Kevin Curry
patreon
Psychoprotective Book 2 Chapter 16
🕑 Added 2023-08-07 14:00:09 +0000 UTCAt some point during Tanya’s out-of-body sojourn, Kevan Galochio had activated the telekinetic restraints that he placed Tanya into. Testing them, Tanya determined… that she’d need to use the Argent if she wanted to brute force them. Sure, she could generally out-muscle, psychically, any two or three psychics, but psychic technology could out-muscle anything. It was only a question of how much psitanium you had to exert that force. While the methodology is significantly more arcane than the programming style she learned from Agent Men- Otto, this was still fundamentally psychic technology, much like magic from her second life was still technology at the end of the day.
“You struggle in vain, child.” Kevan said once he noticed that Tanya had returned to herself. “This region's ley lines are powering the containment circle, only the full power of Maligula can overcome them.”
Did he… hook up his psitanium machinery to the buried deposits? That was actually clever. There wasn’t much point to it, in terms of technological progress, and the Psychonauts can just get more psitanium when they need more… but how did they overcome the inherent instability of natural deposits? The methods that sustain the hyperice at the lake could maybe do that… but allowing him the versatility that this complex machine provides? Tanya once more resolved herself to make sure she preserved this device. “Impressive.” Tanya said honestly. “I’m a bit of a magical engineer myself, this is very good work.”
Kevan puffed up his chest in pride. Ah, so he is the engineer in question. “Naturally. The arcane arts have been passed down through the Galochio family for generations. With this much manatite, my rituals eclipse the power of the petty sciences.” He laughed maniacally. “With my backing, Maligula will be more powerful than ever! She’ll be a true Goddess of wrath, and the Soviets will be finally expelled from Grulovia for good!”
…This man was not as crazy as Tanya thought he was. That was, if you ignored all of the numerous failure points that doomed it from the start, actually a decent plan. Hydrokinesis is somewhat unique among psychic disciplines in that it can act on the largest scales of known telekinetic disciplines. While Tanya was confident she could defeat Maligula in one on one combat, if she resorted to the Argent, in a contest of army-killing, Maligula won by a tsunami. Literally. Tanya could only compete by copying her methods and using her own hydrokinesis, and she wasn’t entirely confident she could manage to use it while drugged up on her war memories. Never in testing had she used a power that didn’t get sourced from those memories, after all.
Tanya imagined a boat lined with these psitanium ritual circles, propelled by Maligula’s hydrokinesis while fueling her with a hold full of psitanium and protecting her with a barrier like the one that kept her restrained. She could certainly defeat the Salamander Kampfgruppe easily with that kind of setup. Her men would escape, but the non-mages would be doomed. More modern arms… she wasn’t sure. It could work. Tanya wasn’t entirely clear on the doctrine that the Americans used when deploying their combat psychics, much less the Soviets. The Vietnam veterans don’t talk about it, particularly with her.
“But what if you’re wrong?” Tanya asked, buying time while she mentally probed the containment circle. Psitanium engineering is a rare enough skill that there was a good chance that he didn’t take steps to make them resistant to tampering. “What if I’m not Maligula?” She was curious if he would even consider it.
Kevan grinned savagely and laughed. “Do you think I would go through all of this trouble, little Maligula…” His expression darkened. “If I thought for a second that I’d ever be this lucky?”
Ah. That explains that. He intended to create a fake Maligula. In fact, he probably didn’t even truly believe it when he said she was a reincarnation of Lucy, he just kept insisting as part of a gaslighting campaign to make the hypnosis stick better.
Tanya frowned. Tanya liked to think she was good at examining psitanium devices, from all of that practice she got during school. Otto liked giving her random inventions and asking her to identify what they did and how as quiz grades. But this… she could pick out some familiar structures embedded in the quartz-like mineral, but the overall design seemed… she didn’t want to say nonsensical, it clearly had some form of logic to it, but it was like trying to learn a new language through immersion, which she only ever had to do once, with German. Twice if you included Japanese, she supposed.
“Lord Galochio.” One of the cultists said as they came into the room. “We have gathered the necessary memories.” Tanya was expecting this, so made sure to project trepidation at the news.
“Excellent. Bring them here and I can begin the ritual.” Kevan said, looking over Tanya appraisingly. “...Bring the meal too. I can already hear Mother complaining about how thin she is.”
“Lady Ophelia will be pleased, sir.” The cultist said, bowing and leaving. Ophelia? As in, Lucrecia’s Aunt Ophelia? The one who she thinks cast the curse on the Aquatos?
