Skinny Ape Part 1 (ft. Cornwind Evil)

Don't be sad for me
I'm a cartoon G
And my intent is to breathe in a new world
Don't be sad for me
- Gorillaz, Skinny Ape

~The Teapot, Now Semi Repaired And Located Near The Pearl, Earth ZF-001~

"I have a present for you, Kaydence," was how Dawn opened up the conversation.

It had been some time since Kaydence Roberts had agreed to work for Dawn Cosineau and leave the confines of Neo Manhattan. And quite a lot had happened in the interim between then and now. Among them was Dawn acquiring a flat for her new employee to live in on Earth, introducing her to the rest of her family and other employees, ensuring that she had her necessities - laptop, workbench and so on - and various other sundries.

Some of said sundries, however, required Kaydence to personally come to the Teapot to collect. And so, here she was, earbuds in and one hand flicking through social media already.

Kaydence, upon hearing Dawn's words, couldn't restrain a smirk. "C'mon, boss, you've done enough for me already. The flat, the rig, the workbench? Real preem stuff. No need to keep butterin' me up." Once more, the streetslang of Neo Manhattan leaked into her dialogue - old habits died hard, and Kaydence's linguistic quirks seemed determined to cling to life with the stubbornness of a limpet on shoreline rocks. And that was before you got to the livestreaming, the social media scrolling, the trashy music and the near-constant tinkering.

It was the latter that always made trips to the Teapot a little... difficult. Her technopathy was singing a full orchestra in her head - everything about Dawn's base was a symphony of calls, responses, packets and processes, rushing back and forth and layered over each other. It was like being caught in a swarm of particularly upbeat dragonflies. And the urge to just touch things, to fiddle and see how something ticked, or to try and make it tick that bit faster or louder... it was a childhood instinct that, much like everything else about Kaydence, refused to let go.

"Never been accused of that before," was the reply from Dawn, who was sitting in a chair opposite Kaydence at that moment. "Usually my, ah... employees have been a little less flattering with their comments about me. Though not always through any fault of my own."

"Yeah, I getcha." The youth's thumb casually reposted a hilarious meme without her eyes even glancing at her screen. "First casualty of any battle is the plan."

"Something you find out once you've worked long enough." Dawn turned back to her desk. "But that's something we need to discuss more. Specifically, the fact that a lot of the work I'll send you on... it can be very dangerous. Lethal dangerous, I might add. Dangerous on the level of 'I have a professional on standby, who is not only superpowered but also extensively trained, in case things go south'. That sort of dangerous."

A cackle from Kaydence. "Have a little faith, boss! You miss the part where I took a punch from Mallus and lived?"

"That, as we have established, was mostly down to your powers." Dawn was typing away at her desk as she spoke. "You were fortunate enough to have absorbed enough power, and that you were quick enough, to raise a protective barrier to dull the impact of Mallus' attack. Not to mention your subsequent impact with the street below. You might not always have that luxury. Especially in a sudden moment of crisis."

"Never underestimate a girl with an entire library of martial arts BD's on her shelf!" Kaydence struck a pose that might have been accurate to one of ten fighting styles in the known omniverse, if you squinted and let your sense of disbelief go out of focus. "A proper solo's never defenceless! I eat sudden moments of crisis and shit danger!"

That was another quirk of Kaydence's - the way the younger woman viewed their working relationship. In the mind of the technopath, it wasn't so much 'employer' and 'employee' as it was 'fixer' and 'solo'. Terms, she'd explained, that referred to a sort of well-connected problem solver-come-information broker and their network of paid agents-come-thugs. Except, as the android pointed out, fixers apparently didn't take the trouble to have their solos sign an official work contract, which implied some rather nasty things about the profession.

Not that it was a bad way to look at it. Just one that needed a few codas on the end.

"We can only find that out," said Dawn, referring to Kaydence's boast, "by trying. And this present I was talking about, I made specifically to ensure that, worst comes to worst, you can actually back that claim up."

She hit a button. A panel opened up, and something slid out on the end of a rack that extended outwards like a curious stick insect.

It took a moment, as well as turning off the awful eurodance track playing on her phone, for Kaydence to properly absorb what she was seeing. And when she did, her jaw dropped.

"Holy fuck," she breathed.

