PomPoko

Chapter 8: The Choices We Make

Once we were outside of the school Kitsune told me that she had something to take care of and that she would meet me back at the base later. She sped off in the air, her face still tinged with sadness and anger. I told her to take all the time she needed. I hoped that she wouldn't do something that she would later come to regret.

My mind was in turmoil. Taylor Hebert was a real person. Taylor was real, not some abstract from an online story, not an idea in my head, but an actual human being with thoughts and feelings just like me. I pictured the faces of Smythe and Reed from a short while ago, the former wearing an icy expression and the latter a fiery one at the recording they had witnessed.. They too, were actual flesh and blood people, I realized. I had known it intellectually, but now I really felt it in the core of my being.

I sagged, quickly going invisible and flying away at a slow pace. I had been playing God with these people, treating them like they were disposable pawns and that I was some sort of chessmaster who had the right to move them about in whatever way pleased me. 'I'm acting like Coil,' I thought sickly.

I thought back to this morning, just hours before; I had had nearly ruined Smythe's career as a PRT officer when I decided to give him powers. I had looked into his mind, I had known that he loved his career as a PRT Officer and a leader of men. He was a man who took a great amount of pride in his profession, he had honed his skills over the decades until he was about as formidable as a baseline human could be. I had known this, and still I decided to empower him because of my long-term plan to give superpowers to people with strong moral fiber and a history of doing good to increase the number of heros on this shitty earth. I had prioritized some nebulous plan of mine over his entire life, just because I could. What had I been thinking?

It was just so easy to pretend I was playing a game, that this new world I found myself in was fictional and that the people here weren't real in the same way people from my home dimension were. It was partly due to my new invulnerable nature, I supposed. I doubted that I could be killed anymore, definitely not by other humans. Not to mention the localized omnipotence. It was almost unreal that I had such power. It was becoming a wedge driving me away from reality, or rather, it allowed me to reject everyone else's reality and substitute it with my own.

'This God complex bullshit was going to end right now,' I thought. I tapped my chest three times, creating powers called Humanity, Perspective, and Compassion. They were set to be permanently active. I felt a wash of something flow across my mind and being, and my universe shifted. Suddenly I was on all fours on the ground, in the originally alley-way that I had arrived in here in Brockton Bay. I vomited explosively, heaving over and over. Hot sick welled up from my stomach as I emptied it onto the filthy ground. Tears escaped from the corners of my eyes, and I panted for breath. What had I been doing?

Politician felt my distress over our telepathic link and queried my condition. "I'm OK, just re-evaluating some life choices," I sent to him. He sent back a quick acknowledgement. I got the impression that he was in an important meeting.

I pulled myself to my feet, and quickly cleansed myself of the detritus I had picked up from the alley floor, as well as the nastiness that I had thrown up. Absently I removed the vomit from the alley as well, no telling what a Bio-Tinker might be able to do with that. I needed a new game plan. My overarching strategy would by necessity remain mostly unchanged, but I would have to fix some of the details. Like, for instance, the fact that I would no longer be playing God with people's lives. If I wanted someone's help I would ask for it, and give them enough information to make a real decision. I was done with regrets, it was time to start being the moral person I had been before I received these fucking ludicrous abilities. What was the point of saving the world if I had to sacrifice my humanity to do it? That was Cauldron's second biggest mistake. The first was putting their blind trust in weapons only their enemy could fully use or understand.

So… a new paradigm. I needed to come up with a strategy that balanced the salvation of the species with the least amount of suffering and the maximum free will for the people who I gave the choice to help me. And I did need help, I realized. Kerako was amazing and insanely powerful, but she was a broken thirteen year old girl. I needed someone smart, someone who could be an advisor to me. Someone moral enough to care for people's wellbeing, but flexible enough not to get bogged down in the minutia or care if we had to break the law to achieve our goals. Someone with excellent problem solving skills and good intuition...

I knew just who I needed. A sense of dread settled in my belly… I was going to have to endure so much fucking smug from my new advisor. I suppose I could use the opportunity to convert the rest of the crew as well, they really deserved better than they got in the canon timeline.

It was time to visit the Undersiders. They would have been active at this point, but not pulled any real jobs yet, I thought. It should be easy to co-opt them. If they agreed with everything, of course; I had no intention of forcing them into my service. It was time to get going, I thought, activating teleportation. The alleyway was suddenly empty.

