"It's just so complicated," the young woman exclaimed, clearly exasperated. She was wearing civilian clothes—drab, more shapeless than most women in their early twenties would be content with—and, despite her obvious beauty, she wore no makeup and had pulled her hair back into a severe bun.
"Can you unpack that for me?" Jessica Yamada asked.
Her patient snorted. "My sister mastered me and turned me into a monster that would make Bonesaw jealous. My parents, my mother, abandoned me, left for two years with nothing but my thoughts, thoughts that Amy put into me. They were wealthy enough to treat me at home, but they didn't want to."
Jessica made two notes: powerlessness, abandonment. "Anger is a natural response," she said.
"It's past anger. It's hatred. Of myself, too. I was so oblivious. All the signs of something being wrong were there—hell, if I'd just thought a little about what Tattletale had said, I could have, should have put two and two together. And then to realize my power played a part in all this, she was lying about being immune the entire time, and every second she spent around me was making her more and more twisted . . ." She trailed off, and Jessica wrote guilt on her pad waited for her to continue.
"Then there's Scion. Billions dead, worlds demolished, humanity sent back to the stone age—and I'm fixated on myself. Do I even have a right to feel so strongly about something objectively so small? I'm still alive. And fixed, more or less." She smiled wanly. "At least it's nice to be able to talk to you directly."
The ceiling fell in before Jessica could reply.
Victoria flew across the room in an instant, pushing her out of the way of collapsing rubble and putting herself in between Jessica and the—
The Simurgh.
The Simurgh had just destroyed her office and interrupted her session.
Jessica knew she should be screaming or running or screaming and running, but she was mostly annoyed.
"Can I help you?" she asked the Simurgh in a tone that very clearly conveyed that yes was not an acceptable answer.
The Simurgh stared down at Jessica, who became aware of a high-pitched cry at the edge of her consciousness, like an irritated cat or someone badly singing Chinese opera.
So that was the "scream." Interesting.
"I'd like you to leave," Jessica said firmly. "Come back when I'm not with a patient."
The air just below the remaining parts of the ceiling tore open.
A barrage of dozens, hundreds of objects rained through from the other dimension. Several of them struck Jessica on their way to the floor, but they didn't hurt. Jessica caught one as it bounced off her head.
. . . Bread?
Jessica started to question the reliability of her perceptions as the parts of her ruined office that were not filled with naked Endbringer and wings were covered by a knee-deep pile of football-sized loaves of bread. A dark-haired woman wearing a white dress shirt and black slacks followed, landed in front of Jessica. She was clutching a suit jacket and staring, wide-eyed, at nothing in particular.
One side of the building collapsed as the bread-spewing portal sealed and the Simurgh departed.
Dream, Jessica decided. Has to be.
"What," Victoria said, "the fuck. I...think I'd better go get the Wardens."
Jessica began kicking her way through the bread to the woman the Simurgh had dropped off, but Legend arrived before she was able to reach her unexpected guest. As he surveyed the room, his expression shifted from grim determination to utter confusion.
"Contessa," Legend said. The woman flinched like he'd slapped her. "What the fuck is this?"
Jessica removed the remaining loaves from her path and stooped down to examine the woman. Contessa rolled away, evading Jessica's outstretched fingertips by millimeters, and wedged herself into the space between one of Jessica's couches and the only intact corner remaining in the room.
Valkyrie flew in through the roof, carrying Chevalier. She deposited him onto one pile of bread, which was flattened beneath the weight of his armor.
Chevalier moved to scratch his head, but his helmet got in the way. "This isn't what I thought I was getting into. This is . . . I don't know what the fuck this is."
"I know," Legend said. He shook his head. "We've found somebody so messed up even the Simurgh thinks she needs a shrink. Wrap your head around that."
Chevalier frowned. He started to approach the corner, but Contessa spoke for the first time.
"Stay back."
His frown deepened, but he didn't approach her further. Was it out of respect or fear? "Can you tell us what happened?"
The response, when it finally came, was almost too quiet to be heard. "No."
"Would you care to explain—well, any of this?"
"I would not." After another pause, she spoke again. "Leave me alone."
Someone knocked on the door. Jessica was relieved that there was still at least one person in the world who thought doors were the correct way to enter a room. "Just a minute," she called. "There's a bunch of—" She couldn't bring herself to say there was a pile of bread obstructing the inward swing of the door. "The door's blocked from this side."
