[Fiction] Keys to the Kingdom (Completed)

[Machina]

Long Island, NY - Friday, 21 April 2017 - 1615 EST

Betty Beaver's truckstop sat on a far-flung reach of Long Island's southern peninsula between a series of seaside villages that hadn't managed to yet congeal and expand to fill the island completely. They were the kind of little towns that once you got out of range of the salt air of the sea blowing in and becoming muddled by the scent of exhaust and diesel, you wouldn't know it from Idaho. The trucks-only gas station that sat in front of a plain red and white building festooned with the icon of a grinning, chubby anthropomorphic beaver in stars-and-stripes patterened spandex shorts was, itself, a spiritual transplant from places like Boise and times closer to 1980 than 2015. Betty Beaver's had the sort of quiet, homey desperation you tend to find far from the manic pitch of the city. The people who come here have no sense of time; they're in no hurry. The come in, sip coffee for hours, eat steak and potatoes and leave. They don't take credit cards, and sit at the center of a cellular blackout point. A sign attached to the front door proudly displays a notice that there's a fifty cent "entry charge" appended to every bill, the clever end-run around New York state's anti-smoking laws.

The drive from Wardenclyffe to the truckstop was one good hour in a hard-top GTO, and Gerad took the opportunity to get a little fresh air and reacquaint himself with the music of Strapping Young Lad, a favorite of his from his days in the Gulf. He wended his way through the back streets of the island with mechanical precision and completely effortless ease, burning down the wet asphalt as the roaring cylinders of the iron beast beneath him beat out their song.

At quarter-after-four, he pulled up alongside a '99 Nissan Stanza in grey and rust, the only other car in the parking lot. Old copper bells hung by bits of string announced his arrival, provoking a tired-old woman sitting behind the counter reading a paper and smoking a menthol cigarette to perk her eyes up wearily, just before her grandmotherly face creased into an easy smile. "Boss", she said.

"June. How's business, gorgeous?"

The woman shrugged, her lip curling into a blithe smirk. "Meh. Same shit, diff'ren day."

Gerad nodded thoughtfully, taking a look around.

He stopped in this place about once a month, just to check up on it. On one of his rare crawls out of his lab somewhere in the neighborhood of five years back, he'd happened across this place and stopped in for a bite. The humble little stop was like getting back together with your high school girlfriend; everything was familiar about it, like he'd been here a hundred times. With its peeling formica countertops, chipped coffee mugs, mismatched condiment caddies, single-page menu that boasted not a single goddamn word in the way of explanation or apology for its hodge-podge of proteins and carbohydrates, Gerad found himself pleasantly reminded of a bygone era he thought he'd buried with his childhood. Gerad bought the place - and the thirty acres it sat on - the following week.

Since then, he'd turned Betty Beaver's into a safehouse of sorts, a place to conduct his business. He fired the cook, a local good ol' boy who spent more time cooking the books than cooking meals, and hired Ricardo, an old Cuban who came to this country forty years ago on a floating door and was sharper than any ten professors. June, the lovable old crone who kept the place in shape, stayed on. She didn't know why the new boss wanted the place or what he did in the basement room, but she knew that for being a hash slinger, fifty thou a year was enough to not worry about it. Despite falling into the red more weeks than not, Gerad had assured her the place would be in business indefinitely, and for that, he'd bought her unwavering loyalty. It didn't hurt one bit that he saw in her something goddamn sharp, in the worldwise, savvy way that only grandmothers and truck stop waitresses can be, and she took care of the place with the kind of attention and veracity that would have marked her as a CEO if her life had gone in a different direction.

"Tell Rico to get me a t-bone, two eggs, and a mound of corned beef hash, will you, June? I'm going to the basement for an hour or three." Gerad rapped his knuckles on the cash register, slipped a wadded fifty-spot into the old coffee can that a local kid had left behind to collect for Muscular Dystrophy, poured himself a tall mug of the oilslick coffee brewing on the back counter, and slinked towards the back room to unlock the basement door.

"Sure thing, Gerry. Somethin' up today?" Gerad was no slave to scheduling, for sure, but he'd last been in only a little over a week ago, and it was off that he'd be back so soon.

"Yeah", he responded from the back room, fitting key to lock and deactivating the security array that kept the basement safe from scrutiny. "I'll have a couplea strangers comin' inna few hours. If I'm not back out yet, make 'em at home, but not too at home, huh? They're guests of mine, but we're gonna be talkin' business today, and I don't have time to coddle anyone."

"You got it", she half-shouted back. "What table you want?"

"Three!" came the reply, and the door made an audible click as it closed.

Three was the corner booth, and June knew enough to keep the table on either side clear in case anybody else came in. "Order up!" she called out to the pudgy old gentleman taking a smoke just outside the open door that lead from the kitchen outside, and he nodded in affirmation, finishing his cigarette before waddling back inside.

[Wargear]

Betty Beaver's Truck Stop, Long Island, NY - 18:45 - April 21, 2017

It was not, on the whole, the most auspicious place for a meeting of sufficient intellect to revolutionize the entire socio-political structure of the world. The truck stop nestled itself against the highway with the easy comfort of a long-term eyesore, the cheerfully obese beaver lit in neon waving to passing traffic like a billboard-sized “fuck you” to urban planners everywhere. It was, in short, exactly the kind of place Alexandra would have expected Machina to enjoy. It probably even shares his complete lack of respect for tidiness and hygiene. The thought curled her lip into a resigned quirk of distaste, but she dropped from the sky to the pavement behind the diner with a swift, precise grace in spite of her displeasure. A moment's scan of the area assured her she had arrived unseen, not that there seemed to be anyone nearby likely looking, and she took a moment to remove her VR sunglasses and slip them into a pocket of her long leather duster before walking around to the front door and letting herself in.

