2.5

-- Taylor Hebert Skitter --

I'd joked about Lisa recycling material, but this shopping trip really bore little resemblance to our first outing so long-- two months ago. I double checked the dates, disbelieving. Little less, actually. What the hell? The last week had felt like two months. Three, maybe. A week ago, my whole life had revolved around taking Coil down. It had felt impossible, sometimes, though I hadn't let that stop me. Four days ago, I'd thought my moment had arrived, a disaster he'd failed to anticipate arising from his own lair. But I'd missed it! He'd already slipped away by the time we'd arrived, but Echidna hadn't.

That had been a desperate, confused mess. I'm used to chaotic fights. Hell, I prefer chaotic fights. The harder it is to keep track of everything going on, the better, because I don't lose track. Still. A cavalcade of new capes coming in with unknown powers? Their clones, with unpredictable variations? Evil Eidolon? I hadn't felt in control at any point in the whole fight.

I'd killed. Lisa. Brian. Fucking Sophia. Myself. More. Many more. I'd always understood that my power could be dangerous. Even before I started, when I'd hated it, I'd known it could kill. I hadn't really gotten it, though, how fragile a person is, until I'd experienced it for myself. Lisa had said--

"Let's stop for lunch," Tanya instructed. She gestured at a small sushi restaurant. "This place looks good."

Lisa rolled her eyes at Tanya's back as she strode off, then smiled at me.

"Well, I guess we have our orders."

We followed her.

I hadn't even had time to think through everything that had happened in the last week. It hadn't slowed down from there.

But, getting back to the point, the differences were striking. Despite facing right onto the bay, the Boardwalk had been spared the worst of Leviathan's attentions. There were still signs. Most of the rubble had been cleared away, but the gaps were still obvious, valleys carved into an urban mountain range. The storm drain system had been thoroughly wrecked all through the city, dotting the cityscape with stagnant ponds. The people had changed, too. Not so wary nor so heavily armed as in the harder hit sections of the city, but that was the wrong baseline. The change relative to even the worst neighborhoods before Leviathan was unmistakable.

And no part of the city had been spared Shatterbird's attentions. I'd been intimidated, a little, shopping at stores my family could never have afforded. Now, lights shattered and storefront displays transformed into gaping cavities, they more closely resembled dark urban caves. Most of the bodies had been cleared away, but not all. We'd passed a bar -- the sort with shelves and shelves of proudly displayed bottles -- that had evidently been quite popular. I'd thought I was going to throw up, and Lisa hadn't looked much better. Tanya had spared it a single incurious glance.

But Brocktonites are tough. The attack had been awful, but that was yesterday. There was business to do today. Samples had been moved out front into natural light, spilling out onto the boardwalk proper in some cases. Some enterprising individuals had apparently made trips out of the city -- no easy task, from here -- to purchase walkie-talkies, radios, satellite phones, and laptops, and were now reselling them at absurd markups. I didn't doubt they'd sell out, anyway.

And, as I was experiencing, there were even a few open restaurants. It felt more than a little extravagant while large portions of the city scrabbled over shipments of rice and beans, but here they were nonetheless. How were they getting ingredients? Well, Brockton Bay's fishing industry, on its last legs before Leviathan, had seen something of a resurgence as other foods had gotten harder to come by. No clue if the native fish are appropriate for sushi, but it seemed more plausible than getting it shipped in.

Tanya had secured us a table with some difficulty. The waitress, and there was only one, didn't seem to speak much English, and she kept glancing at Lisa and me as though expecting us to take the lead. But there were only so many reasons for a gaggle of teenagers to enter a restaurant and Tanya ultimately got the point across.

Tanya and her struggles to be taken seriously had been a bit of a theme today. It was one thing in costume, with her tailored uniform, worn rifle, stained bayonet, and casual power use. She might not look like an adult, but she certainly looked dangerous. Dressed casually? Cute kid. Bit skinny. Striking eyes. Not remotely scary. And she knew it full well. Didn't stop her frustration from slowly mounting each time she was ignored or talked over.

Ironically, it was Lisa who didn't seem to get it. The first time a shop assistant had asked her what clothes to get Tanya, she'd just stared back in disbelief, like she couldn't accept that such an idiot could exist. I was starting to worry about her. The things she said about Tanya and the way she acted around her were drifting further away from 'traumatized child' and closer toward 'Nyarlathotep in a skin suit.' And while I couldn't be certain she was wrong -- hard to second guess her when she'd apparently had me figured out in less than a minute -- it was concerning that she was losing track of how things looked to everyone else.

"She doesn't speak English?" Tanya asked, settling down and flicking her eyes over the menu. "The city has a sizable Japanese population, but I don't see any reason to limit the customer base like that."

