2.6 The Variable

"Wake up! Wake up!" Chet's cries in the darkness startle Junpei. He isn't sure how to wake up.

Junpei tries to extend his awareness, to catch what's going on in the real world, where he's curled up on a brick floor with a sore shoulder from the discomfort of it all, but what he hears is the thwip, thwip of rain striking the sides of a tent. Junpei doesn't recognize this sound.

"Wake UP!"

Riko's eyes open, flooding the enclosed space with pale light. The girl is clinging to him. "What?"

At first, Chet doesn't say anything. To her, the cause for alarm is obvious. Riko must just be trying to mess with her mind, by not reacting. "I think we're under attack," she finally whispers.

Riko doesn't move, but the tent's 'door' is slowly pulled aside by telekinetic manipulation.

Chet crawls to the opening. She can see what makes the sound now. Water. She holds her hand out in it, and when it doesn't melt off, she sticks her head out and looks up. "Wh-where's it coming from?" she sputters.

"It's rain," Riko says. "The dead world fights to live again."

Rain? Rain is a verb, as far as Chet knows. She's heard it in the context of dropping lots of things down on someone. She ducks back into the tent, blinking water out of her eyes. She hugs Riko. Now her eyes hurt and she's cold. "Are you pulling water out of something somewhere?"

"I'm not doing this at all. We're in an area where rain happens." Riko frowns, and returns the hug. "It's not going to hurt you."

The pair have survived well enough. If they ever had dire need for something, Riko could easily steal it, but for the most part he prefers to avoid civilization. That's why they have come to this restricted area.

(At least, that is what Chet thinks is going on.)

"How long do we have to keep running?" Chet asks. 

She stands well away from Riko as he plucks fish from the river with his telekinetic powers. She's not sure what causes a lapse in conscious control for telekinesis; perhaps it has to do with fear or anger. Over-straining the ability might also cause it, and she doesn't want to be anywhere close if objects around Riko start flying apart.

She's found she has little else to do, other than contemplate the state of their existence. 

That and try to focus her precognitive visions.

"We run until they stop chasing," Riko responds.

Chet shoves her hands in her pockets, watching dejectedly as butterflies flit around her, unaware of her troubles. "We're in Riverview, aren't we?"

"What's left of it. What gave it away?"

"I know this place. I remember I took a shortcut and climbed over that fence every time I went to the store."

Chet prided herself on running faster than her brothers. If they were at a certain point behind her by the time she got to the fence, she knew they wouldn't be able to catch up, and she'd won the week's race.

Miles of fields separated their parents' farm from the town.

Home was in the basement under the barn. It was cozy, and windowless, and, being underground, it didn't look odd on the outside for being windowless. It was a good hide for adult vampires.

"Did you bring me here to leave me here?" Chet asks fearfully.

"I thought you were psychic."

"I don't want to give you a headache..." Not to mention, trying to get a reading on Riko is an incomprehensible sensory perception overload. She doesn't know how he can think about so many things at the same time.

"You are getting better at giving me headaches," he concedes. "Unfortunately there's nobody here to leave you with! Everybody's gone. They've been gone for centuries."

"There's nothing in the fields," Chet observes. Her way of agreeing with him.

"You'd think nature would have taken back over." Riko's tone is of disgust. "But the grid prevents that, even on this low-maintenance setting. Everything you see is engineered. Just look at this grass! An invasive created species! It's still obeying the homeowner's association!"

"S'wrong with short grass?" She was always told to stay away from long grass.

"What is that?" he changes the subject, suddenly.

Chet looks around.

A grimy round feeding trough lifts out of the river, and is flicked onto the grass near Chet's feet. Riko's telekinetic feel for things can function like sonar, Junpei guesses. Riko felt something was down there, and wondered what it was.

"That's a-"

"Never mind." Riko's lost interest in the object, now that he's seen it and it looks like a big boring bowl. "We can put firewood in it."

Once the fire is started, on the fish go.

"Why cook them when we could have sushi?" Chet jokes.

"Most sushi isn't actually raw. That's a common misconception."

"You're no fun."

"You planning on checking your old home for anything?" Riko proves how much of a downer he can really be.

Chet blinks. She's been thinking about it constantly since she realized where they were, but...

"Yes or no? I want to get out of here before the sun sets." When she doesn't answer, he continues on to another of his weird asides, "because at night the ghosts come out."

"I don't want to go home," she mumbles.

