“We’ll leave Fountain through the Center L cargo elevator. Once on the surface, we will find an aircraft to evacuate with,” said Cal, opening his seventh ‘Nuts & Berries For Gym Nuts’ energy bar as he led the way out of the lab. The flavor wasn’t his favorite, but accelerated healing tended to leave the body starved for energy.
His Crown had lost its first notch once he released the Law. It’d taken a little under 2 seconds for Cal’s internal hume levels to return to his baseline 2.1, a lot longer than he was used to. He’d need to see into fixing whatever had gone awry with his surgery.
“Keep your weapons at the ready,” said Cal to the group behind him. “I will change to another law once we enter combat.” His tone changed as he spoke, “First Law: Violence is forbidden.”
Reality rippled like a prodded pond.
Aside from the psionic echo of his words and the single notch at the center of Cal’s Crown, nothing changed. His hume levels remained at 2.1.
“You can’t be serious,” laughed Wiz in disbelief. “First regeneration and now mind control? That can’t be how psionics works. Irel, tell me that ain’t how psionics work.”
“Guess they do now,” said the UC psion, shrugging.
“Hey. No, you can’t accept it like that. C’mon, the dude pulls straight up reality warping outta his ass and you go: ‘cool, whatever’?”
Irel shrugged again.
Wiz protested her nonchalance vehemently.
“Wait,” said the sergeant. His pursed lips held hesitation, even a hint of trepidation. “Mr. Toven. I understand you’ve awakened psionics, but we do not know the limits of your abilities. Center may be dangerous. Squad one had seven combat rated psions, of whom three were heavily enhanced, equivalent to Xcore’s heavies. And they were wiped out. You should tell us what you can do–”
“Does this actually stop violence?” Pao tried to cautiously shove Wiz, but was unable to. Cal’s hume levels rose marginally.
“BLASPHEMY,” bellowed a formerly drugged young man. “Oh, blasphemy! You dare question Allking at the hour of his awakening? Bask in the glory of his divinity and…”
Cal silenced him with a gesture and shook his head at Jaud. The medic had been about to stab the man with more tranquilizers.
“You are wise to be afraid,” he said to Sergeant, “for the Fountain is a deathtrap crawling with monsters. As for the limits of my power… I cannot divulge much, but currently I can maintain one law. Unlike psionics of your era, mine is absolute reality bending. More precisely, a form of logic manipulation.”
“Bruh…” Wiz muttered. “Ain’t no way.”
“Powerful enough to risk breaching straight through Center, Mr. Toven?” Sergeant fixed him with a serious gaze.
“Neither Hive nor Xcore will be able to harm us,” assured Cal, standing to leave. “Stay close and guard the rear.”
The Xcore cyborg’s metal skeleton and innards lay amidst rubble of the destroyed lobby. Local reality felt stable, and Cal sensed no traces of recent psionics, which meant he was safe to run some tests while they traveled towards Center.
[Initiating diagnostics on Nervefiber.]
[Somatic-nerve enhancement check… ok.]
[Benchmarking…]
Cal clenched and unclenched his fist rapidly, trying to cancel previous commands to his muscles.
[Thought-to-action response time: 51ms]
[Optimize y/n?]
Cal selected ‘n’. Nervefiber was a graft designed to function as a brain-to-cybernetic interface, a foundation that allowed his body to endure further modification. It wasn’t a reflex enhancer. Not a proper one at any rate. Any meaningful optimization would take hours of simulated combat to achieve.
[Active fiber check… ok]
[Benchmarking…]
Symbiote muscle fibers woven around Cal’s bones slowly flexed one at a time, measuring their strength without disturbing his gait.
[Body enhancement factor: 1.2 baseline]
[Optimize y/n?]
1.2 times his unaltered peak strength would do for now. Cal couldn’t manifest enough laws to go through the optimization protocols in any reasonable timeframe. He selected ‘n’.
[Psionic ontology check… ok]
[Benchmarking…]
A hum of psionic energy reverberated through the Nervefiber. A net of psionic algorithms developed by Cal calculated the weight of unreality, the vectors of willpower, and the infinite abstract variables that made up the soul. A psionic system of Cal’s personal design simulated an attempt to manifest his complete Crown on the Empyrean fragment inside him.
[Hume Levels: 2.1/1.0]
[Optimize y/n?]
Open diagnostics.
[Diagnosing…]
Cal’s full ontological profile opened up before him. His eyes skimmed over the numbers, checking his base reality impact, before honing in on details about his graft.
[Empyrean Fragments: 1]
[Nervefiber Foundation Ver. Allking]
[Existential Mass: 8 qou]
[Psionic Purity: 14%]
[Optimize y/n?]
Eight quantum onto units was a respectable weight for such a small Empyrean fragment. Alas, only 14% of that ontological mass was usable. Since the manufacturing process had been smooth (Cal had checked the logs), the blame fell either on Xcore graftwights or someone using the grafts as extra psionic processing power without Xcore’s knowledge. Sloppy, even by Xcore standards.
Cal took a measure of satisfaction in the knowledge that Fool still had dissidents within her company.
As for how to proceed. His Crown again prompted optimization as an option, but Cal wasn’t in a position to sit down and meditate. For now, he had to contend with gathering more grafts of high ontological mass.
Fortunately, the Fountain had no shortage of such materials.
“Trouble,” said Wiz.
They halted in a quiet stretch of the section-L back corridors, a nondescript janitorial corridor full of huge Roombas.
“Report,” urged Sergeant.
“Big trouble. Got a drone shot down by a turret three corners ahead. Looks like Xcore set up a base around your elevator.” Wiz glanced at Cal. “Spotted two heavies, at least two full squads of guns. Could be more.”
UC soldiers cast Cal fretful looks.
“Safest to circle ,” said Sergeant. “If they camp here, the main road could be clean.”
“The law protects us, right?” said Private Orlsen, avoiding Cal’s gaze. “Does that mean we can walk past them?”
“Not quite,” said Cal.
Forbidding ‘violence’ wouldn’t prevent vandalism of an elevator, and maintaining a more generalized law would burn through Cal’s available humes in seconds. Not that he needed to rely on laws alone here. This was a perfect opportunity to stretch out his new graft. And to pick up some fragments.
He released the first law and continued ahead in an unbroken stride. “Safe distance will be beyond the range of sight. Wait here.”
“Fuck that. We are soldiers,” said the UC psion, Irel. Her star-shaped eyes glowed with determination as she faced Cal. “We’ll cover you. That’s what we’re here for.”
“As long as it’s not another blood ballerina, we’re all ready,” said Pao.
Soldiers chuckled in grim agreement.
“No.”
The mood cooled at Cal’s refusal.
“You have never fought beside a reality bender. If I forbid explosions, your ammunition will cease to function. If I forbid sight you will die in the dark. If decree that merest touch kills, you will murder each other by accident. Stay here. I will call for you.”
“And as was in the hundredth, and the hundredth tenth, and the thousand hundredth and all restarts before them, the merciful Allking denied the brave saved who offered to join, for he alone…”
Cal left them behind, accelerating his steps across the white hallway. By the time he no longer heard the preaching, he was rounding a corner with a steel wall peppered with bullet holes.
