Inexorable Altercation [Round V - Saint Arthelais' Hospital]

Originally posted on MSPA by SleepingOrange.

---

Will glanced upwards hesitantly, giving voice to the question that was on nobody’s mind since they all already knew the answer or had a close enough guess that the specifics weren’t important.

“What is that?”

The crocodile was already striding confidently towards Annaliese. His species appeared to have evolved some truly interesting vocal cords, given that he managed to continue growling even while speaking.

“Neurotoxin. Extremely deadly poison gas. One of the last lines of defense, really. Rarely seen it used myself, since the ship likes to keep us alive. Of course, this is still Hezekiah: dispenses slow enough to give you time to try to escape or just sit in fear. Kills you even slower.”

Annaliese slumped down against the wall, glancing up at the figure that loomed more with every step it took. She had never even learned the conqueror’s name. That made it all worse, somehow; she’d known she was going to die soon since this had all begun, but it was supposed to be at the hands of a maniac like Loran or Greyve, or shakily defying the people running this horrible game. Something personal, something meaningful. Now she was just an unimportant detail in someone else’s story. She didn’t even know who he was, and now he was going to kill her.

“Of course, most prisoners aren’t really in a situation like this. They don’t have a way out.”

The Blastec didn’t have any kind of loading or cocking mechanism like an antique slugthrower might have, so Will made do with flicking the battery’s self-cleaning function. It produced a satisfyingly-threatening ascending whir; when this didn’t have any effect on the crocodile’s advance, he spoke up.

“Don’t take another step. I’m not going to let you hurt anyone. You can’t really believe whoever took over is going to let you get out of here.”

“There’s no choice. I can either wait and die or kill you and hope.” He made a noise that was almost a laugh as he drew level with the apparently-catatonic witch. “It’s funny. I thought I had dealt with hope a long time ago.”

Before he could do anything, her leg lashed out with a precision and determination that most of the contestants had never seen in her before. Unfortunately, regardless of how ferociously it was directed, it was still a leg attached to a weak and frail body, and its impact did little more than hobble him for a moment and roughly push her about a foot across the floor. Still, the momentary surprise was enough of an opportunity for Loran, who had been sidling across the room, hiding in plain sight while the focus had been on other people. He lunged, a dagger drawn seamlessly from a fold in his coat.

No one would have expected a reptile to move so quickly, especially one as obviously ancient; nevertheless, a claw whispered through the air with blinding speed, grabbing the assassin’s wrist and twisting it until the knife clattered to the ground. He didn’t bother to turn his head until he’d disarmed the creeper, and there was what seemed to be genuine sadness in his eyes as he did.

“It’s too bad,” he murmured, holding Loran between himself and Will. “I really would have enjoyed your company under different circumstances. A man with your ambition and lack of scruples comes around only rarely, and one with your vitality even less. But I’ve got to take my chances with the ones with the poison.”

In the space of a blink, Loran’s other fist was pressed tenderly against the crocqueror’s chest. There was always another knife, and this one was currently wedging itself upwards between the armorlike plates of scale, driven deep into the flesh more by the creeper’s finesse than his strength. Lamentably, at least from the contestants’ point of view, it had completely failed to penetrate any vital organs, given the alien’s unfamiliar physiology.

“Don’t assume they’re the only ones with poison,” Loran hissed, giving his pointiest smile.

They were, of course. Loran didn’t carry poison, and especially didn’t carry poison already applied to his weapons. There were simply too many ways to end up killing or incapacitating yourself, no matter how skilled or careful you were. Besides – and more importantly – any attack that left the target alive long enough for the poison to matter was already a failure by his personal standards. Still, only Loran needed to know all that.

With a roar, the crocodile released his grip to pull the blade out, slashing with his other claw; the assassin had been trained to roll with punches, though, and simply fell back and away with little more than a grazed shoulder for his troubles. Annaliese rose behind the pair, knife held without the fear she’d carried when facing Loran; even with her new confidence, she still held it like she wasn’t certain how her hand was supposed to work, but it was an improvement. She seemed to be steeling herself to attack when she caught Will’s eyes and threw herself away from the fray. With nobody in danger of taking a stray shot, Will fired.

