487 Glass Gods [I]

Name: Uva Mettabon

Age: 22 (potentially 23)

Path: Operative (?)

Updated Summation: Up until a few months ago, Honored Sister Uva Mettabon could be considered a moderate to reasonably talented agent serving the city-state dimension of Weave. Though her skill in counter-Psychomancy was worth noting, she was ultimately not significant enough to necessitate a broader Pathbearer profile.

Now, she stands as one of the Favored Three of Gate Piety. The way she has developed is not congruent with someone bearing the Path of the Operative, the cause being her repeated and extreme exposure to the Outside. She has developed abilities aligned with the Stranger, but also a few other Outsider entities that have been identified, notably the Eldest and the Dreamtaker, and she now possesses an entire Eldritch Domain connected to her in conjunction with the Unique mana core of Gate Piety. What this means and how she will develop further is unclear, and that is why she remains the most significant threat to all Aviary operations within Gate Piety. The other two are known quantities to a general extent. Their abilities and reactions can be gauged and predicted. She cannot. She has not taken a primarily public-facing persona. Most assets and agents who have encountered her have been compromised and liquidated—with only our most elite units avoiding notice, yet at the cost of maintaining a passive posture.

Furthermore, there have been fluctuations in the Outside, especially in the realm that once constituted the Dreamtaker's entire being. It is beginning to mature. The entities there, once shaped from the breadth of dreams themselves, now are condensations of pure trauma, paranoia, and general night terrors. These entities are evolving, and furthermore, their mana signatures have been traced along a unified current across the context of Integration toward a singular entity: Uva Mettabon herself.

She is evolving in a way that we do not have the intelligence to anticipate, and this must be rectified. Her threat level and responses must be categorized. A detailed solution to her suppression and potential elimination must be generated.

Proposal Quest Issued: Master and circumvent the False Hydra of Gate Piety.

—Aviary Pathbearer Dossier

487

Glass Gods [I]

Jessica considered herself a woman of many flaws. In a weird way, she was as proud of her shittiness as she was of her skill and strength—and could a motherfucker blame her? She was still alive; still here after lifetimes of the entire world trying to kill her. Didn’t mean she always wanted to be alive, but fuck a bitch and pretend she was your brother; sometimes you learned to take the hand you were dealt.

And that might be just the thing. Jessica was far too good at dealing with shitty hands, but a big part of why she was good at dealing with the worst hands was the simple fact that she learned while serving as a mercenary. Lone wolves were easy prey. Lone wolves died when they were caught lacking—even a high Legend could only be made up of so many skills. But when you weren't good at everything, someone else could fill in your gaps. That someone else, for Jessica, had always been Rusty.

There were others, many others, during better times and worse days, serving both as sunshine and bastions against falling storms. But even in the dusk of her joy and long past the moment of her personal apocalypse, Rusty remained, and stayed true to her. Even though he could have stepped beyond himself, he stayed, and he made sure she stayed as well. Some days, when she was dry of alcohol and melancholy, she loathed herself for using him as just a sword. He was so much more. He deserved to be much, much more. But she couldn't let go. She couldn't let go, and he didn't let go either. They were like two leeches attached to one another, mutual shadows of their true potential, draining away what could have filled vacancies and dulling the little ache of what wasn't anymore.

“Jessica. Outside.”

Bound to her by mind, soul, and battle, Rusty communicated an entire dialogue's worth of information with two words and a tense tone. Jessica immediately drew her lips away from the bottle and froze. Rusty appeared in her hand, and she hopped off her seat at the countertop. Pushing through the gaps in the crowd, she prepared herself for battle.

“What do we got? Assassins or just creeps?” She had half a guess neither was the case. Rusty was never so terse when it came to cleaving through the usual garbage.

“Mettabon.”

It took half a second for Jessica to recognize the name, but when she did, her footwork got tangled. She stumbled, bounced off the pauldron of a passing automaton, and righted herself as she clenched Rusty’s hilt tighter with a grimace. “Got any idea what she’s—wait, how the fuck is she up here? Doesn't she have that Curse?”

Rusty almost sighed. It was close enough to make her feel ashamed, even if she didn't know what for. “Jessica, she's a Legend as well. Also, it's midnight.”

