Microstory 2246: So There’s That

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Moving day! That happened fast. One thing that has made it easier is that we don’t have to worry about selling the place where we lived before, and we don’t have to transport any furniture. Well, we did have a few things. Kelly left some stuff at her old place, and so did Dutch, though his parents had moved a lot to storage while he was missing. I only have enough belongings to carry in one small suitcase because I’ve left my apartment the way it is for the next tenant. I hope they like it. What we’re gonna have to do now is buy stuff to fill the new house up. The security firm is taking care of some of that, because they need it to be secure, of course. Also of course, I can’t give you details on our security protocols, because that would be dumb. But they’re good, so don’t come after us, lemme tell you that. There will be cameras, and other sensors. I won’t bore you with any more information about this stuff. I’m sure you’re all more interested in the surgeries that I’m about to have. Well, there’s no updates on those at all, so I can’t tell you what I don’t know. Oh, and the President of the United States wants to meet me, so there’s that. NBD.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: June 15, 2467

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Putting their heads together, Leona and Ramses were able to fix the issue with the quintessence consolidator. The second test missile they deployed was no different than the first. It was just as intelligent and adaptive as the first, but it failed to penetrate the thick layer of dark matter that was now protecting Stoutverse. After a third test, they piloted the Waycar back through the barrier. The skeleton key allowed them to pass through, which satisfied both of their goals for this mission. They were now done with this brane, and could leave it behind to return to Salmonverse.

It wasn’t very far away, hyperdimensionally speaking, though calculating an entry point close to their exact destination was a different matter. Fortunately, they had Aclima on their side. She understood Maramon technology better than most due to the fact that she was genetically engineered for it, instead of just being born as a normal person. They broke through the membrane, and found themselves in cislunar space, almost running into a shuttle that was parked at the apparent Lagrange point one. After the near-miss, they entered a high orbit, and began to scan the surface. Before they had surveyed the whole thing, a voice made contact with them, and sent them the coordinates for a landing site. Cassius ordered the pilot to make the landing, and told her that she was in charge until he got back. He and Team Matic then exited the ship, and approached the Welcoming Committee.

“My name is Sentry Cassius Hoffman of the Interversal Defensive Ship Waycar, name subject to change. Are we on Verdemus?”

A man broke free from the line of locals. “This is indeed Verdemus. I’m Alpha Leif Merchant. This is Beta Uaiya Merchant. Yes, we’re married. No, there’s nothing in the Charter that says we can’t be.”

“Wasn’t gonna ask,” Cassius said.

Leona stepped forward. “I’m Captain Leona Matic of the Stateless Private Vessel Vellani Ambassador. Apologies for cutting the introductions short, but we came here on a mission of grave temporal importance. We’re searching for something called timonite, and have reason to believe that it’s here. From our perspective, we have already succeeded in procuring a piece. We need to close the loop.”

The Alpha and the Beta exchanged a look. “We know what you’re talking about, and we know where you may find it. Our ancestors accidentally created it, and the garden on top of it, over a century ago.”

“We’ll show you,” Uaiya said, “but you must promise to follow all of our rules and customs. You cannot merely take the timonite. It must be earned.”

“We agree,” Leona promised. “Sentry, why don’t you...go back to the ship?”

“That won’t be necessary,” Cassius argued.

“We appreciate the ride,” Leona told him. “You may go on to fulfill your mandate to the bulkverse. Thank you.”

“You can’t make me leave,” Cassius contended.

“But we can,” Leif said. “We study the Ambassador and Team Matic in school here. I don’t even know you.”

“You’re welcome,” Cassius said to Leona with an attitude. Everyone else was on Leona’s side but they all recognized that Cassius was an okay guy, and that he wasn’t the enemy. He just kind of rubbed people the wrong way, and he kind of did it immediately.

“Aclima, you’re not going back?”

“I will later,” Aclima replied. “He’s obviously not leaving yet. He knows that you’ll be gone at the end of the day, so he’ll have plenty of time to make his exit.”

Leona nodded in agreement. “Tell us about this garden,” she politely requested of Leif. “Was it man-made?”

“Yes, in the middle of the largest desert on the planet,” Leif started to say.

“Won’t be a problem for us,” Future!Mateo assured him.

“It will,” Leif insisted. “We asked you to follow our rules, and our rules say that you cannot teleport there, or even take a vehicle.”

“How do you get there then?” Past!Mateo asked.

“You walk.”

“How far is it?”

“Roughly 6,000 kilometers.

“That’s impossible,” Olimpia figured.

“It’s not. It just takes a long time,” Uaiya countered. “We call it the Pilgrimage. You may not enter Ferdiz unless you walk there from the desert border. To take any shortcut would be incredibly offensive to us, and more so to the ones who did it.”

“I see,” Leona said.

“No. But you can.” He offered her his hand as Uaiya offered hers to Future!Mateo.

All four of them teleported away to be followed by the rest of the team, including Aclima and Carlin. They were standing on the ridge of a mountain. Below them, in the center of the desolate basin, sat a lush patch of fertile ground. It looked so out of place from up here; a paradise surrounded by desert, like an artist’s interpretation of the Garden of Eden. If they didn’t know better, though, they could believe it was natural. This was a reasonable spot to expect an oasis to form. Between them and the garden, they could also see an ant-sized person making their way towards it. They were moving very slowly before falling to their knees, and then to their face.

Angela lurched.

“No,” Leif urged her. “He is close enough to Ferdiz. Others will come for him. He will just not have quite made it all the way. But it is not up to us to help.”

“I thought we couldn’t teleport here at all,” Ramses reminded him.

“Just to show you,” Leif explained, “it’s fine. But if you want that timonite, you have to make the Pilgrimage, following the rules literally every step of the way, and you have to hope the other Pilgrims let you take it. They do not fall under our jurisdiction, so I can promise you nothing.”

“How many people take the Pilgrimage per year?” Marie asked. “How many die?”

“These days, maybe fifty people attempt it? I couldn’t tell you how many die. Taking the first step breaks you free from your duties to society, and also its protections. We don’t retrieve the bodies, and we don’t communicate with Ferdiz.”

“So it could be a deathtrap?” Future!Mateo suggested. “A group of cannibals could be living there, waiting for their weekly meal?”

Leif fell into a very soft smile, and waited to respond as he turned his head to look at Future!Mateo. “Yes. They could be. There are currently around 60,000 people in the world, and there’s a reason we don’t all try it.”

“No one comes back?” Leona asked.

“I believe some have, over the years, and they’ve been welcomed. But they stay quiet, and if their experiences were recorded, I’m not cognizant of the details. Like I said, I’m only the current Alpha; not an expert in this. You’ll have to speak with the right scholars for more information.”

“This planet was populated by Extremusians. Did they abandon their mission?” Olimpia pressed.

