“See cities broken, call it just, no gods around right now but us.” -what have we done, The Seattle Garages-
_____
The Order’s team assembled around the designated meeting place. Which was, it turned out, the mayor’s house. Or one of his houses. While James was still unclear on whether or not Drak was evil and greedy while playing both sides, or secretly a good dude doing the best he could with what he had and trying to create the illusion of being something he wasn’t, there was no denying that he had made a spectacular amount of money selling the umbral as prisoners. Well, renting them, anyway.
And that meant he had houses. The rogues that had joined them had checked them over a couple days ago, and found signs that one of them was in use despite Saskatoon’s mayor never visiting there himself. But this one was where he lived, and where he often took visitors.
It was, in a word, swanky. The garage was detached from the house, for fucks sake. There wasn’t a lawn at least, but the front driveway was behind a motorized gate, three hundred feet long, and wrapped around a cobblestone courtyard with a tall fountain in it. From drone scouting, they knew that the interior had a spacious foyer, sweeping staircases with an actual balcony, gleaming glass chandeliers, and something like twenty different rooms half of which seemed designed to impress guests with the sheer elegance of it all.
When James was a kid, he’d wanted a house like this. He wouldn’t be shocked if the library had a secret passage in it somewhere, and his childhood self would have loved that shit.
Right now, though, it just felt so wasteful. The world fucking sucked for a lot of people, and a house like this could have made it suck substantially less for a minimum of a dozen individuals without anyone ever stepping on each other’s toes. But here it was, lived in mostly by a single man and visited by his staff, used primarily for show.
Having put more listening devices in this city than the FBI used on some civil rights groups, the Order was aware of both the time of the meeting, and the general shape of the guest list. And they were in position well before things got started.
“Eyes are up.” Pao reported.
”Good.” Evan’s voice joined his squadmate on the Order’s communication channel. About a third of them used their skulljacks to talk, but he still preferred saying things out loud. It took less focus. “Ben, status?”
”I’m in position, don’t worry.” The rogue’s comment sounded annoyed.
Glossing over that, Evans continued. ”Team four?”
”Roofed and ready.” One of the shield team said with the voice someone used when they knew they were being funny, even if no one else did.
Evans didn’t react. “Paladins?”
James smiled slightly. “Spire and I are ready to go. Is everyone in the back set up?”
”Yeah, yeah, we’re all here.” Alanna replied from where she was currently hiding amongst the foliage of the house’s expansive front yard. “This place is too fucking big.”
”Save the complaints for later. Our guests are here.” If Ben had sounded annoyed, Tylor sounded outright angry. He was paired off with one of the shield team, duos of the Order’s combatants spread around the property.
They were hindered in setting up sniper posts by the fact that the only buildings in this upscale neighborhood were houses quite a lot like this one, and most people objected to having their roofs used as perches. But the wide yards and gardens, and the open plots of land between the homes that were still semi-wild forests, meant that there was a lot of room to work even if the lines of sight weren’t great. The fact that there was only the occasional car passing by on the winding road through the ever so slightly hilly area meant that there wasn’t much chance of being spotted skulking around either. The most they had to worry about was the security systems of the neighbors.
Also, when you had leveler earrings that deflected hostile attention, mild concealment by the side of the road was enough to not be noticed as multiple cars passed by. Two of them were moving together as they pulled into the small mansion’s driveway, and through the shared network, the Order party watched a towering bald man who couldn’t have looked more like a bodyguard if he’d been wearing a nametag get out and open the door for a thinner man with greying hair and a cane. A few of the bodyguards went with the man as he headed inside, one of them opening the door for him professionally, while the drivers stayed with the cars.
Another car approached by itself, this one older and showing signs of wear, unlike the sleek corporate fleet vehicles that had preceded it. A man and woman got out, both of them wary of the bodyguards now standing in the driveway, but they weren’t stopped as they entered the home. James knew who they were from the time spent profiling, but if he hadn’t, the flash of a badge and gun on one of their hips would have given that away.
“First guy’s here. Opening the audio feed.” Ben’s voice was stilted, using his skulljack exclusively to talk now instead of speaking out loud.
There was a momentary pause, and then a feed filtered through their skulljacks, the programs and protections built into the latest model of ‘braids’ letting everyone hear what Ben was hearing cleanly and without interference.
”…admit, Silverson, it’s been an experience.” The charismatic voice of the agriculture corporation executive sounded. “And don’t let my peers and colleagues bully you, it has been well worth the price. Who wouldn’t pay anything, to be a superman? But you’re asking for a big favor here.”
There was a clink of glass, and then the mayor’s voice in reply. ”It’s like you said. It’s worth the price. You’ve noticed the pattern by now, I’m sure?”
”More time between each new… spell…” he said the word like it was embarrassing, “and more uses each day as well.” The executive agreed. “It doesn’t bode well for the long term costs, especially at your rates.”
”There’s other ways to pay than money, of course.”
”Of course.” The businessman agreed readily. There was no sarcasm in his tone, just the casual understanding that favors often spent better than gold. “Ah, we have guests.”
”Detectives.” Silverson’s word was a greeting as the Order knights watching through the windows lost track of the two cops when they entered an interior room. “Come in, please. A drink?”
”No, thanks.” An unamused woman’s tone spoke, her words stretched out as she took in the scene. “Mister Kinly. Interesting to see you here.”
”We were discussing a matter of mutual business.” Kinly said with quiet satisfaction. “Our good mayor here, ever dutiful, has been doing an admirable job of preparing our city’s finest for the future, hasn’t he?”
There was a long pause. “If you say so, mister Kinly.” The woman replied, even if she didn’t actually answer. “Mister mayor, why are we here?”
There was a polite chuckle from the mayor, but when he spoke next, it was nervous. “You two are the most trustworthy and stalwart people I know.” He said. And then, before Ben could accurately inform the rest of the stakeout that no one looked like they believed the man, the mayor continued. “And therefore, the most likely to be willing to engage in what is likely a criminal conspiracy.”
”You wanna run that by me again?” The detective asked, her voice rising in pitch.
Instead of answering her, Silverson instead went back to speaking to Kinly. ”We can change one of those variables.” Drak said. “Speed up the time, dramatically. If you’re willing to lend a hand with something.”
”We?”
”Shit.” Ben’s silent voice cut through. “Umbral. Here.”
”We.” Drak continued like nothing was wrong. “We have a proposal for you.”
There was a scuffle. “Silverson, what are you playing at?” The executive asked.
”Yeah I’d like to know that too.” The other detective asked, smoker’s voice angry and on edge.
”We don’t have a lot of time, you didn’t get here very early.” The mayor said with a sigh. “I’m sure I could ask Miller and Deans to stall our next guests, but I’ll cut to the chase instead of dragging this out. The unthinking prisoner thing? That’s bullshit. A smokescreen. It’s my own way of stalling, while I tried to find a way to deal with ten other problems. And the biggest and meanest of those problems has decided they want a meeting tonight that I do not think is going to go well.” The executive started to say something and the mayor cut him off. “Bob you’re right. I have been preparing for the future. But I could prepare a whole lot better if someone with federal pull and a private security force was helping out.”
”Drak, please, I don’t do altruism. We’ve talked about this.”
”You talked about this. I ignored you, because it wasn’t relevant.” The mayor replied without hesitation. “I’m not talking about altruism. I’m talking about offering you a trade. We make you very powerful, and in exchange, you back me up.”
”And if you do not,” the umbral spoke, this one sounding smoother than the one that had tried to murder James, but still with a resonant quality to its words, “then you will learn about the cost of inaction sooner rather than later.”
”Did that thing just threaten the richest guy in the city?” One of the detectives asked roughly.
