Truth watched Vig working from a distance. The lady was just barely the wrong side of pretty, and just barely the wrong side of too old, at least next to Vigor. Vig had dressed down, drab clothes cut not too flatteringly. There was no hiding those eyes, though. The smokey darkness of them, like dried opium, promised an inescapable dream and terrible consequences.

Without a doubt, Vigor had seduced the older woman, and the older woman was convinced she was a bad person for preying on him. The question was, why? Vigor had vanished, apparently voluntarily. So just what was he up to?

Vigor moved down the street, relying on a concealment talisman to keep him out of sight. Truth frowned a little. If he could see straight through it, it wasn’t very good. Good enough for the locals, apparently, though he’d bet cash that no few of them had illusion piercing charms or talismans on them. It was Conjin. Perhaps the “dream” of drifting invisibly through a city was common here. He certainly knew what that feeling was like.

They walked together, the lady leading roped voyeurs back towards the city center. She walked over to city hall. Apparently content with what he saw, Vigor dropped the invisibility and glamoured himself like a local. He chose a fairly radical change in face, opting for a daring beard of tiny squiddy tentacles, enormous eyes and a pink boney fin sticking out of the top of his head. “Local Boy Trying Too Hard” would probably be the name next to the charm in the shop. Or it should be.

Vig made his way over to a cafe, ordered a coffee and a sandwich, then sat at an outdoor table. One with a good view of City Hall. He ate leisurely.

Forty minutes later, a fire broke out on the second floor of the City Hall. It raced along, windows breaking, smoke pouring out. Firefighters were on the scene in a minute, the fire extinguished in ten, but real damage had been done. All the offices along one side of the building had been burnt out, the choking black smoke had rolled up and stained the side of the building. When the smoke finally stopped, an outline of a tiger’s head was visible. Unstained by smoke.

Truth nodded slightly. Not bad, as terrorist provocations went. Not amazing, but not bad. He tentatively scored it six out of ten. It just seemed… a bit half assed. Maybe if this had been done a year ago, or more, it might amount to something. But right now? With the enslavement of the nation starting in just a few days?

It also didn’t seem like Vig. He always remembered Vig as having that nastiness in him. Something that had been scared, been hurt, been prey, and finally decided to rebel. Truth remembered when they killed Thierrie together. Vig insisted on staying to watch Truth finish him off. Like he was watching for that moment the lights went out, excited to see it. Hungry to see it.

Truth had nearly gotten killed doing that. Thierrie had been so damn fast, and hit like a truck. And he only got into it with Theirrie because Vig had… Truth felt his head winch back towards the City Hall. The fleeing office workers were clumping together. He could hear them start to chant.

“SMASH THE SYSTEM! THE TIGER MUST RETURN TO THE MOUNTAIN! SMASH STARBRITE! THE TIGER MUST BE FREE!”

Over and over and over. The chanting ones turned on the ones not chanting, tearing them apart. Rushing the cops, rushing back into the building to smash and burn more.

Truth nodded approvingly. Now THAT was the brother he remembered. Vig gasped at the scene like the rest of the locals, then quickly hurried away. Truth drifted along behind him, giving him plenty of distance. He didn’t want to startle him, now that he had found his brother again.

Truth was trying not to feel anything. He tried to just embrace being a drifting ghost. It was hard. Vig, the baby of the family, had been on his mind most of his life. How to keep him safe, fed, alive. Prospering. And now he had thrown in with revolutionaries. Which, on one hand, was certainly a correct choice, but so would stockpiling cans of beans and iron drums of purified water in a shack deep in the mountains. “Safe” wasn’t going to be an option for anyone in the near future, but in the short term, safer was still on the table.

He had no idea what to do.

He could pop up in front of Vig. “Hi, I know I don’t look exactly like anyone you know, but does my face or voice strike you as familiar?”

He could assume an identity, a fellow revolutionary. “Ah, Mr. Medici, we have been impressed with your work. I would like to know more about you. Please join me in this soundproof basement, where we won’t be disturbed.”

Going to pass on that one.

Summon him as The Prince? He could send a note with a cryptic reference to something only the two of them would know. Though if Vigor was a quarter as cagey as Truth thought he was, a note like that would have him fleeing the country and hiding under the biggest rock he could find on the other side of the world. Leaving poison behind him every step of the way.

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Vigor made for a slightly run down apartment building, entered with a key, and vanished from Truth’s sight. Truth thought about it for a moment longer, and decided to follow Vig in. It wouldn’t be hard to pop the lock. He reached for the doorknob, but Incisive screamed a warning before he could touch it.

