Chương 181: Act 3, Chapter 35: Para bellum

Day in the story: 14th January (Wednesday), evening Elle Erikson"Guys, please. I'm your taxi service later today. It would be better if I were hole-free for that, or it might get windy," I told them in Alexa's usual tone—just enough sass to suggest I was very much in control.

"Do what she says," Thomas confirmed, even though he had already motioned for them to lower their weapons. He liked having the last word. In a pack of wolves, hierarchy had to remain clear—or someone might get ideas about challenging the alpha.

"Are we already moving? Where's Penrose?"

"Are you needed here?" I countered. His questions were pointless.

"Yes." Mine apparently too.

"Sorry. I phrased that in a way open to interpretation. Can you appoint someone to handle things here?" I placed my hands on my hips to emphasize the seriousness of my inquiry.

"Yes," he said, understanding immediately.

"Give me a second." Thomas Torque was an interesting creature. On one hand, his tendency to miss small details made him sloppy. On the other, he had a talent for devising backup plans and the guts to carry out even the wildest ones. And despite my soft spot for him, he was a sociopath—I knew it. He had to be, to climb as high as he had. He would kill, maim, or watch a little girl being lashed as a lesson just as easily as he would discuss a book he'd read the week before.

That trait was something Penrose valued above all else in the people he kept close. He picked us—or shaped us—in his own likeness, after all. So the instant shift from the playful tone he used with me to a bark of raw authority came as no surprise. And yet, the contrast was still jarring.

"Listen, you fuckwit runts, I gotta handle somethin', so Ramirez is your goddamn voice of reason now. Is that fuckin' clear?" There was no performance in that roughness. He was dangerous. He was a weapon. And I could not allow Penrose to keep him sharpened and ready to be pointed at me. Ramirez emerged from the back of a van, slamming the door shut and hurriedly tucking his shirt into his trousers.

"You should've told me, amigo," he said to Thomas before even noticing me. A woman slipped out of the front of the same van a few seconds later, adjusting her vest as she hurried off in the opposite direction.

"Change of plans, Rami. I'm needed elsewhere, so you take care of those fuckin' dogs," Thomas replied, giving the last words just enough bite to eliminate any confusion.

"Good luck. I'll be back as soon as possible, friend." Thomas's tone softened as he placed a heavy hand on Ramirez's shoulder and gave it a firm squeeze. It was then that Rami noticed me, winced slightly and gave his bow.

"Where does Penrose need me now?"

"Phillip needs you exactly where you are. I, on the other hand, would like to paint all over you."

"Wha—" He did not get to finish. I stepped forward and touched him, pulling him straight into the Domain.

"I would insist on a tattoo," I said, already moving, "but we don't have that much time. And you'd be itchy, which is not ideal. So follow me into that building, get out of your clothes, and stand still, big man."

"Alexa… this… this is your world, right?" he asked, slowly turning in place. Too slowly for my taste. The ancient Greco-Roman buildings stood pristine around the agora, their marble untouched by time. The black lake beneath us was still and glasslike, yet solid enough to bear our weight. And, of course, it was the soul core—half tree, half spiderweb—that held his gaze the longest.

"Yes. It is. Come with me. We don't have much time to waste." I motioned for him to follow and headed toward the Art Palace. He stumbled when he realized he was walking on water that refused to let him sink. He even dropped to one knee, pressing both hands against the surface, trying to force them through. I dismissed the suit I had been wearing in the meantime, allowing the clothes beneath to relax slightly. My frame—smaller than Alexa's—had been stretching the fabric with all of them underneath.

Usagear dissolved from my body, and my sp-eye-ders crawled up to my neck, settling into place and restoring my perfect, all-directional vision. I could not afford to lose that—I was to used to seeing more.

"Please, hurry up. You're pretty damn huge, so this will take time. I promise I'll bring you here properly later—if you survive."

"If I survive?" he asked, rising back to his feet.

"What exactly are you planning to do with me?"

"Not me. Where we're going. Phillip's whims will lead us to unsafe places for ordinary humans, trust me on that. So I'm going to enhance you a bit with paint." We entered the building. My other self closed the bedroom doors, long before our arrival. As much as I trusted Thomas, I preferred he not know that my original body lay unconscious just one wall away.

I'd prefer to keep my plurality hidden from him or Penrose for as long as I can manage as well, so Gertrude took all of her toys and moved to the armory she'd been preparing.

