“It doesn’t even stop there, does it? Because even that version of the phrase has its own cruel irony. The last time you said it, you hadn’t missed your chance! You just thought you had. And as much as the phrase haunts you, you find you haunting your past self, wanting to grab him by the shoulders and scream into his stupid face “You idiot! You haven’t missed your chance! And now because of you, I’ve missed my chance for real!” And then all of a sudden you feel a familiar set of fingers over your shoulders, and you realize it’s just a violent conga line down to the grave and congratulations, you’ve done nothing. …What was I even talking about? Patreon, I guess.” -JerryTerry, "Interpretation" (or, "Me (or, "Me (or, "Me")")")-
_____
The basement lab room was the same as the last time James had seen it, though missing one copy of his boyfriend, and with a few obviously magical orbs added to the assorted Climb items on the table. It was also uncomfortably cold, especially for James.
“Why are you damp?” Was the first thing Anesh, love of James’ life, asked him as he gave his boyfriend a hug in greeting. “Wait, is this suspicious moisture magical in nature? Am I getting contaminated?”
James stepped back, holding Anesh by the shoulders, staring at the green-haired iteration of his boyfriend. “I was in Alaska, and it was raining. It’s normal Earth dampness, don’t worry.” He informed Anesh.
The small sigh of relief Anesh gave was a little insulting. James would have liked to think by now that people would trust him not to inflict mysterious dungeon liquids on them, especially with how seriously the shaper substance could mess someone up if something went wrong. “Well. Good then.” Anesh said. “How’s Alaska? Is it doing the thing where it’s dark and frozen all the time?”
”It is not.” James shook his head sadly. “It’s not even really that cold, though it’s still pretty chilly. It’s also full of bastards.”
”JP isn’t that bad.”
The joke caught James off guard as he took a seat on one of the stools, a choked cough of laughter erupting from him. “No!” He gasped out a protest before he’d managed to really compose himself. “Not JP! Not even the rogues, really, though let’s be real, half the rogues are wonderful people who just happen to be working as spies. No, I mean Priority Earth.”
”Ah. That.” Anesh shook his head, setting down the pool cue he was wiping down. “I’m still against getting anywhere near Harlan, for whatever it’s worth.”
James leaned forward on the flat counter. ”It’s worth a lot.” He said. “The Wolfpack is scary. In an actual planned engagement, I think they’re a major threat to us. The Priority guys are less scary, because they don’t seem to actually be aware of their own magic, and are mostly just dudes with guns. And we can handle dudes with guns.”
”…James.”
”What?”
”James.” Anesh was rubbing his forehead like he had a headache.
James crossed his arms. “If we’re just saying names, I could do that too. Anesh.”
”We - you and another iteration of me - literally both just got shot barely more than a week ago.” Anesh told him bluntly. “You got… you got shot in the head. Let’s not make a habit of it, yeah?” He met James’ eyes, old and new, for a brief moment before looking away, puffing out a breath as he tried to get back into the rhythm of deep breathing he was doing to refresh his Climb spellcasting supply.
Letting the room fall into silence that was only broken by the air conditioner clicking on, and Anesh instantly reacting by hitting a button he had nearby for some reason to turn it off, James let the words sit for a moment. He knew people were worried about him. And really, even with his partners, he knew it so well that he was having to actively suppress his own annoyance with the reminders. They did mean well though. They didn’t want him to get killed. And James could appreciate that, since dying was near the bottom of his lifetime to-do list.
So when he did speak, it was to try to reassure Anesh as much as he could. “Don’t… okay, saying ‘don’t worry’ seems dumb. But we were careful. The rogues have been doing this for weeks and no one has noticed. Mostly because we can turn invisible and unnoticable.” James tapped the earring he was still wearing. Out of all the magic the Order had, he liked this one least, because he hadn’t wanted to get his ears pierced, but it still needed to be ‘worn’, so it was kind of tied to his ear with an outer shell of cord. “Anyway. I wasn’t part of anything more than a scouting and planning operation. I promise, I really actually promise that I will not get into a situation where I might get shot without telling you.”
”What is their magic anyway?” Anesh said, forcing the topic to change through a clever diversion. “Do we know how they made the hypnoplant yet?”
”No clue. On the plant, at least. We sort of know that their buildings are enchanted, which obviously we want. I mean, they have a little village in the middle of nowhere, a hundred miles from the nearest road, but they’ve got power and running water. That’s pretty sweet. The thing is… okay, we hit them once, briefly, right? Well, the more we watch them, the more it seems like they’re… I don’t wanna say they’re victims, because they did try to kill Yin and successfully killed a lot of other people. But they don’t act normal.”
Anesh looked up from his project notes with raised eyebrows. “How so?”
”They’re acting like NPCs.” James said. “And yeah, I know what that sounds like. But it’s… it’s so fucking weird. They’re so mechanical about how they do stuff. I can’t really explain it, you have to see it to really know. But it’s like they’re living in the uncanny valley. Except we’ve got a few records and stuff we stole from the place, we know they weren’t always like this. So… so victims. Maybe.”
Wincing even as he had the thought, Anesh decided to ask something. ”I think Ink-And-Key was the one that brought this up, but are we sure they’re actually bad people? A little extreme to jump to sniper fire and explosives, but… I’ve seen climate predictions too, you know.”
”Oh, yeah, that.” James started to lean back before realizing the stool had no back, turning the movement into a stilted wobble to his feet before he started pacing while he spoke. “So, we’ve talked about this a little before, especially with Status Quo. I think self defense often includes combat, and I think that self defense from people poisoning the planet is a valid track to take. But typically, the Order draws the line at removing the opposition’s ability to make war, you know?”
”Destroying sources of magic items, counter-kidnapping hostages, leveling property…” Anesh paused. “…James why is it that demolishing buildings is a common thing that happens to our enemies?” He asked with open concern, like he’d only just noticed.
”Attention to detail.” James said quickly with a small hand motion before moving on. “Anyway the Priority Earth targets were, ironically, incredibly low priority if that was their goal. Random investment execs are not… really the people driving demand for fossil fuels? The random people working in the building sure as fuck aren’t. Oh, they’re part of the machinery of the problem, but if you actually wanted to damage the industry, you aim for… you know… industry. Strikes on refineries or oil rigs, lots of them. Disrupt shipping, threaten and blackmail people at every level, poison the product. Do whatever it takes to reduce trust, and make it more expensive than the potential profit. But also, you shoot some specific people, and those people are the ones that are in charge. The very top. And then you shoot whoever replaces them, repeatedly, until the replacements stop coming.”
While his boyfriend hadn’t noticed it yet, doing his pacing and energetic talking with his hands, Anesh was giving him a somewhat horrified look. “You’ve thought about this a bit, have you?”
”I have.” James confirmed. “Because the easier way to break it is to outcompete. Which we can do with our magic. We don’t need to shoot anyone. Anyway, the point is that their targets were weird even for their stated goals. Especially compared to what we know they were doing before and hypno-bombing coal power plants.” He shrugged and spun on his heel to face Anesh. “The actual point is, they suck as ecoterrorists. They also suck as regular terrorists. It’s unclear what their objectives are, which is what we’re trying to learn in the first place. All we really know is that there’s something wrong with them, and asking nicely just does not work.”
”Did you?” Anesh sighed. “Ask nicely, I mean?”
”No, I’m not stupid.”
”I’ll take your word on that.”
James huffed a laugh. “Anyway, JP’s making a big deal out of it, but Priority Earth aren’t doing anything. We don’t even really know where they’re getting their funding from. They just kind of… are there. And still paying the Wolfpack for mercenary services they aren’t using, which is bizarre. The biggest actual issue involved in them is that they’re in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness where telepads don’t work cause there’s no addresses, and, let me just say, logisticors are a lot of things but stealthy is not one of them.”
