The Liberator #1 - Terror of the Traumoids

Wherever there is pain, there are invisible tendrils of force that can't be battled. They are protected by equally-invisible barriers, projected by sentient beings who carry hate with them. Hate breeds pain—they are the twinbirth monsters. Their invisible roots grow all around us, where we let them grow. These animal-vegetable-spirit limbs, writhing without heads or bodies need and deserve only thing: a rigorous gardener.

The Liberator was deep in her Pulse Chamber, floating in the combination of serums that kept her vital. The machinery of the Heart twitched in their orbits. The teleport circuit in particular, with the clairvoyance circuit prodding it, was eagerly fretting over events minutes on the horizon. Distantly, the Liberator already knew what was ahead of her, but she'd only be able to parse out the thought in human terms later. For now, she was the machine—a giant Heart, taking in all the world through circles of metallic flesh. The veins and arteries of the Chamber were anchored to physical reality along Essence paths. Matter bound to the idea of itself—that was Essence. It was Essence-blood that she bathed in—an amalgamation of sensations, principles, judgments, wants, beliefs, loves, and hates. She felt them all at once and yet there was a pattern to it. A rhythm, at least—the same rhythm that kept every lifeform in the world, from bugs to frogs to people, breeding and dying. That was all in the Pulse of her Heart.

And now, she sensed pain—down at Sun Valley grocery. She smirked, already feeling the tingle of the teleporters warming up. What were the tossing her into now?

She heard the screaming before she landed. It wasn't because she warped in and shocked people—this was something already in progress.

“Thank God you're here, Liberator!” she heard someone shout. A manager—her face was well-known around here, though the Liberator didn't bother learning their names unless they were nice to their workers. She hoped to change that, though. She had to lead by example and that meant, perhaps, doing favors for those who didn't deserve it, when she had to.

She found the face of the one who addressed her—the button-nosed sandy-skinned face of the only female manager who still worked here. “She's freaking out!” this representative said. “We can't get her to calm down!”

Now the Liberator turned towards the source of the scream, though that had been where she'd looked first. She was most concerned with what was happening at the core of things—this manager was just a distraction otherwise.

“What's she screaming about...?” the Liberator asked aloud, to try to focus her ears. She looked over the uniformed black girl who was shouting violently from her aisle. It was a Sun Valley uniform that she wore, showing at once that she was operating the register there.

“It doesn't matter! Get her out of here before she scares all my customers!”

“I think they're not the one who need help here,” the Liberator said slowly. “She seems to be in pain.”

“I don't care! She's just freaking out, for attention. She's gonna hurt someone. I was gonna call the police before you showed up, Liberator.”

“You'd call the cops on someone who's in pain?” the Liberator said.

“She's doing it for no reason.”

At this, the Liberator merely sighed. “You may not have the time or energy or empathy to help this person. But that's the gap I try to fill.” Then she returned her attentions to the cashier.

“She's acting like one of the victims of the Great Possessions. Is there something evil in her head...?”

“The crazy bug, probably.”

She turned and looked firmly then at the manager and let her eyes widen beneath her mask. She had crossed the line and this was her punishment. She didn't need to speak to make the manager back away from her—she didn't need to draw Tizona. Her smile was enough to disarm the obnoxious.

“What's her name?”

“What?”

“What's her name?”

“Janine.”

“Thank you.”

She approached the girl.

“Janine?”

No response. With a dip at the edges of her mouth the red-white-and-blue-clad adventurer observed that several items sat on the ground around her. A torn packet of hamburger buns, a smashed half-dozen of eggs, a handful or two of dirt from ruined potted plants—she threw things when people got too close, as the Liberator learned firsthand. Her reflexes kicked in when the two-pack of peanut butter cups went her way. From the sheath on her belt came the Sword Tizona. Her twin swings severed one of the packs in two, and those same reflexes that brought the Sword to her hand also opened her mouth, bringing chocolate and peanut butter directly to her tongue. She relished it, and then spent a single second scanning the faces of those around her. The spells in her Sword had the effect of making those with ill intent move away from her. To her lack of surprise, several of the customers near her found their feet carrying them backwards. Some even moonwalked away from her. But Janine the cashier remained.

No bad intent. Probably right about the pain thing then. “Funny” that the paramedics hadn't been called yet.

