THG: 2.2 Spit of Spite (Patreon)

Preface

I'm technically done with my commissions for the month, but I don't feel right not posting anything on a Friday. So, in the words of Rin Tohsaka, "100% MAXIMUM NO-CHILL!"

Spit of Spite 2.2

John Soprano

I wiped down the glass and groaned in frustration. I looked outside but found no hint of the delivery driver, just like the last four times.

‘Your bounded field would warn you if they were nearby,’ Shirou pointed out.

‘Yeah, I know, but Carl should have been here three hours ago,’ I griped. ‘I can’t help it.’

‘Well wipe that sour look off your face because you’re scaring the customers. What few there are anyway. Customer service is just as important as the quality of food you serve, you know.’

‘Look at you, since when are you an expert restaurateur?’

‘I did work at the Copenhagen for a while, you know. Politeness and good cheer are the basics of customer service.’

‘You’re right.’ I forced my face to relax. With the gang war, there were fewer people than usual, but that was no excuse for poor service.

It wasn’t like this was the end of the world. Delivery drivers were allowed to be late. The smoking process took a few days so it wasn’t as if I’d run out of meat in the next few hours either. There was nothing that I couldn’t make via overpowering my wishcraft. The restaurant would be fine.

‘John, you’re doing it again,’ Shirou chided. I glanced down. The glass was fine. So were the plates. ‘Behind you.’

‘What’s behi-’ Behind me, the grill surged with fire and heat as Laevatein fed off the prana I released in my agitation. I quickly leashed the temperamental Noble Phantasm and turned back to washing dishes. ‘Thanks.’

‘No problem.’

It wasn’t fine.

Carl was supposed to deliver the all-important briskets, as well as wings, pork and beef ribs, whole chickens for the rotisserie, and eighty pounds of raw, uncured pork belly, skin on so I could experiment with smoking them whole. The guy came by twice a week, dropping off all the meaty goodness I thought I’d need. He’d never been late before.

I could theoretically wish it all up, but I’d promised myself I wouldn’t close myself off and be some kind of meat-hermit. The banal task of running a restaurant, deliveries, taxes, and all, was a big part of how I kept myself grounded.

I was distracted from my growing agitation by the feel of Vista entering the bounded field. Compared to the prana desert that was the rest of this world, she and Caliburn stood out like a lighthouse in the dead of night.

“Kingmaker!” she declared, alarming some of the guests who’d been distracted by good food and conversation.

Well, if she wanted to use that annoying name then…

I dropped what I was doing and conjured Merlin’s trademark white cloak. There was nothing innately magical about it, not like the Magus of Flower’s, but it certainly looked the part. WIth it came his gnarled staff.

Twirling it in my hand, I swept into a flourishing bow and took a knee. “Oh, Vista, King of Brockton Bay, Champion of Pixies and Magical Girls, Slayer of Dragons and Their Progeny, Mascot of the Noble Wards, the Holy Grill is yours, your majesty.”

The look of utter horror on her face made my victory all that much more delicious.

“Eww, no! Please don’t ever do that again,” she begged. “And stop that! I saw your stupid PHO post! You’re why everyone keeps saying I stole the dragon’s pearls!”

“What can this humble magus do for you, oh king, you who stands short in stature but tall in dreams?”

Her eyes narrowed in annoyance. “Are you saying I have big dreams or that I’ll only ever be tall in my dreams?”

I gave her my best, friendliest smile, full of innocence and goodwill. “Yes.”

“Ugh, whatever. Can I have the Artoria Special?”

“You’re really getting some mileage out of your royal perks, huh?”

“Yup. Gimme.”

“Fine, fine. Give me a few minutes. And let me know if a delivery guy named Carl shows up, won’t you? He’s my meat guy and I haven’t seen him in hours.”

She looked at me like I was stupid. “Mr. Soprano?”

“Yes, Vista?”

“You know that Bakuda started bombing the streets, right?”

“I mean… yes? She started it to get Lung out of lockup but you kinda neutered him. I’m not a hero though so I’d rather not get involved. Didn’t Fort-that hat-lady from Watchdog take care of it?”

