THG: 2.3 Spit of Spite

Preface

I had lots of wings and wings make me happy so have a free chapter lol.

Spit of Spite 2.3

John Soprano

I ran out of the Rig like a bat out of hell, sprinting along the edge of Ig-Alima.

‘You could have handled that better,’ Shirou said.

‘Oh? Is there a magecraft that lets you find someone’s location from just a name? Maybe by the way they dress?’

‘Yes, actually. The enforcers of the Clock Tower have gotten very good at tracking down criminals and sealing designates.’

‘And how does that work?’

‘...’

‘Shirou, I’m trying to get my supply chain back up as efficiently as I can.’

‘Did you really have to invade the Rig though?’

‘I wouldn’t have if Dinah was elsewhere. I admit I probably should have worded my terms to Cauldron better, but I’m trying to fix this as soon as possible.’

‘Fine, whatever. What are you going to do with Bakuda?’

‘Depends.’

‘Hmm?’

‘I can’t remember when she starts putting bombs in people’s heads.’

‘She does what now???’

‘Yeah, she’s kinda fucked up. She takes the city hostage and plants bombs in both her own gang members and random civilians to coerce them to fight for her.’

‘And you haven’t gotten on top of this? John, what the hell!’

‘I thought Cauldron butterfied this shit away already!’ I cried.

‘She needs to go,’ he said simply. He was the son of Kiritsugu Emiya. There would be no Batman-esque morality here. ‘Is there a way to make her fix them?’

I shrugged at that. ‘We’d need to do it while she’s alive, but Amy can pull the bombs out. A good enough surgeon should be able to as well. If her heart stops, at least some of the bombs will blow.’

What followed was a rapidfire influx of memories from Shirou. He’d dealt with hostage situations before. Between the two of us, there was no question that he had more experience with scenarios like this. Some memories were of missions he’d undertaken while others were Noble Phantasms that might be of help.

‘We should be able to use Carnwennan to bypass her defenses,’ he suggested.

‘Maybe?’ I said unsurely. ‘Carnwennan isn’t exactly the highest grade Noble Phantasm. It’s good, but its main property is that it “clads me in shadows.” That works on human sight and cameras, but does it work on more advanced detection methods?’

‘I know it works on infrared if that’s what you mean. There was a mission in Tel Aviv a few years before all this. A dead apostle was trying to start a cult as a “living saint” or something and I had to work with the church’s executors.’

‘But it won’t help if I trip over something and set off a bomb, will it? I’m not really an infiltrator and a bank is very different from a tinker’s workshop.’

‘Right. If a tinker’s workshop is anything like a mage’s workshop, that makes sense. Avoid entry unless absolutely necessary. Bomb-tinker. What does that mean exactly?’

‘Lots of different bombs. Pyro, freeze, transmutation, time-stop, etc. Anything related to those bombs, she can also make. Tripwire traps, grenade launchers, or even perform hack job brain surgery. She’d be amazing if she wasn’t batshit insane.’

‘Well, fuck. Avalon could probably negate all of that but it still takes time.’

‘Time she’ll use to escape and take more people hostage. I could find her using Dinah again, but she’d probably keep me from approaching altogether by threatening to blow up a hospital or something.’

‘You… John, please tell me we have a way to save everyone.’

I thought about it. The best way to deal with a tinker was to take away all her toys. ‘Maybe… I’d like to try. Let’s see if this works.’

Bakuda’s lab was in a three-story apartment building in what was generally accepted to be ABB territory. It wasn’t a Chinatown, Brockton wasn’t a large enough city to have an officially designated district like that, but it was where many of the Asian community gathered anyway. It would have been a lively place, if it wasn’t so infested with the gang.

The building formed three sides of a square, leaving a park area dotted with outdoor grills and a central fountain. The grills were rusty and the fountain was dry; neither had been cleaned in years judging by the rust and gunk that had built up.

There were sixteen suites on each floor. At a glance, assuming there were roughly three people per suite, Shirou estimated that there were one hundred forty-four people. There could be more depending on if Bakuda moved more mooks to her lab but we doubted she let anyone leave.

There was no way to evacuate everyone without alerting Bakuda.

