New Players In The Pattern

[Sage]

Sage's eyes went wide at the amount of food on the plates. That was like a family's worth of food. Something Nox or Christian might make for all of them to eat on. He was glad Aiden had said something he wouldn't want to feel like he was some ungrateful person after all, not that he couldn't pay for his own meal. He could and he would and if all went well he might get the chance. Aiden hadn't flinched when he touched his hand and Sage wanted to touch more. Thoughts that he shouldn't be thinking on a first date ran through his mind and conjured all sorts of images.

Aiden didn't know the half of it. And he wasn't about to tell him all of it. "So me first. Then we'll play a game." Sage said biting into the wings. He missed all the bad things about chicken wings, when a health nut cooked for you you didn't get things like chicken wings, sure chicken in buffalo sauce, but even that was something rare. Maybe when Christian cooked, but Nox did more of that because he lived on some internal clock no one really understood. Sage had never lived with people until now, and now he was at their whim. It was strange and yet comfortable. He'd found a family outside of his own. Not that they were that much of one.

Sage sat the remains of the wing down and looked at Aiden with a grim smile. "You asked about my ailment? It wasn't a sickness so to speak, my parents when I was five implanted a computer into my brain. They couldn't get funding for a human trial so they used their own offspring to power their careers forward. It worked. I can probably compute things faster than quantum computers because of the speed of thought coupled with the power of the circuit boards. But they didn't think too far into the future and the boards started to corrode and made me sick - headaches, fevers, things akin to the sickness I've heard. I came here to get it fixed. Almost died a few times except for the help of a good doctor who was like Nox - like you. She healed me enough to get me through my surgery and the replacement is spectacular."

Sage threaded another version of the facial recognition software so he could use it while he ran through camera feeds looking for Dorian. It would tax his system, but it was a good trial. A great way to test the new hardware. He'd normally throw the search for dorian on to the server but he didn't have one. Sage sighed, he did need one.

Sage picked up a rib and held it between two fingers while he grinned at Aiden. "I can tell you anything about anyone in this room." Sage nodded towards an older couple seated at the table next to them. He identified them as Mr and Mrs. Herman Volkov, "The Volkov's over there have been married for 35 years today." Sage flagged down the waitress and looked up at the pretty girl with a quick smile. "It's their anniversary today, I'd like to order them a piece of your chocolate cake. But don't tell them where it came from."

Her eyes went wide, and then she nodded. "Yes, sir. I'll bring you a bill for it."

"Thanks." Sage looked at Aiden. "I have all your public data at my finger tips. And all the private details, like the last time you saw Kyle, I used to have video footage of you and him walking into the hotel, and then Kyle following later. But all that information should have burnt when someone tried to get at it. It doesn't exist. But don't worry I'm not the type of 'voyeur' who uses the information to gain favor - most of the time. I like information, the ones and zeros coursing through my mind is like a drug. It is a drug for me. When I couldn't get to the information highway it was like torture. But the very thing could have killed me." Sage knew that this was the moment Aiden had to decide whether or not he was worth it. Sage never told people what he could do. Well except Nox, but he accepted the strange and weird with a grain of salt. His moral compass wasn't pointed in the same direction of everyone else's. It wasn't eve pointed in the same direction as Sage's. Sage knew he was corrupted by the power he possessed. He used it for his own gain. If there was anything Sage admired about any of the Atharim he'd met so far, they were as corrupted by their beliefs as he was, but their corruption was for the greater good. Yeah killing gods was bad, but not all of them believed that, he already found three, out of how many - there had to be more. Sage wondered what Aiden would say if he found out what Nox really was. But he hoped it was after Nox helped Aiden.