I'd say 99% of people got the idea last chapter from what happened, but one or two did not (as ever) and I'll just say this – no, the last two chapters were not me "hating on" or "bullying" furries. If it wasn't abundantly obvious from the mocking of the protesters, etc, the furries were the good guys minding their own business and just having fun. And yes, obviously, I know furries don't want to have sex with animals. They literally 100% believed they were sleeping with other humans in disguise. Kali depicted the whole thing best when she said it was a swinger's club, because that's what it was. A swinger's club with a theme.
Blake would have been similarly freaked out if they weren't furries at all, and if random "sticky" people wrapped her up in a group hug.
And no, Blaise. No. That does not need to be an anomaly.
Cover Art: Kirire
Chapter 58
Night-time was a ritual for Blake at this point. There were a certain set of actions that she took every night; it was a gentle routine which helped her prepare for sleep and get some of the lingering stress of the day out her system.
Step one was a shower. It would have been a bath but the apartment didn't have one. Blake had, for weeks now, kept telling herself she should move out and find somewhere nicer. Money certainly wasn't an issue. There'd be a commute to work each morning, but she could also take her driving test and buy a car if she wanted to. It might as well have been part of her nightly routine at this point that she'd consider it, hyper herself up, decide she was absolutely going to the estate agents in the morning, and then inevitably decide she couldn't be bothered. She blamed her time in the White Fang for getting her too used to roughing it. Even this small apartment was a luxury compared to that.
After she'd showered and scalded her body with hot water, she'd step out, still wet, and wrap herself in a fluffy pink gown. The colour wasn't her, but the thing had been ridiculously soft to the touch and it was the only one left on the shelves so she'd grabbed it. The thing was poofy, ugly, and probably designed for a ninety-year-old woman called "Maureen" or something, but boy was it soft and comfortable.
Wrapped up, body tingling as it dried, she would make herself a warm cup of herbal tea and gravitate to the couch, where she'd turn on the night's news, then settle in to watch. Or listen. The toneless voice of the newscasters always had her drifting off, which was when she'd turn it off, slink into bed and fall soundlessly asleep.
It was a good routine. It worked. That was what made it a good routine.
Sipping her tea, she flicked on the television and brought her bare feet up onto the sofa and settled down on her side, wet hair happily dampening the cushion. I needed this, she thought, eyes softly closing. After our last job, I really needed this. Stupid Jaune and stupid horny conventions. I still don't know what to say to mom. Kali had texted her several times since, but Blake had been ignoring them.
"Don't think about it," she told herself. "Focus on sleep."
It was ten – and without fail, the jingle of the nightly news sounded. It was one of the less popular TV slots, being so late, which meant you didn't get the "good" presenters. That was perfect for her since the best presenters were the ones who could keep you awake and hooked to what was going on. The whole point of her little ritual was to tune into an anchor with a droning monotone perfect to nod off to.
Which was a damn shame because the voice that came out the speakers was not her favourite old-man presenter who could have made a double homicide sound boring. It was a familiar woman's voice she was sick of hearing during the day.
"Good evening. This is Lisa Lavender and you're watching `Tomorrow's News`."
Blake whined piteously. The voice carried and demanded attention. She brought her head up and pouted at the screen. Sure enough, the purple-haired woman was there. Great. Had her presenter taken off sick? Had he died? Had they finally realised how he kept putting everyone to sleep and fired him? She hoped not.
"Breaking News: A violent crash between two lorries and six cars will occur tomorrow on the V11 ring road at 10:46am, blocking traffic for six hours and causing the deaths of all six car drivers and one of the lorry drivers. Analysis of the surviving driver will not reveal any suggestion of dangerous driving or intoxication, and investigations will remain underway."
