Whatever words I’d planned on using fled into stunned abandonment. “Hunting parties?” I managed eventually.

The Interstice was safe. Time was static there. No two people could even be in it together unless one happened to be a Rein.

But the Vein played by different rules. The Vein intersected it, even if I didn't know how. And just because I’d never crossed paths with one of its wanderers before didn’t mean they hadn’t been there.

Maybe we even had crossed paths. Chances were low, but if Er Jid was right, I wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference.

The recruiter nodded agreeably. “Wraiths can’t fight back, so it’s an obvious proposition. As long as our hunters can corner them, it’s a win. The hardest part is catching them at the right time, but we’ve managed to end our share. It’s always cause for a celebration.”

I was still trying to process it.

Maybe I’d interpreted this wrong. If Chapel agents had been murdered in the Interstice, I would have heard about it. Surely.

Normally when an assassin died, it was due to a Defect or Chapel-inflicted killing: someone deserting the fold – which almost never happened – or more likely botching too many missions. Neither scenario was common. Occasionally deaths were environmental such as my close brush with the lava, or more recently on Stabula.

But Chapel structure was highly regimented. How sure was I that every reported death happened according to rumour? How many weren't reported at all? How many people in my own tier did I only know vaguely in passing? Or others? By the time anyone reached third-tier, communications were so obscured I heard from almost no one at all.

Covering up deaths, I realised with a sinking feeling, would in fact be all too easy. And third-tiers – otherwise immortal, godlike bastions of power – still travelled via the Interstice. If Er’s words were accurate, it comprised a critical vulnerability. I wished I had an anti-summons to warn Flinpen to stay away.

Is this why you brought me here? I asked Near Miss, still reeling. To learn this?

“If they’re harmless,” I queried after a moment of preparing my voice, “why bother to hunt them? Just because they make travel inconvenient?”

We’d reached one of the administrative towers, where a few other Garrison members milled about. I blended in better this time, though still attracted a few curious glances; it seemed newcomers only arrived at a slow trickle.

“No, of course not.” Er started up one of the twin staircases. “We hunt them for resources.”

“Resources?” I echoed faintly.

“Despite their ethereal nature, wraiths are powerful liminal creatures. Each of them carries a trove of magical relics within their bodies. Always at least two. The most we’ve seen is ten at a time.”

I couldn’t help it; I closed my eyes. A Deca. They’d killed a Deca. Maybe even more than one. I knew almost nothing about the Chapel’s highest tier other than that that its members put third-tiers to shame, but if even they could be destroyed by a handful of muddling imperialists through a quirk of versal logistics, we had bigger problems than I’d realised.

The Garrison didn’t understand what it was doing, I reasoned with myself. It couldn’t. To it, we were the alien jellyfish butting their heads against Flinpen’s office window. Still, my hopes of a friendly association faded. Convincing people to ally with the hunters of their friends would be an uphill battle.

“Are you alright?” asked Er Jid, pausing on the staircase. “Sick again?”

“Only a little. I’ll make sure I spend time in the white. What do you mean by relics?”

“You're about to find out," Er answered. "Essentially, a type of condensed Function. Much more powerful than what we refine. The downside is that we can’t shape them, so their effects are predefined. But every wraith carries within it the germ of interdimensional travel. Each successful hunt allows our numbers to grow. So this is an exciting time.”

I didn’t trust myself to speak and focused on making it up the stairs. My escort seemed to notice the awkwardness and didn’t press the matter. Our conversation lapsed into silence.

Scavengers. It answered the question on how they were replicating World Slides. They weren’t. They were taking it, mining it from our corpses like a reward and celebrating after the fact. And if they had World Slide, they'd have stolen other augments, too.

Had the Chapel known? It must have known operatives had gone missing, at the very least. Or was that all lost in secrecy, too? Leadership had always seemed tough but infallible, directing the inviolable overrides of Fate. But how much was it really organised beyond the minimum required to hold things together? If most third-tiers abandoned the fold the moment they advanced, was there really much communication going on between anyone?

And if they had known, why weren't they saying?

When I could get back to the Chapel, I intended to ask a few questions.

A sentry guarded the room up ahead, who Er referred to my database entry. It seemed to satisfy them. After some prodding with the construct interface, I brought it up myself and discovered I'd been formally listed to receive a specialisation. I could see the editor responsible for the addition, in this case the administrator Soor Kas. Oddly enough, I also seemed to have edit privileges despite being a brand new recruit, logs all recorded and saved.

The more I learnt about the Garrison, the more its hierarchy seemed entirely flat. You didn’t see that structure in many societies, at least not for long. Even Myrd, by all accounts a utopia, expressed defined structures and protocols.