The first blasts of light hit squarely in the chest, searing flesh and charring fabric but doing little more than prompting the enraged prisoner to charge, snarling, at Will himself. Several more shots struck him to no avail; with no other option, Will stumbled hurriedly backwards and raised the pistol. Lasers bombarded the crocodile’s face; kicked, stabbed, shot, and now blinded, he screamed and finally fell. He was by no means dead or even mortally wounded, but with Loran there, he didn’t need to be. Alien physiology or no, a victim that helpless didn’t stand much chance against the assassin’s ministrations.

He wiped his blades clean on smoldering robes, frowning slightly with a craftsman’s dissatisfaction at a job imperfectly done. There were several beats of silence as the survivors took the situation in, then ducked into crouches as they realized they were developing headaches and watery eyes. It was Will who broke it.

“I didn’t really expect you to help us.”

Loran pretended to look hurt before smiling. “Well, it’s not like he’d have killed you all and then had another cup of tea with me anyway, and I can’t rely on the rules to kick in and take us out of here as soon as Four-Eyes bled out. Not since the addition of that little anklebiter over there.” He rubbed his chin pensively. “’Sides, it’s like we said. We’ve gotta work together, like a team. It’s just us against the worlds now, right?”

The same thing occurred to all three at once, but it was Annaliese who said it.

“Chester!”

The Chester in question was on his knees by the door, hands on the frame and veins in his close-cropped head bulging out with the effort of whatever it was he was doing. It was hard enough under normal circumstances to accomplish anything without a terminal to work through, and now something unyielding and rough and unsubtle was blocking him at every turn. He strained, his eyes occasionally flicking upwards to the lazily-descending, delicate cloud of death. He didn’t seem to be getting anywhere, but the other occupants of the cell wouldn’t really have any way to tell right up until the doors opened anyway.

Will wasn’t a man to whom wasting time came easily, so he got straight to the point. “Can you get it open?”

“I don’t… I’m not sure. I was right, someone’s done something to Hezekiah. They’ve got her almost totally controlled. She’s trying to fight back, but she’s got almost no agency, and whoever wanted this door closed has it locked a dozen different ways. Maybe if I… I don’t know, I just…”

He trailed off. Since the fighting had died down, Parset had picked himself up off the floor; there was no sense huddling down there forever, and it seemed like the poison wasn’t going to reach his head height any time soon. He’d taken the opportunity to rifle through the dead man’s pockets, disappointed to only find several pouches of noxious herbs. After discovering that they tasted nearly as bad as they smelled, he started paying closer attention to the big folks’ worried conversation. He rolled his eyes at their uselessness. Didn’t any of them understand what magic was for?

He strode to the door – well, he’d have called it a stride, but any observer probably would have described it as a scuttle – and began rapping his drumsticks dangerously close to Chester’s knuckles. It was a complicated but repetitive rhythm, full of triplets and promising to cause headaches if it kept up too long, but the gnome pressed on. There was something strange about the door, and its locks weren’t locks as Parset understood them; fortunately, magic is more about ideas than mechanics, and after several tense moments of frantic drumming, the latches snapped open.

They’d have snapped shut an instant later if Chester hadn’t been there, and even if he had been he’d have been quickly overridden if an active intelligence had been directing the security systems the way Hezekiah would have, but he was and there wasn’t. In that fraction of a second of an opening, he pushed and pleaded and was ultimately rewarded when the door snapped open and dumped him into the corridor beyond. The others scurried out after him, Parset in particular beaming with the pride of a job well done.

Annaliese and Loran quickly split up, looking up and down the still-quiet hallway; Will knelt by Chester.

“Come on, Chester, get up. We’ve got to move.”

For the second time since they’d met, Will was surprised at Chester’s speed: without moving from his prone position, the datapath’s gargantuan hand snaked out and wrapped around Will’s throat. Only an instinctively-raised forearm prevented massive fingers from completely blocking his bloodflow, but having his radius pressed against his trachea honestly wasn’t much better.

