E.L.F, Extraterrestrial Lifeform

[Shujin]

Apprentice​

The room was just the right size to feel claustrophobic, but maybe that was just my nerves speaking.

The custom built reclining chair from my test with Number Man had been moved here. The blond man himself was still here wearing a new red/silver shirt and tie combo behind the bulletproof glass that separated the testing room from the technicians' equipment on the other side. Dr. Michael Ruther, senior PRT parahuman expert was peering at a computer screen with him, pointing as they talked. Other nameless people, some I recognized and some I didn't, milled around in the background.

The rest of the room had been cleared out for space. Armsmaster had already claimed a corner by the door and gave me a small acknowledging nod. I nodded back.

"Nice to see you again, in better circumstances," a hero in gold and white said with a quirky smile showing through his face mask as he approached me with his hand out. I recognized his Spartan style helmet and the buckler the size of a dinner plate strapped to his left arm. Dauntless was a bit of a rising star with the ability to 'charge' items that eventually took on powers and grew in strength. If the empowerment truly didn't have a cap, he could stand toe to toe with Alexandria or Eidolon someday.

He was also not my biggest fan. His thoughts were running around in circles. He didn't like the thought of having someone in his head. He kept remembering a scream from an angel in Madison. I almost backed out, but at the last moment decided to stay. What he didn't know wouldn't hurt him.

"I'm not sure this is better, exactly," I said as I shook his hand. I remembered seeing his crackling white form in the sky when I had gone down to the Bay bleeding my anger out from seeing who Shadow Stalker really was.

"Well." He shrugged one shoulder. "It's not worse."

I knew why he was here. Dauntless and Armsmaster were to be my bodyguards, in case the projection 'Master' cape decided to strike again. A reasonable precaution, if that Master had ever existed in the first place.

I didn't tell anyone where the tooth monster had come from. I wasn't even sure of it myself and with everything that happened afterwards? The dead people in some kind of circuit? The Eldar. I didn't know where to begin explaining, so I just didn't.

I told them I had been following the threads of Shanghai, which was true. I had been. Then I was attacked, and I had no idea why.

Also true.

I just didn't correct the conclusion they reached. What was I going to say? My Thinker powers hate me?

I sighed out loud and Dauntless huffed with a bit of amusement. "We gotcha, kid – Farseer," he corrected himself. I had to smile a little at hearing my cape name from the mouth of another hero. Choosing a good name was a surprisingly difficult task. No one wanted to keep Maelstrom, even if just to distance myself a little from the chaos my trigger caused.

Thinking back, I'm not entirely sure why I chose Farseer. Felt right. And wasn't taken.

"Don't worry," Dauntless said in lieu of a goodbye as he turned away.

Easier said than done.

I went to the center of the room and sat in the chair. I filtered out the dusky smell of old leather and the little squeaking noises the chair made. Director Piggot was on her cellphone by the projector screen in front of me, arguing with someone named 'Jim' while Dragon watched me from the cameras.

That last one was a guess. I have no idea where or what Dragon is doing. It was starting to creep me out. She wasn't a hole, like the Endbringers were. I was confident that she felt emotions just like any other person, but there was no evidence for that. No ripples, no threads, nothing. She just didn't exist to my powers. It put me on edge.

"Alright!" Piggot barked as she slapped her phone shut. "Let's get this show on the road, people."

The projector screen bloomed into a satellite image of North America as everyone behind the glass rushed to their stations except for one blond man in a red shirt with a silver tie. The Number Man looked up over the top of his glasses and laptop screen like he knew I saw him just then. He winked at me, then looked back down. Armsmaster and Dauntless took up sentinel positions to my left and right, far enough away not to crowd me but close enough to reach into my space. Dauntless angled himself to allow his shield a full range of motion both in front and behind me.

After a moment of hesitation, Armsmaster nudged me a bit with his hand. An almost, but not quite awkward shoulder pat. I appreciated the effort, smiling a little as I tried to relax. Armsmaster internally crowed, glad I hadn't fixated on the more popular Dauntless.

Armsmaster and Dauntless were rivals, or something. I wasn't sure what to think of that.

Dragon spoke then and I fought down the flinch of surprise. "Normally, I would strongly advise against this."

"Taking down villains?" I asked skeptically.

"Finding them," Dragon said. "Like it or not, villains wear masks for the same reason heroes do. Anonymity. Their identity as a cape is kept separate from their civilian lives. It gives them a safe place to retreat to."

"You mean it protects them from the consequences."

"It keeps them from feeling cornered," Piggot cut in. Her heels clicked on the floor loudly as she walked over to her chair by the projector screen on the wall. "Cornered criminals with powers who feel like they have nothing to lose can and will do a lot of damage, ruin a lot of lives before they are stopped."

I frowned. I could see the logic to that, but it also rubbed me the wrong way. If an unpowered guy in a ski mask held up a gas station, the police would be trying to track that person down. People like Kaiser, Hookwolf and Lung, was it really just a numbers game that let them walk around free?

"So you what, ignore them if they're not wearing a mask?"

"Take the E88," Piggot said instead. "Can you imagine what would happen to Brockton Bay if every single cape in that gang didn't have that anonymity? If Hookwolf could only be Hookwolf and no one else."

Not pretty, I imagined. Hookwolf himself was a nasty character. He was like the teeth creature, able to turn himself into nothing by blades and hooks. He was known for being vicious and bloodthirsty. Still.

"If that anonymity didn't exist, perhaps not so many people would be willing to break laws." I felt Dauntless' amusement jump at that.

"That goes both ways. I'm sure you remember New Wave."

Dauntless' amusement evaporated.

Yes, I remembered. Fleur was a member of the same New Wave family movement Amy Dallon was part of. After they unmasked themselves, Fleur was killed in her civilian identity. I'd read that E88 claimed credit for killing her murderer.

"It doesn't have to go both ways," I said. I looked to the side at Armsmaster. "Why can't just the heroes be protected?"

He grunted. "We don't have the monopoly on Thinkers, or the ability to find identities." He sighed a little before he gritted out, "Much as I wish that were not the case."

Piggot gave us all a sharp smile. "Checks and balances, the great American way."

The way she said that was loaded with an old, tired derision. She wasn't any happier about the status quo than I was, but had to deal with it.

"Then why – "

"Are you here?" Piggot nodded at the projector. "Because checks and balances only work if you can check and balance. There are certain villains that don't bother with the polite fiction, because we lacked good options that would save more lives than it jeopardized. Now we have one."

I understood. "Who's the target?"

"You don't have to do this, Taylor," Dragon said. "There are other ways that aren't so high profile."

Yes, there were. Why go for the slow startup when I could start making a difference now? The Chief Director had that train of thought, and I agreed with her. I could do so much, right now. There was a reason she wanted me in Watchdog. Pretending I was just another teenager, or Ward wasn't going to work.

So let's go in the opposite direction.

"I know." I settled back into the chair. "Hit me."

The satellite image zoomed in on Canada until I could see the definition of cities as gray tumors on verdant green and dirt brown. The image moved around until it found one city. I could tell it was large and had grown larger recently with the way the city seemed to have two or three 'rings' of buildings. The screen split. One half settled on the view of a large white dome and leaning tower. The other showed a picture of a man with wavy dark hair and stubble grinning at the camera between two women, a blonde and brunette kissing his cheeks. Everyone's mood took a sharp downturn with anger and disgust.

"Nikos Vasil," Dragon introduced the man as water crashed against a beach from the speakers. "Also known as Heartbreaker is active in Montreal."

Heartbreaker. An emotion manipulator that used his powers to give himself a harem of women that he used, and then threw away when he got bored of them.

"So far he has proven difficult to pin down, and always seems to know when the authorities are closing in. His," Dragon paused on the word. "Harem includes several parahumans and some of his children also possess powers. We have to assume any and all bystanders in his range will be at risk during operations, and he has turned Protectorate and PRT members before."

I stared at the image. There were trees in the background of a park. The leaves were just beginning to turn orange. The brunette woman had her eyes closed, enthusiastic as she leaned into him. The blonde had her eyes open, stare unfocused and she was slightly turned away. The tendon on her neck was a bit pronounced, mid tremble. New conquest.

It was a recent picture, taken this past fall.

I reached out into the ocean, feeling my way through. I felt through each ripple and thread, discarding the ones that didn't match what I was looking for. It didn't take long.

Found you.

I pulled, imagining I was siphoning the threads through the eye of a needle. I wanted to know where he was staying right now.

My mind was hammered with a barrage of images and sounds. I flinched back, which made Armsmaster step forward.

"Were you spotted?"

"No," I waved him off. "I just got a lot. He's in an apartment complex in the city."

No good. I knew that wasn't any good. I dove right back in, deeper, to the currents. I was vaguely aware of Dauntless and Armsmaster retreating, as if my personal space had expanded. If Heartbreaker stuck to the city, he was practically untouchable with dozens of people around him at any moment that he could turn into soldiers. If we could get the drop on him and manage to gas the place, we'd get a few. Gas doesn't travel very fast, not in an apartment building, not fast enough to guarantee it would get him. Sniper? That left all the women and children to deal with. That was if none of them were able to warn him. It would be easier if he was isolated.

I continued looking, observing every future. There were so many. I didn't have that surety I had before, when I was completely open and submerged. I just had little touches, glimpses of it. Subtle nudges of gut feelings. I wasn't doing this right. I knew I wasn't. But I couldn't risk it.

A drifting possibility flitted into my awareness. I reached out to it, and when I touched it I had to smile. This was it. I grabbed it and pulled it closer. I peeled hundreds of errant threads off of it, like I was breaking ore off a gem.

It had to go just like this.

"In six days, he will be in a suburb home in Pierrefonds-Roxboro. White brick house, two car garage, double sided white door with a small garden in the front of the turret. Rue de la Morandiere," I said out loud. After estranging a woman and her husband, making him decide to visit their grown son to give them time off. "Early morning, everyone will be there."

"Thank you," Dragon said.

I opened my eyes, not sure when I had closed them. "Don't thank me yet. He preps several safe houses at the same time. You'll have to make him choose that one." I paused and shifted in my chair as I looked around. Dauntless was sitting in a chair near me as Armsmaster stubbornly stayed standing. Piggot was nearly sprawled out in her chair and several technicians were missing. Number Man had gotten a coffee and donut from somewhere.

"…How long did that take?"

Piggot checked her watch. "About an hour and a half."

"Damn," I said. It didn't feel lie it had taken that much time. Still strategically useful, but I could read in the Director's head that she wished it didn't take me so long. Aside from just having faster reaction speeds, my precog would be useless in a fight. I'd have to be constantly looking forward beforehand and I didn't think I could monopolize heroes like Dauntless and Armsmaster for unimportant things. Then I asked, "PRT Canada already wants to launch a raid on Heartbreaker, how can I help?"

"We," Piggot began, waving a finger around in the air to encompass the 'we.' Or maybe the finger was pointing upwards because of what happened last time my emotions got the better of me. Either or, really. "Don't want you anywhere near Heartbreaker. Thank you, but no."

Dragon agreed. "You've done a lot for us already."

Double damn.

No, this wasn't the end of the path. I could still work with this.

I settled back into the chair. "I can at least give you the rest of the details. Five of his children have Master powers." One of them was here, in Brockton Bay. I looked to see if his father sent him, but it didn't seem like it. I'll bring it up with Piggot later. "Two boys, two girls are on site. The eldest boy can touch someone, and sense what they will do for up to three hours. You know about the second, fear inducer. Eldest girl is an emotion manipulator like her father…"

Hours later I was finally done. All of Heartbreaker's safe houses, all of his 'family' and all of his victims including current PRT members. The guy had made a field trip to kidnap an actress in Vancouver, but apparently he could do subtle if he felt like it. He had long term plants in stores, in hospitals, in schools. Well, to be more accurate, he had some plants. His daughter, Cherie Vasil had more.

I told them all of the ways the raid could go wrong if I wasn't there helping to oversee the operation. There were paths where they pulled it off perfectly without me, but those were fewer. Did those even count? That would just be leaving it all up to random chance that events would play out that way without anything guiding it. I saw how I could help, if they allowed me to.

That was a big if, right now.

"You helped take down Heartbreaker?" Kid Win said with more than a little disbelief as he leaned in to his camera, his red and gold helmet getting big on my computer screen.

"He's not down yet." I shook my head as I etched more lines into the crystal I was holding. Bits and pieces of shaped wraithbone littered my workbench. "They have to actually go after him first." And I had to pass Piggot's Trial by Gallant with flying colors before she would even consider petitioning WEDGDG and the Chief Director for permission for Farseer to assist. There were a lot of paths that said 'no.'

But not all of them.

"But still," Kid Win said. "Where do I sign up for Watchdog?"

His name was Chris. Under his gold and red armor, he had brown hair that tended to stick up with helmet hair and brown eyes. He went to Arcadia High and had math homework he really should have been doing, but that was low on his priority list. Maelstrom was a Tinker, and Armsmaster had asked him to help her out. He just couldn't screw this up.

I didn't look too deep. Just enough to confirm for myself that he wasn't another Sophia. He was too earnest for that, I thought. Too concerned with putting his best foot forward for the new Tinker. He was also happy that I was having trouble figuring my stuff out, but not in a malicious way. He had dozens of unfinished projects and his own heap of frustrations with his inventions. He had started to think that he was holding himself back.

"Tell you what, get a few Thinker powers and build something that will solve world hunger and I'll put in a good word for you," I said with a cheeky grin.

I knew he rolled his eyes. "Hardy har har. I'll be lucky to build a working cannon."

My stomach twinged, smothering my laugh.

Kid Win noticed, frowning a little. "You okay?"

"I – " Another twinge. I set the crystal circuit board down and closed my eyes, hanging my head in abject despair as I realized what it meant. After four days, it had finally happened. "…I need to go to the bathroom."

"Oh," he said. Then he got it. "OH."

"Yeah."

"I'll just…wait then?"

"Okay."

Fuck.

 

[Shujin]

Apprentice​

Danny stopped by the front door for a moment. It was open, with just the storm door providing protection from the cold of early January. The foyer light was on and outside, Taylor sat on the front step with earbuds hanging around her neck and a small sheet of crystal in her hands. If he strained his ears, he could hear the very, very soft cries of seagulls from the CD player he'd bought her. He'd opted out of the headphones for certain pointy reasons, but he had hoped the buds would work out better.

"They will," Taylor said out of the blue. "I just need to break them in first." She turned just enough to give him a small smile. "Bit of an uncomfortable fit right now."

Right. The mind reading thing. Caught, Danny just shrugged, grabbed his coat from the closet and joined her outside.

"Decided to get closer to nature?" he asked. Damn, it was cold. The wind was cutting right through his pants with a certain kind of viciousness that made his knees ache as he sat heavily. Taylor didn't seem to notice the temperature, still in jeans and a long sleeve shirt with no shoes on. She had her floppy slippers, one tucked underneath her on the step below while the other hung on for dear life from her toes. The crystal in her hands was making slight cracking sounds, as if he was hearing cracks spread through ice.

"Nice night out," he moved on, trying to keep the silence from getting awkward.

The glacial cracking stopped as Taylor sighed. "It really isn't." Internally, Danny was already cringing. "How many cases of violence do you think is happening right now in just Brockton Bay? Muggings, beatings for being the wrong race, wrong gender, wrong religion. Domestic abuse, robberies." She sighed again, eyes stubbornly fixed on her crystal. "How many around the world?"

Danny could guess what had brought this on. "Heartbreaker."

Taylor looked up momentarily, as if surprised by his insight, but then she lowered her eyes again. "Dragon should be leading the preliminary assault on him in a few minutes."

"Should be?" It was such a small thing, a simple substitution that turned what would have otherwise been an assertive statement into something more suggesting, a bit vague. He wished he could say for sure that it was a new thing with his daughter, but they didn't really talk much before everything.

I married the English professor, remember, he thought. Those word plays don't work on me.

Taylor let out a small, amused huff and it got her to look at him, really look at him so he counted it as a win. "I can't see Dragon directly," she admitted. "But I'm watching, everything up there. I have to, if something goes wrong." She gave a half-hearted shrug. "Heartbreaker isn't Montreal's only villain, they have their own troupe up there."

"So do we," Danny said. He kicked his shoe into the sidewalk a bit.

"So does everybody." Taylor set her crystal aside and drew up her legs to rest her chin on her knees. "I can see it. I can feel it. Doesn't that mean I should fix it?"

Did it? Part of him said no. She was fifteen, for crying out loud. The world shouldn't be on anyone's shoulders. It was too big. It would crush them. He didn't want that happening to his daughter. The rest of him? The rest of him was thinking, well, that's what heroes do. The powered ones just held up a bit more of the sky than the normal people, but that didn't mean they did it alone.

He was not the most unbiased source. Union rep in a crime ridden city with rising unemployment, smart money would have had him move years ago. This was his city though. These were his boys struggling to find jobs. It was more than a paycheck to him and that part was just starting to warm up to the idea that Taylor had learned that from her old man.

Heaven knows, he hadn't been much good for anything else.

"So what are you thinking?" Danny said eventually. "Start here, close to home? It's, it's more than just roughing up a few criminals, you know."

The PRT and Protectorate were like secondary police departments. You don't go to the police for societal changes, just to get someone arrested. Taylor was smart no - well, he always thought she was smart, but superhumanly smart now. She'd figure something out.

"Easiest solution is to find a way to bring shipping back," she said. "Easier said than done. I don't have anything that could bring down Leviathan. What could I do that Eidolon can't?"

He just about choked on air. "Setting the bar a bit high there, don't you think?"

"With powers as strong as mine?" Taylor shrugged. "I don't think that bar's coming down anytime soon. You know how strong just my storms are."