”You could use them in the air.” Anesh pointed out. “Though I suppose they’re not exactly mobile once the process starts.” He got a distant look as his brain started reflexively running the numbers on how easy it would be to move something like Pendragon in flight. “Hmm. What’s Pen’s turning radius?”
James laughed lightly. “You can ask Dave later, since I kinda doubt he’s as good at documenting as the potion division is. Anyway, I’ve got a couple days to goof off and be a domestic paladin, so I figured I’d say hi and see if you needed help. What’re we up to here?”
“More testing stuff with the Climb items. Wanna help?”
“Absolutely.” James didn’t hesitate for a second. It sounded like the perfect way to relax after being forced by JP to hike six miles through untouched Alaskan wilderness just to accomplish nothing but perimeter scouting before being sent back home. “I know we’ve got spells that don’t overlap, wanna start with that? Also I see you have Climb orbs here?” The greyish balls looked like they were filled with clouds, swirling on the table.
“Later.” Anesh frowned at the Mountain’s condensed magic. ”But good idea for the spells. Also drink this.” Anesh handed him an oxygenation potion, which James tried to down without tasting. “Oh, we should figure out what your ‘level up’” he used finger quotes for the words, “did to your magic first. How do you feel about freezing to death today?”
”Not great, but I think I can handle being a little dead.” James grinned. “Can we maybe get a space heater for in here or something?”
Anesh’s eyes lit up. “I didn’t even think of that! Okay, procurement first, then testing.”
One procurement later, the two of them began to mess around with their magic. Which, after a few casts, and then the mutual agreement that they should get to real work, turned into iterative testing of their magic. It wasn’t especially exciting, but it was fun to workshop ideas together, and they did start to learn things. Small things, little things, but every individual piece of information they could pin down and add to the Order’s database was something that would continue to push them forward. Any given weird interaction could be useful. Or save a life some day. Or uncover a hidden danger.
The first thing they learned was that James’ spellcasting level was… useless? Or so hard to detect that it wasn’t exactly meaningful. Casting Climb spells wasn’t actually very hard; once you learned one, it was like there was an ingrained trigger for it that you wouldn’t really be able to miss. If James’ improvement made it so that process was easier, it was a fractional improvement that would be measured in tenths of a second at most. And the spells seemed to have a pretty standard rate of effect, one that couldn’t be forced to go faster by shoving more Breath in, nor slowed down by holding it back. So comparing the same spell from each of them should have shown clear differences in something to match to James’ boost. But. Nothing. Not unless it was a reduction in cost, which was one of the only things they couldn’t measure easily.
But it also wasn’t causing problems, so they moved on to testing how different spells interacted with the handful of magic items they had.
There was a theory - really more of an observation of reality - James had that the Office purple orbs were split into two categories. They said they were ‘shell’ upgrades, but it was kind of a coin toss if the shell they were upgrading was the body you were currently inhabiting, or whatever the Office considered your ‘self’, or ‘soul’. To put it another way, some went with you if you moved, some didn’t.
This was relevant because he was starting to think that Climb spells, despite being a little more upfront with people about their duration and Breath cost, had several secret categories that they were working on. And when it came to the Climb’s wand-style items that all had the same broad effect of applying some kind of modifier to a spell, that really became clear.
The first thing James learned personally was that the items could hold enough spell-attuned Breath to cast a spell multiple times. He hadn’t really grasped that properly when Anesh had first mentioned the things, and then he was a bit distracted for a day, which was enough to reset his memory entirely. But it was something that he had to get into his head before they really started going into each of the ‘wands’ and their uses.
The pool cue should have been the easiest one. All it did was make a spell into a ranged bolt. They tested it at the firing range a few times and confirmed that it was accurate out to two hundred meters, but only James could actually hit at that range. Anesh had too much trouble aiming. But it was still a cool effect.
The problem was in the details. Spells like frost vector or worldwalker piton would hit a point, and apply their effects there. Cloud prowler would spawn the cat at the point of impact. Thermodynamic tunnel seemed to use the base of the cue itself as one end of the effect, like it was firing an invisible thread that set up the spell’s other end where it landed.
All of those were fine.
But what happened when you used flare calculation? The spell that made a mathematical problem ‘easier’, and was less devastating to civilization than had been feared, didn’t seem to do anything when it wasn’t able to apply to the caster. They’d tried to shoot James with it, with Anesh selecting the formula to be made easier, but that hadn’t done anything either, and not just because James’ math ability sucked.
Then they’d shot a whiteboard with an equation on it, and it had worked.
“This thing scares me.” James said as the two of them stood over the counter, arms crossed in unison, staring down at the pool cue. “Let’s see what happens if I try to make an arm.”
Reaching frost had made an arm grow out of the wall where James had fired the spell. It hadn’t moved, instead sitting perfectly still, despite the creeping sense that the limb was perfectly alive and functional. A deep and primal fear that there was something on the other end of that arm that they couldn’t see welling up in both of them. They didn’t repeat that test; they’d get to that one when they had a few more people and a flamethrower on hand, just in case.
”What’s next?” James asked as Anesh petted the snow cat. The cat James summoned, which liked Anesh, but not him. He didn’t take it personally, he and the cat had reached a detente.
What was next was the watch that cast spells on a timer from its Breath reserve. It took them a little while to math out exactly what it could hold - thirty five to thirty seven Breath total - which was enough for quite a few spells as long as they weren’t the big ones. Testing on the watch actually stretched over a while because it turned out there was no way to force it to cast, and they had to wait to take notes and make observations.
It was a lot easier. It just considered whoever was wearing it as both the caster and target of any spell. If no one was wearing it, it seemed like it treated those values as blank, but cast the spell anyway even if it was just venting magic into the air. James had hoped that the watch would have its own iteration of the cat summon, because that would be hilariously niche, but no.
The hubcap that triggered whenever pressure was applied - like, say, from someone stepping on it - was very similar, except unlike the watch, it wanted to be shaped up front. Like reaching frost, for example, the size, shape, and abstract positioning on the target of the limb needed to be determined by the caster when they put it into the hubcap, much like when James had used the pool cue. But after that, it would treat whoever triggered the spell as the one who actually cast it, and got to use the arm or leg or comical phallic appendage he afflicted Anesh with once and only once as a joke.
And then there was the sock. A single long athletic sock, certainly the worse for wear from being buried in dungeon snow and mold for who-knew how long, but cleaned up alright. It had a hefty pool of spell-aligned Breath it could hold, but only ever one spell at a time. And when it got warm enough, it would automatically cast that spell, amplified by all the Breath that had been put into it.
Measuring that had been exhausting. James sort of instinctively got it right away, and wanted to see if he could make his summon into a snow leopard just for fun, but Anesh wanted to do careful measurements and give general percentages of improvement. Which was kind of boring to James, who spent a portion of the time while his boyfriend measured things making notes through his skulljack on potential uses for the sock.
He came up with nothing. It was neat, but it didn’t make the snow cat larger. It just kind of made spells generically better, but never in a way that was transformative. And the trigger condition being ‘warm enough that they required a toaster oven to trigger it safely’ was just stupidly untenable.
”I hate to say this, but I don’t think I’m gonna add ‘one mismatched sock’ to my paladin outfit.” James said morosely.
”Which is a shame, because you becoming closer and closer to an anime character has been fun to watch. I have a bet with Alanna about how long it takes you to end up wearing more than three belts at once.” Anesh replied with a satisfied smile as he finished marking off the grid of spells and items they’d tested interactions with. It wasn’t everything yet; they needed to get more people with more of the magic neither of them had in here. “I bet we could find a niche use for it though. Maybe give Camille even bigger dragon wings, so she’s an impact hazard to even more people.”
