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Their new rocket pilot, Hemi has been trying to get as far away from Earth
as possible, but they can’t seem to get far enough. Leona keeps resurfacing
in Mateo’s brain, but then disappears again within minutes. He’s glad to
know that she’s still there and alive, but he can’t hold onto her
consciousness. She can’t say much while she’s active, but she’s been able to
deduce that the Omega Gyroscope’s range is growing. It’s not doing so
spontaneously, though. The math doesn’t work out. Based on how long Alyssa
has been the Gyroscope’s new little keeper, it should have spread far beyond
the current orbit by now if it had been moving outwards at the same pace
that it is exhibiting now. Her conclusion is that it moves as the ship moves
into higher orbits. Or rather, it’s Mateo. As he moves outwards himself, the
bubble expands to compensate. He will never get far enough away from Earth
to escape it; not permanently, anyway.
“Stop!” Leona orders upon her next return. “Don’t go into a higher orbit!”
“We’ve already stopped,” Mateo informs her. He’s speaking out loud for the
both of us. He drops his sunglasses down every time that she’s in the
driver’s seat.
Leona breathes a sigh of relief. “Oh, good. We can’t let this thing get out
any farther. People could die.”
“We need you,” Mateo isn’t arguing that it’s not risky to keep going, but
they have to go at least a little higher, or they may never get Leona back.
He understands that other people’s lives are at stake here, but it’s worth
it. He thinks so anyway.
“I’m sorry, it’s just not going to happen. I’m about to lose you, but I
wanted to tell you one last time...were I you.”
“Were I you,” Mateo echoes. “Hello? Hello?” He closes his eyes in sadness.
She’s already gone. That wasn’t much time. It was the shortest moment yet.
“Forgive my ignorance,” Hemi pries, “but what is the danger in continuing.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to get you to do it. I think I just don’t
have all the facts.”
“The...superpower blocker—I guess I’ll call it—is reacting to me. It doesn’t
matter how far out we go, it will always catch up. Now, I may be able to
teleport away from it, and give myself more time, but then what am I gonna
do? Besides, that could place us too close to our friends, who are already
out here.” This hypothetical bubble will eventually reach the AOC, which
could have terrible consequences. Marie is Angela's duplicate, and she may
pop out of existence, for all they know. If they’re the cause, they have to
minimize the damage as much as possible. “We can’t let that happen.”
“Maybe if we go back towards Earth, the bubble will shrink?” Heath suggests,
not sure if it makes him sound like a total idiot, or not.
“It’s not entirely implausible,” Mateo replies, channeling Leona’s spirit
without actually being able to communicate with her at the moment. “I
suppose I could imagine that the Gyroscope wants to conserve energy, and
really only wants to focus on where there are people to control.”
“Hmm,” Tarboda utters.
“What?” Mateo asks.
“No, nothing. It’s not a solution. I just thought of something. Go on.”
“You can teleport yourself?” Hemi asks. “Like all on your own?”
“Yes, as long as I’m not in this stupid bubble,” Mateo replies.
Hemi starts thinking about it. “How much can you take with you? Can you do
it with a vacuum suit? Can you take a whole ship?”
“Definitely not the whole rocket. Yeah, I could take a suit, but I couldn’t
take both me, and Leona’s suit, and the equipment I’ll need to transfer her
mind out of me.”
“What about a tent? It’s thin and light.”
“Do you have a tent, because yeah, one of the first things we learned when
we became time travelers is that tents will jump with us.”
“Of course I do.” He reaches under the command console, and pulls out a
large pack. He tears something off the back of it. “This will protect you in
the vacuum. Normally, you wouldn’t have long to open it up, and get in, then
inject yourself with medicine before your eyes pop out, but we can set it up
in here, right?”
“Yeah. That will fit me and my wife’s new body?” Mateo asks.
“Sure will. Not too much else, but absolutely,” Hemi replies.
It was an overstatement to say that they were going to set it up. He just
releases the tent. It opens on its own, and seals itself up. They reopen it,
and place what they needed inside, including Alyssa’s vacant body, the
Insulator of Life, and the Livewire. Mateo doesn’t really know how to
operate these things, but none of this works unless Leona is awake anyway.
Against Leona’s orders, Hemi navigates the rocket into a higher orbit. As
soon as Mateo senses that his temporal abilities and bioenhancements have
returned, he tells him to stop. Despite Leona’s protests, Mateo teleports
himself as far as he can without risking getting too close to the location
of the AOC, the distance of which he only has a rough idea of.
“What are you doing?” Leona questions.
“I’m trying to save your life,” Mateo replies as he’s getting the Insulator
and Livewire ready, though he doesn’t think they have any use for the former
in this situation. “Now, you can either make this work while we still have
time, or we can argue about it, and waste this opportunity.”
Leona growls. “Let me drive.”
“Are you gonna get into Alyssa’s body?”
“Yes, now let me drive.”
“Okay.” Mateo relinquishes control of his body.
Leona places one end of the Livewire in Alyssa’s hand, and takes hold of the
other. She reaches over to the portable power source, and prepares to plug it
in. “It might try to take hold of you. Don’t let it. Fight it, Mateo. Only
my consciousness is meant to transmit down the wire. Fight it.”
“Okay.”
She plugs it in.
She was right. He can feel electricity surge through his body, and also
somehow his mind, like he’s also imagining it at the same time. To combat
the pull, he decides to imagine himself holding onto the railing of a
balcony, desperately trying not to fall into the void below.
Leona appears next to him, also holding onto the railing. She’s not putting
as much effort into it, though. “See you on the other side.” She lets go,
and falls. It works.
They float there in the middle of interlunar space for a bit until Hemi
comes by to pick them up. Before they enter the rocket, they leave a little
present outside.
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