08 – Precaution Upon Precaution

The Castle’s lounge looked every part the comfortable venue for a posh party in the late nineteen twenties. Dark wood panels climbed the walls, polished to a sheen in the flickering incandescent light. Large portraits filled empty space, their occupants staring down with grave expressions. A phonograph on a table set to low volume put a layer of swing under the heavy tension in the air.

“I am so sorry.”

Anna—the real Anna—folded her arms across her chest. She leaned back on a short sofa, feet propped up on a coffee table that Erika doubted was supposed to have feet on it. Her lips drew together in irritation, but her eyes looked more tired than anything.

“In fairness to her,” The Doctor said, nodding toward Erika as he placed down a series of photographs on the coffee table, “the impostor might well have fooled you into thinking you were the fake. Genetic testing, X-ray photography, mental skimming, and precognitive affirmations failed to differentiate the two of you.”

Anna’s boots thumped against the floor as she swung her legs off the table. She snatched up one of the photographs and just stared.

“And the other one sent a message with your phone,” Daniel said, flipping his phone out to show off the text.

Anna’s eyes shifted, slowly, like she couldn’t quite drag her gaze away from the clone. “How did it get my phone?”

“It copied all the modifications The Gadget and I engineered during your reassembly,” The Doctor said, making the corners of Anna’s eyes twitch.

“Your clothes too,” Erika added.

“And it just shat out a phone already connected to cell networks?”

Behind The Doctor’s large back, Erika and Daniel glanced at each other with a shrug.

Despite the admission in the interview, and a few follow-up questions that the mimic had willingly answered, the exact details of fake-Anna’s nature were still unknown. Mostly because, if the mimic was telling the truth, not even she knew how she worked. All she knew was that she wouldn’t be a very good copy if something as simple as a lack of a phone could reveal her.

Anna’s eyes lit up with interest. “Did it arrive on a bike? Like, a copy of my bike?”

“Yes,” The Doctor answered. Anna opened her mouth, leaning forward eagerly, but The Doctor shook his head. “It would be unwise to claim it. It is currently in quarantine, undergoing an examination under The Gadget’s supervision. So far, there is no biological material nor any sign of its anomalous nature, but given the creature we are dealing with and its manifestation, it may well be part of the mimic.”

Anna’s jaw snapped shut with an audible click; a slight huff escaped her flared nostrils. “Thought I’d get something out of this waste of a day,” she muttered under her breath. “Can I see it?”

“The motorcycle?”

Anna waved the photo in her hand. “The mimic. In person, I mean,” she added, flicking the picture across the table. It skimmed the surface, falling to the floor at Erika’s feet.

“Not in the same room,” Erika hurriedly said, earning a slight snort from The Stalker. “If you two jumped at each other and started wrestling around until we pulled you off each other—” Erika had to elbow The Stalker in the ribs, hard. “Then we’d have to go through this whole ordeal all over again.”

“What’s wrong with her?” Anna asked, lifting her chin in The Stalker’s direction.

Daniel’s ears tinged red as he answered. “She has dumb ideas.”

“Ignore her,” Erika agreed.

Anna cast a suspicious glare over the three of them before turning to the corner seat of The Castle’s lounge. “Thought Delilah could tell for sure.”

“You’re probably you,” Delilah said, distractedly. She sat in a seat four times larger than she needed, idly stroking her hand through empty air. “Nya knows you aren’t a changeling, but there is always a chance that you got replaced by something else at some point in your life.”

“How reassuring,” Anna hissed through her teeth.

“We could set up the interview room again,” The Doctor said slowly, “but it may not be healthy. Mentally speaking.”

“I’ll be fine.”

Hesitating, perhaps mentally communicating with The Mind, The Doctor shrugged his shoulders. “We’ll make secure arrangements,” he said, turning toward the door.

“Hold up, wait a minute.” Rick raised a finger, palming a snack from the charcuterie board. “Les and I missed the fun part, but…” He glanced to his side where Leslie stood a step away from the refreshment table. “Has your genius come up with any plans to prevent this from happening again? No offense to Delilah, but I’d rather not rely on one little girl to point out fakes.”

“Simple,” The Fixer said from the other end of the room, watching as Carter fiddled with the hands of a grandfather clock. “You all tell me a passphrase, privately—”

“That worked this time,” Erika said, “but only because the fake Anna couldn’t read the real one’s mind. If we walk into Varn’s and find two Ricks arguing over who is real and who isn’t, the fake will just read the password from the real one’s mind.” Erika shook her head, leaning against The Stalker’s armrest with her knuckles cradling her chin. “Help me brainstorm a way to break the truth to people—”

“That just trades Delilah for you, doesn’t it?” Daniel said.

“It gives us two ways to tell people apart.”

