A slow start to the next arc, who's ready for it?!
@Marika Oniki was kind enough to supply a picture for her Knight.
What a clever idea -- *hint-hint* maybe others should follow in her footsteps *nudge-nudge*. Anyway... Let's do this!
-x-
Barefoot, blue jeans, a white apron with a big Crusader's Cross on the front, a black hoodie with an identical white cross on the back – sleeveless – a blue baseball cap with a white pineapple and some stars emblazoned on the front – I was the picture of someone who very clearly did not belong in the eighteen hundreds.
Even so, I felt oddly at home assessing the damage to the Pineapple Express. Marika had done a good job repairing it, but occasionally I would glance over a damaged or repaired area with my Ultimate Eye and clap my hands to fix some details. The people from the nearby diner watched me work with open awe; some declared witchcraft while others called it a work of God.
I clapped, pressing my hands against an area missing a chunk of steel. Either my Knight had missed it or she'd had to take from this area to fix something more important. Either way, I drew from the ground immediately beneath me and from the Black Material I knew so well to mend the broken area.
Medusa sat atop the train, watching me as I went. Another clap of my hands, another press – this time, there were none of the tell-tale sparks of gold and violet. I frowned, drawing back my right hand to look at the palm of my gauntlet. Where the transmutation circle should have been, I could see a long stripe of damage. A black, burnt line slashed straight through the engraving.
For now, it wasn't too bad. My Ultimate Eye could compensate, mostly, and my other hand had enough of the circle that it wouldn't be a
significant problem, but at the same time… now that I had paused, I could see areas I'd worked on before that could definitely use another run. But I wouldn't have time to reexamine everything I'd done up until now. I still had to get to Washington.
"Without your circles and with your eye, basic alchemy should be in your range of ability." Medusa explained to me, "But to manipulate Black Material that finely, those circles were necessary." And with one of them so damaged, my ability to finely tune Black Material alloys had become
nil. For obvious reasons, this sucked ass.
In the greyed world, I looked to her. "So I either need to fix the damage to Centrecroix, or I need to redraw my circle…" Just another thing on the list, I guess. It didn't help matters that I didn't
actually draw the circles. They just
showed up out of
nowhere. Repairing them or redoing them would be made that much harder as a result.
Sighing and rubbing the back of my head, I reentered the colored world and regarded my still-staring audience. Awkwardly, I offered them a wave with one hand. The action was enough to make me wince but none of them noticed. The murmuring just continued. I coughed into my fist and started stepping towards the caboose.
"Grand King Poe, Sir?" I heard Marika step up behind me from the crowd before she spoke. Even so, hearing her was enough to make me lose a step in surprise. "Are you
sure you're alright?" I looked back at her and saw nothing but concern radiating from her. She watched me carefully, like I'd collapse at any moment.
I smiled, "I'll make it to Washington, no problem." Three more hours to the meeting with the president, just three more hours – I could last that long, couldn't I? "For now, let's just leave."
"What about the people?" she asked me. My surprise must have shown as she pressed onwards, "Aren't we supposed to be keeping what we are doing a secret?" she raised an eyebrow.
"Hm, well, following the topic of awkward questions; is your hair dyed or are you a
natural redhead?" Stunned, she gaped at me as my eye went out to the people around us. "And to be honest," I shrugged, "I'm not sure I care." The secrets of the supernatural… at first, it might have
kind of made sense to keep it all from people. But over time, that just became impossible. Now? I figured people were going to or were actively finding out about Akuma anyway, so showing off some more magic wouldn't hurt matters much.
"Was asking me that really necessary, sir?" she was blushing embarrassedly, glaring at me past her bangs. It was only now that things felt
calm that I could notice details around me that otherwise seemed superfluous, such as the fact that her hair was ridiculously long, braided, and visibly crimson when she was clearly Asian. It was
kind of bothering me and, well, I was never known for having tact.
"No, but it
was funny to see you snap out of that "obedient Knight" thing." I smiled, "That, and I'm genuinely curious if you use a dye or not. If so, kudos on the eyebrows, most people forget to do those."
Marika scowled at me, "I will have you know,
sir," her tone was cold, "That one of the two who made me was a Dutch man. Of
course my hair is, um," her blush intensified, "
Natural…
sir." Her hand was twitching, like she wanted to hit me. I wouldn't have minded it, honestly. She needed to relax, and I was kind of used to personal abuse. Though, considering I was recovering, wasn't what I was doing counterproductive?