It was not, on a moment's reflection, quite as bad as she might have expected. Formica tablestops and laminated menus conspired with battered condiment caddies to give the place a faintly archaic air, as though it had been torn wholesale from the less reputable parts of the 1950's and unceremoniously dumped in the back corner of Long Island one step ahead of the building codes. A woman glanced up from the behind the long bar, offered Alexandra a grandmotherly smile. “Something I can get ya, honey?”

The weary cheerfulness of the greeting and her complete lack of surprise at Alexandra's appearance set a silent alarm bell ringing in the back of Alexandra's skull, and she took her time sliding around the edge of the bar; took in the backless stools, the duct tape patched vinyl-seat booths lining the room and the subtle hum of tiny electrical signatures scattered across every surface and hanging in the air like a fine-grain static on her enhanced senses, the more solid pulse of a familiar bioelectric signature toward the back. You always did like your nanites, Gerad, you and Rachel both... She offered the woman behind the counter a crisp, reserved smile, adjusting her skin-tight black gloves automatically. “Two short glasses, empty, and two glasses of water. I think you know which table.”

She turned, walked to the corner booth and leaned against it with a glance down at the magazine spread out in front of her host. "Nova Blue? I see your taste in reading material hasn't improved."

[Machina]

Gerad had returned from his cloister downstairs just in time to receive a modest plate of truckstop fare, toting the January issue of his favorite skin mag under his arm. Lighting another coffin nail, he thanked Rico for the plate and took a seat in the far corner of the appointed booth, shoving a mixture of meats into his mug while he absently flipped through the pages of his pornographic periodical.

By the time Alex had arrived, he'd completed his meal, the vague remnants littering the plate like a grease stain. Four cigarettes had burned down to nothing in the little glass tray. Gerad realized who'd arrived by the time she hit the pavement, the toes of her boots that cost more than most people made in a month elegantly tapping as she became grounded, but chose not to look up from his skin mag, finishing the article on the psychological dilemma of the death row inmate's last meal that he'd ghostwritten some years before and finally submitted.

"Nova Blue?", she crisply approached him, her voice less condemnatory than simply ribbing on his old vices. "I see your taste in reading material hasn't improved."

Gerad snorted, flipping the magazine shut and tossing it on the tabletop. "I woulda bought something classier, like HUSTLER, but this month had a couple shots of you sunbathing topless in Naples, and I had to satisfy my curiosity about what kind of dynamite you pack under those ridiculous 'I'm-a-professional-woman-who-conducts-serious-business-yet-still-abide-by-the-dictates-of-the-Prophet-Mohammed-blessed-be-his-name' suit-things you wear."

June brought two large glasses of water to the table along with a pair of shot glasses that were kept behind the bar chiefly for use by the staff, along with an unlabeled bottle of whisky that proudly bore a metal stamp on the cap that read '1971'. "C'n I get you anything, sweetheart?" she rather matter-of-factly addressed the smartly-dressed nova.

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil:

Nova "Flicker" Madigan descended the open staircase into the vast living room of the Rio de Janeiro mansion she shared with her fiance Neil Preston and her live-in lover Meghan "Mithril" Cutter. Meghan, as usual, loafed on the sofa in front of the oversized wall-mounted video display. Meghan looked up at Nova's approach and paused her video game.

"We about ready?" Meghan asked. She was, again as usual, buck naked. She'd gone without clothes since shortly after she'd erupted. This was less scandalous than normal because of her appearance; she was made of a uniform grey-blue metal that softly shone with a matte finish, like anodized titanium. In addition, she was smooth like a store mannequin in the appropriate places, so her nudity, while startling, could hardly be called indecent. Nova fished around in the pocket of her hooded sweatshirt and retrieved her mobile phone.

"One sec," she said, tapping a few buttons on the device. Nova retrieved a satellite map of Betty Beaver's truck stop and concentrated briefly, setting the location in her subconscious. "Okay," Nova told Meghan as she tucked the phone back into her pocket, "let's go."

Meghan switched off her game console and slid it under the coffee table.

"Are we going in just as we are?" she asked.

Nova shook her head.

"We're going in stealthily," Nova replied. "I don't think there's any danger, but I think Machina wants us to be subtle." Meghan crossed the room to meet Nova halfway and allowed her body to become malleable. With practiced ease she slid over Nova like a second skin, and after a moment her transformation was so complete that Nova appeared to be wearing a metallic blue-grey high-necked bodysuit under her blue jeans and hoodie.

"You're not wearing underwear," Meghan giggled from a nonspecific point on her body. "Kinky."

Nova chuckled without replying as she and her girlfriend became invisible together, and then teleported both of them to the truck stop's interior, arriving soundlessly just inside the doorway.

May as well announce my presence, Nova thought as she looked around the diner without moving. She released a small packet of quantum energy, as if she'd begun to gather her energy to teleport and then let it abruptly dissipate. The "ping" resonated from two other novas in the building. Like sonar, however, the ping worked both ways. She'd announced her arrival.

"Two novas," she whispered as softly as she could for Meghan's benefit.

[Wargear]

(OOC note: this post occurs prior to Flicker's chronologically)

"No, thank you. I'll pour the whiskey that is quite against the dictates of the Prophet myself, if you don't mind." Alex seated herself gracefully, neatly pouring a shot for herself and one for Gerad, then fixed him with the slightest hint of a smirk. "I do hope you found those gratifying; I understand it was very expensive for Nova Blue to have them faked. I doubt they'll see much return on their investment."