“You don’t… have to do this.” Will coughed. “You’re better than this.”

“You don’t know what it’s like here. They said they’d let us go when you were all dead. I have to!”

Will twisted his neck painfully into the crook of his elbow to give himself a little breathing room. “But you don’t really believe that. Whoever took over the ship, they have no reason to free anybody. They’ll just enslave you all, or jettison you into space if it’s more convenient. Don’t become someone beyond saving, Chester.”

“I’m on Hezekiah. I must be already.”

“Then don’t become someone with a big gap where his neck oughta be,” sneered Loran.

“I could snap his spine before you got two steps closer.”

“This isn’t who you are.”

“The hell do you know about who I am?! You’re just some guy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, you’re not my friend, you’re not my anything. You’re just a ticket out of here, and you’ve gotta die for me to redeem you.”

“You don’t want to do this.”

Chester’s hand clenched tightly, then released. Will crumpled, coughing and rubbing at his neck. Annaliese rushed to his side, but he waved her off and shook his head at the approaching Loran.

“Just… get out of here. Before I change my mind.”

“We need you to come with us.”

Chester finally looked up at Will, who had pulled himself into a sitting position against the wall. The huge man’s tear-rimmed eyes were resolving into an expression of utmost incredulity. He was completely nonplussed.

“Why on… What possible reason could I have for that?”

“You’ve been here longer than I have, so I bet you know just what kind of people just got released onto the ship. How many of them do you think are going to politely hunt us down and leave each other and you alone? How many bloody power grabs and revolts and riots and senseless murders do you think are happening right now? How many of Hezekiah’s long-term guests do you think are even sane enough to tell the difference between me and anyone else anymore?”

There was a brief silence filled with Chester flopping back to the floor. “You need people you can trust if you’re going to survive long enough to get off this ship, and I think you know you can trust us more than anyone else. Even if we’d just met this minute, you’d be able to trust us more just because you know none of us belong here.”

“Hey now, I take offense at that.”

Will glared at Loran, who just smiled his dangerous smile.

“What else are you going to do, Chester? Nobody who could win the war that’s about to start between hundreds of deposed warlords and convicted murderers is going to be the kind of person you want in charge. We just want out, and you can bet I’m not going to turn on you. Help us, and we’ll help you.”

Chester finally pulled himself up.“Fine, whatever. Just shut up, alright?”

“Great. Now if you’re done flirting with your big old boyfriend there, can we get a move on?”

Phrased petulantly or not, Loran – although he was more or less just echoing Greyve’s sentiments – had a point. They’d chosen this block and this cell because most of the occupants were either already part of a rebel party, catatonic, or dead, but it wouldn’t be long before the leftovers started pulling themselves into the comparative freedom of the corridor. Even if none were left that could manage that, it wouldn’t be long before Daddy Ham’s lackeys from other areas started flooding in. There was just one problem.

“Yeah, we should probably, uh… But where are we going?” Annaliese quavered.

They hadn’t even come close to discussing everything they’d wanted to, let alone forming a plan. All eyes turned to Will, who swore internally. Well, he had been trying to be the leader, and this is what came with that. He made a snap decision.

“We’re going to Hezekiah’s control center, or brain, or whatever she’s got. We’re not safe as long as some other inmate has control of her.”

“So, what, you’re just gonna turn her back on? Fuck, man, I shoulda killed you when I had the chance. You’re making me miss Meddet.”

“No! No. No, no, just… It seems like whoever wants us dead knew what cell we were in, or at least what block. I doubt they gassed every cell in this place and also put a bounty on us. That means they can use Hezekiah’s systems to track us, which means we’re not safe unless we can wrest some of that control away from them. I just figured it’d be easiest to do that at her core whatevers. I mean, am I right?”

Chester shrugged. “Maybe. Worth a shot I guess.” He sighed. “I still don’t know how I got dragged into your big fight thing.”

Will shrugged. “You’re free to take your chances with the other inmates.”

