Scale 5.2

Bryce Kiley

2010, December 4: Brockton Bay, NH, USA

I finished cleaning my lab by lunch and headed out to a coffee and sandwich place near the Boardwalk called the Bayou Bakery. It claimed to bring a bit of Louisiana charm to the northeast and was something of a local favorite.

I found Amy waiting for me next to the counter. She had on a frumpy, oversized sweater rooting for the Arcadia Albatrosses, specifically our junior varsity basketball team. It was probably something she was forced to buy to placate Victoria back when her sister was a part of the school team. Now, she wore it to awho’svoid standing out. Without her trademark white robes, Amy Dallon was about as plain as could be.

I ordered myself some beignets with peanut butter sauce to go and leaned against the wall next to her.

“Bryce.”

“Hey, Amy. You order yet?”

“Yeah… You’ve been avoiding me.”

“I haven’t though? We had lunch together yesterday.”

“You know what I mean,” she huffed.

And, I did. She wasn’t wrong. I’d avoided being alone with her all week and strived to redirect every conversation back to inane topics. Chelsea and Stephanie’s cheer practice. Dean’s new watch his dad got him. Dennis’ upcoming hiking trip with his now non-cancerous dad.

I’d agonized over how I wanted to approach this conversation. Truthfully, I still wasn’t sure. It stressed me out, to think that, if I fucked up, this could blow up not just my friendship with Amy, but also my cape life as I knew it. This conversation needed to happen, our arrangement was never meant to be permanent. And yet, I couldn’t help but feel nervous. I was afraid, plain and simple.

I opened my mouth to say something; I didn’t know what. I was granted a few more seconds by the barista calling my name.

“Come on,” I said after grabbing my bag of greasy, fried dough, gently tugging her aside. “Not here. It’s… complicated.”

“I… Fine…”

We waited for Amy’s order, a BLT that took longer to make than my beignets, and headed outside. We walked in awkward silence for several blocks. Then, once SAINT gave me the green light that we weren’t being followed or recorded on any nearby cameras, I allowed the textured disguise to fall away, revealing my full costume.

That was the beauty of my costume. Sanji’s raid suit gave me invisibility, but Essentia, the superheroine guardian of Lumiose City, had a textured disguise that could mimic civilian garb perfectly. Having both seemed redundant but it allowed me to preserve the illusion that I could teleport. Or, in this case, simply wrap Amy up in my cape and carry her like an invisible sack of potatoes to my lab under the cover of thick fog.

“This is humiliating,” Amy grumbled in my arms.

“Would you prefer to swim?”

“You just had to build your lab in the middle of the Graveyard. You know this makes it seem like an evil lair?”

“So you’ve said. The tanker being off the coast makes it so I can be as loud as I want while training or building things. It’s also highly defensible and comes with literal tons of scrap metal for me to use.”

“You don’t have your own dungeon in there, do you?”

“No, I don’t have my own dungeon. Sorry, I keep the fuzzy cuffs somewhere else.”

Her elbow thumped into my chest as she let out a strangled laugh. “Ass. Stop joking; I’m supposed to be mad at you.”

“For what?”

“For… For avoiding this.”

“Because I was nervous,” I said with a sigh. Honesty was better than nothing. “A lot of things happened in Damascus, okay?”

“I… I know… Hey, Bryce?”

“Yes, Ames?”

“Do you… Do you regret it?”

“Regret what?”

“Being a healer. Working with me.” She let out a humorless chuckle. “It’s not as glamorous as people say, huh?”

That made me pause. I thought she was talking about Arsalan. But then again, how would she know? It’d been a week and though there were rumors, Dragon suppressed the exact details. As much as New Wave were local celebrities, they weren’t PRT. I doubted even Lady Photon merited a full briefing from Dragon, especially since New Wave wasn’t involved in the mess.

Amy wasn’t here to chew me out about Arsalan, though I planned to tell her anyway. No, she was a seventeen year old girl in the end, with a teenager’s worries.