“Mid—huh? How long have I been down in this waste pit?”

“Since the evening two days ago, when you proclaimed your intent to start the trip after just another drink.”

Jessica pressed her lips together. She was on leave. She was supposed to go home. Actually home—or the closest thing she had to one. Surprise her family by reconnecting after so long. It was way overdue, and she'd thought after recent events and new experiences and allies, she was ready to deal with that. That turned out to be a lie. Or at least she made it so.

Hesitation. Still. Even now.

What was fatal in battle only slowly eroded the interpersonal. But after years of it, you would be left with the same result.

Not that it was all up to her. During her tenure of alienation and absence from her family, the descendants she spawned committed sins all their own. Now, Jessica was on the verge of violence once more—her blade held in uncertain stay against someone who ostensibly stood as an ally yet had every reason to be a nemesis.

If only said someone was so simple to understand. There was a certain wrongness to the girl, one that went beyond the Eldritch crap infesting her. Jessica didn't exactly pride herself on being a good judge of character, but she had a sense about people, especially their odds of survival across the years and Tiers. The girl should have never made Hero, not before calamity cut her down. Yet here she was, waiting for Jessica outside in the rain, the heavy droplets disrupting her translucent, magic-sustained form as they passed through it.

She didn't move to strike Jessica as she emerged from the bar, and she didn't speak either. Instead, the much taller girl just stared at the woman well over a century her senior as her boots splashed through the ankle-deep puddles making up most of the shittily-maintained street.

The cloud-obscured pieces of the broken moon far outnumbered the people present in the narrow alley leading to Jessica's latest retreat. From across the city, there came distant sounds of revels and laughter rising high; the ringing of bells and the sounding of instruments. But in this stretch of the capital, in this little strip of the world, beside the pitter-patter of the rain on the rooftops and the ground, silence was sovereign.

Jessica wriggled her nose and shrank Rusty down to the size of a pocket knife as she came to a stop four meters away from Uva. Physical reach didn’t matter; the girl was pretty far from dull, and if she intended harm, the attack could come from anywhere. “As if I don't hate Psychomancers enough, now we got to deal with someone who goes past the normal bullshit,” she mumbled telepathically, speaking to Rusty in private. “Fucking Uniques. You got a lock on her real body?”

“Perhaps,” he replied. “It warded in an abnormal manner. Her true form feels thin to me—even within Gate Piety. It is not an unfamiliar defense, however. We have faced its like before.”

“Hymn,” Jessica guessed. “One of his tricks.”

“That is my suspicion.”

She grunted. “Of course. More shit on the pile. Is he with her? Actually, never mind that shit—get ready to open a gap straight to Shiv. I’m not cutting his girlfriend down without him understanding why. Better odds he can use that mouth of his to—”

“I am not here to harm you, Legend Hawgrave,” Uva said suddenly. Her voice was clear, crisp, and resonant—conveyed as both sound and thought. Her body shuddered with mana, and a brief flash of lightning where her spine should be reasserted the clarity of her form. “But you might find violence preferable compared to the outcome I desire.”

“And what’s that?” Jessica said. Inside, she had a guess. No. Not a guess. That was her avoiding the truth. She knew. The girl had told her before. This was a personal matter long overdue.

I should have gone home, Jessica groaned to herself. I should have gone home and… fuck, done what? What would I have to say that would make anything better? Her index finger-length hair was beginning to soak through. The cold intruded through her skin and sank to her very core, filling her marrow with dour regret and depressive bitterness. This really wasn't her matter either. But it was still her sin. If she had been there for her children, if she had protected them and guarded them, if she'd bothered to be a mother after everything that happened, maybe they would still be here. Maybe her grandson wouldn't be marked for death by someone that had every right to kill him.

A life could be a heavy or soft thing to take, depending on the person, the time, and you. Most had no drive and no capacity to pursue vengeance. Uva was not most. She should have been. She wasn't. And that was the most unnerving thing about her: the fact that she was breaking away from what she should have been to become something else entirely.

Something Jessica wasn’t fully sure how to fight so far.

