Orthogradient: Antitheses (Part V)

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Hundreds of thousands of years from now, the universe will be a very different place. No world, no culture, no daily routine would be recognizable to someone from the present day, or even thousands of years later. In this future, three boys were born. They lived on Earth, the surface of which had largely been abandoned, and left to thrive in peace. A small sect of humans remained throughout this time, incidentally keeping their population small by emigration, and otherwise avoidable life-threatening diseases and dangers. There were fully organic humanoids elsewhere in the galaxy, but they were genetically engineered one way or the other. This tiny Earthan village was composed of normal people who were the last in a line of natives. Being of the same sex, the trio was unable to further the species, finally marking the end of an era. After their respective parents died, they were all alone in a universe that they despised, and did not understand. They were inconsequential. Or at least that was what anyone who found out about them believed. But there was one thing that set them apart. They were not normal humans. Being the final members of the race had intrinsically made them special, which time itself took to be significant.

The boys grew up, and eventually forgot their own names. They adopted new ones, based on their individual time powers. Time travelers were still around, but only because they traveled through time. Except for these three, they were no longer being born, because the conditions were no longer suitable for them. Antichron was so named because he was a true time traveler, who was capable of freely moving backwards and forward along the timeline. Antiparticle could teleport multiple particles to a single point in spacetime, forcing an unnatural collision that resulted in the annihilation of them all, and an explosion correlative to the number of the particles, and the speed of transport, and reversely correlative to the size of the point. Antintropy could reverse entropy, repairing what once was broken, or healing what once was damaged. He could theoretically restore all of reality to a more ordered state. But to do that, he needed power. To do that, he needed the other two. Together, they became The Antitheses, and set about to change their present. This turned out to mean changing the past first.

A war ravaged the galaxy centuries prior to their time, which contributed to the dwindling natural human population. To win this war, the Antitheses could go back to the beginning of it, and use their considerable powers to win without breaking a sweat, but they did not want to reveal their powers to those who would misunderstand or fear them. They needed to become heroes in their own time, not villains before they were born. They had to win this war using traditional tactics. It was going to take a lot of work, but it was not impossible. To prepare for the mission, they went back even further in time, to an even more primitive technological period, hoping to steal an obsolete warship called the Sharice Davids. It was a powerful vessel, but limited in its advancements, which made it perfect for the future war. There were vulnerabilities in more advanced starships which the Davids did not have to worry about. Unfortunately, this mission proved to be more difficult than they thought it would.

They faced far more opposition in the 23rd century than they ever expected. Antichron’s ability to read the timeline was less refined than he hoped. The ship kept slipping from their grasps. Every time they tracked it to a new point in spacetime, it would move to another before they had any chance of boarding it again. At one point, it appeared to be destroyed, but then it showed back up on their temporal radar, and they were able to pursue once more. Annoyingly, it was traveling much faster than it should have been, and they were having trouble keeping up. Antiparticle was capable of teleporting them from one point to another without annihilating the particles, but this took a lot more concentration, because that wasn’t what he trained himself to do. Destruction was the name of the game for him, and reapplying his skills in another way proved tiresome. It was now the year 2337, though, and the ship was right before them. They were nearly there.

“It’s gone!” Antiparticle exclaimed.

“Again?” Antintropy cried. “How could it be gone again? They were staying in one place! We’re in the middle of nowhere. Why would they come all the way out to this region of space, only to disappear yet again?”

“No idea,” Antiparticle replied. “Follow them, Antichron. Where have they gone to next?”

Theirs was less of a ship, and more of a small snowglobe-shaped lifeboat, protected by a semitransparent plasma field. They didn’t think that they would need anything else, and besides, the more massive the object, the harder it was for both Antichron to jump through time, and for Antiparticle to teleport. Antichron didn’t say anything. His eyes were closed.

“Antichron!” Antintropy shouted.

“I’m looking!” Antichron shouted back. He shook his head. “I can’t find it.”

“That’s impossible!” Antintropy was never really not angry. “We would detect debris if it were destroyed, even if it were vaporized by something. It went somewhere, through a portal, or via the new teleportation drive it seems to have. And if it’s anywhere in the timeline, Antichron, then you should be able to pick it up. All of time and space at your fingertips. Find it!”

“I can’t. I’ve looked,” Antichron insisted. “It never comes back. We have attempted to intercept it at every moment that it has existed after the moment in its personal timeline where it was historically destroyed. I’m telling you, wherever it is, it’s not in the timeline, and it never returns.”

“Not in the timeline,” Antintropy echoed. “Where could they be if not in the timeline? There is no outside of the timeline.”

“Not as far as we know,” Antiparticle reminded him. “We could not find a teacher to help us learn the ways of the time traveler. If we were to find someone now, they might be able to illuminate us.”

“Stop suggesting that!” Antintropy demanded. “We’re not going to look for help. We’ve always done this on our own, and will continue on that way.”

“It’s obviously not working,” Antichron said. “Perhaps we underestimate these primitive people. They may have escaped in a way that none of us is familiar with, and are now cloaking themselves from detection. We’ve been chasing them relentlessly. They could have learned something about us.”

“What can ants learn of gods?” Antintropy questioned.

“Wait,” Antiparticle said, looking at the screen. “There’s something out there. We may have picked up a piece of debris afterall.”