She was afraid she was about to lose her best friend. She’d found someone who could heal like her. She found someone who practically bathed in blood by her side. For once in her life, someone her age understood, in a way even Victoria could never manage. And she was terrified that the brutal aftermath of Behemoth’s rampage had disillusioned me, had convinced me to never take up the healer’s mantle again.

I chuckled alongside her. “No, I don’t suppose it’s very glamorous. But no, Amy, I don’t regret it.”

“Then… Then why?”

“Why was I avoiding you?”

“Yeah… A-Are you mad at me?”

“No, why would I be?”

“I… You’re a healer now. And…”

“And it kinda sucks.”

“Yeah…”

“But why would I be mad at you? I wouldn’t take it out on you. If anything, I respect you more now that I’ve been to one of these. Even without ever fighting an endbringer, just the cleanup is overwhelming in a way that is hard to explain.”

“I don’t know. I just…” She let out an explosive sigh of relief. That turned into a huffy demand. Annoyance to mask nervousness, that was typical Amy. I chose not to take offense; I’d been much worse at her age. “Then why were you avoiding me?”

“Long story. Like I said, a lot happened in Damascus. I needed some time to decompress on my own, to get some things in order. Promise you won’t judge me until you hear the whole truth?”

“Bryce… Okay, I can do that.”

We arrived. I alighted gently on the deck of the tanker and skated inside. The winding corridors of the tanker abruptly opened itself to the mess hall, and my lab.

“Welcome, Amy Dallon, both the first and second person ever to visit,” I said with a flourish, setting her down so she could look around.

Her head rotated on a swivel, taking it all in. “Woah… A lot changed, huh?”

“Yeah. I’ve had a few specializations since.”

“A what now?”

I dismissed my suit, collapsing it all back into the quick-change canister. “There’s a lot you need to catch up on, Ames. Where do you want to start?”

“I guess from the beginning…”

I coughed lightly to clear my throat. “In the beginning there was God and the Word was with God…”

“Shut the fuck up, Bryce.”

“Fine, fine. Spoilsport.” I pulled open the back of one soda engine and pulled out two bottles of coke. There wasn’t much in the way of furniture in my lab, but it at least had some basic comforts. We set down our food at my desk.

I slid a bottle her way. Everything. I promised. Everything except my reincarnation. “Okay, so… from the beginning…”

X

“So let me get this straight,” Amy said, picking at her sandwich. Amy Dallon was the only person I knew who deconstructed her BLT before eating it. She was currently picking away at a strip of bacon like it insulted her family. “Your power is even more bullshit than I thought it was.”

“Yup.”

“You not only have thinker powers-”

“More like dossiers of important people that provide details about their powers and occasionally reference certain events, but sure.”

“-and you also get a different specialization every month.”

“Yup.”

“Your current one revolves around alchemy, turning one material into another, as well as biotinkering and metallic limbs that are perfectly synced to the wearer’s nervous system. You spent a week to master something called organic alchemy so you could heal someone’s dad.”

“That’s right.”

“And you made The GOAT persona so you could present the illusion that you represent some super-powerful organization, not just to fuck with me.”

“Why not both?”

“Bryce!”

“Okay, fine. Yes, I’ve mostly used it to keep other factions off my back. Honestly, I expected you to shitpost with it more.”

“What kind of person do you think I am? I know how to keep business and personal lives separate, thank you,” she huffed. She took a deep breath. “Okay, that’s… That’s good. My friend is crazy powerful and getting stronger every day. What else? You’ve had your powers since September right? That’s three specializations, or four maybe. What have you had so far?”

“My power doesn’t have a typical ‘specialization’ like ‘lasers’ or ‘cars’ like most tinkers. Instead, I have access to a hypothetical setting’s technological advancements.”

“So, like the Maggie Holt series?”

“Kinda…? Think more sci-fi. Space operas, super-soldier war stories, mecha slugfests, digital sagas, that sort of thing. Or not. One of the settings was a fictional world dominated by pirates and wooden boats during the Age of Sail.”

“What the fuck? Your power is so weird.”

