Microstory 2485: Passage of Rites

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They call this an antimetabole, with the name referring to the physical space where rites are performed, as opposed to the original phrase, which involves a more metaphorical passage from one state of being to another. A rite of passage is a ceremony—or a more abstract transitional period—that marks some change in a person’s life, often when they are still young. In some cases, it’s specifically meant to mark someone’s development from youth to adulthood. Bar Mitsvahs, Quinceñeras, and Sweet Sixteens are all about this concept, and come at the age when that culture believes an individual sufficiently matures. It doesn’t have to be based on a particular age, or there might be some leeway. For instance, our ancestors used to have to wait to learn how to drive land vehicles, and once they did learn this skill, it came with a sense of independence that they usually did not feel before. It often happened at a certain age, but it didn’t have to, and some people never learned. Different people have different ideas about what someone needs to experience in their life before they can be respected in some form or another. Some have believed that you weren’t a man, for instance, until you participated in a physically violent altercation. Others thought you really only needed to learn how to hunt game, or go on some kind of lone journey in the wilderness. Some rites of passage are a very specific set of rituals which offer symbolic practices to represent the transition. They might be asked to drink a bitter drink to symbolize the harsh realities of life, then receive a sweet candy to exemplify the reward of a life well lived. Some of them their participants prepared their whole lives for. A lot of the rites of passage shown here have been lost to time as the culture who practiced them forgot, or had newer generations who began to see less value in maintaining them. There’s a relatively new tradition on Thālith al Naʽāmāt Bida where the current permanent residents gift each of their younglings a stone every year of their lives. They are expected to hold onto their collection between the ages of six and seventeen, even as it grows, until their seventeenth birthday, when they throw all of them over a cliff. These stones represent the care and attention the child needed as they were growing up. The weight of them collectively represents the burden they placed on their families. Ridding themselves of their collections represents the second stage in their life, when they are now expected to fend for themselves—to collect their own proverbial stones. That rite of passage is here too, reenacted by visitors, so they can physically feel the meaning behind the traditions. Other rites are performed exclusively by androids, such as the human sacrifices, which thankfully, no culture today has continued to observe. As I was saying about the birthday observances, there’s a lot of fun here, and you can come just to party. But I hope you do venture out to the other areas, and see some of the more somber and profound events. You can learn about any of these things in the archives, but there’s nothing quite like seeing it up close for yourself. I’ve learned a lot here already, even though I’m an archaeologist, and I’m sure you will too.

Orthogradient: People of Stoutverse (Part VI)

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Primus Naraschone Mihajlović sat at the edge of her desk, body bent forwards at her waist, hands braced tightly against the wood. Splinters dug in underneath her fingernails, but she didn’t pay them any mind. She barely noticed, and she almost felt like she deserved it. The war was not going in her favor. The enemy just kept coming, and they couldn’t keep up with it. The aliens seemingly had an infinite supply of fighters, and there was no competing with that tactic. The home field advantage could only take them so far. If they could only figure out where these portals were going to form, she might be able to bottleneck them, or something, but they appeared to be random. Random or intentional. Or both. There was a knock on the door. “Enter.”

Her assistant and Head Bodyguard, Kineret McArthur walked in. “There’s another one.”

“Send a squadron. I’ll watch them all die from here.”

“The ship,” Kineret began to explain, “it’s different. It looks different, and as soon as the squadron responded tactically, it retreated.”

Naraschone perked up. “They’re adapting. Send a second squadron. Overwhelm them with everything we got.”

Kineret held her finger against her earpiece. “They don’t think it’s the Zippers. They sent a message in binary, so the scientists need time to convert it. The alien ship is projecting the golden spiral on the front. That’s a symbol of balance for us. Maybe it means the same thing to them.” She jerked her chin as she listened more. “More holographic images are coming in. Smiling humans. The vierkam heart. A...sort of half vierkam heart. They’re interpreting the next one as an olive branch.”

“What, are they surrendering?”

Kineret kept listening. “They converted the binary code. It’s just text. It says, we come in peace. Take us to your leader.”

“Have the General send them my coordinates.”

“Sir, I would strongly advise—”

“I’m not going to last another week in office, Kin. They’re this close to voting me out. Egypt and Holland are prepared to back my replacement now, which means he officially has enough votes. Dying at the direct hands of an enemy would at least make my biography read less pathetic. Give them my coordinates.”

Kineret turned away, and whispered the orders into her mouthpiece.

A couple of minutes later, as Naraschone was putting her blazer back on, a woman suddenly appeared in the office. “How did you do that?”

“I was born with it,” the stranger replied. “Are you this world’s prime leader?”

“Yes, I’m Primus Naraschone Mihajlović.” She held her hand out, palm up, as was the custom.

The woman looked down at it. “I don’t know what to do with that. Where I’m from, we hug upon first meeting. Most of my crew shakes hands like this.” She pantomimed moving her hand up and down, palm facing the side.

“We do it like this.” Naraschone swung her arm over, and palm circled Kineret, but Naraschone’s hand was on top, since she was the superior.

The stranger smiled, and reached out to mimic Kineret, but as an honored guest, it was her hand that should be on top. “Eliana Prime.” That’s just a coincidence. It’s literally my surname.”

Nararschone carefully turned her hand over for her, and performed the ritual. “So, you’re not from our world either? Humans evolved on other planets, or did you simply arrive in a form that I am supposedly more comfortable with?”

“It’s more complicated than that. I’m from a different universe. My crew all hail from different universes beyond that. We came together to fight the Ochivari.”

“Is that what they’re called?” Kineret questioned. She took out her handheld device to write that down, and take any other necessary notes.

Eliana lifted her chin as if to watch her type, but couldn’t really see, and didn’t care to. “Ochivari is plural. Singular is Ochivar. They originated on a planet called Worlon in Salmonverse. They evolved from semiparasitic insectoids which were accidentally introduced to human DNA millions of years prior. We don’t understand the mechanism by which the foreign code was integrated into their systems, but we hypothesize that it gave their ancestors a survival advantage over their cousins  who did not receive it.”

“This is good stuff, keep going,” Kineret encouraged.

