The Legion of Nothing

Jaclyn added, "I'm not pulling you all again—not unless we know what we're running into."

We didn't. Due to limited fuel supplies, a limited number of bots, and any hints that the place existed, Hal hadn't sent any down here.

"Everybody flies?" Haley asked.

It wasn't a bad idea. Between camouflage and not touching anything, we'd avoid a lot of potential triggers.

A voice said, "I'm here to bring you to Magnus."

It was a real voice—not the implant speaking to implant and producing noise in your head kind of voice. We all turned, Cassie pointing her gun in its direction.

I'd recognized it and wasn't surprised when I turned. Victor stood behind us—purple-tinged skin, Roman soldier-style breastplate and skirt, bald head, and beard. Except for the purple skin, armor, and nine-foot height, he could have passed as a programmer at almost any tech company.

"If you're wondering, yes, I can see you." He paused, adding, "That dog is enormous."

Victor held out his hand in the dog's direction, and Tiger didn't growl. He didn't sniff it either. He watched Victor without moving. If Tiger were human, I'd have described his gaze as calculating.

I couldn't guess what Tiger might be calculating, but knowing the dogs of his homeworld, it might have been his chances of grabbing the back of Victor's neck.

Victor withdrew his hand as Jaclyn gave the dog side eye.

I dropped camouflage on my suit, but continued to use our fake Syndicate L design. Everyone else did the same—including Tiger. Giving his suit a version of the design had been more an exercise in consistency than a serious attempt to fool anybody. Syndicate L didn't use armored animals that I had any record of.

"You're not fooling anyone," he said. "We know you're the Heroes' League."

Pictures and text from Hal reached our group implant channel, starting with the word, "Inaccurate," and showing people in Syndicate L's armor fighting the True, many dressed in the same powered armor we'd seen upstairs.

Other pictures showed the Nine and Syndicate L attacking each other's bases all over the world.

I couldn't say that I loved that. Criminals were less concerned with collateral damage than I'd want them to be. At the same time, I couldn't quite feel bad that they were going after each other.

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

Hal added, "This world's AIs determined that Syndicate L derives benefit from providing services to the Nine and that the Nine depend on those services. Even if both organizations survive, it will be years before they can repair the necessary trust to work with each other again. As such, they placed information in the right hands."

Again, we saw a montage of commanders of both Syndicate L and the Nine receiving footage of our attack on the Nine's base in Syndicate L gear. The Nine's strike teams and Syndicate L's forces attacked each other without warning, mind-controlled supers versus normal humans with technology.

I hoped the world's AIs knew what they were doing because this felt like one way to start the True on the path of destroying humanity.

Vaughn, either less concerned or keeping his cool better than I was, replied to Victor, "Maybe. Maybe we're the Heroes' League. Or maybe the Heroes' League has been Syndicate L all along."

Over implant, Jaclyn said, "Do you think you can keep that up?"

He replied, "The plan is to confuse them. I'm just keeping it going."

Victor grit his teeth, "Regardless, I'm going to bring you to Magnus now."

Marcus raised his hand, "I don't want to interrupt, but did Magnus send you to the past yet? Because if he hasn't, it may still be coming, and I can tell you that it doesn't go well. You might want to do something else."

Victor's face tightened, his tinge of purple skin turning a little darker. "I can't disobey him."

"You might want to try," Jaclyn said. "You must have seen your dead body by now."

His fists clenched. "Can I change the future? I can't even control myself. Whatever Magnus commands, I do. It doesn't matter how small. The Abominator artifact gave me so much power, but the Dominators got their hooks in me before I knew it. Now I'm nothing more than a tool."

"You know what you are? You're a genie," Jaclyn said. "You have to do what they say, but do their commands force you to do what Magnus intends or exactly what he says? As long as you stick to the letter of what he says, you can do what you want."

Victor checked behind himself, seeing, I assume, only rows and rows of the True in birthing chambers. "I used to have choices. I don't anymore. I used to be a man. Now, I'm a thing. There's no word for this."

He pointed at himself—purple skin, massive height, the dim purple glow inside his eyes. "I see beyond the visible spectrum. I don't understand half of what I see, and the part I do isn't good for anyone's sanity."

He pointed at me and then at Rachel. "I don't know what the two of you are, but you're like Magnus. You look human, but you're not. You're seeds and someday something much bigger will hatch out of you. If I concentrate sometimes, I can see others like you. Magnus says I shouldn't because if I look too hard, they might look back, but they're so big. They're infinite. All the rest of you, you're touched by them, too. You don't even know it."

Victor stopped. "Fuck. I sound like a character in an H.P. Lovecraft story."

"Yeah," Marcus said, "but you look kind of like a Jack Kirby character. I think he'd be able to do better for a name than Purple Centurion, though. You've got to admit the name sucks."

Shaking his head, Victor said, "That was the press."

"Hey," Vaughn said, "You did this to yourself with an Abominator birthing chamber, right? Let's say for a second that we can find one of those, an original, not a copy. Captain Commando can control Abominator stuff. Maybe we can switch you back."