After a moment, the door shattered.
A man with close-cropped blond hair and wearing a button-down shirt, tan slacks, and large-frame glasses stood on the other side. He was holding a retractable ball point pen in his hand.
"Did you break that door with a pen?" Chevalier said. He sounded a little envious.
The man in the glasses ignored Chevalier. He returned the pen to his shirt pocket—it had a pocket protector, which Jessica had never actually seen before—and looked around the room.
"Oh," he said as he took in the sheer breadth and depth of the loaves. "Oh, my."
"You're allowed to cuss, Number Man," Legend said. "That's what we've been doing."
Number Man ignored Legend's commentary and began to pick his way through the bread to where Contessa was hiding.
"Keep away from her," Legend said, raising his hand to fire. Number Man's shoe sent a loaf flying into the air and careening into Legend's wrist. The laser went wide, shattering the glass frame that held Jessica's diploma from graduate school.
"Hey!" she shouted. "What the fuck, Legend!"
Legend had the grace to look a little embarrassed. "Sorry," he muttered. "I'll have it replaced. Along with the rest of the building."
Jessica was tempted to ask how he was going to have it replaced, considering that the Bay Area no longer existed. Maybe he could go to another earth that had been slightly less scoured and explain the situation.
Number Man was talking to Chevalier. "We could go about this conversation in one of two ways," he said. "One, we talk civilly about a mutual problem. Two, you threaten me and I reveal my countermeasures in order of increasing severity to the point where you will have to choose between letting us go and precipitating the wholesale economic and social collapse of greater New York."
"That would violate the truce," Chevalier said.
"Fuck your truce," Number Man said levelly. "If you want it kept, the burden is on you to behave."
Valkyrie spoke. "Some might say you're acting with unwarranted arrogance."
"I think you and I are in agreement, here," he said. "I've had to take precautions because Chevalier is still resentful about Cauldron and Legend is wholly irrational on the point. It would be trivially easy for the two of them to talk themselves into executing her out of hand."
Cauldron? Jessica thought. She so distracted by the thought that she nearly missed how he had divided the Wardens into "crazy, murderous Legend" and "reasonable, not murderous Valkyrie" with "waffling Chevalier" in the middle. Ciara could probably see through it, but she was still prone to accepting flattery.
"That is traditionally one of the ways we have dealt with people exposed to the Simurgh for too long," Chevalier said.
The Number Man shrugged. "A dangerous path to go down, when you consider that every parahuman except her was exposed to the Simurgh for the entire Scion fight," he said. "It's probably best the Endbringer chose to eliminate that outlier with something as innocuous as this."
"There is nothing ever innocuous about either the Simurgh or Contessa!" Legend shouted. He was in the middle of deploying his lasers to destroy multiple loaves of bread at once.
"You know what happened?" Chevalier asked, ignoring Legend.
"Not exactly," the Number Man said. "But I think there are some powerful context clues."
"Are you saying," Chevalier began, but stopped. He shook his head, as though unable to acknowledge his thoughts by speaking them out loud. "Are you saying," he said, trying again, "that the Simurgh abducted a human being with the intention of repeatedly making her bake bread?"
"A little over thirteen hundred times, assuming all of it ended up here. I suspect it was an attempt to get her to replicate the time she caused a trigger event in a bread machine, which is what spawned the monster that fought the Three Blasphemies."
"I suppose that explains the text message I received from her before the Simurgh kidnapped her," Legend remarked. "It said, and I quote, 'meet 265 digs kild 3 blasphesmies cookin lol.' What the fuck was I supposed to do with that?"
Chevalier apparently felt the same way about Number Man's pronouncement, as his attempts to wrap his head around it were visibly failing. "I—just—what—fuck—no, that can't be right. Only humans can trigger."
"There is some small precedent," Number Man said. "The Three Blasphemies were powered, and they weren't human. Dragon doesn't have DNA, but she still had a trigger event."
"Instances of Tinkertech approximating humanity," Chevalier said. "But dough? How does that happen?"
"I believe she forgot the yeast," Number Man said.
Legend snorted. "Liar. We know how her power works, now. She doesn't forget to do things."
The Number Man shrugged. "That's true when she's using her power. She hasn't been, lately. The results have been somewhat uneven."
