Rootkit

Gil drummed his fingers on his knee, considering what to do for only a short while before nodding decisively to himself. He turned to Charlotte and smiled, trying to be as warm and reassuring as possible.

“Alright, you’re going to be a messenger.” He said, “Just as soon as Keilnei gets back with Snow, we are going to send you to speak to the fine folks at New Wave and deliver the best treatment I have available.”

“Huh?” She asked, confused, “Weren’t you there like… just now?”

“Yes, but I didn’t have this.” Gil said, holding up his tablet, “Can’t do most of the fancy stuff without it. I loaned it out to Keilnei to use as a map, and summoned it back when I needed it.”

As he spoke, he tapped a few buttons and an Extra Stamp popped out of the tablet itself. 10 stamp credits wasn’t free, but logistically speaking it was dramatically better than leaving Flashbang hanging for weeks. The waste of his one charge of Soul Pact for this trip stung more than anything else, honestly. A world of superheroes and he failed to capture a crippled man without additional tools; that stung.

“You are going to hand this to them and explain that they need to press this end against Flashbang’s skin for about ten seconds.” Gil explained, tapping the active end of the stamp, “If all goes well, he should be up and active by the end of the week. Tell them this is my first, least invasive procedure that has a chance of working. I can inspect him and try something else if it doesn’t pan out. In return for the work, I’d appreciate it if they keep an eye on your family. Got it?”

Gil drilled Charlotte on the message several times, until at last she could recite it to his satisfaction.

“I… thank you?” Charlotte said, “This is a lot, but… um… you seem like you’re doing a lot for me for no reason.”

There was an implied question in there. What did Gil expect in return? She knew that he could do weird, esoteric things. She knew he didn’t consider himself a hero. She knew that he had apparently embedded at least one person into the most unhinged group of people Charlotte had ever met.

“I’ll need to use your body occasionally, if that’s ok.” Gil said thoughtfully. “Not the way your eyes are bugging out over, though.”

“What way do you mean then?” Charlotte demanded. “Are you going to… experiment on me?”

Gil laughed and gave her a smile.

“Good guess, but no. I’d pay extra if you’re volunteering.” He said, and waved off her vigorously shaking head, “I’ll get you a phone you can use to contact my people if you need something. I’ll use you as a switchboard, basically. I’ll swap someone into your body, text someone like Candress who is in a dangerous spot, and make sure they are ready to be swapped. I can’t risk distracting someone in the middle of a fight or something, you know?”

“What if I’m doing something important?” Charlotte asked, a whine leaking into her voice.

“How often are you doing something sensitive enough that you physically can’t stop and get your bearings safely?” Gil asked rhetorically, “I can make it happen at around the same time each day so you can schedule around it, if you’d like. I’m not unreasonable, but if you expect me to have your back, I’m going to want you do help me out. That’s all.”

Charlotte took a deep breath, visibly steeled herself, and met his eyes. Last night she’d helped fight off a horde of rapists, and as far as she knew she’d done it herself. She could talk to a weird magic man.

“What are you planning to do in this city?” She asked, though she was shaking, “what am I going to help you do?”

Gil nodded approvingly.

“Right question.” He said, “The big one is that I’m going to cripple or wipe out all the major superpowered gangs so that the heroes can take over. I’ll be stealing a lot of stuff and doing a lot of sketchy shit in the meantime, but that’s currently my endgame plan.”

Charlotte’s jaw fell open. She sputtered for a few moments before answering.

“But that’s basically impossible!” She said, “The Protectorate and the Wards and New Wave couldn’t do it all working together; why do you think you can? Even when villains do get beaten, new ones just show up!”

“Well you see, I’m a right cunt.” Gil said breezily. “I cheat, I have materials and capabilities they don’t, and I don’t really follow many rules so I can do things they wouldn’t even if they have the capacity. If everyone in your world operated the way I do it would be awful. Just absolute chaos and woe. One guy, though? I think I have better chances than you might expect.”

“My world?” Charlotte asked, her voice faint.

It was right about then that Keilnei and Snow walked in through the portal. Gil immediately grabbed Charlotte and pushed her out the door, not answering her implied question with anything but a wink. He shoved the phone Rose had given him into Charlotte’s hand, told her that the one contact number in there was to his field commander in Brockton, and that she didn’t need to know anything else yet.

Keilnei accepted her marching orders easily enough, thankfully. Gil had work to do, and he didn’t particularly want anyone with morals to be in the room when he started.

He gave Snow a hug, and patted her on the rump.

“Alright. I need to talk to several people. Can you help me with that?”

••••••••••

Snow lay on the body swapping apparatus without putting up a fight, only stopping briefly to examine it and ask a few questions. Technically she’d been in it once already, but she’d been Gil at the time and rather disoriented.

“Ok, this first woman is named Nessa, but she also goes by Menja.” Gil said. “I’m going to ask that you stay calm and try to avoid any kind of confrontation or even conversation. She’s probably going to be surrounded by a lot of very dangerous people, and she’s going to need to run away, so when you’re her I want you to get outside without drawing attention to yourself if you can. Start coming towards this hill, assuming you can find your way.”

