Awoken 1.5

"Look, I just want you to try, okay?" God, this was frustrating. What part of the phrase 'We're gonna mess around with physics today' was boring?

Actually, I might just be a nerd.

"Look, Grant, I appreciate the support, I guess," he said, eyes on the road, "but I just don't know about this. All I've ever done is tech."

"That's why you have a problem, though. You've gotta branch out. Help me on this physics thing, and I'll help you find new directions to take your tinkering. Trust me, it's gonna be easy." I hoped it would be easy, at least.

I'd realized that Zach here had been able to do some pretty crazy stuff, in his short time in Worm. One of the more notable things, of course, being his emulation of Skitter's powers. If he could create scanning equipment that esoteric (and more importantly, hadn't done so yet), I could possibly use a variant of it, plus some of my own starting gear and a few bits of Tinkertech, to learn the fundaments of pretech and metaphysics.

I wasn't leaving him out to dry, either: he hadn't even scratched the surface of what was possible with his power. I could think of a hundred things I would be making in his shoes, and that was just with a moderate, completely non-professional understanding of physics. With his particular brand of mind-warping magic space whale bullshit at my fingertips, I would be a god.

Too bad I'm stuck with some other mind-warping space magic. Gotta work for my godhood.

We pulled up, got out, and made our way inside the shop.

"Okay," Zach said tiredly, "where do we start with this?"

I grinned widely. "We start… with some studying."

He groaned. "Why did I let you on the team?"

Cooking Ingredients...

"Okay, I might have been wrong, I'll admit it. This is some pretty great stuff."

We'd spent the past few hours watching the Bet equivalent of Youtube, trawling through science and mathematics videos. Unfortunately, Zach's workshop was not a restaurant, and as he'd informed me while we both discussed what to get, his usual fridge of snacks had broken down after he'd repaired it one too many times.

Our solution: call up Richard, and meet at Fugly's for dinner.

"I mean, the whole antimatter thing? I think I could crack the code on flipping matter to antimatter, if I gave it some thought."

"…Yeah?" I said with some hesitation. Antimatter is useful, sure, but it's also terrifying as all hell. "That's a pretty dangerous starting point, but I like it. Any ideas on containment?"

"Well, maybe using powerful antigrav fields instead of magnetic ones, or containing it in a forcefield powered by a high-grade capacitor… hmm."

I glanced forward. "Mind the road, dude. You're drifting a bit."

He corrected himself. "Thanks. Probably shouldn't think tinker stuff while driving, huh?"

"Yeah, maybe not," I said with humor. "Just remember, I could really use that scanning equipment we talked about, before you go messing around with antimatter. Might even help with that project, actually." I paused, trying to think of something else to talk about, before I triggered another distraction for my driver. "So, um… oh." I'd just thought of something on the Bakuda situation. A sensitive subject, for sure.

"What?"

"Nothing. I got an idea, but it's something all three of us need to talk about. I'll try to bring it up after." I latched on to the second pass of the thought about Uber. "Speaking of which, I've been meaning to ask… On a scale of one to ten, how much does Richard want to kick me off the team already?"

Zach laughed as we pulled into a spot. "He doesn't hate you. He's just a bit pissed off right now in general."

"You sure?" I wasn't, but I was pretty bad at reading people sometimes, especially the angry or ignorant ones. Not that he was ignorant, just angry.

"Yeah." He put the car in park, and shut off the engine. "You've only been on the team for what, twenty hours? Give him some time, he'll warm up to you a bit."

I smiled, acknowledging the point. "I'll try to keep that in mind."

We made our way into Fugly Bob's, the biggest source of clogged arteries in the Bay since the Boat Graveyard was formed. Like many things, I had a plan in mind. Making our way over to the table Richard was waiting at, I prepared myself for the conversation ahead. Things might get heated, and I needed to have a good counterargument ready.

I studied the menu in detail, deciding on a lemonade to start. When the waitress returned with our drinks, she asked, "So, what can I get for you today?"

"I'll have a Fugly Bacon with fries," Zach started, folding up his menu.

"Let's go for a Fugly Mushroom, also with fries," Richard said after a brief pause, "and can you bring us some hot sauce?"

"Sure!" She took the menus from them, then turned expectantly to me. "And for you, sir?"

"Right," I said, folding up the menu, "I'm gonna try the Challenger."

It was worth it just to hear a few nearby conversations stop. Zach and Richard had the best expressions, too.

See, the way I figured, I had a decent chance of dying in the next month, plot armor and planning be damned. After that, I still had a date with the Nine. Throw in the existential crisis of possibly being a fictional character, plus my other stressors, and you have a great setup for a slow spiral into depression. So tomorrow, I would go on a diet again, and start exercising, to bring myself to a more positive mental and physical state.

But today?

I was gonna get my face on that goddamned wall.

"The Challenger?" she said, looking slightly incredulous. "You're sure? Not the Champion?"

"Yes, I'm sure. No pickles or mustard, please." I couldn't stand pickles, or really any pickled things. Some weird quirk with their taste turned me off them.

