Mask of Humanity

‘What about the guy who ran?’ Nicolai continued his questions, gesturing behind the Chosen field leader, to the tunnel the only survivor of her group had ran through.

She threw a glance over her shoulder, following his pointing finger, an unconscious reaction.

There was a flicker of metal, the rapier springing from its sheath as Nicolai made a twisting gesture which ended in a strike. The rapier moved through the air in mimic, whip-snap, and it slammed through her throat.

‘It was a nice fight,’ he consoled her as she staggered and choked, trying to push some of what he felt at her, trying to ensure she understood how glorious it had been. But she didn’t. She only felt the predictable terror and horror they all did at a blade in the neck, clutching at the rapiers hilt. Blood bubbled from between her lips as she fell to her knees, choking on it, dying. Nicolai gestured and the rapier burst back out and she fell.

The rapier lanced through her temple and into her brain and her body flopped, tensed, then went limp. Her legs and arms slowly relaxed down to the ground.

His eyes were wet. His Mask was crying, but even it agreed she’d needed to die. ‘It was a nice fight,’ he croaked at her, sniffling, lowering himself to his knee beside her. He felt this was right, to be sad. It was the correct reaction, the human reaction.

He remembered the thing people did and ran his hand over her face, closing her eyes. He closed his own at the same moment, so his and hers closed at the same time. He wondered how it felt, to be dead. For a moment he pretended he was dead. Floating, empty. He supposed it might be quite nice. Peaceful. Boring, though. His Mask was still swamping him with emotions, and he let them gather around him, marvelled at them.

He stilled, luxuriating in the bittersweet sensations his Mask pulsed in slow, heavy blankets through his mind and body and Soul.

‘Am I human?’ he asked the empty room and the corpses and his Mask. His Mask said… no. ‘More human than before?’ Uncertainty, a kind of mental shrug. His Mask told him it was still learning.

‘Pity she had to die,’ he murmured, gazing down. ‘I liked her.’ He wished the fight could have gone on for longer. He wished she’d been stronger. His eyes roved around, taking in the corpse of her guard. As to that one and the rest, he felt nothing. They’d died too quickly and easily to leave any impression on him.

His eyes returned to the woman and fell on her radio. Vikrum. Leader of the Chosen. A problem Nicolai had always intended to deal with, and now at last he felt he might be in with a chance at doing so. She’d been pretty strong. No doubt the ultimate leader would be stronger still. He recalled what Maxine had said when speaking about him. The most augmented man here. Now that was someone worth killing.

Vikrum hadn’t spoken again since the singular announcement. The man’s voice had sounded less… collected than Nicolai had expected. It smelt of weakness, and weakness in one’s enemies was an opportunity. He pulled the radio from her vest and looked it over. It looked just like all the others. Had the Chosen found a way to split off a private channel? After thumbing around the radio it didn’t seem to be that way, it had the same channels as normal. He supposed they used some of the more quiet channels. These days, the radio was less busy than it once was, the voices chatting and talking trash going silent one by one. Whether that was because people were running out of food and didn’t have time to sit there talking shit on the radio all day, or because they were dying off, Nicolai couldn’t say.

Nicolai was pulled from his thoughts by noises from behind, emanating from the tunnel with the door, where the others were. It sounded like an argument.

He quickly looted the woman, taking her submachine gun, the axe and its sheath. Then her Seed, SMG magazines (all empty, unfortunately), the radio, and a few Oma crystals. To his annoyance he didn’t find so much as a single loose bullet on her. There was also an Orb of Rejuvenation, but it had so little left in it as to be practically useless, more capable of aiding the recovery of an injury than actually healing it.

Finally, he retrieved the bracelet from her wrist. It was formed of bronze metal and had a few little holes in it. One of these holes had a small, golden feather emerging from it. He Examined the item.

Feathered Bracelet

This bracelet was made to contain two feathers from a Silver Wrapping Wings Symbiote, and one feather from a Gold Wrapping Wings Symbiote. Each feather contains a single charge, which generates a shield around the Cultivator when activated. The Silver Feathers require only a small amount of Oma to activate, and can be used very quickly, but create a relatively weak shield. The Golden Feather requires a larger amount of Oma, and takes some time to activate, but is significantly stronger.

Nicolai considered it. This wasn’t what he’d expected. He’d been excited to get his hands on her bracelet, seeing it as a straight upgrade to his glove. He had wondered why her shield was so much stronger than his, but had figured it had just been coming from a better Symbiote or Imbued.

