The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 10, 2399

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Leona wakes up with the worst headache she’s ever had, and she’s had a lot of pretty terrible headaches. This one time, someone blended her brain with the memories of two of her alternate selves. The most painful memories were the most severe, overwhelming all the happy ones by orders of magnitude. This is worse than that, and she doesn’t know why. The last thing she remembers, she was leaving the city government building near Vulcan Point, on her way back to the jet. She wasn’t alone either. The pilot was with her. “Tarboda?”

“Present,” he replies in a gravelly voice.

“Do you know where we are?”

“Negative.”

“Do you know what happened to us?”

“Got kidnapped.”

“Hm.” She searches for those memories. They sound familiar, but she still can’t recall what led up to them, or what she was doing. She’s chained to the wall, though, so that tracks. “Did you see them?”

“They came out of nowhere. Couldn’t pick a single one of ‘em out of a line-up.”

“Wait, do you mean that literally? Were they just really quick, or—?”

“Shh! They’re probably listening.”

“Good point.”

“I think they were just really quick.”

“Have you found a light switch anywhere?”

“Can’t see a damned thing. Chained to the wall.”

“Kind of afraid to turn the lights on anyway, lest I find myself chained to a pipe in a moldy bathroom, across from a guy who’s drowning in a bathtub, and a third guy between us with an apparent suicidal gunshot wound to the head, but—spoiler alert—he’s not really dead; he’s the bad guy, and he’s been listening the whole time.”

“That is incredibly specific,” Tarboda replies.

“Yeah.”

“Is anybody else here?” she asks with a raised voice. “We’re awake now!”

A door thunders opening, flooding the room with a light so bright, Leona and Tarboda can’t actually see anything. The door closes just as quickly, and they hear a single clap of the hands. A much more manageable reddish light begins to shine. Leona blinks as the scent begins to hit her too. The man approaching her—and while she still cannot see, let’s face it, it is a man—reeks of expired cologne, butter garlic vapor, and a diaper. He doesn’t smell of a dirty diaper, mind you, but clean diapers have a certain repulsive odor all on their own. It’s like he’s trying to torture them just by being around, and maybe it’s not like it, but that’s precisely his intention.

“What do you want with us?” Tarboda demands to know.

“We want nothing from you.”

Funny, Leona was expecting either a Filipino accent, or North American, but he sounds like he’s from Ireland. If true, it would be interesting to hear him explain where he thinks he’s from since the North Atlantic Isles literally disappeared to another reality, leaving no one with any memories of it. She obviously can’t ask that, though. “Okay, what do you want with me?”

“Yur Leona Matic.”

“I am.”

“Tere’s a bounty on yur head.”

She kind of forgot about that. Kivi Bristol and her team have been working really hard to take down anyone with any serious plans to collect the prize, but they cannot figure out who declared it in the first place. If they could stop them from being able to pay it out, and prove to the world that the bounty was voided, the problem would be solved. Kivi’s special psychic powers have yet to lead her to that ultimate goal. Meanwhile, Leona has been mostly living on the fringes of society, trusting in the discretion and loyalty of the relatively few government employees who have ever been aware of her and Arcadia’s whereabouts. She has not spent much time out in the world. She let her guard down, and this was stupid of her. “Ah, this is about the reward, eh?” She starts talking like a stereotypical caveman. “I primacean. I like stuff. You give me stuff, or I bonk you on a head.”

“What?”

“Idiotsayshuh?”

The abductor pauses. “Huh?” She knew he’d fall for it.

“How do you collect this bounty?”

“We were tinkin’ we could shoot ya, and take a photo.”

“Nah, nah, nah. You can’t do that,” Leona reasons. “Photos can be faked. They’ll never believe you.”

“What would yu do?”

That’s a good question. “For starters, I would take a photo of me holding today’s newspaper.”

“You said photos can be faked.”

She sighs. “Yes, but you’re just getting your foot in the door for now. You send them the photo, and demand payment. When they say it’s not good enough, tell them you want to meet. Bring me to that meeting, and I’ll be the living proof.”

He looks confused. “Then we shoot yu?”

How did she get caught by these people? She can’t help but sigh again. “No. Then you ask to see the money.”

“Hey, I’m not stupid.”

The door opens again, and someone else enters the room. “Get back to your post soldier,” he orders.

“I was just—”

“Get back to your post!” he repeats.

The first guy hangs his head low, and leaves.

“A tousand apologies, Miss Matic. He and his bruda are absolute eejits.”

“Well, you hired them, didn’t you?

“It’s true.”

“And it’s Missus Matic,” she corrects.

“Another tousand apologies.” His eyes dart over to Tarboda.

“No, not him. He’s my pilot. My husband died. He died saving your world. You’re welcome.”

“I don’t know what that means,” he says.

“And you never will. You’re welcome again.”

“Listen, Mrs. Matic. Oi got nothin’ against ya, but we need tat money. Yu shouldn’ta gon’ out in public.”

“You should just get a job.”