“Plot an intercourse immediately.” Antintropy was not always the leader. Their trio had no predetermined leader, but power shifted periodically when one of them managed to bully the others into submission. It would continue to change if they never came up with an agreed upon hierarchy. This was assuming, of course that they didn’t destroy themselves by the time they accomplished their objectives anyway.

Antichron did as he was told, and flew their platform towards the only known object in the area. It was very slow, yet still difficult to maneuver. They passed by it a couple of times before they managed to sync up with its drift. It appeared to be a person, wearing a vacuum suit, but they were also sitting down. Antiparticle programmed the plasma barrier to accept them as a non-threat, then floated up to bring them in.

Once their mysterious visitor was completely inside of their transporter, the helmet opened, revealing a man. He was not surprised to see them, but also did not look upon them with any level of familiarity. He moved his eyes from one to the next, to the next. “You are here to steal the Sharice Davids?”

Antintropy cleared his throat, and took a half step forwards. “Yes, we are. Do you have a problem with that?”

“I personally don’t,” the man replied, “but you’ll find it difficult since the Sharice Davids no longer exists.” He paused, only to continue before they could respond. “They changed the name. It is now known as the Cormanu, so depending on what you’re after, you may be too late to the party.”

“Who are you?” Antintropy asked.

“My name is Meredarchos, but I’m currently in the body of a man named Carbrey Genovese. I can help you get to the universe that they have escaped to, but you will have to do everything I say without question.”

“Why would you help us?” Antichron questioned warily. “What’s in it for you?”

Meredarchos nodded as if they had already come to an agreement. “I have been searching for someone to help me in my home universe. I keep believing that I have found my champions, only to be thwarted by someone else, or even my targets themselves. I am trapped where I was born, and cannot leave on my own. I can teach you how to travel to where the crew of the Cormanu have escaped to, but before we do that, I demand that you use this technology to rescue me first.”

“Your physical form is stuck where it is, and you can only leave with your mind?” Antiparticle summarized.

“This is correct,” Meredarchos confirmed. “I seek out the weakest of minds, which might be the mentally vulnerable, or the injured. This man here was too busy trying to recover from truly severe wounds to keep me out. Unfortunately, my intrusion suppressed that recovery further, leaving me in this lame shell. I had to stay dormant for a while to survive. I need strength to find another host, but that does not matter if you can get to my real body. It is dying, and I cannot fix it where it is. It must be transported somewhere else, or I may end up trapped in a faulty new body, such as this one. The Cormanu is of no concern to me, but I’ll help you. As an added bonus, I’ll ignore your universe, and only conduct my work elsewhere. Trust me, that’s a good deal.”

“What exactly is your work?” Antintropy asked him.

“You cannot be made aware of that. It is a non-negotiable stipulation. If you want the Cormanu, you’ll have to agree to that, as well as a few more details. You may add your own requirements as well as we continue to discuss this.”

The Antitheses negotiated with Meredarchos, and laid out their plans. He taught them how to synthesize something called an atomic lance, which tapered to a point so small, it could pierce through the nucleus of an atom. With this, they were able to access hyperdimensional space, also known as the outer bulk. Bulk energy would leak into their lance, and fill the storage tank. This took a very, very long time, but they did not need to stick around to wait for it. All four of them jumped a few hundred years into the future, but they left the snowglobe where it was. When they returned to the timestream, the bulk energy reserves were full, and they were ready to make the jump. The whole thing shook violently, tossing them around like rag dolls. They did not bother installing seats on this thing, nor protective belts to hold them in place. Meredarchos was able to stay put by magnetizing his hover chair to the floor. The Antitheses, however, had to alter artificial gravity to keep themselves against the plasma barrier, which could be as hard as rock, or in this case, as soft as pillows.

They waited patiently as the shaking continued for several minutes before finally reaching critical mass, and falling through the breach in the universe’s membrane. Now that that part was over, they were able to place themselves in temporal stasis so they wouldn’t get bored, because it would be untold time before they could reach Meredarchos’ universe of origin. Seconds later, they were there, so they pierced the second membrane, and landed on the planet. It was desolate and plain. There were absolutely no geographical features. The whole world was entirely smooth. They found Meredarchos’ original body where it was barely holding onto life inside of a small personal living chamber. They pulled it into the snowglobe, which was getting pretty crowded now, and took off. First the shaking, then the piercing, then the stasis, then the piercing again, and they were finally where they wanted to be.

“This...this feels weird,” Antiparticle noted.

“It’s a dead universe.” Meredarchos was still piloting Carbrey’s body. “The laws of physics don’t foster life here. There are no habitable planets, only us, and the Cormanu.”

“Why would they come here?” Antichron asked.

He shrugged Carbrey’s shoulders. “It has plenty of chemical elements. “The ship was heavily damaged, so they need raw materials to repair it. If I hadn’t taught you how to travel the bulk, this would be one of the safest places to hide.”

“They’ve detected us,” Antiparticle announced.

“That’s okay,” Meredarchos decided. “They won’t be able to leave yet. I’m surprised they made it here in the first place, but I’m sure they’ve exhausted their power, so even if the repairs didn’t keep them from escaping again, they’ll have to refuel first. If I were you, I would take your shot now, though. They’ll be looking for workarounds to their predicament.”