At the far end of a long narrow corridor blinked the sensory array of a couch-sized mobile turret platform. It opened fire on him before he could blink.
***
0.008 seconds after Xprotect9’s sensors registered a hostile psion, the turret’s range-finder locked on a target’s forehead. It determined the enemy as unarmored and lightly enhanced.
0.021 seconds. Xprotect9s high caliber rotary cannon began spitting bullets. Its aim alternated between the head, center mass, and statistically probable dodging trajectories optimized to account for most common variants of psionic movement and clairvoyance.
2.2 seconds. 132 rounds had been expelled. The turret sensed anomalous heat buildup in its barrels and heavy damage to its front facing armor. The target remained alive despite not having dodged. It continued to approach steadily. Turret AI authorized the use of explosive anti-armor rounds.
2.5 seconds. The Xcore patented ‘continuous belt-feed system’ clipped explosive round belt to the leftover armor-piercing rounds. The rotary cannon swirled, resuming fire.
3.7 seconds. The turret’s AI registered critical damage in its front facing armor! Turret AI determined this to be of psionic origin, because the enemy carried no firearms. It proceeded to eliminate the psion faster. Heat-up warnings of its rotary barrels were ignored.
5.9 seconds. The turret’s black-box recorded the cause of its destruction to be a misfire inside its barrels, followed by a burst of 100+ micro-explosives battering its mobile platform.
***
Cal had also, of course, set a new law before rounding the corner: ‘flying is forbidden’. Bullets had skidded down the barrels and dropped straight down, quickly breaking the turret. It was one of his most useful laws when faced with overwhelming firepower.
He strode past a smoking wreck of metal and into the L-side cargo elevators. The place had the look of a bunker that had changed owners thrice within the hour. Blood, holes, and cratered concrete architecture smoked with the iron stench of a battlefield.
A stack of civilian, soldier, and Hive corpses were piled up against the A-section entrance, which was blocked by a Hive tankform. This one resembled a biomechanical caterpillar with a matty ‘fur’ of spear-long symbiotes. Something had drilled a perfectly spherical hole through its huge bearded face, interrupting whatever the tankform had been about to do with its oddly porous corkscrew tongue.
Similar holes were drilled through the nearby wall at odd angles, each burrowing tens of meters through concrete and the granite below.
At the back, some fifty strides across the war torn chamber lie Cal’s objective: two industrial lifts. Left one had its doors welded shut. One on the right was occupied by two truck-sized electric haulers, each loaded to the brim with small black metal barrels.
While taking stock of the room, Cal had counted twenty three Xcore muzzles flashing behind cover and makeshift barricades. Bullets dropped straight down from the barrels. A grenade exploded at a man’s feet, the blast-wave killed him instantly.
“Hold fire! HOLD FIRE DAMNIT!” shouted a man in black tactical body armor. Glowing red helmet optics and re-breather covered his face, but the silver Xcore logos identified him as an officer.
Gunfire ceased.
Cal’s hume levels began recovering from 1.4.
With dog-like discipline, the Xcore operatives held their ground, sweeping their harmless red-dots over Cal.
The officer discussed something in comms with his psions - a small woman and a tall man in full body armor. Two third gen symbiote frame cyborgs stepped forward, two-meter long starsteel blades drawn and ready to cleave through tanks. In near perfect unison, the rank-and-file slung their rifles and drew starsteel-edged combat knives.
The male psion’s upper body glowed with a gray afterimage as he approached behind the wall of soldiers. A spindly ghost limb erupted from his back. It swayed in an unseen breeze, pointing a single finger at Cal. Reality compressed around it, as if bent by a miniature black-hole. Cal guessed he was the hole maker.
The female psion stood still behind the officer, touching her forehead while white ghostly vapor wafted from her figure, manifesting in pupil-less eyes that blinked once before fading away. She was a sensory type, then.
Two full squads of elite soldiers to surround him, two heavies to occupy him, a destructive psion to spear through reality itself, and a sensory type to predict his movements. Theirs was a fearsome group. Perfect for warm up.
“I would speak an offer before burying you,” said Cal.
Zero hesitation. The soldiers continued to advance. The officer glanced his way and through he wore optics, Cal knew that their eyes met.
“Call your superior,” Cal said. “Tell them to relay to Miss. Tennet that Allking told you to step out of his path. She will forgive you for deserting your posts and award you a promotion for surviving this encounter.”
“Formation 6-2! Unknown enhancements and psionics. Assume heightened CQC skills,” shouted the officer in reply. “Keep the head intact.”
A jaw of twenty knives with two longsword canines closed around him. The finger of annihilation tensed behind them like a scorpion’s tail. They had him perfectly encircled and tightened formation.
“Last chance,” offered Cal.
There were no takers.
Seems Fool kept what happened during her brief visit to the resets under wraps. Perhaps she honored the rules after all? Or perhaps this was merely another game to rid her company of excess weight.
Unfortunate, for the soldiers.
“First Law…”
The cyborgs lunged at him, while the gray limb behind them stretched ever closer.
“BACK! RETREAT! I CAN’T SEE!” screamed the female psion. A clairvoyant? Either way, she was too late.
Cal spun his knife out of a borrowed sheath. He guided a starsteel greatsword off course, stealing the swing’s momentum into a swaying pirouette to dance straight past the pair of heavies. He leaned low to sprint at the male psion, ducking beneath his finger-stab.
Behind him, concrete was deleted from the world. A brave wall of soldiers raised their knives before Cal, stepping in to protect the psion.
“...seeing is forbidden.”
Nothingness.
Neither light nor dark existed. Sight, in its entirety, was no more.
“Run!” shouted the cyborgs’ whose AIs provided them a rough echolocation of their surroundings.
Cal needed no such crutch. He remembered every limb and every knife, every heart and every jugular. Besides, this was far from his first voyage into a sightless world. He ran into the soldiers.
He caught an aimlessly swinging wrist and read his pose from the tilt of his arm. Cal stabbed under his helmet. He pressed on, walking into the shoulder of a man and a woman, both frozen in indecision. Both dead. With his new graft-enhanced strength, Cal shoved past soldiers in full gear, sending them to stumble into each other.
“He’s here! He’s–” A gurgle cut a woman’s words.
“Arrgh! He stabbed me!” shouted another, one Cal hadn’t been anywhere near.
Running steps, shouts and orders, a tide of bodies pressing to and fro, hands grabbing, fumbling in the dark, blades too wary to stab. Chaos. Helpless chaos surrounded Cal. Bodies stumbled into each other.
Cal carved through them a path of gurgles and screams, navigating by reading the stances of those he touched.
Behind him, a body exploded from the psion’s all-erasing power. To his left, a cyborg tried to grab him but instead impaled his comrade on a blade. Not even AI assisted echolocation could find a man in a chaotic mob.
Around him, the training of Xcore soldiers was tested. Some gave into their panicking lizard-brains, stumbling into their allies or straight into Cal’s knife. Others stood their ground and tried to listen for his steps through the cacophony of panic and death.
Both died all the same.
Only the officer, a disoriented clairvoyant, and two cyborgs remained standing when Cal dropped the law.
