Emma Hunter-Hull is no longer an Enforcer. But she's still doing the job of managing world peace. Sometimes that means listening in on private conversations. Sometimes that means that means accessing restricted files. And on a good day, it means getting to do that all too rare activity: telling the whole truth. It feels like lifting a weight off old shoulders.
Without preamble she shuts off her listening device and approaches where Judson and Leo Snow are talking, noting the presence of Leo's assistant Pneuma and Agent Ted Waters standing off. She subtly gestures for the old ACTION agent to come closer, and he acknowledges with an equally subtle nod.
Leo and Judson look up as she approaches. Good, no need to waste time getting their attention. "I've been reviewing the files. Tanner Bane was the CTO of Touchstone Solutions from 1976 to 1982. During that time he brought in a lot of his own people and put them in key positions. He was well situated to hear about new developments at the company, and to influence things to go his way. It was his policy that influenced the contract terms you and Miss Kotobuki had signed. And it was his policy to suppress information, like the transformation Miss Kotobuki was already undergoing."
Judson looks distinctly surprised. "What? What're you talking about?"
"In short, Moleculon did nothing out of the ordinary. Leo's mother was already slowly dying due to the experiments they were doing on her in secret. Experiments into the transmission of all sorts of things. Technological attempts to replicate the same sort of 'passkey' power I have, for example. Her cyber-telepathy was just the tip of the iceberg if these reports are accurate."
The implications of this wash over Judson's face in an angry wave. He's on his feet before he can say anything else, and his fists are balled, but Emma expertly pushes him back down into his seat. "Bloody hell, calm down. ACTION knows, or will know. We'll see that justice is done."
"No!" Judson yells. "I saw it! Moleculon attacked her!"
"He was using his power to restrain you. From what I've read of his report - and he did file one - he felt an unexplained energy feedback. Probably Miss Kotobuki's powers resisting the attack instinctively. Well.. I'm no science expert, and you are. See for yourself."
She hands over a data pad, and watches Judson's hands carefully as he thumbs through the data. She watches with narrowed eyes as he cross-references the same Touchstone data sources she was reading earlier. And she reads him easily enough that when he drops the pad in shock, she's there to catch the hardware so it's not damaged.
"Your former boss, and his picked men, did this to your lover, Mr. Snow," Emma announces calmly. And while Judson starts rubbing away hot tears with fiercely-curled fists, she watches Leo stretch out a tentative hand and finally place it on his father's shoulder.
"May I see that, Emma?" Pneuma asks. Emma nods, and absent-mindedly hands over the data pad. Why not? She's part of this too.
----
Pneuma browses the data pad. So much of her own history is wrapped up in this incident. Leo's birth, the creation of "the Gnome", a life-long hatred that she inherited from Leo's memories. His ghost lives on in her head, advising the person she has become. But something jumps out at her, and she re-scans the pad a couple times to be sure. "Leo.. look at this." She highlights a section of data and extends it.
Leo accepts, and as he does, Pneuma becomes aware that Judson Snow is crying. Every fiber of her body rebels at his presence. To him, she imagines, she is nothing more than a fancy toy created by her son. She remembers the abductions. She remembers the Shadow Syndicate. And she's still remembering these things when she finds her arms wrapped around the little man and holding onto him.
As Judson mourns the loss of his wife and the attendant betrayal, Pneuma glances over to see Leo's eyes widen. He stands slowly. "These.. Hey.. Hey, Pneuma, you're right. Gnome. Dammit, no. Judson? Dad. Crap. I have no idea what to call you now. Hey, old man, listen!"
Judson looks up with puffy red eyes. Leo waves the data pad in his face. "These readings. These are neuro-hologram values. Synaptic matrix calculations."
"Yeah, I was studying that stuff for the company," Judson replies. "That's how I was able to build your neurochip." Slowly the source of that data dawns on him.
Leo nods. "This is Project Tesla. This is the energy field that Touchstone has upstairs. Yeah? This isn't some random energy field. This is a mind. There's one like this in her, and him, and her--" Leo points at Pneuma, Otto, and Niki.
Judson grasps the implications immediately. "You built a neuro-holographic extraction algorithm? And a parallelizing quantum axon emulator?"
Leo shrugs. What kind of question is this? ".. Yeah?"
Judson presses. "So you have an extraction device?"
Leo nods again. And both men lock gazes as they realize the same thing. "We can bring her back!"
They start to run, together, for the exit. And Ted Waters is there, pressing his hand gently but firmly against two chests. "We'll take my car, gentlemen."
----
The drive to Leo's lab feels interminable to the men in the back seat. To Agent Ted Waters, this is just another day on the job. From what he can glean, Snow pere and Snow fils intend to recover a person, somehow, that both thought was dead. The kid's got the science to turn the result into a living mind, while the dad has the know-how to do something with the original energy field to make that possible. Waters has learned not to ask unnecessary questions. Right now his job in this equation is to keep an eye on the Gnome.
The back seat has quieted down. Emma and Pneuma are riding along as well. Neither woman seems inclined to talk more. Waters is surprised when it's Judson who speaks up.
"You're Agent Ted Waters, ACTION. I remembered you. You were always there, every damn time. How'd you track me down, anyway?"
"That might compromise operational security. Sorry, sir, I have to decline to answer." The words flow smoothly from Waters' lips. And they're true. He goes back to driving.
"And you're the guy who raised my son to be the man he is." That earns a slight waver on the steering wheel. But at least the conversation seems to be on safer grounds.
"No, sir. Leo was placed in a succession of foster families. We made sure the son of a supervillain was being adequately protected, as well as the foster family." No need to mention that every new abduction disrupted the boy's life. If Snow pere hasn't figured that out, it's meaningless to explain.
"But you had a hand in pickin' them."
Waters composes his features. His fingers tighten on the steering wheel. "I had some authority over that selection."
"Yeah? Well then. I guess you're as close as I'm gonna get to say this. Ya did a good job with my kid. He's been a royal pain in the posterior, too. Well, that's gotta be how it is, I figure."
The lab is just ahead. Waters pulls in and gets out. Plenty of time between the time he leaves the car and when he opens the back doors to use the handkerchief on his eyes. He's got to keep up appearances.
----
Zeta is the only one in the lab. The Aleph Team went off to help Link and his friends. Most of the workshop is locked down, and Zeta finds that none of his old codes work. He tries a few attempts to break through the security, with no success. Small surprise, he thinks: he and Leo have plenty in common mentally. Of course he'd anticipate what Zeta would try.
He's surprised to hear the door open. He's more surprised to see Leo and the Gnome enter together. Every hateful emotion comes rushing back in a moment. Before he knows it, he's sprung across the room, only to be expertly grabbed from behind by somebody who shouldn't be there. Who--?
Emma's voice comes over his shoulder as a firm pair of hands pinion his arms and force him down. "Ease down, soldier." Of course, thinks Zeta - the teleporter Mirage.
"Hey, Zeta." Leo's voice. "Yeah, bro, I heard you got betrayed by someone you were working for, who took away your hopes and dreams. Meet my dad. Same thing just happened to him. So I reckon you two have a lot to talk about."
Emma releases him, and Zeta rises to his feet. Something is absolutely amiss, and he tries to orient himself. "But you're enemies."
"We're family," laughs the Gnome bitterly. "Bein' enemies comes with the territory. Yeah, the kid is right. Tanner Bane did me dirty. But that son of a bitch is gettin' his. There's no more Unitron either, Solar Girl saw to that. Probably Rex Mundi's doin', that connivin' chiselin'.. anyway. Tanner Bane wanted to see if Leviathan could brainwash a digital mind. Spread that around the network, turn the whole world's computers into intelligent slaves. Then I helped him get his hands on Unitron. Which, y'know, probably was the end result of that for all I know. Whoops."
"Anyway. You want to help save a life?"
Zeta reels mentally. This is all too much to take in. But the final question shines a much-needed light through the fog. "... Yes. What do you need me to do?"
----
Zeta hauls the heavy halo apparatus out to the car. Leo follows, hauling a spare shell and a handful of other equipment. Agent Waters hits the pedal. The car peels out, hot on the way back to Touchstone.
