Worm

by John Mccrae Wildbow

  Crowds had body language and attitudes much as individuals did. Though they were mingled with the capes in the area, the people who’d arrived to see the people leaving the Birdcage were easy to pick out. They shifted position, as if Chevalier’s request had a physical force to it, a wind pushing at them. Then they planted their heels. Hesitation, out of love or out of hatred.

  But the portals opened, leading to different worlds.

  “Bet, New York!” someone announced, as a portal opened. “Bet, Red Fist HQ! Gimel, New Brockton settlement!”

  More portals opened as locations were announced.

  The bystanders began filing away as their destinations were called out. I was surprised to see New Wave among them. Brandish said something to Panacea, squeezed her hand, and then turned to leave.

  Had they retired? Given up on fighting? Or was this simply a fight on a scale they weren’t prepared or able to participate in?

  “I’m going to go,” Rachel said.

  “Yep,” Imp said. “No use for us here.”

  I looked at them.

  “Okay,” I said.

  “Me as well,” Grue said. “Cozen-”

  “No,” I said.

  He stopped, tilting his head at a funny angle, as if he could get a better understanding of me by viewing me from a skewed perspective.

  “You’re not useless. I get if you don’t have the courage, but your power, there’s potential. Even if it doesn’t work, that tells us a lot.”

  He folded his arms. “If you say so.”

  I nodded.

  “Okay,” he said.

  He stepped back as Rachel and Imp made their way to Gimel.

  Parian and Foil hugged, and then Parian passed through, leaving Foil behind.

  Sophia turned to go as well, very casually avoiding eye contact with me. She didn’t want me to raise an issue, so she was slinking away.

  I drew bugs from the other side of the portal together, then whispered a message to her. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  She turned, but the people behind her were pushing forward. She couldn’t exactly turn back to retort.

  The portals closed.

  “Forty-five minutes,” Chevalier announced. “We’ve got Defiant and Tattletale at systems, managing Dragon’s A.I. and running the data. They are your resource, the people you go to if you need something, be it information or materials.”

  I glanced at the Azazel. Tattletale was sitting on the ramp, while Defiant stood at the end, near Chevalier. Tattletale would process the data, picking up the essential details, while Defiant would handle the lion’s share of the code.

  “They should be able to accommodate all requests, so don’t be shy. Keep them updated on everything, the plans, the weapons, the possible applications of your powers. They’ll categorize and prioritize your plans and we’ll relay that information to people with the ability to put that into a plan.”

  To Cauldron, I thought.

  “Forty five minutes isn’t a very long time,” Lab Rat commented. His voice was a rasp.

  “No. But Defiant has been mapping Scion’s route with his analysis engines, and Scion is somewhat predictable. He’s spent the last few hours veering between extremes, choosing different kinds of targets. He strikes a major population center, then scales down to strike a select target. Individuals, a subcategory of the population like adults or capes, or properties. Right now he’s in one of those lulls. We expect that, in forty-five minutes, he’ll move on to a bigger target again. With luck, this attack will serve to distract him and buy us time to finish evacuating.”

  “He’s tough,” Defiant said. “You know that. He took on Behemoth with minimal effort. This is an attempt to see if we can find his limit, any weak spot, weapons that work. If we can, we expand, extrapolate. Keep that in mind and prepare accordingly.”

  “Alright! Let’s move!” Chevalier announced. “First up, a door to the New York sub-office!”

  The portal began to open. Chevalier continued, “If you don’t have access to costumes or weapons, we’ll outfit you here. Defiant and Tattletale will direct you to other locations for other goods.”

  I watched as a bulk of the forces began to head through the gate to the New York location. Chevalier and Revel stood by the portal, watching the various capes as they made their way through.

  I, too, hung back, watching. I could get a fresh costume and a spare flight pack easily enough. I wanted to know what the others were doing. The people who were hanging back.

