The Myth of the Maker

by Bruce R Cordell

  “What’s that?” Carter said as she produced the ugly thing trailing wires. He crouched down next to her, eyes alight with interest.

  “It’s our ticket into BDR. I have to calibrate it. But you’re the one who’s supposed to be talking.” She rooted in her pack for a fresh 9V battery.

  “All right,” Carter said, and took a breath before beginning. “We were trying to improve computer processing power. Radically improve it, in order to render realistic electronic environments on the fly, quickly enough to walk around in them.”

  “In them?”

  “We had a bank of virtual reality rigs. VR-goggles, haptic gloves, hydraulic harnesses, foot-plates…”

  Kate imagined the set-up. She said, “Ah. Boys and their toys.”

  “Right.” He grinned. “Plus a few women.”

  She’d found a package of unopened batteries and sawed at one end with her penknife. “Well, go on.”

  Carter said, “Peter Sanders, the lead researcher, developed a special chip. With it, he unlocked infinite processing through quantum recursion tunneling.”

  Kate snorted with disbelief. “Yeah… That’s grade-A technobabble.”

  Carter shrugged. “Maybe. We didn’t understand what the Hell we were messing with, that’s for sure. And it bit us. We got mapped into a different network. Not just as avatars. Our minds transferred.”

  Kate plugged the battery into her improvised card-spoofer. The red LED blinked, indicating it was ready to go. But she wasn’t. Carter wasn’t making sense, which was worrisome. She said, “I don’t understand.”

  He nodded, and said, “Because it doesn’t make sense. I can only tell you what I know, which is what happened at the beginning. I have no idea what’s happened over the last three years…” Carter’s eyes focused past hers.

  “C’mon. You can do better than going all emo on me. Spill.”

  “All right,” Carter said. “Listen. This is what happened.”

  Then he told her a story about a VR experiment gone wrong, superposition chips, how dark energy was actually a trap that eventually claimed every intelligent race in the universe, and how he’d triggered that trap on Earth’s behalf three years earlier.

  10: Abrogation

  Jason Cole

  Jason fiddled with his belt buckle. A lesser relic of Ardeyn, the red leather strap granted extra physical strength if he rotated the strap’s buckle to the right, or resistance to psychic prying if the buckle was turned the opposite way. With each flip of the buckle’s orientation, an electric tingle danced across Jason’s stomach.

  Gamma said, “There’s a saying about Rome burning and Nero.”

  “Piss off,” said Jason. The impact of Delta’s sudden end on the other homunculi had obviously worn off. Jason’s highest-grade clones made poor yes-men. He liked to pretend that he appreciated constructive feedback, but in truth, a lecture from a copy wasn’t his favorite.

  Gamma said, “Not until you get off your ass. Carter Strange might be back–”

  “Don’t call him that. It’s Morrison.”

  “Whatever. Even if he’s back, you can still do something about it. He hasn’t reclaimed the Maker’s mantle. At least, not yet.”

  “How do you know?” asked Jason. Anxiety made his voice higher than he intended.

  “Because we’re still here, instead of being chased by umber wolves through the Night Vault, or simply eradicated, as he should’ve been.”

  Jason nodded, letting his gaze wander, pretending that the old fear wasn’t racing through him. They stood in one of the tallest towers of his fortress Megeddon. But he didn’t really see the landscape of Ardeyn rolling away to the north, or the tumult of the Strange to the south. His mind was fixed on all the possible scenarios the future might bring. Gamma was right about one thing, at least: the Maker, the self-appointed supreme being of Ardeyn, wasn’t one for delaying justice, especially against rebel Incarnations like Jason. The Maker could be eying him even now, preparing to dole out justice.

  “You think I should, what, make another deal with the kray?” asked Jason.

  Gamma spread his hands with a slight shrug. “What else? An instance of Carter is active. Why or how doesn’t matter, what matters is finding it.”

  The thought of dealing with the kray again was almost as terrifying as imagining the Maker showing up unannounced. He said, “I’ve got enough agents in Ardeyn to track him down without–”

  “And what if he popped up on Earth, instead of here? If we finally managed to get someone through, who’s to say the Maker, with all his additional resources, didn’t manage the same? And maybe with better fidelity. His abilities outstripped ours by an order of magnitude, before we killed him. We need the kray on this one.”

