Dyna looked over the longest incident report she had ever written, skimming it to check for any major errors or falsehoods while also making sure that a handful of details weren’t accidentally present. Dyna had no intentions of revealing Beatrice’s unshackled nature to the larger Carroll Institute. Neither did she intend to let them know what Id was. There were a few other items of note to be left off but those were the major ones.

Removing the data drive from her terminal, Dyna stood, stretched, and stepped out of her room. Because of an uncertainty in the Carroll Institute’s security protocols following the revelations of Alpha’s abuse of the system, Dyna wasn’t to send this particular report over the mesh network. It was to be physically delivered to Theta as soon as she finished it.

Dyna made it five steps down the corridors of Psychodynamics before a woman in a green cardigan appeared in front of her. In less time than it took to blink, Dyna had her pistol out and its safety off. Even with as fast as Dyna drew her firearm, the woman was faster, disappearing and reappearing just to one side, hand already around Dyna’s wrist to control the gun.

Rather than fight the disarming maneuver, Dyna simply let go of her gun. “You really shouldn’t jump out in front of people like that, Emerald.”

“You really shouldn’t wander alone,” Emerald shot back. “Trying to slip past me already?”

“I really don’t think I need a bodyguard.”

“It isn’t about being a bodyguard. It’s about being a friend,” Emerald said with her usual smile. “Also it’s about complaining again. I can’t believe you ran off without me.”

Dyna rolled her eyes. Emerald was a tad bit upset about being left behind, both with regards to Tartarus and Arecibo. Even though Dyna had tried to explain that both decisions were fairly spur-of-the-moment while Emerald hadn’t been around, she wouldn’t accept that as an answer.

Eyes drifting to a string of bullet holes in the wood panels of the wall not far from the elevator doors, Dyna frowned and asked, “You saw plenty of action here, didn’t you?”

“It isn’t about the action. Besides, the tulpa who attacked weren’t even mildly a challenge for someone like me.”

Dyna just shook her head as she stepped into the elevator. “I promise I’ll take you on my next adventure,” she said as the elevator started moving without either of them doing anything.

Beatrice knew where she needed to go. It was a bit unsettling at times, knowing she was effectively being watched at all times. With all they had been through together, Dyna trusted that the AI had her best interests in mind. And that trust alone might even alter Beatrice to being more in-tune with Dyna. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to think about. While Dyna didn’t affect minds, she wasn’t sure to what extent she could affect code.

She tried not to think about it.

“I’m not sure that I’m supposed to know this but,” Emerald started, drawing out the word. “I might have heard from Sapphire that the administrators want you… benched. For lack of a better word.”

“Benched?”

“No more adventures.”

Dyna raised her eyebrows. “I honestly don’t know what that is supposed to change. It isn’t like they ordered me out to… any of the things I’ve gotten up to lately. Except maybe the Tartarus thing.” Pausing, Dyna thought back to Alpha’s final words with mild irritation. “Still, things are probably going to happen. I’m gong to handle it as they come.”

As long as her power did things out of her control, people were likely going to try hunting her down.

Emerald flashed her a smile. “And that is why I’m here. To join in on any unofficial adventures and hopefully stop them before they get too out of hand.”

“Alright,” Dyna said as the elevator dinged and the doors parted. “Maybe a bodyguard isn’t such a bad idea after all.”

“Of course not. It was my idea, after all.”

“It didn’t come from the administrators?”

“Well, I might have had a few words with some of them. They might think they came up with the idea on their own but we know the truth.” Emerald paused outside Theta’s door, leaning up against the secretary’s desk, much to his annoyance. “You aren’t leaving me behind again while you run off, storming the enemy’s stronghold.”

“I’ll try not to. No promises.”

The secretary cleared his throat a bit louder than strictly necessary. “Miss Onyx, Theta is waiting for you.”

Dyna paused at the door, glancing back to Emerald. “Not coming in, bodyguard?”

“I think I’d just be told to leave. Don’t worry, it’s just a room away,” she said, swinging her pocket watch around by the chain. “If something happens, I’m already there.”

With a shrug, Dyna stepped into Theta’s office. It took a moment to locate the lanky man. He wasn’t at his desk but rather stood off to one side, peering out the windows. As soon as the door hissed shut behind Dyna, he turned to face her with a fairly flat look on his face. Without a word, he stepped over to his desk and pressed a button.

The large windows that looked out onto the hall and the windows looking outside darkened, turning opaque. Standing so close to the door, Dyna was pretty sure they even started vibrating. Probably some kind of anti-eavesdropping measure.

“Here to deliver my report,” Dyna said, stepping further into the room.

“Good. Good,” Theta said, accepting the data drive as Dyna handed it over. He promptly took a seat at his terminal, pulled out a separate tablet, and plugged it in. After humming a moment to himself, he removed the drive and plugged it into his proper terminal.

And then he started reading.

Dyna stood aside, shifting awkwardly. Not once had she stood around while someone read her report. And this was a long report at that. “Sir,” Dyna said, about to ask if she could be dismissed and return later.

The corners of Theta’s eyes wrinkled as he looked up with a smile. “Something wrong?” he asked.

