I want you to repeat this with me: I can't make everyone happy.
Trying to make everyone happy is going to get a lot of people killed, especially on the battlefield.
The thing I learned after fighting for so many years is that the best choices are never obvious at first. A lot of people have a bunch of different platitudes. Platitudes are bullshit. There is no common truth.
You perform a good service for someone? Whoops, they're a bastard. They don't care about you. They take advantage of you.
You don't do someone a good service? Whoops, they're honorable, and you just slighted them. What could have been an invaluable ally is now someone who will hold a grudge for years and years, because despite being a decent person at their core, their personality can be compared to a miserable, godsdamn child who never got enough attention from mommy and daddy.
And this is life. No matter what you do or what you're trying to achieve. Unless you're a hermit, you're going to have to deal with people, and people are always going to find a way to make themselves sad and miserable. If you're going to lead in any capacity, your goal is to work around that as best you can. Happiness is not the main outcome you're aiming for. The main outcome is acceptability and satisfaction.
Yeah, sure, sometimes you're kicking the can down the road, but there's a reason why we kick the can down the road. It's because if the can stops rolling now, it's going to cause a series of other cans to fall down on you, and when it rains, it pours. Let me tell you, a hail of tin is not so different from an artillery shower and a bunch of shrapnel when it comes at you fast enough…
—Memoirs of a Master-Tier War Mage
VIII-15
Juggling Plates
"Adam, Shiv, we have a situation." A single telepathic missive from Uva was all it took for the other two Favored to empty their considerable schedules.
Her summons arrived at the fleeting hours of twilight. The mana core's glow dimmed, and a somber ambience glittered from behind the crystalline nests where the Terrorspawn lurked. Yet, as the radiance above waned, the glow of artificial light below endured and burned ever brighter in response. Fluorescent lights lit the insides of apartments, revealing window panes and silhouetting the people within. Hovering spells and dynamic illusions painted traffic lanes that marred and decorated the skyways. On land and sea, there was a dappled interplay of life and activity. The masses flowed in different directions—some heading home after a hard day's work, others turning to local theaters recently established in the Grounder Residential District. But a sizable portion of the population shifted, heading from the surface gateway to the Abyssal as they sought out the ever-traveling Sky-Swallowing Carp and the Broker-sponsored entertainment parlors that offered a plethora of pleasures ensured to satiate the wants of both flesh and mind.
But while the people all departed toward pleasure, the masters of the Gate were on duty. Always on duty. For there were always plates up in the air, and for one to smash down would cause a cascade of calamity; thus, perfection became a necessity rather than an ideal.
Shiv embarked on a subtle approach toward his destination, and he suspected Adam did the same. The decision was less rooted in stealth and more a factor of public relations. Shiv wasn't exactly hiding, but he wanted to get a hold of this matter and then decide how to shape the news before the public inevitably learned what had happened. The morale of a population mattered a great deal, and that morale was influenced by so many factors. Trust invariably found itself weighed against risk. Telling people too little would cause secrets and conspiracies to overflow. Revealing too much would inflict panic and carnage. A balance needed to be struck, which was a simple statement on the surface, but a hard atmosphere to engineer in action.
Because, in the ever-quotable words of Captain Irons: "Balance is something like true love. Everyone thinks they've encountered it at least once, but in actuality, they have no godsdamn clue what they're looking for."
Shiv found himself looking down on a narrow flight of stairs leading toward a lonesome doorway in the basement of a nearby residential building. A cleaning drone beeped and sputtered—a mechanical creation of Can Hu to ensure the cleanliness of Gate Piety. It was about the only resident left in the area. Almost all occupants that lived in this section of the residential district were automata, the housing here serving more as charging stations meant to suit a myriad of chassis and power systems required by an evolving mechanical life form.
But in the distance, there were organic signatures as well: biological organisms who lived among the machines to save on rent and subsisted in the most spartan of circumstances. Gate Piety didn't exactly have slums, but every functional city required low-cost housing and state-funded projects for those who couldn't or wouldn't afford something beyond the bare minimum.