...yeah. Danny kicked at the sidewalk again. He'd been trying hard not to think of, many things. He was still in danger of losing his daughter to the government. It was one thing hearing that she was 'strong' when he had first signed the paperwork. It was quite another to be at the bank, depositing Watchdog's 'advance' into her trust fund because minors couldn't be seen cashing in on intel bounties. It was another to hear Dragon calmly laying out the facts, that his daughter could create hurricanes in a fit of pique and bury the East Coast if she really wanted to. It was another to see the Protectorate headquarters go into lockdown after the force field around it failed in a flash of light and see the hole Taylor had bored through the walls with lightning.

He didn't want to think about it, so he didn't.

"The gangs won't just get up and leave if the city gets more money either," she continued. "Piggot won't go for it, not right now. But after, Heartbreaker? If I can pull it off, then that opens a lot of doors." She took a breath. "That still leaves everywhere else."

He knew where this was going. A painful lump started to form in his throat. He opened his mouth, but found nothing to say. Nothing that would convince her. Nothing that would work, or even just make himself feel better.

"You're right, though," she allowed, turning her head towards him so that her cheek was pressed up against her knees instead. Her eyes were hard. "I can't do it alone. I'm just some, bullied girl that got lucky."

"No," jumped out of his mouth before the thought finished forming. "You're," he sighed. "You're my daughter."

Taylor smiled slightly. "And you're my dad."

They sat in a bittersweet silence. His chest was cramping. His breath came out in short puffs of white in the winter air around the lump in his throat. He just got her back, he thought. That was what it felt like. Like he finally started being a father only to find out that she didn't need him anymore.

"Now you're just being silly," Taylor said.

Danny half-coughed, half laughed. "Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Hm. Gotta watch that."

Another stretch of silence passed, but this one was more comfortable. His toes were starting to go numb and so were his fingers. He shifted over and tentatively hugged his daughter with one arm. Taylor let him, leaning over and he was painfully aware of the slab of crystal on the steps between them as the corner of it dug into his thigh.

"It's my job to worry about you," Danny said.

He could feel her nod into his coat. "Can you trust me that far?"

"To the other side of the world? Yeah kiddo." Danny smiled sadly. He guessed 'kiddo' didn't really fit all that well anymore. Annette beat him there too, he thought. 'Little owl' had always fit Taylor better. Maybe she had known somehow. "I think I can." He steeled himself with a deep, fortifying breath. "How can I help?"

"The dockworkers." Taylor's shoulders rose and fell. "I need to talk to them, everyone you know. Especially anyone that gets their medication through Medhall, or knows someone who works there. It'll be better coming from you."

He almost hissed out loud. She knew how he felt about any of the boys getting mixed up in cape affairs. On either side of the law. There were no safeties, no guarantees. Just the promise of violence, sooner or later. And she was asking him to -

Trust.

Taylor said nothing, letting him work through it until he finally let out a long exhale. "Alright."

Medhall Corp, huh? One of the few large companies left in the Bay, employing several hundred people alone from their sales department to their manufacturing, delivery trucks, and security guards. The CEO was even a local. Max Anders was almost widely considered a pillar of the community. Maybe she was just going to use the company to bolster the economy.

His gut told him that wasn't it.

He looked down at Taylor, who was looking a little like the cat that ate the canary. "Do I want to know?" Her green eyes almost seemed to glitter as a soft smile turned up the corner of her lips in this knowing way. That was his answer. "Great," Danny said. "You know, there are easier ways to get a hold of laxatives."

Taylor's aura of mystique evaporated. "Daaaad."

"Just saying. If it's that much of a problem, we can always just pay the doctor a visit. Give a few samples."

"No." She shook her head, pulling away with a glare and a pout she would probably fervently deny she had. "I'm done. I'm not dealing with that shit again." He had to say it. Danny opened his mouth, and promptly found himself gagged with her hand. "Don't say it."

He didn't have it in him to let out a full blown belly laugh, but a small, short chuckle he managed just fine. With a mental note to call up Kurt, and Gerry, probably Rand in the morning, he dug the crystal slab out from under his thigh. It shone in the light from the house, allowing him to see the thin, shallow grooves that covered every inch of it. It looked kind of like a circuit board.

"So what were you trying to make with this?" He asked, letting her off the hook.

"Not trying. I'm making on board computers for my costume and my bike."

She plucked it out of his hands as Danny's eyebrows rose. "That's a computer?"

"Kind of," she shrugged. "It computes."

"You got room in your costume for something like that?" He eyed the dimensions of the square. He couldn't say he'd seen anyone wearing a slab like that, maybe there were a few Tinkers that had computers in their power armor but that had to be integrated. From what he remembered of Taylor's costume designs, 'power armor' wasn't what came to mind. He could see it being on a bike as the dashboard, maybe?

"My back," she said. "It wouldn't be visible under the fabric, but there's room for one of these. It would take care of all the secondary systems, like force fields if I wanted to have one."

"Can't hurt." Plus, he'd rest easier knowing his daughter had the extra protection.

"Can't hurt," she agreed. Then Taylor paused, "You should go inside if you don't want frostbite."

Danny hopped up, suddenly acutely aware of how his feet felt like leaden bricks and that he was shivering.

"Going! Going." He stamped his feet on the doorstep a few times as he opened the storm door. Quite a bit of the cold had seeped into the house, but it was still noticeably warmer. "Don't stay out too late?" He didn't know why it came out as a question.

"I won't," Taylor called back, already stuffing an ear bud into a pointed ear as the soft, cracking sounds from the crystal started up again.

Danny double checked the front door, making sure he wasn't about to accidentally lock his only child outside at night, and then closed it.

0o0o0o0o0o0o​

Outside on the front step, I listened to my father's footstep as he retreated into the house. The currents in the space between were always moving. Not moving with it, not as far as it wanted me to, just one step at a time was tedious almost. Exhausting. It had paid off, in more ways than one. The conversation had to go that way. The specifics were fuzzy. There was a half-dozen or more ways that could have gone branching off from every reply.

My Dad and I, we weren't what you would call good conversationalists. We didn't really talk just to talk. Months ago, we didn't talk at all. Our only saving grace was that when we decided that we had to talk, we didn't do a half-bad job at it. Mom had been the social butterfly of the family.

That talk had to happen. It would have happened. What was the harm in making sure it happened now, and making sure it ended well?

I felt like there was harm, for reasons I couldn't put my finger on. I hadn't hurt him, and I made sure he didn't say anything he would regret later. He got confirmation that I wasn't going to just forget about Brockton Bay, or him and let him in a little. Wasn't that what most people wanted out of heart to hearts?

I bit my lip as I snuck a glance at my crystal slab, the other way that conversation had paid off, and rearranged a few lines. Without the annoying cracking sound I'd used. Wraithbone didn't make an audible sound unless I made it make one.

This wasn't a computer. Not really. Not the way that word meant in the way modern English used it, but technically a computer was just something that computes. A person could be a computer by that definition. So I hadn't been lying.

It was way bigger than the small symbolic runes I saw in my dreams, but I thought the basic principle behind them were the same.

Shortcuts.

Safe shortcuts.

Opening myself up to the ocean, letting down my barriers so that it could flow through me let me do things I couldn't otherwise. It had also proved itself dangerous. So what if, instead of drawing my power through myself, I drew it through something else? All I really needed was something my powers could be drawn through.

Already had it. My wraithbone.

I didn't know any of the forging techniques. I didn't know what any of the symbols from my dreams even meant. It didn't look anything like theirs. That was fine. This was mine. I held the crystal up to the light. I could see the patterns my power had worn into the material. The grooves on the surface was just part of it. The entire thing had been eaten through into thousands of tiny channels. This one was divination. Theoretically, if it worked for the short-term, then it should work for long-term. I just had to draw more through it. If I drew too much, it would just crack.

Which would suck, considering how much time I spent on this, but no monsters coming out of nowhere trying to eat me.

Hopefully.

Roughly three hundred miles North of Brockton Bay, Dragon suits flew in formation around an apartment complex. The roads had been blocked off subtly. One at a time, and from far beyond the range I knew Nikos Vasil's son Guillame had just then. It was late. Fewer cars traveling the streets would have been nothing to be concerned about. A lull in traffic would be ignored, right up until the tinkertech dragons dropped in, loudspeakers repeating the bland message calling for immediate surrender.

'Warning. Resisting arrest will be met with force.'

Heartbreaker had known he was due. The man wasn't stupid. He also thought he had more time.

He would escape. That was the plan. Push him too much now in the middle of the neighborhood, make him too desperate and things would get out of hand really quick. This wasn't for him, anyway. Cherie Vasil just needed a little push in the right direction. Enough to spark an argument about the merits of lying low.

I pulled my mind away from Montreal and cast my sight further. I had been telling the truth to my Dad. When it came to Leviathan, there was little I could do that Eidolon couldn't. Behemoth would be an even harder nut to crack, literally. I knew I couldn't hit harder than Alexandria and the Endbringer's dynakinesis made lightning less than effective.

But the Simurgh.

I traveled all of the places she descended upon. I traced every person she touched. The fear around the angel was that it was impossible to tell; who did she twist? Who did she turn? Dauntless had worn a bomb collar on his neck, primed to blow his head off after a certain amount of time hearing her scream. And everyone was okay with that.

That was how deep the fear ran.

This one.

A man in his mid-thirties in an opulent costume made of indigo cloth with real gold chain around his waist over a gold cloth sash and a gold necklace with a sapphire set in it. He was up late, coming back to an empty home. A hero, I saw. It ran in the family; threads ran from him to his daughter that was stationed in another part of the city. In some of his futures, he would be the first person to show Behemoth its own spine. In others, in most of them, he destroyed the city, killing millions of people including his own daughter.

I had a feeling I knew which future the Simurgh would choose.

I reached out. I held my breath, hesitating. This could go wrong. This could go very wrong. Worst case scenario, I'd end up calling the Simurgh down on my hometown. We would have some warning, I thought. At the very least, I would know what I'd done.

Best case, was that I could free people.

That would change everything. Really change it. Before I triggered, the angel had the monopoly on that knowledge. This would be more than just being able to point it out. The best those people had to hope for, was being escorted to the nearest quarantine zone. But if I could free them? No more questions, no more wondering. All of the traps and bombs the Simurgh implanted, defused. Wasn't that worth the risk?

I couldn't see if it was. I think that was what scared me the most.

I drew more power through the slab in my hands. I touched the thread that twisted around his futures.

And before I could second guess myself, I snapped it.

That had not gone unnoticed.

Shit.

 

[Shujin]

Sorry for the delay, had an exam last week and I underestimated how that would impact my writing. Updates will resume normal schedule.​

Apprentice​

All three Endbringers moved as one.

Leviathan moved slowly at first, cutting down out of the Arctic circle. Then as if he had received some kind of signal, the hole he made in my senses abruptly stretched and an almost physical backlash lashed across my mind. I gritted my teeth through it, watching the waterborne creature just stop being a distinct hole and became more like a streak of displaced aether. A missile shot through the ocean in my head so fast it left behind a vacuum. The points of contact, the very edges. He burned through it and the ocean ignited where it touched him.

At the third pulse from Leviathan, in a southern corner of the world, the hole Behemoth made in the world contracted, becoming a pinprick. At the very next, he erupted. A black hole screamed into existence, close enough that I could feel the ocean shudder moments before the tidal wave drowned everything else out. It was an instant of silence and stillness. I was blinded, and vaguely aware of the rune in my hands burning my fingers. The moment passed, and Behemoth was still moving north as a massive, empty shape.

The Simurgh sang.

I couldn't hear her. Just the faint impression of a probing voice that radiated out from her like searching tendrils. They caressed every mind they came across. I felt an almost morbid kind of amusement. Comparatively, the few hundred thousand people in Brockton Bay were not that many. I could see more, easily. The tendrils slid right past me, not even hesitating, treating me as if I was empty space. She can't see me, I realized. Hadn't Costa-Brown been talking about glitching precognition when she brought up the image of the Simurgh? Perhaps she could see more, if she wanted to, but detail came at the expense of scope. She was searching Brockton Bay.

In the house, my Dad stopped, back straight and tense as he looked around for the sound he wasn't hearing with his ears. So were the neighbors. Lights began to turn on within homes as people woke and got out of bed.

"Taylor?" Dad called from the door.

I slowly exhaled, a half-convinced that if I made a sound, she'd know. They were looking for me. All three of them were.

"You hear that?"

I swallowed carefully. My mouth was dry. "Yeah," I whispered, not even daring to reach out for his mind. "I hear it."

The distinctive wail of the Endbringer alarms started blaring. The last of the stillness shattered as I felt the emotions of over two hundred thousand people swell in fear and panic. "No," Dad breathed and I felt him grab onto my shoulder. "We have to – "

"Wait," I said.

"Wait?" He repeated. "Taylor, this is – "

"I know exactly what this is," I cut him off again. I was lying. She might still find me. She might decide to flush me out. She might be waiting for the other two. Whatever was going to happen, would, and I was not going to sit it out in an underground bunker when I was the reason behind this in the first place. Coordinate, Search and Rescue, Fight, whatever Costa-Brown wanted me to do, even if it was just to be the bait to draw the Endbringers away from the city.

My mess, my fault.

"What is it, exactly?" Dad asked, softer.

I shook my head. "You wouldn't understand."

"Try me."

I looked at him and when he saw the look on my face, his own shifted. I was aware that I was starting to hyperventilate. I reached for his hand on my shoulder clumsily. "I'd rather not."

"…Okay," he said eventually and gave my shoulder a little squeeze. "Okay."

A minute passed, then two. I was getting lightheaded, unable to even force myself to do more than take shallow gasps of air. My chest hurt, a cold fist was clamped around my lungs and heart. I couldn't feel my hands.

Above us, the Simurgh stopped singing. She let the very last of the ripples wash through Brockton Bay, before taking off across the Atlantic. Relief…there wasn't a word strong enough to describe what I felt just then. I sagged, sucking in air so fast I started to choke. I dropped my rune. The crystal was brittle, shattering into hundreds of tiny pieces on our sidewalk as I tried to convince my body that I wasn't dying.

"Whoa, take it easy. Just breathe." Dad rubbed my back and I hid my burned hands from him.

"I'm fine," I lied. "False alarm." The sirens petered out reluctantly, several sections of the city stopping, then starting up again. My head was still pulsing painfully and I could already feel my eyes burn with stubborn tears. I tried to blink them away. If he heard me sobbing, he would try to cheer me up, make himself useful. He'd see my hands and he would ask questions I didn't want to answer right now.

I could see that just as clearly as I could see Dad was overcompensating, making up for lost time and deathly afraid for me. Convincing him to just go away right now wasn't going to be quick or easy.

I counted out three of my heartbeats as I got my coughing under control. My voice was still rough as I asked, "Get the phone?"

"Sure," Dad jumped up, eager to do something. He turned around, and just as he registered that the phone hadn't even been ringing, Dad's PRT-issue cellphone started going off from the kitchen. He gave me a short, sideways glance, before darting into the house after it.

He came out, lips tight and eyes sharp. He handed me the phone, and I forced myself to take it as nonchalantly as possible, using his shadow to hide the burns on the underside of my fingers. "Should have looked at the satellite images first," I said as mildly as I could manage. My voice still trembled.

To her credit, Director Piggot didn't hesitate. "Where?"

With my sixth sense, I watched the Endbringers move. Leviathan from the northeast, Behemoth from the southwest and the Simurgh cutting an almost straight line across the Atlantic Ocean. A triangle. There was a lot of land in between them, from the islands of the Philippines and Japan to Great Britain, but I felt a cold certainty that I knew where they were going.

To the man whose fate I had changed. India. New Delhi.

The Simurgh wouldn't find me there either. None of them would. So what then? Would they attack?

Yes.

I could remember clearly the board with the newspaper clippings in the room with Number Man. Since the Simurgh, fear and terror was not their goal. Only results. The Endbringers were not human. They had no emotions. No panic, no anger, no fear here. This wasn't an emotional reaction. There had to be a purpose. The Simurgh suspected I was the cause, that was why she searched Brockton Bay first. Or…no, if she thought it was me with any certainty she would have descended, right?

No. I had reached from here to India. If she couldn't see me to make sure she neutralized the threat I posed, then all she would be doing is telling everyone that I was important enough to go after. Brockton Bay being quarantined wouldn't actually stop me from screwing up her plans.

Quarantine. That was it.

Behemoth had attacked Lyon, France twice. The second attack a couple of months after the Simurgh had surfaced. The only repeat on record. So far. The city of New Delhi, at least a part of it could be quarantined. That would offer no safety. Behemoth could always attack later, months, years. However long it took.

And until she allowed herself to be driven away, the Simurgh could sit in the sky above the city, reaching into people's heads for as long as she needed to. To shift the pieces around. To set the game back up. The walls would go up, and the man I freed would be imprisoned.

"India, New Delhi."

I could hear the woman suck air in through her teeth because she wouldn't allow herself to sigh in relief, not yet, and could almost feel the sharp nod. "Thank you, stay available."

I didn't volunteer information. They would check it, cross reference with other Thinkers. Contact would be made with the Indian government, that then had to disseminate the warning to the correct location because the PRT didn't have a phone line to every major city on the planet. The Protectorate, the Triumvirate, the PRT would be on high alert, but standing by until they got the green light.

I was still untested. I couldn't blame them. If I told them all three Endbringers were involved, they would rush. Make mistakes. Deploy before they were ready. Against one, with advanced warning, morale would be higher than it would be if they knew Behemoth and Leviathan would be there as well.

Better this way.

I hung up and handed my father the phone. As he reached out to take it, our eyes met, and I broke my 'don't think hard at people' rule.

I am already inside, going to bed.

The ocean felt like sandpaper against the inside of my skull. I crafted the scene, mapping out the inside of my house and seeing a phantom of myself tiredly slump up the stairs. I heard my father's footsteps follow the fiction inside, forgetting all about me out on the front porch. The light turned off and the front door closed.

Night, Dad. I thought towards him.

"Night!" He called up the stairs from the kitchen.

I clenched my hands with a soft hiss. I had just bought myself some time.

