The Advancement of Mateo Matic: March 26, 2384

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The security doofus didn’t teleport them to the Asylum Sector, but a quick look at the realtime watch showed that they were at least no longer in the time bubble. Mateo glanced around and sighed. “All right, you can go now. I’ll find my own way there.”

“Get this thing off of my ankle first.”

“Have someone cut it off for you,” Mateo told him dismissively.

“What about the bomb?”

“What bomb?”

“I told you I would kill you if I found out you were lying.”

Mateo had killed before. Sometimes it was for good reasons, and sometimes there was probably a better way. For the most part, he believed in peace and nonviolence, and for any given problem, he always wanted to look for a diplomatic solution first. Regardless, this was an incredibly dangerous life. The worst people in history could potentially show up at any moment, and attack. Genghis Khan was long dead, but also not dead at all. They had yet to encounter a famous violent historical figure who had been temporally displaced, but it was always a possibility, and even if not, there were plenty of other violent people throughout the timeline. It was for this reason that Mateo asked his once-brother, Darko for a few defensive moves. He didn’t need to go through all the combat training that Leona did for three years on Flindekeldan, but he needed to be able to protect himself. He punched the guard in the stomach. When the guard was keeled over a bit, he pulled his fist up, and knocked right into his chin. Then he slammed him against the wall, placed his own heel against his opponent’s, and pushed him down by the shoulder.

“Goddammit!” the guard whispered as loud as he could with what little air was left in his lungs.

Mateo tore the man’s teleporter off of his chest. “I don’t really understand what your job is, but I am not your enemy. You can keep going after me, and find out how powerful my friends and I are, or you can just move on with your life. What will it be, sir?”

He coughed, and regained his voice while massaging his chin. “I don’t ever wanna see you again.”

“That can be arranged...” he dangled the teleporter in front of his face, “as long as this can’t be traced.”

“What do you mean?”

“Can you teleport anywhere you want without anyone else knowing about it, or are your movements being tracked and logged?”

He sat up, and held himself aloft with one arm. “Why would they care where I go? You don’t understand how this place works. Nobody cares what anybody else does. I was not hired as a security guard here. I just wasn’t hired anywhere else. We don’t deal in material possessions, we deal in purpose, and I’m broke.”

“That’s a sad story, man.”

“You take my teleporter, I’ll just print a new one, because everything is free, and nothing matters. Why do you think this thing keeps jumping around the void, snatching up refugees? It’s not because there’s any benefit to doing so. It’s because they have nothing better to do with their time.”

Mateo put the teleporter around his chest. Then he reached down and helped the man up from the floor. “I’m trying to change that, brother. I am gonna take this from you, because I need to get back to my people. And you will not see me again. Unless you want to.” He pulled a card from his back pocket, and handed it to him. “Here’s how you can get a hold of me. I’m not from your reality, and the technology we use is not compatible with yours, which gives us an advantage that no one here predicted. Maybe there’s some purpose to that.” He calculated the coordinates to the only part of the matrioshka brain he knew would be safe. “Oh, and one more thing. I would get that anklet removed as soon as you can. If you don’t do it by the end of the day, you’ll have to wait a whole year.”

“Wait, what?”

Mateo disappeared.

“Back so soon?” Dilara asked.

“Have you seen my friend, Marie?”

“No, I haven’t, and don’t call me Marie.”

Mateo laughed, realizing how long it had been since the last time he did that. “We got separated, and now I don’t know how to find her. She found out how to get to Asylum Sector, but I lost the map, and we ran into trouble in the first attempt, so I don’t know if I want to risk it again.”

“You got yourself a new toy, though, I see,” she pointed out.

He looked down at his chest. “Yeah, I stole it. Not my proudest moment.”

Dilara nodded nonjudgmentally.

“If she comes through, could you tell her that I returned to the ship? We should have come up with a rendezvous plan.”

“I got you covered, friend,” Dilara said.

“Thanks.” He was about to leave, but he thought more on it. “Do you have a past?”

“What does that mean?”

“Do you remember...being born...?”

She winced.

“Where were you born?” He thought he would start there.

“Over there, they tell me. I haven’t left this sector my entire life. I can’t even be a hundred percent sure that other places exist. I just trusted people who told me they do.”

“So you’ve only ever known this world.”

“Pretty much, yeah. Why? Are you gonna offer to show me the universe?”

Mateo smiled. “No, you’re gonna do that all on your own.” This appeared to be her reality of origin, rather than the main sequence, which meant that she was their way back there. The Traversa bracelet was meant to help them with that, but he left it on the other version of the AOC, which was destroyed in the antimatter explosion. This was all seemingly predestined. He gave her a wink, and then jumped to their ship, where he found exactly who he was looking for.

“You made it out,” Marie acknowledged.

“And I guess you never made it to the Asylum Sector?” Mateo figured.

“No, I did,” she clarified. “This is just where we sleep.”

“We?”

“Me,” came Leona’s voice from behind him. She was standing by the steps to engineering.

“Are we in a fight?” Mateo questioned.

“I don’t think so,” she replied.

“Were I you...” he said to her.

“Were I you...I probably would have done what you did.”

He smiled. “Report.”

They were awaiting Xerian’s response to a request for him to use main sequence temporal technology to sneak into the SWD without being detected or halted. He was hesitant to believe he would be surrounded by loyalists, and was concerned about the risks. His apprehension was not unwarranted, nor ridiculous.

“Can you patch me in to him, or whatever?”

