Nexus Event - Chapter 18

I hummed thoughtfully at the magical newspaper.

“Anything interesting?” Sara asked, typing away at her laptop.

“Wizarding World losing its shit over Sirius,” I commented. “How're those subcutaneous tracker on the rat?”

“I've got it cued to set off an alarm if he steps so much as a single paw outside the holding area, much less the ministry building as a whole,” Sara chuckled darkly. “And I have the shock implants set to go off shortly after that unless they get the okay from my console. I still find it hard to believe Sirius didn't end up killing the bastard.”

“Price was too high,” I replied with a hum. “Just means I'll have to pick up that little shite Barty Crouch Jr.”

I sighed heavily, having wanted to avoid that one, but Sirius had decided against playing the part of the secret agent.

“You? You mean Cassandra, I hope.” Sara stated, a hint of chastisement in her tone.

“Right, right,” I grumbled, fidgeting in the cushions of the sofa. “I forgot that being the centerpiece of the plan meant that I'm not even allowed to collect an enthralled puppet and disable his house-elf keeper. Silly me.”

“If you wanted to do things yourself, you shouldn't have picked up a hypercompetent harem of beautiful women.” Sara snorted. “You're lucky we let you go talk to the President as it is.”

I rumbled irritably in the back of my throat, but didn't disagree. As much as I didn't want to see it happen, the plan could survive the deaths of any of the girls – or god forbid all of them – but not me. If I died, shit was fucked.

So the Batman in the back of my head sat, fuming, as things were done for me.

“You're also needed here for when the shipment comes,” Sara reminded me.

“I'm really not,” I sighed. “I've already signed the receipts and you and Sam know what to look for.”

“But you have to talk to Tanya,” Sara stated firmly.

“Oh, right, because you'll provoke a cat-fight.” I hummed. “Sorry, forgot about that.”

“I will not-” My sister paused, her voice rising as she turned to look at me from her screen. I met her gaze, allowing the newspaper to droop in my hands so that I could raise a single eyebrow.

A moment of silent challenge passed between us.

“So, how long until you fuck Cass?” Sara asked.

“Your attempt to change subjects is transparent and obvious,” I replied dully, flipping the page of my paper. “But the answer is – when she's ready.”

“You do understand the only one thirstier than her is Willow, right?” Sara asked plainly, shaking her head as she turned back to her work. “And, by the way, I know you've been letting the little redheaded sociopath suck you off.”

“Willow isn't sociopathic,” I stated sternly. “She's traumatized. There's a difference.”

“Not to the people she's killed,” my sister riposted quickly.

I grunted because – yeah, true that. “There's a difference in how we should treat her, lest we aggravate her condition and indirectly incite more violence on her part. How about that?”

Sara blew out a quick puff of air through her lips, the noise fast and dismissive. “Sure, alright. You going to comment on her blowing you?”

“You going to comment on your lack of commenting?” I asked in reply. “Since I've been having her do it here, where I know you have all your little eyes and ears.”

“Are you accusing me of passive-aggressively hoarding information to verbally strike at a weak point when I needed to distract you or score points?” Sara asked saccharine-sweetly.

“Hardly,” I snorted. “I'm stating that you're a voyeur.”

There was another long pause as I finished the section I was reading and folded the paper up. I'd hand it off to one of the other girls when they showed up. The novelty of magical newspapers was still strong enough that they enjoyed looking through them.

“Okay, how'd you figure that out?” Sara asked, her shoulders losing their tension suddenly as she realized I wasn't simply guessing.

“You set the maidroids to clean the couch cushions and the sheets at intervals that didn't make sense unless they were getting a lot dirtier than normal activities counted for,” I stated, rising up and marching over to the back of Sara's chair.

I leaned down and kissed the nape of her neck, pressing my smirk against the hot flush creeping down to her chest.

“I hate you so much right now,” Sara groused lowly.

“You love me,” I confirmed, “and I love my adorable little sister who now has a voyeurism fetish, even if she won't admit it.”

Sara's only response was a groan-whine as she batted at me in embarrassment.

I backed away, chuckling, letting her fume impotently.

