As I lay there letting the pleasure and conscious realization of what had just happened wash over me, the sound of a soft whine made me blink up. Oh, right, the sharks and that raptor thing. In the rush of killing Fahsteth, I had very briefly forgotten about the whole situation over there. But that fight wasn’t going on anymore. Instead, the two sharks were just sort of hovering in place. Well, floating in their bubbles, anyway. Right between them was that modified raptor. It wasn’t trying to fight or kill either. And it definitely wasn’t trying to escape. It just stood there, looking a little bewildered, like it couldn’t remember why it was here or what it had been doing. Seeing me look that way, the raptor made an uncertain noise at the back of his throat, lowering its head a little while taking a very cautious step forward. It was like a dog that wasn’t sure if it had done something wrong and was going to be punished or scolded.
Seeing that, I grunted and pushed myself up slowly. Then I held up both hands out to show they were empty before taking a few steps that way. The whole time, I was watching the thing carefully, just in case this was an even worse idea than it seemed right on the surface. My sharks watched as well, though they didn’t seem at all concerned. Which itself seemed odd considering they had just been in a life and death fight with the creature. Instead, they just floated there languidly as I slowly moved right up to the raptor. It was still watching me, making a soft whining sound. He didn’t seem threatening anymore. Instead, he just seemed confused and scared. My hand extended until I barely touched its snout. Then I put my other hand on its horn. As I ran my fingers down that rough skin, the raptor made a pleased and happy sound. That was when Princess Cuddles and Sherman swam forward, pressing in for their own head pats and scratches. Which I quickly gave to them, cooing over both as I thanked them for all the help. Then I took a closer look. I could see the spots where they had been bitten and clawed. Or rather, I could see where they had been. But those spots were already mostly healed. As were the spots on the raptor’s body where they had gotten some bites in. Any damage the creatures had done to each other was nearly as forgotten as their actual animosity toward one another seemed to be.
While I was still taking that in, the nearby door out into the rest of the ship began to whoosh open. But I didn’t jump or even move to grab my weapon. I didn’t need to. What I did do, as I heard it start to slide, was quickly shift my body back into my disguised male form before recalling Princess Cuddles and Sherman to their pocket lake. Then I let out a breath and asked, “Everything okay out there?”
Percy piped up cheerfully as she came trotting in with Cerberus right behind her and Gaia a bit further back. “Yes, we are fine, Jacob. The rest of the pirates have been dealt with.” She added in a slightly conspiratorial stage whisper. “Thank you for sending that message about what he said. It was much easier to handle them once we didn’t have to hold back for the sake of the timeline.”
Yeah, I had used my recently-acquired ability to make anyone I had looked at within the past hour hear and see anything I did to make sure Percy and Gaia knew what was going on and that they didn’t have to hold back. Hence them easily finishing the situation down there before Gaia had used her technopathy to take control of the transporter tech to beam herself, Percy, and Cerberus up to this ship.
Snorting, I slowly looked around the bridge of the ship at all the evidence of the fight I had just been through. “Yeah, tell me about it. That does tend to uncomplicate fights a bit.” Giving a short glance toward Fahsteth, I murmured. “Good riddance.”
Gaia stopped to squint that way, her voice thoughtful. “He is full of technology. Half of his internal organs, his legs, and more have been replaced with metal. It would not have been difficult to bring him under control.” Her head tilted, a slightly amused look crossing her face at the thought of what she could have done. “That would have been interesting. I’m just sorry I wasn’t able to get here soon enough to lend you a hand. Or perhaps one of his hands, if it came down to it.” She chuckled softly at her own words.
“Oh, shit, right.” Grimacing, I pushed myself to my feet and met the woman’s gaze. “Look, there’s a–you’re gonna see him again. A few times, actually. But you know, the earlier version, because this is the one from our time. Which means–”
“No killing him,” she finished for me. “No matter how easy it would be. He needs to escape our confrontations intact in order to preserve this timeline properly.” The woman paused briefly, head tilting to the side before murmuring, “I shall have to create some reasoning for why his implants can’t be affected.”
