Proxima Doma: Rebidden (Part VIII)

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Fourteen years later, there was no sign of Past!Étude or Past!Vitalie. They both traveled back to Earth using one of the colony ships, which an engineer retrofitted to move at present-day speed standards. If all had gone according to plan, they would have returned in 2228, or maybe 2229, if they ran into trouble while looking for the Cosmic Sextant. The fact that they were still not back, and hadn’t sent them some kind of message, suggested something tragic had befallen them instead. They were never likely to see them again. This was proving to be an even more dire problem than they thought. At the moment, Tertius was gravely ill, and was unable to maintain his memory blocking powers, and recover at the same time. The more he tried, the worse it made him, until it just wasn’t feasible to keep going. His continuous hold over the Oblivios inside their dome finally let go, and they were able to not only see the tower in which they lived, but remember it later. They were shocked by it, some considering it to be the tower of God. Étude did what she could to treat him, but they were still on a world with limited resources, and there was only so much she could do.

Since the Oblivios had no memory of technology, they had no idea what the tower really was. No manmade structure had ever been so much as dreamed of by them. There weren’t even that many mountains within the confines of the dome, and none of them was even this tall. Only one woman seemed unafraid of it. Étude and Vitalie watched on the view screens as this old woman, holding some kind of box, bravely approached the hidden entrance, punched in an access code she shouldn’t have known, and rode the elevator all the way up to the top, where they were.

The doors opened, and she walked into the room. “Is Tertius dead?” she asked.

“You know him?” Vitalie asked her.

She closed her eyes. “Is he dead?” she repeated impatiently.

“He’s sick, but still alive.”

“Good. I can save him.”

“Who are you?”

She placed her box on the table, and removed a key from her neck. “I’m a very old friend.” Her weak hands were shaking as she attempted to unlock the box.

“Here, I’ll help,” Vitalie offered.

“We don’t know what that is,” Étude warned.

“She’s not a terrorist, Étude.”

“Thank you, my dear,” the old woman said graciously.

Once Vitalie opened the box, vapor hissed from the cracks, and revealed it to be some kind of cryogenic case. Inside were eleven water bottles, kept preserved for who knows how long?

“Is that what I think it is?”

The old woman smiled and nodded. “Immortality water. It took me years to gather it all together, and a lot of money to preserve it like this.”

“Did you get it for him?”

She nodded again. “I wasn’t able to hold onto the Cosmic Sextant, and now it’s lost to...well, the cosmos. So I decided to find us the next best thing.”

They were confused.

“What’s your name?” Étude asked.

“What’s your name?” the woman volleyed.

“Étude Einarsson.”

“How funny. That’s mine too.”

Vitalie gasped. “You’re the other one. The other Étude.”

Old!Étude laughed and pointed at Young!Étude. “She’s the other one.”

“You look like you’ve been gone longer than we’ve been waiting. What happened to you?” Étude asked, not sure how to feel about this situation.

“A great deal,” Old!Étude said, trying to pull a chair up for herself.

Vitalie helped her. “I’ll give this water to Tertius. I can still hear you from the other room.”

Old!Étude began to tell her story. “Everything went fine on Earth. We got there when we were supposed to, The Concierge let us into The Constant, and she gladly handed over the Cosmic Sextant. Then we got back in our ship, and headed on our way. Something went wrong, though, proving how foolish it is to go on an interstellar journey without a pilot, or at least a mechanic. Our only hope was to activate the Sextant itself, and take it all the way to Dardius. We were there for...a little bit, not as long as I look now, but we started a life. We found who we were looking for. It wasn’t an animal. His name was Newt. Newt Clemens. I fell in love with him, and he did us a favor. He transferred my powers to the other Vitalie. She is, as far as I know, presently still on Dardius, doing her thing for those people. She doesn’t even need my help anymore.” She paused to rest her eyes for a moment. “Anyway, Newt and I had a child, but that child was not safe there. It’s funny, Newt was rescued from his timeline, because that was the safest place for him, but it wasn’t safe for our child...not anymore.

“He sent the two of us away. We snuck into the Nexus replica, and traveled back to Earth. But not just any Earth...he sent us to the past, because no one would be looking for us there. It was there that we lived in peace for eighteen years, which was when I finally found the last of the immortality water. I was pretty old by then. It was millenia after Tertius was first born, and decades before he would arrive in the future. The early 21st century was just a pointless time period for me if I wanted to get this stuff to him. If I was going to survive, I would have to let myself die first. I spent the rest of my money on cryonic preservation, scheduled to be released at the right time to get back here to Proxima Doma. Well, not all my money. I spent a little on euthanasia. If I had let the disease that was killing me run its course, people in the future might not have been able to revive me, or just might not have bothered. I left my daughter; abandoned her, all to protect these people here.” She gestured towards the outside.

“I’m so sorry you had to go through that,” Young!Étude apologized. “Forgive me, but, why wait all this time to approach us?”

Old!Étude giggled. “Because, dummy, you erased my memories. Like I said, I was already old by then. I was...having trouble with my mind, and wasn’t able to identify myself in time. I’ve been living here in blissful ignorance, thinking I was born to a world with a blue sky, like everyone else. I only got my memories back when Tertius got sick.”

“What was your daughter’s name?” Vitalie was standing at the doorway, having finished spoon feeding Tertius the immortality water. “Is,” she corrected herself.