Still not as counterproductive as running a secret organization meant to fight another secret organization where one had to operate in the open and the other
didn't have to… ugh, the logistics of that… I mean, I
guess you could make the argument that keeping the mystic side of things secret made things easier for the Black Order to operate, but I wasn't entirely sure things were a secret even then.
An Akuma had become governor, and from what I knew and remembered of canon there were Akuma in ridiculously high political offices as well. Wasn't that one Akuma who accompanied the Noah of Lust a princess at some point in the past? In order to remove those in higher positions of power, the Black Order would probably have to assassinate or expose them… maybe…
The Earl was waging a covert war against people where he couldn't be easily found. But I changed that, didn't I? Why not take it a step further? My senses of sight and hearing were good enough that I could probably list all the discrepancies an Akuma would have as opposed to the people they were disguised as… For an ominous instant, I saw the future.
I saw years from now the banners and posters hanging from walls and buildings, asking the people to report their fellow man to the Knights on suspicion of being an Akuma. Would it eventually evolve the country into a military police state? Would it be permanent? Would all the Akuma be caught and converted into Knights or otherwise freed from their positions of suffering by members of the Black Order?
Keeping things secret would remove all those moral and ethical problems in favor of a different set. Now the people would be unaware of the strange things happening to them. Now a campaign of misinformation and silencing would have to take place. Perhaps the Black Order's numbers would surge with forced recruits, people who saw too much and needed to be added to the fold.
History would be rewritten by whoever won and the secret war would shift everything around for years to come. Anyone who ever discovered the truth would either be made silenced or openly jeered by those around them… and that struck a chord with me. I didn't personally
believe in keeping secrets that significant, not from so many people, not when it affected them so drastically… I lacked the aptitude to know what things were best left in the dark.
But, in a way, I knew the outcomes of both scenarios. The worst that could happen ranged from an open military police state to a secret military police state, at least that's what I thought at the time. Having worked in Amestris for several years, I
knew that a military state that went in either direction could operate perfectly fine and without issue… but I don't think I'd ever been privy to a direct
extreme before…
When I asked the question to myself of whether I thought it would be better to dedicate my efforts and the efforts of my Knights to keeping things secret or not, I felt oddly torn. So I reached into my pocket and pulled out a simple quarter. This would be the decider, I thought. Flip and catch – if it was heads, then I'd let the public know about magic and the supernatural. No more arguments. Otherwise, I'd keep it all hidden from them to the best of my ability.
My hand flicked, I caught the coin, and as though a strange ripple flew through me I made my decision.
-x-
Magic was real. The supernatural existed. There were vampires in this world. There was a devil, and he was called the
Millennium Earl. Every secret the Black Order sought to keep from the public eye poured out of my mouth as though it were a waterfall of words. Considering how direct I was being, it was really more of a firehose than a fall, but the end result was the same as I drenched everybody there with my speech…
I'd like to take a moment to apologize for how terrible that metaphor was. The whole thing dampened my spirits. In the wake of my speech, I couldn't help but
sea how it would annoy – I'm sorry. This time for real.
…Uh, anyway, through it all, Marika Merika watched with increasingly wide eyes. We should have left at least fifteen minutes ago, but I was still standing there and answering question after question. Now that they had seen me use alchemy, they didn't have cause
not to believe me.
When the Exorcists came out to see what was taking so long; or maybe to investigate the noise of the gathering crowd, they arrived
just in time to hear me explain the details of Innocence. Reasonably, they were displeased. "Goddamnit Poe…!" I heard Kanda hiss before he rushed at me, aiming to try to pull me away.
Marika stood in his path, looking down with what I was sure were steeled eyes. "No." her voice was stern and unmoving. Neither Kanda nor the other disciples of Tiedoll would make it past her to silence me. I could imagine her eyes, probably glowing slightly as she wearily watched the boy for any sudden movements.
"He's exposing us!" Kanda hissed at her, "We can't just let him–"
"If you have a problem," Marika said to him, "Then take issue with the Grand King
later. Now is not the time to be petty." I could hear something in the boy snap as made to swing at her. Yet in a moment of self-control, or perhaps because he realized a fight with a Knight would hurt more than just letting me go, he held back from swinging Mugen.
From the corner of my single eye, my Ultimate Eye long ago covered by a white patch, I saw his fingers dancing across the handle of his blade of Innocence. He wanted an excuse, any excuse, to have at me. And if he
did get a chance to tear into me, I wasn't sure I'd have the ability to fight back.
My shoulder panged as I thought about it. Injuries still healing sent flares of pain through my body that I desperately tried to bury as I spoke louder and prouder. I'd moved on now from talking about the supernatural to
campaigning. The world tinged grey as Medusa, currently my only link into my mind while the Skulls' seal was in effect, whispered words of wisdom for me to repeat.
