World Tree MUSH

    Meridian, one of the greatest cities of the region. Atop a plateau, with a giant spire looming above, it is an impressive sight from a distance! But the Adept wasn't taken to the sprawling city above, but the outlying villages instead. Aloy had someone who owed her a favor, with a nice little farming manor near the city, and that was where he'd been taken. Close to a healer, but far from the people of the city, where the powers couldn't damage any stray passerby.

    It was a quaint little spot, and the only people present were two workers, off in the fields. The actual house was empty but for Aloy, the adept, and Yahiko visiting. Aloy was getting water from the well, herself... or supposed to be. She was apparently fiddling with the crank, probably making an improvement. The manor does have walls, but they aren't that difficult to just leap over with a little help, only about 10 feet high.

    As for Yahiko, the young boy is trying to find his way to Tokyo of his own time, and this is even FARTHER away from that. Helping out someone does make for a detour. "He's sleeping," comes Yahiko's voice as he shuts the door, heading out of the house to join Aloy. It's one of those rare moments where he is relaxed... and weaponless. Surely his sword is very close by, but for the moment he looks casual...

    Well, as casual as a kimono-wearing samurai boy from the turn of the century can look in this society.

     It's a shame. 

     Were Copen not who he was - had his life taken a different path, a peaceful, happy path - he would have found in this place a deep and abiding love. The advanced machinery has picked up a life of its own, a fascinating life, a life in emulation of the biological. It's almost soothing, almost pleasant, in a way, even as he is - if only for the knowledge that Man's works can become like God in ways that Adepts cannot even dream of. 

     That people can endure. 

     But that's not the man he is today. The man he is today is a thing of necessity, a beast born for one purpose. The man he is today has no time to stop and appreciate the great metal rexes, the flying bird-mecha, the panthers and horses and all the myriad mechanical life of the plains. The man he is today is on a mission. 

     It doesn't take him long to find the place. It's not all that hard to track radiation. Even in a place full of living machines, it's not hard to narrow down the places they would take the Adept. Somewhere civilized, with access to medical care. Somewhere away from the most civilians, where Copen couldn't cause any harm if he was so inclined. Once he had the village, tracking the radiation was child's play. 

     Copen does stop for a moment to admire the manor, as he takes in potential tactical angles. It's a nice place. Ten-foot-high walls. Primitive, but pleasant. The air was different, too; cleaner, somehow, despite all the machine-beasts. 

     He liked it here. He could disappear here, if he ever needed to. Hacking the machines probably wouldn't be terribly difficult, either. That would put Sumeragi in a bind. A virus, spreading through the herds to target Sumeragi, maybe some means to hijack the sensors or start spreading Adept-hunting upgrades- 

     Copen reaches up and rubs his eyes. There's bags under them again. He doesn't have to look in a mirror to know. No coffee makes Copen unfocused. A quick compartment pops open, just a little emergency store, a little packet of instant coffee. He rips it open and downs it dry, the dust tickling his throat. 

     It would do. 

     Then he goes over the wall. Indeed, as Aloy surmised, it wasn't even difficult - a brief charge to his boots and he's on it, and then he's down, quiet as can be. He walks over to the manor proper at an unhurried pace. She was outside getting water. The Adept was probably unguarded. 

     Copen literally walks in the front door. 

     And stops, freeze-frame, when he sees Yahiko. 

     His face is, in fact, a mess of emotions other than raw, seething hatred. There's frustration across his brows. There's irritation in the twitch of his cheek. But likely the most striking emotion of them all is the look in his eyes. 

     Regret. Shame. 

     But he rallies remarkably quick. Voder leaps to his hand as if by magic, magnetic clamps in his glove designed and tuned to Voder specifically. He raises the gun at Yahiko, his eyes hardening as determination returns. 

     "Give me the Adept. I don't have time to waste on you. If I can find you, Sumeragi can, too."

    Copen just walks in. Aloy looks up, about to answer Yahiko, when suddenly everything changes. She's not completely weaponless, but she doesn't have her full arsenal either... and Yahiko is at gunpoint anyway. Setting down the bucket, Aloy just walks toward the pair... slowly. Her hands up. If Copen had meant to kill them, he could have started shooting and gotten an advantage, so obviously he didn't want a fight. But he shot Yahiko, so she can't put it past him either.

    "Easy, we're just trying to help. You think the Sumeragi will come here?" There is actual concern in her voice, faint as it may be. Strange for a loner such as herself. "Meridian just fought a war, I don't think they want another one."

    Yahiko's stomach is still aching even after all the healing. He could probably fight, if he had his sword, but it would not be pleasant and he'd pay for it the next day... maybe even reopen some wounds. That would be bad, but pretty normal for Kenshin at least. Yahiko isn't Kenshin though.