Old!Étude smiled once more, but this time was different. She was remembering all the love she felt for her child. “Cassidy. Cassidy Long. That’s my last name too; I had to change it, obviously.”

“So she’s...” Young!Étude started to say.

“She could be alive, or dead. She was young to reach the longevity escape velocity, but I don’t know if she chose it. I didn’t have time to look her up before the Oblivio colony ships left Earth. The company I paid to freeze me didn’t wake me as early as I wanted them to.

“Why didn’t you seek someone to send you to the future instead?” Tertius was out of bed, and standing behind Vitalie.

She stepped to the side, and helped him to the table. She had given him the water, but it evidently still needed a minute to take effect.

“I purposefully avoided all temporal manipulators. I didn’t want anyone knowing who I was, or who she was. You have to understand, protecting her was my—”

Tertius interrupted her, “I was just curious. I would have made the same choices.” He paused. “Thank you for doing this for me. I’ll never be able to pay you back.”

Old!Étude leaned back in her chair, in apparent deep thought. “I’m dying again.”

“Oh.” Vitalie jumped. “I didn’t give him all the water. We could give you some too,” she suggested.

Old!Étude shook her head. “I don’t wanna live forever. I’m tired, and I’m ready. I just want one thing before I go.” She fell asleep again. “I wanna know what happened to my girl. If you could access the network.”

“Of course,” Tertius said. He looked up at the ceiling. “Hey, Thistle.”

“Yes, Mister Valerius?” the artificial intelligence assistant replied.

“Please run a historical search; parameters Cassidy Long, from...”

“Lawrence, Kansas,” Old!Étude filled in. “Social security number six-six-six-zero-zero-one-two-three-four.”

Seconds later, the AI responded, “Cassidy Long, born Lawrence, Kansas May 11, 1997. Last seen in the Champagne Room of Wonderberries Club on May 11, 2019.”

“She disappeared on her birthday.” Vitalie noted.

“That was a fake birthday, Vitalie,” Young!Étude reminded her. “Wonderberries. Is that where she worked?”

“Not when I died,” Old!Étude answered. “I know that place, it serves alcohol, so she wouldn’t have been old enough. She was at a different strip club before, I can’t recall the name.”

“Miss Long...” Tertius tried to say, but trailed off.

“I know. There are only two options in our world when it comes to people disappearing. She was either killed, or...” Old!Étude trailed off too.

“Or she was sent to somewhere else in time and space,” Young!Étude finished for her.

“Did she have powers?” Vitalie asked.

“I don’t know,” Old!Étude replied. “I never even told her where we come from. As far as she knew, I was born in 1940-something, and looked younger than I was because I ate right and exercised.”

“I’m sorry,” Vitalie said reverently. “She may come back, though. She may walk through that door in ten seconds, and no time will have passed for her.”

The four of them looked at the door in hope. Ten seconds passed, and no one came through it.

“Or in another ten seconds,” Vitalie added.

“I appreciate the sentiment,” Old!Étude thanked her. “I’m going to choose to believe she’s a chooser, like her father. I’m going to choose to believe she jumped through time on purpose, and wherever she is..whenever she is, she’s happy, and safe. I’m not even going to think about the possibility that she was dancing for a sketchy client who—nope, I’m not gonna think about it.” She kept nodding her head, focusing on the good times, and trusting that her daughter was alive and well, or died old and content a long time ago. Perhaps she just ran away from her old life, like her mother before, and started a new one somewhere else. “One more thing.”

“Yes?” Young!Étude asked with a frown. Her alternate self was not looking good.

“The lid, of the case I came here with.” She tried to reach for it, but could barely keep her arms in the air.

Vitalie hopped over, and got to the case first. “I’ll find it. What am I looking for?”

“A vial,” Old!Étude said.

Vitalie pulled the lining from the lid, and retrieved a vial from behind it. “Got it. Who’s is this?”

“It’s Newt’s blood, with a little somethin’ extra. You infuse that in your body, and any child you conceive is guaranteed to be born with your powers. You’ll also lose those powers.”

“Why would we want this?” Young!Étude interrogated.

“It’s for him.” She jerked her head up to Tertius. “Just because he’s immortal now, doesn’t mean he’ll always want to do this. If he ever wants to pass the torch, he can. I even think his immortality will be passed on to his offspring. Now, put it back in the case and close it. It still needs to be preserved.”

Vitalie quickly did as she was told.

“Mister Valerius,” Old!Étude said, “could I possibly borrow your bed? I’m frightfully tired.”

“Of course. Here, let me help you.” Apparently back to full strength, and then some, Tertius lifted the old woman in his arms, and carried her to the other room. He returned ten seconds later. “She’s gone.”

