The pub would only open with the moons high in the sky, lingering above the overcast landscape.

Hibri of all kinds flooded the doorways, searching out a drink or numerous other social opportunities. Flowing with liveliness, the pub had been one of the louder places Cynth had stepped inside of in quite a while. With the two girls who had foolishly decided to tag along on her hunt for the sources by her side, Cynth dipped inside of the door.

It was surprisingly warm past the threshold, where moon juice and various other drinks were being served across bar counters. Cybele, upon seeing sparkling golden drinks that were fizzing wildly, couldn't help but cast an interested look in Will's direction. Indignantly, Will crossed her arms and stared down the toes of her shoes as Cynth took a determined step forward.

Zair, they had said his name was. But his name wasn't important. To Cynth, he was just another piece on the gameboard. Hunting down the sources was the only thing she had her sights set on, and tracking down wherever Zair was within the tavern was the first step to getting them. "What do you think he looks like?" Cybele asked, going up on the tips of her toes to survey the swirling crowds of hibri.

Filthy vermin.

"That, Valloma," Cynth responded dryly, "is a fantastic question." Without a doubt, Cynth knew that if she wanted to get her business done, she'd have to lose the two girls. Cybele seemed a lot more reluctant to get rid of hibri than Cynth was. And Will, oh Willa... was more than suspicious. The blue-haired girl couldn't trust them farther than she could throw them, which was admittedly quite far, but the point still stood. "Why don't you go and ask around? I'll look in the back."

Going along with what Cynth had said, Will bobbed her head up and down in a way that could be perceived as anxiously. By the time she had refocused, Cybele was already slipping through the crowd. Straightening her posture, Will rushed to catch up with her.

Now that she was, for the most part, alone, Cynth allowed her hand to graze her brow, but only for a second. When it fell slack once more against her side, there was one less hair on her forehead. She barely even noticed the movement. It had become a part of her by that point.

Cynth knew she didn't have time to waste, and so she walked through the crowds. Her silvery clothes were enough to hide who she was, at least for the moment. Despite the warm temperature in the room, it seemed to cool a few degrees the farther she walked. If Cynth's logic-based guesses were correct, Zair would be someone who frequented the parts of the pub that were less populated by customers. Trading secrets was a fine way of making money, but if everyone could hear the secrets you were trading, there was no point in pursuing the business any longer.

Without a doubt, this Zair figure had to be keeping to himself.

The more that Cynth wandered through the pub, the more she analyzed every single rana she encountered. Some of them were nearly human-passing, if not for their gills and webbed hands. Many of those in the tavern, however, were full-bred rana patrias.

Every time Cynth settled her eyes on one of the creatures, she felt a wave of disgust consume her. She needed to forget the revolting beasts she was around. It would be a lot better for her to just get in, glean the information from Zair, and get out.

Cynth released a sigh and tilted her head up to examine the very back of the pub. It was littered by dust-ridden boxes that had likely once been occupied by rana alcohol. A shattered wine bottle lay in shambles on the ground. Cynth toed it out of the way as she crossed the rotting floor, which was still layered with the stench of alcohol.

"Looking for someone?" came a gravelly voice from up ahead.

Like it was succeeded by a crack of a whip, Cynth's attention was now fully focused on the rana who had spoken. Straightening her posture, she narrowed her eyes at the rana. His hair was infested by silvery stripes, a clear display of old age. Gills covered his neck, folding and opening as he breathed. His webbed fingers were wrapped around a glass that contained swirling moon juice. His eyes reflected the golden tint of his drink, and most notably, he was the only person lingering in the back of the tavern.

"It seems I've already found them." Not a glint of hesitation in her eyes, Cynth sat adjacent to the rana she had identified to be Zair. Instantly, she swept her hood off of her head. The strands of her wig fell loose from their cage, an immediate indication that she was the Leeyung daughter.

In response to her action, Zair only raised his eyebrows. Darkness hung low over the back of the pub, making it more difficult to discern his actions, but Cynth managed to spot out what he had done. Actions were a prevalent way of deducing the people you were dealing with, and that had been something both Zoya and Leon had told her from a young age. As much as she despised them, their advice was useful on many occasions.

Lowly, Zair inquired, "What could the lovely Cynth Leeyung possibly want from me?" His tone was layered with a lie. There was no way that this rana saw her, the blue-haired, hibri-despising daughter of the human government's most prominent officials as lovely.

