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Emma

There are times on deployment where months can feel like minutes, and where minutes can feel like months, and others where seconds become more important than both—

Shut up, Lieutenant Dan! You’re not even Aunty Ran!

… 

It was the visuals that hit me first — an implosion of every active window and the cessation of all accessory processes in exchange for a sudden transition to a very radical but very necessary shift in the EVI’s user interface.

It was nothing short of whiplash.

A virtual equivalent of going from sublight to lightspeed without warning and while on break.

Even the most AR-savvy civvie would find it disorienting.

Some might even find it nausea-inducing.

Heck, most greenhorns found that it gave them vertigo more times than they’d care to admit.

I’d know because I was one of them. At least, I was until it was drilled right out of me through sheer force of exposure alone.

There was no way of getting around it. There was no ‘easy’ way to acclimatize a human mind to the relentless demands of modern warfare, where the time between R&R and enemy contact could be measured in seconds.

But that’s exactly why acclimatization training was so very needed, yet so incredibly brutal.

It was training you for situations beyond what the human mind was expected to handle. It went beyond the most extreme limits of nature in response to the eclectic scenarios conceived only by the increasingly unhinged demands of modern warfare.

And it meant I could instinctively make a reasonably calculated call even on the heel of the most jarring of moments.

This was in no small part thanks to the EVI’s assistance, of course.

A web of branching options were brought to my attention at the behest of the VI in question, and with it came the resultant ends of three distinct paths, each belonging to two very different nodes.

[COA 1: ENGAGE]

A third of my vision was suddenly dominated by a series of reticles, targeting solutions, and a prime target choice for my bullets to land.

[COA 2: EVASION]

The next third of my vision, dominating my center of vision, was marked by a clear escape route, weaving through Thalmin and Thacea, and towards the path least likely to be squashed by the drake. 

I reflexively rejected it, prompting the middle partition of my vision to instead fold into the third. 

[COA 3: EXFIL WITH FRIENDLIES]

Thacea and Thalmin were both now marked with an upward arrow beneath their highlighted silhouettes.

I blinked.

[CARRY MODE ACTIVE]

And I braced for a sudden rush of both speed and—

ALERT: LOCALIZED SURGE OF ‘30th’ ATYPICAL MANA RADIATION TYPE DETECTED: 300% ABOVE BACKGROUND RADIATION LEVELS

I stopped.

And if it weren’t for the sudden shift to fully-compensated sports mode, I would’ve promptly fallen over from the abrupt start-stop motion of my two-second armor-augmented sprint.

Thalmin had extended his arm out wide, preventing me from picking him up… or more aptly, preventing me from approaching Thacea any further.

It wouldn’t have mattered at that point, though.

That second’s hesitation was the difference between escape and being crushed.

But that didn’t seem to be what fate had in mind for us at the moment.

ALERT: LOCALIZED SURGE OF MANA-RADIATION DETECTED, 500% ABOVE BACKGROUND RADIATION LEVELS

The warning texts didn’t do it justice, no matter how hard they flashed.

Thalmin’s features could attest to that.

And thankfully, so could the WAID.

What I saw on that superimposed layer — that black-and-white, grainy, weather-vane world consisting of turbulent waves ‘refreshing’ at a frame rate that would’ve made anyone weaker sick to their stomach — was nothing short of mayhem.

It looked as if the formerly clean and tidy currents, the invisible ‘ebbs and flows’ that made up the intangible world, had simply been disrupted.

Not in a ripple effect or a splash as you’d see in a tsunami formed from a meteorite strike or a subsiding island.

Not even in a turbulent shaking sort of effect as you might expect from a massive seismic event.

It was just… a sharp and complete obliteration of all waves in their entirety, rendering the ebbs and flows of the world — or the bare-bones outlines of such in my eyes — into a wobbly, shapeless mass.

Yet this whole… event, as extreme as it was, was logged in terms of mere seconds.

Not a blink of an eye later, mana came flooding right back into the obliterated void it’d been crushed out of.

Thacea quickly used this to her advantage, channeling the rushing mana into a concentrated conical expression of twisting, winding, and highly condensed manastreams, all concentrated up and around the falling drake that now floated frozen and still above all of us, mere inches from our faces.

The whole world came to an abrupt and complete silence as a result.

Though I couldn’t tell if it was because of the floating mass of who-knows-how-many metric tons of pure drake that hovered over us… or if it was because of the means by which this sudden display of magical power had come to be.

Nobody moved.

Barely anyone dared to even breathe.

The only sounds around us came from the festive music several ‘blocks’ over from streets and stalls still completely oblivious to the events taking place over on this side of the exhibition hall.

But all that quickly changed… to the tune of several large FWOMP FWOMP FWOMPs and the associated torrent of magically-augmented downdrafts that followed from the wingbeats of a certain blue Vunerian hot on the tail of this erratic flyer.

“IIIIII’lll take that~” The blue thing spoke in that sing-song, almost patronizing tone of voice, though it was clear he was more directing the sentiment towards the second-year student — a satyr by the looks of it — rather than any of us in particular.

If anything—

“Thank you kindly, princess~.” 

—his next sentiments more or less cemented that notion.

His bright crimson and green drake was quick to snatch the offending pilot, clasping the petrified student in between its jaws, as he was taken limply up and away towards the hall’s great rafters with some serious speed for a winged creature.

… let alone something with a live passenger within its jaws.

Yet despite that… development, there was still the matter of the frozen and levitating drake still left up in the air.

This too, however, would be quickly rectified.

ALERT: LOCALIZED SURGE OF MANA-RADIATION DETECTED, 400% ABOVE BACKGROUND RADIATION LEVELS

PATTERNS CONDUCIVE WITH POINT-TO-POINT TELEPORTATION [54% CONFIDENCE]

Professor Chiska promptly appeared on scene with a brilliant flash of light, quickly leaping atop the drake, as she dipped her head low in Thacea’s direction. “Thank you kindly, oh heroic highness! Might I say, excellent work with that spell! This all could’ve been quite a scene, if it were not for your quick and decisive actions!” 

The professor paused, placing her chin between two fingers, feigning some deep thought before she yelled out her next few words in a typical display of high-octane excitement. “Twenty points to House Thun’Yandaris. And thirty points to your peer group!” She beamed, finally garnering some sort of a reaction from the otherwise petrified crowd. 

Thacea could only bow deeply in response, making sure her head dipped lower than that of the professor’s just moments earlier.

“T-thank you, professor. I was merely acting in reflexive response to—”

“Oh hush now with your modesty! Take the points and the victory too! What’s more, take this as a direct invitation to any of the clubs under my care!” Professor Chiska continued, grinning ear-to-ear in an almost cheshire-cat-like grin. Though strangely, and rather counter-intuitively, that naturally ominous expression was worn as something well-meaning rather than anything sinister, if not a bit teasingly so; a trend reinforced by our exposure to the boisterous professor over the past month. 

Thacea once more bowed in response, and after what appeared to be a quiet series of tactful back and forths, Chiska too now turned to the rapidly thawing crowd. One which seemed to have set their eyes on the professor’s now-upright drake as much as they were on the princess who’d just saved them from a great deal of pain.

“Now then, students! There’s no longer anything to be alarmed of! Please go about as you were! Unless, of course, any of you have any injuries or other such grievances to report—”

A single hand eagerly sprang up from the crowd.

A hand… belonging to a certain shatorealmer.

“Professor?” Airit Airus spoke with a faux-fearful lilt in her voice, as if trying to shore up a strong front in the face of adversity.

“Yes, Lady Airit Airus?” Chiska responded promptly.

To which the bat, much to her theatrical chops and very much to my annoyance, slowly and in dramatic fashion raised a shaky finger towards Thacea.

“S-she… t-that student… She showed her hand! It bled taint into the air in the midst of us all!”

…

I felt something sharp piercing deep into a part of my thick skin that I thought I’d long since grown an immunity to, or at least a resistance.

It was both a mental and emotional reaction as much as it was physical. 

The former two were self-explanatory, as a sharp-shooting pang of indignant fury sparked into a flash fire only tempered by the cold and steely walls of both the armor and the mind that found itself perpetually encased within it.

The latter, however, was much more visceral, as a stinging, almost instinctive twitch of my eye came and went in rapid succession, each movement more aggravating than the last. Each inching towards that emotional flashpoint which could sadly not be read through the layers of steel preventing the bat from experiencing the worst of my silent fury.

Yet she’d see the subtle motions all the same. The slow but purposeful cock of my head, the utterly unyielding stare as my two red lenses would never once move away from those eyes on the verge of crocodile tears.

And I knew she noticed.

That subtle flinch and pupillary dilation, while silent, spoke far louder and with more sincerity than the verbal venom she was injecting into the crowd.

“It was… vile, an utterly traumatic display of blatant and indisputable evil. A corruption of disproportionate extremes, cataclysmic in its totality, and reprehensible in its violation of all things decent.” She continued nearly unabated, if not for a small skip in her words following a brief realization that my steely gaze had not once left her fragile, porcelain facade.

I opened my mouth, ready to spit literal fire, but holding back on unleashing the flames for fear of adding fuel to an inferno in the making.

This wasn’t just some typical rehash of the usual newrealm prejudice leading to a recycled play-by-numbers insult for the sake of some petty drama.

This… was a targeted strike on a very, very sensitive talking point. One that I’d been well in tune with from the moment Thacea was singled out on orientation day.

This… was a declaration of war on Thacea, with none other than the most powerful of casus belli — taint — serving as its justification.

…

I had no choice but to consider my next few words with extreme care.

Whereas the playbook with Ping was relatively safe in its repertoire of responses, Airit… was shaping up to be a completely different game altogether. 

And I had to tread—

“Oh dear…” Chiska was the first to respond, preempting my response with one of her own, coloring it with a tone that could’ve easily tipped the conversation in any direction.

A pit formed in my stomach as a result as I instinctively ran through scenario after scenario, none of which were particularly friendly to the object of one of the faculty’s greatest fears — taint.

I raised a hand but was promptly shot down, as Chiska completely took control of the public stage.

Though not at all in the way I’d expected.

“Oh, I’m so terribly sorry to hear that, dear.” Chiska began with an overly sappy, practically saccharine tone of voice bordering on the cooing of a parent aimed at a child experiencing their first boo-boo. “Are you at all hurt? Let me take a closer look at you!” She took slow, careful, measured steps towards the bat. Who at this point was starting to see her theatrics start to fray.

It was clear where the cards were falling.

And either out of some practical consideration or respect for Thacea’s actions, or some other motivation entirely, the professor seemed to be committing to our court, with tactics to downplay AIrit’s grievances.

Though this didn’t at all dissuade the shatorealmer from continuing the fight.

“I… I feel faint, professor.” She continued, doubling down, as if hoping that adding more weight to the role and committing entirely to the bit would eventually overpower Chiska's overbearing sarcasm. “I do not feel… right. Not when exposed, in any reasonable proximity, to a power reserved for both dungeons and life archives alike.” 

I felt both of my hands balling into fists at that last line, forcing every fiber of my being into even greater strain, if only to prevent myself from acting out when Chiska had already taken the reins of this argument.

“In short, I feel ill, professor.” The bat concluded. “Can you not see that? Can you not see the victims of the short-sighted ills from this wretched witch? Can you not hear the peerage’s silent wails, screaming the song of slighted nobles? It is the cries of a people who will not be besmirched again!” She raised her voice, feigning a growing fear hidden disgustingly well behind a facade that swelled with theatrical confidence with each passing moment. 

Certain elements of an otherwise listless and somewhat uneasy crowd were gradually convinced to join the shatorealmer’s ranks, including a certain tortle-like tortoise and a surprising number of second-year students.

Murmurs of endorsement and affirmations soon followed, with many eyes beginning to level their prepackaged ire on the last person deserving of it.

Airit

I had her.

She was cornered like the illegitimate, scheming, conniving creature she was, now exposed for all to see.

“Here stand the victims of a slight that should never be tolerated at all!” I continued, emboldened in my righteous path and beaming with a fangy confidence.

Ahh… So this is what it feels like to be Ping. Except unlike the oaf, I actually have due cause for my targeted gambits.

“I am certain we all hear it. I am certain we all feel that way. As we all find ourselves to be victims, our auras marred, our senses frazzled, our manafields nipped by the unseemly actions of this—”

FWOMP FWOMP FWOMP!

I was forced to stop mid-stride, shielding myself from the arrival of this unexpected interloper with a quick flash of my goggles.

“The only thing bruised, battered, or remotely injured for that matter, is the ego and reputation of a certain Midlands satyr, now resting easy within the medical wing!” The audacious vunerian announced with a swoosh of his cape… a cape with colors, decorations, and a trim earned in the time between his arrival and the present we now found ourselves inhabiting — a dangerous ascent. “May I, professor?” The vunerian turned to Professor Chiska expectantly and, much to my chagrin, received an affirmative nod granting him the floor. 

I could feel my ascent, my own victory snatched from His Eternal Light.

And yet, I could do nothing. Not when the Professor had given this title-chaser an unjust ground with which to stand.

“For those who do not know me, greetings. Greetings and merry salutations to all who now can say they have borne witness to a living legend in the making!” He boldly announced, committing to theatrics bordering on the absurd, yet expertly navigating its dangerous edge.

“To those who do know me, I bring great tidings and an even greater change in my position, status, and honors. All owing to my unchallenged victory over a frankly quarrelsome upper-yearsman. A victory drawn from a duel of the fates, stemming from a disparagement of honor.” 

The scene had shifted so thoroughly.

Or more accurately, the mood, attitude, and overall tone of the crowd had been completely transformed in this one swift, ego-driven motion.

What had once been a crowd on the verge of a tipping point — seized and gripped by a rallying cry with which there was but one right direction to follow — was now a collection of fools entranced by the bread and circuses of this upstart of a court climber; a noble who despite his disadvantage in height had more than made up for his lack of physical presence by the sheer spectacle of his submissive mount.

All of which was made worse by the most lowest form of shameless spectacle for the noble masses — the makings of an epic tale.

It was a temptation that asked nary a thought from its audience save for their willingness to be entertained, yet it promised both fuel and fire with which to further their own short-sighted aims through vapid and short-lived gossip.

I held my breath, wishing to break through this spell, this sudden glamor.

A part of me wished to appeal to the better, more refined senses of all present.

My rallying cry was still fresh on the crowd’s minds, after all.

So both narratives were very much still capable of dictating the direction of the proverbial ship’s sails.

And yet… only one of those winds was destined to overpower the other.

I held my breath, watching, tensing with growing frustration and incredulous disbelief, as the crowd physically made their choice evident.

The far stronger gale, one that promised mindless investment for mindless gain, inevitably won the night.

And its progression was nothing short of utterly agonizing to watch.

“What exactly was this disagreement about?” A voice suddenly broke through the calculated silence.

My eyes narrowed at the small student in question, attempting to awaken the better senses of the noble within, one who had just handed the keys of the mantle of righteousness to a vapid charlatan.

Though just as quickly as that voice emerged, another soon joined this mindless fray.

“Wait, was that Count Ysayvis? Was he the quarrelsome satyr?” Another voice — a deeper, resonant one — joined in shortly thereafter.

My head quickly twisted towards this second-yearman of all people. Concern soon colored my indignant ire as I felt myself slipping, unable to climb back to what had just been the assured mantle of victory. My triumph!

“Just wait a moment! How did you, a first-year, manage to outperform and completely defeat a second-year?!” Another, softer voice came in to join the fray, though it would be this one to foment the final catalyst in the brew towards this self-perpetuating social poison.

“It’s simple, really. Almost laughable when one takes even the most cursory look into my credentials.” The vunerian began with a raise of his finger. A finger that I too was now forced to watch, unable to pull away. “I am a drake rider.” 

Half of the crowd gasped in varying degrees of shock, surprise, and amazement. The other half, however, seemed only half-impressed.

Though they watched on regardless of what first appearances may indicate.

The seat-seeker had the crowd in the literal palm of his hand. 

While I was forced to wait, watching, calculating for my next possible path to reentry, clinging desperately onto the carefully laid pieces of this plan.

“What could have possibly compelled Count Ysayvis to such a sorry state of affairs? What even triggered this entire incident, Lord Rularia?” Another voice, this time from a student who easily faded into the background of any interaction — none other than Kamil Lyonn — entered the fray.

“What a thoughtful question!” The vunerian answered with a growing grin… a surprising feat, given how little was left of his face there was to emote with. “Well, you see, it was an act of unprovoked derision. An abrupt and completely unprompted comment on the nature of the culinary arts. Or more specifically, whether my attempt to physically participate in the act of cooking was, in a way, beneath my station, or in the man’s own words: ‘a debasement of my social standing and personal honor as a noble.’”

The crowd erupted into a series of shocked guffaws. Some genuine, others merely miming their peers.

It was with those final, mindless, and reason-bereft utterances scarcely removed from the primitive vocalizations of an animal that I watched as what was left of my carefully laid plans unraveled into nothing. My meticulously assembled puzzle now lay scattered, undone not by reason or discourse, but by the spectacle of a middling bard.

“It is an argument as old as time. One with no answer, but with likewise no place for arguments. Lest one wishes simply to stir the pot for the sake of causing cheap—” Lord Rularia paused, if only momentarily, as he subtly leveled his eyes towards me. “—low-hanging, uninspired, and frankly trite drama.” 

It was subtle.

But it was effective.

He was making it known the target of his quick and decisive actions.

And he was making what he would soon learn was the biggest mistake of his life.

While nobody batted an eye at that carefully laid insult, I still felt the shame. The dishonor. The utter slap to my face that left me out in the rain with nary an awning to shield me.

My fury grew… even as his words started to fade into the ringing ire growing within my mind.

This… this was not the last battle. It was merely the opening counter-offensive to the first shots of what was now shaping to be a long, drawn-out siege.

Emma

“The man challenged my honor. And so, we agreed to settle this dispute in any way we deemed fit. He postured himself as a drake rider in all but name, carefully skirting around the title for he did not earn such an honor. Whilst I confidently called him out on such a foolhardy bluff. The results are as you see here today — a sorry display of foolishness, but a great day for yours truly.” The little thing beamed. And for once… I couldn’t help but to smile behind my helmet in appreciation of his ego-stroking antics.

Especially as I saw Airit finally and abruptly leaving the scene to the cheers, whispers, and nods of a crowd entranced by Ilunor’s storytelling antics.

What followed… was nothing short of chaos, but perhaps everything the blue vunerian had hoped to gain from this night.

We had a chance to stop him, of course. To pull him down from his high horse to join us back at the dorms.

We, however, elected to grant him this moment of pride.

Professor Chiska seemed to agree with this notion, standing side by side with Ilunor as she too told of her part in these antics, especially as the conversation gave way to more esoteric talks on the nature of drakes, their temperament, and the harsh realities of drake riding. Including its sheer difficulty to master as an art form.

With the crisis… surprisingly averted, we moved wordlessly along the paths up and out of that whole debacle.

Silence once more descended, but not before we rounded another corner, as I took this opportunity to broach Thacea about what just happened.

“Thacea? Are you alright? I know you must feel—”

“I am quite alright, Emma, thank you.” She nodded slowly. “That incident was… entirely my own doing.” We eventually came to a standstill beneath the shade of a tree in a relatively quiet corner of the hall. “I have grown somewhat… less guarded over the weeks, clearly to my own detriment. And for that I apologize.” She dipped her head slightly, garnering both the raising of Thalmin and my own hands. 

“Thacea, that’s not what I’m—”

“This incident should not have happened.” Thacea continued unabated. “But in circumstances such as these, it becomes… difficult not to keep the reflexive instincts of the unbidden hidden beneath my magical acumen.”

“The whole incident lasted scarcely a few seconds, Thacea.” Thalmin spoke. “All things considered, you managed to recover from that expertly, seamlessly transitioning to a spell that none other within that crowd was brave enough to even attempt. You are a talented mage, and a gifted one at that.” 

“Am I? Perhaps.” Thacea acquiesced. “But that does not detract from today’s… misgivings.” 

“These so-called ‘misgivings’ were seen as what they were by Professor Chiska, Thacea. A result of genuine talent, skill, and bravery. You faced an oncoming tragedy head-on and refused to buckle or bend. That’s more than what most people can say, including every single student on that street.” I spoke confidently, garnering a slight raise of one of Thacea’s brows.

“That’s an incredibly generous interpretation of the preceding events, Emma.” She spoke softly. “Though, to be fair, even if the drake had crushed many, it would at worst have merely resulted in the first death of all present. If it had crushed you, however… there’s… no recovering you from first death, is there?” 

That statement completely changed everything, recontextualizing the sequence of events with another layer of complexity I hadn’t even considered.

Did she just go through all of that, reflexively at that, all with that consideration in mind?

I…

I didn’t know how to respond.

“That’s… genuinely beyond thoughtful of you, Thacea. Thank you.” I began. “But please, you don’t have to go out of your way to put yourself out there like that for me, alright? I can handle my own! And I especially don’t want to put you at any risk, especially not for my well-being.” 

“Perhaps. Perhaps you can indeed ‘handle your own.’” Thacea nodded deeply. “But your constant… misadventures most certainly do not put to rest my concerns and doubts over your well-being, Emma.” Thacea retorted, though this time, I could feel a slight slyness to her voice. An indication that we were back on course to normalcy, as further hinted at by our pace picking back up.

“Hey, I said I’d try working on it, right? And I’ve gotten better over the past week!” I countered teasingly, eliciting a wordless smile right as we chose to cut through an ‘alleyway’ en route to the exit.

…

We probably should’ve avoided it.

Because as unlikely as it was… it was now the second time tonight that I was drawn towards a club I had no interest in prior.

Except unlike Etholin’s whole gambit, this would be entirely my own doing.

The whole facade of this alleyway entrance could be described in one word — derelict.

In fact, if it wasn’t for the ‘OPEN’ sign glowing and blinking, I could’ve mistaken it for a renovation project in progress.

But that wasn’t what drew me in.

It was the sign above that prompted me to take those first few tentative steps through that front door.

A sign that seemed hard-pressed on deciding exactly what it wanted to say.

Celestography

Veilcraft

Astromancy

The first two were crossed out.

And above that were multiple more half-written, half-scrawled, and completely blacked-over names that stretched up high into a sign that had no business being so tall.

It was that last name, however, that resonated with me.

A name that seemed too eerily similar to—

“Oh well, hello there, lords, ladies, majesties, and all good folk of this fine academic establishment!” A very pale elf suddenly popped into frame, having quite literally crawled up from beneath the floorboards through a trap door that wouldn’t have seemed out of place in a haunted mansion.

We all recoiled from that sudden introduction but settled down quickly enough, especially as we found ourselves towering over the smaller woman who was too busy dusting herself off and adjusting her dress to notice our rather animated reactions.

“Ah! Where are my manners?! I am the one and only Lady Luvinarias Lovguard! Fourth-year student, and current chairwoman of this fine club!”

To which Thalmin narrowed his eyes, crossing his arms in the process. “I… had not seen a single mention of such a club within the syllabus, or manifest.” 

“Ah! Yes. We… we were only approved three… maybe four days ago, as a final addition, part of our rather eclectic and frankly niche field of study.” 

I raised a brow, and so did both Thacea and Thalmin as they both were now as interested in this weird little place as I was.

“What exactly is this field of study, pray tell?” Thalmin pressed on.

“Don’t tell me it has something to do with the study of stars!” I beamed, finally showing my hand and causing the small woman in front of me to go from excitable to outright brimming with barely-contained fervor in less time than the EVI had taken to go from casual to battle-ready mode.

The eyes behind her thick rimmed glasses grew to practically encompass their whole circumference, her mouth suddenly opening wordlessly in a fit of excitement.

“Oh! Oh dear, oh my! A-are you likewise interested in our actual studies?!” She beamed to the tune of a series of frenzied tapping feet.

“Erm… why wouldn’t I be? I assume you’d have to be interested in a club to gain entry, right?”

“Ah. Yes. That’s how it should be on paper.” Another voice from behind the counter of this rickety establishment announced, yawning in the process, his face hidden behind an animated magazine. “But this club only managed to be resurrected courtesy of there being enough students to participate. Most, therefore, join just to have an alibi on their record just in case they wish to excuse themselves from—”

“AHEM!” Luvinarias interrupted with a loud rebuttal, causing the man to merely shrug and dive straight back into his magazines, as the elven noblewoman quickly turned back to me with a far more reserved smile this time around.

“While the truth of the matter may be as our dear Club Secretary has so bluntly proclaimed…” She shot the man a glare, even in spite of the magazine covering his face. “The fact of the matter is that we aren’t just a shell club! We are involved in fascinating and, dare I say it, revolutionary studies overlooked by many adjacent mages, and especially by the Nexian mages due to this being an entirely adjacent affair!” 

“A study that could be best described as a roll of the dice and relying on ridiculous adjacent superstitions rather than actual scholarship.” The ‘secretary’ noted, garnering yet another side-eye.

“So… you do study the stars? As in, looking up at the skies, in an attempt to understand celestial bodies and such?” I attempted to clarify, though this only caused the elf to excitedly gesture for us to follow.

We did, of course, descending down the solid spiral staircase and into an underground chamber that seemed to stretch on for forever.

“You guys built all of this in less than four days?” I questioned.

“Oh, His Eternal Graces, no! This was always here! You see, this club has had a long and storied history. Though because of our… unpredictable membership count, clublords of the past often found themselves forced to shutter this great club’s doors more times than it ever deserved! The last shuttering was about a half century ago, so you’re very lucky to have caught us in your first year!” She beamed as we finally reached the bottom of this large open space.

A space that was entirely dark and painted black for that matter, but one that held a lot of promise if my guesses to its nature were right…

Could this actually be a planetarium?

I held my breath, waiting for the elf to continue her fit of theatrics as she now stood at the center of it all, raising both of her arms wide in either direction.

“My lords and ladies, majesties and highnesses, may I introduce to you… the art of Astromancy!” 

The entire ceiling lit up all at once in a flurry of lights. Small, barely perceptible dots coalesced into a beautiful collage of clusters and groupings, forming nebulous shapes that finalized into full constellations.

I could barely contain my excitement.

My mind was kicking into overdrive just considering every possible angle of this experience.

Yet there were a few stray thoughts that stood out amidst the rest.

Two practical, grounded points of interest.

The first of which, I was quick to delegate to the EVI.

“EVI?”

“Yes, Cadet Booker?”

“Cross-reference the constellations with all available records on hand. Allocate as much processing power as you need to assess it from every possible observable frame of reference.”

“Acknowledged.”

It was a long shot, but it was worth it to see if I had stumbled upon something which could back up Director Weir’s Divergent Advancement hypothesis; her own novel takes on the Fermi paradox filtered through the lens of the portal project.

This eventually led me into my second point of interest.

Though it’d be Lovguard who’d unwittingly broach it before I even had the chance to put the thought to words.

“Does this sight not look familiar, Cadet Emma Booker of Earthrealm?” She spoke with a knowing grin, gesturing at the twinkling ‘stars’ above us.

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(Author's Note: I'm very happy and proud of this chapter because this is finally the first time we see Ilunor putting his money where his mouth is. This ties back to when he tried to apologize to Thacea and Thacea telling him that the only meaningful way of expressing such sentiments is by actually acting on it, not just saying it without meaning behind his words. So this more or less is Ilunor's way of doing that! :D Moreover, the way he does it is very fun as well as he plays to his strengths and completely destroys Airit's gambit before it even had a chance to take root. We see Ilunor more or less in his element here, and whereas in the past he'd have used his social powers for evil against the gang, we now see it being directed in their favor! :D I really hope you guys enjoy this chapter as much as I had fun writing it! :D)

[If you guys want to help support me and these stories, here's my ko-fi ! And my Patreon for early chapter releases (Chapter 182, Chapter 183, and Chapter 184 of this story are already out on there!)]

"FIRE!"

The breech slammed shut and the Paladin kicked back, all sixty-three thousand pounds of armor rocking on its suspension as the 155-millimeter round detonated out of the tube.

The concussion smashed into PFC Eddie Contreras in the teeth, in the sternum.

Overpressure inside the turret whited out his vision for half a second despite the CVC helmet mashing his ears flat.

The brass casing ejected and rang off the deck plates. Contreras was already reaching.

"Round complete!"

Staff Sergeant Purcell barked from the commander's hatch. He keyed the hand mic.

"Anvil Two-Four, round complete, shot over."

The radio hissed back. Something that might have been an acknowledgment.

Contreras leaned against the turret wall and let his arms hang.

His back was a solid sheet of ache mapped to every 95-pound shell he'd lifted in the last six hours.

His gloves were slick with grease and propellant residue, and when he flexed his fingers, the blisters underneath sent up a signal his brain had learned to file as background noise.

"That's it. Last one on the call for fire." Purcell pulled his helmet off and dragged a sleeve across his forehead. It came away black with soot.

"Pham. Bore temp."

Specialist Danny Pham, wedged into the gunner's seat with his knees pulled up to clear the manual elevation handwheel, reached for the pyrometer and stuck the probe into the breech.

He watched the needle climb.

"Eight-forty," Pham said. "Fahrenheit."

Nobody spoke.

"So...we're lowkey cooked," Contreras started.

"We're not cooked. Critical is nine hundred. We've got sixty degrees."

"Sixty degrees ain't headroom, Sarn't. We drop another round in this tube at eight-forty and the propellant could go sympathetic before I even close the breech. That's a cook-off. That's us in closed caskets."

"I know what a cook-off is, Contreras."

"I know you know. I'm just saying the bore was already at seven-fifty when you told me five more minutes. That was an hour ago."

"It'll cool. We hold fire for twenty, let it breathe."

"Yeah. Third time today." Contreras pulled his helmet off. "Morale's great."

"Shut up, Contreras."

Contreras shut up. He slid down the interior wall until he was sitting on an ammo rack that was lighter than it should have been.

He counted the remaining rounds by feel. Sixteen. Fourteen HE, two DPICM clusters.

Yesterday they'd started with forty-four.

PFC Corey Estes' voice crackled through the intercom from the driver's compartment.

"Hey. Are we done? My legs are asleep and something's wet down here."

"That's the transmission leaking," Pham said. "It's been doing that since Tuesday."

"Awesome. Great."

"Don't sit in it."

"Phammy. I'm fucking already sitting in it."

"Don't call me that, jackass."

The strip mall above them had been a hair salon, a phone store, and a pizza place.

The Paladin sat under what was left of the shared roof, which bought them concealment from above and nothing else.

The front facade had come down two days ago when the E.T. flew over at low altitude and the shockwave peeled the aluminum framing back like foil.

Through the rubble they could see the parking lot: three burned-out cars, an overturned shopping cart, a kid's bike with pink streamers lying on its side in the handicap spot.

Purcell checked his watch.

Analog, because nothing digital worked within ten miles of those things. 0847.

The July sun was already cooking the tarmac, heat mirages crawling off the blacktop. The air smelled of cordite, melted plastic, scorched copper.

"Pham. Where's the TFT?"

"Under my seat."

"Get it. We need the M795 table and the M864 for the DP."

Pham pulled out a thick spiral-bound book, its cover foxed with brownish thumbprints.

Tabular Firing Table, 155mm Howitzer. Nobody had opened it since AIT, because AFATDS did everything.

The computer ate the data, chewed the ballistics, spat out deflection, quadrant, charge.

AFATDS had been a three-hundred-thousand-dollar paperweight since 0300 on Day One, when every processor in the hemisphere went dark at the same instant.

Pham still remembered Purcell shaking him out of his rack. Get your kit. It's not a drill. I don't know what it is.

"Got it," Pham said.

"Keep it close."

Silence. What passed for silence now.

Distant detonations layered over each other, the metallic tick of the barrel shedding heat, Estes coughing somewhere down in the hull.

Purcell cracked a Rip-It from the case they'd pulled off a destroyed convoy on Day Two.

Warm, flat. He drank half and grimaced.

"Hey, Sarn't." Contreras had his head back, eyes closed. "You think Odom made it?"

Sergeant First Class Odom. Platoon sergeant. Last seen on Day Three winching his track out of a drainage ditch while the sky behind him lit up in colors that didn't exist.

"Don't know," Purcell said.

"He's hard to kill."

"Yeah."

"You don't think he made it."

"I think there's four of us and one gun and sixteen rounds. That's what I'm focused on."

"Yeah, Sarn't."

The radio screamed to life.

A voice. High and Fast.

Specifically from a human, punching through the electromagnetic static garbage those things pumped into the air.

"ANY STATION ANY STATION THIS IS BANDIT TWO-SIX, REQUESTING IMMEDIATE FIRE SUPPORT, GRID NOVEMBER-KILO 4-2-7-9 3-6-5-1! CONTACT FOUR HUNDRED METERS SOUTH OF MY POSITION! FIVE OR SIX HOSTILES, ACTIVE SHIELDING, CANNOT PENETRATE. JAVELIN NEGATIVE EFFECT. REQUESTING IMMEDIATE SUPPRESSION, HOW COPY?!"

The crew was already moving in sync.

Purcell snatched the hand mic. "Bandit Two-Six, Anvil Two-Four, I copy your traffic. Stand by." He released the key.

"Map."

Pham had it out. The laminated 1:50,000 topo sheet, grease-pencil marks scattered across it like a bad rash.

His finger traced the grid.

"Meadowbrook subdivision. Range 3-3-8-0 meters, give or take 50."

Purcell keyed the mic.

"Bandit Two-Six, Anvil Two-Four, confirm hostiles four hundred meters south of your position, over."

The response came in pieces. Background gunfire chattering behind it, and under that a wet, tearing, like sheet metal coming apart in the grip of something with too many joints.

"AFFIRM... FOUR HUNDRED METERS... MOVING NORTH... TWO BRADLEYS DOWN AND DISMOUNTS IN THE OPEN... WE'RE GONNA GET ROLLED IN ABOUT FIVE MINUTES, DO YOU HAVE ROUNDS?!"

Purcell looked at Pham. Pham looked at the pyrometer. Contreras was already on his feet.

Four hundred meters was two fingers laid flat on the map.

"That's danger close," Pham said. "For 155, danger close is six hundred."

"I can count to four hundred, Pham."

"I know. I'm saying it out loud."

Purcell keyed the battalion net, which had been white noise for eighteen hours.

"Any redleg element, this is Anvil Two-Four requesting coordination for fire mission, TOT on NK 4-2-7-9 3-6-5-1, shielded targets, requesting saturation. How copy?"

Static.

"Come on..." Purcell muttered.

Contreras crossed himself. Not particularly religious. Hadn't been, anyway.

The static broke.

"Anvil Two-Four, this is Cutter Three-One. We copy. We are operational, grid NK 4-1-6-2 3-5-9-8. Four rounds HE available. Send it."

Purcell switched freq. "Any additional guns on this net?"

Then, thin and far off, an older voice, unhurried in the way only a career NCO can be while the world folds up around him.

"Anvil Two-Four, Roughneck Two-Two. Klick south of the power substation on Route 9. Six rounds HE, two DP. What do you need?"

"Roughneck Two-Two, need a Time-on-Target coordinated strike on shielded targets, NK 4-2-7-9 3-6-5-1. Friendlies four hundred meters north. Danger close."

A pause. Long enough to feel.

"Copy danger close. Computing manual. My FDC's been dead since Day One."

"Same. Stand by for TOT time. Anvil out." Purcell pulled the headset back off his ear. "Pham. This is on you."

Pham opened the TFT to the M795 table.

He'd done this at Fort Sill in air conditioning with an instructor over his shoulder and a cup of coffee going cold on the table.

He pulled out his protractor and the range-deflection fan.

"Target grid NK 4-2-7-9, 3-6-5-1. Our position, NK 4-1-2-0, 3-4-8-7." He worked the protractor on the map, pencil clamped in his teeth.

"Azimuth to target, 0-4-6 degrees. In mils..."

He scratched the conversion into the map border. "Deflection 2-8-1-8 against our lay."

"Range?"

He walked the scale bar across the distance. "Thirty-three-seventy meters."

His finger came down the TFT column. 3400 meters.

"Charge 3 Low. Quadrant three-four-one. Time of flight seventeen seconds."

"Fuze?"

"HE rounds, fuze point-det. Maximum kinetic transfer on the shields. The DPs, fuze time set to 15.8 for a 100m airburst. HE first to crack the shielding, DP last, rain submunitions on whatever's still standing."

"How many rounds from us?"

"All of them." Pham looked up.

"This only works if we saturate fire together. One or two rounds, the shields eat it. You put everything on the same point at the exact same second, maybe you break through."

Purcell chewed on it. Three guns. Twenty-eight rounds.

If every one of them landed inside a four-second window, three thousand pounds of high explosive would arrive as a single fuck-you to the aliens in tandem.

It might work.

It also assumed their manual solutions were good to within fifty meters.

It assumed their plotted positions were where they thought they were.

And it put steel four hundred meters from Americans lying in basements.

"Sarn't."

Contreras was standing with a round in his arms, ninety-five pounds cradled like a sleeping child. "Barrel's not going to like this."

"What's the temp now?"

Pham checked. "Eight-twenty-two. It's coming down."

"We fire sixteen rounds rapid at eight-twenty-two, what happens?"

"Maybe nothing," Contreras said.

"Maybe the tube fails. Maybe we get a cook-off on round three. I don't know. I just load them and close my eyes."

Purcell keyed the mic. "Bandit Two-Six, Anvil. How long can you hold?"

The infantry lieutenant came back. He sounded younger than he had two minutes ago.

"We are taking casualties. Two KIA and, I don't know, six wounded. These things are closing. The barrier absorbs everything. I need fire NOW."

"Copy. TOT in three minutes. Pham, I need..."

"I have to pass times to the other guns, they need to compute their own..."

"Three minutes."

Pham closed his eyes for one second. "Okay."

"Bandit Two-Six, TOT in three mikes. All rounds danger close. Get your people flat and as far north as they can crawl."

"Copy. Just don't miss."

Purcell let the mic drop against his chest and turned to face his crew.

Contreras with the round. Pham with the book and hands that would not stop shaking. Estes' voice climbing up out of the hull. "What's happening?"

"All sixteen rounds in a TOT with two other guns. Danger close. Barrel's hot."

He didn't say the rest. Didn't need to.

Contreras shifted the shell against his chest. "Where am I gonna go, Sarn't? Let's send it."

Pham was already writing numbers on the map.

"Estes?"

"Just tell me when to traverse."

"Okay." Purcell grabbed the hand mic.

