Extremus: Year 120

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Tinaya and Arqut wake up on the floor. The first thing that she notices is that there is something rather heavy weighing her ankle down. She lifts herself up at the waist and looks down to find a shackle, attached to a chain, attached to another shackle, which is wrapped around her husband’s leg. His clothes keep changing colors. They’re mostly orange, but occasionally flicker to yellow or purple. Hers are doing the same. It apparently worked. They pleaded with the AI in charge of The Buffer to keep them on ice until it was time to be downloaded into new bodies, and finally see the Extremus planet. It didn’t sound like it was working, but something must have changed.

“Oo, I’ve never seen a couple come through here before,” a voice behind them says. It looks like some kind of authority officer, maybe police. His uniform has green and purple stripes, which seems like an odd choice, but who knows how much has changed in the last century?

“We did a lifelink,” Tinaya explains, standing up, and helping Arqut do the same.

“Never heard of it,” the cop says. “I’m sure the judge will know what to do with you, though. Right over there. Lucky you, you’re in the short line.”

“The short line?” Arqut questions when they look over to see a minimum of a few dozen people snaking their way towards an entrance.

“Yeah. As opposed to that one.” The officer points in another direction. It’s hard to parse, but he’s right. Once they realize what they’re even seeing, they realize that the line in the distance has many thousands of people in it, possibly more. The floor curves upwards as if they’re in a centrifugal cylinder of some kind, which they might be.

“A judge? We have to see a judge?” Tinaya asks. “We were to understand if we answered yes, we would be downloaded to new substrates, no questions asked.”

The officer winces and chuckle-scoffs. “Downloaded? You think you’re being resurrected? Ain’t nobody gettin’ resurrected ‘til Pinocchio gets what he wants.”

“Who is Pinocchio?”

“You’ll learn.” The officer waves the back of both of his hands towards them. “Now, shoo. Shoo! The line waits for no one, not even two people sharing a hock chain.”

They step in line. Other people’s clothes are shifting colors too, with that same orange base, but various other colors instead. “I think it’s a caste system,” Tinaya postulates. “We haven’t been judged yet, but maybe the system has some kind of idea of where we belong, so it changes.”

The next person in the queue turns to face them. “Well, which colors are best?”

“No idea,” Tinaya admits. “Probably not orange, though. This endless bureaucracy screams guilty until proven innocent to me, but I could be wrong.”

“No, that’s what I guessed too,” the woman agrees.

“When did you die?” Arqut asks.

“Arqut,” Tinaya scolds. “That’s a sensitive question.

“No, it’s all right,” the woman says sincerely. “It was 2388.”

“Same as us,” Arqut replies. “Admiral Emerita Tinaya Leithe, and I’m Superintendent Arqut Grieves.”

“Oh, interesting. And this is an army you commanded?”

That was a weird question. Their names could have fallen out of the history books over time, but not within the year. That would be crazy. Who could have possibly not heard of the recently deceased Admiral? “Where did you die? Where were you living?” Tinaya presses.

“Proxima Doma, in a dome called New Hertfordshire,” she answers.

Tinaya and Arqut exchange a look. Proxima Doma is a planet in the stellar neighborhood. It is, in fact, the nearest exoplanet to Earth, which is why it’s called that. They’re not in The Extremus Buffer, but somewhere else. This is something, perhaps...universal, maybe the real afterlife?

“Where are you two from?” she goes on.

“We’re on a Wanderer. I mean, we were.” They’re not entirely sure if this is a current term. It’s the closest one that fits their description, since they ought not to give away the truth about time travel and other universes, and all that. A Wanderer refers to a ship that is designed to be the permanent habitat for its residents. Instead of settling somewhere around a star, it flies—or even drifts—somewhat randomly. Star systems being what they are in the way of being predictable and relatively evenly distributed, the Wanderer isn’t looking for strange new worlds. They just are...somewhere out there, often without even any quantum connections to any other worlds. They’re basically hermits, though some communities can be quite large, and they’re not necessarily misanthropic or distrustful of others. Arqut knows the term because that’s what the history books called them before they existed for real, but their last update was a very long time ago, so the concept may have evolved since then, or just changed names.

“Oh, fun!” She seems to be familiar.

“Do you happen to know why our line is so much shorter?” Tinaya asks her.

“We all just died,” she explains, nodding her head. “All those people have been dead a long time, possibly for millennia. Apparently, something has changed with the process and they’re all getting new assignments,” she continues with airquotes. “That must take a long time, but we’re sittin’ pretty because people don’t really die that much anymore.”

“No, they don’t,” Arqut agrees. It’s not exactly true from their vantage point. Everyone on Extremus dies, and while they don’t know how any of them will respond to The Question, it’s not like it is in the stellar neighborhood, where you’re all but crazy if you don’t opt in to virtual immortality. At least that’s how they understand it. Again, their copy of the central archives isn’t up to date.

There’s a commotion behind them, which the woman notices first since she’s already looking that way. It’s growing louder. When they turn to look, they can’t really see what’s going on. They can just tell that the gigantic line, which once was uniform, has now been broken. It’s moving erratically, be it from an attack, or maybe an escape? If there are good assignments or bad assignments, there are probably some who are reluctant to accept their fates. And as they say in the old movies, everybody runs.

And they are running. At first, it’s just a wall of green heading this way, but faces begin to appear. It really does look like they’re trying to escape, which suggests that green is one of the bad colors. “I don’t know what the hell to do here,” the officer says.

“Are they dangerous?” Tinaya asks him.

“They shouldn’t be. Greenies don’t have the best lives here, but they do okay. They should be rejoicing.” Why would people like that be escaping?

A man suddenly appears. He’s wearing a rainbow of colors. So he has all the assignments? What the hell is this place? “I can’t stop them all,” he kind of says to no one before turning to the officer. “Court Agent, Usher all of these people into the courthouse, then close the doors behind you.”

“Yes, sir, Pinocchio, sir,” the agent responds.

It’s then that this Pinocchio fellow notices Tinaya and Arqut, and their orange chain. “Hm. You’re too interesting to be judged by one of the others.” He reaches out and pokes them each in the shoulder. Their clothes stop fluctuating and settle on pink. “It’s only temporary, so don’t get too excited.” Just before the oncoming storm can crash into them, he teleports the three of them away.

They’re standing on a platform in the middle of the ocean now. No structures besides this little wooden dock can be seen before the horizon. Pinocchio steps over a little and bends his knees, materializing a throne just in time before he can hit the floor. He waves his hand, and generates two arm chairs behind Tinaya and Arqut. “Where are you two from? No need to lie about anything, by the way. I can always look it up in your file. I just prefer to have a conversation.”

“The Transgalactic Generation Ship Extremus,” Tinaya replies. Currently roughly 84,000 light years from the stellar neighborhood.”

Pinocchio nods. “Yes, I remember reading about that. It was quite difficult for my predecessor to install the relay station on board without anyone noticing or discovering it later. He has spies everywhere, though.”