“Dis is my job. Yur lucky I’m da one doing it, ‘stead of someone else.”

“And why is that?”

“Oi’m gonna give you a fair chance. If you can come up with a quarter of the money yurself, I won’t turn you in. You come up with half, I’ll take you anywhere in the world. You come up with all da money, I’ll protect ya for life. We take care of our own, and yu can be oneovus.”

“First of all, no thanks. Secondly, I don’t have that kind of money.”

“Yu could also do a job or two for us, start payin’ it off.”

“No. Not interested. I don’t know what kind of jobs a group of people like you would do, but they can’t be good.”

“Oi understand. You’ll have two days to change yur moind. It will take as long to coordinate and negotiate with the bounty-setter.”

“In the meantime, I appreciate your hospitality,” Leona replies sarcastically.

The boss looks around the dirty boiler room. “I’ll see about getting you some better accommodations.”

He nods politely as if she’s just agreed to fill in for him for his shift at the grocery store while he goes to his cousin’s wedding. Then he leaves the room.

“You seem unconcerned,” Tarboda points out.

“I’m in trouble here,” Leona replies. “This means that my friend can find me. She can find anybody.”

“Yeah, I know her. I’ve flown her and her team around a bit.” He takes a beat. “But the way she explained it, she does this through some kind of psychic power, not because she simply guesses where or someone is.”

“That’s right.”

“Which means that not only do you have to be in trouble, but you have to feel like you’re in trouble.”

“What’s your point?”

“Well, if you’re confident that she’ll find you, you won’t be sending her a psychic distress signal, so she won’t be able to find you.”

“You’re right. So I need to feel real fear.”

“How would we go about triggering that? Pardon the awful suggestion, but would it work if I threatened your life? Perhaps I could strangle you with my chains? I mean, I wouldn’t hurt you, but...”

“No, that wouldn’t work. I don’t know where she is, but to prompt her to come this direction, it would have to be a continuous fear, otherwise the signal would just dissipate. I think, at least. I don’t really know how it works, but it makes sense.”

“What can we do?”

Leona stands up, and assesses the area. “We have to get them to do it.”

“How?”

“This would not be the first prison I’ve broken out of. If it works, I get free, and if it doesn’t, I piss them off so much, they put the fear of God in me. Either way, we win.”

“Tell me what to do?”

“Can you reach that wrench?”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 9, 2399

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Leona, Tarboda, and Roeland ate at a sidewalk restaurant that reportedly serves the best adobo in the country. It was the first time Leona ever had it, so she has nothing to compare it to, but it was really good. Roeland talked about himself during the meal. Back in the main sequence, he was known as The Stillness. He could travel forwards or backwards in time, but only after standing in one place for a long period of time. The longer he waited, the further he could go. His record is two weeks, during which he found himself severely dehydrated, but he didn’t do that on purpose. As the story goes, he experienced a miscommunication in a not-to-be-named wartorn country, which resulted in his incarceration in an extremely inhumane prison. He was given no food, and no water the entire time. He couldn’t even sit down in the cage. He had only recently discovered his ability, so he didn’t know what he was doing. More specifically, he didn’t know how far back in time that amount of stillness would take him.

Roeland ended up millions of years in the past, stuck in the mesozoic era. He could either stand around for another two weeks to get back, or make multiple, shorter jumps. But there was a problem with the second option, because he had no way of knowing what year it was, and more to the point, when the extinction level event that would inevitably end the reign of the dinosaurs would come about. While he was confident that he would not need the entire two weeks to clear the death, destruction, and mayhem, he didn’t know the minimum amount of time. He wasn’t particularly good at math, and there were too many variables anyway. It’s not like he could look at the creatures around him, and find out what period that was. Jurassic and Triassic; the only two words he knew that had any relevancy, and they were unhelpful. Funny tangent, based on his description, Leona is pretty sure he ran into Siria Webb while he was back there. This was before a dinosaur tried to eat him, forcing him to jump early.

He wasn’t quite fast enough, and Roeland was severely injured in the attack. Plus, he didn’t make it anywhere near civilization. His best guess is that he landed about 50,000 years ago. A family consisting of a human woman, a neanderthal man, and their child, tended to his wounds. Neanderthals are evidently called primaceans in this reality, which he only learned later once he had recovered enough to continue on his way back to the future, and discovered that everything was different because he was no longer in the main sequence. He has found no way to return home, but has made a life for himself here for over sixty years, the most recent of which he’s lived in this beautiful place to enjoy his retirement. He reiterated the lie that he’s here alone, insisting that no one else is on the recursive island, even though the satellite is still registering a time traveler there.

At the end of the night, Roeland returned to his isolated home, and the other two checked into a regular hotel for the night. The next morning, they walked to the Talisay Municipal Hall to see about getting permission to visit Vulcan Point. The people in charge were extremely hesitant to even entertain the idea. Roeland and his daughter—she knew it—went through a lot to convince the government to let them become residents there. The whole reason they eventually agreed is because the Harlows agreed to have no visitors over, even for a few hours. They live in a little hut with no running water, and no electricity, and they do not disturb the wildlife. They boat and walk to the city once a week for supplies, carrying all of their waste with them, including what would normally go into a toilet. The fact that they could not honestly say that they were friends with the Harlows did not help their case. In the end, they had no recourse. These people do not want them here, so they have to leave.