“You recognize that name, too?” Kevan said, grinning. “This will work even better than I had hoped.” She really needed to get better at concealing her thoughts. She can’t use her shield to do it right now, she needs those psychic senses to analyze the containment circle.
“No.” Tanya lied, “I’m just hungry.” Well, she was, so that wasn’t quite a lie. “Also, how long am I going to be here? There are certain realities of confinement that have not been addressed.” She fortunately went to the bathroom before the massage, so things weren’t desperate, but this telekinetic straightjacket was not the first time she had been locked up for hours.
“You should be back to yourself soon, Maligula.” Kevan said, “Just give it one more hour.” Well, she had her deadline.
It did appear that Kevan had instituted basic anti-tampering measures, making it substantially more difficult to alter the psitanium’s structure. Normally, it was rather malleable to psychic shaping, but once you had it structured how you like, it was just good sense to reinforce the pathways and crystal structures, which served the purposes of increasing the device’s durability, making it tamper resistant, and giving the device a reserve of easily available and non-structural psychic energy to fuel the machine’s function. The metaphor Otto liked using was that it was like how human bones acted as a calcium reserve, ensuring that you never ran out of that crucial substance, as your bones weakening will become a big problem far before you become unable to execute basic biological processes like muscle contraction.
But he didn’t seem to do anything more serious to black box his processes. She was slowly beginning to understand which parts were keeping her restrained, and which parts were restraining her other psychic powers, although she didn’t actually test them.
…She hates that Kevan has made her regret not going straight to violence. That way she’d be having fun.
Tanya reviewed that last thought. Ah, the Argent was still riled up from using it last Saturday, and those fights did the opposite of helping. No, violence was not the best way. No matter how satisfying cutting up Kevan’s smug face would be. If she attacked those cultists instead of surrendering, the others would still be locked in combat woefully outnumbered. Or, in the case of Cassie, outgunned.
A decrepit Grulovian woman came in with a plate of Grulovian cabbage rolls. “Oh, you’re too thin, dear.” She said. Tanya was getting a lot better at understanding Grulovian. Apparently immersion works extra well if you’re telepathic. “Have some sarmale.” She presented the plate.
Tanya attempted to move her arms, using enough power to be able to barely do so before they snapped back into place, crossed over her chest. Instead of attempting to speak Grulovian, she just gave the old woman a meaningful look and opened her mouth.
The woman gave Kevan a gimlet stare, but picked up one of the cabbage rolls and fed it to Tanya. It was delicious, much superior to the ‘secret family recipe’ that Nona Aquato made that one time back at the circus. Her knowledge as a cook, still somewhat separate in her mind as a skill, gave her the impression that it was the same recipe, just created with more skilled hands and better ingredients. A flash of Lucrecia’s smiling face accompanied the feeling, an echo of memory from Compton’s nugget of wisdom.
Hm. It’s been a while since that’s happened. Tanya took her time eating, splitting off the childish part of her that enjoyed being hand-fed to pilot her body while she dedicated the majority of her attention to figuring out how this apparatus worked.
“This is so good!” Tanya heard herself saying after swallowing. “More please, Baachan!”
“What a polite girl.” The old woman said. “Kevan, why can’t you be more like Lady Maligula, she knows how to appreciate home cooking.”
Kevan rubbed his temples. “Mother…” He took one of the cabbage rolls for himself. “Thank you.” He started eating, practically pouting as the woman who must be Lucrecia’s Aunt Ophelia fed Tanya another roll.
Tanya was long since used to feeling her body act without her conscious input, as leaving an archetype to handle menial tasks like eating was something she did fairly often. She could still taste everything, she just didn’t need to think about the minutiae of chewing, swallowing and other such things. It is not recommended to try to do such a thing to do things that are actively unpleasant, as it will not reduce your suffering, and if you pick the wrong archetype to do it with, you may end up not using the part of you that can tolerate the thing in question, exacerbating the problem.
Still, the food bought enough time that Tanya was fairly certain she was beginning to understand the foreign grammar of the psitanium structures. Instead of being structured like a machine, with discrete sections that can be flow-charted and clearly defined user inputs, it was constructed more like an instrument, with the adjustable variables creating complex changes throughout the entire structure, many parallel and interlinking channels, but only one path was used at any one time. That bundle designated which output circle was used, that bundle designated which effect was invoked, that bundle designated which of the programmed options were used… Yes, she understood this. All she needed to do was to run a complete circuit through all of the bundles, making sure that the zero channel was used when the purpose of the bundle was non-applicable.
The only issue was that she didn’t fully understand what each of the channels did. At least three bundles of channels were used to designate the exact effect, and while the parts she did understand meant that she could, for example, do something with pyrokinesis on the circle that was around Kevan’s chair, she had only vague notions as to the difference between incinerating him, if that was even an option, or heating up his drink.
