Microstory 1015: Fernando

< > Table of Contents

I admit it. I was in love with Viola, and I had been for nearly a year. I guess I shouldn’t talk about it in the past tense, because even though she’s gone, my feelings haven’t gone away with her. I don’t know what it was about her that made me so nervous that I couldn’t ask her out. Sure, she was sort of seeing Julius for awhile, I think, but not all the time. I had plenty of opportunities to take my shot, but I always chickened out. I’m not some nerd who stares at girls from afar, and wants what he can’t have, though. I’ve dated lots of girls, and I’ve never had a problem carrying a conversation. I guess that’s why it’s meant so much to me for so long. The fact that she could make me trip over myself every time she appeared only made me want her more. Yes, there were many girls before her, but none of them meant anything. She was the only one for me, and I’ll never know whether she could have ever felt the same way. That’s right, I’m not delusional enough to think she automatically saw me as I did her. I barely talked to her, so I never had much of a chance to gauge her thoughts. I wish I had said something to her, and not just out of some fantasy for what we could have been. If we had become friends, at the very least, I might have been at the river bank that day. I might have been able to stop what happened to her. I can’t sleep most nights. I keep replaying this alternate reality in my head where things turned out differently, just because I was around. I’m not the hero of the story, but I am a witness, and that’s enough to save her life, and Gertrude’s memories. I’ve been trying to work up the nerve to talk to her now. I can’t help Viola anymore, but maybe I can help Gertrude. Maybe some good can come out of this horrible time in all our lives. You know what, I’ve decided. I’m not going to waste time like I did before. I’m going to go over to the Feldt house right now, and see how she’s doing. Sorry to cut this interview short, and sorry it probably wasn’t very helpful. I hope you catch the real killer, or whatever it is you’re trying to do. Thanks!

Microstory 1014: Gertrude

< > Table of Contents

My name is Gertrude Feldt, of the Blast City Feldts, or so they tell me. I’m kidding. I actually do remember who I am, and much of my childhood, but the closer you get to the incident, the hazier it is. I remember virtually nothing from the last few years of my life. The doctors called that the robot’s law for Mercury retrograde amnesia, or something. I wasn’t really paying much attention. Anyway, I was apparently there when Viola died. They tell me she and I were pretty good friends, and we liked to hang out by Masters Creek, but that must have been a fairly recent development. It’s funny that, uhh...was it Rolof who told you to start with the classmates who knew her the least? Sorry, I’m still relearning names. I knew most of these people when we were younger, but I was kind of in my own world back then, and didn’t have the inclination to memorize my contemporaries. So yeah, I might be able to tell you less than anyone else can, even though apparently I was part of that whole group. The others people in that clique haven’t spoken much to me. Wanda’s been the nicest, but even she’s rather distant with me. If I had my memories, I might be offended by this all, but it means so little to me now. When I first woke up, I was confused and belligerent. I was getting over some pretty bad physical trauma, of course, so I wasn’t capable of thinking clearly. Once all that passed, and the pain started subsiding, though, life became clearer. Not a single memory has returned from the threshold since then, but I’ve fully recovered emotionally. I truly don’t care about those memories. Sure, it would be nice if I could answer the sheriff’s huge array of questions about what went down that day—maybe give the Woods family a little closure—but other than that, I’m great. I feel like I can start fresh, and I don’t even know why. What am I missing? What events unfolded in my life that defined me, and what I became, and what am I without them? I’m still Gertrude Feldt, right? Right? Who else might I be? I have all the knowledge I learned in school all this time, even though I don’t recall the moments I learned them. I have all the skills I grew up with, and all my credentials. I have a caring family who have been rockstars in the face of this adversity, and I have several prospects for colleges. Do not misunderstand me, I wouldn’t recommend losing your memory, because again, what am I missing? Did I experience something so phenomenally beautiful, and unique to me, that I will never get back. Did my former self know the loving touch of another woman, but that woman has not taken the opportunity to tell me about it, and no one else knows? Could it have been Viola? Could we have been closer than anyone else realized, and could that have played a part in her ultimate demise? Could it have even been the driving force behind the terrible crime? As freeing as I’ve considered my new reality, these questions you’re making me ask are really bumming me out. Thanks, Alma, for the positively depressing wake up call. Maybe it’s exactly what I need. You seem to know me so well, but I don’t remember a thing about you. Were you and I friends as well?