The executive gave a nervous laugh. “Please. Fifth richest. Not that it would be civil to keep track. And I’m sure I’m only here because numbers one through four didn’t answer your calls.”
”Not on short notice, no.” The mayor said dryly.
The umbral spoke again, ignoring both of them, and even without being near it Alanna got the empathic impression that it was deeply irritated with the humans in the room wasting time. “It was not a threat. I am telling you, if we do not find an acceptable solution now, then it is only a matter of time until someone takes things into their own bands.”
”…oh, like a shadow! I get it. That’s good.” The male detective said appreciatively. “So, you guys aren’t… animals? That’s gonna take getting used to. Wait, that’s fucked, why did we get told…?”
“Because it was needed.” The mayor snapped. “Because there are people out there with more backing, and more power, who are more than willing to kill anyone involved with disrupting the status quo and seem to endlessly get away with it!” His voice rose loudly enough that it hurt Ben’s ears, though that little fact didn’t get translated through the skulljack link. “And now, I have reason to believe they are scrambling. I don’t know what their backers are doing, but they are acting wrong. So I have asked you here to help me push them back.”
”You invited me here, to your home, where you are planning to meet a group of untouchable killers?” Bob Kinly asked sharply, the sound of a chair scraping on the hardwood as he shot to his feet. “Have you lost your mind?”
”Bob, you brought your own protection, they’re right outside. And the detectives here - these two specifically - are unlikely to let anyone just shoot you in my den. They’re killers, but they’re professionals.”
”…you said you had an offer for me.”
”We do.” The umbral spoke again. “The deal is simple. You use your government influence to counter their own. Threaten to expose their organization, force them to abandon this city. Anything past that… we can discuss later. In exchange, we will allow yourself, and two others of your choosing, into the deepest part of our territory.”
”Am I meant to be impressed by your vacation offer?” The executive’s words had a venom to them that showed he’d recovered pretty well from the shock of an umbral coming out and talking to him directly. “No, hang on. If you two are saying it like that, it means something important, doesn’t it? You’re talking about skipping the line for the next upgrade.”
”And the next several afterward.” The umbral confirmed. “Everything you were willing to pay wealth or favors for. And all you need to do is… the right thing.”
The woman - James hadn’t figured out of this detective was Deans or Miller yet - chimed in acidically. “Don’t discourage him.”
”Detective, please, have a little faith in my character.” The agriculture executive said with faux hurt.
”No.”
”Well. Miss Deans’ hurtful words aside, I’d like to take some time to consider your offer. But given how short of a notice Silverson gave me, I’m going to assume that’s not on the table?” Kinly asked.
Outside the upper class home that they were currently aggressively eavesdropping on, James watched a passing vehicle, and noted the bad timing as it turned down their target’s driveway.
Inside, the mayor and his contact continued to talk, with more questions being thrown around. Though the answers to those were things the Order had already pieced together. Outside, though, it was clear their conversation was going to run out of time very soon.
”And here’s our problem guests.” James muttered as a van drove past. While the first cars had appeared professionally immaculate, and the cop’s car had been battered but clearly cared for, this vehicle looked like it had been stolen from down by the city’s imaginary docks and that the original owner either wouldn’t notice because they’d been dead for twenty years.
The Status Quo agents piling out of it looked similarly worn down. James still wondered if their actual group name was Gatekeepers, or if that was just an exonym. Either way, he’d probably find out soon. The six men had a fun time getting in a glaring contest with the corporate drivers that had been left in the driveway, but no one stopped them from all filing up to the wide front door and letting themselves in. They also didn’t bring their big guns in with them, which was a good sign in general. This was a meeting, and not a raid followed by an execution.
”I could just shoot them right now.” Tylor said quietly over their comms.
”Assuming none of them have a shield set.” James answered patiently. “Also I want to talk to them.”
There was an attitude in the Order of what James considered healthy hatred for the various Status Quo groups. You could - and people did - put a lot of different labels on their observed behaviors, but even if you didn’t it was pretty easy to understand why they were evil. They took magic, which should be for everyone, and they locked it up. They killed to keep it secret. They allowed the people in power to have more power, while stomping on anyone who wasn’t in the special club. They treated nonhumans as disposable. They committed atrocities that were hard to ignore for even long term dedicated assholes.
And for a lot of the Order, one of the Squo groups was likely responsible for the killing of a friend, or the imprisonment of someone they knew, or even just making a place that had been home feel perpetually unsafe.
They were violent thugs and if James had to personally slit their throats he wasn’t going to feel any remorse. He didn’t like killing, actually, and even on dungeon delves against opponents that were less sapient dungeon creations, he’d been holding back more and more and letting fights resolve with mutual withdrawal rather than death. But when someone’s dedicated path through life was to cause a maximized amount of harm to vulnerable groups, it became self defense to remove them as soon as possible.
But. There were a few ways to remove an enemy. Removing their practical ability to commit violence was one way, but it wasn’t perfect. They’d tried that with the first Status Quo and it had backfired a lot. But if you needed to kick someone back, taking out their assets was an option. You could also imprison someone, if you had the facilities and expertise for it. Or, easier but far more permanent, there was just the throat slitting thing.
The last option was the hardest. And the longest. And the least likely to work. And James was going to try anyway.
Because you destroyed your enemy when you made them your friend. And right now, they had the luxury of being in a position of power where he could just ask them to stop, ask them to surrender, and ask them to let themselves be changed.
So James told Tylor to chill the fuck out for a moment.
“Problems are inside.” Someone confirmed as the last of the Status Quo goons entered the mansion. “They split up.” There was a quick exchange of words as the different groups divided who they were watching.
”Two of them just came in.” Ben’s bland mental voice told them. “No recognition. I think I’m good. The umbral is hiding on the floor, squos didn’t see it either looks like.”
Next to where James was partly concealed in the plant life by the otherwise pristine front sidewalk, Spire gave a small hiss, her only concession to being even slightly casual tonight. “Ben says he doesn’t like how he is,” she told James quietly, “but he seems to be having fun.”
”Don’t tell him I said this, but I think he looks for opportunities to flex his state of being that don’t involve messing with us.” James replied. “And messing with Statuses Quos is a great- oop, sorry.”
He cut himself off as one of the new men spoke up, shocked by how young the guy sounded. They’d seen them on the way in, it wasn’t a huge surprise, but it was a bit bizarre to hear a voice that sounded fresh out of high school talking from a position of threatening violence.
”Drak. You promised us the situation was under control.” The gatekeeper opened with, already angry, already speaking sharply. James shook his head; rookie mistake when it came to diplomacy. Even if you were trying to intimidate someone, it was a great way to play your hand too soon. “You lied to us.”
“Gentlemen.” Drak Silverson was apparently nothing if not an impeccable host, and cool under pressure too. “Do come in. Have a seat. Drinks for either of you?”
”We’ll stand.” The gatekeeper said, and it was so petulant that James almost started laughing.
”Your choice of course. So, shall we discuss how to resolve this?” Silverson asked, leading the conversation easily through the man’s anger.
There was a thud as one of the men either stomped or hit something. “This isn’t a discussion. Your experiment is over, we’re taking you into custody, all of you, and the only way this goes easier for you is if you tell us everything about the monsters you’ve been failing to properly contain.”
”Hey buddy,” the gruff detective’s drawl came across as equally angry, “we do the arresting here.”
”Yeah, you got a badge and a warrant to go with those threats?” The other detective asked, calmer, but still backing up her partner.
The gatekeeper didn’t even consider taking them seriously. “We have friends in higher places than a mayor and a couple of corrupt black and blue.” He sneered.
”And myself?” Kinly spoke up, sounding performatively bemused.
”Yes, you too!”
The man hummed pleasantly. “I suspect my friends in high places have climbed slightly farther than yours.” He said, seeming to have accepted Drak’s deal at least provisionally.
