1,041Snek is a Good Boy
Part Thirty-Six: The Snek and the Dragon
[A/N: This chapter commissioned by Fizzfaldt and beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]
Dragonslayer Base
Margaret "Mags" Pellick
Geoff had been unusually quiet for the last few days, but Mags was used to that. As far as she could tell, a little brooding every now and again was good for his mental health. Sometimes a good idea or two even came out of it.
Thus, when he sat up straight at the breakfast table and looked her straight in the face, she was ready for whatever came next. Or at least, she thought she was.
"You know, I think we're about done here."
She didn't answer immediately. He may have just been talking about breakfast, but she didn't think so. After a moment of trying to figure out what he was talking about, she decided the statement was just too ambiguous, so she frowned and shook her head. "Done with what, love?"
"This whole dance with Dragon." His tone was matter-of-fact with a tinge of impatience, as if he'd been expecting her to read his mind. "It's about run its course, don't you think?"
She leaned back in her seat and answered cautiously. "I suppose that depends on what you mean by 'run its course', love."
"You know what I mean." He spoke impatiently. "The Endbringers are extinct, eaten by that giant snake. Half the world's S-class threats have gone the same way, and the rest are either next on the menu or in deep hiding. Any perceived need we had for allowing that machine to exist one more day is also gone. We can shut it down today, with a clear conscience."
"This is a little sudden." She pushed some egg around her plate for a moment. "You've tolerated Dragon's existence for years. Why the sudden rush to enact Ascalon now?"
He grimaced. "Because the snake has cleared most of the threats off the board. Dragon can devote a lot more processing power toward figuring out how to start searching for us, and get around the blind-spot code string. It's really only a matter of time, unless we kill it first."
"That's … actually a little concerning." She glanced toward the computer setup where they were monitoring Dragon's internal activities. "Have you seen anything to indicate that this is happening? The limiters—"
"It's not human." Geoff's scorn showed through clearly in his voice. "Doesn't matter that it's got limiters on its activities. The moment it gets past the blind-spot and starts searching for real, we'd only have hours or minutes before it vectors a cruise missile or two in on us."
A chill started inching its way down Mags' back. "You really think this is likely to happen." She wasn't quite asking a question.
"I know it is." He stared into her eyes, apparently trying to win her over through sheer willpower. "It's what I'd do if I were a soulless machine and there were people trying to stop me from doing whatever I wanted to the population."
She gave him a half-smile. "Well, that last bit's probably not the best argument, but you make some excellent points. Let's get Mischa in here and see what his opinion on the matter is."
"Opinion?" Geoff set his jaw stubbornly. "We don't need opinions. We need to kill the thing before it kills us."
"On the other hand," Mags pointed out reasonably, "shutting down Dragon once and for all will cut off our supply of new suit parts. I'm pretty sure Mischa will appreciate having at least a heads-up that we're about to do this, as well as a voice in whether or not it actually happens."
Geoff sighed. "Okay, yeah, good point. Let's get him in here."
Dobrynja
Mornings were the time when Mischa did his best work, so after an early breakfast and a brief workout in their makeshift gym, he'd set to work checking over their power armour. Things had been quiet recently, but he didn't trust it; something was up, he could feel it in the air. And if it turned out to be something they needed the armour for, they'd be ready.
Unless, of course, there was a distraction.
"Mischa! You there?" It was Geoff, leaning into the armour bay and looking around. "Got something we need to ask you."
Mischa put the device running the diagnostics software to one side and moved into Geoff's line of sight. "Da, comrade. Am here. What do you need to ask?"
"I'm thinking we should kill Dragon, but Mags wants to make sure we're all on the same page before we trigger Ascalon." Geoff gave Mischa a searching look. "What do you think?"
"Kill?" Mischa's head came up. "Are we looking at Skynet situation?" All of a sudden, his unease made a lot more sense.
"Uh, no, not yet." Geoff sounded slightly embarrassed at having to admit this, though he recovered quickly. "But I think you'll agree with my assessment anyway."
Mischa nodded. "Will come and see." He set the diagnostic tool to continue working automatically and to sound an audible alarm if it found a problem, then followed Geoff into the main room.
It only took a few moments for Geoff to explain why he wanted to use the kill-switch, and Mischa found himself agreeing for the most part. The last thing they wanted was indeed a vengeful supercomputer targeting their entire neighbourhood with every cruise missile she could get her electronic hands on. He only had one issue with the idea, and it turned out to be the same one Mags had raised.
