Chương 134: Issachar, Part 2

Dr. Tudor was talking my ear off the entire time I helped haul in all the crap from the moving trucks. The conversation developed a rather abrupt rhythm to it.

"Have you managed to produce any uniquely gravitic phenomena yet?"

"Nope."

"Still only able to get the strength and durability out?"

"Yep."

"What methods have you been using to practice?"

"Water bottle." I wasn't trying to be stand-offish with him, he was genuinely a big help and clearly meant well. But I had no good answers for him and every attempt at those good answers was met with a thick glacier of nothing. I was able to do some basic reframing of my strength as gravity in some cases, but even that felt like I was just me saying it was gravity while still treating it as strength.

And partly, I was too focused on making sure I wasn't breaking any of the equipment already placed down in the testing facility by swinging through all the heavy stuff on my shoulders. I was impressed at how little he cared about me nearly hitting him with equipment multiple times, though. Multiple times a near-miss would occur, and when I apologized he just kept talking like nothing even happened. Placing down yet another heavy item, a familiar Southern drawl rang out behind me.

"Well if it ain't Mr. Snap City himself!" Looking towards the voice, it was Diamond Bob, wearing a sling and still in his crystalline form. It had been more than the "week or two" since that test even happened.

"Diamond Bob… why's your arm still in a sling?" I asked. He shrugged.

"You did a pretty clean snap, son. Makes it hard for both sides to really 'grab.' So now it's takin' forever n' a day to get everything to reconnect. And the bonesaws see it as a great opportunity to study potential methods to grow and rebind diamonds to help popularize lab-grown diamonds. So I'm a pioneer in the ethics department too, now!" Given the language he used on me to push me into tearing his arm off in the first place, I was impressed he even had a sense of ethics in the first place.

He wasn't exactly Casney, but he still seemed a bit greasy. If nothing else, I could write Tudor and Bob off as moles. It was good to have a few verified safe individuals. Even if one already has a track record of pissing me off.

"What he's not including," Dr. Tudor added on, "is that we needed some measure of muscle for security. While the Super Commission hires quite a few competent, well-armed veterans as security, Casney was a great deterrent for superhumans. Diamond Bob may not be as strong, but there's absolutely no getting past him."

"Unless it's you," Bob added, pointing a finger gun at me.

"But I thank my lucky stars that we're on the same side." Because he was being paid to be there. Even if he was, nominally, a superhero he still was only here because he was making more money than he'd get by going back to work elsewhere. I just nodded, before resting my hands on my hips.

"Where's the rest area we're supposed to be sleeping in until our quarters are all set?" Tudor pointed off in a direction.

"You'll be heading over towards where Casney's office was, though now it's Tancred's. There's a door there that when you open, should lead to the back half of the warehouse. The room will be there, since the rest of the building hasn't really furnished itself for people inhabiting it." I nodded.

"Does it have bathrooms and showers?" He gave a thumbs up.

"I made sure the plumbers got it hooked up. It's just one shower and one bathroom for now, though. Your quarters will all have their own." With another nod, I made my way off in the indicated direction, though I did stop by Casney's office just to look at the door. His name was removed, with a cheap sticker label applying Tancred's name now instead. As I was observing it, the door swung open and let out an overwhelming flood of scents from various cleaners and air fresheners.

It was like someone blew up a laundromat and flower shop at the same time. Tancred came out with it, coughing.

"Still smells like all the shit he did in there. Guy needs to hydrate," he muttered to himself, before spotting me and raising his eyebrows.

"Oh, hey there, Leo. You needed something?" I shook my head.

"Was just checking the door since Dr. Tudor said it's your office now. Is it any bigger than your old one?" He nodded.

"Yeah, but every inch of it is painted in… Casney, for lack of better words. You turn a blacklight on in there and it looks like an alien's attempt at a Pollock painting. I tried clearing out the smell, but it's still taking. Gonna have a hazardous materials team come in to deal with it. They can clear the stink of rotting corpses, so this should be easy for them."

"How're you going to get your work done?"

"Oh, I'll just dictate it to some of the pencil-pushers for now." He waved the question off dismissively.

"Tudor talk your ear off about your power situation, yet?" I nodded, looking off towards one of the walls.

"Yeah, I keep trying to give short answers but he still keeps asking. I feel like I'm wasting his time because I just can't get this gravity shit to work like gravity. I only ever get it to work like strength." I could see him raise an eyebrow from my peripheral vision.

"Then don't make it work like gravity, ignoramus. That clearly isn't how it works for you." If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Looking back towards him, my own eyebrow went up.

"What do you mean?"

"Think about it like this. For the past nearly a year, you've been reliant on your powers in the frame of it being strength. You never thought 'Oh, let me alter the gravity of this two million ton crab so I can hip toss it into a park.' You focused on building your strength as far as it could go. Same with getting shot or jumping off buildings, or kicking a fucking cloud in half. What were the things you were thinking in that time?" I furrowed my brow, resting my hands on my hips.

"I don't really know what I'm actually thinking, in detail. Just that I try and want to be strong enough to do something. I wasn't thinking when I got shot, though. At least, none of the thoughts I can recall had anything to do with getting shot. A lot of this stuff just happens as I need it, without me thinking about it much. The only times I think about my strength while doing it is when I need just a bit of it, or none at all."

"But those are in the heat of the moment, right? Still fighting something, or you're pissed off for whatever reason."

"Well…" I trailed off, before nodding.

