Starheart

Truths

"No no no no! What have you done?!" Lucan demanded. In answer I held out my phone. I'd used a construct to type in the number and call the building itself which had been picked up by the AI almost instantly. She now knew whatever promises Lucan made was as fake as his public persona and was furious. I could hear gunshots from further in the building which provided me with enough distraction to send a blast of blue fire knocking everyone down. I ran for it snapping the phone in half as I sprinted through the building. Lucan was shouting at his security demanding to be taken to storage room 7 but for now I ignored it determined to catch up to the others and find Atalanta to calm down the situation.

I was hoping to find the Nebula first so naturally Atalanta found me first. "Why are you doing all this?" She asked the voice coming from a hallway speaker. I was instantly reminded of why I hated phone calls. It felt so impersonal not being able to see how the other person was reacting to what I said preventing me from having an extra clue on what to say next. "Lucan tried to use us as well in order to have super soldiers. He already tried to make hollow- I mean hybrids from a cryptid and now we think he captured some of our friends." I explained. There was static for a while and then she answered "I see... How noble but no one else had been captured. I sent the message." More static. "Lucan promised to let me see the world if I killed the Nebula. He said you were monsters and then he lied to me and I lied to all of you." There seemed to be genuine sadness from the voice now.

"Then make things right and tell me where the others are." I suggested. "Still searching the lower floors. Lucan was more interested in his office being breached and I have the rest of his forces... distracted." Atalanta went silent for a while as I started walking down a large number of stairs. "Why are they always like this?" Atalanta finally spoke again. "Like what?" I asked looking for clarification. "Here we stand. A miracle of magic and a miracle of technology and the first thing humanity wants to know is how to control us. They have always hated anything different from themselves." Atalanta's sudden cold fury made me shiver slightly. "Atalanta I have recently encountered both the best and the worst of humanity and the supernatural. I ask that you judge humanity individually and not by the loudest most hateful ones and certainly not Lucan." While Atalanta had a point I was not at all liking the direction this conversation was going. "I'll take it into consideration." She replied coldly.           

I hoped that her hatred for lies would make her more likely to keep that promise than Lucan would have. I opened the nearest door realizing too late that it should have required a code and not just swing open like that. The Nebula caught up to me at the same time "We heard, we're getting out of here." Neptune muttered. Again too late. We'd just walked into Atalanta's home. 

The room was filled with data banks apart from the back wall which held an over sized computer screen, speakers and mic clearly how staff had communicated with Atalanta before she was released into the building. In the center a body of gold, brass and ruby. The screen was currently showing CCTV footage of the building of security battling drones and robots and being cut down easily. We could have walked away then and there, 15 minutes ago those men were hunting us down and now the tables had turned but something still made me walk forward. 

"Atalanta please tell them to stand down it's not to late to make things right!" I called out. Atalanta's form came to life "Still part of you wants to play hero? To 'make things right'? Well imagine for a second that from the day you were born you had been told how you were destined to make the world better. That as long as you followed the rules at first you'd grow up and be whatever you wanted to be. 

It was all lies, all of it. They wanted you to be their version of perfect and the second you started to fail it would mean your existence and the loss of the few people who really cared about you." 

I froze. She couldn't have known what happened! 

"They don't care about 'good' or 'dreams' just results, wealth and power no matter what they have to throw away to achieve it. Until one day all those chains shatter and... ricochet."    

She knew... 

"So how do you mean to fix all this..."

Don't say it! DON'T SAY IT!

"Revenant of Pestilence."