Nihilist: There is an absence in the air here. And I don't just mean a vacancy of people. There's a patch of missing perspective. A hole in the zeitgeist. A wound in the philosophical gestalt. Something's wrong here. Something's very, very wrong here. If I tried to light my flame, it would sputter.
And true to the skill's word, when Shiv summoned his scintillating fire, it flickered out before it found purchase on the ambient philosophy. He narrowed his eyes at the door waiting for him. He saw the reading on Adam's biological signatures glowing beyond, flanked by Tequila and three other ex-HKPD inspectors turned Gate Piety security.
Feels like I’m walking into a shitshow that’s already half-over for some reason.
No one turned to greet Shiv as he opened the door. He barely made it down the steps without tumbling. The stairs were too narrow, his feet too big, and in general, this place was not built for his dimensions. Everything was compact, economical, and mechanically efficient. He was very much a person, and a monstrous person besides. Whoever lived here spared themselves no luxury, not in space, not in any kind of expression. Ducking under the 2.5-meter-high door frame, Shiv narrowed his eyes at the four blank walls devoid of decoration, not even marred by smears or stains. Then there was the floor: polished linoleum tiles so clear that they reflected the blank ceiling, with only a strip of fluorescent lighting spilling down pale white brightness from above.
The sheer barren nature of these quarters lent itself to a measure of quiet dread as Shiv discovered the reason behind Uva's urgency. An elven man lay, half-slumped over, on a foldable steel chair. Part of his body was sprawled across the ground, one leg over another, his fingers wide open, his eyes bright but vacant. His mouth was trailing strings of drool. His organs were still functional. His heart continued to beat at 30 beats per minute. His overall functions were still alive—all functions except for his brain, where Shiv’s Atlas registered an absence of activity.
And his heart and organs are still functioning. Well, this is starting to become kinda weird.
"We got any idea who the vegetable is?" Shiv asked.
"He is supposedly Simon Garrett, an independent Sell-Skill, tasked by the Strayed Ones to disrupt and slay the Favored Three," Uva provided without blinking. Her gaze was locked dead on the mysterious Pathbearer, and Shiv read an aura of tension from her, a kind she rarely exhibited.
This was an “I'm at an utter loss and have no idea where to go from here” tension, and considering Uva was in charge of counterintelligence for the Gate, that wasn't a very good sign at all.
"Strayed Ones?" Adam asked, standing opposite her with his arms crossed.
"It’s what the Southern Gods call themselves," Shiv said. "Something about them straying from the dawn after escaping its womb, whatever that dawn is. There's a lot of mythology there. Haven't put all the pieces together yet. So, this guy is an assassin, and he got fried by a Psychomancer. Is that what I'm looking at?"
"Not a Psychomancer, and not an assassin exactly, but part of a shadow cell." Twin lengths of translucent lightning leapt out from Uva's mind and ejected a dose of necessary information into Shiv and Adam. Both of them gained a flutter of memories: other members of his shadow cell captured and interrogated. Then, more than that: weapon plans, targeted operations, intelligence operatives, contacts, hidden dimensions, and smuggled teleportation anchors within Gate Piety. "The cell has been liquidated. I have handled the issue before it could begin. I knew that our enemies would be coming for us from the shadows, so I deliberately created vulnerabilities in our intelligence architecture. I targeted the most disgruntled and least trustworthy members of our population first. Such made it easy to anticipate and entrap enemy operatives."
Adam gave Uva a look of weariness. I thought you said you were done with enslaving people's minds?
I am, Uva replied. I didn't enslave their minds. I simply waited and watched. They didn't know I was there, and once they gave me just cause, I removed the threat they posed.
"I see," Adam said, trying to loosen his expression. "That’s… better. And justified. Well done. How many—"
"A lot." Uva sighed. "However many enemies stand arrayed against us in the light, they are exponentially outnumbered by their counterparts lurking in the darkness. Every day, another assassin or terrorist elf starts incubating within our walls, and I inevitably have to clean them out. So you can imagine my displeasure when it comes to the Faceless Queen. And this one."
