Vigor Mortis

When I first took a ride to Site 4, my fellow Templars never bound my hands or gagged my mouth, only blindfolded me for purely security-related reasons. It's funny how, now that I'm tied up and gagged like an actual prisoner, I somehow seem to be treated with less suspicion.

"Apologies for the rough handling, Inquisitor," one of the army officers grunts at me. "It's just protocol."

I used to know what the fancy symbols embroidered onto his breast meant, but I forgot that shit days after testing to confirm I 'memorized' the knowledge. Either way, it doesn't really matter. The apology is welcome, but unnecessary. I just escaped a top-secret animancy containment facility that got taken over by the prisoners. I sure hope everyone handles me per protocol! I was walking around with Ars for fuck's sake, for all I know I am some kind of sleeper agent. I can't say any of this with the gag in my mouth, of course, so I just shrug and nod politely, signaling my understanding. He nods back. Social interaction successful, no words needed.

It's generally a major downside, but sometimes I have to appreciate my talent's ability to be incredibly distracting. I just watched my pregnant coworker die because of a stupid stunt I pulled, after all. But that's okay, I can just drown my consciousness in the sound of vendors yelling at passersby, the smell of bodies packed in busy streets, the feeling of heat fluctuating as we walk by other people. I can glance at someone and immerse myself in their tells, crafting a story about their life from vague pieces of information that I've trained myself to pick out. I can forget, just for a moment, why tears are soaking the front of my face. I can forget that look of utter betrayal as three more innocent Templars die under my watch, the unspeakable tragedy of a girl murdering because she knows no other option. I was too late to give her one.

I'm escorted to the closest major church grounds where, to no one's surprise, members of the Inquisition are already waiting for me. Three of them, in fact: two men and one woman, judging by the smell. Which is to say I can tell one of them is going to be on her period for a few days, one of the men—who happens to be an Inquisitor Captain—still has the scent of masturbation on him (it lasts a long time), and the third is starting to stretch the fabric of his underclothes because he finds me attractive.

Yeah, the easiest ways I have to figure out a person's sex from smell alone are pretty damn awkward. I could have puzzled it out from other clues, but some aspect of human nature always makes me zero in on those, even though my talent makes the very idea of sex terrifyingly unpalatable. Thus, the most notable between the three (and also most uncomfortable) is the erection. That isn't a reaction I get very often, so it's pretty damn embarrassing. It's especially weird for it to happen on first sight, too, which informs me that he's likely pretty young. Which sucks. Why would there be an Inquisitor so early into puberty? That's just… sad. I nod politely to them all, but only the boy nods back. Hrm. No love for fellow sinners, huh?

Wordlessly, they surround me and guide me down into the bowels of the church, through lower areas I'd been forbidden to tread before I got black trim on my now-broken armor. Inquisitors only. This is where I was taught to damn myself for the greater good, where I learned the two animancy spells I know before getting shipped off to Site 4 without so much as a briefing. I'm taken to a cell-like room, holding only a single chair that's built firmly into the floor. I'm shoved into it, my already-bound arms are tied to the back, and the gag is finally ripped out of my mouth.

"Name," the female Inquisitor demands.

"Jelisaveta," I respond professionally.

"The necromancer claimed you were an Inquisitor."

"I am one," I confirm. "Unless this debrief goes poorly for me, I suppose."

The Inquisitor Captain lets out an amused noise. The woman interrogating me doesn't.

"What is the identity of the necromancer you were accompanying?" she snaps.

"She's..." I start to answer, but then cut myself off. "...Actually, uh, I need to see your clearance level to answer that. Sorry."

I feel the woman's muscles tense under her armor, and she starts to speak before getting cut off by her captain, who does actually pull out what appears to be proper clearance papers and shoves it in front of my face. I read it over, and as far as I can tell it's the real deal.

"The entire Inquisition is being cleared for knowledge of Site 4," the captain grunts. "We're in an all-hands-on-deck situation. You may speak freely in this room, Inquisitor."

I nod. I guess that makes sense, now that the prison is destroyed and the prisoners are all back to being active threats.

"I was in the company of Vita, prisoner class Epsilon-2," I report.