“Look, I get the whole blood and vengeance thing.” Jessica licked her lips. She noticed how silly the action was after a beat. Water was practically pouring down her face. “I've done it. I've enjoyed it. I've regretted it. Part of who I am now. But… he’s still my blood.”

A few steps away, Uva grew ivory-bright of flesh and armor as her eyes shifted hues a dozen times over. And she never blinked. It was like she'd forgotten how. Her eyes were ever-open pits to somewhere that shouldn't be, and her expression was unreadable—but bordering on a scowl.

“Hence why I came seeking you first. Understand that I do this not out of respect for your power, but in acknowledgment of your relationship with Shiv. Your position and reputation are secondary concerns to me, and as I have told you before, we are due a reckoning. At least, your blood is due a reckoning with mine. You claim to understand. I'm here to say that you do not. I am not a violent animal. I am not going to simply butcher your grandson and call the dead between us even. I am not so simple as to think that this would see things resolved. All lives are not equal; your grandson could die ten thousand times, and it would not make up for the death of my mother. But even so, his cowardice and refusal to face me after what he has done have gone past offense.”

Uva stopped talking. Her pause was as abrupt as it was threatening. “I do not wish to seek him out myself. I would prefer your presence to dissuade me from doing something unwise. For you to be the one to push him toward courage and wisdom. Again, I have offered much respect for you, but in turn, understand that I’m not so much your inferior as I was before. Not quite. And your grandson is no factor alone. Which is beside the fact that I am not the only one who seeks a resolution. As I act in restraint to preserve my love’s apprenticeship under you, and recognize you for the warrior you are, Legend Tulveg suffers the indignity of passivity because he sees the ghost of my mother in me. Know that it is a fragile chain that keeps us bound to peace.”

Jessica slowly ran a hand through her hair, slicking it back, and drowned her grimace beneath a sigh. The worst threats were rooted in honesty. “Okay. Okay. I get it. I’ll…” She barely stopped herself from looking over her shoulder as she trailed off. The thought to flee back into the bar was as intrusive as it was familiar. “I’ll bring him over. To the Gate. But I need time.”

Slowly—almost unwillingly—Uva's façade broke. Her impenetrable expression melted into a look of… genuine pity. It wasn't deep, but it was there. It was as true as anything else Uva had expressed.

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

And it made Jessica feel like throwing up.

“You've had time, Legend Hawgrave,” Uva replied after a moment. “You still have time. But time isn't what you need. Whatever you fear to suffer, you can at least still suffer it. I will never be able to learn who my mother truly was or could have been. I will never witness disappointment or pride in her eyes. Just like you cannot hold your husband. But the rest of us are still here. Comfort and resolution are for the living. I give you one more week. Go home. Go home and make true of your promise. If not, I will seek him out in his dreams. And though I am not dead bound to seeking a certain outcome, I hold no reservations. Ultimately, the outcome depends on him, on me… and on you. My fear and respect are approaching their ends; with everything that looms upon the horizon, I realize there might be little time left for us all. So, please, Legend Hawgrave, be there for your family. Because soon, I will.”

Then, for the first time, Uva allowed a raindrop to strike her projection—and it splattered apart in a burst of kaleidoscopic color, fading out as a gossamer phantom to the building downpour.

The distant song of the capital played on, but the silence of the alley seemed twice as heavy now that Jessica found herself alone.

Seconds passed. She lingered. The ambient rain was muted in her ears. There was a building pressure inside her skull. She swallowed hard, once, twice, three times, as the coldness washing over her became a hand that pulled her, that bade her to turn around and…

Jessica considered herself a woman of many flaws. But she wasn't alone. She was never alone. “Rusty, do me a favor right now?” she rasped.

“Anything, Jessica.” And he meant that. He meant that in all the ways he could.

“Thanks. I… I need you to bring me home. Right now. I need you to seal everything physically behind me in a dimensional lock and just force me to go home. Force me. Please. Because I don’t think I have the strength to—”

She proved herself a liar as she dismissed her Inertium armor the moment Rusty initiated the teleport.

Jessica knew she was a husk, but sometimes, she remembered the woman she was. Sometimes, she remembered that her courage went beyond the martial.

***

A stone flattened Uva’s organs as she watched a flood of static mana envelop and spirit Hawgrave out of the alley.

