Chapter 22-10 The Beast in the Nothing

Chapter 22-10 The Beast in the Nothing

BREACH-LEAD-1: +Aero down. Crashed in the courtyard of megablock designation: Tower-2. Permission to converge and secure package.+

JOCK-3: +Jock-3 to the Breacher-1, we have satellite reign over airspace. Scrambling bombers to divert Exorcist response team. Kill-Team-Secondary has engaged Sanctus assets. Delay in progress. The window is open. Golems on standby.+

INSTRUMENT-VERITIBLE: +Breach-Lead-1, you are cleared to proceed. Breach-Lead-2, 3, 7, and 12, direct your teams and move to place planar anchors. Make sure we’re extraction ready before our hosts arrive. N-DEF-Veritible, prepare to deploy disruption... N-DEF-Veritible? N-DEF-Veritible, respond.+

UNKNOWN: +I see you. I see all of you.+

N-DEF-VERITIBLE: +Come again, Instrument-Veritible.+

INSTRUMENT-VERITIBLE: +That wasn’t–+

[WARNING: TRAUMA PATTERN DETECTARNIN#$99$#Q$!njfjnsdj;dfsaf vak mWNOOOOSISETER!PLEAESE DONEDIEASELERI]

[WARDS FAILING]

MIND FORTRESS BREACHED

MIND FORTRESS BREACHED

MIND FORTRESS BREACHED

EGO BROKEN

[COG-CAP: 771%]

-Recovered thoughtcasts between members of Kill-Team-Primary during Operation “SKINTRACKER”

22-10

The Beast in the Nothing

Cas’ thoughts came flowed like a broken stream choked with drifting debris. It was a little miracle he managed to cast Denton. The greater miracle was how he wasn’t nulled yet. +Den–agh! Den...+

Avo had always thought himself better at breaking things than fixing them. Such a belief remained even after his successful restoration of Lucille.

Now, however, things were different. He was different.

If the attack on Cas happened but days earlier, there would be little he could do to mend the man’s cognitive functions. The Conflagration was a potent weapon. A devourer that lacked a gentle touch. He could have burned Cas’ mind into his consciousness. Generated a template and worn him as a puppet to simulate the actions the real man might take.

Such would have been the most efficient option, but something that the Columner couldn’t consent to. But Avo was beyond such desperate means now, as his warmind of Delusion granted new paths ahead.

Splinters sped from his ego like a salvo of missiles. Some speared deeper into Cas’ damaged mind, melting into the cracked infrastructure of his Meta. The Palace within was a cityscape hidden behind corded strings, built within the hollow of a tower forged in the fashion of a guitar. Trauma patterns flashed and scythed through drifting buildings, memories bleeding like a slit wrist.

Avo assigned a single submind to handle the mending and fused Peace’s template to serve as administrator over the task. Though the Low Master himself was purely an instrument of harm in life, as a modifiable persona in Avo’s inventory, his knowledge of traumas was unmatched, and thus could he decipher the damage faster than any other.

As things stood, an enormous wound stood at the core of Cas’ palace, and entire sequences connected to it were unlatching from his mind as well. It looked like a chain of traumas had sheared through him neatly, cutting his sense of self to the quick.

A chorus of instincts congealed inside Avo. Something made him suspect that the Columner had some kind of deadman’s switch layered to his mind; a self-nulling procedure in case of breach or compromise.

Not an uncommon thing to find inside spies. Or prisoners.

Green River came to mind.

[Dumb cunt,] Peace muttered. His words were directed toward Cas and Avo both. The Low Master surveyed the broken mindscape he was to restore and let out a growl. A wing of twenty-seven splinters threaded into fragmented streets and damaged mem-data. They sailed out as phantasmal chameleons, their ghosts melting into the environment.

In many ways, the splinters were a direct upgrade to his Ghostjack. No longer did he need to collect sequences or spend time analyzing structures as he could directly become the broken or missing. This, along with the deeper insights granted to him by his legion of templates, made Cas’ recomposition a process of seconds rather than the usual weeks or months of intensive treatment.

[Yeah, and it’s all thanks to us,] Peace snarled, his spirit withering with the task. All of him screamed in outrage. He was here to break the invader-shits. To hollow their skulls of thought and disfigure their egos beyond repair. But here he was, playing nanny to one of Thousandhand’s lackeys. [Look. Look at the damage. It’s all internal. His wards are untouched. It came through one of his Seances. With company like this, no wonder your fucking head’s so swollen with pride–this stupid piece of shit let someone cast a trauma directly inside him.]

Unsurprising. Despite Peace’s disparagement, getting struck through an open link was how most Necros got nulled. Social engineering was a hard weakness to overcome, and most humans were creatures desperate for warmth. Desperate for someone to tell them they mattered. They were valued.

Even with the rash beating down on them, they still sought their creature comfort in realms of thought and ghostly fantasies—a willingness to mingle with their kindred in the Nether–an opening for predators to exploit.

Judging from the mem-data Avo managed to assemble, however, Cas’ reason for getting hit was far simpler. One of his spies was likely compromised. The last session logged a Metamind identifier connected to [Nuruna Velters]. Avo didn’t recall ever seeing that name before. A mystery to be unraveled through healing the Columner.

