The Maw’s too damn big for us to cover. There’s practically an unfinished city down in the Umbra–one final fuck you from the Low Masters. Made with the explicit support of the Guilds back when Jaus was still smoking that hope shit, thinking he could charm anyone into believing in his vision.
I loved the starry-eyed bastard–maybe a bit less than Naeko did, but still, we would’ve all done anything for him. But sometimes–and I can't believe I'm saying this–his Zein was right. Zein Thousandhand was right. There are some problems you just need to kill. It's like a cockroach infestation. You don't reason with them. You crush them. You burn them. That, or they become problems later.
Hell, it's the same thing every time. You don't fix something yesterday, it comes back to shit in your bed tomorrow.
And so here we are, looking at a labyrinthine set of mazes, corridors, hidden passageways that run between the channels of the Maw. Perfect for smugglers and other scum festering in the Warrens.
Fucking Nolothi fucks. Always leaving us shit to clean up.
Our drone patrols and spatial anchors aren't enough to cover the entire territory. Frankly, there's just too much space. Too damn big, as I said before. So what do we do? Well, we choke specific intersections and passages from above. We watch streetside traffic and scan for what kind of produce is being moved. We try to break up the Syndicates and plant our informants deep.
It's like chipping at a mountain, but at least we're chipping. Can’t say the same for the bastard Agnosi, who refuse to patch anything in a timely fashion.
We’re not dumping all these canons for fun. These are breaches. Leaks. And for everyone we plug, a billion spring up. They needed to be choked yesterday. Instead, Jaus’ pet pseudo-faithers seem to find more meaning in empowering the same Fallwalker half-strands supplying the smugglers with the means to breach our walls than actually securing the walls themselves.
I guess the city looks all shiny and different when you spend your time living it up in the heights of the Tiers. Not like they’re another part of the genocidal apparatus that keeps everything standing.
…I know I’m not being fair, but a token effort isn’t enough. It just fucking isn’t. I have to look at the dead every day. Dig through their memories, feel the thrill of some sick fuck as his Lustaway fires to the screams of a child he set on fire. And there are millions of them. Millions of them feeding off the misery of the FATELESS. I know the city doesn’t consider them people but maybe–just fucking maybe could we prove ourselves better than the bastards that came before us? Did we come this far just to be a redo of the farms?
…Somedays, the only thing that keeps me from breaking and giving up is remembering Naeko. Remembering what he is. Remembering who he used to be. I can’t become that. Jaus himself chose us to be his Godclads, for fuck’s sake. We have to live up to the dream. I have to live up to the dream. Somehow.
…I’d like to update the earlier analog: I don’t think we’re chipping at a mountain. We have centuries. We can wear that son of a bitch down, doesn’t matter how big. What we are doing is hacking at the sea. And the waves are just getting bigger…
-Mem-log of Paladin Maru Sandrupal
19-18
Walltaker (I)
“Ah, Avo. See you’ve been making more people vegetables recently. I’ve spied a lot more mysterious nullings popping up all over the Warrens.”
Raldi greeted his guests from the far end of a long maple-carved table, its surface so polished that their arriving forms appeared like vague blurs contained within the wood. Sawing away at the roasted ursine he ordered and with a full twelve-course meal already laid out, he took the opportunity to scan each of the six figures loading into his rented demiplane.
Avo approached looking different from before. There was now an ebony exoskeleton spilling out from between his plates of fungal ceramite. The solid tendrils joined to his spine were not also floating behind him on clouds of sparking darkness.
As Avo drew close, so too did Raldi’s skin prickle with static electricity. That might’ve been the most noticeable change if only one could ignore the constant eruption of fire climbing high from Avo’s halo, figures hiding between the flickers of the immolation.
Two figures trailed close behind him.
The first took Raldi but a moment to recognize. Former Regular Jelene Draus. Dread Draus, so named by avid Crucible consumers. She was encased in fluid but featureless white armor, augmented eyes shimmering as she scanned him. Her skin was the color of rusted bronze and her hair swung behind her head in a knotted tail. As their eyes met, he felt a sudden spike of panic pass through his bowels–the same feeling he got more than once when running from a war morph nu-dog.
