A portal opened up and deposited Bruce and Itera on the rug in the middle of the room. Cleo mouthed an apology to them as Ida hopped off her chair and moved to stand in front of them.
"Thank you. Now let's start with your names."
Bruce was the first to answer, trying to keep himself collected.
"Bruce Garcia. I'm a medical student at the moment."
"Didn't ask what you do, but thanks for the enthusiasm. Darius, dig up whatever you can on him and send me a report. Now what about you?" She looked sharply at her other victim.
"Itera," she said shakily.
"Don't care. I want your real name."
Itera hesitated a moment before answering.
"Aubrey Bentley."
"Darius, I want those reports in the next two minutes." Ida glanced around the room, then sighed. "Where the hell did my tablet go?"
"I'll deliver the reports verbally. The man is Bruce Garcia, age 41. Married to a lawyer, Rebecca Garcia. She's 44 years old and they have three children. Quincy is 16, while Iliana is 13 and Opal is almost 11. He volunteers to use his Miracle at the hospital during his studies and they've already integrated him into their system. He treats injuries that would take a significant amount of time to heal, works with patients who can't afford a long medical stay, and uses his Miracle to improve general patient outlooks. The hospital files on him are almost all filled with glowing praise of his work."
"Any criminal history?"
"None. He was an upstanding citizen with a stable job. He married Rebecca in June of 2600 and after his children were born, chose to become a stay-at-home parent. By all accounts, he's dedicated most of his adult life to rearing the next generation."
"Great. What about the other one?"
"Aubrey Bentley, age 29. Was first arrested at age sixteen for shoplifting, then her record's clean until age twenty, when she was arrested again. At nineteen, she paid off a boyfriend's gambling debts at risk to herself, which ultimately led to that arrest at 20. She hasn't really been arrested since, but there's little doubt based on her records that she's involved in something shady."
"Trouble, eh?"
"Itera is a member of Paris' Phalanx, which - "
"I don't need you to tell me about the Phalanx shit. I know plenty about them." Ida walked forward and stood in front of Itera, only managing to tower over her because the woman was sitting down.
"You dig all that up that fast?" Itera asked with a hiss. "I thought that arrest when I was sixteen was supposed to have been sealed because I was under 18 and it was a relatively minor crime."
"There's ways to get into sealed records," Darius replied simply, smiling calmly.
"Even I couldn't have done it that fast," Ida said with a grin. "I might have to keep that sentient bot thing around a while longer. Man is he efficient."
"Why do you care about our histories anyway?" Itera demanded, glaring at her. She moved to stand up, but a look from Darius kept her on the floor.
"I need to know what kind of human I'm dealing with. That one doesn't seem like much trouble," Ida said, jutting her chin towards Bruce, "but you might be a problem child. A Miracle that can reverse time, if taken to its logical extreme, could be quite devastating to this little ship of ours."
"I'm not going to do anything to hurt anyone!" Itera protested. "Not anymore. We've changed tactics. I was running around with him up there because I was helping to heal people. And I fixed your sorry self too!"
"I would have recovered in a few months anyway," Ida said, brushing her words aside like they meant nothing. "As for your change of heart, prove it. How's this? I'll plant a device in your heart that will allow me to kill you instantly if you try anything funny."
"Oh, hell no!" Sawyer roared, standing up and glaring at her. "You don't get to play those life and death games anymore, Odin."
"I won't support you in this," Darius replied coldly. "I may have helped you with yours, but I'm wondering if that was a mistake born of my mistaken impression of Ida. I won't defy her again."
"You friggin' useless sycophant!" Sawyer clenched a fist, barely holding himself back from punching Darius for the comment.
"Down, boys," Ida said calmly. "If she doesn't want the implant, she can offer an alternate solution. One that guarantees the safety of the city beyond a shadow of a doubt. As things stand, either of you could potentially destroy something important and send us all to the surface in a spectacular crash landing that would kill everyone but me. What solutions do you two propose to guarantee that you won't do that?"
"What?" Itera asked, looking confused.
"Can you accelerate time?" Ida asked coldly. "If so, you could make some important component deteriorate before its time and screw us all over. Even if you can only reverse it, if you went back far enough everything on this ship would revert to unshaped materials. And none of you seem to realize just how delicate your little bubble of safety is."
"I wouldn't!" Itera protested. "I promise."
"I need more than your word. Promises are broken as easily as porcelain. What concrete guarantee do I have that you won't cause any more trouble than someone without a Gift?"
Itera fell silent, stewing in her own thoughts. She stared at the floor for some time before meeting Ida's gaze again, a determined glint in her eyes.
"I know someone who can erase Miracles. It's only temporary, but would that help?"
Silence fell in the room. Bruce's eyes widened, while Sawyer looked completely dumbfounded. Cleo looked anxious, chewing on a fingernail as Joey glanced nervously at her. Courtney frowned in thought. Darius remained impassive as ever, but Ida had sunk into thought.
She smiled at Itera.
"I'd say introduce me to this person immediately. Where are they?"
"I don't know. She was assigned to work with Mist. And she won't meet you on your terms. She's very skittish."
"Then we'll have to meet her." Ida grinned. "Have her meet you at a public place of her choice tomorrow at 9:00. You'll bring me and Darius with you and we'll negotiate with her."
Itera shrank back, guilt written all over her face.
"Don't worry, I won't hurt her. I want a genuinely beneficial relationship for both of us. Cleo, escort our guests back to the Business District if you will. Garcia's free to go, but keep an eye on Itera. If she does anything fishy, report to me immediately. And if you don't, I guess I'll have to retaliate against you."
Cleo shuddered, but did as she was told.
"What are you going to do with her?" Courtney asked coldly.
"Negotiate. As I said, I'm very interested in this woman who can erase Miracles, even if only temporarily. If such a Gift exists, I'd love to know how far its applications reach. Could she neutralize the whole city? How long can she do it for?"
"This could solve all of it," Ned said quietly. "Take Miracles away from the bad guys so they can't use them anymore."
"We can start with the bad guys," Ida replied. "Then we move on to the neutral guys, the good guys, and finally me."
"Ida?" Darius asked.
"I've run this ship for long enough. Time to pass it on to the next generation. I'm sick of living as a tiny girl. If someone can let me finally grow up, I'll take that opportunity without a second thought."
"But that would mean you'd die one day."
"Most people do, bot boy. The fact that I'm still here is an aberration, one that should have been remedied long ago."
Darius hesitantly stepped forward, then knelt down and held her tight.
"Please don't leave me again," he whispered.
"Hey, I'd have several decades of life left in me."
"But you have a bad habit of neglecting your health."
"If I stop being immortal, you can nag me about my health choices all you want. I'll listen, I promise. Neglecting my health comes mainly from the knowledge that what I do doesn't matter. I'll live anyway."
"What happens when you die?"
"You find new friends, I suppose. You're a sociable type, Darius. You'll be fine. And if it really gets to be too much, I'm sure you can delete yourself."
Darius nodded slowly, and Ida patted his head, rolling her eyes.
"What'll you do when you grow up?" Ned asked slowly.
"Probably go full time into game developing. You can be my artist, how's that?" Ida grinned at him. "And Darius can handle a bunch of the programming. It'll be nice to have a team instead of doing everything by myself."
"You really intend to erase all the Miracles?" Courtney asked carefully.
"The way I see it, humanity's better off without them. Let's list all the good things and all the bad things that have come from this rash of crazy powers. I'll start - Hot Rod bad."
No one could argue with that.
