214 An Unlikely Alliance
The relevant passage from Perry’s letter surfaced in my mind with uncomfortable clarity.
“Nick,
“This part of the mission didn’t sit right with , so I’m writing it plainly in case sothing happens.
“Forestho wasn’t sent here to conquer Urbanite, sabotage Candyland, or even scout Kingdom. Officially, our task ca directly from the Divine Forest King himself.
“We were ordered to retrieve a cape known only as the Botanist.
“The thod is… strange. We were instructed to accrue two billion points and then spend them on a specific NPC. According to Huston, once the condition is t, the NPC will “find us” on its own.
“I don’t like it. Huston has been acting off for months now. He has beco more distant and erratic. The forest is expanding at a rate that doesn’t make sense, even for him. Whole territories absorbed overnight. People going missing. Augnted behaving like they’re half-awake.
“If the Botanist is just an informant, none of this adds up. You don’t ask for two billion points for an informant. I don’t know what the Botanist really is, Nick. But I’m certain of one thing: Huston wants him back. And badly.”
At the ti, I thought Perry was being cautious.
Standing before Huston’s soul, stitched shut and bound in white, I realized he had been understating the danger.
Gaboy stepped in front of , one bare hand lifted as if that alone could stop what was coming. “I’d rather die, than let you free him. Do you hear ?”
Behind , I felt an eager and almost childish desire. Mal leaned forward, cracking her neck, eyes alight with anticipation. “Ooooh,” she said, dragging the word out. “Can I fight him, Dad? Please?”
There was more here. Far more than a chained madman in a cell.
I didn’t take my eyes off Gaboy. “Then tell ,” I said. “Tell what Huston really is.”
For a mont, Gaboy didn’t answer. Then he exhaled, long and tired, like soone reliving an old war.
“When I ca here,” he said, “there were seven reigning warlords. Real ones. Not this watered-down executive nonsense you see now. Huston was already ancient by then, five generations removed from the original rulers. Whimsy was around the sa age.”
He laughed humorlessly. “You know what he did? He broke the balance. Slaughtered four warlords in one upheaval. Whole territories vanished. Forests eating cities. Cities choking forests. It was chaos.”
Mal’s grin faded. Even she was listening now.
“That war,” Gaboy continued, “was the only reason I survived long enough to matter. Administrator and I… we took advantage of the ss. Cordelia, too. Always behind the scenes. Always pulling strings. According to her, if Huston regained his soul, he’d be too strong for us to stop…”
My jaw tightened. “Cordelia helped you seal him.”
Gaboy nodded. “His soul.”
“I hate nonsense,” I snapped. “If you’re going to talk about souls, give sothing concrete. Sothing causal. Why would Huston grow stronger if he regained it?”
Gaboy spread his hands. “I don’t know. Cordelia insisted. Swore by it. Said power accumulates, fragnts, echoes. Said the soul anchors it. Without it, Huston’s incomplete. With it—” He shook his head. “With it, he becos sothing worse.”
I glanced around the park beyond the asylum walls, the laughing people, the children running through bodies they couldn’t touch.
“So this is it,” I said quietly. “Every NPC above… every mindless body in Urbanite… their souls are down here. That’s the nature of this world, huh?”
Gaboy didn’t deny it.
“A paradise,” he said. Then, more honestly, “Also, a containnt.”
I inhaled slowly and reached into my coat, pulling Perry’s letter from mory like a blade. “Forestho was ordered to retrieve the Botanist. Two billion points. Spend them on an NPC that would ‘find them.’ Huston planned to buy his way in.”
Gaboy stiffened.
“That’s impossible,” he said at once. “Only I can access this place. , Administrator… and the other exectives.”
Then his eyes widened, and his lips parted slightly.
“…Son of a bitch.”
The realization hit him harder than any punch. Huston hadn’t needed direct access. He’d needed a cooperative pawn. Sothing that would move Gaboy himself. Or force Administrator’s hand. Or a third party willing to do his bidding.
“He almost got ,” Gaboy muttered.
Then he snapped his fingers.