Eager for intel, Cynth leaned forward and braced her hands on the weathered wooden table they had decided to seat themselves at. "Information, Zair. Is there anything else that people come to you for? Doesn't it get a bit lonely at times? It must be a sorry life that you lead if you're only kept around for enlightenment."

"Your words mean nothing to me, Leeyung. What information do you seek?"

Without skipping a beat, Cynth told him smoothly, "I want to know everything that you have about Tercy Cess."

Zair leaned forward in a nearly conspiratorial way, as if he were about to give her the information that would lead her down the path to finding the sources. Cynth had not a doubt within her that this path would be filled to the top with challenges and other difficult tasks to maneuver around, but it was also the path that would lead her to ruining the hibri and patrias, the very creatures she had hated from the start. "I don't just give information to girls rumored to have sociopathic tendencies, Cynth."

In response, Cynth merely narrowed her eyes at the revolting beast across the table from her. If this didn't work out (which it most likely wouldn't) there was still an easy way to glean information from him, and it currently resided in one of her pockets. Whether she threatened him with the gun or not, she'd get what she deserved somehow. Folding her hands in front of her, Cynth tilted her head at the rana. "Who do you give information to, then?"

Zair tapped his webbed fingers on the table, creating a low and hollow sound that shuttered through the back of the tavern. Behind her, she could still hear drinks splashing into glasses and the excited shouts of drunken ranae. A raspy whisper fell from his lips, and Cynth had to crane to hear him over the commotion. "I give information to those who have something to give."

The blue-haired girl had more than enough to give. Her pockets were filled with coins, which, for the most part, she'd grabbed from her parents before she had slipped out into the night to the monorail station to begin endeavoring on this whole quest to begin with. They rattled together as she slid her hand into her pocket and retrieved an assortment of silvery coinage.

Raising his brow as if he were curious, Zair surveyed the assortment of coins that Cynth had slid before him. He was nearly bemused, she noted, with his brow raised and the very corner of his mouth quirked upward. "What?" Cynth demanded, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms across her chest. "If you need more, I have much more where that came from."

A drunken rana stumbled by behind them, and Zair didn't speak another word until they had retreated back into the thriving crowd. "I need your raw emotion, Cynth Leeyung, and I know you have plenty of them. You hide it, but you are quite a vulnerable girl."

Air chilled in the back of the tavern, following up his words with a stinging cold. "No, I'm not vulnerable. Those of Leeyung ancestry tend to be strong," Cynth told him stiffly. The silence that Zair continuously fell into was deafening. It was as if he rethought each word he planned to say over and over again. He wanted to tear her down, and Cynth wouldn't let that happen. Nobody tore her down.

"And that's the very thing that your mother antagonizes you for, isn't it?" Zair tsked, settling his back against the very edge of the chair and cocking his head at her. "'Cynth, speak assertively. Stand in the back. Nobody needs to see a daughter who pulls her own hair out,'" Zair mocked.

No, no, no — not a single soul on Selino knew of what she did to herself, with the obvious exceptions being Zoya and Leon. They didn't associate themselves with hibri, so how would Zair know? Why did he know? Her hands were shaking, and her mind was rolling as if it had just been submerged in a tidal wave. Shame hit her as if she had just walked directly into it.

"Cynth, back straight, your posture is foolish."

"Speak properly. There's no need for you to sound like that."

The sound of skin contacting skin as Zoya slapped her hand away from her brow. "Hands off, you're mutilating yourself."

Her world was spinning, and for once, she had no control over where the hell it was going. It was as if somebody had picked her up and thrown her onto the ground, leaving her to get back onto her own feet. Someone had poured water into her vision to blur her world, and she had not a clue if she was crying or not. The silver of her eyes was blending into the whites of her eyes. Polluting her fake lashes, gliding down her face.

Cynth Leeyung felt herself crumbling.

"And so, Miss Leeyung, that brings us directly back to square number one. What do I want in return for my lovely secrets? I want you to take off your wig in front of everyone in the room." His words were made to sting, and had been chiseled into a knife laced with poison. Its metaphorical blade dug beneath her skin, hitting the bone. "Show everyone in the tavern who you really are. You're not the little leader you crack yourself up to be. The Leeyung girl does this to herself. Didn't all of your childhood 'friends' make fun of you for that, too? Oh, to be the odd one out."