Riko nods. She needn't say more. "I was thinking we'd go north. It'll be colder at night, though. And since it's sector eight, we'll need a tent or something. Plenty of rain there."

"What we need... is a shower."

"The hygiene charms work fine."

"The hygiene charms are weird and I hate magic."

 "Keep away from her!"

"You're useless!" The witch complains to the djinn. Curled up on the pavement, the witch twitches in pain as Chet reads her mind and hears her voice, from a great distance. Despite the involuntary twitch, the psychic pry is an unnoticed agony, since the witch has bigger concerns. Subject 8-92 damaged her organs when he threw a wave of raw energy at her. She probably shouldn't have made any hostile movement towards the secondary target—the mysterious kid 8-92 has with him. "Finish healing me, and GO AFTER THEM."

"I'm sorry!" the djinn wails. "They weren't supposed to come after us! I wasn't ready!"

A motorcycle zooms through inadvisable terrain.

"How are they reacting?" Riko's voice has dropped the casual flippancy. It's edged with concentration.

"Put your hands on the handlebars and your feet on the pedal things!" Chet hisses.

"I don't need to do that. I have telekinesis. Also I'm holding you."

Good point. Chet doesn't want to fall.

Wait. Terrible point. Telekinesis isn't something to get this cocky about.

"Kitsune is coming after us," Chet warns.

"Damn," Riko mutters.

The motorcycle's front wheel smashes into a tree branch in the tall grass, sending the fugitives and their stolen vehicle careening too close to a big rock, and in danger of tipping over. Chet screams. Riko manages to sway them upright, and the motorcycle accelerates, faster and faster.

The witch's companion chases them. She flies through the air at a terrifying speed.

"Which way?" Riko asks.

"I can't do this!" Chet shrieks. "Just teleport us away! Please!"

"You can always use your little disc," he reminds her of the time travel device. 

Chet holds onto Riko tightly. "No..." She can't leave him behind. What if she doesn't find him again?

"You should be able to see divergent paths," Riko says patiently. "Should I go left? Or right? Or, what happens if you use the disc?"

"I'm not using it!" she snaps.

"Then you're closing yourself off from possibilities!"

"Rrrraaah!" Chet screams a scream of concentration or frustration, or both.

"I'm just trying to help." Riko tightens his grip on the girl as they drive over an empty ditch.

"I hate you forever!" Chet yells.

"Oh, so dramatic. Just focus, and we'll be fine! Control comes with practice. You must practice."

"The flying lady is a djinn." Junpei has found his voice. It takes a while, but he usually, eventually finds his voice. "How did I know that? Why can't I just know everything all at once."

The act of speaking gives Junpei physical form.

"Riko told me a bunch of stuff about djinn," Chet answers him.

He looks down at the speaker. No double-take required. "Hooray," he says. "Dreams."

"As for your second question, that already happened. I already told you everything."

That's right. Chet dumped all this information in his head at once, and he's trying to sort it out. It's not her fault he couldn't process it all at that single moment, when their minds touched in Bridgeport. 

It is her fault for putting all this stuff in his brain though. Nobody forced her to do that.

"You don't have to pretend you're not mad at me. I caused you pain," she says.

"I don't know if I'm any closer to understanding why."

"I wanted to just tell you. I wanted a conversation. But I knew I couldn't make you understand. You have to understand on your own terms."

"I'm afraid it's affecting my physical and mental health," Junpei says.

"I have the advantage of knowing you're going to be okay, in at least one possible future."

"And how many possible futures are there?" 

Chet doesn't seem amused. "Less than infinite," she answers.

Junpei sighs. "Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer..."

"Why are you still thinking about the djinn? She's unimportant. Her name is Kitsune. She was born in the very same complex Riko and me were held prisoner in. Only a few more levels down. You're wondering if she and Sarala have a connection?" Chet frowns. Junpei can feel the dream trying to accommodate Junpei's curiosity. The air itself seems to change density, grows heavier and contemplative.

"I don't think I'd be seeing this if it was unimportant," Junpei presses.

"Kitsune isn't the important part!" Chet argues. Her little fangs gleam in the moonlight. She takes a moment to recompose herself. "Kitsune is only a child. Her reality-warping powers aren't mature. She's not a real threat, yet. Why are you preoccupied with this? There are better things to worry about. There's something I'm supposed to tell you. There's something you should be doing." A look of confusion crosses her face. "Something... I... I can't. I don't want to say." She stares at Riko for a moment. He's motionless, frozen, right there, on the stolen motorcycle, holding her. The other her.

