This choice: Leave yourself with your partners • Go Back...Chapter #71The Defiant One by: Seuzz   So, you've found a way to give yourself more than twoousiarchs. You could give yourself all ten. You've got the essentia on hand to do it. You'd only have to take Frank and Joe apart.
The temptation flares within you, but passes. You like having them as partners and friends, even if they sometimes get on your nerves. Oh, sure, you could revive them without their essentia, but it wouldn't be the same. Certainly it wouldn't be the same for them, and if they felt the loss, you'd feel it too, even if indirectly.
Besides, you can get access to their essentia whenever you want, just by "possessing" them.
"What?" Joe says.
You blink, and realize you've been staring thoughtfully at him. There is a glitter in his eye that you don't like. A glitter of suspicion. Maybe even of fear.
"Oh," you drawl, quickly covering up those thoughts you've decided to discard. "I was just thinking about whether to give you and Frank some exta essentia too."
Joe's eyes warm. "That'd be real sporting of you."
"I know it would. But I—"
"I wouldn't mind having a little Perelandra to play with. A little more potency."
"Yeah, but we were planning on getting us some new partners."
"Three's company," Joe says. "Four's a crowd. If you keep it to just us—"
"I'll have to think about it." You stagger to your feet, then fall back down again, for you're still wrung out from the operation. So is Joe, and it is only with your mutual help that the two of you are able to stagger back to Jonathan's apartments. Frank—finally returned, and still sporting Straussler's face—looks up vaguely from his schoolwork at you.
* * * * *
"The extra essentia business can wait," you sigh. "First order of business is getting you two guys hidden."
"Figure out the essentia first," Joe insists. "Based on that we figure where we'd best—"
"Frank, will you sit on him?"
"Watch it, asshole," Joe says as Frank steps up with a frown.
"I wish I understood what you guys were all going on about," Chelsea says from the other end of the sofa. She's got her arms and legs crossed and is jogging her foot. "I don't even know why you called me out here if I've got nothing to contribute."
"I told you, we need your input on disguises for these guys—" you start.
"Maybe if you took her apart again, gave her a copy of your brain," Frank says.
"You certainly wouldn't want to give her a copy of your—" Joe dodges as Frank lunges for him.
"Guys!" you shout, and your voice sounds thin and reedy. "Will you stop that and pay attention. I'm supposed to be the boss here! I've even got some of that boss stuff now."
The boys shrug at you, but at least they settle down. Chelsea, though, rolls her eyes.
"I know it's going to take training to get me to know how to use these things," you continue now that you've got everyone's attention. So the first thing—" You shoot Joe a hard look. "The first thing is where to put me and Frank so we can work closely together. You're still willing to be my coach at the meditation and stuff, right?" you ask him.
"Of course," he says. "But we could do that here—"
"You need a new face," you insist. "In case the—"
"And why haven't we been practicing?" Frank continues.
"We will! Once we get some ideas from Chelsea. So come on," you say, turning to her. "Who could Frank and I be, where it wouldn't look weird if we hung out real close for a long time after school? Two guys. Two girls." Your tone grows more desperate as she just looks at you from under lowered brows and kicks at the air. "Siblings?"
She just shrugs.
"Don't be like this, Chelsea," you sigh. God, just how aggravating can she be? You wonder if her boyfriend goes through this kind of passive-aggressive shit with her. "You were really into this stuff yesterday."
"Maybe I just don't like being pushed around," she says archly. She gets up and stalks to the door. "When you can treat me with a little respect, call me." She doesn't even say it over her shoulder.
"Chelsea, come back," you say as sternly as you can.
That at least gets you a black, backward glare. "Like you can order me around."
Your jaw drops.
Fortunately, Joe is on it, and he blurs as he gets between her and the door. He catches her fist as she strikes at him; an instant later she goes rigid as Frank enfolds her with his invisible fist. Joe gently clasps his arms around her, and muffles her with a hand over her mouth. "What were you saying, boss?" he asks.
You swallow, hard. "She's a golem," you say weakly. "She's supposed to— And she didn't."
