Microstory 2502: Father of the Cure

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I’m going to be totally honest here, Landis and I have not always agreed. His mother always believed that he was gonna move on to do great things, but the kid was approaching his thirties, and he had nothing to show for it. Don’t get me wrong, I love him to death, and nothing he could have done would have been able to change my mind. I just remember wishing that he would have some kind of ambition. I wasn’t one of those fathers who had a plan for their kid, and they were going to follow it no matter what. I only had a few requirements. Number one, he had to learn a second language. Most of the world understands English, and I feel like the least we can do is meet them halfway. You can’t learn them all, but you can at least learn one. Well, he didn’t do it. He didn’t even try. He did the bare minimum in school, in his language classes, and everything else. He wasn’t an idiot, but he was a poor student, because he lacked motivation. I only got him into sports to teach him discipline, and perseverance. I didn’t care if he became obsessed with it, or even if he liked it. He could have switched to theatre or A/V Club, if that’s what struck his fancy. I chose baseball, because that’s what I was familiar with, but I made it clear that he had a choice. What he didn’t have a choice in was doing nothing. He couldn’t just coast through school, and work minimum wage for the rest of his life. I know, that might seem unrealistic. Someone is working minimum wage, that’s why it exists. I just wanted him to want more out of his life. Again, he didn’t have to do anything that I specifically chose for him, but he had to have at least some passion about it, even if that passion was for the money itself. He had to contribute positively to society, and if that meant sticking with that minimum wage job, well, I figured I could get over that. At least he was doing something. But he kept losing them, and having to find something new. Secretly, I think that he preferred it this way. He gets tired of things, you see. He doesn’t quit because he’s no good at it, but because he just doesn’t wanna do it anymore. It becomes tedious. I’m actually kind of surprised he came up with his foundation, because it’s the same thing; day-in, day-out. I can’t believe that he can take it, but I’m proud of him, and I’m happy for him. I never expected him to cure the entire world. I would have just been happy with him holding down a job for longer than six months. But he went for it. He really went for it. He exceeded all of my expectations, and I regret every doubt I ever had for him. That’s my kid, and I’m grateful for him.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: August 5, 2518

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Only Mateo was able to try the Daedalus wings during the reception, and that was only because he flew off before Ramses could stop him. They should have been inspected first to make sure that they were safe. Humans with wings were not impossible these days. There was, in fact, a relatively small community of wingèd people on the Core Worlds. The main reason they were impossible prior to genetic engineering and bioengineering was the weight. Wings with enough lift to carry a person would have to be so large that no one was physically capable of flapping them. If they were mechanical, well, that just added to the weight, especially with a powersource, and this all made it totally impractical. Only when humans could build new substrates for themselves did it become a reasonable prospect. Ramses designed the team’s bodies to be lighter than a natural human being’s, but they still weren’t specifically tailored for flight. Daedalus was an android of some kind, and since the mythology stated that the character had fabricated wings, he was almost certainly designed to be perfectly suited for flight. Mateo was not, and that was dangerous.

Fortunately, once Ramses did manage to get his hands on the things, he discovered that they weren’t just well-ordered feathers. Carefully hidden along the underside were tiny little fusion thrusters, which provided the lift, and the forward movement. They were controlled by the adjustment of the wearer’s head. It was essentially a cleverly disguised jetpack. It was unclear whether Daedalus’ own wings operated on the same principles, or if he was just somehow smart enough to build them after being instantiated in this physical simulation. He should have been placed under this dome with the knowledge typical of the time period he supposedly lived in, but who knew what was going on in Hrockas’ head when he conceived of Mythodome? It was one of the few domes that he conceptualized with hardly any help from his AI. He was an expert in Earthan mythology prior to his travels to the Charter Cloud, so this one was near and dear to his heart. He refused to explain it, expecting the art and adventure to speak for themselves.

Now that Ramses was satisfied with the results of his assessment, everyone was trying them. Well, he wasn’t so much as satisfied as he wasn’t allowed to block them anymore. He was hesitant to trust a gift from such a mysterious legendary individual, but he was overruled. Daedalus probably really did have a hidden agenda, but that doubtfully involved killing anybody on Team Matic, or anyone else. He did put his foot down at Romana, though. Her temporary reyoungification had not yet worn off, and she was still walking around in her original substrate. He might consider it later, but he wouldn’t allow anyone else on Castlebourne to use them unless they agreed to let him perform a thorough physical exam, which they didn’t. Leona was the last to give them a go before Ramses took them back, and secured them in his lab. That was okay, because it was about time to get to work.

“Wait, you’re not having a honeymoon?” Angela questioned.

“The average honeymoon these days,” Mateo began to reply, “is one month. That’s thirty years for us. We don’t have time for that.”

“Okay, well, you don’t have to do a full month,” Marie reasoned. “That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t choose a dome or two, and relax for a bit.”

Mateo and Leona exchanged a knowing look.

“What? What was that?” Marie asked.

“You should have noticed by now,” Leona said, to her, and the group, “that there is no such thing as a vacation for us. As soon as we try to relax,” she explained with airquotes, “something will come up, and we won’t be as prepared for it as we should be.”

“What are you talking about?” Angela pressed. “We relaxed for, like, three years on Flindekeldan before The Warrior finally found us.”

“The exception that proves the rule,” Mateo contended.

“You’re not using that right,” Leona told him reluctantly.

Mateo was about to ask for clarification when they heard whooping and hollering in the distance. An indistinct dot appeared just under the lowest clouds a few kilometers away. They focused their telescopic eyes, and were able to zoom in enough to make out that it was Young!Romana. She was wearing the wings, having presumably stolen them from Ramses’ lab. She flew towards them, and almost kissed the ground, but arced upwards at the last second, and headed back for the sky. “Hell yeah!” she exclaimed in her little high-pitched voice.

Ramses was noticeably upset. “I give you people too much access to my operations. I will be changing that.”

“She’s just a kid,” Marie reasoned.

“No, she’s not,” Ramses volleyed.

“Shouldn’t she have re-aged by now?” Olimpia asked. “I thought she said it wouldn’t last more than a day.”

“Yeah, that’s why she went down for a nap,” Leona said. “She said she thought it would trigger her transformation back. I’m not sure if she lied about that, or the nap, but she obviously teleported to Treasure Hunting Dome at some point to sneak into Ramses’ lab.”

