“How’s the neural analysis coming, Cane?’

“Slow.”

“Okay, so in actual progress terms,” Vell said.

“Like twenty percent,” Cane sighed.

“You said you were at ten percent an hour ago,” Harley said.

“It’s a slow process, alright,” Cane said. “I’m comparing different nervous systems from different humans and human ancestors, this’d be a slow process even under the best circumstances.”

Leanne had hauled some advanced equipment from the neurology labs, among others, to make their work faster, but it could only do so much. Cane was still just one man struggling to do a research project that would’ve been a daunting task with hundreds.

“Just keep at it,” Vell said. “We’ll figure this out.”

Vell headed back to his office, leaving Cane to his research and Harley to her frustrations. As a roboticist, she didn’t have a lot of applicable experience when it came to life or its meaning. That was a distinct and disturbing pattern she had noticed. Luke, Cane, and Freddy were stretching themselves to the absolute limits of their expertise, while most of their crew had no experience whatsoever. People like herself, Leanne, Hawke, Samson, Himiko -all effectively useless on matters concerning life or magic. Harley headed for the highest concentration of said useless people, Luke’s table, where Hawke, Himiko, and Samson were all helping him operate some complex chemistry experiment. Alex was also there, but she had magic know-how, so Harley did not consider her part of the Useless Squad.

“Alright guys, I love all of you on a very personal level,” Harley said.

“Don’t plan any celebratory orgies yet, Harley,” Himiko cautioned.

“I wasn’t going to! Jesus, Himiko, have some class,” Harley said. “It’s the opposite, if anything. At this rate I’m not sure we’re making it to a celebration. I’ve been learning a lot about hiring and staffing this past year, and we are understaffed as fuck, people.”

She threw her hands around at the underpopulated classroom they were in.

“Cane definitely needs some more brainpower for his brain stuff, and I’m sure you wouldn’t say no to a few more physicists and chemists for your shit, Luke.”

“A few dozen, maybe,” Luke said. “Actually scratch that, hundreds. Thousands? Are thousands available?”

“Not even in the best case,” Harley said.

“I’ll take whatever I can get,” Luke said.

“I don’t know, I think Vell had a point about not trying to recruit people,” Himiko said. “Asking people to give up their futures for the sake of an experiment like this is a big ask.”

“Well Vell’s a big guy,” Harley said. “Metaphorically as well as literally. How many asses has he saved over the years? There’s got to be at least a few people who’d help him out if he asked. Like, the neurology students, who was it that built that helmet that let us go inside people’s heads? There was a professor too, right, Professor Plokinsey or something?”

“Plocinski,” Hawke corrected. “There’s also Yuna, who built an entirely unrelated memory helmet.”

“See, that’s a start, we can ask them to help Cane,” Harley said. “What about physicists, what physicists do we know?”

Alex did not have many connections, so she sat on the sidelines and waited as the rest started to rattle off a list of students. They racked their brains for a list of everyone that had ever owed Vell a favor, anyone who might be inclined to help him now.

“And...Shareef, I guess?”

“You want to bring Shareef into this?”

“He’s a guy, we need guys,” Harley said. “We need everybody we can get.”

Alex’s brain made a clicking noise as something snapped into place.

“Excuse me for a moment,” Alex said. She stood up and walked right out the door.

“Where’s she going?”

“Probably to use the little witch’s room,” Harley said.

In the halls, Alex walked right past the little witch’s room and headed out of the building. She crossed the quad at a steady pace, moving like she was in a hypnotic trance until she reached her destination.

The broad doors to Kraid’s lab made a noise like thunder as Alex slammed them open. Helena, who had been walking up and down the rows to help steady her heartbeat, took one look at Alex and let out a sigh so deep it almost fucked up her heart again.

“Are you people just going to come at me one by one until I give up or kill myself?” Helena said. “Because I can tell you which is going to happen first, and it’s-”

Alex walked right past Helena and kept heading down the rows.

“I’m not here for you, Helena.”

“Then what are you here for?”

Alex reached the raised platform at the end of the room, and then stood on Helena’s desk to stand even taller. She snapped her fingers and cast a spell to amplify her voice.

