Haunted & Hunted

"It's alright. You don't have set her on fire. We can do something else." Liela thought about what the others said. "I don't know if demons are ticklish but you could always try as long as they are only tickles. And sure kit, get the grossest thing you can find and make her snuff it."

Oddly enough, Maggie and the tentacle monster, whose name wasn't important, decided to cooperate, with her taking off Lillith's shoes and him tickling Lillith's feet.

Meanwhile, Kit went inside the kitchen and started preparing some tea. If the scent failed to wake her up, she could always go for the tried and tested method of sprinkling cold water on her.

"This is weird," the fire mage said. "I can't believe I'm here watching this unfold. What is my life?!" He'd need a cold beer to wash this memory away.

Liela went next to the fire mage. "dude I've been asking that question ever since I died. And I still don't know the answer. " Liela watched the tentacle monster tried his best to tickle Lillith. She didn't wake up but she manage to hiss and give a strong kick to whoever was close enough.

The strong kick not only managed to break Maggie's nose with an audible crunch but also make her faint. The fire mage wasn't even surprised.

"I need a drink," he said. "There's no way I can put up with this sober." When in doubt, get intoxicated – that was his motto. His friends could perform spells better when drunk but he, he only told stories. Bizzare stories. Stories so unbeliavably stupid one just couldn't stop listening to them.

When Kit came back with the tea, she was surprised to find two fainted girls. Her eyes adjusted, her subroutines scanned the situation. 'Disclaimer - Actually happening' – they told her.

"If I had a face, or a head for that matter, I would have been a little afraid," the tentacle monster quipped. "But since I don't." Seeing as his plan didn't work, he stopped.

As Kit walked closer to Lillith, the sweet scent of the tea started to fill the room – the soothing aroma of cinnamon and vanilla.

Liela looked away when Lillith broke Maggie's nose. "ooo that's got to hurt" Liela smelled the very nice tea kit made. "Wow that smells nice." Kit got closer to Lillith. Lillith didn't wake up. Liela had enough of this. "You know what give me the tea!" Liela took the tea from Kit and threw it at Lillith. Lillith jolted up and started to hiss. "THAT BURNSSSSSSSSS. AAAAAAAHAHHHHHHHHHH!!!" Lillith's body looked like it was melting. She looked around the room." WHO DID THAT!!! " She was ready to kill someone.

Kit pointed her finger... at herself. Someone had to take the hit, might as well be someone who isn't alive in the traditional sense of living.

'This is gonna suck,' Kit though to herself. 'Liela, you owe me. If she breaks me, you're putting me back together.'

Maggie was still downed and the tentacle monster was happy to see that Lillith was fine and dandy. The fire mage sneaked out of the room to grab some booze in the nearby kitchen.

(Insta-hitting is allowed for the next reply; Kit will not attempt to dodge any of the attacks.)

Liela looked surprised that kit took the blame. "Uhhh... you do not want to do that Ki-" She couldn't finish her sentence before Lillith started to claw and tear Kit apart. "YOU SHALL DIE!!! RAAAAAAAAHHHHH" Lillith's voice sounded very demonic. Liela got close to Lillith and tried to pull Lillith away. "LILLITH STOP SHE DIDN'T POUR TEA ON YOU!!! I DID!!!" Lillith stopped hitting Kit and slowly turned to Liela. "I knew this day would come where my master would betray me... I didn't know IT WOULD BE THIS SOON!" "Wha? I poured tea on you to wake you up!" Lillith stared at Liela for a moment. Before giving a large gasp! "Oh... Well... umm... Just forget what I said."Lillith went to Liela and kneeled. "Forgive me master for my rash actions but why didn't you say that in the first place? I could have killed you!"

Oil started leaking out of where Lilith had clawed at her. Several cables were cut, others stuck out. Some subsystems immediately short circuited.

A red light had switched on in her eyes, signifying great damage. Tears went down her cheeks and when her servo motors and hydraulics gave up, she collapsed.

"I thought machines were more resilient than that," the tentacle monster noted nonchalantly. "She didn't stand a chance." Magical constructs, those were the stuff of legends. Impervious to magic, sword, arrows – one's only chance of bringing it down was slowly chipping away at its defences.