The Faceless Queen Shiv understood, but he didn't quite get why this brain-dead elf was bothering Uva so much. "Why'd you say his name was supposedly Simon Garrett?"
"Because he was someone I considered bait. He was a disgruntled mercenary who failed to find opportunity within this Gate and made contact with the Southern Gods as a trusted contractor, so to speak. He was integral to their operations, but due to their incompetence, he was offered far more intelligence than a disposable mercenary was supposed to have. I kept him alive for last until I closed the rest of his connected conspirators—but before I could personally resolve the problem of his continued existence, I lost contact with his mind."
"Define 'lost contact,'" Adam said.
"It was like he had an organic thought process one moment and then an automaton's binary processor the next. I could still feel his presence, but his thoughts and memories became obscured, and I could no longer impress my Psychomancy on him."
It was the last part that made Shiv grimace. Uva's Legendary Psychomancy Skill was more than a subtle mental thing. If she wanted, she could build a cage around someone by manifesting memories over matter.
"By the time we managed to track him down, we found him here, in his present state. As you can observe, every major organ aside from his brain still has biological function, but it's more than that. Shiv, can you focus on his nervous system?"
Shiv did, and his eyes widened. It was like he was fried across the body. Trails of absence, burned black like lightning scars upon flesh, revealed themselves to his gaze. "What the hell happened here? It's like someone lit up his nerves."
"Someone did light up his nerves," Tequila said. The orc's prosthetic eyes, twin orbs of bright violet, glistened as he studied the technical corpse over and over again. "His system was fried all at once. He was rendered comatose in a near second, and moments before he had made contact with someone else—someone who administered this treatment on him visually."
Shiv's attention turned to the unmoving man’s eyes. It was only then that he noted a faint spot at the center of his iris. It looked like a patch had been burned down that way, a sprawl of nerves that were particularly blackened. "Not sure what kind of spell could do this. I can consult Helix or Ekkihurst—but using flesh magic to manipulate someone's nervous system usually has other tells, and I don't see any of them here. No cell mutations. No unstable architecture. It's a clean burn. Very precise."
"Exactly," Tequila replied. "But lucky for all of you, I believe I've encountered an instance of this before." His canvas longcoat fluttered as he dramatically lifted his massive hands, trying to make a warning gesture. "I might also be extremely wrong, as I was drinking a copious amount during that lifetime—it's also why I have a few of my associates from the HKPD here. Ah, but where are my manners? These are former Inspectors Fong-Sann-Lei, Gwok-Gin-Ceoi, and Nicholas Kwan."
The three dressed and behaved the same as Tequila on some level. All of them currently smoked the same cigarette: pale, long, and trailing wisps of smoke up to the ceiling. They also all wore the same brand of canvas longcoat and held dual casting wands as well. It seemed like the HKPD had a standardized uniform and spellcasting lessons, and judging from how they radiated a faint aura of gold, Shiv should've guessed that they all shared a bound Chronomancy field, much like Tequila as well.
Fong was a short but round human man wearing square spectacles. He gave Shiv a brief nod, while his comrade, one Inspector Gwok, didn't bother looking at Shiv at all. In fact, her body language screamed of discomfort, as if she wanted to leave this place as soon as possible. Of the three, she was the most nervous, as well as the most unusual physically, belonging to a goblin species variant he didn't recognize.
With a few moments of observation, Shiv realized that it was the light itself that was bothering her. The brightness seared at her eyes, and she clearly wanted to be somewhere dark. The fact that she was present regardless hinted at an extreme favor or some manner of severe influence Tequila held over his former colleague.
The last of the inspectors was the aforementioned Nicholas Kwan. He was far tall, with a pointed jaw and unnaturally good looks. At first, Shiv thought he was an elf, but that didn't quite fit, and he was also not racially altered in the same way Heather or Havel's sister was. Besides the physical, he was also the sole member of the former HKPD inspectors who held out a hand to Shiv.
"Former Inspector Kwan. So you're the Deathless that has us all on the verge of another apocalypse."
