Charm Learning Shard (Worm/Exalted) (COMPLETED)

Spoiler: Alexandria-o-vision

Legend has strong opinions about the battle, and does not hesitate to share them. 'Disaster', 'loose cannon', 'shambles', 'coordination failure'. I let the words wash over me, and wait for him to wind down before I speak.

"Consider: If I had told you this morning that we could ensure the death of Behemoth, but only at the cost of 76% casualties, what would you have said?"

He lets out a sigh and slumps in his chair.

"I would have said go ahead. A victory, after all these years? The morale boost alone would be worth it. In less than two years, it will-" his face twists in a grimace "-it will turn a profit, in lives spent. You are right as always, Rebecca."

That is not entirely true. Parahumans are not as fungible as all that. Even beyond the obvious differences in power, one must consider their skills and temperament, the level of integration with their Agent... suffice to say, someone who has survived two Endbringer fights is far more likely to survive several more, and contribute meaningfully. And we lost a lot of veterans today.

Some would say that the Triumvirate sits atop that pyramid, at 100% survival odds. I disagree. There is no such thing as 100% survival odds, Hero taught me that years ago. But statistically, it's undeniable that most casualties are usually newcomers.

It's unfortunate that we have to waste lives like that, but Contessa and Number Man both agree that it is necessary. Without the culture of 'everyone goes', participation would gradually evaporate as the least useful cohort would bow out, citing their inability to make a difference. Leaving a new least useful cohort in their place, and repeating until we lack the numbers to put up a fight at all.

Though from a different point of view, no one has truly been able to make a difference until today. In that sense, the sacrifice was very much worth it.

Still, I'm not entirely without regrets of my own. If I had- but no. 'An unconventional power that will either ignore Endbringer defenses, or do nothing at all' was a pattern as old as the Endbringers themselves. Until now, it was always the latter. You let the hopefuls take their shot and be disappointed. To dedicate resources, or even attention, to their attempts was a foolish waste of time. Until now. If I hadn't given up hope, if I had treated the two-hundredth freshly-triggered optimist as eagerly as the first...

Legends speaks up again, still looking down at the table. "Who is she? She must have been the target last time too, but she didn't fight then. Why-"

"I don't know," I interrupt.

He looks up at me in surprise. "Didn't you talk to Contessa?"

"I did. When I asked her the same questions, she shrugged."

"She's invisible to Contessa? Like Eidolon? The equivalent Agent, in a natural trigger?"

"No. If she was, Contessa would have said so. Instead, she said nothing at all."

"But-"

I sigh. "I'm going to explain this once, and then we will never speak of it again.

"Esper is visible to Contessa. Contessa is following a Path for dealing with her, a Path that requires that the rest of us know nothing of her. If we were meant to know anything, or do anything, she would have told us. So we will not try to contact Esper. We will not try discover her whereabouts, or her identity. We will not speculate about her motivations or actions, past, present or future. Not the PRT, not the Protectorate, not Cauldron. We will act in all ways as if Esper does not exist."

"That's... I'm not sure I can avoid thinking about the pink elephant. Not when it killed an Endbringer."

"You will do well enough. Contessa has ensured it." Either that or she will kill him in the near future. One member of the Triumvirate, or possibly even all of us, is also an acceptable sacrifice. Let him work that out for himself, or not.

"Should we even be discussing it this much?"

"Yes. This is exactly the conversation we are meant to have." I hesitate, but I can't resist adding one more word: "Obviously."

He chuckles. "Of course. Including my foolishness, and your condescension."

I smile back at him. "Exactly."

A common flaw of Thinkers, that I admit to falling prey to occasionally: 'It was obvious to me.' Unless, of course, Contessa is playing a deeper game, and we're meant to go against 'orders'. But I believe that she's not manipulating me in this instance - which is admittedly something she could easily manipulate me into believing.

Whatever ends up happening will of course be ultimately beneficial to the cause, but there would no doubt be dire consequences for the transgressor. No natural trigger could be said to be entirely well-adjusted, and Esper struck me as worse than most. Approaching her without precognitive support would be incredibly dangerous.

No, these are exactly the things I shouldn't be thinking about.

"Does it ever bother you, the way we've completely given up any semblance of free will?" Legend asks.

"I've given up a great many things."

"That's not an answer to my question," he notes, his voice gentle.

"...Yes. Yes, it does bother me. If you can think of a way, any hypothetical scenario where we could have benefited from this level of precognitive knowledge without shattering such fond illusions... then please don't tell me. I'd like to avoid thinking of the pink elephant."

I can still eke out a fragment of free will within the bounds of predestination. By resolving not to interfere, I can ensure that I will not become the one who was doomed from the start.

Panacea knew her civilian identity.

---

Spoiler: Tele-vision

"Coming to you live from the hottest new tourist destination in America, Colin Oestermann. Colin, what is the situation in Brockton Bay?"

"You must understand, the people living here are those who decided to stick around and tough it out after Leviathan attacked. They've been through this before, and proved that they could handle it. There is some fear that this is the start of a new pattern of Endbringer behavior and that the city will be attacked again, but most of the people I've spoken to are determined to rebuild once more."