That made me wince. “Sorry to make this whole thing so complicated. Especially after everything he’s going to end up doing.” Oh God, I really shouldn’t have said that. But on the other hand, it was probably for the best. I didn’t want the woman to be completely blindsided by the idea of that piece of shit doing terrible things. And I definitely couldn’t get into any more specifics. Just telling her that he would be responsible for bad shit and that she couldn’t kill him for it was more than enough. Maybe too much, but I had to say something about it.
For a moment, the old/future headmistress was silent. I could see a series of thoughts passing through her head. Then she gave a heavy sigh. “It can’t be helped.” Her frown twisted a little bit, becoming more of a smirk. “Besides, it could be interesting to make him and others believe there is something unique and powerful about his specific implants which render him resistant to my ability.”
That made me smirk a little bit too, despite myself as I realized what she was getting at. “So everyone who wants to find a way to protect themselves from it will be trying to duplicate his tech instead of finding something that might actually work.”
Her head bobbed. “Precisely. And if I’m understanding things correctly, I can still stop him from his… endeavors as best as I can without actually killing him.”
I nodded hurriedly. “Yes, chase him off any way you want to, save people from him, stop him from doing as much as you can. He just has to live, that’s all. And you don’t have to hold back too much, since he’s pretty good at surviving.” Pausing, I looked at the dissected body. “I mean, you know, usually. But now he’s dead.” I took a deep breath and let it out. “He’s really dead. Wait, hang on.” That made me think of something, and I closed my eyes to focus on trying to summon up Fahsteth’s ghost to get any information out of him that I could.
Unfortunately, the moment I did that, some sort of invisible force slammed into me. I yelped and fell backward, right into Percy’s hands as she caught me. The bits of Fahsteth’s body that had been organic were melting into the floor.
“Ahh, of course he would have protected himself,” Percy noted while helping straighten back up. “Given Fahsteth’s history of working alongside dangerous Necromancers, he appears to have used several magical traps to ensure his remains could not be used in the event of his death.”
“Yeah, that figures,” I muttered. “Of course he wouldn’t trust the Necromancers he was working with. He probably made sure they knew it too, so they wouldn’t just kill him.”
Gaia looked like she was going to say something about that, but thought better of it. Instead, her gaze moved past me before she raised an eyebrow curiously. “And who is your friend over there?”
“Fahsteth’s friend, actually,” I started, before amending, “I mean, he used to be. Now I guess I’ve inherited him, sort of. He seems nice enough without his psycho master giving him orders.” Raising my hand, I waited until the creature moved cautiously close enough to poke his snout under it, then gave him some scratches. “Since he’s probably from the future too, I’ll keep him with me.”
Giving the creature another look, I took in the spots where he was clearly almost entirely regenerated from that fight. Seeing it again, and looking at the way the formerly aggressive raptor kept squeezing in for more scratches and just generally acting like a puppy made me turn to Percy. I almost asked her to possess me to check on what I had picked up from the dead man whose body was laying in a couple different pieces. This had to have something to do with that. But I caught myself at the last second. I couldn’t say anything that would expose our ability to possess people. That would give Gaia too much information that she shouldn’t have yet. She absolutely could not find out about the Seosten existing until partway into my first year at Crossroads. If I changed anything about that, especially something big like Gaia knowing about the Seosten possession ability, it risked changing something for the worse, like Manakel dying the way he did. If Gaia knew to be on the lookout for that sort of thing too early, he might not be able to possess Kohaku. Which could affect me taking his Necromancy, which would change me taking Fossor’s Necromancy, which could lead to all sorts of problems. Including me simply being able to stop Maestro from bringing the Fomorian home all the way over here.
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Yeah, that was a whole set of dominoes that could completely screw up everything. So, hard as it was to avoid the temptation to just say fuck it and load Gaia up with all the information I could so she could play the next few hundred years with cheat codes, we had to be a lot more careful.