“You can stay here,” Antintropy told him. He took Antiparticle’s hand, who in turn took Antichron’s. The Antitheses teleported right into the Cormanu where they found themselves trapped in what looked like a hock.

A woman casually approached, and dragged her fingers along the laser beams that were preventing them from leaving. When she removed her hand, they saw that the tips had been burned off. “I’ll just get Landis to fix it. Because you underestimate us. You see, we’ve been eavesdropping. We know who you are. We’re currently upgrading the ship, rendering it completely useless to you. It will not serve you in your stupid future war. We’ll let you out if you leave us alone forever, but if you ever come after us again, then we’ll react in kind. We give second chances, but not thirds. What say you?”

Antintropy scowled and approached the lasers. “We’ll leave your ship alone, and revert to our backup plan, but in the meantime, you’ll become our new fixation.”

The woman leaned in closer. “Then you’ll die.”

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Microstory 2165: Professional Being Paid

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I feel like my attention has been really split lately, and I’ve been making mistakes at work. It’s nothing that I’ve not been able to fix before someone else gets their eyes on it, but it’s been frustrating just the same, and I need to get my head right. I’ve had all these things coming at me. The warden wants to hire me, though I’m still an inmate in the jail. I have to stay in contact with my parole officer regularly. He’s cool, but that’s just one more thing that I have to worry about all the time. My therapy helps, but it also contributes to the stress of my schedule. Now I have this dumb potential lawsuit with that jerk of a company who apparently doesn’t have anything better to do than go after a small fish like me. I was going to do some more volunteering with Homes for Humankind today, but I had to cancel so I could focus on my regular job. I can’t lose that, or everything good I have in my life, like a great apartment, and plenty of food, goes away. Since I’m not allowed to talk about what I do, there’s not much that I can say, so I can’t even vent. I think I need someone else to talk to. Someone who isn’t a professional being paid to be there, like a friend. Am I lonely? I think I’m just lonely. I’m going to go see if my neighbor is home. Maybe we can have an impromptu dinner together before I have to report for jail this evening. Though, there is one thing that I should really finish up for work that I don’t want to put off until Monday. I wouldn’t be fired if it weren’t done, or anything, but you know me, I don’t like to leave tasks dangling over the weekend. I think a part of me worries that I’ll never come back, so I’ll at least have reached some kind of reasonable stopping point.

Microstory 2164: Whiny Babies

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A while back, a company reached out to me for a business opportunity. They wanted me to promote their products in my videos, which I do not make, but we still thought there was something there, so we kept talking. An agreement was made, and a deal was quite nearly finalized with a steak dinner. I’m a vegetarian, so I lamented how that affected my mental health. The company didn’t like that, so they pulled out of the deal, and I thought that was the end of it. It’s come back to haunt me today. Now they’ve taken it a step further, and sent me a cease and desist letter. They’re threatening to take legal action unless I remove the posts that mention the issue, and release a public apology. Honestly—and I recognize that saying this might only make things worse—but they’re total morons. I have yet to tell you which company this is, and I will continue to keep that a secret unless they leave me no choice. If I apologize publicly, you will necessarily find out who they are. Now, you might end up on their side because of that, but something tells me that you’re going to continue to side with the lone blogger who was only exercising his freedom of speech over a corporation with an amount of money that I can’t even ballpark, because it would narrow down your list of suspects, which I don’t want you to be able to do. But obviously we’re not talking about some local family run shop with only one location. People tend to not like corporate executives for being the biggest whiny babies in a world that gives them everything they need and want. I don’t think that this will end well for them, which is why I’m doing everything I can to help them move past it. I’m trying to keep things civil, private and confidential, and productive, but I think they’ve just seen how popular I’ve grown to be, and they want in on that action. I guess they think that I’m a millionaire by now, or something. I assure you, I’m not there yet. I may never be, as I’m a blogger, not a movie star. I’m not too worried about where this little legal issue is going to go. They’ll back down when they realize that even if they win, they lose. Their reputation is so much more important than mine is. I can fall into obscurity if I have to. I could live naked in the middle of the woods with nothing, and still survive. A company can’t do that. So come at me, bro.

Microstory 2163: Your Greatest Weakness Is

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Leonard and I had another meeting with the jail warden. He’s not mad, but I think I needed some time to collect my thoughts about what he proposed in the first place. That’s why I’m a writer, and not an improv comedian. We discussed options further, and there’s actually a chance that I could stop having to go to jail altogether. There is precedent for this sort of thing. A few cops who were convicted of various crimes throughout history have gone back into the field during emergencies, and earned their freedom by proving themselves redeemed. In one case, a really dangerous convict broke out of prison, forcing his not-so-bad cellmate to tag along. The latter ended up not only bringing his cellmate down, but also stopped his associates from committing a horrendous crime while he was still on the other side of the walls. So he was set free too. If I went the same route, it would be nothing as glamorous or intense as that. I would just start working for the jail, trying to help them better sort and schedule the guests. I would love the chance to have my sentence commuted, but I’m still not confident that I’m up for the job. I suppose I always thought of myself as someone who wasn’t necessarily talented at anything, but maybe good at finding talented people elsewhere? I could probably come up with a list of desirable positions, and then figure out how to seek out professionals who sufficiently fit the criteria. My dad was in human resources, so while he didn’t exactly ever sit me down, and teach me the ropes, I did pick up a few skills from him. I’ve also had tons of my own job interviews, so I know which questions are too dumb to be asked, like what kind of animal you would be, or what your greatest weakness is. Ugh, that’s such a terrible one. Nobody has a good answer to that, and even if they do, what qualifies you to analyze it to determine some sort of insight into that person’s fitness for the job? I’m getting off track, but none of this is probably going to happen anyway. Remember that business partnership I was working on that went up in spectacular flames? I don’t see things going that sour for this situation, but I doubt the jail that keeps me locked up every weekend is going to turn around and hire me before I’ve completed my sentence. I can’t imagine they would do it even if I had served my time in its entirety. I will admit, though, it’s kind of nice that they’re even entertaining the possibility. I had never, ever, ever been recruited before until I came to this planet, and now it might happen twice? That’s insane. A con can dream, can’t he?