“I’m no expert,” Eliana clarified. “I’m just the teleporter on the team. I’m not even the main teleporter. If you would like to speak with our captain, I could take you to her, but be warned, she is decidedly not human. Her form can be alarming to some.”

“I can handle it,” Naraschone insisted. “I’ve seen plenty of Zippers first hand.”

“Hold on,” Kineret interrupted, holding her earpiece again. “Another one just appeared. Very different form too. It’s...quite large.”

Eliana looked pleased. “Azura and the Transit found us. Thank God, we could use their help. Have you been at war for a long time? Ochivari don’t usually fight physically. They generally release this virus—”

Kineret interrupted again, “it’s a giant cube. It just appeared in the middle of Plangol Field.”

“A cube?” Eliana asked. “That would be the Crossover. There’s no telling who’s in it right now. It changes hands, and I’ve not even begun to explain to you how time works for people who traverse the bulk.”

“If you’re a teleporter, that means you can get me there?” Naraschone asked. “It’s on the other side of the planet.”

“Sir, please,” Kineret urged.

Eliana held out both of her hands. “All aboard who’s coming aboard.”

Naraschone grasped one hand while Kineret hesitated. “I guess I have to go to protect you,” she lamented before taking Eliana’s other hand.

The three of them were standing before the large Crossover cube. A ship was just landing next to it at the same time. Eliana looked upon it with a sense of familiarity that she did not show the cube. A second...building maybe, appeared as well. It was much smaller, fit for only a handful of people. Humans started coming out of all three structures, but more were coming from their own portals, each of which sparkled and shined with two or three dozen brilliant colors. A small group appeared, releasing a blast of energy that was enough to blow everyone’s hair back, but not enough to knock them over. A spacewoman appeared to be literally tearing through the colorful fabric of spacetime. More of this sort of fabric rippled and waved next to her as a coat formed from the aether. The man wearing it pulled the hood back, and smiled. Glass cracked and shattered as another man forced himself through his breach. He reached back through, and helped a companion of his across. A woman slowly faded into view to their left, sitting cross-legged on the ground. Yet another woman burst out of nothing, and crash landed next to her, but she seemed to be okay.

Eliana recognized some of them, but not everyone. She walked over to greet the others from her ship as they were descending the ramp. It was hard to tell who was in charge at first. Unless they came in together, they expressed surprise at being there together. Naraschone would think that the small group from the giant cube would be the leaders, but they looked just as out of the loop as everyone else. It was the woman escorted by the man who literally punched his way here who stepped away from the forming crowd, towards Kiteran and Primus Mihajlović. “Hello Primus. I’m Thack Natalie Collins, temporary coordinator of the vanguard. I wanted everyone to come here so they could see what happens when the natives of a given world fight back. You may feel distress, but you are faring better than you realize. When the Ochivari come to a universe, they usually only do one of two things. They leave it alone, or they sterilize the entire population, and then bug out. You’re proof that they do not get to decide everything.”

“I don’t understand,” Naraschone admitted.

“We’ll talk more about it.” Thack turned to the crowd, which quieted down for her. “Travelers of the bulk, welcome to Stoutverse. The fighting has only begun here. What the Ochivari do not realize is that everything they’ve been doing so far have been only minor skirmishes. The first battle in a multiversal war is coming, and you are all here to bear witness.” She consulted her watch. “The Transit will be arriving within the hour. Until then, I’ll ask the current operators of the Crossover—specifically the managers of Kingdom Hotel—to prepare a meal for us all. Khuweka, if you will, please take the Cormanu back into orbit, scan for breaches, and protect this world until the Transit Army arrives. Your crew will stay with us.”

“I would be honored to, Miss Collins.” This must have been who Eliana was talking about. While everyone else here looked human, Khuweka was tall, white, and almost monstrous. She could be intimidating if she wanted to be, but her voice was soft and unimposing. There was only one other like her. He was originally in the small building, but he followed his brethren up the ramp into the Cormanu without asking for permission, or even saying a word at all. Naraschone didn’t even know if he was a man. He just looked more masculine to her.

There were more in the Crossover cube than the small group that came out of it at first, but Naraschone didn’t get the impression that it was anywhere near full capacity. Picnic tables appeared out of nowhere, but Eliana wasn’t the one who did it. Her ship, the Cormanu itself appeared to be a conscious entity, capable of transporting anything from anywhere on the planet. Probably no one was missing all this stuff right now since most people were trying to survive in the bunkers. Well, not most. They had yet to build sufficient facilities for the entire population of the planet. They never thought they would need anything like that. They should have been better prepared. Lives would have been spared.

Kineret was uncomfortable taking this time away from the chaos of war that they had been in the midst of for the last few years, but Thack Collins was confident that the two Maramon, as they were called, were capable of defending them from orbit. Some of the others who came here were not soldiers, but a lot of them were, so they could jump into action if another wave showed up. Eliana’s remark that they were from all different sorts of universes was true of those who did not arrive in the Cormanu. The man who escorted Miss Collins was father to a young woman on the Cormanu. Her mother was supposed to be coming next on the fabled Transit, which would reportedly mark the whole world’s salvation as it was the only thing actually designed for a war like this one. Naraschone was holding off on judgment until later. For now, they just enjoyed the food that a man named Bell prepared, and talked. The two locals stayed quiet at first to let the others catch up with each other. This was evidently a pretty big deal. They had never all come together like this. There were supposed to be an infinite number of universes out there, but there must be something special about this one. Thack called it Stoutverse, a term that the natives had never used for themselves, but if Naraschone had anything to do with it, they would start now.

Naraschone was laughing with a new friend she met named Curtis, who had an endless supply of interesting stories about his time in an unnamed universe where he was part of a group of superheroes. He was part of The Grenadiers now. But Kineret wasn’t listening to him anymore. She was instead listening to her earpiece, which kept a constant consolidated stream of battle chatter. She was genetically engineered to be able to comprehend multiple voices at once, allowing her to keep apprised on the situation from many sources at once. It was called the Unified Tactical Awareness System, and while a lot of key players around the world could use it effectively to some degree, she could parse the highest number of distinct channels of anyone, which was why she worked directly for the Primus of Earth. “What is it?”