“Everybody.”

The booming sound demanded the attention of the whole room. Alex took advantage of the attention while she had it.

“All of you, listen to me,” she said. “Look at yourselves! Look at what you’re doing! Is this why you came here? Is this why you worked so hard, studied so much? So you could cram yourself into a sweatshop, slaving away at the whims of a madman?”

Nobody answered her. Alex didn’t need a response.

“You’re scientists! You’re not supposed to put yourself in a box to maximize productivity for someone who will give you nothing in return,” Alex said. “You’re supposed to be making us safer, healthier, more connected, more informed. You’re supposed to be making the world a better place. But this isn’t doing that. Kraid isn’t doing that.”

Anyone who was still working slowly ground to a halt as they noticed their neighbors had stopped, until the room was deathly still.

“I know most of you know who I am. And especially who I was,” Alex said. Most of the campus probably still thought of her as “that bitch”. “You know I’ve been where you are. Made the choice you’re making. The choice to do what’s efficient instead of what’s right. Quick and easy cruelty instead of slow and difficult kindness. So listen to me when I tell you it’s not worth it. Every time I made that choice I was sacrificing something without even realizing it. Moments of joy. Friendship. Love.”

Sometimes Alex thought about her past, especially all those months berating, abusing, and avoiding the people who were now her closest friends. She would give anything to go back and slap some sense into her younger self, to not waste all that time.

“It’s a terrible choice, and it’s a fake choice,” Alex said. “We don’t have to choose between ‘winning’ and being good. Right now, Vell Harlan is working on this same problem, trying to find the answer to Quenay’s question. When he finds it—not if, when—he’s going to use it to help everyone. No questions asked, whether you deserve it or not. I can guarantee Kraid will never use that power for anyone else without a price tag attached. So you can sit here and keep making a better product, or you can follow me back to Vell, and make a better tomorrow. Your choice.”

Alex dismissed the spell to raise her voice and started walking towards the door. Much to Alex’s chagrin, her dramatic ‘follow me’ line was completely spoiled by some people being so eager to help Vell they actually beat her to the door. Isabel had looked at Cyrus with a fire rune in her hands, and in a single moment, she set fire to everything they’d done for Kraid’s sake and they started sprinting for the door together, hand in hand. Seconds later, Bruno rolled out, pushed at top speed by a pair of eager ogres.

“Yeah, dad, scratch everything I said about the whole Kraid situation,” Shareef said over the phone. “Change of plans.”

“Change of plans? Kraid Tech is the biggest company on the planet, what are you changing plans for?” Shareef’s father snapped.

“You remember Harlan Industries?”

“I do not, and that means they can’t be any good.”

“They’re all good, actually,” Shareef said.

“Shareef, listen to me, you are working with Kraid Tech, and that’s-”

“Not happening,” Shareef said. He slammed the phone down and started walking before he had a chance to change his mind.

“Sounds like a rough ride, partner,” Dr. Ernest said, as he too headed for the door.

“Probably an overdue one,” Shareef mumbled.

“A solo ride is any true cowpoke’s first test,” Dr. Ernest said. “But it’s the only way to truly know if you’re ready for the range.”

Shareef had absolutely no idea what the fuck Dr. Ernest was talking about, but it sounded like he was trying to be nice, so Shareef appreciated it anyway. He was still thankful for the interruption provided by Yuna walking up to them.

“Do you guys actually know where the rune tech labs are? That chick walked pretty fast, I don’t actually know where I’m going.”

“Seems like you can just follow the river, miss,” Dr. Ernest said.

“What river- oh.”

An aptly-described river of people was flowing out the door of Kraid’s lab, past some confused students still in their seats, and an especially confused Helena. She had expected Vell’s friends to leave at the slightest provocation, but some of these people were tertiary associates at best, complete strangers at worst. As worst as Helena believed it to be, it was about to get even more worst.

As a legion of his fellow students marched past, Orn the centaur was forced to make room -and forced to stand and look at his inadequate, human-centric chair once again. He snorted with derision and thought of the proper chairs in his dorm, and in classrooms changed to accommodate non-human students.

