"What have you done to these people?"

"Oh, don't worry about them." Virus twirled in place, smiling. "They've just caught a little bug. These little bugs, to be exact." She held up her hand, and a tiny insect swarm flew out of her sleeve to hover over her palm, like sparkling silver dust. "Cute little things, aren't they? Quite harmless, but they allow me to get inside a brain and rewrite its programming. Allow me to demonstrate." She gestured to the nearest human, and the man dropped to all fours and started to bark. Virus tittered, clapping her hands. "See? Now he thinks he's a dog."

"Brilliant," Puck said. "Can you make him crow like a rooster, too?"

Ash glared at him. He blinked. "What?"

" seriously, Puck? " Lise muttered to him. " Not the time. "

Isiea tilts her head a little, and takes out the metal spider she'd put in her satchel.

It matches the bugs flying. They also look identical to the one that had crawled out of the chimera.

Isiea didn't see the chimera one. But she's already piecing that one together from what she knows.

She must've definitely been controlling the Chimera.

"The normal fey don't react well to my bugs. That whole aversion-to-iron thing, you know. It drove the stupid beast mad, and probably would have killed it, if it hadnt been sliced to pieces. Mortals, though!" She pirouetted in the air, flinging out her arms, as if to embrace the crowd. "They make wonderful drones. So devoted to their computers and technology, they were slaves to it long before I came along."

" she does have a point there. " Lise muttered.

Isiea silently listens.

Virus regarded them with glittering green eyes. She snapped her fingers, and the mob shambled forward again, arms reaching. "Bring me the girls," she ordered as the circle tightened around them. "Kill the rest."

Ash drew his sword.