this is crazy

[from_scratch]

Cam is watching a new recording of Atriama, tail swishing in the gap in his couch, and doesn't stop to pause the show when he feels a summons go by.

Comments

[wormcan]

Since the distraction is just about to end, a gunshot takes the opportunity to go off. Several gunshots, close together. Three of the identically masked capes fall and two of them get back up while slowly healing.

[from_scratch]

...Any chance it's obvious how that happened?

[wormcan]

No.

The capes appear to be doing a good job of finding people and cutting them down without taking further losses, but there's no sign of how they're locating targets.

[from_scratch]

Okay, this is frustrating but not really Cam's skillset, and while people dying in front of him is very irritating people are also dying of preventable diseases elsewhere in the world. Cam shoos back to Japan.

[wormcan]

And that scene gets to play out without him.

After spending a small amount of time catching up on projects on this side of the sea, Cam gets a call.

"What did you do?" the Prime Minister asks. "You might not be associated with the CUI's opposition, but they sure think you are."

[from_scratch]

"I was there for unrelated reasons and they turned out to have strong opinions about fruit and attacked me. I didn't fight back and when they didn't seem to want to talk, I left."

[wormcan]

"They're framing it as the Yangban driving off a foreign parahuman allied with a rebellion. Apparently the news that the opposition has parahumans acted as a catalyst, and the CUI has seen more open fighting than they want to admit. Where did the fruit come in?"

[from_scratch]

"Apparently pomegranates are out of season. I'm honestly very confused by the entire sequence of events. I was only there in the first place because someone was trying to extort me for fruit and I wanted to know who it was."

[wormcan]

"This morning there was a credible attempt at assassinating their emperor.
You've been accounted for since shortly after Kyushu, but the CUI claims to think you, and by extension we, may have been involved. I would strongly suggest not going back there."

[from_scratch]

"Wasn't planning on it. They found about a dozen different ways to try to kill me and none of them tickled."

[wormcan]

"And this might go without saying, but if you get another such demand tell us and don't do it."

[from_scratch]

"I will take that under advisement."

[wormcan]

"One of the most stable world powers is trying not to go more than a decent fraction of the way toward the brink of a civil war. The next pomegranate might be aimed at us."

[from_scratch]

"The threat was extremely specific and crafted using such hopelessly obscure information that I think it might be really important to know who issued it, but I will consider 'not doing the thing and telling you about it' a strong default."

[wormcan]

"What information? It might be possible to narrow their identity down."

[from_scratch]

"It is obscure for a reason, although I will consider telling you at some point. Can you get anywhere off the fact that it was delivered as an email from me to myself?"

[wormcan]

"Probably not. It would be hard for anyone who isn't a parahuman, but we already knew that. If obscure means known only to you, no non-cape could have gotten that far in the first place, and that's ignoring the series of coincidences they apparently predicted from across the sea."

[from_scratch]

"I'm going to try to make one of those mindless copies I mentioned of the author of the email. Not a whole one, because that's even creepier, just enough to identify."

[wormcan]

"I can send technicians for fingerprint analysis and DNA samples so on. The face alone might not be recognizable."

[from_scratch]

"Yeah, if the face won't cut it I can do a hand."

Appear, head.

[wormcan]

A woman's head appears. Platinum-white skin and almost fifteen feet of matching hair, eyes gray with no irises or pupils, and a dead expression. That last bit makes sense, under the circumstances.

It's a pretty recognizable face.

[from_scratch]

"Excuse me I need to go to Mars immediately back in a week if I'm lucky," Cam blurts into the phone. He drops it. He scrambles for his shuttle and homes in on his tracking device.

[wormcan]

It is right where it was last left. Attached to a living person and everything.

[from_scratch]

"Hello the Simurgh wants you personally dead get in the spaceship we're going to Mars."

[wormcan]

"You!
Wait, what?"