The Owl in the Abyss - Chapter 10 (Patreon)

I was going to kill Leet.

That was the only remedy I could see to the notion that he’d planted into my head. Perhaps I could hit up the Foundation, if they showed up, for some amnestics.

My eyes blearily took in the wiki page of the Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition on the succubi race.

It was ridiculous.

I didn’t have horns, nor a tail, though I could maybe grow the latter. My body just didn’t have the base structure or DNA basis to have horns grow out of my forehead. I wasn’t evil by nature - not by strict definition. The capacity for evil was endemic to all humanity, I just had more innate natural tools to potentially be evil.

Succubi apparently stole souls. From a certain point of view, sure, I drained energy and to an outside observer, if I actually went all the way, my partner would die. I imagined the autopsy would reveal no particular cause of death. The heart and all brain activity would’ve just stopped. Everything in the description about the lower planes, fiends and related creatures, utter nonsense or at least, nothing that I’ve seen or experienced yet. I had to keep in mind the nature of SCPs and the multiverse - something that Henry had at least given me a small primer on.

The Foundation had different names for it, the most common term was ‘thaumaturgy’ or ‘ontokinesis’. It was the principle that human thought, experience, imagination and the mind, had the ability to actually warp reality around it. In some distant universe, where the Foundation was born, a critical mass of some kind had been reached and certain members of humanity had ‘awakened’. Then began to literally mess with the fabric of reality, bringing their imagination to life. The problem immediately became apparent that humanity was not the only ones to awaken and it had also sent ripples into the local multiverse - and attracted the attention of things best left alone.

Now I was that stone in the pond. The ripple into the universe around me was spreading and something was throwing more stones.

I focused again on the screen before me.

Succubi were good at ‘crowd control’. That I could certainly see, had I not done that during the car pileup, not to mention the evening at the swinger club. They could also tame and control creatures, which was an intriguing notion. I’d never thought to see if I could control the minds of animals.

My mind raced with ideas and possibilities to such an extent that I had to try.

I had to know.

I misted from my room and surged out into the night.

There was no way I was testing this in my immediate neighborhood, so I ranged more than three blocks away and began flying low, just over the rooftops of the various houses, searching.

It didn’t take long until I spotted a dog kennel in the backyard of a rather nice two floor house.

I came to a hover just over it and inspected the sightlines and the house itself. I extended my mind web to encapsulate it - finding four minds that were in deep levels of sleep, all of them were dreaming.

My focus turned below me and poking my head in through the roof of the kennel, I saw a rather handsomely patterned German Shepherd, also sleeping on its forepaws. Another bit of examination revealed no indication of the name of the dog on its kennel. My mind decided to rather originally designate the dog as ‘Shep’.

I turned my mental gaze fully on Shep and tried to spot his mind.

It was… there, but hazy.

My mental fingers tried to grasp but it was like I was holding a very slippery soap bar.

For minutes I tried to bring the dog into the web but failed every time.

Okay, experimentation time, I can’t change anything about Shep, so the problem had to be with me.

I moved myself to the right side of the kennel, out of immediate sight, where the kennel would shield me from anyone looking into the well manicured backyard from the house. Then materialized crouched and ready on the balls of my feet. My scent would reach Shep soon enough so I was on a timer for this.

My mental fingers tried again to pull Shep’s mind.

Still slippery but I now had a much clearer view of the dog’s mind.

Come on, Taylor, this would be awesome, come on, I thought angrily to myself, before mentally slapping myself - anger would not be my ally here.

Calm.

Think.

What is the problem?

The dog’s mind was slippery.

No, my ‘fingers’ couldn’t find a purchase.

Could I change my fingers?

Yes, they weren’t physical fingers. It was my mind.

I opened my eyes to True Sight.

Shep’s mind was a conglomeration of ever shifting colors, but while complex, simply didn’t hold a candle to the human mind’s complexity. To grasp it… I needed to understand it.

This was not something I was going to achieve now.

I misted immediately and returned home.

When I was back in my chair in front of my PC, I immediately reached for my journal and began penning my thoughts and observations down on Shep’s mind.

Could I control animals?

I could tentatively answer yes already, but it would not be an instinctual power. It was one that would require study and would be different for every species of animal. I needed to find the ‘hand holds’ that would allow me to latch on. I needed to study the minds of dogs and other animals now. The potential to have them act as spies in plain sight was amazing. Birds for overhead recon, dogs whose nose was still better than mine, to follow scent trails for miles. Various insects to get into small nooks and crannies.

My mind stopped me at that point. I had a lot on my plate already. Don’t get ahead of yourself, Taylor.

At this point, I was putting off jumping back into the headache-inducing reality of Leet’s research and notes into his own power.

No procrastinating, I thought with determination and pushed open the laptop, resuming where I had last left off.

At first I had feared that delving into Leet’s work would be like trying to make sense of a dog’s breakfast or organizing a convoluted mess of a system that would only be understandable by Leet himself. That did not turn out to be the case.