On first glance, the thing hanging up on the rack didn't immediately warrant such a comment. It resembled nothing fancier than a dark black jacket or trench coat, ankle length and made of a material that might have been leather. Yet it took an eye for detail as keen as Kaydence's to note that the leather... wasn't leather. Leather wasn't covered in minute, smooth hexagons that interlaced like the scales of some ancient reptile, nor did it shimmer in a vaguely metallic fashion. It also looked to be oddly padded in places - the shoulders, arms and chest especially.

Kaydence looked over at Dawn. For the first time since she'd seen her, the android was... well, smiling wasn't quite right. A satisfied smirk of a job well done was perhaps more appropriate to describe the expression on her face.

"I'm not going to go into detail about how this thing works," said Dawn. "All you need to know is that it's a lot tougher than what you're wearing right now. Try it on for size, at least."

She'd barely finished speaking when the bright yellow jacket, which fit in nicely with the eye-searing "CYMK" theme Kaydence carried like a neon sign, hit the floor. A mere few seconds after that, the technopath had yanked the new jacket from the hanger and thrown it over herself. The tails of it swished through the air in a manner that, had it been filmed at the right angle, would made for a dramatic moment in cinema. As there wasn't, and only Dawn was present to witness it, it just made Kaydence look like she was trying too hard to impress.

She definitely seemed to be impressed with herself, however. A mirror had unfolded alongside the clothes rack, and the young hacker took the time to admire herself in it, turning this way and that to get the full effect of what she was wearing. She couldn't help bot notice that the chest padding seemed especially prominent - although part of her wondered if that was just her natural endowments at work.

"Nice," she announced at last, smirking. "Pretty nova stuff, boss. Now I feel like a proper punk!"

"Wherever or not it passes your rigorous fashion standards isn't really the point," was her employer's reply. "I designed this thing specifically to provide you with a modicum of extra protection against things your abilities wouldn't cover. The material is meant to dull the impact of whatever hits you and spread it over the surface, minimizing the damage. The last thing I want is for you to come home riddled with bullets or broken bones because you got it into your head to practice your half-learned movie martial arts at the wrong moment."

Kaydence gave another cackle. "Boss, all you're doin' right now is threatenin' me with a good time. Any job you give me's better than bein' cooped up in your own conapt with an ankle monitor on." She turned to face her employer, and her coat swished in just the right way to match the level of badass she'd reached in her own head.

"And speaking of jobs... when do I get to work?"

Dawn seemingly permitted herself another rare smirk.

"Right now, if you're ready."

"Bitch, when am I not?"

"I didn't know you were, until you just said. But, as you're new, let's start simple, shall we?"

Two Months Before

If I say that my somewhat extravagant imagination yielded simultaneous pictures of an octopus, a dragon, and a human caricature, I shall not be unfaithful to the spirit of the thing.
- HP Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu Part I. "The Horror in Clay"

Somewhere off the coast of Whalestrand
March 1st, 2023

It was not yet Kobber season. Not by two months yet. But even so, Whalestrand was making preparations already. Long-term hotel stays were being prepared for, local tourist traps were gearing up. Even local law enforcement and military bases were gearing up, ready to assist and/or detain when it came to the more destructive habits of the transient superheroes. Almost everyone in the city was on high alert, waiting for the excitement that came with the Kobbers.

So the crew of the research ship søhest weren't too surprised when a Kobber appeared before them and made a request. After all, they'd been expecting something like this. Plenty of science-minded Kobbers would have wanted to take a look at the ocean surrounding their temporary new home, just in case it was hiding some nasty secrets. Money was no object - they'd been promised handsome compensation for their trouble. And, in any case, it was their job to do whatever it was

What did give them a moment's pause, however, was where the Kobber wanted to go.

They'd asked if he was correct, and he insisted. One of them - only one - objected, although not very strongly. Dark things were said to have on that stretch of water, he said. No fishermen cast their nets there, no sailboats crossed it. No divers ever went near it, and those who did swore off the place the moment they came back. If they ever came back - two people had vanished and one had washed up on the beach two days later, mutilated in a manner like nothing the coroner could describe. It was, in summary, bad luck to go near that place.

But as it wasn't a very strong objection, and since they were scientists who had been paid a healthy sum, they saw no real reason to refuse. So, in a week's time, the Søhest sailed out one grey, foggy March morning, with the sun struggling to come through, towards the spot.

And when they went, the hestesko, or "horseshoe", came with them, as it always did. The modified triton submersible, only big enough for one, was a constant companion. It had helped in mapping out the shoreline, in charting the health of the reefs and in retrieving important specimens from the floor of the sea. But now it was going to go somewhere it had never been before - a sheer abyss, the drop of the continental shelf that formed a solid wall of rock facing out into the open ocean. It had never gone as far as this, nor really dived as deep as had been requested. And now was that time.

