Foster's Imaginary Friends With Benefits (Part 2)

(Game date: 12/10/2020) 

"You've come to play as well?"

It was an anthrodrone, of course.  Child-size, and incredibly realistic.  Had to be a custom job.  Housing something alien, and dangerous, and it was just standing there, making chit-chat.

Okay.  I'll play that game.  "Nice place," I opened.  Let no one say that I can't be suave.

"Yes,"  Mistress Dawn giggled.  "I do like what you've done with it."   

So.  The Sunchild was fully aware that I'd triggered the drone attack, and was allowing it to happen, for its own purposes.  

No one was making a move yet, though they had spread out, jockeying for position.  I decided to try for a veiled threat.  "Shame about the spot on the rug," I said, indicating with my eyes exactly the place the drone was standing.

Its rejoinder was swift, and equally threatening.  "All will be cleansed, soon enough."  

Ms. Blackrose could no longer hold in her frustration.  "This is it?" she demanded, with a fair amount of disbelief.  "This is the Sunchild?"

"One of them," Katrya snapped, and then she was off.  

A gleam arose in her eyes as she ran, with increasing spead, straight at the pint-sized terror.  Her claws opened several gashes in its body, tearing through artificial muscle, and still the thing did not take any offensive action.  It merely looked down at the damage, and remarked off-handedly, "Foster would not be pleased."

I don't believe that Foster's pleasure was the top priority in Aru's mind when he unleashed his own attack.  As Ms. Blackrose fired her antique pistol, opening another rent in droid flesh, the other foxkin leapt into the fray.  Unfortunately, either his mind wasn't completely on the battle, or the drone body was a bit too fast for him.  It evaded every swipe of his claws.

As for my own mind, our little round of verbal chess had had a calming effect on me.  It shouldn't have done, but I wasn't about to scorn the unexpected respite.  Especially as it had come bearing some interesting gifts.  "Jane," I said, in tones hopefully pitched for her ears alone, "can you simulate a Matrix blocker on it?"

"Simula-... I can try?" she said to my back.  I was running (though not nearly at foxkin speed) toward Little Miss Sunshine, summoning up my personal reserves of Power.  I found that peculiar mental frequency that my sorcerous hacking experiments had revealed, and pushed a single command through it:  Remove your Power Cells.

The drone started to obey.  It reached for the place where an access panel should be.  Then it started to laugh -- a very cruel laugh, for all its girlish tones -- as if it had just noticed what was happening.  "You
want the drone's Power source removed?" it said.  "Alright then..."  Then the access panel opened, and a bright flash of light erupted from the port. Good planning paid off, and flare compensation kicked in, so we got to see the drone dropping to the ground, and a glowing humanoid figure emerge, floating above it.  Otherworldly-light burned in its eyes and mouth, and long, wispy hair flowed all around its head.  You know...very evil queen-ish.  And still very unconcerned.

For all the damage that Katrya had done to the drone, none of it seemed to have carried over to this thing.  The true battle was now engaged.

The next sally from our side was not the most encouraging.  The youngsters opted for magical attacks.  Ryatt's lighting was simply...blocked, or grounded out, and I couldn't tell whether EllieRock's force "bullets" had any real effect.  Varfana's very solid bullet embedded itself in the very solid wall, while Vamir drew his rapier and charged, only getting halfway there before the Sunchild made its move.

A very strange move, indeed.  The creature raised a hand, an expression of concentration upon its face, and then a psychic roar of frustration passed through our minds (I experienced it at the time, and asked everyone later).  Jane wiped sweat from her brow, an equally intense look upon her visage. That voice, like tearing static, rasped out "Very well, I will simply kill you myself."

A-ha!  It had just tried to do something - reach out over the Matrix for assistance of some sort - and Jane had blocked it!  Not bad for a first try!

So much for the good news.  The bad news came an instant later, when the Sunchild lanced out with a flare of light, directly at Aru.  He did not fall, but he appeared very ill for a few moments afterward.  

More bad news:  In this form, the being was much harder to fight.  Everyone had trouble landing any kind of blows on it.  Even Katrya, whom I have personally witnessed gleefully punching a Golborn, only seemed able to successfully damage it minimally.  And Jane was beginning to show the strain of keeping it contained.

