26

Volition 3.4

It was an innocent text. I knew that, but having undertaken so many risky ventures, I couldn't let my guard down. If she really wanted to do anything to me, she could have done so when I was asleep, I knew. But maybe she was snooping around, trying to find evidence that all was not as it seemed with me, maybe she wanted to prepare something bigger to take me out, or maybe she just plainly went crazy. You never knew with shard influence.

I sent Agate to spy on her at the warehouse first.

She was manipulating the growth of several organisms. One was a large brown thing bigger than a human, that looked a bit like a tree but without any branches. No, that wasn't accurate. If I looked closely, it kind of did resemble a human in some ways, like a person that'd been absorbed into it. Creepy. The others were smaller, wiggling things that were shifting constantly and mixed with puddles of goo.

I put on a big coat and hid a pistol, a small rifle with a laser attachment I acquired from Coil's base, and my trusty flamethrower. Then I called back Agate and attached a sharp knife to her.

I went over to the warehouse prepared for the worst, and assuming the best.

I entered with a pleasant smile.

"Hey, Amelia. What are you working on?" I asked curiously.

"You know how Taylor's costume is made of spider silk? It's really strong. Probably bullet proof, even. I asked her about it, and she said she made it by commanding spiders to weave it over her body. We don't have any brute powers so a costume like that would be really useful. But it will take her a week to make a new costume for either of us, so I thought I might try to make something myself."

I looked at the brown tree-human thing and fought off a grimace.

"Is that cellulose you're trying to make?"

"Yeah. This is stronger than spider silk, and also much easier to make."

"Really? Why's it easier to make?"

"Cellulose is produced naturally in plants. There's more cellulose than any other material in the biosphere. But it's not as strong in nature because the nanofibres aren't aligned perfectly, but I can use my power to make them grow the way I want."

I tentatively reached out a hand to touch the organic material, and Amelia nodded her permission.

"So how strong is this?"

"I don't have anything to test for precise numbers, but I'd guess it's about ten times stronger than spider silk."

"Ten times stronger?" I asked with incredulity. "Cellulose can be that strong?" I had researched the strength of spider silk compared to Kevlar to better understand Taylor's capabilities, and ten times would be stronger than graphene.

"Well, it's not just cellulose, I can make properly aligned cellulose in just a few minutes. So I've been experimenting with mixing other things into it."

I looked at the puddles of goo and the smaller organisms. So that was what they were, not processed human flesh. I sent Agate back to drop the knife.

I watched for a while longer, I decided to her ask about one of the things I really hoped she could make.

"Are you able to make living power armour? Like a symbiotic organism covering our bodies that both enhances, protects, and heals us?"

"Probably. But that's a lot harder. If it was easy I'd have just done that instead."

"You were able to make a counter to Bonesaw's mass killer plague in just a few seconds in a future I saw. I'm sure you can do it."

"It's not the same though. Plagues happen naturally, Bonesaw probably just made a mutation. I could also make a plague like that in seconds. Living symbiotic creatures like what you're thinking of are orders of magnitude more complex and there's no natural template to work off of."

"I see…by the way, you know what you're doing looks really creepy without any context? That thing looks like it absorbed a human body."

"Huh…you're right. Fuck, what is wrong with me?"

"Hey I'm not saying it's bad. I'm glad you're making armour for us, the process just looks creepy. I am okay with this. Really. But you should give Taylor a heads up when she comes by."

"Alright."

As she continued to experiment, I went on PHO. Looking at the responses to my post yesterday, there was nothing in particular that stood out to me. Some people were very excited about a new hero team, others were suspicious about our video that failed to show the details of how exactly we defeated Lung and Oni Lee. Some even flamed me for using overly aggressive language in my post and stirring up trouble.

When time for lunch came around, I brought Amelia to a private room in a luxurious restaurant. We were disguised, of course. As a matter of habit, I checked the room for potential bugs and cameras, and Agate scanned it for electronic activity to be sure.

She gave me suspicious looks all the way until we sat down. "I didn't think you were the type to spend on luxury as soon as you got a little bit of money. Is this why you tried to convince me to charge for healing?"

"You really think so lowly of me?" I frowned. "I'm not a stranger to wealth. When I arrived on Earth Bet, I lost all of it, but you saw what conditions I was living in over the past week. I don't splurge meaninglessly."

"Well, what else am I supposed to make of this?" She gestured to the extravagant meal and room. "Besides, you never told me what you did before last week. All I know is that you fell off a tree and had to come to me for free healing."

