[This story is a prequel, set several years before The Fall of Doc Future, when Flicker is 16. Links to some of my other work are here. Planning to update this once a week until it’s done–next update is planned to be up by November 10th.]

Previous: Part 3



Back at her section of Doc’s HQ. Flicker’s personal shower was a customized array of converted waterjet cutters. She set the cycle to ‘potential biohazard decontamination’ and turned the pressure and temperature all the way up. The high pressure streams helped a little. She used emotional and memory compartmentalization as a coping mechanism, but it was fraying around the edges. She’d been able to achieve temporary detachment from the events at the Box, but other issues were creeping back. Burnout wasn’t helping, but it was better than unmanaged anger or frustration, so she’d take it. Could be worse.

She dressed after a medibot scan and checked alerts. Doc had listed his debriefing as 'optional’ but she went anyway. Might as well get it over with.

Doc was in the main control room. A rows of vid screens nearly covered one wall, and Flicker noted that the upper left quadrant was still set to Doc’s preferred 'remain even-tempered while on a voice call with someone obnoxious’ mix–science news feeds and a set of difficult-to-decipher regional heatmaps. She sat down in one of the observer chairs and Doc turned to face her.

“I should have slowed down after he stopped struggling,” she said. "Getting to the Box fast didn’t matter.“

"Hindsight,” said Doc. "And it’s not clear going slower for a longer time would have been less painful for Hermes–he was getting dragged by the leg at hypersonic velocities regardless. You did everything reasonably possible. You stopped the rampage. He’s gone and unlikely to voluntarily return any time soon–his mystique is shattered. Remember, it took us over a month to catch him the first time.“

"However.” Doc tented his hands, his face concerned. "You still aren’t managing your pacing. If you made a mistake today, it was to go on patrol at all–you were only marginally at yellow when the alert hit. I had a discussion with the Database integrity AI. Some of your telemetry on the return trip was very disturbing. And the EMT at the Box reported that you showed signs of combat stress reaction–thousand-yard stare and complete lack of facial expression.“

"Fine,” said Flicker. "I’ll skip patrol tomorrow.“

"I think you should take a longer break. Your stress is–”

“Journeyman is more than two hours overdue for his scheduled check-in. I’m not going on vacation when my partner is potentially in trouble.”

“I’m not suggesting that,” said Doc. "You can stay on-call for his backup without handling response for anything else. And he did request a 24-hour buffer before we take any action when he isn’t on Earth.“

”… Yeah, he did.“

Now I have nothing pressing to do except worry about my partner. Great.

Doc was still studying her. "There were some patterns in the probability manipulation flux levels I measured that bother me. Hermes’ summoning may have been used as a mask for something. I’m going to be gathering and analyzing more data. If you wish, you could assist in some tests. They should be stress-free.”

“Okay. I can try that.”

*****

Flicker had her own place, but its suitability as a permanent home was still largely theoretical. The location had been a rail maintenance shop in a long inactive part of the Iron Range, where she’d been able to secure several important concessions regarding allowable levels of noise and plasma in return for cleaning it up without allowing any contamination to get into the groundwater.

It had a full Database backup node, up and running smoothly–sub-microsecond latency was part of Flicker’s minimum requirement for 'home’–but everything else was progressing more slowly. It was more than a cot in a workshop next to a giant underground server room, as one of Doc’s sysadmins had joked, but not a lot more.

It was, however, far enough from Doc’s HQ to run some esoteric causal isolation tests for probability manipulation–and rule out certain forms of influence that were otherwise difficult to detect. Flicker was quite willing. Glancing at her Machiavelli study context after the weight of the day’s events sank in had turned her stomach. The tests were emotionally neutral–better than anything else available. She sat at her high speed interface keyboard, watching several graphs and responding to a verification program controlled by a random number generator.

It let her go away for a while.

Update, sent the Database, after a long time.

Flicker sped up. Yes?

Journeyman has checked in. Message for you: "Back. Will call when home.“

Something positive to focus on. Finally. Location. Running updates.

Check in at Antarctic secure drop. Current location undefined.

Flicker slowed down slightly to wait on the updates and felt her emotional reaction start to kick in.

Bangkok… Undefined… Tabriz… Undefined… Amsterdam… Undefined… Las Vegas… Undefined…

He was skip-porting, staying just long enough to send a blip from his phone then porting again. Was he worried about pursuit?

Rural Kansas.

She waited. The location didn’t change. What is he doing in Kansas?

Buying groceries.

Okay. Estimate probability he’ll be there for at least ten more seconds.

