Adamant Blood

Steve swirled power and purpose into the carved pottery, into the rich black dirt inside. When the pot was glowing, he took a tiny black box out of his pocket, and then he used tweezers to open it and take out the single seed inside. The seed radiated iridescence in a repeating pattern. Steve set the seed onto the soil, and then he turned on the grow lights overhead.

And then he sat back on the chair to the side of the small grow room, and he waited.

He did not have to wait long.

The seed germinated, a green tendril flowing into the soil and spreading out, while the seed itself lifted into the air. The shell fell away, into the soil, revealing green leaves that spread wide and fast, and a little spiky. The plant grew tall rather quickly.

Perfectly straight and tall, too, with the leaves spilling out in a radial pattern of growth.

Steve turned the grow light on and off at precise intervals, mimicking the day/night cycle, but sped up a lot, and the plant flexed in the sun and relaxed in the night. It grew upward from a single stalk, and then the stalk broke off every time the 'time' reached noon. When the 'time' reached midnight, the new branch took a solid upward turn, to grow straight up. The next 'noon' the central stalk sent out another side branch at an exact 90 degree angle, and at 'midnight' that stalk turned and grew straight upward, once again. It proceeded like that, every day creating a new perfect right-angle growth.

'Rain' came on timers, from overhead sprinklers, along with the sound of thunder reproduced by speakers. The sounds of the forest thrived in that little room, sped up to mimic real time, according to the seed—

Roots smashed out of the pot, breaking the magic, and Steve left the lights on. The magic was done.

The plant was a little over 2 meters tall, with many branches, all of them reaching upward in solid right angles, but each of them were of a different length. The leaves grew at exact intervals.

The name of the plant was Organized Dreamer, and it was one of the best ways to commune with the demons, to put their strange manners into understandable understandings. It wasn't Contract magic, but it was the next best thing. Organized Dreamer was highly regulated, as a consequence.

Most of this wasn't for him, either. He just grew it, and would be using it.

Steve proceeded to dismantle the plant with precise cuts from his plant shears, to pack away every leaf into an individual plastic bag, to break away every branch and set them aside to dry for later, and to unearth the roots, to pull out the 10 seeds that the plant produced, so that he could grow them later. Soon, the seeds were each in their own enchanted box to make sure they never went bad, and Steve was going over the branches of the plant, to see if he could find what he needed. There should have been 10 usable branches.

And yes, Steve found 10 branches thicker than the rest, each with an open hole through the entire length of it.

He turned those branches into pipes.

Soon, Steve had harvested the entire plant and packed away most of it for handing over to the Collective. They'd summon some demons to ask questions themselves, but Steve needed answers, too.

In a soft, warm room, different from the grow room, with the walls made of black velvet and a few cleaner plants in pots here and there, glowing whitish-green, Steve packed a bowl of Organized Dreamer into one of its own pipes, and he lit up.

Planty stepped into the room, her smokey form of light and shadow turning into that of a beautiful woman with tan skin and a yellow sundress and her hair in a wrap. Planty looked at him, worriedly, then said, "I'm never going to require you to fight in a war, Steve. I'm still on vacation. But… Thank you for doing this."

Steve smiled a little, despite the horror of the coming hours. "I want to know what's going to happen, too, Planty. We're in this together."

Planty nodded, and whatever sort of high Steve had been edging toward suddenly evaporated. He was more alert and awake than he had ever been before in his whole life. But that was just the Organized Dreamer, setting the stage.

Steve was laying on the bed.

But also...

Steve walked alongside Planty, into the dark, past the softly glowing cleaner plants, to the middle of a great stone hall.

Beyond the hall lay the surface of the Moon, all pitted and rocky and airless. White and grey and so very, very bright in the full sun. There was no atmosphere to scatter the light, so it was black and white and subtly grey, and that was it.

Beyond the hall was also the golden city of Arakino, of the demons. Skyscrapers and monoliths and floating forests and crashing oceans and tribal spaces in a desert and buildings floating on the wind. All mixed together, all incoherent and different. Screaming abysses and evaporating lights. Blood and viscera and mushrooms and pure arcane magic, flowing on the tides of Endless Daihoon, washing away everything and then bringing it all back.

The stone hall remained unaffected by the crush of realities out there.