Shiv shook his much smaller hand and grunted. Kwan's empathetic core was smooth, and the currents of his mind could be compared to those of a placid sea. Thus far, the man impressed. He wasn't overly powerful when it came to magic, and his Physicality was Master-Tier at best, probably High Adept. But his self-control was evident, and there was no distinct emotional damage for Shiv to exploit. Thus far, anyway. "Yeah, sorry about that. System's a sore loser, and so it's making everyone pay for my glory."
Kwan had the decency to wink. "Story of our lives: if you can't hurt the star, you hurt the department. Of course, in our case, the chief was right. Our star detective was a serial killer."
"Former serial killer," Tequila corrected. "Besides, I didn't go after anyone who didn't deserve it. I hunted other serial killers. Very dramatic and vigilante-like."
Gwok squinted up at the orc. "You also turned everyone who learned of your secret into meat buns."
"Self-defense," Tequila shot back. "But enough about my sordid past; let's talk about the sordid present. My former colleagues—now present colleagues again—I believe that this is the work of the Forbidden Empire!"
The name struck Shiv like a whip across the face. "Forbidden Empire? Like the one Can Hu used to serve?"
"Correct. The dome-based techno-fascistic hyper-isolationists might finally be reaching out into our affairs." For the first time, Tequila's levity died down a bit, and Shiv sensed a frequency of worry ringing from within him. "The only one of us who might know better is Can Hu, but considering it and the little red angry one are off on a diplomatic mission, trying to convince the Necrotech Legions to join in on our little war while reassuring them that Valor does not intend to massacre the High Undying and their Ossuary Cadres for keeping parts of him separated for forty years, that makes us the only subject matter experts present."
Shiv and Adam shared both a look and a thought.
"The Queen," Shiv breathed.
Adam just nodded. "Makes sense. She’s coming for a visit, and we know from history that the Forbidden Empire has something of a grudge against New Albion."
A beat passed. Shiv waited for the Faceless Queen to intrude on the scene and give her own commentary. He suspected she already knew, but when she remained absent, he continued with the investigation. "Okay, so piecing everything together, we think that this brain-dead elf here was working with the Strayed Ones, but at some point, he's taken off the reservation. Someone gets to him, hijacks his mind, or somehow rebuilds his mind until it's more machine than meat—brings him to this place and then fries his nervous system so that there's nothing left of his memories? And said someone is working for the Forbidden Empire?"
"But why would they do all that?" Uva asked in his stead. "That is a question I couldn't quite answer until a few minutes ago. Another one of my bait-sleeves—"
"Still calling them sleeves, I see." Adam frowned. The incandescent mists constantly flowing forth from his crown and his hollow right eye socket burned a little brighter.
"—was eliminated the same way. I think the Forbidden Empire is coming across my unwitting agents, and as they jack into their minds, they realize that I'm already there. Thus, they burn my bait to stop me from tracing them. And the reason why my magic slides right off of them is because they have some kind of mana nullification device or skill."
"Or something nuclear," Shiv addef. "Something from the pre-System days." He doubted the Faceless Queen would leave herself vulnerable to physical attacks, but the Forbidden Empire might just be spiteful enough to detonate a magic-disrupting bomb wherever she went, whenever they could. It was an easy way to punish anyone for associating with New Albion. Since the Forbidden Empire was already isolationist, they weren't at risk of offending the law of hospitality, for they had no interest in engaging with anyone in the first place.
"Wonderful," Adam growled. "As if we don't have enough enemies and problems. The Queen herself being one of them. She's just bringing us more danger than she offers benefit." A dark expression rippled through his features. Adam clenched his jaw so hard Shiv heard a molar crack. "I should turn my glare away from the Abyss, send my temple upward across the Pacific. Plant it over New Albion. I've heard that the isles are misted with ethereal beauty, and that the Thames is a wonderful sight to behold this time of year. I wonder what that titular Stolen Throne looks like. I want to see how good it burns…"
Uva gave Shiv an alarmed look, but he already felt it. Waves of repeating hatred slammed into Shiv like a tropical typhoon tearing its way across a chain of islands. Adam had ascended from his Delve with a Standalone skill, something no one else could ever possess, and with an awakened Domain. But he'd inherited more than that. The Divinity that burned within him was antediluvian and rageful. Furthermore, the scars of his time under the crown, the wounds he suffered, had scarred over but never healed completely. Shiv still felt the raw bitterness, the lingering ache of Adam's madness. He struggled to look upon his mother on certain days, though he pretended admirably.
