"Unlike me, many of you have accepted the situation of your imprisonment, and will die here like rotten cabbages." -Number 6, The Prisoner-
_____
“Would it have saved time to just come to you first?” James asked the soldier of Harlan’s Wolfpack as he stood leaning by the door of their cabin.
The cabin itself was smaller than the others, and noticeably less warm. James added a question to the ongoing list, reminding himself to figure out if the fact that this building somehow paid salaries ‘cost’ a lot of the magic that would otherwise make it worth living in.
There were several of the mercenaries in here. Blank faced, going through weapon maintenance or eating or reviewing surveillance footage with mechanical motions. One of them was talking to James, the wiry man equally unconcerned as he sat in a chair and didn’t bother inviting James to sit with him, just letting the paladin stand by the door. He’d introduced himself to James as ‘Jackalope’, and James more or less just accepted that at face value. He worked with a Thermoclese. Jackalope was overtly normal in comparison.
”No.” The mercenary said. “You aren’t a legitimate Priority Earth member. Our contract says we don’t share information.”
”I might have joined honestly.” James tried, using the enforced lack of feeling to mask his lack of sincerity.
Jackalope met his eyes in a flat stare. “You didn’t.” He said with his smoothly pleasant voice. “But you are on the Wolfpack’s preferred contact list.”
”Right. So a conversation before you either expose me or throw me out.” James paused. “Or shoot me?”
”We wouldn’t need to shoot you.” Jackalope reassured him.
Or at least, James chose to take it as reassurance. “How’d you recognize me, anyway?”
”Some of us were recently deployed to Springfield on an emergency assignment. You were there, and we haven’t had enough seed rounds to store away everything yet.” Jackalope’s casual answer would have made normal-James wince. Being that cavalier with your own memories couldn’t be healthy. “You’ve been asking questions around this station.”
James didn’t even bother to shrug. “There’s a lot of questions to ask.” He replied.
“Orders are to stay out of your way, unless it conflicts with the contract.” Jackalope said, as bluntly as everything was said around here. “We will not share confidential information. But we will answer anything related to Wolfpack operations, that doesn’t compromise us.”
His eyes met James, as the suddenly point of this meeting came into focus, and James realized that he could just… ask anything. He had been prepared for some maneuvering, but if he could just be direct, then there was no reason not to. If he’d been feeling more like normal, he might have had some anxiety that this was a trap. Worked around it a little bit, at least. And logically he realized that was an option, but James mostly just found it interesting how his behavior changed.
He also found the direct approach easier, feelings or not. “Do you help with moving the camp? The buildings, I mean.”
”No. And we won’t disclose information on that.”
”What’s your current primary role?”
”Defensive. And I won’t say more than that.”
”Figured.” James appreciated the directness in return. “Are you involved in planning attacks? No, nevermind. That’s privileged info, huh?” Jackalope nodded once, and James went back to thinking. In a way, this was easier, but he realized that the trap here was that he was entirely exposed, and his interview subject knew exactly what he actually wanted, which would change what got answered. He decided to just cut to the one remaining question that he had, and see what would happen. “What happened that caused Priority Earth to self-destruct? Can you tell me that?”
”Yes.” Jackalope stated. “And I can tell you why. Our current contract with Priority Earth is a separate contract, and we recognize the current Priority Earth as a distinct entity from our previous employer, even if it’s the same people.”
”…So something… changed?” James felt like he needed context. Badly.
Jackalope gave one of those singular nods. “The lack of feeling started.” Jackalope said. “Most people find it uncomfortable. For our employers, it caused a personal crisis. The no-longer-extant Priority Earth had, before our employment with them, been the targets of a mental attack. The ones here are the survivors, because they killed the others.”
James had already started to put some of this together, but confirmation helped. ”So once they couldn’t feel the way they were made to feel, they realized intellectually what had happened?”
”Correct. The new organization has a different goal - which won’t be shared so don’t ask - and our own unit was brought back to Wolfpack standard levels of operation. Our notes say we have you to thank for that, too.” Jackalope gave James a professional incline of his chin. “We have no issues operating under these conditions, so the new contract was accepted.”
Shaking his head, James rubbed at the side of his face as he tried to work through the various facts. “So you’re not responsible for the memeplex. Or the original violence. As far as you know.” Jackalope’s grin in reply to that held exactly no amusement, which seemed apt. “I don’t even know what else to ask here. What are you doing in all this?”
”Making money.” Jackalope stated. “Developing some skills. Stockpiling memories of this place. The Wolfpack isn’t that much different than your own operations, as far as our notes say.”
”Oh I doubt that very much.” James shook his head. At some point he’d need to determine exactly how an enchantment on a building produced payment. Did it just put money in their bank account? Did it make physical bills? Did it care about inflation? So far, he was pretty sure, no dungeon had given a single solitary shit about inflation. “So nothing I’m doing interferes with your contract with Priority Earth?”
”Well.” Jackalope shrugged. “No.”
”…That’s ominous even through the veil.” James squinted at him, trying to pick out any kind of clue just from how the grey-clad mercenary looked. “No, you said that like you’re trying to talk around something. I’m not interfering… am I supposed to be here?” James felt a twist of motion from Zhu; he was not ‘supposed to be here’ in a physical sense, at least.
Jackalope confirmed that. “You’re not required. But you also aren’t an obstacle to their plans. Which is why the Wolfpack has decided on non-interference with you.”
That sounded an awful lot like James had been designated, against his will, as some form of harbinger for whatever plans were going on here. He didn’t say that though.
Instead, what he said was, “Thank you for clearing that up for me.” And then shifted to place a hand on the cast iron of the door’s handle. “I’m gonna go do something possibly stupid. That’s not gonna be a problem, is it?” James asked.
”Not likely.” The Wolfpack soldier answered.
”Cool.” James let himself out.
_____
The dark afternoon was cold, but at least the wind had stopped making it feel like it was twenty below. James enjoyed feeling a little bit like a wraith as he slipped through the unwatched paths and toward one of the cabins.
Most everyone in the camp was inside, but specifically inside the bigger meeting hall. The sleeping cabins, even as large as they were, were pretty much empty of anyone who wasn’t actually sleeping. Which made his current activity of rummaging around their storerooms a lot easier.
This was his third target so far since his little conversation with the Wolfpack. And James didn’t quite know why he was still doing this. Priority Earth weren’t an existential threat to life on this planet, they weren’t a threat to the Order, and honestly, he didn’t really care if they were a threat to American hegemony. Not just emotionally, but he didn’t care on a logical level.