Steve stood with Planty, and to the left, Malaqua appeared, which was a bit concerning, but Steve should have expected that. The Battle for Memphi had been a big deal, and of course Malaqua, the jailer of the demons, would be involved in any demonic forces arguing about what had happened, and what would happen.

Malaqua was a shimmering blue tetrahedron surrounded by a solar radiance, and he was also a man made of stone, 4 meters tall. Malaqua turned his gaze toward Steve and Planty. He did nothing else. He was an observer and enforcer, only. Not a participant.

Planty stepped forward, into the center of the room, and spoke, "I am on vacation. I demand to remain on vacation. Demon Leash and Divinity Malcolm Shaw! You shall appear before me now! We shall have assurances that you will not endanger civilization like this ever again. We demand that such a Resurrection Day not be made necessary, and for a lessening of your hostilities. That magic was quarantined and for good reason, but you have broken out the big spells anyway, and that is angering. It is disturbing, and I do not like to be disturbed."

A man who was not Christopher Powell, Grey Phantom, stepped forward out of the cacophony of Arakino. He looked like Chris, though. Steve was furious, on principle alone. But the 'person' was Leash, in his most recent physical form.

Leash said, "You're on vacation and we respect that, Planty. That is why we had the Resurrection Day failsafe ready to go."

Malaqua spoke, "Point of order—"

Words flowed past Steve; unintelligible and unknowable.

Planty stood stronger.

Leash frowned a little, but he nodded. He said, "We desired to see Memphi's gate program fail, and so we went for it. We failed. And so, in agreement with our own people to let you remain on vacation, we desired to gain as many new followers as possible through the Resurrection Day failsafe. After all, you cannot go on the offense against us, you cannot end your vacation, since no one actually died."

Planty said, "This is true. Blackthorn retains his home. But to say that 'no one died' is a vast understatement. 4.6 million people never came back."

Steve recalled some numbers. 4.6 million never came back, but only 2.3 went to the gods, to the Pantheon. So where did the other millions go? To Thrashtalon, right?

Leash asked, "You will not blame us for the tithe of the gods, will you?"

Malaqua spoke, "Point of order—"

Words flowed past Steve; unintelligible and unknowable. He put his fingers on his ears and wiggled them, like trying to remove earwax or stuck water.

Leash frowned, and said, "Yes. It's our fault. We killed for souls and now we have them. So what! What are you gonna do about it? Come out of retirement? Fuck right on off."

Steve was so surprised and angered by that answer he laughed. And then people looked at him, and so Steve went for it, saying, "You got a bit poisoned by Chris there, didn't ya, Leash? Those kids piss you off that much at the end?"

Malaqua spoke, "Point of order. Hosts cannot speak."

Steve found himself unable to make a sound, which was fine, he supposed.

Planty said, "I need to know that this sort of shit isn't going to happen again. You can War for Life all you want, Leash, and Malcolm Shaw, but I will come out of retirement if you violate the Understandings like that ever again, and my faction is bigger than your faction."

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The world trembled at her words.

Leash countered, "You'd rather we not Resurrection Day the people who perished?"

"Yes," Planty said. "Leave them dead. You do not get to take back your actions like that. No one does. Barely anyone gives a thought to the 4.6 million that are never coming back because you went big and you killed lots, and then you brought them back. You are massaging the thoughts of all of humanity, and I will not have it." Planty spoke to the world, "I call for a moratorium on all Thrashtalon and Cultist and Leash activities for the next 5 years as punishment for the release of sealed magics."

Malaqua spoke, "Point of order—"

Yet again, words flowed past Steve; unintelligible and unknowable.

Leash looked pleased.

Planty frowned. "I call for a moratorium on all Leash-aligned demonic activities for the next 5 years as punishment for the release of sealed magics."

Malaqua said, "Requesting this action would be you stepping back into the churn, Planty."

Steve's eyes went wide—

Planty tsk'd. "Then figure out a sanction without me because this disregard cannot be allowed to stand. The degradation of the understandings will lead to the collapse of mankind and all other species. I have seen it before, Malaqua. Resurrection Day has been used before, and a lot at that. It always leads to a disregard for life itself, and demons becoming unmoored completely from our shared dream of reality."

Leash said, "I move for Planty's whole ingress into this matter to be stricken from care, because she doesn't care about anything that we care about. She's on vacation, after all!"