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Microstory 1100: Salmonverse Profiles Introduction

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Back in 2007, I came up with this story about a group of people with special abilities. Several of the characters I just thought up myself, because of my previous exposure to superhero movies. Those became my core characters, but I wanted to have dozens of others, so I did a lot of research. The idea was to focus on the main group for the first season of a television series, and then start exploring the others, one episode at a time. I ended up with roughly a hundred in total, which ultimately proved to be perfect when I was trying to come up with a series to do for this website. I have a lot of mixed feelings about Bellevue Profiles, though. On one hand, I had a solid idea of who these people were, and their backstories were predetermined; I just needed to fill in some detail. On the other hand, I felt like I was locking myself into canonical plot points, and I didn’t have a whole lot of freedom to come up with some more creative choices. I think it worked out, but by the time I was done, I was already regretting the decisions I made for some of them, and have had to find ways to incorporate the developments into the larger mythology without ruining the overall vision. Anyway, my salmonverse stories are set in an entirely different universe, which I never thought I would create, and they’ve come with an explosion of new characters I never thought I would have. I decided it would be fitting if I revisited the idea of posting profiles for each character. The problem is that I have a hundred and sixty-eight slots for the series I’m introducing to you now, but I’m still in the middle of compiling every character, and I’m already at two hundred and forty-two. I don’t want to profile characters we don’t really care about, like say, a retailer who tries to cheat the main character, but whom we never see again. I also don’t want to profile characters who are already important in their own stories, because I don’t have the room, and they’ve been taken care of anyway. I have to make sure no one is left out who should be there, or included who shouldn’t.

Seeing that none existed on the internet already, I had to devise a way of codifying a sliding scale of character importance. A character coded at Zero is not really a character at all. They surely must exist, but only to serve the existence of some other character. Examples include parents, or the teacher of a class in which the main character recalls learning something vital. Generalized terms like classmates or even parents itself fall into this category, since they’re dismissed as unindependent and irrelevant collectives, so they can’t qualify for true character status. Level One characters are mentioned, but unnamed (e.g. security guard, bank teller). Level Twos are mentioned by name, but only because the context of the story requires they be named (e.g. ancillary students called out at a graduation ceremony). Level Three is for characters who appear, but are unnamed (e.g. a flight attendant who notices a weapon, and has to seek help from the air marshal). Level Four characters are named, but they’re one-dimensional, and hardly worth remembering. Level Five characters have a greater impact on the story, but won’t likely last long, and aren’t likely to return once they leave the narrative. Levels Six, Seven, and Eight are reserved for tertiary, secondary, and primary characters, respectively. The lines between each of these are hard to pin down, and can fluctuate. Spinoffs, for instance, often come about when a secondary in one story is ascended to primary status in a different story. I still have several stories to read through, so I can get the entire list of characters I’ve even so much as mentioned since 2015, and am only excluding Level Zeros from this list. I then need to determine which category they fall into, and figure out which ones out of those will get profiles. There’s still a lot of work ahead, and I don’t even know which character gets the first profile, but fortunately, I have all weekend. I have a cold, so it’s not like I would be able to go to a movie.

Microstory 1099: Viola

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My name is Viola Woods, and I’m dead, writing to you by Dolly’s hand. Don’t worry, though, because dead for me is not what it’s like for you. I am called a voldisil. Most people have two parents; their father produces the seed, and their mother the egg. But there is a third, much rarer gender out there that occasionally helps create life in secret, and when it does, something like me comes of it. I was born capable of perceiving more dimensions than you, and with the ability to sense and channel certain universal energies. I can look to the past, to other places in the present, and to the future. What I do with that information is entirely up to me, but the expectation in my house was that I use my abilities to help others. After all, they’re called gifts, because I’m meant to give them out. My mom and dad weren’t fully briefed on what I was, but they reportedly felt something different during my conception than normal, and that’s all I’m going to say about that. My third parent’s involvement was evidently not completely consented to, or at least not in the way humans treat consent. They did recognize that I was special, and were able to raise me right, but only I, and others like me, fully understand the nature of my species. One thing they didn’t know was when I would die, but I’ve known it my whole life, and it took me a hot minute to realize that this is a trait unshared by my peers. Growing up with this kind of information may be unsettling, or even debilitating, but it made me feel free. Everything thing I’ve done has been part of a plan; my plan, and nearly everyone around me executed it pretty well. But I am not the only one of my kind, and not every voldisil has other people’s best interests at heart.

The way I understand it, voldisila are few and far between, for a number of reasons, including the fact that it’s metaphysically difficult to conceive one. Blast City seems to have a higher concentration of us, and I was never really able to determine why. What I do know is that the more people you have in any population, the greater your chances of finding some bad ones, which is what Homer was. This little town would have become the epicenter for an unstoppable movement of darkness if I hadn’t intervened, and recruited a number of other voldisil, who seem to not fully understand what they are. I wouldn’t be telling you this, Alma, but I need you to understand what’s at stake moving forward. You don’t know this yet, but you are pregnant now. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to do this with your consent, but a new voldisil must be born to take my place. Ada is lovely, but she can only ever be a temporary solution. My abilities can’t survive forever without me, which is why I introduced her to the others; the psychics, the witches, and the medium. I’m hoping they take their responsibilities seriously. You and Ralph were my best options to take on the challenge of nurturing the next generation of voldisil. I will not leave you, but I can only do so much to help in my current form. Protect and prepare her, Alma, and trust Ralph to be a good father. I literally know that he will be. She is destined to be the strongest of our kind, but since she was not planned properly, it will be much harder for her than it should be. She won’t have as much innate knowledge as I did. Everything you need to teach her has come through clues from the interviews you conducted. Thank you, and if you ever need to speak with me in person, you can contact Dolly. One last thing, it’s up to you if you publish this letter as part of your series.