Worse, I didn’t doubt that at least some of the residents here had bombs in them. If they left, they’d endanger other people, becoming one more bargaining chip for the mad tinker. We ultimately decided that we’d rather have the bombs in one place rather than scattered to the four winds.

I didn’t hide. There was no point. I’d already decided not to invade her lab and trying to assassinate the guards would just make her even more paranoid. I landed in the middle of the courtyard and made a show of leaning against the fountain. I projected a pole with a white flag tied to it and made a show of waving it around. It was, after all, the universal symbol of parley.

‘I hope you know what you’re doing,’ Shirou said.

‘I hope so too. The Bakuda I know is arrogant beyond reason. She truly believes she’s a peerless genius who’s unappreciated by the world.’

‘I know the type. They like to gloat because they can’t gain the glory they think they deserve if they just wipe out their opponents. They want even their enemies to know just how great they are before they die. You want her talking.’

‘I just want to see where she is.’ In my other hand, I projected a plain, unadorned blade. It didn’t even have a wooden hilt, nor could its blade, less than three inches long, be used as any sort of weapon. Its oblong shape wouldn’t fly well either. It was a scalpel, a blade meant not to take lives, but to save.

I didn’t have to wait long. Bakuda was a black-haired woman of medium height and slim build. I knew nothing else of her appearance because she wore a large gas mask to obscure her face. She hefted a grenade launcher and was accompanied by Oni Lee.

Men and women began to file out. There were dozens of them, all wearing a flash of red or green in at least one article of clothing. Tellingly, many did not look like gangsters. There were middle-aged women, old men whose backs had begun to stoop, and people who looked like they should be in office buildings, not out on the streets. More than one wore bandages around their heads.

“Look who’s here. Kingmaker,” Bakuda said. Her voice was obscured by the gas mask. There was also some kind of voice modulator that rendered her voice flat and apathetic like a robot. “And you say you’re not a hero.”

I held out my scalpel. It danced between my fingers as if I’d wielded it all my life. The memories of the hero within, one of the few from the modern age who reached the Throne, echoed in my mind. “I’m no hero, but there’s an annoying ginger who’d never shut up if I didn’t step in now.”

“You expect me to believe that? That a pretty redhead batted her lashes and you’re so fucking henpecked that you came here by yourself? Do you want me to put you out of your misery? Is that it?”

“Oh, ew! You think-Nonono, sorry. Ginger’s a guy. And a colossal pain in my ass. More to the point, you forced my hand. Both our hands.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Shirou, he’s the storybook hero type, wouldn’t stop nagging me. He says I should off you for the good of the many, even if it triggers the dead man’s switch you’ve got somewhere. It’s the utilitarian response, you know. Even if dozens die because I off you, it’d be less harmful in the long run. And, to be fair, you did start putting bombs in people. You’re not exactly sending the message that you can be reasoned with here.”

“So what? You think I wanted things to go this way?” she snapped. “You think this is how I imagined my life going? Things would have been fine but Lung had to get fucking neutered like a dog by a child!”

“Right, well. I don’t like to fight, believe it or not. I just want to operate my restaurant and live a nice, quiet life. Shirou’s upset because of the bomb thing. I’m upset because the streets are closed and I can’t get my ingredients delivered.” I flipped the scalpel in hand. “So can you please let me pull the bombs out of people? And maybe tone down the wanton collateral?”

“Why the hell would I do that?” she scoffed. “I have all the cards.”

“For a start, you’re less likely to get a kill order from the PRT,” I said reasonably. “You’re a great tinker, but I doubt even you want them calling Legend over to do a flyby.”

“You think the PRT is going to stop me? You think they’ll eat those casualties? Dream on, Kingmaker.”

“John. Seriously, it’s John. Do you see a mask? Okay, fine, so the PRT aren’t effective deterrents. How about me? You won’t be making an enemy of me. That’s gotta count for something, right?”

“You-”

“I’m not saying you need to stop being a villain,” I said softly. “I’m not even saying you need to leave the city. All I want is for you to operate within the bounds of basic human decency. Follow the laws of war, you know? No targeting civilians, no random destruction, that sort of thing. That’s not too much to ask for.”

