Stumbling into Victory 11 (Patreon)

Stumbling into Victory 11

Jonathan YukawaBrockton Bay, NH, USA

I took deep, slow breaths as I tried not to react. I, with Atem’s generous backseat chess skills, won. That would have been enough to get Coil off my back. He would have been compelled to serve me, to provide me information as I requested, and generally to not act against me.

But that hadn’t been the end of it. Coil had cheated. It sounded juvenile when put like that, but cheating in a shadow game just wasn’t done. I warned him that there would be proportional consequences. He tried to kill me, and so all that he had, up to and including his life, was mine.

In a way, this was what I’d wanted. This was the ideal scenario, and one I predicted would likely happen. Coil was a cheater through and through. He had no sense of honor or fair play and assuming he would try something was the safest bet I’d ever made. And in doing so, he’d doomed himself so thoroughly that I found it hard to fully wrap my mind around.

I hadn’t truly understood what “all that you are is mine” would mean when it came to shadow games. Atem warned me that even winning a shadow game didn’t mean I would be safe from consequences, but hearing was very different from experiencing. Coil was mine, mind, body, and soul.

I claimed his soul. I’d literally yoinked it from across the city, through a phone, and placed it inside the black king chess piece. And now, it was time for the “mind” part of that.

His memories flooded my mind like an ocean tide. I knew everything about him, from his current schemes, to his numerous bank accounts, right down to how he grew up. I saw him as he graduated from the PRT academy, became a trooper, and participated in the fateful raid into Ellisburg. I watched as he gunned down his own friend so he could evacuate.

Most concerning of all, I saw the dropped timelines. From his perspective, those simulations truly happened. Those were all a part of the experience called “Coil.” And now, that perspective was mine as well. All the awful things he allowed in throwaway timelines were things I got to see firsthand.

They made me want to throw up. Acrid vomit stung the back of my throat as I tried desperately not to react. This was Coil, all of him. And now, he was mine.

‘Focus on my voice,’ Atem said reassuringly. ‘This will pass. The influx of memories is the consequence of claiming everything that belonged to him.’

I did so. It helped that I already had a mindscape of my own. With Atem’s help, I funneled the memories into one place. Slowly but surely, a new structure began to take shape in the sculpture garden.

There was now a shed, far from the central fountain. It was placed in the corner, probably because I wanted to distance myself from its contents. Inside, Coil’s memories took the form of countless scrolls and tomes, each I’d do my best to read as little as possible.

The magic faded, leaving me nursing the mother of all headaches. I had his soul. I had his mind. Now, it was time to take the body and his material possessions as well.

“Gather everyone back at the base. We’ve got work to do,” I told the mercenary. Kevin was his name.

He was one of the reliable ones, the kind of guy who could be trusted to clean up bodies so long as he was compensated. He stared absently down at the board. The gun in his hand lay forgotten even as Silver Fang eyed him with a hungry growl.

I wondered what he must be feeling now. I had no idea how someone would go about reconciling what he’d just seen. Or maybe, he was one of those superstitious sorts who’d easily embrace the existence of magic.

I allowed a commanding edge into my voice. “Well, Kevin? Come, or shall I consider this your resignation?”

He flinched at that. His eyes flickered to the horse-sized wolf that had been lounging at my feet. He eyed his phone, where Coil’s body still stared absently into the screen. “W-What the hell–”

“We gambled, remember? I won. He lost. Let’s say his organization is… under new management.”

“That’s not how this works.”

I fiddled with the chess set. “Is it? Speaking of, I suppose it wouldn’t be unfair to penalize the person who helped Coil break the rules…”

He stood swiftly, pistol holstered with practiced ease. “Welcome to the team, boss.”

X

I spent all night in Coil’s base. It was easy enough to get access. Everyone already knew that I was being recruited so when Kevin showed up with me in tow, they just assumed that I’d been given a lucrative offer, not unlike everyone else there.

Then, I locked myself with Coil in his office and began to go through all that I’d won in the shadow game. Not least of which was Coil himself. I found that because he was “mine,” I could command him as I pleased so long as I held his soul. As had been explained to me, the soul was the seat of the self. Everything else followed.

I told him to live out life as a PRT consultant and businessman, carrying out lawful duties and activities to the extent that he would not raise suspicion. It left me feeling strange, as if I was writing and leaving a plot thread dangling unnecessarily. A part of me just wanted to kill him, or order him to off himself publicly so I wouldn’t draw attention to myself.