The second was a bit shorter than Draus. Where the Regular was approximately two hundred and thirty-three centimeters when measured by a Phys-Sim, the other was maybe twenty less. That didn’t mean they were any less noticeable. With her clicking plates and a tetrahedral scanning unit in place of a skull, Raldi thought he was looking at a drone for a moment before he noticed a ring of thoughtstuff flowing around the core of the machine and realized there must’ve been a human mind embedded in its locus core. Running a brief search using his Metamind, Raldi realized he was looking at an Omnitech combat sheath. A damned expensive one at that.
[Omnitech Railjumper]
Standard Market Price -> [35,000,000,000 Imps]
“Jaus,” Raldi muttered, chuckling under his breath.
The mystery snuffer clearly regarded him with apprehension as they narrowed their perception in on him. With every step the Railjumper took, the pallid slats of its armor expanded as if lips exhaling a breath, venting steam with every step. Coiling rings and whining mechanism accompanied each of their movements, and Raldi thought it vaguely sounded like a gauss rifle being charged up repeatedly.
A wave passed over the stranger’s head and Raldi found his attention turned to Quail Tavers, bringing in the final members of Avo’s cohort. He was about to offer her his greetings when he saw them, appearances sinking into him like blows to the gut. Kae Kusanade took him a moment and a sequence match to recognize, but Aedon Chambers and Essus were known to him in an instant. They were wanted people with high bounties on their heads and threat profiles uploaded to ad spaces across the city and the Nether itself.
The Agnos and the supposed Acolyte were encased in the same liquid armor Draus had, but the last member of the group was dressed in an ugly yellow raincoat with malfunctioning holoprojectors.
Suddenly, he didn’t feel so paranoid about spending premium imps to book a private booth in the Easy Armistice for a day. The extra privacy protections seemed wise too. He made his arrangements as soon as Tavers contacted him–and from the way she phrased things, this wasn’t going to be a social call.
Hence, he ensured his new consangs would be received with decorum and hospitality. But judging from their posture, he found himself regretting not coming in that Stormtree exo-rig Reva “borrowed” for him instead of this cockatrice scale suit he was wearing.
Flicking the controls on his knife handle and maxing out its sharpness, he cut clean through the smoking nu-bear with a push, the blade gliding through flesh, bone, and gristle like it wasn’t there. “I hope you’re all hungry because all this cost me fifty large.”
“We can eat,” Avo said, a quiet rasp at the end of his voice, his tone impossible to decipher. But Raldi doubted anyone knew how to treat a mind-burning, Soul-grafting, Heaven-reaping thoughtform nested inside the sheath that was hyper-augmented ghoul.
“So,” Raldi said, carving the bear’s left hind leg loose, “you look different. Did you do something with your hair?”
Draus glared flatly at him. As did the Railjumper. Both Kae and Essus looked at the dome of fungal white lining the top of Avo’s head as Tavers rolled her eyes and took a seat. A single laugh barked out from the back of the group. All eyes turned to Aedon Chambers.
“What?” Chambers said. “I thought that shit was funny. Can’t a motherfucker laugh anymore.”
“It’s not a good expression to make,” the Railjumper said softly. The voice projected from the sheath’s speakers sounded young. Too young. As if the person entombed at the heart of the machine was still but a girl.
Raldi let out a breath and drew on his Heaven to speed up the cutting process. Pulling slashes from every edge and a straight line across the room and drawing from the sharpness of the blade he held, the main course came apart in an avalanche of pieces.
Kae’s eyes widened while the Regular tilted her head.
“Neat trick,” Draus said.
“Thanks,” Raldi said. “Got it from a friend.” Falling back into his own seat, he scooted close to the table and steepled his fingers under his jaw. For a few passing beats, he watched the cadre watch him back, both sides taking the opportunity to size each other up.
Stolen story; please report.
Except for Aedon Chambers. That man had other concerns on his mind, like filling his plate full of bear meat and lathering the chunks in honey while talking to what looked like a swarm of flies hovering near him.
Wait? Flies? Raldi zoomed his optics in on the group and found the faintness of thought-static forming around the insectoid swarm. Huh. Wasn’t that strange? Maybe another Omnitech novelty. Made with Sang support.