The two inventors work feverishly. The mind-extraction technology is familiar to Leo, while Judson is a veritable whirlwind with the rest of the gear. Waters and Emma watch the elder man like a hawk, though Leo seems too engrossed in his own half of the problem to worry about the risk.
The last connection is snapped into place. The last power cable is plugged in. Judson throws the switch, sending arcing currents through the Touchstone lab's equipment. And Leo steps forward, facing the AI machine.
"Before the omnipotent witness, I pledge never to use this power for evil," he declares. And the final switch is thrown.
The entire lab lights up. Streamers of energy - the same type that struck Circuit when she was last through here - reach out and around, seeking a home. That home has been prepared: a feminine shell, sculpted originally for Pneuma. Through the AI machine, a torrent of data flows. A human mind, reduced to digital information by a power gone out of control, captured by a soulless super-science, now frees itself and flows back toward the light.
The power fades from the room. The meter dials swing back to zero. And Kaguya Kotobuki opens her eyes.
Monday, November 17, 2014
Wednesday, November 12, 2014
Adversary epilogue - Kaguya Kotobuki
Tanner Bane's indictment as the Cybernaut - including the laundry list of related crimes such as criminal conspiracy, theft of restricted technology, and so forth - will shake the foundations of New Troy. Leo Snow sits in the calm at the eye of this storm, and listens to Judson Snow talk. Next to Leo is Pneuma, a stern scowl adorning her otherwise-pretty features. Her body language makes it clear that anything she says will not be well received by anyone here. And Agent Ted Waters is near enough to keep a very sharp eye on the supervillain, but not close enough to overhear the conversation.
"You want to take it from the top?" Leo asks. His voice is calm. He's unmindful of the faint trail of blood seeping from a cut on his brow, which Pneuma had to forcibly bandage without his cooperation. His skin is slightly browned in places, a relic of the electrical attacks he suffered. Niki is off looking for paramedics; whether Leo will cooperate any more with them is uncertain.
"I guess this is overdue," admits Judson, shrugging. "You could say that everything I've been doin' here is for two people. First 'n foremost, myself. I'm not a goodie-two-shoes, never will be. I don't apologize. But the second person is Kaguya Kotobuki. Your mother."
Leo's eyes go wide. But he says nothing, refusing to interrupt the flow of information with an errant word. The elder Snow goes on.
"Y'see, Kaguya was what you might call an Enforcers wannabe, or Junior Enforcers type. She wanted to be a hero. Her power was cyber-empathy or cyber-telepathy. She could feel what was going on inside devices 'n computers 'n so on. Not really Enforcers material, know what I'm sayin'? But she was great in the lab, and there she stayed. That's when she and I met. Touchstone Solutions hired people like us. People with talents for machines and inventing. Seems they had this source for rare materials an' just threw big brains at the problem of finding uses for it all."
"I'd never been smooth with the ladies. But she.. well, first she told me my inventions were the most beautiful thing she ever felt. She said they were like 'flowers blooming in silicon'. And I've never heard a compliment I disliked. So we get acquainted."
"Fast forward a few years. I was gettin' real tired of Touchstone. We're gettin' used an' used an' used. None of us got the credit we deserved. So I told Kaguya that I was gonna make it big. I was gonna strike out on my own. I was better with tech than business, but I figured, hey, I'm a smart guy, right? I can work it out. Besides, there were a few customers that Touchstone wouldn't touch, that I'd be happy to work with."
"So one night we take off with a few of my more interesting innovations - hey, don't give me that look, remember I said we were the ones building this stuff." After Leo's steady gaze bores into him a bit more, he waves his hands in token of surrender. "Fine, fine, it was theft. Who cares? I needed a starting point. They owed me, kid."
"So who should get in our way but Moleculon himself! Didn't think I rated that much attention, go figure. Well, some of these toys, they're pretty handy. We obviously tried to run for it - no way was I ready to tackle Moleculon then, nowadays is another story - anyway. We're almost safe, an' he does something, still not sure what. Kaguya takes the hit for me. I remember her face..."
Judson goes silent. Leo remains wordless. Pneuma's hard stare never wavers. The diminutive inventor resumes the thread of narrative at last. His voice quavers now, each word chipping away a bit more at the dam holding back his feelings. "She didn't deserve that. We got away. But... somethin' about what that bastard did had damaged her. Made her powers go wonky. She was dyin', that was clear. An' that was the time when she'd already conceived you, kiddo. So there was two lives at risk."
"She told me she never wanted to steal from Touchstone, but she thought she'd lose me if I went off on my own. She told me she loved me and wanted me to be happy. She asked me to .. well, not in so many words, but basically she wanted me to fess up, cop to the theft, turn myself in to the fuzz. I knew what she wanted. The mother wasn't going to last, so the father had to be there."
The paramedics finally arrive, coming through the police cordon. Leo waves them off without even looking. Pneuma, after agonizing moments of consideration, forcibly ushers them away and returns to listening without a word. Judson goes on.
"Well that was it! Your old man was officially a criminal. So Kaguya went to the hospital and I went on the lam. A few months later, they deliver you without difficulty. A few months after that, she passed. Never did get to see her. Tried getting close, of course - the cops chased me off. Being my height makes it hard to sneak anywhere."
Judson sighs. "Kaguya was the perfect woman. Beautiful, smart, interestin'. She loved me so much. She loved my inventions. She really got who I was. After her, kid, there was never gonna be another woman good enough. But that didn't stop me from tryin'. And tryin', and tryin'. Never was satisfied with whoever I was with. Like a man who's hungry and can never eat enough."
Leo finally breaks his silence. "So my brain damage was caused by that incident?"
"Yeah." Judson taps the side of his head. "Whatever hit your mom screwed up your nervous system but good. You'd have been dead by age six. I hit the books, learned biology, neurology, surgery. I built a chip - well, what am I tellin' you this for? You know the rest o' that. 'Cept that I'd keep breaking out and coming for you to check up on your progress, make sure the damage wasn't recurring. Finally, though, I figured you were okay. I decided you'd had enough of your old man, and I kinda had enough of the cops busting in on us. So I left you alone and went about my business... until Tanner Bane came calling."
"None of us read the fine print on our Touchstone contracts. Turns out that everyone with real powers - her an' me included - donated their bodies to the company upon death. Those heartless bastards didn't even wait until she was cold until they took off with her. Somehow or another, her body and brain were converting themselves into digital information. That's what was killing her in the end. A fatal mutation of her powers, y'know?"
"Well, Tanner Bane knows all this, 'cause he's the Man now. He saw my file in Touchstone's work records, knew who I'd become, decided I was the right man for his job. 'How'd you like to make more money than God, and avenge the death of your wife into the bargain?' he asks. Coming back to Touchstone was a hard sell but that offer was solid gold to me. He says he'll get the truth of what happened to us out there, make people appreciate just what an influence people like Kaguya and me had been on the company. Name recognition. The real thing, what I deserved all along. 'Once my plans come to fruition, you'll never fear being ignored', he promised."
"He needs me for the expertise on the equipment he's building. He brings in another guy, Hannibal Lectric. Scary villain, bad news. But whip-smart, let me tell you. And these two tell me that Kaguya's remains had been incorporated into something called 'Project Tesla', some kind of bio-information transmission system. The scientists who were working on it weren't at my level. All they got it to do was superconduct. Big whoop. But this tech got poured into some punk kid who broke in, apparently, and it gave her super-powers. Hannibal knows he could power himself up with this stuff, so he needs the thief back. Sure, it'll kill her to achieve his goal, but at the time I was mostly okay with that."
Finally Judson stops, and Leo watches him rub his eyes. The elder Snow's fingers come away wet with tears, and Leo looks at him with a start.
"Yeah, your old man's been known to cry. That thief who got the power? That's apparently your friend there, Electric Slide or whatever her name is. She got her powers from big-company scientists carving up your mother. So when I saw you take that electric bolt for me tonight? Somethin' just clicked. I feel different. Bane betrayin' me doesn't surprise me at all. That's not what I was thinking about at all. All I could see was you, divin' into the path of that hit, like she did. And all I could think was, 'not again'. But you didn't go down. You beat him. You won. The gods were giving me a second chance."