Microstory 2162: Don’t Say No to a Warden

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I finished my work hours a little early, so my parole officer could pick me up, and drive me back to jail, but I wasn’t staying there as a guest. I had a meeting with the warden, which was agitating the butterflies in my stomach. I put it like that, because I always keep butterflies in there, they just don’t always move around this much. As it turns out, it wasn’t bad, but I’m not so sure that it was good either. He read my story, as he apparently does every evening, and he thought that I had some good ideas. I hadn’t even realized that I had presented any ideas, but this was in regards to the disharmony that sometimes arises when guests that don’t get along well with each other are forced to live together in an enclosed space. To me, that’s kind of the definition of jail and prison, but he wants to find a way to put an end to it anyway. That sounds like a lovely sentiment, but I’m not sure that it can be done. Perhaps with a sufficiently advanced artificial intelligence, you could figure out how to accurately profile and categorize everyone in need of being housed in the system with as many labels as necessary, and organize them to prevent gang conflicts, or other major disagreements. But here’s the thing, you wouldn’t just want to stop two gangs from going to war with each other, you would want the gang to stop from forming in the first place, or they’ll just translate all that into the outside world once their sentences were up. That’s why you can’t just sit down with everyone’s psych profile, and sort them like you’re simply planning the seating arrangements for a wedding reception.

If you think that I’m being dismissive of how difficult it is to plan a wedding, you’re mistaken. Wedding receptions are hard. This would be virtually impossible. First thoughts, you’re gonna need a team of behavioral psychologists, and sociologists, and who knows what else, maybe a logistician? See, I couldn’t even tell you how to form the team. While it might have kind of been my idea, I can’t be a part of it. But that’s what he wants. He wants me to start a taskforce of sorts to figure out how to schedule the guests at the jail. But you would have to account for people’s job situations, the judges’ particular rulings on each person’s specific sentence. Again, I think you need an AI to do all this for you. Even a team probably wouldn’t be able to figure it out. I didn’t say no to the request, because you don’t say no to a warden, but I’ve not agreed to it either. I would need to discuss it with my lawyers, and my current employer... It would eat into the time I need for my site and socials. It would also seem weird to me if I were both a staff member of the jail, and a guest who had no choice but to be there for 48 hours a week straight. I know that prisons have work programs, but this is not the same thing as shelving books in the library, or renovating the CO break room. Those are references that, fortunately, none of you gets. Anyway, I guess this is more a long-term shift in strategies. The warden says that if this hypothetical pilot program works, they could theoretically institute it at other facilities. I suppose nothing would really start until after I completed my sentence, assuming any of this gets off the ground, and that there’s a place for me in it at all, which sounds ridiculous right now. Until then (or until never) I’ll just go back to doing my thang, and not worry much about it. The stress would not get me anywhere. My butterflies move around enough as it is.

Microstory 2161: All Cons, All the Way

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Last weekend was not fun. Sleeping in jail is usually the hardest part about it. It’s always either too hot or too cold, and of course, you have no control over any of that. We can shut the lights off in our cell, but the lights in the hallway are always on, and shining through the little window. The top bunk is better than the bottom one for that reason, but I always let my cellmate have it, honestly because I have a more comfortable life on the outside, so I think he needs it more. I hope he’s not offended by that. At any rate, these are all things that you can get used to once you figure out how to adapt. The reason it was so bad on Friday and Saturday nights is because we had a group of disharmonious newbies. It takes a certain type of personality to be suited to intermittent jail, or to fulltime prison instead, and determining which is something that I don’t, and never will, comprehend. Either the judges meant to make these assessments made mistakes, or there were variables beyond their control. Knowing where precisely to place each guest is probably impossible to get right, and certainly not every single time. I don’t think that each of these guys was bad on their own, but they just didn’t fit with each other, or anyone else. We were all particularly grumpy and anxious, and no one was happy. Again, I think that it would have been fine if the new guys had been scheduled for a different part of the week, or if someone else had been moved to it. I don’t know. There’s no way to know. It’s just something that happens, so you can add it to the list of reasons to not do something that will ultimately get you sent to jail, in case your pros and cons chart isn’t as uneven as it ought to be. All cons, all the way. That’s the way I see it anyway. I suppose if you’re otherwise unhoused, it might be your best option, but that’s a whole systemic issue that I think can—and should—be solved in a myriad of other ways. Well, that’s what made sleeping so much harder last weekend, but it wasn’t the only thing. I thought that I was going to be able to make up for it on Sunday night, but it didn’t work out that way. The fire alarms went off throughout the whole building at around 02:15 in the morning, forcing us all to go outside, and stand in our designated area for almost an hour before we received the all clear. They won’t tell us exactly what happened, but they promised that no one was hurt, and the damage didn’t spread. This means that there was a fire, though, instead of just a faulty alarm system, or a prank. So I guess I can’t be mad that they woke me up, and kept me up. I had to push my work hours back today, but I got everything done, and at least it didn’t happen on a Friday, which would have screwed up my jail schedule. Here’s hoping that I’m not accidentally foreshadowing the future.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: The Rock – Part 2