Uber had probably helped impose some order and I could see the occasional shorthand language that would be utterly indecipherable otherwise, if it hadn’t been for further notes explaining the shorthand.

Most of my time during this evening and early morning was devoted to these notes.

It was on occasion rather fascinating seeing some of the ideas Uber had come up with and had tried to make work. A lot of it was straight out of some of the most popular science fiction and gaming; a gun that created linked portals wherever its energy bolt hit in succession, armor systems that made even Armsmaster’s suits look a bit pedestrian in comparison, he even had some ideas of how to make the craziness in Super Mario games come to technical reality.

He would put his work through methodical testing, then some glitch occurred or a crucial part was proven to just not work. It made everything just utterly fall apart and he then scrapped the whole idea.

It was as if I could feel Leet’s fury and frustration through his research and notes.

The clock moved past three in the morning when my phone vibrated on my desk. There would only be one person who so confidently called at this time.

“Hello Henry.”

“Morning Taylor, could you come round when you have the time?”

“Sure. How does just after seven sound?”

“Perfect. Need to run this by you and I think it’ll set both you and your father’s minds at ease somewhat. See you then.”

“Okay, bye.”

Now what would that be about?

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Henry’s current abode was a warehouse of typical concrete and corrugated steel construction, that was a dime a dozen in the Bay. The difference with this one was its age, having been built only a few years ago. It spanned just under three hundred feet in length and about sixty in width, the interior lined with heavy duty racks that almost touched the curved overhead ceiling.

It was distinctly weird walking through the place, like I was among the interior steel skeleton of a fleshless animal. It should’ve been filled to the brim with crates, boxes, pallets and so on, but my bare feet slapping against the concrete floor echoed throughout the empty space. The air circulation in here was also quite terrible, it was already muggy and oppressive in temperature. The place had to be sweltering at noon.

I found Henry in the lower floor cubicle office and had to smother a smile at the sight of the living statue moving and working in the space.

He had taken to moving about on his knees and since he was technically a statue, he could keep that up indefinitely and not have to worry about bruising, aches or pains. To solve the problem of interacting with the PC and his more delicate environment, he’d taken to sticky taping pencils with eraser tips on his thumbs, forefinger and middle finger. The large work desk had also been pushed to one corner to allow for more general movement space.

The walls of the office had been utterly covered with sheets of paper, most of which was printed, but some had large scribbles that had been clearly done by Henry himself. It naturally only made sense to him, but I could see some clear divisions and categorization going on.

“Ah Taylor, thanks for coming,” he said, frowning in thought at a cluster of pages in front of him.

“Sure, what’s this about?”

“I’m somewhat sure we won’t be having a visit from the Foundation.”

“Really? Why?”

“It’s rather simple, which naturally made me rather hesitant to just accept the idea. You see, I appeared in this universe on my plinth, something I had left behind in the Foundation universe a long time ago. Do you see the logical problem with that?”

I frowned and bit my lower lip in thought, “If you had been just plucked from your containment site by the Void Event, you should not have been on your plinth when you appeared here?”

He smiled, “Precisely, yet there I was. As if my essence was plunged back in time, to my ‘younger state’, then transported here. An awful amount of thaumaturgical effort for little old me. It almost makes me feel rather honored that a being would spend that amount of power to achieve this effect.”

“You think there is an intelligence behind it?”

“Only explanation. However, trying to determine a motive for it or any design will be rather impossible given that any entity capable of wielding this level of power is not something we want to get on the wrong side of. Even knowing about them could be dangerous and destroy our minds or make us insane.”

“So how does that translate to the Foundation not showing up to reacquire you?”

Henry gave me a pointed look. “Answer this question, do you think the Foundation is currently even aware I’m missing?”

I really wanted to facepalm at my own stupidity for not having made that connection. “You’re not truly gone from there. Your old statue body is still there, only it’s not moving because your essence is gone.”

“Maybe,” Henry admitted. “It could just as likely be that the Void Entity doesn’t want the Foundation to show up yet and I could be a copy.”

“Can you even make a copy of a person’s… essence, soul, or whatever?”

“To a sufficiently powerful anomalous entity, anything is possible, Taylor.”

I gestured around to the office walls, “So what is all this?”

Henry chuckled, “A little cliché isn’t it? As if I’m some conspiracy theorist puzzling together how the big bad organization has screwed with the world.”

I giggled, “A bit.”

“That’s their biggest weapon, you know? Controlled induced disbelief.” He pointed at me warningly. What? I thought in alarm. “The Foundation also uses it - the actual term is memetic warfare. It’s using ideas, stories, social media and pop culture as weapons to discourage and manipulate people from thinking about certain things, to view pre-selected topics automatically as nonsense. Allowing them to easily move through those cultural and perceptual gaps to remain effectively invisible.”

My brain seemed to both grind to a screeching halt and speed up as my thoughts raced away. The dissonance and contradiction almost served to give me a headache.

“That’s… actually a thing? It’s being done here… to me?”

“Sorry about that, it’s not a pleasant thing to point out to someone who’s been experiencing it, but yes, I’m pretty sure that your world has been under memetic assault for some time from various parties.”

