Adventures of an Employed Planeswalker

(Matt's POV)

I can sum up the meetings with the government agents and dignitaries in one word: boring.

And disrespectful. Ok, that was two words but it was that bad.

By the time I spoke with around half of them, I was already on a hair trigger. It would be oh-so-easy to vaporize those fat, self-absorbed pricks. And I'm not even that impatient, those guys were just so insufferable.

What saved me from that shit was unexpected. Or rather, who saved me. General Pentecost himself walked right into the room much to the protest of one Richard. That guy did look like a dick.

Anyway, he no-sold that guy with a harsh stare and threw a stack of papers on the table. Dick Dickson read it, got red in the face, sputtered a bit then huffed got up, and left. Crazy.

"Hello, The General! Thank you for your timely interruption! I was getting tired of repeating the same things over and over." I swear this is the first and last time I play Alien and try to cooperate with the government.

Pentecost quirks his eyebrow, "I managed to pull a favor. You'll be talking with an official General of the Army. Come with me." He turns and starts to leave the room.

General Robert Deshaun. Has a good track record and, a decent media presence although a bit narrow-minded and honestly stupid sometimes. I'll take what I can get.

'Gather more details on him please, Caby.'

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"So it does look just like a human child..."

"Hello, other The General!" His expression instantly becomes stony.

"You are the Alien that appeared in the Gulf of Alaska. I've seen the reports and you saved two pilots from the PPDC. Your achievements are noteworthy but your... nature is problematic."

"Yes."

"... Your contributions to the PPDC are invaluable. The Kaiju threat is increasing and we can not spare any more funding to create more than one more batch of Jaegers. Marshal Pentecost informed me of your technical expertise as well as your... combative prowess." He appraises me. Yeah, I guess I look just like your average non-human child.

"I can defend myself well."

"I can offer you, on behalf of the United States Army, a temporary visa if you agree to participate in the defense against the Kaiju." He gains an almost conspirational look.

"We have plans for the near future that need time. You, along with the remaining agents and Pilots from the PPDC will hold the Kaiju threat until the new batch comes out, at which case you will be participating in the plan."

"Plan... So Operation Hail Mary is going to come out?"

He squints, "How do you-"

"General, I may look like a human child but I am not one. I am willing to cooperate with the defense and attack against the Kaiju. However, cooperation entails considering both parties as equals, something neither you nor your government is willing to do, according to the commanding tone used in this conversation. I am not, nor will I ever be, one of your soldiers. I think the best term would be... mercenary? Or maybe contracted work." Then again, with the way they treat contracted work... yikes.

"And you think you're in a position to discuss your own terms? You are in the middle of an active military base! You will show me the respect I-"

I get up and start to leave the room.

"You- WHERE ARE YOU GOING!?" He stands up sharply.

I get to the door and look back at him, "One thing I've learned from your 'internet' is that respect is given, earned, and lost according to social interactions. And our interaction was not respectful towards me, so why should I be respectful towards you?"

"You- I- I am a General!" He sputtered again, not understanding why his once commanding and authoritative stance was not working.

"And I am not part of your army." I open the door and leave.

Just a few doors away I see Pentecost push against the wall he was leaning in and start walking towards me. He seemed to be expecting a good outcome but when the General came out of the room red in the face and yelling expletives at my back, the black man paled considerably and quickly started apeasing the man.

That could've gone better but honestly? I got into their network and several databases (at least the ones in this base). I have plenty of information and I don't need to 'ask' for their information. I can just take it.

So, despite needing to teach things to people, I don't need to do that to people who treat me as someone, rather something lesser.

I walk towards the room they gave me and sit on the hard bed.

I don't need to be taking shit from no General. What I need to do is to get my bearings, test my powers and get shit done.

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Tattletale's power is weird to use. It feels like I'm always on the cusp of discovering something, only for several different tidbits of information to suddenly connect and boom! I know it.

|Tests show an accuracy of 80% and increasing. Power usage increases accuracy, but the amount of correlated information also helps. Further testing is needed.|

Our testing method was simple: Caby would gather a huge amount of information from the internet and this base's database and feed me bits and pieces at a time. I would then try to 'guess' or connect dots that would be impossible for normal people. The gaps in knowledge didn't impede me, but I still needed a base from which to draw. 

I can also use this power easily. I'll try leaving it on for as long as I can to see how long I can last.

'Now, Symby?'

{Yawn... Yes~?}

'Would you like to form the armor? I want to know how that feels without Caby's armor. We can also test those enhanced tentacles.'

