Non Serviam Epilogue 2: The Girl Who Killed a God

A/N: When the people cried out for a reaction chapter, I delivered

Epilogue 2: The Girl Who Killed a God

“You should be careful, Rias.”

She blinked, looking over at her big brother. Right now, he was definitely Sirzech Lucifer instead of Sirzech-niichan. It was a side of him Rias rarely saw. He was even seated behind his massive oak desk in his study. The blinds were open, revealing the sprawling Gremory estate beyond.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Having a servant so much more powerful than you rarely ends well,” he said.

“Well that’s fine then.” Rias smiled. “Taylor isn’t my servant, she’s my friend.

Sirzech sighed. “Rias.”

“It’s true!” Rias crossed her arms. “Besides, I know she took out Diodora’s peerage, but is she really so strong? I’m a High Class devil too.”

“High class is broad.” Sirzech turned his gaze towards Grayfia.

“The Young Miss already had a wide array of spells,” Grayfia said. “Now, she has power and control of a devil many times her age. While she did not elaborate where the control came from, in my evaluation, I determined that she would likely prove victorious over your entire peerage as well, Lady Gremory. Including yourself.”

“Really? Wow!”

“Take this seriously,” Sirzech said.

“I mean, I told her to get stronger than me.” Rias shrugged. “I can’t be mad at her for doing what I told her, can I?”

“The young lady has a point,” Grayfia said.

“Thanks, Grayfia-oneesama!”

Sirzechs sighed.

“But she really didn’t say where the new control came from?” Rias asked. “I thought you would have been more interested in that.”

“It wasn’t a sacred gear.” Sirzechs steepled his hands. “When asked, she said something to the effect of ‘the stress caused me to trigger, and unleash my full potential.’ Apparently that wasn’t lying.”

“Huh.” Rias tapped her chin. “Is this like that thing where humans, like, only use ten percent of their brains?”

“It is assuredly not, Mistress,” Grayfia said.

Sirzechs reached over, placing his hand upon a ceremonial chessboard sitting on his desk. “And giving her two of your pieces as well? The fallen angel is inconsequential, but giving up Twilight Healing…”

“Brother,” Rias said. “Asia and Mittelt are my friends. I would never stop them from going where their hearts desire.”

Sirzechs lips pulled down into what was almost a frown. “You’re young yet, Rias. But you must learn how to play the game.”

“I know how to play.” She lowered her arms, because she had nothing to hide. “But my friends are not my opponents. They are not my pieces. They are the people who I trust. And if you cannot understand that, maybe I’m not the one who needs to learn.”

A startled laugh escaped him. “I suppose, if you feel that strongly, I’d be a terrible big brother to try to stop you. But, Rias, are you sure?”

“I trust them,” she said again.

“Well, you haven’t been wrong yet, have you?” He stood, reaching across his desk to ruffle her hair.

“Mou, onii-chan!” Rias puffed out her cheeks.

Sirzechs laughed again, and just like that he wasn’t the Lucifer anymore, just her big brother who wanted to keep her safe. “Here.” He pressed the chess set into her hands. “You can be the one to give it to that pawn of yours.”

“Thanks!” Rias smiled. “I’ll give it to her later today. We’re having a full peerage meeting!”

“Oooh my cute little sister, already raising her own high class devils!”

“Heeeey!” Rias squirmed playfully. “Let me gooooo! I’m gonna be laaaate!”

Grayfia cleared her throat before Sirzech squeezed her to death. “Oh, and so I don’t forget.” He said. “Let that girl know that Serafall wants to meet with her.”

“Sonia’s big sister?”

“Yep!” Sirzechs nodded. “She thinks that Taylor would be the perfect Dark Magical Girl for her show.”

Rias opened her mouth, then paused. “No, she’s definitely right. But Taylor would kill me for suggesting it.”

Sirzechs, who had been forced to watch every season finale of Miracle☆Levia-tan on pain of death, replied, “That sounds like a perfect Dark Magical Girl.”

~~*

Taylor sat on the overstuffed sofa and Asia plopped down beside her.

She really did look exactly like a dark magical girl, Rias thought. She had stars twinkling in her jet black hair, eyes like storms, and those tight fitting halter tops and knee high combat boots screamed, ‘I’ll step on you and you’ll discover a new fetish.’ Rias was not bringing up Serafall’s offer right now though. It would be gauche, and Taylor would 100% percent shoot her down.