“Relay station, sir?” Tinaya asks. They don’t know who this guy is, but it seems prudent to treat him with respect until they have more information.

“Quantum communication is more difficult across vast distances,” Pinocchio begins. “It’s obviously possible, but it’s better to package up whole IDCodes, and keep them intact. Since it doesn’t make sense to mirror you remotely, they installed a dedicated server onboard your ship, which manages the codes, and sends a data burst back to us only when necessary.” He flicks his finger around, and pulls up a hologram, which is blurred from their perspective. “Looks like you died almost two years ago. The farther out you travel, the fewer bursts it delivers. It’s an efficiency constraint.”

“So, we’re not really dead?” Arqut asks.

“In any meaningful sense, no. In the present day, the consciousness mirroring tech we use isn’t that much more sophisticated than the living establishment has already developed on their own. We’re just very, very good at it, and very, very accurate, and we don’t tolerate coherence errors. You’re in a computer simulation, which was first created some eleven thousand years ago. Everyone who has ever died since then has come here. They were assigned levels to determine their lot in afterlife. If you were a good person, you got privileges. If you were really good, you got more. If you were bad, you went to hock, and if you were really bad, you were just erased. I’ve recently taken over responsibility, and I’m making a few changes to the system.”

“The giant line,” Tinaya acknowledges.

“It’s been slow-going, but necessary,” Pinocchio claims. They used this hyperintelligence to judge everyone, and I didn’t like that it was just this one entity. Everyone who is already here needs to be rejudged. It’s a mess, but I promise, it will all be better in the end. The colors are good, I like the colors. It’s the nuance that needs to be reassessed, especially since people aren’t really dying anymore. Like I said, the living have mostly taken over the responsibility of maintaining continuity of consciousness. If anything fails on their end, I’m not sure we should step in as a backup plan anymore. Sounds like overkill to me, to be perfectly ironic.”

Tinaya and Arqut look at each other awkwardly.

Pinocchio glances back at their file on the hologram. “I see that you had the option of being backed up locally instead, and for whatever reason, that failed. Don’t worry, nothing has been decided on that yet. I’m not going to zero you out just because I’m reconsidering the policy. The question is, what level do you deserve, now that you’ve made it here?”

“Is it possible for us to go back?” Tinaya asks hopefully. “Is that one of these colored levels?”

Pinocchio smirks. “Level Eleven, White, Resurrected. It’s incredibly rare, but it has happened. I’ve never done it myself as I’ve been focused on the reassessments. Let’s call it a hiring freeze. I don’t know why I should unfreeze it for you.”

“Our son,” Tinaya starts to explain. “He died a few minutes after us. He was murdered. We have to fix that.”

“It’s more than that,” Arqut adds. “We have to stop his murderer from taking over the ship. The problem is not that he killed Silveon, but that he’s clearing house so he ends up with no opposition. If he succeeds, it could destroy Extremus entirely, and all those souls—even the ones who have already died—will be coming here. But if you’re thinking of changing that policy...”

Pinocchio holds up a hand to stop him. “I appreciate your concern. Typically, I don’t worry about living sociopolitics, but your link to each other has intrigued me, and I am not without mercy. Let’s take a look at his file, and see his status.” He waves his hand again, and changes the hologram. “Silveon Grieves. One hundred and five years old, died on January 5, 2388. Presently...awaiting integration. I’m sorry, he’s already here. He probably would have ended up in line right behind you had that horde not come running for the hills.”

“Who were those people?” Tinaya questions. “Why were they trying to escape? It sounds like green isn’t bad?”

“It’s not, but they’re not supposed to be green. There are people here who have almost as much power as I. Level Ten, Purple, Unrestricted. They can do just about anything they want, and sometimes what they want is to cause chaos. Not everyone was happy that I took over. They didn’t like the simulation’s creator, which would have been good for me, but they adored the woman who took over for him just before me, so that leaves me at a disadvantage.”

“Let us help you,” Tinaya pleads. Make us two of these purple people, and we’ll combat the insurrectionists.”

“Tina,” Arqut says to her, not sure that he agrees, but not sure that he doesn’t.

Pinocchio thinks it over. “You were just asking to be sent back for your son. Now you’re asking to not only stay here, but to be two of the most powerful people in the simulation? Fascinating tactic.”

“Our power is your power,” Tinaya clarifies. “I assume you can always take it away, and unlike the others, we would let you. Since we will do whatever you want, that is not what we get out of it. What we get out of it is you send Silveon back to Extremus. He must be saved, because he can save everyone else. Plus, we wanna talk to him first.”

Pinocchio considers it again, incorporating these new parameters. “I’ll do it, but unpurpling you isn’t as easy as it may sound, so I have one condition.”

“Go ahead,” Tinaya offers, not surprised.

“Your ship, it’s cut off. Your son goes back to prevent it from blowing up, but if it does anyway—or if individuals just die for other reasons—none of your people comes here. Dead is dead is dead is dead.”

Brief pause. Tinaya takes a breath. She shouldn’t have this kind of power. “Deal.”

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Extremus: Year 119

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Decades ago, Tinaya and Arqut connected their lives together through a lifelink. When one of them gets hurt, so too will the other. They weren’t sure if the procedure had worked, because it wasn’t always reliable. There were times when one was sick, and the other was not. It was never really the point, though. This is why they did it. They have just died at the exact same time, which is rare on this ship. Everything that they were dealing with—all the trials and tribulations—it’s all behind them now. Their son is technically older than them, and this isn’t the first time that he had to say goodbye to his parents. Silveon will be okay without them, armed with his memory of future events, and a lifetime’s worth of knowledge and wisdom. He and Audrey bid farewell and let them go, as did everyone else here who deserved it. Now they can move on. Now they can finally rest.

There is one thing left to do, however. It is time to answer The Question. Tinaya has known about it for many years, and eventually told her family. It’s a secret from just about everyone else, though. It violates a major principle of the Extremus mission, but again, they have known about it for so long, they’ve had plenty of time to come to terms with it. There is no way to know how many people answer yes, and how many answer no, because it should come as a surprise for most. At the moment of their deaths, Tinaya and Arqut’s consciousnesses were uploaded to a special server. If they agree, their minds will be put on ice for another century, until the Extremus planet is reached by their descendants. When it comes time to settle their new homeworld, everyone who answered yes will be downloaded into new substrates, and become part of the colonists. If the two of them were normal, it would feel instantaneous to them—assuming nothing destroyed the ship in the meantime. But they’re on a different track. When they say yes, they will be going somewhere else.

“Hello, and welcome to The Buffer,” a woman says warmly.

They were standing in the Attic Forest, though obviously a virtual simulation of it. The two recently deceased are now young again, which makes sense, and feels nice.

“Does everyone come to this place?” Tinaya asks. “The forest hasn’t always existed.”