”Cam’s weirdly good at not hitting people with the wings, actually.” James sighed as he tossed the sock onto the counter, the snow cat using some of the tail end of its time to bat at it with an outstretched paw. “She moves with them like it’s natural, it’s really impressive and kinda makes me want to grab that for my next spell.”
Anesh looked up with raised eyebrows. ”Or… just get someone to feed it into the hubcap or sock for you? That is what we determined is likely to work. But also let me record it when you do for archival purposes.”
”Yes yes.” James smiled at his partner. “You know, I really missed this.” Anesh raised an eyebrow at him, until James explained. “Us. Figuring out magic. Ignoring all the outside pressure, nothing trying to kill us, just messing around with… with magic. Magic.” His smile was lopsided, his gaze distant. “It’s just nice. And I love having something to hang out and do together.” He trailed off, before suddenly clapping his hands. “So! The orbs?”
Anesh’s own compassionate smile was replaced by focus as James drew his attention back to the table. ”Oh. I don’t know what to do with these. If you want to take one and try to make a new imbuement technique or something, be my guest. I just had them if we needed Breath back faster, but it didn’t come up since we stuck to mostly smaller spells.”
”Tell that to my freezing toes.” James chuckled, watching as the snow cat on the counter jerked its head up, mimed sniffing the air, and leapt off. It never hit the floor though, instead dissolving into powdery snow as its duration ran out, whatever it was curious about an unfulfilled quest. At least until James summoned it back again later. “Alright, I’ll hang onto this.” He plucked one of the small orbs, slightly larger than the fingertip sized Office yellows, off the table and put it into a drawstring pouch that he pulled from his pocket. He’d started carrying little bags for orbs just to cut down on accidental breakages, which hadn’t stopped the issue, but had made it better. “And I’m gonna go… wander.” He nodded.
”Wander?”
”Wander. See the sights. Walk amongst the people.” James gave his words a playful false gravitas. “Find out if there’s anything I can help with. You know, paladin stuff.”
What made Anesh smile was the knowledge that his boyfriend was joking, but not lying. He was absolutely certain James meant what he was saying, possibly more than he realized. “Have fun, love.” He said, the words coming out with a familiarity that had worn down the last remnants of embarrassment Anesh used to feel speaking the affection out loud. “I’ll be around. Well, some of me, at least. I think half my brains are getting mad at orbital magical failures right now. Don’t bother them. They’re going mad.”
”Good to know.” James kissed his boyfriend on the forehead, and then left the room with a wave over his shoulder. The hours spent on actual research had been fun, but he needed to warm up, stretch his legs, and find some other trouble to get into.
_____
Every now and then, James actually did do the thing he’d promised to do, and focused more magic into his bloodstream so he would be a more effective paladin.
He’d had a package of curated assorted stuff that had been prepared for him waiting for about a week, but he’d held off just because it would mean more small things to incorporate into training, and also some of it was purple orbs that he didn’t want to risk using while he was missing an eye.
Eye restored, and a little free time available for practice, the box of goodies he picked up from the front desk felt a lot more manageable. James had started to make a joke to Zhu as he’d stolen a free desk in the back warehouse to use for exploring his new bounty, only to realize the navigator was in deep slumber that James couldn’t casually reach just by thinking or speaking. It put a little melancholy on the event, replacing the physical dampness from Alaska with an emotional sogginess that James didn’t appreciate much. But the knowledge that Zhu would absolutely slap him with a sheaf of feathers for saying that out loud prompted James to set aside his worry for his friend and crack the box open.
There were… a lot of orbs. All of them with tiny numbered notes tied to them and a menu someone had made listing off what they all were. James loved the attention to detail, and the care that had gone into this, and he felt a little bit like he was a kid at Christmas who was shredding meticulously assembled wrapping paper as he started mowing through the glowing spheres. A waterfall of yellow, blue, purple, red, and green orbs, their sources mixed between two different dungeons and their effects ranging from life altering to niche esoterica.
[+1 Skill Rank : Medical - Diagnosis - Disease - American]
[+1 Species Rank : Canine - Domesticated - Dalmatian]
[+1 Species Rank : Spider]
[+2 Skill Ranks : Repair - Structure - Walls]
[+1 Skill Rank : Weaponry - Knife]
[+1 Emotional Resonance Rank : Anger]
[+.6 Emotional Resonance Ranks : Anger]
[+1 Skill Rank : Typing - Touch - DVORAK]
[+2 Skill Ranks : Athletics - Training - Stamina - Rowing]
[Shell Upgraded : Safe Internal Temperature - Organs - +3 Degrees Celsius]
[+1 Skill Rank : Law - Roadways - Signage]
[+1 Skill Rank : Driving - Motorcycle]
[+1 Skill Rank : Athletics - Martial Arts - Judo]
[Shell Upgraded : +12% Circulatory System]
[+1 Emotional Resonance Rank : Fear]
[+2 Skill Ranks : Language - Japanese]
[+1 Skill Rank : Apiology]
[+4 Skill Ranks : Survival - Wilderness - Plant Identification - Inedible - Asia]
[Shell Upgraded : Lungs - Carbon Processing - 2.9 mm^3/day]
[Shell Upgraded : Adrenaline Efficiency +35%]
[Shell Upgraded : -1 Sprain / Year]
[+1 Tool Rank : Pencil - Mechanical - .7 mm #2]
[+1 Tool Rank : Mattock]
[+1 Tool Rank : Vehicle - Subaru - Hatchback]
[+1 Tool Rank : Knife]
[+1 Skill Rank : Templating - Incident Reports - Police - American]
[+1 Skill Rank : Pilot - Rotor Aircraft - Eurocoptor]
[+1 Emotional Resonance Rank : Pity]
[Shell Upgraded : +3 PSI Puncture Resistance]
[Shell Upgraded : Bioluminescence - Shoulders / Neck - +/- 900 Lumens]
[+1 Species Rank : Avian - Monotonous Lark]
[+1 Species Rank : Carp - Domesticated - Koi]
[+3 Species Ranks : Snakes - Vipers - Bamboo]
[+2 Material Ranks : Metal - Alloyed - Stainless Steel]
[+2 Material Ranks : Concrete]
[+2 Skill Ranks : Communication - Vocal - Tone Modulation]
[+1 Skill Rank : Ecology - Environments - Wetlands]
[Shell Upgraded : Regeneration - Digit - Left - 8% absolute / week]
[Certification Added : Work Permit - Refugee - Syrian]
The very last was an orange that had been listed for an attempt at absorbing, but James’ comically small impact job of turning eaten apples into saffron was still enough to block him from doing that properly. And the associated document showing up in his jacket pocket was a small sliver of icy sorrow at the cruelty that humans were still in the process of inflicting on each other. A problem James didn’t have a solution to yet, and might never actually achieve, but that he hated all the same.
The second to last was the closest James had ever seen a purple orb get to explaining itself. It wasn’t great, but it was nice to know that if he lost a finger on his left hand, he’d get it back in…. He closed his eyes and did the math too slowly, wishing one of the orbs had been for basic arithmetic for way too long before he remembered he had a bespoke calculator program plugged into his brain and did it the easy way. Four months, give or take. Practically forever these days, given how much was happening, but at least it would happen.