Ramses was fiddling with his armband. “I’m working on new security protocols now.”

“She just wanted to be part of the group,” Mateo defended his daughter. “She’s been through a lot over the last few years. She needs this.”

“Daedalus didn’t design those things for a child’s body,” Ramses argued.

“They’re adjustable,” Marie reminded them. “That’s why I was able to wear them after Olimpia managed to fit the straps around her ample bosom.”

“Please,” Olimpia said, feigning disgust while holding up the back of her hand. “I’m a married woman.” She lowered all of her fingers but her ring finger, simultaneously showcasing her wedding ring while making it look like she was flipping Marie off.

“For now...” Marie joked.

“I can teleport up and grab her if you want,” Angela volunteered.

“No, that’s too dangerous,” Ramses replied. “She has to come down eventually.”

“Will the fusion thrusters run out of fuel at some point?” Mateo asked.

Ramses shook his head. “The feathers are lined with microscopic ramscoop nodes, which can draw in hydrogen for processing, so...no. She’ll get tired, though. She’s just a baby. Speaking of which, we need to fix that. Who are these twins who did this to her?”

“The Ashvins,” Angela reminded him. “Twin gods, part of the Hindu pantheon. We found them in the Dawnlands. This dome has many sectors, and they can’t all be accessed just by walking through a door. If you don’t have access to the right portal, you can’t go. Of course as teleporters, we can skip over those rules.”

Ramses tapped on his comms. “Romy, you’ve had your fun. I’m worried about your condition. I’ll let you use the wings later, but first, you need to go from Allen to Garner.”

“I don’t know what that means,” Romana responded.

“Just get back down here, please. I’m not mad, but you could be in medical distress, and not know it until it’s too late.”

Romana suddenly appeared a few meters above them. She slowly glided down towards the ground, and landed with grace and poise. The wings collapsed into their little box, which slipped off of her chest.

“You’ll navigate us to the Dawnlands,” Leona said as she was picking up the box.

“No,” Ramses decided. “The Walton twins are right. You need some kind of honeymoon. Get on the catalog, and choose a dome for your vacation. I don’t want to see you at least until 2521. That’s not that long of a honeymoon. Doesn’t it sound fair?”

“Yes, sir,” Mateo said, standing up straight, and saluting. He bent over real low and gave his daughter a kiss on the forehead. “I love you, sweetie. Be good for Uncle Ram-Ram.”

“Okay, I think we do need to go see the Ashvins again.” Them playfully treating her like an actual little girl got old a long time ago.

After a few more goodbyes, the newlyweds ran off for their honeymoon adventures. They weren’t going to confine themselves to only one dome, but a series of them, starting with Mud World: World of Mud. Ramses and Angela then split off to take Romana back to the Dawnlands sector. Marie said that she would be staying behind to do her own thing elsewhere without telling anyone what or where.

The name was absolutely appropriate. It was dawn here. It was bright enough for them to walk around without running into anything, but not clear enough to see the details of the landscape. It was a beautiful and calming place. Even the air seemed ultraclean, like something you would breathe out of an oxygen tank. As they were standing there,  two horses trotted up to them, pulling a golden chariot. Two strong young men stepped out, and approached. One had lighter skin, and the other darker. They moved with grace, symmetry, and synchronization. They were perfectly attuned to each other, perhaps by some kind of centralized hivemind shared between them. When they spoke, they did so in a seamless concerted effort, finishing each other’s sentences in some cases, and saying words simultaneously in others. “Hello, and welcome to the Dawnlands, foothills to Svarga, the celestial plane of light. How may we help you?”

“Could you undo what you did to her?” Ramses requested, gesturing to Romana. “She was told that the de-aging process would be temporary.”

The Ashvins smiled, again in sync. “Youth is temporary for all before they enter the Svarga or Naraka Loka. Aging is a part of life. It may be undone, but as the lotus reliably blooms each year, so too will man grow and change.”

Ramses gently closes his eyes, exasperated. “Are you telling me that she will only return to her normal age because she’s aging normally from here, and will eventually reach it anyway?”

“She will one day be as old as she was, and following, she will be even older. So too will you.”

“That’s not how my species works.”

The Ashvins were confused by this as it was leaning on the fourth wall, and they did not have a response.

“Look, we need this to happen faster than the full twenty years,” Ramses went on. “She clearly misunderstood the rules when she requested this from you.” She looked down at Romana. “Right?”

“Right. I didn’t want this to be permanent, or...so slow,” Romana confirmed.

“Apologies for the confusion,” the Ashvins claimed, “we meant no harm to your body or mind. We may reverse the ravages of changing seasons, but not hasten them. We cannot return you to the state you were in before your bath in the Sindhu River.”

Ramses shook his head again, which he felt like he was doing a lot of today. “Do you know of anyone—in any realm—who might be able to do what we ask?” No one on the team had ever heard of a retroverter who wasn’t also a proverter, but to be fair, they weren’t all too familiar with the concept. They really should have been questioning how such temporal powers ended up on this planet in the first place. They hadn’t recruited anyone with such abilities. Perhaps someone they did bring here, however, had connected Hrockas with other time travelers. These others could have donated their gifts to building Mythodome, or maybe even other domes, in such ways that broke the publicly known laws of physics.

“That is not something that we would know,” the Ashvins answered, a little bit sadly, but still believing that this wasn’t their fault. They did not know that they should clarify how Romana’s situation would work.

“All right. Let’s go do some research,” Ramses said, turning around. “There are a lot of mythological beings here. Maybe one of the other gods has real powers too.”

“Wait,” Romana said, stopping him with a hand on his arm. “I know someone who can do it.”

“Who?”

“You.”

Ramses’ eyes darted over to Angela’s from a brief feeling of panic, because he didn’t know what Romana was talking about. “I can’t do what you ask. I’m not a proverter either.”

“I don’t need a proverter,” Romana clarified. “I need a cloner.”

Ramses sighed. “That is a big decision, and it’s also irreversible. Once your consciousness is digitized, it can’t be undone. You will never be what you once were. A scar you got when you skinned your knee skateboarding in first grade. A missing appendix from surgery. You will lose all of that. The body that you’re in now, at whatever age you happen to be, will be destroyed as biomedical waste. Your consciousness will remain intact, but not everyone appreciates that. There are those who have expressed regret at being uploaded.”

