B3 Chapter 16 - Banished

There were multiple time limits relevant to Syl and Bianca’s current situation. The most obvious was their limited resources. Their pressure suits had limited supplies of oxygen, and the spell pattern refreshing carbon dioxide and maintaining pressure would eventually start failing even if they replenished it with flux. Still, there were a number of ways they could circumvent that. Food and water wasn’t something they could simply conjure, but there were spells that could keep their bodies functioning in the absence of a supply chain.

The problem with that was that while they could theoretically remain here indefinitely, there was only so long they could spend here before there was no home to return to.

Lila Adams—or, at least, a mound of nanotechnology that had gained a certain set of signals from the intelligence behind the machines and was simulating her existence—remained standing in front of them. Shortly after, she was rejoined by Zero, his body formulating out of seemingly nothing.

“Lila Adams,” he said. “Paragon-class. I saw her fight Lust once. Early 73 AFI. Sinner tried to fold a few schools of promising students into one being. Lila didn’t win, but Lust left with her goal uncompleted. That’s more of a victory than most see.”

“I am aware. I was tangentially involved. You, on the other hand, didn’t see anything,” Syl said. “You’re not alive.”

“Are you?” Zero asked, manifesting a cigarette out of thin air and lighting it. The smoke hung in the air oddly, the different pressure and atmospheric composition making it propagate differently. “I am as real as you are.”

Now that Lila had undergone the same treatment as Zero, Syl was certain of his theory. Zero hadn’t existed since the third world war. He’d been absorbed, information and memories analyzed and uploaded.

It was either that or the crackpot theory that he had actually been a rogue AI the entire time. If it was the latter, it would explain how he was capable of free casting. Syl didn’t particularly care about which one was true—what mattered was that he was not human.

“You are a set of electromagnetic signals running through amalgamated technology,” Syl said. “I never made any claim as to whether or not you exist. I just know that you are not the same Zero who created the Seven Sinners.”

“And you are a set of electromagnetic signals running through a skin-bound bag of blood and organs,” Zero said. “Does it matter?”

“Syl,” Bianca said. “We have larger concerns.”

That was true. Without Pride, it was very likely that the ongoing assault would degrade Earth to a point of being unlivable over time.

Ignoring the two machine-copied magicians beside them, Syl pointed towards the city-sized machine in the distance, beginning to move. Bianca followed wordlessly.

Their enemies had made a mistake in trapping the two of them here. Yes, any innovations they made here would benefit the machines, but there was a fair amount of damage they could do beforehand.

Whether or not Syl could learn the secret behind igniting a Gate himself, he didn’t intend to leave this planet with any of its current inhabitants alive.

#

For the first time since the start of the war, the area formerly known as Auria was in a relative state of stability. From the moment the first dirty bomb had gone off and the first Cascadian Virtue deployed to a critical point of Aurian infrastructure, the country had been under constant pressure from sources both internal and external.

It would be hard to glean the idea that anyone was relieved about this from the mood in the Viridian control room, though.

“You know, I used to look up to him,” Jennifer muttered. “Didn’t know it was him, though. Somewhere in the chaos, we lost the opportunity to sit down and talk about it.”

Though it was no longer news that Syl’s true identity was that of one of the nearly-mythical Seven Sinners, he had also been the de facto head of Incarnate, which had initially been founded as an engineering platform specifically meant for his FCDs before he had joined it and started shifting it towards a more general-purpose engineering organization.

The current head of House Viridian had wanted to work there once. Back when issues had been… not necessarily simpler, but certainly less grave. She’d wanted to make a difference in the world.

Now, their one connection to it was gone.

“That’s the problem with heroes,” Uriel replied. “Or dictators. Same principle. So much power in one place, and once it’s gone, everything falls apart.”

The fragile peace that had fallen upon the Aurian territories was owed almost exclusively to one person. Jennifer had been critical to developing parts of the mass driver that they used to keep their nation from crumbling apart at any given time, but she hadn’t made the discoveries that allowed them to create and use artifact magic. 

It had not been Uriel who had single-handedly killed every single one of the Cascadian Virtues. Even the members of SU-317 hadn’t played a part in scaring the Red patriarch so badly he’d backed down entirely. Not even the other Sinners had done what he had to stop the world from ending in the first place when he’d stopped the tide of grey goo.

With him gone, it was only a matter of time before everything ground to a halt. For the time being, Jennifer knew how to keep the synthesizers necessary for the continued propagation of life in their territory going, and she’d at least obtained enough of a contact with other members of Incarnate that they would be able to send information back and forth. One of those contacts was in this very room.

The problem came in the lack of leverage they had without the Sinner.

“We definitely can’t tell anyone he’s gone,” Jennifer said.

“I fully agree,” Aaron said. He was the one Incarnate engineer who’d come with them for the purpose of securing the ship and surveillance. “I would suggest keeping me here for the time being. Risking an information leak would be catastrophic.”

“Why, exactly?” Avery asked. “Incarnate is secure, right? We should be looking for a way to get him back.”

“Which we won’t get if we admit to literally anyone that the sword of Damocles is gone,” Jennifer said. “Do you know how many threats he was keeping in check?”

“The other six Sinners, the Red family and their associated alliance, Cascadia, Polaris,” Uriel said, ticking each one off on her fingers. “And don’t forget, you know, the fragments of the fucking moon that can and will end the world if we let them get anywhere close to the surface at a speed above a kilometer or two per hour.”