Microstory 1013: Floyd

< > Table of Contents

No two people could be any more different than Viola Woods and I. Well, I guess on a personal level, we probably had a lot in common. After all, we grew up in the same town, and knew all the same people. But she was rich and loved, and I’m lower middle class, and invisible. I’m surprised I’m even on your list. I’ve never shown up for picture day, I don’t have any friends, and teachers often forget to call my name when they’re taking attendance. I have a pretty decent group of friends in online chatrooms, but I don’t really connect with people in real life. I have a lot of anxiety, and not the kind that everyone is diagnosed with so they can get prescription marijuana. I’m the real deal. I was nervous and depressed before it was cool. My perspective is quite different than what you’ll find in the rest of this school, so if you want to get an honest idea of who Viola Woods was, you’ve come to the right place. You see, I identify as asexual, which means I don’t experience sexual attraction towards others. I have an idea of what sexuality is, and it’s not that I don’t feel anything, but it’s not anywhere near what other people feel. Most people probably think that the brain is pretty basic. Your eyes see things around it, determine what they are, and draw conclusions. Your memories are stored in a single place, and your motor skills in another. But it’s far more complicated than that, and there are a lot of oddly specific functions that can be either enhanced or impeded, depending on an individual’s neurochemistry. My therapist thinks it’s possible that I would enjoy sex if I were to experience it personally. But my parents are extremely strict and religious, so there wouldn’t be a lot of opportunity for me to...uh, explore. I’ve also never really tried very hard to steal magazines from Lulu’s gas station, like the other boys, so there’s that.

The reason I may not exactly be totally asexual is because I have a severe case of something call prosopagnosia. The part of my brain that’s meant to interpret faces, and only faces, does not work properly. The better I know a person, the more likely I am to recognize them, but I couldn’t point out my own mother if she dressed like a goth at a football game. I know the people around me based on voices, and context clues. I can tell you that someone has two eyes, two ears, a nose, and a mouth. And I can tell that they’re supposed to be unique, but they don’t appear unique to me. So that’s what it really comes down to. I’m not attracted to people, because they just all look the same to me. An interesting side effect to this is that I have a pretty objective view of others. You would be surprised how much a person’s looks impacts other people’s thoughts on them. The truth is that Viola Woods was a good person. She was nice and caring to others, and she would likely have led a full and happy life. She was also flawed, a bit self-involved, and painfully normal. She was just like everyone else. Yeah, we’re all special in our own way, I get it. But there was nothing particularly astonishing about this one girl. You’re going to hear a lot of opinions about her over the course of your investigation, Alma. I just want you remember as it’s happening that all of these people are talking to you after her death occurred, and that death is going to have an effect on their words. No one is going to be totally honest with you, and no one is going to say anything they would have said if she were still alive, and this was just some random profile piece. If, when you’re done, you want a little extra perspective for those interviews, you may contact me again. I’m happy to help.

Microstory 1012: Edith

< > Table of Contents

Death is such a horrific topic, I don’t want to talk about that. Let’s talk about life; specifically Viola’s beautiful, but tragic, one. I spoke with her dozens of times over the years, and the last one was a couple weeks before it happened. I was walking by her in the library, and noticed that she was doing tons of research on religion, which is a subject I know quite a bit about. I was going to leave her alone with it, but she stopped me, since she knew I was an authority. She wanted to know the difference between a religion and a cult. I know the difference, but it’s something I never think about, so I struggled to articulate my truths. We ended up skipping seventh period to discuss it more thoroughly together. She argued that all religious institutions brainwash their members into believing something, but that’s not true. Cults isolate vulnerable people from their support systems, demand unyielding loyalty from them, and do so under the rule of a single individual. A religion is a network of people who have chosen to believe in the same things, through complete free will, and independently of each other. She pointed out that many children born into a given religion end up remaining there, suggesting some level of repression. I noted that this happens a lot, true, but there are probably more people who reject the beliefs of their parents than she realizes. Or realized, rather. Unfortunately, we never really came to an understanding. My faith is so important to me, but I had never really been in a position to defend it. Honestly, this town is so predominantly Christian that I don’t hear much questioning. I had always assumed she was Christian too, but this incident showed quite a bit of doubt in her heart. I didn’t want to push it, but she was starting to make me think she was actually an atheist. It may sound intolerant of me, but I don’t know of anything that would be worse than that. How terrible it would be to go through life not believing in anything? How lonely and sad would it be, not having anything to look forward to? All religions have some form of the eternal soul, but atheists believe that at the end of your life, you’ll just stop existing. They don’t even believe in some perpetual darkness. They think you won’t be at all. I can’t fathom it. It’s the scariest thought I’ve even almost thought. I’ve been praying for her every night since she died. I pray that she found solace, and that she didn’t leave this world thinking there was no other beyond it. Like I said, our final debate was a couple weeks prior, which was plenty of time to see the light. I will continue to pray that she ultimately found herself being welcomed into the Kingdom of Heaven by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Microstory 1011: Sallie