Truth smiled, and crouched close to the doorknob. There was a very faint discoloration, invisible in the twilight gloom of Conjin. He ran his fingers, feather light along the door frame, stopping where he felt danger. Poison on the doorknob, and a bomb if whoever came after him decided to just force entry. Nasty. But this was an apartment building? How was he planning on…

Truth swore as only the eldest brother could and ran around the back of the building. No one was leaving from there either, but it had been a faint hope. He leapt up to the second story, caught a window ledge, and cut open the window. He got lucky- no one was home. Out the window, into the hall, listening carefully for any movement. Silence. He strained his ears, wishing one of his spells was actually useful for this.

He thought furiously. Could Vig have made it up to the second floor before him? At the speed Truth was moving? No chance. Not without making a hell of a lot of noise. So he was on the ground floor or the basement. If there was a basement, given they were on the ocean floor. Truth quickly made his way down the steps. The hallway was long, with doors on either side, and a complete absence of any hint about which apartment was occupied.

Now, if Vig was willing to rig the building's doors with redundant traps, what were the odds his apartment door was safe? Truth grinned and started moving at eye watering speeds. He zig-zag-ed between the doors, reaching for the handle. One midway down gave him a feeling of danger, but he made sure to check the whole hallway. Could be several paranoid people living here, after all.

Apparently not that paranoid. He doubled back to the “danger” door. He lined himself up for his usual favorite party trick (going straight through the wall), and stopped. His stomach dropped as his body remained agonizingly tense, ready to explode the second his mind gave the command. But he didn’t move.

Say he caught Vig. Then what? What exactly would happen if they had their big, heartwarming reunion? They caught up. Told each other what they safely could. Hugged. And then what? Brother revolutionaries together? No chance. Truth’s ability to move concealed would be completely compromised, and Vig’s organization… well he didn’t know anything about them but it sure didn’t look like they could manage the scale he needed. At best they would be pawns. At best. And he wasn’t going to use Vig as a pawn.

It was a stabbing pain, turning to a tearing pain. He had spent his entire life looking out for the sibs. Vig was the baby of the family. They would have pumped out more, but Mom had some kind of “accident” and couldn’t have kids anymore. Frankly, he wasn’t entirely sure Dad actually fathered any of them. He had sure never caught them having sex. And it didn’t matter even one tiny bit because they were his sibs. Siblings. His only true family.

Truth clenched his fists until his knuckles turned white. He wanted to burst in there. He wanted to see Vig. Tell him that he was alive. Tell him that he had a kind-of sister in law. Check on how Sophia was doing, how Harmony was doing. Take him to dinner at the hotel and introduce him to what truly luxurious food tasted like.

His whole body clenched, squeezed in on him, vice-tight. He wanted to see Vig. He wanted to talk to his sib! But it would get them both killed, sooner rather than later. He silently screamed in frustration.

He had been betrayed, murdered, floated in a well for five years, got rebuilt by sadistic angelic worms, traveled the length of one of the most dangerous countries on the planet, worked for a religious terrorist ringleader, healed his battered soul some and finally, finally! Found love, acceptance, and a measure of peace. The only thing that wasn’t perfect was that his sibs weren’t there with him. That and the world coming to an end, but he could probably put up with the collapse of magic if he had his sibs with him and Etenesh. And now he was walking away. Again.

He hated this. Hated it hated it hated it hated it hated it… the thought ran through his head endlessly, a spinning Mobius strip of rage and indignation. Why was it always him? Why did he always have to get hurt to protect the sibs? He didn’t want the sibs to get hurt, but why was there always, always a situation where they would get hurt if he didn’t step in? Why was the world this way? Why were people this way? Did it have to be this way?

Was he crazy for hoping that it could be different? That they could be happy and together at the same time? That they could be safe from their parents and the evil world?

There was a sudden loud bang from the front door, followed a fraction of a second later by a much louder boom. Truth flinched and ducked out of instinct, but the blast went out, not down the hall.

“Traps! Traps! Send in the Golems!”

There was another loud bang towards the rear. “Rear door clear, breaching!” Half a second later, Truth heard a gasping, choking sound. “Gas! Gas! Clean air spells! We need a medic! The golems came pounding down the hall, multi limbed mockeries of apes and octopuses, coated in dark, rubbery synthetic skin. No weapons. They wanted Vig alive. There was a burst of magic, tingly, feeling like the sound of a drum kit kicked down a flight of stairs. The lights went out, and the golems had seizures.

It might not be as effective as obliterating magic, but forcing talismans to malfunction was a lot easier, and a whole lot safer. Armored mages were piling in through the door now, riot shields out, with stunning fetishes poking around them. Rushing in from both ends of the hallway.

“You aren’t going to believe this. I hardly believe this. I am just so happy to see you guys right now. I could just cry, I’m so happy.”

Truth called the Tongue to his hand, and spun the angelic sword in a fast loop to limber up.

“Let me show you just how happy you make me.”