[Machina]

"They were probably unimpressed with the genuine article", Gerad shrugged. "I mean, after paying some lackey photographer to spy on you like that, all that hazard pay they no doubt paid him, and he comes back with what looks like a couple of veiny sacks of haggis? Well, shit. That doesn't sell magazines, sister." Impudently, he smiled and lit up another cigarette as his old nemesis poured out the single-malt brew into the two small glasses, carefully noting that she opted to short him about a hundredth of a milliliter in comparison.

"We're not alone", his nostrils flared, like a dog catching a scent. "June", he turned to the woman who'd found her way back to the counter.

She turned back at him quizzically, scanning the horizon through the windows behind him.

"Two menus", he amended.

[Wargear]

Her head cocked slightly, dangerously, her node humming with the resonating echo of quantum in the room. Her cool gray eyes locked on Gerad's something flickering there that didn't quite conceal itself swiftly enough to vanish completely. "Your other guests stopping in, I presume?" She sipped the whiskey carefully, precisely, full lips curving slightly with an expression that wasn't quite a smile. "As for the genuine article, I assure you that the slightness of my interest in your enjoyment or lack thereof of my figure challenges even my considerable talent for calculation."

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

"That's them in the corner," Nova whispered to Meghan as she walked their way, her footsteps making no sound. She took the measure of the two novas in the booth as best as she could, but what she could not see told her as much as what she could. Like most smart novas, almost everything she wanted to know was hidden from her view. That fact told her volumes, too, however. Braggarts wore their ability proudly, announcing to the world precisely what they could do. By extension, the braggart also revealed his weaknesses. These two were far cagier.

Nova stopped three paces from the booth and announced herself more conventionally, despite still being invisible.

"Machina and Wargear I presume? I'm Nova Madigan, and Mithril's also with me," she said simply and politely.

[Wargear]

"Wargear or Alexandra will suffice, Nova. Your friend, by the way, has a very interesting molecular structure that I'll enjoy examining at some length. Please do sit down." She flicked her eyes across the table at Gerad and smiled with just the hint of perfect teeth showing between her lips. "Why don't you move over a bit, Machina, and let her have a seat?"

[Machina]

Gerad slugged back the shot in one gulp, one eye momentarily throttling the other for control as he looked at the spot the sound originated from. He squinted hard a moment, his eyes level, and roughly kneaded the skin of his forehead in mute consternation.

"Nova, jesus... Y'know, I'm glad you could make it, but why the kid?" He grunted in acquiescence, his features softening somehwat. "Fuck it. Have a seat. And no worries, we're alone, here. The pair who work here are cool." He gestured to the seat next to Alex, pouring himself out another shot. "Anyway, when Neil shows up, he can sit next to me. I owe the kid a handjob."

[Wargear]

"So nice to know that your level of awareness about dignity in public spaces hasn't changed, Machina." The hint of arch sarcasm in Alexandra's voice could have sharpened titanium, and she slid herself further into the booth with a twitch of her waist so her back rested against the corner and there was enough space for Nova to seat herself.

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

Nova allowed herself to become visible as she took her seat next to Alexandra. As she did, her namesake aberration became evident: she ceaselessly flickered in and out of total invisibility in a random pattern, much the same way as an old fluorescent light bulb flickers on and off.

"You can analyze my molecules any time you want," Meghan replied to Alexandra, taken by her grey eyes. Meghan fondly remembered the last nova to analyze her molecules, Regina Newcastle, and how pleasurably that encounter had gone-- mostly, anyway.

"It's good to meet you," Nova said, looking in turn to Alexandra and then Gerad. "That handjob may have to wait, I'm afraid. Neil's delayed, and may not show up at all." Nova frowned briefly and knitted her Mithril-gloved fingers on the table in front of her in a neat stack.

"Consider me a poor substitute for Neil, minus the hand job I mean," Meghan suggested to Gerad. "You should already know that I'm a crazy idealist who believes that there's got to be a better way to run the world than this, and the only thing we're missing is the proper application of nova genius. Who do you think gave Procyon the idea for his 'Third Way,' anyway? He stole that from me."

[Machina]

As Flicker told him that Neil might not be in attendance, Gerad's features fell visibly, his jaw setting in a mute utterance that made the one word he thought perfectly clear; "Shit."

Gerad looked coolly across the table, rolling his eyes slightly as the Tin Girl took no time in hitting on Alexandra. Way to go, Neil. Leaving me to drown in sapphism while you're out prancing around warzones playing with mangled bodies. If my chances across the board weren't less than zero, I wouldn't accept an SUV full of Nobel's to trade places with you.

"Anyway", Gerad sighed, scrunching up his chin as the three women finished their introductions. "Nova, hey, glad to finally meet you." He paused, adding "Really", just to make sure she knew he was being sincere.

"You should already know that I'm a crazy idealist who believes that there's got to be a better way to run the world than this", Meghan cut in, "and the only thing we're missing is the proper application of nova genius. Who do you think gave Procyon the idea for his 'Third Way,' anyway? He stole that from me."

"Procyon's a fucking moron", Gerad concluded, grounding out his most recent cigarette. "All the supernatural charm in the world isn't going change peoples' basic nature. People", he expanded, "are a bunch of mewling, warlike little monkeys, and I'd say - conservatively - that we're a few hundred thousand years of very convenient evolution from changing that."

June interceded, bringing two more water glasses and two menus to the table, her otherwise placid calm visibly shaken by the two recent additions to the table, though she did a rather admirable job of not letting it show too much. One of the glasses and menus was completely unnecessary, though she hardly knew that. "Y'all just let me know if y'need something", she smiled a little anxiously before meeting Gerad's eyes, which silently told her she could excuse herself without giving affront.