I was tempted to add my own feeble efforts to the melee.  The thought flashed through my brain, quickly, and it went like this:  I have a high-powered plasmer rifle, but I don't know whether the Sunchild will be hurt or helped by the energy.  I have a survival knife, but minimal skill with it.  But...right here I have an inert drone, which the Sun-baby (Katrya's term) cannot control, and some spare Power cells, and my brain - the best weapon of all.  Heh.  

I slipped a battery into the empty compartment.  While it was powering up, I told Ryatt to assist Jane - lend her Power, if he could.  I tried to calculate how long it would take to install the complete martial arts package as the rest of the team slowly whittled the increasingly frustrated Sunchild down.  Every time it lanced out with another bolt of greasy light, I wondered whether I would be the next target.

With Ryatt's help, Jane seemed much less in pain, much more in control.  And the drama queen from Hell became increasingly angry.  If we were unable to land any killing blows, so was she, and she had no healing Ellie on her side.  

I was still trying, and failing, to gain user access to the drone when the soulless soul of Mistress Dawn shouted out in its horribly grating voice, "Your time will come!" ... and then it vanished.

I was stunned.  I think we all were, but I was the only one shouting obscenities and pounding the floor.  (Okay, that may not be true -- I heard some growling, but I don't speak foxkin.  For all I know, Katrya may have been calling Mistress Dawn a son of a motherless goat.)  I was so worked up that I didn't even notice a young woman run past us, screaming.  That may have been what stopped the growling; Katrya followed her out to the parking lot to check on her health.

Compared to myself, Vamir was the picture of composure (and optimism) as he asked, "So these things can just disappear whenever it wants?  That's going to be very difficult to kill when we face one again in the future."  

I calmed down enough to explain.  "I had hoped that, by blocking it from the Matrix, we could prevent its escape."

"I'm sorry, Zeke. Whatever power it used to escape, it doesn't draw on the Matrix for that," Jane Doe apologized, but I waved it off. 

"Not your fault."  I picked myself up off the floor.  "Let's get to the safe room.  That's priority right now."  I left the child sex-bot standing where it was, and followed Aru to a nearby door.  Less than five minutes had passed since we left the ship.  We could still hear a few screams, although the sound was lessening.  

Faced with the biometric lock, there was a brief pause.  Aru piped up.  "Hmm.. May I try?  It's possible it didn't change from one of my parents."

Up until recently, I'd have considered these unhackable without removing the faceplate.  Jane had assured us that she had a good chance of duplicating the Sunchild's trick, but I hesitated to ask it of her after what she'd just gone through.  Of course, that left Vamir's explosives, as he was quick to remind us, but that was truly a last resort.  I shrugged.  "Worth a shot."

The foxkin placed his palm against the sensor.  After a moment, the door slid open.  Slick as a peach smoothie.  (Aru told me later that it tickled, a bit.)  That lock, so far as anyone knew, had never been keyed for Aru.  

I'm not sure what my expectations were from the room beyond this door, but it fulfilled none of them.  It was large and round,  a raised platform in the center, tables to either side, stairs leading up to an overlooking ring.  Rune-covered altars were positioned around the upper level, with runes inscribed into the floor around the central dais. Scorch marks decorated the central altar and the tables, marking places where something was burned.  Upon closer inspection, we found the remains of mixed materials near those scorches, indicating that the burning was recent.  Throughout our search, Ms. Blackrose kept repeating that the entire room seemed familiar, but she, like the rest of us, had never entered this room before today.  She ran a finger through the ashes and sniffed, then said, "Books."

All eyes turned her way.  "There were books here. And now I remember why this feels familiar - this room, it's shaped the same as... as the library in the Crystal Palace."

Aru's face fell.  "If there were books, there was the chance for paper records that would help.. Now, that's all gone."  He sighed.  "Father would be furious."

I tried to cheer him up, and to move things along.  "On the other hand, we can make a forgery from scratch.  Let's get cracking."  

But Cecily held up a hand.  "She... it... couldn't destroy everything. Look at the runes..."

I looked.  Yes, they were runes.  I could make no sense of them.  Neither, apparently, could anyone else, for I was not the only one to ask her what they said.  She did not respond immediately, instead tracing a hand around the markings that surrounded the central platform.  I heard her murmuring, almost subvocalizing, "It's been so long..."  I wondered, not for the first time, how much history resided between those pointed ears of hers.  It would be worth a case of the finest alcohol that my father (not me) could afford to try to persuade her to just speak into a recorder for approximately a month.