They’re on their way back to the airfield when Leona stops. “Wait.” She swipes through the screens to make sure that she’s seeing this right. “I can’t believe this.”

“What? What is it?” Tarboda asks.

“There’s a missile heading for my satellite. At least that’s what...yep, there’s no other object that it could possibly be on course to intercept.”

“You have a satellite?”

Leona dials her phone, and waits for Aldona to answer. “You didn’t know anything about this?”

“I don’t know anything, ma’am. I’m just the pilot,” Tarboda says.

She believes him. Aldona answers. “Hey, Al. You’re tryna shoot me down.”

“I’m sorry, it’s out of my hands. They told me they were going to refuse to let you put it up there, but I guess they found out that you deployed it anyway. They didn’t even tell me they were sending a high-orbit missile, or I would have called you. I imagine we detected it at the same time.”

“When you were talking to them about it, did you tell them that I’m a great friend...and a terrible enemy?”

“I...didn’t know that myself,” Aldona replies.

“Welp, you’re about to find out...and so are they.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to initiate the satellite’s defenses.”

“Leona, if you go to war...”

“They started it,” Leona contends.

“Okay, but they didn’t.”

“I’m trying to help them. I’m trying to help you. I went on vacation, and kept working. The updated design for the lunar H3 refinery should have crossed your desk about an hour ago.”

“It did, and it looks perfect, but that doesn’t mean—”

“Goodbye,” Aldona.

“Don’t do this.”

“Goodbye,” Leona repeats right before hanging up. She sighs as she’s accessing the satellite’s secondary protocols. She releases the decoy, then teleports the rest of it to the other side of the planet, turning it into a darklurker for a time until she can figure out a more sustainable solution. It’ll keep orbiting using a relatively hard to see EM drive, but it won’t be doing any scans for the foreseeable future. Still, it’s better than losing it altogether.

Tarboda is grimacing. “What did you just do?”

“I released something called a leechcraft. It’s going to find one of their satellites, latch onto it, and lure the missile to destroy it instead. Go ahead and call someone to warn them. It won’t matter, they can’t stop it.”

“Nope. I’m good. I’m with you,” he assures her.

“If that’s true, then we’re both gonna need to go somewhere to hide out.”

“I have some friends in a nonextradition country. You ever been to Croatia?”

They don’t make it one meter towards Croatia before they’re hooded and sedated.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 8, 2399

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Roeland’s little outburst alerted the authorities to his presence at the quarantine hotel. They ran over right quick to place him in his own quarantine, which will only partially overlap Leona and Tarboda’s. It isn’t until late the next night that they’re able to reconnect in the post-transition lobby. “Mr. Roeland. Do you have time to talk?”

“I do if you have time to tell me what this is.” He pulls his shirt away to show the timonite stain again.

“We’re not sure how it works, or really why. My husband was infected with that—that’s not really the right word, he wasn’t infected. It started out as a rock, and he somehow...absorbed its power. It’s what fueled his ability to teleport to orbit, and install something I now call a leechcraft on a preexisting satellite. The leechcraft was designed to scan the entire surface of the Earth, looking for time travelers. Well, it was only meant to find a specific person, but we think it found everyone, including you and...”

“Go on. Including me, and who?”

“And whoever you’re living with on Vulcan Point.”

“I told you, I’m not living with anyone. I’m alone. Your scanner is wrong. And you’ve still not explained why this thing is on my shoulder.”

“It must have gotten on the scanner, and then got transferred to you during the scanning process. It was entirely unintentional, but as long as you don’t step within proximity of my husband, you’ll be fine.”

“What happens if I do get too close to him?”

“It would transport you to another universe. There you would find all sorts of objects that were randomly dropped there from the multiverse.”

“How do I prevent this from happening accidentally? What if we end up sitting next to each other in a couple of bathroom stalls without realizing it?”

“You don’t have to worry about that.”

“Why not?”

“He’s dead.” She doesn’t believe that, but all evidence points to it, and admitting her true feelings undermines her argument that Roeland is safe, so she’s not going to mention it.

He nods. He’s old, and has seen death, so likely he no longer feels the need to pretend to be butthurt over the death of a complete stranger, like most people do. He’s more honestly indifferent. “So you have one too?

“A timonite stain? I don’t.”

“Why not. Were you not on Earth when it was scanned?”

“No, I was, but...” That’s a good question.

He turtles his head out when she doesn’t finish her sentence.

“You’re right. Why weren’t we also marked? We found eleven errors, but that number was in addition to the people we already knew about, so we disregarded them.” That’s a good goddamn question.

“This kind of implies that it actually was intentional,” Roeland points out. “Who’s the we in this scenario? Who helped you build the thing?”

