The Hawkshaw Inheritance

Standing outside of Jason's private quarters in the Council's secret base, I can't help but feel like a little kid preparing to knock on the door to his parents' room. It's an irrational feeling for a number of reasons, but I still can't seem to shake it. Obviously, Jason isn't inside, and it seems unlikely that he even spent an appreciable amount of time there before he disappeared. But opening this door feels like the final acknowledgement that I'm here to replace him, not just as Hawkshaw, but as a member of the world's most exclusive, influential organization. I spent so much time trying to grapple with the immense influence that the Council has, that the fact I'm expected to be a part of it is only now hitting me. Anyone who puts on a mask is indicating their willingness to shoulder heavy burdens, but that's not quite the same as someone handing you the nuclear football without any warning, and telling you that the closest thing you had to a real father figure wanted you to have it.

Quieting those thoughts, I pass my hand over the hidden scanner in the wall, which reads the chip in my wrist and allows me access. The fact that Machina could reprogram the door to recognize me, in addition to the room's original occupant, suggests that none of the Council members' private quarters are entirely private. That means I'm unlikely to find any especially compelling evidence in Jason's room. If there was any to begin with, someone could easily have come in and removed it. But I'm not really expecting to find anything pertinent to the investigation in here. After all, I've already got a pretty good idea who the perpetrator was. No, the purpose of this search is twofold. The first is simply due diligence. The second is to keep up appearances. The recording on Jason's hidden file gave me a general idea of who made him disappear and why, but until I know exactly who was and wasn't involved, and know exactly what I want to do about it, I have to maintain the pretense that I'm still completely in the dark. Muddling around in Jason's room, looking under his bed for clues, seems as good a way to do that as any- not to mention the fact that feigning ignorance will make the rest of the Council underestimate me. That's the way I like it.

Judging by appearances, Jason made very little effort to modify the room's original layout. All of the furniture is in black, to match the floor and walls. There's a dresser, a neatly-made bed, and a desk with a computer. It brings to mind a bedroom mockup at a furniture store, or the sample dorm rooms they show people who are touring colleges. Sterile, clean, and clearly not lived-in. Before even entering, I cycle through a few different viewing modes in my helmet, to scan for any traps. Nothing shows up on thermals, EM, infrared, or any of the others, so I cross the threshold in a single step.

The room seems even smaller and more spartan than Jason's usual tastes, and a part of me can't help but wonder if he was assigned to this one out of spite, for the way he forced his way into the group. I certainly can't imagine the ones who live here full-time accepting a glorified closet, not when they're members of the most powerful organization on the planet. Then again, Jason could have just as easily requested a small room with minimal furnishings, knowing that he would almost never have cause to use it.

There's nothing in the dresser but a few changes of clothes. Going through them emphasizes the feeling of being a child in their parent's bedroom, though at the very least I don't feel any sort of urge to put his clothes on. There are no hidden messages tucked away in the back of the drawers, so I close it up and move on. I don't find anything under the mattress, or the bed itself, which seems like it hasn't been slept in for a long time. That just leaves me with the computer. As expected, it's almost completely empty. It clearly couldn't match the processing power available with either the Council's mission computer, or Jason's own, so there was little reason to ever use it for anything serious, and he didn't spend enough time here to use this thing to just browse the internet. I run a few cursory scans to make sure he didn't leave any hidden files on it, but that was never very likely, considering it would probably have been the first place anyone checked when trying to find that sort of thing.

To satisfy the voice in my head that sounds suspiciously like Jason, and always demands thoroughness, I test the walls of the room to see if there are any hidden passages, and turn up nothing. I hesitate to call the entire process a waste of time, because verifying that there isn't anything to find is almost as important as actually finding something, but searching this room was pretty much the sole reason for my visit to the Council's headquarters, and having finished up in about twenty minutes leaves me at something of a loss for what to do next. This place isn't exactly like the Front Line's base, where I can relax with the other members of the team. The design is cold and sterile, while the layout is so labyrinthine that even using a 3D blueprint, navigation is a challenge. Some part of me is almost tempted to leave immediately, but that would be a wasted opportunity. This is the best chance I've had yet to explore this place on my own, rather than being led around by someone already familiar with it. Not to mention, the fact that the Council hasn't contacted me in weeks makes me rather curious as to what they've been doing without me. Given how long they've been operating, it makes some sense that they don't need to call meetings every day, since most of their day-to-day operations are already established. My curiosity is more directed toward the substance of those operations. The Maitreya incident was a good look at what kind of threat the Council exists to combat, but that clearly isn't a constant occurrence. I want to know what an average day in this place is like.

Opportunity knocks not a moment after I open the door to leave Jason's room. Samuel Blake is leaning against the opposite wall, wearing an evaluatory expression. Intuition tells me he hasn't just been staring at the door, either. My suit's sensory suite is powerful enough to see through walls when necessary, and the alien weapon he's supposedly bonded with is doubtlessly a great deal more advanced. Luckily, I didn't do anything in the course of my brief investigation that I would particularly care if he saw. Considering who this facility is operated by, it seemed safe to assume from the beginning that nothing I said or did would be fully private.