It was all a lot. New things that felt like muscles he could flex that let him glow if he wanted was a fun orb, but even better, it let him stop the natural miniscule glow he put off normally. He’d be slightly harder to kill in a lot of different ways now just from the purples, and several of the yellow orbs made him more dangerous too. But several others made him better at just being useful, which was equally part of James’ life now. Others were on the list just to push his Sewer lessons forward; nothing over the edge yet, but hundreds of points of progress in his computer science and biology Lessons. Biology would take dozens more orbs, but… they had them now. He could get them when they were available, and Deb collected the things. James should talk to her, and see if she could help get him from the 3,800 or so he was sitting at now up over the 4,200 point checkpoint line of his Lesson that would make him even harder to put in the ground.
Other things of note were the steel material rank, which would be actually hugely useful for learning a wide array of things, and the resonance ranks in anger, which were mostly left over from red orbs copied for Simon. But… well… James needed that too. James was not a calm person. His anger often guided his actions, and very often that guidance was valuable and just, but as he grew stronger and stronger, he needed checks on his behavior to keep himself from lashing out and hurting people without cause.
Especially if he was getting more ranks in combative skills. Which he wasn’t going to say no to; his job was also to be the front line, after all.
A cluster of copied Route Horizon gears came next. James was one of those people who wasn’t in tune enough with that dungeon’s magic to use more than one copy of each gear, so his gains were limited, but by the time he was done, he had a Velocity cap of nineteen, and was feeling so much better about it than he was with his more limited pool that he’d started the day with.
Next was a handful of spellslot coins for the still-unvisited Utah dungeon. James had no problem snapping all those in half, collecting empty spaces in his magical imprint that he could fill later, bringing himself up to ten level one and six level two spells. He didn’t get any copies of the special level one coin that Arrush had earned, because he wasn’t going to specialize and track his usage of magic enough to make it ever worth it, and he didn’t want to risk any drawbacks for failing to do so. He also wished they had higher level coins, but hopefully that was something they could pick up later.
The other stuff in the box wasn’t exactly consumable on the spot, but it was all useful. Durable flasks of potions, mostly exercise but also the new one for sprinting and some ghost juice. A replacement pair of affiliation glasses, and a few other Office dungeontech items too. A USB stick with a program that could record without a microphone, a stack of sticky notes that burst into thick smoke if someone got too close after they were attached to something, a pen that made whatever it wrote on tougher but only worked if you actually wrote something and not just with scribbles. Small things that weren’t really worth copying when they had other more powerful things to do, but that might be meaningful to James.
And then, the leveler items. Three bracers, an earring, and a glove. All of them, though, had been run through the overhead projector ritual that ‘improved’ something. Slightly faster cooldowns, slightly tougher, slightly better effects. James had unclasped the two bracers he was wearing as part of his everyday outfit, and replaced them with the new ones.
He hated them instantly.
It wasn’t that they were underleveled either; copied shield bracers would end up growing over time anyway, and he always made sure to keep his leveler items charging so no time was wasted. A few minutes off the cooldown would be nice when it happened, but he could and would survive without it. It was more that… well… James had to admit that his mindset was silly here.
They didn’t feel like his gear. They fit too well, were too ergonomic. They missed the little notch he had in one of his bracers from where it had deflected a bullet once, and the small loop of wire that came off of every copy had been shifted so it didn’t poke his arm anymore as he walked. It was wrong. They were nice. And for just a moment, he wanted to complain to the universe for giving him this when he wasn’t supposed to have nice things.
Instead, he took a deep breath, and moved his old bracers into the box to take home. Then he pulled on the modified glove, double checked the imbued extra ability on it to write at a distance, and gave a self-satisfied hum as he put together that he could probably use this with his new magic pen. And any magic pens, actually.
And then, he felt like he was ready for what came next. No longer flailing and making due with what was available. Not hoping for random purple orb pulls that would save his ass. He was arming and armoring himself, helped along by the whole Order and their growing system of delving and self improvement. And he felt prepared.
Not perfectly, not like he was a god among men who could slap down any problem without thought. But he was happy with his chances of doing some good, the next time he was called upon to do so.
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
James packed up the extra stuff into his case, and stood up from his desk. He waited briefly, nodding at the group passing by who were covered in melting snow and grumbling about the Climb delve they’d just returned from that looked like it had been miserable. They weren’t the only ones in the warehouse, but all the different groups of delvers planning operations, waiting for friends, scheduling training, reviewing maps, and practicing small magics, they were all part of the system that James was being trusted to protect and energize.
He was happy with that. He could do that.
He went to go find some good to be called upon to do.
_____
It took exactly twenty three minutes of double checking neatly stacked boxes full of Status Quo documents before James stopped helping a beleaguered and slightly manic Researcher try to find a magic belt. He didn’t ask questions about the belt; he didn’t want to know. He felt like knowing would drag him deep into the same madness afflicting an increasing number of people down here.
_____
James ran into Morgan only partly by accident. The kid - a term he was outgrowing faster and faster it seemed - was taking a break from cleaning the Lair’s main floor bathrooms. A job that James had done himself, and was not envious of; but the fact that Morgan seemed to be handling it basically without complaint was either impressive or just because there was no one nearby to complain to.
James fixed that. Approaching the little bench that Morgan was sitting on and introducing himself with a casual ”Yo.” as Morgan tried to awkwardly get his attention without interrupting whatever James was doing. Which was, currently, nothing.
“Hey.” Morgan said. “Uh… I don’t want to… you know, if you’re busy…”
”Morgan two people said you were looking for me earlier today.” James said, giving a kind smile and intentionally not laughing. “What’s up?”
Morgan’s expression shifted, though not in an intentionally expressive way. Just enough for James to read him as uncomfortable. “Which two people?”
”You can ask them later, they’ll probably tell you.” James took a seat on the end of the bench, leaning his shoulder against the wall that technically led to the briefing warehouse. He thought. But actually he didn’t know where this bench or the little alcove it was in had come from, and so James wasn’t confident this wall didn’t lead to the void between worlds or something. “So hey, what’s up?”
”Oh. Uh. Nothing.” Morgan said, lying.
James shifted against the wall, kicking his feet out and stretching. “Morgan.” He said using his best adult voice. “Alright, look, I’m gonna just blitz into this one. It sounds like you’ve got something bothering you, and I’d like to help. Course, you’re welcome to tell me to fuck off, okay? But I’m told I’m pretty good at a few things, so maybe I can give you a hand.”
The dark haired teen groaned as he leaned forward, elbows on his knees, though keeping his hands off his head since he had that residual feeling of using cleaning chemicals and didn’t want to touch anything. “I… hey, how am I even supposed to talk to you?” Morgan asked abruptly.
”…with your mouth words?” James offered unhelpfully. “Or, I mean, if you want you can just send me random chat messages and I’ll reply at odd hours.”
”Oh come on.” Morgan turned his head to glower at James. “You know what I mean. Are you, like, a parental figure or something?”
James let his smile slide south a bit, adopting a sad expression as he shook his head. “Nah. I think it’s a little late for that. Maybe things could have been different if we’d started out some other way, but at this point, I don’t think either of us feels like that’s what we’ve got going on.” He shifted, moving to sit in the same posture that Morgan had. “Honestly, I know that no one magically becomes an adult when they turn the right age, but you’re not a kid who needs someone like me hovering around taking care of you. Or it doesn’t feel that way, I could be wrong, and that’s not some kind of backhanded insult.” He took a comforting breath as the oxygenation potion’s effects faded and breathing became a little more required and a little more satisfying. “I think you’re someone in the Order of Endless Rooms. And I think I’d like to be your friend who helps you out when you need it.”
Morgan nodded slowly, then stopped and gave a short sharp sigh. “When I first moved in here, Nate warned me on day one that you loved monologuing.”
”I’m not monologuing! You’re saying stuff too!” James protested with a laugh. “That is dialoguing.”
