CHAPTER 18: THROUGH THE BREACH
Natia poked her head into the break room as Hiro and Moria were finishing up eating.
"Hey, you two!" She catches sight of the food, "You're holding out on me!" She beelines straight to a cabinet and pulls out a plate. She begins to fill her plate as she continues, "The doctor says Bellator is doing way better. Still hasn't woken up but you did great Hiro!" She pats Hiro on the shoulder before plunking down in an empty seat.
"Ghram is confident that he is stable enough to travel through the portals. The doctor is heading back with us as well. Between the two of them and you on back up," she points a spoon at Hiro, "he should be able to travel just fine." She was beaming before stuffing her face with a big mouthful.
She spoke around it, "Mm, this is good Moria, I missed your cooking! Anyway, I was sent to have you go pack up Moria. I know you don't have much of anything Hiro, but Moira needs to get her quarters packed up for transport. I finished up this morning and threw Bellator's and Duffy's stuff in some cases as well. You might make sure I got everything, Moria." She shifted her attention to Hiro before reaching out and gently turned Hiro's head away so she could look at her gemstone. "Damn, the newest model is so cool looking! I can't wait until they roll them out and I can get one. I have to admit this is much better than the translator necklace."
Hiro was shocked by Natia's disposition today. It seemed so different than her quiet amusement and then depressed quiet from the day before. Moria had a contemplative look on her face while Natia ate her food quickly.
"How many cups have you had today?" She asks her quietly.
"Not more than headquarters allows." She retorted sharply before pushing away from the table and gathering up her half-eaten food and empty plates and serving bowl. She went to the counter opened a cabinet and placed the plates, unfinished food and all, inside before closing it and hitting a button on a panel.
Moria sighed, "Just because Duffy isn't here to tell you off doesn't mean you get a free pass. Expect a Ghram lecture later."
"It's just a stimulant tea, you all need to lay off." Natia groused as she crossed her arms and leaned against the wall.
"We just worry about you. Too much makes it harder to interface with systems. You know this. If you puke when we portal it's on you!" Moria replied shaking her head. She got up and waved as she left the room to go pack.
Silence lingered for a few heartbeats before Natia spoke up after a sigh. "I know you were only there for one night, but is there anything you need before we go? Anything left in the room?" She tilted her head at Hiro as she uncrossed her arms. She seemed more relaxed now Moria was out of the room.
"No, everything I have is on my person." She gestured to her hand-me-down clothes and 3D-printed shoes.
"Fair enough kiddo. Once we get to headquarters, or rather, I think they're taking you straight to the academy..." She paused in thought before picking back up, "So once you're there you'll get outfitted and you'll have a stipend to buy whatever you want on top of that. Plus between helping close that tear and healing Bellator you'll probably be swimming in credits compared to other newbies."
"What do you mean? Do I have credits? Is that the money around here?"
She felt the vibration of Button starting to speak, "He..."
"Shut it Button," Hiro said and he went silent.
Natia looked momentarily perplexed before her confusion smoothed away, "Right, your PGA. It will learn soon when you're talking to it and someone else. It takes some time, but it'll get there." She smiled at her and slid into a seat again. "Anytime you close a tear or perform a major service or even a minor service for Headquarters, you get credits. Credits are how we pay for things, and you can exchange them for local currencies if needed." She tapped her gemstone, "It's stored up there. The AI handles all the banking unless you pull out physical money on a specific planet"
"Preformance-based bonuses seem unfair. Like if you have a quiet position like Duffy said, and there's not a lot of tears out here to make extra cash." Hiro said her eyebrows drawing together.
"Well, we get a higher base pay for the isolation, and there are ways to even it out, but you're right, we potentially don't get paid as much out here, but also it's one of the easier postings. Pay scales with distance and danger. Except for Bellator, we all accepted this position. He was assigned here as his first posting, but the rest of us wanted a quiet mission for a while." She looked into the distance remembering something.
Hiro was wondering what would cause the people here to want a quiet posting for a while. Duffy had been here for several rotations, why were they out here? Natia picked back up the thread of conversation.
"You'll have a class about it at the academy. It's a short one, but it's important to know how you will get compensated in different ways. Don't worry too much about it. Since the AI takes care of it all, it's more fair than some other systems I've seen or heard about." Natia waved the topic away. "Ask your PGA to tell you your credit balance if you're curious."
Hiro nodded before addressing her mandatory assistant. "Alright, Button, what's my credit balance?"
The pause before he spoke was odd, but soon he replied, "It looks like you have 145,000 credits in your account. 100,000 for closing the tear before training, and 45,000 for healing another Spark with a severe medical condition without training. This is about ten times what a spark would earn from the same duties."
