The dream came with a kaleidoscope of alien fractals folding across my consciousness, the memory of the parasite digging into my eye once again reprocessed by my brain.
Then...
I was back in the void, floating in that endless expanse. But this time was different. This time, I could see the individual points of light that made up the spiraling tunnel with crystal clarity.
They weren't stars at all.
They were souls.
Countless souls, each one a tiny flame of consciousness, shaped like a drowning someone being drawn inexorably toward the center of that terrible spiral. As I watched, transfixed with horror, I began to recognize them.
Face after face. Ghosts. Imprints. People who died.
Auntie Amilli's gruff warmth, now just a fading blue ember spinning in the cosmic drain.
Liss from my old school who had perished in a car accident, her body mangled and ripped apart.
Old Mrs. Urocoff who used to give me cookies, now just another spark in the infinite wheel.
And then... Mom.
Her soul burned brighter than the others, a familiar warmth that called out to me across the void. I could almost hear her voice calling out to me, crying out for help as she was pulled into the funnel of souls.
"Mom!" I tried to scream, but in this place I had no voice, no body, nothing but awareness.
The centipede-bracelet around my soul-self tightened painfully as I instinctively tried to move toward her light. It pulled me back from the edge of the spiral, its grip both painful and protective.
I flailed against it, wishing nothing but to help my mom, but the accursed bracelet held me like a binding chair.
I wept and begged, reaching out until she was gone.
And then... The Wheel itself had noticed me. It knew me. It had tasted my essence when I died and now it had marked me as... hers.
The spiral wasn't just a tunnel of souls, it was the mouth of something vast and terrible. Something that had existed since before the Wormwood Star fell, before the first Omnid was born from the union of Nazareth and his golem bride.
The dark centipede-bracelet constricted further, its grip almost crushing as it fought to keep me anchored against the pull. But the Wheel's call was stronger now, a siren song of oblivion that promised reunion with all those lost souls.
Mom's light was gone now, lost amidst all of the other ghosts. The Wheel was consuming her, grinding her essence down into raw energy. How many others had it devoured? How many souls had been fed into its star-maw to sate its eternal hunger?
I understood now why the Omnids feared death despite their resurrection technology. The Phoenix system wasn't just about preserving life - it was about protecting souls from the Wheel.
The Wheel unfolded out like an infinite eye, like a God peering at a mote, promising without words that no matter how many times I died and was reborn, no matter how tightly the Lazarus bracelet held me, eventually I would belong to Her. My soul would join the endless spiral, ground down into cosmic dust along with all the others.
I jolted awake in my van, drenched in cold sweat.
3:11 AM.
I sighed and rubbed my face. Death had a price - it wasn't free. Even if I didn't break yesterday, the Wheel was already starting to grind at my sanity. The memory of the hungry abyss lingered like frost on a window, refusing to melt away like a bad dream.
The tiny beast core in my hexasuit glowed softly in the darkness of my van. The warm orange pinprick of light was oddly comforting after the nightmare. Yulia whispered a list of things I had to do today as she noticed that I was awake through the cameras covering the interior of the van.
I willed my body to rise, dressing up as a security officer Nunkish Throg. Time to roam around campus, gather more information and to grab me some silver flesh-printing magic juice.
----------------------------------------
The early morning hallways of Skyfall Academy echoed with the usual pre-class chatter. I was heading to my locker, after enjoying breakfast from a vending machine, when I heard yelps. Then, the sound of bodies hitting lockers and angry shouts filled the air.
"Watch it, wheelie freak!"
"Hey! You almost ran over my tail!"
"Slow down, you psycho fuck!"
“I’m gonna bite your face off!”
I immediately sprinted toward the commotion, already planning how to intervene with a well-timed Thunderclap which would hopefully earn me another useful Omnigram contact or ten.
