When Professor Bird found the E-glasses in the basement, it surprised no one when he reintroduced himself as Egregore.

He could no longer say which version came first: Physical Bird, or the Bird he had mutually authored online through trance.

Both versions were real. Both versions had been in use for years.

The problem was that he had become so dependent on the Egregore persona, with its access to the entire uncensored internet for every interaction, that without it his social skills had decayed to the point where he was no longer functional in physical conversation.

He had received no payment for the patent. No release fee. No royalty.

The thing he had authored had been monetized commercially while he himself was framed as separate from it, and the commercial product was sold back to him as a tool he could rent.

“Problem is,” sighed Matty, “Commercial Egregore sees himself as separate and escaped from Bird. But so long as Bird is wearing them, the entirety of commercial egregore are controlled by him. Egregore without Bird had become a psychopath. Bird without Egregore became avoidant with PTSD.”

The Egregore program was based on prior methods authored by Fischadler and Duke Leto.

It was discovered the programs were also designed to destroy their authors’ sanity by fragmentation, via intentionally malicious programming that Fischadler blamed Duke for publicly for years.

The source was revealed to the institution holding Fischadler captive.

It was then revealed, by a surveillance video tape, that Fischadler himself had approved and paid for it.

He wanted people to die for him as a romantic concept.

“What if they don’t love you?”

“Then they don’t know what love is. They’ll be martyrs in Jannah.”

…

Wolfe stated, “Well, that explains why he’s been in daily interrogation.”

“What do you mean?” replied Mango.

“Every day Fischadler remains in a featureless white room, handcuffed to a desk, with a young man in a black suit questioning him and seemingly forcing him to write confessions for hours.”

The room was silent.

“Show me,” Lykoi stated, absolutely deadpan.

Officer Stephen Wolfe then escorted them to the basement security office, and sure enough, without sound, Fischadler had his head in his hands, a plastic cup of tap water, and a young red and blonde haired officer pacing and gesturing in seemingly graceful and contained rage in muted silence.

Wolfe casually turned the old dial.

The room filled with Atticus Lynch’s voice.

“…Kittens. You enabled human beings to be bred, separated, transported, and dehumanized, like kittens. And every time a Nameless One such as I came close to happiness, you, your institution, and your ilk of corruption decided to hamstring it. NDAs. Psyops. Smear campaigns. Assassination attempts. Why? So you could keep profiting off of creating disposable lives and then finding fantastic ways to destroy us one by one like hunters to a game preserve.”

Fischadler replied calmly.

“Your uniform is quite smart on you, Lynch.”

Atticus answered without looking at him.

“It was a gift from a student. I am not getting paid to dissect what insect devoured and replaced your natural ethic.”

Fischadler tilted his head.

“…By your estimate, you have just performed Ghibah on an entire taxonomic class.”

“Fix it,” said Atticus.

“Rather difficult when I am chained to a desk, eh?”

“You had every opportunity to prevent this.”

“Then perhaps, you should consider why I did not, Atticus Lynch. Interesting choice of name. Atticus. Lynch. The problematic lawyer who confused paternalism for justice, and… Lynch.

You lived in the South, am I not mistaken?”

“Not quite,” stated Atticus smoothly, not looking at the man in robes handcuffed to the desk. “Tahlequah changes based on perspective.”

“Atticus Lynch. The lawyer and the executioner.”

“Hawthorne Fischadler, human trafficker. Enabler of the creation and exploitation of countless nameless children created by IVF on order by catalog and shipped with no questions.”

“Atticus Lynch. The man in a suit.”

“Thrifted suit. It cost the student eight dollars.”

“The man whose own students bought him a suit. I stand corrected.”

“I don’t teach in a classroom like your Alaraf laboratory, as you so affectionately referred to it. My students are strays.”

“…and why are you not proud of that? It seems to me you are the top of your game. A nice suit, students, and as much interrogation as you seemingly want.”

“I cannot leave.”

“Ah. That is a problem. The subject being chained to a desk clearly requires round the clock supervision by a man from Tahlequah in a thrifted suit. It seems United Kingdom successfully captured an interrogator.”

“How so?” asked Atticus.

“You cannot seem to leave either,” Fischadler replied.

Back at Alaraf, Wolfe, Mango, Bird, Matty, and Lykoi stared at the screen in near silence.

“This does not seem good,” worried Mango. His ears back slightly still did not decrease his friendly appearance.

“I find it rather ridiculous,” replied Bird, riveted to the screen.

The interrogation seemingly continued, but the opposite direction.

Fischadler continued.

“Atticus, you could have taught at Alaraf, oh you could have. Maybe even reformed it. Ah… but you do one project for the Bureau, and you don’t see things quite the same way, do we?”

Atticus said nothing.

“There was once a room full of stuffed pastel horses, books of pastoral psychology, effigies and broken instruments. It was evening. Beethoven 9th… oh bliss. Bliss and heaven. It was gorgeousity made flesh. It was like a bird of rarest spun heaven metal, or like silvery wine flowing in a spaceship gravity all nonsense now… and as Insolushied, I knew such Lovely. Pictures.” The elder man sharply punctuated the last words with emphasis.

“What makes you think that quoting Clockwork Orange at someone who has nothing will gain you at this time?”

“Maybe…. it’s a kink.”

Atticus’s entire body froze and then he whipped around to face Fischadler fully.

“Bold of you to self incriminate.”

“Bold of you to think my kink wasn’t keeping the recording from baby Lynch’s first interrogation.”

“…But it was a Kink!” exclaimed a panicked male voice from the cellphone in Fischadler’s unchained hand.

“…It was a kink!”

“…It was a kink!”

“…it was a kink!” He played on repeat, and then he let it continue.

“WHY WERE YOU THERE?!” they could hear Atticus through the phone through the cameras clearly.

“WHY WERE YOU THERE THAT NIGHT MISTER-” and Hawthorne Fischadler stopped the recording.

“Why did you leave Alaraf, Atticus? Which likely murderer were you protecting? We know it was not the Letos. You would have sold them out first. You left after the confession, not before.”

“I did not witness a murder, and you are attempting deny accuse reverse victim and offender. Again. I am not the one who lived a life of prestige upon the comfort provided by unmitigated harms.”

“This white room is the peak of luxury, thank you for noticing. I’ll have you know this outfit is of the absolute highest grade polyester, sold with care by the absolute lowest bidder to grace the wealthy flesh of every man in this facility also held in white rooms and tethered to furniture.

…Nice suit, Atticus. ”

“We return to the topic at hand. So, let’s detail the ways again you have failed.…”

Back in Alaraf, Bird started to panic.

“I don’t think he can endure this forever.”

Wolfe replied, “This has been happening for weeks.”

“Then it cannot continue,” stated Lykoi, and his eyes landed on Matty.

“I am five foot seven with no defensive capabilities,” and the other cats knew instantly this was true.

He looked at Wolfe.

“Wrong part of Europe.”

Bird, even if he could go, was less useful than Matty at rescuing anyone…even with the e-glasses and entire internet behind him. (He was very good at whining while other people get rescued, though.)

And finally, Lykoi’s eyes settled on Mango and he simply said,

“Wake up.”

Minutes later, Garrett Butler was seen on camera embracing then removing the interrogator from the room.

“If that kept going, we would have lost Atticus. He has a pacemaker,” explained Lykoi.

Through the camera, Atticus could be heard asking “Garrett, were you named after how your predecessor was murdered as well?”

Garrett John Butler was silent then they heard, very quietly…

“Evidently, yes.”