< > Table of Contents

I never said that the Viola investigation was botched, and neither did my brother. I love Lulu, but she is really good at hearing what she wants to hear. I want to go on record saying that my brother has nothing but nice things to say about his boss. Though said investigation is over, I am not at liberty to reveal anything I learned internally, which is nothing, because I am not a law enforcement officer. I can only speak to the matter as a private citizen, and resident of Blast City. I spoke with Viola once, when I went to visit Lulu, and they were just finishing up one of their tutoring sessions. I couldn’t tell you why she and I never crossed paths before. We didn’t hate each other. We didn’t have any particular thoughts on each other, as far as I know. While this is a small town, yes, we also operate within our own cliques. There are alternate realities where we’re close, I’m sure of it, but this isn’t one of them. You see, there’s this thing called a monkey sphere. People might claim to have lots of friends, but when it really comes down to it, an individual is only capable of truly caring about a handful of others on a deep level. Sure, most of us has a general love for humanity, but as far as real connections go, our brains only have room for so many. If we try to bond with too many people, we become spread so thin that none of them is all that real. That’s what I believe happened with Viola. No, I don’t think she died because of it—though maybe it played a part—but she was probably more lonely than she let on. Even her closest friends couldn’t have known her that well, though they might have thought they did. Maybe I shouldn’t be saying any of this, since I was neither friends with her, nor her therapist. It’s just that I’ve always wanted to be a psychologist, and have been studying the field for the last several years, even before I was old enough to take the class. I would not say no to an offer to join you when you finally interview her killer, should you be authorized to do so.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: October 6, 2213

« < » > Table of Contents

And like Jon Snow before him, Mateo Matic was suddenly returned from the dead. He could only move his neck a little as he gasped for air, and he could feel a tingling in his fingers. He had no recollection of where he had been, if anywhere, but he had an acute awareness of the passage of time. For him, it had been fifty-five days. For everyone else, fifty-five years.

A warm hand comforted him by the shoulder and chest. “Don’t try to move,” Leona said to him.

He tried to speak, but his throat was scratchy, and nothing came out. It wasn’t complete silence, but it wasn’t intelligible. He looked around the room. There were two other women there. He didn’t recognize either of them, but one looked a little like Saga Einarsson. Mateo managed to lift his head some more, and saw another man in the corner, but didn’t recognize him either. A lot of time passed since he left, so it wasn’t super surprising Leona had found a new gang of friends. He had a few questions. He took Leona by the arm, a little too aggressively, and tried to speak again, mouthing his words deliberately.

The woman who looked like Saga moved her arms around. The other woman nodded. “He asked where he’s been.” That was exactly right. She could read lips.

“You were taken out of existence,” Leona answered.

He remembered that. Arcadia could erase people from reality, but she wasn’t the one who did this to him. It was someone called The Superintendent. What a dick. He directed his attention at the lip reader, and asked another question.

She signed his question, and the other woman translated again, “how did you get me back?”

Leona smiled. It had been forever since he had seen that. “It wasn’t easy.”

“How did you even remember me at all?” the interpreter translated.

“It doesn’t matter,” Leona answered. “You’re back now, and no one will ever take you from me again.”

“Introduce me,” she translated.