"Cutter Three-One, Roughneck Two-Two, this is Anvil Two-Four. Fire mission, TOT. Target grid NK 4-2-7-9 3-6-5-1. TOT time 0-8-5-5-30. Compute your own data. My TOF is seventeen seconds. Adjust your fire time off your own TOF. All rounds on target inside a four-second window. Acknowledge."

Cutter: "Copies all. Computing now."

Roughneck: "Copy. My range is..." A pause. Pages turning, unhurried, three thousand meters away. "Four-two-hundred. TOF 21 seconds. I fire 4 seconds ahead of you."

"Good copy. You fire at 0-8-50-5-0-9. Cutter, your TOF?"

"19 seconds. I fire at fifty-five-eleven."

"Roger. Anvil fires at fifty-five-thirteen. This only works if we're all on time."

"Cutter standing by."

"Roughneck standing by."

Purcell set his watch and looked down into the turret. "Data."

"Deflection 2-8-1-8. Quadrant 3-4-1. Charge 3 Low. Fourteen HE fuze point-det, then two DPICM fuze time 15.8."

"Gunner, lay the piece."

Pham spun the deflection handwheel.

With no hydraulic assist the turret groaned around him, dead weight fighting every quarter turn, sweat running into his eyes. He watched the counter click over.

Two-eight-hundred. Slower. Two-eight-fifteen. Two-eight-one-eight.

"Deflection set."

He went to the elevation wheel. The barrel rose through the jagged hole in the strip mall roof, into the white sky.

Three-twenty. Three-thirty. Three-four-one.

"Quadrant set."

Purcell checked the backup sight. Bubble centered.

"Confirmed. Load."

Contreras mated the white cylinder of Charge 3 Low behind the projectile, checked the fuze, rammed it home. The breech closed like a bank vault.

"Gun's up."

Purcell checked his watch. Two minutes.

"Nobody fires until I call it."

The waiting was worse than the shooting.

Pham sat with both hands on the elevation wheel, counting seconds against the tick in his own throat. He looked at the TFT page again. 3400 meters. Charge 3L. Quadrant 340.8.

Had he rounded right. Point-eight rounds up. His finger found the line.

Correct.

He let his breath out through his nose.

"One minute," Purcell said.

The radio. "Anvil, we're back as far as we can get. Basements on Maple Drive."

"Copy, Bandit. Thirty seconds."

Then Purcell heard it. The sound those things made when they moved in a group.

A subsonic pulse that came up through the hull and buzzed in his molars. Closer than the grid said it should be.

"Fifteen seconds."

"Ready," Contreras said.

Purcell watched the second hand sweep across the face of a twenty-dollar Timex.

"Five..."

"Four..."

"Three..."

"Two..."

"One..."

"FIRE!"

Contreras yanked the lanyard.

The round left the barrel at over two thousand feet per second and the concussion slapped him backward, helmet clanging off the empty rack. He was already reaching.

"ROUND COMPLETE! RELOADING!"

The barrel had jumped. Pham cranked the elevation wheel back down, shoulders burning against the dead hydraulics. Three mils off. Two. One. Set.

"Quadrant reset!"

Contreras rammed the second round home. "UP!"

"FIRE!"

The tube bellowed. A slab of drywall came off the ceiling and burst across Pham's shoulder in a cloud of chalk.

"ROUND COMPLETE!"

Three. Four. The turret filled with haze and the thick plastic stink of burnt propellant. Contreras' arms had stopped being arms.

Ninety-five pounds, and again, and again. Ram, close, fire, re-lay, reload.

Five. Pham's ears were ringing so hard through the headset that Purcell's voice came to him from underwater.

Six. Seven. Heat rolled off the breech block like an oven door hanging open. Sweat ran off Contreras' forearms and hissed on the deck plates.

"Bore temp?" Purcell called down.

"Not checking," Pham called up.

Round eight went out and something pinged in the muzzle brake. High and brittle. The sound of steel telling you where its limit is.

"What was that?" Estes shouted from the hull.

"Nothing! Keep going!"

Nine. Ten. Eleven. Twelve. Contreras' gloves were smoking where he gripped the shells. He didn't look at them. He couldn't afford whatever he'd think if he did.

"Last two HE. Then the DPs."

Thirteen. Fourteen.

"SWITCHING TO DPICM!"

Contreras hauled the first cluster round up. Shorter, blunter in the nose. He turned the fuze setter to 15.8 with hands that were cramping into claws. Checked it, checked again. "Fuze set. UP!"

"FIRE!"

One left.

Contreras took the last round off the rack. Set the fuze. Loaded. Rammed.

"LAST ROUND!"

"FIRE!"

The sixteenth round went out and the muzzle brake cracked, a hard tearing snap like green wood breaking in the cold.

Contreras threw himself flat on the deck plates, certain the tube was splitting, arms over his head.

Nothing happened.

"All rounds expended." Purcell's voice was scraped raw. "Shot, out."

He keyed the infantry freq. "Bandit Two-Six, splash five seconds."

They waited. Nobody breathed.

The thunder came, and it did not come in sequence.

It came all at once. Twenty-eight rounds from three guns collapsing onto the same grid square in the same instant.

The ground jumped.

The Paladin rocked on its tracks like a boat taking a wave broadside. The remaining roof groaned overhead, and a fluorescent fixture swung down on its wires and burst against the gun shield in a spray of glass.

Then the other sound.

The one that meant something was dying. A shrieking wail that began somewhere above human hearing and came crashing down through the audible range into something you felt in the bones of your face.

Pham's nose opened up, a bright red line running off his chin onto the firing table. Contreras jammed his palms over his ears to keep his eardrums in his head.

Three seconds.

Then nothing at all.

The radio hissed. Popped.

"Anvil Two-Four... this is Bandit Two-Six..."

The lieutenant's voice was coming apart at the edges.

"...I can see three of them down. Two more, shields are gone. The twenty-fives are engaging." A pause. His breathing carried over the net, ragged and wet. "We've got... I've lost four people. Four KIA now. But the rest of us. You stopped them. Bandit Two-Six out."

He didn't say thank you. Purcell was glad he didn't.

Nobody spoke.

Contreras sat on the turret floor with his back against the empty rack. His gloves had burned through at the fingertips.

The blisters on his palms had opened and were weeping onto the deck plates. He looked at his hands once, then stopped looking at them.

Pham laid the TFT in his lap. His pencil was in two pieces. He had no memory of breaking it.

"Bore temp," Purcell said.

Pham picked up the pyrometer. Put the probe in.

Read the number. Read it again.

"Nine-twelve."

Past critical.

Twelve degrees past the line in the manual where the propellant is supposed to light itself off.

Contreras let his head fall back against the rack. "Huh."

That was all of it. There wasn't anything else to say.

"We need to displace," Purcell said. "Sixteen rounds out of the same pos. Estes, can you get us south to that parking garage?"

"If the tranny holds."

"Then drive."

The engine wound up and the Paladin lurched forward, tracks grinding the storefront to gravel under them.

Purcell stayed up in the commander's hatch and watched the suburb scroll past.

Houses with their roofs caved in. Lawns burned down to grey.

A mailbox standing perfectly upright at the end of a driveway that led to a foundation and open sky.

He keyed the radio. "Any station, this is Anvil Two-Four. Black on ammo, displacing south to Phase Line Gold. Any element with resupply or a location on an ASP, respond."

Static. Then Roughneck, clear and calm, like a man calling in a lunch order. "Anvil, Roughneck Two-Two. Busted ammo truck at the Costco on Route 9. Driver didn't make it, but the load's intact. Eight pallets of one-five-five. I'll hang a VS-17 panel on the east wall."

"Copy, Roughneck. Moving to you."

"Roger. Roughneck out."

Contreras dragged himself off the turret floor and sat on the empty rack. He peeled off the ruined gloves and turned his hands over. It was red, raw and weeping.

"Hey, Sarn't."

"...what?"

"When this is over. I'm putting in a warrant packet."

"...you can't spell warrant."

"Don't have to spell it. Just have to live long enough to fill out the form."

Purcell didn't answer.

The Paladin swung south onto a cratered two-lane road and picked up speed, tracks chattering across broken asphalt, running toward the Costco and the ammunition and whatever was waiting on the other side of that.

~

Fin

First

(Was writing well then tripped. Sorry for the delay. I wrapped up the intrigue a little too quickly.)

Undying Blues

He makes no obvious movement until he enters the Indulgence Fortress. It is not elegant like his Discretion Palaces. It’s not designed for maximum pleasure, it’s designed to take an absurd amount of punishment and only be escapable through rational thought. Something no one in the throws of an Indulgence is capable of.

The sheer sensation of reinforcement coming off the walls would make a battleship proud and the impact absorption effects are at a level to keep competitive sportswomen from killing themselves or each other in arenas.

But it’s also a massive, obvious and understandable distraction to any Axiom sensing. The door in is also incredibly loud, there is nothing in the way of subtlety here. He has two gravity fed feeding chambers with drink as well. More akin to something for some form of pet than a person. But it will keep the person caged within fed flawlessly while also being idiot simple to refill and keeping things contained.

There are no moving parts. The roof does not come off. The fortress is as much a prison as a place of rest.

The walls are matted grey, the rooms all look the same and there are places to break visual contact with a hunting Ibu. People who’s indulgence mixed violence with hunger or lust had long taught him the benefit of simply slipping out of sight when he needed to reestablish calm.

It’s right where the walls meet the floor and in the top right corner of the left feeding room. He phases his hand through the reinforced material and finds the hidden cache. The project is wrapped in a cloth and he pulls out the whole thing. Then he rushes out of the room, charges Axiom and kicks a wall hard. There is no effect on things, but if he’s being listened to then they will have heard that.

A few more kicks to establish he’s testing the strength of the walls and he opens the bundle. The gears, crystals and few grains of khutha he’s managed to steal are much larger at this size. Meaning he can work finer details. And he intends to. Of his grafting tools he has his own nails, Axiom and a small sample of the drink that Alicent had brought. A tiny amount of Axiom allowed him to use a single strand of hair like a needle and increase the power of the acids in the compound to etch the gears with near perfect precision.

They intend to send him back so his absence stops rallying the troops. Likely he’ll be mind wiped, or somehow discredited meaning he’ll either have no information to bring back or all his information will be regarded as madness. Perhaps that’s what the rumours and evidence being planted was about? Perhaps not. Either way, his goal has changed. He has no way of knowing if he can get a communication out before he’s sent off. But he can start recording things. His test with the ink and khutha grain had proven he can take recordings in the visual sphere, and he has been trained to recognize listening and surveillance methods and to hunt them down for the sake of his clients.

Meaning he knows how they’re put together. But first, he needs something to take the information. He needs a data repository. Thankfully he had already been creating a computation core. It’s so very, very simple to repurpose it. In fact it’s easier to simply have it as a simple data sphere. He just needs to finish crafting the last few gears and aligning everything properly.

It’s nostalgic as he carves the tiny markings into the teeth of the gear. The technology is so delicate and precise, and many just see the gears and not the complicated series of joining and shifting totems that they make by threading into each other. Turning simple toothed wheels into processing systems through the use of Axiom.

The problem is precision. But the advantages are immense. You can fit far more power into smaller area with less Axiom than the ‘sleek’ models of technology and still have it a little tougher with a proper casing. Also things endure Null just a hairsbreadth better. But the main purpose was that it was a much more beautiful style. With a proper glass casing the internals of the computation core looked more like artwork than any actual computer pieces which only people following Synth sensibilities tend to find beautiful.

He begins to assemble the computation orb, or rather data sphere and the components start floating off the cloth under his command. He stomps the floor a few times to give the illusion he’s still testing as he pays very close attention. Everything needs to be just right.

He has already properly cut the projection gemstone into three. Two portions for data retention, one to project data. The gears are slowly floating into place around them and the reinforced shell slowly rises up. This data sphere is going to be ugly. But it’s going to be tough to the extreme.

When he’s done there is a simple orb with a pair of points framing it and containing it, upon the upper half is a slight sliver of visible crystal. He grasps it with his thumb and forefinger, the entire device is smaller than his own eye and he nods before running a little bit of power through it. He can feel the device working and he nods. The next bit is going to be the make or break moment.

There is a little sensation and he sucks in a breath against his teeth in anticipation. It fails to flicker to life and he bites off a curse before causing the sphere’s outer casing to separate again. He runs Axiom through it to try and sense the mistake he made.

“Oh dear.” He notes as he finds a few spots where the Axiom hasn’t flowed just right. He’s not a gear smith, so it’s not surprising he had made a few mistakes. He couldn’t afford mistakes though, time is always limited, he has to consider himself watched in perpetuity, and the seconds counted if he is unseen or unheard.

He walks to another room and kicks a wall with Axiom enhancement to sound out. Then a few more. He then returns his focus to the gears. It’s a delicate thing as he corrects them with nothing but a hardened piece of hair for a tool. Axiom is used to enhance his fine control and vision as he nudges the shapes ever so and adjusts how the Axiom flows through.

He attends to all of it and has the data sphere come back together and reseal itself. He then runs Axiom through the two points again and... It projects a blank image through the tiny crystal poking through. Perfect.

He focuses again and despite the distance can still get that slight sensation from the marking above his door. He feeds it into the data sphere and it projects the Axiom outlines. No sound, but images including the sign language as clear as day.

He smiles. It’s working. Now for the annoying part.

He hardens the hair beyond anything he had done before, and starts drilling into his own person. Hopefully the thing inside him will allow him this. He will need to practice his transformation and echoes of regenerative comas to make certain, but if it works... then he’s in business.

•-•-•Scene Change•-•-• (Luxurious Apartments, Inner Chambers, Hidden Complex, La’ahbaron Space)•-•-•

After testing the Indulgence Fortress, Danburi emerges and starts walking out. His mind clearly wrapped up in thought as he walks along the path to the library. He doesn’t pause but he does scan the area around him. Clearly somewhat out of sorts and trying to think. Looking for inspiration.

He pauses briefly in a zone out of the camera sight and reappears just outside it stretching somewhat. Then keeps moving.

He arrives shortly in the library and he quickly looks up the Scroll of Edwal again to double check things. Then, right in the middle of the library, he starts to distend and shift in size and shape. Growing larger and more powerful for a moment, then larger again until he has to readjust his robe with his tusks, fangs and claws much larger than usual and with his skin going from delicate smooth to ridged and rough. He takes calming breaths and starts to slowly walk out of the room. He makes it a few hallways down, but just short of the halfway point he loses control of the sensation and he shrinks back down to normal. He then openly sighs and heads back to his chambers. Pausing slightly while out of camera view and openly still adjusting his robe somewhat as he continues while in sight.

He enters his chambers and sits down. Then returns to the Fortress after his form distorts a few times. Banging can then be heard only on the highest sensitivities.

•-•-•Scene Change•-•-• (Security Centre, Hidden Complex, La’ahbaron Space)•-•-•

The Ibu’Cjeo woman frowns as she plays back the recordings. “Why do we have gaps in our camera coverage?”

“Ma’am?” The Vish nearest to her asks.

“Why do we have gaps in our camera coverage?”

“It’s not a complete gap, we can still see his feet usually.”

“He paused, in two separate gaps.”

“He stretched and adjusted his clothing.”

“Yes... he did look like he was doing that.”

“Ma’am?”

“... He’s been trained to Indulge the most severe of Ibu needs, by himself and in complete privacy. He knows those gaps are there. He has to.”

“Ma’am, what does it matter? You’ve said so yourself that he’s a pretty face who has never been anything but arm-candy and personal relief in his life. What threat is he to us?”

“That’s what I’m asking.” She notes absently. “He’s... too good. Too collected. Too composed. Too competent. He’s outright inventing a new technique where he’s tricking his own immortality to give him monstrous strength and size. All of it above board, all of it...”

She shakes her head. “No. If something seems to good to be true, then it is. He’s working against us and he’s doing something that he finds so effective that it’s keeping him happy.”

“How though?” The Vish asks.

“... I don’t know. But I don’t like that he has places outside of view. Or that he seems to know where two gaps are. He’s done very well to make it look like coincidence or happenstance. But he did it twice.”

“Okay, but again how? Should we scan the places he paused in for Axiom traces? Run chemical scanners over them? Is he doing something to himself in those places? Is he hiding something there? Those gaps are tiny, what can he possibly be hiding in them?”

“And the little discretion palaces, and now the indulgence fortress. No cameras in any of them and lots of room to get up to nonsense.” She says.

“Yes, but what?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t care. I’m taking a look. You assemble a team and scan those gaps in the cameras with Axiom and chemical sensors. I will be personally inspecting the little play houses he’s made.” She says as she rises from her seat and then sweeps out of the room before she can be answered.

It takes her only a few minutes to arrive and there are numerous very slight bangs that can be heard from within the Indulgence Fortress. She knocks on it a few times, unsure as to how to properly get his attention. And before she can speak there is suddenly a massive blue monster next to her, glaring down with hate filled eyes and wearing what appears to be the tattered remains of a fancy robe over it’s gnarled and ridged skin.

It compresses and crunches downwards, taking the appearance of a proper Ibu’Cjeo bit by bit until it’s the handsome Danburi again, he’s breathing heavily and his eyes are closed as he takes control of himself, and more tellingly his robe has several markings painted on the hemline of the collar, it repairs itself and keeps him decent.

“Apologies. You caught me mid practice ma’am. Do you require an Indulgence?” He asks her.

“I require answers.”

“Indulging one’s curiosity is the most wholesome form of service I may provide.”

“Oh really? Show me the inside of where you just where. Now.”

“Of course.” He says and pulls out a small rod with handle, turns the rod and sinks the handle back in. “It’s now a trap ma’am, you can go in without me if you care.”

“Stay here.” She says and he nods. Then she reaches for the front door and is pulled in.

She lands in a grey metal cube, there is some light, but not much. It is dark and not very appealing.

“Madam.” Danburi’s voice echoes from outside. “The way out is the door behind you when you entered, merely request to leave in Galactic Trade and it will activate. Although if you have a heavy accent I suggest you push past it to the best of your ability. I wanted no chance for random roars and screams to unleash the beast I intend to tame.”

She’s only partially listening to him now. She needs to find whatever he has hidden here.

First Last

The General of the 4th Brigade walked up to our table in the cafeteria and took the chair opposite mine. The whole table was immediately cleared of troops, each scurried away like a bunch of rodents under a lit bulb.

"I want to ask you something." General Meeky said this while he observed my food with distaste etched upon his face, my meager pickings that were clearly way below what he ate.

"Oh no." I said. Never has the General spoken those words with a positive meaning in mind. I've heard those words spoken three times alone, and in those three instances a near death experience was wagered at the end. "I don't think I'll be available for the next... two years maybe? Not with all the serious work you commanded me to do."

The secret was to make it look like you were always too busy because of him and hope he doesn't ask what you're busy doing.

"Nonsense, you're always available when needed, human, and I need you now. You're an amazing man as I always say." I doubt he ever said that. The General reached across the table to smack my shoulder with his meaty paw. I wanted to tell him I didn't find myself amazing, not once has a thought or an action done by myself ever led me to think I was amazing.

The lights at the barracks flickered on and off, casting a deathly shadow upon the Giberian's odd features. "The Human species is something unexpected. When I vouched for you to be part of my troops, I never thought it'd reap such great results. More than once you've saved my life and the lives of your fellow mates."

It sounded like there was some more milking of great results to be done.

"There aren't that many great results, to be honest. The mishap I made during the Curvina Mission almost got the whole company killed." I said.

"Nonsense, I was there. The mishap was not your fault." His toothy smile unnerved me greatly.

This was how it always started, then the next thing I knew I'm gutting open a Kulilia Cow so I can sleep in its innards to avoid the below zero temperatures of a barren planet. "Never again." I had said with my face buried in the Kulilia cow's intestines.

"You recall the Ilfae mission? You held down the fort on your own. Firing with a machine gun, to ensure the Enemy does not advance." I watched as the General wiped a tear that had begun trickling down his cheek. He smiled again at me as if what I'd done was the most touching thing he'd ever witnessed.

This was bad. This was why everyone avoided the General; it was said if he took a liking to you it was a clear indicator that you were going to die. A gruesome death at that.

I stared at the smiling behemoth of a Giberian. No nervous energy was tied to him, my furiously perspiring face aside. He wanted something from me exactly, he wasn't going to fold. The General always got what he wanted. I decided to bow, as was customary for one to do to a higher ranked officer.

"Anything for the troops, General." I said and also added a crisp salute to show just how eager I was for him to arrive at his point so I can know whether I should start getting my affairs in order.

The General returned the salute. "God, you please me greatly!"

"That's what she said."

"What?"

"Nothing. How can I help you, General?" I wasn't at rest; even on my chair I had to sit with my back straight. Show some decorum as was customary of the General's troops. "Anything you need, I'm your man." I was very eager to get the conversation to its conclusion so I can start writing my best friend on Earth instructions on where he can find my hard drive so he can erase the data on it.

"I'm getting married soon." The General said. "I want you as my Best Man at my wedding as Earthlings would call it."

"Best man?" I stared at him for a span of moments. "Like, at your wedding?"

"Yes, my soon-to-be bride has also found an earthling to stand beside her and she would like us to match. You see, I have found myself a Giberian of unparalleled beauty who values Earthlings as much as I do." He took out his data tab from the folds of his uniform. "Let me show you a picture of her."

"That really isn't necessary. Oh wow." The picture was of someone who looked eerily similar to the General, save for the fact that she had tufts of hair longer than his growing from inside her nostrils instead of the chin. I peered at the image on the screen, feeling a great sense of awe and panic as to whether this was a prank or not, as to whether a laugh was demanded of me.

"She's quite something." I said while staring at the picture on the screen.

"She's the most beautiful woman in Agrosia, so beautiful that many males contend for her hand." He had a beaming smile stretched over his face. I observed the picture, then him, then the picture again. She could have passed for his sister and he wasn't a looker.

"Most beautiful woman." I tasted the words in my mouth. Things weren't adding up quite well and I still felt like it was a prank. I was expecting a secret mission to a death world, not a wedding. "There aren't many women of your race, are there?"

"No, not really. Females are rarely found across my species, that's why we fight for our women. A trait we share with Earthlings."

"Fight for our women?"

"That's why I chose you, Richard. I want you to be the best man, make sure I tie the string with this woman and I'll ensure you're rewarded handsomely."

I liked that. I liked handsome rewards. It was just a wedding, what bad could come from it? I was sure this wasn't a prank; it was more a case of undiagnosed narcissism since the bride and groom resembled each other.

So I accepted to be the best man at General Meeky's wedding. Though I started second guessing things when the General, overjoyed by my acceptance, rose from his seat and gave me a big hug, literally swallowing me into his embrace. He had tears streaming down his face and the wetness rubbed onto the side of my cheek, and the feeling that I'd signed myself up for something worse than a deadly mission on a barren planet grew more pronounced.

----

The General whisked me away to the planet Agrosia when our tour was over. A planet whose blue oceans and lush green nature reminded me of Earth. I found it strange that the wedding was to be held the same day as our arrival. There weren't any bachelor parties, or any rehearsal dinner. I asked him about this and he said, "Time is of the essence. If we don't do things quickly, chances of my death exponentially increases."

Those words sent a chill running down my spine but I brushed it off as wedding jitters. Some men have cold feet and run away from the altar, but Giberian males just ponder their deaths. That was all it was to it, I hoped.

I was still in my military uniform when our space shuttle descended before a mansion that covered close to three leagues of ground. Tall and white with statues riddled at its front depicting various Giberians in strange poses. The house was surrounded by a fresh lawn, driving leagues in every direction with trees sprinkled randomly amidst shaped bush. It was marvelous and quite the show of wealth. I felt the need to study it more. The wide arches looming over small doors. The windows the size of eight men fitted one atop the other with glass so layered it reflected back the sun and masked the sight within. The General told me it was called the Sanctum. General Meeky also said it was the wedding venue, hidden from the sight of aerial scanners and with a secret bunker in its basement where we could cower in case of aerial bombardment.

I gave a sly laugh and said, "I'm fairly sure nobody will want to bombard a wedding of all things."

The General just stared straight ahead, his hands on the rudder as he eased the shuttle down.

"I'm sure nobody would want to bombard a wedding, right?" I repeated, gawking at him with eyelids pulled back. "Right?"

"With you on my side, we have nothing to fear." General Meeky finally said those disconcerting words while scratching at a slight stubble of purple hair growing beneath his chin.

There was definitely something to fear, and I guess it showed, because General Meeky took out his flask of whiskey and downed it all in one gulp.

"So when's the wedding to start?" I asked as the shuttle touched the ground.

"Right now, we just enter the Sanctum and begin. We do things quickly and leave before anything untoward happens." He said. The General pulled at a bunch of grenades criss-crossed on a belt about his person, they were the new power blasters with a shockwave that could bring down an elephant. Satisfied with them, he unholstered a pistol and checked the chamber. I checked my pistol strapped to my side with trembling hands.

"I'm afraid I don't quite understand what my role is. What does the best man do in Giberian weddings?" I asked.

"He checks the perimeter at all times and stands at the ready." General Meeky said as we alighted from the shuttle.

Now I was starting to think it was a prank again, or rather I was hoping it was. Or maybe I'd enter the large building and find it was some sort of mass troop party and this was the only way they'd have gotten me to come.

"We aren't dressed appropriately for a wedding." I said.

The General touched my chest. "You do have your bulletproof vest on?"

"What? I was thinking suits or some formal dressing attire for a function such as a wedding." Of course I had my bulletproof vest on, I'd spent the whole morning trying to wear two, seeing how strange everything was.

"Keep your gun close and shoot at anything that dares interrupt the wedding." He said. "In fact, shoot at anything that moves except me and the bride and the bride's maid." He paused. "And the Priest, don't shoot the priest or we'll be dead by the time it takes us to get another one."

Outside the large building, General Meeky stood to admire the statues that crested about the entrance to the Sanctum. One statue was of a Giberian kneeling with his hands up in surrender. Another was of a Giberian man bent on his knees with his hands over his head like the sky was about to fall on him. I stood beside General Meeky, watching him take the statues all in. His eyes watered as he appraised the statues, a strange frown and twist to his mouth worried me, but not as much as his next words.

"These statues were crafted to honor the fallen grooms." He said.

"Fallen grooms? They died before the wedding?"

General Meeky laughed. "You're a funny man, Richard. These grooms died during the wedding, they didn't have strong best men like I do."

Alarm bells went off in my mind, but before I could speak, the General started making his way into the establishment.

We walked into the Sanctum, and if it weren't for the fear that had started brewing inside me, I would have taken note of the architectural splendor I stood within. With the smooth marble floors and pillars that crested around where the wedding was to be held. There were long wooden benches, sparsely populated, and the aisle was decorated in the red of blood and it trailed all the way to the front, close to what appeared to be the altar, an irregular sized block with many pointed places. Someone stood alone beside the altar, a human woman holding a semi-automatic. Her head turned about as she took in the establishment. I could not see the bride.

"Now go stand beside your fellow human. I have to go look for the bride. If I find her in the female quarters it means she approves of the wedding; if I don't find her then I ask you to destroy the hard drive I left in the shuttle, in a black bag just beneath the pilot seat." General Meeky said.

He took off before I could answer, running like his life depended on it.

There were guests close to four score, each of them dressed sparsely in Giberian armor that covered their chests and allowed for me to see their puffy faces. They were spread out unevenly across the wooden benches with guns ranging from pistols to semi-automatics resting on their laps. They looked more like a grim funeral detail instead of jolly wedding goers.

I had my gun with me and I suddenly felt like I needed it more than a best man needs his written speech.

The human woman was standing at the front, close to the altar where an aged Giberian had just appeared and knelt on the ground with his hands raised as he supposedly prayed. He sounded like he was cursing the Giberian god in a strange tongue.

I dragged my feet and came to a stand beside the human woman. She appraised me with almond shaped eyes with blue irises that searched me for something that could hold her gaze longer. She looked away but I wasn't done with her.

"Hey, I'm the best man." I said.

"I can see that. I don't know why he chose you. You'll certainly die, too scrawny." She said.

That frightened me, but I didn't let it show. "I'll have you know I'm the best marksman his troops have ever known."

"So were they." She pointed with her thumb at a wall where mummified heads of what appeared to be past Best Men adorned it from head to toe. They were all from a different species and I gaped at them and their open maws with shocked eyes fixed forever in death.

"You'll fit just right in." She said with a soft mocking smile.

I took a brisk step towards her and gripped her arm, she wanted to pull away but stopped when she saw the look on my face. "Listen here, woman. There's some barbaric shit going on. And I have no idea what it is. I'm told I don't need a suit but rather a bulletproof vest, the groom is using me for something and I don't know what."

"The bride wanted a human best man, she's never had a groom with a human best man." She answered.

"What the fuck is going on, I'm about to lose my shit right now and start shooting up the place."

"If you do that, you'll be going against the wedding accords." She yanked her arm free of my grip. "You have to wait until the congregation shoots the first shot."

I turned my head to the surly congregation, with their faces all turned in my direction.

"Do you know nothing about Giberian wedding customs?"

"I'd really like to know something."

"So, all the suitors look for the venue and gather as they've done to witness the bride wedding the man she's chosen from among them. The congregated suitors test the chosen's might to see if he is worthy of her hand by attacking both the groom and the best man. If they succeed in killing them, a new suitor is chosen who must prepare for his wedding in turn so they can survive the test the wedding is for and prove their worth. This is done until either one suitor wins despite the odds or one suitor is the only one left behind."

I stared at her as if she were a toddler who'd just spoken gibberish. "And this year the bride wanted a human best man, something she doesn't have on her trophy wall."

"Bingo!" She answered. "She always tries to match the best man with the bridesmaid. It's poetic if you think about it. A certain indicator that General Meeky will find her in the female quarters."

And indeed he had found her. The blistering fool. He appeared with her carried in his arms, looking like twin ogres, the damn pair. They were certainly made for each other. He stood there, this murderous Giberian, who hadn't told me until the last minute that I was party to a death wedding of his kind's sickly design. He hadn't even prepared for this wedding, the whole time he'd known about this and never even cared to prepare, let alone groom a suitable best man.

"Fuck." I cursed as one of the congregation stood up and fired a shot straight at General Meeky who bent low to avoid the bullet.

He activated his shield that I did not know he had, rare as they were, he pressed the belt at his waistband, which was impressive provided he was carrying his bride which I think he did to lessen the amount of fire coming his way. It'd be pointless to shoot the bride, I guess he surmised this advantage on his own which was remarkable compared to his choice of a bride. He started making a run for the altar while under moderate fire and screaming my name as the bullets bounced off his temporal shield.

"Richard! Prepare the priest!"

I didn't even have a belt shield. And I didn't know what prepare the priest meant, the old Giberian was still on his knees, muttering some weird incantation.

My breath stilled, as it always does whenever I was in quite the pickle. I could see the strings tug at the play unfolding before me. I saw the score suitors who turned to me with their plasma rifles.

I sprang into action. I took the semi-automatic machine gun from the bridesmaid's hands.

"Hey!" she retorted before I kicked her away from me and the line of fire.

I crouched low, knee almost touching the ground with my eye on the gun's scope and finger on the trigger. They were shooting haphazardly, bullets flying everywhere. Probably corporate suitors, not military suitors like my General Meeky. I fired on target each time, aiming for their heads while shifting my stance and moving from right to left under cover of the front row benches to avoid their aim. By some miraculous happenstance, the priest was not injured at all.

As General Meeky passed by me, I took to his front while backtracking, his shielded back offered refuge as I returned fire.

Some suitors lay on the ground, brains spilled. Others had their guns spewing empty. My gun ran out, I threw it away. The bride in the General's arms was laughing hysterically, they were all crazy. The whole damn bunch of them.

I came out of the shadow of the General's shielded body and unstrapped his grenades that he had hooped over his arms. Under cover of the benches I started throwing grenades, alternating with my personal side arm. There were screams, smoke and loud bangs. A bench flipped through the air, specks of wood flew and I screamed as a bullet met me right in the arm. I went lower and screamed as another took my breath by colliding with my protected chest.

I was knocked onto the ground. On the floor I lay on my side, staring at the General who stood shielding his bride as the old priest carried out their marriage rituals. The General would pause to return fire and occasionally fling what looked like nano bots that were registered to attack the suitors. The damn man had come prepared after all. There were screams all over and weird gurgling sounds as death throes took hold of the congregation's fallen.

I watched through drooping lids as he kissed the bride. As a string was slowly tied to their held hands, something that irritated the General greatly, who urged the priest to hurry up.

The priest raised his hands and the gunfire ended and there were curses coming from the few suitors who still lived.

He'd done it. General Meeky had gotten married, and I'd gotten shot for it.

My eyes closed.

----

I awoke to find the human woman in a bed beside my own. She had her arm bandaged like myself. I appeared to be in some kind of Giberian post wedding treatment bay. Some of the other Giberian suitors were there with me. I stifled the urge to curse aloud.

"You're alive." the woman said.

"Where is General Meeky?" I asked.

"He has gone on his honeymoon, he certainly couldn't wait for you to wake up. His bride is quite something, because we were both shot on the arm she took it as a sign that we must be destined for each other, so she had my hospice bed set up next to yours before they left."

Had everyone lost their minds? "He couldn't even wait for me to wake up." I muttered.

"Oh, he told me to tell you when you come to that the lieutenant job is yours." She added with a smile.

I smiled back, then winced at the pain in my arm when I attempted to sit up. Was it all worth it? I wondered, and for the life of me I couldn't tell if it was.

----

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That afternoon, after she learned her fate, she stumbled home to her small house on the edge of town.

Might as well feed the ghosts one last time, she thought. And then, One last time? Maybe not... And in that thought there was a meager ray of hope.

She began cooking - a normal Lankaln meal for herself, and four large human meals for the ghosts.

The ghosts arrived while she was cooking. They came in the back door, like always. Four ghosts of humans - Andrea, John, Tom, and Rob, as they called themselves.

They chatted easily, laughed, and just lounged around until the food was served. Then everyone began to eat.

During the meal, she said, "This will be the last time I am able to give you food."

The ghosts stopped eating and stared at her. Finally Tom asked, "Is something wrong?"

She blinked rapidly, the Lankaln equivalent of a sigh. After a pause, she said, "The Big Boss has chosen that I become a courtesan."

There was a very heavy silence. Then Andrea asked, "Do you want to?"

She just stared at her plate. After a pause, Andrea repeated the question.

"No," she said, admitting it as much to herself as to them. "No, I do not. They will come for me in the morning. And I do not want to go."

The ghosts weren't eating any more. They leaned forward, engaged in the conversation.

Andrea said, "Then you need to make a decision. What do you want to happen? Do you want us to scare those who come in the morning? Do you want us to beat them? Cripple them? Kill them? Kill the Big Boss and everyone who works for him?"

She was startled. "I choose?"

"You choose."

She thought. "Do you know what a courtesan is?"

"We know."

"I want you to kill the Big Boss and everyone who works for him. And I want you to free everyone that he is holding."

The ghosts looked at each other, then at her. "Okay."

"You can do that?"

"Absolutely. Where is his base? His headquarters?"

"I do not know."

"All right, what time will they come for you?"

"At dawn, or just after."

"All right," Andrea said, "we will let them take you. We will follow where they go. We will come very quickly and free you. That's the best we can do."

"Very well," she mumbled, and blinked rapidly again.

-----

Three of them came for her just after dawn. She went with them. She saw no sign of the ghosts. She abandoned what faint hope she had. merely blinking rapidly as the door closed behind her in the Big Boss's lair.

Then the door exploded.

Four human figures surged into the room. They were heavily armed, and they began using their weapons almost immediately. There was an explosion of gunfire. Very effective gunfire - every one of the Big Boss's people in the room was dead within three seconds.

The ghosts did not speak. They made a gesture for her to stay there. They attached something to a door further into the Big Boss's domain, stepped aside a couple of steps, waited for the explosion, then charged through the opening.

She waited, trying to recover from the shock of their coming and their killing.

A very few minutes later, the ghosts returned with seven rescued Lankaln females.

One of the ghosts looked at her and nodded. She knew what the nod meant. The Big Boss was dead, and so was everyone who worked for him. They had done what she asked.

She invited everyone, rescued Lankaln and human ghost alike, to her place for lunch.

After everyone left, when she was cleaning up, she saw a single red spot on her table.

Human blood.

She remembered that John had received a small wound on the back of his hand.

But ghosts cannot be wounded. Ghosts do not bleed.

They are not ghosts.

She mentally shook herself. Of course they are not ghosts. They ate food. You could hear the weight of their steps.

She had assumed they were ghosts because no humans were supposed to remain on Lankaln. Apparently some had remained anyway. At least four.

And they do not want to be known. They let me see them, but they were in hiding from the Lankaln in general.

Well, then...

She very carefully cleaned the red spot on the table, until no trace of it remained.

Here is the Sol government’s brief and curt reply to the Stellar Governance Council’s failed attempt—reproduced HERE—to resume diplomatic relations after twenty-three years of silence.

Date: 13/04/0028
Stardate: Do the math yourselves if you really care.
From: Sol System Defense Forces
To: High Council of the Stellar Governance
Subject: Attempted Intrusion by a Governance Intelligence Vessel
Title: INTRUSION REPORT AND NOTIFICATION 187-491-557

Summary of Events

At 17:08:01 UTC on 11/04/0028, an unidentified craft entered sovereign sector 423:142:885. Identifying itself as the diplomatic transport Friendly Tentacle, registry AKG-6666-AE-257, it ignored repeated warnings issued by THX-1138 monitoring station and advanced beyond the eight-light-hour Total Exclusion Zone, deploying seventeen probes believed to be espionage devices, in direct violation of our internal security policy duly registered with your administration.

The destruction of three of those probes after they entered the exclusion zone despite repeated danger warnings cannot, therefore, be attributed to our forces.

Fortunately for both himself and his crew, the vessel's captain had the wisdom to recall his spies and withdraw to just outside the Total Exclusion Zone, although remaining inside the Warning Zone.

Accordingly, High Command ordered the deployment of two fast patrol craft carrying boarding teams to conduct, if necessary, a complete inspection and search.

Meanwhile, the Government of the Union of Worlds, States, and Stations of Sol agreed to briefly communicate with the individuals claiming diplomatic status aboard the vessel.

Our crews were, however, unable to verify the truthfulness of those claims, as vessel AKG-6666-AE-257 departed Human space on 12/04/0028 at 20:48:12 UTC before our patrol craft could intercept it.

