Skulduggery Pleasant - The Fanclub Unites

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TanithloWrites

Darquesse sat on the hilltop, flames reflected in her eyes as she gazed yet another town she had just torched. Ash and the smell of charred wood reached her nostrils, and the crunch of falling buildings punctured the air every so often as another structure fell down. She contemplated the destruction. Sure, it was fun, but the lack of a fight sometimes got a bit monotonous. There wasn't really anyone who could even begin to match her ability, and she did always like a bit of a challenge. She pondered over the name the young sorceress from a few hours ago had given, right before Darquesse had killed her - Serpine. Nefarian Serpine. Now that would be a fun fight.

 —

China Sorrows had a headache that even her healing runes couldn't magic away. She had spent hours in her re-built library (which was still far from complete, to her annoyance), trawling through books, attempting to find a solution to the conundrum she had. She was just about to go make some tea when her eyes fell on a stack of manila folders. Frowning, she flipped open the first one, and was greeted with the sight of reports from several years ago on Silas Nadir and the events that happened in Mevolent's dimension. Mevolent's dimension...it had all went south when the Sceptre of the Ancients had fallen out of her hands.

China shook her head. Pity the Sceptre didn't exist anymore, or she could use it to— the sorceress stopped mid-thought. The Sceptre. The Sceptre. It wasn't the only God-Killer. There had been four others - that she knew of. And one of them had existed in Mevolent's dimension; Darquesse had used it herself. The sword. China felt her chest swell a little with hope. The beginnings of plan were forming in her mind.

The God-Killer sword was in Mevolent's dimension, and the only people who could get there were Shunters. China was pacing now, more sure of herself, the plan seemed to be constructing itself before she could even go through the process of thinking it. She had encountered two Shunters recently that she knew might be alive - that blasted Silas Nadir and Creyfon Signate. Nadir was most likely dead, considering he was a serial killer. But Creyfon Signate, however...it was time to make some phone calls to the Children of the Spider.
China picked up her phone and dialled.

"Hello?"

"This is China Sorrows. To whom am I speaking?" She said with cold authority.

"Portia. Can I help you?" came the frigid response. "I need information on the whereabouts of Crefyon Signate."

—

"Signate? Why on earth would you want to go back to Mevolent's dimension?" Skulduggery said scathingly after China told him her plan. 

"To find the sword. The God-Killer sword. As you know, the Sceptre no longer exists, and I would rather not go hunting after one of the other God-Killers that Sanguine and Low found considering we know for sure that the sword exists in Mevolent's dimension."

"It needs a better name than 'God-Killer sword'," Skulduggery retorted, deigning not to respond to the other parts of what China had said.

"I'd like to see you come up with something better," China responded with equal vindictiveness.

She had carefully left out the part of who they were going to use it on, as she herself hadn't made up her mind - Darquesse or Serpine? The black-haired mage felt much more inclined to double-cross Serpine, simply because he had dared threaten her in the first place. Also, if she used it on Darquesse, not only would she incur the Skeleton Detective's wrath, but she would also have to deal with Serpine after it was all over. This was going to get very messy, very quick.

Pleasant interrupted her train of thought with a loud cry of, "Smiter!"

"Excuse you?"

"Smiter. That way, before we kill whoever it is we're going to kill, we can yell 'I shall smite thee!', and then stab them with the sword." As soon as he said it, Skulduggery seemed to realise how similar that sounded to something Valkyrie would say, and quickly regained his composure, becoming sombre once more. China rolled her eyes, but said nothing.

"We have a plan of direction, now," she offered after a moment of silence."

Indeed. Find Signate, make him take us to Mevolent's dimension, whereupon we will find the sword and use it to smite...who are we smiting, exactly?" Skulduggery cocked his head at her. If the skeleton had had eyebrows, one of them would be raised.

"Uh, Serpine, of course," China barely stumbled over the half-lie. Skulduggery nodded, seemingly satisfied by the answer.

"And I suppose you're going to propose to doing this all on your own?" China asked, although it wasn't really a question.

The detective looked at her witheringly. "Of course not. We'll assemble a team."

"A team?" It was China's turn to raise her eyebrows.

"I have a few people in mind..."

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"You shouldn't feel guilty about enjoying something that other people don't. Well, apart from torture, but that's probably the only exception."

- Derek Landy; aoh