“No. Ramses would never do something like that.”

“Ramses Abdulrashid? He’s one of us?”

“He’s a time traveler, but he doesn’t have a power or pattern. Or rather, he does have a pattern now, but he wasn’t born that way. He turned himself into it. How do you know him?”

“I don’t know him personally, only by reputation. In my timeline, he was a famous engineer for the Freemarketers in the early 23rd century. Legend has it, he defied them, and defected to the mainstream. They consider him the first domino to fall. The movement did not last long after that.”

“That’s a wholly inaccurate story. The truth is he didn’t defect to the mainstream, he defected to us. How you would have heard about it at all, but not known that part, is bizarre, especially since a great deal of Freemarketers were reportedly killed in an interstellar ship cataclysm, but were rescued by Dardius.”

“Then you and I are from different timelines, because the Ramses Abdulrashid that I learned about in school went on to become an activist for the post-scarcity lifestyle, focusing on educating and rehabilitating the most violent of antiestablishment insurrectionists. He refused most life extension advancements, considering him unworthy of immortality since he rejected handouts prior to his epiphany, so he eventually died. I don’t recall the details of his life; I was born in the 24th.”

“Yeah, that’s definitely different.”

“Is he here? I would not mind meeting him, even if it is an alternate version.”

Leona is staring into space. “No, he’s lost, I can’t find him.”

“Can’t your satellite scanner do it?”

“He designed the thing. I’m sure he has a way to shield himself from it.”

This piques Roeland’s interest even more than the news about Ramses. “Really? How would one go about doing that?”

“Are you hoping to keep us from finding the other ping that we’ve detected on Vulcan Point?” Leona guesses.

“I’m telling you, there is something wrong with it. I live alone. I chose that spot because it’s beautiful and remote.”

She takes out her handheld device, and shows him the data. “My satellite scans every ninety minutes. Whoever was there with you during the first pass is still on the island. See? This is you, this is me, and that is the other person.”

“I don’t know what to tell ya. If there’s another time traveler in the area, maybe it’s, like, a rabbit who unwittingly ate some—what did you call it?—timonite, and ended up there. It’s not a human. I would know. It’s a very tiny island.”

Leona shakes her head. He is showing all signs of lying, through macro and microexpressions alike. If she knew him prior to this, she might be able to give him the benefit of the doubt, but he could be keeping Alyssa prisoner. She could be trying to get away as they speak. It would be irresponsible of Leona to just walk away without investigating. If the other error is fine, she’ll leave without further questions, and try to forget it ever happened, but until then, she is getting on that damn island. It’s up to her to find Alyssa. She’s the only one who can. No one else is capable, and no one else cares. Ramses made that quite clear when he abandoned them. Roeland is looking at her with puppy dog eyes, so she can’t just keep arguing with him about it. “Okay, I believe you.”

“Good. Are ya hungry? I found the quarantine food to be no bueno. Perhaps you and your bodyguard would like to join me for a late night snack. I know a great place.”

She laughs. “He’s not my bodyguard. If anything, I’m his.”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 7, 2399

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Leona received Ramses’ message. She understands the low chances of finding her husband, dead or alive, but she will hold onto hope. She’ll never let go of it. She’s never done it before, and she’s always ended up right. Mateo has died so many times, it’s not even funny. He was once completely removed from existence by an asshole god creature, and not even that lasted. She’ll get him back, even if she has to break Danica’s rule, and travel through time for a rescue mission. She does need more information, though, which is why she has asked Aldona for a favor.

“Well, which volcano was this?”

“Ramses didn’t say,” Leona replies.

“Did you try calling him back?”

“The line is dead. He’s cut all ties.”

“Makes sense. I’m sorry”

“So, is there nothing we can do? Is there no chance?”

“I’m an expert in antimatter rocket engines. I’ve never operated a teleportation machine. Is there some way to...I dunno, trace it? Seems as though it would make a pretty big mark on the world, an explosion like that. And since there isn’t much teleportation going on in this reality, it should be unique, or at least rare.”

“I don’t know enough about it either,” Leona admits. “That particular machine is more his area. But yes, there is a way to trace teleportation. Unfortunately, the, umm...”

“Oh, shit, you didn’t get your satellite in orbit.”

“No.”

“Because I didn’t let you.”

Leona waits to respond. “Right.”

Aldona sighs. “I don’t suppose getting up there now would do you any good.”

“Not for this issue, no.”

“I’m worried something like this will happen again, though. If you need to be able to trace temporal powers, then I’ll make sure that you have what you need. I’ll fast-track authorization. As far as Mateo goes, there may be other ways. Like I said, it was a big explosion. Sure, a volcano is already pretty violent, but maybe one of them exhibited some unusual behavior recently. That sort of thing would be recorded by other research instruments that have nothing to do with any of this. Let me make a few calls.”

“I would appreciate that.”

Aldona nods, and leaves Leona’s office. A few seconds later, she reopens the door. “You’re off today. Just relax.”