So, I simply asked, “The prisoners they had, you’re sure they’re okay? And what about the Necromancer girl? Is she alive?” I still had some questions I wanted to ask her if it was possible, especially if she was from the future. And I couldn’t shake the thought in the back of my mind that Ehn had set this whole thing up not only to get me to kill Fahsteth, but also to feed another Necromancer to me. Which made the increasingly stubborn part of my brain want to talk to her instead. I didn’t like being manipulated and set up like that, whether it was for my own good or not.
Gaia assured me, “Yes, to both. The former prisoners are eating a much needed meal in the cafeteria of that broken ship. It’s not much more than survival rations taken from the emergency stores, but they seem happy enough. Their captors weren’t exactly taking good care of them.” She glanced toward Percy. “And your sister contained the Necromancer using a very interesting spell she says will keep her unconscious. It involved a great deal of colorful smoke and lights.”
That didn’t really sound like anything I knew ab– oh. Belatedly it hit me. Percy had actually possessed the Necromancer and made sure she would stay asleep that way. The colorful smoke and lights had simply been a way to hide when she had vanished and then reappeared. Again, Percy was a lot smarter than she tended to get credit for.
Seeing the looks that were passed between us, Gaia cleared her throat. “Well, if things are handled here, I shall go check on those prisoners to see what else they may need, and where they will need to be taken to get home. I’m sure you’ll want to have your own discussion with them soon enough.” Pausing briefly, she asked, “I don’t suppose they are from the future as well.”
“I don’t think so,” I replied, shaking my head. “From what Fahsteth was saying, they’re probably from… well, another village. He had something else going on that we can’t–”
“Can’t talk about it,” she finished for me again. Her smile was rueful. “I hope that when we meet again in your present day, you will have a long conversation with me about all of this. I’m sure I’ve been positively bursting to learn the details for a very long time.”
“Don’t worry,” I promised quickly, “as soon as I see the future you again, we are going to talk about all of this. And a lot more that’s happened since I came back here.” I did my level best to keep any emotion out of my voice. God, I couldn’t even warn her that she was going to be in prison for at least a year. I couldn’t tell her anything about that. I had to make it seem like I was going to go right back into the future and see her immediately. Not that I was at all certain of my ability to convey that, but I did my best.
Gaia gave me another brief and discerning look before nodding toward Percy. “Your sister knows how to use the transportation controls as soon as you are ready.” She gestured with one hand before vanishing as she used the system to send herself back down to Earth. Something told me she was having as much of a problem with not demanding information as I was with not offering it. I was pretty sure that was why she had left so abruptly, to avoid saying something she knew would be wrong.
As soon as she was gone, I exhaled and let my head fall briefly, letting all those emotions run through me. As I did so, the raptor whined and rubbed his head up against me as though trying to help. That was immediately followed by one of Cerberus’s heads doing the same thing on my other side. Seeing that, I chuckled and scratched both of them. “Hey guys, why don’t you go talk over there for a minute and get to know each other?” Giving them both another few pats, I gestured for them to wander off to one side. Then I looked toward Percy and extended a hand to her. “Would you mind?”
She immediately possessed me and confirmed my own suspicions. I had inherited more of the Akheilosan power from Fahsteth. Which had allowed me to immediately instinctively tame this raptor creature. But beyond that, the upgraded power also allowed my tamed creatures to heal any damage that was done to them as long as I survived for them to draw power from, and gave me the ability to enhance them with things like bone armor like this guy had. I could make them stronger and tougher, and they would heal from any damage they took as long as I was there to help. So I didn’t have to feel quite so afraid to let them get involved in fighting the sorts of things I went up against. I knew they had always wanted to help more, but I didn’t want to get my poor sharks killed. With these enhancements and the healing, that would be much less of a threat. So at least Fahsteth had contributed something useful when he died. Besides the simple act of being dead so he couldn’t hurt anyone else anymore. I was definitely calling that a positive on its own, even if I wished Avalon had been here. Then again, wishing Avalon was here wasn’t exactly anything new.
