“Congratulations!” Makalai cheered as Kyreeda entered the Communications chamber.

She raised an eyebrow. “For what?”

He spoke as though he were a news reporter. “The Scythe has successfully aided the Eredoran Dark Team with their mission of Sylgan infiltration.” He beamed, his wide eyes prominent on his skinny face. “Division S reports minimal disturbance of the Sylgan defense system. The timed glitches were successful. The team has brought back intel on the location of the stealth ships. It is only a matter of time before they launch an attack on their oh-so-precious ally. The real fun is about to begin! This puts me in the mood for a drink.”

“Not until your shift is over,” Kyreeda scolded. Inwardly, she shared his optimism. Eredore’s discovery had been set up years in advance, with some flexibility to allow for unforeseen events. The Draco Program had been originally the work of the Crimson Vein, but the sheer amount of work required to create such an effective system required an enormous work force. The more people they recruited, the riskier it became to keep the project private. Division S eventually decided to transfer the project to Sylga’s military scientists. It took some convincing, but Sylga’s precarious situation between the might of Eredore and the savagery of Trellendek forced it to start taking measures into its own hands. Their desire to become self-sufficient was useful to the Vein.

The main drawback was that research was slower. The transfer of the project took over a year, during which Division S had to keep itself hidden and appear as simply a collection of scientists with a common goal and a fascination with illusion tech. It had been a delicate process, but it paid off. To the Vein’s knowledge, Sylga had no knowledge of them, and it had come up with the idea of the Draco Program itself. There had been one or two individuals who were suspicious, but when they started looking deeper into the situation, they met dead ends. Literally.

The only part of the plan that had gone wrong was the loss of the stealth ship during the attack on Ridgemire. Kyreeda saw now that the Scythe had been impatient, so he was partly to blame for its premature use.

“I need you to report our experiment with Mr. Lazen to the Scythe,” she said. “The data steam from the armor has been analyzed for any anomalous Aetheric readings, but if there are any, they are too small to notice without more experiments.”

“Unfortunate,” he said, dropping his smile. “I really thought that would move the needle.”

“It is not a total loss. Raymi has some theories as to the active mechanism. She will be testing on Mr. Norallis shortly. We know it has to do with the brain, but which portion of the brain is still unknown. It could give us more insight for our illusion detection prototypes as well.”

“Didn’t Crainen drop the project?”

“He did, out of frustration from making no progress. As usual, he was too impatient.”

Makalai tilted his head. “You criticize your former superior? If his ghost did not haunt you yet, it does now!”

She challenged him with her gaze. “Are you saying you disagree?”

“I suppose he wasn’t the shining example of perfection,” he conceded. He blinked intentionally, as though the act was foreign to him. “It is wise for our research project to pull double-duty. Where do you plan to deploy these prototypes?”

“Everywhere,” she replied. “Although we have kept knowledge of illusions secret for millennia, we can’t be certain someone else hasn’t discovered such knowledge on their own. It’s about time we start practicing humility and learn from our opponents.”

“Yes, yes, yes! Wisdom is wise, is it not? But we must not stop there. We must build illusion detector detectors!”

“That will come next, once we learn how Mr. Norallis and Mr. Lazen pierce illusions.”

“I applaud your optimism,” he said, blocky text materializing before him. “Is the Scythe to be informed of our research into the Shingagi?”

“No, keep it brief.”

Instead of getting more insight as she had hoped, research into the Shingagi was confounding the entire team. They had a difficult time keeping the thing completely sedated. They used mixtures strong enough to kill a human. It’s sleep patterns were highly abnormal. Only one hemisphere of its brain slept at a time, while the other was semi-conscious. Not only that, computers and testing equipment malfunctioned at a rate far higher than normal. It was nearly as mysterious as Mr. Norallis’ miraculous maneuver.

She just couldn’t let his case go. How had he known to shoot the craft at precisely the right spot? Piercing the illusion wasn’t enough. Did he somehow generate luck? Division S insisted it was a fluke, but she suspected otherwise. That was why they captured Mr. Norallis. Prior to his one-in-a-billion shot, they thought the stealth ships were secure even against those who could pierce illusions. The ship had been lined with shield generators covering every square centimeter of the hull. It could have taken several bolts from Guard Jets and not drop its invisibility illusion. Even though Division S had been reporting occasional glitches caused by the interactions between the shields and the cloak, the odds of getting through that glitch were astronomical. But that was enough for Mr. Norallis, apparently.

Kyreeda left Communications and made her way to the Research wing of the underground complex. It consisted of rooms of all sizes. The bigger ones stored prototype technology or housed the more dangerous experiments. The smaller ones housed databases, smaller-scale experiments, and occasionally humans. Mr. Norallis sat in one of them. They made sure to give him a toilet. The experiments would be much more complicated otherwise.

She found Raymi, the Head Researcher, at the far end of one of the hallways with an Aetheric welding machine. She dragged the handheld device along the floor to fix a metal door in its frame to the floor. It looked ridiculous, since one could simply walk around it.