Leona smirked, and pressed a few buttons on the table interface.

“Hello?” came Xerian’s voice.

“Hey, Xerian, buddy...”

“Mateo, they found you,” Xerian responded.

“Yeah. Listen, we’re all anxious to get this whole diplomatic solution...umm, solved. What do ya say about coming down here, and taking back your throne, or whatever it is you have to do?”

“I only get one shot at this,” Xerian explained. “If you’re wrong about who’s on the other side of the jump, that’s it for me. The supercluster is lost.”

“I understand that, buddy,” Mateo said, “but you gotta start somewhere, right?”

“I’ve spent so much of my life trying to get back to that thing, and now that I’m one step away, I don’t know if I can do it.”

“No, you can. I know you can.”

“You don’t know me that well.”

“You remember what I told you about how I exist only one day a year?”

Xerian just cleared his throat.

“Well, I’ve had to learn how to read people quickly because of my special situation. As soon as I saw you by that maintenance airlock, I knew you weren’t gonna hurt me. I knew you were a good person. I’ve met a few people on this sunship, and if there’s one thing they have in common it’s that they are all lost. They need direction. They need someone to tell them where to go, so they can stop wandering the void, and end the war. You’re not the only one who can do that, I’m sure...but you’re the only one on this phone call, so if you won’t at least try, it ain’t gettin’ done. Make sense?”

A pause. “Makes sense.” Xerian’s voice sounded different. He was no longer on the other side of the call, but standing behind them on the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

They breathed their sighs of relief.

“Do you need to do anything to prepare?” Marie asked. “The Asylum Council eagerly awaits your highly anticipated return to power.”

“I have something that I would like to do to prepare him for it,” Leona jumped in. “I think you’ll find these contingency precautions will adequately ease your distress.”

“I would like to go to the Suadona,” Marie began, “if that’s at all possible. I don’t think my services are needed here anymore.”

“I feel like I have to keep my regular teleporter here,” Leona said, wrist lifted.

“I have one.” Mateo pointed to his new device. “I’m not sure about the range.”

“We’re actually pretty close,” Leona explained. “You’ll make it all the way.”

“Be careful,” Mateo told them. “Both of you.”

“You too,” she replied.

“Thanks,” Xerian said.

Olimpia was sitting at a console, reading something on a hologram. She looked up, and smiled. “Angela!” she shouted.

“What!” Angela’s voice came from the other room.

“We have visitors!” Olimpia returned.

Angela ran in with her arms raised defensively. “Who? Oh.”

“Angela Marie Walton, allow me to introduce...Marie Angela Walton.”

“That’s not my middle name,” Marie said at exactly the same time as her alternate self said, “that’s not her middle name.”

The two alts approached each other carefully.

“Is reality going to collapse if they touch each other?” Olimpia asked, half-jokingly, half thinking it could actually be the case.

“Never the selves shall meet,” the two alternates recited simultaneously again. They otherwise just continued to stare at each other, though.

Olimpia couldn’t handle the awkward silence. “Jinx, you owe me a coke.”

Marie extended her hand, and Angela reached out to accept it.

Mateo couldn’t help but make a sudden bzzz! sound. They immediately pulled away from each other. “Sorry, the gag was just sitting there. I’m sure it’s fine.”

“Just don’t have any kids together, or they’ll become a serial bomber,” Olimpia joked again.

“I don’t know what that means,” they both said in unison for a third time.

“You gotta stop doing that,” Olimpia warned.

Ramses walked into the room, holding a mess of tools in his hands, instead of in a toolbox, or something else more practical. He just dropped them all on the floor when he saw them. “Mateo, you’re back!” He ran over for a hug.

“Hi, I’m Marie.” She held out a hand.

“Yeah, I know,” Ramses said. He brought her into the hug.

“We’re the only two left,” Olimpia said to Angela. They turned it into a near-full group hug. Though, they were still missing one member of the team.

I’ve been working on something,” Ramses said excitedly. “What I gave to Leona, that was just a rush job, but it gave me a better idea. It’s so cool, let me show you. I mean, they don’t have any Cassidy Long ability-sharing properties, but they’ll give us a nice power boost. And bonus, no one can take them away from you.” He pulled at Mateo’s arm, urging to accompany him to the surprise. “Come on!”

“Okay, okay, okay.” Mateo let himself be escorted off the bridge. “This guy,” he mused to the others.

Ramses led him down the corridors, and into his lab. Inside was the usual heap of tools, gizmos, parts, and equipment. Five gestational pods lined the walls, but there was nothing in them, except for the goo. He smiled and admired them like he had never seen them before either. “I suppose I’ll need to make a sixth one for Marie. Wadya think?”

“What do I think about what? What are they?”

Ramses shrugged, like it was obvious. “New bodies. Upgrades.”

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Extremus: Year 34

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Captain Kaiora Leithe of the Void Migration Ship Extremus wakes up with a throbbing headache. It’s unlike any she’s ever experienced before. It’s focused mostly around her eyes, which are red and maybe even a little misshapen? She goes over to her sink and flushes them out, which is an immediate relief. Her fingers feel smooth and oily now, like there was something in her eyes that’s coming out. That cannot be good. After drying off and taking another look in the mirror, she turns to teleport to the executive infirmary. A blinking blue light on her desktop device gives her pause. She’ll just take a quick look at the message, and if it’s not important, she’ll ignore it and leave, but if it’s really important, she’ll put off the self-care. Heck, it may even be about her eye problems. “Computer, play the message, please.”