Accommodations that only existed because of a petition, and signatures gathered by one man.

With one final disgusted snort, Orn kicked his pathetic chair over and headed for the door. Helena’s lopsided jaw dropped.

“Where the fuck are you going?” she demanded. “You hate Vell Harlan!”

“I do,” Orn said. “But as abominable as he is...at least he made sure I had a place to sit.”

Orn stomped his way out the door, and shortly thereafter he was followed by a tide of minotaurs, harpies, lamias, and other inhuman students joining their human comrades. As the nonhumans made their exit, the real monsters considered their course of action. Michael Watkins kept his head down, and pulled his children close. Michaela had only come to visit for the end of year, but had still been press-ganged into academic service.

“Listen close,” Dr. Professor Michael said. “We should linger for a while, and then head to Vell’s lab for a moment, at least. If he seems destined for success, we stay, if he heads for failure, we double back and say we were acting as spies. Agreed?”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“Agreed,” Michaela said.

“Excellent. Junior, please voice your agreement.”

Junior looked at the rapidly emptying lab.

“No.”

“What?’

“I said no,” Michael Junior snapped. “You’re always doing this, only thinking about yourself, at the expense of everyone else. Can’t you guys see that Vell is only ever trying to save you guys from doing something stupid?”

“What? His frequent sabotage is-”

“Completely helpful,” Michael Jr said. “I am sick of playing along and pretending to be just as self-centered as you guys! I’m going to help Vell, because he’s doing the right thing, and I want to do the right thing too.”

Michael gasped with especially dramatic.

“My god, what betrayal,” Michaela said. “I think we should disown him. And disinherit him.”

Doctor Professor Michael Watkins stood, and glared down at his son from behind dense glasses.

“I’ve always suspected your intelligence would one day rise to the point you would consider challenging me,” Michael Senior said. “Luckily, I know exactly what to do on such an occasion.”

Michael Junior flinched as his father reached down, but all he did was put a hand on his son’s shoulder.

“We can dispense with the infantilizing title of ‘Junior’,” Michael said. “You are now Michael II. And you may lead the way.”

“What?”

“What?”

“Don’t make me second-guess myself by doubting now, Michael II,” Michael the First said. “You are my son, and I trust your judgment as well as my own.”

“Then...we’re going to go help Vell?”

“Reluctantly, but yes,” Michael said. Michael II lived up to his new numerals and did a quick double take before heading out the door. His father and a baffled sister followed.

In his office, Kraid timed out five minutes. He figured that was as long as it’d take for everyone to forget about the dramatic speech. It hadn’t even been particularly good. He thought Vell should’ve worked out a better script, and sent a better public speaker, if they were going to bother with such a rehearsed load of crap. He waited out his timer and then opened the door to his office.

“Alright, Helena, who fell for it?”

Kraid stepped out and stared at the same empty room as Helena.

“Everybody.”

***

Vell was not entirely surprised when Alex returned with Isabel and Cyrus in tow. Nor was he surprised when Adele started leading a whole group of people into the lab. What surprised him was when the people never stopped coming.

“Vell, you dumb motherfucker,” Amy said, as she filed into the room and grabbed Vell by the shoulders. “Why didn’t you tell us you were saving the world?”

“Wasn’t really in the plans, kind of short notice,” Vell said. He looked over Amy’s shoulder and saw Reg and his entire rune tech class filing into the room and seeking out their old desks. “Uh, how many people are coming?”

“Let me do a quick headcount, see who’s already here,” Amy said. “Let’s see, Bruno, the Ballball team, Dr. Khaitan...uh, everybody. Everybody is coming.”

“Everybody?”

“Everybody!”

The incoming surge of people was interrupted by Orn forcing his way through, and stomping up to Vell.

“As reluctant as I am to admit it, Harlan, there is at least one individual on this planet more loathsome than you,” Orn said. “As long as you intend to stop Alistair Kraid, I will allow you to assist me.”

“Fantastic,” Vell said. “How about we just stay across the room from each other and try to interact as little as possible, yeah?”