"You were quicker in there than I expected," the extraplanar explorer remarks. Blake- or 'Astro,' according to his locker in the Council's ready room -doesn't look his age. Though I suppose he isn't actually as old as he should be, despite having been born in the nineteen-forties. Thanks to relativity, he's only middle-aged, and fairly well-preserved. Sandy hair, a clean-shaven face, and the same bomber jacket he's been wearing every time I've encountered him. It's possible that's the form his symbiote-weapon takes outside of combat, but so far I've failed to detect anything unusual about the garment, other than the fact that it was manufactured before I was born. Probably just one of the few relics of his childhood era that isn't currently moldering in a museum.

"Not much to see," I answer, appreciating the fact that he didn't bother pretending to have just been passing by. "Doesn't seem like he spent much time here outside of meetings."

"No he did not," Blake confirms. "Between you and his team, it never seemed like there was much time in his schedule to spend with us."

My detective skills aren't necessary to know why that was. He blackmailed his way into this group- something like that tends to set the tone for a relationship, no matter how long you spend working together afterwards.

"You two didn't interact much, then?"

If Blake is going to be fairly obvious about the fact that he was watching me work, I see no reason to be circumspect about my objectives in this conversation. I'm treating every member of the Council as a potential suspect, and he's one of the ones I know very little about. That means I can't just chat idly with him. I need information. Especially if Jason's theory is right, and every member of the Council was responsible for the end of the world in one of Gilgamesh's alternate timelines.

"No. I was always curious about the man, to be honest. He seemed to be of a different mold than the other masked heroes of this era."

It doesn't shock me that Blake talks about the modern day as if it's a foreign country. Even since his return to Earth, he's been at a remove, interacting mainly with the Council from what I can tell. He translocated out of the last meeting, suggesting that he doesn't live here full-time, but I doubt he's fully assimilated either. Maybe they set him up in a small town that wouldn't give him too great a culture shock. But before I can ask him about any of that, the interstellar pioneer continues speaking.

"I'm rather curious about you, to be frank. Specifically, your motivation for taking up Hunt's mantle. I'm familiar with his... origins, of course. But yours are more of an enigma."

Something about Blake's blunt request suggests to me that he's not fishing for something he can use against me. The man is genuinely curious, as I would expect of someone who left his home planet alone to explore the wider universe. I can't afford to be that open about my own inquiries. Letting a suspect know why I'm asking a specific question means they might figure out the right lie to tell to throw me off their scent. The expressionless mask I wear helps with that, of course.

"Tell you what- I'll give you my life story if you give me yours."

Blake raises an eyebrow. I don't blame him for being surprised, considering Jason would never have made an offer that open. But I'm not Jason, and I don't have the luxury of slowly gathering information on all my suspects without letting them know what I'm after. If they took him down, it was because he'd gotten in the way of something, and I can't afford to find out what it is after the fact. Not to mention I've always been better at making friends than he was. A personal virtue by some accounts, but also a weapon I'm more than willing to wield when necessary.

"Works for me. But if we're going to do storytime, there are better places for it than in the middle of a hallway."

I'm half expecting Blake to suggest we leave the facility for a more ordinary environment, but instead he starts down the hall, glancing back only once to make sure I'm following. The man maintains a brisk pace, always a step ahead of me, so there isn't much room for chatter while we're walking. Unless his alien friend is projecting a map on the inside of his eyelids, he seems to be capable of navigating the facility by memory, as it's not long before we arrive at his chosen destination. Another door slides silently open, and he stands aside to let me enter first. My paranoia twinges, and I half expect to detect a land mine in the entranceway, but there are no traps, and common sense suggests that he's just adhering to some anachronistic rules of conduct I never had beaten into me at a Sunday school.

The room is a lounge of sorts, with a few couches, a bar with no tender, and an artificial fireplace. Sterile in many ways, but not entirely unappealing, at least for the sort of person who appreciates the Council's black stone aesthetic to begin with. Fortunately for me, I don't hate it, though it was always more Jason's kind of thing than mine. Blake heads around to the other side of the bar, and immediately begins fixing himself a drink. I'm not quite familiar enough to know what kind of cocktail it is for certain, but a vague memory tells me that it's probably a Manhattan. If Blake were anyone else, I would internally deride him for trying too hard, but the man isn't adhering to the stereotype because he fancies himself a modern Sinatra. He's just legitimately nostalgic for the era he left behind. Or its trappings, at least, even if he disliked it enough at the time to leave the planet entirely.

"Get you anything?"

"Just water. I don't drink on the job."

Not strictly true, but I don't want to embarrass myself by asking for some cocktail I don't actually know the contents of- or embarrass him by naming a cocktail he's never heard of. Blake chuckles somewhat drily.

"On the job, eh? Well, you'll need to at least take that helmet off to drink your water."