“No.” Leif took a breath, and admired the view one last time. We’re all clones, or descended from the clones.” He turned away. “Stay as long as you like, but don’t take one step closer, or you’ll be killed. That much I do know about them.” Leif and Uaiya took each other by the hand, and disappeared.

“How are we going to do this?” Future!Mateo asked. “I don’t know how long it takes to walk 6,000 kilometers, but I know it’s longer than a day.”

Leona nodded. “Yeah, it could take 200 years of realtime, depending on the terrain, and the fitness level of the Pilgrim.”

“I could go,” Aclima volunteered.

“As could I,” Carlin piped up. “Neither of us is on your pattern.”

“I’m also superhuman,” Aclima added, trying to distance herself from Carlin, even physically. “So it should be me.”

“I don’t think there’s a maximum, since the Alpha couldn’t even give us an exact number of Pilgrims, and he didn’t say you had to go alone. But anyway,” Leona continued, shaking her head, “we can’t ask you to do that. It’s not your problem.”

“It’s mine,” Past!Mateo said. “It’s mine, and mine alone.”

“If you die, it’ll create a paradox,” Future!Mateo argued with himself. “And anyway, you’re on the pattern, just like the rest of us.”

“We need more information,” Olimpia determined. “We need the entire set of rules. What can you take with you, what can’t you? Is there a dress code?”

Leona noticed that Angela was still staring at the fallen Pilgrim. “Angie. This is their way. Whoever that is, he knew the risks, I’m sure of it.”

“There’s nothing to eat or drink around here!” Angela cried. “How does anyone survive this, without an IMS, or anything?”

“We’ve seen very little of the route,” Leona answered calmly.

“Well, Pia’s right,” Angela responded. “I have more questions.” She teleported back to the landing site. Everyone else followed.

They sat down with the Alpha, Beta, and the Gamma in the Delegation Hall of the Ambassador. They didn’t only discuss the Pilgrimage. There was a reason for their leadership titles, and it had nothing to do with alpha-male mentality. Omega Strong was a clone of Saxon Parker. He gave himself that name after the number that he was assigned left him with a mental complex. He abandoned his calling, and struck out on his own, eventually winding up on the transgalactic ship known as the Extremus. To remedy his regrets, he cloned himself more than a hundred years ago to build an army to fight against the Exin Empire. This planet was located relatively close to the Goldilocks Corridor, though it was not considered part of it. The Extremusians choosing it as an outpost placed the two factions more at odds than they already were.

Some of the clones rejected their responsibilities, which should have come as no surprise, since they were all created from the original, defiant Omega. They weren’t exact copies at any rate. Each one was actually based on the one prior, and genetically altered ever so slightly each time, always drifting further and further away in every respect. It was for this reason that the clones who chose to dig in on Verdemus instead of going to war had felt comfortable procreating with each other, even though they all technically had the same progenitor. There were anti-incest laws, though. It was illegal to form any sort of romantic bond with someone within one thousand degrees of separation. As it turned out, Leif and Uaiya were exactly a thousand degrees apart, which was why they were so defensive about their relationship. Different people had different ideas on what was considered acceptable, and many felt that even this amount of genetic drift was too close. Over time, as the population aged, these restrictions would probably relax, especially since the descendants made it more difficult to make the calculation in the first place, but for now, it was a topic of intense debate.

As for the Pilgrimage, they were right that they didn’t have all the rules. Whoever went could not go with an IMS, nor any electronic, or temporal advantage. They were allowed minimal supplies, including shelter, limited clothing, a knife, rope, a fire-starting kit, and initial rations. They obviously had to carry all of this on their backs, though Leona guessed correctly that they could travel in a group. Aclima was clearly the perfect candidate for this since survival was so much easier for her, and the Merchants didn’t see any issues with it. The rules didn’t say anything about what species you had to be. For Carlin, the more they talked about it, the more excited he became. This would be a personal journey for him—as it was meant to be when it was first designed—but he could not articulate his exact reasons. Regardless, there was nothing they could do to stop him. But Past!Mateo was very perturbed. People had already done so much to help him, and he felt like a helpless baby bird. He had to do something too.

“We can help with that as well,” Uaiya claimed. She stood up and disappeared briefly, returning with what reminded some of them of an ankle monitor. “This fits around your ankle. It has a little bit of the timonite you seek, though my guess is that it’s not enough for you to just take. It doesn’t suppress all forms of temporal manipulation, but it does tie you to realtime. It should stop you from jumping to the future. It will use the timonite up, though, just as it would any other power source. And if I’m being honest, if that happens in the middle of the year, it might throw you back on your regular pattern instantly. I don’t know enough about how salmon work.”

Past!Mateo smiled, and graciously accepted the gift. “That settles it, I’m going. It doesn’t matter if anyone else does.”

“You don’t need to be alone,” Aclima said to him, patting him on the back.

“I’ll be doing this for myself as much as for you,” Carlin promised.

“Are you two sure?” Past!Mateo looked to Leif for guidance. “I don’t think there’s any going back.”

“It’s true,” Leif began, “when you begin the Pilgrimage, you forfeit your rights. But...you’re not citizens, you’re visitors, so it’s a bit of a gray area.”

Past!Mateo looked at his friends. “If we can’t wear our suits, then we need time to prepare. You won’t be able to see us off.”

“That’s okay,” Leona “We’ll say our goodbyes now.” She leaned in, and planted a passionate kiss on his lips.

“Hey, that’s my wife,” Future!Mateo joked. It was strange to see it, but he was fine. It had been a long time since his past self had seen his own version of her.

“That ankle thing,” Ramses said as he was eyeing it. “Do you happen to have another one of those?”

“Do you wanna go on the journey too?” Marie asked, confused.

“No. But I think someone should stay and keep an eye on the Sentry.”

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Extremus: Year 83

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It only took Omega and Valencia a couple of weeks to figure out what went wrong with the Nexus, and solve it. Apparently, Vitalie’s use of the network while traveling through time did screw things up, but she wasn’t the only one responsible. A Mark II Nexus, being one that was constructed by the people who invented them in the first place, could handle this complication. It would have been able to compensate for the temporal interference, and sort of reboot itself. The one that Omega built is just as good as these in most respects, but there are some notable differences; differences which the average person would not be able to detect. After careful examination of all the parts and systems, they were able to correct the issue, but only for this particular machine. They’re trying to get to the one on Extremus, which never received the correction. If they could just establish contact with someone on board, the current temporal engineer could probably get it done if they walked them through it, but even their communications are down. They need a creative solution. In three months, they’ve yet to come up with one.

“We can go to Earth first. From there, we can make contact with someone who can help us,” Spirit suggests.

“Do you know of anyone in particular in this day and age?” Tinaya questions.