Maggie woke up from her kick to the face, immediately covering her nose. "Argh, Lillith, you kick like a horse!" She said as she inadvertedly bumped into the collapsed android. "What? Why the long faces?"

Meanwhile, the fire mage was furious about the house's lack of alcoholic beverages.

(She's fine. Maybe.)

"yeah but instead of killing me you killed Kit!" Liela went to kit seeing some serious damage. "Oh dont worry about it. It's not like she was living or something. We can just rebuild her." ". but she was living! Look she was even crying!" Lillith rolled her eyes. "We'll fix her later. Also since when do I kick like a horse. I don't remember kicking anything." Lillith turned to maggie.

Maggie's nose was bleeding profusely. "I tried to wake you up. Didn't go as planned."

"I helped," the tentacle monster said. "I even carried you here, amongst other things."

The phone that now laid on the ground rang and the text-to-speech program read out a message. "Button. Back. Of. Head. Quickly."

Even the simply message was nigh-impossible to send, as her now-unregulated subsystems fought for power and what little remained of energy reserves.

Lillith looked at Maggie's broken nose. "But this is my weakest form. I couldn't have possibly done that." Then she turned to the tentacle. Monster" You carried me here? Thanks. You know what you did over there was something else. I know master said no but I think she'd love the treatment." Liela wasn't paying attention to the others. She just looked at her phone. "Button?" Liela turned Kit's head and found a button. She pressed it.

"All she needs to know is that she's missing out," The tentacle monster said. "And that she may never get a chance like this ever again." Maggie put her nose back in place with yet another loud crunch.

"You're telling me," Maggie started. "That you could knock me out in your weakest form? You work out or something?"

Kit was restarted, but that wasn't enough; someone still had to stop the leaking and get rid of her faulty wiring – replacements were optional, but highly recommended. Her subroutines would handle the rest.

"Tools. Jeans. Pockets. Stop. Leak. Remove. Burnt. W-" The message ended abruptly there, as she had run out of power and was using the the emergency reserves to keep herself from shutting down.

The fire mage then came back, having had pilfered through the kitchen and finding a single, vintage bottle of rum. Some of it was already gone.

"Oy, any of you want sum of this?" He was completely oblivious to the situation.

"I'll make sure to tell her that later. Maybe she'll change her mind." Lillith started to laugh at maggie's comment. "I don't have time to "work out". I guess, I have more power in this form than I thought. I was such a demonic beauty in my original form. Hmm, I wonder if that book can summon ink demons." Liela quickly looked for tools in Kit's jeans. She did find some tools and started to patch up her leaks. What she didn't know was the other thing Kit said. Sort of got cut off. Liela was There thinking of what it could be until she put two and two together. "Remove burnt wires, of course!" She started to cut some wires that looked burned. "Can I have some of that beer?"

The fire mage handed Lillith the rum. "Careful," he warned her. "Strong stuff." The way he said it was a bit odd; it sounded both like a warning and a flirt.

"I'm not participating in this," Maggie said. Weren't they supposed to find whoever killed the girl? When did that become a secondary priority?

Meanwhile, with all the faulty wiring gone and the oil leaks stopped, Kit could reactivate without frying all of her inner workings and finish the rest of the repairs herself.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

"Would you kindly look for a power socket?"

Lillith took the rum and drank some. The face she made was a clear indicator that the rum was in fact strong. "ooooo.that's real strong man. Its good. " Lillith took another shot. Liela was looking all over for a power outlet until she found one farther down the room. "Hey kit I found the power outlet!" 

Kit jolted up, walked over to the socket and stuck her fingers inside. The house's lights flickered for a while and then, she took them out.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

"You'll have to excuse me again. I'll return shortly." Kit then left the room and headed straight for the bathroom once more.

"Hey, gib that back," the fire mage quipped. "Finders, keepers!" He tried to wrestle to wrestle the book from Lillith.

"I go away for a while and this is what happens!" the ghost scolded them. "Mistress Liela, do you condone this? To say nothing of the stains on the carpet!"

