Chương 24: Imposition

"Good. Keep it up." Martin parries Shrike's attacks. She's getting faster, more used to her projected weapon's weightlessness. According to her, it's far more efficient for her to maintain a projection than to create new ones. As such, Martin has been adamant that she practice with her macuahuitl, so in times of low light storage she can still be armed. Shrike thrusts, despite her weapon's fairly blunt point, pushing Martin off balance.

She follows it by lunging forward, the intentionally dulled edge of her weapon connecting with him.

"Hah! Finally! You have been bested!" Shrike taunts, swinging her sword around.

"Proud of you. Still, it was only one time. Pretty sure the score is like one hundred to one."

"Incorrect, it is seventy-eight to one. Soon to be seventy-eight to two." She readies herself again. Martin takes his favored longpoint stance.

"Yeah? We'll see." Shrike grumbles as she goes inside.

"You are damaging my confidence."

"Eighty-four to one now." He pours a cup of water for himself from the sink, before switching the knob to hot water and waiting it to warm up.

"You're absolutely doing better, though. You just need to work on your strength."

"I cannot be adept in every field."

"You can try to be." He fills another cup, passing it to Shrike before his hand starts to burn from the heat. She drinks it in one long chug.

"I suppose... Could you contact Elk on my behalf?"

"Yeah, if you want. Something wrong?"

"Caribou has been absent from our messages for five days now. It is characteristic for it to only add in occasional single word responses, but it has not made a single remark on Isopod's recent tryst." Martin chuckles, scrolling to Elk's contact.

"Uh-huh. Wait, the gargoyle's what?" - Elk picks up the phone.

"Elk here, wazzup?"

"Hey. Apparently Caribou's been missing for a while. Have you seen it?"

"No, but its safe. Its doing some personal business for a couple weeks. Not really sure what, but it left its phone here. It keeps getting messages, but I can't read them for some reason."

"Gotcha. Mind if Shrike sends that to the group chat?"

"Honestly... could you ask her to lie and say its doing some deep cover thing? Caribou was really cagey about it, probably wants to keep it a secret."

"Sure. No problem. See you." Martin hangs up the phone.

"Caribou is off on some personal business, but Elk wants you to lie to your chat and say its a deep cover thing." Shrike frowns.

"The last time I met with it was in the spirit world. It said it was lonely, and asked me if I believed humans were worthy of life. It was... very odd."

"Don't worry. You've done this kind of weird moping thing before too. It's normal for humans as well." - SC: I confirmed with Elk that CZ is currently in a deep cover operation of some kind. IR: ok but weird it didnt say anything CA: Just glad the thing is alright. Btw anyone free tonight? I need to move around more, don't want anyone getting Cained. DE: Cained? CA: If I hang around in one place for too long, humans start to get sick. Sucks, but I just have to keep wanderin' the earth. - The doorbell rings.

Shrike gets up from her cozy spot on Martin's shoulder, and opens the door for the visitor. She takes a step back while projecting her weapon and a series of thin darts that hover around her, shouting for Martin to get up. He does so, instantly alert, gun drawn and pointed at the door. Two men are standing at their doorstep. One of which is Norwood, who responds to Shrike's defensive stance with a floating spellbook. The other responds by offering a handshake.

"Major Anton Krastev, 12th Counter-Magic Group. Good to meet you both, Martin and Shrike." Shrike does not change her position, eyes fixated on Norwood. Martin, though, holsters his gun and accepts the handshake.

"A major?" he asks.

"To what do we owe the pleasure? Also, could you ask Andre to calm down, sir?" Krastev gives a pointed look at Norwood, who begrudgingly puts his spellbook back in place on his hip. Shrike dismisses her projections in turn. Krastev's face lacks smile lines, though every other wrinkle rivals the slot canyons.

"I won't ask to come inside, since I don't want to make anyone tense. I have a request, and an offer." Shrike maintains her look.

"Then you may enter, on condition you leave when asked. Norwood is forbidden from entering if you seek my willing cooperation."

"More than fair. Andre, wait in the car." Norwood slinks off like a moody teenager, as Krastev walks inside.

