Microstory 2662: Last to Still Believe

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Resi wants to go see his family, but it’s not time yet. After the cheering dies down, the Kokore whisks him away to a different room backstage. The Kokore apprentice is going to take over responsibilities for the rest of the ceremony so the current one can explain to Resi what the hell just happened. He’s waiting here now so she can pass the torch appropriately. The way she talked about it, he gets the sinking feeling that none of this was an accident. They knew it was going to happen, and planned for it by accelerating her apprentice’s experience so he would be prepared for this moment.

There’s food in here, but he’s not sure if he is supposed to eat it. Some of it looks like it’s just waiting to be distributed afterwards, but three courses are sitting separately on a tray on a table. He’s getting pretty hungry, but he won’t do anything without explicit permission or instruction. He just waits patiently, recognizing that all will be explained, even if he doesn’t like the answers. There’s no point in fretting about it until he fully understands what this fifth house is about.

The Kokore returns. “Okay, we’re good.” She looks over at the tray. “You’ve not eaten a single thing! The Kidjum elixir makes you hungry, don’t you know that? It doesn’t work if you just fall asleep. People sleep all the time. It’s a serious drug.”

“I suppose I forgot that part,” Resi admits. “I am indeed hungry, but I have no appetite. I’m too nervous. I don’t understand how I could have been assigned this mysterious fifth house. My subconscious didn’t choose it. What does aether look like? I don’t remember seeing it as part of my body in the vision.”

She snags a grape from his plate, and pops it into her mouth before she sits down. “That was the decision,” she begins. “Most people do not experience what you did. Yes, everyone has their own mind palace, and it always looks a little different, but you don’t become the elements. Or rather, you do, but no one else does. Well, I shouldn’t say that. It does occasionally happen, but only when the dreamer’s palace is already very body-centric, like a hospital operating room. Even then, their decision is always really obvious. They’re covered in dirt, or fully engulfed in fire, or totally wet, or something like that. The elements were well-distributed, and not simply on your body, but the composition of your body. That’s how we knew that you were Aether.”

“We were never told that you can see our dreamscapes. That’s another lie.”

“It’s very important that you not be given all of the information ahead of time. You know that things were kept from you. It’s our way of life. The Kidjum is a special, lucid dream state, but it’s not magical. The universe isn’t trying to tell you where you belong. This is our way of surfacing subconscious desires.”

“Yeah, that part I know.”

“Again, most people’s visions are unlike yours. They don’t only see something that represents the House they want to join. They see other things that they yearn for. It’s often...sexual. And to be clear, I did not have access to your dreamscape. Someone else was assigned to bear witness, to you, and to a few others. This is necessary because while I wasn’t lying when I said it wasn’t magic, it is important. What our dreams show us lives at the core of our belief system. We can’t just take people’s word for it. For you, you probably would have ignored the distribution, and chosen whatever House you thought you should join. If we were okay with that, then what would be the point of the Kidjum in the first place? We would just ask you. It would be a lot easier, and save time.”

“I suppose that makes sense, but I still don’t know what this fifth House is, or why I’ve never heard of it. You said I was the first in centuries. If that’s true, why isn’t it in the history books?”

She’s been smiling kindly the whole time, but her face grows serious now. “That’s the result of our last First Tongue of Aether. He destroyed the evidence. It was his final act of anger. Now everything we know about House Kutelin was passed down by word-of-mouth. I couldn’t say for sure why our ancestors played it so close to the vest, but we keep the circle tight to this day because it might have all been made up. Most of my predecessors and colleagues don’t believe that it ever happened. For my part, I didn’t think it mattered whether it was real or not. My job remained the same, which was to facilitate the ceremony. But I always knew it was a possibility, and you’re proof of that. And now...I’m out of a job. It’s bittersweet, I would say.”

“Okay. Now you really lost me,” Resi admits. “Why are you out of a job? Is your apprentice ready to take over full time? Did I precipitate that somehow?”

She laughs uncomfortably. “No, the apprentice is out too.” She pauses, presumably choosing her next words carefully in her head. “As long as you don’t end up like your own predecessor, the Kidjums are no longer necessary.” She points at the door with her thumb. “The others out there are the last round to choose Houses. For anyone who comes of age after today, you will be the one to choose for them. While my job ends, yours now begins. You will have access to their subconscious desires. You will see which of the four Houses they belong to, but you don’t have to do anything they want. You can move them to wherever you think is best, or choose it on a whim, or roll a die. You can select your own brethren too, who will join you in House Kutelin. Everything’s up to you now. According to the lore, the last head of your House chose all warriors to join him in the fifth House. He created conflict by consolidating all physical strength into one place. They used their strength to create a military state, and our culture nearly fell apart. He underestimated how strong others could be when backed into a corner. But...I really shouldn’t say any more about the spoken history. It’s not my place to sway your mind.”

“If this assignment has a history of violence, though, why was everyone clapping out there? Why are they so excited to risk that happening again?”

“That’s one reason we keep it a secret, so no one aspires to become like him. They were excited because this is how it’s supposed to be. The four Houses arose once our ancestors discovered that they were not in the Garden of Heaven. They had been rescued by time travelers, and brought to this world in their future. Of course, over time, even that part of our history has been brought into question; our culture being the last to still believe. But either way, what we do know is that we started with a singular voice. We fractured when we encountered the first Bungulan colonists, who assumed we were crazy, and just forgot that we came here in a spaceship like everyone else.”

