Dawn, Prime Shard, 2565 A.D.

Archos Alpha Site, Northeastern Continent

Farash met the two women just outside, taking a moment to shield his brown eyes from the noon sun with his hands.

"Dazzling, isn't it?" Barb asked. "It seems brighter here, but maybe we are just closer to the equator than Seattle is."

"I wonder how much it rains here?" Alessia gestured to the out-buildings. "Or if they water it? The grass is very green."

"Maybe they use weather spells," Barb joked as the three headed down the path out of the courtyard.

"Possibly," Farash said seriously, "if anyone had the aura for it."

"Maybe we should walk a few paces more," Alessia ushered them on quietly, then whispered a soft, "Privacy!" She looked over at the dark-skinned Farash, who seemed very well composed compared to Barb's hopping with excitement. "Do you know about aura, then?"

"That everyone has some, you mean?" Farash smirked slightly, "or that our spells work here?"

"So you do know!" Barb clapped.

"Of course. I'm pretty sure most people in the workroom do. Even Enz."

"Enz figured it out?" Alessia asked, skeptical.

"Only because he was fooling around in the dorm room and caught his own shoe on fire playing pretend mage." Farash shrugged. "I don't know as it's so secretive as you seem to think." He waved at the air around him. "Isn't Privacy one of my spells, through?"

"I can use it, it's just a bit more tiring than using the Manipulation spells." Alessia furrowed her brow. "Have you tried casting any non-Illusion spells?"

"No." Farash stood straighter. "I didn't think of trying that. But I've casted all my safe-looking ones up through the Adept list."

"You have an adept spell list?" Alessia swallowed a squeak. "How?"

"I just asked Peter for them. We aren't supposed to use them directly in our testing for a couple more weeks yet, but I told him I was curious how the Illusion school would develop, and that might give me ideas for scenarios to test with the lower spells. He sent them over to my pad. Here," Farash tapped through a few screens on his pad.

"Oh, thanks!" Alessia grinned as her pad alerted her that files had come through. She'd have to look through them later. "But if you can cast adept spells, what is your aura level?"

"I don't know, though I suppose if we can cross-cast, I could check."

"Allow me," Barb said, casting "Measure Aura." She wrinkled her nose as his numbers appear. "That isn't fair at all. Twenty-one?"

"That's higher than mine." Alessia frowned, "Mine is 15."

"And mine is only 8." Barb pouted. "I can only use the novice spells."

"It's interesting it varies so much," Farash said thoughtfully, "I wonder how high it can go?"

"The pad says 'life experience' can increase aura," Alessia replied, "although I wonder how they know. Magery is newish - do the other forms of magic that Archos programmed use aura?"

"I don't think so," Farash shook his head.

"And what is aura, exactly?" Barb joined in the conversation. "It's one thing to say it's an existing part of us that just can't be utilized in our own universe, and only manifests here - but how would they have discovered it, let alone figured out how to use it?"

"Now I just have more questions," Alessia groaned as a shimmer indicated the Privacy spell had timed out. The group continued walking for a bit, not bothering to recast it but just speculate in soft tones. If it really was an 'open secret,' then they would just draw more suspicion trying to hide.

"Well, as long as we are out here, we should check out the east greenhouse." Farash pointed. "My supervisor said there were some interesting plants there from Aanbree that I should check out."

"Genetically modified plants?" Barb perked up. "I'm intrigued. There better be a carnivorous Venus Fly Trap or I'm demanding a refund back to Earth."

"Wouldn't the greenhouse be locked?" Alessia asked she followed.

"From what? Robbers? Tourists?" Farash waved airily. "It's a world in another universe, who would come here but staff? And it's not like we can sneak giant plants back through our luggage."

"True."

"Oooh, what's that?" Barb interrupted as they got close to the large glass building. Low in the air above them - it was hard to say whether a meter away or a dozen, a reflective line was growing towards them. While it flashed silver at times, it mostly showed the green of lush grass on the ground and tropical vegetation inside the greenhouse.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

"Is it, a mirror?" Alessia scrunched her forehead.

