Worm

by wildbow

  “What’s the problem?” Teacher asked.

  “Out of action.”

  “Change focus. All observation teams, identify our target,” Teacher said.

  Heads in every second group around the base turned. They looked my way, as if they could see the full five or six city blocks and see me standing in the middle of the road.

  One crossed to another group, touching a young man.

  “Weaver,” the young man said, in turn.

  It’s like a computer. Every person carries out a specific operation, and they’re gathered in clusters with people who can communicate those ideas to others in efficient ways.

  “Tinker group H,” Teacher said. “Defensive measures, modify them for micro-scale drones. Forcefields, area attacks. Group N, to me. We’ll need more tinkers on this problem. We’ll also need to this area. Groups F and J, I’ll recalibrate, put you on more general anti-clairvoyance duty. She’s— You’re looking in, aren’t you, Weaver?”

  I reached out to place a portal in Teacher’s camp, right behind him. I hit a barrier, a dead zone I couldn’t affect.

  Some tinker device was blocking my clairvoyant, which was blocking Doormaker in turn.

  My relay bugs didn’t work either. They only worked on bugs.

  I began laying down portals around the perimeter, instead, finding the exact point I could affect. The portals right next to me were turned around, so none faced me directly. It wouldn’t do if he had students open fire and shoot through the portal to hit me point blank.

  “This is new,” Teacher said. “Have I done something to earn your attention? Crossed a line, somehow, maybe I inadvertently borrowed someone you care about? I assure you, I’m very benign. The vast majority of my students here volunteered their services. I told them I could use them to help stop Scion and save the world, and they agreed. A number of others took the deal with the oath that I could borrow them for a year, and I’d supply them powers with no strings attached for the extent of their lives, no mental bondage at all.”

  I frowned, shifting my weight from foot to foot, trying to ensure I didn’t lose touch with my body. If I had to move, I wanted to be able to move fast.

  One of the groups was close enough to the perimeter of Teacher’s base to fall in range of my portal. I seized them, then took a second to analyze their capabilities. Hyper-acute senses, enhanced aim, the ability to see through walls and a danger sense.

  I thought of Tattletale, boasting to Coil in the moments before I’d pulled the trigger.

  Not, I reminded myself, that I’m pulling any triggers here.

  But I needed to disturb things, shake up Teacher’s elegantly balanced operation.

  They looked at one another, and I gauged the equipment they held. The one with enhanced aim was the ‘soldier’ of the group, armed with an ordinary gun and a bandolier of grenades.

  I controlled his movements, directing him to grab a grenade from the bandolier. He handed it over to the one with enhanced senses.

  The one with the grenade raised his hand, hollering, leaning back, ready to throw—

  My danger-detector reacted, and I had Doormaker create a portal, moving the grenade out of the line of fire. A fat blob of crackling energy soared through the vacated space.

  “You’re full of surprises today,” Teacher said. “I’m going to assume this is actually you, Weaver, and that you’re not an Ingenue thrall or something similar. I want you to know I’m not your enemy. I was there for that whole business against the Elite, pitting Endbringers on them, I understand why you did it. You have your mission, a noble task, and you see it as a universal task. One everyone should inspire towards. Peace and prosperity in your territory, because peace and prosperity are good things, am I right? Please feel free to comment, strike up a conversation here.”

  He gestured, and his crowd of students collectively backed away from the squad of students I’d taken over at one corner of his setup. They faced down the others, their heads and shoulders visible above a section of wall that had fallen to the road hours ago. I watched his group move, and tried Doormaker’s power again. The borders were at the same points.

  “No? Okay. You’ll have to trust me when I say I’m working towards the same end mission you are. I want to stop Scion. But I’m not a warrior, and I’d be offering more trouble than help if I was on the battlefield. My students are fine when I’m giving the orders, but they’re prone to undecision at key junctions. I know where I need to be, I’ll be there shortly, and I’ll be of far more use to our side then.”

  If the group had moved and the borders were at the same point, then it wasn’t a person generating the effect.

  I used my bugs and Doormaker’s power to get a sense of where the perimeter of this clairvoyance-blocking power was. It was just a little irregularly shaped, but I could factor buildings and intervening obstacles into the area. If there was a generated signal, it didn’t extend as far with solid objects in the way.

  “For the books, I was inviting you to ask where it is I was planning on going. You seem more keen on silence.”

  My squad turned a gun on the very center point, opening fire with a trio of bullets.

  A box, a tinker-made device, exploded in sparks, popping into the air and bouncing off of the pavement.

  I tested the Clairvoyant’s power. It worked.

  I placed portals with care. Not to ensnare Teacher’s students, but to cut them off. Portals between them, above and behind them, in front. Assuming twelve to thirteen feet of range, I could space them out and cover a wide area.

  When I started tagging the groups, I worked from the outside in. His precogs weren’t amazing, with only a few seconds of awareness before their power gave them a heads up, but the trap was already in place.

  I left Teacher for last. No students at his disposal. I made a portal, and then stepped through. My soldiers aimed guns at him, while others stood stock still.

  Teacher said something in a language I didn’t understand.