Vell extended a hand to shake on the deal. Orn looked down at it and sneered.

“I am not touching you willingly, Harlan,”

After rolling his eyes, Vell changed his handshake to a thumbs up and pointed to it. Orn reluctantly returned the thumbs up and headed to the far side of the room. Dean Lichman also crossed the room, heading upstream on a river of bodies.

“Alright, alright, this room is already well beyond maximum occupancy,” Dean Lichman shouted. “There are unoccupied labs throughout the building and the campus, please disperse yourselves as needed.”

“That’s going to slow down our communication,” Lee said. “Maybe we could…”

“Hey Hawke,” Vell shouted. “Grab some other communications students and set up a private network for us, would you? Samson, get some servers and set them up for shared access, make sure everyone has access to everything.”

The two of them sped off to work and left Vell to turn around and face another nightmare. Vell nearly had a heart attack when he saw the two Michael’s and Michaela all at once.

“Jesus,” he gasped. “Please tell me you’re also here to help.”

“Indeed,” Michael One said. “My son has made a compelling case for us to assist you.”

“Fantastic,” Vell said. “Life started in the oceans. Get the rest of the biology departments and start studying evolutionary history. If you get any good information about the chemical origins of life, cross reference them with Luke and the physicists, anything on neural development goes to Cane and the neurologists.”

Vell walked over to Dean Lichman and started helping him dissuade any more people from walking into the room.

“Okay, if everyone on campus is going to be here, can we please spread out to everywhere on campus?” Vell pleaded. “You’ll all be better off setting up in your own labs anyway!”

With his encouragement, some of the crowd started to disperse. Lee raised an eyebrow.

“I’m beginning to feel a little redundant,” she said.

“Don’t worry, you still handle the logistics better than him,” Harley said. Vell had forgotten to tell everyone else about the communication net Hawke was setting up, nor made any plans on how people would access it. “But he is doing a hell of a good job.”

Vell continued to do a good job by finally chasing off the rest of the crowd and making sure new arrivals were directed to head to their own labs instead of crowding into a single room. Even with the crowd redirected, there were still hundreds of people crammed into the rune tech lab, and the previously muffled experiments had turned onto boisterous collaborative ventures. They were now almost loud enough to mute an oven’s ding.

“Alright, more-”

Renard turned around to see that about two-hundred more people had entered the room while he had been baking.

“I’m going to need more flour,” Renard said. “And chocolate chips.”

“A lot more,” Vell said, as he helped himself to a cookie before anyone else got the chance. “How many people are on campus, like seven thousand?”

“I don’t know if I can make seven thousand cookies,” Renard said.

“Seven thousand plus. I got in touch with a friend,” Leanne said. Seeing the reinforcements start flowing in had given her the idea to call in some cavalry of her own.

“Who’d you-”

“Out of my way, deadman, I got a backstage pass!”

A boisterous ball of rock and roll thundered past Dean Lichman and locked on to Vell, guitar still slung over her shoulder.

“Roxy?”

“Hell yeah, little brother,” Roxy Rocket said. The rock star and formed looper posed proudly with her guitar as a gawking student took a picture.

“Don’t you have a concert tonight?”

Even at his world-savingly busiest, Vell still maintained his encyclopedic knowledge of everything to do with his favorite rock star.

“I did, gave the audience a rain check and teleported right over,” Roxy said. “They’ll all get complimentary tickets to my ‘helped Vell Harlan save the world’ tour, don’t worry.”

She grabbed both Vell and Leanne in a quick hug, both for normal hugging purposes and to whisper in their ears.

“I also called in every former member of our little club I know,” Roxy said. “And told them to call all the ones they know. We got a whole worldwide network of big-brain bastards ready to tap in.”

She released the younger loopers and headed back out the door.

“Now I don’t actually think music theory can contribute all that much to the meaning of life, so I’m going to go do a mini-tour of the campus,” Roxy said. “Boost morale, make people feel really cool for helping you out. This is still contributing, though, I expect credit for saving the world too!”

“We both know you’d take it anyway,” Vell said.

“You’re damn right I would,” Roxy shouted back. “Rock and roll, Vell Harlan!”