“I know the process, and the rules. It’s about time I become more like you all, particularly Mateo. If I’m gonna be on this team, I wanna feel like a part of it.”

“Ro-ro,” Angela began, placing a hand on her shoulder. “If we’ve ever made you feel excluded, that was not our intention. You are on the team. That’s undeniable.”

“It’s nothing that you’ve done. In the past, I’ve hesitated to digitize, but it’s the practical choice, and it’s inevitable. I don’t wanna die any more than you do. I’m more vulnerable than all of you, and I don’t like it. People have to be more worried about me than they should. This isn’t out of nowhere. I’ve been considering it. I think...maybe, reaching out to the Ashvins was my way of testing the waters, to see how I would feel about my body changing so drastically. I am ready now.”

“Well, it’s complicated,” Ramses started to try to explain. “You were born with your time-skipping power. The rest of us were either made that way from Tamerlane Pryce’s design, or we stole it from those who were. I don’t know if I know how to replicate what you are. You have to remember that we’re not technically on the same pattern. They just technically match up. If you had a hiccup, and got off by one day, we may never sync back up.”

“All the more reason to do this,” Romana contended, like it was obvious. “Don’t worry about understanding my pattern. Just put me on yours.”

“We’ll need to talk to your father first,” Ramses insisted.

“This isn’t his decision,” Romana retorted.

“Absolutely, but he’ll never forgive me if we just do this without even so much as a heads-up. He would feel the same if you got a secret tattoo, or...” He cleared his throat, and chose not to finish that thought.

“Okay. We’ll take our time with this,” Romana agreed, “but it’s happening, one way or another. If not you, then I’ll find some other cloner to do it. You’re not the only member of The Shortlist.”

Ramses nodded. “All right. Now let’s get back to THD. I’m mythed out.”

“Uth too.”

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Microstory 2496: Spydome Network

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This is one of those long-term domes, where you can’t quite get the full experience unless you immerse yourself in the setting, and really forget about your old life. You have to shed your past, and become your character, or you’re playing someone else’s game. The premise is that you are a member of a spy agency in one of eleven nations. Your task is to complete missions for your agency, according to whatever your superiors demand of you. Like I said, this is long-term, so you won’t just instantly become a spy. You will start as a trainee, and work your way up. Or you won’t. There’s every chance that you’ll fail. You have to pass the physical and written exams. I’m pretty sure that they’re easier to take than the real ones on Earth, but I’ve never been a real spy before, so I don’t really know. How well you do is entirely up to your own, natural skills. There is no way to know how far any other player gets, because we’re not technically meant to out ourselves to each other, but my boss may be another visitor. I really don’t know. It really doesn’t matter. What you do is up to you as well. Even though you have superiors, you are not a robot, and you are capable of making your own decisions. If you just wanna lounge about your apartment all day everyday, you’ll probably get fired for that, but you won’t get killed. Unless you’ve done enough spying to put you in danger. You’ll probably only get killed if you go out in the field, or as I was saying, if you’re attacked at home by an enemy. Each nation exists under its own dome, and its backstory is as rich and complex as they are in real life. The relationships between these fictional countries are complicated, and ever-changing. If you were to leave and come back 100 years from now, I’m sure alliances will have shifted. One of them might have been blown up in a nuclear war; I dunno. I couldn’t tell you exactly how far the program will let you take this, but it seems like a pretty decent free-for-all. Each might be one of the eleven most heavily populated domes on the planet, as most don’t need to feel quite as lived in as somewhere in the network. But here, you can go anywhere within your bounds, and if you secure a passport to another country, you can go there too. It’s a really interesting experience, and I’ve only been doing it for about a year and a half at this point. Obviously, I’m writing this anonymously, because there’s no reason a competing agency couldn’t use this information against my own. The android intelligences might not understand where a visitor spy got their intel if it came from an out-of-universe source, but they might act on it anyway. There’s a lot you can learn about the countries, and international affairs, from the comfort of your tablet using the prospectus, but to really grasp what it’s like to live here, you’ll have to sign up, and integrate yourself into this new society. You choose your own adventure. I don’t know the psychological ramifications of starting a new life that could potentially be as long as a standard lifetime, but perhaps that’s part of what they’re studying here. I’m sure the results will be fascinating.

Microstory 2481: Treasure Hunting Dome

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This is like a cross between a race and a treasure hunt, but multiplied by a thousand. Obviously, if there was only one hunt going on at once, it would immediately become impossible to complete, like a million or more players trying to golf on one course. The surface under this dome has plenty of room, so they take it up. Of course, there are different levels of difficulty, and different lengths. You can choose a hunt that only typically takes a couple of hours, or one that can last for days, or even weeks. Like a real treasure hunt—or one you might find in media—you solve clues, or solve puzzles to get more clues to solve. Like a challenge competition, some of the clues can be earned through otherwise unrelated tasks. You might have to complete a Rubik’s Cube in order to unlock a secret hidden inside, or you might have to figure out how to milk a genetically engineered cow that’s as big as a house before an android will hand you your clue. One of them necessarily leads to the reward, while the other is arbitrary, and could theoretically be anything. This isn’t a criticism, just a clarification that there’s a healthy mix of tasks to complete, and while some of them might seem silly, or make you feel embarrassed, they’re all meant to be fun. It gets even more complex, because you’re sometimes working alone, and sometimes with a team, and sometimes against others, and you don’t always get to choose your team. If multiple people arrive at the same challenge or puzzle, you may be required to work with them, or compete against them. It really just depends. And those other people may be on the same treasure hunt with you, or on an entirely different one, which just so happens to intersect at this same point. You can also select a hunt that involves being on a team already, and even that sometimes goes up in the air, because they may make you compete with each other for individual rewards. They always tell you what you’re meant to do, though, so don’t worry about getting overwhelmed by the rules. They obviously won’t tell you how to complete a given challenge, but they’ll make sure you understand it well enough to at least make an attempt. As I said, there are all sorts of different ways of going about this, and you have the power to choose your own destiny. I’ve run four hunts at this point, and I can recommend all four, but I can’t recommend any hunt that I’ve never been on. No one can. I doubt there’s even time for any given person to try every single variation, because I think they’re intending to retire some to make space for brand new ones. It changes all the time, just like life itself. One final note. There are some out there who believe that there is some sort of overarching plot here, and a secret hunt which will lead to genuine, valuable riches. I don’t know anything about that, but my advice would be to stick with what you’ve been given. You can’t get into this dome without choosing a particular hunt, and they’re gonna keep you on task. Even though you’re expected to figure things out on your own, it’s not a free-for-all, so don’t even try.