  I shook my head. I didn’t have a better way of showing my lack of understanding.

  “No?” he asked, smiling a little.

  I shook my head once more.

  “A shame, that,” he said. He sounded genuinely bothered.

  My bugs flowed over him and through his pockets. I didn’t have silk, so I used thread from one of the workbenches, encircling the gun beneath his unfashionable corduroy jacket. It wasn’t a fast process, but Teacher saw what I was doing and helped it along, raising his hands to his head, simultaneously lifting his jacket up and away from the weapon.

  I passed the thread to one of my new underlings, and they pulled the gun free.

  My new minions began examining the gathered components and gear. I looked through their eyes, taking it all in.

  “I’m not unfamiliar with robbery,” Teacher said. “Parcel and part of this whole enterprise. But this isn’t you, I don’t think. For one thing, I’m working towards stopping Scion, in a roundabout way. Or mollifying the damage he does, if stopping him isn’t likely. It seems things have turned around, then, if you’re closer to being the Elite you were so recently condemning, and I’m someone working towards a fix.”

  I gave him a hard look. He shrugged, his hands still on his head, then said something in another language, smiling a little.

  A code word? A trap or trigger for some tinker device hereabouts?

  Except nothing had happened.

  “Well then,” he said. “Scratch that.”

  He tried something and it didn’t work? My swarm shifted their stances, approaching a little closer, guns raised.

  “Definitely scratch that,” he said. “Well then, I won’t ask for your forgiveness, but I can still be blunt. You seem different, and not so much for the better.”

  My attention was on the tables. Weapons, tinker gear… I started browsing through it myself, joining the minions who weren’t actively keeping Teacher at gunpoint.

  “Can I ask why? Or is that too personal? I un
derstand second triggers can be mortifying.”

  I turned around to face him. I put my hand flat against my mouth.

  “Mute. I see. And you came to me for help with that? Do you want to be able to communicate again?”

  I shook my head.

  “Then you’re looking to refine this ability of yours. I can do that. Give capes control over abilities that feel a little lacking in areas.”

  Again, I shook my head.

  “What did you come for, then?”

  I didn’t respond, my attention on the group.

  I found what I was looking for.

  Boxes, small, with a single, broad button along one side. Like detonators. There was nothing to them but a single LED, green, and a few ports where they could be plugged into certain ports or outlets.

  I gathered them, tucking them into spare pouches.

  “I don’t suppose you could sock one for me?”

  I shook my head. I gathered all of them.

  Then I began gathering the guns.

  “This is inconvenient, for the books.”

  You don’t need these against Scion.

  “Again, my power is available, if you should need it. Anything that helps against our reciprocal enemy, you understand.”

  He had an annoying habit of picking difficult-sounding words and using them instead of simpler options. Like someone trying to sound smarter than they were.

  I approached Teacher. I saw him startle a little at the sudden movement.

  He had nowhere to run, and he knew it. He looked around, and he could see his own students caught in my snare.

  I saw the surrender in his body language, an instant before he fell inside my power’s range.

  Memories hit me. Announcing myself as Weaver in front of the PRT building. Taking on the role in New Delhi, coordinating two teams.

  I could sense his power, and I could sense his general awareness of the people he’d affected. There was no constant connection between him and them, nothing like I had over my bugs or my subjects.

  I moved another over to him, and I used his power on them.

  There was a connection then. It only took a little bit of time, and focus on Teacher’s part. I could sense both the power taking hold, and the frailty, the weak point that manifested at the same time. There was a duality.

  I let go of the subject, and I could feel that frail point linger, decaying by the smallest fraction with every passing moment. That was what Teacher sensed, an awareness of both the power and the degree of influence he had over the subject.

  No, I thought. Not an option.

  I withdrew my phone, unlocked it, and found the page I needed. I threw it to Teacher. Rather than try to catch it with his clumsier movements, I had him grab the bottom of his sweater and lift it up, forming a net. It landed in the ‘net’, and Teacher collected it.

  I backed away, releasing him.

  Teacher staggered a little, then muttered what must have been a swear word in that other language.

  “Karma, I suppose,” he said, panting a little. “A… little nerve wracking there. I can’t help but notice you didn’t pursue with yourself, while you had me in command.”

  There would be no way to use the power without leaving myself open to Teacher’s influence. No, I wouldn’t be able to get myself a voice this way. Not if it affected my ability to make decisions. Not if it left a lingering window open.

  These people who’d taken his promise of a lifetime of power, no strings attached, had been misled.

  “Nothing, then?” he asked.

  I shook my head.

  “A disappointment.”

  I wasn’t that disappointed. I had what I needed. A speed bump for Scion, weapons, a little more information on how my power worked, and… I pointed at the phone I’d given him. He glanced down.

  “The C.I.U.,” Teacher said.

  I responded with a short nod, then held up one of the devices I’d collected. I was picking and choosing the members of Teacher’s collection I could use, arming them with tinker weaponry and gathering them near me. I didn’t enclose them in my little cloak of portals.

  “Ah… you guessed?”

  I nodded, once.

