Ava was the first to collect herself and left to grab the orange cones that they had put up so they could leave. Then Cayden let out a long sigh and headed back to the van while smoking another cigarette. Eventually Rick, Jacob, and Hale also joined Cayden and got into the van.
“So what happens now?” Hale asked quietly. He didn’t want to be the first to talk but he was honestly curious.
“Now we go see what’s left.” Ava said without much emotion. She seemed to have been affected by the previous scene for only a moment.
Hale’s face was pale as paper as he imagined walking among those dead people. Hale asked why and Cayden finally spoke up to explain that the only time a CIP like that would hang around the same spot for so long was if it was protecting something. That something was almost always a source of conceptual radiation and since the CIP that they had just dealt with was obviously very aggressive then that source was probably not something living but was an object. That would make that object an artifact, or CIO, and had a small chance to be imbued with a particularly useful concept.
And so the recon team left the above ground parking garage as the sky was beginning to tint orange. The day would be here soon but the dead bodies would never see the light of day. Hale wasn’t sure of the specifics but from what he gathered from eavesdropping on the group's conversations, they had some people hidden inside the government or local authorities that would cover up the dead bodies and stop it from being a big deal. Although Hale wasn’t sure it sounded like it was possible that that was dealt with by another organization that the Crest family worked with. This was the first nugget of information that Hale got about other organizations and how they work together.
Everyone hopped out of the van that was now parked directly next to the empty van left behind by the combat team. They slowly made their way past the dead bodies. The stench of iron was incredibly thick in the air as Hale stepped around huge puddles of blood. He nearly threw up multiple times but seemed to keep it together just barely. This was something that he would not soon forget. Ava took it upon herself to put some latex gloves on and search for the dog tags of the dead.
The rest walked to the other side of the wall that led to the second half of the warehouse. The combat unit never even made it that far but that was where the abomination had been prowling around. Hale passed the corpse of the abomination and he was baffled. The bone structure or how the muscles could even function didn’t even make sense. He wasn’t a doctor but he had taken an anatomy class so he instantly realized that things like the spinal cord were so mangled that it would have been impossible for its brain to send signals down it. Cayden saw Hale’s puzzled look and simply shook his head before informing him, “They are an abomination of conceptual radiation. Their bodies don’t need to make sense. All the ones we deal with are similar to this guy but I’ve heard that some particularly dangerous ones can split in two and turn to vapor before reforming again at another spot. It’s just rumors though.”
It made sense to Hale as he thought about it. If they were some sort of bastardization of conceptual energy then they would have no problems breaking the laws of physics. After all, Hale saw that guy telekinetically control those nails. So he was sure that people had the ability to do what normal people would call magical, why couldn’t the anatomy of CIPs?
After coming to that point he decided to not put much thought into at this moment and keep moving. Besides Ava, the team all ducked through the huge hole in the wall that the monster had made and it was another empty warehouse. Hale wasn’t sure what they were looking for but he started to walk the perimeter. After a few minutes of searching Ava had joined everyone and they were all focused on searching piles of garbage that were scattered about looking for anything that didn’t belong.
It was then, when everyone was focusing on their own search, that Hale remembered that feeling from before and tried to use the abilities like how they were described. He mentally reached out and tried to forcefully change his concept but nothing happened no matter how he tried. He quickly gave up and tried the other way, he let the concept of hidden knowledge flow through him. The moment he opened his mind to that invasion he felt a headache appear as Hale’s eyes began glowing a magnificent violet. If anyone were to look over at that moment they would have found themselves led into a state of foggy confusion just by looking at his eyes for too long.
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Hale found himself in an area of darkness, where he couldn’t see more than a couple feet away from him as it simply turned to fog. He also couldn’t make out what material he was standing on but it was as if it was nothing. Around him were at least 30 different orbs of light that slowly orbited him. They looked quite similar to stars and some even had very small white lines that connected them together like constellations. Hale tried to move but found that no matter what he did he stayed in the same spot. As he scrutinized these little stars he found that their sizes varied greatly. Some were one or two the size of his fist but most were the size of dust particles, floating and slowly shifting around him as they gave off shifting colors of white to red and most in between.
He reached out and felt that he had a general instinct of what the star represented as his hand passed by them. A very large one made him think of Ava as his hand passed by it. But, that large star gave off a fatal feeling. Hale had a thought that if he were to actually touch that star then he might actually die. His concept was not simple.
Instead as he passed his hands by all the little specks, some even being connected by thin white lines it became harder for him to discern what they were representing. After standing in this space and testing a few hypotheses he decided to grab hold of a small speck that made him think of the abomination.
He reached out and grabbed the speck. Encased in his hand he couldn’t see but the little star was soaked up into his skin and ran up his arm as it settled in his brain. As his eyes refocused he noticed that he was back in the warehouse and from what he could tell almost no time had passed at all. Hale’s eyes hurt like he stared at a screen too long while his brain burned as if he just got done taking a multi hour test. If he were to look at himself he would have noticed that his eyes were at least a quarter dimmer and getting closer to gray. However what he found in his mind shocked and amazed him. He realized that now he knew who the man was before he was an abomination. His name, age, profession, and face. Hale knew a general profile of that person. It felt as if he always knew that information but just now remembered it. It was the feeling one would get right after they finally remembered that word that was on the tip of their tongue. It was esoteric and quite pleasant in an odd contrast to the rest of what Hale was feeling since he was in no small amount of discomfort.
Hale took a few moments to think of the repercussions of this ability he had discovered. He also found that along with that information about the man he also now had knowledge of how this ability worked. In essence, if there is any hidden knowledge directly in his vicinity they are represented by stars. The size is the energy needed to learn that knowledge and the thin lines that connect some of them show that some secrets are related to each other or build off each other. Hale didn’t know the exact specifics of how much energy it took or what made some information worth more than others but he had a few educated guesses. With this new knowledge he decided to call the ability “acquisition” for simplicity.
Checking to make sure no one was watching Hale once again let his concept flow into his mind as he found himself in the space of stars once again. He moved his hand through these stars making sure not to touch any and after many minutes of debating and going back and forth he decided to stop at a star that was bigger than he would have wanted. It was about the size of a pea, but knowing how a speck made Hale hesitant. He chose this star because, firstly, it was the beginning of a chain of stars that made a constellation so Hale assumed it must be a rather involved piece of information. And secondly, he didn’t get the normal feeling of what he got from the others. It made him think of a feeling that he couldn’t even describe, which was a contrast to one that, for instance, made him imagine Cayden.
After steeling himself, Hale reached out and grabbed hold of the star. He let out a deep breath as he regained his bearings. Before he could even focus on what he had gained he was immediately assaulted by migraine that could make someone wish to be dead. Not only that but his eyes burned like they were on fire and he found that even his body was fatigued like he had just gotten done with a marathon. Breathing hurt, standing hurt, and thinking hurt. Hale began regretting his decision to absorb another star.