  Slouching, hands clasped behind her back, String Theory made her way over to Chevalier and Defiant. The petite, odd-looking woman glanced around, not speaking up, but waiting until Chevalier deigned to look at her. Lab Rat, behind her, looked more impatient. He wasn’t good at hiding his feelings.

  “I’ll need a lab,” String Theory said. “Tools. My tools, if you can get them.”

  “You can prep something in time?” Chevalier asked. He sounded surprised. “We expected the tinkers to take part in the next attempt.”

  “I’m not an ordinary tinker,” String Theory said. She tapped her head. “I’ve had four years to think, plan what I’d build if I got out. All up here.”

  “Me too, seven years of thinking,” Lab Rat said. “Need a lab. Not sharing one with her.”

  “I wouldn’t let you, darling,” String Theory said, condescending. I could see Lab Rat’s lip curl, but I wasn’t sure if it was in irritation or amusement.

  “You’ll both have what you need,” Chevalier cut in, before anything could start between the pair.

  “Tell me what you need and when,” String Theory said. “You want me to hit him? Tell me how hard.”

  Chevalier glanced at Revel and Defiant.

  “When you were arrested,” Defiant said, “The-”

  “The F-Driver,” String Theory interrupted.

  “Yes. Start from there, scale up.”

  “Oh,” String Theory said. “Interesting.”

  “With a minimum of collateral damage,” Defiant added.

  “Less interesting. Next question: when? My work is one-shot, and my best work is on a timer.”

  “We attack in… thirty-nine minutes. Time things for forty seven minutes from now. Most of the combatants will be cleared from the field by then, and the rest can move to safety before you put your work to use.”

  String Theory nodded slowly, “You’ll hold out for eight minutes after the initial offense?”

  Defiant paused. “Make it forty-three minutes from now.”

  “Done. I’ll need a fusion reactor. Or a suitably large source of plasma. Something I can draw power from.”

  “We don’t have-” Defiant started. Then he reconsidered. “We may be able to find something from tinker materials the PRT has confiscated. Go inside the ship, talk to Tattletale.”

  Without another word, String Theory turned to advance up the ramp, disappearing inside.

  Defiant looked at Lab Rat. “Your old workshop is still there, sealed off.”

  “No. I’d be spending more time cleaning up than working, and the samples would be dead, if you haven’t tampered with them. Something else. A room in a hospital would work. I can stay out of the way.”

  “We’re not giving you access to humans,” Defiant answered, his voice hard.

  Lab Rat frowned. “Animal shelter? With the animals still present?”

  “Fine,” Defiant said. “Thirty-seven minutes. If you’re going to contribute, you should get started. Door, please. To an abandoned animal shelter on Bet.”

  The door opened.

  “Mm,” Lab Rat grunted. “I’ll figure something out.”

  Then he was gone.

  “And me?” Bonesaw asked. “I can help.”

  “You will help,” Defiant said. “After. When you work, it’s going to be with supervision. Panacea can check your work and vice-versa.”

  Bonesaw sighed. “My lab. The alternate dimension, the cloning vats-”

  “Destroyed,” Defiant said.
>
  “You’re serious?”

  He didn’t respond.

  Bonesaw scowled.

  I shivered and looked out at those who remained. Panacea hadn’t gone with the other members of New Wave. Instead, she sat on the cliffside with Marquis.

  I felt a stab of something ugly, seeing that. I couldn’t justify or explain it, let alone give it a name. It felt fundamentally unfair, and I couldn’t rationalize it. Life wasn’t fair. Good guys sometimes got the breaks and sometimes they didn’t. Bad guys sometimes got the breaks and sometimes they didn’t. Panacea had taken more bad hits than most, and yet I wasn’t able to convince myself she deserved to have that.

  Not because she didn’t deserve the chance to sit and stare at the view on this cold mountainside with her father beside her, but because an irrational part of me wanted to have it instead.

  Someone to sit beside, to talk with, to discuss things, to be able to talk about stuff without avoiding everything cape related… someone to lean on, who’d been through some of this stuff.

  I turned away.

