Chapter 59 Character Development!
“You know, I don’t actually like the name Cannibal Holocaust. And even though I’m immune to prions, eating people is getting old. Maybe I should try going vegan.” - Vegetable Holocaust, leader of successful rebrandings.
“Hey Isaac?”
The gadgeteer was in the middle of what Aiden thought was a staring contest with a plunger. The man quickly broke contact though, “Hmm? Aiden?”
“Trist is taking me for remedial, so I won’t be able to attend the Meta Techniques class,” he answered. “I didn’t know if she checked in with you but I just wanted to make sure.”
“That old-” Isaac palmed his head, “It’s fine, she does this from time to time. Don’t worry about it. How’s your progress anyways? You were attempting Simple Reinforcement last I checked?”
Aiden nodded, “Yeah, though I am not making much headway.” He sat down, noting with some annoyance Isaac hadn’t cleaned off the blood they dripped when discussing the Incomplete God. “You described it as ‘removing the ability’ from the usage of Hume, though I haven’t grasped it yet. My ability is too linked to my perception of Hume.”
“How many Gates have you been through so far.” He added as an afterthought, “with the ability.”
“There was the one in Last Stand, Necrada, also the one yesterday.”
“Yesterday? Something happen?” Isaac asked as he circled around him, eyes held on him in the same way Aiden often did when viewing how abnormally normal Isaac was.
“Nothing much, my friends got caught nearby and we helped with some minor parts.”
“Mmhmm.” Isaac picked up the odd plunger and handed it to him. “Take this, and watch your Status as you do.”
Aiden raised a brow as Oros slithered onto his forearm. There didn’t appear to be any noticeable change, he was just holding a plunger. “I feel nothing.”
“I see,” Isaac muttered. “One second, try this one.” He handed Aiden an oddly unnatural feeling object. It was a calculator that had an uncanniness to it. “Feel anything with this one?”
He nodded, “This calculator is Bleed affected isn’t it?”
“Minorly stained in a way that screws with its electronics,” Isaac confirmed.
“Oros is losing some tail.” It was an extremely small amount, his natural Hume regeneration covered it immediately, he only noticed a very thin blotting of black appear and disappear rapidly on the tail.
“Good thing with Simple techniques is that there is a unified way of handling and teaching them. Unless parts of your ability specifically restrict you from attaining Simple Meta Techniques, exposure to Bleed will get you used to the general idea of spending Hume without your ability.” He put away the plunger, “Keep the calculator, you’ll obtain Simple Reinforcement in time.”
Aiden got up, “And the other one?”
“It’ll be easier once you have the feeling for it down, have you put any thought on which you want?”
“I thought you said what I did at Last Stand biased me towards Imbuement and Reinforcement.”
Isaac frowned, “What I said?” He shook his head, “Either way unless you’ve gone and repeated it, it’s only a bias. Don’t mind too much about it.”
“Oh,” he added, “And remember something. I don’t know if Trist told you this, but there are two types of Extended Techniques, those with Names and those without. The latter is rather easy to achieve for most, and is only a factor of time, intent and introspection. The former is more a second or third manifestations.”
“What’s the difference?” Aiden asked.
“It’s an impossible to answer question, because no one is the same,” Isaac shrugged. “Inherited types like the families tend to get the latter. But it’s wrong to think of it as a binary in the first place. Named Extended Techniques happen on their own, it could be considered a natural outgrowth. They tend to be more rigid and harder to change, but with the benefit they come as a complete package. Trist’s Expansion is an example of this, and she prefers people pursue that as a result. But it is about as helpful as being a manifestation seeker.” He scowled at the thought.
Aiden paused awkwardly, not wanting to inform Isaac that he, or at least the old Aiden was certainly one of those people.
Isaac continued without his input, “Too much of this stuff is wishy washy nonsense that might as well be magic. Maybe humanity will figure out a more comprehensive logic to it, but it certainly isn’t going to happen while I’m alive.”
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The first thing Trist had them do was report on the choices they each made.
