String - Ignition 9.5

When I heard the door to my workshop open, I looked up to see Sam scowling as she strode in. I knew she was upset with me about Lucy, but when I saw the state she was in, it apparently wasn’t the only thing troubling her. Her hair was a mess and there was a nasty gash down the left side of her neck that had stained her school uniform with blood.

“Wh–”

A loud rumbling beneath us cut me off before I could ask what happened. Sam immediately reached for the nearest table to steady herself, but it was only a few seconds later when the rumbling turned into violent shaking and she ducked underneath. I was almost knocked out of my chair as various items around my workshop shuddered and fell. 

It was the most violent earthquake I had ever experienced. 

Throughout my life, I had grown used to tremors when The Mountain was reported to have been working on the foundations of the country. It had always been a distant and low rumble, the kind most people would stop to acknowledge for a second before moving on with their lives. This one was magnitudes larger than what I had grown accustomed to.

Six seconds later, the shaking ceased, and I slowly stood from my chair.

“Hooooly shit!” I heard Liam’s astonished cry from upstairs. I turned just in time to see him poke his head through the door. “That was fuckin’ wild! I’ve never felt something like that – oh, hey Sam. We were wondering where you were. You’re not usually this late back.”

Sam brushed herself off as she sheepishly crawled out from under the table and stood up.

“I was following up on a little pet project of mine. It kinda backfired, badly,” she said, flinching after poking at the wound on her neck. “Gonna need some biogel, ‘cause this shit stings. Where are we keeping it now?”

“Yellow container at the back,” I pointed to the area of my workshop I designated for storage. “What’s this about a ‘pet project’? You’ve never said anything about working on something solo.”

“Yeah. Well… Surprise,” Sam drawled. Liam and I watched her dig around in the yellow container for the biogel, and then use the reflective surface of one of my projects as a mirror to apply it. “Got too close… said some stupid things. Didn’t time it right– Fuck!” She hissed. The wound looked painful, but I had seen her handle a bullet wound better. Her gaze flicked to me. “Remember how I said Nikki was fine and not the type of hero that’ll fly off the handle?”

“Nikki?” I narrowed my eyes and wracked my brain to find out why the name sounded familiar. “Seraphim?”

“Bitch is fucking crazy,” Sam muttered, reaching for some gauze and bandages. “I’ve been trying to get closer to her over these last few weeks because I thought she’d be a nice contact to have,” she paused, running a hand through her hair. “I should have seen this coming with how moody she is. If it were anyone else, I would say she was bipolar or something, but it doesn’t fit her personality, it’s something more recent.”

Liam hopped down the stairs to join us, wanting to know more.

“So, what, you decided to do your usual Mentalist shtick and it made her want to jump off a building?”

“You can fuck right off with that,” Sam warned. “I’m not in the mood to entertain that shit right now.”

I frowned. Sam’s encounter with Seraphim must have really struck a nerve, she had never snapped back like that.

“Whoa,” Liam held up his hands. “It was just a joke.”

“Comedian you are not,” Sam said, sighing tiredly. “As far as I can tell it’s her boyfriend, Richard. I was doing a little digging about the guy and she suddenly went psycho. Gold was looking into it in the background and noticed something was off, so I tried to follow up on it. Normally, mind-controlled victims are a bit spacey, a little less than they usually are. Their personality is being suppressed by someone else, right?”

“But she’s still her, otherwise The ECU would’ve noticed immediately,” I said. “Which means whatever power is affecting her doesn’t work like normal, and they don’t know what to look for.”

“She can function almost completely normal, yeah – but not without triggers,” Sam lightly touched the healing wound on her neck. “There are much rarer forms of mind-control, but they don’t quite fit. Enthraller could imprint himself onto people and slowly take them over. Gospel can literally speak through anyone he’s touched, and Twitch can influence nerves inside people’s bodies.”

“But this… isn’t any of those?” Liam guessed. Sam just nodded. “So what is it?”

“Best I can tell he’s able to tweak personalities,” she shuddered. “She’s not acting like a traditional mind controlled person because she’s aware of it, and is conditioned to believe it’s normal.”

“Just how far gone is she?” I asked, suddenly concerned for Abby’s safety. Seraphim spent a significant amount of time at The ECU’s headquarters, as did any rookie. “Seraphim isn’t about to paint The ECU’s walls red, right?”