"I'll never be a good guy, son. I'll be the same crappy father I've always been. I'm always going to build what I feel like, and expect to get well paid by anyone who wants it. But I guess you could say... for now, I'm willing to try it Kaguya's way."
"You want to take it from the top?" Leo asks. His voice is calm. He's unmindful of the faint trail of blood seeping from a cut on his brow, which Pneuma had to forcibly bandage without his cooperation. His skin is slightly browned in places, a relic of the electrical attacks he suffered. Niki is off looking for paramedics; whether Leo will cooperate any more with them is uncertain.
"I guess this is overdue," admits Judson, shrugging. "You could say that everything I've been doin' here is for two people. First 'n foremost, myself. I'm not a goodie-two-shoes, never will be. I don't apologize. But the second person is Kaguya Kotobuki. Your mother."
Leo's eyes go wide. But he says nothing, refusing to interrupt the flow of information with an errant word. The elder Snow goes on.
"Y'see, Kaguya was what you might call an Enforcers wannabe, or Junior Enforcers type. She wanted to be a hero. Her power was cyber-empathy or cyber-telepathy. She could feel what was going on inside devices 'n computers 'n so on. Not really Enforcers material, know what I'm sayin'? But she was great in the lab, and there she stayed. That's when she and I met. Touchstone Solutions hired people like us. People with talents for machines and inventing. Seems they had this source for rare materials an' just threw big brains at the problem of finding uses for it all."
"I'd never been smooth with the ladies. But she.. well, first she told me my inventions were the most beautiful thing she ever felt. She said they were like 'flowers blooming in silicon'. And I've never heard a compliment I disliked. So we get acquainted."
"Fast forward a few years. I was gettin' real tired of Touchstone. We're gettin' used an' used an' used. None of us got the credit we deserved. So I told Kaguya that I was gonna make it big. I was gonna strike out on my own. I was better with tech than business, but I figured, hey, I'm a smart guy, right? I can work it out. Besides, there were a few customers that Touchstone wouldn't touch, that I'd be happy to work with."
"So one night we take off with a few of my more interesting innovations - hey, don't give me that look, remember I said we were the ones building this stuff." After Leo's steady gaze bores into him a bit more, he waves his hands in token of surrender. "Fine, fine, it was theft. Who cares? I needed a starting point. They owed me, kid."
"So who should get in our way but Moleculon himself! Didn't think I rated that much attention, go figure. Well, some of these toys, they're pretty handy. We obviously tried to run for it - no way was I ready to tackle Moleculon then, nowadays is another story - anyway. We're almost safe, an' he does something, still not sure what. Kaguya takes the hit for me. I remember her face..."
Judson goes silent. Leo remains wordless. Pneuma's hard stare never wavers. The diminutive inventor resumes the thread of narrative at last. His voice quavers now, each word chipping away a bit more at the dam holding back his feelings. "She didn't deserve that. We got away. But... somethin' about what that bastard did had damaged her. Made her powers go wonky. She was dyin', that was clear. An' that was the time when she'd already conceived you, kiddo. So there was two lives at risk."
"She told me she never wanted to steal from Touchstone, but she thought she'd lose me if I went off on my own. She told me she loved me and wanted me to be happy. She asked me to .. well, not in so many words, but basically she wanted me to fess up, cop to the theft, turn myself in to the fuzz. I knew what she wanted. The mother wasn't going to last, so the father had to be there."
The paramedics finally arrive, coming through the police cordon. Leo waves them off without even looking. Pneuma, after agonizing moments of consideration, forcibly ushers them away and returns to listening without a word. Judson goes on.
"Well that was it! Your old man was officially a criminal. So Kaguya went to the hospital and I went on the lam. A few months later, they deliver you without difficulty. A few months after that, she passed. Never did get to see her. Tried getting close, of course - the cops chased me off. Being my height makes it hard to sneak anywhere."
Judson sighs. "Kaguya was the perfect woman. Beautiful, smart, interestin'. She loved me so much. She loved my inventions. She really got who I was. After her, kid, there was never gonna be another woman good enough. But that didn't stop me from tryin'. And tryin', and tryin'. Never was satisfied with whoever I was with. Like a man who's hungry and can never eat enough."
Leo finally breaks his silence. "So my brain damage was caused by that incident?"
"Yeah." Judson taps the side of his head. "Whatever hit your mom screwed up your nervous system but good. You'd have been dead by age six. I hit the books, learned biology, neurology, surgery. I built a chip - well, what am I tellin' you this for? You know the rest o' that. 'Cept that I'd keep breaking out and coming for you to check up on your progress, make sure the damage wasn't recurring. Finally, though, I figured you were okay. I decided you'd had enough of your old man, and I kinda had enough of the cops busting in on us. So I left you alone and went about my business... until Tanner Bane came calling."
"None of us read the fine print on our Touchstone contracts. Turns out that everyone with real powers - her an' me included - donated their bodies to the company upon death. Those heartless bastards didn't even wait until she was cold until they took off with her. Somehow or another, her body and brain were converting themselves into digital information. That's what was killing her in the end. A fatal mutation of her powers, y'know?"
"Well, Tanner Bane knows all this, 'cause he's the Man now. He saw my file in Touchstone's work records, knew who I'd become, decided I was the right man for his job. 'How'd you like to make more money than God, and avenge the death of your wife into the bargain?' he asks. Coming back to Touchstone was a hard sell but that offer was solid gold to me. He says he'll get the truth of what happened to us out there, make people appreciate just what an influence people like Kaguya and me had been on the company. Name recognition. The real thing, what I deserved all along. 'Once my plans come to fruition, you'll never fear being ignored', he promised."
"He needs me for the expertise on the equipment he's building. He brings in another guy, Hannibal Lectric. Scary villain, bad news. But whip-smart, let me tell you. And these two tell me that Kaguya's remains had been incorporated into something called 'Project Tesla', some kind of bio-information transmission system. The scientists who were working on it weren't at my level. All they got it to do was superconduct. Big whoop. But this tech got poured into some punk kid who broke in, apparently, and it gave her super-powers. Hannibal knows he could power himself up with this stuff, so he needs the thief back. Sure, it'll kill her to achieve his goal, but at the time I was mostly okay with that."
Finally Judson stops, and Leo watches him rub his eyes. The elder Snow's fingers come away wet with tears, and Leo looks at him with a start.
"Yeah, your old man's been known to cry. That thief who got the power? That's apparently your friend there, Electric Slide or whatever her name is. She got her powers from big-company scientists carving up your mother. So when I saw you take that electric bolt for me tonight? Somethin' just clicked. I feel different. Bane betrayin' me doesn't surprise me at all. That's not what I was thinking about at all. All I could see was you, divin' into the path of that hit, like she did. And all I could think was, 'not again'. But you didn't go down. You beat him. You won. The gods were giving me a second chance."
"I'll never be a good guy, son. I'll be the same crappy father I've always been. I'm always going to build what I feel like, and expect to get well paid by anyone who wants it. But I guess you could say... for now, I'm willing to try it Kaguya's way."
Sunday, October 5, 2014
The pneumatic hammer
Leo reviews the preparations for the upcoming attack on the Shadow Syndicate's headquarters. In the repair bay, Pneuma is watching him work. Or rather, her head is - the rest of her body is separated into its modular pieces, held up like a scarecrow by the repair scaffolding.
"I'm feeling a little exposed up here," the girl quips, noting Leo's stern expression. When this doesn't get a response, she eventually tries again. "If you want to know if I've got the guts to do this, well, you can see them."
Leo looks up, and Pneuma realizes with shock that there's a tear on one cheek. "What is it?" she asks softly.
"I'm afraid of killing my father," Leo answers, plainly. He puts in a new program on the computer console, and Pneuma's parts begin to shift. "That's why you're going to keep me under control. Like you always do. This time more directly."
"I don't understand, Leo. I know you're angry with Judson - we all are - but how..?"
