Tree of Knowledge Ch. 5 (Patreon)

DRYDOCK

There was a lot of material for me to read and learn and I took to it with gusto. My neck ached a little from all the reading but I liked books more than computer screens. I found myself in the library of both the school and the public one almost whenever I had the chance. 

I was a phenomenon, but so far nothing more than that. I tangentially held the most power of any cape in the world, but the real question came when I thought about what I should actually do with that power.

Now here I sat, a little wiser, and a whole lot less confident I my own ability to be even slightly emulate  the people I’d read about. I was no Marie Curie.  I was selfish, juvenile, had no trust in authority, and I had no self-confidence which was essential to convincing anyone of anything. I was ugly, greedy, compulsive, in a bad headspace thanks to Emma’s betrayal, and mostly just… just the worst possible person to be forced to speak for humanity when asking a bored god not to eventually kill us all.

But I had to try, because… well. No one else could. 

So I’d been reading about people. People who’d been revered for their humility. The list was surprisingly obvious. Martin Luther for civil rights, Mother Teresa for feeding those in need. Ghandi for his non-aggressive campaign to rid India of English occupation. Oskar Schindler. Paul Rusesabagina, for great personal risks. More recent billionaires like Bill Gates for his massive donations, or Earth Aleph’s Oprah. 

Okay. Great. But how could I inspire a sense of awe in him for the acts of these people? How could I make Scion be not only interested, but straight up impressed by human sacrifices and empathy? 

It was there that I began to draw blanks. These people had done great things but hadn’t done so by bringing people over to their way of thinking, exactly. They’d been impressive. They’d been giants by their sheer charisma, overwhelming financial power, sheer stubbornness, or foolhardy bravery. And plenty would disagree. Andrew Carne

Perhaps that wasn’t the way to go. Perhaps I should instead focus on the great manipulators, and charlatans of the world. I had a feeling that if Alexandria were on board with my plan she would tell me this was where I should focus. 

Just… doing nothing though? Delaying? That seemed stupid. He listened to me, practically followed instruction, so why the hell would I not try to direct him? Alexandria would just have me act like a regular person and send Scion off to fight Endbringers and that’s all. 

I couldn’t… I couldn’t do that. It just wasn’t right. Not when I could do so much more. Or at least build the foundation for doing more. 

So I read. I read until my eyes hurt. I stayed up at night and fell asleep on my books. PHO actually replaced “The Scion Girl” with “The Library Girl,” with how often I spent there. A few people – okay, a lot of people – had tried to make connections with me. Dennis and Vicky came to mind quickly but I usually just asked them to go away, citing that I was busy. Both of them were outgoing social types who seemed to like to talk to everyone, so it wasn’t very surprising that they’d tried to talk to me.

Fans or genuine victims rescued by Scion would occasionally approach, like Bradley Had.