Dinner was shepherd’s pie, ground lamb in gravy with mashed potatoes on top, and not a bit of green to be seen anywhere. Perry thought he’d probably kill for a vegetable by the time he was done with this world: Richter had a penchant for salads, and he’d come to like them too. His stomach wasn’t entirely happy with the cuisine, but he’d managed not to drink any water that hadn’t been boiled or fermented to kill the bad bacteria.
Flora was sticking to him, which was nice. Perry wondered how he would have gotten along without her, and decided that the answer was ‘poorly’. Coming in with no money and no knowledge was rough, especially since the power armor couldn’t be worn without making a scene. He was pretty sure there would be a next world, and one after that, and as many as he could stomach, and he didn’t think he would always have it so easy, unless having an Ally was a part of it, something that he could count on. He wanted to talk with Cosme about that, and hoped that they’d have a chance to chat before getting down to it. He doubted that would happen though, since it would mean one of them losing the element of surprise.
“You do eat food,” said Perry as Flora picked at her own, smaller meal.
“You’re curious about our diet,” said Flora.
“Yes,” said Perry. “It’s one of those geography things. Food and water are necessities, and they’re the starting point for just about anything. You’ve said what you eat, but not how much, and you were cagey about where it’s sourced from.”
“In truth, we’re kept in the dark too,” said Flora. “The less any single person knows, the less can be spilled.” She watched him, pale gold eyes on him. “Are you asking because you want to walk this path?”
Perry leaned forward. They were apparently safe to talk about this here, maybe because they both wore glamours, but he still felt self-conscious. He’d never been in a pub before. The castle at Seraphinus had one, but it was only for the common folk, and he’d been playing at being a knight there. “I need to be strong enough to beat Cosme. That’s all. If it’s a cursed existence, I won’t do it, but if it’s a pickled kidney every fortnight, then yes, I do think that would be a price I was willing to pay.”
Eating a human kidney seemed like something that was easier to say you’d do in the abstract than to actually do in practice.
“It’s a small portion every day,” said Flora. “No larger than a quail’s egg.” She was watching him. It was as much as she’d given him about the specifics.
“Thank you,” said Perry. He leaned back. “And if you take it seriously, if you want to dissuade people from becoming a — what you are, then why did you do it?”
“I was taken in at twelve,” she said. “If I hadn’t been, with my mother and father dead, I’d have ended up in a bad way. My sister ultimately landed in a madhouse, my brother a sailor, if he’s still alive.”
“Taken in by the vampires?” asked Perry.
“By the strix,” said Flora. “I was groomed for this position. They needed someone who could work for the king, someone young, moldable. Someone who could respond to the Century of Progress, adapt to the shifting tides. Young blood.”
“And you don’t resent it?” asked Perry. “Them doing that with your life, when you were too young to say no?”
“I was twelve,” said Flora. She looked a bit puzzled. “That’s young, for you?”
Perry nodded. “But you don’t want me to do the same? To take on the power of some genus?”
“Growth of our population is controlled by the Custom,” said Flora. “That’s a part of it. Unchecked, we could outstrip the supply of food.” She let that hang in the air for a bit. They were ethical vampires, mostly, and ethical for pragmatic reasons, but they couldn’t stay ethical if they were starving. They’d start having to dip into the ready supply of bodies that weren’t dropping dead on their own. “But people who want power for its own sake are to be avoided, as a rule. Our various powers sometimes grow stronger the more we're fed, and in the past there have been those who gorge themselves, seeking the highest heights of wellbeing.”
That did finally put Perry off his food, but he finished it all the same, shoveling the food down since he wasn’t sure he knew where his next meal was coming from. He watched as Flora paid for their food, since he might have to pay for his own next time, and wanted to make sure he could at least hand the money off like she did.
When they left the pub, the temperature had dropped, and where the noisy pub had been so hot that he’d almost wanted to take his jacket off, the night air was cold enough that he could see the fog of his breath.