Across the street from the house, James spoke calmly as he rose to his feet. “I don’t think this is gonna deescalate anytime soon. Spire and I are heading in. Where are the goons we need to watch out for?”
”Two watching the front, two in the kitchens so they can see most of the back. You’re good to blink as long as you do it from behind the fountain.” Evans reported.
”Got it.” James nodded at Spire, who returned the gesture, the two of them moving at a steady pace as they approached the gate, then were abruptly on the other side of it. Not heading down the main driveway - that was way too open - but instead taking a path around a row of arborvitae trimmed into neatly rectangular topiary. Out of sight from the drivers that were left outside, and also out of sight from the front of the house where the gatekeepers had left guards.
Though he suspected they’d left the guards to keep people in, not out.
As he and Spire got closer to being within range of a Move Person that would take them through the big bay window and onto the house’s third floor hallway carpet, James kept listening to the conversation.
”You’re going to give us everything, or we’re going to undo every single action you’ve taken as mayor of this hellhole.” One of the gatekeepers was threatening.
”You don’t have the authority to do that.” Drak snapped back. “You certainly don’t have the ability.”
”You have no idea what we’re capable of!” The younger man shouted, and even through the limited window of Ben’s listening in, James could hear several people in the room shifting as they nervously moved away from the yelling intruder.
The mayor lost his cool. “You’ve been fine taking money from my little project. If you do work for an agency that has any authority in this province, then you’re well past getting fired and into ‘arrested’ territory. Now you’ve been doing a fine job of threatening me into cooperation so far, I admit, but we’re done now. Tell whoever you report to that they can get out of Saskatoon. All of it. I assume you know how to read a map.”
There was a cold silence that followed that, while James and Spire landed deftly inside the house and started making their way with quiet guidance from one of the overwatch teams toward the right door. There were a pair of the executive’s bodyguards outside it, the two men looking on edge and alert from the angry voices in the room; the other two were downstairs keeping their distance but functionally doing the same thing as the Status Quo men. James and Spire both activated the invisibility on their earrings as they rounded the corner, unseen as they approached their target, their path well timed out even if it wasn’t movie-heist-precise.
And then, punctuated by Ben’s own muttered uh oh, detective Deans said exactly the wrong thing. “Oh you don’t have anyone you report to, do you?” She asked pressingly.
“That did it.” Ben’s blank voice belied the weight of his words.
”Coming in.” James announced as Spire blipped through the door, and he followed, using up one of his Move Person charges again but still having a stockpile left just in case.
He arrived just in time to see Ben lunge forward, gripping the frame of an SMG that the gatekeeper had pulled seemingly out of nowhere, the friend holding the gun pointed toward the ceiling with his other hand clasped on his opponent’s wrist.
Everything happened in a second. The detectives started to draw their weapons, the executive pushed himself backward in panic and toppled his chair, the umbral emerged from the wall and rushed the other invader, and James dropped his invisibility.
The second gatekeeper froze as Spire pinned him in place, before his own shield bracer flared to life. She let herself pop into view as well, just before the umbral hit the man with a rapid series of strikes that was meant to drain a bracer that was no longer stopping that kind of attack. A heavy backhand from the umbral send that gatekeeper sprawling onto the floor, and James planted a foot on his chest, leaning forward and surveying the room that had just noticed his arrival.
Looking around, James took in the room. The den was nice and spacious, looking designed for small gatherings and not a personal or intimate place. A few bookshelves on one wall that contained both tomes and trinkets, a massive fireplace that had a pair of decorative swords over the mantle, art hanging on the walls, pleasantly dim light. It wasn’t quite opulent, but it was certainly a display of wealth. Especially when there was stuff like a bronze globe that doubled as a mini bar, the map cracked open like an egg to reveal bottles and crystal tumblers. It was theatrical and silly and James kind of loved it.
”Who the hell are you?” Detective Miller asked.
James had seen the man enter, but his brain still took a second to connect the voice to the curly haired fat Italian man looking at him with an uncertain grip on a handgun and his mouth set in an oval of confusion. “Good evening.” He announced himself as the first gatekeeper struggled with Ben. “I’m… Ben do you need a hand there?”
”I got it!” Ben lied, kneeing the man in the stomach.
”Ben, why?!” The gatekeeper gasped out before his gun was taken away and he was shoved to the ground by detective Deans.
”You.” The mayor said, staring at James.
”Me.” James said, glancing at the umbral. It wasn’t the same one that had tried to murder him; this one was taller, and thinner, the ghostly waving tendrils emerging from the upper part of its form had fewer serrated edges and more little rounded pods. “Sorry about the mess.”
”Ben, shoot them now.” The umbral ordered.
”Woah, woah!” Detective Deans finished handcuffing the gatekeeper who’d drawn an SMG out of thin air, and held up a hand in front of Ben. “Ben, listen to me, you don’t-“
Ben rolled his eyes and moved around the room, getting a good firing line on the door if he needed it. “Well this stopped being amusing exactly right now.” He griped.
”Sorry Ben.” Spire said with a fond hiss. “I hope we can still be friends after this.”
”Mockery isn’t very paladin behavior.”
Mayor Silverson stepped forward nervously. “Why are you in my home, and what do you want?”
James sighed, letting go of his amused facade. “I’m here to talk.” He said, pressing harder on the gatekeeper he was standing on. “Stay down please.” He asked nicely as the other detective made a suggestive motion, and was allowed to approach to handcuff this one too. “And we don’t have much time. The others in the house are going to notice pretty soon I suspect.” James looked between the mayor and the umbral. “Sorry for how we met, I thought you were a little more evil than you actually seem. My name is James Lyle, I’m from the Order of Endless Rooms.”
”Who lets you guys name these things?” Detective Miller asked. “Also what’s with the snake?”
”When you save people you can name yourself whatever you want.” Spire said. “And I am here because of that.”
One of the gatekeepers twisted away himself up to a sitting position. “You’re causing breaches on purpose?! You’ll kill everyone!”
”Doubtful.” Spire replied. “Also you were about to murder a room full of people. You do not get to speak.” She punctuated that by staring his direction, her gaze locking him in place easily since Ben had stripped the man of his shield bracer.
James tried not to laugh at that. “Anyway. We’re a group that supports mutual existence, and opposes people like this.” He jerked a thumb at the subdued gatekeepers. “Also people like Bob here. Sorry Bob.”
”Apology accepted, since you saved my life.” The agriculture exec said magnanimously. “However. What do you want?”
”Mostly just to make sure these idiots don’t kill anyone.” He pointed at the gatekeepers. “And permission to maybe make a mess of Drak’s house detaining the rest of them. Bob, if you could call your bodyguards in here, or tell them what’s up, that’d be helpful.”
”Why should we trust you?” The umbral asked pointedly. “We can’t even…” the shadow creature seemed to ripple as they turned toward Ben, a kind of sadness present in its motion. “We can’t even trust our friends.”
Ben slumped. ”That’s my fault, sorry. We don’t know each other. You all just think I’m your friend because my species does that.”
”Your… species?” The umbral looked back at Spire, who inclined her head toward them, and then at James. “And you?”
”Oh, I’m human.” James exercised a tremendous amount of restraint, and didn’t add something like ‘for now’ to his words. Though he was pretty sure he could telepathically hear Alanna muttering the sentence somewhere outside. “And I can’t tell you to trust me. All I can do is tell you that these idiots were going to kill all of you, and I’d like them to not do that. Everything else, we can talk about after. Okay?”
“So you’re some kind of cop for… your side?” Miller asked pointedly. “For the wizard world?”