  “Understand, it wasn’t spiteful on my part,” Teacher said. He lapsed into the other language for one moment, “…I gave them the switch in the hopes it would stop the incursions and curb honestly. They were supposed to lock themselves away, but they held on to it, apparently intending to use it if anyone retaliated. An ingress, a portcullis, if you will. A way to raise the drawbridge and prevent passage into their castle.”

  At my order, some of his students gestured with their guns, prompting him.

  He seemed to take the threat in stride. “The one with a white button.”

  I glanced at the ones in my possession. I found it in a belt pouch and repositioned it.

  “Skeleton key, Weaver. I could make you force me to give up any of this detail, but I won’t. I want to get back to work, so I can help.”

  He was giving me a funny look, trying to drive home his point.

  But this was a roundabout plan, some kind of infiltration, and he was clearly working against our side. I wasn’t sure I bought it.

  It didn’t matter.

  I gestured to the phone. He moved to throw it back, and I raised a hand. I pointed to my left.

  He wasn’t stupid. He got my meaning, then used the phone to find the page I was referring to.

  “I assume you’re not looking to find me, which leaves only the Birdcage. No. I haven’t provided any devices to the Birdcage, or anyone allied with it. But you’re going to find entering is difficult, regardless. There are security placements in measure.”

  I nodded. My soldiers got in place, rank and file around me, all armed.

  “If I grasp your intentions, Weaver, I can speculate you’ll be back for me later?”

  I didn’t respond. No need to telegraph my plans to Teacher. Still, the thinkers were figuring out what I was up to.

  I was running out of time.

  Which meant taking a leap of faith.

  Using the Clairvoyant directly was a dangerous prospect. He could grant the power to see the entire world, multiple worlds, but breaking that contact was troubling, debilitating. I could see the toll it had already taken on Doormaker.

  But I couldn’t afford to hold back.

  I separated Doormaker from his partner. I could sense the effect, the sensory shift, the break in perspective, the mild nausea. But he was functionally blind and deaf, and there were only so many senses that he had which could suffer.

  I’d suffer far, far more. If I made contact with the Clairvoyant and was forced to break it… that would be it. Chances were good I wouldn’t be able to carry on. Things would be over before I recovered.

  I took stock. I had a squadron, now. People who would have been slaves anyways. People with simple abilities that were easy to get a handle on and use. I had weapons, better than a typical gun.

  Hopefully we wouldn’t have to use them.

  I took hold of Doormaker’s hand, and I moved it to my belt, hooking his fingers through it. Then I used my hand to take hold of the Clairvoyant’s.

  My awareness started to unfold. A slow, steady, gradual process. I was aware of vast tracts of land. I could see the damage done to Earth Bet. It disoriented me, to see how we were in Washington, not New York. Teacher had returned home. Why had I thought we were in New York?

  If I’d been distant from myself before, the enhanced vision made it that much worse.

  I could remember how I’d once been comforted by the fact that my power put the world in perspective, showing me just how small I was in the grand scheme of things.

  This wasn’t comforting at all. Not this. Not at this brutal scale. I could sense the entirety of the world, from atmosphere to ocean floor. I could, if I wanted to listen for it, hear the wind, the patter of rain, see the shimmers of heat on one side of the planet and the frost forming in caves on the ot
her side of the planet, day and night at the same time.

  I can see how the Doctor got a little detached from things, if she used this power with any regularity.

  Teacher said something. I couldn’t make it out, because I wasn’t really listening.

  I could see the other worlds and tally up the damage. Not even a fifth of us were fighting, but those ten percent were giving it their all. Others had retreated, finding family or friends to take shelter with.

  I could count all of the individual collections of people. Using Doormaker, the Doctor had scattered mankind over every available earth. Collections of a few hundred to a few thousand. People used to civilized life were starting over from scratch. Makeshift shelters, fires, crafting tools. They were tired, frustrated, and above all else, they were scared. There was no news, no media, no way to follow the ongoing fight.

  When I stopped looking, they didn’t leave my attention. They carried on in my peripheral vision, as that field of vision continued to grow with every passing second.

  The only real limitation was a set of blind spots, identical to the one that had hovered over Teacher’s base of operations. I could work around that. There was also the fact that I could avoid looking for things, and keep them out of sight. I could avoid searching and seeking, avoid bringing something or someone into my field of vision.

  Another anchor, another thing to tie me to reality, tie me to Taylor.

  I could see one cabin, off in the distance in Earth Gimel. It would be three days of walking on foot to get there from the settlement.

  Grue’s cabin.

  I’m so weak, I thought.

  I didn’t want to look inside and see him with Cozen. I didn’t want to see them curled up in front of a fire, knowing the world could end at any moment, should Scion decide to shatter the landmass.

  Instead, I fixed that cabin’s location in mind, and I watched it from a distance.

  I found my house, or what little was left of it, in shattered Brockton Bay.

  I found people. I found Charlotte and Forrest. I found Sierra, being very authoritarian and intimidating as she ordered refugees around. She gave off an oddly familiar impression.

  I found Tattletale. She’d left her laptop aside and was helping with the wounded, talking with Rachel and Panacea in an intense, low voice.