“I think they’re gone,” said Flora, voice low. Her skirt swished as she walked.
“Were we followed then?” asked Perry.
“It’s hard to say,” said Flora. “But if we had a shadow when we went in, we don't have it now, or they’re being quieter about it.”
They walked together in relative silence. He wanted to pick her brain about the different genera and which one would suit him best as a thresholder, but he thought she would take that the wrong way. Five was almost too many to pick from, given how different they all were, but the thing he was thinking about most was where he’d get food in the other worlds. Here, there were at least systems in place to get Flora her food every day with a minimum of collateral damage, but if he went somewhere else … the scope of worlds seemed large, though he knew it only through the glimpses of other thresholders. Getting fresh blood seemed like it would be almost impossible if he ended up in a place like Seraphinus again. Perhaps not impossible, but at least morally abhorrent, and difficult to do without angering the locals. It was easy enough to think about skimming from a blood bank, but if he found himself in a post-apocalypse, with only a dozen survivors ... it would go poorly, one way or another.
When they reached the factory, she looked around for a moment, then leapt up to the roof with her shadowy wings, which protruded right through her blue jacket and vanished as quickly as they’d appeared. Perry followed after her, more slowly, floating up behind his sword. It was much more difficult to use without the armor to lock him into place, and he always felt a bit like Mary Poppins.
“I’ll leave you to it,” she said once she’d seen him to his door. “And tomorrow, you’re on your own. I have my responsibilities to the Rose,” she tapped her badge, “and I’m hoping that you can stay safe and out of trouble on your own.”
“You’re not worried that I’m going to start a fight?” he asked.
“I am,” she replied. “But if I spend another day with you, I’m liable to be written up. Keep your head down. Keep to the Custom. Do you know what you’re doing?”
This was a test, he was pretty sure, one that he wasn’t entirely prepared for. “I’m taking a bullet from the world before last to a machine shop,” he said. “I’m doing some reading from the books that I brought with me. And I’m searching for radio signals to see whether Cosme is making a mistake or trying to set a trap. Then, maybe finding a public library, or at least reading through newspapers. I need to understand more about the world, so I can know the shape of all worlds.”
“You can’t wear the armor during the day,” she said. “Not unless you’re going out of sight.” She was watching him, eyes hard. She didn’t trust him, he could tell, which wasn’t what he’d hoped for from an Ally. “I’ll stop by when I’m done for the day, to check on you. You should have enough money for food, drink, and nearly anything else you need. I’ll get those coins sold, and when I do, you’ll have enough to keep yourself in fit shape.”
“Will I be able to buy a gun here?” he asked. “Or is that the sort of thing that King Edmund frowns on?”
“Only a rifle, for hunting, and only out away from the city,” she said. “They’re used by the military too, but only in special circumstances. You won’t be able to get one, not without some negotiation, and you don’t want the gendarmes to be called on you, not like what happened earlier today. Don’t seek out a weapon, not unless you talk to me first.”
“I am talking to you,” said Perry.
“What would you want with a firearm?” she asked. “You have your sword, and your suit. Unless thresholders have had the balance of power changed for them too?”
“Just as a backup,” said Perry. “I’ll ask more tomorrow. I want to explore the city more than I have today, get my bearings, see whether there’s a way to flush Cosme out.” That was assuming that Cosme had gone to ground, which wasn’t entirely certain.
“Don’t do anything that puts us at risk,” said Flora. “If the Custom breaks, if King Edmund lets his bay hounds out after everything strange in the city, it’s not just us that will be in trouble.”
“I know,” said Perry. He let out a breath. “I’ll see you tomorrow. We’ll talk more then. I’ll do what reading I can, see how I can help your people, whether there’s something I know or can build or something to make your lives easier. And if you find Cosme, you let me know.”
“I will,” she nodded. “Stay safe.”
She left the rooftop and jumped down without another word. Perry watched her go, then went inside, where it was still somewhat chilled. The rooftop shed hadn’t been insulated well, had been built for storage or something like that and then converted to a living space by some kind of monster of the night.