  Jason rubbed his face. Several things could’ve triggered Carter’s return, including Jason’s constant probing for a connection with BITER. Hell, the USB stick Jason had made for Banks, with all its recursion programming, might’ve done it. For all he knew, maybe even something the kray had done precipitated Carter’s reappearance.

  Jason said, “No, no more kray. I can’t afford to–”

  “They could give you an entropic seed! Like last time.”

  The Betrayer blew out his breath. “If I give those alien bastards another inch, who’s to say they won’t grab a mile? Or everything?” If Jason opened the fences of Ardeyn as he’d done when he’d first betrayed the Maker, the entire Land of the Curse could be erased, including Jason and all his clones.

  Gamma said, “If we get what we need from them and act quickly, it won’t matter. We’ll take back everything the kray steal, and more.”

  Jason frowned. “Who’s ‘we’?”

  Gamma snorted. “A figure of speech.”

  “I’m sure. Don’t forget who’s actual.”

  Gamma wisely held his tongue. Because he knew, better than Jason himself, that Jason had already decided to ask those fucking kray for another favor. If the Lord of Megeddon was going to survive, he needed to break the rules again, damn the consequences. He needed to be War again, whatever else. That was the only way to be safe. The only way Jason could imagine not being afraid.

  Jason descended from the tower, leaving Gamma behind. He made his way to the Xenobiology Foundry. A few reds puttered about the dissection tables, where a breed of burrowing crawler was stretched, skin flayed and its disintegration organ revealed. Upon seeing Jason, the reds set down their dissection scalpels and bowed. At least Delta’s retirement was still fresh in some of himselves’ heads.

  “Where’s Sigma?” he asked.

  “Off-shift,” a red mumbled. “Back in a few hours. Um, if you want, we can run a message to him?”

  Jason considered. Then, “No. In fact, get lost. I want some privacy.”

  The reds scrambled to obey. Once Jason was alone, he turned to the cryotanks. Time to unthaw an ambassador from the Strange. Well, no, not an ambassador. The Strange was chaos and strife unending, separating domains unimaginable to humans. The kray were cockroaches in the walls of the cosmos compared to all myriad Strangers cruising the dark energy network. But out there, even cockroaches had access to computational wizardry that would dwarf anything in the so-very-finite domain of Ardeyn. The Seven Rules gave Ardeyn protection, but with that protection came limitations. It was an age-old compromise.

  A dark bulk lurked behind the crytotank’s frosted glass. A kray captured after its metamorphic “birth” inside Ardeyn was a difficult achievement, unless you didn’t care how many clones were lost in the process. Though it took time to grow new homunculi, it’d been worth the investment of flesh.

  Jason wished he’d asked one of the reds to remain behind to open the valve on the largest cryotank. The wheel stung his hands with frost. Oh well. He’d heal. And he wouldn’t have to slay the red afterward for witnessing the emasculating event that would occur immediately afterward. Asking the kray for help yet again meant trading away more of his autonomy. But to ensure his success, Jason couldn’t see any o
ther way.

  More than anything else, he wanted a stable connection back to his home, to Earth. Carter created Ardeyn to protect Earth from their bumbling intrusion into the Strange. Somehow, Carter’s death unsynchronized the chronology between Earth and Ardeyn, trapping Jason and everyone else in Ardeyn even more completely.

  Until Banks and Paldridge made a fumbling step toward actual quantum computing, enough that Jason had been to complete the contact with BITER. Unfortunately, the link was unstable. Making it permanent was his primary goal. And he only had a little time before the chance was lost.

  Gamma was right. Jason needed the help only the kray could provide, even though their aid was insanely dangerous to accept. But if he didn’t risk it now, he might lose all his future chances.

  The raw computational power available to the kray and other entities of the Strange wasn’t normally a threat to Ardeyn or Earth. The Seven Rules of Ardeyn fenced out any tampering, no matter how prodigious. But Jason was within Ardeyn’s fence. And as someone on the inside, he could let the barriers down, so to speak, enough to accept gifts from those on the outside. In this case, he hoped, another entropic seed of the sort that the kray brood mother incubated.