An image of herself appears on screen. At first, present-day Kaiora believes the playback is frozen, but then the past version of her blinks. She’s just staring at the camera for a moment, seemingly waiting to find the words. “Good morning, Kaiora, it’s Kaiora. This is not a trick, I have something important to tell you. Authentication code shadow-schwa nine-eight-five-six-seven-three-oh. You may not be feeling great right now, but it’s going to be okay. According to the drug facts on the bottle, normal side effects include headaches, sensitivity to light, burning or itchy eyes, short-term confusion, irritability, and...”

“And what?” Kaiora questions.

“And fragmental phantom memories.”

“What does that mean?”

“That means that you’ll have flashes of the day that you lost, and while you’ll eventually also forget these fragments, you will remember that you had them, and that may cause the irritability.” Is this a recording, or is she actually responding to Kaiora’s questions?

“Did you eat all of the cookies?” present-day Kaiora asks, testing to find out whether there’s a real person on the other side of the screen.

“Anyway, it’s important that you don’t investigate, or try to remember anything that happened yesterday.” Okay, probably a recording. Probably. “You did this to yourself. You consented to the procedure, and no one else knows about it. I obviously can’t tell you why you erased your memories, but it was the right thing to do, and extremely necessary. On an unrelated note, do not look for Admiral Olindse Belo’s second disappearance. Make up a story about why and how she left the ship. The fact that it’s classified works to your advantage. You’re the Captain, you don’t have to tell anyone anything.” The recording of Kaiora breathes in deeply. “I think that’s it. I just wanna reiterate that everything’s gonna be okay. I have to go actually do the thing that you’ve already done, but...happy new year!” She smiles, and the picture freezes.

Kaiora frowns, and looks over at the clock. It’s not the new year. It’s February 2, 2303. She looks back to the screen, and sees the blue light blinking again. There’s a second message. She selects it.

Another recording of herself comes up. This one looks sad and nervous. “Captain’s log, January 2, 2303. I just woke up to find a message to myself. I was obviously meant to watch it yesterday. I don’t...I don’t know if it wiped more days than I realized it would, or if it, uhh...if I just didn’t wake up until now, or what. I can’t imagine it’s the second option. I mean, someone would have noticed the captain was missing for a day. I still don’t want to tell anyone that anything happened. I don’t know what happened, so there wouldn’t be much to tell. Past!Me didn’t want anyone to know about it, so I don’t either. I’m just gonna go through my day, and hope that no one asks me about yesterday. Ya know, if I agreed to—I dunno—release Halan from prison, or officiate someone’s wedding, I’m not gonna remember what they’re talking about. Hopefully, it will resolve itself by tomorrow morning, but I’m recording this in case something else goes wrong.”

Blue light again, a third message. This version of Kaiora is the most upset yet. “Captain’s log, January 3, 2303. I just watched two videos I evidently made for myself. I don’t remember December 31, I don’t remember January 1. I don’t remember January 2. In case you’re watching this on January 4, there’s a weird, silky, film on my eyeballs.” She lifts a little green bottle of eyedrops, and shakes it in front of the camera. “It’s probably memory-erasing stuff, but it’s empty now!” She throws it across the room. “So if you’re still feeling that tomorrow, something fishy is going on. I’m going to record another video at the end of the night, giving you a rundown of everything I did today. Like I said, I don’t recall the last few days, and that led to some awkward moments that made me look like an idiot. I don’t want Future!Me to go through that again. I’m still choosing to not tell anyone that I erased my memories, or that it apparently can’t wear off at some point. January 4!Me, January 5!Me, January 6!Me, and so on, you’re going to have to decide that for yourselves. I can’t make that decision for you, but I don’t think anyone should know about it, because it would really put Olindse in danger. Okay, so that’s it for now. As previously mentioned, I’ll record another one so you’re not lost tomorrow. Today. Your today, my tomorrow. ARGH!”

The blue light comes on again, but Kaiora ignores it, and navigates to the folder where the clips are being stored. There are 33 video files in there. Past!Her has made one for every day, presumably to catch the spotless minded new versions up on the goingson of the ship. Each one is several minutes long. It’s going to take, like, three hours to watch all of the rest. What captain has that kind of time? Wait, some of them are tagged obsolete. She must have rendered those ones redundant with further updates. Even so, this is not a sustainable solution. The memory wiper chemicals must be severely corrupted, or maybe just old and expired. If only she could find the bottle, it may provide some answers. Kaiora gets on her hands and knees by the dresser, and looks around on the floor, hoping it’s still there somewhere. No luck, but that’s not super surprising. A different past version of her probably grabbed it at some point, and may have decided to throw it away. Or one of them found it, and a different one threw it away, because the whole point is she can’t remember any of this!

Something has to change. This version of Kaiora has to break the cycle, or no one will. So she calls Dr. Holmes. “Hey, are you busy right now?”

“I’ve been expecting your call,” Dr. Holmes replies. “Come on down.”

Kaiora cleans herself up, and gets dressed. Then she teleports to the infirmary.

“Glad you could make it,” Dr. Holmes says. “Have a seat.”

Kaiora hops up onto the table.

The doctor begins a cursory examination; ears, nose, and throat. “Did you watch Episode 33?”

Oh, so she knows. “I stopped after the first three. So you’ve known about this the entire time?”