Resi sighs. This is nuts. These weren’t just lies. They were cover-ups. He does not know who he is, or where he comes from. He thought he knew what this island was, but he wasn’t even close. He was so ignorant. How can he ever move on from this?

“I can’t tell you what to think, but I’m here to help. It’s not technically my job, but if anyone has the requisite skills to serve as an advisor, it’s a Kokore.”

“I don’t even know your name.”

She finally smiles again. “Caprice.” A colonial given name? Is she Kinkon?

Microstory 2637: The Ghost of Castlebourne

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Mandica has become a ghost. She sat in a cool-looking chair where a helmet read her brainwaves, and generated an authority profile for her. Now she can go anywhere she fancies, and the automated systems won’t register her as an at-risk organic human. That doesn’t mean she’s going to run head first into danger, but it gives her that option. The other normal humans are limited here, and she doesn’t want that. She wants to be free. That’s why she risked everything just to come to this planet. Trilby is gone now, so she is alone. He said that he had to get back to where he belonged, and kind of made it seem like wherever that was, it was a secret. She doesn’t know much about his backstory, just that he’s been all over, and since they first met, he has spent a lot of time on and around Bungula and Proxima Doma, which are Earth’s nearest neighbors.

She’s looking over the modified prospectus that he compiled for her, and finding herself gravitating towards the red zones, which he said were way too dangerous for someone with only one life to live. The green ones sound boring. In one of them, you pretend to be a pioneer. Like, okay, she likes period pieces, but that’s way too much work for no gain. The reason real pioneers did all that was because they had to. Why are you trying to go back? Anyway, like she’s one to talk. She has an unhealthy obsession with medieval times, particularly the legend of King Arthur. She should have explored this information while she was still on Earth, but it looks like there was nothing to worry about. She searches for the keyword Mordred, and finds a dome called Loegria, which is the realm where Arthur lived, as well as Merlin, Guinevere, and the Knights of the Round Table. It looks fascinating. She’s been cosplaying as Mordred’s lover for years, but that was only one companion. This is a whole immersive world for her to explore.

She’s about to tap on the link to map and schedule her vactrain trip, but then she notices something. At the bottom of the page is a carousel showing other similar domes that she might be interested in. The main dome here is literally called Castlebourne. It’s not Camelot, and is in fact, not an adventure dome at all. It’s where the big boss lives and works, along with his staff. No, thank you. If she’s ever gonna get caught, it’s going to be by running into a bona fide administrator who knows that she’s a fraud because she wasn’t at the end of the year party last year. But the third recommendation. It’s called Mythodome. She taps on it, and starts reading about it. This place sounds insane. It doesn’t limit itself to only one Earthan mythology, but just about all of them. All these gods and creatures coexist in the same environment, and have evidently figured out how to reconcile their contradictions naturally. The NPCs genuinely believe that this is all real, and there is no world beyond the walls. She has to see what that’s like.

She taps on the VISIT NOW link...and it takes her to a pre-registration form. Oh, no, this is a problem. She can physically enter any dome, and pass through their internal security systems, but she doesn’t actually have a genuine identity. She can’t input her name, and she doesn’t even have a Castlebourne Visitor ID number. Trilby said nothing about this, but this isn’t the right route. The way she gets into Mythodome is to schedule the vactrain herself and walk in without warning. She knows that she can do that. That’s how they got to Capital yesterday. It takes longer than making a schedule ahead of time, but when you’re potentially traveling to the other side of a whole terrestrial planet, it’s not that big of a deal, and it’s her only choice. Is she ready, though? Is she ready for this? Perhaps not quite yet. The prospectus gives an overview of what being in the dome entails, but another link leads to this whole subnetwork of pages, talking about all of the mythological beings. It tells her how the stories unfold in the real world, and how these contradictory entities intermingle and adapt to a shared universe. The AI, Thistle can prepare her for what she’s about to face.

She taps on that, and asks it to generate a syllabus. She spends the next two weeks taking a self-directed crash course on the subject. She absolutely does not learn everything there is to know. Scholars could spend years studying this environment. She believes that some academics actually visit Mythodome specifically for that purpose, with the intention of publishing papers and-or teaching classes that have never existed before. This is enough for now. If she doesn’t place a boundary here, she may never, and she will never actually get to go on her first adventure. So she shuts off the tablet, drops it on Trilby’s bed, and leaves.

To her surprise, a vactrain pulls up for her as soon as she taps on the wall interface. Usually, someone going on an impromptu trip would have to wait longer for the right train and right route to be available, but it zooms up like it knew what she was going to ask for. There is no train schedule. It’s based purely on need and interest, and a version of Thistle is constantly shifting it to account for more information. Others, in fact, are waiting on the platform because theirs have not arrived yet. But the transit token on the pod’s display matches the one that the system assigned her. It’s an express train, though, which is very weird. Maybe admins always get those? But no, because she and Trilby didn’t have that the other day. They still had to change to connecting trains. As she enters the private pod alone, she looks back awkwardly at the waiting legion, but none of them seems bothered by her skipping the line. Immortals—they have no sense of urgency. She will never understand it, and honestly does not want to.