He took off the suit she'd procured for him, setting everything aside, then began putting on the skin suit that was worn beneath the power armor.
The armor itself took quite a bit of time to put on, even though it had been built to be easily donned by a single person. There was a different sort of armor, which Richter hadn’t favored, which was a rigid one-piece armor that allowed entry through the back, taking five minutes in total to put on, but it was bulkier and didn’t allow a full range of motion. This power armor, which had been custom-built for him using largely automated processes, took more like fifteen minutes to put on or take off, most of that being connecting everything together.
The last piece to go on was the helmet, and once it was in place, Perry was able to take his first breath of clean air in several hours. He had almost gotten used to the smell, though the mild cough that came and went wasn’t something that he would ever get used to. The only comparison he could make was to the worst wildfires he'd experienced, when ash was thick in the air and the hanging particulate made the sun bath the city red, but that didn't have quite the same stink.
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Marchand had been talking with him throughout the process of putting it all on. There had been no radio signals from Cosme, and in fact, no radio signals whatsoever. Marchand had a report of all the sounds that had happened outside the hideout, but there was nothing of note. He also had a full recording of everything that had happened while Perry had the earbud in, and March’s hearing was good enough that he could pick up on some thing that Perry hadn’t heard. Most of the audio only added slight context to the proceedings: March had heard, through a door, an account from one of the vampires of how the last major thresholder battle had gone. They'd talked about beams of lancing light, hundreds dead, thousands homeless, explosions and winds that whipped people against walls hard enough to shatter their bones. It seemed a far cry from what Perry was capable of.
Perry stepped out of the hideout, looking up at the night sky. The fog had cleared up, and some of the air pollution had been blown away from the city or had otherwise settled down some, though not as much as the night before.
“March, can you give me a weather report?” asked Perry.
“It would be from visual data only, sir,” replied Marchand.
“Go ahead,” said Perry.
“Clear skies, winds of seven meters per second to the north east, temperatures falling through the night,” said Marchand.
“No cloud cover then,” said Perry. He didn’t like that. It meant his return to the manor wouldn’t allow him the same sort of escape he’d had before. Still, he felt the need to go back, just in case Cosme was dumb enough to stay — though it was possible that Cosme was laying in wait with all his power, ready to strike, hoping that Perry was dumb enough to come back.
“Excuse me sir, but you were asking about sounds earlier,” said Marchand. “I think someone is approaching.”
Perry frowned. He wasn’t supposed to be there, but the factory had closed down for the night, and the heavy industry of the city seemed to mostly have punched out for the evening. The gaslamps on the street below weren’t lit, and it was quiet in the immediate area, with most of the sound coming from further into the city.
“Show me,” he said.
Marchand added indicators to the HUD, and Perry turned to look in the right direction. There were three of them, moving quickly, at a run, and after a moment, they disappeared, then reappeared on a nearby roof.
“Stay dark,” said Perry. The suit had outside indicator lights and lights for illuminating the surroundings, but these were all off as a matter of course. Perry wanted to keep them off though, if someone was coming his way, especially someone who was able to leap up onto a rooftop with ease. Three someones, in fact.
It was impossible to tell who it was from just the sound, and there wasn’t enough clarity for Marchand to get a solid look at them, not when they were still a few buildings away. They were moving with purpose though, directly toward the hideout. Flora had said that only she knew where he was, which on reflection didn’t speak highly of her trust of the others. That meant that if these people were coming toward him, they had tailed him well enough to find the hideout. It was also plausible that it was Cosme with some friends, though Perry didn’t think that was very likely.
There was no light around them, just the gaslamps in the distance, but the suit had good optics, and Marchand had compensated for the low light. When they came to his roof, they stopped. They didn’t look like they expected a man in full plate armor waiting for them.
The three of them were dressed in long coats, wearing hats that obscured their faces in the dark. One of them had a pistol in hand, another had a knife, and the third had extended claws. They stood there for a moment, a hundred feet away, watching him carefully.