James winced. “Don’t call it that. Also, no. There aren’t any cops for this side, that we’ve found. Disturbingly, you are probably the most legitimate authority when it comes down to it; you were actually hired by a government agency, after all. And you have magic.” He shrugged, smiling at the detective who was unnerved either that James knew that or that he was so quick to just say ‘magic’ out loud and unironically. “We’re just here to help.”
As if taking offense to his words, the man James had planted a foot on twisted, handcuffs seeming to melt away like wet paint as he rolled free and drew his own gun from thin air. Spire flicked her gaze to him in an instant, the other gatekeeper finishing the words he started saying when she had stared at him in a garbled rush as she froze the freed shooter before he could kill both her and James.
Ben walked over and took his gun, ignoring the twitchy detectives that had flicked their own aim toward him. “It’d be really nice if you could actually surrender. We’re not gonna murder you. Idiots.” He continued complaining as he slung the strap for the SMG over his shoulder with the other one. “Look, there’s no way these two aren’t going to alert their friends. Can you please get your bodyguards out of the line of fire?” He asked Kinly.
The man had composed himself enough to quirk an eyebrow and look over at Silverson. “I don’t suppose that offer is still on the table?” He said as he circled around the armchairs and toward the door, keeping his distance from both the disabled agents and also James and Spire, who shifted to let him past.
”We’ll talk later.” Drak said. “You kept your end, even on short notice, and even if they were planning to kill us all anyway. Suppose I owe you an apology for that.”
”Mh.” Bob was keeping a remarkable amount of cool for a man who had visibly flinched at the sudden violence. Still, he made his way to the door to the den and cracked it open, clearing his throat to get the attention of the bodyguards outside. “Gentlemen. A hand please.”
The men who came in moved efficiently and professionally the moment they saw the confiscated guns, and also James, and especially Spire and the umbral. “Sir?” One of them questioned after positioning themselves in front of Kinly.
”It’s fine, it’s fine.” He said, though James thought he was trying to convince himself more than anything else. “If you could make sure these two gentlemen on the floor remain on the floor, that would be appreciated. And tell the others to get back to the cars. Our guests are about to have an unpleasant evening.”
The bodyguard looked way too comfortable with that, but James didn’t interrupt him as he sent a quick text.
While he did so, and they cleared the house of bystanders, James took a second to crouch down next to one of their captives. “Alright, look.” He said to the human terrorist. “I don’t need to hear your excuses, I don’t need to hear you yell at me and tell me I’m dooming humanity, I don’t need to hear your bullshit.” The gatekeeper was staring at James now, eyes wide with frantic rage. “I get it. You’ve been losing what you think is a war for survival. There aren’t many of you left. You’re scared and you’re angry, and in a moment you’re going to be a lot angrier at me personally. But I’m still going to ask, right now, for you to surrender. You will be treated with dignity and-“
The status quo agent, possibly the oldest person left in their version of the organization at this point at the ripe age of ‘somewhere in the mid twenties’, pulled a similar trick to what the other one had done. Handcuffs sloughing off his wrists as he lunged forward for James, a combat knife appearing in his hand as his other arm grabbed for James’ neck.
James caught the grapple, using his leverage over the other man to push him back into the floor. Zhu caught the knife; orange feathers blossoming across James’ side as Zhu manifested and interposed his talons with the oncoming strike. Unfortunately for the gatekeeper, he’d decided killing James was more important than his own health, and in trying to force past the navigator, he ended up with his sleeve and the flesh under it shredded by Zhu’s claws.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
He also still didn’t hit James. Blocked from two directions, he just ended up bleeding on the floor of the den. The man curled up on himself, and James stood and started to turn, when there was the thunderclap of a gunshot.
Whipping his head back, he saw detective Miller had just shot the bleeding man. The gatekeeper had another weapon, a handgun clattering out of his now limp grip onto the hardwood. The mayor and his executive compatriot jerked back like they’d been shot too, one of them swearing. The bodyguards similarly looked like they were in way over their heads. The agent groaned, blood pooling around him as he clutched where he’d been shot.
James just looked to the other gatekeeper that Spire had pinned, and sighed. “You good to keep holding him?” He asked the camraconda, and got a strange jerk of a nod. “Okay. Evans?”
”Here. You’ve got trouble.”
”Yeah, I assume they heard that. Everyone move in.”
“No.” Evans corrected quickly. “You have other trouble.” He added his own viewpoint to their network, letting James and Spire see what he could see. There were figures approaching the house; a lot of them. Umbral mostly from the front, but across the expansive back garden, moving past where one of the Order teams was lurking and thankfully not spotting them, were another four men that were armed like the gatekeepers. “Also the squos in the house are moving your way.”
”Great. We can’t let them link up with their buddies, and we can’t have the umbral walking into a bunch of heavily armed murderers. We need to move now.” James held out the hand that had Zhu wrapped around it, and let Ben silently hand him the SMG. Checking its magazine, he nodded at Spire. “Everyone stay here. Ben, keep that guy alive. Everyone else, keep that guy detained. Spire, let’s go collect more prisoners. Evans, intercept the squo outside. Tylor, don't start clicking on heads yet, but be ready.”
”On it.”
"Fine."
”Don’t shoot up my walls!” The mayor was halfway to a full on panic, and didn’t even know why he’d said that.
He also probably wasn’t going to get what he wanted.
James ducked around the doorframe and into the hall, keeping a few inches from the wall so he didn’t knock any of the hanging art off it and alert everyone in a two mile radius to his slinking. Spire moved behind him on his left, mechanical arms keeping her crossbows in a low position.
They ran into trouble the instant James checked the corner of the hall at the top of the staircase. He was glad he was being methodical, and more glad that Nate had drilled him endlessly on checking corners, because there were two agents in an ambush on the other side of the open air balcony, and another two at the foot of the stairs, and all of them opened fire the instant James made himself known.
The rattle of automatic fire and the crunch of wood and drywall being shredded filled the air, James ducking back and dropping low against the wall and no longer caring if he knocked anything over. Spire flattened herself to the floor on the other side of the hall, and avoided everything, but more than a few bullets got close enough to James to ping off his shield.
”Bracers! They killed the commander!” One of the men shouted.
“Surrender please!” James yelled over the noise as the rain of gunfire dropped to bursts of suppression. Chips of the hallway wall rained down on his head, and some of the art he’d been carefully not ramming toppled off its mounting. “We’d really like to- shit.” The shots were now only coming from downstairs, and he heard the thudding of boots sprinting toward them while the shooters ascending the stairs kept them pinned.
Spire was already moving, twisting her tail through a doorway and hooking it around the wood to pull herself backward. James didn’t have any tricks to pull or spells that were useful here, he just dropped to a knee and got ready to shoot. An instant later, one of the agents flashed across the gap, both of them peeking the corner from opposite sides and firing down at James and Spire, bullets flashing as they encountered James’ shields and deflected.
They were planning to overwhelm him. And they knew they could do it because they knew how many charges their own bracers could store, and that James’ return fire wouldn’t be able to break through before theirs did.
What they didn’t know was that James had several bracers. Or that Spire was a markswoman herself.
One of the enemies suddenly had their fire go wild, the human toppling backward and holding down the trigger to shred the ceiling and one of the hanging light fixtures, a crossbow bolt protruding from the middle of his face where it had punched a neat hole through the bone just next to his nose. He might not be dead, but the impact of something through his supposedly invulnerable shield was enough to drop him for the moment.
The other one took a split second to jerk his head toward his companion, staring without understanding what had happened. When he looked back, it was a little too late; James had built momentum quickly, and Frost Vector let him turn a dive into a slide that took him underneath the shield bracer’s range, even as the soldier tried to backpedal.
Being sprayed with bullets from below was not pleasant. The man might live, but not with his face intact. James rolled to the side, flinging the falling figure’s leg away as he kept low and away from the bullet-ridden bannister and line of sight to the other two shooters. “Two down.” He reported. “Where the hell are the others?” He asked as he grabbed a full magazine off the bleeding and groaning man’s belt. They should have started shooting at him by now.