“Who authorized this?” Kyreeda hollered, storming down the hallway. She looked at the door a few meters behind the one Raymi was working on. “Isn’t that the Shingagi room?”

“I did,” Raymi said nonchalantly. She frowned at the other door. “And yep, the troublemaker’s in there.”

“Troublemaker?”

Raymi looked at her, confused. “Nobody told you? The computers have been malfunctioning—”

Kyreeda waved a hand. “Yes, yes, I know that.”

“And now the door lock’s broken,” Raymi said, gesturing at the other door.

“Get another one,” Kyreeda said.

“That was the replacement for the original. It failed ten minutes later.”

“Are we locked out?”

“No, it’s the opposite. The electronic lock goes unlocked all by itself, no ID needed. So…” She put her hand into her inner vest pocket and brought out a jingling set of keys. “We’re going old-fashioned.”

“Why are you doing the grunt work? Where is Kelm?”

She rolled her eyes as she went back to welding. She didn’t have to raise her voice much. “So you didn’t hear all of it, huh? He’s in med bay.”

“What happened?”

“He was supposed to check the fittings for the tank filter, but he walked in and had a panic attack.”

Kyreeda raised an eyebrow. “Kelm? Panicking?”

He was the toughest, sturdiest person she knew. He once won a no-flinch contest. He could even override his blink reflex. She felt more on-edge just wondering what the bodybuilder had experienced.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

“It’s not just him, either,” Raymi continued. “Jeras and Frank reported teleportation. They lost time. Half an hour at least, but only when around the troublemaker.”

“What were they doing while blacked out?”

Raymi shrugged. “Who knows? The security cameras keep freezing or disconnecting. The computers still work but don’t log anything. As far as our databases know, we’re not doing anything in this room. The only thing that hasn’t failed, rather conveniently for the creature, is the oxygen supply to its air tube. It can’t remove the sedative. We had to make that a mechanical procedure when we cobbled together the room at a moment’s notice. Had we digitalized the controls… who knows what that thing could do if fully awake?”

Kyreeda folded her arms, biting her lip. “You think the Shingagi is to blame for all this? While in a half-asleep state?”

Raymi gestured dramatically to the room. “What else could explain all these anomalies? I invite you to come up with a better explanation. Anything but mine!”

“So it’s more intelligent than we thought,” Kyreeda pondered out loud. “And potentially more dangerous. Tell me, Raymi, can it pierce illusions?”

Raymi blinked. “I don’t know. I haven’t tried actually. I could bring Brandon into the room and see what happens. It responded to his awakening, remember?”

Kyreeda shook her head. “Absolutely not. Too risky. It could kill him or both of them. Something else entirely could happen. We need to know how to reduce the Shingagi’s influence. You said you detected Aetherite within the creature?”

“We’re ninety percent certain it contains Aetherite.”

“Could we remove it?”

Raymi stood and leaned against the newly secured door, testing its stability. “If we can get someone in there to not black out or panic, then yes. But we’ve never encountered a life form like this before. We could kill it by removing its Aetherite. There’s no way to tell for sure.”

Kyreeda looked at the door as though she could see through it. On the other side was either the Vein’s greatest asset or its greatest liability. Potentially both. Mr. Norallis was more of an asset at this point, even though he was a liability in the past. He was no threat to anyone here.

So far, she thought. They had evidently underestimated the Shingagi and were paying the price. Could the same be true of Mr. Norallis? Did he have another lucky move hiding up his sleeve?

“Keep me updated if any more anomalies occur,” she said. “Have you made any progress with the illusion detector prototypes?”

Raymi’s face lit up. “I’m close. I just need to test more frequency harmonics on Brandon. I’m starting to find a pattern of harmonics that he responds to more strongly, and the detectors are now performing slightly better than chance. It’ll be a while before I come up with a consistent method of detection, because the frequencies depend on the type of illusion. A cloak is a different frequency than a projection. Even an acoustic cloak is different from a visual cloak. Obviously, different projections have different frequencies, but if they have commonalities, it’ll be easier to calibrate the detectors. With a little luck, we won’t even need new hardware. It can be a firmware update to our existing spy network.”

“Hm,” Kyreeda said, mentally assessing the report. “How long will it take to have our first detection system operational?”

“Another week at least. Closer to two.”

Kyreeda nodded. “Good. Make that your priority. I will find a way to… tame the Shingagi.”

That was all the compliments she was willing to give. Getting a big head didn’t help anyone, so she did her best to keep her people humble. Compliments would be counterproductive.

“Sure thing,” Raymi said, slapping the side of the door frame. “After I finish this little side project.”

“Find someone else to finish the job. You’re wasting your time.”

“Hah! Not a chance. I take late lunches, remember? This is my lunchbreak workout.”

Kyreeda scanned her for a moment, then let her be. She needed to focus her mental energy on the issue of the Shingagi. Killing it would do no good, especially when it had abilities unknown to even the Crimson Vein, the keeper of Aetheric secrets for millennia. Studying the creature could open up a whole new toolkit for control. It somehow had deep insight into the human mind, at least enough to manipulate emotions and erase memories. In order to study it, she would need to control it. And there was only one way she knew how.