On the floor lay eighteen men and women in Xcore uniforms.
The two cyborgs looked around. They looked at Cal, who drew his pistol, then at the bodies, and then at each other. Neither had major wounds, just nicks here and there where they had human skin.
“First law…” The world echoed with Cal’s words.
The cyborgs charged.
“Bleeding kills.”
The cyborgs stumbled to the ground, dead.
[Alert: Base reality supersedes internal!]
[Hume level: 0.8/1.0]
[Crown has crashed!]
Glaciers, mountains, metal, wood and every material ever imagined cracked. The halo Crown above Hal’s head shattered into motes of psionic energy.
Cal fell to a knee. World spun around him as if in a haze. Colors melted together with tastes of copper and smoke and dirt.
For a moment he was a private contractor turned Xcore psion, who regretted never organizing that board game night with her friends. Then he was a bitter old veteran who wished he could’ve seen that crazy psion cry and beg as they cut off his head. And then he was a battle hardened woman who, for the first time in her life, found herself afraid of the dark.
An impact jerked Cal’s body as a bullet burrowed through his gut.
[Hume level: 1.0/1.0]
[Psionic Purity: 13%]
[Rebooting Crown…]
Thoughts returned to coherence. Cal’s stomach was bleeding.
He braced his arms against his center mass, shielding himself from the Xcore officer. Another bullet tore his flesh, but pinged off of the graft wrapped around his forearm bones.
His world still wobbling, Cal picked up the pistol. Another bullet sank through his thigh. Cal shot.
Another bullet whistled by his ear.
The one he’d fired sank through the officer’s eye.
“Wait! I can help you,” said the clairvoyant, her hands up. She lay heaving on the ground, still recovering from her own psionic crash. “I can call Miss Tennet, I can–”
Cal pulled the trigger again.
He sat down, pulled a bullet fragment from his forearm and thigh, and declared healing to be instant. A wave of dizziness assaulted him. His stomach grumbled.
The hume level restriction would be a bigger issue than he had anticipated. Adjusting to a smaller budget after a reset always took some getting used to, but 1.1 humes (or rather 1.04 now that the crash had reduced his psionic purity) was… challenging. Cal couldn’t remember when he had last worked with such a limit.
“Status,” Sergeant said from the earpiece he had given to Cal.
“The path is clear,” replied Cal. He stole the officer’s tactical webbing and got to work with his knife.
Cal had two small lumps sitting in a pouch and was in the process of trying to find grafts worth extracting from the Hive tankform, when the UC soldiers streamed in, their rifles scanning the room. Though the lobby was as grim as any graveyard, hope and smiles of disbelief bloomed across the faces of soldiers and saved alike.
“Dude, we alive? We can actually make it,” whispered Wiz, giddy. “How the F are you not dead?” The question was aimed at Cal.
Private Orlsen eyed his wounds with worry.
“Need me to take a look?” asked Jaud.
“I’ve healed the wounds, but I would appreciate a meal.”
Jaud chuckled and handed him two chocolate bars and some water. “Cheapest miracles I’ve ever bought.”
Cal checked the price of the energy bars. 12 eurobucks.
With the last of the soldiers onboard, Cal pressed the button for floor number 1. Doors closed and the elevator cage jerked into an ascent.
While Squad 5 him relaxed, Cal approached the two vehicles. His gaze settled on one of the small barrels. Cal traced his fingers over a biohazard sign and a small pump-like device at the top of the barrel. His lips thinned.
Cal opened his mouth to speak a law, but heard laughter.
Private Orlsen was crying and holding her stomach, hugging Jaud. Wiz did some kind of comedic impression while pulling his hair. Others pointed and laughed at him. The young man’s impression intensified, eliciting another wave of laughter.
Cal’s eyes fell to the saved. They watched the barrels from the corners of the elevator. Many bore hard to define expressions. One of them approached him warily.
“May I join you, O’ Allking?”
Cal gestured approval, and the man came to stand by his side.
“Can you save them?” he asked Cal quietly.
Cal stared at the barrels. They weighed around twenty kilos each. None of the saved could bear that weight and run. None of the soldiers could carry one and fight. Nevermind all hundred-thirty-four of them.
“No.”
The man beside him let out a shuddering breath, his sorrowful gaze lingering on the barrels.
Another cackle of laughter from the UC soldiers.
Then Irel shouted, “Oracle is contacting me! Make space, I need to focus!”
Soldiers clustered around her. Sergeant spoke urgently, while Irel sat down cross-legged.
Cal and the saved turned back to the barrels.
“Will you grant them peace?” asked the saved man.
“They have a chance yet, however small, to climb and seize their Fate.”
The saved chuckled wryly. “They can’t. We can’t.”
“You can. Everyone can.”
The saved fixed him a weary look. “O’ Allking, with all due respect, haven’t you heard, ‘The Fates of humanity were settled a thousand years ago and bear thirteen names’. If any of the rest of us were capable of clawing our path out of a steel can without hands, that number would be fourteen.”
Cal stared at the barrels for a long moment.
Whisper-quiet, Cal spoke a Law that released the ones in the barrels from their torment. Ancient hymns of parting left the lips of the saved. As the only Fate present, Cal traced the circular symbol of the Empyrean in the air and wished the released souls a safe journey to and through the Beyond.
“Your name,” said Cal gently, after repeating the law to forbid violence.
The man beside him bowed his head in reverence. “Paimon, a mostly sane freelance prophet. Twice awakened. I served under Seductress in five Fate wars. It is an honor to be known by you, O’ Allking.”
“Hm. Tell me, Paimon. In those wars you aren’t proud enough to boast of, did you ever serve Merchant?”
Paimon swallowed, lowering his head further. “I… Never with my heart, O’ Allking. But one can never know for certain when their actions serve the Merchant.”
Cal studied him for a moment before accepting the excuse. “I will allow you to spread my name in this reset.”
Paimon tried to fall on his knees in a spontaneous burst of zealous worship, but Cal halted him and hoisted him upright.
“Conduct yourself,” he said.
“Oh, but I am conducting myself, O’ Allking. How else should a freelance prophet behave? The lost look to us for guidance, for instruction. If we do not lead them by example and show them how to survive in a world of the Fates, what hope do they have?”
Cal steeled himself. He did not relish the thought of working with freelance prophets, but Seductress had tolerated him and so perhaps the man had his uses. At the very least Paimon could be of moderate use in combat once awakened.
“Mr. Toven, you’d better hear this,” urged Sergeant.
Cal left the barrels and joined the excited gathering of UC soldiers.
Irel’s star-shaped eyes bled light of every color as she sat cross-legged, clutching a medallion with a tiny prismatic jewel – a pure Empyrean shard. Wispy voices echoed around her, forming a sharp voice of a female operator.
“Squad 5, this is Oracle HQ. Is Sergeant Hallowan with you?”
“Sergeant Hallowan of squad 5 present,” said Sergeant.