Microstory 2480: Archidome

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I recently read a review on the prospectus for another dome. They were talking about how a lot of culture has faded from vonearthan society because of how standardized everything has become. And I must say that I agree. I understand why it happened. The basic design of the arcologies on Earth are perfect for what they’re intended to be. Each unit is a small and efficient living space, and they’re connected in such a way that allows modularization for shifting needs. You can open a door to grant a neighbor’s access to your units, or close them when you’re a teenager who needs to exert more independence. Everyone has a window, yet the structure is sound, because the spokes distribute the weight evenly, and over a sufficiently wide area. They’re nice, but they’re best for people who don’t care about what their homes look like, probably because they spend most of their time in simulations, or at least on the network. What your dwelling looked like, and how it was arranged, used to be profoundly important. I cannot stress to you enough how crucial it was for people to get to decide what their homes were like. That is what made it a home in the first place. There were multiple channels on linear television with dozens of programs about people finding, building, remodeling, or selling homes. And that’s before you include all the innumerable web content. It was a subculture of our society, and it went away due to a number of factors, which I’ve already touched upon. But the biggest moves happened in tandem with the shift to a post-scarcity economy. The government couldn’t put effort into building something to your specifications, or with any sort of flair or whimsy. Even before megastructures, they came up with a few models, and everyone got the same thing, because it was the most fair. Castlebourne gives us the opportunity to go back to the creativity of yesterday, in many respects, and in this respect, Archidome is the place for original architecture. It was empty at first—I really wish I had been here to see that. If you come here, you’re supposed to design your own building. It doesn’t have to be a single-family home. It can be an apartment complex, or a museum, or even a cathedral. The only restriction, really, is that you have to hold the rights to the intellectual property. I’ve heard a number of stories about visitors hoping to recreate some structure from their favorite movie, and that’s just not what this is for. Again, you get to decide what you build, and what it’s used for. It may never be used for its intended purpose, or anything at all. It’s up to you to promote it, and try to get visitors. I’m sure, over time, as the population of this planet in general increases, the chances that someone comes to see what you’ve created will go up. Until then, you might just have to be satisfied with the completion of the project itself. I’m proud of my columbarium, even though people don’t really die anymore. I’m proud of it because its mine, and it’s real. What will you create?

Microstory 2476: Substrate Development Dome

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It’s the opposite of Bot Farm! While that dome is all about mechs, perhaps with some skinning, this one is all about organic substrates, perhaps with some cybernetic components. This is one of the most important aspects of living on Castlebourne, and really, anywhere in the modern galaxy. Life is dangerous, and we’ve only made it more dangerous, because that’s how we like it. Back in the day, when you died, that was it. As far as we knew, there was nothing after that. Now that we’ve let go of our religious superstitions for the most part, we’re pretty certain that there’s no afterlife. So why let yourself die when there’s a better way? We’ve mastered consciousness transference and uploading, and it has given us so many options. You can backup your mind to a body that looks exactly like your own, but you don’t have to. Or it can look the same, but sport different characteristics. It can be stronger, faster, more resilient. You can fall asleep in seconds whenever you’re ready, and wake up feeling perfectly rested after only an hour. The possibilities truly are endless. You don’t even have to look human. You can become a unicorn, or an alien from your favorite media franchise. You can copy yourself, spread your mind into a hive of codependent insects. Be whatever you want, do whatever you want. Just remember, that whatever substrate you choose to move into next, it was built here. This place is really cool, but that’s probably because I was born in the 1960s. That’s right, it’s not a typo. I was barely young enough to reach the longevity escape velocity. Had I been born a few years earlier, I may have eventually died. So I know how vital it is to be able to get a second chance. A third. An umpteenth. And I think it’s so amazing that we have so many options. I know a guy who’s married to a sort of squid. She was human at one point, but now she identifies as a squid who can walk on land. That was designed and implemented here. You can even design your own, if you’re interested. You can make your new design private, unlisted, or fully open to the public. Bear in mind that every single design change has to be approved by the system, so don’t publish it until your ready. The laws are different here than they are in the stellar neighborhood, but they do have them. You can’t make a body that shoots deadly acid out of its hands, even though, theoretically, a victim could just switch themselves to a new body of their own. Come here, have fun with it. It’s available for all. Just don’t take it for granted. My brother died when he was an old man, and I never saw him again. You kids these days, you don’t know how good you have it.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 31, 2513

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Come midnight central, Leona, Angela, and Romana didn’t jump forwards to the future, proving that they were no longer on their time patterns. That was a week ago. Mateo never did come through the lake. Something was terribly wrong on his end. Nerakali said that she would look into it, but communicating with the afterlife simulation was tricky. It still existed in another universe, and getting through that Angry Fifth Divisioner’s thick quintessence membrane wasn’t easy. They took a suite in the Crest Hotel, and had sort of been lounging about, trying to wrap their brains around their new reality. Mateo was dead, and probably never coming back, and they were stuck in the present for the rest of their lives. It made them feel uncomfortable, even Romana, who should have been more used to it.

Leona had fallen asleep on the couch in the middle of the day, but something woke her up. “What’s that noise?” she groaned, not even opening her eyes.

“Sorry, I’m just watching TV,” Romana said, turning it down. “I didn’t know it would get so loud at this part.”

Bleary-eyed, Leona propped herself up on one shoulder, and tried to focus on the screen. “Is this SG Multiverse?”

“Yeah, did you watch it way back when?”

Leona chuckled and pointed. “That happened to me.”

“What?”

“What she’s doing right now. I did that. I had to cut my legs off. It was based off this show.”

Romana looked at her funny. “Are you messing with me?”

Angela walked in from the other room. “Mister Stark,” she began. “I don’t feel so good.” Dark particles swarmed around her, and she disappeared.

Leona barely reacted. She just looked over at her daughter. “Well. Boyd better have a damn good reason for this.” They both disappeared through dark particles too.

