Adamant Blood

“Starting with the basics,” Mark told himself, and also Quark.

They were in a bunker below the house, and an illusion of Mark was up above, reading books by a window. It was a good illusion, courtesy of Addavein and a few tricks with the Castellan inside of the house.

Mark couldn’t fuck off and practice magic whenever he wanted anymore, so he had to make the time, and so it was important for Mark to still appear to be ‘active’, if someone were to peer in at him, at his activities. The first defense of Mark’s experimenting time were the wards around the house. The second defense was the illusion of Mark sitting at the table, and with an adamantium core that could be wealth sensor’d if someone got through the wards. The third defense was Mark’s real being located about 30 meters below the illusionary version upstairs.

No one had made any attempts on Mark’s life so far, but Addavein was rather certain that anyone looking to make such an attempt was also looking for an opportunity, and so they’d study how Mark moved, and where he stopped, and when he was vulnerable.

‘Sitting at a table and reading books’ was probably the best opportunity that anyone watching was going to get for a long while.

And so, the misdirection.

Quark said, “Misdirections are active. I’ll remain mostly out here, monitoring, unless called upon specifically.”

Mark nodded, and then, in the dim room, he dove into himself.

Mark stood upon the porch of his house, and everything about his house was more refined than before. He hadn’t gotten a chance to work on it, but he had made some slight improvements here and there, as he digested his orichalcum.

The house was a simple 2.5 room shack in the middle of a field of black grass, under a sourceless light. The field of grass was actually a whole bunch of early warning systems, mainly indicating if anyone was there, looking in or not. And nope! Mark didn’t see any bent grass anywhere. The porch was wrap-around, and empty, with stairwells leading off into the grass and beyond. The front door was normal, and the glass in the door and the windows were all Mark’s ‘fragment of a divine mirror’, allowing him to see a lot further and better, and as far as Mark saw…

The dream beyond his house was empty.

Mark walked into his house, and his really nice bed was still there, along with his fully stocked kitchen. The posters on the wall indicated his major influences and connections, from Glorious Man to his talzarki, Addavein, to his Mage Society Understanding. That all looked normal, though the one with Addavein on it, with Mark grabbing his hand like they were rivals, was looking a lot less angry these days. The Mage Society Understanding had gotten a whole lot of new sigils and ribbons and wax seals, too. Glorious Man was still glorious. Mostly static, too.

Mark hadn’t called the guy up, and Glorious Man hadn’t called him; Mark felt fine about that, considering all the heroes he ever met all had skeletons in their closets. Mark did not need to know about Glorious Man’s skeletons.

The bathroom was normal, and working properly.

And so…

Mark stepped to the center of his house, and he did something that hadn’t worked properly since Elf Land.

“System Call, Status!”

There was some sort of tug to the side. Which side? Mark had no idea. But the tug went out, and then failed to connect, or something. Mark wasn’t sure what was happening there. It usually took a few tries to get it to work right, and it only ever worked when Mark was inside his house, focusing on System Prime.

“System Prime Call, Status Update!”

Another tug, another failure.

“No signal?” Quark asked.

“Well it worked here last time… Maybe over here?”

Mark walked over to the window and Called, “System Call, Status!”

Nothing.

He went to the porch and Called out, and then he stepped out under the sourceless light and Called. He went to the back of the house and Called. He Called from the roof and he Called from the porch again, and then he went back into the house and tried from his original position.

“Okay, so…” Mark put his hands on his hips in the middle of his house, and looked around, asking, “I could start blind, I guess?”

Quark said, “You could try the parabolic antenna again.”

Mark made a small annoyed noise… and then he crafted a parabolic antenna again, like he had done before and which didn’t work at all, so he had removed it. With a thought, Mark stepped onto the roof of his house and he put the antenna on the back end, making it a pair to the weather vane he had already installed on the central ridge of the house.

Standing tall beside the antenna, Mark Called out, “System Call! Status!”

… Nothing.

“Fuck.” Mark muttered, “Maybe System Prime is completely beyond us now. Fucking per—”

A bruise pushed out of the world just beyond the edge of the roof. It was a purple blush at first, and then the purple became blue, and then brighter blue, then fully blue. White lines traced down the sides of the blue spot, and then words began to manifest. It was wonky. It was misshapen.

It was enough to understand.