Note: read “Sweater The Devil You Know” first.
As Electra and I stand outside the gates of the one place I never wanted to go, I read the words above the open gates with a strong sense of dread.
Don’t Make Us Come Over There
There’s an X in an octagon above those.
Can you guess where we are?
“This bodes poorly.”
“Ewectwa haf awways wan-ed tu see dis pwace up cwose.”
“That makes one of us, Electra.”
scratch scratch
That’s right.
Dr. Pierre Faucheuse’s School for Gifted Individuals.
Headquarters of the ChaotiX.
Here we fuckin’ go.
They had something like that above the entrance to the Foundation, too. The words “Because No One Else Will”, if I remember correctly.
We look past a fountain with a statue of Dr. Pierre Faucheuse, at the main doors of the sprawling, labyrinthine building that serves as the headquarters of the people I loathe the most.
Well, right now, there’s a serious contender.
Jaws.
scratch scratch
It’s been a couple of days since my unpleasant reunion with Jaws in that motel, a couple of days closer to his deadline, and I’ve been racking my brain about how to get out of this mess.
Then I remembered that there was a way to clear my head.
So I took a very small nip of that Liquid Insomnia, given to me by the asshole who runs shit at the School.
Now, Chaos has actively been preventing me from getting drunk…
But he didn’t seem to have a problem with me getting knurd.
Once the caffeine had stripped away all the comfortable little illusions that make life bearable, I saw that there was a way to stop Jaws from ruining my life, and in hindsight, it was so obvious.
And I also saw that there was a loophole.
Jaws doesn’t want me telling the ChaotiX about him.
So, I’m not going to talk to the ChaotiX about him.
scratch scratch
Naturally, I’m feeling extremely hesitant about crossing this threshold.
Not that kind of threshold. In this case, I’m talking about a literal threshold.
Once I take that first step onto the grounds, there’s no going back. I’m locked into the path I’ve chosen, and whatever happens next is on me.
Just being here is taking a risk. If Jaws finds out I was here, he’ll assume that I’ve snitched to Korkea, and I’m fully aware what he’ll do in response.
scratch scratch
But I’m screwed no matter what I do.
If I pay Jaws the fifty K a month he wants in exchange for his silence about my past, I’ll have to turn Electra into a breeding pillow to get the money. Which, of course, will cost me points for every litter, meaning I won’t have to buy Jaws’ silence for very long before Chaos whisks me off to his domain for hot chocolate time.
If I refuse to pay, Jaws will expose me as an abuser to the people of Korkeaopolis. He has videos of us abusing fluffies together back in Detroit, and he has backups.
If I tell the ChaotiX about Jaws and ask them to deal with him for me, well, he’s an abuser too, so they’ll probably do it, if not for my benefit.
But he’ll know that I ratted him out. He warned me specifically not to tell Korkea about him.
So no matter what I choose, this is probably going to be the end of the game, the end of my good reputation here, and the end of me.
And I can’t count on Chaos to bail me out. By now, I’m certain that he wants to see how I handle this without him.
He’s been suspiciously absent from my life lately. The only Chaos I’ve seen since I spoke with Jaws is the soapy one in my bathroom, so at the very least, I can still get SFT so I can take a shower.
I’ve got something resembling a plan, but I don’t know how this is going to play out.
All I know is this:
It was fun while it lasted.
As we wait outside the gates, we see the front doors open, two of the gifted individuals working here striding out the doors and down the steps.
Sure enough, it’s Korkea and Marley. I’d know those two anywhere.
Blue eyes, messy brown hair in a long ponytail, the body of a couch potato who built up a ton of muscle in a relatively short time, and a black battle suit with an almost Liefeldian amount of pouches, and green, red and yellow lines. His magic sword and his apparently non-magical shield on his back, and a black bag that I’m pretty sure is bigger on the inside. He’s got what appears to be a tattoo on the back of his right hand, it looks like a black paw print. Like a cat walked through a puddle of ink, and left a paw print on his hand. And the signature smell of weed and what I believe to be Irish Spring. That’s Korkea.
Judging by the pinprick scars on his neck, he was once bitten by a vampire. I don’t know how he wasn’t turned into one. I’m not sure I want to know.
