[center][img]https://live.staticflickr.com/97/240085515_2138c69204_b.jpg[/img][/center] When Brian Card built this office he had one overriding demand, that it have the best views in town. That’s why it was in the Stratosphere Tower, in a room left off all of the building plans, built in a manner that would make geometry scream. It was far too big to be hidden the way it was without hypertech compressing space, and he made it even trickier by demanding massive windows that still somehow remained unobservable outside despite giving him a perfect view. He only got it done in the first place by calling in a lot of favors from the Void Engineers, they were still grateful for helping him with the whole Groom Lake business over the decades. On another hidden floor was the nerve center of sensors, watching, probing, keeping Vegas safe, a frenzy of activity and spartan finishings crowded with personnel and electronic gear. This place was the opposite, spacious, grand, furnished with his personal favorite mix of mahogany, marble, gold accents, and fine leather furniture. The only difference between it and the gaming floors of so many of the casin’s he had shepherded into the world was the lighting, he liked to keep it dim to appreciate the skyline outside, rather than assault the senses. He got up from his position on his desk, appreciating the small miracles that they had cooked up like a wood finish that would never be smudged when he rest his fine Italian shoes on it, or how invisible forces shepherd his papers into the exact drawers after he had finished with them (Card was still skeptical of too much work on the computer). After checking his appearance in the mirror and confirming that age, wrinkles and weight gain still hadn’t diminished his million dollar smile, he walked down the hall to the conference room. [center][img]https://thelibrary.mgmresorts.com/transform/MlGDQpVNnWg56UDM/BEL156792700.tif[/img][/center] Card was several minutes late to the start, as always; that sent a message to anyone who thought the schedule was more important than the man himself. He timed it perfectly, having worked a little of his own tricks to walk in right as Bennett was going for his own power play of trying to convince the rest of the attendees to start without him, moves like that were for amateurs. The conversation died down quickly when he took his seat at one end of the table, flanked by an overabundance of empty seats around. As he looked at his Patek Phillipe on his wrist he said “Well, I know Gita said she couldn’t make it, but it looks everyone else is here except our guest. She should be here in a few minutes.” He looked at each of them individually, skipping over the cloned assistants standing in the back, those were the equivalent of office furnishings. Jack Bennett was seated closest to him, looking sour as usual, like he just wanted to be back at his desk working on more deals and financial models. No matter how perfect he could wear a suit and fill a seat, Bennett was never a people pleaser. On the other side was Janice Sulkowicz, with a perfectly content expression on her face. That was how she always was, ol’ dependable Janice, never one to make waves, never one to break the rules, and certainly never one to fail to look proper on a formal occasion. Further down the table was Ronaldo Tavarez, wearing a suit he clearly didn’t care about, poor fit, unsuitable color choice, but it was something he rarely had the occasion to wear. Card saw him twitching while in his seat, with anyone else this might make him worried, but that was how Tavarez was, the computers in his head were probably running more optimal combat simulations even now and they didn’t let him rest. If the meeting got to be too long, Tavarez could be on his way in any case. Lastly, at the furthest end of the table was the newest member of the amalgam, Braden Lang, only twenty two years old. He had a fine tailored suit and a carbon fiber Richard Mille on his wrist, but Card always had trouble getting over the kid’s broccoli perm haircut. Braden looked around the room casually with a mix of amazement and confusion, despite his attempts to clench his jaw and keep a stone expression on his face, Card knew the kid was still taking it all in. Amusingly, of all the things the kid was looking at, he hadn’t paid much attention to the Vermeer on the wall that was officially still classified as “missing”. After a little more awkward silence, all eyes naturally concentrated on the elevator, waiting for the guest of honor. A late guest of honor. Down below in the haze of Vegas sun, heat, and concrete that guest of honor stood near the western pedestrian entrance of the upper parking garage, closer to the entrance to the amusement park than to the casino, watching Ubers and Lyfts and delivers come and go, pale plums of thin smoke inking out across the air around the figure as they concentrated on nothing more than base level observation and bringing cigarette to lips, and back to off to the side of them. The last time Tessa was in Las Vegas, it wasn’t the weed capital of the United States. She watched two hotel workers pass a spliff between each other, their conversation kept to the volume of just between the two of them, not that it stopped her from eavesdropping on their tit-for-tat rants about their low-grade direct supervisors. Just the cathartic vents of the underemployed and underpaid, judging by their choice of smoke. The tourists were either smoking cigarettes or vapes, there didn’t seem to be much in-between. It was, like far too many things in their shared reality, a matter of means. When they caught her eyes, their gazes became pensive, defensive, and temporary, quickly moving from the woman in the corner behind the benches wearing white linen Armani; button-up sand silk blouse with sleeves pushed up to the elbow, top button unbuttoned out of comfort, not flirtation, her three inch heels close toed, gold buckled, and base a light wooden grain rather than the off-white