The pod takes her directly to Mythodome, instead of via a hub first. She’s in the intake plaza now, and about to head for the main entrance when something catches her eye. That transit token should have only been relevant to her trip here, but she sees it on a hologram on the wall, along with an arrow pointing to the left. She’s hesitant to respond to it. But for the briefest of moments, the hologram changes. The words THIS WAY, MANDY flicker just long enough for her to see, but hopefully not long enough for anyone else to notice. She follows the directions away from the main entrance. She has to. If she’s already been caught, then walking in the opposite direction isn’t going to insulate her from the consequences that they have in store for her. It’s going to delay them at best. The lights take her to a different door, which leads to a set of stairs, which leads down to a tunnel, which leads her to a second set of stairs, and a second door, but this one is horizontal. She walks back up and opens the trapdoor to find herself on the edge of a forest clearing. It is incredibly beautiful here. It reminds her of her favorite spots on Earth; the ones away from all the crowds.

Suddenly something races overhead, from one side of the trees to the other. It comes back, but is higher in the sky this time, and barely visible. There are a number of things it could be, like a Fury, a Roc, or even a Cherub. Is this it? Not even a month into her trip, and she’s already about to die? When it swoops back down, she starts to see that it’s a man, and the wings look almost artificial. He lands gracefully on the ground before her. “Mandica Kolar, thank you for accepting my invitation. I’m Daedalus.”

Microstory 1739: Jana Crane

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For the most part, Jana Crane tried to keep to herself. She kept her head down, did her job, and didn’t complain when the people she worked with treated her like crap. She tried to be as accommodating as possible, without being a pushover who no one respected. She was a factory inspector, who would go around her region, making sure that the businesses she was assigned to were maintaining health and safety standards. She was thorough and careful, and didn’t let anything slide. Forgetting to fill out your monthly logs completely is one thing, but not properly securing a piece of incredibly dangerous equipment was just something that could not be tolerated. Her reports were not meant to get anyone in trouble, but she saw them as a way for the companies to improve themselves, and prevent anything from going terribly wrong. It would be bad for the floor workers if one of them became injured, and bad for the employers if that injured worker sued the company, or otherwise cost them money. Everyone should love inspectors for preventing such tragedies. At least that was how Jana saw it, but no one else shared her sentiments, even people whose lives she was trying to preserve. Perhaps if she wore a cape, and a symbol of some kind on her chest, they would think differently of her. One person in particular could have done with a little more perspective. He was a floor supervisor who probably should have never been promoted, but far be it for Jana to judge the process. What she could judge, however, was how casual he was with the safety protocols. He didn’t worry about locking down the machines. He let his people go in there without safety goggles. He didn’t care about anything. If she didn’t know any better, she might think he was asking for a bad outcome. Sadly, she was the one who ended up in a bad situation. She gave him low marks too many times, and he had had enough. She was going to stop inspecting his work, whether she wanted to or not.

The last thing she saw before the darkness was his face. He wasn’t wearing a mask, or anything. He probably thought she wouldn’t recognize him, and since she wouldn’t be able to pick him out of a lineup later, he would get away with it. Or maybe he was just a moron who didn’t think things through carefully. That was the most likely reason he not only showed his face, but spoke to her after throwing the acid in her eyes, and made references to their previous encounters with each other. She screamed, but couldn’t cry, on account of the acid. She just tried her best to wipe the chemicals off of her face. She pulled her shirt off, and wiped some more. It got the excess off, but it didn’t stop the pain, and it wouldn’t give her her sight back. He didn’t laugh. He was angry; talking about how this was her fault, and if she had just ignored the infractions, this wouldn’t have had to happen. All this, like it was completely unavoidable. An unlocked chemical cabinet was unsafe, but he didn’t appear to recognize the irony. She could hear his footsteps grow fainter, so she started to reach out around her. Feeling around was taking too long, so Jana had to be bolder. By the end of this, she was going to have a lot of bruises, but she would live. Every second she waited would make it that much harder for the doctors to fix her eyes. She began to run. She didn’t run into anything, so she went faster and faster through the factory, all the way out into the cold, and over to a warehouse down the street, which she knew operated 24/7. Her vision was never quite the same after that, but she didn’t go blind, and the floor supervisor didn’t go free.

Microstory 1657: Portrait of a Universe

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Most versions of Earth advance technologically at about the same rate. This is due to the fact that the majority of them are only c-branes, but I won’t get into the specifics of how that works. The reality is that this can be altered moderately by changing a few key conditions, or more dramatically by something insane, like time travel. In Muxleyverse, an alien descended from a group of Ansutahan who were expelled when The Crossover exploded, came to Earth to decide whether it was worthy of being brought into the galactic community. He brought with him highly advanced technology, which ended up being sent backwards in time. This changed everything about human history. This one little bit of tech transformed Earth from the youngest and weakest civilization to the strongest, and most powerful. This was where the mess began, and why most bulk travelers tend to avoid Muxleyverse, even the Ochivari. Now the dominant race in the Milky Way galaxy, the humans went around exerting their will upon all other worlds. They didn’t enslave anyone, and they didn’t kill unless provoked by a resistance, but they weren’t exactly pleasant either. They knew where they came from, and how it happened. They knew that the aliens would do the same to them, if given a chance. They felt that their only hope was to keep control of the situation at all costs. Unfortunately, one you introduce time travel into the mix, control becomes a laughable concept. Eventually, a rebel group of aliens managed to steal time travel technology. They used it to go back to their early days, and become the dominant race over all others. They were especially ruthless against the Earthans, for obvious reasons. But it did not stop there. An alliance of humans, and a different planet of subjugated aliens, stole time travel technology, and went back so they could become the dominant species. Can you guess where I’m going with this?