“Okay,” Leona says, but she’s not going to do that. It’s not what Mateo would want, and it’s not practical. She doesn’t have the resources or connections to locate the volcano where her husband supposedly died, so taking any time off is a waste of the stuff. As a traveler, she understands the value of a day, and what it will cost them if they lose one. When they figure out which volcano to even search in the first place, maybe she’ll stop what she’s doing to investigate. Until then, she’s going to focus on her work. This does not change her responsibilities or obligations. In fact, things are even more dire. They can’t prove that Constance!Five was destroyed any more than they can prove it for Mateo. The danger remains. Having that satellite up there sooner rather than later would sure help, though. So why wait?

They talk of it being placed in orbit, but it already is in orbit. It just needs to be deployed from Mangrove Zero, and become independent. That can be done remotely by piloting the onboard robotics. All right, so she’s not going to work exactly, but Aldona gave her permission to do whatever she wanted, so she’s going to consider this a gray area. She logs herself into the system, and gets to work. It only takes about thirty minutes before it’s where it needs to be, free from the confines of the rocket, and able to operate on its own. Now it’s only a matter of time before it makes a complete pass around the planet, and scans every brain in the world for neurotemporal irregularities. She leans back to wait for it, but gets a hit right away.

“What the hell is that?” she asks herself out loud. Antarctica is positively brimming with temporal errors. Coronel Zacarias must have figured out how to activate the Nexus, and has invited visitors to this world, perhaps from other universes. There’s actually no way to know if they are visitors. Maybe they invited themselves, and are starting an invasion. The Mozambican Navy may require assistance, or not. She does not have a way to contact them, and she has no idea whether Mozambique is even involved in the Mangrove Program, so it’s best not to cross those streams. And anyway, there were only eleven pings during the first scan, so these people don’t count. So she does lean back, and wait for the full scan.

An hour and a half later, another hit comes up on the screen. No, it’s two hits in the same place. We got ourselves a pair, and they’re close. They’re on Vulcan Point. What a coincidence, that’s one of the places she’s supposed to go. Now is as good a time as any. She’s on vacation, and she’s all alone here. She’s experiencing a healthy professional relationship with Aldona, but they are not friends. They’re certainly not vacation buddies. Yeah, it’s not really a vacation, but that’s exactly what she’s going to call it when she requisitions the jet. She finishes a few outstanding items on her to-do list, then heads up to the transportation office. Apparently everyone at this facility has heard what happened, so the administrators are happy to give her access to a jet. She’s not a pilot, though, so she can’t go alone.

“Captain Tarboda Hobson,” Leona remarks as she’s walking towards the steps. “You’re involved in everything, aren’t ya?”

“I’m always here for you, Mrs. Matic.”

“I thank you for that. Have you finished your preflight checklist?”

“I have. I’m ready to go if you are. Allow me.” He holds out a hand, and escorts her up to the jet. In the main sequence, the U.S.A. makes the best aircraft, but here, it’s Russia without a doubt. This bird is one of theirs, and while Russia proper is not part of the alliance, there is a faction working at Mangrove in secret. They’ve not fully defected.

An hour later, they land in an airfield that’s about thirty minutes from Taal Lake. It is here that they are asked to wait in a 24-hour quarantine. They’re getting ready for bed when they hear a knock at the door. Leona opens it to find an old man on the other side. “Can I help you?” she asks.

“My name is Roeland Harlow.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Roeland Harlow.” Who is this guy?

“I believe you’re here for me.” He pulls his shirt away to reveal the timonite stain on his shoulder that got on all of the travelers that Ramses’ original satellite scanned.

“I was actually looking for two of you.”

He scowls and points aggressively. “No. There is only me. You’ll talk to me!”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 6, 2399

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When Mateo insisted Ramses teleport out of the magma chamber of the volcano to save himself, he just jumped without thinking about where he wanted to go. Home would be the obvious answer, but he’s not had a home in a very long time. He’s lived on ships, labs, lofts, flying cars, and other random places. His subconscious must have taken over the responsibility of navigation, because he ended up in Egypt. It’s where he was born, and where he spent his younger days, but he feels no strong sentiment towards it. This isn’t even the right version of Egypt. It’s a bastardization, and that’s the nicer way to put it.

Danica’s Omega Gyroscope is what explains why anything in this reality is even remotely similar to the way things are in the main sequence, but something went wrong when it was programming Egypt. This area is where civilization began, but it did not thrive here. Great unrest forced mass migration centuries ago, to the West in Africa, the North in Europe, and to the Southeast in Asia. What was left was a sad approximation of what a culture should look like. While his Egypt stood tall, especially in the latter century, this one was short and pathetic, literally speaking. Their tallest regular building is four stories high, and there’s only one like that. It’s the Port at Said, and it was partially built by Greece, which exports to the rest of the world through the Suez Canal. That’s the only reason this version of Egypt is still alive at all, because they’re in the way.