Henry pointed at the wall in front of him, which held the least amount of papers, “This is just my thoughts and research on the current anomalies that are with us in this reality, including you, me, SCP 15 and the other two. Not much I can really add here besides my attempts to find any common elements or patterns that would say why we were selected.” He moved on his knees to the longest wall of the office, which easily had the most amount of papers stuck to it. “My parahuman research.”

“Hang on, what about the memetic stuff, who’s been doing this?” I asked indignantly.

“Getting to that, though I can’t tell you who. I can only infer their presence. I’m quite fortunate that there are entire academic departments in your world dedicated to the study of parahumans. All the legwork has already been done and I’m rather impressed how far it’s come in spite of the conspiracy who is clearly hamstringing their efforts or outright sending them down wrong paths.”

I barely stopped rolling my eyes and scoffing as he said the word ‘conspiracy’. It was like, now that Henry had opened the curtain, I could clearly see how my mind had been ingrained to not accept the idea and just always move it into the ‘nonsense garbage’ category.

He looked at me knowingly and continued. “The PRT classification system of parahumans is a rather efficient shorthand. I rather wish the academics had come up with their own more nuanced and accurate system. It’s understandable though, that if they wanted to present their findings to a wider audience and the PRT, that it would be just simpler to have the singular system. I’ve gone through a lot of the accredited academic literature, the fringe theories, and so on. All this and I’ve barely scratched the surface. Now I’m not going to claim ‘Eureka!’ and say ‘I’ve solved this puzzle, bow before my genius.’ What I can bring is a fresh out of context perspective… understand?”

“Sure, you haven’t been exposed to the manipulation, you’re literally out of this universe, with your own set of biases and filters, you can see what I can’t?”

Henry smiled, “Excellent. Precisely, Taylor. Now, I’m going to demonstrate another memetic tool that I think has been used. Answer this question, don’t think or consider, go with the first thing that comes to mind, put no filter in your response. Brainstorm. Ready?”

I took a deep breath and consciously just relaxed, pushing away from the mental filters, dropping my guard as best I could. “Ready.”

“Imagine yourself as a normal human. A parahuman attacks you in your home. What do you do?”

“Run away,” I answered instantly.

“You are unable, the parahuman is a Mover and will catch up.”

“Call the PRT.”

“For whatever reason, you are unable to call or the phone has been damaged.”

“I- I- I can’t…”

“Can’t what?”

“Fight, it’s pointless.”

“Why, Taylor?”

“He’s got powers, I don’t.”

“The parahuman catches you, you die.”

I blinked as my brain once again seemed to grind its gears, yet my thoughts raced, “Wait… what?”

“It didn’t occur to you to even think of fighting back.”

“But…”

“You just accepted that he or she has powers, you don’t. End of story?”

“Yes… that’s the way it goes.”

“You have hands, fists and a working brain, don’t you?”

I laughed, “What good does fists do when you fight a Mover? You’ll just keep missing. A Blaster would just blow you away and laugh. A Brute would rip you apart.”

“Very logical points, but do you not even try? Reach for a weapon, a baseball bat, any household implement.”

My brain seemed to want to go in two directions. It was very weird and even painful. “No, same problem.”

“So just sit back, cower and die? Let the parahuman slap you around, kill you.”

“No! Yes! I mean…”

Henry interrupted me suddenly, “You have access to a gun. It’s in your father’s bedroom, do you go get it?”

“No, even if I could, the Mover would just stop me or rip it out of my hands before I could blink. The Brute is bulletproof. The Blaster shoots me before I can get to it.”

“Change the scenario, the gun is in your hand. Do you shoot?”

“No, I’ve never fired a gun…”

“Sorry, you have the training to use it well. Do you fire?”

“The Mover just…”  My brain ground to a halt and finally - I could see. Why? Why would I not just fight no matter what? It was my life on the line, after all.

“Do you see it, Taylor?”

“I think so… has… have they stopped people from thinking about that? Not killing parahumans, even in self-defense?”

“It’s certainly there, buried in the memetic overlay of the culture. Even in your laws. The way certain high level judges have made rulings which became precedents. Military funding was diverted which saw considerable shrinking of traditional defense providers, which in turn reduced production of everything from handguns to fighter jets. Even parahumans are targets of the memetic attack, which have seen them hemmed into the hero-villain conflict roles. The so-called ‘unwritten rules’. On the surface it just seems like common sense, a natural development of flawed, broken people wanting to get by and not escalate conflict into brutal encounters but when has common sense ever been common.

“Note those who fall outside of the rules, how they’re ganged up on by both sides. Now, I will freely admit that in the case of monsters wearing human skins, like the Slaughterhouse 9 and their ilk, that needs to be done. However, take a look at so-called Rogues. An exceedingly rare thing, a parahuman who doesn’t want anything to do with the hero-villain label. They try to leverage their power for economic benefit and the red tape smothers them nearly completely. Soon enough, the villain led gangs turn up and they’re either conscripted, have to flee or are killed in the fight. Even the PRT and Protectorate have initiatives which claim to help Rogues, but are just legally veiled long-term recruitment strategies, aimed to frustrate the Rogue to the point where they join just to get away from the bullshit.