As you know, I have the ability to witness events in other universes, but that gift gets complicated when alternate realities are in the mix. You see, since each universe operates on a completely separate timeline, I’m actually watching these other events having happened, not as they’re happening. The past, present, and future don’t just happen all at once; they don’t even exist from my perspective. It’s all just one giant picture to me, which allows me to piece together stories. Alternate realities of all kinds make piecing those stories together more complicated. Concurrent realites are all but impossible for me to see through, because they add extra layers that block each other from sight, but sequential timelines aren’t easy either. The metaphorical picture of the universe is larger than a normal one when that happens, but my perspective hasn’t changed, so every detail is smaller. The point is that I don’t know how many loops these people went through. I only know that it was bad. They just kept going, always trying to gain an advantage over each other, until things got to be so messy that it all fell apart. For the most part, unlike what you might hear in time travel movies, the universe can’t be destroyed, even by a paradox. The paradox simply won’t take place, and everything will be fine. You can overstrain the fabric of spacetime, however, especially for a brane that was never meant to have temporal manipulation in the first place. Everything that those people did, it still happened. The end of the universe didn’t negate the past, also like what you might see in movies. But it did end prematurely, and it’s a shame.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: May 3, 2028

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After Leona exited the homeportal, the first thing she did was look around for Mateo. He was nowhere to be found, so the second thing she did was consult her watch. May 3, 2028. This was the day she disappeared from her old life, and became a time traveler, at least in one reality. Her mind possessed memories from different realities, so the portal must have just chosen the most recent one. It likely did the same thing for Mateo. She should have realized they wouldn’t end up in the same place either way. His special moment was on a different date. Now all she needed to do was find a time traveler who could get her back to him. Hopefully someone in this restaurant would let her borrow a phone. She walked over to the counter to ask, but stopped when she realized she recognized the guy on the other side. “Allen?”

He slid his finger underneath his nametag. “Funny, my mom used to say that all the time. I never figured out why.”

She chuckled. “Is Richard here?”

Allen’s eyes narrowed. “My husband is in the back.”

This was Richard and Allen’s place. She had heard about that once. It was at Mateo’s memorial. They owned a restaurant together, which was fitting for them, but this building was much more than that. “When you say he’s in the back, do you mean he’s in the other restaurant?”

Allen’s eyes narrowed further. “He’s cooking up some salmon.”

“Ah, yes. So you know already. Good.” They heard the bell ring from the door opening. Leona turned her head to find her own younger self walking in with a friend. Fortunately, she wasn’t paying enough attention to see Future!Leona. This was the day she became a time traveler, and that was going to be stressful enough for her. “Let’s just say, she’s not my twin. It would be nice if she didn’t see me at all. Could you get me out of here?”

He smiled. “Come on back.” He opened the counter, and led her through the kitchen, to the other side, where the second half of the restaurant was. This was a secret dining area, designated only for time travelers, or time traveler-adjacent people.”

“What can I get ya?” he asked.

Richard stopped wiping down one of the tables, and stepped over to join his husband.

“I actually just ate breakfast.”

Richard looked at his watch. It was late afternoon.

“It was morning when I stepped through the portal. Anyway, I didn’t really mean to come to this time period. I could use some helping getting back to my husband. Who else set up shop in this little mall?”

“Salmonday Club is next door. Post office is down that way, across from The Switcher’s office. The Forger works in that one over there. Might try him if you’re not just lookin’ to send a message.”

“Hey, thanks!”

“No problem,” one of them said after she turned away. She couldn’t tell which one.

She opened the door to the Forger’s den, though this new location wasn’t a den at all. It looked more like a DMV. It was larger, and more professional. Duane was sitting in one of the waiting area chairs, carrying on a conversation with... “Julius?”

Duane smirked. “Oh, please, call him that again.”

“I’m sorry, I forgot. Saxon.”

“Yes,” Saxon said, “how may I help you?”

“I actually came in here to see the Forger. I need a ride.”

Duane stood up. “Sure, when and where do you need to go?”

“I don’t know,” Leona replied. “I ultimately need to get to March 21, 2014, but I need to find something first.”

“What are you looking for?”

“The Insulator of Life. Do you know of a moment in its history when I could take it without interfering in anyone else’s need for it?”

“Hmm. Have you tried the bank?”

“What bank?”

“Gregorios.” He leaned forward, and pointed in the general direction of the hallway. “It’s that way. It used to just be a regular bank for humans, but they shuttered the entire business, and the woman who owned it switched the whole thing over to a special vault where time travelers can keep their valuables, and access them from the future, or the past.”