A faint memory flickered within Cynth, of one of the Leeyung galas. Standing in the center of the floor, there she was, clad in the outfit that Zoya had dubbed appropriate for the occasion. All of the other human girls and boys alike teased at her, tearing her down for her "absurd" lack of lashes, and difficulty to speak properly at the time.

Zair... Zair knew everything that made her the opposite of Cynth Leeyung. Zair was aware of her weaknesses and the things that would make her fall into tearful pieces right in front of him. This couldn't be happening. She'd wake up in a few seconds, only to find this was a horrid nightmare and she hadn't actually left the Leeyung estate to begin with.

Yet, Cynth was aware it wasn't a wild nightmare turning up turmoil in her subconsciousness. She had to face this problem head on. Stammering, Cynth could only fight out one word. "N... no." For once, she wasn't blunt, word edged with steel. Instead, it was fidgety and loose, and Cynth hated it. She felt like she was back underneath her mother's scrutiny, which she had only just escaped.

"Is the human girl scared?" the strange creature taunted in a nearly menacing tone.

Cynth couldn't be... she didn't get scared... right? No measly hibri could ever break her down. Not like this. No, it would never happen.

"All of the times your mother yelled at you, and your father degraded you, you can't even take off that stupid wig? What a pity, hm?" Each second that wore on chipped at Cynth even more. Soon, she would only be a fragment of who she was if this kept up.

She squeezed her eyes shut. At that moment, she made a promise to herself, something that she rarely did. Cynth was going to make sure that not a single person, hibri, patrias, or even human, saw her vulnerable in this manner again. And so Cynth got to her feet. "I'm not going to take off my wig, but I do want the damn information, and you should best give it to me before things don't work out quite so... in your favor." Her hand was braced on her pocket, prepared to pull out her gun and stun Zair (or worse) in a heartbeat.

"Cynth, I'm afraid I can't do that." He inclined his head toward the space behind her, and she was hesitant to turn around. It meant turning her back on her enemy. Hesitantly, she spun and watched the crowd. Now, all of them were facing her, and two of the foul ranae had Cybele and Will pinned in the center of the room. "Because I already have given them the orders to kill. Humans are worthless, and so I played you to get to this point. Shameful. I do suppose the seventeen-year old rooting for our downfall would be this foolish."

To be frank, Cynth didn't give a fuck if Will or Cybele made it out of this alive, but she did have a problem with every single rana in the room thinking they were her superiors. Not to mention, Valin Valloma would definitely burn her alive if she was the reasoning for his daughter's demise.

Cynth turned to face Zair once more and gave him a coldly detached look. "Zair, they did say I'd have to pay for information, but they never said it would end in bloodshed." Sparing him a careless shrug, she kept her eyes trained on him for a few more beats. "It doesn't have to be like this."

For a second, Cynth had Zair pinned beneath her fingertip. It was exactly what she wanted. Zair had only heard tales of how many hibri that the Leeyungs killed on a weekly, sometimes daily, basis. Her somewhat smooth words would be the very thing that confused him, and confusion was a weapon. His eyes met with hers, and that meant that he wouldn't be able to see her grab the gun, not even out of his peripheral vision.

Her fingertip slid around the handle, gripping the trigger in her hand. She flicked the switch, and each time it increased, she felt it vibrate more underneath her touch. Long at last, she gripped the gun in her hand, and faster than anyone in the room could blink, she turned around and stunned the two ranae who had been holding a (surprisingly) composed Cybele and panicky Will hostage. The latter of the two was still kicking her feet even as spirals of yellow light darted through the crowds and hit the two ranae. Considering they had been shoulder-to-shoulder, they quickly absorbed the shock through their physical contact and slumped over, dropping Cybele and Will by the collar.

"Get out of here!" Cynth called to the two of them as the entirety of the tavern erupted into chaos. Glasses of alcohol shattered once they made contact with the floor, spilling about and making a few of the ranae slip as they chased after Cybele and Will. Will was beelining for the exit, fumbling past the masses of ranae and attempting to push them out of her way every so often. The two that had secured Will and Cybele earlier lay collapsed on the floor. Cynth had no time to deal with the other ranae, and so she tipped the setting on the plasma gun all the way up to red as Cybele stood like a deer caught in headlights amid the fray, Will still attempting to throw herself out of the tavern's door.