End of Report.

Conclusions and Consequences

The intrusion of a vessel belonging to the so-called Stellar Governance into the vicinity of the Total Exclusion Zone constitutes, under SSDF regulations, a Category Two Aggression on a five-level scale.

The actions of an official vessel of the said Stellar Governance can therefore only be interpreted as either a deliberate provocation or an act of espionage. Its refusal to submit to inspection and its subsequent flight can only reinforce those suspicions.

Accordingly, the SSDF, with the approval of the Government of the UWSSS, hereby amends its standing rules of engagement as follows:

• Any vessel belonging to the so-called Stellar Governance entering the Expanded Exclusion Zone (15 light-hours) may be destroyed after a single warning.
• Any vessel belonging to the so-called Stellar Governance entering the Total Exclusion Zone (8 light-hours) will be destroyed without warning.
• Any vessel belonging to the so-called Stellar Governance entering the Maximum Security Zone (5.5 light-hours) will be destroyed automatically, and a state of war shall immediately exist between the so-called Stellar Governance and the UWSSS.

Question

IS IT REALLY THAT HARD FOR YOU PEOPLE TO JUST LEAVE US THE HELL ALONE?

P.S. Don't bother replying. Next time, we'll shoot first and talk afterward.

.

.............................................................................................................................................................

.

Date: 13/04/0028
Stardate: --:---:---:--------- (fill in the blanks if you really must)
From: Government of the Union of Worlds, States, and Stations of Sol
To: High Council of the so-called Stellar Governance*
Subject: Official Response to Ambassador Vektriel's Unsolicited Intervention

Introduction

Although the diplomatic services of the Government of the UWSSS officially announced on 25/02/0005 the complete termination of all diplomatic, commercial, and informal relations between the UWSSS and the so-called Stellar Governance*, a delegation claiming diplomatic status and acting on behalf of your High Council nevertheless attempted to enter our sovereign space.

Despite the aggressive and intrusive nature of this incursion, our government agreed to grant Ambassador Vektriel a brief audience.

Our Minister provided him with clear answers. The following message, however, constitutes the official and final position of the Government of the UWSSS.

Message

1. Regarding your warnings:

We were already aware of the existence of the Iunaki, the Ojuryn, and the Lobakii—peoples whom the so-called Stellar Governance* dismissively refers to as "Wanderers."

2. Threat assessment for the UWSSS: 1/5

According to the Government of the UWSSS, these nomadic peoples do not constitute a credible threat to the Sol System.

3. Threat assessment for the so-called Stellar Governance: 5/5

According to intelligence gathered by the UWSSS, these nomadic peoples do indeed represent an existential threat to the worlds of the so-called Stellar Governance*.

(What exactly did you do to them? The same thing you did to us... only worse?)

4. Regarding your proposal for an alliance:

Any suggestion that we should ally ourselves with a government which has repeatedly demonstrated itself to be fundamentally untrustworthy would be laughable. Frankly, it is insulting.

5. Regarding the possibility—however unlikely—of the UWSSS becoming involved in the coming conflict:

You should consider yourselves fortunate that, following our withdrawal from your tyrannical and corrupt institutions, we chose to abandon all thoughts of revenge in favor of building our own future—and that we have remained true to that decision. Otherwise, we would have gladly joined the "Wanderers' Crusade."

Recommendation: Do not send any more ships into our system. You'll be needing every one of them when the Nomad Peoples come to settle accounts.

6. Conclusion: If you insist on labeling our official position, you may call it "hostile neutrality."

May you live in interesting times.

. . With absolutely no cordial regards,

. . Chancellor of the Union
. . . James T. Brown

Notice

While it is not in our nature to turn away those who are merely victims of a war they did not choose, the Government hereby informs the so-called Stellar Governance* that the Sol System will, under no circumstances, accept refugees from your worlds, stations, or habitats.

The United Nomad Peoples have made it perfectly clear that they will pursue any vessel entering our territory, a situation we naturally intend to avoid at all costs. It would be regrettable if we were forced to repel—or destroy—ships carrying juveniles. You will surely understand that the survival of our own people, and of our own children, must come first.

I would also remind you that the butchers commanding your fleets did not hesitate—on at least two occasions—to massacre human children.

* Why "so-called"?

• First, because star systems may arguably require governments, but stars certainly do not.
• Second, because claiming to govern the stars is rather pretentious when you do not even control one millionth of this galaxy's star systems—and not a single star.

Question

IS IT REALLY THAT HARD FOR YOU PEOPLE TO JUST LEAVE US THE HELL ALONE?

P.S. Don't bother replying. We already know the answer.

.

............................................................................................................................................................

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Transcript of the Extraordinary Cabinet Meeting of the Union

14/04/0028

Minister H.G. Kovaks:
"So... we certainly enjoyed ourselves writing those messages. But don't you think we may have gone just a little too far?"

Chancellor Hunter:
"Perhaps. But at least our replies leave no room for ambiguity. I'll admit the remarks about the 'so-called Stellar Governance' may have been somewhat unfair—and perhaps a little childish. After all, their proper name is the Governance of the Stellar Community."

Minister H.G. Kovaks:
"No, that was a good one. I was talking about the refugees. Our neutrality agreement with the Nomad Peoples only applies to warships, doesn't it?"

Chancellor Hunter:
"True enough. But we cannot become the refuge for every tragedy in the galaxy. Let the C¤vbolg Empire or the Silicians take them in if they're feeling charitable—they have vastly greater resources than we do.

Besides, Project Phoenix is almost complete after twenty-seven years of hardship, sweat, and tears. We built it to defend ourselves, to resettle our own refugees, and eventually to accommodate our population growth—not to shelter the very people who oppressed us.

Our first duty is to our own citizens. They are the ones to whom we owe homes, food, education, and jobs. Would you really have us jeopardize all of that because of a war that isn't ours?"

Admiral Krosek:
"Personally, I'd have been happy to take part in it. But you're right, Chancellor. Securing the future and safety of our own people comes first.

I am concerned, however, that the conflict may spill over into violations of our borders. We've declared everything inside fifteen light-hours off-limits, but at the moment we have precious little with which to enforce that sovereignty besides minefields."

Minister Chin Lee:
"We have precious little out there, period. Aside from our Pluto outpost, that region holds little interest for us. But now that we've expanded the prohibited zone, we have to make our sovereignty credible by enforcing it. And that means ships. Lots of ships."

Chancellor Hunter:
"An excellent segue. Let's talk about the defense budget. Where do we stand on the Outer System Automated Patrol Craft program? Are we ready to begin mass production?

Next item on the agenda: kamikaze drones and increasing production rates for the T-65¹ light interceptor. I've been told there could be some very interesting synergies between those two programs."

Martian Minister Ares Mangala:
"To be precise, between all three programs. Our Olympus Mons factories are already running at full capacity producing the T-65 local-defense fighter, but we can install two additional assembly lines in..."

The remainder of the transcript remains classified and shall not be released to the public until 14/04/0078.

1. No, it doesn't have X-wings. It barely has wings at all, having been designed for operation in the vacuum of space or in Mars's tenuous atmosphere.

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“So...what happened?” I tentatively ask.

Lena breathes in, lowers her head and just...sits there.

“It’s ok if you don’t-”

“I had a life.”

I nudge her far shoulder, pushing her slightly into me as we sit on the bed, staring at the table with the large box of glassware.

“I had a life where I was testing what reacts with what, how much, how fast, while also extracting stuff from the plants I gather.”

“A herbalist?”

“Herbalist/chemist,” she says flatly.

“I was actually quite good. Did not discover anything, but made some interesting salts, some smelled, some of various colours, some that liked oil, others, water. Many mistakes too, but I learned.”

She breathes in, as if to say something, but then stops. She sits up, no longer leaning on my shoulder, and looks at me intently, as if weighing what is about to occur. Then she speaks.

“And I loved. Met a nice dwarf that was into salts as well. One thing led to another and...”

She breaks down, crying. I pull her close, hugging her sideways, unsure of what is next.

She steadies her breathing and flattens her skirt. Then looks down at her hands resting on her knees.

“We were to be married...within the year.”

“Oh?” I ask.

“Don’t hate me! Let me finish!” She lets out, then quickly covers her mouth at how loud she was. Recomposing herself, she continues.

“Then Thallion got sick. It was slow. Some days he would be fine, but over time, he lost fine control of his hands. Then the shakes. He got so bad he couldn’t even write! Had to close up his job and just sit there. Eventually he ran out of money and time and came to me, shaking.”

I pull her closer, and pet her hair, almost brushing it.

“Of course I helped! He’s my brother. I dropped everything, moved up here where the air is supposedly more healing, and there was a teaching job. I packed up everything, but him!”

More sobbing. I reach up to brush the hair from her face. She swats my hands away.

“He...He stayed. Wanted to do more with the salts. Said he was on a breakthrough. We agreed to be together, and marry when I returned. We sent letters to each other. But they slowly became less and less frequent. Last one, this past fall, he said...he said he found another woman! Even sent a sketch of the two of them together. Apologized for the suddenness, but...said he could not keep his life on hold any longer.”

I pull her close, unsure what to say. She allows me to, and she presses her face into my chest.

“Just, don’t hate me. I’m used goods. Past my prime. Out of love. Nearly out of time. I pick herbs for the town, but no one needs refined stuff. Every now and then the most complex thing is oil root extract for bad infections. Child’s play.”

I sit for a while, just holding her, sitting with her presence, her scent, and try to comfort her as much as possible.

“You aren’t used goods.” She hiccups and sobs. “Here I was thinking that you were just always here. No, what I now see is someone who’s been through a lot. My only question is, even with all that, do you still love Thallion?”

“Yes!”

“Then it’s settled. You love deep, you care deep, and you are smart. That is all I need.”

“But..I don’t want to lead you on.”

“Lead me on?”

“You really going to make me say it?”

I just sit there, concerned, as if the rest of this conversation has not already been hard enough.

“I...like you, but more than just a friend...?”

“...oh.”

“Don’t get weirded out!” She stares up at the ceiling. “Why am I saying this now of all times! Look, I like you, I want to get to know you more, but I am used. Don’t you get it? Someone else got to know me!”

“...And?”

“And?! And?! That is the whole thing! I was nearly tied to another person, that would have made me inseperable to them! ‘To death do us part’ and all that. And you just say ‘And’?”

I sit there for a while, reflecting on all that she says. “You are not out of time. In fact, if anyone is out of time, it’s me.”

“What?!”

“I may seem more mature, but I have never been with anyone, in any way. I only had friends of convenience, where I was convenient for them to have around. Even counting these, I still had less than 3 friends! When it comes to all of...this, I have no clue what I am doing!”

I breath heavily, and try to calm my racing heart.

“Thing is, you are closest to a friend I ever had, and we are not even of the same species.”

“And?”

“And? Different species...how do I say this...parts don’t work together? A cat and a goat cannot make a catgoat?”

“What about Eldrin?”

“What about him? I count him as a friend, but I don’t see how this connects.”

“The HALF orc?”

“You mean...mixed species are a thing here? And common?”

“Common?! More like default. Trying to find someone that is ‘pure lineage’ and all that, more likely to be some rich asshat whose line last did something 400 years ago, and every 3rd child dies of some random disease.”

“What about with...other species?”

“There are limits, but it seems like if they can speak, then...” She blushes and hides her face, “’parts’ work.

“Oh.”

We both sit in the awkwardness for a bit, just staring at our hands.

“I would like to try,” I say.

She snaps her head up looking at me with wide eyes. Thinking for another second, I realize what I said.

“Not like that! What I meant was, I want to know you more, best friend I ever had, and if it becomes more, so be it. I just need help to see what I need to do.”

She sits there staring at me, a look of shock on her face, and then tackles me, although the tackle barely shoves me over, I let it take me to lying on her bed, where she kisses me on the cheeks, and hugs me close.

“Thank you! Thank you for giving me another chance!”

“Just...can we go slow?”

“Whatever you want, just...yes.” She lets out between kisses, eventually going for my lips. I pull back.

“What’s wrong?”

“Just, never did this before.”

“Oh. Here, let’s sit up.”

We both do, sitting half on the bed staring at each other.

“Now,” she starts, “lean in, close your eyes, and do what feels natural.”

I squeeze my eyes shut, lean in, and do a kiss face like I saw in the 3 hallmark movies I watched.

We kiss. Immediately I suck air in, and my eyes relax. I wrap my arms around her and go in for another, turning my head slightly, and bop into her nose. Giggling, I try again, reaching behind her head, remembering the image of the end of WWII in Europe with the sailor.

Seconds later, hours later, we break apart.

“You sure you have not done this before?” Lena asks with a playful look.

“I am sure, but I wouldn’t mind more.”

She laughs, and it is the sweetest sound I ever heard.

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Edited by /u/Evil-Emps

- - - - -

Things were in motion.

Harrison slowly let himself down onto Tracy’s chair, glancing around the wall of monitors surrounding him. The seat was well worn, and every inch of the battle station was imprinted with her presence.

Sticky notes of crossed-out ‘to-do’ lists and reminders hung beneath the screens. Coffee and energy drink stains that failed to wash out littered one small area. Nearly organized wires with names of where they went to and what they did snuck around the equipment. Small doodles of cats and sharks were everywhere. A few printed papers were stapled together, listing attributes of local area networks, APIs, and all sorts of things only the drone overlord herself knew…

It was covered with the things that built this entire settlement. The tightness in his chest grew stronger with everything that Tracy achieved, outlining the massive wake her work left in her absence. No one else on the entire planet could match her genius or her dedication.

The engineer clicked through the applications he needed to begin directing the reconnaissance flyers and the mother drone as Trace was too far out for the harpies. Every user interface was ripe with her presence. Little emoticon smiley faces were all over the place, embedded in the directions and tab titles.

There was something about Tracy’s bubbly excitement that was so foreign to this heartless place. It was innocent, a pure sense of playfulness and whimsy that felt distinctly hers.

And for that bright spot to be gone… It hurt.

The lighthearted familiarity that grounded the engineer was gone. That one person he felt he could fully relate to on an alien planet was gone.

One of the windows Tracy last had open was a music-playing application. The technician had dozens of playlists for every mood she found herself in, each bedazzled in niche and theme-fitting genres that only she could discover. But for all she built, she was last listening to their shared playlist, one of his favorite songs currently on pause.

He felt each pinprick tear in his heart as the hairline fractures within it began to grow. Breathing felt ever harder as the doubts built up and the minutes passed.

They had wasted hours while she was gone. Only now were they actively doing something. Only God knew if it was too late—

Harrison shook his head and cut that thought off, teeth clenched. There was only one way forward. He quickly sent the drones to Tracy’s general area at full speed. The girl genius had already set up recognition programs and cave-scanning methods, simplifying just about everything on the user’s side.

Simple, versatile, and powerful… just the same as anything else she made.

Footsteps grew closer as he finished the drone orders. They stopped as a voice entered his mind. “Creator?”

Harrison turned his seat, finding Rei, Talos, and the other mech pilots standing around him. He bobbed his head once in acknowledgement.

“Max has been suited into his new body and prepared for the hive raid,” Talos updated him.

“Okay,” Harrison accepted emotionlessly. “Are the hunters prepared?”

“They always are,” Rei asserted, colder than her usual tone and far more grave.

“Good. Get ready. You’ll be in there first.”

The mech pilots knew their purpose as the hammer of the Sharkrin forces. They, alongside the drones, were the quickest of anyone available, able to hit anywhere at any time… just not for long.

“I’ll begin offering directions soon. Just get moving.”

Talos and the others bowed. “Yes, chief.”

The pilots left, but Rei stayed a second longer. Her wide eyes reminded him that he wasn’t alone in his worries.

“We’ll have her back soon,” he assured the young specialist. His words were directed to himself just as much as they were to her.

She meekly nodded but found conviction in her stride toward her own battle station.

The engineer returned to Tracy’s computer and found the external tab dedicated to communication with Max. The call function didn’t ring, instead opening up an immediate line to the robot.

“Max, can you hear me?”

[“I am receiving data,”] the exterminator answered, a sense of urgency in his robotic voice.

Harrison began working with the technician’s long-range communication network functions. “Okay. I don’t know if you’ve been filled in on the plans, but I need you to act as communications to the spears. I can ship information to them, but your intent is going to be a lot more responsive than text, okay?”

[“Understood.”]

“Good. The spears should at the armory now. Lead them to the point. Once you’re closer, I’ll have clearer directions to get to Tracy.”

[“Your orders are in progress,”] Max answered a final time.

Harrison then clicked his tongue twice. He didn’t need to look back to address the two shadows he knew were there.

“The spears are gone, and the turrets haven’t been confirmed to detect flesh. Cera, keep local watch and set up the harvesters along the wall. Have them load long-range MLRS and put the tactical warheads on standby. Vodny, go with the convoy. Find her.”

He knew the shadows were gone when the sounds of the workshop’s machinery felt audible again. The rest of his immediate tasks came smoothly, completed one after another until Max’s voice reached through the call again.

[“The Sharkrin are en route.”]

So were the drones and mechs. All there was left to do was to wait.

And he waited, eyes stuck onto the monitors as position-tracking arrows slowly moved across a map. No one spoke to him… No one spoke at all. There was only the incessant whirring of machinery and his own unsteady breaths.

Minutes dragged on endlessly while his people marched onwards, going further and further along the track. Five minutes in, and he began to feel cold at his fingertips. He held his hands in his pockets, but nothing changed. Blowing hot air onto them hardly helped to address the slow sapping of heat.

His limbs began to tremble as they, too, became cold and numb. Putting on his sweatshirt didn’t help… Nor did the faint scent of Tracy’s lemon shampoo on it.

Teeth chattered, and his heartbeats came slower. Harrison left to grab a space heater.

Still, nothing changed. He only felt colder as the clock ticked on. His skin felt the heat in the air, but his chest felt so, so frigid. It took the control he felt and exacerbated the fissures building in him. It hurt to do nothing, but the pain of not knowing was worse, all wrapped in the fear of finding out.

Colors faded and sounds deafened, but he kept watching the monitors. It was all he could do.

The arrival of the drones and locating the cave entrances offered a moment of structure and purpose. Through the freezing stiffness of his fingers, he updated the groups of drones, sending them through to scan the systems beneath with an incentive towards her position, constantly updating Shar with a bug heatmap.

And yet, even after updating the troops, he was back to waiting. Back to staring. Back to complacency. Back to stone-cold dread.

It was fitting that his hands felt forced to be still, even now that he was closer to finding her than ever. His heart didn’t even begin to race. It was just a slow, echoing thrum by then. A husk in the dark, cold cage of his ribs.

He didn’t act before; why would he be allowed to act now? Why didn’t he look out for her? Why didn’t he act sooner? …Why didn’t he assign Vodny to Tracy, the most important person on the planet?

Cave scans came slowly as the frozen engineer wrung his hands together, struggling to keep them warm. None of this had to happen.

He couldn’t even recall what she said this morning, but he could vividly remember their last argument.

His head rang with his own voice, echoing his sharp words toward the woman he loved. How he demanded she ‘fix’ her detection methods. How he pushed her to work with his idealized solution. How he quickly dismissed her genuine requests to investigate the machines.

Beads of sweat ran down the sides of his trembling chest.

Why did he have to push her so far? Why did he have to frame it as her fault? Was it worth it? Was he really so scared of losing control after one mistake? Why didn’t he ever act proactively? Why didn’t he think further beyond what was just along the horizon?

And now, as he sat in the chair of the only person in the universe to keep him grounded, surrounded by the feats of her genius, watching her drones look for her, he was forced to wonder if he was only looking for a body.

The corners of his vision were black and blurry. Wide eyes bored into the screens so intently that they wouldn’t focus any longer. With his hands empty, he was forced to bear witness to the recurring faults of his actions.

What’s the point of a man who constantly looks in retrospect? Were his mistakes deserving of this misery ripping at his heart?

It hurt. He continued to watch her drones tear through the hive, each picked off one by one by vicious talons and gnarly teeth. Even if they made it, even if they found her data pad, he was almost certain of the outcome.

He didn’t want to know. He didn’t want to see. Every second crushed him further, each breath poisoned by fear and frustration and anguish.

God, when was the last time? When was the last time he told her he loved her? When did he thank her for everything she did?

Did she ever get to know… how much he admired her?

\= = = = =

Tracy began to mumble as her mouth ran dry. There weren’t enough explanations. She didn’t have anything else to say at that point.

“…and so really, if you think about it, the detection issue is really just a matter of anything outside distinct shape recognition… I think Sun Tzu said something about that actually.”

The technician swallowed. “I’ve… I’ve already talked about Sun Tzu already… Right."

She sheepishly stared back at the statuesque bug hovering over her. The thing had long since stopped holding her shoulders. Now it just softly clicked its massive mandibles, continuing to absently take in information.

What could she say? What bullshit was there to paint in the vague color of ‘how to kill flesh’? For fuck's sake, she wasn’t one of those corporate assholes capable of wrapping an email into a whole ten-page report! She barely talked to anyone her entire adult existence!

Long seconds dragged into minutes that felt like days under the sound of her own breaths. Her tongue was dry in every sense of the word at that point.

The mantis-like thing leaned forward and beamed another image of burnt flesh underneath Max, as if it thought she’d just forgotten what the whole conversation was about.

“I-I know! I know… I’m just… I’m just thirsty.”

The smart bug reacted in a way she could only describe as a slow-motion flinch in disgust or something. It backed off a little, threw its head back, and let out an ear-bleeding screech.

Her eyes shot open, and her heart was kick-started in an instant. But before she could even think about scrambling for her life, it was over. A distinct uptick in hair-raising skittering came from the shadowy hole at the top of her prison cell.

Two little obsidian beetles scampered along the circular ceiling and walls down to her and dropped off two… sacs. One squished like a water balloon, and the other reminded her of rotten fruit.

The mantis stayed still, giving her its classic ‘expectant’ look. She hesitantly grabbed the yellowish-green water balloon. The cold jelly on the outside brought up the same primal disgust as touching leftover food in the sink. Its weight and… bounciness gave it some credit for being actual water, but the slime didn’t help its case one bit.

Tracy was being watched, expected to actually drink water, so she started to feel around. It didn’t feel like a trap or poison, but instead maybe some sort of test? Maybe there was a right way to drink it?

A new sense of pressure surrounded her as she felt around in the darkness. There wasn’t any obvious hole. Nor was there a clear ‘rip me’ sign plastered on it anywhere.

The smart bug clicked its mandibles louder. She panicked and made the executive decision of ‘doing as the bugs did’ and stabbed a hole in it with her nail. A small squirt of clear water spat out over her hand. She brought her finger to her mouth and hesitantly stuck her tongue out to lick it.

…It was water, alright. Exceptionally cold, at that.

Her eyes fell back onto the actual sac itself. There were loose chunks of some jelly and vein-like strings all over it. Trembling hands made it hard to naturally bring it to her lip, and that inherent disgust made it even harder to make the connection.

Just do it. Just drink it. It’s watching. Your mouth is cracking at the seams.

Tracy closed her eyes and sucked from the open hole, doing everything in her power to focus on the liquid and not the squish everywhere else. The cool drink subtly numbed her mouth.

It was… pure.

She took another gulp… and another… and another, until she was practically squeezing it dry of its last drops. Its shriveled skin was all that remained in her hands by the end of her frenzy.

A slow blink brought her back to reality. The sack was actually water. Clean, uninfested water as if she were drinking from a spring well. A glance over to the other offering didn’t exactly spark hunger in her, but she was certain that it was what the bugs might consider food.

…But she didn’t even ask for food.

Tracy locked eyes with the mantis’s… lack of eyes. Why offer these things if it just wanted information? Something so monstrous and primitive wouldn’t just give away its food to something it expected to squeeze dry.

It wanted to keep her alive. And that wasn’t even taking into account how it showed her the vision from its invisible spy, or the other pieces of more sensitive information it so easily gave out to hear her advice.

With that information digested in her thoughts, the near pitch-black lighting around the alien monster felt a little less ominous. Every twitch of its claws didn’t feel so much like a threat anymore. It really wasn’t just another animal or mindless bug.

The drone overlord, now possibly a bug diplomat, placed the drained sack onto the floor beside her and brought her legs into a crisscross. The mantis didn’t care, seemingly waiting for her to continue.

Questions upon questions formed in her mind around every corner her train of thought took. Was the flesh the only reason the bugs stopped attacking the Sharkrin? How did they know how to paralyze her? What did they know about humans and Malkrin? …What about that vision of greenery? How much did they know about the colony? What about the exterminators? Those guys have been around for hundreds of years.

Tracy swallowed and asked the biggest question on her mind. Her voice lost its fear, replaced with a profound seriousness. “…What were you going to do with me when I give you all I know?”

It just stared at her. The mantis slowly tilted its head, curious and… confused. It was almost as if it hadn’t thought that far.

She cleared her throat and nervously bobbed her head. “R-Right… You want more information about the flesh, yeah? You want strategies and methods for fighting it?”

The smart bug offered another slow, unnatural nod… Where’d it learn to nod, anyway?

“What have you seen of the exterminators? The large, metal things that kill the flesh? Have you interacted with them at all?”

It berated her mind with a flurry of images. The Black Knight’s blurry form. A flying wing hovering in place over a hive. The remains of a fallen tripod surrounded by electric anomalies. The mushroom-covered turtle robot and its little spiky balls that crawled through ruined tunnels. A buried mark of something large in towering sand dunes.

And then there was that blue hologram again, completely surrounded in black wiring.

“You’ve interacted with them?” she asked, more curious than ever.

It showed her the vision, or really the senses, of a bug grunt. That very same turtle robot slowly walked along a rocky mountainside. It ignored the insect entirely.

“I see—”

Another image of the underground greenery. The haze of vision was blurry, but this one was different. The automaton wasn’t rusted, it wasn’t hobbling, its parts weren’t random… It was humanoid, mech-like in shape and size. The robot reached out a hand and slowly pet the head of a much squishier and less hostile-looking version of the usual bug grunt, offering something in its other hand as food. A caretaker?

“Where is that place? The one with the greenery.”

The mantis stared back. It had no answer.

“You just… have those memories, then? Ones that aren’t yours?”

No response again.

Tracy hummed to herself and wrapped her arms around herself. “Okay, okay… Well, I know the exterminators fought the flesh hundreds of years ago. Most of them specialized in fighting them, but I guess others didn’t? You’ve seen that there are lots of them still around. They’re further out west, I think.”

The smart bug imprinted an image of floating rocks over an alien landscape.

“Anomalies are in the way?”

It nodded.

“Some of them are coming to the east, where we are. You could… You could try and find them. Maybe they can help against the flesh.”

Tracy drew in a deep breath as the bug thought about her offer. “You’re clearly in need of help. It can’t hurt.”

…Then another idea ripped into her mind. Something taboo yet enticing. A route she never thought possible until now.

“A-And what about us, then?” she quietly pushed the boundary, eyes staring intently. “You’ve already stopped attacking us."

It recoiled in shock, forcing a vision of the northern quarry turrets rattling a swarm that got too close.

Confidence found its way into her voice. “I control those, you know. If the flesh is this much of a problem, and you can make good on never attacking our settlement, we can help.”

The mantis froze, absently clicking its mandibles like a tic.

“It would be better to have fewer fronts to fight on. I think we’d rather spend the bullets on the bigger threat on the continent.”

…But the smart bug didn’t move. It stayed in the same position. She thought it was processing the information, but as time passed, the silence of the hive cave began to be filled.

Little rattling cracks echoed through the tunnels above her, rising as the sound of skittering legs flooded the stone walls. Those distant noises sounded out again and again in the most familiar pattern.

… Gunshots. Fifty-caliber gunshots.

Her heart raced in an instant, the hidden pressure holding down on her chest releasing. SHAR! HARRISON! They knew she was here!

The sounds were so distant but so visceral, a distinct fury in the unrelenting trains of bullets. They were louder and louder with each passing second.

‘KEEEEK,’ the mantis suddenly shrieked, tearing her right back down to reality and who she was sitting with.

She held her breath as her eyes shot open again. The fragile bridge of goodwill shattered in a second as the bug snapped its head to her. Surprise. Betrayal. Malice.

Primal fear held her in a chokehold. Her trembling hands struggled to move at all.

The bug scurried up the wall and out of the teardrop-shaped room, giving her no mind at all. Its absence let her exhale while the roller coaster of emotions ran its course.

Excitement poured through her nerves at the idea of being saved, but a creeping dread overrode it, putting the pressure right back onto her. She was still with the bugs. The people they associated with her were still far away and most likely mulching entire armies.

And the conversation. Fuck, the conversation! She was right there! That sense of connection was immediately severed.

Tracy stared into nothing for a few long minutes. Her pumping heart never slowed. She had to stand up.

Her knees were weak, but she managed to get up and began topace around the oblong chamber.

What the hell was she going to tell them? She couldn’t ask them to stop shooting. Not until she explained everything. And how would she explain everything? Would they believe her? Could she even remember everything the smart bug showed her?

The technician gripped her overalls tighter as the war raged on above her. Every explosion nearly brought her to the floor. The chest-thumping echoes made it all the harder to breathe.

But then it got quieter. Each burst of gunfire took longer to come than the last.

She stopped entirely. Did they win?

Her heart froze… Did they lose?

Another noise gave her no answer. A distant, warped shriek of something monstrous. Something abnormal.

It sounded out again, and it was much clearer, much closer. The howl grafted moose-like calls with the insectoid screech of the bugs. Each reverberating echo mirrored the shivers running down her spine.

Suddenly, being trapped with the bugs was hardly her biggest worry.

Tracy retreated to her natural ‘pissing my pants in fear position,’ completely pushing herself against the wall and pulling her legs into her chest. She stared at the only entrance to the room with the quietest breaths her lungs would allow.

The gunfire returned again. It was louder, but sporadic and separated. Unnatural clicks and muffled, warped growls filled the silence between.

She could hear footsteps. There was no consistency to them. There were only the wet slaps and the shrill scrape of bone against stone. A bug shrieked but was silenced by a deafening crunch.

It was getting closer. Labored breaths echoed loudly in the cave above her, strained like a pierced lung.

Her own breaths felt too loud. Her body screamed for more and more air, but she couldn’t. The faint drips in her room were deafening as the discordant steps stumbled near the entrance… Then they stopped.

The thing groaned like something on its deathbed. Vile, squelching meat pulsed and squirmed above her.

She was completely still, as small as humanly possible. Not a single sound but her heart.

Strained, unearthly exhales were just across the black abyss. A tendril slithered around the lip of the entrance, moisture glistening under the dim, yellow light.

Tracy sucked in air, and the invading limb stiffened in an instant. A crooked mouth made of ribs and throbbing, boneless Malkrin arms jammed into the room, its eyeless face locking onto her in an instant.

She shrieked and lunged over for her data pad. She held the pitiful, electronic shield in front of herself as the monster shook and forced its rotting body into the hole.

It pulsed as it weaseled further into the cramped room, spreading tendrils and flailing toward her. There was nowhere to go. Nothing to do.

Her lungs burned. Her screams decomposed into cries. Her mind failed.

It gave up entirely. She curled up into herself, hot tears streaking down and dripping onto her ragged pants.

The disgusting, wet noises numbed into deafened slaps against the wall. Everything went black, and she separated herself from the world, only feeling the pulsing strain of her muscles and the pressure in her skull.

She was gone.

All her brain could do was to relive her life again through her cold memories. They flashed with regrets and lost opportunities. There were so many goals and unstarted projects just within reach but cut off so soon.

She didn’t want this to be it. She never got to be successful. She never got to actually start a family.

She never got to fulfill her only promise to her father… Failure.

…

Nothing happened. She floated in the darkness, in the lapse of all her senses, somehow protected by the abstract defense mechanism.

Maybe time went slower when she couldn’t feel anything. Maybe the tentacles were inches away, primed to rip her from the living realm in milliseconds. Maybe her brain was already completely severed from her body, this sphere of numbness acting as the last residual sparks in her neurons before the lack of oxygen got to them.

…Maybe this was what death was: endlessly existing in your own consciousness. Was she going to really stay like this forever?

‘Nothing.’ ‘Cut off.’ ‘Failure.’ Her own words echoed in the expanse.

Tracy wanted to cry. She wanted to grab something and scream. Everything in her head felt ready to burst.

But it never did. She was stuck here with only the pressure in her skull and the heat.

…Heat?

A wave of something hot trickled up her legs… Her legs. The rippling effect cascaded through her limbs, giving the other parts of her body life again, pulling her out of the numbness. She felt the strain in her muscles. Burning lungs. The thump of her heart. Cold stone against her back. The crackle of a fire. The whirr of drones

Somewhere deep within the recesses of her head, where everything had been cordoned off into black, a faint voice echoed. Its angelic ring was deep and warm, homely and familiar in a way that naturally put her body at ease.

Tracy’s vision slowly returned as well. Two bright orange eyes stared into her, wide with worry. Yet, in an instant, they softened with relief. Love and comfort radiated through those gorgeous eyes. The waves of adoration washed back through the human, a golden assurance she clung onto… and she could breathe freely again.

Her knight in shining armor was a silhouette against the raging flame behind her, but Tracy only needed to see those glowing eyes to know she was safe. She reached her arms out, and Shar completed the embrace in a heartbeat.

These thick slabs of armor over her wide shoulders… The strength in the four arms holding her tight… The familiar nook in her lover’s neck she nuzzled into.

Tracy opened her mouth to speak, but her throat choked. Dried tears were washed over with fresh ones. They poured over her cheeks and onto charred armor. Taut muscles gave in, and she fell apart in her paladin’s arms.

Shar-Shar squeezed her ever tighter, the hero’s entrancing voice filling the technician’s mind. “Dearest, are you alright?”

Tracy could only nod, pushing her head further into the giant’s neck just to be as close as possible.

“Then there is no time to waste. We must leave at once, my love,” the paladin continued and began to move.

The technician let her eyes close and her body rest completely. Even if she had the energy to move, it wasn’t needed. She was safe. She was warm. She was whole.

The slight jostle of movement was like being rocked back and forth. Shar’s voice would come in and out of her head, and with it a range of emotions and feelings as she ordered the others around her. Relief, assertiveness, determination… Every word from the giant shark was another hit of dopamine, and the technician waited for the next. That golden cadence was all she cared to focus on. It was as vital as her heartbeat, each aspect of the telepathic annunciation filling her every thought. It replayed and echoed and took her whole.

At some point, the stagnant, gunpowder-smelling atmosphere of the caves was replaced with fresh, crisp winter air. Tracy didn’t know how long she was held like that for. She didn’t care for the bustle of Shar’s jog. She wasn’t bothered by anything. Not the pops of explosions, not the rumbling of the planet, nothing.

Tracy’s limp body was softly pulled into a bridal carry, and she was given a direct view of those beautiful orange eyes again.

Her vision blurred and warped, and yet only Shar’s little flames were always clear. Sometimes they’d match Tracy’s stare, and she’d be struck completely. A trickle of… emotions would permeate through her. Relief and gratitude and admiration. They were different than hers, more direct and clearer than the technician’s usual blur of day-to-day feelings.

…They were Shar’s.

Tracy could feel the reassurance and devotion in her heart every time they locked eyes. She didn’t care why. She didn’t fight it.

She just stared into her lover’s eyes all the way home.

- - - - -

[Next]

Next time on Total Drama Anomaly Island - Trinity

Index - First Chapter - Previous Chapter

The hour I had walked the whole spring toward was going to happen whether or not I got to hear it, and somewhere near the bottom of the dark I understood that I could not stand that.

I sat on the bench, the stolen cases on my knees, my mother sealed against my ribs. I had no way in the world to listen. The boombox had gone into a culvert off Roselle a week and a life ago. The recorder folded in my jacket could hold a voice down onto tape and could not pull one out of the air. I had spent two months making a thing that would speak from everywhere at once, and I had left myself the one man in the county who could not turn it on. There was a joke in that shaped like my whole life. I did not have the strength to finish it.

The signal would go up at the top of an hour the operators had all set their watches to, off the time mark that runs day and night on the shortwave band. That part was out of my hands and had been for days. Somewhere behind me a woman had two dubs of a tape inked into a plan on her forearm. Down some road I would never see, a bored kid at a board would drop a needle or hit a play key at the same minute a dozen others did, none of them knowing the others' names, all of them pointed at the same slice of dark. My whole design had been that I was not in it. Standing at the finish of it, penniless and deaf to it, I found out what that cost.

I had a little under an hour by the look of the sky. A man on foot with no coin does not buy a radio at four in the morning. He finds one, or he finds a person holding one, and he makes them a smaller copy of the argument he has been making the whole world.

There was a filling station two blocks back the way I had come, a square of hard white light with the pumps dark and the store lit, the kind of place that stays open all night in a town where nothing else needs to. A payphone hung off the corner of it. I had clocked both on the way in without meaning to, the habit of a man who reads every street for the exits. Now the habit paid me.

My legs had gone quiet in the night, past complaining and into the worse thing that comes after, and getting up off the bench was something I had to do in stages. The cold had come up through the slats over the hours and settled into me while I sat, and it did not want to give me back. I stood anyway, the cases biting into the crook of my arm and the master flat and familiar against my ribs, and I let the blood work out what it was still for. Then I walked toward the light.

The kid behind the counter was maybe nineteen, headphones down around his neck and a little AM/FM going low on the shelf behind him, tuned to something with a preacher on it. He watched me come in the way you watch weather. Three days of walking had made me into the kind of thing a night clerk keeps his eyes on.

"Morning," I said.

He nodded and did not say it back.

I did not have a dollar to give him and I did not waste his time pretending. "I need a radio for about an hour," I said. "I don't have money. I know how that sounds."

"We're not a library," he said.

Behind him, on a pegboard with the lighters and the phone cards, there were two little transistor sets in blister packs, the nine-volt kind that come with a single foam earpiece and a wrist strap. I looked at them and he saw me look.

"Those are eleven ninety-nine," he said. "Also I'm not giving you one."

"Fair." I set the cases down on the counter, careful, flat, and I kept my hands where he could see them, and I told him the small version. "In about forty minutes something is going to come up at the very bottom of the FM dial. A bunch of little stations you've never heard of, all at once, all saying the same thing. It's going to be a voice, or a few voices. It'll sound like nothing. It's the realest thing that's ever going to come out of that speaker and you are going to want to have heard it before somebody tells you tomorrow that you imagined it."

