Chapter 3 - No Return Express - The Unforgettables: A ZeroYear litRPG
"There's beauty in engineers grumbling." Silas thought to himself. And this was a particularly rich night in terms of non-directed swearing, even a few neologisms. It was to be expected that the technology used in the outskirts of Metropolis would have some problems, but nothing in these conditions. However, things are what they are, and Silas and Liora have already resigned themselves to it.
"Good morning, Petra!" Silas said, noticing her movement.
Responding with a nod, Petra stood up and began to stretch. Finally, she said, "Morning! We need to eat something. What we brought with us from the city was almost nothing. It's gone. And I need a bathroom."
"Yes, sorry, I forgot to tell you yesterday. Inside your luggage, there is a shelter cube and a food cube. Just touch them, or now that your nano-translators and communicator links are correctly installed, you can activate them through the mental interface. It takes a while, but you'll see how it works. For those connected devices, all you have to do is think about the specific interaction, and it will activate the functionality. So, if you think about what you want, coffee, for example, the food cube will eventually create it for you. If you're having trouble, touching any of the cubes will open the full interface. The shelter cube can expand to create a private room, and it works like an enhanced Rocatrista bathroom; you can also get some clothing with it, but nothing too fancy.”
"Nano-translators huh? That's why I started to understand your language without needing my old communicator in the middle of the night. Interesting," Frank said, who seemed to be in a permanent light sleep. "I woke up a little while ago. Actually, I didn't sleep. I'm taking a while to get used to this situation. Morning all! Let me check those cubes."
Petra immediately enters the shelter cube, and in almost no time, everyone can hear a shower sound coming from the inside. Frank barely starts to navigate through the full interface. After a couple of minutes, the shower noise stops, and everyone hears Petra's voice: “Thank God!” as she exits the cube wearing comfy cotton clothes.
"Well, let's go over our situation," Liora said. "We're traveling at a speed much higher than the usual maximum, even for a cargo train. And it's headed to a place with no recent information. We're carrying basically scrap and waste. In principle, they could be used to supply a few villages, and that's what we think we'll find at our destination, despite the fact that there isn't any city listed on the itinerary from Rocatrista."
"How is it possible to go beyond a maximum speed?" Petra asks Liora.
"We are at maximum engine speed, not the maximum safe speed. The design of this composition has 4 cargo carriages plus a front, huge windshield made of solid metal with a camera system that allows us to see through it. The first cargo carriage is substantially larger than the others. This one we're in is the second. As we were far above the safe speed, the turbulent air current blew away the upper part of the third and fourth carriages, leaving only their aerolitos with us. According to our calculations, we're safe inside this one. But we'll have to be careful if we open doors to the outside. When they looted the carriages on Rocatrista and left the doors broken open, it certainly did not help the aerodynamics."
"I'm not sure if they were looting the carriages, Liora," Frank interrupted. "Ramirez talked about that when he explained to me that you might be delayed. That night at the bar, we were drinking with the big guys who worked at the station. It turns out the passenger and cargo trains split, and when this happens, the routes often get delayed, or they need to make do to deliver the train on time.”
"Oops. But why, for heaven’s sake...?" Silas scratched his head, recalling the incident, but he tried to recover. "The thing is, during the time of the old Metropolis, there were many small villages in the North, but they weren’t even cataloged. Recently, at the time of the new Metropolis, from what I've seen in the records, they only sent reconnaissance drones a long time ago. They found many isolated villages in the region, but without knowing their conditions. That may explain why they keep some resource lines running.”
Frank nods while Silas, seeming a bit preoccupied, continues speaking: “This liner is quite substantial and doesn't have absolutely anything in the middle. We’re at about Mach 20 and will take over 40 days in a straight line." Silas pauses and mutters something as if he were calculating something. He continues, "Which means we'll be traveling about 16 million miles. Just on this trip, it would be enough to make over 600 laps around your Earth..."
"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!" Petra realized. "Wait a minute. What do you mean?"
"What? And how many laps will we make in Gate then?" Frank asked.
“Well, according to my approximate calculations, and if I haven't made any mistakes, we'll be making 0.000045% of a lap on average in Gate, at most, if it's a straight line. And that's what should be happening because at this speed if it's not a straight line, we'll have serious problems,” Liora interrupted and explained promptly.
"Okay, let's sit down for a bit and talk more calmly. Where exactly are we? What kind of place is this? How is this even possible?" Petra asked, observing Silas, visibly restless and away from the discussion. She stared at him for a moment in silence, then asked. "Hey, big guy, what’s the problem?"