“Mateo Matic, this is Vitalie Crawville. She’s an astral projector who was born on on Durus. You remember Horace telling us about that? It’s a rogue planet that’s been through a lot.” She presented the lip reader. “Étude was born there as well, but she’s the daughter of Saga Einarsson, and Camden Voss. I’m not sure you ever heard his name. He was Xearea’s brother.”

Mateo nodded in understanding, then tipped his chin as much as possible to greet his new friends. Then he looked over at the man in the corner.

“Oh,” Leona said. “I don’t know who that is.”

The man stood up and reached out to shake Mateo’s hand. “Ramses Abdulrashid. Former Freemarketeer, and engineer-extraordinaire.”

Leona awkwardly twisted her arm and shook his hand instead. “Nice to meet you.”

“What’s this thing on my chest?” Vitalie translated for Mateo again.

“Can I remove it?” Leona asked the group. “Does he have to keep it with him the whole time? Is this not permanent?”

“I don’t know,” Vitalie said.

Étude shook her head to indicate she didn’t know either.

Mateo lifted his head more than ever to see. It looked like one of those old glass things they used to put on top of powerline poles. That wasn’t all, though. He could feel something coming off of the object. It was a feeling, packed with information that he couldn’t interpret. He only recognized one word. Who the hell is Sharice? he mouthed.

Étude was shocked by this. She put both her hands into fists, with one pinky up in the air. She then bumped then together three times.

“Sharice?” Vitalie questioned. “Did he know Sharice?”

“Impossible,” Leona said. “Mateo, how do you know that name?”

He focused on the glass thing on his chest more. Another word came to his mind, which he asked Étude about. Four fingers up, with her thumb over her palm. She tapped her cheek, then waved her hands in front of her, almost like a river. No, not a river, but a brook.

“Brooke?” Leona asked. She looked down at the object. “They’re alive. They’re alive in there.”

Étude was frantically signing to Vitalie.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. That’s why we couldn’t find their consciousnesses in the ship’s blackbox. Your seer didn’t tell you it would happen like this?”

No, Étude replied. That was probably the one and only sign that Mateo knew.

“How could we possibly get them out?” Leona asked.

“We would need somewhere to put them,” Vitalie pointed out.

“Okay, great. Let’s mock up some android bodies, and get this done.”

“Uh,” Ramses hesitated, “it’s not quite that easy.”

“I’m not saying it will be easy,” Leona acknowledged. “And we’ll have to convince these people to help, but surely they’ll want to.”

Ramses shook his head. “They would love to help, but they wouldn’t be able to. Two types of entities came here to Proxima Doma. It’s meant to be a haven for organic humans. They figured it was their birthright, since people have been dreaming of coming here longer than anywhere else, though I’m not sure that’s true. It’s possibly the least hostile environment, and definitely the best candidate for terraforming.”

“The point, Ram,” Vitalie pushed.

“The point is that they have helper bots, but no consciousness transference technology. They don’t even have Theseus tech. This is supposed to be our second home, not a transhuman establishment.”

“Well, we’re going back to Earth as soon as we can,” Leona said. “We’ll take the Insulator of Life with us, and transfer them to new substrates when we get back.”

Ramses shook his head again. “There aren’t any interstellar ferries right now. The whole system wants to operate on their own. New colony ships will be coming in a few years, but nobody is leaving.”

“Well, how far are we from civilization, goddammit?” Leona shouted.

Mateo took her by the hand to calm her down.

“Bungula,” Ramses answered.

“Okay, that’s actually better,” Leona said. “That is, if we can get there.”

“I’m sure that can be arranged,” Ramses said.

“There’s one problem, though,” Vitalie said.

Leona understood. “They would have to leave on a day where Mateo and I actually exist.”

“You don’t have to come,” Vitalie said. “Étude and I can handle it.”

“No,” Leona said. “Brooke is family, and by extension, so is Sharice. Now that I have all my memories, I realize that they’re Mateo’s half-sister, and his niece, respectively.”

Well, we can’t do anything about it today, Étude signed. My patient needs rest. It’s been an eventful day for him. Leona, when was the last time you slept too? You better get on it. I will call you if anything changes. Apparently, she was a medical professional, just like her mother.