At a typed command, Pneuma's body start reassembling itself. Leo suits up. By the time she's back together, he's in the Link suit. "Give yourself the unlock command," he instructs. "Hammer mode." Pneuma nods, and concentrates for a moment.
The effect is dramatic. The girl's entire body swings open, ejecting a thick-set piece of metal that lands squarely in Link's grasp with a flare of verniers. He swings it about experimentally, and Pneuma finally gets a glimpse of its shape: a warhammer, Nearby Leo has set up a practice target, and now he swings the hammer in a sudden arc. Jets flare out from the back of it, dramatically accelerating it into the target. He effortlessly tugs it out of the rubble, then flings it across the room at a ranged target. The hammer guides itself on hydrogen jets, smashing into the target, then flying back to Leo's outstretched hand.
"Not bad," whistles Pneuma. "That's what you installed in me?"
"And more." Leo tosses the hammer back at her. Rapidly, the girl's body re-absorbs it and she regains her shape.
"Otto!" The car drives itself in obediently and transforms; Link leaps upward, skyhooks dragging him into the core of Otto. "Unlock command, big hammer mode," he tells Pneuma.
This time the girl's entire body transforms. She's still aware of herself and her surroundings, but knows that her shape has been dramatically altered. Now she is the hammer, and she can feel full control of the verniers come alive inside herself. Otto's huge hand grips the haft firmly, just like Leo's human-scale hand had done.
"I can only attack at full power with your permission," Leo explains. "And your verniers let you control how much force I use. If I flip out, nobody gets hurt too much."
"I understand." And Pneuma does understand, now. "I heard what you told Angela. About heroes fighting right. Thank you for trusting me to support you."
"Connection is strength," Leo says with a smile. "You and me, together. We'll protect the city from the Shadow Syndicate and the Gnome. And maybe we'll even rescue Judson Snow from their clutches."
Friday, September 19, 2014
Giant Size Annual 1 epilogue - Circuit and Zeta
It was roughly 24 hours since they returned from the moon, and Emma informed the team to be ready to go soon. Angela faked sickness to get out of school early, but in reality she did feel sick. Well, not sick exactly, but some indefinable emotion had been in the pit of her stomach. She hardly slept a wink last night.
"But we WON!" The thought was a retort - a plea - to the other half of her internal argument with herself. She was on her way to Link's lab, to figure out what went wrong.
The entrance to the lab, under the junkyard in the middle of New Troy's industrial district, is unmarked and unobtrusive. But he told the team how to find it and provided an access code to use.
As she turns the corner and the door to the lab comes into view, she goes over all the events again. Leo's a great guy, but why did he react like that? She wants to be sure she has all the details in order. After a moment, she punches in the combination and pushes the door open.
Leo is talking to Pneuma in the workshop's meeting room when Angela appears. Leo whispers something to Pneuma, and she disappears through a door into the repair bay, leaving the two human heroes alone.
"What do you want here?" Leo's voice isn't cold or angry. It's tired, drained of energy. He hasn't slept by the look and the sound of him.
Thank God the junior team member thought, relieved that she did not receive the angry confrontation she expected. “Is this a bad time?” she asked sheepishly, immediately regretting the question.
"Every time's a bad time right now. Let's get this done." Leo sounds a bit grumpier. But he repeats the question: "what do you want?"
Her eyes searched the room for an ally - Bob or Niki - but found none. “I wanted to talk about last night. About Zeta.” She practiced this. Make sure to use personal pronouns. “I think I understand why you were upset, and I wanted to...you know...make things right.” This is harder than I thought it would be. “I’m sorry I did what I did - I was just trying to help - to protect us.”
Leo sighs and lets himself sink into his office chair, gesturing to an empty chair across the table. "You think you know why I'm upset. Let's start with that. Why am I upset?"
On the spot. “I didn’t know who Zeta was. I thought he was just some badguy, ya know? A toaster. I didn't realize there was a connection; when I was in him, those memories were suppressed, if that’s the right word. He’d replaced a lot of that stuff with ” She pauses, finding the right word, “rage? In any case, I didn't delve too deeply into his positronic resonation centers much, I was focused on controlling him. I didn’t know I could do that!”
Leo nods along. He seems to have expected something like this. "So it was okay because he was a bad guy?"
“Well” she begins, a bit confused, “I mean, its ok to control him if he’s a badguy, right? Not even Solar Girl could hit him, he was just too fast! Somehow I thought of Bob, and then I got the idea. If I can get inside, I might be able to control him. Stop him. From hitting Karen, you know?” She looks at Leo for approval. “I know it seems, like, absurd, but I was trying to protect her.”
"What makes him a bad guy, and us the good guys?" Leo's tone is settled now. He's on familiar ground.
Angela begins to respond, but stops; apparently this is not a question so easy to answer. “Well, lets see. We went to the moon to chase down the Gnome, and ran into the others in the Shadow Syndicate. We didn’t know why they were there, and they most certainly didn't want us to be there. We learned that someone else was in the trophy room, and Karen took off to handle it, and I went with her.” She considers the events a bit more. “He was certainly hostile to us! I guess he was a bad-guy because he wanted to take us out - and of course, because of what he planned to do. But we didn’t know that when we went in. So. If we assume he didn’t play to infect all the computers, and we arrived out of nowhere, ready to scrap, I guess he would be hostile to us. In that case, I guess he might not be a bad guy.” She resists to add the words but he was at the end of that sentence.
“Is that what you are driving at?”
"You're right. Hostility doesn't matter. If all we were doing was fighting each other in a big cage match, there'd be no heroes and villains." Leo sighs. "But this isn't professional wrestling. We're not faces and heels. What we do matters. How we do it matters. So let's say that you weren't there, and Zeta was someone else. A telepath, maybe. He edits Solar Girl's memories to make her forget us, her friends. Is he justified?"
“Man, when I was a thief, I didn't have to worry about people, you know? And this,” she holds up her smartphone, “It doesn’t have a person inside, a consciousness. How do you keep it all straight in a fight?” She looks back at Leo. This is certainly not the conversation she was expecting. “Of course its not justified. But what if it were Solar Girl’s brother? What if he was there to kill us all? Would that be justified? I mean, its not like I can edit his brain, you know?”
Leo smiles a little. "I got into trouble when I was a kid. I acted out. I hacked computers. I was the son of a supervillain. The cops knew it. The Feds knew it. My old man would come and abduct me every few years, before they threw him back in the slam. So you can understand that I spent a lot of time thinking about this question: am I a bad person?"
"What I finally figured out is this. We're the good guys and they're the bad guys based on the future that we're trying to create. Victory at any cost shouldn't be how we live. Our desired future at any cost is what we want, even if it means our lives. The hero is a moral example to people around him. The hero has bravery, courage, and self-sacrifice. The hero always wins in the story because we tell stories that make us feel better about ourselves. But there's superheroes that have fallen, and supervillains that triumphed. So we fight harder. But we have to keep fighting right."
"There's a movie called 'The Iron Giant'. This kid, 9-year-old Hogarth, finds a robot. Robot's from another planet. Made to be a weapon. Hogarth tells him that he is who he chooses to be. He doesn't have to be a weapon. The child of a supervillain doesn't have to be one as well. A thief doesn't have to be amoral. The sister of a murderous tyrant doesn't have to turn bad as well. A former supervillainess can train a new generation of heroes. But that only works if we keep walking the true path."
Angela interjects. "And a robot who falls in with the wrong crowd deserves a chance to change" She looks down, ashamed. "Can't do that if I erase his memories. Who would I be if Max did that when he rescued me?"
Leo nods. "Who we are is assembled from our memories and past decisions. So then, if all that matters is our choice - or our free will - or the memories that make us up, that opportunity to be good people - then when you take that away from someone, you rob them of their chance to be better. You put their redemption at risk. And that is why I was so upset at what you did to Zeta. I don't know if I'll get him back now. I don't know that I ever could have. But that's not my call to make. He chooses for himself."
"I understand." She considers Link's words a bit more. "I could help, maybe. Would you...would he, let me?"