Silas picked up the two giant knives from Rocatrista, placed them on the ground in the middle of everyone, and said, "Yesterday, I almost did something I would regret for the rest of my life because I didn't realize that someone didn't understand what I was saying. We accepted the information we had about Rocatrista as truth, and the Metropolitans gathered it with a huge bias, and we did not see the obvious. Most of yesterday's problems were in our heads, not in the city. " After a brief pause, Silas concluded, "On this trip, we'll be forced to learn things that will make us dangerous. Now, I think maybe it would have been wiser to stay in Rocatrista a few days before leaving."
“It’s not the first time I’ve heard something about what’s bothering you. Strangely, it brings back old memories. It seems, after all, that you’re on the right path,” Petra responded. “No one got hurt, right? So we’re good!”
“No, it was very close. If I were stronger yesterday, maybe things wouldn’t have ended well…" Silas retorted.
"What’s done is done. If it served to learn something from this, then great." Petra leaned back, looked up, and seemed lost in thought. "Years ago, when I was newly married, I heard something similar... My husband is in the Navy, and when we were younger, we would talk about things like those after the missions back home. Sometimes, it was tough. In your case, big guy, everyone is fine, and the objective was fulfilled." Without a pause, Petra returned to the subject, looking with some curiosity at the weapons on the ground but without losing her focus. "I was an average student in science classes, but what you've just told us doesn't seem to make any sense. Let's talk about something you're experts on, gentlemen engineers. Please explain to me what kind of place this is that we're in, but please, use a language normal people on Earth could understand."
"All right, Petra," Silas continued, a little more relaxed. "Thank you for sharing your perspective. I'll try to draw some parallels with human knowledge from the 20th century. But I warn you that not all the phenomena we observe in Gate have a formal and consensual explanation. I’ll explain what we understand reasonably well. Do you happen to know what a Dyson sphere is?”
“He! The name is familiar, but…” Petra said, smiling at Silas' failure to grasp the concept of simple language. Frank smiled too, and shook his head, getting absorbed in the discussion that followed.
"Okay," Silas said, winking at Liora for help, "a Dyson sphere is an imaginary structure built around a star to capture energy from it. It was imagined by physicists from where you came from. When the first people arrived at Gate, they thought that's what it was. But the gravity was strange for its size. It was much larger than expected, so they thought that Gate was a Dyson sphere built around a black hole, not a star. In fact, Gate, seen from the outside, is a flattened sphere with a radius of around..." He looked at Liora, pausing for a while. "7 trillion miles, which is equivalent to 1.2 years the time it takes for light to travel through space. Or 76,000 times the distance of your Earth to the Sun. In short, it’s as if something larger than the Oort cloud formed a thin, continuous spherical surface.”
“Oort cloud?” Frank asked, still trying to make sense of the numbers.
“I think that's the name. The outer layer of your solar system, made of rock and ice, that lies at the limits of the gravity generated by your Sun.” Silas concluded.
"The names are right, Silas," Liora confirmed. "In Seneca, they must be the same as on Earth. To add to what Silas said, now I will talk about things that are less easily explained, such as Gate’s surface being like an eggshell. The gravity is slightly greater than Earth's outside the shell and varies from zero to values similar to the surface on the inside. It’s believed there’s some kind of spatial distortion around Gate because, in the center, we don’t have a black hole, but rather a kind of structure that also absorbs light, but it seems to be a distortion of space, and not matter as we know it.”
“Oh God!” Petra whispered to herself, trying to focus.
"So, is that what we call dark matter?" Frank asked, remembering the term.
"It's not that. From what we understand so far, it's a structure formed by spatial distortions in a fractal pattern, which means that no atoms are making the structure but rather potential atoms of normal matter within the structure. The structure is formed of smaller spatial distortions, equal in shape but smaller in scale, until an infinitesimal size. The outer layer, the initial layer, is always constant, which defines its shape, and if it’s broken, it will generate smaller pieces, but always in the exact same shape. The humans who came here first gave it the name Monolith because they looked like geometric shapes, a dark stone when observed without knowing what it was. But in fact, they are not stones.”
"So, they are a place in the space that looks like a stone? There's one of those giant Monoliths in the middle of Gate?" Frank concluded. "Are there more of them out there? Can we see one?"
“In a general way, you are correct…” Liora continued. “There are many types of Monoliths. I’ll explain the main types quickly..." Silas sat down in his corner, and Petra was also paying attention.
Liora continued, “The one called the Primordial Monolith is the type of Monolith that forms a colossal spherical structure, larger than a star, in the center of Gate. From this primordial structure, radial pillars emerge that reach and pierce the internal and external surfaces of Gate."
"So they scratch the surface all the time? Because everything spins, right?" Petra observed.
"No," Liora retorted. "They always seem to rotate with the surface of Gate without offering any resistance. So, in the place where they break through the ground, they always stay in the same relative location, not presenting any significant resistance against Gate’s rotational movement. We call those radial pillars Structural Monoliths because they form what seem to be large structures on the surface. Since we only see their very ends.”