"Anyway, that's basically what this is all about", Gerad continued. "No Star Chamber of novas can hotwire man's basic genetic predisposition to violence, but the right amount of smarts, properly applied to relevant fields of the baseline social, political, financial, and military institutions, could save an awful lot of blood, tears, money... Well, shit. Everything. The idea isn't to keep people from being fuckin' animals to each other, it's to pad the blow. Enough people with enough smarts studying enough of the data could do an awful lot in the way of making sure the damage done is comparatively little. Neil spends his time running around the world trying to plug the holes in the Titanic. Alex", he addressed her directly, "you're a tactical surgeon; for you, the end always justifies the means, as long as the end is the most tidy and precise one you can see. And me, I sit on my ass and get really angry. But between the four - five" he regarded Meghan, "of us, I think we could do a lot better than rearranging the furniture on the Hindenburgh."

[Wargear]

Well that was... unexpected. The eager interest in Mithril's voice would have made her intentions obvious to someone with a fraction of Alexandra's brainpower, and she was momentarily grateful for her own preternatural calm before Gerad took the table and she stopped paying attention to anything else for the moment.

"Pad the blow." The cool, distant detachment of Alexandra's features faded slightly, the light-swift thoughts of the penetrating intellect behind her steel gray eyes snapping into place almost audibly as she leaned forward to look at Gerad with the half-drunk glass of whiskey in her hand obviously forgotten. "You're looking to do social and geopolitical surgery; prevention, situation management, playing the entire system like dominos. You read Vector Shock and you're trying to apply the same principle in the opposite direction." She cocked her head, paused for less time than it took Flicker to start to draw a breath. "Why us, and how?"

[Machina]

Gerad cocked his gaze at Alex, one eye squinting as the other bolted wide, his mouth grimacing almost audibly. His voice was so dry he was nearly spitting sand. "Yeah, you got it. Your little book was the revelation I'd been waiting for my entire fuckin' life." He scoffed, shaking his head slightly as he lit up again. "Zip up, Al, your ego's showing, and this ain't the time or place. If you came here to insult my intelligence by insinuating that both of us haven't already thought every thought the other has had already - every thought", he filed it down to a shiv point, "then fuck off. If you're bored with killing civvies and want to do something interesting, then stop stepping on my dick and let's move on.

"The reason", he continued, "is that the time wasn't right before now. You talk about this like dominoes, and maybe it is. But we're dominoes, too, and all the pieces had to be in place, first. Unless I missed my mark, you, Nova", he turned to Flicker, "you and Neil are under a lot of strain right now. It's running him ragged. He needs a change before he fucking annihilates himself. That kid gives too much of himself. Soon, there'll be nothing left. And you", he turned to Alex, "are bored. Don't deny it. You've been doing this shit for enough years now that it doesn't satisfy you anymore, admit it. If I'd brought this to you six years ago in Marrakesh, you'd have laughed in my face. The world and its vicissitudes didn't interest you enough that you'd bother with shit like this. But that's not the case anymore, is it?" He drew off his smoke again, throwing his arms over the back of the booth's bench chair, his eyes drifting to nowhere in particular. "And then there's me. Maybe I was just a spook too long, I don't know. I've been too angry for too long, and all I've been able to do is throw money at the world's problems. I'm tired of it. So I called in some favors and had a sit-down with the ex-cheese. It was a hard sell, but my hands are untied."

"What I am talking about, here, isn't so much surgery as preventative therapy. Beyond even what Argus does. Instead of being first response to the world's brutality, we follow the threads like the Moirae and intervene in the name of the mutual good and stark efficiency. I'm talking about booster shots for the virus of human conflict, vaccinating, if you want to think of it that way."

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

Meghan could manage nothing more than to listen and hope to keep up with the conversation. As much as she thrilled to learn that there were serious motherfuckers actually interested in using nova genius to change the world, she was also terrified to learn that there were serious motherfuckers interested in using nova genius to change the world right now.

Nova, for her own part, had not this far out of her depth since before she'd erupted. She stalled for time and tried to connect the dots as quickly as she could before Machina and Alexandra could resume talking and further muddy the waters with more knowledge and shared history which only the two of them possessed.

"I'm not one of Neil's appendages," Nova said, diverting the topic back a few seconds. "Neil's cracking under the strain, unquestionably, but I must echo Alexandra's question: why me?"

Meghan, still wrapped skin-tight around Nova, nudged her.

"And why Meghan, for that matter?" Nova appended.

[Machina]

Gerad snorted, sitting back up in his chair. "I didnt invite Meghan", he pointed out. "You brought her with you, as long as we're on the subject of appendages. I'm frankly a little fuckin' curious as to why she's here, myself. Maybe this idea appeals to her, maybe it doesn't." He turned his eyes to what passed as Meghan, the blue of his eyes meeting no particular spot on Flicker's clothing, and addressed her directly, "If you want to be a part of this, Megs, there's got to be some demonstrable talent you bring to the table. I'm open to suggestions, but I've got no interest in some vast and complicated affair. For the sake of efficiency and security - not to mention to avoid having everyone with a camera shoving it up our asses - I'm looking only for equals who can add something of gravitas to this little joint."

Taking another drag from his cigarette, he went on, "To answer your question, Nova; Alex is a strategist. As much as I find her views on global political conflict to be bordering on sociopathic, I begrudgingly admit that she knows politics and warfare like few others. So do I, of course, and I also have something of a talent for interpreting the intelligence community. The operative to Al's soldier, you could say. You," he gestured with the lit cherry of his cigarette, "are a financial genius. Like Lenin pointed out, you've always got to keep an eye on who benefits. And among the people I know, you're more uniquely attuned to the fluctuations of the world of finance than anyone. Someone's going to have to watch where the cash is going, and that's where you come in. Plus," he added, "I know I can trust you. You're not a shill or a power junkie or puppeteering, Machiavellian schemer. You and Neil actually give a shit about the world and the people in it. I need that." With a bitter expression, he picked up the remains of his shot glass and downed it, staring into it pensively before putting it down.