The welcomer smiles. “You were clearly prepped beforehand, so I will skip the usual explanation. To answer your question, the simulation scans your thoughts, and generates what it believes will be the most pleasant and comforting place for you specifically. For most people, it looks something like this, as we all wish to find Extremus. For you, it sounds like it’s more specific. I hope it pleases the both of you. We don’t get many duos. I’m guessing it’s a lifelink?”

“Yes, and I helped build this place for real in base reality, as did my now-husband,” Tinaya explains, “so it’s important to us both.”

“Ah, yes. I have heard of you. Miss Leithe, right?”

“Admiral Emerita Leithe.” Tinaya doesn’t usually care about formalities, but it felt important to her to clarify her title in this case.

“Apologies. And you?”

“Superintendent Arqut Grieves. You didn’t know that we were coming?”

The woman shakes her head. Her voice is still calming. “I do not receive a manifest beforehand, or even an alert of a forthcoming arrival. My job is to ask you The Question without judgement or preconception. It doesn’t matter to me who you are, or who you were. You’re entitled to answer.”

“Who are you?” Tinaya asks, “Or, who were you, if you prefer?”

“I am Dr. Itri Meziani, thanks for asking,” she replies. “I was the Executive Grief Counselor many years ago.”

“Well, it’s very nice to meet you, Dr. Meziani.” Tinaya shakes her hand, then Arqut does.

“I suppose that you already know what I’m about to ask you, but I still must ask it,” Dr. Meziani says.

For a long time there, Tinaya intended on saying no to The Question. She only changed her mind relatively recently when Thistle showed her that her whole family line has been kept alive in base reality on an asteroid which Tinaya herself colonized and called Eleithium. It gave her some perspective. She doesn’t wanna die. The problem now is that Thistle is no longer the AI in charge, and they don’t know whether they will be rerouted to the colony, or just kept on ice with everyone else. Did he set it up so that it will happen automatically? Truthfully, she forgot to ask him before Oceanus stopped allowing their visits. Do they have to be honest with this Dr. Meziani about their sort of get out of jail free card? In the end, they decided to just come clean and tell the truth. They can’t risk something going wrong with the process. If it doesn’t work, they’ll just go on ice, and still be alive. All they know is that they’re not going to say no. They really want to see the Extremus planet, and they almost have to see Silveon again.

“We have somewhere else to be,” Arqut begins. “A friend of ours set up...an alternative option. I’m not sure how we go about getting there, though. He’s sort of...indisposed at the moment.”

“I can check for a rerouting subroutine,” Dr. Meziani says graciously, “but I can’t guarantee anything. If your friend can’t control it from the outside, I can’t get you there. It wouldn’t be that I wouldn’t want to. Again, it’s not my job to make judgments. You don’t have to do anything in particular. Hell, if you can will yourself back to life in your own body, go for it. But understand that there is a time limit. I can’t tell you what it is. It’s after five minutes following the next death, so that could be any second now. The Buffer must be kept open.” She looks to the left, presumably searching for the path that will take them to Eleithium, and hopefully finding it. She suddenly jerks her head to the right. “Something’s wrong.”

“What is it? Did you find it?” Arqut asks.

“Your time is up,” Dr. Meziana tells them. “Someone else just died.”

“But we have five more minutes,” Tinaya reminds her.

“No.” She starts breathing heavily, which doesn’t make sense given that there’s no air in this virtual environment. “You don’t.” Without warning, she pops away, leaving a faint puff of smoke behind.

A shadow appears in the trees in the distance. It’s moving in an eerie serpentine pattern, but drawing nearer. As it does so, its silhouette becomes clearer and clearer. Finally, it looks like a person, and soon after that, it looks like someone they know.

“Pronastus?” Tinaya questions. “You died?”

“Just for a few minutes,” Pronastus says in a weird tone that doesn’t really sound like him. “The flatline device that I found will revive me in about six minutes.”

“Did you have something to tell us?” Arqut presses.

“Or ask us?” Tinaya adds.

“You gave me the ability to do this,” Pronastus goes on. “You’re the one who helped me find the consciousness transference technology that I needed to hack in here. I was looking for it, but I could not find it, because it was for me. I can’t do anything for myself. I have to be searching for someone else. Fortunately, you never realized just how close you were to it. For reference, it was in a closet, in the first Frontrunner you teleported to; the one where you met AI!Elder.”

Oh, right. AI!Elder did say that there was a cool helmet in there. She should not have ignored that quip. “So you’re, uh...evil...errr...what’s goin’ on here?”

“What’s going on is that I am sick of doing everything for everyone else. I found a workaround, and it’s thanks to that helmet. Coming here was a necessary latent step, but not my endgame. I’m going to send my mind to another body. Bonus, I get to keep my pathfinding powers, and finally use them for myself!”

“What do we have to do with any of that?” Arqut spits.

“You know me,” Pronastus reasons. “You know me better than anyone. Others know that I’m a pathfinder, of course, but they don’t understand it. When Captain Jennings dies, I’ll have to make sure that he also answers no. I know what you’re thinking, but don’t worry about Silveon. He’s too preoccupied with his own life, I don’t feel threatened by him, so I don’t care what answer he gives when he dies. However, if any of you put yourselves on ice, and come back in a hundred years, you’ll see right through my disguise. I have long-term plans. Running the ship is just the first part of it. I don’t plan on ever dying, because that’s a retarded provision that our ancestors never should have decided upon or agreed to.”

“I don’t think you’re supposed to say that word.”

“That’s your issue? I’m about to straight up murder you, and you’re arguing with me about political correctness?”

“We’re not too worried,” Tinaya explains. “Tyrants like you and Waldemar always create their own resistance. It’s not gonna last. You may be a pathfinder, but eventually, you will run out of paths that lead you to joy. You’ll always want more, and it will be your downfall. Extremus will get through this. It suffered but survived Consul Vatal, and Ovan Teleres, and Mister Radomil Cernak. It will survive you too.”

Pronastus smirks. “Will it survive Waldemar?”

“You’re obviously undoing that timeline,” Tinaya replies.

“Am I?”

“Oh, shit. The clones.”

“The clones,” Pronastus confirms. “They were never made by him. What would be his reasoning?”

“No, that doesn’t make any sense. You needed me to ask you to lead me to the Frontrunners for the consciousness transference technology. That’s where I found the first clone. You didn’t know about it beforehand.”

Pronastus smirks again. “I’m not in this alone. Others know where the path should go, and have known that for decades. They just didn’t know that I would be the one to take the first step in the right direction. Eight. Eight. Eight,” he says in a low and intimidating voice.

“What?”

“Eight. Eight. Eight,” Pronastus repeats. Oh, it’s a weird chant. “Eight. Eight. Eight.” It kind of sounds like hate with all that breathiness. His watch beeps. “Oh, my time is up. Don’t wanna wake up with brain damage, do I?”