“The thing you have to understand about sling travel is that it’s not as quick as everyone thinks. It’s more like you leave time, and your mind can’t comprehend that. It can’t reconcile existing without time. It may be impossible for a human consciousness to interpret anything beyond four dimensions as anything but instant. Then again, we’ve been to the outer bulk before, and time has passed—can you hand me that drewscriver?” That wasn’t only a spoonerism. The drewscriver was a fanciful embossing tool invented in the late 21st century that could pull ferromagnetic metals and metamaterials upwards at precision scale. It was typically used to stamp industrial coding, but could also just be used to create texture for aesthetics. “Time has passed,” he repeated, “so I don’t know what that’s about. What I do know is that the way the slingdrives work, you actually spend a lot of time in the universal membrane, but you don’t remember it. It might even essentially be an eternity, but if thought stops, and metabolism stops, it’s like it never happened. You feel me?”

“I just push these buttons and tell machines to build domes,” Hrockas replied as if he were an idiot. It was obviously a lot more complicated than that, and he had to have a certain level of intelligence to even get this far, but point taken.

Ramses finished his finishing touches, and set the box back down. “There it is. The escape module.”

“That’s not big enough for a person,” Hrockas pointed out.

“No, I told you, that’s not—oh, you’re joking.”

“So. If what happened to you in the future happens again, all of your supplies will automatically be spit out of these pocket dimension things through this thing.”

“Not all of the supplies, just the essentials,” Ramses clarified. “Which I guess is pretty much everything. What else are we gonna put in there?” Ramses tapped on his wrist interface and whistled for effect. The escape module disappeared, tucked away safely in its dedicated pocket. “Oo, I feel heavier,” he quipped.

“Does that mean you’re finally ready to go?”

“No time like the present, even if 2396 isn’t my present.” Ramses engaged his new EmergentSuit, and walked towards the slingdrive, which was already programmed to send him back to the future. “Hey, man. Thanks for letting me use this dome for my new-slash-old lab. I didn’t want it to interfere with the lab that I end up building in my past-slash-future.”

“Mi Dome Eleven is su Dome Eleven. It’s been a hell of a year, Rambo.”

Ramses smiled as he stepped into the chamber, and turned back around. “Did you ever decide what you’re gonna do with it once I’m gone? I don’t remember what it ends up being in the future. You stop using numbers when you come up with names.”

Hrockas smiled back. “I’m thinking that it’s going to be a scavenger hunt, or something. The terrain has lots of natural corners.”

“Interesting. See ya in a hundred and sixteen years.”

“Apparently, I’ll see you in seventy-nine.”

“True. Hey, Thistle...” Before Ramses could execute a command, dark particles started to swirl around him.

“Is it supposed to look like that?” Hrockas questioned.

“No, this isn’t right! I don’t know what’s happening! Thistle, lock down the la—!” He disappeared.

Marie and Olimpia appeared from their swarm of dark particles and landed somewhat roughly on the ground next to the rest of Team Matic. They were surprised, and a little embarrassed, having been wearing their pajamas when it happened. Well, Olimpia was in her pajamas. Marie looked like she was auditioning for a jungle porno.

“Yoink!” Mateo exclaimed. “Nailed it.”

Everyone steadied themselves. They had all traveled through dark particles before, but this time was more turbulent. “You did this?” Leona asked.

“I stole his power,” Mateo said with a shrug. “NBD.”

“You can have it,” Boyd said sincerely.

“At least someone can still do it. We’ve been off our pattern for a week,” Romana lamented.

“It’s been a year for me,” Ramses one-upped.

“Boyd,” Mateo scolded.

“This isn’t my fault,” Boyd insisted. “I told you, work backwards to find him in the timestream, then once you do, go back further to see how long he’s been there. I told you that,” he reiterated.

“Oh, yeah, you did say that.”

“It’s fine, I was working on something. New upgrades. I even built a new lab. Actually, since I was in the past, it’s older than the last one, so... We can check it out if you want.”

“We need to make a decision first,” Mateo explained. “Boyd has something to say. Boyd?” he prompted.

Boyd looked at the ground abashedly for a moment. He then reached up to squeeze the collar of his shirt. A hologram over his face flickered before collapsing entirely to reveal his true face underneath. He still looked like himself, but crystal shards were embedded in his skin. It looked very painful.

“Ooo, that’s gotta hurt,” Leona noted with nurse-level concern.

“It’s not that bad.”

“He came out like this when we came back from the afterlife simulation,” Mateo explained. “I tried to kind of...remove them with dark particles, but I still don’t understand what they can do, and what they can’t.”

“It’s not something you learn,” Boyd said as he was putting the holographic illusion back up. “You build your intuition around it.”

Mateo nodded. “He is a living temporal energy crystal now. He believes that he can restore your powers, but that he would have to restore them all. You can’t just get back the teleportation and Alyssa’s lightbending. It’s all or nothing. You would be back on the pattern.”

“Is that even a choice?” Leona asked.

“We’ve been through this before, but this is another opportunity to leave. You probably can’t get Alyssa’s powers back, but Ramses could just build you new bodies with teleportation capabilities, and isn’t that really all you need? You don’t have to skip time. We got used to it, but it’s also been really annoying at times.”

“Can he...remove it from you?” Romana asked him.

“I don’t think so,” Mateo replied with a shake of his head. “I was already dead when the crystal was destroyed. I wasn’t affected by it. This is more of a reversal of what was done as a result of the lemon juice explosion, and it was only done to the six of you. And Octavia, I guess, but who cares about her?”

“We’re not gonna leave you behind,” Olimpia argued, stepping closer to him. She wrapped her arms around his waist. “I’m not done with you yet.”

“Let’s put it to a vote,” Marie suggested. “Raise your hand if you want to stay off the pattern.”

No one raised their hand.

“Boyd?” Leona asked. “Could you put yourself back on the pattern? I’m just asking. You decide whatever you want...”

“I don’t know, but I doubt it. I’ll explain why later, but I think it would be like trying to get a lighter to light itself on fire. It don’t bend that way.”

“Are you upset by that?” Marie pressed.

“It is what it is. I’m the one who poured the lemon juice. Good or bad, these are the consequences, and I’ll live with them.” Then he chuckled for some reason.

“How does it work?” Angela asked. “Do you just...stare at us with your crystal face?”