“Well, who owns the Insulator?”

“No one can own something like that, but anyone who has used it before, according to their own personal timeline, can requisition it.”

“I’m one of those people.”

“Perfect. You do still have to be approved, so there’s no guarantee.”

“Okay, cool. Thanks for your help.”

“Wait. You come back with what you need, I’ll take you anywhere you wanna go...for a price.”

“What’s the price?”

“I need you to get me a ret-gone coin from the bank.”

“I think I can guess, but what exactly does one of those things do?”

“It’s incredibly dangerous, but I need it for a client, who’s willing to take the risk. You flip it. Heads, no one remembers who you are. It erases your entire timeline, past and future. You can do whatever you want, and no one will remember it long enough to do anything about it. You won’t be able to maintain a single relationship, but you can’t be stopped either. You’ll also be immortal. You hit tails, though, it is your memory that will be wiped; both retrograde and anterograde amnesia. Like the Insulator, no one owns the coins, and no one knows how many there are, but rumor is that Alexina is in possession of all of them. It’s impossible to know whether anyone has ever used one, and they’re each single-use.”

“What will I have to give her for it?” Leona asked.

Duane shook his head. “I don’t know. Obviously, you can decline. You’ll just have to catch a ride with someone else.”

“I’ll see what I can do. Thanks again.”

She walked down the hallway once more, and entered Gregorios Bank. Alexina was standing behind a pedestal deliberately, as if she had been waiting for her. “Hello,” Leona began. “I know you from the future.”

“Are we friends?”

“We have a mutual friend, but we didn’t talk much.”

“Oh, okay. How can I help you today?”

“I need two things, and you might not want to give them up. The Insulator of Life, I believe, is the only thing that can save my husband from two psychics who have hijacked his mind. I was told I would be allowed to take it as long as I’ve used it before, which I have.” Alexina seemed inclined to accept her plea. “This is the thing that I really need. Once I have it, I’ll then need to go find my husband, before the psychics make him do something else against his will. The Forger has agreed to provide transport...if I get him a ret-gone coin.”

“Do you know what a ret-gone coin is?” Alexina asked, noticeably upset about being asked something so despicable.

“He filled me in, yes.”

“There’s a reason I spent twenty years of my personal timeline hunting them down,” Alexina explained. “I didn’t want to use them myself, or have control over them. I wanted to keep people from using them. I’ve been trying to figure out how to destroy them ever since.”

“I have no personal interest in them either,” Leona told her. “The only question you have to ask yourself is whether you trust Duane Blackwood with one.”

“No, I have to decide whether I trust whoever it is he wants to give it to. I know he doesn’t want to flip it himself.”

“That’s a fair perspective. I can get by without his aid. I can find another time traveler. I can’t survive without the Insulator, though. In fact, the whole timeline can’t. The people who took over Mateo’s body are not going to do good things with it.”

“Your husband is Mateo Matic?” Alexina asked.

“Yes. What do you know of him?”

“I know he rescued one of my best friends from a prison he didn’t belong in with his bare hands.”

Leona didn’t say anything as Alexina was thinking hard about what she was going to do. After a full two minutes of this, she removed one of her earrings, and held out her hand. “Give me yours.”

“I’m not wearing an earring.”

“Your hand. Give me your hand.”

Leona did as she was asked.

Alexina used the sharp end of the earring to prick Leona’s finger, letting only two drops fall onto the pedestal. She then pricked her own finger, and dropped some of her blood. She looked back to watch the vault door behind her swing open on its own. Finally, she removed a key from around her neck, and handed it to Leona. “I took two drops of blood, which means you are entitled to two withdrawals. You are not entitled to any specific item, however. What you are seeking, you will only be able to find using your intuition. Walk into the vault, and pick a safe deposit box. Open it with this universal key, and see what’s inside. It might be the Insulator, or the coin, or something else, or nothing. A lot of the time, it’s nothing. Your blood donation only gives you access to the vault, not your desire. That’s up to you, and the covenant you’ve made with time.”

“I understand.” Leona walked into the vault, and took a deep breath. She didn’t waste too much time trying to look for the best deposit box. This was about her intuition, so the only way she was going to find the right one was if she just let it happen without thinking too much. She was right. The Insulator of Life was waiting for her inside the safe. She closed it back up, then quickly went over to the next box. Inside was not a coin, however. It was the HG Goggles. She had once used both of these objects in tandem, along with several other things, to bring Mateo back from nonexistence.

Alexina regarded the withdrawal as Leona was walking out. “Hm. Interesting choice.”

“What does it mean?”

“I don’t know,” she answered honestly.

Curious, Leona placed the goggles on her face, and looked around. The room now appeared in an indigo tint. She could see lights dancing along the edges of the safe deposit boxes as the vault door was closing back up. The whole bank was a little more lit up than the rest of the building that she could see from in here. There was one particular spot over by the hallway that led to the bathrooms that was particularly bright. “Do you see that over there?” she asked.

“I’m not wearing the goggles,” Alexina said.