"Wait, isn't Epsilon what Ars was under?" the younger boy asks, and if I had any doubts as to his age they're cleared at the sound of his voice. My guess is that he's no older than sixteen. The other two Inquisitors turn to glower his way, which is somehow still effective despite their helmets. He shuts up immediately.

"That's correct," I answer anyway. "There were two Epsilon-class prisoners at Site 4: Ars and Vita."

"And what's the status of Ars?" the Captain demands.

"Escaped," I report. "He killed himself."

"What?" the woman asks. "So he died after escaping?"

"No, he escaped by dying," I clarify.

"Epsilon-class prisoners are abominations known as 'Liches,'" the Captain explains. "Upon death, their soul can possess another body, returning them to life. It is believed that Ars has to prepare viable bodies in advance, but we have no known way to locate or identify those bodies, so the assumption is that at least one is still alive after all these years. We can bet he's back and healthier than ever."

A grim mood sets over the room. That's more than I knew about the whole thing, but it makes sense.

"But enough background," the Captain continues. "We're just going to have to ask these questions again if we keep badgering her before we start. Inquisitor, have you ever been in decontamination before?"

I hesitate.

"...Ah," I say. "Yes, but I don't remember it."

He seems immediately startled.

"Who performed your… ah, wait. Captain Manus, I assume?"

"That's correct," I tell him.

He relaxes, nodding.

"We don't have that level of skill, so I'm afraid you'll remember the whole experience. Apologies in advance."

I swallow, nodding slowly. Sheesh, is there any way he could have been a little more intimidating?

"At least I won't walk into my boss' office and then randomly wake up terrified in my room," I retort, trying to inject a bit of levity into this. I've been surrounded by animancers for months now, but this is the first time I have the impending knowledge that I'm about to have animancy cast on me. My soul is about to be violated by my peers. Shit, shit, shit, shit!

"You have nothing to fear if you're innocent," the woman says, her fingers starting to twist together a spell.

"That is the least true statement I have ever heard," I counter, clenching my bound fists as tightly as I can.

"Just drop your magic resistance," she orders.

I do, although it's pretty damn hard considering how much my stress response wants to keep my defenses as high as they'll go. She puts her hand on my abdomen, just over where my soul rests, and yet nothing seems to happen. There's no crippling dread like when Vita brushes my soul. The Inquisitor's spell has not even a hint of contact or warning. Somehow, this is even scarier, and I tend to like to talk when I'm stressed. I enjoy getting people to open up and learning about lives more interesting than my own. Everyone has their own story, you know? It's incredibly fascinating, not to mention humbling, to immerse myself in the reality that every single person in the entire world has a life at least as complex and meaningful as my own. If I wasn't being interrogated, I'd like to chat with these people, learn their names, and figure them out. Of course that wouldn't be appropriate in this context, and for whatever reason I'm kind of in the mood to talk about myself. What the fuck do I talk about in this situation, though? Site 4 stuff? I'd better make sure not to leave out any details. I open my mouth to start rambling, but I'm quickly cut off.

"Wait until you are asked a question, Inquisitor," the Captain orders, as if he was expecting this reaction.

I shut my mouth. Hmm. He was expecting… oh Watcher he was expecting it. This is the animancy! I instantly stiffen up, my eyes opening wide. They're giving me a desire to relay my experiences truthfully and completely. Which… okay, I admit that's a pretty reasonable interrogation method. It won't be that bad, probably. I slow my breathing as best I can, calming down. It's fine. Things will be fine. It'll all probably be easier if I just actively try to ignore all the animancy being done to me and just go with the flow. It's not like I can or should try to avoid decontamination.

"How many times have you been in decontamination before?" the captain asks.

"Only once, that I know of!" I answer, happy to finally have a question asked of me. "Not counting this time, I mean."

"Have you ever had animancy cast on you for other reasons?" he presses. "If so, by who?"

"Yes!" I confirm. "I cast animancy on myself as part of my duties! I've sinned with soul sight and soul shield daily. But it's okay! I'll work it off in the afterlife, right? It's worth it to be able to keep more dangerous people in check. Although I guess I didn't actually do that! I'm kind of a failure of a Templar, aren't I?"

The words roll easily off my tongue, the painful emotions accompanying them passing through me and sliding off like they're covered in oil. I guess that might have been a bit too much information, but better too much than not enough, I think! I really hope my answer is everything they want to know.