"A lovely home you two have. May I sit?" Shrike gestures at the couch, and Krastev takes a seat in the exact middle. He adjusts his glasses slightly.

"Let's address the elephant in the room. Counter-Magic's combat forces and Shrike aren't exactly friendly. Our job is to limit the dangers of supernormal threats, Shrike's job is to be a supernormal threat. It's just the nature of things." Shrike projects two squat columns of light, and sits on one. Martin follows her lead and sits on the other, nearly slipping on it. Krastev eyes them both.

"I suggest we stir the pot a bit, to keep it from boiling over. Norwood is one of our better combatants in the region, and even when actively trying to injure Shrike, he still failed while she was holding back. From what he said, you could have killed him, Shrike. That's quite a bit of restraint."

"Skip to the upshot?" Martin asks, not wanting Shrike to accidentally threaten anyone again.

"We'd like to borrow Shrike from time to time. She would make an excellent sparring partner for our guys." Shrike clenches her fist a few times.

"You understand my skepticism after my last Counter-Magic encounters. I have ample evidence suggesting this is a ruse to lock me away again, or simply kill me." Krastev looks her directly in the eye.

"I get it, Norwood handled the situation poorly. You are a valuable asset, though, one we wouldn't bury even if we were sociopaths."

"And what would you offer her?" Martin asks.

"No offense intended, but Shrike's outlived every country to ever exist. Not a lot of patriotism there. Also, there's no way MBR would allow this."

"MBR will do what I say. Have you forgotten they're under the Counter-Magic umbrella?" Krastev wipes his glasses down, setting them back on his face.

"I can offer Shrike three things. First, Counter-Magic will stop harassing her. Second, I will have Norwood kiss her ass every time they meet. Third, and most importantly, we'll not only pretend your problem doesn't exist, but we'll also give you a number to give to police next time."

"What problem?" Martin interlocks his fingers in his lap.

"According to your report, you drove all the way to Texas, nearly got arrested, killed some chupacabras, then went back. Something is going on, obviously. Don't know what, and don't need to know." Shrike stands up, dismissing her temporary chair.

"I have certain requirements for combat."

"Whatever you deem necessary. I'm very excited to see you in action firsthand." Shrike takes a simple stance in the large field. On one side, thirty or so Counter-Magic soldiers are watching like its a sports game. On the other side, Martin sits alone, watching through short range binoculars. He was given a whistle to call the fight at any time, and although heavily discouraged from doing so, he brought his own gun. The whistle isn't very reassuring.

Shrike's opponent is a larger man, light on his toes like Norwood, with a thin spellbook. Sergeant Horace Smith. A good combatant, she hopes. The grass on the field is high, nearly six inches, and notably enchanted to be soft in case of hard impacts. It feels strange to step on, but probably for the best, she thinks. At the sound of a whistle, Shrike leads with a series of darts of light, pouring out at the opponent relentlessly.

Horace summons a protective shield, which is followed by him replying with his own ranged attack, a pair of coiled energy strings that slowly undulate and follow Shrike's movement at a crawl. She throws up a weak barrier to judge its strength, which the strings easily shatter. No blocking that, it seems. She summons her sword, and starts moving. She could use the practice at short range. Horace's spellbook has him leaping back rapidly, trying to make space, as she avoids the strings.

She chases after him, trying to slow him down with wall after wall of light, which Horace dodges with whatever spell he's using to push away. The spirals of magical energy seem to be picking up speed as she runs after him. That's the game: playing tag until time runs out. She had agreed beforehand to not use her beam of 'potentially cancer-causing' light, as they put it. He's moving too fast to bind him. He's able to dodge midair. There's really only one solution. The crowd is going to hate this.

She covers her eyes, and creates a blindingly bright light as close to him as possible, too bright for anyone else to see through. She intuits where the next barriers go based on him dodging away from the light, and feels contact being made. She dismisses the bright light. His eyes will have to adjust now, while she opens hers and sees clearly. She has a blunt cylinder push him forcefully into the ground, and when he makes contact with the earth, she binds him.

Martin blows the whistle, and both Horace and Shrike dismiss their projections. She jogs over to Horace, crouching down next to him on the tall, soft grass, and extending a hand.

"Are you uninjured?"