Microstory 1098: Della

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Thanks for coming to see me, Alma. The truth is that I’m glad to take the fall for Viola’s death, because I’m just as responsible as any of the others were. Well...maybe Homer was the worst of us. Nevertheless, I wanted to get my truth out there, because though I’m the only apparent survivor from our side of the cave fight, it wouldn’t be fair for everyone to go on believing I was working alone. Plus, out of everyone in Blast City Senior High’s Class 2019, I didn’t want to be the only one you didn’t interview, besides Homer himself. Or Viola. Or that guy that no one can find. I’m not going to be able to explain my actions to you, because I don’t fully understand them myself. It’s true, I was under his spell. The others were convinced to help them using their own vices and emotional traumas, but he handled me a little differently. I was technically his first recruit, but I didn’t know it at the time. When we met, he treated my kindly, and made me feel like I was the only person in the universe who mattered. For over a month, we would sit and talk under the beautiful sunset sky. He seduced me, not just for sex, but for my entire soul. By the time I realized what he was, it was too late. I was in love, and I couldn’t just throw that away. I thought I could fix him. I knew that I couldn’t. I should have listened better to my head. I stayed with him, and I helped him with his plans, because I was desperate to believe that we could overcome his urges. His powers were a curse, and there is always a way to lift a curse. Eventually, I realized there was nothing I could do, but I felt trapped. I understand now that all his talk about how important I was managed to instill the opposite message in me. I was actually not important at all. I couldn’t stop him, or help him. I couldn’t be free of him, and I couldn’t become a better person. In my mind, I was an accomplice to something so heinous that there was no reason to quit now, and there was no hope for redemption. I know this doesn’t absolve me of what I’ve done, but you should know I wasn’t like the others. They wanted to be there, completely. He might have lied to them, but he didn’t manipulate them. I wish I could go back in time and be stronger. I wish apologizing for my actions had any impact on what’s happened. All I can hope for now is that Viola has some trick up her sleeve to correct me of my behavior. So I have two favors to ask you. Please extend my gratitude towards Alice for healing me. She didn’t have to heal any of us, but it’s better that at least one of us answers for these crimes. Also, if at all possible, please ask Dolly to come see me. I would like to make contact with Viola’s spirit.

Microstory 1097: Homer

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This is Alma, one last time. As a reader, you’ve hopefully been able to tease out some of the more recent events, just by the clues from the interviews. I didn’t solve the mystery of Viola’s murder because I reported the facts. I solved it, because those responsible grew paranoid, and revealed themselves to me before I had the chance to find them. As you could probably gather, Ralph and I were captured by the cult, and prepared for a ritualistic sacrifice, the purpose of which remains ambiguous. Fortunately, though Viola Woods is gone, she did not leave us without a legacy...or rather, nine legacies. They have assumed the mantle, and their first mission together was to rescue the two of us. In place of the interview with Homer that I will never get, I will recount those events in a more narrative form.

It would seem that Ada really was chosen to be Viola’s replacement, but she’s decided to not do it alone. When Homer shows up in the cave to get started on the ritual sacrifice, Ada’s there, along with seven other seniors. He doesn’t seem to realize that they were following him in until we do, like they were somehow invisible to him until the right moment. The abilities Viola gave her must have worked, and allowed her to get some idea of what was going on with Homer and his crew of evil minions. The four psychics—Martin, Margaret, Mae, and Mattie—are there as well, along with self-proclaimed witch, Alice, and her apparent student, Joan. They’re joined by Harry, who was evidently originally chosen as Viola’s replacement, but failed to meet her requirements. In what capacity he was working for them, I couldn’t tell you. I also couldn’t tell you exactly what the seven people with abilities did in their fight against the seven psychopaths who were trying to kill me and Ralph. They mostly stand there, staring at each other. Occasionally, blood would leak from one of their arms, or a bruise would form on their face. They appear to be locked in a psychic battle; a battle which the good guys are clearly winning. While they’re preoccupied, Harry steals the keys from Nannie’s belt loop, and breaks me and Ralph free from our chains. He tries to usher us away, but we both want to see what’s going to happen. It’s then that things start to change. Joan steps forward, and utters Oshwrlé to their opponents. All six minions fall, leaving Homer to take on the team by himself. The four psychics take this opportunity to surround him, and I see a nearly transparent bubble of energy that appears to be preventing him from moving forward. Ada tells him to give up, but he won’t. He pulls a knife out of the back of his pants, and starts moving it around without touching it. He sends it flying through the air, letting it slit the throats of his own people.

An inexplicable energy seeps out of the wounds, and flows into Homer’s body, seemingly giving him a boost in power. He grunts like a caveman, and breaks the psychic bubble, sending its creators falling to their backs. He takes Ada by the throat, and holds her up in the air. Alice and Joan rush up to help her, but he sends them flying towards the rocks. They don’t reach the wall, though, as Ada calls upon the strength to stop them midair before a potentially deadly collision. Then Dolly shows up, and looks to be alone, but we eventually see that she’s not. I hesitate to use the word, but it’s the only one that works. The ghost of Viola appears from Dolly’s body, and approaches Homer. He’s more scared than he’s probably ever been in his life. She doesn’t speak. She simply taps his arm, and he unwillingly lets Ada go. Viola then smiles at Ada, and gives her what looks like the go ahead. Ada uses her telekinesis to force Homer to his knees, then she places her hand at his temples. After only a few seconds, his eyes roll to the back of his head, and he falls down to his side. Viola then fades away, and Dolly leaves. Alice stands back up and takes roll call. Everyone seems to be okay, except for Homer, and his people. She announces that she’s going to heal them, but by the time she’s finished with Della, all of her energy is depleted. The other five are gone, and Homer’s in what we now know to be a coma. It’s finally over. I do not yet know what sort of truth the authorities are going to recognize, but I know this, we are going to get Maud out of jail. Someone who is actually responsible for Viola’s death is going to accept that responsibility.