The gun pulsed in her grasp, thrumming with energy. She kept it trained on the crowd, a clear indication that she would shoot anyone who was out of line. Pulling another gun from her adjacent pocket, Cynth tossed it toward Cyble.

Awkwardly fumbling to catch it, the gun clattered into her hand. After she'd gotten used to the feeling of the gun in her hand, Cybele turned it on and kept it on the green setting. The lowest one, not to Cynth's surprise. "Move an inch, and you'll be ash," Cynth spit with venom, her voice carrying through the tavern.

She kept her gun settled on the hibri behind her as she approached Zair. "I'm not going to give you the information," he told her blankly, his eyes lidded with annoyance.

"Even if I were to tear through this entire crowd one by one, and make sure that all they are is a pile of ash on the ground?" Cynth clicked, making a point to press her finger on the trigger down harder. The gun whirred as it began to charge a laser, and Cynth was seconds away from letting it fly free. "You're not ready for the shitshow that will follow unless you give. Me. Information. About. Tercy."

With her penciled-in eyebrow raised and a vicious smile on her face, Cynth could only tell him with a sweetened voice, "I am a leader. The leader to your demise. You better remember it."

Out of the corner of her eye, Cynth saw Cybele breaking out into a nervous sweat and fidgeting in place, barely able to clasp the gun. Will had long since disappeared from the chaos and rushed out onto the dirt paths outside. Zair seemed to be running over his options, and a sigh slid from his chapped lips. "Fine." He fished into his back pocket and withdrew a slender piece of paper. Unfurling it and extending it to Cynth, he allowed her to grab it. "It's the map to her grave. That's all I have on her, but I have heard rumors that there's something special hidden there. You can connect it to that gun of yours and digitize it with a scanner."

Curiously, Cynth analyzed the map. It looked real, with weathered edges and a detailed map of Altiu that led all the way to the northeast coast. Very few people knew where Tercy's grave was after she was accidentally tortured to death by humans. Her fellow ranae had found the body and buried her. It served her right for hiding the sources.

While most people who came across mysterious documents about Tercy Cess would merely scan them, Cynth was so obsessed with the idea of finding the sources that she had read them over and over again. On the monorail. Before she left the Leeyung estate. She had practically memorized every word written on the documents she had scanned.

Cynth folded the map and slipped it into a compartment in the plasma gun for future use. She feigned as if she were about to leave, but whipped around at the last second and pressed the trigger inwards.

A flash of red burst through the room like blood being spilled, and suddenly, Zair was no longer seated in the chair. Instead, there was a widely dispersed array of ash scattered around the back of the pub. Ash fell from the ceiling like blackened snow, and scattered through Cynth's wig, on her clothes, on the tips of her shoes.

Cynth took a calming breath and said in an eerily kind voice, "Cybele, come on. And if any of you even flinch, you'll be just like that creature of yours." Silently, Cybele moved to Cynth's side, nearly guiltily kicking Zair's ash out of her path.

"Don't feel sympathy for bastards like him. We're humans, Valloma. We don't feel bad for hibri."

Cybele nodded her head in acknowledgement of her words, and kept her eyes trained on the ground as she continued walking.

They took the back exit out of the tavern, seeking out Will. Cynth had a grave to find, a grave that would potentially be the bridge that she could walk over to give the humans all the power they could ever need. The bridge that would lead her to her parents finally approving and being proud of who she was.

And if she couldn't find that bridge, she'd damn well burn the bridges of others. 

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BOOM BADOOM BOOM GO OFF SIS YES QUEEN PSYCHOQUEEN YOU'RE A GODDESS BUT LIKE A REALLY SCARY MURDER ONE

AnYwAy, thank you for reading chapter eighteen, in which Cynth has a breakdown and we change the name from Mostlybreakdowns to Albreakdowns! Everyone has a breakdown here in Albreakdowns! Twas written by the talented-if-horrifying cressio, and yeah! That's about it! We hope you liked it!

Also happy holidays! Tis the season or whatever!

With virtual hugs, purple Google features, and murder,

Gay Fan Children

(G.F.C.)