“Mr. Soprano, why would Watchdog deal with Bakuda? That’s not at all how they operate. You’re a great chef but you’re kinda stupid, huh?. The city’s paralyzed right now. Traffic is slow because people are clearing debris from the affected streets. Non-essential personnel have been asked to avoid driving at all if they can help it.”

I froze at that. This was unacceptable. In a way, this was also entirely my fault. Looking back, I told Fortuna to clean up after me at the bank. I didn’t give a damn what she did with the Undersiders or Coil, only that they were out of my hair.

More, I’d told Fortuna and Rebecca to leave the city alone. To go back on that and demand they take care of Bakuda too would be… It left a sour taste in my mouth.

“So… Carl the meat guy is…”

“Probably not driving today, or working at all for that matter,” she said definitively. “Don’t worry, we’re going to find Bakuda. Director Piggot is probably going to ground me for life, but I decided that I’m going to use Caliburn anyway.”

“As you should. Caliburn might look like a sword purely meant for ceremony, but it’s still a Noble Phantasm, with all that it entails. It deserves to be wielded by someone who is worthy.”

“Right… Hey, is there a way to change the activation phrase? It’s a little long to use in a fight,” she said, doing her best to sound casual  as I slid a heaping pile of food in front of her. I saw right through her though.

“Pft, you just want to stop sounding like a magical girl.”

“I do! Do you have any idea how hard it is to get people to respect me?” she raged. She grabbed a huge beef rib and waved it around like a club. “Sure, I can blast the ocean in half, but everyone still makes fun of me!”

“Well tough. I really can’t change that,” I told her honestly. Arias were declarations of intent, the outward manifestation of the Noble Phantasm’s nature. In a way, it was the legend coming alive in the form of oral tradition. I dipped a finger in the barbeque sauce and booped her nose, leaving a sticky, brown spot at the tip. “Don’t look at me like that. I mean it. I really can’t change it even if I wanted to.”

“Grr… You suck…”

“Anyway, back to Carl. When do you think deliveries will start running again? I’d rather not start wishing up meat if I can help it.”

“Oh, right. You can do that. Why do you even do all this then?”

“Because running a restaurant is sacred. If it makes you feel better, I’ve been taking all leftovers to the local homeless shelter along with the proceeds. It’s not like I need money.”

“Huh… You’re a pretty good guy, Mr. Soprano.”

“There’s more than one way to help people. So, Carl?”

“You really have a one track mind… I don’t know. Whenever we find Bakuda, I guess. It’s not like I’m an investigator.”

I thought back to what happened in canon. How did they find Bakuda again?

‘Lisa,’ I realized. Her deductive skills were critical in locating the crazy tinker. Technically, the heroes captured her, with Vista and Clockblocker neutralizing her massive EMP bomb, but I had no doubt that it was in part due to information Coil funneled their way through his position in the PRT.

‘Information they won’t have because Coil is gone now and that Lisa girl is who knows where,’ Shirou pointed out. ‘John… How bad can Bakuda get?’

I winced. This would definitely set Shirou off, but I didn’t have it in me to lie to the idiot. ‘She’s… bad…  Her magnum opus was an EMP that would wipe out all electronics in the entire New England area if not the east coast.’

Shirou let out a deep sigh, one of those that usually came from a disappointed parent. ‘Can the heroes deal with her without Lisa’s help?’

‘I don’t know,’ I answered truthfully. Could they? Possibly. In a timely manner with minimal casualties? That seemed unlikely. Armsmaster wasn’t an idiot or anything, but he sure as shit wasn’t a thinker.  I didn’t even know when she started putting bombs in people’s heads. Then again, they had Dinah so perhaps they’d get their shit together before she could really build up momentum. “Have the heroes asked Delphi?”

Vista shrugged. “Maybe? But probably not. She hasn’t really been around much because she’s apparently working for some bigshot Watchdog lady. And when she’s around, Director Piggot doesn’t want to use her for some reason.”

“No meat delivery then.”

“No meat delivery.”

I groaned in frustration. Piggot probably didn’t want to rely on advice from a twelve year old girl, never mind that said girl was one of the greatest thinkers on the planet. Was it her ruffled pride at having Watchdog seemingly “invade” her territory? Or was it her paranoia of capes? Or maybe even just me in particular? I did have a lot to do with Dinah joining the Wards after all.

