Chapter 10.1
(Part 10)
***
While she wasn't the first cape with super-strength, super-toughness, and flight, there is a reason that relatively-common powerset is known as the "Alexandria Package": for nearly thirty years, Alexandria has defined the "flying brick" stereotype due to her dominating physical presence in every fight barring Endbringer battles (and even then, she regularly tosses the monsters around).
But all those years ago, the heroine chose her name in the hopes of being recognized for the more subtle aspect of her power: an eidetic memory with instantaneous recall of even the most trivial of details. While memory doesn't necessarily mean comprehension, the merchandise of her that you collected as a young girl touted such feats as learning languages as quickly as she could read a translation book, memorizing expansive maps with a single glance, or even adapting her memory of all her past conversations to perfect the art of cold reading.
When people consider the Triumvirate, while Eidolon is recognized as the most powerful and Legend the most charismatic, Alexandria is undoubtedly the brains of their group.
The woman before you no longer access to these feats - Saki's prison having blocked her shard's connection and rendered her completely
human.
You, however, are not so limited.
Repeatedly tapping your
Aura-Dampening Component charm to prevent your anima from bursting to life, the world slows to a crawl as you pump more and more essence through the bio-mechanical wonders installed throughout your body - each installed charm shaping the essence in specific patterns that enhance your mind, body, and soul.
While your
Dynamic Reaction Enhancement System is your typical go-to for whenever you need to give yourself time to think, you've discovered (and confirmed with Iris) that's barely the tip of the iceberg; nearly
any action, including activating your other charms, can be sped up if used in conjunction with the boost. Augmenting
everything you do in such a way will completely drain you of essence in a matter of moments, however, so you only save repeated applications of the charm for situations such as this.
Your
Incomparable Efficiency Upgrade is already on, of course, as granting you additional trains of thought allowed you to balance the onslaught of information streaming in through your
Optical Enhancement's
Diagnostic Overlay during the operation. The former charm also received a dramatic improvement from your recent reconstruction, as your expanded Essence reserves have enabled the charm to grant you
eight simultaneous consciousnesses instead of the original six - an improvement that similarly carries over when you provide it to parahumans, much to Armsmaster's and Accord's (restrained, in their own ways) delight.
But it is one of your new charms that you are most focused on activating right now.
Reactivating, actually, as you just finished using it to help augment and streamline your Assembly's combined efforts during the operation:
Synergy-Promoting Upgrade. A curious bundle of orichalcum wires around a white jade ball-bearing set just under your right clavicle, activating it emits continuous, invisible pulses of essence that wash over everyone you consciously consider to be "helping" you with some task - the pulses subtly nudging them to align their thoughts and actions so that your entire group performs less like a series of individuals working towards a goal… and more like a seamless array of cogs in some perfectly-tuned machine.
It's not mind control or telepathy, as both you and the PRT initially worried over during the re-testing you went through last week. Thankfully, none of you actually know what the others are doing or thinking at any given moment, and any one member of the group could easily break out of the charm-guided harmony without any observed difficulty or side-effects; despite some initial skepticism, the reviewing board ultimately called it a "harmless" Master/Shaker effect and gave you permission to use it freely in your "Tinkering" efforts.
As you are about to once again demonstrate, its absurd utility stretches
far beyond the laboratory…
… such as allowing your team to
absolutely dominate one of the world's greatest orators.
"No."
Still, the odd quirk of using
Synergy-Promoting Upgrade is that it feels like you're all acting on a script that none of you quite remember; in this case, Prayer's stern, crystalline tone voices your thought just as you realized it needed to be said. Similarly, Saki is the one to voice the next line in your head - not because you couldn't, but because the message has more meaning when conveyed through
her lips.
"We fixed you because it's the right thing to do, and you deserve it," the burnished-silver girl frowns, seemingly disappointed. "You don't deserve to be one of
us, though. You're a liar."
The charm isn't flawless, however, and if some of you are working at cross-purposes then it tends to fail… dramatically.
In this case, you had expected Saki to keep Alexandria out for a bit longer so that you could discuss whatever she'd gleaned from her mental conversations with the heroine - specifically, if what she found in there made a compelling argument for her becoming your Assembly's Orichalcum caste. Alexandria's mention that the "conversations" had been experienced through the reliving the heroine's dating life was... exasperating, yet not unexpected; you had keyed onto the Twins' potential for the Starmetal caste because of their uncanny ways of figuring people out by looking at a person's love life, romantic desires...
and their perversions.