“Don’t be like that.”

“Come on.”

---

“How what happened?”

Felix turned his scaly new face to look at the speaker. It was some vaguely-simian thing with too many limbs and too much fur; he didn’t know what it was, what it wanted, where this place was, or why it was speaking to him so apparently comfortably, but he didn’t like it. Probably best just not to engage at all.

“Oh, nothing, old chap. Just thinking aloud.”

It looked at him for a few moments, then turned lethargically back to the only other conscious occupant of the room.

“Been a while since we’ve seen one that enthusiastic.”

“Yeah, I’m surprised Hezekiah’s taking on new cargo, as overpopulated as everything already is.”

“Might just have been one that’s been here a while and finally lost its grip. Didn’t seem too lucid to me.”

Their idle chatter continued as Felix focused inward, trying to take stock of his situation. The first thing he realized was that he could no longer feel his dark matter. Any of it at all. That was bad; he wasn’t totally powerless without it, of course, not a man of his intellect and skillset, but he’d come to rely a lot on the abilities it granted him. The second thing he realized was that if he was correctly interpreting the signals this disgusting body was sending him he was a… Well, woman was obviously the wrong word now, but female at least. If anything, this was even worse; he hadn’t had the dark matter forever, but he’d been being a gentleman for as long as he could remember. It was his entire identity. How was he supposed to be a gentleman while looking like a reject from a Jules Verne drabble and in possession of entirely the wrong set of parts? The third thing he realized was that he’d died.

He remembered it clearly, remembered the little bug man setting off the device, remembered the light, remembered the searing sensation of being reduced to molecules then less then nothing at all. Felix had never had much time for theology – in his line of work, it was at best an uncomfortable affectation and at worst a liability – but he was familiar at least with the concept of reincarnation. That almost seemed to fit as an explanation of being alive but having died and being in the wrong body. Only almost, though. Weren’t you supposed to not remember past lives? Or at least be born as an infant instead of a, let’s see, middle-aged bordering on older lizard? He was also pretty sure that any god or force of the universe that ran the reincarnating business wouldn’t be too thrilled with his conduct and karma or whatever. An ant or slug or retail clerk seemed a more fitting fate for someone so thoroughly and unashamedly evil as the great Felix Atrum. No, no, reincarnation just wasn’t adding up.

It was then that his great intellect managed what would have taken anyone else at least two tense hours filled with subtle clues and dramatic foreshadowing to realize in an exciting and narratively fulfilling twist. If Gias was to be trusted – and even if he wasn’t, that alien queen that had taken over the witch’s body – the Vorlons were masters of memory. The Sollipor was just a lifetime in a box without Felix’s black matter, and as he’d just reminded himself the queen had uploaded her mind into a handy body. It stood to reason that someone had recorded his memories and dumped them into this inappropriate receptacle.

Well, bugger.

The embuggrance didn’t last long, though, for it was then that his iron-hard mental fortitude managed what would have taken a lesser man weeks of soul-searching and weepy poetry and probably a fair amount of alcohol to shrug off. He was dead. He was dead! And what was more, he wasn’t really him anymore! He was dead and someone else and that was great because that meant he was free! The contest had presumably moved on without him and now he could get back to what was really important. World domination was world domination, regardless of whether it was the wrong world. To think, his biggest problem solved all at once and him beholden to no-one for it. He could barely have planned it better himself.

Well, okay. He could have.

Still, even if not ideal, things were good. First things first, he had to find out more about where he was and who was around. And who he was supposed to be, he supposed, since those other two didn’t seem to know yet he was just inhabiting their friend or cellmate or whatever’s body. That wouldn’t last long, though; he had no intention of acting any part other than his own an instant longer than it served his reconnoitering needs. The wise supervillain knows it’s all about personality, and his own was just fine thank you very much.

He realized he was pacing as he pondered and cursed inwardly. Pacing was such an amateur tell, especially when he knew he was being observed. These people certainly weren’t trusted lieutenants or kidnapped damsels, who ought to have been the only people to see him like this. He stopped short, shaking himself, but it was too late. The hairy thing had turned back to him and was speaking.