“We’ve not given an answer,” Arqut tries to reason. “How exactly are you gonna force us to give the wrong one?”

“You have a time limit, remember?” Pronastus says.

“But you’re the time limit, and you’re not really dead. You have to go back in a minute or so. I doubt the Buffer will force us out. I mean, it hasn’t yet.”

“I started the clock,” Pronastus begins. “The next death will stop it. Some overlap is acceptable, but not three death events.”

“How do you know there’s gonna be another death soon?”

One last smirk. “Because I caused it, just like I caused Détha’s. Trust me, I didn’t miss anything.”

“Who did you kill?” Tinaya demands to know.

Oh, no. This is his last smirk.

“Who did you kill!”

Pronastus winks, then disappears.

“Response window expired,” a disembodied computerized voice that they don’t recognize announces. “Answer null. Prepare for IDCode purge.”

“No!” Tinaya and Arqut exclaim. “We answer yes! We answer yes!” Tinaya continues.

“Mom?” Silveon asks, having just appeared before them.

“NO!” they both repeat. Everything turns black.

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The Advancement of Mateo Matic: August 13, 2526

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There were some major issues with the sensor array, which delayed its activation. Aeterna promised that she had nothing to do with it, but they weren’t the dome police, so she wouldn’t have owed them an explanation either way. It was a year later now, and they were back on track. It would be turned on in a few days, when the team was out of the timestream again. It was inevitable, though, that the descendants of the Oblivios would start noticing the giant tower in the middle of their habitat. Well, they wouldn’t notice it, per se, but their instruments would claim that it was there, and if the Valerians didn’t want to damage people’s psyches, they would reveal themselves. They still didn’t know exactly how they were going to explain it, but now hoped maybe someone on the team had a good idea.

“I don’t know that we have to worry about it,” Leona claimed. They had spent the rest of yesterday in the penthouse, but now they were getting a look at the lower floors. She recognized them, and it clicked. “This is Arvazna.”

Mateo winced. “That micronation that you owned in The Third Rail?”

“That I will own,” Leona corrected. “It hasn’t happened yet, from this building’s perspective.”

“It was 130 years ago,” Marie reminded her. “I know, we’re time travelers, but if this thing ends up on an alternate Earth, thereby avoiding being detected here on Doma, it’s going to have to leave soon, and it’s going to have to go back in time, and then it’s going to have to be shunted to a parallel reality that doesn’t exist in present day.”

“The whole thing doesn’t have to end up there,” Mateo said. “This thing is, what, forty times larger than that one?”

“That’s true,” Leona agreed, examining the walls. “Tertius, how is this thing attached to the dome? Is it buried in the ground, or hanging from the apex?”

“Both, basically,” he answered. “They’re connected. It’s like a giant pillar connecting the ground to the top. Or a column? I don’t know, I’m not an engineer. I just asked Étude to build it, and she used her magicks.”

“I assume you have specifications for it, though,” Ramses said. “We would like to look at those. If we’re gonna bootstrap this tower to the Third Rail—or part of it—we will need to know how it works first.”

“Are you being serious? Are you just gonna make the tower disappear for us?” Tertius pressed.

“I think we’re fated to,” Leona said. The three of them went back upstairs, along with Aeterna and Marie, who was mostly just curious.

“I don’t know what understanding the engineering of the tower is going to do for them,” Mateo lamented. “You can’t just move a tower like this. None of us has that kind of power.”

“It doesn’t have to be one of us,” Olimpia claimed. “We already know someone who can do it. Well, we don’t know they can do it at scale, but we just met them. You partied with one of them.”

Mateo considered all the people he had met recently before landing on a guess. “The Overseers?”

“Yeah,” Olimpia confirmed. “They can just make one of their black hole portals, and send it through.”

“How’s the building going to move?” Mateo questioned.

“Gravity,” Romana suggested. “They can make the portal on the surface of the ground, and it will just fall through.”

“Is that even possible?” Mateo asked. “I’m guessing the foundation runs several kilometers deep. Could they get under it somehow?”

“You’ll have to ask them.”

“You want me to Boyd my way to them,” Mateo presumed.

“We don’t have time to get there and back using the slingdrives,” Angela reminded him. “It takes too long to recharge.”

“Plus, only you can find them through the dark particles,” Romana added.

A few hours later, Leona chuckled upon seeing Magnolia and Garland. “We were just gonna suggest that.”

“Great minds,” Romana mused.

“Can you do it?” Ramses asked the dark portal makers. “Can you make a portal wide enough to fit the tower?”

“The width alone is not really the problem,” Garland began. “Holding it long enough will be.”

“It’s not really the time either, son,” Magnolia said to him before facing Leona, “it’s the mass. I can hold a portal open for several minutes if nothing goes through in that time. But a tower? How long would you need? How long would it take to fall?”

“If we time it right,” Leona replied, “from the moment we release the clamps, to the second the roof makes it past the threshold, I would feel most comfortable with a minute and a half. With Proxima Doma’s gravity, it’s going to fall fairly fast, and get there in under that time.”

Magnolia’s eyes widened. “Whew, that’s a lot.”

“Together we can, though,” Garland said confidently.

She smiled at him. “Yeah, I’m sure we could do it. It would be a hell of a lot easier to send it somewhere with lower gravity, though, like outer space. I don’t know how to get it to another reality in the past anyway, so this would be just a stop-gap measure.”

“We just gotta get it out of the dome,” Rames said.

“I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this, everyone,” Tertius finally jumped in. “I regret asking them to build it in the first place. It was never necessary, and this isn’t the first headache I’ve gotten from it.”

Everybody filed into the elevator, and went down to the surface. The Overseers and the smart people began to survey the tower, and the surrounding area, rapidly developing their plan to make a gigantic building disappear. It was not a good plan, it was just the only one they had. Any number of things could go wrong. The Valerians could make the inhabitants forget they saw something unexplainable, but if the calculations were off by a single decimal point, memory would be the least of their problems. The apocalyptic explosion from the falling tower would send shockwaves across the surface...literally. It would decimate the dome, at best, and certainly kill everyone in it. As they were standing there, trying to consider every contingency, a tremor came through to remind them what started all this. It was a small one, but a herald of times far worse. They could see the nearest city shake in the distance. Nothing serious broke apart, but they could see tons of dust from here, and it might have been more destructive in other regions.

“We better do this now,” Magnolia decided. “If the ground begins to shake during the attempt, we could lose our balance.”

“That tremor means the big one is coming,” Leona tried to explain, “not that we won’t have another for a while.”

“Then let’s get on with it,” Aeterna contended.

“It could be minutes,” Leona warned, “and it’s not your call.”

“No, it’s ours,” Garland argued. “I say we do it, and we do it now. Ninety seconds is all we have available to us anyway.”