What they were, James had determined, was a kind of walking wounded. Maybe not victims, exactly; they’d been combatants of a sort, and might still be at that. But they were hurt, and they weren’t hurting anyone else right now. By all accounts, he should convene with JP and the other rogues, send Earl and Buddy a gift basket as an apology for the trouble the Order had probably caused, and then dust off their hands and go do something else.
But he wasn’t doing that. He was, almost on automatic, sneaking into another storeroom and looking through crates and bins for a blueprint.
There was a logic behind his actions. Partly it was that Zhu was keeping him ‘on task’, so that was what he was doing. But also, James had a desire to not just ignore things that crossed his path, but resolve them. And he couldn’t really resolve Priority Earth while he was feeling like this. He could just leave, but then he wouldn’t be in the camp and capable of talking to or challenging anyone. Also he just did not trust the FBI agents to do anything useful. If Debt was here, that meant DeKay was here somewhere too, and while no one had aimed a gun at him recently, he felt like that would change if she saw him.
So James had an outline of a plan. Find the source of the emotional dampening, turn it off, and then, when they weren’t able to hide behind the wall of apathy, have an actual conversation with the Priority Earth members who weren’t new. Figure out what they actually wanted, what their long term goals were, and, most importantly, if they’d be willing to work with the Order directly.
The door to the storeroom was easy to get into, because it recognized him as Priority Earth, even if James knew that wasn’t quite true. Fortunately, this one didn’t have a corpse in it, but with the fact that it wasn’t covered in dust, he was pretty sure that the reformed group wasn’t stopped by whatever weird antimemetics were layered on some of the doors anymore.
The storeroom wasn’t packed, but it was definitely in use. Boxes full of cold weather gear, personal effects, and one that contained a bunch of metal oddities that James suspected were dungeon-created objects. Possibly metal that didn’t exist on Earth, or in reality. But they didn’t feel magical, and he also actually wasn’t here to steal from these people. More and more, the currently dominant rational part of his brain just kept circling back to the fact that there was no conflict with Priority Earth. And that meant there was no justification nor reason to rob them.
It didn’t take long to find a heavy wooden chest, rustic on the outside but containing cushioning foam and a supply of desiccants in its interior, that held what James was looking for. He’d found several other blueprints so far, the things clearly having been split up for what was likely safety. And he’d gotten a chance to look closely enough at them to see that while they often had common options like electricity or security, a couple had bizarre choices. One of the cabins had an ink dial on it, set to zero with a sticky note taped over it, that was just labeled as hands.
It was, James admitted, probably for the best that he couldn’t feel that much curiosity. Because if he could, he would have touched that dial.
This blueprint, rolled up and secured in its hard metal tube, was different from the others. Different paper, different color, and different function as well. The others were all clearly blueprints, for single structures. This one, though, James could see instantly as he unrolled it while kneeling in the dark storeroom with only a pen light between his teeth to see, was for an area. Laid out like a map of a development or complex, it depicted what was clearly the camp itself. All the cabins, the designated places for paths and fencing and parking, even the little sheds for storing tools or weapons, all of it.
James had figured the blueprints were that dungeon’s version of green orbs. But he was thinking, now, that maybe this was the green. Something that could blanket an area, not just a single construction. Maybe it wasn’t a good comparison.
His eyes, mostly the one with biologically enhanced night vision, scanned the page. There was a kind of layered rectangular sigil that seemed to be an indication of the page’s maximum power, the design’s maximum power, and what was actually generated based on how well everything was placed. The fourth part of it, presumably what was available, was empty. All of it being used by one of the three effects.
Two of the effects, ‘collective mobility’ and ‘practice conversion’, were set to zero. They also had, to James’ mild surprise, full descriptions of what they did in that absurdly tiny text underneath them. All the other blueprints had too, even the one marked ‘hands’ had said what it did, it was just so small and dense that he hadn’t taken the time to read through them all while he was skulking. James had figured that maybe if this page was different, it would break that rule too, but nope.
Collective mobility was exactly what he thought it was. The ability to shift the relative geographical position of the designated area, allowing for a charge to be built up that would then be consumed to convert as much of the camp as possible into temporary smaller versions of themself, which would regrow to full size when placed somewhere new. Building miniaturization. It sounded like the least practical way to move a structure, just because if you were delayed, then you were going to have a random cabin sitting in the middle of a rural highway, and the camp itself would no longer be generating power to charge up the map to do that again. The description actually had a lot of hard numbers in it, and the more James read, the more he realized that it was not just a small paragraph; it was a non-Euclidean text. Like the menu for the Officium Mundi vending machines, the more he read, the farther he ‘scrolled’, without actually covering any distance.
He stopped himself from reading the other one. He could get to that later. The important thing was that he had the magical document that was causing the broader effect. Quelling wave. The description also used hard numbers, seeming to measure the human frequency that emotions came and went, but it was exactly what James figured it was. It was also turned all the way up, consuming all the available magic that the camp generated to this map.
And the second important thing was that, finally, someone was aiming a gun at him.
James didn’t look up from where he was kneeling. “Hello there Buddy.” He said around the pen light in his teeth.
”Wally.” The old ecoterrorist pointing a matte black assault rifle at James said politely. “Didn’t think it’d be you in here.”
”Because you figured I’d be smarter than that, or because you figured it would be someone else?” James kinda wanted to know what the man’s estimation of him was.
The man didn’t answer, instead just stepping closer, the gun held at his hip wavering slightly as he pointed it in James’ direction. “I can’t let you take that.”
”I’m not stealing it.” James said, standing up slowly. “I’m just using it for a second.”
”That either.” The man said unwaveringly.
So James tried to make him waver. Or at least get him thinking, which was kind of the equivalent under the present conditions. “Buddy,” the name sounded wrong to James; even if it was this man’s name, saying it was weird, because that word was supposed to be reserved for people he was actively dating, “what is it that you want?” James asked.
“For you to put the magic scroll back.” Buddy didn’t sound amused.
”Long term. Work with me here.” James prompted. “What do you want the world to look like?”
Buddy hesitated, before giving an actual answer. Though his unprofessional grip on the rifle didn’t actually waver. “Clean.” He said. “Alive. Like something that will last. Where we never have to question if the five hundred year old trees will get cut down to make a house that gets bulldozed next year.” A sliver of passion crept into his voice as he spoke about the natural world.
James adjusted his mouth into a thin smile. “Not a bad vision. How are you going to get there? Where does Priority Earth fit in this world?”
