by Isaac Hooke
“But they’ll be able to lift the information from you,” Tane said.
Lyra cocked an eyebrow behind her faceplate. “I wish them luck in doing that.”
Tane glanced at the beacon stone uncertainly, then shrugged. He placed the stone into one of the loops of his harness and tightened it. “How long will it take you to get to us?”
“I’m hoping a day, maybe two,” Lyra said.
“My oxygen runs out in three days,” Tane said.
Lyra pressed her lips together into a thin line. “I’m well aware of that.”
“I can supplement your suit oxygen with my own, if necessary,” Jed said. “Though the installation of O2 tanks is a bit messy in deep space.”
“But you just said you’d use up half your own oxygen as propellant,” Tane told the Volur.
“Yes, but I have larger capacity tanks than you do,” Jed said. “I’ll have enough to supplement yours.”
“What about the crillia?” Tane asked, in reference to the fist-sized creatures that inhabited deep space throughout the Umbra. “If we disable the energy fields inside your storage pouch, we’ll be exposed to them. Unless of course this will protect me.” He tapped the shield generator at his belt.
Lyra shook her head. “No. The fields generated by storage pouches are specifically intended to keep out crillia and cosmic rays, whereas the shield produced by the generator you wear, like those created by starships, is designed to absorb mostly laser and plasma blasts, as well as the bludgeoning weapons of this universe. You’ll have no protection. But my hope is the crillia will leave such small targets as you alone. If not, I believe simply Siphoning the Dark Essence will keep them away. I could be wrong.”
“Except I can’t Siphon a thing at the moment,” Tane said. “From either Essence.”
“You’ll be somewhat recovered by the time any crillia find you.” Lyra studied him earnestly. “If you don’t want to go, if you’d rather face whatever fate the TSN has in store for you, I’ll understand. There are risks with either choice. I can’t say which is the better option. That determination is yours.”
“The TSN will really inject me with controlling nanotech?” Tane asked.
“If they don’t lock you away entirely and keep you sedated for the rest of your life, yes,” Lyra said.
“The Umbra it is,” Tane said.
The shuttle shook.
“The collector craft just deposited us inside the hangar bay,” Cub said. “The bay is pressurizing.”
From her pouch, Lyra retrieved the Chrysalium staff she’d used against the dwellers on Remus. She straightened immediately when she gripped the staff—evidently it bestowed an Endurance bonus. Even if her planned negotiations were going to be non-violent, she obviously wanted to show no signs of weakness to the TSN.
Lyra positioned herself in front of Tane. She produced another storage device from the pouch and placed it on the cabin floor. The new device looked almost identical to the pouch she was wearing at her waist. With the bottom end of the staff, she opened the lip of the storage device, spreading it wide to reveal a large, black hole to infinity.
“Once you’re inside, wait until Jed appears before you activate the EM pulse generator,” Lyra instructed.
“The hangar bay just pressurized,” Cub said.
“That was quick,” Jed commented.
“Robot and human troops are flooding inside the bay,” Cub continued.
“Are there any Essenceworkers among them?” Lyra asked.
“Yes,” Cub said. “But they’re staying back. They appear to be conserving their strength.”
“Letting the robots do all the work,” Jed commented.
“Probably a good idea on their part,” Sinive said. “Considering how weak most Essenceworkers in the military are.”
“These will most likely be equipped with enough Chrysalium to put them on par with a typical Volur,” Lyra said. “I think they’re staying back mostly because they fear Tane. We’ll use that to our advantage.”
“They’re really that afraid of me?” Tane said.
“More than you know,” Lyra told him.
“They’re probably expecting you to burst out of here firing plasma channels from your ass and nukes from your eyes,” Sinive said.
He smiled feebly.
“The robots have assumed defensive positions around the shuttle,” Cub said. “They’re asking us to open the ramp.”
“Do no such thing,” Lyra said. “Tell them we’re having technical difficulties, and we’re working to resolve them as quickly as possible.”
Cub responded a moment later. “Their reply: prepare to be boarded.”
Tane glanced at the black hole in the floor in front of him and hesitated. “I don’t like this. I’m the Bender of Worlds, not the Coward of Storage Pouches.”
“There’s still time to change your mind,” Lyra said.
The spark of laser cutters drew his eye to the bulkhead formed by the ramp; the sparks moved downward in an arcing fashion as he watched.
“But if you’re going to go through with this, now’s the time...” Lyra continued. There was a rare urgency to her ordinarily calm tone.
Tane gazed at his companions one last time. At Jed, who was coming with him. At Lyra and Sinive, both of whom would stay behind.
His eyes lingered on Sinive.
“Go,” Sinive said. “We’ll come back for you.”
With that, Tane looked once more into the infinite darkness in front of him and jumped.
2
Tane floated in absolute darkness. There was nothing out there, nothing at all. Nausea assailed him now that the artificial gravity of the shuttle was gone, and he swallowed several times, trying to keep himself from throwing up. The sensation passed but he still felt slightly sick. He would have reached into the Dark Essence to calm his stomach, if he could. Unfortunately, even with the Endurance rings Lyra had given him he still couldn’t touch either Essence.