"Meanwhile, notorious criminal and thief Roman Torchwick will rob the store `Dust til Dawn` in the early hours of the morning, making off with approximately 150,000 lien's worth of dust. The man running the store will report that he was threatened but ultimately unharmed. VPD Police Captain Mira Ash will confront her team over the slow response and instances of failure surrounding their attempts to capture Roman Torchwick and detail new plans, which Officer Davies will later leak to Roman Torchwick for a sum of 25,000 lien."
"Finally, our big story of tomorrow: shadowy government organisation ARC Corp will begin their investigation into the disappearance of Lisa Lavender, and the appearance of `Tomorrow's News` with the view of silencing the program and preventing the spread of a precognitive news services." There, on the screen, a picture of her and Jaune, in uniform, was shown in a room surrounded by television sets. Jaune looked more than a little angry, while she looked concerned. "The investigation will be ongoing. That's all for tomorrow. This is Lisa Lavender signing out."
The show fizzled out and went to adverts, then blinked off as Blake hit the red button on her remote.
Well…
There went her nice little routine.
Her scroll angrily vibrated a second later. Blake answered it. "I saw it."
"Every freaking person awake in Vale just saw it!" Jaune sounded panicky. "My office! Now!"
Jaune was pacing the inside of his office like a trapped Beowolf. His hands kept shaking, and he glanced occasionally at his scroll, bit his lip, then continued on. Timothy, more than capable of sensing something was wrong, was curled up over Blake's legs rumbling contently as her hand rubbed his head. It was something to keep her hands busy because, in all honesty, she was no more relaxed than Jaune.
"Is this another temporal anomaly? Is the world going to end if we deviate from what she says?"
"No. I don't think so. Lisa used the words precognitive news service herself, and I think that's what it is. The thing about temporal anomalies is that you don't normally realise you're in one because they don't tell you what they are. They just change things. This is… This is predicting the future. Or making it happen."
"Making it happen?"
"We can't assume anything right now. Maybe she can tell the future, but maybe – maybe she's causing these things to happen. Making the news, as it were."
"But then how would she know about us?"
"I don't know." Jaune slapped his hand into his face and dragged it down. "I don't… Okay, it's probably the precognitive. We'll keep an open mind on the other. This is bad, Blake. It's bad enough someone can tell the future without being psychopathic enough to broadcast it. That kind of knowledge can't become public. It's too dangerous."
"Because it's an anomaly."
"Not just that," said Jaune, shaking his head. "Imagine that car crash tomorrow. Imagine we don't close the V11. Think of all the people who will be curious to see if this is true or not. They'll go there to watch and see if it happens. They might make it worse! They might get caught up in it!"
He wasn't wrong. People wouldn't immediately believe this, so they'd want to verify the one thing they could. The robbery was too early to stop, and the shadowy government organisation was too vague and conspiracy-sounding. A car crash, though? That wouldn't be too hard to verify. That many people, though. It'd be dangerous. A real push situation. If one person fell onto the road then they'd create the very accident Lisa predicted.
"That's not even getting into what people would do to have this kind of power at their command. Imagine being able to predict the stock market, or predict crimes before they happened, or Grimm attacks, or horse races or… or anything, really. Every criminal group on Remnant, every government, every law enforcement agency and every single person with betting money is going to want her." He threw his hands in the air. "Lisa Lavender just started an information arms race, and she's the only provider. Consider that for a second."
Blake didn't have to. "That's… That's really bad. Holy crap. The White Fang would kill to have her."
"Forget that. Atlas will kill to have her. And guess what – they, along with visitors from every kingdom – are here in Vale for the Vytal Festival. They've got the perfect excuse to try and find her. This is bad. This is really, really bad. We need to find her. We need to find her before anyone else does."
He dashed for his desk, yanked his jacket off the back of the chair and swung it on. Blake gently shooed Timothy off her legs and stood. The spider, already tired this late at night, trundled off to the web it had strung in Jaune's wardrobe. Jaune packed his laptop down, picked up his scroll, stuffed it in his pockets and then grabbed the keys to their "ghost hunter's" van. Blake sighed. "Where are we going?" she asked.
