Marked: Interlude C (Patreon)

Interlude C

"Hello, Colin," a digitized voice announced, cutting into his attention. Under ordinary circumstances, Colin might have resented the interruption. This, however, was someone whose values reflected his own more than a little, something of a kindred spirit-- and who Mouse Protector insisted on referring to as his Canadian girlfriend, much to his everlasting annoyance. Thankfully, of his former Wards team, he had much less contact with Mouse Protector than Miss Militia, who at least understood the concept of professional. "Dragon. It's good to hear from you. Is everything alright?"

"Well enough, yes, thank you." Her voice was mildly amused. "I had a few minutes free and decided I'd see if you were busy."

"Nothing that's particularly pressing," Colin admitted ruefully.

"Mm." The hum was quite emotive, in ways easy for even Colin to understand. It was another of the things he appreciated about her; he never had any question where he stood, even when she was, as now, considering how to ask her next question. Finally, she ventured, "Colin, you've been becoming increasingly... unfocused? Or maybe just distracted, of late. It's not like you. Something is clearly bothering you, and, if you trust me, I'd like to know what."

"Ah." Yes, indeed. That. The extended period of lack of crises, and even a small amount of headway in the Bay should have been cause for celebration. But instead of advancing into gang territory, every move made by the PRT and Protectorate had been almost glacial. Director Piggot had refused to take the risk of overextending, patrols had been cautious and with a mind to securing already established zones of law and order, and the gangs in their low activity had remained more or less free to act in what small ways they chose. "I feel like my career is stagnating," he finally admitted. "When we should be making great strides, we're tiptoeing around. Visibility, but almost no real progress."

"I see." Dragon's visual avatar tilted her head and smiled. "Maintaining peace and order in a city like Brockton Bay is itself no mean feat, despite the smaller flare ups that occur now and again. You can hardly blame the Director for her caution. It would do a great deal more damage in the long run to overextend and lose the headway that's been made, would it not? Forward moment, even slow momentum, is movement in the right direction, and when matters are finished, in five years or ten, they'll remember who was head of the local Protectorate when the Bay was finally freed of the gangs."

"I suppose you have a point. I just feel like-" like my time is running out, he didn't say out loud. "-like I could be doing... more."

Her virtual voice was filled with amusement. "Well, clearly, you're doing something now. Mind if I ask what you're working on?"

"I don't mind at all," he replied, and set down the puzzling piece of bread. "I was contacted by a priest for a local Catholic church regarding some unusual rolls that were donated by someone, whose name he couldn't give me. A pity, I'd like to see them about their work."

"... Bread?" Dragon asked after a moment, clearly confused. "Why bread?"

"Because the first batch went bad in a day," Colin replied. "He wanted to know if there's something wrong with the bread, something toxic about it."

"And is there?"

"As far as I can tell... no. Quite the opposite." He called up some of the chemical analysis he'd performed earlier. "These are the results of the chemical testing I've done on it. Three separate batches from different portions of the loaf, all the same. Almost perfectly uniform distribution of amino acids, proteins, polyunsaturated fats, and an odd breed of starchy carbohydrates that are extraordinarily easy to biochemically break down in digestion. Going by weight to caloric content, each roll appears to be roughly seven hundred calories, with the exact dietary balance of protein, fats, minerals, amino acids, and fiber for optimal human digestion. Three of these in a day could effectively feed an average human indefinitely with no dietary deficiencies or excesses."

There was a brief pause as Dragon looked over the data. "Interesting. The hyper digestability, then?"

"Yes. As far as I can tell, it's perfectly normal bacterial action on an unequaled source of nutrients. I'm very interested in meeting the tinker who devised it."

"Would you be able to reverse engineer it?" Dragon asked.

"I... don't see how," he admitted. "Not without a dedicated nano assembly setup. Which I would dearly love to get a look at, if that's how this is made, because frankly making a perfect dinner roll is a waste of the limitless potential of such a technological marvel." He shook his head. "But I'll be informing the priest that, aside from being exceptionally perishable, the rolls are as safe as any food possibly could be." He took a small corner of the roll, and tasted it. "Well, perfect from a dietary sense, at any rate. The flavor is remarkably unexceptional."

"Bad?"

"No, not bad. Just... bland." He took another small bite. "Not offensive in any way, though. And I admit I'd like very much to secure a ready supply of these; they could reduce my time spent eating by as much as twenty minutes per day. With the added benefit of being as close to perfect nutrition as anything I could assemble for my meal plans."