“My advice thing is kinda stupid.” Morgan abruptly swerved the conversation, trying not to let James get him laughing himself.
James’ frown this time was just a bit sarcastic. “If you need help with your sex life I don’t know what I have to offer you. Try asking your partners what they like, then do that more? That’s about all I’ve got except to say that there’s free condoms in the bathrooms?”
”I know, I restock them.” Morgan said, battling through the rush of embarrassment as his face turned beet red. “And no! I don’t need… I know what I’m… that’s fine thanks.”
”I’m just trying to help!” James held up his hands in surrender. He was, actually, trying to help. It was just that he was applying a trick that he’d had used against himself as a younger human, that it turned out, worked great on most people. If someone was having trouble breaching a topic they thought was awkward, and you took the conversation off a cliff in a swan dive, it felt a hundred times easier afterward to bring up what was really on their mind.
And it worked on Morgan like clockwork. “I wanna be a paladin!” He said abruptly and louder than he intended. James didn’t shift expression or say anything, just sat there next to him in the shadow of the janitor’s cart that Morgan was using. People walking by mostly ignored them, and the steady noise of conversation from the front desk provided a kind of muffled backdrop to their chat. “I want… I want to do what you do.” Morgan reiterated, staring to his right, away from James and into a wall like he was analyzing the drywall at a molecular level. “I want to be a hero.”
James didn’t say anything for a few long seconds, because in his head, he was reliving another conversation he’d had once. Not exactly here, but nearby; just a couple dozen feet away in the dining area. There had been another teenager, though one younger than Morgan, who had asked James to let him fight. Hell, they’d probably gone to the same school. And James had said no. And that kid had died anyway.
The memory was sudden and heavy, and James had to stop himself from giving a reflexive response based deep in his own fears. Because even though he was seeing Morgan grow up in real time into something resembling an adult, James also did feel like he was protective of the teenager. Like he should tell Morgan that everything would be fine, and keep him safe and secure in the Lair, away from the worst and violent parts of the world.
”I…” he started to say in a soft exhale.
Morgan cut him off. “I know it’s dumb.” He said. “I’m not stupid, man. I live here. I see how fucked up everyone gets about… I mean, a lot of stuff.” His distant stare toward the building’s front door briefly confused a passing camraconda. “It feels like I should get superpowers and just fight everything that’s bad. But I know that’s stupid too. I just want to do something useful. I like delving. I like… I mean, I like at least two people. I could probably like other people, even if it feels like most people kinda suck. But I don’t know where to start.”
”Ah, the eternal problem.” James nodded, at least able to answer part of that. “So, just so you know? That’s not dumb. That’s… you want to be a good person, and you’re asking how to be better at being a good person. Morgan that’s it. That’s the thing. That’s what the Order exists to inspire.” He raised a hand between them. “You got it. High five.” He said.
Morgan’s gave him a side eyed squint, waiting for the joke or the trap to spring, but nothing came. Slowly, he raised his own hand and gave a halfhearted slap on James’ palm. “So…”
It was interesting, James felt, to look at someone younger and recognize a lot of himself in them. Less experienced, more obvious, but it was kinda easy to tell that Morgan had a desire to be a kind of storybook hero, along with a growing anger at the world for its injustices. James remembered, personally, how hard it was to manage those emotions when he was growing up. How much he’d wished it were easier; not that he’d wished for help, exactly, but only because he hadn’t known help was an option.
Morgan was young. But he was trying his best. And it wasn’t like lacking years was a big deal in the building where practical knowledge was just an orb away.
”So getting started.” James nodded. “This is still hard even for me.” He started to formulate an answer, and then, when he was halfway through mentally workshopping a sentence about how problems required solutions that created system that prevented the problem from popping up again, he realized that wasn’t what Morgan needed. What Morgan needed was guidance, and a safe environment to learn practical skills while he worked on internalizing the more complex parts of Order philosophy. “Where do you want to start?” James asked instead.
”I dunno. I don’t even know what my options are.” Morgan shrugged. “I got a Sewer book for social studies, so I’ve been trying to learn more about that. And I saved the rest of my points for skill orbs I guess? But I don’t know how to do the thing. I haven’t used any of my Climb spell slots either, but that’s not the problem, the problem is I don’t know what to do.”
”Yeah, I’m starting to see the shape of the issue.” He said. “You wanna come with me on a delve?” James asked suddenly.
”What, really?” Morgan blinked back surprise.
James nodded. ”Yeah.” The idea started to take shape. “Here’s the thing. Being a paladin is… complicated. It’s not really about power or combat ability or how many spells you have, okay? It might be a while before you’re a candidate.”
”Yeah, I get that. I’m not in a hurry!” Morgan was quick to try to make himself look good, though he didn’t think of it that way. James still got amused at the quick defense though. “Um… why a delve?”
”Because it’s a good place for you to learn a few specific things that I don’t think are teachable.” James said. “Like how to be afraid. How to be kind while you’re in danger. And how to fight.”
”I’ve fought before!”
”You got in a brawl with someone your age and general shape.” James pointed out. “You haven’t fought something to the death. And I don’t think you’ll like it. I’m not saying that’ll make you a bad paladin, I’m saying you need to know. And it’ll be a good way to start to figure out how exactly we should train people. We can learn together.” He nodded. “Actually hey, wasn’t Simon going to be helping you out with this?”
Morgan looked away again, taking a deep breath and clearly working through something before he answered James. “Simon’s busy.” He said. “It’s fine, he’s just… he doesn’t do things like you do, I guess? He’s organized and scheduled and shit, and I don’t want to get in his way. Not like I’m being mean to myself!” Morgan said that so quickly that James was certain he’d heard pushback on this exact thing before. “But he actually is busy, and just does stuff different than you. And… and I dunno. Everyone’s cool, but if I had to pick someone…” he looked down again, ducking his head as he realized he sounded sappy and emotional.
Regardless of who he was going to say, James decided to let him let it drop. ”Alright.” He said instead. “We don’t do anything like an official squire program or anything around here-“
”Wait, what about Brian? Isn’t he Arrush’s squire?”
”…I… I have no fucking clue…” James trailed off, staring up at the ceiling. “I should be interrogating my boyfriend more, clearly.”
The look on the teen’s face was one of open shock, without any attempt to cover it up. ”You’re dating Brian?!”
”…Morgan if you’re gonna be my temporary squire, we cannot be vaudvilling our way through every conversation.”
Morgan snapped to attention. “Okay! Yeah, sure, I can do that! I’ll… I’ll have to look that up later, but I can do that!”
Standing up, James let his back adjust with a stretch as he shook his head. “Message me when you…” his phone pinged instantly as Morgan sent him a message using his skulljack without breaking eye contact. “…alright good reminder.” James laughed. “You’re good with that thing, huh?” Morgan nodded proudly, and James just sighed as he remembered that they were nominally trying to keep people from getting skulljacks until they were a little older. But whatever. “I’ve got a thing for the next few days to try to learn how to kill a god, but feel free to ask questions or harass me so I don’t forget, okay?”
”Okay.” Morgan said with the kind of tone that someone used when whatever the fuck James said had become normal in their life. “And… and thanks.” He stood himself, kicking the lock for the wheel of his cart full of cleaning supplies. “Uh… does being a paladin or a squire or anything like that mean that I don’t need to clean the bathrooms anymore?”
”Oh Morgan.” James clapped a hand on the teen’s shoulder. “I still take a turn doing that every week. There’s no way in hell you’re escaping it.”
_____
After a short detour to use his powers of unobstructed communication to solve a mild interpersonal issue, and then another detour to use Call to Blood to track down an injured shellaxy that had hurt itself escaping from the pen, and then another diversion to deliver some aid packages Recovery had prepared for victims that were leaving the Order’s care soon, James took some time to himself.