98%+. However, there is a 94%+ chance he will be at his home within five minutes.

Groceries implied at least a short stay.

Flicker got up from the keyboard and made sure her travel pack had a fresh change of clothes–it had been a while since she’d used it. 'Off-duty’ was not a state of mind that came naturally anymore.

Flicker was waiting on Journeyman’s doorstep when he ported in. He was in an outfit she’d seen before; a stylized armored vest over archaic-looking clothes. His shapeshifting hat was wide-brimmed and black. He looked like the handsome villain from a poster for a historical drama with skilled costumers but no concern for accuracy.

"Hey,” she said, then held out her hand, fingers spread. "Yellow.“ Not great, but able to handle immediate priorities.

"Hey.” He touched his fingertips to hers in their personal substitute for a high five. "I’m at yellow, too,“ he said.

"What’s up?”

He waved his hand. "Paranoia, probably. But, you know…“ He took a breath. "We can talk inside.”

He scowled at the multiple locks on his front door. Flicker knew there were invisible wards on it as well.

“Can you just port us both?” she asked.

“I got into this mess because I was overconfident at the wrong time,” he said. He put down the grocery bags, stuck out both arms, and moved them slowly upwards in a smooth arc. Faint green fire trailed from his fingertips. "Sorry for the wait, but I’m not going to get sloppy at the end.“

After finishing with the wards, he pulled out a set of keys to unlock the physical locks. "I’d like to close this properly after we’re inside. You willing to leave it unvaporized if something comes up?” he asked.

“Do you still have a replacement emergency exit window handy?”

“Yep.”

“Then yeah,” she said. "I’ll use that if I have to go in a hurry.“

Journeyman heaved a sigh after they entered and he closed the door. "Now we can–” Something chirped, interrupting him. "Great.“

Flicker sped up and checked her sensors. There was no sign of anyone or anything else living or recently mobile inside. The chirp had sounded similar to a low battery alert from a smoke alarm, but had come from midair. Whatever was amiss, it wasn’t anything she recognized. She turned to Journeyman and slowed down again.

"No obvious intruders,” she said. "What alarm is that?“

"Higher than expected magic level.” He waved a hand to silence the alarm, then pulled out his glasses from a vest pocket and put them on. He used them for detail work and distinguishing subtle magic. He looked around the room before turning to Flicker and doing a double take.

“False alarm,” he said. "But you certainly have a fine magical glow about you this evening.“

"Should I worry?”

“Depends on how you got that way.” He paused to put the bags of groceries on the kitchen counter, then he took off his hat and tossed it onto the hat stand, where it transformed into a flat cap.

He looked back at her with a raised eyebrow. "Did you, like, beat up a demigod and take his lunch money or something?“

"Does Hermes count?”

Both eyebrows up. "…for this purpose, yes. Would that be why you’re at yellow?“

"I was already at yellow from my shift when he showed. But my day improved when you ported in alive.”

A short laugh. "Mine too. You up for telling me what happened? Is he, ah…“

"I didn’t kill him. And he got away, off Earth, because…” Flicker shut her eyes to try to organize what she wanted to say. “Can I show you the feed from my visor cam? That’s easier than just talking. I’m pretty burned out. Doc strongly suggested I take time off. But are you expecting an attack? I got really worried after you missed your check in.”

“Not a direct one. Not anymore. Certainly not with you here.” He pulled off his vest and dropped it on a chair, revealing blotches of sweat on the shirt underneath. "The magician part of the 'Byzantine interdimensional magician mess’ should be over. But I’ve been reliving an old style, an old set of habits, as cover, and I’m not all the way back yet, so–“

Flicker frowned at a cut in the outer fabric of the back of the vest. "That looks like someone stabbed you in the back.”

“Yep. That was a while ago. I left the cut to discourage anyone else from trying, then forgot about it.”

“You forgot about being backstabbed?”

“Eh. He was okay, he was just testing me. I finessed it. He laughed when his sword broke because I warp cut it, then I asked if he was done yet. Wasn’t even in the top ten most stressful things that happened that day. Not incidentally, I could use some time off, too. But you had a bad day involving magic, and I wasn’t here to back you up, which I regret. So tell me, or show me, whatever you want. We can use the TV–it has one of Doc’s data scramblers, and I warded it so no one can use the speaker as a mic.”

“Okay.”

Flicker set up a playback of highlights from her visor, edited by the Database, then joined Journeyman on the couch. "I had already hit my patrol limit for the day and was reading something kind of depressing when the alert hit…“

Flicker described events tersely and spent the vid segments watching Journeyman’s reaction. He had red hair, a light complexion with freckles, and a very expressive face. Unfortunately, Flicker wasn’t very good at reading faces. He looked intent and slightly alarmed–which was his default with anything important.