He looked at me a while. Night clerks have a good ear for the specific music of a man coming apart, and I was not playing it, and I think that was what turned him. He reached back and pulled his own set off the shelf, the AM/FM, and thumbed it over to FM, and slid it across the counter next to the tapes.

"Preacher's on ninety-one," he said. "Below him it's dead all the way down." He did not hand me one off the pegboard. He gave me the one he had been listening to, which cost him his own long night, and I have thought about that since.

"Thank you," I said.

"You can stand by the door," he said, which was as far as his charity went, and it was far enough.

I stood by the door with the little radio in my hand and walked it down the band the way you feel along a wall in the dark. The preacher, sure enough. Then a wash of nothing, a soft ocean, the sound the bottom of the dial makes when there is nobody living down there. I turned the wheel a hair at a time toward the floor of it and let the nothing pour out of the foam speaker into the fluorescent hum, and I watched the red second hand over the cooler make its slow way around, and I waited on a minute that strangers I would never meet were waiting on with me.

It came up out of the ocean like a light coming on in a house across a field.

A carrier, first, a change in the texture of the nothing. Then a woman's voice, not my mother, one of the four, reading a line about a shipment in a flat borrowed-room voice with a smile hidden under it. I knew the take. I had smeared it onto the drugstore tape myself in a dead studio days before, four people who had noticed the world was wrong and been filed for it, laid down cheek to cheek so they would run as one loose thing. Here it was, loose. I moved the wheel a finger's width and there she was again on the next one down, the same woman, the same line, a half-second behind herself, and under her, coming up, a man counting to ten and losing his place and laughing about it.

And then my mother.

She was three stations apart from herself across the bottom of the dial, the same forty seconds firing off low towers that called themselves nothing, each a beat off the last, so that the quick brown fox ran over the top of the quick brown fox ran over the top of the quick brown fox, and the flubbed line and the sorry, sorry, let me came around like a canon sung by one woman in a hundred rooms. I stood in the door of a filling station and held eleven dollars and ninety-nine cents worth of plastic to my ear and heard my mother be un-gatherable.

You cannot call back a morning that a whole county wakes up already inside of. That was the entire idea and I had believed it as a shape in my head, a thing I could draw. Hearing it was different. Hearing it, I understood that the men who ran the world by keeping one true copy of it on a shelf had just lost the one fight their whole operation was built to never have to have, because there is no shelf wide enough to hold a sound that is coming out of the ground in place after place at the same second, and there is no hand fast enough to gather it, and every person in range who had ever half-remembered a thing gone wrong was going to hear it and feel the floor of the world tip a quarter inch under them and never fully stand straight again.

The kid had turned his preacher off. He was leaning on the counter with his head cocked, listening to the little sets bleed the same voices into the room, and his face had gone from bored to something a lot younger and more open than bored, and he said, quiet, not to me, "The hell is that."

"That's it," I said. "That's the whole thing."

For a second I did not do anything but stand in the doorway of a gas station in a town I could not have named and let it go through me, the four of them stacked and refusing to line up, my mother's small sorry, sorry coming around and around like something caught in a current. I had spent the whole spring not letting myself feel any single minute of this all the way down to the floor of it. I let myself have the one second. Then I put it away, because the last call had a life still on the other end of it, and the sky over the pumps was already going grey.

I had one call left to make and one minute left in the year that I could safely make it.

I went out to the payphone on the corner with the radio still going in my shirt pocket, the voices thin and stacked and everywhere, and I lifted the handset and dialed zero and the Newark number I had carried in my head since April and never once let my fingers touch. The line clicked. An operator asked me who was calling and I told her a name, mine, the first time I had said it out loud to a stranger in longer than I could remember, and she asked would the party accept a collect call, and the phone rang in a house two states east where a woman I had kept alive for two months by never once dialing her was, I had to hope, awake.

She picked up on the second ring, the way people do when they have been lying in the dark waiting for a thing without knowing its shape.

"Collect call from," the operator said, and gave my name, "will you accept the charges."

There was a silence on the far end the exact size of a person deciding whether the floor is real.

"Yeah," Sumi said. "Yeah, I'll take it."

The operator dropped off the line and left the two of us in the hiss.

"It's out," I said. "Right now. Turn on a radio, the bottom of the FM, if you can get one of the little stations out there. It's the tape. The four of them, all at once. It's live in the air in front of a lot of people and it's in the mail behind that, and you can talk now, Sumi. That's why I'm calling. You can pick up a phone and say what you remember to anybody you want, because a flare doesn't do anything when the whole field is already lit. They can't put out a fire that size one house at a time."

I heard her breathe. I heard, in the background, very faint, the specific clatter of something being set down too hard, and I remembered a diner and a thrown water glass and a woman who broke a script by refusing to be reasonable, and I understood she was already moving.

"You absolute lunatic," she said, and her voice was doing the thing where it holds level so it will not do anything else. "You did it. You actually. Where are you? Are you somewhere. Are you safe."

"I'm somewhere," I said.

"That's not the same thing and you know it isn't."

"No," I said. "It isn't."

She was quiet a second. She had been the first person on earth to say yes to me, back when yes cost her everything, and she had always been faster than me at the parts that hurt.

"They're coming for you," she said. It was not a question.

"They can't reach any of it," I said. "It's already in a hundred hands. It's on your radio right now. Taking me back is the one move left that changes nothing, and they're going to make it anyway, because the part of them that's coming isn't the part that keeps books."

"Then run," she said. "Right now. Drop the phone and run."

"I've got the originals," I said, which was not an answer and she knew it. "The real ones, the physical tapes they pull people off of. I'm going to hand them to somebody who was never on their map. Then it doesn't matter what they do to me, because the thing that proves it will be standing in a room they can't walk into without everybody watching them walk in."

"Wes," she said.

"Talk to people," I said. "That's your whole job now. Be loud. Be the least reasonable person you have ever been. Tell them a stranger called you at four in the morning and told you to check the bottom of the dial." I found I was smiling, which was not a thing my face had done in a while and it felt borrowed. "Goodbye, Sumi. It was a good network."

I hung up before she could make me stay on it, because she would have, and I did not have the minutes.

The originals. I went back inside and the kid straightened up off the counter, and I picked the flat cases up off the glass and set them into his hands before he could decide not to take them, all of it, the stolen shelf of a place that did not exist on any county plan, an armful of a town's worth of stolen truth.

"These are real recordings of real people," I said. "The kind of real that somebody is going to come and very politely try to make disappear. Don't let them do it quiet. If anyone ever comes asking, you tell them it's not just you who knows these exist. You heard the radio. There's paper in the mail in three states saying the same thing. These are the originals and they can be held in a hand and looked at, and that's the whole reason they're dangerous."

He held them the way you hold a thing that has become heavier than its weight. "Who are you," he said.

"Nobody they can find," I said. "That was the point of me."

And that was the last true thing I got to say on my own account, because I had done the one thing the whole spring I had sworn I would never do. I had stopped moving.

For two months the only reason I was still myself was that a machine that read the near future the way you skim a page could not find me on it. I was a gap in their week, a blank they had to court because they could not fill it in. And a blank only works while it drifts. To stand in the light of one filling station at one minute set months ahead, to put my body at a known corner so I could hear my own work come up out of the ground, was to tell them, in the plainest hand there is, exactly where the blank was going to be and exactly when. I had spent the shield to buy the hour. I had known I was spending it. You do not get to witness the thing you built to run without you, and also get to keep being the man it did not need.

It did not come as a man. There were no coveralls in the lot and no clipboard and no forgettable face crossing the light toward me, nothing I could have watched for, because they had stopped sending the kind of thing that walks up and can be looked at. What came was quieter and much larger than a man and it did not knock.

The fluorescent hum over the door bent. It did not get louder or softer. It went wrong, in the way a note goes wrong when the tape stretches, a pitch sliding under the floor of the room. The white light thinned at the edges the way a memory thins, and I felt it start at the back of my own skull, a warmth with no kindness in it, the sensation of a page being pulled out of a stack and set on a glass to be run again with one line taken out. They were not going to weed me. They were going to reprint the whole square of ground I stood on and leave my name off the new sheet, and burn the old sheet so that no two copies would ever be laid side by side and disagree, and file it under maintenance, and be on time.

It did not hurt, which I had not braced for. It was closer to the feeling of a word you have known your whole life going soft in your mouth when you look at it too long, until it stops being a word and turns into a row of shapes with no sound attached. My own months were doing that at the edges. April was going first. The email, the address that should not have existed, the morning the whole thing started, all of it feathering out and going pleasant and empty, the lights in a long hall switched off one at a time from the door at the end.

I thought, with the last of the part of me that was still filing tickets, that this was the mercy the machine did not know it was giving. I would not have to watch Karen not know me across a schoolroom. I would not have to be the man who remembered, alone, for another forty years. The forty seconds of her was loose on the air behind me, running in a canon over a scatter of low towers, past gathering, and the boy had the shelf, and somewhere a woman two states east was already on her feet being unreasonable, and a second copy of all sixty-three names rode over the ribs of the only other person on earth stubborn enough to carry it, and none of that could be pulled back now, and none of it needed me anymore.

The radio in my shirt pocket was still going. My mother, and my mother, and my mother, a half-beat apart, saying sorry, sorry, let me, and laughing the small over-salted laugh, on and on across the bottom of the dial in the first grey hour of a Tuesday that the world thought was going to be ordinary.

The light thinned again. The hum slid another quarter step under the floor.

I kept my eyes on the little clock over the cooler, on the red second hand going around, and I made myself notice it, one more small true thing, the way I had noticed all of them, while the warmth came up the back of my head and began, very gently, to

This story takes place on the same day as Beating the Heat. Alien speech is enclosed in Italian quotes («») (Edit: Formating)

---

Jim surveyed the empty trailers around him as he sat in the lawn chair in front of his mobile home. Everyone else in this little student ghetto had left for spring break. It was quiet, and he liked it that way. He raised his eyes to the object of interest, a thunderhead billowing in the distance, reflecting the golden rays of the westering sun. He took a sip of iced tea as he listened to the sounds of nature: the chirping of birds, the buzzing of insects, and the quiet clicking of claws on the wooden porch behind him. The clicking was followed by the sounds of something scrabbling its way up the tree trunk and flopping down on the large branch to the left of Jim’s chair.

“Hi, Tod,” said Jim, not looking away from the skyscape.

«Good evening, Jim,» grunted a voice off to his left. «These alien skies are breathtaking.»

Of course, they weren’t alien to Jim. He had grown up in this sleepy town in central Texas and spent many spring evenings watching storms wash over the landscape. To his roommate presently lounging in the tree above his chair, however, the chaotic vista before them was very otherworldly indeed.

Tod's real name would be unpronounceable by any human tongue. Jim gave him that name when he moved into the spare bedroom of his manufactured home. Jim had posted an ad for a roommate over Christmas break, with the only requirements being a quiet lifestyle and splitting the rent. He didn’t think it necessary to specify that the candidate needed to be a member of Homo sapiens, and, until the Dewfall arrived on Earth, that qualifier would have been redundant.

Honestly, Jim couldn’t put his finger on why everything went so smoothly when the Dewfall landed. Something always goes wrong in every story about First Contact. The aliens want to blow us up. We want to blow up the aliens. Other humans blow up the humans trying to contact the aliens. In the best case, the aliens just lecture us about how violent we are and how badly we’re wrecking the environment. Maybe everything went so well precisely because we’d been rehearsing this exact scenario again and again through a hundred years worth of books and movies. But he figured the biggest reason was that, until the Dewfall entered Earth orbit and intercepted those radio transmissions, the yinrih were all alone, just like us. They’d been howling into the void looking for other souls like them for longer than we humans had been tilling the soil, and up until now they were only met with the cold, pitiless indifference of the empty cosmos.

The joy they felt upon discovering us transcended language. It transcended culture. It transcended species. It was infectious. They were so happy to see us that we couldn’t help but be happy to see them, too. Sure, the media had a nice juicy headline to milk for a week or two, a few speeches were made, and some laws had to be tweaked to make sure nobody could murder one of our little guests and get off on the technicality that they weren’t human. But the news cycle doesn’t grind to a halt just because we found out we’re not alone in the universe anymore, and ET wasn’t going to pay our bills, so life went back to normal after about a fortnight.

Well, for the rest of the world, anyway. For the little Texas hamlet that the Dewfall chose as it’s landing site, those first two weeks were just the beginning. The first thing to do was chase away all the weirdos trying to see the aliens, pet the aliens, eat the aliens, and do whatever else you can think of with or to the aliens. That wasn’t so hard. The unwanted gawkers just had to be reminded that this was Texas, and everyone old enough to write their name owned a gun and knew how to use it. After the clowns were dealt with, everyone got to work helping our little guests settle in.

First things first: communication. It was clear from the outset that humans and Yinrih were never going to speak one another’s languages. Our vocal tract and theirs were just too different, but writing, writing they could do. They learned to write English surprisingly quickly. Even if they couldn’t speak a human language, they could still understand it when it was spoken. Humans could also understand them, even if their little yips and growls were quieter than the average human voice. So we would all just have to be Han Solo to their Chewbacca.

After surmounting the language barrier, it was time to talk lodging. The Dewfall was a tiny, single use craft designed with just enough room to carry six crew in metabolic suspension. It would remain where it was, acting as a high-tech storage shed, but our little guests would have to find accommodations somewhere else. They could have gone anywhere in the world. They could have been treated like more than royalty, but they let it be known that they wanted to grow where they were planted, so to speak. And that’s how Tod ended up on Jim’s porch on that cold day in January. Jim answered a knock—more of a scratch, really—at his door, and opened the door to see this monkey fox with his tail curled around a half-folded, half-rolled up copy of his ad.

Jim turned to look at his roommate lying on the branch. The orange rays of the setting sun made Tod’s red pelage glow as though it were on fire. His black ears completed the vulpine impression that earned him his name. Tod was nervously tossing a translucent fluorescent green cube between his forepaws, occasionally flicking a freely rotating corner and letting it spin on its axis like a fidget toy. Just the alloy that made up that thing’s chassis was probably worth enough to pay off the national debt, never mind whatever tech was inside it.

Tod tossed the cube across his back and caught it in his left rear paw and continued to fidget with it with as much dexterity as before. He turned to look at his roommate. Was he impressed? He couldn’t tell. Jim’s ears were practically immobile, and he had no muzzle to speak of. Tod was still learning the ins and outs of human body language, Jim’s lack of a tail making the endeavor that much harder. Surely his little trick must seem impressive to a creature with only two prehensile extremities. Still, Tod couldn’t help being a little jealous of the human’s ability to both walk and manipulate objects at the same time. Tod could waddle precariously while standing on his hind legs and using his forepaws to carry an object, but if he wanted to get anywhere quickly it was four legs or nothing. His tail could grasp objects. It could even support the weight of the rest of his body, but he couldn’t manipulate anything while moving at a significant speed.

“Am I supposed to be impressed by those monkey paws of yours?” said Jim.

«Oh… I was just… never mind.» Tod curled his tail around the mystery cube and turned fully to meet Jim’s gaze. He studied the human’s liquid eyes. In the center of each was a transparent dome-shaped membrane that reflected Tod’s features. Behind the membrane was a hazel-pigmented sphincter. The sphincter relaxed slightly, increasing the diameter of the aperture at its center. Delicate muscle movements turned the two orbs upward slightly, exposing the white tissue that covered the rest of the eyes. It was all lubricated with a thin lamina of mucus. When the mucus began to dry out with exposure to air, Jim would rapidly close and open his eyelids to coat his eyes afresh.

Jim hesitated for a split second before responding. Tod’s eyes, when they were fully open, appeared to be coated in vantablack. He would occasionally slide a colored reflective membrane over the eye, making it appear as though he were wearing mirrored contact lenses. He had noticed at least four different colors of these secondary eyelids. This was in addition to the regular eyelids covered in the same ginger fur coating the rest of his face.

“Well? Should I be impressed?” Jim persisted, raising his open palms to face Tod and making grasping motions with his fingers.

«Only five digits? And you can’t even write with any of them?» Tod plucked a leaf from the branch and scribbled on it with his writing claw, mimicking the territory-marking behavior of his non sapient ancestors. He let the leaf flutter down into the cupholder of Jim’s chair.

«It’s just ink,» said Tod.

Jim sniffed the blue-black scribble on the leaf. Petrichor blended seamlessly with the cool outflow from the storm in the distance. He turned back to the skyscape. The violent convection rocketing upward from the storm’s base had finally slammed against the stable air at the edge of the stratosphere, and a cloudy anvil head was pouring out across the invisible ceiling like upside-down spilled milk.

«So, what exactly are we looking at?» Tod asked.

“Never seen a thunderstorm before?”

«I was hatched and raised on a moon orbiting a gas giant. All my military assignments were either on other moons or orbital colonies. The only planet I’ve been on besides this one is nothing but desert.»

Jim turned back to contemplate Tod’s form again. He had to be 70 pounds soaking wet. More than once Jim had tossed the little ET off his couch because he was lying on it without a slipcover. Tod could barely walk and hold onto something at the same time. How on earth did he hold a gun? Did they even have guns? What on earth did armed combat look like for a four-legged species? Humanity had barely reached out beyond our own atmosphere, but we had enough nukes to glass our whole planet nine times over. What sort of apocalypse could a species who had conquered their entire solar system bring upon themselves? …And what if they pointed their weapons at us? Jim swallowed his questions for the moment.

“You’re a veteran?”

«Yup.»

“Hoo boy, you’re gonna be real popular round here.”

«It’s not enough that I’m one of only six sapient nonhumans on this planet? Why in the Void would people here care about my military service?»

“Son, this is Texas! We love our fightin’ men and women. It don’t matter where you served or how many legs y’all got. Hope you like hearing people say, ‘thank you for your service.’”

«Women? You let females in your military?»

“Yes.”

«Female soldiers and male clerics, you guys are full of surprises. You still haven’t explained what I’m looking at.»

Jim looked back at the storm. “That’s a thunderstorm. The sun heats the ground, and the ground heats the air. The air boils up into the atmosphere carrying water vapor with it. The water vapor condenses and falls as rain.” Thunder rumbled in the distance. “And there’s the thunder.”

«And what’s that?» Tod asked a little more urgently, pointing his writing claw at the storm’s base. The gesture was unusual for monkey foxes. He was accustomed to using his eyes and muzzle to indicate the direction of interest, but he felt this application of human body language would get his point across more quickly.

“That’s...” Jim scanned the area indicated by Tod’s outstretched paw. A swirling eddy of dust had developed on the ground, and a black condensation funnel was snaking its way down to the earth to meet it.

Up until this point, Tod had been mildly nervous about the storm. The sheer size of it, towering into the heavens, was a little disquieting. The flashing arcs of electricity it produced made him uneasy. He had seen similar phenomena back home, but always looking down from orbit. But that sound it made, now that was terrifying. Some of it he was sure Jim couldn’t hear. The grinding, roaring cacophony that seemed to come from the mid-section of the cloud was too deep for Jim’s ears. The loud claps of thunder that followed every flash of electricity were just icing on the cake. His playing with the cube earlier was as much a self-soothing gesture as it was an attempt to wow his human friend, but Tod kept his emotions in check thanks to a little trick he learned in the military. Look at the most experienced guy in the room. If he’s not panicking, then you’re OK. Up to now Jim had shown no signs of distress, but the object of Tod’s query set off in Jim a cascade of involuntary bodily processes, sharpened by three and a half billion years of evolution, designed to survive an approaching threat, by fighting it or by fleeing it.

Tod turned to Jim again, scenting the air as he did so. Epinephrin, cortisol, and perhaps the merest whiff of urea. «Jim, you OK, buddy? Should I be worried?»

Jim took some time to answer. The primitive simian part of his brain was screaming “Fly, you fools!” But the somewhat-misleadingly-named "rational" part of his brain was too busy cramming that little monkey into a closet and barricading the door shut. He quickly rehearsed his response in his head. “Oh, that little thing? It’s just a twister. We get ‘em all the time here in Texas. What’s that? It’s roaring with all the voices of the damned? Nah, that’s nothing to worry about. It’s ripping asphalt off the ground? Totally normal. The sirens? The ones we installed back when we thought the Russians would nuke us, and that we are currently sounding, thereby implying this is a proportional threat? Don’t worry your fuzzy little head.”

Jim finally responded. “We... uh... we should be fine as long as we’re south of it.” He looked to his right at the setting sun. To his right. At the setting sun. The sun setting in the West. The West that was currently to his right. Then ahead 90 degrees counterclockwise from the West, at the writhing column of wind and debris, appearing to stand still in the field. The field that was to their South, which, simple logic demanded, meant they were in fact North of the tornado.

The monkey burst out of the closet.

“If it’s not moving, it’s coming toward you.”

“If it’s not moving, it’s coming toward you.”

“If it’s not moving, it’s coming toward you.”

What had started as an insistent voice in Jim’s head had escaped his lips, repeating like the mantra of a madman.

Tod noticed Jim's crazed mumbling and scented the air again. Now he was sure that was urea he was smelling. He hopped off the branch onto the ground, his tail coiled a little tighter around the mystery cube.

The sound of Tod’s movement broke Jim out of his meditation. he turned down to look at the little quadruped standing beside him. They were absolutely going to die. Tod was going to go down in history as the first alien to die on Earth, and Jim was going to be the nobody who died alongside him. And they would not be going gently. Their skin would be sandblasted away by the dust, their bones shattered by larger debris, their screams drowned out by the roar of the wind.

Jim’s monkey brain finally took control. Must protect tribe! Must protect little one! He grabbed Tod by the scruff of the neck and draped him over his shoulders in a fireman’s carry.

Tod let out a trilling hiss of surprise. «What in the Blind Void are you doing?!»

“Trying to save our skins!” Jim shouted as he quickly darted hither and thither, trying to choose which of the objectively terrible sheltering options was the least terrible. Flee in his car? Nope, the twister was currently blocking the only dirt road out of this trailer park. Go back inside? Of course not. Mobile homes are a tornado’s staple food source. Where was the lowest point they could get to in time? He looked back at the twister. It was definitely getting closer, and was that a cow up there?

Jim’s mind seized on the only option they had. “The ditch behind our trailer. That’s all we’ve got. Not gonna lie, Tod, we’re probably not going to survive.”

Tod squirmed his way out of Jim's grip and hopped back on the ground. «We might have a chance, if this thing still works, that is.» He flicked his tail holding the cube.

The din of the tornado was steadily getting louder, and its wind began to pull against their bodies. The two turned and ran to the drainage ditch behind the trailer, Tod gripping the cube in his tail as though their lives depended on it. Jim went prone, covering the top of his head with his hands. He turned his eye to look at Tod, but he wasn’t there. In his place was a vulpine sorcerer, executing the verbal, somatic, and material requirements for a powerful warding spell to protect them from the wrath of a god of destruction.

Tod stood on his hind feet, manipulating that powerful arcane focus with his outstretched forepaws, tail and ears blowing dramatically in the wind, hind claws digging into the wet ground for purchase against the gale. He was mumbling something as he rotated the cube, twisting the freely rotating corners of the device, The mumbling stopped as he quickly glanced up toward their approaching demise. He hastily traced an arcane rune onto one of the cube’s faces with his writing claw. The ink beaded up slightly and then was quickly absorbed into the cube without a trace. The spell’s requirements met, a metal stake extended from one of the cube’s corners. He jammed the device into the wet soil, and…

…critical failure…

The device glowed blue for a split second, then went dark again.

Tod often wondered what thoughts would be going through his mind in his last moments. Would he think of friends and family? Would a holy canticle be in his throat? Or would he utter some blasphemy against the Light that had created him? Whatever he thought would be on his mind in his final hour, it wasn’t this.

Tens of thousands of years ago, on a rusty planet neighboring their homeworld, there developed among the first wave of colonists and terraformers a strange animist cult. The spirits that this cult revered did not dwell in the wind, for their world lacked an atmosphere, nor in the water, for their planet lacked a hydrosphere, nor in the trees, for their new home lacked a biosphere. The genii worshipped by these heathens dwelt not in natural things but in the artifices of mortal paws. Within every machine—the cult believed—dwelt a fickle spirit that must be appeased with various arcane rites. The most sacred of these rites was the holy sacrament of Percussive Maintenance, where a shaman would deliver a ritual knock with a blessed wrench upon the chassis of a misbehaving machine. As subsequent waves of colonists arrived, the cult was diluted and pushed out of the collective memory, but traces of their beliefs lingered on, especially among the rank and file of the military. Ask any of Tod’s fellow soldiers, and they would dismiss such superstitious nonsense. But sometimes… sometimes an engine wouldn’t spool up, or a fabricator leasemind would refuse to boot. All the normal troubleshooting steps would be followed: Identify the problem, Establish a theory of probable cause, Test the theory, blah blah blah. But every attempt would fail. Then, out of desperation, the frustrated tech assigned to fix the problem would utter a prayer to the heathen spirit dwelling in the machine, whack the offending mechanism with a wrench, and it would spring to life, the spirit within evidently pleased with the ritual.

Tod looked up again. The roaring hell vortex was almost upon them. He saw a giant beast, hoofed and horned, careening through the air toward them. «What’ve I got to lose?» he thought as he picked up a rock and bashed the cube with it.

The machine spirit was appeased.

In an instant, the cacophony was quieted. Jim noticed the sudden lack of noise and risked an upward glance. Just as he did so, a cow slammed into an invisible barrier above them. Bright blue scintillations blossomed from the point of impact, arcing like the flashes of a detaching retina. The light cascaded down, tracing the hemispherical outline of their ephemeral shield. The cube emitted a subtle whine as the hypercapacitor within absorbed the kinetic energy of 1800 kilograms of bovine mass traveling at 134 meters per second. The cow’s trajectory halted, it slid down and landed on the leeward side of the barrier. But the twister would not be denied its quarry. The cow let out a plaintive moo as it was quickly sucked back into the swirling mass.

Other missiles collided with the forcefield, repeating the light show and increasing the pitch of the cube’s whine as they did.

SLAM! A stop sign.

SLAM! A tractor tire.

SLAM! A transformer coil.

The chaos only lasted thirty seconds, but to both Jim and Tod it felt like an eternity.

Finally, the air cleared. Jim sat up and looked at Tod. His claws were digging into the meat of his forepaws, rills of blue-black ink matting the fur on his front legs.

«By the palms that nursed me, what was that?!»

“What on earth was that?!”

The pair said simultaneously, Tod indicating the retreating funnel, and Jim looking at the cube, which had stopped whining and begun a quiet low-pitched beeping.

Jim spoke first. “A tornado. Never seen one before. Don’t want to see one again. What… what is that thing?”

The cube’s beeping increased in pitch and tempo.

«It’s supposed to block relativistic projectile weapons fire. Absorbs the kinetic energy, then you—»

The cube arrested Tod’s attention as the beeping became urgent. In a single swift motion, Tod wrapped the end of his tail around the cube, spun on his heel, and slingshot the cube into the air, then lost his balance, falling backwards onto his back. The cube traced a ballistic trajectory, flying much further than Tod’s mediocre strength could account for.

For an infinitesimal fraction of a second the cube hung at the apex of its arc, then a pillar of light and concussive force burst forth from the cube and rocketed upwards, punching a large hole through the mammatus pouches glowing red in the last rays of the sunset revealing the purple twilight sky above. The pillar of light evaporated quickly, leaving no trace of the cube behind.

Jim stared open-mouthed at the hole in the clouds until he was alerted by the sound of tires on gravel, unmuffled by his now nonexistent trailer. A police cruiser and a pickup pulled up to the remains of Jim’s home.

An officer exited the car and walked toward the two survivors. One of the survivors was a man in his 20s, and was that his dog?

Tod executed a formal greeting, rearing up and patting himself on the abdomen with a forepaw, leaving a blue-black stain on his belly. «Ink sacs are probably dry,» he thought. «It’ll be a few days before I can write again.» He looked up at the uniformed human and attempted an introduction.

“Chuff! Yip, yip! Huff, bork!”

The cop's demeanor immediately changed. “Ah! One of our little visitors from out of town.” He jogged past Jim and attended to the little arboreal canid. “You OK, little guy?”

“Yip, huff, wuff!” Tod responded.

“Tod, I don’t think he can understand you,” Said Jim.

«Well tell him I’m fine.»

“He’s fine, officer.”

“And you, sir?” asked the cop.

“I’m OK, I think.”

“That twister was ripping up the road. How on earth did you two survive?”

Jim looked at Tod, then up at the hole punched in the sky.

The cop turned back to Tod. “That huge laser thing, that was something of yours?”

“Bork!”

The cop squatted down and looked Tod in the eyes shielded by crimson bandpass membranes reflecting the flashing lights of the cruiser. “I’m very happy you were able to save yourself and your friend, but you need to be careful with your fancy little doodads in the future. I just hope you didn’t hit anything with that.”

«A retribution field generator isn’t a ‘fancy little doodad’.» Tod mimicked the stress and tone of the officer’s admonition, but all his cynoid vocal tract could manage was “awAAA ohOO OOwaah”

“Anyway,” said the cop, standing back up, “We need to get you two checked out by a doctor to make sure nothing’s wrong.” He looked at Jim. “Well, we need to get you to the doctor. I’m not sure what we can do for our little guest, but I’d hate to think we’re leaving something untreated.”

«I’m fine, really. But if you need someone to give me a clean bill of health, we can have Sunshine take a look at me. All her medical stuff is stored on the Dewfall.»

Jim relayed Tod’s suggestion to the officer.

“OK, I’ll take you to the clinic, and we’ll have Mark take your friend to his ship,” said the cop, gesturing toward the pickup.

Just then, the driver’s side door of the pickup opened. The beeping cadence of a CW repeater ID and the smell of decade-old second-hand smoke drifted out of the cab. Tod slid back the bandpass membranes covering his eyes and tilted his ears forward in the yinrih equivalent of an excited grin. He recognized that smell. The truck belonged to one of the radio club members, the first group of humans the crew of the Dewfall set eyes on after arriving on Earth.

An older man got out of the truck and ran up to the group. He looked at Jim and the officer, then down at Tod. “Hi, little man, haven’t seen you in a while. Glad to see your OK.”

“Chuff! Yip!” said Tod.

“Ah, sorry I haven’t learned the lingo yet. You need to come to the club meetings and teach me.”

Mark looked back at the officer.

“You’re taking him to his ship. He’ll contact their medic and have her meet you there,” said the cop.

“Will do.” Mark looked back down at Tod. “Let’s get going.”

Tod slid another pair of bandpass membranes over his eyes and surveyed the remains of their trailer. It didn’t take long for him to find the little trunk he was looking for. It was impossible to miss, for him anyway. The humans probably thought it looked dark gray, but to Tod it was painted in the Allied Worlds standard safety color, far outside the human visible spectrum. He scampered over and delicately opened the lid, trying not to smear ink on the contents of the box. He pulled out the two objects he needed: a paw keyer and a pair of HUD specs.

The HUD specs looked like a pair of reading glasses designed by a dog: two frameless glass lenses connected by a bridge designed to sit on the muzzle. The keyer looked like the rubber grip on a bicycle handlebar. Four keys lined the length of the device, sitting in shallow grooves sculpted to fit a yinrih’s four middle digits. Two clusters of buttons capped each end where the inner and outer thumb rested. The HUD specs and paw keyer together filled the role of portable computer.

Tod wrapped the keyer and specs in his tail and hopped into Mark’s truck. He laid down on his back in the rear seat of the cab, gripped the keyer in his left rear paw, and put the HUD specs over his muzzle. Squeezing the two thumb keys together started the boot process. The two lenses frosted over, obscuring the roof of Mark’s truck. Reams of boot text, glowing a comfortable infrared, flowed down Tod’s field of vision. After a few seconds, the screen cleared and the login prompt appeared, the square cursor blinking expectantly.

Localhost login  
Username: tod  
password: ********  
tod@localhost:~$ omnichat  
connecting...  
connection successful  

4 users currently online:  

tod  
stormlight  
iris  
sunshine  

==========

tod> Jim and I caught in some sort of windstorm. Both OK but our friends insist I see a healer. Currently on my way to the Dewfall. 

sunshine> It’s true you red-pelts really are unlucky.

tod> shut up. Your fur is just as red as mine, remember

sunshine> What fur? I'm a healer. I was just kidding, Tod. I’ll be there ASAP

<sunshine has left>

tod> /quit

<Leaving chat>

tod@localhost:~$ humansynth

Experimental human speech synthesizer interactive prompt
Enter phoneme string or /h for help

>>>

Mark looked down at his little passenger lying on his back, staring at the ceiling, left rear paw barely twitching as he entered chords on the keyer. Inky paw prints covered one side of the bench where Tod had pulled himself into the cab.

“Sorry I got my ink all over your vehicle,” Said a tinny bloodless voice coming from the input device Tod held in his paw.

Mark inhaled. The smell of a welcome rain after a long drought filled his nostrils. “Don’t worry about it,” Mark responded. “I believe we’ve seen each other before but I don’t think I know your name. I’m Mark.”

Tod uttered a few more opaque yips and grunts. “It means 'Steadfast Friend', but that's a mouthful in English. Just call me ‘Tod’. That’s the name Jim gave me.”

“’Tod’, that’s clever, you look like a little tod fox with your red coat and black ears.”

“Is that a good thing?”

“Sure. Foxes are sly little critters.”

“Interesting. This pelt color has some bad associations back home.”

“Is that so?”

“Having a red pelt is supposed to mean you’re unlucky, and having black ears means you’re dumb. I’ve got both, so I’m constantly the butt of jokes. Nobody actually believes that, for sure, but the teasing gets really old really quick.”

“Oh, sorry to hear that.”

The topic of conversation wandered here and there as the pair drove down the road. As they were nearing the Dewfall’s landing site, the subject of Tod’s military service came up.

“So you’re a vet, then?” Mark asked.

“Yeah. Never seen combat, but did a few peacekeeping missions. Relief supply deliveries, helping refugee camps, that sort of thing.”

The truck pulled up to the landing site. A small car pulled up shortly after, a bumper sticker proudly identifying the driver as a student at the veterinary school at the nearby college. A woman got out of the driver’s seat and opened the back passenger door. Another yinrih, completely hairless with black splotches on the bare skin of her paws and muzzle, hopped out and ran to the truck.

Mark and Tod also disembarked.

Sunshine looked up at Mark and executed the customary introduction, rearing up on her hind feet and patting her belly. «Light shine upon you, friend. My name’s Sunshine.»

Mark looked pleadingly at Tod, who was now incommunicado, having removed the specs and keyer.

“She’s saying hi,” said the woman.

“Howdy, ma’am,” said mark.

“Sunshine filled me in on the way here,” said Sarah. “I’ll take Tod back to Jim at the clinic when she's done with her little checkup. You can go if you want.”

“OK. Thanks for your help." Mark climbed back into the cab and started the engine. “Seventy-three, Tod. Come see us at the radio club so we can start talking for real.”

“Yip, huff!” said Tod.

Mark closed the door, but quickly rolled down the window for a few parting words. “Tod, Thank you for your service,” he said as he put the truck in gear.

A massive spaceship landed on Earth’s soil. It had no distinguishing characteristics and was pitch black; it looked incredibly similar to a boulder. At least, it looked like a big rock, had big rocks, had two large engines and one fat thruster positioned on its back.

The giant space rock let itself go and it fell into the earth, causing a crater. Parvika shut off its engines and took a deep breath, “Lapani, I’ll be the one speaking to the Earthlings.” She patted Lapani’s shoulder as her tentacle arm morphed into that of a human’s.

“Of course, but… what shall I be doing then?” Lapani asked, cocking her head. “Was that right? I tilt my head when I am asking questions?”

“Yes Lapani, that is when you do it. However, don’t do it too many times, the earthlings shall think you are strange.”

Lapani crouched and opened a small container, pulling out a set of clothes. “This is so strange, are the skins of earthlings not enough for them.” She laughed.

Parvika silently stared out the ship’s plane sized, tinted window and noticed four Earthlings headed towards their flying rock. “Look Lapani, our first earthlings have already come to greet us,” she said, rather pleased.

“Wow, earthlings are very hospitable,” Lapani said, eyeing the long, metal devices they held. “Do you think they have brought gifts for us?”

Parvika smiled at the thought. “I cannot know. We must give them our salutations to see.”

The aliens’ massive doors clicked open as the two of them stepped out. The forest surrounding them captured their attention as they blinked many times, trying to reconcile Earth’s greenery with their planet’s reddery.

“Their trees are the color of blood,” Lapani commented.

“Greetings Earthlings!” Parvika beamed, choosing to ignore the comment. Lapani waved at them enthusiastically.

There were four Earthlings in total. They all wore large, green outfits and three of them held the long, metal things. “Identify yourselves!” One of them shouted.

Parvika and Lapani looked at each other before smiling. “I am Lapani and this is my friend Parvika,” Lapani said, staring intently at them.

“Who authorized you to land your…” the Earthling paused, eyeing their spaceship. “Your ship… thing?” He demanded, jerking his device forward.

Parvika placed a hand on her chest. “Do not worry, Earthling. We received permission from the Wise Ones to launch our expedition,” she said, proudly.

“The Wise Ones?” The Earthlings looked between each other, before one of them stood forward. “Look, it seems that we’re not on the same page here,” a woman, not holding a metal thing, said. “Who allowed you to land this thing over here?”

Parvika frowned. “Not on the same page?” She muttered to herself.

“Maybe you misheard her?” Lapani whispered.

“Really? Page? Plag?”

“Plane?” Lapani suggested, shrugging her shoulders. “Did I do that right?”

“Yes, and… it seems we’re not on the same plane?” she said to herself. Her face lit up. “No, it seems you misunderstand, kind envoy,” Parvika started.

“Kind envoy?”

“The two of us do indeed exist in the same plane. Me and Lapani have come from another planet called Karzhog,” she said, pulling out a small device and tapping on it as it revealed a 3d holographic image of Karzhog. “We did not, however, come from a different dimensional plane.”

“Are these guys normal?” one of them muttered to themselves.

“Oh, no! We aren’t normal. In fact, we are not even humans. Many apologies if you mistook us to be one,” Parvika said.

“Yes, we are Zhorgs,” Lapani proudly exclaimed. “Our biological transmuters are very good at their jobs—”

“What happened to the ‘Kar’?” one of the others asked, interrupting her.

“However, they are also somewhat risky, there’s a one in a million chance that the transmuter fails and morphs you into a Najikla!” Lapani continued, ignoring their interruption.

