Author's Note: OK… assignments due in the next five weeks: 2 (or was it 3?) 5 page papers for Nature Writers', plus one 10 page and a referat; two 7-10 page stories for fiction writing (plus 40 pages of the cleaned up stories) and one public reading, one 10-12 page paper for Japanese Religious History, and 2 photo critiques (2 photos each and one 12 photo final portfolio… and what do I do? WORK ON MY COSPLAY COSTUME FOR A CON LESS THAN TWO WEEKS AWAY. Priorities, priorities. I do not own Doctor Who or FMA. And there was internet problems :(
Chapter 9 Signs of Things Hidden
Ninety years had passed since the Amestris war, and the world had changed. For one, it was more connected now than ever before. Envy was shocked to learn that humans invented something that could actually make the world a better place- the Internet. He also found that it was the perfect place to waste time with mindless entertainment, spread lies about anything and everything, conduct scams, and harass people who hold too strong of views (or too poorly supported) without the realistic threat of physical retaliation. It was also conceivably the lovechild of an affair Grammar had with Chernobyl. It was all too fascinating, and after a week of introduction, he asked for a computer of own.
"Mac or PC?" the Doctor asked.
"Linux," Envy replied. The Doctor groaned. Linux are the computers of choice for hackers and virus writers. Leave it to Envy to find the underground of any cultural phenomenon. It was the image he was attracted to; there was no denying it given his cyber-punk style.
He was also infinitely curious about anything- something that was a good trait as far as a Time Lord's duty goes, but it was also one of the things the apprentice had difficulty curbing.
Yet, every once in a while, a child left to its own devices can come upon something important. Envy had no real reason to hack into a site meant specifically for certain engineers of the Large Hadron Collider, but that's what made it fun. He just wanted to learn about what he could do with a computer.
"Envy, look at where you are," the Doctor said. Envy was deeply immersed in the pastime and had not heard the Doctor come up behind him. The Homunculus jumped, lost footing as the wheelie chair scooted back and he got one foot caught in the tangle of wires. He hit the floor with a solid thud.
"On- on the ground now, yes," Envy supplied. The Doctor gave him a look. The Homunculus took a quick breath and said, "Oh- oh, you mean on the Internet! Um, um, Facebook?" The Doctor continued to stare. "Er- well… it was- you see… there's- there's this thing I wanted to learn about, yeah- and, and it was about particles and-"
"This isn't the design for a Hadron Collider, it's the plans for an artificial high-density gravity stimulator." The Doctor said.
"Oh- oh it is?" Envy failed to conceal his rise of hope that he might yet get out of trouble.
"And you know what that means." The Doctor turned back to Envy with a serious look.
Envy looked puzzled for a second and then said, "A black hole. Someone wants to make a black hole right on Earth. That would be bad."
The Doctor nodded.
"Who'd do that? What for? And that sounds a bit early for humans to be doing that."
"Exactly. So, let's get going."
"Where?" Elisa just came in from a Starbucks run. "Here you go, Envy I hope you like yours, it was the most expensive out of the lot."
"To save the world," the Doctor said. He took a sip of his drink and promptly set about readying the coordinates.
"Really?" Elisa replied, eyebrow quirked.
"Twenty ounce triple espresso with a double shot of English toffee creamer, orange syrup, whipped cream and sprinkled with nutmeg and anise?" Envy asked.
"Yes. And you owe me a scalp message that meets national safety regulations because my brain had to remember all of that."
"What?" the Homunculus slapped on a pseudo-shocked expression in his face. "I wouldn't do anything to give you brain damage- who else could I reliably count on at being abhorred at the thoughts I say out loud?"
"You say a lot of things- in an overtone in public!"
"I think you're getting hung up on details."
The TADRIS landed. It was hidden in a grove of fir trees, and the trio stepped out onto a mountainside just beginning to green. They all took a sip of their coffees to ward off the chill of the wind. Envy transmuted some outerwear for himself.