"The broadcasting station. We'll start there."
/-/
It was technically tomorrow when they arrived and were allowed in, the clock having ticked past midnight. The receptionist on the night shift had tried to fend them off since they had neither an appointment nor were they on any list of accepted visitors, but Jaune had eventually managed to get someone from the Council on the line and passed his scroll onto the well-dressed woman, who blanched and let them in, giving them badges on lanyards marked with "VPD-SI"; the Vale Police Department – Special Investigations unit. Blake supposed that was their cover for the day.
While they entered an elevator, Jaune was still on the line. "Yes, I need the V11 ring road closed tomorrow – or today. No, I don't care how hard that is. Call it emergency roadworks or something. We need to discredit that story right now! I want people arriving to check the veracity of it to see the whole area under routine roadworks and dismiss the news as a PR stunt. No, I'm not saying she was right about things." Jaune grimaced. The person on the line must have expressed interest in Lisa's new anomalous powers. Assuming they were hers; it could also be an anomalous item, like the 8-ball, but this time actually telling the future. "It's a safety measure, councilman. We have no reason to believe she's accurate in any way. Please leave this to us but make sure that road is closed!"
He hung up and leaned back against the elevator wall. "They're already interested in her," he said, confirming her suspicions. "Not a single prediction has been proven true and they already want her. This is going to be a disaster."
"You think they will come true, then?"
"That picture was of us in a room filled with televisions. This is the broadcasting station. I bet there'll be a room just like that here. And there's no way for to know about us without seeing the future in some way. ARC Corp is known by a select few at every station, but it's mostly the people running the place. They'd never dare tell a journalist or reporter. Too much risk them leaking it for the story of a lifetime."
"Then we need to interfere in the predictions, don't we?" The thought was more than a little daunting. It would be hard enough tracking the woman, but if they also had to run around Vale stopping things from happening then it would only get worse. "There's no way we can do everything at once. Have you considered calling Ruby?"
He grimaced. "I'd rather not involve her."
"Jaune, this is bigger than her causing problems one time."
"I know. I…" He sighed again. "Argh, why is this happening now of all times? What do we get all the bad anomalies? Why can't we have a serial killer anomaly or something? At least that would be easy to cover up. Not precog news." His scroll blared again. "Jaune her- No, we're on the case. Yes, we know of it. We're at the broadcast tower." His face drained of blood. "No, no, no, that won't be necessary. We can handle this. We're going to shut down the broadcast at the source- Yes, we're then going straight after Lisa Lavender. The Containments Office can- Alive? Really? I… Uh, yeah. Of course. We'll do our best. No, no. We don't need them here. I- Okay, yes, that's fine. Understood."
He hung up, turned to the wall of the elevator, and began banging his head against it.
"That was your father, wasn't it?"
"We have three days to fix this before he shoves the Fist Office so far up Vale's ass the city will be choking on it. Better yet, we're to take her in alive if at all possible."
"Why? Not that I'm against it, but why would they allow that?"
"Turns out even we want the precognitive hidden away in our basement where we can use her." Jaune smiled and waved his hands as if to say this was so far out his control as to be funny. "Great. There's no way this will backfire on us." The elevator door pinged open and he strolled out with her at his side."
The studio was already busy, even at this hour. People were running around and there was a lot of shouting. A lot of shouting. Blake couldn't imagine it would normally be like this at before one in the morning. The phones were ringing constantly as well. There was an elderly man in a blue pinstripe suit haranguing a panicked-looking man at a desk. "Find out what the fuck happened and make sure it doesn't happen again-"
"Mr. Wade, it's the Council."
"I don't care if it's the easter bunny!" he yelled at a woman nearby. "Tell them I'm busy!"
Jaune nodded to the man and approached with Blake beside him. "Ahem. Sir. We'd like to ask you a few questions."
The man snarled and rounded on them. "Who the hell are you?"
"Special Investigations unit. VPD."
