Location: Velstand Capital Building, Governor General’s Office
Time: 3:15 AM, 02/28/2108
“Alright, I’ve got a couple of things to say to you, but first, how is it that I have to rearrange my schedule to make time for you?”
I was sitting at my new desk, and Henry was sitting across from me. There was no one else in the room, so I didn’t even bother trying to keep up my usual appearance. The very idea that I was the one who had to make an effort to arrange this meeting was already ridiculous enough.
“I’m a busy guy. Between classes and work, I barely have enough time to come see you as it is. I’d have loved to just ignore you, but that would just be more of a headache in the long run.”
“I just annexed this city last week! Do you think that I’m not busy as well?”
“Hard to say, you never really look like you’re doing much.”
“That’s because I always try to look like I have everything under control. And now, thanks to you, everyone in the city knows I don’t! I’ve got more problems than I can deal with.”
“Hey, don’t blame me for your problems. I never wanted to come to this city in the first place. I just wanted to live a normal, peaceful life back home.”
It sounds stupid to admit, but I hadn’t really considered that before. I was the one who forced Henry to move to Velstand in order to join the ATC. Even with how hesitant he was to serve me back home, I figured that in a strange city where he didn’t know anyone, he’d eventually agree to serve me.
Would I really try such a chance based strategy?
I doubt it, but in regards to Henry, all of my ideas seem to make sense. I never did figure out the limits of his original augmentation, so it might be somehow causing me to make such bad decisions when it comes to him. Is he actually fated to always become the main character? Like I thought before, even my initial choice to turn him into a vampire was overly risky. Noting seems to add up when Henry is factored in.
Either way, that doesn’t change the current situation.
“I did, but I didn’t think you’d join up with some terrorists!”
“Oh, that’s what this is about.”
“Of course it is!”
That information broker’s little display the other day had caused far more trouble than I anticipated. I assumed the senators would be up in arms over her attack, but that was hardly the case. Just like she said, they all seemed intent to just ignore the whole thing. Did she actually have dirt on every single senator? How is that even possible?
Not that I’m any different. I was keeping quiet about it as well, under the pretense of gathering information. The reality of the situation was that I already had more than enough information, or rather, Alexis had enough information to keep me from doing anything. She made it clear that if I went after her she’d release enough information to ruin my reputation.
That was the one thing I couldn’t allow. I’d sooner let her burn this entire city to the ground before I let her ruin my chances at regaining my lost status. Even something as simple as the fact that I technically killed Henry when he was still a human could ruin me.
Velstand was a part of my plan; only a single piece though. Antagonizing her over this city was hardly worth it.
I hated playing her game, but I would. It sounded as if she’d allow me to respond any time she caused some kind of public disturbance, so I’d have to use one of those opportunities to silence her for good.
And as for her followers, well, that’s why I needed to talk to Henry. I already decided to just ignore them and wait for an opportunity, but some of their members are problematic.
Allison Albright, Emelia Emin, and Kamiya Kanon are all nonfactors. Allison and Emelia were just high schoolers . For their age, they are fairly strong, but not enough to actually cause much of a problem. And as for Kanon, I already received word that the ARA found the person she was in this city for, so she should leave on her own soon enough.
I wasn’t sure how to deal with the one Eren brought here, Sara, but I’d leave her for him to deal with. He needed to clean up his own mess.
And Vier, well, I didn’t really have any kind of plan for him. All I knew was that I’d need to call for more help from the Empire.
That just left one person. Alexis Albright’s final lackey.
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“Can we hurry this up? I need to get ready for my shift at the bakery.”
The final member interrupted my internal monologue. The person I specifically brought to this city to serve me was openly working for my enemy.
“Why are you working for her?”
“Well, I already had a lot of experience working at a bakery, so they offered me a good hourly wage.”
“I’m not talking about that, you work obsessed idiot! Obviously, I mean the information broker!”
“Ah, that. I’m working with her, not for her, but I guess that’s a distinction that you can’t make.”
“Shut up! That doesn’t matter. I’ve spent years trying to get you to work for me, but you always ignore me! Why would you work for her all of a sudden?”
“Because she’s the first person to ever recognize my problem, and the first person to ever give me a solution, of course I’d help her. And even if Alexis’s plan falls, Allison should be able to help me. I hate all the attention it’s bringing me, but for now I’ll just have to deal with it.”
