Chapter 3 - Part I

I wasted no time rushing to my feet.

Throwing caution to the wind, I stuck my head and shoulders through the hole and peered outside into a giant spherical room with a dull grey inner wall.

From first impressions it appeared the square room was a cube that hung from the ceiling of the sphere – if a sphere could be considered as having a ceiling.

Taking a deep breath, I climbed out of the hole and stood unsteadily against the wall.

My fingers could just curl over the top of the cube.

With Cassidy’s enormous strength, I was able to haul myself quite easily onto the roof of the cubed room.

Once on top, I took stock of my surroundings.

The spherical room had a diameter of around fifty to sixty feet. It was hard to gauge accurately without a frame of reference, however, it didn’t feel that large. With that in mind, I had to wonder what lay beyond the sphere’s walls.

As I’d suspected, the cubed prison room hung from the sphere’s ceiling by a long telescoping shaft that was roughly a foot wide where the collar connected to the cube’s roof, but a foot and half at the ceiling.

That implied the shaft would either lower the cube into the sphere or pull it up.

Though it wasn’t well lit, I studied the ceiling but didn’t see anything that resembled a square that would indicated a hatch for the cube to pass through.

Lowering myself onto my belly, I peered down at the base of the sphere, where light from the equatorial ring of strip lights barely reached.

There was a square down below.

Hmm. Interesting.

I sat on the edge of the cube with my legs hanging down.

I considered my situation.

One. I was trapped inside a sphere.

Two. The sphere could either be inside a larger structure, hanging from the air, submerged underwater, or floating in a vacuum.

Three. Before I made an attempt to escape, I needed to know what was outside the cube.

And finally four. I didn’t hear any alarms, and how long before the guards came rushing in through some unknown means.

Sweeping my gaze slowly along the interior of the sphere, I briefly considered how much damage Cassidy’s body could do to the shaft, but I quickly dismissed any thoughts of damaging it. Cassidy wasn’t a machine. She was flesh and blood, though a lot stronger than any person.

Taking a deep breath, I stood up then, gauged the drop to the floor.

It looked to be around thirty feet.

That didn’t seem too bad since I’d managed more or less the same when chasing after the Gun Queen.

Holding my breath, I dropped off the side of the cube…and landed on the hard metal floor of the sphere.

“Gah!”

As my feet hit metal, I became aware of two things.

One. Landing barefoot on metal wasn’t like landing on grassy ground while wearing shock resistant boots.

Two. My breasts were large and heavy. In fact, they were so large and bouncy, they smacked my chin upon landing.

“Guh!”

My cry resounded inside the sphere, as I rolled onto my back, flipping over a couple of times as pain shot up my feet, all the way to my crotch.

I came to a stop spread-eagled, my boobs wobbling a couple of times like supersized mounds of firm jelly on my chest.

Gasping for air while waiting for the pain to subside, I truly wished I had Mercedes’ clothes to wear. And her guns. And a sports bra!

I rubbed my sore breasts, and choked back a laugh when I considered the possibility of my summoning the Sarcophagus.

That certainly didn’t seem likely, at least not without Jive’s help.

Jive….

Where was Jive?

I cocked my head, and listened to the sounds inside the sphere, and inside my head.

No Jive. Not even a peep from the annoying disembodied Artificial Awareness.

I remembered his spine-chilling scream before the wall released me and I landed on the floor.

What had happened to the Maestro? Why had he been screaming at me to stop? Stop what?

“Aggh.” I grabbed my head in frustration, my groan echoing a little within the chamber.

An echo?

Come to think of it, when I landed just now, it sounded rather hollow. There was a dull twang sound.

I stood up gingerly, but quickly noticed the pain from my legs had vanished.

“He he he,” I chuckled. “Way to go, Cassidy. You’re one tough chick, aren’t you.”

However, the first thing I’m going to do after getting out of here is find some clothes. This place is cold. Too cold.

I walked to the four by four meter square depression in the middle of the floor, directly under the cubed room. Kneeling on top of it, I rapped my knuckles loudly on the metal.

From what I could tell, it was definitely a hatch of some sort. From the edging, I surmised it probably swung down and out of the way. Then again, I could be wrong and it retracted into the sphere, though my gut told me that didn’t make sense.