In truth, the detours and diversions and tangents were what being a paladin was about. His job was, essentially, picking up every side quest and sequencing them in a way where no one was forgotten. No one was left alone or afraid. And he knew that he wasn’t enough to help ‘everyone’, even within just the Order. But he could set the example, and there would be more people coming after him.
The time he had to himself was spent in the most boring way possible; staring at as-yet-unvisited Utah dungeon spellbooks, to fill up his newly acquired spell slots. None of the times involved were individually a huge hit to his schedule, but because other people wanted to use these things, he couldn’t just put a stack on his desk and hog them all for himself. Still, he made good use of his time, and of the new books looted from their enemies that had been ceded as part of their current peace treaty.
James remembered that Becker, or whatever the man’s real name was, had said that he had a spellbook for ‘normal vision from one eye’, and he kinda wished that the guy had held off on betrayal long enough for the Order to buy that off of him. It would have been handy, and saved him some neck strain, for the week and a half where he was missing an eye.
As it stood, they still had some options that were useful for the busy cosmopolitan paladin. The lack of access to level three or up spell slots cut off a surprising number of the books - and also the single battered e-reader that was also a spell source - but the level one and two spells had some useful stuff, even if James didn’t want to spend hours and hours stacking up the bonuses that made them really good.
Appointed Arrival was a level two spell that tipped into level three if you got even a single upgrade to it, but what it did was still worth it. Letting someone bend space to cover up to about twenty feet in a single step, it looked weird from an outside perspective, but was perfectly safe for the user. James grabbed three uses of it, spending almost half an hour on just that.
Jester’s Sip, by contrast, was a party trick of a level one spell. Taking twelve minutes a use, it let you drink something at range. More upgrades meant more range, and more drinking, though while the caster still tasted their target, it basically teleported the liquid into the stomach, skipping the awkwardness of swallowing arbitrarily large volumes. Which could obviously be unsafe, but James really only needed the two or three ounces it could call up so that he could drink potions in a fight without having to open a flask or wear a vapor mask. He took two uses.
Jubilant Crossing let you copy whatever someone else was physically feeling, and feel it yourself. It wasn’t exactly that useful for fighting or anything. James took it once, for personal reasons that he pretended were ‘testing’.
Breathe Quartz was arguably the most valuable spell. Level one, six minutes, and it turned plastic litter - it had to be actual litter - into gold. In reality, it needed ten upgrades to even convert something the size of a single soda bottle, and James didn’t have an extra hour. So he took two copies of Charm River Transformation instead, in case they went back into the Sewer and he needed to help pacify a frog dog.
Mindful Reverberation was a great spell for therapy, or for brainwashing children, and James didn’t really want to touch that until the psychiatric department they’d practically hired completed at least a basic study on the thing. Instead, he looked to another level two spell to eat up the rest of his free time.
Copper Craft made a knife. Specifically, it conjured a knife out of nothing, which was neat, but it was also the same knife people kept trying - and sometimes succeeding - in stabbing James with. They had a few of the things in the vault, and James specifically picked this spell to actually focus on for almost an hour because those knives had a feel to them.
Granted, Anesh had already proved to him that just cause an item felt magical, didn’t mean it was. Which was cool on its own, but James still could use a backup undetectable weapon, just in case. And also knives were often useful for a ton of other non-stabbing things.
And he made sure it was no longer than an hour, too, because more than two pluses and it ticked to a higher level, which would banish it from his list and also hurt like fuck.
So after a while, staring at the runes and symbols and non-words of mostly just the first page of a bunch of different books, James had a final prompt that looked something like this.
|1 : 3 Slots Empty
1 : 1 Saint’s Wrap
1 : 1 Saint’s Wrap +++
1 : 2 Jester’s Sip
1 : 1 Jubilant Crossing
1: 2 Charm River Transmutation
2 : 2 Slots Empty
2 : 3 Appointed Arrival
2 : 1 Copper Craft ++|
He’d completely forgotten that he had towels queued up and ready to go. That might have been useful over the last week. James made sure to record his spell list to his skulljack notepad, because he didn’t want to have to relearn a new spell just to check; these spells didn’t feel like anything until you cast them. It was a lot less convenient than Velocity’s constant pressure in the chest reminding you that you were brimming with magic.
He’d put more time and practice into these new spells, and look over the rest of the new books, later. And there were others; some of them James knew would be useful, but that he didn’t have hours to put into. For now, this was a start. More tools, more armaments. More options for the next trial.
He just wished it didn’t take so long.
_____
The soles of James’ shoes crunched into gravel as he walked across the most intact part of a pumpkin farm on the edge of civilization in Yamhill. The idea of cultivating pumpkins here was long gone, though the defiant gourds were growing across the fields anyway, along with every variety of weed farmers normally tried to keep out of their crops that had followed in the wake of the chanter’s brief stop here. The farmhouse was just a pile of blackened sticks jutting up from the ground like the skeletal fingers of a dead beast, and the nearby barn hadn’t fared any better. And there was still an overturned SUV in a pool of debris and stained gravel between where James landed and the vaguely spherical chunk of the Status Quo prison that they’d scooped out and teleported here.
This left the parking lot, which was really just gravel and dirt that wasn’t even that well compressed, as the least damaged part of the whole territory.
The place was a wreck. And the lingering smell of woodsmoke from the mass fire spell that had ravaged the nearby urban area and hundreds of acres of farm and woodland didn’t make it feel any more welcoming. Time had passed since that event, but not enough to fully heal the wounds or the memory of it.
Legally, the Order of Endless Rooms owned this property. Practically, no one was going to be coming out here anyway. It wasn’t between anywhere important, and no one was gonna stop at a burned down wreck unless they were looking for adventure.
Research tested dangerous stuff out here. A thing that they’d started doing on their own initiative, which James appreciated. There was a non-joke that regulations tended to be written in blood, and at least twice now some Research experiment had threatened to consume the Lair in some kind of calamity, so the fact that it hadn’t taken an actual lethal disaster to get them to decide to start doing totem work elsewhere was a good sign.
As soon as James had landed from his teleport, the pair of small drones he had on him all the time launched skyward. He was getting better at controlling the things, and did so constantly whenever he had the chance. The Order didn’t have a custom made or magically grown program for handling drone control through a skulljack, but James had been the first person to learn that you could do this on ‘manual’, and he liked to think he could keep up with the people who took it to a real skill. It was comforting to always have a pair of video feeds of the space around him, especially with how life was lately, but it was also really convenient for helping him find the cluster of people he was looking for here.
Stopping on the outside of where a bunch of red rope threaded through posts driven into the ground marked off a circle of terrain, James circled the outside of the danger zone until he got close to the people who were currently measuring purple orbs with calipers and arguing about something.
”Hey folks.” James approached knowing he’d already been spotted. There were at least seven people here, mostly humans and camracondas, and James was sure there was at least one infomorph he couldn’t see. He recognized Thermoclese and Paper-And-Words, but most of the others were either new or James hadn’t been around them enough to cement their names in his brain. “Just checking in.”
A young hispanic human turned his way, face blank of expression. ”Ah. I recognize this. This is the part where we learn that we are doing something risky and problematic.” He said with a monotone.
James spread the fingers of one hand, slowly shrugging as he gave a placating “No no no. Sort of. But no.” The inhabitor wasn’t completely wrong, but it wasn’t that what they were doing was dangerous.
”So is that gonna blow up or something?” Thermoclese pointed a hand like a gun toward the cubic design out in the middle of the marked off circle. “Cause it would save us time if you tell us now.”