… … …

Brian looked around the vacant loft appraisingly. There was an already constructed bathroom with shower, as well as pipe runs for kitchen appliances. Besides the bathroom, the entire place was all one big open area with artfully placed support columns. It might not be much now, but the teen could see in his mind's eye it becoming a real base of operations for the Undersiders. He grinned.

All he would need to do would be to put up a few modular walls to make rooms for storage and sleeping and hook up a sink and dishwasher in the kitchen. Maybe put in a nice home entertainment center for their downtime once the cash started flowing in. It was beginning to come together in his mind. The young parahuman's thoughts were interrupted when one of his teammates entered the loft behind him.

"Knock-knock!" said a feminine voice. Tattletale… Lisa, he reminded himself, sauntered into the large open space. She was moving around inquisitively, peeking here and there. "Nice choice, much better than any of the last three. It has real promise, and it's in a decent location besides. Should I tell the boss to go ahead with the purchase?" she asked, a foxy grin flashing.

Brian flinched slightly. He didn't know how to feel about this mysterious "Boss". Less than a month ago he had been approached by Tattletale at one of his bouncer gigs with an offer for a more permanent position, one with better pay and benefits. When he learned how much money was on the table he nearly agreed. When he found out that the Boss had connections and might be able to help him gain custody of his little sister Aisha, to help her escape the hell that was living with their mother, he had jumped on it.

Tattletale had told him that the Boss wanted to make sure that they could work together as a team first before he committed to anything. He wanted them to get a couple of jobs under their belts to get a feel for how the team was shaping up. Brian was uneasy about working for someone without meeting them, but he was determined not to waste an opportunity that could help get his sister to safety.

"Yeah, I think so," he said, "This place has possibilities. I hope that the other two like it; neither of them seemed to care enough to come along and take a look at the places we've been scoping out." The other two in their merry little band were Rachel and Alec, AKA Bitch and Regent. Both of them were broken in very different but very visible ways.

Brian had been attacked by Rachel the first time he met her, when she found out that he was going to be the leader. He had needed to be especially brutal in order to put down the snarling teen. The young man still didn't understand the content look that had appeared on her bloodied face when he helped her up after he had whooped the tar out of her. He had been leery of her dogs at first, but they had stayed clear. He had vague ideas that it had been some kind of fucked up challenge, some weird dominance thing.

Alec, on the other hand, had just nodded when Lisa told him that Brian was going to be nominally in charge of their group. Brian had hung out with the other boy several times since then in an attempt to get to know him, playing video games or just sitting around watching movies, and he had found out that there wasn't much that the fair young man cared about at all. He seemed to be content to laze about playing video games or listening to music for hours at a time. Brian thought it lucky that Alec seemed to enjoy using his powers just as much as he did his leisure activities. He still couldn't get the boy into the ring with him, though… Well, he would keep trying anyway.

Lisa was still poking around, and Brian lost in thought, when the sofa appeared. It was a beautiful white leather couch, a piece from a catalog for the wealthy, resplendent with hardwood accents and artfully placed steel rivets. It snapped into existence five feet in the air and dropped to the floor with an appropriately loud clatter. Lisa dove behind one of the support columns and Brian began to pump out clouds of concentrated darkness. Or at least he tried. No matter how hard he pushed he couldn't make the darkness go further than a foot or two from his body. He pulled a domino mask from a pocket on his cargo pants and slapped it on beneath the concentrated shadow covering his face. Reaching into his right pocket the dark skinned young man slipped a set of knuckle dusters onto his right hand, clenching it into a loose fist. He was ready. Lisa peered out from behind her column, her own slightly crumpled domino mask adorning her face.

"Something's messing with my darkness!" cried Grue. He kept trying to push out the darkness, but continued to feel overwhelming resistance. It was like a giant hand had his power in a loose but unbreakable grip.

"Some kind of Trump effect," said Tattletale. Her eyes moved back and forth quickly, considering. "No attack, though. No follow through. The couch… it's a present. For us. The person who sent it is still here. They're sitting on the couch. He… yes, he. He's invisible!" Her eyes widened, and she relaxed slightly, smiling foxily. "It's OK Grue, he's not going to attack us."