"Jesus, monster, you could have melted my eyeballs."

"Incorrect. After extensive testing and research into the human eye on my part, I have discovered what range of brightness-""Yeah, yeah." He takes her hand, as she uses all of her physical strength to help pull him up.

"What was your name again?"

"Shrike C, moon-rank hunter, partnered with Martin C, three-star hunter."

"Uh-huh." He rubs his eyes, trying to blink away the afterimage.

"They're making hunters tough these days. Good fight, good fight." He returns to the stands to playful jeers as he flips them off. Shrike stretches a bit, looking to the crowd and giving a thumbs up. She can do one more. She should not have done one more. Shrike is completely exhausted by the end, and knows she'll need to stare at the sun for hours to recharge herself. She feels a hand on her shoulder as she sits on the bleachers, looking up at the sky while talking to Martin.

She turns around, seeing Norwood looking at her with a tight grip on her shoulder.

"Very well," she says.

"Attempt something."

"I'm not here to 'attempt' anything, besides, I know you're bluffing." Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. She looks back up at the sun, wiping her eyes a bit as they start to water. She really needs to pace herself more.

"Say what you need to."

"Yeah. I want to apologize. I took things way too far. Is your shoulder okay?"

"I heal at an accelerated rate. I hope your sunburn faded." He chuckles, letting go of her shoulder and sitting down a healthy distance away.

"Sunburn my ass. It's good you're okay."

"I do not hold anything against you. Being trained in this environment likely clouded your judgement on how to handle a dangerous and magical non-threat."

"Guess so. By the way, do you still have that video?"

"Indeed. So does Krastev, now. I believe he will be premiering it soon."

"Damn it... Later, Shrike. I'm back to boring officer duties for a while." He hops off the bleachers, walking back to the Counter-Magic barracks. Martin sucks his teeth.

"You buy any of that?"

"Not a singular iota. I likely traumatized him, as intended. For a few moments in our fight, I lost myself to... myself, I suppose. I was genuinely attempting to fell him and take his heart."

"Glad you didn't."

"I remain undecided." - Five days of travel. A few flights by plane took it to Fairbanks, Alaska, and from there four days as the raven flies. Caribou touches down, shifting to its usual form, but in more traditionally Inuit clothes. While the village is clearly visible to it, outsiders can never truly perceive it, due to it being only half-physical. A few of the older ijirait stop and stare at Caribou, mostly confused by its presence here.

One closer to Caribou's age, around five hundred, walks over while speaking a very unique language, with only a passing relation to Inuktuk.

"I remember you." The other Ijiraq says in the nameless tongue. It's a formal greeting, as well as an acknowledgement of what the other is.

"I remember you, Shtiya." Caribou replies.

"I am always Caribou."

"An unusual name. It means caribou."

"It means caribou." Caribou confirms. The culture is comforting to it. Simple, without inflection or compromise. No questions, only corrections. It imagines Shrike would like it.

"You are here."

"I am here. I am lonely. I seek my people. I am allowed here."

"You are maybe allowed here. I will ask the others."

"You will ask the others." Caribou waits in the snow as Shtiya checks with a village elder. Repetition is a large part of the culture, signifying the end of a topic. Said elder follows Shtiya over after a brief explanation. The elder appraises Caribou.

"You are ijiraq. You have done no harm. You are a traveler seeking understanding. You are allowed here."

"I am allowed here." It confirms, letting the elder shuffle away as Caribou turns back to Shtiya.

"I have gone far to seek understanding of humans."

"You have understanding of humans."

"I do not have understanding of humans. They are confusing and bothersome creatures."

"They are larva producers."

"They are not only larva producers. I do not know what they are." Shtiya pauses for a moment, letting the statement hang.

"They are larva producers. I have no interest in this topic. We will eat."

"We will eat. Thank you, Shtiya."

"You are welcome. I am happy to see you safe."

"I apologize for my absence."

"I am happy to see you safe. You are welcome." Shtiya bookends her previous statement. One of the few nuances in their tradition. It is meant to comfort, and to express assurance when they suspect doubt in another. It makes Caribou feel at home.