"T-They're the ones from the broadcast," stammered the man trapped at the desk. "A-ARC Corp, wasn't it?"
"Their badges say VPD, Steve. Don't be a fucking idiot." The Director shoved the man's chair back at the desk. "Fix this while I deal with the police." He jerked his head. "With me." He led them to an office and inside, then closed the door. "You two couldn't have exercised even a modicum of fucking subtlety, could you? I knew ARC Corp would be coming the moment that broadcast happened, but I hoped you'd have the sense to come in quietly and not as good as confirm the news story to my entire crew. You have any idea how hard it's going to be to keep them all quiet now?"
Ah. He had a point there, and Blake winced. Jaune did too, but he pushed on regardless. "We want to know where Lisa Lavender is."
"You and half of fucking Remnant. I've been fielding calls all morning – and shit fucking news, but that dust store? It's been robbed. I wish Torchwick had got the fucking memo and backed out, because that's two instances of the news confirmed now, and it hasn't been three hours since it aired." He yanked out a folder and tossed it on his desk. "That's her employee records. Take 'em. Most recent news is her figures were down and we had to make the call to move her to ten O'clock news, so she was meant to be on there, but she didn't show up last night. That wasn't broadcast from here, and we couldn't shut it down. Believe me, we tried the moment we realised our show wasn't airing as it should. We tried everything from overrunning it to pulling it off the air to putting the entire channel into administration mode. Nothing worked. Or rather, it ran over all that. We turned everything off. Screen should have gone to our emergency work screen with a promise of being back soon, but it didn't." He poured himself a shot of whiskey from a bottle on his desk and downed it. "Whatever that was, it wasn't done from here. I can tell you that."
"I assume you've tried to call her."
"Of course I fucking have. I've tried to bring her in so I could wring her freaking neck. Not answering. Her number is in there so you're more than welcome to try."
The man poured himself another shot. He was aggressive and rude, but she assumed it was because of how bad things were right now, or the staff out there would have been used to it all. He must have been under just as much pressure as them. Jaune pushed the file into Blake's hands and said, "I want you to investigate her home. Do what you have to and find anything you can. I doubt she'll be there, but, if she is, arrest her. I'll stay and try to piece things together here."
They were splitting up. It made sense. There was too much ground to cover, and way too much riding on this. "I'll get on it. Are you going to talk to Ruby?"
"I'll consider it."
"Jaune-"
"I said I'll consider it," he ground out. "Just go."
Blake shook her head and hurried away. On the way out, down on the ground floor, she walked by six police officers rushing into the building. It looked like they were on the case as well – either to try and confirm the truth of their apparently crooked cop, or because the Council wanted Lisa Lavender found and arrested. There were others too, around the building. It was hard not to see the people watching the doors but not moving anywhere. People were loitering, and more than a few vans and cars were parked nearby with people sitting around them smoking or talking.
When she pushed out the doors, hundreds of eyes were on her, and then dismissed her. They want back to their cigarettes and conversations but kept their attention on the door just in case. Blake didn't see weapons, but she could assume there were many hidden under jackets. Had Lisa Lavender walked out or tried to walk in those doors then she couldn't help but think there'd be at least ten different people trying to kidnap her at once.
Blake flagged down a taxi instead.
/-/
The door to the suburban home crunched inward and smashed around and off the back wall, banging loudly. Blake's momentum carried her in, and rubbed her shoulder and pushed the door shut behind her. It didn't click, well broken now, but it might at least look it from a distance. Technically, she could pick a lock, but it would have taken time and she'd have been hunched at someone's door in broad daylight in a suit. Better to take a quick look for witnesses and then knock the door in.
No noise from inside. Blake let out a breath and moved further into the small house. It was neatly set up, and in a nice part of the city. Mostly urban, but a residential area with a lot of identical homes with small front gardens. It must have cost a lot for location alone. There were knickknacks around the house; little portraits of family or friends, and some day-old flowers with the petals just beginning to curl.