“Same as when it was a regular crystal on its own,” Boyd corrected. “You’ll touch my face, and I’ll transfer the energy to you. At least that’s what my intuition says. I’ve obviously never done this before.”

“There’s something else,” Mateo started. “It might change your mind, so just give me one last chance.” They all agreed nonverbally, so he led them down the hill, and then down the trail. They were in Canyondome, which was just a naturally-formed canyon on Castlebourne. It wasn’t even the largest one. It was only the largest one that still fit within the radius of a standard-sized dome. It was particularly deep, though. They were standing just over 14.5 kilometers below the edge of the canyon, which meant that they were 56 kilometers from the top of the dome.

They came ‘round the bend to find a man chained to a stake in the ground. He was sitting quite comfortably in a lounger, and seemed none too bothered by it, though he apparently couldn’t leave. “Is that...?” Olimpia began to ask.

“What’s Old Man Bronach doing here?” Leona questioned.

“I resurrected him,” Mateo answered. “We’re gonna help him regain power in the Goldilocks Corridor from his quantum duplicate.”

“Why the hell would we do that?” Marie asked.

“Because he’s the lesser of two evils,” Mateo claimed. “Some people in the Exin Empire don’t want an Oaksent to be in power, and we’ve helped them escape. Some, however, are true believers, and we’ll probably never be able to change their minds. So we compromise. We install this version on the throne, and in exchange, he doesn’t actively stop the rescue efforts of the Vellani Ambassador.”

Leona looked down at the Oaksent. “Is this true? Can you be trusted with this?”

Bronach grinned. “There’s a catch.”

Mateo sighed. “Anyone who wants to leave is welcome to leave, but he is free to...repopulate his worlds the way he did it the first time.”

“We’re allowing him to breed a new generation of sycophants?” Leona was disgusted.

“We can’t stop him unless we kill him,” Mateo argued. “But if we kill him, his most loyal subjects will just do it anyway, and the ensuing war could be devastating for the whole galaxy. We’re trying to end the Ex Wars, not make them worse. As I said, it’s a compromise. I don’t like it, but it’s the best I could do. There’s a loophole, though. He’ll accept your counsel, but only while you’re in the timestream. If you get back on my pattern, we only have influence on his decisions once per year.”

“Whose influence?” Leona asked. “Anyone on Team Matic.”

Mateo nodded. “The offer extends to anyone currently on Team Matic, including Boyd. It’s not the team itself. I had him sign an itemized list. We’re all on it.”

A lightbulb clicked on over Leona’s head. “Ramses is on the list?”

“Of course he is,” Mateo replied.

Ramses was hurt. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“No reason,” Leona answered. “I accept these terms.” She spun around, and placed both hands on Boyd’s cheeks. She then pulled his head down to her level, and planted a kiss on his lips, no tongue. Those standing at the right angle saw technicolors transmit from his crystalline face to hers before quickly dissipating.

“I never said we had to kiss,” Boyd reminded her once she let go.

“Just something to remember me by. I mean, something for me to remember you,” she said solemnly. After a beat, she spun back around. “Who’s next?”

They all took their turns, not even knowing what Leona had in mind to keep Bronach in line. They each gave Boyd a kiss, because monkey see, monkey do. Most of them were pecks. Romana’s was more than that. She only stopped when her father cleared his throat suggestively. Ramses was last, still nervous about Leona singling him out regarding the Bronach contract. He evidently got his powers back just in time. Because shortly afterwards...Boyd fell down and died again.

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Microstory 2465: Steampunk Sanctuary

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It’s steampunk everywhere, so I hope you like steampunk! I sure do, but you’re not here to hear about who I am. What you really wanna know is if this place is any good. Does it live up to the spirit of steampunk culture? Why yes, yes it does. Because of course it does. It’s one of the easiest themes to implement, and it doesn’t take much to please the fans. To the ignorant, it may seem like nothing more than an aesthetic. You have brass, and you have steam. How nuanced could it be? But it’s actually a way of life, and one which we’ve never been able to explore at scale. Steampunk communities have existed for centuries, but by the time the technology was available to simulate it in base reality, there really wasn’t any practical space for it. Humanity was trying to rewild the world. We built vertically, and left the majority of the land to the plants and animals. Steampunk survived, but a city based on the concept wasn’t feasible. We could have fought it, and declared independence somewhere, but we understood the reason for shrinking the amount of area that humans were taking up, so we played ball. We limited ourselves to small corners of the arcologies, wherever we could find room. But those modern walls...they were still there, made up of their superadvanced metamaterials. We were only actors in a play, pretending as best we could, but knowing that there was nothing authentic about it. Enter Castlebourne, Stage Right. This is the perfect setting for us; a blank canvas that we can paint however we want. We’re using steam to power our technology, from trains to computing machines. It’s not efficient, but it is fun, at least for us. It’s not for everyone. But the best part about it is you don’t have to live here permanently. You can just visit. You might hate it, and want to leave right away, and that’s fine. Nonetheless, you might find yourself enjoying it a little, and maybe want to stick around longer. That’s great. There’s plenty of room. We have everything they have anywhere else. It just looks a little different. And it’s loud. Some people don’t like how loud it is, but that’s what you get in a world without transistors. I can’t get enough of it. The VR steampunk worlds were great, but nothing beats something you can feel in your real hands. That’s the whole ethos with steampunk. It felt like cheating to immerse ourselves in a computer simulation to live in a world where computers exist without the computer chip. Now we don’t need that anymore. Now we can be ourselves...truly.