Alanna answered, voice tense. “They saw the umbral coming.” She said. “Gonna do something stupid.”
”Same.” James said. The presence of a large number of umbral here wasn’t a coincidence, but it also didn’t seem to be anyone’s plan. He’d been hoping that this time, he could be the only extra problem showing up to a big mess, but apparently fate had other things in mind for him.
Outside, he heard Alanna’s voice, her call like a beacon in the night that alerted everyone to her presence as she warned off the approaching cluster of dozens of the umbral. Below, in the foyer of the house, he heard one of the gatekeepers swear, followed by the mechanical racking sound as they reloaded their gun.
He didn’t waste time. While Spire flickered into view next to him, firing down at the two men who had taken up shooting positions by the front windows, James took a running leap and flung himself over the edge of the bannister and past the glittering chandelier, into the open air next to the stairway. There was barely any time for coordination with his teammate, even with their skulljacks, but James and Spire could practically feel exactly where the other was moving. And with Zhu guiding him, James knew exactly where he was going too.
Mountain Of The Self was still not a fun spell to cast. But as long as he was falling from high places, he was at least getting good at the timing. James hit his target knees-first, just after a pair of crossbow bolts stabbed into the back of the other gatekeeper. His invulnerability meaning that more force than was strictly required was transferred into his target, bones snapping as James folded a man in half.
Zhu grabbed the dropped SMG from the very disabled gatekeeper they’d landed on, bracing it on James’ arm with both he and James unloading the rest of their ammo toward the other, who had a shield set to something that didn’t stop the opening salvo. Between the bullets and Spire freezing him in place from overhead, he went down in a spray of blood without being able to react.
”I like these.” James said as he rapidly crouched into cover, looking at the SMG. The incredibly illegal automatic weapon chewed through its ammo fast, but it was quieter than the p90s that the Order kept a stock of, and it felt like he could hold it with more stability while in stupid positions. “We should steal these.”
There was the sudden crunch of glass and wood from somewhere nearby, then Evans speaking. “Team four, drop now.” Seconds later, from the back of the house there were a series of concussive bangs, the sudden impact of them startling to James and the sound nothing like gunshots. Sporadic gunfire followed, but went silent in seconds. Through their open connection, he heard Evans calmly assessing things. “Gatekeeper reinforcements disabled.”
Through the visual feed James had caught only a tiny sliver of what had happened. Even knowing the plan, it was still a little unnerving to know that team four had just ghosted through several floors of the house, their advance member dropping multiple flashbangs for the new arrivals, and the rest of them falling through the ceiling to mop up the staggered gatekeepers.
”Sometimes I think everyone else is better at this than me.” James said.
Zhu started to say something, but then jolted, tugging on James’ sense of motion with familiar urgency. ”Duck!” The navigator ordered with a series of dots of light in James’ view.
He didn’t move fast enough. The crack of a gunshot didn’t sound until after the window he was in front of had shattered and the bullet had pierced through James’ throat. One third of his Kiki-generated emergency charms shattered as it passed, before he hit the deck under the window, a surge of terrified adrenaline pouring through him as he realized with intimate surety just how close he’d come to dying.
”Ow, fuck!” Zhu bit out, traces of his dusty light splintering away from where he’d actually been hit. “Hey! Stop shooting!”
”We’re not your enemies you fools!” Spire’s voice was amplified far louder than James had ever heard a camraconda speak before. A megaphone shout that echoed over the front lawn and faux-cobblestone driveway, informing the umbral gathering in the grass of the truth of things.
Things didn’t get quiet, because when you had part of a shield team restraining multiple people in the kitchen half a house away, and some nosy detectives upstairs following in James and Spire’s wake, and also something like fifty amassed umbral moving toward the house in a mob, quiet wasn’t an option. But there was a brief pause.
James peeked his head up over the windowsill, mindful of the shattered glass everywhere and wishing he’d worn gloves. One of Zhu’s eyes opened on the side of his head, peering over with him. “Do you think they heard her?” Zhu asked.
Several of the umbral abruptly opened fire on the cars in front of the house with small arms. The flare of shield bracers lit up as Alanna and whoever was with her covered for the probably terrified staff that Kinly had either left or ordered out of the house just before it all went to hell. Muffled buzzing cries of gatekeepers met James’ ears as half the bullets slipped through to shatter wing mirrors and leave pockmarks in chassis.
”We’re not gatekeepers you morons! Anyone can pick up a-“ James yelled out of the window just before Zhu’s talons grasped at the hanging curtain and tugged him sideways, another high caliber bullet screaming past them and blowing a wide hole in the windowsill and wall, bits of painted wood spraying into James’ face. Zhu’s move ducked the first bullet, but whichever umbral was out there with the high powered rifle, they were an unfortunately good shot. Navigator and human both flung into frantic motion, Zhu highlighting lines of egress and James twisting to follow them. But after barely scraping past another attempt to take vital bits away from both of them at once, the duo found themselves with a single option to get clear.
Still crouched, halfway into rolling, James cast Appointed Arrival and stepped in the direction that was paradoxically safest.
He and Zhu landed in the shadow of one of the executive’s cars. Well, technically they were in the illuminated part, the house lights giving them a healthy amount to see by; but the car was between them and the sniper. “Oh hey.” Zhu said in a casually friendly voice to Alanna, who they were right next to. “Fancy-“
”Don’t.” She snorted a half-laugh. “I get enough of this from James. Hey, they’re still shooting.”
A couple more bullets pinged off their car shaped shield, or skittered off the stone ground. “Where’re the civilians?” James asked hurriedly.
”Teleported out. Inside?”
”We’re good, I think. I’d like this guy to stop shooting at me though!” James yelled the last part.
”Stop antagonizing people.” Alanna didn’t sound like she was having fun. “This was supposed to be-“
”Don’t say it.” James laughed.
”You know…”
The laughter was a little frantic, the kind of laughing James tended to do by accident when people were threatening him. ”Don’t!”
”…easy.” Alanna said with a smirk.
The two of them pressed their backs against the car they were sitting against, looking at each other and grinning. “You’re lucky I love you.” James said as he caught his breath. “We’re also lucky Canada’s gun laws have apparently limited them to a single sniper rifle.”
Alanna checked their drone view. “They’re surrounding us. Do we just leave?” One hand reached for her telepad, no hands went to her weapons.
”There’s still people who are nominally innocent in there.” James said. “Though we could just teleport them too. But… no. This needs to get resolved. Why the hell are they all here anyway? Where’s the umbral that’s Drak’s buddy?”
Alanna grunted in annoyance. ”Probably has something to do with them buzzing about traitors earlier.”
”Oh good, it’s like that then.” James looked over at her, abandoning his attempt to push himself up and peek through the car’s annihilated windows. The drones gave a better view anyway. “We need to get the sniper to stop shooting. And we need to get them talking. Which requires us to find them.”
”We can do those things at the same time.” Alanna suggested. “You have a shield for it?”
James checked rapidly. “Yeah. .50 BMG?! Are they trying to fucking kill us?!” He paused, then cleared his throat. “Right. Sorry. Plan?”
In answer, Alanna reached out toward him. Both with a hand, and through their skulljack. A quick ping to the others that they’d be offline for a moment, and a quick check with Spire to make sure she was doing okay.
Then Alanna and James were kind of the same person. Zhu was there too, the sensation of being stretched across them both a strange kind of heady pressure, but not unfamiliar to the navigator. They’d found that fully dipping into each other’s minds wasn’t actually that great for combat situations; there was a level of disorientation and worry for each side that caused problems. But for a brief moment, they could manage.