“On the other hand, the hero-villain paradigm also subconsciously elevates parahumans to a higher effective status in society. One of the first things a person does when so elevated is to measure themselves against the ‘strongest’, in this case Alexandria, Eidolon and Legend. Then find ways to leverage the power to move above something as mundane as bullets, the great equalizer of the old paradigm. Among parahumans, it’s right back to the might makes right, of the old days. The gaining of power is almost akin to being reborn into a nobility class.”

“That’s what the PRT and Protectorate is there for though, it’s right in their name,” I pointed out.

“Fair point,” Henry agreed. “That led me to research the PRT. It’s an admirable attempt and they’re backed up by a semi-monopoly on force, in the form of the Triumvirate and they have the law of the land behind them. The problem is that monopoly can quickly evaporate at any time with the next Trigger Event. Those who can challenge their power are very rare by nature and among those, they’re either monsters like the S9, the Blasphemies, Ash Beast etcetera and literal containment zones are built around them or they’re sent to the Baumann Parahuman Containment Center or Birdcage.

“Now I’m not going into a debate on the morality or very dubious legality of that place. The Foundation can be seen as a monstrous thing. If you’re an anomaly, forget the law protecting you or any human rights for that matter. When you’re dealing with threats that can rewrite reality itself or destroy it there’s no room for compromise or compassion. This Birdcage though, I see as part of the memetic tapestry used for control. ‘Behave or off you go to the Birdcage.’ The supposedly inescapable prison and such an interesting nickname for the place. It’s rather in your face when you look at it with open eyes.”

My brain was still somewhat trying to keep up with the startling knowledge Henry was idly relating to me as if he was discussing the weather, but that brought things to a screeching halt. “Wait, Henry, what are you saying?”

“You never let a bird out of its cage if you’re the owner, but when might you one day need to open the cage and let that bird free?”

“Never, that’s the point of the name.”

Henry chuckled and shook his head. “Perhaps that train of thought can be discussed at another time. I fear I’m somewhat overloading you and it’s not a nice thing to discover you’ve been memetically affected. Let’s somewhat change the subject, do you want to hear my thoughts and opinion on the Endbringers?”

I rubbed my forehead wearily, “Might as well, it’s not like I can sleep it off anymore.”

Henry moved over to another part of the office, where the wall had a large global map collaged together that tracked each Endbringer attack, in addition to a timeline.

“Here’s where we enter the realm of speculation. The research done is limited by the semi-classified nature of the specifics of Endbringer attacks. All that is said is that Behemoth attacked this city, resulting in the loss of a large amount of civilian life, infrastructure damage, the parahumans who died and participated and so on. Analysis is done on short, medium and long term effects to the economy of that region. Then it ends. It never asks why, what or even who.”

“Well, surely there’s theories, I’ve read tons on that,” I pointed out.

“Yes, but all of them are just that, wild ass guesses. It seems the very inscrutable nature of Endbringers prevents even those parahumans with Thinker powers from trying to find out anything or even hope to predict them. Trying to find a holistic analysis of the results of their attacks is difficult and what you do find is watered down and lacking in detail. I’m forced to conclude that this is deliberate. It generally would mean that the actual truth is something that would cause considerable panic if it were revealed. I really have to grudgingly admire the conspiracy, because it’s actually once again right there, hiding in plain sight. You just have to look at it all together and see the forest for the trees. Again, it’s right in the name given to them; End - Bringer.”

My teeth gritted a bit in frustration, “Henry, memetically affected here, please explain.”

“My apologies, Taylor. Try this, those three entities are Bringers of the End. The End of not just a city or people of that city, but of this world, the civilization on it, of humanity.”

“B-but, that’s…” I sputtered as my brain felt like it was hit with a sledge. “What? That’s not… The Protectorate has always driven them away and Scion always stops them… eventually.”

“Yes, but what is left behind and the impacts of those attacks, the ripples they generate, the supply chain interruptions. You’re already seeing a preview of the future in Africa. There’s barely any recognized governments left on the continent, it’s all been reduced to parahuman warlords. The other continents are hanging on admirably but the Endbringers are steadily attacking key points of infrastructure and industry that is slowly wearing even that down. It’s a classic case of the frog in steadily warming water being slowly killed.”

“I think I need to sit down,” I said and uncaringly just dropped myself to the floor on my butt.

Why was this affecting me so much worse? The SCP problem had the potential to destroy the universe and here I was falling apart because of the Endbringers. Was it because I had literally grown up with that threat? Behemoth first appeared in 1992 in Iran. I was born a year or so later. My earliest memories that I could recall was when I was four years old. I had first learned of them when I was six. I had been so frightened and only both mom and dad working together, telling me of the great heroes who fought them had calmed me down.

After that, Behemoth had attacked every year or was it eight months?

Then Leviathan appeared in Norway, utterly flooding Oslo and surging the ocean to reduce the country’s landmass by a significant percentage.