“No at all,” Dr. Holmes promises. She feels Kaiora’s lymph nodes. “You came to me yesterday, and said that something had to be done about this.” She finishes the exam, and begins to pull off her gloves.

“And...?”

Dr. Holmes takes off a necklace with a key on it. She unlocks a cabinet with it, and takes out a bottle, which she hands to her patient. “And I concocted this.”

“This doesn’t look like a very pleasant way to squirt something in my eyes.”

“That’s because it doesn’t go in your eyes. It’s a nose spray. One shot in each nostril before you go to bed. When you wake up, you should have your memories back.”

“You’re sure it’ll work?” Kaiora rolls the bottle in her hand.

“Only one way to find out.” Dr. Holmes takes a burnbag out of her pocket, and hands it to Kaiora too. Most of the waste on this ship is recycled, to the best of their ability. In fact, everything that can possibly be constructed out of aluminum is as such, because it has 100% recycle potential. There is no limit to how many times it can be reused, which makes it an invaluable resource in a closed system. Of course, they can mine raw materials from nearby planets by using a form of time travel, but that demands energy, and isn’t the best option in most cases. Still, there are some things that need to be destroyed, either because the waste is a health hazard, or because it contains sensitive information. A bottle of memory restoration solution is a little bit of both, because it could be used as leverage, or to gain knowledge of things that not even the original user wanted to keep. The best way to get rid of it is to place it in this bag, and teleport it to the stern of the ship, where the powerful force from charged relativistic plasma melts pretty much anything.

“You’ve not been able to test it?”

“Not in a day. You can wait, but...”

“No.” Kaiora takes the bag. “I’ll try it. I trust you. I don’t want to remember what happened, but it seems there is no other way.”

“Make a 34th video, just in case it doesn’t work,” Dr. Holmes advises.

“Thanks doctor, and...”

“And I already have this programmed to delete from my own memory tonight. It’s easy to target memories when you know they’re coming.”

“Thanks again.” After making a pitstop to drop her goodies off in her cabin, Kaiora heads for the bridge, where Lieutenant Seelen is waiting to go through the morning briefing. Once that’s done, she goes about her day, and doesn’t run into any awkward situations, even though she never did watch those latter highlight videos. No one seems to suspect a thing. It is a pretty big day, though, with a lot of running around, putting out fires. It feels like she’s busier than she has been lately, though that doesn’t mean much, because even with the videos, she wouldn’t have much idea what the past month has been like. At the end of the night, she is so exhausted that she jumps back to her cabin, and literally falls faceforward on the bed. She completely forgets to take the nose spray that the doctor gave her.

That night she dreams of Olindse Belo, jumping into a portal to the future. That’s it. That’s what she was so afraid to remember. They risk deconstructing the timeline if anybody knows even a little bit of what’s coming.

When she awakens, she remembers asking Dr. Holmes for help on Day 11, and that she has received the so-called memory restoring nose spray 22 times since then.

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Microstory 1835: Death Comes For Her

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The only crazy thing to happen to me was my death. It was so prolonged and complicated. It almost feels designed; like something out of a horror movie, written for ultimate suspense. Convoluted might be the word I would use for it. I kept getting this close to being killed by something, only to survive it, and make my way to the next danger, which also didn’t kill me. Obviously, it happened eventually, or you wouldn’t be receiving my story, so here it is. I woke up to the sound of my neighbor banging on my apartment door. I groaned, but I didn’t get up, because I couldn’t. I wasn’t paralyzed, but it felt like there was a silky web holding me against the bed. I heard a crash as he broke in, came into my room, and lifted me out. There had been a gas leak throughout the entire complex, and it evidently hit me worst. I survived, and breathed in the oxygen that the firefighter gave me. Everything was fine, and I was feeling livelier—albeit with a headache the likes of which I didn’t know was possible—when my oxygen tank exploded. I don’t know if someone shot it with a gun, or if the valve was turned wrong, or what the hell happened. All I know is I woke up feeling worse than ever, on the ground, covered in debris. I was still alive, though...for the moment. The ambulance, not so much. That thing was wrecked, so they gave me a new one, and tried to take me to a hospital, but wouldn’t you know it, that one wrecked too! We had just gotten through a huge winter storm, and most of the ice had melted, but there was just enough on the on-ramp to the highway to send us flying over the edge, down the grass verge by the underpass. I opened my eyes just as a semi-truck was barreling towards us, unable to stop either, for whatever reason; maybe another patch of ice. After that, someone pulled me out.

I was drifting in and out of consciousness, but I was alert enough to recognize that I was just riding in the backseat of some random person’s car. I asked the driver if he was taking me to the hospital, but he said that wasn’t what I needed. At last, he stopped. So I tried to escape, but he was too strong, and I was too hurt. He carried me up some steps, and onto a rooftop. He didn’t even explain what he had against me. He just unceremoniously dropped me over the edge, like it was the only logical thing to do. I don’t even know if he expected me to crash onto the pavement, or if he knew that a garbage truck was passing underneath at the right time. I suspect he wanted the truck to run me over, but didn’t time it right. I was even more hurt now, but still ticking. I tried to call out for the garbageman to stop, but there was all this noise, and I wasn’t confident anything was coming out of my mouth. The truck stopped, and trash fell on my head, including a bucket of knives. I don’t know why they were throwing them out. They were good enough to cut me a thousand times. After that, the compactor began to run, threatening to crush me, but something went wrong with the hydraulics, and it halted. The garbageman found me when he came back to investigate, and called for a third ambulance. On the way, it almost got in another accident, at least that’s what it felt like from the back. I finally made it to the hospital where I received a severe overdose of pain medication following surgery, apparently due to human error. But that isn’t what killed me either. No, throughout all of this, my wounds weren’t properly treated for a long time, and I found out too late that I contracted a nasty bacterial infection—likely from something in the garbage—which finally did me in two months later.