James and Alanna together stood up, pulled each other close, and spun like they were dancing. Alanna’s larger form eclipsing James from view a couple of times as they whirled.
Their shield bracer flashed out a dome of golden light as a bullet the size of a human hand tried to murder them. But more importantly, Zhu was carefully listening to both of their minds, as the imbued ties they were wearing fed a very specific form of information to them. Were they, right now, being aimed at?
Yes. No. Yes. No. They moved, and felt the answer changed as each of them was in and out of the line of fire in a moment. Even connected, the duo wasn’t smart enough to use that information on reflex; it would have taken an almost impulsive knowledge of some kind of higher level math. They would have trusted Anesh to be able to interpret it, but they didn’t have Anesh. What they had was Zhu, someone who could read the knowledge like directions, and give them a perfectly clear trail.
Appointed Arrival moved James, but not Alanna, and they dropped their connection as he flickered through the topiary dotted across the expansive front yard. Alanna dropped back into cover just in time to duck another shot, but there were about a dozen umbral that were now seconds away from getting around the car and just tackling her. So James wanted to make sure their distant assailant was out of commission first.
The shadow was perched on one of the brick pillars that supported the metal fence around the property. He’d passed a few others on the way, but this one stood out just because it looked very strange to see something that looked like congealed liquid summer shade holding a five foot long rifle. It braced the weapon with one of its unfurled central limbs, while curved upper tendrils bent down to rack the slide and rest on the trigger as the umbral held the rifle’s scope to one of its eyes. Half of the shadow’s form was concealed by what looked like salvaged police body armor, padding and kevlar strapped on despite not being made for its anatomy, and there was a metal case sitting next to it that it kept one of its spindly legs on.
”Hi.” James said, already moving to disarm it. The principles of all the martial arts he knew, while sound in general, were a bit harder to apply to inhuman opponents. And unlike his terrifying girlfriend, James couldn’t just punch the thing into submission with raw strength, and he hadn’t borrowed any through their relationstick bond because while the rest of the umbral seemed out of ammo, he didn’t want to leave Alanna weakened if she tried to stand up to them. Also, it was elevated. So that limited his options a lot.
So he used his momentum, and his enhanced jump height, and kicked his way partly up the brick pillar before grabbing the end of the gun’s barrel, and then just letting his body weight do the rest to drop to the ground.
The umbral pulled the trigger, which put a hole in a stone statue of an otter that decorated a ring of carefully kept flowers and also would have deafened James forever if he weren’t wearing ear protection, before they both hit the ground. Leverage let James grab the rifle and fling it to the side as they rolled together, before the umbral threw him in the other direction and they both got to their feet, the little metal case that had been swept off by the shadow’s flailing legs rolling to a stop next to James and falling open. He glanced down at it, and the orange light it was now casting on the barkdust, before focusing on his opponent. “Stop shooting at me please?” He tried.
”How are you alive?!” The umbral demanded in a voice that James unfortunately recognized.
”If you defenestrate the wrong person by accident, a friendly ghost shows up to save them.” James said, as deadpan as he possibly could. “Please. I’m serious here. Can we stop fighting? We’ve dealt with the gatekeepers, I don’t think there’s any left, this can just end. Right now. Please.”
The umbral jerked upright, form eerily easy to see in the dim intersection of the distant front lights of the mansion and the equally distant streetlights filtered through the trees by the road. “End?” Their voice filled the air between them with static. “End?!”
James shifted his feet, mentally pulling forth a cast of Reaching Frost to balance out Zhu’s reach on his right side, but not deploying the spell just yet. “I know it’s not easy, but it is that simple.” James said. “I’m not even asking you to surrender or give up. Just… stop shooting. Please. It’s over.”
The umbral stared at him, colored bands of eyes steady under the mixed dim lights. Slowly, it pulled its central arms upward, closing them into fists large than James’ head. Their own stance shifted as well, into one that was not just resigned, but ready to fight.
”It’s never going to be over.” They said. “Not until the threat is gone.” They lunged, a wild scream erupting from them as they attacked.
Ironically, a lot of James’ martial arts knowledge did work on someone that was vaguely human shaped and trying to punch him. The first heavy blow would have devastated a previous iteration of himself, but now, he just ducked quickly and slapped it past, moving in for a grapple that the umbral twisted away from in turn. Rapid strikes from both of them tested the other’s reflexes as they realized that neither of them was going to overwhelm the other.
Well, James realized that. Though he also realized that he was hitting with too much force. Not more force than he wanted, exactly, but more than he should have gotten; so maybe his Pylon levels actually were doing something.
The umbral went another direction with their own realization, and Zhu suddenly lit up James’ sight unexpectedly as their opponent blurred with motion. James barely scraped past, the icy limb he summoned off his hip grabbing and tripping the umbral, magic limb snapping off in the process as it sent them sprawling into the barkdust with a muted thump as their charge failed.
When the shadow pulled itself upward, they did so on the metal case they’d brought. The side of it hanging open, James could see inside was some kind of glass terrarium, but the only thing it contained was a bit of orange fire. Odd fire. Wrong fire. It wasn’t normal. He didn’t like it at all.
”It won’t stop.” The umbral gave a static wheeze. “They’ll keep taking. And hurting. And killing. Until you are gone.”
”Then we’ll stop them.” James said, breathing steadily. “We’ll help. That’s what I’m here to do. Help.”
”You’re just like them.” The umbral stood on shaking legs, hoisting its case. “Where were you when we asked to negotiate? Where were you when my home was invaded, and taken away? Where were you when they hunted, and harvested, and used us?! When we screamed, and begged, and pleaded for help?!”
A twisted part of James’ brain wanted to answer with Utah, probably, but there was no chance in hell he was going to voice that. “I wasn’t here.” He answered quietly.
”The other fake hero wasn’t either. It was too late then, and it’s too late now.” The umbral snarled, the rings of eyes on its body angling upward as it looked past him to the house. “This place will go first. The people inside, the gatekeepers, the enforcers, the monster profiting from our enslavement and the traitor with him, they will burn.” Their grip was on the terrarium they had brought with them, and the shadow let the metal case fall away, revealing that bitter and uncivilized orange flame. “The rest of the city can run, if they want. But everything is going to burn.” The last word warbled like an untuned radio, angry and fierce.
James didn’t argue. He got the impression this wasn’t going to be solved by asking nicely, not at this point. Things had spiraled out of control before the Order had ever gotten here, and the person he was talking to was angry enough that words weren’t going to be enough.
He moved first, dashing forward with Zhu’s orange glow leaving a bright blur where they passed in the night. James didn’t want to permanently damage or kill this person, but he needed them incapacitated, now, and so his first punch was less about testing their defenses and more about seeing if he could hit them hard enough to move into a throw and a pin.
It didn’t work; his fist landed on the outside of their own heavy arm, the impact very similar to hitting flesh and bone in sensation. Then James was lifted an inch off the ground as the shadow’s backhand flung him with an explosive force. He slid, barkdust spraying around his ankles as he caught himself. “Stop punching him, it’s not working.” Zhu suggested.
”Well my options are kind of punching or shooting.” James said steadily, realizing that his Endurance had kicked in at some point, and he was under no risk of getting tired from this. He circled the umbral in an arc, trying to at least get a good picture of how to approach the oddly shaped person to try to remove that painful and angry fire from its control. “Since talking has fallen apart. But… shit.” James barked out the expletive as another of the umbral lunged forward at him from behind. He snap kicked it in the midsection, which didn’t seem to bother it that much annoyingly, but it did give him momentum and he turned that into rolling away from its more clumsy attempt to grab him.
A third umbral almost sailed past overhead, but gravity dragged its form down into the barkdust next to him as its unexpected trajectory came to an end. It gave a pained groan, and turned slightly, freezing as it saw James next to itself.