Perry unsheathed his sword. It had a faint glow to it, which grew when its magic was being used, or in battle. It brightened the surroundings, like he was holding an oversized glowstick.
The one in the middle, who held the pistol, raised it and fired at Perry.
It struck the armor in the shoulder and plinked off harmlessly. The caliber was far too low, the metal of the armor too hard, the distribution of force too efficient. Against a gun like that, the armor would withstand a virtually unlimited number of hits. The sound of the gunshot echoed across the rooftop and the one in the middle took a moment to glance at the pistol before stowing it. The one with the knife likewise sheathed it, and without a word, the three of them spread out and moved closer, crouched low.
Perry was tempted to use the armor's gun, but there were only three bullets left, and he wanted at least one of them so he could have more made, if not in this world, then in another. He wasn’t sure the gun would actually work against them, but at the Jade Council it had been mentioned that the forward march of progress was making them more vulnerable in a physical sense as well as from an information security perspective. What a bullet impact looked like, he wasn't entirely sure, and it didn't seem like the proper moment for attempting ballistic science.
When they threatened to surround him, Perry went for the one on the right, shifting his feet and pushing off the factory roof so hard he heard the boards groan below him. He saw a look of surprise in the man’s face, stained teeth in an open mouth with a scraggly beard, and then the sword was straight through the man’s midsection.
He looked down at it in surprise, then looked back up at Perry and hissed blood.
The blood covered the cameras, blinding Perry for a half second, then Marchand switched to a few of the suit’s other cameras, these ones at lower resolution, and a half second after that, March had completed a reconstruction of the view, this one with an even lower resolution, like the world had become a PS2 era version of itself. Perry could immediately tell that the latency left something to be desired, and that he’d be sick to his stomach before too long, but it was better than being blind, and then he was fighting again.
The one who’d been on Perry’s left was now behind him, and had grabbed him while March was figuring out something like visibility. The vampire was squeezing with surprising strength, arms locked around Perry’s chest, but there was no groan of the metal, and Perry knew that it was a strong grip mostly because trying to pull the arms off was giving a lot of resistance. He finally managed to get one free, then turned around and slashed out with the sword. This seemed a bit more effective than the thrust had been, cutting straight through an arm. The relative silence of the fight was broken by a scream as the vampire’s hand fell to the ground, and Perry spun to deal with the others, hoping that for these creatures, losing a limb was enough to take them out of the fight.
The middle one, who’d been holding a pistol when the whole thing started, had something else now, long white knives that on closer inspection were made of bone — not just made of bone, but bone itself, protruding from his forearms. He came at Perry, moving fast, in a boxer’s stance, and he went for Perry’s armpits, maybe thinking that they were a weak point.
Perry brought his arm down on the bone, crushing it, and when it splintered, he moved in close for a headbutt, which crunched more bone, this time in the man’s face. Perry had headbutted people with the suit before, and it could kill a normal man instantly, but the vampire only stumbled back, making a sad sound and clutching his nose, where blood was running freely.
Perry moved forward and brought his sword down, cutting straight into the skull, again with far more resistance than he’d ever had before. He watched the body, then turned back to the others.
They had regrouped, but were looking worse for the wear. The arm was still on the ground, and blood was dripping down from their wounds. All this was rendered for Perry as a reconstruction from other cameras, low-poly, low-resolution, and he was feeling sick, his stomach churning at the slight delay between his body and his perception of his body.
He had a thought to spare them, and that thought immediately died. They’d come to where they’d thought he would be sleeping, where he possibly should have been sleeping, without his armor, and they’d tried to kill him there. If they left, they could bring back reinforcements, and any damage to the suit couldn’t be repaired. In the worst case, they’d figure out some way to kill him.
“Sir, the filters are clogged,” said Marchand. “Moving to supplemental oxygen.”