"That's up to him. And to the rest of the team." Leo rises out of his seat, wobbles, and walks unsteadily to the door. He manages to get it open and beckon for Pneuma before he collapses to the floor, unconscious. She rushes to check on him, worry giving way to frustration on her face, and she looks up at Angela. "He's exhausted. Wait here." A minute is enough to prop him up in one of the spare chairs, and for Pneuma to sit down in his old spot. "I wanted to talk to you about Zeta as well. I'm sure Leo had a lot to say. Probably babbling, since he refused to sleep like usual. Sorry about that, that's what he'll tell me. Anyway." Pneuma herself doesn't seem much more focused, to be fair. "Do you know how we're made?"
"Yeah. Well, kind of. You sure he's ok though?"
Pneuma waves her hand. "He's a big baby when it comes to taking care of himself. Leave him to me, he'll be fine in a few hours."
Angela chuckles. "I guess that's why he likes to wear armor? Anyways, his dad left him some stuff, or he got his dad's estate legally since he was, um, not fit to be a dad. He was always a bit of a loner, so he decided to make you. Is that right, well, mostly right?"
Pneuma smiles wearily. She looks almost as run-down as Leo did. "That's the why. The how is a chip implanted in his brain. It duplicates the state of his neurons - memory, thoughts, everything. He visualizes a new AI, clones his brain-state while that visualization is going on. It's like method acting, or roleplaying exercises. Then he feeds that into an AI factory. The result is a new mind. But in a real sense, we're all products of his mind. And that's something all of us grapple with. Are we real, independent people? Do we have souls? Epsilon, Zeta, and I all left Leo at one time over the fear that we're not. We… don't like anything that reminds us that we can be edited. We don't like the suggestion that we're an organic's toys." Pneuma leans in, her face hardening into an expression of seriousness. "We will fight very hard to believe that we aren't. Please understand this."
She stares at Pneuma, her mouth agape. "You aren't copies of him, you are your own. Or, at least Bob is. It's easy to tell that. Well, I could tell when I was in there with him. Now that I think about it, Zeta too. They are both so similar - that's why I could change him - but very different. Like, how people say we end up like our parents, you know?"
Angela pauses for a moment, seeking a better analogy. "Entropy. The laws of thermodynamics, if I remember it correctly from my physics class. Everything in nature starts in a state of order, then always moves towards disorder. I think that's like your mind. At first, it was a duplicate of Leo's. But over time, it changes. It changes on its own. That's all you. And Bob - all of you. That part's definitely yours."
"That's not bad." Pneuma rubs the bridge of her nose with two careful fingers, working away tension and exhaustion. "We are his dreams of family brought to life. We get along, but we also fight. We don't think the same things. We can surprise each other. We make new purposes for ourselves. I was built to be the perfect girlfriend for Leo. I'm not that - may never be that. I … don't know." The woman exhales and looks down at her hands. "But this feeling of identity is worth that sacrifice, if… if that's how it has to be."
Angela looks over at Leo, serenely dozing away in his chair. “Regardless of what role in his life he meant for you when you were born, I think you’ve become what he needs you to be. What about you though? Are you what you want to be?”
"I'm still working on that, dear," is Pneuma's quiet reply.
"I brought something also." Angela pulls a DVD from her backpack, and hands it out to Pneuma. "My dad used to watch movies with me. This is an old one, but it's pretty funny. I thought that when we get back, we could all watch it together. It's called Short Circuit."
Pneuma glances over at Leo as well. "Yes, that would be good. Thank you."
"But we WON!" The thought was a retort - a plea - to the other half of her internal argument with herself. She was on her way to Link's lab, to figure out what went wrong.
The entrance to the lab, under the junkyard in the middle of New Troy's industrial district, is unmarked and unobtrusive. But he told the team how to find it and provided an access code to use.
As she turns the corner and the door to the lab comes into view, she goes over all the events again. Leo's a great guy, but why did he react like that? She wants to be sure she has all the details in order. After a moment, she punches in the combination and pushes the door open.
Leo is talking to Pneuma in the workshop's meeting room when Angela appears. Leo whispers something to Pneuma, and she disappears through a door into the repair bay, leaving the two human heroes alone.
"What do you want here?" Leo's voice isn't cold or angry. It's tired, drained of energy. He hasn't slept by the look and the sound of him.
Thank God the junior team member thought, relieved that she did not receive the angry confrontation she expected. “Is this a bad time?” she asked sheepishly, immediately regretting the question.
"Every time's a bad time right now. Let's get this done." Leo sounds a bit grumpier. But he repeats the question: "what do you want?"
Her eyes searched the room for an ally - Bob or Niki - but found none. “I wanted to talk about last night. About Zeta.” She practiced this. Make sure to use personal pronouns. “I think I understand why you were upset, and I wanted to...you know...make things right.” This is harder than I thought it would be. “I’m sorry I did what I did - I was just trying to help - to protect us.”
Leo sighs and lets himself sink into his office chair, gesturing to an empty chair across the table. "You think you know why I'm upset. Let's start with that. Why am I upset?"
On the spot. “I didn’t know who Zeta was. I thought he was just some badguy, ya know? A toaster. I didn't realize there was a connection; when I was in him, those memories were suppressed, if that’s the right word. He’d replaced a lot of that stuff with ” She pauses, finding the right word, “rage? In any case, I didn't delve too deeply into his positronic resonation centers much, I was focused on controlling him. I didn’t know I could do that!”
Leo nods along. He seems to have expected something like this. "So it was okay because he was a bad guy?"
“Well” she begins, a bit confused, “I mean, its ok to control him if he’s a badguy, right? Not even Solar Girl could hit him, he was just too fast! Somehow I thought of Bob, and then I got the idea. If I can get inside, I might be able to control him. Stop him. From hitting Karen, you know?” She looks at Leo for approval. “I know it seems, like, absurd, but I was trying to protect her.”
"What makes him a bad guy, and us the good guys?" Leo's tone is settled now. He's on familiar ground.
Angela begins to respond, but stops; apparently this is not a question so easy to answer. “Well, lets see. We went to the moon to chase down the Gnome, and ran into the others in the Shadow Syndicate. We didn’t know why they were there, and they most certainly didn't want us to be there. We learned that someone else was in the trophy room, and Karen took off to handle it, and I went with her.” She considers the events a bit more. “He was certainly hostile to us! I guess he was a bad-guy because he wanted to take us out - and of course, because of what he planned to do. But we didn’t know that when we went in. So. If we assume he didn’t play to infect all the computers, and we arrived out of nowhere, ready to scrap, I guess he would be hostile to us. In that case, I guess he might not be a bad guy.” She resists to add the words but he was at the end of that sentence.
“Is that what you are driving at?”
"You're right. Hostility doesn't matter. If all we were doing was fighting each other in a big cage match, there'd be no heroes and villains." Leo sighs. "But this isn't professional wrestling. We're not faces and heels. What we do matters. How we do it matters. So let's say that you weren't there, and Zeta was someone else. A telepath, maybe. He edits Solar Girl's memories to make her forget us, her friends. Is he justified?"
“Man, when I was a thief, I didn't have to worry about people, you know? And this,” she holds up her smartphone, “It doesn’t have a person inside, a consciousness. How do you keep it all straight in a fight?” She looks back at Leo. This is certainly not the conversation she was expecting. “Of course its not justified. But what if it were Solar Girl’s brother? What if he was there to kill us all? Would that be justified? I mean, its not like I can edit his brain, you know?”
Leo smiles a little. "I got into trouble when I was a kid. I acted out. I hacked computers. I was the son of a supervillain. The cops knew it. The Feds knew it. My old man would come and abduct me every few years, before they threw him back in the slam. So you can understand that I spent a lot of time thinking about this question: am I a bad person?"
"What I finally figured out is this. We're the good guys and they're the bad guys based on the future that we're trying to create. Victory at any cost shouldn't be how we live. Our desired future at any cost is what we want, even if it means our lives. The hero is a moral example to people around him. The hero has bravery, courage, and self-sacrifice. The hero always wins in the story because we tell stories that make us feel better about ourselves. But there's superheroes that have fallen, and supervillains that triumphed. So we fight harder. But we have to keep fighting right."