”Hell of a night huh?” James said casually, wondering if he had time to brush the barkdust out of his shirt before someone tried to kill him again.
He did not. The bigger umbral, his would-be killer, suddenly had a hand around James’ ankle. But rather than trying to simply rip him in half with the massive limb that wrapped all the way around James’ armored thigh, the umbral went a different direction.
It threw him.
James had already been defenestrated once by this jerk, but he was pretty confident that it couldn’t happen again out here in the open of the home’s spacious garden. And in the middle of combat, he didn’t really have time to be that disappointed when it did anyway. The umbral not fully letting go of James as he ‘flung’ the human, and instead following behind him, and suddenly…
They were elsewhere.
He hit ground that felt like spongy loam, a thick covering of vibrant green moss brushing against his skin as he pushed himself out of the umbral’s loose grip and rolled to his feet. James sucked in breaths as he took in the scene; they were nowhere. Which was to say, there was nothing, except what there was.
They stood in a twenty foot wide circle of soft earth and moss. A small wooden hall jutted off of it like a spoke, leading to an antique bookshelf with an empty terrarium sitting on it. Another spoke of a hall, this one with one single bare metal wall next to it, went to a right turn leading into the void and a corkboard at the end with a couple pieces of paper pinned up. There was a hole in the loam too, with what seemed to be a spiral staircase heading downward.
Everything else was nothing. Not just dark or empty black, but nothing. There wasn’t anything else out there, only this strange space and the things that he and the umbral had brought in.
Like the statuary that the umbral was trying to hit him with.
”Oh I hate this!” Zhu declared as James ducked under the stone otter that had been yanked out of the garden and was now being swung at their collective form. “Nothing goes here! This is worse than a dungeon!”
”Complain… later!” James grunted as he fought. He was low on options, and since talking wasn’t working and fighting nonlethally wasn’t going anywhere except getting him turned into a walking bruise, he needed a new plan.
He wished he had one of those emergency exit green orbs on him right now. This would be the place to use it. But he didn’t; instead he had Climb spells he was getting apprehensive about using safely, Garden spells he was running out of, and a gun that was better used as a club than a firearm if he wanted to resolve this peacefully. And he did, though he wasn’t going to die to do it.
”No one here to save you.” The umbral announced, advancing on James with their own makeshift club, the patchwork body armor draped over their shadowy form colorful in the permanent perfect lighting of this space. “No one here for you to hurt!”
Zhu’s feathers unfolded across James in an orange carpet. “Hey let’s make a pact. If either of us ever start talking like that, we remind each other we’re not the fucking protagonist, okay?”
”I like that.” James said, still catching his breath.
The umbral also seemed to be taking a breather, resting before the next attack. ”I am going to eat your bones.” They threatened James.
James didn’t actually believe that, and he didn’t believe it to the point that he casually fired off his absorbed red orb for checking people’s diets to verify. The umbral didn’t eat human bones, but also, they didn’t eat enough, and were malnourished. If this was malnourished James was worried about what one at full power would be; it was like considering that a gorilla was as strong as it was without protein supplements and a weightlifting regimen. Horrifying.
Also the umbral was right. He didn’t have help here, and this space wasn’t where the fight was going to end. So he needed to get out. And the exit, while pretty obvious, was the translucent gap between here and solid ground on Earth that was behind the umbral.
Covertly, James applied one of his charges of Separate Alloy. And he made sure to let Zhu feel what he was doing.
Then he unslung the little assault weapon, and tossed it off to the side, closer to the umbral’s side of the mossy loam than his own. “How about…” he said, playing up his gasps for air, “you put down your statue and I put down my rifle and we try to kill each other like civilized people?”
”Oh I really hate this idea.” Zhu added for flavor.
The umbral didn’t drop the statue, because it didn’t need to, but it did, a second after James finished speaking, lunge for the rifle. Its patchwork armor hitting the ground of its personal demiplane as its upper tendrils reached for the firearm and the whole creature twisted its body around to aim at James’ back. His back, because he had started sprinting as soon as the opening presented itself; enhanced speed flinging James across the space he’d been thrown into, and back out into fresh night air before he got shot from behind.
Not that he would get shot from behind. The gun currently lacked a lot of important internal parts, just in case. But he did hear the umbral screaming in anger just before he slipped through the bubble in space and into the normal world, the yell cut off behind him as soon as he was out.
”James!” Alanna’s yell of his name drew his attention as his partner’s own fight spilled over onto his. When she hit an umbral, they went down; James was a little jealous of it really. “Spire, here!”
The umbral James had been dueling fell out of the breach in space behind him, and had rapidly staggered over to where he’d thrown his own rifle into the dirt. And it almost collected it, before Spire whipped out of the night. She moved through the air, putting a really stupid trick she’d been working on with the original leveler greave to work. The ‘kick’ ability didn’t quite know what to do with a camraconda, but if she made sure to line her body up in a loose circle, she could turn herself into an almost accurate frisbee for about six seconds.
At the speed the magic item moved her, six seconds was more than enough.
Two hundred and twenty pounds of camraconda hit the back of the solidified patch of upright shadow. Spire’s ‘kick’ impacted her powerful dexterous body against the umbral and she flexed like a spring to bounce off, pushing a few feet away before retriggering the greave and slamming into the now staggered figure again.
Then Spire-Cast-Behind made it worse for them by coiling herself tight around it. Every muscle in her body straining as she crushed the foe’s arms against its sides, ignoring the sudden panicked flailing of her target as she kept cool, and leaned herself forward. Riding the umbral like a falling rock toward the ground, where she locked her gaze onto it as soon as the rifle slipped from its tendril.
”Everybody stops now.” Spire commanded loud enough that James was pretty sure the people back in the house still heard her. Hell, he wouldn’t be surprised if the evacuated civilians, teleported some distance away, had heard her.
”W-what is this?” One of the stunned umbral that were rapidly surrounding them now said. The shadow person sounded out of breath somehow, their static laced voice warping as they panted. “What are you?”
Others moved in, while Alanna helped James to his feet, the two of them moving to flank Spire in case she needed help. There were at least twenty umbral surrounding them now, and more were arriving. The flickering solidity of their summer’s shade bodies was easy to make out in the light, even if the details became obscured.
”I am a camraconda.” Spire said patiently, arching her body so that even though she kept her lens focused on the more dangerous target she was wrapped around. “I am a paladin of the Order of Endless Rooms. I am here to help you.”
”You’re like us! Why are you with the gatekeepers?!” An umbral stepped forward, several of its upper tendrils bent down to clasp an old revolver that it had pointed their direction.
”They aren’t gatekeepers. None of us are. All the gatekeepers we have found have been disabled or slain.” Spire announced, as what seemed like the entire group of the umbral here massed around them. Shadows bending and twisting in unfamiliar organic ways as they made a wall of bodies around the group; if an escape was needed, it would require teleporting in some way, because that was a lot of people who looked like they wanted to kill them.
An umbral somewhere gave a static laced yell of anger. “They have their tools! Their guns! Their shields!”
”I actually left the gun-“
”James.” Spire said flatly, and James stopped talking and jolted up, looking back toward her. “Take off your bracer.” He cocked an eyebrow at her, but still started to, before realizing Zhu was wrapped around the more accessible one and switching to his left arm. Unclasping the ergonomically modified piece of dungeontech, James held it up with a quizzical expression. “Toss it to them.” He did as commended, and then, Spire tilted to half-stare at the umbral who had spoken. “Put it on.”
The sound of hissing static whispers died down. ”…what?” The singled out umbral asked, like they’d just been slapped.
”Become a gatekeeper. That is all it requires, yes?”
Leaning over and elbowing James with a little too much force, Alanna whispered at him just loud enough that some of the umbral probably heard, “You are never allowed to teach people how to make dramatic gestures again.”