“No,” Spirit admits. “The historical records don’t go this far.”

“What about Team Keshida?” Belahkay offers.

“Gatewood isn’t in the directory,” Omega explains as he’s pointing to the screen. “I don’t know why not. Maybe they cloaked themselves, or...they moved. A few of these Nexa are in weird places in the galaxy, which could be controlled by friends; maybe even Keshida, but maybe not. I wouldn’t feel comfortable reaching out to them. The Exins think that Verdemus was destroyed. We cannot disabuse them of this misconception, so we cannot risk connecting with any mysteries.”

“I can do it,” Aristotle volunteers for the umpteenth time.

“Remember what happened the last time you tried?” Lilac asks.

Aristotle nods. “I was young, and ignorant.”

“It wasn’t that long ago,” Niobe reminds him.

“I have the tools that I need now,” Aristotle insists.

“The timogramen,” Tinaya realizes. “You’ve learned something about it.”

“Not me,” Aristotle clarifies. “Vaska never stopped studying it. She understands how it works now. It interferes with temporal manipulation when not accounted for, so all you have to do is account for it. You have to know how much timogramen radiation is in your system, how much there is nearby, the temperature and barometric pressure,  the position of the sun and celestial bodies, the precise distance of the destination, and a few other minor factors. But she thinks she can do it. She’s been building something.”

“She’s been building what, a timogramen detector?” Valencia asks him.

Aristotle bobs his head. “She calls it a temporal radiation compensator, but like I said, it has to include a whole lot more in the calculations. Plus, it has to be calibrated for what you’re actually trying to accomplish. If you’re just trying to teleport, it’s one thing, but where I’m going, it’s a whole different thing.”

“Wait, but that’s true,” Tinaya begins. “We teleport on this planet without issue.”

Valencia sighs. “It’s not without issue. The relays just seem to work okay, because most of the time, people are only making short, simple jumps. But we’re doing a lot of maintenance on them. The old relays, before the explosion, were no better.”

“What do you mean, did something happen?” Tinaya asks.

“The Captain. I don’t have the whole story, because I’m not in the loop anymore, but just before the mirror exploded, she tried to hustle the kids through. They evidently didn’t make it to where they were going. I’m not sure how Lataran eventually made her way back, but she was gone for a year. The Ship Superintendent has to step in.”

Tinaya looks over at her husband. “Arqut, is this true?”

“I guess I forgot to tell you about that. The second lieutenant assured me that it was only temporary. She seemed to know something, and it seemed better not to press it. A year later, she showed up.”

“Without the kids,” Tinaya figures. She looks at Aristotle and Niobe now, who are also hiding the truth. “Why does it feel like I’m the only one in the dark here?”

“I am too,” Spirit assures her.

“As am I,” Belahkay agrees.

She’s kind of used to it at this point. There were a ton of things that Lataran didn’t tell her about while she was First Chair, even though she initially expected to be privy to everything upon being elected. Their persistent link to this planet was one of those secrets. Full transparency has never been assumed on the ship, and in fact, would be a dangerous goal to seek. Ignorance Tolerance is a subject that students study nearly every year. When it comes to time travel, no one is entitled to know everything, and children have to learn to deal with it maturely. This is where they memorize Leona’s Rules for Time Travel. She decides to let it go. “Where’s Vaska?”

“Her lab is in the megablock,” Lilac replies. “She likes to work near a lot of other people, like she did on Gatewood.”

Tinaya grabs Aristotle by the hand, and teleports him back down to Verdemus without a word. She sends a quick message to Vaska, who drops a pin. The two of them walk across the courtyard, and enter the lab.

“Miss Leithe, it’s been a while. How have you been?”

“I’ve been all right. Just trying to get home.”

Vaska’s gaze darts over to Aristotle.

“I told her about what you’ve been working on,” he divulges.

“Well, it’s ready. I mean...it’s ready to be tested.”

“Show me,” Tinaya requests.

Vaska opens up a cabinet behind her, and takes out a fairly large box. “It’s just a prototype, so it doesn’t look pretty, but I’m confident in its functionality.” She sets the box down, and removes the lid to reveal a plethora of gadgets, gizmos, and innerworkings. In addition to the expected wires and antenna, there are gears turning each other around, like a timepiece. Tubes are ready to transport fluids between an exposed logic board, and some other apparatus. Two buttons that kind of look like they were originally from a mechanical computer keyboard are rhythmically going up and down in an alternating pattern. LEDs are blinking, and a small display is showing status data. Vaska extends a tiny spyglass to have it standing straight up towards the ceiling. She lifts up what kind of looks like a tiny microphone, but Tinaya recognizes it to be a portable radiometer, probably full-spectrum, in this case. The familiar crackling sound that a radiometer makes when it’s picking up radiation begins to overwhelm the soft buzzing sound that’s been coming from somewhere inside.

“Well,” Tinaya says. “I don’t know what I’m looking at. I don’t know why I thought coming here would be helpful.”

“I can take a look at it.” Valencia turns out to have been behind them. “I’ll make sure it works, and if it doesn’t, make it so it does, or maybe just improve upon it.”

“It’s certainly big enough,” Vaska acknowledges. “I would love to streamline it. What if Mister Al-Amin could wear it on his wrist at all times?” She proposes.

“Does he need that?” Tinaya wonders. “I thought the only issue is when he’s coming from Verdemus. If he’s anything like his father, he’ll be doing a lot of traveling.”

“He is standing right here,” Aristotle states the obvious. “And he considers this to be his home, so he’ll probably frequently return.”

“You’ll need this at any rate,” Vaska explains. “As you said, it’s your home. The temporal radiation that our respective bodies have been exposed to would eventually dissipate given enough time away. But you’re both a choosing one, and you were born here. “It’s a part of you, and it always has been. You probably can’t survive without it. I imagine you’ll have to return here whether you want to or not, or grow the timogramen elsewhere. I hesitate to suggest the latter.”

“Why is that?” Valencia questions.

Vaska is reluctant. “It’s not harmful. It’s time. Temporal energy and radiation are properties of time, and time isn’t harmful. Except that it is. Time leads to entropy. It’s what kills us, and destroys what’s not alive. The timogramen is dangerous. It could be weaponized, and abused...misused. It would probably serve as an invasive species if allowed to spread to other worlds.”

“How did it evolve in the first place?” Valencia presses. “Is it just a coincidence that it grows here?”

“That I don’t know yet, but I’m pretty sure that you did this. You may have created it when you came here. All the teleportation, and the parallel dimensions...Tinaya’s glass skin thing. Plus, the way I understand it, this planet was annihilated years ago, and then someone went back in time to prevent it. That may have had unforeseen consequences, I really don’t know. Fittingly, I need more time for my research. One thing I know for sure is that it’s not perfectly natural, but there has to be something here, or we would already find the stuff on Earth, and anywhere else that time travelers have visited.”