Mateo tried to sleep after everyone left, but he was wide awake. It felt like he had been asleep the entire time he was missing, so now he had tons of energy. Of course, he couldn’t do much with this energy, as his body was no longer used to moving. He channeled his inner Beatrix Kiddo, and commanded his muscles to move, starting from his big toe, and upwards until he was fully standing at the side of his bed. Étude came back into the room shortly thereafter and smiled, as if this was her plan all along.

“Can you speak?” she asked him.

This was a shock. “I...I can. I thought you couldn’t. Are you not deaf?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m just mute.”

He turned his lizard brain, but instead of responding, he simply waited for her to elaborate.

“I’m what we in the business would call a late bloomer. I wasn’t set to talk until  I was well into my second year of life. As crazy as it sounds, I recall the moment I decided to start speaking. My mother, Saga was in the middle of a conversation with a family friend of ours. We were in danger on Durus, you see, or at least that’s what Saga perceived. This woman created a haven for her in a parallel spatial dimension, so they were the only two people I knew for years, until Leona and her friends found us. They were discussing my womb-mother, and Saga’s wife, Andromeda. More specifically, they were discussing her tragic death. I know I didn’t understand everything they were saying, but I could certainly feel my mom’s pain. It wasn’t so much that I made a conscious decision to stay silent; it’s more like her heartache silenced me. I was going to start talking once I was older, but ended up not doing that either. Several years ago, I resolved to say my first word at the age of forty-five, which was how old my womb-mother was when she died.”

“If that’s today, why is it that the others still think you’re mute? Did you not, like, announce it, or anything?”

Étude shook her head. “I’m not forty-five yet. Your return from the dead galvanized me. I didn’t plan for it, it just feels like it’s time.”

“I don’t know whether I should apologize, or say you’re welcome.”

“I don’t know either.”

Mateo sat back down on the bed, and stared at the Insulator of Life, which he had set on the nightstand. “Where are we?”

“Proxima Doma, Proxima Centauri,” Étude answered.

“I do not understand that designation.”

“The star is called Proxima Centauri. The planet is Proxima Doma. It’s a pseudo-habitable rocky world where vonerthans have chosen to migrate.”

“Vonerthans?”

“It’s a collective term for any entity originally sourced from humans of Earth. The only intelligent creatures that the greater vonerthan population has encountered are from Earth. As salmon and choosers, we’re privy to information about aliens, but most people aren’t, so at the moment, it’s a hypothetical distinction. A lot of people here are artificial intelligences, so we can’t identify them as human. Transhumans and transgenics sometimes don’t consider themselves humans anymore either.”

He waved towards the insulator. “What are they?”

“You knew Brooke Prieto-Matic. As a transhuman, she was able to interface with a regulated artificial intelligence. A set of particular conditions resulted in the awakening of her daughter, Sharice. Right now, their consciousnesses are trapped in there, as per your claims.”

“Can they hear us?”

“Probably.”

And we have to take them to...?” Mateo couldn’t remember what they had said.

“Bungula. It’s a planet orbiting Alpha Centauri A. It isn’t that far.”

Mateo nodded as he swung his legs forwards and backwards in an alternating pattern. He was warming his legs up before he tried walking.

“Does it bother you to be so far from Earth?”

“I’ve been farther.”

“I know, so maybe you’re ready to go back home.”

He stood up and gazed out the viewport. The sky looked about as it did in the Earthan night sky, though maybe it was always night here. Was there any atmosphere at all?  Perhaps it never turned blue. “I have no home.”

Leona walked in. “What about me?”

“Yes.” Mateo smiled at her. “You are my home.”

Leona didn’t say anything, but she was holding her stomach in one hand. He had seen that move before.

He looked around, possibly looking for a calendar, or a clock. “What year is it again?”

“2213,” Leona answered.

“Are you showing yet?”

Leona’s face so swiftly turned sad that Mateo almost couldn’t remember what it was like to see her smile, though it was just seconds ago. “How did you know about them? I didn’t find out until...” she trailed off.

“I’ve met them before. It took some time to put it together, but they appear to be a couple of quite powerful choosing ones.”

“Those are not our children,” Leona said cryptically. “This is a new reality.”