As much as I wanted to tie this up in a neat, little bow, I couldn’t do that. I had his accounts. I knew everything about his mercenary operations. And yet, I had to keep him around for a few reasons: 

For starters, Coil was a multi-millionaire to the tune of nine digits. After paying off his Cauldron vial, he used his power to game the stock market, gaining an investment portfolio that could rival some private equity firms on his lonesome. He owned multiple companies and properties, forming a network of both legal and illegal assets that spanned the entire country.

But not all of that was liquid assets. I couldn’t just log onto Coil’s bank account and give myself a hundred mil. Stocks, properties, and similar assets could not be liquidated without raising eyebrows, especially since I wasn’t particularly economically savvy. I was a historian, not a financial planner, but even I understood that this takeover needed to happen gradually.

Second, there were the mercenaries themselves. They were a mixed bag. Some, like Kevin, just wanted money, which I could simply continue to provide. Those were the easy ones. They even tended to be on the competent side; Coil would never have bought out their contracts in the first place otherwise.

Others were… disgusting. An unnerving number of them were wanted for murder. One man shot his commanding officer, back when they were on tour. Yet another raped a female colleague and fled when he was being suspected. Two more were wanted for kidnapping and what Coil heavily suspected was organ trafficking. Reading their dossiers was like playing bingo, but for human rights violations.

‘You know, the only crime I don’t see is the sale of state secrets,’ I pointed out sardonically as I combed his files. ‘Guess even Coil wanted men who could keep their mouths shut.’

‘I noticed that as well. Now, you must make a decision, my friend: What crimes can you personally tolerate?’ he asked. ‘And, what will you do with the ones you cannot forgive?’

‘I… I don’t know. Murder outside of combat. Rape or sexual assault. Human trafficking, especially of minors. I consider these unforgivable. I’m just not sure how I should handle this.’

‘You have dragons,’ he replied blithely. ‘You are well-read on history; I don’t think I need to tell you what we did to such men in Egypt. Ma’at must be established.’

‘So… I should just kill them all and let Anubis sort them out?’

‘Perhaps. You must do so in such a way as to preserve order among the rest of your men.’

‘I understand. I’ll think of something. Death, but with order.’

The third and most pressing reason I could not simply kill Coil off was the fleshy, cannibalistic abomination in Coil’s basement. I could live with only a portion of Coil’s money and assets. I couldn’t have Noelle losing her shit. The Travelers were already here. They’d arrived in late February and had been lying low in Coil’s bunker since.

I… didn’t know too much about them. It’d been a literal decade since I read the web serial and they just didn’t get as much screentime as the Undersiders. I remembered that Francis, their leader, was a douchebag, but loyal to Noelle. The rest of them were… pretty alright?

Trouble was, the Travelers were Simurgh bombs, one and all. They’d come to Brockton Bay, lured by Coil’s promise of a cure for Noelle. Killing Coil would make her run rampant, unleashing a mini-endbringer on the city. That would defeat the purpose of trying to keep Alice under control in the first place.

All told, I made hundreds of millions of dollars. Even the fraction that I felt safe using solved my immediate financial troubles. But alas, I’d inherited a few other problems.

I checked my phone. Ten in the morning. I’d worked through the night, cataloging memories, browsing Coil’s assets, and making plans for a poisoned apple of an inheritance. 

‘You were going to have to face this “Noelle” character eventually,’  Atem pointed out. ‘I think you are in a better position than you were before.’

‘I know. I have information, wealth, and authority. All the problems I see now are things I would have had to face sooner or later. Still, it’s a little overwhelming, being presented with them all at once,’ I replied.

‘Do you have any ideas?’

‘I do.’

‘Oh?’

‘I need help. Smug, sarcastic help.’

‘Maybe you should get acclimated first. I recommend sorting his memories before whatever you’re planning next.’

‘You’re right. Let’s give it a few days.’

X

Lisa Wilbourn

I had no idea what to expect here. It wasn’t often that Coil called me into his bunker. He knew I wasn’t loyal, and that meant he tried to deprive me of as much information as possible. He usually gave orders over and received reports over the phone.

I could count on one hand the number of times I’d been down here. I still remembered the way to his office. Getting frog-marched at gunpoint tended to leave a lasting impression.

Inside, I found two people waiting for me. One was Coil, as creepy and lanky as always. The other was Konami, that new “hero” who literally disarmed some guy. I knew Coil had been looking to recruit him. I guessed he’d succeeded.