As Chambers loudly attacked his food, he gave an excited croak as he noticed a nearby wine bottle. “Listen, I don’t really know you yet…” The supposed Low Master acolyte stopped to chew, mouth open, specs flying free from his tongue. “...But this is nova as fuck. Where’d you find this guy, Avo? Why can’t you find more guys like him? Why can’t we live like this every day instead of just killing ourselves when we get hungry? Huh? Not all of us can just eat people.”
The ghoul didn’t respond. In fact, he gave no hint that he even noticed Chambers. “Appreciate the meal.”
“You haven’t eaten anything yet,” Raldi countered. He pointed at Chambers with a smirk. “Are you going to let my newest and most vigorous consang show you up, or are you going to show me some appreciation.”
Avo grunted and awkwardly picked up a knife and a fork, his claws too long to allow any ease of use. “Here to thank you. For what you did at Veng’s Stand. And also maybe to snuff you. For hiring someone to shadow me.”
“Now don’t be sore, Avo,” Tavers said, lighting her hiflass. “That’s a bad habit in this line of work.”
“Not sore,” Avo said. “Feelings are just a bit hurt. Helped you. Trusted you. Grafted you. Then you sent someone to track me.”
Raldi sighed and leaned back into his chair. “Are you going to tell me that if a magical ghoul your dead mentor made from your mind appears in your life one day offering a free Soul, you wouldn’t be a bit curious?”
“No,” Avo said. “Would just secure situation. Handle problem.”
The Regular rubbed her nose before she tore a strip loose from the bear leg she was holding. “Bullshit.”
A sharp hiss escaped Avo. He spun to face Draus as his Echoheads expanded into spinning discs, volts pulsing out his body and coursing through the streams of dark particulates enshrouding each of the segments.
Draus swallowed her food. “Hiss all you want, rotlick. I remember when you first met Zein. Looked lost as a pup in a butchery.”
“Was learning her weaknesses. Using her to expand my knowledge.”
“Yeah, and that’s why you beat her ass in the Trident right?”
The flames over Avo’s head crackled. “Burn her next time.”
Draus grinned viciously. “Sure you will.”
The ghoul grumbled and turned back to Raldi. “Apologies.”
Raldi blinked. “No. No. It’s fine. Say, did she just say ‘Thousandhand’?”
Avo grunted again. “Might meet her soon. In a few weeks. Or earlier. Who knows.”
“But she’s…” Raldi scoffed and stared at Tavers. “Why do I have the feeling I ended up getting myself dragged into something I’m entirely unprepared for?”
“Because the feeling’s right,” Tavers said. “You done did it this time, kiddo. Right to the deepest deep end there is.”
“How bad?” he asked.
She shrugged. “Anti-Guild. Revolutionary. Cult supporting. System redefining.”
Air wheezed out from Raldi’s lungs. “Ah. Fuck.”
“Yeah,” Chambers said, pointing at him using a knife. “I know that feeling. And that face.” He laughed.
“So,” Raldi said, speaking to Avo again. “I’m assuming this meeting’s about more than just introductions.”
Avo grinned, revealing rows of bladed teeth. “Have something for you. Potential dive. Something you might like.”
“Right,” Raldi said, half expecting this. “So. What’s the mess you’re planning to make.”
“Chambers,” Avo said, not even shifting his head to look at the man.
Ghosts leaped out from the rim of Chambers’ accretion and phantasmal chain formed.
[INCOMING LINK REQUEST ACCEPTED]
Letting the packets of mem-data settle just past his outermost wards first, Raldi scried the contents using his own ghosts first before triggering [AUTO-SEANCE-01] and shunting the information into a specialized lobby. As the sequences spilled over, Raldi activated all the phantasmics he had in his [Full-Deep-Scan-03394] server and synced to its systems. Using an external silo in the network was a trick most Necros learned sooner or later, but few had the patience or skill to build mind palaces, labyrinths, fortresses, or diggers as he could.
To everyone sitting across from him, his Meta would barely give off any indication of activity, and he doubted anyone but Avo would notice.