Kineret looked up at the crew of the Cormanu, who appeared to be listening to their own radio system. “They know. Breaches all over the place. It’s a full tactical assault.” The whole crowd stopped talking as she faced her superior. “We need to get you to the bunker. Eliana, it’s back on the other side of the world.”

“The mass incursion,” Thack Natalie Collins said, standing up. “I predicted this, but timekeeping is difficult to measure for me. You have so many time zones.”

Ecrin, the Captain of the Prototype—the small building that only a handful of people crewed—stood up. “What do we do?”

“I’m not a military leader,” Thack replied. “I can’t tell you what to do. But given the low maneuverability of your respective machines...I suggest everyone convene on the Cormanu.”

“Diamond Zek,” Kivi said, “beam us all up.”

They nearly all disappeared, leaving behind only Naraschone, Kineret, Thack, Thack’s bodyguard and universe puncher, Limerick, and Eliana. “Where’s this bunker?” Eliana asked.

“Right underneath the International Assembly House,” Kineret answered as she was tapping on her handheld device. “I’ll get you the coordinates.” Before she could recite them, a loud horn blared in the distance. A giant, and particularly long, object raced towards them. It stopped suddenly, right between all of the other machines and the picnic tables.

A woman stepped out of it, and approached the small group. Others followed behind her. “Where’s my daughter?” she asked Thack.

Thack pointed towards the sky, and looked up. “On the frontlines. The Darning Wars have begun.”

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Extremus: Year 60

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Today is the grand opening. Hundreds of workers contributed to the construction of the Attic Forest, whether it was planting a single seed, or installing the walls on what was once the exterior of the ship. They actually made Extremus bigger, adding an entire new layer on the top. Well, it wasn’t entirely new. There was already and eleventh deck, but it hardly extended more than a few meters. Now the rest of the kilometer has been filled in for this project. Right now, it’s all dirt and paths, with a few little ponds here and there, many of which are connected to each other via a series of streams, waterfalls, and pumps. There are spots to picnic, and a smallish venue for entertainment. The paths will be predominantly lined with beautiful plants that were genetically engineered from the DNA data stored in the database. Most of the plants were taken from Earth, but a few came from Thālith al Naʽāmāt Bida’s records.

Right now, the only stuff that’s full grown is the bamboo, which is exclusively used to signify entrances, exits, facilities, and emergency terminals. At the moment, the rest of the trees and plants are ready to go. Temporal engineer Greenley Atkinson and her team have created a time bubble that will speed up the growth of all of this life. They just have to find out who is going to push the button. It’s up to Tinaya to pick the name out of the proverbial hat, but the ceremony is being delayed, because there is an issue in the basement. “What is it? People are waiting.”

“It’s Operation Wellington, sir.” After Tinaya was promoted to Senior Forest Guide, it only seemed right to hire a Junior Forest Guide. Cainan Suárez switched his primary studies to botany soon after Project Attic Forest was announced. He is still studying in college, but he helps out in his free time. He missed a skills evaluation this morning to work on this, but his advisor is allowing him to make it up next week. Cainan is distantly related to Halan Yenant’s first Lieutenant, Rita Suárez.

“Obviously that’s why we’re down here. What’s the issue?”

“It’s this.” Cainan steps over to the wall screen, and brings up the genetic information for the Journey Tree. “Okay, here is the DNA for a giant sequoia. This is supposed to be the genetically modified DNA for the giant sequoia we’re planting, because it needs to be tailored for an indoor environment.”

This is how Tinaya knows that the mind sharing machine that messed up her friends’ brains gave her knowledge that came from at least one person besides the other three in the machine. None of them possessed this much of an understanding of genetics. “It’s too big.”

“Yeah. They modified it too much. The root system is going to dig too deep, and the canopy is going to spread too wide.”

In the center of the ship, there is an atrium. It’s this giant metal tube that goes all the way from the engineering section, up to the tenth level. Tinaya isn’t sure why the ship designers included it. It’s big, but it’s not beautiful. There’s nowhere to sit, and no elevators or stairs. There’s no plant life either. It just sits there. If you happen to be on the bottom deck, you can walk through it, but if you’re on any other level, it just forces you to go around. Because it’s thirty meters in diameter, and it serves no real purpose...until now. Now it’s going to become the growing tube for the ship’s largest tree. It will grow to be so big that they can’t even plant it in the Attic Forest, or it will crash into the ceiling. Actually, all of the trees would crash into the ceiling, if given a chance. Once that big red button is pressed, the tallest of the trees are going to grow up to thirty meters, which won’t work, because the ceiling only goes up six meters, which is two meters higher than most decks. That’s why Atkinson also designed a pocket dimension for them all to grow up into. But even that won’t be enough for the ultimate height of the Journey Tree. Hopefully, by the time it gets to be too big, though, they will be able to transplant it to the Extremus planet. That’s one reason why it’s not going to be part of the temporal bubble. It represents the journey that they’re all making together, so it will grow at the same rate as everyone else. That’s the idea, anyway.

“How did they make this mistake?” Tinaya questions. “They can see, it’s got a radius of fifteen minutes.” She points to the atrium, and then down to the floor “And they know that below this level is frickin’ outer space. It can’t be that big.”

“I know, I wish I had caught it, but I’m still learning this stuff.”

“No,” Tinaya says with a shake of her head. “That’s not your job. I should have caught it. I know how to decipher this stuff.”

“The way I see it,” Cainan goes on, “we have two options. Either we delay the planting of the Journey Tree so this problem can be fixed, or we plant it anyway, and hope that the walls of the atrium regulate the tree’s growth.”

She shakes her head again. “We can’t let it do that. First, I would say that the roots are the bigger problem. They’ll spring a leak, if allowed to go as deep as this code commands it to. But also, the sequoia is a symbol. It’s a symbol of unimaginable growth. It’s a metaphor for Extremus itself. We can’t let the walls dictate how big it gets, because the who reason we’re on this mission is to go against the rules, and find a new home in the outskirts of the galaxy.”

“Yeah, I was kind of thinking the same thing too.”