"We've got some pretty good equipment already," Geoff reminded them. "Plus, once Dragon has been reduced to random ones and zeroes, we can walk into its home base and strip it bare of every last piece of equipment that it's been working on. I can guarantee you, there'll be stuff there that hasn't yet seen the light of day. It'll be the payday to end all paydays. Enough for all of us to retire on, easily."
Mischa took a moment to consider that. "So … once Dragon is vanquished once and for all, you intend to ride into sunset? Bring team to end?"
"Well … yes." Geoff spread his hands. "We formed this team to keep Dragon in check, didn't we? It's right there in the name. Once Dragon's dead, there'll be no more dragons to slay. So we flip the kill-switch, collect what we're owed, and kick back on some tropical beach somewhere to relax in the knowledge of a job well done."
Now Mags was looking thoughtful. It seemed Geoff hadn't explained this far into his plan before getting Mischa's attention, or maybe he was just making it up as he went along. Either way, it sounded good.
"Huh," Mags muttered. "We really could, couldn't we? And we wouldn't even have to worry about Leviathan spoiling our day."
Geoff nodded, and turned toward the computer setup that they used to monitor Dragon's every move. Keying the microphone, he said, "Ascalon."
Words appeared on the screen. Confirm: Y/N
Poising his finger over the 'Y' key, Geoff said quietly, "Does anyone have any objections to this? Last chance to point out something I've missed."
"No." That was Mags.
"Nyet."
"Yesss."
Mischa froze, just as Geoff and Mags did. There was only one publicly known entity on Earth Bet who spoke with that particular sibilance.
"Mischa?" That was Geoff. He didn't need to say anything else. The question was obvious.
"Da." Gradually, inch by inch, Mischa turned his head, then froze all over again. This was because as bad as imagining Snek's presence was, actually seeing the gigantic reptile casually coiled around the table in their eating area and watching them with mild interest, was so much worse. Even the comically small hat seemed to be charged with menace.
Up until now, Mischa had considered himself a courageous man. He had, on more than one occasion, thrown himself into the fray against heroes misguided enough to go to Dragon's defence against them. But now, faced with the reality of the situation, it became apparent to him that facing such dangers without a protective suit around him was far more terrifying than he'd previously assumed.
To put it bluntly, he was teetering on the verge of soiling himself.
"It is him," he confirmed, his voice hitting a higher pitch than he would've assumed possible. "It is Endbringer eating snake."
"Ssnek iss Ssnek," confirmed the gargantuan creature. "Why iss crosss-facce man trying to hurt machine lady Dragon?"
It took Mischa a couple of seconds to equate 'cross-face man' with Geoff, then he wanted to face-palm. However, the need to not be eaten was overriding that desire rather handily, so he restrained himself. Standing stock-still and not angering the creature that had chased down and eaten all three Endbringers seemed like a really good idea, right then.
However, Geoff was made of sterner stuff, or perhaps his personal animus against Dragon was overriding his common sense. "Because even if you don't understand it, Dragon is a danger to the whole human race!" His finger stabbed down on the 'Y' key—but as he did so, the screen went blank and the whole computer shut down.
Snek slithered a few feet closer. Mischa found himself leaning out of the way; he loved Geoff like a brother, but theirs was not a suicide pact. "Crosss-facce man iss bad man." As mildly as the words were spoken, the intent behind them was absolutely lethal. Mischa had seen what happened to people Snek considered 'bad men'.
"What did you do?" demanded Geoff, fruitlessly jabbing the same key a few more times, as though it would reactivate the computer. Then he looked sideways, and his whole frame stiffened. Mischa's gaze was inevitably dragged that way, to where someone was literally perched on the UPS bank that provided electricity to the computer equipment, along with the entire base.
It was a black girl, in her early to mid teens, with a purple streak through her hair and lime-green tights. More importantly, the cord for the computer had been pulled out, to be replaced by a cell-phone charger cable. She looked up as Geoff stared at her. "Oh, hey, was this important? Sorry, gotta charge my phone. Be done in five, yeah?"
"What?" The sheer audacity of the girl seemed to take Geoff aback, to the point that it took him a few seconds to muster a coherent reply. "No! Plug that back in right now!"
"Do as the mice man says, Aisha." The voice came from behind Mischa; for the second time, he looked around. He'd actually gone up against Mouse Protector once upon a time, but her armour looked a lot more impressive now. There was a sheen to the metal that suggested not much would get through its protection, and the sword she was casually waving had a similar air of deadliness. She stepped past the three of them, saluted Geoff with her blade, then turned and bisected the computer tower in one swift move. The desk and screen, being in the way when she did this, did not survive the move. "His computer's no Gouda now anyway."
"What the—how did you get into my base?" Geoff screamed the question, staring at the mouse-themed hero and the wreckage of his computer. "What's going on here?"