”…They can fight for it.” Buddy said quietly. “Even if we never win, we have to fight for it.”
There was what James was waiting for. “They.” He reiterated. “Not we, not you. I saw it last night. You and Earl, you’ve given up, haven’t you?”
”No.” Came the flat reply. “We’re doing the right thing. Not that it matters to you.”
”Try me.” James prompted in return. “Tell me about it.”
The man appraised him, standing there in the storeroom with only the light from the hall casting them both in shadows. “Fine.” Buddy said eventually, still not lowering the gun. “We’re the old guard, most of us here. But you might notice that we’ve been trying to revitalize.”
”Recruiting.” James nodded. “Which, now that I think about it, must take a pretty strong mind. For someone to leave here and then want to come back. Or… the other way around, isn’t it? To be willing to leave at all?” He searched Buddy’s face for the signs of remorse or guilt, and was surprised to find a little of it even through the dampening. “You’re like the Wolfpack. You like it here, because it lets you forget.”
The reply came back harsh and sudden. ”Not forget.” The armed man said sharply. “It doesn’t make us forget. It makes us not feel. There’s a difference.”
”Which is?” James felt like he knew, but he wanted to hear it.
”Difference is, we know what happened.” Buddy’s voice stabilized at a flat plateau of emotionless explanation. “We know, intellectually, that it wasn’t our fault, that we were fucked over. But it doesn’t change that if we leave, we feel all of it.”
James nodded. “All of the fact that you killed your friends.” He said as gently as he could, red orbs working to let him have a flexible amount of empathy despite the situation. “And worse, I assume.”
”It turned us into monsters.” Buddy said. “You know how hard it is to relearn how to not be racist from first principles?” The words, combined with his rural southerner accent, made James almost bark out a laugh, again through the haze of the field. “Maybe you do. Maybe you’re working on it right now. It doesn’t matter. You’re missing the important part.”
”I don’t think so.” James shook his head as he stepped sideways to sit part of his ass on the edge of a shelf. “I think I get what’s going on. You’re guilty, you know you feel guilty, so you’re trying to… recycle. You’re recruiting new people, retaining the Wolfpack unit, keeping the magic going, so that you can hand the reins to someone else. I don’t know what you plan to do with yourself, any of your old guard, but I don’t think it’s good.”
Buddy’s appraisal of James shifted. “That’s… pretty good, I’ll admit it.”
”I’ve been asking questions. And no one here has any resistance to basic polite manners.” James informed him.
The look the Priority Earth founder gave him would have been withering if James cared. “That’s the stupidest damn thing I’ve heard today, and you just tried to tell me you aren’t stealing the priceless magical paper you’re holding.”
”Okay, fine, they might also all be trying to self-destruct, lowering their inhibitions when it comes to questioning.” James admitted, flicking his eyes to look past Buddy and out into the hallway. “The fact that Edgar just let me walk in here after a two minute conversation in a parking lot does not say a lot for your security. The fact that he got two other spies recruited with me is much worse.” James stared into the eyes of the man still deciding whether or not to shoot him. “I’m just saying, it’s not like anyone’s tried to stop me so far.”
”Except me.” Buddy pointed out, his free hand indicating his rifle.
James looked down at the gun, then back at the man, his mind switching two of his shield bracers to the correct bullet type just in case. “Except you. And I don’t think you’re going to shoot me.” James told him.
It wasn’t exactly a spur of the moment decision. But James had come to a conclusion. A mix of Zhu’s prompting that he sort this mess out keeping him on task, the way he could be detached and professional here with utter clarity, and also the ongoing development of the Order’s philosophy, had led him to a conclusion that he might have been surprised by even a couple years back.
These people weren’t their enemy. Not really.
They were dangerous, they needed to be better, but they weren’t evil. Not right now. The Order, he, could take vengeance if he wanted to. For the people who had been killed, for the attempt on Yin’s life, for the damage done in New York, for essentially kidnapping their new recruits, for any number of things. But vengeance didn’t solve problems. And James was, as a paladin, bound by his own sense of duty to solve problems.
Priority Earth didn’t need to be wiped out. They didn’t even need to be stopped, exactly. What they needed was to be channeled. Their constructive wants put to use building a better tomorrow, and their destructive pasts treated as they should be. As trauma to be healed from.
James knew, as he scoured his own list of thoughts about Priority Earth, that he would likely feel ashamed later for having at one point essentially sold their location to the FBI in exchange for maybe looting the magic these people had. It had been a childish attempt to treat a problem as a combat situation when what was needed was words.
But he was here now. Ready to talk, and to hope that he could still be listened to.
”Why not?” The man asked, wondering how James was so sure he wasn’t about to get gunned down.
”Because I’m going to give you what you want.” James said openly, spreading his hands, the map hanging loosely in his grip.
That caught him off guard. “What?” The gun’s barrel dipped down, and the nagging sensation in James’ mind that he was being aimed at faded. “How?”
”Not by killing you.” James got that out of the way before some kind of comic misunderstanding happened. “No. I’m going to offer you a way to work toward the world you want. Probably with a little less killing, but… well, I see your vision. I appreciate it, even if I don’t feel it. I think your perspective would be valuable. And I think, no matter what has happened, that people deserve another chance.”
”You get that we’re way past second chance territory here, right?” Buddy pushed him.
James shrugged. “I didn’t say a second chance. I said a chance. Everyone, always, deserves a chance.” He started walking for the door, and the man blocking it, rising off his uncomfortable seat. “At least that’s what I believe, and I can keep believing it here, because it’s been working out for me so far. Plus, you’re far from the shittiest people I’ve met, even if at one point you did try to blow up one of my friends. Now, you’re going to want details, and your voice would be really helpful, so do you wanna help me gather people up so I can make a collective offer?”
”I… don’t know.” Buddy hesitated, moving aside to let James pass. “I know what happens when you mess with that magic. I know I don’t want to feel that. Can you make your offer and keep that in place for us?”
”No.” James said with that raw honesty this place brought out. “Because I cannot trust myself like this. And I need to know if you’ll say yes when you can feel, because the offer would probably have you moving again. And not to a place like this.”
Buddy looked like he was considering shooting James again just to be expedient about this. “Not sure I like that.” He said. “But.” The word was a punctuating statement. “But. Well hell. Said it before, didn’t I? You seem like a good guy.” He made to follow James, before adding one last thing. “But man, I am tired. And even when it feels like nothing, half the time I’m just waiting for everything to end.”