I hesitated. The memory of Vernasse's visions of warning was strong. The memory of teeth scraping the barriers of my mind was stronger. I stared down at where shards of my rune glittered in the moonlight. I didn't have my safeguard anymore. Coward, I thought. I pushed past it, and opened my mind a crack. My headache bloomed behind my eyes as I impatiently shifted through the threads of possible futures. Quarantine; that meant only the Simurgh would be visible with the other two on standby.

I discarded visions of all three tearing the Indian peninsula apart, refusing to consider it. They still left a cold pit in my stomach that grew with every bleak future I saw.

Think more, feel less.

New Delhi was farther from here than Los Angeles. I had a point of reference, but the distance…I tried anyway.

The Simurgh is coming.

The aftershocks of Behemoth and Leviathan obliterated the message almost immediately, as if I had tossed a letter written on paper into a storm of razors. I didn't even have to really think about it to know what the problem was, it just bubbled up to the forefront of my mind.

Power. I needed more of it. I was just getting used to the idea that I was already exceptionally strong. Now I was too weak?

Compared to the Endbringers, yes. Think. Was there any way I could - ? Open myself up more, yes, but now I found myself thinking. The ocean flowed through me. The more open I was, the more that went through and the stronger my abilities were. Ocean. It was like water; how do you get more water from a faucet? Widen the pipe, or increase the pressure.

Yes. I knew how to do that. I'd done it before.

I dropped my barriers and reached right into that storm of razors. The whispers started. A foul smell, like carrion, wafted on the air as I began to pull on the ocean just as much as it was pushing on me. I felt that prickling, tight heat pool in my stomach before I shifted something, changed, corrected how I was doing it and the heat dispersed throughout my body, bone deep. The object in my chest began to glow. What was my limit? How much could I take?

I heard one of the whispers then, crystal clear. Keep going and find out.

I ignored it. Leviathan was already slowing down, nearing the Indian Ocean. Behemoth would get there next, unhindered by the Earth's mantle but in no rush. Simurgh had reached Germany and slowed down. Cautious.

She knew. It felt like a punch to the gut. Abruptly, I was out of air. She was a precog. She couldn't see me. She could see everyone else. She could see the future changing. Leviathan, Behemoth, would she call them? If she was pressured, if she was pushed by stiffer resistance than expected, maybe. What would push those futures out of reach?

Me. Call her back to Brockton Bay? Expose myself?

Yes. No. The Simurgh would get there last.

Good.

I didn't bother with the words this time. In hindsight, expecting everyone to understand English was stupid of me. I used images instead. Concepts. Intent and direction. I needed a medium. Sound. The Simurgh had done it that way, I thought. I could too.

I opened my mouth, and screamed the warning across the world.

New Delhi woke.

 

[Shujin]

Apprentice. 6​

Leviathan had always been heralded by a swift and vicious coastal storm and giant tidal waves. Between attacks, it lived in the seas. It didn't attack boats. Three or four ships total over the years since its appearance. Maybe they had strayed too close. Behemoth always came in the wake of earthquakes, sometimes the aftershocks gave him away hours in advance. Funny, when Behemoth retreated back under the earth, there had never been so much as a single tremor in his wake.

I've read those reports. What stands out to you?

The theatrics, I remembered. The Simurgh wasn't like them. She was always present, visible if you knew where to look. Always watching. And yet, her arrival had always been silent. The eyes of nations on her, but when she descended from heaven, it was always sudden and unexpected.

Not this time.

The emotions of over three hundred thousand people in New Delhi froze with incomprehension. I could feel them take a breath as my warning sunk in. Realization dawned. Like a warm updraft creates a haze on the road, I felt the ocean's shifting immaterial currents swell with raw fear and panic.

Behemoth turned, and I knew he was trying to orient on the path my cry had cut across the world. I couldn't help smiling a little as their own chaotic currents finished washing it away. A glimpse of a general direction, that was all they had. A little knot of tension in my shoulders eased. If the Simurgh couldn't even find me, despite being right on top of my city, then I had nothing to worry about.

I reached for New Delhi's futures. Did they have time? To evacuate, mount an organized defense? Would the call go out in time? Would the Protectorate be there soon enough to make a difference, stop the city from being quarantined?

The future shifted through my grasp like grains of sand from an hourglass.

No.

I had to buy them that time. I couldn't slow the Simurgh down, but perhaps I could occupy her attention? With something, or – or someone. I widened the pipe, increased the pressure and an acidic taste scorched the back of my throat as I searched America for one man. I had to talk to him directly. Sending a message to his general area would fracture the futures, introduce too many variables as other people overheard what I intended for him alone.

Austin, Texas. I grabbed at the shifting ocean and twisted, bringing up an image in my mind's eye. He was pacing, impatient and barely restrained. I brushed the ripples emanating from him and found self-loathing, fear, desperation and determination so intertwined that they were almost indistinguishable. Other heroes and two villains were in the room with him. The room stunk with tension as they all waited.

It is only the man in green. It's always him. He is at the epicenter.

Of the fight?

Of everything.

I reached, and dipped underneath into his thoughts.

Eidolon, I called.

He stopped pacing. "What the – "

I chose a future to show him. Not one with all three Endbringers attacking, that would make him too fearful and desperate to be useful. I didn't have to show him all of it, I realized. He's been there before, with other cities. He already knows. I pushed the vision of the Simurgh descending on New Delhi, sightless eyes wide as she screamed, from my mind to his.

I felt him recoil. Help them, I pleaded. Please!

"Who is this?" He demanded. The rest of the room began to pay attention.

Farseer.

"How far out?" He'd heard just enough about me. He didn't dismiss me. He didn't ask if I was sure. That gave me an implied legitimacy. People respected Eidolon. If I approached them all at once, on equal footing? They might have asked questions. I wasn't in the Protectorate. Everyone who didn't know my power saw Endbringers, or how old I was. We couldn't get caught up in that.

Futures solidified, became closer to being real.

I broadened the scope a little, enough to include everyone in the room, anticipating a certain question. At her current travel speed, she'll be over New Delhi in an hour, maybe two at most.

Eidolon nodded out of habit. His mask covered his cringe. He looked over to his left, at a man in black and purple body armor. "Everyone heard that?"

They did. No time wasted re-explaining things.

Eidolon's personal future altered. Discarded some powers, grabbed others. Mass long range teleportation. Vector analysis. Biological tissue reset, interval every three seconds. "We're going."

I chose a location. It was a large parking lot. The building it was in front of was unimportant, some store or warehouse. What mattered was that if Eidolon and the others teleported in there, they would intercept the man that started this as he ran towards the center of the city.

At any other time, I would have said putting someone you want to protect right next to the front line was stupid. Any other time, it would be. The Simurgh was a manipulator. Divide and conquer. I was counting on it.

I watched the room huddle close to the man in green. He was in the center. I felt an echo of amusement at that. I wasn't sure why. This wasn't exactly a laughing matter. Eidolon looked up and to the east then. I could see the trip. He would take them to Mumbai first as he had already been there. Get a map or image of New Delhi to use for the second leg.

I touched his mind and gave him the location moments before he activated the teleport. The group appeared in a parking lot and the Simurgh stopped. I shifted my vision. It was almost a mirror of the picture the Chief Director had showed me that first night. A porcelain angel against a backdrop of green and brown landscape that was dotted with the grey tumors of cities. I didn't recognize the landmass. I dove down to the people, increasing my draw on the ocean at the same time. At some point, it had stopped feeling like it was flowing sluggishly, and started feeling more natural. I barely noticed it anymore.

I swept through dozens of minds before I found one. Young man, late twenties on his laptop in bed. I barreled into his thoughts.

What is the name of your country in English?

He jumped near clear off the bed. His laptop crashed to the floor, sending his sleepy cat bolting from the room. Whatever, got what I wanted. Croatia.

Thank you. And then, feeling bad about the laptop, I paused. Tell your mother to go to the doctor. Her cancer can still be treated.

The future shifted. Some of them were favorable, some of them very much not. New Dehli became less certain. The threads were changing, fast. I imagined they were changing just as fast as the Simurgh was calculating. Sisak, Croatia. Debrecen, Hungary. Podgorica, Montenegro. Bari, Italy. Graz, Austria.

My window of opportunity was shrinking alarmingly fast.

No, you don't, I thought. I didn't have time to sift through my best options. If one man, one bomb had been enough for the alien intelligence in the Endbringer to move, then what would make it not stop?

Deliberately, I found another Simurgh victim in New Delhi, one of four others and cut their altered fate. I didn't allow myself to hesitate, moving on to the next one. A woman this time, with two children. Free now. Young man, parahuman. The third thread snapped and the shifting currents of the ocean screamed.

My head snapped back, ringing as I felt something press in from the outside like this entire time, the ocean had been held inside a thin membrane. A plastic bag or bubble and now someone was digging a rusted nail into it, sawing, trying to get it to tear and spill. Was – was the Simurgh trying to break in? To – to my power? Why – what was she doing? How was she doing it?

The ocean rebelled, and spat the Simurgh out. The angel's face was a frozen rictus of rage. The Endbringers didn't have emotions, I reminded myself. That didn't stop a lump from forming in my throat. I licked my lips and tasted something sweet. I reflexively raised a hand, and it came away bloody. Nose bleed? I wiped it away. The Simurgh hadn't moved, oddly still. Slowly, her face eased back into a neutral expression.

New Delhi's fear spiraled upwards. My attention snapped to it and saw, a second Simurgh descending upon the city way ahead of schedule. What – I turned back, and the illusion came apart. White wings and feathers became stray clouds.

My blood froze as I watched the very futures I was trying to prevent abruptly shift closer to reality. With a sense of finality, the Simurgh opened her mouth. Theatrics, some part of my brain said. Her singing wasn't audible. For her to be indulging now, it was a message. For me. You lose. I snarled. It wasn't over yet. I was not done! The anger came easily, hot and bitter.

Don't fucking play games with me.

I targeted every parahuman on standby in America and Canada with a simple message: New Delhi. Now. Alexandria had the gall to question me.

"You sure?" She said outloud. I shoved the vision into her mind. Of Eidolon blinking to the top of a building, form crackling with black lightning. The Simurgh shifting lazily out of the dark arc of energy. I didn't waste words.

The black-clad heroine nodded. "Stay where you are."

So she could make sure I'm watched? Have someone report on my condition, what I'm doing while shit was happening on the other side of the world? Where would I even go?

New Delhi. Was it possible? I could see that Alexandria thought it might be; that I might gain a new power to travel great distances when I wanted it, if I needed it.

Maybe.

But going there in person, that would just make me another target. Even if I could, I would be putting myself right in the middle of three Endbringers.

I didn't have to be there physically. I had been across the world, over China. Over Russia. Over India before. I hadn't seen this then. I guess it made sense that I hadn't. This was only happening because of me. More lives I was ruining. Four hundred and counting, now. I owed this.

I lunged forward, out of my body. I didn't float on the currents and eddies of the immaterial ocean this time. The waves from Leviathan and Behemoth slammed into me painfully, pulling and pushing me into different directions. I dug my heels in, feeling the ocean respond. It was hard where I needed it to be, and it flowed around and over and through me when I didn't. I steadied myself and swallowed the trickle of fear that shivered down my spine.

I don't think I'd be able to feel another monster coming. Not with the ocean this turbulent. My fear played tricks on me in the shifting currents. I could almost see the shadows of creatures trying to form around me, reaching, only to be torn apart by the waves.

I breathed in, feeling the silky flow pass through my lips. Not yet. I haven't reached my limit yet. How much farther was it? Did it matter? No, not really. It didn't matter at all.

There.

I took a step.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o​

David grunted as the concrete block clipped him in the shoulder. He heard the wet pop as he was spun around by the force of it. The pain came an instant later. Broken, he thought. She'd seen him coming. Of course. He was going to hit a building, one of his powers helpfully informed him. Right. He blinked back to a rooftop a block away. He hit the gravel hard and rolled. His broken arm became a rusty knife, piercing pain making him grit his teeth as he squeezed his eyes shut. He forced them open. He couldn't afford to be blind, not even for a second.

He counted out the two seconds and his body reset. The pain vanished, but the memory remained. He gingerly got to his feet.

Don't engage her yet. Farseer's voice spoke in his head, momentarily drowning out the Simurgh's scream. I need to figure out what she's doing, her goal. That would be easier if the focus was off you for at least a little while.

Out the corner of his eye, David could see a faint figure, but when he turned to face it, it just shifted to his peripheral again. He frowned. "Farseer?"

The figure was that of an elfin girl as tall as he was with dark hair and green eyes locked onto the Simurgh in the distance. She wore decorative bone armor underneath a crimson and black tabard. In the center of her chest, a large green teardrop shone with an inner light and to his alarm, it looked she was crying blood. Her eyes shifted to him and her face showed some surprise.

You can see me?

"Yes," David answered. "What are you doing here?"

I am physically still in Brockton Bay.

"Projection," he said. Her presence adequately explained, he didn't see a need to go further with it. "Can you see it? What the Simurgh is doing?"

Farseer's face was placid. I can see everything. She is twisting the populace. Not all of them. A few here and there. To do what, to accomplish what, I need to know.

Her voice was still drowning out the Simurgh's, David realized. When she spoke, the scream vanished as if there was only room for one voice in his head.

Farseer turned to face him fully. Really?

For a moment he was off balance, belatedly remembered the mind reading thing. "Can you expand it? To everyone? Block the Simurgh out?"

Some emotion flickered across her face, but it was gone before he could identify it. Her smile looked brittle.

Yes. She opened her mouth and began to sing. The Simurgh's oppressive presence in the back of his mind faded.

"Thank you," Eidolon breathed. Then he turned and blinked back into the fight.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o​

Behind him, I closed my mouth. Like the Simurgh, it had just been for theatrics. All of it. The Simurgh's scream; it had never been about the sound. If you could hear it in the first place, she already had you. Smoke and mirrors. But if you knew where to look, there was a glimmer of something real.

I dropped three floors through the building. I stopped behind a young woman who was glued to the window, speaking rapidly into her helmet radio. She was dressed opulently in turquoise with silver bands and long wavy brown hair spilling down her back. I gave her a mental tap.

Spooked, she turned. "तुम कौन हो?"

I ignored the question. Your father is known as Phir Se. The Simurgh is going to kill you in order to set up a future where he irradiates the Indian peninsula.

Her mouth worked, and nothing came out.

Yeah. That's about what I thought.

 

[Shujin]

Apprentice​

Come with me if you want to live, my brain joked in some dusty corner of my skull. I wasn't actually going to say that, but I was really tempted. I spared a moment to finish compartmentalizing the song from my dreams in my mind. I couldn't let it falter or stop, but every ounce of attention that I spent on it was attention I wasn't spending on other things.

Things that would actually do something about why the Simurgh was even here. I crossed over the windows beside her and looked out. From here, it was a clear view to the scene of the battle. There were close to sixty people down there, with more trickling in every minute. The Protectorate. I noticed a few familiar costumes. Armsmaster and Dauntless, I saw. Dragon. That meant she had to pull away from the Heartbreaker operation early. I recognized the blue and white costume of Legend.

An angel, roughly double the size of a full grown man, hovered below New Delhi's skyline. She shifted between and around the skyscrapers. To break line of sight, I noticed. Not out of necessity. The Endbringers, all of them, were notoriously hard to hurt. The Simurgh didn't allow herself to be hit regularly. Many attacks simply went through concrete and metal. No, it was just psychological.

Human beings relied on their sight. When you can't see your target, it would make you hesitate. It would make you uncertain. There was an equal chance that instead of hitting the Simurgh, any number of the close range capes could be shot in the back. Killed by their own allies. Many didn't wait for her to become visible again, simply shooting through the buildings. It was late in this part of the world. There wouldn't have been many people in them. But there were some.

The building we were in trembled with ground tremors. Everything creaked as several of the windows splintered at the edges with sharp cracks. The city lights were still on, festive blues and purples lighting up a smoking skyline lit by gas and electrical fires. Thunder constantly rumbled as floors of buildings collapsed in on themselves, bright with pain from victims trapped underneath falling rubble.

Underneath were the quieter sounds of gunshots, squealing brakes on cars and trains, wailing and crying of people on the street running to escape.

What else could I be doing? Search and rescue? Focus more on the fight, try to influence their attacks so that they would hit, actually do damage? How was this all going to end?

Can't dwell on that. Think more, feel less.

This building was far enough from the battle that only the loudest sounds reached us. It was too far for human eyes to see much of anything with any detail. Phir Se's daughter could see it, I knew. A Thinker with powers centered around her eyesight, feeding information to more experienced capes that had not involved themselves. Yet.

"Father can't do that," she said. Her speech was accented and stiff in the way that made think she was not at all used to English. Her dark eyes were flickering over me, taking in every, single meticulous detail. Her gaze lingered on my ears and face. A small note of concern/alarm came from her that I ignored.

He can't, or won't? She glared mulishly at me. How old was she? Twelve, thirteen? I literally towered over her. He can do it. Will he? I nodded out the window.

She bit her lip. "He protects India."

What the Simurgh was capable of doing to people, capable of twisting them into, she already knew. She was just being stubborn now. I rifled through her head for words. Despite thinking in…Hindi? It was easier to read than if she thought in numbers like a certain someone I knew.

There is a reason why he is thanda, yes.

'Thanda' meant 'cold.' There were other concepts attached to that word, defining 'cold' as a cold without light. Shadow. I had no way of knowing if that was really how the word was used, just what she thought of it. It was enough to give me context. She had no doubt that her father was a good man, in the end. In her mind, 'good' did not mean 'nice.'

She wasn't that naïve. She knew what kind of person her father was. Didn't matter. I wasn't here to debate with some kid about her dad's heroing policy.

India is not that reason, I said. I would prefer he lose no one else.

That did it. The future shifted, slightly. I hated the uncertainty. If I could reach out to the Simurgh directly, see its thoughts, its intentions and goals, or even just see its immediate future…but I couldn't. Blind where it mattered.