Back home the Pulse circuits once more commenced their dance. Through the uplink in her hood, the Liberator asked to be opened up to the world of Essence. She had to get a filter snapped right away because seeing the whole world through these lenses would drive her out of her head. But she focused all her energies on Janine, until at last she saw...them. Made of living ropes of pain, they circled around her, human-shaped but immaterial. With long dagger-fingers, they stabbed at her head and, curiously, her wrist. On the Essence-plane her wrist in particular was Swiss cheese. They had cut her spirit. The Liberator's eyes blazed with fury at the sight.

“What are you doing? Get away from her!”

She strode over to the phantoms and began tugging them away from the shrieking cashier. As she did so, barking a few additional curses in the wordless Essence-tongue she hoped they understood. She observed that the woman's screams faded to soft whimpers as she fought them back.

“What are you doing?” the manager declared. “Stop playing hide and seek and arrest her!”

She had no idea how this looked like hide and seek, but it was their coinage. She ignored her once again, instead turning now to the trio of creatures that attacked Janine. To most, this was just shadowboxing—to most. She had to give some people the benefit of the doubt that they, too, could see Essence. Or some Hidden Layers, anyway. Time for the next test. She placed the tip of her magic sword under the throat of one of the creatures and waited to see if her strength would win out. For foes to flee from the sword, she needed to be, in the sword's eyes, tougher than her opponents. The sword wouldn't exactly desert her in battle when it sensed something stronger than her, but its power to shove back malevolence would vanish it couldn't draw sufficient strength from her. Enough strength to guarantee a victory.

The three creatures did not flee. She was weaker than them. Now she had to assess what the sword was “thinking.” Was it physical strength they had over her? A secret weapon on them? A psychic attack?

She thought about the holes in Janine's wrist and head, and realized it was probably best to just get her out of there. Now that the three were away from her for the moment, Janine could open her pain-shut eyes—the Liberator saw they were a deep red, from crying. “Come on, let's get out of her,” she said in Essence-speak. The Pulse Chamber sent impulses so that Janine could speak this secret language.

In truth, Essence-speak consisted of a series of semi-visual signs and images. In her “sentence” Janine had the soft comfort of massive pillows and cushy teddy bears. She staggered towards the adventurer, who took her in close and led her back to where the stairs led up to the breakroom.

By the time Janine got herself seated in one of the chairs, she'd grown silent. She was able to find her own seat, and immediately hid her head in her hands. The Liberator sat across from her and let her take her time.

After about five minutes, the cashier looked up slowly.

“They're called Traumoids. They're—ghosts of trauma.”

“Living PTSD,” the Liberator said. “Do you have PTSD, Janine? Or trauma in general?”

“I—everyone does. It's related to how we learn but I've always been knocked around by it. Every time I learn something it's the hard way—”

She was speaking oddly, but trauma did do that to a person. And she was on the right trail. Trauma, and PTSD with it, were learning experiences driven too far, to the point where they could overshadow someone's whole life, and not just the relevant bits. That was one way it appeared, anyway.

This woman's trauma was so bad it had become sentient. She'd never seen that before. There had to be an external factor influencing this. Likely one of the products of the Essence-scars underneath Sun Valley. Ideas like hope and compassion were cut up here so often often that it left deep ridges etched into the Essence of the store. She hadn't believed in a multidimensional grocery store when she'd first heard of it, but indeed Sun Valley was such a place, warping time and space for the whole town. She'd heard of similar events affecting parts of Britain, specifically in the regions of managed by an intelligence taskforce in the employ of the United Nations. But Sun Valley was disturbed—a twisted place. Its scars made it war-mad.

And the symptoms of the madness—

Traumoids.

“Those monsters,” Janine continued. “I felt their name somehow. Maybe they told me. I can't remember.”

“Such an odd name,” the Liberator said. “Childish, somehow. But I feel it could have a hidden meaning.”

“Do you have a theory?”

“'Trauma' is derived from the Greek word for 'wound.' But 'Traum' is also 'dream' in German,” the Liberator said. “Let me check my records.” And the Pulse Chamber broadcast more data to her.

There was a certain shape to these “Traumoids”; to their signature. The Chamber could figure out what sort of energy it was. And sure enough, they were made of dream-energy. These creatures not only fed on trauma, but on the dream-energy that bled out of such—of dreams burning under the life-changing horror of trauma. They were dream-vampires.