Alexandria seemed only confused instead of insulted or angry, so she likely understood the reasoning as much as you do.
Still, Saki has plenty of ways to communicate subtly and silently if she'd found anything exceptionally positive
or negative. So… that likely means she's playing up the darker side of Alexandria's history, but ultimately will defer to however you want to steer the conversation. And you
think you get where she's going with this...
The hispanic heroine, for her part, reveals a slight widening of the eyes that morphs into a furrowed brow before she completely schools her expression into what you expect is her usual mask of cold confidence.
"You know what we're up against," she replies icly, giving Saki her full attention. "I made it a point for us as we set out to routinely run the numbers for going public with what we had, what we
knew, just on the off-chance that it would improve the numbers for the final fight."
She shakes her head, her jaw tensing and composure cracking as you suspect she tries to pull up memories and - again, for the first time in decades - fails to recall them as perfectly as she normally should. Nevertheless, she regains her confidence quickly enough that the break in character could be passed as intentional if you specifically weren't looking for it.
She looks up from her recollection to meet your eyes again.
"We had plenty of candidates that had the discipline and fortitude to make the decisions we needed, but no one had the…
perspective, or the resources I could bring to bear at a moment's notice. If you think things are chaotic now, you should have seen what it was like back then - when
every decision was establishing precedent and it was just normal police against people that could punch down buildings and walk through bullets."
Lifting your hands from your sides, you spread your arms slightly in front of you in a conciliatory gesture while otherwise remaining motionless - your various active charms lending the movements a smooth, mechanical appearance.
"You misunderstand, Rebecca Costa-Brown. We don't like what you did, yes, but none of us have looked at the threat we face and devised a better solution. We are not disappointed in you because you
lied. We are disappointed because, somewhere along the way,
you became a liar."
"To the world, to yourself" Prayer intones, seamlessly continuing your thought. "The Truth is your enemy, in all things."
"You lie about everything, control everything… even the things you don't really need to," Saki finishes, with a sad smile and a more genuinely-remorseful tone than you or Prayer mustered. "I think you
did forget something: how to
stop."
It wouldn't surprise you if she's received comments like this from Legend in the past, but if so it also wouldn't surprise you if she's learned to tune him out with regards to her life choices. After all, Doctor Mother confirmed that he is only aware of Cauldron's involvement with the PRT and their selling of vials, so Alexandria would only consider him another uninformed - albeit well-intentioned - opinion and keep on doing what she normally does…
… or maybe even lie, hiding just enough of her actions so that he
thinks she took his advice.
Regardless of who or when she may have heard similar comments, you know for a fact that none have had such raw, metaphysical
power behind them. The same argument, printed upon paper, would have little-to-none of the emotional weight that you know she's being hammered with right now… and you're pretty sure Saki isn't even breaking out the
actual mind-control charms.
It's a testament to how she's lived her life up until now that Alexandria barely flinches, beyond a darkening behind her eyes that you suspect will linger for days to come. Which is what you want, because…
"You can be better."
Her gaze sharpens again at your statement, but you press on when she's about to question it - you need to keep her off-balance if this gambit has any chance of actually getting through to her.
"Just reviewing your public history is enough to see that you weren't always like this, Rebecca. You donned a dark costume, to demand that you be taken seriously next to Eidolon, Legend, and Hero, but it also fit your wit and humor."
Saki shakes her head, empathy pouring through her expression to the point that it brings old memories of your own crashing back. "You've been hurt so much, and you still kept going, kept saving lives… but you can't stop being happy just so you won't be sad anymore."
"Orichalcum do not settle," Prayer finishes, arms behind her back as she nods once at Alexandria's stilled form. "Neither shall we."
Bringing your left hand down, you raise your right gauntlet fully to point at the circular portal frame several yards beyond Alexandria - which immediately springs to life, the supernatural precision of your teamwork allowing Saki to understand exactly what needs to be done.
Alexandria, for her part, straightens up immediately at the sound of the portal's whirring, casting a quick glance at it to confirm that it's showing the Cauldron base she is expecting.
"Show us you want to be better," you calmly finish, gesturing to the blank corridor beyond.
"Then we'll see."
***