Beyond those major upgrades, I’d gotten a few things from the six guards I killed as well. Two of them had given and immediately enhanced the ability to make liquids become solid for myself or any other single person as long as I was focused on it. Not like turning water into ice, exactly. They would still look like liquids, and behave like that for everyone aside from the single person I was affecting. So basically I could make myself or anyone else walk on water.
The third guy had given me the power to make my hands (and only my hands) into gaseous forms. I wasn’t entirely sure when or how that would be useful, but sure. The fourth gave me some sort of super-lying ability so that even someone with truth detection powers, as long as they weren’t too strong, would be fooled.
Then there were the fifth and sixth guys, who had also given me a combined ability. That one allowed me to summon a small energy disc, about the size and shape of a frisbee. While holding it, I could basically imbue effects into the thing and dictate how long they would last. For example, I could tell it to be sharp for two seconds, then bouncy for three seconds, then burning hot for one second, then sharp again. With those instructions programmed into it, I could throw the disc and it would first be sharp enough to cut through someone in its path, then bouncy so it could rebound off a couple different walls, then turn very hot in order to burn its way through a rope or chain or something, then sharp once more to embed itself in another target.
That was all just an example. There were many different effects I could imbue in the thing, but I had to hold it longer the more of them I wanted to use. And actually hitting the things I wanted to with the disc was up to me.
Maybe I could get Shiori to help with that at some point. Her weapons were discs that she threw, she’d teach me.
Shaking that off, I looked around once more. “Okay, so I guess this ship is from the future. Which probably means it can’t stay here or anything. Can’t let people from this time find it. After we finish squeegeeing its former crew and captain off the walls and floor, what are we supposed to do with it?”
“The ceiling too,” Percy helpfully put in. “That will all need a good scrubbing. But I think the robots can handle it.” She quickly assured Cerberus as one of his heads twisted our way to stare accusingly. “The other robots. Janitor robots.” To me, she added, “And since you were the one who killed the captain, I believe this is your ship now to do whatever you wish with.”
Oh boy, that complicated things. Where was I supposed to keep this thing? Pausing, I asked, “Can you fly it somewhere and hide it down on the ground until we’re ready to do something with it? Somewhere it won’t be easily found, I mean.”
“Of course,” she confirmed. “The cloaking device is still intact. We can hide it until it’s time to move on.” Biting her lip, she looked at me intently. “Do you think Ehn sent them specifically for this? Do you think he was the one who brought them back to this time?”
I had to hesitate for a moment before answering. “Yes and no. I think he’s the reason they ended up in the specific position for us to find them, and I don’t think me getting this opportunity was an accident. But from what Fahsteth said, it was more subtle things that put them in that specific location. Well, not subtle. But the way the ship they were shooting down got hit so much harder than they intended, and how it just happened to manage to fly all the way to that spot… yeah, I think Ehn made that happen. But if he was the one who initially sent them here, it seems like he would’ve just told them to come to where I could find them instead of going through all those hoops. And why pretend to want them to kill Aylen’s mom or anything like that? Would he want Arthur to stay dead so there’s no competition? But if he does, why make sure it didn’t happen this time and do it in a way that I’d find out about the threat? It really feels like two different people opposing one another, and since we already know Ehn is the other one, he can’t be the one who sent Fahsteth back here. I… think.” Even as I said that, a frown had crossed my face. “This is all complicated.”
As Cerberus and the raptor came closer once more to reassure me that everything would be alright in their own special ways (mostly involving getting me to rub their heads), Percy cleared her throat. “Well, we shall find out soon enough. I’ll take the ship down and then we can see to Millersby and the other prisoners.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “And I’ll talk to Laein–wait, did you get anything out of her when you possessed her?”
“I could not take the time to try,” she admitted. “Not without risking Gaia noticing.”
“Right, fair.” Nodding slowly, I turned to look back at the planet through the front viewscreen. “Well, let’s get back down there.
“And for the record, you’re right. I’m the one who killed the captain. So this is my ship now. If Ehn tries to show up and claim it for his own, he can go suck it.”