Leona crept towards it carefully, then stopped just centimeters in front of it. It was like a silent miniature lightning storm. She pushed her hand towards it, but nothing happened. This made a bit of sense, because spacetime anomalies were reportedly all over the place, but most people didn’t just accidentally fall through them. You had to have some means of opening them up. The goggles seemed to only be good for illuminating them. There were points of light among the lightning that looked like rescaling buttons in a photo editing program. They moved as well, but at their own pace, which was much slower than the rest of the lights. She took two of them with her index fingers, and deliberately pulled them apart. Yes, this was it. This was opening the tear. She stepped through, and found herself in the foyer of Fletcher House.

“Madam Matic,” a man said to her. He executed a manual flourish as he bowed to her reverently. “My name is Old!Declan Aberdeen. Your husband is waiting for you downstairs. I have contained him so that his psychic invaders can do no one any harm.”

“Thank you very much, Old!Declan,” Leona said to him. She walked down to the basement to find Mateo wasn’t alone. Arcadia was there as well, though she was glowing, so she must have been a psychic manifestation, rather than a physical presence. They were standing in some kind of glass chamber.

“Why did you go back to him?” Mateo was asking her. “Why are you working with your father?”

“I could say it was because he promised to undo my siblings’ deaths,” Arcadia responded after a beat. “I could claim I just want to make a better reality. The honest answer, though, is that I would do anything for a family member. If Zeferino showed up tomorrow with some conflicting plan, I would go along with that instead, because he was the last one who asked. I’m just no good on my own.”

Mateo stepped closer, and gave Arcadia a hug, even though she was theoretically not really there. “You don’t need to be with a Preston to not be alone.”

“That’s touching,” Leona finally spoke up.

They separated from each other. Can you see me?” Arcadia asked her.

Leona pointed to her goggles. “These let me see things like you, yeah.”

“I’m sorry, Leona.”

“I am too,” Mateo added.

“I understand what’s wrong with you now.” She reached into her bag and showed them the Insulator of Life. “So let’s fix it.”

Ramses Abdulrashid surprisingly walked into the room. “Can I help?”

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Microstory 1341: Bad Thoughts

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New Patient: Where should I sit? Or should I lie down?

Psychologist: You can sit or lie down wherever you like, however you like. That’s why I have so many options. I have one patient who prefers to curl up against the wall, because it makes them feel safer.

New Patient: Okay, thanks.

Psychologist: So, what brings you in today? The way I understand it, you’re having mixed feelings about something?

New Patient: Well, that’s one way to put it. I would describe what I’m experiencing as bad thoughts. I just keep—not seeing things; I don’t have hallucinations—but I have these urges to do things I know are wrong.

Psychologist: Things like what?

New Patient: Well, the other day, the cashier at the grocery store got upset with me, because I’m apparently supposed to scan my rewards card before I pay, so now there was nothing she could do about it. I can’t say that I wanted to do this, but I just had a vision—this flash—where I shoved the card in her mouth, and told her to scan it now. Oh my God, that’s so terrible. I can’t believe I’m telling you this.

Psychologist: That’s okay. This is a safe space. Everything you say is confidential, and I’m not here to judge you. Mine is only to help.

New Patient: I sure hope you can, because this isn’t even the worst example. I can’t explain it. Like I was saying with that one, I don’t have a desire to hurt people, but I can’t help but think of these alternative responses. The normal thing to do is just open the door that’s just been accidentally shut in my face, but a part of me wants to get them back for that; to physically drag them back to the threshold, and slam it in their face too.

Psychologist: So your thoughts are more about exacting justice, or revenge, on people who have wronged you.

New Patient: Yeah, I guess that’s probably an accurate limitation. I don’t walk past someone on the street, and think about randomly slitting their throat. It just seems to bother me more those little annoying things that people do. I mean, I would almost rather just be the kind of jerk who snaps at others, because then at least I wouldn’t be hurting them. I’m worried I’ll one day just lose control, and actually act on these thoughts.

Psychologist: Well, I wouldn’t be worried about that just yet. Simply by acknowledging that these are, and would be, irrational reactions, you’ve taken the first step in changing your perspective.

New Patient: I’ve just never been like this before. I grew up totally fine, but now it’s all I can think about, at least for a few moments after something frustrating happens to me. It’s making it hard to focus on everything I need to do.

Psychologist: There’s probably some reason it’s happening now. When people change their moods like that, it’s usually due to newer, stressful situations. Let’s talk more about who you are, what you do, and what has changed in your life recently that could cause you to feel a little more temperamental than before.