“I’m full now, thank you Baachan.” Tanya heard herself saying. “I would like something to drink, please. Milk?”
“Of course I can get you some milk, Lady Maligula.” Ophelia said, smiling.
“My name is Tanya, Baachan.”
“Of course it is.” Ophelia said on her way out.
Right around the time where Tanya thought she figured out which channels were being used to restrain her, the other members of the expedition finally gave her the signal. She thought about starting the plan now… but decided to instead send them a delay message. Some milk sounded good. Besides, she wanted to study the circle some more. How is it stopping her from using telekinesis? She’s pretty sure it’s that part, but how is it doing it?
Once Ophelia got back and both Tanya and Kevan drank their glasses of milk, they were ready to begin. “You should really appreciate your mother more.” Tanya said to Kevan after she re-combined with her archetype. “She was being so considerate and you didn’t even say thank you.”
As expected, the statement threw him off of the dramatic statement he was about to make. “...I hate you.” He said, “But you’re not going to be who you currently are for much longer, so…” He took out the psitanium diadem that Ophelia delivered with the food, and placed it on top of Tanya’s head.
Tanya sent the ready signal, and sent her attention inward, leaving only a small fraction of attention behind.
---------------------
It was raining inside her mind. The mechanisms behind the diadem were much more familiar, as because it was a dedicated device the differences in the construction methodology were not as severe. It was memory storage, but also communicative. Otto had created a similar device that could take a picture then infuse the memory into the user’s mind instead of printing out the image, creating a crystal-clear memory that lasted weeks before it started to fade, and made it nigh impossible to completely forget.
This particular device was intended to create a powerful hypnotic attack, in the form of rain. As her mind flooded, the more the artificial Maligula personality will overwhelm her own. However… this was an expected event that was planned for. The pyramid that her mind’s structures surrounded shifted, along with the roofs and streets, creating ducts and gutters that diverted the vast majority of the rain into a newly-created aquifer.
Proper psychic combat, where an invader wants to impose things on the target mind, was explained to her as being similar to a ‘wizard’s duel’, with a Disney film about King Arthur being shown as an example. It wasn’t about raw power, although power still mattered, but instead about outwitting the enemy by pitting metaphor against metaphor.
Tanya thought a more apt comparison was the kind of play fighting that elementary school boys engage in, where the goal was to invent a counter to whatever the hell the other boy came up with.
Still, ‘rain’ is countered by ‘civic engineering’. Your move, Kevan.
The aquifer, which was outside of the city and in the infinite-looking desert outside of its borders, started to surge upward in a twisting waterspout. From the water cyclone, a copy of Maligula emerged, a near identical copy to the one Tanya defeated in Helmut’s mind. The primary difference was that it did not have any of the normal Nightmare accouterments, it was much more real to life. You know, if you ignored the fact that the Maligula copy was fifty feet tall.
Good choice. ‘Civic engineering’ does indeed lose to ‘kaiju’. The question is, what defeats a kaiju?
“I call upon the power of friendship!” Tanya boldly announced. On cue, four other minds entered hers, as they were invited.
“So here’s where I left my nightmares. I knew I smelled trouble.” Helmut said, grinning at his own one-liner. Battle music started up around him, a heart-pounding beat setting the mood.
“I just cleaned up, you know!” Bob said angrily at the manifestation. “Stop making a mess!” Vines appeared out of the ether, whip cracks sounding out as the plants were twitching with energy.
“If you don’t have a library card, it’s just stealing.” Cassie added, frowning as a swarm of bees sprung into existence around her.
“I’m afraid this is Psychonauts business, my dear. Let the Agents handle it.” Compton said as he came astride a bear. A few other animals manifested around him.
Excellent. They all took her ‘say something cool when you come in’ instructions to heart. Bob’s could use work, though.
“You are… Maligula!” The apparition announced. “An avenging angel, destined to bring Grulovia to greatness!”
Tanya frowned, then started to slowly smile. She knew what to do with angels… She started focusing on her creation, it’s been a long time so she’ll need to dig deep to create this…
Bob’s plants surged upward and speared the Maligula shade, drinking deeply of the water. “I’d like my memories of Lucy back!” He shouted.
“I don’t, but Mama Fullbear didn’t raise no litterer!” Helmut added as he started inhaling strongly, a stream of water from the aquifer going into his mouth.