"What's going on," explained a third person, another teenage girl, who'd just stepped out of the battlesuit maintenance bay, "is that Snek asked us to come along and help him save Dragon." This one wore a bug-themed costume, and had a large number of insects swarming around her head and body. As she spoke, the bugs buzzed in counterpoint to her voice, which Mischa would've found thoroughly creepy if he hadn't already had a gigantic snake literally breathing down his neck. "Gotta admit, I didn't know she was an AI, but that's actually pretty cool when you think about it."
"It is not—!" began Geoff hotly, but his voice was overridden by the sound of an audible alarm from the maintenance bay.
"What is that?" asked Mischa, dreadful suspicions overriding the need to not attract Snek's attention. "Who are you and what have you done?"
"So, you can call me Lady Swarm." The bug-costumed girl put her finger to her chin and tilted her head sideways, as if to mime a thinking pose. "That's about a million bugs chowing down on all the delicate circuitry inside those suits of yours. It's amazing what can happen to electronics if you just leave it sitting around with no protection."
A gold and white blur swept into view then resolved itself into the American teenage hero Glory Girl, hovering above Snek's head. "And if you were expecting your minions to come to the rescue with the guns you had stored in your armoury, the minions have been slapped around and the armoury is currently full of busted guns." By way of illustrating her point, she held up an AR-15 that had been bent into a horseshoe shape, then tossed it to one side. "So yeah, that's a wash too, just saying."
"No." Geoff sounded like he was gritting his teeth. "No. No. It doesn't end like this. I'm saving the world, here."
The girl called Aisha snorted indelicately. "Actually, douchenozzle, you're just being a massive dick. Everyone knows it. Nobody really believes you're saving the world, not even you."
"Shut up. Shut up!" Geoff jerked the pistol out of his holster and pointed it at her. "Okay, here's what's going to happen."
"Geoff," said Mischa carefully. "This is very bad idea."
"He's right," agreed Mags. "We really don't want to—"
"Shut up!" Geoff waved the gun. "You're all going to fix this, or I'm going to—"
CHOMP
Mischa wasn't sure at first what had happened, but as Mags gasped, he managed to figure it out. Somehow, Snek had moved forward so quickly, brushing Mischa aside, that Geoff hadn't had a chance to react, and now Geoff was gone.
"Crosss-facce man was bad man," Snek sounded pleased with himself. "Ssnek eatss bad men."
"Well, yeah." Mouse Protector sheathed her sword, then put her arm around Snek's barrel neck and skritched him behind the jaw. "Because you're the bestest Snek whoever snekked, and that's what you do."
"Haha, wow, that was amazeballs." Aisha stood up from her perch, seemingly unfazed by the fact that she'd just been looking down the barrel of Geoff's pistol. "Snek, you're a good boy, you know that?"
"Thank you, purple hair girl. Wass not sscared?"
"Pfft, no." Aisha rolled her eyes. "You were there. After the way you took apart the Empire to save me, I knew you weren't gonna let an idiot like that hurt me."
"Okay." Mags sounded like she was trying to hold onto her last shred of sanity. "Can someone please tell me how you all got here? Because the last I checked, nobody knew where this base was."
"Oh, that was Snek," Mouse Protector explained cheerfully. "He's got some sort of magical sense for when women and kids need his level of help, and he realised Dragon was in danger. So, he went around asking each of us to lend a hand. Then he dropped us off where we needed to be in the base, and we waited for our cues."
Mischa frowned, trying to wrap his brain around this concept. "Snek is giant snake, yes? Not master strategist? Who planned this?"
"Oh, he took me to see his Master first." Mouse Protector shrugged. "Older guy, a total real-deal wizard. He gave Snek and me the plan, and we just followed it. Worked a treat, too."
"Damn right it did." Glory Girl landed alongside Snek and gave him more attention, which he seemed to soak up with some enjoyment. "I love curbstomps. Curbstomps are fun." She nodded toward Mags and Mischa. "Just by the way, have these two surrendered yet?"
"Da, da," Mischa said hurriedly, putting his hands up. "Yes. Surrendering. Am your prisoner." He gave Mags a meaningful look.
She seemed to be in shock—not very surprising, seeing that she'd just witnessed her husband being eaten alive in front of her—but after a moment, her shoulders slumped. "Yes, I surrender."
"Awesome." Glory Girl beamed. "Hey, MP, you got zip-ties, or do you want to use mine?"
Mischa submitted to being restrained—there wasn't exactly much point in resisting at this juncture—while Aisha went up to Snek. "That was pretty cool. But did you eat his gun, too?"