"Perhaps an introduction can be arranged for both of us; I too would like to investigate the possibility of nano assembly."

Colin smiled. "I'll do what I can."

---

As Colin pulled up to St. Bosco's, he couldn't help but notice that the late afternoon sun cast the front of the building in a rich, vibrant red. Someone more poetic might have titled it as blood or rose or some other tritely metaphorical descriptor, but 'vibrant red' worked well enough for him. The color shifted slowly but constantly in tints and hues that most people would never know existed, a minor side effect of his power that allowed him to differentiate between chemical compositions and alloys even without the help of equipment. Whatever paint was used to resurface the exterior of the church had a point two percent higher amount of titanium oxide, allowing for erosion, than the original paint. The difference was still noticeable even in the sharp red of the setting sun.

Colin put it out of his mind as best he could as he kicked the kickstand down and stepped over the saddle of his bike, strode purposefully up the concrete sidewalk, and knocked on the doors to St. Bosco's. The church and grounds were in better shape than he remembered it from the last time he was here. Admittedly, over the last couple years, conditions in the Bay had improved far more than most people realized, with the current underworld stalemate between the ABB and Empire Eighty-Eight. The reasons for said stalemate were uncertain, but rumor pointed the finger at multiple sources. Some said it was because they had reached a mutual non aggression treaty prohibiting anything beyond token engagements between the two; others claimed that the revival of Brockton was the cause, not the effect. Still others claimed a mysterious figure was undermining both sides, and that the criminal underground was effectively paralyzed from doing more than consolidating their crumbling holds.

The last possibility concerned Colin the most. Someone with that much power, influence, and subtlety could possibly worm their way into any organization or institution in the city. Revitalizing the city could quite easily be a first step to a larger agenda of subversion and conquest; working from a hidden position to influence social interactions and accumulate political power was a key indicator of Thinker activity, and one only had to look at the Elite to see how out of control that could get.

That was a concerning thought. Were the Elite using Brockton Bay as a foothold on the East coast? It was possible, and even understandable, given the mystery actor's efforts to clear the port for commerce again. But the good that it had done the Bay also meant that anyone investigating it too hard would be seen as attempting to prevent things from getting better, despite the fact that this sort of recuperation just didn't happen without someone's hands in the works behind the scenes. Moving against them would require watchfulness and patience, as well as a lot of work to collect the necessary evidence to build a case.

But then his thoughts were disrupted by the door to the church opening, revealing the priest he'd met years ago. Father DiMaggio's face was more lined, his hair grayer, but it was unquestionably him. "I've gotten the results of that bread you gave me. I can say that it's not dangerous in any fashion I can detect, although I have yet to determine if there are subtle effects that aren't immediately obvious. Chemically speaking, though, it's not harmful."

The priest had an odd expression on his face, one that Colin's HUD interpreted as 'anticipation mixed with irritation and contrition(52% joy 17% anger 14% shame 10% guilt 7% other)'. "And the rapid process of spoilage?" Father DiMaggio asked. "Also, thank you for getting back to me so quickly. Please, do come in."

The priest stepped back and to the side, a gesture of invitation; it seemed smoothly effortless, like it was one he'd done a thousand times. Colin followed him in, noting almost immediately the exceptionally, almost unnaturally, well cleaned church. He set his visor to record, taking a few magnification shots. The stained glass windows were immaculately spotless, without even a hint of streaking or spotting, and even interior corners of wooden joints were dust free. This made him frown a bit; that WAS unnatural when in an absolutely comprehensively uniform fashion. The sort of cleaning that was accomplished by tweakers on a high spending four to six hours on detailing a car. A church, though, even a small one, was a good bit more than a single person could detail clean in a day, and this had to have been done within the last twenty four hours. He paused in his pace, and peered into the ledge pocket used to hold hymnals. Not a scrap of dust or lint there either. And that wasn't just odd, that was physically improbable, given the seams didn't even have any grime or dust in them. He knelt a little closer, changing the spectrum of his visor's recording, and frowned. No fingerprints. A fast look around the church confirmed it; save for in a few, very fresh spots the priest had touched, there were no fingerprints ANYWHERE in the nave of the church. And that was cause for outright alarm.

Father DiMaggio noticed Colin had stopped, and was himself watching Armsmaster with a mixture of curiosity and worry(46% curiosity 20% confusion 10% anticipation 8% joy 8% other). "Is everything alright, Armsmaster?"

