Broker

Chapter 175

 A few hours earlier…n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

Sonya’s return to New York had been a whirlwind of activity since the moment she left the others behind at the Guild Hall. Marta had already gone on ahead to the apartment and left Sonya with a bit of time to herself. Her first stop, without question, was her favorite burger place where she shamelessly ordered at the counter with everyone staring at her in confusion. It was fun and a little taste of normalcy that she’d been desperately craving. After the shitshow that was the visit to the Hague, any time just to catch her breath and do her own thing was something she valued highly. Even so, she knew that it would only last a few hours at best as the Pandora Committee assembly was scheduled for that afternoon and she was planning on making an appearance at the Styx.

A little bit of shopping, some self care, a couple phone numbers from cuties acquired and she felt refreshed. Throughout it all, Ishtar remained silent, likely judging her. She didn’t really care, though. She’d embraced this life and was happy to enjoy it as long as it lasted. After her relaxing afternoon out she returned to the guild hall and picked Cass up. Apparently she and the others were going to begin at least familiarizing themselves with the city starting in a few days after they got their affairs in order. It was heartening to see that Cass was really bonding with her new friends. She had been a bit worried after observing that Alex had gone from a slight infatuation to resentment over her basically slipping into their friend group but apparently it had been resolved. Sonya had pointedly stayed out of it, she’d meddled enough in their lives, especially with Ollie and Lillian.

Stopping off at the apartment gave Cass an opportunity to change and within a short period of time they were at the Styx for her little guest appearance. There she had the amusing experience of meeting Charon’s first henchman, Tenebra, who had proven to possess a very interesting gift.

< New Ability Acquired: Umbral Nightingale >

It was a unique ability name, one of the more dramatic ones for sure. As for what it did, trying it out produced some curious results. She immediately felt a craving for attention far beyond her usual playful showboating. It turned out that being the center of attention provided the ability with additional fuel and potency, enough eyes and it could push right past heroic in strength, though it only lasted as long as the attention was fixed on her. 

That explains why she allowed her fans to stream her shows.

The ability itself allowed its user to project its strange black-mist shadows that could be made solid and used to manipulate objects or turn into deadly constructs. What made the ability spectacular was that it came built in with singing talent in a similar vein to how Genius Level Intellect worked. It amplified the user's existing singing ability significantly. 

That realization-that the ability came with a function that perpetuated its own fuel source-was enlightening and she wondered if perhaps Liberty’s ability actually had a similar function that no one was aware of. If it was true then perhaps she could use that against her. She wondered how it could interact with her other abilities if she merged it, but decided to hold off for now. She was still mastering what she had and that warning about Visage of Titania’s reaction to further mergings hung over her head.

Those considerations were set aside, though, when she returned to New York not long after Ishtar’s appearance and conversation with Cass. That conversation had been the inspiration for where she was when the call from Colin had come in. Sonya decided to show Cass a bit of the high life in the city and introduce her to a few of her contacts. So she made a few calls, got in touch with Bluestar, and threw a welcome party for the new heroes the next day. She even went as far as to invite those not from the East Coast camp who had recently registered as heroes. The result was a noisy venue at one of the larger hotels in town, hastily flooded with light-touched, politicians, businessmen, and Sonya’s own agents.

It was a wild party.

She’d been in the middle of having a very pleasant conversation with a local model-a blonde this time-when Colin had called her. The brief buzz in her head alerting her right as she was moving in to seal the deal. A bit annoyed, she had begged herself off by pretending to accept the call on her real phone. She answered it and Colin spoke quickly, he sounded out of breath.

<“Mistress, we’ve got him. He attacked first, bad intel from the contact, we’ve got heroes incoming too. Euclidia’s making an arch.”>

She pursed her lips, I figured he would attack them based on that new intel. She thought begrudgingly, I’m glad they were able to handle it anyway. She sighed, “...well that’s no good!” She said brightly over the noise of the party. <“I’m at a party dear, give me a moment to find somewhere quiet!”> She added before glancing around for an escape route. She spotted Otis in the crowd who was paying her no mind, talking himself up to a few businessmen while Jessica stood guard next to him. He’s not watching, okay, she thought before turning and making her way through the crowd, releasing tiny bursts of imperious here and there to nudge people out of the way. She had nearly reached a door leading out into the hall outside the venue when she sensed someone moving through the crowd in her direction. Dammit, not now!