[Wargear]

"Not to mention, Nova, that you add an impressive degree of mobility to his operation should he require it. He's not mentioning that because he doesn't want you to feel exploited, and of course he's right that your talents with money will be useful." Alexandra finished her drink and set it down precisely on the table with the faintest clink of glass on plastic. "The thing he's not mentioning about me is that I have high level military and political contacts the world over through my work with DeVries, and since he's been playing a ghost in the woodwork for the last decade or so he's short that kind of access outside the intelligence community. Specifically, a department of the intelligence community that's not going to be thrilled with what we're planning to do." Her eyes met Flicker's a moment, held, an ice-and-steel appraisal that send shivers down her spine.

"Speaking of what we're planning to do." A flick of Alexandra's gloved fingertips adjusted her long black hair back into place over her shoulders, her eyes settling on Gerad's unflinchingly. “The Moirae; classical. A nice allusion, very good. We don't change the paths, just smooth the transitions, minimize negative impacts and try to make sure all the wheels run smoothly? Or are we talking about playing God here and smiting the heathens while protecting the righteous, Gerad? Because last time I checked, you were trying very hard to stay out of that business.”

[Machina]

"Still am", Gerad grunted. "I've got no interest in running the world, just saving it from itself." He poured himself another shot, gesturing over for another two shot glasses, in case they be needed. "You could argue pretty convincingly that any sort of meddling in the world's affairs is doing just that, that nobody's got any right to try and 'fix' the world. But fuck it," he swigged back another shot, "We're novas, and not the only ones. Somebody's going to do it. If not individuals who actually have what they believe to be the common good of all sentient life at heart, it might be a group that has their own interests as priority. These groups already exist", he asserted rather thoughtfully, swishing his tongue over his teeth, "and we'd be opposed to their interests. But anyone who cares to look can see that this planet is on the fast-track to oblivion for any number of reasons, and I reckon somebody ought to step up to the plate to do something about that. Sure, maybe we ain't got the right. But a passenger on a runaway train has no business breaking in to the conducter's booth to hit the brakes, either."

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

Nova leaned forward in the creaky vinyl bench seat of their booth, locking eyes with Gerad.

"Meghan doesn't have to bring a damned thing to the party," she said with elaborate patience, "Being with me is enough." Nova leaned back and continued: "But since you ask, she's got a knack for getting under the skin of damned near every nova under the sun. You on the other hand have the manners of a goat, Machina. You've spent too much time away from people, and you've lost the knack."

[Wargear]

"He never had it in the first place." Alexandra flicked her fingers, pulling the whiskey bottle across the table to her and refilling her glass with tidy precision. "You should have known him years ago; he could kill a room's worth of conversation with one of those scowls." She leaned back against the wall, eyes wandering over the metal coating covering nova with the unblinking fascination of a child in a toy shop. Now how on earth does she manage that level of molecular flexibility with a metal of that tensile strength? Low grade carbon-bonding wouldn't be nearly so elegant. Her smile was smooth and faintly distracted as she took another sip of her whiskey."I'm sure you can see to it that your obviously close friend keeps our information private, since you seem to keep her wrapped around considerably more than your little finger?"

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

"I don't think you need to worry about that," Nova said flatly.

Meghan slithered off of Nova's body and re-formed in her usual shape--a petite teenaged girl--wedged tightly in-between Nova and Alexandra. The booth suddenly became very crowded, and Meghan was acutely aware of Alexandra's warmth. She set that aside for a moment.

"Everyone's talking about me in the third person as if I'm not here," she said, "but I am here, and things that are heard cannot be un-heard." Meghan looked into Alexandra's hypnotic eyes, and she wondered briefly if she'd been more or less intimidated when she went toe to toe with Revenant.

At least she wasn't attracted to Revenant.

"Look, you have no idea the secrets I'm carrying around inside me," Meghan explained, "So you'll have to take my word for it. Believe me, though, they're big ones, the kind that get people killed. I can deal with it. K?"

[Wargear]

Alexandra's unreadable gaze took Meghan in from joined feet to metal curve of hair, as though she was picking her apart a molecule at a time and liked what she saw; there were vast tides of thought moving behind those steel gray eyes, like looking into an ocean of ticking metal gears, and the concentrated attention of the mind that contained them would have sent cool shivers up her spine if she'd had one any longer. "I think I might be able to guess." Her lips curved into a smooth little smile that was as tempting as it was dangerous, and she reached out a gloved fingertip to shift Meghan in the seat so she could settle her back more firmly against the corner of the wall and look at the metal girl more fully. "I trust you'll be a good girl, Meghan?"

[Mithril]

Meghan could not believe how turned-on she was. It was as if Nova, Wakinyan (during the week he spent female), Regina Newcastle, Knockout, Sylvan, and Timeslip had just been foreplay.

"I'll be better than good," she promised.

[Wargear]

That elegant smile spread a fraction further before parting slightly to allow Alexandra to take another sip of her whiskey. "I know you will."

[Machina]

And this would be why I didn’t want the fucking kid here, Gerad mentally heaved. He didn’t know or care if any of the ladies in the room could hear his silent thoughts, but the arch of his eyebrows, the insistent, insect-like twitching of his left eye accompanying the facial tic that overcome him during moments of frustration wherein his normal reflex of hitting things and shouting profanity were for whatever reason stifled, said it loud enough. “Yeah, hey”, he cut in flatly, “thaaaat’s fascinating. Could you two maybe keep it in your fucking pants long enough to finish this conversation? Or do I need to tell the idealistic pacifist at the table about Riyadh, Alex?” His gaze shifted over to Wargear, daggers lighting a fire in his eyes. It was a taunt, but he wasn’t kidding, either.