”Yeah, that’s why I’m on antidepressants.” James stated. “It’s healthier than what you have going on.”
Buddy shook his head. ”You don’t understand.”
”You have no idea what I understand.” James said, perfectly calm despite the fact that he knew what he would have felt if someone said that to him normally. “Hm. It’s weird to not get angry. Kinda like that. Anyway, come on. Let’s figure out who wants to build a utopia instead of committing elaborate suicide.” He walked through the cabin, nodding to a couple people they passed in the hall while Buddy started talking to the other Priority Earth members in a low voice. “Hey, actually, do you have any blank blueprints?” James asked as he waited by the door for the man to get layers of coats and snow boots.
”A couple. You can’t just have them, no matter what your offer is.”
”My offer is to make duplicates of them. How do they handle being folded?” James asked.
Buddy took the information in stride, like someone who was all too used to magic having bizarre interactions. “Badly. But not too badly.” He opened the door into the blackened and snow covered early evening, freezing air flooding the entryway of the cabin before the blueprint magic fought it back. “Come on. Let’s get this over with.” He said, stepping into the polar night.
James followed. Calculating if he was making a good choice here, but also, not too worried even if he wasn’t.
Which was probably not good. He needed to wrap this up and get out of here before he lost his emotional perspective entirely.
_____
The collective membership of Priority Earth was smaller than James thought.
Throughout his exploration of their camp, he’d sort of assumed that they were about forty, maybe fifty people. Plus Wolfpack, plus new recruits. The assumption was sort of built out of the fact that he’d realized the cabins had more rooms than they should, and while it was hard to make estimates with things that worked like orange totems in play, his rough guess was that the camp could probably sleep a hundred comfortably despite its small profile.
After Buddy kicked Earl awake, and calmly and rationally explained to the other founder what was going on, the two of them assigned the others in the cabin their own tasks and set out to gather the rest of Priority Earth in the main cabin, where James was waiting. And as people filed in from the snow and biting cold, then stopped filing in, James quickly came to the conclusion that he’d probably already spoken to half of what was left of Priority Earth.
Nineteen people, including the ones he sort of knew were new recruits. He didn’t count the probably-not-FBI, though they’d shown up too. James was unsure if he should have them thrown out, just because he felt they were more likely to be problems than solutions. They barely outnumbered the Wolfpack squad.
He got glanced at repeatedly as people entered. The zone prevented curiosity, but not thought, and they were all capable of assessment. James could see the gears turning as they made the connection. He was new. He had been asking questions. He had something to say.
Things were going to change.
It was clear that not everyone liked the deduction. But the members that had been on watch and armed still left their long guns in the rack by the door, and no one spoke to him or yelled. Instead, they just followed the directions they’d been given.
One more small thing clicked into place in James’ map of this situation. There were, he knew, constant gaps in things like guard patrols. And he had thought it was because the field just instituted apathy at an overwhelming level. But he could think, and so could they. Possibly better than him, since they had experience. So that made it likely that the gaps were… intentional. Vulnerabilities left open, because many of these people were, overtly, trying to throw their lives away. Just in a more methodical and slow way than some suicides.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
”Thank you for gathering.” James said into the quiet interior of the cabin, the only noise coming from the whir of the big fridge in the kitchen and the soft popping and crackling of the fire set in the hearth. “I don’t know what Buddy or Earl have told you, so I’d like to start from the top. If anyone is new and doesn’t understand, this should explain things.” James saw some nods of acknowledgment, and continued. “I’m from another group, somewhat like yours. We focus on the future of the world, and using magic to get there.”
Someone raised a hand and didn’t wait before speaking. “Magic isn’t real.” The guy that was technically James’ bunkmate, and probably a new member, said.
”Incorrect.” James felt Zhu’s grin like a flash of sunlight across a wing mirror as the navigator blossomed out of his body and layered glowing orange feathers and eyes across most of James’ right side. “Any further questions?”
There were not. Acceptance came pretty quickly when you couldn’t go through the very human process of being terrified of the world being different than you expected. That was actually very convenient, James would need to remember that point about this effect.
”Alright. Quick refresher. Some of you are here because you joined recently, wanting to take direct action for environmental preservation. The rest of you are here because you believe you need to atone for things you did under duress. This group, Priority Earth, has taken no offensive action since New York roughly eight months ago. Correct?”
Earl, sitting near the front door with his fellow founding member, spoke up. “Not quite. We tried a couple disruptions on a logging operation. But it was hard when we left, and we didn’t do more than brick a few pieces of heavy machinery.”
”Good to know.” James nodded at him. He continued, pausing briefly to lock eyes with the spy who was currently hosting Debt, the man not even pretending to hide his alarm. “Regardless. I have an offer to make to you all. There-“
He was interrupted as the door was kicked open with a bang of the metal fixture hitting the wood of the cabin’s interior. The last member of Priority Earth. Hugh, who James hadn’t noticed hadn’t been in attendance coming bursting in revolver in hand. “That man is a traitor.” He calmly but forcefully spoke as he leveled his weapon.
Not at James though. At Chip, who actually looked like he’d gotten calmer now that someone was pointing a weapon at him. James understood that, he did the same thing sometimes.
It looked like a few people were about to start speaking, and James himself had a couple things he wanted to explain. But there was a calculating coldness in Hugh’s eyes; the man wasn’t here to try to expose the agent, or convince anyone he was correct. He was here to shoot Chip in the head and his words were entirely because he was giving a warning to the others about the gunfire he was currently pulling the trigger on.
James, also operating on that calculating logic, and also having a faster reaction time than anyone else in the room, dropped his hand to the map of the camp that he’d unrolled on the table he was standing at, and twisted a dial all the way to the left. Ink and magic alike realigning to his simple input, and changing the atmosphere in the room instantly.
For James, it wasn’t actually much of a change. He could feel again, but he wasn’t caught up in the stockpiled irritation at wasting time here, the grim curiosity at the situation Priority Earth had engineered, or even the mild tactical anxiety that he had no real way to deal with the Wolfpack unit if they decided to kill him. Instead, he was still himself, and in the moment, his main emotions were concern and maybe adrenaline, if that counted as an emotion. James had kind of hoped to do this with no one getting shot, and while his thoughts were now unshackled, that was still his primary goal, though the hope part was more at the forefront.
For the others… it was a bit more chaotic.
The newer recruits mostly just gasped and flailed as their stolen emotions flooded back. Some of them started yelling accusations, apparently not having been consulted on if they actually wanted to stay. Intellectually, they’d been fine with it, because most of the reasons to leave had been emotional ones. And now those reasons were restored.