Running my fingers along the dark edge, I stopped and sighed.

I had no idea how I’d managed to escape from the cube, but I suspected it had something to do with the silver hair strands that emerged from my hands and fingers.

On a hunch, I placed my hand on the depressed hatch, and closed my eyes.

I imagined my sense of touch expanding along the cold surface of the metal.

I imagined my hand and fingers spreading along the metal and then into it.

Part of me was aware it was nothing more than a delusion. But another part of me was certain I had not imagined the sensation back in the cubed room when my hands were trapped in the amorphous wall.

I relaxed my breathing, and concentrated – imagined – that my hand was gently spreading into the metal.

After a while I opened my eyes, but observed a distinct lack of progress.

With a sigh, and another deep breath, I closed my eyes, and tried again….

#

(Erina)

At a near run, Mia, Uma, Colin, and I, boarded the elevator large enough to haul twelve people.

I pressed my right palm on the scanner beside the control panel, watched it blink green when it recognized me, then hastily pushed the button to the security wing some twelve levels up.

That alone was enough to demonstrate that the Periphery was anything but small.

In fact, the research ship was almost four times the size of the ancient cruise ships of old mother Earth. To be specific, she was a trimaran design some four hundred and seventy meters long, and two hundred meters wide. With twenty-four levels or decks, and Rion reactors that could provide power for an entire city ring, the Periphery sailed above the waves of Teloria like a goddess of the seas.

The elevator raced upwards on its maglev rails.

I turned to Colin. “Is Jive still online?”

Colin shrugged noncommittally. “Well, there’s no reason he shouldn’t be, unless something happened to the Sarcophagus.”

“Then get a hold of him,” I impatiently urged. “We don’t have time for his dramatics.”

“Ah—yes, yes ma’am.”

Uma stared at me.

“What?” I asked her.

If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

“You think it was being dramatic?”

“Of course I do. The Maestro’s core is located inside the Sarcophagus. It needs to be there in order to reduce the possibility of interference between the wetware in Mercedes’ head, and the Sarcophagus. Of course that shouldn’t be possible since it’s a quantum link. But to our surprise we noticed interference when the Sarcophagus travels through Limbo yet Cassidy is somewhere else.”

Uma frowned. “Really?”

I nodded tersely. “The engineers were shocked out of their lab coats. Nothing should interfere with a quantum link, yet clearly something about Limbo introduces ‘noise’ into the proverbial line.” I shook my head this time. “In any case, there’s only a small part of Jive inside her head. It’s the classic client-server approach. So he’s not dead!”

“Okay. Okay. Calm down,” she retorted. “I was just surprised by its behavior.”

Mia muttered, “It was rather scary.”

I clenched my right hand. “If he had a face to punch—I’d punch it.”

At that moment a multicolored cube roughly a foot wide appeared within a holo-bubble floating just below the elevator car’s ceiling.

I glared up at the cube. “You bastard.”

“My apologies, Doctor, but it was truly a frightening experience. I do believe I envisioned my short yet memorable life flash before my awareness routines.”

“That isn’t possible.”

“And I saw a bright light. And I went to the light.”

“Jive!”

“And I found myself back in the Sarcophagus—which I might add is behaving in a most peculiar manner.”

Everyone in the lift car stared at the cube with sudden trepidation.

I broke the silence first. “Care to elaborate?”

“It is out of standby mode and powering up its Reflex core.”

I sucked in a lungful of air. “Why the Hell is it doing that?”

The cube wobbled side-to-side in an attempt to mirror a person rocking their head. “If I may postulate a theory—”

“Yes, yes. Get on with it.”

“—I would say it is preparing to travel to her aid.”

My eyes widened, then narrowed when I said, “So there’s another control system.”

“Yes. It would appear I am not piloting alone. I have a co-pilot, or perhaps a pilot instructor watching over me.”

Uma snorted and said, “Maybe you’re the co-pilot, and not the captain of that coffin.”

“That appears to be quite likely. And may I remind you it is not a coffin. It is a sarcophagus. Sarcophagus. Repeat after me. Sarcophagus!”