Finally, she spoke.  I'm going to put the audio of the original language here, because I'm fairly certain that I cannot duplicate it with any grace.  (No video, sorry - that room is not for public viewing unless the Nepetas say otherwise.  Some trusts are not to be violated, even if others have done so.)

Audio begins, Cecily Blackrose speaking:

"Sor aerari air aerardoraer thys eil shia si Chys vaedi sai maraendres si caer eindral paerelol."

 Audio ends.

Fortunately, she did not expect us to understand the spoken language any more than the written.  She immediately translated:  "This estate... is established for and by the Fox people, to... " She paused, then blurted out the rest, her eyes going wide, "to safeguard the keys against destruction!"

Her words caused a minor pandemonium, so I quietly excused myself and finished taking control of that pint-sized drone.  I had a hunch that the contents of its memory would prove useful over the next few days.  I managed to get it to follow me, at least.  

When I got back, Aru had almost grasped the concept that Chystari manor belonged to his family (the root word "Chys," from the recording before, translating to the "Fox people," or "foxkin."), and was trying to work out just how the Fosters wound up running things.  

Cecily, on the other hand, still seemed stunned by the mention of the keys.  "The keys, the... Weapons of Power, the Samaritans wielded them, long ago. If they're here..." She was speaking aloud, at a normal tone, but I'm not sure anyone understood.  

I was about to ask for clarification, or at least ask that people take a number for topics, when Katrya verbally assaulted me.  "Keys, keys... BREAD. Zeke, the bread..!"  And that statement ... kind of derailed the conversation.  

I must admit that it took me a few seconds to process it, and I was there when it happened.  "The key bread recipe," I said.  

Then Ms. Blackrose answered Aru's question about the Fosters, which explanation he did not hear at all because he had become fixated on the non sequitur of bread.  Some time in the future, when we are all safe and happy, I shall play that sequence and we will all have a good-natured laugh.  At this time, however, it did not seem quite as funny, and I bade Aru sit down.  He did so, with excessive vigor.  For now I will try to straighten what was actually quite a tangled thread.

The word Foster, in the ancient runic language, was a title for caretaker, or steward.  Essentially, over the generations, the "fosters" managed to switch roles with the foxkin owners of the manor.  In short: they stole it.  All we had done today, was take the first steps toward returning it.

As for the bread: some days before, Ms. Peach Chef had shared a recipe for "key bread."  A quite
incomprehensible list of ingredients, but still simpler than the longevity buns recipe.  The bread is baked in the shape of an old-fashioned key, and has ceremonial significance as a blessing at the start of a successful journey -- and it also is a lesson in self-sufficiency, not relying upon divine intervention.

All good?  We still have the archives if you want comedic value.

For now, however, I return to the very significant actions of Captain Blackrose, who, still translating, was pointing around the room at the runes engraved before each of the five pentagonal pedestals in the room.  

Audio begins, Cecily Blackrose speaking:

• "A patient tongue, a leader's mind. For you, a key within you'll find." 
• "A quiet power, a fluid peace. Your key's within, the search may cease."
• "If many-skilled, a craftsman true, then find within a key for you."
• "Both life and death in equal yield, come seek within, this key you'll wield."
• "With fiery strength a righteous friend. Your key's within, the search may end."

Audio ends.

Well.  As Katrya put it,  "Perhaps it is that I am worn from the battle..... But I am finding this very creepy. Is anyone else finding this creepy??"

Yes.  I could feel a few thrills along my spine.  But it was also revealing.  

The Samaritans were the legendary heroes who defeated the Sunchild, in days of yore.  And, if the runes in this room were to be believed, this was the location of their weapons.  Which we would need, if we were to stand a chance of defeating it, now or in the future.

And all the clues were here, too.

"The keys are, most likely, within the pentagons," I said.  "Would everyone like to self-assign an inscription?  Or, simply try each one until one opens?  I suggest that we do this immediately. The manor rightfully belongs to the Nepeta, but we may still have a legal battle ahead."

But Cecily Blackrose was already striding over to the central podium.  Once there, she struck quite a pose, standing at it with a fire in her eyes.  I could imagine her in days of yore, as well, taking her ship into battle.  She cried out, in her most commanding voice:

"I call upon those with the vision to open the way!"

(to be continued)
..::Zeke::..