“What do you know? You think I give a fuck about any of that?” she yelled. She was starting to sound unhinged even through the voice modulator. “I’ll show them why no one fucks with Bakuda!”

I looked at her and felt nothing but pity. I would have walked away had Bakuda agreed to step down. It would have pissed Shirou off, but I didn’t care about arresting villains. So long as the worst didn’t come to pass, I didn’t have a problem with a “live and let live” mentality. But as she was now, I didn’t think anyone could talk her down.

“So you’re going to keep doing what you’re doing? Even if I tell you that the giant EMP you’re trying to build won’t work?”

“How the hell-”

“I’m a thinker too. Deal with it. So? What if I told you that you could redeem yourself? That you could be great without being labeled insane? What if I told you that you could be a hero?” And she could. She could replicate Clockblocker’s power. How much time could she buy Earth-Bet if she tackled S-class threats?

She laughed. “You think you can sweet-talk me? You’re going to die here, Kingmaker. Then everyone will know who Bakuda is.”

“So be it then.” I cast the white flag aside. It clattered to the ground and vanished into motes of blue light. The time for parley had passed.

The scalpel in my hand began to glow. Its owner was the Angel of the Battlefield, that legendary nurse whose very name defined the profession. Though it was no sword art like the Tsubame Gaeshi, the memory of a lifetime spent saving lives, the obsessive need to rescue others, shone in the depths of my soul like a blazing beacon. It resonated deeply with Shirou’s own convictions until it burst outward, altering the very world around us.

I was done. There was nothing else to say to her. When I next spoke, I turned to the people. My eyes found an old man, far past his prime. He held a gun in trembling hands and bore bandages stained red. The gun in rhis hand told the tale of a man who accepted the bomb, one per family, so his daughter wouldn’t have to.

It was to men like him I spoke. “I will cure you, even if it kills you. I will purge all that is toxic, all that is harmful! For as long as I have this power, I shall see everyone to their welfare. Nightingale Pledge!”

I slashed the scalpel down, leaving an arc of blue that expanded outward. A surge of blue light surrounded me like a corona, though nowhere near as bright as when I’d summoned Ig-Alima.

Florence Nightingale was a spectacular woman, a hero so dedicated to the art of saving lives that her conviction qualified her for the Berserker class. She was a woman who abandoned everything for the sake of others, running into gunfire to reach even one more person. She was no god, nor was her scalpel a divine construct, but a woman who earned the title of an angel.

I was playing spiritual hopscotch here. I used my familiarity with Noble Phantasms Shirou had not seen, coupled with his ability to access the histories of objects, to imitate the spirit of a Heroic Spirit neither of us had met in life. It was no different than what I'd done with Laevatein or the weapons of the Round Table.

And yet, in this moment, as Nightingale’s obsession swept over me and took on the tangible form of an angel, I felt as though I’d become a different person altogether. Above me, an illusion of her took shape in phantasmal blue. She swung her sword down and cleaved the world around her, altering the laws of the world, if only for a short while.

Her dreams became my dreams. Her ideals, my ideals. For this one instance, I was Florence Nightingale.

“Fuck, kill him!” I heard Bakuda shout. She hurried to bring her grenade launcher around.

Several took aim to fire on the column of blue prana that surrounded me. Oni Lee teleported in front of me, dagger pulled back to strike me down.

And then the Nightingale’s Pledge took effect. It wasn’t a technique, not really. It was her obsession made manifest, the compulsive, all-consuming need to save lives taken to such extremes that reality itself had no choice but to acquiesce to her obsession.

In Worm-terms, it was a shaker effect, a zone of forced, absolute tranquility in which the law of war, “hospitals are a refuge from violence,” must be obeyed. Though Nightingale was not a powerful Servant, her Noble Phantasm worked on a conceptual level, to the extent that even other Servants were not immune.

She could stop the likes of Cu Culain from saying Gae Bolg’s name.

What were mundane weapons in comparison? Guns would not fire. Knives fell out of people’s hands. Bullets and bombs refused to undergo any chemical reaction. No fuse could be lit. No weapon could be drawn. Violence was forbidden in the hospital.