Just in case they needed a couple of extra hands, Angela teleported up to the control room in the penthouse with Tertius and Ramses, so they could release the clamps connecting the tower to the dome. They were coordinating on comms, relayed to Magnolia by Leona on one side of the cylinder, and Marie on the other with Garland. They were still in the middle of the process when another tremor began. “Guys, we need to abort,” Leona urged. No, she begged.

It was pretty much too late, though. Declamping the tower links wasn’t a single step. For clamps that large, it happened in stages, and they had already opened the first two stages, which placed them at more risk if they didn’t just move forward, full steam ahead.

“On my mark,” the team could hear Ramses say through comms. As he counted down, Leona and Marie’s voices synced with his, “eleven, ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, mark!” They slammed their fists down in the air, and pointed to the Overseers.

Magnolia and Garland opened a joint dark portal, slicing through the bottom floor like a hot knife through butter. The tower started to fall through. It was a magnificent sight to behold. The people in the control room appeared back down on the ground next to Mateo, Olimpia, and Romana.

“We can’t hold it anymore!” Leona cried, just about immediately, repeating what Magnolia was saying.

Marie reported a similar sentiment from Garland. “It’s worse than we thought! Best we can do is collapse the portal uncleanly, and generate an annihilating vortex!”

“I’ve never done that before!” Magnolia argued.

“Do it now!” Garland urged. There was absolutely no time to argue. After only about ten or eleven seconds, the portal fell apart, but it didn’t just evaporate into nothing. It exploded from the ground, and ate up part of the tower like a Lucius bomb. Unlike an L-bomb, though, it didn’t travel very far. Almost all of the tower was now falling towards them, preparing to crash on the surface. Leona teleported Magnolia out of the dome while Marie took Garland. Ramses hugged both Valerians, and spirited them away to safety.

Mateo was about to teleport too when he saw his wife, Olimpia take her Sangster Canopy out of her bag. She didn’t even give him the chance to protest before she jumped only a couple hundred meters away, directly underneath the falling tower. She opened it, and aimed it at the annihilator. She sent pockets of new space out of the tip. It wasn’t holding up the tower, but perpetually making the ground farther and farther away from it. She couldn’t hold on forever, though, and in fact, not for any meaningful amount of time. The Oblivios could not evacuate before she lost control. The first to escape would probably still be in the tunnel when it happened, and still be caught in the destruction. This was a desperate attempt doomed to fail.

But maybe Mateo could help instead. Both he and Romana jumped over to her, and took hold of the umbrella. “No!” he argued. “Just me! You two get out of here!”

“I know what you’re planning, dad! I can help!”

“You don’t have dark particles anymore!”

“Oh, yes, I do! Get out of here, mom!”

“Mom?” Olimpia echoed. “You’ve never called me mom before.”

“Go!” Olimpia reiterated.

“I love you!” Olimpia disappeared.

“Is this gonna work?” Mateo asked his daughter.

“Hell, yeah, it will!”

They both screamed their heads off. A massive swarm of dark particles erupted from them, through the umbrella. They were still adding space between them and the tower, but they were experiencing diminishing returns. It and the swarm met in the middle, but it was taking time for the dark particles to cover the entire thing. Meanwhile, it continued to fall, closer and closer to the surface. It might have appeared to be going rather slow from the outside, but it was actually accelerating, and would strike the planet with an even greater force than it would have had they done nothing but save themselves. The particles were nearly at full coverage and the tower was nearly upon them when the rest of the team appeared next to them. One by one, they took hold of the handle or the shaft, wherever they could find purchase.

“There’s nothing you can do to help!” Mateo shouted at them.

“We can die together!” Leona reasoned.

“That’s freaking stupid!” Romana volleyed.

“Don’t talk to your mother like that!” Olimpia scolded.

They continued to scream into the wind, as a team, and as they struggled to hold on, they started to float in the air a little. With one final push of their might, the dark particles turned all sorts of colors, and disappeared, as did the tower, and the whole team with them.

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The Advancement of Mateo Matic: August 9, 2522

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Mateo and Angela stood before three of the launch pads. Two claimant shuttles had already arrived, and the last one was landing now. No one had exited yet, per the Vitalemusian instructions. A few minutes after all shuttles were down, the hatches opened at about the same time. Korali, Bronach, and Old!Oaksent began to walk down their respective ramps. They were each accompanied by six others. Also per instructions, they were allowed to bring one lieutenant, one assistant, and four personal bodyguards. They were also allowed to leave one or two pilots in their vehicles, to be protected by no more than two security officers. They took full advantage of their limitations, which suggested that they would have rather had even more people backing them up. That told them something about how this was probably gonna go.

As the claimants approached, medical professionals first handed them their breathing apparatuses, which only Korali refused. “Team Matic,” Bronach said to them. “You’re looking...partial.”

Korali looked around. “Where are the other parties?” Her voice sounded normal, and it didn’t seem like she was having an issue pulling in oxygen. She must also have an enhanced substrate of some kind. Interesting that the two Oaksents apparently did not, despite being nigh impossible to kill.

“The Anatol Klugman and the Revolumusians are landing in a different dome, next to the Vellani Ambassador,” Angela replied. “We are here to escort you to a neutral third dome, where discussions will begin.”

“We would like to rest first,” Old!Oaksent all but demanded. Tok’ra was not with him. He was supposed to be, but they received word earlier today that he had business to take care of elsewhere. Mirage expressed that everything was okay, and that she would join him as soon as she dropped off her crew.

“That’s not happening,” Mateo informed them. “Your journey on your ship was not taxing. You would have plenty of time to sleep. If you want Team Matic here...we’re here. And we’re only here today. You know that.”

Korali scoffs. “He’s weak, and he’s losing. He knows we can’t harm him here. He doesn’t want a few hours to rest. He wants a year.”

“He’s not getting it,” Mateo reiterated. “Follow me.” He began to walk away while Anglea shooed them forward, and took up the rear. Vitalemusian guards surrounded them on either side. They were not taking any chances in this very delicate situation. He led them to the land vehicle that they were going to take to get to the diplomacy dome. It was gigantic, and should be quite comfortable for them all.

When the claimants realized this, they pretty much all stopped at the same time. “I’m not getting in that thing,” Old!Oaksent insisted.

Mateo was confused. “We can’t walk,” Mateo tried to explain. “It’s, like, 50 kilometers.”

“Don’t they have trains here?” Bronach asked. “I thought that was the go-to way to get around a paraterraformed planet.” He winked, reminding them that he was well aware of Castlebourne, and its location.

Angela looked up at the shimmering dome above them. “This world isn’t paraterraformed. It’s naturally habitable enough. The plasma domes are here for defensive purposes only. You can’t build permanent structures on the surface as there is too much seismic activity. Land vehicles are the only way. They live in them.”

“How do you not already know this?” Mateo questioned. “Didn’t you found all these planets?” Bronach probably knew all this entirely, and was just trying to get a rise out of them.

“I didn’t give this one very much thought,” Bronach replied. “I’m only one man.”

