෴Raz෴

෴Midnight෴

෴෴෴ ෴෴෴ ෴෴෴

Disclosure

෴෴෴ ෴෴෴ ෴෴෴

  Raz quieted the noise of memory and emotions inside him to focus on the moment.

  Two diverging paths shone in his mind. One side held the safety of the familiar, tainted with the echoes of lost chances and future regret. The other, an unknown path into a new life. A path into darkness, lit by hope, shrouded with the phantom of the unknown and the uncertain.

  My old life is gone. The sooner I accept that for real, the sooner I can move on. I can’t keep one foot in my old life and make any progress in the new. I’ve got Sia—Hex, mom, Bee, and maybe even Midnight on my side, but I gotta show a little trust and faith myself, and lay some cards on the table.

  His gut clenched hard, just once, as he let the dream of returning to, and rebuilding his old life go, and felt it fall into something less than dust, a possibility that never was. He took a deep breath and looked Midnight in the eye, and stepped toward the unknown future. “I’ve got an ability that does all that and more.”

  Midnight blinked. “That is not what I thought you were going to say. Interesting. You have my undivided attention. Go on.”

  Raz told him about the night he’d spent locked up in the lab restraints. He talked about his state of mind that night, and what he remembered about the process of the HUD coming online. He told Midnight about how the HUD had evolved from a simple tool into a pseudo autonomous being over time, and the way he interacted with the HUD directly, and with Bee.

  He couldn’t help leaving some of the details out, but by the time he was wrapping up, he felt he’d explained the situation well enough.

  Midnight sat there motionless for several minutes. Finally he looked up from what he’d been staring at and locked eyes with Raz. “I’ll want to try a few things with you to verify all this, but for now I’ll take you at your word and start by saying I’m sorry about how our first meeting went. I shouldn’t have been so dismissive.” He sighed and swallowed audibly. “It’s no excuse, but it was a stressful time for me, and I’m all too aware that one of my greatest personal failings is that sometimes I see the big picture so well that I forget the importance of the people around me who make up that picture. They—”

  He paused, and Raz watched uncomfortably as the older man’s head sank down, and his shoulders shook with silent sobs. Several minutes passed while Raz carefully pretended not to notice what was happening.

  Are you fucking crying now? Get yourself together man!

  Midnight eventually looked back up at him, his face calm and clear aside from slightly reddened eyes. “Sorry about that. It’s not your problem, but I’m dealing with some personal losses at the moment, and things keep reminding me of it, messing me up.”

  He made a visible effort to compose himself further, shifting his position and taking a few deep breaths. “Now that you’ve given me so much to think about, I guess I should ask. Do you have any more questions for me?”

  Raz let out a harsh laugh. “I have so many questions. You don’t even know. I hardly know where to start.”

  Midnight stood up. “Well, we’ve got about fifty minutes til she comes back to check on us. Let's take this show on the road. You can ask your questions, I’ll answer what I can, and if I’m lucky, I might even learn a thing or two.”

   Raz nodded hesitantly, “Ok, I’ll get my stuff and we can go.”

  Raz looked around frantically for the gloves until he realized they were probably still in the van. He came out to find Midnight folding a slip of paper in half and setting it on the kitchen table next to a pen. “We wouldn’t want to worry her if she comes back early.”

  Raz grabbed the set of keys and clipped them to his belt. “Good call, I was just thinking I needed to leave her a message. I also need something in the parking garage before we go.”

  Midnight smiled, his grin had a bit of an edge to it. Raz wasn’t sure whether he liked that smile.

  “That’s just fine. Me too.” Midnight said as they left the apartment.

  They made their way down to the garage. They both looked around, but no one else appeared to be there. Raz jogged over to the van and grabbed his gauntlets. By the time he got back to the stack of parking bumpers, most of them were gone. Midnight was working on what looked more or less like a shiny two seater car. Raz had never seen a vehicle quite like it. It had the basic shape and some lines in common with a modern muscle car, with oddly sharp edges and some poorly executed corners in the trim.

  “Well, identifying that should give any car enthusiast a mental hernia.” he commented.

  Midnight grunted, a frustrated sound. “I really struggle with cosmetics. My armor isn’t black and featureless because I want to look like a villain. I pass my intent into my abilities, and it happens. I can feed in technical specs, but I don’t have a sculpting tool or anything.”

  Sounds like a very cerebral kind of left brain way of controlling it.

  He took a deep breath and glanced around the parking structure. “Functionally, it’s flawless. I can build complex structures and shapes, make weapons, and fight using metal, all in fractions of a second. But make something artistic? Make this car look like an existing model? I’ve never gotten the hang of that. The second I try to determine what it looks like, instead of just what I want to accomplish, it all grinds to a halt and it feels like I’m dealing with a recalcitrant program or maliciously compliant child.”

  Well, that sounds suspiciously like he needs a HUD.