"…in the face of these dark invaders, will there be a broken population for them to tear apart? Or will there be a people united? Will our veterans go hungry and broke after fighting a war that split this nation or will they live with their families? Will our children grow to be easily fooled or will they be made wise and smart enough to see through the lies of the Earl?" Running on a platform that was anti-devil after demonstrating the existence of magic and pro kicking ass by making everything better was clearly successful.
These people, once unsure whether I was man or monster, had started to look at me as though I were someone amazing and impressive. In less than twenty minutes, I'd just earned their support in my endeavors, and that meant
everything to the end goal. I heard them cheer for me even as I was finally forced to leave on the train.
It was an uplifting feeling that only came crashing down when Noise Marie stepped forward and punched me in the face. I collapsed like a sack of bricks on the floor of the caboose, rubbing my jaw in pain. It wasn't broken, but I was worried it'd bruise.
We were crossing the border. The likelihood of another attack, especially one on our passengers several cars up or on the gold carried had been drastically lessened. So Marika was there to watch as I got decked and, as a Knight, she took offense to that. She
moved, her feet nearly indenting the floor as she stepped towards Marie with intent to break his arm.
But I held up a hand, "Stand down…!" and I gave my command. She listened. Though I could still see she wanted to rip Marie a new asshole, she clenched her hands and stopped. My other hand still ran across where I'd been struck – I'd have to shave again when I arrived in Washington. I looked terrible with facial hair.
"You son of a bitch," Daisya snarled at me, "You've started another witch hunt!" I could see energy gathering around him in preparation for an attack. He wanted to use his Innocence, I was sure. "Wasn't one time enough?! As soon as those people stop cheering, they're going to turn into paranoid
lunatics!"
Slowly, I stood. "You don't have a high opinion of people." I remarked, "I guess that's fair. You've probably seen some shit. But I made a judgment call. And now, it's out." I shrugged, "So, yeah, blame me to your heart's content. It won't change that the Black Order just needs to take a different approach now."
Wordlessly, Daisya just opened and closed his mouth as he racked his brain for something, anything, to prove me wrong. He came up dry and empty. His eyes wide in fury and shock, he sat back and buried his face in his hands. "Bastard…" he hissed, "We've been trying to keep this secret for
years and you just… in one instant, you tore that all apart."
"I do that sometimes," I admitted unabashedly, "Upset the established order to bring in something new; it doesn't always work out. But, uh, I'd like to think I've got a good score for it." Sort of, kind of, not really… "Besides, in a few decades, people are going to look back and think I was nuts."
"That implies you think we'll win." Noise said aloud, "You're a very confident man, Mister Poe. But we don't have the Heart, we don't have the country, and we don't have the manpower to match the Earl."
"No problem," I said, "The Earl's Akuma aren't invincible," I said, reaching under a nearby cabinet. My hand grasped and pulled out a box of cards, "I cut down a huge portion of where they're coming from," I took the cards out, shuffled them, then screwed up and dropped them to the floor. "Damn – and, uh," I needed a third thing, I thought as I grabbed seven cards and passed another seven to Marika. "We're less than a day away from establishing one of the most powerful economies on the planet. That's not bad, right?"
Marie frowned, "It's not, but–"
"Then we're fine," I said with a smile, checking my hand. "Got any sixes?" I asked my Knight.
She glanced over her hand, sighed, and shook her head. "No, sir. Go fish."
"You're just going to leave it at that?!" Kanda snapped, visibly agitated. "Seriously?!"
My eye drifted over to him for a moment. I stared before slowly turning my gaze back to my cards. "Yup," I drawled out, "We're on the train, what's done is done. That's the approach I'm taking–" I stopped talking, slowly looking over my cards at the small pile next to Marika. "…How do you already have
four eights?"
"I'm good at Go Fish, sir."
"Of
course you are." I breathed.
Marie's back was to the wall as he adjusted the device over his ears. I could hear the twists and cranking. It reminded me of Stein. Out the window opposite him, there was nothing outside but trees, grass, and animals. I could see clouds rolling by in the sky, the sun beaming down.
"Any fours?" Marika asked me. I looked at my hand.
"Nope."
"…Please don't lie, sir. It's honestly pathetic."
I handed her three fours.
And so the train ride went. The worst of it was over, now it was just a matter of getting to our destination. That wouldn't be a problem. It was
after I got there that I wasn't really looking forward to.
-x-
One Foot on the Platform
OR: One Foot on the Train
End-205