  Acidbath had stayed, rather than leave to go get a costume, and was splayed out on the rock of the cliff face, his shirt off and laid out beneath him. Soaking up the rays, insofar as they was any sun to be had.

  Just a short distance away, Glaistig Uaine was using her power. A shadowy figure, translucent, was kneeling before her, hands raised in a supplicating gesture. The figure had created a flame in the two joined palms of its hand, and Glaistig Uaine was using the flame to warm her hands.

  I hesitated a moment, and then approached her.

  “Queen administrator.”

  “Faerie Queen,” I responded. “Mind if I share your fire?”

  “Not at all.”

  I glanced down at the spirit. It wasn’t smoky or blurry, and was fairly substantial, all things considered, but the features of the costume that the figure had once worn had been smoothed over, to the point that the line between costume and flesh was impossible to discern. An overly pointed nose, sweeping up into flames at the sides and top of the head, eyes without irises or pupils, pointed fingertips with more flames at the edges of the wrists. The gender indeterminate.

  Odd, that it had picked up on something so integral as costume, but not identity.

  How had Golem put it? Someone who’d had a life, a mother, a father, family. He’d had dreams, had undergone a trigger event or paid a small fortune for powers in a jar. He’d had a story.

  Relegated to being a servile handwarmer.

  Was there any of the original personality in there? The memories of the person that was? If there were, then it implied something ugly. Glaistig Uaine collected passengers, tapped them for power, and if this thing had memories, then what did that suggest about the passengers?

  I didn’t want to be cold and uncaring anymore, I didn’t want to be calculating and efficient. It made sense to ignore this individual, the spirit, to maintain peace with the Faerie Queen, but I didn’t like what it forced me to do.

  So, instead, I turned to the spirit. “Hello.”

  It opened its mouth to speak, but the words were faint, incoherent, as though it were emulating language rather than actually uttering it.

  “Did you have a name?”

  “Phoenixfeather,” Glaistig Uaine said.

  Bit of a mouthful.

  I warmed my hands at the fire. “Thank you, Phoenixfeather.”

  He only lowered his head, shutting those featureless eyes that could have been lenses.

  I felt a bit of a chill at that.

  What if I fell in battle? Would she claim me? Would I become like that? What form would that body take? Skitter, Weaver, or a blending of the two?

  “You’re not armed for battle,” the Faerie Queen observed, as if reading my mind.

  “No. Soon.”

  “Yes. I wait as well. The head that wears the crown bears a heavy burden.”

  “You view us both as queens, Faerie Queen?”

  “I do. But let us drop the titles when we talk.”

  “Okay… Glaistig Uaine. Anyone else?”

  “There are others who stand shoulder to shoulder with us, but queen is the wrong word, Administrator. The champion, the high priest, the observer, the shaper, the demesnes-keeper. Why do you ask?”

  “Just trying to make sense of it, trying to figure out where you stand.”

  “Ah. Do explain.”

  “You want to see the faerie rise again, apparently, and Scion’s a big part of that whole equation.”

  “Yes. I’m seeing what you’re getting at, Administrator. A conflict of interest?”

  “Essentially.”

  “We all have our parts to play.”

  “Parts.”

  “Yes. Like actors taking a role in a play. We wear our human faces and harbor our dramas and fantasies, but it’s the same individuals playing the parts, as the play starts anew on a different stage, with different faces and forms. If it all goes well, a figure from the crowd joins the stage for the plays that follow, and the roles are refined.”

  “And us… Queens and Kings. Do we have a bigger part? Leading roles?”

  “Everyone’s the lead in their own story, Administrator. Some roles are bigger, some smaller, but none are more important, understand?”

  “Yes,” I answered her. “What’s your role in this, then?”

  “We’re back to the topic of my… conflict of interest. I have a special role in this. I keep the company of the faerie who have left our metaphorical stage.”

  “The dead,” I said. “You keep the company of the dead.”