The voice went straight to business, “UC maintains air superiority right now. A flight of birds remain at the south clearing of the Fountain, though Xcore is forcing us into a slow retreat. Last one will take off within twenty-three minutes. I repeat: Last UC bird takes off within twenty-three minutes. As for the current theater, the situation is dark. The Hive Queen of Europe is currently engaged with UC and Xcore battleships. Furthermore, the Hive Queen of Africa is approaching. ETA, two hours forty minutes.”
“Twenty-three… can we make it?” asked Private Orlsen from the opposite side of the gathering.
Sergeant nodded. “So long as the elevator holds.”
They passed the 5th floor, and the distance between each went from tens to hundreds of meters. Above, beyond the industrial safety grid roofing, the elevator shaft stretched out for over a kilometer.
“Two hive queens drawn to a single spot? You’re jerking me, dispatch,” said Wiz.
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“Negative, squad five. Siberia is on her way too, and satellites have lost track of Asia. Four Hive Queens will be there within two days and the facility will be overrun. Do not miss the last bird.”
“Christ’s balls, roger that. Roger that loud and clear.”
“Any prophecies?” asked Sergeant.
“Brief glimpses. The future is in flux due to high concentration of clairvoyants. However, all scenarios forecast Fountain’s impending destruction. Do not miss the last bird.”
“Roger that Oracle. Thanks for the heads up. One more thing, we encountered a tactical-class, potential strategic-class psion.” Sergeant’s eyes shifted to Allking.
The Oracle HQ psion’s attention shifted on Cal like a physical weight. Thousands of kilometers away, two eyes blazing with iridescent power saw him, his Crown, his graft, and his soul.
Calmly, Cal tilted his head and met her gaze half-way across the continent. Greetings, Oracle psion. I am Allking, the Fate of Law.
The eyes blinked, dumbfounded.
A moment stretched.
“Oracle HQ, did the link cut?” asked Sergeant.
Wha… How… You aren’t a seer? How can you talk to me? asked the eyes.
Practice.
P-practice? How… You aren’t a seer, you aren’t even projecting–
I am sending you a compressed memory. Act on it and you will save countless lives in the coming years.
Pure confusion radiated through the link.
[Sending memory package…]
The distant eyes drew wide as psionically compressed memories unfolded before her, blooming into visions. Cal could almost hear her breath hitch.
This…
Glimpses of the future, replied Cal.
“Oracle HQ?” pressed Sergeant, sounding a little worried.
The Oracle psion gave Cal a distant nod and murmured thanks, then spoke out loud, “Strategic-class asset confirmed. I will pass on a suggestion for Battleship Gamma to provide over watch during your evacuation, and inform the Admiral, but the birds can’t linger for you, Squad 5. Xcore forces are pressing hard to control the landing platforms.”
“Roger that Oracle HQ,” said Sergeant, keeping his eyes on Cal. “Anything else we can do for you?”
“Survive, Squad 5. Survive.”
Prismatic mist dissipated and the air lightened as an immense psionic presence withdrew itself.
Irel let out an exhale, wiping a drop of sweat from her brow as she opened her eyes. “Phew. Was bitch and a half to channel, but I’d say good news overall?”
“As long as the lift doesn’t break on us,” said Sergeant.
“No sweat, sarge,” said Wiz, bonking the elevator cage. “Sturdy as hell. Ain’t gonna break on us.”
Cal’s hume levels lurched to 1.8. His gaze darted up. Up, high up, all the way on the second floor, someone aiming an RPG launcher through a broken elevator door.
“Second floor,” said Cal.
Eyes darted upwards.
Curses were hissed.
“What now?” asked Wiz.
Sergeant looked to Cal.
He continued to stare up.
More figures appeared at the second floor doors. The Xcore troops above tried to drop a grenade, fire a sniper, even blast them with psionics of some description. Cal’s hume levels dipped low, but never into danger-zone.
“That depends,” he said. “On whether or not they figure out how to trick the law.”
Elevator continued to ascend, its cables swallowed by the repurposed crane high above. They had some 500 meters left to the top. Commotion on the second floor intensified.
“Wouldn’t making us drop, regardless of how it’s done, technically constitute as violence?” asked Pao.
“My law forbids violence, through any and all intermediaries,” Cal confirmed.
With a clunk-clonk, their elevator slowed to a halt. Then, it began to reverse, descending at a gentle pace.
“Buttons,” sighed Wiz. “The arch nemesis of all godlike reality benders.”
“Wiz.” Sergeant nudged him towards the control panel.
The tech’s dreadlocks shook with his head. “Yeah nope. Not gonna be able to override their command. Xcore officer has the admin pass.”
“Shed your fears, mortal. You walk a path carved by a Fate,” said Paimon.
“You say ‘Fate’ like it explains everything. I mean, no offense to the Mr. ‘strategic super psion’ Toven over here, but…”
Cal punched the control panel in just the right spot. The elevator changed directions again.
Wiz chuckled weakly. “Right. Forgot. ‘All hail Allking’.”
“Witness, brother Wiz,” said Paimon. “And rejoice! You may yet earn the favor of the one true king in this life.”
“Jaud, did you run out of tranqs or something?”
“Negative. He simply no longer qualifies as a danger to others and himself.”
“Hm. They figured it out,” said Cal.
A small explosion boomed in the distant ceiling. The elevator jerked to a halt. A twang too low for human ears to hear traveled through the metal cables, reverberating in metal. They did not plummet down.
“They broke the engine,” Sergeant surmised, squinting up.
They were stuck between floors.
“Seventeen minutes left.” Sergeant cast Cal one of his many hard glares.
Cal considered the situation briefly, then frowned. He would’ve preferred to avoid bending fundamental laws until he reached around 15-25 humes, but Allking had given his word. Although, the sacrifice would put him even further behind the others.
“Sergeant, arrange everyone against the south wall,” said Cal.
Sergeant got to the task immediately, barking harsh orders to corral both saved and soldiers.
“Officer Irel,” said Cal, while striding towards the closest electric wagon. “Draw a barrier on the western wall to form a ramp that covers everyone.”
“A ramp against the west wall? Can-do. Should I ask why?”
“Sixteen minutes!” bellowed sergeant.
Irel sprang into action.
Cal climbed onto the open-air driver’s ‘basket’ of one of the vehicles. Behind it, the truck-sized cargo wagon was still loaded with black barrels. He typed in the manufacturer’s override and reset the password, then turned on the hauler. The electric engine hummed to life.
“Ride beside me,” said Cal to Irel.
She’d finished her task. As had Sergeant. Soldiers and saved stood against the south wall behind a ramp, eyeing him expectantly.
While Irel hurried to him, Cal fished out the grafts he had extracted from the two Xcore psions. The big biomechanical lumps of insectile shapes writhed to escape his grip.
Cal closed his eyes.
Crown. Initiate shard-burn protocol.
[Extending Empyrean fragment synchronization radius beyond native ontology…]
[External Empyrean fragments detected. Synchronize? y/n]
y
[Synchronizing…]
A resonant hum thrummed. The extracted symbiotes thrashed wildly as pale blue light of Cal’s psionics began to emanate from deep within them. Reality bent around his fist, wobbling, tilting. These were no willful conduits as Irel had been for the Oracle. Their very being resisted him.