“So we have mountains made of monoliths here?" Frank asked.
“No, not generally,” Liora continued. “Because the structures actually look like enormous buildings with a colossal architecture. We have three main clusters of these structural monoliths. In the North Pole, there is the Tempus cluster. No one goes there very much, but apparently, it’s the only way to reassemble a Monolith that has been broken into many pieces, which is why we also gave it the name Tempus Forge. Very close to here, north of the Metropolis, we have the Academy Cluster, which is the largest, with eight structures we called “Houses of the Academy” in the Old Metropolis because it was possible to enter them. And in the South Pole, we have the Entry Cluster. It’s believed that it’s possible to enter the Primordial Monolith through this Entry Cluster. But if it’s really possible, little is known about it. Some have gone in, but I have no information about anyone who has come back.”
“So we’re on the side of the Metropolis monoliths. Do the people in the city enter these structures? What's inside them?" Frank asked.
"Yes, in the Old Metropolis, they entered, and they could learn things inside. That’s why they called the place Academy. There was a large number of “Didactic Monoliths” there, which I’ll explain in a little bit later. Five moons orbited the external surface of Gate during the time of the Old Metropolis. One of these moons was even large enough to ignite like a small brown dwarf star. During the catastrophe that destroyed the Old Metropolis, all these moons were thrown on top of the Academy Cluster, turning it into a huge mountain range. You can even see its pinnacle on the southern horizon of Rocatrista today if something illuminates the background enough."
"Something knocked five moons, one the size of the Sun, on top of a city?" Petra asked, perplexed, while Frank threw his arms up in disbelief.
"And even worse things…" Liora responded. "But whatever did that, it’s in the past. Shall we continue?”
"Sure. Please. I’m now trying to figure out how big of a mess we got ourselves into right now." Frank evaluated.
Liora continued calmly. "Another interesting type of Monolith is the Venal. It radiates from the pillars and forms megastructures similar to the veins of an organism, scattered across almost all of Gate’s internal and external surfaces, supposedly preventing matter from collapsing into planets with gravity. We are flying over one of them right now, covered in eternal snow since we no longer have any stars close enough to Gate. Because of these Venal Monoliths, along with some engineering, we can reach high speeds over the surface. This North vein we’re on is atypical because it’s very straight, allowing us to reach higher speeds, as we can see right now. When we get to the end of it, we'll find a spiral structure that descends close to the rocky surface, where there should be a village. But sometimes, the veins form huge plates above the surface. Both Metropolises were built on top of one of these monolith plates."
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“So they don't build cities directly on the surface?” Petra asked.
“Sometimes, yes, but it’s perilous,” Liora responded in a more analytical tone. “Rocatrista was practically built on the rocky surface. It’s on a slope where the North vein cuts through a natural mountain and allows for the construction of things around the pathway." She continued, “It´s dangerous because creatures are roaming around Gate, ones that are not rational nor communicative, which have enough strength to annihilate civilizations. They don't seem to notice our cities when they are built right next to the monoliths, maybe because the energy radiating from the monoliths grabs all the attention. That's why we travel close to the venal monoliths and also why we use aerolitos to build vehicles like the one we are traveling in. The aerolitos are a kind of artificial small monolith made with magic. But no one knows for sure why those creatures tend to ignore the monoliths, but it works.”
Frank put his hand over his eyes, lowered his head, and attempted to laugh at something, but when he noticed the pause, he gestured for Liora to continue.
Liora returned to her neutral, explanatory tone. “We don’t want to encounter these creatures along the way. Not all of them destroy civilizations, but some have already done so. Rocatrista has stood longer than most of the human civilizations on your Earth, and it’s not built on top of any Monolith.”
“Thanks, Liora. I feel a lot calmer now," Frank retorted, with no one, maybe not even himself, knowing how much sarcasm was delivered there.
"Well, as I was saying," Liora continued to a now attentive Petra and a dejected Frank. "On top of everything else, we have the Didactic Monoliths, as I mentioned before. Generally, they were discovered in concentric circles with the purpose of teaching a rational being to use certain kinds of powers. They emit a sound that we call the Ancestral Tongue of Gate. Beyond teaching, they seem to be some type of memory record, though nobody knows for sure if there was an ancestral civilization. It appears so, but it no longer exists and has left no explicit record of itself."
"Okay, those are particularly interesting to me, Liora. Can we access them?" Petra asked.
"Of course we can, but not directly at this moment. I have a record of several of those Didactic Monoliths stored locally in my database. You can access them from your terminal whenever you want. Actually, some of these simpler powers are supposed to be developing subconsciously by us right now. Others, however, will require specialized training."