“What’s wrong, KshKalala? You seem shaken.”

Felix’s nose would have wrinkled with disgust if it hadn’t been too busy being a snout. Was that supposed to be his name? Bad enough it was feminine without being foreign too. Still, no helping some things. He opened his mouth to let his tongue glib its way through some non-conversation on autopilot, then closed it again as he realized he was so unsure of the situation that he didn’t even know where to begin. His jaw open and shut a few times as gears furiously turned, before he finally *– and he’d even admit it to himself, lamely – shrugged and came out with “My head feels a little off. Gone kind of fuzzy.”

The creature’s face wrinkled with something that might have been concern for all Felix knew. “Did that guy do something to you when he grabbed your head?”

A-ha! Someone had grabbed the lizardwoman’s head. Chalk one up for the “someone deliberately uploaded Felix’s memories” column then, as well as the “this might be an opportunity to learn about things without arousing suspicion” one.

“Maybe,” he muttered, letting his voice come out as meek and uncertain. “I just feel… Off, like I can’t remember the difference between what’s real and what I’m imagining.”

The conversation meandered forward like this for a while, the villain gently pumping for information under the guise of slight amnesia or a concussion while trying not to overplay his hand or reveal the real extent of “KshKalala”’s memory loss. It was cut short, however, when a speaker crackled to life; Daddy Ham worked fast, though Felix couldn’t have known it or even what a Daddy Ham was.

”Attention, inmates of Hezekiah! This is... this is Daddy Ham. I have taken control of this prison. Freedom lies within your grasp. You will find I have deactivated the guards and all the instruments of torture to which you have become so accustomed. However, before I begin to leave people off the vessel, I will need an assurance that certain enemies of mine are deceased. Though this should be a short matter — let me see — I would like to be absolutely sure. So, if you meet any of the following inmates, please kill them.”

“Will Haven.”

“Annaliese Nibbs.”

“Parset.”

“Loran Twight.”

“Thank you, that will be all.”

Felix’s heart – or was it hearts now? – sank even as it rose. On the one hand, he’d somehow been brought along with the battle. On the other, it certainly seemed like nobody believed he was part of it anymore. Probably safe to assume for the moment that whoever had brought his memories with them had been one of the contestants rather than the organizers. He should still be left behind when they eventually killed each other, which would be pretty soon if the shipwide ultimatum was anything to go by. Who was Parest, though?

More importantly, and more encouragingly, based on what he’d learned from his apparent fellow inmates and presumable future minions it sounded like there had been a hostile takeover of the facility. That was perfect! It was exactly the sort of power vacuum that someone like him could thrive in. He had to find out more. Without hesitating longer than it took to beckon to his cellmates, he strode out the door.

He rethought this lack of a plan after a moment for two reasons. First, he really had no idea of where to go to find out more. Second, the room or hall or wherever outside was pitch black. As soon as the door shut itself behind him, he was utterly alone and blind. He turned smartly around only to find not even a glowing border where the door should be. He reached out a hand to find a handle or trigger or frame, but met no resistance. He stretched as far as his claws would reach, but pawed only empty air. Perhaps he had simply walked farther out of the cell than he thought, his mind supplied with the manic cheerfulness of a man telling himself something he knew was a lie. He took a hesitant step forward, then another, then three more. No matter how far he’d enthusiastically dashed out of the cell, he should have hit something by now. He’d just… gotten turned around, then. That must be it.

He kept walking, reasoning that the sooner he found an edge, the sooner he’d find a light or a door. It didn’t take long to realize that the sound of each footstep was fainter than the last, and not much longer than that to realize he could no longer feel his legs.

Or his anything at all, actually.

There was a brief rising panic, replaced quickly by the awareness of the faint and incongruous scents of peppermint and sandalwood, then the awareness of Nothing, then the awareness of nothing.