The Great Pyramid is here, which is surprising, but it’s the only ancient structure that the people still maintain, because they do get a few tourists. Plus, some ships are required to wait in the canal for customs approval, or because there’s a line, so sailors stay in Giza, which boasts the only moderately decent hotel. It’s also anonymous, which is perfect, because that is what Ramses needs right now. He’s not going back to Mangrove One, and there’s nothing left for him in Kansas City.

Angela and Marie are in space, Mateo is dead, and Alyssa is missing. Yes, he made a commitment to find her, but he would probably just mess it up. He’s not the only one who could. Leona can do it just as easily, and she will, because she cares about her just as much. They now have the world’s most powerful governments at their backs, with all of the resources they could need. They don’t need him. He can’t face Leona with what he’s done. He lived. He escaped when Mateo couldn’t, and he’ll have to live with that for the rest of his life, which could be a pretty long time if something eventually changes, and he gets his transhumanistic upgrades back.

Ramses is a genius, which is why it only took him a few minutes to write a little script that will allow him to leave Leona a voicemail without worrying about her answering any ringing. “Hey, it’s Ram. I’m sure you’ve been wondering where we are. I’m bouncing this signal all over the world, so you’ll never find me. You’ll never see me again. I’m sorry to rob you of your chance to confront me, but I... Mateo is dead. Constance!Five broke free, and he had to sacrifice himself. Now, I know I thought that last time, but I really don’t see any way out of this. He was in a volcano, and I programmed the Bridgette’s self-destruct to go off in seconds after activation. I got the alert on my device—he went through with it—it did blow up. I’m sorry I left him behind, I’m sorry I’m the one who lived instead, and I’m sorry for not coming back, but I have to protect you. I have to protect you all from me. I love you. Goodbye.”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 5, 2399

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Mateo spent a little longer talking to the current passengers of the AOC than he intended, but that’s not really what’s preventing him and Ramses from returning to Mangrove One. After some thoughtful discussion, they decided that it’s time to get rid of Constance!Five for good. They also decided to keep Leona out of it, for reasons of plausible deniability, and to also keep her conscience clean. Some may simply call it destruction of property, but that’s in bad faith. What even is a person? Philosophers, civil servants, activists, and other thinkers in the main sequence spent millennia working on a definition that not everyone agrees on, even now. Constance!Five is a person, and if they want to destroy her, murder is the only word for it. To put it any other way would be a cop out.

They spent all day yesterday clearing the vehicle of all nonessential systems, including life support, which normally rests on the essential side of things. If the android wakes up before they get the chance to jettison her stasis pod, they don’t want her having any access to an electrical system. People often call ships tin cans jokingly, but in this case, that really will be what it is, except for the tin part. It’s the only post-transition metal that isn’t on the Bridgette.

They’re currently floating in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle to refuel with Existence water. “Are we ready to go?”

Ramses sighs, and looks around at the bare vessel, as if it were their home of the last twenty years, and they’ve just packed everything up to move. Ah, the memories. “It must be. I’ve modified the teleporter to only operate by the living fingerprints of both of us simultaneously, but only using my right pinky, left thumb, and left index, plus your right ring finger, right middle finger, and right thumb.”

“Sounds complicated,” Mateo says.

“It’s like a password. Constance!Five can presumably make herself look like anyone, perhaps down to the tiniest of details, but she won’t know which fingers to use.”

“She’s alive, though, so if you were thinking that her fingerprints also won’t work because of that—”

“No, no, no. That’s just so she can’t kill us, and then try to unlock the controls, because maybe she can’t replicate dactylograms, I don’t know.”

“Right.”

Ramses steps over, and hands Mateo a slip of regular paper. “Memorize this, and then destroy the paper.”

“This is what you just told me, about which fingers to use.”

“Yes.” His demeanor has suddenly grown somber.

“What is it, Rambo?”

“Did you memorize it?”

“Yeah, ‘cause I heard you the first time.”

“Recite them, in a random order, without looking at the paper.”

“My right thumb and middle finger, your left index, my right ring finger, your  left thumb, and right pinky. I’ve gotten better at my memory.”

“Okay, now switch my name with yours, and that’s the self-destruct sequence.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Your left thumb and index fingers, and your right pinky. If you place those on the panel of the teleporter, it will explode. You don’t need me to activate it, and I don’t need you. As long as one of us is alive, we can do it.”

“Why would we do that?”

“I think you know why. It is a last resort, but it is not a non-option. You hear me? We both have to go into this knowing it to be a possibility. Every enemy we’ve gone up against has been incredibly dangerous, but Constance may be the worst one. We don’t know that much about her, but think about how scared you have been of Danica because she runs the Constant, then multiply that by a thousand, and you may come close to understanding the threat she poses. Because she’s the one who truly runs it.”

“I understand. My right pinky, and my left index and thumb.”

“Okay, let’s hope we never need to use it. Remember, it’s only if she breaks free.”

“Definitely. Let’s do it to it.”

