by wildbow
“Going by what apparently happened in Brockton Bay,” Wanton said, “not so much. If she has a reason to hold a grudge, you don’t tend to live very long.”
Golem frowned.
“You’re not being helpful, Wanton. Or fair to Weaver,” Tecton said.
“I’m suffering, Tec,” Wanton said, making the words into an exaggerated groan.
Tecton shook his head, turning to Golem. “Tell her. Explain your circumstances, let her know you’re from the same city, that you don’t share your family’s ideology.”
“The name should say as much,” Golem said.
Tecton nodded. He drew in a deep breath, then exhaled. The adrenaline was burning off, and with it, a deep exhaustion was settling in.
He looked at Weaver, where she sat at the far end of the bench. Her old teammate had insisted on coming with her, along with a small cluster of dogs. They’d fallen asleep within two minutes of takeoff. Weaver had been first, her head leaning against her friend’s shoulder. Her friend had been next to drift off, a dog in her lap, others lying underneath the bench.
“We’ll talk to the bosses,” Tecton said. “See about taking Weaver onto the team.”
* * *
How was this supposed to work?
“Door me,” Pretender said.
A light sliced across the floor of the alleyway, three feet across. When it had reached its full length, it began thickening, raising up until the portal was a full four by seven feet. There was a long white hallway on the other side.
Carefully, he stepped through, with legs that weren’t his own.
“Pretender.”
He stopped, then turned around. “Satyr.”
“You don’t have to go with them,” Satyrical said.
“I think today proved I do.”
“And everything we were working on? Everything we were working towards?”
“I talked to some powerful people. People behind the scenes we’ve barely heard of,” Pretender replied. “What we were working on in Vegas doesn’t even compare. Small potatoes.”
“Doesn’t feel like small potatoes. What’s so important that you’d run off?”
Pretender frowned, an expression hidden by the helmet he wore.
“You can talk to me. You know I can keep secrets. Or are you talking about the Endbringers? I think today showed they can deal with Endbringers on their own,” Satyr said.
“It’s bigger things. Bigger than Endbringers,” Pretender answered. “End of the world.”
Satyrical sighed. “Of course it is.”
“I’ll help you with the little things, when I have the time. We have resources, and maybe we can use you guys.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Satyr said. He approached Pretender, extending a hand.
Pretender shook, gingerly, unsure of the full extent of Alexandria’s enhanced strength.
Satyr held on to the hand, caressing it. “They say you should marry your best friend, and now that you’re a woman…”
Pretender chuckled a little before withdrawing his hand from Satyr’s. “That line again? I don’t think that’s what they meant.”
“She’s yours for keeps?”
“Brain dead. Her body’s peculiar. Doesn’t really age. Hair doesn’t grow, nails don’t grow. Wounds don’t really heal or get worse. She used cosmetics to look older, to throw people off. Only the brain was left pliable, adaptable. Even then, most of it was hardened, protected, those duties offloaded to her agent.”
Satyr studied Pretender’s new body without shame. His eyes rested on Pretender’s forehead. “I see. And with that plasticity, the brain was left more vulnerable.”
“Only a little. Enough to be an Achilles heel. She’s a case fifty-three, I suppose. All of us may be.”
“All Cauldron capes?”
Pretender nodded. “To some degree or another.”
Satyr seemed to take that into consideration, rubbing his chin. When he spoke, though, he spoke of something else. “What you did… you knew that they’d figured you out, and that I was next in line, that I’d get questioned too. You killed her for my sake, to buy me time.”
“Are you mad?”
Satyr shook his head. “We’ve killed before. Selfishly, selflessly. Only difference is you got caught.”
“Well, I got away.”
“In a fashion, yes. You got away,” Satyr said. “You’ve even reached a higher position in life.”
“Wearing someone else’s skin, living their life,” Pretender replied.
“Yes, well, that was always going to be your fate, wasn’t it?”
Pretender chuckled. “I’ve missed you, buddy.”
“Likewise, you freak of nature,” Satyr responded.
“Just because we’re doing different things now, it doesn’t mean goodbye.”
“Good.”
“We stay in touch,” Pretender said. “I’m sure my new group can use you, and you can draw on our resources, I’m sure. Our goals are more or less aligned. Only difference is scale.”
“Well then. Good luck with saving the world.”
“And good luck with saving civilization from itself,” Pretender answered. He looked skyward for a moment. “Close the door.”
The portal closed.
* * *
Connecting to “agChat.ParahumansOnline016.par:6667” (Attempt 1 of 55)
Resolving Host Name
Connecting…
Connected.
Using identity “Iblis”, nick “Iblis”
Welcome to Parahumans Online Chatroom #116, ‘The Holdout’. Rules Here. Behave. Obey the @s.
Ryus: shorthand for seismic activity. earthquakes.
Kriketz: any word on deaths yet
Divide: No word on deaths. This is Behemoth. It’s normal to see a radio silence like this.
Divide: They can’t report deaths because the armbands get knocked out.
Spiritskin: Hi Iblis!
Iblis: Word is first capes are returning home.
Aloha: !