"Zoke said you think it's my destiny to kill that guy."

The mini-vampire's response is to stare at her shoes. 

There's too much of her child-self in this memory to directly turn on Riko.

"When we met, you asked me and my sister what we knew about the marid," Junpei pries.

"I thought you were talking about Kitsune's father. Not about Sarala."

"Kitsune's father?"

"Riko set him loose. It was part of the plan."

"Plan?" Junpei tries not to feel offended.

"Huh?" Chet blinks, startled by Junpei's thoughts. "I didn't know that. I didn't know you died."

"I didn't know either, at the time."

She stares up at him, intrigued. Junpei was already killed as a domino-effect consequence of Riko's actions. This is a variable Chet did not know of, or did not realize she knew. "You died yet you are alive. I wonder if that means something."

"It means our lives have been interconnected for longer than I thought."

Her expression hardens. She turns away. "It wasn't that the agents were tracking us and Riko felt threatened when they were close. What you're seeing here is darker than that. He had this idea to test out my precognition. I was such a stupid little girl. If I'd have stopped to think, I'd have realized that if I set the disc to take me to the future, he'd have just teleported away. He would have watched me set the time, and returned to retrieve me. This entire incident was just to scare me into using my powers."

"Am I about to see something bad happen?"

"Only if you want to, Junpei."

"G-go to the bridge," the Chet in Riko's arms stutters. The motorcycle zips away, but Junpei can still see and hear the two of them, in a surreal way. Like watching two films at the same time. "There will be cars and people on the other side of the bridge. Flying lady isn't confident in her invisibility yet. She doesn't have experience with normal people and won't risk being seen, so she'll run right back to the other agent for help. We'll get away."

Riko does as instructed. "Sounds plausible!"

Chet shakily reaches into one of Riko's pockets, and withdraws a pair of sunglasses, placing them in front of his glowing eyes. "Here. You need these."

"Wow," Junpei marvels. "That guy can be an a******."

"The black marks make you that way."

"You're quick to make excuses for him."

"It's not an excuse. It just is."

"Going out of your way to terrify children into using their magic powers is a very special sort of evil."

"Maybe if someone had told me that back then, things would've been different."

"You've been using me to make this all fall into place!" Chet accuses. She's so raw with anger and horror, Junpei doesn't know where they are, where this all came from, where the story begins or ends.

Riko shrugs. She was clever enough to find him; there's no use lying now. "I taught you to guide your visions," he taught her to seek multiple paths and find complex solutions, "because I knew I could guide them too."

"I thought we were stealing these artifacts so MorcuCorp couldn't get their filthy hands on them. But you actually want to use them. You want to open Pandora's box."

Riko t'sks. "Pandora's box is already open. Is that a story you even know? Outside of the figure of speech? Pandora was given a box of horrific things to guard, but she failed, and the horrific things spilled out, escaped, frightened her away from the box! At the last second, Pandora summoned all of her strength and courage to get past them and close the box. Only one thing was left inside. That thing was knowledge of the future. If we had that, there would be no reason to go on. We'd know every outcome and we would have no hope, only despair. You are what was in that box."

Chet glares at him. "Just take me home now. Right now. Do you hear me?"

He picks her up. "As you wish."

Chet bristles. Riko's teleportation only works on another person if he picks them up. This is why she expected him to make a portal... not to just grab her.

Riko wobbles a bit. He shouldn't have the strength to carry a teenager. Especially given how sick his body has become. It's the energy from the scars that carries him forward, compelling him to live until the unnatural affliction kills him.

The two disappear, and reappear elsewhere...

"Jerk," Chet mumbles.

Riko sets her on the ground. She runs inside the house.

The dryad.

She's not covered in corruption marks yet, but it's definitely the same one as before.

"I told you you shouldn't follow him tonight," she says gently.

Chet wanted to appeal to this woman for help, but it is at this moment she realizes she's alone. "You... you knew about this?"

"Yes. I decided not to stop him. He's right about everything. The soil under our feet is mechanical. The grid has integrated itself in each of us. We need to be free of it."

"But without it... no one will survive!"

"And we don't deserve to." The dryad frowns, using the soft tone one might use to explain the death of a family pet to a young child. "We're horrible to each other. We're the only creatures capable of contemplating our own violence, and yet, we fail to make it stop."