“This is all fascinating,” Aristotle interjects, “but what does it have to do with me, and the job that I need to get done? I have to travel to Extremus, and get that Nexus working, so we can reconnect. Does this do that; that’s all I need to know.”

“That’s not all that I need to know,” Valencia contends. “You will be taking me back, and I need to feel comfortable and safe with that. The questions that I’m asking now are directly related to me reaching that level of trust in your abilities.”

“Fair enough,” Aristotle relents.

“Can that thing make him more precise and reliable?” Valencia goes on, pointing to the contraption.

“On a planetary level, yes,” Vaska answers. “What happened to him before, when he went back in time, and landed way off course, that shouldn’t happen again.”

What does that mean, on a planetary level?”

Vaska clears her throat, and starts touching things on the compensator, and moving some things around as she’s explaining. “The spyglass is a modified form of the Jayde Spyglass, which is why it has any hope of seeing thousands of light years away. But relative to other stars, planets don’t really move. Of course they do—everything moves—but compared to the reframe speeds of the Extremus? It’s nothing. These tubes here feed clarified timogramen juice into the contaminant filter to capture and counteract the temporal radiation that’s bombarding the compensator while it’s in this environment. There’s a limit to that, which is dependent upon its size. The pure timogramen juice can’t absorb enough background radiation to protect the other instruments for the precise targeting that you’re looking for. Therefore, we can shoot for a planet, but not a ship.”

“What if you built a bigger one?” Tinaya decides to suggest. “You could be more precise then, couldn’t you?”

Vaska winces. “With the bigger one, you can specify a more precise target on the planet, but still not a ship traveling at reframe speeds away from us. At a certain point, size doesn’t matter. A larger surface area means more radiation, which means more clarified timogramen juice is necessary, and you end up with diminishing returns.”

“You didn’t say a bigger one,” Aristotle points out. “You said the bigger one. Did you already build it?”

“That’s what I built first,” Vaska answers. “This one is the prototype portable model. I didn’t think that you would want to use the other one, because it’s a power hog, and for my part, I don’t know why it would be necessary.”

“It still needs his temporal ability, right?” Valencia poses. “It just helps people do what they already do?”

Vaska shakes her head. “No, this one only works with him. The bigger model too. It would be useless for anyone else’s power. But yeah, he still gotta do what he does.”

Valencia nods. “We need the precision. Aristotle has to aim for a mining site in one of the star systems where the Extremus deploys a fleet of resource automators. We’ve been getting a lot of data from Project Topdown, so I know where those are going to be.” She consults her watch. “But if we’re gonna intercept them, we have to leave today. The next proverbial gas station isn’t for another proverbial hundred miles.”

“It’s ready when you are,” Vaska promises. “It’s in my garage, and it’s on wheels.”

“Do you wanna say goodbye to your husband first?” Tinaya asks Valencia.

Valencia taps on her neck. “Omega?” She waits for a few seconds. “Bye.”

Vaska leads them into the garage. Aristotle uses his manly strength to pretend to pull the giant temporal radiation compensator out, and onto the sidewalk while the electric motor does the actual heavy lifting. The pallet jack drops the machine onto the grass. A few of Omega’s clones approach out of curiosity. Vaska and Valencia hook it up to the grid, run through a diagnostic, and a form of a preflight check. She and Aristotle agree to take the risk, knowing that it could kill them, and then they unceremoniously turn on the machine, gather the necessary data, and have Aristotle interface with it. Once it’s at full power, he receives the literal green light, and they both disappear.

“I hope it worked.”

“Let’s go find out.” She takes Vaska by the hand, and teleports up to the moon base. They walk into the Nexus lab to find Valencia and Aristotle waiting for them.

“Welp,” Valencia begins. “It technically worked, but we were off schedule by about four hundred years, and needed to build a couple stasis pods.”

Vaska frowns. “I must have missed something. I’m sorry.”

“It’s quite all right, right?” Lataran says as she’s coming out of the control room, eying Valencia. “Now. I’ve been cooped up on that ship forever, and I haven’t been here in a long time. Who here is gonna give me a tour?”

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Microstory 2245: Complaint to You

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I had lunch with my old friends today. It was my former assistant, who replaced me at the jail, and my former parole officer. At first, I thought that Leonard was being respectful by ordering a vegetarian meal, but as it turns out, I inspired him to become a vegetarian. I’m really happy about that, and I hope the trend continues, if only due to the fear of a prion disease. They ran a full investigation of the restaurant where I allegedly (I legally have to say it like that) ate contaminated meat, and they were unable to find evidence of further contamination. So you should be able to eat there again if you want, in case you were waiting for an answer regarding that problem. I guess I should have said something earlier. Anyway, the meal we had today was great, and I enjoyed the company. It was nice to be out in public again, even though men in suits were standing at the ready. I always wanted to be famous, but important—like a politician would be—is a different concept. Someone like that is a target. I did not want it to be like this. I knew there was a chance that I may end up with a stalker or two, but not that everyone I saw was a potential threat. People were staring, not only because it was me, but because I was clearly under protection. Fortunately, it didn’t get any worse than that. I’m not one to advertise my location, so it didn’t draw a big crowd, or anything, but I fear that this might start happening if the media begins to track my movements. Maybe I should just stay home all the time, and never show my face. That may sound like a complaint to you, but it doesn’t sound like one to me. There are worse ways to live, believe you me. Speaking of which, we still haven’t gotten word on whether my offer on the house has been approved. Even if it is, it will still take some time to complete all the paperwork, and whathaveyou. Until next week, goodbye.

Microstory 2244: Living With Other People

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I took a look at the new place where I think we’re gonna move into. It’s really nice and new. The couple who originally commissioned it to be built ended up going through a divorce pretty much right after it was finished, reportedly because of the stress of building it. I don’t wanna gossip, though. It has five bedrooms, a finished basement, and a near finished attic. It’s not dusty and cobwebby up there, but you wouldn’t want to carry up a bed, and sleep. It’s not the kind of place that I would normally even consider, but things are different now. It’s not just about me anymore. It’s important for it to be this big. It will be easier to fortify while still maintaining privacy for each of us. Members of our security team will actually be able to live inside the house with us, instead of just being posted in a car on the street. Everyone will have their own bathroom, which I think is the biggest problem with living with other people. If you can just have your own space to clean up and take care of your business, it makes it a lot easier to deal with everything else. Well, anyway, I put in an offer, and I’ve not heard back yet, so there’s no guarantee that it’s even happening. We’ll see. In other news, I managed to schedule my next surgeries. They’ll be happening in eleven days, on a Monday. In the meantime, I’ll be sending samples to the surgeon, and occasionally going in. While Kelly no longer works for me, she’s still trained as a lifecare assistant, so I won’t have to drive to the lab every single day, or anything. I think that’s about it for me today. I’m having lunch with Jasmine and Leonard tomorrow, so that should be fun.