"Yeah, I guess so. Usually I'm pretty mad. But then there's the time with the hydraulic press, where it just… didn't weigh down on me. I wasn't really thinking about it and it still wasn't working."

"Then it sounds like it's not really tied to how you think about it or how you frame it. It sounds more like it's tied to your state of mind. You're handing it all off to however your brain's jury-rigged a means of autonomously controlling gravity around you. Either because you're not interested enough to think about the situation, or because you've gotten yourself just so pissed off that nothing else matters in that moment and you're willing to forfeit that much thinking power over."

I thought about Foras' warning. A stroke. My brain somehow partially burning out. Would it be from too much thinking? Some other medical condition somehow every medical professional that had looked at me simply couldn't find? What could even cause it?

"That sounds easy to describe, but I can't exactly just tell my brain to turn itself off."

"Well, no, you can." My eyebrow went up yet again. Felt like I got more movement out of them when talking to Tancred than I did with anything else.

"And how would I do that?"

"Looking at it from my perspective, you already use that mechanism, often. That whole zoning out issue is the opposite of you turning your brain off. You turn it on and flare everything up and get caught up in it. You were doing great in not giving into it. But do you think you've ever gotten like that in the middle of a fight where your powers were really going off? Like you and Jairo's first match with Technofiend?" Crossing my arms, I shook my head.

"Not that I recall, but everything in those moments is kind of a blur. I know the basic events but things like emotions and sensations are completely lost."

"Exactly. Because that's your brain turning itself off. What you need is a way to accept it. Do it on purpose." The auditor tapped the side of his head.

"I don't know how exactly you can, I'm not a neurologist, but I think part of it is faith-based. I think if you really hit the point where you know it needs to be done, you'll do it. And I think all the mechanisms will come to you as easily as riding a bike. We just haven't hit a point where your brain and body agree with the whole you that you need to know everything right now." I shook my head.

"I don't think that's at all a logical way to look at it. That just means that, unless I get lucky, I might never be able to use the full extent of my power. We're in moments where it could be plenty useful. If I could control gravity the way Dr. Tudor thinks I'm capable of, that entire bombing incident wouldn't have happened. Same with the crab dying, or anything else.

You may not really grasp how it feels for your brain to just be locking away so much about yourself, Tancred, but I can tell you that kind of thinking doesn't help." I turned and made my way away from him as he waved me off dismissively. Technically I knew I might be able to. Foras' prediction said I'd remember everything and figure it out. The issue is, if I did "remember" anything, would it still be me? A lot of who I am has to stem from what I remember seeing, doing. More memories are more influences on "me."

How much of me would survive being eroded by those memories? I was scared of dying, with only my mask being remembered by anyone but me. Now I was scared of the fact I might forget myself too. Forget how to be myself. Drowning in my dread distracted me from how long it took to get to the common quarters area. I was only made aware of it when May's voice got my attention and reminded me of my environment. The walls were this pale blue color.

In the center was one large table with seven chairs, and seven cots surrounding it. Three of the cots were directly next to each other. The others were all at different ends of the room. I could imagine who those three cots were for. May was sitting at the table, looking up towards one of the walls where there was a TV. Was some pedigree dog show. A poodle was running around and doing tricks.

She seemed oddly fascinated with it, to be honest, her speaking voice only coming out and catching my attention to gush over the animals she saw.

"Oh, didn't realize you were already here," I noted, getting her attention off the screen.

"Hey! Yeah, Sam and I got here earlier because she wanted to get some things set and I'm the only other person who even kind of understands how to set up a computer." I nodded.

"Where's Sam?" I asked, not necessarily wanting to know, but knowing better than to stir up more conflict.

"Off looking for her kids. This place is basically an amusement park for them, so they just keep running around and trying to play hide and seek with just about anyone they can get the attention of." Kind of nauseated me a bit. Those kids haven't had a stable life for their entire lives. They were conceived and born illegally and then they've been under government stewardship for God knows how long. Now they're stuck living in a warehouse.

Everyone clearly cared for the kids, and I knew I did my best to help them regardless of how I feel about their mother, but they still never had a chance to live the way a normal kid is supposed to.

"I see," I acknowledged, clambering over to the table and sitting across from her, my arms resting on the top of it.

"Has anyone claimed beds yet besides the obvious?" I asked, nodding towards the three cots that were adjacent to each other.

"It's kind of just first-come, first-serve. But they're all thankfully really samey looking, so once we've all gone into one for the night, we'll likely just stick to those. No one wants to lay down in the smell of anyone else." She laughed.

"You're all good guys, but I could do without smelling guy B. O. for the rest of my life. Even when you all are showered up and clean, I can still get a whiff." Not even bothering to disagree there. I didn't pay too much attention to smells that weren't signs of violence or general concern. Or food. Some foods were starting to really grab my attention by just smell, now.

In the silence of that moment, where we were just trying to relax from all the tumult of the past few days, tumult decided to reintroduce itself to us. The TV snapped to a breaking news bulletin. On the screen, video footage of an incredibly large man, with wooden horns growing from his head, wielding a massive axe of Wyrdwood, stood outside a brick building. Flanked by barbed wire fences that were torn down. In front of him, the building's wall had been torn down. Most likely by that axe.

There was no audio, but from the distance the person was filming, not much sound would be in earshot anyway. May and I looked towards each other.

"You got your costume?" I asked. She nodded.

"Let's go."