No Longer A Tool
"We did what the Path demanded of us."
Previously: Crowley and Astra confront the new world they created, almost waking up Homo conexus.
○ Opening Era: Spring, 2026, Brooklyn
Astra took Crowley’s still-shaking hand. She brought him across the street to a small public plaza.
“We need to learn about the new world. Starting with them.” She mentally nodded him toward a Whole Foods Market across the plaza.
“Them? Who’s them? Whole Foods?”
“The masked gang. They’re in there.” She gestured with her chin.
“And you know that how?”
“I can feel them.”
“You can feel them…”
Astra walked past a hotdog vendor. “High salience stimuli induce flashbulb memories. I can sense them around us.”
“You’re saying the gang left an impression on the people milling about here, and you can feel that.”
“Precisely.”
Crowley shook his head. “If your father could hear the way you speak––”
“I hope he’s dead.” An image of her father had flashed in her mind’s eye. He’d been staring down at her with that imperious stare, the stare of divine authority, and she’d been looking up at him after failing one of her cognitive flexibility exams. She’d had another “meltdown,” as she’d heard him telling her mom. Then her father had stared down at her and said, in the familiar way, You failed. It is required of you to do better, Astra. You understand the stakes we’re dealing with here? Have you comprehended the term “existential risks?” Well?
“I wonder if he killed himself,” Astra voiced, calmly.
“Dear…”
“You know…he was using you just as much as he was using me.”
Crowley squared his shoulders. “We were allies. And friends. And we did what the Path demanded of us.”
“Do you really think a man who would turn his own daughter into this would have anything resembling a friend? You were his tool.”
“And now I’m yours I suppose.”
“That’s right. So let’s get on with it.”
Hearing herself, Astra clamped her jaw shut. Then she clamped down on her mind. She found the entry repair damage to psyche from captivity in her mental priority queue and moved it toward the top after threat assessment and situational awareness.
Then she stared into space. “I’m not well.”
There was a pause.
“You don’t say.”
Ahead of them, a middle-aged woman ran out of Whole Foods. Her blue wide-brimmed hat tumbled off her head as she tripped near the exit. Someone else helped her up and then ran across the plaza with her. Several others followed, panicked looks painting their faces.
“I was right,” Astra said, beginning to walk closer. “The masked gang is in there.”
Crowley grabbed her arm. “I’m not sure meeting them is a good idea.”
Good, Crowley’s protective instinct was kicking in. That should distract him from the apparent failure of their mission. And her outburst. Meanwhile, Astra would gather intel on what new affordances were available to them in this remade world.
“No.”
A feeling shot up the bridge of Astra’s nose like a streak of crimson. “No?”
“Your mental conditioning is in disrepair, little dove. I can sense what you’re thinking, even as you try to cover it up. You’re as leaky as a faucet.”
“I––”
“It’s like reading a book! I really am a tool to you, aren’t I? I’m like an action figure that you can manipulate. You can move my arms and legs and brain around oh so easily, as if I’m fresh out of the package. ‘Crowley, the Neurologist. Now with a detachable conscience! Watch as he makes ethically questionable decisions at your command!’”
“Now is not the time.”
“Oh? When is the time then? Hm?”
She sucked in a sharp breath. “You can stay here.”
“No,” Crowley said for the second time, matter-of-factly.
Astra stood there, trying to calculate. Her mind was uncharacteristically foggy. She was exhaus––
“You’re exhausted, love,” Crowley said, reading her. “We both need to rest.”
She turned to him. “What of your––”
“Vow? Fuck my vow, actually. And you’re a brat. There, I said it. You’re still a little girl. That you were trained to become a messiah doesn’t change that. Makes it worse, actually. You’re stunted. And it’s my fault for enabling your savior complex instead of helping you grow up.”
Astra blinked as she felt a boiling under her chest. Something inside her was teetering, set to fall. “But your vow….” she said, as if to herself. The words felt distant. Her heart thundered in her ears as if she were underwater. She was dissociating, said some part of her, a part that was reserved for internal emergencies. She tried to remember…something. She tried–– She tried to remember–– What was it that was needed right now? She was dissociation. No she was dissociating. So…she needed…her protocol for un-dissociating. Yes, the protocol. It was: focus concentration on surprising external stimuli. These were types of stimuli that brought you back to reality.
There, good, over there: Across the plaza, there was a commotion. The masked gang was there, squeezing through the automatic doors and pouring out. There were many more of them than she’d seen before. Their masks were hodgepodge, shoddily made of different materials – plastic, cardboard, paper mache – depicting different animals and mythical entities – a pig, a genie, a yeti, a gorgon. They were hugging large packets of something, presumably stolen.
She walked closer to sense into them.
Crowley did not follow.
But turning would show weakness.
So she left him standing there, at the edge of the plaza. She sensed his presence rapidly growing smaller, as if he were walking in the opposite direction. Maybe he was. She would find him later. Somehow.
Astra filled her stomach with breath and walked on.
Next release: Astra meets the masked gang…and their pursuers.