Uma sang back, “Coffin. It’s a coffin.”

“Gah! You detestable woman!”

I waved my right hand about. “Enough! Stop it—both of you. We can worry about that later.”

The cube turned into an incensed crimson pyramid. “What?”

I glared up at it. “Right now I want to know if you can regain control of the Sarcophagus. Can you get it to power down?”

Jive returned to its cube form. “It appears not. We must consider the possibility that our partners in crime have given it hidden directives. These directives are clearly designed at ensuring the survival of their investment.”

I nodded bitterly but wasn’t surprised. “In other words, House Alus Novis isn’t taking any chances with Mercedes’ safety.”

The cube appeared to nod. “However, should the Princess’ situation improve, we should see an appropriate response from the Sarcophagus.”

“Too many unsaid ifs in that statement.”

Jive wilted a little. “My sincere apologies.”

I cradled my left wrist. “So, what is Cassidy’s situation?”

Jive was silent for a short while, its colors swirling in shades of blue.

“Jive?” I asked, trying not to sound impatient.

“Well…her situation has improved….”

“Explain.” This time I tried not to sound anxious. “Is she having a temper tantrum?”

“No. She has moved beyond the tantrum. Rather, it was not a temper tantrum per se. More like an episode of severe distress.” The cube performed the equivalent of a shrug. “But as I said, she has moved beyond it.”

I pictured a possible worst-case scenario, and the image left me feeling cold and confused in its wake. “So how is she doing now? What is her situation?”

Jive sounded like he was taking a deep breath. “I do not know how, but during her last spell of extreme panic and anxiety that broached outright despair, the Princess was able to use the Angel Fibers to disrupt the morphic properties of a containment unit wall. As a result, she created a hole in the wall and escaped from the block.”

I heard muted whispers of shock, and softly asked, “She got outside…?”

“Yes, and she is currently exploring the base of the sphere. It seems she understands that the Angel Fibers facilitated her escape. Consequently, she is attempting to reproduce the phenomenon with the wall in order to open the access hatch. Thankfully, she has not had any success.”

I kept my breathing even and my voice steady as I considered the implications.

Mercedes had a limited conscious control of the Angel Fibers. It was probably responding to her emotions rather than conscious, concerted thoughts. That is, it reacted to her strong feelings rather than her will.

Mia sounded ill. “She’s accessing her latent abilities already. Not good.”

Colin cleared his throat and spoke fearfully. “For her to be using the Fibers now exceeds all our predictions. It is happening too early. Much too early.”

I swallowed and shook my head. “I doubt she has more than limited control. Barely any control.”

“But even so—”

“Yes, I know it’s ahead of our predictions. We’ll just have to adjust our models.” I frowned at a sudden realization. “Jive, are you back inside her head?”

“Yes. Though the Angel Fibers have robbed me of my ability to influence her neural matrix, and thereby her body. In effect, they have cut off my arms and legs within her brain. Now I am nothing more than a voice between her ears, though I can perceive my surroundings through her senses. That is, I can see what she sees, and hear what she hears.”

Uma guardedly asked, “And how is she?”

“Calm. She has calmed down and is attempting to draw upon the power of the Angel Fibers though she does not appear to know how. I am rather surprised to see her this mentally composed considering her despair only minutes ago. She is truly remarkable.”

The interest in Jive’s voice made me blink and stare sharply at the cube.

Its colors had mellowed into a soft orange hue and it wobbled languidly.

Abruptly, Jive asked, “Do you wish for me to pass on a message?”

I inhaled deeply, and gave his question some thought as I watched the elevator level indicator with growing anxiety. The elevator car was nearing the floor of the security wing.

Was it wise to intrude upon her now?

Without preamble the indicator panel blinked and displayed a change of direction.

The elevator car was being redirected.

“Huh?” I blurted out.

Uma and the others looked at it too. “Where are we going?”

The destination was presented a moment later, and my stomach tightened into a nervous little ball.

“This is bad,” I muttered. “Very bad.”

Jive assumed a melted appearance. “It would appear the Chief Director would like to see you.”

Uma grimaced and subconsciously crossed her arms over her breasts as she complained, “What does that ero midget want now of all times?”