Last Man On Earth When There Is No Earth ?

Sector twenty one, planet Gorgola, Tiga one, Seven

First meeting of the day was done and it was time for the second one. I asked Lilia, Estel and Ginger to clear the room and not long after Hono arrived along with Feather and Blue.

"Fea~ther~" seeing the little cutie I couldn't help but smile. I reached out toward her asking for a hug, but she only looked at me nervously and hid behind her father's tail.

"I can work with that…" taking my book with one motion I used its camera to snap a few pictures of the super cute little angel. Seeing her shyly peeking from behind the fluffy fox tail is a sight that warms my heart and as if the sweetness wasn't enough Blue approached me before extending her arms.

"Wha-" I was overtaken by shock but before I lose the chance I jumped right into her embrace.

"Un… small Seven is cute" she said, gently c.a.r.e.s.sing my hair "you should stay like this."

Now I don't want to go back to normal.

"You have to be a special kind of pervert to enjoy staying like this" a certain someone said.

"What? Are you jealous, perhaps?" I replied, causing Iris's frown to deepen.

"Why would I?"

"Because you've been a ghost for almost a year and can't feel anyone's touch?"

I'm pretty sure she's longing for the feeling of being embraced into Lilia's voluptuous bosom, but of course she wouldn't admit it herself. Iris is a bit of a tsundere after all.

[When I get my body back the first thing I'm gonna do is kill you a few times.]

It seems she took the liberty of reading my mind and now she's glaring down at me. Scary.

'Now now, you're scaring the kids.'

Though Blue seems to have gotten over her fear of this ghost that's haunting me, she still flinches every time Iris gives her a scary look. Feather on the other hand is on the verge of crying. I know she doesn't like kids very much, but I wish she could at least not glare at them like that. I don't want them to be too afraid to get close to me.

"Lord Seven" noticing the tears forming in his daughter's eyes, Hono picked her up as he spoke "thanks for granting me some of your time"

"Well, you don't have to worry too much about that." I said as I moved away from Blue "we have a lot to discuss. Blue, could you take care of Feather in the meantime?"

The topics in this meeting aren't exactly for kids to hear. I wanted the little ones to go play in the next room but it seems Feather doesn't want to be away from her father. Honestly, I'm quite jealous.

"Feather, your papa has to work now" Blue said, her eyes sparkling "I will read another book for you so let's wait for him to finish together, okay?"

Feather looked between Blue and Hono, the conflict visible on her face. Hono smiled at her, the bags under his eyes indicating how tired he is. He gently patted her head and told her to be a nice girl and wait for him, promising to finish everything quickly and come back.

Feather left the room holding Blue's hand anxiously peeking behind before disappearing behind the door. I got my body which melted from all the sweetness back together and cleared my throat. I then offered Hono a seat before taking one myself.

This was a serious discussion between those who knew the details concerning mythical beasts. Sitting around the table were me, Hir, Hono and Iris. Though the others knew a few things already, especially Lilia who was there during my fight with Verta, we can't really converse with Iris when they're here. We already elected to keep her existence a secret until we get her body back -well, Lilia already knows there is something suspicious going on since Blue told her that she saw a ghost around me-.

"Alright then…" clearing my throat I stared "Hono, before we get to the main you should know a few things."

I told him about what happened to Habs and the three mythical beasts. Shock is the appropriate reaction for anyone to have so I wouldn't blame him. It's hard to grasp the real scale of such catastrophes. Billions of lives were lost in a matter of minutes and nothing could be done about it. That's the kind of disaster mythical beasts could bring.

"Were there any of your old crew on it at the time?" Hir asked.

"Many were caught so…" Hono tapped his temples trying to remember "quite a few, actually…"

"I see. My condolences" I'm not sure how close they were but I would guess he still cares about them even if the crew was disbanded.

"It doesn't matter, honestly" the fox tailed man said "those who were caught are from the group that split apart from Bright Sun before Feather was born. The others, those who survived our fight against the church, they should be fine… I hope…"

"Is that so…" it seems he doesn't care about those who betrayed him. A bit cold, don't you think?