"I was a self-made, very wealthy businessman, despite my youth. I am very good at managing resources, rest assured. Anyways, I brought you here for a reason. I have very good news and thought we should celebrate a little."

"Good news? Does this have to do with how late you were up last night?"

"That's right. I tracked Coil to his base last night and used my powers to spy on him. Then I got some of his passwords and hacked him, stealing $30 million in the process."

"You…what? $30 million?" I smirked at her dumbstruck face.

"I think that's worth a small celebration, don't you? And we should celebrate with Taylor tonight after school too."

"This isn't a joke, is it?"

"Not at all." I took out my phone and accessed one of the many accounts I opened, then showed her the balance which was in excess of two million.

"This is just one of the accounts I transferred the money to. I'll be heading to the bank to grab our new debit and credit cards this afternoon. Everything was set up through the Number Man, so it's safe."

She was still staring at the number shown on my screen silently.

"There is some bad news too though," I said.

She turned her attention back to me as soon as she heard my say bad news.

"Coil hired Faultline's Crew to investigate us, and specifically asked her to find out our civilian identities. Faultline agreed."

"That's against the rules!"

"Coil doesn't play by the rules. And now we know, neither does Faultline," I said with a dark look. "We can't hold back against that kind of enemy."

"But why would he want our civilian identities? Do you think he suspects who I am?" She asked worriedly.

"Yes. I spied on him discussing it with Tattletale as well. She is confident that Araliac is Panacea."

"Shit!"

"Don't worry, it's not that big of a deal if they know. It was going to be revealed sooner or later, and what really matters is that the PRT doesn't treat you as having turned villain by leaving New Wave – which they won't now, because you joined another hero team with a major public accomplishment."

That was when the waitress started bringing food in, so the conversation paused for a bit as we started eating.

After a while, she spoke up again. "Coil was able to target Taylor's dad, right? That means he probably knows her identity already. What about you? Do you have any family he might target?"

"Worried about me? Don't be. I don't have any family or anyone else close to me. Remember, I don't even have a real civilian identity, seeing as I'm not originally from this plane of existence."

"You keep saying that…what does that mean? Why can't you tell me?"

"I have something I want to show you this afternoon. I'll tell you a little more about it then."

O O O

After lunch, we went back to the warehouse base. Then I held out my hand, and Agate phased into existence with colorful lights. Without waiting for Amelia to respond, I opened a portal to the other world, which I decided to call Earth M.

I suggested to Amelia to check her GPS signal to verify that it was a different world, but to my surprise, she said, "I can already tell by the different strains of bacteria in the air, there are some that simply don't exist on Earth Bet."

"I haven't been able to find any human settlements on this world yet," I said after bringing her to the edge of a vast forest using another portal back to the warehouse and then a second portal here.

"That means all this biomass is available for you to use freely."

She went up to a tree and touched her hand to the trunk. "Amazing…this species…"

"I told you before that I come from different plane of existence entirely. Not like the parallel worlds the Entities can access. This is another of the parallel worlds, similar to Earth Aleph. I was experimenting with this yesterday and figured out how to open these portals. Over time, I will develop even more abilities, because my powers don't come from the same source as parahumans."

She turned back to me. "Rather than coming from a different plane of existence, how I do know you didn't just get some of Professor Haywire's stuff?"

"I don't actually have any way to prove it to you, which is why I didn't want to talk about this before. You can use your ability to check for lies on me again if you want, but does it really make any difference? I can't prove that I'm not just delusional, or from a parallel world that I thought was a different plane of existence. It's like that for the things I know too, isn't it? There are always other possible explanations for why I have powers and apparent precognition without a Corona Pollentia. I could be an Endbringer in human form, a human-based projection by a cape who does have a Corona, or I could have been told these things and given some Tinkertech by other capes who tricked me into believing that I'm from a different plane."

Her eyes assessed me, looking as if she wanted to believe me. "I'm still not sure I can believe you, and there's still not a lot of proof about the whole Scion will kill everyone thing. But you have been right about a lot of other things and I do believe that you believe what you're saying. I can't honestly say it's impossible either…so why did you come here, if you're from another plane?"

I gave her an appreciative smile.