"This is always Caribou. Caribou is ijiraq. Caribou is a wanderer in search of understanding humans." Shtiya re-introduces Caribou to two other ijirait.

"Caribou is a strange ijiraq. Strange is not bad. It is welcome." One of the other ijiraq says.

"Strange is not bad." Caribou confirms.

"My stay is short, a few days."

"Your stay is a few days." Shtiya says, a twisting smile flickering.

"You will help hunt."

"I will help hunt but not participate in a birthing ritual should one occur during my stay." Shtiya's mandibles click togethers a few times.

"An agreement is struck."

"The agreement binds." Caribou finishes. It's glad Shtiya is being so courteous, despite the rudeness of Caribou's statement. - Shrike's phone rings as she lays in bed next to Martin. He's quietly reading on a laptop, halfway through annotating a report with notes. Ximena had talked him into reviewing unstarred hunters' reports for anything strange or requiring specification. Not something he would usually be doing, but the lack of progress on the rogue kynde has him in a tight spot.

Shrike takes her phone, squinting at the harsh light, answering it.

"Ferret, you are currently on speaker with Martin and I."

"Good. Look, you two have to get here quick. I texted the address. Some crazy shit, will explain when you get here." The sound of gunfire, and he hangs up. Shrike exchanges a glance with Martin, as they race to get ready. Shrike changes her outfit to one that's charged, while Martin grabs a duffel full of different pieces of gear. Shrike tries to open the door to the grocery store, but its locked.

As she readies herself to cut through the lock, Martin picks it in fifteen seconds, opening it quietly and slipping inside. Shrike follows closely behind. They move along the aisles, one after the other, until the see what's happening. Ferret is crouched behind a display rack, a gun drawn, the pharmacy's metal shutter torn open. Martin slides next to him, revolver in hand.

"Moth?"

"Hostage. Bulletproof and probably sapient, beyond that not sure." Ferret says, steady and focused.

"How bulletproof?"

"Moth had a penetration seal on a USAS-12 in full-auto loaded with tungsten slugs."

"God damn." He glances to his partner.

"Shrike doesn't have that kind of stopping power on anything smaller than a building."

"Not why I needed you two. It surprised us when we got here while responding to a disturbance call, Moth reacted and fired, and is still alive. You're not hunting the beast, and Shrike is one herself. Just talk it down."

"Any projectiles?"

"Not that I know of." Martin steps out around the corner, hands at his side.

"Hey. I'm Martin." Something moves around amongst the medications in the pharmacy. Too dark to tell.

"Shrike, come out here? And hit the lights." Shrike walks around the corner as well, mimicking Martin's casual approach. She summons a few lights around the pharmacy's counter, illuminating both themselves and whatever's within the pharmacy section. It's an entirely unfamiliar creature to Martin. The only thing he can focus on is the teeth. So many teeth. It's hard to focus on any specific part of the oily, iridescent creature.

Not through a magical barrier like Cain's, but because of how difficult it is to find anything to focus on. Every inch of it is in superpositions. Impossible to look at the whole thing at once, and when looking away from one section, it changes when looked at again. It is roughly quadrupedal, Martin thinks, but its hard to be sure. It has a torso and between six and eight arms, He's counted seventeen individual mouths, but may have been double counting... It stands relatively still.

Martin can't read its body language. He notices that there is an open wound flicking in and out of visibility on its chest, which it seems to be leaking out of. It talks twice at once, making Martin wince a bit. Impossible to understand.

"Okay, I didn't understand that, but we can figure it out... Shrike is going to put a very small light somewhere on your torso. We're going to test if the effect of looking at you is just visual or actual physical decoherence." He nods at Shrike, who slowly floats a small light at the creature, which moves backwards while talking again. It's starting to give Martin a headache.

"It's completely harmless, I promise. Actually, Shrike, never mind. Our friend can just pick something up, and then Shrike will focus on whatever you use to hold it without blinking." Shrike dismisses the light, unsure what Martin is planning, but fully confident in his ability. The creature picks up a pill bottle from a rack. Shrike obediently looks at the long fangs of a mouth that holds onto it without blinking. Martin intentionally turns his head away, and then back twenty times.

"Yep, it's physical, or I'm the unluckiest person to exist. You can blink again, Shrike." Shrike fully closes her eyes for a moment.