"Fine. Do it," he said, stepping across the threshold. I entered first and paused. My paper spiders were hard at work. Each held brushes in four legs, painting across a long, unrolled sheet. What they had created so far was magnificent. A little girl stood at the center of the scene, surrounded by others on their way to a public school. Children. Adults. All rendered in shades of gray and black, laughing, talking, moving forward together. Only the girl was painted in color.

She was smiling—yet her knees were bruised, her face swollen, her eyes half-shut.

"Bloody fuck… what's that?" Thomas muttered as he stepped in behind me.

"Solitude, my friend," I replied quietly.

"It's my old walk to school. And proof that those little spiders draw inspiration from being connected to me."

"You made them do that?" He crouched to examine one more closely. They were smeared with paint in every imaginable color, yet they wielded their brushes with eerie precision—sometimes using their legs directly to smear and blend in ways no human hand could replicate. And still, the result looked unmistakably like something I would have painted myself. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

"Yes," I said.

"I have more power now. And they are helping me." I straightened and pointed at him.

"You're still clothed. So get out of that," I told him, arranging the body paints on the desk for easy access. He complied, shrugging off his jacket and letting it fall to the floor. Then came the trousers, leaving him in loose, short boxer briefs and exposing legs mapped with old injuries. When he finally pulled off his T-shirt, the map expanded across his back, chest, and stomach. Interestingly, his arms were mostly unscarred.

"I'm keeping the boxers on."

"Fine. I'll paint over them. Take your socks off, though."

"I like having warm feet."

"Take them off."

"Fine…" he muttered, dragging the word out in protest. He was missing a small toe on his left foot and the middle toe on his right. Both feet were heavily scarred—more than any other part of him. The damage crept up toward the middle of his calves. It looked as if they had once been engulfed in flames and burned extensively.

"I ran through heavy fire once," he explained.

"I don't judge, Tommy," I said, selecting a proper brush and dipping it into a deep ruby red. I pressed the first strokes against his skin.

"I hope you don't mind, because I'm turning your skin into power armor laced with drake scales."

"Drake? As in dragon?"

"Something like that," I replied, circling him and nudging his arm upward to expose his ribs.

"It should make you very hard to damage. I'll weave in mechanical elements as well—enhance your strength and speed. Similar to my suit."

"Fuck, yeah!" he barked as I worked across his back, laying down the base layer.

"Don't move."

"It tickles."

"Would you wiggle if someone were torturing you? Treat it like that."

"Fine…" He gritted his teeth and forced himself still.

"Do you mind if I paint over your face too?" He considered it for a moment.

"Yes, actually, I do. I appreciate you making me stronger, but I don't want the others thinking they matter less because they didn't get special treatment. Bad for morale."

"You're unnecessarily putting your life at risk for appearances."

"I'm hard-headed and thick-boned. I'll be wearing a helmet. Let's hope that's enough."

"As you wish," I said.

"But I'm reinforcing your bones. Just in case." I drew a strong line along his entire posterior chain, up to where the skull met the spine.

"I've got to tell you something. You might not like it. I'd prefer you stay calm anyway."

"Shoot straight," he replied, keeping his body rigid.

"I'm helping Penrose for a price. There's no good way to say this, but… the price is you." The moment the words left my mouth, I realized I was doing exactly what Malik once had—negotiating someone else's fate on their behalf.

"What do you mean by that?" He turned his massive frame toward me.

"I'm no slave."

"You are. Just without a name tag—and you know it," I said evenly.

"Everyone tied to him is, to some degree. That's why you wanted out, right?"

"I wanted out because he wasn't himself. He told me it was because of the person he got the Domain from. Said it changed him. He claimed he fixed it. And he does seem more like he used to be. So what exactly did you do?"

"I asked him to release you, in good faith, from any obligations you have toward him once this job is done. I help him, and he lets you walk away. Do whatever you like. As long as you don't move directly against him."

"Is that why you're painting me? To make sure I survive so I can be your slave instead?"

"Employee, Thomas," I corrected, staying perfectly still even as he stepped toward me, his face twisting with anger.

"You shouldn't have done that behind my back."

"The last time we spoke, you wanted an out. I took a chance when it presented itself."

"Only that—and our shared history—is stopping me from hitting you in your stupid damn face," he growled.

"You undermined my position. He might think this was my idea."

"If you'd prefer to wear a leash around your neck for the rest of your life—" He grabbed me hard by both shoulders.

"—just say so," I continued calmly.