“As I was saying, Nova”, he shifted his gaze and his posture to one more relaxed. Flicker had said something that was digging like a splinter under his skin, but he decided to let it go. No sense in not picking your battles, especially when you’re trying to prevail on someone’s desire to go into business – or enter a conspiracy – with you. “My concern ain’t in Meghan being here, it’s with the idea of including noncontributing members to the board. However”, he conceded, “you make a good point. We’re going to need a face, and it sure as shit won’t be me. You’re hampered by your namesake, and Alex”, he directed his gaze passingly to her direction, “you’ve got no stomach for pleasantries. You can smile through them – I can’t – but you know as well as I that dog don’t hunt.”

[Wargear]

“You, Gerad, are the last person on this planet who is permitted to lecture me on 'keeping it in my pants'. As for our mutual pasts...” She trailed the phrase off, but the sweet chiding in Alexandra's voice was punctuated by a tight smile as sharp and merciless as a rapier's tip. “And as for your biting insight into our relative social abilities, I will cheerfully cede the conduct of negotiations to those both more capable and more interested. I'm sure Meagan would make an excellent choice.” With plenty of careful supervision slid silently over the table between them without the need for words or even a cue. “So you want to break into the metaphorical driver's cabin and start yanking switches, Gerad? Why don't you share a bit more detail with the class as to how you plan to pull this off.”

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

"This is the part I'm going to find fascinating," Nova said without irony.

[Machina]

"Well", Gerad began, crushing out his cigarette between a pinched thumb and forefinger, shards of tobacco falling to the table like legs from a squashed bug, "this is where we come to the definition of the difference between 'simple' and 'easy'. The 'how' is simple; but it's the last damn thing from easy.

"I've got a surveillance array in my lab that'd shame the NSA. I watch fifty channels at a time. Probably read about a hundred papers a day. And that's just to kill time. Taking in all that information, you start to see how things come together... Like all these little events are all part of some vast tapestry, or a chain of dominos. Some events start a new chain, and if you bother to look far enough down the line, you can see how things're gonna turn out. Some of these things that happen, you read or hear about them, and something clicks in your mind, and you think of something that happened a week, a month, a year ago, and you see somebody's hands sunk into it, like picking up a fingerprint from a piece of pottery. Naturally, I have my specialties in this. I fare better with politics, military action, social upheaval, than I do with, say, finance, natural disaster, relief efforts. That's where the rest of you start: I'm developing a system right now that catches those threads and puts them together into a cohesive vision, but, natch, I don't know all the variables to look for. The rest of you know the parameters, the subtle fluctuations of aspects of global changes, better than I could ever be bothered to. So step one, being a consolidation of our respective talents into a database that'll take in and process information every second of every day, based on the programmed parameters we set. It's a good opening move; the system collates the data and punches out probabilities, along with the data these guesses were drawn on. Naturally", he added affably, "we'd still have to keep our fuckin' eyes open. No computer is perfect, even if I can program it to read more papers and opsites than all of us could combined."

With a cough, Gerad pinched another cigarette from his shirt pocket, letting smoke fill his lungs before going on. "Step two", he cut himself off, "is that we do something about it. We've got a situation, and now we've got an educated hypothesis in way of what's going to happen next, based on factors we've acquired from sources both public and private. All that's left is to guide the hand of fate in the direction that's going to prove most effective and beneficial for the people we want to see win, that is, the good guys, whoever that is in a given situation. Sometimes that's going to mean people die, sure. Killing Hitler may not have stopped the Holocaust, but taking out Goebbels, Himmler, Eichmann, Hess and Heydrich as well probably would have. Sometimes it's going to mean putting a scare into someone. Sometimes it might mean getting your hands dirty." He shrugged. "I guess it depends on whether you think the end of creating a better world justifies the means of the occasional crime. By and large, we'll be strictly philanthropic, but I don't want to give you, Nova, or anybody else the wrong idea. Sometimes saving a hundred people means making sure a few other people stop living. I'd never ask you, or Neil, or Meggers to do wetwork, natch. Merely illustrating the depth of what I'm talking about.

"Of course", he went on, "there are a couple ways we can go about this. We could always be strictly above-board, too. After all, people kill each other all the time, and it's neat and perfectly legal. A group like what I'm proposing could easily exist in the same arena as a guy like Argyle, the difference being that unlike him, we can capitalize on our intel by and large before the shit goes down, because we'll have reams of data at our back. That, of course, means that we're limited in scope by who wants to work with us. And that could be okay. Small victories count, too.

"The alternative is that we take up the mantle of the Moirae in more than just a cutesy, professional gimmick. We help people whether they want it or not. No apologies." Gerad inhaled deeply, his nostrils flaring, his eyes growing dark. "There are many, many novas already who are out there, doing this now. The difference is that the only interests they serve are their own. Some of these guys, they pull the strings of entire countries as a joke. Competing with them could prove dangerous and difficult; it may also be the only way to actually do some genuine good."

His harangue finished, Gerad took another shot of the whisky, the bottle now down to a few good draughts, and he cleared his throat, his mood returning to normal. "But hey, fuck it. I'm no damn good at being a tyrant, and that's why I called you guys here. To discuss this. Left to my own devices, I'd probably fuck it all up. What I'm talkin' about is teaming up to save the fuckin' world, and I think that together, we might be able to actually pull it off. How we go about it and whether we can at all is the reason I called you guys here t'begin with."