Hiro's jaw dropped. That's more than her salary was on earth, but maybe it was like how some Asian money was, where they seemed to have more zeros on their numbers than necessary. Her eyes narrowed. "How much would it cost me to buy a meal?" she asked Button.
"As a member of the Spark Network and headquarters, your food, housing, and necessities are free as long as you live in a Network-owned residence or travel to a network-owned mess hall. If you desire to buy a meal outside the network it could cost you between five credits from a street vendor to one hundred or more credits from a high-end restaurant. You can also buy a personal residence on many planets and choose to buy your own food printer and get a meal stipend from the Network."
Hiro's eyebrows rose as she listened. She had been paid more than she made in a year. She made good money at the machine shop, but not nearly 150,000 in two days. Granted that was more than normal since it sounded like she got paid extra for having no training yet. "You weren't kidding about hazard pay" she muttered.
"I assume you got a pretty good payout. I got more than normal because Genesis showed up. Normally it's a 5,000 credit payout to close a tear, which is just over a month's salary at my rank, I got double that!"
"Yeah, I also got a non-trained bonus for being dragged into it."
"Nice! I haven't heard of that bonus, but I suppose new sparks aren't often allowed near tears. Only final year trainees start heading out to get practice and they are well trained by then." Natia's eyes slid over to the food printer while we talked. She had her hands clasped in front of her and she was rubbing her hand with her thumb.
Hiro slid her eyes back and forth between Natia and the printer and decided a change of scenery might help. "So we'll have cash to burn but what do these portals look like? Do you need help carrying anything?"
"I'll show you! And it's sweet of you to offer but I have it stowed in the transport module already. I know I didn't pack Duffy's things up to their standards, but it should all be there. They parked the transfer container in the living space so I didn't have to carry our boxes far. I also don't bring a ton of stuff to postings." She pushed herself up and tilted her head for Hiro to follow her. She took her down the main hallway to the room at the end. This would be under the conference room she had met the Headmaster in. Natia slid open the double-wide hexagonal doorway.
Inside Dr. Medicie and Mrs. Celeste were sitting next to one another, both with interface helmets on their heads. The high-tech gurney Moria had put Bellator on when they had brought him back to base was next to them with a wire plugged into it. It led to the large half-circle desk they sat behind.
"No Syvis, you can't take out and reprogram the servos. We are going back to Headquarters soon enough and you have a whole workshop in a whole district dedicated to your tinkering! This just needs to get young Bellator home in one piece. If you mess with something and it blows up, think about what his family would do to you!"
Mrs. Celeste scoffed, "They couldn't touch me if they tried Harriet and you know it. But I see your point." She pulled off the helmet. "Killjoy," she muttered before catching sight of Hiro and brightening significantly. "Why hello!"
Hiro was still staring in awe at the portal. It was something straight out of Stargate but on a smaller scale. It dominated the room. It was a circular device with an empty center. Multicolored lines ran from it into the floor. If filled the space from the shallow platform it sat on to just below the ceiling. The rest of the room had other features. Several small-scale shipping containers sat along one wall in an area that was labeled "Outgoing". A single container sat along the "Arrivals" wall. Each container had a dark panel on its side. Along one of the opposite walls sat the half-circle desk. That was where the doctor and Mrs. Celeste were sitting having their discussion.
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Hiro started when the tall woman was suddenly in front of her. She had been too busy gawking at the room to notice her move over to them. She had moved fast. Mrs. Celeste bent down to look behind her ear. "Is everything working properly? Has your PGA noted any error messages? How did the visual integration go?" She rapied fired while examining behind her ear. Very close but without touching her.
Hiro leaned away from her scrutiny, uncomfortable with her being in her personal space. "Um, yes, no, and fine?" Hiro said answering the questions in turn.
"Good, only a slight irritation of the skin around the PGA, good, if you focus your healing powers you could probably get that redness to go away. The numbing agent I put on the area probably is preventing you from registering the irritated skin." She backed up after looking at it for a long moment.
Hiro hadn't felt anything but she focused some power up to the area behind her ear. A flash of itchiness hit her right before it was smoothed away. She reached up and rubbed at the spot. She hadn't even realized it was inflamed and now it was healed. If she could bottle this somehow she'd make millions.
"All the systems look good when I ping it. You placed some pretty heavy information-sharing restrictions on it. All I can see is if a system is operating in green, orange, or red. No numbers, no percentages." She looked seriously down at the much shorter woman. "That means it's on you to report if your system is acting oddly in any way. If your PGA says something is wrong or something feels wrong, send for me right away. If it's serious enough, have a different spark send me a message as well just in case."