The girl frowned. "Answer me. Who are you?"

I frowned right back. Precocious creature.

I am called Farseer. Are there any more questions we could waste time on or would you prefer living instead?

Her face blanked. To no effect, I could feel the small blister of uneasiness in her fester. "I have not heard of you," she said carefully. "You are not Indian. You are from America?"

The Protectorate were 'garam' or 'hot' in her mind. In the light. Recognized, publicized. If I was not garam, then I was thanda. The latter definitely had connotations I didn't want.

But fuck if I was going to tell her that technically? This was my first night out as a cape. I absorbed that, pausing a moment.

Fuck.

So I plastered a slight smile on my face and chose to ignore the question entirely. In three minutes, this building will collapse. Tell him that.

"Wha – " Her helmet radio sounded with a male voice demanding something. On reflex, she turned to the window. When she remembered herself and turned back, I dropped through the floor.

The girl here. The woman there. The man further to the north of the city. I had time. I could make it. Two others were already dead, killed in the opening salvo that brought down an office building. Nothing I could do for them. There were others that were meant to live through this. Who they were and why changed every minute. Just when I thought myself certain, the Simurgh changed her plans.

She was running through all of her contingencies, I thought. Evaluating, and the future was changing with it. And hundred thousands of others that were white noise distractions I had to sort through. She had spent years setting New Delhi up to fall. The pieces were already in place.

Too many, too quickly.

I stepped through the lobby doors into the crush of people fleeing downtown. The whir of military helicopters approached in the distance. Quarantine, I remembered. How long did the city have? I risked it and sent the thought to Armsmaster. I dimmed the song in his head first, just enough for him to notice so that he was paying attention.

How much time until the city is condemned?

"Farseer," the hero murmured. I heard him repeat my question to Dragon under the noise. "Twenty-six minutes."

Less than half an hour. I had choices. Change the verdict. If I could make them believe that I could truly counter the Simurgh, then maybe I could move that option off the table. If. And worse, I didn't think that would even be true.

I could snap the threads of fate she wove. I couldn't unbreak minds.

Twenty-six minutes. Shit.

"Farseer?" I heard the uncertain whisper. I turned to see the girl step towards me, shouldering her way through the crowd of people. Her eyes flicked up and to the south where the Simurgh was periodically.

We're going to your father, I told her. What are you called?

"दूरनज़र."

I stopped. Your cape name is Farsight?

Or Farsee-er. Was the universe having some kind of joke at my expense right now?

That got me a bit of a wry look. I shook my head. Never mind.

Farsight's eyes flicked up and down the buildings. "How?"

I knew what she was asking. That one right there. I pointed out the building on the other side of the road. The two had a large metal and wood terrace structure between them. Not strong enough to walk from one building to the other, there weren't any openings for that anyway. It was just decoration for the large advertisement plastered to it. As for how?

Behemoth.

Earthquake, I said instead. I reached out and planted a vision of the ground just giving way under one side of the building, of the entire thing buckling for a moment, before toppling over the road into the other one into every nearby mind.

Pandemonium as half the fleeing crowd in the shadow of the doomed buildings reversed in panic.

I expected it. It was the only way that would get the most people clear of the site in time. That didn't mean I felt the three people that were trampled in the chaos any less.

I gave Farsight a different vision. It led her off the road and into an abandoned clothing store. She could get out through the metal door in the back. A shortcut into a small alley that led into another main street on the other side and well away from the fallout.

It fell apart shortly after she escaped the mob into the store. She found the back door, right where it was supposed to be. It was locked. I stopped dead, a pit forming in my stomach. It wasn't supposed to be locked.

Farsight tried the door, futilely. She looked up sharply as the ground rumbled, rattling the walls and windows. There was no time for her to leave and find another way out. Such a small detail. If I had known, I would have – would have what? She was twelve. I didn't want her to be run into the ground, that was the entire reason I chose this route.

Move away from the wall, I commanded. I could feel it around me. See through it still, enough to touch minds. That should be enough. I reached out to touch the space in between and pushed.

The world went sideways as a serrated spike of pain speared through my head. I was up, down, right, diagonal, back in my body, out of it half in the ground and partly into the outer atmosphere. I lurched forward and vomited nothing but blood onto the sidewalk.

I dry heaved a few times after. The back of my throat burned. My head felt like it was splitting in two and my nose had started bleeding again. I wiped my face with my sleeve.

Ow, I thought, clutching the short metal handrail on our steps. I pulled myself back into a sitting position, leaning against it.

I froze. Wait. If I was here –

I lunged out of my body.

Above New Delhi, rain had begun to fall. Cracks were opening in the street with constant tremors. I tried to get my bearings, turning in the middle of an empty side street. I sung, willing it to reach everyone over the splitting pain in my head. A sharp sound rang out. I looked up and watched electrical wires pull taunt before snapping, whipping into the air sparking with live electricity. The poles bent from the force with painful squeals as the connectors and fuse boxes sheared off the side of buildings to rise into the air. Further, I could see an engine block rip itself out of a car and rapidly disassembled in midair. Within a minute of watching, the air became clogged with metal debris moving towards the Simurgh. Building something.

For the defenders? For New Delhi? For me?

The angel turned, a growing ball of material in front of her. A man was yanked up. I felt a sick kind of relief. Unfamiliar costume. No one I knew. Dread pooled in my stomach as he flailed in the air, clearly not there of his own power. I lunged into the future, grabbing at the threads. What is it? What is it? What did she want? What was she going to do?

I saw Legend break away from the defenders as a dark blur, but I already knew it was too late. At one moment, it was a man hanging in the air before the Simurgh.

In the next, his organs were splattering on the pavement.

No.

Time slowed to a crawl and I saw it. A hundred and one atrocities were being primed all around New Delhi. For tomorrow. For next week. For next year. I expected this from her, didn't I? Divide and conquer. She was going to make me choose. The ground rumbled beneath our feet. I saw the device she was building. I saw what it was for.

A storm.

 

[Shujin]

Feel free to skip updates until Causal if you aren't a fan of Endbringers.​

Apprentice​

I've never been to an Endbringer fight before.

The almost idle thought was jarring, both in the incongruity of tone and the complete absurdity of it. Without powers, what could I have possibly done in an Endbringer fight besides get myself killed? At the same time, it was relevant in a macabre kind of way. Brockton Bay had never been the target of an Endbringer attack. We've never really been close. The closest was probably when Behemoth attacked New York City.

For all of the heroes and capes that showed up to defend the Big Apple, how many powerless people watched the Herokiller Behemoth batter right through the defenses? I saw the aftermath. Still or moving images of all the collapsed buildings, air still choked with concrete dust, rescue teams in white and red lifting rubble. I heard the list of casualties, the damage cost in dollars. There were experts talking about it, how it would impact the economy, how long it would take to recover. Clinical and after the fact.

They don't televise Endbringer fights. I had no doubt there were cameras running somewhere, if only just to look back over to pick apart with analysts. So that next time, maybe, less people would die. Maybe.

Seeing it through visions of the past wasn't the same. Not when I could feel the tremors. Not when people crowded me in the street, passing through me in their panicked, desperate need for safety. Not when I could feel people die.

I forced myself to simply stand still. The ocean that swirled around had a faint acidic tinge to it as it scraped against me. The headphones on my body were still playing the sound of waves crashing against a beach and I listened.

Think more, feel less. So think.

Farsight. Was she okay? I didn't want to look. If I hadn't gotten that door open. If she hadn't managed to get out some other way in time. I scanned the skyline for landmarks. There was a ragged gap where the hotel was with dust and smoke beginning to billow up. So she was dead then.

No, damn it. Don't assume.

I forced myself to calm down. I closed my eyes and cast my awareness across the city. The Simurgh's manipulations stood out starkly like blisters oozing pus. Shadows of the futures in store for them flickered like silhouettes. If I looked harder, looked deeper, even the people themselves seemed to physically twist into monsters.

I wrenched my gaze away.

Phir Se was underground, in some kind of bunker watching computer screens showing images of New Delhi. I had to stop. A shadow of a shadow in his fate filling me with dread.

Don't, I spoke to him.

Phir Se controlled his reaction, turning a surprised twitch into an incline of the head. "आवाज़."

Farseer. Call me Farseer.

His brows drew together as he smiled. "Like my daughter?" He half-asked carefully, not fully convinced he had a good handle on what my name meant.

Like the girl you were just weighing the life of. I could see the pieces. The culmination of years of cause and effect set in motion shaped each and every one of the Simurgh's pawns, including this one. He hadn't started. He likely wouldn't. The Simurgh was known to be precognitive. She could see it coming.

Rationalization. He'd talk himself down this time.

This time.

Yes, like your daughter. I found her. I almost burst into tears right then and there out of sheer relief. She was alive. How? I seized the thread and ignoring the swell of nausea that rolled through me. I traveled the thread back.

It fell apart shortly after she escaped the mob into the store. She found the back door, right where it was supposed to be. It was locked. I stopped dead, a pit forming in my stomach. It wasn't supposed to be locked.

Farsight tried the door, futilely. She looked up sharply as the ground rumbled, rattling the walls and windows. There was no time for her to leave and find another way out. Such a small detail. If I had known, I would have – would have what? She was twelve. I didn't want her to be run into the ground, that was the entire reason I chose this route.

Move away from the wall, I commanded. I could feel it around me. See through it still, enough to touch minds. That should be enough. I reached out to touch the space in between and pushed.

The ring of metal as the door abruptly buckled as it tore itself out of the wall drowned out the sound of Farsight's gasp. It did nothing to mask the sound of my scream.

The door.

I – I could affect things. Even here.

You need to find your daughter, I told Phir Se distractedly. If I allowed for the pain afterwards, the disconnect. I couldn't rely on it, I knew that. But if I could physically affect even just one more thing. A twelve-year-old girl was still alive because of me. There was still a chance!

"Why?"

I turned my attention back to him incredulously. You mean beside the fact that a twelve-year-old is running around in an Endbringer fight?

Phir Se waved a hand, as if a fly was bothering him. "She is in the care of others. Wants to be."

I was quiet for a moment.

You let your wife and son stay dead, so a monster would stay dead with them.

Phir Se tore himself away from the computer screens, shock and fear and anger needling him as he realized I was much more than just a voice.

Your daughter is all you have left. And Phir Se?

I touched his mind and imparted a vision of his failure. From the girl's death to Behemoth surviving, to the blighted wasteland that used to be India. He rocked back on his heels, mortified.

The Simurgh let you escape that quarantine.

I opened my eyes and looked up, scanning the skyline. I took a step and distance blurred as I moved to the top of a building that was still standing. Helicopters with military lines and angles were approaching from the south. A convoy of heavily loaded trucks and vans burned rubber beneath them. Quarantine, I remembered. The sores of the Simurgh's influence infested the city. I could undo them, I thought. Divide and conquer. Bring other people in, get them involved, point out all of the threads spooling themselves.

It would be a waste of time and resources.

Save everyone, just to have the Simurgh tear open that storm in the sky. The threads just stopped there. They became muddled, indistinct, as if just by succeeding, the Simurgh introduced hundreds of distinct possibilities that kept shifting and none of what I was seeing made any sense. Images blurred into each other. Sometimes it was just destruction. Other times, things came from the storm. People mutated. They stayed the same. The land warped. It didn't.

Could I stop her from succeeding?

I gazed along the thread to see Behemoth and Leviathan reveal themselves. Behemoth in a plume of lava like an erupting volcano, lightning in the ash cloud as he pulled himself to the surface. Leviathan simply rocketed out the river as he made the rain fall in torrents. Most of the paths lead to that. Push and they would push harder.

Escalate. Reinforcement arriving from other areas. New Delhi was close enough and all three Endbringers at once? Yangban would send a few teams. Russia. Military response, strategies and plans for worst case scenarios triggering.

The Endbringers retaliate. I watched a dozen scenarios of people just…popping as the water exploded out of their bodies. Behemoth flash frying equipment and capes and soldiers from the inside out from miles away. The only one who didn't reveal some unknown capability was the Simurgh. Instead, she just lingered high above the city and watched as her machine assembled. New Delhi was a scene right out of Madison, Luxembourg and all the others. People missing something, a small vital piece that just broke them.

In a future that could be, people were harvesting each other for parts the Simurgh could use with smiles on their faces. Even if it had been destroyed, nothing stopped her from building another.

Figured something out? I could almost hear the Number Man's even, bland voice.

They could do more damage. A lot more. They aren't.

Son of a bitch.

All this time. This entire fucking time – for fucking two decades. From the very beginning, they had just been messing with us. Letting us think we had a chance. That we could do something. Oppose them. Fight them. Anything.

There had to be something.

_________________​

"We have to destroy that thing," I overheard Legend say. He was easy to pick out in a crowd wearing a skintight blue costume with white lightning decorating it. The effect was barred a little by the metal band clamped around his neck. His mask covered his eyes leaving wavy brown hair on the top of his head and the rest of his face uncovered as he flew back and forth before an eroded line of defenders. Just patches of people in clumps standing around, not knowing what to do, staring up at the city's broken skyline or watching the angel. Around them other people streamed, people retreating from the fight, rescuers carrying others to the hastily erected medical tents, searchers heading back out with a grim cast to their movements.

Out by the Simurgh people were still fighting. Brutes or people that were just hard to kill like Alexandria were still out there. Stalling? How? Just brute force? Eidolon would still be fighting too, I realized. The Simurgh might be allowing him to stall her.

I hoped so.

Legend's back and forth flight wasn't accomplishing anything, near as I could tell. He was pacing.

Pull everyone back.

Legend stopped roughly. His head jerked in my direction. Constantly looking ahead seconds at a time was tedious and exhausting. I only needed the broad strokes about what to say, how to respond, but still I knew what he was going to say, even if not the exact words.

When was the last time you actually stopped the Simurgh from building something?

It wasn't in Madison. I could tell from the way Legend stiffened slightly and turned just the tiniest of degrees away that I had been right on the money.

"She's using people." He spat. I could see the way his face twisted and feel the rage pouring off him. Rage, and more than a little bit of shock he was still reeling from. That shock was echoed in everyone around us. Building things, the angel was known for that. But she didn't fight like her siblings. She had never been the physical threat. This – this was all wrong. I could sympathize. Nothing was going the way I thought it would, the way it should have gone.

Deprive her of targets.

"What is she doing?" Legend demanded. "What is it?"

I hesitated, but only for a second. It's to make a storm.

Legend's head rocked back a little, uncertain. "What? Like, a hurricane?"

No. Like my kind of storm.

The leader of the Protectorate blanched and I smiled humorlessly. No one had told me, not even as a passing reference. They didn't need to tell me. When Director Piggot had let me in to talk to my father and I saw all of the Directors up on that screen? I knew then. Dad couldn't stop thinking about the storms I made. And I didn't need Piggot to spell out what it meant.

"Can you help? With destroying it?"

How to explain just how much of a terrible idea that is? I could hear the other question in his mind. Could I help fight her? I could do it, I thought. The Simurgh couldn't see me. She could only guess based on the results of my actions. I could copy her. A lot of little actions at once all across the city at the same time. Drown her perception of me like dozens of pebbles dumped into the puddle, obscuring the pattern. I could do that.

I could bring the Simurgh right back to Brockton Bay.

It wouldn't stop. It would just keep going like some kind of twisted precog battle of attrition. The taste of blood in my mouth told me I would lose that. Unless I found a way to kill an Endbringer, for good, and make it actually work when they weren't holding back. With all three of them active? No way in hell.

I lose. That was all I could do. There was no point in lying to myself. My only choices were to lose badly or to lose gracefully. I just –

I just fucking lose. I'd lost from the very beginning, when Leviathan and Behemoth responded. I just hadn't seen it then. I had been too focused on fixing my mistake to see that there was no fixing it.

I triggered an Endbringer attack. I thought the worst case scenario was causing the Simurgh to attack me. Brockton Bay. I assumed I could just fix it. Help the heroes fight it off so the city wouldn't be bricked in like Madison. I could do something not even Eidolon could, after all.

I'd never been to an Endbringer fight before.

I turned and pointed at a TV tower in the distance to the northwest. It was a long, slim structure with what looked a lot like a toy top crowning it.

Behemoth is a mile underneath that. That was a guess. He was under the city. I knew that for sure. I also knew that a concrete figure sounded better, made things more real. No one was going to say I was wrong, he was actually a kilometer to the left. Leviathan is in the river.

The blood drained from Legend's face.

"They're all here. All of them."

Yes.

"Why – why haven't they…?"

As far as I can see? Legend's lips tried to twitch into a smile at that. They only show themselves if we start winning. I let that hang in the air for a bit. Please call everyone back. We need a plan.

"Not everyone," Legend said slowly. He held up a hand before I could protest. "Pulling everyone? Too obvious we're up to something." He held the black band on his right wrist up to his mouth. "Dragon, you copy?"

It wouldn't make a difference. She can see you anyway, I thought. I didn't voice it.

"I hear you, Legend," Dragon's voice came out of the tiny speaker a few seconds later.

"Sitrep on Behemoth and Leviathan."

I could feel my eyebrow inch up into an unimpressed arch. Really? He opts for a second opinion when there are earthquakes and it had suddenly started raining?

Dragon didn't answer for a bit before admitting, "I've lost track of them." Legend gave me this vaguely apologetic look. "There were some tremors in South America near Behemoth's last known location shortly after the situation in Brockton Bay."

"Leviathan?"

"Went through rivers."

And that was significant for some reason? It only took me a moment to get it. Leviathan was the classic sea monster. Emphasis on sea. He attacked coastal cities and ports. Rivers greatly expanded his range of potential targets, and it was something he just didn't do before. They were breaking all kinds of conventions today.

That sent a shiver of fear through me. What if they broke one more? What if they just didn't allow themselves to be driven off this time? At all? The Simurgh had been setting India up to be irradiated by a parahuman.