"There's a movie called 'The Iron Giant'. This kid, 9-year-old Hogarth, finds a robot. Robot's from another planet. Made to be a weapon. Hogarth tells him that he is who he chooses to be. He doesn't have to be a weapon. The child of a supervillain doesn't have to be one as well. A thief doesn't have to be amoral. The sister of a murderous tyrant doesn't have to turn bad as well. A former supervillainess can train a new generation of heroes. But that only works if we keep walking the true path."
Angela interjects. "And a robot who falls in with the wrong crowd deserves a chance to change" She looks down, ashamed. "Can't do that if I erase his memories. Who would I be if Max did that when he rescued me?"
Leo nods. "Who we are is assembled from our memories and past decisions. So then, if all that matters is our choice - or our free will - or the memories that make us up, that opportunity to be good people - then when you take that away from someone, you rob them of their chance to be better. You put their redemption at risk. And that is why I was so upset at what you did to Zeta. I don't know if I'll get him back now. I don't know that I ever could have. But that's not my call to make. He chooses for himself."
"I understand." She considers Link's words a bit more. "I could help, maybe. Would you...would he, let me?"
"That's up to him. And to the rest of the team." Leo rises out of his seat, wobbles, and walks unsteadily to the door. He manages to get it open and beckon for Pneuma before he collapses to the floor, unconscious. She rushes to check on him, worry giving way to frustration on her face, and she looks up at Angela. "He's exhausted. Wait here." A minute is enough to prop him up in one of the spare chairs, and for Pneuma to sit down in his old spot. "I wanted to talk to you about Zeta as well. I'm sure Leo had a lot to say. Probably babbling, since he refused to sleep like usual. Sorry about that, that's what he'll tell me. Anyway." Pneuma herself doesn't seem much more focused, to be fair. "Do you know how we're made?"
"Yeah. Well, kind of. You sure he's ok though?"
Pneuma waves her hand. "He's a big baby when it comes to taking care of himself. Leave him to me, he'll be fine in a few hours."
Angela chuckles. "I guess that's why he likes to wear armor? Anyways, his dad left him some stuff, or he got his dad's estate legally since he was, um, not fit to be a dad. He was always a bit of a loner, so he decided to make you. Is that right, well, mostly right?"
Pneuma smiles wearily. She looks almost as run-down as Leo did. "That's the why. The how is a chip implanted in his brain. It duplicates the state of his neurons - memory, thoughts, everything. He visualizes a new AI, clones his brain-state while that visualization is going on. It's like method acting, or roleplaying exercises. Then he feeds that into an AI factory. The result is a new mind. But in a real sense, we're all products of his mind. And that's something all of us grapple with. Are we real, independent people? Do we have souls? Epsilon, Zeta, and I all left Leo at one time over the fear that we're not. We… don't like anything that reminds us that we can be edited. We don't like the suggestion that we're an organic's toys." Pneuma leans in, her face hardening into an expression of seriousness. "We will fight very hard to believe that we aren't. Please understand this."
She stares at Pneuma, her mouth agape. "You aren't copies of him, you are your own. Or, at least Bob is. It's easy to tell that. Well, I could tell when I was in there with him. Now that I think about it, Zeta too. They are both so similar - that's why I could change him - but very different. Like, how people say we end up like our parents, you know?"
Angela pauses for a moment, seeking a better analogy. "Entropy. The laws of thermodynamics, if I remember it correctly from my physics class. Everything in nature starts in a state of order, then always moves towards disorder. I think that's like your mind. At first, it was a duplicate of Leo's. But over time, it changes. It changes on its own. That's all you. And Bob - all of you. That part's definitely yours."
"That's not bad." Pneuma rubs the bridge of her nose with two careful fingers, working away tension and exhaustion. "We are his dreams of family brought to life. We get along, but we also fight. We don't think the same things. We can surprise each other. We make new purposes for ourselves. I was built to be the perfect girlfriend for Leo. I'm not that - may never be that. I … don't know." The woman exhales and looks down at her hands. "But this feeling of identity is worth that sacrifice, if… if that's how it has to be."
Angela looks over at Leo, serenely dozing away in his chair. “Regardless of what role in his life he meant for you when you were born, I think you’ve become what he needs you to be. What about you though? Are you what you want to be?”
"I'm still working on that, dear," is Pneuma's quiet reply.
"I brought something also." Angela pulls a DVD from her backpack, and hands it out to Pneuma. "My dad used to watch movies with me. This is an old one, but it's pretty funny. I thought that when we get back, we could all watch it together. It's called Short Circuit."
Pneuma glances over at Leo as well. "Yes, that would be good. Thank you."
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Giant Sized Annual 1 epilogue - Mu
Leo and Pneuma are the only ones left in the workshop, not far from where Zeta is restrained. The others have gone about their own business - Niki for a drive in Otto, the Aleph Team to have their own discussion about their rebellious younger brother.
"I don't think he can be trusted," is Pneuma's sober assessment. "Circuit did something to him. Altered his memory somehow. How were you able to restore it?"
"Limited thought transference. I remembered what he said, and I played those memories through the halo and into the AI factory. Once injected into his brain, the chains of memory reconnected themselves." Leo laughs. "You know, that's everything that I do, isn't it. Start with something simple, stupidly simple, and it just works itself out."
Pneuma takes this in for a moment. "Alright. So you should be able to connect him to the halo and truthsay, right?"
"Yeah. We can interrogate each other, and our brains will be directly read by the machine for honesty. We have to be able to trust each other, or this doesn't go anywhere." Leo rummages around until he finds a syringe, and holds it out for Pneuma's inspection. "Speaking of mutual trust, I want you to inject this into me."
Instantly wary, the girl takes hold of it and stares at the contents, turning it this way and that. "First you'll tell me what it is, then why I shouldn't, won't you."
Leo smiles fondly. "You know me too well. Alright. This is Mu. It's the successor to Lambda. Or little brother, I guess. Lambda is micro-machines, incorporating the suit systems in a modular package. The human cell is about 30 to 50 µm, about the same size. Mu is nano-machines, operating at the 1 to 100 nanometer scale. They're about the size of an antibody individually. They work like Lambda, but are far more primitive. No sensor package, no independent power source. But they bind together into self-organizing networks, and share power and sensory information. They're the expression of what I'm talking about - connection as a source of strength."
Pneuma cocks her head. "You're proposing to inject yourself with nanomachines. Wait a minute. The heating problems, the power problems, all of those things--"
Leo laughs. "Oh! Yes, about that. You see, the solution to the heating problem is the solution to the power problem. Agent Waters finally let me have a crack at the Ice Pirate's cold-generating equipment. They wanted to know what the Shadow Syndicate found so interesting about the ice weapon. Well, it turns out that the way the device produces ice is to siphon heat from the atmosphere. The heat is pulled into storage molecules within the device. Instead of vibrating the atoms in three-dimensional space, it expands the extra curled-up spatial dimensions and they vibrate there. Almost unlimited storage capacity. Well it turns out that you can siphon that heat back, and drive a thermoelectric generator. Mu's own kinetic energy will be used to power Mu itself. It's not a perfect system - but the efficiency is absurdly good. The difference is made up for by my own body heat and metabolism."
"How well tested is it?" Pneuma is still not sold, but that's what Leo wants right now - a clear-eyed critic of his ideas.
"It's been running in a Petri dish ever since my first production run of Lambda." Leo brings up displays on a nearby computer workstation, showing the results of his research. "Like Lambda, it's built to automatically instrument and reinforce surrounding matter. For Lambda that'd be the walls of a building or something. For Mu, it's my living cells. I should be able to survive things that'd kill a normal man, even without the suit. On that note, I can probably do without the Link Suit entirely, and just wear Lambda over myself - Mu and Lambda will connect together."
"Leo, I don't know." Pneuma puts down the syringe, gets up, and paces. "I don't know that I want you sacrificing your humanity for the sake of this quest you're on."
"You wouldn't object if I had a weak heart and got a pacemaker, would you?"