I didn’t want to resort to wishcraft, but I’d run out of meat in a day or three otherwise, even without my usual flood of customers. There was only one way to restore equilibrium in my restaurant: I’d have to deal with Bakuda.

Standing, I loudly clapped my hands. What few customers I had turned to look at me. “Can I have your attention for a few minutes, everyone? Thank you. Seeing how I’m not going to get deliveries for the foreseeable future otherwise, I’ve decided to close the restaurant while I go deal with Bakuda.”

“Seriously? That’s what got you to move?” Vista asked in disbelief. She didn’t know, but Shirou echoed the same sentiment. “Your precious meat supply?”

“Of course. I am a chef. A chef without food to cook is nothing. That is like a sword that cannot cut or a Taiga that will not mooch food; it is a fate equal to death, for it is the death of purpose. Ergo, I must avoid such an outcome at all cost, even if it means that I must step onto the battlefield once more,” I said solemnly.

“Fine, whatever. Come on, we can report to the PRT HQ.”

“Call ahead for me. And tell them to find Delphi.”

“One sec,” she said. She pulled out her phone and began to text. A few seconds later, she had a response. “Delphi’s at the Rig. She’s hanging out with Triumph apparently.”

“Got it. I’ll go to her,” I said, stalking out. The bonded field would urge people to leave if they weren’t eating anyway.

“Wait! You need a pass to get there, dummy! Mr. Soprano!”

X

Missy Biron

Mr. Soprano shot off like a rocket, not even bothering to close up his store. Considering the incredibly powerful tinkertech on display, I assumed he really trusted his shop’s defenses. I reminded people not to get any ideas, never test a tinker’s workshop, and stepped out.

He was fast, faster than Armsmaster in his power armor. How, I had no idea, but the guy could move when he wanted. I kept up by bending space and hopping onto a nearby rooftop. I caught up to him as he reached the pier.

“Console, John Soprano is headed to the Rig to speak with Delphi. I think he’s looking for Bakuda’s location.”

“Negative, Vista,” came Aegis’ voice. “You know how the director feels about Delphi. No one gets to ask her questions until she’s fully debuted and cleared for action.”

I frowned at that. The director did not like Dinah. Not because of anything she did, but because of what she represented. She probably felt like Watchdog was interfering in her city or something, like a pitbull that starts barking because someone’s in its yard. She insisted that for “best practices” and “standard operating procedure,” no one got to use Dinah without her permission.

It was stupid. What “best practices?” It wasn’t like she could run out of questions for the day.  Dinah didn’t even get thinker headaches thanks to something Mr. Soprano did. When Assault pointed that out, she shut it down by saying it was untested tinkertech and that too should go under review. She couldn’t do anything about Chief Director Costa-Brown browbeating her with Watchdog, but she could shut down operations in the city.

I wished the chief director would just tell her to shut up and let Dinah do her thing already, but apparently that was crossing the line.

I sighed and pinched the space between me and Mr. Soprano. I grabbed him by the arm. “You can’t go there. The director doesn’t want Delphi answering questions yet.”

“Really? Costa-Brown didn’t tell her to fuck off?”

“I guess she still respects Director Piggot’s independence. It’s her city and all that.” He muttered something under his breath. It sounded like “Rebecca,” “poultry retribution,” and “rules-lawyering bitch” but what did I know? “You need the tinkertech bridge to get there anyway. It’s pretty cool, like a rainbow road.”

He looked at the Rig, then down at the pier beneath his feet. Somehow, I got the sneaking feeling that I was about to see something ridiculous. Again.

He gauged the distance one more time and held out a hand.

“Console, I don’t think Mr. Soprano’s going to stop,” I told Aegis. For self-evident reasons, we had standing orders to never fight Kingmaker. According to Triumph, who sat in on the Protectorate meeting now that he wasn’t a Ward, the order came from way up top.

“Shit, what’s he doing?”

“I don’t know! Mr. Soprano, what are you doing?”

He looked back at me with a smug, trollish grin. It was the same grin I saw on Clock before he glued the fingers of Gallant’s armored gloves together.

“Making a bridge.” Then, with a surge of blue light, he began to chant: “Sword of Zababa, War God of Kish, part the skyline and cleave the thousand peaks! Ig-Alima!”

