empire. Nerissa wagered that even Apollo’s mysterious teacher would not know what the word meant. This meant Apollo had another delicious secret. Now all she had to do was figure out just what it was. Something that left her with a wide grin on her face.

”Intriguing.”