An earthie stallion with green fluff, red and yellow mane and tail, orange eyes, and more muscle than I’ve ever seen on any other fluffy. A silver collar, a black and white X in an octagon on it. That’s Marley.
The fluffy who could kick my ass without even breaking a sweat.
scratch scratch
They walk up to the gates, both smirking.
“Our mutual friend told us that you were coming, dude.”
“Kinna weiwd tu see yu hewe.”
“Good to see you’re not running away from us anymore, though. Progress! But all we were really told is that you need to talk about something.”
When me and Electra try to pass through the open gates, only she does.
WHUD
“Oof!”
I, however, slam into an invisible wall.
“This place is warded too?”
And Korkea laughs.
“Were you expecting the School to not be warded? I was just about to tell you that I need to invite you in before you can pass the wards.”
“So why could Electra get in?”
“Dat am a gud kwest-yun, mistah Caw.”
Korkea points at Electra and Marley.
“Because all fluffies, barring a few exceptional exceptions, have an open invitation to come on by. If they need help, or are escaping an abuser, well, helping fluffies is a big part of what the ChaotiX is about.”
“Wen we nu am sabin da wowwd, at weast.”
“Speaking of, could you hold on for a moment, please?”
Korkea flies up into the air, and the three of us watch him.
He’s glaring at someone with blueish-purple skin and black armor, flying towards the School, screaming in a language that sounds so horrible, it makes us wince.
VA-VOOM
Then Korkea vaporises the bastard with an energy blast, making me jump.
Strangely, none of the passersby who happened to witness that seem to be disturbed, and instead, they cheer for Korkea.
He floats down to the ground as casually as if he had been distracted by an unexpected phone call.
“Sorry about that. Where were we?”
I, on the other hand, am staring in absolute shock.
“You… you just killed someone like it was no big deal!”
“Oh, that was yet another would-be assassin from New Tenneb. They’ve been trying to kill me ever since Old Tenneb vanished and took most of the Tennebites with it, which I didn’t do, but they already hated me for killing their princes and their god, so they don’t believe me.”
“You killed a god–”
“It wasn’t a real god, it was just a mecha that they worshipped as a god, and before you ask: I only killed one of their princes, he killed his brother.”
“We wuz dewe wen it happund.”
I find myself stammering and gesticulating wildly at the smoke cloud still in the air.
“But y-y-you just-- just vaporised that guy, in broad daylight–”
Korkea laughs again, and waves off my concerns.
“He was a Tennebite. They’re the most xenophobic race in the universe, they hate everyone who isn’t them, they have no respect for any laws but their own, and they’ve attempted to exterminate everyone else at least twice. They aren’t protected by intergalactic law, so it’s not a crime to kill them. They don’t care about our laws, so why should our laws protect them?”
“An dey keep twy-in tu kiww daddeh fiwst, su yu nu can say dey nu haf it come-in.”
“Even though most of their race has disappeared, they still won’t quit it. If they wanna go extinct trying to kill me, I’m done trying to talk them out of it. You think abusers hate me? Compared to Tennebites, abusers are practically adoring fans of mine.”
“Da Tennuh-bites eben hate Mawwey tuu. An Mawwey nu weawwy did a wot to dem.”
“You did pin Scha down so I could finish him off, Mar. As far as the Tennebites are concerned, that’s more than enough.”
Let me see if I’ve got this straight.
Somewhere in the universe, there’s a planet full of people who despise Korkea and Marley with every fiber of their being.
Y’know, if it wasn’t for the xenophobia thing, those Tennebites would be my kinda people.
scratch scratch
“So, if you didn’t make their planet disappear, who did?”
“Sorry, classified information. Anyway, you’re not here to talk about that. Why don’t you come in? I, Sir Calvin Korkea, official leader of the ChaotiX, hereby invite you into Dr. Pierre Faucheuse’s School for Gifted Individuals. There, now you can pass.”
This time, I step over the threshold without any issues.
“Sir Calvin Korkea, huh? You’ve been knighted?”
“Yup. I’m also an official Knight of Drakonia, knighted by King Lorik himself. So the title doesn’t mean a lot on Earth, at least, not yet…”
Drakonia? That sounds oddly familiar.
