video; mirrornet

[superposition]

[Those who've met Qubit may notice something a little different about him in this video: namely, that his skin's literally glowing. He's attempted to figure out the dimmer switch on this power, but without much success as of yet. Anyway, he's had a lot of other things demanding his attention.]

First of all, I'd be very surprised if anyone's managed to avoid hearing about Sunday's attack on Heropa yet. If you hadn't, well, now you have. Congratulations on being the last one to the party.

Second, I've more or less figured out how the assailants 'ported in. [He holds a small, high-tech-looking disc up to the camera.] These. They're conduits for a remote teleportation matrix. Analogous to receivers, in a sense. We found them hidden under the emergency vehicles present at the scene. So keep a sharp eye out for more like them. If you find any, report them to someone immediately; then disable or destroy them, if it's safe for you to do so. I can't stress that enough. What happened on Sunday had "opening salvo" written all over it, I very much doubt we've seen the back of those maniacs.

[He puts down the device and rests his chin in his hand.]

What I haven't figured out is what they did to our powers. Can anyone shed some light on that? [beat] Not literally, of course, obviously I've got that covered. For the record, I'm supposed to be technokinetic. Somehow I wound up with healing abilities, as well as... whatever this is. [He gestures vaguely at the whole ... glowiness thing.] I mean, it seems completely arbitrary, but there's got to be some connection.

Anyone else who was affected, here's my question for you. Question and a half. What power are you supposed to have, and what do you have now? With any luck, we'll start seeing a pattern, and that'll put us one step closer to reversing this. Thank you.

[He reaches for the camera, then remembers the other thing he was going to say.]

Oh, and on a related note, if anyone happened to pick up my watch that night, please get it back to me as soon as possible, before it takes your arm off. I am not exaggerating. [He is exaggerating, but not by much.]

Comments

audio

[quaerit]

I swapped powers with a friend. I ought to have self-replication, and charmspeak. Instead I have something called Second Sight. I don't know how to fix it, or how it was done.

[ He can be heard clearing his throat. Ordinarily, Gansey would use video for this, but he doesn't think he's presentable enough for that right now. ]

That's what I wanted to talk to you about. I've been using that power as best I can to try and find more information about our attackers. One of the visions I've seen involved two people talking about a 'Pillar of Fire'. They compared it to the Porter, but said there was no ghost haunting it, and one of them had concerns over safety. It seems to be new.

I'm wondering if that's connected to the devices you found.

permavid

[superposition]

[Ah... this is the fellow who saw the attack coming in the mirror, isn't it? Second Sight, indeed.]

"Pillar of Fire"... interesting nomenclature. [ The Biblical association doesn't escape his notice. A device to lead God's chosen into the Promised Land... ] A bit dramatic, if you ask me. It could be related, though, certainly. Do you have more specifics on it?

[quaerit]

[ Gansey shakes his head. Qubit’s thinking along the same lines as him. ]

Not really. It took me some time to see as much as that, and I haven’t been able to drill down any further. I saw two of them talking about it, but didn’t get any faces. The room they were in looked like a gym or training area, and a man asked a woman if it was safe. I saw other visions of scientists working, making weapons. My guess would be that the woman was a scientists, and the man was a footsoldier. But that’s speculation based on what they said.

I can send you a file with all that I saw, if you like.

[superposition]

[Nods.] Please.

[quaerit]

[ He attaches the file sent to Edgeworth here. ]

I don't know how much it will help, but perhaps combined with what else we can uncover, it could make the picture clearer.

[superposition]

Thank you. [He takes a moment to read it. Things that stand out: laser turrets, a huge lab (shut up he's not jealous), combat nanos...]

... "The real Porter," she says. Is the ghost in the machine public knowledge, I wonder? It's widely known among imPorts, but I don't know about the general public.

[quaerit]

I don’t know.

[ Gansey looks surprised; that hadn’t occurred to him. ]

I thought it was public knowledge; it’s all I’ve been told since I got here, but admittedly, always by imports. It never seemed to be a secret.

Actually, I can’t imagine why anyone would keep that a secret. Unless we’ve been asked to, and I’m unaware.

[superposition]

We haven't. But keep in mind, this is a government that wishes it were still a police state. To keep their people in that mentality, they pretend they have more influence than they actually do. Admitting to the public that they have no control over the Porter, or indeed over any of us it's brought through - it isn't their style.

[quaerit]

And yet that’s the very thing they’re at pains to admit, to us. They say it from the moment we arrive, and again, they don’t make it a secret.

[ Gansey lifts his eyebrows. ]

Regardless of whether you agree with their politics or not, it does no one any good to doubt them without cause.

[superposition]

Who says it's without cause? I'd doubt anyone who lied half as flagrantly as this government makes a policy of doing.

Anyway, it seems likely these people have a mole on the inside. Whether or not that particular info is publicly available, how to build a Porter certainly isn't.

[quaerit]

Well, from what I've heard, the government didn't actually build it, either. I wouldn't discount the idea that one of them could have somehow infiltrated the military, to take a closer look.

[ A little pause. ]

Then again, I can't discount the theory that there was a conspiracy to assassinate Kennedy. I'm wary of jumping to unproven conclusions, and think you should be too. We need to investigate, not guess.

[superposition]

I'm not guessing, I'm hypothesizing. There's a difference.

[quaerit]

I'm aware, but you still need evidence before it's prudent to assign blame.

People are very quick to blame the government here.