“She’s not a drooling vegetable but if someone says the wrong thing, she’ll lash out. Otherwise her normal personality remains in control, completely unaware of her triggers,” Sam explained, shuddering. “Richard, has been pulling her strings for a long time. I don’t know if there’s a way to reverse that kind of conditioning. Not without his power anyway.”

“We’re talking about the Rookie with the big shiny metal wings, right?” Liam asked, eager for clarification. When Sam and I nodded, a thoughtful look formed on his face. It was… strange to see that expression on him. “I think I’ve run from her a couple of times before shacking up with you guys. Fast flier, strong enough to punch holes through brick walls. Are we… going to do something about her or just leave the mess for someone else to clean up?”

“Of course we’re going to do something about it,” I answered as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. Sam made a sound like she disagreed. Seraphim was her pet project after all, and she would want to get something out of her venture. “She’s a direct threat to the people around her, which means Sam and Abby are in danger.”

“I am not in any danger. I go to school to maintain my cover, but I can leave whenever I want,” Sam remarked defensively. “The only people she’s a direct threat to are those closest to her, so yeah. I would imagine your friend is just one snide comment away from losing her head.”

Knowing Abby, that would be sooner rather than later.

“Then we need to do something. Take out the guy controlling her – Richard.”

“Would that work?” Liam hummed. “It can’t be that easy, right?”

“Usually it would, mind control is almost always an active or maintained effect. Kill the controller and the control goes poof,” Sam’s expression twisted as she tried to think. “But if he’s twisting her personality, we can’t be sure of what will happen. Maybe she’ll be fine, but Gold is almost certain she’ll snap if anything happens to him.”

“So she’s… like a sleeper agent?” Liam’s mouth opened. “She’ll go all murder machine on everyone. Seraphim, one of the strongest rookies, will go on a rampage. Asshole knows how to pick his victims.”

I groaned, rubbing my head.

“If she snaps—”

“If she snaps, she’ll be killed or shoved into an evo-prison.” Sam cut me off. “Reversing even mundane conditioning can take years. For all we know we can’t reverse this. I talked to Cyberspace and they don’t have the means or desire to help. That means we have no way to reverse it, unless you want to build something. Don’t even bother, by the way. If it got out that we had mind altering tech, we’d be dead within hours. Everyone would be gunning for us.”

I had to concede, she had a point.

“Even if we wanted to I’m not even sure where I would start—”

“It’s too dangerous,” Sam continued with a glare. “It’s not our job to take care of messes like these. We can’t save everyone and we have enough to worry about.”

“Don’t give me that crap,” I snapped, glaring back at her. “You wouldn’t put all this time into a ‘project’ just to throw it away. Just because we’re not heroes doesn’t mean we can’t help people. We need to do something about her before she murders everyone at your school for spreading a rumor about Richard.”

“How do you propose we do that?” Sam disputed. I couldn’t remember a time since I met her that she had been this wound up. Despite her slip-ups, Sam always seemed to keep her cool. “Because I’ve been really thinking about this, and let me tell you everything I come up with is unpleasant.”

Kidnapped, imprisoned, and forced to undergo power-assisted mental alteration… again. It didn’t matter who was the one to do it, Seraphim would never be able to be certain that she was back to normal.

The easiest solution was to ignore it, which seemed to be what Sam wanted to do. Cyberspace would agree. Getting involved was problematic and would potentially put us in a bad situation. In fact, Seraphim’s situation was probably a boon for Cyberspace. A ticking time bomb right at the heart of The ECU that they didn’t know about and couldn’t trace back to them? The perfect opportunity.

What else could we do?

Sedation and lobotomization were the only other options I could think of and they didn’t sit right.

“I don’t want her dead. If anyone needs to die, it's the twisted piece of shit that’s controlling her,” I said. “You’ve said it before, killing is a slippery slope. I’ve already got one body to my name and the only one I’m willing to make an exception for is Mirage. But if Richard needs to be next, I don’t want him dragging any of his victims down with him. Ajax and The ECU wouldn’t even give us the chance to share our side.”

“I’m right there with you,” Liam said lowly. “If we kill this guy, at least I’ll have evened things out a bit.”

That Morpher’s death still weighed heavy on his shoulders, and I couldn’t blame him. At the end of the day, he had just been a kid even younger than us completely out of his mind. It had been in the midst of a life-and-death fight. Self-defense, that’s all it was.

We had that in common, at least.