Liela didn't look happy. "Excuse me? I was trying to fix Kit because Lillith literally tore her apart! I had to put all my focus on her repairs. I can't be keeping these monsters in check and do that at the same time. There is only one of me. The carpet can be cleaned and I'll do that later." Liela looked pretty stressed. Lillith was doing a sort of tug of war with the fire mage."Hey you gave the bottle to me! I thought it was mine!" Liela rolled her eyes and went closer to the both of them. "BOTH OF YOU STOP THAT. YOU'RE ACTING LIKE LITTLE KIDS! NOW GIVE ME THE BOTTLE!" Liela raised her hand and summoned a beam. This beam clearly looked like one of dark energy.

"You're no fun," the fire mage taunted her. "Did anyone ever tell you that?" Still, he kept his distance from what looked like dark magic.

"You suck." That was when Maggie lost it, and slapped him with her tail. He failed to dodge it and it left a deep cut on his cheek.

"No one disrespects mistress Liela!" In her attempt to calm down the situation, Maggie probably just made it worse.

"Everyone calm down," the ghost tried to reason with them. "We're all reasonable and mature. Let's act like that."

The fire mage licked his cheek, smiled and lit himself on fire, turning into a living fireball. The only discernible feature of him were the white dots that were his eyes.

"I honestly don't care if I'm fun or not, Obahn. There is a time for everything and this isn't a good time." Liela saw Maggie get a good hit on him. She was glad it was Maggie and not her. Liela took the book and talked to it. She didn't want to be distracted anymore. "Can you go to the page to summon a... Voidwalker. I heard you could do that."

The book turned to the page the Voidwalker.

The book described Voidwalking as using runes, soul gems and dabbling in all sorts of dark magic. In more general terms, it all meant travelling in and out of the a dimension known as the void, the supposed emptyness between worlds and dimensions.

The book illustrated a void walker as a tall, slender being in violet robes, holding a staff in one hand and a book of unknown origins in the other.

The individual up for summoning was described as a teacher and scholar of said dark arts and the one of best in her line of study.

Meanwhile, Maggie managed to turn the fire mage back to normal with just one slap. A slap of the century. It made him sit down and look very confused.

"You hit like mom..." he whispered

"I had a feeling they would somehow be related to dark magic. Welp time to Summon." Lillith looked at the slap Maggie gave Obahn. "Ooooooooooo! I felt that slap from here. Man if your mom slaps you like that, it's time to get a new mom. "

Oddly enough, there were no summon words, just a 'place hand here' sort of thing. 

"But she loves me," he argued. "She wouldn't do it if it wasn't out of love." And she only did when she was angry, which was all the time. Pretending it was supposed to be that way the only way he could cope with it.

"Mine abandoned me," Maggie told him. "Right after I turned into this." Note for future reference - if your husband dabbles in dark magic, gets burned at a stake and you pledge to the dark lords for a child, you're gonna have a bad time.

"No one cares about you!" Then came another slap, from the tentacle monster. The fire mage's face was now fittingly red.

"I don't really remember anything before I became what I am," he said. "Some days, I just don't even feel like I'm really here."

Liela stopped reading the book and walked towards Maggie. "My parents abandoned me too. I wonder what life would off been like if they hadn't and I didn't have these powers." "I'm on the same boat with tentacles. I have no memory of my parents or my life before I became a demon. I don't even know what I did to get sent to hell." Lillith looked a little more unhappy when she said that last sentence. Liela looked back at the book. She kind of felt weird putting her hand on the book. It was certainly a different way of summoning.

The ghost thought the he could add in his story as well. "I, we, traded away memories for longevity and survival. We have come to regret this decision, amogst many others." Lack of physical body being one of them.

"Ma and pa were always drinkin' to forget," the now-calmed fire mage said. "Both my sisters died when I was younger and when their son turned out to be just an average sod, they pretty much lost it." One of the reasons he was saving money was to buy his own place and get the two of them out of his life for good. Uphill struggle, blood, sweat and tears, but had to do it. For them. For himself.

Additional text appeared on the book regarding the summoning. 

It said something about how a miniscule amount of her blood would be taken as form of payment and that it was common for more advanced summons, examples included demon lords, supreme valkyries and collosal elementals.

"So basically either you have bad parents or you don't remember who they were. Great! Aren't we all the lucky bunch" Lillith was being very sarcastic." You want my blood? Sure I guess." Liela took her gun blade out of her pocket and used the blade end of it to slit her wrist. Some blood came out