In moments, the Kobber had climbed inside the hestesko. The entrance lid was shut and screwed tightly, the instruments checked and the engine turned on. With a shout from the captain and a whirring of gears, the craft was hoisted out over the open water, then dropped into the rippling grey sea. And in a matter of moments, in a whirring of motors and a flurry of bubbles, it had begun its long descent into the depths.

But as the crew watched their monitors, glancing out occasionally across the iron, rippling ocean, they were desparetly trying to put something out of their minds. And that something was the reason why this place, far out from the shores of Whalestrand, was sometimes called helvedes mund.

Or, translated from the local tongue, "the mouth of hell".

Busted and Blue

I was asked by a computer, a shadow on the wall
An image made by Virgil to rule over us all
To amplify the sirens and to find real amends
I'm through the echo-chambers to other worlds away
- Gorillaz, Busted and Blue

It had been over a month since the incident at Burger Factory. And it had not ended well for Kaydence.

Crime was, by the very design of the city, difficult to do in Neo Manhattan. Oh, people tried all the time, but between the digital and physical surveillance, the AutoCops, financial incentives and citizens more than willing to snitch on each other, criminals tended to last as long in this city as spiders in a bath. The most criminal one could be here was in cybercrime - picksocketing, theft of data, creation of illegal braindances, virus-based vandalism. And even that carried the risk of having armed AutoCops kicking your door down at three in the morning.

But it happened enough that a legal system existed, even on this planet. One that, much to her own surprise, Kaydence had ended up being dragged through.

Valley of the Pagans

Welcome to the land of the permanent sun
Where the flowers are melted and the future is fun
- Gorillaz, The Valley of the Pagans

Our story begins not on Earth. It begins elsewhere. Very, very much elsewhere.

Many years ago, long before Zoofights Corporation took off to the stars, there were thise who had given up the Seanet~ravaged Earth as a bad job beyond saving. This meant that other corporations, rising out of the ashes, were all making the big space race, hoping to snag whatever pieces of galactic pie they could grab. And while there were many failures, there was one group that, in the background, was quietly - almost insidiously - succeeding. Formerly known as Osmond & Sharpe, it would eventually grow and gain influence over the planet Spero in almost the same way as ZF Corp influenced Earth, slowly assimilating almost every kind of service into itself as it swelled like a bullfrog on helium.

By the time of the completion of the planet's new captial city, Neo Manhattan, they'd undergone a rebrand. Partly because the "Sharpe" of the original name had left under mysterious circumstances, but primarily because, in the course of the city's development, they had become the sole provider of almost everything anyone could ask for. They hadn't allowed any competition - with no regulation, any potential rivals were snapped up like chicken nuggets in front of a shark. Food, technology, entertainment, living space... it was all under their thumb, though under many different brand names.

And thus did they become United Everything Services - or UES, for short. Founders and sponsors of Neo Manhattan. And it is in this city, ruled by one brand, that our story begins...

Six Months Before

Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope.
- Dr. Seuss

Inside his private mansion, on his Whalestrand estate, Cleveland Jeremiah Sharpe sat in his study and polished the dagger.

The newly-christened Sharpe Manor was not really his. It had sort of... fallen into his hands, like most things had. But it had been acquired long before the purchase of Aqualand had ever come to fruition, as sort of a safety net in case things went south in America. And while they hadn't per se, he had been started to be viewed through a lens of suspicion for a while. A lens he didn't particularly want on him for extended periods of time. In any case, it meant no more expensive and boring long-distance flights to inspect the parks progress.

In fact, the way that Sharpe was looked at in Whalestrand was refreshing. There was none of the inherent cynicism of America - it was all wide eyes and outlandish gossip. It was almost like he'd started afresh, with how many wild stories and flights of fancy buzzed in the press and on the street like inquisitive wasps. Was he a wilful dreamer, brought up from poverty in some far-flung farming state? The product of infidelity between a rich countess and some vagabond? A charming rogue from some other dimension, or perhaps another planet? Plenty of speculation, but very little detail.

That was good. Keep things vague and the punters filled in the details themselves. And when you let them do that, you had them in the palm of your hand.