Hiro nodded, "I can do that, Mrs. Celeste." She didn't want him to explode or go all Terminator on her, so she resolved to report it if she did feel like Button wasn't doing what he was supposed to. She didn't have much context though. So hopefully it would be obvious if something went off.
Mrs. Celeste met her eyes for a long moment before nodding, "Good. I will call you in for a check-up in a few days. Standard orders to make sure everything is connected fully and properly in the next few days. With your healing, I have no doubt it will be fine."
She shifted her rather intense focus onto Natia who seemed to stand a bit straighter, "Why are you here? I don't think you're group is leaving for," she paused eyes losing focus before coming back to her, "another hour."
"Hiro wanted to see the portal. I thought it would be good for her to see it when it was off and then compare it to when it was on."
Mrs. Celeste turned to Hiro, "Are you interested in learning how they work?! I helped refine the current system you know!"
Natia slowly backed away as Mrs. Celeste grabbed Hiro's arm and began to walk her around explaining the systems used to travel through space and the multiverse. Hiro's head spun at all the concepts behind its working but managed to ask a few questions that Mrs. Celeste seemed extra excited about answering. For example, she had seen some weird colors sparking out of the non-powered-up portal and Mrs. Celeste was so excited to explain how she was seeing glimpses of the tunnel system flashing through the artificial weak point they generated with the portal.
Soon Hiro realized it had been that hour. Dr. Medicie had left with the gurney and Natia had also slipped out at some point while Hiro had gotten a crash course in portal physics. They both reappeared as Mrs. Celeste was showing Hiro how you could tune the portal to various places in the system. They both had helmets on and Hiro was patched in watching what Mrs. Celeste was doing when they all reappeared. Dr. Medicie and Ghram were walking with the gurney with a sleeping Bellator tucked in on it. Natia and Moria were pushing one of the shipping containers. The panel on the side was lit up and the whole box was floating a few inches from the floor.
Mrs. Celeste finished cycling on the portal. "Take your helmet off and watch this!" she said to Hiro excitedly. Hiro pulled it off, and the little suction cup connected to her gemstone popped off. The group stood to the side to watch. The whole construction hummed and pulsed with power. A swirl of lights and sounds spilled into the room before stabilizing. Soon they could see a group of five waiting on the other side. Hiro was mesmerized, she could see the group, but there were other flashes she caught in the corner of her eyes when she wasn't looking directly at them.
The group on the other side wore the standard uniform but with bulkier armor and weapons than what Hiro's group wore. Hiro started, she hadn't realized she thought of them as hers. She wasn't even trained or assigned to this post, but all of them, even the touchy Bellator had become her group. A touch of anxiety shot through her, would any of them stick around once they got to the other side? She didn't want them all to leave her. She took a deep breath, Niss was on the other side. She would at least have her dog. She would be fine.
At least, that's what she told herself. She couldn't quite shake the anxiety as the group from across the way walked across the portal. It looked like they were pushing through a membrane or water as they passed through, but otherwise, it was simple. The bulkiest guy pushed through and turned white as a ghost. stepping to the side and breathing heavily.
"Good to see you're still shit at portals Hendricks!" Moria called to him.
"Yeah yeah, it's my one weakness." The big man waved to the rest of the team. "Go take the container and get settled, I'll get the lay of the land before this lot takes off. Meet in an hour and we'll get the duty roster finalized." The rest of the team nodded before taking the single container in arrivals and passing it out the double-wide door.
While they were clearing out the massive man who was as tall as Mrs. Celeste and three times as wide walked over to Moria and wrapped her in a massive hug. "I missed you little fish! Maybe after this posting, you'll swim back to my team eh?"
"I don't know about that," Moria said sliding her eyes over the team she had in the room. Her eyes even landed on Hiro in her look. "I like my current team. I want to help them recover."
He nodded, "I get it, I know you're not the captain here, but the acting captain, but do you have anything we should know? It's not often a full team switch happens all at once like this."
"Yeah, come here, I'll give you Duffy's logs. I spent some time adding some notes yesterday and today for you. I'll point out the relevant bits."
They pulled off to the side as Mrs. Celeste pulled her helmet off. "Ms. Kinross you have fifteen minutes before this portal spins down!" Moria waved and continued to talk to the massive man in her rapid cadence. Natia beckoned Hiro over to her and she joined her with the floating container. "Watch the other side of this as I steer it will you?" She asked in a low voice. "I don't like steering it through that tiny portal blind."