Unlike ordinary rifts in spacetime, which, when traversed, led to the same star system in the alternate universe, the storage devices opened into fixed, random areas of the Umbra that were assigned during pouch creation. So he could be anywhere, really.
His HUD was still active, and he checked for available mixnet networks but got nothing. His connection to the GalNet would have been severed the moment he arrived in the Umbra, of course.
He should have experienced panic, being trapped out there in the middle of nowhere, yet his emotions had become distant, just like the last time he had journeyed into the Umbra. This place had a strange dampening effect on feelings, especially fear. At least for him. He welcomed the sensation, as he needed to remain calm at the moment.
He also felt less exhausted than only a few moments ago. He wasn’t entirely sure why that was. Maybe because when he wielded the Dark Essence, the drain on his stamina was less severe than the White Essence, and now that he was in the realm where the Dark was sourced from, he basked its benefits.
Or something. Whatever the case, he’d take less exhaustion any day.
According to the spacesuit, while there was no gravity, the external environment still had atmosphere, courtesy of the pocket of air provided by the inventory slot. That would last until Tane blew the containment field. He couldn’t actually see the outlines of that field, of course, but he knew it was out there, keeping him fixed in place.
He vented some oxygen from a side nozzle in his suit and caused his body to rotate. It took a bit more oxygen than it probably should have, because the environment wasn’t yet frictionless thanks to the air pocket.
As he rotated, he spotted the other items Lyra had placed in the storage device, items that floated within the fixed spaces of their “inventory slots” beside him. These objects included various pieces of jewelry, armor, and food. So at least he had some company in the unending darkness until Jed decided to show up. That he could see those items without having to turn on his helmet lamp meant there was a distant sun somewhere
out there, he just couldn’t see it. Light behaved differently here: its rays were down-shifted in frequency, and became visible only at relatively close range, which is why stars, planets and any other celestial objects wouldn’t appear around him until he came near them.
He returned his attention to the inventory items. They seemed blurry, insubstantial. In addition, everything was shaded a dark blue—a sign of the frequency downshifting. Altogether it made his eyes water.
Blinking away the tears, he held his hand in front of him. It appeared just as blurry. When he moved his glove, it left visible motion trails. His eyes burned all over again and he swallowed rapidly as the next wave of nausea hit.
Don’t throw up. Don’t throw up.
To his relief, he didn’t. When the nausea passed, he studied his gloved hand and arm assembly more closely. Squinting, he could just make out the tiny black filaments emerging from his wrists and elbows. Those were the ethereal threads linking him to the Dark Essence contained within the closest gravity well. Probably a planet.
The strands were too thin to make out for more than a few centimeters from his body, and vanished entirely after that. Glancing down, he searched for other filaments but didn’t spot any. That they were thin and almost invisible told him the source planet was very far away.
Jed blinked into existence beside Tane: the Volur appeared within the fixed space of one of the adjacent “inventory slots.”
“What took you so long?” Tane transmitted. “I was expecting you to arrive right after me.” His voice distorted in his ears, with each word sounding at two octaves, one high, the other low, and both playing simultaneously. The overall effect was downright eerie, but it was another odd yet expected aspect of this place.
“Lyra and I had a short argument,” Jed said. The man’s voice similarly distorted over the comm, with high and low-pitched versions overwriting one another.
“About?” Tane pressed.
“It doesn’t concern you,” Jed said.
Somehow, Tane doubted that.
There was something I was supposed to do when the Volur arrived…
Oh yeah.
Tane reached for the small cube that was attached to his harness.
“Probably should stow your rifle before you press that button,” Jed said. “Wouldn’t want the electromagnetic pulse to damage it, after all.”
“What about my suit?” Tane said. “Or the shield generator?”
“Both should be fine,” Jed said. “That particular rifle model has some unshielded electronics, however.”
Tane slid down the D18 from his shoulder and shoved it into his storage pouch. It was interesting to think that the inventory slot he chose was actually located somewhere else in this very universe, if far away.
Pouches nested within pouches.
What a strange universe.
He resealed the pouch and then clutched the cube, which remained firmly looped into his harness. He found a small button and pressed it.
The secondary HUD display projected by his faceplate disappeared, but the HUD provided by his chip remained overlaying his vision. A moment later the secondary HUD returned as the helmet AI rebooted.
He glanced at Lyra’s items, which would now be freeze-dried after exposure to the void. Most of the items didn’t look any different. Well, except for the food. A bunch of apples contained inside a translucent sack had blackened and become wrinkly, no doubt as a result of all the moisture boiling away before the surface froze. The same fate awaited him should his suit fail.
Jed jetted toward him.
Tane released oxygen from a side nozzle and grabbed one of the nearby items floating beside him.
“Engineer!” Jed said. “What are you doing?”
“What are you doing?” Tane said.
“Collecting you!” Jed said.
“Just wait.” Tane shoved the object into his pouch and thrust toward the next one. “I’m collecting a few of Lyra’s items.” He grabbed the nearest item, and realized what he had just said sounded kind of bad, so he added: “For safekeeping, of course. I’ll return them when we reunite. Wouldn’t want them to get lost in the void of space.”
