Sister Nimue strapped the backpack tightly on her shoulders and locked the door of her bedroom behind her. It was her space, small as it may be, but it could not give her everything she wanted. The ingredients hanging from string, the wall of books warded against others (especially Connor), the small chest of drawers containing the handful of clothes she possessed. Quincy didn't have the affordances of finances that her lover did, and most of the stipend went towards research materials and so forth, but that didn't matter. Quincy had grown up in a life of labour, she would carry those lessons here. She could design and craft her own dresses, her own tools.

Adjusting the denim jacket that covered her black sweater, Quincy put the keys away and made her way down the corridor towards the stairs. Thor's head floated ominously inside the jar that clinked on the metal straps of the backpack. A small tent from the modern world was tied against it as well, and various other camping amenities. Quincy was a Witch, not a cruel stereotype of a pre-columbian culture. And after going through what she had, the idea of cooking an animal she had hunted only brought a sense of stomach churning sickness.

Quincy made her way down the stairs, departing into the grounds of Citadel M and then left its gates behind her, beginning the long walk out into the desert of Nevada. She still had sunlight left, she would have to get set up as soon as possible. With the Citadel still in sight behind her, perhaps an hour and a half away, Quincy began to clear the site.

She worked in silence, letting the work guide her and her thoughts... And the thoughts of her Coven Self, who had decided to embark on a journey of guidance with her. There had been a shift in the dynamics of their being, The Mother had made herself visible to another, aiding in Quincy's bid to remind Connor who exactly wore the the bonnet in their relationship. That was a new one, but it was entirely unexpected. That one of her Coven Selves should be able to reach across the Veil, project themselves as though they were a part of this world.

"I lost this love some years ago." The Mother spoke. She too was Quincy Able, cast across the engulfing chasm of time when the pyre took her. Her story was different, and she had lived another twenty years that Sister Nimue had not. A cloak of black and sea green covered The Mother’s shoulders, flowed down her back and brushed against the ground. This elder Quincy had never gone into much detail as to how their lives differed. Quincy would take the chance to rectify it now, putting forward the question.

"For me, the Institute had fallen when the Squadron Supreme assaulted it." The Mother began, hammering a pitching nail into the ground beneath them, muscles rippling with each movement. The Mother was larger than Quincy, having channelled herself into more physically demanding sports. And yet she was the Sorcereress Supreme to be, Quincy had learned that early on. "When the ritual took me from my passage as it did you, it was in the basement of the Institute, besides Cerebro. I didn't have the luxury of thinking slowly, I had interrupted their plans."

Quincy took the hammer from The Mother as her physical presence waned, and hammered in the rest of the pegs. Each one holding the tent as firmly as this land seemed to hold herself. She had not been recovered by Kamar-Taj, nor En Sabah Nur nor anyone else. Both of them, then, were tied to Arioch before they knew of such things. The Mother continued, pacing in circles about the tent. "Avalon led the siege that night, pushing back against the MRD in a bloody battle. The Institute fell, and I was rescued by a young woman with insects in her heart."

Quincy did not know such a Mutant. Perhaps in her own time, they had been killed. Or their life story was simply so different, that the two of them could never be bound to meet. With the tent finally pitched, Quincy began to lay out her possessions within it. The backpack, Thor's head, gave her the usual blank and befuddled stare of an inept falsehood who had gotten himself killed. Bedroll, ceremonial ingredients, the Gjallarhorn and other stuff. All of it laid out neatly, along with some food supplies.

"After this, I was found by Doctor Strange and his husband, and the rest is history. They gave me purpose again, all three of them. They took my magical potential and shaped it into a force of good." The Mother explained. Quincy snorted loudly. Her experiences were so very different, but having your power shaped into a force of good by another? Quincy shaped the power herself, directed it into becoming a Heiress to Hell.

"You must have fought against the bearers of hell on many occasions." Quincy begins, collecting up wood and stones to make a fire with. Quincy was digging for information, and they both knew this. The Mother shrugged her shoulders and smiled.

"Of course. Mephisto, Satannash, Umar... Satana. You might find her to be of benefit to you, if you can make contact, if she exists." The Mother informed Quincy casually, getting distracted by something in her own space. Quincy couldn’t be bothered to see what it was.