For the older members, though? The ones that had been through the hell of having their minds altered and their actions puppeted? It was both worse and better.
Many of them just stopped moving, going still as their eyes flicked around the room or widened in shock. Some of them, like Edgar, who were used to going in and out of the effect, were less bothered by it. A couple started swearing, a few others began openly weeping.
One man, sitting next to where Hugh had hesitated in pulling the trigger, lunged to try to grab the man’s gun, his hand dragging the barrel over toward his own forehead as Hugh shouted in alarm and jerked backward. The big outdoorsman was a lot of things, suspicious being high on the list, but he also wasn’t an idiot, and he wasn’t evil. By the time his fellow preservationist was half-screaming his desire to be killed, Hugh had already flicked the safety on the gun, and jerked himself free.
It was actually fascinating to James - and he enjoyed being fascinated again - that the man who had managed suspicion and distrust and the willingness to kill under the effect that took away his emotions immediately stopped any hint of violence when he could feel again.
But the general chaos in the room was rapidly building. Voices, some of them shouts, were growing. Accusations were being made. And James decided it was time to jump in. “Hey!” He yelled out, and got only a few people focusing on him. “Your attention please!” He followed up, more of a directed shout this time, pulling air into his lungs and shaping the words not with magic but with the kind of measured bluntness that got a room’s attention.
To his surprise, it mostly worked. Though Hugh did point an outstretched hand at him. “You! You found it!”
”Yeah, it wasn’t hard.” James said bluntly. “Alright, everyone settle down. Take a minute if you need it. If we’re all not shooting each other - Beth don’t you fucking dare draw that gun - then we’ve got all the time we need.” James glared the agent down until she let go of her concealed weapon. “I know this is probably hard for a lot of you, and definitely confusing for the rest. So let me get this out of the way; I am here to cut through all the bullshit. I’m not here to order anyone what to do! But I have an offer, and also a kind of overt threat, and I think half of you will want to hear at least one of those.”
”You’re… you’re goin’ a little off script, my man.” Buddy said, composing himself roughly as he stood up and walked up to stand next to James. His eyes flicked down to Zhu, who blinked up at him. “Hey.” The man ventured.
”Hey. Weird day, huh?” Zhu replied.
Buddy shrugged. “Had weirder. Earl? Earl! Get your ass up here.” He waved his companion over. “Alright. This is… this is harder than I wanted it to be, but Wally here’s right. This is a long time coming.” He jerked a thumb at James, who felt like he should probably correct the false identity sooner rather than later.
Stumbling a bit and bumping one of the tables, Earl joined them. “Knew you were too comfortable with magic.” He grumbled as he stared at Zhu. “Bud, you sure?”
”No.” Buddy shrugged. “But what else are we supposed to do?” James felt like the words were some kind of old in joke within Priority Earth, because he saw a few flickers of smiles and nods as Buddy spoke the words. What followed though was filled with a despairing exhaustion. “Alright, listen up everyone. We might… have fucked up again. Wally says he’s got an option for us, and I… well he’s convincing. So let’s listen, and then we can figure out what we’re doing, alright?”
The people who had been here for a while gave the man respectful nods and murmurs of acknowledgement. Even some of the recruits did; the lack of emotion not stopping them from coming to understand Buddy and Earl as trustworthy men, even if the two of them might disagree.
James nodded and straightened his spine, tapping fingertips on the wooden table in front of him as he looked at the gathering. “Okay. Here’s the deal. My organization, my real organization, has a vested interest in the long term health of the planet. I want any of you who are willing to work with us, to develop plans for that future. Both of our groups have magic - sorry for anyone who just learned that, this is probably a challenge - and we want to leverage our combined abilities into things like building more eco-friendly cities, eliminating plastic waste, and vaporizing anyone who profits off of coal when there’s better options now. The details, we’ll have to work out, but basically… well. We want what you want. And I want to give it to you, with your help.”
”What about me?” One guy called. “I don’t even know why I’m still here! My head’s all fucked, and I wanna go home!” A couple other voices echoed the sentiment.
”Yeah, that’s kind of a sticking point.” James nodded. “I get the thought process that led to this, but some of you are kidnapping victims, so we’ll need to handle that. Anyone who wants to leave is coming with me, no questions asked, and that includes from the rest of you. Got it?”
”Wait, why are you giving us orders now?” Hugh asked, only half-joking, the humor covering up a tension that had flared up in the room.
James raised his eyebrows. “No, no, this is the threat part. Sorry, I didn’t make that clear.”
”Hah. Fair enough.” Hugh looked like he wasn’t even thinking about the gun he was still holding, which was good. He actually started laughing to himself, holding in silent heaves as the feeling of wry amusement crashed back into him after too long absent.
“No one needs to decide now.” James said. “Discuss it. If anyone wants to leave, we’ll be taking off pretty soon. If anyone is here for alternate reasons,” he gave a tight lipped stare at the two agents who had been pretty cavalier about wiping his memory, “then we’ll talk later. For everything else… there’s time.” James sighed. “You guys need help though.” He said honestly. “I understand something terrible happened to you. But you need therapy, and security. Not hiding in the tundra and waiting to die. You’re running from the consequences of something that wasn’t your fault. Please. Let us help you.”
”It seemed like a good idea at the time.” Buddy said, kind of sadly.
James shook his head. “I sort of doubt-“
He cut off as the door was thrown open again, a tall figure in cold weather gear rushing in out of the snow. His first thought was Wolfpack, but they continued to be absent from the meeting, as the woman who’d slammed her way into the building swept her gaze around the room. “James!” She yelled.
”…Alanna?” James raised his eyebrows. “Uh… hi? Why are you here?”
”I…” his partner faltered. “I’m gonna level with you buddy, I figured you’d be in here held at gunpoint.” Alanna relaxed, ignoring the fact that at least two startled Priority Earth members had briefly pointed weapons at her.
”You know her?” Buddy asked.
”We’re dating! It’s pretty nice.” James grinned, happy that he could just be simply happy about that. “Anyway, hi! No, I’m not in mortal peril this time. I decided to fix a problem by just talking to everyone and not shooting anything.”
Alanna frowned. “You?”
“Okay that’s hardly fair.” Zhu piped up. “James loves talking.”
”It’s true.” James nodded stoically.