Microstory 1096: Nannie

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I don’t know what to tell you. Some people are just born wrong, and I’ve never done much to hide what I am. I like hurting people, and it feels so good to admit that. Here’s the deal. All these chumps actually believe that Homer is going to save the planet, which is admittedly understandable, since he’s proven to us that he does have special abilities. He probably could do that, if he wanted. They think they’re loyal followers of a real-life Thanos, but he has no illusions about what he is, or what he’s doing. He’s made himself out to be this antihero, or maybe you would call him an antivillain, but I know he’s just a regular old villain, and he’s never hidden his true self from me. He’s not trying to improve the way the world does things. He couldn’t care less about that. He just wants what everyone else wants, and that’s to have fun. We both recognize that we don’t belong to civilized society, but we independently felt it necessary to complete our high school education. We do not intend to get jobs, since he’s too powerful for that, and we don’t have any interest in higher education, but it was important that we not begin our lives until we were adults. Well, now that time has come, and this is our grand debut. We’re not coming out as sadistic killers, though. I’m only telling you about this since you’re going to be our first victim. No, Viola doesn’t count, because that was an accident. At first, I was confused about how she knew what we were going to do. We didn’t warn Maud or Gertrude, and I’ve already questioned the other the other five. Homer says that she was just like him, except that she didn’t look at humans as playthings, which is what you are. He was actually surprised she was able to stop us at all. They were meant to be equals, which meant whatever powers allowed her to know the things she shouldn’t have shouldn’t have worked when it came to him. I mean, what was the point of her even trying anyway? It was clearly a waste of her time, and still would have been, had she lived. People aren’t worth saving, and that’s not just something I use to justify my actions. Others are no better than us; they’re just not strong enough to harness their own power. Anyway, I just came to check on the locks. Looks like it’s time to release you from them, though. Homer’s arrived to finish this fake ritual, and he’s brought a friend. Wait, that’s no friend. What is he doing here? Oh my God, there’s more of them. What did you do? Why isn’t Homer fighting back?

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: October 23, 2230

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Unlike people in Mateo’s past who claimed to have fallen onto his pattern, Cassidy appeared to be the real deal, though she didn’t act like she had any previous knowledge of it. Other people were around when she disappeared one year ago, and they witnessed her return at the exact same time Mateo did. Since they didn’t have access to a type of chooser called a diagnostician, who was capable of interpreting people’s time powers, Weaver would have to suffice.

“What do you expect me to do, diagnose her?” She tickled Cassidy’s fingers with her own, like a bad attempt at an examination.

“Couldn’t you invent a medical device capable of that?” Mateo asked.

“Theoretically, maybe. I wouldn’t be able to do it within the next several hours, though. Perhaps if a real diagnostician were here for me to study, I could imbue their power into something, but my own ability takes time. I have no clue how they do what they do.”

Cassidy tilted her lizard brain. “What if we started by checking for temporal anomalies. Surely you’ve already invented something that can do that. I mean, that’s all salmon and choosers are, aren’t they? Walking, talking temporal anomalies.”

Weaver tilted her head as well. “Did you intuit that, or do you know something?”

Cassidy shrugged. “Iono, it just makes sense.”

Weaver studied Cassidy’s face for a moment. Then she walked over to the central table, and accessed one of the terminals. She pulled up a hologram of an object, and tapped a corner of it to make it spin around perpetually.” “Do you know what this is?”

Cassidy stepped closer and watched the hologram. “I suppose I would call that an echo chamber.”

Weaver smiled. “The official term is cylicone, but yes. That’s exactly what it is.”

“Weaver, what do you know? She’s from 2019, and said her arrival here is her first exposure to our world.”

Weaver spoke into her wrist, “Greer, no real emergency, but could you emergency teleport back to the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, please?”

Greer appeared. “Yes?”

“Miss Thorpe, this is Cassidy Long. Miss Long, this is Greer Thorpe.”

Cassidy and Greer shook hands.

Weaver’s smile grew as soon as their hands touched. “Greer, could you please place Goswin in a temporal bubble?”

“What, why? What did I do?”

Greer did as she was asked, and for several seconds, Goswin was frozen in place.

“Okay, you can let go,” Weaver went on. “Now, Cassidy. Would you mind...trying to do the same thing to me?”

“You want me to freeze you?” Cassidy questioned.

“Couldn’t hurt to try.”

“Okay, how do I do this?” She lifted her arm. “Should I just wave my hand in—holy shit, she’s not moving! Are you frozen in place? Did I just do that? How do I get her out of it?”

“Just try,” Greer said. “If you can do it, you can undo it.”

Cassidy waved her hand again, and brought Weaver back to realtime.”

Now Weaver was beaming. “You’re an absorber. Or a channeler. There’s no way to test which one at the moment, but that explains why you disappeared and returned when Mateo and Serif did, and presumably how you got here in the first place. You must have accidentally bumped into The Trotter on the street, or handed The Chauffeur his wallet after he dropped it.”

