Born a Monster

The Reticule has several sub-modules, such as enemy detection, that sound cooler than they really are. At the time, having been just able to purchase the reticule, I didn’t know that yet.

But I could link skills and abilities into the reticule. For example, Beast Detection from my Hunter class confirmed that Kismet was type [Person/Mwarri], and not a beast. I was [Titanspawn/Protean/Shapeshifter], which became [Person] only when I wondered whether I was not a person, and then reset itself as soon as I stopped.

Incidentally, there were some [Animal/Aware] around, just not as many as I’d gotten used to. And they had [Bloodline: unknown] for both their mother and their father, unless I had scanned the mother or father, in which case...

“Awaugh!” I said, as Kismet whacked me with her book.

“Rhishi, stop assessing the animals for nutritional value.”

“I wasn’t. I was assessing...”

She sighed. “Do you suspect the animals of supporting the Nine?”

“I guess only the Aware ones. They’d see humans as just humans; they’d make good scouts or watchers, once you get past their animal-attention-spans.”

.....

“Good idea.” She said. “Get on that. And some animals have better attention spans than you.”

“And most have worse.”

“But nobody will suspect them, and they can see things without raising suspicions. Can you talk to them with just your mind?”

“I... guess so?” I responded.

“Good. If people see you talking to animals, they may lock you up in an insane asylum. Besides, I need to know if anyone else is using the animals that way.”

It turns out you can burn through a LOT of psi points that way. Four psi points, ten minutes each, and my Telepath class was tapped out. Which didn’t stop me from using my normal System communication channels.

After a few hours, I was more confused than ever. Some animals accused me of shouting, others of whispering. The volume (and theirs to me) seemed to be a function of interest, expectation, and (I was guessing at the time) ability. I was better able to gauge the proper volume for creatures that I had evolutions from.

Also, I took great care not to overwhelm those who, like Gamilla, were vulnerable to psychic emissions.

Oh, in case I hadn’t mentioned it before, my System comms used mental (sanity) fatigue points to power it. I found myself less able to focus than normal and unwilling to be active. So, I was just sitting there, chewing on a spare piece of board.

To her credit, Kismet did try words before striking me. She was angry at first, and became fearful. It wasn’t my mind that responded, not any more than it had to.

“I’m okay.” I heard someone say, in a listless version of my voice, “I’m just very tired.”

And she tried a long string of angry words, at which point my serenity just stopped trying to respond to hers. It was an overcast day, but only little spots of rain. Never heavy and never long, and the thunder was soft and distant.

[You now have 1/40 mental fatigue points.]

I blinked. “Okay, try that again. I think I’m okay now.”

“No. First, you tell me what just happened.”

“I exhausted my mental fatigue.” I said. “My conscious brain functions shut down. Kind of like how you collapse prone and can’t move when you exhaust your physical fatigue.”

“Talking to you is doing emotional fatigue to me.” She said, rubbing the bridge of her nose near her eyes. “Okay, fine. I have hope, an emotion, that you’ve gotten something back from the animals?”

“Yes. They find all of the activities we’re doing highly suspicious. And also...”

She muttered something.

“I didn’t hear that, could you repeat...?”

“Continue.”

“The citizens have already started killing and eating the animals; they’re very concerned about that. On the plus side, I can say with certainty that with the exception of one woman who has a pet owl, none of the nine are making use of the animals, either day or night.”

“An owl?”

“One of the women who started the fires had an owl as a pet. I suspect it may be a magical familiar, or perhaps possessed by a spirit.”

“Rhishi.... That’s not useless, but it’s not a day’s worth of spy work. What else do they know about the Nine?”

“Almost nothing. They’ve seen enough hostility between humans that it only registers with them because of the fire.”

“So, what I’m hearing is that Awakened animals are still animals?”

“Kismet, there are different levels of awakening. It’s not an all or nothing thing.”

“I remind you, this was YOUR idea.”

“And I’m putting as much effort into it as I can.” I said.