“W-What?” Bakuda stumbled back as if physically struck. I could imagine her power going haywire, trying to understand a concept that wasn’t at all physical in nature. “What did you do?”

“I made a pledge,” I replied simply. “You’ve heard of it, right? The Nightingale’s Pledge? The promise to save lives, even if it means running into a hail of bullets?”

“That’s impossible.”

“I said my weapons were crystalized legends. Did you think I meant only the great heroes of fantasy and myth? Who in the modern age deserves to be immortalized if not the Angel of the Battlefield?”

“S-So what? If you kill me, everyone dies. You hear me? Do you have any idea how many bombs I’ve left around the city?”

I started to walk towards her. “Kill you? I’m considering it, but you’re right. I just promised to save everyone, didn’t I? So I suppose you can have your stay of execution for the moment.”

“Don’t come near me! Take another step and I’m going to kill one of them here!” she yelled. She was starting to panic now. No doubt, nothing she did worked. No one I recognized as a foe could act violently here so long as my Pledge was active. My only worry was that if I killed her now, her stopped heart would eventually trigger the bombs around the city once I withdrew the Noble Phantasm.

I supposed I could keep this field up in perpetuity with the Heaven’s Feel’s infinite prana, but that was no way to live. Nightingale’s obsession was more mentally taxing than I expected.

I took another step. And then another. “Go ahead. Cross your toes. Yes, I know you have a targeting system in your goggles and activate your bombs via toe rings. Clever, really.”

“H-How-”

“Because I’m bullshit. And magic. I keep telling people that. Why won’t anyone believe me?”

“Shut up! Why won’t it work?”

“Again.” I blurred forward. I reached out and yanked her gas mask off. Bakuda gazed up at me with wide, blue eyes. She was unremarkable, fairly pretty but in a forgettable sort of way. Without the mask, the mystique and dread inspired by a supervillain was absent.

Funnily enough, the Pledge didn’t keep Nightingale from enacting violence onto others; it was an absurd, unfair Noble Phantasm that restricted only her enemies. It was the kind of Noble Phantasm that allowed a frankly mediocre Servant to participate in a war against the Demon God’s Pillar.

With each word, I slapped her across the cheek, not hard, more to sting than to actually hurt her.

“Because.” *Slap* “I’m.” *Slap* “Bullshit.” *Slap*

The sound of my hand meeting her cheeks rang out through the silence of the apartment courtyard. When I let go, she slumped to her knees with tears streaming down her eyes. I almost felt bad; pops had been the traditional, “never hit a woman” types so common in Texas. Then again, I assumed he’d forgive me for this one.

Taking a few black keys, I began to throw them like daggers. First to Oni Lee, before he could get it into his broken head to escape, and then to any of the gang members who looked like they might try something.

Looking around, I met the eyes of the terrified people. I flipped Nightingale’s scalpel like a pencil. “Well? What are you lot standing around for? Get in line. I’ve got surgery to do.”

X

Minutes later, the PRT had swarmed the apartment. Bakuda, barefoot now, was frog-marched into the back of a van while EMTs tried to sort out who did and did not have bombs. A few were insistent that I stop making my patients better so I pinned them by their shadows as well.

I remained on-site, primarily to keep the Nightingale’s Pledge active. Without it, we might be back at square one. In front of me was a white bed I’d conjured out of wishcraft. With it came all that Nightingale herself had used during her time in Crimea.

I sterilized a boy’s head and shooed him away. “Next.”

“You!” I heard before another person could take their place on my operating bed. Glory Girl swooped down, Panacea in her arms. “You’re a surgeon now?”

“I’m magic. I’m whatever the hell I want to be,” I snorted.

Amy stomped over to me and jabbed a finger in my chest. “Do you have any idea how dangerous operating on people’s heads is?”

“I do. Check over my work until you’re satisfied. Actually, if you could speed up healing the cuts, that’d be great. You don’t like getting near brains, right?”

“You’re not qualified for this!”

“Neither are you. Powers are bullshit. Go. There are people to save,” I growled, lacing prana into my words.

It was unnerving how much a Berserker’s mental pollution could influence me. I was still myself, but the compulsion to save lives was an ever-present need, much like hunger or thirst.