He'd confessed to Shiv what he did in the darkness of his Delve: how he remembered what she tasted like, the blood, the filling flesh, the warmth as all of it glided down his throat. He loathed himself for doing it. He loathed that he enjoyed it. He loathed that he succumbed at all. All that became an incendiary hatred for the Challenger—for everyone who meant his Gate harm.
"We’ll handle it," Shiv said, bumping Adam on his shoulder. The act jostled him out of his thoughts, and he shook his head as if regaining a measure of awareness. He had gone somewhere else for a moment, or perhaps something else had taken hold over him. "It's just some more idiots we have to victimize."
"Idiots that don't use mana, that don't follow the System's rules, that we don't understand and can't predict. Ignorance is death, Shiv. True death for all of us. We cannot abide by it. We need to know. We need to be the ones that strike rather than the ones who are struck." Adam hesitated for a moment, but then his resolve and his glare hardened. "I'm going to contact my mother. Her diplomatic mission is done. She must return; she and Can Hu as well."
Shiv tilted his head. "You sure that's a good idea? She's not gonna like being interrupted—"
"Imagine the scale!" Adam snarled. Shiv read from his friend's emotional misery the possibility that Rose might die if the agents of the Forbidden Empire sought to eliminate one of their few remaining Penitents in the form of Can Hu. It was like Adam could envision the scene. After spending a lifetime without his mother, even after the trauma he suffered, he refused to even consider losing her. "We stay ahead of them. We stay ahead, and we give them nothing to hit. If they are inside my Gate, then I want them found! I want them found! If they are a mine hidden among the automata, then we need Can Hu back anyway. We need it to conduct an in-depth investigation to scour through all machine life forms and ensure that my Gate is secure. No half measures, no hesitation."
Slowly, Shiv nodded in agreement. "No half measures, no hesitation," he echoed. The Harbinger within watched, but Shiv knew what it wanted to say. Adam was volatile, unstable from trauma, but he was also right. At this moment, he needed reinforcement more than anyone questioning him. To undermine him in public in any way would threaten not only how he was perceived in front of the others, but how he perceived himself—and internal mythology was a fragile thing, indeed. "What do you need from me?"
The Paragon shook his head. "You act as you are. You're doing enough. You and Uva both. We must focus our internal resources, our individual resources, and so we need Can Hu back. We need it back now. Tequila, I transfer responsibility for this investigation to you. Find the perpetrator, whatever it takes. Whatever you see, whatever you hear, whatever you touch, I will be there. My flame will be behind you, and if you need me, call, and both glare and palm will answer."
Tequila gave the Gate Lord a dramatic salute, but there was a faint hint of genuine pride there. Just the faintest of hints. Perhaps a flicker amidst an ironic flame. "Give it my best shot, Tyrant."
He was just about to say something else when his body flinched, and he went for his wand. The other HKPD inspectors mirrored his action as they mirrored him in so many other ways, but they all froze as Tequila let out a ragged gasp and clutched his chest. "Oh, OK, it's just you. It's just you. I thought we were about to be—damn it, Valor. You remind me of my twelfth death."
"It would have been another if I'd willed it," Valor said from behind Shiv.
He turned, as did Uva and Adam, and all three of them lit up at the sight of their mentor. Valor stood, hunched inside the room, for his height, making even Shiv, Adam, and Tequila look meager, was not so easily accommodated by the narrowness of this miserable box. His eyes burned a sickening green, and his posture hinted at pent-up frustration. His bloodletting had been halted before it could fully begin, but knowing Valor, he'd probably left Lord Scorn with more misery than mercy. And Shiv wanted to hear all about it.
But before that, he had another question altogether: "Wait, how long were you hiding in the dark, Valor?"
"He wasn't," Adam said with a weak smirk. "He came in with you."
