by C H Duryea
“Masters of slag,” Augie repeated. “Slagmasters?”
“Figure out your nom de guerre later,” Narissa said. “What are we going to do now?”
“We gotta go back to Inverketh,” Harbinger said. “We have to put the Dodecahedron back down in its hole.”
“Inverketh is in the stellar neighborhood,” Narissa replied. “Nav tank says it’s only a few super-light days from here.”
“Good a place as any to regroup,” Zeke said. He turned to Vibeke and squeezed her hand in his. “What about it? You ready to patch back into the NeuralNav?”
“Am I ever!” Vibeke exclaimed.
“Hey, look,” Harbinger said, pointing out to the slag field.
In the distance, thousands of molten asteroids began slowly crowding in on each other and converging, like loose globs of mercury. As they watched the accumulated globs started to stretch, chucks ripped off the main body again, this time facing towards the hyperstack.
“Some kind of gravitational shift,” Zeke guessed. “The lens may have been maintaining a gravitational stasis around the base. Now that it’s been destroyed, it looks like the stack’s distortion field is resetting the barycenter.”
The ground under their feet trembled slightly.
“That’s our cue,” Augie said. “This rock is already in free fall. We should go.”
“Right,” Zeke said. “Back to the ship. We gotta jet if we’re gonna shake the new gravity well.”
“Don’t get your spacesuit in a twist,” Vibeke said with a slight smile. “I can do it.”
“I should rue the return of our old sorcery to Inverketh,” Lady Mica said as she examined the blaster in her hand like she was testing a new limb. “One could become rather accustomed to this new magic you call ‘tech.’”
Zeke and Augie exchanged an amused glance.
“Get Mr. Clarke on the horn,” Augie quipped as he stepped up into the open cockpit of his mech unit.
Zeke double-checked the supplies loaded into the final cargo pod and secured the lid. He looked up as Augie closed the canopy and powered up the massive battle suit. He stomped over to the line of pods and began loading them into the Friendly Card’s cargo bay. Under the ship, Narissa and Vibeke ran systems diagnostics from a console that ran cables out to dozens of sensor and data ports. Beyond the ship, Lankshale Falls cascaded from the craggy heights over the training field they were using as a landing site. The spray coming off the falls obscured the view of the steps leading from the temple, but he could make out a group of figures descending. He recognized Harbinger among them.
“Restoring Inverketh’s magic, my Lady,” Zeke said to Mica, “will return you to favor with your people. Especially now, after your rout of the Tozzk invaders.”
“By your design, Traverser,” Mica responded. “Once again you show yourself to be the Defender of Inverketh.”
“Yeah, but it was your forces that mopped the valley floor with their rusty hides.”
Mica’s reminder about his legendary status on this planet gave him pause. This was not the first time he had come to Inverketh’s rescue. Something he had yet to do was already history here. He remembered the fighter who killed the Tozzk intruder back at XARPA. He could no longer ignore the possibility that he had also been that fighter.
Just how many holes in the fabric of space-time had he already poked? How many were yet to follow?
His gaze lifted to the Friendly Card. He marveled briefly at its transformation from a nondescript cargo hauler to this gleaming hunk of general spacefaring badassery. Then he wondered the same about his own recent evolution. What would the bookish scientist he was back on Earth have to say about the interdimensional space-rogue currently inhabiting his boots?
“Tell your mages, Your Ladyship,” Harbinger called as he strode towards them from across the airfield, “they’ll be able to get back to work as soon as we’re gone.”
“The Dodecahedron is back in place?” Zeke asked as Harbinger approached, a soldier and two mages in tow.
“We had to find a new cavern,” Harbinger said. “The old one was in pretty bad shape. But the new warding is tighter and more effective. It’s more secure, but it will produce an even higher caliber magic than the old one did.”
“My Lady,” one of the mages said, “it will take years for us to master the new forces that Lord Rattus has placed at our disposal.”