---

As Azgard had lead Peth away, Iifa had followed; she was worried about Azgard’s increasingly paranoid and erratic behavior, and she certainly wasn’t going to let him strike the boy again. She had to protect him, because… Because… She had to protect him. Barabbas hadn’t been in the main hall for some time, preferring whatever inscrutable errands of his own he had to viewing the bloodshed and watching what he suspected was the collapse of the cultists’ carefully laid plans. Only the massive but vague and shrouded frame of Endo was standing near the orb, his impassive facelessess directed unblinkingly at the tableau it showed. He did not stir for some time, even as the view seemed to break from relevant perspectives to watch a reptilian victim of the memory golem’s fall to the floor, even as she stood and chatted, even as she vanished into darkness. It was only once she was truly and fully gone that he moved, silently exiting the viewing chamber through the same door Azgard had taken.

A pair of sparkling blue eyes watched him watching, then watched him go.

Some moments later, Barabbas stalked his jerky little stalk back in; he was surprised to see only Atelia in the room, placidly sitting on the floor and toying with her orb, and even more surprised when she turned to him and spoke. The two rarely had anything to say to each other, which made her volunteering anything at all noteworthy enough to pay attention.

“You shouldn’t look so worried, Barabbas.”

Ah. Or perhaps not. Still, protocol demanded at least a perfunctory response.

“And why is that?”

“Because,” Atelia fluted, “it’s all going to work out fine.”

“… And what makes you say that?”

“As long as something can happen, it will happen somewhere, right? So if it’s possible that we succeed, we will. Even if it’s not here. And because failure means death, for us, our consciousness will eventually only be aware of the story we win in. Even if this you dies, there’ll always be a you who doesn’t, and it’ll seem like that’s the only one of you there ever was. Gias is already experiencing a better future, and even Xylphos must have gotten a happy ending somewhere. They call it quantum immortality, I think.”

“That’s oddly… philosophical, for you. Where did you read about such things?”

Atelia tittered. “It came to me in a dream.”

Barabbas’s solemn face managed to become even more solemn, if such were even possible. “That’s not funny.”

“Alright.”

“It’s all immaterial, anyway. We’re outside the rules and influence of universes here.”

One of the orbs-within-orbs surfaced and magnified, showing a man running to or from something Barabbas couldn’t see before her hand twisted, sending the man back to the depths and uncountable other bubbles spinning and rotating past.

“I bet that’s what they think, too. There’s always a bigger sphere, Barabbas.”

His wrinkled face wrinkled further with distaste for an instant before he caught himself and returned it to disaffected placidity. “It’s turtles all the way down, then?”

Atelia just looked up at him with that childlike and innocent little face of hers; bemusement wasn’t far removed from her usual expression of detached serenity in any case, so it was hard to know if she was ever following a conversation. Barabbas sighed and relented. She really did understand so little.

“Even if you are right, it may not matter. Without the book, without the Leader, there may be no possible sequence of events that leads us where we want to go.”

“It’s a good thing we still have them, then.”

His eyes flicked over to the viewing sphere that was following the fourth round, but it betrayed nothing. “What did you see?”

She turned her attention back to her toy, humming tunelessly to herself. She never had gotten the hang of music. “You never had time for my dreams before, Barabbas.”

“What did you see, Atelia?”

---

The contestants’ journey had thus far been a surprisingly uneventful one. It might not have been possible at all, though, without Chester: even unable as he was to influence Hezekiah’s systems, he could still access security cameras and the ship’s inmate tracking measures; he lead them in a circuitous but safe route, avoiding all the major clusters of inmates he could and warning the group whenever they were about to run into or be discovered by some roving band of prisoners turned bounty hunters. On those occasions when there was no avoiding it, Loran would disappear around a corner and leave the others to determinedly not think about what was happening. He’d come back smiling a wicked smile and they’d continue; there would never be any sign of what had happened.

“Gotta cover your trail,” he’d said once when Will had spent too long looking around at a too-pristine corridor. “Don’t want someone just following the bodies right too us, yeah?”