"Ha-ha," Envy said. "This is one of the few times when someone will actually waltz on into an enemy base."
"The LHC most definitely came from humans," the Doctor said. "It's the ones who hijacked the plans who're the problem."
"Wait a minute, you guys keep saying the LHC, but I don't see anything." Elisa said.
"That's because it's built underground," Envy said. "It's a particle accelerator that's supposed to detect Higgs bosons. Well, that's what it should do."
"They don't know about them?"
"The idea is only a few decades old," the Doctor said. "It's only theory now. Come on, let's go."
Inside the base, the Doctor pointed out parts of the collider to the other two, as they strode past. It was the first time Envy saw the psychic paper- which the Doctor used go gain entrance, and while Envy could do a good job transmuting fake IDs, the paper had its pluses: no guessing at the designs of cards you never seen before, and they don't disappear when handed over. "I knew you couldn't be all that upstanding! That's what I like: emphasis on results. Kudos, Doctor!" The Doctor rolled his eyes and ignored his apprentice's comment.
The Doctor led them into an area under construction. Even though Envy had seen the schematics of the supercollider, seeing it in real life made him faze out. The machines that moved the pieces into place dwarfed train engines alone. All this just to find evidence of some of the smallest bits of matter humans ever theorized of. The juggernauts of steel tunnels formed what would look like to an alchemist the foundation of one-hell-of-an ambitious alchemic ritual. "Why don't they hire an alchemist or two to help with this?" He asked when he caught up with the others.
"Remember," the Doctor replied, "that this is only 2007, so the theory they are testing is less than century old. Alchemists are still holding onto their pride– the implications of the "new theories" are seen as a threat– something that removes all the predictability from the world."
"Really?" Elisa asked. "I thought that relativity and quantum mechanics came out of alchemy."
"No, the records got muddled over the years," the Doctor replied.
"It feels weird, like I'm not supposed to be here." Envy looked around. "But– I can't believe I'm saying this– I can't believe that humans came up with something like this. I wonder if even Father could have thought of this."
"HEY!" a voice shouted. "Who're you?" a man, in a blindingly yellow vest stormed up to the three.
"I'm John Smith, technology consultant," the Doctor held up his psychic paper again. "And this is my intern, Evan Holmes, and journalist Elisa Grant."
"Well, what's the problem? I should have heard about it," the man groused.
"Oh, nothing, really," the Doctor replied, "just a few little things were found that we'd need to check out. I hope you don't mind, Mr… Bausch."
"Well, don't get in the way," the construction worker said.
"Sorry, we very much plan on getting in the way," Envy said under his breath.
Envy wandered under the tubes, staring up in awe. He thought he saw something disrupted the brushed steel finish. Climbing up a support and crawling upside-down on the spanner, he made his way over to the discontinuity. It was something weird. A design of sorts Envy had never seen before. Or rather, an array of designs. Writing? The TARDIS would have translated it. Envy fished his phone out of his pocket and took a picture. "Hey Doctor, I think I found something here." Envy returned his phone, let go and flipped to the ground, landing on all fours. He handed the phone to the Doctor.
"Oh, you sure did," the Doctor replied, putting on his glasses. "It looks like Rumullitaben to me."
"Who are?"
"Well, their kind tends to generalize. They lost their home planet in a supernova. They mostly became hired hands- any job, anywhere."
"And someone wants the Earth to go bye-bye. So who- and why?" Envy finished.
"Something strikes me as odd," Elisa said. The others turned to her. "Turning a planet into a black hole is a really complicated way to destroy it. The simplest way is by nuclear holocaust, for example."
"Then you mean that the black hole itself needed, and for whatever reason, the Earth is the best planet suited for the job," Envy reasoned.
"Good thinking!" the Doctor chimed. "So the question is who doesn't want to dirty their hands, and why they would stand to profit from destroying the Earth in such a specific way."