Lisa answered, "You might be surprised by some places in former ABB territory. But on the Boardwalk? Most likely the normal server just isn't available for one reason or another."

"Hmm. We're OK to speak freely, then?"

"Should be. Maybe avoid any recognizable names."

"Normal people do gossip about capes," I pointed out.

"Fair," Lisa shrugged. "Uh, can we talk about the meeting later? In private?"

Tanya didn't even glance up.

"Of course. I hadn't expected otherwise."

Lisa shot me an apologetic look, mouthing 'later.'

I had to admit that stoked my curiosity. I could be wrong, but it sure seemed like she'd gone to that meeting wary of Tanya and left terrified. But I'd trust Lisa's judgment. For now, at least.

The waitress came over and Tanya immediately pointed at her menu. When she nodded and started to move on, Tanya pointed to something else, then a third. Did she even know what the portions would be like?

"Hungry?" I questioned, pointing out my own order.

She grunted.

"The Empire is a great nation, but its maritime tradition leaves something to be desired. Seafood was hard to come by even before the war."

Fair enough.

"Are we done shopping?" I asked. "I think we've gotten you all the necessities."

"Just about. We'll stop by a bike shop before heading back."

Ah, of course.

There was a part of me -- the part where half-understood fragments of Mom's philosophy had best taken root -- that was uncomfortable with Tanya's disdain for the trappings of femininity. Then again, Mom had had some things to say about getting taken seriously as a woman in the workplace, too. In the nineties, not the twenties. In academia, not the military. And she had actually been an adult. If Tanya had wanted respect in that environment and all the people she saw did get respect were conspicuously masculine, it was easy to see what conclusion she'd draw.

More perniciously, she might interpret invitations to express her femininity as attempts at sabotage; Lisa had mumbled something about paranoia compensating for an inability to gauge others' intentions. (It was one source of paranoia among many, apparently.) Probably best I leave it, then, at least until I've earned some trust.

The server came over with our food. Tanya had ordered three types of nigiri, apparently.

"Careful," I warned. "They sometimes put wasabi between the fish and the rice. It can be pretty spicy."

She snorted.

"The rations on the Rhine were known to kill the weak of constitution. I had a man get a medical discharge for food poisoning. An A-rank mage, brought low by our own cooks! I can handle a little spice."

She picked up a piece with her hand rather than embarrass herself with the chopsticks. She dipped it in the soy sauce -- upside down, for some reason -- and popped it in her mouth. Her eyes did widen briefly, but, true to her word, she quickly adapted to--

"There's a spell for handling spicy food?" Lisa blurted, exasperated.

Oh.

Tanya swallowed, not rushing. She gave Lisa a level look.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

A solid eight out of ten. Nine, if not for the slightest hint of red in her cheeks. A valiant effort but clearly futile, given her audience. It was best just to let Lisa get her digs in in these sorts of situations. She really couldn't help herself -- she needed to win these games -- but she wouldn't get mean about it if you let her have it. We all have our--

"Right," Lisa muttered, subdued.

She looked down and started eating without another word. Fuck! I stared at her in disbelief. Glory Girl, who could tear her limb from limb? Panacea, who could start a plague at will? Hookwolf, the human blender? Alexandria, who no one in the world could have stopped had she chosen to do anything at all to her, or all of us, or the entire city? Lisa had mouthed off to all of them. She hadn't hesitated and she hadn't regretted it. I had no doubt she'd have talked back to Leviathan if he'd said anything to talk back to.

I looked at Tanya, searching for clues. She'd already forgotten the exchange, as far as I could tell. Had she even been angry? Now she was concentrating on her food, visibly pleased. What the hell was going on? I nearly demanded an explanation, but... I did trust Lisa. If she felt this was the right move -- and she obviously did feel very strongly -- I didn't want to get in her way. I would be getting my explanation, though, when we next had some time alone.

Noting with a start how far behind I was falling -- Tanya eats fast -- I grabbed my own chopsticks. Then I put them right back down, stomach rebelling, as a breeze brought in a truly horrific stench. I'd noticed the men on body collection as soon as they'd entered my range, given all the bugs they'd brought with them, but I'd been pretty successfully ignoring them until now. It wasn't as bad as the bar, but I hadn't been trying to eat then. Lisa had stopped, too.

"I think I'm done," she said.

"What?" Tanya asked, only then slowing in her attempt to inhale her meal.

Her eyes flicked between Lisa and me, confused for a couple moments before finally noticing.

"Oh, don't be such a baby. They've barely started to stink. Eat when you get the chance, or you'll regret it later."

Suiting action to words, she got right back to it.