Sirzechs thought Rias didn’t know how to play the game. She rolled her eyes at the thought. For today, it had been enough to give Taylor her new evil piece set. They’d even traded an extra pawn, to symbolize Taylor’s new freedom, and she’d made the most adorable expression when Rias had explained it to her.

Most importantly though, that business was all now concluded. Rias clapped her hands. “So, is it finally story time?”

Taylor sighed, running a hand through her still-shorter hair. “I promised.” Rias thought that Taylor’s hair would have grown all the way back out by now, but it now seemed stuck at perpetually shoulder length where it was styled into a glimmering wolf-cut.

That second part was probably Mittelt’s hand. Rias was so happy her first pawn was making friends of her own. Not pawns though! Taylor had bucked conventional wisdom and had begged a Rook piece for Asia, and a Bishop for Mittelt. That was probably most of why Sirzech was upset, if Taylor had refused to trade her new pieces, it could impact the strength of Rias’s peerage. Rias had known that wouldn’t happen, and wouldn’t have cared if it did.

“We’ve been waiting for ages!” Rias replied. “Almost as much as the rest of the Underworld has been waiting for how you defeated an entire peerage by yourself!”

A frown flicked across Taylor’s face. “That much?”

“It’s a big deal!” Rias leaned forward. “You’ve already got your own moniker.”

“Of course I do.” Taylor rubbed her face. “Better that someone else came up with it.”

Kiba laughed. “That’s not what most would say.”

“I’m bad with names.” Taylor waved a hand. “I’ll get to that bit later.”

Akeno breezed into the room with a tea tray. “You’re now the ‘Fake Queen’.” She sniffed, setting out the saucers. “I doubt you could do much worse. Yubeluna, Riser Phenex’s queen, is telling everyone she came up with it.”

Taylor pulled a face.

“Ah, yeah, before story time…” Rias poked her fingers together. “I was wondering if I could still count on your help, if my betrothal to Riser comes up in a Rating Game?”

“Well.” Taylor drew herself up, grey eyes going stormy. “Now that I’m no longer your servant, I no longer need to obey your commands.”

Rias slumped, a sharp pain lancing right through her heart. She’d tried so hard to reach out to Taylor, but—

“But,” Taylor echoed. “If a friend needs my help…”

Rias perked up. She met Taylor’s gaze, unsure, searchingly. “You mean—?”

Taylor gave her a heartfelt smile. “I’ll be there.”

“Taylor!” Rias pressed a hand to her bosom. “You scared me!”

“Sorry.”

Rias pouted. “Mou, I never wanted to be anything but your friend in the first place.”

“I know,” Taylor replied. “That’s the only reason it worked.”

“Hehe.” Rias grinned. “What can I say?”

Koneko clambered up onto the couch next to Taylor. “Story.” She poked the taller woman’s side. “No more distractions.”

“Ouch.” Taylor rubbed her side. “Mean.”

“Grrr.” Koneko growled cutely.

Rias couldn’t help but giggle. “But where am I supposed to sit? I want my hugs.”

“You can have your hugs or you can have your story.”

“Well…” Rias dithered, head tiling back and forth.

Koneko fixed her with a golden glare. “Story.”

“Okay, okay, no more distractions! Everyone grab a seat.” She shifted on the couch, making space for Kiba and Akeno. Mittelt fluttered up onto the back of Taylor’s couch, massaging Taylor’s shoulders until Taylor picked her up by the neck and set her on Koneko’s lap.

Koneko’s hands clamed shut around Mittelt’s waist. “Bird.”

Mittelt sighed. “Must you?”

“No more distractions!” Rias clapped her hands. “Taylor, quick, start! I can’t hold them for long!”

Everyone laughed, Taylor sighed. She half leaned into Asia, eyes drifting towards the wall. Then she spoke:

“When I was fifteen, my mother died, my father fell into depression, and my closest friend betrayed me. All of that led to me receiving super powers from an uncaring force beyond mortal ken.” Her eyes tracked over to Rias. “She had red hair too, my friend. Not the same shade as yours but...”

“Ah…” Rias nodded. “And, betrayed?”

“She replaced me for a better, stronger, best friend and spent the next year of my life making me as miserable as she could.” Taylor shrugged. “It was mostly school bullying, just focused, relentless. Trying to break me down.” A wry smile played over her lips. “I got shoved in a locker once, but that’s less important than the super powers.”

“So you became a super hero?” Rias clasped her hands.

“Well…” Taylor shrugged a shoulder. “Eventually.”