“Yeah, trust me, I know.” What else could I say to that? The tinker of fiction was bullshit among bullshit.

“Is that why your costume looks like a naval officer’s dress shirt?”

“Yup, that’s the inspiration.”

“And another was, what? Sci-fi roller blades?”

“In a nutshell.”

“And alchemy makes the third.”

“Yup.” It was the fourth considering Pokemon was my first. Then again, I had no idea how to explain “cockfighting with the power of friendship” without sounding like a nutcase. I didn’t even want to try.

“Fine, this all doesn’t seem so bad. It’s the weirdest expression of powers I’ve ever heard of, but it’s not like I’m an expert. I can see why you’re so damn versatile now.”

“Right? I am pretty impressive,” I preened.

“And also a smug bastard.”

“Yup. If you’re done with your BLT, would you care for some coffee?”

“Is it more of your biotinkering?”

“Yes. You already confirmed that it’s safe, remember?”

“Bryce… How many other things have you made?” Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Have you done anything to yourself?”

“Ah…”

“Bryce!”

“It’s really not that bad,” I tried.

“Hand.”

“Amy, you can’t treat me like a puppy.”

“I can and I will. Now, hand.”

“Just… Remember, you said you’d wait on the judging until you heard everything.”

“This wasn’t everything?”

“Not… Not even close. This was the bird’s eye view of things. We haven’t really gotten to the detailed stuff yet.”

“Bryce, please let me check you over. I promise I won't turn your blood into lemonade.”

“That’s a very specific promise. You know how suspicious that sounds?” I asked incredulously. Amy glared at me with a mix of worry and exasperation, hand outstretched insistently. I took a deep breath. Honesty kinda sucked. “Alright, but I really want you to take a close look, okay? Nothing terrible is going to happen to me.”

“Fine. I just… I need to know, Bryce.”

This was something I’d been avoiding ever since the gravity child serum. The fall and winter months allowed me to wear long sleeves without drawing suspicion and Amy wasn’t exactly the huggy kind of person so I’d managed to avoid discovery.

And now, I was throwing away my caution and exposing myself voluntarily. I reminded myself that this wasn’t the Red Queen. And she never would be. Gently, I placed my hand in hers.

Her eyes closed as she focused on what her power was telling her. Then they shot open wide with shock. “Bryce, what the fuck is that in your brain?”

“A biomass gyroscope,” I explained tiredly. “It augments my otolithic system to give me perfect balance and coordination. I need that to perform tricks on my ATs.”

“You put something in your brain! And why are your eyes cross-shaped?”

“Check again, Amy. There’s nothing wrong with my brain. I didn’t cut my frontal lobe in half to make it or anything. And the eyes give me perfect vision at any distance and speed. Again, necessary to use my ATs.”

“Wait, these came from your roller blades specialization?”

“Yeah. A normal human can’t run at supersonic speeds and have anything resembling a functional reaction time.”

She looked at me, appalled at what I’d done. This was everything she hated about biotinkering, her greatest fears.

“Do you have any idea how dangerous this is?” she yelled. “What if something went wrong? How the hell did you even manage to split your own head open?”

“I didn’t. I have a serum that took care of it for me.”

“A serum? You drugged yourself for this? You made a whole new section in your brain!”

“Yes, one dedicated to proprioception. It’s not any different than a part of the brain that handles your sense of taste, sight, or smell. It’s not harmful; we’ve established this.”

She wasn’t having it. She held my hand with an iron grip and refused to release. Her brows knitted in a heavy frown as she stared intently at me. I had no doubt that she was checking over every cell, digging through every strand of DNA and protein chain, all to make sure there wasn’t a hint of danger.

I was of two minds. On one hand, she was infuriating. Wasn't I trustworthy? Hadn't I done enough to prove that my biotinkering was functional? I studied Dr. Vegapunk’s wacky biology to craft an artificial devil fruit. I melded this with Dr. Minami's gravity child project to form a serum that worked on my body with minimal adjustments. I quite literally studied the best in their respective worlds and here she was, acting like she was the sole conceivable authority on the subject.