"They were people," I pointed out, trying not to sound angry.

"Yeah?" she half asked, apparently a little baffled why I'd felt the need to point that out. "Only human corpses smell like that."

... She wasn't joking.

I almost corrected her, but that... wouldn't help. If she had misunderstood, it wasn't because she was dumb and needed it spelled out. That someone might get upset about a stranger's life ending for its own sake just wasn't a serious possibility in her mind. Who the hell raises a child like that? Well, that was an easy question to answer: the Imperial military.

Making her understand something like that wouldn't be easy. If I tried, I'd probably accomplish nothing but burning my credibility in her eyes. Which... actually made total sense. I could explain things like that to Rachel now, but a couple days after we'd met? When I hadn't really understood her? Hadn't built trust? With... everything else that had been on my mind, I'd lost the plot. She really was much better at hiding her issues, to be fair.

Well, understanding came first. Fortunately, it shouldn't be too hard to get her talking.

"How do you handle it? The way you talk, it must have been even worse on the Front."

She shrugged.

"You get used to it. You get hungry. Maybe you miss a meal or two and lose another, but starving yourself isn't easy. I'd hope anyone with the willpower to manage that would be smart enough not to try, though I suppose I should know better. Regardless, I've never seen it happen. Of course, while a few missed meals won't kill you outright, the enemy might if you're not at your best. Eat."

What enemy, exactly? It was like she just forgot sometimes that the war was worlds away. But I was understanding, not explaining. I took a bite. The smell had mostly dissipated, anyway.

"Come on, that's it? I wanted a war story."

She raised her eyebrows.

"You sure about that? Wouldn't want to put you off your lunch."

"Actually, I'd like to hear about that too," Lisa offered. "If you don't mind."

I nodded in agreement.

She leaned back and regarded us.

"Very well. Let me tell you about the Rhine."

She paused to collect her thoughts, eyes going distant.

"You'll come in by train. The Empire is surrounded by jealous neighbors and our defensive doctrine, the internal lines strategy, demands excellent rail infrastructure from one border to the other. War is expensive, understand. Ruinously so. Earlier generations were spared war on this scale because they simply couldn't afford it. So the trains run around the clock, stuffed to the brim with ammunition, guns, rations, uniforms, lumber, shovels, canteens, and a hundred other things, all just to replace what got used up. Oh, and they've each got some passenger cars, too, to replace the men that got used up."

She gave me a smile like she was sharing a joke.

"Much emptier on the way back, of course. All that payment and the purchases wouldn't fill a single train car. But you're not going back. Ever, probably, though maybe you haven't realized that yet."

"The first thing you'll notice is the smell. You wouldn't believe how it travels. Slaughterhouses are normally banned within city limits, but the Rhine Front is a slaughterhouse on the scale of a nation encompassing dozens of cities. And all the meat just left out to rot. But really, the smell's not so bad. It's foul, but it's one note, at least a distance, and you'll stop noticing it before too long."

"Next is the artillery. Just the big guns at first, a muted rumble. You might even think it's thunder, except that it never stops, and that it only gets louder as you approach. Once you're in the thick of it you'll realize there's nothing like it, nothing at all. But let's not get ahead of ourselves."

"Soon enough you'll start passing trenches. You might think you're close, now, but you're not. Defense in depth. Line after line, each kilometers long. And if you're smart you'll realize there'll be as many on the other side, where their logistics is easy and ours is hard, and you'll start to understand what victory would cost. I wonder if you can still see the scars on this world, so long after your Great War? I doubt it. The rearmost lines are well constructed and tidy. That impression won't last."

"You'll probably see your first body while you're still a ways away. Or a part of one, anyway. Artillery can scatter a person over a remarkable distance. They'll get more common as you close in. There are huge sections of the Front where there's no direction you can look without seeing the pieces of a couple dozen men littering the ground. Though of course you shouldn't look. Sticking your head up over the trench lip is a good way to join them."

I was spellbound. Not by the description itself -- I'd seen my share of bodies myself -- but by the way she spoke about it. There wasn't any harshness in her voice, but it wasn't dead either. She wasn't trying to intimidate me -- she hardly seemed to realize I was there. She was reminiscing. Telling me about a part of her childhood like I might talk about a rare trip to Boston with Mom. I'd probably sound more upset about that, to be honest.

"Other places they're so thick you'll struggle to walk without stepping on someone, though you'll give up trying before long. All sorts of people, corpses of every age from minutes to months, all mixed together and around without a care. A hand sticking up out of the mud like the rest of the person might be just under the surface, reaching up for help. A tuft of dirt-caked hair fuzzing a trench wall, where it had been repaired with whatever was on hand. Artillery craters turned into stagnant little ponds full of bobbing bodies. And let me tell you, you'll notice the smell again when you get near those."