As Avo conducted internal repairs for Cas, he directed other fragments outward into the environment, converting them to Skimmers for a better view of his surroundings.

They were in a downed aero. A cheap secondhand Zephyr, as indicated by the vehicle’s locus. It was hard to tell the chassis alone, seeing how warped and damaged it was. There was no obvious harm from a missile or gauss fire lacing its exterior. The main damage sustained was blunt force. Warped metal, shattered glass, and a sparking engine spraying flames across the side windshields.

[Volt-thrower,] template-Draus said, seeing patterns from the damage.

Avo kept an eye on the Columner as he siphoned mem-data out from the Necro he just compromised. She was a Highflame Necrojack. A forward scouting element for the rest of the team sent in to secure Cas.

One of his cells was compromised prior, and they managed to capture the aforementioned Nuruna Velters after she finished some dealings with a local Gold-aligned Syndicate. Her mind was also pre-laced with the trauma bombs Cas had, but unlike him, she was no Godclad.

That should have been the end of things, but one could never accuse Highflame of being quitters. Somehow, by luck or by skill, they managed to piece enough of her back together and access her Auto-Seance, managed to secure her sessions too. Through her, they tracked Cas and hunted him. Struck him. They must’ve expected to compromise him Necrotheurgically, but somehow, he managed to maintain sufficient coherence even after his near-total nulling to cast Denton and pilot his vehicle, forcing them to use direct measures.

And so it was they found themselves at the present, with multiple squads of Regulars taking a walk through Sanctus territory on a snatch and grab, their target supposedly down and out.

But such was not so.

Just like how Cas couldn’t have anticipated the subversion of his asset, neither could Highflame know the thing that studied them now, that was threading himself across their Necro into their minds, into the lobby they used the run this operation, into the nine other Necros they had diving in surrounding networks, into the commander they had in charge of Necrotheurgic operations, and the Instrument in charge of the entire operation itself.

Avo spread and spread, and spread. He spread, and waited, wondering if Veylis could sense him when his Heaven went unused, if the Nether pressed on the paths as well.

+Shit,+ Cas said, spitting sourness into the dirt. +Denton? You there?+

+We’re all here,+ Avo replied.

Cas eld’Canduir touched his eye and eyed his halo. A final fissure came together before his eyes. +Avo? Did you just... mend me?+

+There’s been some changes,+ Avo said, relishing in the man’s shock. +Going to need to catch you up on certain things. But only after we get you out.+ He shifted his attention over the encroaching Regulars, the first unit pushing up under the cover of cloaked precision-firing assault drones. Avo grunted. +Draus. Could try to spare them. Know you were.+

Back in the enclave, the Regular scowled. +No. Fuck that. Null ‘em. Break ‘em. Snuff ‘em. Whatever it takes. They got their guns pointed the wrong way. All there is to it. My time with Highflame is done.+

Avo chuffed a laugh. What fortune he had to encounter someone like Draus in the Crucible. Or maybe more than that. Maybe it was by Walton’s design.

Whatever the case, her template wasn’t going to be lonely for much longer. The cadre was about to get some premium sparring partne–

EGO-ID DOWNLOAD REQUEST: [IF ON A WINTER’S NIGHT A WANDERER]

The ghoul’s mirth doubled. He accepted the link without hesistation, and his Neurodeck, left cold and vacant without the EGI’s presence, suddenly came alive with a thinning of his ansible.

And then Calvino was back in Avo’s mind again, hovering like a misted sunrise made from trailing nanoparticles. {Avo. Apologies, I had to–Oh, what kind of nightmare are we involved with now.

+Calvino. Welcome back. Operative Canduir ran into a bit of trouble. Going to get him out. And find out how much it takes to crack a Regular’s mind.+

{Well, then. I suppose I didn’t miss much.}

+Have Canons of Chronology now. Should’ve seen it.+

{I have missed too much; Kant is going to consider self-deletion. Well done.}

There was a tone of genuine amusement in the EGI’s voice. The mind was even less human than Avo was, and capabilities at subterfuge couldn’t be underestimated. But something in the ghoul suspected the mind wanted to be here, that he enjoyed their time together.

All the same. The feeling was mutual. Best to give him a show worth returning for.

+Peace,+ Avo said, shifting the Low Master’s template over himself, calling upon traumas refined and Necrotheurgic unparalleled. +Done treating you like a nu-dog. Going to give you a choice now. Do you still want to hurt? Still want to hate? Still want to be a weapon?+

A pause followed. A weight passed against Avo’s Domain of Air.

[Yes,] Peace growled, forcing the words out. [Yes, godsdamn you. Yes. You already know–already fucking know.]

+Good,+ Avo replied, as he paired more templates of Peace over to his subminds. +Because I’m going to give you what the Hungers never could. Actual victory. Actual success. Chance to hurt Highflame. Hurt your foes. To break the occupiers of Noloth. I unchain you, my Famine. Go. Give them your Peace.+

And so over one-hundred and twenty splinters shifted their sequences, going from blended architecture to active trauma, and for the third time that day, bombs began going off inside unprepared minds.