He had a baby dragon on his lap that he was stroking like a cat. Its scales were inky black and polished to a mirror shine, like slivers of obsidian. Its eyes were large and crimson. It saw me and yawned, revealing pearly whites that could easily bite off a finger or two.

And yet, it was cute. Obviously a hatchling, it was everything I loved about the fantasy genre brought to life. I almost thought it’d be worth it to risk my fingers if I could pet the damn thing once.

[The hatchling is relaxed. It behaves like a feline. It is dismissive of all but its master. Konami is similarly relaxed. He is here willingly,] my power supplied. 

Dragon or no, that killed any appeal he had. Anyone who signed on with my bastard of a boss wasn’t someone I wanted anywhere near me.

Still, I plastered a wide grin on my face. “Hey, boss. What’s all the hustle? And who’s the new kid?”

“Tattletale, sit down,” he said, gesturing to the seat next to Konami.

[Coil is in a neutral emotional state.] I took that as a good sign. His emotions had been some of the biggest clues to his power.

When he was angry or frustrated, he used his power to torture those around him, blowing off steam with no fear of consequences. That he was feeling nothing in particular probably meant I wasn’t being horribly tortured or assaulted in another timeline.

I took my time and studied Konami. This was my first time seeing him in the flesh. He was a fairly unremarkable man. A few years older than me, reasonably tall for a Japanese man at five-eleven, and with a decent muscle tone. He wore a dark-blue doublet and the golden pyramid that most definitely wasn’t Japanese.

[Konami is built like Brian. He is a boxer. He is wearing a seventeenth century doublet. The seams are slightly off. The embroidery is homemade. He made his own costume. He is a fan of histo–] I cut my power off. I knew all of this already from when Coil first showed me footage of his raids.

I gave Coil seventeen names of Asian students from out of town. What I didn’t give him was that Konami liked to sew. Combined with the period-accurate fashion, he was either a history or art major. There were just two among those seventeen, and only one perfectly matched his build.

Konami was Jonathan Yukawa. I’d hung on to that little tidbit in the hopes of using it against Coil, or maybe bribing him, but it was worthless information now that the idiot summoner had joined the snake so readily. Or maybe, I could force Jonathan into doing me a “favor” here and there.

Of special interest to me was the pyramid around his neck. The video hadn’t been clear, but my assumption had been that it was a brass ornament. I was wrong.

[The pyramid is made of gold. The pyramid weighs roughly twenty-four pounds,] my power informed me.

That made no sense. That was an insane weight to carry around your neck willingly. And I’d seen the footage; he moved like the damn thing weighed nothing.

[Konami is not a brute.]

That wasn’t right. It couldn’t be. My power told me that he only recently began training in boxing. Long enough to have some muscles, but not quite the definition Brian’s had.

That wasn’t brute behavior. Typically, brutes who were confident in their strength didn’t train a martial art. Hell, it could be genuinely hard to find a place they could train at without outing themselves or snapping their partner like a twig. Outside the PRT, brutes relied on their powers more often than not.

And, I’d seen Konami hide and flee. He ducked behind corners. He always positioned himself behind his monsters. Whenever possible, he tried to stay away from conflict altogether. Unless his brute power specifically gave him neck strength and nothing else, he wasn’t a brute.

[The pyramid is a tinkertech object of unknown function,] my power concluded.

I became even more wary. That was also unlikely. A summoner with shaker abilities was already hard to believe, but a tinker as well? 

If the pyramid was tinkertech, he had to have been gifted the pyramid by someone else. And since it didn’t come from Coil, it meant he’d had contact with someone before meeting Coil.

He was a bundle of contradictions. His name was Japanese. His costume was reminiscent of medieval Europe. His pyramid had the Eye of Horus on it. It was as if he was trying to cram every ancient culture onto a single cape.

Could Konami be a double agent? No, if he was, he was the dumbest I’d ever seen. Coil almost certainly had similar suspicions so reaching out to Konami to plot against him would likely just get us both killed.

I wondered if–

“The ‘hustle,’ Tattletale, is that I’m setting you free,” Coil said.

“W-What?” I sputtered, then forcibly schooled my expression. I heard the words, but they refused to register in my mind. I refused to believe that these words were coming from Coil’s mouth. “Free to do what, boss?”

“Leave. Go back home. Join the Protectorate. Start your own organization. You are free to do whatever you wish, Tattletale.” Then, he did something that blew my mind. He bowed. Sure, behind his desk, but it counted. “I apologize for my actions. Pressganging you at gunpoint was highly inappropriate. It was a violation of the unwritten rules and you deserve better.”