“You offer her too much latitude in your kindness.” Tulveg had a habit of speaking the words he felt but didn’t truly mean. Back in the Gate, granted insight through Uva, he was a miserable witness to the transpiring scenes.

“I offer her what needed offering,” Uva rebuffed. “Force is her place of comfort. If we simply sought the rawness of vengeance, this would not end with my mother’s murderer and the Giantsbane’s grandson slain. Blood follows blood, but I have no intention of seeing things done halfway. It will be finished, Legend Tulveg. It will be finished because I am not a child.”

Tulveg visibly wilted. How fast did the outrage in him turn to shame. “You are her spirit, her pride and dignity,” he breathed. “I wish she were here. I wish she could witness you.”

“A wish shared,” Uva said, as she mourned with one mind, but kept operating with countless others. “A wish that cannot be. There is pain, and there is what we do after, I suppose. But I do not want to be a slave to my past and miseries. I do not wish to erode into becoming her, and for the sake of my mother, I would hope that you can surface as well.”

A low growl of torment escaped Tulveg. “Sometimes, the cost of dignity is too great for me.”

Uva hummed in acknowledgment. “I think Legend Hawgrave showed us an answer to that problem: don’t pay it alone. I am… grateful for your restraint.”

“Of course,” Tulveg said, mind and voice softening. “And I am honored that you find me trusted enough to share in this… this…”

“It's more than trust,” Uva admitted. “There is much we have to decide about one another as well. But discomfort is a terrible excuse when time brings more cruelties.”

Their thoughts went in a symmetrical direction at that. “Do you think she will abide by your arrangement? That we will see her escort her own grandchild to our judgment?”

“I think she will try. I think she understands. I think this is the best way.”

“And the reason you didn’t involve the Deathless?”

“Personal discomfort,” Uva admitted with a frown of unease. “I do not wish to trouble him if I can avoid it. Joining him has already led me to discover the identity of my mother’s slayer. Now, the remainder of that wish should be fulfilled by my own hand. I know Shiv will do what he can to try and reach the right outcome. But I don’t think righteousness exists for this; only people, and the choices that follow choices already made.”

And Uva was in the process of making more uncomfortable choices than one.

***

Across the threshold of realities, on the border of Integration, another sliver of Uva’s consciousness stood alongside her senior Seeker as they addressed the Stranger.

Unlike the Dreamtaker, who took to humanity, sapience, and godhood with not only willingness but blazing passion, the Stranger only grew ever more loathsome, but in the most human of ways. His personality was at once childish and dour. He knew too much of the what, yet not nearly enough of the how, and nothing of how to wield that knowledge. His power pressed upon his personality, malforming his development as certain abilities were cemented under the System, granting him more strength for far less freedom. The Stranger despised change. He was, effectively, a being of past and present intertwined—memory made manifest across time. But at the same time, he was also, in effect, crippled and diminished from what he was, and addicted to his growth on a vertical scale. An Outsider god was an expression of higher freedom, of self-definition. Now, he gained a skill, and it had a name, but it wasn't one he chose. It wasn't what he wanted to be. The System reigned, and everyone had to accept and accommodate its decisions.

Just like Uva and Hades had to accept and accommodate the Stranger to get what they wanted for the benefit of the Gate.

Even if they both yearned to strangle the unreasonable million-eyed Eldritch child to death.

“Roland! Roland! Roland! Roland!” Through the Supplicant, its maker bellowed that name over and over again, and the rest of the living Garden repeated it as a frustrated chorus. Every time Hades tried to speak, the Stranger would yell louder. Every time Uva tried to soothe, the Stranger spoke faster. Roland, Roland, Roland. As in, where is Roland? As in, I only want to speak of Roland or speak to Roland. As in, Roland is the only one I accept, and I will forever hate you if you are not Roland.

For whatever mad reason, the Stranger found himself enamored with the Lord of Blackedge, even after all he'd inflicted upon the town and after all the people he'd butchered. How this came about was beyond Uva. She'd learned, however, that some things were better accepted. It made life easier. If individuals couldn't be rational, then why did she expect such high-mindedness from an Eldritch god?

“Roland! Roland! Roland!”

“I’m going to pour a thousand memories harvested from cholera victims into his mind,” Hymn seethed.