The winter sun was low, so even the largest window permitted only a little light into the room. But what little that did come in still made the metal of the short, pointed blade gleam dully against the clinical white of the cleaning cloth Sharpe ran over it. 

The dagger was not the only unusual thing in his study. On the furthest wall, a large engraved mezzotint depicting some old-world country manor marred the pale surface like a black bruise. Rows of glass cases showed other curiosities - masks, bas-reliefs, statues, arrowheads, jars, a strange whistle. Locked in its own separate case with an iron padlock, a canine skull grinned without mirth from behind the reinforced glass. Something on the mahogany desk faintly glowed and span, the pinkish-purple light throwing weird highlights on the sharp, eagle-like face of its current owner.

It would be trite and inaccurate to say that Sharpe did not believe in the supernatural. In a world that persistently proved that the supernatural existed, such beliefs were the equivalent of putting a hessian sack over one's head to escape the sunlight. Far better to say, perhaps, that he had no romantic ideas about the supernatural. He saw them for what they were and attached no greater significance or fable to them. He put no stock in superstitions or flights of fancy - he stripped the phantom and the banshee and the alien bare and saw their bones, without finery or adornment. 

And that meant he saw their worth.

Ten Years Before

WARNING: Mentions of animal abuse and suicide. Reader descretion is advised.

Man, do not pride yourself on superiority to animals; they are without sin, and you, with your greatness, defile the earth by your appearance on it, and leave the traces of your foulness after you - alas, it is true of almost every one of us!
- Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov 

Berufjörður, Eastern Iceland
November, 2012

Julius Eriksen, captain of the fishing boat Hvidhal, was not sure about what he was going to do.

He knew what he was going to do, of course. He'd been paid a lot of money for it, by a man who spoke with a strange accent and had said a lot of big words. And he was nothing if not a man who knew his trade very well, and wanted badly to support his family through that trade. Three thousand US dollars was not something you sneezed at, not if you knew anything about exchange rates and cared about keeping your house.

But Julius was starting to have second thoughts, the intrusive little voices that, just as you find yourself set on doing something, pipe up and go "Here, can't we have another talk about this?"

It was a bad time to have them, too. He was on the deck of the Hvidhal, and they were waiting for word from the boats that had gone up ahead. The day was fine - no clouds, a pale blue sky, but still chilled by an icy sea wind blowing in from the west. A wind that pulled at the tangled mass of his hair and beard and threw the faint, salt spray of the waves over the side of his boat. His men were waiting all around him, as tense with anticipation as he was.

So the second thoughts were very unwelcome at the moment.

Seven Years Before

Evil begins when you begin to treat people as things.
- Terry Pratchett, I Shall Wear Midnight

For a long time, mankind has found amusement in the suffering of others. There's something about seeing somebody go through some sort of pain and knowing it isn't you that's darkly reassuring or entertaining. It appeals to the remnants of ape in the back of the head, the part of us that looked at what the leopard just did to their troopmate and think 'hey, that's one less male I have to fight to chat up Doris over there'.

When the average man does it to the average man, it's called schadenfreude, and people laugh about it. When governments do it to the average man, it's called tyranny and people tend to do something about it, or at least grumble. The Romans were smart enough to sell popcorn when they did, which made it entertainment and so it was okay, even though people were still getting killed horribly.

When humans do it to animals, its a lot more complicated. Some animals, like dogs and cats, were smart enough to realize that acting cute was an eternal meal ticket for them. Anything done to them was considered unthinkable. Others, like cows and pigs, weren't so quick on the uptake, and so nobody makes a fuss when entire herds go into the big shed and never come out again. 

And then there were those who were quick on the uptake, but they weren't dogs or cats, so it didn't matter. And the only people who cared were those in white coats, and okay, maybe they stroked you and fed you fish, but that was as far as that went. You didn't have fur or big honest eyes, so there was nothing preventing you from being shoved in a tank several times too small for you and made to do somersaults. When people did that to animals like that, it was called entertainment. The ideas the Romans left behind were a lot more tenacious than first thought.

Or perhaps not.

In 2016, The Orca Welfare and Safety Act was passed by the California Assembly. It meant one thing, and one thing only. No more animal shows. No more dragging these actually quite intelligent out of the ocean and making them do tricks. No more breeding animals just to keep it going. Someone, somewhere, had turned around to ancestral memory of the Roman, the man who sat and laughed while a spear went through a lion's throat, and said 'no, this is not okay, and honestly your nose is hideous'.

There were a lot of people upset about this. But one of them wasn't.