Microstory 1834: Much Older Sister

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My sisters and I were never close, mostly because they didn’t know that I was their sister. Our parents were split on whether they wanted me to help take care of them or not, so I kind of did both. Let me start at the very beginning. Our parents didn’t much like each other. They were the product of an arranged marriage, precipitated by four mothers and fathers who were themselves not products of arranged marriages. Nor did the bloodline have a history of it. It was just something they wish they had done. All of them were unhappy, and decided the only way to prevent the next generation from going through the same thing was to make this decision for their children. Of course it didn’t work, because that wasn’t exactly a scientifically proposed hypothesis. Still, my mom and dad stayed together—to the end, as it happened—because that’s what was expected of them. They were pretty good actors, and only got better with time. I’m old enough to remember how apathetic they were towards each other, but my much younger sisters are not. More to the point, they were never really paying attention, or they may have noticed that they never saw their own parents show affection towards one another in front of them, not even when they thought they were alone. That was weird, and honestly, my sisters should have picked up on it. But this isn’t just about them. When I was still an only child, I left home at age sixteen, and started to live my own life. They never really wanted to have me, because I was the result of an obligation, rather than love, so they were fine with this. We didn’t hate each other, but we stopped talking, because we had never developed a support system, so there wasn’t any point. I met a man who I loved dearly, and began to plan my own family, which never materialized.

After seven years of being estranged, my parents sent me a letter, informing me that they were pregnant again. I wish I could find that letter—or note, to put it more aptly. I remember it being so formal and to the point. It was something like, I’m pregnant with another daughter, and nothing else. My husband had just died not one week before, and I was feeling so alone. I wanted that support system I never had, so I tried to return. Again, there was no hostility, but my parents didn’t care about me, and they didn’t want me to live with them. As fate would have it, a house went up for sale in their neighborhood around that time, so I bought it with the money my parents-in-law were giving me to help out after their son passed. I realized then how much closer I was with them than my real parents, and I was grateful for this. I kept my married name, and tried to be in my sister’s life as much as possible. She remained completely unawares of our true relationship. She, and our youngest sister later on, would always refer to me as their aunt, but ya know, the kind of aunt that isn’t related. It was heartbreaking, but I chose to respect our parents’ wishes. Or rather, I respected their parents’ wishes, because I had long ago accepted that I was no longer a daughter. Their health declined at about the same time, even though they were seven years apart, so I contributed as much as I could for someone who wasn’t supposed to be too invested in their lives. When they passed, I suggested the three of us take a trip together to connect, and put the past behind us. They were interested in hiking up a mountain, so that’s what we’re doing. I was planning to finally tell them who I was when a selfie accident kills us all.

Microstory 1833: Younger Sister

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My sister and I were never really close growing up. She was seven years older than me, so we didn’t have very much in common. Our parents tried to get her to help take care of me, because they were so old and tired, but she had an excuse for everything. Before quite recently, she thought the world of herself, and didn’t give too much thought to anyone else. She needed to get away from the two of them, and be free of the burden, and it wasn’t relevant that I couldn’t leave. I had to grow up fast after that. I started driving them around even though I was nowhere near old enough to have my license. I’m just talking about the bread store and the pharmacy, but I got caught by the cops a couple of times, and suddenly I’m the bad sister. The judge went easy on me, because she understood that I wasn’t just going out for joyrides. Still, if I let it happen again, she would contact family services, and then we would be in a real mess. I continued to care for them even after that, though I no longer drive. I started to hustle, because we needed money for all the rides we were sourcing. Don’t worry, I didn’t get caught from one of my schemes, and I put those old habits in the rearview mirror when I was old enough to get a job and start driving again; legally, this time. I didn’t do great in school, but it didn’t really matter. I just needed to graduate so I could be taken at least a little bit seriously. Not going to college is a very normal thing that a lot of people do, and you often don’t even have to tell them why it never happened. It could be money, it could be grades, it could be having to stay home with family. Anyone who judges you for it can go suck a—anyway, all of those reasons were mine. I had to focus on holding down a decent job with flexible hours, and upward mobility. I didn’t need to become the owner of my own franchise, but some kind of manager would suffice. That was my goal.

I busted my ass. I was still taking care of the parents, who weren’t getting any better—mind you—but taking as many shifts at the department store as I could. My co-workers liked me, the customers loved me, and the bosses were impressed with me. I had that promotion in the bag. It should have been mine. When they told me they gave it to someone else just because he had a dick, I lost it. Okay, so that wasn’t exactly their reason, but it sure felt that way. I started rampaging through the store, throwing clothes around and...well that’s all I did. It was an inconvenience to clean up, and I was super fired for it, but they didn’t even call the cops. I realized then that this was all my big sister’s fault. She left me here to deal with all this crap, and now she was living the high life out in Vegas, or whatever. I was literally in the car, having just turned in my badge when I got the call that my father’s medical bill was overdue. So I lost it again. I called my sister to complain, but a volcano erupted inside me, and I started to scream. She was cool about it, to her credit, and after a few more conversations, she agreed to come back and finally pitch in. While she was helping, we got to know each other better, and learned that we had more in common than we realized. For instance, we both wanted to try mountain hiking. We didn’t want to do big long backpacking treks, but we wanted to admire the view. Now that the parents are dead and buried, we’ve decided to go on a trip to Whiteside Mountain with a family friend. It’s great, and we’re having a lot of fun, so we want to commemorate our newfound relationship with a selfie. The edge of that cliff just comes out of nowhere. Someone really should have put up a sign on the fence.