The living room was a mess, however. Blake's nose twitched at the smell of leftover takeout – there were pizza boxes, but the mell was from rotting kebab meat. There were also a lot of beer cans around the place. More than looked healthy. They were stacked in places, like the homeowner had tried to make little towers, but later, as she got more drunk, she must have thrown them wherever there was space. Dark stains had seeped into the carpet in places.
Of Lisa Lavender, there was no sign. And it didn't look like she'd been in the house for at least a day.
Blake quickly texted Jaune to say Lisa was AWOL and that she'd investigate the home. His response came as a thumbs up emoji seconds later, and then a longer text reading: "Party here. Half city shown up to demand answers. Looking to take whole channel off air. Prevent 2nd broadcast tonight. Keep me posted."
A second broadcast. Good lord. At least they had time until ten. Blake scanned the living room and moved into the kitchen, where she quickly noticed a stack of letters on the counter. Many of them were open and, worryingly, there was a knife there. That wouldn't have been too much a cause for concern if it wasn't bloody. Gently placing that aside, she eyed the papers. Some of them were bills in the mail, including rent, but they were announcements to say the money had been taken successfully from her account. None were threatening or claiming she was overdue, as her job must have paid quit well.
One of them she found in the trash, however, had red marks on the corners. Bloody fingerprints. It had been scrunched up into a tiny ball, and she had to carefully unfold it on the side so as not to tear it. The printed writing inside was barely legible for all the creases, but she could make it out.
Dear Lisa Lavender,
We regret to inform you that your appeal has been denied. We, at the VPN, use a quantitative system to determine ratings and postings, and it is undeniable that your ratings have been below the average for the third month running.
As a result, your role in th 6 O'clock news has been suspended and you are being stationed on the 10 O'clock news, starting from the following date.
Yours Sincerely,
Robert Wade
C.E.O
Beneath that was handwriting in a more casual style, and with more casual words. That read:
Lisa,
Don't take this so personally. Ratings fluctuate and it's not the end of the world. We'll get you some remedial training and see if that doesn't bump you back up. These things happen and sometimes it's only a month or two before someone's back on the prime spot. You might just be having an off few months. Take a week off to de-stress and relax. You've got this.
Robbie.
P.s. I've spoken to accounts and we've agreed to freeze your wages at the old rate for 3 months. Give you time to get back into the groove without losing pay. Drop in if you want to talk. My office is open.
Blake set the letter down on the side once she'd finished. The guy really was a lot nicer when he wasn't running around swearing and screaming because the city was coming down on him. Come to think of it, he mentioned Lisa being busted to the 10pm slot. It looked like she'd taken it a lot worse than it actually was, though if she really did lose it forever then she'd have probably taken a pay cut in time.
Taking a photo of the letter on her scroll, she checked the rest of the kitchen and found some white powder on another side. Lines of it. Blake touched them with her gloved fingers and took a tiny sniff. It didn't smell of anything, and she wasn't daring enough to take a lick. It wasn't sugar or salt by texture alone, and she doubted Lisa Lavender was making lines of flour for the world's smallest baguettes.
"I always heard it was high-class people who were mostly likely to turn to recreational drugs," she said to herself. "They have money aplenty to try every other vice, and their lives get boring after a while."
She wondered if hers should count as that, as well-paid as she was, but the constant pressure of one anomalous case after the next probably counted as a higher rush than any drug. Either way, it looked like Lisa was up to lose the position she'd worked for, and that she hadn't taken it well. An anomalous item wasn't out of the question, but she'd seen a case like this before in San Valeo, hadn't she? The woman running the tour boats who lost her livelihood when the resort nosedived.
But if Lisa had undergone a transformation, then where was she? And why had she looked so normal on the television? Blake eyed the one in the living room again. Lisa had to have known she'd be in trouble for this, so it wasn't too unreasonable to think she might have pre-emptively made a run for it. The problem was where? And how she was accessing the channel. It wasn't the broadcast station, and she highly doubted it was the CCT in Beacon or Ozpin would have captured her by now. A good hacker could, in theory, break into the system, but she doubted a professional presenter would have such a skillset.