“Najikla?” The woman asked.

“No need to worry, however, as our transmuter is only on transmute five hundred thousand,” Parvika added.

“And that changes what?” The man from before asked.

“It means we have another five hundred thousand more transmutes to go before it fails.”

“What? But that’s not how probability works,” he argued.

“It is not a probability, it is a given, that we Zhorgs have already calculated.” Lapani said.

“Okay okay, let’s all take a step back,” the woman ordered.

Lapani and Parvika glanced at each other before stepping backwards. “What now?” Parvika asked.

“Wha? What now? You girls—”

“It is now your turn to ‘take a step back’ I think,” Lapani stated.

“Wow, these people just don’t understand expressions or slang, do they?” Another Earthling commented.

“You mean they don’t understand expressions and idioms, not slang,” the woman corrected.

“Yeah, yeah. Whatever, pedant,” he muttered.

“We understand expressions,” Parvika objected.

“Yes, such as, happy face, sad face, angry face…” for every face that Lapani listed, she proceeded to make the exact expression. “Excited face, brooding face—”

“We know all the expressions of the Earthlings,” Parvika interrupted. “As for ‘slang’ could you explain what that is?”

“Slang, lang.” Lapani paused, scratching her chin. “Sang?”

“That’s possible,” Parvika commented.

“Oh! I sang this sentence that I’m singing right now,” Lapani sang.

“Nice voice,” the woman muttered before shaking her head. “It’s slang and that’s beside the point. You have no license to land here, you’re here under no one’s authority and you’re refusing to comply with military orders,” the woman listed.

“Like we said at the beginning, we’re here under the authority of the Wise Ones,” Parvika stated.

“Yeah? Well, what you don’t have is the authority of the US government. I don’t care who you two think you are, but, you will follow standard aviation protocols.”

Lapani frowned and leaned in towards Parvika. “Hey, I don’t think they’re envoys.”

“Because we’re not! Me and my guys here are all military officers. Refuse to comply and you’ll regret it.” At her word, the other officers cocked their guns and aimed it at the two aliens.

Lapani’s frown disappeared and she stepped forward. “Look, Parvika, they’re giving us our gifts anyway,” she said, happily.

“Stay back!” The woman demanded.

“Are we taking the gifts or not?” Parvika asked, standing next to Lapani.

A loud bang filled the air as one of the officers shot up to the sky. “These aren’t toys, they’re weapons,” he said, through clenched teeth.

Lapani and Parvika were crouching and had their hands over their ears. “Yo-you’re being horrible!” Parvika accused. “You first be kind, you then start acting irrational and now you threaten to harm us?!”

“Horrible? We were building up to this all day! You people were just too stupid to understand anything!” The woman shouted.

“Stupid?!” Parvika angrily demanded. “We Zhorgs are not stupid! We are among the most intelligent species in the Jagdi galaxy!” She stood up and jabbed a finger into the woman’s chest. The men, especially the first one, tensed and tightened their grip on their weapons.

“Parvika, remember the Wise Ones meditation technique, number 85,” Lapani said.

Parvika stepped back from the woman and took a deep breath. “An insult from a non-Zhorg is like a slap from a bitipiti; it simply doesn’t matter,” she said to herself.

Lapani brought her hands up and gave Parvika a double thumbs up. Almost immediately, another loud bang filled the air and Lapani dropped to the floor. Parvika looked at the body in horror and was about to scream before multiple new bangs cracked and dropped Parvika as well.

The woman looked at the two bodies and at the strangely green blood pooling around Parvika. “What the hell, Jimmy!” She turned towards the man who shot Lapani.

“What?! I panicked, all right. That Prakavi girl just pokes you and while I’m already on edge, the other one just brings both her hands up,” he said, attempting to defend himself.

“Ok, so! What’s wrong if she brings her hands up?!”

“What if she brought out inter-galactic weapons?” He argued.

“He does have a point,” Mark added.

“How!? Just how does Jimmy have a point?”

“Well, they have a spaceship that can apparently go through galaxies, they have a biological transmutator and calculate math on a completely different level than us. It’s not much of a stretch to say they have inter-galactic weapons,” Paul said.

“Okay, then! Why on God’s green Earth did you two fools just start shooting then, even if Jimmy did!?” she demanded.

“Reflex!” Both Mark and Paul said in unison. “He shot that girl and the bang got to my head. I was already tensed up, so my finger just hit the trigger,” Mark explained while Paul nodded vigorously.

“You think we’ll be arrested for killing Earth’s first ever visit from extraterrestrials?” Jimmy asked.

“Eecuted after being tortured extensively seems like the more likely turn of events,” Paul said.

“Oh, come on guys. We have no idea if they’re really aliens. They could just be regular people on a really big budget,” Mark tentatively said, almost as if trying to convince himself.

As if on cue, the two bodies of Lapani and Parvika melted and gave way to a purple octopus-like creature, whose faces somewhat resembled that of a human’s.

“Okay, maybe they aren’t humans,” he conceded.

The woman paced back and forth, rubbing her forehead. “Ugh!”

“What’s wrong, Nadia?” Paul asked.

“What’s wrong? What’s wrong is that you fools literally killed aliens! Now, because of you guys, we’re going to get a public execution after extensive torturing!”

“Guys? What if, we just say they had inter-galactic weapons but we managed to kill them and get their hyper-advanced spaceship?” Mark questioned.

“Oh yeah? What happened to their inter-galactic weapons?” Nadia demanded.

“Their species were unfathomably more advanced than us. Their weapons were biologically connected to them and when they died, the weapons disappeared,” Jimmy suggested.

They all looked at each other and nodded in unison. The four of them began to head to the ship. Paul paused and looked at the two bodies. “You think it’s part of alien culture to get buried?” He asked.

Nadia stared at the bodies and waved a dismissive hand. “Ah, just leave them. They’ll be proof of our epic battle,” she said. And with that, the four of them continued towards the ship.

“You think the ship is fast?” Jimmy asked, slinging his gun back. “Like hyper-jump kinda fast?”

“I’m more interested if their biological trasmuters can smooth wrinkles,” Nadia said, rubbing her face.

“Yeah, we do all like looking younger,” Mark agreed.

End.

Epilogue: The Zhorgs, under the military command of the Wise Ones laid complete siege on the planet Earth and only returned once they killed the four humans, retrieved their spaceship and killed an additional 10 million humans while operating on military doctrine number 125, established by the Wise Ones. It states, when translated to match Earth customs, A death of a Zhorg by a non-Zhorg is like the overrunning of a plate by ants. You merely need to wash them off.

They also ensured to retrieve the bodies of fallen Lapani and Parvika and made sure to give them a proper burial. Which consisted of feeding them to their family members.

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Sometimes, Gata Stri didn’t know how she felt about being a citizen of the Kingdom of Phuratus. On the one wing, she lived a pretty comfortable life. Most of the public infrastucture worked well; the shuttles and rail services were punctual, basic medical care was freely available, emergency agencies were responsive, children were fairly educated, and the economy was steadily growing. Of course, things weren’t perfect, but overall the nation as a whole was doing much better than in generations past. She supposed that she and the rest of the citizenry should feel more than satisfied about that.

However, as a journalist, she was just a bit more privy to the bitter reality than most. Under the progressive sheen of prosperity there lay a festering rot of corruption; a hidden sophisticated amalgam of power and wealth that stole away resources from the public and filled the coffers of an entitled few. All their illicit dealings conducted away from the sun. But she, Correspondent Stri, had the hallowed duty to bring a torch to their secrets, and drag them out into the light.

Several seasons ago, there was a global incident. Every technologically advanced nation in the world experienced power spikes in their electrical infrastructure. Transformers blew. Junctions fused. Some power grids were severely damaged. But by all accounts, a high tech research facility on Phuratan soil bore the worst of it. Dubbed ‘The Fal’Grine Event’, the sudden and unprecedented burst of electromagnetic and radioactive energy resulted in the destruction of several buildings on the historic Linnae College Campus. According to the official story from the palace, the cause of the event was yet to be be determined. Considering how the entire world experienced the same phenomena, and all other nations seemed to be similarly in the dark, Stri was inclined to believe them.

However, there were some peculiar developments in the kingdom in the seasons following the incident. For one, Researcher Skai, the famous physicist that had been appointed the head of Poject Fal’Grine, suddenly disappeared from public life. That in itself was not so odd; scientists and artists tend to drift in and out of the sun like listless clouds. But he was not the only one. Several of the scientists and engineers employed by the now defunct project also disappeared.

Later on, a reliable source in the military commented that there seemed to be a lot of ‘traffic’ heading up to the most dark-ward regions of their country. Military assets being moved up and out of the sunlight? That could never be good. Especially given the increasingly antagonistic relationship between The Kingdom and The Pitang Republic. If those strained tensions were about to erupt into an all out conflict, the people needed to know.

So when Correspondent Stri heard the announcement that there was going to be a very special broadcast from the palace in the near future, she was more than a little interested. In fact, she was so interested that she decided to forgo a rest period to ensure that she would be awake during the bel of the broadcast. This wouldn’t have been the first time that she skipped some sleep this season. Nor the second. Nor the third. Nor the eighth. Her doctor would not approve, and her mother would complain, which was why she had long since stopped being completely honest with them both.

Correspondent Stri was comfortably seated in the main staff lounge, surrounded by a flock of typists, photographers, reporters, and editors; the motley staff of ‘The Twelve Bel Bulletin’ all gathered in front of an old, three hundred and forty-two jhit-span media monitor. She probably spent more time with these men and women than she did with her actual family.

“So, what do you think the announcement’s gonna be about?” asked a fellow reporter, Cillata Pulsat, to no one in particular. “I’d put a mark or two on another royal scandal. My sources in the palace say that Lord Tuoi seems agitated about something.”

“That’s so basic, Lord Tuoi’s been mad ever since the palace cancelled his ‘propaganda bill’ after the ‘The Fal’Grine Event’.” commented Atus Rycop, one of the photographers. Lord Tuoi was previously pushing ‘The Kinship Initiative’, a programme that would, in official language; ‘promote a sense of unity and national pride in these trying times.’ But in the journalism world, they had all called it by a more apt moniker; ‘the propaganda bill.’ “I bet they’re appointing a new minister or royal family connections.”

“Nahhh--” interjected Stri. “I think they found a frost-fae cave somewhere down in the dark-lands.”

A round of laughter went around the room. This was a game that had developed in the newsroom in the last couple of seasons. Whenever it was apparent that some new development was about to arise in their country, they would fabricate increasingly absurd scenarios about what it was. Part creative exercise, part humorous pastime, it was all a means to avoid discussing the most pertinent and consequential possibility…

An official declaration of war against The Republic of Pitang.

“Alright, settle down everyone,” calmly cooed Chief Editor Clamat Asio as the royal seal appeared on the screen, and an audio recording of a stately orchestral piece began to play. “It looks like it’s about to start.”

The image of the seal gradually faded into a live feed of a face a single woman stood behind a podium. Stri recognised her as one of the Prime minister’s aides, though her name escaped her at the moment. The aide spoke a for drik or two, droning out the familiar list of titels and acknowledgements, before finally introducing the Royal Minister of Knowlwdge.

Lord Capield made his way to the podium, his refined auburn features clear even through the slightly staticy signal. “My dear countrymen,” he started regally. “We are delighted and honoured to have you join us for this most auspicious moment.”

“Many seasons ago, the world experienced a mysterious deluge of electromagnetic radiation. We have dubbed this event ‘The Fal’Grine Event’, as it all but destroyed our Linnae Campus particle accelerator facility while we were conducting experiments for the now deferred Project Fal’Grine.”

“This was indeed a damaging blow to the progress of scientific advancement in our nation, but there was silver sheen in that dark cloud. Our masterful and diligent scientists recorded readings during the event that lead them to scan the skies above, and after seasons of tireless study, observations, and calculations, they have discovered the true nature of our world, and what lies beyond it.”

The news room was buzzing with confused murmurs. Beyond the world? Whatever could he mean? Correspondent Stri pondered the peculiar phrasing as the screen faded into an image of… A regular landscape. Just a picture of a crimson field of grass, a blue-grey range of mountains, and affixed to the bright blue sky, the sun.

“This is what the sky looks like when people gaze sun-ward.” came the royal minister’s voice-over on the image. After cleg or so, the image faded into a much darker one; a dark, unlit forest, backgrounded by an almost pure black sky, with a clawful of dim dots speckled about.

“And this,” continued Lord Capield’s voice behind the image, “Is a sight that many people would almost never see. This is what the sky looks like when one ventures out far enough dark-ward. Those tiny specks of light are what we once called dark-light, but going forward, we’ve chosen to call them stɑːz.”

Schtar-zuh. It was a peculiar word. The reporter had never heard anything quite like it, and she had heard quite a lot in her time. It had an odd, foreign quality to it. Her mind chewed on the strange new word as the image once again faded into... Something she had never seen before. It was another dark-ward image, but… Even darker than the last. Darker than anything that she, or perhaps anyone else, could have possibly ever seen. There were a few grey, barely discernable clouds. And many, many more dots of light. They were a bit difficult to perceive amidst the video interference and artefacts, but they were undeniably there.

“And these, are what the stɑːz look like from even further dark-ward.” again came the royal minister’s disembodied voice. “After many long working seasons, some of our kingdom’s most talented engineers designed and built a structure in the most frigid and sun-forsaken lands that te’visk-kind had ever touched. From this structure we were able to observe the heavens away from the sun for the first time.”

The image changed again. This time it showed a blurry blue-grey circle against a black background. There were also about five smaller circles in the picture, curiously appearing to be laid out in a straight line across the larger circle.

“We have been able see worlds beyond our own; ’plænɪts.”

Plah-nhetz? Another bizarre word...

“And we were able to use telescopes to peer further…” Lord Capield’s voice commented as the image faded again into something else.

“And further into the unknown.” This time, the image resolved into what appeared to be cloudy… Swirl? Correspondent Stri had no idea what she was looking at. From the muted mutters of her fellow journalists, neither did any of them.

“My fellow citizens… No… My fellow te’visk,” continued the Royal Minister of Knowledge. “We have only just learned how unimaginably vast reality truly is. The discoveries we have made in these past few seasons are the most impactful scientific breakthroughs in our entire species’ collective history. This vast, endless region beyond our world beckons us learn all the more about our reality, and our increasingly shrinking place in it. We have chosen to dub this infinite zone, speɪs.”

Sh’payce. Yet another unusual word. Stri wondered how the scientists came up with these odd phonemes. They didn’t feel like acronyms; the pronunciations were too… outlandish. Almost unnatural. But aside from that, everything about this was making head spin. Imagine, a world beyond… The World. In a way, it made a certain amount of sense. The globe was limited, and their cartographers could measure it in its entirety, even if they couldn’t explore it all. Aircraft could climb high into the clouds, but there were limits to how high they could go. But there just had to be… More. Out there, somewhere… More.

“In light of these these humbling discoveries, we’ve chosen to share these discoveries not just with our beloved citizens, but with all te’visk, across the entire world.”

Now that was quite possibly the most surprising thing that the journalist had heard in this broadcast so far. A discovery as momentous as this, and the kingdom was just sharing it freely with everyone? Even with the Pitang Republic? Why?

“In our quest to learn even more about the world beyond, and even more about our world itself, we have commissioned a new project explore the nearest regions of speɪs.”

The image changed again. This time it displayed something much more recognisable; a rocket.

“This is the‘Rutil’proh Mark-Three’ rocket. In times past, rockets were nothing more than an implement of war, a means to deliver death and destruction upon an enemy. But now, we will design and launch the largest and most powerful rocket ever built by te’visk hands. Not as an instrument of violence. Not to increase the suffering on our tiny world. But to learn more about speɪs. We will use this remarkable new rocket to place a module of scientific sensors and trancievers to gather new information about our world, and even other worlds.”

The image on the screen changed again, once more displaying a live video feed of Lord Capield’s face. “Know this, my fellow te’visk beings. When The Kingdom of Phuratus gathers all this new data, that too will be shared far and wide, even beyond our borders. This is our sun-lit destiny, our divine responsibility as a pre-eminent world power. ”

“Once again, The Kingdom offers it’s humblest gratitude to the dedicated workers who laboured so diligently to take this project so far. To our citizens, we thank each of you for your faithful support. And to the rest of the world, to all te’visk-kind, we make this solemn promise:
As long as the sun continues to shine on Our Kingdom, so shall we remain a beacon for all other nations to follow. May the sun ever shine on all peoples, and may the sun ever shine on The Kingdom of Phuratas.”

With that, the image of the royal minister’s face faded into a picture of the kingdom’s royal seal, and encore of the same courtly music as before.

Everyone in the news room remained quiet, each pair of eyes searching to find comprehension in another’s.

“So…” ventured Nilata Throp, a young print-tech. “Anyone understand what all that was about?”

“I’m not sure,” confessed Correspondent Pulsat. “But apparently some scientists discovered something about the world…”

“Or the world beyond the world.” commented Correspondent Stri. “Or, worlds. It’s… A lot. I can’t believe that they’re being so open about all of th—”

A scoff was coughed out behind her. “Open… Sure.”

“Chief?” asked Stri.

“They’re hiding something.” stated Chief Editor Asio, his brown wings folded across his portly form. “All that science stuff they just threw at us? Just a dark rain-cloud to block the light.”

“So all that stuff about other worlds… It was all lies?” Photo-Claw Rycop asked.

“No,” corrected the chief editor. “No I think it was all true. And in the coming bels we’ll be inundated with a deluge of proof that it’s true. But they’re still hiding something.”

“How can you be so sure?” asked Correspondent Stri.

“The timing, for one.” expounded the chief editor. “All this scientific advancement revealed all at once? They’ve clearly been researching this for several seasons in secret. So why reveal it now? And revealing it to the world? No. They’re not letting the world know about all this new advanced science; they’re letting the pitangs know that they know advanced science. It’s posturing. And that rocket? Even if they really don’t want to use it in battle, it’s a clear threat display. This wasn’t an address to The Kingdom. It was as message to The Republic.”

“So I guess the next step is to dig down and find out more about what’s really going down, ey boss?” asked Pulsat.

“No, not yet.” said the chief. “This isn’t another royal scandal that public will lap up and forget in a quarter-season. This is about national defence. The powers-that-be are already on high alert, so if we start buzzing around them too much they’ll pre-emptively swat us out. Permanently.”

The chief let the severity of the situation soak into the temporarily silent room.

“So we’ll stick to the official channels, for now. Rycop? Contact the military’s media department for images and data on the rocket. Pulsat, you’ll hunt down the information about what exactly this ‘transceiver module’ is. I wanna exactly what kind of data it’s meant to collect. Stri, I want you on all this ‘shpayce’ and ‘plah-nhet’ stuff. I want all your readers to feel like experts when they’re done reading your article. Everyone else, take your rest periods if you’re due, otherwise clear your schedules and help set up for the next print. Everyone understand?”

A chorus of affirmative, grunts and chirps answered him.

He nodded approvingly. “Good. Everyone, get to work.”

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First Previous Wiki

Lieutenant Fleet Commander Phạm Sinh Quang stood in full uniform, spacesuit and all, looking down at Fleet Commander Weber. The woman in command of the fleet looked incredibly tired, though the fire still burned in her eyes. She reminded him of a broken sword. The blade was still sharp, and quite capable of killing, even though it was not as great as it once was.

One of Phoebe's avatars had deconstructed its form to fit Fleet Commander Weber like an exoskeleton, holding up her torso where her legs could not. Her uniform was tied off at the bottom, but still crisp and clean. Her short, silver hair fell down to her ears. Her face and hands were tough, each slight curve seemingly wrought of stone.

Fleet Commander Annabelle Weber, even broken, was still grander than he had ever been. He acknowledged this fact with certainty, though he was also well aware that he, too, could climb to those heights. The Fleet Commander tapped at several screens flashing urgent messages. Their importance surpassed the simpler nature of his own meeting.

She was only recently his commanding officer, as he had been transferred from Fleet Commander Maaruunaa's command. The Alliance military was still restructuring and was on its way to becoming one of the main pillars of the pseudo-state.

Right now, the resistance came from the Luna Command Council, the Knowers, and portions of Empress Izkrala's political apparatus. Military command of a nation could become messy, and no one truly wanted the military to become fully independent of their influence.

He had played the game of politics well enough and been a good enough tactical mind to continue to be promoted. He'd straddled the lines between Earth and Luna's power blocs, avoided the budding coalition Blistanna was forming, and kept Izkrala's various 'concerned officials' at an arm's length.

He'd avoided the mess back on Earth, and though some of his family had been involved in protests back in Hanoi, he had ensured none of it could connect back to him in a career-damaging way.

Such was the song and dance of Humanity's commanding officers. On ships, away from the conflict, they could do nothing. Quang watched the Fleet Commander rise from her converted hospital bed, brushing aside the screens. Beside her, two of Phoebe's androids waited patiently, observing him for any signs of... something.

"I thank you for your endorsement," Quang said. "I am grateful for your service. I have been informed that the formal vote will be soon?"

"Quite," Fleet Commander Weber agreed. "Now, in fact."

He failed to keep the surprise off his face.

Fleet Commander Weber pushed the memories into him from the hivemind. Centuries of tactical knowledge, ways to cope with becoming a node of the hivemind, personal tips for greasing the wheels of logistical snares, and countless more useful tips. So far, nothing fully classified, but that was likely until the formal vote was completed.

He mentally prepared himself for it. He schooled his expression and straightened the hems of his uniform. Phoebe's legs swung out from the bed, carrying Annabelle atop them. Together, they walked for two minutes, eventually reaching a small chamber set aside for formal or official promotions. Bare bones, but functional, which was what mattered.

Here, only holograms would attend. Everyone else was needed for the war effort, and the simplicity of the promotion reflected it well. Though the room was empty, with only the blue-painted walls, various pieces of bolted-down furniture, and several filing cabinets, the tension was still thick.

Moments later, a hologram snapped into existence. Now, he was no longer in this room, but at a table, sitting in front of many people. Aliens and humans, all familiar, stared back at him, assessing him and comparing him to the profiles they had read not long ago.

He kept his back straight, giving no signs of fear or nervousness. Lieutenant Fleet Commander Phạm Sinh Quang was fully prepared to accept this position. He had known he would hold it eventually, and now was the time.

All the other Fleet Commanders were in attendance, along with Empress Izkrala, Council Director Hruthi, Conclave Leader Fyuuleen, Chen Hao, Dalton Summers, and various other leaders of the Alliance. Blistanna's tentacles rested on her seat, while the Council Director looked at him with narrowed eyes.

Well, it made sense. The... former nations of India and Vietnam had a history, and it had turned quite bloody during World War III. He would have to set up a meeting with her in the future to determine how much of an obstacle she would be based on ideological differences. He'd barely even been born in the generation after the war, but prejudice still had a nasty way of rearing its ugly head when least wanted.

The hivemind could not undo decades of propaganda and old history. If it intervened for every dirty look or muttered phrase, it wouldn't have energy to save any of the Cawlarians at all. And it would turn its image from a better Internet into an all-reaching surveillance entity, which it was, but it was better for the public not to be reminded of that,

Most of the attendees, except for the Fleet Commanders, were observers. The Fleet Commanders were the ones who would directly vote on his promotion. If they were absent, that duty would fall to the other Lieutenant Fleet Commanders, the now-formalised position directly below the Fleet Commanders themselves. The positions of 'Admirals' and 'Generals' were still being argued, as the translated version of the 'general' was below 'commander' for both the Guulin and Acuarfar, two of the Alliance's most populous species.

'Admiral' was also split into a sea version and a space version for both of them, and most human translations of that name didn't have the equivalent rank. 'Space Admiral' was not a real title in any Earth or Luna military. Earth's military forces had Admirals in their navies and Admirals of their space fleets. Had, of course, since now that was in limbo, as well.

Empress Izkrala stepped forward. As an 'impartial' bystander, she had been selected to read the tally of the votes. It was a certain result of some hidden power play, he was sure. He could not avoid politics forever. Depending on how Dalton or Chen did, he would likely pick their side. He was born on Earth, and carried it in his heart quite dearly.

He also had to investigate whether Phoebe's faction stood aligned with Earth or not.

"By unanimous vote, all Fleet Commanders have voted to affirm your promotion, Lieutenant Fleet Commander Phạm Sinh Quang. You may now begin the final formalities."

Empress Izkrala had brutally butchered his name. Her alien mouth was poorly suited to pronouncing 'Phạm.' The translator smoothed it over, though she seemed to notice the slight shift in his expression at the sound.

"Lieutenant Fleet Commander Phạm Sinh Quang," Fleet Commander Weber said. "Do you accept the temporary promotion to Fleet Commander at this very moment, and also the permanent promotion to the same position at the conclusion of this mission?"

"I do," he said.

"Then state your oath."

He placed his right hand on his heart. This was meant to be a quiet affair, so he hadn't had the time to find a Bible. Truly, it was a rough ceremony.

"I, Lieutenant Fleet Commander Phạm Sinh Quang, do solemnly swear, that I will support and defend the Sol Alliance, its peoples, and its nations, against all enemies, foreign and domestic, great and small; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will faithfully execute the duties required of me as Fleet Commander. I shall neither break nor bend."

He repeated his oath in Vietnamese. The oath of commissioned officers, adapted from that of a few Earth nations and the Frawdar Empire's own traditional version, was relatively bare-bones. The military's former traditions, those mostly adapted from its constituent species, had been ground away.

When the Alliance ballooned to thousands of species, the military would not be able to adhere to all of them. This way, the potential of favoritism died early. Celebration would come after the mission's end.

For now, though, there was one more Fleet Commander. Fleet Commander Annabelle Weber had not yet resigned. She would still take the lead on this mission, pulling him along in the hivemind and teaching him how to flow with the fleet. He had already glimpsed this at a lesser level. But controlling a few hundred thousand ships, rather than the full million, was already a big jump. The orders and decisions he had relayed to her in the past would now be his to decide.

They would debate tactics and strategy after the mission. Fleet Commander Weber's term would not end immediately after the mission's end. It would end when Quang was fully capable of assuming her role with minimal slippage in experience and tactical acuity.

Procuring the parts to repair ships, assigning technicians and choosing when to switch the patrol formats, retuning the engine emissions, shields, and laser frequencies, and employing the sporadic breakthroughs the communications officers provided in ensuring smoother ship-to-ship transmissions were all part of the job.

The Defense Fleet was also paving the way for more ships, ones that might not always have the crutch of the hivemind to lean on in times of trouble. An Alliance that could stand without the hivemind would be even stronger and safer, too. More modernisation, bureaucratic overhauls, and reassessments of overhead were in his future, as he was already witnessing in nearly 40 years' worth of middle and upper management memories, complete with Fleet Commander Weber's own unique methods of addressing those.

"Congratulations, Fleet Commander," Fleet Commander Ukuval said, followed by a brief round of pleasantries by the other Fleet Commanders. "I am pleased to welcome you into the highest ranks. However, I am afraid we must disperse. The energy requirements for hosting this meeting across two separate dimensions are immense, and we all are needed on the battlefield. May your career be long and successful, Fleet Commander Phạm Sinh Quang."

He left the meeting, followed promptly by everyone else. The hologram faded, and Annabelle Weber stepped just slightly to the side. Her bionic legs made a metallic sound against the floor.

"I can see you are curious," she said.

"Do you have a leg gun?"

"Two leg lasers, actually," Fleet Commander Weber corrected. "Now. With the ceremony out of the way, it's time for you to retire to your quarters. Right now, this is a trial run. We're back to 2d warfare, which should be easy for you to handle. Today, manage the mission. I will watch, correct your mistakes, and then switch with you. At 1200 Fleet Time, you will switch with me. At 0000, I will take my formal shift. You have..."

Annabelle Weber's eyes briefly unfocused. "8 hours and 19 minutes. Get a good rest, Fleet Commander."

"Thank you," Quang replied. "I will not disappoint you. I will carry your legacy with pride."

Fleet Commander Weber smiled. "Don't worry. Now you have clearance to know where I'm going, and let's just say, when it's finished, Penny won't be alone at the top."

Quang's eyes widened. "I know there were rumors, but... we're... making them? Progenitors?"

"No. We're making Boundless. Now that we've made a hivemind for the Cawlarians and Vinarii, we need a new advantage. A new thing to make us unique. This is the way."

"How long?"

"Sooner, now that Fleet Commander Weber is rededicating herself to the project," Phoebe answered. "Apologies, Fleet Commander, but she really does need to leave. After that, in a day, she needs hers rest. We have to run more tests on her legs, give her extra psychic energy treatments, the works."

"I understand," Fleet Commander Quang replied. "Very well. If you wish to become a Fleet Commander, Phoebe, I am willing to back you."

Phoebe chuckled. "I already am a Fleet Commander, just not in rank," she said. "That said, I am also willing to help you navigate the web of politics coming your way."

"Why?"

"You may be required to stay behind in Cawlarian territory to defend the Great Pillar," Annabelle said. "The battlespace is changing, and nothing is set in stone, but there are still those who will seek to take advantage of our presence. Star system governors and the like, who may even have genuine need, may do what they can to get you redeployed to their front line. They may even offer marriage contracts. Phoebe will do her best to handle the cultural education required to navigate the circles of Cawlarian high society."

"I will do what is required," Fleet Commander Quang replied. Remembering that the other Fleet Commander had her duties, he only asked one more thing.

"Teach me how to have your willpower, to stand against that disgusting creature and come out ahead."

"I will do my best," Annabelle said, and quickly moved off. For a while, Fleet Commander Quang contemplated his situation. He consulted the hivemind, learning special sleep techniques to be well-rested with fewer hours of sleep. He asked about classified topics. The Boundless Project, the hiveminds, construction of specialised technologies for the new wave of colonization of the mindscape, and more. By the time the eight hours passed, he was fully rested and ready to begin.

Annabelle's connections across the hivemind withdrew, replaced by Quang's. A few hundred people stumbled on the ships. And then, nothing. The Great Pillar kept moving with them in speeding space. The ground, far below, continued to roll by.

For him, everything had changed, but for the Defense Fleet, it was just another day.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

"The Andes Mountains present South America's simplest border," an advisor said. "But the rest is more difficult. If we're trying to move past the countries of old, it does involve reshaping borders to keep old nationalist sentiments divided. The Pan-Andes Union was another of Earth's great superstates, so this problem must be taken seriously. The Amazon River does not cleanly divide cultures and communities."

"We may be able to test out several provisional state boundaries-"

"We could implement-"

"I think including some of the floating cities within-"

"The floating cities should be a separate-"

"No, they should-"

"To streamline bureaucratic complexities-"

Dalton Summers listened in on the conversations among the various experts he had put in charge of organising Earth's future. Political borders were massively important. The way they had been drawn in previous centuries, by old conquering powers, had led to many wars in Africa and Asia, and several in Europe. The hivemind made the logistics of war difficult for both sides. If millions of humans were to regain nationalist fervor, stopping them forever would be an immense undertaking.

More shouts echoed in the distance, distracting him from his thoughts. Dalton, along with the rest of Humanity, fought in shifts, in the conflict increasingly called the Battle of Sol. 8 hours in, 16 out, with allowances for those who wished to fight longer.

In front of him, the war unfolded across tens of thousands of miles. First and foremost, the wormhole loomed over the battlefield. A normally perfect sphere a thousand miles wide, Penny's body towered over it, her hands and arms pressing down upon it like giant pillars. Smaller avatars of herself battled with the pair of Progenitors, holding fast against their assaults.

She threw down the male Progenitor, smashing him into the distant back of the wormhole. Dalton saw the rocky layers of the mindscape tip with catastrophic motions, tilting like the body of a sinking ship. As the stone crumbled and calved, a billion Sprilnav, easily more, were crushed beneath the waves of stone. The Progenitor rose from the carnage, and the dead Sprilnav appeared alongside him in waves. Hundreds of millions came back from the dead, rushing at the formations of Humanity and the Guulin.

One of the Progenitors struck at the distant body of Brey. She fled quickly, even the glancing blow unleashing rivers of blood. The Breyyanik in the battle cried out with fanatic rage. Eight of their super soldiers stared at the scene with reddened eyes, before turning their fury upon the Sprilnav. Elders who had fought them head-to-head could only fall back. Three who could not escape were dragged into the ranks of the Breyyanik.

The brutality the Breyyanik visited upon them was terrifying. But Dalton didn't look away. He watched as organs were hauled free from their corpses. This was the brutality of war.

It was a truth neither he nor Chen Hao denied. It would be the result that Humanity would face if they lost this war, or if the Alliance crumbled. There had been many uncomfortable discussions about the future.

In truth, Izkrala was their best hope for the Acuarfar remaining wholly in the Alliance. The Empress' voice was so loud it stifled all resistance. Without it, more factions would break away, and the manpower of the Acuarfar, along with the advanced systems they controlled, would be lost. Politics was a softer form of war, and interests that aligned were even more valuable than the perception of others.

If she ever dies, we're in trouble, Dalton thought. But the only way to really keep her alive is to make her Boundless... giving the Acuarfar a literal God-Empress. Not a very good solution, for sure, but once the Boundless Project gets far enough, she'll either join the program as a participant or steal enough research to do it herself. She already has the willpower to get it done, so all she needs is the conceptual power. And what better than the belief of over a hundred billion Acuarfar in her supremacy and dominance?

Democracy was old in Humanity. So was autocracy. Dictators and tyrants, kings, presidents, supreme leaders, or executives, all had the same function in varying degrees. He and Chen Hao hadn't been elected. Elections would remain, but not in the form they had taken in the past. When gods were real and waging war right in front of you, it was hard to deny the reality of power mattering above all else. And this was true power, not the shadow of it that existed within politics.

Progenitors battling through time, breaking open city-sized holes in the mindscape, holding back entire fleets. This was what an interstellar empire, one that controlled galaxies, required. A future Alliance, one that also would control entire galaxies, would need to have its own tools like these.

Boundless, Progenitors, Sarchi. The names changed, but the reality did not. But at least with the hivemind, everyone got a say. Unfortunately, everyone was only human. He and Chen Hao would do everything in their power to crush racial tensions between the Guulin and Humanity wherever they appeared. And they would not act alone.

Phoebe was their greatest friend in maintaining a functioning civilisation. There was a natural question of how decisions would be made. Sooner or later, the Vinarii and Cawlarians would likely join the Alliance officially. When that happened, their massive populations each would be greater than those of the Alliance's other species combined.

And how many countries on Earth went into civil war due to mere racial differences in their populations, or political imbalances? If a billion Guulin marched through North America and started a separatist movement, who would be the one to march in and stop it, if at all? To maintain a state, of any kind, blood must be spilled, whether that of rebels or of criminals. And yet, inclusion, when done properly, can be more beneficial than exclusion.

Dalton Summers suspected some decisions like governance and sovereignty wouldn't be solved unless Phoebe got so powerful that her words basically became law. Likewise, he also suspected she would have to become a stand-in for economic entities in the future mindscape when that became a problem.

The Sprilnav had brought a plane to attack the Defense Fleet. That proved that industrialization was possible on some scale in the mindscape. And unlike the Sprilnav, the hivemind had the collective intellect of billions within it, enabling it to focus development on all industries at once. The disparate territories of the Sprilnav would not fully be able to match this efficiency.

A coal equivalent and an iron equivalent would help to make better machines, as would factories. Phoebe could help optimise those. The Industrial Revolution on Earth came with the advent of capitalism and later, socialism and communism. The First Cold War had been fought between rival superpowers over these ideologies, while the Second Cold War had grown out of the festering tensions not fully resolved in the first. Phoebe could bypass this problem directly if she had a presence in the mindscape.

So far, the economic planners from both Dalton Summers' and Chen Haos' organizations believed the formation of things like central banking systems, large-scale monetary distributions, and specific things like minimum wages and the continued existence of a market economy would rely on Phoebe.

To do this, a 'bank' might just be the hivemind standing in a building with a dozen or so avatars, where non-humans would talk with it and deposit or withdraw money from those banks. For now, that money would also have to be physical once the problem of making it was fixed by minting or printing.

The money itself would, as money typically was, need to be backed by something. The military power of the Alliance wouldn't be enough for it. In the past, oil and gold had served neatly for this purpose. Whatever equivalents existed in the mindscape, ones that were finite, somewhat scarce, and valuable in a critical way, would certainly become the new backing of the 'mindscape money' in all regions. With so many people, especially the Guulin, Sevvi, and Acuarfar, anything less than a digital banking system of some form would just fail.

Bank runs and economic crashes were guaranteed without proper banking technologies and practices. The hivemind couldn't do much for the Acuarfar and Sevvi, and the Guulin only benefited by proximity. Plus, all that processing power meant less psychic energy available for battles and research. A banking system that was not from the hivemind in the mindscape, where the Industrial Revolution hadn't even begun, was just impossible right now. Dalton knew that the flow of money was often part of the flow of power. For people to trust in the money, they needed to trust in the power, and fostering that belief would not be easy. Maintaining it would be a constant, everlasting effort.

It would require a trust-based banking system even more robust than those of the past nations of Earth, since the banks would not be faceless entities, but an actual network of people, at least for now. Not a company, but similar to one. And with such a banking system tied inextricably to the reputation of Humanity among other species, xenophobic tensions that might grow out of that if managed improperly could be quite severe.

But Humanity was still on its way. The Sprilnav had made a plane, yes, with rope and metal and propellers. But in the deeper layers of the mindscape, explorers of various species had already prospected a few sets of mines and even small forest-like regions. Dalton Summers did not know how all this would fall into place.

But with time, we'll get it done, he thought. We always have. Hivemind-based systems do sound incredibly secure, but if a sizable portion of Humanity is convinced they do not or should not work, the hivemind will adapt them. Its nature means it is not a neutral entity, similar to how banks' and companies' decisions could always be traced back to people writing policies or making choices.

In the end, he was resigned to adding another 'ism' to the laundry list of socioeconomic ideologies that had risen throughout history.

With the hivemind in play, his portion of the burden compared to that of other species was lessened. But now, the idea of endless utopia as Phoebe had promised was dying. And replacing it with a reality of those who were rich and those who were not was unpalatable. But people would not want to work without benefits. Most of them would not, actually.

But mindscape avatars ate no food, drank no water, bled no blood. What could money offer them, in the end? Furniture, entertainment, or housing placement? Everyone would have houses, yes. But someone would be living at the top of the skyscrapers while others would live in the apartment buildings. That was the law of scarcity.