The entire world trembled. A column of light towered into the sky. At first, I had no fucking clue what I was looking at. The light faded but I still struggled to believe what I was seeing. I could feel my power reach out, trying to grasp the space around it, only for it to come back with a big, fat “What the fuck.”

It was like dividing by zero. Not actually zero, I think my power understood the concept of nothingness, but undefined, as if it was physically incapable of comprehending what was happening.

The sword, it was indeed a sword, was monstrously large. But if it was just that, my power would have grasped it. I was the shaker-nine, the space-girl. There was something else about it, a power that I couldn’t put to words. It was as if the very horizon had been condensed into a single weapon, so hilariously tall that even Behemoth would look like one of those LEGO men standing next to it.

Then, with a deliberately slow swing, Mr. Soprano brought the sword down. He was gentle, slow, as if he feared causing a tidal wave with just the sole swing of his weapon.

Even so, the sheer mass of his sword sent waves throughout the bay that dislodged a few of the abandoned ships. They’d been mired in the muck for as long as I’d been alive now, but they were set free and now lurched along tumultuous waters like rubber ducks in a bathtub.

“Vista, what the hell happened?” came Aegis’ panicked voice.

“I don’t know!” I cried back. “He made a bridge!”

The sword, Ig-Alima, its name was engraved in my mind, now crashed down onto the Rig. Or rather, just next to it because the sword was longer than the distance between the pier and the Rig. It scraped against the Rig’s force field and the barrier the PRT paid millions for popped like a soap bubble.

Ig-Alima now sat in the water horizontally, lying on its edge and probably buried several yards into the muck. The edge still towered over the surface of the water like a wall made by giants. The hilt and pommel was pressed against the pier, leaving a convenient place to step onto Mr. Soprano’s ridiculous “bridge.”

“Welp, that’s that,” he said. He wasn’t even trying to be humble anymore. He reached out a hand to me. “Shall we, your majesty?”

I glared up at him with what was definitely not a pout. Vista did not pout. “You’re in so much trouble, you know that?”

“No, I’m not. Piggot can say what she likes but there isn’t much she can do about me, is there? Now come on, I want to ask Din-Din some questions.”

“Respect the unwritten rules!”

“Nah, too much of a bother.”

So saying, he hopped onto the hilt of the sword, then the blade itself. I found the blade to be relatively dull and wondered if he could alter the shape mid-creation.

Then I realized something. “You’re not a tinker.”

“Nope,” he said, strolling and humming along. “You lot are the ones who gave me your silly ratings without asking. I never claimed anything of the sort.”

“Then what are your ratings?”

“Hmm… I probably count as a mover, brute, shaker, and blaster by default. I suppose my projections can qualify as tinkertech so you weren’t entirely wrong there. The Heaven’s Feel should grant me a breaker rating for the sheer physics-breaking nonsense that it is. Really, every other rating could easily be had from one of my Noble Phantasms. Oh, and I can rip souls from people’s bodies. That’s technically one of the fundamental abilities of the Heaven’s Feel so I guess that also makes me a striker. So… I’m a big, fat YES to everything except changer…”

“You’re kidding me.”

“No, wait… Could I adjust a Saint Graph? That’s spiritual anyway… Hmm… Hold off on the changer thing. I might be able to Install a Heroic Spirit eventually, in which case I also become a changer-YES.”

“You make no sense, Mr. Soprano.”

“I know. It’s great, isn’t it?”

I sighed and followed along. At this point, I figured I may as well see what other insanity he got up to.

X

“Mr. Soprano!” Dinah yelled happily as she launched herself into his side. Next to her, Rory, dressed as Triumph, looked like he had no idea how to react.

Good, that made two of us. The crazy chef had marched right in, pinning everyone in the building who tried to stop him by their shadows.

Seriously, how many of those black key thingies did he have?

“Hey, midget. How’s Fortuna treating you?” Mr. Soprano asked, patting her head like an overeager puppy. From what little I knew of her from school, I thought Dinah was a gloomy, quiet girl but that was apparently because of the headaches. Without them, she turned out to be a bubby, energetic sort.

“She’s great! She’s having Mr. Wynn teach me all sorts of things about numbers. He makes the numbers make more sense.”

“Good, good. Do you mind helping me out a bit?”