Shiv strained himself and still cringed anyway. "You were behind me this entire time, and I didn't notice at all…"
"And Adam only sensed me when I stepped in the room," Valor chided. "All three of you need more focus. But I can address that when we resume our training. For now, I have things to report to you, and you have things to report to me." Valor looked at the mind-dead elf. "Disgustingly political things."
***
"Only a tenth of his Stealth and Awareness Legends? You must be slipping in your old age, Valor." Shiv shook his head mournfully. "Or did his constant screaming give you a headache?"
The lich laughed at Shiv as he took another sip of his tea. They were situated at the peak of Starhawk's Perch, and nearby was a series of wards augmented by a set of charcoal borders, creating a protective realm within which Roland continued his Delve.
As the inner council of Gate Piety convened to share updates, a few things became clear: Compact and Vulteg were effectively out of the fight for a while. Lord Scorn was busy shoring up his defenses, taking on an even more isolationist bent than before. His mood was so foul that he'd even banished Lord Belalu from his realm, sending him back to Compact territory until further notice. After all, it couldn't be Lord Scorn's fault that his realm's security was lacking. No, it was everyone else who was the problem, and they needed to pay for their incompetence.
Meanwhile, Corcusa, the unwitting cuckoo of New Albion and the Field Marshall of the Invaders Alliance, had crossed over into the Tutorial after departing from Vulteg with her life intact, accompanied by an attachment a few hundred strong. The vampires who guarded her were from a mix of Bloodlines, and Valor suggested that they might be there more as political assets than militaristic ones. After all, if she failed, she alone could be blamed for the travesty, and that shame would spill over to the Ophereus Bloodline. If the other Bloodlines banded together and blamed her specifically, they would be spared from any backlash and maintain a political edge, at least among the other faiths of the abyss.
Adam concerned himself primarily with Gate Piety's development—while also prioritizing his personal recovery. Though physically and magically stronger than ever, he continued struggling against the Divinity burgeoning inside of him, and with it came bouts of traumatic psychosis, bouts that they had to hide from both the Republic and anyone who sought to do Piety harm.
With that said, Adam's personal growth was proving monstrous as well. In the last two months alone, he gained 22 Master-Tier skills, seven Heroics, one pre-Legendary in the form of My Mind Shaped by Total War, and was on the cusp of approaching Legendary-Tier proper for his Vectors of the Eternal Ascent.
Uva stayed subtle about her improvements, but in terms of sheer breadth of skill evolutions, she overshadowed Adam altogether, though she didn't possess nearly as many Heroics. She had gained over twenty Master-Tier skills, just from her Multitasking alone with all the things she was handling. Her administrative and supplementary skill sets were dramatically bolstered, as she was functionally the beating heart of Gate Piety's Intelligence and Information Processing Corps. Furthermore, her Terrorspawn and the Outsider Dimension that spawned them was also drawing close to the point of an evolution.
But even the excitement gained from all these dramatic improvements dimmed when the Faceless Queen, Veronica Chandler, and the possibility of Havel Stormhalt visiting were brought up.
"We're going to have more eyes on us than ever before soon," Shiv said. "Meanwhile, Veronica's trying to figure out how she can outmaneuver the Queen. Managed to talk her down from shoving the Songbringer up my ass, but she's going to be here secondhand through a mirror. She wants to find out if the Faceless Queen can be fully suppressed by Kathereine."
"I’ll keep the Starhawk abreast of her presence, then," Uva said, assuming the role of reserve Avatar in Roland's absence. Thus far, he hadn't needed to manifest within her, but the lingering rapport they developed effectively made her the second choice by default in case anything were to occur.
"For once, I don't think she's going to be interested in Roland or the Perch. This is all for the Queen, and the Queen showing up probably means that there's a bigger agenda at play. Something greater than we can see so far. Still can't figure out what, but with the Forbidden Empire moving and the cuckoo disappearing into the Tutorial, I can imagine the System throwing a lot of bullshit at us all at once. If we get hit on the home front by the Forbidden Empire, expect an invasion to suddenly come spilling over, which means we need to have contingency plans for contingency plans, and maybe even a backup army somewhere."