<“Sixty seconds,”> she said into the call and hung up just as the person stopped behind her.

“Miss Chernovna,” a calm voice said and she turned to see a young man of what had to be of Asian descent standing there. Despite his youth he was far taller than she was and built like a truck.

Huge… She thought, looking him up and down before she smiled a little uneasily, “Can I… help you?”

He bowed slightly before reaching into his jacket. She had to resist the urge to tense up only to see him pull out a slip of paper that had been neatly folded in half. He held it out to her and stood up straight, his expression stony and unmoving. “I have been instructed to give you this, that is all, miss.”

She stared at it and then at him, his hand outstretched and his stony gaze expectant. She pursed her lips together and took it from him, “Thank you, I think?” she muttered before turning away from him. She started marching her way through the crowd again without so much as another word, she didn’t have time for this. While she did, though, she opened the slip of paper out of curiosity. On it was a simple statement in a rushed hand, ‘The mythic beast craves the end of tedium. The villainous queen is its nip and bane.’

“Nip and… what?” She paused and read the line again, “...villainous.”

She whipped her head around, her heart pounding, searching the room for the face that she had barely taken in. I didn’t learn his name. I was in too much of a rush. Where? Her eyes flitted about. He was gone. She scowled and quickly rewound her memories to find an image of his face. I don’t know who you are, but you just made a huge mistake, she thought angrily as she distributed the face to the scattered society agents mingling in the crowd. His image would appear on their phones along with the words ‘Find Him’.

Already irritable and worried over Colin’s situation, she pushed through the last portion of crowd until she managed to get outside of the venue, hustling to a vacant room in the hotel and using technopathy to get inside while disrupting the cameras along her path. It had been far longer than sixty seconds and the thought made her gut twist. The heroes will be there by now. Even so, she knew for a fact that at the very least, Colin was alive. She didn’t think too much about it, but as he had been one of Otis’ assets in the previous timeline there was no mistaking that if he died while doing something for her, she would know via a reward notification.

Taking that into consideration and the fact that Kera was vastly more powerful in a direct confrontation, she was confident that they could survive and evade capture. That didn’t mean she wanted to leave them hanging. She checked the room once with a sweep of technopathy before holding her hand out and focusing on the coordinates where Colin’s call had come from. It was a huge distance, deep in a South American rainforest, but she’d made larger trips to her beach house in Maui. She felt her ability rise up and reach out, forming the connection between locations only to grind to an abrupt halt.

Huh?

She focused harder, pushing against an odd sense of resistance at her target. It didn’t repel her or try to shock her. It’s not Rift, she considered, checking her fingers for any signs of that tell-tale red spark that she’d learned about from Gravitic. Then who? It feels like I’m hitting a wall. She frowned and tried once more to no success, her mind straining against an immovable object. She let out a gasp and sat down on the bed, clenching her fists before calling Colin back.

<“Mephisto? I can’t get a portal to form at your location. What’s happening over there?”> she asked only to hear another voice come in over her comrade’s microphone.

<“I have a wish that I want granted.”>

Unforgettable.

A chill ran up her spine and she leaped to her feet, <“Qilin!”> she barked, <“Mephisto, get out of there! Now! I don’t care about securing Drastic, you and Kera run!”>

–

Mephisto looked up into those soulless eyes, swallowing hard as her presence pressed down on him. It felt a bit like being under the influence of the mistress’ imperious aura. She’d warned him about the people she called the ‘heralds’. They were just as monstrously powerful as An Set if not moreso since they’d had more time to grow than he had before Vegas. Among them, she’d insisted that there was one that needed to be avoided at all costs until a counter could be devised. The very same person that was looking down on him right now. Qilin.