“Leona, what does that mean?”

She paused, frightened and nervous. “We need to talk.”

« < » > Table of Contents

Laymen’s Terms

< > Brooke’s Battles (prequel)

Ecrin Cabral stepped into the machine, known as The Prototype. She was led there by a white monster called Relehirkojun ‘Relehir’ Rokoglubederi, a.k.a. Repudiator. With them was Vito Bulgari, and together they were set to travel to other universes, fighting against Relehir’s people, the Maramon. Though Ecrin had said all of her goodbyes to her friends, she did not know that they would leave so soon. As if it had a mind of its own—which it very well may have—the machine started up, and spirited them away.

“Where the hell are we going?” she demanded to know.

“I’m sorry,” Relehir said. “I copied the files for our recruits onto the machine’s computer. It must have interpreted that as a directive to head for them. We’re leaving the universe now, and entering the bulkverse.”

“What exactly is that?”

“It’s a higher dimension,” Vito answered instead. “Technically, we’re always in the bulkverse, because it describes every universe collectively. But now we’re going to an area of space outside any universe.”

“Why would we leave our universe?” Ecrin asked. “Aren’t all the recruits in ours?”

“Yes, but they exist all throughout time. The only way this thing can travel the timeline is to leave it first.” Relehir took a look at the screens, which were displaying information in a language Ecrin didn’t know. “It looks like the computer has chosen our first recruit for us.”

Ecrin looked at the screen as well, and was able to recognize one word. “She’s the one person I was completely unsure of, because I do not know the others personally.”

“This is a different version of her,” Relehir said.

“I know that, but Leona told me about that other version. She was evil there too.”

“We need a strategist,” Relehir argued. “and she’s one of the best in histories. I can guide you, and operate the Prototype, but we need someone to plan our battles.”

“I understand, which is why I didn’t reject her like I did three of the other candidates you provided, but I’m still concerned.”

The computer made a noise, which Relehir consulted. “This is your last chance to decide.”

Tristesse Ulinthra was a flavor of temporal manipulators called salmon. She could less manipulate time, and more be subject to other people’s manipulation. At the end of every day, she would go back in time, and relive it. She sometimes used this gift to save lives, but she sometimes used it in the reverse, by killing people for fun, and then evading the consequences. People had memories of her in multiple realities, and she was never good. She could theoretically, however, become good, if given the right tools. They were planning to recruit one of these other version of her, mostly because the one Ecrin knew best was erased from history, and the only reason she knew about that was because another time manipulator had the power to alter memories. This other version was also considerably less murdery than all the others.

“I’m in, but how do we handle this? Do we try to talk them into it where they are, or take them and ask later?”

“We have to take them. They’re all going to be living in precarious times, so we won’t be able to hang around, or we’ll disrupt the timeline. If they don’t agree, I guess we’ll rebuild that bridge when we get back to it.”

After they grabbed Ulinthra just before her timeline collapsed into oblivion, the Prototype navigated them back out to the bulkverse, and then back into the real world. They landed on an island. Vito, who was apparently capable of turning invisible, agreed to take this one. He snuck up behind a group of four people as they were arguing on the beach. One magically apported a gun into her hand, and pointed it at one of the others. Vito reached for it, turned it invisible, and snatched it out of her hand.

“What the shit?” she questioned. “Who’s there?” Then she noticed one of the others holding what appeared to just be a pen. “Where did you get that? Give it to me!”

Not knowing what the pen would do, as soon as the guy clicked it, Vito took ahold of their recruit, and teleported her back to the Prototype.

Once they appeared, Relehir injected the woman with a sedative, just like they had Ulinthra. “Lady and gentleman, the infamous Arcadia Preston.” He gently laid her down on the cot, and restarted the engines.

The Prototype landed on the edge of town, which Ecrin recognized as Kansas City. They walked down the street until they came across another four people arguing, this time in a warehouse. Instead of holding a gun, however, this woman was the only one without a weapon. The other three men were holding theirs towards each other’s heads. Ecrin realized that two of them had served on the ship she once captained, The Sharice Davids. This was the past, though, so for them, that had not happened yet.

“Now, fire!” the woman argued. She was Volpsidia Raske, the next one on the list.