Aiden got to hear the account of everyone else during the encounter, Luther apparently assisted civilians outside the Gate and coordinated with emergency services while they were inside. The teacher occasionally asked a question on why one of them made their choices, she frequently asked Jun and Tuba why they prioritised certain people.
When Aiden was halfway through his account, Trist stopped him, “Why did you originally split with Jun?”
“The hostages had higher priority, not to mention Jun had been doing a more active role, his Hume level was low, I was relatively fresh up with my own Hume because I keep a storage of it,” he answered. “I judged then that since I could damage him, I could hold him off for longer and alleviate the pressure.”
She nodded, “Was your priority to take him out?”
Aiden shook his head, “No, that would’ve been a nice bonus, but it was enough to keep him contained in the building.”
Trist raised an eyebrow, “And do you understand where you messed up?”
Aiden nodded. “I failed to keep him contained within the building. My attack with the t-rex didn’t serve to disable him, but only corner him enough to do something drastic.”
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Jun raised his hand and spoke up, “Aiden you were out of options then, your Luther’s luck ran out and none of your attacks were having an effect.”
“That isn’t the problem,” Trist said. “Sometimes you can make all the right choices but still arrive at a terrible outcome.”
Aiden nodded in agreement.
They continued to discuss the events. Trist overall found their evacuation of the civilians to be satisfactory, and thus focused on what they could’ve done better during the fight. It was something Josh noted which surprised him.
“Aiden did no damage to him,” he nodded apologetically to him, “The man’s ability gave him what is essentially a high base DR, which got lower every time he had to throw something out. But his mass was unchanged, so Aiden’s attacks were useful in moving him around. Only Jun and the t-rex harmed him because each brute forced his protective layer.”
Trist raised an eyebrow, “You don’t count the t-rex as an extension of Aiden?”
“Aiden doesn’t,” Josh said.
He shrugged. “Once they’re free of me I don’t know what they’ll do.”
After a while, they split up, with Trist going to a side office to interview each of them one by one. Darius went in first.
“Is it just me or does she treat you differently?” Jun whispered, despite the fact they were a good distance away.
“Does she?” Aiden raised an eyebrow, “I’m manifested, and I don’t have your background, so she might be considerate of my lacking knowledge.”
“That’s not it,” Luther whispered. “She treats you like a peer. The rest of us she just treats like kids.”
“She does!” Jun nodded.
“I mean Aiden does feel pretty adult at times,” Wren quietly added.
Aiden’s hand clenched into a fist, unseen by everyone else, “Wren you’re mature as well, we’ve all been through some terrible things.”
Tuba coughed, “That’s not what-”
“Aiden!” Trist called out as Darius stepped outside.
Aiden gave them a helpless shrug before stepping into the office.
Trist leaned back casually into an office chair, she gestured at an empty seat, as he sat down, she spoke. “I won’t beat around the bush, what’s the real reason you split up with Jun?”
He paused. “I don’t understand, I gave you my reason.”
She rolled her eyes, “You’re a good liar but I’ve seen better. If you’re afraid I’ll tell them, I won’t.”
He looked warily at the teacher, before sighing. “I simply don’t want to see them hurt. It that so strange?”
“They’re tougher than you in every way, they weren’t in any real danger during the situation regardless of how it went out. Staying indoors was a problem, but you didn’t know that at the time.”
“It worked out in our favour in the end, didn’t it?”
“And if Jun didn’t figure out they could heal, you would’ve been a stain on the pavement.” She stared evenly into his eyes.
Aiden shrugged.
Trist blinked, “Oh, oh. You’re one of those types then. You genuinely don’t care.”
She was silent for a moment.
“I won’t tell you your thought process is wrong,” she evenly said.
“You only imply it,” Aiden replied with a small smirk.
“When you live as long as I’ve had, you realise there are all sorts of types with metahumans,” she rubbed her brow. “But by the dead gods, why do I always get the insane ones?”
“I thought people valued self sacrifice?” he asked.
“That just means people value something insane, if anything it just shows how fucked our current situation is,” she seemed to come to a decision. “All right, here’s your lesson plan.”