Loyal: Who? Who? Names!
Deimos: how is new delhi?
@Deadman@: I’m in contact with main channel, can pass on details if you can verify.
@Deadman@: PM me.
Iblis: Loyal—Not sure.
Iblis: Deimos—City hit bad.
Iblis: Deadman—Not sure how to verify. Only have texts on phone. Sending PM.
Poit: they made it
BadSamurai: how bad?
Ultracut: Poit nobodys saying they amde it
Poit: they stopped him or they wouldn’t be leaving
Deimos: Nooooooo! new delhi hit bad?
Aloha: X(
Iblis: Texts I’m getting from cape-wife friend are saying Scion finished Behemoth off.
Iblis: Absolute annihilation.
QwertyD: Troll
Groupies: no fucking way
Aloha:
Deimos is now known as Absolute Annihiliation
@Deadman@: Verify now or ban.
Absolute Annihilation: fuck yea Scion!
Arcee: Omg wat?
Iblis: sending PM with texts.
* * *
Colin shifted his weight restlessly, watching the screens.
There was a process, he knew. He’d been filled in on the details, forewarned. That didn’t make this any easier.
Too many years he’d spent alone. Too many years, he’d had nothing to care about. Nothing and nobody to hold precious. A dad who worked two jobs, a mother who traveled. They’d divorced, and virtually nothing had changed in the grand scheme of things. They’d looked after him, but they hadn’t been there. They had been occupied with other things, with dreams and aspirations that had never included him.
Colin knew he had been the weird child. Had never made friends, had convinced himself he didn’t want or need them. He was efficient in how solitary he was.
He’d even prided himself on it, for a time, that there was nothing to hold him back. That he could, should the mood strike him
, pick up and leave at any time. He’d modeled his life around it, had led a spare existence, devoid of the little touches of home, of roots. He’d saved money so he had the ability to travel, to get a new place in a new city if the mood struck. It had even been an asset when he had joined the Protectorate, the ability to relocate, take any open position.
It was only now, a full fifteen years later, that he started to wonder what he’d missed out on. Did most people know how to handle this sort of thing? The absence of someone they cared about? Did they have an easier time handling the moments when they weren’t sure if they’d ever see those people again, or was it harder?
He’d altered Dragon’s code. It wasn’t a tidy thing. Tinker work rarely was. There were too many factors to consider, and a tinker who didn’t specialize in a particular area would never be able to plumb the depths. Too many things connected to other things, and the full extent of the connections was impossible to fathom in entirety.
At best, he could study each alteration as much as was possible, act in ways that could minimize the damage.
Every adjustment, even on the smallest levels, threatened to damage a dozen, a hundred other areas.
And now he would find out if Dragon’s backup would restore properly.
Error: Temporal Modelling Node 08 has failed to load. Attempting child routines to bridge.
Error: Horospectral Analysis Node 1119 has failed to load. Attempting child routines to bridge…
Successful Load: Circadian Checkmatch Node ER089. Require 2/3 more stable child routines for acceptable bridge.
Error: Metrological Chronostic Node Q1118 has failed to load. Attempting child routines to bridge…
Error: Stimuli Tracking Node FQ has failed to load. Attempting child routines to bridge.
Successful Load: Orientation Patch Node FQ02903. Require 3/3 stable child routines for acceptable bridge.
Error: Parietal Space Node FQ161178 has failed to load. Attempting child routines to bridge…
Error: Recognition Demesnes Node FQ299639 has failed to load. Attempting child routines to bridge…
He pulled off his helmet, setting it on the bench beneath the monitor. He rubbed one hand across his head. He’d taken to shaving it close, in part for the efficiency of it, in part because the surgeries to replace his eye and the implants he’d set into recesses in his skull had required incisions in his scalp. Dragon had handled that.
His fingers traced the faint, almost imperceptible scars that ran neatly across the sides and top of his head. Marks she’d left him.
More errors appeared on the screen. The estimated time of a successful backup clicked upwards with each one. Two hours. Three hours. Six hours.
At the same time, in Colin’s head, the odds of a successful load were going down. Twenty-five percent. Twenty three. Fifteen.
There were other backups. He suspected the ones that had been uploaded after his tampering would run into the same issues. The same errors.
The ones before? Before he’d altered anything? It would be a different Dragon than the one he’d come to know. She would watch the video feeds, listen to the tapes, even experience some of those things for herself, where the system had taken it all online. But she wouldn’t be the same Dragon he knew. The organic A.I. architecture would develop in different ways, with different nuances. So many things connected to so many other things with each new experience, and the connections would occur in a different fashion.
No, he realized. Even worse. He would have to head her off before she got access to the data. If he had to load that backup, he would be loading her as she was before he freed her of the PRT’s shackles. She would be obligated to fight him. He’d managed a sneak attack the first time. The second? She’d see what he did, force him to try another means.
And he’d have to be more ruthless, knowing he was doing harm to her, injuring her to her core.
He couldn’t bear to watch further. It was too soon to try another backup, both in terms of the system’s ability to handle the task and his own ability. But sitting here, watching the list of errors grow, it was angering him, and it was an anger without a focus.