What if she settled for 'good enough' and had it irradiated by Behemoth?

I felt sick.

"Why didn't we hear about this before?" Legend asked.

"The Simurgh was singing over Brockton Bay," Dragon said flatly. "Barring an actual sighting, one took precedence over the rest." The rest could be covered later. Afterwards. It was the same reason why I didn't just blurt out that all three Endbringers were at New Delhi when I contacted Eidolon and spoke to Alexandria. Good to know I could at least judge something correctly.

It made me wonder though. Could the Simurgh see Dragon? It wasn't like it was with Eidolon. I could see how the Endbringer reacted to him.

Like she was holding him out at arm's length. Avoidant. A jarring difference, when you considered that everyone else she countered, manipulated, twisted. They danced to her tune. Eidolon made her dance to his.

I couldn't see Dragon.

Can Dragon head the distraction effort then? Organize the token resistance and keep an eye on the situation. Legend nodded. There was an awkward silence as we kind of just stood there looking at each other. Dragon can't hear me, by the way.

"Ah." He relayed the request to Dragon. It was more or less what she'd been doing anyway apparently. Good to know. "Tell Alex and Eidolon to get back to base. If they need a reason, tell them Behemoth and Leviathan are here."

"What?"

"I know." Legend sighed, passing his free hand over his face and squishing his chin for a bit before he let his hand drop. "Tell them. Legend out." The hero looked down at the people milling about, waiting for new direction. "Let me handle things here for a bit. Could you wait in that tent over there?" He pointed. I looked and nodded. He smiled a little. "We'll get through this. We always do."

Because the Endbringers let us. False security, I thought.

False hope.

__________________​

"Where are they?" Eidolon hissed the moment he entered the tent. His dark cape billowed weakly behind him where Alexandria trailed quietly.

"Eidolon," she said. He simmered, but gave a small, grudging nod before he took a deep breath, willing himself to calm. The Triumvirate couldn't be more different from each other. Legend was dressed to be inspiring. It was in his color choice and how he left some of his face and features be exposed. It was enough to emphasize him as a person.

Eidolon was dressed like his namesake. His face was completely covered and yet was still shrouded in the eerie green light that shone from underneath his hood. He had a cape that instead of looking heroic, it engulfed him along with sleeves that hid his hands from view with the same green light. He didn't look approachable. Instead, he looked a bit dangerous.

Alexandria was a clash of concepts. Her iconic costume with knee high boots and skirt was designed to look good. Feminine without being overbearing about it. Classy, including her off center cape clasped with a silver pin that naturally bunched itself about her shoulders and steel helmet. It was a look designed for tasteful colors in the darker range. Reds, blues, greens, purple.

She chose black. Black and grey. The effect seemed to crush everything that might have stood out in her costume to a uniform look. The only thing that caught the eye was the tower symbol on her chest. Unlike Legend and Eidolon, it was as if she didn't want to be noticed.

The tent we were in was already cramped. Supplies had just been dumped here with little rhyme or reason. There were piles of blankets in one corner on top of crates marked with symbols. There were waterproof backpacks and bags thrown on top of each other. Sweats and coats on the floor, kicked to the side. There was a small generator in the corner by the tent flap, cords dripping down to the floor where they ran along the ground out the door. An electric lantern hung from a hook at the top of the tent. Having four people in it nearly obliterated the remaining space.

"Where were they sighted?" Eidolon asked in a more reasonable tone.

Legend answered for me. "Leviathan is in the Yamuna. Behemoth is about a mile below us."

"Tremors aren't caused by building instability, they are causing the instability," Alexandria connected the dots instantly. Mixed in with genuine shakes caused by buildings collapsing from their supports giving out thanks to the Simurgh's redirected attacks, I could see no one looking too closely at the ground under their feet. Not with something like the Simurgh right out in the open. "And this rain…"

"Yes," Legend said. "They are holding back, for now. That could change at any moment."

"How should we do this?" Eidolon asked, crossing his arms across his chest. "Split into three, one each division. Alex, Simurgh. Legend, Leviathan. Me, Behemoth."

I couldn't stay quiet anymore. Do you really think you'll win? Against all of them at once?

"It's not about winning," Alexandria stated and it was with this tone of certainty that gave me the impression that she'd already discarded 'winning' as an outcome.

... I was actually in a tent with the Triumvirate. Holy fu – focus.

Good, I said. Because that is exactly why they are here. To make sure we don't win this.

I could see Alexandria's eyes narrow slightly behind her helmet. "What is that win condition?"

I didn't know the exact details. I could only tell them a handful of specifics. That we prevented her from completing her project that would tear a storm into the sky. That her plans in New Delhi were unraveled to the point where she couldn't just set the same dominoes up to fall the same way anymore. If my interference meant she couldn't defend herself effectively. If I moved from New Delhi, snapping threads of altered fate somewhere else so she could force me to concentrate here. Or just scorched earth.

If if if if if if if IF!

That the Simurgh considers the situation unsalvageable.

Eidolon started. "Wha – "

Alexandria cut him off. "What was her goal? Why is she here?"

I knew what I had to say. If not now, then eventually. The Simurgh had started singing over Brockton Bay. It really didn't make it any easier to focus on the words to transmit.

Phir Se is a local thanda cape. At the next Endbringer attack, in the process of trying to defeat it he will irradiate the Indian subcontinent. Legend's eyebrows jumped even as Eidolon shifted uneasily. A few million dead. A few hundred million more over the long term. I tried to change that.

Eidolon sucked in a breath. "You can see Simurgh victims?"

Not just see. See what she wants them to do.

"This is because of you." Alexandria said. The accusation rang sharp in her voice. I could even feel it like her words had launched a barb into my stomach. She wasn't wrong. "She attacked early - "

I snorted loudly to cover up how shaken I was. Please. So you have two more weeks and no better prepared -

"You can see the Endbringers," Legend said. His proud bearing wasn't so proud anymore, more tired. He rubbed at his forehead. "We could have been."

Let me finish. I had to take a moment to vent my emotions into the shifting ocean. It was getting hard to think. Stifling. The threads of future possibilities didn't feel like spider webs anymore. Rather, more like strands of glass. Grabbing too hard, too long, was starting to burn. Frustration, rage boiled out of my head along with the burning sting of anxiety, desperation. We didn't have a lot of choices. I couldn't see anymore. If I could make them understand that.

Let me put this into perspective for you, I began. The Simurgh's scream is not a physical sound. You don't hear it with your ears. She's letting you hear it. Her precognitive ability is directly tied to it. The longer she screams, the further it travels. I've seen it in action in Brockton Bay.

"She was searching." Alexandria said blandly. Eidolon shifted his weight and glanced at the tent door. "For you. Didn't learn the first time?"

What? Oh, the teeth monster. I almost laughed out loud. If I had learned my lesson there, I wouldn't be here to fix this. The irony.

So you wanted me to just ignore a few hundred million deaths, and say you're a hero?

"Don't put my words in my mouth. You think heroics means acting blindly?"

"Alexandria," Eidolon said. She stopped. The three of them looked at each other. Legend frowning even as Eidolon stepped forward. Alexandria, for a moment seemed like she wanted to step forward as well. Legend's eyes flicked over to me. Through her helmet, Alexandria's dark eyes met mine for a moment, then she looked away and backed down.

"Rules, restrictions, guidelines. We have these for a reason."

Something about the way the light from the lantern above us hit her eyes hadn't looked right.

You're not getting it. The longer she screams, the further it travels, the further she sees. Do you know what she's doing the entire time she's up in the atmosphere? No one answered. Do you know what she's doing up there undisturbed for months on end?

Looking over the world. I shoved the memory of that picture Costa-Brown had showed me that first night when I emerged from my locker into her head. Of the angel in high atmosphere, the curve of the earth visible behind her.

She's screaming. The silence, this time, it rung. Everything up to now. Everything. I – we, we lose. I lose. We've been doing nothing but losing. Here and now? That doesn't change.

As long as I played by her rules, she wouldn't flip the goddamn table.

Legend turned away. One arm crossed his chest as the other cradled his chin as he thought. Alexandria flexed her fingers, once. Then she looked over at Eidolon.

"She wins then," the man said.

That was it. The opening. I let myself smile a little.

I didn't say the Simurgh wins, did I? I just said I lose.

A flicker of ironic amusement came from Alexandria. "Let's hear it."

Scion.

Eidolon's head rocked back almost imperceptibly, but I caught the movement. He was inexplicably stung. He expected me to offer someone else as our way out of this? Him?

The harlequin in the masque, I thought. It was a strange recollection. No, it wasn't going to be Eidolon this time.

"You know what he is," Alexandria said slowly. Did the Chief Director tell her? I almost frowned. Alexandria was the head of the Los Angeles Protectorate, the same city Watchdog was headquartered. How many people knew Scion wasn't what he seemed?

What, dangerous?

Not an ounce of surprise from Eidolon or Legend. How deep did that rabbit hole go?

"We don't know where he is," Legend said as the voice of reason. "We can't contact him. We can barely speak to him."

Eidolon took a different approach. "How would you get him here?"

Incentive. All we have to do is give the Simurgh exactly what she wants.

I spread out my hands, palms up.

A storm.

 

[Shujin]

Apprentice
​

This was the plan.

Aircraft, weather balloons, drones, low orbit satellites, flyers. Anything and everyone in the air was at risk. Airspace had to be as clear as possible over New Delhi, or rather over India, as quickly as possible. Mid-sentence, Legend bolted from the tent in a flash of yellow before Alexandria could even twitch in that direction. Within the next thirty seconds, the leader of the Protectorate would receive the provisional authority to order aircraft to make emergency landings from India's government.

"That should have been your first priority." Alexandria's voice was clipped. "As soon as you realized what the Simurgh was planning."

I vented a bit of my frustration into the ocean. It was. Who is flying near a city the Simurgh is attacking?

"And the rest are only a concern if your plan gets the green light." Eidolon came to my defense. "Otherwise, it would just invite widespread confusion."

And possibly alert the Simurgh that we knew something she didn't.

Low end estimate, fifteen minutes to storm event horizon. On the high end, twenty-five to thirty. Even as I said it, I knew that wasn't a huge variance in time. It didn't give anyone much time to do much of anything at all. If I could have figured out the Simurgh's plan sooner, seen more then maybe. But I didn't, so I had to make do with what I had. If Alexandria was going to keep getting on my case for could have's, should have's, would have's?

I was just going to stop telling her things she didn't absolutely need to know. It was not helping.

I guess all it really took for the shine of hero worship to fade was said hero going out of their way to be an ass.

You are still affected by power granting effects, right? I asked Eidolon. I was reasonably sure he was, but there were some irregularities. I would rather ask now and get confirmation, then assume that was the case and be disappointed later.

He nodded curtly. I could feel his emotions buoying slightly in anticipation.

The amount of time we have is dependent on how much you can give the Simurgh a run for her money.

"Just me?" He clarified.

I didn't need to see his face to know there was a small smile on it.

You have been singlehandedly credited with driving off the Endbringers over twelve times, and integral to joint efforts of at least ten more.

"Endbringers that have been purposely holding back," said Alexandria, as if it was her personal duty to hold a pin to Eidolon's ego.

I don't idly flatter people.

Endbringers that have in every single appearance, since Behemoth's debut in Iran, tailored their responses to Eidolon specifically.

It took a moment to sink in.

"Why…" Eidolon shifted as he warred with the impulse to reach for a Thinker power.

Alexandria's eyes widened slightly before the thinning of her lips told me that she had decided against commenting. Legend would not have been so reserved. The tangent might not have lasted long, but it would raise more questions than answers right now with an equal chance of me coming across like I always knew more than I was telling. Which was true, but in a way that left a bad, untrustworthy impression. That was why he was not here. I was telepathic. When it came down to it, I could have done what he was doing now and probably faster too. I didn't need a radio.

Not significantly faster. Whatever time I saved speaking to pilots directly would have been lost negotiating why a complete unknown was ordering people out of the sky.

The Simurgh can't see you.

"You're certain about that?" Alexandria said with a sharp inhale.

Very. The nature of his powers obscures him from her precognition. But… I paused just to make sure my words had extra impact. I think she has postcognition as well. And you didn't always have powers.

Both members of the Triumvirate tensed in their own way.

I get it. I really did. No one would like the idea that the fucking Simurgh was looking into the worst day of your life.

She has a good idea of how you think, how you would react, how you would prioritize. So if we want to throw her off as much as possible?

"I need to change things up," Eidolon said with another curt nod. "Instead of my own power, use the powers of other Trumps?"

Use your own powers too, but change them as frequently as you can. That would be the exact opposite of how you usually operate.

"If she can't see you, then that changes everything – "

"I know." Eidolon shifted his hands in the long sleeves of his costume. "I can…avoid engaging head on, focus on running interference. Hit hard, hit fast, relocate." I could see his personal future shifting as he prepared to alter the powers he had. "Should I try to destroy the device?"

I bit my lip. Or the projection of my lip.

You can try. She will make another. I didn't need to say 'and kill more people to do it.' We do not gain much from stalling too long.

We gained nothing at all. New Delhi had already been condemned for quarantine. There were very few ways to come back from that and every path needed influence, experience and time that I just didn't have. All it would do is increase the chance of Leviathan and Behemoth interfering.

Eidolon and Alexandria exchanged looks.

"Organize the brutes," Eidolon said.

"Gathering the Trumps and Tinkers?" Alexandria asked without an expecting an answer.

Eidolon inclined his head slightly before turning to me. "She can't see you either, can she?"

I smiled humorlessly. If she's just pretending she can't, we're fucked. I rushed my next words to preempt Alexandria. The Endbringers are not human. They don't think like humans. They don't feel like humans. I can see in broad strokes what they are doing. I am missing half the input that would tell me why.

"But can you contribute?" Eidolon pressed. "The more advantages we have – "

We what? I cut him off. Win?

He winced. "Regardless, if we can make this as…smooth and painless as possible, with as few casualties as we can manage, I'll take it."

Beyond this point, until the storm, I was functionally useless. I could talk to people, but that was redundant. Radios, personal communication systems covered that niche well enough already. My precognition was only getting more and more muddled the closer to the storm we came, and worse, looking hurt. I couldn't see any more. I had only one shot at physically using my powers. I wasn't about to tell anyone how much that one effort was going to cost me either.

Even I wasn't sure. I couldn't dwell on it.

I smiled anyway.

I'll do what I can.

I could feel him smile back, and in the next instant, teleported away.
_____________

I stopped Alexandria just outside the tent. Look, there's something I need to –

She cut me off. "Do nothing."

I didn't quite snarl. What is your problem with me? What do you want from me? Do you want a press release where I can say I'm sorry? I'll do it.

That was a lie.

Admitting something like that to the world at large would make a pariah. Forget high school drama and politics, being alienated at Winslow High would be nothing like not being welcome anywhere. The amount of good I could do with my powers might as well be tossed out the back door. The only people that wouldn't distrust anything I said or did would be Endbringer worshippers, and they were not people anyone in their right mind would associate with.

If that was what Alexandria wanted, to just take being a hero away from me just so people knew who to hate, wouldn't I be morally obligated to not do something so counterproductive?

"I don't have a problem with you."

Try again.

The woman shrugged. "The feeling is temporary. This entire situation is…frustrating and could have been handled better." She held up a hand to stop me from interjecting. "There are very few situations you can't say that of. I can get over it."

She was telling the truth, or what she thought was the truth. That sapped enough of my ire to let me take a step back.

Is this where you try to convince me you were just playing Devil's Advocate back there?

I could see her raise an eyebrow through the dark faceplate of her helmet. "Disagreeing with you doesn't make me an enemy."

I know that.

Alexandria made a considering noise before dropping the subject. "By how much does your involvement make it more likely the other Endbringers respond?"

That was a leading question.

It is just as likely they don't respond at all.

"Uncertain then," she said, picking up on my word choice. At this rate, this woman was going to make me prejudiced against working with other Thinkers. I could tell Alexandria was thinking over her words carefully. Not in the way she usually picked out the words she was going to say, but deliberately attempting to craft a message of some kind.

"If there is one thing I've learned, it's that chasing the small percentage of might, could, maybe will result in a lot of failures. You will often make things worse."

This was coming from someone who couldn't see just how desolated India would have become. She didn't know exactly how many lives were ruined, how many families were going to break with the quarantine, how many people were going to just fall apart under the stress. Alexandria couldn't feel the sudden emptiness left behind when people died.

You should tell me more of what you've learned later, and how relevant it is, I said. Or we can start with why Scion doesn't like you.

Alexandria stilled. "Will that be a problem?"

I…don't know. I don't think so.

"You don't think so?" She just about hissed.

I hated this. I hated the uncertainty. I hated the uneasiness that was churning in my stomach. I hated the sick, acid tinge poisoning the ocean around me. I hated seeing the Simurgh. I hated this rain. I hated not seeing. I hated not knowing. I was dreading having to just sit here and wait for the Hail Mary.

I hated losing.

World ending? No. Our collateral disaster cap is irradiated India. There is a lot of room for error. In the future, it might be. When? I couldn't say. Not now. But if he's agitated? Give him space.

For a moment, the darkly dressed heroine didn't say anything. "You sound like you won't be there."

The storm is our best bet, I said instead. And it's not safe. You will know as soon as it happens. I'm not saying it will happen, alright, but if it does?

If it does, then there was something very wrong with my powers.

Focus on the big one first.

 

[Shujin]

In Aeturnum​

'[ – move is precisely controlled, isn't paying attention, usually doesn't, power is doing it for her. Power is precise, perfectly accurate. Doesn't make mistakes, can't make mistakes –] '

Yeah, not helpful. She moved her eyes and caught on the pacing man spinning a pen about his index finger.

'[Perfect geometric circle, movements according to the golden ratio 1.61803398875 –] '

She ripped her eyes to the ceiling.