Let's see... Sam was down in the engineering now, busying herself with the potential hardware upgrades and side-grades for the 90's American military. I didn't want to interrupt her until the resupply. Illyana was down there with her, blowing things up under annoyingly controlled conditions. Cass was out running around doing fun stuff. Kitty was hanging out with her, getting some lessons in Bat-ness to broaden her skill set.

Which, frankly, was vaguely terrifying.

A Bat-trained stealth specialist who could phase through matter?

Well, I was just glad she was on my side.

That left Willow and Pepper, who were both working from home for the next few days. Pepper was primarily prepping the various press releases we'd need in a month or so. Many of them had to be specifically-tailored to their respective magical and mundane communities, to say nothing of their linguistic ones. At bare minimum, we'd need to prepare magical and non-magical versions for English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Hindi, and Vietnamese.

Normally, I'd pass on specifically informing the Vietnamese, but I was banking on them turning their entire country into a deathtrap once the Chinese military inevitably got crushed.

I mean... I had no doubt they'd probably take out at least one Demon Prince before they started fragmenting, but their military was built on the soviet model. The only thing they were really good at was massed charges and throwing ordinance at problems. What was worse, their regime was ideologically-hidebound and thus unwilling to listen to advice on the matter of tactics, strategy, or logistics.

Oh, and they had an institutional disbelief of the supernatural.

Needless to say, but the Pepper-Sam-Sara 'thinktank' didn't have good projections on how long China would last as a coherent nation, even if they allowed significant western support.

“News is breaking that Japan is putting forth a motion to amend their constitution,” Sara stated suddenly.

“Bush pulled through, then,” I commented approvingly. “They – we – will need the area as a staging ground. I'll need to contact Pepper and check in on how the purchase of Hashima Island is going. Hopefully we can sneak that past with all the hullabaloo.”

“I seriously can't believe you just used that word unironically,” Sara sighed, shaking her head. “Anyway, it'd be a good time to do it, certainly. Protests are already forming and its only been a few hours. I have to admit, it's odd seeing Japan so peaceful in this world.”

“If memory serves, the last time they had significant widespread civil unrest was during the pro-communist protests of the sixties,” I stated authoritatively.

“Of course you'd know that,” Sara muttered.

“How about the Australia properties? That close yet?” I asked, curious.

“Right before Harriet's birthday party, last week,” Sara confirmed. “Honestly, it's basically a wasteland. They were happy to part with it. Apparently it was only good for driving cattle through and they'd bought it to make sure no one would ever fence the area. So when their ranching business went belly-up...”

“Well, at least that part was easy,” I muttered. “The next part, though...”

“Columbia, right?” Sara asked, her voice... worryingly blank.

“How did you-” I paused, then grimaced. “Right.”

“You might have done the research to find those serial killers, but it isn't as though I could have reasonably avoided seeing them,” she replied. “I am your right-hand woman, after all.”

“You disapprove, then,” I observed.

“Whether I approve or not doesn't really matter,” she stated, her fingers typing away at the keys... and pressing slightly harder than strictly necessary.

I sighed. “There aren't all that many good alternatives in the long run.”

“And in the short run you'll be employing mercenary companies, disabled veterans, and wrongfully-convicted criminals in the meantime,” Sara stated, her voice tired. “They'll be the front-line combatants for the first waves, so I don't have room to complain. Anyone you pick up will be past the age of majority by the time they see combat.”

Sara paused meaningfully.

“Unlike the wards,” she eventually concluded.

“It isn't something I approve of, either, you know?” I hummed, occupying my gaze with the various trinkets and treasures accrued by the Bat Family. “Bruce – Batman – had his justifications for sending children into mortal peril. Charles Xavier did as well. The wizarding world does, too, because it needs them with how dangerous magic is... but, when you look at the alternative.”

“We're entering combat against an existential threat,” Sara nodded, finally looking at me. “You're not acting like those assholes from the Catholic Church, Solomon. This isn't really a choice for us. We use who and what we have or everyone dies.”

“And this will objectively be making their lives better, likely longer for most of them, and that's fucking disgusting to confront the truth of and I hate it,” I growled out in a lengthy rant.