"Okay... so when you talk, you're saying two things are once, but they're in a superposition of two states... Shrike, pick a mouth and stare at it." Shrike bites her tongue to keep from asking about Martin's bout of insanity, and obliges, looking at a mouth on the creature's arm.

"I am observing the mouth located closest to the location of the pill bottle."

"Got it... Okay, try talking again, friend."

"(This won't work. /This is pointless.)""Shrike, what did you hear?"

"It stated that it was pointless."

"I heard it won't work, and I focused on a different mouth. Okay... looks like we're both getting half of the speech." The creature behind the pharmacy counter suddenly shifts around excitedly, talking rapidly, making Shrike cover her ears as Martin winces, telling it to stop.

"Wait for our go ahead. Shrike, look at the same mouth as last time. If you don't see it, blink until you do, then say you see it." Shrike nods, and says "Good." Martin does the same.

"Also good. Go ahead."

"(I can't believe this. /You two figured something out!)" Shrike and Martin both say what they heard, before Martin nods.

"Okay... We'll start blinking with one eye at a time so we have uninterrupted sight. Shrike, hold my hand."

"Scandalous." She says with a smile, doing so.

"Okay, squeeze my hand when you need to take a break, and I'll do the same. I'll raise my other hand, and when our friend stops talking, we can both rest our eyes until we're good to keep going. We'll unsqueeze once we have the mouth in view again. Friend, Shrike has very sensitive eyes, so please be patient. Make sense, Shrike?"

"Yes. I am ready to proceed." Shrike affirms. Martin puts his hand up, waiting for Shrike to loosen her grip. He puts it down as soon as she does. (Who are you? /Who are the people that had guns?) Shrike and Martin explain the situation, gradually communicating what's happening, and extracting the information from the monster. It needs a specific medication regularly, but recently it had a national shortage. It waited a month, and broke in to try and find it again. More importantly, though, it isn't bulletproof.

It has been physically holding itself together despite three large slugs that pierced through its body.

"Okay... Ferret, you can come out. We got the picture. Our friend is good. Don't get in our line of sight, and look for a medication spelled..." Martin spells out the name. He recognizes it as some kind of antipsychotic. Ferret, holding his hands up, walks behind the counter, crouching to avoid interrupting line of sight, and starts searching. After ten minutes, he shakes a bottle, and tosses it to the creature, which catches it and takes one.

Almost instantly, it starts to stabilize on itself, and slowly starts to take a stable form. Fully iridescent, slick skin like a frog covered in oil. Four two-jointed legs keep it standing. It has eight arms attached to the torso that each end in a mouth. Notably, still no head. It holds six of the arms in places on its body, plugging holes that are ringed in thicker, white oil. It speaks from just one mouth at a time, thankfully.

"Oh, thank the gods... I can think straight again... I'm stable. Okay. Look, I can't give you back the girl who shot me until I'm helped here. I don't have blood, but I'm leaking out the stuff that does keep me alive." Shrike tilts her head.

"If you are not bulletproof, we can simply kill you now."

"Jesus." Martin rolls his eyes.

"Shrike, go look for... a needle and thread?" He looks to the creature for confirmation. The creature affirms it, along with adding cotton balls, gravy, and pineapple. Shrike wanders off into the store, trying to remember what gravy is. Ferret slowly creeps towards Moth, as the creature stands aside now that Shrike made its situation clear. He ungags her, and slices open the charging cables the creature used to keep her bound. Moth stretches wordlessly, before nodding at Ferret and thanking Martin.

The creature has no eyes, but its obvious where its attention is.

"What... what happens now?" It asks.

"Well," Moth says, "Do you have a cell phone?"

"Yes..." It adds.

"I left it at home."

"What's your living situation where you can pay a phone bill?" Moth is asking mostly for her own curiosity at this point.

"I work from home. I'm a customer service rep. Well, I'm actually four customer service reps, and my boss thinks I'm four people. You know he shit talks me to myself? I used the name-""Okay. Christ." Moth talks a breath.

"And you get everything delivered. I'm up to speed... can you read?"