Aside from a plain stone pillar in its centre, at first glance the room appeared to be empty. I was starting to get to know this universe a bit better, however, and my eyes went to the distinct nexuses of versal magic hiding behind the patterned walls, clear enough for me to make out their exact locations and number. Sure enough, Er approached one of the mosaics and swivelled it into a code. Moments later, a drawer popped out.

In it sat a single augment.

A Chapel agent had died for this.

Er picked it up between thumb and forefinger, swivelling to show it to me. “This is a specialisation,” she announced with a serious expression. “One of the relics I mentioned. It belonged to Fal Mier, recently retired. Now it will be yours until you retire.”

They didn’t work like that – unless ‘retirement’ was a euphemism – but Er Jid was waiting with an expectant pause. “Thank you,” I replied.

The recruiter smiled. “This will grant you the ability to travel to and from the Vein,” she said. “You must never lose it.”

I nodded back. All I could think about was wraiths.

Er lowered her chin. She stepped forward, picked up my wrist and dropped the augment in my palm. “If you lose this, I’m retiring you myself. It’s worth more than you are.” Her hand hovered over mine for a moment, her brow slightly furrowed.

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It snapped me back to some semblance of normality. Drawing back the hand, I managed a small smile. “Got it.”

I rubbed the wrist with my other thumb, colder than it should be in the Garrison's comfortable climate. One slip-up I would probably get away with, but I’d have to be careful about tells like that.

World Slide burned a metaphorical hole in my palm. I didn’t know what would happen upon absorbing a second augment of the same type. It wasn't done. To my knowledge, no one had tried. It wasn’t worth risking the sheer waste.

But the Garrison didn’t absorb augments, it seemed. I wasn’t sure how else it would be possible to use them; not doing so left them as little more than pretty rocks to admire. Holding one now made me aware just how much more versal capacity I had at my new tier. I could afford to experiment, especially with no other options to try.

I gripped the World Slide tighter in my fingers.

“There’ll be a row of pouches in your inner shirt.” Er’s instructions cut into my thoughts. “They’re strapped up tight; you may need to undo a few layers. Choose one and contain the specialisation there, and make sure it can't fall out. Then try and forget it’s there. There’s no chance of breaking it accidentally; these might resemble glass, but are harder than anything else you or I will encounter.”

I’d noticed the clasps while getting changed. “What if someone tries to take it from me?” I asked, fiddling with the layers.

“You travel away. To do so, you need to view the specialisation through Function. On the interface there'll be an option to activate –”

Following along, I did so and found myself abruptly in the Vein.

So that was how they did it.

Very carefully, I slid the World Slide orb into the open pouch and made sure I didn’t jolt it off into the bottomless abyss. As carefully, I resealed the layers. It felt a little heavy, but the weight mostly came from the existing fabric.

Outside the Garrison, my body felt different again. Hollow. I clambered out of the stone sphere surrounding the Garrison's gate and onto one of the accompanying paths. My internal lenses were gone here, replaced by… not much, if I was honest. I felt almost able to drift, but physicality got in the way, as though I was half the form I took in the Interstice. Half-wraith. Not the useful part.

I pulled up a foresleeve and briefly parted its skin, finding a swirl of grey mist underneath. I let out a laugh in spite of everything. If it hadn’t been for Er’s words about hunting parties, I’d have triggered Gear Shift to see if it transformed me the rest of the way. But I was now legitimately worried.

For now, I seemed to be alone in the Vein. Its twist of convergent paths was still present, but the sculpted paving and handrails I’d noted on the way in were now missing. Rearranged away, if Er was to be believed.

The universes nearby had been no-to-low threat and all categorised; now their labels were random. Most gates didn’t have any. With time frozen, I used the opportunity to meander down the current path, inspecting a few at leisure. Where labels occurred, I found more instances of the word ‘Seed’, always on worlds without Reins.

Other patterns stood out: Pre and post-death universes were accompanied by varying status reports: ‘Safe. Review at X date. Ready. Not ready. Low priority. High priority.’ There could be no doubt; the Garrison had an interest in the Reins, and, like us, it seemed their primary factor of concern.

Did they follow the same goal as the Chapel independently? Though the comments between pre and post-death universes seemed much the same.

Compared to my first time through, the Garrison's database revealed slightly more of an insight. I took some time to experiment. As well as comprising a standard interface, it could wrap a pseudo-overlay on the environment linked to the larger map. With it, the overwhelming dance of roads and floating gates became something more decipherable.

I looked for the GIA and found it very far away, zooming out a great distance to reach it. I looked for Myrd and found it a little closer in a different direction, though still impossible to reach via foot within a hundred human lifetimes. I zoomed out and kept zooming till the map became a fading circle, lights winking out with their labels until only isolated examples remained in a sea of blankness.

Lastly, I searched for the Chapel. Of it, the construct listed no trace.