"And I'll go tell Phillip I shared my idea with you and you were displeased. I'm sure he'd happily renegotiate and give me more money instead." He shoved me back and shouted in frustration.

"Bloody fuck. You can be just like him, you know that? Pushing and pulling all the time. Moving pieces around without a damn thought about what the pawns feel and want."

"That's not true. I told you now—while it can still be changed. And I didn't do this purely for myself."

"But you did it for you!" he snapped, pointing a finger at me.

"At least you've got the balls to admit it."

"No balls… yet," I said quietly.

"But yes. Partially. Because you know me well, and if he ever aimed you at me, you'd be dangerous. And partially because I wanted to give you a chance at a calmer life—if you still want one." He stared at me, jaw clenched, eyes burning.

"Fuck it," he muttered at last.

"Finish the painting. And don't say a word about this to Penrose. As far as he's concerned, I know nothing about any deal. I'll think about it." He turned his back to me again. I stepped closer, placing a hand against his skin and guiding the brush along his thigh in slow, wide strokes.

"I'm sorry," I said quietly.

"I believe it's for the better."

"We'll fucking see," he replied, exhaling hard, tension leaving his muscles with the breath.

"I just don't want you to paint a literal target on my back."

"I won't. Would you mind if we sped this up with some additional… hands?"

"Why are you saying it like that?" He glanced over his shoulder at me.

"I mean my arachnid helpers. Together, we'll be done in no time."

"Do it." I reached through my aura and summoned the little spiders to a new task. As they scurried into position, brushes clutched in their legs, another part of my mind drifted—pondering the nature of aura and the soul. The mere fact that I could sense that field around my body suggested that some fragment of a soul resided within me, granting the ability to perceive through it. Which begged the question: was consciousness an emergent property of the soul rather than the brain? Or did it require both?

My additional brain granted no aura-sense of its own. No separate stream of awareness. Only parallel processing: raw computational force. Yet the bodies I willed into existence—those aspects of myself—developed both self-awareness and aura perception in tandem. That led me back to the question Penrose had once asked me in Chinatown—whether my art might one day dream of me, as its creator. Having a soul would be a clear perquisite to having a consciousness and in turn an ability to dream, which meant…

perhaps it was possible.

"What the hell is that?" Tommy's voice snapped me back. Anansi's spider body had leapt onto the makeup desk a few yards away. She watched Thomas intently with her large black eyes, rabbit ears twitching at every subtle sound.

"That's my intelligence spirit," I said, guiding my brush between two paper spiders whose hind legs were texturing the paint into layered drake scales.

"She helps me control my magic."

"Are you… fucking lying to everyone about your powers? Are you actually some kind of spider mage?"

"I try to lie less with every passing day. And no, I'm not a master of the Domain of Spiders. Though what they represent matters to me—as an artist. They're creators too. In literature and folklore, they're often symbols of craftsmanship."

"For real?"

"For real." I painted half-metal, half-organic stabilizers along his arm. Two spiders mirrored my movements on the other side while the rest continued layering scales over the ruby base coat. It was already starting to look formidable.

"Why is it staring at me like that?" he asked.

"Maybe because you're the asshole who almost hit me for trying to give you what you asked for."

"My initial anger's fading," he admitted, "but I still don't know if this is the right move, Alexa. I need to think it through. So respectfully—fuck off." Gertrude Monkey While Elle was busy coloring the big white guy for her assignment, I finished packing two Glock 19 FS Gen Fives and a Sig Sauer MPX. I wasn't a gun nerd, so I relied on the clerk's recommendations, but I wanted both the handgun and the long-barrel weapon to run on the same 9mm ammunition so I could carry only one type of round.

Various differently painted types of ammunition went into specially prepared boxes, which I anchored into a hastily made Weaponry spellbook—a simple sketchbook I slipped into my backpack. I added two spare magazines as well, just in case teleportation failed. I threw in Equinox for good measure, along with a pack of explosive cards. The weapons had been repainted with heat-resistant coatings, each given a distinct aesthetic.

One pistol I styled as an angelic, holy weapon—gold, white, and pale blue, adorned with feather motifs, golden halos, and fragments of scripture for good fucking measure. The second was its opposite: fire and brimstone, blackened steel from the depths of hell. The rifle I redesigned to resemble a futuristic death ray, something that could pass for a portable laser weapon. I would have preferred this whole thing to go as smoothly as possible.

But for that to happen, I needed to be ready to wage war on anything that came even remotely close.