Never been there, but I think Chaos has mentioned it.
Y’know what, I’ll ask him the next time I see him.
This is more important.
“Where are we gonna have this little chat, Korkea? I’m not talking out in the open.”
“How about we take this to my office? Shall we walk, or do you want us to teleport you there?”
“Teleport? Oh yeah, you don’t need one of those doohickeys to do that, do you?”
“No, but I would have to be touching you.”
“…Let’s just walk.”
scratch scratch
So Korkea and Marley lead us into the building, a few floors up, into Korkea’s office.
The stairs all have ramps for fluffies, and there’s elevators with button panels at human height and fluffy height.
Once we enter the office, Korkea sits at his desk, and as Marley jumps up onto the desk, Korkea waves his hand, and a glowing white ball flies towards me.
Before I can panic, it forms itself into a glowing white armchair, gently landing on the floor.
“Please, sit down.”
I stare at the armchair, and he sighs.
“It’s a hard light construct, dude. Here, watch this.”
He waves his hand again, and the armchair turns pink.
“I’m still working on doing constructs with more than one color.”
“Did you have to make it pink?”
“No, I didn’t have to.”
Meh, fuck it, my feet are sore and I’m itchy.
I reluctantly sit down on the armchair, not sure that it won’t suddenly vanish underneath me, and lift Electra onto my lap so I can occasionally pet her and relieve my itching.
“So you can do that too? Korkea, I’ve gotta ask: don’t you think it’s kinda unfair for you to have so many powers?”
He shrugs.
“By now, you should have a clue about the kind of threats we have to deal with, and power like mine is necessary to stand a chance. Yeah, being this strong doesn’t guarantee that I’ll win. It takes more than just brute strength to win the kind of battles we fight. You were in San Francisco too, you saw how bad it was. And honestly, that was an easy one. Has Chaos told you anything about the World Revolution?”
“He’s mentioned it, but he didn’t elaborate.”
Marley grins, curled up in a basket on the desk.
“Dat wuz sum weaw shit.”
Korkea nods.
“Yeah, and someone’s gotta do all this stuff, y’know? Someone’s gotta fight the battles that no one else can fight. There’s gotta be a Man on the Wall. And for now, that man is me. You know the old line, right? With great power…”
“Comes great responsibility, I know.”
“Actually, it’s there must also come great responsibility. It’s a small difference, but it matters a lot. The point is, yeah, I’ve got a lot of powers, but I’ve had to deal with assholes trying to kill me, or steal my powers and/or body, and destroy the world and kill everyone I love, ever since I crossed Threshold X. As I got stronger, the opponents I faced became stronger too. Being an Omega Class has its ups and downs, its pros and cons. You saw me blast that Tennebite, and he was nowhere near the first one to take a swing.”
“Dey am wike buggies awn da wind-sheewd tu daddeh nao.”
“And if you think I’m overpowered, there’s a certain masked alternate universe version of me you should pray you never meet. Anti-Calvin is exactly as bad as you think I am.”
“An den sum.”
I shudder at the thought.
“I can’t lie, one of you is one too many for my liking.”
“I get it, we’re not friends. But we don’t have to be enemies, either. So what brought you here today, oh he of the hideous sweater?”
I stroke Electra as I try to find the right words.
“Well… I’m here to ask you for some advice. You know my story, right? Chaos told you, I’m aware.”
“I know that you’re an abuser from Detroit, and that you’re here because Chaos is doing a thing with you. To be frank, I’m currently doing something like that too, with one of the guests in the cells down in the basement.”
“…Cells…?”
“They’re not for people like you. They’re for the kinds of villains who couldn’t be contained in prison. Or, in one case, because he’s in protective custody.”
“Dehak wan kiww Haw-vee cuz Haw-vee knu tuu much.”
Chaos mentioned someone called Dehak when he was… angry at me. So Korkea and Marley know this Dehak too?
Whoever Dehak is, they must be bad. Like, as bad as ten Jawses.
Y’know what, also not important right now.
Korkea gives me a scrutinizing look. He looks me right in the eyes, almost like he’s looking through my eyes.
Then he nods, apparently satisfied by something.
“Can I make an educated guess, dude?”
“Go for it.”