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The Pryce Tree temporarily bestowed the Vellani Ambassador with the power of time travel. Leona could navigate to anywhere or anywhen she chose. His only rule was that they could not stay in the Nucleus, and it was his preference that they go somewhere rather neutral. A region of space under control of one culture or the other could be construed as favoritism. Even a totally uninhabited planet could be claimed by one or another. Totally neutral? Where could that be? After some thought, and consultation with Ramses, they decided that the meeting would take place throughout all of time, and at no particular point in space. Instead of jumping once, and remaining at the destination, they would sail through the timestream at an accelerated rate. They were moving 108,000 times slower than objects outside of the bubble, so for every second that passed for them, thirty hours was passing for everyone else. They were ten billion years in the past, though, so there wasn’t actually anyone out there observing anything. This was about as neutral as it could get since the time period predated the creation of every branching alternate reality.

The hypertime factor was mostly for fun, but it also had a calming effect on the diplomats. The ceiling and floor of Delegation Hall could become completely transparent, allowing them to watch as the stars that they were surrounded by danced around each other. They called it the Stellar Waltz. Whenever anyone was getting stressed out or frustrated, they could just look up or down. Some of them did not care for the Waltz, so they were provided with special glasses that blocked out the view, and made the hull look opaque again. They would occasionally remove these anyway.

Olimpia served as Primary Host. She kept people fed and watered. One person needed a special neck pillow once, and another was colder than everyone else, so she retrieved a blanket. Ramses kept an eye on the ship’s systems, since it was not designed to operate in this manner, but everything was going fine, so he also split his attention to his own projects. Leona was more involved than she ever intended to be. They often demanded her insights, and her help mediating brief disagreements before they escalated. Angela and Marie were there to do that, but some of them had too much respect for the Captain to listen to anyone but her. She found it difficult to explain to some of the delegates that she was not in charge here.

Mateo’s may have been the hardest job of all, though. Pryce Tree provided them with a special AI that could receive and synthesize input from the multitudes of people watching from the Sixth Key. They had a lot to say about the situation themselves, and while it would be quite impossible to field questions, comments, and concerns from individuals, they could pare it down to consensus thoughts. There were still many hundreds of these generated ideas, so Mateo had to read through them, and relay them to the meeting members. No one but others on Team Matic could appreciate how much effort he was putting into this responsibility, so they grew frustrated when he asked for breaks. But the thing was, he wasn’t actually taking the breaks. He was using that time to catch up with the input. It was everyone else who could visit the restroom, or dine on the little cakes that Olimpia made for them using the Biomolecular Synthesizers.

They did take full breaks at the end of every day, for sleep and recharging, to prevent burnout. Each day’s worth of talks lasted for eight or nine hours, which resembled a standard workday on 21st century Earth. They were in the middle of one of these right now. For one hour every evening, the team went into their private pocket dimension to discuss amongst themselves, or to not talk at all. They were getting burned out, and they needed time away from everyone else. No one was allowed to disturb them during this period, but they were also discouraged from doing so at any time outside of the official negotiation sessions. The delegates had their own special pocket dimension. There was relatively low security in there, which could open up the possibility for one delegate to cause harm to another. Yet they were expected to police themselves, and Pryce Tree was able to protect them using his power. If he had to, he could simply transport someone away from someone else. To Team Matic’s knowledge, this had not yet come up, and probably never would. Killing one delegate, for instance, would have little effect on the outcome of this meeting, or the rest of the Sixth Key’s situation. As Ellie explained, there were so many other people in the biverse. Anyone trying to derail these discussions was going to have to work a hell of a lot harder than that.

Ramses, since he wasn’t a part of the talks in any capacity, was able to work at his own pace, so he wasn’t nearly as tired as everyone else. “Why are they calling it The Rock Talks again,” he asked, “because those words rhyme?”

Marie was chewing on her cuticles. “It’s really complicated, but the whole thing is based around rocks. They draw rocks to decide who talks first during a given segment, or for a one-on-debate. They select rocks to indicate their votes unambiguously. They even play games using stone dice when the dilemma appears to be about even on either side, and no one is too passionate about one or the other. They’re not trying to figure out who is entitled to have control over a border river, or something, like historical negotiations have been about. There are millions of little decisions that will add up to a bigger picture, and decide the fate of quintillions of people, and it’s exhausting.”

“The Rock,” Ramses repeated. “How long do you have left?” Their patterns were obviously temporarily disabled, though they didn’t know if that was a side effect of the temporal bubble they were in, or if Pryce Tree had to do something special to keep them on the same path as everyone else at the meeting.