She sighs. “I can fix it. I can rewrite the code, faster than even the real geneticists can. I just...I don’t have time today. I don’t want to delay the planting. The reason we’re doing these two things at the same time is to lean into the symbolism I was just talking about. I mean, ideally, we would have planted it on day one, but barring that, any day but the day that the rest of the Attic Forest goes online will be arbitrary and meaningless. It has to be today, and I have to be in two places at once.” A child is going to be selected to engage the temporal bubble that will grow the forest before their very eyes. Every kid who wants the honor has put their name into the lottery, which Tinaya is scheduled to select right around...exactly right now.

“What if...no...” Cainan doubts himself.

“No idea is a bad idea. Go ahead and say it.”

“If we’re most worried about the roots, then let’s not plant it on the bottom level. Let’s toss in some more dirt, and plant it higher.”

“I dunno,” Tinaya says nervously. “Look at this here. They also programmed it to be bigger than a normal giant sequoia. In the next 156 years, this thing is going to grow, and at the moment, it will be a tight fit. The canopy could reach the top of the pocket dimension. In order to get this project passed, Tinaya and Lilian had to explain how they were going to fit the really tall trees in the forest. Most decks are four meters high. Some of them are double heighted which means the ceiling of one deck has been excluded, and is just using the ceiling for the deck above it. And some parts of some decks are only two and a half meters high, leaving the rest for crawl space. But all added up, including the thick hull, Extremus is only about fifty meters high. The government didn’t want to build a forty meter high deck on top of that just for the forest, so to make it work, the pocket dimension will make it bigger on the inside. There are risks to this. If there is ever a power failure on the ship, they’re going to prioritize things like life support and artificial gravity over superfluous pocket dimensions. Perhaps one day, the ceiling will be raised, but that’s a decision for a future administration. For now, if everything remains as is, and that giant sequoia gets too big, it’s unclear what will happen.

“What do we do? Do we lie? We could plant this tomorrow, and just tell everyone we did it today. That’s why it’s a secret. I mean, of course, this isn’t why, but we may as well take advantage of that.”

“No, that won’t work either,” Tinaya contends. “I’m going to repair the DNA, and the file will reflect the save date before we 3D print the seed. There will be a record of the delay in planting, or at least it could be called into question, and that would just be embarrassing.”

“I’m all out of ideas then.”

“You could do it.”

“Me?” he questions. “I can’t write code like that. Like I said, I’m just learning.”

“But you can pull a name out of a hat,” Tinaya reasons.

“You want me to do the ceremony. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. I’m just a Junior Guide. I can’t do that either.”

“Cainan, that’s a made up job. These are all made up. We’re making up the rules as we go along. There’s no reason you can’t do it. Just go up there and pick a name. When the kid shows up, shake their hand, crack a few jokes—”

“Crack a few jokes? What jokes? I only know dirty jokes, and I don’t think you want me to say them on broadcast.”

“You’ll know what to do; I trust you. Lilian will be right there next to you. Meanwhile, I’ll be down here, recoding this seed.”

“You don’t have that much time. If the lottery draw starts right now, the kid will push the button pretty quickly.”

“No, I won’t be planting the seed at the same time, but it will be before midnight.”

He hesitates. This isn’t his thing. People aren’t his thing; he’s always said that. He’s much better with plants. He talks to them, and treats their reactions to his care as responses. But she really does have faith in him, and he trusts her just as much. “Okay. I’ll need to change first, though, and my cabin is on the other side of the ship.”

“You don’t have that kind of time.” She takes off her ring, and hands it to him. “We’re obviously not allowed to teleport, but I have my ways. Just rub the gem, and concentrate on your destination. Make sure to make jumps to unoccupied spaces, so no one sees you. And obviously don’t tell anyone about it. I’m not supposed to have that.”

“You are in two places at once sometimes. I’ve always thought that.”

“Go, Cainan. Good luck.”

“Good luck to you too.” He puts the magic ring on, and disappears. Hopefully he didn’t accidentally land on the bridge, or something.”

Tinaya takes a deep breath, and switches the broadcast on so she can keep one eye on the show. Her other eye will be focused on her work. She’s had this genetic engineering knowledge for years now, but she’s not used it, because the right situation has not yet come up. Well, it’s here now, so hopefully whoever’s mind she unwillingly copied them from is as smart as her initial impression makes them seem. Two centuries from now, children may be able to sit under this tree to read or have a chat, but that can’t happen unless she figures out how to translate it from code to seed.

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Extremus: Year 56

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They did not have much time to listen to Nerakali Preston explain what she meant when she claimed that she died and lost all of her powers. They could hear a security team coming down the hallway. Rodari switched off the mirror quickly, so that when the guards opened the door, it looked like they were still trying to figure out how to work the thing. Tinaya was grateful for his quick thinking. There was no way that they weren’t going to get caught, but at least now no one knows that they were trying to reach out to Nerakali. Their lie was that they were trying to contact Captain Halan Yenant. It was believable and not unreasonable. Tinaya wanted to be Captain some day, and even though that dream seems to have fallen right back into the valley of implausibility, it made sense that she would seek counsel from the first Captain.

It’s been nearly a year now. They were all sentenced to as much time in hock for unauthorized entry into a restricted area. The court was not cruel, though. Instead of keeping them locked up separately, they lived together in a sort of prison suite. They had their own rooms, but also a communal area. It was during this time that Tinaya and Rodari got to know each other better as they worked together to take care of Omega and the others. Though Valencia and Lataran grew more independent by the week, being locked up was not doing any favors to their recovery. Today is the day that they’re going to be released, and Captain Soto Tamm himself would reportedly like to come down to see it happen in person.

“Can we talk?” Rodari asks.

“Yeah, is everything okay?” Tinaya replies.

“I wanted to, uhh... I wanted...”

“What is it, Rodi?”

“He shuts his eyes, and breathes out his nose. He starts to whisper, “Bridger spies are not allowed to fraternize.”

“Right,” she agreed. “We’re just friends.”

“Are we, though?”

It is an unwritten rule that Captains do not get themselves into romantic relationships. It’s a sacrifice that they’re all expected to make. Aunt Kaiora broke this convention with Chief Medical Officer Holmes, but they never really made it official. Candidates for the civilian government tend to do better in the elections when they can parade around their spouse, but the crew—particularly the executive crew—is the opposite. It just seems to everyone that it should be like that. Tinaya cares about Rodari, but she made the choice to not even consider dating when she was a child, for this very reason. So it really doesn’t matter how she feels, and it doesn’t matter how he feels either. Then again, everything Avelino supposedly did to restore her reputation appears to have been reversed by the mirror room incident. The chances that she actually does make Captain one day have only gone down. He’s no better off. “We are.” She tries to sound certain, but the expression she slips into at the end of the sentence betrays her.