"So we noticed," Frank says. "I thought it sounded like a bad idea, what you were getting up to with your 'new ousiarchs." He crooks his fingers in air quotes.
"I fucked myself up," you groan, and fall back onto the sofa. "I fucked up my essentia, and now—" You gnaw your lip. "We can't let her go, not with her knowing everything, and being free to talk."
Chelsea's eyes widen.
"You've still got that remote sigil in her, right?" Joe asks. "You could take direct control until we figure out what to do. But I know you'd hate to do that," he grins.
"Looks like you'll have to take her apart again and start over with your new essentia," Frank says. "If you didn't irretrievably fuck it up."
Your new essentia. Why did your improvement have to fuck things up with the golem? You were very careful to arrange it so that each set up was disentangled from the other. The new—
You blink hard. Is that it? Is it that stupidly obvious what you did wrong?
You close your eyes and concentrate. Dimly, Glundandra and Eldibria appear. Mentally, you grope about them, feeling for something like a latch or switch. A little mental hinge that will let you— There it is.
Like this afternoon, you feel a dreadful internal lurch; you hope you eventually get used to it. Glundandra and Eldibria vanish, to be replaced by the more familiar Sulva and Kenandandra.
The planets associated with the essentia you used to enslave the Chelsea-golem. You open your eyes. "Let her go, Joe," you say.
Chelsea is very red in the face, and her lip curls hard. For a moment you think she is actually going to spit at you.
"Who's your boss, Chelsea," you ask her quietly.
She goes very white. "You are, Will," she croaks.
"That's right. Are you going to do what I say?"
Her head jerks up and down.
"Tell me you're sorry for being such a cunt earlier."
"I'm sorry," she says in a small voice.
"What are you sorry for?"
Her nostrils flare. "For being a ... a cunt."
"You are sorry, Chelsea. You are very sorry. You want to help me and Frank and Joe. You want to help us a lot. It's the most important thing in your life, helping us. " There's a subtle shift behind her eyes, and though she still looks abused and unhappy, she perks up a little. "You'll do whatever we ask, and you'll be cheerful about it. Because helping us makes you happy."
Chelsea sniffles, then does the last thing you'd expect. She darts forward and hugs you tightly, burying her face in your chest.
* * * * *
After that, it all goes smoothly, though you notice that Joe and Frank keep shooting uneasy glances at Chelsea. For her part, she perches on the sofa, smiling in a glassy kind of way at you and the others. You're sure she's utterly confused and probably bored, but she at pretends to be raptly interested in the conversation.
"It's the way I set it up with my new ousiarchs," you explain to the others. "They're so segregated they're like two different essentia. When I switched over to the new ones, it was like I wasn't my old self—"
"You weren't," Joe interjects. "Literally."
"Well, that's how come Chelsea didn't obey me. I was switched over to the other ousiarchs, so I was running with an essentia she didn't recognize. But when I switched back—"
"Two different essentias," Joe muses. "Now, suppose you switched back over to your new ousiarchs. And then you used your hair to fashion a new golem. When would it obey you?"
"Only when I was running with the new ousiarchs, I guess," you say. "I wouldn't be able to order Chelsea and the new golem around at the same time. So I guess I better stick to using my old essentia when making golems."
"Why?" Joe says, and his smile is very sly. "If you did that, you'd be limiting yourself to only half a dozen golems."
"Right," you say, and frown at him in puzzlement. "That's one of the first about golems, is that you're limited. You've only got so much essentia to go arou— Oh!"
"Exactly!" Joe exclaims. He splays the fingers on one hand. "With Sulva and Kenandandra you can have five, maybe six golems." He raises his other hand. "With Glundandra and Eldibria you can have another five, maybe six golems."
You rub the side of your face. And why stop there? The way you made the connections this afternoon, you could stitch in a third essentia— You glance at Joe and Frank before your eye settles on Chelsea. You've still got her essentia in a bottle in the ballroom. With hers, you could have fifteen to eighteen golems.
With her essentia, you'd also be Chelsea Cooper. Literally, as Joe said.
You'd only have to take her imago for yourself as well.
The girl smiles vacantly at you.   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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