"Yeah. I have about a thousand very small eyes. Well, more like 984 now. They grow back, no worries. Once I-""Stop. I'm not your friend."

"Sorry," it says, seeming very apologetic.

"Look, I'm going to give you a number to call next time you're in a bad spot." Moth takes out a notepad, scribbling a hidden MBR hotline on it.

"You may have mine additionally." Shrike adds, returning with the requested items.

"I have friends who share similar difficulties with blending in. One is a gargoyle."

"No shit?" it says.

"That... would be really nice, actually. I have friends on the internet, but no one actually knows I'm... this." They take the things Shrike gathered, and starts sewing themself up while replacing the white oil that leaked out with gravy.

"I'm Gyes, by the way." They start eating the pineapple, biting through the tough skin.

"Thanks, I love pineapple. It's like a salad with a coconut beneath it."

"Hello, Gyes. To be different in secret is a lonely affair. Fortunately, we all find those who can accept our oddities. Such as Martin, who has found a partner in me despite believing that among the space wizard movies he enjoys-""Please don't," Martin asks, jokingly. Shrike smirks.

"Among the space wizard movies, he asserts the chronologically seventh movie is the best in the series."

"It has problems, but-" Martin's weak defense is cut short by Ferret, Moth, and Gyes all talking over each other to argue against Martin. - GX: Hey there! I'm the one Shrike mentioned. IR: yo whats up GX: Not much. Weird question but do you play League? IR: used to but hate getting matched with randoms and am too busy to have a regular team of five GX: You're never gonna believe this. - Shrike and Martin sit on the edge of Bear River, fishing together, trying to spark the memory of the fish hook.

It's been a week since they started and no level of facsimile, down to using actual bone fish hooks Martin learned how to make online, has seemed to do anything beyond faint feelings of deja vu. After an intense fight, Shrike pulls in a mackinaw.

"Hah! An easy victory, peasant."

"... peasant?" Martin shakes his head, reeling in his own rod and starting to pack.

"I think we need to call this one. I don't know what more we can do." Shrike scratches under her eye.

"I have been theorizing. Perhaps it is not the actual activity that causes it, but includes the intent behind it. My battle with Norwood had me in a life or death, emotionally charged battle. The coin toss was literal, but symbolic of leaving events entirely to chance, and affected by a conversation with Caribou in the spirit world." Martin carefully packs his fishing rod away, stepping onto the path back to the car.

"Makes sense, but you said it was a playful wager. We've been doing that."

"I feel it was more of a rivalry, and you are not a rival of mine."

"Ouch," Martin says with a snort.

"Problem is, you don't have rivals. You have people who you either can't deal with at all, or people you can beat every time. Very little in between." - Caribou delivers the killing blow, the whale's struggle ending with Caribou's harpoon lodged deep in its brain. It has had plenty of practice hunting much smaller targets, it thinks. It and the other ijirait help pull the great beast onto the ice, quickly dismantling the whale and sorting its various meat into different sections.

Caribou, as the one to claim the killing blow, is by tradition given the honor of praying to the whale they had slain. Caribou recites the long prayer by heart. Towards the end, it hesitates on one line, and with a difficult grunt skips over it. As Caribou aids in cooking the skin, Shtiya approaches it, a difficult look in Shtiya's deep red eyes.

"You forgot the line 'may the ribs house the cradle of our newest born.'""I did not forget any line. I chose not to say it." Shtiya looks down at the steaming skin.

"You are not happy. You see the humans as more than the whales."

"I do."

"You are welcome here, but you are not home."

"I am not home." Shtyia puts a gentle hand on Caribou's shoulder.

"Your home is with the humans."

"My home is..." Caribou takes a shuddering breath.

"I do not know where my home is."

"You will find it. I am certain."

"I am not certain."

"I am certain. You will find it." Shtiya pats Caribou lightly, before taking a few steps away, and when Shtiya looks back, only a single black feather rests where Caribou was standing a moment ago. - CZ: i am back IR: wb! bet you did well! CZ: i did well. IR: good! now you can go back to being annoying. btw what did you do anyway CZ: you missed a word or something IR: what? CZ: ahh, yes. i forgot how english worked. IR:??? CZ: exactly, use more of those