His eyes widened slightly at her exchange with Hermes in the Tyrrhenian, and he spent the replay of the transfer at the Box with his hands clasped in front of his mouth.

”…and after I decontaminated, Doc was really insistent I stay off duty for a while,“ Flicker concluded, after the replay segments finished. "But you were overdue, so I killed time running some tests until you ported in.”

Journeyman met her eyes. "Whoof. Lots of things I could say. Most aren’t urgent, since he lived and you didn’t spill any blood. Anything you wanted to ask me about first?“

"Well, Doc said Hermes’ escape wasn’t a big problem. I’m not so sure. What do you think?”

“Heh.” Journeyman shook his head. "He didn’t escape. He got boomeranged when his summoner died–I’m actually more concerned about how that happened, because the whole thing sounds fishy. I’ll have to see if I can find out who the summoner was. And I really don’t think Hermes is going to be eager to come back to Earth again, which will make him rather more difficult to summon, even if someone wanted to.“

"Why not?”

“Because you live here.” Journeyman waved a hand. "You delivered one of the most thorough pseudo-mythological curb-stompings I’ve ever seen, followed by a disturbingly effective bit of operant conditioning. And that 'fire is hot’ bit where you changed your voice? That–“

"My voice changed? I was just trying to speak clearly when I was tired and out of patience.”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t sound like a superhero. You sounded like an angry goddess. To me, and to Hermes. You saw his eyes.”

Flicker looked away. "You know how I feel about being called a goddess.“

"I do. But if the shoe fits… And I’ll need to check on a few things. You’re likely to get a lot of weird or disturbing messages. For sure when whatever vid the Box recorded leaks. But that’s not urgent.”

Flicker sighed. "I get plenty of weird emails already. Enough for my Database bots to do robust statistics on small fraction subgroups. I look at the results sometimes when I’m having trouble getting to sleep.“

"Then rejoice, for your somnolence-aiding samples will surely grow.”

Flicker snorted a laugh. "Thanks. There’s another thing that bugging me a bit, though.“

"Yes?”

“Hermes didn’t seem to recognize me. So how did he learn that claiming to know about my biological parents was a plausible trick to try?”

“Ah.” Journeyman looked down and said nothing for a moment. "What did Doc have to say about it?“

"Nothing. And I didn’t bring it up because I didn’t want to restart the old argument I’ve had with him since I was twelve. He was more concerned about some probability manipulation detector anomalies. He’ll probably want to talk to you about them, eventually.”

“Ah.” Journeyman put a hand to his mouth. He looked worried, like he was trying to solve a hard problem in his head and failing. He stood and shut off the TV, then walked over to the bookshelves. After standing silently for a while he turned back around.

“You said you were reading something unpleasant when the alert hit. What was it?”

“A heavily annotated translation of Machiavelli’s The Prince. I’ve started trying to learn about politics.”

“Oh. Yeah, that would… Damn it. Okay. You asked a question. I have a theory about the answer. I owe you an explanation, but it’s going to lead somewhere pretty dark, and I’m not sure you’re up for it right now. And I have a nasty suspicious mind, and my paranoia dial has been turned to 11 for a while. I could be wrong about any or all of this. I don’t know anything. Like whether this is safe. But I don’t think it’s safe to leave it for later, either.”

Flicker sped up. DASI? Any idea what’s going on?

Yes.

Care to enlighten me?

Not at this time. It would not aid your memory integration and could create an incomplete information bias hazard. Listen to Journeyman.

Flicker stared at her visor display for a long subjective time. A hazard if she didn’t listen…

She slowed back down. "It isn’t going to get any less dark if you wait, is it?“

"No.”

“Then go ahead.”

He came back and sat down on the couch beside her, clasped his hands in front of his face, then turned to look at her. "So. Let’s start with why you’re sensitive about your biological parentage. You told me about your fight with Doc about your DNA tests. I’m afraid I’m on his side. DNA tests are easy to spoof with probability manipulation if you have any kind of divination or you know how they work. Takes hardly any power. I can do it, no sweat. I could even put a ward on someone to make a DNA test on their blood match the DNA of the tech that did the draw, so they don’t get outed as a non-human by a drug test. Hypothetically.“

"Uh…”

Journeyman waved a hand. "That said, I think that if your biological body has two parents and if you were conceived by sexual reproduction, then you’re right–Doc is probably your father. It’s still the simplest explanation.“

Flicker looked down. "Doc won’t assume that. He told me that wherever my body came from could be a lot weirder and still be less unusual than my speed powers.”