”Uh… no. Probably not.” James realized suddenly that the reason the circle of red rope was so huge was that they were prepared to use a logisticor to teleport whatever they were working on somewhere else if they needed to get rid of it, and the boundary of that effect was what dictated their safety limit. He hoped it wasn’t aimed into the sea; that sounded like it was just making new problems for whales. “Nah, I’m here to tell you you’re replicating work.”
”But not work that causes explosions, right?” Thermoclese clarified. “Like, this one isn’t going to explode or anything, right?”
James wasn’t quite sure how to reply to that. “I mean… I have no idea? I’m just doing the communication improvement part of my job. You guys are working on purple totems, right?”
”Yeah, we’re… oh, oh!” Thermoclese clapped her hands in one loud motion, looking somewhere between annoyed and excited. “Was my guess right? Are they memeplexes?”
”I… don’t… know?” James asked. “See, I-“
He didn’t get very far before the group of researchers started debating with each other about the nature of a purple orb based totem. Apparently, James had walked into the middle of a fierce academic skirmish here, but also, he’d screwed up and not spoken fast enough to cut off any incorrect assumptions.
”This simplifies a lot of things.” Paper-And-Words stated, synthesized voice coming out contemplative. “If your guess was correct, then we do not need to build anything, merely find what we already built.”
”Yeah, I’m thinking we probably put it in the basement.” Thermoclese nodded at the camraconda. “And by we I mean whoever did this before I signed on, because I would not.” She stretched out the last word, shaking her head as she waved the group together into a circle. “Alright people, we need to figure out how to search for-“
”Uh…” James raised his hand, getting an irate look as he cut her off. “Hi, sorry, still here and didn’t finish my explanation.” He cleared his throat and spoke up so everyone could hear him. “I am not here to tell you that we’re looping antimemetics divisions and you’re replicating work that has been made forgotten. That would be… that would be pretty bad! I would be worried, and would have showed up faster!” James felt like he should be seeing fewer people be disappointed that they weren’t experiencing inflicted amnesia. “No, I mean, you’re literally doing something that’s being done in another part of the Order, and I’m just double checking on all those today so that no one gets surprised by it later.”
”Oh.” Thermoclese really sounded put out. “I guess that’s reasonable, I just kinda hate it. You know you’re allowed to talk faster, right?”
The inhabitor - James was pretty sure his name was Em - at least didn’t look like he’d been hoping for a hostile memeplex. “Who else is working on purple totems?” He asked in his dull voice. “They may have already been added to our group.”
”Yeah, you guys have a crowd here, huh?” James said. “But no, it’s not people, which is why you might not know about it. Uh, about two weeks ago, after our resident witch built a machine for making pencils on our roof like a proper mad scientist, Momo asked the weird tablet that we have to design a purple orb totem. Apparently it can do that? The loading bar puts the end date at sometime in a couple months, but I wanted you to know that was happening.”
Thermoclese nodded, then called everyone in for a huddle, quiet conversation moving through the group as they quickly shared their thoughts on the matter with each other. James waited, and instead of listening in, focused on flicking between his newly vibrant vision, and the view from his overhead watchers. It was a good distraction from the wrath of the late August sun. In a minute or two, the group of Researchers broke apart, and Thermoclese turned back to James. “Alright.”
”Alright?”
”Yeah, alright. We didn’t know that, so thanks for keeping us clued in. But we’re gonna keep at this.”
”Okay.” James shrugged. “I mean, you’re totally allowed to, I really am just doing confirmations. It’s entirely possible that the tablet will be unusable or something.” He looked over at their assembled wood and stone construction, cubes positioned on their edges at what were probably specific distances from each other. “If you’re good here, that’s all that matters.”
Paper-And-Words bobbed a nod. “Yes. We have decided we will continue. We have two months to win. And if it is not known to detonate, that means we can continue with today’s attempt.”
”…It’s not a race, exactly…” James tried to tell the camraconda, but Paper-And-Words was already back to helping two other humans measure the diameter of purple orbs, ignoring him. “Hey, uh, Thermoclese? Why is everyone here twitchy about explosions?”
”Eh? Oh! Yeah, so, we’ve tested it with orange and red totems so far. Turns out, if you try to imbue them? They just blow up.”
”What… why did you…” James wasn’t prepared for this. He’d forgotten the kind of people who gravitated toward Research. The last couple hours of checking documents and quick conversations with people in Recovery and other parts of the Order had lowered his guard. “Was there a reason for…”
Thermoclese looked at him with a pitying gaze. “Yeah, we wanted to see what it did. I mean, obviously there’s practical uses to something like a living spatial warp, or an enchanted information source. But either we’re doing something wrong, or there’s conditions for safe applications that we don’t know, or it’s not possible. Probably not the last one. If it weren’t possible, it just wouldn’t work, like purple imbuements.”
”…you mean incepting infomorphs. Assignments.” James clarified with a frown.
”Yes. Yellow and blue orbs work for imbuements on red and orange totems, but the results are unstable. Purple imbuements don’t work, period. Though we’ll test it all again once we get a purple totem working.” She cracked all her knuckles in one quick intersection of her hands. “Alright! I’ve gotta make sure no one breaks anything. You need something else?”
James had a bad feeling about something she’d told him. “Maybe.” He said, turning to stare at the collection of materials that made up their latest attempt to form a geometric totem that would take a purple orb. He didn’t think it would be that easy, and their guesses were probably not going to pay out, but there was something that nagged at him.
They’d never seen a purple totem in the wild. Granted, they’d never seen a blue or yellow totem either, and only one red, but still. This was uncharted territory. Except he just had a feeling that something was off about the whole project.
Had they had a purple totem before? James felt a cold pooling in his stomach, a distant dread that had no real source that he could determine. Something about this didn’t feel quite right, but all he could come up with to actually say was something that he couldn’t even place the accuracy of. “I don’t think purple totems need to be that big.” He said.
”Oh yeah? Why’s that?” Thermoclese’s eyes widened slightly, and the way she asked the question had heads turning back their way from the others. “Some kind of insight?”
”No, no.” James tried to laugh it off. “Maybe? Just a feeling.” A feeling of alien familiarity. “Just be careful, yeah?”
”Absolutely.” Thermoclese gave him a thumbs up. “Hey, no one even got hospitalized when the other tests exploded! That’s kind of a point of pride for us.”
James interrogated the structure of that sentence. “What about killed?” He asked.
”No one got hospitalized or killed!” Her good mood soured as she gave James an irritated glare. “Anyway, we’ve got tests to finish before half these idiots go off to murder god tomorrow, and before a rock replaces all our jobs.”
He nodded knowingly. “Automation comes for us all, I suppose.” He said, reclaiming a sliver of humor, and recalling his drones as he headed a safe distance away from their gathering point. The warmth of the summer day put some comfort back into his blood, especially after a morning spent freezing, but the lingering anxiety stayed with him for a while.
James wasn’t sure it was nothing. But he didn’t know what it was. So for now, he’d just have to trust that they weren’t going to end the world while he wasn’t looking.
_____
After returning to the Lair, and having a conversation that made James feel a little too much like a very stiff adult where he explained bullying to a ratroach and how to both identify it and stop doing it, James arrived exactly at the time of his appointment at Harvey’s office door.
How, exactly, that happened he wasn’t sure. Planner was effective and powerful to the point it was almost worrying, but as far as James knew, the informorph didn’t have the power to alter time itself. And he had been running late.
Checking his phone’s clock revealed that he was, in fact, not late. Which meant the most likely outcome was… “Planner don’t mess with my perception to motivate me, please.” James said with quiet seriousness. The assignment ever-present inside the Lair didn’t reply, but he was pretty sure Planner had heard him.