"An expanding mirror?" Farash frowned, "I don't think we shouldn't get closer."

They all took a step back, but the sky-mirror expanded, several meters across now and oblong, angling towards them. It tilted, slightly, now reflecting more sky. Then more, until it was near perpendicular to them and mostly clouds and atmosphere. If they hadn't spotted it earlier or didn't know where to look, it would have been hard to notice.

"Yah," Alessia took another step back. "I'm not sure that looks safe." Plus, hadn't the man removed from the cafeteria mentioned something about a mirror in the sky?

"Maybe it's just to reflect sunlight, for the greenhouse." Farash suggested.

"That...that could be it." Alessia nodded, but the hair on her neck prickled anyway. "Maybe nanobots or something, growing a mirror and angling it to reflect the needed light?"

"Aw, way to ruin the fun that I might have spotted my first ghost," Barb laughed.

"Get back!" Farash suddenly shouted.

Alessia jumped. Barb screamed.

The mirror 'opened' - there was little other way to describe it - into a circle of triangular shards circling someplace else. The slivered shards still reflected Dawn, but between them was more like a window, a rift, looking at an angle across an icy landscape of frozen waterfalls and jagged mountains.

Then phantasmal, icy hands reaching out, stretchy plasmatic things that wrapped around Farash and pulled the struggling boy in. And the 'other' who jumped down through the mirror rift after Farash was pulled through, landing on the grass and dusting himself off. The teeth of the mirror closed back until all that could be seen was the reflection of sky and grass once more, then shrunk until no hint of it remained.

The girls stared in shock, huddling together.

"Oh," the other-Farash said, as if only now noticing them. "...a neat trick, right?" A pause. "You should see your faces. It's just an illusion spell." The man grinned, but it was too wide. The angle of his neck as he looked at them was wrong.

"An illusion, of course," Barb squeaked. "Good one."

"Yah, good one." Alessia squeezed Barb's hand. "I guess we should get back to the dorm - have fun touring the greenhouse like you wanted."

"Oh yes," he paused again. "I did want to tour the greenhouse. Thank you. Enjoy your day."

Alessia backed away with Barb, the two only turning their backs once the man had finally gone into the glass building.

"Privacy," Alessia whispered when they were a few dozen meters away. "That's not Farash, Barb."

"You think?" Barb snapped sarcastically, then rubbed a hand through her hair. "But what is it?"

"I think, I think they are something a like service aibots that mimic human interaction. Whatever they are, they're just copies, but can't do much other than they think they are supposed to be doing. Like an actor hired to play a part, but with no real memory. They go off the information they can glean from the environment or cues you give them in your speech."

"You mean there are more of those, those things?"

"I think Kai was replaced by one, maybe even while he was on Fennoth. And Melinda Bates - she's a receptionist here."

"The one the crazy guy mentioned at dinner?"

"Not so crazy, perhaps." Alessia shuddered. "But the weird thing is, I think she was replaced *before* we came to Dawn. And there's no way one of those mirror rifts could open on Earth, right?"

"But Earth has two-way portals to the shard planets." Barb pointed out. "So, not impossible after all?"

"What have we gotten into?" Alessia sunk to the grass as if bonding to it, suddenly suspicious of every patch of sky. "Do we tell someone? Do we act like normal? How do we get our friends back?"

"For now, just try breathing." Barb laid down on the grass beside her and cast, "Calm."

"Yah," Alessia closed her eyes for a minute. If something from one of the shard worlds was kidnapping staff at Archos and replacing them with copies, they were going to need to figure out how to get them back. And that wasn't going to happen if she panicked.

"Better?" Barb asked as Alessia sat up.

"For now." Alessia glared towards the greenhouse and the imposter who still hadn't re-emerged. "We'll have to be careful - there's no telling if the copies are reporting back somehow to whoever or whatever sent them. But maybe, just maybe, we can find a way to get Kai and Farash back."

"That's the spirit," Barb encouraged her, offering an elbow as the two headed back. Planning a rescue mission might be better done away from the open sky.