“Nope, ask away!”

“Now wait a moment, Kingmaker,” Triumph said. He tried to be diplomatic. “It’s not that we don’t trust you, but-”

“Hush, Rory. And for the last time, it’s John.”

“How do you-Hey!”

A sword appeared in Rory’s shadow. Mr. Soprano waved him off and pulled out his phone. “Don’t worry, I’ll dismiss the black keys later. You just stay there for a bit. Now, Dinah, I’m going to open a map and we’re going to play a game of twenty questions. Okay?”

“Okay!”

“What is the probability that Bakuda is not traveling at the moment.”

“Ninety-nine percent. She should be holed up in her lab.”

“Yeah, but it’s worth asking.” He pointed to the half of Brockton Bay that covered the Boat Graveyard, known ABB turf. “What is the probability that Bakuda is in this half of the city?”

“Ninety-eight percent.”

“And how about strictly within the bounds of the Boat Graveyard?”

“Fifteen percent. Sorry, guess again,” Dinah said with a giggle. She was almost treating it like an actual game.

“Alright, how about…”

The two went back and forth like that. It was weird seeing how well Dinah got on with Mr. Soprano. There were theories, of course, of just what he was. According to Dennis, he was a Watchdog spook sent here to watch for specific threats. Dean pointed out that it made no sense. A Watchdog spook wouldn’t give away tinkertech to people, especially not a little girl. He didn’t say it like that, he said “any Ward,” but it still kinda stung.

But there was also no denying that he knew things. Victoria made that much abundantly clear. I overheard some troopers say he was a recruiter, and that was why Tattletale was never heard from again. Maybe that was also why Dinah joined the Wards, out of consideration for her age, even while still being part of Watchdog now.

That didn’t seem right either. It ran into the same problem as the spook theory; no one from Watchdog would give away magic weapons. And, if the PRT had control over someone who could make stuff like Caliburn and Ig-Alima, there would be more heroes running around with them.

Scary words, words like “S-class,” “WMD,” “endbringer-tier,” and “sleeping bear” were thrown around. Seeing him joke with Dinah though, it was hard to believe that the same guy who made a bridge out of a mountain-sized sword was the one that stood before me now.

“Alright, what about this building?” Mr. Soprano asked. He’d narrowed down Bakuda’s location to a single street on Google maps and was going building by building. There was also a miniature sculpture garden in and around the lounge, staff and heroes with their bodies nailed to the floor via their shadows. “How likely is it that she’s here?”

“Ninety-five percent. You got it, Mr. Soprano.”

He stood. “Okay, good. I’m going to go nuke her now-What, Shirou? Oh… Yeah, shit… Alright, Dinah, one more question.”

“Okay, but I want more of your meat candy,” she chirped. Next to her, Rory choked on his own spit. I was more worried about whoever “Shirou” was. Was this confirmation that Mr. Soprano was schizophrenic?

“Sure, I’d love to give you some candied bacon,” Mr. Soprano stressed, glaring at her cousin. “Gaia’s cunt, I should never have made that joke…”

“Hehehe, shoot.”

“Alright, if that building were to disappear, right now, how likely are civilian casualties?”

I didn’t like the sound of that. “I don’t like the sound of that. What are you planning?”

“Hrunting.”

“You know that doesn’t answer the question!”

“Well, Dinah?”

“EIghty-nine percent,” she said. She then gave him the biggest puppy eyes she could. “Please don’t hurt anyone, Mr. Soprano.”

He ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “Ugh, you two are so frustrating… Fine, guess I’m taking another enthusiastic walk…”

“Wait, come back!” I yelled as I chased after him. “At least free them!”

Author’s Note

Made an aria for Ig-Alima because it doesn’t have one. Its title however is the “Green Field Cutting Through the Thousand Mountains.” I could have just used “Trace On,” but it didn’t feel right for the pageantry of it. Laevatein was in private. Here, John’s trying to wow the girl.

Are there other ways to get to the Rig? Yes. With a “body that reflects his soul,” John could probably Reinforce his body to the point that he could run on water. It’s hardly the most impressive feat of speed a Servant can do.

On the other hand, having Vista freak out over a divine construct that embodies the very concept of the “skyline” was a part of the ideas that made me start this story.