Microstory 1832: Older Sister

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My sister and I were never really close growing up. She was seven years younger than me, so we didn’t have very much in common. Our parents didn’t encourage me to take care of her, which is something she probably regrets more than I do. She could have used my support and guidance. I don’t want to say that she went down the wrong path, because she didn’t, but she could have learned some better coping skills, and been a little bit more responsible for her actions. Me, I got out of there, and I never looked back. I only applied to schools that were on the other side of the country. I wasn’t trying to get away from my family, per se, but I didn’t want to be able to lean on them. I needed to start making my own choices, and figuring out how to get myself back up when I fell down. My grades were never terrible, but they weren’t excellent either. It’s not like I had my pick of the litter. I applied to a state school, and then I moved to that state so I could pay a lower tuition. I know what you’re thinking, you can’t do that, but I could, because I had a friend out there whose address I was able to put on my application. A little shady, but I don’t feel bad about it. It’s not like the college was starving for funds. The truth is, I never once went to the guy’s house. He was still a hundred miles away in Reno, and we were never very close. Friends was surely a strong word to use, and he ended up starting a tiny business where he would do this for other people. He never charged me to deal with the few pieces of mail that would get sent to him, but it sounds like he turned it into a nice side hustle, and it’s all thanks to me. Anyway, college ended, and I just sort of stayed out there, because I felt like Nevada was my home now.

Meanwhile, my sister stayed in North Carolina, fostering a resentment towards me for saddling her with the responsibility of caring for our aging parents. They were already old when they had me, but they were damn near geriatric by the time she was born. Talk about irresponsibility, it was their mistake for waiting that long. They got married when they were in their early to mid-twenties. They would have had plenty of time to have children, I don’t know what they were doing with their time before then. We used to make up stories about them once being international spies who worked for competing agencies until they fell in love, and had to escape to America to start new secret lives together. She is of Polish descent, and he is Armenian, or something. Nah, I never asked, but I’m sure it’s as simple as me being an accident, and then she was also an accident. They probably never wanted kids, which is why they didn’t much care whether we were close. They weren’t bad at raising us, but they definitely relied on a fleet of teachers and preachers. A few years after I begin my post-education work life, my sister calls me up. She tries to stay calm at first, but then she can’t help but yell. I don’t get mad back, because based on the few keywords I manage to catch, I know her issue. I abandoned her, and the parents are both doing terribly, and not only can they not afford to send her to college, but she wouldn’t be able to leave them alone anyway. She needs me to come home and help, and I can’t argue, because she’s right about everything. So I returned, and together, we got them settled into the best assisted living facility we could get. Neither one of them lasted long after that, but my sister and I grew much closer while we were waiting. I might even say that we’re best friends now. We even decided to treat ourselves, and a neighbor, to a trip to the Appalachian Mountains. It does not go well.

Microstory 1831: Tour de Force

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At the moment, there are 216 countries in the world, but it wasn’t always like that, and not all of them are recognized by every international governmental body. That doesn’t matter to me, though. I’m not traveling to these places as a diplomat. If they have declared themselves to be an independent state, I have to visit them, even if I was technically already there when it was part of a different nation. Well, I don’t have to do any of this, but I’ve made it this far, so I need to see it through. Let me explain. When I was a girl, my parents received a hefty inheritance from a distant relative that my mother didn’t even know existed. According to her executor, my mom’s great aunt something-something didn’t have any other family left by the time she died. Mom didn’t get this inheritance just because she was next of kin, though. Her aunt knew of her, and even followed her career as a trombonist. Sadly, we never got to meet her, but we did get that money. The two of them took some time off work one summer to travel. We went to several countries in Europe, plus Egypt, plus India. Just like that, I found myself having seen three continents, and one subcontinent. I felt compelled to continue, so before I began my studies at university, I spent a gap year backpacking through Asia, seeing five more countries. Every year, I became more obsessed with adding to my itinerary. North America, South America, even Antarctica. I developed rules about my stays. I had to remain for at least one week for it to count, and I had to go to multiple cities. I couldn’t just hang out near the airport, or straddle the border between two neighbors. I could have done it much faster without these rules—which some people do, thinking faster is better—but money runs low fast, so I still had to work. It took me decades to do it right.