"I don't think Feather would figure it out on her own but please keep the specifics hidden from her."

As he spoke, a pained expression painted his face. Hono's body shook with rage. Somehow I could tell he's angry at himself. For not being able to save his crew. For letting his wife die and for being unable to protect his child.

"Hono… is Feather having nightmares?"

At my question, Hono's pain seemed to deepen.

"… Feather… she… calls a bunch of names…" hanging his head he followed "all of them belong to those who died defending her. When she calls for Celeste, her mother, fire erupts from her wings… even I am barely able to withstand it…"

"I see…"

Hono's powers are fire related so I expected him to have some resistance, but it seems even that isn't enough. Feather's powers leaking while she's asleep was within our predictions, that doesn't mean we actually have a solution though.

I faced the same problem a while ago. I don't remember what I dreamed about but thankfully Iris was there to wake me up each time. Recently I've been working myself to the point of exhaustion so I don't really dream at all. My life is stable and fulfilled as well, most of the time at least, and if what happened on Layl didn't give me trauma I doubt it will happen again.

But Feather isn't me. She's a five year old child who just lost her mother and awakened power beyond her understanding. I doubt those nightmares will stop anytime soon.

"To be honest, I don't know what we're supposed to do here…" in such situation the best course of action would be taking her to a psychiatrist, but does something like that even exist out here? Even if they do, would they know how to deal with this?

"I'm open to suggestions" I said, letting out a long sigh.

"First of all" Hir began, brushing his furry beard in thought "we have to make sure she doesn't hear about what happened in Layl. The burden is too much for a child to carry."

"I see, but that won't be easy…" things didn't go too well for the orange ninja kid even when no one in the hidden leaf village told him about the incident.

It's true that Feather went in a rampage, but it's hardly her fault. Her powers manifested out of nowhere and expected a kid that went through all those horrors being hunted for reasons they don't understand to keep it bottled up is unrealistic.

[No.] Iris said telepathically [for it to be her fault she has to be in the wrong first.]

'What do you mean?' I asked, careful not to look her was so the others don't notice we're conversing among us.

[You're being too nice, you realize that? Layl isn't our ally. They sided with the church and helped them kill one of your citizens, and that's without mentioning their plan to use you as a battery. Every bit of distraction was brought on them by their own actions.]

Letting out a long sigh she continued, this time audibly.

"The kid did nothing wrong so there is no problem in telling her." All eyes turned her way, the tension in the room skyrocketed "it might be different before we met, when you were still wanted criminals. But the moment you got my invitation no one had any right to persecute them. Layl moved an entire army just to make sure they're killed, that was basically a declaration of war."

At the time, beside the white cloaks of course, no one knew Feather would awaken her powers. We also wanted to keep it a secret and with how it all turned out we decided to let them off the hook easily. However what Iris said is true. Be it Layl or the church neither of them had the right to murder Celeste or Feather so they had it all coming. It was pure self defense.

"I see… Maybe we can use this…" I murmured to myself.

"What do you mean?" Hir asked, rising an eyebrow.

"Well, you see, I was thinking of what we will have to do about Feather from now on. It's only a matter of time before other planets learn of her existence, when that comes how are we supposed to explain harboring the beast that almost destroyed Layl?"

When we were asked about the six winged beast's whereabouts Iris told them I ate it. They probably think that meant it's dead so what will be our excuse this time?

I feel like we've been telling too many lies, I'm afraid they will catch on sooner or later.

"Before you say anything stupid, no" Iris glared my way. "we don't have any prior connection with the six winged beast, we can't change that part of the story"

"I guess you're right" my shoulders slumped in defeat.

"What're you talking about?" Hono asked. It seems he's finally calmed enough to join the discussion. Or so it seemed.

"He wanted to wave another story. If the story falls apart one day he wants to claim that everything that happened was retaliation for killing one of our citizens and trying to imprison us. Basically telling the truth." Iris said with a sigh, slowly shaking her head.

"Well, you said everything they did was kinda like a declaration of war" I think I'm leaving something out here…

"Indeed. What you're forgetting is that we must never let the fact that Feather is a mythical beast get out"

"I don't think I understand…" I thought we were discussing what to do when it gets out?