"I can fucking hear you," Contessa said.
"Correction," said the Number Man. "The results have been completely disastrous."
"Less disastrous than letting her go would be," Legend said. "I imagine your idea of a solution here is to release her with complete amnesty."
"Amnesty for what? Unless you're saying her baking is criminally bad." He paused for a moment during which something like a smile briefly touched his lips. "If you were seriously contending that, I would volunteer to be a witness for the prosecution."
A small sound of protest came from the corner.
"What do you propose, then?" Chevalier asked. "And we both know it doesn't matter what you say, it matters if she agrees."
The Number Man nodded and finished his progress to where Contessa was hiding. He easily moved the three hundred fifty pound couch out of his way with one hand, and sat on the armrest.
"I was thinking this," he said to Contessa. "We leave immediately, and stop or undo everything I've set in motion. You stay off of Bet and away from any portals leading into Bet, permanently, and undergo a complete psychological evaluation without the aid of your power. They can determine whether you need follow-ups and how many."
"Okay," she said.
"How do we know that's not a lie?" Legend asked.
"She stopped using her power once he arrived," Valkyrie said.
"And she's ludicrously bad at lying on her own," Number Man added. "It's like asking a crumb-covered child what happened to the cookies and watching it stumble through a chaotic tale about peculiarly sweet-obsessed highwaymen."
Contessa's mouth tightened, but she didn't say anything.
Chevalier spoke after a little bit. "If we suspect anything amiss, I'll ask Valkyrie to go after both of you."
That sounded like acquiescence to Jessica.
"I wouldn't expect anything less," the Number Man said. He pulled out of one of his pants pockets and pressed a little red button. A tear opened mid-air, and through it Jessica saw a white room with two white couches. He stood and extended a hand to Contessa. "Let's go home."
It wasn't until they'd stepped through and he turned to her expectantly that Jessica realized that she was the one he expected would be conducting the evaluations. Chevalier and Valkyrie seemed to agree with his assumption, and Legend was too busy vaporizing bread with his lasers to notice.
"Let me grab a few things," she said. "I'll be along in a minute."
The Number Man nodded and disappeared completely through the portal.
"I'll see if I can't get this cleared up before you come back," Legend said. "We'll start looking for another office for you as well."
"Thank you," Jessica said.
"You look nervous," Chevalier said.
"Something's telling me that this is a bad idea," she admitted.
"Maybe," Chevalier said. "It could very well be that the Simurgh had you in mind when she made her move and, through you, the stability of the Wardens. We're trying to build something good, here, and she has historically targeted people who do that."
Jessica considered this, but didn't stop packing her briefcase. It was a possibility, but . . . Duty called.
A young man who looked like someone had recently burned out his eyes sealed the portal after Jessica had stepped through. The Number Man and Contessa were sitting on one of the couches. She had her head in her hands and appeared to be . . . plugged in? to some device the Number Man held. He frowned at whatever the screen was telling him. "Nothing seems to be wrong," he said.
"Of course not, you sadistic shitwaffle. She'll have taken steps to ensure that any damage is hidden from the diagnostic scans, obviously. Everything is pain. I hate you."
He rolled his eyes. "Melodrama. Brains do not have pain receptors."
"Yours doesn't. Mine's on fire. It's going to melt. That's it, that's the Simurgh's plan, trick you into melting my brain."
"Would that it were that simple," he said. "We'll have to get Bonesaw to do a more thorough evaluation."
"We'll have to get Bonesaw to bring Gray Boy back again. How would you like to be scalped? I'm thinking I can get him to use a scalding knife."
"Hold still, I'm taking this out." He set the Tinkertech aside and wrapped an arm around her. "It was admittedly cruel of me to save your life and then check you for sabotage. Having me brutally tortured for hundreds of thousands of years is a reasonable and proportionate response."
She leaned into his shoulder. "You understand."
"Words cannot express how much you owe me," he said.
"Can numbers?"
"Oh, yes," he said softly. "You'd need to use your power to understand the scale, but it's possible."
"You make it sound like you did something more harrowing than talk to Tattletale."
"I did," he said. "I went to Tattletale because I needed her help. I'll be washing residual smugness off of myself for years."
"What you mean is I'll be hearing about it for years," Contessa said.
"You can start working your debt off now. Sit down with—" He looked at Jessica.
"Mrs. Yamada," Jessica supplied.