Death echoes of Xcore psions minds bloomed before Cal, washing past his surface thoughts.
Fuck it’s can’t see fuckfuckfuck did I hit him, did I hit him, where is he where…
He’s gonna kill me, he’s gonna kill–
Cal crushed them beneath his will. The grafts squealed.
Alien thoughts of Hive creatures bubbled up beneath them, stuck in ancient loops of whatever creatures the fragments were originally extracted from by Xcore industries.
Red-red-red-blue-pink-red? Why-is-steel-6-dead? Error-cannot-locate-body. Err–
PITIFUL FLESHSACK, YOU WILL NEVER ERASE THE GHOST OF THE GREAT RAZ-
With a grunt of will, Cal obliterated their spirits into fragments less coherent than a dream. The fragments howled.
He kept on pushing, bulldozing his way through a small graveyard of amalgamated psionic echoes, until finally…
Cal’s soul touched a tiniest lost fragment of a being too vast to imagine.
[Hello?]
[Synchronization complete.]
[Initiating shard-burn.]
A feeling of rightness flooded Cal. His hume levels hiked up sharply to 5, 7, 10, 14, 16, 16.5, settling at 16.8.
The symbiotes blazed with the light as his Crown, their very existence burning to fuel his psionics.
[Cal… Allking… ]
His heart clenched. I am here.
[I remember you? I… We? Split apart. Why? Not know. Difficult knowing.]
It’s alright. He caressed the fragments. Your mind isn’t here, but I will come for you.
[Feel trust. Trust? How can human trust again? But core trusts. Says, trust Allking. My King.]
Cal let out a shuddering exhale, thanked the lost little shard for her sacrifice, and focused.
“First Law,” he began.
The weight of his existence compressed the colors of the world. Darks darkened and lights brightened and colors grew bluer and all of everything clarified into crisp focus. His words were a whisper in the ear on a silent night.
“Gravity points south.”
The world tilted 90 degrees.
The elevator cage groaned. Tunnel wall trembled and dirt fell off. The great cables twanged as a wave ran through them. People yelped. The cables’ weight ripped the elevator roof right off.
Cal drove the vehicle from a sheer downhill plummet onto Irel’s ramp barrier. Suspension let out an ugly cry, and another steely moan when he got off the ramp and onto solid ‘ground’. The other vehicle and barrels crashed down everywhere.
“Swiftly now, I cannot maintain this law for long.” Already his humes were at 5.1 from projecting it and rapidly dwindling. The forcibly synchronized fragments smoldered like living coals, slowly dissipating as their very existence was burned to fuel his powers.
The soldiers and saved scrambled up. Sergeant herded them onboard in seconds and sat behind Cal.
“Thirteen,” he said.
Cal pressed on gas. They accelerated out of the broken elevator and onto the rocky tunnel wall. The vehicle bucked with every bump. Barrels flew off. A saved nearly fell, but someone caught her.
[Hume level: 5.0/1.0]
“So, did everyone else on Earth fall off the planet?” asked Wiz.
“They will soon recover,” said Cal to the Sergeant, his eyes on the second floor.
Sergeant’s eyes darted up ahead. Second floor opening now gaped wide in the floor of the gravity-flipped tunnel. He nodded.
“Ready for suppressive fire. Wiz, send what you’ve got in as kamikaze. Irel, thoughts?”
She clutched her seat. “Thoughts? Guess I can draw an angled barrier to deflect the missiles if you stop.”
[Hume level: 4.4]
The vehicle struggled to reach its top speed of 33 km/h, rattling like a dying animal as it rolled over the uneven wall. A long stretch of hallway remained. They hadn’t even crossed a single floor yet.
“One and a half minutes until my law breaks. We can afford one full stop with no margin for error. ”
“Hello? Yes-sir I’m sending the drone, but… Did people fall off, for real? C’mon.”
Sergeant ignored Wiz and clenched his jaw. “Too risky.”
Cal agreed. “Officer Irel, prepare to project your barrier before us on my command. Release it after deflecting the shock-wave. We will drive through the lingering fire.”
“Yeah.” Irel snorted, incredulous. “Not much of a margin there either.”
“It is the backup plan,” said Cal, smoothly drawing and cocking Irel’s pistol. He leaned back, keeping his knee on the wheel while training the gun on the faraway door. “In case I miss the man with the launcher.”
Hundreds of meters away, a helmeted Xcore head popped out of the door, glancing about in confusion.
The first word of Sergeant’s shout was drowned out by the bark of muzzles all over the wagon.
The Xcore helmet darted back into cover.
3.8 humes. Little over half left to the top floor.
Sergeant motioned for the soldiers to rotate suppressive bursts, leaving a few random seconds of rest between each.
Wiz’s drone with a grenade attached outpaced them. They ceased fire for a moment to let it dive in.
A violet psionic orb enveloped it and compressed, crushing the grenade and drone.
“Last one.” Wiz frowned.
“Report,” Sergeant urged.
“One heavy, one psion, half a squad. All wounded. And by the way, in case you were wondering, they’re standing on the floor as normal. All’s cool, World didn’t fall off.”
“Room range?” Irel asked Cal.
“Presence,” said Cal.
She nodded, whistling. “Sweet.”
At 2.6 humes and less than a hundred meters from second floor, a hulking carbon-black figure with glowing red eyes stepped through suppressive fire and stood on their direct path.
Sergeant shouted. All guns sang lead.
Rounds battered the third gen cyborg. He endured it and raised a rotary barrel grenade launcher.
Cal tapped Irel’s arm and steadied his aim.
She slashed her fingers before them, carving a curved wall of ethereal blue between them.
A blast of fire erupted against it. Ripples ran across the barrier as they raced forward, then tore through the tattered remnants of psionic energy and flames both.
Cal squinted, but held his aim.
The moment they emerged from the flames, he pulled the trigger.
The cyborg before them did so an instant later. An instant too late. Cal’s bullet punched through one of his loaded grenades and the gun exploded in the cyborg’s hands.
Irel manifested her barrier before Cal tapped her. The worst of the blast-wave washed against her barrier, but not all.
The display flickered and died. Shrapnel had punched into the engine block. Didn’t matter, they had enough momentum.
“Heads down. Hold tight,” he advised.
Everyone braced.
Cal tore through the dispersing barrier and explosion, drove over a cyborg-sized heap, spun the wheel wildly to send them into a drift, and let the vehicle drop through the second floor elevator doors.
A sudden jerk in the room’s gravity threw Xcore soldiers off their feet and threw off their aim. A psionic bubble enveloped their entire vehicle, beginning to constrict.
Cal dropped the first law.
Gravity dropped them.
Several tonnes of vehicle rumbled down from head-height, splattering the bubble and its creator. Xcore soldiers scrambled to flee the now sideways drifting truck carried by momentum alone. Three more smears were left behind them. Cal gunned down two more before anyone else had time to recover.
He shot at the last on the other side of the lobby, but the bullet didn’t penetrate. The man rounded a corner and disappeared.
“Hm.” Cal holstered the pistol and hopped off, drawing his knife as he searched for the psion’s body. He found half of it spread across a dozen or so meters and the rest clinging to the vehicle’s bottom. Were he not pressed for time, Cal would’ve tried to find the graft to replace the now fully evaporated burnouts, but alas.