“Here.” She said, thrusting a small stack of papers at me. “Review these, the way Gamilla taught us. I want to know if this looks like an honest accounting of expenses for an inn.”

“I don’t...”

“I’ve seen you do this before.”

“I don’t read every language that I speak.”

“You’re an ass.” She said. “Unlock them in your System.”

“But that... I... Okay, I’ll figure out where I have the points sequestered.”

“Rhishi...”

“AND I will do this inside, just in case it rains, and to protect these pages from the wind and also from prying eyes.”

“Okay, that was almost spy-worthy. Get to it, I want a report in no less than an hour. Earlier if you find something, but certainly not after.”

It isn’t cheap to unlock an entire skill group; fortunately, I had a lot of experience on the spoken side. Between that and my training in business finance (which was apparently more extensive than I’d given it credit for), I was ready to report.

“This individual has terrible penmanship. However, they appear to be a good innkeeper. It is only recently when the army took their food supplies that the business itself began to collapse. Perhaps because of this, they are charging the officers staying there more than civilians who have comparable rooms.”

“A woman after my own heart.” Kismet said. “Okay, here’s the first four books of Fifth Support company’s logistics. Make sure you can find the food supplies they’re complaining about.”

“Organized by date?” I found it in the third book. “Here. Foodstuffs. They tried giving her half value for them, then corrected the amount.”

“What? What? Show me. Holy Crap, Rhishi. I see three such corrections on these two pages alone. Find out how much of that is going on.”

“Just the ones they gave out coins for, or the ones they handed out paper receipts for?”

“Wait, they can do that?” she asked. “Like how Donna and I just signed for stuff we picked up in the stores?”

“Different reasoning, but yes. They mark them with this sign, versus this one, which seems to mean coins.”

“How tired are you?” she asked.

“I could take a nap.”

“Could you put that off?”

“It’s near dusk, anyway.” I said.

“Rhishi. System away tonight’s sleep.”

“That won’t help my accuracy any.” I said.

“I’m going to get you the books for the other support companies.” She said. “I need to know how much debt the army’s actually in, and how many of these companies seem to be cheating people to get in their supplies.”

Cheating people to get...? I hadn’t said anything like that, had I? But...

I tried saying that definitely wasn’t going on, and the words died silent in my throat. “If that’s what’s happening, it’s important for us to know. I can skip one night’s sleep, but I’ll need to make that time up tomorrow.”

“No, you don’t. I’ve seen you do more.”

“Kismet, I am a Truthspeaker. I literally cannot lie to you. I will need to make up my sleep tomorrow; I consider it urgent that I regain my health, my FULL health, before facing Xinyi Shi again. And make no mistake, that conflict is coming.”

“Did you have your full health last time?”

“About half.” I said.

“I’ve seen you fight at half. I don’t think you’re taking full damage penalties like the rest of us.”

“I have abilities to offset damage penalties; most warriors do.”

“Uh-huh. Rhishi, how many people survive having their middle section eaten by a jungle cat? Or regrow half their brain? And that’s not that just last year you regrew half of your frikken skin in less than a season?”

“Well, that’s...”

“It’s not normal, Rhishi. YOU are not normal. You remember teaching me how to craft the woodsman’s healing potion?”

“I remember it failed.”

“It failed THAT TIME, sure. Did I ever tell you I kept trying? Or when I succeeded? I’m a BRAWLER, Rhishi. You don’t get more non-magical than that. Not just my System; any System on this world will tell you I have no chance of making a healing potion.”

I closed my eyes. Now. NOW, I needed to say the right thing. “I think all of us are capable of so much more than our Systems let us know. I think... I think the power is in us, Kismet, not in the Systems.”

“Yeah, and you’re busy telling everyone that. But nobody else is YOU, Rhishi.” She moved the fur of her wrist aside. “What do you see?”

I shrugged. “Your skin.”

“A scar, Rhishi. You see a scar. I checked again, while you weren’t here. Do you have any scrars? Are you a person?”

I held up my hand.

.....

[Person], it flashed, then,

[Monster]

Fuck.

You.

System.