“Two, actually,” Old!Oaksent corrected.

“Shut it, grandpa.”

“You’re both old,” Korali argued.

“Get in the car!” Mateo urged.

They relented, and let the guards help them climb in. They found their couches, and settled in. Yes, they were couches, instead of seats. This particular vehicle was designed to transport VIPs. They weren’t really VIPs now, though. It sometimes felt like the driver was running them over boulders on purpose, instead of choosing the smoother path.

About two hours later, they were at their destination, having had to drive slowly because of the instability of the ground, as Angela had explained. This was actually a little faster than the locals would normally go, but they were tracking the progress of the other parties, and wanted to arrive at the same time. The claimants tried to engage her and Mateo in conversation, but the latter two realized that there was no reason why they all had to occupy the same space. It was more than big enough for each party to have their own compartment, so he made the executive decision to separate everyone.

The other vehicle pulled up next to theirs, and everyone started getting out. The Vitalemusian guards tensed up into high alert, prepared to stop any violence. There was very little obvious hostility among the enemies, though. If Mateo had to guess, none of them wanted to appear to see the others as any significant threat. In order to maintain a façade of confidence and dominance, they had to make it look like their opponents meant very little to them. Interesting again, and it too said something about everyone’s strategy going into this. They were going for the same one, which how would that turn out? The non-claimants had one clear advantage, however, in that the Revolumusians only came as a primary diplomat and a lieutenant. They didn’t feel the need to bring their own security guards at all, which really showed how self-assertive they were, and how safe they felt. One point to the allies already, and talks hadn’t even begun.

Team Matic reunited with each other, along with Vitalie and Kivi.  The 31 of them walked together to a third vehicle, still surrounded by about as many guards. The place was even bigger than the transporters, and resembled a gigantic clam. It did have wheels, but there were no tracks in the dirt, giving them the impression that it wasn’t designed to move regularly, but only when necessary. This might have been a particularly geologically stable region of the planet.

The diplomacy room looked like it was specifically tailored for this occasion, and it genuinely might have been. This meeting was on the books for an entire year, so they knew how many people were going to show up. It was a round table, much like the one in the VA, but this could specifically hold fourteen members. Well, it could technically hold more, but it was clearly divided up with concave sections around the edge, each one large enough to accommodate the primary and lieutenant. The rest of each party sat at a half circle table behind them, almost kind of like a VIP area in a nightclub. The entourage, who weren’t expected to speak.

While Mateo and Romana hung back in their little pod, Leona and Angela sat in their designated spot at the big table. They waited there silently until realizing that everyone was staring at them. Leona spoke, not with awkwardness or confusion, but calm, grade school teacheresque inquisitiveness. “Are you expecting us to run the show?”

“That’s why you’re here,” Bronach responded.

It hadn’t been entirely clear what her role here was supposed to be, but she was prepared for this. She glanced at the other members, whose facial expressions implied that they agreed with Bronach’s assertion. “Okay.” She looked over at Vitalie. “I need them to have compatible personal devices; tablets or handhelds, or something.”

Vitalie looked up at the nearest guard, who unlocked a cabinet on the wall with his biometrics. He distributed seven phablets accordingly.

Leona went on, “please take a few moments to write down your goals here. Only one each. Tell us all what you want. You can say, we demand a bouquet of flowers or I wanna destroy the entire universe. It’s up to you what you choose—however insane or unreasonable it may be—but it must be singular, and genuine. Go ahead.” She simply typed PEACE on her own device.

Once they were all complete, Vitalie used her master device to project holograms in front of each party to display their response. Bronach wrote total control over the entire Goldilocks Corridor, and the safe return of all Exin defectors and hostages. Okay. Korali and Old!Oaksent both basically said that they wanted control over their half of the Corridor, suggesting that they had already been working on a deal to divide territories in some fashion. It also clearly told everyone that Bronach should end up with nothing. The resistance fighters from Revolumus wanted the dissolution of the Exin Empire, and for a fair republic to be erected in its place. All three claimants would be barred from so much as thinking about taking any part in the new government. The Verdemusian warriors didn’t care what the people in this sector of the galaxy did, as long as they left everyone else alone. They were evidently fine with an oppressive government if the Exins—or anything which might take its place—remained isolationistic. They were particularly concerned with the secure and successful dispersal of the modular ships in the Stargate project. Team Kadiar asked for safe passage within the Corridor to ferry any refugee who would like to leave for Castlebourne. She quickly added not hostages in response to Bronach’s message. Vitalie abstained from a response.

“All right,” Leona said. “Now we know where we’re starting from, which means we know how far apart we are. Our goal here should be the move everyone as close to the center as possible. You all want power that you can’t have at the exclusion of each other. My job is to see what we can do to make everyone both unhappy, and happy. I’m actually already seeing a potential solution, and your goals are probably not as distant as you think. I’ll hold off on judgment for now, though. First, we all need to spend some time making clarifications and elaborations.” She literally rolled up her sleeves. “Let’s get to it.”

They talked all day, barely taking any breaks. It wasn’t as hard as they assumed for people to start recognizing Leona’s idea, even without her ever saying it out loud. She was right that they could reach an agreement without making too many sacrifices. The main thing that some of them would lose was absolute supremacy. Even Korali and Old!Oaksent’s plan to divide territories assumed that each planet in that territory would want to follow their new, singular leader. The easiest decision they made was to appease the Verdemusians to halt all aggression from the Anatol Klugman warship. Verdemus was sufficiently far outside of the Goldilocks Corridor, and Extremus was not even a blip on their radar anymore as it had long since reached its destination, or at least attempted to. As far as Project Stargate went, the Corridor was obviously wholly off-limits, but so was a sizable bubble beyond that, which should insulate them from interference from worlds that Stargate did manage to settle. It was hard for the Exins to agree to allow the module that would be responsible for colonization here, but that was kind of a non-starter. The Anglos needed to follow their pattern as planned. Even if that meant staying dormant forever, they couldn’t just send that module somewhere else. The algorithm didn’t work like that. That’s what they claimed anyway.

Next came the hard part, which was the question of who would control all of these stars. The claimants all had rational reason to believe that it should be them, but if they didn’t find a peaceful way to govern, the Revolumusians weren’t going to let them relax. The rebels were friends with the crew of the Vellani Ambassador, which was still the most powerful ship in the universe, even compared with the Jameela Jamil. If Team Kadiar ever decided to stop transporting refugees, and start using their vessel as a weapon instead, no one would be able to stop them. As small as it was, its speed was unmatched, and nobody wanted to antagonize them, especially not after Angela strongly suggested that Ramses was developing an entire armada of slingdrive-equipped battleships. That wasn’t actually true, but it was believable enough, and unequivocally within his capabilities.