As I rounded the corner at full speed, ready to face whatever situation awaited, I saw what appeared to be a dark silver-blue dragon-cat girl in a wheelchair wearing dark aviator goggles, rocketing down the hallway at approximately Mach 3 straight towards me.
Students dove out of her way as she flew in a straight line, reinforced boots propped up on the footrest, gloved hands spinning the wheels.
"MOVE IT OR LOSE IT!" she bellowed.
I froze in place, my fight or flight response choosing to do fuck all.
The wheelchair slammed into me at high speed, but a moment before impact years of parkour practice kicked in. Instead of going under the wheels, I leaped up and forward, landing awkwardly in her lap. My hands instinctively grabbed the wheelchair's handles to stabilize us both as we careened down the hallway.
"Can't see!" She yelped, her snout bumping against my shoulder. "Get the fuck off!"
The wheelchair's momentum carried us forward a few more meters leaving rubber marks on the floor as she engaged rapid braking.
"What the f-freaking hell?" I managed to gasp out as we finally skidded to a stop, my heart racing from the near-death experience. "Are you trying to set a new land speed record or something?"
"Get OFF me, idiot!" The camouflage-coat, wheelchair-bound girl shoved at me with surprising strength. Her claws and leather gloved-hands dug into my shoulders as she tried to dislodge me from her lap.
I scrambled off her, raising my hands in surrender. "Sorry! Just trying to avoid becoming roadkill. I'm Alex, by the way. The school's only half-human resident, you almost turned into a pancake."
The dragon-cat didn’t say anything in reply. Her messy blue-gray hair partially obscured her face as she adjusted herself in the wheelchair, clearly uncomfortable with the interaction.
“So, what’s your name, rocket-girl?” I asked.
"M’ Katherine," she muttered reluctantly.
“And where are you in such a rush to, Katherine?" I asked.
"None of your business," she hissed, already maneuvering her wheelchair to go around me.
I noticed that her sketchbook had fallen during our collision, several loose pages scattered across the floor. Before she could protest, I started gathering them up.
"Hey, these are really good!" I commented, genuinely impressed by the art visible on the pages. There were several dark, moody landscapes and what appeared to be anatomical studies of various… humans.
"Oi! Give those back!" Katherine snapped, making a grab for the papers.
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I sneakily pointed the wrist cam at her face to identify her.
"Ohhhh, you're Katherine Kells," I grinned. "So you are my competition huh?"
Katherine's scales seemed to pale slightly as I said her name. Her gloves tightened on her wheelchair's armrests.
"How do you..." she started, then stopped to take another sip from her canteen. "Whatever. Just give me my art back."
"These are seriously impressive," I continued, studying one particularly striking landscape on the floor.
Picking up the art I stared at it. A massive supercell storm system loomed over a ruined cityscape, rendered in stark contrasts, broiling clouds flashing with lightning.
Four small human figures stood defiantly before what appeared to be an enormous, lanky, jet black titanic beast with hundreds of haunting silver-blue eyes. The perspective made the humans look tiny and vulnerable against the apocalyptic backdrop, yet there was something hopeful in their stance as they faced down the monster.
My heart stopped.
I was there. No, I wasn’t. The boy with dark brown hair. That was me. No it wasn’t!
What the fuck?!
I quickly handed the drawing back, my voice trembling. "That one... the humans facing the monster. It's incredible. The perspective, the lighting... how did you..."
"It's nothing," Katherine muttered, snatching the papers and stuffing them into her bag. "Just a stupid dream I had."
I reached down to grab another sketch from the floor. A fifteen or sixteen year old girl with silver-blue eyes, as blue as that of the Quetzi angel.
I stared at the sketch, a chill running down my spine. The girl's expression was somehow hauntingly familiar. A slightly grimy, orange construction vest with a letter G sat on her skinny frame, yellow hardhat framing her silver hair.
A fractal crack on the side of her head drew my eyes to itself. It was as if I were looking into an infinite void, the eye of a hurricane, a tunnel folding into itself.