”Also,” Earl added, not wanting to be left out of the conversation happening in his magically enhanced cabin, “we aren’t idiots here. I know we’re screwed up, and we keep screwing up. I’m guessing you found us cause we hurt you at some point, and… and I’m sorry.” He raised his chin. “But we’ve had a lot of time to think, isn’t that right?” Several of the people in the room nodded along with his words. “We’ll… we’ll talk.” He said, but extended a hand to James. “But we’ll probably say yes.”
James took the offered hand and shook it, Zhu pulling away a bit to give him space for the maneuver. “Thanks.” He said quietly. “Also, it’s James, not Wally.”
”Ah, so we did have a spy.” Earl gave an unsteady grin.
”Yeah. And now, I’m gonna take my girlfriend and your other spies and get out of here.” James said. “Who wants to come with us?”
To his surprise, the number was lower than he expected. Which was to say, it was no one. The people who had been recruited and then mentally trapped here… weren’t nearly as hostile about it as James would have been. Or maybe that was the point; they hadn’t felt trapped the whole time they were here. They certainly had thoughts about their time with Priority Earth, and from what he could tell, the exception the field had for experiencing joy at the nature of the living world had given many of them a newfound appreciation for things, but when it actually came time to leave, they all decided to take a few days to think and feel for themselves before deciding.
He spoke quietly with Earl and Buddy before leaving himself. Just giving them contact info, more concrete details on his promise, and the rundown on what the Order was like. They had so many questions, especially Earl, who talked like he was overdosing on a rush of curiosity. But James, while he could have talked all day, didn’t want to linger.
The camp, the longer he was in it now with the field turned off, felt more and more sickening to him. He had been someone else for a while. And while he could understand the motivation, and even see the use in it, it had been done without him knowing. And that sensation was very slimy, now that he could feel again.
The founders had ended their chat by not exactly apologizing, but they did give James one of the blank blueprints. He told them he’d return it, maybe a little creased, and could tell they didn’t believe him but were willing to part with it anyway. He suspected they still knew where the dungeon it came from was, and knew they had more tricks up their puffy coat sleeves. But even the tiny edge this represented could be massive when it came to the continued development of the Order’s presence in Townton.
The two non-FBI agents had been hesitant to follow him and Alanna, but Hugh had made it very clear they weren’t welcome, and the Wolfpack had been lurking nearby to remind everyone of the fact that Priority Earth still retained the services of an armed and vicious mercenary band. So they’d followed, griping about the extensive hike through a new wave of snow and wind, even if Alanna had found a little trick to get her authority to form a wedge in front of their group.
Partway back to the little mud and gravel parking spot where all the Priority Earth trucks were stashed, James realized there was another person moving with them. Ethan, he realized as the kid called a greeting, emerging from the darkness into the pool of light cast by their lights. He’d been lurking on the edge of the hill overlooking the camp, camouflaged and with a rifle, apparently ready to cover Alanna if anything went wrong. The stern role of sniper contrasted with his overly bubbly personality as he chatted with the two agents while they walked.
James’ legs ached by the time they got back, the effort of trudging back through snow harder than the trip out the other day. He slumped into the passenger seat of Alanna’s rental truck with relief, the others except for Ethan doing the same.
”Okay.” Alanna said. “Before we leave, is there anything I should know about? Like, we’re not gonna get back and you two are gonna get DeKay to shoot us, right?” She asked the agents.
”Oh shit, DeKay’s here?” James groaned. “I mean, I knew about Debt, but I didn’t think this far ahead.”
”How do you know Debt anyway?” The male agent asked him. “That’s not just classified, he’s impossible to learn about.”
”James and Debt go way back.” Alanna said coyly. “So what were you two doing here, anyway? I had assumed it was hunting James, but if not…”
”We don’t have to answer to you.” The woman said sharply, and her partner gave a tiny nod next to her in the back seat.
”Cool.” Alanna and James sighed in unison, and then shot each other happy smiles from across the center console of the vehicle. “It’s probably fine.” Alanna muttered to James. “They aren’t FBI, so their ability to mess with our new friends is probably small.”
”Got it.” He whispered back, settling back and letting the rumble of the engine and the bumps of the car’s chained tires going over the snowy roads lull him not to sleep exactly, but to a distant and mentally checked out state. Zhu and Alanna had a soft conversation, while Ethan engaged the agents in the back with his own slightly too-loud banter.
And James let himself drift off for a while.
_____
It was a novel experience to see a very literal version of a city’s sphere of influence. For most cities, it was a technical boundary that existed on a map, in zoning laws and bureaucratic definitions. The practical effects flowed from the arbitrary ones. For Fairbanks, caught in a snowstorm that had been sudden and dramatic even by the standards of somewhere this far north, it was much more physical, and it took the form of absence.
Wherever there was snow on the roads, Fairbanks hadn’t reached yet.
They passed by what James would almost define as a phalanx of snowplows on the forested highway, the city exerting its will out farther from its core as the sunless day wound on. Past them, the drive got noticeably smoother and safer, and when they started navigating the streets of Fairbanks through businesses and rows of single story homes, the roads were clear except for what had fallen since the plows had been by. All the snow turned into great mounds that dotted sidewalks and empty lots, some of the larger of them having been claimed by kids that were using them as forts or thrones as they ran around in the ongoing soft snow and glow of the streetlights.
“So. Where are we leaving you bozos?” James broke the uncomfortable silence that had fallen as Alanna drove them back, turning his eyes to watch the agents in the rearview mirror.
”Oh, same place we’re going.” Alanna jumped in. When James gave her a questioning look, she nodded morosely. “Yeah, they’re in the same hotel JP’s using. It’s a whole thing.”
”And you left JP there, with DeKay? They’re going to… something… each other.” James didn’t know what, exactly, but he didn’t like it either way.
Alanna snorted. “No, I sent JP back to the Lair to sleep, because the moron hasn’t been sleeping.”
”That checks out.” James gave a sad half grin out the window as he watched the streets pass.
”And Marlea’s there.” Alanna added. “Just keeping an eye on stuff.”
“Like our boss.” Chip said from the backseat. The two had been mostly quiet, even through Ethan’s barrage of enthusiastic nonsense, but they were clearly listening in. “You’re stalking us. And now you’re kidnapping us.”
Alanna rolled her eyes, getting the sarcasm out of her system before patiently answering. “We’re giving you a lift to your hotel. You can just get out now if you want.” They were, in fact, stopped at an intersection and waiting for a van to slowly navigate the slippery chunk of road, so that was true enough. Neither agent moved, though they did look like the idea of walking through the ongoing and once again escalating snowfall was unpleasant. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”
”Ah, give ‘em a break. They’ve had a hard day.” James said with amused fondness.