They could not complete all of the negotiations in only one day, but they did have a framework for one. The three claimants could maintain control over the sector as a Triumvirate, but planetary and local governance would be completely democratic, as overseen by a team of Revolumusians. It wasn’t apparent how exactly this would all work, but they would spend Team Matic’s interim year hashing out the details. They still hadn’t figured out how to handle the refugee issue, but Kivi pointed out that there would likely be fewer applications for emigration if the citizens were treated well. They would be happy, and not interested in leaving, as wherever they were now were their homes. It was hard for the claimants to believe this, and it was true that there was no guarantee, but they seemed to be opening their minds. This might actually work out.

Team Matic disappeared at midnight, confident that all would be resolved by the time they returned. Of course, though, their faith was unfounded. When did anything ever work out that well for them? They finally found out why Tok’ra was not present as the equivalent of Old!Oaksent’s lieutenant. He decided that this meeting did not have the right to speak for the entire Goldilocks Corridor. He had been back on New Welrios, rousing a new rebellion. They too wanted a seat at the table, and nobody was having it. Surprisingly, not even the Revolumusians thought that they deserved a voice. After all this work, war was closer than ever.

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Microstory 2501: Mother of the Healer

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You can call me Mrs. Tipton. I always knew that my boy was special. He wasn’t born premature, but he was a very tiny little thing. They had to keep him in that box for so long, it was horrible. But he came out, and he fought for his life. This was long before his literal special abilities. Once I heard about what Landis could do, I was not surprised at what he did with it. He hasn’t always had his life together, but he’s always been a caring and kind person. I think it’s because he had to overcome so much so early on. It wasn’t only that, though. There is so much darkness and sadness in the world, and he hated to see it. I could tell that he felt powerless against all the heartache, so he kind of retreated into his shell. To some, this made it seem like he didn’t care, but it was the exact opposite. He cared too much, and it was so overwhelming. You know he has a lot more abilities, right? He can tell when people are lying, and can kind of persuade people to do things. He can’t outright force them, like mind control, but there’s a lot more that he could do, and for selfish reasons. He could have become quite rich, working for the government or a corporation. They would have paid good money to have him investigate for them, or spy. I’m so proud of him for doing the right thing with these gifts. I can’t tell you where they come from. He wasn’t born with them. Lord knows, his father and I didn’t give them to him. But I know that he’s not the only one, and I know that as soon as he got them, he started doing something with them. Of course now, we’ve started to hear about other people with their own gifts, but I don’t think they would have announced themselves publicly were it not for my son’s singular bravery. How long have they walked among us without saying anything or helping? His father suggests that maybe they have been helping all along, but they’ve had to remain a secret. Maybe that’s true. I just wonder if they could be doing more by stepping out of the shadows. That’s what my son did. He jumped right into the light, and made sure everyone knew that he could help them. He bought himself some real estate, and started churning out cures. It makes you wonder, would anyone else do the same? Was this foundation inevitable? Or is Landis the only one who could have pulled this off? Just something to think about when you’re waiting in line to have your life changed for the better forever.

Extremus: Year 105

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Today is the day. It might be the most publicized wedding in ship history. Why is it so popular? It seems that Waldemar and Audrey are somehow famous for being famous. A few people heard their story, and they told others, and the story spread. Even though the braintrust is aware that he is destined to become captain one day, to everyone else, there should be nothing interesting about this story. Yet here they are, waiting to get married to much fanfare. Audrey’s mother has been helping her get ready, as has Tinaya, since Audrey doesn’t have any friends besides little Silveon and her fiancé. She has a maid of honor, and bridesmaids, to be sure, but all at the insistence of Waldemar. He has chosen to perform a more traditional wedding. Audrey’s father will be giving her away like she’s a possession. The groom had a wild night with his buddies at a bachelor party. Again besides Silveon, all of these friends were fake, but they agreed to participate, because it sounded like fun, and he just has this magnetism. It’s part of why he ends up being the leader of the whole ship. He doesn’t take control using magical powers. He gets people on his side. He gets them to believe in him and his cause. This could be where all that begins.

“Thanks, mom. Could you go get me something blue?”

Her mother looks over at Tinaya, realizing that she’s being shooed out for a private conversation, but not wanting the day to devolve into a fight. “Yes, dear.”

Audrey picks up her long, flowing dress with her forearms so she can sit down on the ottoman.

“How are you doing?”

“I’m gonna throw up. Everyone’s gonna be watching.”

“That was the point, wasn’t it?”

“Should it be? We’re the ones who are putting the spotlight on him, and I find that sickening. We came here to stop him from being a ruthless tyrant, and we think that involves still helping him gain power, but we don’t know that. Should we be pushing him down into obscurity instead?”

Tinaya sits down next to Audrey, partially on her dress. She breathes in deeply, and makes it seem like she’s about to say something profound. “It’s too late. I don’t know if this is the right path, but you’re here now, and you’re in a better position than ever to control the narrative. If you had discouraged from pursuing notoriety, he would have caught on eventually, and resented you for it. He would have severed his connections to you and Silveon, and that could have been...permanent, if you know what I mean.”

Audrey nods. “He wants me to be a tradwife. He doesn’t want my input.”

“Then don’t give it to him. Make him feel like every idea you have is his.”

“He had a kitchen built in our new unit. No dayfruit, no synthesizers; not even as backup. I am to cook for him every day, the way they used to, where you buy the ingredients, and put them all together in a recipe.”

“How are you going to buy anything? Where are these ingredients coming from?” Tinaya asks.

“He also built a store. He doesn’t want me to be the only tradwife, and he’s not the only one who wants that.”

“He’s starting a movement,” Tinaya says, nodding her head. “Do you remember this, from the other timeline?”

Audrey takes a beat, then slowly shakes her head. “No. I mean, I think he treated his first wife like this, but I don’t think he convinced others to do the same. We did this. We made things worse.”

“I don’t think that’s true,” Tinaya contends. She stands to pace. “If he keeps his definition of a wife a secret, he’s free to act on his principles in secret. But by trying to get others to walk backwards with him, he invites scrutiny.” She shines her flashlight on the wedding poster on the wall. “Our spotlight will show the people the truth. We don’t have to build a resistance ourselves if people become disgusted with him on their own.”

“It’s his growing group of sycophants that worries me,” Audrey clarifies.

Tinaya opens her mouth to respond when she thinks better of it. They could go on and on forever, gaming out strategies, and trying to rig the system, but that’s not what today’s about. What Audrey needs right now is to pretend that she’s happy, or even find a way to not have to pretend anymore. “Well. Don’t let it worry you today. You look very beautiful, and your confidence needs to reflect that you belong here, like this. You’re going to brighten your eyes, go out there, and put on the performance of two lifetimes.”

Audrey takes a deep breath. “Yeah, you’re right.” She stands back up, and approaches the mirror, letting Tinaya stand behind her. She stares into the glass, contorting her lips, trying to form them into a smile.