Then Behemoth attacked again, but now only five months later. The attacks continued like clockwork.

Finally, they were joined by the Simurgh nine years ago, who fell from space onto Switzerland. Her constant presence in orbit effectively destroyed the tentative steps humanity had taken into space. The fledgling moon base had to be abandoned, the astronauts making the return journey successfully despite the fear of the Simurgh smashing their spacecraft to pieces with her macro-telekinesis.

I looked up and spotted Henry’s attack timeline.

With their sister, the Endbringers had accelerated, attacking every three months.

The pattern indicated that the Simurgh would be next and she was due to attack in this month of February. Henry estimated a date sometime in the next week.

Next week.

The question that I had been avoiding for a long time since I had become… an anomaly, surged to the fore.

What could I do against the Endbringers? Against the Simurgh?

Seduce her?

A bubble of incredulous laughter wanted to emerge but I managed to catch it.

She was a ‘female’, if she was even human at all or had been human. It would mean a mental battle for emotional dominance. Did she even have emotions? Would my sight and power even register that there was a mind to latch on to?

Even if I waded through all those maybe’s and dominated the Simurgh, what would I do with her?

No, my Master power didn’t help here.

What of my Mover ability and my intangibility? That looked more plausible. I could scout, search and rescue, though the latter depended on whether I could carry people into my ‘misting’. I did it with ‘15 and my phone, so theoretically the answer should be yes. As long as my power didn’t arbitrarily judge I was using someone to cover my body.

The final issue was the biggest elephant in the room. The Simurgh’s worst weapon - her ability to mind fuck people into ticking time bombs or twist them into nightmarish versions of themselves. Should I even risk exposing myself to that? She could literally turn me into a fair imitation of the behavior of a succubus.

Henry began writing something in his shorthand on the map of the world and it finally broke me out of my introspection.

“I need… time to process this.”

“There is certainly no hurry, Taylor,” he said graciously. “It’s no comfort, but my best guess is about thirty to forty years before civilization collapses. This is of course dependent on factors staying the same, with the current status quo maintained. It could be lengthened or even hastened depending on many variables which I won’t burden you with now.”

“But the Simurgh-”

“Ignore that,” he interrupted. “Taylor, you are young with your powers and I can tell you they will be growing. Fighting that entity or attracting her attention now is not wise. It’s widely accepted that the Simurgh is a precog of considerable power. Whether that’s what it actually is or simply reading an extremely detailed simulation of reality that she runs internally, we can’t know if she can see Anomalies. Whether our out of context nature innately protects us from her sight.”

“That would be a good thing though, wouldn’t it?”

“Maybe, but it will make us stand out like a sore thumb. Imagine her reaction when we are there in her immediate sight, but her precognition sees us as not there.”

My back shuddered at the thought, “I can imagine how I’d react.”

“Precisely, you’re anomalous, unknown, a threat. Taylor, I’m not in any position of authority over your life. You’re almost old enough now that even your dad couldn’t stop you. Therefore, I urge you, show patience, grow and when you’re ready, you’ll make the Simurgh your bitch.”

I couldn’t stop the burst of laughter, “You’re serious? You think I can do that eventually?”

“We’re Anomalies, Taylor. Conventional rules don’t apply to us in every respect you can imagine. The only rules we have are that which brought us into existence, everything else is fair game. That is why the Foundation can contain SCPs, because they’re very adept at learning those rules and exploiting them.” He pointed to a sheet of paper tacked to the side of the world map, with very esoteric writing on. “My doodles on scenarios of certain SCPs against the Endbringers or very useful SCPs we could use.”

“If a so far utterly random Void Event would be so kind as to bring them,” I pointed out immediately.

“True, but I’d rather not have some of these SCPs on Earth Bet at all. In most cases, the SCP would be worse than the Endbringer.”

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I winced as I saw dad staring blankly into the mug of his coffee. He was clearly wishing that there was something a lot stronger in there.

The kitchen table was bedecked with the remains of a dinner that I had spent a lot of time preparing and was one of mom’s best recipes.

Only when he had a pleasantly full stomach did I begin speaking of Henry’s explanations and theories on the Foundation, Parahumans and Endbringers.

Now his face held an expression that was completely numb and his shoulders were visibly slumped.

I hated that I was the bearer of this news. That I had turned his evening, that should be a time of destressing and relaxation, into a depressing nightmare of revelation that the world was actually doomed if nothing was done. That the world itself was subject to a constant source of memetic attack from multiple apparent vectors. I hadn’t been able to pull off Henry’s masterful exposition in exposing the memetic influences, but fumbled my way through it so that dad eventually understood and saw.

He rubbed his head and looked at me. “I can somewhat see now why the Conspiracy did this. If the world in general knew, can you imagine what it would inspire people to do or not do. Suicide rates would go through the roof, people would just stop caring, stop working, it could precipitate the collapse of civilization even earlier. The Endbringers wouldn’t even have to try anymore, we’d be doing most of the work for them.”