  An entropic seed was a computational spike. A singularity of calculation that approached infinity… Really, it was a magic wish. He’d used one before, when he’d “betrayed” Carter to his death during the Age of Myth. Using a seed was dangerous, because it splintered the protection of the Seven Rules, and broken rules were slow to mend in the aftermath.

  But Jason needed one to salvage the situation slipping away from him. With it, he could permanently link Earth and Ardeyn. The power of the seed should allow him to accomplish at least that much. Even if he had to project himself to Earth directly.

  With a firm connection, he wouldn’t have to race deadlines. He could collect the other Rings at his leisure. He could take his time unlocking the Maker’s ancient bastion: the Maker’s Hall.

  Once in the Maker’s Hall, he’d fully revitalize the Rings of Incarnation, starting with his own. He’d be War again! Nothing would ever be able to threaten him again. It was the dream that’d started him scheming in earnest… but now it was almost academic. Because of course he’d also be master of the Hall, equal to the Maker in all ways. All Ardeyn would be his to command. It would be glorious.

  He could go home. Return to Earth as he chose. He couldn’t wait to meet some real people again. It’d been so long since he’d labored in this fantasy realm of caricatures, of make-believe beings. He imagined the sun on his face, a glass of cold IPA in one hand, and a cigar burning in the other, surrounded by friends…

  New friends, anyway. All his old ones had turned against him, or were missing. Maybe he could introduce someone new to the idea of root beer floats like he and Carter used to enjoy.

  He chided himself on entertaining, even for one second, such a sad, pedestrian, and melancholy goal. He had far grander visions of the future. Nothing would be beyond him, really, as the new Maker. If he wanted to, he could seed a recursion of his own into Strange, one of his own design, not fucking Carter. Maybe a world where demons didn’t live beneath the crust. Or a world where you could soar through the sky as easily as thinking about it. A new realm. Nothing was too amazing to imagine.

  Though even that paled before an even grander possibility. A fresh idea, should he manage to claim the Maker’s Hall for his own, tickled him. Why not indeed? Why should he not try his hand at extending his influence into Earth itself? Out “there” in the world of normal matter, he might be able to leverage the computational power of the Strange to amazing ends. Maybe that’s all the planetovores wanted to do – escape captivity and transform new worlds…

  Either way, better him than them. What’s the worst that could happen?

  Jason double-checked that his belt was set to protect his mind. Before dread of what lay inside overcame him he grabbed the locking wheel and turned. Ice lanced his fingers. He only tightened his grip and spun the wheel harder, until the door creaked open.

  Icy fog spilled out, revealing the carapace of the kray interpreter. Dead eyes stared at him with abyssal hunger.

  11: Aspiration

  Elandine, Queen of Hazurrium

  “Elandine,” Navar said, “Hazurrium isn’t this way.”

  Elandine owed her First Protector more than royal inscrutability, so she didn’t shrug; she reined to a stop in the shade of a date palm. Behind her, the captain, newly promoted after the death of his predecessor, called a halt to the twenty-odd members of the queen’s detail. Elandine shifted in her saddle to face Navar on her charger and said, “I know that.”

  “Then where–”

  “We’re not returning to Hazurrium.”

  The qephilim’s ears pointed askew from each other in surprise. She said, “And why is that, my queen? I know I don’t have to tell you–”

  Elandine said, “That’s right, you don’t. So stop.”

  Navar rumbled in frustration. “But your sister’s internment–”

  “Doesn’t matter anymore,” Elandine said. “See this?” She pointed to the ring snugly fitted to the index finger of her right hand, glowing red like the sunset.

  “The Ring of Peace,” said Navar, her voice uncharacteristically soft. “You’re still wearing it?”

  “It’s awake,” said Elandine.

  The First Protector gazed at the queen for several heartbeats. Then she said, “Your Majesty, you’ve lost me.”

  How could Elandine describe it? If she concentrated on the relic, burning letters scrolled across her vision describing wonders she’d thought permanently relegated to a mythical age when the Maker fashioned the world, during the Age of Myth.