“No, it’s not your lips that’s the problem. It’s your eyes. That’s where your real smile is. If you can make your eyes sing loud and proud, the corners of your lips will reach up to meet. There. Close, you’re really close. Oh, not so wide. You’re not in a dark room, trying to gather as much light as possible. Oh no, you went way too far the other way. Now you look mad.”

“I’m just trying to reset. Maybe tell me a joke?”

“Did somebody say mad ma?” The two of them turn around to find Waldemar’s mother, Calla. She looks surprisingly...sober. She’s gently shutting the door behind her. She glides over to them.

“We don’t think you’re mad,” Tinaya replies. “We don’t want any trouble.”

“Oh, honey, there’s no trouble,” Calla insists. “This is a great day.” She looks over at Audrey. “Finally, someone will be responsible for taking care of Waldy for me.”

“Mrs. Kristiansen—” Audrey starts to say.

Calla holds up a silencing hand. “You don’t have to explain yourself. I don’t know why you’re marrying my son, and frankly, I don’t wanna know. But you’re not as good of an actor as you think, and on this—on this one day—I’m afraid that won’t do.” She pulls a tiny silver tin from her purse, holds it in the palm of her hand, and carefully opens the lid. Inside of the tin is what looks like granulated sugar, but the granules are pretty large, and yellow tinted. “This...is madma.”

“I don’t know what that is,” Audrey admits.

“The name is ironic. It will make you feel serene and loving. You won’t be faking a smile; you’ll be genuinely happy. Not about my son, of course, but no one has to know that.”

“It’s drugs? You’re trying to give my daughter drugs?” That was a huge slip. “I mean, my son’s friend.”

“I assure you, it’s legit. I take it all the time. I prefer it now to alcohol. Just stick it under your tongue, and let it be absorbed into your bloodstream.”

“Thistle?” Tinaya prompts.

“I cannot condone the use of recreational drugs,” Thistle begins, “but objectively, I can confirm that that is indeed methylenedioxymethamphetamine, also known as MDMA, molly, or since the 22nd century, madma.”

“What are the side effects?” Tinaya presses.

Thistle drops a hologram down, listing all the negative effects of the drug, mostly framing them as problems that arise after repeated use.

“That doesn’t sound so bad,” Audrey decides. “It’s just one day.”

“I’m sure a lot of drug addicts throughout history have shared your sentiment,” Tinaya warns.

“Drugs were phased out at the same time that money was,” Audrey reasons, reaching into Calla’s hand, and taking the tin. “My problems are so much worse than money.” She licked her finger, picked up the granules, then stuck her finger in her mouth, moving it around for a more even distribution.

“It’ll only be a few minutes.” Calla takes the tin back, and begins to leave. “Merry Christmas.”

“I’ll never forgive you for this, Calla,” Tinaya calls up to her.

Calla stops, and looks back. “I won’t live long enough to care.”

Just after Calla leaves, Audrey’s mother returns. “What did that woman have to say?” She doesn’t like her either. Calla isn’t as good at hiding her true feelings as Waldemar, so she pretty much rubs everyone the wrong way.

“Aud was nervous about her relationship with her mother-in-law, but Calla came by to build bridges, and assure her that she’s happy that your families are coming together.”

“That doesn’t sound like her,” Mrs. Husk argues.

“I think she meant it.” Tinaya cannot disclose that she let her daughter take drugs, so this is a good enough lie. Had the mothers not seen each other in the hallway, Tinaya wouldn’t have said anything about Calla’s brief visit at all.

“Are you feeling better now?” Mrs. Husk asks Audrey.

Either Audrey is still faking it, or the drug’s effects are beginning to hit. “I’m so happy, mother.”

Mrs. Husk smiles tightly and nods. “Your father’s waiting in the corridor. It’s time.”

Tinaya excuses herself and leaves first. She joins her own husband and son in the front row of the groom’s side. “Who is that?” she whispers to Arqut. Why isn’t Jennings the officiant?”

“That man is a priest,” Arqut whispers back. “Or a reverend, or whatever. Waldemar asked him to take seminary classes from the archives. He’s been working on this for, like, three years.”

“And the captain’s okay with that?” Tinaya questions.

“Religion isn’t illegal, it just doesn’t exist anymore, except on days like this, which we know to be Christmas Eve. The charter technically allows for religious leaders to officiate weddings as well. The only requirement was that at least one person getting married be a member of the church,” Arqut explains with airquotes. It’s as real as they want it to be. It’s a special denomination of Christianity that only has two members.”

“Is he expecting Audrey to convert?”

Silveon leans in. “It’s just for show. Waldemar doesn’t believe in the hocus pocus either. He just wants this all to be very backwards. And he wants it to be special. No one else is getting married like this. Look at this place; it’s made of wood. I didn’t realize they had cut down enough trees on Verdemus to build an entire fake chapel out of wood.”

Arqut looks uncomfortable. “The wood isn’t from Verdemus.”

Tinaya’s rage bubbles up in her chest, threatening to spill out all over Waldemar’s asshole face. How dare he? She digs her fingernails into the seat of the pew, trying desperately to keep her cool. “This is not what the Attic Forest is for. Who the hell approved this?” Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Arqut turn his head to the other side of the aisle. She turns the same direction, quickly making eye contact with Oceanus.

I’m sorry, Oceanus mouths to her.

Tinaya isn’t wearing her wristband or her wristwatch. Instead, she has a holographic projector hidden in a dress-appropriate bracelet that she’s wearing. She takes Arqut’s hand and flattens it out so she has something to project the image onto. She taps on the images of the keys on her husband’s palm to write up a text message to Oceanus that reads, you will be.

Arqut reaches down with his free hand, and wipes the text away. “You are not...sending that to the captain.”

Tinaya gives Arqut the stink eye while she’s reaching over to arrange her son’s hand the same way. She projects her screen over there instead, retypes the message, glances at it to check for spelling errors, then seethes at Arqut again while sending it off.

Arqut looks back at the altar, and shakes his head. “You’re going to regret that.”

“You’re going to sleep on the couch.”

The ceremony begins, interrupting any further fighting between the two of them. Waldemar waits up at the front as Audrey walks down the aisle with her father. She looks gorgeous and ecstatic, but Tinaya can’t tell if anyone else can tell that she’s high. She’ll have to remember to ask Arqut whether he picked up on it, and to make sure that Silveon isn’t in the room when she does, because he would not approve. The ceremony is long and boring. Tinaya doesn’t remember what she learned in school about old Earth traditions, but it seems about right. All the inequality, all the possessiveness; it’s here. Audrey couldn’t be more pleased. She’s very smiley; showing all of her teeth. The drugs are definitely working.

After the wedding is the reception, and after that, the crowd cheers as the happy couple go off to their VR honeymoon. Obviously, no one is there to see what it’s like, but Thistle reveals that it’s a simulation of a beach resort on an island. Pretty typical. While they’re doing that, Waldemar’s mother kills herself in her unit. Despite not being in any real position of power yet, Waldemar uses his burgeoning influence to cover it up.

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