He didn’t even get to knock before Harvey’s resonant voice was calling through the door for him to come in. So James did just that, shutting the upgraded piece of the basement behind him. The old door had been a heavy metal thing that ‘came with’ the basement when it was added; the new one was wood, light and mobile, and had a classic frosted glass window. Everyone liked it better. “The schedule has you listed as being here for six minutes. That seems low for the crap you usually bring me. What changed?” Harvey looked up at James, and his eyebrows inched upward, jaw working as he took in the new look. “Nice eye. Very metaphorical.” He offered.
James fingers reflexively went to prod at the edges of still tender skin around his eye socket. “Is it?” He asked. “Wait, shit, what did I do? This isn’t gonna be weird, is it?”
”Nevermind.” Harvey didn’t explain further. “What can I do for you?”
The question galvanized James back into a more comfortable and confident attitude. “Ah, knight captain, the question-“
”Don’t call me that.”
”-is not what you can do for me.” James was absolutely going to keep calling Harvey that. The man had gone along with the conspiratorial plot to call James ‘boss’ and put him in charge for long enough that he deserved a little backlash for it. “The question is what I can do for you.” He saw Harvey open his mouth to ask that exact question, and shook his head with a sigh. “I’m here to let you know that we’ve got a few cool magics that Response could probably make use of.”
Harvey raise a hand to his chin, fingers framing his mostly controlled goatee. “Do you have a way for us to teleport without worrying about budget, or let us copy responders for a little while?”
“…No. No I do not.” James admitted. “I mean, technically the fractal avalanche spell does the copying but it’s not that long term. And the phone that makes an echo of someone… yeah the answer is no.”
Harvey didn’t bother shaking his head or frowning. The man liked to keep his disappointment quiet; it was a trick he’d picked up from his old life in the business world, and it made a world of difference in how effective it was when he actually told someone he was unhappy.
But the truth was, Response needed something extra. The telepads were great, and the ability to rapidly train new people was probably more powerful than someone like James realized. Skulljacks and shield bracers let Responders do their jobs with less fear, which made them calmer and more effective. And the armory of copied dungeontech, even if it was limited, was still consistently saving lives. Hell, just the laser pointer that let you broadcast an emotion was enough to end most problems before they got out of control.
And yet it wasn’t enough. Harvey didn’t believe in utopia or a perfect world, he didn’t think there was some ultimate state of order out there that could be chased. And even if he did, he’d probably say they shouldn’t chase it. But he believed in doing better. Doing more. And they were running into the wall where they either needed an expansion that would see Response spilling out to secondary operation centers, which would come with a massive increase in cost as well, or they needed something new. Something game changing.
Or both. Response currently handled over three thousand calls a day, which was half of one percent of the US’s daily emergency call count. With something game changing, they might only need a hundred times more people, instead of two hundred. A difference so abstract that Harvey figured only Karen would really care about it.
“So what do you have?” He asked the paladin standing in his office and refusing the comfortable chairs he’d rescued from the Stacks a month ago, voice as calm as it ever was.
James finally sat down. “Mostly it’s the Utah spells. Access is mildly limited right now, but the slots themselves are small, easy to copy, and permanent. So I wanted to run it by you and see if you’d looked at the list yet.”
“I have not. Highlights?”
”Short range teleport-ish thing, easy potion use magic, and mental self-control.”
”You wanna do me a favor and explain that last one?” Harvey’s stare bored into James.
James gave a nod, lips pursed. “So, I’ve been thinking.” He waited a second for the familiar joke, before remembering that Harvey wasn’t really in his friend group and wasn’t going to ask if he’d hurt himself trying. “It’s called mindful reverberation, I’m gonna call it reverb for this chat. And it makes the caster believe the next thing they say out loud.”
”I’ve been keeping up on the kids we’re taking in, I know this much.” Harvey said. “Real problem there. Why do you think we can use it?”
”I think we should have a long and serious ethics discussion about using it as a requirement for joining Response.” James said, holding up his hands defensively before Harvey could continue. “I am not saying anything is wrong! I just finished reading the oversight reports for this month, and you had, what, two incidents out of eighty thousand calls? Actually absurd. In a good way. What I’m saying is, having simple and plainly spelled out directives that everyone agrees to when signing up would go a long way toward creating the foundation of a permanent culture for… well…”
”For law enforcement.” Harvey’s voice was almost disbelieving. “You’re serious?”
James focused his eyes on the wall behind Harvey, where a cleanly kept shelf held pictures of people he didn’t recognize. “I’m preparing for a contingency.” James said cryptically. “But also, I want your actual opinion. Not right now, but when you’ve had time to think about it and talk to people. Is it wrong, to make an entry requirement for the position that gives people the kind of strength and collective power we do? Is it wrong to ask people to not just say the words, but mean them?”
Behind his appraising stare, Harvey’s mind moved the information around like puzzle pieces. They could make the spell a disciplinary action. A responder who overused force or showed unhealthy bias could have that behavior corrected directly. But he also quickly saw why James hadn’t even mentioned that; it was too controlling. Too oppressive in its flexibility. There was an elegance in making it something you did when you joined; it meant everyone knew what they’d be getting into. Which meant that for most people, the spell itself would be a formality. People would join who already believed. And people who didn’t believe but wanted to would get exactly what they desired.
Also they were sure to find more spellbooks later on, which would make those spell slots more and more useful.
”I’ll think about it.” He said simply.
James just nodded at him. “No rush on that one. I still want to get some long term tests done. Also someone found some headphones that translate everything into Māori, and we happen to have a language orb for that, so we can maybe use that as a patch for language barriers in the emergency call center. Uh.. what else? I’m pretty sure you know there’s a .mem now for emergency first aid for broken bones?”
”Yeah, half of Response already ran it, the others are just waiting for the cooldown period on a previous .mem before they get it themselves. A little niche, but when it helps, it really helps.” Harvey made a note to himself about the headphones. They were looking for ways to restructure and improve their call intake, though this didn’t seem like his perfect wishlist of some way for people without phones to get their attention. It was still something. Every bit did help. “Anything else?”
James shrugged. “Not really. There’s more sap available right now, so your potion budget is going way up, but nothing revolutionary. Just wanted to keep you in the loop, and see what you specifically needed.” He stood up and almost yawned. “I’ll see what I can do about making a responder duplicator or something.”
”…Appreciate that.” Harvey said as James opened the door and walked out, exactly six minutes after entering. “Sometimes working here scares the shit out of me,” he said out loud, “but damned if it isn’t easier.” Now, all he needed was a couple orders of magnitude more people, and he could get a real start on making the world safer.
_____
That night, James made dinner for his roommates. A simple thing, or at least, it felt simple. But it meant so much to him.
His home and his friends meant almost everything to him. And as he centered himself in his little slice of the world, eating chicken and rice and talking about their days, he felt like he could do the whole day of work and effort a hundred times more. Over and over again, if it meant having this. But ten thousand times more if it meant giving this specific mundane magic to the entirety of humanity.
The night ended slowly. Alanna vanished off to a late night Response shift, kissing Sarah on the way out. Anesh left with her, two of him going to do some kind of alchemy thing. Zhu, awake for only an hour or so in a kind of reverse nap, dozed back off, assuring James that he was fine and just very tired.
And James felt that way himself. Excusing himself from the room, abandoning Sarah to do the dishes with her blessing, so that he could remove a half dozen magical trinkets, shower, and collapse into a bed he had missed more than he’d realized.
Sleep took him almost instantly.
Which was good. He had plans to try to not kill a god thing tomorrow, and he’d need all the rest he could get.