{Sure thing! Finally giving us some attention~}

As the black goo armor seeped out of my pores and covered me, I relished the feeling of power it gave. I could also feel like a bunch of new thin arm-like appendages appeared on my back.

{I can control those if you want, you know~}

'I bet. They're you after all.'

{That's US, silly~ There's nothing like you and me in our relationship, only us.}

'Part of us, then. Still, I want to train my multitasking by... multitasking. Controlling all 12 tentacles and doing manual tricks with them should help. Also, can we use these tentacles without the armor on?'

{Yeah! It's probably going to look weird having a mass of black tentacles coming out of your back, but who cares!}

No wait, I care... hmm, not really.

For now, let's juggle.

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"You've caused me a lot of trouble, Matthew. Why did you have to do that? Why aggravate the General so much?" Pentecost is upset. He seems to be teetering between regret, desperation, and anger.

"I've made my stance clear with you and did the same to that man. Why is it any different?"

"Of course it's different!"

"Mr. Pentecost, please don't stress yourself. I'm sure your daughter wouldn't like to see her father so upset over something." His eyes widen and then squint. Ooh, settled in anger.

"How do you know?" Stopping some tentacles from the juggling routine I look at him.

"I know many things, Stacker. And I know what the military is thinking. I know what you probably are thinking. I'll be even clearer in my stance and this time it's final: I will deal with the monsters. If you do nothing, get in my way, or help me is up to you."

Seeing the seriousness in my face and the weight of my statement he huffs and looks up at the ceiling, thinking about what to do.

"If it serves anything, If you have me with your current Jaegers we could probably pull off Operation Hail Mary." Having this many things all going on at once was hard to get used to. Juggling with tentacles, maintaining aura on, extrapolating information (why so much security in this Sector 7 in Hoover Dam?), and debating possible upgrades with Caby.

But practice makes perfect, so here I am.

"Operation Hail Mary... that is a long-term plan. It even has possible casualties factored in for it to have any way of working. At all. And you think you would change things that much? Even without the new Mark-5 blueprints?"

"Yes."

"... If I could assure General Deshaun and our funders that we could fight back without their funding, they might be more amenable." He ponders deeply as I drop a ball. The tentacle that dropped it quickly reaches for the ball, sticks to it, and starts juggling it again.

"Do you have to do that? While we talk?" Pentecost opened up to me a lot since I cured him of his cancer. A few dead cells here, a little tweak in damaged DNA there, and that was that. Yep, it was that easy-

{Having Mr. Know-it-all whispering in your mind what you needed to do had nothing to do with it, I'm sure~}

... Can you blame me? I needed leverage and wanted it fast. I learned a few things on the way (including how to cure early-onset cancer, duh) and got an ally. A very grumpy and stressed-out ally, but an ally nonetheless.

"No, I don't have to do it. But I don't like wasting time. Anyway, I made myself plenty clear. Can I have my few days off now?"

"For now, yes. I'll expedite Operation Hail Mary. You'll have a few days to yourself and then you go right into the thick of it, so you better enjoy it." He gets up and starts to leave.

Before passing through the door, he says, "Leave Mako out of this, Matthew." And leaves.

What an overprotective father. I retrieve all the hardened symbiote balls back into myself and get up to leave as well.

'Caby, get the intensive Biology crash course ready. We'll try to strengthen this body and finally have a decent biological knowledge base.'

|Routine is ready and waiting.|

{Ugh, studying time...}

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An interesting thing about the human body is that while it's made of several different components, they all have a part to play and complement each other in incredible ways.

These past few days I've been researching biology here in this world and so far the humans here are the same as in mine.

DNA, RNA, cells, molecules, hormones, and fibers, all the good stuff works the same. That means less learning for me and more time for experimenting.

I found an interesting thing while I was monitoring my own body. A couple interesting things, actually.

First, Inviolate is broken as fuck, just like any other protection. My lungs don't need to breathe, there's always oxygen in my system. My bladder doesn't need to fill, my body filters even the water it uses to filter my blood and reuses it.

It's as amazing as it is disgusting and efficient. Just like good old Biology should be.

And the crazy thing is: It seems that all of that is somehow optional as well. It's weird, but when I tried to delve deeper into my cardiovascular system, I stopped it for a few seconds (knowing that even if it fucked me over Symby and Caby could've saved me) but the blood all stopped and I didn't few anything that different.

I tried a more severe test and the same result occurred: My brain doesn't need oxygen, my blood doesn't need oxygen or water, I don't need food for energy to keep going.