“Still doesn’t help if I walk into Varn’s to find two Ricks fighting. Maybe like… RFID chips—”

“It copied my phone and all my… me,” Anna said with a shake of her head. She stretched her arm out, then out a little further. Telescoping pistons in her forearm pulled her skin apart at the seams as she reached for a glass of beer sitting on top of the table without leaning forward. A faint grinding noise of metal on metal mixed with bone on bone made Erika wince as her arm snapped back together, drink now at her lips.

“No implants,” Daniel said, looking pale. “Right. Okay.” He shook his head, finding something else to look at.

That something turned out to be The Stalker, grinning. “I think I got it,” she said, “but I’ll need to stare at the fake one a bit more to be sure.”

“You stared for the last several hours.” Erika nudged her more gently this time. “What changed?”

“There are subtle differences, but I couldn’t tell which was which before. Now I know.”

“Is that going to help when there are two Ricks fighting each other?” Leslie asked. “If you must know which is the real one before you can determine the real one…” He trailed off before he could say something he would regret, lips pressed together, but The Stalker was already on her feet.

“You doubt me?” The Stalker curled her lip into a sneer. “Guess we’ll find out next time I come to your little arcade. Maybe I’ll even accuse the real Rick just to be a bitch about it.”

“Why are you all assuming—” Rick stopped, sighing. “Never mind. Hey, Doc…” He blinked. “Where’d The Doctor go?”

“He sneaked away while you all were arguing,” Carter said, winding the mantel clock backwards and then forwards. “One-eight-nine seconds ago.”

“Damn. He’s coming back, right?”

“Someone from The Castle will be… unless they want me to try breaking out of the asylum,” Erika said with a glare up at the ceiling, certain The Mind was watching.

Everyone fell silent, thoughtful expressions turning inward. Everyone was probably trying to figure out how to tell apart a fake when they could copy memories, appearance, and technology. If Erika were being honest, she didn’t see any way to do so outside Delilah or another supernatural effect. The Stalker maybe could do it, if she was right about whatever subtle differences she saw. It didn’t sound reliable.

The Castle would probably figure something out, either via questioning or experimenting on the mimic. Whether or not they would share their methods was another matter that Erika somewhat doubted. Beyond them…

Could anyone in The Eclipse? Erika mentally ran through their roster and came up with nobody. Maybe The Hanged Man, depending on his ability to sense emotions, but she doubted that would be reliable. The Hermit was mysterious and The Hierophant’s abilities differed based on the mask he wore, so they were big question marks. Nobody else had a power that came to mind.

The Analyst might know things, but she had the same problem The Castle did in that she might not share her means.

“The Warrior might be able to enchant some items,” The Stalker said just as Erika’s thoughts were coming around to The Puppet. “But that depends on whether these things can copy magic as well as everything else. Maybe she can make a mimic detector… but she would probably need access to it, and frankly, I’m surprised they’re letting me in their clubhouse.”

“Would you ask her?”

“She’ll probably want a favor.”

“That’s fine,” Erika said. “Within reason. Kind of shocked she hasn’t come to me already after making our fancy weapons.”

“She and The Strategist have been cooking something up.” The Stalker shrugged. “I’m last to know these things, so no details. Shouldn’t say them here even if I did know anything.”

“Last? Out of three people?” Rick laughed a little, shaking his head. “Not like you’ve got an Eclipse-sized organization going on.”

“There is The Healer.”

“Oh… forgot about her.”

“So does everyone else,” The Stalker said with a barking laugh. “Don’t think anyone tells her shit until after the job is done and we all need healing. Probably why she’s so pissy all the time.”

“Isn’t The Puppet someone else in your group?” Erika asked.

The Stalker’s smile turned stiff as she slowly nodded. “That’s… It’s mostly The Strategist and The Warrior running the show,” she said with a note of finality before she quickly changed topics. “Anyway, yeah. I’ll check in with The Warrior and see if she can figure out good ways of identifying people.”

A beat of silence passed—Erika did not miss the concerned glance shared between Leslie and Rick—before The Fixer spoke again.

“I still believe a passphrase is required. Multiple redundant fallbacks can only help. Passphrases, The Warrior, Erika… and Delilah—”

“Question!” Delilah said, raising a finger. Her black, glossy eyes shifted around the room. “How will you know it’s me? What if another mimic copies me, and then tells you that someone else is a fake?”

Erika hesitated, feeling a momentary spike of adrenaline at the thought that their one guaranteed method could easily be compromised, until she remembered what, exactly, Delilah was. “Can they copy Nya?”

Delilah glanced down at her lap, then back up. “Unlikely.”

“Then all we have to do is give you a little cut and see if Nya stitches you back together.”

Stiffening, Delilah sent a worried glance down to her lap. Her eyes rolled, and settled back into a flat, emotionless gaze directed at Erika. “If I must prove my identity, there are less destructive means.”

