Reckoners 01 - Steelheart

hesitated, just briefly. “Yes,” he said. “Too bad.”
    I helped him unload the supplies, and Megan joined us, working with characteristic efficiency. She ended up doing a lot of supervising, telling us where to stow the various foodstuffs. Abraham accepted her direction without complaint, even though she was the junior member of the team.
    About halfway through the unloading, Prof came out of his planning room. He walked over to us while scanning through some papers in a folder.
    “Did you learn anything, Prof?” Abraham asked.
    “Rumors are going our way, for once,” Prof said, tossing the folder onto Tia’s desk. “The city’s buzzing with the news of a new Epic come to challenge Steelheart. Half the city is talking about it, while the other half is bunkering down in their basements, waiting for the fighting to blow over.”
    “That’s great!” I said.
    “Yes.” Prof seemed troubled.
    “What’s wrong, then?” I asked.
    He tapped the folder. “Did Tia tell you what was on those data chips you brought back from the power plant?”
    I shook my head, trying to hide my curiosity. Was he going to tell me? Perhaps it would give me a clue to what Abraham had been up to the last few days.
    “It’s propaganda,” Prof said. “We think you found a hidden public manipulation wing of Steelheart’s government. The files you brought back included press releases, outlines of rumors planned to be started, and stories of things Steelheart has done. Most of those stories and rumors are false, so far as Tia can determine.”
    “He wouldn’t be the first ruler to fabricate a grand history for himself,” Abraham noted, stowing some canned chicken on one of the shelves that had been carved to fill the entire wall of the back room.
    “But why would Steelheart need to do that?” I asked, wiping my brow. “I mean … he’s practically immortal. It’s not like he needs to look more powerful than he is.”
    “He’s arrogant,” Abraham said. “Everybody knows this. You can see it in his eyes, in how he speaks, in what he does.”
    “Yes,” Prof said. “Which is why these rumors are so confusing. The stories aren’t meant to bolster him—or if they are, he has an oddway of going about it. Most of the stories are about atrocities he’s committed. People he’s murdered, buildings—even small towns—he has supposedly wiped out. But none of it has actually happened.”
    “He’s spreading rumors about having slaughtered towns full of people?” Megan asked, sounding troubled.
    “So far as we can tell,” Prof said. He joined in, helping unload the crates. Megan had stopped giving orders, I noticed, now that he was around. “Someone, at least, wants Steelheart to sound more terrible than he really is.”
    “Maybe we found some kind of revolutionary group,” I said, eager.
    “Doubtful,” Prof said. “Inside one of the major government buildings? With that kind of security? Besides, what you told me seems to imply the guards knew of the place. Anyway, many of these stories are accompanied by documentation claiming they were devised by Steelheart himself. It even notes their falsehood, and the need to substantiate them with made-up facts.”
    “He’s been bragging,” Abraham said, “and making things up—only now, his ministry has to make all of his claims sound true. Otherwise he’ll look foolish.”
    Prof nodded, and my heart sank. I’d assumed that we’d found something important. Instead all I’d discovered was a department dedicated to making Steelheart look good. And more evil. Or something.
    “So Steelheart is not as terrible as he would like us to think,” Abraham said.
    “Oh, he’s pretty terrible,” Prof said. “Wouldn’t you say, David?”
    “Over seventeen thousand confirmed deaths to his name,” I said absently. “It’s in my notes. Many were innocents. They can’t all be fabrications.”
    “And they’re not,” Prof said. “He’s a terrible, awful individual. He just wants to make sure that we all know it.”
    “How strange,” Abraham said.
    I dug into a crate of cheeses, getting out the paper-wrapped blocks and loading them in the cold-storage pit on the far side of the room. So many of the foods the Reckoners ate were things I’d never been able to afford. Cheese, fresh fruit. Most food in Newcago had to be shipped in because of the darkness. It was impossible to grow fruit and vegetables outside, and Steelheart was careful to keep a firm hold on the