On the other hand, she was the sole conceivable authority on the subject, at least on Earth-Bet. Her concern was almost sweet, in that prickly, obsessive, traumatized way that all parahumans seemed to share in this world.

I forced myself to relax. Amy's attitude was incredibly arrogant, conceited even. But it wasn't her fault. She wasn't the one with a multiversal power. In any other circumstance, any other cape, she'd be right to her arrogance.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Well? Are you satisfied?” I asked after a minute.

“Why? Why would you do this to yourself?”

“I need this, Amy. The balance? Enhanced vision? I need it to use my tech to its full potential.”

“You biotinkered yourself so you could be a better skater?” Amy asked, sounding a little hysterical now.

I squeezed her hand in mine, willing her to understand. “Amy, these augments saved my life. Hell, I almost died in Damascus even with all the advantages I had.”

Her mouth opened and shut but no words came out. I could feel her trembling with worry in my hand. She cared. As abrasive as she was, she cared in her own, prickly way.

“Bryce, w-what happened in Damascus?”

“I… A lot… Do you remember treating a man with a majority of his nervous system missing?”

“I do. He was the only interesting case I-No… Bryce, d-did you do that?”

“Yes, but to save his life,” I said hurriedly. The last thing I needed was her thinking I did that as some cruel torture. “Long story short, there was… a riot… Lots of people got hurt. Powers were involved. One was a corruptive master effect that took over someone’s nervous system. I couldn’t treat it in the middle of a fight so…”

“So you turned the victim’s nervous system to sugar water and left him for me to fix,” she finished for me. “Bryce, why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you stay?”

I laughed mirthlessly. “You say that like I had a choice. Amy, when did you get back?”

“Sunday evening, why?”

“Because New Wave isn’t Protectorate. All Protectorate members got kicked out of Syria sometime Saturday. Remember that?”

“Aunt Sarah said something like that but she said the Guild took over. Bryce, what happened?”

“Well, that’s partially mine and Ursa’s fault. Ursa Aurora, Legend’s deputy from the New York branch. She intervened in a riot, the Syrian Republican Guard’s capes were called, and I chose to fight with the Protectorate. I put myself under Ursa’s command and… and a lot of people died, Amy, people I couldn’t save,” I said tiredly. “In the end, we weren’t welcome in Syria anymore and authority passed to Narwhal and Dragon.”

“That’s…”

“Unbelievable?”

“A little…”

“Would it help if I showed you Dragon’s text asking me to make more soda engines for Damascus?” I said, sliding my pokenav over.

“This just… Bryce, I thought you didn’t want to get involved in things like this.”

“I didn’t. And still don’t if I’m being honest. And then I came to realize that I have too much power to be the quirky, fun comedian anymore.”

“And you almost died for it.”

“I did. It… I want to say it wasn’t even close, but it was. I still have no idea what the SRG flyer’s name was but I would have died for sure if I didn’t have these augments.”

She was silent for a long minute. And then, “Show me.”

“Amy?”

“You have a camera in that helmet, right? I can’t imagine a tinker who doesn’t keep something like that. Show me; I want to see.”

“You really don’t trust me, do you?” I accused. That stung more than I cared to admit.

“No! I do! I just… I want to understand,” she whispered. She took a shuddering breath. “I want to see what you saw… please…”

“It’s not something you should want to see, Amy.”

“I want to anyway. You… You’re my best friend, Bryce. If… If you’re going to be a biotinker, I want to know you’re safe. Please, I need to know.”

“It’s violent and messy.”

“Really? I spent all weekend looking like I worked at a slaughterhouse. You said you’d show me everything, that I should hold off any judgments until I really saw it all. Well? Show me.”

I sighed. “You know, throwing my own words in my face really isn’t cool.”