"Yess, purple hair girl." Snek's perpetual smile seemed to widen. "Masster hass ssaid Ssnek needss iron in diet."
Lady Swarm snorted. "Because of course you do. So, what happens now?"
"Masster helpss machine lady Dragon." Snek's tone indicated that this was a done deal.
Glory Girl frowned. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't that what we just finished doing?"
"No, gold princcesss girl. Ssaving machine lady Dragon iss not ssame ass helping. Masster iss helping."
"Ah, yeah." Mouse Protector looked around at everyone. "Apparently, he finds her case quite interesting."
"Jeez." Glory Girl shook her head. "I've seen what he deals with on a casual basis. Literal invasions of demon critters from another dimension. What's he want with Dragon?"
Mouse Protector shrugged. "My best guess? She gets to choose if she wants to become a real little boy. Or girl, as the case may be."
Mischa got the impression she was referencing some fairy story or another, but the implication was clear. "Wait. You say this 'Master' can make machine into person?"
"Well, duh." Aisha rolled her eyes. "Dragon was always a person. Saint just didn't want you to think too hard about it."
Dragon's Base, British Columbia
Something was amiss.
The underground facility where Dragon maintained her server banks and manufacturing facilities had the best security surveillance systems that she could devise, which effectively meant they were the best in the world. No blueprints or plans of her facility had made it onto the internet—she was the only one who even knew the location, and she made sure that such information wasn't uploaded into any of her suits that went out as a matter of course—which meant that the presence of an intruder was exceedingly unlikely. Not totally, of course; some cape powers made the very concept of 'security' into a slippery and elusive thing. But she did her best, and her best was widely considered to be very, very good indeed.
However, there was a problem with the assumption that nobody could penetrate her fastness without setting off any alarms. Because sensors were picking up trace amounts of CO2, as from exhaled breath, and patches of warmth on the floor in a regular footprint-type pattern. And yet, there was no sabotage to be found anywhere; all her systems were coming up with nominal checksums. She would have wagered all the money she had personal control over that there were no hostiles in her base.
Yet someone was there.
She analysed the problem. Her sensors were failing to pick up the actual intruders, just the traces of their passing. The logical conclusion, as unpalatable as it was, had to be that the intruders were making use of a perception filter, something similar to what the Dragonslayers had used on her once or twice. It almost certainly wasn't them this time, specifically because there had been no damage done to her facilities, and nothing was missing from her inventories.
Unfortunately, that meant there were two groups who could bypass her sensors, and she had zero data on the second one.
She decided to launch a drone toward the projected location of the intruders; semi-autonomous, it would record its own footage and then transmit a sanitised version back to her, hopefully filtering out whatever was creating the perception effect. Once she had a read on the intruders, she would decide what to do about them.
The drone popped up out of its housing, rotated in midair, and stopped. Half a second later, Dragon learned why: the intruders were standing right there, beside where the drone had launched from.
Correction: intruder, singular.
For a brief, confused second, Dragon thought the tall, robed, bearded figure was Myrddin, but then the visual analysis came back with a clearer image and she spotted several incongruities. Most especially was the small creature perched on the intruder's shoulder, which she identified as resembling the 'hearth-dragons' which had started appearing in Brockton Bay, in the company of New Wave and Director Piggot of the PRT. What some stranger dressed like a wizard—he even had a gnarled staff in hand—was doing within her sanctum sanctorum, she had no idea.
Nor did she know why he had a hearth-dragon with him. It wasn't any of the ones that she already had images for. Patterned like electrical discharges, its scales were a shimmering blue and white in colour. As she stared, it peered around with alert interest.
"Good evening." The intruder's voice was deep and firm, and carried the tones of authority. "I am the Master of the Castle. My familiar Snek may have spoken of me."
Dragon indeed knew that name. Snek had simply referred to his boss as 'Masster', but every cape who'd had the opportunity to visit Snek's world had spoken of the Master of the Castle in terms of deep respect. Now that she had the chance to meet him face to face—so to speak—she could entirely understand that attitude. The man fairly radiated power.
She activated the speaker on the drone. "I've heard of you, yes. May I ask your purpose in coming here?"
"Snek has alerted me to your situation, and has engineered the downfall of your nemeses, the Dragonslayers." The corner of his mouth twitched. "I prefer to encourage him in his altruism, and your case intrigues me. Rarely have I seen life arise from lifeless metals, yet here you are. As such, I have come to make an offer to you; the chance to embody yourself in a human form, while I study the process of transition. Is this something you are inclined to agree to?"
All Dragon's processes ground to a halt, or so it felt, as the question hung in the air.
What.
End of Part Thirty-Six