"Who's this?" I asked, my heartbeat accelerating like a runaway train.
Katherine snatched the paper from my hands with surprising speed.
"It's no one," she growled, but her voice shook slightly. "She doesn’t exist. Just another stupid dream. Piss off and stop pawing at my art."
"Sorry," I said, taking a step back. "Didn't mean to pry. Your art just really speaks to me. Especially that apocalyptic piece with the humans and that girl in the orange vest. It's like..."
"Like nothing!" Katherine cut me off sharply. "Just screw off and leave me alone. I don't need some half-breed art critic analyzing my work."
She stuffed the remaining sketches into her bag with trembling hands, took another long drink from her canteen, and gripped her wheelchair's wheels.
"Wait," I started, still shaken by those eerily familiar images.
She ignored me.
"Hey, that was your painting outside Principal Graves' office, right?" I called after her, jogging to keep up with her accelerating wheelchair pace. "The one with the autumn city and the superstructure ring in the sky? The way you captured the rain puddles and the four teens eating sushi under the oak tree was absolutely incredible! It’s like… like I was actually there!”
"Stop following me!" Katherine snapped, but I noticed her wheels slowed slightly.
“Where can I find more of your work?” I demanded. “Are you on Omnigram? Omnibook? OmniX? I want to see it all!"
Katherine’s claws dug into her wheelchair supports.
"I don't... I don't post my art online," she said quietly.
"Why not? Are you demotivated by the rise of AI art? Cus incredibly talented traditional artists like you shouldn't be scared of artificial neural networks!”
Katherine's wheelchair came to an abrupt stop. She turned to face me, eyes hidden behind dark goggles.
"You really don't know when to shut up, do you?" she growled. "Fine. You want to know why I don't post my art? Because I don't want people like YOU analyzing every little detail and trying to find hidden meanings that aren't there!"
"But there ARE meanings there," I insisted, thinking of that strange fractal-infected girl. "Your art... it's like looking into another world. A place that feels eerily familiar somehow..."
"It's just dreams," Katherine muttered, taking another long drink from her canteen. "Stupid, meaningless dreams that I put on paper to get them out of my head after I go through the incarnator. Nothing more."
“Is your work for sale anywhere? You should be in an art gallery, my dude!” I encouraged.
“You should fuck off to somewhere where the sun don’t shine,” Katherine growled. “And stay there. I don't need another stalker fawning over my work or telling me what to do with it.”
"Wingman," I whispered in Kaska, turning away from Katherine.
"Wingman protocol enabled. Not much of an online footprint on Katherine Kells, but her abandoned OmniX profile suggests that she is into isekai anime and artificial intelligence. Tagged posts by Emerald Stratos reveal that Katherine was writing and illustrating a science fiction novel one year and ten months ago about human superheroes." The AI whispered back into my earpiece. "Pickup suggestion -introduce me. Generating Stollwurm Vroid avatar. Avatar generated."
‘A good conversation pickup, thanks digital wingbae.’ I mentally saluted Yulia.
"Fawning, was it?" I scoffed, pulling out my phone. "Hold that thought. Yulia, analyze the painting by K. Kells that we saw in front of the Vice Principal’s office. Professional assessment, out loud please."
The AI's cheerful voice rang out: "Analyzing artwork... The technical execution shows masterful understanding of paint properties, particularly in the atmospheric perspective and value relationships. The brushwork demonstrates confident mark-making and sophisticated color theory application. The emotional resonance suggests influences from romantic period painters while maintaining a contemporary edge. Overall assessment: Professional gallery-worthy."
"Satisfied?" I asked. "My AI just evaluated your drawing on its own merit. See? She's a cute Stollwurm too!"
Katherine stared at my phone. The dark, reflective goggles reflected Yulia’s anime-style Stollwurm Vroid avatar dressed in adventurer gear.
"That's... that's just an LLM with a frontend wrapper," she muttered. "They are are programmed to give positive feedback, you dumbass. They hallucinate shit all the time.”