“Lord Rattus?” Zeke asked. “You’re sticking with that?”
“It’s served me well so far.” He took from his pocket an emerald green crystal about fifteen centimeters long and held it out to Mica. “I’ve programmed the new warding with a proximity sensor for the Friendly Card. Once our ship is back in orbit, it will kick on. At that point, your magic will come back, but any technology that’s still here will go inert. Your Ladyship, this crystal is strictly an ‘in case of emergency break glass’ measure. If you ever need to shut down the warding, for whatever reason, this will do it. Your mages here know how it works, but I’m giving it to you.”
Mica took the green crystal, her eyes lingering on Harbinger’s.
“We are in your debt,” she said.
“The pleasure is entirely ours,” Harbinger replied, holding her stare with a confidence Zeke had never before seen in the coder.
Augie closed the bay doors on the last cargo pod and climbed out of the mech as Narissa and Vibeke finished their calibrations. The three crossed over to the others.
“How goes the launch prep?” Zeke asked.
“We’re almost there,” Narissa announced. “We still need a suitable power relay for the new supercapacitors. Seems you broke our last one.”
Zeke waved his arm in dismissal. “We can take off without that.”
“Hey!” Harbinger exclaimed. “He made a movie reference!”
“See?” Vibeke said, punching Zeke in the arm. “There’s hope for all of us!”
“What’s your plan for the relay, then?” Narissa asked.
“Recent events prove I’m a pretty good conduit and transformer myself,” Zeke said. “I’ll just insert myself back in to the interface and MindLink the exact conversion specs to Augie and Chuck. They’ll be able to fabricate it on board.”
“Neat trick, that,” Vibeke said. “It’ll be quite the party gag back home. If we ever make it back.”
“If,” Zeke repeated. “Except—”
“We can’t go back,” Narissa finished. “We all know it.”
They all looked uneasily at one another.
“I don’t understand,” Mica said. “What prevents you from returning to your homeworld?”
“Even if the Frogger was working, which it isn’t,” Zeke explained. “We can’t run the risk. We don’t know who’s pulling the Tozzk’s strings. Whoever has it in for us might follow us back—and bring even more firepower. If we stay out here and get the Frogger fixed, we can stay ahead of them, buy us some time to figure out who we’re really up against.”
“At least they didn’t get their hands on the Frogger,” Vibeke said.
“But there’s still the hyperstack,” Narissa said.
“Whoever our true adversary is,” Augie added, “they’ll continue to use the stack to universe hop as long as the event remains stable.”
“You call that monstrosity stable?” Vibeke asked. “What the heck’s it like when it’s unstable?”
“Trust me,” Narissa answered. “When that monster goes unstable, it’ll be a multiversal catastrophe waiting to happen.”
“And on that pleasant thought,” Zeke said, “supercapacitor relay notwithstanding, where are we with the pre-flight checks?”
“On the beam, Cap’n, sir,” Vibeke chimed.
“Locked and loaded,” Augie added.
“Ready when you are,” Narissa confirmed.
“Where’s Qaant Yke?”
“Already on board,” Augie answered. “He’s in the hold, building something.”
“Isn’t that gonna be tough going,” Zeke asked, “him missing an arm an
d all?”
“Try telling him that,” Augie suggested.
“Later. Right now, let’s board and prep for takeoff.”
“Where will you go, if your homeworld is denied you?” Mica asked.
“It’s gonna be a blind jump,” Zeke explained. “We’ll have to hope the Heisenberg corollary delivers us somewhere with the resources available to fix the Frogger.”
“It strikes me as a mighty and perilous endeavor,” The Lady observed.
“I can do it,” Vibeke said under her breath.
Zeke turned to her. “What’d you say?”
“Nothing,” she said. “What are we waiting for? Let’s get this rumpus off the ground!”