  Elandine said, “Functions my mother told me were lost may have returned. The Maker could be stirring. Amazing as that is, it’s not what excites me. I care only that the Ring is working again. See, I plan on using it to bring Flora back.”

  Navar gasped. “Back? She’s set to be interred into the Path of the Dead. She’s in Hazurrium–”

  “Navar,” Elandine said, “we’re going to the Moon Door.”

  Once every thirty-three days, the moon called Glitter passed between Flare’s unblinking light and Ardeyn. When that happened, the moon’s shadow was cast across the land beneath. At one spot in particular, Flare’s light was blocked completely, so that night kissed the land by day. When that happened, the Moon Door opened.

  “But, what… how… you can’t!” said the First Protector.

  “I can,” Elandine said.

  Navar got hold of herself and started again. “Even if Peace has remembered ancient functions, the Moon Door lies across a termination zone!”

  She raised a hand to object, but Navar plowed on, saying, “What you’re really suggesting is stepping through the Moon Door into the Night Vault.”

  “Exactly.” Elandine savored the word.

  “If umber wolves don’t get you, the Court of Sleep will,” Navar pleaded, her voice soft.

  “I hold a Ring whose true name is Death. Elder qephilim of the Court will bow to its authority,” Elandine said, “as they once did to she who wore it during the Age of Myth.”

  Navar said, “But you’re not an Incarnation. You’re a woman with a magic artifact.”

  Before she could stop herself, Elandine shouted, “I’ll drag Flora’s spirit from the night tunnels, even if I have to kill every member of the Court of Sleep to do it!”

  The First Protector’s ears laid back and her eyes narrowed. But she kept any responses to herself. Say one thing for the First Protector – she knew enough not to push Elandine too much.

  Though it was already too late. Anger had stripped away Elandine’s earlier exultation, leaving behind smoldering coals. Elandine wanted to hit something. Why did she let Navar bait her?

  The queen spurred her horse into a canter toward the black silhouettes that tumbled up over the horizon. They approached the Serpent Hills. It wasn’t necessary to
convince Navar who was right, or get approval. She only had to prepare the First Protector for what was to come. That, she’d accomplished. Let Navar stew in her wake.

  The clopping of hooves on stone meant Navar’s charger followed close. The calls of the queen’s detail as they saw her sudden departure floated up from farther behind. She understood that from the First Protector’s point of view, Elandine’s actions were erratic. Her temper only exacerbated that impression. If she wasn’t careful, Navar would think that Brandalun’s affliction had come to Elandine, too, without the excuse of elderly dementia.

  If the queen hadn’t cut the conversation short, the First Protector might’ve brought up another of her favorite ways to chide Elandine. Another duty Elandine had failed to discharge. As queen, Elandine must either bear an heir, or name one. Each time she sauntered off into danger’s teeth, Navar broached the topic, directly or indirectly. If Elandine failed to return to Hazurrium, the council would name a regent, and the line of queens of Hazurrium would fail. To prevent that, the shading council would likely name that wench Shari Marana, Elandine’s cousin in Mandariel as the new queen.

  Elandine spurred her steed to a gallop. Flora would be the heir, or no one. She just had to raise her younger sister from the dead.

  Many hours later and some hard riding up a series of switchbacks saw the mounted company to the top of Lobahn Pass. The pass was one of the few easy routes up the southern arms of the Serpent Hills. Full night had nearly descended, and they set camp.

  Elandine’s sleep was troubled with images of her dying sister, and dawn’s creeping orange fingers came too soon. She rubbed the tired ache from her eyes, glad to be rid of dreams of Flora.

  Elandine dressed and left her tent. Her detail immediately began striking it. The queen’s gaze fell into the plunging valley north of their campsite down to a twisted albino jungle. The sun’s morning light limned the steep valley and white vegetation with shades of burning ember. The valley was a termination zone, where the Seven Rules sometimes bent and flowed like hot wax, making it a place only the foolish ventured. At the center of the uncertainty was the Moon Door. Elandine had never been. Her mother, however, had told her daughter the story of exploring the place so many times that it almost seemed as if Elandine had been the one to explore it herself.