"Despite that, I understand that there has been some talk of officially abandoning the city?"

"Yes, that's true. However, the idea was never seriously considered, because the tourists started arriving almost immediately. People from all over the world are coming here, people who have lost friends and family to Behemoth or the other Endbringers. The concrete plinth sealing away Behemoth's remains was originally simply meant to contain the radiation, but it has become a monument."

"So they are hoping that the tourist industry will be enough to revitalize the city?"

"Yes, but there was also the concern that people would not stop coming just because the government pulled out. Crowds surround the monument day and night, and people are already starting to call it the 'Mecca of the West'. Brockton Bay will remain - whether as a US city or a lawless shantytown on condemned ground."

"Speaking of the law, Brockton Bay is also famous as one of the worst cities in the country as far as parahuman crime is concerned. Is that still a concern?"

"That is a bit of a concern, yes. Although very few of the old gangs survived the upheavals of the last few months, new ones have moved in to take advantage of the power vacuum. But while the local Protectorate suffered heavy losses the attack, Esper herself has been spotted patrolling several times, and whether out of fear or respect the villains are keeping well away from the area around the monument."

"There is another big concern, which I alluded to earlier when I called it the 'hottest' tourist destination: Hot in more ways than one. Tell us about the radiation situation, Colin."

"I know there are many tall tales out there, but the truth is that it's quite safe to visit. As long as you bring iodine pills and bottled water, a week in Brockton Bay right now is no worse than getting a CT scan. You obviously wouldn't want one of those every week, but there is a team of Tinkers working to sanitize the city as we speak. They promise that they will have the radiation down to normal background levels before the permanent residents can receive a dangerous dose."

"Thank you Colin. Later tonight we have an interview with one of those people: Former villain Dr. Atom, who says that the death of Behemoth made him reconsider his life choices and gave him hope for the future.

"After that: Is Bakuda's greatest crime the key to room-temperature cryonics? We talk to the chairman of the Human Longevity Foundation, which has recently published startling results on the fine structure preservation of amethystization. If you didn't understand any of those words, don't worry. We didn't either.

"But first: In the studio with me is Phil Armstrong, president of the Atomic Advocacy Association. I understand that things are looking up for the AAA, Phil?"

"Indeed. In the past, our two greatest obstacles were concerns over Behemoth, who did occasionally target nuclear plants, and alarmist myths about radiation. Not only do we not have to worry about Behemoth any more, but millions of people around the country are educating themselves about radiation as they contemplate a pilgrimage to Brockton Bay."

"So we will be seeing more nuclear power plants springing up in the future?"

"I certainly hope so. Now that we know that Endbringers can be defeated I would encourage everyone to focus on more long-term problems, like global warming. If we can reduce our dependency on coal and oil-

---

Spoiler: Paparazzi-o-vision

Business has been good lately. Esper footage is selling like hotcakes - good footage from a proper camera, not a blurry red dot in the sky from some pilgrim's shaky cellphone. It takes preparation and dedication to get such shots, but there are worse jobs than sitting on a rooftop all day waiting for a celebrity to fly by.

A noise behind behind me makes me turn around - and drop my camera in shock! (This is why you always keep the lanyard around your neck)

"Esper!" I exclaim.

"Stranger," she greets me in turn. I instinctively start to fade in alarm, but stop when she narrows her eyes at me. It doesn't work so good when someone is looking straight at me.

The sensible thing to do would be to apologize for using my power on her. I almost succeed, but what actually comes out of my mouth is "I'm sorry, but would you mind answering a few questions?" It started out as an apology!

I just couldn't help it. To be the first person to score an interview with Esper... I reach for my phone - despite my earlier thoughts about cellphone footage, the camera around my neck is currently useless, as it can only capture still images of things very far away.

I somehow lose my footing and fall. Well-honed instincts have me dropping my phone and grabbing for my camera, cradling it against me and twisting around to cushion it with my body. The camera is far more expensive than the phone. Pain shoots through my left arm as I land poorly. But the camera is safe, so I breathe a sigh of relief. It is far more expensive than a hospital visit, too.

By the time I pick myself up and find my phone - it fortunately survived the impact on its own - Esper is reading something written on a small piece of paper. Her brow is furrowed in concentration, and I can make out her lips moving beneath her mask as she sounds out the words. Whatever is written there, it causes her to snort in amusement as she crumples the note in her fist.

Dammit! If I had been a tiny bit faster to recover my phone, I'd have footage of the world's greatest hero struggling with literacy. The prices I could get from special ed foundations alone...

Esper looks up to see me filming her. "I'm not here to give interviews," she says. "I'm here to kill Endbringers and chew bubblegum, and I'm all out of Endbringers."

She uses her baton to gently push down on my phone. I take the hint and stop recording.

"You owe me," she says, and I nod fervently. A soundbite like that has already paid for my vacation this year.

---

Apparently that's Esper's public persona now. Not what you'd have picked, but what the notes say, goes. The optimal thing to say would have been 'I'd like to thank Jack Slash for teaching me to strike things at a distance. Behemoth would not have died without his efforts.' But that was never in the cards. Jack will get what's coming to him, and it's not a fulfilled soul price.