The swarm of bees surrounded Maligula, threads of telekinetic power creating a cage between them. The rain continued to pool beneath the waterspout. “It takes more than a few memories to make up a person, Galochio!” Cassie shouted. “Even from multiple people! Split up!” Maligula’s image punched the cage, her fists getting cut up by the razor wire and letting water drip down to lead to Cassie.
Compton just kept summoning animals to drink from the aquifer. “Yes, those are our previous memories, and you may have been able to take them, but there’s nothing stopping us from taking them right back.”
The Maligula entity thrashed against the cage, furious at the interference. But the rain continued… until it stopped. “Ah, finally.” Tanya announced. “I was wondering when my archetype was going to finish disabling that blasted diadem.”
After another moment, Cassie called out to Tanya: “Okay, we’ve done our parts!”
Tanya unleashed the final weapon her imagination called forth. A pair of black metal spears, twisted against each other to create a single fork-like weapon. It pierced the Maligula entity in both the head and the heart, shattering it into an incoherent puddle of water.
With the entity reduced to a morass of mental energy, it was a simple matter for each of the present members of the psychic six to siphon what remained into their own minds for later disposal. “Excellent. Now, hopefully those other memories will be useful when it comes to dismantling the Deluginist’s operations.”
“Yes, let’s hope so.” Compton said, worrying at the brim of his hat now that the action was over with.
“Ah, here’s the nugget of wisdom you asked for.” Cassie said, handing Tanya a golden book. “This will help your plan.”
Tanya seized the book, digesting the information within. “Thank you. Now, I have an appointment with my least favorite “cousin”. Remember the plan.” Tanya said, before willing herself outside of her mind.
---------------------
Tanya opened her eyes, an inner light shining forth. “A storm is coming.” She said, in her best Lucrecia impression. There wasn’t any water nearby, but enough was in the local air that Tanya was able to condense a small water snake that wrapped itself around her left arm.
“Ah, how are you feeling, Lady Maligula?” Kevan asked, a big smile on his face.
“Like my mustard’s about to jump off.” Tanya said, invoking one of the Grulovian idioms she picked up from Cassie’s language nugget. It was actually really difficult to learn a new language through a nugget of wisdom, but it was very good at expanding one’s knowledge of a language that you already knew at a basic level. “You have five seconds to justify your continued air supply.” The water-snake she had on her arm hissed at Kevan.
Kevan flinched at the frosty reception, a look of confusion on his face. “I’m Kevan, your cousin.” He said, “The son of your Aunt Ophelia? Your father Zalto’s sister?”
“...why would that matter?” Tanya asked, affecting confusion. “I never let blood relations stop me from killing people. I kill lots of people, you know.”
“I’m here on behalf of the Gzar, overseeing your recovery!” He hastily added. “Gzar Gristol Malik? His father died while you were indisposed.”
Interesting. Tanya pretended to hesitate at the invocation of an authority. “...You live another day.” She said, as if deciding right then.
While the conversation occurred, Tanya felt her power grow as the members of the Psychic Six added their mental energy to her own. Using that power, She forcefully broke the telekinetic constructs holding her back, using her connection to the psitanium construct to direct the damage to a part that she understood well enough, ruining it while preserving the parts she still wanted to study.
“My ritual circles!” Kevan exclaimed, distraught. Tanya sympathized, she’d likely react much worse if someone destroyed her prototypes.
“Eh?” Tanya vocalized. “I don’t care.” She walked out through the door like she owned the place, her water-snake hooking Kevan’s arm and dragging him along. “Where’s the Gzar? I should report.”
“Ah, he’s in a safehouse.” Keva said, to Tanya’s glower. “In America.” He added.
“Why?” Tanya asked.
“The Soviets have installed a replacement regime here in glorious Grulovia.” Kevan explained, “While they doubtlessly keep their communist spies watching the Gzar, once the Soviets are expelled by your invincible might, he will return to bring Grulovia back to its glory days!”
Tanya scoffed. “What glory days?” She asked, “Even when I was here, I was just trying to keep a failing nation from getting overtaken by the communists. The Gzar was a joke that failed to understand basic civics and sociology.” Tanya admittedly didn’t know that much about what happened, but the point was to make him abandon his plan by thinking that it was poorly conceived, or else he might do it to someone else.
Kevan frowned suspiciously. “You don’t sound like yourself, cousin.” He said warily. “How do you feel?”
Tanya took on an angry look. When questioned, go on the attack. “How do I feel?” She asked hysterically. “I’ve lost half a meter in height, I have the body of…” She looked over herself, steeling for the insult she was about to say about herself. “-some fourteen year old girl, who knows how many foreign memories swimming around in the mental stew you decided to make of me.” The water snake lashed out, wrapping around the man’s neck and lifting him bodily into the air. “I’ve already brought this nation back from the brink before. Why should I try to do it again?”