  [Doesn’t it though.] Raz could feel a sort of satisfied smugness from Bee.

  “Why bother then? We could take her van if you just want to take a drive.” Raz ventured.

  “Well, we can’t take this with us in her van. Adding a few tons of weight would probably ruin it, assuming it could drive that way at all.” Midnight replied absently, studying the car and making small tweaks to its appearance.

  “You said it was safe here, no one going to look at it twice. Can we just leave it here?” Raz proposed.

  “That’s not really an option.” his reply made it clear he considered that a non-negotiable point.

  Bee, can you superimpose a car, that’s close to what he has, over this for me visually?

  Bee didn’t reply, but a faintly glowing outline of several vehicles appeared one after another, settling on a classic Corvette, over the work in progress.

  Nice. He’s actually pretty close. Just a few spots are wrong enough to spoil the whole look. Especially the tires. Those just don’t look right done in metal. The curves are all a little wrong.

  “How long have you been working on this car design?”

  “Hmm? Oh, this is pretty much the design I’ve been tinkering with for years. I have another one that looks like one of those blocky SUV’s. Totally functional, but I don’t like that ugly squared-off look very much, so I use this when I need to roll through town. I know it’s not a perfect match for any car, but I like it better than rolling in an ugly box with wheels.”

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  I bet that's another reason he’s not into using her minivan. Do you think there’s any way we could share this projected image with him?

  [Yes, but you won't like the answer.]

  Wait, don’t tell me. Let me guess. That requires Advanced Interface Four.

  [That is not truly a guess, you already have that knowledge available to your subconscious, I distill and present it]

  So you’re saying I'm right?

  [Yes.]

  What’s the downtime like for activating it?

  [I’ll be offline for approximately 72 seconds.]

  Is there any gotcha, like “72 seconds, plus or minus 10 hours” or, also, you’ll lose control of your bladder during that time, or anything else?

  [There is one, nothing like that though.]

  [You currently lack sufficient catalyst, you’ll need more.]

  Raz sat down on the much shorter stack of parking bumpers and casually slipped the vial out of his pocket. Satisfied that Midnight was busy with his car-shaped object, he poured two small dollops onto his arm, closed and replaced the vial.

  [It will absorb faster if you rub it in to increase exposed surface area.]

  I know, I want this absorption kept at a manageable pace for a moment. I’m going to rub one of them in. As soon as enough catalyst has absorbed, do what you need to do. Once that happens, I’ll rub the other one in, and ideally it will come close to filling my stores back up. Discard any extra if it’s less than one full unit. If it’s more than that, let me know asap.

  [Acknowledged.]

  Ok, I’m going to rub it in now.

  [Make sure you do not make the mistake of rubbing one out instead.]

  You are way less funny than you seem to think.

  [When sufficient catalyst has entered the host, I will fully activate Advanced Interface level four.]

  [This will result in the activation of three sub abilities, and the unlocking of one unknown ability.]

  And you’ll just be rebooting for a minute or so? No other side effects?

  [Your HUD upgrades are well integrated, ample capacity exists.]

  [No problems predicted.]

  Raz crossed his fingers and arranged himself on the parking bumpers in a stable half reclined position.

  Not that I don’t trust you, but if something unforeseen happens, I don’t want to faceplant on the concrete floor.

  [Wise precautions are wi—

  Bee, along with the rest of the interface went to multicolored signal noise and then vanished. The world around him seemed to drop away, losing focus, sensory acuity, and intensity.

  That is so weird. Hard to notice how much extra perception the HUD adds until it’s gone.

  The sound of a car coming up the parking structure reached his ears. Midnight clearly heard it as well based on the frustrated sound he made.

  “Well, looks like this is going to have to be good enough. I was hoping to make it a more comfortable ride, but seats are hard! Literally in this case.”

  Midnight hopped into the driver seat. “Let’s go.”

  Raz carefully got up, counting the seconds under his breath.

  Damn it, why couldn't he have wanted to work on it for another minute.

  Raz got in on the passenger side. The seat really was hard and uncomfortable. “You sure you don’t want to keep working on it? It sounds like whoever was coming already parked on the second level.”

  “Sorry, it’s not good enough for you. I know it’s not perfect, but it’s never been a problem.” Midnight countered with an annoyed edge to his voice.

  Raz put a hand up to concede the point. “It’s all good with me. You just seemed to be into getting it just right, I didn’t want you to feel rushed by me.” Raz casually rubbed the remaining dollop of catalyst into his forearm.

  “It’s fine. We haven’t got all day.” Midnight grunted, his tone coming out a bit on the surly side.

  I think I might have touched a nerve.

  There was no reply, not even the inner sense of acknowledgment Bee often gave rather than a distinct reply.

  Come on Bee, come back already. Turns out I miss you when you’re gone.