Word spread what I was doing. As I said, I wasn’t the only one, but I was famous for it before I was halfway through, because I was actually spending time absorbing culture. Airlines would send me free tickets to promote their planes. Countries would pay my way to draw in tourism. Everybody wanted a piece of the action, and it was totally fine by me. I was the girl who saw it all, and people wanted me to tell them about it. I tried to write a book about my travels once, but I’m not a very good writer, so I hired others to do it for me. I sent them updates to include in the book, and we realized that it was going to be too long for one volume. This wasn’t a travel guide; it was deeply personal, but the audience ate it up, because there are so many people out there who will never get to see this stuff. Finally, in my old age, I reached my goal. I went to some of the most dangerous parts of the world, but I survived, and no one could take that away from me. Except they almost did. A few years ago, a community in Spain called Catalonia declared its independence. Just last month, the rest of the world finally agreed to recognize this independence, and the Catalan Republic entered the United Nations as a separate body. This is great, but things are still shifting, and during this time, travel to Catalan is incredibly restricted. All tourism has been blocked. But that put me in a pickle. It was a new country, and we all knew it, but I couldn’t go there. Now, had I spent time in the area when it was considered only a community, I might have argued success, but I never did, and I needed to get there. The world united in my favor, and pleaded with the governments involved to let me in, just for one week. Surprisingly, my request was actually granted, and it is in a hospital in Barcelona where I draw my last breath.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: March 25, 2383

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Mateo and Marie made their way to the nearest library, which wasn’t all that near to where they were. They walked, took a sort of subway transport, stepped on a teleporter pad, took another subway, and walked a little more. The library was gigantic; large enough to fit millions of books, but there was not one in sight. This was the future, they didn’t use paper books anymore. They didn’t even bother building shelves for them. The architecture was complex and highly vertical, with pillars going up hundreds of stories at least. The highest part of the ceiling went beyond the horizon, so it may have gone higher. It would seem that whoever designed this just wanted it to look pretty, when a single terminal built into the wall of a nondescript hallway would have sufficed. No one else was here, as one would imagine. According to Dilara, there weren’t very many people on this vessel planet thing compared to its size, and probably most people walked around with a library in their pockets, or perhaps in a tiny chip implanted in their brains. That was if they weren’t just full-on androids. So far, they hadn’t encountered anyone who appeared to be even somewhat nonbiological, but surely they were from being this advanced.

“What are you doing here?” It was a man. It was a very tall man. Maybe this sector wasn’t quite so deserted.

Marie stepped forward to prevent Mateo from speaking first, even though he had no intention of taking lead on this. “We seek asylum.”

“You’re far from it,” the man pointed out.

“We’re here to look for it.”

“If you’ve done something wrong, I have every right to arrest you before you get there. You can’t be granted asylum if you haven’t crossed that border.”

“Are you?” Marie pushed.

“Am I what?”

“Are you going to arrest us?”

The man checked his lower arm, where a tattoo that could move was telling him the time. “You have ten minutes.” He rolled his neck, and shook out the sedentaries. “Then you better learn how to run to where you’re goin’.”

“You’re literally gonna chase us?” Mateo questioned.

He cracked his knuckles. “You don’t understand how boring it is working security in an abandoned sector.”

“Okay,” Mateo said, sending a psychic message through a facial expression to Marie that she ought to get to searching. He, meanwhile, kept an eye on his own clock.

“Found it,” Marie said rather quickly. She swiped the navigation data over to her own cuff, and then swiped it over to Mateo’s. “In case we get separated.”

“I’m right behind ya.”

They took off down the corridor together. Then Mateo carefully began to let himself fall behind, so the bear chasing them would reach him first. “Keep going!” he cried up to her when she started showing signs of downshifting. “I’ll catch up!” he lied. As Marie’s footsteps redshifted away from him, their pursuer’s footsteps blueshifted towards him, and Mateo stopped completely. He took a breath, waited until the man was close enough to keep pace, and then turned to the left. His diversion was working. Marie was moving off safely, while Mateo was going in the wrong direction.

It wasn’t long before the guy did catch up to him, but he didn’t even tackle. He just tapped Mateo on the back as if this were a game of touch football. Still, Mateo felt compelled to stop.

“Where is your compatriot?”

Mateo played dumb, and looked around. “I thought she was with you?”

He chuckled. “Doesn’t matter, this was fun.”

“That’s all it was?” Mateo asked. “So you can just let me go.”

“Oh, no. I’m still arresting you.”

“What does that mean? What happens to me?”

The security officer slapped a pair of cuffs on him. They just looked like thin silver bracelets. He pointed a little remote at him, and pressed a button. Mateo felt his arms being flung over to the wall, and trapped against it with magnets. “Exile.”

“Exile to where?”

“Like I said, this is an abandoned sector of the SWD, but it’s not the most remote, by far. I’ll escort you so far away that you won’t see a single soul even if you walked in the right direction for your entire life. No teleporters, no relativistic trains, no windows to get your bearings.”

“Get on with it then.” Mateo was all right with this if it meant Marie was free to make her attempt to end the war. It would all be worth it if it was the last thing he did.

The security man released Mateo from the wall, but immediately snapped the cuffs together. He was even more immobile than he would be with the regular handcuffs cops used in his day in the main sequence. “You won’t need this anymore.” He removed Mateo’s Cassidy cuff, and stuffed it in his pocket. He had no idea what he was dealing with here. “Let’s go.” He pressed a button on the remote once more, and jumped them to some other sector. It didn’t feel any more abandoned than where they were, but he seemed pleased.

“This doesn’t look so bad,” Mateo mused.

“You’ll get sick of it. From here on out, you’ll always be alone.”

Mateo sported his best impression of Joker. “No, I won’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ll never be alone as long as you’re with me.”

“Uhh, I’m leaving.”

“If you’re leaving, then I’m comin’ with.”

The man winced. He pressed a button one last time, to unlock the cuffs. They flew right into their dock against the remote. “Good luck with thaaaaaat...”

“Activate ankle tag,” Mateo ordered.

The Cassidy cuff in the guard’s pocket teleported out, and wrapped themselves around his ankle. “What the hell?” he reached down, and tried to remove it, but of course he could, because that would have defeated the purpose of the security feature.