“We can deal with the fragments now that we have a functional weapons system,” Avery said. “We just proved that.”

“A weapons system that won’t stay intact for long if we let slip to the prismatics that we’re free pickings,” Jennifer said. “Some of us”—she glanced at Uriel—“are better equipped to fight now than we used to, but we don’t have the manpower or the resources to split our focus across several hundred thousand people’s worth of refugee settlements.”

“I still don’t get why Incarnate would be a problem, though,” Avery said, furrowing his brow. “They’re a friendly organization, and any leaks should have been spotted out a while ago.”

“Some of our enemies have our families,” Aaron volunteered. “Mostly prismatics who worked with people we cared about who were quick to react when the sequence of incidents began.”

“Then why hasn’t anyone flipped already?” Avery asked.

“That much should be obvious. Fear and respect. My old mentor used to say those two were the only things you would need for absolute loyalty. I don’t know how true it is because one of his students ended up poisoning him, but it certainly applies with Incarnate.” Aaron delivered his monologue in an almost monotone. Certain mannerisms from his superiors seemed to have rubbed off on him. “If you disobey, you risk your family—but you also have one of the most powerful magicians on this planet angry on your behalf. They know this. We know this. So they won’t hurt people that matter unless it gets really desperate.

“Try to betray him, on the other hand, and there’s a good chance you’ll be dead before you’ve finished thinking about it. We know some of his magic because we’ve worked on his FCDs, but we certainly don’t have a comprehensive overview of what he does. Everyone operates under the assumption that he is always watching not because he has constant surveillance spells but because the mere possibility that he’s there is enough.”

“It’s a wonder none of you have snapped,” Uriel commented.

“I mentioned the part about fear. He commands respect, too. Sylvester is the best of us, and though he may be inscrutable, he is never unfair. Many of us would lay our lives down for him—but knowing that he is somewhere we cannot find is a different story.”

“I see now,” Avery sighed, putting his head into his hands. “That is a problem.”

“I have no aversion to finding a way to extract Sylvester, but I do not know which members of Incarnate might potentially give up information. We cannot afford a potential leak.”

“Smoke and mirrors,” Jennifer said. “If Waylan was here, he’d say something about the Wizard of Oz, I’m sure.”

“Where is he, by the way?” Uriel asked. “Have you been tracking him?”

“Of course. He’s been moving. Often between locations that correspond with the bases of other prismatics. Still alive, looks like. At a guess, they’re actually listening to Syl’s commands and are keeping themselves busy by fighting the other prismatics.”

“What a waste.”

It was yet another reason they had to keep up the facade that Syl was still alive and active. None of them had actually assumed that he or Bianca had died, of course. It was impossible to believe a magician of that caliber would just vanish so easily.

“We got good data, though,” Jennifer said. “Aaron, you have the on-site records, yes?”

“Of course,” Aaron said. “I can upload them to your database at your earliest convenience.”

“Please do.” Jennifer rubbed her eyes, looking around her.

She and Aaron were engineers, but the latter’s specialties was in drone and sensor tech. He had delved so deep into his specialization that it was unlikely that he would be of much help in finding a way to not only artificially generate a Gate but also target a specific one.

To that end, the grand total of her information was whatever was in Incarnate’s archives plus the visual, flux, and drone data they had received from a single machine-created Gate. On top of that, she had the notes Syl had left her in an effort to catch her up to speed on the language of the machines and how to break down their magical patterns.

Jennifer lacked data. That had always been one of the major problems when it came to magic, the military, and life itself. Variables. Too many of them, each of them influencing the ultimate result in ways that could be predictable if only she knew about them.

“Uriel,” she said idly, “how many Gates do we have appearing naturally these days?”

“Quite a few,” Avery said, intercepting the question. “The Towers are all especially active as well. Most of the Gates that form have been doing so in regions affected by war and aren’t being cleared, though, which means that they overflow out into the country. They’re usually not fit for life under Earth conditions, which means they’re usually easy enough to handle by a team of comptent magicians.”

“Okay,” Jennifer said, the inklings of a plan forming. “Aaron, do you have a direct line to the special unit Syl is or was a part of?”

“Not a direct one, but I can reach them,” he replied.

“Fantastic. We need to requisition a magician.”

“Oh?” Uriel asked. “You have an idea?”

“I need data, which means I need to see Gates. Maybe the Tower. I can’t clear them, but I know people who can.” Jennifer stood, tapping the table. A number of work-in-progress FCD designs popped up, displaying themselves to the watching group. “You’ve been pushing your limits. All I need you to do is test them out a little.”

“Sounds good,” Uriel said. “We’re clearing Gates, then.”

“Until we have a way to get them back,” Jennifer said. “In the meantime, we’ll replace his role.”

“Bold words,” Avery said. “None of us are even strategic-class—“

“Uriel is now.”

“—and none of us are even approaching paragon, let alone the level of a Sinner.”

“We aren’t,” Jennifer replied. “But we don’t need to be. All we need to be is enough.”

After they split up to pursue their new tasks, a ping at her FCD alerted her to outside sensors being tripped, which was normal enough. Even with the apocalyptic surroundings, there were more than a few people walking around the surface either scavenging a life for themselves or stealing. They often accepted being added to one of the expanding Viridian cities.

What wasn’t normal was who it appeared to be.

Jennifer checked her camera and sensor display, and her blood ran cold.

She’d seen that signature before.

Another Sinner.

Gluttony was here.