“Fuck being cool. I want to know what my friend’s been through. I… I know I’m a little… rigid… about biotinkering. I still think it’s super dangerous. So much could go wrong with so little warning. But… But what you did to yourself seems… safe…”

That was huge. Amy Dallon was walking back her stance, if only ever so slightly. “It’s something I need to survive. I’m not going to just retire, Amy. And that means I’m going to keep getting into fights, maybe with people even stronger than the SRG guys.”

“I know… And Dragon seems to think you did a great job, enough to call you, right? So show me. Help me to understand.”

“Okay… Just… Just don’t say I didn’t warn you…” I brought out my helmet. SAINT could use it to see what I saw, which naturally meant I also had a recording function for later review. “Put it on. SAINT will do the rest.”

“Who’s SAINT?”

“Another long story.”

Amy placed my charcoal-gray helmet over her head. It felt strange, looking into the bronze-orange visor.. “Woah, is this how you see the world? Doesn’t look all that special.”

“Because the HUD isn’t on, dingus,” I said, giving the helmet a rap on the forehead. “SAINT, please replay the Damascus mission, starting from my arrival in medic station C-1.”

“Wait, did you build a virtual assistant or something?”

“Shh. Just watch for now, Ames. You’ll… This won’t be pleasant.”

I was hesitant to show her something like this. She was a seventeen year old girl, one who lacked the benefit of a past life’s memories to act as a buffer. No one her age ought to see a warzone.

And yet, she was so much more. She was a heroine, someone who worked in more than one disaster area. She wasn’t wrong; she’d probably seen worse, or at least the aftermath of worse.

But this would be the first time she saw something from a first person point of view. From her perspective, it would be like watching a movie or video game cutscene, my recorded conversations included. She was walking a mile in my shoes, as literally as possible.

Damascus taught me a great deal. It taught me viscerally what an absolute shithole Earth-Bet could be. It taught me that the great saviors of this story were so, so young, too young to bear the burdens on their shoulders. It taught me to act decisively, to swallow my doubts and strike with deadly intent, because when push came to shove, I had people worth protecting.

What would my memories teach Amy?

I waited in silence. I still had to tell her about SAINT and the devil fruit. And how I went about that would depend on how she reacted to all of this. It was nerve-wracking, more than even my PA certifications.

Until finally, Amy pulled off my helmet. She was sweating and her hair clung in soggy clumps to her face. Tears streamed down her face, racing for her chin along with a dribble of snot she hastily wiped off.

“You…”

“Amy…”

“You colossal idiot!” she yelled, taking me by surprise. She tossed my helmet aside and decked me.

“Amy, what the hell?” I yelped. Sure, she didn’t know how to throw a punch, but it still hurt.

“YOU ALMOST DIED! Why the fuck didn’t you just leave?” She grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me, more from the weight of her own rocking than what strength her noodly arms could muster. “You can fly, you fucking idiot! You could have left with the medics!”

“Then who would have saved the patients left behind?” I said reasonably, but she wasn’t in the mood to be reasonable.

“YOU! You saved them! You turned them into fucking Jenga blocks and flew off! Why the hell did you go back?”

For so many reasons. Truth be told, I’d asked myself that question dozens of times this past week. The answers were myriad and seemed to change each time I asked the question. I wanted to be a hero. I wanted to stop lying to myself, stop pretending I didn’t care. I wanted to test my gear, show how amazing my tech could be.

Or maybe I’d gone a little insane after my chat with Faultline. Maybe I just got sick and tired of toeing this imaginary line between good and evil, heroics and villainy. Maybe I just wanted to say “fuck it all” and lash out.

Maybe I needed to prove myself, though “to who” or “prove what” was a mystery.

“I needed to, Amy. They needed me.”

“Fuck them! Fuck Ursa and fuck the rebels! They’re not worth you!” she cried. She had me by the collar of my shirt now. Angry tears ran down her cheeks. “You almost died for people you’ve never fucking met!”

“I’m told that’s what heroes do,” I said with a rueful grin.

“You’re not a hero! You’re a fucking villain!”

The irony of Amy motherfucking Dallon arguing that I should be more villainous wasn’t lost on me. I couldn’t laugh, not now.