Since then, the others had been even more studious about not asking questions or even wondering about things. None of them wanted to confront the reality that simply by continuing to be alive in this place, they’d be causing deaths. More than once, Will had considered just shooting the assassin in the back, ending things there, saving all the people that were going to die so he didn’t have to, but… Well, there was always a reason not to, always a rationalization not to pull the trigger. And, as much as the thought sickened him, they might need Loran. And anyway, it wasn’t as though the victims were innocent. It was a ship filled with tyrants and mass murderers who had already been sentenced. And after what Hezekiah had done to them, death would be a mercy, right?

And, and, and. There was always another and, and Loran kept drawing breath and drawing his blades.

Will’s predictions had been right, as it turned out; for every prisoner that had jumped at the sound of a voice from the steely sky offering freedom for one more crime, there were three that could only see what was in front of them or didn’t trust the stranger enough to risk anything, and five who were so broken from their time being tortured that they couldn’t manage anything at all. Hezekiah’s chains had been forged so strong that even once they were removed, their ghosts held the prisoners in place, content to apply the thumbscrews themselves when the hand pressing them in had gone.

It all added up to a chaos the hunted contestants could skirt or blend into, which was about the only survivable situation. Even the most lethal among them was trained only in stealth and precision and wouldn’t be able to stand up to a coordinated attack by a large group, and the least lethal… Well, any of the rest of them, really, would have been hard pressed even to fend off a chance encounter with a single determined alien having a psychotic break. It was fortunate for all of them that there was no real central leadership; Daddy Ham was mostly occupied trying to subdue the still-struggling portions of Hezekiah, and if he ever brought her fully to bear, there really wouldn’t be much realistic chance for the others’ survival. Chester was only just managing to keep the automated security forces misdirected enough to perpetually be minutes away from closing in on them; active leadership from someone who could see the whole of the place would have spelled instant doom.

All of this left Annaliese with very little to do. Will and Chester were handling leadership and planning, and Loran was handling… the things Loran was willing to and capable of handling. The gnome and the witch weren’t expected to do much more than follow along and not blunder into something likely to get them killed. She’d quickly discovered that Parset wasn’t much of a conversationalist. Moreover, the way he kept looking at her made her… uncomfortable. Like he expected something of her, or like he expected her to explode at any second. She didn’t like it, and she was avoiding him. Which left her with even less to do. Not seeing any other options, she turned her attentions inward; it was quite a situation, really, when the best company she had was an imaginary monster.

“You haven’t said much in a while.”

She was careful to think it, not say it; several times, she’d nearly blurted out a question for the queen, or a response to something she’d said. It would have been quite hard to explain, and she wasn’t ready yet to reveal she was being haunted by the long-dead ruler of a conquering empire. Even if between Will’s constantly-changing history and Loran’s hallucinations it didn’t make her the craziest person in the group.

“I have been examining the memories we absorbed when Gias was destroyed. There is much information here you are not consciously aware of yet, and I wish to piece it all together. I am particularly interested in his memories of the others he worked with and the book itself; I feel those things may hold the key to our victory.”

“Oh.” The queen wasn’t bothering to manifest an avatar for Annaliese to interact with at the moment, which made the conversation feel even more awkward. “What have you figured out?”

“Much, yet little. It is rather jumbled and incomplete, and seems to resist close examination. However, I believe you are correct in assuming what you experienced was chronologically accurate and linear. Which actually makes things more confusing, frankly. It will all take time to piece together.”

There was a sigh, or at least the idea of something equivalent. “Still, as long as you live, time is the only resource I have in abundance. I will continue to work and learn what I can.”

Perhaps the implication was there, or perhaps Annaliese put it there herself, but there was to her definite a empty space in the shape of and that will go much faster if you stop bothering me and let me get to it. She sighed, which disappointingly didn’t draw the attention of anyone but Parset, who looked up at her expectantly. Not knowing what else to do, she smiled nervously and waved; he watched her for several more seconds before turning back ahead.

She sighed again, but inwardly this time. It was the waiting that was the worst part. Well, no it wasn’t, not really. The worst part was all the parts where she was almost being killed. Except that the part where she eventually actually was being killed would probably be the worst part. Unless it was preceded by a part where she was being horribly tortured or something. That would probably be the worst worst part if it came down to that. Really, all told, the waiting was probably the best part when you looked at things that way.