Perry lunged forward with the sword, swinging it through the air with as much power as he could muster. It cut cleanly through bone, slicing several ribs in the process, and the vampire — the one who’d lost his hand — didn’t quite fall apart in two pieces, but there was so little connecting the two pieces that a sharp yank would have taken them apart.
The final vampire, the one with a gut wound, tried to flee.
Perry pursued him. He had no idea who this man was, who’d sent him, or even really what his powers were — he was varcoli, blood-spitters and manipulators, but Flora had left things out, not liking a line of questioning that had begun with ‘so what are you weak to’.
They were two buildings away when Perry managed to land on the vampire with a leaping tackle that broke part of the roof beneath them. He wrestled with the vampire for a brief moment, then grabbed the back of its head with the gauntleted fingers, positioning them so the full force of the suit could be exerted at a moment’s notice. He almost crushed the skull, as he’d crushed orc and hobgoblin skulls before, then stopped himself.
“Who sent you?” he asked.
The answer was unintelligible, and Perry lifted the vampire’s face up from where it had been pressed against the roof.
“Repeat that,” he said. He was queasy, the motion of the chase having made the virtual reality feel even worse.
“Mellins, Mercer,” the vampire said, more clear this time.
“Why?” asked Perry.
“Don’t know,” the vampire replied. There was a pool of blood below them, growing with every minute. Perry hadn’t thought that the gut wound would be fatal, not if the vampire could run with it, but he was fading fast.
“Oxygen is critical,” said Marchand. “You’ll need to get out of the suit soon, sir.”
Perry crushed the skull in his hand. He had experience crushing skulls, but it was still grisly, even filtered through the unreal low-poly images that March was providing. There was more resistance too.
He went back to the small shed he was supposed to be living in and gave the area another scan before finally taking the helmet off.
He was able to see much less well with the helmet off, but he could see the destruction. It wasn’t much, just places where the roof had damage. Much worse was the blood and the bodies, which were strewn around. He didn’t know what he was going to do about that, but it might leak through the roof, since he had no faith in the waterproofing, especially where some of the tar had been ripped up. He took a moment to breathe, then set the helmet to the side and gathered up the bodies, stacking them like cordwood.
The battlefields of Seraphinus had prepared him for this. He’d killed there, moved bodies there, grown accustomed to death. The smell of blood was sharp in the air, covering up the acrid stink of air pollution.
Perry left the bodies where he’d laid them out, then began taking off parts of the armor, looking at the legs in particular, where the air intake was. He had limited experience with servicing the armor, and it wasn’t really meant to be serviced, but the air intake was one of the bits he knew how to fix, at least in principle.
They were gummed up with blood, which had somehow gotten up through the ducts and into the main area responsible for air exchange, stopping only at the filter, which had stopped it. That wasn’t how blood was supposed to flow, the vents had a downward angle specifically because it meant that they’d only have to deal with water when he was actually underwater. The blood had behaved strangely, like it had a mind of its own, and when he looked at the helmet, he could see that it was once again clear, the hydrophobic coating working properly.
Hemokinesis? Hematokinesis? Something like that. That was probably the varcoli, and the one with bones sticking out was probably the osten, which left the one that had tried to crush him to death, who he suspected was the flesh-eating one, but there he wasn’t entirely sure.
He cleaned the filters as best he could, using a rag to get sticky blood out of the ducts and vents, then wiped down the armor, which still left quite a bit of blood in the cracks and crevices. It would be easier to remove when it dried, and maybe the coating that was supposed to keep it from getting dirty would work better then, or when he stood in the armor while the rain fell around him.
Mellins and Mercer had been the names. They were both members of the Jade Council, one of the two varcoli and the council’s lone osten. Both were in favor of breaking with the Custom, which would mean either making themselves indispensable to the king or overthrowing the monarchy entirely. That he was being attacked by them didn’t seem to make sense, but he’d heard it directly from the mouth of a man whose skull was moments away from being shattered.
He was still mulling it over when Flora showed up, breathless, bringing a warning that was coming half an hour too late.