“No. No, you will not. Compose yourself, Headmaster. Just treat him like a stupid child.”

“The cholera memory blast is how I punish the worst of my students,” Hymn responded, his tone so volatile that it was impossible to tell if he was speaking the truth.

Uva clenched her teeth together so hard that a spiderling hidden between the fissures of her physicality burst into shrapnel inside her mouth. “I am dealing with one impossibly powerful idiot child. Do not make it two. I’ll have the Starhawk speak with him.”

“Is the Starhawk Roland?”

“He’s closer to being Roland than either of us.”

Hymn stopped arguing for a moment, but his searing ire endured. He was sorely needed for the ritual of binding the consumed mind-copy of Harkness to the flesh of a Recollector, but despite possessing the knowledge and skill, Uva worried how long the man’s will would last in the throes of unaddressed resentment.

“Starhawk,” Uva called out internally again, unsure if the Ascendant of Justice could hear her at all. “Starhawk. We need your aid right now.”

No reply or reaction sparked within. She was a reserve Avatar in Roland’s absence, but that mattered little when the Starhawk himself was beset by a lasting depression. Ever since Adam’s ascent to Divinity, the once unshakeable relationship between Roland and the Starhawk was in a state of freefall. The former refused to speak to the latter sometimes, and the latter often vanished for periods without justification, even when he could have been immensely helpful.

Such as right now.

“Is the Starhawk having another one of his moments?” Hymn asked.

Across from the branch they stood on, the Supplicant bobbed up and down as the Stranger continued invoking Roland’s name.

“He might be,” Uva said tersely. It felt wrong to slander the Starhawk. “Or he might have a greater matter to resolve.”

Hymn scoffed at her defensive reply. “One would assume so. But I suppose I would be a bit shaken about my worth and place in the world if I realized my Divinity was socially engineered by an ancient warring faction and that the god I stole my power from has actually been using me like a chess piece for untold eons. Not that I would know anything about being groomed and deceived.”

“Has anyone told you that you are a supremely undignified man, Hymn?”

“Ikki has. She does so quite often, in fact. But I never really got the big deal about dignity. It just seems something the weak and unfortunate have to perform to protect the feelings of their grand and violent masters.”

Uva rolled her eyes. “It is also a preferred alternative to whimpering cynicism, but I suppose we are all due one or a few thousand flaws.”

“Roland!” the Stranger wailed. “Ah, I'm bored! Bored! Bored of shouting! Where is Roland?”

“Handling essential matters,” Uva explained once more. “But—”

“I AM essential! Wait.” The Supplicant’s mountainous form approached in a burst of recoilless acceleration. “What do you want? Why are you here?”

“Great Stranger,” Uva said—ignoring Hymn’s glare as she kept the honorific. “We have need of one of your Fingerlings. A Recollector specifically.”

“Will it make Roland come?”

Uva was about to continue pleading her case when she suddenly paused and decided to interpret a probable truth. “…Yes. We seek to use the Recollector to inspect the pasts of certain individuals from the Forbidden Empire and establish an asymmetrical means of communication—”

The Garden’s tantrum ended. As did the bargaining. One of the branches' eyes widened, and it spat out a full Recollector into the world. The monstrosity shaped like a ten-fingered hand regarded her and Hymn with disdain. “Have Roland come faster,” the Stranger demanded. “Want him to tell me why I had inner pains when I remembered killing.”

“Oh, gods, he's growing a conscience,” Hymn realized with distaste.

Uva looked at him from the corner of her eye. “And that’s a bad thing?”

“He's a giant idiot; he will ask Roland how to remove these ugly feelings rather than deal with them.”

Hymn likely wasn’t wrong, but ultimately, that would be Roland’s problem when he rose from his Delve. And I do hope that comes sooner rather than later; your presence is desperately needed. Even if you’re going to want to go back into a coma once you learn what we have to deal with.

***

Back in Farnest, another instance of Uva nodded at Valor and Adam. “We have a Recollector. Operation Déjà Vu is now actionable. I expect to make contact with the Gaia remnant in the near future. But Valor, what do you expect the outcome of this endeavor to be?”