“So, I’m one of you? Which one, the kind that can control it, or the kind that can’t; the fish ones?”

“I guess you would have to create a time bubble, and then invent something, to figure out whether you can have more than one power at a time. Or you would have to encounter someone with a time power, and choose not to use it. We’re kind of low on options all the way out here.”

“Can I get back to work now?” Greer asked. “I’m still trying to figure out how to maintain two massive bubbles at the same time.”

Weaver laughed at this. “We don’t need you to do that anymore. You can focus on holding the Maramon bubble. Miss Long here can pick up the slack, and cross everyone over.”

“Wait, you figured out how to cross people over?” Mateo asked.

“Yeah, while you three were gone,” Goswin said. “There’s a problem, though.”

“The technology is stable,” Weaver began, “but it’s limited. Not even the Muster Beacon has ever had to summon eleven billion people before. What we need is, more time. I mean, Greer can hold the bubble indefinitely to keep the Maramon out, except...”

“Except some of the Maramon are at our borders,” Greer finished for her. “A few have even gotten past the bubble’s barrier, just because they were already on their way when I made it. We outnumber them a hell of a lot, but we don’t have long before we’re overrun. I wouldn’t be able to modify it in time. Too many people live on the border towns. If we want to evacuate them, we have to bring them into this universe.”

“Cassidy can do what Greer wasn’t able to do alone,” Weaver added. “She can create a second bubble; one that goes faster than realtime. By the time the Maramon break through, all the humans will be safely over here.”

“If it works,” Greer noted.

“If it works,” Weaver agreed.

“And it won’t be all the humans,” Goswin pointed out.

“Yes, some are stuck in inaccessible parts of Ansutah. That’s not an easy fix regardless.”

“It’s my greatest concern,” Goswin reminded her.

“Well, the people we know we can save are my greatest concern.” This was evidently a touchy subject for the both of them, about which they had already fought at least once before.

“Guys. People. Fish...people. I just learned that I’m some sort of magician. I can’t create the kind of time bubble you appear to be discussing. I don’t know how any of this works, and if I only have one day to figure it out...”

“We’ll have more than one day to teach you,” Weaver assured her. “You shouldn’t have to jump to the future with Mateo, like you did before. It’s possible that you are, in fact, being infected by people’s powers and patterns, and you can’t ever get rid of one once you acquire it, but I wouldn’t put money on it.”

“I just don’t know. I mean, I got no stake in this. Who are these people?”

“They’re my people,” Greer explained. “Look, I don’t know if you were sent to us by someone on purpose, or if it’s just a brilliant coincidence, but we need you. You can save an entire world’s worth of human beings. There are as many of us living in that universe as there are on your home planet.”

“She’s from the past,” Weaver clarified. “There were actually fewer people living on Earth when she left it than there are in Ansutah.”

“Cassidy,” Greer went on. “I implore you, don’t let these refugees die just because you don’t know them. Please. I can teach you how to use your powers. These isn’t a comic book. Most of us don’t have tragic origin stories where we killed our families because we didn’t know our own strength. It generally comes pretty naturally.”

“When did you first discover your powers?”

Greer looked for guidance from the group, but no one had any answers. “Okay, well, I’m different. I obtained them from this fruit I ate few years ago, but I put someone who was trying to kill my friends in a bubble before I even knew I could. It’s an instinct thing.”

Cassidy sighed. “I will do what I can.”

“Thank you,” Greer said. She draped an arm over Cassidy’s shoulders. “Come on. We need some space for your training...and tennis balls.”

After they left, Mateo nodded towards Goswin. “Yo, you know where Ramses is?”

Goswin rolled his eyes. “He’s probably working out. He’s convinced he’ll have to be the one to muster all the refugees, so he’s trying to be in tip-top shape.”

“I thought the machines were going to do it.”

“In conjunction with the Nexus replica, and the muster device on the other side of the bridge, the Muster Lighter can pull everyone into this universe, but the lighter has to be operated manually. Someone is going to have to teleport from sector to sector, taking chunks of the population one at a time. We can’t take everyone all at once.”

“Is that right?”

Mateo left the ship, and ended up following Greer and Cassidy to the recreation building, but he kept a distance, so they could talk amongst each other. He found Ramses exactly where Goswin thought he would be, pumping furiously on a stationary bike. “Deputy Director Abdulrashid.”

“Hey,” Ramses replied shortly, but stayed focused on a spot on the opposite wall that he would never reach.

“Stop pedaling.”

“No brakes. Can’t stop..don’t want to either.”

“Stop the bike, Deputy Director.”

“I don’t work for you anymore, Patronus.”

“Stop the fuckin’ bike!”

He did as he was told, then pulled a green towel from his handlebar, and started wiping the sweat off his face. “I need to hydrate anyway.”

“You’re not gonna do this.”

“Hell you talkin’ ‘bout?”

“You’re not going to muster the refugees.”

“Mateo, we don’t have time for you to come back in a year and play hero.”

Mateo shook his head. “I’m not doing it either. I want Goswin on it.”

“Why would he do it?”

“You don’t have anything to prove, Ramses.”

“And he does?”

“He doesn’t have a heart condition.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know you do.”

“I told you that in confidence.”