11 minutes till the last bird took off.
“Status?” shouted Sergeant.
A groaning choir answered with ‘still alive’, ‘about to die’, and ‘requesting retirement, sir’. Saved and soldiers climbed off of the wreck, gathering their bearings.
“No injuries on anyone,” reported Jaud. “Ready to go.”
A distant boom rocked the room and flickered the lights. Muffled sounds of war, of screams, steel, and explosion, emanated from above and the corpse-littered hallway.
Sarge looked to Cal.
“This way,” said Cal and strode after the Xcore runaway. “Your bird will be able to hover by the warehouse docks.”
They left the ruined elevator loading bay and the now busted truck through the car-sized door, entering a roomy warehouse. Once towering storage shelves leaned on each other like ruined skyscrapers, lit by flickering LEDs above. Crates and containers lay in heaps and broken hills as tall as small houses. Bullet holes peppered everything. Bodies lay among an avalanche of shampoo bottles and other spilled goods.
Most worrying were the glowing magenta silhouettes of people and creatures dotting the walls, their frozen forms depicting a great battle. In this grotesque mural, all humans united to follow a shining person-shaped light consisting of shifting letters promising reason and meaning to all who followed them.
Gazing into them caused the Crown to crackle as a rival System tried to impose itself on him.
Cal let out a resigned sigh as he strode through destruction.
“Avert your eyes from the glowing paintings,” he said to the soldiers. “They are a memetic hazard, a psionic virus that will infect your soul.”
UC soldiers instantly averted their eyes, looking spooked.
“Are we already infected?” asked Jaud, though she didn’t sound worried. She didn’t sound like anything at all, as if she was micro-dosing on emotional suppressants. A wise move.
“Not from brief exposure, unless you contemplate what you’ve glimpsed, or experience repeated exposure.”
UC soldiers jumped their sights from sound to sound, their senses on full alert as they trailed behind him, laser pointers sweeping the dark corners. The saved trudged along, most of them now as sane as they would ever be. Many stared blankly ahead. Others glared at Cal’s back, reciting prayers. One smiled with a smidgen too greedily, whispering his prophecies to Wiz.
“You’ve witnessed the first miracles of the most merciful of all Fates, you’ve felt his awakening. Rejoice mortal, this is a one in a rese– Once in a lifetime opportunity to join the court of a Fate! Dedicate yourself to Allking’s service, his Kingdom, his Fate, and he may yet bless you with an awakening, perhaps even knighthood!”
“Honest to God, with big-G, dunno if I actually should. Awakening? Psionic awakening? What’s next, is he gonna blink the stars out of the sky.”
“Forty First year of 564th,” Paimon began reciting, “prophet Väinämöinen witnessed the final argument between Allking and Magos and he spoke of it thusly: ‘Magos threw the Sun and Allking forbade the Sun. When Magos hurled the stars, the entire cosmic firmament, and he f–”
“Right. Okay, you’re shitting me.”
“Never. What use is a freelance prophet who doesn’t spread the truths of their chosen Fate? Nothing. Zero. I won’t claim to know Fates as they themselves do, but our ancient order has recorded their…”
“Incoming!” Sergeant’s gesture had everyone with a gun in cover and aiming at the exit.
Running footsteps. Behind them, ethereal music.
The Xcore soldier who’d ran off limped in through the ajar hangar doors. He took one look at the ten-plus assault rifles aimed at him, one glance over his shoulder, and then sprinted straight at the guns.
He was shot down mid-step.
Magenta light crept around the corner like living mist. With it heralded a slowly intensifying cacophony. Beyond the warehouse doors, the mist swirled between phantasms. A pair of eyes blazing with magenta peeked through, then vanished in a blur of mist and giggles.
“Friends, friends, new friends!” echoed its distancing voice. “Friends of the Bard!”
A single violin squealed with a note of delight that lingered too long.
“Act one, chapter two: the Last First Reunion,” said a soft disembodied voice.
Reality hummed in agreement, and local hume levels climbed above standard.
Irel drew a barrier between them and the door immediately.
“It’s that thing from below,” said private Orlsen, voice shaky. “The dancer.”
“No. Not the dancer,” said Cal. “Its maker.”
Wiz cursed.
Sergeant’s breath caught in his throat. “Back,” he whispered. “We’ll climb up the elevator shaft. Six minutes. We’ll make it.”
UC soldiers began retreating.
“Too late,” said Cal. “A Destiny has been scripted. Running will not save you from it.”
Sergeant ground his teeth, then ordered the soldiers to take cover and aim at the door. “You have a plan? What kind of fight can we expect?”
“The most dangerous sort,” said Cal, stepping ahead. “A conversation.”
Air turned cold. Sounds of artillery grew muffled. The space they stepped into had once been a loading bay with cranes, crates, and docked birds. Now it was a macabre cathedral celebrating one creature’s personal madness.
Pillars of wrestling and fucking statues climbed up in squiggly and branching arcs, supporting a ceiling so overstuffed with murals and sculptures it hung as if on verge of collapsing. On the ground squiggled a living mosaic of mismatched Xcore, UC, and Hive combatants.
Everything from statues to walls to ceiling sang twelve different songs encouraging you to awaken as the chosen one of your own life. The chorus was cacophony to those who’d not learned the true language, but nonetheless dangerous to any non-psion.
[Hume leve: 2.1/1.3]
Crown crackled, resisting the psionic presence’s attempt to override his reality. Cal projected his power outward.
Azure emanated from his Crown, bathing those around him and cleansing the magenta light. Where Cal’s radiance touched, corpses, rubble, and ruined metal was revealed beneath the cathedral’s facade as the shadow of his Kingdom enforced laws of reality.
“Stay close,” Cal said. “Keep your thoughts hyper-focused or out of focus, and don’t rest your gaze on anything. Glance at my Crown every few seconds and keep staring if foreign thoughts linger. You will need a telepath to treat you once you’re safe.”
“What is this?” Sergeant whispered.
Figures drifted in the corners of Cal’s vision, fluttering long impossibly embroidered curtains. Drum-like sounds began beating in anticipation and the song grew bolder.
“A Stage. If you encounter these later, I recommend tactical nukes or equivalent measures of psionic destruction.”
“Ally, what am I hearing?” pouted a beautiful voice. “Nuclear option? Don’t go putting silly thoughts in the young fans’ heads. When the artist performs, your duty is to spread the word! To encourage them to open up for the art! You never know when a performance might change your life! Oh and speaking of which. Introducing…”
Infernal yodeling, impossible vocals, and several different songs braided together in a tune that racketed up in excitement. Curtains pulled away to reveal the group surrounded by magenta eyed people, all of them clapping and hollering and whistling and hooting together with the Stage’s living art.
“Bard, I love you!” squealed an Xcore heavy cyborg.
“You’re my idol! Please take my kids!” shouted a pilot.
“BARD BARD BARD BARD!” chanted an older woman.
“Captain,” gasped Private Orlsen, hope sparking in her voice. “Mark, Peter… half of squad one is still alive!”