“Okay,” Sam agreed, exhaling slowly. “We take this guy out and Seraphim flips out. There’s not much point kidnapping her because we can’t hold someone as powerful as her for too long and the ECU will try to track her down. We don’t have the means, and Cyberspace won’t take the risk of exposing their operation. There will be collateral damage, are you willing to accept that?”

No, I wasn’t. Not if that meant gambling with Abby’s life.

“There has to be something. Abby is one of my best friends, and I’m not about to sit on the sidelines.”

“Afraid she can’t take care of herself?” Sam asked. “I seem to remember her being perfectly capable of restraining all three of us. Her powers don’t exactly adhere to the laws of physics, so Seraphim’s strength and speed don’t really factor into it. Comet and Domination can contain her long enough for The ECU to figure out what to do.”

“That’s different. She was expecting us. I know Abby, and she won’t expect to be betrayed, she likes to think the best of her friends. If she’s at least aware of the possibility, she’ll be on guard. The same can be said for her mom.”

Sam immediately caught on to what I was insinuating.

“Don’t,” Sam warned, every trace of humor gone from her tone. “Don’t you fucking dare, Max. Don’t even suggest it!”

Liam stepped between us before any heated arguments could break out.

“Whoa whoa okay, lets just chill out for a second. There’s no need to start yelling,” Liam said, drawing our attention to him. He turned to me, looking for an explanation. “I ain’t a mind reader, so could you fill me in?”

Gold must have read my intentions as I was putting them together.

I sighed.

“I was going to suggest making a request to Abby. If I meet her as Upgrade, I can deliver the warning – let her and The ECU handle matters without sticking our noses into their business. It’s the only way that works out best for us, and them,” I explained. “I know Abby. If I word things right and approach the situation cautiously, she won’t attack me on sight.”

“She seemed pretty keen on attacking us last time we interacted…” Sam argued. When my gaze turned hostile, she continued with what she conveniently left out. She stepped back and rocked on her heels. “Uh, right after the part where I might’ve mouthed off to her.”

“Might have?” I remarked, shaking my head. “If we do this, you are definitely not coming. She will attack you. I can keep things civil with her because I know how she operates.”

“I know you want to do the right thing, but it won’t work. Let me map this out for you,” Sam nabbed one of my notebooks, ripped out a blank page, and began scribbling. “So we go with your plan. You warn The ECU about Seraphim and her Mentalist boyfriend by using Comet as a proxy. They’ll take the information with a grain of salt, but because of the amount of possible damage, they’ll pull some resources and get some specialised mentalists to look at her. Chances are they find traces of conditioning – hiccups in her personality that anyone could overlook. They take her, lock her down, and immediately apprehend the boyfriend under suspicion. Problem solved, right? We don’t even need to kill him.”

Liam and I exchanged confused stares. It sounded perfect on paper – literally, but Sam’s tone implied something sinister.

“Yeah?” Liam shrugged. “Sounds good to me.”

“Wrong,” Sam snapped her fingers at him. “Problem one: There’s too much leading back to us. How did Upgrade come by this information? Well, me, obviously, they know about my capabilities, so that means we’ve been looking into Seraphim specifically for some reason. If we pass on how the conditioning works – which we’ll have to do so that they can verify our info – they know enough about my power that they’ll figure out I spend a significant amount of time with her. Her friend group at school will be put under surveillance and it’ll be very obvious that the new girl, who just so happens to match Alice’s build and face, is me. Then they’ll nab me when I’m not even looking. Game over.”

“Sounds like you should have been wearing a costume that obscures your build, perhaps one that covers more than just your torso? One with a helmet maybe?” I gave her a pointed look. “Just saying. That could have been prevented.”

Sam’s smile was poison.

“What a fantastic solution. Oh, if only I had met you three years ago when I got my powers and never joined The ECU! Man, I really wish I thought of that.”

“Okay, but—”

“Problem two,” Sam stopped me by holding up her hand. “You can’t tell Comet, once they figure out we weren’t lying they’ll investigate everything about the interaction and why you contacted Comet specifically. Admittedly, some of it can be negated by proper planning to make things look coincidental, but the point is to not give Mentalists anything. They could pretty easily pick up on a personal connection between the two. If you meet her in costume, you better bet that conversation is being recorded. Not only do you out yourself, but potentially the rest of us. You two,” she pointed at me and Liam, “are friends at school. We’ve been seen in public together. Dominos, Max. They will fall, and fall fast. So we can’t forewarn her specifically like you want.”