"—Mrs. Yamada, and get the psych eval out of the way."
Contessa's eyes snapped open and fell on Jessica. "You're not serious."
"The last time I played a practical joke was in 1986," he said. "Thirty people died."
She was sitting upright now, and frowning at him. "I thought you were just saying that to make them back off."
"Partially, but I thought you were showing signs of instability before the Simurgh came along," he said. "This might help. Besides which, you agreed."
"I'd asked for escape and my power suppressed itself when you arrived. I figured it was calculating that we'd only get them to let us go if I wasn't using it and just went along with whatever you said. I didn't know you expected me to mean it."
"You want us to lie to the Faerie Queen? Did the Simurgh make you stupid?"
"I'd say rather that listening to that scream for seventy-eight hellacious hours has made me considerably less willing to put up with bullshit."
Contessa's behavior didn't qualify for a professionally recognized diagnosis, but Jessica was able to categorize it all the same: parahuman temper tantrum. Though, considering she was one of maybe three psychologists left in the United States, she probably could get "throwing a superpowered fit" into the DSM . . . a project for later, perhaps. "What is your power?" she asked.
Contessa stared at her for a full ten seconds. "Your husband is a little too selfish to really accept your dedication to your work, and he's always been jealous of your proximity to so many parahumans. Now it's worse because you're still important, but the world isn't going to need any third-rate professors of music theory for quite some time. This won't stop you both from trying, which in this case means having the same three fights until your death from lung cancer in 4,416 days."
"You can see the future," Jessica said.
"If I feel like wasting time. More importantly, I can shape it, choose what I want and make it so, one step at a time. Your life, for instance, would be very different if you quit smoking, divorced your husband, and approached Chevalier."
The eyeless boy spared Jessica from having to formulate a reply. He took a pen out of his pocket and started to hit it against his thigh.
"I do understand," Contessa said. "I know she's nice. But you're wrong. I—"
A furious barrage of taps cut her off.
"Yes, I am very scared right now. I need to think about it, not talk about it with strangers. You know my power. It will make me be all right."
He responded.
"How did you know that?" She shook her head. "Never mind. It's nice of you to think about this, but we're going to return her to Bet right now."
A sly smile crept across his face.
She frowned at him a moment. "You swallowed the teleporter? That was our last one!" She rose to her feet and reached into her pocket, retrieving a little knife. "If you think I won't cut it out of your sneaky little guts—"
"Contessa," the Number Man said. "Panacea would need to touch him."
"Riley wouldn't," she said grimly.
"Perhaps not." He took off his glasses and started polishing them on his shirt. "I think you should consider not stabbing your allies mere hours after you were exposed to the Simurgh's scream."
There was a pause.
"Fine," she said. "I'll do it."
"Mm, I don't know if I believe you," he said. "Which is why I went through a list of the Students' abilities and found a perception Thinker who can detect use of parahuman abilities in the surrounding area. We'll be sitting in the next room over, and she'll let me know if you start trying to use your power in here."
"You're worse than the Simurgh," she muttered. She glared at Jessica. "What do I need to do to make this be done?"
"That depends largely on how you want to approach this," Jessica said. "If you're not sure, I brought some forms I usually ask new patients to fill out. That will give me an idea of where to start asking questions."
"I will do that," Contessa said. Then she added: "My English isn't very good without my power."
Considering the nearly childish shiftiness that accompanied the remark, Jessica mentally flagged it as a lie—the Number Man had been right—but said she would take it into account.
Apparently satisfied, Contessa started writing. It took her about ten minutes to fill out the intake paperwork, and Jessica reviewed it in less than half that time. Fully two thirds of the answers, including Name and Address been left blank. Date of Birth simply had one word, "winter," next to it, Place of Birth was followed by "the bedroom," and the section on educational history had an X through it. Parental medical history indicated she'd been orphaned at the age of nine by "monsters," she claimed to average less than six hours of sleep a week, and reported difficulty expressing emotions, frequent thoughts about harming or killing others, large gaps in memory, detachment, dependency on others, and longstanding feelings of guilt and sadness.
Jessica glanced up. Contessa was hugging her knees. She was holding her knife—probably a comfort thing, because parahumanity—and would have looked considerably less defensive crouching behind a shark-filled moat.
"I think," Jessica said, "I will need a lot of context for this."