[Wargear]

“Ambitious.” There was a hint of respect in Alexandra's voice that hadn't been there before when she finished the slow sip of her drink and set it back down on the table. “To start with, no matter what comes out of this meeting, I have a system you should at least look at, if not slave straight into whatever you're working on. I've been using an AI almost exactly like what you just described to track hotspots and potential contracts worldwide; it's called Delphi and I've had it running for the last five years or so.” Long fingers twitched slightly on the tabletop, a delicate sequence of movements as she signaled the computer settled against the curve of her spine to broadcast a selection of encrypted data to a select Opnet server, then stilled. “Call it my ante for our little club. As for the rest of it...” She paused for perhaps a fraction of a second, head cocked slightly to the side. “Fascinating. I think you can count on my services, assuming you mean to make this more than another consulting firm mucking about around the edges of things.”

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

"This is a non-starter for me," Nova said quietly. "I'm about to graduate medical school and swear an oath to do no harm. I can't assist--even indirectly--in an endeavor that will kill people." She looked at Gerad and Alexandra sadly, and sighed with remorse. She'd genuinely expected something world-changing from Neil's most esteemed friend. Nova looked into Meghan's eyes and found support there.

Meghan took that as her cue.

"I'm with Nova," Meghan said disappointedly, not caring that her chance to score with Alexandra was slipping away. "I refuse to believe that two ultra-genuises like you can't come up with a way to improve the world which doesn't involve killing."

[Machina]

1...2...3...4...Jenna Jameson...Tori Wells...Dixie Dynamite...Asia Carrera...FUCK! FUCKING FUCK FUCK FUCK! Gerad was trying to keep it in, and he was losing. He nearly bit his tongue in half. For a moment, he sat silently, his eyes bright with barely restrained anger, his breathing slow-to-no as he threw lines into the ocean of his mind, hoping to come up with the words he needed at the moment.

"Ah, yeah, would that be the one that starts with 'first, do no harm' and goes on to forbid abortions, seductions, and 'cutting of those who labor beneath the stone'? Where exactly do you two draw the fucking line?", he finally said, albeit wearily. "Look", he rubbed his temples angrily, "you are missing the goddamn point. I have put something on the table. The reason I fucking asked you here was to flesh it out. You have a problem with killing? Fine. I have a problem with killing, too. My problem with it simply doesn't exclude me from doing it in the pursuit of the greater good." The rest of his reply came through gritted teeth, all lacking contractions and one word at a time, "I. Am. Willing. To. Negotiate. That is why you are here."

He sighed angrily, "And please, spare me your 'oh, I expect so much more of you' crap, will you? You sleep soundly in your bed at night because rough men stand on guard, ready to do rough things on your behalf. So that you don't have to." The words were Orwell's, not his own. He counted on Nova recognizing them.

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

"Killing isn't negotiable," Nova said with iron resolve. "That's where I draw the line." Despite her resolve, she looked around uneasily, recognizing the danger in being a dove in a conference of wolves. Gerad lost his cool in a real hurry, she noticed. Do I really want to enter into such a risky proposition with this man?

The latter was a rhetorical question, of course. However, Nova's curiosity had been piqued, so she resolved to stay a bit longer.

[Wargear]

"You remove cancers, Doctor, do you not? Use antibiotics to eliminate bacteria, retrovirals to destroy a virus?" Alexandra's voice was cool and deliberate, almost academic, but her eyes never left Nova's for a moment. "The destruction of life is often regrettable, but just as often entirely necessary for the health of the whole. If you yourself are too squeamish to conduct such a surgery, will you object to associating yourself with those who are not? If they cut out the diseased tissue on the behalf of the whole, do they not sin on your behalf whether you know of it or not?" A gesture of her hand refilled her shot glass and brought it floating to her fingertips, and she took a slow sip before continuing. "I have not heard anyone at this table ask you to bloody your hands personally, Nova. You would reject an association with us because we were willing to kill someone to prevent more deaths? With your help, it is entirely possible we can reduce the effusion of blood across the world and improve the health of the global body politic besides; by witholding it, are you not contributing to all those deaths you could have helped us prevent? Killing by inaction is still killing, after all."

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

"A virus is not a person," Nova said, stating the obvious with such sincerity that it could only be interpreted as an insult to the intelligence to match the one she'd just been dealt by Alexandra. "Nor is a tumor. I will not be responsible for or a party to the killing of a single person. No matter the good, that person--a person who is just as entitled to life as you or I--is dead, dead, dead. No."

[Machina]

Gerad's nerves settled somewhat. That cagey bitch beat him to the punch, but that was alright. She'd probably said it better than he could've at the moment, anyway.

Mildly sedated, his demeanor sobered, he added "Okay, fine. Cancer's a living thing, but it's not people, right? So where do you draw that rather fine line? Chances are you kill an animal every time you have Thanksgiving dinner, so it sure as hell isn't at the microbial level. If it's the calculated destruction of sentient life you balk at, do you object to killing members of the great ape families? There are many animals that have proven out equally as intelligent as some human children. And if sentience, where does that leave people in a persistant vegetative state or brain death? Can we kill them, since they're effectively clumps of living tissue in the shape of a person?

"Look", he continued, "I didn't want to get into some ethical debate about killing, but I saw this coming. The fact of the matter is that you kill by the very act of living. Sure, you don't kill other people. Would you? Could you? Would you kill to defend your own life? Meghan's? Neil's? Anybody's? Where does that leave you? Is it okay to kill in defense of others? Because that's what we're talking about, here. We're talking about the lives of many innocents as opposed to the lives of a few tyrants. I'll grant you that under ideal circumstances, we wouldn't have to kill anybody. But sister, take a look around; this ain't a perfect fuckin' world. Maybe we'll get there someday. In the meantime, what we're talking about is exactly the same as shooting some psychopath before he slit's your mother's throat, writ large. I'm not trying to fucking buffalo you, but what we're talking about is saving lives, possibly by cutting out a few cancerous members of the species. Our inactivity would be no less morally culpable or just than allowing a cancer to rampage through an otherwise healthy person. If you have a problem with that, I'm listening. I can work with you. But if you're going to walk away from this because you think it somehow compromises an oath that was penned about two fucking millenia before germ theory and heliocentrism, maybe you can tell me what you plan to do when someone from dee-double-you-bee gets the nerve to shoot some Zapatan guerrilla trying to plant his seed in a ten year-old?"