It's weird as fuck. I feel like a homunculus or something.

Wanting to know how this shit happened I tested it further.

Tattletale's power is interesting because it synergizes with so many things.

I noticed pretty soon that when I stopped all biological functions in my body, my aura was dimmer and ended sooner. By further testing, I came to the theory that what those protections really did was to change my soul in different ways.

Blindspot made it and my body unseeable by impossible phenomena of any kind.

Invictus strengthened me, my sense of self, my mind be it Will, Ego, or the Idea of myself.

Inviolate made it so my body is truly just an extension of my soul, being powered by it if needed. It also ensures that my soul envelops my body and is strong enough to repel any attack targeting my internals, as my body is an extension of my soul and is powered by it. That could maybe help me practice Armament Haki...

Singularity is the only one I couldn't be sure exactly. I mean, I can't see souls or anything like that so I don't know if mine's different from other people's. I remember it saying that I was immune to things that alter the timeline/reality, that my powers only rely on myself and nothing else, and that I would be unique in any alternate timeline shenanigans. I don't know how exactly it does that and not even extrapolating information gives me a way of conceiving how it works.

So the Protections are like a buff to my soul and by extension my body.

Focusing back on what I can change now (my body), leaving it to continue its normal biological functions makes it so I can use other soul-related power for longer. The more functions I let my body handle normally, the less noticeable the drain in my 'Soul power?' is.

Normally I don't need to eat, drink, or breathe anything, nor do I pass waste. That seems to be a point where it's manageable enough I don't notice any decrease in Aura, which is my main way of measuring my 'Soul Power'.

I also tested actually eating, drinking, and breathing these last few days, and while I did notice a slight increase (from the base of 5 hours maintaining Aura non-stop it became 5 hours and 20 minutes, roughly) I can't be sure if it is actually due to these biological imperatives or just the constant use and practice.

The little tattletale in my mind says is probably the latter, but as Caby likes to put it 'Further testing is required.'.

Onto the little tattletale and its friend biokinesis, the corona pollentias in my brain... they're definitely there, right between the frontal and parietal lobes, lodged in there good.

Also, the infinite energy thing was NOT a lie. I've had tattletale on for 4 days straight and while it's annoying sometimes, the only 'detrimental' seems to do is give me slight headaches when there are a lot of people around me, which is bad. The good news is that the very same power giving me trouble deduced that further developing my multitasking ability should diminish and eventually negate this problem.

Another point towards tattletale: every time I do something, I deduce ways of doing it better, faster, or more efficiently. This means that learning and experimenting times are considerably lowered.

It always comes down to how big and smart and wrinkly your brain is, I swear.

These 4 days I've been messing with my hormones, enzymes, and muscle fibers. I expected it, but if I don't have either the Scarab or the Symbiote Armor, I'm weak.

It's both because of the drawback of being a kid and my low exposure to adverse phenomena. My EVO nanites and my modification Adaptable should help with all that, as long as I give it something to adapt to.

So I did.

Man, if I could kiss my past self I would. That motherfucker picked Invictus and I'm so proud to be future him. I could feel my muscle fibers tearing and regrowing in real time, each and every time noticing how I could do it faster and more effectively, and let me tell you: the pain would be UNBEARABLE.

This is torture. Imagine perpetual day-after-workout pains plus active muscle tearing.

As for the pain, I still feel it, it's just very subdued. Honestly, I think the body should handle pain like this normally. Instead of it being everything you can think about, clouding your judgment, and taking up your full attention, it's a warning system that is insistent enough to wake you up or make you pay attention to it but not to disable you.

Some people saw me walking funny, or glowing sometimes, and for those that asked (mainly Jenkins because he is a nerd and Yancy because he is curious) I gave the same excuse: "I'm learning!"

While I'm not quite where I want to be, I'm much stronger. I could probably bench press 100 kg (225 lbs) easily. What takes the cake is these EVO nanites in this process.

They are just so adaptable it's crazy. I compressed them, wrung them up, and rebuilt them stronger and harder, without compromising flexibility.

My next project involves messing with nervous terminations and connections. I want to know if I can make the synapses faster or at least more numerous since those still count for a good part of my current reflexes. I am a lot more reluctant to mess around with those since it could majorly fuck me up.

While I was thinking about that, someone knocked on my door. I get up, open the door, and see Pentecost with a grave expression.

"We've got readings, the rift's opening again. Prepare yourself and head to the bay, the Jaegers are getting ready and they have the nuke." He gives me a stony nod and leaves.

Time to get to work.