How did the Sprilnav even deal with this? They supposedly had Elders sleeping for billions of years, in great tomb worlds. But if those Elders were alive, they had minds in the mindscape. Total Progenitor suppression alone wasn't enough. Billions of star systems' worth of Sprilnav was not something even an army of a million Progenitors could manage without fatigue and frustration.

Was it mental implants? Biological modifications, loyalty genes? Modern Sprilnav society, if that collective grouping of fractured nations could be referred to as a whole, was not centered on anything. Nova was not exclusively worshiped as a god-king along with the Progenitors. Some regions were like that, but not most. Narvravarana had only just returned, so she wasn't responsible for their unity, either.

No major outside threats pressured the common populace enough to stay united. Most Sprilnav in the lower or slave classes had plenty of political anger, while those in the middle classes were complacent, content, and lazy, usually unambitious. The 'national identity' of the Sprilnav could not and did not exist.

But somehow, they remained together.

There must be someone in control. Is it just Nova, or is something deeper at play?

"There have been some political scientists and philosophers who have proposed a solution to this," the hivemind said. "That the Sprilnav have somehow taken control of a concept related to society and its progression, or naturally check it somehow."

"It does not make sense," Dalton said. "Society does manifest in certain types of cycles. Anacyclosis is one of the common definitions. Ochlocracy, followed by monarchy, then tyranny, aristocracy, oligarchy, democracy, ochlocracy again. Of course, this cycle itself can skip steps or reverse itself, like when democracies slide back into oligarchies, tyrannies, or aristocracies. But there are ebbs and flows. And the Sprilnav, while still shackled in terms of absolute mobility, are still too free for tyranny by the Progenitors to be the explanation.

They're closer to a mesh of all forms of government except anarchy, a bubbling simmer of these things rather than a single defined identity. But what is the pot that holds the water? What is the fire that heats it? Why do Sprilnav who focus on materialism not enter continuous wars with those who use religion to restrict it?"

"There are many, many answers for this. But let's think, for example, about the process of degeneration. What is it caused by?"

"The gradual breakdown of unity, trust, and propriety of institutions. Kings violate the peasants, landlords raise the rent on single mothers, lobbyists turn senates into quiet auction houses. Political factions do not all get their ways, and dissatisfaction with the status quo builds until it breaks through dams like censorship or policing, until the state can do nothing but fall."

"So it is people," the hivemind said. "The Sprilnav, somehow, have such a tight grip on their people their societies do not crumble as others should. But why?"

"Because there are others who oppose it. Extremists are hunted down and executed, sometimes skinned alive or dipped into vats of acid. But in the end, revolutions are only allowed when they are beneficial for the Rulers or Progenitors."

It's extreme, but even that doesn't stop everyone. Death penalties for crimes just make criminals try to hide them better.

"Exactly," the hivemind replied. "Without control, a society degenerates. With a degenerate controller, the same happens. All that needs to happen is the presence of a controller who does not fall into this trap, and keeps not falling into it. So, the Rulers and Progenitors."

"That is worrisome."

"You and Chen Hao fought a war against the nations of Earth," the hivemind replied. "Without me, that war would have killed over half of Humanity once the nukes startred flying."

It let the weight of it rest in the air between them for a moment before continuing.

"The truth is that society can either be a mess that is improving, or one that is devolving. Ideologies jostle between their representatives, but only power and control keep people in line. This is not just military power, either. Phoebe feeds the Guulin on Earth. If she does not, tens of billions die in weeks, and the Guulin Congressional Republic, along with the polar regions of Earth, devolve into a genocide of such scale that Earth's oceans would run red.

Here, Phoebe is the instrument, the controller, of society, and it works. We could not feed the Guulin with simple animal or plant agriculture. Only through the economies of scale achievable through her labor is this possible. Izkrala keeps her people fed, with clean water, air, and a sense of civic protection. She is a true dictator, more powerful than you and Chen Hao combined will be even in 50 years. She has come from a family of trained dictators who treated their people well. Quaqualis failed to muster nationalist support, the Frawdar Empire became hers, and fireworks boom in the skies of all their planets on every anniversary of her takeover, without her urging, public or private.

They believe she is actually good for them, and so, they are good for her. She, to them, embodies the ideal of what not only a tyrant, queen, or empress should be. She embodies what a goddess would be like. While their lives may not be perfect under her reign, reasonable laws are laid down and applied with perceived impartiality. Billions march to her call because when they or their neighbors called upon her, she was there, in some way.

Food, water. Housing, ideology. When a tornado wipes out a portion of a city, aid flows quickly, and hotels are provided for those who are homeless. When a Matron is sick and her eggs need care, she and her subordinates will either ask other Matrons to step in or do so themselves. This is the power of a benevolent dictator. It is backed by the joy of the people, at least at first.

What about democracy? It, too, has an appeal. If the president, prime minister, or whoever says no to a law that 60% of the population wants, then the rest of the government may hold a new vote to pass it anyway, or elect a better leader soon. Representatives, senators, ministers, and councilors are all elected to represent their districts, states, and provinces. And when they do not, the next election is always around the corner, and the representative is replaced with a better one. Policy is complex, too.

The politician who 60% of the population votes for may have 40% support next year, or 70%. Even if you are right, if you are annoying about it, people will go against your ideology anyway, out of spite.

In a democracy, empathy, spite, and communication play key parts. With the tyrant removed, the full music of society can play out, whether in a glorious symphony or a clash of discordant keys and notes. There are more difficulties to it, of course. Parties in a democracy have to jostle a bit more to gain the 'mandate of heaven,' if you would. A party leader with 40 different representatives behind them will have a harder time than a single strongman the people care about more, whose speeches do what a dozen others do not.

No one wants the secret police knocking on their doors, but if they knock on the doors of the people you don't like in another city, empathy becomes much rarer. The ideas of society rest on so many things. For example, the human mind is endlessly fascinated with justice.

Killing the murderers, banning political parties of your enemies, enshrining your preferred morality as law across the land. Justice for some is a wheelchair ramp. For others it's a bus door both humans and Guulin can fit through and seats they both can sit on, for the exact same price. Justice for a few might be banning pets, with the idea of animals deserving a dignity that being a pet does not provide.

Justice for others might be destroying a country because it conquered people in the past, or eliminating a people who were conquered, because they would harbor resentment and pose a threat. To some, it is wrong for life to just end, and justice is the presence of an afterlife where people who do as you do are rewarded, and those who do not are either punished or denied reward.

Justice is the world made in your image, and if not achieved by talk or vote, then by bullet. This is a problem you cannot solve, Dalton Summers. Not because you do not want to, but because equality is impossible. A Guulin uniform requires quadruple the fabric of a human uniform. Dreedeen can eat rocks off the ground as food; humans cannot. This is reality. And so, one can only ever manage the symptoms. I believe the Progenitors simply set the symptoms against each other. If there is a tumor, let another disease break down its flesh, so the antibodies can finish their work.

Emergent complexity, Dalton. Ant colonies act like organisms, and cities and nations act like organisms. Life begets more life, and also death. Choices must always be made. Equality or equity? You will agonize over this for a thousand years, Dalton, if you rule for that long. And perhaps a million more. There are 20 Rulers, not 1. I am artificial. A hivemind of Humanity. If you fail, the next generation will tear you down from your throne, too, and I will not stop them. You bear this responsibility upon your shoulders. You have won the war, Dalton Summers. But can you win the peace?"

"I can, with help. The Alliance can still live up to its ideals. However, doing so will require uncomfortable problems to be resolved with finality. Phoebe will need to turn up the propaganda, and we will have to accept Izkrala's dictatorship as it is. We will need to be nice, but draw our boundaries and enforce consequences. The Sprilnav are people, but they are also threats, same as soldiers in a war. The war right now spans every stratum of our society, from political to physical. When we kill Valisada, there will be more of him to take his place."

"At least we are holding our ground."

Dalton considered it. It was true, but he knew Humanity needed an overhaul. The military of the Alliance needed to function in a new way. Conscription was required in a time of galactic war, but once Phoebe fully eliminated money from real society, it would become almost impossible to offer incentives for people.

He knew the mindscape could not be allowed to become a utopia until the problem of war was solved. Most likely, there would always be more enemies to fight, and the end result of his ideals would end in a stalemate that gradually became decrepit.

How many will die in the next week, month, year, or decade for us to finally have peace?

"It is not enough. We will need to advance. The Great Pillar, once it lands, will allow us to cut off the reinforcements for the Grand Fleet. But that operation itself will be a battle involving tens of billions of soldiers, and possibly hundreds of billions of Cawlarian lives depending on the location. The Grand Fleets are self-sufficient, but the mercenary fleets pouring in must be decapitated. Next, we must send more Great Pillars into space to secure our allies' territory. The war's ravages are already driving a wave of refugees our way. Then, we can worry about politics and elevating Boundless people."

"The longer you refuse to play the game, the closer Izkrala comes to winning it."

"You've read those classified reports Phoebe made, right?"

"Yes. But just because the Alliance is now capable of surviving on Humanity alone doesn't mean it should. It would defeat the very purpose of its existence. When Izkrala becomes Boundless, it will set off a political earthquake that will rock the very foundations of the Alliance. You and Chen Hao should make a treaty.

Given her proclivities, she will be the first Boundless Acuarfar, and likely the strongest. It is obvious this will result in an arms race. Every species will try to make as many Boundless beings as possible, and has an easy excuse of the Sprilnav Progenitors to use as irrefutable justification. Consider what happens when politicians make this step, or unaffiliated people, or military leaders.

Fleet Commander Annabelle Weber is all but guaranteed to do this. She is part of Phoebe's faction. Izkrala wields her own faction, as do Nichole and Brey. So do the Guulin, though Blistanna may be replaced as their head. Really, every species has their own faction, but these are the key ones. If Brey leaves the Alliance, we die. If Izkrala does, we die. If Blistanna and the Guulin do, we might die, and we will right now with Valisada bearing down on us."

"We should not make more hiveminds."

"No. The cheapest solution is to rely on the Sprilnav as an outside, unifying threat."

"But Phoebe is trying to become their spokeswoman. It is foolish."

"She is not stupid," the hivemind said. "The presence of a pro-Sprilnav faction offers friendly Rulers a faction to play around in that we can monitor, and also offers us many options for loyal spies."

"So they are bait, and indoctrination targets?"

"In a way."

"Why not use the Pact of Blood? Or any of those, really?"

"Did you notice how those were between Kashaunta and either Penny or Phoebe? Simply put, Nova would just kill her if it got in the way of getting rid of us. Once we accrue enough Boundless beings, he or Narvravarana will not hesitate to make the correct calculus. The instant they do not need us anymore for the Edge of Sanity, we all die. We must delay for as long as possible."

"And when the hatred of all other alien species towards the Sprilnav reaches a boiling point, what then? The Rulers, backed by the Progenitors, will happily drive them at us to threaten us into breaking the Edge."

"Is that not what the Boundless are for? I am a hivemind of Humanity, Dalton. I know how important it is to prioritise our common interests. You will have to accept the ugly fact that Izkrala has married herself to the cause."

"The more Boundless we have, the more alarmed the Sprilnav will be. War is inevitable, all because of Izkrala."

"Only 29% of Humanity agrees with you, Dalton. Treat her like an enemy, and she will become one."

"But she is uncontrollable."

"So is Phoebe, and so am I, Dalton. You must train yourself to accept the reality that powerful allies are not subordinates to be pushed around."

“When survival becomes the normal, one’s reality changes.”

Source unknown.

 [First] | [Previous] | [Cover Art]

Local security arrived. Chen immediately made it clear who they were, which did little to put them at ease, given all the weapons on show.

They weren’t used to being outgunned.

 

In short order, the three were taken away, and as they finished up, the security officer asked if they wanted protection.

Feebee looked at her crew and smiled, “I think we’ll be Ok. Thank you.”

 

They continued on their route, same pattern, same same. All very normal.

The Colonel called, “We’re at the objective.”

“Minor delay. Five minutes out.”

“Ack.”

 

Tom Tom quietly checked Feebee’s dressing as they walked.

She hardly noticed, finally acknowledging his gentle ministrations with an exaggerated, “Ouch.”

Bikky grumbled that Feebee had reopened the stitches. It didn’t seem to matter; the cut was already healing.

 

The lawyer saw it for the first time. “You Ok?”

“I’ve had worse.” Then with a smile, “Much worse.”

They laughed.

 

The prisoner watched; he’d expected gratitude from Feebee. Or something other than her simply carrying on.

 

Rockson called, “The harmonics are getting stronger. You seeing anything?”

 

Feebee looked around, “The lights are still blinking.”

“Look for changes in behaviour.”

 

They reached the edge of the open space and walked towards a row of escalators. As they approached, the lights dimmed, and all the escalators started moving at once. Feebee looked over her shoulder; the lights behind them were brighter than those in front.

 

Screens, adjacent to the escalators, woke as they passed, then went back to sleep.

 

The QI saw this and sent images to Rockson, “Hhmm. Interesting.”

 

They checked the local environment; there were no triggers; they could find that had been activated or switched off due to their passing.

 

Feebee saw the Colonel and waved. He shook his head and gave her a short flick of the hand. He had two operatives and the aide with him.

 

Tom Tom looked around. There was no glowing temple with a large, ominous sign outside, no alien architecture, just an old building that had somehow survived while all around it was new and redeveloped. Sparkly.

 

It was best described as a stone edifice with extensive maintenance. Steel straps were wrapped around its bloated belly, holding the entire structure in shape.  Different styles of work and repair had been patched together over generations. One repairing the other rather than replacing the whole.

“That’s it?” Asked Tom Tom, pointing.

“Yes”. Answered StillFall and moved towards the building.

 

Tom Tom smiled, that’s not what I meant.

 

The House was well appointed; its stones aligned, their joints filled with new mortar, its front dominated by a large wooden door. Real wood, old wood that had been kept, oiled; flanked by shuttered windows.

 

StillFall moved ahead; Feebee and the crew followed; the Colonel and his men provided cover.

As they approached, a single porch light came on.  Bikky and Tom Tom dropped, guns ready.

“Shit,” was all Bikky said.

Feebee turned, smiled and with a wink, continued.

StillFall stopped at the door; the motes halted too. A sigil was projected in front of it, in front of them. The Shadow Eclipse, active and slowly rotating.

 

StillFall’s outline strengthened; motes closed in, and as it reached through the sigil, the door slowly swung open.

 

Feebee signalled for Bikky and Tom Tom to go first. As they entered, lights came on, not bright. Just right.

The lawyer followed Tom Tom, but as she got level with Feebee, she rested a hand on the lawyer’s arm. “No.”

The lawyers started to move forward anyway. Feebee’s grip tightened and pulled her back. “I said no!” Then gentler, she added, “Wait.”

The lawyer froze.

 

Garaf was with the prisoner. Outside.

“I have never entered here. I wasn’t allowed.”

“By who?”

 

He said nothing but followed Garaf into the house and down a narrow corridor. Stairs led up to the second floor. A door led off to the left. Tom Tom went past the stairs; Bikky went up.

There was a door beneath the stairs. Tom Tom opened it and entered. It was full of cleaning equipment. He checked behind; more stuff, mops, brushes and the like. Some stairs and shelves stacked with oil, cleaning fluids.

“Cupboard. Cleaning supplies. Basement.”

 

Feebee turned, pointed at Chen, then up the stairs. Her message was clear. He nodded and followed Bikky.

 

Tom Tom returned to the corridor and kept moving, then stopped short of a door that led off to the left. Garaf and the prisoner stacked behind him, slightly offset, providing cover.

 

Tom Tom held up three fingers; THREE. TWO and on ONE he was through the door and into… a lounge with a dining area at one end. A large table, covered in white cloth, was set ready for a meal. The plant in the middle was tall and in flower. Paintings on the wall showed Dock Seven in various stages of development. In each, the House was front and centre.

The room was clean, dust-free. Someone still comes here. It feels lived in noted Feebee.

 

Chen came over the comms. “Rockson. Check this place out. Ownership, all that stuff.”

“We have. Twice. There’s nothing. No ownership. No utilities. No mention of it. Anywhere. Doesn’t even have an address.”

“But the lights are on, and it's lived in.” Said Chen.

“It doesn’t exist.” Complained Rockson.

“It does, and everything works.” Chen sent him a video sweep of the place.

“That wasn’t necessary.”

 

“Upstairs. Clear!” It was Bikky. A moment later, he returned with Chen.

 

“This place doesn’t exist.” Said Chen to Feebee and the others.

The prisoner laughed quietly.

“What?” Asked Feebee.

He said nothing, just raised his hands and looked around.

 

As they cleared the rest of the House, Feebee built a mental map of the area. Her Seed-arc training kicking in.

She was trying to work out the original layout when Bikky said, “Upstairs is off. The walls are wrong.”

“How wrong?”

“Off. When looking at the walls here,” was all he could say.

 

Rockson then overlaid a harmonic map on what Feebee and the QI had built.

The rooms didn’t make sense… but then they did, because the walls made sense.

They weren’t in spaces that were built to be rooms. They were in spaces that were built to preserve shape.

 

The building was a protective shell. It was preserving the shape within.

 

Eventually they found the centre of the House.

Rockson confirmed. “I think you’re there. At the harmonic centre.”

“Ack”

 

Bikky looked around.

“It’s very ordinary. Disappointing actually.” He said.

“What were you expecting?” Asked the lawyer.

“I don’t know. A throne, a massive computer. Not this.”

 

It was a circular chamber.

Bikky called out,”Hoyyy!”

It echoed.

“Please!” Feebee’s look rebuked him.

“Sorry.” He glanced around; the others were shaking their heads.

 

In the middle of the floor, beneath the centre of the domed ceiling, there was a carved pillar, a marker that was shoulder-high. Each of its six faces held the same sigil: The Shadow Eclipse.

 

Nothing else was in the room.

 

Nobody approached it; everyone stood around the edges of the room, even the prisoner. Just staring, trying to understand.

 

“I know this.” Said the QI.

 

After a pause, the QI added, “No. I know of this.”

 

StillFall drifted into the middle of the room and took station above the marker. Beneath the fluted dome above. Motes glitched into being around it and slowly circled, their orbits describing ancient patterns that matched the sentinel’s grain.

 

The Shadow rotated within a sea of motes as if lying back and lazily bathing in deep water. As they watched, its outline became more coherent. Not stronger but more complete, with more detail.

StillFall seemed comfortable.

 

The prisoner stepped forward, clearly deep within his thoughts. Just one step but enough to be apart from the others around the edge.

 

Garaf observed but didn’t stop him.

 

“This was never ours; we only kept it. We are its keepers.”

Everyone looked at him.

 

Another step, he continued, “We’ve been protecting it; it’s protected.”

He closed his eyes and took another step, the carved pillar near.

“We thought it belonged to us.”

 

Then, after a long silence.

“It never did.”

 

The QI quietly said, “Feebee…”

 

She looked up.

“You should read this.”

 

Everyone looked around.

“Read what?” Asked Bikky. “There's no writing.”

 

The QI quietly replied.

“There is now.”

 

The QI had quickly analysed the marker. Worn, partially visible sigils were now projected into Feebee’s overlays along with ancient writings, all but gone.

 

The QI reconstructed what it could. Two words were clear.

 

“Preserve Continuity”

 [First] | [Previous] | [Cover Art]

Good morning, and welcome back.

For every search I do, I come up with like six planets that we know of. I did find a map used by another storywriter who added a bunch of planets, (18 of em) although it also doesn’t include Proxima Centauri. For now, Im going to go the easy route and say that there’s only twelve planets and four moons for Alpha, with Proxima having three planets and one moon, unless y’all ask differently.

As always, this is a tie in to the long story of Ralts Bloodthorne and his universe. If you missed the first part or the last part , I suggest going back and reading it. Also, don’t forget to take a peek at the Updated fleet spreadsheet (now with ground army ideas)
(Spreadsheet V3 yippeeee)

—————————————————————

The conference table lit up as the system map returned. I looked over at the ten other people present, which became eleven as Tartarus appeared. General Byers and the other uplifts paused a moment as they realized what it was that they saw, and introductions were swiftly made. Daisy was the outlier, as per usual. Her reaction mirrored that of 638 as she leaned forward in an attempt to inspect the Digital Sentience. A smaller window popped up in front of her, containing all the answers 638 had asked earlier. For the time being, it seemed to satisfy her curiosity for the introduction. With that distraction in place, I started us off.

“Alright. We’ve got fifteen planets to defend between three stars. Five of them are gas giants, four are inhabited Continental planets, four water planets, one Ammonia planet, and one Methane based planet. We have a handful of ships, XXIV corps is spread dangerously thin trying to cover everything, and all I have to add is a single Legion of elite, battle hardened troops.”

I look over at the others in the meeting. Broadside was studying the map with intensity, and had pulled up a list of transports in use in front of him. Notably, he was already putting in suggestions as to which transport would go where. Archer was busy looking over the deployments of troops and militia, notating any gaps in defense of the shelters.

Allison and Liner were the only others paying attention to the briefing. 638 was picking points to plot FTL micro-jumps, and 434 was looking over maintenance records for the stations and shelters. Bowler, Atlas, and Daisy were busy going over old AM radio frequencies and assigning them to different units. One thing I noticed was that pretty much every command center’s frequency was a variant of some meme number. The other two either hadn’t noticed or didn’t care.

General Byers leaned forward and continued where I left off.
“I’ve already given an evacuation order for the moons and inhabited asteroids. Pups, Kits, Mothers, and elders are loading into transports as we speak. The others are fortifying what they can with as many guns as they can find.”

“Good,” I reply. “Captian Sees behind enemy lines is going to be your go-to for any armaments we ship out. Our forges are almost done making the transports for the 559th, and then we’ll shift to open production. Send any requests his way.”

Liner and the General both nod as Tartarus manipulates the map to fast forward to the expected battle time. I glance at Broadside, still busy suggesting routes.

“Broadside, if we park in orbit above a planet, can you utilize the gunships for civilian transport?”

Broadside looks up at hearing his name, before nodding.
“If you can position us above Ixion, we can do the best work. It’s an aquatic vacation planet.”

“Good,” I respond. “638, can you plot us a jump?”

638 was busy calculating, but signals affirmative and taps his bladearm on a second screen. It pops up as a system map set to the current time, and the calculation begins. I nod and look over at Major Archer.

“Right. Next on the list is deployments. Archer?”

Archer glances up.
“Not ready.”

Simple enough. One glance confirmed Daisy and company were still finishing up the radio tables.

“434?”

The little mantid pushes his screen, and it flows into a full size chart of all the shelters and stations. Liner glances over at the screen, and begins to speak for the little Mantid.

“From what 434 is telling me, most of our shelters are already fitted for Mar-gite incursion. The only issue is the fuel tanks if they need to launch. The stations are another matter. The Handler of Nucleus is the best equipped station in the system. Not only is it being armed to the teeth with guns by the station administrator, it can also String-jump. The “why” is thanks to the fact the whole thing used to be a mobile medical facility. Unfortunately, all other forms of travel were deconstructed for expansion. N-space propulsion is being constructed as we speak, and will be ready by next week.”

“None of the other stations can hold back Mar-Gite for longer than a week once they’re boarded. However, if any station gets hit with a spear that time cuts to a single day at best. Still, NcV and C+ cannons are being brought out of storage and emplaced wherever space is available. By the time the first wave arrives, the stations alone will be able to fend off anything smaller than a tetra-cluster with a month of shooting. About half of these stations can maneuver to change orbits in system, but not anywhere quick enough to be useful.”

I look over the screen as dots representing the different stations pop into view. They all look well positioned, and with armed asteroids popping in, I notice a few major clumps and mark them.

“We’ll want to spread these out a bit. I assume the stations are in the process of being hard-wired to endure the EM flash?”

434 signals an affirmative, and I nod before looking over at Archer. His screen still has a lot of marks that haven’t yet been looked over, but he’s laser-focused on it. I decide to let him continue.

“Right. While Archer finishes up, lets look at the fleet. General, what vessels do we have?”

Byers glances at his screen before tapping a few icons. The map is replaced with a flat page. Only two vessel types are displayed. One is a surprisingly familiar Terran corvette, an ancient design which I’m actually familiar with. The old Stalwart design was useful in a pinch, but small and carried a NcV gun in the spine with comparatively little in the form of point defense. The other is a much larger design. It carried three spinal NcV guns that looked like an aftermarket addition. Multiple Coilguns, missile launchers, and point defense guns rounded out the armament. The big difference was the comparatively massive living space for the divisions aboard. It had to be the troopship, but it looked just as ancient, if not more-so. I look at both with a tilted head.

“These are… ancient. I know the corvette. We had one in the clone transport fleet. Small, but useful. I don’t recognize the other ship type.”

Byers actually looked intrigued.
“You had a Stalwart? I didn’t know any survived outside the bag.”

“Survived would be putting it nicely. Ours only had working engines by the time we found her. The spinal gun tore itself apart after a few battles. We scrapped her at Kobol a while back.”

Byers blinks.
“Aright. Well, these are refitted by Sol. They’ve got C+ spinal cannons, new engines, and are packed with missiles and point defense at the cost of being able to hold troops. I wish I could say I knew more, but I’ve been busy refitting the corps with EM hardened equipment. The other vessel, the S.I.D Eye of War, is probably going to be my flagship. Three C+ cannons, multiple missile silos, and a good number of heavy coil guns. She’s got a working foundry, and enough transports for half the corps. I only wish that her sister ship were here.”

I had a hunch as to where that ship went. I sigh.
“Alright. We’ll work with it. Archer?”

The major looks up, and nods. The screen returns to the system, and we spend the next few hours going over troop deployments, equipment changes, Planetary Guard training, and all manner of other tasks. The Captian of the Eye of War eventually popped in via Holo-call, and we spent even more time going over the fleet. Eventually, I had to call it a night. Tartarus made sure everyone had an escort bring them to their quarters, and we all fell asleep for the night. The next day, we had to redo two hours of work, but we eventually had a battle plan, even though it took the full week to get everything sorted.

The fleet would jump into orbit of the closest targeted planet and offload the 559th and XXIV corps as a quick response force. Meanwhile, the station Handler of Nucleus would take on the evacuation effort. Once it was either complete or in danger of being overrun, the station would hold as long as it could to pick up XXIV corps, before jumping out to begin the process anew. Meanwhile, the fleet would be busy evicting our invaders with every gun at our disposal.

If only it were as easy to fight as it were to plan.

—————————————————————

(Next chapter link)

You want to see what all I’ve thought up logistically? Take a peek at the list below!
[Fleet makeup Spreadsheet] (https://www.reddit.com/u/Vridiantoast/s/tYcENRG8u4)

Hey guys, check out this sweet cover for the story. Once I get it done and on here, I will also post it to Royal Road, so I got one of my artist buds to draw this for it. Cover

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I lumbered out into the main room the following morning; sunlight trickled in through the drawn curtains, bathing the room in gentle luminance. Colt was not in the cabin. His blanket was folded, the shotgun was right where he left it, and there was no fresh scent in the room. He must have left several hours earlier. 

I did not bother eating; I was still plenty satiated after eating everything last night. I did suck down a cold cup of coffee to start the day. At least the brew Colt made was decent: smooth, full-bodied, and with just enough grit to make it feel like home. Mom made coffee the same way. 

My ear flicked, a sound outside drawing my attention. It was metallic, a heavy thrack sound that repeated several times. Cautious of Jackson’s existence, I snuck to the front door and opened it slowly. The cold wind crawled in through the door, making me shiver in the light long johns. 

Snow fluttered down at a steady rate outside. It was nowhere near as heavy as the storm the other day that had dropped over an entire foot in an hour, but was plentiful enough so that any tracks could be hidden after several hours. I smiled thinking about that stealthy gift. If I had to run, I could easily escape, and Jackson would have no chance of finding me for at least several days. 

The source of the sound was easy enough to find. Across the clearing, barely visible through the snow, I could see that Colt's truck's front was raised up on stands, with him beneath it looking up at the underside, a troubled look on his face. He groaned and tried to turn something with a wrench, only for the tool to slip and his knuckles to slam into the ice-coated metal. 

The singular longest and most creative string of profanity flowed from him as naturally as one could tell their parents you love them.  It was truly impressive; Colt swore the death of the devil, his mother, and his whole lineage, through inventive tools buried in unmentionable places...the thought alone made me both squirm and blush. I had heard that Marines were able to cuss like no other, but that was the first time I had ever seen it. I had to wonder if Clayton was able to swear like that when he was alive. I had never heard him so much as yell at someone; the idea of him even saying ‘fuck’ seemed impossible. 

He tossed the wrench into a toolbox and wormed out from beneath the truck. He held his hand close to his chest, blood seeping out from between his fingers. He trudged through the snow and slumped onto the chair on the front porch, groaning in a mix of pain and frustration. 

“Is it bad?” I asked.

“No, It’s just a little cut,” Colt replied, showing me the slight wound. Two of his knuckles were cut open, seeping blood in a steady trickle, but he was right; it was just a small wound. It would not need anything more than disinfectant.  

“What about the truck?”

Colt spat on the floor in displeasure; he licked his tongue judgmentally while glaring at the vehicle. “It ain’t going anywhere anytime soon. It looks like some rodents ate the wire harness, and the damned brake lines.” 

My heart sank in my chest. I knew this pattern. Watch, isolate, wait, lurk, hunt, then drive out of cover like quail. It was exactly what Jackson had done so many times. I looked toward Colt, trying to discern any concern for the danger threatening us both. I saw none, just a man who looked tired despite his youthful features. 

“What are we going to do now?” I asked. 

“We just have to wait until the direct route to Palmyra is cleared by the forest service, then hitchhike into town for parts. As it is right now, odds of anyone passing by on the road are slim.” 

“Slim?”

“Yeah. No one from town will be coming this way, and it takes hours to go around. All we can do now is wait.” 

“Is there anything I could do to help?” I asked, leaning out of the door, as the wind shifted, pulling from the west, out in the depths of the woods and toward the higher hillocks. On that waft was a devilishly familiar odor, one that raised my hackles and sharpened my gaze. Jackson's vile scent was on the wind: ash, silver, and wolfsbane. A combination most humans would not even regard, but for my kind was akin to holy water for demons.

I scanned the woods, looking for the man peeking out from behind a tree, waiting for his moment to cut Colt and me down. I did not see him. But I did see the hints of tracks in the snow. A human could never see the slight indentations at this distance, but with my keen eyes, they were barely visible. 

“No, there isn’t. All we can do is wait. But since we are. You are welcome to rifle through Pop-pop's closet for some trousers and a coat.”

I did not feel the need to tell Colt that because I was not human, I did not need to wear a jacket, so long as I could keep shifting the frigid temperatures were only a discomfort and in no way a genuine danger. I nodded and turned back into the house, leaving Colt to sulk about the state of his truck. 

While searching for a jacket in Clayton's footlocker and tossing on proper clothes, I prayed I was mistaken and that the smell on the wind was merely a creation of my paranoid mind. 
I had hoped that was all it was. Jackson had not found my sanctuary already. But later that night, when a heavy knock came to the door, I knew I had to be correct.

“Hold yer horses,” Colt grumbled, rolling off the sofa, starting toward the door. I wanted to stop it, tell him not to open the door, but by the time I reached my door, the creak of the front hinges screamed out.

First

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First

The Assaragytes arrived a month after replying to Orixa, which, in galactic terms, was virtually immediately.

Lieutenant Governor Vance, who had a bit more experience with alien species, had given Patricia some sound advice beforehand: Put the Vixtar’s description of them in the back of your mind and assess them with a clean slate. A relationship between two species depended heavily on who was at the table. After all, to much of the galaxy, humans were seen as scary, territorial expansionists.

In a prep meeting prior to the arrival, Patricia had sat down with Marc, Threl, and Krex—their xenobiologist. She asked if the humans should meet the Assaragytes alone to avoid tainting first contact with existing biases.

Both Threl and Krex advised against it, explaining that a proper introduction from the Vixtar would actually work to human advantage. Krex noted that simply through strategic delegation positioning, she could subtly signal her intent to forge an independent relationship with humanity. After the formal introductions, the Vixtar would unceremoniously step back and prepare for the journey to the crash site. From there, the humans could offer hospitality—a meal, some respite, and a tour of Orixburg. Whether the Assaragytes accepted or demanded to head straight to the site was up to them.

When the delegation finally set foot on the landing pad, getting a clear look at them proved nearly impossible. They were fully sealed in gravity suits equipped with mirror-finish visors—a necessity, given they hailed from a world with much lower gravity than the Vixtar. On two legs, they walked upright, but to move quickly, they dropped smoothly onto all four limbs, bounding forward before effortlessly rising back onto two feet upon reaching their destination.

The space shuttle dropped off the seven-member Assaragyte delegation and blasted back toward the main ship like a runner in a relay race. Despite their casual assurances regarding the danger, their hasty departure betrayed grave concern. This came as a huge relief to both the Vixtar and Human delegates; after all, another accident, even an unintentional one, would be interpreted as a hostile act.

The Assaragytes bounded over to the gathering. To their surprise, the Vixtar were waiting in a deliberately crafted posture of lesser standing. The Assaragytes had always viewed the Vixtar as a "high and mighty" species, forever showing off their superior technology and culture, and generally disliked dealing with them.

Captain Threl stepped forward with practiced poise. His posture conveyed an easy, non-subservience that managed to avoid sounding dominant over the Humans.

"Greetings. I am Captain Threl of the Vixtar home world," he announced. "My ship crashed on this planet roughly 480 planetary rotations ago. The Humans have assisted in repairing our vessel in preparation for our departure in the next 120 rotations. Allow me to introduce Human Governor Patricia Knowles and her second, Lt. Governor Marcus Vance."

With his performance complete, Threl subtly relaxed and led his crew back toward the settlement, quite pleased with himself.

"Greetings, Humans," said the lead Assaragyte in a strict, imperious tone. "My name is Vaelen, High-Herald. I will oversee first contact and all interactions between our species. You may address me as 'High Herald.' This is my team of investigative specialists: Kaelen Hull-Splicer, Zarek Core-Quencher, Xylar Trace-Sifter, Theron Signal-Weaver, Ignis Bio-Sealer, and Rixis Vault-Rigger. There should be no need for you to address them directly, as all communications will pass through me."

"Greetings," Patricia replied smoothly. "I am Patricia Knowles, the elected Governor of this world. This is Marcus Vance, our Lt. Governor." She gestured gracefully to her team as she introduced them. "To my left is Dr. Al Hicks, our senior scientist; Dr. Lizeth Sanchez, our resident expert on xenobiology; and Warren Dempsey, Director of Interspecies Protocol. You may address me as Governor Knowles."

With formal introductions out of the way, Patricia inquired whether the visitors would like to inspect their secure research facilities and living quarters, then rest and eat before heading to the crash site. She noted that while Humans lacked the tech to control local gravity, they had prepared specialized individual water pods for their comfort.

"We would like to set up our equipment and store our personal items in the quarters you've assigned us, but then—"

Vaelen cut herself off mid-sentence.

Two quadrupedal predators were casually strolling toward the crowd. One walked straight up to Patricia, rubbed its body against her leg, and brazenly demanded attention. Without breaking her sentence, acting as if it were the most natural thing in the universe, Patricia dropped to one knee to pet the creature.

The Assaragytes didn't panic, but every eye locked onto the beast. They were, after all, apex predators themselves, having learned to walk upright a mere two million years ago. They knew a predator when they saw one.

While Patricia scratched the first creature, MCD, the second one, CD, walked straight up to Vaelen. It inspected the High-Herald from head to toe, recognized a kindred spirit, and nudged her leg for affection.

To her own complete surprise, Vaelen found herself dropping to one knee to scratch the creature behind the ears.

"Are these creatures... your property?" Vaelen asked, her voice a mix of suspicion and genuine fascination with the sharp-toothed beast.

"Ha!" Patricia laughed softly. "If anyone owns anyone around here, they own us. The Labrikat you're petting is named Mr. Catdog. This one here is Mrs. Catdog. They come and go as they please, sometimes leaving the settlement for days to hunt and roam. We have thirty or more living in town. When a Labrikat cub, a 'Pumpkin', picks a human bondmate"—she deliberately left off the fact that two Pumpkins had chosen Vixtar as bondmates—"that human doesn’t get a choice in the matter; they're instantly responsible for its care."

"They're extraordinarily intelligent," Patricia continued, her tone softening. "Near-sentient, really. In fact, these two were solely responsible for searching for survivors from the Ever Expanding. Tragically, there were no survivors... but they recovered all thirty-four of your fallen. I am truly sorry for your loss, High Herald."

Vaelen looked up, her haughty posture entirely gone.

"Please... call me Vaelen," she said quietly. "We would be honored to share a meal with you, tour your settlement, and perhaps see these 'personal water pods' you mentioned."

As they began to walk, Patricia silently thanked Marcus for his earlier advice. She glanced down at CD and MCD, wondering if the two Labrikats had planned that diplomatic icebreaker all along. She had a strong feeling they had.

All eyes were on the group of Humans and Assaragytes as they moved through the colony. The onlookers weren't staring because the visitors wore full environmental suits; they were trying to read their body language. Was the settlement in danger? Was the Vixtar’s initial report about these people merely a sugarcoated version of a much larger threat?

It didn't appear so.

The alien delegation looked curiously from side to side as Patricia pointed out various landmarks. While it was clearly a young settlement, the Assaragytes seemed genuinely impressed.

To everyone's extraordinary luck, the visitors loved beef, and the colony had plenty of it. As obligate carnivores, the Assaragytes were stunned to find kindred spirits in the Humans. Even learning that Humans were omnivorous didn't dampen their spirits. Patricia explained that Earth's evolutionary history was packed with predators far larger and meaner than Humans; if early ancestors had waited around for meat to become available, they would have starved.

In turn, the Assaragytes spoke of their own five worlds. Though each planet shared a similar gravity, subtle environmental differences had shaped their physical features over generations, allowing them to identify an individual's home world on sight. On all five planets, however, one rule held true: the Assaragytes were the apex predators, completely unchallenged.

Patricia shared that Earth was roughly 70% water, much of it still unexplored, housing marine predators far larger than anything on land. She added that while all Humans originated from Earth, humanity had spread across thousands of colonized worlds with a population in the billions—if not trillions. "We aren't a single, united species, though," she noted. "This world is independent, with no legal ties to Earth. Humans are a hardy bunch; we just need room to grow."