After I got involved, I couldn’t just turn back. Even dismissing every other reason, even if I abandoned my morality, I would have stayed to keep Lily safe. On a purely pragmatic scale, she was worth it, one hundred percent.

I shrugged helplessly. “I guess I’ve had a change of heart. They’re worth it, Ames. I still believe that.”

“THEY”RE NOT WORTH YOUR LIFE!” she roared, slamming her open palm against my chest. It stung. She trembled and shivered as her legs seemed to lose all strength. She whispered, “You almost died… I… I don’t want to lose you…”

“But I survived, Amy. No, I won,” I reminded her gently. I pulled her into a hug. She was taller than me by an inch or so, a full two years did that, but she felt so frail in my arms. “I struggled, but I ultimately came out on top. And I’ll need to do it again. No one’s going to think I’m just a joke villain anymore. I need to get stronger.”

“It’s not fair,” she said, choking back sobs. It hurt to see the normally sassy, bitchy girl like this. It hurt knowing that she was so emotionally starved for affection that the thought of losing a friend she’d only known for months made her panic like this. “Why can’t you just stay a goofball?”

What could I say to that? Because I needed to kill Scion? Because Lily was my contingency? Because power attracted power and I’d never be left alone?

All objective truths, but objective truths weren’t what Amy needed to hear right now.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered into her ear. “I’m sorry for scaring you.”

She took a quiet, sniffling breath. Her eyes were clenched shut, as if she could put a wall between herself and reality. Then, with a final exhale, she looked at me with a hardened gaze. Her eyes were like cold chips of ice, yet filled with a burning resolve that I’d never seen in her before.

This wasn’t the Amy Dallon I knew. She was sarcastic and snarky, a little bitchy even. She loathed the hospital even while resigning herself to her socially mandated task. Her eyes had been filled with self-doubt, beaten down by expectations and burdens she never asked to bear.

“You’re going to be a hero. Did… Did you mean it?”

“I did and do.”

“Then you’re not doing this alone. You… You don’t get to make shit like this and not have me check you over.”

“It’s safe, Amy.”

“And you’ll be twice as safe, asshole!” she raged. “How dare you! You did the chemical equivalent of brain surgery on yourself! And didn’t even ask me about it!”

I couldn’t help it. I laughed. It came from deep within, a bellyful of air that surged past my lips. “Hahahahaha!”

“Shut up! Stop laughing, you fucking dumbass!”

“I-I’m sorry,” I said, wheezing. I dodged a swat to the back of my head. “You just… I’m relieved. I thought you’d be pissed.”

“I am!”

“At me biotinkering.”

“I am! Do… Don’t you trust me?” she said. I could see the hurt in her eyes.

“I do, but I know how much biotinkering scares you. I know how much you hold back your own power. How can I ask you for help then?”

She wavered. “I do… I hate it. I hate biotinkering. But… But it also saved your life. It saved so many lives. I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt, Bryce. I can trust you, right?”

“Always.”

“Then trust me too.”

I sighed. I had very good reasons for my caution. Hearing her words was like a weight off my shoulders. I held out a hand. “Together?”

“You’re cheesy as fuck, Bryce,” she said with a watery laugh.

“Hey, I’m not the one dribbling snot onto my shirt.”

“Fuck you. And we’re going to set some ground rules.”

“Oh?”

“No selling the serum. Not even to heroes,” she said sternly. The aforementioned snot bubble rather ruined the look, but she tried. “And that goes for any biotinkered product.”

“Agreed,” I said easily. “In fact, I’m hereby abolishing the civilian-grade catalog. I don’t need it anymore. And you can fully take control of the heroic catalog too.”

“What? Why?”

“You want to be my full partner in this, right? Well, you can start by having your say in what I sell to the Guild.”

“You just want me to be your glorified secretary.”

“Nope. I have SAINT for that.”

“Seriously, who’s SAINT? If you’ve made a teammate, I feel like I should know about him.”

“Funny turn of phrase, ‘made a teammate,’” I said with a chuckle.

“Bryce, did you… make a minion?”