"Work your head a little" sighing once more, she decided to give me the answer anyway "we all know we can't hide the fact that there is a second beast is here on Gorgola, not forever. Feather's appearance is a dead giveaway that she and the six winged beast are one and the same. However what we have to hide no matter what is that Hono Nohi and Celeste Sharpeye's daughter is that same mythical beast."

"…" we all stared at her, confused. It seems I'm not the only one who heard her say that we must not let something that will happen anyway happen.

"It sounds confusing, alright" sighing again she finally simplified it enough for us to understand "we can't let them know that the children of parents from different species turn into mythical beasts, meaning we have to make sure there is a distinction between the Feather we gave an invitation to and the Feather we have with us right now.

"I see…" Hir nodded "what you're saying is that we have to make sure no one knows that Hono's child and the child we have here are the same, right?"

"Yeah, that's it."

Damn, this is so confusing. So we have to make sure they don't know that the six winged beast is Feather, but we also have to make sure they don't know that Feather is Feather. I feel like my head is spinning.

"You really aren't that bright, huh?" I can't really blame her for being disappointed, but I really am feeling confused.

"Okay, so what you want to say is that the little girl currently living here and the little girl that was with Celeste aren't the same?"

"Oooh…" Hir's eyes went wide all of a sudden and his jaw dropped "is that why you asked me to do that?"

"Wait… you mean…" Hono looked surprised as well.

"Exactly" I could see the smugness slowly creeping onto Iris's face.

I turned to Hir for an explanation, which he gave after clearing his throat.

"While we were still negotiating with Layl she gave me a strange order. She told me to list Hono, Celeste and Feather among the casualties from the great Archipelago"

"She also forced me to stay hidden the entire time" Hono said "I thought it was strange since I'm no longer wanted, but now it makes sense…"

"Right" nodding once, Iris explained "with you being dead there would be no need to clear your records by sending you to prison world. And since only a few people ever saw Feather it would be impossible to make the connection between her and your now dead kid."

"I think I get it now… so we just faked Hono and Feather's deaths and will give them new identities, right?"

That makes a lot more sense now. The fact that offspring of parents from different species could awaken b.r.e.a.s.t powers must never be known by anyone. The mess it would generate would be astronomical and that's without counting the chance of anyone ever succeeding at creating one.

"So, we can safely say that Feather is the six winged beast?" I asked, causing Iris to sigh at me.

"That's… gonna be difficult…" leaning against the back of her seat she talked while staring at the ceiling "as you already know just having one mythical beast is enough to make other planets really careful when dealing with us. Our population is still small yet we have unparalleled resources and a powerful military, if you add another beast on top of that, it would be as if we just skipped over all the major powers in the known universe and claimed our spot at the top"

"And not many would be happy about it…" Hir commented.

"Exactly" Iris continued "we're already threatening the Zesioniens' hold on the sectors from the twentieth to the twenty third. Once we're open about Feather's existence we can just declare ownership over them and they won't be able to do much. I expect they will try to stir some trouble and assert their dominance, it might even turn into a full blown war, but no matter what happens we must not let them look down on us. They will keep pushing their luck and most likely they will demand we hand over Feather as part of a peace treaty to balance power."

I started to compare it to the political landscape back on earth, where if one country tries to rise in power and create weapons that could rival those of the world's major powers. They would try to impose restrictions on them and rally the rest of the world against them all while doing the same thing themselves. Zesion is a military empire famed for its warriors. They are the most technologically advanced biological specie at the moment and reign over five entire planets without counting the open ones where they're the dominant race. It's only a matter of time before they try something to assure their control over the sectors they rule is never questioned. At worst they will attempt to conquer us and I suspect they already started the propaganda campaign to get their citizens' support.

I would like to avoid all unnecessary violence but if they try to disturb the life I have now I won't hesitate to massacre them using any means possible. At that moment, out of nowhere, Hono slammed his hands on the table. Our eyes fell on him. He directed a nasty glare at me.

"I understand there is no avoiding it, but I still can't accept it…"