“Sooo—” 

“Problem THREE!” Sam stopped Liam. “Last one, promise. Problem three — and I will admit this is a bit of a stretch but It’s happened before so there’s no reason it can’t happen again — we cause a cascade. Richard’s power might be stronger than what we know, or the ECU anticipates. If that happens he might be able to compromise Bayside’s entire ECU branch if he’s captured. Then, we’ll have a much bigger problem on our hands.”

“No way they’re that incompetent,” I pointed out. “I know they’ve had their moments, but if they were that stupid I don’t think Bayside would exist right now.”

Sam laughed weakly.

“Max… the city was nearly wiped out a couple of weeks ago.”

Liam groaned and turned away, but I could see she had a point. 

“You’re saying all of that could happen if we just… tried to warn them?” Liam wasn’t convinced. “How can they get to you from all of that, when they can’t even see one of their own being brainwashed right under their noses?”

Sam sighed, rubbing her forehead.

“Mentalists need a direction, and we’re often limited in what we can figure out, even with a thread of information.”

“But you aren’t limited?” I asked.

“Yup, it’s part of what makes me so special, mentalists are rare, ones as good as me are even moreso. That means the ECU has to be very careful with how they use us. But for something like this? They’ll devote a bunch of resources. They’ll want to know how his power works, how we came by the information, how to deal with it… literally everything they can find out so that when someone with a similar power pops out again they’re prepared.”

All of this back and forth and we still had not come up with a plan. It was starting to grate on my nerves.

“And we’re back to square one,” I grumbled, trying to rub the fatigue out of my eyes. “It feels like all we can do is kill Richard or wait for the situation to blow up.”

Sam snorted. 

“Hey, you said it, not me.”

“So we have nothing else? Am I supposed to just sit around and hope my friend doesn’t die when Seraphim snaps? I get it Sam, you can easily disconnect yourself, but I can’t – I don’t want to.”

“I know,” Sam ground her teeth. “In a perfect world, you’d all be like me—” she paused, scowling at Liam to prevent any input. We saw him open his mouth to make a cheeky remark but stopped when he clued into the tension. He held up his hands and shrugged, signaling for her to continue. “This goes for the both of you, and Mia. The deeper we get into our Super lives, the harder it's going to be to maintain normalcy. They don’t mix, and sooner or later we’re going to have to give one up.”

I didn’t know what pissed me off more; the fact that Sam was seemingly trying to convince us to throw our ‘normal’ lives away, or that she was actually making sense. I was already struggling to find reasons to keep going to school and if push came to shove, I was worried I really would drop all of it.

“I thought the whole point of working with Cyberspace was to give us the ability to do that,” Liam frowned. He clearly wasn’t happy with being faced with that reality, and while I knew it to be a possibility in the back of my mind, it didn’t make me happy either. “They can cover for us and make shit easier while we do the heavy lifting stuff – jobs ‘n shit, y’know? Else, what’s the point of all this?”

“Well, we didn’t exactly have a choice. Cyberspace might have claimed we could refuse their offer, but trust me when I say it wouldn’t have ended well for us,” Sam explained. “It was a no brainer partnership, but make no mistake, we’re in the big leagues now. No backing out for us, and it’s only going to get crazier from here. This is why I don’t bother trying to play both sides. We all have powers, and we will until we die.”

I didn’t want a repeat of this conversation. That horse had been beaten enough already for my tastes.

“We’re getting off-topic. Talking about how we’re going to cope with the pressure can be a conversation for another day. Right now, Seraphim takes priority. I don’t like my friend being in danger. Ajax’s war machines… they–they can wait.”

“Gotta agree there,” Liam said, siding with me. “She seems pretty cool when she’s not… y’know, trying to capture us. I don’t wanna see her dead. Plus, helping them out could win us some good will.”

“That all depends on your definition of good will,” Sam replied sardonically. “If you guys are serious about tipping them off, we need to do it in a way that doesn’t put Max and I in their line of scrutiny. All of us are already under a microscope for what we did to Grim, and hijacking one of Ajax’s Walkers is only going to make that worse. We don’t need to give them any more breadcrumbs.”

“How do you suppose we go about this?” I asked.

“Max…” Sam gave me a pleading look, but I didn’t relent. I challenged her with a stare, daring her to keep pushing for non-action. It didn’t take her long to fold. “Okay, I’ll try my best, but I’m going to need time to come up with a solution that works. So I’m going to need you to sit tight and there’s no guarantee I’ll figure something out before she goes nuts.”