Microstory 724: Credos, Convention One: Coordination, Chapter Two

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And then the farmers went into the fields and asked, “why do the crops not grow?” A man was walking in the fields, and heard their question, and answered, “the crops did not grow because it has been but a day.” And so the farmers waited until the next day, and they went back to the fields, and noted, “the crops still did not grow.” The man was still there, and he explained, “you still have not waited long enough. The crops will grow when they are ready.” And so the farmers waited another two weeks, and the crops grew a little, but then they died. They asked, “why did the crops die?” The man answered, “there are many reasons. Here you have planted two seeds too close together, and they fought for nutrients, and then both died, for half nutrients it not enough for any plant, for this is no such thing as a half plant.” “I planted one of those seeds, but I did not plant the other,” said one of the farmers. “I planted that other seed,” another farmer said, but I did not plant the one that he planted.” “You must coordinate,” the man told them. They heard him, but they did not listen. So they burned the land and tried again, but the crops died again. After looking at it, the man said, “here you have planted a western yipeflower next to tinge ivy. Tinge ivy is known for choking out all other plants. Tinge ivy is not a food, but it can protect your garden from weeds and some predators. Plant it along the perimeter, but watch it so it does not stray inside. Trim it back if it becomes unruly. They burned the land and tried once more, and some of their crops grew, but not all. “These are the seeds of hacklefruit. Hacklefruit cannot survive on a world such as this, for there is too much argon in its atmosphere.” “What is to be done?” the farmers asked. “Our forefathers have sold hacklefruit for decades. Our customers are counting on us to grow them.” “You must grow hacklefruit on another planet.” “But we must grow them with the kulien, and the pelby, for they go together in salads. If we grow them on different planets, how will we get them to the same markets?” The man smiled, “you must coordinate”. And then they understood, and all was well, for the light of three suns shone upon two gardens, and the plants grew, and the people ate hack salads.

Microstory 723: Credos, Convention One: Coordination, Chapter One

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The beginning of the journey of the wandering child; a child was born on a world, and he would grow up to be a great man. When he was a child, he came across a creature in the creek near his home. The creature had the body of a fish, and the head of a woman. When he first saw her, she was eating the other fish. He asked her, “why do you eat your own kind?” She replied, “we all eat our own kind. We take from our brethren. We kill, we conquer, we colonize. Everyone is a cannibal. I just do it my own way.” Then the fish woman moved on. The boy followed her. “Excuse me,” he asked, “what are you?” “I am what I am,” she replied, still swimming happily. “But what is your kind called? If you are not fish, nor woman, what could you be? Was one of your parents a fish, and the other a woman?” She answered, who I am is unimportant, for the only question you should be asking is who are you?” And the boy realized that he did not know who he was. “I am but a child. Should I know myself already?” “You should know what you want out of life, at least.” “I came to eat fish.” “Then eat fish.” “I am looking for a purpose, however.” “A quest?” “A quest, yes.” The fish woman sped up, and hopped over a branch that was hanging down. “There is a quest,” she told him. “You can open the Canisters of Cultivation. That is a fine quest.” The boy asked, “what are the Canisters of Cultivation?” “They hold the secrets of the universe. They will bring order to a cosmos of chaos.” This interested the boy, and so he agreed. And so the fish woman sent him on his journey to find the special canisters. She could not go with him, but she gave him a cup. Whenever he needed help, he could fill the cup with water, and she would appear in it, and she could help. For ye, the fish woman of Coulr Creek was convenient and comforting. At the source of the creek was an everlasting spring. There on the bank were fourteen canisters. He tried to open one, but failed. He tried another, but it would not open either. He filled the cup with water and spoke with the fish woman again. She told him that the canisters must be opened in order. And so the wandering child walked over to the first canister, and opened it, and it opened. He tried to open the second canister, but it would not open, so he fill the cup with water again, and asked for help a second time. She said that he could not simply open the canisters. He would have to first learn from them. “Stick your arm into the canister.” He stuck his hand into the first canister, and it transported him to another place; not his body, but his mind. He could see a farmhouse, and people walking out of it. He could not speak with them, for he was not there. This was but a memory.

The Departure of Hokusai Gimura: Chapter Four

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“When are we?” I ask, recognizing some landmarks of the city. Night is falling.

“November 18, 2000.”

How does she know that?

As if reading my mind, she explains, “I have an innate sense of time. It’s one of my required secondary powers. Most time travelers don’t have it, which means they’re always getting lost. That’s why the world’s not even crazier than it is.”

“Did you send us here, or did that woman do it?”

“Kinda both, I guess.”

“Well, this is where we need to be. This is the day that Rothko Ladhiffe disappeared.” Suddenly, the sun disappears, as if the light in the sky was no more than a lightbulb that can be switched off.

Sanela shivers. “Something’s wrong here too. I’m the Screener. We shouldn’t be feeling the weather.”

“Come on, let’s go find RL.”

We’re several blocks from the Ladhiffe house, and since Sanela doesn’t trust her powers at the moment, we have to walk the whole way. We see zero signs of life on our way. Not only are there no cars driving home from the bar, or people setting their trash bins on the curb, but there’s nothing. It’s like this area of town was built overnight, and people haven’t moved in yet. As expected, RL’s house is empty, so we go back outside, hoping to run into him. It is then that we come across the special disappearing house. A figure is standing at the entrance, banging on the door.

“No,” I cry, like an inconsiderate audience member at a movie screening. “Don’t go in there!”

I reach the house just in time to see RL open the door, and steal a flashlight from the figure who was knocking on it, who’s turned out to be some other version of RL. “You won’t need this,” he says to himself. “Go inside. Trust me.” For some reason, the other RL complies with his duplicate’s orders, and steps in. I’m about to follow when the RL with the flashlight stops me. “Not you,” he says.

“Oh my God!” Sanela complains. “You can see us too?”

“Yeah, it’s this whole thing. Come on.”