"People try every day to make a difference." Chet is not accustomed to playing the part of the optimist. "You're going to tell everyone they have to stop trying because you've given up?"

"Telling everyone isn't part of the plan."

"I'll find someone who can stop you," Chet threatens. 

"I pulled some interesting information out of Brigit," Finley says. She takes a seat next to her brother. "Bridgeport isn't the only major city with a vampire uprising problem. It was the first of many."

Junpei groans. "You woke me up to tell me this?"

"I'm wondering why we haven't heard about the other cities."

 

Junpei blinks a few times, trying to will himself to be more alert. "Does it matter?"

 

"It could?" Finley persists. 

 

"I don't know, are they as violent or newsworthy as this one? Bridgeport is the only city with a significant vampire population. You told me they usually can't get permits to live other places."

 

Finley taps her index fingers together thoughtfully. "Another thing. Brigit is almost positive the person who started the terrorist cell here is a non-vampire named Chelar."

 

As in Riko Chelar? Junpei doesn't have to say anything. Finley can sense the bad, empty feeling her news has given him. It's not shock. It's just falling deeper down the rabbit hole, with nothing to grab onto. It's clear to him that they are in over their heads on this.

 

Finley nods. "She was surprised the name meant anything to me. She said Chelar basically started a cult. Her daughter was part of it, and that's how she found out about its non-vampire origins. She thinks the fae or werewolves are behind this."

 

Junpei groans again. Sick of conspiracies. 

 

Finley continues, "Maybe a mother-daughter falling out may be one reason Brigit was set up to be the scapegoat the media focused on? If her daughter had real power in this terrorist... cult... faction."

 

"Okay... but that's a really messed up thing to do to one's own mother..."

 

"Anyway. I took that nugget of information and did some further research." She averts her eyes for a moment. "Several people down here are well-versed in the practice of hacking and blackmailing and general criminal-ing, so they helped me look into some records I wouldn't have been able to find on my own. Unfortunately I can't get my hands on anything outside of Bridgeport right now, so the trail vanishes into multiple directions, BUT it turns out one Carlo Kehri left a financial trail, funding people the vampires here know are part of the terrorist cell."

 

"You have been busy... how long have I been asleep...?"

 

"Junpei, they're anagrams! Riko Chelar, Carlo Kehri." 

Junpei stares at her blankly.

Finley shows Junpei her phone, and keys in the different letters to rearrange. "See?"

Junpei watches the letters swap around. "Riko with a K? I thought it was with a C. Like ricochet."

"Well you were wrong. I mind-linked with Brigit to show her the man from your nightmares. She is positive Kehri and Chelar are the same man."

 

"But... but... anagrams? That's silly," Junpei complains. "Why would anyone do that?"

 

"Maybe he wanted to be caught? Or maybe he's very unimaginative." Finely makes a dismissive gesture. "So what we know is, this conflict encompasses more than one city, in more than one nation, and the person you have nightmares about may well have started the whole thing."

Junpei rubs his eyes. "But why?"

 

"I don't know, but I think you're way too late to stop whatever this Chet wanted you to stop."

"He's out again?" Meela's eyes hold a soft hint of worry.

"'Fraid so."

"This is a bad time to be unconscious." Their hideout could be discovered, and everyone would need to run. What's more, replenishing the plasma fruit supply has been increasingly difficult, and Meela has seen the way some of the others are looking at the two 'humans' she brought down here.

"I know," Finley says. "So could you stay here with him? I'll find someone else to go back above ground with me."

"Very well. Be careful."

"I know he's having problems right now. And I'm sorry about that. But—"

"You are both mages." Meela smiles weakly, after interrupting. "Having two mages on our side is better than one."

"Exactly. If you get in trouble, Junpei can help."

"It's too hard," Chet complains about her precognitive abilities. "It doesn't work when I want it to."

"Because you're still letting your subconscious mind call all the shots without you," Riko says. "Your powers are like a muscle. You need to flex them."

"Why does that mean I'm letting my subconscious call all the shots?"

"You're still only having most of your precognitive visions in dreams. You need to learn to have them more often when you're awake. At will. On command. Understand?"

"No."

They're in a graveyard. The graveyard sits up on a hill. Junpei knows exactly where they are.

"Why do I have weird powers?" Chet sulks. "The rest of my family were just vampires. Normal ones!"

"They're also dead..." Riko points out.

"Rrg!" Chet punches the stonework she's sitting on. A stand-in for punching Riko. 