cream of the rest of the show. There was no handbag, and there was little guessing where she’d even gotten the cigarette from as she flicked it out and watched it fuzz and fade from what constituted her immediate reality. It wasn’t fair to say she made the meeting reluctantly, it was just a matter of process and procedure. It was next on the schedule, even if she had a harder and harder time caring about such things the further, the longer, she dared to go on her journey. Eventually the end would come, and she knew the mirror at the end that awaited her. It was as discomforting as it was absolute to know exactly what the monster at the end of your road looked like. The way to the elevator wasn’t familiar, but it wasn’t unknown, either, a quick pace with one hand neatly, casually, folded into her pants pocket, the other tapping the rose gold metallic slender device with white frosted tip mid-length fingernail as she stepped into the elevator that went to the floor that wasn’t there if you wanted to continue existing as you currently did. Without authorization, anyway. The doors opened to the expected sight of the man, to which her lips gave dutiful upward tug towards, “Card,” Tessa found herself saying in a typical sing-song half-sigh as she closed the distance and regarded the surroundings and the other attendees with the interest of an art critic breezing through an upper east side gallery, wondering which she’d erase first, “what’s going on in Sin City?” At the end of the question, her head cocked just, barely, to the side, her subtle red glossed lips encroaching into smile territory like a slow burning fire threatening to skip a fire barricade and go full wildfire. She knew she needed to be here. Control made that clear, it was the details in-between that she didn’t know yet. Card said “A lot, Tess, a lot’s new. This city’s like on of ‘em deep ocean fishes, it just starts moving and it never ever stops, even when it wants to rest it’s still running. I still remember what you said about it last time, and I’ve been puttin’ some stuff for the highbrow crowd around. Look down the strip, got buildings by Pelli, Foster, Liebeskind, public art by Ai Weiwei, hell I’m even classin’ up Fremont Street. No more off brand Disneyland, it’s about class, vice, and making vice classy.” David got up to walk and talk, as liked to do. He didn’t feel like he could make the point as well without adding some motion to his delivery “Rest of the business is going well, I was worried for a bit when the big ‘ol VPs got that whole legal gambling thing through, but with Bennett here as my money man things are better than ever, and he even found a way to get some of that national money to flow back here. I know I rag on him cuz he doesn’t always take the classy approach, but he never fails to deliver results. Janice, well she’s got all of the normal government busybodies and newshounds on our side, can’t say much about that either; and whenever crazy stuff pops up Tavarez shuts up down real fast. Braden here, the kid’s new, but I’m sure he’ll be alright once he gets something to do, you know the RD activity has been kinda quiet, they’re all a little scared after we busted up their little club at the Luxor and neutralized that crew.” “I always keep my mind on the big picture, and right now I’m tryin’ bring some of that tech money to the outskirts, Graff’s the biggest whale out there and I know I’m close to getting him to open up his pocketbook, when he does the amount of cash he’ll drop on the area will make that time I got Mr. MSG from the big apple to drop a cool 2 billie on that big ‘ol eyeball look like a $2 off coupon for Applebees. Other stuff, well you know I got that eyesore Xanadu out there that just can’t quite get finished, and but the town is smooth, people bitch ‘bout homeless people or make up stuff about killers cuz they don’t remember how bad it was, like the days when the mob was running wild. Coulda always used your help of course, maybe some bad times wouldn’t have hit if you were here.” Card made a gesture and Janice pulled out a tablet that she handed to Tess. It contained the briefing on suspected reality deviant activity. As she handed it over, she shot Braden a nasty look, who only then realized that he was supposed to join her in reviewing it. David never stopped talking during this “Anyway, I know I gave my whole spiel about how it’s all so rosy, and I know you’re gonna ask for the files and rip me a new one over some unresolved threat that ain’t so bad, but before you do, I got one thing to show you. You’re about to see the finest work of art in the whole city, and I ain’t talking about this ‘ol Vermeer missing it’s home in Boston that you got me.” He tapped the desk and some of the wooden panels in the wall slide away to reveal a hidden compartment. The rest of the people around the table looked barely amused, like they had seen this trick before. In the compartment was a tank full of stasis fluid holding an inanimate human body inside it, one that looked like the spitting image of a younger David Card, perfectly healthy and vigorous. If one had known David in his younger days, they would realize it wasn’t a perfect replica, it had been cleaned up in ways the original lacked. A stronger jawline, a few extra inches of height, fuller hair, toned six pack abs, like a perfected version of his younger self. Card said. “Ain’t he perfect? Gita worked on him extra hard, I looked over every follicle myself, wanted him to be right if I’m gonna do the whole mind transfer thing, cuz we can’t all age as well as you, Tess. I’ve been doing the whole backstory thing for him, couple glamorous photo ops, some stints at elite schools, a party here or there, just enough to plant him but not overexpose him. I figure I’ll make the jump to the new body soon, just gotta put the ink on a really great deal and figure out how to give myself the most Vegas funeral you’ve ever seen. If I’m gonna start walking around with Junior on my name, I gotta