“Any old mimic can drop into a monotone voice and act all—”

Nya’s lips stretched wide, maw filled with sharp teeth that did not belong to the girl she possessed. She opened her mouth, black tongue worming around, and clamped down.

A quarter of the coffee table vanished with a thwump, along with a chunk of the floor. Photographs and medical papers scattered, wafting through the air as they settled to the floor. A current of tension struck everyone in the room, though reactions varied from the stiffening of Anna and Leslie to Rick, still-sheathed sword in hand. The Fixer shifted, one moment standing there as Leah, the next as Mister Dice.

Nya just licked her lips, a red in her eyes fading back to the flat black.

Erika, boots at the very edge of the newly formed crater in the floor, slid back a step. “Fair enough,” she said, licking her suddenly dry lips while watching as Nya’s emotionless eyes flipped back to the worried gaze of Delilah.

“I’m so sorry! She didn’t tell me—”

Erika raised a hand. “It’s fine. I shouldn’t have threatened you…” she muttered to herself. “Honestly forgot she could do that.”

The first and only other time Erika had seen that, things had been a bit hectic.

Nya was protective of her host. Erika really needed to keep that in mind. Even if drawing a little blood to test for a mimic seemed perfectly reasonable to her, Nya obviously disagreed.

“Um…” Delilah said, glancing back and forth between the couch next to Anna and Rick. “Nya says the sword is probably safe.”

“It can’t be copied?” Rick asked, not looking excited in the slightest. If anything, the news made him shrink back a little. “I bet the sword can be copied, but the curse can’t… meaning I’d have to draw it and then…”

Leslie clapped him on the shoulder. “Not worth worrying about. Any impostor can draw a fake sword and claim they need to stab something.”

“Actually,” Anna said, now staring at Rick. “All we have to do is try to take the sword away. It’ll teleport back to him. Unless that can be copied…” She glanced to Delilah, getting a negative shake of the girl’s head after a brief, wordless consultation with Nya. “So, Rick should basically always be safe. It’s too easy of a test. A mimic wouldn’t try unless they’re an idiot.”

“Similarly, Erika’s power is unique. It should be impossible to copy. Nya says that, if it weren’t…” Delilah stopped and swallowed. “The Mummy would have assimilated the Earth already.”

Erika hummed, thinking she should have realized that. “Anyone can break something simple like a pencil,” she said. “I’d have to do a more esoteric demonstration if there was ever any question. Maybe hand me your phone and see if I can break into it.”

“So, Erika and Rick,” Anna said, looking around the room. She stopped over at the mantel. “The Fixer as well, I presume, if their mind truly cannot be read.”

“They wouldn’t need to read my mind if they read yours and acted how you expect me to act,” The Fixer said, remaining as Mister Dice. “However, I doubt these creatures can change guises. Simply ask me to swap from Dice to Leah and that will be your proof.”

Anna glanced to Delilah for confirmation, but got an uncertain shrug this time around.

A light knock on the door stalled any future discussions. Nobody responded, but The Butler stepped inside anyway, stooping to duck through the doorway. “Good evening, Hunters, Stalker. The Castle hates to be an ungracious host, but the asylum is closing its doors in twenty minutes and will not reopen until morning.”

“Kicking us out, huh?” Anna ground her heel on one of the fallen photographs. “I still want to meet this thing.”

“If you do not wish to be trapped inside, now would be an optimal time to leave, yes. We can provide accommodations, if necessary. As for meeting, future arrangements can be made.” The Butler did a full hand gesture toward Erika. “The Agent has requested weekly meetings, if you wished to join her.”

Erika glanced around, noting that everyone else was doing the same.

“We won’t be staying,” The Fixer said, resting a hand on Carter’s shoulder. They were back as Leah again—Erika wasn’t sure when they swapped.

“Us as well,” Leslie said, getting a hasty nod from Daniel.

“No offense, your place is kind of creepy.”

The Butler just smiled.

Anna clapped her hands to her thighs, standing. “Whelp. Got to check on Sofia anyway. Make sure she’s all caught up on things. She’s not going to be happy.”

“She’ll be happy she missed this, but not about the ramifications,” Rick said. “Glad I don’t have a day job…”

With a grand sweeping gesture, The Butler led everyone back to the asylum’s halls. Nobody elected to stick around for the night. The Butler didn’t seem offended, and Erika was fairly certain the offer had been empty to begin with. It was just for the sake of being polite.

Erika glanced back down the empty hallways of The Castle’s asylum, wondering which path led toward the fake Anna. If they hadn’t caught that fake as fast as they had, things could have turned out far, far worse. The Prescient had certainly been correct about his fortuitous meeting. They were forewarned, at the very least.

Whether that meant forearmed, only time would tell.