  “Yes. The other nobles, their tasks are more immediate, shorter in term. What makes us truly noble is our role before and after this act. The others sleep, and we toil. We’re practiced, stronger, for that constant effort. The champion and observer ensure the next act goes on without a hitch. The shaper and demesnes-keeper clean up after we are all done here, one way or another. So it goes.”

  “And the priest?”

  “The high priest,” Glaistig Uaine admonished me. “You and I may be doing without the titles, but we mustn’t offend the others.”

  “Right,” I said.

  “As for his role, well, you should know.”

  “I should know?”

  “Yes.”

  I could only think of one powerful individual who was on a par with the others she’d named. Contessa and Glaistig Uaine were easily twelves or higher on the power-ratings scale, and I could look to others with powers in that neighborhood to figure out who she was referring to. Panacea, Labyrinth…

  Which raised two questions.

  Why the hell was I on that list, for one thing?

  And was Eidolon the high priest? He was the only one I could think of to fit the role.

  “I’m not sure I follow,” I said.

  “He doesn’t follow either,” Glaistig Uaine replied. “Which complicates things. We have two courts, but the other court arrived to the stage bedraggled, maddened, and they don’t have any instructions or forewarning, you understand?”

  “I believe so,” I said.

  Trying to, anyways.

  “The high priest is in similar straits to these unfortunates. He stands straight and bluffs through his lines, but he’s wearing the wrong costume and he’s arrived at the wrong time, just like the others.”

  “And… what does he think of this?”

  Glaistig Uaine shrugged. “I couldn’t tell you. But what would you think of it, in his shoes? He’s set this in motion, and there’s no finale, there’s no promise of another play after this one is done. The nobles of our court’s mighty faerie may have no role to play.”

  “But you’re not concerned?”

  She smiled a little, but didn’t respond.

  “If it comes down to it, if we somehow get one over on Scion and if it looks like we might win, are you going to back him up? Because you want to see the next play?”

  She used long fingernails to tuck hair behind
her ear, turning pale eyes towards the horizon. The sky was still red, but it was more to do with the dust-heavy atmosphere than the sunrise. “I do wish to see it. I’d like to see the spirits of the dead dance through the landscape, even more than they are right now. Yet I’m still carrying out my role, and that’s the evidence I’ll give to my loyalty in the here and now.”

  I wasn’t quite putting two and two together, and I suspected that might have been because she didn’t want me to. She was still carrying out her role, which was to collect and comfort the dead. Because… she hoped this all to go according to Scion’s plan?

  I looked down at the fire that her shadowy specter was creating, then to the specter. To Phoenixfeather.

  I’d watch Glaistig Uaine for trouble. I thought of the other major players who I already was keeping mental tabs on.

  “What is Scion to you? He’s the director of this… play?”

  “The audience, as well. The metaphor falls apart at this. He’s our father, our child, our creator and now our destroyer.”

  I could grasp that much. Was there another I could ask about, that I wasn’t so sure about?

  “Doctor Mother,” I said, without even really thinking about it. “Can I ask what role she plays on this stage?”

  “Ah, now you’re asking me to answer questions that could make enemies.” Glaistig Uaine glanced up at me, and there was an implicit threat in the glance.

  “I wouldn’t ask you to answer questions if it was inconvenient, Glaistig Uaine. I’m sorry.” Be polite, keep in her good books.

  “I should hope you wouldn’t,” she said, and there was an admonishment in her tone. Then, her tone lighter, she replied. “No matter. She’s not one of ours. A prop, nothing more.”

  “No powers, then.”

  “Like I said, a prop.”

  “She doesn’t seem that unimportant,” I said. “She has a lot of power.”

  “A prop can be important. The grail was a subject for innumerable quests and tales. A message can decide the outcome of a war. A living prop…” she trailed off.

  “Forgive me, Faerie Queen,” I said. I saw her start to object, then hurried to continue, “I’m using your title because I’m about to be rude, and I do want to show you the respect you’re due. It’s been a hard day. I’m not quite so distanced from this as you are, not so willing to be the actor rather than the act, if that makes any sense.”