"What are you picking up, Ewan?" the captain asks.

"Er… well, she's integrating very quickly," the boy answers. "Which I suppose is both convenient and worrying?"

Ewan! What a nice name.

"Hi, Ewan!" I greet him. "It's nice to meet you."

"Er, hello, ma'am," he responds awkwardly. "Anyway, I do see signs of a fairly obvious memory wipe, like she reported. Can't be more than a few days, though, based on size. Nothing else."

"I second that report," the nice woman modifying my soul grunts.

"I as well," the Captain nods. "So, what are we thinking? A couple hours, based on integration speed?"

"Three at most," the woman grunts. I hope she's not grumpy! I want to cheer her up.

"Then let's talk outside," the Captain says, and the three of them leave the room, locking me inside it.

Wait… no one is here to ask me questions now. Oh, no. But I want to tell them things!

"My first impressions are positive," I hear the woman speak from a few rooms down. "If she's been affected by cognimancy the signs of it are gone, and I couldn't find any evidence of a soul tumor. I don't see any way she could be a sleeper."

"Agreed," I hear the captain confirm. "It's quite the relief, but stay on guard until after your modifications finalize. We still need to fish for conflicts of directive regarding—"

"Hey, I can still hear you!" I shout at the top of my lungs, since I doubt they'll be able to hear me unless I do so. "You'll have to move further away!"

In response I hear the telltale void of sound that accompanies a silence bubble. That works too, I suppose! I should have expected that. Most Templars are better at magic than me. I hope they appreciate my honesty there, they were talking about pretty interesting stuff. I'm curious about what sort of spells they casted on me but I think I'll make a point to actively not think about or try to memorize any. Seems like the smart thing to do. Hmm… I suppose I'm alone now for a while. That really sucks. I want to answer all the questions and get this over with.

Well! No sense thinking about what I can't do. It's really nice that this interrogation room doesn't smell like blood. I'm really fucking tired of the smell of dried blood. It is moldy, but what forbidden sin basement isn't? Not that I've been in many, but they've certainly all been moldy so far and I see no reason that would change. I wonder if sin helps mold grow. Would that make any sense? No, of course it wouldn't. Still, maybe someone will ask me about it! I want to talk very very much but I shouldn't talk unless it would help the Inquisitors. I hope they come back soon. I want to answer their questions.

Heh, I guess that's the animancy talking? I sure got cognimancy'd, huh? I should be scared. I should be terrified of this. Why am I not… no, of course I'm not. This is important, they have to know for sure I'm trustworthy. Only animancy can confirm the use of animancy. This is good. This is fine. They just need to come back so I can tell them everything and answer all their questions. I want to answer them. I want to. I want to. I want to I want to I want to I want to I want to I want to I want to I want to—

Time passes with wretched slowness as I sit in agonized silence, arms twitching against my bindings as I internally war with my desire to go find my fellow Inquisitors and tell them everything and my desire to stay here and wait like I'm supposed to. They need to know, but I'm stuck here! Why won't they come back in and let me speak to them? Did I fuck up again? But they should know, they need to know, I want to tell them! Gah!

Every footstep that seems to approach makes me spasm with anticipation. I can smell them walking around outside my door, I can hear them navigating hidden passageways, peering at me from cracks in the wall behind my head. They're there. They can ask. I want to blurt out everything but I have to wait until they ask! Why won't they ask? Why!?

Finally, finally they open the fucking door and walk back inside. How many hours of agony has it been? I'm not usually this impatient but it hurts, it hurts so much and I have to tell them everything…!

"Tell us about your time at Site 4, Inquisitor," the Templar captain orders.

With an explosion of relief, the words start pouring out of me like a mudslide, bolstered by an overwhelming joy at finally being able to say them. I tell the whole story, starting from the wagon ride to Site 4, trying to give every detail possible. The young Inquisitor frantically scribbles down my every word with a pen, recording it in shorthand as I blabber on and on, describing all the miniscule details my talent picks up for the first time in many, many years. It feels so great to do so, so fulfilling to finally put this information to use! At least, it does up until I'm asked to omit those unless I consider them 'particularly relevant,' which is a shame because we've barely even started talking about the first day! It's okay though, that's okay. I can report. I can do this right and not screw it up. I can help. I can tell them everything, and it feels so good!