“You’re here because you’re thinking about coming clean about your past, aren’t you? And you’re worried about how the public will react, if they know that,” finger quotes, “Ugly Sweater Guy is actually an abuser who is only being so nice to fluffies due to liberal application of the carrot and the stick.”
“That’s… that’s partially right.”
Electra raises an eyebrow.
“Dat am a weawwy wucky gess, mistah Caw.”
Korkea smiles mischievously.
“Yes, it was definitely just a guess.”
Wait, can he read minds too? I can’t remember right now!
Before I can ask, he continues.
“I think you may find that people around here can be rather forgiving. And it’s actually good timing that you came to talk about this. I’ve been meaning to introduce you to a couple of people, you know. People who know exactly what you’re going through. Are you familiar with Dave?”
“Dave? You mean Doomguy Dave? I’ve seen some of his YouTube videos, yeah…”
And I’ve seen what his fluffy Slayer does.
Honestly, if I had to choose between being locked in a small room with Marley or Slayer, I’d pick Marley.
He probably won’t rape me.
Korkea looks at a photo on the wall, of what I assume is a teenage Korkea with his friends. His hair is short, but he’s still recognizable. The four of them are at a convention, in cosplay: the teenage Korkea is cosplaying as Mega Man, doing the bunny ears behind the head of a dark-haired boy cosplaying as Doomguy. That’s probably Doomguy Dave. There’s a black boy, cosplaying as Luffy, and a blonde boy with long hair cosplaying as the Shocker. I think their names are Andre and Seth?
Clearly, they weren’t doing a group cosplay.
“Dave used to be an abuser too, but he was motivated by profit. And you know why they call him Doomguy Dave, don’t you? Trust me, there was a time when I thought that Dave was the biggest asshole in the world, and you should see how far he’s come since then. And then there’s Al. Short for Alpha, ringing any bells?”
“No.”
“He’s basically my robot doppelganger, and he was made to exterminate all life in the universe. In his timeline, he all but wiped out life on Earth, at the very least. Like Dave, he’s come a long way. Al eventually chose to go against his original purpose, and became someone who defends and nurtures life instead. All he needed was to have the parts of his programming that rendered him addicted to killing removed, and he had begun to feel remorse before we reprogrammed him! Dave and Al have both worked very hard to atone for the terrible things they did in the past. And, in Al’s case, the future too. So did François, and Henry, and Kirk, and Scotty, and our friends in the Intergalactic Faucheuse Foundation. So let me ask you something, dude: do you regret your old life in Detroit? Or do you miss it? If Chaos said you could take the sweater off for good, and go back there… would you go back to abusing fluffies, too?”
That…
That’s a good question.
I still don’t trust myself.
I still don’t think I’d be able to resist jumping off the wagon, if I wasn’t effectively nailed to it.
I’m still struggling with that urge to abuse.
But maybe it’s not an urge, it’s a habit. Maybe I was just so used to hurting fluffies, that it just became a… what’s it called, a Pavlovian response?
Habits can be broken, can’t they?
If I could leave this city… if I had followed Jaws back home…
Would I end up as bad as him?
“I… I don’t think I want to go back to abusing fluffies… but I don’t know if I could stop myself, Korkea. I mean, it’s not like you can just reprogram me to make me not feel that urge anymore. I’m not a robot.”
Korkea smirks at me.
“Can’t we? Y’know, Kirk was conditioned by Hans, the same asshole who built Al. Hans experimented on Kirk to draw out his latent power, and brainwashed him into being… well, being a pawn, an agent of death and destruction, same as Al. Hans was Kirk’s father, if that wasn’t horrifying enough.”
Hans did that to his own son?
What kind of father would…
I’ve never met that Hans guy, but fuck him.
“So… you’ve dealt with Hans a few times?”
Korkea gives me a humorless smile.
“He was Erwin’s great-uncle, and the man who proved that joining the Nazis isn’t the worst thing that someone can do. Believe me, Hans was bad enough when he was just a Nazi. And he only signed up with old Toothbrush Face to further his own genocidal agenda. Old Hans was hellbent on replacing all life with machines of his own design. Most of the Stahlberg family is nicer than Hans ever was. He was the black sheep of the family. And take it from me: he was an uninspired hack. Smarter than most, but not as smart as Pierre, and entirely devoid of common sense.”