'[Stress fractures on beams, poor construction not tolerated, stress related to age, external factors –]'

She thrust her hand in the air like she was sitting in the math class she hadn't gone to in two years. "Question."

The pen made a meaty thwack against Number Man's palm in the sudden silence. She was not a self-conscious person. It was hard to be self-conscious when everyone else's problem of self-consciousness picked up a signal horn and red flags the moment she looked at them hard enough. Still. She felt that cold prickle up her spine. She was looking at the ceiling with her hand in the air, and people were looking at her.

People with body counts in the double digits at least.

They were listening, so she had to continue. "Why New Delhi?"

She let her eyes fall from the ceiling just enough to see the Number Man's dull grey eyes behind thin frame glasses flick over to the right with an oddly bemused smile on his face. Evil conspiracy super accountant was dressed like one in a dark business suit and fractal patterns on his tie.

"I was under the impression Tattletale had been briefed," he said.

"She was," Contessa answered.

"I'm not talking about the obvious," Tattletale defended herself. "Ziz primed New Delhi for bad shit to go down, Farseer interfered. I know that. What I mean is why New Delhi? Look at this," she swept a hand out. "Facility's roof collapses in or something and bam," she slapped her palm on the table and internally winced. Bomb, she meant to say bomb. There were two other floors above them, roof would have to do a whole lot more than collapse to get them all.

Dumb ass power, she didn't need to know about fucking ceiling stress.

"There goes a group of literally strongest thinkers on the planet."

"Tattletale paying me a compliment," Thomas Calvert's voice filtered through the speakers. On the screen he was still lying prone on the gurney. A blindfold covered his eyes and he had a white knuckled grip on a pale teenage boy's hand. The boy had flat skin flaps over where his eyes should have been and his other hand gripped the hand of a third male, early twenties. She had never heard them speak. "Should mark it on the calendar."

Says the man having limp dick wet dreams about what he could do with Contessa's power.

"She was hovering over Brockton before this, right? What's special about New Delhi? How many people is it, couple hundred thousand?"

"Twenty-one point seven five million," the Number Man said.

"Huh," Tattletale replied. "No shit?"

"It breaks the pattern Farseer observed," Contessa mused. She sat on the other side of the table with one leg over the other. Like Number Man, she could fit into any urban scene around the world. Dark pants and blood red loose turtleneck shirt simultaneously striking and mundane.

"This attack does," the Number Man confirmed as he moved back towards the white board flipping his pen across his knuckles. "But then, this attacks breaks the pattern for all of them."

'[Leviathan and Behemoth present, not visible. Endbringers are being deceptive. Maintaining illusion New Delhi is a standard attack. Acted in response to Farseer. Acted in response to Farseer's interference in New Delhi. Could have been Behemoth or Leviathan. Chose Simurgh. Simurgh chose herself. Wanted a result.]'

"She wants the city quarantined," Tattletale muttered. "That's why it isn't Behemoth or Leviathan."

'[Wanted a certain result.]'

"Quarantined, not destroyed."

Contessa drummed her fingers on the table exactly once. "She thinks the situation in New Delhi is salvageable, or will be salvageable. Not that time sensitive, but requires control. Important?"

"She only needs to run out the clock on condemning the city," the Number Man pointed out. "Not a second more. Why is she staying?"

"The device," Coil interjected. "It builds it in every timeline. No deviation. Destroy it, it builds another." The thin man in blue sweats gingerly shifted his pillow. He was careful not to lose his grip on the boy's hand. He raised his free arm and lazily rotated a finger in the air. "I'll add 'in less pleasant ways.'"

'[Unexpectedly complacent with new circumstances. Needs control, lost it. Needs power, lost it. Can't escape new arrangement. Concerned. Hiding it. Convinced to cooperate, offered -]'

Not now.

'[Device not intended to destroy city. Device is important. Building device because of Farseer. Device is for Farseer.]'

If it's for Farseer then why is she building it in New Delhi and not right on top of Brockton Bay?

Why New Delhi?

'[Device is for Farseer. Device will affect Farseer.]'

"I'm drawing a blank," Tattletale admitted reluctantly. "Did she do something like this before? Against other Thinkers? Against Contessa?"

"No," the woman said.

"Not exactly," Number Man said at the same time.

Their eyes met. Contessa raised an eyebrow questioningly and Number Man shrugged one shoulder as he started to spin his fucking pen again.

"Madison," he said.

"Woah, wait." Tattletale held up both hands. "What about Madison?"

'[Wanted a certain result.]'

It hadn't mattered that Wisconsin was nearly the very definition of bumfuck nowhere with only two cities worth anything. One had Elvis Presley's motorcycle and the other one had a shitty football team, but it was still America. The Simurgh could have picked an Amish settlement in Wherever, Utah, and it still would have rocked everyone. If Madison hadn't been on the map before, it was now.

As the largest insane asylum on American soil.

"We were relatively close to a breakthrough on the formulas," the Number Man began. "Strength and stability. We had a fair number of successes." One side of his mouth tugged. "She took it."

"Took it," Tattletale repeated. "How?"

"A replica of Professor Haywire's technology, the very same device that had originally brought us into contact with Earth Aleph. She built and used it in Madison. The reports of monsters were a slight exaggeration. One of the dimensional breaches was in our holding cells." He shrugged again with a slightly frustrated air. "The research database and backups were wiped. Cases of stable formulas missing. Subjects that provided key insights set loose. She took it."

Tattletale looked over at Contessa. "She knows?"

The woman inclined her head. "So it seems."

That doesn't make any sense. Or it made sense, but not the right kind of sense. And she needed to think about the sense it did make, because if she didn't, she was going to be thinking about how even on another Earth, none of them were actually safe.

"That's it?" Tattletale licked her lips. "She didn't kill you. She didn't even attack you, she just – she just lost your paperwork?"

'[Simurgh moved against Cauldron. Directly interfered. Why Madison? Quarantined city, Cauldron members not physically present. Cauldron had no investment in Madison. Madison chosen for a reason. Reason unrelated to Cauldron. Two birds one stone. Madison chosen. Responds to Thinkers. Thinker in Madison?]'

But Ziz had started screaming over Brockton Bay.

'[Target was Farseer. Farseer is a threat. Attacks neutralize threats. Cauldron hindered. Not neutralized. Simurgh does not neutralize threats.]'

And Madison had been a normal Endbringer attack. No Behemoth, no Leviathan. And this attack was sudden. Unorganized almost. Why start over Brockton Bay, then up and leave to the other side of the world?

Change of plans?

'[Farseer more of a threat than Cauldron.]'

" – don't know if the Simurgh can actually see you, or if she's seeing around you," the Number Man was saying. "A hard thing to determine, for obvious reasons."

"Scion has been our primary focus since inception," Contessa said evenly. "We decided there was no use in splitting focus to counter a threat the world was already aware of. The inherent overlap in our solutions would have had to suffice."

Leviathan could have attacked Brockton Bay instead, she realized. The Endbringers were either communicating somehow or just conspicuously had the exact same goals as one another. Leviathan could have entered the bay and attacked the city to literally drown Farseer.

Instead the Simurgh descended. Screamed. Stopped and flew the fuck off to New Delhi.

'[Farseer is a threat.]'

Jesus H. Fucking Christ Hebert, you scared Ziz shitless.

" – be able to get more information if Scion shows up."

"Repeat that," Tattletale snapped out.

Calvert had sat up. The blindfold was pulled up, revealing bloodshot and unfocused eyes. His pupils were too big for the brightly lit room, because he wasn't using his eyes to see anymore. Being physically blind didn't seem to matter to Clairvoyant or anyone he gave his sight to, but the disconnect was two bitches and a half.

She knew that from personal experience.

"Farseer intends to create a storm over the city to lure Scion to it," Coil said patiently. He paused. "Paraphrasing from half a conversation. Can't hear her projection. The Triumvirate believes it will work, enough to let her try."

"And he's what? Going to chase three Endbringers away?"

"Yes," Number Man said.

"Right." Tattletale pinched the bridge of her nose. "Because there is no problem with relying on the alien god that wants to kill us all for goddamn super heroics. Don't know how I forgot."

Her life had gotten really fucking absurd since that storm over Winslow High.

'[Taylor Hebert is Farseer. Bullied. Isolated, low self-esteem. Mother died in car accident. Low trust in authority.]'

"We have a distinct lack of good options." Number Man caught his spinning pen. "At this time, Farseer is not expendable."

Implying that other people were expendable, and leaving open the possibility that Hebert would become more trouble than she was worth. Here was a guy who really knew how to make a girl feel appreciated.

"I can't be the only one who saw this coming." Tattletale's left hand hunted for her water bottle. "Come on, bullied highschooler. Powers to self-esteem is like Viagra to old men with trophy wives, and she got good powers."

Contessa's dark eyes looked down for a moment.

Tattletale stopped, water bottle to her lips. "I wasn't the only one who saw this coming," she said. "You people."

"I ran the numbers," Number Man said. "Sooner is better. More time for us to act on new information, less time for externalities to become acclimated. The response was outside the margins of error."

"So the numbers were wrong."

"Yes," Contessa said.

"And that's good." He turned back to the white board. "We want to know just how wrong we are. The Endbringers just played a card we did not know they had. If Scion does respond to Farseer, the implications are huge."

Thinking about Scion wasn't quite an exercise in futility, but it was damn near close enough. Golden Boy was the very definition of a black box. There just wasn't enough information. He vanished off the face of the Earth at the drop of a hat, didn't talk to anyone, hung around in the Atlantic and spooked the hell out of everyone who's ever met him.

That wasn't because of bad PR. He just didn't care much about people. Like a bad penny, he followed disasters. Why?

Fuck if anyone knows.

She cast her eyes over the whiteboard. "Scion does fight the Endbringers though. Sometimes."

"Less damage, fewer injured, fewer deaths, shortest attacks when he does," Number Man confirmed.

"That's just it." Tattletale sprang out of her chair to the front. She snatched up one of the markers out of nervous energy. She underlined one of Farseer's quotes on the board. "They escalate on Eidolon. They escalated on Farseer." And others. Moscow, Kyushu, Newfoundland. "Scion? They don't even try."

'[Endbringers avoidant of Scion. Caution means uncertainty. Fear. Endbringers are aware of threats. Endbringers move against threats. Scion is a threat to the Endbringers. Endbringers know Scion is a threat. Simurgh knows Scion is a threat. Endbringers know Scion is a threat.

Cauldron knows Scion is a threat. Simurgh attacked Cauldron; attacks neutralize threats. Cauldron not neutralized. Simurgh does not neutralize threats. Simurgh moved against Farseer. Simurgh does neutralize threats. Cauldron not a threat. Cauldron is an asset.]'

Her mouth dropped open.

"Fuck me," she breathed.

'[Farseer is a threat. Farseer aware of Endbringers, aware of Scion. Farseer knows she is a threat.]'

"Eidolon is re-engaging the Simurgh," Coil reported with a thousand yard stare fixated on the corner of the metal table.

"End timeline," Contessa ordered. "Split."

"Uh, guys?" Tattletale began.

'[Farseer is a threat; knows. Farseer is a threat to everyone; knows. Provoked Endbringers unintentionally. Isolated, low self-esteem. Desperate. Farseer knows she is a threat to everyone. Won't be a threat.

Refuses to be a threat.]'

Something cold settled in the pit of her stomach.

"Someone needs to check on Farseer," Tattletale said. "Someone needs to check on her right the fuck now."

On the screen, Coil stilled. "I believe Farseer is going to require medical attention. Soon."

Number Man jumped, as if stung. "Attacked?"

"Possible," her ex-boss allowed. "I do not see anyone on site. Injuries do not match any parahuman I know of in the Bay." He paused. "Her power does not seem to be Manton-limited. In any direction."

Self-harm.

"I'm going," Tattletale informed the room. "Door me to that street."

"Door me to my hotel room," Number Man said. The window in space opened in front of the blond man who wasted no time in going through.

Tattletale grit her teeth as she met Contessa's gaze. The woman's stare was evaluating.

'[Knows me perfectly. Doesn't make mistakes, can't make mistakes. Power is perfectly accurate. Power limited. Doesn't know outcome, can't know outcome. Has to guess.]'

"Door her."

The rip in space opened and she went through. There was a slight drop before her sneakers hit the pavement. A cold winter wind was blowing hard. The street lights were flickering. Some were dead and sparking, others were just unsteady. Most of the houses on this street had been hastily abandoned. Some ran from the Simurgh to shelters or out of town, some ran from someone else. There was a thick frost on the lawns.

'[Not cold or wet enough for this much frost. Caused by powers. Caused by Farseer's powers.]'

The Hebert house was lit up like it was in front of a high-powered work light.

Taylor Hebert was that high-powered work light.

The elf was floating limply, an aura of white-purple lightning snapped and crackled around her and shone from her eye sockets. Eye sockets that were bleeding, thick pulpy blood in streams that merged with the blood seeping from glowing lacerations in her skin. The edges of the wounds were charred.

She'd been standing there, gaping for maybe ten seconds before Farseer noticed her.

Why are you here?

Holy shit she's telepathic.

The voice in her head sounded tired.

I don't need your help, Sarah. Farse – Taylor, said stiffly.

"Well," Tattletale said grimly as she shifted to look up at the Hebert house. Danny Hebert had a file. There was no way he'd let his daughter do this to herself if he knew.

"I kind of disagree."

 

[Shujin]

Tattletale cast her eyes over the Hebert home. It was an older building, 40, 50 years old with the signs of wear and tear all homes that age had at one point. The paint was peeling off the rotting windowsills. Too many windows for a single income family in Brockton Bay to afford replacing. The copper coated roof over a small bay window was oxidized green under the gutter's water trail and one of the wooden steps in front of the door needed fixing. Garage was filled with junk, so the truck was parked outside. Badly dented mailbox; someone had taken a baseball bat to it.

'[Danny Hebert, grieving widower, depressed. Problem avoidant, garage is filled with dead wife's things. Old family things. Unused sporting equipment, tools for house projects, old books.]'

It was the little things, both old and new that told her what she needed to know. Like that truck with the BAYU REP license plate's frequent presence in the PRT's parking lot around 5:35 pm every day. Old Dodge pickups were a dime a dozen, Bay Union Representative vanity plates weren't.

It took fifteen minutes to drive from the Dockworker's Union building to the PRT, the DU let out at 5 pm sharp. Danny Hebert forgot his home and threw himself into work. Fifteen minutes would be spent sitting in the car in the parking lot on his cell phone, not going anywhere.

His wife died in a car accident while on the phone, see?

'[Emotional, invested, irrational. Endbringer alarms went off less than an hour ago. Should still be awake, isn't. Went to sleep. Made to go to sleep.]'

I don't need your pity either, Taylor said.

"That what you think this is? Pity?"

Taylor's lips curled into this gently amused smile. I could have said that I don't need your self-serving hypocritical sympathy, but I was trying to be nice.

Ouch.

"You know," After a moment of deliberation, Tattletale plopped her butt down on the curb by the Hebert's mailbox. She could afford to get these pants dirty, but she was really starting to wish that she had thought to bring a coat. "Usually people are happy when someone cares about them hurting themselves."

And what was Taylor Hebert to you before you saw her picture on TV?

Tattletale's eyes did cartwheels. "Seriously? Blaming someone for not being omniscient is a bit much."

An insecure, low self-esteem woman with an eating disorder works in a clothing store. I am blaming you for deciding to twist the knife just to make yourself feel better.

That – Okay.

She remembered that.

The boy in the wheelchair. The alcoholic at the bus stop. The couple in the supermarket. The woman –

"I get it." She idly ran a hand through her blonde hair. The sigh she let out was exasperated. If she had to think back and consider things, she thought she might do it differently. At the start when she left home, she hadn't been in the best frame of mind. She could admit that. A lot of bitterness there. Some things she said, she regretted.

'[Low self-esteem, isolated, bullied. Farseer does not like bullies. Farseer possess post-cognition. Past behavior counter-productive here.]'

"I get it," she said again. Quieter.

Sarah, Taylor's telepathic voice sighed. You've always gotten it. That's the problem.

"It's Lisa," she interjected. "Lisa Wilbourn. Not Sarah."

She could have just dumped the last name. Sarah was a common enough name. But same first name and similar appearance? That would have raised questions. She could have changed appearance too, different haircuts to shape the face, dyed her hair another color. Darker color. She could have kept the name.

She hadn't wanted to keep anything. A clean break.

And yet Lisa Wilbourn is the one mourning Sarah Livsey's brother.

Tattletale's head rocked back in shock, eyes wide.

Yes, Taylor said softly. That is exactly how it feels when you do it to others. It's not clean, and it's not pretty. The sharp smell of ozone assaulted Tattletale's nose. I think you should leave now.

In response, she buried her hands in the crease between her stomach and her knees. "So were you always this much of a bitch or is it a rec – Jesus!"

Taylor had opened her eyes.

Behind the eyelids, the eyeballs were gone. Something she could only expect with how much blood was making the tracks down her face, but seeing it directly was something else. Instead there were orbs of bluish white lightning where the eyes would be, sitting atop a thin layer of ash. Tattletale felt like every part of her was cringing. Her stomach rolled.

Taylor's smile had a cruel edge. It's not as bad as it looks.

"It looks pretty fucking bad."

She had to look away. Just for a second. Get her bearings back. She wiggled her toes. They were going numb.

'[Does not think of injuries as something to get help for. Injuries are to be endured. Can fall apart later. Not just suicidal. Martyr. Low self-esteem, but prideful. Bad combination.]'

She bit her lip.

This wasn't helping. She wasn't helping. She needed more information, leverage. She needed to take a minute and think about how she was going to talk a super powered teenager into the idea that they were wrong. That dying wasn't worth it.

'[Danny Hebert, depressed, irrational. Annette Hebert died in car accident. Taylor loves her parents.]'

No.

She wasn't going to use that.