"...Then I recorded our whole conversation on her captured souls in her file, though I omitted the thinly-veiled death threat. Then—"

"Why did you omit the death threat?" the captain asks, cutting me off. Yay, another question!

"Because I believed not doing so would be pointlessly harmful," I say honestly. "Vita is a person that needs to feel powerful and in control in order to be comfortable, likely as a side-effect of a damaging childhood. She's caught in the fallacy of assuming all power will be abused except her own, and lashes out as a way to make herself feel more comfortable. She also struggles with anticipating the consequences of the things she says. If I recorded those words and they came back to bite her, she'd consider that an abuse of a pointless detail, not a justified response to a statement that was not okay to say on her part."

"And do you think she would have been right or wrong to believe that?"

"Wrong, of course," I tell him. "But establishing mutual respect is the first and most important step to teaching her that, so I made the call I thought was the right one and removed the possibility of that confrontation."

It doesn't seem like that answer completely satisfies him, but I can't really think of a better way to explain myself and I don't think the problem is a lack of understanding, either. It's not at all important that he agrees with me, only that I give a complete answer to his question as I understand it.

I continue to speak, detailing the start of the escape, helplessly watching Vita kill my allies, and other unpleasant memories that I just can't drum up the effort to feel terribly bad about right now. Just the facts, I have to give the facts. It makes me so happy to do so. I love not having to wallow in the regret, honestly.

"Part of your duty is to ensure neither Vita nor Ars are released," the Captain reminds me. "This is a more important duty than your own life. How do you feel about your own survival, in that light?"

"I'll accept any punishment for my breach of protocol," I tell him. "But frankly, if I could have stopped Vita by sacrificing my life, I would have. I just believe such an outcome would have been fundamentally impossible. Vita is inhumanly strong, both physically and through her capacity to kill with a thought. I attempted to stop her on multiple occasions; I simply failed so utterly that she could stop my attempts without causing me permanent harm. Furthermore, the speed and skill with which she can create undead means my death would actually lower the chances that a more skilled Templar could successfully stop her."

I continue my story. They ask me a lot of questions about Ars, but I can't answer most of them, I can only tell them what I saw. They ask for detailed descriptions of every person involved in the break-out, and I give them damn detailed descriptions, down to the soul. They seem to appreciate that, which makes me giddy and warm inside. After I finish my story, discussing the forest trip, my desperate attempt to free the Templars under Vita's control, and ultimately my release back to Skyhope, I get hit with a round of questioning I'm not at all prepared for.

"Did you in any way assist with or cause the breakout at Site 4?" the Captain asks me.

I blink in surprise, but the compulsion to answer forces the words from my mouth anyway.

"I… don't think so," I answer hesitantly. "If I did, it certainly wasn't with my knowledge or consent."

"Elaborate further," the Captain demands.

"I can't think of any way in which I could have enabled the breakout," I answer firmly. "But anyone can see the timing is suspicious. Rosco's arrival—er, that's the bird plushie I told you about—only arrived because I ordered it reexamined, and the breakout happened very soon after its arrival. I don't understand what connection there could be, and of course the Templars reexamining it no doubt did their duties to the fullest extent, but I can't get it out of my head that I somehow screwed things up with that. Vita was exceptionally happy to see it, it's the catalyst that made her promise my survival. Yet at the same time, I didn't get any impression that she knew about the breakout before it actually occurred. I don't know. I just feel like I'm somehow missing something, but hopefully it's just paranoia."

They don't ask anything further about that, thankfully, returning to questions I'm entirely happy to answer. It's pretty wonderful, all things considered. Just rambling about things I've done and feeling a sense of accomplishment for it… I could really get used to this. They ask me about people I care about (my family is very important to me, but to some extent I care about everybody and I make that clear), they ask me about what Vita made me say (I explained it's all part of my honest opinion and that Vita firmly believes in keeping her word; leaving her alone would be the best option) and then they ask why I believe it's acceptable to let an animancer and soul-enslaver run free.