The stitches sealing the Botanist’s mouth unraveled like rotten thread. Flesh parted. Blood beaded, then dripped.
The white-haired man inhaled deeply, greedily, like a drowning victim breaking the surface.
He smiled.
“Oh,” the Botanist murmured, voice hoarse but delighted, “how I missed the sound of my own voice.”
Gaboy’s patience snapped.
“How did you do it?” he demanded. “How did you get around ?”
The Botanist tilted his head slightly, lips curling into sothing almost playful. “Do what, exactly?” he asked. “You’ll have to be more specific. My mory isn’t what it used to be.”
The lie rang loud in my head. Empathy made it impossible to miss, a slick, smug satisfaction coiled beneath his calm exterior. I rembered Rachel and Selena, rembered the way Gaboy had lashed out when he felt control slipping through his fingers.
Gaboy snapped.
A knife appeared buried deep in the Botanist’s shoulder, the impact wet and final. Blood spread across the straitjacket.
“Ouch,” the Botanist said flatly, without a trace of pain.
Gaboy leaned forward, face twitching beneath the glitch. “I’ll ask again,” he said. “How did you do it? How did you turn my won against ?”
The Botanist’s smile sharpened. “Does it frighten you that much?” he asked softly. “That you can’t trust the people around you anymore? Even your dear little Mal?”
Gaboy froze and turned slowly. “Have you ever been in this room?” he asked her, suspicion bleeding into his voice. “I told you this place was off-limits. I told you to guard the building, not wander into it.”
Mal recoiled, eyes wide. “I swear,” she said quickly. “This is my first ti here. I never ca in. I never touched him.”
Gaboy’s gaze bored into her. “What about Rachel? Selena?”
“I saw them near here sotis,” Mal said, voice trembling. “I chased them off whenever I could. They weren’t supposed to be here.”
I reached out and placed a hand on Gaboy’s shoulder, grounding him before paranoia could spiral further. “She’s telling the truth,” I said evenly. “Huston’s ssing with you. That’s all this is.”
The Botanist laughed, a dry, delighted sound. “Oh?” he said. “There’s soone here who knows my na.”
I t his blindfolded face without flinching. “It would’ve been better for you if I didn’t,” I replied. “I know what you were planning. I know you were setting up a breakout.”
For the first ti, sothing shifted. It was subtle, but I felt it through Empathy, a flicker of surprise quickly buried beneath layers of arrogance.
“That’s news to ,” Huston said lightly. Then he chuckled. “Which must an I succeeded.”
I frowned. “Succeeded at what?”
He leaned back as far as the restraints allowed, tone almost conversational. “You see,” he said, “unlike the rest of you, I don’t believe in souls. Not really. What you’re looking at right now is only a manifestation of my consciousness.”
Gaboy stared at him. “What are you talking about?”
“My body,” Huston continued, “still thinks. It still plans. A brain doesn’t stop functioning just because you cage part of the mind elsewhere. I simply gave it a goal so vast, so unthinkable, that none of you would ever consider it.”
The answer ca to before he finished.
“You planned to destroy Lockworld,” I said.
Gaboy’s breath hitched. “That’s insane,” he blurted out. “No one would even think of attempting sothing like that.”
Huston’s smile widened, proud and unrepentant. “Correct,” he said. “Which is why I’m here. Can’t you see? I’m insane! Ha ha ha ha ha ha~!” He turned his blindfolded face toward . “Now tell ,” he asked, voice almost curious, “how did you know?”
I explained it to him step by step, not because Huston deserved the courtesy, but because Gaboy needed to hear it laid bare.
“Forestho’s expansion was never organic,” I said as we walked. “Not if you look at it on a long enough tiline. Two hundred years of growth isn’t just spreading roots and territory. It’s modification. Iteration. Digging deeper and deeper with intent.”
Huston scoffed behind us. “You’re stretching.”
I didn’t even look back. “If all you wanted were minerals, you’d strip-mine. If it was energy, you’d experint, fail, and adapt. If it was science, you’d leave records, structures, and redundancies. Forestho did none of that. It kept going down. Always down.”