Trist pulled out a paper, jotting some stuff down. “First off, you need a more varied fighting style. The current one you use is far too lethal, against someone you can’t immediately put down, you only put them in a corner. As a survivor of a Requiem, I don’t think I need to tell you how dangerous that is.
“Second off, find more opportunities to practice with your friends. You did well once assembled, and you perhaps even intellectually understand the concept that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. But that doesn’t change the fact the outcome would’ve been much greater in your favour if you didn’t tell Jun to leave- As Jun said, you should’ve jumped him then and there.
“Third off,” her pen paused for a moment, “your ability allows you to raise your capabilities right?”
He nodded, “The tattoos exert force and mimic their original properties.”
Trist nodded appreciatively, “Spawners using their monsters as armour is one of the best tricks in the book, you can vary their capabilities right?”
Aiden nodded again.
She continued writing, “Then you’ll be perfect for this trick, it’s called a spontaneous pact. You’re aware of conditions and costs, but you can bring it further. When you see an attack coming, sacrifice a portion of your protection to temporarily raise it in the area being hit. Or saying: ‘After three minutes, my power will fully deactive,’ to temporarily buff it for the duration. Or whatever else you can sacrifice, sky is the limit. Just know that because of the spontaneous and impermanent nature of it, you’ll have to be giving much more than you usually would for minor benefits.”
She put down her pen, passing him the paper, “I’ll have to warn you, this relies on an extreme level of battle intellect and predictive prowess. You’ll be vulnerable to feints, and if you mistime it, you will die. Knowing that, do you still want to try it?”
Aiden skimmed his lesson plan. He liked the idea of the third. His tattoos benefited from him placing enhancing concepts into them but unlike with Jun’s Night and Daycore benefits, or Luther’s luck generation, which was exactly equivalent to the chances of worst possible outcomes of the die occuring naturally, the amount his tattoos were strengthened weren’t set in stone. More concepts meant more enhancement, but the benefit of every singular one was a soft part of his power.
Thus, changeable.
“It’s better to have it and not need it.”
“Very well,” she shooed him out. “Jun!”
Afterwards, Trist called Darius back in and amended his lesson plan. Leaving all their plans with a strange little addition.
When Aiden least expects it, hit him.
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As they left, Aiden was grappling with a now unavoidable fact.
Trist was right, even if it worked out fine until now, his self sacrificing will get him killed. Maybe not today, maybe not in a year or a decade, but one day.
And he still didn’t really care.
Aiden feared death for a moment, when he stood under the gaze of the slit throat boogeyman, but he accepted it. It was what he deserved. Once Ranpo was safe, it didn’t matter how the result went.
But when he died, who would take care of Jaiden?
Jun would mourn him, even if he didn’t deserve it.
Ranpo would move on, he was sure, but it wouldn’t be easy for him.
His death would leave the people he cared for without him.
What a damnable thing he was then, to not care whether or not he lived or died.
‘I see,’ Aiden sighed. ‘I’m still a horrible person. I am still running away.’
Far away, Jaiden laid comatose, Ranpo flew in the air, friends surrounded him, behind him, Johnjohnjohnjohn stood as the one who deserved to kill him.
They were all chains, stopping him from running away, despite his best attempts to free himself.
Didn’t he tell the Incomplete God that he wanted to see what life a better person led? It was time he actually tried, rather than flailing lazily into the dark, waiting for an end that would ruin the life of others.
But what did that look like? How does someone become a good person?
He didn’t know, he wasn’t sure if anyone knew.
Aiden only had his own judgement, and that judgement agreed with others.
He looked at his friends, they were… so young. They didn’t deserve this world, they didn’t deserve him. Was the wall between them always there, or did he put it up?
Aiden stepped forward, trying to walk past the wall that separated them, he clapped Jun on the shoulder, and smiled jokingly, “Hey Jun, how about we show everyone the girl you have over in your house?”
In hindsight, introducing Puppet Rain like that and breaking the image of his stoic persona wasn’t exactly the best idea.