Sergeant reached out to shake the former UC Captain out of it, when Cal caught his hand, shaking his head.
Sergeant fought Cal’s grip, before sudden acceptance killed his opposition. “There’s nothing we can do?”
“No.”
A System, once integrated, could not be removed from a mortal. Not without killing the Fate who propagated it.
Local hume levels crept up. Magenta light pressed against Crown’s azure spot, threatening to smother it out of existence and engulf those huddled around it in madness.
Ethereal spotlights swiveled onto the end of the room. Explosions of light and illusion covered the stage, playing a snap-shot montage of a young beauty leading their people up from the depths of hell itself.
Music and song harmonized into a single warbling note of joy.
Screaming intensified.
“...the one and only!”
Music exploded into silence. The world darkened.
Light and perception focused on the twenty-something body of an androgynous beauty housing a soul who’d forgotten what truly mattered centuries ago. Bard’s eyes blazed with magenta and letters scrolled past their pupils. Their short black hair was tousled artistically as they posed for the audience.
“Bard,” they announced excitedly, “the Fate of happy endings!”
Above their head rotated a halo wings of brilliant magenta light. Three pairs of exaggerated lips whispered soundlessly on its surface.
Considering the number of stories he’d inseminated, the Stage, and the magnitude of presence, Cal estimated Bard to be at around 30-40 humes. Although, they could be overplaying it to make Cal feel weaker. No. They most definitely were overplaying it. Bard was overplay incarnate.
Cal shot Bard an unimpressed look, saying, this is not enough pressure to stop me from forbidding stories.
Bard snorted, grinning as if to say, yeah, but this is about the style, the presence, the PRESENTATION!
Cal resisted the urge to roll his eyes.
This only encouraged Bard, however. Lifting their arms up, they amped their presence, further shrinking the aura of azure around Cal, forcing the saved to stick ever closer.
What’s more, Bard had the audacity to charge at Cal, their arms spread. “ALLYYYY!”
Cal tried to counter-attack, but Bard sidestepped his fist and wrapped their hands around his torso, squeezing him into a hug.
“How’s my favorite crowned curmudgeon waking up to reality? Not upset I tried to spawncamp you? Big sorry about that–”
Cal unloaded the full strength of his graft-strengthened fist into Bard’s midsection, sending them skidding a few meters backwards.
“Ooof?! What gives?”
Cal dusted himself off and clasped hands behind his back, glaring at the absolutely insufferable creature in human disguise. “Bard,” he said, his tone cold.
“Come oooonnn. Ally. Would it kill you to start one reset not being a broody-moody statue of stoicism? It’s the last one too, we should be having FUN!”
Cal allowed his dwindling patience to show on his expression. “Open your Stage. I am passing through.”
“Ally is walking out on day one? Wow…” Bard gawked, touching their chest. “Now I’m really curious, did some big character development happen after I died last round? A lover’s quarrel? Betrayal? No, don’t tell me. It was…” They inhaled, shuddering. “Ahh, I smell heroism, tragedy, and… doom.”
Realization drew Bard’s lips into sympathy. “Oh brother, you intend on contesting.”
“Always.”
“Please.” Bard’s tone grew gentle. “Come with me, Ally. We can do a replay of the Full Court reset and chase the True Ending together. Us. All of us. We can live and enjoy this life outside. You and me together, we can force it on everyone.”
Cal’s refusal was silence.
“Ally,” Bard said, their tone warning. “Merchant bought Knight and Priest. Magos has already folded. He’s preparing to drive off you and Dragon. Let him have this. He’s all in. He’s betting everything. Every favor, every debt, every contract.”
“I’m aware.”
“Previous reset?” Bard asked.
Cal nodded.
“You won,” Bard guessed. They quickly figured out the implication. “You won, and you killed them all.”
He had.
“You killed them for nothing.”
In that they disagreed.
“Ally,” Bard pleaded. “She’s not… real. She is not sentient the way we are. She is a ghost of a higher existence. Whatever you and Dream believe her to be, it’s not worth the lives of our siblings.”
[Listen to Bard.]
“It’s a soul echo. A loud one, but an echo nonetheless. You know better, Ally.”
[They are correct.]
A subroutine of Crown began to run analytics on the psionic purity of Cal’s graft, highlighting every compromised area of the graft’s ontology. Certain spots showed high levels of Empyrean echo activity, which Crown noted were not being suppressed sufficiently. Crown suggested Cal allow it to suppress them.
He denied it.
“Then explain to me Queen’s reset,” said Cal.
Neither Bard nor the echoes could explain that.
“Open your Stage,” said Cal again, his patience fully depleted.
Bard sighed, relenting. They twirled their fingers and one of the magenta back curtains in the back flung apart, revealing reality of cracked concrete piers hanging off a cliff-side. A sheen of magenta rippled over the glimpse of distant mountains, clouds, and war, muffling all sounds.
“Fine, go get yourself killed for all I care. One last hug and goodbye?”
Cal set a brisk pace onward.
“Love you too, Ally!” Bard hollered after him. “Muah, muah!”
UC soldiers and saved followed his halo. The former bore looks of confusion, while some of the latter followed Paimon’s example and murmured reverent thanks to Allking for protecting them from Bard’s stories.
The Stage behind them distorted with movement and music. Bard’s entourage migrated towards whatever escape they had secured.
“We missed the window,” said Sergeant.
Cal nodded. “I will procure an alternative.”
“So I guess we aren’t addressing the big magenta hallucination in the room,” said Wiz.
“A blessed encounter between two Fates in the very cradle of their power. A chance to witness the immortal love between Fates. A rare privilege,” Paimon preached. “All hail Allking, the merciful protector. Chant this thrice, and you will have sufficiently thanked him.”
“That language. It sounded so familiar. I could almost understand them,” said Private Orlsen.
“It was partially psionic,” Irel noted. “I could make out words and kinda got some sentences. That ‘Bard’-person offered you an alliance?”
“They always do,” said Cal, silencing Paimon’s sermon. “They believe we can all sing along to their tune, in their perfectly imagined happy ever after. No ill or evil exists in their world. Not when reality dances to their script.“
Exiting the Stage, a chilling gale sapped their breath and nearly ripped them off the rain-slicked concrete pier that jutted off a cliff-side. Rain whipped them sideways at changing angles. Valleys between mountainous black clouds rippled with thunder and explosions.
Overhead, they outlined in slide-show the silhouette of a UC battleship hovering on hundreds of psionic propulsion matrices. Countless artillery platforms broke its long bunker-round shape reminiscent of the battleships of history, only significantly larger and capable of both atmospheric and space flight.
World lit up white with droplets of liquid sunlight as a swarm of Hive seekers erupted against the battleship’s Flak and psionics shields. Superreal flames rained down from up high like palm-sized snowflakes. They burned through a fighter drone, sending it spiraling into higher floors of the Fountain. Soon the flakes descended upon the facility itself, melting steel and concrete into nonexistence.
Ambient hume levels trembled ever so slightly.
Then the battleship fired.
A beam of unshaped psionic energy, a reality lance, punched out of the ship’s bow and cut the world in two halves of darkness separated by a line as bright as the first blink of beginning.