“Are you getting bored?” Leona asked him.

“No, I love this extra time that I have. I’m getting so much done. I’m working on some things that I think you’re gonna be real excited about. I’m worried about you lot.”

“I’m worried about him.” Mateo jerked his chin behind most of the group, where the internal security feed was showing on the wall monitors. Pontus’ second from the Nucleus was pacing in front of the entrance to their pocket. He obviously wanted to ring their doorbell, but he knew that it was against the rules, so he was just stressed out, and probably waiting for the hour to be over.

Leona tapped on her armband. “Berko, what’s up?”

“Nothing. It can wait. I know you need your alone time,” he replied.

“Just spit it out,” Leona urged.

“There’s just a..minor...problem with the walking tree, and the princess, and...where they live.”

She stood up. “I’m coming out.” She headed for the door. “Matty, you’re with me.”

They exited the pocket, and walked down to the other side of Delegation Hall, to the visitor’s pocket. About half the group of delegates were in a crowd in the common area, arguing with each other unintelligibly. A couple of others were sitting in the lounge chairs, not participating, but everyone else was presumably in their respective living quarters. “Silence, please!” Mateo shouted. “Your Captain is here.”

They all fell quiet, and parted the Red Sea to show that they were standing in front of Pryce Tree and Princess Honeypea’s door. It was fully open, but there was a second door after that, which was still closed. “What’s the issue?” Leona asked.

“Those weird people,” the delegate from the true main sequence began. “I caught a glimpse of where they live. It’s bigger on the inside, like the T.A.R.D.I.S.”

“This whole thing is bigger on the inside,” Leona explained. “That’s what a pocket dimension is. You wouldn’t have a bed if it didn’t exist.”

“Right,” the delegate agreed, “but theirs is much, much, bigger. It’s outside, and I could see the horizon.”

Leona nodded. “I’m not surprised that they go home to the Garden Dimension every night. I still don’t understand what the  problem is.”

The delegate sighed shortly. “We’re living in these cramped quarters. I understand that it’s another dimension, or whatever, but we thought there was some kind of limitation. We each only get one room, and we accepted that, but there’s an entire island on the other side of that door. Or maybe even bigger, I don’t know. We just didn’t know that nested dimensions were possible.”

“Of course they’re possible,” Leona confirmed. “But that’s not what this is. That door apparently leads them back home. It’s more like...a stargate.”

“Well, why can’t we live in there?” one of the other delegates questioned, but Leona couldn’t remember who she represented. “There’s so much more space.”

“The Garden Dimension is protected ground,” Mateo answered in Leona’s stead. “We’re not even allowed there.”

“It’s a nature preserve,” Leona added. “Highly protected, highly regulated, highly secure. It’s there to shield plantlife from interference. It’s not a place where people live, except for the few who work there.”

“Well...” the true main sequence delegate stammered, “can’t you make a larger pocket for us anyway? It’s getting tough. The smell. Can’t you smell the smell?”

Leona breathed in, a reflex triggered by his words. There was indeed a stench here, which she had subconsciously commanded her nose to block. Most of these people did not enjoy the same control over their senses, so she could appreciate their struggle. “I’ll ask Ramses to fix the ventilation system. I’m sure that it won’t be that hard, he just wasn’t aware. I am not here to help with the diplomatic discussions. These are the things that I need to know about, so do not hesitate to alert me.” They seemed responsive to this, but she wasn’t done yet. “However, if I catch you trying to break into anyone else’s space, or doing anything else of that nature, there will be consequences. I don’t care what the tree says, I’ll throw you in hock, and I can’t promise that they’ll find a replacement representative, which means your culture may end up being locked out of the benefits of this budding union. Do you all understand me?”

Some of them shrunk away, but they all nodded.

Leona nodded back. “Now get back to your rooms. It’s gonna be a hard day tomorrow, just like it always is. I know I need sleep.”

“That was so sexy,” Mateo whispered as they were walking across the realspace portion of the ship.

“I’m not in the mood, Mateo.”

“No, of course not. Me...me neither.” It had actually been a long time for the two of them. This was stressful for everyone.

« < » > Table of Contents

Orthogradient: The Cormanu Crew (Part IV)

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Carbrey Genovese woke up. A quick look around told him that he was in the infirmary. No one else was there at first until Landis Tipton walked in. After he turned the lights on, he thought better, and dimmed them back down. He checked Carbrey’s pupillary response, and his vitals. “You have taken a long time to recover. I’m ashamed to say that I was unable to heal you myself. The theory is that my ability works on atmospheric medical conditions. You suffered complications due to temporary exposure to the vacuum of outer space, which I’ve never had to heal before, therefore my ability did not know how. Still, that doesn’t explain why I can’t repair the nerve damage you suffered due to likely traumatic injury.” He shook his head in shame. “I’ll keep trying.”

“What happened?” Carbrey asked.

“It’s not my place to say.” Landis paused before going on, “I mean, it’s not that I’m not authorized. I’m not qualified to understand it. Khuweka, could you get in here please?” he asked through his comms device.

She appeared out of nowhere. “Mister Genovese, I’m glad to see that you’re awake. How are you feeling?”

“Confused,” Carbrey answered.

“That’s understandable, given your recent medical issues.”

“He asked for the story,” Landis relayed.