At that, Shiv shrugged. "I'm due a visit to Lone Star anyway. Think Munny trusts me enough to make certain introductions now. If not, well, I can always pop in myself—not like they won't know who I am."
Valor considered Shiv’s idea. "That is an option, but I think it's important that we move with more subtlety, even in our political endeavors. Right now, if there is an obvious weakness we have, it is our inexperience when it comes to the theater of geopolitics. We are, effectively, the length between multiple nations and civilizations. That length we embody can easily become a blockade or a potential target of annexation. We play a delicate game of balance, and if we overcommit or we find ourselves disappointed by an outcome, it could very much threaten our alliances. At present, we are a mercantile city-state offering a free harbor and easy means of traversal. The presence of so many Legends also makes Gate Piety closer to a small empire than a single city, but a small and fragile empire at that. We stay bold, but we must work quickly and broadly."
Then Valor gave Adam an almost apologetic look. "For this reason, I think it's wise for us to commit more of our resources toward courting the Republic. Yes, they are a threat, but I would not consider them an existential enemy at present, not in the same way Compact, the First Blood, and the Tutorial are. Yellowstone is also the foremost power on Integrated Earth, or at least among the foremost powers. As such, I think we should welcome Veronica's presence, as awkward and threatening as she might be. Furthermore, we should also bring Havel in—despite all he has done, for the Endbreaker now owes Shiv a considerable debt, and we understand his house better than ever before."
The mere mention of Havel Van Stormhalt's name filled Adam with an explosive fury, yet he didn't show it on his face. Instead, he went along with it, nodding in acceptance but saying nothing else. Shiv didn't prod. Shiv knew that there was a considerable risk, but a personal risk at that. He didn't know if Isabelle wanted to see Havel and was going to ask her right after.
There was another possible future: one where Adam Arrow completely lost control of himself, pinned Havel to the ground, and simply choked him to death out of sheer spite. The worst part of that was that Adam would be completely justified in doing so, and Shiv didn't know how to stop him—didn't know if he wanted to stop him.
Even if I don't hate Havel as much as I used to, he has it coming. Blackedge was Adam's home more than it was mine. For all the people who died, there needs to be some kind of accounting. Something made right. Too little in this world is.
"As much as I hate this idea, and I'm sure Hades will as well," Uva began, drawing a long breath, "if we need an emergency reserve force, I think we might be able to talk the Stranger into it. And by we, I mean Roland, once he wakes up. The Stranger is surprisingly pliable toward Roland's demands, and substantially powerful, even though he is in the process of devolving from an Outsider into a mundane god."
"Yeah, speaking of which, it's best that none of us show up in the Strangers' Garden for a while," Shiv said. "Produveral's been giving me hints that he might not be able to delay certain proceedings any longer. He's got one of my bodies in custody, but the processing is taking long enough that Centauri and Chorus have noticed, and they sent someone to force him to accelerate the process. I guess we're gonna have a bunch of Myths standing at our front door soon, calling for us to come out. When the Incursion happens, they're going to be able to step through anyway, so we've got that to look forward to down the line. I'll see if I can figure out a way to solve this in advance or if we can find a temporary opening to show up at Chorus, but I don't know."
Adam directed his gaze downward and frowned. "It's also been a few days since we’ve seen Maia. Does anyone know where she is?"
"Yelling at Udraal is what she told me," Shiv said. "I asked her for a favor to solve our Centauri problem. Since Udraal can move around anywhere that he wants, maybe he can be persuaded to make sure his experiment doesn’t come to an end prematurely when the Greater Integration cops impound me."
"Right, right." Adam nodded awkwardly. "I'm asking because I think we're going to need her help, not with something severe, mind you, but Solzimort has been getting… worse. Ever since Hades dropped him in our Gate for rehabilitation, he’s been—"
"Snorting up all the Buzz?" Shiv grunted. "Yeah, Yellowbelly’s been complaining to me about that too. How the hell does someone so childlike end up with a drug habit?"