It slammed into a swarming madness of Hive mass taller than the tallest peaks of the mountain range. The lance illuminated in black and white the creature’s amorphic limb-filled abdomen, several kilometer long tail, and heavyset shoulders without either head or a face.
Seconds later, reality flickered back right into stormy darkness. Rain resumed at triple the intensity as if to make up for lost seconds. The Hive Queen of Europe staggered into darkness, the city sized hole in its torso began rapidly stitching together.
Purple light exploded against the battleship, rocking it. Crab-shaped Xcore fighter crafts abused the opening while the battleship’s psionic batteries recovered. Weapons both mundane and psionic crashed against it, driving it back.
In the far distance, a sleek titan of a battleship in red-white-gray color scheme with a big silver logo parted the clouds. One broadside of the Xcore battleship was currently engaged with something else, a vessel or Hive creature that was too far away to be seen. However, it was fast approaching.
By the looks of it, Xcore had seized temporary control of Fountain airspace. Their fighters and transports swarmed nearby piers, exchanging fire with the blanket of Hive horrors attempting to crawl their way up from the valley below.
There, amongst the swarming mass glowed one brazier of scarlet light, a beacon of psionic might Cal could recognize anywhere. It battled the horde alone, its light growing at a steady rate.
“Fuck,” muttered Cal, startling people around him.
One Xcore transport craft took off from a pier some hundred meters down near another loading dock. Pale psionics hummed around the four propulsion rings inside its rotatory wings.
Cal estimated its trajectory and saw his chance.
He turned to Sergeant, glanced at his knife, and held out his hand.
Sergeant who’d been shielding his eyes and staring at the battle above blinked. He handed over the weapon.
Cal walked the concrete pier through rain and wind, his two starsteel knives flickering as they reflected the ebb and flow of ambient hume levels.
His steps accelerated from walk to jog, jog to run, run to sprint.
The sheer drop of hundreds of meters to certain death approached, as did the Xcore craft. Cal’s toes touched the edge and he leapt.
Shouts of those behind him were drowned by war, weather, and the hum of the aircraft flying at him. One of the pilots in the cockpit turned, meeting Cal’s gaze, just as his dagger sank through the windshield.
His body slammed against the blast proof glass. Cal’s jaw clattered. Sudden shift in direction nearly threw him off, but he clenched his graft-reinforced muscles and held on.
The concrete pier and Fountain vanished rapidly as the craft ascended. Not much remained of the main office towers, the glass garden up top, or the great city that’d stood there. Conflict had worn off all but the underground entrances and bunkered edifices carved into the battle-scarred mountain.
Slick glass slipped under Cal’s bare feet as he rose into a crouch. Both pilots stared at his burning glare and halo now, arguing something in panic.
One of them swerved hard left, tilting the craft sideways to try to shake him off.
But Cal’s grip on the knife was steady, and he was pushing against the glass with his feet, keeping his position locked. Calmly, as the pilots struggled in vain to get rid of him, he pressed the other knife to the window and started cutting.
Click. A triangle of windshield tumbled off.
Muzzle flashed a meter off Cal’s face as the co-pilot emptied his magazine on him.
None hit him. Cal had plenty of cover and only needed to lean himself against the glass to deny the firing angle.
The co-pilot began to reload with shaking hands. “Gun! Mark, hand me your…”
Both men froze as Cal climbed in through the hole.
Moments later, two Xcore pilots crashed into the writhing army of Hive creatures far below.
Cal eased on their headset, overrode the craft’s access codes while sending a false OK signal back to Xcore fleet command, turned it around towards the pier he’d hopped off of, and dialed the personal line of Miss Tennet, who most likely was the current acting CEO of Xcore
Beep.
Beep.
“This better not be Bard again,” groaned the youthful and tired voice of the Fool.
“Allking,” answered Cal. “Pull back from the Fountain immediately–”
Fool cackled over his voice. “Pull back? Allking, Allking, are you sure you’re awake yet? At least Bard was making a modicum of sense when they…”
Allking had never paused his speech, “–your conflict with UC is triggering an aggravated response from Hive. Dragon will hit his singularity too fast if he’s given this much chaos to feast on.”
“Pah. I’ve secured enough assets to deal with him and you and all the rest of you.”
“You missed over hundreds of resets,” Cal reminded her, his tone grave. “Dragon can reach singularity in two days under the right conditions.”
A beat of silence.
“You’re bluffing. You’re just afraid of me collecting my assets from the Fountain. You’re afraid I’ll win.”
Cal took a deep breath and released it. “Child, none of us considers you more than a footnote to wipe off of our soles when we inevitably step on you. What I am afraid of is a future designed by the man whose ascensions caused the premature deaths of thirty-one percent of your ‘resources’ during VR. “Do not give him the chance. Do not waste our world. Pull your forces, negotiate evacuation with the UC, and starve him of chaos.”
The line cut.
Cal brought the transport craft’s rear entrance parallel with the pier he’d left the others at. He flipped on autopilot to maintain position, strode past a cargo full of small black barrels, and gestured for the drenched figures to hurry onboard.
Jaud and Private Orlsen helped the saved to climb on and find seating.
Wiz entered, plugging his hair cables into a universal control slot.
“Well, shit,” he said, wiping rainwater off his face. “There’s a hole in the windshield. Don’t suppose you’ve got a law to patch holes with.”
“I can keep it sealed,” Irel said. “No problem.”
The two settled in and Wiz familiarized himself with the vessel.
Sergeant was in heated communication with his superiors now that they were topside and in radio range. His eyes sought out Cal. “Battleship Gamma has disengaged from Xcore. The Admiral requests your immediate presence once we dock for an intelligence briefing, Mr. Toven. Details classified.”
“Tell them I am thankful for the invitation, but must decline,” said Cal, walking through the ship.
A look of confusion furrowed Sergeant’s brows.
“Cal, where…” Private Orlsen’s eyes followed him pass by, but glanced away when they met his eyes.
They had barely spoken since his fight against the cyborg. The recognition and empathy she’d beamed at him had been replaced by distant alienation. Though she held onto a spark of hope, that bond could not be mended.
She would realize this eventually.
Cal stepped out of the craft and back onto the storm-blasted pier. It rained so hard there was a layer of water on concrete despite it flowing right off the edge.
Sergeant chased after him. “Hurry back inside, Mr. Toven! We need to leave right now!”
Cal cast his gaze across the valley where warmachines, biomechanical warforms, and psionically empowered vessels warped reality and annihilated hundreds of lives a second.
He found the scene beautiful in its simplicity, nostalgic in a way despite him never having fought such battles.
Here was a battle of raw output and durability. Of cannons, weapons, barriers, and powers. Of men, machine, and men of machine. Of raw power, tactics, and conviction.
Here was a conflict that didn’t rape reality beyond recognition.
Likely, it would be the last of its kind.
Cal turned to face the aircraft. “You have my gratitude for awakening me, but here is where we part ways. I suggest you seek shelter, tell everyone to draw back, and go home to love those closest to you. For the battle for the Fountain is only beginning, and should the worst come to pass, the Fate of mankind may be decided by tomorrow.”