Not Worthy Yet

I ran my hand over my disheveled and dirty hair for a moment trying to understand that then nodded solemnly as it clicked. "Right, they just didn't happen to me."

Primus shook his head again. "Remember that a Bastion of Noyanu would have united your existence with your alternates'. They were you and you were them. It happened to all of you, except that it didn't happen in all your universes."

It hurt to think about it, but I was kind of getting it. "Just in the universes of the ones in the memories?"

Primus confirmed that with a nod. I relaxed a bit at that. "So this is actually the first time I'm returning from the realm of the Aeons and weeks haven't gone by. Where did the conflation start?"

Primus folded his arms and adopted a thinking pose. The energy within me helped me deduce that he was somehow using the power of origin to access the knowledge. Not my memories, he never came near my mind, but he just suddenly knew everything that had happened to me.

"The second time you were imbued with the Aeon Genesis' blessing. You can only get blessed once a week. It can never happen twice a day. By that point you were already existing in the conflation," Primus explained, providing me with the exact point things went to shit.

At least, it was a salvageable shitty situation because it had been a training program which meant I had all the skills displayed in the memories by my alternates. Still it wouldn't hurt to confirm that.

"So now that the training program is over, I now have the skills of my most skilled alternates right?" I asked.

To my relief I got another nod from Primus. "You do but it has been locked and will be unlocked as you progress with your duty."

I froze in surprise and glared at him. "What do you mean? How could I go through all that shit and then you withhold the benefit from why it happened? What right do you have to do that?"

Primus looked a bit amused. "We are just being careful to make sure we don't give people reality altering powers and leave them unaccountable. How do we know you will perform your duty to the letter? What assurance have you given us that you will uphold your agreement?"

I frowned and scoffed. "Agreement? You say that like any of us had a choice. We didn't even get the chance to speak up or reject them while the Bastion of Finire was speaking before we received the blessings," I said, emphasizing on the last word with a hint of sarcasm.

Primus frowned at me in disapproval. "You were all there by choice. The others agreed to be Bastions and as for you, you gave me a blanket permission to do what I want. Have you forgotten that?"

I exhaled and let go of all the tension I'd held on to. He was right. I'd felt like I couldn't stop him anyway even if I wanted to so why not just see what he could do. I suppose to an alien that sounded like permission and not taking advantage of someone. Still, in a certain way I'd hoped he'd been real, that this would happen, so he may have gotten a good read on me. At the end of the day, it was technically my choice. I'd technically given the permission to be made a Bastion.

"So how do I go about unlocking the skills you people tricked me into earning," I said, now only just being bitter to maintain the familiarity of animosity.

"By doing your duty. You cannot see to all the worlds you were assigned as you don't have the powers to access them yet, still you can do your duty by protecting your home world," Primus explained, as the noise of morning traffic traveled up to the attic. "Your skills will be unlocked based on the scale of troubles and crises you successfully oppose or deter."

"I see," I said, clasping my hands together as I interlaced my fingers. "So if I like...stop a mass auto accident I unlock maybe level one skill? Stop a mass murder from happening and unlock level two? Stop a national crisis and unlock level three? Things like that?"

Primus smiled. "Ah video game analogy. Well, you are right, but your powers are not based on levels, but more like percentages. Currently you have access to just five percent. Also it's not a strictly level based unlocking process. Should you save Earth from an alien invasion tomorrow then you would find yourself fully unlocked, with unrestrained access and possession of all your skills and powers. Your access to your powers is based on your worthiness."

That made sense. But how would I even stop an alien invasion with just five percent. The answer came to me easily. I'd do it by being creative, after all wasn't that my power?

Primus took a step forward, his imminent departure evident in his posture. "My end has come. I must face death now with pride after an eternity of duty. This is the last time you will see me, but don't be discouraged. You will go through more training as the program hasn't ended but I made it that you will be able to recognize them for what they are. Also, you must choose a name to go alongside our shared eponym now, all Bastions do as I'm sure you have noted." He paused, looking contemplative and apathetic for a man whose death was at hand. "Finally, don't fail your duty. A Bastion's power can never be taken once they have been blessed, but they can be restrained as many Bastions in Purgatory discovered to their detriment."

And like that he was gone again, not disappearing but suddenly ceasing to exist in the attic. It was an effect I wanted to learn so much. It was beyond superspeed, beyond teleportation that saw you existing in two places for a nanosecond before arriving at your targeted destination in a flash. If there was a superior form of translocation then this was it. My powers clued me on to how Primus used his powers. He generated concepts for whatever he wanted done. Don't want to be in the attic? Then generate the concept of you not being in the attic anymore. Want to punch someone in the face? Then generate the concept of you having punched that person successfully in the face.

It was a level of creation I wouldn't get to even after having had access to all my powers for centuries. From what I was getting from my powers, which I was starting to suspect was an empathic link to the Aeon Genesis, the closest I would come to Primus' use of his powers without his years of experience, is by engendering favorable probabilities. But that was very shaky. It was a hit or miss and twenty percent of the time it would be a miss. That was supposed to be fifty percent, but I had reality altering powers of creation so failure with manipulating probability was greatly lessened.

Now that I'd come to understand the situation and accepted the fact that I was now a Bastion. I had several things I needed to do. The first was to choose a Bastion name, it was tradition apparently. Next I'd start practicing with my powers so I can unlock all the levels to them and maybe one day reach the level of that my alternate self who'd created a world out of nothing but a thought.

Once I have seen to the understanding of my powers then I would see about getting the thing that was driving the desperation behind my creation; I will see to getting Stiff pay for everything he did.

Let's see if taking down his precious empire doesn't push me up to level ten.