"Yes, sir." She made the note on her pad. "It'll be a few minutes. Would you like anything else?"

"I'm good for now. You guys?" I looked to the other two, who had gone from shock to disbelief. Looking back, I smiled and said, "I think we're good for now." She nodded and walked away.

"So," Zach said, "You do realize how much food that is?"

"I have an idea, yes."

Richard continued, "And you realize this comes out of your pay if you fail?"

"I'll take that chance," I said without hesitation. Pay was very low on my priorities, now, and dammit, I was eating this burger.

Zach sighed. "Fine, then. At least we get to watch him humiliate himself."

I grinned. "I'm glad we understand each other."

We sipped our drinks a bit, not really having anything more to say. A few minutes later, their food came, and I bummed a fry or two. Pretty good. Somehow greasy, yet satisfying.

Finally, it came, in all its majestic, artery-clogging, fat-roll creating glory.

I'd taken on challenge burgers before. None were quite like this.

Four pounds of beef. A pound of cheese. A quarter of a head of lettuce, half an onion, a whole heirloom tomato. Another half-pound of bacon. A side of fries.

A seven-inch-tall, ten-inch-wide cylinder, a monument to the name of Fugly Bob.

With reverence, I picked up the knife, and cut into the oversized onion bun. Zach and Richard looked on with awe, their own burgers forgotten in the face of the Challenger's glory.

"1 hour." I raised the slice, and Richard, who had the presence of mind to get a timer ready, hovered his thumb over the button. "1 hour starts… now."

The first bite was heaven.

I'd had burgers. Great ones. The kind of burger that ruined fast food burgers for you, permanently.

This was not one of those.

This was a burger that reveled in being 'fast food'. Embraced the idea of a patty that seemed closer to being deep-fried than grilled, and managed to make it incredibly tasty, too. The meat was flavorful, the bacon thick and juicy. The veggies helped balance the fat and salt out. The bun- mmmph. Delicious.

I realized my slice was gone. Had I eaten that quickly?

"Holy shit, this is a good burger."

I cut another slice, and quickly tore into it. Meanwhile, Zach and Richard went back to their food. I soon went for a third slice, and a fourth, settling into a rhythm. A sip of lemonade to cleanse the palate, a fry or two, and another slice. I finished well over half the burger that way before I started flagging.

I began to take smaller bites, resenting the burger. I was no longer hungry, but not full either.

The third of a burger sat there, mocking me. Every bite was now a race against the clock, and against my better judgement, I continued the challenge. Another slice, larger this time, bringing the burger down to a quarter. It was still larger than your average burger, even now, but I pressed on. I'd eaten more than this before! Why was it so hard to finish?

My fries lay forgotten: they would only fill me more. My drink, too much new flavor, making it too tempting to quit. The others, holding cameras or chatting about whether I would finish in time; distractions. I cut the next slice off the middle corner, taking it apart into bite-sized pieces. After that, I took the bacon, lettuce and tomato off the remaining piece, to eat last. Picking up the cut-down sandwich, I tore into it with renewed gusto.

"Five minutes!" Richard said. The room, now mostly distracted by my Challenge, started cheering me on.

"Go! Go! Go!" one table chanted, and another quickly followed. Soon, much of this side of the restaurant had joined in. A man who I assumed was the manager walked up.

As I forced myself to finish off the last bits of the main burger, Richard called the one-minute mark. I rolled up the remaining three ingredients, which I had set aside for this very reason. The lettuce and tomato were refreshing to my palate, and the bacon kept it savory enough. I tore into the wrap, wasting no time trying to enjoy it: the end was in sight.

Thirty, twenty-five… by twenty seconds, I was on the last bite. As I bit into it, I knew the taste of victory.

"He's done it!" the manager declared, eliciting a round of applause from the crowd. As the clapping and cheers died down and they began to disperse, he asked, "What's your name, sir?"

"B-Grant," I said, barely catching myself on the fake name. I was kind of distracted by the sudden realization of exactly how full I was.

Regret. So much regret.

"Well, Grant, the meal is on us. Congratulations." He smiled. "I'll be back in a few minutes to get a picture for the wall."

You'd better get a good one, I thought with a slight grimace, 'cause I'm never doing that again.

As he left, I stared at the plate. "Guys?"

"Yeah?"

I looked up, putting on my best serious expression. "I think I'm gonna need to be carried to the car."

"Yeah, we're not doing that," Richard said.

"Aww, come on, I just bought you dinner."

"Yeah, but you also aren't paying rent," Zach followed, "So it breaks even."

I groaned. "You villainous bastards." A moment later I realized just how on-the-nose that last comment was, but they laughed it off, so I relaxed a bit. As much as I could when I'm so full oh god why did I do this to myself.

Resuming Main Questline...

We returned to the workshop, this time with Uber in tow, a phrase which I almost joked about before realizing that, A: This is an alternate universe where Uber wasn't a thing, and B: even if it wasn't, this was 2011 and Uber wouldn't have been invented yet.