"The parallel worlds like Aleph, and this world, Earth M, all exist within the same reality cluster, which we can also call a plane of existence. All of these worlds share the same set of physical laws, but there are other planes even beyond them, with different laws. I come from one of those planes. On my plane, there were some records of events that happened, or would happen, on some other planes. I had read some of the records about this plane we're in now, which is where my special knowledge comes from. However, at the time, it was little more than entertainment and curiosity. Travelling to or from other planes wasn't supposed to be possible, and nobody knew if those records were even real. But one day, two individuals with godlike powers arrived on my plane, and everything changed."

"That sounds an awful lot like what happened to us with Scion. Did your plane also have Entities?"

"No, they were different. These two were travellers from other planes, not other realities within the same plane. They also didn't come from the same plane, but two different ones. One of them was just exploring, having just discovered how to travel between planes. The other one had followed the first one, and was an old being that had been able to travel the planes for a long time, and did not like that other beings not of his race could travel the planes, so he attacked the first one. I was caught up in the middle of their battle and the second traveller tried to kill me just for seeing him. The first traveller was more reasonable…he gave me the ability to travel planes myself in order to help me escape."

I turned around and looked at the sky in melancholy.

"To survive, I was forced to leave everything behind and travel to a random other plane, then I found myself in Brockton Bay. When I arrived, I discovered that something had blocked off the way out, so I couldn't leave anymore. I was in a foreign world, penniless, injured, and alone, with nothing but a bit of special knowledge, which might not have been reliable, about the past and future."

There was a moment of silence, and then Amelia walked up to stand beside me.

"Kaleidus, tell me honestly. Do you actually want to save the world? Or do you just want to go back home, to your own plane?"

I looked down and sighed. I didn't answer for a few seconds. "That second traveller…before I escaped, he summoned a legion of monsters to attack my plane. It wouldn't be safe to go back, even if I could. For all I know, everyone on my world might be dead or enslaved by now. I can't say that I'm looking forward to fighting Scion. I don't see it as my obligation, really...I'm stuck here right now and don't have a choice, but if I found a way to escape the barrier, I can't say I wouldn't be tempted to leave for another, less fucked up plane. I mean, if I told the right people the method to defeat Scion, isn't that already enough? I have no family and friends here to fight for. I was just a civilian back on my plane, and this isn't supposed to be my fight."

I clenched my fists and trembled. "Heck, even if we won against Scion, how do I know everyone won't just turn against me because I'm from another plane? How could they know that I'm not just an alien hiding in a human body, just as bad as Scion? The future I know where humanity won against Scion, the person who saved the world, she was just a lonely eighteen year old girl, she sacrificed everything she had and still…after the fight, the people she saved betrayed her. They thought she became too powerful, too dangerous. They took away her powers, shot her in the head, and threw her body in the middle of nowhere in an empty world. Is that the fate that awaits us at the end of this road? I don't know if I can be that selfless, fighting for a world that will only fear and hate me," I finished my rant bitterly, not looking at her.

But through Agate, I saw that she was appropriately shocked and was watching me with a look of pity.

"I'm sorry," she said finally, in a quiet voice, after it was clear my rant was over.

I turned to face her. "You of all people shouldn't be sorry, Amelia. Do you know what the first thing I did was once I knew that I was in Brockton Bay?"

"What?"

"I looked for Panacea. You have no idea how relieved I was when I found you. Even though I was a stranger to you, you weren't a stranger to me. You were like a bastion of hope when I felt as though the ground was falling away. You were proof that the things I knew weren't entirely useless, and that with that knowledge, I might survive even though I was essentially still unpowered at that time. I know it must feel like an invasion of your privacy, but it was like a lifeline to me."

"But…why? Why me? Was it just because you needed healing?"

"No. I obviously couldn't go to any of the villain gangs. The PRT is dangerous and corrupt, and they also have protocols for dealing with interdimensional travelers that wouldn't be good for my health. Although I knew of Skitter too, she doesn't trust anyone, and certainly wouldn't have teamed up with me if you hadn't been there when we met her and revealed yourself as Panacea. You were the best, and really, the only choice, the only person who would help me and who I could trust with the knowledge of what lies ahead. I didn't expect things to turn out so badly with the Dallons, but I knew that you would be willing to help me eventually once you heard my story, despite all your own personal troubles. And I was right. So thank you," I finished with a smile.

She looked away and then to the ground. "You helped me too, Kaleidus. These past few days away from Carol haven't been so bad. Even though I can't see Vicky anymore, I feel…freer. And now that there's someone who I can talk to who knows about my secret…it's like a huge weight off my shoulders."

"I'm glad, then."

We spent a few more minutes simply standing there in amicable silence.

"There is one more thing I want to show you. Come."