“How long?”

“For fucks sakes! I don’t know!” Sam yelled, throwing her hands up in exasperation. “A week, maybe two! Could be a couple of days but there’s a lot going on, okay?! I’ve been focused on trying to figure out how to take down a Walker without getting all of us killed. I’ve also been helping to coordinate Cyberspace’s agents and root out problems, then I have all this Seraphim crap. I’m feeling a little stretched thin, okay?”

“I thought we had a plan for the Walker. I use my power and Liam transports it,” I shook my head in confusion. “Besides, I thought you said Gold wasn’t limited.”

“Gold – Gold isn’t. We’re talking about me here,” Sam sneered. “Gold can do a lot of heavy lifting and isn’t as limited as other Mentalists, but she’s still me and I’ve only got one brain. On top of all this, I now have another thing to worry about – namely the Pandora stray you brought home from school,” she paused and rubbed her head again. “Also that’s not a plan, Max. It’s a goal. I need to figure out how to get you in a position where you can actually use your power on a Walker. With how much firepower they’re packing, along with their shields and a billion fucking safeguards, take a guess at how easy that’s gonna be.”

“Whatever happened to ‘striking it hard and fast’ and ‘overloading it’ or whatever?” Liam asked. “Wasn’t that the plan to begin with? You said we’d be done in like five seconds.”

Sam groaned.

“That’s not— ugh…” her head fell into her hands. “That’s not a plan, Liam. That’s the overview. The plan is how we actually accomplish all that without dying and escape.”

“Oh… That makes sense. So, uh, how about that earthquake?” Liam coughed, trying to change the subject. “That sure was something else.”

I idly looked around my workshop, noting all the loose bits of paper, tools, and other various items that lay scattered around the place. Thankfully, nothing had broken, but that didn’t mean there wouldn’t be any cleanup.

“Nothing broke, so that’s a plus,” I said casually, trying to move past my irritation. “I don’t know if I’ve felt one that big before.”

I side-eyed Sam, waiting for her input on the subject, but she was uncharacteristically silent. Her eyes were glued to the floor as if she were trying to stare through solid concrete. Her eyes narrowed before looking up to observe the building.

“Could do with some slight improvements so the next one doesn’t collapse the building,” Sam said. “Though, I have to wonder what it would look like to see the whole building turn into a giant ball of folding liquidy weirdness. Might wanna save that for when nobody’s looking, probably sometime in the early morning.”

I had never upgraded a structure this large before. I couldn’t help but wonder what it would do to everything inside.

“That’s it?” Liam looked disappointed. “We just had the biggest freaking earthquake ever and that’s all you have to say?”

“So you want me to tell you that Bayside will collapse into the sea if we get three more?” Sam asked, perplexed. “I honestly figured I would keep that to myself since it’s pretty daunting, but if you’re so eager to know…”

Liam chuckled as Sam started walking toward the stairs. When she didn’t share in his amusement, the laughter abruptly died.

“You’re not serious, right?”

“You really think I’d do that, Liam? That I would stand here and tell lies for my own amusement?” Sam asked. Just like that, her mischievous side was back in action like all that angst she was spilling minutes ago never existed. “I’m shocked and appalled that you would think so little of me!”

Sam hopped up the stairs two at a time, and Liam almost tripped over himself when he tried to follow after her.

“Hey, wait! You can’t just say something like that and not elaborate!”

I followed closely after them, watching as Sam sauntered into the room with her hands on her hips.

“A new face! I always love meeting new people,” Sam exclaimed with a bright smile. “Don’t mind the blood on my clothes. Happens all the time,” I stepped into the living room behind Liam to see Mia and Lucy at the table, hunched over some books. “I’m Sam! You must be Max’s friend, right?”

“Err, yeah… hi,” Lucy said slowly. “I’m Lucy. Uh, nice place…?”

“Thanks! I did it all myself,” Sam waved her off. “So! You’re the girl trapped inside of Pandora. That must be a bit of a pickle— oh…” she paused, biting her lip and tilting her head back before letting out an exaggerated groan. “Let’s hold that thought, I’m starved. Who’s up for some pizza? Tonight is definitely a pizza night.”

The conversational whiplash had me sharing uncomfortable gazes with Mia and Lucy.

Sam cheered.

“I’ll take the resounding silence as a yes.”

I fought down the urge to groan.

Tonight was going to be a long night.