“We should discuss payment,” Raldi said, making absent-minded small talk as he deconstructed and rebuilt every strand of memory he received to ensure no hidden mem-cons or traumas were woven within. He did a double scan on every artifact and then commanded [Full-Deep-Scan-03394] to build imitations of all the present information to see about any inconsistencies.
“Payment,” Avo said, almost sounding incredulous. “Gave you a Soul.”
“And for that, I will be forever grateful,” Raldi replied. “So grateful that I hired the best godsdamned squire in Idheim to protect you, and then got nulled twice by Incubi for the crime of keeping you safe.”
“Don’t reframe history.”
Raldi smiled. “But that’s kind of what we Necros do, isn’t it.”
The statement didn’t seem to leave the ghoul amused. Oh well.
SCAN 100%
NO TRAUMAS DETECTED
NO MEM-CONS DETECTED
RECONSTRUCTION PARITY 100%
Drawing the mem-data back through the Auto-Seance and downloading the intelligence into his inner palace, Raldi frowned as a simulated map of New Vultun’s border began to construct itself. “What’s this…” Information about border wall designation [SE-7777] flashed into his consciousness. Details about its surrounding defenses also followed, along with the general aspects of what Avo’s was planning. With each passing moment, the information settled, and Raldi felt his jaw falling further.
Architectural blueprints detailing the interior of the sixty-kilometer-tall spatial pylon housing [SE-7777]’s techno-thaumic reactor flooded his brain, along with the nine hundred different rapid-response golem Knots hidden in the structure’s curving geometry.
“The border wall?” Raldi breathed. More details loaded into his mind with each passing second. Slowly, his alarm settled into calm and then excitement. This wasn’t going to be an overt terrorist action as he feared. And his part was more than achievable. The only risk was engaging the Exorcists, and though he wouldn’t consider them bad, he was a few decades removed from considering them an active danger in his life. “So… you want me to jack into the Paladin’s networks. Intercept and alter the details of the commission they’ll be sending to the Agnosi, so you can… what? Make a backdoor that you and yours can walk in and out at any time.”
“Something like that,” Avo said.
Raldi smacked his lips together. “Can I be included in this backdoor?”
“Maybe. Is that the payment you’re going to be asking for?”
“No,” Raldi replied. “That’s a favor. For a… mutual consang.”
Avo turned his head slightly and clicked his teeth together. “The trial?”
“Yeah,” Raldi said. “Trouble at the home office. Afraid they might use her to grease some wheels.”
The ghoul understood. “Can be arranged. Curious about Stormtree anyway. But can you do this? Seems like a hard job…”
Avo’s obvious taunting earned him a flat stare from Raldi. “You know, for someone supposedly made by Walton from parts of my mind, you’re really kind of a half-strand sometimes.”
“Maybe if they stuck me in a soft human body I might be nicer,” Avo said.
“Yeah? Somehow I doubt it. Don’t need to worry your ugly, burning head about things. I got this. I’ll have the edits done before the Paladins even finish their first draft. I’ll even fix any sequencing errors I come across in the cast.”
“Don’t,” Avo said. “Might make it too perfect. Too suspect.”
Raldi snorted. “Yeah, yeah. I’m being a smartass. Synced on the details. This’ll be a…” He stopped himself from saying the words. Milk-run. Even thinking it felt dirty. Strangely, the easiest part of the job was on his end. Most dives he completed were the other way around. “Say, intercepting the commission isn’t going be hard at all. But how are you getting in and out without being noticed? I can forge the credentials, but the FATE-Skeins and memories needed are going to be another matter altogether.”
“Oh, that,” Avo said. “That’s already solved. Don’t need to worry your soft, vulnerable little head about things.” And the ghoul said no more.
“Alright,” Raldi sneered, leaning in. “Spill. Show me what you got.”
“Don’t think I trust you that much yet. Might want to hire Tavers to watch you for a week first.”
“Fuck you. Show me the rest of the plan. I wanna see.”
“Dangerous,” Avo said, grinning widely. “Might get you into trouble you can’t escape from if you commit.”
Raldi sighed. Somehow, the ghoul was proving to be a bigger tease than Reva ever was.
He then paused and let disgust flow through his mind as he struggled to process the disturbing implications behind such a thought.