A headache bloomed in her temples. A bit of nausea crept up her throat as her face tingled. The air seemed colder. The symptoms were familiar, a random piece of trivia lodged in her brain.

'[Barometric migraine symptoms. Severe air pressure drop. No thundercloud, no storm. Farseer is causing a localized air pressure drop.]'

Tattletale read about things. Beyond just getting her GED, she had to. The more symptoms, the more causes, the more disorders and motives and vices she knew, the easier it was to see it in others.

Taylor's floating body tensed, curling up in a reflexive defensive movement. Her hands reached out like she was trying to push something away. Something big. Icy patterns spread across the pavement underneath her. All the lights on the street went out. The smell of ozone became rotten eggs. A shadow of a thing superimposed on Taylor's face for a moment before it cleared, and Farseer relaxed.

You are distracting me, Taylor said.

"And you are going to get yourself killed," Tattletale replied.

A risk I'm willing to take.

"It's a fucking stupid risk to take. Think that's the only thing at fucking risk here?" A thought occurred to her. Tattletale had walked out of Doormaker's portal onto the middle of the street. Not dressed for the weather. No obvious mode of transportation. For a super Thinker, Farseer should have noticed. Clairvoyance, empathy, pre-cognition, actual honest to god telepathy? Fuck. Should have commented on it if she knew.

Farseer wasn't like Contessa. Tattletale could almost smell the vulnerability. "You don't actually know why I'm here, do you? You're just guessing."

You're here to sand the rough edges of guilt off, make yourself feel better. It's what you do when you think someone is suicidal.

"Because it's fucking stupid!" Tattletale barked a harsh, grating laugh. "You know what I see? Someone who's trying really hard not to think. It's not like we have no one else who can see the Endbringers. It's not like the world is massive, stinking shithole someone with global fucking reach on their fucking powers could do something with. It's not like Cau – the Protectorate isn't honestly starting to believe that a certain someone could be the best chance to save everyone instead of just some that anyone's had in a long fucking time."

Taylor's brow furrowed.

It would take too long to explain.

"Don't need to. This is you feeling sorry for yourself." '[Hypocrite.]' "This is you deciding that you had all the answers when you know you don't. This isn't a risk you want to take because it's necessary. It's a risk you want to take because it means you don't have to face your fuck ups."

She already knew what she was about to say was going too far.

"This is you being just as stupid as Emma said you were."

Something stole the air from Tattletale's lungs. She choked. She tried to breathe in but her lungs wouldn't inflate. She was seeing spots in her vision by the time the pressure cleared.

She coughed. Lightheaded and dizzy. A headache was still drilling into her temples. She wasn't Number Man. Or Contessa. She was a Thinker with no direct combat applications. Vulnerable. That wasn't something she liked being reminded of. And she thought, keep talking.

Keep talking.

"Cause that's what's left, right?" She rasped. She grabbed a handful of frost off the Hebert's front lawn and pressed it to her head. Let it melt down her face. "After New Delhi and the Endbringers, after the quarantine and survivors come back, that's what's left. You fucked up. And everyone knows."

Taylor didn't respond. Her eyes were closed again, leaving a seemingly unconscious elf floating in the street. The puddle of red underneath her was spreading along the black ice.

"And it isn't even the first one. Plane crashed, other missing. There's guilt for that. You put a team of PRT troopers in solitary confinement. You fucked the city over, again. You don't know what you did to Sophia. You haven't thought about it cause if you did, you'd know. You've been fucking up ever since you came out of your fucking locker, right?" She waved a hand at the Hebert home. "Before the locker. The last time you weren't a fuck up was years ago."

Saying that stung a bit. Word association. She said something like that before she left home. She couldn't remember the last time her family wasn't a fuck up.

"So you decide you have to do it. You have to fix things. And you've got to stop yourself, 'cause you went from fucking over four hundred plus in that plane and now you're at twenty one point seven five million. You've got to stop. And if the Protectorate can't or won't stop you, then you will."

Her throat was dry. Her toes were completely numb now and the wet had soaked through her pants. The curb was not a comfortable place to sit.

"Have I gotten warm yet?"

Taylor didn't say anything. That was fine. She expected that. Taylor Hebert was not the kind of person that easily conceded a point. But she was a Thinker. Not saying anything was pretty much conceding the point.

In the distance, she heard the wail of a siren.

'[PRT squad cars, van en route. Breaking speed limits. Number Man warned them.]'

I don't know how to stop, Taylor's voice whispered.

"You have to trust someone." Because Tattletale had spent a lot of time thinking after her brother shot himself. Every missed implication, every wasted opportunity, every ignored sign jumping up and down screaming help me was there. Hindsight was 20/20, right?

And Thinkers could see better than most.

"Not your Dad." She knew that wasn't going to work. "But you're Farseer. You could go to any team you wanted. You could ask Myrrdin, or Chevalier, or Alexandria. You could go to New York, and knock on Legend's door if you wanted."

They aren't going to want me after this. I wouldn't want me. I'm a walking liability –

"Shut up." Tattletale snapped. "Are you telling me what you think or what you know?"

There was no answer.

"Do you think we aren't all fuck ups? Do you know the utter shit people go through to trigger? Do you know mine?"

Farseer had post-cognition. That was just asking for the other girl to look, but that didn't matter. Lisa Wilbourn had made peace with it a long time ago.

"They're heroes. They get over it. They learn to live with it. They try to do better. That's what they do." Listen to me, she thought. Giving the heroes a recommendation. She meant it though. Most didn't live up to that. Most couldn't, that was just how things worked.

But some did.

That was just how things worked. Call it the human condition.

When did her opinion change?

The day she went to the kitchen for morning coffee, and Contessa was sitting on the couch with a pot already brewed.

"You can read minds, right? You've got everything." She ran a wet hand through her hair. "You can find out. You can find out who to trust. But you need – "

The light from the glowing oval on Taylor's chest intensified as she breathed in deep. The way everyone was always saying how to do it. In through the nose.

" – someone."

And a white mist billowed out from the mouth.

The roiling cloud touched the blood on the street and gained a reddish tint. The mist solidified quickly. First, it was a silhouette of someone tall and very thin holding something like a staff, or a spear. The details filled in quickly. Loose pale red clothing with dark tribal designs running the hems of its pants and singular sleeve. A triangular winged design dominated the front above a wide sash. Tattoos of a red snake curled up the neck and under the eyes. Pale hair swept up and back. It was partially transparent, with washed out colors and faded form. Like a ghost.

The projection '[Not a projection.]' took in its surrounding methodically. The recognition reflex, the tendency for human beings to focus on other people, on faces was missing. Its gaze lingered on the battered mailbox as it barely noticed Tattletale.

'[Not human. Not a projection.]'

Not being noticed was good. She didn't want to be noticed. She read the report from Number Man about the thing made of teeth that crashed his party. Just because Taylor made this one didn't mean it was safe.

It didn't feel safe.

'[Not human. Not a projection.]'

Once it satisfied its curiosity? Caution?

'[Threat assessment.]'

Threat assessment, it turned to its creator. Tattletale couldn't tell exactly what emotion had appeared on its face just then. The angle was wrong. The shape of the face was wrong. And whatever it had been, it had vanished just as quickly.

It extended a hand. Hesitated. '[Fear. Caution. Disgust. Relief. Irritation. Fear. Relief. Grief. Relief. Fear.]'

It closed the gap and settled the hand on Taylor's shoulder.

Nothing happened.

Tattletale let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding. "When I said find someone, I meant find someone. That's cheating."

There was no response. She waited until her ass was thoroughly numb and the sirens of the PRT sounded like they were just a block a way. Her window of time had run out. She thought about asking for a Door. Beat it before the redshirts of bureaucracy showed up. She stood up and looked up at the Hebert house.

Danny was still asleep.

Tattletale frowned, already annoyed with herself. "Fuck it," she muttered.

She marched up to the front door and banged as hard as she could. Doorbell was broken. It took a couple more banging before she saw one of the windows light up. About a minute later, the door was opening.

Danny Hebert looked at her with the annoyed confusion of 'Do you know what time it is?' Then looked past her. His mouth dropped open as he threw open the door and brushed past her.

"Taylor? Oh god. Oh god please."

When the projection leveled its spear at him, to keep him away, she could hear his confused, desperate attempts to get Taylor's attention. To get a response. To get something. It provoked a painful twinge in Tattletale's chest.

Danny Hebert was still yelling at it when the PRT rolled in.

_______________​

"Name?" The PRT trooper asked curtly.

"Lisa Wilbourn," Tattletale said with a hint of a grin. Not too much of one, or people would get suspicious. But a small one? People react to uncertainty and fear in different ways, after all.

"Place of residence?"

"Just five houses down." She pointed at the nearest home still being occupied by its owners. The neighbors had cleared out. The neighbors' neighbors had booked it. It was a bald-faced lie, but not one that was going to catch her anytime soon. The PRT could paper push with the best of them and Farseer was right there having a little crisis of her own.

He wasn't going to actually check.

They blocked the road off with squad cars and their red and blue flashers. They were setting up a police cordon now, and not just to keep out curious bystanders. It was for them with overly generous margins that would place anyone well beyond the reach of that ghostly spear.

"I could see the light, right? And I know the Heberts, that they lived on my street and we didn't go to the same school, but I saw the news." She spoke quickly, as if she was nervous. Worried she'd be in trouble. "I woke Mr. Hebert because, she doesn't look like she's doing okay."

The trooper's head bobbed as he scribbled in the comment box. "You did the right thing, Miss Wilbourn. Don't worry, help is here."

Tattletale nodded, and turned away so he couldn't see her smile turn.

Yeah. Help.

The bullied, isolated teenage girl with super powers.

She wasn't the only one who saw this coming.

" – actually can't, ma'am," one of the troopers by the van was saying into his company issued cellphone. "Literally can't without engaging. Farseer's got some kind of Crusader ghost bodyguard right now. It's not letting anyone close."

'[Not human. Not a projection.]'

Tattletale watched it from the trunk of a PRT squad car. Something about it kept drawing her eyes. It was alien in a way Taylor wasn't. It didn't respond like it should or move like it should or even feel like it should. It felt like a cold prickle on the skin. Its very existence made her want to shy away. It was like –

It was like looking at Contessa.

'[Can't win. Can't run.]'

It was focused on something in the distance. East. Towards India? To New Delhi? Tattletale's ears popped painfully as the air pressure buoyed. The ice on the ground spread further, faster. The projection was shifting. Slight, very slight movements that were nearly swallowed whole by the clothes it was wearing. It was tensing. Conversation among the troopers were petering out. Stopping mid-sentence as everyone's hind brain sat up and started paying attention.

It's fear, Tattletale thought. The projection '[Not human. Not a projection]' was triggering a kind of instinctive fear.

The air hummed.

The projection shook its head, a tiny movement accompanied the small clenching of the pale hand on Taylor's shoulder.

'[Not yet. Not yet.]'

"Taylor?" Danny whispered and it carried.

'[Not yet. Not yet. Not yet.]'

"Mr. Hebert," Farseer's handler, the only plain clothes officer there, cautiously called out. "You might want to move back. Danny?"

'[Soon.]'

"Danny? Mr. Hebert!"

'[Soon.]'

When it opened its mouth, Tattletale knew what it was going to say.

'[Now.]'

A cold wind blew through Brockton Bay. Icy fingers stabbed into every spine.


The mouth of Hell opened over New Delhi.

 

[Shujin]

A/N: In my defense, work happened. Sorry folks. Update next week Monday. (I mean it! PM me if I don't!)

In Aeturnum .2​

"फिर से बोलो?" Ryan said.

He stared at her blankly for a moment, then started to turn towards Manvir before he caught himself.

"Avni. Say that again?" He half-asked with his voice rising in pitch near the end, making it sound more like a petulant demand.

"I'm not leaving," Avni Singh, the girl called Farsight repeated.

Her team was gathered underneath the dubious shelter of a parking garage. It still shuddered with the trembling ground, dripping bits of concrete that clack-clacked onto the ground amid bursts of grinding from deeper in the complex. Grinding from load bearing pillars straining, grinding from the steel cores around elevators and steel I-Beams in the ceiling. A continuous reminder that New Delhi was falling apart around them.

Ryan obsessively ran a hand through his thick dark hair every time rubble shook loose, making it clump into wet wavy lines. His synthetic gem encrusted robes had a large gash running down the shoulder. The hems and his shoes were muddy. Seeing that made some tiny, hidden part of her cringe. The part that used to gush about his perfectly styled hair, elaborate earrings and half-crown that made him look like a modern-day Mughal prince.

Talk shows loved him. Advertising, tours around India casting fantastical illusions in front of cheering crowds, even a few Bollywood movies where he could use his abilities among career actors. He played the good prince, generous, thoughtful and larger than life.

Off camera, he was a very different person. It had taken her an embarrassingly long time to realize that.

"Don't be stupid," the reedy voice of their strategist, Behar, cut in. She didn't even turn from her vigil by the garage's exit, staring out into the downpour. All of them had gotten caught in the heavy rain. Her bra and underwear were showing up under her wet, translucent blue silks, but the Kurdish model showed no sign of caring.

Avni wished she could be that confident. "I'm not being stupid."

"Wanting to stay in an angel-visited city that will be tied with a tourniquet and cut off like a rotting limb is the definition of stupid," she countered. Her dark hair splotched with the white locks grown over surgery scars was plastered to her scalp and neck. When Avni looked, she could see the blue eyes narrowed in contempt reflected off individual rain drops. In an interview last year, Raşit said the Aryan princess to Ryan's prince was the mother of the group.

The Turkmen was their civilian face. He was very good at lying with the truth.

Behar didn't mother anyone.

"Never mind that," Ryan said. "I'm responsible for you. If you stay, your father will kill me." He said it like it was a self-evident truth, the way one would say the sky was blue and the sun was out.

Avni could not say he was wrong.

"It's been too long," Manvir's deep rumble was like hearing a mountain speak. He hid half of his face underneath a dark visor. He was very tall, usually in dark armor-plated clothing that had wiry connections snaking up his neck to the visor. He was the oldest, and his stature made him hard to ignore. He went with it, openly flaunting the garam spectacle and scene of India.

"We should have left already," Behar said, tapping a pattern on the pillar beside her. The concrete rippled like water.

"Not us," Manvir was still looking straight at her. The unofficial leader of the group never rushed things. He was meticulous and pragmatic. It was his best quality, he didn't dismiss her like the others. She had a power, and he treated her like she did. It was also his worst quality. He marketed them. Illusion shows for Ryan, modeling contracts for Behar, work for the team.

Sometimes Behar's contracts were private donors and sometimes she came back with bruises. The illusion tours were loud, raucous events no one would ever remember clearly. Exhaustion, illness and injuries, some property damage and maybe a death only the local paper would report? That was just what crowded concerts were like.

Ryan's illusions weren't harmless.

He had her learn how to lip read and memorize codes and passwords. Some nights she spent staring into office buildings and reporting what she saw. Phir Sē knew Ryan and Manvir, and she was her father's daughter. She didn't ask.

"The Simurgh," he said. "It's been too long."

Avni bit her lip. "Yeah."

"Why does that even matt – " Manvir turned his head and Ryan went quiet.

"You are needed?" The Punjab giant rumbled. At her nod, his lips twitched into a smile. A knot in her stomach eased. If he wanted to, Manvir could easily stop her. He could order the others, or draw his gun and march her out of the city. But he never did anything like that before, not with Behar or Ryan or her. She felt a little ashamed she thought he would this time.

"What do we tell Phir Sē?" Ryan asked, voice tight and high. "What do we tell him? Avni wanted to stay and we let – " A thought occurred to him and he whipped his head around towards her. "How close did you get to Simurgh?" He demanded.

"It makes no difference," Manvir answered for her. "She's staying." He subvocalized something into the microphone piece hanging down from his visor, then nodded. "I expect to hear about you then."

That was a saying older than she was. It was an invitation, of a sort. It meant they hoped you were someone worth hearing about. Declaring an expectation to hear something, it was almost like wishing someone good luck.

"The sun won't shine on New Delhi after tonight," Behar murmured, still looking out into the rain. "I hope we don't."

∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞​

Behar was the only one still standing with her, looking out into the never-ending deluge of rain. The storm clouds were ominously dark and eerily silent. No lightning, no thunder. The floor of the garage was already flooded in water up to her ankles, so she sat on the hood of an abandoned car. Or as good as abandoned. The back of the sedan was crushed underneath a large chunk of concrete and steel.

"Why are you staying?" Avni asked as she spun her iron bracelet around her wrist.

"I am not staying," Behar said with a small scoff as she leaned against a crumbling concrete pillar, looking out as if she was counting the rain drops. If Avni was a camera, then Behar would remember to look at her when speaking. "I am simply not leaving yet."

"Stay too long and you'll be trapped here too," Avni tried hard to say it lightly. She would worry about the quarantine after.

This time Behar barked out a laugh. "You know me, bahana. As if I would be trapped anywhere I did not want to be!"

Avni smiled tightly. Sometimes, that slipped out. 'Bahan.' Sister. They were not sisters off camera, but sometimes that was hard to remember. There were more ways to trap people than just physically, Avni knew. Her father could rewind time itself, but he was stuck in that one minute, five years ago. Maybe even forever.

"You just want to tell me the plan is stupid."

Behar snorted. "If you are worried about that, then maybe the plan is stupid."

"I don't actually know the plan," Avni admitted cheerfully and watched her 'older sister' blink dumbly.

"Truly?"

"Mhm."

The Kurd took a moment to digest this. "I refuse to believe you are that stupid."

Avni kicked her feet and laughed weakly. There wasn't an easy way to explain faith. Not to Behar, she had already tried to explain why she wore her iron bracelet and the wooden comb in her hair. It wasn't something made of logic, or science, and it was barely tangible. It would be hard to explain her sense of …karmic debt. That she had a duty, and was morally obligated to fulfill that duty to the best of her abilities. Behar would say that was stupid. She would say that Avni can do a lot more good by being able to do it, and not locked away behind a wall. But it wasn't about making that kind of pragmatic calculation. It was about walking every step of that path, not just taking the convenient ones.