…
I can see why Erwin hasn’t brought his great-uncle up to me.
I don’t think it’s a good idea to ask him about this. It might reopen old wounds.
Incidentally, Erwin’s got some weird slimy silver alien following him around a lot these days.
It tried to scam a free toy out of me at Starbucks, by shapeshifting into a silver fluffy.
But I saw it shapeshift while they were waiting in line.
Marley smiles just as humorlessly.
“We deawt wif Hans faw tuu manee times.”
“Damn right, Mar. Anyway, like Al, Kirk started to fight his conditioning before Des deprogrammed him. So, what I’m saying is, Des could probably help you, if you’d let him. He isn’t just a fluffy psychologist. Or maybe Ulysses could help you.”
“Is Ulysses another fucking ChaotiX member?”
“Not yet, but he’s been invited. My point is… you don’t have to do this alone.”
Marley nods again.
“Hewp am dewe if yu wan it, but we nu am gunna make yu wet us hewp yu.”
“Exactly. We’re not gonna force you to talk to any of those guys, but I think it would really help you if you talked to them. Let them give you their perspective. If you truly regret what you did in Detroit, if you’re seriously committed to atonement, and you’ll never hurt another fluffy again… then I think people will understand if you tell them the truth. And I’ll tell you this: if Chaos didn’t think that you could atone, he wouldn’t be playing this game with you.”
“You understand him better than I do, Korkea.”
“Well, I am his Harbinger. I’m one of the few people who can keep up with him.”
“An daddeh am jus as wai-wee as Kay-ohs.”
“Dude, you should have seen how I dealt with Carnage. Or rather how we dealt with him.”
“Yu meen yu an Mawwey, mistah Caw?”
“No, Electra, I do not. Your da-- owner missed a lot of the good stuff.”
I shrug, glancing at my sleeve.
“From what you told me after that shitshow, it sounds like Chaos was right to keep me away from Carnage. And I still walked away with a lot of points from saving all of those infected fluffies. But I’m probably not gonna keep my points for very long. If people in town know the truth about me, they’ll never let me near a fluffy again.”
“Dude! I told you, people will probably understand if you’re sincere about this.”
“Will they, Korkea? They don’t know what I’ve done to fluffies. They’ll never look at me the same way again… I won’t be able to show my face around here!”
“Ewectwa knu, an Ewectwa stiww wike yu.”
“…I’m still screwed, though.”
Korkea gives me a sympathetic look.
“I completely understand how you feel right now. You feel lost, and afraid, and you don’t know if you’re going to get out of your situation unscathed. I know this, because I’ve been there. Yes, really, don’t give me that look. You seriously think I don’t know that kind of fear? You think what we do is all witty quips and awesome power-ups? It’s not. There’s been plenty of times when everything seemed hopeless, and all appeared to be lost. But I never stopped fighting to find a way to win. When I was fighting assholes like Duwen, or Deedee and Freddy, or fucking Vulcanus, there were points where I felt like that was it, I was gonna die, and I could only hope that I would drag the bastards down with me, or that my friends would finish the job without me. If only you could see those fights from my point of view.”
He winks at Marley, and Marley winks back.
Dunno what that’s about.
Then Korkea smiles at me.
“I know you’re scared, and unprepared. You’re not the only one, I swear, who’s ever been afraid or felt this way. And I believe that you will make the right choice. Maybe you’ll never be a hero, but that doesn’t mean you’re meant to be a villain. At the end of the day, you choose which Way you go, and no one can choose for you.”
“I didn’t choose to be in Korkeaopolis, though. I didn’t choose to play this game.”
“And I didn’t choose to be born as an Omega Class. But I chose what to do with it. You can do the same, and choose how you play the game. And you can leave the game whenever you want.”
“Yeah, by walking through the door of death.”
“…Shall I tell you something that Chaos once told me, dude? You may not realize it, but he gave you an incredible power.”
“What, the power of itchiness?”
Korkea rolls his eyes.
“Ha ha. No, he gave you the same power he gives everyone when they’re born: the power to make choices. He told me so himself, the night we met at Bran Castle.”