They've had this conversation over and over again. Chet is never happy with any answer he gives her.

"Hey now. Cheer up. Don't hurt yourself over it. I know how you feel. I wasn't anything like my siblings, and it just didn't seem fair." Riko leans over, trying to look the kid in the eyes. She lowers her head, hiding behind her bangs. "I could teach you how to suppress your visions instead, if you want..."

"No." She sniffs. "Then I'm just a useless liability. And you'll leave me with someone."

Riko pauses, contemplating his plans for her.  "Would that be so bad?"

"We have to stay together. I don't know why. We have to stay together," the child insists.

The fate of the world depends on it. She can't comprehend that yet.

"Hop down. There's someone I want to visit." Riko jerks his thumb towards the mausoleum.

"Are they a ghost?" Chet asks dully.

Riko breaks into the locked up mausoleum and pries open the well-hidden entrance to a network of underground tunnels. The corridors beyond are dark and dank. Chet has no problems with this disagreeable atmosphere. Riko, though, glances at empty corners and shudders every once in a while. There must be something he sees that Chet doesn't.

They come across a lanterns stuck to the wall, and Riko sets the candle wicks inside on fire, lighting their path. "Enchanted," he announces. "They'll burn for one hour, and the wax won't ever melt." He shakes his accidentally-scorched fingers and winces, not very good at creating fire without consequence.

"Are you afraid of the dark?"

Riko continues walking, at a more brisk pace.

Chet scurries after him. It takes effort to keep up. "You can't just go anywhere you want with teleporting, can you?" she asks. "There are rules."

"There are always rules," Riko agrees.

They round another corner. It looks like all the other ones, but at this one, Riko stops and begins knocking on the wall. Getting no response, he casts some magic at it.

Chet peeks back around the corner. She can see the other side of the wall Riko is so interested in, and there's nothing there. She walks to the empty space, flails her arms around. Nothing. She goes back into the darker corridor with Riko. "What are you trying to do?"

"Annoy someone," he says.

'Someone' turns up.

Chet wonders what she should think is weirder: the guy with the tail getting up in Riko's face and sniffing at him, or the fancy, suddenly-appearing door the guy burst out of.

"Go away!" the stranger demands. "I have nothing you want! Nothing works! All useless! I've spoken to no one!"

"Eeeasy, Faraday! Back off! No need to bite me." Failing to ward away the werewolf with simple commands, Riko points to the tail and says something in a language Chet has never heard.

"Wait... what? You?" Recognizing Riko's scent, Faraday backs off. "Are you here to kill me?"

Riko glares. "Do I have a reason to?"

Faraday's tailfur puffs out. It almost doubles in volume. "Well! We studied the..." he motions vaguely at Riko's face, "...phenomena... quite thoroughly, yes? Final stages of the disease, you get murderous."

"We've been acquaintances for so long! And still no trust?"

"No, of course not! Even your name says 'don't trust me, I lie'."

"It's Riko these days."

Faraday accepts this without question. "What do you want, Riko?"

"You have something of mine."

Faraday relaxes, and stands up straight. "You're only here for that old thing?"

The tailed guy is introduced to Chet as James Faraday, someone who worked with Riko in the past.

"Those damn Landgraabs stepped in and tried to seize our research," Faraday says, as if to himself. "I feel bad about how it all fell apart. They went after you, but spared no time to chase me. Unless you're an agent now, here to—"

"I'm not a number," Riko says, meaning he isn't one of the S.C.'s agents. Everyone Riko and Chet comes across is living in paranoid fear; Riko feels sour all over, just thinking about it. Junpei can feel it, too. He can feel Riko struggling to push the negativity down, as if it's going to boil over and become its own thing, its own vengeful force. Riko changes the subject. "You have a swimming pool?"

"I was storing some things there. Then Winona showed up, and insisted it should be filled with water and heated and cleaned up and all that." Faraday growls. "This is my house. It's not a spa resort."

"Wi-no-na? You married?"

"No no no no no no no no. Winona is my niece. Sort of. Distantly. She's here to hide for a while. Got herself in minor trouble. What about you? Married? Kid? There's a kid following you, if you hadn't realized."

"Kid? What kid? What are you talking about?" Riko snarks.

Past the foyer and the swimming pool, there's... what's supposed to be a living room.

And this lady! She seems shocked, to see Faraday has company.

"They claim they aren't here to kill us," Faraday says, in a way that isn't too reassuring.