Microstory 2463: Overdome

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You can live here. It’s called Overdome, because everything here is oversized. Not only that, but most of them are habitable. I’m talking gigantic shoes, gigantic bookcases, gigantic whisky bottles. I’m not gonna list every little thing (or every big thing, rather) that serves as some sort of abode. What I’ll tell you is that most of the dome is empty. It’s up to you to request what you want if nothing that you envision already exists. You can be as involved in the process as you would like, or totally stay out of it. One woman I met in The Crystal Ball was only staying there temporarily while she designed her dream home to her exact specifications. It’s a 3D integrated circuit layout, obviously with multiple layers, known as a logic cube. You probably take them for granted, but every classical computer uses them to process and store data, and they’ve been doing it pretty ubiquitously since the mid-21st century. She loves them, and she wants her home to reflect that. I suppose I ought to go back a little and explain The Crystal Ball. It’s a giant crystal ball. That’s it. Lol, obviously it’s more complicated than that. Some of the objects here are just for show. They’re more like art pieces. But this one is a real building. It’s one of the biggest here, which is an important note to remember. These objects are not scaled relative to each other. The bookcase is actually smaller than the Crystal Ball, even though it’s the opposite for their real-world counterparts. The Crystal Ball is located in the very center of the dome, and serves as a central hub. You can book a room on a temporary basis, like the logic cube designer, or for a very temporary stay, like a hotel. Or you could just stay there permanently, if it strikes your fancy. It looks just like it should, except you can see people walking around in it. Don’t worry, if you are in a private room, you can adjust the opacity at will. I saw one guy as I was walking down the corridor who had the opacity at 99% for the outside, but it was fully transparent on the interior, so we could all see him change his clothes. Whatever, man. I would recommend coming to Overdome for a look, but it will be up to you if you want to stay. And then it will be up to you to decide if you want something new all to yourself. The possibilities are virtually endless. I noticed one option on the application form that was just a question mark. Apparently, you can select a mystery home. Someone will choose a design for you, and not tell you what it is for the entire time you’re waiting. They won’t even tell you where exactly your lot is located. You sign a contract that promises to stay there for at least a year, and they have all these stipulations about vacation periods, and whathaveyou. I don’t know if they choose embarrassing things, like maybe an ancient tampon, or what, but it could be kind of fun if you’re bored, or just like to live in the anticipation. Me? I can’t wait for my oversized alarm clock to be done.

Extremus: Year 98

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It’s been well over a year, and Audrey Husk has not reached out again regarding her mandate to secretly aid Silveon in his mission to stop Waldemar Kristiansen from growing up to become a violent tyrant. As per Extenuating Circumstances Executive Time Travel Protocol, Tinaya hasn’t reached back either. While time travel is illegal on the ship, the council recognizes that there are situations where it may be necessary. It may not be safe to report such time travel activity, and under those extreme conditions, it is up to the executive crewmember to exercise caution at their own discretion. That only goes for people like Tinaya and Lataran, though. If, say, a passenger were to discover a time travel event, it would be their responsibility to report it accordingly, and they would be just as liable for any damages if caught in the lie or conspiratorial collusion.

They’ve all seen each other regularly. Audrey has maintained her cover as Silveon and Waldemar’s friend. Despite being at wildly different places in their education, they help each other out. Silveon still doesn’t know that Audrey has the mind of an adult, so she pretends to be lacking in certain areas. Silveon, despite not being able to reveal himself as also from the future, has propped himself up to be somewhat of a prodigy. This gives him a decent excuse for being more intelligent than anyone would expect him to be. More importantly, it frees him up to focus on his real work without any questions. As for Waldemar, he’s still struggling. He went the other way by pretending to be dumber than he is because he has an almost total lack of motivation, which is something that neither Silveon nor Audrey can teach him. If he’s not listening to the apparent adults, he’s certainly not going to take advice on self-discipline from a couple of kids that he believes to be younger than him. Again, Tinaya is mostly staying out of it. Her son tells her and Arqut some anecdotes about his progress, as anyone would to confide in someone they trust, but he doesn’t deliver official reports, or anything.

Since the ship is fortunate enough to have two living admirals at the moment, only one of them is asked to attend each daily meeting. That leaves the other one back at the office with nothing to do for slightly longer than on days where she’s in the meeting instead. There’s not really any strategic reason for this. The council seemingly just doesn’t want to hear too many voices in the room. These huddles are boring, annoying, and intrusive for most, so they want to get them over with as quickly as possible. The admirals switch off every other day, and today is Tinaya’s turn to not have to be there. At least that’s how she claims to feel. In reality, she would rather be there every time. She actually misses being involved, and—if she’s being honest with herself—needed. The solution may seem like a no-brainer, but it’s not. She doesn’t want anyone to know how she feels, not even Lataran. So she goes along with the so-called fair routine.

“Sir, I’ve received a request for a visit,” Thistle says from the aether.

Who could that possibly be? Everyone authorized to see her is in that meeting. “From who?”

“Another child.” Oh, God. Not another time traveler. Thistle goes on, “he’s been assigned to write on someone he admires. He’s evidently chosen you.”

That’s flattering. “Does he seem nice?”

“I can’t answer that.”

“Have him meet me in the Attic Forest—no, the Central Sequoia, at the base.” Tinaya planted the tree at the bottom of the ship nearly forty years ago, and it has since grown around eleven meters, allowing it to pass through three decks at this point. She won’t live to see its full potential, so she likes to frequent it when she can to get the most out of her masterpiece.

She teleports directly there, expecting to have a little time to herself before the boy arrives, but someone is already there. At this time of day, it’s not very busy. Well, it’s never very busy here, but people are preoccupied with other things, so there’s not a whole lot of traffic going in and out, or sticking around.

A young man appears from the other side of the trunk. “Admiral Leithe, thanks for meeting me.”

“How did you get here so fast?” Tinaya looks down at the boy’s wristband, even though it’s impossible to know from here whether it’s teleportation-capable or not.

“Oh, I’m a Pathfinder,” he answers, both like it’s no big deal, and as if she should know what that means.

“I don’t know what that means.”

“I don’t so much as see the future as I know where to be, and when to be there. And I know when someone’s in danger, or when their luck is about to change. Things of this nature. To me, the future is more like a haze, while for everyone else, it’s a darkness.”

“You’re a choosing one. Those are rare. They’re, like, real rare.” Back on Earth, there are people who are born with the ability to manipulate time and/or space in some way or another. There aren’t a lot of them, but they can be anyone. Some of them have full control of it, and some are being controlled by this mysterious force known as the powers that be. They’re practically nonexistent on Extremus, though. Their ancestors were wayward sons and daughters, who found themselves trapped in the universe of Ansutah with all the white monsters. A baby came out stillborn, and this tragedy erased everyone’s powers, whatever they happened to be. They say that, had this baby been healthy, he would have had the ability to control other people’s powers at will, but because of the unfortunate circumstances, his meta-power was only activated once, and could not be reversed. And it had consequences for the future. Not only were the powers stripped from everyone present, but their descendants didn’t have powers. Statistically speaking, over the course of millennia, new choosers should have been born, regardless of their lineage. It’s just something that happens every once in a while. No one really knows why time travelers exist in the first place. But there are almost none on the ship. The real question is actually, why does it ever happen? Why are there any exceptions at all? What makes this boy different?