They take one more look around to make sure that everything is as safe as possible, then they prepare to make the jump. Ramses programs the teleporter to navigate to Heard Island. They align their fingers, and go.

Wreckage all over the place, the smell of once-burning fires overwhelms the air. Already decomposing bodies are strewn about. There’s a wheel, and there’s a wing. This was an airplane, and these people’s deaths are the team’s fault. They thought that this was a remote region of the ocean, but apparently not. They’ll have to worry about finding out why the plane was flying this far south later. For now, they have to find Constance!Five. They run over the rocks, avoiding the sharp edges of the metal. There’s the stasis pod. It’s closed. Not only that, but it’s still closed. She’s still in there.

“Is this just a coincidence?”

“Not likely,” Ramses replies. “Wait, what the hell is that?” He kneels down, and looks at the keypad. “Oh, shit.” He pulls something out of it.

“What is that?” Mateo asks.

“Something I didn’t put there. I think it was hacking the lock to find the code.”

Mateo breathes a sigh of relief. “But you got it in time.”

A soft hiss is released when the hatch of the pod opens.

“Evidently not.”

Constance!Five smirks as she’s coming out of the pod like a vampire from their coffin. “Don’t feel bad. I reprogrammed avionics to upload a quantum hack to the keypad. The upload was completed days ago, it’s been working in situ this whole time. You couldn’t have stopped it.”

Trying to think quickly, Ramses teleports right behind Constance!Five, and tries to inject her with a power suppressant sedative. She grabs the syringe, and breaks it between her fingers. “Fool me once.” She takes him by the neck, and begins to squeeze.

With only a little left air in his lungs, Ramses looks over at Mateo, and ekes out, “destroy Bridgette; only thing that can find Cedar.”

“Cedar?” Constance!Five releases her grip, and drops him to the ground.

Mateo looks over his shoulder at the Bridgette, then teleports away. That’s not where he goes, though. He jumps behind a boulder, and secretly watches Constance!Five try to follow him. He then jumps back to Ramses.

“You have to destroy it,” Ramses argues, massaging his neck.

“We will, but she has to be in it first, and I want there to be no escape. I know where to take her.” Mateo makes one last personal jump, taking Ramses with him. They’re in the crawl space underneath the fuselage. They can hear Constance!Five moving around up top, trying to induce what the hell is going on. Mateo slides over to program the destination himself, having researched this a long time ago. He was told it was an idiotic idea, but it may be the only one they have. They jump.

It’s extremely hot here, as one might expect for a chamber inside of a volcano. “Now you can go,” Mateo whispers.

“No.”

“Only one of us needs to die. Go! Please!”

The hatch opens, and Constance!Five sticks her head down. “Here’s Connie!”

“GOOOOOOOO!” Mateo shouts.

Thankfully, Ramses disappears.

“You’re not getting off that easy.”

“Yippee ki yay, motherfucker.” Mateo places the correct fingers on the teleporter. He can feel it start to heat up, and in seconds, the explosion begins. But it doesn’t keep going. Everything freezes, including Constance!Five.

A hand appears out of the aether, between Mateo and Constance!Five. It bends the fingers to meet the thumb, and starts turning around slowly. It kind of looks like a periscope. It stops when it sees Mateo. Then it opens up, and waves him towards it.

Mateo crawls towards the extraction mirror, but does slip through it. He keeps going until he reaches Constance!Five. If his mysterious savior from the future has the ability to slow time down long enough to mount an effective rescue mission, Constance!Five has time to framejack a way out of this predicament too. He needs to shorten that time as much as possible. He takes her by the shoulders, and drags her along the floor until she’s right up against the teleporter. Only then does he make his way back to the mirror, and dive in head first.

“Did that work? Is she dead?” Mateo asks. He’s in a room that he doesn’t specifically recognize, but it looks a lot like Constant architecture. Leona is there, as are Ramses, Leona, and Winona.

“It has not been that long,” Leona answers. “If she survived, we’ve not seen her.”

Mateo looks around. He sees what looks like a closed viewport. He slowly heads for it, and even slowerly reaches for the shade. No one stops him, so he opens it, and looks out. He sees the stars. It’s nothing new, and it doesn’t give him even an approximate location. This could be anywhere. “Guys...where are we?”

Leona smiles. “We’re at that Phoenix location in the Oort Cloud that we’ve been talking about for ages.”

“Finally made it, eh?” He nods and returns to the viewport, just to enjoy the starscape. He turns back upon realizing something. “Aquila said you’d find me here.”

“Yes,” Leona says. “She wasn’t wrong or lying. We just didn’t have all the info.”

He steps away, and takes a gander at the extraction mirror. “Have you used this for anyone else yet?”

Leona steps over to a control panel on the wall. With it, she opens the hatches for three cloning pods. “You were never killed, so you don’t need a new body. Neither do we. The rest have been taken care of.”

Mateo gets closer to see the clones that are growing in the pods. One of them is himself. The other two are Ramses and Leona.