Her father would say she was being stupid too. Because he didn't believe anymore.

A blur of shadow streaking through the air outside towards them caught Avni's attention. She had enough time to slide off the car and open her mouth to warn Behar, when the street shattered. Avni choked on the warning. The blur was a person, a woman and when she stood up the symbol of a tower was on her chest.

"I'm looking for far sight," Alexandria said in passable Hindi. Through the darkly translucent pane of her helmet, Avni could pick out the false eye by the faint scarring.

That wasn't her name, but it was the literal translation of what the ghostly girl had called her. Avni stepped forward and squeezed a faint, "Me" from her throat.

Ghost girl had just gone up a few categories in her mind, and it wasn't like she started out low either.

Alexandria's eyes swept over her quickly, before shifting to the right. "And this is?"

Behar introduced herself simply. "Behar."

Avni smothered a smile. Yeah, she wouldn't have wanted to tell Alexandria to call her the Princess of Space either.

One of the most powerful women in the world, leader of a team in Los Angeles, California, nearly everyone had heard of her. The Protectorate of America had been what the Garama had imitated, in their own way. The flashy costumes, the public relations and ties to the government, just with authentic mirchi and filmi dance numbers right out of nowhere.

India wasn't alone in taking after the Americans. It was an almost universal truth. People with powers were commodities. They were force multipliers. They were highly visible. Having these gifts, using them, was an easy way to get attention, and with attention came money. With money, came influence.

That was what the costumes and uniforms were for. That was what the shows and movies and ads and silly, catchy names and color palettes were for. She could follow the noise and spectacle of those with powers around the world. Heroes. The sentai teams of Japan and individual stars such as Masamune. The state teams under Mushin in Korea. The Guild. Die Heilige Truppe. She knew the names and costumes of people from Mexico and Egypt and Australia and Russia. She knew what they believed in, what causes they fought for, who they were. Or who they wanted people to think they were.

The morally corrupt played the game too. The Nuqi. The Red Gauntlet. Moord Nag. Gesellschaft. The Yàngbăn.

On the international level, Alexandria was an aberration.

Her clothes might have worked in the spotlight, but they were a monochrome dark grey to make it as drab as possible. She let people see her face, but her helmet was dark enough to just suggest the contours and shape of it. Her dark eyes stared out from the gloom. She was on TV, but it was only when she had to be. The only cause she championed was that of her government's. Avni didn't know what the heroine's favorite movie was, like she knew Legend's. She didn't know what her favorite animal was or why, like she knew El Negro Gato's. Favorite food? Did she have any family? What made Alexandria laugh? Cry?

Hero had been philosophical and playful. Legend was bright and inspiring. Eidolon was fearsome and mysterious.

Alexandria was.

Avni didn't understand it.

"C4, you have six minutes. Be prepared to disengage, C4," Dragon said in a tinny, granulated tone that was half lost beneath the steady pitter patter of rain. Avni knew it was Dragon though, she'd recognize the voice anywhere.

"D4, standby for relief, six minutes. C5, you have thirteen minutes. Heightened alert. D6, you have two minutes, get out now. I repeat, D2, get out. Fail safes will activate in two minutes!"

Alexandria shifted from one foot to the other. "Dragon," she said. "Mute announcements on my end."

Dragon said something curtly that she didn't quite understand. It must have been either an acknowledgment or an explanation, because neither said anything more.

She wished she was better at English.

Behar understood though. "Which group are you?"

"None," Alexandria replied. Her dark eyes stared out from the gloom of her helmet like she was trying to see through Avni. "What is your power?"

"I can…" Habit made her glance in Behar's direction. Everyone knew दूरनज़र had the gift of sight. Standing on one side of a field as over 25, 50, 100 meters away someone held up randomized cards written in the smallest size for her to read for the cameras. They told very few people exactly how far, exactly how light or dark, exactly how deep, exactly how small or even exactly how fast.

"This is your choice, Avni," Behar murmured. "You don't need your hand held. Do what you want."

"I can see down to cells and up to the surface of the moon," Avni admitted. She'd been able to see much farther, much smaller and much faster than nearly everyone alive for three years now. Others would say that it was a gift to be able to be so much more than a normal person. Thirty years ago, they used to say that it was a blessing. That it was proof that she had been devout enough, righteous enough, sacrificed enough. That she had suffered enough.

It had not taken very long for people to stop saying such things.

Alexandria frowned. Frowned and closed her eyes with her head tilted back a little as if she was having a headache.

"This would be a good time to explain why we need someone with sight powers," she said in English. Behar coughed once. Avni stepped out into the deluge as a small gesture of defiance, even as her stomach froze and scrunched into a little ball. The rain drenched her immediately. The cold water finding its way down her collar and plastering her hair to her head just made her feel worse. Like she was being foolish, and silly, and should just go back inside to where she was protected.

Do nothing.

And maybe that had been some of it too. Wanting to not just see, but to do something.

She should have known. Isn't it what Ryan had been saying since she joined the team? 'You're just a girl Avni. You worry too much, Avni. What can you do, Avni? Leave it to others. You need to be safe, Avni. What would your father say?'

At the end of the day, she was just a thirteen year old girl that could see really well.

And that is exactly why I need you.

A cold feeling settled into her head, like there was ice dripping down the inside of her skull. The faint snatches of the haunting melody she heard further into the city faded in. It was different from the Simurgh's wail. Softer. Stranger. Beautiful in its own way, and terrifying in the way that it clung. She knew Behar could hear it too, by the way she stiffened, eyes going wide. A dead street light beside the garage came alive with white sparks hissing into the rain. And beneath it, the one called Farseer walked into existence.

I need you to be my eyes, she said as her own luminous green orbs burned with energy above twin blood red grooves etched into her face. As she moved forward, the centimeters of water covering the street parted, as if physically repelled by her presence. Every raindrop that would have touched her, burst into steam.

A crimson tabard alive and writhing with glowing designs lay over close fitting armor the color of a full moon. In the center of her chest, the stylized design of an eye glared out at the world.

Looking at it, at her, stung.

Avni stifled the cry as she wrenched her watering eyes away and rubbed at them. She blinked them open a few times and everything was vague. Blurry. It was as if she had stared directly into the sun and had gotten punished for it.

Close your eyes, Farseer whispered in her head. Avni squeezed them shut as hard as she could. There was a touch, like a breeze over her eyelids. The pain faded. Sorry about that.

Everything was clear again when she opened her eyes. She could see the water sloshing about her feet. She could see the small organisms in it, particles of debris and plastic. She dragged her eyes up. Behar was staring, face pale as if she'd seen a monster.

She walked to the edge of the garage's broken ceiling, a step between falling rain and falling rubble. If she reached, she could put a hand on Avni's shoulder and pull her back.

"What are you?"

Maybe Behar wasn't as good at English as she thought. Even Avni knew that the correct word was 'who.'

In her peripheral vision, Farseer inclined her head. You may call me Farseer.

"Why are we here?" Alexandria cut in, impatient.

Farseer's expression shifted to something partly amused, but mostly wry. If I had Clairvoyant, we wouldn't be.

Alexandria froze for a split second.

So instead, I'll take the next best thing.

"…You can see more than them," the heroine said, but without any heat. She sounded more cautious. Wary.

Yes, Farseer allowed. But with a lot more effort. Everything I'm doing takes effort. I'm not physically here, and that's making everything a fuck ton more difficult.

Avni's eyebrows rose. Not physically here? How was that possible? She could see the cellular makeup of the black under suit Farseer was wearing under her armor, the threads of what looked something like artificial muscle fibers but strange. She could see the thousands upon thousands of tiny channels in the armor. Every fiber of the red thread. She could see the blood cells she was bleeding.

"How much would our options have changed if you were physically present?" Alexandria demanded. "Better?"

Farseer sighed. We'd have more options. And so would she. Then she raised a hand to the bridge of her nose. And then there is what Legend is going to tell you in two seconds.

Avni silently counted to two. And right on time, there was a granulated beep from Alexandria. The woman raised a hand to the dark metal band clamped around her neck.

"Legend?"

"We've got Yàngbăn," Legend said after a short pause. Avni imagined he looked similar to how he did on the TV with a bright smile and easy laugh. He didn't quite sound like how he did on the TV. There was no smile in his voice now. The Yàngbăn were not something to smile about. "Two suicide strike teams."

That was a word she knew. Avni caught Behar's eye. 'Suicide?' she mouthed. 'Why?'

And she bent down a little, to be closer to Avni's ear. "Because of the angel," she whispered. "The Chinese do not take chances."

"They are after someone they expect will be extraordinarily difficult to subdue." Alexandria slightly turned away from them. "That, or difficult to get to. Brutes, thinkers, tinkers, shakers. On the higher end, 7 and up."

"Too much to hope that they're here to help, huh?" Legend grumbled something. "One could be a decoy while the other extracts, someone well known or well connected."

Alexandria's head shook. "The CUI do not have the Yàngbăn to waste."

And Avni knew, the CUI does not act in good faith.

Alexandria turned back just enough to look at Farseer out the corner of her eye. As if responding to some unasked question, or hidden thought, Farseer nodded.

"Dragon, can we get a surveillance on the Yàngbăn?"

"Yes," the answer came back instantly. "I have already begun moving some u -u-u-uni-i-i-i – " A loud electronic squeal assaulted Avni's eardrums. Everyone but Farseer flinched, before Alexandria pinched the band between two fingers and tore it off. It fell silent.

Something happened to Dragon, Farseer guessed.

Alexandria finished crushing the metal into a little ball and tossed it into the garage behind them. It rolled under a car. "Seems like it."

We don't need this, Farseer muttered, both hands rubbing at her temples. Alright, fine, I'll handle communication.

"For everyone?" Alexandria asked skeptically.

No, just for who needs it.

"Which is everyone."

Farseer looked at Alexandria then. No, because Farsight here is going to be seeing for all of us.

Seeing, for everyone? She had a hard time wrapping her mind around what Farseer intended for her to do. Behar's thin fingers twisted around some of the loose silk of her clothes. "What am I seeing? What am I looking for?"

"Why?" Alexandria demanded.

Farseer simply smiled a small, secretive smile.

Right, so. I figured out how to share my precognition. With everyone.

For a long moment, Alexandria said nothing. Then she closed her eyes. "Now? You figured out how to share…your precognition, with everyone?"

Yes.

"Just now?"

About three minutes ago, yes. The American teenage girl with long, dark hair and long ears shrugged one shoulder. Before you ask, yes, I had a plan five minutes ago. Yes, I needed her for a similar-ish reason. This plan is better. There was a shift in the burning green orbs, as if she had looked to the side. Someone gave me the idea and I'm going to abuse the shit out it.

Behar tugged lightly on the cloth she held. "Well Avni," she murmured. "Seems this plan of yours might not be completely stupid, after all."

Avni smiled. Her smile only weakened a little as she thought about what was to come after it was all said and done. This was New Delhi, her home forever, for better or worse.

Farseer glanced at her. The quarantine won't apply to you. She held up a hand with three fingers extended to cut off what Alexandria had been about to say. Phir Sē's her father. Yàngbăn. She's clean. The girl's lips twitched downward. If you trust me that far.

Alexandria stared Avni straight in the eyes. And she was much too off balanced to do much more than stare back. The darkly tinted helmet visor was supposed to obscure the contours and shape of the woman's face, while leaving her eyes visible. Such visibility tricks didn't work on Avni's eyes. She saw a woman of Latin or Mediterranean descent, wearing a very familiar expression.

It was the face of someone who was used to making bad decisions, because they rarely had good ones. So rarely, that sometimes, sometimes… when one was available, they didn't see it. Her father wore that expression often. Many of the Thanda she had met wore it. She could almost see the questions float through Alexandria's mind. How much will this cost? In time, in effort, in money, in lives, in reputation, in political capital. And is it worth it?

Avni hoped she was worth it.

If it makes you feel better, you might as well because you probably won't be able to hide, Farseer waved a hand in the air. My everything.

Alexandria flexed her hands open and closed. "That doesn't make me feel better."

Didn't think so. She smiled a mirthless, tight smile. Consider it?

After a moment, Alexandria nodded and Avni felt that little ball of ice in her chest melt a little. It wasn't a promise or guarantee, or even an attempt. But it wasn't a no either.

"I am assuming I am going to be protecting her?"

Avni's eyes widened. She was going to be Alexandria's responsibility? That meant she was going to need that kind of protection. Before, she was always safe because she was so far away. It didn't matter which direction the target looked, because they wouldn't be able to see her. And if there was doubt? That maybe, they could? Because of gifts of their own, or technology, then the 'Princess of Space' could twist space.

Right and that just leaves…you. Farseer's gaze settled on Behar, who took a step back. They stared at each other for a second or two. Then the long-eared girl looked away, dismissively. And Behar looked away, shivering.

"Didi?" Avni whispered.

The woman shook Avni's questioning hand off and walked away.

"Behar!"

"Don't sound so helpless, Avni." She turned around to face her, walking backwards as she threw her hands out. "This is what you wanted, is it not?" she replied.

There was a dull snap from within the garage as space warped. The remaining concrete pillar's profile stretched and scrunched and twisted. Colors shifted as a light breeze heavy with raindrops whipped past her into the garage. Behar turned back around as the air cracked. That familiar fractal pattern of twisted space was solidifying. Avni looked away, because staring into the eye of it was always dizzying.

A heartbeat later, the garage violently collapsed in on itself. When the short-lived plume of dust settled, there wasn't a piece of concrete or steel left bigger than the size of Avni's foot.

"What was that power?" Alexandria asked off-handedly. Avni saw her eyes widen a little after, as if she had just caught herself saying something she shouldn't have.

Wormhole generation, Farseer answered. The wormhole itself is nice, but I'm more interested in what happens when it goes away.

"It destroys things," Avni spoke up hesitantly.

Farseer flashed her a small smile. Everything within the collapsing field is destroyed. Everything.

"What?" Alexandria bit out, turning towards the remains of the garage as if she could follow Behar. "She – "

Yes.

"You – "

The Simurgh has her set up to die in four months. Avni felt her heart stop as she too turned, already knowing that Behar was long gone. Murdered by a friend undergoing a psychotic break, or delusion, from untreated paranoid schizophrenia. Schizophrenia the Simurgh gave him.

Alexandria seemed flustered. "And you let her leave?"

Or what? Farseer said, soft as silk. She was no longer smiling. Force her to stay?

And the woman laughed lightly as she collected herself. She took a moment to gaze at the heap of rubble. "You can do that too, can't you? Control someone directly."

Farseer frowned and said nothing.

"Yes, then," Alexandria said for her. "If not now, then eventually. Soon."

We are wasting time. Farsight.

"…yes?" Avni ventured.

Do I have your permission?

Permission to what? At first, she was confused, but then she remembered what had been said at the beginning, when Farseer had first arrived under a lamp light shooting white sparks into the rain. They needed her eyes.

"Y- yes! But, Behar…"

I will handle that, Farseer said. And she sounded so sure, that Avni felt her protests getting uncomfortably stuck in her throat. Her mouth was dry and she compulsively swallowed.

"What do you need me to do?"

Farseer took those few steps forward until she was standing in front of her in a space of pavement conspicuously dry as water streamed down around them. She held out a pale hand with long, thin fingers.

Take my hand. Avni reached out and as their hands touched, Farseer disappeared. Only her voice continued.

And tell no one.

Avni could not reply.

She was blind, floundering in a void that robbed her of smell and sound and taste. All that was left was the feeling of acid being poured into her veins, burning her from the inside out. She begged and pleaded and screamed, but she heard nothing, as if she had no mouth. She reached with no hands, grasped with no fingers. She walked with no legs or feet. She cried with no eyes.

Look, someone said. You must see.

She spun in place without moving and reached out with no limbs towards a person she couldn't see.

Help me! She silently screamed into the dark. I can't!

No one can see with their eyes closed, the voice gently admonished her. It almost sounded like…how her mother used to. It was hard to grasp the thought over feeling her skin melt, but she tried. She tried to reach for it, as if she was reaching across the infinite cosmos in search of God. It was like she was praying with every fiber of her being as her soul was set alight. She was burning.

Look, it commanded.

I can't.

Look, it ordered.

I can't!

There was a sensation then, as if a hand made of ice had placed itself over her eyes. Icy barbs on the fingertips buried into her eyelids and for the last time, the being commanded.

Look.

And Avni's eyes opened.

A million and one sensations flooded her mind. Emotions flaring like bright sparks raked across the corners of her skull. The city was large and close and loomed before her eyes as a broken, wretched thing. Shadows of what had been and what could be phased in an out of existence, each solid as stone and simultaneously ephemeral as they walked through her. As they were her for precious fragments of existence. The acid taste of their panic and fear scorched her throat as she felt dragged, pieces of her coming loose and drifting into the future.

Everywhere she looked, reality came apart at the seams. Her eyes stung as she felt her pupils dilating further then they should to take everything in. The garage was pristine and whole and it was broken and crumbled. The lights were alive and dead and sparking and the streets dry and wet and dry and filled with cars and bicycles and broken and -

Shit. The voice of a girl said. Give me a second.

Her vision shuttered. The lines of time were cut away until all that was left was static and dull. Her mind was still spinning on an axis. Avni looked at Alexandria in the dark costume and saw a diseased emaciated woman staring at her with rheumy eyes, covered with bed sores. Her hair was falling out and her ribs were showing through her skin.

Avni burned with a low heat, like a fever. A nauseating euphoria was clawing at her mind, filling her limbs with a buoyancy that felt like flying and radiating out from her skin as pure light.

"Far sight?" Alexandria asked slowly.

Avni took a step and felt the corrupted giant expanse in her head, like an ocean filled with razors and rotting corpses, move with her.

"I'm fine," Avni said.

Then she bent over and threw up.