“I…” Dyna trailed off, pressing her lips together as more of Alpha’s words came back to her. She changed her question. “Did you lose anyone?”

“Lose… anyone?” he asked, angling his head to one side in a way that made his large ears look even larger than they actually were. “Ah. In the attack? I personally didn’t lose anyone. A few security guards around the Vault were unfortunately killed in the line of duty and Doctor Teeth got shot twelve times but is expected to survive after Hematite performed some emergency surgery after finding him. The—”

“I’m sorry to interrupt, Sir,” Dyna said. She had already read through Beatrice’s accounting of the attack. The mountain man was supposed to have been Alpha’s main resource here but with the mountain man being DT, the attack hadn’t gone as well as the former administrator had likely hoped for. “I actually meant if you lost anyone when I first… became aware of my powers? Roughly a little over a year ago.”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Alpha said she and the rest of the administrators lost their identities that day. Nobody in their lives was around when they returned home and they couldn’t find any evidence that they ever existed. Even Beatrice hasn’t been able to locate anyone likely to be Alpha’s lost family.”

Theta stared at Dyna, clasping his hands together with his elbows on his desk. His eyes flicked back and forth, looking from Dyna’s left eye to her right and back. “The incident that first occurred when we discovered you was quite volatile in nature. You recall the alterations you brought to reality during the test Walter performed before you acquired your artifact?”

“The room looked like it had been ripped out of a horror movie.”

“That occurred except on a larger scale. We had to quarantine an entire suburb, relocate everyone, and treat most residents for unhealthy exposure to a strong psionic source. You. To the best of my knowledge, nobody was killed or otherwise disappeared. I cannot speak for the other administrators—as a rule of thumb, we rarely speak of our personal lives—but while I do not see my husband or daughter all that often, I have spent time with them since that incident.”

“But…”

“Have you considered that Alpha was lying to you? Attempting to manipulate you into being an agent of her revenge against the rest of us?”

Dyna went still, pressing her lips together in a tight line. “It sounded genuine, Sir.”

“Well, I’m glad it didn’t work. Perhaps the presence of the Continuity Engine stalled your power or maybe you just subconsciously rejected her words. Either way,” he shrugged. “I wouldn’t let it bother you.”

“I… Have you spoken with them since this latest incident?”

“Indeed, I have,” Theta said, unclasping his hands to pull out his phone. “I could make a call right now if you would like to speak with them yourself.”

“I… No.” Dyna shook her head. “I’d rather not, if it is all the same to you. I wouldn’t want to accidentally do anything.”

“Of course. I understand.” Theta looked down at his phone for a long few moments, staring at the screen with a wistful expression on his face. It vibrated with an incoming text that made him smile.

Dyna just stood on the other side of his desk, feeling awkward. “Um…”

“Ah.” Theta glanced up as if he had forgotten she was there. “Was there something else you needed?”

“I don’t think so, Sir.”

“Very well. Thank you for bringing me your report. You may go,” he said, motioning his free hand toward the door.

Dyna didn’t wait around any longer. She beat a hasty retreat to the door but paused before stepping outside. Glancing back, she noted Theta in a frantic typing session on his phone rather than reading her report. Narrowing her eyes, she stepped outside and tried very hard not to think about anything that just happened.

“What’s with the sour look?” Emerald asked, shoving off the secretary’s desk.

“I… I think I need to talk to Id. Sooner rather than later. Like…” Dyna trailed off then glanced up to one of the five-lensed security cameras in the room. “How soon can I get a flight down to Texas?”

“You’re supposed to be benched,” Emerald said.

Dyna shook her head as her own phone buzzed.

ATTENTION: Onyx moved to ACTIVE DUTY.

ATTENTION: Priority Objectives Updated. Please review and acknowledge.

PRIORITY 1: Board flight 3801 at 1900 tonight.

PRIORITY 2: Make contact with Person of Interest: Id.

PRIORITY 3: Ensure safety of public from psionic incidents.

PRIORITY 4: Safeguard interests of CI.

END OF LINE

Dyna flashed her screen in Emerald’s direction, showing off her new ‘orders’. At the same time, Emerald’s phone buzzed. The other woman looked down at her screen with a frown that quickly shifted into a smile.

“At least you aren’t leaving me behind this time.”

“I doubt it is going to be much of an adventure. It shouldn’t be much of an adventure.” Dyna let out a small groan. “I hope it isn’t going to be much of an adventure.”

“Just in case it is…”

“Right.” Dyna hurried back to the elevator. “Psychodynamics, Vault, please,” she said as she entered.

“The Vault?” Emerald asked, slipping inside just as the doors closed.

“Kind of might have lost all my artifacts.”

“You think Cross is just going to hand them out?”

“Maybe he will.”

Emerald let out a hearty scoff but didn’t say anything else before the doors opened on the lower levels of Psychodynamics. On the way, Dyna was stopped three times to show off identification, two of which used some psionic scanning device to try to make sure that she wasn’t an impostor who merely appeared as Dyna Graves. Alpha’s attack on the facility made them a bit nervous. They did not want anyone to have unfettered access to the Vault.