"Wonderful, Liora. Now, that sounds more fun. I'm going to start looking at this today. I’ll make a plan for what I want to learn, and I ask everyone to share what they want to do so that we can organize a coordinated strategy..." Petra continued, now excited.
"Fun? Do you think we’re going to train to go toe-to-toe with creatures that play snooker with moons and stars?" Frank asked ironically. "Well, I already know how to play snooker!"
"We have to start somewhere, or are you going to give up again?" Petra teased.
"The idea of planning what we’re going to train for as a team is a good one because there are many options, but let’s first try to stay alive and not go looking for new problems. We have the issue of Seneca that we need to try to advance. It seems quite urgent since we just learned that people are already prevented from being resurrected." Liora interrupted.
"Gate was a place where all the rational beings who once lived in the universe could return and live together. That was also the proposal for the Old Metropolis,” Silas concluded, listening to everything and looking out the small window, his mind already drifting. "The Old Metropolis was a place of harmony that managed to survive for eons against the dangers of this world. And now, in the New Metropolis, we can barely survive ourselves..."
“The Old Metropolis is gone! Unfortunately. But does anyone know for sure what destroyed the city? At least, know for sure if it was something external?” Petra said, holding back a little. "Because from what I've understood so far, that supposed utopia of the past, what you and Ramirez told us about, smells really bad. But maybe it’s because I still don’t know enough…"
“I think, for the first time, I really agree with you!” Frank exclaimed, jumping up in catharsis.
"Well, about Old Metropolis, there are several hypotheses, and no one is sure these days. I am more concerned about New Metropolis. So you can check your comlink and review the list of monoliths and the possibilities of what to train here in Gate," Liora advised after finishing uploading the files to everyone. "I'm taking advantage of this opportunity to allow you to upload some Earth martial arts from my local database right away. Before I lost my connection with Metropolis, I kept a copy of many things from Earth, so you can use it to eventually supplement what you know. In this case, it’s a bit different than simple data because these are memories you can upload to your minds as if they were your own, kind of similar to the nano-translators. There's a certain limit, but despite that, it’s quite helpful in the situation we’re in."
Frank and Petra stood close to Liora, accessing the material through their communicators as they intended to spend a lot of time exploring these possibilities. Silas took charge of fixing the remaining devices, with help from Liora's less famous copy on a terminal. Before, he looked at the knives from Rocatrista, now forgotten on the floor, and then turned to look again at the small window facing the complete darkness outside. He mumbled to himself, "Finding culprits won’t always solve the problem. I'll be happy if I can manage to make sense of my own actions." Liora's copy listened but didn’t respond, and both returned to work on some device without saying anything more.
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Name: Silas "Archon" Cade Species: Ebex XP: 6 / 2 Powers Super-Life Magnitude 1 Super-Resistance (ebex) Magnitude 1 Super-Technique Magnitude 1 Unknowledge (ebex) Magnitude 1 Natural Combined Armor (ebex) - Know it all (party) - Skills Traditional Dancing (Dex) +2 Mathematics (Int) +4 Computer Engineering (Tech) +4 Kung fu (Res) +4 (fixed - know it all) Essence: Reality +4 Days: 9118 Equipment Superior safety clothes (AC 3) 2x Crude mafia knives (d6), melee, hit: Dex Other 3 credits on Paradiso account Survival kit (food cube, shelter cube)
Name: Liora “Stardust” Gorgath Species: Oioioi XP: 5 / 2 Powers Super-Life Magnitude 1 Super-Dexterity Magnitude 1 Shardify (oioioi) Magnitude 1 Superior Technology Network (oioioi) - Structural (oioioi) - Know it all (party) - Skills Video gaming (Dex) +4 Informatics (Wis) +3 Streetwise (Cha) +4 (refocus) Kung fu (Res) +4 (fixed - know it all) Essence: Reality +4 Days: 8563 Equipment Still empty hands :-) Other Secure private network nano-connector Mk1: enables connection with Mag1 safety 2 credits on Paradiso account Survival kit (fuel cube, shelter cube)
Name: Petra Somerson Species: Human XP: 4 / 2 Powers ??? Magnitude 1 ??? Magnitude 1 Skills Cycling (Res) +4 Shooting (Dex) +4 Military Discipline (Mor) +4 Tang Soo Do (Str) +4 (fixed - know it all) Essence: Reality +4 Days: 5232 Equipment Empty hands :-) Other Survival kit (food cube, shelter cube)
Name: Frank Summers Species: Human XP: 4 / 2 Powers ??? Magnitude 1 ??? Magnitude 1 Skills Snooker (Dex) +4 Bar Politics (Int) +4 Power drinking (Res) +4 Drunken Fighting (Str) +4 (fixed - know it all) Essence: Reality +4 Days: 4952 Equipment Empty hands :-) Other Survival kit (food cube, shelter cube)