The Doctor lead the others to certain parts in the collider, having Envy make certain adjustments to the machine as the Doctor explained to him what the changes would do.
"Why not change it all, you're being so selective about it," Envy complained.
"Look at what we're altering," the Doctor replied. "These are critical points. If we manage to disrupt those ones alone, then the worst that will happen is that the simulator simply won't work."
"Fine, fine. Could you move the light a bit over then?" Envy asked.
"Um, guys?" Elisa said tentatively.
"We're alright up here, Elisa," the Doctor said.
"Hey, I said I needed the light over this way."
"Why should I do that?" Said a slimy voice above the Time Lords' heads.
They looked up to face it. "That, Envy, is a Rumullitaben." The alien was hanging from the rafters. Amphibious yellow skin aside, the thing had a sloth-like body, with long, toned limbs and curved talons. Attached to its snake-like neck was a head with too-huge brows, a nose like an elephant shrew's and horses lips.
"Ugly son-of-a-bitch," Envy commented. He leaned back and addressed the alien. "I don't suppose you'll part with information willingly, are you?" He moistened his lips.
"Envy," the Doctor warned.
"Because one way or another, we'll figure things out. Your choice: you can enlighten me or amuse me." Envy was picking at dirt beneath his nails. "Either way, I win."
"You are not the commissioners," the Rumullitaben replied.
"Oh, is that a problem?" Envy glanced at it.
"Under section 32 of the Shadow Proclamation, I order you to identify the ones who hired you," the Doctor said.
"You are not the commissioners, why should I listen?" the alien twisted its neck to look at the Doctor.
"Because," Envy shot his hands around its neck, eyes glinting, "if you don't, you're going to have to call in dismembered." The Homunculus tightened its grip with every gasp the alien emitted. "Oh dreary me, it seems that I'm not very witty today. Guess I'll have to compensate." Energy started crackling around the Homunculus: Envy's eyes glittered like a stalking cat, jaws softly parted; the massive form of a liger emerged, emitting a rumble like melted chocolate.
The alien detached its front two limbs from the rafters and jabbed at Envy with his talons. Envy lashed out with his claws, raking the alien's chest and limbs. Envy decided it was an even sorrier fighter than he was: exposing a soft belly to an animal with big pointy teeth. Well, soft under those plates of bone, he discovered. Those made it harder.
The Doctor took the chance to point the screwdriver into the machine till its parts popped and fumed.
Envy felt his knees give away as his opponent scooped them with its claws. It only made Envy claw his way upward, gouging out chunks of flesh out of the Rumullitaben's hind legs. Without Envy's good footing, the two swung, colliding with the Doctor, who managed to grab onto the mass. The alien's claws swung off their perch. They all felt a brief moment of weightlessness– rotating a quarter-turn before the head rush came. It was a forty-foot drop.
Envy broke from the others and oriented himself to land on his feet; the air was punched out of him as he met the ground. Gasping for air, his world was sorely black for a few moments before some form of feeling crept back.
The Doctor was sprawled across the alien, who shook him off as soon as it righted itself. Envy, seeing the Doctor lay prone and limp on the floor, dragged the Doctor back to him with a massive paw. He growled long and low; the others could feel it in their chests. "Worm, there's two ways you can die. One, you tell us what we need to know," he said, advancing on the Rumullitaben, tail writhing, "and you get a quick death after we're finished with this place, or I can take my sweet time turning you into jerky strips in the machine."
The alien backed away, whimpering. "You– you're not a paying customer… I have no contract-"
"I'm a Homunculus, fool. A Sin. We are created from the worst emotions of the species that spawned us. We don't deal in contracts. We deal in ultimatums."
"Envy, stop it!" Elisa cried. She ran over to the Doctor.
"B-but that's not…" the alien stammered.
"Whatever your ideals are, I don't care, worm. Following social norms are only one way to survive." Envy gathered himself up and launched.