"... Who cleans your church, Father DiMaggio?" Colin asked, as he walked around the church, inspecting the improbably clean room. "And do you have a ladder?"

"One of our Deacons, Henry Thurman, usually does the cleaning. Why do you ask?"

Colin grunted. A leader in the church? He called up the definition of deacon in the Catholic sense; a ranking awaiting ordination into full priesthood. "How long have you known him?" He was eyeing the hanging crucifix thoughtfully. If that had been cleaned too, he could be positive there was something parahuman at work here.

"Henry has served this parish for six years, now, although he's a local, so he's been here much longer."

"Does he have any unusual interests in engineering?" Colin pressed.

The priest's expression closed down, and he aimed a disapproving look at Colin. "I feel like you are preparing to imply something unsavory about one of my deacons, Armsmaster." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "If there's something bothering you, I'd like to know about it. You seem to have noticed something about the church. Some kind of chemical cleaning residue? Something harmful? If there's a danger to my congregation I'd like to hear about it directly."

"No, nothing... like that," Colin said. How forthcoming should he be here? If the priest had been subborned by a parahuman, any information he leaked now could potentially be funneled immediately to the parahuman upon his departure. Should he leave a monitoring bug? "I actually was impressed with his work. The place is spotless; he must have spent a great deal of time on it yesterday."

The ratio of puzzlement grew for a moment. Then, Father DiMaggio said, "Henry didn't clean the church yesterday. He does that on Mondays. Yesterday, he was assisting a congregant with a eulogy for this Saturday." Honesty assessment: 95% certain. "Armsmaster, that is not what's bothering you- or at least, not directly. Speak plainly, because your behavior is... I hate to say this of a Hero, but it feels almost duplicitous." The honesty assessment dropped to around 65%; either he didn't believe Armsmaster was being duplicitous, or he didn't dislike saying it. A social lie? Armsmaster wasn't prepared to guess without reviewing the footage later. For now, though, he didn't need his social assessment suite to tell him that the protest was becoming agitated with him.

"Father, I apologize. I have reason to believe that the food you gave me samples of was tinker made; and now, the church here appears to be impossibly clean."

"Tinker-- you believe the food was made by a machine?" The priest's demeanor went from suspicious to surprised to outright mirth in the span of a few seconds. "I can promise you it was not. I watched it being made. But I feel like you are trying to pry into the identity of the donor, who is not only wishing to remain anonymous but has confided to me on matters which I must insist remain confidential. But to head off any misunderstanding, yes, this person is a parahuman, a new one, who has sought guidance on how best to help others with their power while under a great deal of strain in their personal life. And it is possible, even likely, that this parahuman gave the church a thorough cleaning, possibly as an attempt to repay the church for comfort given when it was needed, though the Church does not and would not ask for any such service as barter."

Colin grimaced. While his HUD didn't register any hostility, it did clearly indicate that the priest had probably reached the end of his tether in terms of cooperativeness. It also registered some oddity in the statement about the possible parahuman, as though the protest harbored some doubts as to the person in question actually being a parahuman. Although if he witnessed the power in question, there should be no doubt. Or was the protest uncertain as to whether it was some sort of trick? The recording would need extensive analysis later. "I apologise again, Father DiMaggio. If you could make a request for me, I will not bother you further. I wish to secure a supply of the bread, for personal use."

"I'll ask her if she would be willing to sell you some," DiMaggio replied, and Colin suppressed a smile at the slip. Any identifier could be useful. "I do not know when that will be, however." Partial truth. "Until I get that opportunity I have to give my own apologies-- both to you for wasting your time and to her for the error I made in involving you at all."

Colin wasn't sure how the conversation had turned hostile, but it clearly had. He could only assume that the mystery parahuman's hold was stronger than he'd suspected. And since he couldn't very well put a Catholic parish on Master/Stranger protocols, he could only do the next best thing, notify the Director, and keep the church on surveillance. "I'm sorry to have caused you distress, Father DiMaggio. Have a good day."

He turned and showed himself out. In the process, he launched four surveillance bugs: one at the doors to the rest of the building, one at the altar, one at the confessional, and the last one at the entry doors. He had plenty of evidence to get an internal warrant now, and once the recording was presented to the Director she'd almost certainly issue one. There wasn't much reason to assume that he'd be viewed with less hostility if he were to return tomorrow. Therefore setting the bugs now, if not strictly considered kosher, was still the most efficient and convenient way to do so.

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