“You’ll be worshiped as a Goddess of vengeance!” Kevan said frantically, arms failing to dislodge the aquatic binding. “Your family is still here, me and Mother and Uncle Luca!”
“QUIET!” Tanya shouted. “I’m in charge now. Have everyone of importance report to the meeting room. I have a speech to give.”
“Yes Lady!” Kevan stammered as he raised his hand to his temple, presumably contacting his confederates.
---------------------
They actually had a throne room prepared for Tanya to hold court, which was amusing. Well, it was really more of an auditorium, but instead of a podium, there was an elaborate throne on a pedestal, with the chair positioned so that the area in front of the stage was bigger and more easily visible, clearly part of the show.
Tanya had collected some additional water, and had five water snakes around her to further the ‘Maligula’ facade. Controlling this much water this precisely for this long was harder than Tanya expected it to be, but mental energy can assist with more than just raw power. Cassie was helping manage the mental load, and Compton was helping with the snake’s animal mannerisms.
The seats were not full, indicating that the Deluginist’s full membership could not be called upon so quickly. It looked like the place could seat half the town, although that was more of an indictment of how small the town was than the seating capacity of the auditorium. In fact, less than a dozen people were present, presumably the inner circle.
Tanya frowned at the lack of attendance. “Well, the speech can wait, I suppose. Now, report on all operations and resources.” Tanya declared. “I need the full picture of the organization’s reach if we’re going to launch a coup.”
Another cultist, a man by the name of Vlad Burcur, explained things. Apparently, the cult had more or less full control over the local town, with the mayor and city council being members. The Deluginists operated in a cell structure, with each cell being led by either a member of the Grulovian nobility, this cell being an exception, instead being controlled by the Galochio family. As Kevan was a notable “sorcerer”, with enough expertise to actually execute the “necromancy” required to “resurrect” Maligula, he had significant influence over other Deluginist sects.
The resources they could command were psitanium reserves measured in tons, all “rituals” being limited only by the throughput of the circles. The facility could hold prisoners and had supply reserves fit to feed, fuel, and otherwise supply the whole town for a year, although this was intended to be a strategic resource for their takeover of the country.
Tanya was sure to spend copious amounts of time during the explanations to further intimidate her audience, of course.
Their financial resources were not as significant. They had the income of the fancy bottled water facility, as well as tourist income, but the total income was not particularly great, as the exchange rate of the local currency and, say, the dollar was not favorable.
“But what do we have to garner international support?” Tanya asked, “The Psychonauts, as you say, were the ones to stop me before, but do we have any leverage over them? A bribe, a hostage?”
“We have four of the Psychic Six in our jail.” Vlad announced proudly.
“Psychic Six?” Tanya asked, aping confusion. “We were the Psychic Seven! If it was reduced because of my demise, then why isn’t it the Psychic Five? I know I killed one.”
“The frozen apostate lives, Lady Maligula.” Said another one of the cultists, a man by the name of Radu Dragos.
So they really do call him that. “...Who?” She asked.
Vlad cut back in. “Helmut Fullbear, Lady Maligula.” He said, “We found them coming to seek the frozen body of him, he is a brain in a jar.”
Tanya rubbed the bridge of her nose, silently conveying how much she did not like that news. “Okay, do we know where it is?”
“We have it, Lady Maligula.” Vlad continued. “It was thought by Lady Ophelia that we could trade it to the Psychonauts in return for their support against the Soviets, or at least their non-interference. They are opposed to the Soviets, but they ignore their puppet regime, pretending to be fooled.” He shifted uncomfortably. “The Psychic six have repelled our best sorcerers, so they could be planning something nefarious.”
Finally, some good news. “Alright, I’m going to take a nap. Get as much information as you can about the Deluginists as a whole down on paper, and once I’ve read it through, I’ll have your next instructions. I want it at hand the second I wake up, understand?”
"Yes, Lady Maligula!"
Comments
Kevin Curry
Thanks. Tanya's mental association with the Evangelion Lance of Longinus and angel-killing/kaiju-killing is what made it do serious damage, but Kevan could have recovered... if the Psychic Six didn't use the moment of weakness to siphon the mental contamination into their minds, each taking a quite manageable 25% of it.
Chris Larson
Nice use of the Lance. I especially like that it probably wouldn't have worked (kaiju survive stabs all the time, the body is water so it doesn't have conventional biology, etc.) But because it was an angel using a weapon made to kill kaiju angels with physics breaking biology worked perfectly. It kind of gave itself its own weakness.