She vanished around the corner, out of sight, leaving Vell with a broad smile on his face. Leanne felt pretty proud of herself for that one. She couldn’t take all the credit for calling reinforcements, though.

“I don’t know what the hell you said to people to get the whole campus showing up, but it must have been good,” Leanne said. She gave Alex a proud slap on the shoulder, which would leave a bruise.

“Honestly, I just told people what Vell was doing,” Alex said. “I think his reputation did most of the heavy lifting. Maybe a little peer pressure, too.”

Nobody wanted to be the only asshole who stayed behind to help a supervillain when there were other alternatives. Even the eternally optimistic Vell did not believe that every single student here was present entirely out of the goodness of their hearts. Most of them just didn’t have enough badness in their hearts to tolerate Kraid.

“Whatever the reason, I’m glad to have the manpower,” Lee said. “Hopefully we can start getting things done.”

“I don’t mean to alarm anyone,” Wataru shouted, as he stared out a window. “But a very large skull is approaching our island rapidly.”

People got alarmed anyway. Vell stomped out of the office and headed for the window, then immediately relaxed. Wataru had a good sense for skulls, so he’d seen their new arrival coming from much further away, and was far more chill about it than most people -with the exception of Skye.

“Everybody calm down, it’s fine,” Skye said. “That’s just my dad’s submarine.”

“You called your dad?”

“I generally keep my dad informed when I’m challenging a madman for the fate of the world, yeah, that’s sort of his thing,” Skye said. Doc Ragnarok further demonstrated his “thing” by practically knocking down the door as he made his dramatic entrance.

“Hello! I heard there was going to be a battle for the fate of the world,” Doc Ragnarok shouted. “I’m quite excited to be on this side of it for once. Wonderful material for my next book.”

“Hey, Doc,” Vell said. “Good to see you.”

Doc Ragnarok waved a hearty hello and then turned his attention to his daughter. Vell also made some polite chit-chat with his potential father-in-law, while Harley appraised the crowd, watching students and teachers mill about with mothmen and octopi.

“Any other Avengers want to pop out of the portals, or are we still waiting on the Howard the Duck cameo?”

“I think we’re all accounted for, dear,” Lee said. “Or perhaps I’ve just lost track.”

“I can’t think of anyone,” Harley said. She looked up at a spectral student passing overhead. Some of the local ghosts were moving room to room, making sure neighboring labs could communicate without overwhelming electronic feeds. “Oh, wait, I know. Lee, what’s that guy?”

“Well, dear, that is a ghost-”

The door slammed open again for another dramatic entrance, this time with a burst of confetti and hard rock riffs. A man in a jumpsuit rolled through the door and struck a dramatic pose.

“Did somebody say ‘ghost’?”

“Hey Garret,” Harley said.

“Oh, hey Harls,” said Garret Geist, Ghost Getter. “What’s up?”

“Well, we don’t actually have any ghosts to get, but I’m hoping your knowledge of the spectral will help us figure out the meaning of life.”

“Huh. Not exactly my usual forte, but I guess I can lend a hand.”

“Sick. I’ll get you set up,” Harley said. Kim glared at Garret as he strolled past. Of course the one time there were no real ghost problems, he actually showed up.

“Okay, I’m going back to my office before this gets any more out of hand,” Vell said. “I can thank everybody for showing up afterwards.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“Since you’re headed in there anyway,” Hawke said. “Vell, do you have a laptop or something set up in there? I’m going to do the groundwork to make it the center of our little info-sharing network.”

“Okay, sure, I guess.”

He headed into his office with Hawke, and Lee and Harley followed, with Lee elaborating on some of the network infrastructure needs as Hawke started to work. Hawke sat down behind the laptop, powered it on, and immediately went wide-eyed.

“Uh oh.”

“Uh oh? Why uh oh? Uh oh’s bad.”

Vell circled around Hawke and stood behind the chair. All he saw was a download in progress.

“Why is that ‘uh oh’, what did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything, that started up as soon as I powered it on,” Hawke said. “Something must’ve hacked your computer!”