It seemed the answer was more complicated than that. There were factors he didn’t understand. The bracelet was a kind of emergency item, one which could only be used a few times, and then it was useless. She’d left him only one charge. Better than nothing, I suppose. At least, the charge—the feather—she’d left him was apparently the best of the bunch, at least in terms of power. It must have been difficult for her to utilise it, considering she only had a Seed, and that he’d given her very little time.

Touching it, his Soul pressed into it and he found the bracelet to be lacking the typical sensations of an Imbued item. It wasn’t an Imbued item. The only special part of it was the little feather that emerged from it. The golden feather was solid, more like it was made from metal than biological matter. It reacted more strongly when his Soul felt at it, and it did feel somewhat like an Imbued item, but different.

Confusingly, the feather felt somewhat organic and alive, moreso than any Imbued item he’d ever held. He could feel how activating it would be a simple process, though it would take a moment. He only needed to send Oma into it. From what he sensed, it would require about a Node’s worth.

Nicolai slid the bracelet over his hand and onto his wrist then headed towards the tunnel, SMG hanging from his shoulder by its loop, the axe in its sheath now attached to his belt. The axe was quite small and surprisingly light, but it was solid, made from carbon steel. A good find.

As he moved, his Soul Sense tendril extending before him, he thought on what would await him. He’d left some guns on the ground. Naturally, the group would seek to claim them. He didn’t like that idea. He was the one who’d killed the original owners of the guns. But he knew they would likely be holding them, anyway. Best if he could have some Oma ready to form a shield, just in case, and his Node was low. He reached into one of the pouches hanging from his belt and tugged out one of the crystals. His Node pulsed, hungry, and he pulled at the Oma.

He felt the crystal shrinking and crumbling in his grip as he drew from it, and it turned to dust that fell between his fingers just as he was stepping through the tunnel. He grasped another and continued refilling his store as he spotted the others. They were gathered around the Chosen he’d initially killed, and all seemed to be fine, except for Perro who was covered in chalky dust and leaned against Azure, his arm over her shoulder, face pained, one of his legs lifted to avoid touching the ground.

Some kind of argument was underway and Nicolai quickly understood the reason.

One of the men, a quiet individual who’d mostly just sat or lurked in the background, had taken the loaded pistol and now stood between the others and the shotguns on the ground. John and Cait were yelling at him to hand it over.

‘It’s mine,’ he said, smirking at them. ‘I picked it up first, finders-keepers. It’s mine. You’ve got your arm.’ He gestured to Cait. ‘You’re a big guy.’ He gestured to John. ‘I get a gun. Fair’s fair.’

‘It needs to go to whoever is the best shot, whoever can do the most with it,’ John said, scowling, taking a step forward.

The man half-raised the pistol, faintly threatening, and John abruptly stopped, eyeing the gun.

‘That’s me, then. I spent a lot of time in VR FPS simulations.’

‘That’s—‘ Cait began, frowning, while Azure snorted beside her.

‘That’s how it is, my gun!’ the man yelled, raising it high.

Nicolai had continued walking towards them all this time, and those facing him had started to notice. As they grew silent and set their eyes on him, the man with the pistol followed their gazes, turning.

‘Look who it is, everyone!’ the man yelled, seemingly excited. ‘The guy who abandoned us!’

Nicolai smirked, understanding easily enough. They were upset with this man, so he wanted to point them at someone else.

‘The guy who killed the Chosen and saved you all, actually,’ he said, quick to make his case. He was a little confused, however. Had they not seen his note, scrawled on the table, that he was going but would return?

‘Whatever.’ The man sneered at him, and Nicolai saw how his eyes moved to the submachine gun hanging on Nicolai’s back.

Nicolai reached out invisibly, his Soul Sense tendril stretching and settling around the man, and sensed emotions. He felt the man’s vicious, desperate greed almost like his own, familiar but different, and experienced an odd twinge of kinship. Then the greed morphed into anger and Nicolai sensed a decision being made.

Nicolai had already raised his gloved hand and formed a shield by the time the man had whipped his pistol up to point it at him. Nicolai kept moving forwards, as he had been this whole time, and other than the raised shield he adopted a calm, non-aggressive posture and expression as he closed the distance. He walked as though completely unaware there was a pistol pointed at his face, but hidden beneath his poncho he held the rapier loosely in his hand. It was necessary to keep it hidden, because it was glowing; charged and ready to go.

‘Stop fucking moving, stay where you are!’ the man yelled, stepping back, putting both hands on the pistol.

Nicolai stopped. He was already more than close enough. ‘What’s up?’ he asked, blinking with amiable confusion at the man he had decided to label Idiot.