Tattletale stepped out from behind her makeshift cover, approaching the beautiful sofa. Grue followed her over from the other end of the room, moving warily. He was still holding onto the knuckleduster. Tattletale stopped a few feet from the new piece of furniture in the center of the loft. The end cushion was depressed as if there was a weight upon it. Slowly, an impossible man coalesced into being, sitting on the sofa. He was smiling warmly at the both of them. Grue tensed, but then relaxed minutely when the stranger made no move to attack.

The newcomer was enormous, at least eight feet tall. Brian felt wary due to his size alone, not even taking into account his obvious status as a parahuman. Sitting down, the intruder was the same height as Grue standing, and the leader of the Undersiders was not a man of inconsiderable height. The giant was clothed as a Japanese Samurai, though he did not appear to carry any weapons. His hair was shaped like pointed ears, and he had a big, bushy tail poking out from behind him, which was currently wrapped around the arm of the couch. The large cape had a mug in his hand and sipped from it slowly, a smile of enjoyment on his face as he did. The mug sported the words "World's Best Case 53" in comic sans bold.

"Well, well," said Tattletale, smirking. "It's a little early for housewarming gifts, we haven't even put down a deposit yet." Her eyes widened. "Wait, you knew that. What…? This really is a housewarming present, isn't it?" She scanned the still-smiling cape, looking bewildered. "Who are you?"

Brian decided that confused was not a good look for Lisa. He face had been painted in various shades of smug the entire time he had known her, and seeing anything else would have normally have been a nice change, but he was still worried and ready for a fight if need be. He was panicking internally about his powers as well, they had never failed him before. The tailed cape turned to him, and spoke.

"I'm truly sorry for suppressing your powers young man. I needed to speak with the both of you, and doing so would be much harder through a cloud of impenetrable darkness. I assure you that I mean you no harm; quite the opposite in fact. If you will agree not hear me out, I will release my hold on your ability," he said.

Gure glanced at Lisa, who was watching the newcomer with an expression of awe on her face. "It's fine Brian, he just wants to talk. And to help us. He wants to help everyone, actually?" she asked, as if it was a rhetorical question. Lisa spoke softly, "Don't you?" she asked softly, a note of dawning wonder in her voice.

"Indeed. You seem to have my measure, miss." replied the cape with a chuckle, "By the way, you can call me PomPoko. It's a pleasure to meet you both. I'm sorry for the entrance, but I really needed to speak with the both of you and it could not wait." The large man spoke in a smooth, cultured baritone voice.

Brian calmed a bit, a smidgen of tension leaving his body. It seemed there wouldn't be a fight. As if waiting for that thought to cross his mind, he felt his control over his powers return. He had to force himself not to plunge the entire city block into darkness. "I'm Gure, and this is Tattletale," said the young man swathed in a cloud of shadow. "What do you want from us?" he asked.

"He wants... to save the world?" asked Tattletale, confusion coloring her speech. She cocked her head to the side, looking at PomPoko consideringly. The large man smiled at the both of them. He waved a hand, and matching white leather chairs appeared behind the two teens. Lisa grinned and hopped up, taking a seat on the arm of her chair. She crossed her legs. Brian remained standing.

"Lets not get ahead of ourselves, shall we?" he asked. "While the salvation of the world may be my end goal, there are many considerations that need to be addressed before it can be realized. Chiefly among them the fact that I need help. Specifically, I have need of wise counsel and loyal allies to assist me. I am willing to pay in money, precious metals, favors, powers, really anything you could wish for as an incentive above and beyond doing the right thing. I am aiming to work with good people who sincerely want to help the world become a better place. You two are such people." he finished.

"Leaving that intriguing comment about paying in powers aside for a moment, why do you think two low-level criminals such as ourselves would be make good allies?" asked Tattletale. Brian noticed a throbbing vein near her temple, a frown on her face. She had mentioned the terrible Thinker headaches she sometimes got when she overused her ability; it seemed she was beginning to get one now.

"I know that you would make excellent allies, Ms. Livsey, Mr. Laborn." A look of shock crossed both of their faces. "I use your civilian names not to show that I have leverage over you, as I have no need to do such a thing, but to demonstrate that I am familiar with you both. I know your character of person. I know exactly what each of you have been through, I know where you're at motivationally, and I think you good people for the way you have dealt with the hardships that life has inflicted upon you. Also, I want to help. I want to improve your lives, and I will do my best to do so even if you decide not to take my offer. The world needs more people such as yourselves in it, and I would not want despair and circumstance to eventually rob you of your virtues." PomPoko had a very serious look on his face as he finished, and Brian couldn't stop himself from gulping.