Vito thought quickly again. He placed the men in a time bubble. The bullets were practically stopped in mid-air, just before they could hit their targets.

The woman looked over at the newcomers with curiosity. “Who are you people?”

“Your new bosses,” Ecrin told her.

Vito shook his head like a disappointed mother. “Trying to kill three people on your first day. Not a good start.”

“First day of what?”

“The rest of your life,” Relehir said. He looked over at Vito. “How do you wanna do this? You catch one bullet, and I’ll catch the other two?”

Vito scoffed. He waved his hands towards the men, and disintegrated all the bullets at once, like it was nothing. “What bullets?”

Volpsidia watched it happen in awe. “Whatever this is, I’m in.” She let a small bag slip off her shoulder, and drop to the ground.

“Okay,” Relehir said after they stepped back into the Prototype. “We have our strategist, our mascot, and our fighter. The next one is going to be a bit tricky. Our medic is on The Crossover, which is the finished version of the machine we’re in. This will probably be the only time the two machines are in proximity. I don’t know who is operating it, and I don’t know how they’ll react to our showing up.”

But it was Relehir’s reaction that was the most interesting. A woman named Mindy greeted them at the door. She did not seem surprised or perturbed by their arrival. She led them down the hallway, and into a room, and then she left. A monster was standing there. He looked like a Maramon, which was Relehir’s people, but different. All Maramon that Ecrin knew of were white. This one was black.

“Oh my God,” Relehir said. “What are you?”

The other monster was speechless for a moment. I’m, uhh...” He took a moment to gather his own courage. “I am Enarkased Edcubijmohjac, first Maramon operator of The Crossover since The Shepherd relinquished control, but you can call me Exile.”

“A black Maramon,” Vito said. “It is is an honor to meet you.”

“No, it is an honor to meet you, forebearer,” Exile said.

“You’ve heard of this?” Relehir asked Vito, almost scared. “I left my universe when it was in such infancy.”

“They’re incredibly rare,” Vito said, nodding his head, “and they are not very popular. They’re usually killed soon after birth. How did you survive?”

“A group of sympathizers saved me,” Exile answered. “They smuggled me to Eden Island.”

“The human refuge,” Vito understood. “And they accepted you?”

“To an extent.” It didn’t sound like his life had been super easy. “I hear that you are seeking to recruit our prisoner?”

“He’s your prisoner?” Ecrin asked.

“Yes, is that an issue?”

She shook her head. “It’s probably for the best.”

Mindy returned with the man they were looking for in chains. “Enobarbus Agnelli, a.k.a. Barbwire, your sentence is hereby commuted. You are the Prototype’s problem now.”

Their last recruit was a man named Smith, and they couldn’t have missed him if they had tried. As soon as the Prototype landed, they could hear the shrillest cry ever. Ecrin had heard it before, as had apparently everyone else. It was the Time Shriek; a pervasive sound that could be heard all over time and space, apparently throughout the bulkverse. But this time was different. It sounded like it was coming just meters away from them, and then echoing throughout the Prototype itself. Perhaps that was why it could be heard in other universes. Had they just created the Time Shriek?

They could hear the conversation as they rounded the corner. “I can still see you!” their recruit shouted, but there was no one to hear it. He was all alone, except for Ecrin, Vito, and Relehir, who he hadn’t noticed yet.

“Smith,” Ecrin said.

Smith turned around, and put his arms up defensively. “What the hell do you want?”

“To give you a purpose,” she answered him.

“I have a purpose. I protect this town from this world’s monsters.”

“And you have done that,” Ecrin said unconvincingly, “in your own way. Now we are the ones who need you to fight the monsters. These are much worse, for they are intelligent and self-aware.”

He snarled, and nodded in Relehir’s direction. “Like him?”

“Exactly,” Ecrin confirmed, “but not him. There are a few good ones. You will never meet them, though. We need you to fight all the rest...and perform repairs and general maintenance on our ship.”

Smith wasn’t completely convinced, but he would be around for the big speech that Ecrin was planning to give the whole team. Once the drugged people were reawakened, they all stood in a semicircle, and waited patiently for a full explanation.