I tapped my temple with two fingers. “And I didn’t co to this conclusion alone. I have two precogs who tore your patterns apart from every angle. Past intent. Future vectors. Probability curves. Everything you are doing right now was already screaming at them.”
Silence followed, thick and uncomfortable.
I turned slightly. “Gaboy. Restrain him.”
Gaboy hesitated for half a second, then snapped his fingers. The Botanist’s bindings reford instantly, the straitjacket tightening, the blindfold sealing back into place, the mouth stitched shut once more. Huston didn’t resist. If anything, he seed amused.
We exited the ntal asylum together, the artificial light of Undercity washing over us. The city buzzed on, blissfully unaware, souls looping through routines they didn’t rember choosing.
I nodded toward Mal. “You don’t need to be here.”
She crossed her arms, scowling. “Like hell I don’t.”
Before either of us could argue further, she vanished in a blink of teleportation, leaving only disturbed air behind.
I stopped walking and faced Gaboy fully.
“You should understand this by now,” I said calmly. “I’m not part of your system. I’m not Candyland. I’m not Forestho. I’m not Kingdom. I’m my own faction.”
Gaboy’s glitching face tightened. “Then explain this,” he said, snapping his fingers.
Screens blood into existence around us. Images froze mid-motion: a dragon standing amidst ruin, scales crackling with power; a superhuman seated casually beside a split skyscraper as if resting after a jog; a swordsman surrounded by mangled cars, blade still dripping.
“I’ve never seen capes like these,” Gaboy said quietly. “Not here. Not ever. What are you?”
He snapped his fingers again. “Are you so relic from an older generation? Sothing the Box forgot to erase?”
I shook my head. “No.”
I let the answer hang for a mont before continuing. “I have access to world-hopping technology.”
That finally broke through him.
“What?” Gaboy said sharply. “That’s impossible. I can’t even warp one into existence, and you’re telling you built one?”
“Yes,” I replied. “I researched it.”
His voice dropped. “Power ratings are capped at six. Isn’t it?”
I didn’t answer that.
Instead, I said, “And before you ask how the Box missed fiddly with portal technology, I already accounted for that. I have a man inside SRC. He made sure my work stayed invisible to precogs, psychics, researchers, and whatever else you rely on to feel safe.”
“Just who are you?” asked Gaboy slowly in disbelief.
I extended my hand.
“Eclipse,” I said. “Leader of Godslayers.”
I t his gaze squarely. “I’m offering you one chance to join hands with .”
He stared at my hand for a long mont, then clasped it firmly. “Fine,” he said. “But don’t misunderstand. This is an alliance of equals.”
I smiled faintly.
“That depends.”
We shook on it.
Gaboy exhaled slowly, the earlier tension settling into sothing colder and more deliberate.
“So,” he said, folding his arms, “what’s next?”
“Diplomacy,” I answered.
He blinked, then laughed once, short and incredulous. “That’s rich, coming from you. Wait, it totally makes sense… Still… How exactly do you plan to do that, and what do you want doing in the anti?”
I didn’t waste ti dressing it up. “I want resources. Real ones. Materials that don’t exist naturally in Lockworld, tolerances that don’t crumble under multiversal strain. I need you to generate them with your power. Not just that… I need a place to hide the work. Sowhere even the Box won’t casually scrape.”
His head tilted. “And you’re just trusting not to steal it? Or use it to run?”
I t his gaze without flinching. “I’d advise you not to.”
For a mont, I thought he might snap back with sothing theatrical, but instead he shrugged. “Relax. Outside Lockworld, I’m powerless. You should know that, if you knew how my powers work. Urbanite took centuries to build. I’m not abandoning it on a whim, even if I could.”
That answer was honest enough to be useful.
“As we build,” I continued, “we send invitations. Not quietly, not indirectly. We call a summit. Candyland. Forestho. Kingdom. Everyone who still thinks they’re a sovereign power.”
Gaboy frowned. “And after they show up?”
I didn’t hesitate. “They bend the knee,” I said evenly, “or I kill them.”
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