Silence fell for a moment as the kids took in Ida's question. Courtney and Sawyer looked completely out of their element, but they'd catch up soon enough. More important was getting all of this out of the way. It had been ages since Ida had had another person to talk to, so she'd never really thought about explaining herself to anyone, but at the rate things were going it was probably best to come clean.
"Everything," Ned finally said. "I want to know everything you do. You obviously know more than us, and if you're offering the information, it probably has something to do with the current Miracle mess."
"Fine," Ida replied. "Speaking of messes, I assume the one up top is mostly cleaned up?"
"It is," Darius said.
"There's one or two more on the loose," Cleo added, looking into the void or wherever her annoying clairvoyance came from. "They'll be back behind bars soon enough without us doing anything, though." She refocused on Ida. "I agree with Ned. Who are you exactly, Odin? And what do you mean about humans being rotten?"
Ida sighed. Where to begin? It really was a conundrum. But before she could collect her thoughts, Sawyer spoke up.
"So you really are Odin?" he asked, glaring coldly at her. Ida had no reason to lie to him about it so she nodded with a shrug.
"That is the name you gave me."
She barely registered what happened next. Sawyer cursed loudly, then ran at her full tilt. A gunshot echoed through the room, making everyone freeze. Darius stood next to her, holding her gun. It was pointed at the floor, and she could see the scuff mark where the bullet had landed right next to Sawyer's feet.
"Do not lay a hand on Ida," Darius said coldly. "Consider this your last warning."
"You expect me to stay calm?" Sawyer demanded. "When this kid has been playing life and death games with me? Screwing around with my life? Making me kill people? At least let me punch her!"
"Later," Ida said with a sigh. "Later you can punch me to a bloody pulp. Hell, if you want to, I'll let you kill me. But I won't apologize for anything. For now, though, both of you sit down. Where do you kids want me to start? Before Arx, when Arx launched, or sometime after?"
"Before Arx?" Courtney asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Right, you'd remember that," Ned said in awe.
"She what?" Courtney spun around and looked like she wanted to interrogate them. Ida waved her confusion aside and pointed firmly at Sawyer's seat.
"I'm immortal. Honestly, you can conceive of fire powers, super speed, portal abilities, super stink, making shit appear out of thin air, and Joey's weird super jump thing over there, but not an adult's mind in a child's body? Get some creativity."
Courtney and Sawyer were both struck speechless. It was kind of amusing watching Sawyer struggle to sit back down while processing the information.
"I was seven years old when I got my Gift. And you've mentioned I look younger than that, so I'll tell you why. Long story short, I was malnourished. My parents were poor, and there was a ton of shit going on in the world at that time. I was born three years after the war started, and things only got worse as time went on. I'm the only survivor of my family, and the only reason for that is because of my Gift. If it weren't for my immortality, I would have died in a ditch somewhere the year I was seven. Any questions so far?"
Silence fell for a bit before Ned spoke up again.
"What war?"
Of course. War was a foreign concept to them. Their lives had been completely peaceful up until the Miracle nonsense, and that didn't even compare to WWV.
The war that ended the world.
"It has two names. World War Five, and the War of Flies. It's the reason everything went to shit and Arx Nubibus was created. Before I was born, there was massive melting at the poles and the world started to flood. The oceans got bigger, and the land people could live on got smaller, so conflicts over who got what piece of land became widespread. One of those conflicts involved some country dumping a box of virus-ridden flies in another. That country retaliated, as did their allies, and before long it ballooned into everyone throwing new bioengineered diseases at whatever country they didn't like.
"Except viruses don't care about national borders. Neither did the animals who carried them. So in trying all of that shit, humanity doomed themselves. I don't remember much of it since I was so young, but hospitals were completely overrun. There were far more patients than medical staff, so they'd be lined up outside, dying in the streets. That's where my parents died. Out in the streets because they couldn't afford to pay to skip the line for medical treatment."
She clenched her fist, forcing herself to focus on the present. That nightmare was far behind her, and she'd never let it happen again.
"Because of my Gift, I survived. I still don't know why Solitude chose me. He thinks I should be grateful, but my feelings are mixed if I'm being honest. Anyway, when Arx was completed, I stowed away on it because I was sick of living in that hellhole. There was no way I could afford to get on legally, so I had to resort to more desperate measures. I lived in the Underwing for a while, stealing food, until Dr. Archer found me. She thought I was still a little kid even though I'd had my curse Gift for a few years at that point.
"So she adopted me. When she realized that I was...different, that I'd never grow up, that I was immortal, she trained me on everything that has to be done down here. She and her team were the ones who made Arx Nubibus and they were the ones who ran everything from down here. Eventually, though, they'd die. New people would have to be taken under their wing and trained on how to keep the ship running. Val...Dr. Archer wanted to make sure the people down here never forgot what we escaped.
"The leadership has wanted to return to the surface and recolonize it a couple times throughout Arx's history because they've forgotten just how delicate they are. I've put a stop to it because of all the crazy prep that would take. The dust alone would probably kill ten percent of you. Without having grown up with those environmental stresses, your bodies aren't at all ready for what's down there. The viruses have probably calmed down without any human hosts to propagate in, but it's not nearly as simple as landing the ship and walking out.
"We have no idea what kind of bacteria are down there, or where reliable clean water sources are. We don't know how the ecosystems have changed, or how various species have evolved. Without a thorough understanding of where we're landing, you don't stand a chance. The only reason I stand a chance is because I'm immortal. And I don't like dying too much, so I'll pass on anything that looks too dangerous.
"Anyway, that's where I came in. Since most of the tasks down here can be automated and Arx back then was all about efficiency, when the leadership found out about me, they just appointed me the sole keeper of Arx. I could keep an eye on everything, and never have to train a successor. For all time, I'd take care of Val's ship. At first I didn't quite understand what I was getting into, but I'll be dammed if I'm going to let things end easily. No matter how stupid you humans are, I can't give up on you for Val's sake."
Ida stared at the floor, letting her story sink in. She hadn't told them everything of course - they didn't have nearly enough time for that. But it would be enough for now. It told them where she came from and hopefully conveyed just how precarious their precious normal lives were.
"And what does this have to do with why you killed people?" Courtney asked slowly, folding her hands over her knees and resting her chin on them.
"You don't seem to understand just how delicate the balance in Arx Nubibus is. Hot Rod could have poisoned the entire air supply with his stupidity. Sawyer there could break a hole in the side and ruin the air pressure, making us all die of hypoxia. Most of your precious Miracles could kill us all if one thing went wrong. My job is to keep as many of you alive as I can."
"So why have you never intervened before now?" Sawyer asked coldly. "People die up there all the time. Treatable diseases, workplace accidents, whatever. And you've never lifted a finger."
"Those were within parameters," Ida replied. "If I stuck my nose into everything, I'd just be an overzealous dictator. I've let democracy reign. This is the society your ancestors built, whether you like it or not. The Miracles, though, are something none of us could have predicted. I mean, until about a year ago, I was the only one I knew who had a Gift, and it's not particularly destructive. For them to appear so suddenly, in such great numbers, and with such destructive force, I'd be remiss to ignore it."
Sawyer glowered at her, but seemed to accept her explanation.
"Now if there's nothing else," Ida said, standing with a deep sigh, "let's clean up the messes you kids have made. Bring those two back here, Cleo."