So, with a final round of farewells, they ascended into the ship, closing the boarding ramp behind them. The engines powered up and the vessel soon lifted off, and Lady Mica, Regent of Inverketh, watched intently as the Friendly Card flashed into the stratosphere and disappeared into an unknown and unknowable, multiplicitous void!
Epilogue
Tozzk, Zeke! Augie shouted. Zillions of ‘em—
Dr. Charles Harbinger sprayed the MindLink antidote into each eye and Augie’s voice in his head silenced. The only sounds now were the rumble and hiss of the Tozzk catacombs and the fury of the battle on the surface and up on the Laue lens.
The tunnel he followed was dark, but it was hardly cramped. As catacombs went, it was spacious, though he suspected an average-sized Tozzk would probably beg to differ. The heads-up display in his retrofitted glasses threw a glowing line along the route he had already committed to memory.
The Dodecahedron was close—he could feel its presence. Powerful and brooding, but with an angry edge that cut at the peripheries of his consciousness, like a slow-acting acid. He wasn’t worried. Once he was close enough to it, he would throw an insulating code around it that would last long enough to get it back to where it belonged. He wouldn’t be exposed to its corrupting influence long enough for it to do him any harm.
He clutched his portable atom-mauler, which he figured would slow down any resistance long enough for him to code a counterattack. The sword on his belt would be useless in any fight against the Tozzk, but its familiar weight gave him a modicum of reassurance as he descended deeper into the complex.
He stopped at an intersection of corridors. The vault holding the Dodecahedron would be just around the corner and about ten yards down. He readied himself and whipped around, the muzzle of the mauler leading the way.
Nothing. He expected at least a couple of Tozzk guards, but the corridor was dead still.
But not quite empty. He edged forward and realized that a slender form stood slouching, shoulder against the wall. A human figure.
He approached slowly. The figure resolved in the gloom as Harbinger closed in. He suddenly recognized him.
Feldspar.
“No sudden moves, Your Highness,” he warned.
The prince didn’t answer. He simply stared back at Harbinger. It wasn’t until he was right on top of him that he spotted the line of blood from his mouth, and the dagger hilt protruding from his ribs. He prodded the hilt and Feldspar crumpled to the deck. Harbinger stepped over the body and kept going.
The door to the vault was huge, even by Tozzk standards, but a quick scan revealed a rather unsophisticated lock. He gestured in the air and coded a simple disengagement command. The lock mechanism rumbled and clicked, and the door slid aside. He holstered the mauler and crossed the threshold.
The vault was a wide, round space with several more doors like the one he had just opened around its circumference. Overhead, a vast but inactive network of instrumentation circled the perimeter and disappeared into the shadows of a dark shaft rising up towards the surface. The space was empty.
Practically empty.
The Dodecahedron of Doom, glowing a vile florescent green, throbbed angrily on a pedestal in the center of the space. Harbinger’s stomach twisted uncomfortably at its proximity. He could feel the object’s corrupting force, needling at his consciousness, probing his deepest insecurities, his darkest desires.
“You think that’s gonna work on me?” Harbinger asked out loud. “I made you. I don’t care if the rule of ignorance isn’t working on you—as long as this does.”
He gestured into the air with a flourish, calling up the code for a new warding spell. A small constellation of tiny glowing ones and zeros appeared in the air before him. They hovered for a moment, then vanished. He thought little of it—after all, he was still learning this new code wielding skill. He reset his hands and repeated the gesture.
Still nothing.
“It didn’t work for me,” a voice said. A sharp and familiar voice. “Did you honestly think it would work for you, brother?”
A figure strode leisurely from the shadows on the other side of the chamber. As he came closer, the light of the Dodecahedron revealed his face and Harbinger felt a sudden and disturbing sense of vertigo. He drew the mauler and took aim.
“Sorry, brother,” the other said. “You’re going to roll a double fumble there. Why do you think all the machinery up there is dark? Our friend here is still nullifying tech for a respectable radius.”