"Well, maybe 'leave her alone' isn't the right way to phrase it," I answer. "Vita isn't a good person, really. I thought she was, but I… I was wrong. She wants to be a good person, though. And she could be. She's vengeful, but not malicious. She's brutal, but not sadistic. She can and does go out of her way to do the right thing, and she's a remarkable empath. I feel like if I just had more time, if we didn't have this breakout, I could have gotten through to her. I could have found a way to get a happy ending for everyone. I guess that's arrogant, but… even after all this death, I can't think of her as a monster. I just… Watcher's eyes, she killed so many people. She murdered and twisted the closest people I had to friends at Site 4, and I know she's evil for it. Yet all I see when I look at her is a child in pain. She doesn't deserve to be what she is."

There's a long silence for a while, or at least the closest my talent lets me get to silence with three other people in the room.

"If you were ordered to kill her, would you?" the woman asks me.

I can't help but laugh a little.

"I would attempt to follow that order, yes," I say. "I will do what I am asked to do. I wouldn't succeed, though. I'd be more likely to live through jumping off the island."

"So if you were ordered to what you know would be certain death?" she presses.

"Then I'd go," I confirm. "I expected to be dead months ago, after all."

I still remember the dull feeling of having my body bit into pieces, too caught in the throes of a sensory episode to consciously acknowledge my own mortal wounds. At least dying to Vita would be quicker, less shameful.

"Anyone else have any questions?" the Captain eventually asks.

I hope they say yes, but unfortunately they do not. Wait, what am I going to do now? Oh no, I hope they don't leave me in silence again!

"Go ahead and fix her, then," the Captain says, and the woman nods before starting to cast something.

I blink, a sudden fear hitting me.

"W-wait," I stutter. "Fix me how?"

The boy stops writing, calmly walking behind my chair as the Captain answers.

"We're returning you to normal, Inquisitor," he says calmly.

"Are you, uh, are you sure you wouldn't rather ask more questions?" I ask desperately.

"We're sure," he soothes, kneeling down next to me. "It's going to be okay."

"I-I don't want to go back," I admit, because I know the shame that runs through me at saying it will just wash away like the rest of the bad feelings.

"I know," the captain tells me. "That's common. But it's better to be how the Watcher made you, isn't it?"

How the Watcher made me. Right. Of course. I cared about that a lot before this.

"I like talking," I babble. "I like being able to focus on your questions more than the smell of what you did two nights ago."

"I know you do, but it's important that we always..." he pauses a bit as I watch him figure out what I'm alluding to, and I giggle a bit as he winces. "...That we always avoid the worst temptations of this evil craft. Your soul is just as sacred as any other, Inquisitor Jelisaveta."

"You're right," I admit, because I know it's true. "You're right. But please don't. Please."

"It will be over soon, Inquisitor," the captain damns me. "You did well. Now be quiet, and be still."

I try my best not to feel it as the female Inquisitor puts her hand on my belly and starts to take away all my gifts, but the terror of it hurts too much. I try to hold onto the joy of talking, the joy of answering, but it slips away from my soul. No, no no! Being quiet is easy again. I won't feel it if I answer anymore. I know it's true and I want to cry. I… I… oh, Watcher, I liked it! They used animancy to make me like it! What the fuck!? This is decontamination? This is what Manus did to me!? Or… no, wait. I don't remember what he did to me. It could have been anything. Why didn't I think about that before?

The longer the other Inquisitor works on me, the more sick I feel. I'm so fucking pathetic. Am I really that desperate to feel like I'm not a fuckup that I'd beg my coworkers to stay a mindslave? I start taking deep breaths, trying to calm my instinct to vomit. Holy shit, I'm so pathetic.

"You're going to be okay, Inquisitor," the Captain reassures me. "It's okay."

"Are you… are you sure you can't remove my memory of this?" I gasp.

He chuckles as if it's a fucking joke. No… no, that's unfair. He gets it. He's just at the stage where he has to laugh to keep doing it.

"I really, really fucking hope I'm at least clear after all that," I groan.

"The final decision isn't entirely in my hands, but I'll certainly be giving my firm recommendation that you are," the Inquisitor Captain reassures me. "You're one tough woman, Inquisitor. Most people would have broken under that."

I can't help it. I give him an incredulous look.

"I fucked up hard," I insist. "I let literally every Templar at Site 4 die, sir."

"It's understandable to think that way," the captain nods. "But put another way, you survived an unprecedented disaster that no one else could. You brought us hoards of valuable intel that we were just one life short of losing entirely, and you did it while convincing an army of monsters to keep your body and soul intact. Considering the circumstances, Inquisitor, I think your performance was exemplary."