“You’re the communications guy,” Harley said. “Unhack it!”

“That’s not what communications does! You’re thinking more like...” Hawke trailed off and then gasped. “Helena!”

They held their breaths as the download bar reached maximum. The screen opened up to a command prompt, and then opened to a large text file displaying >:P.

“Huh.”

The text file booted into a new document that started spelling out text as they watched.

TheOtherGuys:

hi vell harlan

sorry for the scare

was fastest way to get you info

+wanted to scare you

friendly rivals are still rivals after all

heard you were up to some big science bullshit

hope this helps

ps: remember to credit us or we kick EOC’s butt even harder at next paintball game

The odd text file gave way to a folder containing numerous different files with labels covering terms like biology, chemistry, physics, and philosophy. Each of the folders was bedecked with a logo from Zeus-Stephanides, Coyote-Oppenheimer, and the other international academies.

“Oh, the guys from the other schools,” Vell said. “I guess they heard what was going on and decided to help.”

“Damn, you met most of those guys like one time,” Harley said. “And they spent most of that time trying to whoop your ass. You got a gift, brother.”

“I just try to be nice to people,” Vell said with a shrug. Hawke shook his head, clicked out of the document and got back to his actual job. Thanks to his expertise, and the fairly low difficulty of the task he was working on, Hawke got them back on track and got the job done in moments.

“There you go,” Hawke said. “You are now the centerpoint of our huge, weird, research team.”

“Centerpoint? Is that necessary?”

“I mean, yeah,” Hawke said. “The whole butterfly thing, remember? You’re the only guy who can figure this thing out, everything has to go through you at some point.”

Hawke double-checked his work and headed out. Vell took back his seat and stared at a rapidly expanding flow of information, most of it utterly incomprehensible to him.

“Hm. Roxy being here blasted that whole ‘fate of the human race’ thing out of my head for a second,” Vell said. “Should’ve tried harder to stay in that zone.”

“Vell, after everything that’s happened, I thought you’d be done doubting yourself,” Lee said.

“I mean, jesus, if that whole thing with the crowd out there wasn’t the final nail in the coffin, I don’t know what could do it,” Harley said. “Because of you, people listened when they were told to do something by Alex. Fucking Alex.”

“She’s been working on her people skills lately, she can be persuasive.”

“Vell, your ability to give due credit to everyone but yourself is astounding,” Lee said. “But it’s time to turn that talent inwards.”

She got out of her seat and walked to Vell’s side, to grab on to his shoulder.

“You can do this, Vell,” Lee continued. “And the best way for you to do that is to finally see in yourself what everyone else sees you.”

“And what’s that?”

“A generally kickass dude who’s super smart and nice and talented,” Harley said.

“I was going to be slightly more poetic about it, but yes,” Lee agreed. “Generally kickass.”

“Well let’s hear your version too, it’s probably way more inspiring,” Harley said.

“Very well then. Hope, Vell,” Lee said, giving his shoulder a gentle squeeze. “Everyone is here because you, more than anyone I know, inspire hope. We live in a world that tries to force us to take, and to consume, but at every opportunity you choose to give, and to build. You give us reason to believe that the world can be better. That we can be better.”

“Damn, that is better,” Harley said.

“I appreciate both,” Vell said. “Might even like Harley’s a little better. ‘Generally kickass’ is a much easier standard to live up to.”

“Setting achievable goals is a good way to make progress,” Harley said.

“And speaking of progress, I think the hope for a better tomorrow had better start working on the actual problem instead of sitting around getting pep-talked,” Vell said. He checked his list of incoming messages. “Hopefully I can get into-”

Vell stopped himself, and looked around the room.

“-this without any interruptions,” he concluded.

“Why'd you say it like that?”

“I just realized that if I said ‘without any interruptions’, there would definitely be an interruption,” Vell said. “So I interrupted myself in a different part of the sentence to avoid that.”

“Hmph. He tries to be humble and then outsmarts the universe in the same conversation,” Lee said. “I’m certainly glad you’re on our side, Vell.”

With a contented smile, Vell sat down and got to work, uninterrupted.