“There’s no time,” Jed said. “She obviously chose a pouch whose contents she didn’t care about.”
“I disagree,” Tane said. “She put these items here for a reason. We might need them.”
Jed thrust toward him, fast.
Tane quickly jetted toward the final item he had in mind, a silver bracelet that had to be made of Chrysalium. He scooped it up just as Jed latched onto his shoulder assembly.
Tane shoved the bracelet into his pouch along with the others, planning to examine all three more closely later.
“For an Engineer, you certainly are dense sometimes,” Jed said. “And here I thought those Chrysalium rings would boost your intelligence.”
“Relax,” Tane said. “I’m sure Lyra has already nested the pouch several layers deep, inside other storage pouches. It’ll take the TSN a while to reverse it all.”
“The first thing the robots will do when they break inside the cabin is confiscate all of her belongings,” Jed said. “The TSN’s troops will proceed to empty out her storage pouch, and all the storage devices nested within. Quicker than you think. You know how fast robots are, don’t you? And the Essenceworkers with them will deactivate any traps.”
Jed stopped venting oxygen, cutting thrust, but the pair continued at the same velocity, moving away from the pocket of the Umbra Lyra’s pouch had opened into. Tane switched to his rear view helmet camera and zoomed in, watching longingly as the items receded into the distance, lost forever.
“Turn down the power output of your mixnet node to its lowest possible level,” Jed continued. “Which will be just enough for us to continue to communicate.”
Tane did so. He stared at the rear video feed one last time and then shrunk it, repositioning it to the top of his faceplate so that it acted like a rear view mirror.
“You know, one day I plan to be faster than a robot,” Tane said. “Once I can afford enough Dexterity boosts.”
“Oh, of course,” Jed said. “The newbies always say that. Until they realize how draining Siphoning is, which makes Endurance seem so much more desirable. Or when they finally have enough money to afford a Dexterity boost, and then see all the fancy Essence works available that they could put their money toward instead. Kind of makes the Dexterity boosts seem not so great.”
“Infuriatingly, I know exactly what you’re talking about,” Tane said. “Sometimes I wonder if the chip makers designed it all just to keep us addicted. We keep striving for the dopamine boost we get from acquiring a new skill. And sure, some of that boost is a natural part of learning, but I have to wonder if it’s not supplemented by the chip to keep us addicted, secretly flooding our brains with dopamine every time we level up. Same thing probably happens when the chip teases us. You know, those times when the chip pretends to give you a skill by granting a level zero in something. ‘Hey, you skimmed a pebble across a lake! You just got the skill Pebble Skimmer Level Zero!’ I remember when I got Bargaining Level Zero, I was so thrilled I almost crapped my pants. Okay, not literally. But you know what I mean.”
“Somehow, I can’t imagine the Bender of Worlds crapping his pants,” Jed said. “Then again, when I imagine him as you...”
“Yeah, I guess I should start behaving myself now that I’m the so-called World Bender, huh?” Tane said. “Except it doesn’t seem real. I don’t know why I should change my behavior. Just because everyone says I’m some so-called hero who’s going to save the galaxy.”
“That’s probably a good attitude to take,” Jed said. “It’s best not to change yourself, not for anyone, and especially not to mold yourself into a man you think others are expecting or wanting. Simply be yourself at your best. That’s all you need to do.”
“You don’t think I’m really the World Bender, do you?” Tane said.
Jed didn’t answer.
“If you don’t, that’s actually kind of reassuring,” Tane said. “Because I’m not sure I am, myself. Sure, I have some skills that a few other people might not have, but that doesn’t mean I’m the one written about in some ancient prophecy. Besides, I don’t believe in prophecies. I make my own fate.”
Jed glanced at him from behind his faceplate. The movement was blurry, his head leaving a trail behind the glass. “That is a good belief.” Jed’s eyes glanced upward, as if he was checking his own rear view camera feed. “Looks like we just passed the ten kilometer mark. They won’t find us now. Especially not with our mixnet nodes broadcasting at the weakest power.”
“That was quick,” Tane said.
“Yes.” Jed released Tane to float alongside him. “It’s lucky the storage device didn’t open too close to a gravity well.”
“How much oxygen did you have to vent?” Tane asked, remembering how Jed had cut thrust after seemingly traveling only a short distance.
“Not as much as I worried I’d have to,” Jed replied.
“Okay, so what now?” Tane said.
“We wait,” Jed said.
Tane sighed. “Thanks for coming with me, by the way. I’m not sure I would have been able to handle being out here alone for two days, or however long it takes for Lyra to get back here.”
“Of course,” Jed said. “Just don’t make me regret it.”
“How would I make you regret it?” Tane said.
“Sometimes, you tend to talk a lot,” Jed said. “Asking question after question. If I tell you to shut up, I expect you to do it.”
“Oooh,” Tane said. “All right, well, I expect the same of you, tough guy.”
Tane instantly regretted the words. He was acting too familiar with the Volur. He didn’t think Jed would appreciate it.