“You’re not my brother,” Harbinger said.
“That’s true,” the other said. “We’re much, much closer than that. You had to have at least suspected.”
“The possibility occurred to me. I couldn’t quite square the quantum ramifications of a prime meeting his own—”
“Don’t be so quick to designate yourself the prime! Your assumption of yourself as the axis-zero in these matters will not serve you. Do you really question why the rule of ignorance didn’t kick in? Have you really not thought this all the way through?”
A cold, stark, unwelcome realization integrated in his mind.
“How could I have been so stupid?” he asked, tossing the mauler aside. “The Dodecahedron didn’t deactivate for me—because I didn’t build it.”
“You did build one,” the other said. “At least by proxy. Just not this one. But the warding was in your code so we needed you to open it.”
“But you could never have known we’d end up on Inverketh! It was my Heisenberg influence that brought us—”
“The Heisenberg influence was never yours. It was mine. I guided you to Inverketh.”
“Impossible,” Harbinger insisted. “Narissa’s math would never allow for that.”
“And dear Narissa’s mathematics are very, very dependable.” The other cracked a grin. “Do you remember that first visit to the station? Do you remember what you bought on the armillary?”
“We bought weapons.”
“True. And something else.”
“What? The dice?”
“Pity you never bothered to open one of them up. You’d have seen some really slick tech there. It allowed me to override your Heisenberg influence with my own.”
“All this,” Harbinger asked, “just to get your hands on the Dodecahedron? What are you going to do with it if your magic is useless on it?”
“The Dodecahedron’s not nullifying our magic,” the other said. “We’re nullifying each other. It seems that our respective talents are calibrated to opposite polarities. As long as we’re both alive, neither of our powers will work here. Not that it matters. Soon you’ll be dead, and we’ll have what we need.”
“We?”
“You really need to start thinking on a larger scale, brother.”
“I really wish you’d stop calling me ‘brother.’”
The other shrugged. “You’re right. I probably shouldn’t. It makes this whole business stink of fratricide anyway. And that’s kind of a buzzkill.”
“Sorry to sour your joviality,” Harbinger said. He drew his blade. “But I can’t let you take the Dodecahedron.”
“Somehow I knew you were going to say that.” The other drew his own sword. “Do you think our weekends at the SCA made us the swordsmen we think we are?”
“I was
n’t bad then. I’m better now.”
“Really?” the other asked and assumed an en garde. “Well, there’s only one way to establish the veracity of that claim.”
“You bet your critical hits there is,” Harbinger said, and he lunged.
Here ends The Heisenberg Corollary.
The Slagmaster Cycles will continue
in The Deadly Analogues.
I hope you have enjoyed reading The Heisenberg Corollary. If you had half as much fun reading it as I had writing it, then I’ve done my job! Please consider leaving a review for this book on Amazon.com. It’s one of the single best ways you can support my work as a writer (aside from buying my next book, of course)! If you would like to receive news and updates about my future releases, please sign up for my mailing list at chduryea.com.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the folks at New England Speculative Writers, especially Remy, Cristina and Amelia for their support and their willingness to share their experiences of a road I am just beginning to trod. Thanks to my early readers and Betas, especially Mark, Fred and Dan, and to Paul Martin at Dominion Editorial for cleaning up bucketloads of punctuation. I tip my space helmet, of course, to the original Slagmasters, without whom this story would have no genesis. My deepest gratitude goes to my wonderful wife Annie, for her quiet and unflagging certainty that all of this was within my ability and my grasp.
C. H. Duryea is a writer and educator living in Massachusetts. He is a member of New England Speculative Writers, and a curating editor of the NESW anthology, The Final Summons. He has published three short stories over the years. The Heisenberg Corollary is his first novel. He is hard at work on the second book of the Slagmaster Cycles, The Deadly Analogues, as well as a dieselpunk-infused second-world fantasy, Shadow Of Bionon.