  They pulled out onto the street. Midnight seemed to have a destination in mind. They headed out of the Mid-Town area and headed toward the southside. The car-shaped object rolled along nearly silently. The only sounds it made were some odd high pitched squeals at times. Raz assumed it was just places where small flexes in the metal structure rubbed on other parts of the metal. He noticed that each time a squeak happened, Midnight would snap a glance in the direction of the sound and then it wouldn’t repeat. A few minutes into the drive the car was just rolling along in silence. The seat was indeed quite hard, and far less comfortable than a car that looked like it did, should have had.

  Several more minutes passed with no return of the HUD. Raz was starting to worry. He continued counting seconds as they drove, his worry and stress mounting as several minutes came and went. He occupied the silent drive with testing his ability to activate abilities himself. Somatic Restoration on himself worked fine. None of his HUD tree abilities responded at all.

  And of course, I can’t use Siphon or Transfuse without a target. Too bad I can’t test them on myself.

  The HUD overlay snapped crisply into existence.

  [That is too bad. It would allow you to increase your skill and skill rank in those abilities much faster if you could self target with them.]

  Bee! Welcome back!

  Raz let out a big sigh of exultant relief.

  Midnight looked askance at him. “Everything all right over there?”

  Raz smiled faintly. “Yeah, I just—” He considered evading the question, then considered a partial answer, before deciding to just go with the truth. “While I was waiting for you to finish the car, I unlocked another ability. Bee said it would take 72 seconds, but it was closer to five minutes.”

  Midnight gave him an appraising look. “Was this an ability with sub-abilities attached?”

  Raz nodded. “Yeah, three of them.”

  Midnight smiled for a fraction of second, the expression there and gone so quickly Raz barely caught it. “Was it five minutes, or was it about 288 seconds?”

  “It was 290 seconds by my count, how’d you guess that?”

  Midnight grinned widely. “Well, most abilities that involve any kind of time lag on activation, that time is multiplied by the number of sub abilities that are being acquired in the same pass. Was it one with multiple ranks?”

  Raz started to answer but Midnight didn’t stop talking.

   “What am I saying, of course it was. Sub abilities are never attached to abilities without ranks.” He said, almost to himself, his voice had slipped into a different tone, almost like he was delivering a familiar speech or giving frequently offered advice. “You should make sure to save up enough catalyst and experience so you can get the ranks all at once. Otherwise you end up waiting the full time, each time. Trust me, It’s freaky if you don’t know it’s coming, but five minutes is nothing. Wait till you run into an ability that takes hours.”

  “That’s good to know. I did get the whole thing.” Raz couldn’t help feel this whole situation was surreal. He was driving in a silent car that wasn’t really a car, talking about his abilities to Doktor Midnight, and he actually seemed interested!

  Some abilities take hours to come online?

  [None that I have found info on. However, you only have abilities with energy manifestations. Anything that changes your physical structure might take longer.]

  Good point. So, anything I need to know about new abilities?

  [There is a lot to know, I’ll give you a quick breakdown. AI4 will give you some additional cognitive resources, but also cost more to run me. As a side note, in retrospect, try to avoid making any big decisions for a day or so. It appears that unlocking new levels of AI costs you in cognitive function immediately, but the increases that are meant to make up for that extra cost take some time to become available. This might be the kind of long period activation he is referring to. This leaves you at risk of exercising poor judgement during the window of depressed cognitive function.]

  So you’re saying you make me dumb? That is a hell of a gotcha, but I’ve gotten along that way so far, so it can’t be that bad.

  [Now is neither the time nor place to discuss it, but looking back at some of your decisions recently, let us agree to disagree on that.]

  Raz laughed softly.

  Midnight glanced over at him. “I’m starting to see why people at HQ acted like I was a bit off my rocker when I got too deep in my own head. I just hope I wasn’t as bad as this.”

  What are the other abilities?

  [Drain, Clone, and Send. Send is the one we needed to share HUD data. The other two we should discuss later.]

  Ok.

  Midnight pulled off on the side of the road under an overpass. Raz realized they’d arrived in an abandoned area of the old southside train yard.

  Midnight got out of the ‘car’, “This’ll do.”

  Raz got out. “What are we here for?”

  Midnight scanned the area around them. The shaded underpass didn’t have a direct line of sight to anything outside the dilapidated old rail yard. “I needed to take you somewhere away from her apartment and the risk of prying eyes.”

  Raz suddenly realized that if Midnight wanted to kill him with no witnesses, he’d picked a great spot for it. He glanced around, looking for escape routes before another thought occurred to him.

  What am I bothering to worry for? He’s literally the most powerful person on the planet, if he wants to kill me, it’s going to happen. Might as well stay chill and optimistic.

  “So why did we need to be away from her place?”

  Midnight checked his phone. Raz noticed it wasn’t the same phone Sia had given him. “I want to take you someplace where you can give me a demonstration. It’ll give me a chance to show you something as well.”

  Take a ride with a supervillain. What could go wrong?