"Maybe we could react out to Coda and see if she could track it."
It was a thought. The anomalous code-turned-sapient-being might not like Jaune and ARC Corp, but she, along with the other anomalies living peacefully here, understood that there had to be some degree of cooperation to keep the more militant members of ARC Corp out. If Lisa threatened to reveal them, then it was in their best interests to put her down.
The only problem was that Coda had hacked Blake's scroll in the past to talk to her and hadn't left anything in the way of a caller ID, a contact, or any way to activate a previous call and reach her. Her only choice was to head to Alistair's and hope to find someone who knew her there. Blake texted that to Jaune: "No sign of her here. Was going to head to Alistair's. Want to see if can reach Coda and get her to hack or trace the broadcast."
Jaune's response was to call her. Blake answered quickly. "I'm here."
"Good call on Coda," he said. "I'll forward you Gem's number – he can put you in touch. Tell me what you've found so far." He listened as Blake ran through her findings. "That checks out with what we have here. Wade says that Lisa had been struggling for a few months now. Nothing concrete, but she lost the `pizazz` whatever that's supposed to mean. Apparently, she took it really hard when she was busted back to a weaker timeslot, but he says almost everyone who faces that does. It's a competitive market and everyone fights tooth and nail for the best slots."
"It looks like she handled it really badly from what I'm seeing. Do you think it's enough to set off a transformation?"
"It's our best lead at the moment, isn't it? The question is where she's hiding. I'm going to give this place a thorough look over. You get in touch with Coda. I'll reimburse however much you have to pay her, just see what she can do to help and stress how bad this will be for them if their identities get leaked. Mention that the Fist Office are coming in three days if we don't clear this-" There was a commotion on the other end of the line. Raised voices. Jaune's voice joined them, but muffled, like he'd taken the scroll away from his mouth. "What do you mean? No. Shut it down! Shut it down right now! Pull the plug – I don't care! Shut the whole building down! Shit." His voice returned to normal levels. "Turn the TV on now! It's happening again!"
Again? Why? This wasn't her timeslot. Blake dashed for the remote on Lisa Lavender's crowded coffee table and turned the TV on. She didn't even have to find the right channel, Lisa having left it on her own channel.
Her face appeared on the screen, smiling brightly.
"Good morning everyone. This is Lisa Lavender with `Tomorrow's News`. Our main story tomorrow involves the spectacular fallout from events taking place today. On Walker Street, an altercation between rival criminal organisations searching for Lisa Lavender will explode into violence, leaving twenty-six gang members dead, and killing three pedestrians unable to escape in time, including one girl aged just six. Our thoughts and prayers will be with her and her family when she dies."
"Moving on, a continuation from today's story will see Mira Ash commission a team to hunt down Officer Geoffrey Davies, accused of being a mole for criminal, Roman Torchwick, who fled his home this morning. The manhunt will eventually bring the team to a warehouse on 6th Iron St, where a brief shootout will result in Officer Davies take two hostages and hole himself up. Hostage negotiation teams will be brought in."
"In Beacon, Vytal Festival organisers will finalise the installation of a rotating and slots-determined arena system on Amity Colosseum. This system will see variable and random battlegrounds selected for teams. While completely random, this system will prove controversial with pundits and businesses in Vale, who will argue, after seeing this story, that the system takes skill and agency away from competitors and places it in the hands of fate. They will argue this impacts gambling and betting on the fights because favourite combatants will be at the mercy of a random battlefield that might nullify them or provide an unfair advantage to other teams. Headmaster Ozpin will hold an emergency meeting with faculty members of Beacon, and General Ironwood of Atlas, where they will sit and drink coffee and play boardgames and pretend they are having a real meeting, then present a press release stating that, after great deliberation, they have decided to keep the random arena scheme."