He pretends not to notice. “You deserve to be loved, Tinaya, on a personal level. You don’t have to be all things to all members of the crew, and residents of the ship. You’re allowed to have your own life.”

She breathes in deeply. “No. I’m not. Captain Tamm is coming today. I have to show him that I’m worthy. Now, my stint in hock does not look good on my record, but I’m not going to stop going for this. I’m not gonna quit. Someone will be replacing him in seventeen years, and I won’t stop fighting to be that person until someone else sits down in that seat.” Ugh, she doesn’t have time for this. They still need to figure out how to fix their neurological issues. She’s been spending a lot of her time organizing the knowledge that she absorbed from the others. Now that she has the tools in her brain, she needs the tools to get back into the Bridger section. They still don’t know who did this to them, but she is pretty sure that she can trust Rodari. They just need to make sure that no one else catches them. The first step is getting the hell out of here, and the last one is total domination. Getting a boyfriend is decidedly not a step on the task list. 

“I understand, I just...wanted to get us both on the same page.”

She nods once respectfully, as if they have just finalized a modest real estate deal.

Tao Li approaches them from the hallway. They don’t even lock the door anymore. None of them is going to try to escape, and even if they did, they would have to get through several more doors before they reached any semblance of freedom, and even then, they’re stuck on a spaceship in the intergalactic void. Where would they go? Tao became Hock Watcher years ago when the first one, Caldr Giordana retired a week before he died. Fortunately, as his health was beginning to decline, he took on an apprentice, so Li knows what he’s doing. “Tamm isn’t coming.”

“Let me guess,” Rodari says with a chuckle. “He’s busy dealing with the longest stretch of peace that this ship has experienced since it first launched?”

“That’s not for me to know,” Li replies, “and it’s certainly not for you to know. Anyway, he has sent his lieutenant in his place. Allow me to introduce you to Second Lieutenant Athan Velitchkov.” He steps away to reveal the man behind him.

Tinaya resists her urge to crack a joke about not being able to swing the First Lieutenant. “Lieutenant Velitchkov,” she instead says with an outstretched arm. It’s nice to meet you.” Second Lieutenants can be touchy about their position. It’s technically more correct to address him with his full title, but leaving out the second part is more likely to make him happier.

He smiles, and shakes her hand. “We’ve actually met, but I doubt you would remember. You were about three at the time.” Every important member of the crew has a reputation that goes beyond what people know for sure about them. His reputation is that he’s quiet, nice, and as sharp as a whip. He’s also known to be a lot more competent than his bosses, though it’s unclear how he feels about that, or about them. He smiles even wider, and faces Li. “Thank you, Hock Watcher, you may go now. You as well, Mister Stenger. I would like to speak with Captain Leithe alone.”

She looks bashfully at the floor. It’s fine when her peers joke about her already being the Captain, but when a real member of the crew says it, it rings a little differently.

He wraps his arm over her shoulders, but does not actually make contact. He just starts walking away for a private conversation, and allows her to follow. “Can you keep a secret, Captain?”

“I would ask you to stop calling me that, sir?” she requests.

“Can you keep a secret?” he repeats.

She nods.

“I’m calling you the Captain, because I know that you’ll be the Captain. I even know when. And I know this, because you and I went to the same school.”

Her eyes widen, and she looks back at Rodari.

“Yes, I’m aware that he too attended said school, but I still wanted to speak with you alone. If you would like to share what we discuss with him later—if you trust him enough for that—spy to spy, then I’m not gonna write you up. I just wanted to touch base with you, because this experience in hock has been what I’m sure you believe to be a setback, but I promise that it is anything but.”

“Sir?” She doesn’t understand.

“Tamm hasn’t gone through anything. He was born to a lot of privilege. He’s never suffered, he’s never lost, he’s never had to work for anything. People are going to get sick of that, if they haven’t already. What you’ve gone through is not what’s going to stop you from making captain, it’s what’s going to get you into that seat. Make no mistake, no one is doing this on purpose. We just see the future, and we’re allowing it to happen. We could stop it. We could protect you. And you would still become Captain. But you wouldn’t be respected, and that’s what we need. That’s what our future needs. Let me ask you this, have you ever heard of the term Eighth of Eight?”

“No,” she answers truthfully. “But it sounds like something that I shouldn’t hear about. It sounds like a temporal issue.”

He nods. “Yenant, Belo, and Leithe were all great leaders. Tamm is an okay guy, if you get to know him. Honestly, your two successors are up in the air, though. We don’t know how they’ll fare, because the future keeps shifting. You keep shifting it. You’re making decisions outside of time that we don’t understand. Now, I’m not going to try to explain it to you.” He looks over at Valencia. “I’m sure you have the knowledge somewhere in there yourself. But what I can tell you is that the eighth Captain...is not shifting. That asshole is written in stone, and it’s looking more and more like there’s a reason for that. Like...another force at play is making him inevitable, despite the fact that he hasn’t even been born yet.”

“Why are you telling me all of this?”

“As I said, he’s inevitable, but you can alleviate the problem, by being the best Captain this ship has ever seen, and making the next two after you even better. People will fight for Eighth of Eight, but they’ll surely win unless people also fight for you. You will become a symbol, an historical figure, whether you want to be or not. The future leaders will cite your tenure as the reason for whatever they think that future should be. You can either let the good guys of that future cite you for your successes, or the bad guys cite you as a failure. The Bridgers, they—we brought you into this; we created all this drama surrounding the years leading up to your rise to power, hoping to make you strong. Now you can give up, and just rest on your laurels, or you can be the source of inspiration for the next generation, and the next. That could be what makes Eighth of Eight’s reign of terror ultimately short-lived, and corrected infinitely afterwards.”

“You’re somehow telling me too much about the future while not really saying anything about what I’m supposed to do about it.”