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

For a moment Nova wondered if Gerad had somehow discovered that she'd killed two men in Kyrgyzstan in March of 2016, interrupting their summary execution of twenty medical students. Did Neil tell him? she wondered. They are friends. . .

Nova set that aside and leaned forward in the cheap vinyl booth seat, unwilling to let Gerad's pushiness intrude on her personal space.

"For someone not wanting to get into an ethical debate about killing, you sure can carry on at length about it," she snapped. "Killing is not the only way to deal with a person who is--to put it indelicately--a problem. I challenge you to find the alternative. I'm repulsed by how quickly you're glomming onto the idea of murder. I don't like what it says about you." Nova made a mental note to discuss Neil's choice of friends with him later. Nova leaned back into her seat, and Meghan re-entered her peripheral vision.

Meghan, for her part, remained silent but communicated everything she needed to say by squeezing Nova's hand under the table. She stole another glance at Alexandra, and wondered just how hard it was going to be to get a date with her, considering how poorly the discussion was suddenly going.

[Machina]

"Nova", Gerad replied softly, his brow still in full furrow. "You're preaching to the converted. Okay? I don't fucking advocate murder. I'm a jerk, not a monster, and I don't even have a choice on that first one. Given a choice between killing someone and being able to achieve the same end by not killing someone, I'll opt for the latter. I know what death is. I have been to war, okay?

"Me, baseline Gerry, all pink and squishy, I've been in firefights. People have shot at me. I've shot back at them. Popular opinion holds that I succeeded more than once. It sucks. Okay? And yeah, maybe I'm a little jaded when it comes to death. Fuck knows I've seen plenty of it, more than enough to deaden a lot of guys I served with. But the reason I'm trying to do this is because don't want people to die. You challenge me to find an alternative to slaughter? Fine! I have zero fucking problems with that; I don't want to slaughter anybody. What I am trying to impress upon you, however, is that doing good things for many people sometimes means blood gets spilled. It was true at Thermopylae, Gettysburg, Normandy, Agincourt, and Berlin. I aim to do what I can to prevent that, but I ain't all-powerful. Neither are you, neigher is anybody here. Sometimes desperate situations call for desperate means. Like John Stuart Mill said, the only thing worse than war is the decayed and degraded state of morals that says nothing is worth war. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing that is more precious to him than his own life, is a miserable creature that will be made and kept free only by the exertions of better men than himself.

"Anyway", he took a long drag, "I only brought it up because you seemed ready to walk out of here over it. Should I have spoke in cryptic little fucking snippets of conversation to stretch this debate on a bit longer? Fuck that. I said my piece. We're having a discussion, here. This is your moral qualm with the proposition; I am addressing it. We are groping towards a resolution."

[Wargear]

And Alexander looked on the knot, which no other could untie, then drew his sword... Alexandria's lips twitched in the hint of a smile as she took another sip of her whiskey and let her eyes linger on Mithril a moment longer before returning her attention to Nova. "You're afraid we're not going to look for a higher solution, Nova. That we're just going to kill people because we can't think of anything else. Correct?" She gestured to Gerad with the whiskey glass, then to Nova. "Walking out won't change that. I'm a strategist by training and a solider by trade, and Gerad's a warrior at heart; leave us to work on this alone, and the old adage about every problem looking like a nail comes to mind. Want to see that that doesn't happen? Stay in, and keep us honest. Make us go over the arguments three times or a dozen times before every single action to see if we can find a 'better way' to handle it. That's why he asked you here, after all. Gerad's looking for a financial expert, but he could have found that any number of places; he wants you to be his conscience."

[Doctor Nova Madigan]

I'll be his conscience? Nova boggled, reeling with disbelief after having her intelligence insulted twice in rapid succession by Alexandra. Until Nova had voiced her objection to killing, both Gerad and Alexandra had seemed clinically untroubled by the idea of "wetwork," as he had so indelicately put it. Alexandra's assertion that the plan--all along, no less--that Flicker would be the moderating influence had seemingly been pulled from her rectum.

While Nova fumed over how best to frame her reponse without starting a fistfight in the diner, Meghan leaned forward with renewed animation and entered the breach.

"Nigga please," Meghan said in scornful sing-song tones. "Until we spoke up against killing people, you two were all 'kill people blah blah wetwork blah blah make the world a better place blah blah kill people blah blah hugs and bunnies sounds like a great idea.'" Meghan looked quickly from Alexandra to Gerad, watching their responses for both anger and deployed fisticuffs. "You pulled that bit about Nova being your conscience out of your butt just now. My brain didn't get any bigger when I popped, and even I can figure that one out."

Nova put her hand on Meghan's shoulder as a cautionary measure, a firm but affectionate touch that effectively silenced her. Meghan stopped, and Nova picked up the thread, hoping to defuse the tension.

"Look, you can't bullshit a bullshitter" Nova said. She intentionally threw Gerad's words back into his face: "I'm not interested in 'cryptic little fucking snippets of conversation to stretch out the debate' either. So here's where I stand: If I join you, killing is off the table. Period. If a situation arises in which killing is deemed unavoidable, then I am out."

Do I finish this? Nova wondered, gauging Alexandra and Gerad. Yeah, I will.

"You two are sneaky, to put it simply. If I join up and I discover somewhere down the road that you've been killing for the cause and withholding that from me, not only will I be out, but I'll go public." Her eyes narrowed like those of a predator. "I know you think I'm soft and weak, but believe me this: on this issue I am hard."