Chet is distracted by a train set.

Hey, trains are cool!

Listening to Faraday talk about how the train and hot air balloon work, when nobody asked? Substantially less cool. Seems to involve 'alternate fuel sources', though.

"The heck are you supposed to be?" Winona makes her discomfort known. "Has my uncle taken to running his experiments on people now?"

"I'm an inventor!" Faraday reminds her, from across the room. "People have already been invented! Riko saw it happen!"

Winona narrows her eyes at Riko.

Riko smiles at her. "I saw it happen."

"You'll be fast friends with these people, Winona. They want to take some of my collection away."

"To a dumpster, I hope!" Winona folds her arms.

"Don't you have a high-society-something-schmoozing to go attend? Shoo."

"Why?" Her tone grows worried. "What's going on?"

"Nothing that concerns you."

Faraday leads Riko through different areas of the house, searching for something Riko left in Faraday's care. Chet follows. This place has more rooms than she'd ever thought a house could have. Dusting must be impossible! Then again, there's not a speck of dust on anything. More magic at work, perhaps.

"Seriously, though," she hears Riko commenting from the other side of the room, "you still have your tail?"

"I'm not amputating my tail!" Faraday peeks behind a fishtank filled with a marbles. "It's part of my spine!"

"Do people ever think you're a furry?"

"Lay off. I have a better question. How did you get messed up? What were you doing?"

When Riko told the elemental, Zoke, about growing tired of dodging the S.C.'s constant attempts to capture him and so turning himself in to them, just to see what would happen, Zoke's reaction was outrage. Faraday's reaction is a nod of understanding.

"You just couldn't resist, could you? Being captured meant access to places you had never seen. Pasts you had not yet investigated." Faraday takes the head off a statue and searches inside of its hollow neck.

Riko smiles, all teeth. "I hope you haven't lost the artifact."

"Pretty nice find, wasn't it? Where were we, outside Aurora Skies?" Faraday glances at Chet. "There was this amazing waffle place, but Riko here had just been traumatized by psychometry again, so he wouldn't try anything. So Parsley said 'you have to eat something', and Riko said 'fine' and proceeded to pick up my syrup bottle and drink the whole thing. This has been a roundabout way of saying I don't see why anyone would trust him with a child."

Chet meets Faraday's eyes for a moment, then goes back to studying the motorbike parked in front of the chess table.

Faraday gets on his hands and knees to sniff out whatever he's looking for. "Where did I put the damn thing..."

I'm not sad, Chet tells herself. I'm a vampire. "What is he?"

"He's an inventor."

"You know what I mean, Riko..."

"I'll explain werewolves some other day." 

Faraday remembers where he put the object Riko is looking for.

He's found it. Chet has no idea what it is.

A prism of unknown material? Its structure shifts in a slow, surreal way.

Faraday smiles at it, then glances up at Riko. "What happened to its match?"

"I let them take it, when they captured me."

"I see, I see. How long ago?"

"I don't remember, exactly. Before my natural lifespan would have been over though. I'm only alive because of what they did to me."

"You'd best get it back before they figure out how it works."

"I will. Don't worry."

"What is this?" Junpei tries to steer their conversation.  "It feels strange. I think I've seen it before. It was one thing I could pick out from the flash of images you gave me, on the night we met."

Have we met? Riko gives Junpei a brief scare, speaking inside his head.

"I was talking to the lady." It was a stupid thing to say, Junpei realizes, after he's said it. Everyone here is just a character from Chet's mind. They are all Chet. Aren't they?

Or all they all Junpei?

"It's a piece of a mosaic," Riko says. He addresses Chet, as if she were the one who asked. Out of the corner of his eyes, though, he's still watching Junpei. "It-"

Faraday interrupts. "Is this really a story for a little kid?"

"Precognition! The more she knows, the more effective she is."

Faraday nods mechanically, accepting this logic. At least, he's accepting it readily enough in this dream representation of events. "Thanks to Riko's effectively-if-not-literally-unique abilities, our research team was able to investigate the origins of a frightening device called the Infractus Mens. What we found was, while the Infractus Mens is a horrible weapon on its own, it wasn't originally meant to be on its own. It was broken off of a larger device."

"Put them all together, and they make an even more powerful weapon," Riko simplifies things.

"I thought we'd agreed the mosaic was not meant to be a weapon." Faraday tilts his head, frowning.