“He has a point. But let’s go ahead and assume it for the moment. He’s not the problem, is he? Your mother is, because she’s definitely not human. You’re on pretty firm ground there because of your strength and healing ability. And you aren’t happy with what that implies.”

“No. I’m not.”

“Sooo… Suppose a demon shows up at Doc’s HQ tomorrow and says 'Hi Flicker, I’m your mother’, and Doc says 'Could be her’, and runs some tests–you know he would–then says 'Yup.’ How would you feel?”

“I would have many questions.”

“I’m sure,” said Journeyman. "But how would feel? Happy… or angry?“

Fury. Flicker sped up. DASI? Is anger a reasonable response?

He did not ask for justification. Is anger an accurate description of your projected emotional state?

Yeah…

She slowed back down. "Angry. Very angry.”

“More angry than you were at Hermes today?”

Flicker took a deep breath. "I… don’t know. Maybe. Why did you say 'demon’? You usually–“

"Say non-human person or something. Yes. Demon isn’t a great word. Emotionally loaded as hell. But it’s the one that gets used. It’s the one you think, right? So maybe you can understand why she might not want to drop in for pizza and chitchat?”

“If she knew, but–”

“Now suppose she doesn’t stop by, but someone tells you her name. Would you want to go have a little talk with her? Maybe while you’re still angry, because of those many questions that haven’t been answered yet?”

“… Yeah.”

“So can you see how her name could be used as an attack, against you or her, even though you want to know it? And the correct name might be worse than a lie or mistake?”

Another breath. "Yes.“

"So. Back to your question. I think Hermes was primed with a hint that you were sensitive about your biological parents, either by the summoner or by someone else before he was summoned.”

Journeyman waggled his hand. "I suspect that the whole thing might have been a premeditated attack aimed at you that didn’t quite work, but I’m less sure about that and it’s messy to explain. If it was, the probability manipulation Doc picked up on was probably part of it. And it might not be over.“

"But if Hermes planned to attack me–”

“I don’t think he did. I don’t even think he was the weapon–that would be the summoner. I think Hermes was ammunition. And the planner was someone who had really good intel. A seer at a minimum. You got hit at about the worst possible time, and I don’t think that was an accident. But we’re getting into wild-eyed paranoia territory now. Both you and Doc are swimming in a sea of probability manipulation, against and for you, because you’re both so important to the survival of Earth. So it’s hard to sort things out. Anyway. Are you ready for the not safe part?”

“Okay…”

“You gave him more than one chance to talk. And he didn’t try 'I know who your parents are’ right away. Not until the last thing he said, right after you went angry goddess. I think he recognized something.”

“What?” said Flicker. "He’d already seen me.“

"Your voice changed. I think he heard a resemblance to someone he’d met. And guessed she was your mother.”

“You really think he could tell just from a bit of voice? Why?”

“Because that’s what I thought, about someone I’ve met. At the same spot in the recording.”

“Do you think it’s the same person?”

Journeyman looked down. "Important question. Any name occur to you?“

Flicker’s mind whirled. "No.”

“Okay. Not sure my guess is right. But I’m a lot more sure that if it is right, she doesn’t want you to know who she is. At least not right now.”

“Who do you think she is?”

“Aaand now we start with the dark part. I’m not going to tell you. You’ll eventually learn, if I’m right and we all live that long.”

Journeyman looked back up and met her eyes. "But not from me. I won’t be the weapon.“

Another breath. And a lot of anger that wasn’t a projected emotional state. "What was the point of making this so… personal, if you won’t tell me?”

“You asked the question, and it’s a threat exactly because you take it so personally.” He looked to the side. "I have another reason. It’s more personal for me, and the rest of the dark part. I’ll tell you, if you want to hear, but it will take a bit. You up for it?“

"Yes.”

“Okay. But you’re stressed and burned out and angry and probably a little buzzed from that hit of magic you picked up, and I’m tired and stressed and hungry, so I’d like to fix dinner first. You want some?”

“We can get takeout, you don’t have to–”

“I cook to de-stress sometimes. That’s why I got groceries. And it will give you a bit of a break, too. Are you hungry?”

“No… but I probably should be.”

Journeyman smiled. "Great. Food coming up!“ He stood and headed for the kitchen.

Flicker felt a sense of emotional whiplash as she watched him. But he hadn’t brushed her off or ignored what she wanted…

My partner. Helping me remember things I shouldn’t forget.



Next: Part 5