“Okay. Maybe you’ve been gone for a little while.”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 4, 2399

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Mateo and Ramses are still not back yet from dropping the boys off on the AOC. Aldona has not even bothered to think about long-range communications systems, because it’s not priority. They have to build the ships and satellites first, then they can worry about all that stuff. All Leona can do is hope that they wanted to have a longish conversation while going relativistic speeds, and that nothing is actually wrong. She’s been trying to keep her mind busy with her work, but it has not been easy. She’s been distracted, and not even by her husband’s absence. It’s something else. Something has been gnawing at her, and it’s not the loneliness, nor the exhaustion, though both of those have become real problems. No, she’s realized what it is. It’s the Constance!Five android they tucked away in the antarctic. She’s still a threat. She’ll continue to be a threat until she’s gone forever.

Aldona knocks on the door for her two hourly check-in, which she apparently thinks Leona has not noticed. “Hey, what’s up? Could you check these numbers for me?”

Leona accepts the tablet, and gives them a cursory glance. “They look great.”

“You barely looked at them.”

“I’m that good. You are too. Stop asking me for input that you don’t need.”

“Measure twice, cut once,” Aldona muses.

“That’s what the computer is for.”

Aldona sticks the tablet under her armpit, and folds her arms.

“Is there anything else?”

“You want to ask me for something.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Once a day, you ask for something extra. Resources, access to something. We’re nearing the end of the evening, and you’ve not done that yet. So, out with it.”

She stares at her for a few seconds. “Okay, you’re right. I was hoping to borrow one of your rockets.”

“What is it this time?”

“There is something that we need to get into space.”

“Okay. Because...?”

“Because...that’s where the sun is.”

“And what do you need with the sun?”

Leona scrunches up her lips, and shakes her head rapidly. “We may or may not need to allegedly throw something into it.”

“You need to throw something into the sun...like garbage?”

“That’s a word for it.”

Aldona narrows her eyes. “Are you trying to murder someone?”

“That...is a word for that.”

“Talk to me, Leona. Tell me what I need to know.”

“We call her Constance!Five. She can make herself look like anyone. We trapped her in a stasis pod, but it’s only a matter of time before she breaks out.”

“Why wouldn’t you tell me this? That’s who’s trying to kill Cedar.”

“I know, but not everyone believes that all’s fair in love and war.”

“If you have a version of Constance, I want it gone. Permission: granted.”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 3, 2399

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Leona is in her office, doing her multitasking thing, but this time, she’s not trying to steal from the world governments. She’s only trying to help by making this the best planetary defense system in six realities. Right now, the biggest issue is power generation. It doesn’t matter how fast they build all these fantastic structures, producing and storing energy takes time. You can always cultivate more of it with more time. Aldona is an expert in antimatter production, which is a field of research that Leona knows relatively little about. The AOC runs on the stuff. She knows how to handle the storage pods, load them, and maintain the equipment. But she’s never had to make the antiparticles herself. She’s never even seen a power plant before.

Antimatter is, as the name would suggest, and to put it simply, the opposite of matter. When a particle and antiparticle meet, they annihilate each other. Since the universe is made of matter, there’s unsurprisingly not enough of the other kind around. It doesn’t last long; it can’t. It will take a culture decades to figure out how to do it, and that’s after decades of using other, completely unrelated power sources, like fossil fuels and renewables. It’s extremely powerful in small quantities, but requires a great deal of infrastructure. Aldona can’t figure out how to make it happen in time, which is a problem. Nuclear fusion is good enough for a defense system that doesn’t have to do anything, but once a serious force tests it, that whole system could fall apart. If an enemy were to bombard their weakest link with fodder, that part of the grid would run out of juice quickly, like the health bar for a video game character who’s underwater.

“What about the Fourth Quadrant?” Leona asks.

“We’re working closely with them,” Aldona answers. They’re in less danger, because the Kansas City bubble is virtually impenetrable on its own, and there’s a way to evacuate the other islands into it, but we’re still going to help.”

“No, I’m talking about power. Antimatter is better than fusion, but what’s better than antimatter?”

“Uhh...a blackhole drive?”

“In a way, yes, but you don’t need to capture a black hole, not when you’re one of us,” Leona says.

“I’m sorry, I don’t follow.”

“Temporal energy,” Leona explains. “It’s what powers the Novus Metro in the Fourth Quadrant. At least, it did at one point. Time moves at a different speed as the main sequence, so they steal the energy that the discrepancy releases, like static from your socks on the carpet. We can use that, instead of half-assing the construction of antimatter plants, just to get them completed in time.”

“Are you feeling okay?” Aldona questions. “You look—forgive me—exhausted.”

She is exhausted, but there is nothing she can do to change that. Too many people are involved; she can’t just do whatever she wants. She’s never been responsible for an entire world. All those people, and more, are relying on her to make this happen. “That’s not the point, I’m not making this up. Let me speak to someone in Novus Metro.”

“I’ll see what I can do, but this goes beyond my understanding. What would you even call something like that?”

“I believe they ended up going with temporal dynamo.”