Lisa was experiencing a full blown migraine at this point, Brian could see, and for himself, he was immobilized by shock. This PomPoko knew both of their identities, but claimed that not only did he not intend to use them as leverage, that he wanted to help solve their problems without expecting any kind of payment or commitment in return. It sounded too good to be true. Who would even claim that, though, unless there was a grain of truth to it? What did the man have to gain by lying to them versus telling the truth? It would have been better for him to keep their identities secret unless he planned to use that information to blackmail the two teens. Grue turned his attention to Tattletale, who was staring at the large man, her face now a mask of agony.

"You can… you can…" she said weakly, stuttering; she fell backward off the arm of the chair onto the seat. A drop of blood flowed languidly from her nose. Brian paled; Tattletale had never mentioned anything like this being normal.

"Please, help me," whimpered the blonde girl, now slumped over in her seat, hands covering her face, "It hurts so much..."

Pompoko moved quickly, running a glowing hand over Tattletale's head slowly, ending with a tap to her forehead. "There, that should take care of those nasty Thinker headaches for you."

Lisa sighed in relieved pleasure, color returning to her face. The drop of blood running from her nose disappeared, pulling itself back up into her nostril. Tattletale slowly peeled her hands off of her eyes. She sat up straight, blinking. "A healer as well as a power-suppressing Trump?" she asked slyly, the grin returning to her face. She seemed to be fully recovered now. "What can't you do?" she asked half-jokingly.

"What is your power, exactly?" asked Brain, his back wooden. "And what do you need us for? What would we be doing for your organization if we decided to join?" He was impressed with the abilities of this PomPoko so far, but still leary. If the cape really knew as much as he claimed then he would know what Brian would ask for as payment for working for him. If he was confident that he could get custody of his sister with the help of this new cape then that was better than maybe, possibly, getting help someday from the mysterious leader of the Undersiders.

"My powers… are complicated. Basically, I have power over powers. I have the ability to permanently create any power that I want, and to either keep it or pass it on to someone else. I can also copy, suppress, enhance, reduce, or remove the powers of others. So I guess you could say that I'm The Trump." PomPoko said while smiling a big toothy grin.

Brian's face went ashen, and he took an involuntary step back. Lisa blinked. "What?" she asked, confusion marring her features. "Seriously, that's the most ludicrous power that I've ever heard of before… And I've been on PHO. And you're telling the truth." she said in surprise. Brian sat down in the chair he had been offered earlier, stunned speechless.

A big, genuine smile which was in no way fox-like covered Tattletale's face. "Well Boss, I'm in." she said. "I assume the "wise counsel" you mentioned earlier has something to do with me?"

"Yes," said the enormous cape, "It does." He sighed. "Since arriving in this city two days ago I've made several mistakes. In truth, I've crossed moral lines that I'm very uncomfortable with for no other reason than because I could and it expedited my goals. I need some natives as allies, and chose your little group both because you're known to me, and because I know that you're good people. I need you to help keep me grounded."

"Why us?" asked Lisa, concentrating. "Why not the PRT, or the Triumvirate? They would make you a member in a heartbeat if you can have any power that you want. You're basically a super-Eidolon with no limits." She looked at him intently; Lisa could tell that he was being open with her and not attempting to deceive her ability in any way. In fact, her power was working better than it ever had before... Each insight that she received was coming through quickly and clearly, and most importantly without any pain at all.

The large cape sighed. "The PRT is corrupt... you know that, but not to what extent. The Protectorate… is more corrupt. Much more, in fact. I wouldn't let them be my conscience if I had the morals of Joseph Stalin." he said sternly.

Tattletale's eyes widened and she looked stunned. "That bad?" she asked quietly, a frown marring her freckled face. PomPoko nodded solemnly.

Brian glanced at his teammate, then looked at the large cape on the sofa. "So, what? You would run your plans past us before acting on them to make sure that they're above-board?" he asked, more confident now. A cape who might be more powerful than the entire Triumvirate put together was asking them to be his advisors… He had been a bouncer for the last few years, and sometimes pulled a minor job, but he knew that he really wasn't cut out to be a hard core criminal. Brian knew that he didn't have the "killer edge". All he really wanted was to make a decent living and find a good home for himself and Aisha. So far the only opportunities he'd been able to find that might help him with that were illegal.