Microstory 2243: Keeping Watch Over Us

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I received a clean bill of health from the doctors, who were truthfully a little perturbed by it. It’s not that they wanted me to be unwell, but they don’t understand how I could have been cured in the first place. They want to find a reasonable explanation. They want to find evidence that something happened to me, but they’re not going to, because my brief exposure to my own immortality cleared me out entirely, and brought me back to square one. They had no choice but to approve any medical treatment with any other doctor I choose. In turn, the FBI had no choice but to let me move out of the safehouse. Kelly, Dutch, and I are in the new apartment now. It’s not technically a safehouse, but it may as well be so far, since our security guards are keeping watch over us 24/7. It’s only a temporary place, as they have all been for a while. But I’m really hoping that the next one will be permanent. It has to meet all sorts of conditions, and my new security team will have to run an inspection first. It sounds like a lot of fun. While the other two are working more on that, I’m working through the details of my upcoming surgeries. I think it’s gonna happen pretty quick now that I can make my own decisions again. I don’t see this going more than a couple weeks before we get through it. I’m pretty wiped from all the poking and prodding, so I’m gonna have a nap. I hope it’s not a symptom.

Microstory 2242: Uncharted Territory

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The FBI are releasing me to my private security firm, contingent upon me scheduling an appointment with my doctors. Given the circumstances, I’m sure that this makes sense to them, but it doesn’t serve much of a purpose for me. I guess there’s a chance that I’ve been stricken ill with something new in the last couple of weeks. That would certainly fit with my M.O. I’m really hoping that it hasn’t happened, though, which is why I’m being really careful about what I eat, and where. Of course, I wash my hands religiously, but I’ve always done that. I shower twice a day too, which may be overkill, but you can never be too careful. I also don’t go outside without sunscreen on. This was something that my mom kind of wanted me to always do, and it seems that it just took several decades, and having multiple near-death experiences, to take her advice. Still, that’s not really what they’re worried about. You see, they don’t see a man who was miraculously healed from a terminal disease. They just see a man who had a terminal disease earlier this month. The doctors feel the same way, and they’re not going to let anyone take samples from me until I’ve had enough time to recover from that. Which is ridiculous, because there is no such thing as recovering from a prion disease, so right there is their failure in logic. But I get it. It’s uncharted territory, so they’re doing their best to figure out how we proceed. Their training tells them that I need to wait—that I’m not ready to undergo a serious procedure after my last health ordeal. As doctors who study science, it’s hard for them to understand that my brief immortality means no waiting period is necessary. In the end, though, it’s not really up to them. My body, my choice applies to many different situations, this one included, I would say. I’m going to let them take my index, and a little bit of my bone marrow. I’m going to do it for the money, and for science. Then I’m going to get back to my life, or at least determine what that life is from here on out. Maybe I’ll go back to working at the nursery, if they’ll let me. Or maybe it’s too hazardous there, so I won’t. Or maybe I will anyway.

Microstory 2241: Me as a Weapon

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Yo, what up, kids? My name is Dutch Haines, and I won’t take up too much of your time. People have just been asking where I came from, and I thought it might make sense to clear the air. I won’t go into too many details, to protect the innocent, and even the not so innocent. Months ago, I woke up just as I normally do, and tried to leave the house to head for work. I never made it, though. I ended up in this underground bunker, apparently on another Earth. That’s what people told me anyway. It was also centuries in the future, so maybe it was our planet the whole time. Wouldn’t that be a great twist for a movie? Anyway, there’s this weird phenomenon called Westfall, which sends people to different worlds all the time. You’re not supposed to know it’s happened, but sometimes it glitches, I guess. Don’t ask me how it works. All I know is that I was sick, kind of like Nick. I was the carrier of a disease that’s harmless to humans, but deadly to an evil race of aliens who are trying to sterilize people they don’t like all over the multiverse. The natives asked to study me and my blood so they could use me as a weapon, and sadly, I believe they got their wish. I just wanted to come clean about my part in this. It’s not like I really had a choice. Maybe the Westfall thing wasn’t a glitch. Maybe I was destined to go there for that. I dunno, but I’m hoping to make up for it, so I would like to dedicate my life to service, if you’ll have me. I’ve never been one for social media, but I’ve signed up now, so maybe y’all can follow me too, and help me figure out what I can do to help the world. I’ll hand this website back over to Nick for now, though.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: June 14, 2466

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According to a more thorough sweep of The Waycar, it was designed to accommodate a crew of precisely 89 people. They were assuming that the three larger sleeping compartments were meant for the captain—or whatever the leader was called—and their two most executive associates. The other sleeping quarters varied in size. A few others had their own bathrooms, but they mostly shared. Four of them were just pods in a hallway behind main engineering, which was probably for the engineers, who were likely expected to be ready to work at all hours of the day. This was more than enough space for the special squadron that the Stoutversians had now filled it with, but Ramses being the generous type, he had other ideas.

“What the hell is this?” Angela questioned as they were carefully sliding down the ramp. The topmost level overlooked the level below it, which stopped before reaching the back wall at about the same distance. It then dropped off to a slant, all the way down to the same height as the next level. No, that wasn’t quite how Past!Mateo described it. He called it a weird-ass slant, which was pretty fitting. Directly under the floor was the armory, so there was no explanation for why it was designed like this, except maybe to make it harder to reach the stasis perch where Cassius was found? The more they looked at that, though, the more they started to think that that perch didn’t belong there at all, and was an after-market retrofit. Cassius wasn’t sure. He wasn’t always Nereus Jolourvedin’s second most trusted advisor. And he wasn’t that anymore either, but he was the only original member of the crew still standing, so in everyone’s mind, it was his birthright. The central computer’s records appeared to support this.

“I believe it’s the hock,” Ramses suggested.

“There’s no door,” Future!Mateo argued. “If it’s dark, or you’re not careful, you just fall down the slide.”

“It’ll be harder to climb back up,” Ramses explained. “Check out these eye bolts. I think they’re for shackles.” He tugged on a large metal ring bolted to the wall, which didn’t budge one bit.

“Jesus,” Cassius said. “We never used  them.” They had to remind themselves that this thing was designed by and for Maramon. That was why the doors were wider and taller, and explained at least kind of why anyone thought that an open slope hock made any sense.