That angle hadn’t even occurred to me. “It just stinks, dad. That head in the sand syndrome is exactly why no one in school lifted a finger to stop my bullies.”

“As this latest revelation shows and something we’ve both learned many times now, the universe is not inherently fair in its design, Taylor. If it was, your mother would still be here. Winslow would’ve stopped your tormentors in their tracks. You would’ve not become…”

Dad trailed off and finished his coffee, slamming his mug down with a bit more force than necessary. “I’m going to bed early, little owl. Maybe the universe will be kind and let me forget this, but I don’t think that will happen and now that I know - I don’t want to.” He stood and walked around the table, before gathering me into a hug. “Whatever happens Taylor, tomorrow, next week, next month, however long we have on this Earth, we’ll face it together. Understand?”

I slightly tightened the hug and nodded into his shoulder.

After a long few moments he let go and headed out the kitchen, “Good night, dad.”

He merely nodded and thumped up the stairs.

The monotony of cleaning the dishes and working with soapy warm water was all that soothed the burning anger stewing in my gut. Anger at the universe and world, the Endbringers, including myself for what I had done to dad. It was something I had resolved to endure though, no matter how painful. The truth might hurt but I had to believe in the end, it would be better to know it than coast through life living and thinking in the lanes dictated for us by this Conspiracy.

The sun was just about to fully set outside and it was about time for me to head to the Red Light District.

I headed up to the bathroom for a quick shower, taking the opportunity for a quick shave of my body hair, including taking the plunge to further reduce my pubic hair to create a thinner landing strip and reduce its volume considerably. Then I combed and styled my hair to form my mask.

‘15 and my phone was next and suitably armed for the night, I misted and flew into the night, heading directly south.

It was tempting to go high for the wonderful view on the way but I forced myself lower and slower, so as to not lose sight of what was happening below. As much as this was another working night, I would not blind myself to any crime I could possibly intervene in.

As usual to orient myself, I first headed directly east towards the bay, then turned south to follow the main highway that hugged the coast.

The city below me turned from suburbs to stretches of business districts, then large plots of utter darkness. Then reaching the taller high rises and buildings of downtown.

It was as I was passing an interchange of the highway that branched off towards the west that my eyes spotted something hinky.

A gathering of six men, just standing around in a loose circle under the curving concrete interchange. The only reason I spotted them was because my flight path had taken me further west, keeping the highway to my left.

Their body language and bearing sent some red flags waving in my mind. A glance at their auras also confirmed it - a combination of eagerness, along with another emotion that was almost anger but not quite, I didn’t have a real association for it yet. One among their number was nervous and practically shaking with fright.

Their attire was the most obvious next clue as to who or what this gathering was. Some looked like they could be right at home among a biker convention; black leather sleeveless jackets, jeans, boots. The others were also in jeans and street casual. Some even had full arm tattoo sleeves. Two of them had completely shaved heads. Put all this together with the location, not a single minority among them and I could only be looked at card carrying members of the Empire 88.

Picking an outright fight when they were on ‘their’ territory was not a good idea. Their emotions though were the big red flag and I hovered closer until I was well within earshot of their conversation.

One of the skinheads looked at his watch, “Seriously, what’s taking so long?”

“Will you relax, Max.” The one with a snake tattoo all over his arm replied lazily. “It’ll take as long as it takes.”

“I’d rather know who you guys are betting on this week?” This was one of the biker guys.

“That’s easy, Prince, all the way. Got a solid hundred riding on him.”

“Prince?” One of the others scoffed. “Braden, you hardly have any eye for talent. Maeve will kick ass.”

“The biggest don’t always win, idiot,” Braden retorted.

“Let’s ask the newbie,” another biker suggested. “Who will you bet on?”

“Baxter,” said the nervous one shortly. He was the most ordinarily dressed of the group, with his only claim to looking as if he was in a gang, being the black shirt with the typical metal music symbols printed on it, pronouncing the name of a band that I couldn’t even read.

“Baxter eh? Ha, talk about going for the underdog,” Braden laughed.

They were clearly talking about betting on some form of competitive matching and given these were E88 gangers that could only mean one thing.

Dog fights.

I wasn’t really a pet person, but like anyone with an ounce of humanity, my heart melted from cute pics of cats and dogs on the Internet. Just the thought that these assholes participated in that, stoked a fury in me that made me want to smash their faces in, just on principle.

One of the Empire’s most notorious and deadly capes was Hookwolf, who ran those arenas where they threw dogs into deathmatches. He was essentially a Brute Changer, who could turn his own body into a mass of bladed metal that he shaped into the form of a massive wolf.

There were two known villain sources of income in this city that I dearly wanted to shut down, and those pit fights were one of them.

At this point an old looking sedan pulled onto the small side street that parallelled below the highway. It drove with an unhurried purpose and stopped close to the gang men.

“At last,” Braden declared. Almost all of their emotions turned eager, with that off-color anger spiking.

The driver of the car emerged and the distinct aura of a parahuman hit my senses.

The man who emerged was seemingly young, looking like he was just a few years older than I was. The difference was he had looked this age since he appeared on the cape scene of Brockton Bay just under two decades ago.