”That’s your fault.” Beth snapped at him. “We were in the middle of an investigation, and you-“
James flicked his hand over the shoulder of his seat. “Please. You know how I found you guys out? Someone from Priority Earth told me. Impressive job from Debt screening for the emotional effect, but when you’re the only person in a five mile radius who has facial expressions, you kinda give yourself away.”
Chip hid a wince. “Yeah that’s on me, the man’s got a point.” He admitted. “Can you please tell us why Debt’s terrified of you? He won’t even come out, and he loves showing off.”
Ethan decided to field that answer, much to James’ chagrin. “Oh, that’s easy! The paladin kicked his ass in the before times! And he was around with Tiff for a while, so he knows a little of what we can do! I guess…” he faltered as he noticed James running his hand over his face in the front seat. “I guess I should feel bad for him? I mean, it’s not his fault all his hosts are assholes. Or that he kept running into James. Or-“
”Thanks Ethan! Thanks… that’s… eh…” James sighed. “Sorry, yeah, you are right. Debt tried to kill me once.”
”…and?” Chip asked.
”And it didn’t work? I don’t know what you want from me here.” James chuckled as Alanna steered them into a much more treacherous hotel parking lot, the car leaving fresh tracks in the snow as she pulled them into a space near an elevated patio. “Come on. Let’s go say hi to your boss, and we can hopefully clear some stuff up before your partner shoots me.”
Both of the agents looked at each other with tight lipped expressions. ”We aren’t partners.” They said in unison, before swinging themselves out of their respective side doors in almost perfectly mirrored motions.
James and Alanna lingered in the car for a second as Ethan clambered out with his awkward energy, the delver laughing as he almost instantly slid three feet on some buried ice before recovering with a casual grace that came from his time on the Climb. “This is a mess.” Alanna said softly to her boyfriend. “Are you doing okay? Both of you.”
”I’m fine!” Zhu answered. “James isn’t.”
”I…” James closed his eyes, welcoming the darkness for a moment. “I’m… struggling to find the words.” He took a second, and Alanna patiently waited for him, her warm hand clasping around the back of his neck and massaging at his tense muscles. “Okay. So. They had this thing where no one in the area could feel anything. It wasn’t total, but it was a lot. And I could tell that it would, gradually, change the nature of who I was. But I didn’t care. I didn’t even really think about how that was happening, because it wasn’t relevant to the job at hand. And that scares me?” James leaned forward, Alanna reaching over with her other arm to rub his shoulders. “Partly I’m glad that this whole thing was simple. It feels like it took forever to get almost nowhere, and I’m mad at JP for not just doing this before. But I can’t tell if the anger is just more than it should be because… because I dunno, it’s rubber banding from not feeling anything at all?”
”Oh, don’t worry!” Alanna reassured him. “I, too, am pretty pissed at JP! He’s been working at this for months and it took you a day.” She paused. “I mean, not that I’m complaining about that part. Hey, you wanna go do something fun later? Since you have free time, and, you know, I love your dumb ass.”
James smiled so hard he almost started crying. “Love you too.” He murmured. “And sure. But we should go actually talk to McHarn. I get the feeling there’s another story here.” He sighed. “Also don’t be too hard on JP, maybe. The entire point of my job is that paladins take the stupid risks. And this was a stupid risk. I don’t think I’d have even considered it if we hadn’t had… uh… non-murder based contact with the Wolfpack recently.”
”Fair enough I guess.” Alanna looked out the windshield, already half covered in snow with its pebbled crystal formations turning the interior of the vehicle to patterned shadows. “You think your plan will work?”
”Plan is a strong word.” James muttered reflexively. “I dunno. Like, at the very least, I peacefully secured a magical blueprint that could, with our bullshit, change the world forever. And that’s cool! But also? I think… I think those guys are so fucking damaged after what they’ve done and what’s been done to them, that I have no idea. In my ideal scenario where we want an environmentalist point of view, we would hire a bunch of non-traumatized professionals with their own fields of study and passion.”
Alanna clicked her tongue. ”We did do that.” She reminded him.
”I know!” James threw his hands up, getting an amused flutter from Zhu as the infomorph flattened against the car’s roof. “We don’t actually need these guys. Or their magic, really. But… but I feel bad for them. And I’m worried that they’re going to say no, or just turn the field back on and go back to languishing, but… but…” he waved an arm around.
Alanna twisted her body across his seat, wrapping him in an awkward but tight hug. “It’s not your job to save everyone.” She reminded him. “But it’s hot that you’re trying.”
”Thanks. I think.” James laughed lightly with her. “But you’re right, a bit. I have no idea if this’ll work out.”
”Eh.” Alanna tightened her grip before pulling back and shifting in her seat, one hand going to unlatch the door. “Maybe it does though. And maybe we get some new friends. It’d be nice to have a group that’s not the Order and actually allied with us, just to have some cultural perspective for a change.”
James laughed as he opened his own door and let the cold flood the cabin. “What, you don’t think the Mormons-“
”Shut the fuck up.” Alanna was laughing as she stepped out into the snow, boots sinking a whole foot into the stuff next to where she’d parked. “Let’s go reassure our weird little spy cluster that we’re not their enemy too, and we can get two tenuous victories today!”
”They’re really not FBI, right?” James asked to confirm. “JP said… I dunno, something, he said a lot of stuff. But I just wanna make sure.”
Alanna elegantly slammed the car door, snow shifting down the still-warm hood at the impact. “Glasses show them as something else. I think they all wish they were FBI though.” She held out her arm to James. “Come on, it’s freezing out here, and the sooner we do this, the sooner you get to be cryptic to people. You love that shit.”
The words got a genuine smile out of him. “It’s true, I do.” James acknowledged, some of his dark mood truly disappearing now.
”And!” Zhu added happily. “And maybe you can bully Debt more!”
”I’m not bullying anyone.” James insisted as they headed into the false-rustic lobby of the hotel. “Well, okay, maybe you a little bit. Don’t be a dick to Debt, he’s had a hard time, okay?”
Zhu flattened himself against James before letting out a begrudging rumble. “Fiiiine.” The navigator agreed. “But only because we’re good people or something. Anyway, our new friends are this way. I think they’re either waiting for us, or they’ve taken all of Marlea hostage, which seems unlikely.”
_____
“So let me see if I understand everything here correctly.” McHarn was seated across from James at one of the tables in the otherwise empty restaurant the hotel had on its second floor.
