Mister Foley embraced the wind as it passed over his weasel form. His scythe-tail flicked and sent out a line cut across the rooftops. The buildings in an arc before him stuttered briefly before shifting, no longer connected in a long line along the curved path of his cut. He smiled as the rooftops scraped against the top of the buildings, sliding down the slight slope and to the ground.

Boom.

"Do you see the power of wind?" Mister Foley cackled, his gate blazing bright as power flushed through his body. "Now give up before I turn it on you!"

He turned, searching the remaining rooftops for the two men, but they weren't there. Even in his weasel form, Mister Foley managed to frown. That wasn't right. The two men didn't seem like the type to run away. From what he knew about Baptiste, the man never backed down from a fight. On Diamond Peak, he had left one of their expedition beaten nearly to death when the man had never been a real threat. His curse let him control spaghetti.

What kind of monster took someone like that seriously? Foley would have just given him a beating and left him with enough dignity to walk away. He had taken pity on the man, of course, and gotten him to Undertown. From what he had heard, the man had picked up as a cook in the Underground, though he didn't keep tabs on him. It wasn't Mister Foley's job after all.

That was all to say, Mister Foley was sure that Baptiste wouldn't just run from the fight. His eyes raced across the rooftops and the sky, but the two men were gone. He clicked his long claws together, four in his weasel form.

Click. Click.

He wasn't sure what to do. He couldn't just go around destroying more buildings. They would have to be rebuilt for the operation to continue. Even cutting off the rooftops had been a slight error on his part. He couldn't drop the second level of his curse either. Entering the second stage was so draining on one's body that dropping it suddenly weakened the user for some time. Going into the second level as a gambit for Mister Foley, and dropping it would be the losing move.

Thump.

Below. He had forgotten the streets below, patrolled by the knights. His eyes raced downward.

Like ants, the knights swarmed towards a central point below. However, as they approached that central point, they froze in place. A winged demon with a feminine form stood at the center of an empty circle in the crowd. Her arms were crossed over her grotesque and vein-covered body. Her wings spread out wide behind her, leathery and white. Mister Foley recognized the creature, if not in name, in type. It was a mistwalker, though not of the normal variety.

Normal mistwalkers were not that different from less intelligent drimn. They wandered the realm between the Surreal and the Outside, and could be seen anywhere the realms leaked into the Real. Keita stood with one hand up beside the creature. He was controlling it, and it was exerting some influence over the knights. A foolish idea. The knights were distractions at best. Focusing on them would do nothing.

"I'll show you." He flicked his tail downward, only for a hard hit to slam into his face.

Crack.

Mister Foley hadn't seen Baptiste running across the rooftop toward him. He hadn't seen him flying with the spirit spinning in a broad kick. He had been too focused on the melee below. He shuddered in the air, and some of the supporting winds around his body. It wasn't over yet. Mister Foley could still recover. A simple kick across his jaw hurt, but it didn't have enough weight to bring him down.

"Wind—"

"Spirit Cross!"

Crack. Thud. Crack. Thud.

A series of kicks slammed across Mister Foley's head in a circle. Each one carried a bone-cracking force in it, and the vibrations echoed across his long body. Batiste had entered a spin with his spirit, trading places in the air so that he didn't fall, and allowing him to keep up the momentum of his attacks. He had negated Mister Foley's aerial advantage far too easily. Miste Foley sucked in a breath, calling on the wind to blow his foe away.

He just needed space. Then he could counterattack.

"Wind—"

"Tempting Whip!"

Flap. Shing.

From below, Keita had left the crowd of knights behind, taking to the air on the back of his mistwalker. Foley glanced down just in time to see the demon flip over, sending a hard kick skyward with a boney pointed heel. It cracked into his stomach, piercing through his fur and skin and sending his body bending up. Mister Foley's vision blurred as his head and tail bent in the opposite directions. Under the force of the kick, he became a distended tube.

His breath fled from his lungs, and darkness flashed across his eyes.

The two men had taken him by surprise. They had used his arrogance to get into position, and allowed one to distract while the other got in a hard hit. Alone, Mister Foley hadn't stood a chance. His nerves shook across his long form as the realization hit him. His best option was to run. He needed to get out of the mistwalker's kick and fly away. He could figure everything else out later.

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"Spirit Step!" Baptiste appeared beside his head, his ghostly partner outstretched in his arms with her leg pointing out above him. "Spirit Pirouette!"

Like a top, the spirit spun faster and faster on Baptiste's finger, rotating with one outstretched leg. A ballerina, that was what she looked like, dancing with her partner. Mister Foley might have thought it was beautiful if the foot wasn't coming down onto his skull with bone-cracking energy. He closed his eyes, trapped between the monster above and the monster below.

There would be no escape.

Jean smiled as he descended back onto the nearest rooftop. Eliza's hand held him aloft until his feet finally reached the ground, and a cold stone surface gave him a solid hold. Fits of chuckles wracked through his body, despite his misgivings before. They were back together, fighting again. When he and Keita worked together, there was no barrier they could not overcome.