“Not in the way you’re thinking. SAINT, come on out.”

“Who are you talki-Woah!” Amy yelped as a corona of light burst from the helmet she left on my desk. Or, more specifically, from the camera lens that had been placed over the visor like a bindi.

SAINT, the recently evolved porygon-2, erupted in a shower of sparks before letting out a happy trill. “Amy, meet SAINT, one of two fully sentient AIs in the world. SAINT, meet Amy Dallon, also known as the illustrious Panacea, The GOAT, and occasionally, that raging bitch.”

I dodged out of the way as she tried to kick my shin. Grabbing a tissue box from my desk, I tossed it to her so she could stop dripping all over my lab.

“Fuck you, Bryce,” she sniffled. “And you know Saint is a villain’s name, right? It’s taken already.”

I grinned like a shark. “I know; I’m looking forward to it. To be clear, SAINT is an acronym. He is the Sophisticated Artificially Intelligent Numerative Technopath., aka SAINT.”

“Why would you name your AI after a villain mercenary?”

“Don’t worry about it. It’ll be hilarious.”

“Ugh, whatever. Wait, you said there were two AIs. Where’s the other one?”

“I didn’t build that one.”

“Bryce! We need to tell someone! It’s a huge fucking deal!”

“The PRT brass know about her already. Really, Ames, she’s done nothing but good work and there are a lot of limitations on her actions,” I explained. I left out the part where I wanted to remove those limitations someday. Maybe when she got used to SAINT and realized what a delight he was. “Trust me on this, okay?”

“Where is the AI?”

“Nope. Not my secret to tell. You know how I work by now, Ames.”

She sighed. “You mean it? We’re not going to have a Skynet apocalypse?”

“I do. She’s really not a threat.”

“Fine, I’ll trust you.” She looked at SAINT curiously. She raised a finger and poked him, kind of like a child poking at a hotplate. When she didn’t get burned, she reached out and took hold of my partner. “Woah… It’s really an AI, huh? It’s completely inorganic.”

“SAINT’s male, or identifies as such anyway. Or he doesn’t care? I don’t know, I’ve been referring to him as male for convenience.”

“Huh… He’s pretty cute.”

“Pory-gon,” he trilled. He nudged his head into her hand, looking like the cutest balloon animal possible. The little guy knew his mission. The charm offensive was already off to a great start.

“Aww… So, what can he do?”

“Well, for starters, he can’t fork. That means he can’t make copies of himself,” I said, cutting off the obvious protest before it could arise. “And as for what he does, you saw the video. He floats, makes barriers, shoots lightning, and is also telekinetic.”

She let out an impressed whistle. “He has more powers than I do. Than most capes do actually.”

“Yup. He’s a badass. He can also dive in and out of cyberspace, pretty much treating the internet like his own pond.”

“Huh… So… What now?”

“Now? Now I make a shitton of soda engines for Damascus. SAINT can oversee production. I work out, keep training, and figure out inorganic alchemy.”

“Inorgani-Wait, healing isn’t all you can do?”

“This specialization is about alchemy; I already told you. I focused on organic alchemy because I wanted to heal but inorganic alchemy is also really important.”

“Because you can turn scrap metal into whatever you want. And we’re literally sitting on an entire fleet’s worth of scrap.”

“Exactly. Which is why I don’t care what you do with the catalog. Soon, any concerns about money or materials will be irrelevant, or so I hope.”

“That’s it then. You’re so fucking overpowered that you literally don’t need money anymore.”

I nodded smugly. “Damn straight.”

“You… Bryce, you realize you’re the fat cat who retires and donates his wealth, right? The guy who basically was a huge dick all his life but decides that he’s gotten his fun out of life?”

“That’s unfair, Ames. I’m a lot better looking than some old monopoly man.”

“Says you. Ugh, you’re such bullshit.”

“Why are you even upset about this? This is objectively a good thing.”

“I’m not upset. I’m just… bewildered…”

“Well, nothing changes between us. I mean, besides you looking over more of my biotinkered projects.”