    Finding himself staring into the gun, Yahiko holds very still. "If you want to talk, we talk easier without a gun pointed at us. I'm unarmed, you want to lower that somewhere else?"

    Whether Copen lowers it or not, Yahiko isn't one to just hand over the Adept. He's pretty stubborn in his own way! "What did he do wrong? We're just keeping him here for a little while until we can figure something out. Let it be our problem, now, if they come after us. Or are you going to shoot me again?"

     Copen flicks his eyes over at Aloy. He makes a motion with his hand, gesturing for her to get next to Yahiko. Easier to keep track of both of them. Easier to... 

     ...to what? To shoot them again? 

     Where will your God be then, Demon? 

     "You took something that belongs to them. Something they want. Of course they'll come here." Copen's eyes lock onto Aloy's for a brief instant. They're determined, but ...shaky. He clearly hasn't slept since the incident. He's been up...all this time, tracking them? Hunting them? Hunting that boy? Hunting that Adept. 

     "You're trying to help a monster." 

     Copen's lips twist into a hateful scowl. "You don't have any idea what you've brought to your world. What an Adept is. You think that's a human being in there. You think it's capable of humanity. Of course you do. Why wouldn't you? Its guise is extremely convincing." 

     Copen shakes his head. "Move. Show me to it. I'm going to exterminate it and take the body before Sumeragi arrives. That resurrection witch won't be able to restore it." 

     Copen doesn't lower the gun as Yahiko asks. When Yahiko asks what the Adept did wrong, Copen's eyes flick to him. "It's a monster. A devil in human skin. It was born with power and it is corrupted by power like every other. Whether you keep it or let it free, it will be a plague. It will-" 

     'Are you going to shoot me again?' 

     The words are a slap across Copen's face, and it shows. The composed, hateful visage cracks, and that wash of regret and shame and self-loathing fills his eyes for a brief moment. The gun wavers in his hand. 

     "No. I don't shoot humans. Only monsters. That was..." 

     Copen's voice hesitates for a moment. It cracks. 

     "An unfortunate necessity." 

     Then he lowers the gun and bows. It's only a split second, but it's very Japanese. "I'm sorry." 

     Then Copen is back up, and the gun is back pointed at them. "And I'm sorry. I can't let it be your problem. I don't know what Sumeragi will tell you. I don't know what Sumeragi will do to you to get that Adept. A brief glance at Aixgear told me his power was radioactive." 

     "Do you know what that means? Either of you?" Copen tilts his head to the side, looking at them both. It doesn't sound patronizing. It sounds curious.

    Aloy speaks up, "I know a little." She lifts her hand, making no comment as to Copen's obvious conflict... yet. She's waiting on that. "It wasn't something that we need to worry about much here, but from what little I've heard of before times, it was a dangerous energy that could burn or sicken animal life. People always thought it would be the end of the world. They were just wrong, I guess."

    That's probably as much as she knows, though. She does fight with a bow and spear, even if it's a REALLY nice bow and a spear that can hack robots.

    "You look like you haven't slept at all," she points out. "And you don't kill humans, but you want to kill that kid in there? Just because he was born wrong?"

    Plenty of emotions go through Yahiko's face now, but the boy stands firm... even if he's a little shaken by how Copen's fanaticism is at odds with some things. "I don't know what it means," Yahiko admits. "But he's hurt and anything he did was an accident. I think someone else should figure out what to do with him, and I don't think I like how desperate you are that you'd shoot me."

    Funny though, because the moment he says that he waves his hand. "It was a fight. I'm not going to hate you for shooting me, but I don't want you killing an innocent. This is Aloy's home, anyway. Who are you?"

     "It's fire. Invisible fire that brings with it a rotting plague." Copen looks at Aloy directly, and despite the lack of sleep there's an intensity in his eyes that burns brighter than the sun. "Even if you aren't touched by it directly, you can rot just from being near it. Just from being exposed to enough of it." 

     "Do you understand? You think it's a kid. It's a walking bomb. It's death on an unimaginable scale. It can dry the world around you, salt the earth you walk upon that nothing ever grows there again. It can blight your crops, your families, and your friends without you ever knowing. In the right hands it can save lives, burning out poisonous cells-" 

     Copen catches himself, and shakes his head. "Never mind. That's not important." 

     His hand slams against the entryway of the manor. It's enough force to crack the stone, though not enough to do much more - all the power's in his legs right now. "Listen to me!" The intensity in his eyes goes wild, almost unfocused, a raw mass of seething hate. "That is not a human being. It was not born wrong. It was born exactly as it is meant to be born. It is a curse. It is a plague. A poison. Its *kind* is poisonous. It's the nature of things." 

     Copen's fingers tremble around Voder. "Have you ever had power? Real power, power over life and death? The power to decide if a person lives or dies? The temptation to simply end the existence of another human being, another person? As simple as a dagger. As simple as a gun. As a bow." 