send the original out on a high note” It felt to her like Card had delivered the punchline before he even told the joke, as inspiring to her as a Top 100 list. Her dark eyes took in the painting as relaxed as a cat regarding an old scratch post, flickering to the tank again, and then to the attendees once more. “Revisionist history, Card?” She asked, blinking back to the man, remembering the young Card. She hadn’t changed much. She wasn’t always certain why, at that, but when the mirror watched and waited as you forced a smile and waved goodbye to life as any regular soul might process it in the whirs and proton exchanges of the universe, you just kinda went with it. Not Card. “Do you think he does it for a joke? Maybe there are oaths involved?” The crack came at the detriment, or benefit, of the kid at the table. She could see the new-ness, and she could recall the file, several hours or several years, it was all about as equally bleak at that point in a Technocrat’s career. The kid probably even thought he had a real chance at being somebody. Whatever that meant. Her eyes went back to the offering of the tablet as she started to focus, her tone half-present, half-consumed by what she read, barely able to respond to his poke at if-only she’d been present more, “yeah, my fault, becoming Control’s boogeyman fills up a planner.” She could feel it. It was there. Where? She scrolled, white frost tipped fingernail going fast and faster, until she simply sighed, and set it on the table before her, and placed her rose gold ‘phone’ on it, her fingers tight on the phone as information hyperspaced from digitized bits to her brain, and through it, her reality-stretching intuition. It was Janice that Tess turned her eyes on next, intensity firing on quantum levels of brightness, the very hue of her following tone dangerous enough to make the inherent danger or who, and what, Tess was painfully abundant, as if there was no Card, just a senior investigator and an analyst who was about to be blinked, “Expand on recent deviant history. Focus on clustered activity.” Janice scowled, but internally she lit up. She spoke with a monotone, summoning precision and speed like someone that knew these words by heart. She said “If you will look at the filings, tracking deviancy is a tertiary responsibility of mine, as we have elected to follow structure 7E of the approved amalgams standards specified in the Precepts of Damian, code section 97865.234.2357.9mu, current revision. This structure was reaffirmed at our all-hands on January 8th, 2019, with unanimous signoff. 7E specifies that our termination division will hold primary responsibility for tracking deviancy, and as the lead of our administrative affairs division, my tertiary responsibility requires only that I log known deviants I encounter in my normal conduct, and you will find quite extensive descriptions of every known or suspected encounter I or someone beneath me in our org structure has determined to be suspicious, sparse as such encounters have been given my duties. Our structure splits the termination division among two branches, a syndicate specific branch and a non-syndicate action group, and specifies that both are to share the responsibility equally. Tavarez is the head of the action group, and the syndicate duties would lie with Card, but he has used his right to delegate to give them to Bennett, who has in turn used his to give them to Lang, with considerable vacancies in between. I apologize about the state of record keeping for their work, but as specified 97865.234.30097.9phi, if I were to work their records that would require executive level approval to avoid violating information integrity protocols. I wish to inform you that Tavarez has repeatedly invoked protocol 97865.111.3588.9xi, a formal request for modification of record keeping standards to maintain tactical readiness. He has not informed me as to whether the request has been granted. The syndicate branch has not filed such a request.” It came to her lips like blood, the metallic taste of it her first realization it was even there, “…nephandi?” Her eyes blinked, her feet took a half-step back as her heeled feet clicked on the polished floor of the conference room. The phone came off the tablet, her eyes might have been on Janice, but her gaze was barely still in the same spectrum of light as the rest of them, the very floor and walls of the room beginning to hum, like the deck and hull of some great ship vibrating from the power of its engine deep within and under foot. And then it stopped, and Tess found herself sighing. And wanting another cigarette. There wasn’t another note spoken to the assembly, just a quick heel turn and suddenly she was walking out, tossing an afterthought behind her at the group, “The kid is with me until further notice.” [i]We’re all going to fucking die in this city.[/i] [hider=Deviancy Report #32456, author Ronaldo Tavarez] Deviation: Gerta von Ohlhausen Affiliation: Order of Hermes Deviant Level: Priortiy One Case log: Fuckin german hermetic bitch shows up what the fuck we just 86’d the whole black pyramid what she want. bitch stop hiding in your house come fight me mfer what the fuck she turned that dude to liquid how tf she strong fuck you card let me fight her i swear the city will be fine you can clean it up fuck idk what now..why i have to make report anyway [/hider] [hider=Deviancy Report #32522, author Braden Lang] Deviation: Suspicious Deaths in sewers Affiliation: Unknown Deviant Level: Priority four Case Log: AUTOMATED REPORT Extreme psychological deviation led suspect to commit multiple homicides with no conceivable motive. Level of violence and suddenness consistent with nephandi standard operating procedure, indications of possible manipulation ---AUTOMATED FOLLOW UP, ACTION TAKEN---- NONE ---AUTOMATED FOLLOW UP, ACTION TAKEN---- NONE ---AUTOMATED FOLLOW UP, ACTION TAKEN---- NONE ---AUTOMATED FOLLOW UP, ACTION TAKEN---- do I have to write none here? will it stop? [/hider]