“Well, you’ll use this area now,” Ramses claimed. One thing about it, which they weren’t able to see when it was so dark, was that there was a door at the bottom of the slope. It was rather far from all the eye bolts, and was probably expected to be kept locked at all times, and the Waycar was designed to spend a lot of time in the outer bulk or outer space, but in any case, it was a security flaw. That was how they felt about it anyway. They couldn’t match alien idiosyncrasies to human logic. Ramses reached over the door with a stick, since he wasn’t tall enough, and flipped on the light to illuminate the door. It wasn’t just a light, though. It was mainly a pocket dimension generator. It wouldn’t have to be an exit anymore. Then again, this open-dungeon concept could be ignored no matter what. They could store bags of rice down here instead. How about that; doing something socially responsible with the space.

“Do you just, like, have a box of those lying around in your lab?” Angela asked.

“I build them in my spare time, for occasions such as this.” Ramses opened the door to reveal the bare, but capacious, magical extra space they had access to now, well beyond the confines of the Waycar’s hull.

“Oh, wow. Why did you do this for us?” Cassius asked. “I mean, thank you. And also, what did you have in mind...specifically?”

Ramses stepped halfway over the threshold of the portal. “I didn’t have anything in mind. I just figured that you would rather have it than not.” He dropped a fob into Cassius’ hand. He admired his work for a few silent seconds. “But what would I do with it? I would build a garden.”

“Not a lab?” Future!Mateo questioned.

“I got plenty of those,” Ramses replied dismissively.

Cassius lifted the fob, and pressed a button. The pocket disappeared, revealing instead the outer door, which would lead them to the deadly equilibrium of the bulk. “I appreciate the gesture.”

Ramses nodded, and looked back up towards the slope. “It is up to you to decide who you wanna tell about it, and who you don’t. That’s why I brought you here while the squadron was asleep.”

“I’m not calling it a squadron. I prefer the term bastion.”

“The Waycar Bastion,” Future!Mateo articulated fully. “I think I like it too.”

“Plus, The Squadron’s taken.” Aclima was standing at the top of the slope.

“Aclima. We were just making sure that the emergency exit was secure,” Angela lied, “Wouldn’t want it falling open accidentally.”

“Save it,” Aclima called down to them from over eight meters away. “I know about the pocket dimension. I saw Rambo installing it. It’s fine. I won’t tell anyone.”

Angela took Cassius by the hand, and teleported them both to the top of the slope. Everyone else followed. “Is this your home now? Are you joining the new mission?”

“A mission is what I’ve been looking for. What could be greater than literally insulating the multiverse from the cancer that is the Ochivari?” That was the Waycar’s mandate. Their job was not to fight against invaders, but to hop from brane to brane, activating the quintessence consolidator to thicken the membrane that protected each one. This was how they contributed to the Darning Wars. Cassius was their leader. He chose the title Sentry for its connotations of protecting others, rather than killing.

“Aclima, I’m glad you’re still awake,” Cassius said.

“Hybrids don’t need as much sleep as humans,” she explained.

“That’s a good thing. I was hoping to talk to you about being my second-in-command. Now that you’ve just declared your intentions to stay after we drop off Team Matic, hopefully it won’t be too hard to convince you.”

“Would you not want someone with more experience,” Aclima questioned, “like Hadron?”

“I already asked him what he wanted to do, since he was already familiar with this technology. He’s going to be my Communications Officer, since he has a knack for languages.”

“And Kineret McArthur?” Aclima pressed.

“Head of Intelligence. She’ll be sifting through the database of known universes, determining which ones to go to first.”

“Carlin McIver?” Aclima suggested the next one down the line.

Cassius chuckled. “I don’t think he’ll be staying with us for long. I believe he wants to see his family again.”

“What about Velter?” Aclima either really didn’t want the job, or she didn’t want to sound too desperate. Velter must have been some random member of the bastion.

Cassius looked down at his tablet. “I’m afraid I don’t know who that is.”

“My mistake, I’m thinking of something else,” Aclima said dismissively. “If you...really believe that I could do it, then I would be honored. I mean, I know where you came from, and I’m sure you’re not too fond of Maramon, so I just wouldn’t think—”

“I don’t hold anything the Maramon have done against you. I’ll only hold your own actions to account. That’s one thing Nereus and I could agree on.”

Aclima smiled softly. “Very well, I accept.”

“Great! Now we need to come up with a title for you,” Cassius decided.

“Cassius,” Leona said through comms. They decided to give him a disc for himself, in case they ever needed to make contact with him sometime after they parted ways.

He tapped his neck. “Go ahead.”

“It’s done. We’re about to fire the test missile.”

“I’m on my way.”

Angela took Cassius’ hand again, and teleported him down to the engineering section. Future!Mateo did the same for Aclima. It was odd, though. Why didn’t the Maramon give the hybrids such powers of their own?

Leona had been working down here since they left Stoutverse. Sealing it up with an overabundance of quintessence was the test, to see if the technology was even viable. “I thought you might want to be the one to push the button,” she said to Cassius. There were only a couple of other people here. They were the most trusted members of what was now called the bastion. They weren’t necessarily the most trusted by the government, but by Cassius and the team. They couldn’t have just anyone understanding how to thicken membranes, nor knowing how to break through them. It had to remain a well-kept secret.

Cassius smiled at the thought. “I’m not sentimental. Go ahead and do it to it.”

“Why are we firing a missile at the universe again?” Angela asked.

“To make sure the consolidator worked,” Future!Mateo answered. “The missile is specifically designed to harness bulk energy, and travel through the membrane, but also trigger an explosion that could not propagate back out. It’s the ultimate shield. You could be meters from your target, but not suffer the same damage, because the universal membrane of quintessence—also known as dark matter—will protect you, but not the target. The missile still has its limits, though. If the consolidator worked as desired, it should not be able to pierce it.”

Everyone looked at Mateo, except for Leona. “Oh, don’t look so impressed. He just rote memorized the speech that I wrote when we were pitching the full plan to the Primus. He has no idea what he said.”

“Yes, I do,” Future!Mateo contended.

“Firing missile,” Leona announced. She pressed the button. The Waycar came with some great advanced sensors. Despite there being no real viewports in this room, it was able to generate a realistic depiction of what was happening in the bulk right now. They could see a missile leave the weapons array, and fly towards the membrane of Stoutverse. If all went according to plan, it would be deflected by the quintessence, and explode before it got anywhere near inside. If they had failed in using the consolidator correctly, the missile would get through, but it would find itself at least two light years from Earth, or any interplanetary outpost, so no one should be in danger. Hopefully that didn’t happen, though.

“It’s off course,” one of the technicians told them.

“It’s fine, it’s still fine,” Leona assured him.

Finally, the missile struck the wall, but was not deflected. It lodged itself inside, and tried to wiggle its way through, like a sperm to an egg.

“Trigger the explosion now!” Cassius ordered.

“No, it will give up, and self-detonate,” Leona insisted. “Just give it time.”

“Look at the angle. It’s not off course by accident. It knows that we plotted a vector towards an unpopulated region. It’s seeking out Earth. It’s more intelligent than we realized. If it doesn’t work, and it gets all the way through the brane, people will die.”