“—utterly inane, puerile, irrational, and, worst of all, illogical.”

“Cross.”

“It might make sense if she had slipped inside undetected. She didn’t. Tulpa popped out of the noosphere and attacked. If it wasn’t for Phrenomorphics—”

“Cross.”

“All I want is to be left alone to work,” Doctor Cross said, gesticulating with each word. “How am I supposed to do my job when they show up every ten minutes asking for identification?”

Walter, one arm in a sling, pressed his other hand to his forehead. Although he still wore his black vest and button-up shirt, Walter no longer wore his sunglasses. Dyna had tried to return them. They ended up confiscated as they were displaying anomalous properties, likely as a result of being in Dyna’s possession for so long. She hadn’t noticed anything while wearing them but she had been far more focused on other matters at the time.

Opposite of Walter, Doctor Cross stood in front of a spherical metal chamber used to measure the type of psionic energy emitted by artifacts. Dozens of bright green lasers shined into the machine, at the center of which was the fuse-like artifact that Dyna had retrieved from Frankenstein.

She still didn’t know what it was, only that Frankenstein, in his human form, had been trying to retrieve it but, in his tulpa form, he had been afraid of it.

“Dyna,” Walter said, noticing her approach first. He looked absolutely relieved to see her, excited to have an excuse to avoid his conversation with Doctor Cross. “You should be resting. Let me escort—”

“Actually, I’ve got orders against resting at the moment.”

“Orders?” Walter asked, narrowing his oddly visible eyes.

“It seems as if Emerald and I are heading back down to Tartarus for a short time.”

“What.”

Dyna shrugged and glanced over to Doctor Cross. “Any luck with the fuse thing?”

Cross adjusted his rectangular glasses as he peered down at the terminal in front of him. “Not really, no. Quite the puzzle. I do wonder where Alpha got it. It doesn’t emit energy readings like normal artifacts yet we can tell that it does store psionic energy. To put it in layman’s terms,” he said as if physically pained by the notion, “it appears to be a psionic battery.”

“Why would tulpa be afraid of that?”

“Perhaps it is powered by tulpa,” Cross said. “Such comments are pure speculation at this point, however. Nevertheless, I will figure it out.” Glancing aside, he shot a glare at Walter. “If certain people would stop disturbing me every five minutes.”

“Well, I will certainly get out of your… hair…” Dyna trailed off then shook her head. “But with everything that has gone on, I’m a bit leery of traveling without any kind of artifact to use should the situation change for the worse. I don’t suppose you might be willing to authorize the release of four-one—”

Cross held up a hand, stalling her. “The Vault is locked down. Nothing in or out until we’ve ensured the security of everything. I’m just glad you brought this to me so that I have something to work on,” he said, motioning toward the machine and the fuse-battery-artifact.

Dyna pressed her lips together. She glanced up into the corner of the room, making eye contact with the red light of the security cameras. Shaking her head, Dyna looked away. Even though she could probably ask Beatrice to unlock the Vault, Dyna probably shouldn’t. Her ‘orders’ to go to Texas again were probably pushing things a little far as it was.

Especially with the way Walter was staring at her.

“Why haven’t you simply made your own artifacts?” Cross asked, adjusting his rectangular glasses.

Dyna winced. “I’d… rather not, honestly.” She took a deep breath, trying to keep her mind clear. “That’s fine. That’s fine. Emerald is up to the task, I’m sure.”

“Of protecting you?” Emerald said, grin on her face. “I don’t know, last time you said we got shot in some aborted timeline. Saved only through the power of rewinding our existence.”

“That’s true,” Dyna said with a frown. She rubbed her chin in thought. “Maybe I could try to make something—”

“It was a joke. A joke. Don’t worry, I’ll be more alert. And—” Emerald’s phone buzzed, interrupting her. She glanced down at it then smiled. “And it looks like Ruby is coming to help. She can take the sniper shots for us.”

“What.”

Dyna looked over to Walter and gave him her best apologetic smile. “Sorry, Sir. This is something I have to do.”

“You should be taking a break. Why are you going? Who authorized it?”

Dyna slowly shook her head. “I’ll be fine. I just need to… talk to Ado. Make sure Id is okay and… It’s a… family thing? I guess? Consider it a family emergency.”

“Who authorized this?”

Shrugging, Dyna held out her phone. “The orders don’t come with a signatory, sorry,” she said with a half-hearted apology. “But better that I’m authorized to do this than try to do it on my own, wouldn’t you say?”

Walter shot her a look. It was really strange to see his eyes. Unnerving in a way. Especially because this particular look said something along the lines of ‘that sounds like a threat.’ Instead of actually saying that, Walter said, “When will you be back?”

“I don’t know. However long it takes.”

“It?”

Dyna shrugged.

Walter tried to cross his arms only for the sling to get in the way. Shoulders slumping, he stared for a long moment before sighing. “I want a full report when you return.”

“Thank you, Sir. I’ll have it ready by the time I touch down back here.”

“Dismissed,” Walter said with a nod of his head.

“Great,” Dyna said. “To the airport then?”

“I’ll drive,” Emerald said.