“That’s my strength as an orator. That’s why the Bridgers chose me, and why Tamm chose me too. I was gonna be Captain myself, ya know. The Bridgers kept trying to put one of their own in that chair, until they realized that their safest bet was to find someone who was destined to sit there anyway.”

“So they chose me? I’m a puppet.”

“Everyone is a product of their environment and upbringing. That’s why I’m here, to give you the scissors to cut your strings. But it has to be a choice. Cutting all of them means cutting yourself off from the only people on your side.” He hands her her skeleton key. “Leaving at least one on, at least lets us keep helping you.” He walks away coolly.

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Microstory 1941: Uneven Trident

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Generated by StarryAI text-to-image AI software

Myka: So, what is this formation called?

Reese: It’s called the Uneven Trident. The center tine is only responsible for heading for the objective. The two tines on either side are responsible for protecting them.

Myka: Why are we farther behind the right tine?

Reese: They’re responsible for protecting the leaders. We’re responsible for protecting them as well as the leaders. This is the standard configuration for a six-person team on an extended journey, as opposed to a specific raid.

Myka: It’s funny that you have all these different arrangements, yet fugitive agents generally work alone.

Reese: We like to be prepared, for anything.

Leonard: *click, click, click*

Reese: They found something. Head on up there. Wave your girls over there too. I’m gonna run a fifty meter radius perimeter sweep.

Myka: *approaching Leonard and Freewoman 3.* What is it?

Leonard: The footsteps stop here, and then there’s this thing.

Myka: What is it?

Freewoman 3: Some kind of pattern in the sand. Pretty large, by the looks of it.

Myka: *straightening her posture as much as possible* What does this look like to you, Freewoman 2? I’ll give you a hint; it was in that movie we watched last week.

Freewoman 2: *getting a better look too* It kind of looks like a crop circle.

Leonard: *placing an ear on the ground* It may be my imagination, but I think I hear...machinery?

Freewoman 4: Maybe it’s their ship.

Leonard: They didn’t come in a ship.

Freewoman 3: There’s nothing out here. We’re so far away from any sort of semblance of civilization, if you’re hearing anything, it’s manmade. Or alienmade, as it were.

Reese: Y’all seein’ this? It’s big. It’s really big. More than a hundred meters wide. I stepped on it. There’s something different about the ground where it’s been depressed. It’s...harder, like there’s something buried just underneath.

Freewoman 3: If we think there’s a ship buried just underneath the ground, there must be a way to access it. What do we do, try to open it?

Leonard: Why is everybody lookin’ at me?

Reese: You’re the closest we have to a resident alien expert. What do you think? If we find a door, should we open it?

Leonard: If we find a door, yeah, I guess that’s why we’re here, right? At least that’s why you and I are. The rest of you can leave now to protect yourselves.

Myka: We’re staying. Six-person team, right?

*the other free women cock their guns*

Reese: Are you legally allowed to carry those firearms?

Freewoman 2: Nope. *points her gun at the ground* Wanna fight about it?

Reese: Not at this juncture. Welp. This triangle is precisely where the footprints end, so I’m guessing it’s the entrance. Let’s see if we can’t figure this out.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: December 31, 2398

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It takes a second for them to realize that Treasure never actually said a word with her mouth. Instead, an invisible speaker in the tiara that she’s wearing outputs her voice. It does sound like what they would expect a woman of her looks to sound like, but they all independently decide to not ask her about it. Mateo steps back into the master sitting room to shake Treasure’s hand. “I’ve been trying to get a hold of Thack Natalie Collins via Amber Fossward this whole time. Did you just get my message?”

“Miss Collins didn’t pass along any message,” Treasure says. “I heard a scream. I thought it was just the Time Shriek at first, but I felt compelled to investigate.”

“That’s weird that you would hear that from the bulk,” Leona says from still inside the neuro-tampering chamber. “What is this room?”

“What was the message?” Treasure asks Mateo.

“Can you help us get out of here?” Mateo recites the psychic signal he was trying to send across the bulkverse.

“I can, yeah,” Treasure says politely.

“Is it okay if you take two trips?” Leona asks. “There are four of us.”

“No, five,” Mateo says. “Alyssa needs to come too.”

“She can’t,” Leona tells him with a shake of her head. “We’ve already seen her in the future. She’s destined to wait in a time bubble. If we hadn’t found her, we never would have known to come back here to get you.”

Treasure chuckles. “Four, five; I don’t need two trips. I can take you all.”

“Two people is usually the limit,” Leona points out.

“It’s not my limit,” Treasure contends, literally rolling up her sleeves. “Where would you like to go? I hear Schurverse is nice this time of Bearimy.”

“We actually just need to get to the future,” Marie clarifies. “Preferably November 26, 2398, but at least no sooner.”

“That’s four and a half billion years from now,” Leona adds.

“I can’t technically travel through time,” Treasure explains. “But what I can do is take you out of this brane, then back in at a different point in time.”

“That works for us,” Mateo says. “But actually she needs to go to a different point, and a different reality.” He points to Abigail.

“Then I will make two trips.” Treasure steps into the neuro-tampering room, and offers her hand. “I can’t read your mind, but my ability can. You navigate, and I’ll drive. We’ll get to where you need to be. Just concentrate on your target destination.”

While Abigail is on her way home, Mateo and Marie carry a sleeping Danica over to the couch. Leona starts to take the neuro-tampering device apart. She rips out its guts, and throws it into a pile. She places the innocuous pieces, like the casing and hardware, into a separate pile. That can all stay, because it’s not enough to rebuild the whole thing. Mateo and Marie come over to help, following her direction.

Just as they’re finishing up, Treasure returns. “It turned out to be a rather long trip. Something I should have said to your friend is that we can’t really talk while we’re in the bubble, but you can breathe just fine. Don’t try to hold your breath, it will only make the pressure worse. You can try to use hand signals but it’s also a bit hard to move. Otherwise, just enjoy the ride.”

Once they seal up the secret bookcase entrance, Treasure gathers them together and screams. As the sound intensifies, they feel themselves being jerked into the protective bubble she mentioned before with the same force as the start of a roller coaster. They’re then pulled into the bulk. Treasure was telling the truth when she said that they would be able to breathe, but not speak. They could hear each other’s muffled voices, but not make out any words. The bubble wasn’t this hollow object that they were inside of, but a dense gel that formed around each of them tightly. There wasn’t any seating per se, but they could bend their knees, and adjust their weight as they would if sitting down upon something.