     His gauntleted free hand swings up past them. "Inside this place is a creature that will have that temptation every day of its life. It will, forever, have within its skull a voice that says /I could kill everyone in this room right now and no one would stop me/. It will, without meaning to, without wanting to, without thinking, have power over each and every life it walks past." 

     Copen's voice shakes. "An innocent. For how long? You look like a samurai. Aren't you? From the past. Probably from an era where men with swords killed each other for the pleasure of it. Have you ever killed a man?" His eyes lock onto Yahiko's, and they don't seem nearly so tired, now. The coffee's probably kicking in. "No, it doesn't matter. You talk like someone who doesn't carry the burden of another's life. Your sword was blunt, wasn't it? I noticed when you drew it. Injuries, blunt force trauma. Probably enough to kill without medical attention, but I'll wager not unless you wanted it to." 

     He shakes his head. He's waking up now. Aloy and Yahiko can see the alertness in his eyes. "Imagine if each and every samurai could not have their weapon taken away. Imagine if each and every samurai who ever killed a man, who has ever killed a man for any reason, no matter how justified, could never be separated from their weapon." 

     "Now imagine that those weapons can do anything. Can resurrect or destroy the dead. Can kill from afar with a touch. Can spread poison throughout the land, sickness on a scale unimaginable. Can ignite a home with a flick of a wrist." 

     Copen's fingers tighten around Voder. Yeah, he's awake now. He's aware. He's broken out of his rambling and gotten to the point. "That is an Adept. A creature that will one day take another's life into its own hands because it has the power to do so. It will come up with an excellent excuse, perhaps, or it will convince itself that it had no choice, or, in all too many cases, it will enjoy it. And then it will continue to do so, because..." 

     Copen's voice cracks. "Because once blood is on your hands you cannot go back to the way things were."

     Yahiko asks who he is. The young man shakes his head again, rallying. "I am the Demon of God. The Adept Slayer. I am the cure to the sickness called Adept, called wizard, called witch, called magician. To the sickness of the superhuman that would replace humankind, in its arrogance believing itself to above the justic of the LORD." 

     "I am Copen, and I will ask you once again. Will you step aside? I do not..." 

     He cuts himself off. It's clear what he was going to say, and a flash of self-loathing in his eyes tells the story. 

     'I do not want to hurt you, but I will if I must.' 

     And just the thought of it revolts him.

    "You have a strange morality," Aloy announces. "And you can control machines. I knew people like you. I fought against them... I STILL fight against them. People who are devoted to their god or gods... who worship some being and it tells them to hold human sacrifices, or to control the machines to destroy settlements. I'm not afraid of killing a human, I'm afraid of what humans can do."

    She's scowling, but her look softens a little. "You want to kill him because of the danger. What if we can find a way to take away this power? If you truly don't want to kill then can you give us that chance? A way to remove it? He might even want it taken away. Can you give us time?"

    He has the look of a fanatic, she knows. But this would be far better than fighting in the middle of her friend's house.

    "From a samurai family," Yahiko confirms... and realizes he didn't introduce himself. "Yahiko Myojin, now a student of Kamiya Kasshin style. I haven't killed anyone, no... and I don't want to start. The Revolution killed far too many already. I'm from the Meiji era." That, he's found, tends to give anyone from a similar world enough of an idea of when he's from to get the idea.

    Aloy's suggestion obviously shocks him, though. "Take it away?" It only halts him when she says that he'd probably want it taken away. "I... guess that would work. I don't really have any idea bout this stuff. What you've just said sounds really terrifying, but I also don't think I can let you just kill him while he's helpless. I don't think I can let you do that, even if I have to keep standing in front of you."

     "You think this is about sacrifice?" 

     Copen's about to snap at her, but he stops. No, in a way, it was, wasn't it? It was. But it wasn't human sacrifice. No, they'd have to be human for that. But still it was blood, blood offered up like Abraham and Isaac to the LORD. That almost made him laugh. Yes, she was right enough. She was right enough. 

     "If you're afraid of what men can do, you should have put a knife in that creature's throat immediately. All the evil of men given the power to exercise it however it likes, whenever it likes. There is no stopping it. There is no curing it." 

     Copen's eyes are unwavering now, and there's only the barest trace of his sleeplessnes in his voice. "You can't remove it. You can, at best, put it in a Glaive, a...a bottle. A container. A stopper. And the stopper doesn't prevent them from using it. On the contrary, the stopper makes it...more dangerous. Easier for Sumeragi to control them. Easier for them to pass as normal people. They're still connected to it, all the time. It's part of their blood, part of their self." 

     "It's more than a sickness of the body. It's a sickness of the soul. I could give you my data, give you my research, but nothing would convince you, and - I mean no insult to you - you would be incapable of understanding it anyway. But you saw, didn't you? You saw what I did when I..." 