“Really? He’s not giving me a choice.”
“Oh, but he did. See, that power… it comes at a price. Remember that whole thing about great power, and what must come with it? Great… rrrrr…”
“Responsibility, you don’t have to treat me like a child.”
“Got it in one. You have the power to make choices, and the responsibility to accept the consequences of those choices. It was your own decisions that put you on the Way into our wonderful city, and it’s your own decisions that can put you on the Way out of it.”
“Nu wun made yu gib fwuffies owwies.”
“And no one’s making you be nice to fluffies. It’s all up to you. All Chaos is doing is making you face consequences if you screw up, same as if you had been arrested. If you want to leave the game, it just means that you’ve given up on atonement. And what would that say about you?”
“…”
“Yeah, nothing good. So you get the point I’m trying to make? You’re not irredeemably evil. If you were, you wouldn’t be able to see how bad you are. And if you keep playing the role of a nice guy… who knows? You might end up changing for real. You’ve already changed a bit since you started playing the game. When’s the last time you called a fluffy a shitrat?”
“…Huh. I haven’t said that in a while.”
“See? You’re on the right track. But, uh, I think we need to wrap this up. I’ve got a lot to do today.”
“I get it, Korkea. You’re a busy man, I should be grateful that you made time for me, blah blah blah.”
“Oh, I am a busy man, but you needed help, and that’s what I do. Do you need us to show you and Electra the way out?”
After carefully putting Electra on the floor, I get up.
“Yeah, this place is like a maze.”
“If we git wost hewe, we mite neba find da way owt.”
“You’ve gotta put some maps on the walls, Korkea.”
He gets up too, making the armchair vanish with another wave of his hand, and Marley hops off the desk. Huh, most fluffies can’t survive that unscathed, but I shouldn’t be surprised.
“I’ll keep it in mind, thanks. We’ve made a lot of additions. Like, that training facility was built after the World Tour–”
“Does that have anything to do with the World Revolution?”
“…Al and Hans were there for both of them…”
So Korkea and Marley lead us back out of the building, through the front doors, past the fountain, in which a couple of fish people are now relaxing like it’s a hot tub.
The smoke cloud is gone, by the way.
Calvin waves at the fish people as we pass, and they wave back.
“That’s Gyll and Dorz, they’re brothers.”
“I do see the resemblance. They’re both, uh, Land Hydroxians, right? Those are the ones with dark green scales, I heard.”
I’ve taken a look at Little Hydrox, Korkeaopolis’ Hydroxian neighborhood, so I’ve learned a thing or two about Hydroxians.
It’s a good thing Electra stayed at the hotel.
There’s a lot of water features in that neighborhood.
“Yup. They’ve still gotta immerse themselves in water frequently, but not as often as Sea Hydroxians, or Deep Hydroxians.”
“I know Sea Hydroxians have light green scales, but I don’t think I’ve seen a Deep one.”
“There aren’t a lot of Deep Hydroxians on Earth. They’d rather stay on Hydrox, in their own familiar ocean depths.”
We pass through the gates, my car parked across the street.
“If you want to talk to Dave, swing by Fluffy Auschwitz, he’s usually working there. I’ve already talked to him about you, he’s been eager to introduce himself.”
“I’m sorry, Fluffy What?”
“It’s… it’s a long story, dude.”
A few minutes later, Ugly Sweater Guy drives off in his Pontiac Aztek, Electra riding shotgun in her carrier, Calvin and Marley waving them off.
Once their visitors are out of sight, the two Omegas turn around, walking back onto the grounds.
And Calvin takes his phone out of a pouch, making a call.
Whoever he’s calling quickly picks up.
“Yo, Vic. I’ve got another job for you.”
The duo passes the fountain again.
“No, not that kind of job. Not yet, at least. I need you to put a disguise together and go to Detroit to gather information. Yes, for real. No, I’m not punishing you for anything. …What? That was you? Damn it, Vic! Now I am punishing you! Just get changed and move out to Detroit, or I’ll teleport you there myself! This has gotta be done quickly, and discreetly, so listen up.”
Then Calvin smirks audaciously.
“I want to know everything there is to know about a gentleman who goes by the alias of Jaws, and where he is now. Yeah, I can give you a description…”