Taking a deep breath, I tried to relax.

It was a tug-of-war I'd had with my conscience for weeks, ever since devising the coming step in the plan. There were a lot of places around the world that had discarded children. I had a desperate need for manpower in the coming decades. It was easy, appalling, grotesque math and it sickened my soul every time I thought about it.

Thankfully, a distraction manifested itself in the form of an alarm on the monitor.

“You up for this?” Sara asked plainly.

I sank into the meditative cool and level attitude stored in the back of my mind, then nodded. “Put her on.”

Sara tapped a key and Tanya's face appeared on the screen.

“I got you the Bubblegum Crisis hardsuits,” she stated, dispensing entirely with the pleasantries, “I wasn't able to snag a Valkyrie fighter, sadly. The push-back on that leads me to believe there's pressure and ulterior motives behind it, but my hands are tied as far as investigations go right now.”

“They probably know that,” I nodded.

Tanya scowled, but nodded as well. “In all likelihood, yes. Given how I'm focusing our efforts on figuring out who killed all of those Agents? They rightfully feel like they can get away with a great deal while we're otherwise occupied.”

I narrowed my gaze at her body language and word choice.

“If that's the case, then we'll need to be on the lookout for someone smuggling things into the world,” I observed pointedly. “We don't want to have to deal with any more complications than we already are.”

“It's a valid concern,” Tanya hummed, her eyes locked on mine. “Anyone with the right kind of technology and know-how could sneak anything onto your world... provided they had the relevant maps of the eddies and gyres formed by all these dimensional gates opening, at least.”

Like the ones you have?

I didn't ask the question, though, already knowing the answer. “Well, that's a relief, at least. The Demon Princes running the Death March likely don't have the kind of equipment necessary to pull those stunts.”

“No, they don't,” Tanya shook her head, “but other parties do. I'd be on the lookout for anything out-of-context popping up.”

I chose to interpret that warning as the double-edged sword it was as I placed a hand on Sara's shoulder to stop her from vibrating out of her seat with the, 'I have a secret,' energy pent up in her small form.

“And the aura user?” I asked, genuinely curious.

Tanya paused, then dipped her head a fraction. “We got one. She's from Company Stock. I called in a favor or two and sent her through Processing. Loyalty implants, nothing past that.”

I frowned deeply at that. “If you've read my file, you know how opposed I am to that sort of thing being done unwillingly.”

“Which is why it wasn't,” Tanya countered.

I blinked and Sara stared, unnerved. “Someone volunteered for processing?”

I'd read up on that shit. The Agency was at least decent enough to softball modifications like that. The Company? You were either functional or they'd make you functional. And the latter process was as invasive as they felt it needed to be.

“She got blacklisted,” Tanya explained. “Screwed up several missions, got her Contractors killed, she's generally a problem. It was either volunteer to have parts of her rewritten or find herself processed out in an entirely different way. One she wouldn't survive.”

...and I'd just gotten finished lamenting on necessary evils, too. Ah, well... I shouldn't waste more time bitching about things I can't change. It is what it is.

“And she's not going to fuck things up here?” I asked, cursing for effect with a raised eyebrow.

“You have an entire group of highly-capable specialists with generalized support skills in overlapping areas of competence,” Tanya replied dryly. “If you absolutely must, have her sit in a corner with a box of crayons. That way the worst she's capable of is doodling on the walls.”

I hummed, considering the ultimatum.

“Look, you wanted someone capable of awakening aura,” Tanya pressed on, her tone less confrontational. “I got you that, at significant personal difficulty, I might add. Aura-users are in high demand, it's either this or nothing.”

“Alright,” I sighed, “as long as it's not Raven Branwen, I can deal with her.”

I'd desperately wanted someone with Remnant Aura for the team, but been unable to pick up a contract from The Agency. Aura was one of the few low-hanging fruit powers that could be easily duplicated and spread to others without the need for advanced technology or special requirements. Ultimately, if the price for acquiring it was to accept some dead weight on the team that I would need to bench outside of absolute emergencies, I could do that.

“It's not,” Tanya promised, poking something on her control panel. “I'll need your countersign to accept the delivery.”