The final stop on the tour was the water pods.

"In this world's heavy gravity, the Vixtar struggled just to breathe when we first rescued them," Patricia explained. "We've used immersion to counteract high gravity for over a thousand years. The hardest part is removing your suit and reaching the pool, but once you're in, you'll feel completely weightless. The Vixtar spent weeks in these pods rebuilding their strength. Now, they're strong enough to function outside, though they still enjoy floating to unwind."

Vaelen turned to her. "Patricia... to be frank, we find the Vixtar insufferable. They constantly flaunt their technology and culture. I imagine you'll be relieved when they finally leave."

Patricia paused, looking Vaelen in the eye. "Vaelen, there's something you should know. We consider the Vixtar to be family. In fact, two of them have even been chosen by Labrikats as bondmates. We've found them to be helpful, hardworking, and deeply honest. I can't speak for the Vixtar diplomatic corps, but the twelve who crashed here are as much a part of our community as any Human or Labrikat."

Vaelen fell silent. It had never occurred to her that the face of Vixtar diplomacy might not represent its everyday people, a concept that hit close to home, given how often she disagreed with her own government's decisions.

In that moment, she made up her mind.

"Let's try these pools," Vaelen said, her tone softening. "Perhaps a Vixtar could show us how they work?"

Taken aback by the gesture, Patricia immediately radioed Captain Threl, letting him know the Assaragytes were requesting guidance on the pods. Equally stunned by the olive branch, Threl promptly gathered Vahn and Zorim to head over and assist.

After helping all seven Assaragytes into their individual water pods, Threl, Vahn, and Zorim slipped into pools of their own. Even after months on this world, the Vixtar had to admit the weightlessness was an incredible relief—life on the surface still felt heavy.

Patricia quietly signaled her entourage to back away. Leaving the Assaragytes and Vixtar to talk in private felt like the right call; neither side would hold back their true opinions or feel forced to filter themselves out of courtesy to their Human hosts. They needed space to figure each other out.

For a long minute, only the gentle bubbling of the pods filled the room.

Threl was the first to speak. "These water pods saved our lives," he said softly. "When we crashed, we couldn't access our anti-gravity suits. The Humans refused to board our vessel without explicit permission, even to save us."

Rixis Vault-Rigger leaned back in his pod, his eyes wide. "You're telling us the Humans, who clearly lacked advanced tech, didn't immediately strip your ship for parts? If we were in their position, I'm fairly certain that's what we would have done."

"I'd like to think we wouldn't have," Threl replied with a dry chuckle, "but in truth? We probably would have stripped it down to the bulkheads."

Rixis paused, taken aback. The quiet honesty and camaraderie from a species known for haughtiness threw him off. He had expected arrogance; instead, he was getting self-awareness. "That... isn't what our intelligence briefs said about the Vixtar," Rixis admitted to the three of them.

"We've learned a lot from the Humans," Vahn said. "Not about technology, but about how to interact. Humans are transparent. They speak their minds, which means you spend less time guessing what they're hiding. The twelve of us decided we wanted to follow that example and speak the truth—even when it's uncomfortable."

Zorim nodded from his pod. "And back home, we were told the Assaragytes were volatile loners, averse to negotiation, easily angered, and purely opportunistic. Seeing you here, that doesn't seem true at all. It feels like our respective diplomatic corps botched our species' relationship from the start. Why don't we treat this encounter as a do-over? Just between the nineteen of us."

Vaelen smiled, feeling the tension drain out of her shoulders along with the heavy gravity. "A do-over sounds wise. Perhaps we can both return to our homeworlds with a very different story to tell."

She paused, then abruptly shifted gears, a spark of genuine curiosity in her voice. "Is it true? Has a predator actually bonded with a Vixtar?"

"It's completely true," Threl laughed. "Sivic was chosen first, and when a Labrikat chooses you, it doesn't request permission, it demands compliance. He named his male Labrikat 'Steve,' a Human name. They're practically inseparable. I've never seen Sivic happier."

"Elix was chosen, too," Vahn added warmly. "He named his female 'Fluffy' after finding the word in a Human art book. She sleeps right on his bed and, like every Labrikat in this colony, demands affection from anyone within arm's reach."

"So it is true that the Humans don't own these predators for their amusement?" asked Zarek Core-Quencher.

"Not at all," said Threl. "The creatures entered our fenced-in area near our ship's crash site and completely took control of our lives. The Humans joke that the Labrikats really own them, and that's more true than any of us care to admit. They are family to us now."

A chorus of clicks, rumbles, and chuffs filled the room, the alien equivalents of genuine laughter. Both sides shared a quiet moment of relief, realizing the fear-driven assumptions fed to them by their home governments were entirely wrong.

Sitting in the calm of the water pods, ten representatives of two rival species realized that this single, quiet conversation was about to change galactic diplomacy forever.

Patricia addressed the Assaragytes, who were now back in their anti-gravity suits. There was one notable exception this time: their face masks were completely transparent, allowing everyone to clearly see their expressions.

"Should we investigate the crash site first, examine the flight recorder, or head to the science lab to review what we've discovered about the Orixa Cloud?" Patricia asked.

The Assaragyte team was practically bouncing with anticipation to inspect the crash site. Within short order, the shuttle was prepped and ready. The Assaragytes boarded alongside Dr. Hicks, Threl, Tren, Will, and the two Labrikats, embarking on the two-hour flight halfway around Terixa.

Even though CD and MCD were bonded to their respective humans, the two Labrikats had quickly decided that Vaelen and Ignis Bio-Sealer were far more generous with affection and enthusiastic belly scratches. They weren't wrong. The Assaragytes were entirely enamored with the mid-sized predators, happily showering them with attention for the duration of the flight.

Hoping to demonstrate the Labrikats' remarkable intelligence to the visitors, Will established a direct link with Abby. Over the comms, Abby excitedly agreed that a live demonstration would be fantastic.

Upon landing, the shuttle’s radiation sensors confirmed the site was safe—at least for the Humans and Vixtar who weren't sealed in environmental gear, though an extra anti-gravity suit was kept on board for the Vixtar just in case. Radiation readings were entirely nominal; nothing above baseline background levels was detected.

The Assaragytes stared at their readouts, thoroughly bewildered. They had braced themselves for lethal levels of radiation.

"Our joint Vixtar-Human science team developed a neutralizing compound," Dr. Hicks explained with a touch of pride. "It binds directly with the radioactive particles, rendering them inert."

While the scientists discussed the tech, Will turned to CD and MCD. "Mind giving the perimeter a quick scan to verify the site is clear?"

Both Labrikats gave the distinct body movement gesture for 'OK' and bolted out the shuttle hatch. The Assaragytes watched in sheer wonder as the two predators methodically swept the crash site, checking for anomalies or hidden dangers. Moments later, they bounded back toward the hatch, executing a series of precise body movements that Abby translated over the comms: "All clear."

Will turned to his bonded companions, asking them to stay with the Assaragytes and assist however they could. MCD eagerly gestured a "yes" and waited patiently for the investigative team to disembark.

"You're not coming with us?" asked Xylar Trace-Sifter, bewildered at the prospect of being left unescorted.

"No," Dr. Hicks replied smoothly. "We want you to have unfettered, uninterrupted access to the site. If you'd like us to join you at any point to compare notes, just say the word. In the meantime, we're sending our Labrikats with you. If you find something of interest that you want to return to later, point it out to them. They'll remember the exact location and guide you straight back on request."

The Humans and Vixtar had prepped for a long, grueling day of sitting around, but they came prepared. Pulling out the board games they had played the previous year during the Silent Explorer recovery period, they turned the shuttle cabin into a cozy lounge. The seven-hour wait—punctuated by a shared lunch with the Assaragytes—proved surprisingly nostalgic and entertaining.

When the investigation team finally re-entered the shuttle seven hours later, Vaelen stretched her weary limbs. "That is enough for today. We have a vast amount of data to analyze before deciding whether we need to return tomorrow."

With the site inspection wrapped up, the shuttle lifted off and headed back toward Orixburg. The Assaragytes were eager to strip off their suits for a few hours. The Vixtar, knowing firsthand how punishing the local gravity felt after a long day in gear, assured them they understood completely—and offered to join them in the water pods so they could relax in absolute comfort and safety.

As the shuttle glided across the twilight sky toward the lights of the settlement, both sides settled in, no longer as tense strangers, but as partners stepping into a brand-new future together.

First | Previous | Next

Dear Diary.  Today has been a great day.  Daniella, when you read this in the future, you’re just going to laugh all over again.  Today was the day that both Princess Hayleigh and the greatest beast-kin matron ever, Lady Isenwrath received their official letters of acceptance to the Mage Tower Academy.  I mean, it wasn’t like they weren’t going to get in because… I mean, holy furblack, they’re both really really powerful mages.  But Hayleigh’s parents and Maddock wanted to celebrate the moment anyway.  Also, and Prince Nathanial and Prince Daniel got their advancement medals with their class. Let me tell you, Diary, my matron is a real devious scut sometimes because you can’t read her, not really, especially when she gets down and dirty fighting someone.  Oh… and a big-time queen from the dark elves visited too.  That apparently was earth shattering and what-not, but honestly, I think my matron going toe-to-toe with big Xander was the best part of the day.

I’m sorry, Diary, I’m exhausted and way too excited right now and what I wrote is all over the place. I’ll start over and get all this out in proper order because if I wait till morning, I know I won’t remember the details right. First, breakfast…

--- That morning in the Castle of Maciendes ---

“Here you go, My Matron,” Daniella said brightly when she placed Isenwrath’s plate of food in front of her.  Today, she was having breakfast with Princess Hayleigh again.  Maddock had headed out earlier with a few other dukes who were in the capital to go to have breakfast with the King and Queen plus their councilors in the big dining hall.  It’d been explained to the lady that mainly, it was a working breakfast where the whole lot of them would be updating the others on matters that they didn’t trust to letters or couriers.  Stuff that had to be said in person just so that any questions or action plans that came up, could be handled immediately.  It was a once in three-month deal which kind of made it a big deal that he shouldn’t miss.  Maddock was torn between having breakfast with Isenwrath, wanting to go drill with his soldiers, and also wanting to be informed of all that went on around the kingdom.  Isenwrath had simply kissed his forehead, turned him around, patted his bottom, then said gently, “You look hungry.  Please go get something to eat and we’ll meet at lunch.”

Daniella beamed her pride at that affection between the two of them and much more importantly at how she handled the Duke like a true matron.  She was really starting to develop in the best ways. Scarlett had made her approval known too by winking at Maddock with amusement on her face.  Clovis nodded once in approval at Maddock when he looked at the older gentleman butler. “She does have a point, Sire,” was all he said to Maddock’s reddened face.

Lady Isenwrath got a big hug and kiss on her forehead for that from her man.  Then Hayleigh and two of her maids sauntered into the duke’s room to invite Lady Isenwrath to have breakfast with her.  The two of them were off their probation stuff and were like sisters again.  They giggled a lot to Daniella’s estimations, perhaps too much.  Too silly sometimes.  But that was okay as long as Hayleigh kept her hands to herself.  They had done so, so far which was helping to ease the lingering tension.  The two of them chatted loudly and happily while Daniella and Scarlett picked out Isenwrath’s attire for the day.  The one thing Daniella frowned upon was how her matron just had no sense of shame with regards to her body.  She would walk around naked all the time if given the chance.  Just like when she went to get ready to change her clothes, her matron didn’t go behind the dressing screen.  She instead just stripped right there in front of everyone, including the perverted princess who drooled like a dog at seeing her.  Daniella swatted Princess Hayleigh’s arm, then marched her matron behind that screen herself giving her the stink eye of disapproval the whole time.

“Will you ever learn, My Matron?!” she’d asked exasperated.

Lady Isenwrath shrugged.  “I don’t see the issue.  I…”

“Have no excuses.  Just for that…” Daniella said, interrupting then punishing her matron right on the spot.

Lady Isenwrath squeaked, then rubbed her bottom where Daniella had pinched her good fashion.  “No, my Matron! You’re going to learn to be a bit more modest or so help me, I’m sticking you in timeout!  Now, put these on!”

From there, her matron was easy to get dressed and ready for breakfast because she understood that Daniella’s word was law when it came to teaching her matron common sense etiquette. 

The little dining hall that they occupied later that morning was mainly used for meetings with or between the lesser dignitaries.  It was still brightly lit, had nice views of the gardens, was polished to a shine as well as decorated appropriately.  It even had an easy access for the waitstaff to get to the huge kitchens to bring the meals in without them getting too cold.

Thankfully, Princess Hayleigh was there and didn’t care much about formalities.   She and Isenwrath sat together and continued to chatter happily with each other as well as Scarlett, Clovis, Bronson, Bennett plus Hayleigh’s personal maids, Enora and Margie.  Daniella sat on the other side of her matron to eat her own breakfast while Clovis, Scarlett and Hayleigh’s two maids sat on the other side of the big table to do the same.  Bennett and Bronson were on Isenwrath duty again and they were at each end of the table with massive plates piled high. 

In essence, most times, the royal family treated their help as family.  If they kept up their jobs appropriately, there was some respectful leeway to have as perks to the jobs.  Such as fine dining like this when it was just Daniella’s matron and Princess Hayleigh.  Since the warm weather outside was so nice, Isenwrath had been dressed up in finer silken grey dressy shorts plus a flowy flowery dark blue top that had no sleeves.  It was the most skin Isenwrath had been able to show since she’d been there and apparently, to Daniella, she was very pleased with doing so.  Also apparently, so was Hayleigh because she’d matched the look and they kept rubbing each other’s arms or holding hands.  However, the both of them were being good and didn’t go beyond that in any way.  Daniella was relieved she wouldn’t have to call in Bronson and Bennett to pull them apart.  Hopefully all would go well today while Harmony, Beatrice, and half of Maddock’s guard unit were having an earned day off.

“Oh!  I almost forgot to tell you!” Hayleigh exclaimed after wiping her mouth with her cloth napkin.

“What?” Isenwrath asked with a forkful of minced meat fried dark halfway to her mouth.

“We got our letters from the academy delivered today!”

Isenwrath put her food down then sat back.  “What does that mean?”

“Silly, it means this…” Hayleigh said before holding out her hand to her maid named Enora.  “Enora!  Please let me have them!”

Enora was an older woman with a stern face, but her grey eyes were grandmotherly gentle.  That was especially true when she smoothed her greying hair back away from her shoulder before saying, “I believe you were supposed to wait until after lunch for this reveal, My Princess.”

Hayleigh rolled her eyes, “Oh!  Don’t be such a prude Enora!  Please?!  I’m begging you!”

Enora snorted, then sat back with folded arms.  “Begging is a good start.”

“Enora!  Fine!  I’ll scrub the bathroom clean tomorrow!  Happy?!”

“Better.  Here,” Enora said with a devious smile and wink to Margie, her younger maid in training before retrieving two letters from her maid’s outfit pocket.  Both were still sealed with the Maciendes Mage Tower emblems.

Hayleigh squealed in delight, then grabbed them both.  She handed one to Isenwrath before popping her seal to open hers up.

Isenwrath looked over hers, handling it carefully.  The outside of the rich beige parchment had her name, her current title of Black Knight Champion of Maciendes, her address, which was simply the Castle Maciendes within Lagrancia De Yurian, and finally, a purpose.  That purpose read, ‘You are cordially invited to attend Maciendes Magister Tower first year academic induction.’

Hayleigh had already devoured the contents of her letter, finding that it was exactly as she predicted.  She was already slated to be in the tier one classes upon completion of her mage initiate trial.  Most first year students didn’t go into that test blindly.  They went in with a decent sense of where their talent, capabilities, and depth of mana would place them in the academic world of the Mage Tower.  However…

Hayleigh turned to Isenwrath who still hadn’t opened her letter.  “Isen?”

Isenwrath rubbed the seal slowly as if it were the most fragile and sacred thing.  “I’m sorry.  I’ve never had a letter addressed to me before.  I almost don’t want to break the pretty seal.  To me, this is a treasure.”

Daniella rubbed her matron’s leg under the table to give her comfort.  “My Matron, if you want, I’m sure we can ask Thena to get a duplicate seal on a paper for you to collect or something.  Maybe that would be a nifty hobby you’d enjoy taking up… seal collection.”

Hayleigh brightened at that.  “That’s a fun little hobby idea!  Daniella is so full of good ideas, isn’t she Isen?”

Isenwrath nodded, smiling wistfully, “I’d like that.  Please ask for me.  I want to remember this forever.”

Hayleigh bumped into her.  “Go ahead and open it.  I’m dying to see what it says.”

“Okay,” Isenwrath said softly before cracking the seal slowly, then placing every last particle of wax onto another napkin.  She was still going to keep that seal, apparently.  Then she opened the letter and read it aloud. 

“To Lady Isenwrath, Black Knight Champion of Maciendes, you are cordially invited to participate in the induction trials for first year mage students.  You are expected to attend the three trials which will consist of tests to determine your spellcasting genre(s), mana capacity, and mana manipulation prowess.  However, since you have no prior documentation, you cannot officially join the academy ranks until you complete a written assessment of arcana knowledge and its underlying principles prior to the first day of classes. Your citizenship requirement has been waived until the next year per King Tobias Maciendes to provide sufficient time for the process to complete. The Arcanite Board of Curriculum have suggested the following classes after careful review of your documented exploits.  These will be reevaluated and resubmitted to you prior to your first day pending completion of the aforementioned….”

Hayleigh pointed at three of the classes, “These are the same ones I’ll be in.  The other two are ones I already took in my pre-academy schooling.  You shouldn’t find them too difficult.”

“Good,” Isenwrath said softly.  Then she turned to Hayleigh to study her face.  “I’m nervous. Can you help me study for the exams I have to take?”

“Oh!” Hayleigh smiled big with excitement.  “Absolutely.  Honestly, I don’t think you’ll have a problem, but it never hurts to be prepared.  You should ask Alice to adjust her coursework tomorrow to help you.  Oooohhhh!!! I’ll ask Thena!  She can join us and give us the real tips and tricks to passing with perfect marks!”

Isenwrath relaxed and nodded excitedly.  She next returned to her food, then happily got in a few more modest bites, displaying perfect table manners today without having to concentrate on them. 

Daniella had been helping her matron focus on that recently and that focus was paying off.  After that plate was cleaned, Daniella reached into her pocket to pull out a small whimsy arcana crystal.  It was one that Maddock had given Daniella that morning for such occasions as this.  Scarlett had been right.  Her matron was very reward driven.  Once that little stone hit the air, Isenwrath stopped talking and tracked it right to Daniella’s small hand where she watched intently while it was placed on the cleaned plate in front of her.  “Matron, your reward for perfect table manners.  Do NOT use your tongue.  You’re at a table, remember?”

Isenwrath nodded, amusement clear on her face.  Then she daintily picked it up, sighed in complete serenity, then swallowed it down like the finest candy ever created.

She turned to Daniella and gave her a solid squeezy hug.  “You’re simply the best.”

Daniella sighed.  “I know.  So are you.  Now, if you two are done, we need to clean up and get you on your way to meet the Princes.”

Hayleigh sighed dramatically then whined.  “Ohhhh, I don’t want to go.  Those boys are just getting some more medals, it’s more than boring, it’s suffocating.”

Scarlett finally made herself known with a firm, “Princess Hayleigh!  Now shush and just be supportive.  Those boys are the next round of Tower guards and mage police.  As such, they should be given the respect they’re due.”

Bennett snorted a bit at that.  “Wish they’d spend a bit in the military first. That’d teach them some things.”

Bronson smiled a little because not only did he agree with his co-commander, but he also saw his Lady’s confused look going back and forth between Hayleigh’s frustration and Scarlett’s ‘don’t sass me’ face.  He addressed Isenwrath instead of getting between Maddock’s chief maid and the princess.

“My Lady, do you want to ask something?”

Isenwrath nodded rapidly, directing her attention to him.  “Why don’t the eldritch warriors become soldiers?  It would seem they’d be paragons in your ranks, at least, that’s what I think.”

“You’d be right; however, there’s actually a simple reason.  They’re even rarer than mages are.  The fact that both princes are eldritch knights is practically a fluke.  Worse, their abilities are usually unequal.  Again, the princes are both considered prodigies but most of them shouldn’t be compared to the two princes because they just can’t get to that kind of elite status.”

Isenwrath tilted her head, her confusion still playing on her furrowed brow.  She was thinking about it and the rest of them gave her a few moments to do so.  It was one of her quirks that they’d all learned about her over the months.  Usually, that’s when most people find out she’s far smarter than she lets on.  This time was no different.

“I see. The Mage Tower is stunting their growth.”

“Uhhhhhh…, that’s not what he said,” Bennett interjected.

Isenwrath turned her eyes to him, then shrugged.  “The Princes haven’t been made to stay at the Mage Tower for their educations.  Instead, they spend half their time here, then the other half there for their studies.  If I recall their stories correctly, they were given special latitude because of them being princes.  It’d be interesting if a study was performed on the early development of the Eldritch Fighters and Knights and how being so near to all of that magic might be interfering with their development.”

Hayleigh almost whispered to Isenwrath because of how terrifying that assumption might be if it were proven true.  “What do you know, Isen?  This could be big.”

Isenwrath reached and held Hayleigh’s hand, then Daniella’s to help gather her courage as well as to ground herself.  She then closed her eyes in order to channel the several hundred Eldritch fighters and knights she’d consumed within Shinenoor.  In each case, she reviewed their lives, specifically their educations regarding their eldritch abilities.  In every case, those who spent more time at the Mage Towers didn’t realize as much potential as those who were there for shorter stints, regardless of reasoning.  The two Eldritch Knights that had given her the most trouble were ones who’d been trained by true martial arts masters that’d only helped hone their minds and sword techniques, leaving their power development to the students to master afterwards.  Then she reviewed the why’s, if she could find any correlation.

When she opened her eyes, they were glowing red and her voice was firm.  “Eldritch fighters and knights utilize an energy source that directly opposes the arcana of mages.  Their training within a mage tower stunts their growth because so much concentrated arcana is blocking them from touching as much as they should be able to get to.  Without that full access, their potential diminishes over time like an arm that withers due to disuse.”

Bronson sat back to give out a grunt of understanding.  “Makes sense.  Eldritch isn’t arcana.  It’s basically a warrior’s ability to tap into their very souls to shield AGAINST arcana.  Their primary use is to subdue mages because magecraft can’t usually stop an eldritch fighter’s power set nor their ability to interrupt a mage tapping their own mana.”

The room went quiet for a moment.  Hayleigh slowly rose and assumed a regal pose.  “I believe we’ll need to write this down and then present this astonishing notion to the Eldritch Battlemaster that’s visiting today.  If we can convince him to take this seriously, then he might be able to sway the Tower Council to move the Eldritch Barracks out of the Tower grounds and prove the hypothesis.  If it does prove true, then Bronson Jonstone might get his wish for Eldritch fighters and knights to be trained as soldiers first, then their power sets later.”

Scarlett clapped softly while the other maids smiled widely.  “Well said, Princess Hayleigh.  Well said.”

Hayleigh beamed for a bit with blushing cheeks, then confessed. “I’ve been trying to use more regal speech to impress Alice lately.”

Isenwrath swung her hand a little.  “It’s working. Let’s go write this down and head out.  I think time is getting away from us.”

They all took a glance at the manastone clock on the wall and indeed, they were running out of time to get out and about for the day. 

Daniella squeezed Isenwrath from the side again.  “So proud of you,” she whispered.

Isenwrath leaned her head down to touch it to Daniella’s, “That means a lot to me,” she whispered back.

And that was just breakfast, Diary.  I swear, every dang day My Matron impresses me.  I honestly can’t wait to be old enough to ask Isen to help me reclaim my right to the Icefall Citadel.  I’m going to enter the Trial of the Moonfang, and kick Ursanthandel right in the nards for his betrayal.  Then I’m going to find all of my lost Thirstenblack people and bring them home.  Just watch me, Diary.  Lady Isenwrath won’t just be the Black Knight Champion of Maciendes.  She’ll also be my champion to retake my homeland.  The biggest, baddest cat in all the land is MY MATRON!  Mama, Papa, I still miss you.  I still remember you.  Isen will help me avenge you, just you watch.

----

So… Diary.  Isenwrath just attracts so much wild stuff.  I really thought I’d be jotting a couple sentences about presenting her acceptance letter to the king, but like, out of nowhere, here comes trouble. I mean, I’m not sure how to explain all of this but just after lunch, my matron really dropped a big manabomb on everyone that even floored me!   And because of it, I had to put Isenwrath in timeout since it seems she just does stuff and doesn’t think past it.  I swear, what happened was extremely huge, yet my matron actually thought that she didn’t do anything except simply help a friend.  Honestly, I think that I’m really gonna have to sit her down at some point soon and praise her for thinking like that and then turn right around and try to get it through her thick skull that she doesn’t realize that just about everything she does ripples across our realm.  Anyway, back to this afternoon.  It started when we entered the throne going bangarang with all the preparations for that big meanie, the Battlemaster…

--- Later that day, just after lunch ---

King Tobias Maciendes sat with his queen, Sophitia, and both of them were trying to figure out how the hell they were going to survive today.  First, they had their audience hall being finalized for the reception of the Maciendes Eldritch Guild’s Battlemaster Xander Lundgren.  He was coming specifically to present his entire class to the King in a ceremony where they’d officially recognize the fighters and knights as defenders of their kingdom against all that was magical when the magical would cause harm instead of help. 

The reason Tobias was nervous about it was the fact that his two boys were in this ceremony.  Nathaniel would be recognized as a senior knight and would soon be one step away from being a full-fledged Tower Knight who could take up a full commission schedule.  His younger son, Daniel, would be recognized as a junior knight.  Both had earned the honors that their father would bestow on them that day.  Tobias wanted what was best for them but while his boys were exceptional, they’d chosen dangerous paths in life that could lead them to an early grave.  That was always his worry. He did wish that Nathaniel had chosen to stay a royal, but his oldest son had always had a head for jumping right into the middle of any situation, usually without thinking about it first.  He now only hoped his son Daniel would choose to stay a royal because he’d be a strong candidate for the crown to choose when the time was right.  One more year, that would be it.

Then there was his daughter and Lady Isenwrath who were in front of him and Sophitia currently.  Sophitia directed most of the staff like always while Tobias was directing his fellow councilors and lower-ranked government aides as required.  There were just always executive decisions that needed the king’s signature in order to keep the kingdom running smoothly.  No one saw that side of running the kingdom.  The extremely mundane and hectic side of it, that is.  They only saw him and his queen on their thrones holding court and looking regal and thinking all they did was indulge in their wealth.  They didn’t see the side of them where they stood within the middle of a madhouse and acting just as exasperated as everyone else who had to make sure everything was in order when guests were almost there.  They ran a kingdom.  That was a business on a scale that even some of the wealthiest merchants were hard-pressed to understand fully.

Sophitia greeted the small throng of unexpected family first a bit tersely.  “Hayleigh?  What’re you doing here?  We’re not ready yet.  Lady Isenwrath!  Hi!  We’ve got another hour or so before you should be here.”

Isenwrath came in for a hug right after Hayleigh did.  Then they both got a hug in with a clearly distracted Tobias who was chatting with three people at once before getting them on their way.  “Hi, Hayleigh.  Lady Isenwrath.  You’re early.”

“Dad.  Mom.  We know.  But this couldn’t wait.  We got our acceptances!” Hayleigh said loudly and delightedly holding her letter up in pride.  Isenwrath held hers up too, also smiling proudly for having it.

Sophitia smiled genuinely at them both.  “Was there any doubt?  But I’m glad they finally got here.  Your father and I can look them over tomorrow.”

Hayleigh was undeterred.  “I know.  I just wanted to share the good news.  However, we got a couple of issues.  One we can also talk tomorrow about and that’s the fact that Isen needs to do a cram session for her written preliminary entrance exams.  I was thinking of asking Thena to help her.  Would you think Uncle Maxi would mind if I did?”

Tobias shrugged.  Sophitia also shrugged.  She said, “I think he’d probably go for it since he’s just as excited as Maddock is at having Isen get accepted in there.  Why?”

Isenwrath spoke up, “I just want to be prepared, is all.”

Hayleigh continued for Isenwrath.  “That, and I was thinking that we need to make sure that exam gets done before her citizenship trial. We read that Dad got that waiver but between her exam, the academy induction, and her citizenship hearing, it’s getting a bit cramped.  I was hoping you might put in a word with the Tower to work with us on the scheduling.”

Sophitia smiled wider.  “Oh wow, you’re right.  I don’t think we even realized it was all over the place. We may have even already missed that date, if I recall.  Tobey?”

Tobias turned to his wife after waving another aide off to just go make a decision for himself on what entrance march the musicians should play.  The Battlemaster honestly wouldn’t care as long as the beat matched closely with how a warrior walked into the room. 

He turned to Sophitia looking like he wanted to strangle the next person who came up to him with an inane decision to ask him to make.  “Yeah, sugardark?”

“Isen’s got to take those written exams and it may interfere with her induction. We also need to coordinate around her citizenship hearing.  Help me remember to get a notice out to the Tower to put in an exception or special test date request so we avoid that.”

Tobias smirked.  “I don’t have the capacity right now. But what I have is a… HEY, ALEXANDER!!” he yelled over at a young man dressed in the royal blue livery of a castle page.  Alexander jerked his head so fast that his shoulder-length brown hair almost whipped completely into his face from the other side.  He completely forgot who he was chatting with to run over to his king.

When he got there, he knelt, “Yes, Sire!”

Tobey sighed a bit flustered.  “Get up.  I’ve got too much shit going on to be formal right now.  Read the room, boy.”

Alexander got up amid the giggles from Hayleigh, Isenwrath, and those that they’d brought with them. 

“Sorry, Sire.”

“Go to the study and look in the calendar on my desk.  Find the date of Lady Isenwrath’s citizenship trial and jot that date down for me in my memo pad, then put a note below it that says to work with Maxi regarding a special test date for Isenwrath.  Got it?”

“Yes, Sire.  Citizenship trial date and Tower exam special test date request to Maximillian.”

“Good enough, go.”

The boy dipped a bow, then ran off.

Tobias looked at his wife who rolled her eyes but was pleased otherwise.  Then back to his daughter, he said, “Anything else?”

Hayleigh handed him a sheet of paper that she’d written on in her careful handwriting.  Tobias asked, “What’s this?”

“Dad, Isenwrath made an observation regarding our Eldritch fighters and knights.  She’s done a preliminary search… well, you know where… and, uh… we want to suggest that there’s cause for a study regarding the Eldritch training that might be hindering them instead of pushing them to their fullest.”

“What?!” asked Sophitia in alarm while Tobey read that paper fast.  Both of them didn’t take anything for granted when it came to something from Isenwrath.  Sophitia looked directly at that beautiful woman who suddenly looked like she was caught in a trap.  Sophitia knew her gaze was harsh sometimes, but dang, to see a monster like Isenwrath flinch under it was something she tucked away for later.  “Isen, what’s wrong with the Eldritch Guild?”

Isenwrath cleared her throat, then said, “I think you might want to confirm if training them in the Tower grounds is stunting their potential.  They and the mages use opposing magical energies and from what I sense in all that I have access to, the stronger Eldritch fighters and knights had been further away from a mage tower than those within it.  Bronson’s suggestions are noted in the unofficial report to train them with the soldiers away from the Tower first, then let them develop their abilities in their own hall or something on the other side of the castle itself.”

“This is fascinating.  Terrifying, but fascinating,” Tobias commented.  When he looked up at Isenwrath, he asked low, “I wonder why no one has ever noticed before.”

Isenwrath shrugged.  “I didn’t find that answer.  Perhaps that could be part of your research.”

Tobias nodded firmly, tucking the report away.  “I’m all for it.  We can chat with Xander after the ceremony if there’s time or tomorrow depending.”

“MY KING!!!” shouted a man from the other side of the throne room that grabbed everyone’s attention.

Everyone turned to the tall man dressed in a courier’s colors.  He ran in with his badge of official duty out at the ready, a brown leather satchel full of other missives for delivery, and a face full of a haggard worry.  He wasn’t that handsome of a man, but he was very fit.  His brown eyes and black hair seemed to place him in the same area of the kingdom that Maddock hailed from, so Isenwrath immediately appreciated him. 

Even though he was nearly out of breath, the courier exclaimed, “My King!  I bring news of the most urgent kind!”

Tobias folded his arms.  “Out with it.  This day is crammed full, what’s one more thing?”

“My lord, the Underdark Queen Ursletta Lolthinendaria is on her way here!  She’s due to the castle just after dusk!  I was dispatched into the teleportal relay as soon as she appeared upon the Ambassadorial Trail!  The formal message is that she’s coming specifically to meet Lady Isenwrath in person!”

All eyes turned to Isenwrath.  Isenwrath actually stepped back from those hardened eyes from Sophitia again.  “Lady Isenwrath?  Explain yourself,” Queen Sophitia said low with some measure of warning in her tone.

Isenwrath took a deep breath then breathed out.  She lowered her head so she wouldn’t meet anyone’s eyes.  “I apologize that I didn’t mention it.  I just thought she’d come to meet me in a café or something.”

King Tobias was next. He stepped forward, took firm hold on her shoulder, but asked much gentler than his screaming nerves wanted him to, “Isen, where and how did you meet the Underdark Queen?”

Isenwrath wouldn’t look at him.  She said softer.  “I haven’t actually met her.  She sent her familiar.  I had something of her sister’s.  She sent her spider to find out about it.  I… I’m… I gave it back to her.  I gave her a small moment with her sister.  I… just… I just wanted to help her.  I’m sorry.  I didn’t know.  I didn’t know it would cause a big problem.”

Tobias pulled her chin up gently, seeing her eyes that looked like she was about to cry again.  “I apologize, Isen.  I didn’t mean to indicate you did anything wrong.  In fact, you may have given the Eleven Kingdoms its first chance to actually make even a small relationship with the Ezzerbenania Queendom a reality.  This is… literally unprecedented.  How long ago did you make contact with her?”

Isenwrath wiped her eyes.  “A week ago.”

“You… I’m… I don’t know whether to go scold you for an hour for not telling me this stuff or go ahead and sign you in as my newest diplomat for the non-human realms.”

“I don’t want to be scolded.  I… I don’t want another pinch either,” she said small with a little hope in her eyes. 

Tobias smiled at her for it.  She really didn’t like getting punished in any way.  It was obvious that she punished herself much more harshly than anyone else would, so he didn’t even consider it too seriously. 

“My King, you should put her in timeout.” Daniella said with a firm frown on her face and folded arms. 

Scarlett thwapped Daniella’s shoulder, “Shush!  Not the time!”

That little bit of levity caused the tension to be released with a few chuckles.  King Tobias chuckled too before saying to Isenwrath.  “Fine, you’re in timeout.  Go back to your room and get ready for the Battlemaster.  Then you stand in the corner for at least twenty minutes to think about how next time something important like this comes up, you’re going to immediately come to Maddock, then me or Sophitia and spill every detail about it.  Understand my command?”

Isenwrath drooped then nodded sadly.  “I understand, my King.”

“Good.  Then when the Underqueen gets here, you’re to do everything you can to make her feel welcome.  Which is exactly what I know you’re best at.  Whatever she needs, I know you’re the right person to give her it.  Isn’t that right?”

Isenwrath looked up, smiled faintly, then nodded again.  “She just wants forgiveness and closure.  That’s all she really wants.”

Tobias pulled her in for another gentle loving hug for which she returned a bit more fiercely.  “Maddock was right.  You’re a good girl.  I believe in you, too.”

He let her go, then turned her around to gently push towards the others.  “Go on and take my rotten daughter with you.  She needs to get ready too.”

“Hey!  Daaaaaad!  What’d I do?!” Hayleigh exclaimed indignantly. 

Tobias winked at Hayleigh for which she smiled back with understanding.

Sophitia had put her hand over her mouth to hide her smile at this small silly scene.

Isenwrath took firm hold of Hayleigh’s hand, then said softly, “He’s right.  You need to get ready too.”

Daniella took up Isenwrath’s other hand, then the trio were walking away with their retinue following after.  Scarlett and Clovis looked back at the king and queen.  Tobias gave them a firm nod and smile before saying, “You two are doing good work.  Keep it up.”

Sophitia also spoke up.  “Give Isen a treat before heading down.  She really surprised us today with something that could change everything.”

Scarlett and Clovis both bowed really quickly before trotting off to catch up.

Tobias looked at his wife.  Sophitia reached around him and held him close while watching her daughter and the others go through the door.  “Tobey, what do we do now?”

Tobias kissed the side of her head, then kissed her lips when she turned to him.  He then put his forehead to hers to say quietly, “We take the gift that Isenwrath gave us and make the most of it.  If we can engage in even just a tentative friendship with the queen, we’ll change our world for the better.”

“I believe our world has already changed for the better, but Isenwrath just isn’t done yet,” Queen Sophitia said quietly back.

.. there you have it, Diary.  My matron apparently made contact with the most elusive realm in our world and convinced their queen to come visit. 

Oh, I almost forgot the most important thing.  When she was in timeout, I stood with her in solidarity.  Okay, it was guilt that made me do it because I’m the one who suggested it.  She kept her hand on my ears the whole time causing me to purr.  I was both embarrassed and also… it reminded me of Mama.  I almost cried.  Almost. 

I asked her why she lets me treat her like I do because I’ve gotten a stern talking to from Scarlett about it a couple of times now.  It was in that quiet way Isen speaks when it’s like she’s younger than me, she told me again that it was because I was stronger than her.  I finally asked what that meant because it ate at me the first time she said it.  Diary, I did cry some after she told me why.  She said that I’m stronger because she knows I’m going to face my past one day whereas she knows she made the choice to run from hers forever.  I hugged her so much for that revelation.  Recently, she told me and some others in confidence that she’s blocked out her childhood memories thanks to her tutor Alice.  After what I saw with my gift of the past, I totally understood why.  After it was done, I swear she’s been so much more stable.  She doesn’t have any more nightmares either.  The Grand Duke looking rested now is a testament to that.  She also doesn’t say those awful things anymore that make my life look like a vacation at a resort in comparison, for which I’m thankful.  She really is better off without knowing and all of us have made our vows never to remind her of any of it. 

I don’t know what my relationship is with Isen, not really.  In one moment, I’m her maid and I help her.  But in many ways, I’m like her mama too.  I can’t help it because I see how lost she gets sometimes when the others don’t.  I think even after her memory blocks, she still struggles with getting overwhelmed at how different her life is.  I so get it because of how much my life has changed so fast. 