I let go of the map and returned to the pouched World Slide. The database named it an ‘Interdimensional Transit Specialisation’. Accurate with none of the charm.

When I turned the interface on myself as a whole, it delivered me my own profile. I was becoming better at shifting its attention; the trick seemed to be focusing on tangible objects. While not strictly necessary, gesturing also assisted; an extra layer of defining confirmation.

Turning it inwards, I pushed further in an attempt to locate my existing augments. The construct resisted. More than once, I thought I almost had something only for it to slide away.

The two Houses – Fate and Function – really didn’t play well with each other, in large parts behaving like the other didn’t exist. Yet so much of both was so similar.

I needed to warn Flinpen about approaching the Garrison, but the Chapel was invisible from the Vein. I was too spooked to draw her to a nearby universe, either.

What had Er said about shortcuts? Function could be used to navigate by trait. I set my mind to monastic utopias and started walking.

For a while, not much seemed to happen. The labels on the gates weren’t much help, either. I read a few of their descriptions in the database while passing:

[Ingred – High threat, low tech, high magic. Widespread interplanetary civilisation. Extremely hostile. Population engaged in constant mass conflict to establish individual dominance regardless of planetary damage; tendency to migrate and repeat. Seed.]

[Owallah – Medium threat, medium tech, no magic. Single civilised world with highly diverse population and many disconnected island countries. Culture unpredictable; requires strong adaptability. Seed.]

[Pridith Ayat – High threat, medium tech, low magic. Hive mind civilisation, difficult to determine true population. Probably low. Locals are ancient and at uneasy peace. Ready - low priority.]

When I peered back towards the Garrison, I found it more distant than it should be, banked in a swirl of crossing vortices.

I started to see more mentions of theocracies. Myrd was still nowhere close on the map, but neither was the Garrison. Minutes later, it had fallen from view entirely. Threat and technology levels continued to fluctuate, and I focused on lower-tech worlds. Before long, piles of them surrounded me.

Fate, this method of travel was inefficient. But I had to admit it could find something specific. In theory.

I’d been walking for about an hour in static time; twice that again on experimenting with the database. On the surface, the Vein still appeared beautiful, awe-inspiring, and aesthetically consistent. Myrd had moved closer on the map and I was still deep in theocracy territory, though the herd had started to thin. Peace was becoming a more common description. Monasteries rarely received a mention, which I suspected had more to do with the priorities of the note-takers. After the mandatory observations had been covered, some summaries were more detailed than others, with different stylistic signatures.

I switched tacks to spirits, found myself moving sideways in relation to Myrd, and began wrestling with impatience. I wasn’t very good at this yet.

It didn’t have to be Myrd. Most of the universes nearby seemed relatively unthreatening. Scanning the gates nearby, I found one with potential.

[Makiwa – Low threat, low tech, low magic. Entirely beaches. The people are nice and the environment utterly terrifying. Remind me to build my holiday house here.]

The tone differed from anything else I’d seen so far, signed by an Allie Wei and dated twenty years ago. Good enough, but I’d have to be fast.

“Don’t trigger on me this time,” I requested of Near Miss. “I just want to leave Flinpen a warning. Now’s not the time for grand revelations.”

Just to be sure, I used World Slide #2, the non-Defect version. Although I’d never confirmed it wasn’t also a Defect. Anything Chapel-made still had the five percent chance.

Makiwa was, indeed, all beaches – and Near Miss didn’t fire.

I stepped onto a wet sandbar barely above the ocean while the rim of the earth curved noticeably away. This wasn’t a planet so much as an asteroid – with a plentiful water supply and breathable air. Other water-doused asteroids rotated not far above my head in the starry sky. Gravity was low, and my first step sprung me high enough I worried I’d shoot off the surface.

My body had changed yet again without a trigger from Gear Shift. Since reaching second-tier, my human form had clearly become unstable. This variant had apertures pierced across it, opening and closing with pressure from my movement against the air, and emitted a chorus of whistling noises. Airflow moved through me disconcertingly, hampering my movements until I got a grasp on the directing pistons. A form designed for precise air travel at short range.

Low-tech space travel? No matter how many universes I visited, some could always surprise me.

Ocean water lapped at my boots. My outfit interfered with the incoming air currents, disrupting my sense of balance. I transitioned fully into vehicle mode, a kind of palanquin with pointy legs and melodic airflow, and skittered across the sandbar. I felt capable of jumping to the next asteroid, or perhaps the one after, but stuck to my entry point and a lightly damp part of the beach.

[Garrison unsafe,] I scratched clearly in the sand, transforming back as I shot off a summons to Flinpen. [Don’t approach.]

I’d already spent long enough here for my absence to be noticed, and resisted another glance at the sky. I knew where Makiwa was, now; I’d be able to return. Then I stepped back to the Vein, changing yet again, and prepared for the long trek back.