Pain.

***

Brandon sat on the toilet seat, pondering his life decisions. If he had the option, would he do things differently? Were Evan and Marvain safe? Would they still be if he changed his past?

He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. It was no use. The past couldn’t be changed. Neither could the present. And his future was all but determined by those who kept him in captivity. There was little he could do trapped in this infernal tin-can of a room, undergoing cyclical mental torment from unknown adversaries.

He knew they were experimenting on him, and he knew they were interested in his mystical abilities. The scientist in him would’ve loved to get an explanation of what they were, even if he wasn’t released. Still, as the days passed by, the questions piled on.

On the positive side, he was getting used to having no answers, and once he realized he might never get answers, the questions stopped burning. The only question that really disturbed him was how long this could continue before he lost his sanity. He had to hope they cared about his state enough to keep him from doing anything dangerous. If there was a way to gain leverage on these crooks, losing his sanity would be it. He was tempted to fake it, but too afraid it would become real. Maybe they would call his bluff anyway.

At least they fed him decent food. It was somehow comforting to know that someone cared for him half a minute each day. It still registered as human contact, though he still hadn’t seen any faces or heard any voices except his own when he sang his favorite songs to pass the time.

Air hissed from the corners of his cell. He knew the drill by now, or at least the beginning of it. He laid his head back on the wall and closed his eyes, relaxing his body to make sure he didn’t smack his head when the gas knocked him out. As warmth oozed through his limbs, he wondered if he’d be able to stay lucid in the coming visions. Each one had appeared like a dream to him, but he hadn’t recognized them as dreams yet. If he could become lucid, maybe he’d have more control over what happened to him.

The world faded to blackness.

Sparkling multicolor patterns played over the dimensionless depths. Geometric forms morphed into existence, evolving into larger, evermore complex tapestries of light. They erupted into the third dimension, taking form. Densifying, solidifying.

Brandon watched the pulsating structures weave together to form a hallway stretching into a black infinity in front of him. There was no ceiling or floor. He was contained between two infinite planes, each mirroring the other’s dazzling patterns.

A single tone coursed through the structure of this new existence. It was singular and unchanging, yet comprised of countless other subtones. It was simultaneously loud and quiet. A thundering whisper. Through these paradoxes emerged a beauty Brandon could not possibly comprehend.

His awareness drifted closer to one of the walls, entranced by the sheer complexity of light. The details refined themselves upon further inspection, revealing miniature hallways leading to miniature infinities. A gravity pulled him in closer and closer, yet he never made contact. It expanded further in all directions, weaving constantly deeper fractals for Brandon to follow.

There was no time for decision. He was simply attracted to directions with no clear pattern, yet there was a sense of intentionality behind it. He was following a predetermined path of his own free will. There was no questioning it, because he knew paradox was the closest he could ever get to the truth.

The patterns took on more organic forms, transforming from hard edges to soft curves. The curves spiraled into spheres branching out into all the other spheres. The zooming accelerated at one of the spheres, revealing further substructures of filaments formed by thousands of white points. He flew into one of those points and found it further dismantling itself into more points of light.

Then the acceleration accelerated, and he could no longer follow individual elements with his awareness. The expansion became exponential. White spirals careened past him in one great spasm of movement.

Everything stopped. The tone was gone. He immediately recognized his surroundings.

His body was still in the cell, now strapped up to the chair with his head propped up with a forehead strap. The hemispheres on both walls emitted a pulsating red energy that repelled his consciousness. He drifted through the opposite wall as a leaf blown through wind.

After passing through the wall, he became aware of multiple other sources of this red, pulsating energy. Most were above him, though distance was impossible to tell. There were thousands of sources scattered as a red screen above him, but a few were at his level. His momentum took him toward one of the brighter sources. As he approached, forms took shape.

A rectangular prism formed around the slowly pulsating sphere of energy. It bobbed up and down slowly, as if suspended in water. Vortices spun lazily near the surface of the sphere, giving it the resemblance of a red star. He expected it to repel him too, but instead a swirl unraveled and lashed out at him. It locked him in position where he was. He had no defense. There was simply an all-pervasive sense of fear and dread.

It drew him closer, then stopped. He sensed a presence there, inspecting him, analyzing him. It emitted a general sense of worry and fatigue that he knew were not his. After a few moments of mutual staring, he caught a glimpse of a more defined shape within the sphere. It looked like a fish, but not a normal fish. He got a crescent-shaped impression before it slipped out of his grasp. The red sphere grew opaque to conceal the image.

It contracted inward on itself, dragging Brandon toward it again. Just when he started to panic, it snapped back to normal size, flinging him away with speed. He slammed into his own body and jolted awake.

He gasped for air, frantically unstrapping himself from the chair. He collapsed forward onto the floor, sweat dripping from his forehead and dotting the floor. He smelled even worse than before, but he welcomed the distraction. It would keep him from thinking too much about what he’d just experienced.

Then that ominous sound reverberated through the walls again. A slow, otherworldly clicking. He got a suspicious feeling that someone, or something, was trying to communicate with him.

Had he just met it directly?