Qilin paused as she glanced at the side of his head, “Who are you talking to?” she asked, frowning, “We are doing business. I do not like being ignored.”

He cracked the best smile he could given the circumstances, taking a step back and holding up his hands, “Can’t do business with someone of your illustrious-ness without talking to the boss, you know? You’re a high-profile client.”

She paused for a full heartbeat, her expression unmoving even as she hesitated, “That is Ishtar on the other line? I take it that it is her who is trying to create a portal in my domain?”

“You felt that, huh?” He laughed before glancing at Kera, “She was already in the process before you came out, nothing to do with you, of course.”

“Really?” Qilin asked, taking another quiet step forward and re-entering his personal space. She reached out towards him.

“Don’t you lay a finger on him!” Kera bellowed, her body immediately transfiguring into a bolt of lightning, she launched herself at Qilin who turned lazily in her direction. Mephisto didn’t have even a second to react before Qilin stepped to the side and caught the hurtling bolt with one hand. She frowned, glancing down at her fingers as they sizzled and burned before turning away and hurling Kera towards the sky, “I was not speaking to you,” she said flatly as Kera crashed into the clouds and went out of sight. 

Mephisto swallowed and reached up to tap his earpiece, “Kera, don’t engage,” he said before switching the channel back to his boss with a quick tap. “So… you wanted to make a wish? I could arrange that,” he said, trying to get back into character as she stepped back over to face him. “What do you want?” he shifted on his feet, “Just so you know, my dealmaking ability requires equivalency. You’ll have to give-”

“Lies and Half-truths,” Qilin cut him off, “Only some deals require equal compensation. It depends on the nature of the deal I suspect. You are stalling. Do you not want to make a deal with me?”

She can sense lies too? He cleared his throat, “I haven’t learned what you want, yet, Miss Qilin. Can’t very well write up a contract without that, you see,” he said, straightening up to look at least a bit more professional. Her aura was setting off his fight-or-flight and making it hard to keep his usual casual demeanor.

“What options do I have?” she asked.

Is she testing us? He kept his smile on, “Whatever your heart desires as long as it is within my Mistress’ power to grant and you provide a payment that she will find satisfactory.”

<“Be careful,”> Sonya urged in his ear, <“She-”>

Qilin glanced at the side of Mephisto’s head again, “She’s still on the line?” she demanded. He opened his mouth to explain but was instead buffeted by a strange tingling feeling that washed over his body as her expression grew harder and harder. 

What the hell is she doing?

–

Sonya was pacing back and forth, listening in on the conversation; What the hell does she want? She thought, gritting her teeth. 

Sonya, we have another problem.

What now? She shot back then felt something with her senses, a presence making their way towards the door to the hotel room. Her eyes went wide as the person knocked. 

“Hello? Is someone in there? This is hotel security.”

What the hell? How could someone-

Another presence approached, “The guest said it was this door?” came a familiar voice. Sonya’s gut fell. Crusader?! God damn it! What kind of bad- oh. She clicked her tongue and nearly drew and illusion around herself before stopping. She can sense mana use. Even if I make it seem like the room is empty, she’ll be able to tell. Qilin and her luck manipulation. This was why she needs to be avoided until I can figure out a weakness! Should I use mind control to push her away? What if that causes a cascade? How do I counter Qilin? She pushed her enhanced brain, thinking with all her might. She could feel Ishtar trying to come up with a solution of her own, frantically looking for a way out.

I am NOT getting caught like this. How stupid would that be?

Crusader knocked on the door, “Hello? I’m coming in!”

<“I want to be freed of this endless tedium.”>

The words came through in her head over the connection with Colin and she froze. Slowly she reached into her pocket and pulled the slip of paper that had been presented to her by the young man out. She opened it and looked down at the handwritten words.

‘The mythic beast craves the end of tedium. The villainous queen is its nip and bane.’

<“Put me on speaker, now!”>