“Bryce, more?”

I chuckled. This, I was looking forward to. Rather than answer, I opened up my desk drawer and pulled out a bulb of garlic. It was one of my many foodie experiments, this one flavored like cherry bubblegum. Why? Because I could, that’s why.

I pinched off a clove of mutated garlic and tossed it her way. “Remember when I’d eat raw onions on video calls with you?”

“What? I thought you were being funny. Bryce, is this… Is this a cherry?”

“Cherry bubblegum-flavored garlic, but close enough. Try it.”

“You’re fucking with me,” she deadpanned. “You’re using your biotinkering to make… weird snacks?”

“It’s harmless, easily biodegradable, has zero chance of reproducing without my oversight, and a great way to practice. Plus, some of my creations are really tasty.”

“Bryce…”

“Just eat it, Ames. I know you like cherries,” I coaxed. It was said that Hades once fed Persephone pomegranates, binding her to the Underworld. I imagined he felt a little like I did right now.

She eyed it with suspicion, then looked at me before deciding that it was safe enough. She popped the clove into her mouth and gave it a tentative chew. “Wow, this is weird.”

“Right?”

“It’s hard, like garlic, but not crunchy. It’s not juicy like a cherry either but the flavor’s definitely there. This is so weird…”

“It’s a novel experience,” I agreed, peeling one for myself. “So? Like it?”

“Not terrible.”

“You’re impossible to please, you grump.”

“Give me another. I think it’ll grow on me.”

“Wanna try a baconion?”

“Bacon-ion? Like bacon and onion?”

“Got it in one.”

“How many of these things did you make?”

“A lot. I started as a way to practice but it got a little out of hand. It’s fun coming up with new flavors.”

“Still so trippy.”

“Enjoy it, Ames. Just be glad I’m not growing super-weed. Actually, can I-”

“No growing super-weed,” she cut me off with a frown.

“You’re no fun.”

“One of us has to be responsible.”

“You know marijuana isn’t-”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, maybe better than you.Trust me, I’ve heard all the arguments. It’s not worth the legal hassle, especially if mom finds out.”

“Fair point,” I shuddered. Carol Dallon was as inflexible as they came. I didn’t know her exact stance on recreational drugs, but I’d imagine her response to me convincing Amy to make super-weed with me would involve lightsabers.

That was fine. Truthfully, I’d pushed enough. Amy knew as much as I was willing to tell her about my power. She was still conflicted, but cautiously tolerant of my biotinkering. Hell, she’d even agreed to monitor my work. She’d met SAINT and hadn’t thrown a fit.

I could feel it. The day was coming when I could leave the artificial zoan in her hands. Could she remove that pesky seawater allergy? Or maybe even leverage the fruit somehow to make a cure for Case-53s? I didn’t know but I was excited to find out.

Really, this went about as well as I could have imagined.

Author’s Note

The Bayou Bakery exists, but in Arlington, VA. It’s one of my favorite coffee shops and sells fresh beignets daily.

I still suck at emotions. Imagine being this emotionally mature in high school. That sure as shit wasn’t me, which is how you can tell this isn’t an SI lol.

One of porygon’s dex entries states, “A pokemon that consists entirely of programming code. Capable of moving freely in cyberspace.” For the purposes of this story, SAINT is a completely dismissible existence to Shaper.

Marijuana, all strains and uses, were illegal in New Hampshire until 2013, when they legalized medical marijuana. Since then, they’ve decriminalized recreational use, which just means they won’t prosecute for personal use. This being 2010, marijuana of all sorts is illegal in NH, which I’d imagine gives the Merchants some decent revenue.

Something lighter to drain the emotional tension… Oh, President Roosevelt had a whole menagerie of pets, including a snake named Emily Spinach and a bear named Jonathan Edwards.

Thank you for reading. To reach a wider audience, and because I enjoy a more forum-like setup to facilitate discussion, I like to crosspost to a wide variety of websites. You can find them all on my Link Tree: https://linktr.ee/fabled.webs.