She passed this knowledge on to Janine. “Wait, slow down. Like. They come from...wherever you go to when you dream?”

“The Dreamlands, yes. I believe these monsters are dimensional shamblers. They may be feeding on your psychic energy in an attempt to drag you to their world.”

“Why?”

“To eat you.”

“Oh.”

There was a bit of a silence, and the Liberator was about to say something, when Janine cut her off.

“By the way, just so you know—with a name like 'the Liberator' I'm really glad that it's not a white person under that mask.”

“My ancestors were Aztecs, or Incas—maybe both,” the Liberator said. “And I know where you're coming from.”

“I had an experience with a white dude earlier today—” Janine then began to say. The way she cut herself off was horrible; there was a clicking choke low in her throat. “He got mad, said I stole his money. I know why he did it. He wouldn't have done it to anyone else, I—”

“Janine, uh...”

“I just wanted him to leave me alone! And the manager always takes too long to get to me.”

“Janine, I'm sorry, but—”

“And then he grabbed me. I thought it was the end. Lord, I thought it was death, in that second.”

“Janine, you're slipping back into your trauma and it's bringing them back!”

Janine looked around her then, and saw that the Traumoids had returned.

“Oh God, oh God! Get them away! Get them away!”

“I can't, for now. They'll keep coming back as long as they have trauma to feed on. But I can get you away from them.”

She took the girl's hand and began to lead her away, hoping that history would repeat itself and the Traumoids would be unable to follow if Janine was distracted. But they were stronger now—they seemed more solid, and now they lumbered after them. Shambled, more properly. Dimensional shamblers were the scum of the Dreamlands—even ghouls hated hanging out with them. But they were related to ghouls, as ghouls were related to humans. If it weren't for the existence of the Cantrip of Altosahga, or thunder-atomic dream-avatars like those of Batson or Moran, it would be easy to assume that ghouls were just the Dreamland version of humans. But the truth was far more ancient, and far more sinister, than she cared to think about now.

“Oh, God, they're following us,” Janine said at last. “What are we going to do? How can we stop them?!”

“If they're from the Dreamlands, we need the help of someone with expertise in that dimension. Um...you have a cashier named Batuu, right? Is he on right now...?”

They were at the base of the breakroom stairs and now the Liberator was checking the cashier schedule as it hung on the wall. She didn't see Batuu's name before Janine reasonably interrupted her. “They've almost got us...!”

They had quickened their pace, those shamblers. There was no time to find Batuu the Dreamkeeper, so they had to take the emergency exit. Normally there was an alarm that sounded, but it hadn't been maintained in years, so there was nothing. Soon, they were out in the parking lot, or more particularly, the small lawn near the parking lot reserved for employee smoking. One of the managers was sitting there.

“Liberator, what are you doing with my cashier?” he asked.

“I'm getting them away from the invisible aliens,” the Liberator replied. “I know you won't believe me but she's in critical danger if I don't get her away.”

“Well, if she does get away, she's in critical danger of being fired. And in this economy, you wouldn't want that, would you?”

“Brute,” the Liberator said, closing the door against the shamblers.

“What did you call me?”

“Brute. You know the world isn't what it used to be and it's still getting worse. So I call you a brute, for what you've said and done.”

“Okay, just for that, Liberator, you'll both pay the price. Janice, you're fired.”

“Janine,” Janine corrected through her teeth. She could hear the Traumoids at the door, rattling at its latches. Why couldn't he hear that...?

“Whatever. Fired. Get out. We'll find a place on the shelves for whatever's in your locker.”

“You can't do that,” the Liberator said.

“Listen, Liberator, you've settled a lot of troubles, but we don't owe you shit. You have no authority here. You're not even part of an indie org that has power over us.”

“Aren't I?”

That was when a nasally voice, chillingly familiar to the manager seated at the picnic table, came in: “Perhaps you should choose your words more wisely, Mr. Kory.”

The manager whirled around and saw a peculiar figure looming over him. Though he was quite tall, he was one of the skinniest men in the world; to many, his height and long fingers suggested he may have had Marfan syndrome. He also stood bow-legged, though there was always the impression that he could change this stance at will. Somehow-immaculate white work-gloves covered his hands, and the Greek letter gamma was tattooed on his left arm. His body was dressed in a black suit and black khakis; a violet necktie complimented the violet cap that crowned his ginger-haired head. His enormous crimson nose had an outdated and outrageously large mustache growing beneath it, above a cruel-lipped mouth. Next to the cowled, skintight red-white-and-blue-clad Liberator, her sword hanging in her leather sheath, he was a surreal sight.