“We don’t know that it’s headed for Earth,” Leona argued. “You’re thinking in three dimensions. What you’re seeing on the screen right now is only an approximation, translated from hyperdimensional space to something that our brains can comprehend. It isn’t real.”

“It’s real enough. Blow it up..now!” Cassius repeated.

“I’m in charge of this mission,” Leona reminded him. “You don’t officially take over until my team and I leave for Verdemus.”

“And if you want to continue to have a positive relationship with the crew of the Waycar, you will heed my advice,” Cassius urged. “Abort mission immediately.”

“Detonation confirmed,” the other technician said.

“So it did work,” Leona assumed.

“No.” The tech shook her head. “I followed his orders.”

Leona breathed deliberately through her nose. “I see.” She stood up passive-aggressively. “Captain Hoffman, it looks like you have command.”

“It’s Sentry Hoffman,” he corrected.

“Whatever.” Leona disappeared.

Cassius turned back to the tech. “Go back to the specs. Find out why the consolidator didn’t work, or whether it’s as simple as leaving it on for three point five seconds longer.”

“The specs that my wife risked her life to get for you...while you were fast asleep in your little pod,” Future!Mateo reminded him.

“Thank you, Mister Matic. That will be all.”

Future!Mateo teleported to one of the executive crew compartments, which was where they were staying while the Vellani Ambassador was still miniaturized. “I saw the English screen. The missile was only 31% through. There’s a chance that it would have detonated itself before making it all the way.”

“No, he was right, I fucked up.” Leona contended. “It’s smarter than we knew. It recognized that it was dealing with a harder target, and it adapted to compensate.”

“Then you can program a dumber missile,” Future!Mateo reasoned.

“An enemy would have no reason to do that,” Leona reasoned right back. “The whole point is to test its strength against all-comers. Let’s face it, I failed.”

“Okay, let’s say you did,” Future!Mateo began. “Are you gonna sit here and sulk, or are you gonna go downstairs, and fix it?”

She breathed deeply, and waited to respond. “Good point.” She disappeared.

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Extremus: Year 82

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Tinaya has a job to do. She’s standing in the Nexus cavity with Arqut. To her, he’s a hologram, and to him, she’s the hologram. Omega and Valencia want to activate their respective Nexa to full working order at exactly the same time. They have each left one component disabled so they can make their connections simultaneously at the end of a countdown. Tinaya and Arqut will be handling that countdown by syncing up. They’re just waiting for Valencia to finish septuple checking her systems to make sure that this isn’t a huge disappointment. If they end up having messed something up, and they fail to activate at the same time, it’s not the end of the world, though. This is more for fun.

“What exactly is going to happen?” Spirit asks. It’s rather surprising how little she knows about this stuff, given that she’s a Bridger. “Will we be free to travel back and forth right away?”

“No,” Omega answered from the top of the stairs. “We have to wait for approval. Each Nexus has its own term sequence; a unique identifier that allows it to be recognized by the rest of the network.”

“Who exactly makes these approvals?” Spirit questions.

Omega gives Tinaya a look, because he can’t give one to his wife. “Well, we don’t really know. When we built the first one decades ago, it just sort of happened once we fulfilled the requirements.”

“So if we don’t get one of these sequences, we’ll know that you did something wrong,” Spirit figures.

“Yes. It could be a faulty power relay, or even an open access panel. Things don’t have to be perfect all the time, but they do at its first moment.”

“She’s ready,” Arqut announces.

Omega smiles. “Wonderful. Start at eleven.”

Tinaya and Arqut nod, and watch each other’s lips. “Eleven, ten, nine...” They keep doing down until, “one, go!”

Omega pops his head over the desk in the control room, and looks through the window. He switches his gaze between the Nexus chamber and the interface screen.

“Did it not work?” Spirit asks him.

Omega reaches over to the PA microphone. “Everything is loaded, and we’re online. I can see a number of other Nexa that I can shake hands with, but we still haven’t been assigned a term sequence. How’s Val?”

“She seems to be seeing the same thing you are,” Arqut answers.

Technicolor lights fall down from the drum on the ceiling, and flood the cavity. They expand beyond the confines of it, though, and spread throughout the rest of the building, which it’s not supposed to do. Something really is wrong. In a final flash, they find themselves swept away, and dropped onto a floating platform in the middle of the ocean. It’s nighttime, and eerie, but still somehow reassuring? All of them are here together. Even though they still don’t know what the hell is going on, Tinaya instinctively reaches over, and pulls Arqut into a hug. Omega and Valencia do the same. Feeling left out, Spirit and Belahkay hug too, even though they were never apart.

A stranger pulls up in a rowboat with one passenger. They tie off the boat, and help the woman step out. They have to continue to help her when she stumbles like a newborn foal. She smiles at the crowd. “It’s okay, it’s just been a really long time since I’ve stood on a planet.” She clears her throat, and composes herself. A deep breath helps her find her center of gravity, and then she can begin the short walk towards them. “Good evening. My name is Venus Opsocor, and this is my associate, Senona Riggur. I’ve asked to borrow their space so that we may communicate, but understand that you are not entitled to any wishes. We are only here as guests.”

Everyone just looks at each other, trying to figure out what they’re talking about. Wishes?

Venus continues, “normally, when a Mark III Nexus model is adequately constructed, I automatically assign a term sequence to you, and then move on with my duties. It is not custom for me to speak with the builders directly. But I decided to leave my pod this time due to the fact that two Nexa activated at exactly the same time from their reference of time, which I found interesting. Don’t worry, you’re not in trouble. I was just curious.”

“Are you the Nexus network?” Omega asks, stepping forward. “Like, are you the embodiment of it?”

“I helped build the Nexa, and I maintain them as a central intelligence. The network is just that, a network. I’m not the network itself, but I live in it.”

“Wait, you actually invented them?” Valencia asks her in awe.

“It was mostly my partner, but yes,” Venus answers.

“They are a wonder of technology. Can I ask what prompted you—her?”

Venus isn’t sure if she wants to give them an answer, but she does. “In my home galaxy, interstellar travel was difficult. Every journey required traveling to a single location in the center, where a military force kept the gates. Not everyone liked the system. They wanted anarchy. We built the first Nexus network as a sort of compromise to appease them. They thought that they were finally in control, and we...let them believe that. After our civilization collapsed to a great war anyway, I decided to go out and find others who might benefit from their own networks.”

“Fascinating,” Omega and Valencia utter simultaneously.

Venus widens her eyes, and tilts her forehead forward at an angle.

“Oh, right,” Omega says. “Our story. We were stranded on one of our outposts. The ship could not be turned around, so we each built a Nexus to reconnect. We activated at the same time for the symbolism. It’s nothing crazy. We apologize if you having to come here put you out. We didn’t know that it was such a rarity.”