It wasn’t the perfect answer, but it was the only one Mateo had. This was the primary cuff, which meant that the owner was the one in control of it, but only while he was wearing it. The order he just gave was the last one he could. Right now, no one was the owner, and all features were deactivated, except for the one that placed the wearer on the last pattern programmed into it. This man was now on the Matic pattern, whether he wanted to be or not. It was going to take a clever engineer to get it removed, but that could take time, and they only had one day at a time now.

“What does it do?”

“You’ll see,” Mateo said, thinking it would be much more fun to watch him squirm at the sight of the clock.

He checked his device. “My teleporter still works. I can just leave you here, and figure it out.”

Mateo shrugged. “Okay, but...”

“But what?”

“Good luck deactivating the bomb before that happens.”

“You’re bluffing.”

He was indeed bluffing. The anklet was real, but the bomb was not. “It’s not the only extension I have for my substrate. That thing is linked to me, even though it’s now on you. If you get more than a few meters away from me for too long, kablooey.”

“Turn it off.”

“You really think I’m gonna do that here? Come on, man. You’re smarter than that. I certainly am.”

“What do you want?”

“Just get me to the Asylum Sector, and leave us alone. You had your fun.”

He hesitated, and looked at the time again. “It’s been nearly two months.”

“We’ve been here for weeks?”

“Yeah, see?” He presented the clock to Mateo, which was running quite quickly.

“You idiot!” Mateo scolded. “That’s coming up on two years, not months. The bubble runs faster than you know.” He pointed a finger at his chest. “You better get us out of here before the next year passes, or I’m going to run a few meters away, and the bomb will blow your leg off. I assume they don’t have doctors around here?”

“I’m gonna kill you if I find out you’re lying.”

“Teleport. Now. Now!”

“Dammit,” he hissed. He pressed a button, and got them out of there.

“Have you found them?” Leona asked a year later.

“Yes,” Ramses said. “It wasn’t easy. This isn’t technically a Cassidy cuff. It’s like a new model on a different network. I can’t just pull up a list of the other cuffs. But I was able to trace its signature.”

“Just one?” Leona asked for clarification.

“I only found one online. The others are dormant, and I can’t see them.”

“Oh, okay.” Leona put on the brand new cuff. “I’ll contact you when it’s time to carry out the mission.

“Be careful.”

“I will.” Leona activated the associative teleporter, and jumped. She was surprised to find herself next to Angela Walton. Mateo was nowhere to be found.

“Leona,” Angela said. “No need to worry, this is my associate. She’s here to help.”

“What are you doing here? I left you on the ship,” Leona said to her in a whisper, which the nearest other people in the room could probably hear.

“Time, right?”

“Marie, our patience grows thin,” someone of importance declared. “First you tell us that you can unite the detachments, then you disappear for a year, and now you’re back with someone else. If you want to negotiate, then let’s see what you have to bargain with. Your asylum credentials will only last three more years, so if we don’t get something working, we’ll have no choice but to inform security that you are here, and let them begin the pursuit process of you and the rest of your team.”

“That is why she is here,” Marie explained. “She can bring you Xerian Oyana.”

“Is this true?” the leader asked.

“What would you do to him if I did?” Leona asked her.

“We would follow him. He is the true owner.”

“I can get him here,” Leona promised, “but I demand assurances that neither he, nor my people, will be harmed.”

“We can do that.”

“I’ll need some time to make preparations,” Leona insisted.

“How much time?”

She looked over at Marie, who she believed to be a future version of Angela. “One more year.”

The leader sighed. “Very well. We shall move on to other business.”

“What are you wearing?” Marie whispered as they were leaving the diplomacy room together.

“Do you like it? Ramses made it for me.” Leona extended her arm like she was showing off an engagement ring.

“It’s...”

“Different,” Leona agreed. “Do you remember where the AOC is?”

“Yes,” Marie replied. “I can’t sync with you, though.”

“Just beam me the coordinates. We don’t know that this can be synced. But it can teleport without having to associate with a beacon device.”

They teleported to the ship almost at the same time. It was here that Marie explained who she was, and how she came to be here. Leona was surprised at the news, but not shocked. It obviously wasn’t the first time she met an alternate version of someone. Why, she once sent her own alternate to another universe to live out her life safely and happily, away from all this drama.

“So you don’t know where Mateo is?” Leona asked.

“Not anymore. I didn’t wanna say anything to them, even though they might be able to help, because we don’t know for sure they can be trusted.”

“That’s why we’re here,” Leona began. “Insurance.” She pointed to her new model cuff. “This will get me back to the Suadona, particularly a beacon on the bridge. But we may still need to destroy his ship, even though you’re clearly in the middle of negotiations. I need the other cuffs, so we can associate to a lifeboat that Olimpia and the other you are on. That is our way to safety if anything goes wrong.” She knelt down, and started to access the hidden safe. “I need to get their cuffs back around their wrists.”

“Stop,” Marie said.

“What?”

“Mateo didn’t want anyone else to get hurt. He may be dead by now, and if so, he sacrificed himself in the name of peace. I want peace too, and if I want it, Angela wants it. Bring Xerian here, leave the others on the Suadona, and don’t make plans to turn any ship into a teleportation missile. If we can’t learn to trust a little, these negotiations aren’t going anywhere. This is war, Leona, and in war, the diplomat speaks first.”

“Marie...”

“Close the safe, and walk away.”

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