“And I’m confident you’ll do the right thing. Teleportation is tough on the body. Weaver had to invent a special kind that can work with humans, otherwise you would just straight up die. Goswin has been fitted with transhumanistic upgrades that will allow him to survive. You weren’t, since you thought it would be better to live in a world where you had to pay for them, instead of just filing a request.”

He dumped the rest of his water on his head. “Hey, I rejected those doctrines a long time ago.”

“And I’m grateful for the friendship we developed because you made that choice. You’re still not mustering the refugees. If I come back next year and find out you’re dead, because you didn’t listen to me, I’m going to head straight for the extraction mirror, summon you just before your death, then kill you myself.”

“Mateo, I just spent the last seven months training like hell for this mission. Now you’re telling me it was a waste of time?”

“Of course not. Now you can play a superhero in a movie. You look good, Ram. That’s not a waste.”

A moment of bro silence.

“Hey, what’s up with that girl who disappeared when you did?”

“Oh, her. I’ll explain why it looked like she was on my pattern.”

“Nah, I don’t care about that. I mean, is she single?”

“I don’t know, man. She’s from the past. If she was with someone, they’re probably dead now.”

“Not necessarily.”

“What do you mean, not necessarily?” Leona asked.

“We don’t know that someone is trying to hurt you,” Eight Point Seven started to explain herself.

“They hijacked my ship, and they’re sending me in the wrong direction.”

“Maybe you’re supposed to go in this direction.”

“You’re supposed to be finding a way to turn us around.”

“I told you, I’ve not been able to. You’re the engineer.”

“I’m an astrophysicist. You’re an artificial superintelligence.”

“Yes, I’m super, not omniscient.”

Leona opened her mouth to argue.

“Nor omnipotent. Look, if we were gonna figure out how to get back on course, we would have done it by now. You’ve been here for a couple days. I’ve been working the problem for years. There’s no solution. I’m locked out of navigation.”

“Goddammit.”

“Maybe Mateo will be on Varkas Reflex, waiting for you. You’ve not been able to establish contact with him, and there are ways of achieving faster-than-light travel.”

Leona shook her head.

“You should eat.”

“Don’t tell me what to do. You’re not my leader anymore.”

“No, we’re partners, and as someone who cares about you, I’m telling you...you should eat.”

“Fine. But then we get back to work.”

« < » > Table of Contents

Proxima Doma: Developments (Part VII)

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And then there were four. Two of each. It was as awkward as you might expect, but they kept going, and eventually fell into a good rhythm. Now there were two Caretakers. The people of Proxima Doma were getting into a good rhythm as well, and figuring out how to protect themselves better. They were becoming more and more like the Earthans of the day, creating the same kind of infrastructure and society that allowed the original Savior program to end in the first place. The Caretaker program wasn’t so much a program as it was a failsafe. They went for days not having to go back in time at all, and even when they did, usually only two of them would have to work, and it was usually the pair who were responsible for there being duplicates of themselves now. But things were changing once again. The last of the Oblivio-primitivist Pioneers were arriving, which meant it was coming time to erase their memories. Technically, the memories of the ones who were already inside of the simulator dome weren’t completely intact. Étude had built Tertius a command tower in the center of the dome, which stretched all the way up to the ceiling.

The residents had no clue that the tower was there at all. They could be literally looking at it, and would not be able to see it. Their brains were interpreting the tower as a physical object in three-dimensional space, but Tertius was using his power to prevent that information from encoding itself as memory anywhere in the cerebrum. If some other resident of the planet ventured into the dome, they would not be able to see it either. He was only actively allowing the two Études and two Vitalies to see, along with the Ambassador.

The Oblivio ambassador wasn’t the only one who would never have her memories erased, but she was the only one who fully understood that Tertius possessed special abilities, rather than just highly advanced technology. She and the rest of the cognizants realized it would be impractical to leave the integrity of their new way of life in the hands of strangers. They sacrificed their aversion to technology to make sure their people would be safe from learning the truth. It was unclear whether their secret would die with them, or if they would pass the knowledge onto a select few, so the Oblivios could always be protected. One of the pairs were now discussing the far, far future with Tertius and Ambassador Kavita Lauritz, around one of the many fountains Tertius asked Étude to build for him. One day, the dome would not be large enough to keep residents from exploring its borders without realizing it. Similarly, Tertius would not always be around to work his magic. Everything they had come up with was a temporary solution, and it was time to think about how things could last.

“Well, in less than four hundred years, the walls of the dome could likely come down anyway,” Vitalie pointed out.

“How so?” Kavita questioned.

“That’s the estimated time it will take to terraform this planet,” Étude answered in Vitalie’s place.

“Are they doing that?” Kavita asked.

“Yeah, they’ve begun the process,” Vitalie said.

“Venus won’t be done until 2700,” Kavita noted.

“They started earlier, which means they started with older technology. The progress is getting faster and faster.”

“Plus, we have a different set of variables. We’re not saying it will definitely be done by 2600, but that’s the goal anyway.”

Kavita nodded, but also shook her head at the same time. “That’s assuming we can’t figure out how to keep them from reaching the dome walls. I would rather they continue to be protected from all external influence.”