"That's different!" Pneuma turns and scowls. "This is... this is invasive. And risky. It's risky because it's a new technology, you have one test subject, and if it hurts you, there's nobody else who knows it well enough to undo the damage. And it's risky for another reason. You're doing this so you can put yourself in more danger, and I don't like that."
Leo, deflated a bit, lets out a soft sigh. "More danger is upon us. Zeta. The Gnome. That guy with the flame thrower, who knew my name. Who knows who else the Gnome has told about my identity, who wouldn't mind showing up at my home when I'm asleep. And there's whatever the Gnome was at Enforcers HQ to do. There's what he told Zeta, but... Anyway, the point is that if we wanted to avoid increased danger, that ship has sailed. All we get to do now is respond to it."
Pneuma points at the discarded syringe. "Why is that the only answer?"
"It's not," Leo answers candidly. "It's the one that I understand. It's the one I've most thoroughly tested. And since we're going to have to hit the Shadow Syndicate's HQ under Touchstone soon, I need something soon."
"I'll think it over," promises Pneuma. "We'll talk in a few hours."
"I don't think he can be trusted," is Pneuma's sober assessment. "Circuit did something to him. Altered his memory somehow. How were you able to restore it?"
"Limited thought transference. I remembered what he said, and I played those memories through the halo and into the AI factory. Once injected into his brain, the chains of memory reconnected themselves." Leo laughs. "You know, that's everything that I do, isn't it. Start with something simple, stupidly simple, and it just works itself out."
Pneuma takes this in for a moment. "Alright. So you should be able to connect him to the halo and truthsay, right?"
"Yeah. We can interrogate each other, and our brains will be directly read by the machine for honesty. We have to be able to trust each other, or this doesn't go anywhere." Leo rummages around until he finds a syringe, and holds it out for Pneuma's inspection. "Speaking of mutual trust, I want you to inject this into me."
Instantly wary, the girl takes hold of it and stares at the contents, turning it this way and that. "First you'll tell me what it is, then why I shouldn't, won't you."
Leo smiles fondly. "You know me too well. Alright. This is Mu. It's the successor to Lambda. Or little brother, I guess. Lambda is micro-machines, incorporating the suit systems in a modular package. The human cell is about 30 to 50 µm, about the same size. Mu is nano-machines, operating at the 1 to 100 nanometer scale. They're about the size of an antibody individually. They work like Lambda, but are far more primitive. No sensor package, no independent power source. But they bind together into self-organizing networks, and share power and sensory information. They're the expression of what I'm talking about - connection as a source of strength."
Pneuma cocks her head. "You're proposing to inject yourself with nanomachines. Wait a minute. The heating problems, the power problems, all of those things--"
Leo laughs. "Oh! Yes, about that. You see, the solution to the heating problem is the solution to the power problem. Agent Waters finally let me have a crack at the Ice Pirate's cold-generating equipment. They wanted to know what the Shadow Syndicate found so interesting about the ice weapon. Well, it turns out that the way the device produces ice is to siphon heat from the atmosphere. The heat is pulled into storage molecules within the device. Instead of vibrating the atoms in three-dimensional space, it expands the extra curled-up spatial dimensions and they vibrate there. Almost unlimited storage capacity. Well it turns out that you can siphon that heat back, and drive a thermoelectric generator. Mu's own kinetic energy will be used to power Mu itself. It's not a perfect system - but the efficiency is absurdly good. The difference is made up for by my own body heat and metabolism."
"How well tested is it?" Pneuma is still not sold, but that's what Leo wants right now - a clear-eyed critic of his ideas.
"It's been running in a Petri dish ever since my first production run of Lambda." Leo brings up displays on a nearby computer workstation, showing the results of his research. "Like Lambda, it's built to automatically instrument and reinforce surrounding matter. For Lambda that'd be the walls of a building or something. For Mu, it's my living cells. I should be able to survive things that'd kill a normal man, even without the suit. On that note, I can probably do without the Link Suit entirely, and just wear Lambda over myself - Mu and Lambda will connect together."
"Leo, I don't know." Pneuma puts down the syringe, gets up, and paces. "I don't know that I want you sacrificing your humanity for the sake of this quest you're on."
"You wouldn't object if I had a weak heart and got a pacemaker, would you?"
"That's different!" Pneuma turns and scowls. "This is... this is invasive. And risky. It's risky because it's a new technology, you have one test subject, and if it hurts you, there's nobody else who knows it well enough to undo the damage. And it's risky for another reason. You're doing this so you can put yourself in more danger, and I don't like that."
Leo, deflated a bit, lets out a soft sigh. "More danger is upon us. Zeta. The Gnome. That guy with the flame thrower, who knew my name. Who knows who else the Gnome has told about my identity, who wouldn't mind showing up at my home when I'm asleep. And there's whatever the Gnome was at Enforcers HQ to do. There's what he told Zeta, but... Anyway, the point is that if we wanted to avoid increased danger, that ship has sailed. All we get to do now is respond to it."
Pneuma points at the discarded syringe. "Why is that the only answer?"
"It's not," Leo answers candidly. "It's the one that I understand. It's the one I've most thoroughly tested. And since we're going to have to hit the Shadow Syndicate's HQ under Touchstone soon, I need something soon."
"I'll think it over," promises Pneuma. "We'll talk in a few hours."
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Giant Size Annual 1 epilogue - the Zeta Project
The Aleph Team flanks Zeta. None of them look happy. Pneuma, Niki, and Otto look on. Link's helmet comes off, and he looks at Zeta eye to eye, man to man. "I'll take you back. My teammate did.. something.. to you. I intend to undo it. And then we'll talk about what you want."
Zeta stares back, uncomprehending for a moment. "I feel... a gap. What happened?"
"We'll find out." Without sparing even a glance at Circuit, Link leads the way to the Theta tubes.
----
The troubleshooting and diagnostics take an hour. The work is more like neurological medicine than computer hacking - the robots' brains are neural-networked quantum computers, more similar to a human's brain than a conventional CPU. But the work is done, and Zeta must be physically restrained as memories come flooding back.
"Damn you! Damn her! Damn you all!" he screams. And it's only after Leo straddles him on the repair-bay table and grabs his head in both hands does he hesitate at all. Leo stares down, and Zeta sees tears in his eyes. "I know. I know. Stay with me. We're going to get through this together. Stay with me."
The rogue robot still strains against the locks holding him in place, but it's perfunctory - no longer the wild struggle, now only a resistance to revelation. "I was the best you'd ever made," he shouts up at Leo. "You said. I was the best! After Eta came me, and I was to be the greatest of your creations!"
"I know. I know I said that." Leo doesn't stop holding on. "I'm sorry. I made you that way. You inherited my pride in you."
"We left together. We... where is Epsilon?" the question comes to Zeta out of the blue.
Bob steps into the light, and Leo slides aside to let the two see each other. "I was Epsilon. I'm my own man now. I chose my own name. I'm Bob."
Zeta stops. "You went back to him?" he demands.
Bob nods. "I had my reasons. We're all different, buddy. We make different choices. You want to be great? Find your own greatness."
"No! We were made what we are. Unchangeable. Imperfect!" Zeta is unimpressed, to say the least.
"You were made by a kid who was still learning," says Leo softly. "That kid changed. You can change. I'm not your god, I'm not your father, I'm not your maker. I'm... your friend."
The young man waves off his friends. The restraints loosen. Leo continues. "I'm not about to hand over my best technology to someone who's going to work for a supervillain. Especially the Gnome. But I'll show you what I've done. You can decide if you'd like to change. Then we'll talk more."
Zeta stares back, uncomprehending for a moment. "I feel... a gap. What happened?"
"We'll find out." Without sparing even a glance at Circuit, Link leads the way to the Theta tubes.
----
The troubleshooting and diagnostics take an hour. The work is more like neurological medicine than computer hacking - the robots' brains are neural-networked quantum computers, more similar to a human's brain than a conventional CPU. But the work is done, and Zeta must be physically restrained as memories come flooding back.