God, If an Aleph version of me existed, he was still in high school. Poor bastard.

As we walked in, I remembered the things I needed Richard around for. First off…

"So, real talk for a minute, before the two of us get tinkering." I fetched some chairs.

"What's up?" Zach asked, as he and Richard caught the rolling chairs I'd sent across the room. "This about that thing you wouldn't tell me earlier?"

"Yeah," I said, rolling up my own chair and grabbing a handheld whiteboard off the wall on the way. "Okay, how do I put this… well, to be honest, there's no good way to start. We've got a problem, and it's named Bakuda."

"Oh, come on."

I tried to head him off. "Look, Richard-"

"What? You think you can just walk in here, pull up some chairs, and preach about how the Bakuda job was a bad idea in hindsight?"

"Richard-"

"No! You literally joined us yesterday, on a temporary basis! You don't get to call us out on stuff when you have no experience!"

"I may not have experience, but it doesn't take experience to see you guys are struggling! For fuck's sake, you guys were treated like a joke before you took a job from a crazy bitch like her!"

We sat a moment, huffing at the impromptu shouting match. "Jesus," I said, "at least hear me out first."

"Rich, I think we should," Zach chimed in. "Grant here has some pretty good ideas, and while I don't like hearing it put so bluntly," he said pointedly, shooting me a look, "he's not wrong."

Richard stood up, sighing. "Fine. Let me go get a beer first."

The complete one-eighty of his reaction left me feeling whiplash. I knew he had been barely functional without Leet later on, but this was ridiculous. It was like his entire mindset was as fucked up as Bitch, but if his only pack member was Zach.

This might be harder than I thought. I could still convince him of stuff, but any majority vote might fail on principle.

No, it was worse than that, I realized. All of my well-reasoned mental arguments meant jack-shit, because I'm a fucking tabletop character whose ultimate fate is ruled by unknowable dice rolls. I was going about this all wrong: I should be focusing less on talking things out, and more on trying to decrease the difficulty of rolls.

All of which meant nothing right now, because I had no time to figure out how to do that, considering Richard was returning with his beverage of choice.

"So, as I was saying… I think that, as a team, we should figure out what our plans are with regard to Bakuda. My suggestion- and trust me, I can't believe I'm saying this- is that, if she doesn't stop soon, we should do everything we can to help stop her. Ally with someone, raid ABB stuff, something." I put a hand to my face for a moment, considering my next words more carefully. "People are dying here, and this can't go on too much longer without some response. When the dust settles, you guys might get lynched for helping her start all of this. A good way for that to not happen, is to be seen trying to stop this shit."

Persuade Check(Cha): Rolled 10+0 against difficulty 9. Pass.

Richard had a scowl on his face when he broke the ensuing silence. "It makes sense, strategically. Fix our public image by trying to right a mistake. Plus, if I'm thinking about it, the gangs are probably gonna make a show of force soon, especially if the Protectorate isn't doing enough."

Finally, he was Thinking strategically. Thank Gold Jeebus for Thinker powers. Actually, no, fuck that guy, but still.

"Problem," Zach said. "You have no gear."

"I was getting to that. If we do this, you and I will have to pull some pretty late nights making gear for all of us, and Richard, I'd appreciate it if you could teach me a few things, too. I currently have, to my name, a grand total of zero fighting experience, and while I'm a decent shot with a shotgun or bow, I doubt those will come up." Actually… I had an idea on that front. Later.

"Fine. Any other big ideas?"

Besides revealing my true nature and plans, forecasting the future, and suggesting the three of us become Cauldron's R&D department? "No, I think that's it, for now."

Richard got up, and stretched a bit. "Okay. I'll put out some feelers with the other villains, keep an ear out. You guys get working, I guess. Oh, wait!" he said, snapping his fingers, "One more thing. We need a game."

We all thought about it a minute.

"I would say minesweeper, but that's not exactly something we can theme costumes off of…"

"No kidding. Hmm…"

"We could do Double Dragon! No, wait, that's two-player, shit…"

"Contra?"

"Also two-player."

"Dammit."

Zach facepalmed. "Guys, we're idiots. Saint's Row 2." He started counting off points. "Gangs, one of which looks like the ABB if nobody had powers. Crazy gear, good characters to copy, and it's not one we've done before."

Goddammit, they managed to still make SR2 in this universe? Now I wanted to play that. "I'm in, as long as we get to build the Pimp Slap."

"I'm game," Richard agreed with a grin.

"Dude, that was just bad," Zach said with a laugh. He got up and headed for the fridge

"I'm terrible at jokes, and I could still do better than that," I seconded.

"Ah, screw you, fatty," he said with a biting tone.

"Yeah, yeah, go for the fat joke," I shot back. "You'd think a guy with super skills would make better insults, but…"

"Guys, guys," Zach said as he returned with drinks, "Chill out, take a Mountain Dew, and let's get some shit built."

Amen to that.