The female Inquisitor takes her hand off my belly and nods at the young Inquisitor behind me, who starts untying me from the chair.

"Welcome back," she grunts at me. "You're nice and normal again."

Is that a hint of sadistic amusement I feel from her? No, it can't be. I shouldn't be uncharitable to my fellow Templars, I'm probably just grumpy from getting mindfucked. I'm sure she's a kind and wonderful person.

"I really, really hope I never have to go through with this again," I say softly.

"Hopefully not," the captain agrees. "It's a painful thing to submit yourself to."

I'm escorted to another room down below the church as I think about those words, this one much nicer but still unmistakably a cell. Painful to submit to? I shudder. I'm much less worried about the pain than I am about the pleasure. I get why they do things that way; generally, cognimancy is at its most powerful when it's making people want things. But the combination of joy from speaking my thoughts and suppression of any shame or regret that might hold my tongue… fuck, I feel so violated. It was wonderful, and that makes me want to scream.

My new cell has a bed, and I suspect it'll be a day or so before I get final word on whether or not I'm safe to resume my duties, whatever those new duties might be. I'm more than okay with that; I am absolutely exhausted to my core, body and soul. I slip easily into rest, dreaming fitful nonsense about joy, failure, disgust, and for the first time in a long time, sex. I don't really remember much of it, though, as when I'm finally woken up I find myself trapped in the cacophony of my own mind, business as usual. Soon after I get up, the report exonerating me comes in and I actually get a whole fucking day to myself as a reward before I'm expected to return to active duty. Wow. One damn day, after all that. I feel like I need a vacation for a year. Unfortunately, Inquisitors are apparently in high demand and short supply given the whole Ars thing. Sucks to be me, I guess.

Still, I use my time to splurge on the first fancy bath I've had in a damn long while, since I've been sitting on months of pay I've been physically unable to spend. Then I head quickly to my mother and father's house, resolving to spend the rest of my day off with them. Bless them both, they neither hug nor kiss me. I'm not a fan of touching people, least of all getting their saliva on me, but I happily enjoy being in the same room with the two people I love most for the first time in far too long.

Even better, they understand not to ask me too many questions. They're far more than I deserve, I love them so much. All good things must come to an end, though. I wake up just before first light, say goodbye to them both, and start walking towards the closest temple to pick up my new orders and new armor. Early mornings are nice. There's far less activity, far less noise. The faint smell of dew even adds a pleasant undertone to the normally-wretched stench of the city. I make a point to focus on it, trying to isolate the beauty out of the foul. It doesn't go very well, but that's okay. Careful, slow progress is how I stopped myself from going crazy when I first got my talent. It's how I'll continue to improve with it. Still, practicing my focus does leave me a bit uncharacteristically surprised when I hear the voice of someone I never expected to meet again. I suppose it's not entirely unreasonable that I didn't notice her, though, considering that her smell is completely different from the last time I saw her.

"Inquisitor Jelisaveta," First Lady Vesuvius greets me. "What a pleasant surprise."

I quickly turn to face her, bowing slightly. It's not really needed or expected to bow to true nobles, but they certainly tend to appreciate it.

"F-first Lady Vesuvius!" I blurt out. "Thank you again for healing me! I hope your research into my talent was helpful!"

Sure enough, she seems amused by the bow, and my reaction in general. Lady Vesuvius is quite the generous philanthropist if you believe the propaganda: an eccentric, outspoken, but ultimately very kind woman. I can't personally help but find her intimidating, though, even if she was nothing but polite the one other time we met. Besides, what kind of 'eccentric but kind' person casually slaughters twelve thousand soldiers in an afternoon?

"Extremely helpful," Lady Vesuvius answers, smiling as if at a joke. "Though unfortunately I learned little beyond how to replicate it, which I suspect is information that would do you little good. Do accept my apologies."

"O-oh, it's no trouble!" I answer hurriedly. "I wasn't really expecting anything from it. I know you're a very busy woman."

She chuckles politely as I set to figuring out what the fuck her game is, here. Why did she appear behind me? What does she want? It has to be Site 4 related, there's no other reason I'd warrant her time. Does she know about Site 4, though? She certainly shouldn't know about it, but she's a close ally of the Church and at the very least is smart enough to figure out that something big happened. It could just be that she saw the commotion between Vita and the Army and recognized me from that. Fuck, actually, a ton of people will probably recognize me from that now.

