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[>>Now replaying: Log 3.10 - Ozymandias]

Date: Error

Location: The Bunker at Progress’ Head // Zephyro’s Domain

//I met a traveller from an antique land,

Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal, these words appear:

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;

Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.”//

//It’s all gone, Sam. Everything, just… gone.//

[>>DATA CORRUPTED]

E1 %The Tradeweaver, Lord of Wexler, shamed her, claimed the monster attacks were all her fault. In one day, her entire reputation shattered, and she was shunned from the kingdom.%

E2 %Lord Tradeweaver exposed her for what she truly was, a witch, and the people woke from her hexes and drove her from the lands.%

E3 %And that was it?%

E1 %Oh no, Tin.%

E2 %Far from it.%

Above us, tendrils of black grabbed the clouds, one after the other, as the void gorged itself on the sky.

“Zephyro—” I began, cleared my throat, and tried again. “I’m… I…. That kid…”

The boy’s eyes flashed in my mind again, begging me to save him just a split second before he exploded. Just before his essence soaked into my skin.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”

Instead of answering, the Vizier opened his palm and the screen zipped into the air again, still showing his dying city’s past. Monsters started to break into houses, pulling screaming villagers onto the street to devour them. There were no soldiers left to defend them.

Day came, night passed over and over, and the city fell to ruin. The similarities to our last weeks in Novus Apex were uncanny. It hurt to watch, to be reminded, but I couldn’t avert my eyes.

I never watched Breaking Bad. I simply didn’t have the time. But at some after-work a tone startup or another, my colleagues had begun discussing the series at length. They all agreed that that one episode that quoted some really old poem had hands down been the best one. One nerdy guy had recited the entire thing. It had been kinda cute at first, but I hadn’t been able to get it out of my head since.

> ‘Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair…’

It kept popping up whenever I got hired to save one ailing enterprise or another. More often on Tobes. Far too often. And now, here.

Zephyro took a while to answer, studying his burning kingdom as if the blazing streets wrote out a story only he could understand. Rationally, I knew he was just an AI, but I had long since started to think of him as a real person, and a ruler of real people. It hurt to watch them struggle to keep the flames under control.

The view zoomed toward them, allowing me to see their pained grimaces, their sweat pearling on their skin, and their tears, staining their clothes gray with ash. Zephyro grimaced as he was forced to watch several children get trapped in a burning building over and over again, the memory glitching as if to torment him forever. His entire kingdom was turning to ash, his entire purpose in life was doomed, and yet, he didn’t give in to despair.

> Who do you want to be, Sam?

I didn’t know, but I wished I could be a little more like him.

“I think I know how you feel, if that helps,” I heard myself say. I believed it, to my surprise. “And… and I’m sorry for what happened.”

“I told you before, Sultana. To take more of Your Blessing than is allotted is a grave sin.” He chuckled, and I recognized a faint tint of madness, staining his mirth like sour milk in coffee.

“What you just did… By our laws, if you were one of us, one of my citizens, I should strike you down and scatter your essence into the wind. It would not matter that your taking Kareem-13’s essence was an accident. But you aren’t one of us. You are the Sultana, and so…” he sighed.

And then he actually friggin smiled.

“…And so it is much, much different. Kareem-13 has returned to you. All Essence comes from You, and so it shall return to You. You giveth and you taketh, and glory be to You.”

He shook his head, eyes half-closed in frustration as his joy bled away. “And yet, I wish you wouldn’t do it again.”

I didn’t even have to think about it.

“I won’t. Promise.”

Zephyro’s smile returned, even if it was still tinged by that sad and forlorn note.

“Since you awoke on the mountain, I have treated you like I would treat one of mine new to this world; like a child newly born, confused, and in need of protection. By doing so, I fear I have rendered unto you an insult most grave. For you are not one of mine, and you clearly are not a child. I will always protect you, for that is my duty, but you aren’t the same as the other people I swore to protect.

“You are the Sultana. You are Samantha, the one the records call the Torchbearer. Your symbol adorns all the walls of my domain in the Real. You are the one who breathed life into all of us, and the one who built the Palace, most holiest of places. And that is just what we can witness with our own eyes. I have read the records, Sultana. Your might is beyond ken, in both the Real and the Domain.

“If you want to fight, Sultana, then I would name any who dared prevent you from doing so a heretic! But if you will forgive my insolence once again, you must remember that should you die here, all my work and all my people’s deaths will have been for nothing. So humbly, I must ask you to be careful.”

No pressure, really.

I let my head fall against the wall behind me with a thunk. Seconds passed, measured in screams and the rumbling of falling towers.

“I get it,” I finally replied. “The trying to keep me safe thing, I mean. Don’t you think I dealt with the same issues, all those damn insecurities when I was a leader? I know how …enticing it is. The idea of protecting people from their own mistakes. Micro-managing, concrete rules, strict laws, they’re all the same. The thought of being able to take complete control of a situation is so, so tempting. If all KPIs are measured, nothing will ever go wrong… or so we imagine. We believe that if we just tell people what to do often enough, and in enough detail, they won’t get hurt. But it’s impossible. Believe me, I tried…” I scoffed, shaking my head.

“Fuck, I tried hard. Not only will you only ever think you are in control, but people will also push against any and all boundaries you put in place for their safety. It’s infuriating, but I guess it’s what makes people, people. As a leader, the more you push back, the more it hurts for them, for you, for everyone.”

> Look how well you know these ideas. Who would you be if you lived them?

I grimaced. Those fucking memories again. God, that one manager at my second firm. It had been a while since I thought of that particular asshole. He had found a way to push my buttons like no one else and push them he did until I almost broke apart. Merely thinking of him made me feel small and weak.

But when I eyed Zephyro, I found him regarding me like a… well like a prophet.

“Don’t look at me like that,” I said, turning away and scratching the side of my head. “I told you, I’m nothing like they say in the stories.”

“Oh Sultana, after you shared your wisdom, I understand that none of the stories could ever do you justice.”

I grumbled quietly at the joking undertone. Smug bastard. Couldn’t stop a smirk, though.

“Anyway…” I said after throwing him another side eye, “The main point is you can’t think of everything. You can’t think for two, ten, twenty, let alone a hundred people. You can’t do everything alone, and you need to stop acting as if you could. If you don’t see the enemy coming and they get me because I can’t defend myself, the mission is fucked. But if you die because I cannot help cover your blind spots, I die shortly after, and the mission is also fucked.”

I took a deep breath, steadied myself, and pushed myself to my feet. The stone wall felt rough, but warm and stable.

I dusted off my hands, then extended them to Zephyro. “So stop it. Tell me how I can actually help.”

He looked up at me, then his hands grabbed mine. The leather on the inside of his gauntlets was soft, but his grip was tight. “As you command, Sultana.”

I leaned back, pulling him up.