RL then runs off, and we chase after him. “Rothko!” I keep yelling up to him. “I’ve been looking for you!” He ignores me, and leads us to the high school, only stopping once we reach the gymnasium.

“What are we doing here?” Sanela asks.

RL just steps into the equipment room and starts looking around.

“Answer her!” I demand. “What’s your problem?”

RL finds what he’s looking for in a baseball bat. “Sorry, we just don’t have much time. Take this.”

“He can’t take that,” Sanela says. “We’re not really here.”

“The rules are different in this dimension,” RL explains. “Take it.”

I reluctantly take the bat. “What is this for?”

“You remember your surrogate daughter, Hogarth?”

“I’ve never really considered her my—”

“You remember her, though,” he interrupts.

“Yes, of course.”

He points at the bat he’s just handed me. “Protect her.”

“From what?”

“You’ll see.” He starts looking around again, eventually deciding he now needs a basketball. “Somebody got a pen?”

I always keep a pen on my person, and have been doing so since I was a child. What kind of man leaves the house without a pen? my father would always say. It made an impression.

RL takes the pen, draws a sorry excuse for a cat on it, and stuffs it in my face. “Take a mental note of this. This is the most important basketball in the worlds. I’m going to leave the Rothko Torch in here for you. You will retrieve it in 2022, and then leave it in 2160. I would give it to you now, but I need it for something else first.”

“I’m so confused. Why don’t you come with us?”

“I have to save them all.”

“Save who?”

“You’ve already seen.”

“I don’t understand,” I say.

“One last thing before we part ways. I’m going to tell you something that no one else knows.”

“What is it?”

His watch beeps. “Shit. Remember the cat!”

“What did you want to tell me?” I ask hastily.

“The Rothko Torch,” he says, “it’s not one of a kind! There is one other. It’s in my—”

Time runs out, and we’re transported once again, apparently out of Sanela’s control. She can’t even sense what year it is. As I’m trying to figure out which direction we should go. Hogarth Pudeyonavic appears out of the darkness. She’s running with a woman I don’t recognize. Behind them are town residents Paul Harken, and a very pregnant Hilde Unger. They duck around a corner, and I’m about to run after them when I notice three men already chasing them. They don’t look like they have the best of intentions.

“The bat,” Sanela says simply.

They don’t seem to be able to see me, but they can definitely feel me. I lower the bat and use it to trip one of the pursuing men. The man in front got past me before I could stop him, so I toss the bat in his direction. It’s not a particularly elegant throw, but it does the job, hitting him in the face, and causing a nosebleed.

“Nice shot!” Sanela says joyously, but becomes ashamed of her schadenfreude, and calms back down.

The third man is still standing up, so I fix that with a quick jab in the back of his kneecap. I don’t know what his deal is, or why he’s chasing after Hogarth, but RL said to protect her, so that’s what I’ma do. Like I needed a reason.

A fourth man runs up and looks at the mess. “What happened here?” He carries with him an air of authority.

“Invisible force,” one of the henchmen replies. “Smith. Help. Please.” Maybe I hit him a little too hard.

“Where did she go?” the leader, whose name was apparently Smith asks.

“We don’t know.”

“Invisible force, you say?” he starts thinking it over. Then he takes the HG Goggles out of his pocket.

“How did he get those?” I ask, feeling my pocket to make sure mine are still there. “I still have them.”

“Time travel,” Sanela whispers. “He acquires them sometime later. Either that, or there’s more than one, like the Rothko Torch. I don’t know what any of these things are.”

Smith puts the goggles on and looks right at the two of us. “Ha-ha-ha!” he LOLs. “Who the hell do you think you are?”

“It doesn’t matter,” I answer simply. “Whatever you want with Hogarth, you can’t have it. I’ll see to that.”

He smiles and points to his goggles, and then to us. “You’ve lost your advantage.”

As if on cue, we all hear a basketball bouncing in the darkness. It gets quieter as it loses momentum, but then we see it roll into view. The cat doodle ends up on top when the ball stops at my feet.

Smith nods to the bat I’m still holding. “Wrong sport.”

I grimace at him and get down on one knee. I lift the bat like it’s Excalibur, and jam it into the ball. It pops, revealing the Rothko Torch, just as promised. I switch it on and shine it on Smith’s face. He cries in pain, instinctively trying to block the light with his hands, and then turning away. After I turn the flashlight off, I’m near guilt for what I’ve done. He’s trembling, down on his own knees, and trying to cry, but no tears could fall from those eyes. The HG Goggles have been burned into his face permanently. He’s been turned into a hideous monster by most accounts. It’s unclear what he sees, if anything, when he removes his hands, trying to look at at them. At anything. The intensity of Smith’s whimpers increase until they reach critical mass, and he lets out a shriek no human should be able to produce on their own. Vearden Haywood could probably hear it all the way back in 2017, it’s so loud.

Once he’s done screaming, Smith stands back up, working hard to force himself to push through the pain. “I can still see you,” he yells, not as loud as the shriek, but loud enough to strike fear in my heart, and likely Sanela’s.

“We have to go,” I warn her.

“I’m on it,” she says, lifting her hands to just in front of her face. She then pushes them outwards and upwards, driving the scenery away from them to make room for the next scene.

“When and where are we now?”

“2161.”

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