“My name is Captain Ecrin Cabral. I am a chosen one. This is something my closest friends don’t even understand about me. I was born human on Earth in the year 2012. I was in Springfield, Kansas when it was sucked into the portal that sent it to Durus.”

“I don’t remember you,” Smith pointed out.

“I was a child, but not a special child,” Ecrin explained. “You only cared about the time babies. After you left, which was just moments ago, from your perspective, Springfield spent years without true leadership. When those time babies were old enough to think for themselves, they sought a proverter, who aged them into adulthood. They then started forming a new society. They used their own powers to create others like them, which they called mages, but on Earth, we would be considered chosen ones. I am hundreds of years old, and have gathered lifetimes of experience as a law enforcement officer. I was recruited by this man here,” she said as she gestured towards Relehir, “to start a new assignment. We are taking this machine to other universes, where we will hunt down and fight against all Maramon, until they have been wiped from the multiverse.

“We have brought you here to join our crusade. Each and every one of you has been a villain in someone else’s story. Except for you, Vito, you’re different. I am offering you the chance to become heroes in a new story.”

“You mean like Legends of Tomorrow?” Volpsidia questioned.

“No, not like...” Ecrin began, but then thought about it more. “Okay, maybe a little bit like Legends of Tomorrow.”

“What will happen to us if we don’t agree?” Arcadia asked.

“Sometimes time can be changed, and sometimes not,” Ecrin said. “You were all taken at a specific moment in your lives when no record of your future could be found. For some, your disappearance was a mystery; one which our current situation explains. For others, you were barely noticed. The fact of the matter is that we cannot allow you to return to these moments, and alter the timeline. If you don’t come with us, we will find a lonely planet in an empty universe, where you can live out the rest of your days in a sort of penal colony.”

No one protested.

“Ah, it doesn’t look like anybody wants to do that.”

“I’ll gladly fight, but it won’t be alongside that thing!” Smith scowled at Relehir.

“Shut up, racist,” Volpsidia said to him. “Get woke! It’s 2028.”

“No! It’s not!” he yelled back.

“This is gonna be fun,” Vito noted.

Suddenly, a black portal opened in the ceiling, and dropped a man to the floor. He was alive, but clearly in a lot of pain. He struggled to turn over to his back.

“Looks like you have your first patient, Enobarbus,” Relehir said. “Heroes and villains, may I introduce you to our last recruit for the group I’m tentatively referring to as The Laymen, Platinum Creaser.”

< > Brooke’s Battles (prequel)

Microstory 1010: Lulu

< > Table of Contents

I’m Lulu, otherwise known as The Other Louise. I was here first, but I agreed to go by something else in kindergarten when she threw a fit about it. Let’s see, a specific example of my relationship with Viola. We had a few encounters, but nothing earth-shattering. You must have heard that she was really smart, and did very well in school, but that didn’t mean she was good at everything. She loved to read, and probably would have grown up to be one of those people who read a book a week, or even one a day. She was not so good at grammar, though. It’s not her fault, because while a lot of how English works makes a level of logic, there’s also so much more that’s just arbitrary. Even if you understand the concepts as they operate in the real world, you may still struggle with proving that in school, because the curriculum is even more arbitrary. I actually tried to petition the school board to stop teaching kids to diagram sentences, because they’re a massive waste of time. There is no direct relationship between the part of speech of a word, and its placement in a diagram. Not only do they not help you grasp the material properly, but I strongly believe they hinder the learning process. When I was tutoring Viola, which I only needed to do for a week, I ended up teaching her a better way. Then we worked backwards so she could complete her assignments the way the school wants us to do it. I failed in my petition, by the way. It’s all based on the national program, which means nothing can really change. I’m thinking about studying education, and maybe work for the education department of the government. I got into a few good colleges, but it’s one of those fields where you really need to know where you’re going with it before you take the first step. It’s not something you can just decide to try later on. The whole system is broken, and no one knows that better than Viola’s family. Even if it’s true that they caught the right person, the whole investigation was botched. You should talk to my friend, Sallie. Her brother is a deputy, and he saw how the sheriff screwed up first hand. Yeah, I may go into education, but maybe I could do more good in a more general governmental position. That is, if I don’t have to stay in this crappy town and work at the gas station with my parents. If Viola were here, she would have some good advice.