I stared at him as if he’d grown a second head. No, Coil could have literally grown a tumor from his neck and I would have been less baffled.

[Coil is completely sincere,] my power informed.

Naturally, that meant that my power lied. It had to be lying. Coil was spoofing my power somehow, all to play some fucked up prank to amuse the new–

I whirled on Konami. He was a master. That was the only way those words would ever come out of Coil’s mouth.

I was halfway out of my seat before the thought fully formed. My right hand slipped to my side, clutching my pistol. I wouldn’t be out-shooting anyone, but the threat itself mattered. If I could buy enough time, then I could talk my way out.

The dragon uncoiled. Before I knew it, the toddler-sized hatchling pounced, its jaws open wide.

“Aah!” I yelped as it collided with my chest, knocking me off my feet and onto the floor. Its mouth wrapped around my wrist.

“I figured that wouldn’t work,” Konami said conversationally, as if he hadn’t sicced a dragon on me.

I now knew what that pyramid did. It mastered people. Too bad that I wouldn’t get the chance to do anything about it. “N-Now, let’s talk about this!”

“We can and will. You’re the one who reached for her gun first, Tattletale. Red-Eyes doesn’t mean to hurt you.”

“T-Then can I get up?”

“Of course, but please leave the gun on the ground. I really do just want to talk.”

“F-Fine,” I said shakily as I took my seat again. I eyed Coil. Still nothing. There wasn’t a single sign of him being mastered. Even if I didn’t notice, I would have thought that my power would have caught on. “What did you do to him?”

“My power allows me to enforce the details of contracts when certain conditions are met. We made a wager and he lost, with the condition being that he serves me now,” he explained.

“That’s… Just like that?”

“Just like that. I learned about all that he did. Everything he has is mine now, for both good and for ill.”

[He is telling the truth.] I listened as my power filled in the gaps. Everything he said was true. Or, he thought he was telling the truth. There were things he wasn’t telling me, but that was a given.

For now, what I knew was that Konami was a human master on top of monster projections and “spells.” That made him the strongest grab bag cape I knew of short of Eidolon. He was strong, took over my boss’ life, and I knew too little about him.

“Fine, what now? Why me? You know he’s got other capes, right?” I asked with forced calm. It was surprisingly easy to default to info-gathering mode. If he wanted me dead, he would have had me shot and been done with it.

“None of your teammates know he’s their boss. As for why you, Coil said it himself: What he did was fucked up. You deserve closure,” he said as the little dragon crawled onto his lap again. It nudged his hand for scritches, exactly like a cat. That thing was distractingly cute.

“Clear the air? A hell of a way to do it.”

“There wasn’t ever going to be an easy way to talk to you, at least if I planned on being honest.”

“Is this it, then? You just… cut me loose? After telling me that you’re a human master? Sorry if that sounds unbelievable.”

“Of course, I want a promise from you to never talk about my abilities, but that’s an option, yes. You can walk out this door and I promise I will not hunt you for any reason, provided you do not try to harm me or mine. If I ever contact you in the future, it will be to hire you as a third party thinker consultant. You are a thinker who can out-perform the majority of Watchdog on her own. You will be compensated as you deserve.”

“That…” Konami, despite what the PRT said, considered himself a hero. He genuinely thought he was doing the right thing, or at least, the best he could with the cards he’d been given. “You’re serious. You’re seriously considering letting me leave.”

“What does your power tell you? We’re meeting face-to-face so you can get a proper read on me, Tattletale. I’m not your enemy. I’m not going to hurt you.”

I pointed to Coil. “I want him dead.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t do that. There are things he needs to be alive to do,” he said apologetically. And… And he meant every word.

“He’ll break free. His power is to split timelines. He’ll find a way.”

“He won’t and it isn’t.”

“You can’t convince me.”

“Not with words, no,” he agreed. Then, casually, as if he was asking about the weather, he demanded, “Tom, take off your mask.”

Coil, Tom, did so. He reached behind his neck and unzipped the mask. It fell away, leaving a black man in his mid-thirties with a sharp, military crop. His face was blank, as if he was completely ambivalent to us sitting here.

[Tom is Thomas Calvert, PRT consultant,] my power said. It began to list everything he did in the background to keep the city the powderkeg that it was. Everything made sense. His ridiculous information network. His Bond villain bullshit.

This was the man who’d tormented me since I arrived in Brockton Bay. I almost reached for the gun on the ground without thinking. Only the low growl of the too-cute-to-have-teeth-that-sharp dragon brought me back to reality.