‘Drop your weapons. Put the SMG on the ground,’ said Idiot, relaxing slightly now Nicolai had stopped.

‘Why would I do that?’ Nicolai gave him a puzzled grin through the shield. He was in no danger here, but he wouldn’t strike yet, because the others were watching. He wanted to ensure they knew he was one-hundred-percent in the right when he killed this man.

‘Because I’ve got this, dumbass. I’ll shoot you.’ Idiot scoffed, his stance shifting as he raised the pistol, waving it at Nicolai. ‘Are you brain fried? Put the stuff on the ground.’

‘Really?’ Nicolai formed a doubtful expression. ‘Do you even know how to use that thing? I think you’re holding it wrong.’

Idiot laughed. ‘Back in VR, I topped the leaderboards in just about every FPS there is.’ He spun the pistol around. ‘This is the safety,’ he said in a slow voice, pointing it out. ‘It’s set to unsafe, that means when I pull this,’ he pointed at the trigger, ‘bullets come out. Those bullets go through your head and make you dead.’ He snorted. ‘But I never liked pistols. I was good with SMGs, like that one on your back. I’m the only one who knows how to use it right. So, I should get it.’ He glanced at the others, at John. ‘Right, John?’ He gave a meaningful smile.

John just gazed dourly back, his eyes moving slowly between Nicolai and Idiot. Those eyes were quite a bit smarter than Idiot’s. Those eyes knew that someone was about to die. But he said nothing.

Meanwhile Idiot decided to emphasise his words by doing this little spin-thing with the pistol, which Nicolai recognised as a model known for a rather light trigger pull, twirling it by the trigger guard. It was one of the stupidest things Nicolai had ever seen someone do, and his mouth almost dropped open.

‘Wow, that was so cool,’ he managed, voice heavy with goading sarcasm.

‘Yeah?’ Idiot sneered at him, clearly picking up on the sarcasm and not at all pleased by it. Nicolai grinned hugely back. Idiot’s dark little eyes narrowed with anger. Then he smirked. ‘If you like that, watch this.’ Nicolai felt a pulse of aggression from him, knew he’d made the decision.

Idiot spun the pistol again and Nicolai could see what he’d do, complete the spin then shoot. He was aiming right at Nicolai’s face, which meant right at the shield. He didn’t seem to realise the bullet wouldn’t get through. Nicolai was watching the spin of the pistol and preparing to crouch down—he didn’t think Idiot was going to surprise shoot him in the leg, because Idiot was an idiot, but he would take the precaution regardless—and launch the rapier, when a bang rang out.

It came earlier than Nicolai had expected, catching him by surprise. He almost flinched.

Idiot stumbled back, clutching at his chest where blood was pumping out of him, dropping the pistol. He fell to his knees, staring in utter shock and horror at his chest. ‘Oh my god,’ he said.

The moron had shot himself. ‘Oh my god!’ Nicolai echoed him, laughter bubbling out from between his lips and rising sharply in pitch, bending him over as it wracked him. ‘Holy… shit!’ he croaked between the gales of howling laughter, unable to stop.

Old Ben tried to step forward, face tight and eyes wide with reflexive concern and desire to help, but John blocked him with an arm. The big man shook his head.

‘I’m dead,’ the dying man gurgled and coughed blood, his eyes round, his voice full of terminal disappointment.

‘You’re dead!’ Nicolai shrieked with laughter in response, his legs weakening till he fell to his knees, gasping for air between outpourings of mad laughter, slapping the floor with one hand, drool dribbling between his lips. He was trying to stop himself, as his Mask was informing him that this wasn’t the typical human reaction, and he was aware it wasn’t the best look, but he couldn’t. His body was out of control. It was just. So. Funny!

Idiot toppled and blinked and his mouth opened and closed, fish-like, the movements of his lungs slowing, stopping. Nicolai’s laughter was unceasing, jagged and random. The others stared, mute in their shock, except for John who stepped forward to lay claim to the pistol.

That pulled Nicolai out of his fit of good humour as he finally managed to force the laughter down. He pushed himself to his feet and wiped the drool from his mouth, and he did his best to clamp down on the laughter but little spurts of it still made their way out here and there.

Some of them had warily moved forwards, poking at the corpse. ‘Dead,’ said John, managing to form a regretful expression Nicolai was sure was false.

‘Good riddance,’ said Cait with far more honesty.

Nicolai left them to it. The laughter was finally under control, bottled tight inside his aching lungs. He stooped and took the double-barreled shotgun from the ground by one of the corpses.