Rias gasped. “A super villain?!”

“Yeah.” Taylor tilted her head back. “I joined a team of villains. I took out multiple rival gangs, I beat most of the heroes in town. For a while, we owned the city.”

“You can’t just leave it at that!”

“The details aren’t that important,” Taylor replied.

“Of course they are! Like, what were the other gangs? Or, or, did you ever rob a bank?” Rias asked.

Taylor pulled a face.

Akeno tittered. “You’re letting your imagination run away with you, Prez,” she said. “Something so cliché…”

“Actually…” Taylor said.

Asia turned to her, eyes wide. “You robbed a bank?” She sounded appalled. Mittelt burst out laughing.

“I think we are getting distracted again,” Kiba said. “None of us have even asked the most important question.”

Rias tilted her head. “Most important?”

“What was Taylor’s super power?”

As one, everyone looked back to Taylor. The woman laughed. “You all have magic.”

“Magic isn’t powers.” Rias nodded decisively.

“You’re right,” Taylor said. “It isn’t.”

“So?” Rias leaned forward, feet tapping against the floor. “What was it? Could you fly? Did you have laser eyes? Oh, oh, could you defeat any enemy as long as you had prep time?”

“Bugs.” Taylor said.

Rias blinked in surprise. “Bugs?”

“I controlled bugs,” Taylor said.

“That doesn’t seem like much.” Rias replied.

Taylor smiled. “I defeated a dragon with them.”

“A dragon.”

“Twice,” Taylor said.

“Dragon these.” Mittelt waved a hand. “I want to know how you robbed a bank with those creepy crawlies. Was it like that one movie with the impossible mission?”

“Ah well.” That that, Taylor’s smile turned sheepish. “Having ants eat the camera wires or something like that would have been better. Maybe if I wasn’t fifteen, I would have thought about it.”

“So?” Rias asked again.

Taylor shifted; it was the first time Rias had ever seen her embarrassed. “I threatened everyone with black widows.”

“Taylor!” Asia gasped.

Somehow, the telling only grew more fantastic from there. Supervillains, turncoat heroes, a secret underground bunker base, complete with a secret boss monster. It was everything Rias would have expected from a super hero manga.

And there were the funny things too, like how the heroes ended up naming her Skitter.

“I heard they almost named me worm, as revenge for beating them the first time,” Taylor said.

“My, that would have embarrassed them even more later,” Akeno replied.

Or how on her first day in a new city she’d taken out an entire gang with only butterflies.

“It wasn’t only butterflies.” Taylor shrugged. “They just wanted me to be more PR friendly.”

Kiba shuddered. “I never thought insects would be so terrifying.”

Of course, there were the truly terrifying things as well: the endbringers, the fearsome slaughterhouse nine. Rias kept inching forward until she was on the edge of her seat, waiting for the reveal of how Taylor defeated them.

The ending she never saw coming, nor what Taylor had sacrificed to save the world.

“You mean, your powers…” The words slipped out of Rias’s lips.

“They didn’t come from us.” Taylor said. “The trigger events, that was when my passenger connected to me, to give me my power.”

“Wait…” Rias paused. “Trigger?” The word tickled something in her memory.

Taylor raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”

Earlier, when Sirzechs had told her about Taylor’s sudden growth, he’d used the word trigger. Taylor had told him that the trauma had triggered her to awaken reserves she didn’t know she had. Or, Rias realized, triggered her to reconnect with the alien super computer. Wow, that seemed kind of important.

Rias smiled. “Nothing, I just thought it was an interesting word.” She’d kept worse secrets for her family.

“What would they have done,” Kiba asked. “These passengers.”

Taylor looked at Rias for a moment more, before turning to look out the window. “They were given to us to learn. And then Zion would have eaten the world, all of the worlds.”

“Even this one?” Kiba frowned.

“I don’t know.” Taylor shrugged. “There’s a barrier around this dimension or something, I think.”

“The Dimensional Rift.” Rias nodded. “This Zion would have had to beat Great Red.”

Taylor smiled. “So maybe you would have been fine. One world left, spinning through an emptiness just beyond your sight.”

Asia reached out, grasping Taylor’s hand. “But then we never would have met you.”

Taylor squeezed Asia’s tiny palms. “Yeah.” She turned back to Rias. “You know, when you first found me, I asked you to let me die.”

Rias swallowed. “I remember.”

Taylor smiled. “I’m glad you didn’t listen.”

The End