Quincy thought on that last one for a time as she prepared her campfire, arranging the various rockery she had found into a ring. The sticks were laid out in a rough pyramid shape, fortified with firewood she'd brought from the Citadel. Quincy clicked her finger and thumb together, speaking a word far older than Latin, and a solitary spark bounced into the rocks and wood, igniting them all.

“Satana… Tell me about her as you know them.” Quincy pulled the denim jacket from her shoulders and threw it into the tent, rolling the arms of the sweater up afterwards. She stared into the flickering flames, imagining how they must surround a throne of Hell. Was Dante true in his knowledge, or did he write with an embellished hand? Why the exemplar was so obsessed with Dante boggled her mind.

“What form she takes can change. She’s had red hair, white, and brunette. She has been a white woman, or black or hispanic. It doesn’t matter what she looks like, but she is as valuable an ally as she is a strong enemy. But if you carry on as you do, you’ll do fine. You don’t suffer fools, Quincy. And neither does Satana.

“She may be different here.” Quincy muses. How would she appeal to such a woman, so tied to hell itself. She wouldn’t make a bid to summon her tonight, that was a fool’s errand… She would do her research first. Make plans, work out how to appeal to someone like that.

Would she be appealed to in a way that Alaine did? Quincy wasn’t certain what about her even appealed to her newfound lover. Was it her honesty on that passion filled morning? That she promised the model to sit beside her in hell? After all, Quincy had shown up in Alaine’s home in a fit of power-drunk mania, having just cursed Salem and the bloodlines of those who put her to flame. But Alaine had welcomed her, shown her kindness and affection, cleaned her from all the dirt and grime that Salem had physically and mentally given to her. All that baggage, even if much of it was dispelled in a dazzling display of witchcraft.

And yet Quincy doubted herself, doubted her relationship with Alaine. Not because the Veilmaster had done something, but because Quincy could move past that singular worry, that singular fear. “What if I were to jump again?”

“Pardon?” The Mother asks, looking down at Quincy with a raised brow. Quincy shook her head, explained that she was thinking out loud.

“I should desire some peace. But before you depart, I have a question. What became of this girl you spoke of? The one with insects.”

The Mother flashed Quincy a smile, and held up a hand with a solitary wedding band on it. Then she disappeared, leaving Quincy to her own imagination regarding her Coven Self’s family. Did they have a loathing of children they had to move past? Or had they simply sidestepped that entire concern. Perhaps it was not children that had surrendered The Mother to their shared fate.

“Tch. Children.” Quincy moved from her seat and entered the tent, collecting up ingredients. She had questions for the realms beyond this one. A steel bowl, foxglove, the tongue of a hanged man… All sorts of oddities, perfectly suited to burn and gain the attention of a particular Hellbound woman. The Scorned Witch had questions for a woman she had witnessed at Salem.

“Darkchild.” Quincy cut her arm as she had those few weeks ago at Salem and let the blood run into the bowl, before casting it into the flames. “I wish to speak with you, Woman to Woman, Witchbreed to Witchbreed, Heiress of Hell to its prisoner. Come to me, and let us discuss the terms of your freedom.”

Quincy’s play was ballsy. It could backfire in an instant, leave the Witch hurtling through time once again, or simply binding her to Hell in a fashion she wasn’t yet prepared for. No doubt The Changing Eight were watching her, considering the steps they may need to take if Quincy failed. Would they intervene? Did Xiombarg and the others still lurk about her?

Quincy stripped herself down to almost nothing, and began to dance about the flames, blood flickering against the desert sands and rock beneath her feet, reciting the tongues of ones who had called upon Darkchild past. It mattered not if she opted to stay hidden, Quincy would seek her out. Travel into Hell itself to find the Darkchild wherever it lurked. Quincy had done her research, she had an idea of what that position entailed. Quincy danced until she could no longer, the cold chill and the touch of heat alternating against her bare skin, soothing whatever goosebumps prickled.

When she was done, Quincy sat down once again, pulling a blanket about her shoulders and staring into the flames. She took another bowl from the tent, filled with stew she’d raided from the kitchens earlier in the day. It wouldn’t take long to reheat besides the fire, placing it down on the rocks and turning it every so often.