“Confirmation,” Valor answered. “We need a way to communicate with all of our enemies, and isolate any incongruities between their stories before we act. I expect war to be necessary between the Forbidden Empire and us simply by the nature of our divergent goals, but even if that is to be so, we do not need to act in blind accordance with the Great One’s calculus. I understand that I’m asking you to take up a great amount of responsibility, and that this shift in labor might come as sudden and surprising.”

“No,” Uva said. “It’s optimal—and more than a little overdue, if I'm to be honest. I have more capacity as an offensive asset regardless. If conditions within the Gate can remain stable, then I can more than make up for Shiv's destructive onslaughts through subversion and constant pressure. If this can accelerate the development of Shiv’s general and Unique skills, then this rearrangement should have occurred earlier.”

Valor nodded along—and his movements repeated one time too many for Uva’s comfort. “And… what of you, Legend Valor?”

“I? I am—” Valor came close to a casual lie. “I am attempting to stay distracted.”

“I understand. But, if that is the case, perhaps it might be wise for you to recede alongside Shiv and commit the fullness of your efforts to helping him level and protecting the Gate. Forgive me if I overstep and insult your fortitude, but I fear what might happen if you are struck with even more… unwanted truths.”

Valor hummed the way an old man might when he acknowledged you had a point but didn't want to give voice to his own discomfort. He chose to make an affirmative noise instead and let the silence follow thereafter. “You should speak with Shiv. It will be good for you two to—”

“I’m already on the way to the Carp,” Uva said, shrugging off his attempts to reroute her. “My Multitasking is quite potent; my reflexes and mental capacity grow with how many simultaneous operations I run through the minds I tap into. Valor, it seems my duty today is to be a nuisance for a great many people. I do not want to press, but yet I must as we are bound by fate and struggle. You aren’t well. I am not going to taunt you with worthless platitudes. What I want to know is this: Do you have need of my Psychomancy?”

It was a vulgar thing to state aloud—so vulgar Adam grimaced where he sat with his arms crossed.

Valor, meanwhile, bowed his head and shook. “The sentiment is more than appreciated, but… I fear being diminished more than I already am.”

“Understandable,” Uva said. “But if you ever find yourself at that point of desperation—our shame must come second to our effectiveness. We remain at war, and right now, the war is only growing. I find myself struggling to balance empathy with cold truth. But perhaps balance is no longer a luxury we can afford. Valor. Be responsible for yourself. I overstep, but insist.”

“Legends do not overstep against one another,” Valor replied. “And your attention is more than warranted. The answer remains no.”

“And once more, it is acknowledged.”

Uva and Valor stared through one another as if they were gazing somewhere afar. Adam, meanwhile, looked between them, his own apprehensions rising like steam.

Something had shifted between her and Valor. Though she was closely associated with him and a critical member of the Favored Three, she was not, in fact, a true disciple of Valor, as he had never taken her as such.

With that came costs and benefits. Here was one.

Where Adam might be uncomfortable, where Shiv might hesitate, she wouldn’t. And couldn’t. Everyone occupied a different piece in this struggle, and she would hold to her worth in a way no one else could embody.

“There is something that comes to mind,” Uva said, pressing her boldness. “I don't need to change your mind, but I will ask for a donation from it. You currently suffer an existential crisis that is rare and perhaps singular in its pain. The Terrorspawn feed off of this. Our enemies suffer the Terrorspawn, and that realm is already close to evolution. I think I'm going to venture further into this realm of discomfort. I'm asking if you will accompany me.”

Her words were like heresy to Adam. His eye grew wide, but Valor simply bowed once more and chuckled. “Boldness, absolute boldness. And for anyone else, perhaps blind hubris. But not so for you. It's simply an opportunity, and one you cannot let slip.”

“Discomfort is an unmaking force, but it is an unmaking force for children and victims. We are no longer children, and we can't afford to be victims. I have decided. What is your choice, Legend Valor?”

In the end, he didn’t hesitate at all. “I will grant you my dread, Uva. But if it will be of any worth remains to be seen.”

“Perhaps it won't,” Uva admitted. “Or perhaps it will make all the difference. The only real choice is to try. We use everything we can as a weapon. Everything.”

“Everything,” Valor agreed.