"Come here, love," he whispered, turning to Eliza and taking her into an embrace.

She shimmered in his arms, her ghostly form still that one step from the Real that he didn't know if he would ever overcome. He wanted her back, and his curse was the only path he had found that might ever bring her home. She was his reason. As Alex would say, 'Simple as that.'

"One day," Jean whispered, letting go of Eliza and letting her float away on his arm. "One day."

Thump.

Behind him, he heard Keita land on the same rooftop, or the creature he rode upon, at least. Jean hadn't wanted to voice his thoughts on it during the fight, but the form was familiar. Though it was not Eliza, his first thoughts when looking upon the shape was that it was modelled after her. A recreation, that was the best way for him to say it. A mockery, in the worst way.

Jean turned, questions burning on his lips, until he saw his friend's stance.

The creature stood before him, wings unfurled and arms held close to its body. Before Jean could think about it, words entered his mind, fast and loud. A sharp pain echoed through his skull, and he reached up for it instinctively, even if it couldn't do anything for the pain.

Kneel.

He had no muscles, but his legs tried to buckle anyway. Jean clenched his teeth and focused his mind. In the moment, he was vulnerable, every thought was focused on just allowing himself to break free and move. His legs and arms refused. His head, however, slightly twitched.

While his body was trapped, his focus allowed his lips to be free.

"What—" Jean started before lurching to a stop under renewed force. "What are you doing?"

Each word required a force of will to utter. Jean wouldn't let the attack go unanswered. Keita stood behind his monster, hand up and focused. It was only then that Jean realized that Eliza wasn't reacting to protect him at all. It was like she had disappeared. He couldn't turn his head to confirm.

"Acquiring what is mine," Keita said, his fingers flexing as his beads floated around his wrist.

Darkness, black as night, followed the beads. Keita made a pulling motion with his fingers, pointing beyond Jean with them and drawing them together toward his palm before repeating the motion. A solid weight fell into Jean's stomach, though he had no internal organs. He wanted nothing more than to turn his head to confirm what Keita was doing, but he was held stunned by the creature's power.

"I never understood why you trusted me again," Keita whispered as he continued the motion. "After what happened last time, I thought you would have killed me when you regained your memories. It seems you don't remember what happened that night. I don't know whether to be grateful or to pity you more."

Ba-bump.

A heartbeat echoed through his head. Blood on the floor. A cold feeling that crept across his back. Rain was falling against the window as he waited for Eliza to return. He had fallen face-first. He remembered that. Darkness cloyed at the edge of his vision in the memory.

It was the night he had died, the first time. Eliza would come later and kill herself over his form. He would wake up with her lying on his back, her blood mixing with his own. However, at that point, he no longer needed his own blood. When he had woken up, he was just bones from the neck down.

"It was a failure," Keita whispered as he clawed at the air. "I thought I lost her for good, and when I learned to capture the mistwalkers, I thought I found her again in those grey mists. However, you had her all along, didn't you?"

Clink.

She appeared then, floating and wrapped in spectral chains beside Jean. The black chains pulled at her, drawing her closer to Keita and the monster. Pain ripped through Jean's mind again as he pushed against the monster's control. Keita was taking Elia from him, and his body wouldn't respond.

"Why?" Jean's breath came in rapid gasps as he tried to pull in a surge of aether. "Why are you doing this, Keita? Weren't we friends?"

"We were." Keita chuckled. "Until we weren't. I still remember the day you both came and told me, you know? The day you both came home so late. I should have suspected, but I never thought you were together. You both abandoned me that day. You left me out in the old and dark so that you could be together!"

He spat, and a chill ran down Jean's spine. He had never known that Keita had felt that way. He had loved Eliza, the same as he did. Then the pieces tumbled together in his mind. The old stab in his back. The hot breath on the back of his neck before he fell to the ground.

He stood in front of his own killer.

"You—"

"Clamp down on your control, Temptress," Keita hissed. "I almost have your new soul."

Keita drew a black knife from his pocket as he drew Eliza closer. Eliza struggled against the chains. Her black, empty eyes looked back at Jean. She had no voice, but he could hear her pleading for Jean to stop Keita. He was going to take her away from him. He pulled aether into his gate, forcing the power out with a mental grip.

He would not let Keita take her. He tried to close his gate. That would dismiss Eliza, but his gate refused. Like when he had fought Fettucine on Diamond Peak, some power held his gate steady. Was it the chains? Was it the Temptress? Jean didn't know.

"Spirit Step!"

A burst of speed sent him jumping at Keita, but Keita's monster wouldn't let him past A clawed hand ripped away from her chest, slamming down on Jean and sending him crashing to the ground. He landed hard, face down as he had when he died. The claw came down, pressing his bones down hard against the stone roof.

"Now, for the cut," Keita said.

Snip.

Jean's gate exploded. A cold sliver came immediately after, cutting into his gate and sending power crackling through his bones. Jean screamed. His mind went white hot, and then darkness came for his mind. Then the tension in his bones released as he closed his eyes.

"I'll let you live this time," Keita whispered as Jean's consciousness faded. "For her sake."

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