He shrugs. “Maybe my great great great great grandparent was a space traveler who secretly snuck into the Gatewood Collective, and ended up starting a mixed bloodline of Earthans and Extremusians.”

She narrows his eyes at him. She’s getting the sense that he’s telling the truth, and genuinely doesn’t know why he’s an exception. It’s not like it’s illegal anyway. Nothing is against the law that you’re born with, though if someone made it so that you were born a certain way, that may be cause for a response. Maybe it’s just that he doesn’t care. Some people are also born apathetic, and that’s not illegal either. “Maybe...”

He offers her his hand. “Pronastus Kegrigia, secondary school student at Stern Academy.”

“Secondary school?” Tinaya questions. She looks at her watch, again stupidly. She knows the date. “I figured you were in tertiary already. Shouldn’t you be taking your assessments?” That’s one of the reasons why the corridors are so empty today.

He chuckles. “I’ve known my destiny since I was a little kid. I’m going to become the ship’s first—and if the captain has his way, not only—official Pathfinder.”

“They’re expecting you to give direction, I’m guessing when it comes to personnel assignments, and general scheduling? Any policy?”

“Not there yet. Don’t know.”

“So you’re not going to tertiary school, or what?”

“I’m on the civilian admin track. I don’t need any test, I’ve been shoehorned in.”

“Why civilian, and not crew?”

He tightens his lips.

Tinaya lifts her chin, realizing the answer to her own question. “The crew are expected to listen to a civilian voice if their superior officer commands them to. It doesn’t work the other way around. You have to remain a civilian in order to maximize your power and influence.”

“I don’t make the rules, ma’am.”

“You will.”

“I’m supposed to be asking you questions.”

“For your report. Is that in lieu of the placement tests, or did you just make that up to get to me?”

“I made it up, and my instructor approved it. I didn’t tell her that I was choosing you. I did not yet know that I would. We’re encouraged to come up with our own learning tools. I’m sure you remember.”

“It was a long time ago, son. I’ll answer your questions if you answer mine.”

“Why did I choose you?” He doesn’t wait for her to confirm that he guessed right. “You’ve been through the ringer. You were kicked out of the captain’s program, for no apparent reason, except I’m thinking that I’m not the first pathfinder you’ve ever met; built a forest on a spaceship; restructured multiple departments; became First Chair; abolished the Chair system in favor of a more democratic council, even though it caused you to lose your power; disappeared for many years for a secret mission, which evidently lasted longer than the time you were away; and finally, went full circle to become captain anyway, despite the initial setback, which is how you’re an admiral now.”

“That about sums it up.” He doesn’t know the part about her being a secret spy for the Bridger Section, nor the truth about Verdemus. Which is good.

“Satisfying answer?”

“Yes?”

“Would you care to ask me anything else before we continue?”

“I reserve the right to stop the interview at any time, to ask more questions of you, or because I have to pee, or because I suddenly decide to stop making noise between 09:37 and 09:42 everyday.”

He laughs. “Fair enough.”

Pronatus goes on with the interview, asking all the questions one would expect in this situation. He asks after her feelings on all the dramatic shifts in her life, and whether any of it was planned or predicted. He’s really interested in her time in the Parks Department, and how impressive it is that she came up through there, and accomplished so much, not only afterwards, but also during. Things seem to be going okay with the interview until they start to approach the end. That’s when he throws her a curveball. “One last thing. When you die...are you going to choose to live on, or just let go, and see if there’s a true afterlife?”

Tinaya is shocked by this, and thrown totally off her game. “How do you know about that?” She’s met a number of people who are aware of this secret. She herself found out when she was a rebellious kid who was good with computers. She should be an outlier, though, not a trend. There is no protocol for what to do if someone who knows meets someone else who knows, because that’s never meant to happen. She could deny, and play dumb, but he obviously knows what he’s talking about. He’s not grasping at straws. He’s heard the details.

“I told you, I’m a pathfinder.”

“You said the future was a haze. It sounds like you get clear pictures sometimes.”

“My abilities themselves didn’t give me this knowledge. They lead me to places, and sometimes in those places, I end up overhearing things that I’m not supposed to.”

“You’re an eavesdropper.”

“Not by choice. It’s...an impulse.”

“An impulse that you should learn to control.”

“I can’t. I mean, I could. I could draw upon my willpower, and ignore it, but what if it’s leading me to save someone’s life? The very fact that the path is hazy is precisely why I have to follow-through every time. I never know how important it is. Sometimes, yeah, it’s innocuous, like seeing a guy’s towel fall off in what would have otherwise been an empty corridor, but sometimes, it’s profoundly vital. I don’t know until I get there.”

She sighs. “Have you discussed this with anyone else?”

“Of course not. I don’t even know if captains know. Something told me just now that you do, or I wouldn’t have brought it up.”

“Well, maintain that policy. Don’t tell anyone. Leave it out of your report. Don’t even hint at it with colorful language. As for me? I’m obviously not going to answer that question, and even if I did, I could always change my mind, so it’s not like it would tell you where I am after death.”

“You’re right. It was a dumb question. I should have ignored that one. I had enough information to stop myself. I can do better. See, this is why I admire you? Because you’re so...good.”

She has no response for that, so she just moves past it. She stands up from the bench, and sighs. “Is that all you need from me?”

Pronastus stands up too, and folds the cover over his tablet. “Yes, I’ll try to have the first draft of my paper to you tomorrow for approval.”

“Approval? I’m meant to approve it?” She wasn’t expecting this.

“Yes, I’m not a monster, and this isn’t a hit piece.”

“Well, I appreciate that. Give yourself enough time as you need. I don’t do much as an admiral, as we’ve discussed, so I’m sure I’ll be able to read it right away, and get it back to you.”

Everything goes fine in the beginning. Pronastus takes two days to write the paper, and Tinaya is able to approve it with only a few minor grammatical corrections in three hours. She couldn’t help herself, even though it’s not technically her job. The paper’s content is fine, and she has no problem with it being submitted. It’s the instructor who decides that the three of them should not be the only ones to read it, though. She releases it to the public. And it kind of causes an uproar.

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