"Finally, shadowy government organisation ARC Corp will continue to search for Lisa Lavender, after employing black-hat hacker `Coda` to isolate the source of the broadcasts. Attempts to locate Lisa Lavender will, however, be stymied by an altercation and subsequent running battle with undercover operatives from the Kingdom of Atlas, serving under General Ironwood, who will be seeking to capture the precognitive news service to utilise her for the benefit of Atlas. Unfortunately, the result of the battle cannot be reported due to anomalous interference. That's all for today. This is Lisa Lavender with `Tomorrow's News`. Signing out."
The channel blinked back not to adverts, but to an emergency screen with a static message reading: "This channel is experiencing difficulties. We will be back soon." They must have tried to shut it off again, only for it to refuse.
"Blake…?"
"I'm here. And I saw it."
"Get onto Coda. I think I need to have a word with General Ironwood and remind him of his place in these matters." Jaune sounded furious. "We're lucky Lisa didn't mention anomalies past the interference at the end. People will just think she means TV interference."
"What did she mean?"
"It's probably me. Lisa can predict ARC Corp because you're in it and you're with me, but I'm anomalous so her powers shouldn't work perfectly on me when I'm alone. That she couldn't predict the outcome must mean I had to break out my powers in this fight. That's to be expected if Atlas agents brought guns with them. I'd have died otherwise."
That might be it, but Blake couldn't help but think it might also have been the book at her side. It felt warm to the touch, almost like the anomaly within was trying to signal or communicate with her. As if it had an offer it wanted to make her. A deal. Blake wasn't sure how she knew all that from an increase in temperature, but she could also feel a chuckle in the back of her mind. It had implanted the thought and then confirmed it just now.
No. Blake shook her head. This was… well, this wasn't "under control" by any stretch of the imagination, but it also wasn't a situation where she needed to trade something for power. Maybe the future fight with Atlas had been, especially if Jaune was hurt or transformed, but hopefully now it wouldn't happen.
"What about the road accident?"
"It's too early to say. It'll be a few hours before that time comes. The road has been closed off – but now I'm worried she might have factored that in, and that maybe the crash will happen BECAUSE we closed the road."
"We can't second-guess ourselves like that. We need to-" Blake's scroll buzzed as a message came through. It overtook her screen.
Coda here. Hang up on him and we'll get started.
Huh. It looked like she'd seen the broadcast as well. It was probably enough that Lisa mentioned her by name to get the AI involved; even knowing she existed made Lisa Lavender a serious threat to her, especially when dropping the word "AI" would doubtless have Nicholas Arc coming to Vale with murder on his mind.
"Coda is calling me. I have to go."
"All right. Pay her whatever she asks – we need help."
Blake agreed and hung up, and she didn't need to press a button or accept a call because Coda overtook her scroll and forced it to connect on its own. "I'm here, Agent Belladonna. I saw the broadcast as well." Coda's voice sounded frustrated, and very human, even if she was but a machine. "I am prepared to nominally waive my fee, and my dislike for your group, in this case. If Lisa Lavender decides the existence of anomalies in Vale would make for a good story, she will tell it, and it will be war in the streets."
"Good to hear." Blake took a deep breath. "What can you tell me?"
This chapter was actually inspired by "The Onion" and their youtube video about the Folsom Dam disaster, which is a very fun clip well worth checking out. It's years old but I watched it this weekend and chuckled. Basically, it's making fun of a US government for not repairing a dam because of the cost, and instead just putting a far smaller amount of money into making a memorial for the deceased, even though the accident hasn't happened yet and no one is dead. The quotes in it are brilliant.
"This disaster will have been preventable. The signs are all here now. And yet no one will have done anything about it. As a result, I am tendering my resignation to come into force on the day the dam bursts."
Aside from making me laugh, the way it reported a future disaster made me think it could be an interesting anomaly. A "future" news as it were.
Next Chapter: 26th June
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