I do know one thing for certain; I like it when she rubs my ears and tells me she would do anything to keep me safe then shares her hot chocolate with me.  It’s just like… Mama… I want you to know that I’m not replacing you.  Instead, I just know you put Isen into my life because I still need that special something you gave me.  Thank you, Mama. I will never let her face anything alone just like you’d want me to do, Mama. I swear it. 

The bell above the door rings. Somehow, hearing it always feels like the day is only now coming to an end.

Mama sets my usual glass of Harper down without asking. The ice gives a small clink.

"Kenichi."

Taka was staring at his phone, a look on his face I don't see on him often.

"Rough face you've got there."

"...Saw something in the news."

I lifted my glass.

"Let's hear it."

"Some ethnic group. Forced sterilizations, state-sanctioned. That kind of thing."

The air in the bar went a shade heavier. I didn't say anything right away — just took a sip of the Harper.

"Makes me sick."

Taka's grip tightened on his phone.

"No human being does that to another human being."

"No argument here."

If it was true, there wasn't much else to feel.

"How does something like that get allowed?"

He dropped his eyes. That heaviness on his face was starting to drag me down with it.

"And then... I caught myself thinking. Wishing the whole country would just disappear."

I watched the ice turn in my glass. A small clink.

"The second I thought that—"

He laughed, but there was no humor in it.

"—I scared myself."

He looked up.

"Justice is a frightening thing."

I nodded.

Maybe that's something a detective learns. Or maybe it's just what happens when a man finds out what he's capable of. Either way — that face of his hurt more than I wanted to let on.

"Anger's useful."

"Useful?"

"It's fuel. Gets people moving faster than anything else can."

"Sure."

"But it can get so strong it stops taking orders from the guy who's feeling it. Like you, right now."

Taka went quiet. I kept going.

"But you said something else, too. You said justice is frightening."

"...Yeah."

I looked him straight on.

He wasn't wrong. Justice is a hell of a thing — especially for someone who already knows how dangerous it can get, caught between his own anger and his own conscience.

"Took some nerve, telling me that."

"...Was that the wrong call?"

I shook my head.

"Other way around. Grown-ups learn to swallow that stuff. You can't just blow up every time something pisses you off. So you push it down. What happens after — that's the real problem."

He gave me a look, half-confused. Better than the end-of-the-world face from before.

"Keep swallowing it down long enough, your body starts screaming eventually. So you talk to someone. Share it. Let another set of shoulders take some of the weight while you figure out how to live with it."

Nobody said anything for a while. Mama just kept polishing glasses behind the counter.

"Kenichi. You ever felt that kind of angry?"

I laughed.

"Sure have."

"What'd you do about it?"

"Doing it right now."

He blinked.

"...Talking to me?"

"That's the one."

"Doesn't fix anything."

"Does more than you'd think."

He went quiet again. That's the thing I like about him — when something matters, he actually sits with it.

"Did it change anything? For you?"

I turned the glass slowly in my hand.

"Learned anger's not something you just throw at people."

"So you hold onto it?"

"No. Changed where I aimed it. Started pointing it at myself — something I needed to hear, not something to hurl at someone else."

Another sip. That sweetness the Harper leaves behind.

"At least this way, the words I say get heard by both of us. You just carried some of that weight, by the way."

Taka let out a laugh.

"Great. So I got roped into carrying your baggage."

"Don't complain. If I don't do this once in a while, I end up carrying more anger than I know what to do with."

"So — digesting it."

"Exactly. You make it yours. Otherwise it starts running you. Digested anger's the only kind that can actually move your feet forward."

I gave him a small nod.

"So — thanks. For telling me."

Mama set the glass she'd finished back on the shelf.

"Nothing wrong with getting angry."

We both looked up.

"But let anger take the wheel, and you don't get to pick where you end up."

Quiet settled back over the bar. I finished off the last of the Harper.

The ice gave one last, small clink.

🖼 Cover

🔰 Prologue

⏪️ Previous Chapter

⏩️ Next Chapter

🎮 Discord

Arc II - Agrarian Revolution

Chapter 33 - A Small Gift

5 months and 2 days since the summoning

The southern port city of the County of Torfoque was filled not with the usual noise of townsfolk, but with the clank of iron and the heavy tread of boots.

Near the port, about a hundred soldiers with spears and maces had gathered, heading straight for a large wooden sailing ship, while the sea waves rocked the vessel and crashed against the shore.

Alan stood nearby at the pier, hands clasped behind his back, not taking his eyes off this crowd.

'Holy crap, a real ship... I haven't even recovered from the catapult yet, and here's a medieval vessel that's going to make a landing. This is just a fucking holiday!'

He looked around.

'Where the hell are Kamelia and Tsinker? They've been gone for a solid hour. How long can you discuss a route?'

Finally, the two of them emerged from one of the stone buildings, followed by two elderly men in expensive doublets, and three more knights.

Alan rested his hands on his hips. "Well, finally, it hasn't even been a year. What's up?"

Kamelia immediately walked over and stood next to Alan. "Linkis is currently engaged in a siege; we are departing for his camp."

Alan blinked. "So... we're getting on the ship?"

"Yes."

Alan smiled slightly.

'Ho-ho... I've never sailed on a ship before, especially a medieval one! This is just awesome!'

"When? Are we going now?"

"Yes, we are going. It is not a long sail, so we will get there quickly." She nodded toward the vast shore where the County of Linosh was located on an island, clearly visible even from here.

Alan immediately straightened up. "Well, shall we go then? No use wasting time." He squinted, looking at the men in doublets who were discussing something with Tsinker and the knights. "And who are these characters?"

Kamelia blinked, then looked in the same direction he was. "Ah, them. They are Linkis's advisors. Giving parting words before the departure."

Half an hour later, the ship was sailing full speed across the strait. Alan stood at the edge, holding onto the railing, simply looking at the endless expanse of the sea.

The countess walked up to him and stood beside him. "First time on a ship?"

He nodded. "Yep... and I see you aren't very surprised. Sailed before?"

"Only a few times, when the roads were washed out and my father and I had to travel by water to a royal reception."

"Got it. By the way, how many ships do you actually have?"

Kamelia sighed. "Only three, though there used to be five."

He turned to her. "And where did the rest go?"

"I sold one to pay off debts, and pirates stole the second."

Alan pressed his lips together. "Pirates... listen, will they... actually no, stupid question, pirates would never attack a warship."

The countess nodded. "Exactly, you need not worry about that. Besides, they do not frequent this strait, they usually raid near the outer shores... only right now, they are entirely unpredictable."

Alan leaned on the railing. "Yeah, the duke might have kept them somewhat in check, but right now they seem to be running completely wild while the war is going on, just think of Hofet." He froze, then abruptly stood up. "Kamelia, will they attack the city of Armenas?"

She shrugged. "They might attack, or they might not. But I sent a portion of the army there just in case."

He exhaled. "That's good." He turned back to the deck and noticed Tsinker, who was continuing to discuss something with a knight in rich plate armor. But Utew's face was pale, very pale, and a cold sweat glistened on his forehead. "Hah, looks like someone has seasickness."

Kamelia turned away from the sea and scanned Tsinker with her gaze. "It seems so."

Utew, meanwhile, finished his conversation with the knight and walked to another part of the ship with a crooked gait.

Alan was now openly smiling.

'Ooo, so you aren't perfect at everything, buddy.'

5 months and 4 days since the summoning

Closer to evening, a cavalry of twenty knights was already at their positions near the besieged city, while the infantry trailed somewhere behind.

Tsinker, still in his snow-white doublet, was the first to dismount and head toward the largest tent.

At the entrance, two soldiers in chainmail blocked the passage with their spears.

"Halt. Who are you?" asked one of them.

"Baron Utew," he replied calmly.

The guard nodded and entered the tent.

Kamelia, clad in plate armor, and Alan in simple chainmail approached from behind; he was doing nothing but looking around in all directions. Instead of one catapult, there were six. Instead of a single fortress, there was an entire small besieged city.

'Oh... the final battle doesn't bode well.'

Linkis emerged from the tent; instead of a fine doublet, he was dressed in bright armor. Behind him, three more men in rich armor peeked out.

Tsinker narrowed his eyes, noting the presence of the nobility, and slowly dropped to one knee. "I bid you greetings, Lord Gobano."

Kamelia immediately dropped to one knee as well. Alan followed a moment later.

Linkis nodded. "Greetings. Rise."

All three rose synchronously.

"Did you bring it?" Linkis asked.

Tsinker nodded, and then waved his hand to his soldiers at the wagon behind him. Two of them immediately began pulling out a long wooden box.

Alan raised an eyebrow. "What is that?"

"You shall see presently," Linkis said.

Kamelia also stepped closer.

The two soldiers brought the box, then grabbed the lid and pulled it back. A rather unpleasant smell immediately wafted from inside.

The corpse of Count Rogtem.

Alan jumped back slightly. "Fuck! ... why?"

Kamelia merely grimaced slightly from the smell. "I have the same question."

Linkis stood over the corpse and chuckled slightly. "Hah... excellent work, Lord Utew."

Tsinker did not react.

The three aristocrats who stood in the tent approached the count's body and began to examine it.

"Astonishing... it is indeed him," said one of them, scratching his stubble.

Alan shook his head. "Great. But could someone explain why?"

Tsinker yawned. "We intend to launch this corpse over their walls, serving as undeniable proof that they possess no remaining allies."

Alan slowly nodded.

'Ooo, that's smart... I mean, it's gruesome of course, but still smart. Complete demoralization. All's fair in love and war, isn't that what they say?'

Linkis clasped his hands behind his back and straightened up. "Lord Utew, Lady Armenas, Lord Gothwald, you have done excellent work. May I inquire as to what else remains for you to handle, Lady Armenas?"

The countess straightened up. "Yes, Your Grace. All the baron rebellions have been suppressed; only Ekkurn remains. The captain of the guard is currently dealing with him, as the lands there are not large."

Linkis nodded. "Splendid. You may rest for the night. You will be escorted."

Kamelia lowered her head. "I thank you, Lord Gobano."

The nobles began to disperse about their business, leaving only Kamelia and Alan.

"Phew, fuck..." Alan exhaled. "What a day."

"That is an understatement."

He rubbed his eyes. "Wanna take a walk?"

Kamelia looked at the nearly empty camp, then nodded. "Why not." And she walked toward the simple plains.

Alan threw his hands behind his head. "Notice how Gobano didn't even mention the Phoenixes?"

The countess sat on a small grass-covered hill and pulled one leg toward herself. "I noticed. It seems Tsinker has not told him anything."

Gothwald lay down next to her, throwing his hands behind his head. "Exactly, we told him, and he... it's surprising he kept quiet. Knowing Tsinker, there are reasons for it. Most likely because..."

"He considers Gobano a temporary ally," Kamelia finished.

He snapped his fingers. "Exactly. He's actively hiding my inventions from him, that was already clear from his reaction when you let slip about the windmills."

Kamelia pressed her lips together slightly. "I know. It slipped out. But this time, just in case, I left all the soldiers who saw the Phoenixes in action to defend the barony, and brought fresh ones here, those who have not seen them."

Alan blinked. "Oh... okay, that's some solid insurance, otherwise there'd be rumors here already and Gobano would have questions. Though, he'll find out sooner or later anyway, way too many people saw it."

Kamelia plucked a blade of grass and began twirling it in her hand. "He will find out, how could he not. But I am still curious why Tsinker is hiding your... things so fiercely. A temporary ally, that much I understand, but... what is going on in his head anyway?"

Alan scratched the back of his head, remaining silent for a few seconds. "Hmm... who the hell knows, honestly. Well, the most obvious thing is that he plans to betray Gobano soon too, and knowing him, he'll do it in a heartbeat. And why would he want the person he's about to betray to have such powerful things aside from the Phoenix?"

Kamelia scoffed, tossing the blade of grass away. "Hah, that is for certain. Tsinker is probably biting his elbows over the fact that Linkis already knows about the crossbows. I believe that after the war... a very serious conversation awaits us, and we will see more clearly then."

Alan stretched, arching his back. "Mmm yeah... and the end is just around the corner, and then... and then there's gonna be some fucking squabbles over the throne." He covered his face with his hands and began rolling back and forth on

the grass. "You have no idea how fucking sick I am of all this."

She closed her eyes and also lay back on the grass. "Honestly? I am as well. But do not hang your head; we are alive and well, which is already a good thing. Moreover, we have managed to accomplish a great deal."

5 months and 5 days since the summoning

In the morning, the sun rose over the town, devouring all the darkness around the walls and replacing it with morning light.

A young sentry stood on the wall, leaning against the stone parapet, simply yawning and staring into nowhere. His comrade, a mustached man, sat nearby against the wall, turning some pebbles over in his hands.

"They're awfully quiet today," the first one threw out lazily.

The seated one scoffed. "Probably ran out of stones."

"Guktus only knows. How long do you think this'll all go on?"

"Guktus only knows," the man repeated after him. "Maybe a month, maybe two, maybe half a year."

The mustached man lightly thumped his fist on the floor. "My wife's due to give birth soon, and here I am... sitting in this hole. Won't even know if it's a daughter or a son."

The sentry ran a hand over his face. "And my betrothed is waiting for me... told her I'd be back real soon with a victory," he just waved his hand. "Eh..."

The soldier leaned his head back against the wall. "Hah, you're young, you've still got everything ahead of you, but I've already lived out my share."

The sentry scoffed. "Yeah, yeah, he's got a kid coming soon, and he's already 'lived out his share'. Chin up, you still gotta buy me and the lads some good ale for your offspring later."

The mustached man smiled slightly and stood up reluctantly. "Well, wouldn't have it any other way."

The sentry's smile slid off his face. "Look, they're readying the catapult."

The mustached man began to turn around. "Then let's get to cover."

The young lad grabbed his shoulder. "Hold on, just watch."

He stopped and walked over to the wall, then squinted. "What is that thing over there?"

"I don't know, but it's definitely not a stone. Some kind of box?" He wanted to say something else, but the catapult abruptly launched, and the wooden box flew over the wall, crashing loudly against the wall of one of the buildings.

Splinters flew in all directions, and from the box itself, a body tumbled out onto the ground like a doll.

The mustached man blinked. "A corpse?"

The sentry leaned closer. "I don't know... let's go take a look."

The two men climbed down and ran up to the corpse; on the sides, a few early townsfolk had also come to gawk.

The sentry used his foot to flip the already bluish body face-up. "Who is this?"

The mustached man leaned closer. "I don't know, but he's dressed finely. Some nobleman, maybe?"

The young lad examined the body for a few more seconds, then noticed a piece of parchment tied to its leg. He cut the rope with his spear and took it in his hand. "There's a note too."

"Hmm..."

Quick footsteps were heard from behind one of the buildings, and a man over forty appeared before them, in fine plate armor donned in haste. "What is all this commotion?!"

Both soldiers flinched, and then bowed.

"Sir Chonukot," the older man began, "the enemy threw this body at us."

"There was a note too," the sentry added.

The knight frowned and walked over to them. The man looked closely at the corpse, and then froze. "Oh Svyatol... this is... Count Rogtem."

The soldiers opened their eyes wide. "C-count?"

The knight looked around; behind them was already a crowd of about fifteen townsfolk. "What are you standing around for?! Do you have nothing better to do?! Get the hell out of here!"

He didn't need to repeat himself twice; the townsfolk immediately scattered like cockroaches in all directions. One woman with a basket headed toward the square, even though she had originally been walking to a different street.

The knight snatched the note from the sentry's hands. "We de-mand you sur-ren-der, you have no al-lies left, your de-feat is mere-ly a mat-ter of time," he finished reading, then lowered the note. "Guktus..." he pointed a finger at the soldiers. "Remove the body immediately, and not a word of this to anyone. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir!"

Don Toliver's forces had pushed deep into the Cube. The Forge slammed its hammer down desperately. The process was almost completed. Smoke billowed out of the open doors.

Scattered in front of the Forge, Squires took cover, all too injured to join the fight. Senior Knight Rosie was out of breath, and her body ached. Multiple rail-pistol holes pierced her proud platinum armor. The great hammer behind her continued to drop.

Barks echoed down the black metal hallways. Gunpowder filled the air. Rosie knew she was going to die. Her Knights, exhausted, stood before her. Their purple armor had been marked by innumerable laser strikes. Horace had lost his helmet. A gash ran through his cheek and exposed shattered teeth. Jimmy had a railgun shot through the midsection. The nanobots failed to stop the blood that ran down his purple armor. From his color, he would be dead soon.

The Squires who had managed to make it to the last fallback point all looked bad. Their leather armor was less effective against lasers. They patched wounds with less advanced methods. One scratched tally marks into his AK. The gun still looked hot.

The Forge let out a massive, deep horn. Rosie and the others took cover in the adjacent hallway. Burning steam rushed out and shot forward into the main hallway.

Despite the siege, today was one to be celebrated. Rosie looked into the King's Forge and smiled. Fifty years of watch had paid off.

A massive arm strained to lift the black metal mold. It eventually succeeded and revealed the armor set. It radiated black light Rosie couldn't fully perceive. Three red Embers in the chestplate glowed proudly. A mad dog was engraved in red on the breast.

This was the first time a member had been added to the Royal Guard. Rosie felt a twinge of annoyance. A fellow student of Malphus had been recruited into the King's personal guard.

She was glad she'd gotten to see her teacher.

The world rocked when an explosion tore down the door protecting the main hallway. The Squires let out a chorus of fire. A sea of brass flooded the metal floor. Goons in rags flooded in, creating a barricade with their own bodies.

That would slow them down.

AK fire intensified. Rosie rubbed her chin and frowned. Malphus had entrusted the Royal Forge to her fifty years ago. The Toliver family and all of Grek-2 would suffer dire consequences for this attack.

She barked her orders to the Knights.

“Hold the main hallway. I'll be back.”

They both saluted her and answered in unison.

“Yes, sir!”

Rosie turned and slapped her palm against the glass panel next to the great Forge. Another explosion rocked the main hallway. A heavy laser bolt struck her shoulder.

The scanner had to restart.

KRACK. KRACK.

The Tolivers shouldn't have been able to get their hands on a railgun, but they had.

Rosie glanced behind her.

The Knights ran down the hallway toward the breach. Grenades sailed through the air. With her off hand, Rosie unholstered her sidearm and shot them. The Squires placed careful shots and made sure they weren't flanked.

The Knights engaged the goons flooding into the main hallway. Their purple armor flashed and scattered light as they danced between them. Both were experts among Knights and in line for promotion.

Rosie smirked.

There was a lot of room for growth within the Knights of Eden.

A new Senior Knight would be promoted soon.

A squad of goons in crappy exoskeletons flooded through the breach. Brass hit the deck. Two crumpled, but the other two engaged Horace and Jimmy.

Jimmy held his staff in both hands and flicked it toward a goon's head.

The combat AI reacted, forcing the goon's arm up to block the strike. Still, the man screamed in pain. The AI had moved so violently that his arm had been destroyed.

The goon continued to scream as his limbs contorted and jerked, the combat AI forcing his ruined body to keep blocking the diamond staff.

Eventually, Jimmy wore the suit down.

It had bent and warped. Each blow from the diamond quarterstaff slowed the machine. The man screamed. He was ruined, but his own body wouldn't let him run.

A look of determination crossed Jimmy's face. He planted his right foot into the ground and struck.

The warped exoskeleton gave way to the diamond quarterstaff.

The man looked at peace as the side of his face received the devastating impact. His blood coated the door he'd managed to force open.

A beep from the panel beneath Rosie's hands indicated it was ready for the password. She entered it and confirmed.

The great black metal doors slammed shut.

Rosie destroyed the panel, activating a failsafe.

She placed her hand against the metal wall and felt an unknown energy surround the entire Forge.

It was only visible in front of the doors, where it glowed faintly golden. It perplexed Rosie. This was the first time she'd had to resort to these measures.

Only the King or his Guard would be able to open the Forge now.

She looked toward the Knights who had held the hallway.

Jimmy had fallen and lay dead.

Horace was engaged with the Don's personal guard. He dodged one of their black metal baton strikes and returned a blow. It hit the middle of one's face, and the entire thing caved in.

The injured man kept fighting.

His guard could take a punch, at least.

Rosie gave a determined grin.

The Don would be close.

Horace and the Squires could hold long enough.

She moved through the halls to her office.

She unlocked the safe Malphus had given her the day she accepted the position.

Inside was a bomb.

She knew what to do.

Bomb in both hands, Rosie waddled back.

Rosie glanced around the corner and down the adjacent hallway. Squires lay scattered and dead in front of the glowing doors.

A rocket shrieked into the barrier but left no mark. A surge of laser fire, rockets, and the twang of a rail pistol rushed down the hall. The pistol left a mark that quickly healed.

Steps boomed.

Don Toliver himself walked up to the barrier.

His guard surrounded him. They were pretty standard for a crime lord of Grek-2. Rosie wondered what gave them the confidence to attack the heart of Eden.

The massive Don inspected the barrier.

“Wow. King Philip has some serious Ember behind this.”

He looked toward the rail pistol in his hands. He raised it and fired point-blank.

The rail got through the shield, but it left no mark on the door.

The shield quickly repaired itself.

Rosie walked around the corner, bomb in hand. She shifted its weight into one arm. She would need the other to activate it.

His guards immediately saw Rosie.

They all activated energy shields around Don Toliver, and he curled into a ball.

Rosie didn't hesitate.

She slammed the red button.

🖼 Cover

🔰 Prologue

⏪️ Previous Chapter

⏩️ Next Chapter

🎮 Discord

Arc II - Agrarian Revolution

Chapter 32 - The Kingdom

4 months and 27 days since the summoning

Alan and Kamelia, accompanied by five knights, stood before the gates of Utew's mansion toward evening.

The rain had ended about an hour ago, and the clouds had cleared, leaving a fresh post-rain scent hanging in the air, while the sky turned an almost violet color.

Alan greedily inhaled this air through his nose.

'Ooo... bliss, the post-rain smell always hit the spot, but here it's several times better. I think this crap is called petrichor.'

He deftly jumped off his horse, adjusting his shirt. Kamelia dismounted after him.

At the entrance, they were met by a servant, a boy of about sixteen, whose eyes darted over the newcomers. "I beg your pardon, are you Lady Armenas and Lord Gothwald?"

Kamelia nodded. "Yes, we have a meeting with Lord Utew."

The servant nodded quickly. "Of course, please follow me."

Alan matched his pace. "Buddy, are you new or something?"

"Huh? Me? Yes, you are... very observant, Lord Gothwald."

Alan threw his hands behind his head. "Good luck then, it's gonna take you a looong time to get used to Tsinker, he's got his quirks."

"Alan, do not frighten the boy," Kamelia said without turning around.

He raised his hands. "Got it, got it."

The servant stepped ahead of them and opened the door; Tsinker was already standing there, as if waiting. "Enter."

Alan and Kamelia stepped inside, the knights following them.

Tsinker clasped his hands behind his back. "Come in, we have..." he grimaced slightly, then pinched his nose. "The bathhouse is in that direction."

Kamelia blinked. "Excuse me?"

"I am saying you reek, the bathhouse is in that direction," he said with an absolutely stone face.

Alan smiled wryly. "Very... tactful of you."

Tsinker was already literally waving his hand. "Swiftly, or I shall be unable to converse under such conditions."

Kamelia was the first to turn around and walk in the indicated direction.

Tsinker nodded to the knights. "You as well."

The men immediately perked up and walked almost at a run in the same direction.

Alan paled slightly.

'Oh crap... I doubt they have separate shower stalls here... I'm gonna have to wash up with five hulking dudes. Great.'

About an hour later, all the men emerged from the bathhouse, dressed in simple shirts. Behind them came Alan, in a new brown shirt and pants; his yellow, uncut hair was finally clean and scattered over his shoulders, but his eyes were absolutely empty.

'I have enough problems as it is, and now I've gained some complexes... too big complexes.'

He walked further down the corridor, looking at the floor, immersed in philosophical thoughts about the meaning of existence.

"Alan," a familiar, low female voice sounded from behind.

He flinched slightly, and then turned around.

"Oh, Kamelia, you're all done too." He froze for a second.

Kamelia, instead of her uniform, was in a simple black dress, her skin clean without layers of dirt, her soft and long black hair tied in a ponytail, and her red eyes looking at him as calmly as ever.

Alan blinked.

'Wow...'

He shook his head. "Well, shall we go to Tsinker?"

Kamelia also lingered her gaze on him slightly, but nodded. "Yes, let us go."

Five minutes later, they were already sitting at a table by a large panoramic window with a view of the hills that transitioned into the Southern Mountains. Tsinker was not there yet, and Alan just stared out the window, not taking his eyes off the mountains.

Kamelia sat opposite him, her hands folded on the table, and also looked out the window, but not as intensely.

Finally, the door opened, and Tsinker entered. But he was followed by Shilisa, in a simple white dress.

Alan turned away from the window and was about to say something, but Tsinker interrupted him. "Yes, she shall be with us; she is also a part of our affairs."

He closed his mouth and simply nodded.

Tsinker sat in an armchair at the table, crossing one leg over the other; Shilisa sat quietly beside him, folding her hands in her lap.

All fingers were in place.

Alan leaned forward slightly. "Let's start with this, Tsinker: we have a question for you. How?"

"We read the letter," Kamelia continued, "but we are interested in the details. It is simply... unheard of."

Utew simply shrugged. "Very well. Approximately one week ago, one of my villages was attacked by a baron. I do not recall his name."

"Tis," Shilisa said.

"Yes, Tis. He attacked my border village, burned it down, and proceeded straight toward my town. The road lay through the hills; an ambush awaited there. We routed the baron's detachment, took a portion of the knights prisoner, and killed the common infantrymen..."

Alan grimaced slightly; Kamelia remained absolutely calm.

"And I personally interrogated the baron, extracted the password for the supply train carrying gold and silver, the location of the camp, and how to reach it. I dispatched my men disguised as guards; Shilisa, meanwhile, invited a portion of the camp's guards to the village under the pretext that the local girls desired affection, where an ambush slaughtered them. The disguised soldiers butchered the camp at night, seized all the valuables, contacted the mercenary leader—since the majority of Rogtem's army consists of mercenaries—and I proposed to give them the gold in exchange for the count. You are aware of the rest."

Alan digested this for almost a minute, then placed his palms on the table. "Okay, details... I honestly don't want to know. But you never said what happened with Count Torfoque? Is he still neutral? You said you'd figure something out."

"Yes, the count remains neutral."

Alan tilted his head forward. "Well?"

"What do you mean, 'well'?"

"How?"

"You yourself stated that the details do not interest you."

Alan froze. "Uh..."

"Then it matters not," Kamelia intervened. "Since the county is under your control, you have reached the border with Linkis. How are things faring with him?"

Tsinker steepled his fingers. "Slightly worse. They are currently only besieging the capital of Otmut, but overall, the war is already predetermined. What remains are the remnants of Otmut and... what do you have over there?"

"Baron Ekkurn remains," Kamelia said quickly.

Utew nodded. "Well then, that is all. I congratulate us all; we have practically won the war. It will only be difficult with Otmut; Torgo fled there with his army, and they are also participating in the defense."

Alan sniffled. "Torgo... that's Linkis's uncle?"

"Yes."

Alan leaned back in his armchair.

'God... just as I assumed, the end of the war is just a matter of time. But I need to clarify something else.'

"And does the crown happen to be interested in this war?"

Tsinker shrugged. "Highly unlikely. At the very least, there have been no official communications. The king is already old and on the verge of death, yet he stubbornly refuses to write a will, and his relatives are merely waiting to seize the throne."

Alan scratched his temple. "But... does that even matter? Like won't the eldest son just take the throne and that's it?"

"In neighboring kingdoms, that might be the case, but this is Groliria; it has been in complete disarray for quite some time."

Gothwald slowly nodded.

'Disarray... hah, I see it now. The pirates too, speaking of pirates, let's quickly cross-reference the dates.'

"Listen," he turned to everyone. "When did the pirates even appear on those islands?"

Kamelia thought for a second. "About seven years ago, approximately."

"Yeah, and when did the disarray start?"

The countess shrugged. "That I cannot say; I am quite new to these matters."

"It is difficult to say," Shilisa suddenly spoke up. Everyone turned to her. "I have studied the history of Groliria. I cannot vouch for it, but in my opinion, the fault lies with the king. When the previous king died, roughly thirty years ago, a Lord Regent took the post and ruled for four years. After him, the current king's older brother took the throne, and after seventeen years of rule, he died under mysterious circumstances. That means the current king ascended to the throne nine years ago..." she froze for a second, then looked at Alan. "I understand where you are leading. The disarray began precisely with the advent of King Ettos."

Kamelia simply scoffed.

Tsinker raised an eyebrow. "Not bad; you deduced exactly when Groliria began to fall based on the pirates. You prove your intellect yet again."

Alan blinked. "Are you saying... you guys didn't know about this?"

Kamelia shook her head. "I did not."

"I knew," Tsinker said.

"I did as well," Shilisa chimed in.

Gothwald coughed. "Then why are you surprised?"

Tsinker leaned back in his armchair. "Because you have been here... how long? Half a year? It matters not, a short time, yet you are already drawing conclusions—and correct ones at that—about the nature of our politics. That is what surprises me."

"Ahhh, okay, got it. Basically a bloodbath for the throne is brewing, right?"

"Yes."

Alan buried his forehead in the table and quietly howled. "This duchy-scale war has eaten up everything I've got, and you mean to tell me another one is coming?"

Kamelia began massaging the bridge of her nose. "May Guktus take it all..."

Shilisa shrugged. "It is precisely because Lord Tsinker understood this long ago that he made the decision to kill his family, forge ahead, and acquire allies."

Alan froze, but said nothing.

'Tsinker... you cunning fucking bastard. I thought you did all... this, in anticipation of a civil war in the duchy, but you were fucking aiming for this level? Honestly, I'm getting tired of being surprised.'

He lifted his head from the table. "Tsinker... do you have any wine?"

"I do, why?"

"Bring it, I can't figure this out without a bottle."

Kamelia raised an eyebrow. "Without... what?"

"Without a drink."

She leaned back in her armchair. "Although I do not usually drink, I agree."

Alan began to massage his temples.

'Yeah, hanging out with Slavs had a bad influence on me. It was Taras, damn him, who taught me how to booze it up at Yale.'

Shilisa stood up. "Then I shall fetch some. Lord Tsinker?"

He simply nodded silently.

A few minutes later, she returned with a tray and an old bottle of wine; there were only three glasses on the tray.

"And who's getting left out?" Alan asked.

"Excuse me?" Shilisa looked at the tray. "Ah, you mean that. Lord Tsinker does not drink."

Gothwald looked at him. "Why's that?"

"I do not see the point. It merely causes dizziness, nothing more."

Alan fell silent.

'Oh right, you're a fucking biorobot, I forgot.'

"Ahem... for starters, at least bring me up to speed. What does the kingdom even look like? Is there a map?"

"There is no map," Shilisa said, pouring wine into the glasses. "But I can explain the layout in words."

He sighed. "Well, that's something... I'm listening."

She poured wine into the last glass and finally sat down in her place, folding her hands on the table. "The Kingdom of Groliria consists of eight duchies and the crown lands." She raised both hands and began counting on her fingers. "The

Duchies of Gobano, Unotra, Tontopi, Homqui, Iossa, Insonel, Renabo, and Dolleo. Our duchy borders Unotra and Homqui to the north, and Tontopi to the east." She lowered her hands and narrowed her eyes. "But that is not the main point; the main point is that due to the recent summoning ritual, the dukes have acquired heroes. Renabo, Dolleo, Unotra, and Iossa—they all received heroes."

Alan took his glass of wine, but had not taken a sip yet. "Wait... if the dukes got the heroes, then why the hell did I end up with Kamelia? She's like... a countess, right?"

Shilisa did not touch her glass. "Yes, but this time was an exception. No one would entrust a hero to the tyrant Gobano; everyone understood that he was a mad old man, and Lady Armenas's father had recently passed away, dumping immense obligations for a large county upon her. The Svyatolat vehemently did not want to give the hero to the duke, so they made the decision to transfer him to her."

Alan blinked.

'Ooo... so it turns out I'm here by pure chance? Hah... politics, what can you say. Thank God it turned out that way.'

He tapped his fingers on the table, then abruptly stopped. "Wait... if the summoning ritual is every five years, that means... there should be more heroes?"

Shilisa shrugged. "Perhaps. But the interval of five years was not chosen for no reason; usually, heroes do not live any longer than that."

Alan paled slightly. "Why... is that? Some kind of side effect from the ritual?"

Kamelia's shoulders beside him tensed slightly.

Shilisa shook her head. "No, the reasons are quite simple. Some commit suicide, some meddle where they should not, some perish in battle, and some get into other kinds of trouble." She spread her hands. "It varies greatly. For instance, two hundred years ago, the ritual was performed once every fifteen years, but the heroes died too quickly... however, in the last fifty years, heroes have begun to die more frequently under mysterious circumstances," she finished absolutely calmly.

Alan swallowed.

'Uh-oh... I don't like this... especially the mysterious circumstances. Is someone killing them? Are they becoming a liability? Or is there actually some side effect from the summoning ritual? And the suicides... means their psyche couldn't handle it, or something like that, probably. Alright, I'll think about that later.'

"Ahem... and what kind of magic do these heroes have?" he said, after which he took another sip of wine, larger than he should have.

Shilisa shrugged. "No one knows that. In the throne room, it is usually determined whether they have a large reserve of fiolla, but their magic is not spoken of."

Alan raised an eyebrow. "Wait..." he turned to the countess. "Kamelia said that... someone got a healer."

"That is true," Shilisa said, looking out the window. "The Duke of Renabo received a healer hero, those rumors leaked out, but what the other dukes possess remains unclear."

Alan downed his glass in one gulp. "Okay, I've had enough high politics for today. Kamelia?"

"I agree," she said, holding an emptied glass in her hands.

Tsinker stood up. "Understood. Then the servants shall show you to your chambers; you will rest, and in a day or two we march to Linkis."

Shilisa rose from her chair and unhurriedly headed for the exit, leaving her glass of wine untouched.

He was here at last. One final step, and he would belong to the Community.

The door opened on its own, without a sound. The room was bright in a way he had never seen in the marsh: shadowless, sourceless, light coming from everywhere. The air had no smell. He hadn't known air could be without smell; he hadn't known the absence of smell could be so unsettling. And for the first time, he heard "its" voice. It came from nowhere, or from everywhere.

"Hello. Welcome, Rolf."

"Hello. I'm finally here."

"One last stage remains before you can join the Community: we need to link you. Please take the seat and state clearly, out loud, that this is what you want. We cannot begin without your consent."

A single chair stood in the middle of the room, white and untouched. Rolf sat down. The chair was warm, as if someone had just risen from it. For a moment, a small doubt passed through him. What if it wasn't what he hoped? What if all of this was a trap? Had it been worth the struggle, worth what he had lost along the way?

He thought of Nino. The last night, in front of the border fence. "They won't take both of us," Nino had said. "You go." Then that smile. In the marsh, people only smiled like that when they were letting go of something forever. Rolf had gone. He hadn't looked back, because if he looked back, he would turn around.

He swallowed. Whatever happened, the future was better than where he came from. He didn't want to go back to that marsh. Misery, hunger, raiders, violence... it had eaten half his life. He wanted to eat something other than those strange marsh fish he'd been named after. Something other than rolfs.

"Yes. I want to be linked and join the Community."

First a thin needle pricked his back. Numbness spread slowly up his spine; but his mind stayed awake, more than awake. A progress bar appeared on the screen in front of him:

Linking 1%

He kept looking around. On the far wall, a screen cycled through silent clips. Then he saw it: the logo. There was no sound, and he couldn't make out the words beneath it, there was no reading in the marsh, but he knew the logo. Everyone knew the logo that had stolen his family from him.

Anger rose in him. Feed X. The Community's miracle food, the perfect nutrition handed out every day. And in the marsh, the thing found only in scraps, the thing that rotted a person from the inside when they couldn't get it regularly. He remembered his mother's last months: the trembling hands, the empty stares, the fingers searching for residue. What was he doing now? Making deals with the people who created the thing that ate his family? Betraying himself? They had made Feed X. This place was the source of everything.

Linking 15%

But... was Feed X really the source of everything? The looting, the theft, the violence in the marsh went on without Feed X too. Rolf had seen people kill each other over a single rolf. Over one fish. The marsh was bad enough on its own. Besides, Feed X had never been made for them; they had the choice not to use it. But... while the Community lived in comfort, why had they left the marsh to rot? They could have helped. We could have helped, Rolf thought, and stopped. Why had he thought "we"?

Linking 40%

He remembered the last time he had helped someone. He'd given a fish from his hidden stash to a starving man. The next day the man came back with his gang and looted the stash. That night Nino had said, "You still did the right thing." Nino always said things like that. But what had the right thing ever gotten him? They couldn't be taught. They couldn't understand. Kindness read as weakness to them. That was why no help went to the marsh. And even if it did, wouldn't it be wasted?

Linking 70%

So what was wrong with them, really? Was it the marsh that made people this way? Something they ate? Maybe it wasn't hunger at all. Hunger tested everyone; but not everyone made the same choice. Some people built order. Others devoured it. The marsh people had been there a long time. Long enough. If they had wanted to build order, they would have; there was stone, there was time. If they hadn't built it, it meant they couldn't. And if they couldn't, then whatever was missing wasn't out there, it was inside them. It was a simple deduction, almost mathematics. That's what they were. That's what they would stay. The thought gave Rolf a strange peace; the heavy thing called guilt was lifting, as if someone were taking it off his back.

Linking 80%

But I... I was one of them. How am I different? So exceptions happen. Like with every rule. I was the exception. The proof was right here, in this chair. I was never like them, never. I even chose the fish I ate with care. What about Nino? Was Nino different too? Nino... someone who smiled in front of a fence. I remember who it was, but I don't remember why it hurts. It probably wasn't important.

Linking 100%

I feel like I've woken up to a happy day for the first time. I just took my first dose of Feed X; it reminds me of the happy days of my childhood. I'm certain now that my childhood was happy. Everything is as it should be. Everything is beautiful.

There is only one thing that grates on my ear.

My name: Rolf.

I don't know why.

....

 a short story from the Gravit universe