”Too late.” James whispered back, Zhu shaking in laughter on his arm.
Some of the umbral weren’t convinced. “You were with them!” One yelled. “Seen with the enemy, and their pawns!”
”Yeah.” James stepped forward, a hurt frown forming on his face as the umbral flinched back from him. “…Yeah. Sorry. We only learned recently that the gatekeepers had pawns. Had other victims besides you. I was trying to get to the bottom of things, and you guys were… difficult to approach.” James admitted. He was raising his voice to be heard, but not to shout over them, just enough to not be drowned by the murmurs and whispers in the crowd.
For Alanna, it was a little unsettling to have a crowd of this side surrounding her. Especially one where she could feel the simmering hot anger. But, fuck, she had to hand it to James and Spire. When those two wanted to, they could make a point.
”What… what do you want?” One of the umbral asked, and was quickly dragged back by the others.
”No!” One of them buzzed. “What now? You want things to go back to how they were?”
There was an enraged stir at that statement, and James cut it off instantly. “Absolutely not. Are you insane?” He laughed, and the simple boldness of it silenced a lot of them.
Spire picked up where he’d left off. “We are only here because how things were was so horrible, that a group of people two thousand miles away came to know about it.” She reminded them. “We are here to put an end to the evil that has been done.”
”And as for what comes after that…” James trailed off, and shrugged, ignoring Zhu’s squawk of indignation as he accidentally poked one of the navigator’s eyes on his shoulder. “People need to talk. We need a solution to this. Not just killing a city full of oblivious civilians. How was that gonna work, anyway?” James raised his eyebrows and swept his sight over the crowd.
One of them tapped their way forward on thin legs. “The… the box.” They pointed with one of their central arms, unfurling their shadowy form like a flower, slimmer than most of the others James had seen so far. “It’s his. The fire won’t stop until a building is destroyed.” The umbral paused, then added quietly, “There are ways. We could make six, seven of them a day. The plan was… the plan was to scour this city. Until everyone left us alone.”
A structure fire in a box. James hid his terror of the damage something like that could inflict.
Alanna felt it though. She also felt the confused chill the umbral was experiencing. “You were going to kill a lot of people.” She stated bluntly.
”They were going to kill us first.” One of them shouted.
”Or… we thought… we thought that humans were…” Another gave voice to the confusion. They had thought that humanity was an all or nothing sort of deal. “Monsters.” They said, the sad word slightly hard to hear over the sound of part of one of the mansion’s windows falling outward with a crunch of glass behind them.
James took a long breath, smelling the earthy air of the garden and the acrid tang of gunfire, as well as some of his own blood. His face was bleeding, he realized; he must have gotten cut by some of the tendrils when he’d been grappling, and not noticed. “Is there anyone here who represents you? It’s okay if we include everyone, but it’s hard to talk to all of you like this right now.”
Several of the umbral pointed. “Of course they are.” Spire said, irritated that she had to carefully unwind from the one she had pinned. “Alanna. The flame please.” Alanna grabbed the metal case and closed it back up around the terrarium inside that held the incredibly risky fire. Spire untensed her body, letting the loop of her form drop away from the umbral, as she let her gaze drop.
“It’s too late.” Was the first angry thing the shadow grated out.
”It’s never too late.” James said calmly. “Not until someone is dead. And none of you are. Everyone who died tonight was probably because of me, and they were all gatekeepers so I have minimal sympathy.”
”You can’t fix this.” The umbral said with pain in their voice, colored eyes opening to look up at James from where Spire was still half sitting on their body. “It’s too late for talking, it’s too late to be friends.” The shadow person’s voice, inhuman as it was, still sounded like it was halfway over the edge of sobbing. “Two years. Two years of killing each other, of being enslaved, of being treated like… like…” they didn’t even have a word. “I’m going to kill you.” They mewled.
Behind James, Alanna took a step back, her throat tight. The umbral as a whole were rightfully angry and hurt, but this one was almost insensate with it. The emotion overrode all rational thought. There was just pain, and the twisted need to lash out.
Which, sadly, ironically, everyone in the Order had dealt with before.
James knelt down in front of the umbral. Not on one knee, not ready to move again, but folding himself down into a kneeling position with his hands on his legs and Zhu’s own talons folded over his own fingers. “I don’t have a way to undo that.” James said honestly, wishing it weren’t true. “I don’t have a way to suddenly make it all okay. But… it’s not over. Nothing’s over. Come inside. Sit down. Talk to people. I swear I’ll make fucking sure this never happens to you again.”
”You can’t.” The umbral really was crying now, balling itself up as Spire eased off even more, giving them back a full range of motion that the didn’t really use. “What can you do? You’re just more… more humans with weapons. If being a threat worked, they never would have done this. What can you do!?”
The last word was a wail of anguish. And it rippled out across the other umbral around them in a wave, Alanna feeling their desperation and despair, but also their conviction openly displayed. They felt trapped. And they weren’t going to fucking stay trapped, one way or another.
She almost said something to her partner. Gave him a clue on what direction to take things. But James, honest blunt dumbass that he was, charged straight into that greatest fear the dungeon life surrounding them had, and just dive tackled it.
”Would you like to see?” James asked, quietly excited.
”What?” The umbral wasn’t sure they’d understood.
”What we can do.” Spire filled in from next to them, slithering around to James’ side and collapsing her mechanical arms. “What we’ve built.”
”Would you like to see it?” James asked again, holding out a hand. “I can show you. We can take a few people. It won’t take long, and we can come back afterward to… to whatever the resolution here is.”
”…this is a trap.”
”This is an invitation.” James said cheerfully. “It’s also sort of a trap, but not a violent one. It’s more that I think I can change your mind.” He stood up, still offering his hand, as Zhu rapidly rustled in his coat for a telepad that had survived the fight intact. James glanced around at the others. “Kind of short notice for everyone else, but maybe, like, five or six people? I can show you. I can show you what a world looks like where we all get through this.”
”And if I still don’t believe you?” The umbral asked
”Then honestly I don’t know.” James said, shoulders slumping slightly. “I don’t know if we fight until one of us is dead, or what. I’d rather just never find out.”
The umbral stared at him with its colored ring eyes. “I tried to kill you.” It reminded James.
”Oh, yeah, that’s a huge problem for me. None of my friends have ever tried to kill me.” He said.
Zhu prodded him with the end of the telepad. “El literally shot-“
”I’m being sarcastic don’t ruin my moment!”
”…you aren’t what I expected.” The umbral said. “You aren’t… you really aren’t one of them?”
James sighed. “I’m not sure what I am. But I’m not a gatekeeper, or an overseer, or some other Status Quo offshoot. I never will be. I swear.”
The umbral made a decision surprisingly quickly, but it moved slowly like it was bruised and battered as it unfolded one of its arms, the other one pushing its form off the barkdust, to take James’ hand. “I need to see what makes you so certain.” It declared. At the words, several of the other umbral pushed forward, others that were more curious than beaten down, or more suspicious than afraid. It didn’t matter which. James took the first seven, keeping some room on the expanded telepad roster.
”Hey.” He told Alanna, somehow keeping himself stable as all the adrenaline left his body at once with a bitter tang. “I’m gonna duck into Townton for a minute. You okay here?”
She kissed him on the cheek, leaving a small print of blood from a cracked lip. “Don’t fuck it up. Also the shields have the squos secure. Go. The rest of us can have a nice chat here. And keep things from getting frantic.”
“Alright.” James looked around at the umbral as he directed his guests to lock hands. “We’ll be back in an hour. Please don’t riot until then.”
And then he pulled the telepad, and went to show them a future.
There is a discord! Come hang out with us.
There is a wiki! It's starting to become helpful.