“Right.” Khuweka cleared her throat. “For reasons we still haven’t been able to piece together entirely, the Project Stargate probe was flying in the wrong direction. We successfully teleported around it, but instead of matching its vector, it just tore right through the back of the ship.”

“Casualties?” Cabrey asked.

She took a moment to respond. “Freya and Limerick didn’t make it. They shouldn’t have been standing so close.”

“You’re blaming them? This was my fault.”

“We do not believe that it was,” she said.

“It was my job to calculate the vector. I must have made a figure negative when it should have been positive, or something. Going the wrong way? Who does that?”

“We recorded three temporal energy signatures,” Khuweka began to explain. “It’s impossible to assign them to any particular temporal manipulation event, but we were only expecting one. Diamond Zek teleporting us to the probe was the only thing that we were going for, so what could the other two have been? My guess is that the probe was also altered, by some other party. We did detect that we were being followed. That was always a risk. If the Ochivari ever found out what we were trying to do, they could have gone to any extreme to stop it.”

“It wasn’t the Ochivari.” Another woman was in the room, who Carbrey did not recognize. Judging by the expression on Landis and Khuweka’s faces, neither did they.

“Who the hell are you?” Khuweka questioned, all tensed up.

“Sanaa Karimi. Who the hell are you?” she snapped back.

Khuweka relaxed. “Oh, you’re fine. How long have you been here, though?”

“Longer than you.” Sanaa had a bit of an attitude.

“Care to elaborate?”

“Not really.”

“She was in stasis.” Eliana walked in as well. “Diamond Zek finally picked her up when the primary power source on her pod faltered from the crash, and it reverted to the secondary. That split second power distribution anomaly tipped us off. Otherwise, we never would have found her.”

“Actually, it is I who found you,” Sanaa claimed. “Where do you think the ship came from in the first place? It was randomly shifting through time and space to escape the clutches of an evil trio from the future. They were tracking it the entire time, and it was running out of power. Its only hope was for me to fake its destruction, and command it to make one final jump. Unfortunately, the only jump that I was able to trigger was back to its underground hangar of origin, where you happened to be. Everything was fine there until you decided to take it out for a joyride, putting it back on the trio’s radar, allowing them to catch up to it. To you. To us.”

“I’ve never heard of an evil trio from the future,” Khuweka contended.

“You’ve not heard of everything,” Sanaa reasoned.

“What can we do now?” Eliana asked. “I assume they’re still after us.”

“They don’t care about you,” Sanaa explained. “They want this ship. It’s important to them, and they won’t stop looking for it. There’s only one place where it can survive, but if you take it there, there’s no coming back.”

“Unacceptable,” Khuweka determined, shaking her head, not even bothering to ask for specifics. “We have to stop the Ochivari. That is the only mission that matters.”

Sanaa sighed. “I’ve been reading your ethicist’s mind. She knows more about this than you believe. You expected to be able to pose any problem to her, and have her vomit a response, but you didn’t think she would do her due diligence? She’s been studying just as hard as Freya has with her engineering courses.”

“How long have you been out of stasis?” Khuweka questioned.

“You can read minds?” Carbrey asked, still lying back in his recovery bed.

Sanaa ignored them both. “The Ochivari are bulk travelers, and as you know, each brane operates on its own timestream. They have absolutely nothing to do with each other. You can leave 2337, and when you end up in the neighboring brane, it might be 2024. You didn’t travel back in time, you simply pierced the membrane at the spot where 2024 exists, because for the membrane, time is a spatial dimension.”

“Yes, I know all this,” Khuweka asserted.

“Then why were you under the impression that you could stop the Ochivari? They’re bulk travelers!” she reiterated. “Once you leave the universe you were born in, your existence becomes inherently locked in. You cannot be erased from the past. The best anyone could hope for would be to erase the timeline where you were from, but at worst, if you ever go back to your home universe, you’ll just end up in the new timeline. It’s irrelevant that you were never born there, because you were born there at one point. That cannot be undone anymore.”

Khuweka grimaced. Or she was horny. It was really hard to tell what a Maramon’s facial expressions meant. “Yeah, I was afraid of that.”

“This mission was never about stopping the Ochivari,” Sanaa said.

“What was it about?”

“It was about how great I am at timing big reveals,” Sanaa said cryptically. She stepped over to the smartwall, and masterfully transitioned it into a hull camera feed, making it appear as though it simply turned into a large viewport. A tiny ship appeared out of nowhere. “It was about making her.”

Khuweka went over to the wall, and opened a channel. “Unidentified vessel, please identify yourself.”

“Cormanu, this is the Strongbox. Please open an airlock for boarding. We come in peace. We have some mutual friends.”

Khuweka looked over at Sanaa, who nodded approvingly. Khuweka hesitated. “Zek, mauve alert. I don’t know if we should be trusting whoever the hell that is.”

They all teleported to the airlock, even Carbrey, who was placed in the future’s version of a wheelchair, though it had no wheels. It was electromagnetic, which allowed it to hover around thirty centimeters from the floor. He could steer it with a simple and intuitive joystick. The seat was soft and comfortable, and the cushions could conform to suit his needs as they changed. He was still in a lot of pain, and he couldn’t move his lower body, though he could still feel down there, particularly the pain. The autodoctor’s initial diagnosis was an incomplete spinal cord injury. He was immobilized, but not fully paralyzed. The prognosis was not yet available, but he may never walk again.