“It’s not simply a rarity, it’s never happened before.” Venus looks around at the group. “You’re from Salmonverse. Are you familiar with a woman named Leona Matic?”

“She’s a celebrity in our culture,” Tinaya replies, “but we’ve never met.”

“I’ve met her,” Omega contends. “I might even call her a friend.”

“If you ever see her, could you pass along a message? Rules have changed amongst my own people. I may not be able to speak with her again myself.”

“We would be happy to,” Valencia promises.

Venus reaches her hand behind her, silently prompting Senona to hand her what looks like a shiny business card. “Can I trust you with this term sequence? Leona will find help there if she ever needs anything, but you would theoretically be able to steal it if you go before her.”

Tinaya reaches for the card. “You can trust me.”

Venus scans the crowd for a consensus on Tinaya’s trustworthiness, which they appear to give, so she hands Tinaya the card. On it are the sixteen symbols that she’s seen all over the place on the Nexa. Most term sequences don’t seem to use every single glyph, but what does she know? “Remind her that she will have to be accompanied by someone who has yet to make a wish of their own,” Venus adds.

“What are these wishes?” Belahkay asks before being elbowed by Spirit.

Venus doesn’t answer. She just looks back at Senona, who nods. “Okay, you may all use the quantum summoning console, even though you didn’t come here on purpose. But try not to be greedy. Whatever you request, you take from somewhere else. It does not conjure something from nothing. I’m setting your return trip on a timer for eleven minutes. Be sure to ask for what you want before then.” She and Senona get back in the rowboat, and disappear into the darkness.

The group walks over to a pedestal sticking up from the platform. It has a dialing pad, and a speaker, but nothing else. “Has anyone here seen anything like this?” Spirit asks the group. “Strongs?”

Omega and Valencia Strong shake their heads. “Nope. This is all new to me, and news to me.” Omega leans his chin forward. “Could I have a pair of cool sunglasses, please?”

A tray slides out of the console, and materializes a pair of cool sunglasses. “It’s like I’m inside the internet.” He puts them on, and shows off. “How do I look?”

“Snazzy,” his wife answers. “Does anyone need anything?”

“I have everything I need right here.” Tinaya has had her arm wrapped around Arqut’s like two snakes this whole time. Now she tightens it.

“I can’t imagine there’s anything we could ask for that we couldn’t procure or fabricate ourselves,” Spirit determines.

“I’m more interested in these wishes,” Belahkay says. “I think they’re meant to be greater than sunglasses.”

“What could be better...” Omega begins, before pulling off the glasses dramatically. “...than these babies.”

They all mostly sit around for the next ten minutes. Belahkay jumps into the water, but climbs back up when Spirit worries that he might end up stuck here if he’s not on the platform when the imaginary timer hits zero. He suggests that they need to find a way back here to get their wishes, but no one else seems to care. They have finally reunited, and have a way to get back to the ship. What else is there?

Just before their time is up, Spirit thinks to request a big beach towel from the console. The technicolor lights overwhelm them again, and send them back, but this time to the same place. While Spirit is drying off her love interest like he’s a helpless child, Omega and Valencia go up to run a diagnostic.

Tinaya prepares to make the jump back down to the planet to tell everyone what’s happened when the Nexus powers up once more. “Are you doing that?”

“It’s not us,” the Strongs say, shaking their heads again.

The drum drops more light down towards the cavity, but this time, only red. After it subsides, one woman is standing there, wearing a heavy parka. She removes it, and looks around, surprised. She’s even more surprised when she sees that she’s not alone. “Oh, cool. You have your own Nexus.”

“Who are you?” Tinaya demands to know, very suspicious of this interloper.

The woman steps out of the cavity, and holds out a hand. “Hi, I’m the Caretaker.”

“You take care of what?” Tinaya asks, still concerned.

“Of your planet,” the Caretaker replies as if it should be obvious.

“We do fine on our own,” Tinaya explains.

“Great!” the Caretaker says. “Then my job should be easy. Sounds like I got the luck of the draw here.”

“Omega, does this facility have a hock?”

“Nope.” The Caretaker disappears, but she returns a few seconds later. She balances her hands on her knees, and catches her breath. “Coulda told me we were on an airless moon. Thanks for that.”

“We didn’t know that you were going to teleport out of here, or even that you could,” Tinaya argues. “Do you require medical assistance?”

“No, I’ll heal. I wasn’t out there for very long.” The Caretaker stands back upright. “Let me start over. My real name is Vitalie Crawville, and I really am here to help. I have no intention of taking control, or causing any harm. I used to help people on Dardius, and now I’ve decided to quantum replicate myself to spread myself around the galaxy. Well, around this galaxy, I mean.”

“I know that name,” Spirit jumps in. “Vitalie Crawville. She was a secondary god on the Elizabeth Warren. She was instrumental in creating the universe of Ansutah. None of the Extremusians would exist without her.”

“Just to be clear,” Vitalie begins, “you don’t actually believe that I’m a god, right?”

“No, that’s just what the Maramon called you, and we adopted it, because it’s a fitting enough description to categorize people who were on that ship on that day.”

“I don’t remember her from my studies,” Tinaya says to Spirit. “Is she okay?”

“I have to assume so. She was friends with Leona,” Spirit answers.

“I should like to believe that I still am,” Vitalie counters.

Omega looks down at the tablet that he uses to interface with the Nexus. “There’s no incoming address. Where did you come from?”

“The Nucleus.”

“Never heard of it.”

“Not many have.”

“I’m locked out. All of the destinations I could have selected before are missing, and while I can see that we finally do have our own term sequence, I can’t see what it is.”

Vitalie frowns. “If this occurred right when I arrived, then I’m sure it’s my fault, but I certainly didn’t do it on purpose, and I don’t know how to fix it. I’m terribly sorry.”

Omega frowns too while he’s tapping on his device. “Did you come here through time as well as space?”

“I did,” Vitalie confirms.

“The Nexa weren’t designed for time travel,” Valencia insists.

“The one at the Nucleus was,” Vitalie reveals.

Omega shakes his head, very annoyed this time. “You’re going to have to explain to me what the hell that is, what you did, and how to make it right.”

“Hey, show some respect!” Spirit shouts. “I told you who she was.”

“I’m not from Ansutah, so I don’t give a crap that the Maramon call her a god. She broke my new machine!”

“Omega,” Valencia says calmly, placing a hand upon his shoulder. “We’re back together now, and we’ll figure it out together. It will all be fine, I promise.”

He takes a deep breath in and grits his teeth before exhaling. “It’s just that I had an idea of how this was gonna go today. But you’re right, we only need time, and each other. But Miss Crawville, I will still need to know what you do know about it.”

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