I’d be happy to be rid of it.

‘You’re doing a good thing,’ Shirou said. ‘You need to take all the bombs out before you negate the Pledge.’

‘I know, Shirou. That doesn’t mean I’m happy.’

In the end, Amy insisted on checking over every single person.

“Does she not trust me? It’s just a simple procedure,” I huffed.

“A-Are you pouting?” Vista asked disbelievingly. She’d come with Miss Militia and Velocity but had nothing to do.

“Shut up. I don’t pout. It’s not like I saved their asses or anything.”

“And we’re very grateful, but you’re not a qualified surgeon.”

“I’m better than any normal person could ever hope to be. And what about you? Shouldn’t you be practicing your sword forms or something?”

“I could, but the PRT bigshots decided that since I’m going to go off on my own anyway, I may as well be your liaison.”

“Joy…”

“Hey, Mr. Soprano?”

“Yeah, midget?”

“C-Can you… That is…”

“What? Don’t get all shy on me now.”

“Can you train me?”

“Train you?”

“You know how to use Caliburn better than anyone.”

I shook my head. Better than Artoria? Hah! No way in hell. She may have considered herself unworthy, Caliburn itself may have turned from her in the end, but that was a woman I considered all but perfect. “No, not better than anyone. Its original wielder for one.”

“Well, King Arthur’s not here now. And since we’ll be seeing each other more often…”

“Nope. I’m busy running my restaurant.”

“Oh, come on!”

“Seriously, the main reason I got involved was because Bakuda’s nonsense closed down the streets and made my delivery driver late, remember?” I asked her.

“FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU SO MUCH! THAT’S WHY YOU CAME HERE?” we heard Bakuda howl from the back of a van.

We chose to ignore the outburst.

“You’ll be paid as a consultant?” Vista tried. I dropped a lump of gold on the ground, heavy enough that it cracked the sidewalk. “W-Well…”

‘You know, it’s not a bad idea,’ Shirou said. ‘I won’t lie, the thought of training a mini-Saber does appeal to me.’

‘You just want vengeance for all the times she clubbed you over the head with a wooden sword.’

‘Training. It’s called training, John.’

‘I don’t know anything about kendo.’

‘You can know as much or as little as you want.’

‘I’m busy.’

‘So hire her on as a part-timer. Who’s going to say no?’

I let out a mock gasp. ‘Really? The Wrought Iron Hero flaunting child employment laws? What kind of hero are you?’

‘The kind who wants her to represent Artoria’s legacy well,’ he said flatly. ‘The Wards have some kind of trust fund, right? That’s what you told me. So clearly employment laws are flexible for parahumans.’

‘Fine, I’ll think about it.’ Outwardly, I held out a hand. “You work for me now.”

“What?”

“You’re going to be my waitress, cashier, and dishwasher, and anything else I damn well please. And, if you do a good job, I might teach you a few tricks.”

“That’s not fair!”

“It’s totally fair. My time is valuable and my restaurant means a lot to me. I’d be long gone here if the crazy bitch didn’t put bombs in people’s heads.”

“But I’m a hero,” she whined.

“And now, you shall be Vista, King of Brockton Bay and Scourge of Food Stains.”

“I hate you.”

“Then I guess you can learn on your own.”

“B-But… Ugh, fine,” she growled. It was like I asked her for her firstborn child. “You better teach me!”

“Sure, why not. An hour of work for an hour of lessons. Fair?”

“This is so lame…”

“Even King Arthur cleaned stables. Hard work builds character.”

“You sound like my dad,” she grumbled.

“No, I don’t. Your dad is a piece of shit human being who’s only alive because killing him would inconvenience me.”

“I hate thinkers.”

“Spoken like a true blonde.”

“Oh, shut up.”

Author’s Note

The Nightingale’s Pledge isn’t just a Noble Phantasm. It’s one that is so intrinsically tied to her mental state that separating the two isn’t really possible. John feels that pressure. Funnily enough, Shirou enjoys this version of John.

Random crane fact because Cloud Retainer memes and Genshin pity: Cranes can fly extremely high, up to 26,000 feet and over the Himalayas during their migration. For scale, the average passenger plane flies at 33,000 feet.