"I do certainly wish I had more time to deal with projects like yours," Lady Vesuvius admits. "Unfortunately, most of my research time is devoted to national security matters, such as the vrothizo. Very fascinating creatures, I must admit. Anyway, I suspect you've divined I have a purpose here, and you're right. After you left my care I didn't get to see you again until just now, and I would consider myself quite the failure of a doctor if I did not do a follow-up chat with you to inquire if you have any problems with your new limbs."

"Is that so?" I ask, feeling oddly stressed about that. I'm sort of getting the general feeling that was a massive lie, and that's… weird. Really weird, because I don't see or smell or hear any of the tells I would usually use to confirm that someone is lying.

Honestly, I don't think I've felt like this about someone since before I got my talent. I've always been pretty good with people, even before I obtained super-senses and then trained myself to pick up information without overwhelming myself. When I got the general feeling that someone was maybe full of a bit of bullshit, I ended up right ninety-nine percent of the time. Since obtaining my talent, I learned that the things that gave me 'general feelings' had actual reasons behind them, tiny details that my conscious brain was unable to latch onto but I still subconsciously absorbed. Most people seem to be able to do that pretty well, Vita herself being a notable exception. It hasn't really come up since I got my talent, though. I can just look at someone and know exactly where the 'bad vibes' are coming from. Not so with Lady Vesuvius, though, which is weird. Maybe I'm getting a false positive?

…Or maybe she's just a really, really good liar.

"My arm and leg are fine," I tell her honestly. "I haven't had any problems with them. I still kind of smell that damn nutrient goop everywhere I go, but I—"

Shit! I very, very carefully try not to pause my sentence or otherwise outwardly react as I come to a horrifying conclusion, heart beating out of my chest.

"—have mostly learned to ignore it by now. It's been getting less and less noticeable since you warned me about it."

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck she can copy my talent and she gave me a distinctive scent fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck! No way, no damn way. This has to be a coincidence, right? Why would she even… wait. Weren't they both hunters? Is she why Vita smelled so bad when we ran away? She could be the 'family' that Vita left to meet with! Fuuuuuuck!

"That's wonderful to hear," Lady Vesuvius says demurely. "Please let me know if it fails to disappear completely, or if you have any other problems."

"Of course," I agree pleasantly. "I'd… I'd be… happy… to."

My words falter as they leave my mouth, because as I speak them I'm also listening to far quieter words, subvocalized so only I can hear them.

"I told her you'd figure it out," Penelope whispers, her fanged smile terrifyingly fake. "You're lucky that it took you until now."

She continues at a normal tone, before I can respond.

"That's settled then," she announces with wretched pleasantry. "That's really all the business I had, but it seems we're going the same way and I'd be delighted to have someone to walk with."

I regain my composure halfway through her words, copying her private communication method. It's a scary idea; a silence bubble is an easy way to have a private conversation, but this way no one even knows we're having a private conversation.

"This is above me," I tell her while she speaks, trusting flat honesty in a situation where I have no clever ideas. "Even if you threaten me or my family, I can't in good conscience ignore this."

"I'd love to have you with me," I then lie at a normal volume. "It's truly an honor, Lady Vesuvius. Do you often go for, uh, for walks before the sky brightens?"

"I'm not threatening to hurt you or your family," the noblewoman insists in what I only assume is a very technical way. "I'm asking you to help me prevent a war."

I hesitate, forgetting to pay attention to the follow-up pleasantry she responds with. Vita did threaten war if we fuck with her, and ousting the person responsible for her freedom probably counts as that. Is it really my call on whether or not my nation goes to war, though? What I already said still applies: this is above me. My whole job is to relay shit like this to people who are equipped to make these decisions!

"I see you're still on the fence," Vesuvius the Inhuman whispers to me again, barely intelligible because she doesn't even move her mouth to do it. "But if you're struggling to reconcile your duty with war, consider this: you know what I accomplished before I had a Valka-sponsored biological weapon research lab sitting within Skyhope's walls. And if you fuck with me, Inquisitor? If you start this shit? I won't be on your side."