You used to fret a lot about where the hell the notes were coming from, but there was a note the other day saying 'stop trying to figure out where the notes are coming from'. Like all notes, you trusted it and did exactly what it said, and it worked out to your benefit. It's so much nicer when you don't have to fret over things like that.

That happy conviction last right up until you fly out of Aisha-range, and remember where the notes come from. You heave a deep sigh. But it was enough of an interview to secure the guy's soul price (gotta respect a man whose soul price is to do his job well). Not that a Stranger power weak enough that you can actually study it in action would be very useful, but it was tempting enough for him not to suffer the happy little accidents Aisha has been arranging for his colleagues. Can't have people tracking Esper's whereabouts too closely.

Taking into account how much leisure time you currently have, you'll perhaps get around to studying him sometime next year. As the de facto monarch of what is simultaneously an utterly ruined, mildly radioactive wasteland of a city, and the most popular tourist destination on earth, the amount of free time you have is negative infinity. Just taking over and doing things right for once sounded like a good idea at the time, but it turns out that being a ruler - an actual ruler, not just some asshole sitting back and skimming off tax revenue - is a fucklot of work.

Not necessarily work for Esper - Esper needs to be aloof and mysterious and worshipable, and occasionally be spotted flying above the pilgrim-heavy areas to keep predators at bay, because no one wants to fuck with Esper. But her presence is rarely useful otherwise, because being fawned over by adoring crowds is pointless.

No, you do the behind-the-scenes work of governing in the guise of 'Esper's most trusted minion', an unassuming older lady who, unlike Esper herself, won't be instantly recognized and mobbed wherever she goes. And, as the situation demands, in the guise of her third, fourth, seventh and ninth most trusted minions. Did you mention that you have no free time whatsoever?

You sigh again as you shapeshift, change clothes, and summon the first of your 'fellow' minions to give his report. While by far the most common reaction to Esper's presence is amateur photography, followed closely by blubbering, useless gratitude, a small minority of people man up and ask if they can help. Such people form the non-you part of the new civil service of Brockton Bay (calling it 'the sovereign nation of Esper' outside your own head is just gauche).

Of course, such minions aren't reliable. They're not Loyal. Some of them may theoretically have had the death of an Endbringer as their soul price, but you didn't go around and plant seeds of Loyalty in them ahead of time, now did you? So far there's been exactly one person whose soul price was to 'faithfully serve the great Esper', and she's a teenager with no useful skills whatsoever.

So yes, there are going to be bad actors, seeking you out under false pretenses to benefit themselves, and you can't even use soul's price to weed them out. After all, just because someone's greatest desire is to become filthy rich and never have to work another day in his life, doesn't necessarily mean he will steal to achieve that, or even slack off more than usual.

Luckily you have an invisible minion who can go around looking over people's shoulders. She's been invaluable in rooting out corruption, even if you currently wish she didn't think she was quite so funny.

"It's the fifth one," your chief of police is saying, showing you several pictures of a corpse, taken from various angles. "Clean tox screen, no injuries or disease that my coroner was able to find. Just dead. It's definitely parahuman involvement."

"Don't worry about it," you tell him.

"Don't worry about it? They've all been members of our organization! Someone is targeting-"

"You don't have to worry about it," you say slowly, "because you haven't been embezzling Esper's budget, now have you?"

While you expected him to show some reaction to the revelation, you did not expect him to freeze up like a deer in headlights, with a look of horror on his face. Oh dear. It seems like your invisible minion missed one. You briefly close your eyes and sigh. You really don't want to have to find another chief of police. The guy is good at his job and capable of initiative, for all that he's apparently also terminally stupid.

"Do you believe in an immortal soul?" you ask him.

It takes him a moment to recognize that he is being spoken to. "Well, uh, I suppose yes. I'm a christian man."

You nod sagely. "You know, when I asked Esper what her power did, she told me it cleaves souls asunder. I don't know what a theologian would make of such a claim, but-" you gesture towards the corpse pictures on your desk "-there's clearly something going on there, that did not take place in the physical realm."

He doesn't respond, unless looking like he's about to throw up can be considered a response.

"Look," you say placatingly, "if your department were to receive a large anonymous donation by this time tomorrow, I would not necessarily have to inform-"

He nods and dashes out the door before you can even finish, pale as a sheet. You really hope he's not stupid enough to make a run for it. That would waste even more of your time.

"Next," you tell your uniquely faithful teenage secretary.

---

Finally, long after darkness has fallen, the last minion is dealt with and your day as a bureaucrat is at an end. Which doesn't mean that you get any free time. In the wake of Behemoth, villain group BITN has switched from doing heists (who is even left worth robbing?) to claiming and defending territory. Because while Esper's patrols make her the hero of the people, someone has to be the villain of the vital infrastructure.

No one wants to fuck with ShatterbirdBanshee any more than they want to fuck with Esper, but she can't be everywhere at once, hobbled as she is by the need to not destroy everything around her. You probably spend more time as Poltergeist than in any other guise.

Man, imagine if you needed to sleep.