Touching two fingers to his lips, Colin moved those fingers to the monitor’s frame, pressing them there. The gesture was sentimental enough it felt unlike him, somehow false. Doing nothing would feel wrong too.
That was his current state, stranded inside his own head, in the midst of his own feelings.
Uncharted territory, in a way.
He pulled on his helmet and stepped outside, and hopped up onto the nose of the Tiamat II.
New Delhi loomed before him. Ruined, damaged, impossible to recover. The sun was only now setting, and the sky was red, mingling with the traces of clouds that still remained in the sky.
He wanted to contact Chevalier, to know that his friend was okay, that the Protectorate was okay. He didn’t trust himself to stay calm, to keep from saying something about Dragon, from venting, being emotional.
Chevalier would understand, he suspected. But Colin’s masculinity would take a hit, and it would only cause more trouble than it fixed.
Staring out at the city, and the crowds of people in hazmat suits who were moving in for relief, for search and rescue, he frowned. He and Dragon had had some intense discussions on the subject of what it was to be a ‘man’. To be human, to be masculine, feminine.
Dragon had been pissed when he’d suggested she was the feminine ideal. That, in the eternal crisis that any woman faced between being the virgin, the madonna, and being sensual, sexual, she was both.
He wished he understood why she’d been so angry.
To be a man, though, it wasn’t much easier. The standard society set was just as high. To be a provider, a rock, to be sensitive, yet to avoid being emotional.
For long minutes, he stared out over the city, watching the sun dip beneath the horizon, the smoke and dust making the distant star’s light hazier, fuzzier.
“Tiamat II,” he said. “Alert me when the system is finished the backup process, one way or another.”
“Yes, Defiant.”
Uncomfortably similar to Dragon’s voice. He felt an ache in his chest.
He hopped down from the nose of the craft, then used his spear to help himself down from the craggy edge of terrain that had been raised up from the earth in the chaos. He strode forward, towards the city proper, calibrating his helmet to help identify any warm bodies.
* * *
“Annex? Kirk?”
Kirk sat up from the hospital bed.
“You can stay where you are,” the doctor said, not looking up from the clipboard.
“I’m okay,” Kirk said.
“Your test results are taking some time, I’m sorry. We can expect a two or three-hour wait. Half an hour for the MRI, forty-five minutes for the CT scan.”
“At least it’s something to do,” Kirk replied.
“You’d be surprised at how quickly it gets boring,” the doctor answered.
Kirk winced. “Okay. Can I maybe use a phone in the meantime? Call my parents? They’ll be wondering.”
“They’ve already been informed,” the man answered. “They’ll be here shortly. There’s paperwork they’ll have to sign, because a few of your teammates are also walking around without any protection for their identities, but I don’t imagine that’ll take long.”
“Maybe I can call my friends? They’ll be wondering how I’m doing.”
“They know about your life in costume?”
“They were there when I got my powers. I just want to call someone, anyone I know, to occupy my thoughts, to talk.”
“There’s a phone at the nurse’s station, center of the floor. Ask and they’ll punch in the number to dial out.”
“Okay,” Kirk said, smiling. He gripped the side of his hospital gown to bind it shut.
“I…” the doctor started, he stopped and frowned.
Kirk had halted in his tracks, shifting his weight to keep his bare feet from mak
ing too much contact with the cold floor.
Odd, in a way, that he had to. But his power tended to be all or nothing.
“I shouldn’t tell you this, and I’m not naming names, but the first test results have come in, for some of the others who were at your side in New Delhi. Here, and in other cities. The tests for radiation are coming back negative.”
Kirk blinked.
“No promises it’ll be the same for you, but…”
“A bit of hope?” Kirk asked.
“With luck.”
“Thank you,” Kirk said, smiling for the first time. “Thank you.”
“I should be the one saying that to you,” the doctor said. “Just… don’t be too disappointed if the answer isn’t what you wanted, okay?”
“Deal,” Kirk answered.
* * *
“…further reports are coming in from multiple sources. The Endbringer Behemoth has been reported as being slain in New Delhi!”
“Yes, Lizbeth. Video footage is always scarce when dealing with the Endbringers, but verification has been consistent from multiple sources. It seems the footage seen earlier of the great shaft of light was an attack from an unknown party, debilitating the Endbringer. Defending forces held the injured monster off until Scion could arrive, delivering a finishing blow.”
“Earlier in the year, for those of you who don’t remember, Chevalier boasted of a new Protectorate, clear of the sabotage and interference from its own leaders. Today may serve as a testament to that boast.”
“All around the world, people seem to be celebrating, but it’s a markedly cautious celebration. Early polls on the UKCC web site suggest that a full eighteen percent of people who voted are waiting for more information or verification before celebrating the heroes’ victory, and ten percent of people don’t intend to celebrate at all.”
“Not at all?”
“No, Lizbeth. In the comments thread of the poll, a common trend seems to be the feeling that he isn’t or can’t be dead, that the heroes were mistaken, or that this might even provoke a response from the remaining Endbringers.”