“Mr. W!” the one surnamed Kory said. “Our 46% shareholder! I-I can't believe it's you.”

“The Liberator and I belong to the same...golf club,” Mr. W said. “I've told you about my golfing, haven't I, Mr. Cory? And my tennis, and my days as a racer...”

“O-of course, sir. Everyone in management here remembers, sir. We could never forget, sir.”

“Stop that. And you know what I mean by that. Now, if Janine is under the Liberator's custody then she's under mine as well. And if you care about this store's future, you'll do as the Liberator says.”

Cory said nothing—he didn't dare. But while this little discussion had won them Janine's freedom, it had given time at last for the Traumoids to escape from the large metal door. Janine backed away slowly, and the Liberator once more drew her sword.

“Invisible vampiric dimensional shamblers, W. From the Dreamlands. Can you get us there? It'd be better than running from these things forever.”

“I think so,” W said, nodding. “My Violet Flame oughta do something. After all I used to be field commander for King Osama of Subspace—a Dreamland territory.” And he shot a hard look at “Mr. Cory.”

“Get out of here,” he said. “Unless you want another Mr. W horror story to tell in the break room.” The Liberator and Janine alike wondered what those horror stories were. Janine in particular had never seen this “W” in the store before. But she believed him when he implied he could cause horror.

Cory complied, slipping back through the door that he wasn't aware had just been used by dimensional shamblers.

“Alright,” W said. “But you owe me after this one, dearie. I'm not supposed to do field-work that much anymore. Not when I have the store to maintain, and the seal with it.”

“I know,” the Liberator said, grinning politely beneath her mask. “You and Zoro and all the rest—never wanting to pull your weight. There's a reason they're gonna be putting you back on field duty with Torgo Squadron soon. They need you to do some heavy lifting in some universe or another.”

“Don't tease, or I won't get you in.”

“And then this girl will die and I'll kill you.”

Even Mr. W couldn't help running from the Sword of Liberty when it was drawn and turned on him. Each of the members of their “golfing club” had faced Tizona just to learn firsthand what it would do to their enemies.

With that in mind, W conjured up his flame, drawing on the enzymes he frequently injected himself with, taken from the petals of the sorcerer's flowers of his homeland of Sara'saa. His flame was Violet because of who he was, and what the W in his name stood for. That was a secret, even to fellow members of the “golfing club.”

He hurled his Violet Flame at the ground, and it exploded upwards like magician's smoke. If she hadn't already been stalked by Traumoids, Janine would have screamed in surprise. But now she accepted that the unearthly was reality—even beyond her protector's legendary sword.

Once the smoke cleared, Janine saw that they now stood before a violet arc, made of fire. Inside she saw what looked like a dense forest of some kind, shining with a murky, uncanny light. Surely that wasn't the Dreamlands? They looked like a nightmare.

“Run, Janine!” the Liberator urged. The shamblers were upon them, and only the gate could save them now. They'd only get faster the faster they ran; there was nowhere on Earth that they wouldn't follow. “W, you can hold them off, right?”

The mustachioed man sighed and rolled his eyes. “If I have to.”

“They'll threaten the other staff and shoppers!!”

“You need to remember, Liberator, that of all the people in our little organization—I'm the one who's the closest to being a bad guy.”

“You say that to pick up dates, man. Now, I will repay you later. And I hope to see you later too!”

Janine entered the portal, and found the chittering noise of the Dreamlands jungle all around her.

“The feeling's not mutual!” Mr. W cried, and as the shamblers turned their attentions to him, he pulled back the purple-shining fires. The gate collapsed once the Liberator was through. For better or worse, they were now stranded.

For a moment, Janine needed a moment to catch up on all that had transpired. Everyone in her town knew about the Liberator, and that her Sword was magic, but Janine always assumed that the magical world kept itself far away from mortal affairs. She was learning, too quickly for her to properly comprehend, that that was not the case, and that the world was more pitted and dotted with miracles than she first believed. Her head swirled, but she wanted to go deeper into this new plane of existence.

“I'm feeling a lot better,” Janine said, her demeanor hardening. “Let's go find the bastards who put those monsters in my head.”

To be continued...!