"Intentions aside, the potential to do harm is undeniable." Riko plucks the object Faraday is holding out of his hands, and traces a pattern only he can see across it. The object collapses in on itself, falling into a more manageable form. A small, flat square. "However, it was intended to save or at least preserve the world. On a long enough timeline, our planet faces inevitable threats, you see. Space debris could collide with it, our sun could engulf the Earth as it expands... any number of apocalyptic events could have occurred to destroy our fragile ecosystem. The designers of the Setran artifacts sought to safeguard us, with their machine. The 'mosaic' can generate enough power to reshape reality. It's never been used before, and yet, reality has already been altered many, many times. Pop quiz, Chet: can you think of anything else with the power to alter reality?"

"Djinn?" Chet guesses. Riko has told her many stories about them. Mighty creatures of fire, formed from the chaos of the beginnings of the universe, inhabiting an unseen world, capable of warping reality... 

"Exactly right. You're learning quick."

Faraday stands up, brushing imaginary grime from his hands. "Upon discovering the existence of the djinn, the machine's then-keepers — generations removed from the original designers — panicked, and converted some of the individual pieces to specifically counter djinn magic."

"The elves and djinn were the most bitter of enemies," Riko says.

"Your 'Riko' spent a long time trying to understand elves, so he could understand himself," Faraday explains. "The machine was of particular allure, because of its age. Anyway, Supernatural Control actually had a marid under its thumb for many years. A few reality-stability field generators were all that was keeping civilization safe from being enclosed in a bubble of altered reality where we are cheese puffs."

Riko pokes Chet's orangey bangs. "Cheese puff."

Chet slaps his hand away. 

"That was a joke," Faraday clarifies. "We're not really sure what Ashvin would have done, if he were freed. That all being said, I've come to the suspicion that rumors of the marid's death are false and you need this instrument because you are being chased by him. Are you wanted dead, or are you wanted alive?"

"I'm not sure." Riko doesn't confirm or deny his reasons for wanting the device. "They sealed ol' Ash away, though, I know that much. His daughter isn't mature yet."

"He has a daughter? What? Is the S.C. breeding djinn, now?"

"You need to put a stop to this," the dryad pleads. Her tone is angry, but hushed. She doesn't know Chet is listening. "You've put a lot of fear into that little girl. She's pushing herself too hard. She's going to hurt herself one of these days."

Riko's posture shifts. Defensive. He's offended by the accusation. "I haven't done much of anything, since we've been here."

"You haven't done anything to undo the damage you did before you got here, either. Chet loves you. So why you've convinced her that if she doesn't learn to use her powers, horrible things might happen... that's just beyond me. She's too young for that stuff. You're both safe now anyway. No one's coming to get you."

"The world outside this fence is dangerous. I'm not going to lie to her and say it's not. We were both tortured in a laboratory, am I supposed to say that never happened?"

The woman sighs. "I know your mind is slipping away. And you're afraid."

"I'm not crazy!" Riko hisses.

 "But you have to remember how you struggled when you were a child," she continues. "You weren't exactly young by the time you could control your ESP."

"I didn't have anyone to help me. She has both of us."

 "Well in case you forgot, we don't have precognitive powers."

"Too bad Acheron is so weak in this iteration..."

"Iteration? ... What are you talking about?"

Starlight Shores has a thin strip of beach. The air tastes like sand and smells like garbage. The ocean, crashing loudly against the shore, sounds angry.

"Isn't it a bit bright out for vampires?" the woman in teal asks.

"Ah." Chet half-turns. "8:16 AM, and you're here. I knew you would be. Hello. Vampires are cursed to react to direct sunlight, not light in general. I'll forgive your ignorance because you're almost fresh out of the bottle. You were expecting you might be awakened only as far as ancient Siam, but here you are, on the other side of the world, in the year 3375." Chet then offers a sarcastic: "Welcome to my century."

"I have questions for you, mortal." It's Kitsune's voice, but too flat, and lacking any comprehension of the fact that her quarry is mocking her. "If you answer them, I will not harm you."

"That's right, you won't harm me, it'll be someone else doing the harming. You were planning to tell me a sob story about Kehri stealing an artifact, and if I'd only tell you everything I know about him, it would please your master."

A flash of anger ripples across the djinn's features, to be reminded she has a master, but she regains her stoic composure immediately. "That is not the only reason I am here."