It was a shortened version, no stock just a pistol-grip, the barrels sawn-off, which made it lightweight and significantly less bulky than standard. Only a little larger than a pistol. Not much good at range, but it could be drawn fast and in Nicolai’s experience two barrels of 12 gauge could turn problems into not-problems with impressive speed. It was loaded as he’d shot the man who’d held it before the guy could fire a shot.

Next he began to search the bodies of both of those who’d had shotguns for more shells, while keeping track of John and the pistol with his Soul Sense tendril. The pump-shotgun had been fully loaded, but he’d used all of those shots in the fight; taking out the ones with guns and breaking the Chosen leaders first shield. He took it anyway. The others kept their distance, allowing him free pickings.

Taking advantage of this, Nicolai kept digging and found a hip-holster sized for the sawn-off on its old owner. His Soul Sense moved between John and the others now, twitching about almost automatically in response to Nicolai’s paranoia, an endless check, check, check for betrayal.

He found three more shotgun shells and loaded them into the pump-action shotgun, which he slung over his back beside his new SMG. Further searching revealed little else of value on the majority of the Chosen around him. The others had all clustered and were talking in low voices, words he hadn’t paid too much attention to. But he saw them all looking at him, then John was moving forward.

‘What?’ Nicolai asked.

John stared at him, brows creased. The others formed up behind him. ‘We thought you’d abandoned us,’ said John.

‘Why?’ Nicolai asked, confused. ‘Did you not see the note?’

‘Note?’ John seemed equally confused.

Huh. So, what, had they just glanced into his room, seen he wasn’t there, and that was it? The words had been quite obvious on the table, but apparently none had seen. Annoying. He was about to expand on this, having decided to simply explain about going to perform the integration, when another spoke.

‘Are we just not going to talk about what happened?’ Karl stepped forward. ‘We all saw that, right?’ He stared at Nicolai, the red lens of his right eye clicking as it moved up and down. ‘What the fuck is wrong with you? You found that funny?’

The words reminded Nicolai of the fantastic moment he’d witnessed and a splutter of laughter burst out. He turned away, covering his mouth with a hand, his shoulders shaking.

‘This guy is off. We can’t trust him. We ought to just split.’ Karl was talking to John now, pointing right at Nicolai who was struggling not to grin.

‘I’m not at all sure about him, either,’ stated old Ben with a big serious look on his face.

John was looking back and forth between them and Nicolai, uncertain. Nicolai’s Soul Sense wrapped around the man and he felt John’s indecision, bubbling away, pulling the man in multiple directions.

It was looking like things were going to fall through with the group. A large part of him was feeling that this was a good thing. They’d taken his band off, which was all he’d ever really wanted. It was about time to leave, go and find a new place to stay the night.

But the thing on his face, his new, living Mask, had been growing increasingly unhappy as it heard the words of the others. It actually wanted to argue in his defence, to point out how he’d helped them. It was upset… it felt this was unfair. Nicolai blinked with surprise as, without bothering to consult the rest of him, his mouth opened and started speaking.

‘That’s fine, then.’ His foot kicked at one of the dead, pulling their attention to the corpse of a Chosen he’d killed. ‘I save your lives, again. Then that idiot tries to shoot me, and kills himself in a way that was, frankly—’ his Mask was unable to hold in Nicolai’s dismissive little chuckle, ‘—hilarious. But I’m the one who’s in the wrong. Okay.’ He scoffed, and his Mask threw his hands up in frustration. ‘Fine. If you want me to leave, I’ll leave.’

His Mask subsided back into him, waiting anxiously to see how the others would respond to what it thought of as heartfelt words. To Nicolai the words had sounded more like an attempt at a guilt trip, but he supposed it could be both. He didn’t think on that long, busy frowning and replaying the words he’d just said to himself. Why was he upset? Why did his Mask care?

‘What am I doing?’ he murmured, staring at his hands. Was he angry? Was there a darkness rising through him? His awareness briefly dove inside, checking the cage in his Soul, but it was locked up tight and the thrill was quiet.

All of this was coming from his Mask. His previously simulated emotions, simulated humanity, had turned very real and… surprisingly annoying. Did he… care about these people? Was that it? Was it possible? His face twisted with confusion, and disgust, and something else. Was he upset and defensive, or was he happy, or was he angry? He didn’t know, and neither did his Mask.

Something stirred in his stomach. He felt the cage creaking, the dark squirming. His lips drew back in a snarl. He ought to just leave. Get out of here before he did something his Mask would regret.