“Your problem? She can cure your vampirism?”
“No. She’ll destroy the curse that always makes me into the hero.”
“That again?”
“Yeah, I know, you don’t understand what I’m talking about. No one ever does, not even Alexis. But that doesn’t matter. She plans on turning the world back to normal, and I have to believe that my abnormal situation of always winding up as a hero will be fixed as well.”
“She plans on turning the world back to normal? What exactly does that entail?”
That sounded too abstract. In a manner of thinking, that was my goal as well. I wanted to return to the position that was mine from birth. That couldn’t have been what Alexis was after though. She said it herself, she planned on bringing chaos to this city.
“Who knows, I don’t really understand it myself. You know though, after talking to her and Allison about it, I can actually see where they’re coming from.”
“Why, what did they tell you?”
It was annoying, but I doubted Henry had any plans to join my side anytime soon. So I’d just have to settle for getting as much information as possible from him. Information might be my most valuable defense against Alexis.
“Stuff that makes you think. Like, the two of us, we’re vampires.”
“Technically we’re just aberrations, but people refer to us as such.”
“Yeah, but considering we match up so well with the idea of a vampire, even down to not being able to deal with garlic, it seems like the idea of vampires itself would need to be based on an aberration like us.”
“That’s probably true. I imagine it’s the same with a werewolf like Lucy, or any other aberration for that matter.”
“Exactly, so then wouldn’t that mean the world has always had augmenteds?”
“I imagine so. It’s not like the ability to connect with the information dimension is dependent on the current age. There are lots of old stories from the past about supposedly mystical powers. I’m fairly certain proper study on it didn’t start until the 1930s though.”
“That’s exactly what Alexis said, but let me ask you something else. When was the first time an augmented or an aberration had a confirmable impact on history?”
“What’s the point of that?”
“Just answer already, I have to get to work soon.”
“Probably during the wars of the 20th century.”
“That’s what I said when Alexis asked me the same question, but she told me I was wrong. We’re all taught about how augmentations were used heavily for the first time during that period, but there’s no concrete impact from that. The Allies could have beaten the Axis powers with only traditional weapons. Even the more showy parts could have been caused by a nuclear weapon. There’s no concrete evidence that augmentations actually affected anything. The first time a historic event was confirmably affected by augmentations came in 2033.”
He didn’t have to name the event, obviously I’d know it. The founding of the Pacific Empire, and the subsequent wars that sprouted off of our bid for independence.
“Alright, so what? Even if that’s true, what does it matter?”
“Think about it for a second. Throughout all of human history, there’s not a single example of augmentations having any effect on absolutely anything until the year 2033, but since then, I mean, is there anything that isn’t affected by augmentations? Doesn’t that shift start to seem unnatural the more you think about it? And now that I’ve actually said this out loud, doesn’t it seem even stranger that you’ve never heard anyone bring something like this up before? It’s not like this is an incredibly high minded topic or anything, but I’ve never heard anyone say anything about it before. And when it comes to vampires like us, the truth is even stranger. If you do even a little research, it’s obvious that vampires aren’t based on reality at all. And yet we somehow perfectly match up with a fictional construct. Weird, right?”
“So what does all this have to do with Alexis’s plan?”
Most of what he said sounded like nonsense, but I at least wanted to get some idea of what Alexis planned on doing.
“I can’t give you an employer's confidential information. Doing that is career suicide for a part timer. But her overall goal seems to be what I’m trying to tell you. To make things normal again. To get the world back to the way it was up until 2033.”
There were multiple ways to interpret that, and based on how ridiculous Henry sounded, I’m sure he doesn’t actually understand what Alexis’s true aim is. But one thing stuck out. She seemed to view the founding of the Empire as some kind of mistake.
It would seem that I underestimated her threat once again. She wasn’t just attempting to ruin my plans for this city, she was planning something against the entire Empire.
That was the first piece of good news I’d received in some time. Now I’d be saving the entire empire by dealing with her, not just some new territory. Not to mention, now I had all the justification I needed to request the assistance I’d need to handle Vier. I’d need to make sure to set the stage so Vier would deal some damage to the emperor first though.
I also had to figure out a plan to get Henry back on my side, but the rest of this was falling into place. A weaker mind might have fallen into panic upon learning about Alexis’s plan to destroy the Empire, but I was only looking forward. Unsurprisingly, even at the end, this was an epilogue on success.