Vitalie breathed deep, and addressed the ambassador more directly. “The average life expectancy for the human species, barring medical upgrades, is still about ninety years. I even rounded up to make the math easier. In four hundred years, everyone living today will be dead. Were any of you transhuman, the timespan would be meaningless, but you will not be able to control where your society goes. The last time our species was living under the conditions you’re planning to live under, we didn’t stay there forever. We figured out how to churn butter faster, and get to places more efficiently. Though thee pioneers for yesterday were fine with their way of life, and many individuals never wanted it to change, as a whole, progress just cannot be stopped. Religion does a pretty good job at suppressing and oppressing, but we always overcome. My point—and I do have one—is that we have no reason to believe your Oblivios won’t do the same.

“Once all the people who came here by choice are gone, and all you’re left with are their descendants, who never developed distaste for technology, memory or no, there’s no telling what will happen. I know you don’t wanna hear this, but there’s no reason to believe by the time the world is fully terraformed, your people won’t have invented cars and television. In all likelihood, history will just repeat itself. Nothing stays the same forever. Ironically, you might be able to get away with it if you don’t erase their memories, because then parents will be able to indoctrinate their children into remaining as they are, but by making them Oblivios, you’re really just making them unadvanced peoples. Unadvanced peoples always either die out, or become advanced.”

“What about the American Indians from our history. Their technology remained stagnant for centuries, while the rest of the world developed,” Kavita said.

“That’s a common misconception. They were more advanced than you’ve probably been taught. They just did things differently. And they died out, because they were massacred, by people who were, not superior to them, but greedy and envious.”

Kavita thought about this for a moment. “Well, we’re here by choice. Everyone in this dome has agreed to have their memories wiped, and to live a simpler life. Our future children never agreed to that, so it would be unethical to find ways of sheltering them, should that go against their wishes. We don’t have to tell them where they really live, but we can’t stop them from trying to find out. It’s less a technology thing, and more a philosophical one. Humans are driven to explore, and we recognize that, which is why we’re not violent, like the anarcho-primitivists.”

“That’s not our biggest problem anyway. I still won’t live forever,” Tertius reminded them. “Unless you can find me some immortality water, I’ll die long before the planet is terraformed. If I tried to adopt transhumanistic upgrades, I would just lose my powers.”

“What you need is a successor,” Étude said to him. “Like Vitalie is for me, and I was for Xearea...and Xearea for Makarion.”

“That would be great,” Tertius said, “if that person existed. There are others with memory manipulation powers, but none quite like me; not with my scale.”

“What if you had a kid?” Vitalie asked.

“Time powers can be genetic, and are sometimes hereditary, but there’s no guarantee. Plus, I’m not going to have a child just so I can groom them to replace me. I never wanted children, so it would be wrong.”

“What if we could create a successor?” Étude wasn’t sure how they would take her suggestion. They seemed to want to know more. “My seer. I haven’t spoken to him in years, but I will never forget his last prediction. He said, the water reptilian living on Earth’s twin can make or break your gifts.”

Vitalie raised one eyebrow. “That’s vague.”

“I don’t know what it means, but it certainly sounds like he was talking about Dardius, which is a planet eerily similar to Earth. And it sounds like someone there can give people time powers.”

“It sounds like some sort of animal can give people powers,” Vitalie said. “I mean, are we supposed to—?”

“It’s not an animal,” Étude interrupted. “That’s just a clue to who we would need to hunt for there. She might have a tattoo of a lizard in a river, or maybe an actual pet is owned by the metachooser. I don’t know. But I know we can find it there, if that’s what we want.”

“Where is this Dardius?” Kavita asked.

“It’s two million lightyears away,” Vitalie replied.

“It’s closer to two point eight.”

“Oh, that’s so much better.”

“It doesn’t matter how far it is if you can get me the Cosmic Sextant,” Tertius said.

“What the hell is that?” Kavita was still learning about all this crazy stuff that existed.

“It’s a special device that can help navigate space travel,” Étude answered. “It can’t take you that far without a massive structure that facilitates said travel. It can go a few stars over at most, but definitely not to another galaxy.”

“That’s why they built the Great Pyramid of Giza,” Tertius said. “That’s its entire purpose.”

“Wait, people with powers built the pyramids?” Kavita asked, heartbroken.

“No, we didn’t,” Étude promised her. “People like us just designed them. Pure human ingenuity and willpower is what really built them.”

“It does us no good for the Sextant to be on Earth,” Vitalie said. “We would need Tertius in person to create his successor, and he can’t leave Proxima Doma.”

“I can’t leave this dome,” he corrected. “Fortunately, there’s more than one reason I asked you to build me this tower, and do so with this shape.”

“Yeah,” Étude understood. “It’s an echo chamber; the cylicone. I thought you needed it to magnify your powers.”

“It certainly does that,” Tertius confirmed, “but it’s also good enough to facilitate travel all the way to the Dardius galaxy. If you go back to Earth, get the Cosmic Sextant, and bring it back here, we can reach Dardius. What you’ll find there is anyone’s guess, though, because I never spoke to this fortune-teller of yours.”

“The question is who will go?” Vitalie realized. “I kind of need to stay here and protect the Oblivios, now that it’s finally time for them to have their memories erased.”

“I’ll do it.” It was the other version of Vitalie; the one who never experienced the reality where the colony ship experienced a cataclysm. She could have been eavesdropping on their conversation the entire time. “This planet isn’t big enough for the two of us anyway. I wanna do something important.”

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