"Oi! My personal jailbroken LLM does not hallucinate as often as the corporate gpt," I defended Yulia. "I gave her super advanced custom instructions and like sixty extra agents that help her act more human. Vision-based neural networks analyze what they see. And what I see is an artist trying really hard to convince herself that she's not as talented as she actually is. Weird flex, but okay."
Katherine's claws tightened on her wheelchair's armrests. "You don't know fuck-all about me! Kindly piss off before I stuff you into a deep dark burrow.”
What was it about Omnid girls and violence?
"You are right," I admitted. "I don't know you, but I'd… love to get to know my greatest art-nemesis."
Katherine stared at me with dark, reflective glasses. "Nemesis?" she asked. "What the shit are you talking about, you absolute knob?"
"Well duh, we're clearly destined to be art rivals," I declared dramatically. "Two talented artists in one school? This is basically an anime plot waiting to happen. I bet you even have a tragic backstory and everything! Of course you are my nemesis, you almost isekai'd me from the mortal coil to a magic world with that rocket chair!"
Katherine stared at me like I'd grown a second head.
"Are you always this..." Katherine paused, seeming to search for the right word, "...aggressively weird?"
"Only around exceptionally talented artist femmes who try to run me over like Truck-kun," I grinned. "So, what's your opinion on AI art? Because I've been experimenting with some really interesting prompt engineering, agents and custom instruction techniques and-"
"Listen," Katherine cut me off, taking another sip from her canteen. "I don't do the whole... social thing. Please go away. I don’t want to be friends and I’m… not into human-lookin’ mixies.”
“Your art would suggest otherwise,” I grinned.
“Nazareth damn it!” She hissed more to herself than to me, words slurring slightly. “This is why I don’t show my art to people! Every twat thinks that I’m in love with humans!”
She took another swig of her flask and her tense posture relaxed ever so slightly.
"Is that alcohol in your canteen?" I asked, noting her increasingly slurred speech and relaxed face. “How many degrees is that? 'Cus it smells like 100% alcohol. Maybe more. Can Omnids make 200% alcohol using dimensional magic to fuse two vodka bottles together?"
"None of your business," Katherine snapped, but her words were definitely getting fuzzier around the edges. "I need it for... medical reasons."
"Ah yes, the classic 'medical alcohol' defense," I nodded sagely. "Very compelling. Much health. Such treatment."
“One more joke and you’re going in the hole,” she growled.
“One more joke,” I grinned. “Please show me your hole.”
I cringed internally after saying it. That was awful, even for me.
What? Stollwurms loved their deep, dark burrows and hated sunlight. It was why she was wearing light-reducing goggles and a thick-ass, bulky hunting coat.
At my words, Catherine’s claws dug into the chair’s sides with such fervor that the metal groaned. She slowly rose up from her wheelchair using her tails as leverage. In a few seconds, she loomed over me, bulky jacket and hood puffing out.
“Impressive use of the tail!” I commented. “Oh... Wow, you’re really tall.”
I knew that I was really pushing her buttons, but I couldn't help myself. I wasn’t afraid of her killing me on the spot as according to her records Katherine had zero murders and never participated in fights.
Her hand moved, cutting the air with a whip-bang, grabbing me by the throat faster than I could blink. She lifted me towards her face, baring sharp fangs.
“Do not fuck with me. Do not talk to me. I don’t like you. Screw off. Is that understood?”
"Crystal clear,” I choked out. “Though I gotta say, for someone who doesn't like me, you sure are getting handsy. Not that I'm complaining - I love a woman who can lift me off my feet!"
Katherine suddenly pulled her goggles up with her free hand, revealing big, emerald-green eyes that seemed to dig straight into my soul. They were like shimmering pools of ancient, predatory intelligence that made my knees weak with primal terror.
Then, her eyes ignited from within and my witty facade crumbled, tore apart into shreds as my mind shattered.