They float in darkness mostly, but occasionally detect the vague outline of gargantuan objects in the distance when some kind of light ripples by. They look like knives, and Mateo gets the sense that each one is its own universe. When it’s over, they find themselves standing in the middle of a dense forest at twilight. “This is my homeworld, but I don’t think they want you spending much time here,” Treasure says apologetically.

“That’s okay,” Mateo says sincerely. “Perhaps one day.”

She nods and screams again, sending them all on the journey back. This leg is much shorter, suggesting that their respective timelines are closer in modern days, but Mateo doesn’t really understand the hyperdimensional physics going on here, and he doesn’t believe Leona does either. Despite it being her field of study, this goes far beyond her education and experience. It’s like the difference between knowing that an apple will fall down to your head from the tree, and truly understanding why and what causes that. The scream is complete when they land at their destination. At least that’s where they think they are; it’s where they’ve stopped.

“This doesn’t look familiar,” Marie notes. “Leona, what time is it?”

She looks at her watch, which always knows the exact time and date for when and where she is, no matter how much time traveling she’s gone through. “December 31st, 2398 at 15:02. Hm.”

“Sorry, I’m off,” Treasure says.

“No, I was meant to be the navigator,” Leona laments.

“No, it was me. I thought I overshot it. I’m still pretty new at this, to be honest. I should have been upfront about that.”

“It’s really fine,” Mateo tells her. This isn’t that long. I mean, it’s pretty long for me, but November 26 would have been a gap too.”

“Look at that architecture,” Marie says as she steps towards the skyline, towering up into the twilight sky. “We can’t be in the Third Rail. No where on Earth is like this; not yet, anyway.”

Leona looks down at her watch again. “Unless this thing is broken, it’s right. Maybe we’re in the wrong reality. I worked really hard to think about the right one, though. I purged all other thoughts from my brain.”

“Could your watch be broken? Did leaving the universe mess it up?” Mateo asks.

“I’ve done it before,” Leona notes. “It’s never been an issue.”

“This is definitely salmonverse,” Treasure assures them.

“Can we ask that person?” Mateo suggests. “Would it be weird?”

Leona shrugs her shoulders. “If he looks at us funny for asking what year it is, what’s the worst that could happen?” She leads the way towards the man who is walking his dog along the treeline. “Excuse me?”

“Yes?” He’s not perturbed that they’re interrupting him in the first place, which is a good start.

“Could you tell me...?” She can’t even say it.

“The date?” he just somehow assumes. “It’s New Year’s Eve, 2398.”

“Which calendar?” Mateo furthers.

“Clavical,” the man replies. He reads their expressions. “Are you from before the Clavical? I’ve never met travelers from that far in the past. Could I get a photo?” He raises a hand, fingers separated, thumb placed on the band of the ring on his index.

“Sorry,” Leona tells him. “Better not.”

“I understand, you wanna keep a low profile. I’ll always remember this, though.” He and the dog casually walk away.

“They do this in the main sequence,” Mateo says. “They get rid of the old calendar, and start a new one. It’s 2398, but not our 2398. This is where Cheyenne is from, but she wouldn’t say how far in the future.”

“That tracks with everything we know of her so far,” Leona determines.

“I saw something when I was here briefly with Danica,” Mateo reveals. “There was a sign. It was six keys, each had its own symbol on it.”

“That’s where the word clavicle comes from,” Marie says. “Key.”

“What were the symbols?” Leona asks her husband.

“It’s hard to remember. Like I said, it was so brief. We accidentally took Cheyenne with us, which is why she needed the Insulator of Life; to get back to her future. One of them was, like, two vertical lines next to each other, complete with the arrows at each end. Another was three lines, but no arrows. Oh, there was one that was squarish...two lines intersecting each other. The bottom right was filled in.”

“Oh my God, that’s a quadrant, Mateo.”

“Let me guess, the fourth quadrant,” Marie figures.

“The Parallel, the Third Rail, and the Fourth Quadrant,” Leona lists. “Did you see the Fifth Division symbol? It had arches, we saw it while we were there.”

“I think so, yeah, and that would make sense. The symbol on one of the other two keys was a circle, and then several crescents to the above it.”

“The main sequence,” Leona realizes. “We’ve been moving through time with bad information. Everyone has only ever talked about there being five parallel realities in total, but they’re wrong. There are six.”

“That’s why we call it The Sixth Key.” They were so deep in discussion, they didn’t even notice someone approaching them. As he steps into the dying light, they get a better look at his face. It’s Ramses. Well, it’s a Ramses.

“Report,” Leona requests.

“The report is that you’re not where you’re supposed to be. You gotta go.”

“Wait, just answer one question,” Leona begs.

“No.” Alt!Ramses holds his palm towards them, and gently pushes air forward. They can feel themselves being flung backwards in time, but just the three of them. Treasure doesn’t come with. When the streaks of speeding light around them give way to discernible form, they realize that they’ve landed in the Crown Center parking lot. But then time has to move the opposite direction for a little bit. The cars drive off, and a large tent is erected. Soldiers are aiming guns on them. “Hold!” one of them orders. The leader steps forward. “It’s them! Welcome back, Agent Matic.”