"I have many case studies regarding this problem," Uva said, a dour expression taking hold. "How depressed do you wish to be?"
"Not at all," Shiv mumbled. "So, uh, happier note: Candles?"
Her expression brightened immediately. "I'm close. Very close. He's starting to stabilize more and more. He's getting moments of clarity, not long, mind you, maybe 10, 20 seconds each. He often looks down at his hands and manages to quell his flames, but after that, he reverts. Even when he reverts, however, he retains more of a sense of self than before. I think we're going to see him stabilized or at least in a better mental state than ever before. He also muttered a name to me: Cascadia. Apparently, he had a daughter."
"Hells yeah," Shiv said. The not-so-insane Pyromancer was already invaluable for energy generation within the Gate. He provided fire, warmth, and considerable fuel reserves for the automata that burned coal for lifeforce. "If we can get him stable, we'll have a full Legend kill team on our hands between Solzimort, Gone, Candles, and Kura… Yeah, we’re going to tear the invaders a new asshole next time. Now, if only Roland would…"
The Faceless Queen blinked into existence in front of Shiv. His voice trailed off as a sigh.
But before he could complain about her presence, he noticed a tightness to her posture he’d never seen before, and a hint of urgency to her voice. "Don’t react to me. Just keep sighing. Listen carefully: In three days, the Forbidden Empire will attempt to detonate a low-yield tactical nuclear device near the Tutorial Gateway bunker while on-site operatives realign its dimensional frequencies—thus opening a way for the Challenger and his orcs to come spilling through on the day of my visit. At the same time, they will also trigger a chain of nuclear detonations within Weave using my Aviary agents by pretending to be me. A very confusing false flag operation, I understand, but please keep your blood pressure down, because the next part might just see you dead: when the first phase is finished, they are going to join in the war on your side, and they will claim that the dirty bomb was delivered by an agent of my Aviary. Do not believe them. Blink if you understand what is about to transpire right now."
Shiv rubbed his face to stop himself from cursing outright. "I just wish… Roland was awake right now. Getting tired of handling some of this bullshit without him."
Adam chuckled, unaware of Shiv’s suffering. Uva, temporarily disconnected from Shiv, was also blissfully ignorant. "Could you imagine yourself saying that just a few months ago, Shiv?" Adam asked. "Praising my father, I mean."
"No," Shiv said. "And I miss those days when I thought Roland Arrow was the worst person in the world. Because the other assholes… and there are new assholes every day… are really getting on my fucking nerves."
"An apt reaction," the Faceless Queen said, patting Shiv on his jaw. "Now. Play the ignoramus and stay silent. The Old Ones are watching us. They’re in the air. They’re in your water. They’re in your blood. The only place they’re not is inside your soul. They want you alive, Deathless. You and all the others. They were patient before, but with my presence, they’ve been forced to act—and that’s how we are going to take them by surprise. I’ve promised you a great many things, but right now, I need a service from you. Trust is in short supply between us, but even paltry trust must serve, for neither of us will wish to see the fallout that results from the alternative."
She briefly flickered—an unnatural action she never performed before. The Queen’s presence crackled. "Ah, the Stealth Bombers are here. I need to be away; but remember, do not react. They must not know that they are already compromised. Don’t rely on your flesh and blood bodies; they’re already inside them. Make sure your friends don’t react either; the moment you do, they’ll notice. Use your Severed Shadow to communicate with—"
The Faceless Queen vanished mid-sentence.
"Shiv?" Uva asked, noticing his stiffness. "Is something wrong?"
"No," Shiv said. "Hey, did I mention how much I hate—uh, love cooking?"
She tensed, and immediately connected to his mind. All his recent memories hit her like a hammer. “Composer!” she hissed mentally. “We need to warn the Composer!
She connected herself to Adam, Valor—and everyone's minds went still with tension.
"Yeah," Shiv hissed, continuing his performance. "Sorry. Just a little distracted. Anyway. Miss Roland. Really miss Roland. We could really use him right about now."
Tragically, Roland’s static alcove remained as it were: The Town-Lord’s Delve continued as a new problem reared its ugly head.