The mysterious little ship entered its side of the airlock, and waited for it to be pressurized. Once that was done, three people stepped out of it, and patiently waited for the hatch to open, which Khuweka was still reluctant to do. Sanaa rolled her eyes, and just opened it instead. “How did you know the co—oh, right; psychic.”

The three new strangers stepped through. One of them was a teenage girl. “My name is Treasure Hawthorne.” She didn’t say it with her mouth. A voice came out of a tiara-looking thing on her head. “I am Freya and Limerick Hawthorne’s daughter. This is my friend Rosalinda James, and my lover, Quina Velsteran.” She was horrified at herself. “I shouldn’t’ve said it like that. I’m sorry,” she said to him.

“It’s fine,” he replied.

“It’s just that we never really defined the relationship.”

“Really, Treasure, it’s fine. Let’s get back to business.”

“Right. Here’s the thing. I have my father’s ability, and each time I use it, I end up somewhere that has recently experienced its own bulk traveling event. At least that’s our theory. I think my body is seeking sources of bulk energy. I can’t figure out how to get home, even though I know for a fact that the Transit recently showed up there—”

“The Transit?” Khuweka asked, hope and excitement in her eyes. Or she was bored. Again, it was hard to tell. “Who’s piloting the Transit?”

“Azura.”

Khuweka’s eyes widened now. That had to be surprise. “She survived. Ho-ho-oh my God.” She stepped away to pace. “Azura is the founder of the Transit Army.”

“Uh, no, my mother is,” Treasure clarified.

“Right,” Khuweka accepted. “Because she’s alive. What happened to her?”

“I don’t have time for the full story,” Treasure said. “I need to get back to Voldisilaverse, and I think you can help, and I think that my power sent me here for a reason, because maybe there’s some sort of separate sentience to it. I’m rambling again, but the point is that I need to link up to your power-boosting platform.”

“Uh, power is limited,” Eliana chimed in. “This thing can barely hold life support online. We’re dead in the water, so nobody’s using the platform right now.”

“I can make it work,” Carbrey informed them.

“You are in no condition to do anything,” Landis countered.

“My brain is fine,” Carbrey argued. “I just need to be sitting while I do it.”

“I’m good with my hands,” Quino said. “You tell me what to do, and I’ll do it in your stead. Will that work?”

They all looked to Khuweka. “I am not a doctor,” she began, “nor Carbey himself. If you’re feeling up to it, you can go ahead, but Landis is in charge of your health, and he can override any decision you try to make in regards to the work that you perform. He has the power to bench you, which may mean getting some rest back in the infirmary. We’re time travelers, people. There is no such thing as urgency. Doctor Spellmeyer, please accompany them, and make sure that everyone is happy and safe. Treasure, Sanaa...you’re with me.” She walked off.

Diamond Zek teleported everyone to their stations. The three ladies were in Captain Kadrioza’s Strategy Room, which was just a fancy thing to call her office. She sat at her desk while the other two sat in the two opposing chairs. Eliana teleported in soon thereafter. “You are not needed here,” Khuweka told her.

“Yes...I am,” Eliana insisted. She stood by the door like a bodyguard. Back in her home universe, she underwent the same basic combat training that everyone in her agency received, but was never on the operative’s track, so there was only so much she would be able to do in the event of some kind of attack or altercation. Though with Limerick gone—and besides Khuweka herself, who was a nigh invincible alien—Eliana was the probably best fit for ad hoc ship security.

“Very well.” Khuweka cleared her throat. “I know you by reputation, Miss Karimi. Treasure, if you are who you say you are, I’m sure you’ll do great things. But trust is not something that I can just give away freely. This is a very delicate situation, and—”

“Captain, an unidentified ship approaches,” Kivi’s voice came in through the intercom. “It’s not responding to calls. We’ve begun evasive maneuvers.”

“That would be the trio,” Sanaa said confidently.

“Is that bad? That sounds bad,” Treasure guessed.

“Yes, it does, but as I was saying, you two arrived here unexpectedly. Maybe they too are friends, not foes.”

“They’re def foes,” Sanaa insisted. “You have to get out of here fast.”

“Zektene, do you have the power you need?” she asked, but the response was not vocal. They only enjoyed a psychic connection to Diamond Zek.

The two who had not yet formed a bond with her sat in silence, Treasure having no clue what was going on, since she could only recall so much of what her mother taught her about this ship, and her long-lost friends.

“No,” Khuweka shouted with her voice, but it was too late.

Zek transported Treasure next to the booster platform.

“Uhh, it’s only been a minute,” Quino told her. “Mister Genovese here hasn’t even finished explaining to me what it is exactly. We need to divert power first—”

“There’s no time for that.” She stepped onto the platform just as everyone else was appearing in the room.

“Don’t do this,” Khuweka ordered. “Zek, listen to me. Get her out of here.”

“I’m gonna get us all out of here,” Treasure contended. She placed her hands upon the handles, and closed her eyes tightly. She let the ship’s remaining power surge through her body, mixing with the bulk energy that was already metabolizing in there. Then she screamed the whole vessel into a different universe, hopefully leaving their pursuers behind.

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