Microstory 1489: Solar Democracy

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Here was the end of the second Democratic Republic, and the beginning of the Solar Democratic Republic. What was the difference? Well, while a lot of things were different than before, and a lot more was deliberately changed to fit the theme, it wasn’t any more or less democratic than it was before. Of course, laws and policies were constantly changing, so it could not technically be said that the government was the same today as it was four decades ago, but that could be said for any organized region. In 2204, the rogue world of Durus finally stopped being rogue, after the however many hundreds of millions of years it likely spent wandering the interstellar void. It was now orbiting the 70 Ophiuchi binary star system, and though its orbit was artificially generated using powers and technology, they finally had a home. The Durune felt safe, independent, and empowered. They no longer relied on unwitting aid from Earth, but were taking care of themselves using all the resources they had at their disposal. No one could be sure who came up with the idea first, but it sparked at some point before arrival day, and the people voted on it during the 2205 elections. Changing the name of their government was more of a symbolic gesture than anything, but that didn’t mean it was stupid, or pointless. There was no doubt that this was the dawn of a new era; just as dramatic as the shift from the Adhocracy to the Mage Protectorate, or phallocratic Republic to the Provisional Government. They had to acknowledge that things were a lot different now, not simply because they believed they were, but because society was adapting to its new environment. Laws had to be passed to account for their new star system. These were not controversial, or even more progressive, but they did need to decide on them if they were going to survive the first full orbit, which would take years to complete. They changed other things about their government too, like renaming the head of state Luminator Prime, and having officials dress up in special clothing that apported photons of light from the center of their new suns. It was symbolic, but still important. Some were worried that it was doomed to be short-lived. They read a lot more into the symbolism, but suggesting the phrase itself was as if bookending their journey. Solocracy, they argued, could be considered a combination of the words Solar and Democracy. Obviously that had nothing to do with it, and it was merely a linguistic coincidence. Unfortunately, those people turned out to be right, in a way. The Solar Democracy did not last forever, or at least its defining characteristic didn’t. The people of Durus did not know this, however, as laws had been passed overtime which regulated what secrets seers were allowed to reveal, and which they were not. For now, they celebrated, because it took a lot of work, but they came together to get this done, and nothing would have happened without this sense of unity.

Microstory 1487: Top of the Morning

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Sixteen-point-six light years from Earth is a binary star system known as 70 Ophiuchi. These two stars orbit each other in a highly elliptical path, and the chances of there being a stable planetary system around either, or both, of them is highly unlikely. It just so happened that the rogue world of Durus was sent flying towards this system after its close call with the planets of Sol. It would have taken decades for them to reach their destination at their speed at the time, but the people didn’t want to wait that long, so they conscripted a number of key paramounts to make the planet move faster, so that it would take less than twenty years. Now it was 2204, and their dreams of orbiting their own stars were finally being realized. The experts knew that this was going to be a tricky process. There was a reason why circumbinary planets were probably rare, and why their orbits were generally unstable. That was okay, though, because the Durune weren’t looking for a traditional orbiting pattern. They obviously had the ability to manipulate their own movements, which was a power they could use to enter whatever orbit they pleased. They chose a sort of figure eight. They would orbit one of the stars, and then head towards the barycenter, which they would orbit once before flying off to orbit the other star. They would continue this pattern ad infinitum, or until they decided to do something else. There was nothing stopping them from altering this pattern later, or from leaving the system to find a new home. Again, it wasn’t going to be easy, but with their access to time powers, and time technology, it certainly wasn’t impossible. The problem was that they had to be precise and careful, because they wouldn’t get a second chance.

Accelerating and decelerating was one thing, but changing directions was a whole different ball game. Experts spent half their careers practicing for this one goal. They ran computer simulations, and came up with disaster scenarios, and figured out how to abort the mission. The last time someone tried to steer the whole planet, she just needed to avoid colliding with another planet, but this was much more complicated. There was a little bit of wiggle room when it came to finding their orbit, but if they missed their window, that could be it for 70 Ophiuchi. They would probably have to wait until they were picked up by some other system in whichever direction they ended up going. They also had to take down the sunlight they had been borrowing from Earth up until this point, or they would end up with too much heat. So it was really important that these people knew what they were doing, and that they accounted for every little thing that could possibly go wrong. Many things did go wrong, and their extensive preparation was invaluable in their efforts to correct them. Once the initial maneuvers were over, it wasn’t like they were finished. This orbital pattern was impossible in nature, and though automated systems could keep it humming, they had to maintain constant watch over the machines, because even the slightest deviation—especially in the transitional spots—could mean the end. They were ultimately successful. The husband of one of the engineers even came up with a new symbol to represent their finally independent world. It was a vaguely figure eight with a circle in the middle, and though it wasn’t completely accurate, it did look cool, and honestly embodied the people’s perseverance, fortitude, and most of all, their durability. Now they knew that they could do anything.

Microstory 901: Diversity

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The rainbow flag has been used as a symbol for a lot of different things over the course of centuries. Today, it is most commonly associated with the LGBTQ movement, but I’ve never thought of it like that. Most people believe that there are seven colors in the rainbow, but the truth is that there are literally all of them. We arbitrarily break it down into seven standards, but it could just as easily be eight, or 39. In this way, the color spectrum represents all that a human being is capable of perceiving, which is most of what matters to everyday life. Because of this, I have always seen the rainbow flag as less of a symbol for any one sexuality, or even multiple sexual orientations. I’ve always interpreted it as a symbol for diversity. People who preach peace often do so by pointing out our similarities. We all live on Earth, we all bleed red blood, we all need to eat, etc. But as a futurist, I see this as becoming a problem in the future. We won’t always live exclusively on Earth. If we encounter an alien species, their biology would most likely be different than ours, and they might not possess red blood. And our nonbiological friends, who are energized by other means, will not need to eat. It is a problem for us to emphasize our similarities, because that’s really just another way of valuing homogeneity over variety. You see, we are not beautiful creatures despite our differences, but because of our differences. If we were all the same person, we would not be capable of coming up with new ideas. We would not create stunning art, or discover medical breakthroughs, or come up with technological conveniences. We would just sit here in the boredom of our own predictability. And in but a few generations, we would simply die off, because nobody wants to procreate with themselves. When I walk into a room, I want to see men; women; young people; old people; black people; Asian people; people of all shapes and sizes, from all backgrounds, of all identities; maybe even a few white people. A recent study has suggested that those living in an ethnically diverse neighborhood are more likely to help a stranger in need. Their experiences with people unlike them have given them perspective, and a whole hell of a lot of empathy. Because when I say that we should value diversity, that doesn’t mean I think we should ignore how well we relate to each other. Our ability to put ourselves other people’s shoes will always drive us to good works more than inherent altruism, which is fundamentally difficult to achieve, and far rarer than you probably know. King Dumpster was elected president in my country because he spoke to the hearts of an astonishingly large number of people who prefer mirrors over windows. It is up to the rest of us to prove that we are not all like that. Because we aren’t. We are diverse.