“Oh dear.” Snow said, “She’s in danger?”

“Sorta.” Gil answered, keeping it vague, “I intend for her to come live with us, ok?”

“I can’t wait to meet her!” Snow said with a bright smile, and Gil strapped her down and tapped a few buttons.

Snow’s eyes narrowed and her entire demeanor changed. Confused, but faintly hostile. Probably her default reaction to anything she didn’t understand.

“Nomad, I presume?” She asked, looking around, “Where am I? What have you done?”

“I helped make you stronger,” Gil said, “and now I’m going to hopefully push you towards a happier life.”

He was even honest. In his experience, neither living in a warzone nor being part of a hate fueled **** cult were particularly pleasant. He could speak with personal experience on both counts. Gil pulled out the bottle of absolute gullibility spray, popped off the cap, and poured the liquid all over Snow’s face.

“You’ve been touched by my power,” Gil said with a smirk, “so you’re basically my wife now, agreed?”

“I… suppose that makes sense.” Nessa said, eyes still narrowed, “Hardly romantic, however.”

The Absolute Gullibility Spray would ensure that for the next hour or so, she’d believe anything she was directly told. She wouldn’t necessarily like what he had to say, but she’d buy it.

“Apologies for that.” Gil said, “With that said, you’re a traditionally minded woman, yes?”

He’d phrased it as a statement followed up by a question, so he figured that it would become at least marginally true in her mind.

“Yes, what of it?” Nessa asked.

“So traditionally the man of the household is in charge.” Gil said, “His wife’s job is to support him, trust him, and follow his lead, no matter what he does, with whatever skills she has. You believe that’s how our relationship should work, since you’re my wife.”

She sighed, and nodded. Her shoulders even relaxed a bit.

“Well… yes.” She said, “It will be upon your head if you lead us astray. It’ll be nice to not worry about the big picture. So… where are we, exactly?”

Gil smiled to himself. He could probably have left things as is there, but frankly he didn’t really want an avowed white supremacist as a wife even if she’d keep quiet about it. He had her here, she’d go for anything he told her, so it seemed best to make a few more renovations. And almost as important, to push the conditioning as hard as he could.

“Don’t worry about that. You’ll find out soon enough.” Gil said, “There are a few more things you need to be made aware of while I have you here, ok?”

“Of course, Nomad.” Nessa said, nodding. “But it probably shouldn’t take too long. The base I was in was attacked, and I need to speak with my companions about our response. I need to get back, now.”

“About that…” Gil said, “Beaver, spiffy, kaleidoscope. Those were the release codes that deactivated your false personality, so you should start remembering some things over the next few minutes. You aren’t actually a white supremacist. That was a false set of beliefs we embedded into you so that you could infiltrate and destroy Empire 88. You are actually very open minded and accepting of other races and cultures. You can pretend to be racist easily, even enjoy racist humor and engage with racism as an intellectual topic, but it’s just an act. An idea you can entertain without accepting it, a role you can slip into completely without changing who you are.”

Nessa’s eyes glazed over for almost a full minute, twitching slightly as if she were on the verge of a seizure. Having core character traits edited was usually a bit rough, so Gil decided to give her a moment.

“That was… intense.” Nessa said, her voice quiet. “I’ve been horrible. Thank you for waking me up.”

“You’re welcome.” Gil said, patting her on the shoulder. “I need to pull you out of the Chosen of Fenrir anyway. Ok? I’m sorry that your Sister died while still undercover.”

Nessa nodded mournfully, seeming to accept the implications of his words as easily as direct statements.

“At least she died fighting something she would have fought either way.” She said, “It would be so much worse if she’d died trying to oppress Asians just because we couldn’t understand their rich and beautiful culture.”

“Right.” Gil said, not entirely sure if he’d done the right thing. “But remember, if I say Eagle, Glorious, prism, you’ll get right back into character. You’ll slip right into the Menja headspace. Right?”

“Right, if you think that’s for the best.” She said. “I thought I was going to leave the Chosen, though?”

“I’ll only do it when it’s important or I think you need to practice staying in character. Your mission might not be over.” Gil said, “There’s one last thing you need to know. Most conspiracies are bullshit. In fact, all of them are unless I tell you otherwise. For example, the Jews aren’t secretly puppeteering any world governments, but the entire world that you know is actually just a set for an entertainment product created by inscrutable beings. That’s why your world sucks. They made it that way because it would be more interesting.”

Nessa stared at him in shock as the curated truth crashed through her mind. She wasn’t out for as long as she’d been the first time, probably because he’d just given her a new and different **** that she could blame all the world's ills upon. Shifting focus from one kind of zealotry to another was much easier than convincing her she was categorically wrong.

“Alright. I’m glad we could have this talk.” Gil said, leaning down and kissing her. “You come back home safe. The portal is near the Leviathan Memorial. It’s a big blue mass, you can’t miss it. Get through the portal quickly, before it closes. You have a few hours.”

She leaned down and kissed her gently, which she responded to in kind.

“Eagle. Glorious. Prism.” Gil said, and swapped them back.

He cracked his neck, already planning for an experiment.