“Here you are,” I stepped up to the Bat-computer and hit a few keys as well.

“Best of luck to you,” Tanya stated after an awkward moment. “This will likely be our last communication for some time. Years, possibly. The interdimensional turbulence is getting worse, as expected. Good hunting, Agent.”

“Thank you,” I nodded, then the screen cut off.

“So...” Sara drawled awkwardly, “Let's see what she sent us?”

I hummed thoughtfully and nodded, leading us down to the teleportation bay. Hitting the device on my wrist, I spoke into it, “Illyana – Sam, our resupply just showed up.”

“Back to Cass now,” Sara began, smirking.

I sighed again as we entered the elevator.

Thankfully, it was a quick trip down, though not fast enough to beat Sam and Illyana. The engineering area was just closer, making for easy trips in and out in the name of being able to teleport some of the larger vehicles.

“I didn't think she'd send them in crates,” Sara stated as we walked in to find the two blonds breaking the seals on the large metal containers. “Maybe a security measure?”

“Maybe,” Sam grunted, Illya beginning to lose patience and simply slicing through the chains-

Or trying to.

“Sonnuva-” The mutant cursed, looking between the magical blade of energy and the long chains tied around the crates.

“Stop,” I stated, calling them both back. Stepping up and examining them, I tapped the large crate. “Hmm... this isn't steel, not tungsten or anything mundane...”

Illyana blinked, then breathed in sharply, her eyes going wide as she moved up next to me and studied the chains and boxes again. “This is adamantium. I've seen it before. It was rare in limbo – it's rare everywhere – but I once had a sword commissioned from it.”

I chuckled as the truth set in. “She sent us our resupplies in metal crates tied up with chains that are all made out of adamantium. Okay, that's pretty slick.”

“I'm guessing one of those fictional miracle metals?” Sara asked.

“You'd guess right,” Sam snorted, shaking her head. “Jack would be losing his shit right now if he could see this, probably make a joke about coating someone's skeleton in it. Depending on the thickness and our ability to work it, this could be a substantial boon.”

“Let's see what's actually inside it, shall we?” I asked, approaching the lock itself and pressing my thumb to it. I felt the device draw off a measure of my magical energy as a secondary identification before popping free and allowing us to move the chains.

I handed the lock to Sam, who took it with a curious expression.

“That's an electronic lock. It's not urgent, but there's potential that it could have other data piggybacking in its databanks,” I nodded, and her eyes widened as she tucked it away.

“Right, right... I was never all that good at playing spy games,” Sam stated, quirking a lip and stepping out of the way for Illyana and I to open the door...

And, as a result, not getting caught in the rush of loose crumpled-up paper that flowed out like an avalanche from within. As things settled, I could just see the head of the first two hardsuits standing upright within the crate.

“Packing paper? Really?” Sara asked, almost rolling her eyes before picking up a single sheet and examining it. “Let's see...”

“-fusion reactors should be tuned to parallel capacity in the event of fluctuations in the thrusters. To diagnose the problem, put systems into STALL mode and attach supply cables to-” Sara shook her head and handed the page to Sam. “I'm just guessing, but this is probably the manual to that fighter Solomon wanted.”

Illyana and I shared a smile as we looked through the pages.

“Not it, by the way,” Sara stated, holding up her hands.

“Not it,” Illyana and Sam echoed quickly.

“Pepper and Willow can do it,” I stated bluntly, then paused. “No, wait. I'm being stupid.”

I reached into the holster tucked into my forearm and plucked my wand out. “Now, let's see... Ordino Turbamentum.”

The papers immediately began to move in a fluttering whirlwind, pulling themselves out of the metal crate and quickly stacking themselves into six separate stacks. Even the front and back covers were in place. I shrugged and cast the reparo charm on them, the bindings knitting themselves back together as the creases smoothed out. Normally, I don't think the charm was supposed to go that far, but... well, The Agency's advantages were useless if they didn't do anything.

“Looks like we've got... construction and maintenance manuals for the VF-1 Valkyrie Variable Aerospace Fighter,” Sam read aloud, her smile growing as she picked all six thick books up and stacked them off to the side.