There were a pair of waiters and a chef lurking, waiting to see if they would have anything to do aside from stand around and clean the same tables for the fifth time. But aside from ordering several appetizers, James wasn’t planning to indulge them. “Go for it.” He motioned to McHarn invitingly.
”Magic is real.” He got a nod from James. “Which I already knew, to be frank. And we’ve met before?”
“In person, even.” James said. “Sorry about your memories. Honestly. It’s a shitty thing to go through.”
”So I have found.” Malcom McHarn said, delicately dismantling the crab cake that he’d accepted from James’ eclectic food order with a fork. “What’s your assessment of Tiffany DeKay?”
”You’re taking this really well.” Zhu observed.
James and McHarn both looked at the navigator with similar expressions. Expressions that said something along the lines of sure, but you’re a glowing talking bird thing, so maybe it’s hard to ignore that magic exists like this.
Still, James could admit that the man was showing a lot of emotional composition and maturity about it. “Tiff worked with us for a while.” He told him. “She was… convinced that we were a threat to national security.”
”And she was wrong?”
”Oh, hell no. We probably are. I haven’t counted, but I think we break a few dozen laws every time we breathe. Actually one of our lawyers found a thing recently that makes it possible that just the presence of some of our nonhuman members is a crime? But that sort of assumes that we ‘own’ them, which is…” James shuddered.
McHarn nodded along, calmly taking in the words. “I am going to go mad.” He said with that comforting and even voice of his. “Why are you telling me this? You understand that just because I no longer work for the bureau, I am still an American, correct?”
”I get it. Technically I’m an American too.” James gave a thin smile over the scattered plates on their table. “We’ve met. I think you’re an honest man. That’s all. And, I’ll tell you something that we’ve learned; the world is headed toward something majorly disruptive.” James’ mouth quirked into a frown for a second. “Technically I was told it was ‘the end of complex civilization’. But the thing is, it’s not because of us. I don’t really give a shit about America, or any nation, but I do care about people. So we’re fighting back against the loss of life wherever we can.”
”Even if it means working with ecoterrorists?” McHarn probed.
”They sort of aren’t, exactly.” James sighed. “It’s complicated. But also it’s not. I’ll work with anyone that can help me build a better tomorrow, as long as they aren’t monsters.”
McHarn’s eyes drifted to Zhu, who was poking at one of the crab cakes like he was wondering if he could eat it. “And by monster, you don’t mean nonhuman.”
”Correct. Also I think we had this conversation before.”
”You don’t remember either?” McHarn’s fluffy eyebrows dipped upward.
James laughed. “I’m magically enhanced to have better memory, and I still forget a lot of details. It’s a problem I’m working on.” He admitted. “But you want my assessment of DeKay; I have no idea. Debt says she’s doing better, maybe she’s less of a lunatic than I remember. You say your whole department got forgotten? I doubt she did that, because I doubt Debt would agree to that.” James sighed. “I hope she’s doing better. Her stupid beliefs really fucked up her life, you know?”
”I’m somewhat aware.” McHarn was willing to concede. “So. What now?”
”Like, between us?” James asked, and got a quick nod in reply. “Well, I have no idea.” He leaned back in the chair, stopping just shy of tipping himself backward out of a lingering sense of embarrassment at being watched by the staff from across the cavernous restaurant. “What are you doing? What’s your goal, even?”
”Figuring it out.” McHarn said instantly. “Even if Danson and Ports aren’t field agents, even if-“
”Sorry, who?”
”You met them. You drove them back here.” McHarn didn’t appreciate the interruption.
James let out a silent “Ah” at the information. “Sorry, I got fake names from them. Carry on.”
”…even if we aren’t like you, we want to know what happened to us. Even DeKay, though it’s easier to trust her when whatever Debt is doing involves being separated from her.” The older man, no longer a fed but still bearing himself like a professional, took a long breath and exhaled through his nose. “You want us to work for you.”
”It’s a potential option. Joining us, anyway.” James said. “It wouldn’t be my call. I have a lot of leeway in chaotic situations, but for you guys? You’d need to convince a forum. And that’s assuming you want to give up some of your autonomy to the Order.”
McHarn sighed. “An Order.” He muttered. “What about an exchange, then? We need more protection against the things we’ve seen. Writing notes and leaving voicemails to ourselves only goes so far. What would it take to get what you have?”
It impressed James how easily the man started looking for an advantage, when up against situations that had actually driven other people mad. ”We could probably work something out.” He kept his reply vague. “I think what we need most is information. That and a magical device that solves all problems forever. Got one of those?”
”…I’ve got information.” McHarn ignored the joke.
Well, the partial joke. James would like a Magical Device. But he’d take what he could get. “Okay. I’m not our negotiator, so I’m gonna probably put you in touch with someone smarter than me to work this out. In the meantime, I’d like to ask that you leave Priority Earth alone for a while, until we can work some stuff out, and extend an invitation to a place we have set up that’s safe.” James paused as he thought about Townton, and its ongoing… everything. “Mentally safe.” He corrected himself. “Mostly safe, in most ways.”
”You really aren’t the diplomat, are you?” McHarn shook his head like he was disappointed in James.
”I’m the idiot that walks into weird hostile places and starts asking questions.” James admitted.
Zhu’s feathers flared out as he spoke up. “In his defense, he’s really good at it!” He said, like he was defending James’ honor. “In my defense, I’m also a really good defense!”
”Why would you need a defense?” James quietly muttered to Zhu.
The navigator’s main eye rolled to fix on James’ face. “I dunno, I just felt like we were being accused.”
”If I hadn’t seen Stephen and Debt have an almost identical conversation two days ago, I would find this to be an event that would shake my belief in reality itself.” McHarn idly said, the first real quip he’d made the whole conversation. “I think… yes. I think that we can trust you well enough to take shelter with your people for a bit. At least until we can work out an arrangement.”
”Okay.” James nodded. “Thank you. And… well, thank you for talking. I think JP was worried that you were here to assassinate him.”
”From how ag- from how Tiffany talks about the man, I wouldn’t rule it out yet.”
”Super.” James expected nothing less from his friend’s social life. “I’m going to go get my people, and we can get out of here whenever you’re ready. Oh! I should warn you, the place we’re going…”
McHarn was already standing, offering James - and by association Zhu - a handshake. His grip was firm, and confident, which spoke a lot to the character of the man who had taken his erasure from public record completely in stride. “I have at least one record of you saying that half your people aren’t human. I think we’re as ready as we can get.”
”I’ll remember that for comedy purposes later.” James promised.
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