     He glances at Yahiko, guilt across his face again, then back at Aloy. "...I know what it is. I've spent my life learning about it. At one point, I thought the way you did. That there was a way to turn them all back to humans. It would have made my life easier, to just rip their power out so they could never hurt anyone again. A mass scale. Some way to nullify them, some way to..." 

     "But it doesn't exist. It's the naive dreaming of someone who won't commit." Copen's voice hardens to a sharp and dangerous edge, and he takes a step forward. "Who thinks that half-measures and compromises are enough in the face of creatures who can throw fire from their hands and kill a city block if they feel like doing so." 

     "You would have to unmake them utterly and remake them in a new shape, with a new soul, with a new psychology, with a new...everything. You would be killing them regardless, and even then, I don't know that that would sever their connection to the power." 

     There's a deep frustration writ on Copen's features, and, again, a flash of deep and personal loathing as Yahiko introduces himself. As Yahiko says that he's never killed, and has no intention of starting. He did more than shoot an ordinary man. He shot a better man than he was. 

     "I know," Copen's voice is quiet, "I know you think that what you're doing is right. That what you're doing is...is protecting an innocent person, that you're..." 

     "I admire it." And his voice is honest. "I wish there were more people like you in the world. More good and honest people who would stand up for what they feel is right, even at cross purposes." 

     "But we don't have time. I told you. If I can track you, Sumeragi can, too. They'll have people watching every exit. They'll have already reported where you went, already assigned an agent to come here. They'll figure out how to track him. Then they'll come. They'll take his Septima, the power, and put it in a bottle, and let him do whatever he wants with all the backing and power and money he can have. He'll be told that he's better than a human being, that he's like a god. He'll not just have ultimate power, he'll be told that it's right to use it. He'll be a slave in a gilded cage. Maybe he'll hate it. Maybe he'll embrace it. But he won't be innocent."

     "Please." Copen lowers his gun. "Let me go through. This isn't your world's problem. This isn't something you can understand. You think this is blind hatred, but it isn't. It's hatred born from knowledge. It's hatred born from study. From psychological profiles. From analysis of cases. From copious notes pored over late into the night." 

     "They can't be cured. They aren't people. Let me take this weapon and give it a clean death and send it to its judgement." 

     "Please. If you are the good and honest people I desperately want you to be, then step aside, for all the people he will be forced to kill in the future, for all the people he will enjoy killing in the future, and for all the people he will kill without even meaning to in the future."

    Aloy frowns, "I don't think Yahiko wants to do that, and I am glad that people like him exist in these other worlds." She steps forward and puts a hand on his shoulder. "I'm not a nice person, I just want people to have a chance. I don't think we can let you through. You... the things you say, they're the same excuses that people have used to attack one another. The same things that started the war that destroyed everything and sent everyone back to this, instead of the wonders we had before."

    She gestures around. "And this isn't something I think I should allow on Avad's land anyway. You'll have to wait until I can talk to him anyway, or you'll be making an enemy of the entire Carja people." That's... actually a bluff. Aloy has Avad wrapped around her finger anyway.

     "They are not the same excuses!" Copen snaps. "I am not some blind, ignorant savage from your backwards little world hunting down members of another tribe!! I am not some deluded worshipper looking for a chance to spill some blood and justifying it to myself as God's will!" 

     "I have studied this for my entire life. I know Adepts. Inside and out. I know how they think. I know how they act. I know their psychology. I know, as much as it is possible to, how their powers work. If I could destroy the source of that power without a single death I would have done so years ago." 

     "But it isn't possible. Dreams don't come true. Happy endings don't exist. There's only the people who remain innocent, and the people who cover their hands with blood to protect the innocent." 

     "And you cannot actually stop me." Copen's eyes flash. "You can try to stop me, but I don't need to kill you. I don't need to injure you. I just need to get past you - and we both know that that's much less difficult than it sounds when I can shatter stone with my armor." 

     "The only reason I haven't done so yet is..." 

     His eyes flick to Yahiko. Then, they go back to Aloy. "Because I don't even want to risk hurting you when I don't believe I need to. But we *are* running out of time. I will not ask again. I have to kill it before Sumeragi arrives, or this will get exponentially worse for my world, and probably for yours, too."

    Yahiko hears all this, and he grimaces. But he has his principles, and rather than swaying him this just makes him scowl and stand his ground more firmly. His posture even says it, straightening up from the slightly defensive on to hold himself firmer, and the boy's glare is pretty angry, in fact.

    "If you respect our principles, then you'll understand that if I back down about this now, then they really aren't important to me," he says in a much more firm voice. "I can't let you through."

     "Then," Copen says as his armor blazes to life, red light spreading throughout his arms and legs, "I apologize once again." 

     "But I am going to go through you and kill that creature. And you are not going to be able to stop me."