Amelia, Ch 405- Lisa
Dragon's voice and face were as deliberately passive as always when dealing with me. We knew she was an AI, no sense in her trying to fight it, and since she couldn't be certain what may or may not tip off my powers, she opted with too monotone to offer any inflections.
If only she knew how many clues that gives me. "There's been a change of plans."
I didn't bother responding. Making other people ask the questions was my game. I simply waited. It was important enough for her to make an impromptu call. It was important enough for her to risk known association between Avalon and Cauldron, not that anyone could do anything about it if they did find out. It was important enough that she wouldn't play games.
"Dinah's predictions have started changing. Our odds of success plummet if we wait more than another few weeks, and they're already starting to dwindle."
"How badly?" It was the question DM would ask first. This was always a numbers game, and Cauldron expected fully to lose this fight. They kept fighting, not because they wanted to succeed, but because they didn't want to ask themselves if they could have succeeded at the end of the day. In a way, I could respect that. My life was ruled by those questions.
What happened? Why did it happen? If I were just a little bit better, if I tried just a little harder, could I have stopped it from happening?
"The odds of the apocalypse occurring haven't fluctuated more than a quarter of a percentage point in the next five years. It's happening, and your plan, it seems, doesn't get much better than it currently is."
My one hope of stopping Scion proactively, without starting a war. "And that is still less than five percent." I always knew it was a long shot, but everything we were doing was taking shots in the dark, so it paid to fire as many bullets as possible.
"...And is still less than five percent. Avalon's plans have reached what I believe is the pinnacle of their resources. Wruenele and Mashu are already being mobilized. We'll be ready to act in two days. We'll be forced to act in eight under all possible circumstances."
"Wruenele's still not completed."
Just confirmation of the rest of my theory. I had hoped that Dragon, as she wasn't a parahuman, would not be subject to the laws of Primacy. It was an artificial power, one created by virtue of the Agents deliberately loading their dice in favor of Scion. If we could trick them, convince them to fight Scion for real, we might have something.
But Dragon was built by a parahuman, and apparently that intentional design flaw was inside her as well, and not one that she could remove. Or, possibly worse, it was removed as she reworked her code, but she would simply never be strong enough to beat Scion in battle, no matter how much time she had to prepare for the conflict. We were back down to only one answer.
"And the Dragon's Teeth? Are they aware? Prepared?" Natural humans, but operating parahuman tech. Hopefully that degree of separation was enough to tip the rules in our favor.
Parahumans are subject to Primacy, but is the tech itself similarly designed to fail intentionally? If wielded by humans, will that be enough?
Dragon nodded. "And I'm about to contact the United Worlds Defense Force. They won't know the particulars, of course. But our reports will read an unknown destructive event, possibly the new Endbringer." Which is true enough, Scion will certainly bring the end. "Avalon's calling on all its political influence, risking exposure of some of our secret political alliances." She means the various people they've Coil'd over the years, such as well over half of the CUI's leadership. "If your plan succeeds, we'll be in a pretty difficult spot. A quality problem to have, I grant you, but a problem."
Suggesting Avalon's putting everything on the line. Wants Cauldron to be aware they're taking this as seriously as Cauldron does. Wants to make sure we know to take this seriously. Implying they're making themselves vulnerable. Is unaware of just how good Cauldron's Thinkers are. "Don't be ridiculous. If our plan succeeds, the world's going to be so confused over the lack of Scion that they won't be paying attention. You'll just say something along the lines that it was apparently the event predicted. No glory, but no costs."
"You make a good point. We will be able to cover our tracks in the confusion, thank you for the suggestions." The statement wasn't for Dragon's benefit, it wasn't even for Cauldron's. It was for mine. I'd built up resources of my own, and I needed to protect them until it was time to use them.
"When did you discover the changes? What are the increases in the destruction?"
"They started climbing yesterday morning, so we changed our questions and invoked Akaihana, Prism, and our other Trumps who can mimic Dinah. Each day we wait decreases the overall number of survivors by approximately a quarter million. There is little, if any, hope left if we wait more than a week. The Bola are primed, the dimensional piercers are prepared. We've already given Legion, V.F." The final loadout. Glaistig Uaine, Contessa if hers works, Gavel and Victoria, myself in the hopes that all those powerful Thinkers can come up with something. "We move in two days, the moment we're fully prepared, unless you give us a damn good reason to hold back a little longer. Waiting risks losing our chances forever."
Not that there was much to begin with. "I'll see to it we're ready to do our part. She's feeling cooperative lately."
Now that they're talking about marriage and starting a family after this is all over, maybe we have a chance.
"Let them know we have a supply of the power enhancing drug ready, if they want it. Side effects are limited unless you overdose."