"Something like that." said PomPoko. "I'm assembling an organization, like a club or organization with the goal of bettering society through both mundane and parahuman means. It's going to be open to anyone who wants to join, no matter their other affiliations. I want you two to help me run it. I also want to be able to bounce my ideas around with the both of you, and have you help me keep from hurting people or treating them like they don't matter when making plans. I'm done with that." he said with finality.

The tall cape looked at both Tattletale and Grue seriously. "It's going to be a burden, especially after I give you a rundown of what my goals are, and what the opposition is capable of, but I promise that there will be things that make up for it."

PomPoko paused. "Let me explain what my goals are, what I have done so far, and what my plans are for the future. Then you can decide if you want in or not. How does that sound?"

Both teens nodded their agreement. The large man began speaking, his audience listening intently as he laid waste to their perception of reality.

… … …

Hours passed, though the sun outside of the window didn't change position.

"I don't know how intelligent he really is." I said, responding to Tattletale's last question. "Human terms can't really describe how smart Zion is; he's completely alien. From what I know he is severely lacking in creativity and original thought, though his mental processing speed should be much, much higher than any human's. He's almost like an Autistic savant, but with multiple areas where he is a prodigy thanks to his Thinker powers. It's not an accurate comparison, but it gets close to describing what his mind is like, at least from our perspective." I finished.

"This is insane," said Brian, "He's got all of that power, but he can't come up with any novel uses for it at all? That's a large part of being an effective cape, coming up with new ways to use your power."

"That's the entire point, Brian," said Lisa, "That's what their 'Cycles' are for. They give us the powers that they have developed using something similar to Natural Selection, and we show them how to use them in new and interesting ways." she finished, collating and putting together several of the things I had explained to them over the last few hours.

"It's just so… fucked up!" said the tall boy. "If they would have just asked us… People would have done anything for that power and knowledge. We would have dedicated lifetimes to trying to discover what they are looking for. Humanity would have been united, not broken apart because of the crazy bullshit these fucking Entities caused."

Brian was quite upset, but it had nothing to do with his shard influencing him now. After explaining the bare minimum, nothing that the Golden Idiot would have cared about if he had been listening in to either of their shards, I gave the two teenagers a choice; let me make their powers shardless (along with a substantial boost) and continue explaining things, or end the discussion there. Both had thankfully chosen to let me remove their conflict engines and tune up their powers.

"Enough about Scion," said Lisa, "Let's talk some more about this 'Cauldron'...?" she asked.

"There's not much more to tell." I said sighing, "Basically, they make poor decisions due to trusting too much in their main Thinker's power, and because they value secrecy too much. They got into the mindset of doing anything at all to save humanity, and forgot to stay human. They're willing to kill any number of people if they believe that they're working against them or even if they're in the way of their plans. They would probably kill us all in a heartbeat, if it were possible, just because their main Thinker's power doesn't work on us."

"Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster..." said Brian trailing off. There was a sad note in his voice.

"Pretty much." I said.

"So, any more questions for now? If not, I believe you two have a decision to make. Are you in all the way, or should I erase your memories of the last few hours?" I asked solemnly.

"Of course," said Lisa quickly, her trademark grin in place. "I wouldn't miss this for the world."

"I'm in," said Brian, "Can you really get me custody of Aisha in less than a week?" he asked wonderingly.

"Sure, I just need to make some changes to the records at Child Services and the Courthouse, and that should do it. If your mother or father complains when you take her to live with you, then the authorities will check and see that you're the person listed as being her guardian." I advised him. "The tricky bit, and the reason that Lisa probably wasn't able to help you out already, is that many of these organizations' records are still on paper. I just need to use a long-range matter manipulation power to insert the required papers." Brian seemed satisfied.

"So now we just need to get a few more hands on deck. I'd really like to get the other two Undersiders on board as well. I don't really need them for my plans in any way, but they've been handed a fairly shitty lot in life, even worse then you two. I would like to help them out if they'll let me. Then we just need to have a meeting with my other associate to introduce you guys." I advised my two new team members.

"And we have to fuck Coil's plans up. Seriously, that guy is bad news." Lisa's eyes sparkled, a malicious grin on her face. Brian nodded, as did I. We had work to do.