Malaqua asked, "Do you wish to be back on active duty, Planty?"

Steve felt worry creep upon him like a stalking shadow. It wasn't there until it suddenly was, and then you were facing death with no real plan—

"I'll help Mark, then," Planty said. "And I will remain on vacation." With malice in her voice, she added, "Who doesn't love a good proxy war!"

Leash turned darkly furious, his voice calm but his words not calm at all, "Mark is embroiled in worldwide events now, Planty. You cannot involve yourself in him anymore. I move for Planty to be sanctioned against being anywhere near Mark ever again."

Planty smirked. "I knew him before he was big, therefore I can do what I want regarding him!"

Leash yelled at Malaqua, "Point of order!?"

Malaqua vibrated, "At the current time there are no points of order to be had."

Leash tried to say something else—

Planty took Steve's hand and turned him away from the scene, saying, "We're done here."

Steve shocked awake.

Steve groaned as he stretched out on the bed in the dark room, with the cleaner plants glowing in the corners. That had been a trip and a half. Fuck. Steve sighed and stayed there for a moment.

And then Steve asked, "Planty? Who are you, really?"

Glows and shadows came together and Planty said, "You don't really want to know the answer to that one, so I will not tell you. But if you ever truly want to know, then I will tell you."

… Steve nodded. And then he sat up. "No sanctions, huh?"

"It would have been nice to get some sanctions, but I never expected them. Someone else will have seen that meeting, and they will make decisions beyond our time up there; that is what we hope for, now. When the others use the Organized Dreamer they'll find out more."

Steve looked at Planty, wondering who she was, who she had been… And then he pulled away from whatever big thoughts he was thinking. He didn't want to get involved, and she didn't want to get involved, but the War for Life had come for Memphi and so they were uncomfortably involved, for now…

Steve asked, "What's the plan for Mark?"

"Resources to Duchess Elaria Valen in the settlement, most likely. Maybe through Reeni Thumb as well. She's a powerful witch who is also mostly on vacation since the Reveal. She used to be a lover of Addashield."

Steve fell back onto the bed, saying, "I recall the dossier on Addashield, and also on Addavein. She's trying to split the dragon back into his parts, which is strangely close to Leash's desires. Do you want to pursue that?"

"We could," Planty said. "The demons are scared of Addavein, but they have no issues with Addashield. Helping someone else distill Addavein back into his parts would erase him from reality and appease Leash, and Leash would go inactive. It is a path we could take. Having Addashield back would be a fine thing to achieve. He could even get a new Contract with someone else and be a Hero of Humanity once again."

"… Didn't he, you know, turn people into hidden dragons because of his Contract?"

"So?"

Steve hummed, and gently said, "Let's remain on vacation."

"I suppose so!" And then Planty said, "So why is it that Mark can't dance well? He fights like a champion, but he can't dance! It makes no sense to me at all. Let's get him signed up for dance classes."

Steve smiled a little, and then he took out a joint and lit it up, saying, "I'll broach the subject tonight when they get back from the Wall. How about Miss Leggs for an instructor?"

"She's a good choice," Planty softly said, settling down onto the bed, to put a hand on Steve's chest as she curled up with him, to smoke the joint with him. She blew out the sweet scent of pleasurable oblivion, adding, "But I was thinking Sergeant Hamburger."

Steve laughed. "That hardass?"

Planty smirked. "Yes, that hardass."

"… Well… Might be a nice choice. Let's see…" Blackthorn pulled out his phone and sat up, while Planty turned to vapors with a smirk. The line connected and a voice started spouting off things about being busy and please leave a message. The machine beeped and Blackthorn began, "Hey Sergeant Hamburger, this is Steve Blackthorn and I'm calling to—"

"Archmage!" came Hamburger's voice, interrupting the recording. "I didn't recognize your phone number. How can I be of service?"

"I'm trying to get one of my friends into dance lessons. He's a good fighter. Do you have space for private instruction?"

"… Uhhh. Everything is destroyed, Archmage. I have no building to teach anyone in."

"I can fix that for you. In fact I will, regardless of your acceptance of a new student or not. I haven't even asked him about it yet."

"Yes, of course I will accept a new student."

Blackthorn smiled to himself, and to Planty, who did a cute little fistbump in the smoke. "I'll see if he wants to do it then. I'll be in touch."