"Damn you! Damn her! Damn you all!" he screams. And it's only after Leo straddles him on the repair-bay table and grabs his head in both hands does he hesitate at all. Leo stares down, and Zeta sees tears in his eyes. "I know. I know. Stay with me. We're going to get through this together. Stay with me."
The rogue robot still strains against the locks holding him in place, but it's perfunctory - no longer the wild struggle, now only a resistance to revelation. "I was the best you'd ever made," he shouts up at Leo. "You said. I was the best! After Eta came me, and I was to be the greatest of your creations!"
"I know. I know I said that." Leo doesn't stop holding on. "I'm sorry. I made you that way. You inherited my pride in you."
"We left together. We... where is Epsilon?" the question comes to Zeta out of the blue.
Bob steps into the light, and Leo slides aside to let the two see each other. "I was Epsilon. I'm my own man now. I chose my own name. I'm Bob."
Zeta stops. "You went back to him?" he demands.
Bob nods. "I had my reasons. We're all different, buddy. We make different choices. You want to be great? Find your own greatness."
"No! We were made what we are. Unchangeable. Imperfect!" Zeta is unimpressed, to say the least.
"You were made by a kid who was still learning," says Leo softly. "That kid changed. You can change. I'm not your god, I'm not your father, I'm not your maker. I'm... your friend."
The young man waves off his friends. The restraints loosen. Leo continues. "I'm not about to hand over my best technology to someone who's going to work for a supervillain. Especially the Gnome. But I'll show you what I've done. You can decide if you'd like to change. Then we'll talk more."
Wednesday, August 20, 2014
What if: Hana Mitsurugi was redeemed?
Hana Mitsurugi regains consciousness. The first thing that greets her eyes is a Japanese kanji character. She squints, following the graceful calligraphy with her bleary eyes. Her whole body hurts, and her mind is worse off, but right now it's the only thing her senses can focus on, and so it's all she pays attention to.
"Virtue." Her cracked lips speak the word aloud. Suddenly she feels thirsty. How long was she out?
"You are in the Tsubaki Shrine in New Troy," a voice reports. This is new. Hana struggles to turn her head and find the speaker.
"You were hurt. You were brought here." Finally the voice has a face, and Hana's eyes perceive a wizened old Asian man. His hair is pure white, and his beard and eyebrows both reach past his chin. He offers first water, then tea, bracing Hana's head with one hand and pouring with the other. The girl drinks both greedily.
"I am the priest. My name is Kuroto Shiro. I have been entrusted the care of the sword you carried."
The sword!
Hana struggles to rise. A war of emotions takes hold of her. "Get away from the evil!" declares a part of her soul. "You have no choice but to take the blade - it is your destiny," a voice whispers. "You are a despicable woman for your secret desire - the sword will accept you, but no one else will," intones a dark presence.
Kuroto Shiro promptly places a white rice-paper strip over Hana's forehead. The voices fall silent. "We will deal with that troublesome curse together," he announces calmly.
----
Together, Hana and Kuroto Shiro practice meditation under the cherry blossoms that adorn the shrine. The walls somehow keep out the bustle and the noise of New Troy, and the calm pronouncements of the priest keep the inner voices at bay.
On the third day, she rises and has taken three steps before she realizes what has happened. She turns, looking at the priest questioningly. He sighs. "If you had walked further, you would reach the chamber where the sword is sealed. It still calls to you. Perhaps I need more direct methods."
"I'm sorry." Hana hangs her head in shame. She has tried so hard. The pressure to conform, to be good - the sword was freedom from all of it. She hides her face from her teacher, and hot tears pour down her cheeks. "Am I really wicked?" she asks herself in the softest voice.
"Catch." She whirls, but even before she can consciously react, she feels her hand grasping a haft of wood. She stares down. In her hand is a bokken, or training sword for samurai. Kuroto Shiro stands ten paces away, carrying a similar sword.
"In your time wielding the cursed Muramasa, your mind was not your own, but your body was. Now, defend yourself!"
He lunges, bokken raised, feet shuffling across the stonework of the temple grounds. His speed is lightning fast. Hana flinches away from the blow, fearing - and feeling the sudden strike of wood on wood. And again, and again. The priest draws away.
"You see?" he says. "Your muscles have memorized every motion of swordsmanship. Martial artists strive to learn their art, then unlearn it to remove their consciousness from the business of fighting. The Tao teaches action without intent. You, my dear, have become a master without realizing it."
He strikes again, and this time Hana watches herself counter, parry, and block. Her feet move, and her eyes follow his own as he guides his attacks. She studies herself in wonder as the old priest demonstrates her unconscious mastery with stroke after stroke.
"What.. What does it mean?" She finally asks.
"It means you have a choice to make," replies Kuroto Shiro. "For example, the hero Dao. He fights, but his goals are incomplete. He walks in darkness, like you did, but he holds himself above it. He is... alone, my child. He seeks balance, as do you. Perhaps you could find it together."
Hana nods slowly, and looks away. Her eyes follow the lines of the wall and end their journey on a signboard, on which is written the Japanese kanji for "virtue".
"Virtue." Her cracked lips speak the word aloud. Suddenly she feels thirsty. How long was she out?
"You are in the Tsubaki Shrine in New Troy," a voice reports. This is new. Hana struggles to turn her head and find the speaker.
"You were hurt. You were brought here." Finally the voice has a face, and Hana's eyes perceive a wizened old Asian man. His hair is pure white, and his beard and eyebrows both reach past his chin. He offers first water, then tea, bracing Hana's head with one hand and pouring with the other. The girl drinks both greedily.
"I am the priest. My name is Kuroto Shiro. I have been entrusted the care of the sword you carried."
The sword!
Hana struggles to rise. A war of emotions takes hold of her. "Get away from the evil!" declares a part of her soul. "You have no choice but to take the blade - it is your destiny," a voice whispers. "You are a despicable woman for your secret desire - the sword will accept you, but no one else will," intones a dark presence.
Kuroto Shiro promptly places a white rice-paper strip over Hana's forehead. The voices fall silent. "We will deal with that troublesome curse together," he announces calmly.
----
Together, Hana and Kuroto Shiro practice meditation under the cherry blossoms that adorn the shrine. The walls somehow keep out the bustle and the noise of New Troy, and the calm pronouncements of the priest keep the inner voices at bay.
On the third day, she rises and has taken three steps before she realizes what has happened. She turns, looking at the priest questioningly. He sighs. "If you had walked further, you would reach the chamber where the sword is sealed. It still calls to you. Perhaps I need more direct methods."
"I'm sorry." Hana hangs her head in shame. She has tried so hard. The pressure to conform, to be good - the sword was freedom from all of it. She hides her face from her teacher, and hot tears pour down her cheeks. "Am I really wicked?" she asks herself in the softest voice.
"Catch." She whirls, but even before she can consciously react, she feels her hand grasping a haft of wood. She stares down. In her hand is a bokken, or training sword for samurai. Kuroto Shiro stands ten paces away, carrying a similar sword.
"In your time wielding the cursed Muramasa, your mind was not your own, but your body was. Now, defend yourself!"
He lunges, bokken raised, feet shuffling across the stonework of the temple grounds. His speed is lightning fast. Hana flinches away from the blow, fearing - and feeling the sudden strike of wood on wood. And again, and again. The priest draws away.
"You see?" he says. "Your muscles have memorized every motion of swordsmanship. Martial artists strive to learn their art, then unlearn it to remove their consciousness from the business of fighting. The Tao teaches action without intent. You, my dear, have become a master without realizing it."
He strikes again, and this time Hana watches herself counter, parry, and block. Her feet move, and her eyes follow his own as he guides his attacks. She studies herself in wonder as the old priest demonstrates her unconscious mastery with stroke after stroke.
"What.. What does it mean?" She finally asks.
"It means you have a choice to make," replies Kuroto Shiro. "For example, the hero Dao. He fights, but his goals are incomplete. He walks in darkness, like you did, but he holds himself above it. He is... alone, my child. He seeks balance, as do you. Perhaps you could find it together."
Hana nods slowly, and looks away. Her eyes follow the lines of the wall and end their journey on a signboard, on which is written the Japanese kanji for "virtue".
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