Amos had experienced a lot of strange things since the flash. He had awakened his first ability and suffered through the head trip of his mind expanding. Then his world became even more complicated as a particular local crime boss metaphorically put his boot on Amos’ neck. After that, Amos met Sonya for the first time, and at first he really thought his life was over. Instead, she’d opened his eyes and awakened his technopathy. She’d given him the foundation to build himself back up on. Put him in the position to meet the love of his life.
All with the shake of a hand.
He looked down at her outstretched fingers, her glittering skin faint in the low light of the storage room. He looked back up at her and saw the smile in her eyes. “How does becoming a walking apocalypse sound?” she asked with that mischievous grin he knew all too well. It was like she had just thought of a joke that she wasn’t going to tell until just the right moment. A whimsy that would have made him hesitate two years ago.
He knew her better now, though. Far better. He’d seen her at her worst. He’d seen her collapse under the weight of everything she’d taken onto herself. He’d seen her build herself back up and become the person standing in front of him. Someone he knew could take the whole world for a ride and get away with it. Someone he trusted.
Amos Carter didn’t hesitate when Sonya Chernovna grinned like that.
He snapped his hand out and grabbed hers. “I figured Charon was enough apocalypse for you.”
She laughed and shrugged. “What's one more, right?”
“It’s a deal,” he said, and the strangeness began.
The first thing that he felt was a sudden awareness of something that was a part of him, separate from him, and inside of him all at the same time. In the brief millisecond it took for his mind to process the information, he initially settled on ‘Amos-ness.’ Then he realized it was something far more significant, something that called a lot of things into question for him while answering many, many more. He could feel his own soul, sense it, like something substantive that had been digitized within the core of his being. A ghost that made up who he was.
Then the next eureka moment came. He was his soul. Not in any metaphorical or metaphysical sense. He and his soul were one being now; the change had been so sudden he hadn’t even felt it. He was simply aware that the body he resided within was nothing more than an extension of the will cradled within. The feeling shook him to his core as more changes came. He could feel his body breaking down and changing in a ripple, his skin shuddering like a disturbed pond. Every cell, every molecule, all of them an individual Amos, yet not.
He staggered and nearly fell before Sonya caught him. His senses were in overdrive, every sound processing faster than a human brain could ever comprehend. The details were compounded, condensed, extrapolated, and translated into meaning in the blink of an eye. He gripped Sonya’s hand as the instincts came next. A collection of powers brought together and combined into one complete form. A merger of features and functions. Somehow he even knew their names, the individual parts, and the strategy she’d used to make them.
He gasped as she pulled him to his feet, only for him to understand that breathing was just an involuntary reflex now. Meaningless. My lungs aren’t… lungs?
“You alright?” she asked, and her voice rang about in his head.
“I’m… good lord, Sonya,” he babbled, clutching at the side of his head. “Is this how you hear?”
She hesitated. “Pretty close, I imagine.”
“How do you not have a perpetual headache? Shit!” he coughed and pulled away, forcing himself to stay standing. He stopped and looked at his fingers. They were trembling, but not with feeling or emotion. He could sense them, his new instincts making sense of the incomprehensible nature of what he had become. Gray Goo. Neumann’s Cataclysm. He swallowed and looked up at her. “You weren’t joking about turning me into a walking apocalypse.”
She stepped back from him and gave him an encouraging gesture. “How is it?”
“It’s a little more complicated than the name implies,” he said thoughtfully, letting the inborn details guide him for a heartbeat. Fascinating. The ability is transcribed onto my soul, I think. It's still too much information to take in all at once. Is that a structure? Are abilities something that have building blocks? What am I-
He shook his head. Focus. You can explore the nuances later.
He took a deep breath and walked over to the pile of metals. He reached down and plucked up a lump of what looked like iron. It was the earliest metal found in Common and Uncommon-tier dungeons. At some point he’d started calling it “cold iron” out of habit, and the name stuck. He clutched the lump in his grip.
He felt he could examine it with far more precision if he wanted, but the bare-bones detail was sufficient. He crushed it. The feeling of strength came so naturally the motion almost startled him as the lumps of metal were absorbed into his skin. The rock clattered to the ground, filtered out until nothing remained. Every cell studied it. No, every nanite. His body learned the metal, down to the very base molecular structure. Ah, mana isn’t just something that helps create the circumstances that form the metal; it makes up part of its molecular structure. Interesting.
He turned to Sonya, who was watching him with curiosity. “First step is learn the material,” he explained.
Sonya raised her eyebrows. “And the second?”
He threw his hand out towards an empty wooden crate in the room, and his limb changed, stretching until it became a thin spear of rippling, unidentifiable material. It pierced the wood and spread across it like a plague, consuming it before his limb retracted and his hand took shape again. The crate was gone, and he felt… fuller. He closed his eyes and let the change happen. Sonya let out a gasp of surprise, and he looked down at his body. It had taken on that silvery-white metal sheen of refined Cold Iron, the same material he made most everything out of. He flexed his fingers experimentally. “No loss in flexibility, nice.”
“So you convert matter,” Sonya said thoughtfully.
“Basically. I need a blueprint and substance to work with,” he said. “This is amazing.”
“What does it feel like?” she asked.
He looked up at her and chuckled, scratching the back of his head. “You mean being an amalgamated mass of nanites rather than an organic living being?” He scratched his nose and shrugged. “I think my brain is compensating for it, or my soul, rather. I don’t really notice much of a difference.” He squinted. “That’s something I’m going to have to wrestle with for a bit.”
Another idea occurred to him.
He held up his hand. “One sec. Sorry, Sonya,” he said and concentrated. He felt his link to the computers on the ship and enjoyed the rush of syncing up as usual. His senses spread throughout the ship for a moment before he pulled back and focused on the core servers.
Another rush; this time it felt like a tug on his soul. A tiny piece of it peeled away before whisking off through his connection to the server. He felt the spot like a raw wound that would need to take some time to recover. It was a dull ache, cold and deep. He let out a sigh and turned his focus back on her, breaking the connection. The lights flickered for just a moment before settling.
Sonya looked up. “What was that?”
“I backed myself up into the Idol,” he said casually. “I’ll be able to keep helping on the ship that way, even if I’m away.” He hesitated. “Oh, and if something happens to me, I think I can just… come back? I won’t have any memories of what happened after the backup, though.”
Sonya stared at him for several moments before bursting into laughter. “I think I’ve created a monster.”
He threw his head back and laughed. “Yeah, maybe!” he said. “But what Supervillain is complete without their monstrous mad scientist?”
He shoved his hands into his coat pockets. “Thanks, Sonya. With this, I feel like I can be of just as much help as the others.”
She tilted her head. “Were you really worried about that?”
He snorted. “Hardly. None of them know the first thing about how their gear works,” he said with a wave of his hand. She crossed her arms and gave him an impatient look. He cringed and met her eyes sheepishly. “Okay, maybe a little.”
“If I didn’t trust you as much, even more than anyone else, do you think I’d be sending you to the Backrooms?” she asked.
Got me there, he thought and flushed a little. It was odd knowing the nanites were simulating his embarrassment. It was all he could do to change the subject. “Speaking of which,” he said quickly, “I need to do my rounds before leaving.”
She shook her head wryly. “Go on,” she said and waved towards the door. “I’ll get the portal ready.”
Amos was almost to the door when he stopped and looked back at her. He squared his shoulders and cleared his throat. “Hey, Supervillain Ishtar.”
“I won’t let you down.”