"You'll try your best to be nice to me. You'll downplay your connection to Supernatural Control, because it's true, your ass is actually currently owned by MorcuCorp. With the people who experimented on me. They won't hesitate to do the same to you, by the way. As soon as I've answered your questions, you touch some of your magic jewellery, and a dozen of the S.C.'s goons pop up and try to grab me. Serril says something misogynistic at me about how I've grown up, I flip him off, and I escape."

The djinn narrows her eyes. "What is a 'Serril'?"

"It's a name. You don't know their names. But you will, one day. You'll be one of them. We'll meet again. And no matter what I tell you, no matter what I say to warn you, no matter how I plead for help, your sorry collection of agents fail to stop Riko. MorcuCorp nailed together its own coffins by creating him in the first place."

"You would have... come to us for help?"

"I thought about it. The job of an S.C. agent is to keep the magic in the world from destroying the world, right? Go ahead though, brush off everything I've said, and ask me what I know about Kehri."

"We know you have been following his movements. They tell me he may have been your caretaker when you were young. You were reported to be in the same-"

"Spotted in the same location multiple times. Yep. He's got big plans. But if I talk about them, you guys talk it over amongst yourselves, dismiss it, always find a way to catch back up to me, try to convince me to work with you, then stab me in the back, and ultimately fail to stop the guy you should really be after." Chet shrugs. "It sucks. You suck."

"If you know the future so well, why did you allow me to find you?"

"Drop the disguise."

"Excuse me?"

"I said, drop the disguise, shape shifter. You're not Kitsune. Kitsune is sealed away, still screaming her head off. Poor girl." Chet's tone isn't entirely unsympathetic. "She and about five other agents tried to capture Kehri, and they all ended up cursed to scream every waking moment. I know all about that. Ri—Kehri was only able to survive that ambush because of me. If I could take it back, I would."

The appearance of Kitsune fades away. The figure left behind inclines her head down, just slightly. Enough to communicate her sadness. "I am Sarala. Kitsune is one of my own kind, and so young. When they showed her to me, I was ov-"

"Overcome with pity, and you want to help her."

Sarala blinks, offended to be interrupted so many times. "How do you know these things?"

"I can still be surprised, but sometimes my brain picks out an event for me and shows it to me... allowing me to focus on it, analyze it, angst over it, see it from many angles. This is one of those events. I know exactly what you're going to say. We've had dozens of conversations, I've steered them all different ways." Chet takes a deep breath. "What you need to be feeling isn't pity. What you need to be feeling is rage against the people responsible for this. And by that I don't mean myself or Kehri."

"You must know I am bound to the will of my master. I will do everything in my power to capture you, as per his wishes. Nevertheless—"

"You're going to ask me if I know what Kehri did to Kitsune, and if I know how to fix it."

"Do you?"

"I stayed here this morning and let you find me because this is a turning point, Sarala. This changes the game. I don't know why, but in one future where I let you find me here, things turn out different."

"I don't know what you're going to do when we part ways," Chet continues. "I don't know how point A and point B are supposed to connect. The possibility of things turning out okay was only part of my vision for a moment, but it was never there before. Never. No matter how hard I searched. So if this is my chance... I had to let you catch me here today. At least for five minutes."

"Time is meaningless to me." Sarala raises a hand, intent on doing... something. But nothing happens. "You... how are you stopping my powers, mortal?!" she roars.

"You aren't the only one with magic jewellery." Chet calmly slips a hand into one of her back pockets. The time device is there, smooth to the touch. If she does nothing, Sarala throws her off the porch, into the sunlight. If Chet escapes before imparting any information at all, the future is bleak. Whatever Sarala does that changes the unfolding timeline, concern for the younger djinn is the match that starts the fire. "Kitsune is under the effect of the Infractus Mens. What she needs is for the artifact to be shattered... or for the person who imposed it on her to reverse the spell."

Sarala looks Chet up and down, presumably searching for whatever object is countering her mighty djinn will. Before she finds it, Chet disappears.

Sarala searches frantically for the vampire. How could it have escaped?

She was warned of the tricks 'Subject 8-92' and his child would play, but she thought, it was not actually possible, that they could vanish without her noticing the preparation work that is required to make things happen. Energy must be gathered, spells must be weaved.

This vampire just... ceased to be.

"3375?" Junpei questions. The current year is 3413.

Chet's attempt to 'change the game' happened almost 40 years ago.

Something was set in motion, here. Something he still doesn't understand.

 

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Etc:. Faraday is genetically this sim (except for the eye color). Thanks for permissions, Lunararc!