Reading

Open fileNeed to knowMy clearance

A.Journal

Checks

9,823 checks

Gut churn vertigo.

Said more for herself than for you.

If she survives, she will be the first to be interrogated. They will make an example of her.

She's savouring it.

What is the plan here, operant?

Pass some time with the stranger, why not. Your quarry is old, slow. The assignment can wait.

Behind her mirrored sunglasses, she's around your age.

Is she In On This? Paid off, threatened, fanatical?

This is a normal woman, doing her normal job. She has no clue that she's just ferried up a contingent of the Weeping Eye.

She's playing it too normal. File under 'Goon, potential'.

Right. Alcohol is known to damage the brain, after all.

The real question -- how did he get them to serve him?

Transparent liquid, normal glass, ice cubes and crushed leaves. Appears to be something-tonic.

UNQUESTIONING, UNWAVERING ACCEPTANCE. EXACTLY WHAT THE PARTY DEMANDS.

Something about the look in his eyes tells you he'll be with you till they come to mop the blood up.

Utter impenetrability in the event of capture. No torturer is breaking through to this one.

He's a good luck charm. A rabbit's paw you wear around your neck.

The autopilot is immaculate, all things considered.

Opposable thumbs- check.

No complications whatsoever. If he'll work with the woman who lobotomised him, he'll work with anyone.

Like a well-scrubbed bathroom tile.

The paleolithic huntress exhales as she fondles the precious river stone, the primal superstition inside her calmed -- for the moment.

You are milking your lucky cow dry, take it easy on him. Once a day is more than enough.

The vacant smile hits you like a bag of bricks.

A mixture of guilt and the desire to lobotomise him even more comes over you.

He has been subjected to the 'Hershel Wilk Special'. The history of all your former assets, condensed into just a few days.

Still no pants on him, though.

The nagging idea that you should just finish the job accosts you.

Just take him on the assignment with you. He'll catch a stray one, and the problem will solve itself.

An obnoxious little mirror, well-worth the seven years of bad luck incurred by breaking him.

You are. He did.

Your desire to stay out of the freezer and prove yourself in the eyes of the Opera has clearly been foregrounded in his mind. You can use this against him.

Based on the reports from Constanz and Melita, he certainly wasn't like this before.

YOUR AUTHORITY, DEAD IN THE WATER.

Translation: you're paying for it.

All at once he internalises the defeat in his posture, the shoulders sinking in time.

He's not just saying it. He has actually understood.

Congratulations. You have made your point, and in doing so, you have toppled one of his few psychic pillars.

Unfamiliarity without novelty. A hell of alienation.

No hint of accusation. He's convinced he is misremembering somehow.

You remember the feeling of inert PSEUDODPOD -- at once mundane and disturbing, like some piece of surrealist human furniture.

He swallows hard. You can practically see him pushing the emotions and thoughts down his throat.

Lucid, self-aware -- this really isn't the worst version of yourself, all things considered.

He strips you naked with his gaze, on his expression a desire that is not lust.

As though at a mirror that refused to respond to his movements.

Not the bald spot! The font of luck.

The information to process is simply too much. He has no choice but to roll with it.

Like an epic romance from mythology, your hatred of Eszti echoes through your incarnations, undying.

Skill checks - ZERO PARADES field manual - Page 143 of 197