He was utterly flawless in appearance, with short hair and a chiseled face as if some Renaissance sculptor had worked on it and was decently muscled. He’d easily feature as front page material on any women’s magazine, if not for the fact that his skin and hair was utterly white. The other major detractor was his eyes; there were no pupils or iris, just more white, giving him a look that made you want to shudder and turn away the instant you perceived it. It was an overall appearance that at first drew you in, then pulled the rug from under you once you saw those soulless bland eyes.

This was Alabaster.

An enforcer for the Empire 88 and had the power to essentially ‘reset’ himself. If he received any damage, which would normally be fatal to a human he’d just revert back to a pristine undamaged state moments later.

That was the publicly known facts about him but like with any power, I was sure there had to be nuances and unknowns that were not apparent. The most obvious one I had brainstormed about him was the fact that his damaged clothes also reset on him. He was currently wearing a puffy leather jacket, brown shirt, black jeans and rugged work boots, the kind that construction workers often favored. The jacket was perfect for hiding his preferred choice of weapons.

The six men hurried to the car and crowded around the rear trunk eagerly.

Alabaster opened it and began handing out void black police batons to each of them. Then as if that wasn’t enough, glass whiskey bottles with rags stuffed in their necks, filled with clear fluid - Molotov cocktails.

“All right, you all got lighters?” Alabaster’s voice was deep but like his body still had a youthful rich sound to it. Everyone produced a variety of fire starting devices; cheap gas flick lighters to elegantly adorned flip lighters. “Good. Follow.”

It was clear that there was no need to explain or brief the E88 men on what they’d be doing.

They walked with purpose across the street and seemed to be headed to a large department store that was nestled next to the highway all on its lonesome with a large expansive parking lot. It was closed for the night, but it was still highly likely there were employees inside, doing the last minute things to close off the day and some security guards, judging from the scattered cars still parked here.

It didn’t take a genius to know what was going on here. Alabaster was a known enforcer and this was E88 territory. Somebody in that store had not paid their ‘protection’ fees and now the consequences were going to be dished out.

Now the problem was what would my intervention in this actually achieve.

I’d stop this tonight and even if I took down Alabaster, which was not guaranteed or certain, the Empire had a literal roster of their own capes who could finish the job a few days after the PRT or Protectorate response had come and gone.

The only possible win condition here was to take Alabaster off the streets permanently and buy time for the store owner to wise up and pay. Though the Empire could still torch the place as spiteful retaliation for losing a cape. I’d also come to the attention of the E88 and make an enemy out of them.

Fuck this was stupid.

How could I be ‘good’ in this situation? What was a pro hero supposed to do? Was I overthinking this?

More than likely, yes. I was an undeclared enemy of the E88 anyway. I despised their racist supremacist Nazi ideology, that should’ve been anathema in a country that fought a world war against that shit. Yet simply because parahuman power had entered the equation, now it had to be tolerated and placated. Fifteen known A-list capes stood under the E88 banner and there were also rumors they were supported internationally with more they could call in.

Alabaster and his gang passed a parked car. He casually gestured at it.

One of the men smashed a window in and tossed a lit Molotov inside.

The parking lot resounded with the car’s alarm as its interior was engulfed in yellow flame that was soon belching out of the smashed window.

More windows were smashed to add oxygen to the fire.

The gang approached the store frontage.

Shit.

I zoomed forward and stopped myself above their heads, reaching out with my mind web.

All seven, including Alabaster’s mind, were snatched.

Their emotions immediately changed, becoming relaxed and already started to head towards the realms of pleasure. They dropped their batons and their Molotovs uncaringly, which shattered and spilled flammable fluid all around them.

Oops.

Then Alabaster seemed to visibly flash with a muted blue light briefly and my grip on his mind vanished.

What?

The ultra-pale cape blinked and shook his head, turning around in alarm. He saw his gang just standing there with blissful expressions on their faces and idly rubbing their crotches, their pants beginning to visibly tent from the erections underneath. “Fuck!”

He reached into his jacket with both hands and produced two Glock pistols in each hand. He whirled on the spot, clearly searching for me.

Then, I could perceive his mind again. It was as if it had just popped back into existence.

I grabbed a hold of it and Alabaster relaxed, the pistols lowered. His eyes closed with pleasure and face slacking.

His body flashed and again I lost his mind.

He whirled on the spot, raising his guns again and aiming, but no target presented themselves.

“What is happening? Come out! I know you’re there… shit, no, you idiots!”

All his gang now had unzipped their trousers and were fumbling to bring their hardening dicks to hand. He rushed up to one of them, grabbed them by the shoulders and tried to shake some sense into them. “Snap out of it, fool! A Master’s got you!” He even followed that up with a slap to the face.

The gang member just took the punishment with a smile and kept stroking his manhood.

Then Alabaster’s mind reappeared and I automatically snatched him into the web again.