“Thomas Calvert, former PRT trooper and one of two survivors of the Ellisburg mission,” Konami confirmed. “I think we can agree that he would never unmask for either of us. Does this convince you that he is thoroughly mine?”

“It… It does,” I said shakily. His control was total. “You said that I can leave.”

“You can. The door is that way.”

“That… You said you know everything. That includes my name, doesn’t it?”

“It does, but I won’t use that against you, Lisa. Not only would that make me no better than Coil, I suspect you have a good idea of who I am, or will find out within a few days at most.”

“Jonathan Yukawa. History major. From Boston.”

He nodded. He removed his mask with a calm smile. “Yeah, I thought so. I don’t want this to be a game of leverage, Lisa. This is your chance to make a clean break. If you walk, I’ll simply respect your decision.”

“You said that’s one option,” I said slowly. I could see it now. He meant it. He’d let me leave. But… But of course he’d want to keep me if he could. I knew how valuable I was. “I suppose option two is the recruitment speech?”

“You always were a smart cookie,” he nodded, smiling. “I set this meeting up so we could clear the air, so you could have some closure, and, if you’d be amenable, to possibly hire you on.”

“To do what exactly? You’ve won. You have Coil’s money, his men, and his little black book of secrets. What’s the end goal?”

“I’m a hero.” He said that so sincerely that I couldn’t help but snort. “Yes, Lisa. I do consider myself a hero. What the PRT thinks about me doesn’t factor into my own opinion of myself.”

“So what? Are you going to take on the gangs? Use Coil’s millions to start soup kitchens?”

“He’d hate that. Let’s pencil that in.”

“Heh, he would.”

“But yes, I plan to take on the gangs. I understand that crime is a part of society, but I’d at least like it if we didn’t have rampant human trafficking and literal Nazis in my city.”

I waved to his pet. “That isn’t going to cut it against Lung, you know. Or any of your other dragons. You’re definitely a heavy-hitter, but you’re not on his level.”

“I’m not, no,” he agreed, though he didn’t seem bothered by that. He had a plan, or thought he did. So did all the Asian gangs when Lung first came to town. “Like I said, there are a lot of things I can’t tell you yet. Nonetheless, I would like for you to join me.”

“Let’s say I do. What would I be doing?”

“You’d be my second-in-command. Your first job would be to weed out the worst of Coil’s mercenaries, clean house while maintaining operational security and stability. At the same time, I think it’s about time we give Brian custody of his sister.”

“Just like that?”

“No strings attached,” he confirmed. “Get him a job. Nudge some things down at city hall. Do what you need to do to get Aisha away from her druggie mother.”

“I… I can live with that. I get it, you’ll do right by us. But what about the gangs? It’s everything else that bothers me, you know.”

“I won’t lie to you. Joining me will be dangerous. You’ll learn things you wished you’d left buried. You’ll probably want to strangle me sometimes.”

“Geez, you’re really selling the job,” I snarked. “What do I get for all that?”

“In exchange for your loyalty, I promise mine in turn. I promise not to hold a gun over your head, or to use your name as a source of leverage. I promise that you will save countless lives and make a difference in this city.”

“Wow, you can cut the melodrama. You don’t know me very well if you think I’m motivated by good vibes and the power of friendship.”

“I think you’re a better person than you like to tell yourself,” he said with an annoyingly genuine smile. “But if it helps, you can also have some of Coil’s millions of dollars and boss him around.”

I leaned back with a satisfied smirk. “That’s not a bad start. I do have one more thing I want, though.”

“Oh?”

“I want to pet the dragon.”

He laughed. “Welcome to the team, Lisa.”

Author’s Note

Ma’at is not just the Goddess of Truth. It is also the word for order, justice, etc. as a concept, not strictly a personified figure. It could refer to righteous retribution, for example.

Long chapter, but it felt wrong to split this.

Animal Fact: East Asian people smell better than everyone else. This is a true, scientifically proven fact.

A lot of East Asians have a single letter mutation in the ABCC11 gene that prevents apocrine sweat glands from producing chemical compounds that skin bacteria feed on. These sweat glands are located primarily in the armpits and groin.

Sweat itself doesn’t smell. What causes body odor is actually a byproduct of skin bacteria consuming and breaking down the compounds in sweat. People with an active ABCC11 gene produce more of these compounds than people with the mutated gene.

What’s fascinating about this is that this gene is also correlated with the consistency of your earwax. If your earwax tends to be wet or sticky, you likely have the active gene. If your earwax is dry or flaky, you likely have the inactive, mutated version.