Giving Blake an equally dry laugh in return, I do just that, removing the helmet and placing it on the bar, before taking a seat. My coat goes on the one directly to my left. Sitting down wearing only my armor might look a little odd, but leaving the trenchcoat on wouldn't be much better. Pretty much no part of my costumed ensemble was designed for casual wear. Occasionally, I envy people whose powers mean they don't need to wear a hundred pounds of armor into combat. Spandex tends not to leave much to the imagination, but it's probably a lot more comfortable in contexts like this.

When Blake's done mixing his own drink, he places a glass of water on the bar, and circles back around to my side. Thankfully, the seats are spaced out, so we aren't uncomfortably close while we talk.

"Not much to do around here, is there?"

It's still a little surprising how much easier it is to socialize with the mask off. Without it, I don't have to worry about people seeing Jason when they look at me. Even so, I haven't forgotten what I'm after. The more banal parts of the conversation are a part of that objective, as they help me establish a rapport with Blake.

"Not at all. It was something of a challenge convincing Robards to have this bar installed at all. Of course, he doesn't spend nearly as much time here as I do, so it's easy to understand why he wouldn't see the need."

Blake's way of speaking is odd. He's clearly picked up some modern vernacular, but there are aspects of his speech that are stilted compared to mine. On the other hand, if this were the fifties, the way he talks would be seen as strange and informal. A microcosm of the man as a whole, caught between the two eras, unable or unwilling to fully commit to either.

"He doesn't strike me as the drinking type, either."

Not many of the other Council members seem likely to drink much, at least not outside of a social context. Robards in particular is far too serious, and I have a hard time picturing Zero drinking anything other than energy boosters, to keep her going during a marathon coding session. Geas has champagne during events he hosts at the Royals' castle headquarters, I'm sure, but never enough to risk him slipping up and exposing any of his carefully maintained facades.

"Not at all. But don't try to deflect, Graves. We made a deal."

I don't sense any annoyance in Blake's tone. He doesn't think I'm actually trying to deflect, just doing his best to get the conversation back on track.

"Right. What is it you want to know? And keep in mind there are things I can't tell you about."

It's hard to think of much that Blake and the rest of the Council couldn't plausibly know about already, besides Jason's secret dossier on methods of dealing with each of them. Then again, the appearance of having secrets can sometimes do almost as much good as actually having them.

"Oh, I'm not interested in the details. I've worked most of those out myself. I want to know... why. Why is it that you do what you do."

That does elucidate some things. Blake understands the logistics of our operation, or at least thinks he does. But the analytical engineer's mind inside of him can't calculate why I would devote my life to Jason's mission the way I have. The rest of the Council has more obvious motivations- protecting the world at large, and improving life for as many people as they can. Standard liberal humanism. My job involves a lot more violence. Less high-minded pontificating, more cutting apart dead bodies in search of evidence. I could give him the standard speech about justice, and the need for an investigator who'll solve the cases that the ordinary authorities won't, but that isn't going to be anything new for him. He wants my own personal motivations.

I nod, and take a second to get my thoughts in order. This isn't something I'm uncomfortable discussing, exactly. But I'm not exactly used to talking about it, either. Not with relative strangers. But it only seems fair to give Blake some insight into me, when I'm looking for insight into him.

"I grew up in Pax. Parents were junkies, though thankfully that only started after I was born. My mother was prescribed painkillers for some chronic pain, and ended up getting hooked on them. Can't really blame her, or my father for following suit. They both worked multiple jobs, around the clock, and still never had enough to hire a babysitter. Or they didn't want to spend the money when it could have gone towards the next hit. Either way, I practically raised myself. If my ability hadn't manifested earlier than most, I would probably have turned out just as bad as them."

Blake holds up a finger to interject, though he's mid-sip. Placing the glass down swiftly, he swallows and opens his mouth to speak.

"Enhanced information absorption and retention, right?"

"Yeah. I learn faster. And the public schools in Pax are incredibly under-funded, so I was essentially self-taught as well as self-raised. By the time I was ten or so, my parents had both graduated from painkillers to the harder stuff. It was more difficult to know what an appropriate dosage was with a drug they were less familiar with, so my father ended up in the hospital for an overdose. They saved him, but without insurance, the medical bills meant he was pretty much better off dead. The prospect of permanent debt didn't exactly motivate them to clean up their acts- they started using even harder. Eventually, someone turned them on to a new high- Meta. You familiar?"

If the blase way I'm describing my family's sordid past bothers Blake, he doesn't show it- just shakes his head.

"Everyone I knew back then called it 'cape crack.' Gives you powers, briefly. On paper, it's got no narcotic properties, but being able to fly is more addictive than heroin. Or so they said. Meta gave my parents something more to live for than the next hit. With powers, they could make some quick cash, and pay off their debts. That was what they told themselves, and me. In reality, most of what they made knocking over convenience stores went towards the next dose of Meta. And they managed to kill a few people in the process too."

That had been the point where I lost most of my sympathy for them. Fucking up their own lives, and even mine, was one thing. But cutting another life short, just