"It'll affect you, at first. You'll wonder about them, who they were, what they could have done differently. I found half a torso with a Naval wound medal my second day. Never worked out how the poor bastard managed to die hundreds of kilometers from any ship. But you'll have bigger concerns. The artillery is a constant irregular pounding. Sometimes slow, sometimes fast, but it never stops. And even the idiots in your cohort will have seen the bodies and realized what it means by now. It wears on you."

"I don't know if it's better or worse for mages, because a mage can stop an artillery shell... if you're ready for it when it comes, which could be any moment of the day or night. And if you're willing to draw ten times the fire to your position while you fly away. There's very little they could hit that's worth more than a mage, but the people you leave behind might disagree. And all that? It's just backdrop. You'll have your own responsibilities. All those corpses don't make themselves. There's only so much you can focus on."

"What I'm getting at is this: if you ask a man on his third day on the Rhine what he hates most about it, he might say the lack of respect paid to the dead. He might say the ever present threat of random and meaningless death. He might even say the enemy. Rookies spout all sorts of nonsense."

She shook her head with a small smile and met my eyes, returned to the present.

"Ask him again on day thirty, if he makes it, and he'll tell you it's the mud. Guaranteed."

We ruminated on that for a bit, quietly finishing up.

"Do you... miss it?" Lisa asked.

That startled out a huff of laughter. She started to respond but paused. She frowned, humor draining away.

"Say one thing for the Rhine: it's not the Eastern Front."

And that was the end of that.

"Lisa said you had a full day planned? If we're done shopping, what's next on the agenda?"

"I'll have to leave by seven to make the interview, so--"

"What?" Lisa yelped. "You've already set it up? Today?"

"Yes? You weren't available this morning, so I spoke to some of Coil's people. It took some work, but we secured a nine o'clock spot on CBS at their New York studio."

Lisa had visibly paled by the time she finished, hands clenched on the table so they wouldn't tremble.

"I said not to make any big moves until we talked it over."

"We are talking it over."

"Just setting it up was a big move!" She took a deep breath, struggling to get a handle on her tone. "We need to call this off. Right now. Maybe the PRT hasn't heard about it yet."

"... How would the PRT hear about it? CBS is a private company, and they obviously wouldn't want to ruin their own interview."

"You don't get how important PR is to the PRT. They have people at CBS. And CBS would rather ruin your interview than every hero interview until the end of time."

"... Really? What happened to a free and independent press?"

"The last thirty years!" She worked to calm herself again with more success. "Look, I wouldn't have expected you to know about that. It's not public knowledge. That's why we need to talk things over. And it's not just that. We need time to prepare. And you can't go to New York. Legend is in New York."

Tanya tapped her fingers on the table, displeased.

"I have set an hour aside for preparation. And why does it matter where Legend is when he can get anywhere in seconds?"

"He can, but he doesn't. The Triumvirate only comes out when things get really bad. It's part of how they maintain the balance of power, incentivize not making things really bad. But that doesn't help if you go to him. And an hour? We need days. We need to go over everything." She shook her head. "No, we need a list of questions in advance. We need editorial control."

"I'm not a novice at this, you know. I've participated in propaganda shoots. I've presented research papers. I've addressed the general staff. I've stood for court martial twice. We need to get this done before the PRT get their act together and put out their own statement, and we need to scrupulously adhere to journalistic ethics to deny them easy avenues of attack."

"You're not getting anything you want if this turns into a cape fight at the studio! You need..."

They went back and forth for another ten minutes before settling on a course of action. I didn't know the first thing about any of it, so I kept my mouth shut, even as things got a bit heated. Dad had once told me a good compromise left no one happy, so this one must have been great.

Tanya canceled the CBS spot in favor of a small local station tomorrow. Their equipment would be wrecked, so we'd 'generously' let them use stuff we'd prepared. Hopefully, they'd discuss their plans for the interview in range of a backdoored mic, so we'd get the question list without having to ask. Even then, we'd spend four hours tomorrow morning prepping for any curve balls.

The interview would be broadcast 'live,' which apparently meant 'on a short delay' even in the normal course of events. (How the hell did Tanya know that?) That should enhance our credibility without much risk, as the local news hadn't had great viewership before Shatterbird destroyed every TV in the city. If it went well, it'd be syndicated later. If not, the equipment would mysteriously 'malfunction' and delete the footage.

It all sounded pretty good to me, for what that was worth.

"Fine, then," Tanya acceded. "That shifts the schedule around somewhat, but I think the next item is still good. Coil's people have figured out where the Chosen are holing up, and..."