"And the OD still risks permanent loss of parahuman abilities?"
Dragon's pretend face nodded. "A last resort, one of many." The screen flicked off, leaving me alone in the dark.
One of many.
....
I was the first person at the meeting. A strange experience for me, and hopefully it would unsettle the others. Doctor Mother followed, missing her shadow. She'd be talking through the com that Doctor Mother wore.
Number Man was, shockingly, not the first one there, walking in almost a minute after DM. "My apologies for being late. I wanted to verify Dragon's story. They are indeed calling an emergency U.W.D.F. meeting. And we've gotten Clairvoyant confirmation that Avalon is mobilizing its full forces, including the ones they think we don't know about. Pantheon is busy diverting resources and getting their clone memory backups updated. They're either preparing for war, or this is the most elaborate bluff in history."
"Given that it's Pantheon, we can't discount that possibility."
Doormaker managed to pull the others in, including our metaphorical and literal trump card, Glaistig Uaine.
"I trust you've all had time to review the conversation Crow had with Dragon?" Doctor Mother opened. For a normal, if pretty much delusional, woman with dreams of slaying a god, she was actually a pretty good leader. Keeping such powerful, divergent, personalities together took work. And most of it wasn't Contessa. She may have provided the vehicle, but DM was the one driving it. "Crow and Number Man both seem to think it's legitimate, I believe."
I glanced over at Alexandria. At this point we barely even needed to see each other to communicate. She took a slow breath.
It's almost time, are you sure about this? "I have to agree, there's nothing Avalon has to gain from a fraud of this nature that is worth the risk."
"The Alcott girl has been wrong, before," Legend offered. He was the one hoping against hope that we could avoid ever having to try this. That Scion would simply go away. The others faced it with grim determination, regret over opportunities lost, and perhaps a level of eagerness to simply get this over with, win or lose. Legend was still stuck in the denial phase.
I closed my eyes slightly, breathing out.
I'm only sure that we have no other choice. "It doesn't matter. Dragon, Gaea and Khepri all believe her. They are all of Avalon's decision makers, which means they'll attempt the dimensional ramming device immediately after we fail. When that fails, the war begins for real."
That made everybody go quiet. There was no real hope that we'd succeed, no real hope that any of our plans would work. This was one of many small chances. A chance that every angle and dirty trick I could think of over the course of almost two years had managed to bring up to four and a half percent. Attempting to talk him into dormancy always failed. Attempting to convince him to kill himself... four and a half percent.
After Reggie, after Taylor, after Taylor again, and after Taylor one more time, here I am deliberately plotting to drive someone to suicide. That it was an alien monstrosity didn't change the irony much.
Alexandria stepped forward, offering me comfort. A twitch of a hand, a caress of my cheek that never happened. An apology for the hell she couldn't protect me from. "Every chance is worth taking." Her eyes closed some.
Evocative of tears, of shame. Apologizing for not being a better friend to me, not being a better person for me. No longer cares if the others began to suspect we were communicating. Nothing matters anymore. "We'll prepare our forces."
I tilted my head, as if leaning against her. Thanking her for everything she'd done for me. The risks she was taking. I, too, was sorry I couldn't be a better person. I ignored the other subtexts, that 'forces' was a polite way of talking about the monsters in the basement that were once people. They had a strategy to let them escape, convinced that Cauldron was in league with Scion. Contessa, of course, dreamed that up. Or at least was responsible for making it happen. I expected it would work.
Legend looked down. "This is it, then. I had hoped we could put it off longer."
"We know he'll start the process, eventually. To hope he doesn't is like hoping that HIV will spontaneousy decide to stop killing people. It doesn't work that way." It may have been manipulative, selecting a disease that was so tied to gay culture and history, but I needed to pick something suitably horrific, and preferably slow acting and insidious, and HIV was certainly all of those things. If Legend resented me for the manipulation, then so be it, but it wasn't him that I needed to convince.
I eyed Ciara. She was both the linchpin of the operation and the least reliable member. Rebecca caught my meaning immediately, speaking where I couldn't. "Glaistig Uaine, this ultimately rests on you. the rest of us aren't likely to be able to speak with him. Just you and Crow. Of those, you're one of the Royal Court. You're the one he's most likely to listen to."
She looked at Alexandria. "No."
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A/N- And so it begins. Dragon Unchained. Years of minmaxing the most bullshit powers in the world. Fifteen Enbringers. Three worlds mobilized for total war.
Chapter 404 will not be found here. It has enough character development to be a valid chapter. But it's still mostly just lesbian sexy time.
https://forum.questionablequesting.com/posts/314617/