"Sure," Hiro agreed. Dr. Medicie and Ghram were already working their way with Bellator through the portal pulling off to the other side. The doctor was checking readings on the gurney and nodding happily at them. Mrs. Celeste then followed. Next, Hiro and Natia navigated the container that was as tall as Hiro through the portal. It did feel exactly like walking through water at the bottom of the pool. Her ears popped on the other side and she felt heavier. She stumbled and Ghram was there to catch her.
Natia moved away to another bigger portal at the end of the massive room they were in. "I'll catch you later kiddo! I have to hurry to hit my window with this big thing!" Hiro waved a heavy hand
"Easy there, gravity is a bit different here on this transfer planet. Just wait until the next stop. Gravity there is light if you have a strength-based concept you can jump the height of a building!" She hadn't seen much of Ghram since the day before. His hand was under her forearm as she caught her balance.
"This is weird." She told him.
"And it will get weird the more you travel." His face stretched into a smile. "I haven't had a moment but thank you for fixing Bellator. I'm heading straight to medical with him, so I wanted to tell you in person. Can I hug you? Are you a hugger? Does your culture hug?"
"Arms around the other's torso to show various emotions? That kind of hug?"
"Yes!" Ghram said excitedly, "Not all cultures do it, but it's a way to say thanks to people that are in your close circle in mine."
"Yeah, that's how ours uses it too." She pulled him in and they hugged. He squeezed her tight three times before releasing her." Moisture was in the corners of his eyes as he pulled away.
He took a deep breath. "I expect you to take some healing lessons at the academy and feel free to reach out to me whenever you need or want to. I'll come by and check in on you after Bellator and Duffy are on their feet."
"I don't know how much control I have over what I learn, but I'll say something about it," Hiro responded finally looking around. Natia and the container were heading in one direction and Dr. Medicie was heading to a different one. Portals of various sizes circled the room. Her eyes went wide as she realized there was a scattering of several humanoids from fantasy and science fiction movies and some she couldn't identify. She took an instinctive step closer to Ghram.
He chucked, "Good, and don't worry about anyone here, we're in a Network switching station. We got special dispensation to come straight here. When there's time to schedule it, it's not as hard as emergency changes. Normally we take smaller jumps to end up here. All these portals lead to an adjacent portal that will take you directly to a district in Headquarters. Mrs. Celeste is over there at the R and D district portal. The doctor and I are heading sight to medical from here. Natia volunteered to drop all our equipment off at our various residences and Moria will be through soon to take you straight to the academy. You'll still have two more portals, but it's faster to split up here than to stick together. three portals to six."
Hiro just looked around wide-eyed. Suddenly another presence was near. She nearly jumped out of her skin before realizing it was Moria. "Shit, you scared me!"
She gave her a crooked smile. "Come on, let's get you to the academy. Natia still has a residence nearby so we have plans to meet her tomorrow. When Bellator and Duffy are up to it I'll take you to visit them." Some of the anxiety she was feeling eased knowing she could see them all again."
Ghram clapped her on the shoulder and smiled, "Until next time Hiro." Hiro pulled him into one more hug and let him go. He hurried to catch up with Dr. Medicie who was waiting by a portal that was spinning up.
Moria led her to a portal of their own. Across her vision, a countdown to the next opening popped up over it. Hiro startled again. This time unused to overlays in her vision. "A little warning next time Button, at least until I get used to that."
"Of course Miss. Normally it's a verbal warning, but you and Ms. Kinross are together so I figured a visual instead of a verbal warning about the portal opening would be better received."
Hiro sighed and shook her head, "I suppose I do like a visual over the verbal. Thank you Button."
"Of course Miss."
Moria was steadfastly looking forward but not bothering to keep the amusement off her face. Hior pursed her lips in mock annoyance.
Gram wasn't kidding when he said the next planet had low gravity. She walked through the portal took too energetic of a step and flew up two feet her arms waving wildly before she fell on her face. Moria gave her full belly laughs as she walked through after her. Adapting to the difference in gravity with apparent ease. She helped her up and led her through one more switching station before they faced the last portal of the day.
When the view on the other side clarified Hiro caught a glimpse of a room with an odd architecture. A single person stood on the other side, back to them an interface helmet on their head.
"Ready to meet your new world?" Moria asked still smiling about her earlier fall.
Hiro shook her head unsure. "I already met my new world, this is just a different setting with more backstory. At this point, it's just once more into the breach." With that Hiro carefully maneuvered her way through the portal. Her words held more bravado than she felt.