She still didn’t have to like it, though.

---

Eventually, the whole thing bled together, individual encounters and events and near-misses blurring into one enormous game of cat and mouse with uncountable hundreds or thousands of cats all as willing to fight and kill each other as hunt the mice. Sustained stress and worry gave way to numbness and familiarity, even in the direst circumstances, so it didn’t come as a surprise when Chester grunted out an “Alright.”; it barely even registered at all.

They’d been travelling through maintenance areas for a while, which meant comparatively few brushes with Daddy Ham’s de facto forces, but maintenance area or not, this wasn’t really what anyone had been expecting. Just another door in just another hall. There were locks and cameras, sure, but no more than there had been anywhere else nearby. Or anywhere else on the ship, even.

“What, already?” Will scanned the corridor, figuratively and literally, then holstered his data reader. “No, uh, guards? Turrets? Dangerous fifty foot drops from perilous scaffolding?”

Chester shrugged, an impressive gesture on someone of his build, which probably explained why he did it so much. “She can call guards any time she needs, so having them standing around somewhere would just draw attention. Same reason we’re just tucked away in maintenance, not breaking into the bridge or power core or anything. Old girl’s big into letting prisoners ruin things for themselves, as you may have noticed, so she likes to hide in plain sight. Likes subtlety.” He glanced at one of the omnipresent surveillance cameras. “Thinks she’s a lot smarter than she is, if you want the honest truth of it.”

“So, what, this is where she monitors everything? Her main consciousness?”

“Nah, she’s a lot more diffuse than that. You’re really underestimating her processing power, I think. Hard for humans to really understand AIs, though. I mean, really empathize. Too different. Anyway, she does sometimes maintain an avatar in the ship, to keep her finger on the pulse and see things from the thick of it, but not here. Likes to be more central than that, takes part in the riots sometimes. This is just where the bulk of the hardware is. Well, I say hardware. Wetware, really. Never been here myself.”

He sighed and gave another rolling shrug as he realized most of his audience’s attention was wandering as Will tried to jimmy the door open. “Anyway, with, uh, whatever’s happening… I dunno, she could be here, she could not. No telling. Nothing like this has happened before, I think, but if she’s being controlled then this is probably about the last place she’s holding out some autonomy. Presence, maybe.”

This also failed to produce whatever reaction he’d been expecting. “Look, this is the best place to interface with her, or whatever you’re planning, but she might not be happy about it. Or go along with it. Or it might all be too late, who knows.”

Annaliese did look a little worried at that, but then she always looked at least a little worried. It was hard to imagine her not biting her lip nervously. Disappointed without being entirely sure why, Chester turned his attentions to helping Will with the door. Maybe whatever was on the far side of it would impress upon them the magnitude of what they were doing, and by extension what they were making him do.

In fact, the scene that greeted the group did leave several mouths hanging open in horror, a realization which might have secretly pleased the datapath if he hadn’t been too busy taking things in himself to notice. Hezekiah’s apparent brain took the form of hanging sheets of slimy synaptic fiber that twisted to cables at the corners and knotted their way into ports embedded in the floor. The whole mass swayed gently in the breeze of a dedicated climate control system, and the air that rolled into the maintenance hall was wet, and hot, and smelled sickeningly of the greenish nutrient slurry being pumped lazily through the veins that crawled like throbbing ivy over the papery brain matter. Once the initial revulsion had passed, it all actually spoke of a setup designed specifically to be as off-putting as possible; there wasn’t even a single sensible pane of glass to protect the ostensibly delicate tissue, a train of thought which was quickly dispelled when a woman stepped out from behind a neural veil.

She was thin and haggard and her hair hung limp around her face, but she strode from her hiding spot with the bearing of an empress and an executioner. She glared with red-rimmed and sunken eyes, and when she spoke it was barely more than a modulated snarl.

“I was wondering when you’d get here.”