Interesting, that was about 4 seconds, I thought. So his reset power had a timer on it and his power considered my domination of his mind as worthy of ‘resetting’. There had been no indication that Alabaster was Master resistant in this fashion as well, which was not surprising. It wouldn’t be something that I would blab about idly. Human controlling Masters were rare enough that I could imagine this detail escaping attention.

I thought of an idea but this would require quick timing.

Alabaster reset again. His face turned into a rictus of fury. He whirled around, putting some distance from his gang mates who were now well into jerking themselves off and groaning with pleasure.

Can’t let all that go to waste.

The instant I could grab his mind again, I rematerialized behind him and shouted, “Freeze all of you! Alabaster, drop the guns!”

The masturbating gangers stopped their stroking and froze.

Alabaster practically threw his pistols to the tarmac at his feet where they clattered and thankfully didn’t go off accidentally.

I grabbed both weapons rather awkwardly, because I still had ‘15 in my right hand and misted with them.

My next destination was the roof of the department store, where I dumped the weapons.

Alabaster flashed blue and vanished from my mental grip.

“For fuck’s sake,” he cursed, turning around to where he had heard me briefly appearing. He pulled a stiletto knife from his belt, falling into a loose stance and carefully kept moving and turning on the spot.

I reappeared behind him but well out of lunging range, just as his mind fell into my mental hands again.

“Throw the knife away from anyone as hard as you can.”

He nodded with a smile and with admirable technique, chucked the knife away so that it sailed through the night and disappeared into the depths of the unlit parking lot.

I misted and hovered up into the air as he reset again.

“Bloody bitch! You’re gonna die!” He screamed in frustration balling his fists.

My next reappearance was twenty feet away, directly under a lamp post. I leaned against ‘15 planted on the tarmac and tried my best to affect a somewhat seductive pose, flaring a hip, smirking at him, giving a dainty wave with my fingers. “Come, you big boy.” He turned to me as I caught his mind. “Drop your trousers.”

He eagerly obeyed, popping a button, working his zip, then pushing down on his pants.

He stood and then flashed in a reset.

Interestingly, his clothes didn’t reset to normality at that point. Perhaps his power judged that wasn’t classed as damage.

Alabaster initially started to try to run in his anger to get to me, only for his bunched pants around his ankles to almost trip him up. He growled in annoyance and pulled them up, hurriedly buttoning it up before beginning to run for me. “There you are, gonna get it now!”

“What am I going to get?” I asked cheekily and misted just before he could tackle me.

He twisted on the spot, trying to not give me an opening to his back. No doubt in response to my weapon.

I rushed back to the gang members and reappeared in front of them, giving a rueful look at the long line of manhoods that were there for the taking, but circumstances prevented me. “Sorry boys, zip up. Run along home and rethink your lives hard.” I pushed the command deep and with strength.

“Awww.”

“Yes, Mistress.”

“Please Mistress, come visit.”

I misted just as Alabaster came running back.

“Damn it! Get your batons, we have to get out of here,” he snapped at the men.

“Yes, we do,” said Braden, calmly picking up his baton. The five others did so and looked at each other.

What they did next I could only later attribute as some effect of what happened when someone threatened me, whilst anyone was within my mind web.

He slammed Alabaster in the chest with the baton, driving the air right out of the cape’s lungs. Another came from the side and swept his legs right from under him. The other four closed in on the prone cape and began bashing him with fist and baton. All the while they were shouting.

“You dare threaten the Mistress!”

“You won’t touch her!

“Her beauty is not yours!”

Alabaster flashed underneath them in a reset, all his wounds and contusions healed, but their assault continued unphased. It was also interesting to note that the cape was enduring all this with no signs of pain at all, even though he has six batons wailing on him. I even heard ribs and bones breaking, but not a peep of complaint was coming from the Empire cape.

This was not sheer masochism on display, there was no way anyone with functioning nerves and the capacity to feel pain could be like this. No, this was another expression of his power at work.

I rematerialized ten feet away from the ongoing beatdown and shouted, “Enough! Restrain him.”

My thralls responded immediately, each grabbing a limb and in concert with the batons, put them in holds that would prevent Alabaster from getting any leverage to do anything.

Rather amusingly, the sixth gang member, the perpetually nervous one, was left without a limb to restrain. He simply sat down on Alabaster’s chest. He was just under six feet and looked like he definitely could be in a football team, so it definitely helped.

The Empire cape squirmed and wriggled but was totally helpless at this point. “You’re dead, naked bitch.”

I sighed in annoyance. “How original. Do you really think that insult actually carries any weight with me?”

My hand worked on the holster strap of ‘15, and I pulled my phone out, activated it and dialed.

Three ring tones later, “PRT Hotline, how may I help you?”

“Hello, my name is Escort, I’ve got Alabaster rather tied up and would appreciate Armsmaster with a containment foam grenade at my location; Clayton’s Home Improvement, just off Old Church Street, Downtown.”

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A/N: Poor Taylor. For someone like Henry from the SCPverse, an Endbringer is basically Tuesday.  Link to full story so far for new folks: forum.questionablequesting.com/threads/the-owl-in-the-abyss-worm-scp.18012/page-3