“The armored suits look good, too,” Illyana observed, stepping into the crate and looking them over. “We've got six, total... and it looks like they have computer stuff inside of them. Hard drives, I think?”

“Ooooh~” Sara grinned, moving forward. “Lemme see!”

“It's probably more engineering data,” Sam noted, a bounce in her step.

“Could be intelligence on the enemy,” Sara hummed, pulling the drives from within the suits.

I ignored the back and forth between Sam and my sister, nodding at Illyana and moving towards the back of the large enclosure where a number of smaller boxes stood, each with the adamantine sheen readily apparent on them now that I knew what to look for. But, those aside, my focus was on the cryo capsule and its sole inhabitant.

“New teammate?” Illyana asked, looking into the clear pseudo-glass front plate. “Doesn't look like much.”

“No, she doesn't,” I nodded, “but do any of us actually appear all that threatening?”

The blond sorceress paused, then nodded. “Point.”

I kept my true opinions to myself. I'd wanted an aura user and that's what I'd gotten. She was short, petite really, with a build that was slim even for her size. In her silent repose, she looked peaceful, which I had to admit was strange to see on that face. Her head, though, was topped by the familiar dual-shock of dark brown on her left side and bright pink tresses on the right. A single strand of white cut through the pink, drifting down to cut her face in twain and hide eyes that I knew to be heterochromatic should they open.

Or, if one were to use the proper terminology, her hair looked like a classic type of strawberry, chocolate, and vanilla ice cream paired together.

I was somewhat surprised that the little chaos gremlin had chosen enforced servitude rather than nonexistence, but I suppose that faced with the existential certainty of obliteration most people would be intimidated enough to accept a blow to their independence.

Then, as I was contemplating exactly how to approach waking Neo up, the alarms went off.

All of the alarms.

“What's going on!?” Illyana shouted out the awful din of sirens blaring.

“One of the fucking wormholes is opening!” Sara replied, reaching for her communicator and shutting the noise off. “That wasn't supposed to happen for another month!”

“Where's it hitting?” I asked, then shook my head. “Illyana, gate us to the main computer.”

She nodded and popped a portal open, all four of us streaming through to the other side and Sara diving for her chair. “Shit-shit-shit... fuck! England! It's the one from the Saderan Empire!”

“Why's it opening so soon?” Sam asked, leaning over to look at one of the screens and parsing the complex calculations. “Wait, it was the resupply! It changed the portal's vector!”

I cursed, “How long have we got?”

“Hours,” Sara winced.

I took a deep breath, momentarily calculating the possibility of enemy action, then disregarding it. It didn't matter at the moment, not immediately anyway. “Call everyone in. Make whatever excuses you need to. Get Pepper on the phone with the American government. Sam, you're up for the British. Start making calls. Exact location, Sara?”

My sister stared at the screen, her eyes unblinking. When she spoke after a moment's hesitation, it was with a combination of dread and anger that, I could tell, belonged uniquely to Sara Pendragon and not the girl she'd once been in another life.

“Colchester, Essex,” she stated.

I stilled, shock overwhelming me for a moment.

“Colchester?” Sam asked, looking between us. “What's there?”

“Camulodunon,” I informed her. “When the Normands crossed the channel, the early French language corrupted the name into something you'd be more familiar with.”

“Camelot,” Sara stated. “It's the site of the ancient castle-town of Camelot.”

“...while I understand the burden of legacy,” Illyana stated slowly, frowning. “What does it matter here and now?”

“When the surrounding mundane lords burned the town down during the final war to wipe the kingdom out,” I explained, “something as normal as fire couldn't destroy a castle enchanted by Merlin himself.”

Another long moment of silence.

“I'll inform Father,” I stated, turning back to Sara. “Contact the castellan and tell him to rally his forces.”

“Wait... you mean we're deploying out of Castle Camelot?” Sam asked in disbelief.

~~~

Admittedly, I took a day off, so this is a day late.

But here it is, a return to Nexus Event.

And things are happening!

So, next up is Mind Games. As per the demands of the poll. Mind Games won handidly this time around, with Butler Boy coming in a hard second. So look forward to that!